POLL: Chronic Restarter seeks Re-Orientation on Melee Weapons

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It's happening again. I have designed the perfect rogue-fighter-weaponsmaster, gaining WM levels as early as level 7, but alas, I am very unhappy with my weapon choice - the scimitar. I picked it for criticals but I simply don't like the crappy looks of the things (same reason why I have never gotten myself to go for falchions). I have also crafted a few nice scimitars already, so clearly the loss is mine - the gems wasted on enchanting them will be missing when I enchant new stuff, but alas. Plus, I can still sell the old crap.

Now to restart the game again (I haven't finished yet) for looks alone is just silly, and I am about to fix that in a more direct and less time consuming fashion.

So I made up my little list of requirements:

• single handed
• not exotic
• not crappy looking
• worthy of a weaponmaster
• 1d8 damage

I have narrowed down that list to three candidates: Longsword (which look silly), battleaxe (which in part look silly too), and light flail.

Point is, I can't decide. Help me

Poll Information
This poll contains 1 question(s). 7 user(s) have voted.
You may not view the results of this poll without voting.

Poll Results: Chonic Restarter seeks Orientation on Melee Weapons (7 votes.)

Chonic Restarter seeks Orientation on Melee Weapons (Choose 1)
* Battleaxe - 14% (1)
* Light Flail - 43% (3)
* Longsword - 43% (3)

 

i would go longsword, more crits and looks better with a rogueish guy. while the powergamer in me screams battleaxe for the higher critical damage. also if you have the treats, duelwield and put a shortsword in offhand for the looks

 

My rogue is more a smoothtalking type, and very straightforward in battle. As for the beginning of Act II my char has 2 levels rogue, 4 levels fighter and 5 levels weaponmaster. Supremely capable in melee. And will be supremely nasty when he gains more sneak attack capability later.

 

I actually voted for the light flail just because I haven't seen it done *grin* I don't know what weapons are available in NWN2, but if you want power, go for longsword for the criticals and take improved critical; otherwise, go for the flail for coolness and the first Weapon Master I've heard of that does bludgeoning damage. Battleaxe just doesn't have the suaveness & finesse I'd associate with a Rogue/Weapon Master, it screams "Thog go smash!" to me

 

BTA,
I see your point, and I would usually choose the katana (about only weapon in the game, with flails, that looks normal) or even dwarven waraxe, if it wasn't for the exotic weapons feat required. But it is more complicated than that alone.

Choosing a dwarf would still have left me one feat short, not to mention the extra skill points a human char gets - with a dwarf I'd have to go for a higher INT than required for a human. That mostly compensates for the dwarf's ability advatages. With a dwarf I would get the WM class two levels later if I take fighter levels, and three levels later if I picked rogue levels.

What makes my char build possible is the bonus feat humans receive (means, it would work with a strongheart halfling, to), and the skill bonus (no need to invest more stat points in Int). I could have traded the able learner feat for exotic weapons (and a powerful and cool looking weapon) but would have ended up being short on skills. You see, my char is finely tuned to my gaming style

Tia,
don't mind the looks of people who will inevitably be staring at you if you follow my advice, and build yourself a flail. A tennis ball, some cord and a stick will do fine for that purpose. And then try to use it in a controlled way I think it is worthy of a weapon master

 

@ Rags,

I've been amazed at the sheer number of excellent and interesting short swords in this game. I think a rogue dualing short swords looks cool as hell, and you can really maximize that by beefing up your parry skill.

I'd try this (the character I just started, and am loving):

Teifling
Fighter 6 / Rogue 7 / Weapon Master 7

Emphasize dex over strength and go for weapon finesse, dump points into parry, and spend feats on two-weapon fighting skills. Invest your weapon master feats into the short sword. Sure it only does 1d6, but whoopty doo. Sneak attack and high dex bonuses will offset the lack of high strength. Have a decent strength (14-16) but emphasize your dex. It fits with the character you're going for, it looks cool, and it's a recipe for tons of damage and cool weapons to choose from. Can't go wrong here.

ps - I was amazed at the sheer LACK of decent long swords in this game. Long swords are supposed to be the bread and butter of melee, and I found only 2-3 magical long swords (by that I mean more than just +1, +2, etc.) in the first two chapters. Dumb.

 

DR,
same for axes - the good stuff you got to make yourself. I'm tending toward axes atm, but alas, I'm still undecided. It seems the only cool looking weapons in the game are flail, dwarven waraxe, katana and kukri. Everything else they screwed up visually.

As for dualwielding, you are of course right. Dualwielding, with a finesse character, going along the rogue-figter-weaponmaster is terrific in terms of sheer number of attacks, and of course, sneak attack. Coupled with two weapon defense feats and high parry the char will probably be untouchable. I built and tested such a char, a halfling rogue wielding kukris. Awesome. I intend to play something like that in MotB. A human or drow rogue with short swords.... ?

With the Kukris, I thought about going to improved crit and enchant two disabling weapons (one with daze/slow, the other with hold/stun - both with with massive critical). Though admitteldly, that would be quite cheesy.

 

** SPOILER **

It just occured to me that the advantages of this character will be all but eliminated once I reach Act III, because most of the enemies in Act III are immune to sneak attack and critical hits. Poopy.

I may reboot this character by ditching the weapon master part and going for Frenzied Bizzurkular instead.

You may want to try one as a dwarf dual-wielder, Rags. That way you can Axe yourself silly, dodge and mobility certainly lend themselves well to such a build, and you could really take advantage of dwarf traits. Try something like this:

Fighter 8 / Dwarven Defender 5 / Frenzied Berzerker 7.

Dual weild, taking battle axes & dwarven war axes in the main hand, and hand axes in the off hand. I'd go ahead and put your dex at 13 and emphasize strength. Avoid the Improved Critical feats (as you can have Sand or Qara cast "Keen Edge" on you, or better yet, make a scabbard of Keen Edges) and instead invest in two-weapon fighting feats. I never use Knockdown or anything like that, so you should have plenty of feats to invest in it now that you don't have to work towards being a weapon master. This character would be a tank-o-rama, and fun to boot. By the time you get Improved/Greater Two-Weapon fighting, you'll have 6 attacks per found.

If you don't dig on dwarves, you could probably work something fun out with a human. Maybe switch out Dwarven Defender for a few levels of Divine Champ. Fun fun.