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His parents thought he was going to be a girl and named him Marilyn. His close friends call him Merryl for short. Among strangers he introduces himself as Power, Maximum Power. Oh yeah.
He hides his insecurity (and real name) through plenty of layers of false bravado. He likens himself to a real life superhero. He thinks fighters are poor sods who only know how to swing pointy sticks and thinks that other wizards are squishy and weak little things because, hey, all they can do is some finger waggling.
But above all else, he thinks that nothing beats a good bash to the face with a large, preferably blunt, object.
Str: 17
Dex: 14-16
Con:12-14
Int:13-14
Wis: 7 (he is a fool)
Cha: 7 (low self esteem, hidden by boisterous bravado).
Human male wizard (transmutation specialist).
Opposed schools: Necromancy and either divination or evocation.
Skills:
Knowledge arcana
Knowledge Dungeoneering
Linguistics
Spellcraft
Extra skills (from into increases etc):
Fly
Diplomacy
Knowledge history/planes
Acrobatics?
Feats:
Two-weapon fighting
Dodge
Toughness
Double slice
Arcane strike
Power attack
Improved shield bash
Shield focus
Shield slam
Arcane armor training or improved two weapon fighting.
Spell focus...? Conjuration, I guess.
Extend spell or quicken spell. Probably quicken with a rod of extend.
Planning wizard 5, fighter 1, eldritch knight 5. Or fighter 2, ek4 for earlier feat access.
Marryl, er, Max- will use a warhammer and a light shield. Until he is proficient he'll deal with a quarterstaff or a club. I was originally going for a full quarterstaff build. But the ac from a shield seemed really useful.
Should be fun. Whacking things ftw!
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First thought, might want to start with levels in fighter first. Gets you more starting HP and your armor/weapon prof. without having to wait 5 levels on your current plan.
Second, you seem to be trying to wear a lot of hats. You cast spells, hammer things, shield bash. Maybe try to trim it down some. You are basically dual wielding with the BAB of almost a Wizard. At lvl 12, your BAB will be +9, 3 lower than a full Fighter (which translates into hitting ~15% less often.) Dual wielding reduces it to +7, which means you hit ~25% less often than a typical Fighter. You can pick up a shield and use it for defense, but I don't recommend using it offensively with this type of character.
I would actually suggest having your Int be you 16 stat. Why TWF? take advantage of reach 2handed weapons.
Build the equivalent of a Reach Cleric, but as an Eldritch Knight? That would be kind of cool. Use your normal actions to cast spells and use the weapons reach and Combat Reflexes to AoO people who get close. It could be interesting.
It might be worth seeing if you can get earlier access to the Eldritch Knight class via Spell-Like Abilities. This is officially viable, but GMs are going to be variable. You can get these SLAs via racials or through the Scryer divination sub school (which as part of the APG should probably be considered "Core").
This way you get into Eldritch knight from level 3, allowing you to realise the concept pretty early. Otherwise you're stuck with sucky HP and BAB for a long time.
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I'm going to second the Reach Fighter thing. I recently made a character like this, and have a few suggestions:
1) Take that fighter level EARLY. It will reduce your spellcasting progression, which will sting a little bit, but the benefits you gain from it will be HUGE, especially the weapon proficiencies and BAB bonus. The extra hit points help too.
2) If you really want to delay taking your fighter level, select either half-elf or half-orc as your race. They can get bonus proficiencies (with exotic weapons as a half-elf) starting at 1st level, which means your wizard can use a decent weapon for a while.
3) Consider ANYTHING other than Fighter. 1 level of fighter gets you a bonus combat feat, and THAT'S IT. A level of Freebooter ranger lets you use a move action to grant you and all of your allies a +1 to attack and damage rolls against a guy, all day, every day. A level of bloodrager increases your move speed and gives you a big damage and survivability bonus for a few rounds per day. Even slayer would work a little better. As far as entry into EK goes, a single fighter level is, imo, one of the weaker options.
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For starters, some of you seem to be missing the 'core campaign' aspect.
No archetypes exist in core. I'm not trying to make a truly optimal PC but definitely a fun one. I will likely take that fighter level pretty early, though. The proficiencies and bonus feat will come in handy sooner rather than later.
I considered a reach weapon but it feels lame and not particularly flavorful for this character concept.
16 int is wasted via point buy. I gain nothing out of that.
Shield bashing was a compromise as previously, he just used a quarterstaff and followed the twf tree. I definitely want to sell the wizard aspect the most. The wizard is hitting you for 1d8+11 in melee with his first attack, again with his hasted second, oh- and he's not done bashing you in the face with his shield, oh, and...
And then he starts casting spells.
16 into comes with a +2 headband. His Bab is not really a big deal. His to hit ends up being +9 while using twf at level 5 as a pure wizard. So I am not concerned about actually hitting stuff. I always assume the casting of a single in combat buff and nothing else.
Twf with shield bash seems like too many hats? Feels pretty straightforward and useful to me.
BTW, he has a toad familiar so even as a wizard, first level HP look to be around 11-16. I will probably take the 15 or 16.
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This guy looks like fun to play! I'm playing a somewhat similar 'Strength-based Mystic Theurge'. We're not likely to survive season 5-6 games, but that's OK! It's not wise, but it makes for fun sessions until we both die :-) I second avoiding an optimal reach-fighter build because, well, the guy is a fool :-)
It might be worth seeing if you can get earlier access to the Eldritch Knight class via Spell-Like Abilities. This is officially viable, but GMs are going to be variable. You can get these SLAs via racials or through the Scryer divination sub school (which as part of the APG should probably be considered "Core").
This way you get into Eldritch knight from level 3, allowing you to realise the concept pretty early. Otherwise you're stuck with sucky HP and BAB for a long time.
Core is the CRB, traits web enhancement, and PFS guide to society play.
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CRB is fine. I still think a level in Ranger or Barbarian would be better than fighter w/o archetypes, but w/e floats your boat. Oh, if you want the defense of a shield, why not just two-hand a heavy shield? The only feat you need is improved shield bash, and once it gets spikes and the bashing enchantment you'll hit like a truck with all the bonuses along with it.
Still, it sounds like you've got your heart set on the dual-wielding, so that'll be fine. If you're REALLY dedicated to the martial aspect, Ranger 2 would let you pick up two-weapon fighting without the Dexterity prerequisite, so you could get your Con or Int a little higher (or not have extremely low Wis). Still, I think the whole wizard 5/fighter 1 route is fine, so go for it if it's what you really want.
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Well, I did the math and a sword and board or two weapon fighting build provide superior results to two-handing. I either do substantially more damage or I have remarkably higher survivability. Outside of core, who knows? Regardless, I wanted something interesting and fun rather than repeating concepts that are defaults (unless they simply prove too cool not to do). I pictured a lightly tanned, bald guy who was muscular as a Greek god and often bare chested. He's often seen at the taverns asking ladies that if they want to feel real power, to take a gander at these guns (then he flexes and grins his big grin).
But the guy is a wizard.
I considered a great club, quarterstaff and various other blunt instruments. I even stepped outside of the silly anime character goofiness and considered a two-bladed sword and two-weapon fighting via crit fishing. 3-5 attacks a round with a 17-20 threat range and retaining the ability to cast seemed pretty spiffy. This is something I may do later down the road for a more serious character.
But this guy isn't serious. He's a joke and ideally going to provide laughs at the table, either by dint of outperforming some martial characters despite not being a martial class, or by the various stories that will be generated from a wizard with a primary attribute being strength, followed by Dex.....then by con....and int is an afterthought.
But he is viable. Whatever style I went with always functioned at or above what would be required at various levels, in melee, while being pure wizard with no fighter levels and one buff max.
So at this point it is an issue of which flavor feels better and how much mechanical advantage can I squeeze out of that flavor. The quarterstaff was too offensive and left ac maxing at around 23, while the hammer and shield pushed ac to nearly 30 (without devoting many resources to it) and by investing in two-weapon fighting and shield bash, increased damage output to something similar to the quarterstaff.
For the record, I think each primary hit on the quarterstaff was dealing 1d6+16 and the offhand was doing 1d6+13 or 14 with some preliminary writeups. I think that at higher level he could squeeze out another 2-6 static damage per hit without upgrading his weapon. The accuracy was at something like +10 before buffs (at wizard 5) depending on what feats I grabbed. The hammer does deal less damage via lower accuracy (no weapon focus-weapon specialization) but the added shield defense and options seem cool enough and worthwhile. I mean, imagine the expressions on everyone's faces when I say 'I'll tank the dragon, the rest of you, go handle the mooks- I got this'.
And I can actually pose a threat to the dragon and protect myself from his claw, claw, nom.
Epic!
I'll put up the quarterstaff build later, when I dig it out of iMessage. And for kicks, I might do a mockup of a crit build, just to see what can be done with it.
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This looks like an.... interesting concept to roleplay. Shame the numbers don't match up, and you'll be halfway through your career before the basics for feats kick in, nevermind the full package.
Be wary about shields. Arcane spell failure is a thing. Low BaB and TWF penalties means a whole lot of missing. Plus, casting in melee means eating AoOs or trying for concentration checks. And since those checks have a chance of failing, It's basically an extra chance to fizzle on top of shield penalties.
A mockup crit build is functionally impossible, since the juicy crit feats require BAB 11 or higher.
I'm curious as to how your math worked out; your chance to hit at 5th level should be more like a +4 or 5 with TWF and your transmutation bonus set to strength.
It might be worth seeing if you can get earlier access to the Eldritch Knight class via Spell-Like Abilities. This is officially viable, but GMs are going to be variable. You can get these SLAs via racials or through the Scryer divination sub school (which as part of the APG should probably be considered "Core").
This way you get into Eldritch knight from level 3, allowing you to realise the concept pretty early. Otherwise you're stuck with sucky HP and BAB for a long time.
Here I partially put together a build for this (actually more like one and a half builds) -- search for "Third Character" in the post, because the first part of the post is about other characters. The original poster specified Core-only, so that would make both versions of the build somewhat more feat-starved for not being able to use the martial class archetypes, except that you get your feat back for not being able to trade out the Human Bonus Feat for Dual Talent, so overall it ends up giving you somewhat worse ability scores. Alternatively, you could be an Elf for the Reach Eldritch Knight version of the build to get +2 Dex and +2 Int, although -2 Con hurts; or you could be a Halfling for the Ranged Sorcadin version of the build to get +2 Dex and +2 Cha, although -2 Str and using Small weapons hurts even more. Check out the rest of the thread, too -- for its group-mind play purpose, it could use some more people.
You may want to consider not dumping Cha (12 is probably enough, though) and going fighter 1/wizard 3/sorcerer (Draconic bloodline) 1/dragon disciple (boost wizard spellcasting) 4/wizard +2/eldritch knight +9 (or wizard 3/fighter 1/...). The +4 Str and +3 natural armor help make the character better in combat/tougher and the bloodline arcana boosts damage in one element; plus, you get Eschew Materials and some extra spells that don't need preparation (4 cantrips and 2 1st-level spells; feather fall and true strike may be good choices, since they don't require scaling). You lose out on 9th-level spells (maximum progression as a 16th-level wizard), however.
^Actually a pretty good idea for the Ranged Sorcadin version of this.
Could even replace Eldritch Knight levels with Dragon Disciple levels after getting to character level 5 (required for the skill ranks), although this would hurt both BAB and casting progression speed.
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This looks like an.... interesting concept to roleplay. Shame the numbers don't match up, and you'll be halfway through your career before the basics for feats kick in, nevermind the full package.
Be wary about shields. Arcane spell failure is a thing. Low BaB and TWF penalties means a whole lot of missing. Plus, casting in melee means eating AoOs or trying for concentration checks. And since those checks have a chance of failing, It's basically an extra chance to fizzle on top of shield penalties.
A mockup crit build is functionally impossible, since the juicy crit feats require BAB 11 or higher.
I'm curious as to how your math worked out; your chance to hit at 5th level should be more like a +4 or 5 with TWF and your transmutation bonus set to strength.
Asf- it's part of the game. Oh no, I failed at something. It happens. Shrug. Shield will be mithril to keep the failure rate from being too frequent.
At level 5 we can have a 22 strength and a Bab of +2 assuming we went pure wizard. That's a +8 to hit and +6 to damage. This is the baseline.
Twf quarterstaff:
Weapon focus: quarterstaff, twf, arcane strike, dodge.
+1/+1 quarterstaff. First round of combat, enlarge person or heroism or haste maybe.
Attack bonus total: +10 (+12 with heroism, +11 with haste).
When using twf: +8 (+10 with heroism or +9 with haste).
That is hitting an 18-20 ac on the roll of a 10 at level 5.
A car 5 monster has an 18 ac. A cr 8 monster has a 21 ac. So between level appropriate and epic encounters, we aren't having problems hitting anything. Sure, in the worst matchups- us with only a +8 and no buffs while using twf against an epic challenge and no flanking or support from any of the other characters who should be doing 'something' to help us win the fight- then yeah, I have to roll 13's or better. *gasp*
And I don't know why a crit build is so impossible. The keen edge spell, like heroism, has a duration of ten minutes per level, so it is not unreasonable to assume it is up before a fight even starts (allowing for another buff to be placed).
Scimitar, kukri, shorts words and longswords even, pick a couple of weapons with a reasonable threat range. Cast heroism and/or keen edge before entering a dungeon. You can't always have these up before combat but more often than not, (except during travel ambushes) you can. Ideally, select two of the same weapon to consolidate feats but different ones are OK.
We will assume our wizard is 11th level, took his eldritch knight to level 4 and fighter to 2. He's got five levels in wizard.
His feats are
Wizard-
1.) twf, double slice.
3.) Arcane strike.
5.) Weapon focus: (pick weapon).
Fighter-
6.) Weapon focus: (pick other weapon).
Ek-
7.) Itwf, dodge.
9.) Weapon specialization (pick weapon).
Fighter-
11.) Weapon specialization (pick other weapon). Power attack.
You crit on 15 or 17-20, you have a Bab of +8, 3-4 attacks a round, with an unbuffee attack routine of: +16/+11 when not using twf or any buffs, including greater magic weapon (and why aren't we using it?).
When using twf we have +14/+9/, +14/+9 (unless I did that wrong).
Our base bonuses are +8 Bab, +6 str, +1 enhancement and +1 weapon focus.
This isn't with any effort put forth into actually being good at this- like precasting greater magic weapon for another +1 to hit and damage, using extended heroism (extend spell is our rod or free metamagic feat of choice), no quicken spell, no QuickDraw or use of the same weapon to preserve feats.
Then, we look at pur damage: +6 from str (22), +1 enhancement, +2 arcane strike, +2 weapon specialization, and if we want to power attack with a -3 to hit (and we can afford to take that hit if we are buffed at all) we add an additional +6 on primary attacks and +3 on offhand.
The total damage per hit is 1dwhatever +17 and 1dwhatever +14. Double that up when we crit, and we haven't even hasted.
Crit sounds completely legit. I bet I could make it work as a pure wizard, too (but coming online rather late).
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I think we had a misunderstanding as to what a "crit build" is. To me, it involves making your crits go above and beyond the boosted damage. Status related feats such as Sickening Critical. Or, if this weren't a core game, teamwork feat combos that trigger AoOs from crits. What you have is more what I would call "a build that happens to have crits" from wide crit range weapons enchanted to be keen.
I see that you're calculating buffs. That makes a little more sense for the numbers, and some of my initial worries about you missing in combat were in the idea that you would be going straight Wizard. The multiclassing makes it closer to a standard Gish.
The feat plan is somewhat problematic. Improved Two Weapon Fighting is listed at a level when you don't actually have the 6 BAB to take it, nor do I think you'll ever meat the hefty Dex requirement on your already MAD character. Weapon Specialization is also also a bit wonky, since I'm not sure if EK adds caster levels to your effective Fighter level. Speaking of, try to limit yourself to one weapon to focus on. Saves a lot of feats.
And that spell failure chance can still wreck you at the worst possible time. I would advise trying to find another way around it. The Shield spell, perhaps? It makes an okay wand.
You Will save a lot of feats by going for a Big blunter weapon instead of 2 small, and it Will fit your description better as well.
I know you said you made the calculations bit if they tell you that TWF are better than THF they are most likely wrong. I would get a reach weapon like a lucerne hammer and try to Think like a reach cleric.
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Not very mad at all. It is easy to have a 17 base str, 14 dex, 14 con and 14 into to start before racial adjustments or the transmuter bonus. As you level, that transmuted bonus and any magic items and your level advancement bonus make stat distribution a non-issue. I was being lenient when I put the str at 22 as it is very likely it will be 24-26 instead without the other stats being penalized in any way.
Asf will happen. I am OK with a character not being perfect. Not that I will be doing a lot of casting in combat. First round buff and move action to wear shield, unless I am using a full round spell like enlarge person. But depending on the situation, there are the occasional potions for that.
The feat plan was not an actual plan. I should have !mentioned that I was just listing those feats in no particular order. I did, however, mention that going one weapon was better than selecting two different ones for twf. It absolutely does save feats- but some people might want two different weapons, so even with that drawback, I proved it could be done.
Even without buffs my numbers show a very clear level of competence in combat. While I make no claims as to being able to outdamage a charging cavalier on horsback while raging on a pouncing barbarian mount who is sharing his rage with him, all builds do plenty of useful damage and have fun things to do besides that because hey- wizard in melee.
The multiclassing is just sort of a requirement if you're going into eldritch knight. A single level dip in fighter works as well but delays the last feat. Ek's get a bonus fighter feat at level 5 so no matter what you end up with the same number. Pure wizard is fun, too and still can work. It requires more careful building and is rather difficult in core, but more viable with all material available.
And while a crit build may be more than just a high threat weapon made keen, improved critical is a 9 Bab feat making it a late game feat chain to enter for anyone, period. Furthermore, not many characters are landing critical hits with any frequency or in any great number that early in their careers. At fifth level our wizard has 2 attacks a round with a 15-20 threat range and viable damage and to hit and probably has not spent any more on their weaponry than anyone else, it's possible they have spent less if they are using any foresight. There are, of course, levels where the wizard tapers off or falls behind but so what? He can still break reality and still bash face really well. Heck, he still gets ninth level spells and the into to cast them. Pummeling wizard am amazing!