GameBanshee Forums

Im making a 4 man party that will be very unique to say the least. The party will be somewhat nefarious and sneaky, thus the characters reflect that. I want a cleric of mask who will be mostly a summoner and healer. Summoning i have already used before to great lengths (summon undead!). Then followed by a full class barbarian for obvious tank reasons. And a single class fighter who will work as a defensive fighter with a shield and the works. Finally i wanted to make a backstab/diplomat/minor spellcaster. I want to make a bard 4/Rogue. This class is the one i am contemplating making due to its rarity. I definitely want it, since i am dual classing 2 of my favorite classes. I am thinking the bards dont get a lot of good spells later on that are worth getting rid of the sneak attack damage for. So it only makes sense to get the good will and reflex saves, plus nifty minor buffing spells, and the songs which are just icing on the cake. I wanted to make this character the main focus on the party since he is the diplomat. Though he wont get all the kills, he will be very good at battling mages or destroying them.

I think that if i make a tiefling rogue and keep the rogue levels higher than the bard levels; it should work out alright. I also am going to make sure that i dont go any higher than lvl 5 bard since that would destroy the build. The reason he will be a mage killer is 3 things-Sneak attack + Resistance from tiefling+ naturally high saves from bard=equals pretty decent mage killer. Correct me if im wrong, but i am pretty siked for this. Does anyone have any advice.

I'd take 8 bard levels. At level 4 you can only cast one level 2 spell per day if you have 14-19 cha, not enough for cat's grace, eagle's splendor and mirror image. Level 5 adds a very powerful bard song, level 7 grants access to the very powerful emotion:hope spell, +2 to saves +2 to hit and +2 to damage for everyone including summons is more useful than a little extra sneak attack damage. Going from level 7 to 8 will add BAB, save bonuses and extra spells.


I'd start the tiefling as rogue with the following stats:

str:18
dex:16
con:12
int:14
wis:3
cha:15

For killing mages you have to hit them and you have to hit them as hard as possible to bypass the damage reduction provided by stoneskin.
The 8 extra starting strength grants +4 to hit and +6 to damage, you need 6 extra rogue levels to get similar benefits only for sneak attacks.
I'd only raise strength at level up.

You can trade points among dex(you need at least 13 for certain useful feats),con and int depending on how you value AC, hitpoints and skillpoints.

Wis should be dumped to the minimum, it's almost useless. The iron will feat is as useful as +4 wis for this character, luck of heroes and bullheaded are more useful than +2 wis while you'll run out of other feats which are as useful as 1 stat point during the game. But I wouldn't even take iron will or luck of heroes, there aren't many will checks and with bard songs, spells or other tools you can easily gain immunity or perfect save chances.

I recommend 15 cha so you can get 16 for the bonus level 3 spell by having Oswald make a winter wolf hat. If you don't want to take more than 6 bard levels start with 13 cha and put 2 extra points into dex, con or int.