Community

Part II of the Revenant Assassin: Heroic Tier

Level 2(Utility+Feat)--Cloak of Shades is a nice little Encounter buff to defense and evasion, though not earth shattering, and is what we take. If you are playing in a game that focuses a lot on non-combat adventuring, I would take Shadowed Legion instead, as it makes the entire party sneaky once per day. Our feat for this level is Melee Training(Dexterity). We're a melee character, and this feats gives us the ability to charge and make opportunity attacks with our full attack bonus.

Level 3(Encounter)--Army of the Night is our level 3 Encounter power. It doesn't deal much damage, but targets will, is a fear effect(helps in Paragon), and has an effect that is loads of fun. This isn't something you casually spam, you save it for when enemies are marked by Defenders or can't really move in some way. Or, you could use it as your shroud attack since its a Weapon attack vs Will. The other powers at this level are ok, but nothing special, so this is what we take.

Level 4(Stats+Feat)--We raise Dexterity(19) and Charisma(17), now and forever. We take our third consecutive boring feat that raises our numbers, and take Focused Expertise(Bastard Sword). Since our Implement attacks work off of our sword, this boosts the accuracy of every attack we make.

Level 5(Daily)--Who doesn't want a little shadowy toady who does your bidding? Thats why we take Twilight Assassin. It deals a little extra damage and gives us almost permanent flanking. The other level 5 powers aren't that interesting, I'd take Grave Spike(level 1) over any of them.

Level 6(Utility+Feat)--All four of the Utilities here are pretty solid. Darting Shadow is good if you hide a lot. Slithering Shadow makes us Shifty like Kobolds, but we already teleport at-will. Slayer's Escape is a reaction teleport plus invisibility, but that invisibility only lasts until the start of your next turn(we can still teleport behind cover and stealth) and we teleport every turn. In the end we take Sheltering Dark. It looks a lot like Cloak of Shades, but is actually somewhat different. It works like this: 1. spend a minor action to activate Sheltering Dark, 2. use Shadow Step to teleport outside of the burst, rendering you invisible, 3. Either use the invisibility to make an attack with combat advantage or attack before you do this and teleport to somewhere you can invoke stealth and remain hidden. Offense or escape gets the nod. For our level 6 Feat we finally make use of our Half-Elf Past Life and take Half-Elf Soul. This gives us the Dilettante power which we can use in place of our crappy racial power, and which we can really abuse at Paragon. We get to choose an At-Will from another class for this. Three classes attack with Dexterity, but none of them really fit since Rogue and Monk require you to use weapons other than a Bastard Sword, and Ranger only uses Dexterity with ranged weapon attacks, which isn't what we do. Our secondary stat is Charisma, where we have much better choices though our attack and damage will be one less. We rule out Implement powers since we don't use the Implements of other classes. This leaves us with Bard, Warlock, and Paladin for Charisma based weapon attacks. The two most interesting choices are Eldritch Strike, a melee basic attack that also slides 1, and Virtuous Strike which is also a melee basic attack that deals Radiant damage and gives us +2 to saves this turn. A Dilettante melee basic attack lets us trade out Melee Training at Paragon, which gives us a bonus feat. We take Virtuous Strike, as having At-Will Radiant damage is very nice with all the enemies vulnerable to it, and is a truly amusing thing to see on a Shadowfell powered Assassin.

Level 7(Encounter)--Echoing Threat is another pest type power. Its fairly common to find an enemy in a position where it really can't get 2 squares away from everyone else, and in that circumstance this power hits very hard. It can really hassle non-mobile enemies with no ranged attacks as well. On top of that, it gives you a free teleport on your next turn(not like we need more, but its free). Captured Shadow is a solid alternative.

Level 8(Stats+Feat)--Our Dexterity and Charisma are raised to 20 and 18. In addition, we take the Velvet Blade Trick feat. It grants an extra shroud to your shroud target when you use your Dilettante attack. Its ok as is, but later on we're going to make our Dilettante attack At-Will, letting us pump out 2 shrouds a turn.

Level 9(Daily)--I had Bound by Shadow penciled in here, over the protest of my player who swears by Wall of Shadows. Bound by Shadow is a solid defensive power that can also deal good damage if you act in a self destructive fashion. After our last session though, I have to give in and agree with my Assassin's player that Wall of Shadows is the better choice. Wall of Shadows isn't the easiest power to use, but it can be incredible if used well. By itself, you can drop it on top of enemies for automatic damage, and it blocks line of sight for everyone but you. You can hide behind it and use Executioner's Noose to pull enemies into it, which deals damage to them twice, once for entering it and another for starting their turn there. If your allies can push/slide enemies into the wall, thats just gravy. Where it becomes truly spectacular is when you place it in a small room where enemies can't get away from it. You don't want to use this in a big open space. It fails there. Its not a power to use in boss fights, its a power to destroy a group of standard enemies, and it does so with style.

Level 10(Utility+Feat)--Given that our standard tactic is to build up 4 shrouds on an enemy and then attack and invoke them, Slayer's Endurance is an automatic choice here. Its basically 20 temporary HP every battle on round 4. Who said we were squishy? Our final Heroic feat is Weapon Focus(Heavy Blades). This boosts all of our damage since the Bastard Sword is also our implement, and next level it will become +2.

Looking at ourselves at level 10, we have it all. We hit like a train, have incredible mobility, a surprising amount of control effects, and have a bunch of tricks that makes us very survivable. We have to juggle a lot and our lives are not simple, but that's the price you pay for being awesome.

Next up, Paragon Tier and twinking out hardcore.

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&D Character Builder ======
Revenant Assassin, level 10
Revenant, Assassin
Guild Training: Night Stalker
Choose your Race in Life: Half-Elf
Background: Occupation - Criminal (+2 to Stealth)

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 12, Con 14, Dex 20, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 18.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 12, Con 12, Dex 16, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 16.


AC: 25 Fort: 20 Reflex: 23 Will: 22
HP: 60 Surges: 8 Surge Value: 15

TRAINED SKILLS
Stealth +17, Endurance +14, Bluff +14, Thievery +15, Acrobatics +15

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Arcana +4, Diplomacy +9, Dungeoneering +5, Heal +5, History +4, Insight +5, Intimidate +11, Nature +5, Perception +5, Religion +4, Streetwise +9, Athletics +6

FEATS
Level 1: Weapon Proficiency (Bastard sword)
Level 2: Melee Training (Dexterity)
Level 4: Focused Expertise (Bastard sword)
Level 6: Half-Elf Soul
Level 8: Velvet Blade Trick
Level 10: Weapon Focus (Heavy Blade)

POWERS
Assassin at-will 1: Shadow Storm
Assassin at-will 1: Executioner's Noose
Dilettante: Virtuous Strike
Assassin encounter 1: Nightmare Shades
Assassin daily 1: Targeted for Death
Assassin utility 2: Cloak of Shades
Assassin encounter 3: Army of the Night
Assassin daily 5: Twlight Assassin
Assassin utility 6: Slayer's Escape
Assassin encounter 7: Echoing Threat
Assassin daily 9: Bound by Shadow
Assassin utility 10: Slayer's Endurance

ITEMS
Adventurer's Kit, Light Shield, Magic Leather Armor +2, Magic Bastard sword +2, Amulet of Protection +2
====== Copy to Clipboard and Press the Import Button on the Summary Tab ======

Its been a while. These, believe it or not are quite a bit of work. I've decided to keep up with what Wizards has been releasing for 4E, and there are piles of new things to play with. We have two fairly new classes in Assassin and Seeker, and I just picked up my copy of Primal Power today. I'm tentatively planning to do Assassin and Seeker, and follow these with the four classes from Primal Power using the new book. I'm going to start off with the first of these, the Assassin class, one of the most complicated and challenging classes 4E has released. The Primal Power classes might be a little rough, as I'll likely have to build them(at least at first) without my beloved Character Builder as it won't be updated again until November 17th. Unless I waste a lot of time again, I'll be without a Primal Power update when I start these.

I have added a few clarifications and additions to my rules for making these. I will bold them for emphasis:

Simple plan: I take a character concept, build it from level 1-30, explaining my choices each step of the way. I have a few basic rules for this.

1. This isn't an optimization excercise. I want a playable character that is enjoyable at all levels.

2. I'm not going to be gearing these beyond generic enhancement items. Access to gear varies from game to game, so for this blog's purposes gear will remain generic, and I won't be building characters that depend on specific gear.

3. I'm going to keep this fully legal, with no house rules. I will be using every source available through the character builder, as well as the background rules. I will be forgoing Forgotten Realms and Scales of War backgrounds as these are more likely to be excluded from home games. In addition, I will avoid using campaign setting specific character options like Spellscarred and Dragonmarks, as these also are often forbidden in some games.

4. I try to keep non-AC defenses as high as possible accross the board. If I have to skimp on AC a little bit to do this, I will.

5. I take cheesy/broken options when they're the right choice. I don't apologize for it. On the other hand, I try to keep the powergaming within the bounds of good taste. I try not to build a character that a DM would be tempted to hit with the nerfbat. I'm fairly lenient as a DM myself, but there are some things that give me pause. I'll push things fairly far, but not towards the very high end of Character Optimization style powergaming.

On to business...

For our fourth character, we're going to go with the D&D Insider exclusive class Assassin, and are going to take it one step further and take the D&D Insider exclusive race Revenant to go with it, as they are a fantastic fit. One of my players has an Assassin in a Paragon level game I am running, and they truly do work well as a Striker, and do so in a unique manner. Now, in building an example of the Assassin class I'm going to stick to a fairly vanilla take on things, which was likely to happen in any case since the Assassin class doesn't have the pile of options the standard classes have when paired with the accompanying Martial/Arcane/Divine/Primal power book.

Revenant Assassin, Level 1:

Race--Revenant--We choose Revenant because its a great fit for the Assassin class, and to shine the spotlight on the D&D exclusive content. Revenant has a bonus to two of the Assassin's primary stats, Dexterity and Constitution, though we will be using the Charisma build for our Assassin. Regardless, Constitution is still a stat we want a good score in, and it won't go to waste. The Revenant's two main racial features are Unnatural Vitality, which will see good use on a low HP character who spends a lot of time in melee, and Past Life, which we are going to cheese the hell out of. The sexy choice for past life is Half-Elf, which allows us to take Dilettante and all sorts of craziness later on. We get to pick a language, and since we used to be a Half Elf we take Elven for flavor reasons.

Class--Assassin--The Assassin is an interesting take on the Striker role, as it requires patience. The class is built around the concept of saving up for one big hit, instead of trying to do as much damage as quickly as possible. The teleportation and stealth/hiding/invisibility powers of this class make it very elusive, to make up for its Wizard-style HP. Don't let those low HP fool you, as its fairly easy to keep AC high with this class, and its almost impossible for enemies to gang up on you and you have an amazing ability to disengage from combat. I've seen this class in play, and survivability isn't one of its problems. Looking at the Assassin's class features, first is Assassin's Shroud. This is your main source of extra Striker damage, and it gets better if you wait and save it up. What you need to learn to do is to attack one creature, place shrouds on another, and take a big hit when the shrouded creature is bloodied or has four of them. The second feature is Guild Training, of which we choose Night Stalker despite Revenant giving us a Constitution bonus(Constitution boosts the other Guild Training path). Night Stalker gives us a second and independant source of extra Striker damage, with an easy to fulfill condition. Night Stalker hits harder(we're a Striker), and has the more interesting power options, particularly for our Dilettante, so its what we take. We also get Shade Form, which is a subtle and itneresting power. It can be used to escape, defend against being damaged, to hide easily, and has some interesting interactions with Assassin powers. Finally, Assassin gets one of the best mobility class features in the game in Shadow Step. You teleport into someone elses shadow, up to 3/4/5 squares depending on tier. Useful both to get position and to get away(you can teleport next to an ally), and will be your standard mode of transportation.

Background--Occupation(Criminal +2 Stealth)--Our Class already gives us access to most of the skills we're after, so we're looking for a strategic bonus to an important skill from our Background, and Stealth is the most important skill for Assassins. I take Criminal, but anything that gives +2 to Stealth will do.

Ability Scores--We use Dexterity to attack, so putting 16(9pts) into it gives us an 18 with our racial bonus. We are taking the Night Stalker path, so we place a 16(9pts) there as well. We have Wizard HP and are going to be a melee character, so 12(2pts) Constitution gives us a 14 with our racial bonus. We spend the last two points on Strength, as this will become useful later on when we want Hide Armor. We drop the 8 into Intelligence, which does nothing for us, and leave Wisdom at a 10. Our stats end up Str12, Con14, Dex18, Int8, Wis10, Cha16

Skills--Assassin gives us Steath for free, as if we would even think about passing on it. We take Thievery since its rare and we have the Dexterity for it, and also take Acrobatics to go with our high Dexterity. We have a racial bonus to Endurance, and its a useful skill so we take that too. For some reason, Intimidate(Revenant gives +2) isn't a class skill, so we take Bluff as our social skill instead to round things out.

Feats--If I plan to take a Superior weapon, I prefer to take it at level 1 to avoid issues later on with having a non-superior enchanted weapon. Given our fragility, we're inclined to use the Light Shield Assassin gives us, so we spend our feat on Weapon Proficiency(Bastard Sword) for a very nice one handed weapon.

Powers--

At-Will 1--Shadow Storm--This is the best of the Assassin At-Wills, as it comes with some built in extra damage. Hitting hard is what we do. Shadow Storm is much better for this than Leaping Shades since the Assassin tends not to attack its shrouded target.

At-Will 2--Executioner's Noose--This is a nifty piece of control, as pull 2 and slowed is much stronger than it sounds. It also works as your standard ranged attack.

Encounter 1--Nightmare Shades--Boosted by the fact that we're a Night Stalker, this hits hard, targets Will for accuracy, and sets us up for another big hit on the following round. Its also a fear attack, which becomes important later. Gloom Thief is nice with its added Invisibility and gets some consideration, but Nightmare Shades is hard to pass on.

Daily 1--Targeted For Death--Some of the other powers are interesting, but they don't compete with Targeted for Death in terms of raw Violence. Targeted for Death allows you to shred Elites and Solos, and shredding Elites and Solos is a good thing.

Gear--As I stated previously, Assassin gives us proficiency in the light shield, and we'll take one thanks to our fragility. We spent a feat on a Bastard Sword, so that's our weapon. Leather Armor is our only choice on that front. We have At-Will ranged Implement attacks, so we don't really need anything else. We buy an Adventurer's kit just because we can.

Next up: Heroic Tier

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&D Character Builder ======
Revenant Assassin, level 1
Revenant, Assassin
Guild Training: Night Stalker
Choose your Race in Life: Half-Elf
Background: Occupation - Criminal (+2 to Stealth)

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 12, Con 14, Dex 18, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 16.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 12, Con 12, Dex 16, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 16.


AC: 17 Fort: 13 Reflex: 15 Will: 14
HP: 24 Surges: 8 Surge Value: 6

TRAINED SKILLS
Stealth +11, Endurance +9, Bluff +8, Thievery +9, Acrobatics +9

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Arcana -1, Diplomacy +3, Dungeoneering, Heal, History -1, Insight, Intimidate +5, Nature, Perception, Religion -1, Streetwise +3, Athletics +1

FEATS
Level 1: Weapon Proficiency (Bastard sword)

POWERS
Assassin at-will 1: Shadow Storm
Assassin at-will 1: Executioner's Noose
Assassin encounter 1: Nightmare Shades
Assassin daily 1: Targeted for Death

ITEMS
Adventurer's Kit, Light Shield, Leather Armor, Bastard sword
====== Copy to Clipboard and Press the Import Button on the Summary Tab ======

Just two small addendums to my previous two builds, the Human Wizard and Eladrin Warlord:

Wizard--With the loss of Reaper's Touch, and the absence of a generous DM who lets you take it anyway, we have to make a choice on how much we want to have a melee Wizard Implement attack. We can stay Human and trade Reaper's Touch for Melee Training(Intelligence), and have a crappy Staff attack that doesn't really work with Dual Implement Spellcasting. Or we could skip Melee Training and take another feat. Keeping Magic Missile isn't necessary if we don't have Reaper's Touch. On the other hand, we could go Shadar Kai to keep Reaper's Touch. Going Shadar-Kai means we lose +1 Reflex/Will and we lose Illusory Ambush and Action Surge. On the other hand, the Shadar-Kai teleport is quite useful, and the +2 Shadar Kai gets to Dexterity lets us shift two points over to Charisma to qualify for Spell Focus at Paragon. I would trade out Psychic Lock, which isn't as useful without Illusory Ambush for it. I actually decided to start out this character for my next RPGA character(I named him Valtrex), and I chose to go the Shadar Kai route.

Eladrin Warlord--I wanted to add that it is possible to go Greatspear with this character, depending on party construction. I designed that Warlord to take care of its own well being, and using a shield to keep AC as high as possible. In a party with multiple Defenders, or one really effective Defender, you can skimp on your Defenses a bit. It is still possible to get Weapon Mastery at Epic with Spears by shifting our +2 to Intelligence to Dexterity from Chosen. This gives us 19 Dexterity, qualifying us. Losing 2 Intelligence and dumping the shield leaves us with an 3 less AC, though we can trade 2 Fortitude for +1 AC by swapping Voidhide for Elderhide. I would only do this if you can count on your friends 100% to keep you alive.

After posting this, I'm going to add a new feature of this blog, which I'll call updates. Basically it will introduce alternate build options and issues people have brought up, both in comments and in the threads I create to go along with these blog posts in the Character Optimization forums. Things like using a Heavy Shield or Greatspear with this character, for example. Its easier to deal with these issues in their own post than to go back and edit the four previous posts. I'm also going to try to start including alternative options in the blogs themselves when they occur to me.

And now, on with Epic Tier:

Level 21 (Epic Destiny+Feat+Retraining)--We consider taking Warmaster for a second. Spring the Trap is an amazing Utility, almost worth taking Warmaster just for that. It doesn't offer much more than that however. This us brings us back to Demigod, the default Epic Destiny for all characters. We began play with 16 Strength and we want more, so we're going to stick with Demigod/Chosen, but while Demigod's big regeneration Utility is probably the strongest choice for the level 26 ED Utility, we're a Leader role character, and there is one choice among the Chosen slate of Epic Destinies that really fits us, both the role and our race, and that is Chosen of Corellon, and that is what we take. Its Utility, High Arcana, is both very strong and an encounter duration party buff. At level 21, Chosen of Corellon gives us +2 to two stats, those being Strength(24) and Intelligence(26). For our first Epic feat, we'll take Heavy Blade Mastery in the spirit of being a threat in and of ourselves in addition to being a buff machine. There are more leaderish feats for Epic, but none with the raw power of HBM so we take Mastery first. Also at this time we retrain Iron Will for Robust Defenses, since Robust Defenses does everything Iron Will does and boosts the other two defenses as well.

Level 22(Utility+Feat)--Its hard to argue with Quickening Order at this level. Simply stated, you pop Quickening Order before the fight begins, the party goes first, and they destroy everything with prejudice for a turn. Made of win all around. For our feat, we'll solidify our sub-par Will defense once and for all with Epic Will. I don't like having sub-par defenses if it can be helped, and it can.

Level 23(Encounter)--Level 23 is a tough level for us. We have three solid choices, none of which really stand out. Quickening Force deals solid damage and grants saving throws all around(we don't get the bonus for Resourceful though). Rabbits and Wolves deals solid damage and grants solid repositioning with two full move shifts for allies. Sudden Assault grants an ally a free standard action with a large bonus to attack against your target, but deals piddling damage. Rabbits and Wolves is the most dynamic of these three, so that is what we take. We trade out Surprise Attack for this.

Level 24(Epic Feature+Stats+Feat)--From Chosen of Corellon, we get Divine Recovery which heals us back to our bloodied value when we are dropped to zero for the first time each day, which is pretty darn nice. Strength and Intelligence go up again(25 and 27). Our feat is Protective Leadership. Its not a big boost, but +1 to the defenses of all allies while bloodied is pretty solid.

Level 25(Daily)--Our level 25 Daily is Relentless Assault, which cranks critical hits up to 11 for the party. This is somewhat dependant on the party's ability to deal critical hits, but even so this power can get crazy. Precision Stance is a strong alternative, and what should be taken if your Epic party sucks at getting crits, but Relentless Assault is too much fun to pass on otherwise. We keep Lead the Attack again, and trade out Anticipate Attack.

Level 26(Epic Utility+Feat)--If we had taken Demigod, we would have had a Daily Utility that granted us regeneration equal to our Intelligence stat(not modifier), essentially making us unkillable. In keeping with our Leader role, we instead took Chosen of Corellon, and here is the sole difference. We get High Arcana, which for the duration of the encounter grants you and each ally either +4 to Fort/Will/Reflex or +2 to attack rolls with implements, chosen at the beginning of each turn. This is a huge, party wide buff, and good for taking on the powerful boss battles Epic play seems to generate. Our level 26 feat is Feywild Warrior, as much for fun value as utility. Free teleports after resolving Daily powers for you and your target is sweet, and can get crazy with Spiral of Fey Death and all its targets.

Level 27(Encounter)--Brutal Setup is the power of choice at this level. It buffs allies, but is in addition a bit of control, which is somewhat rare for a Warlord power. A lot of powers give the Dazed condition, and your buff for these lasts until the end of the encounter so your buff may happen again. We swap out Beat Them Into the Ground.

Level 28(Stats+Feat)--We finalize our stats with 28 Intelligence and 26 Strength. In addition, we take the Triumphant Attack feat, adding a debuff to our 19-20 crits.

Level 29(Daily)--We finally say goodbye to Lead the Attack after 28 levels of win, as we finally have two Daily powers that are more painful to give up in Break the Tempo and Relentless Assault. For our final attack power we take Stand Invincible. Perfect Front is a strong alternative, and puts out a lot of offense, particularly if the party can bunch up around you, but we have offensive boosts up and down all over this character, while Stand Invincible's strong defensive boost rounds us out more. Note that High Arcana's defensive buff is not a power bonus, while Stand Invincible is a power bonus. They do stack, and +8 to Fortitude/Reflex/Will is great for killing gods, demon lords, and the like.

Level 30(Epic Feature+Feat)--We get the capstone Demigod/Chosen feature here, the infinite Encounter power loop we all know and love. We get one more feat, and we take Martial Mastery for more Encounter recycling.

That's all for our Epic Taclord. Next up will be the two classes new to Character Builder this month: Seeker and Assassin!

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&D Character Builder ======
Eladrin Warlord, level 30
Eladrin, Warlord, Spiral Tactician, Chosen
Commanding Presence: Tactical Presence
Divine Spark: Divine Spark Intelligence
Divine Spark: Divine Spark Strength
Background: Society - Noble (+2 to Diplomacy)

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 26, Con 12, Dex 17, Int 28, Wis 10, Cha 13.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 16, Con 10, Dex 13, Int 16, Wis 8, Cha 11.


AC: 46 Fort: 44 Reflex: 43 Will: 40
HP: 169 Surges: 10 Surge Value: 42

TRAINED SKILLS
Religion +29, Endurance +20, Athletics +27, Diplomacy +23, History +31

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Acrobatics +17, Arcana +26, Bluff +16, Dungeoneering +15, Heal +15, Insight +15, Intimidate +16, Nature +15, Perception +15, Stealth +17, Streetwise +16, Thievery +17

FEATS
Level 1: Eladrin Soldier (retrained to Weapon Focus (Heavy Blade) at Level 14)
Level 2: Tactical Assault
Level 4: Weapon Expertise (Heavy Blade)
Level 6: Tactical Inspiration
Level 8: Durable
Level 10: Saving Inspiration
Level 11: Combat Commander
Level 12: Fey Tactics
Level 14: Weapon Proficiency (Bastard sword)
Level 16: Iron Will (retrained to Robust Defenses at Level 21)
Level 18: Shield Specialization
Level 20: Heavy Blade Opportunity
Level 21: Heavy Blade Mastery
Level 22: Epic Will
Level 24: Protective Leadership
Level 26: Feywild Warrior
Level 28: Triumphant Attack
Level 30: Martial Mastery

POWERS
Warlord at-will 1: Wolf Pack Tactics
Warlord at-will 1: Commander's Strike
Warlord encounter 1: Warlord's Favor
Warlord daily 1: Lead the Attack
Warlord utility 2: Knight's Move
Warlord encounter 3: Steel Monsoon
Warlord daily 5: Stand the Fallen
Warlord utility 6: Guileful Switch
Warlord encounter 7: Surprise Attack
Warlord daily 9: Knock Them Down
Warlord utility 10: Bolstering Shout
Warlord encounter 13: Beat Them Into the Ground (replaces Warlord's Favor)
Warlord daily 15: Anticipate Attack (replaces Stand the Fallen)
Warlord utility 16: Warlord's Banner
Warlord encounter 17: Thunderous Fury (replaces Steel Monsoon)
Warlord daily 19: Break the Tempo (replaces Knock Them Down)
Warlord utility 22: Quickening Order
Warlord encounter 23: Rabbits and Wolves (replaces Surprise Attack)
Warlord daily 25: Relentless Assault (replaces Anticipate Attack)
Warlord encounter 27: Brutal Setup (replaces Beat Them Into the Ground)
Warlord daily 29: Stand Invincible (replaces Lead the Attack)

ITEMS
Adventurer's Kit, Light Shield, Magic Voidhide +6, Magic Bastard sword +6, Magic Javelin +6, Amulet of Protection +6
====== Copy to Clipboard and Press the Import Button on the Summary Tab ======

And now, after a modest wait, part III, Paragon Tier:

Level 11(Paragon Path+Feat)--Here begins the controversy. It is widely held that Battle Captain is the best Paragon Path for Tactical Warlord. I don't dispute this. What I will say that Battle Captain is more than a little guilty of being boringly effective. It does have some of the most incredible nova generating powers in the game with some great static ally boosts, but its powers aren't terribly interesting. Eladrin have an alterative Paragon Path called the Spiral Tactician. It doesn't have the supernova generation of Battle Captain, but its still fairly solid in that department, has greater ability to manipulate initiative and party positioning, and the powers are really fun. Because of our goal to balance the fun to play factor with optimization, we're going to take Spiral Tactician here. At level 11, this Path gives us the ability to recharge Fey Step when we spend an Action Point(and one level from now we start doing flippy tricks with it), the ability to allow one ally to reroll initiative with a sizable bonus at the start of every fight, and Fey Step Assault, an accurate and hard hitting Encounter Power that is boosted by your Fey Step. Our feat for this level is Combat Commander, one of the most powerful feats in the entire game. Adding your Intelligence modifier to the initative rolls of the entire party is an incredible advantage, and we want it right now.

Level 12(Paragon Utility+Feat)--At Level 12, Spiral Tactician gives us Convey Ally, an Encounter Ranged Teleport of one of our allies. Knight's move, only better. Our feat for this level is Fey Tactics, which allows you to teleport an ally within 5 squares when you Fey Step. Combined with the fact that your Action Point recharges Fey Step, there is no end to the fun here.

Level 13(Encounter)--Our Encounter power is Beat Them Into the Ground(trading out Warlord's Favor). Its a lesser version of Knock Them Down, but as an Encounter power. Your allies get a big boost to their knockdown attempts, and this should be able to knock a good number of enemies prone. Nothing really special, just more interesting and appropriate for this build than any other choice.

Level 14(Stats+Feat+Retraining)--Our stats are increased to 20 Str and 22(+6) Intelligence here. At this point we choose to up the damage we deal with attacks by taking Weapon Proficiency: Bastard Sword. We would have taken this sooner, but Fey Tactics and Combat Commander were priorities, and there isn't anything at Heroic that we would have been willing to trade out. Seeing that we aren't using it anymore, we also retrain Eladrin Soldier to Weapon Focus: Heavy Blades. We wait until Paragon to switch to Bastard Sword as this is when we get the ability to have +2 damage with it. We lose our Tratnyrs for this, but its a small price to pay.

Level 15(Daily)--We take an interesting power here, Anticipate Attack. Its an interrupt attack in response to being hit with a melee attack, accurate(targets reflex), than gives us a free shift if we hit that can nullify the attack if we can shift out of reach. In addition, hit or miss every adjacent ally gets to beat on it. Timed right, this is amazing, so look for the right moment. Also note that you can provoke an Opportunity Attack to try to force the issue with this. No way we're trading out Lead the Attack for this, its just too good. As good as Stand the Fallen is, we let go of it at this time, as we have another mass heal as an Encounter Utility(Bolstering Shout).

Level 16(Paragon Feature+Utility+Feat)--Our Paragon Feature for this level is Fey Tactics(not to be confused with the feat of the same name we took at level 12). Its our consolation prize for taking Spiral Tactician, as it changes our Tactical Presence feature from half Int mod bonus to allies Action Point attacks to a bonus equal to our full Int mod. Its not as good as adding our Int mod to attacks and damage until the end of our next turn of allies we heal with Inspiring Word(what we would get from Battle Captain), but that's the price we pay for having more interesting things to do. Our Utility power for this level is Warlord's Banner. Its an Encounter mass heal spell, and gives a +2 bonus to attack rolls to all effected(whether they choose to spend a surge or not). Its a Standard action, but it does enough to justify the cost. This gives us two mass heals per encounter, which combined with three Inspiring Words is the definition of overkill, but I'm not really sure there's anything else we want. Bolstering Shout is more flexible, being a minor action instead of a standard, and if we were going to trade out Bolstering Shout it would be for a level 2 Utility, and with a lack of conviction we're going to stick with Bolstering Shout. As our Feat for level 16, we take Iron Will, to buff our terrible Will defense that we've suffered with long enough.

Level 17(Encounter)--Thunderous Fury is our level 17 Encounter power, and its a non-choice. It deals big damage, it dazes, and our allies get to rip the target to shreds until the end of your next turn. It does it all, and theres nothing else we even think about taking here. We happily drop Steel Monsoon for this.

Level 18(Stats+Feat)--Intelligence and Strength go up to 23 and 21 here. We take the time to buff our AC at this level, with the Shield Specialization feat. We could take Heavy Shield Proficiency here for an extra boost to Reflex we won't loose at Epic, but taking Shield Specialization keeps our armor check penalty lower. We could go either way with this, but I personally prefer not to penalize skills.

Level 19(Daily)--For level 19, we take Break the Tempo, which lets us chase enemies around, smack them with free out-of-turn attacks, and penalize their attacks. We don't interfere with Defender marks to do this, either. This even works if the enemy chooses to attack us, so there is no avoiding us short of moving more than 4 squares away. More or less, a no-brainer choice. We again choose to keep our awesome level 1 Daily, and dump Knock Them Down instead. We have its lesser cousin as an Encounter power anyway.

Level 20(Paragon Daily+feat)--Spiral Tactican lets us go supernova at level 20, with Spiral of Fey Death. We hit an enemy for solid damage, then get to choose to either slide them or apply ongoing 10 damage, and then we teleport and do it again, and again, and again... For our final Paragon Tier feat, we look to choose between Heavy Shield Proficiency and Heavy Blade Opportunity. Heavy Shield further boosts our AC, while Heavy Blade Opportunity gives us some fun options with Opportunity Attacks. Our AC, while it could stand being higher, is fairly solid, while Opportunity Attacks aren't exactly our specialty. We choose Heavy Blade Opportunity, simply because its more interesting, as our At-Will Warlord attacks slide our allies and let them hit for us.

Next up: We take on Epic Tier and pass on Demigod. Sort of.

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&D Character Builder ======
Eladrin Warlord, level 20
Eladrin, Warlord, Spiral Tactician
Commanding Presence: Tactical Presence
Background: Society - Noble (+2 to Diplomacy)

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 21, Con 11, Dex 16, Int 23, Wis 9, Cha 12.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 16, Con 10, Dex 13, Int 16, Wis 8, Cha 11.


AC: 35 Fort: 32 Reflex: 32 Will: 29
HP: 118 Surges: 9 Surge Value: 29

TRAINED SKILLS
Religion +21, Endurance +14, Athletics +19, Diplomacy +18, History +23

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Acrobatics +12, Arcana +18, Bluff +11, Dungeoneering +9, Heal +9, Insight +9, Intimidate +11, Nature +9, Perception +9, Stealth +12, Streetwise +11, Thievery +12

FEATS
Level 1: Eladrin Soldier (retrained to Weapon Focus (Heavy Blade) at Level 14)
Level 2: Tactical Assault
Level 4: Weapon Expertise (Heavy Blade)
Level 6: Tactical Inspiration
Level 8: Durable
Level 10: Saving Inspiration
Level 11: Combat Commander
Level 12: Fey Tactics
Level 14: Weapon Proficiency (Bastard sword)
Level 16: Iron Will
Level 18: Shield Specialization
Level 20: Heavy Blade Opportunity

POWERS
Warlord at-will 1: Wolf Pack Tactics
Warlord at-will 1: Commander's Strike
Warlord encounter 1: Warlord's Favor
Warlord daily 1: Lead the Attack
Warlord utility 2: Knight's Move
Warlord encounter 3: Steel Monsoon
Warlord daily 5: Stand the Fallen
Warlord utility 6: Guileful Switch
Warlord encounter 7: Surprise Attack
Warlord daily 9: Knock Them Down
Warlord utility 10: Bolstering Shout
Warlord encounter 13: Beat Them Into the Ground (replaces Warlord's Favor)
Warlord daily 15: Anticipate Attack (replaces Stand the Fallen)
Warlord utility 16: Warlord's Banner
Warlord encounter 17: Thunderous Fury (replaces Steel Monsoon)
Warlord daily 19: Break the Tempo (replaces Knock Them Down)

ITEMS
Adventurer's Kit, Light Shield, Magic Bastard sword +4, Magic Javelin +4, Magic Feyhide Armor +4, Amulet of Protection +4
====== Copy to Clipboard and Press the Import Button on the Summary Tab ======