I am looking for advice on character creation. I am the DM and we would like to start a new campaign based on Souls for Smuggler's Shiv, we are new to Pathfinder (and kinda new to D&D 3) so the players asked me to help them with character creation, so I came here for advice.
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Background:
I am really new to pathfinder, I avoided it on purpose for several years, mainly because I never really played AD&D or D&D 3 (+3.5) (I did, but it was in an OGL total rules conversion sort of way). I was kinda happy how D&D 4 turned out and played it for a couple of years. I was really looking forward to D&D 5 but when D&D next came out I was little disappointed so I started looking elsewhere and finally I gave Pathfinder a look. I am totally blown away and I love everything about it, I don't really mind that I avoided Pathfinder for so long because now I have all of these excellent resources all at once,... but I am still very new to the system and Golarion.
We started with Fangwood Keep, me and my party loved it, I gave my PCs pregens and we breezed through the adventure and had a lot of fun. Since then I am trying to build a campaign, I tried to familiarize myself with Runelords and Curse of the Crimson throne, but I would have to make a ton of little tweaks to adjust it for my party (and for my taste).
So I peeked into every AP and finally I have found Souls for smuggler's shiv and I am in love with. I definitely like James Jacobs' style, Red Hand of Doom was my favourite D&D 3 adventure.
Me and my party have a really strong homebrew campaign setting (which mainly I created) and although we are happy with it, Golarion is so cool I thought it's time to move on and start something new. I have tried to read as much Golarion as possible but it is a lot of material, I don't understand and know everything yet.
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Question: My players would like to play with these type of characters:
- a Paladin (or cavalier, fighter) tank, with lots of hp and heavy armor, lawful good, worshipper of Iomedae
- a divine controller (some sort of D&D 4 Invoker, maybe a divine flavoured sorcerer, warlock, witch, cleric would be best), lawful good, worshipper of Iomedae
- a Monk (damage dealer, a divine fighter/warrior of some sort), lawful good, worshipper of Iomedae
- a World of Warcraft style hunter (ranger with pet or something like that)
- a swashbuckler (perhaps a bard or rogue), mainly a damage dealer (weapon finesse style), but has some thieving skills, with lots of social skills, not really magic focused
- a shape changing druid (for a very young player), warcraft style night elf druid
what builds do you suggest, which books should I buy to be able to create them... etc.
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Question 2: The first three characters would come from the same part of Golarion (Absalom would be cool), the Paladin and the Monk are the bodyguards and advisors of the Invoker, what reason could you think of for the three of them wanting to go to Sagrava on board of the Jenivere?
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Question 3: If I would like to create a monastery of some kind for the three "divine" characters who worship Iomedae, where should I put it?
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Question 4: How is the Serpent's Skull overall, I love the first adventure, haven't read (or even peaked) into the the next few? Should I buy all of them? I was thinking about doing an orc themed campaign, or an undead themed one, I am sure I could tweak Smuggler's Shiv to accommodate that.
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Question 5: Pathfinder Society Character Creation rules, where do I find them, are there some pathfinder society rules I should use/avoid, right now I only know about the 20 point buy system and nothing else.
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Any additional advice or suggestion, I am kinda overwhelmed a little bit. I am still learning the rules, trying to read a lot of Campaign info, read a lot of character creation, read a lot of adventure and AP related stuff, come up with ways to integrate it into my homebrew campaign setting and trying to create my over campaign... I'm lovin it. :)
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Paladin: Dedicated tanks aren't generally a thing in Pathfinder, though the Sacred Shield is workable.
Divine Controller: Druids make for the best divine control-casters; Dark Tapestry Oracles do it pretty well, too. Something tells me neither of these options are satisfactory flavor-wise.
Monk: Sounds like what they want is a Sacred Fist Warpriest.
WoW Hunter: While it's definitely something you can do with just a Core Ranger, the Hunter is built for this.
Finesse DPR: You want a Daring Champion Cavalier. The skill monkey part will be difficult on that chassis, though; if they're willing to compromise on being more magic-oriented the Archaeologist Bard would be a good fit.
WoW Druid: The Core Druid does this perfectly, though if you're worried about 9th level spellcasting being too complicated for them you could just take a Ranger, exchange Hunter's Bond for Wildshape and call it a day.
As you can probably tell from the myriad links I used, you won't NEED to buy anything to build these characters; basically all of Pathfinder other than flavor information is available freely online. I would recommend purchasing the stuff you especially like anyways, of course, since that gravy train is what brings the next hardcover to town.
A shaman can be a divine control caster. With the right feats and hexes... they can totally wreck your day. The combination of oracle and witch can be extremly effective. (Evil eye, chant, Misfortune) just to name a few (and argually the best)
Tank: Tanking in heavy armour favours the fighter over the Paladin - especially if you're on a ship and Swim and Acrobatics checks are going to be a thing.
Invoker: Empyreal is the divine flavoured sorcerer, though Oracle is the thing that springs to mind most given your description.
Hunter: The hunter, the ranger, or the Inquisitor with the Animal Domain or one of its subdomains can all meet this role.
Swashbuckler: The Slayer translates the weapon finesse rogue's fighting style into a better combatant, but still gets plenty of skill for out of combat socializing and stealing.
Shapeshifter: The Druid, as mentioned, is the class for the job. Archetypes like Bear Shaman give up very little, but simplify wildshaping around a single form of choice, which might suit a very young player more.
d20pfsrd, Archives of Nethys, the Paizo PRD are all very good resources. If you've bought the APs, they should cover you for a lot of loot and enemies and NPC statblocks.