Unabatedtuna |
So me and my Girlfriend have joined a group of friends playing pathfinder, and we have zero RPG experience. we have already been taught how to build a character, and She has already found a cool miniature, and made a dwarf cleric. The party as i understand it Already has a Rogue that checks for traps, a Fighter with a hammer that uses cleaves, a sorcerer, a WEIRD sorcerer that fights in melee, and now of course, my girlfriend being a support cleric. (this is all what the DM told me.)
My question is, what role is left that i could fill, and what are some easy characters i could role up to fill it.
master_marshmallow |
Depending on the sorcerers, it looks like the party may lack a party face, so that is one role to consider.
I've found that whenever I join a new group I try and make a Jack-of-all-Trades Ranger and it usually goes pretty well.
In fact, an archer would not be a bad addition to this group, nor would a bard. My vote goes either into a ranger focused on archery, or a bard, possibly also focused on archery.
Orfamay Quest |
Looking at that character set, I would recommend your playing a bard.
First, bards are relatively easy to play, as they can do almost anything adequately, even if they can't do anything particularly well. You can fight, you can battle-mage, you can heal, you can talk to the bad guy, and you can even pick locks if you need to. The system mastery to make a decent bard isn't a particularly high threshhold.
Second, bards make everyone else around them have more fun, because you can use your bardic abilities to make everyone else really good at what they do. You can quickly be everyone's best friend.
Something else that the party could use is another front-line fighter, perhaps a fighter, a paladin, or a battle-cleric. If you want to play on hard mode, a ranger could fill that role as well and also back up the rogue.
Finally, you don't seem to have any archery specialists, so an archer (fighter, ranger, or monk/zen archer) could work.
But I'd suggest bard.
Orfamay Quest |
There are some how-to-build-a-character guides available here including four different guides to bards.
If you want to combine bardic skills with archery, take a high dexterity and charisma. There are a fairly standard set of feats for archery : Point Blank Shot, Rapid Shot, Precise Shot, et cetera that are pretty much the bread and butter of any archer. Alternatively, there are some good metamagic feats that will make your already flexible spellcasting more so.
Finally, pick some spells that will help other people and some spells that will mess up the bad guys. Then pick a cool look (you ARE a rock star, after all) and channel your inner Johnny Depp.
Thymus Vulgaris |
Everybody loves a bard :)
You'll probably want to look for races with a charisma bonus. If you're restricted to core races, that means halfling, gnome, human, half-elf or half-orc, as you can choose which ability to put your +2 into.
My suggestion if you want to play a ranged bard is either halfling or human—halfling for the bonus to dex (and size bonus to hit), human because a bonus feat is never a bad thing and the human favored class bonus is stellar.
Ulfhedin |
I would also recommend a bard.
They are a lot of fun and you can build them in many different ways.
One very cool combo is lingering performance (feat), mixed with the 1st level spell saving finale. Both of which you can find on the PFSRD. Your party members will love you.
Alternately, you could go with an Zen Archer (Monk Archtype) if you are into that sorta thing.
Orfamay Quest |
There are lots of them. Anything that's purely vocal or kinesthetic -- sing, act, comedy, oratory, dance -- will leave you with hands free for your weapon.
Something important to bear in mind is that the versatile performance class ability lets you use perform as other skills as well, so if you have the sing skill, that also turns into both bluff and sense motive. This basically gives you a 3-fer-1 sale on skills, and in this case, bluff and sense motive are very important social skills.
Deadmanwalking |
Bard sounds great. What performance should i focus on? i do like the idea of a bow, so i should probly get a performance i can do so i dont have to constantly put my bow away and get it out?
Yep. Sing, Dance, and Oratory are the classics. What level are you starting out as? We can probably give better advice if we know.
Thymus Vulgaris |
When it comes to versatile performance, you probably want to plan ahead a little, if only not to waste too many ranks on skills that you will soon have covered through perform.
There are 8 skills that can be covered with versatile performance. They can all be covered with just 4 performances, yet you get to choose up to 5 different performances. This leaves you room to choose for flavour and still get to cover most or all of the 8 skills once you reach level 18 (if the game goes on that long), or at level 14 if you go the "optimal" route, which is:
Act (bluff, disguise)
Dance (acrobatics, fly)
Oratory (diplomacy, sense motive)
Percussion (handle animal, intimidate)
(in no particular order)
However, I'd probably look at my character, ask myself "what kind of performance does this guy do?" and go for that.
Deadmanwalking |
I will be joining lvls 4-5
Okay, if going Human, your Feats should be Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, and either Lingering Performance if you want to play with the Performance ending spells, or Rapid Shot if you want to focus on your archery. Then at 5th, grab Rapid Shot if you don't have it, or Arcane Strike if you do. After all those, Deadly Aim and Manyshot are the other Feats you'll eventually want as an archer.
In terms of Performance types, I'd grab either Sing or Oratory, depending on style, as your Versatile Performance, though others are certainly valid. Plan out what you want as your future Versatile Performances to be and see how lenient your GM is, if they're lenient they might let you reassign points from, say, Bluff to Perform (Acting) when you get Versatile Performance...if he's less lenient you want to avoid putting points in skills that'll become obsolete.
Silent Saturn |
As far as choosing your spells known, at first level I recommend grabbing Grease for terrain control and instant disarming, Touch of Gracelessness for a single-target debuff, and Sleep for when you need something locked down. You might want Cure Light Wounds, but you're better off just getting yourself a wand of it and using that instead. Identify is another bard spell that's good, but you don't need to learn it yourself if you can just buy a scroll of it.
CKorfmann |
+1 for the Zen Archer Monk since you don't have a ranged attacker in your group. They are a great class to play when learning an archer character. It gives you all the archery stuff you need for free and very good saves, AC and other stuff. If Monk's don't appeal to you, then my second choice would probably be either Bard or Ranger if you like the idea of a Robin Hood type character with an animal companion.
Zotsune |
As a bard at levels 4-5 you will have a good bit of magical ability with your bardic skills. You will probably want Cha>Dex>Int>other depending on what else you want the bard to be good at.
Strength if you want to be a more useful archer (composite longbow/shortbow and give the weapon a strength modifier equal to what you have, now granted this is why most rangers and fighter archers have a decent strength but for an archer bard I wouldn't really recommend it I'm just throwing it out there because you can fan-angle to make it work with an archetype).
Wisdom if you want to be good at knowing if others are deceiving you and being good at your mental saves.
Con if you want to have more health and be good at resisting poisons and other nasty physical things.
Deadmanwalking |
So i rolled some Abilitys and got 17,15,15,15,14,12 how should i best alocate these?
As an Archer Bard? Depends on whether you want to focus on the archery or spells.
For either:
Str 15 Dex 17 Con 14 Int 15 Wis 12 Cha 15
And then, if Human, put your +2 from Race and your +1 from level into Dex if archery-focused, Charisma if spell-focused.
EDIT: Sorta ninja'd.
Silent Saturn |
I didn't see that you were starting at level 4-5. Then you'll have access to level 2 bard spells right off the bat.
You should definitely get Gallant Inspiration. Being able to make an ally's failed skill check a success retroactively is a very nice ability to have. Blistering Invective is a nice room-clearer, and Hold Person is a good single-target debuff. And of course, that's the level you get Invisibility. ;)
BigDTBone |
Unabatedtuna wrote:So i rolled some Abilitys and got 17,15,15,15,14,12 how should i best alocate these?As an Archer Bard? Depends on whether you want to focus on the archery or spells.
For either:
Str 15 Dex 17 Con 14 Int 15 Wis 12 Cha 15
And then, if Human, put your +2 from Race and your +1 from level into Dex if archery-focused, Charisma if spell-focused.
EDIT: Sorta ninja'd.
The (almost) complete symmetry suggests that we are geniuses and should be given monies and other things.
Deadmanwalking |
I didn't see that you were starting at level 4-5. Then you'll have access to level 2 bard spells right off the bat.
You should definitely get Gallant Inspiration. Being able to make an ally's failed skill check a success retroactively is a very nice ability to have. Blistering Invective is a nice room-clearer, and Hold Person is a good single-target debuff. And of course, that's the level you get Invisibility. ;)
Those are okay, but far from the best 2nd level Bard spells, IMO. Personally my favorites are Glitterdust (for anti-invisibility and maybe blinding a guy...better as a caster-focused Bard) and Mirror Image (the single best defensive spell in the game for absolutely anyone).
The (almost) complete symmetry suggests that we are geniuses and should be given monies and other things.
Agreed. :)