Unarmed Arcane Swordsage with Ascetic Mage?

[saggitar]

How do you handle the swordsage adaptions from ToB? Would you be able to combine them, to get an unarmed arcane Swordsage?
Because IIRC an unarmed arcane Swordsage would be the easiest way to pick up Ascetic Mage, since he'd get both imp. unarmed strike _and_ spontaneous 2nd level spells (if you start with 3 Levels of other classes first, and you rule the arcane maneuvers as "spells")...

If we pick Mad Faith as a feat at 3rd level to get 2nd level divine spells we could do something like

Druid 1 /Hexblade 2/Unarmed Arc. SS 2/ Mystic Wanderer 1
with the Druid ACF from UA to trade Wildshape for Wis to AC and w/e, Mad Faith at level 3, and Asc. Mage at Level 6.

Maybe add 1 Level of the Savage Ghost Progression, to get rid of the negative effects of taint, and another instance of Cha to AC:
Druid 1/Ghost 1/Hexblade 2/Swordsage 2/Mystic Wanderer 1
would get Cha to AC 4 times, and Cha to Saves vs. Spells... add a silly optimized race like Magic blooded Kobold, and be teh Uber-Cha-Monster at ECL 7.

another Level of Ghost somewhere in between, then finish with 3 Levels of Uncanny Trickster, and you've got +6Cha and all the crazy Ghost abilities. Like MALEVOLENCE. So you can pick up the body of something with high Dex and Str, and fuck shit up.

Maybe you can even get Mad Faith as a bonus feat for a high taint score... and several other bonus feats as well.
So Druid/Ghost/Hexblade 2/Swordsage/Ghost/Swordsage/Mystic Wanderer/Uncanny Trickster 3
played by a venerable Magic blooded Unseelie (Winter Chill) Dragonwrought Kobold with starting Cha of 17, would end up with 32 Cha wearing a cloak of charisma +2
That's a touch AC of 54 (without Dex), undead immunitys, +11 to saves vs. spells and -11 to the saves of non-fey 5ft of him.

The Malevolence DC would be 26 maybe 30 (with Ability Focus and a Veil of Allure), and against non-fey who don't have immunity against morale effects a -11 debuff for their saves. Who would be able to beat an effective Will DC of 41 at level 11?

Any suggestions for even more broken Charisma synergy? Paladins won't work, since you'll have to be NE if you're palying as a tainted Druid, and there are no NE Paladins, am i right?
Anything else? Or wouldn't you be able to play an Unarmed Arcane Swordsage in the first place?

[TC X0 Lt 0X]

If I remember correctly, the Arcane Swordsages spells count as Maneuvers so I do not believe you could pick up Ascetic Mage with it.

[ClayQ]

Id like to point out, acetic mage specifically calls for monk and sorcerer levels, not your srcane caster class level.

[thewyrmdude]

It is true that it says that if you have levels of monk and sorceror, that your levels stack for your AC bonus. But it doesn't say it requires the monk/sorceror levels for turning the Wisdom to AC into Charisma to AC. It just uses monk as an example.

If you would normally be allowed to add your Wisdom bonus to AC (such as for a unarmored, unencumbered monk), you instead add your Charisma bonus (if any) to your AC.

edit: However, you can't take just one level of savage progression in a monster class, you have to go full out and complete them in one go.

[saggitar]

edit: However, you can't take just one level of savage progression in a monster class, you have to go full out and complete them in one go.

Characters are not required to complete all the levels of a given template class in uninterrupted succession. For example, a character who takes a level of wereboar could then take a level of fighter and a level of rogue (or any other combination of other class levels) before taking another level of wereboar. A character must still take the first level of wereboar before taking the second, just as with a normal class.
(see the articel about savage progressions)

[saggitar]

Also the text in ToB says that "The arcane spell is “cast” as if it were a martial maneuver", but that still means I am able to cast 2nd level arcane spells, doesn't it? (I just don't cast them th normal way. I still "cast" them.)

Anybody has a point why you shouldn't be able to take Ascetic Mage after 2 levels of Unarmed Arcane Swordsage?

[TC X0 Lt 0X]

Kind of off topic, but in that Article, according to the Vampire Savage progression, you can be a living Vampire.
The f**k did I just read.

[thewyrmdude]

edit: However, you can't take just one level of savage progression in a monster class, you have to go full out and complete them in one go.

Characters are not required to complete all the levels of a given template class in uninterrupted succession. For example, a character who takes a level of wereboar could then take a level of fighter and a level of rogue (or any other combination of other class levels) before taking another level of wereboar. A character must still take the first level of wereboar before taking the second, just as with a normal class.
(see the articel about savage progressions)

Ah, I was going by Savage Species, which says on pages 27 and 152 that monster classes can't multiclass until they've taken the whole thing. But that seems to only cover Savage monster classes, not Savage template progression. Which honestly seems off that they'd exclude that from the normal rule.

[caelic]

...which is why I take web articles--particularly web articles from that long ago--with a very, very large grain of salt.  They tended to be about as consistent and well-though-out as the typical Customer Service answer.

[X-Codes]

...which is why I take web articles--particularly web articles from that long ago--with a very, very large grain of salt.  They tended to be about as consistent and well-though-out as the typical Customer Service answer.

Same for the Arcane Swordsage "adaptation."  We need to emphasize that more, I think, that the Arcane Swordsage is an "adaptation," not an actual alternative class feature.  As such, how you handle it has very little to do with the RAW.  It's more like a proto-idea that leaves a lot of questions about the mechanics unanswered.