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.
I'm not sure I understand the Gestalt rules completely, so my apologies if this doesn't work at all.
But how's this sound:
1.) Race: Play a fetchling. Heck, this guy's partially made of shadows. Also, you're going to take the Shadow Magic Alternate Racial Trait which will help (see below)
2.) I dunno, whatever you think
3.) Ninja. It's going to get you sneak attack damage, which is solid, plus those handy ninja tricks like invisibility when there aren't any shadows. The CHA-based ki pool is also going to pair nicely with:
4.) Arcane Bloodline Sorcerer. Focus on illusion spells. Get bonuses to the DCs from Shadow Magic and the Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus (illusion) feats. Also, use metamagic (like silent spell) to further boost your DCs (see the bloodline arcana for arcane sorcerers) and keep you hidden.
Swing a katana around like a madman, cast illusions all over the place to terrorize your enemies, and look into the shadow conjuration and shadow evocation guides in the "Guide to the Class Guides" thread. Those spells give you an enormous amount of utility.
Perhaps some of my "shadow" builds can help to inspire you?
Dark Knight, The
Raven King, The (mythic)
Raven King, The (non-mythic)
Ravendark
A Wayang Witch with the shadow patron would be good. Witches make great use of the shadow spells since they expand their otherwise very limited spell list; for the side of the gestalt that moves into Shadowdancer I'd recommend Slayer.
You'll want to worship one of the deities that give the Shadowdancer prereqs for combat style talents to enter Shadowdancer ASAP. Your options are Calistria (Combat Reflexes), Cayden Cailean (Combat Reflexes) and Sarenrae (Mobility). Pick one of these deities and you'll be able to meet the prereqs to enter Shadowdancer at level 6 with 2 feats to spare.
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.
In the Inner Sea Combat book, there's a section for Ranger Combat Styles related to specific deities. If you worship one of the Core deities (there's entries for Besmara, Kurgess, and Achaekek as well) you can select that combat style instead of one of the usual ones.
Granted, now that I think about it you don't really have to do that. If you don't worship one of those deities you can take the prereq feats at 3, 4 (Combat Trick) and 5 and use 1 and 2 (RCS) for your regular feats.
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.