So I got brought in to play through Council of Thieves with a group of friends. It was a sort of a spur of the moment type thing and the game begins in a few days. I figured I give Ninja(of which I've looked up jack and weapon prof.) a shot. Unfortunately due to my schedule, the short time I have to prepare, and my lack of knowledge about ninjas I don't have as much of a chance to work out a build as I would like. And thus, I turn to you, my fellow gamers, for assistance. Any and all help is appreciated.
90% of the game is in a city. The same city.
I'd suggest at least one skill to influence people, probably Diplomacy. Maybe Knowledge History or Knowledge Local to not walk everywhere blind. Nobility wouldn't be a bad choice either.
And, since you're a ninja, Stealth, Acrobatics, and Perception. If your Wisdom is good, Sense Motive would be ok.
Finally, if your DM is anything like me, you might get a bit of use out of Disguise and/or Sleight of Hand. I do NOT let people walk down streets with heavy armor and drawn weapons. Your results may vary on this one, though.
90% of the game is in a city. The same city.
I'd suggest at least one skill to influence people, probably Diplomacy. Maybe Knowledge History or Knowledge Local to not walk everywhere blind. Nobility wouldn't be a bad choice either.
And, since you're a ninja, Stealth, Acrobatics, and Perception. If your Wisdom is good, Sense Motive would be ok.
Finally, if your DM is anything like me, you might get a bit of use out of Disguise and/or Sleight of Hand. I do NOT let people walk down streets with heavy armor and drawn weapons. Your results may vary on this one, though.
Yeah I have plans to play him as a bit of a talker when he isn't on the job. Good to know that won't go to waste. Any advice about stat placement and feat selection?
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Need some more info. to help you with crunch.
1: How are you doing ability scores?
2: What is alowed in your game. Is it pathfinder only or can you pull from 3.5 feats.
3: Do you want a optimized character or more of a RP type character?
Having played almost all of CoT. A few things you might want to rember. There is alot of use for your socal skills. For this reason bards do extreamly well in this AP. Ninja should do well for the same reason. You will run in to the problem of not enough skill points for every thing you need.
What skills you will need in this AP. All of the following skills are used throw out the AP.
Bluff, Diplomacy, Disable Device, Disquise, Knowledge Nobility, Knowledge Local, Linguistics, Perception, Sense Motive, Stealth,
Along with Knowledge History, Preform Act, are very important for parts of the AP.
Need some more info. to help you with crunch.
1: How are you doing ability scores?
2: What is alowed in your game. Is it pathfinder only or can you pull from 3.5 feats.
3: Do you want a optimized character or more of a RP type character?Having played almost all of CoT. A few things you might want to rember. There is alot of use for your socal skills. For this reason bards do extreamly well in this AP. Ninja should do well for the same reason. You will run in to the problem of not enough skill points for every thing you need.
What skills you will need in this AP. All of the following skills are used throw out the AP.
Bluff, Diplomacy, Disable Device, Disquise, Knowledge Nobility, Knowledge Local, Linguistics, Perception, Sense Motive, Stealth,
Along with Knowledge History, Preform Act, are very important for parts of the AP.
Oh right, duh, sorry about that. It is a 20 point buy and I can pull from 3.5 at GM discretion. I'd say I lean more towards decent optimization with RP ability than being the best of the absolute best at combat. My general plan is to pick a character concept(useful, silly, or otherwise) and try to make a build to accommodates the concept. I just don't have the knowledge or time to do that properly this go around. Oh and one more thing, no matter what weapon(s) he focuses on, I plan on having him carry a plethora of additional weapons and gear so STR(assuming it isn't the main stat for the build) can't be dumped too hard.
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Human Ninja
Str 14 Dex 17 Con 14 Int 10 Wis 8 Cha 14
Feats:
Human: Weapon Finess
1: Two Weapon Fighting (2 Wakizashi)
3: Double Slice
5: Combat reflexes
7: Improved Two Weapon Fighting
9: Dastardly Finish
11: Improved Critical wakizashi
Ninja Trick
2: Weapon Training Wakizashi
4: Fast Stealth
6: Rogue Talent: Follow Clues
8: Darkvision
10: Evasion
Skills (9 points per level)
Bluff, Diplomacy, Disable Device, Disquise, Knowledge Local, Linguistics, Perception, Sense Motive, Stealth,
Or make a information broker. More of a control things from the shadows kind of character. And still keap the ninja theam going with out being a ninja.
Human Bard
Str 14 Dex 17 Con 12 Int 12 Wis 9 Cha 14
Feats:
Human: Weapon Finess
1: Two Weapon Fighting
3: Exotic Weapon: Wakizashi
5: Quick Draw
7: Improved Two Weapon Fighting
9: Double Slice
11: Improved Critical Wakizashi
Skills (7 per level + Verstal Performance Act 2nd, Oratary 6th)
Perform Act(Bluff/Disquise), Perform Oratary(Diplomacy/Sense Motive), Perception, stealth, Linquistics,
Disable Device, (2 points for knowlage skills. 1 point each untill you have min of one point in each so you can take 10 or 20. Then focus on Local, History, Nobility.)
Hmm, according to the SRD, ninjas are already trained in the use of the wakizashi, so no need to spend a feat there.
Were you going with a power attack build there? 14 is quite a high strength for a rogue character. Personally, I'd rather just boost Dex and pick up an agile weapon (+1 enhancement, +dex to damage if weapon is finesseable).
Instead of going down the slice and dice route, sap adept and sap mastery make a nice combo with unarmed strike and knockout artist. Whenever the enemy is flat-footed and you do nonlethal damage, you do twice the sneak attack and 1.5 times your level in extra damage.
prototype00
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The ninja build did not take exotic weapon Wakizashi the bard did.
Power attack for a rogue is not worth it. You have the bouns damage called sneak attack. You just need to hit and be flanking. Even dex base rogues need Str for carry and damage. Yes it's only a few points but that is all you need some times. As for Sap adept and Sap Mastery. You probly need to read the rules for nonleathe damage befor you do any thing else.
The ninja build did not take exotic weapon Wakizashi the bard did.
Power attack for a rogue is not worth it. You have the bouns damage called sneak attack. You just need to hit and be flanking. Even dex base rogues need Str for carry and damage. Yes it's only a few points but that is all you need some times. As for Sap adept and Sap Mastery. You probly need to read the rules for nonleathe damage befor you do any thing else.
Ah right, gotcha on the wakizashi. If its about carrying capacity, just leave it to the meatshield, and if its about damage, as I said, the agile weapon enhancement will let you add your dexterity to damage (and it replaces strength).
So I'd rather go with +5 to damage from dex rather than +2 from splitting some of my stat points into strength and being able to carry an armoire.
I don't quite understand your final statement, are you asking me to read the rules on non-lethal damage or the OP to read the rules? Against anything that lives (i.e. not undead or constructs), nonlethal damage is as good as regular damage, except your foes get knocked out.
prototype00
Play a fetchling ninja with the Shadow Child trait. Darkness will forever be your friend. The stats line up nicely, too. Pump up your Stealth when needed, but you can also play party face, since you'll have a decent Charisma.
Alternately, a tiefling with the Div or Rakshasa heritage would be effective and appropriate, especially if your GM lets you take the alternate racial stuff for free.
BTW, a half-elf or human ninja with eldritch heritage for the serpentine (regular or envenomed) or draconic (linnorn) can make a pretty good ninja. Half-elves get a skill focus, humans just get a bonus feat; both diplomacy and perception are great ninja skills. The rakshasa one also works, I guess.
I'd go with serpentine, as ninjas can be pretty decent diplomancers, and the specialties are quite cool: a natural attack that works with your TWF and gives you more sneak attack damage (as well as poison, which never hurts), speak with reptiles + familiar (ergo alertness, helper, and +3 to bluff checks), bonus to natural armor (stacks with enhancements)/poison saves/escape artist checks...
And leathe and noneleathe damage do not stack.
Sorry, I am confused by your response. Of course they don't stack, but once your nonlethal damage is more than your current hit points (which is reduced by lethal damage), then you're knocked unconcious, which is as good as dead, no?
Or are you protesting something else, because if you are, I'm not understanding.
prototype00
Tiefling(variants) and Dhampir both look like good race choices since they have a lot of abilities that mesh well with ninja. Dhampire I'm a bit iffy on due to the negative energy affinity, but the rest of the stats are quite tempting.
I agree with Prototype that 14 STR seems too high for the ninja. Since STR would only be used to make sure the Ninja can carry all of his gear, the highest it would ever need to be is 12, and I'm doubtful I'll even need it that high.
The sap mastery stuff is very interesting, going to put that one in my pocket for another character. Unfortunately I envision him killing far too many people to justify a nonlethal damage build.
Oh and my GM just told me this morning that she is giving power attack and weapon finesse for free as she feels that they should be combat options and not feats. So that frees me up a feat slot.
The sap mastery stuff is very interesting, going to put that one in my pocket for another character. Unfortunately I envision him killing far too many people to justify a nonlethal damage build.
Hey, just because you make them unconscious via non-lethal damage doesn't mean you can't coup de grace the life out of them while they are down.
Fetchlings have +2 Dex, +2 Charisma, -2 Wisdom. Low-light vision AND darkvision, a +2 racial bonus to Stealth, Disguise Self 1/day as an SLA, and they gain extra concealment in shadows. Perfect ninja race, and would make a good candidate for Shadowdancer.
Hey, just because you make them unconscious via non-lethal damage doesn't mean you can't coup de grace the life out of them while they are down.
Well that is true.
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What it dose mean. If the monster hase 50 HP. You deal 30 points of non-lethal, and your party deals 30 points of lethal. You still need to do 20 points of lethal or non-lethal damage to bring them down. They are not tracked as one number. This is the part people miss when they start looking at non-lethal damage. Most of the time it dose not matter, becous the party is trying to take a npc alive. If your main form of damage is non-lethal it makes a big difrences. When your party is working on lethal numbers and you are working on non-lethal numbers.
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What it dose mean. If the monster hase 50 HP. You deal 30 points of non-lethal, and your party deals 30 points of lethal. You still need to do 20 points of lethal or non-lethal damage to bring them down. They are not tracked as one number. This is the part people miss when they start looking at non-lethal damage. Most of the time it dose not matter, becous the party is trying to take a npc alive. If your main form of damage is non-lethal it makes a big difrences. When your party is working on lethal numbers and you are working on non-lethal numbers.
I do think you're mistaken. If a monster has 50 hp and the party does 30 points of lethal damage to it, then it has 20 hp left. If you then do 30 points of nonlethal damage to it, the monster is unconcious.
They are tracked separately, but they apply at the same time in combat, which I think you're missing.
prototype00
So which ninja tricks are good and which ones are traps?
So which ninja tricks are good and which ones are traps?
Vanishing trick will be your bread and butter ninja trick, its nice at low levels to keep enemies guessing, and you need it for invisible blade at 10th level (I like to call that the DM pulls his hair out level). Shadow clone looks applicable, though you only ever get 1d4 clones, its better than nothing, but a bit swingy for my tastes.
Finally right before you're ready to graduate to advanced tricks, forgotten trick will open up every single other ninja trick (and via the rogue talent trick, all the rogue tricks as well) for temporary use (at a slightly higher price).
Though others might have differing opinions.
prototype00
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Vanishing Trick first and then I personally get Forgotten Trick next. Most points are spent for Vanishing Trick, but on occasion one of the other tricks can be helpful and it's well worth being able to use it on a whim.
Personally, if you have Weapon Finesse for free I would grab Extra Ki Feat at some point. I personally loved having 6 points at lvl 4 instead of just 4. Gives more freedom to use the forgotten trick or Vanish more often.
Vanishing Trick first and then I personally get Forgotten Trick next. Most points are spent for Vanishing Trick, but on occasion one of the other tricks can be helpful and it's well worth being able to use it on a whim.
Personally, if you have Weapon Finesse for free I would grab Extra Ki Feat at some point. I personally loved having 6 points at lvl 4 instead of just 4. Gives more freedom to use the forgotten trick or Vanish more often.
Yeah I was thinking about extra ki, but only 2 extra didn't really seem worth a feat.