Grizzly the Archer's page

Just remembered from reading this thread that there is the +1 dc per 10' away modifier. I now wonder how pcs, or even enemies, can see or attack, from over 400'+ away when they don't have perception scores that can reach the 40's. R even less, when the pcs have low perception checks.

Composite longbows have a range of 1100', over 10 increments. If the archer wanted to see the enemy at even half that distance, he'd need a perception of at least +35, with a roll of a natural 20 to see the enemy.

Even at Level 20, max ranks, a +12 modifier for wisdom, and a +10 it to see, and +10 ability over 20 levels, that's only a= +52.... Even with other magic items to push it even further to +62, and a mat 20 on the roll only gives an 82 total. That equates to seeing out to 820'. That's 290' less than max range for such an item.

Just very daunting for perception checks.
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As for dungeon, or alarm type situations, it occurs fairly often. The sound of combat, talking, footsteps, armor, all create sounds. Any one of these can lead the enmy to get the upper hand first on you. If however your actively being stealthy, then there will be opposing rolls, your parties individual stealth rolls vs. the GM's perception checks. And vice versa for those other times.

Not found in ultimate combat

Any specific crafting you want to excell at, or just be an amazing crafter overall?

My favorite is Craft:alchemy for mundane craftine, magical crafting has its own gains.

A throwing weapon is worth something to a fighter, but not until he already has +5 worth of enhancement. Then adding throwing and returning (and maybe versatile) would give him his ultimate one-weapon-fits-all. He can do anything with it and retain all of his bonuses for using his favourite weapon.

Versatile ability? Can't find it. Where's it from?

I understand how you feel on this topic. Many times have I had a GM who not only one time or another, but repeatedly overpowered, change on the fly, change something that shouldn't be into something more. It happens now and then to any group.

However, if it's a repeated occurrence, it not only gets annoying, but sometimes, idk, rude? We're all trying to play a game, including the GM. If my way of having fun is making my character concept, or roleplay, or background, or whatever, then whats the problem of me having some fun. I understand i can't always get my way, because the game is not built on easy mode, everything goesmour way style, there must be challenges. No problem. But if its practically every single occurence of it coming up as an issue, then there is an issue, and not over the character.

If the first thing to cross the GM's mind is "how can I mess with that (negatively)," then there is an issue amongst the group, or rather between the DM and what his issue is with the character(s).

Maybe he isn't planning stuff out, so on the fly stuff is a common occurrence. Remedy:write long term plans, and details for role playing and combat.

If he doesn't like having you guys have all the fun, have the GM introduce an NPC perhaps, even though that in itself causes issues. If not, have him make his NPC/ enemies be tougher/more resilient/smarter. (too many times GM's play their. Characters roles as not true smart characters, but those with some above intelligence. If the party is fighting demons, and they can summon or gate in friends, DO IT.

My, now not so short answer is thus, either talk tot the GM about it, or make a character that is not optimized in one way,,must great all around. You cover more territory with broader strokes than with pinpoint accuracy on one particular function. The last option, even if funny, is what you already said, create a crap character. Focused in not one particular thing, and even if so, is horrible at it. (zen archer, with low wisdom; barbarian with a penalty to con, Druid who picks a bird as an animal companion and not a pouncing cat or something else.)

Edit: Also, if players have issue with your character for optimizing, is it because they aren't and dislike your use of it, or are they optimizing as well, just don't like what your doing? It's just as likely the situation as with the GM.

Dazing assault and raging brutality, even reckless abandon are 3 abilities, once gained, that is all dependent on the situation. Fighting other melee combatants, dazing assault probably won't be best, not only for the low fort save, but even the -5 to hit will hurt vs them. Fighting non-melee brutes, or high fort characters, then daze assault away. They have to fail on just one save. You force them to make a save with each attack.

Raging brutality, for the 3 rage rounds, in my mind is pretty much worth it, unless you are low on rage rounds. One way mitigate the downside of the rage round expenditure, is get the trait optimistic gambler. The trait allows you to continue all morale bonuses, which includes your rage bonuses, superstition and such, for 1d4 rounds. Since you can use that to continue your higher str, and con, you can need your rage, even in combat, to help stretch out rage rounds. These two things, optimistic gambler+ raging brutality pretty much guarantees most of the time that you will be adding your con modifier to your damage rolls.

Reckless abandon again as the other two, is dependent on the availability of the situation. Vs high hitters (strong enemies) I'd use it, because they will still hit you, so you MIT as well get the ability to have a better chance to hit them. VS. weak/caster type/squishy enemies, I wouldn't use it unless needed. Keeping the higher AC will make it harder for them to hit you, and you won't really need that higher to hit bonus. But if you think you do, just use it no big deal.

Understood, but in the overall scheme of things, would it really be worth it for even another 90 (45 per hit) points of damage just to be able to do that to have a mount, when I'm already doing 180? Depending on the build, it makes sense, and that's fine, for my actual barbarian build I put up, I'm not sure I'd be in the mindset to switch him to a lance, and switch some feats rage powers to make him a a charge lance build just for 1/3 extra damage. 45 per hit, 4 attacks, vs 6.

For barbarians damage is a key role, obviously, but in my mind, unless I'm making a more damage focused build like that utilizing charging and bit some other damage heavy GUI
D for barbarian, I'm more likely to make a well rounded build. However, for charging builds utilizing a mount I'd quickly go to the lance builds. No question.

However, for an overall well rounded, great at all fronts: pounce, spell sunder/ regular sunder, high HP and dr, high saves, I'm pretty much set. More damage is always great, but I'd like to cover my rear on a few things if I have the chance. Since I do, I did. That's just me.
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As a side mention for broken builds, many if not all archer builds tend to be broken, but that's because they are more likely to get a full attack off then even a charger/pouncer. Zen archer, fighter archers are in the top builds of those types. Gunslingers are also seen as broken, especially with some of the archetypes.

Not in a worse position, just not a godly position like people expect them too.

Let's say each attack does 25 points of damage minimum.

-Same 4 attacks for abnormal pounder= damage equaling 4 attacks(100pts min.)

-Lance pounce, actual ruling: damage equals 3 attack damage on first attack, 1 attack eqch other attack. Total damage: 3+3= 6 attacks of damage (150 pts Dmg min)

- ragelancepounce as people WANT it to be= each attack does triple damage.. 4 attacks. 4x3= 12 damage groupings (12 x25= 300 points min damage)

So as you can see, the lance pounder isn't in a worse position, just not godly one.

As for 400+ DPR. That is possible, but not as easily gained using a normal pouncer, vs the overpowered illegal lance pounced on all attacks. The legal lance pounder, triple damage on first attack, only does 2 extra attacks of damage, so not a huge disparity.

Lance pouncing DOES NOT work. It has been faq'd and the triple lance damage is only on the first attack, no extra damage for the iterative. This is why ragelancepounce builds at people tried to make for barbarians originally, although worked on paper, did not work in actuality due to the dev ruling.

Can we discuss the merits (or lack thereof) of Raging Vitality? I see it left off of many builds but proponents of the feat consider it a death wish if you don't take it.

It helps give another 1 HP per level to your rage HP you gain. It also helps out when you get below 0hp to allow you to continue raging, thus keeping your higher HPS stilled,mane not dropping them off, and thus practically killing you. I recommend it for those 2 actual reasons alone.

However, another good reason that many people miss is that it works well with raging brutality. Raging brutality will allow you to spend rage rounds to get your con modifier to be added to your damage rolls. With rqging vitality, that damage is increased by 1, and if 2 handed weapons are used, an additional .5 Dmg for every 1 damage additional.

Makes my barbarian throwing hammer build ridiculous, with deadly aim, raging brutality, 2handed thrower, rage, and so forth.

@gobo: thanks for the praise. I had only made the barbarin about 2 years ago, and had not seen some of the other barbarian builds, especially fully fleshed out ones. At the time, everyone was doing either the huge rage cycling half Orc for deathless stuff, or the ragepouncelance builds, that don't actually function. This build seemd like a happy medium of all the best barbarian stuff, smoothed out nicely. I also enjoy Diferent builds, but until now, I had never played a barbarian, some wanted to see what all the hype, fun, and talk was about. Loving it every moment.

There are also plenty of threads that have very powerful and broken builds. It would probably be best to check those out first.

The guides to the builds thread, ravingdorks characters thread, the op thread of which there are many.

I suggest barbarian as well, because they unlike the fighter have more roleplay options, and more abilities to make them more of a threat. Such as:

DR

Rage powers: superstition, witch hunter spell sunder, greater beast totem ( pounce), come and get me are the best rage powers you can get.

Rage: increases your health and your damage from con and str respectively. Increased strength gets 1.5x for damage treatment, which is better than a fighter.

Raging brutality: use 3 rage rounds to apply your con modifier to each of your attacks for damage. Again, due to rage this will also be increased.

Yes,mtjar item has saved me a load of times, as well as helping me out boost certain rage powers when the circumstances required it. Increase superstition bonus when coming through a room, around a corner, increase witch hunter ability to deal a little more damage, or even beast totem, to get a better AC. The immediate effect is icing, for 2 rage rounds you get to effectively rage from when you want to.

Bigdaddy: replace "link" when you post the url with "url", no "". The link will then work.

I would recommend, if going zen archer, and if you dip inquisitor, is to do so for 2 levels, of inquisitor. You will now gain a huge bonus to your initiative. Your Dexterity being +2 (+4 min I assume by 10th+) and your wisdom being +4 base (+6 or higher by 10th+ level), will total a +10 initiative, without othr additional magic items, like ioun stones, or higher level magic items to boost dex and wisdom, improved initiative is another +4, so now a +14 to initiative.

Your pretty much going first now, and always.

I need help building him is all, really. I'm afraid the low strength will hurt me too much, even if I take Weapon Finesse. I'm also doubtful as to the use of the Plague Vial anyway, if it only lasts for 10 minutes, and can only be used once a day, what's the point? That's like one fight... Even with the Sticky Poison discovery, which lets me retain the disease up to a number of times equal to my Int modifier, that's still going to run out pretty quickly, especially if I make a full attack against the same target (there's like, 4 stacks gone?)

1. It's not once a day for the disease vial, it's one vial allowable at any given time. So you Create a vial in 1 hour, use it, then create another vial once the effects of the first vial wear off.

2. The disease vial effects last 10 minutes/ per level. So of your level 1, it's only 10 minutes. If your 12th level, it lasts 2 hours (12 th level X 10 min= 120 min= 2 hrs). So, it lasts quite a bit of time.

Yes, I also do that trick, giving myself extra damage instead of to hit because my attack was so high. I definitely recommend you use the small size to get an extra 2 point to your attacks. That's another 10% chance your damage will take. It's always better to boost your atk over Dmg, because if the atk doesn't go through, the damage is pointless.

Efficient quiver is needed highly, maybe 2.

If you can, poisons on arrows are the most effective way to get poisons into the enemy. Certain poisons ad more control style than pure damage, like: woundweal, spellscorch, blue whinnis, drow poison.

Goz mask, amazing for archers who get bogged down by obscuring mists and fog cloud and the sort.

Specialty arrows: blunt, silver/cold iron / adamantine, durable adamantine, smoke arrow and more.

Make the bows adaptive, and with seeking on them.

Hmm, 3 attacks,, with all those negatives, you can make it work, but any bonus you can get, like haste, or bless or prayer, will be a huge boon for you.

Dex 19 + 3 level at 13th level +6 item= 28 (+9)
Weapon focus, greater weapon focus= +2
Gloves of dueling +2
Weapon training +3
+3 weapon by 13th.
BAB: +15( over 16 levels, +14 over 15 levels)
Total attack bonus: +34

Including the -10 from everything
24 first*/ 24 rapid shot / 24 TWF/+19 2nd iterative/ +14 3rd iterative
* many shot

Damage: Str: +2 base + 3 enhancement str belt + 4 get. Weapon. Spec. + 2 gloves of dueling + 3 weapon training + 3 bow + 8 deadly aim = 1d8+ 25

What I don't understand is why get a second set of arms for another bow, just for one extra attack. For trading out the one attack, you lose out on +5 potential to your attack. However, two bow wielding is cool.

Most CR 15 ish monsters an enemy have their AC in the mid 30's give or take. Let's just say 35. Your first 3 attacks will have a 50% chance to hit, the fourth will have 25% chance, and the last will need a natural 20 to hit.

Mind you, that is with an AC of 35 which is just an extreme to test the build under. If it can pass at the high need, it has no issue passing at the low end of combat challenge.

My suggestion, is forget the toothy half Orc idea. It's nice on paper, and even in combat, because there are builds that have a barbarian making 7+ attacks, all natural, from different things, tails, hooves, claw, wing, bite, and the sort. Problem is its very focused on damage where the barbarian is already a beast. The human + superstion boost to saves is HUGE. Currently my level 10 barbarian is getting a +7, +8 when using headband of havoc, that is huge on a rage., considering you will always be raging.

Door blocking a room, but you know the big bad is on the other side, rage a round before and burst through.

Your saves at even level 10 will be: base 7+ con 2 (assuming even a +2 start con), rage con bonus +2, superstition +4, human favored bonus +3= +18

That is not including magic items to boost your con stat, or items such as cloak of resistance to boost the save itself. Also, this is not including the courageous bonuses you would get from your weapon.

Instead of the rogue going into a room first sometimes, or a scout, send in the HIGH save, DR having, heavy HP barbarian who can take a whooping, and still smile at it, because he hasn't gone yet. Your damage will be impressive, and actually higher than a fighters will be if when raging, otherwise the fighter does a few more points than you would. However he will have poor saves compared to you, and so is his HP, and no dr. So I suggest that barbarians go in first, because they just can.

I am currently in the process of making a poison guide. Need to upload it to something like google doc, or whatnot.

"I Don't Summon. I AM SUMMONED!"- said by my CN barbarian after being interrogated.

"This is taking too long." ::goes down the hall, comes upon an enemy, kills it, returns back to party. "You guys are still talking?"- same barbarian as above

Your not taking the beast totem for the claws, your taking it for the level 10 rage power to pounce. You can now full attack at the end of a charge, using your falchion/ nodachi. The claws are weak for how this build is made, just use your weapon, which is better.

STR: 17 DEX: 12 CON: 14 INT: 10 WIS: 12 CHA: 8

You could max out strength to 18, but would then need to cut back on Int to 8 and wisdom to 10. This is more well rounded, and gives you some more skills for perception, survival, acrobatics, and whatever else you want.

Trait: Reactionary, xxxx
human: favored class bounds: 1/3 level superstition bonus
DR 6/-

1 power attack- feat , Race feat: raging vitality
2 superstition- power
3 improved sunder- feat
4 witch hunter- power
5  ERP: reckless abandon-feat
6 spell sunder-power
7 erp: beast lesser
8 beast totem
9 combat reflexes
10 greater beast totem
11 Dazing assault
12 come and get me

Use a nodachi, or a falchion if you can't. Get furious, courageous, dueling-fg, keen on it and make it +5

Normal gear: +6 enhancement bonus items for your main stats ( str>con>dex= wis)
Cloak of resistance +5
Boots of speed/ boots of striding and springing
Headband of havoc- amazing barbarian item
Cord of stubborn resolve- free rage cycling
Ring of protection
Necklace of natural armor

Since this is for PFS, the ruling-fg weapon property should be allowable, considering it came from a PFS book. It will allow your enhancement bonus from your weapon to double up ( so a +5 weapon, now gets a +10 bonus that is a luck bonus to your original enhancement...making it a +15 to certain combat manuevers, sunder being one of them, even if not listed due to writing errors).

Spell sunder is a very powerful ability, so use it wisely and with the dueling-fg enchant on your weapon, your CMB to sunder, or spell sunder will be very high, making you miss on nothing but a 1 typically.

Hold off taking the one level in oracle or rage prophet for rage cycling. Your better off getting a cord of stubborn resolve, found in the Ultimate Equipment book, to rage cycle practically for free, and cheaper too.

Lame oracle curse provides fatigue immunity, at the cost of -10 speed to your movement.

It's taken at 9th level, because for curses, non-oracle levels count for half to qualify. So a level 8 barbarian.... 8/2=4. 4+ 1 oracle level means 5 to qualify. Which would occur at 9th level.

Upside is that the flame oraclatoms battle( or metal I think, no books with me right now), provides a +10' movement, so the curse and this bump to speed negate each other.

A quick bump in speed for crafting can be gained by using the Amazing Tools of Manufacture. However they in of themselves have a few FAQ issues as well to sort out.

There's a thread for the FAQ in the rules section for the item, found here. As for the item, it provides a +4 circumstance bonus, and allows you to craft up to 2,000 gp a day in one hours time.

The go to scholar on all myth is Joseph Campbell. His contribution to Star Wars really changed it. His most famous concept, The Hero's Journey, which, if you google, will keep you up past midnight complete with plot diagrams. It's the idea of the monomyth. That all myths are expressions and variations of a single master myth.

It's from his most famous book The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Not easy reading. My book mark in it is maybe a decade old (but I'll get to it this summer. I promise!!)

Agreed. Learned most of what I know of mythology from Campbell's writings. The Hero's journey, Monomyth, the 4 encyclopedia books of mythology ( only 2 were finished before his death).

Myth stories that I have used/ will use:

Creation stories- particular deities starting commotion in the behind the scenes

Prophecy- many types of these, most around a particular hero/ villain issue, a war ( ragnarok style), the future event of a particular person (Oedipus),

Love myths- the Love of two( or more) 'powers' that possibly shouldn't be, or even if it's ok, can cause a dynamic to change.

Item myths: Mjolnir, Odin's spear, Zeus's lightning bolt, so forth.

Location myths : shang-ri-la, mt. Olympus, Atlantis, etc.

The best ones are the forbidden myths: stories that are rare to know, but have some insight into a bigger truth. (fenrir being chained up wasn't well known of a a fact, but was freed in a rare circumstance, which led to ragnarok events involving baldric and such. (most people know of nidhogg the gnawing dragon who would eat the world trees roots, and at the top the raven who would be in the branches. Less people know of the squirrel who kept pestering the dragon, to eat faster, so as to collapse the world tree faster.)

Plenty of abilities outweigh their cost in effectiveness and power. I don't see how this is any different.

Why not try= not dumping CHA?

No, Grizzly, remember CHA is also force of personality.

Low CHA is The Spleen. A 5 is the guy villagers throw rocks at. He's the antithesis of cool and heroic. No hero has a 5 in CHA, because he'd never become a adventurer or hero to start with.

I know its also how the personality is presented. Was just referring to the high wis low cha type.

Come and get me... Cagm. Referring to the cagm rage power, that is available at 12 th level. Also, combat reflexes is needed to provide plenty of AoO's.

Sherlock Holmes ( any version really) / Dr. House (based on Holmes) type characters are perfect high wisdom- low charisma personalities.

My GM also has a problem with my spell sunder usage.

I recommend dazing assault, its just too good to pass up, especially for CAGM builds.

So...the likelihood of a wyroot bow is highly improbable?

Conversion inquisition gets you Wisdom to social skills, but that's about it. It's nice in a Wisdom-heavy build.

True, it's a nice bonus, but since it's to diplomacy, intimidate, and bluff, the three social skills that a vow of silence and truth monk might not use very often, it might not be very beneficial. Bluff is deceitful so can't use that and silence makes it hard to be diplomatic or intimidating unless I use sign language or have sign language " caption" gloves to physically create the words I'm thinking/ signing.

So for a 2 level dip in inquisitor for my 12th level zen archer, feather domain is what you recommend?

I wouldn't get use of the animal companion, only the +1 to perception, and +2 initiative during a surprise round.

Do you think the travel domain might be better? Or perhaps an inquisition? The build is wisdom heavy. 12 zen archer monk/ 2 inquisitor

In this instance I think you would be unconscious. Gaining HP, minimum 1 per level has nothing to do with con or hit point loss or poison.

1. Spell sunder ignores miss chance and concealment, so you can hit them.

2. To my reading, yes. As for which type, the creature itself is summoned which is the active spell going.

3. The communal/ mass spells are casted once and affect the area or selected targets as mentioned. You sunder the one spell, and it removes it entirely.

I noticed Ogaro doesn't have a normal rage stat block. From the wording of controlled rage it certainly seems to allow regular rage, besides controlled rage.

If you get an amulet of many fists with the agile weapon enhancement that can help.

perception, profession sailor (or equivalent), know: local

I will be running a pirate you're campaign soon. More crits seem to be preferred for pirate games than higher critical multiplier. Has to do with the quick fight styles of many swashbucklers or pirates. Using light quick strikes to kill the opponent versus beating them to death.

When figuring out CMB, the first number is the characters BAB, so f you are replacing one of your interstices for a trip attack, and it's the last iterative that is 15/10/5.. Meaning 10 less than the highest, you use the 5 BAB for that and all other numbers for CMB as normal.

Ex. Your normal trip CMB is +38. And your level 12 so you have 3 attacks, at +13/8/3 if full bab progression. If you use your first and second attack for damage for normal attacks, but your third and final is a trip, you use the +3 BAB number, not the +13, and continue adding on the other abilities or stats for CMB as normal.

I am a huge fan of sunder, and I can't understand why its getting such a bad rap. I understand loss of loot, however, you can give the item the broken condition, without destroying it. Worst case, you can have you're casters use the make whole spell, to repair magical items back to normal.

The main benefit of sunder is for the spell sunder rage power. it is too versatile and useful to be ignored. For spell sunder alone I would bump up sunder a few more spots in usefulness.

Also, sundering a spell pouch, or the cloak of a wizard to lay more damage on him through greater sunder.

In both games I play in currently I have near identical sunder type barbarians. Both have spell sunder and extremely high cmb's, so I never fail unless it's a 1 really. About every session sunder attempts occur, and from other players either a trip/disarm from the bard/healer or a load of trips from the new trip based monk character our new player brought in.

The thing about sunder is that it is also used for destroying objects. It's not just a normal attack, but a sunder maneuver on let's say a chest that might have something hidden inside.

I've used sunder for spell sunder (best use ever!), sundering material component spell pouches, sundering armor to help out the rogue and monk characters to hit more, sunder bests or robes (which if magical will stop the magic long enough for us to kill/knockout the enemy and then steal it later for repairs.

If anyone decides to be a sunder specialist I recommend they read up on every rule for sunder, which can now be used for an AoO. Also, if you want tons more versatility, spell sunder via 6 levels of barbarian is highly worth it. Never seen a combat maneuver outpace the usefulness and awesomeness of any other combat maneuver till now using that.

I'm going mostly zen archer, the 2 level dip is in inquisitor, not zen archer, sorry.

What would you recommend for an inquisition or domain/sub-domain for an inquisitor that is a 2 level dip for a zen archer?

Bodhizen: do you plan on adding in an item section? For magic items and equipment that can beat be utilized by the inquisitor?

Such as the bane baldric, or a furious weapon for a rage subdomain inquisitor, or a courageous weapon to pump up the morale bonuses.