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I've currently got an 8th level character who's an Archaeologist bard, who along the way picked up a level of lore warden (fighter) and mysterious stranger (gunslinger). So really, a 6th level Archaeologist.
He's completely underpowered, and I need some serious advice on retraining him.
He's uses a two-handed reach weapon to trip. He has Combat Expertise and Improved Trip, and I've invested a lot in his tripping maneuver (his weapon is heirloom; he's got Gauntlets of the Skilled Maneuver for that maneuver). By 8th level, you either can't trip a lot of enemies, or their CMD requires me to still roll a ~15 or higher to be successful.
He has a pistol for ranged attacking, and he has Point Blank Shot, but without more levels, 1d8 damage - even to touch AC - at 8th level is garbage. Especially without Quick Clear (although Reliable will fix that).
The DC's on the spells aren't good enough to push through save DCs at this level; I'm still only casting 2nd level spells - at level 8. Multiclassing is to blame for that, but even without that, I'd still only be casting 3rd level spells.
I don't have the sheet immediately handy (ask if you want to see it), but here's the stat array (PFS) for now:
Str 7
Dex 16
Con 14
Int 14
Wis 9
Cha 18 (with +2 @ 4th and 8th)
Feats include:
(Human) Agile Maneuvers
(1st) Combat Reflexes
(3rd) Combat Expertise (not from Lore Warden level 2 class feature)
(Bonus) Improved Trip (from Lore Warden level 1 bonus feat)
(4th) Improved Initiative
(5th) Point Blank Shot
(7th) Butterfly's Sting
He's pretty good with skills (especially disable device and perception - his greatest asset, thank you Clever Explorer), but that's really all he's got going for him. In a fight, he's often useless.
I've got a lot of prestige to burn, so the sky's the limit for retraining. I'm expecting a major retrain, though a minor one would be welcome, obviously.
At mid to high levels, I just can't see how the archaeologist would work at all. I feel like the way to working this out is to think of the most ideal build and head towards it, but keeping the ability scores in mind.
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Ok, here are your problems that I can see:
1) Combat Maneuvers suck
2) Multiclassing out of a spellcasting class sucks
3) Combat Maneuvers suck even harder on a 3/4 BAB class with 7 Strength
The simplest ways to improve yourself immediately:
1) Get an Agile weapon or rearrange your stats so you have decent Strength and grab a two-hander
2) Ignore Combat Maneuvers
3) Take all 8 levels in Bard
Archaeologist's Luck is awesome and combined with Arcane Strike and the excellent Bard buffs (Heroism, Good Hope, etc.) should allow you to hit very accurately and decently hard. Oh, and make sure to pick up the Fate's Favored trait.
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How much optimization do you want and what one or two things do you want to focus on or excel at?
Honestly, optimise to pieces. The trend with scenarios seems to be getting harder and harder, so I'm quickly losing patience with adding fluff and I'm happier to move into mechanics.
3) Combat Maneuvers suck even harder on a 3/4 BAB class with 7 Strength
This should be no problem with Agile Maneuvers, which uses Dex instead.
The weapon is a reach/trip weapon, if that helps. Not sure what other maneuvers would be worth considering, maybe Steal or Grapple. Someone mentioned Reposition flyers to the ground then trip them with multiple attacks, but I think that's very situational.
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Lingering performance. You are going to want and need it.
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trip isn't particularly easy unless you go all in for it at your level, I feel your frustration...
cheliax book gives you fury's fall which adds your dex bonus to your cmb
pathfinder society field guide gives the dueling weapon enchantment property, grants double the enhancement bonus on a weapon as a luck bonus to trips and disarms
not sure if that's the way you wanted to go... my pole fighter hasn't bought dueling for his weapon yet out of deference to his gm's but with self buffs he will be at +48 to trip at current level 12 when he does, so one can get up there (granted, that is ALL he does).
This should be no problem with Agile Maneuvers, which uses Dex instead.
Needing to spend a feat to make something sucky doable is exactly one of the things making that route suck harder.
The weapon is a reach/trip weapon, if that helps.
It does not. Ditch it for an Agile weapon ASAP.
Not sure what other maneuvers would be worth considering
Hint: None of them
For a full BAB class or Tetori, focusing on Grapple or Dirty Trick is "ok," but maneuvers used to inhibit the bad guys are always inferior to just killing them faster.
Seriously, ditch the maneuver thing entirely. Get an Agile weapon. Hit things for damage.
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First, I concur with the above, Lingering Performance will be as important to your character as Weapon Finesse and Arcane Strike will be.
What book is Agile in? or what does it do? I can only find Agile armor.
I have no idea what book things are in--d20srd is your friend. What it does is let you use Dex to damage with a finesseable weapon--in short, it makes a Str-dumped character viable in melee without requiring a scimitar.
And Fate's Favored? I've got a single Extra Trait boon I can use here.
That's from Ultimate Campaign. Any time you receive a luck bonus, that bonus is increased by 1. Archaeologists Luck is a luck bonus. Enjoy.
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For a full BAB class or Tetori, focusing on Grapple or Dirty Trick is "ok," but maneuvers used to inhibit the bad guys are always inferior to just killing them faster.Seriously, ditch the maneuver thing entirely. Get an Agile weapon. Hit things for damage.
in general yes, but a group with good tactics and a tripper with greater trip adds a silly amount of damage to the equation.
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trip isn't particularly easy unless you go all in for it at your level, I feel your frustration...
I have gone all in, and it still isn't enough! Even when I face off against trippable opponents - the best case scenario. And that's even considering the full BAB I get from the 2 multiclass levels, offsetting my 3/4 BAB from Archaeologist.
cheliax book gives you fury's fall which adds your dex bonus to your cmb
There's other threads (plural) on whether Agile Maneuvers and Fury's Fall stack with a lot of FAQ requests that never got answered, and enough debate that it could fall either way. Too much for table variance on PFS.
pathfinder society field guide gives the dueling property, grants double the enhancement bonus on a weapon as a luck bonus
not sure if that's the way you wanted to go... my pole fighter hasn't bought dueling for his weapon yet out of deference to his gm's but with self buffs he will be at +48 to trip at current level 12 when he does, so one can get up there (granted, that is ALL he does).
Not sure if this is viable. I'm using a +1 weapon at the moment, duelling is another +1 bonus, which would make it +2, or +1 than what I already have. Upgrading to an effective +3 weapon, to make it worthwhile, is a 14000gp investment. It's not impossible, but not easy.
in general yes, but a group with good tactics and a tripper with greater trip adds a silly amount of damage to the equation.
For this character, Greater Trip requires three feats, and by dumping strength, he has necessitated Weapon Finesse and Agile Maneuvers.
That's 5 feats (1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th), just to make the Trip thing worthwhile--and with only one more feat available in PFS at 11th, I just don't see doing that on a non-Fighter.
Here's the thing, though--while with a perfect set up, Greater Trip is impressive--even for a Fighter, I bet you'd be adding more to the party by taking better feats and just dealing more damage to the bad guys than you ever could tripping.
Combat Maneuvers are novelties, and they might make the game more interesting sometimes, but they're inefficient compared to just attacking.
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in general yes, but a group with good tactics and a tripper with greater trip adds a silly amount of damage to the equation.For this character, Greater Trip requires three feats, and by dumping strength, he has necessitated Weapon Finesse and Agile Maneuvers.
That's 5 feats (1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th), just to make the Trip thing worthwhile--and with only one more feat available in PFS at 11th, I just don't see doing that on a non-Fighter.
Here's the thing, though--while with a perfect set up, Greater Trip is impressive--even for a Fighter, I bet you'd be adding more to the party by taking better feats and just dealing more damage to the bad guys than you ever could tripping.
Combat Maneuvers are novelties, and they might make the game more interesting sometimes, but they're inefficient compared to just attacking.
A solid opinion, but after 12 levels of playing a trip character I soundly disagree with that as a blanket statement... removing somethings ability to full attack so it can stand up, or giving it a -4 if it chooses not to is one of the most effective debuffs one can throw, especially as a melee type character. That however is a discussion for another thread.
If what he wants to do is trip there are ways to increase it, he never said that he was locked in to it, but he also never asked for advice to move away from it. I see no reason to immediately shoot down an idea as impossible or even impractical.
Dueling isn't cheap, but once you are in the range of level 10 you start to run out of reasonable ways to spend money, a 6/6 belt or +6 hat is too costly, a ROP or COR at +4 is cost prohibitive... what's 35k between friends? :) Also I would spend 16k on a str belt, go greater trip, save the feat from agile and let the fighter/barb/pally in your group do the damage from the provoked AoO, but that wouldn't exactly put you into the overdrive category.
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A quick bit of research on how others have used Arcane Strike/Agile weapon led me to this thread which seems to have some useful info, though I'm not sure if any of that is tested.
also, for some reason I totally refused to notice the 7 strength, has anyone suggested transitioning to one of the ranged archaeologist builds yet?
Ranged characters need Strength for damage. The only viable damage dealing routes for Str-dumped characters are:
1) Dervish Dance
2) Agile Weapon
3) Gunslinger 5
4) Spells
An archeologist is a great jack of all trades, above and beyond even other bards.
What goes along with that, however, is the "master of none" issue.
You've got to accept you're not exactly optimized for certain things, or if you want to be REALLY good at something in combat, you need to pick that one thing and stick with it. Even the bonuses of archeologist's luck can run out and can't always be relied on (even if you max that out as much as you can with Extra and/or Lingering Performance).
Assuming you're not/can't retrain stats, I'd suggest going for a ranged build (also assuming you're not needed in melee). Keep your Gunslinger level if you want, but I'd forget the fighter level.
And especially as you already seem interested in fighting with a pistol, the maneuver build as it requires the extra Agile Maneuvers feat tax for you as well as the usual Combat Expertise feat tax, you could fill out your feats better with ranged feats (like the nearly mandatory Precise Shot feat, which you don't have yet and you're level 8).
Mind, most of my own advice comes from my building my own archeologist entirely unoptimized. ;)
Maneuvers tend to be Fool's Gold except perhaps Dirty Trick due to its universality and versatility...
I have a Halfling Archeologist who took two levels of Halfling Opportunist and later some levels of Lore Warden. He's invested heavily in Dirty Trick and in two-weapon fighting with kurkri's. He's one of the most fun character's I've ever built or played and I've used all the tricks I know to make him as effective as possible...
...and he is still, compared to my other PC's woefully under-powered. That's okay though. He's good for comic relief and having just the right thing at the right time to help or even bail the other characters out. He's alomst never targeted due to the many greater and more obvious threats that surround him so his survivability is good and he gets plenty of flanking opportunities. He can get in and out of places most of the other players can't, is a wealth of random knowledge and is a world-class trap-spotter. Its a fun class to play, but think of it like Indiana Jones if he had been surrounded by special forces soldiers for most of his adventures.
"Thanks for spotting that pit and that's a pretty nice whip - but step back if you don't mind, I need to lase this target because we've just called in a Tomahawk strike from off the coast."
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Rory's rebuild is looking pretty spectacular on paper compared to what I had before.
Question: why is Dervish Dance better than an Agile weapon in this instance with the scimitar? Seems like I'm burning a feat I could use for something else, and I could possibly even choose a better weapon than the scimitar (though I haven't looked into what weapon, yet).
Are they interchangeable?
Some GM's particularly dislike Agile but don't mind Dervish Dance as much (dervish dance "costs" more in that you need to not use a shield 'normally' with weapon finesse and it's a second tier feat (meaning you have to take another feat first) and it is limited to one weapon that you can't use piranha strike with). Also having dervish dance means you can have a +2 weapon meaning a better to hit chance and an extra point of damage per hit (optionally you could go with a +1 keen weapon).
So you would be +14/+14/+8 Kukri +1, Agile (1d4+14 18~20/x2)
As you can see probably better off with the scimitar and dervish dance.