Bear warrior

[Calen]

Few questions about these as it doesn't work on jechts.
How long does the bear form stay?

With that said, what is a good bear warrior build?
I was thinking of 3FF/10BW/5FB/12 Barb but truth be told I'm clueless how to make one.
Just go full out con for AC from FF and get the damage reduction and regen feats in epic.

Any suggestions how to make it work?

[RagingPeace]

I played a 20 barbarian / 10 bw with the EDR and Regen feats, while it's a solid build, it really lacks damage. With so much DR in PVE you'll want to find a way to do decent damage.

I don't remember the calculations for the duration, but you really want to be able to stay in your form till you can rest, since you're more or less useless besides from soaking up damage out of form.

Your class combination seems solid, though I'd be slightly worried about having enough rages.

[KOPOJIbPAKOB]

How long does the bear form stay?

It has the same duration as your standart/whirlwind rage and uses your rage charges. But! It doesn't get any benefits from other rages, thus if you chose whirlwind frenzy, you won't get additional attack in bear shape as it's a separate feat.

With that said, what is a good bear warrior build?

It's a tough question, lol. What RagingPeace suggested is pretty simple, but works, although in BW builds there's no point to go for Barb20 as epic rage doesn't give any benefits in Bear shape, thus you can experiment. For example, I played Barb14/R3/WS3/BW10, thus gaining evasion, full umd and scent+swift tracker combo. As an option, you can also dip into bear warrior while using normal Barbarian rages. For example, Barb20/B-guard3/WS3/BW4 is a build I made up and it looks really solid, Bear warrior here gives you scent+swift tracker combo and free knockdown and extended rage feats.

A little bit more about how bear warrior works...
First off — your damage is going to be garbage ANYWAY, no matter how much you invest into strength, Bear warrior is a PvE tanking class. Still, there are ways to make it not-as-bad, thankfully non-physical damage from your weapon and unarmed strike feats transfer into bear shape. So:
1) Some weapon with elemental damage, the best choices are imho Jolt of lightning and Spectral dagger as they are cheap and give +1d6 non-physical damage that transfers into Bear shape, other weapon properties don't matter as they're overwritten with BW natural weapon.
2) Blades of fire wand or Perfected alchemical fire. +1d8 or +1d10 fire damage respectively. Duration itself is ridicolously low, BUT if used prior to shifting, it will maintain through the whole duration of your Bear shape which can be up to maybe 5 minutes with feats and Con.
3) Weapon of Frost wand. +1d8 cold damage, it will work strictly for its duration (3 minutes for a wand) unlike Blades of fire. Why not Flame weapon instead? Because it doesn't stack with other fire damage sources.
4) Unarmed strike feats. They all work in bear shape and transfer there, such as weapon focus, weapon specialization, improved critical etc. Moreover, feats given by items transfer as well, so gloves with Improved critical (unarmed) are really useful.

So with all abovementioned, you will additionally have +3d8 damage bonus atop of your basic damage which almost doubles BW's damage output, heh.

As for defensive part. You can read on the wiki what transfers and what doesn't to shapechanged armor. But basically, in epics your AC should be around 51-54 by default. Turn on ICE and you're reaching 60ish. All the dex transfers into Bear shape, so it lets you go much above that.

Poke me if you got questions here!

[Calen]

Thanks for taking the time explaining it, it is one of those builds I can't test anywhere.

Would a build like 5FB 10BW 3FF 10Barb work for a bear warrior, basically you're adding 1D4 and AC to con.
Another one could be 10 WD 10BW 10Barb though you might get low on rage.

From what I read you're pretty much better off making a 20 >insert some stuff< barb tank than a bear warrior, though I like the RP flavor of it.

[Rudolph]

You could also go for a charging bear - it is a bit fiddly to build but has good synergies: B/DB/BW/FB

This is the build - with annotations assuming very rare high end equipment - adapt and replace as you see fit. There is a shop armor that grants Improved Crit Unarmed.

http://nwn2db.com/build/?310366

Oh, you might also want to rethink skill distribution and INT. I made this before the Bear Roar was implemented.

[Okan]

For that battlecharger build, how do dear warrior forms interact with powerful charge? Do brown and dire bear forms count as large creatures for extra damage?

[KOPOJIbPAKOB]

Would a build like 5FB 10BW 3FF 10Barb work for a bear warrior, basically you're adding 1D4 and AC to con.
Another one could be 10 WD 10BW 10Barb though you might get low on rage.

Dodge AC is neglected completely in bear shape (including FotF's armor), Con-based bear warriors would've been slightly imbalanced if it was otherwise. Still, bonus damage works!

From what I read you're pretty much better off making a 20 >insert some stuff< barb tank than a bear warrior, though I like the RP flavor of it.

Overall... soooort of, although Bear warrior can reach much higher AC than barbarian is ever able to. Rp wise though yeah, I played a bear warrior and it was really fun!

For that battlecharger build, how do dear warrior forms interact with powerful charge? Do brown and dire bear forms count as large creatures for extra damage?

Charge works in bear shape and all the charge feats properly apply. I tested powerful charge and it gives proper +2d6 damage due to size. This, by the way, also applies for knockdown DCs.

[Rudolph]

This, by the way, also applies for knockdown DCs.

Wow, you're sure about this? I was told years ago that the +4 size bonus for large (vs. medium opponents) was not applied as it should be. Glad to hear this was fixed. The large size modifier and charge attack boni made me think of the DB/BW combo in the first place. I've updated the build now and implemented the Roar as well as some added AC at the cost of some CON. And also took note of the Barb improvement from a year or two ago, which gives the build another bonus feat at Barb 10. It looks pretty good now - even damage wise. Does what it does better than a Barb 20 / ? 10 could, I think.