Elven Arcane Archer

[Lansirill]

I'm considering taking AA on my wizard. So far searching around has only shown me threads on multiclassed wizards doing this and I'd rather stay pure wizard. What I can't figure out is if the bonus sps and 'free' arrows are worth two feats and 14 aps. It would be nice to do more damage when out of or conserving sps, but if all this is likely to do is boost my damage by a tiny amount while 'off' it's probably not worth it. Any words of wisdom?

[Visty]

not really worht it, it costs alot of feats to make it worthwhile. and if you take those, your casting will suffer...so why play a wizard at all?

if you want just to pew pew away abit, grab a wand of flame arrows and make your own arrows...not 100% free but still **** cheap

[Doxmaster]

Its a wizard though...so you can afford losing a few feats. So long as you keep the basic spellcasting ones, you'll be fine.

[krud]

The problem is that you really need more than just the two AA prereq feats to make bow damage worthwhile. At a minimum you'll want many shot, which requires point blank shot, and rapid shot. That's three more feats right there. If you don't get those then you'll just be plinking away enough to annoy mobs, without doing anything really substantial.

Another ranged option that I used on my original wizard was to just find ways to maximize my ranged to-hit (precision feat, divine power clickies) and stick with on-hit effect bows (curse/imp curse, shattermantle/imp shatter, destruct/imp destruct, paralyzer, etc). If you can find gear slots for potency and spell pen, then a shattermantle bow is quite useful on mobs with high spell resistance. No need to constantly switch weapons when you cast.

[joesully]

an elven AA wiz is a great character to play.you will never have epic DCs but you will have plenty of mana and be great for solo. I believe youll havealot of fun with this.Even on harry youll be able to pummel him with manyshot
and then dump mana on him in between

[Visty]

Its a wizard though...so you can afford losing a few feats. So long as you keep the basic spellcasting ones, you'll be fine.

point blank shot, weapon focus, rapid shot, power attack, bow strenght, manyshot, precise shot, improved precise shot, improved crit

how many feats do wizards have again?

[wolflordnexus]

point blank shot, weapon focus, rapid shot, power attack, bow strenght, manyshot, precise shot, improved precise shot, improved crit

how many feats do wizards have again?

I don't believe Power attack works with bows but your point is true regardless not to mention the horrible stat spread

Str needs to be good for bow dmg
dex needs to be good for bow to hit
con needs to be good for hp
Int needs to be good for spell dc's

[Visty]

I don't believe Power attack works with bows but your point is true regardless not to mention the horrible stat spread

Str needs to be good for bow dmg
dex needs to be good for bow to hit
con needs to be good for hp
Int needs to be good for spell dc's
power attack is required for bowstrenght
well, or zenarchery but that would just shift dex over to wis, doesnt make it better for a wiz

[JeffreyGator]

One problem with AA on a pure wizard is that it requires BAB of 6 so you wait until level 12.

Most of your levels when you are using a bow you will be using flame arrow or randomly found arrows - which is fine there are plenty of arrows out there to be found.

And you don't need to be an arcane archer to have some decent ability to hurt people with a bow.

With a +1 frost shock bow of pure good (which would be ML 4) you can shoot +2 flaming or +2 acid arrows and average. d8 + 4d6 + 2 damage. ~20 pts which isn't horrible as an extra.

As a wizard you would be unlikey to have bow str or other modifiers.

I haven't played much with the terror arrows having just turned 17 but I have hopes for them.

[Lansirill]

To be fair I'm about 25k away from level twelve (which is why I'm asking... I had played around with arcane fluidity once I was able to max it and was completely disappointed. Having to respec APs isn't a huge problem, but it's a bit of a pain) so the having to wait isn't really a problem.

It definitely sounds like that, if I want to be an archery power-house, I'd need to put some serious resources into it. I buy that (it does make sense that it should take more than proficiency and a +5 bow to be good at archery after all) but this is mostly just for trash clearing or if I screw up and don't have enough spell points to cast (I'm usually pretty good about managing my spells so I don't run out though.)

Do you really need all of that stuff for clearing trash?

Another way to look at it is how are my trash clearing abilities improved by the AA path?

(I probably should have put trash in my original post, but I didn't think of it until now. If I run out of mana against a boss I'll probably chug a potion and get awfully selective about what I cast.)

[IllOracle]

I've been toying around with the idea for a little while and this is my first attempt. Pure Elf Wizard with Arcane Archer. I know it's not a new concept, but then what is? Besides the question of whether to do it or not, because there is no question, what advice might you all have?

Considerations:
- I haven't bothered with skill points, it's mostly a play style choice anyway.
- I keep hearing how STR is so very important, I'm not sure I agree. (someone change my mind, as this is pivotal)
- Quicken was selected to get around the need to make spell checks in combat.

Level 20 Wizard
Hit Points: 182
Spell Points: 1790
BAB: 10\10\15\20
Fortitude: 8
Reflex: 11
Will: 12

32Build Starting Feat/Enhancement
Abilities Base Stats // Modified Stats
Strength 12 // 14
Dexterity 16 // 20
Constitution 12 // 14
Intelligence 18 // 30
Wisdom 8 // 10
Charisma 8 // 10
+2 Tomb of Supreme

Level 1 (Wizard)
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Extend Spell
Feat: (Selected) Toughness

Level 3 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Weapon Focus: Ranged Weapons

Level 5 (Wizard)
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Quicken Spell

Level 6 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Point Blank Shot

Level 8 (Wizard)
Enhancement: Elven Dexterity I
Enhancement: Elven Ranged Attack I
Enhancement: Elven Ranged Damage I
Enhancement: Wizard Improved Quickening I
Enhancement: Racial Toughness I
Enhancement: Wizard Energy Manipulation I
Enhancement: Wizard Energy Manipulation II
Enhancement: Wizard Elemental Manipulation I
Enhancement: Wizard Elemental Manipulation II
Enhancement: Wizard Force Manipulation I
Enhancement: Wizard Force Manipulation II
Enhancement: Wizard Spell Penetration I
Enhancement: Wizard Energy of the Scholar I
Enhancement: Wizard Energy of the Scholar II
Enhancement: Wizard Subtle Spellcasting I
Enhancement: Wizard Subtle Spellcasting II
Enhancement: Wizard Intelligence I
Enhancement: Wizard Intelligence II

Level 9 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Rapid Shot
Enhancement: Elven Dexterity II

Level 10 (Wizard)
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Mental Toughness

Level 12 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Manyshot
Enhancement: Racial Toughness II
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer I
Enhancement: Wizard Intelligence III

Level 13 (Wizard)
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer: Imbue Force Arrows
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer: Conjure +2 Arrows

Level 14 (Wizard)
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer: Imbue Acid Arrows
Enhancement: Elven Ranged Attack II

Level 15 (Wizard)
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Maximize Spell
Feat: (Selected) Spell Penetration
Enhancement: Elven Ranged Damage II
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer: Conjure +3 Arrows

Level 16 (Wizard)
Enhancement: Wizard Improved Maximizing I

Level 17 (Wizard)
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer: Imbue Explosive Arrows
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer: Imbue Force Burst Arrows
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer: Imbue Terror Arrows
Enhancement: Elven Arcane Archer: Conjure +4 Arrows

Level 18 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Power Attack
Enhancement: Elven Arcanum I
Enhancement: Wizard Force Manipulation III

Level 19 (Wizard)
Enhancement: Wizard Elemental Manipulation III
Enhancement: Wizard Subtle Spellcasting III

Level 20 (Wizard)
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Improved Mental Toughness
Enhancement: Wizard Master of Magic

[William_the_Bat]

Two things:

1. Taking one level of ranger saves you from taking both power attack and bow strength. Take it at level 11 to raise your BAB to six and take AA a level early. You also will need the extra BAB for later.

2. Taking a level of fighter at level 20 will give you a BAB total of 11 and a martial bonus feat: You can now take improved precise shot.

No, you can't take two levels of ranger instead because the bonus feat has to occur at level 20.

[richieelias27]

As a pure wizard your manyshot will fire 2 arrows and you are completely locked out of the other most important ranged feat: improved precise shot...

I'm sure the other members of your group would prefer to see you at least throwing down a token web instead of firing off arrows at random monsters, possibly pulling aggro onto yourself if it hasnt been swung at yet, and then wasting the clerics mana on healing you.

I honestly believe that this build is not workable. Too much of AA is dependant on hitting a BAB that a pure wizard simply cannot attain.

[krud]

There are plenty of wizard AA builds, all of which are multiclassed. As a pure wizAA you can pretty much forget about ranged damage, it won't be very much. You'll spend a lot of time kiting a single mob around, which will probably trigger other mobs, which will then need cc and kill spells, which pretty much negates the reason you want AA damage - to conserve sp.

If you must stay pure then pick up bows that help your casting (shattermantle, cursepewering). Maximize your to-hit, and don't worry about damage at all, you just want the effect. You will need divine power clickies for hard to hit targets. The only ranged feat I took was precision for the +4 to-hit. I always leave it on. If you want you can take rapid shot, but it doesn't seem to give much of an advantage when all you need is to hit a mob once for the effect, and it requires two feats. Also, pick up as many greater slaying arrows as you can get. They will work very well for a few levels, until mobs keep saving against them (~level16+). Most people leave them in chests, so just ask for them. Works really well on the beholders in Von3. No need to get within casting range. It's even better when it does zero damage. It won't draw agro, and you can keep plinking until it fails its save.