I'm dreaming up a Barbarian that skips Power Attack until the later levels. To make up for that, I need to up my early level attacks and damage. I'm also not interested in the beast totem line with Pounce as its capstone, because the payoff is a bit too delayed - I'm starting at 1st, and want to have fun with my guy now, not later.
To that end, I've came up with a few ideas, aiming at max ownage at level 3/4:
Razortooth Halforc lvl4:
Spoiler:
Take the feat Razortooth for the bite attack, as the ferocity racial ability is pretty useful for staying upright (in conjunction with the accelerated drinker trait), and saves me from taking a bunch of feats that are situational: Endurance, Diehard, and/or Raging Vitality (this one is more useful at higher levels, imo). Take Fiend totem at Lvl 2, Step Up at lvl 3, and Lesser Elemental Rage at 4. At 4th Lvl, assuming STR 18 pre-rage and a nothing fancy greataxe, we can do this with a full attack while raging
Looking to entry into dragon disciple at later levels. Human, with Magical Lineage trait for enlarge person, Magical Knack for the Sorcerer class; spend feats on Still Spell and Combat Reflexes. Take Reckless Abandon as your rage power. At level Three jump into Sorcerer and we spend round one with a Stilled Enlarge person effective for 3 minutes. UMD will come in handy later on. We're assuming 18 str and 16 dex, and we will be playing with a Lucern Hammer for the tasty 3d6 damage with reach after we Still Spell enlarge ourselves on round 1. For the third level feat, take Stand Still to dominate that battlefield.
Enlarged, with 4 AoO a round:
+9 3d6 + 10
Anyone else have other builds? I just really really hate missing with my melee attacks.
rather than taking a level in sorcerer so that you can cast Enlarge person on yourself (with an arcane failure chance) just have potions of Enlarge person with you, same time to pull out and drink(and that's if you pull out, you can cheese it and always have one in hand), only 50 gold a pop, and most combats don't last more than 1 minute
rather than taking a level in sorcerer so that you can cast Enlarge person on yourself (with an arcane failure chance) just have potions of Enlarge person with you, same time to pull out and drink(and that's if you pull out, you can cheese it and always have one in hand), only 50 gold a pop, and most combats don't last more than 1 minute
No arcane failure chance due to getting to apply Still Spell for free due to the Magical Lineage trait. Also, that build presumes a later entry into Dragon Disciple PrC for the Strength, Natural Armor, and Natural Attacks and slight increase in spell casting. Still, that is a good point. With the drunken brute archetype that would be easy to pull off, and with 15 foot reach the limited mobility is not a bad trade off.
Also, looking back, it looks like I forgot to add the Reckless Abandon modifier, which would give another +1, making it +10 total.
Here's another build:
Double-Fisted Wild Rager lvl4:
Spoiler:
Human, we need the feats to make this work. Two Weapon Fighting and Weapon Focus: Kukri 18 str and 16 dex again. For extra fun, consider Light Picks! At 2nd level, we're taking lesser fiend totem for the gore attack, and at 4th lesser elemental rage. Our 3rd level feat is extra rage power: animal fury. Pro-tip: You only take the heinous penalties off-hand penalties if you actually swing your off-hand weapon at someone; and your secondary natural attacks are not effected at all other than taking the flat -5. Furthermore, the DC to avoid the wild rager confusion effect is against your Cha, so be sure to tank it - it will keep you going until you can afford to pick up Iron Will and Improved Iron Will (and hopefully Clear Mind at Barb 8)
For crying out loud, just take Power Attack. I can't see any reason to take a bunch of weaker "You do more damage" feats first, let alone stinkers like Diehard.
For crying out loud, just take Power Attack. I can't see any reason to take a bunch of weaker "You do more damage" feats first, let alone stinkers like Diehard.
I was thinking the same thing. Maybe there is some thematic reason for it. If not then I am interesting to see why power attack is not taken first and/or why it can't be worked into the theme.
For crying out loud, just take Power Attack. I can't see any reason to take a bunch of weaker "You do more damage" feats first, let alone stinkers like Diehard.
Word. (Diehard is especially weak for barbarians because they're far better off with Raging Vitality anyway.)
For "pseudo" multi-attack, simply use a polearm and take Cleave and Combat Reflexes or Quick Reflexes -- you'll get lots of opps once you're routinely Enlarged
Play a half-elf instead of a half-orc, take Ancestral Arms for a fauchard.
Avoid wild-rager (it grants the most DPR, but eventually your own friends will murder you, and for good reason).
Isn't power attack a Barbarian class feature? I find it hard to imagine a barbarian that doesn't have it. I mean really: a slow steady and careful barbarian?????
Isn't power attack a Barbarian class feature? I find it hard to imagine a barbarian that doesn't have it. I mean really: a slow steady and careful barbarian?????
Those are Urban Barbarians; and they take Piranha Strike instead.
For crying out loud, just take Power Attack. I can't see any reason to take a bunch of weaker "You do more damage" feats first, let alone stinkers like Diehard.
1. Playing around with a DPR spreadsheet, at 4th, power attack is adding +2 expected damage. I hit harder, but take a 10% penalty to do so. Glancing through the bestiary, a CR4 monster ranges between AC 16-20 - so I have 65% hit chance of ac18 when not power attacking versus 55% when I am. And thematically, I just really despise missing. Later on, when I have plenty of bonuses, I will definitely add it, but early I'm not convinced I get enough for it.
Mike Schneider wrote:
For "pseudo" multi-attack, simply use a polearm and take Cleave and Combat Reflexes or Quick Reflexes -- you'll get lots of opps once you're routinely Enlarged
I like this idea. BUT, I also like Wild Rager's extra attack - by my reading, it stacks with haste. Also, the will save to avoid the confusion effect is determined, bizzarely enough, by my barbarian levels. So instead of going straight barb, let's just dip into it for two levels and then jump into Fighter. Wild Stalker seems thematic, but I don't think you get enough out of it.
Drunken Wild Rager lvl4:
Spoiler:
. Tank cha to 7, and dwarf brings us down to 5. That gives a -3 to the save DC. We're stepping out of Barbarian at level 2, when we get our haste effect. The dc to avoid going Hulkified is 9, with a +7 bonus to will saves!. That's something we can work with. The drunken brute Archetype will allow us to extend rage when we don't get a chance to full attack.
Stats:
20 point buy:
Str 17 + 4th bonus. = 18 at 4.
Dex 14
Con 16
Int 7
Wis 16
Cha 5
Our Will Save is +7 at 4th level when raging. After 4th, we can alternate Barb and Fighter levels, as Improved Iron Will greatly improves our chances of ignoring the wild rager's confusion effect.
Our feats will be:
1) Iron Will
2) (Rage) Good for what Ails you
3) Combat Reflexes (Fighter Bonus), Improved Iron Will
4) (Fighter Bonus) Stand Still
At 4, assuming enlarged, our full attack looks like this:
+ 10 3d6 +10
+ 10 3d6 +10 (Wild Rager Ability)
With 3 AoO's a round and 15' reach. Stand still allows me to keep opponents in place so I can full attack them next round, and keep them from getting past me. Lucern Hammer is superior to all other reach weapons at this level because of how it steps up in damage when in enlarged.
With a DPR calculator, +1 weapon, 18 Str, level 4 :
I get 8,91 DPR with a greataxe, 10,73 with PA.
You do know that the DPR statistic already includes miss chance into calculation, and that having 10% more failure is irrelevant if you are finally 20% more deadly on average ?
just take power attack already. yes you miss more at the low levels, but you are a high strength full bab combatant. -2 to hit isn't that bad, especially when you are rocking +6 to damage in excchange. if you are really worried about accuracy, take weapon focus already.
i hate missing too. but it's a part of life. you cannot expect to make every basket or always hit home runs. sometimes, you will be hit by a streak of natural ones.
You will average more damage with power attack, and if you are really that worried take furious focus which allows you to ignore the power attack penalty on your first attack with a two handed melee weapon.
BARBARIAN SUGGEST POWER ATTACK AS WELL. MAYBE TAKE RAGE POWER TRADE AC FOR ACCURACY ALONGSIDE. AM NEVER MISS, AND AM NEVER NOT POWER ATTACK. BEST OF ALL WORLDS, ALWAYS.
what they said.
also, re: the fast drinker thing, the ability doesn`t mention DRAWING the potion/drink at all, which means that normal rules apply: that is a move action (or can be done while moving). it still improves your action economy when you are doing stuff that leaves extra move actions available, or are moving around and can draw the potion as part of that... and it is VERY nice if you are hit with a status condition reducing you only to move actions!
