Highest AB builds in Arelith

[Lurch]

Inspired by the melee DPS builds thread, what are some of the highest attack bonus builds out there? Assume it's a steady source of AB. Melee or ranged can be a separate competition, although I'm pretty sure Arcane archer for the whole 19 levels takes the ranged cake outright.

Everybody can use true seeing potions to cap out their bonus should they really need to (other than true flames) so buffing spells don't count for that much here. I'm not sure if Arelith's barbarian rage bonus and two handed bonus count towards the attack bonus cap or not. I'm going to assume they dont.

Excerpts from wiki:

"The following combat feats can be used to directly increase the attack bonus for a single attack (none subject to the cap): disarm (if using a larger weapon), smite evil, and smite good."

"The following general feats directly increase attack bonus (none subject to the cap): bane of enemies (ranger class only), epic prowess, epic weapon focus, point blank shot (ranged combat only), and weapon focus."

"The following class and racial feats directly increase attack bonus (none subject to the cap): battle training vs. goblins, battle training vs. orcs, battle training vs. reptilians, enchant arrow, epic superior weapon focus, good aim, nature sense, opportunist, and superior weapon focus."

Assuming a proper viable build with good damage and/or utility like power attack, improved knockdown, called shot, disarm, etc. that actually utilize the ultra high AB, what are the highest numbers that you can get?

Off the top of my head: Human (in order to get feats in time) Kensai Barbarian 14 / Weapon Master 16

Using a scythe, getting 25 BAB, +2 two handed, +2 rage, +1 weapon focus, +2 epic weapon focus, +1 epic prowess, +1 superior weapon focus, +2 epic superior weapon focus, +15 str mod (say, 40 str fully buffed, since 18 base + 2 gift + 7 level boosts + 1 great str feat + 12 from gear) = 51 AB with a mundane weapon (71 with true strike)

EDIT: Oops, 18 constitution is required for the full bonus for barbarian (mine would only get 12), so 50 AB. Might be more useful to swap barbarian for fighter, human for half-orc or orog (for +1 str mod) and take full 19 levels of weapon master (+1 additional epic superior focus) to get back to 51 AB (which is unconditional, unlike the rage bonus)

EDIT: Forgot to mention, tactical ways of lowering enemy AC like taunt or curse song, or situational attack modifiers, like stealth, are also valid.

[yellowcateyes]

I'm not sure if Arelith's barbarian rage bonus and two handed bonus count towards the attack bonus cap or not. I'm going to assume they dont.

They do. Arelith's custom content, by and large, makes use of applied effects that count towards the AB cap. The only abilities that you should assume don't are hardcoded vanilla abilities, like Smite.

This is one big reason a Spellsword's max achievable AB is low - much of their AB is a bonus granted by script, meaning they hit the +20 cap much sooner than most.

[Lurch]

I see, even more reason to stay away from barbarian then, and that also makes one handed builds competitive.

I figure for the ranged character, there are a few arcane archer builds, one is just ranger 6 / fighter 5 / AA 19 and a close second would be Bard 6 / Master Harper 5 / AA 19. Even though the harper version loses 3 BAB, it almost closes the gap with endless curse songs that manage to lower target armor class by 2. Bard song gets it further ahead but then again it counts against the cap and is not worth as much.

It's even possible to take the curse song further to -4 by giving up +2 on the enchant arrow and taking 4 more levels of bard. Essentially the same, but gaining more spells to cast. However, when it comes to tactical options like called shots, there only the real attack bonus matters, not lowering AC, as the check is against discipline, so this avenue is not as valuable. EDIT: Actually curse song lowers skill checks too, -2 with lvl 11 bard song, -3 with 15, so it's close but not enough.

Also, bard spellcasting might not be that beneficial if it worsens the UMD item use caster levels for all time thereafter, from 30 to 10.

So, let's say a wild elf ranger fighter arcane archer, starting with 22 dex, putting 7 points from levels and 3 from epic feats (through arcane archer and general epic feats) + 12 from buffs, gives us 44 dexterity in total. Still has room for epic weapon specialization.

25 BAB + 1 from point blank shot + 1 weapon focus + 2 epic weapon focus + 1 epic prowess + 10 enchant arrow + 17 from dexterity = 57 + longbow attack bonus

55 with mundane bow and rapid shot, 75 with true strike added (77 with a +2 longbow or better).

Due to the multitude of pre-epic feats and lack of compelling options for ranged characters, the archer variant with it's arrow crafting might be more enticing than sniper, even if one only gets steel arrows. Weapon finesse should probably be there for emergencies. Starting out as a fighter allows us to not put 3+ points in wisdom, because we have more important things like strength, constitution and intelligence to raise.

So as it stands, 69 for melee and 77 for ranged, so far.

[OutOfChwi]

I was toying with a CoT build in the test server that got pretty close to 60 AB so 80 with a TS pot. Fighter WM CoT I think I ended up with. Not really ideal as its very reliant on top tier items but possible.

[Lurch]

I was toying with a CoT build in the test server that got pretty close to 60 AB so 80 with a TS pot. Fighter WM CoT I think I ended up with. Not really ideal as its very reliant on top tier items but possible.

I'm fairly certain you were including bonuses that count towards the +20 attack bonus cap (for example, divine wrath) in your close to 60 AB estimation, so true strike woudn't give you +20 AB, but something noticeably less, though I'd still like to see the build.

The only special thing I see about CoT is getting bonus great wisdom feats for a character that uses zen archery, but then again, every other arcane archer level all through epics gives an equivalent thing through enchant arrow, when discussing ranged characters.

[One Two Three Five]

Don't think it's necessarily a functional build but the dumbest one I can think of is a pixie ranger. (You don't need to be a pixie, it's just funny to me, I guess.)
22 dex to start, 7 from leveling, even out with one feat for 30. Gear+Grace for 42. 16 bonus.
25 BaB+16+3 EWF+1 Epic Prowess+2 Bane of Enemies+5 enchanted weapon+ 1 small size bonus for a total of 53.

You can push it just slightly further by taking 3 druid levels to pick up nature sense for another +2. 21 ranger can self-cast a 21 minute Aid spell for another 1, topping this build out at 56 AB vs favored enemies, 54 vs non. Of that, 6 (enchanted weapon and aid) goes towards the cap, so true strike will give you 14 only, for 70 AB vs favored enemies.

The damage wont be super good, of course. (You can run this instead as a +2 str gift half-orc and only lose the 1 ab from small stature, though, and get a pretty little +16 damage mod on a scimitar or something.) Chose ranger/druid since they and weapon master have the only 'always on, non-magical' AB boosts I can think of off-top. Heavily situational, though.

Edit: I think the horc one would do something like d6+16+6 (epic spec if fighter dump, 2d6 sneak attack average roughly if rogue dump)+5 enchant+d6+2d8 bane+4 favored enemy bonus.. assuming averages, 47 per hit? Not too bad. 94 on a crit.

Alternatively I think a 19 weapon master (+4 ab bonus) with a high enough combat modifier will be pretty high.

[Trunx]

I see, even more reason to stay away from barbarian then, and that also makes one handed builds competitive.

I figure for the ranged character, there are a few arcane archer builds, one is just ranger 6 / fighter 5 / AA 19 and a close second would be Bard 6 / Master Harper 5 / AA 19. Even though the harper version loses 3 BAB, it almost closes the gap with endless curse songs that manage to lower target armor class by 2. Bard song gets it further ahead but then again it counts against the cap and is not worth as much.

It's even possible to take the curse song further to -4 by giving up +2 on the enchant arrow and taking 4 more levels of bard. Essentially the same, but gaining more spells to cast. However, when it comes to tactical options like called shots, there only the real attack bonus matters, not lowering AC, as the check is against discipline, so this avenue is not as valuable. Also, bard spellcasting might not be that beneficial if it worsens the UMD item use caster levels for all time thereafter, from 30 to 10.

So, let's say a wild elf ranger fighter arcane archer, starting with 22 dex, putting 7 points from levels and 3 from epic feats (through arcane archer and general epic feats) + 12 from buffs, gives us 44 dexterity in total. Still has room for epic weapon specialization.

25 BAB + 1 from point blank shot + 1 weapon focus + 2 epic weapon focus + 1 epic prowess + 10 enchant arrow + 17 from dexterity = 57 + longbow attack bonus

55 with mundane bow and rapid shot, 75 with true strike added (77 with a +2 longbow or better).

So as it stands, 69 for melee and 77 for ranged, so far.

+2 AB from a bow counts towards the AB cap, so you don't get +20 from True Strike.

How are you getting 69 for melee?

[One Two Three Five]

I should note that my build is probably borderline unplayable. And also that in PvE you can have your animal companion -guard you for another +2 flanking bonus, not subject to the cap.

Aaand also that if you've got 50-some AB but have to keep chugging true strike potions to hit something, you should probably just run.

[Lurch]

+2 AB from a bow counts towards the AB cap, so you don't get +20 from True Strike.

How are you getting 69 for melee?

The AB from the bow does count towards the cap, yes, but I was under the impression that you can get it to stack with +20 from truestrike, assuming there's something that lowers your attack bonus overall, like rapid shot in this case.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it is my understanding that the engine counts up all the miscellaneous bonuses and penalties, adds them together, and treats any result over +20 as exactly that (stacking bonuses like ability modifiers, weapon focuses, etc. are handled separately). This is at least how dodge AC stacking works, such that over +20 dodge AC can be beneficial, if it counters AC penalties like curse song (I believe).

This means that combat modes like expertise and power attack can be used without penalty in conjunction with true strike by, say, a battle cleric or spellsword that has buff spells and effects pushing their AB way over the actual +20 cap.

The +69 comes from adjusting the barbarian / weapon master build to fighter / weapon master, where the removal of rage is compensated by additional +1 epic superior weapon focus as well as +1 strength modifier by changing to an orc race. the reason why it's not 71 as I had previously counted (with truestrike) is because Arelith's two-handed weapon attack bonus does indeed contribute towards the attack bonus cap, so it had to be subtracted from the previous result.

[One Two Three Five]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it is my understanding that the engine counts up all bonuses and penalties, adds them together, and treats any result over +20 as exactly that. This means that combat modes like expertise and power attack can be used without penalty in conjunction with true strike by, say, a battle cleric or spellsword that has buff spells and effects pushing their AB way over the actual +20 cap.

I am 99% sure it doesn't work like that. Combat feats specifically don't effect the cap positively, so I doubt they would effect it negatively. Love to be proven wrong though! That'd open up some interesting room on the 'builds that chug TS potions to function' front.

Edit: Actually, that in mind, someone wielding a two-hander using either that ranger or the WM build, using improved disarm, vs someone with a small weapon, will add another +4 AB. 8 vs tiny. Situational modifiers, yay! 3rd edition's legacy of fiddly +1 bonuses everywhere lives.

[Lurch]

Aaand also that if you've got 50-some AB but have to keep chugging true strike potions to hit something, you should probably just run.

Maybe, but let's imagine a PvP situation:

Say we have a wild elf sorcerer / harper paragon / monk character who has armor class out the wazoo:

stats: 8 / 16 / 12 / 13 / 16 / 16 (counting gifts) + 7 charisma from levels and 1 from epic feat -> 24 charisma. Let's also say he has +6 dexterity, wisdom and charisma from items, the rest would be dispellable.

So, with items: 8 / 22 / 12 / 13 / 22 / 30

base ac 10 + 1 for being wild elf, +6 from dexterity, +6 from wisdom, +6 from tumble, +10 from divine shield, +20 from epic mage armor, +2 from armor skin = 61, all undispellable. If he decides to not cast spells and use expertise, thats additional +5 or +10 on top for 71 AC.

If we grant him buffs that can in theory be dispelled (though not breached, except for mage armor), there's the option to get +5 dodge AC to cap out the bonus with mage armor and haste, as well as +6 from higher dexterity and wisdom, giving him 72 without expertise and 82 with improved expertise.

Maybe even use shapechange to become a red dragon with 30 base dexterity and true seeing so he's hard to catch flatfooted if he's attacking something.

Now depending on what he can do offensively, fleeing or not in this situation is another topic (might be difficult as he can stack movement speed with monk speed + spells), but one can clearly see that we're gonna need all the help we can get to hit him outside the rare 5%.

[yellowcateyes]

Inspired by the melee DPS builds thread, what are some of the highest attack bonus builds out there?

I had a free moment, so I took up this thread's silly challenge.

The highest AB I could come up with is from a DEX Fey CoT using Smite Evil while wielding a finesse-able melee weapon.

Race: Fey
6 Fighter / 5 CoT / 19 WM
Stats: All stats 8 except for 18 DEX, 14 INT and 15 CHA. Becomes 22 DEX and 19 CHA after subrace. After 7 level-ups: 28 DEX, 20 CHA, or 40 and 32 when buffed. (+15 and +11 modifier).
Four Epic feats go into Great DEX for a buffed stat score of 44 and a +17 modifier.
(The 14 INT is required for expertise, a WM prereq. All four general feats can be spent on Great DEX as 9 epic levels of WM get you more than enough feats to get both EWF and Epic Prowess)

Non-Capped AB = 50 [25 BAB + 3 Weapon Focus + 4 Superior Weapon Focus + 17 DEX + 1 Prowess]
Drinking a Truestrike Potion gets you to 70.

Then you smite an evil target at +11 CHA over the AB cap, landing you at 81 AB.

Note: Do not play this build. Do not.

[gilescorey]

Note: Do not play this build. Do not.

TOO LATE

[Lurch]

Then you smite an evil target at +11 CHA over the AB cap, landing you at 81 AB.

Note: Do not play this build. Do not.

Wrong thread, but this reminds me of a max damage build I saw someplace long ago with 10 levels of Paladin and 30 levels of Champion of Torm, that took all 10 great smiting feats for 440 bonus damage, multiplied by criticals.

Basically run with a keen scythe and a lot of strength, find a baddie (better make sure they have evil alignment), use this trick 3 times (with extra smiting) tops, until you need to rest. Hope to get a that 15% critical threat and confirm it for about 2000 damage in a single swing.

Ditto on playing this build.

Smite evil should really just be on a cooldown instead of daily uses.

[One Two Three Five]

Yeah people have tried those great smiting badass instagibber build enough times that half the bosses and monsters got changed to neutral instead of evil, back in the day. Including, notably, a dragon in the Abyss. Dunno if that was ever reversed.

Edit: Man I wrote a big ol' post about this, edited a few times, and then realized I didn't care. tl;dr: the build I came up with is a realistic expression of a minmaxed ranger. still bad, by virtue of being a ranger, but not a triple-max-stat sorc/paragon running expertise on a race with -2 int

[Lorkas]

Race: Fey
6 Fighter / 5 CoT / 19 WM
Stats: All stats 8 except for 18 DEX, 14 INT and 15 CHA. Becomes 22 DEX and 19 CHA after subrace. After 7 level-ups: 28 DEX, 20 CHA, or 40 and 32 when buffed. (+15 and +11 modifier).
Four Epic feats go into Great DEX for a buffed stat score of 44 and a +17 modifier.
(The 14 INT is required for expertise, a WM prereq. All four general feats can be spent on Great DEX as 9 epic levels of WM get you more than enough feats to get both EWF and Epic Prowess)

Non-Capped AB = 50 [25 BAB + 3 Weapon Focus + 4 Superior Weapon Focus + 17 DEX + 1 Prowess]
Drinking a Truestrike Potion gets you to 70.

And another +1 for small size, or +2 if they're actually tiny instead.

[Kalopsia]

A greatsword ranger build can get some crazy AB with Disarm.

BAB: 25
STR-mod: 16 (2x Great STR is doable when using the ranger bonus feats for EWF etc)
Bane of Enemies: 2
Epic Prowess: 1
WF&EWF: 3
Blade Thirst: 4 (Or 5, depending on build)
2H Bonus: 2
Disarm vs tiny weapon: 8

That’s 61AB without True Strike.
True Strike could turn this into 75AB.

[Lurch]

Disarm is a feat available to most builds so it doesn't really help any single one, on top of being situational. Fighter 11 / Weapon master 19 can get it too to push max AB from 69 to 77.

I noticed that since great strength isn't on any classes' bonus feat list, taking red dragon disciple through epics nets us +8 strength compared to other builds without sacrificing BAB, other than the 1 from taking 4 levels of bard.

So: Wood elf Paladin 16 / Bard 4 / RDD 10

Start out with 21 str, 8 dex, 8 constitution, 13 intelligence, 8 wisdom, 18 charisma (with gifts)

End up with 38 / 8 / 10 / 15 / 10 / 20 (epic feats go to great str II, epic weapon focus and prowess, paladin levels raise wisdom incidentally)

buffed up: 50 / 8 / 10 / 15 / 10 / 32 (assuming you can get +12 on both str and cha)

24 BAB, 20 str bonus, +3 (epic) weapon focus, +1 epic prowess = 48

+11 with smite evil = 59 (not a very steady source of AB but it appears we've moved from the realm of practical into the theoretical)

79 with true strike.

87 with disarming a tiny weapon with greatsword.

76 disarming with true strike against non-evil.

Start with the bard levels for extra skill points and base 8 wisdom. Have to get stuff like prayer from scrolls to get even higher (by lowering enemy AC), since our wisdom is too low to cast any paladin spells. Taunt is a situational buff of +5 too.

[yellowcateyes]

+11 with smite evil = 59 (not a very steady source of AB but it appears we've moved from the realm of practical into the theoretical)

79 with true strike.

87 with disarming a tiny weapon with greatsword.

You can't Smite Evil and Disarm in the same attack.

[yellowcateyes]

And another +1 for small size, or +2 if they're actually tiny instead.

Good point. The AB of this absurd build, that no one should ever play cj, would end up 82 when fully buffed and smiting. Conceivably, someone could get a triple digit attack roll on Arelith.

I'm fairly sure that Fey retain the small size of a halfling base, and is not counted as tiny, since they can still carry a small weapon in one hand.

[Sockss]

This AA's pretty neat for reliable AB, but I wouldn't recommend playing it.

10 Ranger 3 Druid 17 AA

(3x Gdex, Eprowess, EWF, WF)

DEX: 20 (Base) +2 (Gift) +7 (Levels) + 3 (Great Dex) + 12 (Items) = 44

BAB 25
+17 (Dex Modifier)
+9 (AA Arrow Enchancement)
+1 (Weapon Focus)
+2 (EWF)
+1 (E Prowess)
+2 Druid (Nature Sense)
+1 (Point Blank Shot)

+20 Magic Cap (True Strike)

= 78

If you're doing effective AB, it's likely more bard/pdk orientated though!

[Lurch]

Update to the weapon master with PDK in mind

Half-orc: 22 str / 14 dex / 10 con / 14 int / 8 wis / 6 cha (str and int gifts)

Stats ending at 32 str (44 buffed) with 3 great strength feats, gains epic weapon specialization and overwhelming critical on top of epic weapon focus and prowess.

pre-epic: 3 Fighter -> 7 Vanguard -> 10 Weapon master
epic: 9 Weapon master -> 1 Fighter

AB: 25 BAB + 17 str + 3 EWF + 1 EP + 4 from WM = 50 AB -> 70 with true strike, can use PDK's Fear ability through intimidate skill for 8 times per day to lower enemy AC and skills by 3 for a minute, with disarm it's up to +8 AB as well, so technically 81 in total.

Could also drop one epic superior weapon focus (WM 16 / Vanguard 10) to get additional -2 on enemy AC and skills (with 3 additional uses) for effectively 82 AB. This way it loses overwhelming critical, which was there just for extra damage.