So I just started a game of WFRP3 and one of the players is a Wardancer. He waffled a little on whether he wanted to take that career at the start since I warned him (and he quickly saw) that Ritual Dance actions are kind of unusual. So I was wondering, does anyone have any suggestions on good "builds" for a beginning wardancer? What talents, and actions would you suggest buying? What about starting characteristics?

The Wardancer is probably the hardest career of all to play in combat. No armor and no career ability that helps reduce damage (as opposed to the Troll slayer). Added to this is the ritual dance cards and the need to figure out how to do the stance changes in the best way. It seems really complicated, and I would only recommend it if the player really wants something different/challenging. I haven't tried playing one yet, so I can't give you any solid advice, but I posted my thoughts in another thread:

From what I can see (leafing through the ritual dance actions) Wardancers are really not meant to stand toe to toe with the enemy. They just can't take that punishment. They should burn fatigue and use cards that let them increase mobility to absurd levels. They have some actions that let them perform movement and attacks at the same time. Try to always end your rounds at medium range, and always attack targets that are engaged already (which makes it less likely that they will pursue, depending on how the GM plays it of course). I haven't really playtested it, but thats how I would try to play a wardancer in battle.

Yes i will be hard, but it's not impossible that you could keep it up for 2-3 rounds. For the inevitable times when you're going to suffer damage, make sure that you have some active defenses ready and have some defensive talents (Catlike reflexes, Roll with it). Bribe your soldier friend to use Guarded position.

When making a wardancer, splurge on ability scores (and hope your GM is nice enough not to throw too hard stuff at you the first couple of sessions), a str 4 t 4 agi 4 int 2 wp 4 fel 3, stat line will cost you 17 build points, but makes a really strong warrior. Buy both improved parry and dodge as soon as you can.

I do think that Wardancers should have gotten some kind of passive defense as a career ability, the one they have seems quite pointless (but I might be wrong). Something like, "Wardancers may not use armor but have a defense score equal to the number of recharging ritual dance cards (max 3)" would have made more sense to me. Or ignore/tweak the fluff to let them use up to leather armor, you could argue that they use leather straps and bracers that can be used as protection (to deflect cuts and blows).

I'm at work so I don't have the box right here, but as far as I remember there is nothing stating that the wardancer could not use armour, I might very well be wrong I can't fact check it, anyone?

There is no game mechanics that stop it no, but fluff-wise wardancers do not use armour (it says so on the back side of their career card). Mechanically there is nothing to stop a troll slayer from being a pacifist either

Yeah, the player took some fairly heavy armor. I said I wouldn't stop him, but if he met other wood elves they'd probably give him crap about it, at the least. On further thinking, I don't like the idea of him being able to use the ritual dances in probably anything heavier than leather armor. I mean, I'm not hugely knowledgeable about the fluff, but I'm assuming it's a lot of nimble jumping and spinning around, martial arts kata-type stuff, right? And of course, why be a Wardancer if you can't use the ritual dances? If I impose this rule, i'll give him a chance to switch careers...

but assuming he doesn't want to switch careers (and does stop using heavy armor) and doesn't want to dump all his points into abilities (I'm going to give EVERYONE a chance to tweak their characters before we start the next session) what talents and actions would you recommend? In particular, what ritual dances are the best to start out with?

I started with:

Shadow's coil to get some much needed defense and allow a quick stance change
Tempest's Fury for a high critical attack, ready the next attack/defense cards and have a long term recharging dance to power other cards
Whirling Death as a basic attack which can also power up
Stooping Hawk Leap second attack

Tactics

Catlike Reflexes
Roll with it

I have leather armour

My basic sequence is(which never seems to work out in practice):

First Round
Go to 1 in conservative
Whirling death 4 recharge, 3 at end of round

Between rounds
Defend with Shadows coil 2 recharge and change to stance one into reckless, and dodge (power up with catlike reflexes) if necessary

Second Round
Go to 2 in reckless
Tempest Fury, remove 1 recharge from Shadows coil and 2 from Whirling death, both now have 1 recharge and on conservative side.
With only two successes this is +6 damage +3 criticals which is not good for anyone, two boons gives an extra +4 damage from the recharging dances. Use Wardancer abilty to flip card to conservative 6 recharge
End of round Whirling death and Shadows coil recharged, Tempests Fury on 5 Conservative

Between rounds
Defend with Shadows coil 2 recharge Reckless, and dodge (power up with catlike reflexes) if necessary.

Third
Stooping Hawk Leap 3 recharge and look for the two boons for yet another critical. Use Wardancer ability to flip card to conservative.

You can run the cards as you want maybe Tempest’s fury next round with two conservative cards to power it up.

I have found the Tempest Fury to cripple most single opponents and most henchmen groups, but the wardancer cannot stand toe to toe with multiple opponents. It is important to maneuver in and out of combat with the Wardancer, this does mean burning fatigue. I have tried to use Woven Mist which does work in longer combats but would not pick it to start, maybe first buy.

I just want to chip in, a dancer friend of mine can do a backflip wearing 40kg of fullplate, handstands and so on... Ok he is in better shape than most professional atheletes, but a wardancer would probably not be hindered much by this, other than general fatigue from doing acrobatics in a plate aremour of course, give him an automatic fatiuge every other round if he wears medium armour and one every round if he wears heavy stuff maybe?

Having looked at the cards again if I was to remake the character I would Orion’s Gambol rather than stooping hawk leap, this to me gives a more certain critical to trigger the Wardancer ability.

UncleArkie said:

The issue isn't what can be done in full plate - it has been pretty well established to anyone who cares to do a little research that the mobility of a practiced wearer is hindered very little even in full armor, and warriors used to wearing it have been documented swimming rivers, climbing walls, etc.

In the context of Warhammer lore, however, Wardancers are universally equipped with little to no armor and traditionally wield two swords. I suspect the stricture on armor is partially religious in nature as they are devotees of Loec, the elven god of fortune. The other factor of course is their preferred woodland environment, which isn't as conducive to the use of heavy armor.

In game terms, while Wardancers don't have the hard stricture against armor that Slayers have, a Wardancer wearing anything heavier than leather armor is probably not really in the spirit of the career. While this makes survivability a little tough at the outset, on the other hand, with a starting AGL of at least 4, Improved Dodge is available right off the bat.

Personally I'd only take 1-2 Ritual Dance cards to start with due to the difficulty modifiers and the need to get a solid foundation of maneuvers going first. I'd round out the selection with Improved Dodge, Nimble Strike for the good crit chance + hit and damage based on AGL, and Double Strike - yeah, the card has its issues, but it certainly fits with the Wardancer glass cannon role, and isn't nearly as abusive in the hands of a lightly armored S3 A5 or S4 A4 elf as a S5 T5 Ironbreaker.

Early on I'd focus on purchasing wounds and talents such as Combat Awareness and Quick Wits (the one that recharges a card immediately, don't have my set in front of me) as well as the previously mentioned Catlike Reflexes and Roll with It. I'd also pick up Improved Parry early on, and maybe an out-of-career skill or two such as Stealth or any of the other racial skills I didn't choose at creation. Then once I'd passed from rank 1 to rank 2, I'd see about training a second rank in Weapon Skill and Athletics, and turn my attention towards the more difficult Dance maneuvers either right before or right after getting my second expertise die in Athletics (again IIRC that's the skill roll used for most Dances). At that point I'd be looking at moving into a complementary career unless RP circumstances dictate otherwise - probably Scout or Mercenary - and use those careers' action card purchases to fill out my selection of Ritual Dances. Note that I also wouldn't really consider either Scout or Mercenary a career change per se , but rather jobs or roles a Wardancer could fulfill while still dancing their way across the Old World.

Haggard said:

I can't really agree with you on this. I feel that you need to get a good few Ritual Dance cards from the start to get the synergies between the cards and you have a good chance of success with them with weapon skill and coordination trained even with a starting character. Lots of the Ritual Dances are basically attacks and as soon as you begin to pick Nimble strike and Double strike you are diluting what make the War Dancer unique. Would agree that early upgrade of the dodge skill is a must.

All I can really say about the armour stuff is that it feels wrong to me. I'm also slightly bothered by the player choosing to take two weapons, but not two swords. I think he's got a regular sword or a rapier and main-gauche. And he's wearing a chain shirt, I believe. I'm just looking at it and thinking "This doesn't really feel like a Wardancer." I'm going to give him the option of switch careers (last time was our first session and we only made characters and played the very beginning of an Eye for an Eye) because I'm not sure he really wants the complexity of dealing with the ritual dances and it doesn't seem, with the armour and weapon choices that he's really into the style of the wardancer in general.

No that certainly doesn't feel like a wardancer to me. Mercenary or Soldier probably fits better. Maybe he was training to become a wardancer but got thrown out for being too crap at the dancing

Buying agi higher than 4 for a wardancer is completely wasted. The attacks (dances) a wardancer use are almost all based on strength. You're a lot better off starting with str 4 agi 4 than str 3 agi 5. Agi 4 is great because it lets you buy/use improved dodge. I would probably also start with only 2 dance cards though, selecting Imp. dodge and Double strike for the final two.

He took Improved Dodge (because I strongly encouraged everyone to consider at least 1 Improved defence card if they qualified for one) and Double Strike. Then he took 2 dances that I picked out... I think I picked Tempest's Fury and... umm... Shadow's Coil? But I'm certainly no expert at the dances. I just grabbed Shadow's Coil because it seems like a fairly solid defence (and a stance switcher) and Tempest's Fury because it has good chances for a critical wound.

But I printed out some of the earlier tips suggested in this thread to show him if he wants to stick with the Wardancer (though I'm going to strongly encourage him to change his equipment to more appropriate stuff if he does) or give him the option of switching to another career. After all, he could always transition to Wardancer later once he's more familiar with gameplay and combat tactics.

fnord3125 said:

Sounds that Wardancer is not for him, looks like he would be happier with a more basic combat type. If he still wants to go down the agility route he could pick up Nimble strike and Acrobatic strike which fit well if he is armed with a rapier.

gruntl said:

No that certainly doesn't feel like a wardancer to me. Mercenary or Soldier probably fits better. Maybe he was training to become a wardancer but got thrown out for being too crap at the dancing
Buying agi higher than 4 for a wardancer is completely wasted. The attacks (dances) a wardancer use are almost all based on strength. You're a lot better off starting with str 4 agi 4 than str 3 agi 5. Agi 4 is great because it lets you buy/use improved dodge. I would probably also start with only 2 dance cards though, selecting Imp. dodge and Double strike for the final two.

Defiantly agree on stat buys. I still think that initially Shadows coil is a better buy than upgraded dodge, you can use it and basic dodge in the same round which I think is just as effective as improved dodge and you have another ritual dance to get bonuses. Though I know double strike is a really nice card and fits in with the Wardancers two weapon style I would still go for another dance but that may just be my aversion to every fighter type seeming to have it.

Amketch said:

Fortunately in our group I don't think anyone took double strike, instead focusing more on what was appropriate for their character. If any career should have access to it, though, it's a Wardancer, since it's pretty much their signature style. I'd be more inclined to discourage the other warrior types from taking it.

It's also one reason I suggested the S3 A5 build for a Wardancer - sure, it's not as min-maxed mechanically, but it feels right, keeps Double Strike from being too overwhelming (IIRC damage tops out at 13, S3 + two hand weapons at 5 each), and with Nimble Strike that A5 becomes a pretty strong attack. Plus it gives the Wardancer a very good shot of pulling off things like Stealth checks untrained, which lets them allocate their racial training die to a skill like Observation which is going to be based on one of their weaker stats, which helps with the feel of playing an Asrai as well as a Wardancer.

Just my two brass.