Best Sneak Attacker

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I made some investigation about the Ranger. There is a 3.5 Ranger version what fits to the Rogue. You can download it from the nwvault.ign.com

So the Improved Dual wield abilities are achieved at the level of 6, and if you want to invest some more levels at level of 17 Hide in Plain Sight is granted.

In the OC the Ranger(10)/Rogue(10) was a perfect build, with epic levels a Ranger(21)/Rogue(19) also a good one. Well balanced favourite enemies and sneak attacks, Hide in Plain Sight, Improved Evasion, Deffensive Dodge, Bane of Enemies maybe Epic Dodge... and lot's of skill points. (3.5 Ranger gets 6+Int) and 3.5 Ranger has 2 primary saving throw the Reflex and the Fortitude... so improved Evasion is maxed.

If you find the 10d6 sneak too less, choose the Black Panther as a summon and it will also do sneak attacks. One of you will ALWAYS do sneak attack against the enemy. No need to run away and hide again... the Panter sneaks like a Rogue, and it is only 3 levels lower than you.

I know I said before that Ranger is not suits to the Rogue, but the 3.5 Ranger is as good as the CoT (because of the saving throws) but with more levels you would get a balanced powerful char.

Do you know, that with Bane of Enemies you do +2d6 damage against favoured enemies and +2 attack? Well choose favoured enemies as constructs, undeads and other non sneak attackable ones... you will have min 5 favourite enemy, that means +7 attack and extra 5+2d6 damage at every hit...

If you raise your WIS to 14 you can even access all the Ranger spells too...

This is the best sneak attacking build (with the Black Panter) !

 

No it is not... I mean...true, its a very EFFECTIVE build..no arguments about that. Its just that it isn't what I'm looking for! I don't want my panther to be doing the sneak damage while I get one shot in then tank...I want to do it myself!

@Taza: I'm relying on HiPS a lot because that is the whole point of the build...RPing Artemis Entreri...the way I interpret him atleast!

Well...I'm in Chapter 2 of the OC right now, and my character is about 100 xp away from lvl 12. I'm thinking of using the console to modify him to Rogue/ShadowDancer/Assassin...preferably buff the Int and take my STR down and get him back on the Weapon Finesse route.

You are right about the Epic Dodge thing though...it's very much possible and I SHOULD be looking into it.

Question - Is it a good idea to take my STR down to 8 to allow for the Dex to start at 18 and INT at 16? I want to push my Assassin death attack DC up.

Final Build will probably be something like Rogue/Assassin/ShadowDancer 5/25/10
This way I get ALL cool bonus rogue abilities for my character as well as Death Attack with a DC of around 28-30...not to mention a total Sneak/Death Attack damage of 16d6 not counting the Improved Sneak Attack feats.

Now, is there anyway to incorporate these feats:
Pre Epic:
Improved Initiative
Ambidexterity+Two Weapon Fighting+Improved Two Weapon Fighting
Weapon Finesse
Dodge
Mobility

Post Epic:
Epic Dodge
Self-concealment V
Superior Initiative

???

 

Crippling Strike is an excellent ability.

So Rogue10 would be preferred. Maybe Rogue20/Assasin10/Shadowdancer10?

You aren't going to get +16 BAB with that build anyway.

Aand... Self Concealment V is VERY hard to get. I never pick the initiative feats either.

I usually keep my STR at 8 when making a dexxer with finesse. STR, WIS and CHA are generally at 8 with such a build.

 

How about Rogue 8/ Shadowdancer 10/ Assassin22 ?

11d6 death attack DC 34
4d6 sneak attack
Can get 'Self Concealment V', 'Epic Dodge' and (for instance) 'Great Dex IV'

Pre-epics he (or she...?) could for example make good use of sneak/death attack by getting improved two-weapon fighting.

 

@Taza: The whole point of taking 10 SD levels is to get the defensive abilities like Slippery Mind, Death Roll, Improved Evasion etc...if I was going to take 10 lvls in Rogue I might as well go all the way with a tanker class to get +16 BAB. 10 lvls of Assassin isn't worth it IMO.

@Erikhk: Sweet...do you have a lvl 40 build for that? Because I always seem to stuff up the timing of the different levels. Let me know more!

 

How will a Rogue(5)/Assassin(25)/ShadowDancer(10) get the Epic Dodge? It's a Rogue epic feat isn't it? Or it can be selected from the "standard" list?

Ok so you would like to sacrify 15 levels Rogue(5)/SD(10) for Slippery Mind, Deffensive Roll, Improved Evasion... and you also get 3d6 sneak attack.

But with a Rogue(16)/SD(1) you can get theese abilities too and instead of 3d6 you will have 8d6 sneak attacks and +18 skills points and if I calculate the difference with the Assassin levels too: +26 skill points... But Slippery Mind is not as useful I think. You will fail the first and the second will savings too... Use an item what can prevent from the mind afecting spells.

Maybe a Rogue(13)/SD(1) is a better one... And Assassin(26) let's you optimize the bonus Epic feats...
- 7d6 sneak attacks
- 13d6 death attacks
This is the maximum plus you can add as much improved sneak attacks as much you want...

By the way the 3.5Ranger(21)/Rogue(19) build would also get 10d6 + 9d6 sneak attacks and the black panter looks very cool I dont mention the 4+2 attacks per round... and the favourite enemies...and the spells...and the free feats...

Whenever it would try an attack it will succeed...

 

If you go for sneaking power, Crippling Strike is a must. 2 _CUMULATIVE_ strength damage on every sneak. Anything that in any way relies on it's strenght is helpless. (and that isn't immune to sneak attacks or ability drain. )

And if you take the rest of the rogue levels in epic, you can take Improved Sneak Attack as the rogue bonus feat.

 

Rogue 8/ Shadowdancer 10/ Assassin 22

Human, LE

str 10
dex 18 (32)
con 14
wis 8
int 14
cha 8

Levels:
1-8 Rogue
9-16 Shadowdancer
17-20 Assassin
21-22 Shadowdancer
23-40 Assassin

Feats:
1: Dodge, Mobility
3: Weapon Finesse
6-12: Ambidexterity, Two-weapon Fightning, Improved Two-weapon Fightning
15-18: Your choise. Example: Improved Critical and ?
21: Great DEX 1
24: Epic Dodge
27-32: Great DEX 2-4
33-40: Self Concealment 1-5

Skills:
Hide/MS - 43
Tumble - 40
Your choise. I recommend having a good UMD.

 

@erikhk: Did you try this build? How can an Assassin select the Epic Dodge? The Rogue and SD levels are not epic ones... isn't that a criteria is it?

 

It was first done on paper, but when i tried it i had no problems whatsoever.
About epic dodge:
At level 24, if you have put every single point in DEX, you would have 24, 25 with Great DEX 1.
The requirements for Epic Dodge is the following:

"21st level, Dexterity 25+, Dodge, ranks in Tumble, Improved Evasion and Defensive Roll"

Hopefully, it answered your question.

 

A good sneak attacker is a strength-based monk/blackguard/assassin. I tried a build like this once that was a Half-Orc with huge strength.

Monk's flurry of blows gives you an insane amount of attacks per round. That coupled with high strength and sneak attacks from Blackguard and assassin (which stack) and you'll be doing enormous amounts of damage.

I think I figured the average damage per round this character would be doing at level 40 was something like 480.

Of course, this build has horrible AC. She's basically a sneak up on enemy and kill them in a single round before they have a chance to see what just hit them.

Good luck against the hordes of undead and golems, but hey, you asked for a sneak attacker.

 

I'm surprised that the blackguard has been left out of this discussion so much -

Right now, I'm rocking a CE Half-Orc Barbarian 10/Blackguard 13 through HotU. Wielding a halberd, he's putting the smack successfully down. (stats to come, if I can remember to do it.)

 

Blackguard doesn't bring much to the table in terms of sneak attack damage. He doesn't need much investment, but he isn't a crucial class to take either, when you have Rogues and Assassins to invest heaps of levels in.

Ergo...he's not in the running.

However, I must say that I have had to eat my words...Monks ROCK in NWN! They were so gay in BG2 it wasn't even funny.

A Monk/Rogue/Shadowdancer 20/19/1 is AWESOME! It gets even better if you dual weild kamas...you can get 7 attacks per round with all the dualweilding feats and 6 levels of Monk pre-epic!

[Edit: Forgot to add...if you factor in Flurry of Blows and Haste...you get +2 attacks, so that's 9 attacks per round...for 6 lvls of Monk dualweilding Kamas! Not to mention Improved Knockdown for free...but that's another story ]

Lvl 20 just gives you reeeeally awesome bonuses! The only problem with this build is that it doesn't reach its full potential until you are at about lvl 35-38...

 

The build also works if you go Monk9/Rogue10/SD1 and then 20 rogue.

(Monk9 for Improved Evasion - the Mind Spell Immunity is gained from items preferably.)

 

You know...if you're getting 30 lvls of Rogue...it shouldn't be too hard to pick up Slippery Mind. The Monk's awesome saves help...so it shouldn't be too bad.

Playing a Halfling will be good for this sort of build. If you're dualweilding kamas anyway, the reduced fist damage is inconsequential.

However, if you're playing a lvl 20/19/1 Monk...then Human rocks!