Jaerilla Redralle, The Undying Xbow Rogue (Rog40)

[arek]

Well, I just rebuilt my crossbow rogue yet again, and made some rather large changes to the build, so I thought I would post it here. Like many of my builds, this was originally posted on the wiki. I decided to repost it here so that I can get more feedback on the build, and to give the build more exposure. Here it is:

Race/Subrace: Elf/Undying (Elf/Half-Fiend would work as well with a few modifications, and get +2 ab and +1 skill, at the cost of some saves)

Stats:

(starting/after subrace/L60/2xDemi/+14):
STR 8/10/10/14/28
DEX 20/22/46/50/64 (66 w/DEX arti)
CON 10/14/14/18/32
INT 16/18/18/20/34
WIS 8/10/10/14/28
CHA 8/10/10/14/28

Alignment: Any

Class Progression: 40 Rogue

• Feats:
  • Feats in green are rogue bonus feats.
    
  • Pre-Epic:
    • 1. Strong Soul
      
    • 3. Rapid Reload
      
    • 6. Point Blank Shot
      
    • 9. Weapon Focus (Light Crossbow)
      
    • 10. Improved Evasion
      
    • 12. Improved Critical (Light Crossbow)
      
    • 13. Opportunist
      
    • 15. Greater Weapon Focus (Light Crossbow)
      
    • 16. Crippling Strike
      
    • 18. Power Critical (Light Crossbow)
      
    • 19. Defensive Roll
  • Epic:
    • 21. Improved Sneak Attack I
      
    • 24. Improved Sneak Attack II
      
    • 24. Improved Sneak Attack III
      
    • 27. Epic Weapon Focus (Light Crossbow)
      
    • 28. Epic Dodge
      
    • 30. Epic Prowess
      
    • 32. Improved Sneak Attack IV
      
    • 33. Superior Critical (Light Crossbow)
      
    • 36. Improved Sneak Attack V
      
    • 36. Improved Sneak Attack VI
      
    • 39. Improved Sneak Attack VII
      
    • 40. Improved Sneak Attack VIII
  • Legendary
    • 42. Legendary Weapon Focus (Light Crossbow)
      
    • 45. Legendary Luck
      
    • 48. Epic Skill Focus (Listen)
      
    • 51. Hardened Soul
      
    • 54. Skill Mastery
      
    • 57. Legendary Will
      
    • 60. Legendary Fortitude
      
    • Pandect: Use a sneak attack pandect.
• Skills:
  • Max the following:
    • Appraise
      
    • Craft Armor
      
    • Craft Weapon
      
    • Disable Trap
      
    • Discipline (cross class)
      
    • Hide
      
    • Listen
      
    • Pick Pocket
      
    • Open Lock
      
    • Parry
      
    • Search
      
    • Tumble
      
    • Use Magic Device
      
    • Concentration (Cross Class)
  • Put 5 points into Set Trap, and the rest (7 points, or 10 if you stopped taking tumble at L57) wherever. I put them in lore, but they might as well be left hanging for all the good they'll do. :-)
• Equipment setup
  • Primary Weapon: Spelljammer Crossbow
    
  • Secondary Weapon: Dragonhide Sling
    
  • Shield (for use with sling): Dire Buckler
    
  • Armor Robes of the Dim Mak Master
    
  • Helmet: Scintillating Scarf
    
  • Gloves/Bracers: Fiendish Fingers
    
  • Belt: Ainafea's Masterwork Belt
    
  • Cloak: Cloak of the Elements
    
  • Boots: Clockwork Boots
    
  • Amulet: Amulet of Ordered Malevolence
    
• Other notes
  • This build was originally based on The1Kobra's Click. Kudos to him for creating and posting such a great build. :-)
    
  • Legendary Fortitude/Will? Wth? Yes, these feats are kinda needed in new areas, since many monsters in new areas have 65+ DCs on their abilities, and this character, while viable in the hells as a searcher/picker will be at her best in the new areas.
    
  • This build will do best when using Wings of Corruption. If you don't have those, Divine Pings are the next best thing (and a far cry from Wings). I'd really like to see some DB-level and DIS-level ammo come out one of these days, to give us more options.
    
  • This build requires one of demigod status, the int artifact, or items with Skill Focus in Disable Trap and Search on them. Without one of these, you will not have enough int to max DT or Search.
    
  • This build also requires HG Enhanced. Without HGE you won't be able to Greater Weapon Focus, Power Critical, or Superior Critical during levelup, and this build is far too tight to shuffle them all into legendary levels. None of these feats are really required for the build, so you could take either Blind-Fight or Shield Proficiency and Toughness (demi or using the int arti), or SF: Search and SF: Disable Trap (not demi or using the int arti) instead of GWF and Power Crit, and take Armor Skin instead of Superior Critical.
    
  • Further, this build assumes you will be using the DEX arti. If not, you should probably find a way to fit blind-fight into the build, since the dex arti provides IMM: Blindness as its special. Perhaps you could drop GWF or Superior Critical for it.
    
  • In the very deep hells, Clockwork Boots May not be the best boots to be wearing, due to the lack of useful properties (besides +1 attack). If you don't want to wear them in that case, I would recommend Legendary Boots of Absorption instead, for the extra little bit of %elements (and the AC of course).
    
  • I know that the Dire Buckler isn't the best shield for this setup, but I don't have a better one atm.

I welcome questions and comments on the build. Over the next day or 2, I think I'm going to see if I can get screenshots and such posted. :-)

--Arek

[maljin]

I've been building a similar version of this with Air Genasi (on -HC-) since the addition of more preLL ammunition and lowbie quests. So far I'm lvl 35 (holding lvl 30 though since I'm after some last tags) and had a lot of fun with that build. I had to drop most of the save feats to keep superior critical and Imp. Sneak Attack VIII and get some skill focus feats for search and disable trap, though I should still come out at 60 fort/will.

One problem I've got though while leveling is the scarcity of light crossbows...those from the shop go up to +7 or +5 with 2d6 massive crits and while I can still reasonably hit most stuff in my range at the moment I doubt that will be true for Manatakloss/Immortal.
Are there any set crossbows usable from lvl 30 on until you get the LL crossbows (ssithrak?, uro, beholders)?

There's about the same problem with slings and shortbows (I think a +15 can be bought) don't count as light weapons, so I would not only lose two attacks per round but also the extra ab from int and weapon focus.

maljin


It's a great build though and with the extra damage from the new bolts and the lowbie quests leveling a pure rogue (even soloing) wasn't that hard as it might have seemed before...now if darkness scrolls were added to the shops, leveling would be hilarious.