Arelith

Alright here's the deal.

I'm rolling a female human roguish character. I'm planning on making her dualwield (something) and picking Shadow Dancer as a PrC later.

I'm thinking Rogue/Ranger/Shadow Dancer, or something along those lines. I'd want her to be a sneak, and deadly with blades. Assassin could work as an alternative for rogue, but then I'd have to start as a ranger (not that that's a problem).

I'm fairly new at this character building stuff, so I'd really like some input from you veterans.

Thanks in advance!

I'd remove shadowdancer from the build and go Ranger 9/Fighter 5/Rogue 16--which is still not an especially good build (though viable) but probably the best you can get if you want to be a ranger with a rogue theme. The rogue levels can give you access to epic dodge, and the ranger levels give you dual-wielding feats. The fighter levels are for epic weapon specialization.

I don't necessarily need the ranger levels. I thought they'd be nice for the dualwield feats, and the divine wands with no umd.

What about rogue/shadow dancer builds.. Are there anything out there that's viable?

Thanks!

Szaren wrote:I don't necessarily need the ranger levels. I thought they'd be nice for the dualwield feats, and the divine wands with no umd.

What about rogue/shadow dancer builds.. Are there anything out there that's viable?

Thanks!

You'll want both UMD and a class other than Rogue/Shadowdancer to give you adequate BAB.

Rags wrote: You'll want both UMD and a class other than Rogue/Shadowdancer to give you adequate BAB.

Rogue/fighter/dancer then?

To all the people requesting builds, may I suggest digging through the forum for past threads on similar requests first? This way, we won't have to explain the same things over and over again. Here are three threads that I could find, that give many variations on what you are looking for:

viewtopic.php?f=36&t=12878

viewtopic.php?f=36&t=12993

viewtopic.php?f=36&t=13131

To summarize:

The optimal builds in this case are 19 rogue/5 fighter/6 monk (standard, as explained by yellowcateyes), 19 rogue/6 fighter/5 shadowdancer or (with lower AB) 19 rogue/6 monk/5 shadowdancer. If you want to fit in ranger, look through the threads. Some SUBOPTIMAL builds are given there. In pretty much all cases, however, you're better off with one of the three builds I've just given. Ranger is just a mediocre to bad class, even with the attempts that have been made on Arelith to make it viable. Maybe, with a ranger-heavy build, you could make some strength-based dual-wielding half-orc for kicks, or something. I don't know. Also, with that new armour, rangers still are not good.

Higher level SD (16 in general) is generally more optimal solo, compared to high rogue, since the rework - as you can actually do PvE at a decent pace without a friend (Once shadow summon is fixed anyway). You'll lose a little bit of sneak attack damage for that however.

Ranger dumping for dual wield is bad compared to grabbing fighter in its place. So I'd go with the latter.

Play a 23 ranger 4 fighter 3 rogue.
21 ranger fetches you all player races as FEs along with bane of enemies and you get hide in plain sight at level 21 ranger
and you'll have infinitely more killing potential than playing somekind of build like that

RamblerTeo wrote:Play a 23 ranger 4 fighter 3 rogue.
21 ranger fetches you all player races as FEs along with bane of enemies and you get hide in plain sight at level 21 ranger
and you'll have infinitely more killing potential than playing somekind of build like that

no

Rogue/Ranger/Shadowdancer could work, though its much less optimal than Rogue/Fighter/Shadowdancer (fighter gives you more feats than ranger would even after sinking 3 of them into dual wield feats)

I'd reccomend one of these level splits:

17 Rogue/ 8 Fighter / 5 Shadowdancer (This works well if you want something like kukri AND Shadowdancer levels)

19 Rogue/ 6 Fighter/ 5 Shadowdancer (Probably the most optimal due to highest sneak damage)

And if you're really married to the Ranger thing maybe like...

22 Ranger/ 5 Shadowdancer/ 3 Rogue

^(Most of your damage here would come from Bane of enemies (Which is pretty terrible) But you'd be able to convert animal spawns into henchmen, plus your summon shadow and animal companion, the rogue dip is just for UMD. You'd probably be okay in PvE but it would be solidly bad for anything else.)

Barradoor wrote:

RamblerTeo wrote:Play a 23 ranger 4 fighter 3 rogue.
21 ranger fetches you all player races as FEs along with bane of enemies and you get hide in plain sight at level 21 ranger
and you'll have infinitely more killing potential than playing somekind of build like that

no

barradoor dies to lowbie wizards dont listen him

Unconquered_Pariah wrote:I'd reccomend one of these level splits:

17 Rogue/ 8 Fighter / 5 Shadowdancer (This works well if you want something like kukri AND Shadowdancer levels)

19 Rogue/ 6 Fighter/ 5 Shadowdancer (Probably the most optimal due to highest sneak damage)

I'd probably flip the rogue and SD levels around there. Level-for-level, an SD with Epic Shadowlord gets the same amount of sneak attack as a rogue, plus a summon that -guards (though apparently it's broken right now?). I suppose is depends on where you want to be stronger. In PvP, your Shadow probably won't do much, but it shines in PvE.

Personally I think a ranger/SD combo is kinda redundant. Both classes are at their best with higher level investment: 16 SD nets you enough bonus feats to grab both Epic Shadowlord and edodge, plus a level 26 Shadow, while 23 ranger gets you Bane, HiPS, animal henchmen and +4 blade thirst.

I'd go with either Ftr 8/Rog 5/SD 17, or the Rgr 23/Ftr 4/Rog 3, myself.

Baron Saturday wrote:Personally I think a ranger/SD combo is kinda redundant. Both classes are at their best with higher level investment: 16 SD nets you enough bonus feats to grab both Epic Shadowlord and edodge, plus a level 26 Shadow, while 23 ranger gets you Bane, HiPS, animal henchmen and +4 blade thirst.

Can you elaborate more on that? I have a couple suggestions that could work. Feel free to disagree.

Option 1: Ranger 25 shadowdancer 5
You get Bane of Enemies, 6 Favored Enemies, high BAB, one extra feat at level 25, and an extra attack per round.

Option 2: Ranger 23 Shadowdancer 7
You get BoE, Slippery Mind, 5 FE

Option 3: Ranger 14 Shadowdancer 16
You get a strong Shadowlord, high Tumble skill, Epic Dodge, and Epic Shadowlord.

These are my two cents.

Aero Silver wrote:

Baron Saturday wrote:Personally I think a ranger/SD combo is kinda redundant. Both classes are at their best with higher level investment: 16 SD nets you enough bonus feats to grab both Epic Shadowlord and edodge, plus a level 26 Shadow, while 23 ranger gets you Bane, HiPS, animal henchmen and +4 blade thirst.

Can you elaborate more on that? I have a couple suggestions that could work. Feel free to disagree.

Option 1: Ranger 25 shadowdancer 5
You get Bane of Enemies, 6 Favored Enemies, high BAB, one extra feat at level 25, and an extra attack per round.

Option 2: Ranger 23 Shadowdancer 7
You get BoE, Slippery Mind, 5 FE

Option 3: Ranger 14 Shadowdancer 16
You get a strong Shadowlord, high Tumble skill, Epic Dodge, and Epic Shadowlord.

These are my two cents.

I mean, first off, all the builds you listed have either Ranger 23 or SD 16.

General critique: All of those builds lack UMD, which (as someone currently playing a character without UMD) I can confirm, is a big deal.

Option 1: SD 5 gets you HiPS, darkvision, evasion, uncanny dodge, Shadow Daze, Summon Shadow, Shadow Evade, Defensive Roll, and tumble. Ranger already has evasion as of level 9, and HiPS in nature areas at level 21, so this isn't terribly relevant. Neither is darkvision, which doesn't work all that well in my experience. Shadow Daze, Summon Shadow, and Shadow Evade all scale with SD levels, and aren't terribly useful at SD 5. So the most worthwhile reasons to take SD 5 in this option are uncanny dodge and tumble... and you can get both of those with Rogue 5, PLUS UMD, without having to burn feats on dodge or mobility.

Option 2: As above, except that if you trade SD 7 for Rogue 3/Fighter 4 you get UMD, Weapon Specialization, and Epic Weapon Specialization. Which are a lot more useful than Slippery Mind.

Option 3: Probably my favorite option of these, but still... Ranger 14 gets you the dual-wield feats, three Favored Enemies, Trackless Step, Woodland Stride, and +2 dodge AC when dual-wielding. The Ftr 8/Rog 5/SD 17 spread that I suggested loses these, but gains 5 fighter bonus feats (enough for the dual-wield feats plus WS/EWS), UMD, and 4d6 sneak attack, and partially negates the +2 dodge AC loss by gaining +1 armor AC at Fighter 5. Alternatively, Ftr 10/Rog 3 loses 1d6 sneak for a potentially higher BAB, 1 more fighter feat, a soft +1 to STR/DEX and +1 shield AC, so if you needed to swap from dual-wield to sword & board, that option would be more effective.

Basically, there's enough overlap between ranger and SD that taking them both on a character diminishes the benefits of one class or the other to the point that there are better alternatives.

Thanks for the feedback. You have brought me something to consider.

It seems to me that combining SD with almost any melee class is bad for PVP, but mainly good for RP and PVE.

I hope i am not derailing, but why is UMD so useful? Most of the craftable items have higher UMD requirement anyway. Can't Shadowdancer survive without it?

Aero Silver wrote:Thanks for the feedback. You have brought me something to consider.

It seems to me that combining SD with almost any melee class is bad for PVP, but mainly good for RP and PVE.

I hope i am not derailing, but why is UMD so useful? Most of the craftable items have higher UMD requirement anyway. Can't Shadowdancer survive without it?

Wands and scrolls.

Cortex wrote:Wands and scrolls.

I am not convinced. The original post suggested a ranger or rogue coupled with SD. Rangers can use divide scrolls and wands. So why not skip the rogue entirely and get more levels to either SD and empower the Shadow, or more levels to Ranger and get additional FE?

Aero Silver wrote: It seems to me that combining SD with almost any melee class is bad for PVP, but mainly good for RP and PVE.

Not sure where you got this idea. I would say that an SD-heavy build NEEDS at least 4 levels of a full BAB class pre-epic in order to get at least 16 BAB and thus 4 attacks. Ranger, fighter, blackguard, PDK, even paladin would work (though it would be really strange...).

Of those options, fighter, blackguard and PDK are probably the best choices because they add the most. Ranger overlaps with SD too much, and paladin benefits charisma-focused builds more.

As for skipping UMD, yes, you could survive without it, you'll just have much less flexibility and PvP will be much harder. And you'll lose access to shield and mage armor, and have to use haste potions, which have a much shorter duration than haste wands.

It's doable. It's just not as strong.

Thanks for the feedback. I learned something new today.
Hopefully the player who started this post finds this useful.