Read these two threads:

http://www.ddovault.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1428810580

http://www.ddovault.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1428433579


18 rogue/2 artificer or 20 rogue are probably your best options.  I think the 18/2 split with a RXB is slightly better.  The good thing about these builds is that you can easily swap between GXB and RXB.  See which one you like.

What is the splash of bard for?

Is it to have a heal, cc from otto's, exped retreat, or some part of one of the enhancement trees?

I made this character as a tester and can easily delete and reroll if I screwed something up, but:

I went ahead and rolled a pdk iconic  as fighter 1/ bard 1/ rest rogue and used the human/pdk enhancement tree for the heal amp and damage boost, and bonus Int (just one time), then full Harper all the way to the top  (taking know the angles and INT boost to ranged attack ones) with the rest going into mechanic for most of the xbow bonuses.

I was looking at the assassin tree to see if it could be used to further boost sneak attacks, but wasnt seeing anything I had points for nor in  bard   could I see anything easily grabbed that was in your face useful (but then I've never played bard).

Started with 18 Int (planning to base everything around Int), put first 2 bonus stats into CHA to bring it from 8 to 10 (figured Id need at least that to do anything bard wise), dex to 15, rest con.

Levelled skills across the board as a trapper would with 10 in perform (again just in case with the bard being an unknown), and maxing umd (no brainer).

I dont have a lot of tomes - just enough to raise con up two points, str 2 points, and dex 1. (basic build, havent unlocked 32pt yet).

I took all the feats that were ranged oriented and grabbed empower healing as a bonus just in case and because I didnt see anything more useful towards level 15.

The servers went to shit right after I rolled up,so wasnt able to even test him at all, but trying to get an idea as to what I should be looking to do.

LMK what you think and keep in mind I am really new to this game with little experience outside running a wolf melee build.

Waffling and not enough knowledge of the game to decide - both character planners I have downloaded omit the harper tree, so I cant really use them effectively.

Could use a hand deciding.

I hear of them, haven't played one yet. They definitely do exist now.

I ran across this old thread from a bit ago.

Does it look like it would be okay now to any of you who have experience with these?

http://pitntdw.guildportal.com/Guild.aspx?GuildID=367093&TabID=3075179&ForumID=1...

Hag Master wrote on Apr 30^th, 2015 at 5:58pm:


and this means what exactly?

I'm just trying to get some useful info on building one of these.

Starkjade wrote on Apr 30^th, 2015 at 7:19pm:


Really, just on this note. I usually just hold down W until I get xp. With a ranged toon it's S. You need to know where you are going and be intimately familiar with the quest though, or you are going to run into a wall and get gang raped.

Fail wrote on Apr 30^th, 2015 at 6:24pm:


You were already given several links and several builds.  What more do you want?

18 rogue/2 X as a base, tier 5 mechanic, max INT.  Lots of options, but it's all pretty flexible and also differences are probably marginal. 

I suppose I came across as wanting a fully fleshed out on a  plate build, but I was looking more for ideas on what I had thought about and posted in the thread a couple above.

I see what was posted but the issue is more I dont understand why they work or what people were accomplishing by taking the builds in the directions that they did; game is still pretty new to me.

I'd like to get ideas as to how or why the builds work, just like I did with the wolf melee and people were really helpful with getting me to not only understand the build but the mechanics behind it - thats kind of what I was going for.  The wolf melee became much more enjoyable to play after I understood what was going on under the hood so to speak.

Like, for example, why would you take 18 rogue over say a lower splash but with 4 fighter for the ranged bonus and no penalty ranged shot?

Fail wrote on Apr 30^th, 2015 at 10:42pm:


Mechanic core 5 gets you +1 extra critical multiplier on repeating xbows and +2 crit multiplier on great xbows.  This requires 18 levels of rogue. 

Also, rogue levels gets you a sneak attack damage, which is getting boosted by ranged power.  It's significant.  You can't get tier 5 mechanic and extra critical multiplier except with 14 paladin.  But you are losing a lot of sneak attack damage in the process. 

With the last two levels, you can do a lot of different things.  2 arti lets you use rune arms and gets you one extra feat. 

Mech cores increase SA range quite a bit, so that's not really a big issue. The sneak attack damage is huge, so you'll want to slot deception and improved deception accessories. Diplo is a good idea as well, since you will pull a lot of aggro.

My Pally/rogue GxB is destroying crap left and right.

Seems odd not to have a runearm on but so far so good.  His skills are only marginally less than my pure mechanic, and the threat range is magic. He can also take a lot more hate and so I find I am running higher archer focus scores by and large because I will stand and shoot much longer than I will on the Pure Mechanic.