Post by Yojimbo on Apr 15, 2009 21:56:18 GMT
Black Snake Moan
4 Rogue/6 Fighter/30 Blackguard
When I began this build there were no open-sub Blackgaurd builds so I began mine and went through numerous changes to get to what is posted here. This build is a smiter and to do this you must give up spell casting. If you are wanting spell casting then I would suggest you look at strykerofchaos' build Oxec Tuzzom ia Wount. This build is designed for those who want to be a Blackguard with smites and not a Lash of Hatred and are willing to give up casting.
Sub-race choice:
Yuan-ti
I chose Yuan-ti because out of all open sub-races it is one of the few to offer enough Charisma (CHA) boost needed to get your Great Smite I-X feats. It also has the advantage of being Human based for the extra level (lvl) 1 feat. You will need to give up your BG spells which does hurt you but BG does have a ring in the module to give you the Critical hit Immunity that the most important spell gives you as well other items which can grant it. Humans will also receive extra skill points so you can easily max out all the skills you need.
Class choices:
-Rogue (Rog): I picked rogue for a few reasons one being that while leveling not too much is immune to your Sneak Attacks (SA). You will get an addition +1d6 SA for every odd numbered lvl of Rog helping you deal out damage. You also open up the options to put points into Tumble and Use Magic Device (UMD) skills.
-Fighter (Ftr): This is in here because the build is a little bit starved for feats so the extra feat for its first lvl helps. This will also increase your AB.
-Blackguard (BG): This is the whole reason for the build but let us highlight a few of its benefits. This class has its own SA as well which stacks with any other SA and maxes out at +9d6 for the class. Greater Smiting is your friend and your purpose you get it at 20 lvls of BG and you can choose from 4 damage types: Cold, Negative, Divine, and Magic. A BG smiter also has the unique advantage of being able to use Greater Smites on any alignment. Finally you get Armor and Weapon proficiencies at lvl 1 and at lvl 2 you get the Dark Blessing feat, which adds your CHA modifier to your saves.
Do not confuse the Greater Smite for your Smite Good or the Great Smiting Feats it is a unique tool to HG.
The tables below will guide you through the leveling process notes on it can be found at the end of each section. Items which have a note at the end of their section will be marked with a *. Before we start I will highlight a few of the benefits this build takes advantage of.
Please note that Tumble uses base ranks only.
Starting Stats:
Sub-race Edits:
Pre-Epic:
Pre Epic Notes:
Hide only needs 5 ranks and it is maxed at lvl 2
Cleave can be a free feat from a certain vial of dragon blood
Iron Will is elective I would replace this with Greater Weapon Focus if you have HGE
Epic:
Epic Notes:
Remember that each Great Smiting feat will give you +1 STR when you take your first legendary level.
Legendary:
Legendary Notes:
Tumble will reach maximum effective ranks with 60 at lvl 57
I do not recall how many extra skill points are left but my math says 13 and I dumped them into Concentration.
Final Stats:
AB is calculated with only +12 stat boosts and +1 from CW you should easily be able to get +2.
Saves are given with +12 stat boosts and no feats.
HGE User Notes:
There are a few new feats with the HGE Hak that can be taken instead of some of the feats in the build. The feats I would recommend one consider are Power Critical and Greater Weapon Focus. Iron Will is elective, Toughness isn't required, and Cleave can be gained from a onetime use item.
Final Notes:
If you can find or acquire a vial of a specific dragon's blood you can gain the Cleave feat for free which then allows you to take Weapon Proficiency Exotic or any other pre epic feat you wish to add in.If you can achieve double demi you could drop your last 2 STR into WIS and take the WIS Artifact to gain the abilty to cast spells. From reading recent posts of caster quasis, a Staffmaster to be specific, it could not reclaim Demi bonus due to not having enough caster score for spells so this likely would not work on reinc and would need to be done from the start.
4 Rogue/6 Fighter/30 Blackguard
When I began this build there were no open-sub Blackgaurd builds so I began mine and went through numerous changes to get to what is posted here. This build is a smiter and to do this you must give up spell casting. If you are wanting spell casting then I would suggest you look at strykerofchaos' build Oxec Tuzzom ia Wount. This build is designed for those who want to be a Blackguard with smites and not a Lash of Hatred and are willing to give up casting.
Sub-race choice:
Yuan-ti
"Humanoid - Yuan-ti" - requires Human (changes Appearance) CHA +2, INT +1, DEX +1, WIS-3, STR -1m +5 spellcraft, sr5 +1/lvl, speaks Draconic
I chose Yuan-ti because out of all open sub-races it is one of the few to offer enough Charisma (CHA) boost needed to get your Great Smite I-X feats. It also has the advantage of being Human based for the extra level (lvl) 1 feat. You will need to give up your BG spells which does hurt you but BG does have a ring in the module to give you the Critical hit Immunity that the most important spell gives you as well other items which can grant it. Humans will also receive extra skill points so you can easily max out all the skills you need.
Class choices:
-Rogue (Rog): I picked rogue for a few reasons one being that while leveling not too much is immune to your Sneak Attacks (SA). You will get an addition +1d6 SA for every odd numbered lvl of Rog helping you deal out damage. You also open up the options to put points into Tumble and Use Magic Device (UMD) skills.
-Fighter (Ftr): This is in here because the build is a little bit starved for feats so the extra feat for its first lvl helps. This will also increase your AB.
-Blackguard (BG): This is the whole reason for the build but let us highlight a few of its benefits. This class has its own SA as well which stacks with any other SA and maxes out at +9d6 for the class. Greater Smiting is your friend and your purpose you get it at 20 lvls of BG and you can choose from 4 damage types: Cold, Negative, Divine, and Magic. A BG smiter also has the unique advantage of being able to use Greater Smites on any alignment. Finally you get Armor and Weapon proficiencies at lvl 1 and at lvl 2 you get the Dark Blessing feat, which adds your CHA modifier to your saves.
Do not confuse the Greater Smite for your Smite Good or the Great Smiting Feats it is a unique tool to HG.
The tables below will guide you through the leveling process notes on it can be found at the end of each section. Items which have a note at the end of their section will be marked with a *. Before we start I will highlight a few of the benefits this build takes advantage of.
Craft Armor
- Now grants +1 AC per 40 points.
Craft Weapon
- Now grants +1 AB per 40 points when wielding a weapon.
Parry
- Reduces damage taken from critical hits. The total damage taken is reduced by 1% per 2 points of Parry skill above 20, to a maximum of 50% with a skill of 120.
- A skill of 100 or higher grants immunity to Assassin Mortal Strike.
Tumble
- AC bonus is now capped at 12 - (PM + RDD AC bonuses), with a minimum cap of 6.
- If you have 5 points of AC from RDD levels, for example, the most AC you can get from Tumble ranks is 7.
- The 2 base AC from level 1 of Pale Master do not count in this calculation.
- Tumble can lower the duration of some knockdown attacks. If there is a chance of this, you will see a Tumble check when you are being knocked down.
Divine Shield
- Divine Shield duration doubles with at Cleric 21, Paladin 21, or Blackguard 21, and triples at character level 41 if the previous requirement is met. A divine damage shield is also added to the effect at level 21, inflicting damage equal to the character's CHA bonus + 1d6 on anyone swinging at the character in melee combat. The base damage also increases by 50% at character level 41, to (3/2xCHA bonus) + 1d6. It also provides 1% immunity to divine damage per point of charisma modifier, regardless of caster level. Characters with control class Paladin or Blackguard gain Shield AC equal to their Charisma modifier / 2, if they do not receive Wisdom AC from any other source and do not belong to a quasiclass.
Divine Might
- Divine Might duration doubles with at Cleric 21, Paladin 21, or Blackguard 21, and triples at character level 41 if the previous requirement is met.
Great Smiting
- Legendary Paladins, Blackguards, and Champions of Torm receive +1 Strength for each Great Smiting feat they possess upon taking level 41.
Greater Smite
- At Paladin 20, Blackguard 20, or Champion of Torm 20, characters receive an enhanced Greater Smite ability if they have the Smite Evil or Smite Good feat.
- It is usable an unlimited number of times per day, but it only works if you have smites available. You may use it once every 6 minutes. This recharge time between uses is decreased by 20 seconds for every Great Smite feat the character has, and by 40 seconds more if they have the Extra Smiting feat. A Character with all 10 Great Smite feats and the Extra Smiting feat is able to use Greater Smite once every 2 minutes. Resting also recharges the ability. The character must recharge the ability after dying.
- Greater smite can be targeted a short distance away. At the targeted area, you 'attack' every enemy in a large radius by rolling (Attack Bonus + Charisma Ability Modifier + 1d20) vs AC. Temporary AB buffs like spells and bard song are NOT included. If you hit, you deal (Number of Greater Smiting Feats +1) x (Total smiter levels) damage. This means a maximum of 660 damage to every creature in the area of effect that you hit.
- For Blackguards, the total smiter level is the number of Paladin levels plus the number of CoT levels plus the number of Blackguard levels, plus legendary levels if the character's control class is Paladin or CoT or Blackguard. Blackguard smite effects creatures of all alignments.
- The smiter is able to select from a variety of damage types depending on his classes, by using chat commands.
- Smiters with 20 levels of Blackguard can select from:
!damco - Cold
!damne - Negative Energy
!damma - Magical
!damdi - Divine
- These commands may be hotkeyed, and are instantaneous. They are selected before the Greater Smite is used. If none is selected the damage type defaults to divine damage.
- Undead creatures are immune to Negative Energy smites.
Legendary Ability Bonuses
- Legendary Blackguards gain +1 per 5 legendary levels to Strength and Charisma.
- Hide is now a class skill for Blackguards in Legendary Levels.
Call of the Grave
- At Blackguard 11, the Contagion ability instead casts a mass Vampiric Touch spell centered on the target at the Blackguard's caster level, with a +15 bonus to spell penetration.
Dark Blessing
- Dark Blessing requires evil alignment to grant its Charisma bonus to saves.
Overwhelming Critical
- Now adds +1 to critical hit threat range for the weapon chosen in addition to the normal effect.
- If you have the Weapon Master Ki Critical feat, the threat range expansion will not work for any weapon.
Devastating Critical
- Now adds +1 to critical hit multiplier for the weapon chosen instead of the normal effect.
- Now grants +1 AC per 40 points.
Craft Weapon
- Now grants +1 AB per 40 points when wielding a weapon.
Parry
- Reduces damage taken from critical hits. The total damage taken is reduced by 1% per 2 points of Parry skill above 20, to a maximum of 50% with a skill of 120.
- A skill of 100 or higher grants immunity to Assassin Mortal Strike.
Tumble
- AC bonus is now capped at 12 - (PM + RDD AC bonuses), with a minimum cap of 6.
- If you have 5 points of AC from RDD levels, for example, the most AC you can get from Tumble ranks is 7.
- The 2 base AC from level 1 of Pale Master do not count in this calculation.
- Tumble can lower the duration of some knockdown attacks. If there is a chance of this, you will see a Tumble check when you are being knocked down.
Divine Shield
- Divine Shield duration doubles with at Cleric 21, Paladin 21, or Blackguard 21, and triples at character level 41 if the previous requirement is met. A divine damage shield is also added to the effect at level 21, inflicting damage equal to the character's CHA bonus + 1d6 on anyone swinging at the character in melee combat. The base damage also increases by 50% at character level 41, to (3/2xCHA bonus) + 1d6. It also provides 1% immunity to divine damage per point of charisma modifier, regardless of caster level. Characters with control class Paladin or Blackguard gain Shield AC equal to their Charisma modifier / 2, if they do not receive Wisdom AC from any other source and do not belong to a quasiclass.
Divine Might
- Divine Might duration doubles with at Cleric 21, Paladin 21, or Blackguard 21, and triples at character level 41 if the previous requirement is met.
Great Smiting
- Legendary Paladins, Blackguards, and Champions of Torm receive +1 Strength for each Great Smiting feat they possess upon taking level 41.
Greater Smite
- At Paladin 20, Blackguard 20, or Champion of Torm 20, characters receive an enhanced Greater Smite ability if they have the Smite Evil or Smite Good feat.
- It is usable an unlimited number of times per day, but it only works if you have smites available. You may use it once every 6 minutes. This recharge time between uses is decreased by 20 seconds for every Great Smite feat the character has, and by 40 seconds more if they have the Extra Smiting feat. A Character with all 10 Great Smite feats and the Extra Smiting feat is able to use Greater Smite once every 2 minutes. Resting also recharges the ability. The character must recharge the ability after dying.
- Greater smite can be targeted a short distance away. At the targeted area, you 'attack' every enemy in a large radius by rolling (Attack Bonus + Charisma Ability Modifier + 1d20) vs AC. Temporary AB buffs like spells and bard song are NOT included. If you hit, you deal (Number of Greater Smiting Feats +1) x (Total smiter levels) damage. This means a maximum of 660 damage to every creature in the area of effect that you hit.
- For Blackguards, the total smiter level is the number of Paladin levels plus the number of CoT levels plus the number of Blackguard levels, plus legendary levels if the character's control class is Paladin or CoT or Blackguard. Blackguard smite effects creatures of all alignments.
- The smiter is able to select from a variety of damage types depending on his classes, by using chat commands.
- Smiters with 20 levels of Blackguard can select from:
!damco - Cold
!damne - Negative Energy
!damma - Magical
!damdi - Divine
- These commands may be hotkeyed, and are instantaneous. They are selected before the Greater Smite is used. If none is selected the damage type defaults to divine damage.
- Undead creatures are immune to Negative Energy smites.
Legendary Ability Bonuses
- Legendary Blackguards gain +1 per 5 legendary levels to Strength and Charisma.
- Hide is now a class skill for Blackguards in Legendary Levels.
Call of the Grave
- At Blackguard 11, the Contagion ability instead casts a mass Vampiric Touch spell centered on the target at the Blackguard's caster level, with a +15 bonus to spell penetration.
Dark Blessing
- Dark Blessing requires evil alignment to grant its Charisma bonus to saves.
Overwhelming Critical
- Now adds +1 to critical hit threat range for the weapon chosen in addition to the normal effect.
- If you have the Weapon Master Ki Critical feat, the threat range expansion will not work for any weapon.
Devastating Critical
- Now adds +1 to critical hit multiplier for the weapon chosen instead of the normal effect.
Please note that Tumble uses base ranks only.
Starting Stats:
Level 1 | Rog (1) | STR: 15 DEX: 9 CON: 13 WIS: 9 INT: 13 CHA: 16 | Blooded Power Attack | Craft Armor(CA): 4 Craft Weapon(CW): 4 Hide: 4 Parry: 4 Tumble: 4 Use Magic Device(UMD): 4 | Any Evil Alignment |
Sub-race Edits:
STR: 14 DEX: 10 WIS: 6 INT: 14 CHA: 18 | Spell Craft +5 | Spell Resistance: 5+Lvl | Speaks Draconic |
Pre-Epic:
Level 2 | Rog (2) | CA +1 CW +1 Hide +1* Parry +1 Tumble +1 UMD +1 | ||
Level 3 | Rog (3) | Cleave* | CA +1 CW +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 UMD +1 | |
Level 4 | Ftr (1) | CHA +1 (19) | Weapon Focus | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +7 Parry +1 |
Level 5 | Ftr (2) | Blind Fight | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 6 | Ftr (3) | Toughness | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 7 | Ftr (4) | Great Cleave | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 8 | BG (1) | CHA +1 (20) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 9 | BG (2) | Extra Smiting | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 10 | BG (3) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 11 | BG (4) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 12 | BG (5) | CHA +1 (21) | Divine Shield | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 |
Level 13 | BG (6) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 14 | BG (7) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 15 | BG (8) | Divine Might | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 16 | BG (9) | CHA +1 (22) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 17 | BG (10) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 18 | Ftr (5) | Iron Will* | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 19 | Ftr (6) | Improved Critical | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 20 | Rog (4) | CHA +1 (23) | CA +1 CW +1 Parry +1 Tumble +4 UMD +17 |
Pre Epic Notes:
Hide only needs 5 ranks and it is maxed at lvl 2
Cleave can be a free feat from a certain vial of dragon blood
Iron Will is elective I would replace this with Greater Weapon Focus if you have HGE
Epic:
Level 21 | BG (11) | Great Charisma I (24) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 22 | BG (12) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 23 | BG (13) | Epic Weapon Focus | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 24 | BG (14) | CHA +1 (25) | Great Constitution I (14) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 |
Level 25 | BG (15) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 26 | BG (16) | Great Smiting I* | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 27 | BG (17) | Great Smiting II | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 28 | BG (18) | STR +1 (15) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 29 | BG (19) | Great Smiting III | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 30 | BG (20) | Great Smiting IV | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 31 | BG (21) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 32 | BG (22) | STR +1 (16) | Great Smiting V | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 |
Level 33 | BG (23) | Great Smiting VI | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 34 | BG (24) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 35 | BG (25) | Great Smiting VII | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 36 | BG (26) | STR +1 (17) | Great Smiting VIII | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 |
Level 37 | BG (27) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 38 | BG (28) | Great Smiting IX | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 39 | BG (29) | Great Smiting X | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 40 | BG (30) | STR +1 (18) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 |
Epic Notes:
Remember that each Great Smiting feat will give you +1 STR when you take your first legendary level.
Legendary:
Level 41 | BG (31) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 42 | BG (32) | STR +1 (29) | Legendary Skill Affinity Tumble | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 |
Level 43 | BG (33) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +36 | ||
Level 44 | BG (34) | STR +1 (30) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | |
Level 45 | BG (35) | Armor Skin | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | |
Level 46 | BG (36) | STR +1 (32) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | |
Level 47 | BG (37) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | ||
Level 48 | BG (38) | STR +1 (33) | Epic Prowess | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 |
Level 49 | BG (39) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | ||
Level 50 | BG (40) | STR +1 (35) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | |
Level 51 | BG (41) | Legendary Weapon Focus | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | |
Level 52 | BG (42) | STR +1 (36) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | |
Level 53 | BG (43) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | ||
Level 54 | BG (44) | STR +1 (37) | Overwhelming Critical | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 |
Level 55 | BG (45) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | ||
Level 56 | BG (46) | STR +1 (39) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1 | |
Level 57 | BG (47) | Devastating Critical | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 Tumble +1* | |
Level 58 | BG (48) | STR +1 (40) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | |
Level 59 | BG (49) | CA +1 CW +1 Discipline +1 Parry +1 | ||
Level 60 | BG (50) | STR +1 (42) | Great Charisma II (30) | CA +1 CW +1 Concentration +13* Discipline +1 Parry +1 |
Legendary Notes:
Tumble will reach maximum effective ranks with 60 at lvl 57
I do not recall how many extra skill points are left but my math says 13 and I dumped them into Concentration.
Final Stats:
Blackguard 50 Rogue 4 Fighter 6 | STR: 42 DEX: 10 CON: 14 WIS: 6 INT: 14 CHA: 30 | CA: 63 CW: 63 Concentration: 13 Discipline: 63 Parry: 63 Tumble: 60 UMD: 23 | AB: 94 | AC: 120-126 | Fortitude: 72 Reflex: 66 Will: 61 | SR: 65 |
AB is calculated with only +12 stat boosts and +1 from CW you should easily be able to get +2.
Saves are given with +12 stat boosts and no feats.
HGE User Notes:
There are a few new feats with the HGE Hak that can be taken instead of some of the feats in the build. The feats I would recommend one consider are Power Critical and Greater Weapon Focus. Iron Will is elective, Toughness isn't required, and Cleave can be gained from a onetime use item.
Final Notes:
If you can find or acquire a vial of a specific dragon's blood you can gain the Cleave feat for free which then allows you to take Weapon Proficiency Exotic or any other pre epic feat you wish to add in.