PC for Intrigue


Advice


Friend is thinking about a new campaign and I’d like some help on a PC concept. Concept would be to bring about the downfall or ruin of the current government of some imagined country and hopefully put our choice (or even ourselves) in power.

Still in development so I don’t have any details yet on the build rules. However, this GM usually allows anything Paizo and about 50/50 on 3pp stuff that isn’t ridiculous.

The campaign would be fairly heavy on the intrigue, social situations, and spying. Combat is more likely to be on the lines of assassination rather than face-to-face open combat (but that will still occur occasionally). Probably framing others for treason. Spreading rumors and fomenting rebellion.

So I think this is going to be pretty skills heavy along with divination and illusion magic. As described, I can imagine the PC’s having to function as very small teams or even individually sometimes. So we will have to be careful to not make PC’s that can’t function without support. Characters probably can’t be one dimensional. They will have to function in a variety of situations.

Probably not a mounted cavalier, heavily armored/armed main combatant, or super blaster caster build. Unless that is only a persona and the character could ditch the obvious stuff to also be a sneak.

The builds that seem obvious for this are the arcane trickster, inquisitor, and bard. As well as potentially one of the few times a rogue could be strong.

I guess the inquisitor is sounding best to me at the moment. What would you build for this rather nebulous campaign idea?


Sczarni Swindler Rogue with the Rakshaza bloodline through Eldritch Heritage.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Anyone with good strong social skills and the ability to think on their feet.

Class is nearly irrelevant as far as choice since this isn't a goal acheived through standard wargame encounter combat, but as a series of extended social interactions, given that the people you influence, dominate, control, etc.. are going to be doing the grunt work.

That said, classes that give more knowledge and social interactive skills as class skills are the advantage here, so rogue, bard, aristocrat, are top contenders.

Grand Lodge

Investigator, probally human or Elf. Just have a high INT and take all the fun talents that expand what you can use Inspiration on.

Then, you just go nuts with tons of inspiration boosted skills. Probably use a sword cane when you absolutely MUST fight. Glamoured Armor and a glamoured Swordcane (because sometimes, the built in deception is not deceptive enough).

Roleplay a limp to explain the cane. Basically, reduce your speed to 20ft unless you know you need to kill the foe, then you can show you are faking it.

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Side note, this will likely be a great place for the party to bust out Master Spy PrC. It can be a fun class, and will fit most builds for this campaign. Have to wait till level 8 to take the first level in it however.

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An inquisitor would likely want to be of a Diety of deception, or assassination if you are looking to make a coup quietly. Social skills, with perhaps the inquisition that lets you use Wis on all of it.

If you are into it, and the group is not against it, Women have been the cause of many conflicts. As such, something of Calistra's influence might be fun (though I like magus better) and opens up her delicious obedience to give you a boost and offer up the PrC classes of Inner Sea Gods (evangelist especially)


Oh hey, I didn't even think of aristocrat or investigator. A level or 3 of aristocrat would probably work well with most anything in this campaign.

This guys campaigns usually end in the mid levels. Somewhere around 8-12 mark. Master Spy might be excellent near the end game though.

You know a druid that shapechanges into innocuous cat, dog, mouse, snake, bird, etc... could be very good as spy and infiltrator.


Seems like a good campaign for a Stygian Slayer for me.


Slayer seems well suited for this.

The slayer has a variety of abilities that add onto the skills related to this kind of campaign. Their main damage/attack boosting mechanic, studied target, also gives a boost to bluff, knowledge, perception, and sense motive check (and later disguise, intimidate, and stealth) against the studied target.

And this can be used against any creature as a move (and later swift) action, so it would not be hard to use it against every single person you meet. There are limits on how many targets you can have studied at once, but you can drop that and get a new target with no penalty or limit.

You can also get things like select rogue talents (fast stealth seems useful, and the terrain master talent is useful since this is mostly an urban thing, no?). And at level 10, you get the assassinate ability- by spending 1 standard action and waiting a round, you can potentially kill a target instantly with a sneak attack (and there are feats to make this a silent kill too.

And there is an flavorful archetype built for these kinds of campaigns- the cleaner. It gives you the ability to alter a crime scene with a stealth or disguise check, and thus force people to accept the altered scene as the truth. While it is a bit of a stretch of the text, this seems like it could be used to frame people for crimes. It can also cast misdirection at will, which lets you fool detect alignment spells and discern lies.

Overall, the slayer has a lot of options, and it can serve well in an RP heavy intrigue campaign. It also has powerful combat abilities, which can be labeled as 'insurance'.


Partially from a gaming, partly from an RP approach, a few thoughts:


  • A few of you should definitely take the Noble Scion feat in one of its many iterations. Great for RP, and most of them include a handy-dandy bonus.
  • Consider a rogue.
  • I think a cavalier would be an interesting choice here. You could play him less as a warrior, and more of a tourney knight and a respectable face to your party's shenanigans.
  • The swashbuckler, the fighter (cad), and the Aldori swordlord (in his various forms) are great for those duels.
  • The vanilla investigator and the vanilla alchemist are both good hands with poison.


Yeah! If it happens, this campaign could be one of the few where poison would actually be useful.

I was leaning toward inquisitor, but now I think investigator is where I will have to go for this one.

Scarab Sages

Urban Druid is also very useful. Alter Self at will is huge, plus several powerful domain choices such as charm, nobility, or repose.


Lots of things work here.

In addition to the above suggestions of Rogue, Bard, Inquisitor, Investigator, Cavalier, Druid, Swashbuckler and Slayer (and some others), Wizard and Witch are made for this kind of campaign. Tons of skills points because of intelligence. Traits that make social skills based on intelligence. Lots of Divination magic. Lots of Enchantment magic. Familiars for recon.

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