Hello! Just a quick introduction here, feel free to skip to the technical stuff below in order to get to the point :)
I'm a fairly new pathfinder player. I've been part of a single on-going campaign for about a year and a half. In our ever expanding adventurous world, each player has controlled two characters. We switch character every other session depending on what plot point we are following up on. Personally, I've been playing a ranger and a witch. Recently, I was tasked by my GM to make stats for a key character from the Witch's background story, with hints that he might become a playable character in a future intermediate session which would bring him into the main story. I've been wanting to check out one of the less "noob friendly" classes, and decided I would go for the alchemist as it suits the information previously given on the character. His theme will limit some optimal choices, but I'd still like to make him as savage as possible.
I will begin this post with the thematic fluff I had in mind and then move on to the more technical crunch aspects, which is where I'll need your help and tips.
The Theme:
Our guy is not a very sympathetic man to the point where I'd be tempted to say he's CE. I wanted to try this alignment mainly as a response to how my other characters have all been Neutral Good at worst to the chagrin of my CN/LE team players. I'm going out of my comfort zone with an evil character, and it's going to be fun!
But no, I'm not making some cliché gung ho, murderous loner lunatic who kills for sport. I'd rather justify the alignment by saying he plays by his own rules, often doing what seems beneficial only for the time being, with needle thin amounts of conscience. He's arrogant, narcissistic and possibly delusional. He's also impulsive, manipulative and charming, traits that could be interesting to play from a CE standpoint. Think The Swede from Hell on Wheels. I'll try to make him work as a team player by having his team mates be viewed as beneficial contributors to his journey (perhaps they have money or access to places?) or simply someone that will make things less boring. He's kind of on a soul searching quest to rediscover himself.
Backstory: Growing up both intelligent and driven, he began the prestigious & studious road to become a doctor. It seemed like the logical thing to do for a man of his intellect & skills. Finding himself indifferent or even disgusted from treating his patients, he quickly quit his practice as a doctor and went into making and selling drugs, soon making a name for himself with the local crime lords. There is more to his story, but I think we have what we need to move over onto the build!
The Technical Stuff - This is probably the relevant part.
First of all, I want to clarify that none of us are optimizers. We start by creating the role, then looked into what would suit said role. We sometimes even forego obvious choices if it simply doesn't fit. With that said, we have become increasingly aware that some feats, races and classes synergize better than others and strive towards making functional builds that can dish out some useful dmg!
Ability Scores: We use 15, 14, 13, 12, 10 and 8 as base stats and can distribute them as we like.
Race: He was originally meant to be a Half-Elf. I'm willing to adjust it to Changeling or other suggestions, as long as he keeps an elven appearance.
Class & levels: I've decided to primarily go for a Vivisectionist build. I think it would go well with his medical background as well as sinister, un-empathic undertones. Also, he's a professional. Bombs lack finesse!
I've looked into other builds that recommended pairing Vivi with the Beastmorph archetype, which I'm no stranger to doing as making him nightmare-ish and scary is all part of the plan. The other builds relied too much on options I don't have in my campaign which is why I'm requesting help here.
I'm also considering taking a level dip in Rogue (Smuggler-archetype) to reflect of his previous occupation as a drug dealer and open up for some of the social skills that will let him be more manipulative (Smugglers have some circumstance bonuses here!) And hey, Sneak Attack! Vivisectionists likes those, right?
Suggestions regarding other level dips & multiclassing is also welcome. His starting level might be anything from 5 - 10 depending on when we get to him.
Gear: Magical items, +1 belts, amulets or the likes have been a rarity in our campaign :( This is why some of the other builds turned me away. Still, I might have a sizeable starting wealth to squander so it might not be completely out of option. Crafting is a world we have never even began to think about. Maybe this is a good time to start considering it? Not a necessity though.
Feats: I'm pretty much blank. I've considered running with the dex-based Finesse, natural attacks focus, vestigial arms etc. But I'm open to anything.
Thanks in advance for the help! If you read everything you have my utmost gratitude and respect!
What sort of options are available in your campaign if some other builds won't work for you? Is the campaign restricted in what books you can use, or is there some other limitation? I'm hesitant to offer suggestions without knowing where I might trip up.
If it's just a lack of gear this would affect most alchemist builds about equally.
Thank you for the quick response and offer to help :)
I might have sounded a bit dramatic when I talked about limitations. Yeah, it's mostly about the gear. Nothing too fancy unless it could be affordable for a lvl 8-ish starting wealth. but I imagined the preset race and ability scores also might seem a bit limiting to some. But again, I might be exaggerating.
OK. Half-elf vivisectionist alchemist, 'elite' array, level 5-10, all Paizo books open. We can do this.
The advantage of going dex-based rather than strength-based for an alchemist is that a mutagen which improves dex doesn't impose a penalty on intelligence, unlike a mutagen which improves str. As a vivisectionist you want as many attacks as possible to maximise sneak attack, so weapon finesse, piranha strike and two-weapon fighting is a possible option.
If you go that way then you might start with Str 10, Dex 15+2=17, Con 13, Int 14, Wis 12, Cha 8 and raise con and dex at levels 4 and 8. You could easily take a level of rogue, preferably the rogue as modified by Pathfinder Unchained. The feats might go
1: Weapon Finesse (bonus from rogue), Skill Focus (stealth), Two-weapon Fighting
3: Deific Obedience (Pharasma) - no, you don't have to be within one alignment step to worship her, that's for clerics.
5: Piranha Strike
7: Hellcat Stealth
9: Improved Two-weapon Fighting
Some useful discoveries (assuming a level dip in rogue pushing these back 1 level) might be
3: Elemental Mutagen (fire)
5: Spontaneous Healing
7: Enhance Potion
9: Chameleon
This would be a stealthy killer who uses two daggers.
Thank you so much! This suggestion looks very interesting and surprisingly fitting with what I had in mind. I'm impressed that you managed to make it up, just like that! Incidentally, Pharasma was actually the proposed deity before I started considering taking the character into CE-territory. This really works!
Out of curiosity; how much tweaking would this build require in order to implement Beastmorph archetype that I've heard synergize well with vivisectionist? I'm assuming the dagger focus would have to be changed to a natural weapon's focus if anything. Or would it require fundamental changes regarding ability scores and such? I'm already seeing an impressive damage potential coming from this build, but at the same time it's fun to explore options :)
Not a lot of changes to the build, but the way it plays is a little different. With two claws and a bite (feral mutagen) you do about as much damage as the dagger-wielder does when he gets improved TWF. The beastmorph adds mobility mainly, especially from pounce at level 10. The downside is that none of these work when you don't have a mutagen available. If you have to fight without a mutagen a beastmorph is at a significant disadvantage.