TheSideKick's page

the most powerful character in the game is a scarred witch doctor by far. i would rather play a scarred witch doctor then a summoner.

but the basic witch is a game changer in your party, i built my wife one and she would misfortune + cackle and ruin the bbegs. but on a lot of smaller enemies she would be at a big disadvantage and would have to play defensively.

i think witches are very powerful, but not OP. i mean who cares about sleep hex when i can play a barbarian,god wizard, cleric, rage prophit, or paladin. all of those classes are much much much more op then a witch... but not a scarred witch doctor.

just remember that when you die again, its going to cost your group thousands of gold to get you back alive, and then 2 thousand more and 2 weeks to remove your negative levels.

you will never truly die from hp damage with that feat, and isnt that the point in the character lol? i mean 28 rounds for your group to finish combat and pick you back up, seems like a worth while investment.

why no tenacious survivor? that is my favorite feat for a high hp diehard character. also if youre willing to dont take diehard and endurance instead dip into 1 level of unbreakable fighter. you get both for free, and then you can grab 2 extra feats. i like extra rage power.

im assuming that youre talking about choke hold? tell your monk to stunning fist the target the round before he tries to choke the target and they wont be able to hold there breath. other then that yes you are right trying to just choke someone out will take longer then the combat will last, but add on neck breaker and you can really speed that up.

a cr 20 red dragon has a dex of an 8, a tetori can deal up to 6 points of dex damage in one round with neck breaker, so as a bad example that wouldnt work for RAW reasons, the toteri could go straight to con damage with 2 neck breaker attacks and comatose the target at the same time.

like i said the dragon was a bad example but you can see how , with neck breaker, a tetori can dispose of a high cr target solo with above average rolls.

so in conclusion if he: stunning fist>choke hold> pinning KO he can deal some serious damage to a large sized target, or i guess for a half giant it would be as big as huge and colossal if he has enlarge person on him.

She doesn't have a weapon cord.

prove it, they are redoing all the stat blocks

Sheathe sword.

Lay on Hands.

Pull out sword.

Attack.

That is how she does it.

nope weapon cord. all that needs to be said.

weapon cord, now shut up :P (jk)

yeah free hand fighter + magus is a bad idea, much better to just go solid magus.

im a big fan of letting the player say "my bastard sword is really a scimitar in looks". nothing is lost from reskinning gear or fluffing class features to fit the concept.

with that in mind, i would go with a disarming character, and TWF with IUS. they have a few pretty awesome disarming feats in APG and UC. you would need to have a secondary fighting style to makeup for enemies without disarmable objects, but man ive always wanted to see one in play.

you're trying to pick apart an anecdote based on speculation of how you think it happened? how about the dragon was flying towards us from his mountain perch smart guy...

second you're assuming that this dragon was about to "shred" me with his prone+grappled ac when i have 4 other players about to full attack/spell cast on him?

stop trying to "win" the conversation, you last post is pure fallacy. and stating that "one or 2 archetypes" desnt make the class good, doesnt hold weight. the fact is that if you build your monk right it will do what you want it to do well enough.

and i wouldnt call 6 awesome archetypes 1 or 2.

ok so im at work right now, so im going of memmory so bear with me.

13th level monk with dimension door and dimensional agility. once a grapple lands "Grappled creatures cannot move and take a –4 penalty to Dexterity. A grappled creature takes a –2 penalty on all attack rolls and combat maneuver checks, except those made to grapple or escape a grapple. In addition, grappled creatures can take no action that requires two hands to perform."

if you cannot move you cannot fly or even hover, so by raw if you grapple a flying creature they hit the ground like a rock. my tetori has Boots of the Cat which allow me to take minimum damage from falling. so the dragon takes xd6 (height/10 -10).

he literally powerbombs dragons.

at 13 he has cmd of 45 and a cmb of 33 (+ true strike as a SLA)which is enough to grab a cmd of 52 on a 2+. my gm was thoroughly impressed, when he was thinking the dragon would just strafe us with fire breath. then i powerbombed the dragon from 400 feet up dealing 39d6 damage.

you may want to tell him that even though his character lost a good friend his character shouldntquit the fight. soldiers lose squad mates and friends all the time. as long as they have a clear goal or objective they dont let that loss effect their mission.

mind you they still feel the loss, they just accept that it is part of "the job" and keep going. new additions are added to the group, or squad, and they continue the fight.

with that being said, if he is using this event to change characters, then that means he isnt having fun with that character. so my advice is to let him change it because this game is all about FUN.

all i have to say is my tetori uses dimention door to grab dragons, then bowerbombs them to the ground, and beats the snot out of them.

he is a pure monk and is the second most bad ass character ive ever played.

you can take all your bs "monks suck" talk over then and bury it.

ok so this orc is not for a PFS game correct?

if thats the case i would drop the extra traits feat pick up combat reflexes at level 1 and iron will in the place of extra traits.

thunder and fang can net you top damage, you need to waste 2 feats for it.and yes i know it doesnt effect the towershield, but you still get the earth breaker as a one handed weapon.

but other then that, i would focus on bull rushing, and reposition phalanx fighter can accomplish this very well while still having a good trip ability, which when used with pin down and stand still will give you a very powerful tanking character.

zeddicus zul zorander is the best wizard ever, so i would go off him, he projects his voice.

i cant find a youtube link :( i fail

that is how i always thought it worked, but the CRB states "at the top of the round" and doesn't qualify as a "full round" in definition.

ok so i have a tetori with snapping turtle style. now on my turn i:

* move through a threatened space
* provoke the AOO
* after the target misses i use the counter grapple ability of turtle style which is an immediate action.

i then use my standard action to pin the target if my grapple is successful, everything is ok so far... but when does my swift/immediate action rest? is it when the person who won initiative goes or is it one full round from when the action was used, in this case my turn?

you my want to try an oracle for this build. you can go with metal or battle and get full plate and a few other nice revelations to go with the undead smasher/healer type character. you will lose out on channel positive, but it isnt the end of the world as you gain a few really nice boons instead.

ok i just thought of the best class for you to play. it is a paizo class from 3.5 called the death master. it gives you a pretty crazy powerful minnion, a clerics control undead, and a hybrid of arcane and cleric spells.

one draw back is that your spell list is very small, but it has quite a few good spells on it none the less. i think its everything you're looking for.

so you're mad that your fighter doesnt need to carry around fly potions anymore?

i dont get how you feel a feat should be better then a class feature, and im also concerned that you dont see to useful ness of having a fighter or barbarian that can fly without any magic.

that opens quite a bit of wealth and a slot, just for a racial feat.

just be happy hes not playing a come and get my invulnerable rager, those guys WANT to get hit. this guy just deflects a single attack once per round.

once he gets past level 8 he wont seem quite so broken, at lower levels let him have his fun.

players: "we search the room"

me: "ok 16 hours later you guys are hungry and fatigued from..."

players: "no no no we meant a quick search, i got a 20"

me: a quick search around the room gives you nothing, but you get the sensation that if you looked in a particular spot you may find something of value"

players: "fine then i move stuff around"

me: "what stuff?"

after a few session of this game, i finally got them to say "i search the pile of rags" type statements. mind you the entire time i was asking them what they were doing i was smiling to get the point across that i was just messing with them.

if you allow 3.5 material for your games, i would suggest the necrotic cyst feat from libris mortis. best feat ever for a necromancer, it gives you some serious power to make up for your low end offense.

Too stationary. That's more American wrestling

FYI there is no such thing as "american wrestling"...

my vote would be a rage prophet barbarian, more hp then a paladin, hits harder, heals better, better mitigation and last but not least better spell list.

i havent ever played a character as strong as a come and get me rage prophet with a vital strike build.

life oracle/invulnerible rager (or armored hulk) vital strike with furious finish and potions of enlarge person... s&++ gets crazy fast.

TheSideKick wrote:

you dont nerf him, you play his weaknesses more.

Yeah ofc, that is what the dm has done a few battles now. But the problem that than occurs is that its not logical for the enemies to first round target the ranger-lookalike. You take out the bomb-flinging madman or the spellcaster first. Only logical.

And it is not that easy to nerf a player. Fx a hold-spell becouse of low willsave is easy, but to take out a high-number player for (most likely) the entire duration of the fight is a bit mean if you do it every time it is supposed to be a "main-fight".

And than it is the fact that the dm cant build an encounter based on the chance that a hold-spell works or dont work. If it works than the encounter is way to hard for the rest of the party as we lose 40% of the dps, if it fails than the encounter is done in 2 rounds.

thats not true at all.

obscuring mist takes ALL ranged characters out of combat for a few rounds, hindering terrain will stop melee, any person who has a stonghold or a base of operations, and isnt a complete dumbass, would have counter mesures in place for stopping assults.

should mooks be countering him every time? no, but im not talking about mooks. if he is one hitting the BBEG then the BBEG needs to have stong defenses in place other then AC and HP.

this is my point, you dont do it every time. if he kills mooks in 2 round great, weak combats shouldnt be long, but that BBEG should have defenses in place, magic or mundane, to stop his dps. if this is the case then his gear wouldnt matter much because the gm would be playing in a realistic way that would force the archer to move or try to counter a counter-mesure, so he can actually use his dps.

you dont nerf him, you play his weaknesses more.

ranged characters are very very weak. obscuring mist is a first level spell that will take him out of the fight for a few rounds. ray of enfeeblement will also hurt his dps by making his composite bow less effective. create pit will hurt him due to fighters having a low reflex and force him to climb out and keep fighting wasting a round or 2 of his dps. they have MANY ways to stop a ranged character from owning everything with arrows, and doing so wont ruin his fun. it will force him to start countering the things that he never knew were a bane to his archer.

in conclusion just play smart as a gm and you can , when you find it appropriate, stop his dps and force him to spend time countering your counter measures. so dont think "hes to powerful for my npcs", think about how your npcs would fight a group like this.

i would rather play an oracle then an inquisitor. i like the lore of the class, but they just cant do anything better then other classes.

Right, ive had this same discussion with 30 other people on the boards, as well as in RL. No one could make heads or tails about how this feat was supposed to work, but i guess the guy who wrote the feat made a post somewhere a year or more ago. I havent ever found the quote so play it how you want to, but this is how i was told the feat works.

which i agree with when used with a reach or ranged weapon, a non reach melee weapons is a little different IMO.

ok so hamatula strike is a very very poorly worded feat that is a very very misleading as to how it works.

"Benefit: Whenever you damage an opponent with a piercing weapon, you can immediately make a grapple check; success means the opponent is impaled on your weapon and you both gain the grappled condition. While the opponent is impaled, as an attack action you may make a grapple check on your turn at a -4 penalty to damage the opponent with your weapon, even if your weapon cannot normally be used in a grapple. "

ok so the feat clearly defines what happens when you make the check, "success means the opponent is impaled on your weapon and you both gain the grappled condition" it DOES NOT SAY you are grappling the target, so the rules for hamatula strike SUPERSEDES the rules for a normal grapple. so basically this feat does nothing but apply the grappled condition , not create a grapple as in a standard action combat maneuver.

its a great feat that is poorly worded and causes a ton of confusion.

You got a slight problem. With two hands busy holding a greatsword, you don't have a hand free for casting.

i will say it one more time

YOU ARE WRONG!! do a search and figure out why you're wrong

I'm Hiding In Your Closet wrote:

So, WHEN, oh WHEN, will they make a Magus archetype that permits 2-handed weapons??? They've already got one for archery shenanigans and one for shields.

Not going to happen. They've pretty much set the limit on how much of the Fighter's schtick you're going to steal, just like they did for the wizard side of the street.

You CAN use a greatsword as a Magus now. You simply can't do any spellcasting in the same round.

this isnt true, you can use spell strike with a 2 handed weapon, you just wouldnt be able to full attack with spell combat.

martial classes are boring?

huh...

killing a monk will be very difficult for a low level group. they have the saves to stop casters, the mobility to evade melee and the second highest ac in the game with defenses against ranged characters.

unfortunately i cant tell you what to get to stop the monk because i dont know how he was built, but what i can tell you is create hindering terrain as much as possible, stone call is a great spell for this because it hits a large area and does not allow a save. flank him and make sure you dont try to stand toe to toe with him, as a high level flurry can kill a lower level character that doesnt have an insanely high ac. force him to move as much as possible and buy potions of expeditious retreat so you can catch him if he tries to run away.

Oh, and if you want an example of a high-intelligence fighter, might I suggest Roy Greenhilt from the Order of the Stick webcomic for inspiration?

epic... just epic..

you know what after thinking about it for a bit, if you dropped barbarian and went druid you could go with a huge sized elemental form, thats a
+8 size bonus, then tack on blood rage for an additional +10 (or less) then the eldritch heritage orc blood line for another +4

+8 size,
+10 moral
+6 alchemical
+5 untyped
+4 orc bloodline
+6 enhancement
20 base
---------
+59 strength

oh damn and if you cast moment of greatness then bloodrage would net you a +20 for one attack, that would be nutz.

1. yes it does

you would have a +6 strength if you were a second level rage chemist and +6 from the rage if you were an 11th level barbarian. +12 and the higher level mutagens would also gain this +2 ability.

so if you were playing a 15th level character i think the highest you could get would be ...

11 barbarian = +6 moral bonus when raging
2 alchemist = +4 strength *alchemical*
2 ragechemist= +2 strength untyped
manual of physical strength = +5 strength also untyped, but from a different source so this may stack or may not
belt of physcial might= +6 enhancement bonus
rightous might= +4 size bonus

= if all of them do stack, as i think they do, you would be able to achieve a 20+ 25= a 45 strength.

first off, you should be choosing a race that has "extra rage rounds per day" as an alternate class choice, and having more barbarian levels then oracle or rage prophet levels. also you should be rage cycling with the lame curse.

lame curse give you an advantage over a normal barbarian in that you gain the ability to rage then end the rage on your turn, or there turn, to prevent burning through unnecessary rounds of rage during a fight. normal barbarians cant do this until level 12 (i think), also rage cycling allows you to use your guidance ability every round as well.

so while yes you do lose out on the over all number of rage rounds a normal barbarian would have, you gain the ability to be "surgical" with your use of rage rounds. and thats a trade-off i would take every day of the week.

I am going based on Appearances not just names. As Zweihanders are a type of Greatsword.

Especially when a Zweihander was only 5 inches across on their Foreguard. Foreguard: The 2 Curved prongs on the Blade. Not the 2-3 feet that Siegfried's has.

I guess it is mostly the Width of the blades that bugs me most. I could see a long blade and long hilt. As Zweihanders and Greater Claymores were Long. Heck, some averaged around 5-6 Feet based on the Wielder. But I think the Widest Greater Claymore recorded was only 7 Inches where the blade met the crossguard and quickly tapered down to 4 inches before it went to its point over the last 6 inches of its length. And that blade was only 4 feet 9 inches with a 1.5 foot hilt.

hey if i can kill a dragon with my bare hands, i should be able to wield what ever style of sword i want, personally my greatsword is 12 feet long and shaped like a tree trunk that somehow still deals slashing damage.

in conclusion GET YOUR REALITY OUT OF MY FANTASY!!!

(not really shouting, just kidding)

they wouldnt survive the initial damage, how you flavor it is how you choose to. 15+damage delt auto crit damage is the DC they need to survive, so a level 1 warrior with a great sword would auto kill a dragon except with a nat 20 on the save roll.

ok... i get that youre trying to make a fast character... but why? what would this character accomplish?

hm... if i played this character i would need to play him as a mymidarch magus, i know i spelled that wrong, otherwise i couldnt get the true gambit feel. i would love to toss shocking grasp and a few other nice spells i could toss on those cards.... man i think ill play this guy in pfs now !!! GRRRR... character number 800

since you're playing a gesalt character you really can go nuts with your build.

if i were you, i would play something like this.
(20pt buy) human

str 14
dex 16 (14 + 2)
con 14
wis 10
int 10
cha 14

as a balanced character, you can change it as you feel necessary.

feats:
h = TWF
1 = PBS
3 = rapid shot
5 = dodge/agile maneuvers
7 = weapon focus
9 = ITWF

basic feats to give an idea of where you want to take him

tricks/revelations (deff curse)

tricks

vanishing trick
flurry of stars
ki charge (paper bombs)
shadow clones (water clones)
combat trick (lunge)

revelations:

water sight
Freezing Spells
blizzard
Wintry Touch
Fluid Nature (you wouldnt need dodge as a feat then)

last but not least spell selection
fog spells are the most important of all the spells you can choose. after them i would choose either a buffer/debuffer type ninja who uses murderous command and haste/slow silence spells as your main assult, change cha to your main stat, or go more for a self buffing damage dealer keep dex as your main stat.

damage dealer:
1
magic stone
weapon wand
infernal healing
entropic shield
protections from ...
abundant ammunition

2
SILENCE!!! cast on you for ultimate cheeze, remember you get to cast silent metamagic every spell for free

hold person
resist energy

3 warding (depending on your campaign
from here on you basically want to focus on damage based spells and self buffing spells to net you a bonus to your damages.

now i want to point out that clerics do not get many cold based spells, so you wont be very ... justsu based. if you want to be more of a hard core every other round i cast a spell or use a magical ability you can still kind of play this character using wizard/sorcerer as your base by getting this item goz mask for 8,000 gp, gaining the ability to use water sight but with the sorcerer/wizard list. the character wont be as good over all, but it would have a much more flamboyant aspect to the fighting style.

benalitybob actually touched on the character i was going to suggest for you to play.

reach weapon, chained kama is a good choice, with the deff curse, for free silent spell, then swift action invisibility run 10 feet away from your target, cast obscuring mist (silent woot!!) the enemy has no clue you're 10 feet away and when he goes to leave the mist you trip him.

then you get:
+2 for total concealment
attack flat footed ac(cmd also)
+2 improved trip
+magical bonuses from weapons

= a prone enemy, then you full attack using a ki point to TWF then to death

the only spell you need is obscuring mist, other fog spells are viable options later on. i played this character very successfully, i used ninja stars for ranged attacks and a **kusarigama** (is the name of the weapon i was thinking of)

you do not need to go with levels of sorcerer to play this character "like naruto" when i played this guy i had him function very similar to that guy with the sword (setsubo or something like that) they first fought and the boy/girl with the mask

i will post a ninja build i have used to great effect once im no longer at work. it was a very fun and flavorful build.

when you first hug someone, it deals 1d6+strength+ magic etc..

then every round after you get to choose if you want to deal damage with the spikes OR a different weapons BUT not both.

here si whats so awesome about the magus:

spell storing 2 handed weapon (spell storing elven curve blade with improved crit/keen)
cast 10d6 shocking grasp @ 7th level
cast 10d6 shocking grasp from weapon
maximized spell strike
lead blades
truestrike

all this means you have one dead BBEG.

all joking aside, the magus is a very wanted base character a fighter mage. it is one of the more romanticized types of characters in fantasy. a spell sword/battle mage or what ever term you choose to give it. other then that it isnt better then an eldritch knight past level 6, and the newer 3/4 bab classes are generally better over all. you play a magus because you like the lore of it.

hmmm... 9 pages this may have already been covered but i will throw in my 2 cents.

if you want to make a character that focuses on skills, and does not deal damage in combat, may i suggest a bard fighter?

bard will net you the skill monkey role better then a rogue and you will have bardic bonuses to make your teammates better in combat. then to add to that you can focus on steal and dirty trick maneuvers to have a non combat function, like taking the wnd, sword, shield, etc.. from the target giving you an advantage in combat without being a damage dealer. you will also have spells to use for party buffing.

if you really really really want sneak attack then they have bard archetype that will allow you to still have Sneak attack, but i dont know why you would want it when combat isnt a focus for you.

the rogue class and a rogue character dont need to be the same thing, you can use what ever class you want, like fighter if you wanted to, and call it a rogue.

i was just thinking about my best character, by best i mean the one i liked the most, and it turned out to be a character i didnt think i would like when i first created the character.

my group needed a healer/tank to flush out the group. i suggested that i play a paladin since i knew it could fill both roles very well. when i talked tot he gm he advised me not to, becuse another player was playing a neutral evil character as well as a chaotic evil barbarian would be joining the group later.

i was going through my list of characters i had played in the past and couldnt really think of anything that would be better then a paladin, or at least equal to. then i had a "moment of clarity" and started building a rage prophet (life oracle/invulnerable rager). when all was said and done the character was a beast, mechanically awesome, fit the role so well, and, contrary to my bias against barbarians, a blast to RP (like a shaman type character, wore a wolf skin over his head and back).

he went down as my best character i have ever played.

so what was your best?

yeah when i gm i end arguments by saying "until the end of the game it works like this, once the game is over you can prove me wrong."

im usually correct, but i do make mistakes. so by using this method you dont invalidate the rules, and you dont sound like a prick. you just sound like a gm who wants the game to continue going smooth.