Pallywhacker

[AlcoArgo]

*** Updates in post #9 ***


Hey all,

After 8 years of trying I have finally completed an ESOS so I wanted to try out a 2HF melee character. Alco has always been conceived as melee so with the new changes Bladeforged Pally seemed the obvious choice. I didn't really follow a template (although I did steal some ideas from Sestra's 2HF Pally build)

Why is this called a Pallywhacker? Because "Pallywhacker" is fun to say and the playstyle is to jump in the middle of things, drop a Consecration and start whacking the baddies.

Please comment on this as I am looking to tinker with it. Neither build nor gear layout are final.

BASIC BUILD ASSUMPTIONS:

1) Primary weapon is the ESOS (Currently have slotted Ruby of Recon +114, Diamond of CHA +6) ESOS won't change but augments are up for debate - I have a new toy and will be playing with it.
2) 16 paladin levels gets Zeal and Holy Sword
3) 2 monk levels gets evasion
4) 2 fighter levels for extra feats
5) Self healing through Lay on Hands (90% of total HP) and Communion of Scribing (50% of total HP)

Alco (Argonessen) - 16 Paladin, 2 Monk, 2 Fighter. Lawful Good. Bladeforged. THF with ESOS. Divine Crusader

Active past life feats:
Artificer x3, Barbarian x3, Bard x2, Cleric, Druid, Favored Soul, Fighter x3, Monk x2, Paladin x2, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer, Wizard

Active epic past life feats:
Martial (Doublestrike) x3

Active iconic past life feats:
Bladeforged

Tomes:
+6 tomes on every stat.

Feats (In no particular Order):
Completionist. Cleave. Power Attack. Quicken. Two Handed Fghting. Improved Two Handed Fighting. Greater Two Handed Fighting. Force of Personality. IC Slash. IC Bludgeon. Toughness.

Epic Feats:
Overwhelming Critical. Perfect Two Handed Fighting. Holy Strike

Base stats:
Str 14. Dex 12. Con 16. Int 8. Wis 8. Cha 18.
All level ups into CHA

Leveling order:
Lvl 1 - Lvl 15 Pal. (At the Creation Forge)
Lvl 16 Pal.
Lvl 17 Mnk.
Lvl 18 Mnk.
Lvl 19 Ftr.
Lvl 20 Ftr.


Skill points:
Balance 2 ranks, Concentration 13 ranks, Intimidate 6 ranks, Jump 2 ranks, Repair 1 rank, UMD 11 ranks
Note: Skills are kind of all over the place. After UMD and Concentration I mostly splashed what seemed nice at the time.

Destiny:


Twists:


Enhancements:


Self Buffed Stats:


Gear and augments:

Head - EE Helm of the Black Dragon (Insightful Con +3, Yellow: Globe of True Imperial Blood, Green: Good Luck +2)
Goggles - Epic Glimpse of the Soul (Power 250)
Armor - Flawless Black Dragonscale Docent (blue: Heavy fort)
Bracers - Epic Ethereal Bracers (not upgraded).
Boots - Cannith Boots of Propusion
1st ring - Skirmisher's Ring
2nd ring - Ring of Shadows (colorless: DEX +7)
Gloves - Sanctified Gages (not upgraded).
Belt - Guardian's Girdle
Cloak - Guardian's Cloak
Trinket - Epic Litany of the Dead (not upgraded).
Neck - EE Jorgundal's Collar (Colorless: STR +7, Green: Deathblock
Main weapon - ESOS (Red: Recon +114, Colorless: CHA +6)
Secondary weapon - Triple Positive Green Steele Maul
Quiver - Epic Quiver of Alacrity.

[AlcoArgo]

I know there is some redundancy in the gear setup - some of the augments were needed for past lives. Currently I have no trouble soloing EH quests but EE is out of my reach. Based on Sestra's build (linked in post #1) STR is far too Low, CON is far too low and CHA is too low so I will need to address that.

Gear needs an upgrade and that means grinding - working on it. Advice as to what the final gear setup could be will help me grind more efficiently.


Many thanks in advance for all advice.

[Hobgoblin]

are you stuck on monk? evasion is nice, but so is the mmr/prr you get from heavy armor

hob

[AlcoArgo]

are you stuck on monk? evasion is nice, but so is the mmr/prr you get from heavy armor

hob

Not stuck on anything except ESOS and Bladeforged (I need a couple more BF lives)

[phalaeo]

Alco, it sucks. I'll tell you in vent.

I'll take SS of Saraphima's for you to compare for options.

[AlcoArgo]

Alco, it sucks. I'll tell you in vent.

I'll take SS of Saraphima's for you to compare for options.

Your tough love is always an inspiration, Pallai.

[Lycurgus]

Your tough love is always an inspiration, Pallai.

Pallai is down with the flu, so I'll try and follow up in the meantime. Assuming you want 2HF with feats targeted towards orchard content for the time being and will be using Divine Crusader, something like this may work better for you:

18 Pal/2 Fighter

Starting Stats: 16 Str 10 Dex 16 Con 10 Int 10 Wis 16 Cha, all level-ups into strength.
Feats (in no special order): Adamantine Body, Power Attack, Precision, 2HF x 3, Completionist, Quicken, IC:Slash, IC:Bludgeon, Overwhelming Crit, Force of Personality, Epic 2HF, Epic 2WF.
Twists: Endless Lay on Hands, Intolerant Blows (or Grim precision), Extra Action Boost, Cocoon (or Unearthly Reactions) when you have your 4th twist.

Gear:
Head - Epic/Mythic Emerald gaze
Goggles - Intricate Field Optics (Cha +3)
Armor - Heavy Thunderforged, DR 30/60
Bracers - Epic Ethereal Bracers
Boots - Epic Boots of the Innocent
1st ring - Epic Circle of Malevolence
2nd ring - EE Consuming Darkness
Gloves - Sanctified Gages
Belt - Epic Belt of Thoughtful Rememberance or Battleragers Harness
Cloak - Adamantine Cloak of the Wolf
Trinket - Epic Litany of the Dead
Neck - Epic Shroud of the Ardent
Main weapon - Thunderforged Falchion
Secondary weapon - Thunderforged Maul
Quiver - Epic Quiver of Alacrity.

Self-buffed Character Stats (Divine Might only, no yugo pots, tensers, etc)


Enhancements

[nat_1]

Dat capstone though...

+10 Melee power alone would be tempting, but +4 Cha and +2d6 light damage step up from the lvl 18 core.

Evasion isn't as valuable now with the state of heavy armor and haste boost can be obtained from LD. So Monk/Fighter splashes are really down to feats, but KotC doesn't have to take Cleave/Great Cleave anyway so it's not as starved as in the past.

Splashing deeper than 2 loses another 2d6 light damage and 500 on vorpal v. undead.

What 4-6 levels of anything are going to get you +10 melee power, 4d6 damage on hit, +4 Cha (so +2 saves and +2 damage under DM)?

I am having a tough time seeing a splash I like outside of 4 Cle/Fvs specifically for quell-proof Amilio Estevez Strike.

I'm also having a tough time going Bladeforged these days. Immunities are nice but the one that really matters right now you can get from KotC. BF is down 1 feat for Adamantine Body and 1 more v. Human.

Talking BF comes full circle to the evasion discussion. Heavy armor (or Adamantine Body) gets greater stalwart stances and lets you feel less bad about dex becoming more of a dump stat. Recon sla is tempting, but heal amp is easy and repair amp is hard. Power of the Forge is admittedly pretty sweet. Also, evasion right now can be done with light armor and a small shield, keeping evasion and still getting decent PRR. THF with a nekkid BF doesn't get you the PRR.

So, I'd go Human, pure Pally, T5 KotC, 2 Greater Sacred Stances from Sacred Defender. Then decide between hamp from human or Versatile Adept from Harper.

[AlcoArgo]

Pallai is down with the flu, so I'll try and follow up in the meantime. Assuming you want 2HF with feats targeted towards orchard content for the time being and will be using Divine Crusader, something like this may work better for you:

18 Pal/2 Fighter

... snip ...

Thanks Fin. I just LR'd into pure pally with adamantine body for heavy armor. It is performing better than the 2 mnk/2 ftr experiment. Your build looks good and I am going to start farming for what I need. Per the gear you suggested, this is my current state:

Gear:
Head - Epic/Mythic Emerald gaze
Currently wearing Epic version
Goggles - Intricate Field Optics (Cha +3)
Currently wearing Epic Glimps of the Soul - time to farm Tor?
UPDATE: Got 'em!
Armor - Heavy Thunderforged, DR 30/60
Currently wearing Flawless Black Dragonscale - looks like Raid Night is back!
UPDATE: Got it - Upgraded to DR 30/60!
Bracers - Epic Ethereal Bracers
Got 'em. Wearing 'em.
Boots - Epic Boots of the Innocent
UPDATE: Got 'em! Finally!
1st ring - Epic Circle of Malevolence
UPDATE: BOOM! Got it!
2nd ring - EE Consuming Darkness
Have EN version.
Gloves - Sanctified Gages
Got 'em. Wearing 'em.
Belt - Epic Belt of Thoughtful Rememberance or Battleragers Harness
UPDATE: Got the Epic Belt of Thoughtful Rememberance
Cloak - Adamantine Cloak of the Wolf
May have the mats for it. Gotta check.
Done!
Trinket - Epic Litany of the Dead
Got it. Wearing it.
Neck - Epic Shroud of the Ardent
Need about 10 more MoD runs to get that. Next on list to get
.... and DONE!
Main weapon - Thunderforged Falchion
Hook up the oxen, Mabel! it's time to farm!
Done. 1st Degree Burns, Paralyzing Fear, Mortal Fear
Secondary weapon - Thunderforged Maul
Hook up the oxen, Mabel! it's time to farm!
Done. 1st Degree Burns, Dragon's Edge, Crippling Flames
Quiver - Epic Quiver of Alacrity.
Got it. Wearing it.

So as you can tell it isn't entirely hopeless but still plenty of work to do. Of course, as soon as I get close to all of this gear being acquired it will be nerfed and something else will be the top dog. I think the devs watch my account and use that metric to schedule their releases.

I hate DDO.

[phalaeo2]

Ok, Alco- here's what I've got. Not perfect, but I think you'll be a lot happier with it for a starting point. Hit me up in vent with any questions.

[Theolin]

I prefer this type of build for Pally, you can get the same defenses & a little bonus as well.

[AlcoArgo]

I prefer this type of build for Pally, you can get the same defenses & a little bonus as well.

That's nice, Theolin, but what does that to do with a BF THF Pally? That is the idea behind this - I have a couple more BF lives to do as well as divine ED lives.

[unbongwah]

That's nice, Theolin, but what does that to do with a BF THF Pally?

It's fairly easy to convert that build to THF or SWF (see my Divine Fencer).

Perks of wiz 3 splash: extra metamagic (Quicken in my case), Imp Mage Armor & Shield (+10% AC & +10 PRR), Arcane Barrier, +3% doublestrike; possibly AM SLAs if you have the APs to spare (Jump or Invis+Blur)
Perks of ftr 2 splash: two extra feats, Haste Boost, extra action boost

Drawbacks of heavy-splashing a pure pally: you lose two lvl 4 spell slots, KotC lvl 18 core (+2d6 light dmg, 500 dmg vorpals vs undead) & capstone (+4 CHA, +10 Melee Power, +2d6 Light dmg, Good DR bypass).

Right now pure pally is so strong that the only good reason for splashing is extra feats, IMHO. That may be necessary for certain builds, but a THF pally can (just barely) get by without them: Power Atk, THF x3, IC:Slash, Adm Body, and Overwhelming Crit, leaving 1 heroic and 2 epic feats free (e.g., Quicken, Completionist, and Imp Sunder or Stunning Blow).

[Theolin]

It's fairly easy to convert that build to THF or SWF (see my Divine Fencer).

Perks of wiz 3 splash: extra metamagic (Quicken in my case), Imp Mage Armor & Shield (+10% AC & +10 PRR), Arcane Barrier, +3% doublestrike; possibly AM SLAs if you have the APs to spare (Jump or Invis+Blur)
Perks of ftr 2 splash: two extra feats, Haste Boost, extra action boost

Drawbacks of heavy-splashing a pure pally: you lose two lvl 4 spell slots, KotC lvl 18 core (+2d6 light dmg, 500 dmg vorpals vs undead) & capstone (+4 CHA, +10 Melee Power, +2d6 Light dmg, Good DR bypass).

Right now pure pally is so strong that the only good reason for splashing is extra feats, IMHO. That may be necessary for certain builds, but a THF pally can (just barely) get by without them: Power Atk, THF x3, IC:Slash, Adm Body, and Overwhelming Crit, leaving 1 heroic and 2 epic feats free (e.g., Quicken, Completionist, and Imp Sunder or Stunning Blow).

Pretty much, only addition is you can get 1d6 & an extra cleave from EK as well that resets momentum swing. And it also really nice to have Invs, & blur.

And for 2HF I'd go the 5 wiz & get displacement as well.

[unbongwah]

And it also really nice to have Invs, & blur.

Since both of these are available as wands, the SLAs count as nice but not necessary.