Building more potent alchemist's fire and similar alchemical weapons

[Saurstalk]

A player in my campaign is playing an alchemist. The character is relatively high level and along the way, has been collecting alchemist's fire and similar alchemical weapons. I was thinking of house ruling a means for him to combine flasks into more potent weapons and thought that this may have already been discussed. I want to take as balanced approach as I can to allow for him to do this, and would appreciate any comments, suggestions or guidance. (As an aside, he has access to the Alchemy Manual. So, ingredients work as well.) Thanks.

[Firebug]

Option 1: Hybridization Funnel for a 'double hit', but it takes 10 minutes and a skill check each.
"...when thrown as a splash weapon, the mixture has the effects of both component substances and creatures are affected as if hit by both. "
Strong enough wording to allow the Alchemist to apply their Int bonus to each 'hit'.

Option 2: Focusing Flask very expensive, but a 'triple hit'.

Option 3: Concentrated Splash kill the splash damage, for a 50% damage bonus on a single target.

GM discretion to stack all of the above for decent numbers. Something like (6d6 + 6xInt) x1.5. Cost: 700 (focusing flask) + 30 (3x acid flask) + 45 (3x alkali flask) I prefer Acid/Alkali due to being relatively cheap, both being the same damage type, and less resisted then Fire. Just don't apply any real world chemistry knowledge.

If the class is a little up for consideration, the Grenadier archetype for Alchemist, to throw Option 1(and/or 2) onto a weapon attack, or even better, into an explosive missile discovery. Possibly with a Conductive enchanted weapon. Possibly using a Tangleshot or Dye arrow/bolt to still target touch AC.

[avr]

Artokus's fire is the direct upgrade to alchemist's fire. Allow him to make it out of 4 or 5 flasks of alchemist's fire maybe? Also, look up a hybridizing funnel for combining odd alchemical weapons.

The alchemical strike feat might be worth looking at.

If you want a house rule beyond those I guess you want to allow him to do level-appropriate damage with these. What level is 'relatively high' to you?

[Zwordsman]

Could consider allowing a discovery to be taken that increases alchemical weapons DC and damage by INT (which would stack with the splash damage boost)

[Saurstalk]

avr wrote:

Artokus's fire is the direct upgrade to alchemist's fire. Allow him to make it out of 4 or 5 flasks of alchemist's fire maybe? Also, look up a hybridizing funnel for combining odd alchemical weapons.

The alchemical strike feat might be worth looking at.

If you want a house rule beyond those I guess you want to allow him to do level-appropriate damage with these. What level is 'relatively high' to you?

Thanks. He's playing a 13th level alchemist.

[avr]

Saurstalk wrote:

avr wrote:

Artokus's fire is the direct upgrade to alchemist's fire. Allow him to make it out of 4 or 5 flasks of alchemist's fire maybe? Also, look up a hybridizing funnel for combining odd alchemical weapons.

The alchemical strike feat might be worth looking at.

If you want a house rule beyond those I guess you want to allow him to do level-appropriate damage with these. What level is 'relatively high' to you?

Thanks. He's playing a 13th level alchemist.

Oh. It's competing with at least 90-100 potential damage from bombs then (maybe more), and even as a backup less than 30 is a waste of time and 50 should be on the cards. An Artokus's fire and an acid mixed via a hybridizing funnel and a +8? Int makes 18.5 on a hit, 7 the next round; concentrated splash would take that up to ~30 for the first round. Maybe add the Int bonus to both components of the mixture separately, and/or to the 2nd round damage as well?

[swifthunter420]

I like the idea of using hybrization funnel with focusing flasks and applying to melee weapon is super cool. Are there any other alchemist archetypes that combine with grenadier?

[Dark Midian]

Yeah, the Paizo devs (Pretty sure it was Jason Buhlman or James Jacobs) blatantly said, "Yeah, alchemy was never intended to be as good as magic, it's low level utility fodder, deal with it."

If the alchemist wants to do more damage beyond the methods mentioned, some homebrew is required.

[Zwordsman]

Honestly, Alchemnist should really have a way of using extracts to empower a block of alchemical items for a while.
Like one extract of each level adds random benefits to damage or dc in someway for a bunch of alchemy items for Lv hours

[Wheldrake]

Honestly, Alchemists have enough bells & whistles already. Instead of wanting to upgrade existing alchemical items, they should learn to make judicious use of their bombs and other resources, so they don't run out.

This said, existing items like the funnels, flasks and such mentioned above do already exist in the game. Alchemists just need to live with that.

[Saurstalk]

Thanks all. Here's the HOUSE RULE that I came up with:

An alchemist may be able to use a Focusing Flask (or two) to combine more potent concentrates in a Hybridization Funnel without destroying the Focusing Flask. For each flask, add +5 to the Craft (alchemy) check and +10 minutes to the use of the Hybridization Funnel. On a failed check, the flask breaks, causing damage equal to the contents to the character mixing the concentrates (no miss chance) and splash damage equivalent to the concentrate mixture. All other qualities of mixed concentrates with a Hybridization Funnel remain unchanged.

Not sure if +5 is enough to demonstrate the dangers of this, but this seems the norm by which Pathfinder increases DCs.