So I am wondering why there is no class guide or really anything for the Warpriest in reguards to guides. Just looking at it seems like a pretty solid class, maybe that's just with a quick look and in a bubble not really compared to other six level casters.
I would like to know from all the optimizing and guide book making experts why is there no love for the Warpriest?
Do it yourself!
Best way to optimize a Warpriest is, however:
- Be a Human. OP FCB is OP.
- Don't screw your INT.
- Try to build feat heavy styles to really highlight the strengths of your build. Archery, TWF, Shield Bash, Reach, they all benefit from the plethora of feats you use.
- CON needs to be higher than you think and Toughness is a great idea.
- Low damage dice, good critical weapons are the best for the class. Greatswords < scimitars here.
- Use Fervor to buff, not to heal, but use long duration buffs like Heroism before battle - no point in wasting good points of Fervor.
- 16 WIS is all you'll ever need. You are more desperate for solid accuracy, so focus your purchases on combat readiness over casting prowess. A Pearl of Power pulls more weight than a +2 headband of Wis in my opinion.
- Be a Human. OP FCB is OP.
Was there ever any clarification that the FCB does in fact work like the class feature and let you count your Warpriest level as your BAB and Fighter level? I recall that being under some debate last I looked at it.
FCB what is that?
- Be a Human. OP FCB is OP.Was there ever any clarification that the FCB does in fact work like the class feature and let you count your Warpriest level as your BAB and Fighter level? I recall that being under some debate last I looked at it.
Whether or not it actually gives you 'Warpriest' bonus feats doesn't change the fact that FCB bonus feats is pretty great. Sacred Fist gets even more mileage out of the FCB since they don't get the typical bonus feats.
There was a guide for the warpriest that was not that good and the author of it disappeared. Several people in that thread for the guide said they would write a guide but sadly none have so far. If I had any ability to do so I would do it. I've played several warpriests and it is a solid class.
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Speaking as a very attractive person, ACG classes aren't really the most fun to write guides for, at least in my experience.
A lot of the material for the class is already been played around with, and in some cases (the swashbuckler), there's painfully little new ground to tread on without feeling like you're repeating things. Hell, my Investigator 'guide' is more of an expansion to the alchemist guide because there's so much overlap.
I like the warpriest, I think it fills a niche, but its parent classes have great guides already and that leaves less room to explain for the warpriest guide, which isn't fun to write about in my experience. I want to talk about new things and help players innovate.
With the amount of solid threads and builds that the warpriest has, a guide is probably less necessary than for other classes that are more barren in that respect (alchemist or monk for example are good classes that need guides due to the complexity of them and the ease in which they can be built poorly), and the warpriest's chassis isn't exactly hard to screw up with sacred weapon, another thing that I like about the class's design.
If you want a guide for it, I'd just say go for it and write one. No one is ever 'elected' to be a guide writer, we do it for fun and to help the community. I know I started because I thought Treantmonk's guides were awesome, and now I've authored like 7 myself. The community is always there to help new guide writers too, as everyone likes making sure a guide is accurate to help the community even more.
These are just my thoughts on the subject, but if you think something needs a guide, the best thing you can do is try and write one.
To add-
Not all Blessings are created equal. All the Alignment Blessings are flat out better than the others. Assuming all Warpriests pick up Quicken Blessing (because they should, it's as much a class feature as Power Attack is for barbarians), a Swift-action long-duration summon that scales with your level is absolutely incredible. Always take them if you are planning on playing a game that goes past 10th level.
Other than the Alignment blessings, there are a few others that stand out.
Void Blessing is a Caster Shutdown from level one. Combine this with some way of getting Spectral Hand and you can hold the front line and shut down a caster at the same time. With Quicken Blessing, you can do this, and still beat on them too.
For a Ranged or Throwing build, Air Blessing is pretty impressive in the early game, but the Greater Blessing isn't great.
Also for a Ranged build, the Charm of Glory blessing is incredible. That Sanctuary effect lets you focus on one enemy at a time and mostly not worry about the others.
Liberation Blessing is amazing for any build, but particularly for Melee war priests. Freedom of Movement is one of the best abilities in the game.
Magic blessing is also impressive for a melee build, because it gives a much needed ranged option, but even better, with Quicken Blessing it lets you use your Swift action for a free attack! Not much better options out there for melee characters than that.
A ranged Warpriest with Weather Blessing and some means of Flying is all but untouchable. This is a combo that you could build an entire character around.
The absolute best Warpriest melee weapon in the game is the Spine Flail. Aim for that. Even better is a Large version with Effortless Lace. Then you threaten out to 15 feet with it.
As far as Blessings go, the Glory or Charm minor Blessing to cast a specialized Sanctuary is incredibly powerful - especially with Quicken Blessing - and the 'Dominance Aura' Charm major Blessing is pretty unreal. Of course being wisdom-based means that most more conventional Warpriest builds probably won't use them, but if you work in a strong wisdom score...
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Speaking as a very attractive person,
well hello
One thing I noticed when looking at the Sacred Fist was that it was surprisingly powerful even after it had it's 'full BAB' nerfed, assuming that it went with a weapon (it's ideally positioned to grab Crusader's Flurry). Before the nerf, the combination of full BAB Flurry and full Cleric buffing was actually a bit broken. Even as it is now, think of a level 8 Gorumite Sacred Fist making four - or five with ki - greatsword power attacks with the Destruction Blessing and Divine Favor running.
Come to think of it, you could use the new Spear Dancing Spiral feat to use Weapon Finesse and Flurry with any spear or polearm, regardless of deity.
I've been thinking of writing one, but I've never done a guide before, so it would be a lot of work and it'd have to wait until I'm less busy. I've also never played one before, so all my knowledge of it is theoretical.
How are you getting the flurry with non-monk weapons, via Crusader's Flurry or something else ?
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Well why don't we just start with this thread and keep talking about good things for the War Priest so when some one starts a book then there is a giant thread already done full of resources
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Yeah, I've been thinking of doing a whip wielding Calistrian warpriest. Focus on combat maneuvers, and use all the bonus feats and swift action buffs to actually be good at it (unlike most divine whip wielders).
My only warpriest so far is also reach and combat maneuver focused: He's a pacifist warpriest of Shelyn, who uses her favored weapon (glaive) to trip people and/or sunder their weapons, then ask them to surrender. He's only level 2 so far, so mostly just theoretical, though I had fun playing him in Wounded Wisp. In the biggest fight, I tripped two people and sundered an archer's bow, which helped the party win while still letting my allies hog the "glory" of doing all the HP damage.
I've played three warpriests so far two in RotRL and Mummy's Mask and one in a homebrew. First was a dwarf warpriest that could TWF a dorn dergar and a shield, fantastic fun and fluff wise it really worked great. One in MM is a khopesh/shield trip build that became a Living Monolith PrC. Very fun, very good frontline tank role.
Third was the most fun. I used the Mantis Zealot archetype which you can find here http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/hybrid-classes/warpriest/archetypes/paizo-- -warpriest-archetypes/mantis-zealot-warpriest-archetype
and had a blast with it. I think I added either three or four levels of slayer to go with it and it was a very hard hitting full to the brim of RP goodness that I never got tired of playing. Having TWF for sawtooth sabres as a warpriest shouting about how great the Great Mantis was made for some great RP chances. It also kicked ass in combat.
Somehow every time I try to plan out a warpriest build I only get to the point where I try to find useful blessings, get frustrated and trash the build.
In my opinion blessings, as a class feature, are more lacking and bad designed than rogue talents.
Somehow every time I try to plan out a warpriest build I only get to the point where I try to find useful blessings, get frustrated and trash the build.
In my opinion blessings, as a class feature, are more lacking and bad designed than rogue talents.
The difference being that some blessings are actually useful. :P
The difference being that some blessings are actually useful. :PSomehow every time I try to plan out a warpriest build I only get to the point where I try to find useful blessings, get frustrated and trash the build.
In my opinion blessings, as a class feature, are more lacking and bad designed than rogue talents.
Are there any that are useful from level 1 and stay useful later on? Most seem useless until you have quicken blessing.
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Talents for a Rogue depend on the Rogue build. Bonus Combat feat, Weapon Finesse and Fast Stealth are always one of the first I get. All three help my Rogue since I plan and do go Shadow Dancer. Poor designed and made Rogues means poorly chosen Talents.
So, two bonus feats rather than rogue talents. Feats are usually worse than class abilities. Rogue is the exception where you're better off trading class abilities for feats.
That's not good.
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I like some of the blessings, though others are underwhelming.
Liberation is awesome. I'm tempted to make a warpriest of Milani just to get that one.
The 1st level Trickery power is the same as the Trickery domain for clerics/inquisitors. The fact that it's a move action to activate means you can use it for defense while attacking in the same round. I do this all the time with my cleric of Besmara with the Trickery domain. My only complaint about the warpriest version is the low uses per day of blessings at lower levels. If I make that whip wielder of Calistria mentioned above, I'll definitely consider taking this.
Stuff like Destruction, Good, War, or other 1 minute buffs are good if you have a spare round to buff at the start of a fight, or before kicking in a door, but they're not spectacular.
The most disappointing to me is the 1st level Luck blessing power. The Luck domain for clerics/inquisitors is fantastic for buffing teammaters, so you'd hope that the blessing version would be similar for buffing yourself. But it's nowhere near as good. You only get the bonus on one roll, rather than all rolls for a round like with the domain.
Great sword, fates favored, divine favor fervor, war and destruction blessing.
Calmly single moving, casting, fervor casting as you walk across the room calling down Gorum's power at the bbeg, is hard to beat on the role playing and the roll playing scales.
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Travel Blessing is good 1-20. Level one is swift action ignore difficult terrain. Always useful.
Level 10: Teleport as a move action with the ability to make an action after you move. It lacks the end your turn language of dimension door. This becomes dimensional pounce with quicken blessing.
Actually, I was just looking at the Quicken Blessing feat. It says that it works on blessings that are normally a standard action. So I don't think you can use it with a blessing that's normally a move action.
One thing to note about the Warpriest is that while the whole Sacred Weapon damage die upgrade thing can be very useful, it's not really that relevant to many solid Warpriest builds. If there's a good reason to use a wimpy weapon then it's great, but just picking up a greatsword means you've got a better damage roll than Sacred Weapon gives until level 15.