Arelith

Hello everyone,

Could please someone recommend a couple of blackguard builds? Specifically, one fighter-centered and one rogue-centered. Is the second one even viable? Any feedback on how to build the blackguard properly is highly appreciated. Optimap, sub-optimal and crazy builds are all welcome. I have some experience of building this type of character from the other PW (my was a bard\BG), but here too much has been changed regarding the summon, level-dedication for a class (how many to take) and so on.

Myself more interested in how to build a blackguard around dual-wield as a rogue, is it viable, what would it be good at. Dex BG, perhaps? I guess it should start like 3 rogue, 4 ranger, 13 BG, 1 ranger (bonus feat?), 2 BG (epic fiend), 5 ranger (fav enemy), 1 rogue, 1 BG.

I know that fighter build is going to be more viable cause feats are never extra, but for a dex based build this seems to be more optimal, because you need to dual-wield = ranger, and rogue provides more skill points as a starter with no need to take wis11, unlike ranger. Something like that would be quite feat-starved, but you can squeeze the most important things in. I know I'm a Chimaera builder xD

For a dual-wield dex BG I once played one that was uh...

9 Monk/5 SD/16 BG. Dual kamas. You don't need to worry about the BG pre-reqs (monks get cleave and you're getting hide anyway) so you burn 3 feats to dual wield, 2 for SD, and on a human that leaves you room for blind fight and two more. the SD and monk mix gets you epic dodge, and 16 BG lets you take epic fiendish servant.

I'm sure someone's managed a better one though.

I wouldn't do more then 4 BG as there's literally no point, the summon gets obliterated by anything you'd want it to tank or fight. It's not worth the investment for a novelty.

10 fighter, 16 rogue, 4 bg, for epic dodge and crippling strike. Take as much rogue as you can in epic and at least one fighter in epic for maxing discipline and epic weapon spec

When you take BG, make sure BG 3 is on a feat level so you can get divine might, and then make sure BG 4 is also on a pre-epic feat level so you can get divine shield.

Worth noting that BT's opinion on the usefulness of the summons is not shared by everyone.

It's true. I demand a lot from a summon that forces you to give up as much as deep BG does.

But the big

13 rogue 17 bg

is solid if you want epic summon and epic dodge.

Baron Saturday wrote:Worth noting that BT's opinion on the usefulness of the summons is not shared by everyone.

I’m playing a BG now and fully endorse The Baron. Both Summons are very useful. They’re on a cool down and all forms have some kind of crowd control. Plus the usual advantages of summons still apply (they distract, soak damage and greatly increase damage output).

The summons are fine imo.
And the 9 monk 5 sd 16 bg seems REALLY fun.

telmarael wrote:...I guess it should start like 3 rogue, 4 ranger, 13 BG, 1 ranger (bonus feat?), 2 BG (epic fiend), 5 ranger (fav enemy), 1 rogue, 1 BG.

15 BG is required for Epic Fiend

BegoneThoth wrote:I wouldn't do more then 4 BG as there's literally no point, the summon gets obliterated by anything you'd want it to tank or fight. It's not worth the investment for a novelty.

[#sadpanda] Saving Throws, Sneak Attack, the summons r fine IMO.

Anatida wrote: 15 BG is required for Epic Fiend

First level you can take epic fiend is 16.

Mine was regular boring 10F/16BG/4Ro, it was fun

The feat is available at 15, but you can only take epic fiend on a blackguard bonus feat which happens at 16 ..if anyone wanted the reason behind that.

Having played a fiend servant duder to 30 and mucked around on him for a while I don't think the fiend is worthless, but the yugoloth is markedly worse than the other two, because he spends the majority of his time casting pretty useless spells. His daze cone isn't even party friendly, making him worthless in group PVE without a wizard or sorcerer to provide mind blanks.

He (as in, the fiend) has upper 30s AB, pretty decent HP, 32 sr. Poopy AC/Saves but overall he's not bad. Equal to a top-tier warlock summon. And you get plenty of sneak damage (meh) out of the deal.

Tl;dr it's not a great build but it's alright. It's fun to play, most pertinently.

EDIT: BegoneThoth's build is pretty strong -- at 30. Levelling it is going to be a chore without a dedicated party, as most DEX builds tend to be. Fiend servant has that definite advantage; being able to pop out summoned buddies to tank for me or do damage for me was really nice.

Personally I tend to shy away from the idea of a dex-based BG, mostly because the Templar half-plate with its +3 cha makes gearing soooooo much easier.

For what OP is asking for, though? I'd honestly probably do BT's 10 fighter/16 rogue/4 BG build. Much as I love the epic summon, it's not worth the feat starvation that you'd run into on a dual-wielding 13 rogue/17 BG.

Also, regarding the summon, I really like the BG/PDK combo in making it more useful. Being able to -guard it or allowing it take the aggro makes for some nice tactical flexibility. Also a 10 PDK/16 BG can give its epic summon 25-55% physical immunity, depending on the summon and the PDK path, which is pretty cool.

Whatever you do, make sure to check out poisons! Most of them aren't terribly useful, but there's a few...

Let me clarify or quantify my position then.

The summon is fine, but unlike fiendlock in which the summon is something you get by going deep into a class that you keep getting things for going into, late bg, past 4, gets you very very little.

Therefore I base my opinion on the summon as an "exchange" in what you give up as a PC for a mediocre summon. Given that you'll lose a ton of fighter feats and ac and more, it's very hard to recommend. You yourself are far weaker as a summon blackguard and the summon hardly makes up for it.

Consider all that and it's perhaps easier to see why I find the summon so lackluster.

No, I don't agree with that. The AC loss is 1, or 2 if you go for a 5/8/17 build, though personally I feel 11/16/3 is better outside of sadbrained skillmonkeying. The feat loss is less than significant; you can still afford all the feats you'd like to get, like armour skin and prowess.

The summon is stronger than you give it credit for, I think. Considering it hits for around 30-40 and has x3 crit, it outputs pretty solid damage.

On subject of feat sacrifices you're giving up 1 AC, probably overwhelming critical or saves feats; pretty mediocre on a x2 crit character, or unnecessary considering divine saves and the runic system -- the 1 AC sucks to lose, sure, but considering shield potions can net you back that 1 extra AC I don't think it's as big of a deal as you make it out to be.

As for the so-called "more," I don't really see what you're getting at. The fiend servant blackguard gets a handful more of sneak dice. Fighter bonuses don't really exist anymore outside of AC and AB bonuses for anything but laughably bad pure builds.

I think you lose out on about four epic fighter feats, the loss is real and huge, and being dex (as op wanted) you really need esf discipline in there, making it more fest tight.

Not to mention the loss of build flexibility.

Either way you end up with a summon that can't tank epic content or bosses, like some others can. I'm just not a fan of the immense tradeoff.

But if you disagree that's fine. I personally would never take or recommend it outside of 13/17 epic dodge bg, and that build is still sub optimal.

BegoneThoth wrote:But if you disagree that's fine. I personally would never take or recommend it outside of 13/17 epic dodge bg, and that build is still sub optimal.

oh what the heck hold on

do NOT make a 13/17 dodge bg

I missed the part about DEX. If you're DEX go 16/10/4 like he suggests. Do NOT make a 13/17, holy heck.

Oh good, everyone's on the same page now. xD

Thanatosis wrote:

BegoneThoth wrote:But if you disagree that's fine. I personally would never take or recommend it outside of 13/17 epic dodge bg, and that build is still sub optimal.

oh what the heck hold on

do NOT make a 13/17 dodge bg

I missed the part about DEX. If you're DEX go 16/10/4 like he suggests. Do NOT make a 13/17, holy heck.

17/13 is literally the only dex summon bg build I could think of that isn't horrid. If your heart is set on a summon bg and dex that's all that sprang to mind.