Sniper Archer: is it possible to optimize one?

[Bard]

Hunter's Mercy has been reprinted in the Spell Compendium as snowowl's thread points out, there's no need for bless weapon anymore.

I feel Glass of distance (or any kind of mundane binocular) works better with the flavor of this build (doesn't make much sense to me being able to do a sniping shot having visual of the target from a third party source with a different point of view), but Malphus is indeed a nice idea that I'll use for some other concept.

So change it.  The rule never made sense any way.

Changing that would make insane critical ranges more common for all kind of builds, I prefer rewording the Sniper ability of the Targetter so you can achieve insane cryticals easily only by giving up a sizable number of attacks.

On a side note the mention of hulking hurler made me think about shooting a colossal arrow shrinked to "normal" size... I wonder how the rules are for that even if I doubt there are

[Scrollreader]

There are rules in the enlarge person/reduce person spells.  Projectile weapons, unlike thrown weapons, do damage according to the size of their bow/crossbow/sling, not according to the size of the projectile.

[Kasz]

Can you use monkeygrip with crossbows? or some other method of holding a weapon one size category larger?. Then enlarge person, voila your range went from 1.8 miles to about 3 or 4. Glass of Distance has you covered up to ten.

btw even at 1.8 miles the projectile breaks the sound barrier, like a regular bullet would.

The real life sniping record is 1.82 miles, by a british sniper with a very good sniper rifle. He broke the record with 3 shots and 3 hits. Craig harrison.

I like Barrett at medium size as the distance he shoots at is 1.88 miles so it feels very realistic... but if you were to size up to shoot 4 miles etc... that'd not be a bad idea at all.

The advantage of specialising in crossbows as well means you might be able to double as the spotter / aimer in a ballista team... Ballista sniping anyone?

[nijineko]

if you use cragtop archer you get 15 range increments, instead of 10, half to all spot penalties, and a special shot with no range penalty to hit class feature. i have a ranger/targetteer/deepwood/cragtop build with medium greatbow who can routinely hit stuff a mile away. not even seriously optimized.

there should be rules for spot bonuses for elevation and size of target.

there is a psionic power that lets you know the exact wind and weather conditions for 1mi/lvl, so you can acurately aim / place your shot without dm arguments.

for loads of fun, shrink item on ballista bolts and/or cabers, tie the results to an arrow, have an arcane archer imbue an area dispell on the arrow, or something similar....

[Cagemarrow]

Can you cast invisibility on your ammo? No sense letting the guy with block arrow have a chance to avoid it. . . plus it would make it harder for them to pick a direction to spot in if you fired from behind a Silent Image hunters blind. No need for hide checks then.

[Phoenix00]

Guided Shot lets you ignore penalties due to distance and cover for your range attacks
Hunter's Mercy lets you treat your first shot as a critical hit (you still have to confirm it, which means another attack roll that has to hit the target ac)
There are many effects that only go off on a critical hit.  These effects can be quite powerful.  If done correctly you should be able to kill an enemy quite simply with critical hit effects.

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Or you can go the Binder/Cleric route or the Binder/Archivist route.
1.  Create a vorpal arrow
2.  Cast Surge of Fortune and use the immediate action effect to make it a natural 20.
3a.  Then use the Anima Mage 10th level capstone to make any spell an immediate action.  Use next turn's immediate action to cast true strike.  Eat that +20 insight bonus to the attack roll 
3b.  Or use Moment of Prescience on the chance to confirm the critical hit, up to +25 insight bonus.

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So in sum spellcasters with enough preparation, SUCK

[Kajhera]

Guided Shot lets you ignore penalties due to distance and cover for your range attacks
Hunter's Mercy lets you treat your first shot as a critical hit (you still have to confirm it, which means another attack roll that has to hit the target ac)
There are many effects that only go off on a critical hit.  These effects can be quite powerful.  If done correctly you should be able to kill an enemy quite simply with critical hit effects.

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Or you can go the Binder/Cleric route or the Binder/Archivist route.
1.  Create a vorpal arrow
2.  Cast Surge of Fortune and use the immediate action effect to make it a natural 20.
3a.  Then use the Anima Mage 10th level capstone to make any spell an immediate action.  Use next turn's immediate action to cast true strike.  Eat that +20 insight bonus to the attack roll 
3b.  Or use Moment of Prescience on the chance to confirm the critical hit, up to +25 insight bonus.

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So in sum spellcasters with enough preparation, SUCK

Don't waste your Immediate spell on a True Strike confirmation. Wear a Flesh Ring of Scorn.

[Cagemarrow]

Any chance for an optimized E6 build for this?

[Peregrinebf]

I see everyone has forgotten the Eagle's Cry longbow. From Dragon #326, also the Dragon Magazine Compenduim:
It's a +5 composite longbow (+4 str bonus) with a 220 ft range increment that lets you shoot out to 20 range increments. It also tosses off an inspire courage with a 15 ft radius that lasts 5 rounds each time you fire, though it does sound like an eagle (so may give away your position.)
Flight Arrows (10 gp for 20, 2lb/stack, +25 ft to range increment)
Find a way to make the bow out of Dragonbone for +20 ft to the range increment.
Enchant it with distance for x2 range (again).
Make sure you get one in Large size, and have powerful build/some other way to use it. That's x1.25 range increment.
So 220 ft +20 ft (dragonbone) x1.25 (large)= 300 ft range increment
300 + 90 ft from Deepwood Sniper  + 25 ft from Flight arrow  = 415 ft.
415 x2 x2 x1.5 (x3.5 with multiplier stacking rules) = 1452.5 = 1450 ft.
1450*20 range increments = 29000 ft range. Or about 5.5 MILES. The game board with 1 inch 5-foot squares would need to be 483 feet long. 161 yards. Hope you've got a big living room.
Now, the horizon of earth is about sqrt(height in feet) * 1.323 = miles away. At 5.5 miles that means you need to be 17.3+ feet up to have the horizon that far out. So bring a stepladder.
Some method of scrying is probably also advisable.
Now, 29000 ft is a pretty nice range. That's 193 rounds of running, with the run feat, straight at you for a character with 30ft base speed.

For extra cheese, get psionic minor creation via ardent (may need to use substitute powers for this, not sure.) Be sure to pick up the magic mantle. Make 1 cubic ft of black lotus extract for 1 power point. 1 dose of poison = 1 ounce. 1 (cubic foot) = 957.506494 US fluid ounces. Manifester arrows give extra PP. Magic mantle always treats psionics and magic as equal, so you can go spellwarp sniper. Psionic minor creation has a range greater than touch (0 ft) and is an area (1 cu ft/lvl) spell. So it can be a ray. So the arrows can be power storing. Since you have to manifest 3rd lvl powers for spellwarp sniper w/magic mantle cheese, you're at least manifester lvl 5. Which means 5 cubic feet. Per arrow.  5*958 = 4790 doses of contact poison, Contact DC 20, initial 3d6 Con, secondary 3d6 Con. Assuming they only fail on a natural 1, they still fail about 239 saves, taking an average of 2510 CON DAMAGE initially.

In short, screw sneak attacks/crits/whatever. 14370d6, apply directly to constitution, from 5.5 miles away. Creatures immune to poison could be a problem, but hey, 190+ rounds of 1d8 damage per round = about 855 damage anyway. So most things that are immune to poison will die before they reach you. Especially if you're using improved manyshot.

[nijineko]

and with the weather power i mentioned, you can negate any dm penalties for wind or weather.

sounds like an expensive bow, if very nice. what does the 20' range increment ability calculate out to pricewise?

[JaronK]

Just saw Dragon Magazine 358, which has a cheap enhancement to any bow that adds 20' to the range increment.  Combine that with Dragonbone as your material (+20' range increment) and you've got a lot more range.

JaronK

[Phoenix00]

Don't waste your Immediate spell on a True Strike confirmation. Wear a Flesh Ring of Scorn.

Nice Item, so in sum you can have a very effective archer that is about level 10.  (Binder 1/Cleric 3/Anima Mage 7)

[Peregrinebf]

Hmm.
So 220 ft +20 ft (dragonbone) + 20 ft (dragon 358 enhancement mentioned by Jaronk) x1.25 (large)= 325 ft range increment
325 + 90 ft from Deepwood Sniper  + 25 ft from Flight arrow  = 440 ft.
415 x2 x2 x1.5 (x3.5 with multiplier stacking rules) = 1540 ft.
1540*20 range increments = 30800 ft range. Or about 5.8 MILES. The game board with 1 inch 5-foot squares would need to be 513 feet long. 171 yards. For the obligatory reference, an American Football field is 120 yards long.

The bow is Strong Transmutation, CL 15th, craft magic arms and armour, far shot, true strike, creator must be an elf, price 73,800 gp. Weight 3 lb. Oh, and don't steal one. Easy way to get yourself kill-on-sight to all elves.

So we need 9 levels of deepwood sniper, 4 cragtop archer, 1 spellwarp sniper, 5 ardent.
Deepwood Sniper needs BAB: +5, Hide 4, Move Silently 4, Spot 4, Far Shot, Point Blank Shot, Weapon Focus (any bow or crossbow).
Cragtop Archer needs BAB +6, climb 10, spot 5, survival 5, far shot, mountain warrior (bab+3, survival 5 ranks)
Spellwarp sniper needs Concentration 8, spellcraft 8, point blank shot, 3rd lvl spells, sneak attack or sudden strike +1d6
Ardent is a base class.
Either way, that's min lvl 24 without cheesing for more BAB/manifesting. So let's cheese.
Shapechange/polymorph can be cast on you from a scroll. Use those to get spells (Jaronk's summary of why this works) means you only need ardent 1. So 5 levels of fighter+ranger (2 fighter, 2 ranger, 1 warror and take sneak attack as the lvl 3 feat (UA pg 76) without losing BAB.)
Fighter 2 lvls: feats Point blank shot, far shot. Noncombatant (-2 melee attack rolls) and Vulnerable (-1 AC) as flaws let us pick up weapon focus (composite longbow) and 1 other feat. 1 lvl warrior taking sneak attack as the lvl 3 feat. 2 lvls ranger. That qualifies us for Deepwood sniper, so take that. Max spot. Get Mountain warrior in there somewhere. Pick up the Cragtop Archer, and 1 level of Ardent. Get yourself polymorphed into a creature with 3rd lvl arcane spells, or use earth power/sanctum spell (power via magic mantle)/heighten/expanded knowledge cheese to get a 3rd lvl power, class into Spellwarp sniper. Dark Chaos Feat Shuffle/other rebuild tricks if needed. Either do this as goliath (+1 LA) or take Monkey Grip (plenty of feats to spare). Lvl 20 complete, gamebreaking CON-damage artillery enabled.

[Bard]

while I do appreciate the help with the sniping distance, it's way more that they'll ever need in this campaign even if I think I'll toss in a couple of the things mentioned just for flavor (even if you won't need being able to hit stuff at a couple of miles of distance, it's always nice being able to do so).
The main issue I have with this build is making a character able to do enough damage with a single arrow/dart/bullet to be on par with someone doing a full attack with 5/6 arrows or whatever.
Something that would bring him ALMOST on par with with an archer with skirmish/sneak attack (I say almost because having the advantage of range, it'd perfect if the damage per round was 20% lower or so).

Distance is a nice plus, but the main point is "high damage with a single arrow (as a full-round action)", I want my players to be able to choose this instead of a Travel Devotion Swift Hunter without being weaker or less useful.

[nijineko]

i wonder if the 15 range increments would stack with the 20 from the bow?

i've noticed that piling on the damage is tough without precision based builds for ranged. (excepting hulker and related...)

[Bard]

yeah it is, that's the whole point of this thread :\

Targetter from Dragon Magazine (#310 iirc) helps (adding dex, improving crit chance, free exotic weapon proficieny, adding 2 more attacks to sacrifice for added threat range). but without rewriting his Sniper ability to stack with Keen or Improved Critical it's pretty much useless.

For now the best I've got thanks for the suggestions of the thread is:
Turn 1:
* Move Action: Get a Psionic Focus with Psionic Meditation.
* Standard Action: Cast Hunter's Mercy (or use a custom item that can cast it at will, price should be low), the Spell Compendium version, that doesn't require the crit to be confirmed, not the old FR version.
Turn 2:
* Use the Psionic Focus to activate Fell Shot, making the attack a touch attack so you don't need to worry about hitting
* Use Peerless Archer's ""power attack"" to move all BAB to damage
* Targetter adds Dex to damage (it is instead of Str damage iirc, so composite longbow isn't needed)
* Deepwood Sniper makes the Bow's critical a nice 5x
* Shot as a standard action doing 5x(1d10+BAB+Dex Mod+5 Collision) + the enhancement that do additional damage on crit.

Even so it's 5 good attacks worth of damage every 2 turns... it's GOOD, but I'd like a bit more

[Peregrinebf]

Yeah, the damage is why I went for the minor creation of black lotus extract. But the basic concept idea of spell-storing arrows + spellwarp sniper can give some rather fun effects.

[skydragonknight]

Targeteer's Dex to damage is only within 30 ft. The Arrow Storm ability however might be worht it. Also, four levels of Targeteer would open up Ranged Weapon Mastery (+20 ft range increment).

[Peregrinebf]

Just remembered:
Shivering touch from Frostburn (pg 104) is a lvl 3 spell, with a target. No save. Yes SR. 3d6 Dex damage.
Stuff that into spell-storing arrows.
Ray of stupidity for 1d4+1 int damage. No save.

Really, save or die spells with no save on a long-range artillery platform are far better than doing HP damage. Let the barbarian do HP damage to the twitching moron with a liquified skeleton.

[Bard]

Ah! the (in)famous spells that instagib Dragons and Animals! That's actually a good idea I never thought about before.

Targeteer's Dex to damage is only within 30 ft. The Arrow Storm ability however might be worht it. Also, four levels of Targeteer would open up Ranged Weapon Mastery (+20 ft range increment).

Are you sure you're not getting confused with Crossbow Sniper (60ft) or Dead Eye (30ft)?
It doesn't say anything about distance in the Targetter (DM#310, p.38-39 for reference), it just says you can't use it if you've got less than 10 str and if you use it you don't get the str bonus damage from composite bows... that doesn't work on people immune to criticals and that's it.