Demonskunk's page

Tiny compared to what? Have you seen 5e Sorcerers for example (old ones at least)? Because while repertoires are still constrained, in 2e you can get most of useful things for several categories of spells. Even if probably not for all of them...

Compared to a wizard, I guess? A wizard starts with nearly double the known spells as a sorcerer and gains known spells twice as fast. The trade-off is that you have to prepare specific slots and you can cast 1 fewer spell per level.

I'm not the type of player that chooses the best-in-class obvious picks. I tend to go for weird utility spells like Magic Mailbox or Create Tool that aren't really all that useful to constantly have in your toolbox, vs the 'obvious choices' like... I dunno, fireball? Magic Missile? Needle Darts?

5e's sorcerer has fewer spells known, but because 5e's spell pool is a lot smaller it doesn't feel as restrictive.

Demonskunk wrote:

me and my group are more interested in playing fun characters who are cool and interesting

Cool! Do that!

'Ignore all situational spells' is sort of counter to the idea of playing a character that's 'cool and interesting' over 'optimized'. And also ignoring all situational spells tends to require carefully weighing options to pick out which spells are going to be useful in the most situations, and which of the most useful spells to pick over the other most useful spells.

Yeah, stun is a bad one unless you know an enemy has a very low will. A pacifist-themed wizard is probably better off taking the Nonlethal spellshape feat at L2 and then just using it with Electric Arc, Frostbite, etc.

I'm surprised you say the save spells rarely worked; one of the benefits of using them is that they almost always do at least half damage, unless you're fighting L+2 or similar enemies. And if you can catch multiple enemies in an AoE, well....3 half-damages is one-and-a-half damage. :)

Sounds like you may be more comfortable with a spontaneous caster. Nothing prevents you from picking sorcerer or oracle etc. as your class but donning a pointy hat and theming your PC as a pacifist utility magic nerd. Hmmm, now, how to combo spontaneous caster with Nonlethal feat...well, you could archetype to get it?

Half damage feels pretty pitiful compared to the martials striking 2 or 3 times a turn and doing reliable damage + Strength. But also most of my spells weren't damage dealing, so on a success they just do some minor effect like making the enemy groggy for 1 round.

Spontaneous casters have one MASSIVE problem compared to prepared casters in that their spell repertoirs are TINY. As a prepared caster I can theoretically have every spell in the game AND prep them at any level.

As a spontaneous caster, I have to carefully curate a list of.. what... 4 spells per level? That I can't change without spending an impossible amount of time retraining? And the game has hundreds of spells, many of which are extremely situational. I *think* there are magic items that let you essentially slot another spell in, but in the case of Spell Hearts the save DC never increases on them, and items are generally extremely expensive compared to my party's wealth in APs so far.

Kineticist isn't appealing to me because I generally don't want to play a blaster. The cool and interesting utility spells are what continually draws me to spellcasters.

Perhaps you might start an advice thread discussing what you're playing and what you've been doing and how that's not working for you. And then people can make suggestions about what you could do alternatively. Very likely it's about your strategy and approach. PF2 is very tactical. You have to use the right tool for the job. You can just select one favorite tool and use it all the time, you're going to fail if you do that.

It is worth noting that spellcasters do generally have a tough time than martial characters in PF2. You need to use a spell that has a save your enemy is weak with. Not just whichever spell you like.

See, the issue with that is that I need to know what I'm going up against ahead of time to be able to use the right tool, and that's... frankly impossible a lot of the time. It's difficult to tell at a glance what saves an enemy might be weak against without metagaming. I don't THINK learning save strength is a function of Recall Knowledge?

And even if I did know what an enemy may or may not be weak to, I can't rewind time and re-prep my spell slots mid-combat to take advantage of that.

And worse, if I WAS a spontaneous caster, I would be TRAPPED inside of my spell repertoire. Casting implements only solve part of this because Wands can only be used once per day without risking breaking them and staves are not cheap. (Nor do I fully understand how they work, but that's a different issue).

Edit: OP, did you have a lot of experience with PF1? If so, you probably have a lot of ideas about strategy and approaches from that that are terrible ideas in PF2 because they simply don't work. It took me over a year to like PF2 switching from PF1 (and honestly it was partially I had to quit playing TTRPG because of life stuff and forgot a lot of details) before I was able to come back to PF2 and enjoy it (because I stopped trying to play PF2 like pF1).

I've played a fair amount of PF1 and frankly I hate it a lot more than I hate PF2 in general. My issue doesn't stem from trying to play PF2 like PF1, it comes from...

I dunno, a desire to choose cool and interesting options when the system wants me to be a master planning min-maxxer who tactically assimilates with a hive mind called [party] to perfectly dominate every combat encounter?

That's definitely a bit of hyperbole, but me and my group are more interested in playing fun characters who are cool and interesting than playing Rainbow Six: Absalom or whatever, if that makes sense? And I feel like PF2 hates us for that.

And/or maybe I'm falling into some of the ivory tower trap options that feel like they'd be cool or good but are actually bad, and I'm overlooking useful options because they feel underwhelming or situational? It's probably very complicated and a lot of it stems from the fact that I don't enjoy carefully perusing options to build a character.

I'm rambling uou sorry. I could post an advice thread, but I'm worried I'd just start fights or something, or come off disingenuous?

Edit: I think I struggle to understand what the game 'wants' of me, what it's designed to do. Maybe it's a mismatch between the lore folks and the mechanics folks in the design team. My party struggled to get through battles in Edgewatch with a 6 person team when the general opinions we could find online talked about how easy all the encounters were for many groups.

What was it you liked so much about your monk? That'd be a clue about what role you click with. Maybe you can build another character like that

I felt effective and like I wasn't constantly trying to play 4D chess trying to figure out exactly how many casts of Magic Missile I needed that day, I guess.

I was playing a strength-based Tanuki monk with Teakettle and Statue form, and Mountain Stance. The shapeshifting gave me fun utility and flavor and Mountain Stance was a simple and effective way to strike well while also keeping my AC high enough not to get obliterated due to my low dex. I had lots of HP so I could be on the front line without too much issue. It was a character with a simple goal that I was able to reach without much fuss.

That vs. the spellcasters I've played where my concept never really feels like it matches with mechanics, or I feel like I'm getting backstabbed by the rules or the fact that NPCs have extremely high bonuses to saves.

I was trying to play a nonlethal pacifist utility wizard. I took Daze as my main combat spell. Did low damage and had an abysmally low chance of inflicting Stun ONE. I genuinely don't think it ever stunned anything. Since most of my spells were save-based, they rarely worked. As my GM described it 'spells feel bad in PF2 because most of the time they do a lesser version of what they did in PF1, and only do their main thing on a crit fail'. or something like that.

And that's added to the fact that most casters have to micromanage exactly how many casts of every spell they need, so you need to be a divination mage just to know how many times you'll need to cast Fireball vs Charm Person, vs, whatever. THAT combined with the drastically reduced spell slot pool compared to PF1.

I've always pegged striker options in caster classes as being for striker classes dabbling in the MC AT, not for the pure caster to take for themselves unless they also have means to better their attack rolls like druids do through their form spells

Some of them are way too high level for that, like Animist's Grudge Strike. You can't get it until level 6, so you'd need to be level 12 to get it as an archetype and at that point it's effects would be very weak.

That will depend heavily on your subjective opinion of what is fun and useful, and which roles you enjoy. I've played many different classes that were great, but I enjoy playing many different roles

I've primarily played spellcasters and most of the time I feel very weak and like my spells rarely do what they're supposed to. The only significant exception to this is when I managed to get a chain of Sleep spells off to get my team into a place without having to fight half the people inside.

There is quite a bit of freedom in having the system take care of the math for you as long as you aren't trying to build something silly.

Feats become something to build an interesting character with - not something that you have to agonize over for building a powerful character with.

Sadly they're very much the latter for me, since my experience playing Adventure Paths has always been "You'd better build correctly or you'll go down in every fight".

Pretty much all of my characters to date have felt very useless at all times except the time I built a Monk. He felt great.

Man this system feels so oppressive.

So, what's the point of taking something like Witch's Armaments or the Witness to Ancient Battles if they're just going to give you a subpar mediocre option that ultimately ends up being a waste of feats?

I'm trying to build a melee dex animist. It's probably a terrible idea. I was trying to pair it with Monk dedication, but it turns out that's probably a worse idea.

Either way, I'm confused about the way the Kholo Jaws attack works. It says you have a Jaws Unarmed Attack that deals 1d6 Piercing Damage.

Does this Jaws attack have the same keywords as Fist? Or is it sacrificing Agile, Finesse, etc just for a damage die bump?

AC is a DC.

OH. Y'know... that makes sense.

Fake out is rolled against DC 15, as it is an Aid action ("Make an attack roll to Aid the triggering attack"). If you have cooperative nature, you add an additional +4 to your gunslinger proficiency.
I suggest to get a gauntlet bow, as fake out does not require you to actually fire your weapon, you only need to have a loaded gun or crossbow - which the gauntlet bow provides.

Alkenstar (as a city) has a lot of clockwork constructs, which do not like electricity. Having matching ammunition may improve your damage considerably, at least in some fights.

Getting a good number of debuffs stacked on eachother is a key to a lot of difficult fights, and if you can get some teamwork going it will benefit all of you.

What is Cooperative Nature? a Feat?

I'll definitely look into a wrist crossbow and some electric ammo.

No, frightened imposes an AC penalty. I'm sorry if I gave the impression it didn't.

It doesn't seem to? The AONPRD page for it just says checks and DCs

You're gripped by fear and struggle to control your nerves. The frightened condition always includes a value. You take a status penalty equal to this value to all your checks and DCs. Unless specified otherwise, at the end of each of your turns, the value of your frightened condition decreases by 1.

Maybe I'll consider Fake Out, though, since it would let me aid allies in rolling better, and my allies are much better damage machines than I am.

We had this problem in Outlaws of Alkenstar, as many of the relevant fights were against higher level enemies.

COINCIDENTALLY we're ALSO playing Outlaws and having this exact same problem. Almost all of the fights so far have been against small numbers of higher level enemies who hit real hard and have high AC. We're level 2 and the bridge fight had enemies throwing a cool 1d8+6 damage at us every time they hit, which has been its own frustration >:c

I'm not exactly sure what you're intending to get out of Bard. Since you have Battle Medicine, Medic would be a good archetype as Doctors Visitation at level 4 would let you move and battle medicine as a single action, and Gunslingers are action intensive so anywhere you can save actions is helpful. (That said, since you are a Maestro Bard, Courageous Anthem + Lingering Composition will be great later when you can get it online.)

That's my plan, actually. I only took Battle Medicine because the player who was our dedicated medic ended up not being able to play, and we needed SOMEONE who could patch us up because PF2 fights are brutal. My plan with Bard was to get the party buff compositions.

It's been awhile, I hope Outlaws of Alkenstar is going well. Anyway, my thoughts

It's been going... alright. As per usual I feel like the fights are a bit brutal, but I've been enjoying my character and the party dynamics.

I mostly took the double barreled pistols for aesthetics and the fact that I can fire multiple times without reloading, but "Dual weapon reload" does not, in fact, let me reload multiple weapons so it's not been as useful as I'd hoped.

I will be able to get +5 by the end of the campaign. We're using gradual stat bonuses, so I can hit +5 as early as... level 6? or 7?

I'll bring up tripping with my party, I think we might have at least one person who can lean into that.

Fake Out is... interesting, but Aid doesn't... ever seem useful to me? It's a high DC for what usually amounts to a +1 bonus, and failing actively imposes a penalty. Pistol Twirl hasn't been especially useful for my crit fishing exploits, but it is an effective 1 action debuff before a shot. I THOUGHT frightened imposed an AC penalty, but I guess I was misremembering.

I'm playing a gunslinger with a free archetype into Bard and I'm struggling with guns feeling... worthwhile.

Here's a copy of the character: https://pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=1032692

My frustration is that my double barrel pistols sort of feels like a strictly worse version of a hand crossbow unless I crit. I'm built to fish for crits about as best as I can (Raconteurs Reload to Frighten, Pistol Twirl to feint). My dex COULD be higher, but I'm leaning a little more into my social role right now, and will be increasing my Dex probably next level.

So I guess what I'm asking is: Is there more I can do? Or should I just switch to hand crossbows unless I'm fighting lower level enemies?

Edit: My bard abilities haven't really come online yet, at level 4 I'm going to start focusing on grabbing Composition cantrips from it.

The way it's worded made it sound like it would reduce my known, since it says "when you gain a spell slot, you gain a new spell"

Pathbuilder is coded to give me 5 total spells known, so I feel I should ASSUME that it's correct.

Against my better judgement, I'm making a Wellspring Summoner, and I realized just today that it's going to have some interesting problems. One of which being that, RAW, I think I might have 0 spells known by level 11??

So, Wellspring Mage reduces your spell slots by 1 per rank, and your cantrips by 1.
Summoner gains 1 rank 1 slot at 1st level and 5 cantrips, meaning that a Wellspring Summoner gains 0 rank 2 slots and 4 cantrips.

I gain my first rank 1 spell slot at level 1, and my first rank 2 spell slot at level 3. Each time I gain a spell slot, I gain one spell known.

At level 5 I lose access to 1st level spells, which RAW causes me to lose 2 spells known.

Meaning my total spells known at level 4 is 4, At 5 it's 3, at 7 its 2, at 9 its 1, and at 11 the knowledge of all spells is banished from my mind.

Unless I still gain spells known as if I was gaining spell slots as normal?

This seems like a weird oversight given Summoner and Wellspring Caster were released in the same book.

Demonskunk wrote:

But when a shield is Broken it can't be raised and can't be used to block with, so it's essentially just a useless hunk of wood at that point until repaired. I think?

Correct, like I said, that is the trade-off that you make for blocking an attack that you know will break your shield. Late into a fight, it may be an option with few consequences to block that attack that could down you. However, having your shield break in the first round could be tough, but may be necessary if that damage coming in would put you in a worse position.

When you use a shield, you have to balance your priorities in an encounter. These are decision points that shield-users have to keep in mind rather than just trying to Shield Block every attack.

But what I don't understand is: What is the other half of the shield's HP bar for?

I can't speak to your build much as it seems like a very personal thing. I can, however, speak on shields! Shields break because damage reduction is incredibly powerful and getting it does not come easily. It's important to remember that "broken" does not mean "destroyed" and both of these conditions typically only occur when you choose. So when you Shield Block an attack that will break or destroy your shield, you are making a judgement call, "I currently value taking less damage now than I do taking more potential damage later." Shields have this associated cost to them for the damage reduction trade-off and their ability to boost AC beyond normal bounds. A shield should not be used to get to normal AC much in the same way as it shouldn't be considered reliable damage reduction. The opportunity cost to do so is too low, so reliable access to either of these things is gated off (through action economy, feats, or shield HP - which can be mitigated through runes, magic items, and feats).

Also, I would suggest viewing AC as less of a "they will miss me" and instead think of it as "they will not crit me." The opponents willhit you, AC and damage reduction just mitigates the damage taken, statistically.

But when a shield is Broken it can't be raised and can't be used to block with, so it's essentially just a useless hunk of wood at that point until repaired. I think?

And yeah, I've had experience with being crit constantly. My first character was a Wizard with low Dex and high Str so basically any time I got hit, I got crit.

@Gisher I used the wrong word, I currently have the Shield Block feat from Viking Shieldbearer, so I can block as well as raise.

As I am the king of trying to make Multi-Attribute Dependent characters, I'm a Wellspring Summoner who is receiving Wizard as a free archetype from the Adventure Path (Strength of Thousands). Unlike normal, Wizard isn't locking me out of other archetypes until I'm 2 feats deep, because of an adventure path special rule.

My eidolon is a Beast, so I'm getting the Primal spell tradition.

I'm trying to be a front-line tank, and I would LOVE to get access to Heavy Armor, but the only way I see that happening is taking the Sentinel archetype, which I won't be able to do until ~level 8 because of the Wellspring archetype locking me down until I have 2 more Wellspring feats.

My character is weird. Essentially I'm the Eidolon of a dead summoner. I am both the summoner and the eidolon. This isn't RAW so it's a little touch and go.

Currently my Dex is +3, + Mystic Armor and I'm making up the difference by holding a shield. I took the Reinforce Eidolon as my first level class feat, so I can spend one action to give myself +1 Status Bonus to AC and Resistance 'equal to the spell's level' (which is 1? It's a cantrip, and I'm not sure what this line means.)

So Raising a shield and boosting myself should push my AC bonus to +7. I've also considered the Shielded Arm spell, but that only lasts a minute and eats one of my two daily spell slots.

I COULD raise my dex, but I feel like I should have at least +1 in Con and Str, and I want at least +1 in Int because I'm going to be Wizarding at least a little bit and I don't want my spellcasting bonus to be +0.

Here's the Pathbuilder link to what I've got so far. I'm not decided on Ancestry or Heritage yet, but currently Human > Viking Shieldbearer are crucial to my ability to shield effectively.

https://pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=721253

On shields: Why does a shield Break at 1/2 HP and then become completely useless? Why does it have all that extra HP? Just to resist becoming completely destroyed? I've seriously considering just carrying a stack of shields on my back to use as droppable ablative armor.

On Reinforcement Runes: I was not aware of those, they sound like they could be pretty dope.

On AC: I know Armor Class is really important, but my brain values damage reduction a lot more because it's not something a series of lucky rolls can completely bypass. The fact that I can eat a shield to GUARANTEE that I take reduced damage, instead of just HOPING that the attack misses because I'm harder to hit is much more appealing to me.

I'm trying to assemble an absolute nightmare of a character that I'm not going to get into.
Long story short: I'm struggling with AC. Currently I have a shield (+2 AC) and I can raise it to soak damage, but it breaks at 10HP and apparently becomes useless (despite having 20 HP???)

So I'm looking at Glass Shield or Protect Companion as backups for if (when) my shield breaks.

The problem is: The shield spells feel like crap. +1 AC if you raise it, and 5 Hardness if you block, but if you Shield Block with it, it locks the spell down completely for 10 minutes. It has worse AC and equivalent Hardness to a steel shield, but can only realistically be used once per fight.

Glass Shield has only TWO hardness, but deals 1d4 damage to the attacker if they're within 5 feet. Its Hardness increases, but so does its HIT POINTS, which means that if you block an attack that is too weak, the shield might not even deal damage to the attacker, since RAW (as I understand it) the shield vanishes immediately after you use Shield Block.

I'm a summoner who is my own Eidolon, so I can technically use Protect Companion on myself. It effectively gives me Resistance 5 on the triggering attack (and increases by 5 every time it heightens, which is nice), but it also has the once every 10 minutes restriction.

This is what I have so far. https://pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=719485

I'm waffling on Background. Hobnobber is a really good background feat, but Lore: Alcohol isn't doing much for me (Except giving me the ability to sound very classy on dates, I guess?).

My stats are probably sub-optimal. I've got a +3 in Dex and Cha which are my two big boy stats. It would be more optimal to use standard attributes and drop the + to Str and Int, as well as the penalty to Wis, but I'm kind of a fan of 'working with the hand I'm dealt' so to speak, and leaning into the Gnoll stat block.

I've been considering how I want to encorporate my 'muse' narratively. I need to look through Pathfinder's cosmology and see if there's some sort of creature whose 'helpfulness' could be ambiguous enough to satisfy me.

Spell Shot sounds pretty good, actually, but I'm turned off by the fact that it interacts EXTREMELY BADLY with free archetype. It traps you in the archetype for 2 feats but doesn't get a second available feat until level 6, which would delay me getting Bard Dedication until level 6 or 8. Which is... near the end of the campaign.

I haven't checked to see if Gunslingers have a method to gain a second Way, but if they can, maybe i'd like to pick that up.

Oof. Lot to unpack here. First off, if you're that worried about picking the wrong class, you should talk to your GM about whether they would let you change it down the line...

That's a good place to start, I suppose.

I want to be the party face, I want to be able to manipulate and fool people, and I want to mostly be support in battle. I don't need to be popping heads, I just want to be able to pull my weight.

You are correct in that you are always going to be "Class + Thing" with archetypes.

There's no sense in thinking about it in those percentages, though, because it simply isn't how the system works.

The percentages are just to help visualize, not anything near precise, I understand.

It's more like... If I'm making a Fighter + Wizard in something like PF1 or 5e, I can 'correct course' and lean more into Fighter or Wizard depending on what I'm feeling. I can ultimately end up leaning harder into the Wizard side even though I started out as a Fighter.

In PF2 my starting class largely defines my trajectory, and any Archetypes I pick up can only nudge me slightly in that direction.

So I'm experiencing a lot of analysis paralysis anxiety trying to figure out a way I can start out as a Caster but still feel like shooting a boy is a viable course of action.

And then even more anxiety around how each Caster is different and if I'm going to regret choosing Bard over Witch or what have you.

Retraining is TECHNICALLY an option, but based on how my last AP went (Agents of Edgewatch), we're not going to have time for me to theoretically retrain all or most of my class levels if I figure out something isn't working. I largely consider Retraining nonviable in most games. Perhaps this mindset is wrong.

Cool.

I'm just wanting to get that all clarified up front. A lot of miscommunication can happen otherwise on these text-based forums. No point arguing past each other.

Are there any other Class Archetypes that you feel are more justified and feel more rewarding? My sample size is only the two I've run into while trying to figure out characters.

Gunslinger's Way of the Spellshot specifically does seem a bit strange.

The other class archetypes fit the balance and design better. So if you are complaining specifically about Spellshot, do us all a favor and specify that rather than presenting the complaints as being against all class archetypes generally.

Spellshot is the current target of my ire, and I was replying to PossibleCabbage who only expounded on Spellshot, but I explicitly mentioned Flexible Caster as well, which has a similar issue where the 'rewards' for burning a feat (going from 4 cantrips to 6) feel like they could have been a caster feat instead of an explicit archetype.

I SUPPOSE Flexible Caster has the benefit of not being locked to one prepared caster, but with it costing A FEAT, I would expect not to lose such a substantial amount of my spellcasting power as well.

What do "hexes and things" cover that regular occult spells plus Dirge of Doom don't? And can you achieve that by multiclassing into witch to get the familiar+basic lesson for a hex with no save like Stoke the Flames?

It feels like you're asking for an awful lot of things for one player character to be, which feels like a tough sell for any d20 game based around character specialization.

A lot of this is residual frustration with how restrictive multiclassing in PF2 feels crossed with how many moving parts there are in the system vs how much I know about it and how different classes from PF1 are in PF2.

My experience with the system is very little, but as I understand, in PF2 I can never be, say, 1/2 Fighter 1/2 Wizard. If I start as a Fighter I'll only ever be ~~1/4 Wizard, 3/4 Fighter, and vice versa.

So if I want to mainly be a caster, I need to START OUT as a caster and choose Gunslinger as my Archetype or else I'll be a Gunslinger that can cast instead of a Caster that can sling guns.

Do I have that correct? I might be mistaken.

I understand what they're trying to do, but why is it necessarily linked to an Archetype? It could have been a standard Way with its Feats added to the Gunslinger pool with the caveat that they require Spellcasting or something.

Instead I'm trapped in an archetype that is so thinly defined that I'm trapped in it until level 6 because I cannot possibly gain 2 feats in the archetype before then.

It feels like a really janky way to design something like this, and it plays hilariously poorly with the GMG's 'free archetype' rule.

I'm struggling to understand why Archetype Subclasses exist mechanically the way they do. I was looking at Way of the Spellshot Gunslinger for a character, and previously I was looking at Flexible Caster.

Spellshot doesn't seem like it's drastically more powerful than a regular gunslinger, it gains the same number of features as a regular Way, the only thing it gains is access to additional Feats as if it were an archetype.

Flexible Caster is similar, it affects your casting, but in no way does it seem like it should require additional buy in. It lets you prepare a (small) pool of spells, but cuts your daily slots per level down to 2.

It feels like equivalent exchange BEFORE the feat, and the forced feat spend feels like punishment.

If I'm playing a cowboy setting, I wanna shoot guns, so replacing guns with other things is out of the question.

I tried Spellshot Gunslinger out, but you're locked into 2 feats from an archetype dedication that doesn't have a second feat until level 6, meaning I'm barred from gaining *actual magic* through some kind of other class archetype until level 8

Saedar and Captain Morgan's pistolero suggestion does kind of feel good. The flashy, showy reload of the pistolero feels very on-brand. And bard, admittedly, does fit with the whole dancing magic angle... But The hexes and things are something that I badly want, and I don't think anything Bard can get has a similar sort of feel mechanically or flavorfully.

What aspects of "witch" are you actually interested in emulating mechanically?

Hexes, curses, having an interesting familiar, and generally being a weird little guy. And also playing a caster that isn't a Wizard, since I've played that before.

Witch is absolutely not the right Class choice here, I don't care what the lore calls it, the PF2 Witch is quite simply incompatible with what the protag of those games does and can do...

I'm not so much interested in emulating her mechanics as her *vibe*. A confident, attractive lady with cool powers and a neo-witch vibe.

*mechanically* I'm not sure what I want. I know PF2 is extremely... restrictive? With how you need to do things - everything is just-so, so I'm wary of defining what I *want* before I have an idea of what I *can do*.

What is an MCA?

To elaborate a little, the gunslinger's abilities are tailored around the single shot, crit-fishing nature of most of 2e's firearms. Other classes really struggle to make them work...

I noticed in my brief flip through that a lot of guns have low base damage, but Deadly or Lethal. The thing that sort of speaks to me about what I've seen is the trick shots. Banking shots off of things and stuff.

I had to look up what a Thaumaturge is, and I'm unfamiliar with Starlit Span. Why do they manage to make firearms work where other classes don't? I was looking at a pair of double barrel pistols, but their damage *is* extremely low.

Yeah, don't play a Witch. The class is fun but it is terrible at what you want to be doing here. You want a Way of the Pistolero Gunslinger as your base class, and then either Pistol Phenom or Bard for the archetype.

That sounds so... unsatisfying, though. I worry that archetyping into a caster will make the casting aspect almost worthless. But I guess archetyping into Gunslinger makes guns almost worthless. I find myself frustrated with the way multiclassing works.

It's too late to edit, but our GM is giving us the Free Archetype rule.

I'm making a character for Outlaws of Alkenstar, and I bumbled into an idea I like.
A Sweetbreath Gnoll bullet witch that charms her way across the country stealing hearts and loot along the way.

I'm fairly unfamiliar with Pathfinder 2 (I've played one campaign), and I'm hoping I can get some help figuring out possible options for her.

My natural inclination is to go Witch then archetype into Gunslinger. I'm more interested in the charm and shooting side of this than the punching people with guns side. I like the flavor of witch, along with the whole 'you have an otherworldly patron' thing.

I'm aware of Bullet Dancer, but it's very keyed toward Monk and with the way PF2's multiclassing Archetypes work, I don't think it's worth going down that path in a 10 level AP.

Demonskunk wrote:

Woah, $60 per book, and you need at least THREE of them!?

$180 is a BIG ASK for the bare basics you need to play the dang game.

All the rules are available for free on Archives of Nethys! So you really don't need to spend any money. $60 for a beautifully illustrated hardcover book is perfectly reasonable I think!

Like, you're not wrong, but I'm still upset.

Woah, $60 per book, and you need at least THREE of them!?

$180 is a BIG ASK for the bare basics you need to play the dang game.

I have always read that Automatic Bonus Progression removes Mage Armor from the game pretty much entirely.

ABP removes all item bonuses from things like spells and mutagens. The only item bonus that is left is the item bonus from armor. Mage Armor is a spell - not armor.

Source Gamemastery Guide pg. 196

Nope, it removes the item bonuses and DCs usually provided by magic [i]items it never mentions spells.

For a wizard at low levels, Mage Armor is +1 item bonus to AC. The cost is 1/5 of your starting spells. Very minimal.

After that, even if you leave it in the spellbook and never prepare it again it costs nothing.

My wizards figure it is a good deal until they can afford an armor rune. That is generally 5th level.

Lots of wizards quit using certain spells after they are two levels below their highest spell slot.

But the vast majority of my spell slots are going to be two levels below their highest spell slot. Are you saying that it's fine for my low level spells to just be worthless after a point? That doesn't seem right.

with the exception of the heal spell really (and maybe harm if your party heals with negative damage), there are almost no spells in PF2 that you want to be carrying around and using the same way from level 1 to level 20. Mage armor has numerous levels where it is a much more economic option than hurrying to get the next level of fundamental rune for your armor. If it was always better than buying runes, it would pretty much become a spell slot tax on all arcane casters.

Mage Armor is meant to be Mage Armor but as it stands, it's no better than enchanted robes. It fails to sell the fantasy, and it doesn't even come close to being as valuable as some of the other higher level spells you'd need to eschew in order to gain access to it's higher level versions.

They should be available at least one level before the armor runes, or they should be equivalent to or better than the armor runes. It's not a spell slot tax, it's a consideration.

Do you save the money and spend a slot on Mage Armor, or do you free up your slot and pay out for an equivalent or slightly worse magic item?

As it stands, Mage Armor is only an option if you're flat broke, somehow caught with the ability to cast spells but with your equipment stolen, or desperately need some other magic item invested.

Because you may want to use them in those weird specific situations? It isn't like Mage Armor is unique as far as 1st level spells which stop being optimal overtime. (Magic Weapons, Burning Hands or almost any damage spell) Or for just replacing things you can do with equipment. (Magic Weapon again, Know Direction, Healing Plaster, Stabilize, Create Food and Water, Fabricate, Mending, Restyle.) Or that occupies a pretty small niche. (Share Lore, Unseen Servant.)

There are actually remarkably few spells which are must have, and they don't tend to align with their PF1 equivalents. Even the all powerful Haste has become something which is good in certain parties but not others.

I genuinely cannot think of an instance where Haste is not extremely useful, barring it's weird clause of not being able to use non-land-based movement for the extra Stride.

I take issue with the idea that spells just become less useful as you level up, especially given how much PF2 has cut down the number of spells you have per day.

u right. That's why I'm considering trading him out.

Mirror image is best used behind another obfuscation tool, your invisibility type abilities or even the humble mist form elixir imo.

As they come into play during the targeting phase and mirror image occurs during the hit determination phase. (The idea of invisible multiple images being harder to hit does hurt a tad though ;) )

Things to consider, certainly. Probably need to grab a couple scrolls of that.

Demonskunk wrote:

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

But yes it isn't always useful.

I guess ultimately my problem with Mage Armor is that due to the way it functions, it's not even as good as Light Armor, when in previous editions it was as good as Medium Armor.

...

And while it is true that Mage Armor isn't a good idea if you're getting runes with the clockwork efficiency of the automatic bonus progression, in actual play that may not be the case. You might not have the money, shop access, or time to get runes for your entire party as soon as the wealth by level table says they are available. Mage Armor is basically a back up plan.

The idea that it only works as a backup plan is kind of my problem. If something exists as a contingency in case you're not able to gear up as intended, then why does it exist at all?

It's the inferior of the two options when put side by side, it only shines in weird specific gameplay situations.

Ironically, using the Automatic Bonus Progression rules makes Mage Armor objectively better, putting it on par with real armor with runes, highlighting the issue with the spell.

Demonskunk wrote:

I genuinely cannot think of a justifiable use for them unless you're a Witch.

You can use them to give bonuses to your skills or to mimic skill feats: Accompanist, Ambassador, Partner in Crime, Second Opinion, Snoop and Threat Display. Then you have Master Abilities like Cantrip Connection, Familiar Focus, Innate Surge [can get you a free casting of a 10th level spell], Restorative Familiar and Spell Battery. And you can pick and choose which ones you want for the day.

You just have to change your way of thinking about them: they are a pretty good item and a bad animal. As long as you treat them as a magical pet rock, it's fine.

Hmm. I guess some of those might be useful. I'd need to put another point into Familiar points to use any of them, though, since I've got a Calligraphy Wyrm, which is eating up all 6 of my current ones.

Corgi mount familiar (I hope) will make an okay mount for my sprite fighter. I'm concerned about it's hit points, but since it will have my AC and saves it should be decently defended. As long as a pick up life link (from a mechanical perspective) I'm going to think of it as an extension of myself that gives me extra HP and extra actions to move.

However, for my specific character it's really the RP I'm after.

I got mine primarily for RP, and was hoping I could find a good use for him, but the restrictions on Familiars being able to activate items kind of kills any good reason for him to have Manual Dexterity, and I'm a little frustrated.

I also got mine for flavor, since my wizard is a big book nerd, and a calligraphy wyrm is essentially a living pen.

The two options I would suggest for a high Str low Dex character would be Drakeheart Mutagen (works for anyone with low Dex) or Sentinel archetype.

Of the two, the mutagen would be easier to combine with a Wizard. You could either go for the alchemist multi class archetype or just pick up crafting and the alchemical crafting feat. Either could be made to work.

The sentinel would take better advantage of the strength, but the wizard doesn’t improve their proficiency in armor so you wouldn’t become better than Trained in armor until 13th level.

Interesting, I hadn't even considered Mutagens. I figured it was an Alchemist only thing.

I considered Sentinel, but the main issue is that I don't really want anything else from the sentinel archetype, so I'd be trapping myself.

Demonskunk wrote:

Captain Morgan wrote:

Sorcerere and bards both have feats that let them get spell books. They only get to "prepare" a single spell from them each day but that is often all you need on top of your normal repertoire.

That could be interesting, but one spell feels... like a waste?

Why?

I dunno, it just seems... underwhelming. I guess since it works as a Signature spell, it means it will be at your highest level, and it gets added to your repertoir, so you can cast it as many time as you can any other spell of that level, which is nice. It just seems... Like I want more. I'm greedy.

My problem with Spell Delivery is that I end up ending my turn next to an enemy that now considers me to be a noticeable threat.

Just smooth down your fur and look real cute.

Demonskunk wrote:

The best use I can see for them is giving them manual dexterity and commanding them to hold and use items for/on you, since it would save you the action of digging them out, then another action for using them.

Familiars can't use [activate] items: Ask a Paizo Designer #3: Familiar Actions

That's unbelievably stupid. It's even stupider that it's hidden away in a section on items, instead of pointed out in the familiar section, and also absolutely nonsensical. If that's the case, Familiars are even more useless.

I genuinely cannot think of a justifiable use for them unless you're a Witch.

Sorcerere and bards both have feats that let them get spell books. They only get to "prepare" a single spell from them each day but that is often all you need on top of your normal repertoire.

That could be interesting, but one spell feels... like a waste?

Now, the next time that you level up and gain new spell slots, you can also swap Mud Pit in to one of your 1st level Repertoire spell slots. You don't need to use Learn a Spell or make any skill checks in order to do this. You can also swap the spell out of your Repertoire when you level up and gain spell slots.

But you still need to spend (at least) a week retraining the spell, so it's not quite the same as a wizard who can freely plan their spells out of a spellbook, so long as they have a spellbook.

I don't really understand the need to Learn a Spell in the first place, unless you're specifically adding an Uncommon or Rare spell, though, since all classes have the same list of spells as long as they share a Tradition. Retraining should automatically include learning the spell, since you're retraining your spell choice.

Yeah, the swap out time is the limiting factor. Spontaneous casters can learn spells the same way that prepared casters can.

but Prepared casters don't have to replace a spell they know, they can just add it to their spellbook, while Spontaneous caster must forget a spell to learn a spell.

You could also start a request on the Homebrew forum to see if someone knows of something that already exists, or can help you navigate the process of creating something balanced.

I might consider it, but this game is still very hypothetical. Our experience with Edgewatch has been... rocky, with the system largely getting in the way of itself. Next time we get together to play, we're going to be doing some character rebuilds and establishing some house rules to see if we can't enjoy ourselves more.

Yeah, at this particular point in time, we don't really have a good option in the official rules for wild magic or other types of unexpected spell results.

Perhaps there is something in 3rd party products, or perhaps you could homebrew your own based on the Wellspring Surge table. Neither would work in a PFS game or with a GM that is uncomfortable with 3pp/homebrew.

I'm not super comfortable with 3pp/homebrew because I don't know enough about PF2 to know if something is busted or bad. My GM might be willing to cook something up, or just modify the wellspring for prepared casters. Or I'll just have to suck it up and just do a spontaneous caster flavored as a prepared caster.

Yes, and no. Other than Cleric and Druid, the prepared spellcasters have to learn their spells - and that costs time and money to get a wide selection of them. They will naturally gain a bit wider of a selection than a spontaneous caster, but not by much.

The option to add to your spellbook by spending money or finding scrolls feels so powerful when compared to the fact that Wizards gain 44 spells as part of their class (10 at 1st level, 1 from school, 2 every level) by level 20

Sorcerers gain 40 spells as part of their class (2 spells + 1 bloodline spell every odd level, 1 spell every even level) by level 20.

And Sorcerers need to learn each spell level separately except for their signature spells, which effectively reduces their repertoire if they want non-signature spells to be accessible at low and high level.

You can switch one spell every time you gain new spells (without spending downtime to retrain), meanwhile the Wizard can just nip down to the Magic Shop, or find new spells in a dungeon. It costs money, but I feel like money is cheaper than time.

I've always felt like Spontaneous Casters get the short end of the stick because of the relative permanence of their choices, but I do appreciate that they can cast more often and more freely in PF2.

So Magus + Wizard Dedication or Fighter/Champion/Battle Oracle + Wizard Dedication or even a Polymath Bard is what best fit for you.

I'll need some time to flick through these, but I appreciate the many suggestions!

For my Eidolon, Thesis, I'm wanting to be more combat than utility. I've heard blasters aren't exactly... good in 2e, though, so I'm not sure if 'combat spellcasting' would be better used on self buffs though.

Flavor-wise, I wanted him to be a learned caster, not an intuitive or blessed caster, if that makes sense. He was taught magic by his summoner, whether or not he had any natural aptitude for it. I was really into the idea of wellspring magic causing problems when he mispronounced words or what have you, but it seems that's only available to spontaneous casters, which throws that right out, because I don't think I can combine Flexible Spellcaster with Wellspring Mage, and even if I did it would give me a staggering 1 spell per day.

Also spontaneous casters feel very limited, given they don't have a spellbook they can prep from, they have X number of spells with a hard limit, and that feels poopy given Pathfinder has hundreds of spells (and will likely end up with 1k+). I suffer from the tyranny of choice.

Bard halfway fits, since they do go to college, but I can't see this guy performing. He could maybe sing in howls, but I see him as quiet. Mechanically it might work, thematically it's all wrong in my head.

Race-wise I was leaning human just because they're generic and malleable, and nothing else fits the idea of some bestial creature from beyond the veil.

Wellspring Magic is only available to spontaneous casters - the ones that have a spell Repertoire. So Magus and Wizard couldn't use it. The only Arcane tradition classes that could are Sorcerer and Summoner.

Well, that just ruins my entire concept in one fell swoop.

Demonskunk wrote:

Eoran wrote:

That would be a good plan too for a high strength, low dexterity spellcaster.

I'm planning on retraining the feats I've invested in Familiar, since they're apparently not very useful unless you're doing something specific that I'm definitely not doing.

Seems reasonable. I also find it difficult to find combat uses for my familiar.

The best use I can see for them is giving them manual dexterity and commanding them to hold and use items for/on you, since it would save you the action of digging them out, then another action for using them.

Spell delivery is nice, but it has a hard limit of 25 feet because casting almost every spell is arbitrarily 2 actions, and you need to spend one action commanding them to deliver the spell.

Non-casters (or those without access to mage armor) still need to invest something into dex to hit that AC cap.

Are there any non-casters who don't at least get access to Light armor, which caps out at +2 AC (+ Runes) and +5 dex bonus, vs Mage Armor which caps out at +3, but cannot use runes?

That would be a good plan too for a high strength, low dexterity spellcaster.

I'm planning on retraining the feats I've invested in Familiar, since they're apparently not very useful unless you're doing something specific that I'm definitely not doing.

Which is going to be a shame since I love my calligraphy wyrm and he feels very flavorful for my librarian nerd wizard.

But yes it isn't always useful.

I guess ultimately my problem with Mage Armor is that due to the way it functions, it's not even as good as Light Armor, when in previous editions it was as good as Medium Armor.

I'm running into the situation where if we're ever fighting a boss, it's going to guaranteed crit me, and since the bosses are designed to be a threat to martials, they're liable to murder me in one round due to multiattack. We had a boss fight where I got surprise swallow'd whole and I realized that I was actually safer inside the boss because it could only damage me once per round, instead of up to 3 times.

What if mage armor instead gave an item bonus to AC = to 5 - Dex mod? (Minimum 0.)

The issue with Mage Armor is that it doesn't count as real armor, so you can't apply runes to it, meaning that Adventurer's Clothes + Runes invalidates Mage Armor. You cannot benefit from AC + Rune and Mage Armor at the same time.

So it's worse than the worst Light Armor.

If it gave a +2/+3/+4 it would at least be on par with leather.

If it increased AC instead of Granting it, it would also be viable, but then it would technically be usable with regular armor, which would probably be considered broken.

Buying runes at other levels is probably the most efficient way to not break the bank

The game is *designed* around the party gaining +3 runes by level 18, so you're liable to keep finding enemies wearing +1/+2/+3 armor runes, or finding it by that point, unless you're running homebrew... But in order to make use of the game's encounter building rules, your party should have the requisite plusses by the requisite levels.

Also look into miss chance spells like Mirror Image.

I need to start using them. I remember being frustrated with the fact that Mirror Images are destroyed even if they miss, which is why I ended up not taking it, but I suppose it would increase my survivability.

In addition, thanks to how limited the spell slots are, I feel like I'm completely wasting a spell slot on Mage Armor since it adds a piddly +1 to my AC, which *technically* decreases my chances of getting hit, but only meaningfully decreases my chances of getting crit, and I would rather prepare useful utility spells instead.

Sadly making scrolls isn't very viable because I'm playing Agents of Edgewatch and there's very little downtime between jobs.

There are some options though

Sadly all of my feats at the moment are spoken for, and I personally consider a feat that only grants light armor to be a complete waste of a feat, since it tops out at 1 point better than my Wand of Mage Armor.

I'm considering stepping into Martial Artist for Mountain Stance and its chain of feats, since that gives me the ability to bump my AC up by 4, then 6, without having to wear armor, and my musclewizard has been enjoying grappling and handcuffing people, so I think it'll move nicely into Wrestler.

The other thing I'm considering is Champion Dedication, but champion feels like a... weird... wrong direction to take him. He's very scholarly, not particularly zealous.

Well, it takes a top level spell slot each day you use it, but the other option is that you don’t buy armor runes and use that gold for something else.

I don't know that a minor increase to AC for the day is a great use of your limited spell slots, but I suppose it depends on your group.

Depending on the level you get it at, you can also save money by purchasing a wand of Mage Armor rather than paying to rune up your clothes, as well.

Edit: heck, if leveling is particularly brisque in your campaign you might even save more money by paying for scads of scrolls, instead.

-- +1 AC --

-- +1 AC / +1 Saves --
Mage Armor 4 Scroll: 70g
Mage Armor 4 wand: 700g
+1 Rune + Resilience Rune: 500g

-- +2 AC / +1 Saves --
Mage Armor 6 Scroll: 300g
Mage Armor 6 wand: 3,000g
+2 Rune + Resilience Rune: 1,220g

-- +2 AC / +2 Saves --
Mage Armor 8 Scroll: 1,300g
Mage Armor 8 wand: 15,000g
+2 Rune + Greater Resilience Rune: 4,500g

-- +3 AC / +2 Saves --
+3 Rune + Greater Resilience Rune: 24,000g

-- +3 AC / +3 Saves --
Mage Armor 10 Scroll: 8,000g
Mage Armor 10 Wand: N/A
+3 Rune + Major Resilience Rune: 70,000g

So, a 1st level Mage Armor wand is a stupidly good value, but a level 4, 6 and 8 wand are terrible comparative values.

A level 1 scroll isn't better than wand unless you'll cast fewer than 15 times.
A level 4 scroll isn't better than Potency + Resilience unless you'll cast fewer than 7 times.
Level 6 and 8 scrolls aren't better than potency + resilience unless you'll cast fewer than 3 times.
A level 10 scroll isn't better than Potency + Resilience unless you'll be casting fewer than 9 times.

I've been looking into Mage Armor recently, trying to find a way to increase my low dex wizard's AC. From everything I'm seeing Mage Armor is actively worthless after 7th level, barring specific circumstances (Like having your clothes stolen while you still have spells memorized, or a scroll/wand in your back pocket that wasn't stolen for some reason)

I'm using Wizard progression below, because that's what I'm familiar with.

IB is Item Bonus

1st level Mage Armor (available at Level 1) grants a +1 IB to AC
+1 Explorer's Clothes (available before Level 5) grants a +1 IB to AC

4th level Mage Armor (available at Level 7) grants a +1 IB to AC and Saves
+1 Resilient Explorer's Clothes (available before Level 8) grants a +1 IB to AC and Saves

6th level Mage Armor (available at Level 11) grants a +2 IB to AC and +1 to Saves
+2 Resilient Explorer's Clothes (available before Level 11) grants a +2 IB to AC and +1 to Saves

8th level Mage Armor (available at Level 15) grants a +2 IB to AC and Saves
+2 Greater Resilient Explorer's Clothes (available before Level 14) grants a +2 IB to AC and Saves

10th level Mage Armor (available at level 19) grants a +3 IB to AC and Saves
+3 Greater Resilient Explorer's Clothes (available before Level 20) grants a +3 IB to AC and +2 to Saves
+3 Major Resilient Explorer's Clothes (available before Level 20) grants a +3 IB to AC and Saves

So, the Wizard only gains ANY benefit from Mage Armor before reaching level 8 and after reaching Level 19 (and then only if they want to burn an extremely valuable spell slot on +3 Armor and Saves). It's also important to note that you can, in theory, find potency runes and resiliency runes before their level, thereby making Mage Armor even more useless.

Am I understanding this correctly? Does it stack with Potency and Resiliency runes on Explorer's Clothes? Is there some use case for Mage Armor, or did Paizo nerf it into the ground?

Demonskunk wrote:

Basically I'm just trying to feel out my options and decide what to do. I'm *probably* going to end up starting with Magus because it's the only realistic way to have spellcasting and martial-ing from Level 1.

Bard isn't bad with the warrior muse.

Alternately, champion with an ancestry that allows you to gain innate spells and the Oracle Dedication is better at fighting (although worse at spellcasting).

Being a spellbook-user feels very important to the character fantasy, so bard feels weird, and divine magic just feels all kinds of wrong as a creature summoned by arcane magic.

Though I do appreciate the suggestions!

This is definitely a thread for me, but...

...this should not be in the rules area

Oh, should it not? I'm sorry, I figured talking about class comparisons would go in the rules area.

The big question is, what are you envisioning? What do you want?

Spellcasting + some decent martialing?
Martialing + some decent spellcasting?

something somewhere between?

Uh, I'm not sure, to be honest. I'm playing a nonviolent utility Wizard right now in an Agents of Edgewatch campaign and I'm very frustrated because I built high strength, low dex to reflect the character idea (He's a wizard that lifts at the library, you see.) And I feel like I'm being punished by the fact that the game expected me to max out Dex to have a functional AC, but also demands that I spend 2 actions to cast basically any spell.

I've been trying to figure out how to improve my AC in a realistic capacity. Thought about Armor, but I couldn't find any means of gaining armor without blowing a ton of feats, and the Mage Armor spell is a piddly +1 AC unless I cast it with one of my very limited high level slots.

I was considering Archetyping into Magus, but all you get from that is Spellstrike, which isn't useful to me. Could archetype into Sentinel for Light and Med armor proficiency, but I don't really want to become an armor master, I just want to be able to wear it, so the archetype ends up trapping me more than helping me. I'm seriously considering Wrestler because I've been enjoying grappling and handcuffing people in combat, but then my garbage AC makes me very easy to hurt and my wizard HP makes me very easy to kill.

*But* if we decide to keep playing after this campaign concludes, I'm planning on making a gish for Strength of Thousands, and I'm not sure how I want to build him.

His concept is that he's an eidolon whose summoner died to permanently summon, and he's only got one arm. He struggles to speak, so I'm going to give him Wellspring Magic to mimic Wild Magic from 5e. (He's inspired by this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6q41EnhPnU&vl=en)

Basically I'm just trying to feel out my options and decide what to do. I'm *probably* going to end up starting with Magus because it's the only realistic way to have spellcasting and martial-ing from Level 1.