As the title.
One of our otherwise 5-man party appears to be going on a predicted, long hiatus (this isn't the first time this has happened, it's actually one of many...hiatuses? Haitii? Anyway, so), we decided to create a separate 4-man good-guy party and start on our first ever Adventure Path (normally we play 3.X or homemade campaigns), the Rise of the Runelords (I believe it's the hardback anniversary edition too). Although we might seem mechanically sound, I have a feeling that there are critical things we are missing.
Before we begin, there are a few houserules that people should be aware of that we're enforcing; it makes a difference, and does help us enforce our choices. They are as follows:
2. Power Attack and Point-Blank Shot are given to everyone for free, but otherwise only work (and count as having the feat) when you fulfill the pre-requisites (at least in the case of Power Attack).
3. Weapon Focus and Shield Focus (and their greater counterparts) are removed completely from the game. What this means is that they cannot be chosen as a feat, and therefore are no longer a pre-requisite for feats/abilities that otherwise require them.
4. Spells and abilities that function as (or very similar to) Haste are removed completely from the game. The GM also talked about making adjustments to summoning (such as by altering their duration and casting time), but nothing concrete has been given to us in relation to that.
With all of the disclaimers done, we have our 4-man party, each with 15 Point Buy:
1. Gnome Wizard with Illusion specialty/Transmutation+Enchantment opposed (I personally suggested Sorcerer, but he absolutely insisted on being a Wizard; since he's adamant on his flavor choices, I decided not to argue with it.)
2. Half-Elf Melee Inquisitor of Ragathiel (Destruction Domain, no archetype)
3. Half-Dragon (Wyvaran) Melee Warpriest of Ragathiel (Destruction and Good Blessings, no archetype), with SR = 11 + HD
4. Human Bolt Ace Gunslinger -> Slayer? [me]
On its surface, we have a fairly well-rounded party. We have two melee "cleric" types with 3/4 BAB (and spellcasting), we have our full arcane spellcasting Wizard, and we have our skill monkey (me) who is full BAB and provides ranged "support". But, there are a few lingering concerns as to our composition. They are as follows:
1. Although we've never actually played an AP, from what I've seen from the forums, they usually require at least 1 full Arcane spellcaster and 1 full Divine spellcaster, as well as 1 full BAB frontliner, and 1 skill monkey. Although I know that the players made these characters to be more fun than powerhouses (myself sort of included), is lacking a full Divine spellcaster (with 2 3/4 spellcasters in its place) going to hurt us in the long run?
2. One thing I noticed is that almost every one of us dumped Charisma (except the Warpriest, who dumped Intelligence instead), to further our offensive capabilities, and our highest Charisma character doesn't have any Diplomacy ranks. I mean, we are more of a hack-and-slash playstyle table, but since we are playing an AP, and decided to put Charisma back on the table as a result, I have a feeling there will be a lot of missed opportunities by not having a "face" party member to help gather valuable information and open special doors for us. (I would've considered being the face if I could've stacked the Mysterious Stranger archetype that allowed Charisma for Grit instead of Wisdom, but per the rules I can't do that since the Grit feature is replaced via Bolt Ace.) So, on a scale of 1 to "You should just quit the AP now," how big of a mistake would this be to leave it unchecked, even if only from the beginning? Is there a way to, at the very least, switch the attribute allocation of Diplomacy to something other than Charisma, so that other party members with more skill points can make use of it?
3. Even if I am a skill monkey who basically watches for traps and tries to disarm them, I won't be able to disarm magical traps until 9th level, when I get my Slayer talent for trapfinding. As with above, on a scale of 1 to "You're going to end up dying in a 20x10 hallway with a maximized empowered intensified fireball," how big of an issue would lacking the ability to disarm magical traps for that period of time become?
As a bonus question, I'm not sure if picking levels in Slayer is the smartest thing to do past 5th level. I do want the full BAB, and the trapfinding feature, but is there another way besides Slayer or Rogue to be able to disarm magical traps (while still maintaining the full BAB)?
I do appreciate some answers and feedback as to how we could improve our performance for an adventure path. Thanks in advance!
In general, you seem to have a decent composition. You shouldn't have any problems with RotRL, its not very aggressively designed and you've basically checked all the minimum requisite boxes with the options already chosen.
1) This shouldn't be a problem. 6 level divine casters will be able to tackle most of the issues you'd want a divine caster for.
2) Not being able to use social skills well is a bit of a shame but won't block you from completing anything in the first few books at least. If you want to take the Student of Philosophy trait, you can cover some aspects of diplomacy with INT. Regardless RotRL works OK as a smash and loot kind of campaign if thats the style of your group.
3) As far as I remember, you don't have too much to worry about. My recollection of the first three books is that they were fairly trap-light anyway.
Bonus) Off the top of my head: Urban Ranger, Trapbreaker Alchemist (not full BAB, but you get mutagen to make up for it), probably some others. Slayer isn't doing much for you because ranged sneak is tough + you won't get swift action study until 12th level.
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While I haven't played the whole of RotRL, I have played and run other APs and played part of the first book of RotRL (twice).
So, that in mind:
Those choices look workable. Lack of Haste will hurt that many weapon users quite a bit in the mid-levels, though. Still, no good way to avoid that.
1. That's...not exactly accurate. You need access to occasional high level Divine/Arcane spells, a skill monkey, and melee frontliners. But who has which of those capabilities isn't actually super relevant, and you can probably fudge some stuff with scrolls and other consumables.
2. Yeah...not having any social skills at the very least seems likely to make things less fun. That said, there are indeed ways to make Diplomacy not Charisma based. The two most relevant are the Student of Diplomacy and Clever Wordplay Traits, which make it Int-based, or the Conversion Inquisition, which would replace your Inquisitor's Domain, but makes all social skills (except Perform) Wis-based and is available to any deity. I'd probably do the latter, assuming the Inquisitor is willing to go along with it.
3. It's not too bad, at least early on. Spotting them should be mostly sufficient.
Bonus: While maintaining Full BAB? There's Urban Ranger. There's also the spell Aram Zey's Focus, but it's 2nd level (for Bards, Alchemists, and Wizards) and has a range of 'Personal'...so probably not while maintaining full BAB.
Personally, I'd either go Slayer, which works fine and is a very neat class in its own right, or go Alchemist (Vivisectionist) and grab the aforementioned spell. That'll delay trapfinding (unless you also grab Trapbreaker), but dabbling in being a 'caster' has a lot of perks.
Your inquisitor is going to be your face. +1/2 lvl to Intim and Sense Motive, plus Bluff & Diplomacy are class skills. Don't forget they get 6 spill points per level.
3. Weapon Focus and Shield Focus (and their greater counterparts) are removed completely from the game. What this means is that they cannot be chosen as a feat, and therefore are no longer a pre-requisite for feats/abilities that otherwise require them.
While I think these are boring feats so I can understand removing them to encourage more interesting selections, I have to wonder why the same wasn't done to Spell Focus.
1. Gnome Wizard with Illusion specialty/Transmutation+Enchantment opposed (I personally suggested Sorcerer, but he absolutely insisted on being a Wizard; since he's adamant on his flavor choices, I decided not to argue with it.)
Transmutation as an opposition school is strongly discouraged. Transmutation has far more spells than any other school in the game, and the spells it does have tend to be extremely diverse and above the curve in terms of power. Conjuration and Transmutation are significantly better than every other school of magic, by a significant margin. I'd much rather oppose four schools that take either Transmutation or Conjuration as an opposition school.
3. Half-Dragon (Wyvaran) Melee Warpriest of Ragathiel (Destruction and Good Blessings, no archetype), with SR = 11 + HD
That sounds incredibly over the top compared to everyone else in the party.
1. Although we've never actually played an AP, from what I've seen from the forums, they usually require at least 1 full Arcane spellcaster and 1 full Divine spellcaster, as well as 1 full BAB frontliner, and 1 skill monkey. Although I know that the players made these characters to be more fun than powerhouses (myself sort of included), is lacking a full Divine spellcaster (with 2 3/4 spellcasters in its place) going to hurt us in the long run?
Two partial divine casters should be a sufficient replacement for a full divine caster. It'll hurt a bit at very high levels, but at lower levels you won't even feel it.
2. One thing I noticed is that almost every one of us dumped Charisma (except the Warpriest, who dumped Intelligence instead), to further our offensive capabilities, and our highest Charisma character doesn't have any Diplomacy ranks.
Remember, the difference between 8 charisma and 14 charisma is only a +3 to your diplomacy check. The Inquisitor (or even the Wizard in a pinch) could easily invest skill points to get the skill to respectable levels in spite of a low modifier.
3. Even if I am a skill monkey who basically watches for traps and tries to disarm them, I won't be able to disarm magical traps until 9th level, when I get my Slayer talent for trapfinding. As with above, on a scale of 1 to "You're going to end up dying in a 20x10 hallway with a maximized empowered intensified fireball," how big of an issue would lacking the ability to disarm magical traps for that period of time become?
Go around them or cast Summon Monster I to trigger them are two common work-arounds. Traps that you've already spotted are seldom major issues. It's the ones you don't spot that are the issue.
As a bonus question, I'm not sure if picking levels in Slayer is the smartest thing to do past 5th level. I do want the full BAB, and the trapfinding feature, but is there another way besides Slayer or Rogue to be able to disarm magical traps (while still maintaining the full BAB)?
There's the Trapfinding trait, if your GM allows it. Not sure what sourcebooks he's permitting. Nothing wrong with Slayer; you are correct that there's very little reason to go with Gunslinger past 5th and multi-classing out is preferable.
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Transmutation as an opposition school is strongly discouraged. Transmutation has far more spells than any other school in the game, and the spells it does have tend to be extremely diverse and above the curve in terms of power. Conjuration and Transmutation are significantly better than every other school of magic, by a significant margin. I'd much rather oppose four schools that take either Transmutation or Conjuration as an opposition school.
Right! This. I meant to mention it but got distracted and apparently failed to.
Transmutation is probably the worst opposition school a Wizard can take (Conjuration being a close second). Divination, Necromancy, Evocation...all would be miles better Opposition picks.
There's the Trapfinding trait, if your GM allows it. Not sure what sourcebooks he's permitting.
This Trait is specific to another AP, and thus really unlikely to be allowed, IMO.
Again, I'm not going to argue about what the Wizard is doing, because he's valuing flavor over power. The only thing I bothered to tell him is that he has no right to complain about being crappy or saying his character or the game sucks, because in essence, he chose those results.
Thanks for showing the Clever Wordplay, that will really help later down the road. We use a special points system that rewards out-of-the-box tactics and completion to be assigned to certain categories (10 points results in a trait, or for certain categories, 20 points for a specialized feat).
The SR appears nice, but probably won't see useful play until past 3rd level or so, when spellcasters become a regular thing. I mean, he is Half-Dragon, and Dragons usually have spell resistance to deal with; that, and the GM OK'd it, so it's already a done deal. Plus normally he'd have a fly speed, but he substituted that and his broken tail attack that doesn't work right (but is somehow valued at 3 RP) for the SR, so he more than paid for it in both a racial trait and RP value standpoint.
As others have suggested, I may have to go Urban Ranger, perhaps with the Guide archetype (because I dislike Favored Enemy) as well; as cool as Slayer is, I can't make use of the Sneak Attack too well with ranged attacks, and Studied Target can basically be emulated with the Guide archetype, and plus I get other utilitarian goodies. Not the best idea, but it will serve.
There's a difference between telling the wizard to go sorceror because he's a gnome (at least, that's why I assume you did it), and showing him the fantastic school that is Transmutation.
Besides, what flavor reason is there for choosing Transmutation over, say, Divination? Or Necromancy?
I think the biggest thing you should be worried about is the massive amounts of buffs your party just won't have.
He's a Gnome Illusionist, I get that, it's cool. But he shouldn't be giving up the best school in the game for no reason.
I'd at least try to let him know that Transmutation actually is awesome, even for an Illusionist.
The SR appears nice, but probably won't see useful play until past 3rd level or so
The SR is nice, but it's only the tip of the iceberg for a half-dragon. +8 to strength, +6 constitution, immunity to sleep, paralysis, and one energy type, 60 foot fly speed, +4 natural armor, claw and bite attacks... that's a lot of bonuses and I'm shocked your GM is allowing a half-dragon when everyone else appears to be a standard race.
The SR is nice, but it's only the tip of the iceberg for a half-dragon. +8 to strength, +6 constitution, immunity to sleep, paralysis, and one energy type, 60 foot fly speed, +4 natural armor, claw and bite attacks... that's a lot of bonuses and I'm shocked your GM is allowing a half-dragon when everyone else appears to be a standard race.
The SR appears nice, but probably won't see useful play until past 3rd level or so
I said Half-Dragon because that's effectively what he is. As a Wyvaran, he's allowing the 10 RP Dragon template for the character, which gives Immunity to Sleep/Paralysis, Darkvision 60, and Low Light Vision. That's it. He doesn't have the Half-Dragon Template, he has the Dragon Type, and for simplicity purposes, we're calling him a Half-Dragon, because Wyvarans sound like a bunch of degenerates.
It's basically a supped up version of any standard race that normally gets Darkvision or Low Light or Sleep Immunity, in which case he's paying 2/3 of his RP to get all of that stuff rolled up into one. It's not overpowered in the slightest.