Brass Dragon Bloodrager questions

[Cymoric]

Decided to go main character as mage Azata and figured I'd build a party that involved a number of people who would eventually be able to transform to into dragons.

Created a mercenary Bloodrager with Brass Dragon blood and Claw focus cause it seemed rather unique vs what I've played before. But it is kinda annoying so far. Got to lvl 4 so at least Claws count as magical now. But lots of enemies also have massive DR unless you also have Cold Iron weapons. So am I going to have to be constantly swapping to a weapon I'm not focused on and suffering penalties vs the claws in order to deal with this? Also most of the high DR seem to be on miniboss type enemies so you're worst at fighting the toughest enemies you face. And since you are designed to strike twice with claw your single hit damage is naturally lower making you even worse at getting past DR. And you only get claws at all when you're bloodraging. And Bloodrager has 3 different stat types that are focused in STR, CON and CHA, so it's harder to maximize STR and thus you're even worse at doing enough damage to pass DR.

I tried stone fist for times when I'd have no rage, but that doesn't seem to do magic or cold iron damage as far as I can tell.

Is there a magical punching weapon that will fix these problems? or a mythic ability? or a class progression that will eventually sort this out?

[Yannir]

There is atleast a Mythic Ability that will solve the issue, Brutality Incarnate. Which doesn't work against blanket-all-DR but should work against any specific DR, like Cold Iron.

[Deo]

Bro who cares about DR. Just pick Power Attack, then Mythic Power Attack and go crush enemies.

[hilburnashua]

Amulet of Might Fists +3 will allow you to bypass DR/magic/cold iron/silver as well as improving your chance to hit and damage.

Covenant of the Inheritor will allow all party members within 30' of the bearer to bypass DR/good which will allow you to bypass the DR on all the demons. I am assuming that is what the cold iron is for since fey and linnorm aren't a big issue in this game.

I think a lot of people that go bloodrager might suggest dipping one level into scaled fist monk to get your charisma bonus to AC. 4 levels into Dragon Disciple gets you +4 to your Str which is very nice. Two levels into Paladin would get you smite evil once per day as well as add your charisma bonus to saves.

[GunStarX]

Once you finish act 1 you can get an item that let's you bypass cold iron/good Dr, if you talk to storyteller immediately.

The real issue to sort out is that in a game with over 160 classes not every one of them is going to be immediately viable, or even viable at all depending on difficulty. Sometimes that cool idea just isn't that great in this game. You will probably get annoyed by the lack of extra attacks you get from a claw attack bloodrager if you keep playing, it's a much bigger drawback to the build.

I do also think that a bloodrager with max starting strength, enlarged and using power attack should be able to hit for more than enough damage with claws to overcome anything in act 1.

[hilburnashua]

I did a 12 Bloodrager, 1 Scaled Fist, 1 Thug, 2 Paladin, 4 Dragon Disciple build for Dragon path that was pretty effective the entire game althoug I did mostly use weapons, not claws, early on until I could start either using scrolls with UMD to change shape or have Nenio change me.

[GunStarX]

Originally posted by hilburnashua:

I did a 12 Bloodrager, 1 Scaled Fist, 1 Thug, 2 Paladin, 4 Dragon Disciple build for Dragon path that was pretty effective the entire game althoug I did mostly use weapons, not claws, early on until I could start either using scrolls with UMD to change shape or have Nenio change me.

Back when this came out my first real build was something similar, but to get the most bites, using motherless tiefling, primalist serpentine bloodrager, with vivi feral mutagen, oracle wolf scared face and natures whispers, and dragon disciple. They patched all of that fun out, so now you pretty much have to take 6 levels of shifter to do almost any natural attack build

[Yard]

Bloodrage is a kind of barbarian with basic buff magic and that's how he should be seen, so the best way to play him is to charge him as if he were a barbarian with a 2-handed weapon and his magic only to buff. If you want him to use his claws as his main damage-dealing weapon, you will have to build him very well from the beginning and support him with specialized equipment for this purpose, which is very difficult if you are only level 4 since most of the specialized equipment is found in the upper levels.

[Cymoric]

Well I got the mythic ability to pass DR and I think that's mostly sorted it out.

I'm pretty sure 2 weapon fighting gets additional attacks over time right? Does bloodrager bloodline claw also not do so? I avoided Elemental build as I heard it didn't get extra attacks.

Hard to "max str" when you have 3 "core" stats to put points into.

It doesn't have to be the best thing in the world I just want it to do more than 0 (reduced) dmg.

[GunStarX]

Originally posted by Cymoric:

Well I got the mythic ability to pass DR and I think that's mostly sorted it out.

I'm pretty sure 2 weapon fighting gets additional attacks over time right? Does bloodrager bloodline claw also not do so? I avoided Elemental build as I heard it didn't get extra attacks.

Hard to "max str" when you have 3 "core" stats to put points into.

It doesn't have to be the best thing in the world I just want it to do more than 0 (reduced) dmg.

Your claws don't count as weapons for twf, and you won't get extra claw attacks every 6 bab unless you have the shifter's furry ability.

Bloodrager stats are one of the drawbacks vs barbarian. Starting with 19 str so you end up with 24 str is what you should do for any str based martial build.

[hilburnashua]

Originally posted by Cymoric:

Well I got the mythic ability to pass DR and I think that's mostly sorted it out.

I'm pretty sure 2 weapon fighting gets additional attacks over time right? Does bloodrager bloodline claw also not do so? I avoided Elemental build as I heard it didn't get extra attacks.

Hard to "max str" when you have 3 "core" stats to put points into.

It doesn't have to be the best thing in the world I just want it to do more than 0 (reduced) dmg.

Natural weapons don't get extra attacks as your BaB advances, exception being the Shifter class.

Everyone not using natural weapons gets additional attacks as they advance; Bab 1-5 = 1 attack, 6-10 =2, 11- 15 = 3, 16-20 = 4, etc. For each one of these additional attacks they take a stacking -5 to hit. So if you have a BaB of 15, your base attack bonus is 15 for the first attack, 10 for the second, 5 for the third.

Two Weapon FIghtning gives you one (and never more) additional attack with your offhand. If you take Improved Two Weapon Fighting you get an additional attack with your offhand at -5 (same as normal second attack but remember you still take the -2, or more, for using an offhand weapon). Greater Two Weapon Fighting gives you a third and final offhand attack at a -10 to hit.

The stat balance on bloodrager isn't as bad as you think. They only get up to 4th level spells so you only need a max of 14 charisma to cast them. You can easily dump that down to 12 at start and only use headbands to bring you Charisma up to the minimum. They do get a few offensive spells but due to how the DC system works and the need for spell penetration against many foes most of the offensive spells are going to be fairly dead. I always just used their spellcasting for buffs, especially Mage Armor + Archmage's armor and the shield spell. Constitution for rage rounds can be bypassed easily through Endless Rage mythic ability.