my swashee lives

[cru121]

Around the time when Devil's Gambit set was released I rolled a new iconic character called Swashee - because I wanted someone to use the set. Since then I went through multiple swashbuckly incarnations. For the sake of documenting this journey - and perhaps collecting ideas for future lives, I decided to start this thread.

Here's what I played so far.

PDK Int-based 12 bard / 6 fighter / 2 rogue with Skullsmasher
- I decided for high Int because I wanted to catch up with skills when starting with a fighter life and only two rogue levels
- I think I took 6 fighter for extra feats, because I wanted to fit in Shield Masteries and Cleaves
- I went T5 in Swashbuckler for this life.

PDK 12 fighter / 8 bard Kensai with Light Picks 17x5
- T5 Kensai + power surge; strength based
- lots of DPS here; lot of feats; this one could also be fun as a T5 warchanter for frozen stuff

Shadar-kai rogue 2 / bard 3 / barbarian 12 (not sure about the rest of levels)
- T5 in.... frenzied berserker for accelerated metabolism
- Strength based, supreme cleave
- I think I have now most of the EDs complete. This one performed nicely for example in Fury of the Wild, with two sources of no-save helpless: Adrenaline/Overwhelming Force and Ear Smash/Knockout.

[cru121]

Right now on a dance of death swashbuckler life.

PDK, dex-based. Bard 3 / Ranger 11 / Fighter 6. I think. Considering to check out if IPS+Manyshot is worth it.

Starting at level 14, I should have gone with fighter 2, ranger 9, bard 3. Unfortunately, I went for fighter 3, ranger 8, bard 3. This proved to be a substandard choice, evasion would have been useful. Gonna get it next level.

AP at 14:
- 33 in tempest for Dance of Death
- 11 in swash for buckler use
- 6 in DWS for dex to damage
- 6 left for rounding up stuff

EDIT: This build was nerfed, Dance of Death requires TWF. I took a break with this character. However, I managed to finish the life recently with T5 kensai. Manyshot sucked.

[cru121]

I have started a rogue heavy variant this life.
shadar kai, dex based
20 dex, 17 con, 12 int, 11 str

rogue 10-11
bard 3-4
fighter 6

1 Rog SWF
2 Figh Shield Mastery
3 Rog Weapon Finnesse
4 Bard
5 Rog
6 Rog Precision
7 Figh Power Attack
8 Figh
9 Rog ISWF
10 Figh Cleave
11 Figh
12 Rog ICrit
13 Bard
14 Bard
15 Figh GCleave, GSWF
18 Rog ISM

Starting at level 14 as bard 3, rogue 6, fighter 5. Did R1 GH and felt weak.
Upon taking 6th fighter level at level 15, things improved. Two level 15 feats, 4 extra AP, 2 extra reaper points, and kensai 3rd core helped a lot.

AoE dps, often a weak point of swashbucklers, is fairly decent with two Cleaves + En Pointe. En Pointe has a slower animation than Cleaves, but with a 17-20 x 5 Light Pick it becomes 5-20 x 4, that is AoE and often hits twice.

Currently using mostly old crafted +5 Holy Silver Light Pick of Deception. Buckler of Demonic Soldier with devotion slotted. Drow Outrunner armor for max dex bonus / dodge.

Targets immune to crits are a PITA. That should improve with level 10 Rogue feat and some epic twists. Perhaps I should use Forgotten Axe or craft something with extra damage dice for those.

EARLY EPICS UPDATE:
Running in Divine Crusader. Crafted me some ML20 Melee Alacrity goggles, some dex item. Using ring and belt from Good Intentions. Tier one Epic Ring of the Stalker.
@20: Piked through Spies in the House at epic reaper, duoing with a well played wizard. Got some kills, did traps.
@21: R3 Servants in a full group. No dedicated CC or heals. We had a notorious player tanking, I was able to steal most kills. Yay. I should start on epic challenges to upgrade the ring...

With Ravenloft I left Swashee parked at 30. Still don't have the buckler cane thing, need to grind harder. Saw two Light Hammers in raid, rolled on one, didn't get it. Meh.

[cru121]

Swashee does not get much attention. It's just an alt. Anyway, I TRed into Deep Gnome Wiz 1 / Druid 1 / Fighter 13, then used the free +3 Heart into Rogue 1 / Bard 2 / Fighter 12. Eventually gonna be Rogue 2 / Bard 4 / Fighter 12. Two levels free for ad hoc tweaking, maybe fighter for another feat.

So this life has maxed Int and Con, rest into Str to allow PA/Cleaves with tomes.

The twist this life is to take Color Spray from Deep Gnome. That's a locked 8 AP. Also got Quicken, because it's slow without it. And I am taking Bard 4 to allow Heighten. Probably gonna dualbox to test how Heighten Spell interacts with Color Spray. Does it take into account my actual caster level (i.e. Bard, so only +1 DC) or my character level? Gonna check it out.

I am going to grab Power Surge from Kensai for +8 to all stats, most notably Int. That should help with the Color Spray DC. With that large investment, probably gonna take T5 in Kensai as well.

12 AP into Harper for Int to hit, damage, and KtA. Eventually I plan to reduce this to 7-8 AP (7 AP would match KtA and Power Surge duration), and pick up int to damage from Swashbuckler. Right now at level 15, I don't have neither swashbuckling nor evasion, so using some heavy armor and Riftmaker. Also having ****** UMD, starting with 6 charisma sucks. Swashee has no past lives that would help with UMD.

Deep Gnomes have 6 racial SR, I am thinking about leveraging that somehow. There are some ML15 Light Armors that add to SR.

Eventually targeting 33 in kensai, 8 gnome, 13 swash, 8 harper, 13 stalwart.

[Hjarki]

The twist this life is to take Color Spray from Deep Gnome. That's a locked 8 AP. Also got Quicken, because it's slow without it. And I am taking Bard 4 to allow Heighten. Probably gonna dualbox to test how Heighten Spell interacts with Color Spray. Does it take into account my actual caster level (i.e. Bard, so only +1 DC) or my character level? Gonna check it out.

It Heightens to your maximum caster level. So you'd only get +1 DC. Note that you also lose DC from an inability to take Spellsinger cores. You also lose DC from not taking Illusion Focus from Gnome.

I did a similar concept but it was 16/3/1 with Bard/Fighter/Rogue. T3 Swashbuckler (including Two Steps Ahead), T3 Spellsinger (including Spellsong Trance), T4 Vistani (to Celerity), Harper (Int to attack), T3 Stalwart Defender. With Gnome, I picked up all of Illusion Focus, some of the MDB/Dodge Cap and 1 point in PK.

Shadowdancer as a Destiny granted Evasion and 25% Incorporeal, as well as more Intelligence. In theory, a 15/3/2 Rogue would be more versatile, since it could do most any melee-focused Destiny while still retaining Evasion. However, Shadowdancer is the only Destiny which provides Intelligence and melee abilities.

[cru121]

It Heightens to your maximum caster level. So you'd only get +1 DC.

That's a bummer. Maybe I take SF:Illusion instead, that'd allow the magister twist +3.

[cru121]

So, Swashee is again parked at cap. Being int-based is great. Getting traps is easy-peasy. And KtA adds a decent chunk of damage. Bought me some +6 or +7 INT tome from ASAH for 700ish shards. This nearly depleted my AS reserves...

I hang around in Shadowdancer. Swashee doesn't have any displacement clickies, so getting 50% uptime from ED is nice. Immunity to Energy Drain is very nice for lazy people like me. Shadow form helps with the defense. And IIRC Shadowdancer has some 5% vulnerability that helps in raids. Lot of other useful stuff in the destiny. DDoor clicky, trap skills, fort bypass, clicky that helps vs high AC bosses...

With ~82-84 INT in Reaper with Power Surge, Color Spray does not land too often. I should really get that Ravenloft Illusion necklace. However, it does not really matter at this point because Dire Charge works nicely.

Gearwise, still don't have any raid stuff
* Ravenloft Light Armor set (armor, belt, cloak)
* the Age of Rage INT tiara
* the other ravenloft set: FoM boots, Stunning bracer, Ins Int Ring, van richten's cane, Garstone goggle
* trinket: often running with Cove Spyglass with +2 Festive int
* ring2 iirc prowess
* necklace I forgot. perhaps the ward inscribed pendant

Did some babas, got some runes.

Using Light Picks. Planar Spike and Morninglords. Not sentient. I slapped all useless named gear onto an ML21 drow dagger, which is now complete with a 4 piece trappers delight set (+8 to rogue skills). I should probably add sentience to one (or both) of my main picks. So I read that Prowess filigree doesn't cooperate nicely with Power Surge; probably gonna go just with a single +5 melee power filigree for now.

Next life, I would like to do some divine life. Unfortunately Swashee does not have any caster past lives, I'd love to do the Soundburst thing. Hopefully Warpriest/War soul end up useful even without it. Maybe Strength domain cleric with daggers or sickles...

[cru121]

Intrigued by the barbarian changes in update 39, I want to try a Frenzied Berserker again. And this is the first time Swashee embarks on a heroic life.

The plan: Human Bard 3 / Barbarian 17. Levels subject to change. No evasion this life. Ouch. Not sure if I venture into epics, we'll see how it's gonna work out. If I do go epic, I will experiment with Fury of the Wild. Adrenaline with 17-20 x 6 Light Picks could be tasty.

1 PA, Cleave
3 SWF
6 Great Cleave
9 IC:Pierce(?)
12 ISWF
15 GSWF
18 TBD, maybe a second IC.

Started with 18 str, 18 con, rest in charisma to help with UMD. This life I will definitely need some healing help. Hoping to find some friendly pug healers, or hide behind the warlocks. Snagged a Tiefling Assassin Blade recently from ASAH.

At level 1 did Stealthy Repo elite, ate a few daily dice XP things and hit level 2.
Bard 1 / Barb 2. Just before the downtime of U39 I managed to find some ML2 twohanders (Guardian's Dagger, Nicked QStaff, Impact Vorpal Maul), plus some Shadow Weapons clickies from Mabar. Just need to purchase few hundred CSW pots and off we go.



Leveling update
level 12: this is where the nice crits start. warlocks occasionally pause and toss me a heal scroll, makes me think that I am actually contributing
level 15: this is where the build becomes really nice, with GSWF and lvl 12 barb cores for a chunk of HP and more heal amp.
level 30:
* As a raging barb, I don't have to worry about the penalties of Epic Defensive Fighting. More HP is nice.
* Running in Shadowdancer. Cause Evasion. Somehow even with starting dex 8 I feel Evasion is useful. I suspect Legendary Cursebane Focus is helping me to hit decent Reflex save.
* Gear: non-raid Silent Avenger set. Morninglord's Handaxe+Van Richten's Cane. Various non-ravenloft quest gear (Ring of Prowess, Ring of Power, Epic Precision Lenses)

[cru121]

Planning next life

Animal Domain Cleric 14 / Bard 3 / something
Wisdom-based Vistani Falconer of Vol
Something like: 41 Falconry (t5 + cores). 11 Swashbuckler. 25 Vistani. (That's a 77; 4 AP left with +1 AP tome)
Any opinions? Is Falconry t5/capstone worth it?

Handaxe Rogue
bard 3 / barb 5 / rogue 10
32 frenzied / 7 KtA / 13 swash

Handaxe Artificer
bard 3 / barb 5 / artificer 12
32 frenzied / 7 KtA / 13 swash; rest in RMM for heals + maybe that int-based sundering stun?

Handaxe Cleric
bard 3 / barb 6 / cleric 11 for heal

[Puntos_mx]

Ammmmmm....

12 fighter / 8 bard
rogue 2 / bard 3 / barbarian 12
Bard 3 / Ranger 11 / Fighter 6
rogue 10-11/bard 3-4/fighter 6
Bard 4 / Fighter 12
Bard 3 / Barbarian 17
Cleric 14 / Bard 3 / something

Most of the incarnations of Swashy have Bard as secondary or splash Class. Do you actually feel these are bard characters?

[cru121]

Ammmmmm....
Most of the incarnations of Swashy have Bard as secondary or splash Class. Do you actually feel these are bard characters?

*shrugs* I am always swashbuckling, so there's definitely a degree of bard in them.

Anyway, for now I postponed the plan for falcon swash. Instead I went with Tiefling Bard 13 / Sorc 6 / FvS 1. Tier 5 in EK. Charisma to hit from EK, Charisma to damage from Swashbuckler, Charisma-based KtA from FvS.

Feats are tight, BAB is low, I think I have to postpone 5th sorc level to lvl 13.
SWF - Precision - metamagic filler - ISWF - ICrit - GSWF - free

I am going to eat that +7 charisma tome that I've been trying to sell expensively on Ghallanda ASAH in the last weeks.

This is kind of a late bloomer until it all comes together, perhaps I should have used the iconic Tiefling instead.

Anyway, ATM Bard 4 / Sorc 1, rocking a Tiefling Assassin Blade. With 20+ reaper AP, fairly easy. Two cleaves (En Pointe and Eldritch Cleave) for AoE goodness.

EDIT: At level 8 with 2 piece Red Fens melee set and 5 piece Slavers Sorcery set, still a lot of fun. Swashee does not have any caster past lives, but slavers is obscene, chucking soundbursts left and right tilomere-style. Spell resistance is a show-stopper though.

[cru121]

I ran 6 lives (3x tiefling, 3x dragonborn) as a charisma based Bard 13 Sorc 6 Divine 1, tier 5 EK. This is a very pleasant build. Great freezes, great temporary HP, 15x4 with hand axes. Large blue bar for those hastes and displaces, or even cures.

But I felt like it's time for a change. TRed into Wisdom-based Aasimar Scourge using Skullsmasher (15x5).
Plan is to use 41 AP in Falconry, 17 in Scourge, 11 in Swash; this does not leave much room for other class enhancements.
I used a fairly esoteric split Ranger 6 / Rogue 11 / Bard 3. Why? I think I could use a rogue past life. And I'll probably invest some spare AP into DWS for the melee version of Sniper Shot (not sure what it's called).

This is the first time I am seriously using the Falconry tree. Let's see how it goes... The occasional instakill is fun!

I am already missing the on-demand freezes and the temp hp. On the other hand, the DPS seems better, and I am getting some extravagant crits. Mostly in the 500-600 range, but every now and then there's 1000-1100

[Shadospawn]

I ran 6 lives (3x tiefling, 3x dragonborn) as a charisma based Bard 13 Sorc 6 Divine 1, tier 5 EK. This is a very pleasant build. Great freezes, great temporary HP, 15x4 with hand axes. Large blue bar for those hastes and displaces, or even cures.

I was thinking of going this route with sickles but I suppose hand axes work also. The basic idea put just enough into swash for skirmisher, 5 EK, and mostly the remaining into warchanter?

I have a freezing warchanter that I love (PDK with short sword) but wanting to try something else.

[cru121]

I was thinking of going this route with sickles but I suppose hand axes work also. The basic idea put just enough into swash for skirmisher, 5 EK, and mostly the remaining into warchanter?

I have a freezing warchanter that I love (PDK with short sword) but wanting to try something else.

Handaxes can benefit from extra multiplier from EK, because swashbuckling just grants them extra threat. But sickles should work just fine.
Here's how I leveled that build: I went for bard 12 ASAP, and grabbed core 4 and tier 5 warchanter in heroics - mostly the big heals and passive stuff. Then 1 FvS for Divine Might or whatcha call it. Then slowly start investing in sorc. I retrained from warchanter to T5 EK at 20.

Also, I level with empty off-hand and switch to buckler at 20.

Indeed the final enhancement split is 21+ in warchanter (definitely keep 4th core), around 40 EK for T5, ~13 in swash, 4 in divine.

[cru121]

My wisdom-based falconry experiment was okay, but I decided to go back to charisma-based; this time for Bard 13 / Barb 6 / FvS 1. Hoping to purchase the tasty raid handaxe using runes.
However, I still do have some characters alive on HCIV so ... this will take a while. (Or it can go fast haha)

Another thing I would like to try is an Elemental-shaped druid swashbuckler. Most of the druid trees are useless for this endeavor, so this will be probably again some Falconry + possibly racial action. I was thinking 17 druid / 3 bard for Mass Regenerate. 41 Falconry, 11 Swash, 11 Bear tree for defensive stance. Probably using the obscene Forester Brush Hook while leveling, because druid doesn't offer any crit expansion. Feats are very tight.

Druid has the additional complication of not supporting metal shields. And Wild Shape is exclusive with some cool stuff.


EDIT: My HCIV "distraction" has been partially solved. Vampiric Priest of Vol's bane hit you for 483 points of damage.

[cru121]

Couple thoughts:

Mass Regen swashbuckler would be particularly tasty as an Aasimar Scourge, but that requires a +1 heart. Just gotta verify how racial bond stuff coexists with elemental shape. And find a +1 heart somewhere...

Also not sure whether to purchase The Magmatic Reaver or not. After all, it's changing in the next update. I did run a couple DoDs but after seeing a perma-monk looting a nicely mythic reaver I think I am ready for a TR. Which brings me to: Shadar Kai overlords.


Shadar-Kai are a +2 dex, -2 cha race, so going charisma based is not such a great idea. They are getting some new tasty cleaves and displacement; that would be most useful on a class split that cannot cast displacement natively. Maybe simply take a bunch of rogue. Bard 3 / Rogue 11 / Barb 6? If I go dex then I have to waste a feat on Weapon Finesse.

Or maybe I should finally roll that animal domain cleric I've been dreaming of. 14/3/3 with sickles. Maybe even t5 in Radiant Servant? But feats are tight. Or just stick to Falconry.

Gotta check how many rogue past lives I have on Swashee. IIRC one rogue life and two SDK lives, now that's a pity.

[Artos_Fabril]

Shadar-Kai are a +2 dex, -2 cha race, so going charisma based is not such a great idea. They are getting some new tasty cleaves and displacement; that would be most useful on a class split that cannot cast displacement natively. Maybe simply take a bunch of rogue. Bard 3 / Rogue 11 / Barb 6? If I go dex then I have to waste a feat on Weapon Finesse.

SDK Vistani-Swash-Assassin, SWF dagger. dex to hit and damage from assassin cores, depending on your RPL you might be able to fit in dex trance from HW, if there's enough other melee stuff in the v2 tree to get you there.
41 vistani, 23 assassin, 13 swash, remainder+RAP into SDK. shuffle a couple points around if necessary to get SDK goodies, assuming they're good enough to make the build worth it in the first place.

[cru121]

SDK Vistani-Swash-Assassin, SWF dagger. dex to hit and damage from assassin cores, depending on your RPL you might be able to fit in dex trance from HW, if there's enough other melee stuff in the v2 tree to get you there.
41 vistani, 23 assassin, 13 swash, remainder+RAP into SDK. shuffle a couple points around if necessary to get SDK goodies, assuming they're good enough to make the build worth it in the first place.

Yeah, this would be probably a strong character, but I don't like daggers on a swashbuckler. It feels like the build would actually be stronger if you ditched bard completely, going up to assassin 5th core instead.