Tips for creating a Magical / Spiritual Archer


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion


Hello, first post here. If this is the wrong forum section for a question like this, I apologize!

I'm trying to build an Archer priestess character that primarily uses a bow as a weapon, but her actual profession is closer to that of a cleric or, say, a shrine maiden.

In an ideal world, I'd like her to be:
1) A passable healer (not necessarily with magic, but decent with herbs)
2) Proficient with a bow and arrow
3) Be able to enchant her arrows with magics of some description. Say, good clerical magics to fight evil/the undead, purifier arrows, and so on.

I don't need her in anything more than cloth/light armor really, but my primary goal is a spiritual battle priestess who's aim is primarily to use arrows.

In essence I'd like to build a class similar to Kikyo from Inuyasha, as I like the concept of the archer priestess theme and think it would fit thematically well with our campaign.

Any tips on where to start?


MMMmmmm, Arcane duelist bard (they dabble in some healing spells), and use the bladethirst performance to enchant your bow and arrows with a variety of things. You'll have to use a shortbow unless you want to use a race that is proficient with longbow. Straight cleric archers are perfectly viable as well.


I'm tempted to say inquisitor with perhaps a few levels of Zen Archer monk. I'll look more into this tomarrow.


Thanks for the response!

To further clarify what I'm trying to get across, I think Exorcist Archer comes across better than "magic" archer, as I'd like an exorcist-like priestess or uses a bow, in the thematic sense. Her goal is to tear down evil and undeath and demons with her magics and/or arrows, preferably a mix of both.

Arcane Duelist Bard is close to what I'm looking for, but not quite there. If I take the healing out of the equation, is there an easier way to work with the ideal of imbuing arrows?

I like the idea of a cleric archer, but do clerics have any ability to imbue arrows or are they mostly an either/or? I also fear that being too Cleric may have me fall too far under, say, the group healer as I am trying to aim for a bit more of a damage dealer with skills in, say, dispelling, minor in healing (optional), and the like.

Its an odd request for what mechanics we have, but I'm sort of aiming for an offensive-like magics cleric/bard with some flexibility. The Arcane Duelist bard looks good, but I fear makes her too much of a wizard.

I will look into Zen Archer as well as Inquisitor as well, as both are looking at a glance fairly close


I made a character with 1 level of Zen Archer and the rest in Inquisitor.
Inquisitor gets Bane and Judgement and all that type of stuff, Bane sounds fluffable for your purposes.
It EVENTUALLY ends up with less attacks than a full Zen Archer or normal archer with Rapid Fire + Multishot (it loses the latter, in essence),
but it gets great attack bonuses that a Zen Archer doesn't get, along with damage bonuses,
and is probably one of the stronger archer Inquisitor builds you can get, especially if you want it to work well from Level 1.
(my build is not human, yet starts out with precise shot and perfect strike, with zen flurry having similar effect to rapid fire, at level 1)
It never gains Zen Archer's WIS to Ranged, but that's sort of a blessing in disguise, since switching attack stats 4 levels in is awkward/unoptimal.
You could not go the zen archer route, just putting feats into rapid fire and multishot,
but that takes more feats, you lose out on monk saves and bonus feats, and takes longer to achieve any advantage.
Since it's a 6 level spell caster, spell DCs are never the prime focus, although with my racial mods of +2 DEX and +2 WIS
I do end up with a nice WIS score, alongside DEX and STR:
PFS point buy: STR 14 DEX 16+2=18 CON 12 INT 10 WIS 14+2=16 CHA 8
The Domain I chose for Inquisitor also comes with a Save that autoscales with level, and the WIS keeps that relevant.
It ends up with plenty of free Feats, for Stunning Fist via Feat, Spell Bane, Expanded Arcana/Extra Bane, etc.


could look at magician if you wanted to buff the magical side of it.. and use the random arcane spells you cna get to get some weapon buffing ones..
otherwise were you big on being of divine magic, or just willing to flavor arcane that way?(kikyo always felt more divine, and kagome felt more arcaney)


Thank you both for the recommendations, been researching all of them thoroughly!

Zwordsman wrote:
otherwise were you big on being of divine magic, or just willing to flavor arcane that way?(kikyo always felt more divine, and kagome felt more arcaney

Either or, but preferably I'm going for more of a divine Kikyo-ish approach opposed to Kagome's raw power deal - I like the idea of hyped up arcane arrows, but for the purposes of this character I'm looking more at the exorcist, anti-evil divine idea.

In that vein, Zen Archer + Inquisitor fits the bill almost perfectly it seems - its got a good balance of clerical abilities, but with the added bonus of being a pretty heavy ranged buzzsaw.

Shadow Lodge

so i take it you're trying to emulate that chick from Inuyahsha?

i would suggest a solid cleric, or inquisitor. inquisitor would probably be your best best since she is a demon killer by nature.

also i would suggest sohei over zen archer if you were going to multi class.

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