It ocurred to me that a great way to add in a decent amount of melee ability without having to spread myself too thin would be to take a 1 level dip in Dervish of Dawn and grab that Dervish Dance for free along with a little spell-casting and some self-buffing goodness. The character would be primarily a ranged threat, but would be able to melee and I wanted to get some opinions from all those switch-hitters out there...
I'm thinking Human, 1 level of Dervish of Dawn, then 12 levels of Weaponmaster (Bow) for the accelerated Weapon Training and then finishing her out with 7 more levels of Dervish. The build would look something like this:
Human Dervish of Dawn 8 / Weaponmaster (Bow) 12
Attributes: (20 point build)
STR - 8
DEX - 17 (+2 racial bonus, +1 @ 4th, 8th, 12th, 16th & 20th)
CON - 12
INT - 12
WIS - 10
CHA - 14
Traits:
Maestro of the Society
Reactionary
Feats:
1st - Dervish Dance
1st - Extra Performance
1st - Point Blank Shot
2nd - Rapid Shot
3rd - Precise Shot
3rd - Weapon Focus: Bow
5th - Weapon Spec: Bow
5th - Deadly Aim
7th - Manyshot
7th - Improved Initiative
9th - Improved Critical: Bow
9th - Greater Weapon Focus: Bow
11th - Critical Focus
11th - Clustered Shots
13th - Improved Precise Shot
13th - Greater Weapon Specialization: Bow
15th - Hammer the Gap
17th - Blinding Critical
19th - Discordant Voice
This is just a rough draft of what I'm thinking and any advice or insight would be much appreciated.
I think it's a great idea. I have a bit of a pet peeve about ranged fighters who don't have a melee option, so I'd happily have a character like this in my party. (If you have a great AC, HP, BAB, Martial Weapon Proficiency, and your abilities don't require a concentration check to work in melee, you should be willing to get in the front row when it's the best tactic.)
It looks like your build is well thought out, and the only part I question is the focus on critical hits. Because bows only crit 5% of the time, 10% when enhanced, critical hits just aren't common enough to be worth the feat investment. I'm not sure what I would replace it with though.
Doesn't the bow have issue with strength penalties? I would strongly recommend at least having a 10 there. Of course my real recommendation is to just have a good strength on your archer to use composite bow's ability to use your strength for damage. Having a high strength means you can wield a 2 handed weapon to good effect, invalidating the need for the dervish dip. making him a ranger means you get some good archery specific bonus feats, full BAB, and a decent assortment of spells (gravity bow, instant enemey...). Oh, having an animal you can use is also handy.
For the most part I don't see much of a point going out of your way to have a melee option; Snap Shot can come in as early as level 6 and now you can do everything a melee guy can do besides fight in a grapple.
I'd suggest take your bard to lvl 10 and add the sound striker archetype to it. Weird words is a POWERFUL ranged volley by even the best blaster arcanist standards.
It looks like your build is well thought out, and the only part I question is the focus on critical hits. Because bows only crit 5% of the time, 10% when enhanced, critical hits just aren't common enough to be worth the feat investment. I'm not sure what I would replace it with though.
I don't know that I'd call it a 'focus' on critical hits per se - I had the feats and figured I'd be getting off more attacks on average than most which would equate into more opportunities. To be honest, it occurred to me that I might need another one or two crit options and Crit Mastery, taking my levels of Fighter to 14 because it'd give me a little more punch with a keen scimitar when in melee.
Doesn't the bow have issue with strength penalties? I would strongly recommend at least having a 10 there. Of course my real recommendation is to just have a good strength on your archer to use composite bow's ability to use your strength for damage. Having a high strength means you can wield a 2 handed weapon to good effect, invalidating the need for the dervish dip. making him a ranger means you get some good archery specific bonus feats, full BAB, and a decent assortment of spells (gravity bow, instant enemey...). Oh, having an animal you can use is also handy.
Yeah, its just that I wasn't setting out to make a Ranger really, but rather a high Dexterity character and there wasn't room left over for Strength. Having an 8 shouldn't hurt me at all, and don't forget as a Dervish of Dawn I'll get a double-strength Inspire Courage to make up the difference. Some spells too.
I'd suggest take your bard to lvl 10 and add the sound striker archetype to it. Weird words is a POWERFUL ranged volley by even the best blaster arcanist standards.
I was on the band-wagon for Sound Striker for a while, wanting to take the archetype to go with Dervish of Dawn since the two didn't conflict, until it was proven to my satisfaction that you couldn't use multiple words against a single foe and pointed out to me that not only did DR affect the words individually but the target also got a Fort save for half. That dulled its apparent effectiveness to almost zero.
For the most part I don't see much of a point going out of your way to have a melee option; Snap Shot can come in as early as level 6 and now you can do everything a melee guy can do besides fight in a grapple.
I don't know if I'd call it 'out of my way' since I'm really only making a 1 level investment and getting a lot for that dip. I should probably consider Snap Shot as part of my build anyway, but wouldn't I also have to take Point Blank Mastery to get into the realm of being able to do everything a melee guy can do?
Not that it should have any bearing on the 'official' build I'm trying to put together here, but a major house-rule we've adopted is the changes to Weapon Finesse.
Weapon Finesse has been done away with as a feat, and in its place we now have the Finesse weapon quality (similar to the Reach or Double qualities) that automatically applies your Dex bonus to both attack bonus and damage bonus whenever you use a light weapon, rapier, whip or projectile ranged weapon like a bow or crossbow.
For us it was just common sense across the board.
I was talking about the Strength penalty to damage for having a penalty (bows inflict this on you). Sure it doesn't sound like a big deal, but are missing out on 1 damage per attack starting at level 1. As an archer you are going to be making a lot of attacks.
Inspire and other abilities do not "make up" this lost damage. You could have this lost damage AND the other abilities damage.
The problem lies in the buying of a 19 at first level. That sucks up so many attribute points it is not worth the +1 to AC and to hit at 4th level that you gain from it. By "settling" for only an 18 at first level, you can boost your strength up and put a point somewhere else that could be useful.
You can also settle for a 13 Cha because you won't get much benefit for higher for a long time, and you can boost it later. The 2 attribute points now are more valuable anyways.
I guess what I'm saying is the choice to go nearly full dex doesn't IMHO give enough benefit to justify the damage it does to the other stats. A more modest (strange that an 18 is "modest") primary ability score actually strengthens the overall character. In this case quite a bit since an 8 strength character can't even wear armor and carry his weapons without being encumbered. Which is really bad for a concept that wants to use high dex bonus to do nearly everything.
I was talking about the Strength penalty to damage for having a penalty (bows inflict this on you). Sure it doesn't sound like a big deal, but are missing out on 1 damage per attack starting at level 1. As an archer you are going to be making a lot of attacks.
Wait a minute - as non-thrown projectile weapons, bows automatically inflict a damage penalty on you for having a low strength?
Man, I am so glad we have the houserule that we have... that's just ridiculous.
It has to do with the IRL problem of not being able to draw the bow back all of the way. If the bow is rated for a certain draw strength, and you can't actually manage that draw strength, you will not be able to use the bow properly. The fact that it is ONLY a damage penalty is what is ridiculous. It should also have a range and accuracy penalty IMHO.
But If you are house-rule/hand-waving away that part of the rules (which started IIRC in 3.0 version of D&D) then my advice loses some but not all of its value. The strength penalty to your carry capacity is still going to be crippling for a dex based character. Of course if you house-rule no encumbrance than disregard that as well. IMHO having your max dex capped at +3 and losing out on movement is pretty crippling on top of the -3 check penalty to skills. That is just for medium encumbrance which an 8str character will hit at 27 lbs of carry weight. Even studded leather weighs 20lbs, which is nearly all of your carry weight. Add in a scimitar and your bow and you are already over and that doesn't include your arrows, you clothes, your consumables, ect.
Of course if you choose to fight naked you are far braver than I am.
