PFS: Replacing hurtful


Advice


Hurtful is no longer legal and I have no idea what to replace it with. I have an intimidate/Melee focused Nagaji paladin (Chosen One). Mechanically he was always built to use hurtful and cornugon smash.
He is childlike and naive, and adorably simplistic out of combat, relentless and scary in a fight, with a knack for making people feel like a small prey animal. I'll be honest hadn't really thought about what I was going to do after 7th level - see what fit at the time I guess. The downside to this focus is that I have no idea what direction to go now.

Askaji
Chosen One Paladin 5
S 19
D 12
C 14
I 5 (Taking Lawful Stupid literally)
W 12
CH 16

Feats: Power Attack, Intimidating Prowess, Hurtful.

So questions are:
1) Is it still worth taking Cornugon Smash?
2) What do I replace hurtful with?


Yeah, Cornugon smash is probably your best bet.


Should have been clearer. I can only take Cornugon smash next level (6 ranks of intimidate and only being level 5 = :(). I need to replace hurtful with something else now.

Sovereign Court

Blade of Mercy/Enforcer combo.


Well, weapon focus is good. Also it opens up Dazzling Display, which is not a terrible feat chain for someone terrifying.


Depending on what weapon you wield, Quick Draw will let you pull quickdraw light shield hijinks: attack two-handed and then switch grip and defend with a shield.

A very interesting fighting style if you flavor it as quickly two-handing with your shield-arm when you get an opening for an attack.

The Exchange

Charon's Little Helper wrote:
Blade of Mercy/Enforcer combo.

2nd this combo.


Honestly I think your GM should allow you to finish playing the character if you made it before Hurtful was deemed illegal. I don't think it's at all fair to wreck someone's planned build halfway through like that. However, if you haven't yet played the character, or if the GM isn't willing to budge on the Hurtful thing, you could request a complete rebuild or switch to another character.

But if you're stuck with it, then here are some ideas:

Weapon Focus -> Dazzling Display -> Shatter Defenses/Gory Finish

Cleave -> Cleaving Finish
Improved Sunder - Greater Sunder
Furious Focus -> Dreadful Carnage

The Hurtful+Cornugon Smash combo is VERY strong, and if your build is centered around intimidating, then there's not many ways to recover that free hit. Normally I'd suggest going for Improved Trip into Greater Trip for more AoO, but your character doesn't meet the INT requirement.


Its PFS, there is not an option just to continue on as is. I might suggest furious focus it is simple it works, and until you get your iterative you are essentially power attacking for free.


David Neilson wrote:

Its PFS, there is not an option just to continue on as is. I might suggest furious focus it is simple it works, and until you get your iterative you are essentially power attacking for free.

It's a reasonably effective option for turning 'odds are pretty low that you will miss' into 'odds are very low that you will miss', though to be fair it's boring. Depending on your deity and style of combat and such, there are potentially much more interesting options.

A two-step Eldritch Heritage chain could do all sorts of really fun stuff by 7, like going Skill Focus: Knowledge: Nature retroactively and picking up Eldritch Heritage: Fey for the awesome Laughing Touch power at 7. With a Conductive weapon you can charge enemies with a shut-down attack.


It's a long, long way to Disheartening Display. You could dip a level of Thug Rogue to Frighten people instead.


Some good suggestions, thank you.

Furious Focus is simple and effective, but I was hoping to find something that retained the relevance of intimidate. Definitely a solid fall back option.

Is there an alternative to Blade of Mercy? (several issues: Iomedaean Paladin, would require extra traits feat and don't have the players guide). I do want to keep multi-classing to a minimum as I would like the familiar to stay on track, otherwise I would be considering 2 levels of cavalier (blue rose order)

Thug - not sure the flavour fits, Is there a way to pitch this less, um, thuggish and more, I don't know, 'penance stare-y'?

Grand Lodge

Merciful Weapon, Bludgeoner, Oils of Touch of Mercy, and I am sure I missed a few others.

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