Multi-Classing focus on a Staff/Melee Combatant with Rogue/Spell Caster Capacity

[Seanzie75]

So, I've been fiddling around with a few ideas of late based on what I've tried playing class-wise and read upon thus far. As I appreciate the feedback I get from this welcoming community, I was hoping you veterans could assist me with a few concept builds I've been considering of late.

As I really find myself enjoying lock picking/trap disarming as well as spell casting if I'd like on the fly. I've also been curious about melee combat as far as Staff/Bo wielding for combat is concerned. So I have questions regarding multi-classing possibilities with the following:

Rogue/Monk/Druid (for druid I should preface I prefer Caster abilities over shape-shifting)
Rogue/Wizard (Again, emphasis on Staff-weapon preference with spell casting as a bonus, not focus)
Rogue/Bard (Love a Bards, CC-like spell options--Charm Person, etc.)
Rogue/Monk/Cleric (Buff Spells, Healing Spells)

My goal here is to have the capacity to focus Staff Combat, deal with traps/doors as well as spell casting (which can be CC/Utility focused and/or Damage (I really like Ice/Acid/Lightning based spells)...of the class combinations I've listed, which ones would allow me to emphasize these abilities?

Or are there other class combinations I should also consider? With a 28-pt build starting out.

Racial-wise I was considering either Halfing, Human, HE or Drow.

Thank you in advance. :)

[Jaid314]

my advice to you is that unless you're extremely restricted on character slots, you should make one character to satisfy your melee curiosity, and one to satisfy your spellcasting curiosity. my advice is that you start with the spellcaster, because once you utter the words "i want to make a quarterstaff build", you're already well into uphill battle territory if you want it to be effective.

the difference between any geared character and that same character ungeared is huge. the difference is that for a build that is very effective in the first place, no gear can still work well, just not as well... whereas for a quarterstaff build, you need to have really good gear just to do well at all.

you're almost completely dependant on named quarterstaff options, and most of those are bound to character or account. apart from that, you'll need to find the actual decent lootgen quarterstaff choices, and most of those will take an extended period of time (and platinum) in the auction house.

i'm not saying you can't make one as a first character, mind you... i'm saying that you'll probably be feeling very frustrated in comparison to what other builds would get you if you make one as your first character.

that said, if you've absolutely got your heart set on it, something like a 16/2/2 bard/rogue/fighter or bard/rogue/barbarian would probably be your best bet. your spell-based CC will be pretty lousy at cap (otto's irresistible dance is still good though), but your buffing should be pretty solid.

[t0r012]

The main problem with a caster/staff melee build is that both require huge level investments in classes. Too much so in fact. Casters require as many levels as you can put in to them to be decent. And wielding a quarterstaff in combat effectively pretty much requires 12 or more levels of rogue to get acrobatII and a boats load of sneak attack damage.

So you either end up with a really weak caster that is decent at swinging a stick or an ok caster that is terrible at swinging a stick.
-------

If you like the idea of doing traps and or being sneaky coupled with strong spell casting going with the classic 2 rogue splash on a max int wizard is a great way to go. Max Skill points in UMD, Search , disable and move silently (plus hide if you can swing it or invisibility spell if you can't)
Recommend warforged for the self healing if you have access otherwise human for the skill points. Half elf or drow make decent secondary choices.

[Seanzie75]

I appreciate the feedback. So, its essentially an either or scenario. (While a little disappointing, it is what is given within the confines of the game's workable mechanics.)

What if I went Rogue/Monk with a focus on the Monk's Quarterstaff wielding? (I understand that I lose out on pointed spell casting abilities, but some of the combos/combat skills seem spell-like/elemental to some extent.)

While I'm probably reaching a bit here (and probably have to give up on a Qstaff focus wielding character), I figure it wouldn't hurt to ask. :)

Thanks again, for the feedback.

(I should also add that I'm a subscriber to the game.)

[Daemoneyes]

What you want is possible but only to some extend.
As said spellcasting requires heavy class investment but!
buffing / selfheal / non DC damage is always an option.

Easiest road for that would be something like 12rogue/8druid
will be tight on feats
with cleave/gr.cleave and maximize for the heals
but has Shillagh for additional staff damage

Rogue/Bard with maybe Monk or Fighter for Feats
but you wont have the DC for charm spells but the bard buffs and the innate bard ability to cc the enemy would still work (it relies on Perform skill for the DC)

other way would be concentrating on melee
http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=399216&highlight=Stick+build

[unbongwah]

See my Three Ring Circus thread (http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=399244) for my take on Acro II-based staff builds.

[Mastercard]

You don't have to mix/max your character to be effective. I've seen so many times people take the UBER builds and do horrible because the way they play, not the build they are.

That said, here is my suggestion :)

Warforged (for self repairs)
16, 14, 16, 16, 6, 6
18 Wizard / 2 Rogue

Take Rogue at 1 to get all the skills you want, wizard for a while, putting 2 ranks into each rogue skill to keep it up to date as best as possible. Then take rogue again when you want and catch anything up that you fell behind in (shouldn't have fallen behind in much)

You'll get all the meta magic feats you want with the wizard bonus feats. (Quickened Reconstruct ftw)

You'll have full lockpick, search and disable.

You can go archmage and get some of the SLA's.

You can use your leveling feats to keep up to date in your fighting skills. Power Attack, Cleave, Greatcleave, Improved Critical, etc.

Tenser's Transformation! +4 Str/Dex/Con, +6 AC and a base attack bonus on par with a fighter (well, 1 less than a fighter due to 2 rogue levels) (All Stackable as it's alchemical)

Put your level ups into Int or Str. Whatever you want to focus on. You'll still be able to land spells if you go Int or you can focus on stuff without saves and go Str.

These types of builds are fun, which is what this game is all about.

[EssenceofEvil]

Arti/rogue combo[better yet all arti]? Deadly weapons doubles your staves damage.. kinda like the druids ability, but not limited to wooden staves. Plus all the buffs to bypass DR..and stoneskin.. elemental weapons..oh yeah you can do the battle engineer one which increases the damage a little bit as well. With construct essence you can self heal or just use you classes enhancemnts on wands/scrolls and the innate item level increases to heal thyself with wands and scrolls better than a regular rogue.


Ya know I wanna try this now..but I hear melee artis aren't great.

[voodoogroves]

Ya know I wanna try this now..but I hear melee artis aren't great.

Not in the way you're thinking.

[bonscott87]

A great flavor build that is actually effective and fun to play is a H'Orc Rogue 13/Fighter 7. It doesn't meet your spellcasting want but it's a good build to see what quarterstaffs can really do. H'orc gets a bunch of racial bonus enhancements for two handed weapons, Acrobat 2 and Kensai 1 specializing in staffs. I also pumped up Bluff. By level 20 you will easily do over 100 pts of dmg per hit not counting huge sneak attack damage available and other boosts. You're a bit squishy but I did get this guy over 400 hp without greensteal or epic items. I didn't run in epic content so if that's your thing I don't have much advice if this toon would do well or not, but I would think it could. Play more like a Rogue that does a lot of DPS, but you certainly don't want to tank as your AC isn't good enough. I used the "Big F@#$ Stick" build as a base.

And with UMD I could do Heal scrolls at about 65% which came in really handy in one quest where the whole party wiped but me. I got in a corner and kept trying the Heal scrolls on the healer until I got him up, then I stepped out and took aggro while he went and hid, healed himself up and then started bringing everyone back.

I plan to TR this guy soon and build him back up the same way and see how well he does now.

Possible other splits could be 13 Rogue/Fighter 5/Monk 2 or Barb 2. I originally had him at Fighter 6/Barb 1 but wanted the extra enhancements at Fighter 7 instead so lesser TR'd to take out the Barb level.

Either way it's a fun build to play and solo's well too.

[sigtrent]

Monk 2 gives you a lot of bang for your buck, two feats, a small buff from a stance, Wisdom added to AC, save boost, and evasion. This is likely your go to to add some melee punch to a caster.

Rogue or Artificer can give you trap skills, Rogue only works well with staves if you level up to at least 6, better yet 12, its great for a pure melee + traps but not good if you want casting in the mix. Splashing rogue 2 for traps + evasion is fine.

Artificer combines traps and casting so that is a nice two-fer, but its not great with staves, though it has lots of buffs that can help with that. You get some ranged skills as a throw in bonus. Go Waterford and you get self healing too. You will be forswearing your rune arm which is good damage at high level, but its always there if you want to use it.

Druid comes with great early game buffs for the staff, and gives you caster power. It combines poorly with trap skills as a caster since its wisdom based and gets few skill points.

Wizard comes with feats which really helps caster/fighter combos and its casting stat plays well with trapping. The low HP can be an issue though and skills are still very tight unless you really max out Int.

Bard is super versatile but it lacks any elemental damage spells like you mention, on the other hand it comes with potent crowd control with the spell options and lots of buffs.

So my recommendations to get nearly all of what you want....

Warforged: Artificer 17 / Monk 2 / Druid 1 (druid is optional for added buffs)
This is decent trapping with evasion, some bonus feats, tons of buffs, decent elemental damage of many types, reasonable damage, and a bonus of ranged combat (and two pets, though they won't be all that useful in combat).
You will need to be Lawful Neutral alignment, Str/Int as primary stats Con secondary, the rest spread around.

Half Elf or Human: Rogue 2/ Fighter 2 / Bard 16
This is a pretty classic combat bard build, you need fighter for some feats to take warchanter. Rogue skills are pretty easy to maintain. Damage is not crazy but its decent and out boost everyone else's damage too. You can make your fascinate songs quite effective maxing perform and keeping a decent charisma. Stats are mixed but Str/Cha/Int are all important. No elemental damage here though.

If you are willing to drop to two of three...

Half Orc: Wizard 18/Monk 2 Pale Master
You get cheap repeated necro casting damage, great defensive buffs, whatever elemental damage you like, self healing and if you crank on the strength, somewhat reasonable staff damage if you crank on the strength (thus half orc). Its also just kind of a fun concept character. The only downside is you can't specialize your instant kill casting that much, but it may still be good for trash mobs.

Half Orc: Monk 13, Rogue 6, Druid 1
I have one of these. There is no casting but you have some insane damage off the staff, especially at lower levels and while rogue skills are kind of on the weak side, you can develop them to handle most non-elite traps.

[eachna_gislin]

I appreciate the feedback. So, its essentially an either or scenario. (While a little disappointing, it is what is given within the confines of the game's workable mechanics.)

What if I went Rogue/Monk with a focus on the Monk's Quarterstaff wielding? (I understand that I lose out on pointed spell casting abilities, but some of the combos/combat skills seem spell-like/elemental to some extent.)

While I'm probably reaching a bit here (and probably have to give up on a Qstaff focus wielding character), I figure it wouldn't hurt to ask. :)

Thanks again, for the feedback.

(I should also add that I'm a subscriber to the game.)

You don't have to give up on a quarterstaff focus build. Look up the "Big F'n Stick" build or other rogue/monk q-staff builds.

Basically the character will spend it's time in Air Stance, with at least 12 levels of rogue for the 2 levels of acrobat prestige (how much more rogue you'd take vs monk after that is flexible). Mine has 6 levels of dark monk.

It's not the highest DPS build but it's awesome fun and has some utility (immunity to knockdown and multiple levels of stacking haste). Also, it jumps around like Yoda in Episode 2 and traps like a pro (as long as I keep up with the trapping gear).

What I would suggest tho is playing it and another character. Let the qstaff user be your "fun" toon, and the other toon be more serious. That's the toon you play to try out casters or whatever else you're interested in.

To the person who answered that it's very gear dependant, they're correct. But, many of the staves are unbound, BTA, or BTCoE. This makes them easy(ish) to farm, as does the fact that they're not very popular weapons. Many PUGers will pass them over if you say you have an acrobat that can use them. There's *much* more competition for caster gear.

[Maelodic]

I can actually see this working rather well with a 12 rogue/7wizard/1 druid build. 7 wizzy gives you almost all the arcane buffs as well as fire wall, ice storm or acid rain for some awesome air dot casting as you wack away at them. It'll help you feel like a caster. Druid 1 adds rams might and shilly to boost your damage.

Something like:
True Neutral Half Orc
Stats (32)
17 STR | 14 DEX | 15 CON | 13 INT | 10 WIS | 6 CHA

Leveling Order:
1-2 Rogue
3 Druid
4-8 Wizard (Haste)
9-18 Rogue (PrE)
19-20 Wizard (Firewall/acid rain/ice storm etc)

Feats:
1: Toughness
3: Power Attack
6: Cleave
9: Great Cleave
12: Imp. Crit: Bludgeon
15: Combat Expertise
18: Imp. Feint

Wizard:
Maximize
Extend

[ThePrincipal]

rogue12/wizard7/barb1 seems like a hoot.

barb for the movement speed

[Disavow]

My Bro Grikks is currently utterly LOVING his stick build. Just a second lifer with basic health gear and whatnot. Other than a lifestealer, I don't think he had any named sticks before TRing. We went over good and bad builds for a while, and end the end, he wound up with this one.

Lawful Neutral Half-Orc
12 Rogue / 7 Monk / 1 Druid

As many would attest, 12 Rogue is almost key if you are stressing a stick build, as Thief Acrobat IS the stick build. That being said you get no obvious benefit furthering rogue after this.

The 7 Monk was for access to Wind stance and the first upgrade of such for double strike (another focus for his build). This also allowed for him to reach the 2nd of monk healing amp, and also wholeness of body, which is beautiful for just sitting and healing up.

I believe someone just touched on the Druid part of the build, but it is here for 2 reasons over 8 monk and the additional unarmed. For one, he hates going unarmed after getting to high level on this build. He often simply outdamages/kills even geared unarmed monks.

The main reason is that druids, even 1 level of such, gain access to 2 spells that are of decent enough importance at level 1. Ram's Might gives +2 size bonus to strength and damage. There are very very few places you can get a size bonus, and getting this early on gives HOrcs even higher strength early on.

The 2nd spell is of course Shillelagh. Simple but beautifl spell that adds +.5 Weapon damage to wooden weapons. Staves on the other hand receive +1 Weapon damage. This means you have a level 1 Deadly Weapons buff for your staff, for the rest of the game. Being able to utilize your rogue staff abilities / monk stance with an effective great sword is no laughing matter. Note that these spells don't last inherently long, but since you won't have any other spell to even slot other than these 2, you will have a spell point bar to burn, especially with any item.

One of the main reasons my brother is able to output so much damage is that his build is based on double strike, and cleave. He has Cleave + Great Cleave, and being in Legendary Dreadnought, you can add Momentum Swing + Lay Waste to that. LoL, he never gets sneak attack, and hes dumb as a rock, (only has a decent pick lock, you can do better), but he hits hard, and hits everyone.

I think he did EH Caught in the Web, and was first into the fray each time, and wound up around 70+ kills ahead of the 2nd on the kill count. I know its not about the E-Peen, but he was happy as a lark that he was able to show the strength of the stick build. He still isn't happy that Sireth has yet to drop for him though.... It was his first actual time using Master's Blitz to good effect, so much that he is trying to use it more and more. Went from the Lolth legs sprouting til the shrine you lay at the bottom of the final island (where you pull everything down to) while under the full stacks.

As I said in the beginning, he is still 2nd life atm. Has only a GS HP item (Min II Helm), and the stick he used while leveling was Nat Gann's (bound to account from chrono, easy to get), lifestealer (BtCoE, which you can buy from the AH for pretty cheap) and pretty much every decent randomly rolled staff until he got to 20 and picked up the Stout Oak Walking stick ( which you simply get for Villager Comms).

They are correct that some time and patience are necessary to build a stick wielder in this game, just remember that it can be done, even effectively so with no access to high level or even named staves, or gear of any kind. Yes being able to have some of the better at level (Breeze is something my brother truly wants for his next life. Also to be a stick build. The same one in fact.), but I'm sure you will do just fine.

[unbongwah]

rogue12/wizard7/barb1 seems like a hoot.

As many would attest, 12 Rogue is almost key if you are stressing a stick build, as Thief Acrobat IS the stick build. That being said you get no obvious benefit furthering rogue after this.
I'd rather have +1D6 SA and the extra feat from rog 13 so I could have both Imp Evasion & Opportunist.

[Steveohio]

13rog 6monk>>>12rogue 7 monk

7 monk gets you 10% more healing amp, 13 rogue gets you both of improved evasion and opportunist + 1d6 more sneak attack.

[Maelodic]

You could probably go with 12 Rog/7 Druid/1 Barb as well.

Reaving Roar/Fatal Harrier is fantastic, and you still have sleet storm, cure serious, and plenty of great buffs.

With fatal harrier combined with your PrE attack speed, you'll be so speedy it's not even funny.

20% Compitence+25% Enhancement attack speed bonus.

Oh my.

[Firepants]

Try this build: https://forums.ddo.com/showpost.php?p=4590439&postcount=2242

I'm currently running a 13/6/1 rogue/monk/druid build that I'm TRing into a WF Juggernaut (using Sireth). His DPS is pretty insane at 25 with LD as his ED but the versatility of the Jug is hard to pass up.