Ninja trip / dirty trick build


Advice

Dark Archive

I am making a replacement for a pc that died going through emerald spire and was considering a ninja that uses a kusari gama for tripping and maybe eventually using dirty tricks. I would also love dex to damage ASAP. With 5 levels, a 20 point buy, 10,500 gp to work with and pretty much any race and pathfinder material to work with, how would you stat out this build?

The Exchange

Don't bother with ninja for combat maneuvers. You'll never get them to land. You need an ability that gives you "treat your class level as your BAB for the purpose of combat maneuvers", if you're not a full BAB class. Otherwise, don't try. Monster CMDs get too high for you to succeed.

If you want to do combat maneuvers, lore warden fighter is the way to go. Dip cavalier so you get your armor proficiency back/ranger for ability to use clw, perception on class skill list.


Dex to damage is making me think Unchained Rogue more than Ninja. You get Dex to damage at level 3. There is the Skulking Slayer Archetype that gives you Dirty Trick capabilities starting at level 1. I'm not 100% sure Skulking Slayer works with Unchained Rogue.

I would favor developing Dirty Tricks before Tripping. You can use Dirty Tricks to make your opponent Blind, denying Dex and locking in Sneak Attack Damage. Tripping can be really cool, but Dirty Tricks gives instant synergy with Sneak Attack and is more versatile.

Are you married to Kusari Gama? Meteor Hammer is also a double chain weapon that does more damage and because both ends do Blunt damage, it will really work well with Sap Master, doubling your Sneak Attack Damage with every hit. I'm not sure about Dex to damage with either Meteor Hammer or Kusari Gama. Both should work with Skulking Slayer's ability to use d8s instead of d6s for Sneak Attack. And I know that Meteor Hammer will work really well with Great Cleave and the 'Slayer's Surprise Follow Through.

Fretgod99 recently reintroduced me to Skulking Slayer.

I go a different direction than most for Tripping Weapons. the chief advantage of a Tripping Weapon, I feel, is that in the event of a catastrophic Trip Attempt, you can drop your Trip Weapon rather than get Tripped yourself. But I would really miss my double-reach-Trip weapon when it's gone. So for Trip Weapons, I actually prefer small, cheap weapons like Sickle and light Flail. Then, if I have to drop it from an unlucky roll, I just shrug my shoulders, pull out another one off my belt, and keep fighting. On the other hand, since we're talking Rogue here, there are Talents you can take that let you deal easily with being Prone, so just take one of those.

The basic Trip Feats are Combat Expertise or Dirty Fighting(also the prereq for Imp. Dirty Trick), Improved Trip, Fury's Fall, Vicious Stomp, and Greater Trip. Since you are thinking about Dex-to-Damage, and therefore Strength dumping, you might also consider Agile Maneuvers, switching your Dex for Strength for all your Combat Maneuvers

A problem I have had with Tripping is that there is a size limit: no more than 2 sizes bigger than you. There are a few ways around this. Punishing Kick works like Stunning Fist only instead of making your opponent Stunned, you make him Prone. Not as good as Tripping, but no size limit. There is the Harder they Fall Teamwork Feat, which bypasses the size limit directly, but that is more labor intensive as a Teamwork Feat. To take that, I would take 2 levels in Eldritch Guardian Fighter. Eldritch Guardian Familiars know all the Combat Feats their masters know, and Harder they Fall is a Combat Feat in addition to being a Teamwork Feat. A dip into Eldritch Guardian might not be such a bad idea for a Sneak Attack Build, anyway. Get a Mauler Familiar, and you have a Flanking buddy who knows all the Combat Feats you know as well as all the Teamwork Feats that are also Combat Feats like Paired Opportunist.

In a current thread about Tripping Strike, Manly-man teapot is proposing an interpretation of the Feat that would allow Tripping via Tripping Strike to bypass the size restriction of Tripping. He is saying that since it uses the Crit Confirmation Roll, Tripping via Tripping Strike doesn't count as a Trip Combat Maneuver. And one of the consequences of that is that Size wouldn't matter. This would be a way for a Halfling to Trip an Iron Golem. This interpretation seems controversial to me. Seek out the thread for yourself, and perhaps press Manly-man teapot for a thorough rules-based justification within the rules that you can bring to your GM.

I just learned of a new set of Feats that work with Dirty Tricks. Cloak and Dagger Style Feats. They look promising.

Dark Archive

So I guess I have to go snakebite brawler or maneuver master monk. Maybe a few ninja levels at most. Is high dex/low str viable with this build?

Silver Crusade

I have a maneuver build that I'm looking for advice. You should check it out and see if there is anything you like.

http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2tnfr?Maneuver-Master-build-advice


Try this Ninja Dirty Fighter Build

There are ways around the high level creature CMD problem, namely True Strike.

Silver Crusade

Take a look at the Bounty Hunter archetype for Slayer if you were considering focusing more on the Dirty Trick route than the Trip route. It basically does what the Skulking Slayer Rogue does except the Bounty Hunter Slayer gets a few more feats and a full BAB which is important to compete against CMD. I actually have a Level 5 Dirty Trick/Disarm character that I'm waiting to play. I can pull him up for you to reference. He's a Mutagenic Mauler Brawler(2)/Bounty Hunter Slayer(x, currently 3). Not exactly optimized but he's dex-based like you wanted. I'll post his build.

Kitsune Dirty Tricker lvl5:

Brawler, Brawler, Slayer, Slayer, Slayer for levels
Anything denoted after "/#" means what it would be under the effect of his Dexterity Mutagen. I also left out skills that he doesn't have skill ranks in. In the home game we get Weapon Finesse for free for all light weapons so I would trade out Kitsune Style for it if your table doesn't have a similar rule. His item buying and skill point use is fairly flavor-intensive, just to warn you. Level 6/7 is when this build really takes off because at 6 I get Greater Dirty Trick and 7 I can get Quick Dirty Trick.

Race: Kitsune. Alternative Racial Traits (all third party, found here: Skulker (-Agile), Shifting Mind (Modified: Reroll Will Save 1/day, -Kitsune Magic), Nine-Tailed Inheritor (-Natural Weapons)
Ability Scores:
Str: 14(-2race), Dex: 18/#22(+2race, +1lvl, /#4Mutagen), Con: 14, Int: 8, Wis: 12/#10, Cha: 10(+2race)

Defenses:
HP: 60
AC: 19(20)/#+4 (5 armor, 4/#6dex, /#2Natural Armor, sometimes get +1 because of Tekko-Kagi), Touch:14/#16, Flat Footed: 15/#17
Saves: Fort: 9, Dex: 13/#15, Will: 4/#3, CMD: 21/#23

Skills: Acrobatics (8/#10), Bluff (4), Climb (6), Disguise (4), Kn:Dungeoneering (4), Kn:Geography (3), Kn:Local (5), Perception (9/#8), Sense Motive (7/#6), Stealth (13/#15), Survival (5/#4)

Offensive (add +2 to hit for all when under mutagen):
Initiative Mod: 5/#7
Cold Iron Masterwork Cestus: +9 1d4+2
Silversheen Tekko-Kagi: +9 1d3+2
Composite (+2str) Longbow: +8 1d8+2
Brawler's Flurry Cestus: +7/+7
Sneak Attack: +1d6 damage. Can forego sneak attack damage to get free Dirty Trick at a bonus equal to damage dice.
Disarm (Tekko-Kagi): +11 (can flurry disarms for +9/+9), extra +2 against blades, +4 flanking bonus (Tekko-Kagi lets me attempt disarms without provoking, giving me the +4 bonus from Dirty Fighting)
Dirty Trick: CMB 9 +4 flanking bonus (flanking gives +4 instead of +2), +1 Sneak Attack, +2 Feat)

Feats/features/traits:
Feats:Improved Unarmed Strike (Brawler Bonus), Magical Tail (Racial Trait), Agile Maneuvers (lvl 1 feat), Improved Dirty Trick (lvl 2 bonus), Dirty Fighting (lvl 3 feat), Kitsune Style (lvl 5 feat)
Traits: Indomitable Faith (+1 Will Save), Superstitious (+1 to saves against arcane spells)
Features: Disguise Self 2/day, Studied Target, Brawler's Flurry, Mutagen, Track.

Notable Equipment:
+1 Mithral Chain Shirt (might trade this out in a few levels due to Max Dex. I'm going to see if I can maybe reverse-engineer a Catskin Leather armor with my GM to get something useful. If not, I can always just go with a Silken Ceremonial Armor)
Cold Iron Masterwork Cestus
Silversheen Tekko-Kagi (I recommend you read up on that thing. It's like a super-disarm weapon and a buckler rolled into one)
Composite (+2str) Longbow
Cracked Dusty Rose Prism
Cloak of Resistance +1
Shining Wayfinder (Nice bit of help with that low will save)
Gloves of Reconnaissance
Boots of the Cat

General Notes:
The overall idea for the character comes online at 6 and gets good at 7. At 6 I get Greater Dirty Trick which makes the status effects last longer and requires a standard action to remove which means they either need to fight while debuffed (of course I'm going for the Blind to start) or give up their next attack. If the enemy is blind then I get to Sneak Attack without having to flank with an ally. It generally needs two rounds to set up by yourself but with flanking you can get it off first round. As soon as I do they're basically completely helpless. Quick Dirty Trick just makes me a bit faster on solo-shutdowns of a creature and makes it so that I'm still attempting damage while getting it set up instead of just potentially whiffing Dirty Tricks over and over.

Lvl 6 combat would go like this:
Round 1:
A. If getting a flank: Flurry and try to apply debuffs with Dirty Trick.
B. If not flanking: Attempt to Blind.
Round 2:
A. After the enemy is debuffed to my satisfaction through Sneak Attack Dirty Tricking... sweet murder.
B. Assuming they are Blinded, follow "If flanking" path.

lvl 7 combat:
Round 1:
A. If flanking, same as lvl 6.
B. If not flanking, Flurry (giving up first attack to attempt a Blind. If first attack leaves enemy Blinded then jump straight to track A. If not, repeat until enemy is Blinded.

You can replace the Brawler with Ninja to level 2 or 3. You'll lose a point of BAB but make it back up because you'll have an extra Sneak Attack dice or two over the Brawler Counterpart that you can trade out as bonuses to a Dirty Trick Attempt. Unfortunately you can't get the massive bonus from Dirty Fighting on your trip attempts with the Kusarigama without using a feat somewhere to get Improved Trip (kind of disappointing that the tripping end can't reach, otherwise it would work). Other than switching Brawler to Ninja, shuffling a level or two and squeezing in a feat somewhere you can almost straight copy my character over and it will fight your concept somewhat well.

Silver Crusade

Oh god, this is what happens when I'm trying to type something fast right before I have to meet someone...
"over the Brawler counterpart"*
"and it will fit your concept"*


Cory Stafford 29 wrote:
So I guess I have to go snakebite brawler or maneuver master monk. Maybe a few ninja levels at most. Is high dex/low str viable with this build?

If you want to, but there is no reason why your idea for Ninja isn't just swell.

Just a Mort wrote:
You need an ability that gives you "treat your class level as your BAB for the purpose of combat maneuvers", if you're not a full BAB class. Otherwise, don't try. Monster CMDs get too high for you to succeed.

There is just such an ability. A Rogue Talent called Tricky Combatant. Ninjas can take Rogue Talents.

Also look at the Deadly Tricks Talent. And do check out Cloak and Dagger style feats.

Driver_325yards wrote:
There are ways around the high level creature CMD problem, namely True Strike.

A little off-topic, but what I thought would be cool would be to get the Ninja Vanishing Trick and 4 levels in Quinggong Drunken Master. Take Scorching Ray: a Range Touch Attack. Take the Potion Glutton Feat so you can replenish Ki as Swift Actions (or pop Alchemal Extracts of True Strike, which is what made me think of it). While Vanished, you deny opponents their Dex bonus to AC, so you will be making Ranged Touch Attacks vs. Flatfooted AC, doing 4d6 Damage + Sneak Attack Damage! Another option would be to take a level in Arcanist instead of the 4th level in Monk, gaining Cantrips like Jolt and Acid Splash--Ranged Touch Attacks--and Dimensional Hop, which helps you lock in your SAD with Flanking. Then ride the rest of the way with Ninja, building up more and more SAD.

Cory Stafford 29 wrote:
So I guess I have to go snakebite brawler

I like the idea of taking a level in SbSB just to get that extra d6 SAD.

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