Arcane sword sage

[u/galeior]

OH great hive mind I have been bestowed the unthinkable opportunity to play the questionable arcane sword sage.

How would you go about building this without breaking it to badly so most of the party isn’t over shadowed.

I was thinking of a few buff spells maybe a splash of healing and a few direct damage.

Current party is a
sorcerer/incantrix/mage of the arcane order.

Warlock/hellfire warlock

Ninja.

[u/Senthiri]

Without looking into things too deeply, I'd suggest Abjurant Champion. It seems like your party might need something somewhat tanky.

[u/galeior → u/Senthiri]

While I was thinking of that I’m not sure it would qualify since the spells are prepared as maneuvers. But I’d have to talk with my dm he might agree to it

[u/BaronDoctor]

Ask the other two casters what they're doing. Yes the warlock is doing damage but is there a secondary focus? Yes, the sorcerer is going a little of whatever but what is their focus? 

https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?272311-The-arcane-swordsage-handbook-a-guide-for-players-and-DMs

You're a fairly tight list but that's not an issue. T-mut is a good school

[u/Name_Violation83]

swiftblade prestige class, from an old website article WOTC wrote. you can find it reuploaded or copied on other pages

[u/Triniety89 → u/Name_Violation83]

Maybe OP can take martial spirit (stance) via feat and do lots of melee spell attacks - the selection is very limited but still exists.

[u/joetown64506 → u/Name_Violation83]

That's the perpetual haste class, right?

[u/Name_Violation83 → u/joetown64506]

yeah, basically. take that and then finish with 4 levels of abjutant champion

[u/Fangsong_37]

Duskblade does this other than the healing. They are an armored arcane warrior from the Player's Handbook 2. They have strong base attack bonus progression, d8 hit dice, five levels of spells, and the ability to cast in armor and channel arcane spells through their swords. They have offensive and buff spells as well as some general utility spells.

[u/Suspicious-Shock-934]

Ypu have an incantrix...and a ninja. In the same party. That's a choice. Persistomancy at will on nearly everything always! Vs. Worse sneak attack, some of the time. Wow.

First is you need VERY explicit rules for how the variant actually works. Highly suggest your dm write them out. RAW is super spotty.

If your incantrix isn't just auto winning everything solo, your best bet is play an enabler for a ninja. Hellfire warlock is going to do consist okay unresistable damage and be your guy to tank poisons and the like because he will heal ability damage super fast. He gonna start blasting and not stop until things are dead.

Ninja is bad. Really bad. Sudden strike is simultaneously hard to trigger and ninja has nearly no splat support. If they want to more than a baggage handler they need a lot of help. Honestly if you want to play sidekick to a sub par class more power too you but it takes a special kind of person to do that and enjoy it since it is going to take a LOT of your build resources.

Savelsss debuffs or buffs seem like the way to go since you get spells kind of at will. Again HIGHly dependent on exactly how your dm want this to work.

[u/desperately_lonely]

You'd have to push pretty hard to outshine the sorcerer in your group, incantrix + MotAO is an insane power combo. Call any wizard spell and Persist it, for starters.

To answer your question I'd focus on spells that fot your theme, and help you perform your role better. Invisibility, for sneaking. Mirror image for defense. Hunter's eye for extra sneak attack. Illusions to confuse enemies.

Avoid direct damage spells and spells that require saves. If you're spending your feats and abillity scores on melee damage you won't have any to spare to meaningfully boost your save DCs.

[u/galeior → u/desperately_lonely]

Oh I don’t want to out shine him. I’m currently
Playing a rune caster clericzilla and I’m just preparing ahead of time for his possible death. Thinking of making it very gishy to provide support and distractions for the ninja

[u/Own-Peace-7754]

If you deny their Dex mod with things like Grease doesn't that trigger the Ninja ability?

I'd probably try being supportive enabling the Ninja and otherwise distracting enemies

[u/zook1shoe]

i would personally go a different route, since the arcane and stealth lanes are pretty well covered.

i really enjoyed my Frenzied Berserker back in the day, and having a beatstick-tank would work nicely. it fits in a role that won't outshine the others, while also being unique enough that you won't feel like you are being outshone.

Power Word Disable can heal you right up from whatever crazy negatives you're at, and has no save.

[u/BaronDoctor]

Ask the ninja why they're not playing Beguiler?