Okay heres the most modern example I can think of for this character in respect to how I want my Shadow dancer to work.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/af/Elektra_3.jpg/250px-Ele ktra_3.jpg
Elektra!
She uses Sai's, She is incredibly nimble, but very deadly with her weapons. Essentially sums up how I want to play the character. She has the ability to move quickly between the shadows.
And yes, the Ancient greek amazons were the ones I was refering to.
I know Wonder Woman is Amazonian. Never heardof She Hulk or Red Sonja.
I essentially had 2 different ideas for my sai weilder. I wanted either of those options that work well. Elektra represents the second of those options.
Ive seen the movie, and its pretty bad. But I liked the concept of her character. But I wasn't really thinking of her until today when trying to find someone to show you guys who I wanted my character to represent.
Also I am infinitely aware she is not an amazon. I have taken numerous university classic courses, I know what an amazon is.
Dont really see how the characters much different. She does similar things, you just said shes an ninja/assassin, who essentially can do everything I want my character to.
Does this have to be PF? Like I said originally, 3.5 and PF are very very different. 3E, especially with the later books rather than just the core rules, was much much MUCH more amenable to your concept.
And you never answered my question. Is re-fluffing some other sort of light/one-handed weapon as a sai but keeping its mechanics (damage, crit range, etc...) ok, or not? I know you love sais, I hear you, Raphael is my favorite ninja turtle. But the rules simply haven't done anything with them. While as if you went with say...a dagger, there's a bunch of dagger-oriented class features, feats, etc... out there.
Just trying to help you make the best "sai user" I can...
Pathfinder is the only one my DM has. Its the only one I have tried playing. And There was a guy that essentially played a cavalier as a chinese general rebranding weapons to how he wanted. So I wouldn't be opposed to switching it up and finding a weapon and branding it as a sai. I know the damage produced by the sai is incredibly small.
With that, does it open up my options for the character?
I build a female rogue/ranger/shadowdancer in Living Greyhawk, and went from level 1-15. I've played this character. Here's what I know...
1) Class is unimportant. You can be acrobatic and stealthy with a fighter, a ranger, an inquisitor, or a monk. Rogue works too, of course, but not as well as you think.
2) It's nice to have the skills you want as class skills. In Pathfinder, that's easy. One level of a class will do it, as will many traits.
3) Your main idea is fight people with Sais. You MUST keep hit points and BAB near fighter levels to make this work. It won't matter a lot at first level (everyone is terrible), but you will fall further and further behind. At level six, you could be unplayable if you build this character wrong.
4) It seems like shadowdancer goes well with rogue or ninja, but its not true. Shadowdancer makes you stealthier, which rogue and ninja do not need. And Shadowdancer will give you benefits like evasion which you already have. It's smarter to mix a fighting class with a stealth class to get what you want, and lean toward the fighting class.
5) Two weapon fighting is good. Improved and Greater are not. An extra attack at -10 to hit is basically giving yourself an extra miss every round. You CANNOT waste feats like that, and have the character you want to have.
Okay good to know, so no improved or greater TWF :P
It does. So you want to be stealthy, good in combat... nature-themed?...and dual wielding. Is one weapon ok, or must it be TWF?
Melee, thrower, or some combo of the 2?
doesnt need to be nature theme'd.
I had 2 characters in mind, 1 nature themed - Amazon. The other Stealth themed shadowdancer. Both use the same weapon, but both different characters. The one I would rather play is the stealth based one. So for the purpose of this thread, lets remove nature from the equation, as I do not want another ranger!
The thing about the Sai was that I would be able to throw it as it had that capability. Melee primarily but throwing weapons are fine in my book too. I know deadly Aim + Shuriken is a good combo, but I don't know if there are the feats available to this kind of character to capitalize on it.
So you want a thrower...man, it's a shame 3E isn't on the table. :)
You're going to run into a problem by mid levels and certainly higher levels where you simply can't afford the enhance all the weapons you throw in a given combat w/ +1, let alone keep them upgraded to the level of someone who fights with only 1 weapon. The returning property is both expensive (needs to be a +1 weapon first, so minimum of 8000 gp +masterwork weapon cost per returning weapon) and unhelpful -- you don't get it back till start of next turn, and if you moved squares at all, you won't be getting it back.
How would you feel about someone that uses "two sais chained together" or something? Or sia-on-rope? Then you could use a kusarigama or rope dart or anklys or the like. They're melee weapons, but are either reach weapons or can be thrown 20 ft and retrieved, so it's sort of like having a short ranged thrown weapon... Do you want to TWF, or is "one hand empty" style ok?
Also, what was your starting level?
Starting level is 1. I would like to ideally keep the character as close to concept as possible. So changing a weapon is fine but ideally I would like to have 2 weapons.
and blackbloodtroll, you are misreading. There are TWO different characters, they aren't the same one. the Amazon-like character is not the same as the stealth one. I also said we are removing the amazon-like character from the equation all together and only going to focus on the stealth one.
Hmm...emei piercers look similar to sais.... If I understand the text for them correctly, they are still unarmed strikes, they just make it piercing damage. So, you could get an amulet of mighty fists w/ the Agile property to affect attacks with them... This interpretation may be wrong, and the whole idea largely hinges on it (well, it means you can fight good when not sneak attacking 1 level earlier than you could if you had to enhance each of the piercers).
Perhaps an Unarmed Fighter 1 / Vivisectionist Alchemist 19?
Ideally w/ Beastmorph archetype as well, but if that doesn't feel right w/ your concept, there's also the Internal Alchemist you could combine w/ Viv.
You'll want very high dexterity, some int and con, and wis not terribly bad as your will save will be poor. Ideal race of goblin, but Tiefling, Ratfolk, or any race that buffs dex and doesn't hurt con or int would work.
The Unarmed Fighter dip gives you proficiency with monk weapons, Imp. Unarmed Strike, and a Style feat. I'd pick Crane. Later on going for Crane Wing.
Alchemist lets you down a dexterity mutagen for +4 dex and gives you "spells" in the form of extracts. It also lets you grow extra limbs, which is "handy" (heh) if you want to use even more than 2 weapons or use 2 weapons and still have a hand free for Crane Wing.
You obviously use Weapon Finesse. Until you get Agile property, your damage will suck horribly, but that's what sneak attack is for.
You can use traits to get stealth, acrobatics, or whatever other skill you feel you're missing as a class skill.
Just one idea...
does improving unarmed strike affect monk weapons? I thought it just improved non-weapon fighting.
I don't know, honestly. The whole unarmed thing is kind of a giant rules debacle at the moment. I was just trying to stick close to sais and get you sneak attack or some other means of bonus damage, which is what TWF needs to be relevant.
Okay thanks! yea this character doesn't appear to be doing any of what I really want it to do. I didn't think it would be nearly that complicated. I might go back to the drawing board and figure out an oracle, which is another class that caught my interest.
If you can ever swing a 3.5 game, I could help you out. I'd present a lot of stuff, but having to sort through lots of good options is preferable to grasping at straws, and always up to you if you want to scale it back. But a thrower rogue can be pretty awesome in 3E with the right book access.
There is one other option I can think of...have you considered being a paladin? They get smite damage on every attack, it can make TWF viable. Main problem is how thin your stats get spread. Pal needs str, con, and cha. Dex is usually only a small bonus, but the TWF feats require 15, 17, and 19. You could try going the agile route, but your damage will suffer till you can afford two agile weapons, and you won't have sneak attack to back you up, with smite only once or twice a day.
If you're willing to not TWF, look at Dawnflower Dervish bard. In return for not buffing the group w/ inspire courage, the DD gets it at double rate, which actually more than makes up for the medium BAB vs. full. And you get Dervish Dance feat, to apply dex to attack and damage, right out of the gate. If you could refluff a scimitar as a sai....
Say you made a human with 18 dexterity (after race). At level 1, with inspire +2, you would be attacking at +6 to hit for d6+6 damage.
Fetchling would work well with bard, too. Human just...has a really nice favored class option...
I dont know if this helps at all. But my DM plays that the 6 stats you get, each value is different. Theone you ant for your class highest is 18, and it decends down to 13 (for your dump stat). I know its a lot different then how its suppose to be, but thats how he plays. Will that having stats like that, aid me at all, with the shadow dancer?
I figure with you guys knowing that stat distributions with how he DM's we might be able to come up with what I need.
Essentially I would be looking for my shadow dancer starting like this for Fetchling:
Str: 14
Dex: 18 + 2 = 20
Con: 16
Int: 13
Wis: 15 - 2 = 13
Cha: 17 + 2 = 19
Well I was just figuring that with the stat distribution that I am allotted, it might make playing the class a little bit easier. Any other thoughts?
So, Azelyan, do you ever check out this thread as I earlier suggested? The more I hear about your concept the more I think it fits.
As for the Elektra comparison I much prefer Oedipus of Tick fame. Of course I never was big on naming characters after Freudian incestuous complexes either way. ;)
Something that I feel it is important to point out that not a lot of people realize mostly due to faulty pop culture tropes of characters who use sai: they are bludgeoning weapons. Pathfinder/3.x got this right in the weapon stat block. I mention this because I have played with a DM that this bothered so much that he insisted that it must have been a typo in the book and that the weapon was clearly a piercing weapon. He said this despite historical proof to the contrary.
I also bring this up because you mentioned the Elektra movie specifically. Her sai are NOT typical of what real sai were like. Neither are Raphael's of TMNT fame. If you are looking for a piercing weapon then the sai is not what you are looking for. If you like the sai specifically then I hope you don't mind that it is a bludgeoning weapon.
i know what sai's are, own a pair of them myself. I know traditionally they are blunt, well the training ones I have are. They aren't piercing objects. I did check out your thread though, and there are some interesting ideas, but I don't think it works with sai?
Why would it not work with sai? Sai are just a weapon. A means to an end. The concept could work with any weapon. In fact, I even talked about the original concept using sai in the thread.
Sorry guys i was out o the country for 9 days. Just got home. So If I wanted to make Elektra, what would I do?
I know someone said she was an assassin, but would that be the class I would take to play her?