Shadow on the Wall's page

I know this is Necrothreading but I thought I would bring it up for gear.
Runeforged (Jealous) allows the weapon to absorb up to 3 negative levels a day for the cost of 18,000 GP.

I think you could keep the weapon somewhere, reincarnate, go to the weapon and draw it, letting it absorb the two negative levels, and then put it back.

I am just not sure if I agree that Smiting is an encounter long crusher. It pertains to 1 opponent, And adds a lot of damage output as well as a buff against that opponent.

But with the increased damage you will kill that bad guy on average of 3 or 4 turns if he is proper geared and given benefit of feats and so forth. But once that opponent falls if you still have bad guys in the fight you are now dealing much less damage overall as most of your damage output was from Smite.

I do agree the more control of the 3.5 Power attack was nice, but the Pf version seems better balanced and requires less math work. Though I will point out in 3.5 Power attack allowed you to -1 from attack to add +1 to damage. And it was limited to base attack bonus so at most you could do was a -20 for a +20 at level 20

Here is some ideas, this mixes in Dragon mag and so forth from 3.5

Wedded to History (Apostle of the Forgotten/Lost God) and Voice of the Bitter Experience feats (As flaws)
Aasimar race with the racial variants
73 If your body is placed on consecrated ground and prayers to your deity are recited continuously for 24 hours, you return to life as if by a raise dead spell. This ability works 1d4 times in your lifetime.

91 If you die, your body can never be reanimated as an undead creature.

Paladin on one half and either Cleric or Warpriest on the other side (With Dynamic Priest from Dragonlance to make them Cha based) but I am not sure which one.

That would occupy my first feat, my two flaws, but leave me with 3rd level and 5th level for other uses.

Though to be fair the Aasimar's resurrection variant ability listed tagged onto a reincarnation druid makes it awesome.

Except for Elans who do not physically age, basically they are stated as never physically aging so they would not incure the normal penatlies.

But yeah Samsaran would be good, and since when you die and revive with Reincarnated Druid you gain whole new physical scores.

I found a guide that says I should be a Samsaran for the first lifetime.

Paladin has Restoration on his spell list can I use it without having access to it?

After all the talk about how the shade template is just to powerful for a character to really play with I decided I wanted to change my angle of attack.

I want to make a character similar to Duncan MacLeod from the Highlander series. Highlander has Immortals who cannot die unless their head is removed. Well we cannot make a race only killable from Vorpal weapons as those are expensive as heck and one of the far less inventive ways to kill someone.

So I wanted to take the Elan and take on one side of my gestalt Reincarnated Druid 5 and on the other side, a Paladin.

Because of the Venerable age he has +3 to all mental stats which allows me some use of the Druid spell list (I only get to 3rd level spells)

But once I get to 5th level of Druid I don't know what else to take. I plan on taking Paladin as far as possible.

So any advice on what to take after Druid 5?

Also I plan on pleading for a Runeforged (jealous) item drop.

Is there anyway to get more resistance to death effects, or immunity to it?

The gestalt itself is midline. The template by itself is obscene. That said, there are non-Templated Gestalts that are stronger...>.>

But why Arcanist and not just a Sorcerer? You are less MAD, and you can even take the Shadow Bloodline to have a rather powerful thematic fit.

Honestly I dont know why but I never really liked the Sorcerer much, it never really seemed that impressive. Honestly I would rather roll a Bard then a Sorcerer. They always just felt like a second rate Wizard. I love the Spontaneous Casting but the limited spells known really felt choking unless you went for only generic general spells that you could spam.

and yes I am aware there are stronger gestalts, that was not really the point of this. If it was I would have just converted Erudite and Artificer and gone Psionic Artificer//StP Erudite

Wayangs are nice but lets look at their racial traits.
+2 to Shadow school DCs
+1 to Shadow Subschool Saving Throws (If you can cast shadow school spells)
1/day SLAs (2 1rst level spells and a Cantrip)

Alternate racial trait
Pseudo Invisibility for a max of 5 rounds per level 1/day

Honestly Feltchings are a bit more shadow focused then that, especially if they are not spell casters.

I am not sure I agree with the stronger then anything Pazio has printed template. But I agree it is a very strong template.

I suppose I don't have to do the batman approach. The Paladin Arcanist seemed a very good base archetype with Shade being a nice compliment for a dark knight style character.

For the record, the Arcanist's spell DCs are based on his Intelligence.

PRD wrote:

To learn, prepare, or cast a spell, the arcanist must have an Intelligence score equal to at least 10 + the spell's level. The saving throw DC against an arcanist's spell is 10 + the spell's level + the arcanist's Intelligence modifier.

I meant the Exploits are based off Cha, my bad.

Dropping the Template is doable, I could do 10 levels in Shadowdancer for a majority of these abilities but I really do like the shadow based powers.
There is only one template, elan is a race.

Ok it does say you sacrifice some of your soul but makes no statement on being evil.

I suppose you could say that the shaovar have good intentions for the world but are more of the means justify the ends sort and that sacrificing part of your soul to champion what they consider the "greater good" is a very noble thing to do and I'm guessing you are going to need a deity who would agree. I'm mainly trying to help make this concept work from a role play aspect as mechanically this has some serious potential but some of the things you are trying to mix feel contradictory in concept.

The nongood aspect was mostly so you never put the good before the Shadow Prince's needs or goals. But this is a personal thing so you could see the will of the Shadow Prince as the greater good very easily I believe their culture to be Lawful Neutral.

The only way the Shadovar lets people go out without escort is if they are high military rank or be a prince of Shadovar themselves.

While it didn't say anything in the provided link about this, I believe in 3.5 shades were evil. I don't know what it takes to become a shade in this but I seem to remember in 3.5 you had to sell your souls basically to become a shade. This doesn't seem very paladin like, not that I'm pushing for the stereotype Paladins have but I'm not sure that this makes much sense character wise.

Keep in mind I had a shade in 3.5 years ago and what I'm remembering may be off a bit, but I know for a fact he was evil.

As i have looked up the template and the flavor for it.

It actually never states this could not be done to someone before they became Lawful Good, a loyal servant of Shadovar who was sent down from their floating city and found God, found enlightenment or simply lost his memories and was retaught by the church this would allow him to have his Shade powers, searching for the missing piece of his soul.

The template is extremely good but only works in when in shadows or darkness and is negated via daylight or bright light effects. but I agree Shade makes it a monster.
PFs Cr rules would put it as a 2 level adjustment which I agree is a little short especially if it can be bought off.

You are right Paladins only have advantage against evil, but as LG I shouldn't be killing foes who are Good, and foes who are Neutral are typically more likely to run away then fight to the death so I was thinking focusing on Intimidate.

Ok so I have been wanting to make a shadow based paladin lately in a gestalt game. But I was curious if taking Paladin//Arcanist would be a little too powerful?

Arcanist save DCs are based on Cha which Paladin has in spades. My Build revolves around using the Shade template which adds a +4 deflection bonus to AC and +4 bonuses to all saves which is a luck bonus.

So I could get away with wielding Light Armor and not be too squishy as well as have ungodly good saves, full BAB a good HD and some skills (Paladins really should have 4+Int as a martial)

Is the following just too powerful?
Shade[CR 2, No HD]
Paladin
Arcanist

Elan
[Start Venerable for +3 to mental and no negs to physical]

Take fate's favored trait to make the luck bonus to saves a +5 on top of my Cha.

Taking a few flaws allows me access to more feats, so I could readily built for moderate spell usage and moderate combat with little trouble right?

I do see your point, but maybe its my OCD I don't like odd numbers and 7 smites a day is a bit odd. Really it should have been moved to 8 smites so its two smites per battle, after all at higher levels you have multiple foes which are mini bosses so having access to smite on the mini bosses helps out a ton.

Yes Smite can only work on evil things (Well Smite Evil) and because the majority of bad guys fall into Evil this does give them a wide birth on targets. Challenge lacks the bonus to hit but allows use of two handed attacks which boost damage output. Precise Strike is straight 1 handed and thus does not benefit from Two-handing and grants no bonus to hit.

I agree there is a balance there of sorts. Paladins wielding a Two handed sword power attacking on a smite is going to out perform even the Daring Champion using challenge I am not denying this.

Now when the paladin is not smiting and you bring in Precise Strike that is different Paladin drops behind the Daring Champion w/o challenge unless he is two-handing a weapon which not everyone wants to Two-hand.

Giving more uses of smite means he is using his main gimmick more often. If the Barbarian could only rage against 7 targets a day would that be balanced? for numbers a Barbarian with a +2 con (Before rage) can rage for 44 rounds per day at level 20.

Ninja//Paladin does describe Batman pretty well.
I could use the Feather Fall, Fast Stealth, and either Wall Climber or Unarmed Combat Training.

Question: Shade says you must be non-good while Paladin requires you to be LG. How are you reconciling this? Presuming you have taken this into consideration, I'd say maybe pick up 1 level of Oracle of Nature to grab Nature's Whispers; it lets you use Cha in place of Dex for AC. Also grab Scion of War to get Cha in place of Dex for Initiative and Paladin's Divine Grace adds Cha to all your saves. With this, you can disregard Dex altogether. Throw in a few levels of Bard and your Versatile Performance can sub Dance in for Acrobatics and Pageant of the Peacock can let you sub Bluff (Cha skill) in for any Int check or Int skill (uses 1 round of Bardic Perform per 10 minutes of effect). With this, you can disregard Dex, Int, and Wis and only rely on Str, Cha, and Con.

Well that alignment is tricky but it is not like you dont get the Shade template if you become Lawful Good. to become a shade they carve out a piece of your soul and implant Shadowstuff to turn them into a Shadow.

So a dark avenging warrior of goodness that is more at home int he shadow due to his own darkness fits the theme well.

Where is Scion of War?

You want a honorable knight who uses the shadows...

...YOU'RE BATMAN!!!

That was kind of the idea.

I have never heard of Complete Rogue.
Rogue would be nice for the 8+Int

I am taking the trait Fate's Favored which turns that +4 luck bonus to saves to a +5 and it stacks with Divine Grace so my saves will be AWESOME.

Probably using medium to heavy armor, the +20 foot speed from Shade offsets the heavy armor penalty.

Combat reflexes is to allow for more use of the Parry and Riposte as it uses attacks of opportunity or something like it, so I just figured having more then 1 a round might help allow me to pull off more parrys.

Not really trying to side step the flaws weakness but i am saying if the person had the Caught off Guard feat I could argue if they are using it to count for a staff or club I could fight them without penalty. But only if they are using it as a melee weapon.

Thanks and yeah any female opponent will be a pain, and I really should not have to deal with the ranged fighters that should be our ranged fighters job. But since there are ways to use a bow as a staff weapon i could probably argue it as a melee.

WARNING: I am using Pathfinder as the basis of this build, but I am making use of 3.5 (3rd Party) rules and game options as well as features like Templates, Flaws, and Feats.

I wanted to build a shadow based paladin. Now I don't mean anti-paladin.
I wanted a character who uses the shadows and darkness to strike fear into the hearts of evil beings, to use the night they shroud themselves in to terrorize them.

So I am taking the Shade template
I am currently running this as strictly a one sided idea. But we tend to play Gestalt games, so I will have access to a whole different level run. I am thinking of taking something then adding Shadowdancer onto it.

The Shade Template has a CR of 2, currently I am keeping that on the Paladin side but with Gestalt I will likely shift it off to get the most out of my paladin levels.

Flaw Feat: Power Attack
Flaw Feat: Exotic Weapon Prof (Falcata)
Human Bonus: Weapon Focus (Falcata)
1: Amateur Swashbuckler (Parry and Riposte)
3: Combat Reflexes
5: Extra Smiting (Smite Evil 4/Day total)

Flaws are:
Chivalrous Courtesy
Code of Arms

Smiting at 4 times a day allows 1 smite per battle (Assuming 4 battles a day)

Now the Falcata I am using uses another 3.5 book called AEG's merceneries (might be 3.0 don't know)
But I am giving it the Laminated Steel and Serrated edge mods (900 and 300 GP) I add those and the price of the weapon (18 GP) and times it by the number of mods (x2) so I am paying 2436 GP for this sword but it is now dealing 1d8+1 and crits at 18-20/x4. So at level 8 I will be picking up Improved Critical or maybe buying Keen before that. A 15-20/x4 weapon when Smiting is dang scary and of course can add that to the riposte from the deed I am picking up.

Any insights on this idea so far?

You do make some very valid points there Claxon.
I was just pointing it out because it is very similar. I did not take into account a Two-handed approach. Mostly because I really do like the Sword and Shield playstyle for flavor so I rarely think of it.

That has one deed, which is just horrible, it allows for the use of a single smiting shot. Which means at level 20 he can use a smiting shot 7 times a day, and this applies directly to just one shot each.

But I was more talking about the deeds of the Swashbuckler were it pertains to swords.

I was looking through the Pathfinder SRD and i noticed that two of the most iconic Cha based characters the Paladin and Bard, why don't they have the Deeds in one of their archetypes?

I mean the Daring Champion could have easily been the name of a Paladin who makes use of the Opportune parry and riposte abilities and would do great with the Precise Strike on top of Smite.

But honestly the Bard would have done even more amazing of a job if given the five six deeds of a Swashbuckler.

So why don't we have deed archetypes for those classes?

Well I agree with the caught off guard aspect.

But Swashbuckler gets level to damage on every hit now. Cavalier has an archetype that mixes a Smite-like feature with Level to damage on every strike through Precise Strike. So really how much more powerful is Smite compared to that?

There are ways to reduce the last three, Archetypes limiting or removing Spells is not unheard of.

Can I honestly ask how much more?
What is the downside to a Paladin who can smite evil as an at-will?

It has only been a few weeks since we began using more and more PF things, so I have been exploring the SRDs to find out as much as I could.

I have noticed that PF has a serious power upgrade to most of their feats, but yea I noticed a distinct balance to them and I have to say even though many of 3.5's feats are weaker there just is a lot more of them. Things that are just unique enough to be something a person might need to fill out a specific hole in their build.

Most of what I have seen on PF feats is they are more general or versitle and don't focus as much. Not to say there is no focus to them as there are specific feat chains that give benefits to a very specific build type but those are the outliers.

I reread the Conversion Guide, as a quick refresher just now. It makes mention of removing feats if they pertain to things that have been removed or changed. I say changed and I do think this means changed entirely from how they used to work (See turn undead) but Extra Smite has Smite Ability and a +4 BAB requirement both of which still exist in pretty much the same way. Smite was only expanded on but still functions the same way.

So one might say that that was only to pertain to when the game was first coming out, it was new and the 3.5 compatibility was to lure in players and not totally outdate their characters. but that not that it has many books and an established base we can pretend 3.5 is a 3rd party product line. And sure we can, but a lot of us got into 3.5 before PF and while PF is fun and new and inventive for sure there is a lot of background in 3.5 material like the Races of Books and the Complete books that give a lot of flexibility to a PF character that PF just doesn't have.

Saying that 3.5 feats where not designed to work with a PF character is correct, it would also be correct to say that PF characters are designed to at least make use of and benefit from 3.5 feats. Take Power Attack a staple in both games. Power Attack is straight up stronger in PF as it allows a -1/+2 where PA in 3.5 allowed for -1/+1. Now I am sure there are more feats like Extra Smiting that when used with the PF system could be hilariously over powered, that doesn't mean they don't work together just that the rules may have been extended and because of that they don't fit so snugly anymore.

For that I do agree that it should be a case by case if the system needs adjusting to accommodate the feat. Extra Smiting still works because it applies more uses of a limited resource, now if Smiting was an at-will ability then adding +2 to a virtually infinite source makes no sense.

No but if you began at level 5 and had access to Flaw feats and where human. Thats a potential 8 Smites per day. Meaning you can smite something like twice a battle.

The way I read PF smite evil is you mark a foe with your Smite Evil ability and every attack that hits them deals level to damage. your first, second, fouth, eigth, etc. All attacks against THAT specific foe are smiting strikes.

Now if you could smite so often at level 5 you have roughly the smiting count of a Epic paladin because level 20 Paladin can only smite 7 times in a day.

How powerful would a Paladin be if every foe he fought was under the effects of a Smite Evil? Of course that is if they qualify for Smite Evil.

How does Extra Smiting from 3.5's Complete Warrior interact with the way Paladin's smite works in PF? 3.5 and PF were suppose to be compatible but with the upgrade to Smite this ability seems WAY to powerful.

Because from the way it is worded it you gain two extra attempts to Smite per day. So at level 5 when you gain your next feat, you can choose to take this feat and give your paladin Smite Evil 4/day instead of the 2/day it would normally have.

Or am I reading this all wrong and they wouldn't interact at all?

I will need to look into that, it could definitely help me out.

Briefly I considered tagging the Bard onto this build so he could move in the shadows, intimidate the foes and inspire courage his men. But a Shadow singing, or dancing just doesn't seem to inspire as much fear as I could imagine (Though would have helped with the Perform (Dance) requirement.

Would a Dervish style of combat benefit from this idea?

Edit: If we used Flaws, and I gained access to those bonus feats, would it make the build flow faster? Because I could really use those to benefit either spellcasting or martial damage or just use those to suck up the feat tax. If I went Human I could buy off all the feat tax from the start, but loose a lot of the benefits of the shadow races (increases shadow powers)

The Shade is a CR 2 which would hit me with a two level loss on the non-caster side but that can be bought off by level 9 I think.

Could you explain how worshiping the gods give you the feats?
Some of these ideas are very nice. A Witch is a full 9th level caster and the Shadow Patron would give some meaningful spells. And the ability to use Slumber on a foe and coming to get them after they fall asleep is thematic as all get out.

Wayang and Fetchling are both good choices for a shadow race.

Keep em coming.

So in an upcoming game I wanted to play a character that is based around using Shadows, Darkness, and Intimidation. I wanted to play a character almost like Batman, in that at night or in darkness creatures that have heard of him Fear him.

The game is a gestalt and so I have a little more room to work with for sure but I really want to roll into the Shadowdancer Prestige Class.

So I have a few things I need advice on.
1. What race best fits this style of character?
2. What template best fits this style of character?
3. What class should I take on the side I am taking Shadowdancer on?
4. What class should I take as my straight run on?

3.5 Material is allowed so long as I can find a reliable source (no Dndwiki).
We are using CR buy off rules should that come up. (Creatures with HD can only buy off CR down to half their original DR, Creatures without Hd can buy it all off.)

The Shade template from the Campaign Setting of Faerun is one of my favorites and would mix well with the Shadowdancer PrC as a lot of it is shared and compliments one another and a Shade with a Shadow Companion just sounds badass... I wonder if I can name him Robin.

I am not sure what classes to go with though, I have seen a guide called 'Why is that Shadow holding a Greatsword' a guide to Two-Handed Shadowdancer which strongly suggests Paladin, which would actually work for a Strict moral code character one that wants to put an end to evil. And of course the mechanics of Paladin are pretty nice. But it also suggests Ranger and a few others might be nice such as Brawler for the flexible feats, or straight fighter for the boatload of feats. There was an archetype I saw somewhere that gave a boatload of feats to another class almost as much as a fighter but I forget where i saw it.

For my solid 1-20 style class I just don't know I considered Arcanist for the ability to do virtually anything if given enough time. And appearing from the shadow to throw fireball might be funny from time to time.