Two Character Arena Build


Advice


Hey All,

We're doing a one off thing tonight for our gaming session and I wanted to get some opinions.

The situation. Round robin tourney idea. Two - 10th level characters. Standard WBL + 10K for each character (No giving one the lions share of it though, and no crafting). Spells, hp, class abilities all reset between fights. No time to buff beforehand. If you use wands / potions, they don't reset. Only Pathfinder material. No 3rd party or 3.x.

So I was thinking of either a "God" wizard/ summoner (sp) and blasty sorc. Or for fun, either two mounted fighters / cavaliers.

What do you all think? Or any thoughts on builds/ tips and tricks for me to get the edge?

We're playing for the choice in Christmas dice we get from the host, so needless to say, a lot is riding on this.

Thanks.

EDIT: I don't know what the battlefield conditions will be beforehand.


Twinned melee characters with Reach Weapons, Unarmed Strikes, Bodyguard, Snake Fang, and Paired Opportunist springs to mind. Attacking either of them will provoke an Aid another from the other, which will provoke an attack of opportunity from the one you attacked, and if the attack misses the Aided defender, that provokes attacks of opportunity from both of you again! Give them both Crowns of Swords. If the attacks hit, then Spiritual Swords appear and attack the attacker.

I call this a damned if you do, damned if you don't strategy: attack either one of them and provoke attacks of opportunity, if the attack hit, spiritual swords, if the attack misses, more attacks of opportunity!


A couple of melee characters would be good in a cage match, OK in a larger arena, and terrible in a square mile of wilderness. I'd go for one wizard with max initiative who can buff, debuff or fly high as necessary and one mounted fury beast totem barbarian who can deliver an absurd number of attacks on a charge with no preparation required. You want glitterdust and wall of stone available, and you want muscle, but going all in on one or the other is asking for trouble IMO.


10th is the edge of wizards starting to rule the world, but it is also a point when they are still pretty vulnerable. 10th is also the magic point at which a barbarian can pounce, which is pretty huge (and can make a bad day for an enemy wizard.)

I think I would go with a barbarian and a kensai magus. With bladed dash and dimension door (with dimensional agility) the kensai can get into position to hit an enemy caster hard right off and they could have fly for the barbarian in case something got into the air. In addition things like see invisible could be covered.

The Exchange

Why doesn't anyone want to do it like Hangover Evangelist cleric + Sylvan Sorcerer, with their twin animal companions doing combat reflexes + twin Anklyosaurus daze? You have arcane + divine battlefield control. Also, how about metamagic rods?


A dual cursed battle oracle based aroun misfortune would be top pick for being able to say no to enemies critting you and is a good combatant, twice over with grapple or trip being so strong low levels. An inquisitor with his teamwork feats and solo tactics is a great choice as well. Some measure of healing would be nice but if you can hit hard enough its not a must.

If I had to pick a party of two I'd do a cleric/inquisitor of Zon-Kuthon and that oracle or one of the two with a magus.


A hunter- standard melee build with Pack Flanking, Paired Opportunists, and Outflank. A small cat with maxed DEX for tripping, and a Barbarian with Paired Opportunists, and Outflank. Make sure they all have high crit weapons, and unleash.

EDIT: Or a negative channeling cleric that dazes, and a Damphir something.


Assuming you don’t know what you are up against I would recommend a warpriest and magus combination. Both of these have a good mix of magic and mundane abilities. More importantly they both have good fortitude and will saves. At this level you have to worry about spells like baleful polymorph and dominate person. Any character who cannot deal with these will probably lose.

They both have a good mix of normal combat and magic. Both are actually designed to do both at the same time. The magus gets spell combat and spell strike, the warpriest gets swift action fervor which allows you to use a swift action to either cast a buff spell, or heal. At this level you will be getting 4th level spells vs. the 5th level spells of the full casters. The other abilities you get more than make up for that at this point.

The action economy is in your favor. Both characters get the equivalent of two actions per round which is going to be a big advantage.


The OP said this was for 'tonight', yesterday. How'd it go?


I ended up going with a Wild Rager (something I'd never do in a real game)) beast totem barbarian, and a wizard who buffed the barb (haste, monstrous physique, and heroism) and could lay down battlefield control and had a few save or sucks.

First match I went up against a sniping rogue and a sorc. I murder death rage pounced both of them very quickly, but not after the wizard went down due to sniping and some failed saves on evocation spells.

Round 2, I went up against two goblin slayers that were spec'd straight into assassinate (Like a dc 30). Everyone passed their saves for the assassinate and I pounced them again. No problem.

Round 3 was against a fighter and cleric. Once again, no problem there.

Ran out of time before round 4, so we'll finish it later. But that'll be up against two inquisitors. So we'll see how that goes.

EDIT: Thanks for the advice everyone. They all seemed like they could be very viable. In the end, I went with the decision of barb just for the sheer amount of damage he could put out with pounce and the extra attacks from wild rager and haste. Best defense is an overwhelmingly aggressive offense.

Edit 2: Offense for barb was something like:

+22,+22, +22, +17 6d6+32 (huge size due to monstrous physique, haste, and a +1 impact furious Great Sword)

sting natural attack at about +16 for 2d8+20 or so damage.


The way to win against the inquisitors will be to make sure you don't get flanked and take one of them out quick. If you get flanked they become lethal because of teamwork feats. If you can knock out one of them fast the one that is left is in a horrible position.


Yup, looking pretty good for you. Enjoy your shiny dice when they arrive!

Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder First Edition / Advice / Two Character Arena Build All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.