Scimitar user

[Lord_kNiels]

Have tried out almost any class so far but haven't rolled a favored soul yet and now I feel like doing it.
Went with 2 monk levels for the feats and evasion on top of that. The goal of the build is to be able to solo much of the game content and being a decent raid healer. I already have a level 20 cleric so I have some experience with healing.
I am mainly looking for response on my spell and feat selections (should I swap Spell Focus: Evocation for Heighten?) as well as the necessity of a decent base CHA.
Would also like to know if I'm better off with 20 fvs or if I should keep the 18/2 split.

Character Plan by DDO Character Planner Version 3.9.1
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Level 20 Lawful Neutral Elf Female
(2 Monk \ 18 Favored Soul) 
Hit Points: 287
Spell Points: 1617 
BAB: 14\14\19\24
Fortitude: 15
Reflex: 17
Will: 17

                  Starting          Feat/Enhancement
Abilities        Base Stats          Modified Stats
(32 Point)       (Level 1)             (Level 20)
Strength             16                    21
Dexterity            15                    17
Constitution         12                    12
Intelligence          8                     8
Wisdom               14                    16
Charisma             13                    13

Tomes Used
+2 Tome of Dexterity used at level 7

                  Starting          Feat/Enhancement
                 Base Skills         Modified Skills
Skills           (Level 1)            (Level 20)
Balance               6                     9
Bluff                 1                     1
Concentration         5                    25
Diplomacy             1                     1
Disable Device       n/a                   n/a
Haggle                1                     1
Heal                  2                     3
Hide                  2                     3
Intimidate            1                     1
Jump                  3                     5
Listen                2                     5
Move Silently         2                     3
Open Lock             n/a                   n/a
Perform               n/a                   n/a
Repair               -1                    -1
Search               -1                     1
Spot                  2                     5
Swim                  3                     5
Tumble                6                     7
Use Magic Device      n/a                   n/a

Level 1 (Monk)
Feat: (Monk Bonus) Toughness
Feat: (Selected) Two Weapon Fighting


Level 2 (Favored Soul)
Feat: (Diety) Favored by the Undying Court
Spell (1): Cure Light Wounds
Spell (1): Divine Favor


Level 3 (Favored Soul)
Feat: (Selected) Empower Spell
Spell (1): Nightshield


Level 4 (Favored Soul)
Ability Raise: STR
Spell (1): Shield of Faith


Level 5 (Favored Soul)
Spell (2): Cure Moderate Wounds


Level 6 (Monk)
Feat: (Monk Bonus) Power Attack
Feat: (Selected) Quicken Spell


Level 7 (Favored Soul)
Feat: (Favored Soul Bonus) Energy Resistance: Fire
Spell (2): Resist Energy


Level 8 (Favored Soul)
Ability Raise: STR
Spell (3): Cure Serious Wounds


Level 9 (Favored Soul)
Feat: (Selected) Improved Two Weapon Fighting
Spell (2): Soundburst
Spell (3): Prayer


Level 10 (Favored Soul)
Spell (4): Divine Power


Level 11 (Favored Soul)
Spell (2): Hold Person
Spell (4): Cure Critical Wounds
Spell (3): Remove Curse


Level 12 (Favored Soul)
Ability Raise: STR
Feat: (Favored Soul Bonus) Energy Resistance: Acid
Feat: (Selected) Improved Critical: Slashing Weapons
Spell (5): Raise Dead


Level 13 (Favored Soul)
Spell (4): Restoration
Spell (3): Magic Circle Against Evil
Spell (5): Divine Punishment


Level 14 (Favored Soul)
Spell (6): Heal


Level 15 (Favored Soul)
Feat: (Selected) Spell Focus: Evocation
Spell (6): Blade Barrier
Spell (4): Freedom of Movement
Spell (5): Mass Cure Light Wounds


Level 16 (Favored Soul)
Ability Raise: STR
Spell (7): Mass Protection From Elements


Level 17 (Favored Soul)
Feat: (Favored Soul Bonus) Energy Resistance: Electricity
Spell (7): Mass Cure Serious Wounds
Spell (6): Mass Cure Moderate Wounds
Spell (5): True Seeing


Level 18 (Favored Soul)
Feat: (Selected) Greater Two Weapon Fighting
Spell (8): Mass Death Ward


Level 19 (Favored Soul)
Spell (7): Mass Spell Resistance
Spell (8): Death Pact


Level 20 (Favored Soul)
Ability Raise: STR
Spell (9): Mass Heal
Enhancement: Valenar Elf Melee Damage I
Enhancement: Valenar Elf Melee Damage II
Enhancement: Undying Call
Enhancement: Favored Soul Angel of Vengeance I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Angel of Vengeance II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Scimitar Specialization I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Scimitar Specialization II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Improved Empowering I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Improved Empowering II
Enhancement: Way of the Patient Tortoise I
Enhancement: Racial Toughness I
Enhancement: Racial Toughness II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Prayer of Smiting I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Prayer of Smiting II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Prayer of Life I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Prayer of Life II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Prayer of Incredible Smiting I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Prayer of Incredible Smiting II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Prayer of Incredible Life I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Prayer of Incredible Life II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Smiting I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Smiting II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Smiting III
Enhancement: Favored Soul Life Magic I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Life Magic II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Life Magic III
Enhancement: Favored Soul Spell Penetration I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Energy of the Scion I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Energy of the Scion II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Energy of the Scion III
Enhancement: Favored Soul Wisdom I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Wisdom II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Toughness I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Toughness II
Enhancement: Favored Soul Toughness III
Enhancement: Favored Soul Toughness IV
Enhancement: Favored Soul Wand and Scroll Mastery I
Enhancement: Favored Soul Wand and Scroll Mastery II

[Rusty_Can]

feat selections (should I swap Spell Focus: Evocation for Heighten?)

Yours looks like a melee-healer-buffer build: base STR is higher than WIS, all level-up points spent to raise STR.

Barring the odd nuking spell, I would consider giving up offensive casting and focusing on melee and healing: Empower Healing or Maximize would be better options for your build.

[Zharfie]

Yours looks like a melee-healer-buffer build: base STR is higher than WIS, all level-up points spent to raise STR.

Barring the odd nuking spell, I would consider giving up offensive casting and focusing on melee and healing: Empower Healing or Maximize would be better options for your build.

I agree, hit points might become a problem at the end too, try calculating how many hit points you're able to get and consider increasing starting con, wisdom is not needed (either it should be very high (evocation type) or just dump it) and with 10 starting charisma you could still get around 2200-2300 spell points. the extra 3 doesn't give much extra either.

[Standal]

By taking the 2 monk levels, you're giving up +2 CHA and 10 DR/cold iron. You're also forced to lawful alignment.

I wouldn't give up the DR10 on my WF healer/melee.

[sirgog]

I agree, hit points might become a problem at the end too, try calculating how many hit points you're able to get and consider increasing starting con, wisdom is not needed (either it should be very high (evocation type) or just dump it) and with 10 starting charisma you could still get around 2200-2300 spell points. the extra 3 doesn't give much extra either.

The low-ish HP and the inability to stay pure without losing feats that are required for TWF or healing is the reason I've never made a scimitar FvS.

[Clay]

Sirgog's soul survivor build is a very nice build. Check it out.

[kcru]

I have a cleric/fighter Scimitar/shield user. Works pretty well.. the crits really help. The shield I'm using is the crystal cove shield with Guardbreaking, Riposte, and Doublestrike.

If you went that way, you could drop the TWF feats. You'd have less offensive output, but better defense (guardbreaking mezzes on a crit, allowing you to daze then switch to another target) and more feat flexibility.

[Lord_kNiels]

Thanks for the responds.
I kinda see that I shouldn't focus too much about DC's as it lowers my hp too much as I will (hopefully) fight and not heal and therefore generate some agro.

[Illiain]

The low-ish HP and the inability to stay pure without losing feats that are required for TWF or healing is the reason I've never made a scimitar FvS.

I've found the almost complete lack of melee based enhancements on elves works well to make a tripe spec Undying Court FvS. Each on their own are slightly weak, but when combined make a nice little package of raid healing and damage dealing.

With GS hp and Conc Opp items, I'll have 500hps, 2800+sp, DR10/Cold Iron
Feats- GTWF, PA, Maximize, Toughness, Quicken (No IC:Slash so limited to Min2 GS)
Enhancements- AoV II, Valenar Attack and Damage II, Scimitar Weapon Mastery II, Racial Toughness II, FvS Toughness IV, Smiting IV, Prayer of Smiting III, Life Magic IV, Prayer of Life III, Energy of the Scion III, Undying Call, Charisma I, Capstone

I loose the Improved Crit lines for smiting and healing, but with everything combined I don't miss them at all. I've seen Divine Punishment ticking for 500 and the archon hitting for 100+ along with my melee damage. Now if I could just fit in IC:Slash and a pair of PosIII scimitars, then everything would be purple damage.

[Aganthor]

You can also take a look at Gratch's build here.

It's basically the same class split but with different feats.

[unbongwah]

I agree with everyone else that you're spreading your build a bit too thin; either focus on melee or offensive spells, but trying to split the difference doesn't do much good.

Do you have half-elves? At this point I think they're a better choice for TWF FvS. I posted a pure HE FvS here; I would use a monk 2 splash to add Imp Crit Slash & another metamagic.

[sirgog]

I've found the almost complete lack of melee based enhancements on elves works well to make a tripe spec Undying Court FvS. Each on their own are slightly weak, but when combined make a nice little package of raid healing and damage dealing.

With GS hp and Conc Opp items, I'll have 500hps, 2800+sp, DR10/Cold Iron
Feats- GTWF, PA, Maximize, Toughness, Quicken (No IC:Slash so limited to Min2 GS)
Enhancements- AoV II, Valenar Attack and Damage II, Scimitar Weapon Mastery II, Racial Toughness II, FvS Toughness IV, Smiting IV, Prayer of Smiting III, Life Magic IV, Prayer of Life III, Energy of the Scion III, Undying Call, Charisma I, Capstone

I loose the Improved Crit lines for smiting and healing, but with everything combined I don't miss them at all. I've seen Divine Punishment ticking for 500 and the archon hitting for 100+ along with my melee damage. Now if I could just fit in IC:Slash and a pair of PosIII scimitars, then everything would be purple damage.

Ouch at no Empower Healing - you don't want to be healing Horoth tanks in PUGs without it. (It's not needed if you only have tanks with Claw gloves for 30% healing amp and a ToD ring or DT with the other 20% on it).

It's horrible to have Heal scrolls on cooldown, see a Heal not take the tank to full after a DBF/Meteor Swarm (or worse a Disintegrate, but they are rare), and so need to throw a Maximized Cure Critical as well.

[Illiain]

Ouch at no Empower Healing - you don't want to be healing Horoth tanks in PUGs without it. (It's not needed if you only have tanks with Claw gloves for 30% healing amp and a ToD ring or DT with the other 20% on it).

It's horrible to have Heal scrolls on cooldown, see a Heal not take the tank to full after a DBF/Meteor Swarm (or worse a Disintegrate, but they are rare), and so need to throw a Maximized Cure Critical as well.

I haven't had any issues without Empower Healing. Just alternating between heal spell and scroll works fine. Most of the good PUG tanks on Ghalla are fleshy with healing amp. (I've actually noticed we have very few WF tanks that PUG.) If I have to use a maximized Cure Crit, then I use it. I tend to have more then enough SP left over. Plus the extra damage I can toss in with Divine Punishment really stacks up and makes the run so much faster.

[samho]

I don't feel too horrible on my Half-Elf 2Mnk/18Fvs experiment build after all (compare to my own Lord of the Blade 20 FvS version)

SP and DR wise, yes, you probably have less than pure FvS; however, even my 1.9ksp version battle cleric could survive most quest without major pot, I doubt sp would be serious problem for such build. On the other hand, you receive evasion as well as almost full TWF feat chain (beside oversize TWF, at the moment, unless I decide to drop improved critical).

For feat selection, I went for (not following the order) Maximize / Empower / Quicken / Toughness / TWF / ITWF / GTWF / IC: Slash / Power Attack. Losing out the extend is probably a litte hit for a melee intense build, but I still manage to live without it.

Stat wise:
(32 point build)
STR 16 +2 (tome) + 6 (gear/divine power) + 1(HE enhancement) + 1 (HE deli fighter) +1 (exceptional STR from dragontouch robe) +5 (EDIT: level up)
DEX 15 +2(tome) +5 (standard spectral glove)
CON 15 +2(tome) +1 (HE enhancement) +6 (standard gear)
INT 10 (didn't even eat INT tome after all, since it's my experiment build at beginning -- but if I ever redo this again or TR, I will certainly eat tome at lv 7)
WIS 8 +2 (Goggle of Time-Sensing, before I finish concordant opposition accessory)
CHA 12 +2 (tome) + 6 (regular gear)

I totally dump down the wisdom, maximize all smiting line and focus on Divine Punishment + Archon in trade of fewer life magic enhancements. Your Divine Punishment damage output will be very similar to pure evoker FvS (you can access to right gear like Super Brilliance V clicky, eardweller and green blade as pure FvS), and probably outdamage regular FvS.

Weapon wise: while scimitar is the weapon of choice, HE deli fighter give me enough freedom to use (almost) whatever weapon suitable for quest ( +4 holy greatclub of Greater Undead Bane for Sor'Jek ? Phase Hammer or Atonement for necropolis quests? ), make level up a lot easier.

Healing wise: well .. this build is not the ultimate healer (especially with only 1 rank of Wand and Scroll Mastery, 2/3 life magic enhancement line), but you can still function as regular healer on quest if you choice to (of have to due to "real" healer dying / having trouble)

So far, I do enjoy this character since U9 (I create him right after U9 release)

[Calebro]

The low-ish HP and the inability to stay pure without losing feats that are required for TWF or healing is the reason I've never made a scimitar FvS.

The lowish HP is almost a non-factor. You have 20 less HP than a similarly halfling, about 40 less than a similarly built human, and about 60 less than a similarly built dwarf or WF.
Now with half-elf and a rogue dilly, the DPS remains and you don't lose the HP.
On a self-healer, these are almost not even noticeable.
And if you splash monk then evasion makes the missing HP are even less noticeable.

It's the loss of the DR and capstone that are noticeable. But the two extra feats from the monk splash, coupled with evasion, make up for that for many people.
It's a judgement call. Some people like the splash and some don't, looks like you're one of the latter. Neither group is wrong and neither is right. It's a matter of taste.

[muffinlad]

I will say that the Scimitar wielding "Capstone" of unlimited command undead may be right in game flavor- I never used it even once before TRing. The DR is great, no doubt. If you had the Mabar Cloak and Evasion- the Two Monk seems worth it, but I need to test it out.

Regards,

muffinflvs

[Calebro]

I will say that the Scimitar wielding "Capstone" of unlimited command undead may be right in game flavor- I never used it even once before TRing. The DR is great, no doubt. If you had the Mabar Cloak and Evasion- the Two Monk seems worth it, but I need to test it out.

Regards,

muffinflvs

This is exactly my point.
The elven faith capstone sucks. It's the DR that ends up costing you if you lose it.
But with Min2 accessories, Seal of the Earth, UMD for Stoneskin scrolls, etc, losing that 10DR is a lot less of an issue. So the only *real* loss is a few spells and a few SP.

For melee Souls:
If you're going Lord of Blades, the capstone is a no brainer. If you're going Unyielding Sov the capstone is tough to give up. If you're going Undying Court, the capstone is almost a non-factor, and instead you should consider if the loss of the actual spells is a factor for you.

[Illiain]

This is exactly my point.
The elven faith capstone sucks. It's the DR that ends up costing you if you lose it.
But with Min2 accessories, Seal of the Earth, UMD for Stoneskin scrolls, etc, losing that 10DR is a lot less of an issue. So the only *real* loss is a few spells and a few SP.

For melee Souls:
If you're going Lord of Blades, the capstone is a no brainer. If you're going Unyielding Sov the capstone is tough to give up. If you're going Undying Court, the capstone is almost a non-factor, and instead you should consider if the loss of the actual spells is a factor for you.

What I like about the capstone is not wasting more points at character creation than I need. 2AP for a +2 Chr and easily having a 18 Str, 14-16 Dex, 14 Con is well worth staying pure. Melee FvS can easily dump Int/Wis/Chr and still heal just as well as Evokers and Nannybots. The new DoT doesn't have a save, so no need for a high Wis for the PrE either.

[Calebro]

What I like about the capstone is not wasting more points at character creation than I need. 2AP for a +2 Chr and easily having a 18 Str, 14-16 Dex, 14 Con is well worth staying pure. Melee FvS can easily dump Int/Wis/Chr and still heal just as well as Evokers and Nannybots. The new DoT doesn't have a save, so no need for a high Wis for the PrE either.

Even that +2 Cha really doesn't make a huge difference. Start with a 17 Str instead of 18.

17 base Str
2 tome
5 level ups
6 gear
2 exc
-------
32
vs 33 with a starting 18 Str

+7 gear vs +6 means you need an additional +1 Exc Str on a ring to get an even number, but you'll probably be looking for one of those rings regardless so it doesn't matter.
If you have a +3 Str tome in th bank for him it might make a difference, or if you have some epic gear ready to go, but that's it.

Use those 3 points in Cha instead of Str at creation, and you essentially get the same Str score with 1 more point of Cha.
11 base Cha
2 tome
6 item
-------
19 for 9th level spells

[Illiain]

Even that +2 Cha really doesn't make a huge difference. Start with a 17 Str instead of 18.

17 base Str
2 tome
5 level ups
6 gear
2 exc
-------
32
vs 33 with a starting 18 Str

+7 gear vs +6 means you need an additional +1 Exc Str on a ring to get an even number, but you'll probably be looking for one of those rings regardless so it doesn't matter.
If you have a +3 Str tome in th bank for him it might make a difference, or if you have some epic gear ready to go, but that's it.

Use those 3 points in Cha instead of Str at creation, and you essentially get the same Str score with 1 more point of Cha.
11 base Cha
2 tome
6 item
-------
19 for 9th level spells

You're forgetting one major issue. To be Undying Court, you need to be an elf or helf. Elves have very few melee based enhancements. They're not loaded down with DR, Toughness, Str/Con, Power Attack enhancements like WF/Horcs are. They have 2 racial Toughness and 2 racial attack/damage bonuses. This gives you a lot of freedom spending AP. AP are never tight for elven melee FvS. Personally I'd rather keep my Str capped and spend 4AP for a +3 Charisma.