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10 months ago ::
Aug 14, 2012 - 11:15PM
#11
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Date Joined:
Apr 14, 2010
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Zelink: how did you take Novice Power more than once? Or did you retrain one power into the other?
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10 months ago ::
Aug 15, 2012 - 12:02AM
#12
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Zelink: how did you take Novice Power more than once? Or did you retrain one power into the other?
It's not Novice Power. It's Eternal Seeker.
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10 months ago ::
Aug 15, 2012 - 4:56AM
#13
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Date Joined:
Feb 26, 2011
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You do need Novice power to use Hail of Steel effectively, but yeah Eternal Seeker. Note this is best on a bard. Why? You want bard for the ability to go with a Con/Cha array to use Half-Elf, and for the fantastic utilities (some of the best in the game), and all around solid powers You want the War Chanter PP for temp generation, extra use of AP/enc, and of course, the buff You want Warlord for the MC feat, perhaps Avenging Spirit (entirely DM dependent, and honestly not that needed), Relentless Assault, and Hail of Steel. You need MC cleric for BCL You need Shaman to atually use Spirit of the Ram and ultimately Fury of Athas (seriously, thats probably the best leader capstone, especially if you can turn that MBA into a standard  ). Plus, MC shaman opens up the spirit companion 1/enc OA, one of which grants a BA, and I've had that triggered in 95% of the combats I've been in. It also opens up an additional 1/enc heal. Oh yeah, for true shenanigins, take both Martial Mastery and Divine Mastery (Seriously, thats 5/enc uses of "everyone attack", and it seems excessive. So yeah, best on a bard who can MC a bunch and grab eternal seeker. There is one glaring hole. At level 24, the typical AP sequence (optimally), goes like this. 1st round Standard AP--> Standard 2nd Round Standard (APed last round)--Standard AP--> Standard I'm not there yet, but I'm not sure what to do with 3 standard actions given the free action limit.
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10 months ago ::
Aug 15, 2012 - 11:53AM
#14
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Date Joined:
Apr 14, 2010
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How about we parse this per tier?
It's pretty obvious that for Epic tier, the enabling Bard is solved. Thanks for the ideas Zelink!
For Paragon tier, War Chanter is head and shoulders above all the other stuff you could be doing as an enabling Bard. If your goal is to end combats quicker, take this and don't look back.
For Heroic tier, it's a little less clear. I think the best way to grant multiple attacks per round is to choose Blunder, Echoing Weapon and Rhyme of the Blood-Seeking Blade as your encounter powers. With Staggering Note and an AP, you can make+grant 6 damaging attacks in the first round (2 from Blunder, 1 from Echoing Weapon, 2 from RotBSB including the missed attack and one from Staggering Note). Wis or Int make good secondaries here, but it's not like Blunder and RotBSB aren't good with Con as your secondary.
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10 months ago ::
Aug 15, 2012 - 12:32PM
#15
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Date Joined:
Mar 28, 2010
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I find this very interesting as I've never played a bard myself. I've been in groups with some but they weren't optimized to do what you plan to do here.
I am playing with a bard right now however, who is trying to figure out how to build. I'm playing a revenant githrezai avenger with power of skill and the other goodies of the race. So if I could convince him to get some enabling going I could really rip stuff up hehe. The rest of the party could definetely benefit from a build like this as well ! (and no I am not abusing revenant cheese and I do have a fully developped back story and no I will not be using the belt of cheese even though my DM was nice enough to actually trust me with that item)
SO with all that said, keep up the good work here and if someone wants to post a build or something I wouldn't mind checking it out. I'll see if my bard is open to suggestions for his build and the notes about combat speed up (we're a group of 7 players !). I'm sure the DM would enjoy faster combat rounds too hehe.
"Non nobis Domine Sed nomini tuo da gloriam" "I wish for death not because I want to die, but because I seek the war eternal"
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10 months ago ::
Aug 16, 2012 - 6:09AM
#16
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Date Joined:
Apr 14, 2010
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This is my concept build for an optimized enabling Bard for heroic, looking ahead to paragon where you take War Chanter. The only thing I'm not too sure about is the level 9 daily. The feats are solely chosen for combat, but I can see delaying one or two for other cool feats like Bardic Knowledge. Spoiler:
Show
====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&D Character Builder ======
level 10
Half-Elf, Bard
Build: Valorous Bard
Bardic Virtue Option: Virtue of Valor
Half-Elf Power Selection Option: Dilettante
Theme: Elemental Initiate
FINAL ABILITY SCORES
STR 11, CON 20, DEX 13, INT 10, WIS 8, CHA 20
STARTING ABILITY SCORES
STR 11, CON 16, DEX 13, INT 10, WIS 8, CHA 16
AC: 24 Fort: 23 Ref: 20 Will: 26
HP: 77 Surges: 12 Surge Value: 19
POWERS
Basic Attack: Melee Basic Attack
Basic Attack: Ranged Basic Attack
Elemental Initiate Attack: Disciplined Counter
Bard Feature: Majestic Word
Bard Feature: Words of Friendship
Artificer Attack 1: Magic Weapon
Bard Attack 1: Staggering Note
Bard Attack 1: Vicious Mockery
Bard Attack 1: Blunder
Bard Attack 1: Arrow of Warning
Bard Utility 2: Moment of Escape
Bard Attack 3: Rhyme of the Blood-Seeking Blade
Bard Attack 3: Echoing Weapon
Bard Attack 5: Song of Discord
Bard Utility 6: Revitalizing Incantation
Bard Attack 9: Counterpoint
Bard Utility 10: Mantle of Unity
FEATS
Level 1: Ritual Caster
Level 1: Ki Focus Expertise
Level 2: Combat Virtuoso
Level 4: Superior Implement Training (Accurate ki focus)
Level 6: Improved Initiative
Level 8: Superior Will
Level 10: Improved Defenses
ITEMS
Ritual Book
Rain of Hammers Ki Focus +2 x1
Longsword
Time Link Chainmail +2 x1
Amulet of Protection +2 x1
Longbow x1
====== End ======
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10 months ago ::
Aug 16, 2012 - 7:06AM
#17
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Date Joined:
Mar 28, 2010
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ok so you dropped the echoing weapon in favor of the ki focus route. Nice build, I'll show it to the bard in my group and see what he thinks  edit: You're missing the level 7 encounter power i think
"Non nobis Domine Sed nomini tuo da gloriam" "I wish for death not because I want to die, but because I seek the war eternal"
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10 months ago ::
Aug 16, 2012 - 7:26AM
#18
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Date Joined:
Apr 14, 2010
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This build would be better off with a Songbow instead of a Songblade, but it doesn't really matter all that much what you use.
I didn't think there was a better level 7 power than Echoing Weapon or RotBSB, so there are 2 level 3 powers.
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10 months ago ::
Aug 16, 2012 - 7:44AM
#19
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Date Joined:
Mar 28, 2010
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just wondering but if you go ki focus doesn't that mean that powers like your dilettante, arrow of warning, etc (basically any power that doesn't have the implement keyword) lose out on your expertise bonuses etc ? Right now, at level 10, from what I'm seeing you would only get +12 when using arrow of warning for example vs +14 if you were using a power with the implement keyword.
Basically my questions is, is it worth the accuracy loss when you think that it's only going to get bigger as you level ?
"Non nobis Domine Sed nomini tuo da gloriam" "I wish for death not because I want to die, but because I seek the war eternal"
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10 months ago ::
Aug 16, 2012 - 7:59AM
#20
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Date Joined:
Apr 14, 2010
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Not to be rude, but if you read the ki focus expertise feat you see that the attack bonus is for both implement and weapon attack rolls ;-)
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