What options for an eldritch guardian?


Advice


I've been looking into it, and there's some interesting build path options.

For example, one thing I've been tinkering with is a catfolk with any familiar with claws, or even taking the "evolved familiar: Claws" feat and tacking claws onto any familiar you want. I'm partial towards fox because it can get its strength bonus so much higher with the mauler archetype.

The build is pretty feat heavy, though:

Evolved familiar: Claws
Improved Unarmed Strike
Feral Combat Training(Claw)
Dragon Style
Stunning Fist
Dragon Ferocity
Weapon Focus (claw) (so your fighter half can pick up the focused weapon option)
Nimble Striker
Claw Pounce

is what you end up with at level 10, but the build doesn't kick in until level 7 when you pick up dragon ferocity and begin applying more strength to all your claw attacks. The advantage of this build is that every one of these feats are combat feats, and thus get passed on to your familiar. Additional advantage is that later taking weapon specialization and similar feats also similarly improve your familiar's damage.

Another option I thought of is the use of teamwork feats. In this way, any combat teamwork feat you pick up, you also grant to the familiar. So if you pick up, say, coordinated charge, you suddenly get into a situation where you can have your familiar charge an opponent, which grants you an immediate action(swift) to charge your opponent, and now you're next to that opponent and still have a standard and move action to take your full attack. Improved pounce, anyone? Plus, teamwork feats route includes the ability to use "precise strikes" for extra 1d6 to every attack that hits while you're flanking.

The current problem I'm having, though, is that the claws build doesn't come online until level 7, so I'm leaning towards going the teamwork feats route. If I go that route, it'll free up a lot of feat slots. So what other options do I have, should I decide to go that route?


I prefer the teamwork build. It doesn't come fully online until later level, but coordinated charge+pummeling charge is hilarious. Familiar charges and full attacks, so you get to charge and full attack, and then when it's your turn you are already standing there, so full attack.

I also like to combine this with the mutagen archetype. Get the wings discovery and a flying Familiar and you can pull off your charges almost anywhere.


Melkiador wrote:

I prefer the teamwork build. It doesn't come fully online until later level, but coordinated charge+pummeling charge is hilarious. Familiar charges and full attacks, so you get to charge and full attack, and then when it's your turn you are already standing there, so full attack.

I also like to combine this with the mutagen archetype. Get the wings discovery and a flying Familiar and you can pull off your charges almost anywhere.

I'm a little skeptical of the legality of pummeling charge.

from the feat:
"You can use Pummeling Charge in this way only if all of your attacks qualify for using Pummeling Style against a single target."

and from pummeling style:
"This ability works only with unarmed strikes, no matter what other abilities you might possess."

Doesn't that prevent natural weapons from working, even if you took feral combat training?

That would be a great combo, though. Additionally, note that a familiar acts in the same initiative time as you, so you should actually be able to simply charge with the familiar, take your immediate action to charge as well, and then take your full attack.


Johnny_Devo wrote:
Melkiador wrote:

I prefer the teamwork build. It doesn't come fully online until later level, but coordinated charge+pummeling charge is hilarious. Familiar charges and full attacks, so you get to charge and full attack, and then when it's your turn you are already standing there, so full attack.

I also like to combine this with the mutagen archetype. Get the wings discovery and a flying Familiar and you can pull off your charges almost anywhere.

I'm a little skeptical of the legality of pummeling charge.

from the feat:
"You can use Pummeling Charge in this way only if all of your attacks qualify for using Pummeling Style against a single target."

and from pummeling style:
"This ability works only with unarmed strikes, no matter what other abilities you might possess."

Doesn't that prevent natural weapons from working, even if you took feral combat training?

It absolutely does.

Johnny_Devo wrote:
That would be a great combo, though. Additionally, note that a familiar acts in the same initiative time as you, so you should actually be able to simply charge with the familiar, take your immediate action to charge as well, and then take your full attack.

Doing initiative like that is common, but it's for convenience, not because the rules actually say that. If you start getting some large mechanical benefit from doing that instead of the familiar acting on their own initiative count the GM should probably enforce the latter.


Instead of just trying to give the familiars good melee abilities, I tend to prefer to use them to double up on action economy on somethings.

A dirty trick build, for example, can allow you to apply tons of debuffs left and right between the two of you. Eventually, you can even cripple an enemy for the entire fight with just a one,two.

Since you can grab some form of pounce with just the coordinated charge, you can leave plenty of room for tricky builds (since coordinted charge is just one feat t level 10; just a midway capstone).

This claw build needs a lot of work to even insure you can apply claws to the familiar and make them even halfway decent. In the terms of the forge of combat guide, a pair of hammers is nice, but getting an anvil (the familiar) and a hammer that is also an anvil (the fighter with regular melee and the same tricky build) seems better.


My coordinated pummel build doesn't actually use the claws idea. You instead boost your unarmed strikes with your feats that the familiar can also benefit from. In this way, you don't have to care about how good your familiar's natural attacks are, since it will just be using unarmed strike. You can even make a hedgehog your familiar and get that sweet will save bonus, but I prefer flying familiars for this build. If you have the stats for it, you also add two weapon fighting.


I just whipped this up on my phone so there could be errors.

Pummeling charge build
1: Improved unarmed strike
2:
3: weapon focus(unarmed)
4: weapon specialization(unarmed)
5: advanced weapon training (focused weapon(unarmed))
6: two weapon fighting
7: <some combat teamwork feat>
8: greater weapon focus (unarmed)
9: <some combat teamwork feat>
10: coordinated charge
11: pummeling style
12: pummeling charge


How is the fox better than a goat in the "get a lot of strength" department?


Anger Nogar wrote:
How is the fox better than a goat in the "get a lot of strength" department?

A fox has 9 strength and starts at tiny, whereas a goat has 12 strength and starts at small.

As per polymorph rules, increasing to small size from tiny size will come with an inherent +4 str bonus, while increasing from small to medium comes with no bonus.

Thus, a medium fox has 13 strength and a medium goat remains at 12 strength.


Anger Nogar wrote:
How is the fox better than a goat in the "get a lot of strength" department?

It is the size change under polymorph rules.

The goat starts off small, and goes to medium with mauler. So it doesn't get bonuses to strength for that. But the fox goes from tiny to medium (well, tiny to small to medium). That carries a stat change of +4 str/-2 dex.

With the fox's 9 str, it gets 13 str for a total of 16 str at level 3 with all the mauler stuff (+2 for mauler form, and the scaling +1 maulers get by level 3). Meanwhile, the goat starts with 12 str and goes to 15 str. At least if I am remembering the math right.

Anyway, it doesn't help that the fox just has a better image. A medium fox is basically a brightly colored wolf. While a goat is... a goat.


The hawk has 3 less strength than the fox, but it can fly, so it's my choice for this build.

Edit: and if it's allowed, the mauler wasp familiar can be a beast. Not allowed in PFS though.


I'm toying around back and forth with different options, and I've begun to wonder. Is there any way, at all, that I can get my familiar to benefit from two-weapon fighting? Would prefer to stick with the fox, if possible.


Get it improved unarmed strike and it will be able to two-weapon fight with it I think.


Anger Nogar wrote:
Get it improved unarmed strike and it will be able to two-weapon fight with it I think.

Oh? I didn't think that would work. Is there a rule anywhere that states what kinds of creatures can use unarmed strikes?


Well, an unarmed strike can be anything. Headbutts, kicks, etc. It doesn't have to be punching really.

So yes, nonbipeds physically capable of an unarmed strike. It is obviously silly, but allowed.


Huh. so if I got my fox familiar with feats "two-weapon fighting", "improved two-weapon fighting", "improved unarmed strike", and "Evolved Familiar: Claws" by level 6, he would have headbutts/kicks at 6/6/1/1, two claw attacks and a bite at 1/1/1, and everything modified by his 17 strength (18 at level 7)?


Anger Nogar wrote:
Get it improved unarmed strike and it will be able to two-weapon fight with it I think.

Yeah, that's what the build I posted above relies on.

The best evidence that animals can use unarmed strike is the hedgehog. It doesn't even have natural attacks.


And we all know foxes can do anything that hedgehogs can :)

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