Respec

[Alasanii]

Hey everyone, it's been a while since I have posted here but I am.looking for some help.

We have a group of 4
Dwarf fighter 2 weapon
Druid giant archetype...he grows big and hits hard witha scythe....animal companion that is a raptor of some sort.
Sorcerer who is all about control
Me...half orc skald.

So I have a chance to retool my guy via a magic item, basically reset and make it what I have. I am looking at trying to fill the gaps as a skald. Is there a way to switch hit with this guy or should I just focus on range? A half orc hornbow has been wonderful so far. We recently came into contact with an item that has mighty cleave on it...should I bother?

I was looking at possibly taking the following feats to work with...
1.skalds vigor
3.Power attack
5.rapid shot
7 lingering pwrformance( needed to have raging song and song of the peoples revolt on at the same time to push amplified rage to the party.

Thanks for the help. Skald vigor is a must everything else is good for switching. I just want to try and contribute the most to the party.

[Name Violation]

Maybe swap out power attack for point blank shot.

Not actually sure how you have rapid shot without its prereq point blank shot

[Java Man]

If you are using Lingering Performance to keep 2 songs going then your move action is spoken for every round. Without full attacking Rapid Shot is worthless, picking up precise shot would do much more good, since it looks like you'll be firing into melee often.

[Alasanii]

Oops...

Yeah. I guess I would need PBS then rapid shot. I was trying to figure out how to be the most useful to this group. Looks like Archery is what I will be doing. I was kind of hoping to do a bit of melee every once in a while. Is there a way to do that? Wait till 9th and take Power Attack? Or would I be better off just sticking with Archery?

[Java Man]

For a switch hitting Skald I'd do arcane strike before power attack.

[Alasanii]

Java Man wrote:

For a switch hitting Skald I'd do arcane strike before power attack.

Thanks. I forgot about that feat.

[Mark Hoover 330]

So, the idea for this PC is to use a Move action to start a Raging Song/Inspire Rage, then a Standard Action boosted by Lingering Performance to let Inspire Rage linger a couple rounds while you instead add Amplified Rage through the Masterpiece Battle Song of the People's Revolt. Only, the Masterpiece requires Perform (Percussion) or Perform (Wind) and you need one of those 2 as your Versatile Performance, so you need to be using a Percussion or Wind instrument to complete this action.

Can you sub in a Hornbow or an arrow for the instrument? I don't know that much about skalds. Also, skalds look pretty feat starved. In order to make the character work to your liking, you need at least Skald's Vigor and Lingering Performance, so that's 2 feats right there. If you want to use a bow in a party with 3 melee types at least (Fighter, Druid, Druid's companion), you should pick up Precise Shot ASAP.

Precise Shot has a prereq of Point Blank Shot. Those 2 eat up another 2 feats right there, meaning that by level 7 you've already assigned all 4 of your feats; Arcane Strike, Power Attack or Rapid Shot (if staying fully ranged) wouldn't come online until level 9 unless you want to sacrifice accuracy into melee.

I'm wondering about the desire to switch hit with this PC. As it stands, if you can use the Raging Song and Masterpiece, you're spending the first full round of combat delivering +4 Str and Con, +2 Will and -1 AC to the party. After that, you've got however many enemies are left in front of you, with a melee involving 2 of your fellow PCs and an Animal Companion already. With Point Blank and Precise, you're attacking at BAB +5, plus your Dex bonus and the Enhancement on the bow, +1 if you're at 30' or closer to the action and delivering 2d6 +Str Bonus, Enhancement on the bow, and +1 from 30' or less.

What would the advantage of attacking in melee be at this point? You don't have an opportunity to use a Swift action that I can see, so you're not using a Swift to cast Enlarge Person on yourself, therefore the best damage you're going to do with a Greatsword is 2d6 +Str Bonus and any Enhancement on the sword. If you've already paid a ton of money to make your Hornbow adapt to both your non-raging and raging strength, AND paid to enchant it with an Enhancement bonus... it is unlikely you have a magic greatsword lying around.

So, you do as much or likely more with your hornbow, unless you have NOT improved that weapon to accommodate your Str score for damage. And you've also just delivered +2 damage on all of the successful attacks that 3 other members of the party hit with, for 3 rounds. Do you need to tack on a melee component to all of this?

[Name Violation]

Alasanii wrote:

Java Man wrote:

For a switch hitting Skald I'd do arcane strike before power attack.

Thanks. I forgot about that feat.

Arcane strike eats up your swift action, which you'll need for timely/gallant inspiration and activating you skald song soon

I would suggest enchanting adaptive onto your bow and getting point blank shot, precise shot, Rapid Shot, many shot, lingering song, and deadly aim.

[Alasanii]

Yeah..I think I am trying to do too much. I have thought about it more and I think I will just stay ranged and have a back up just in case I need to melee.

I do not see taking percussion or wind as a versatile performance as a prerequisite for the battle song of the peoples revolt. I do however need 4 ranks in one of those to do it.

So I will probably end up going...
1. Skald vigor
3. Point blank shot
5. Precise shot
7. Lingering performance
9. Arcane strike
11. Rapid shot

Unless there is a better way...say wait until I can use the spell shadow bard to push out two performances at once.