Arelith

Change paladin to Harper Paragon, gain tumble!

Lose two feats, though.

Come to think of it, PDK doesn't key off int anymore, so you wouldn't double your int damage. And 3 pally/bg is only enough for one of the divine x feats, making that a waste too, unless you just want it for saves, I guess. If that's the case you could pick up saving throw feats or some save gear instead.

One Two Three Five wrote:Lose two feats, though.

Paragon dips are actually feat-positive compared to paladin dips. Highly so if you take all your paragon in epic.

Paladin takes power attack, divine might, divine shield, three feats.

Paragon takes alertness and iron will, gets divine might and divine shield for free. If you take paragon in epic, you also get 2 free great charismas. Two feats, for the same benefit, potentially with +2 charisma ontop of that.

Ah, true! I still wonder at the utility of running an Int/Cha/(Str or Dex) spellsword, though. You'd end up needing int, cha, your attack stat, con, for a number of benefits I'd find dubious over the fighter/rogue versions. Granted, it's a fun concept, though.

Adding CHA as an important stat to a Spellsword is a bridge too far, IMO.

Admittedly, Paladin would allow you to use Aura of Glory Wands. Still, that's not something I would build around.

yellowcateyes wrote:Adding CHA as an important stat to a Spellsword is a bridge too far, IMO.

Admittedly, Paladin would allow you to use Aura of Glory Wands. Still, that's not something I would build around.

Really could hit max CHA with armor slot, head slot & aura wand.

Ork wrote:Really could hit max CHA with armor slot, head slot & aura wand.

Hitting the +12 cap isn't the issue in my mind. The issue is having decent CHA while also getting INT for spellcasting / spellsword perks, a main physical stat, and solid CON. (Spellsword remains a 1d6 HP class, and dangerously squishy for a melee.)

It's probably doable, but my initial reaction is that your stat spread will suffer from adding CHA into the mix. This is gut feel, mind, and not based on any attempt to actually make a paladin/spellsword.

Added a big fat warning to the builds on the front page. Rework pending.

Fighter/monk/SS looking real scary now...

I, too, am eyeing monk for spellswords. But actual builds will have to wait until I have time. If someone else wants to post ideas in the meantime, that'd be great.

Does the spellsword off-hand AC stack with monk's wisdom AC because it's not an actual shield?

I mean, the only answer I can come up with is 21 wizard minimum (EMA), 3 monk minimum (monk ac and ab progression), 4 fighter minimum (hitting that 16 APR)

So you'll have, what, 6 attacks a round, non-dual wielding? 7 hasted, 8 flurried? Double-imbued kama? Heck yea.

How would yall do the level spread though? 16 wiz/4 fighter pre-epic with exotic prof to use kama is the 'easiest' I feel like, but also kind of uh, bad? But going 12 wiz/4 monk/4 fighter has its own problems.

(AC should be whatever the dex ones get +6 or more from wisdom mod, right?)

Edit: I did some terribad napkin math and it looks like a single-kama wiz/monk/fighter can get pretty hefty ac?
10 base
13? dex (this is the big one I guess)
1 boots
20 EMA
6 wisdom (the MAD on this boy)
6 tumble
4 haste
4 int shield
2 armor skin
66! Then 76 with IE, right?

I think AB can get in the 44ish range? 8...? APR with the lights running, doing what, 50some damage a hit? Neato burrito.

Wrote this up really quick.

EDIT: Tweaked it

Strength-based? (I guess wis ac makes up for losing dex ac?)
Notes tho: Transmu is almost certainly the right choice what with how MAD this might be.

Wonder how good it'll be in the, like, 10-15 range, though. Also, that build loses 2 tumble ac but I can't see any way to run it otherwise without massively delaying monk.

You're totally right about missing the tumble dump. Hmm. I will think.

Here's a dex variant of a similar build:

It's looking, though, that you may need to just suck it up and swap out fighter 5 and make it a monk 5. Lose out on epic weapon spec but if you're dex-based you'll want to grab esf: discipline because you don't have the strength mod to bump it up.

Let's say you had an even 10 strength. +12 makes it 22, mod of 6. 30 discipline, 6 from strength, 10 from esf, 7 from spellsword. This puts you at 53 before gear, which is workable. 43 before gear? Not so much. I know some casters get away from that, but you'll be in melee a lot!

Okay, getting into really weird territory here.

This one uses a q-staff:

Zavandar wrote: Let's say you had an even 10 strength. +12 makes it 22, mod of 6. 30 discipline, 6 from strength, 10 from esf, 7 from spellsword. This puts you at 53 before gear, which is workable. 43 before gear? Not so much. I know some casters get away from that, but you'll be in melee a lot!

+1 from fighter, +16/18 from gear puts you at 60/62 without esf:d

Gearing these is going to be a nightmare, it occurs to me. Possible, certainly, especially with the new system (If it works the way I think), but a nightmare. With epic transmu and assuming you don't get dispel-spammed, you need 5 gear-buffs in wisdom, intelligence, dexterity, constitution minimum, I'd think. That gets your AC (wis and dex), damage (int), and AB (dex, for dex ones) as far up as possible. Str is probably also a decent get.

For strengthers since you're a monk you'll want str, wis, con, int, AND dex to fix that you can't wear armor.

Is the Spellsword parryist dream alive? With DEX spellsword, you could reach a passable Parry for a diminutive investment with 5 attacks per round Hasted, each Parried attack giving a significant boost to the attack throw in terms of damage and AB.

I'm wondering if this could actually overcome the hypothetical probability of dealing damage versus high AC opponents without the Parry mode, where the hope of dealing damage would solely rest on the off-chance of 20s given the generally low base AB.

Surely this could be calculated somehow, but the maths is beyond me at this hungover minute.

I mean, with the spellsword lights running- haste, etc, true strike if you're nasty- you're probably better off just dropping out of invis and carving [the monster] a new breathe-hole instead.

I do my level best to never ever do parry math, so that'll be up to someone else, but the damage on a riposte wouldn't necessarily be insignificant, just worse than attacking normally unless you couldn't hit them normal. Ac should be high enough, especially on the monk version once that's figured out, to avoid hits through that if not parry.

Okay! This is the best I have so far, I think:

Strength, constitution, and wisdom can all go +/- 2. Depends on if you want more health/fort, ac/will, or damage/carry weight/discipline.

ECL dex and int, grab 1 int somewhere while leveling to get 19, then dex all the rest of the way. 19 int +11 from buffs gives you 30, which gives you the 10 mod you need to maximize on your bonus spellsword damage.

Didn't bother with weapon specs. Fighter serves to give necessary bonus feats and 16 BAB. I take arcane defense: abjuration to raise caster level vs. dispels to 26.

Esf: transmute and runecrafting really enable this build. The enchants aren't terribly difficult. I highlighted the two that'd be somewhat difficult.

Another possible build--this time paladin.. and human aasimar.

Can also now grab Wizard for AA or just an Uncanny Dodge + epic feat without great compunctions! E.g. Pally21/Spellsword6/Monk3 for knightlier Gandalf build *drool*

Making Spellsword compatible with monk UBAB actually might have been too big of a buff.

Ok.
Dex-based, dual wielding.

16 pre-epic BaB
5 epic
3 weapon focises
13 dex
3 mdamask
40?
-2 for dual wielding, 38. Not super high! You can always pop true strike for 58 I guess. Also, stick a fire imbue on your main hand for the AC loss might help. Note: Monk bab is -3, not -5, so the lower AB might not hurt as much? (You can always GMW to get back to 40 even) If you switch on flurry, 36. So again not great.

Damage offfff..
3.5 kama average
6 mdamask
4 essence
11? int damage
2d12 (average 13?) dual imbue
6 strength mod
43.5!

Assuming you drop a true strike and land all hits (you wont) looking at 56/53/50/47/44/41/56/53/56/56? Right? I'm doing this from memory, correct me.
And you'll do an average of 435 damage. If all hits land (no).

Kind of a death by a thousand cuts scenario honestly. The 20 rogue kama one does.. I think more damage? Granted, slinging 40 imbue saves at someone a round is absolutely hilarious and possibly broken.

Other than the imbue thing it's just another gimmicky dual-kama build that doesn't work as well save situationally.