Arbane the Terrible's page

My group is bad at doing AoEs, so my Oracle of Battle may need to branch out a bit into crowd control. Currently level 9, close to level 10.

What are some good spells to hit each of the saves/mess up large groups of enemies? I'm already got Wall of Fire from the Mystery.

Greater Forbid Action (Will)
Flame Strike (Reflex)
Hold Person (Will)
Bestow Curse (Will)
Sound Burst (Fortitude)

Any gems I'm missing?

There's some things that are bizarrely difficult in Pathfinder.

1: Jumping high. At level 3, a Wizard can levitate to any height they like. At that level, good luck jumping higher than your height, anyone but a Gnome Monk!

2: Regeneration It is significantly easier to bring someone back from the dead than to restore a missing ear. (Do the rules make any allowances for if they died of decapitation?)

3: Surviving cold weather. By the rules, a skiing holiday is risking death, and a Minnesota winter should be a TPK.

Any others people can think of?

Devastating: (Weapon enhancement)
When added to a weapon or ammo, it increases the critical multiplier by one.

Transcendent: (Armor or shield enhancement)
This armor or shield's AC bonus is added to touch AC.

Any way for a Monk to get it, or do you need to be a Brawler?

Our GM is fairly generous with retraining, so I've been thinking of changing my Oracle meleer/buffer to the Warsighted. I lose four Revelations to get three flexible Feats - possibly a good deal.

Has anyone here tried it out, and any advice/warnings?

I had the random idea for a half-Valkryie, but I don't know what sort of stats/abilities they should have.

Does a normal animal turned familiar age, get old, and die like any normal member of their species?

(If so, witches are even more hosed than ever.)

Necrotic Corruption
School [Necromancy]; Level witch 3
CASTING
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S, M (fragment of bone from a destroyed undead creature)
EFFECT
Range medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
One target
Duration 1 round/level
Saving Throw Will negates; Spell Resistance yes

You reach out and subtly twist the necromantic energy that empowers the undead, turning it upon its own existence. Every round at the start of their turn, the target must make a Will save, or take 2d6 damage and be sickened for 1 turn. On a successful save, they take no damage, are sickened for one round, and the spell ends.
Undead with Fast Healing have a -4 on their saves against this spell, and Fast Healing will not function while this spell is active.
This spell has no effect on targets who are not undead.

Notes:

I am getting so sick of Undead being immune to all my witch's good spells, so I thought up this one. (This is the second version - the first one was overpowered.) The -4 on saves is there for the same reason Feeblemind has it - this is specifically intended to hose vampires, since our party is fighting them every other adventure. :-P

It's single-target, very narrow in scope, and gets a LOT of saves.
On the other hand, witches do get the Misfortune hex, and this could potentially do twice as much damage as a same-level Lightning Bolt, just spread out over multiple rounds. (At high levels, the fight's probably going to be over before this does much. Maybe the damage should scale a little?)

Too strong? Too weak? Too low-level? Just a generally bad idea? What other classes should be able to get it, if any?

From the description of the Dhampir:

All dhampirs have elongated incisors.

Incisors are the flat, wedge-like teeth at the front of the mouth. The Canine teeth are the ones that most depictions of vampires (except in Nosferatu) have as fangs.

So, all dhampires are buck-toothed. This amuses me mightily.

Can a Witch take a level of Witch with a _different Patron_, to gain access to that Patron's spells?

Yes, it'd cost a caster level, but I'm getting mighty sick of undead.

Can an improved familiar that's an Outsider be banished by spells like Banish, Dismissal, Holy Word, etc? This seems inherently wrong, but I don't see anything stopping it from working.

If so, then 'Improved' Familiars just became a massive DOWNGRADE for a witch. Bye-bye spellbook...

And if so, is there any way to get them BACK?

Imagine, if you will, a wizard who was burned at the stake on a fire fueled with their own spellbook. Who has come back as a ghost.

How do they cast spells? They can't carry material components, and they don't have a spellbook any more.

My party's all at 12th level now, which means that everything and its grandmother has spell resistance. Aside from the Spell Penetration feats, what does PF have to make beating spell resistance easier?

My witch character is fed up with vampires being immune to 90% of her spell-list, and decided to come up with a new and original way to make them suffer.

So, about what level should these spells be?

Vitalistic Corruption
School: Necromancy;
Level: Witch ??? (Should any other class be able to use it?)
Casting time: Standard action
Components: V, S, M (A dried tumor)
Range: Close
Target: 1 ray.
Duration: 24 hours or until healed
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: Yes

You blast the target with a bolt of carefully-disordered negative energy, throwing their innate healing abilities into chaos. Any time within the next 24 hours the target would normally benefit from natural healing, Fast Healing or Regeneration, they take that much damage, as their malfunctioning healing produces cancerous tumors, bone spurs, and other grotesque deformities.

The spell's effects end immediately if the target receives any magical healing.

-----

Necrotic Corruption

Works exactly like Vitalistic Corruption, except that if effects undead only.

(Is this even necessary? Probably, since undead are IMMUNE TO EVERYTHING...)

So, comments?

Because that particular argument really doesn't belong in this thread, I thought I'd start a new one.

Personally, I've been playing one from level 2 to level 12 (so far), and I've been having a great deal of fun with the class, though I will freely admit it's short of ULTIMATE COSMIC POWAAH compared to the Wizard.

And now, for the dissent:

RumpinRufus wrote:

... you've never played a witch, have you.

No, because i mentioned its an awful class. You don't have to eat poo to know its not going to taste good. I've seen other try and fail.

RumpinRufus wrote:

Witch is an amazing class, .. Evil Eye, Slumber, and Misfortune are all amazing abilities, and you can use them all day, every day.

So can a wizard, cleric, druid, most every other class. We dont need to do it all day cause round 3 everyones laying on the ground. Thanks for playing.

RumpinRufus wrote:

Funny you mention getting two domains and specialist, because those are exactly the things that are kneecapped by going Mystic Theurge. The Mystic Theurge gains spellcasting levels only for spells, not for these class abilities.

Riiighht, but they still have them. The witch has none. Swift action teleport at 1st level, yes please. Domains that let me make someone take the lessor of two d20 rolls and my allies take the better, sure I'll take that. And i get to channel energy? Awesome.

Quote:

But go Witch instead? For what, a few low DC hexes and a piss-poor spell list (no Heal, Harm, Time stop, Wish, etc etc

...

I don't think you can stack the Witch spell list to either wizard or cleric. I put it on par with the magus list. This means you've got on par healing with cleric without the channel or true res. The offensive spells arent that offensive that drops off quick. Limited buffing spells but thats offset with some nice debuffs that in some cases are better. But the big bread and butter high level list is gutted, theres very little left. This means but 11th level you're obsolete and by 15th you're flat out useless. If your familiar gets killed you're likewise useless. Its like they started with a cleric, stripped his spell list down, took away channel, domains, weapon/armor profs, gave him a bad save and BAB then said "but heres some very limited hexes and a pet that will one-shot you. Enjoy that".

Yes some of the advanced hexes aren't bad but they are nearly word for word rips from spells wizards and clerics are getting on top of their other spells. Wow you can summon a 18 HD outsider, I got that in a feat (True Name) and my buddy the conjurer got a perma-MS9 pet.

If you're the 7th player in a party that can be overlooked and its maybe fun as a flavor or maybe in a single player setup but in a 4 to 5 player party its literally the worst class.

MT on the other hand is extremely versatile for a slight power trade off. This stacked with spell synergy means he can cast three spells in round 1 stacked with spell perfection for almost certain spell penetration and high DC. I think you have to seriously look at that and say how it that not a great option if not OP.

You don't have to get all emotional about your pick, the facts are the facts. You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts.

Greyfeather somehow seems to have gotten the impression that if a witch's familiar dies, they immediately lose all spellcasting ability. Not sure where that came from, and the rules don't support it.

Yes, even more.

Cook People turns bodies into delicious (but evil) magical food. Does the food need to be eaten immediately to have effect, or can it be saved for later? If it can be saved, what's its shelf-life?

What's the range on Ward and Water Lung?

Forced Reincarnation says 'Those that fail are slain and immediately brought back to life with the spell reincarnate.' But the spell Reincarnate says:

The magic of the spell creates an entirely new young adult body for the soul to inhabit from the natural elements at hand. This process takes 1 hour to complete. When the body is ready, the subject is reincarnated.

So, how long does it take to reincarnate the victim?

And regardless of how long it takes, does this mean the reincarnatee will be naked with their old corpse right next to them? (If so, a possibly-useful way to disarm a blinged-out foe.)

Oh, and can a witch use Forced Reincarnation on themselves?

So, who's made a Summoner? What did you get for an Eidolon, what did they do, and how have they worked out?

Quite a few of the Witch's Hexes say "Whether or not the save is successful, a creature cannot be the target of this hex again for 1 day." or some variation. Does this mean that a witch can deliberately hex all their allies at the start of a day, let the hexes expire, and have them be immune to any OTHER witch using those hexes on them?

(Conversely, it also means only one witch can use Healing or Fortune on anyone in a given day.)