Best class and race to dual wield shields?


Advice


Lets say I wanted a character to run around bashing things with 2 shields, what would be the best class setup for this build? What about the race?

I assume there will be three different concepts to this; Tank, Mixed, and Shield DPR. All are applicable setups for the character.

Also would Stalwart Defender be a good class to work towards, assuming the character is going Tank-style with their setup?

I'm looking to essentislly optimize an NPC for the lols. Not so much an enemy as a neutral/helpful character. The players would get a kick out of it, plus it would be a throwback to Smiter Paladins from Diablo II for all of us.


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I really like the combination of Shield Slam, Greater Bull Rush, and Paired Opportunist.

Shield Slam gives you a free Bull Rush with every Shield Bash.

Greater Bull Rush gives all his Allies Attacks of Opportunity when Bull Rushed out of Threatened Squares: your PCs should LOVE that!

With Paired Opportunist, he gets an AoO whenever his Allies do.

If this character achieves battlefiled positioning--and this build seems to be all about gaining positioning--the character's Attack of Opportunity can be another Shield Slam, triggering another round of AoOs, looping until everybody runs out of Combat Reflexes.

I initially thought of this combination to be used with Thunder and Fang, using 3 levels of Inquisitor to gain Paired Opportunist. Thunder and Fang might be a good Feat for your character even if he is using 2 shields instead of Earthbreaker and Klar: T&F makes the Klar a Light Weapon, and a Klar does more damage than a Light, Spiked Shield. This character can then benefit from a Heavy Shield then.

I really like putting the Bashing Enchantment on the Klar so that it does 2d6. Perhaps, he might also take a level in Warpriest, doing Sacred Weapon Base Damage.

A feature you've got to look at is the combination of a Quickdraw, Throwing Shield, the Quickdraw Feat, and a Blinkback Belt. Throwing Shields are Thrown as a Free Action. The Blinkback Belt instantly returns your Shield to your Belt immediately after resolving the Attack to be re-drawn as a Free Action, and perhaps Re-thrown as a Free Action. This can be a Free Action Attack Loop, allowing potentially Infinite Damage. As the GM, you can use this as a Plot device-excuse to save your party from TPKs whenever it looks like they are about to blunder themselves into one.


I gave some related suggestions on another Thread:

Teamwork Fighting Character


An aberrant bloodrager can get reaching shield slams. pushing something back with attacks of opportunity is always fun.


It's specified in Shield Bash that it does not provoke an attack of opportunity. At which point we're looking at conflicting rules, so I question if that amazing combo would actually work (dunno if it's been faq'd).

The item/feat combination sounds good, but I limit free actions to what can be accomplished in 30 seconds (speech is usually what this refers to). Pretty nice though for a solid run of a few of these (2 or 3).

These hijinks are cool, but as DM I also have to be cautious the players don't abuse the same rules I do. XD


You'll want to be a Ranger or a Slayer, I think. They have the ability to grab the Shield Master feat at Level 6, which removes all 2-weapon fighting penalties from fighting with 2 shields, if they have chosen the Sword and Shield fighting style.

The Shield-trained and Shield Bearer feats might also be worth looking into.


Ventnor wrote:
You'll want to be a Ranger or a Slayer, I think. They have the ability to grab the Shield Master feat at Level 6, which removes all 2-weapon fighting penalties from fighting with 2 shields, if they have chosen the Sword and Shield fighting style.

It also lets you use your shields' enhancement bonus on attack and damage without requiring you to enhance it as a weapon also.


Ventnor wrote:

You'll want to be a Ranger or a Slayer, I think. They have the ability to grab the Shield Master feat at Level 6, which removes all 2-weapon fighting penalties from fighting with 2 shields, if they have chosen the Sword and Shield fighting style.

The Shield-trained and Shield Bearer feats might also be worth looking into.

Seconded. Ranger/Slayer is fantastic for this.


Racewise I'd go with half-elf, half-orc, or dwarf to get some additional save bonuses to shore up the weak will save.

Alternately, a vanara or tiefling with prehensile tail would be helpful seeing as your hands maybe be more or less occupied, depending on whether you go with light or heavy shields.


So on the racial side human would likely help for the bonus feat. After 6 levels of slayer or ranger, would jumping ship to another class be a better option, or continue later for more feats? Ignore the whole concept of a level point to aim towards, as this can easily be used through to level 20 hijinks

Liberty's Edge

Oxylepy wrote:
So on the racial side human would likely help for the bonus feat. After 6 levels of slayer or ranger, would jumping ship to another class be a better option, or continue later for more feats? Ignore the whole concept of a level point to aim towards, as this can easily be used through to level 20 hijinks

I'd probably stick with Ranger/Slayer unless you have a compelling reason not to. Both are good Classes with very nice features as you go up in level.

I'd also note that Slayer gets Sneak Attack, which is a bigger benefit on TWF than other styles, and thus might edge out Ranger for your best option for this mechanically. If going that route, the Accomplished Sneak Attacker feat is likely worth picking up.

The Shield Trained Trait is also worth noting. It's not super necessary for this build once you have Shield Master, but makes wielding paired Heavy Shields much more viable before that, and would let you do this as a Dex build if you wanted.


Oxylepy wrote:
So on the racial side human would likely help for the bonus feat. After 6 levels of slayer or ranger, would jumping ship to another class be a better option, or continue later for more feats? Ignore the whole concept of a level point to aim towards, as this can easily be used through to level 20 hijinks

Maybe make his ethnicity Ulfen, specifically. The Shield Bearer trait is limited to Ulfens, and grants a +1 bonus to shield bash damage rolls.


Could one (going off standard rules, without the houseruling thing) go Half-Orc Ulfen follower of Gorum? That would essentially allow the 2 requirements to be met. If so, is it necessary to go through wonky other steps to pull this off, or is it straightforward and would just work?

Also, would assassin be a better investment of levels considering it has a mid attack bonus progression and advances the sneak attack faster than through Slayer?


If you plan to plan to utilize sneak attacks, then you need to build around having sneak attacks which means getting something like the two weapon feint chain.

The good thing about the Slayer is that while he gets sneak attack, he doesn't rely on it and still does competitive dos when it's not available.

Liberty's Edge

Oxylepy wrote:
Could one (going off standard rules, without the houseruling thing) go Half-Orc Ulfen follower of Gorum? That would essentially allow the 2 requirements to be met. If so, is it necessary to go through wonky other steps to pull this off, or is it straightforward and would just work?

That should be kosher. Taking both of those on a Half-Orc loses you out on the wonder of Sacred Tattoo + Fate's Favored, though.

Oxylepy wrote:
Also, would assassin be a better investment of levels considering it has a mid attack bonus progression and advances the sneak attack faster than through Slayer?

Probably not, no. Remember, Slayer keeps advancing Studied Target as well, so a Slayer 17 has +21 to hit, +4 damage, +5d6 Sneak attack from class alone while Slayer 7/Assassin 10 has +16 to hit, +2 damage, +7d6 sneak attack. -5 to hit, -2 damage, for +7 conditional damage is a bad trade.

Scarab Sages

Another option to consider is the Siegebreaker fighter archetype. You only even need 1/2 levels of it, but you can get a lot of abuse out of Shield Slam. Basically, you Shield Slam, and every time you attack with a shield, you get a Bull Rush attempt, which gives you an Overrun attempt, both of which not only move/debuff your target (prone is GREAT), but also deal damage equal to your Strength modifier (+more because you'll likely pick up improved/greater bull rush/overrun). By backing your enemy into a corner (or having an ally throw up a wall/barrier of some kind) you can do some pretty ridiculous stuff if you can get the feats to combine it with two-weapon fighting.


Oxylepy wrote:

It's specified in Shield Bash that it does not provoke an attack of opportunity. At which point we're looking at conflicting rules, so I question if that amazing combo would actually work (dunno if it's been faq'd).

The item/feat combination sounds good, but I limit free actions to what can be accomplished in 30 seconds (speech is usually what this refers to). Pretty nice though for a solid run of a few of these (2 or 3).

These hijinks are cool, but as DM I also have to be cautious the players don't abuse the same rules I do. XD

Well, for starters, you are the GM aren't you? That being the case, the rules are what you say they are.

It's true, by RAW, that Shield Bashing neither provokes nor nets you Attacks of Opportunity. It's the Greater Bull Rush Feat that provides Attacks of Opportunity to all your allies. It's by Paired Opportunist that the 'Basher gets the Attack of Opportunity, too.

You normally need everyone in your group to take Teamwork Feats like Paired Opportunist, but there are classes that have special abilities for getting around that. Level 3 Inquisitors get an ability called Solo Tactics, which lets them enjoy the benefits of a Teamwork Feat as if their allies had the Feat, even if they don't. This seems exactly what the class ability was made for.

So, what?
Human:

Lvl 1 Ranger 1: Weapon Focus Klar, 2 Weapon, Freebooter's Bane(?), BAB+1
2R2: Shield Slam, BAB+2
3R2Fighter1: Weapon Focus Earthbreaker, Thunder and Fang, BAB+3
4R2F2: Power Attack, BAB+4
5R2F2Inquisitor1: Improved Bull Rush, Domain, judgment 1/day, monster lore, orisons, stern gaze
6R2F2I2: Cunning initiative, detect alignment, track, BAB+5
7R2F3I2: Greater Bull Rush, BAB+6
8R2F3I3: Paired Opportunist, Solo Tactics,
9R2F3I4: Judgement 2/day, Combat Reflexes, BAB+7
10R2F3I5: Bane, Discern Lies, BAB+8

Something like that?


Brutal and enticing as that is, the Earthshaker fails to be a shield, and the concept of dual wielding shields is integral

So a 2 level dip into Siegebreaker allows for the free overrun attempt, combined woth shield bash and the Inquisitor 3 level dip for Paired Opportunist would allow for the janky AoO nonsense on the dual shield Slayer. So 6 Slayer and the 5 investment to the other two, finishing slayer... It could work, but the feat requirement is pretty heavy.


Deadmanwalking wrote:


That should be kosher. Taking both of those on a Half-Orc loses you out on the wonder of Sacred Tattoo + Fate's Favored, though.

Additional traits, the feat. If there is any room left over, the +1 to saves may be worth it... maybe not though... however if anything else grants a luck bonus then it really makes it even better.


Oxylepy wrote:

Brutal and enticing as that is, the Earthshaker fails to be a shield, and the concept of dual wielding shields is integral

So a 2 level dip into Siegebreaker allows for the free overrun attempt, combined woth shield bash and the Inquisitor 3 level dip for Paired Opportunist would allow for the janky AoO nonsense on the dual shield Slayer. So 6 Slayer and the 5 investment to the other two, finishing slayer... It could work, but the feat requirement is pretty heavy.

So? Take Thunder and Fang and use 2 Klars!


Okay, how does this look so far:

Half-Orc Ulfen follower of Gorum
Traits: Shield Bearer, Shield Trained
Feats: Power attack, Shield Master, Improved Shield Bash, Shield Slam, Two-Weapon Fighting, Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, Greater Two Weapon Fighting, Improved Bull Rush, Greater Bull Rush, Paired Opportunist, Improved Overrun, Greater Overrun, Combat Reflexes

That leaves 1 free feat (Paired Opportunist, Improved Shield Bash, Shield Master, and TWF all come from classes), or potentially more.

6 levels of Slayer, 2 of Siegebreaker Fighter, 3 of Inquisitor, finish off Slayer.


Darn, I should have recalled this before, Quickdraw would be the other feat for the throwing shield effect. That totals out the feats (except as talents).

That allows for the blinkback belt trick, over running for AoO, and Bullrushing for AoO. It ends with a +19 bab and requires 19 in Dex (so starting out with a 15 would be fine because by the time GTWF could be taken the character would have 19). The rest of the stats would be for str and con, then Wis for the save, Int and Cha can be dump stats as the slayer already gets good skills. On a 20 point character that'd be something to the effect of 17/15/15/10/13/7 if I'm doing that right


I don't know much about Slayer, Seigebreaker, or Shield Master, but it looks like that Bull Rush AoO loop is worked in quite well.

The reason I recommended Thunder and Fang is for the use in Klar. T&F allow you to use the Klar as a Light Weapon. Without it, you need to make 1 of your weapons a Light Shield. Also, T&F lets you keep your Shield Bonus to your AC without needing to take Improved Shield Bash.

If you dip 2 levels in Ranger, you can take Shield Bash without having to take Improved Shield Bash or without a +6 BAB. If you want to meet both prereqs normally, you can take 2 Weapon as your level 2 bonus Ranger Feat. Your way works just fine. I was just explaining why I did it the way I showed you.

A lot of GMs consider the Shield Spike to constitute a Virtual Size Increase, which means that the damage will not stack with the Bashing Shield Enchantment, which I consider essential to the build. If the Bashing Enchantment stacks with Shield Spikes, the base damage of a Heavy, Spiked Shield with the Bashing Enchantment is 2d6. If they don't, 1d8, the same if your heavy shield is not spiked. The Klar is technically not a Spiked Shield, so its base damage is 2d6. But you yourself are the GM, so rule it any way you want.

Another option is to dip 1 level in Warpriest or take 3 levels in Warpriest, Divine Strategist instead of Inquisitor. That will let you do Sacred Weapon Damage with your Shields and therefore get around the Virtual Size Increase that may apply to Shield Spikes. Divine Strategists also gain teamwork feats like Paired Opportunist, and the Tactician Ability which gifts all allies with your Teamwork Feat. Not as good as Solo Tactics for Greater Bull Rush, but still good.

You might consider the Spiked Destroyer Feat which gives you a bonus Shield Spike Attack as a Swift Action upon a successful Bull Rush.

If you are using Spiked Shields, you might consider taking Hamatula Strike, which gives you a free Grapple with every attack with a Piercing Weapon. If you are wearing Armor Spikes, you do Armor Spike Damage (+ ST, + other bonuses!) with every Grapple. Just using Grappling as a way of doing 'Spike Damage, you release the Grapple every time, which you can do as a Free Action.

Before taking Overrun Feats, think about taking Merciless Rush. It gives you a Free Bull Rush with a regular attack following a charge, and a chance to knock your opponent Prone and do extra damage besides. This seems to me to mean that if you have Shield Slam and Merciless Rush, you can Shield Bash for your regular attack, which comes with a Bull Rush followed by a 2nd Bull Rush due to your Merciless Rush + Shield Spike Damage if you have Spiked Destroyer, and if you Shield is Spiked, and you have Hamatula Strike, that also means 2 Grapples + 2 more Armor Spike damages. Since, by definition, Bull Rushing makes your opponent move away from you, scoring 2 Bull Rushes in 1 round is problematic, but not necessarily impossible, sometimes, perhaps as part of your charge, you might be allowed to move with your victim.

But, by all means, take Improve Overrun, Greater Overrun, and Wheeling Charge.

Scarab Sages

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Siegebreaker is awesome with shields because it deals damage to your target equal to your Strength modifier whenever you successfully bull rush or overrun an opponent, and gives you a free overrun attempt whenever you make a successful bull rush. (Also, gives you +2 damage per appropriate combat maneuver feat, and allows you to add your shield enhancement bonus to the damage as well). That's why the overrun stuff works well. At higher levels, a single bull rush is adding 10-ish extra damage, with another chunk if you overrun, not including the obvious bonus of your target being prone now.

Oh, and Shield-Trained (Trait) lets you treat Heavy Shields as light weapons.


Davor wrote:


Oh, and Shield-Trained (Trait) lets you treat Heavy Shields as light weapons.

Just be sure to follow the right god!


Hrm, how does Sacred Weapon actually help? It looks like it just treats the weapon damage (1d6) as the sacred weapon damage (1d6).

As for the slayer, it gains the Ranger style feats in the same way as a ranger, but as an option (it can be chosen with Talents).

Not to mention the AoO loop potentially generates 2 AoO from every attack with Shield Bash. One for the bull rush, one if they are knocked prone.

Silver Crusade

Oxylepy wrote:

Hrm, how does Sacred Weapon actually help? It looks like it just treats the weapon damage (1d6) as the sacred weapon damage (1d6).

As for the slayer, it gains the Ranger style feats in the same way as a ranger, but as an option (it can be chosen with Talents).

Not to mention the AoO loop potentially generates 2 AoO from every attack with Shield Bash. One for the bull rush, one if they are knocked prone.

Warpriest is an AWESOME dual shielder, but sacred weapon doesn't help going shield trained at all. You're better with light shields which allow for object manipulation with your hands (like holy symbols and casting), which is what you want in life.

Seriously, half-orc warpriest with the fate's favored+ancestral weapon traits dual wielding silver shields is silly good, especially with everything else discussed in the thread.


Fighter with the Brawler archetype is simple, but solid.


Discounting other gear, would the Warpriest outperform the Slayer in combat, though? He gets a lot of nasty abilities, especially with the AoO loops from before, and deals solid damage (2d6+ if it's counted as a size increase, assuming he also caps at level 15 and takes the Siegebreaker and Inquisitor classes), but can he handle making up for the sneak attack damage lost that way?

He can definitely hit the number of required feats. Follow up, how much of a reduction in speed to reaching Shield Master would he face?


Just throwing this out there.... Have you looked at the Brawler class with the Shield Champion archetype? Essentially kind of a Captain America with shields, gets some of the stuff mentioned free with advancement and returning shield at 5th lvl.


Nope, XD this topic is to determine a relatively optimized character for dual shield nonsense, this is a new one to look into

Hrm, it looks like the damage would be lower compared to WP or S, however it also looks like it gains a considerable number of feats. Some of the class abilities, though, may be a problem (no AC bonus because of medium armor).

Anyone else check it out to see if it could be an effective base for the build?


Well it would mean you can take startoss style for extra damage since you are throwing your shield.


Woodoodoo wrote:
Well it would mean you can take startoss style for extra damage since you are throwing your shield.

But that would mean you only use one shield, and not two.

If you're gonna do wrong, you gotta do wrong right! And this wrong feels so right...


Davor wrote:

Siegebreaker is awesome with shields because it deals damage to your target equal to your Strength modifier whenever you successfully bull rush or overrun an opponent, and gives you a free overrun attempt whenever you make a successful bull rush. (Also, gives you +2 damage per appropriate combat maneuver feat, and allows you to add your shield enhancement bonus to the damage as well). That's why the overrun stuff works well. At higher levels, a single bull rush is adding 10-ish extra damage, with another chunk if you overrun, not including the obvious bonus of your target being prone now.

Oh, and Shield-Trained (Trait) lets you treat Heavy Shields as light weapons.

Holy crap!


Ventnor wrote:
Woodoodoo wrote:
Well it would mean you can take startoss style for extra damage since you are throwing your shield.

But that would mean you only use one shield, and not two.

If you're gonna do wrong, you gotta do wrong right! And this wrong feels so right...

But... flurry.


You can flurry with two weapons if you want. Or two shields in this case


I am playing skulls and shackles and if my current character dies I am envisioning a shield champion brawler that flurry shield slams people all over the place, even off the ships during ship combat. His catchphrase would be "Yarrr walk the plank".


I know you can flurry them with brawler. It's like gaining the TWF feats free. All around it opens up a lot of feat options. But really, running this build I am going for power-game-y with it, hence trying to narrow it down to an optimized class. Race is already handled by the traits, so now it comes down to just which class to choose.

The current winning combat gimmick is smacking them around like meat with bullrush and free overruns (which move you with the target, which is awesome since it's free, so no worries about pushing them into walls). This is why the other 2 classes seem set in stone, the bonuses they give are enough to have you smacking the enemy up to like 11 times in a round, more with haste. And in addition to that you get bonus damage. Sooo, yeah. Which leaves the main build class.

So far the contenders are Warpriest, Slayer and Brawler, which leads to:
Which can do the most dpr with this build?

Brawler seems to lose some aspects of the class in medium armor, which kinda blows since the armor helps a lot. But it also leads to more feat options and a couple other little tricks.

Slayer gives sneak attack and some other handy tricks.

Warpriest, like brawler, replaces the weapon damage and gives a couple handy tricks, plus it can cast.


Well I'm going to recommend Slayer again because you can access Shield Master a full 5 levels early. Less money needed to upgrade attack and damage = more upgrades available = more damage output.


Oxylepy wrote:
Discounting other gear, would the Warpriest outperform the Slayer in combat, though?

I don't think you can discount the other gear. Rules on the gear affect my recommendation. One of the Warpriest's most important abilities is to do damage based on Class Level rather than based on what it says about the weapon.

I don't really see what Slayer brings to your combinations of Bull Rush and Overrun and Shield Bashing. Slayer seems to have a lot of out-of-combat things that are pretty cool. And I like Sneak Attack, but you aren't talking about any other features that develop Sneak Attacking like Dirty Tricks, Ninja Vanishing Trick, or Shatter Defenses. I might be overlooking something. I'm not very familiar with Slayer.

To my eye it's about combining that Seigebreaker with Inquisitor or Waarpriest, and possibly slipping in 2 levels of Slayer or Ranger (Freebooter). I'm thinking that between Inquisitor or Warpriest, it's about Sacred Weapon vs. Bane and Blessings vs. a Domain.

Oxylepy wrote:
But really, running this build I am going for power-game-y with it, hence trying to narrow it down to an optimized class.

Well, I need some rulings from the GM, who would be you in this case, right?

What is the damage done by a Heavy, Spiked Shield with the Bashing Enchantment?

What is the effect of the combination of the Quickdraw, Throwing Shield, the Quickdraw Feat, and the Blinkback Belt I brought up in my first post on this thread? It's a Free Action Attack loop, and it could theoretically do infinity damage. But the description of Free Actions in the Core Rulebook specifically call for the GM imposing "reasonable limits" on the number of Free Actions a character can take in 1 turn, undoubtedly to prevent PCs from abusing Free Actions just like I am suggesting. But this time, you are the GM. So, what would this combo do for your character?


Scott Wilhelm wrote:

I don't really see what Slayer brings to your combinations of Bull Rush and Overrun and Shield Bashing. Slayer seems to have a lot of out-of-combat things that are pretty cool. And I like Sneak Attack, but you aren't talking about any other features that develop Sneak Attacking like Dirty Tricks, Ninja Vanishing Trick, or Shatter Defenses. I might be overlooking something. I'm not very familiar with Slayer.

To my eye it's about combining that Seigebreaker with Inquisitor or Waarpriest, and possibly slipping in 2 levels of Slayer or Ranger (Freebooter). I'm thinking that between Inquisitor or Warpriest, it's about Sacred Weapon vs. Bane and Blessings vs. a Domain.

Slayer is a rangeras far as getting the necessary feats go. It's also a solud primary class for the build because of the high BAB and sneak attack, not to mention other talents.

Inquisitor is a dip for paired opportunist only, hence 3 levels. The 2 in fighter increase bullrush/overrun effects.

Brawler/Slayer give bonuses to the build with high BAB, yet Warpriest increases damage for the shield, and gives casting.

Unless WP can somehow grant the AoO loop, Inquisitor is still necessary.

Scott Wilhelm wrote:


What is the damage done by a Heavy, Spiked Shield with the Bashing Enchantment?

What is the effect of the combination of the Quickdraw, Throwing Shield, the Quickdraw Feat, and the Blinkback Belt I brought up in my first post on this thread? It's a Free Action Attack loop, and it could theoretically do infinity damage. But the description of Free Actions in the Core Rulebook specifically call for the GM imposing "reasonable limits" on the number of Free Actions a character can take in 1 turn, undoubtedly to prevent PCs from abusing Free Actions just like I am suggesting. But this time, you are the GM. So, what would this combo do for your character?

2d6.

It would work, however they would only be able to pull it off a couple times (not am infinite loop). Something to the effect of 3 itterations would occupy the space of free actions, as a full round action it would be triple the number of attacks you have, plus the free action space, so with +16 bab you'd have 15 total attacks with it.

That's because while no one has ever tried a loop, they have pushed it to 3 free actions which has made me warn thrm to be cautious as it would push into a move action. Usually I allow speech to hit about 30 secobds, a minute with move/standard and 2 minutes for a full round action


The Warpriest allows for things like spellcasting, true, and does boost the weapon's base damage up substantially, however the build is much slower and the reduction to BAB is 4 points, which is harsh, as well as a reduction to other things like skills, hit die, etc.

Hrm... though the shield, stacked up would deal about 6d6 damage for the WP, while the slayer would be dealing 7d6 if the enemy were flat footed for the entire ordeal, in both cases the shield would also have a +5 enhancement modifier, but the slayer would also have a +4 to hit and damage, as well as the +4 increase from BAB. Statistics for the Slayer could swing more toward physical, while the WP would need 15 in Wisdom, which is roughly a +1 decrease on to hit/damage, but free weaon focus mitigates a point of the to-hit loss. That totals a +8 to hit and +5 to damage for the slayer.

The Slayer could also increase her sneak to take sneak shield bashes up to 8d6, which does overpower the Warpriest, however they aren't multiplied on criticals and aren't always effective.

Additionally WP wouldn't qualify for Shield Master until 15th level, while Slayer would have it at 6th.


You could say the slayer has free weapon focus too. Such a build would surely grab the weapon training talent at some point. The slayer basically gets 6 bonus feats through talents: 3x ranger combat style, weapon training, combat trick, and feat. The default slayer gets 10 talents in his 20 levels, and six of those will almost certainly be for those feats.


So while the WP may out DPR the Slayer, because of criticals and more damage dice regularly (not relying on sneak attack), the slayer seems to win out within the situation it gets sneak attack, and is more likely to hit, which means it's more likely to succeed on the combat maneuvers. All around it seems like it will be more successful running the build than a WP would be, although a WP criting, or increasing its size to large would end up generating a horrifying number of damage dice.


Oxylepy wrote:
Slayer is a rangeras far as getting the necessary feats go. It's also a solud primary class for the build because of the high BAB and sneak attack, not to mention other talents.

I like Freebooter's Bane a little more than Studied Target, but to each, his own.

Oxylepy wrote:

The Warpriest allows for things like spellcasting, true, and does boost the weapon's base damage up substantially, however the build is much slower and the reduction to BAB is 4 points, which is harsh, as well as a reduction to other things like skills, hit die, etc.

Hrm... though the shield, stacked up would deal about 6d6 damage for the WP, while the slayer would be dealing 7d6 if the enemy were flat footed for the entire ordeal, in both cases the shield would also have a +5 enhancement modifier, but the slayer would also have a +4 to hit and damage, as well as the +4 increase from BAB. Statistics for the Slayer could swing more toward physical, while the WP would need 15 in Wisdom, which is roughly a +1 decrease on to hit/damage, but free weaon focus mitigates a point of the to-hit loss. That totals a +8 to hit and +5 to damage for the slayer.

Maybe, it depends on the build and how many levels we're talking about. What level are you making this NPC, what is the average level of the party, and what level do you think the campaign will go to?

To be honest, you kind of lost me with your numbers, here.

Oxylepy wrote:
The Slayer could also increase her sneak to take sneak shield bashes up to 8d6, which does overpower the Warpriest, however they aren't multiplied on criticals and aren't always effective.

If you are going to develop Sneak Attacking, you should develop some way to lock in SA Damage like Ninja Vanishing Trick, Arcanist Dimensional Slide, Travel Domain Dimensional Hop, Shatter Defenses, or Dirty Tricks, and you are already working on Bull Rushing and Overrunning. It might take a very long time to develop Sneak Attacking, and in that case, it might not be worth developing in a SA Class. If you are, then you will be regularly be denying your opponents their Dex Mods, and that will usually more than make up for any reduced BAB.

Oxylepy wrote:
Additionally WP wouldn't qualify for Shield Master until 15th level

Level 11, actually: Warpriest levels count as Fighter Levels and BAB for qualifying for Feats.

Oxylepy wrote:
while Slayer would have it at 6th.

But 6 is smaller than 11, too! Point taken.


Is there something where the WP will treat his BAB as his level for determining CMB? Because he's going to need that.

Slayers have full BAB, get a bonus against a studied target (caps at +4 for this build), and deals additional damage for having a studied target. If I can sure up sneak through talents I may be able to pull off more damage through the Slayer, but it isn't critical. The sheer number of attacks and BAB is pretty solid for the build and how it functions.

As for the level -shrug- Any level will work, I have a boatload of NPCs and intend to go epic ultimately, I'm just trying to optimize this build because everyone thinks it's silly and would never work, yet none of them have ever seen optimized or even decent character builds, they're all haphazard in their choices, so it would be comical to bring this in as an ally.


I don't think WP needs any more CMB. I made a WP maneuver spec and compared to a Lore Warden. Depending on level and buffs, they are within 1-2 points of each other.


^Can you? Because right now the Slayer is leading by a solid 9 points for CMB, doesn't need a buff round, and can start smacking things like the racket balls they are. If by chance you can push the WP above and beyond the Slayer, feel free, it will lead more credit to that build


Scott Wilhelm wrote:
Oxylepy wrote:
Additionally WP wouldn't qualify for Shield Master until 15th level
Level 11, actually: Warpriest levels count as Fighter Levels and BAB for qualifying for Feats.

Make that 12. The WP can only treat his BAB as his level when gaining his bonus feats.


Welp, I've decided to just have both the Slayer and the Warpriest. And just have them be brothers, the Warpriest older and choosing the long road to achieve the dream of being a dual shield wielder. The slayer younger and trying to best his older brother, seeking the faster path to dual shield wielding.

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