Fellow pathfinders,
for our upcoming Skull & Shackles campaign, I'm going to play an Arcane Trickster. I was originally going to play a straight Diviner, but since there was absolutely no trapfinding in our group, I switched to AT. My DM allowed me to get the feat Street Mage, so the build will look about as follows:
CN Male Sylph Unchained Rogue 1/Wizard 5/Arcane Trickster X (I guess 7 or 8 in the end).
Feats:
1 Scribe Scroll
1 Improved Initative
3 Craft Wondrous Item/Cloud Gazer
5 Street Mage
7 Airy Step
9 Wings of Air
11 Spell Penetration/Inner Breath/whatever
13 Quicken Spell
The question is as follows: I'm not sure what to do with my 5 wizard levels. I could just go straight Diviner (Foresight), which gives me the best school powers, but divination spell slots aren't the greatest.
I could go Transmuter with the archetype Wind Listener, which gives a +2 bonus to Dex or Con, depending on what belt I have, which is pretty good, I guess, plus the Spontaneous Divination thing of the Wind Listener, which I feel is pretty good as well, but takes away the level 5 bonus feat for a crap ability.
I could also go Exploiter Wizard, which gives me two exploits (Quick Study, obviously, and 1 other), but leaves me with less spells per day (because no specialist slots). Also has the least "divination flavor", so to speak, which is what I was originally going for.
Well, there you have it. If anyone has advice, it would be much appreciated. Feats aren't completely set in stone, either. Thanks in advance!
What about taking the void element as your arcane school? It's got a fair few divination spells, the powers are good (if not foresight-good) and there's at least one decent spell at each level. The flavour can match divination easily too.
The spontaneous divination thing sounds good until you realise that an arcane bonded item is better 90%+ of the time. You seldom need to spontaneously cast two divinations.
What about taking the void element as your arcane school? It's got a fair few divination spells, the powers are good (if not foresight-good) and there's at least one decent spell at each level. The flavour can match divination easily too.
The spontaneous divination thing sounds good until you realise that an arcane bonded item is better 90%+ of the time. You seldom need to spontaneously cast two divinations.
Hm, that's actually a really solid choice. Hadn't even looked at it cause I didn't think it fluffed well with my character, but it's really light on the void theme. Thank you!
Also, the more I think about it, the less I care for the spontaneous divination, especially in comparison to essentially Arcane Bond plus a bonus feat.
The Air school isn't a bad choice: +3 on Fly checks, plus at will feather fall and (at wizard 5th) levitate; Lightning Flash is more useful for when the character is attacked in melee than as a frequently used attack, but can come in handy. Diviner/Foresight is nice, but limited; because of the few levels in wizard, what benefits the character receives is situational. Evocation/Admixture is probably one of the most useful schools for an arcane trickster (IMO); the ability to convert Evocation spells from one type of energy damage to another on the fly is a tremendous benefit for the blaster aspect of the prestige class (Sneak Attacks with ranged touch spells). Transmutation/Enhancement can be useful if you want a free +1 (+2 at wizard 5th) enhancement bonus on one of your physical ability scores and to be a bit better in buffing allies; Augment can be used to add +2 to an ability score of choice or +1 natural armor (+2 at wizard 5th) for a couple rounds.
If you're going with the class progression above, your feats should be:
Rog 1- Improved Initiative, Weapon Finesse
Wiz 1- Scribe Scroll
Wiz 2- Street Mage (ensure you have 3 ranks in both Spellcraft and Stealth)
Wiz 4- Cloud Gazer
Wiz 5- Craft Wondrous Item (you have to have CL 3, so you don't qualify at rogue 1/wizard 2 without Street Mage)
AT 1- Airy Step
AT 3- Wings of Air
AT 5- Quicken Spell (you have access to 5th-level spells at this point)
AT 7- whatever feat seems useful
Alternately, if you want to emphasize the blasting/Sneak Attack aspect more, rogue 1/wizard (Evocation/Admixture) 4/arcane trickster 8 or 9 might be worth looking at:
Rog 1- Airy Step, Weapon Finesse
Wiz 1- Scribe Scroll
Wiz 2- Street Mage
Wiz 4- Cloud Gazer
AT 2- Reach Spell
AT 4- Wings of Air
AT 6- Quicken Spell
AT 8- Improved Initiative
While a little bit weaker than Street Mage, Accomplished Sneak Attack will allow you to get into Arcane Trickster with Rogue 1/Wizard 3,if you prefer. You'll have to cover that caster level drop with a trait, though. Or I suppose you could take both feats.
Good advice, thank you guys!
With Accomplished Sneak Attacker I'd have to drop Reactionary for Magical Knack probably. I guess more Arcane Trickster is better than going Street Mage (plus I think I prefer staying non 3rd party, even though my GM allowed it). I think that's a really solid plan.
Still undecided on the school, and even more options to consider than before :D