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Take one level in Pit Fighter.

You don't get full use of your build until 6th level (which could be built into the flavor), but it gets you everything you want.

It does not count as a bardic performance, it only duplicates the effects, so you could not get extra performance.

While it would be possible to multiclass bard and have both bardic performance and stigmata active at the same time, it would be useless with the inspire confidence performance because the bonuses provided are of the same type (morale for the saving throws for and competence to attack and damage for both effects) and thus would not stack.

It might be useful to have two inspire greatness, but that would require a level 19 character. It would almost certainly be better to put all your levels in one class.

Fred 'Freddy' Jones is both the epitome of lawful good (in my humble opinion) and uses traps to capture all the monsters.

Trapmaking is definitely not evil, but only as long as you wear a stylish ascot.

I believe they would stack.

Starting at 1st level, a monk can make a flurry of blows as a full-attack action.

When doing so, he may make one additional attack, taking a –2 penalty on all of his attack rolls, as if using the Two-Weapon Fighting feat. These attacks can be any combination of unarmed strikes and attacks with a monk special weapon (he does not need to use two weapons to utilize this ability).

For the purpose of these attacks, the monk's base attack bonus from his monk class levels is equal to his monk level. For all other purposes, such as qualifying for a feat or a prestige class, the monk uses his normal base attack bonus.

At 8th level, the monk can make two additional attacks when he uses flurry of blows, as if using Improved Two-Weapon Fighting (even if the monk does not meet the prerequisites for the feat).

At 15th level, the monk can make three additional attacks using flurry of blows, as if using Greater Two-Weapon Fighting (even if the monk does not meet the prerequisites for the feat).

A monk applies his full Strength bonus to his damage rolls for all successful attacks made with flurry of blows, whether the attacks are made with an off-hand or with a weapon wielded in both hands. A monk may substitute disarm, sunder, and trip combat maneuvers for unarmed attacks as part of a flurry of blows. A monk cannot use any weapon other than an unarmed strike or a special monk weapon as part of a flurry of blows. A monk with natural weapons cannot use such weapons as part of a flurry of blows, nor can he make natural attacks in addition to his flurry of blows attacks.

Flurry of blows is stated to work similarly to two-weapon fighting, and later as improved and greater two-weapon fighting. To answer your question, just look at the two-weapon fighting rules and two-weapon fighting feat text.

If you wield a second weapon in your off hand, you can get one extra attack per round with that weapon. You suffer a –6 penalty with your regular attack or attacks with your primary hand and a –10 penalty to the attack with your off hand when you fight this way. You can reduce these penalties in two ways. First, if your off-hand weapon is light, the penalties are reduced by 2 each. An unarmed strike is always considered light. Second, the Two-Weapon Fighting feat lessens the primary hand penalty by 2, and the off-hand penalty by 6.

In addition to the standard single extra attack you get with an off-hand weapon, you get a second attack with it, albeit at a –5 penalty.

You get a third attack with your off-hand weapon, albeit at a –10 penalty.

So we can see that each attack given in the flurry of blows (at level 20) table is actually, after some math

At 3rd level, a monk uses his monk level in place of his base attack bonus when calculating his Combat Maneuver Bonus. Base attack bonuses granted from other classes are unaffected and are added normally.

Finally, let's take a look at what a combat maneuver roll really consists of.

Performing a Combat Maneuver

When performing a combat maneuver, you must use an action appropriate to the maneuver you are attempting to perform. While many combat maneuvers can be performed as part of an attack action, full-attack action, or attack of opportunity (in place of a melee attack), others require a specific action. Unless otherwise noted, performing a combat maneuver provokes an attack of opportunity from the target of the maneuver. If you are hit by the target, you take the damage normally and apply that amount as a penalty to the attack roll to perform the maneuver. If your target is immobilized, unconscious, or otherwise incapacitated, your maneuver automatically succeeds (treat as if you rolled a natural 20 on the attack roll). If your target is stunned, you receive a +4 bonus on your attack roll to perform a combat maneuver against it.

When you attempt to perform a combat maneuver, make an attack roll and add your CMB in place of your normal attack bonus. Add any bonuses you currently have on attack rolls due to spells, feats, and other effects. These bonuses must be applicable to the weapon or attack used to perform the maneuver. The DC of this maneuver is your target's Combat Maneuver Defense. Combat maneuvers are attack rolls, so you must roll for concealment and take any other penalties that would normally apply to an attack roll.

So we can see that whatever affects an attack roll would also affects a Combat Maneuver roll, so when you substitute your final roll (AKA your 4th iterative attack) for a trip attempt, the roll is actually 20 Base attack bonus - 2 two-weapon fighting penalties - 15 for being your 4th iterative attack = +3. If you're wondering where the rules for penalties on your iteratives are, they come from the full attack rules and ultimately the tables of Base attack Bonuses from the classes.

The lesson is that the trip, disarm, and sunder combat maneuvers, being made with weapons and in place of melee attacks, have nearly all the same modifiers and properties as regular attack rolls, with a few notable exceptions (size modifiers & CMB only modifiers such as the ones from the Improved and Greater Trip/Disarm/Whatever feats). If you want about a 20 higher CMB roll, make use of true strike, because it does apply on trip attempts.

Oh, and be careful when you try to trip on your last iterative-- the consequences could be unfortunate.

If your attack fails by 10 or more, you are knocked prone instead.

1)This one is probably the hardest to determine. A strength based rogue would be the best fit, I think. Just be sure to have a decent int for insane skills. Also, take the Clever Wordplay trait if you want to have a social edge somewhere (I suggest bluff).

2)I would say Alchemist. Just be sure to use Craft (food) and not profession (chef) to use that sweet intelligence bonus. Sadly the Vivisectionist isn't PFS legal, but you can be deadly enough with knives. I would suggest a high dex (with weapon finesse), pumped up even further with mutagen, and focusing on bombs. Zagim could also be a ninja with some poison related feats and talents, if you desire.

3)Swashbuckler, definitely. You can give him the Corsair archetype as well, but it's pretty weak and you'll have enough sailor flavor from the class and a few ranks in Profession (sailor).

4)I would say that Xemestra is probably an Occultist considering her skill in acquiring artifacts and using magic items. Give her the Dervish Dance feat to make her skilled with that scimitar and you seem golden. If you want a more divine flavor, make her a Reliquarian Occultist and have her worship Sarenrae.

I believe it means 3 or more attacks overall, not 3 different types.

A good example is the Unicorn.

Of course, this feat is probably of no use if all of your attacks are primary attacks anyways, which seems to be the case in your listed example.

I can't think of anything for spears specifically that would help at this level (although Spear Dancer might be useful at a later level).

The best thing to focus on would be all the Attacks of oppportunity you get from having a reach weapon. You could try and get Combat Expertise to go for Improved and Greater Trip later. If you want to control the battlefield a bit more, you could get the Stand Still feat.

It depends on whether you're fighting one person at a time or if you're going to end up fighting multiple characters, either with or without your party.

If you're fighting one person, then the best build would be a grappler of some sort. Sadly you're one level too short to get greater grapple, but you should manage just fine. Going this route would mean going with the Strangler brawler archetype. The monk also has a great grappling archetype, the Tetori. This one is good because it helps with grappling at higher levels, negating effects like freedom of movement. It's even possible to mix the two- I like two levels of Strangler Brawler and then the rest as Tetori. Styles relevant to grappling would be Grabbing and Kraken Styles.

If you're fighting multiple enemies at once, a straight-up damage build would probably be for the best (this style also avoids grappling rules, which can be cumbersome for the unacquainted). I like the Mutagenic Mauler archetype. It replaces martial flexibility with straight up attack and damage boosts, and has the great flavor of taking a big ol' swig of something before destroying everything in combat. It makes combat quite a bit simpler. Good styles for damage would be Dragon and Pummeling Styles. As for stats, going strength-based would be simple, easy, and effective, but going dex-based with the weapon finesse feat and an Amulet of Mighty Fists with the agile enchantment would provide a nice defensive boost.

If you're interested, other flavors of unarmed combatants include Iroran Paladin (called the Enlightened paladin on d20pfsrd), the Unarmed Fighter, and the Sacred Fist Warpriest.

Sorry. Can't talk about Dwarven Fight Club.

OH SH-

A couple more archetypes to consider would be the Sorrowsoul and the Arrowsong Minstrel archetypes.

The Sorrowsoul bumps up your inspire courage to almost ludicrous levels on yourself and keeps bardic knowledge (but loses versatile performance, sadly). The only thing to keep in mind is that between the Lyric Sorrow and Spurn Harm abilities your bardic performance rounds may become a much tighter resource. I also love the flavor of this archetype, I like to think of it as a Sad-barian.

The Arrowsong Minstrel focuses on using a bow along with magic. This one will have much better defenses being largely dex-based. It also allows you to select combat feats as if you had full BAB, which is very strong for an archer. It is also a really good precursor to the Arcane Archer prestige class.

As a note on what's already been said, the optimal combat bard equipment is the longspear with flagbearer feat and Banner of the Ancient Kings.

Are they all CR 1 ghouls? If so, then it seems like they would be pretty easy to slaughter en masse. Just have the cleric prepare Abundant Ammunition a bunch, possibly with extend spell, along with other anti-undead spells. The fighter will have a great day, I promise you that (probably along with the magus).

I wouldn't advise rolling for each and every one, but slaughtering ghouls should be easy enough to handwave after a couple rolls. If the fighter DOES run out of ammo, just give 'em a reach weapon and let them murder things from 15 feet above the ground all day (bonus points if the reach weapon is a whip, allowing attacks from hilariously far away). Everyone else can hide in the castle while this happens, if they desire.

If there are stronger ghouls, then that's when the spellcasters come in with a hefty dose of fireball (or whatever ever damage spell they desire).

As a side note, levitate can only push creatures up and down. You would have to be pushing against a wall or using some other mode of transport to move horizontally.

Enjoy your murder spree!

My character design process depends on whether I'm actually building for a campaign or if I'm just theorycrafting a build for fun.

If I'm creating one for a campaign, I usually talk to the GM to get a gist of the campaign. If they're inspired by a source material, I try to make my character fit into that material fairly well. Then I talk to the other people in the party to make try and make a character that will fit into the party (haven't had a 5 bard party yet sadly). By then I usually have enough of a concept to build a character and choose a role.

When I get down to the nitty gritty I consider my classes, possible archetypes, races, and if I want to multiclass or Variant multiclass (or both). Once that's decided, I fill in the feat slots left with relevant feats to my build, choose appropriate alternate racial traits and regular traits. Lastly, I do equipment (I generally dislike being overly reliant on equipment, which may need to be something I work on).

If I'm just theorycrafting, I usually start by noticing a possible interesting mechanic combination or cool mechanical concept I want to fulfill. For instance, I have created builds for a raging Kineticist, a charisma-based Alchemist, and a fighter that uses disposable weapons. Then I do the nitty gritty, as described above (except often leaving out equipment, I get a bit lazy!).

It's not a perfect process but I think it's fun! I consider character creation to be one-third of Pathfinder, so for me, creating a character is playing the game as much as fighting or role-playing.

What would be the major differences in builds if I was going to

A. Unchained Monk with Cleric Variant Multiclass

B. Sacred Fist with two-level dip into Master of Many Styles

Would I be able to master both Ascetic and Crane styles? Would I possibly be able to fit the Evangelist prestige class in either? How well would I be able to grapple? I'm looking to build a character who deflects and redirects attacks back at his opponents, sort of like how Aikido works.

Oh! I didn't know you wanted both crane AND ascetic styles! If you want both styles, Sacred Fist with a two-level dip would definitely be the better option because then you would have bonus feats. An unchained monk with Cleric VMC would only have the feats for Ascetic style, and just barely. As for overall build differences, the UMonk with Cleric VMC would be a much more martial character while the Sacred Fist w/dip would have a much heaver focus on spells and styles.

You could also fit in the Evangelist prestige class on either build, but it would be better with the sacred fist due to having 3/4 BAB progression and the extra feats so you can get deific obedience. It also heavily depends on your god, since they each grant different boons.

As for grappling, the UMonk VMC Cleric would probably be a better grappler, but grappling and its associated feats often take up the entirety of a character's build to be reasonably effective, so it's not something that would play too well with either build (unless you took a grappling archetype). It'd probably be better to not invest any resources and instead just take the AoO when you grapple occasionally.

As for deflecting and redirecting attacks, the best style chain for that would be Snake style (here,here, and here). You could also consider Panther style, but that one's really only for attacking back.

As a final note, if you do go Sacred Fist, get the Combat Style Master feat. It'll save you a lot of heartache and swift actions.

I present a third option- instead of dipping cleric, consider taking the Cleric Variant Multiclass (here, just scroll down a bit). You'll have to wait until level 9 (or level 7 with retraining) to get the feat, but it offers the full effectiveness of unchained monk.

As a side note, if you DO go Sacred fist, I would advise a two-level dip into Master of Many Styles Monk. This will get you any 2 style feats you need and evasion.

It is definitely possible to go dex-based, even as a bloodrager. All you need is the Urban Bloodrager archetype. From there, you just need the weapon finesse feat, an Agile Amulet of Mighty Fists, and as many natural attacks as you can get.

You get claws from your bloodline, so that's covered. You need to get a bite from a trait, either take adopted (choosing half-orc) and tusked OR Mother's Teeth, worship Lamashtu and take adopted (choosing goblin). The Tail Terror feat is definitely worth it, any extra attack helps (and secondary attacks can have their penalties reduced with the multiattack feat). Natural attack builds focus on getting as many natural attacks at once, so you'll need other ways to find more as you level up, like the Helm of the Mammoth Lord and the Wyvern Cloak.

Going dex-based will waste some of the dragon disciples strength bonuses, but you will stay combat effective. If you want to go strength-based, you can honestly just eat the racial -4 to strength and be the normal power-attacking two-handed fighter Bloodrager. You can also Variant Multiclass Sorcerer (which is here) or take Eldritch Heritage with the Orc or Abyssal bloodlines to get some of that strength bonus back.

A character like this, either strength or dex-based, won't be optimal, but they should be effective in any adventuring group. Going Bloodrager into Dragon Disciple is very rarely a bad idea.

Let's see...

When worn, this simple brown robe confers great ability in unarmed combat. If the wearer has levels in monk, her AC and unarmed damage is treated as a monk of five levels higher. If donned by a character with the Stunning Fist feat, the robe lets her make one additional stunning attack per day. If the character is not a monk, she gains the AC and unarmed damage of a 5th-Level monk (although she does not add her Wisdom bonus to her AC). This AC bonus functions just like the monk's AC bonus.

At 2nd level, the cavalier does not provoke attacks of opportunity when she attacks foes while unarmed so long as she is dealing nonlethal damage. In addition, the cavalier's unarmed strikes deal more nonlethal damage than usual; she is treated as having a number of monk levels equal to her cavalier level for the purpose of determining how much nonlethal damage her unarmed strikes deal.

For example, a 12th-level cavalier of the order of the hammer would deal 2d6 points of nonlethal damage with her unarmed strike. The cavalier must still select the Improved Unarmed Strike feat if she wants to deal lethal damage with her unarmed strike, and lethal damage dealt with her unarmed strike is not increased by this ability.

It appears the Monk's Robe doesn't increase the damage as the Cavalier doesn't count as having any levels in monk that are applicable for applying the effects of wondrous items. It DOES seem that the Cavalier would gain the damage of 5th level unarmed strikes from the item though, but that wouldn't be useful by the time you got a Monk's Robe.

If the Cavalier does gain any levels in monk, the situation is a bit sketchier. It seems her Monk levels and Cavalier levels WOULD stack when dealing damage with her unarmed strikes since the table indicates the damage is based on monk level. It would also mean that the robe WOULD increase the damage by increasing her effective Monk level. However, the rules on this are kind of wonky and you might just use the higher of the two effective Monk levels for determining damage.

TL;DR: The damage wouldn't increase if the character is a pure Cavalier but they would increase if the Cavalier had any levels in monk (probably).

Do you have access to the Weapon Master's Handbook? If so, then you should seriously consider the Overwatch Style feat chain (1,2,3). This style is perfect with the Crossbowman archetype because it allows multiple attacks on your ready action, allowing you to to use the main source of your damage - your damage modifiers (which fighters tend to have a LOT of).

While taking five levels in Bolt Ace is almost certainly optimal, Overwatch Style allows you put all your levels in Crossbowman Fighter and stay reasonably effective. You'll be slightly behind on feats due to the chain itself, but all the other prerequisites are feats you'll take anyway. Hopefully this helps!

Hi, I'm DMing a game and I want there to be social combats from the new Ultimate Intrigue book. However, we are all busy students so I wanted to create a sheet to make it easier. My sheet for social combats is here .
Does it seem to be missing anything? Is there anything you would add? Would you use this sheet if you were using social combat (feel free to, by the way).