I want to play a caster for the first time in an upcoming game and will probably have to carry my party. I can understand how casters can be powerful, but I never got the whole "god" thing. I know that a lot of spells are unbelievably awesome (flesh to stone, flight, haste, stone skin, dominate person) but hacking stuff up with a furious falchion always seemed way easier. Let's assume I've got maybe one martial (either a ranger or a fighter) who's reliably good, a blaster sorcerer who will reliably blast things, and three nooblets who made terrible characters for "role play reasons". What do I need to play and how do I use it effectively in combat? I play support all the time in video games, so I'm down for that kind of thing, but I'm afraid there won't be much to support.
The” god thing” refers to a casters (Usually a wizard) ability to alter the world to suit his needs. Read Treantmonk’s Guide to Pathfinder Wizards: Being a God. It is old so only includes the core rule book, but the idea is still valid.
Look in the first post in advice for the link to it and other guides.
What are the nooblets playing? Since there is already a sorcerer, your party may need a cleric. How about a dwarven cleric of Torag? You will have healing spells and not too bad offensive capabilities. (Not sure on the spelling of Torag, but at the moment I can't pop my pathfinder disk in.) This way you can also help bail out the nooblets and hopefully teach them a thing or two.
I've got no idea what they're playing, they're just regulars in the games I'm in and consistently roll up awful characters.
Look at some of the casting classed and decide which ones peak your interest. Playing a caster with 9 levels of spells is a "full" caster (druid, sorcerer, etc.) and ultimately provide you with the greatest arsenal of magical ability, as well as the most spells per day. However, a caster with 6 levels of spells (bard, inquisitor, etc.) has no shortage of magical options, and will have a number of other martial and skill-based abilities that may make it easier for you to transition into the role.
Since you seem hesitant, picking the ones that seems the most fun or interesting is pretty important. If, after reading the entire class entry and perusing the options you are still unsure how to proceed, I suggest taking a look at the guide to the class guides and see how some other people have done it. The guides are typically designed specifically for optimization, so take them with a grain of salt if that is not what you want. You should still cater your build according to your party and what will make the character fun for you.
Learning to play a caster can be difficult at first, because you have to make choices before knowing what will happen before events unfold. A martial character is sturdier and has fewer options when the S drops. Thats requires one kind of cleverness. A caster requires more forethought and preparation. Sometimes the preparation doesn't pan out completely and you have fewer good tricks up your sleeve, but experience will teach you how to hedge your bets and choose a good variety of spells. This requires a different kind of cleverness. When you learn how to pick spells well and how to use them, spellcasting turns into a very rewarding experience.
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I'd go with something that can fill several roles, as you can't be sure what the 3 awful chars will be able to do.
Something like a caster druid with a combat pet, or a battle oracle/cleric, or a summoner, will make you able to help your falchion-user team mate, while being able to cast spells that help the whole party. An evangelist cleric would be good too, specially an evangelist cleric with a pet (feather domain for roc, for example).
The "god" role is what is known, lately in this forum, as an "arm" or "anvil" character, following the paradigm of "anvil, arm, hammer" that someone brilliatly put in a guide. You have a couple of hammers in your team (melee and blaster/ranged, but both hammers). You could focus yourself into the anvil & arm roles.
Anvils focus in making the enemy useless, not able to damage your party. That can be done by tying them in combat while having uncanny AC and soaking their damage, or by rendering them useless through the use of spells or abilities. For example, if you cast Fog spells that cloud the goblin archers while your party kills the goblin melee, you are doing an "anvil" role. Spells like Entangle, Summon Monster, Wall of Iron, or Rime Frostbite fill this role.
Arm role specialize in helping your hammers to deliver damage. For example, if you cast "fly" on your melee so they can cut the flying harpy into pieces, you are being an arm. Often people fail to understand that the single thing that killed the harpy wasn't that huge falchion crit, but the Fly spell that allowed him to attack to begin with. Spells like Haste, Fly, Heroism or Magic Weapon fill this role.
In a certain way, healing spells (those that heal conditions, not HP) are also part of the "arm" role. A fighter with 4 levels drained can't help the party much, so Restoration will help the "hammer" to do damage again
I'd go with something that can fill several roles, as you can't be sure what the 3 awful chars will be able to do.
Something like a caster druid with a combat pet, or a battle oracle/cleric, or a summoner, will make you able to help your falchion-user team mate, while being able to cast spells that help the whole party. An evangelist cleric would be good too, specially an evangelist cleric with a pet (feather domain for roc, for example).
The "god" role is what is known, lately in this forum, as an "arm" or "anvil" character, following the paradigm of "anvil, arm, hammer" that someone brilliatly put in a guide. You have a couple of hammers in your team (melee and blaster/ranged, but both hammers). You could focus yourself into the anvil & arm roles.
Anvils focus in making the enemy useless, not able to damage your party. That can be done by tying them in combat while having uncanny AC and soaking their damage, or by rendering them useless through the use of spells or abilities. For example, if you cast Fog spells that cloud the goblin archers while your party kills the goblin melee, you are doing an "anvil" role. Spells like Entangle, Summon Monster, Wall of Iron, or Rime Frostbite fill this role.Arm role specialize in helping your hammers to deliver damage. For example, if you cast "fly" on your melee so they can cut the flying harpy into pieces, you are being an arm. Often people fail to understand that the single thing that killed the harpy wasn't that huge falchion crit, but the Fly spell that allowed him to attack to begin with. Spells like Haste, Fly, Heroism or Magic Weapon fill this role.
In a certain way, healing spells (those that heal conditions, not HP) are also part of the "arm" role. A fighter with 4 levels drained can't help the party much, so Restoration will help the "hammer" to do damage again
This was really helpful. The "anvil" role seems most appealing to me, although the guy who's DM'ing this game always pulls punches against useless characters, which makes them slow combat down quite a bit just by being so fragile that the DM has to worry about killing them. So I may go for more of the "arm" role. Either way, this gives me a firm idea of where to go.