Falco271's page

Dirge affects their defenses and attacks. Compare it to Inspire Courage, or laughably Bless/Heroism. This power embarrasses one of the strongest powers in the game. It is as broken as anything gets in PF2.

Lingering Dirge, Circle of protection pre-cast on a martial and bless on the bard, who has actions to extend it sometimes. That's the combo I try to go for. As a bard I like to stay close to the martials anyway. That really shifts the odds.

Taja the Barbarian wrote:

Falco271 wrote:

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A bard/rogue is a very useful combination and is very strong in social event, but not much more in combat. You can choose to buff or fight in combat, but both as a bard or as arogue you need your actions.
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Dread Striker + Dirge of Doom by level 6 seems pretty damn nasty...

It is, but you'd be better off with one player taking rogue and another taking bard, and both getting the durability of a champion too or whatever.

Exactly. It's not difficult for a bard to use 3 actions, 4 even. That doesn't leave much room for rogue actions. Yet another useful 3rd action, I'd almost say. Certainly not bad to have a strike with sneak as that 3rd action, but that sure won't be something you'll use every turn.

I've played a fighter/cloistered cleric. Smite becomes really strong, if you add a cleric with true strike it's really strong.

A bard/rogue is a very useful combination and is very strong in social event, but not much more in combat. You can choose to buff or fight in combat, but both as a bard or as arogue you need your actions.

Not do fighter in a dual class will do much to help. Also martial/martial (flurry ranger/rogue...) should not be allowed. Otherwise, playing the DC characters was fun.

If anyone is interested in the build, but wants to optimize a little more: Light Hammers are better in every way for this build (range increment doubled and bludgeoning, same damage; the sweep trait of the hatchet is almost worthless for a ranger (exception: you have double prey, are not using it in conjunction with Shared Prey and the opponents are adjacent).

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And there is even a talisman that can give you sweep so indeed, hammers are better. Or kukris for the trip , dogslicers for the damage, sawtooths also.

But in the end the differences are small. Just go with what you want.

Btw, until you actually need 2x agile (for sneak, or lvl 18 imposs flurry) you can just use a d8 normal weapon and an agile weapon for the second attack. Warhammer plus light hammer with returning on the LH.

Super strong indeed, but for RP purposes having a FP char walk around normally is also very nice. The char is also a dual wielding ranger, but also a very good medic who works in a hospital sometimes. Walking around normally is a big plus, no more armor or weapons visible. Until a fight starts and all of a sudden the harmless bystander is suddenly a metal played blender.

You might want to check soulforger, which is super useful. Summon and dismiss weapons/armor anytime, way better than QuickDraw for dual wielders. And the powers aren't bad either (once per day).

You're already going for Monster hunter, that would have been my next advice.

L12 look at double prey. Very useful for hatchet wielders due to sweep. Get a +1 circumstance bonus if you attack a second target with the same weapon.

If you're considering keen icm with true strike, doing it for the second attack is much better than for the first attack, because keen adds little to the first attack, where a 19 can be a crit already.

But spell strike is 2 actions already, so the answer would be that keen is not the most effective rune for true strike / spell strike combo.

It does make a second attack much stronger. Hit - true strike - hit.

2 I would say. Include maybe a reference to level. Gets better at higher levels. Or starts strong weakens after x.

At higher level, have a flurry ranger and thief as martials in a party. Use shared prey for lots of low MAP thief attacks.

@Kyrone: Opportune backstab does as much damage as the normal sneak attacks. And those added d6 really count.

It's a nice overview, but to actually mean anything you should add why you come to these values, and also which variant of the class you're looking at for these values. Not all barbs do the same damage, same as rogues, same with rangers.

Edit: I missed your post where you mentioned to explain the ranking. Would be very useful indeed. I would love to see how a champion would do more damage than a two-weapon flurry ranger.

Edit 2: I agree with what I saw elsewhere about tiers also being defined by level. low level play can be a lot different than high level play, on all fronts.

I consider spell attacks spells part of a casters play, and whether you want to use them or not is up to the player. My 14th lvl bard has only one spell attack spell (biting words) but it is a signature spell. She has a shadow signet and a staff of divination (useful both in combat and out of combat). Which spell and levels to use depends totally on the situation and using biting words certainly has its uses. It helps that you get 3 attacks with one 7th level spell, with the second and third attack using only one action (bard are king of one action actions).

In short: part of the game, use it or not, but it has it's uses, with or without true strike (although it helps of course).

The best is probably double slice into twin takedown. Double Slice doesn't have flourish, right? Not sure why this is an either/or thing.

This is indeed the main advantage, get 4 attacks in at 0, 0, -4, -4 (DS, TT) which is a bit better than 0, -2, -4, -4 when doing TT followed by two strikes.

Whether the extra Mapless attack is worth the feats depends on what else you gain from the archetype.

Pre-errata AC (nimble: bird) had no problem surviving. Flanker mostly. Went wrong twice at lvl 13 (weakest level for AC) due to wrong positioning. Bird got sandwiched and was gone in a round. But otherwise, with healing available it never went wrong.

With the new errata, a nimble AC will still be OK, but you'd need to be more careful. Not sure I'd still want to play one. Maybe on a char that would optimally use it (flurry ranger not being the best char for an AC).

I would have preferred a solution where the nimble AC would have stayed as is and the other would have been made stronger. Adding expert/master armor for example. Having comparable or better AC AC to casters is not bad, given the limited options for ACs.

Extradimensional Storage: The armament is stored in an extradimensional space when not in use, and you can Manifest it to summon it into your hands or onto your body. A soulforged armament can be Dropped, Disarmed, or otherwise removed from you, but its soulforged abilities don't function for anyone else, and you can Dismiss the manifestation to return the items to the extradimensional space no matter where the items are. If you die or choose to pass ownership of a soulforged armament to a successor, it loses any soulforged abilities; violating the spirit of the soulforged bond by selling the item tends to have disastrous results. There might be special techniques or rituals by which a determined foe can break your bond with a soulforged item, but otherwise, your ability to Dismiss and Manifest it essentially means it can't be stolen.

I think the above implies that Manifesting is actually retrieving it from this extra dimensional storage. So dismiss/manifest needed.

But I agree extra clarity could be useful. Simple line mentioning manifest is only possible from the ED storage.

Darkness "suppresses magical light of your darkness spell's level or lower", so if you're rocking a Level 5 light, you don't need to counteract it.

Thats also how we interpret it. Makes the light cantrip pretty powerful as darkness effects are usually not cast at highest level.

You know when I clicked on this thread I forgot I was the one that started it, hah.

Falco, I don’t think you need to dismiss and resummon to activate the essence power. Although that really should be spelled out better (hence why I started the thread hah)

When you Manifest Soulforged Armament, you can summon any number of your armaments (you must meet the Requirements for each), and when you Dismiss the effect, you can choose to Dismiss some and not others. You can choose to manifest the essence form of any number of your armaments when you take the action. Each armament can manifest its essence form only once per day.

The above part of the rules disagrees with your remark, I would say. When you take the action of manifesting your armament you can choose to manifest the essence form. And to manifest, you need to have your hands free and/or no armor.

Well. It was fun while it lasted :-D

I had already replaced my whip with a staff on my linguist bard for a shadow signet assisted true strike biting words, but it was fun. Also for the primal witch who used my whip for some searing light flankin attacks on synesthesia-ed enemies while blessed...

The good old times.

I've chosen planar pain, planar bond and healing grace on my flurry ranger. I've not used them much yet (retrained beastmaster for soul forger @14th level), but in the last extreme encounter two of the three were very useful. Dismissing and manifesting isn't fun, but the added extras are worth the trouble.

Flank with a whip in hand. Ok, still semi melee, but can be useful sometimes.

1st Heal, Soothe (both are good every level), Fear, Magic Missile (good every three when you have no other spells that would be directly applicable)

Biting words, my favorite 1st level spell (signature) on my bard. Damage is not too bad, but the follow up actions are truly terrific. One action to do the same damage again on following rounds, which works very good with all the other single actions of a bard. Or add true strike from a transmutation staff. Shadow signet helps.

Enter Esoteric polymath and start having real fun as a semi-prepared spontaneous caster.

Out of curiosity, why would you want to do that? Other than an analysis to make sure that the RNG is actually random, what would be the point?

For fun. We actually write stories on all sessions, and would be fun to add details like "this was a very unlucky day for <insert name>. Something was off, and .... ".

Most important rolls are memorable anyway, as a ranger twice in one session disrupting a L+3 boss who tried an interact (nat 20), thereby preventing that boss from being able to leave (and thus die ;-). Or the rogue, using social skills, twice succeeding with a nat 20 in different sessions to influence the story. But this trackin could add extra some flavor.

There's a module called Roll Tracker that'll track that. You can clear the results between sessions, it let's you know if you're on a streak, gives you the median and mode of rolls, and all that fun stuff.

Thanks, will try that.

Is anyone aware of an add on for foundry for Pf2, where you can track dice rolls for analysis after a session? For example to see who was the lucky one, or who rolled most nat 1/20's.

Thanks.

Hello community. Thanks for reading my post. I am new to Pathfinder.

check this site for lots of information about pathfinder (no videos). In the class guide page you'll also find some useful links for beginners.

Lost omens: Legends indeed. The character travelled all the way to Azir to get access to speak to Kassi Aziril (Ok, travelling is easy at 14th level...). He is already a well known medic in Taldor. Paragon Battle medicine was the main reason.

Herbalist dedication replaces artisan tools with healing tools, for the same items, so there is already something somilar in the game.

Thanks for your answers.

Medical Researcher:
Kassi has taught you not only how to apply medicines with your medical skills but how to craft them as well. When you Craft healer's kits, vaccines, addiction suppressants, antidotes, antiplagues, elixirs of life, or other non-magical medical or healing items, you can use Medicine instead of Crafting.

I take it this means you also don't need the alchemical or magical crafting feats to create any of the above items. Have the recepies and you're good to go.

You can have the diplomacy bard: swash dedication with One for all, guardian deflection for a good reaction (whip as weapon).

The super face: rogue dedication. Get more face skills with skill mastery. Illusory disguise for extra options (greater hat of disguise).

I built a kobold dragon disciple flame oracle for a one shot, that could work pretty well I think. Lots of options and when you hit the major curse, become a dragon and burn everything around you by just standing there...

Not sure why te comparison is with a str AC (bear) instead of a dex AC (wolf, bird) and a flurry ranger when a precision ranger would be better for damage of the Animal.

AC 38 -> 45
Reflex 30 -> 35
Th 31/30/29 -> 33/28
Dam 3d8+10 (24) -> 6d8+6 (33) and 5d8+6 (29)

Attack and defense-wise, the dex AC is better than the construct (only the first attack is interesting anyways and that is better for the AC).

It's the other things you'd want a construct for, in combat stats, the dex AC is just better.

We need separate pages for Gisher's goodies and Gortle's guides. Added all again.

Added your basic builds doc to the main builds page of my resources page. Nice info for people looking for examples.

Just eyeballing the numbers from there, if you're using Deadly Grace you mainly want to be making multiple attacks vs lower level enemies to get best use of it, whereas Perfect Finisher sees a dramatically bigger increase in single-use finisher attacks. I'm not sure I'd want to take them together - if I were to pick the best use for Deadly Grace, I'd look for it to be used on Dual Finisher instead, but if I didn't have Dual Finisher, I'd much rather take only Perfect Finisher.

I agree that perfect finisher is the must take feat. Deadly grace could be skipped. But with a swashbuckler having at worst a 1 in 5 chance of a crit (19%, OK) against any boss, which is better than other martials, due to the "keen true strike", you should target to crit as often as possible, including against on level or lower monsters, which will still have loads of HP. Deadly grace add 2 or 3 extra dice to those crits. Not too bad. Works best for the "finisher every round" builds of course. Those builds should also target to have as many extra damage damage dies as possible (damage runes, sneak).

A soulforger swashbuckler, harming malice for an extra die, planar pain to convert all precision/physical damage to another type, against those precision immune creatures. Healing grace for some fast healing.

I'm amazed how low you value perfect finisher and deadly grace. Combined with keen flair, L14-L16 cause such a spike in damage for the SB with perfect finisher, keen flair and deadly grace that in my eyes that should all be blue or better even.

Ok, but then you have given up on trying to play the rules. You are just going with whatever makes sense. Suddenly everyone is playing a different game.

I wouldn't mind it if it was an edge character case. But Wildshape is a core part of a well established class. It should be rock solid and clear. It is just not. Then they have gone an expanded it with all these ancestry feats that grant battle forms.

You can't grapple or escape in wildshape
The +2 status bonus to attack applies in all the wrong places
Additional damage most likely adds maybe

Very pathetic Paizo. Its been years now. It should be clear.

Wasn't it written somewhere if something was too good to be true, it probably isn't. This feels like something similar, but reversed. It's unplayable if you take RAW.

Marks comment didn't strike me as he actually knew what the question really was about, or the implications. He just checked the literal text.

Even RAW, the wild druid isn't bad, because the druid isn't bad. But it doesn't make sense indeed.

Blave wrote:

HumbleGamer wrote:

I remember that somebody did made a chart meant to show what level a STR 16 wild shape druid would have gotten the form status bonus, but I couldn't find it.

It's level 4. Only level 4. I made a similar chart for myself.

Again, this is assuming you use a form spell heightened to your top spell level.

Yes assuming you are always taking the best form possible. To use it you have to be in a lower level form for some reason, or be a multiclass martial.

It's not fit for purpose.

Hence my conclusion that it's not meant to be used this way. I've remarked on it before, but if you choose to use your own unarmed attack modifier, whether higher or lower, you should use the +2. With "choose" to be read essentially as is for the focus spell, not referring to the spells of the shapes used.

Makes sense for a wild shape druid. Makes no sense for a martial taking the druid archetype, but that is a simple fix, it should be druid only.

Bastion is very strong. Another shield block, a disarm attempt with a block (not that disarm is very good, but its extra).

Liberator is very nice to get people out of the dangerzone with the free action step and free escape attempts.

Captain Morgan wrote:

The rules are pretty clear, but how that works in fiction feels much less so. The way I've always justified Battle Medicine in my head is that you're basic stabbing the target with a shot of adrenaline. It gets them back in the fight with one action, but if you do it more than once per day their heart may explode.

But making the ability based on a cool down for the user and not the recipient is rather perplexing.

Yes, it's a little strange. Understandable from a design point of view, though. Still probably not the strangest thing.

Godless healing is the recipient version. More logical indeed.

Fishing for an explanation: The doctor is so good that (s)he knows exactly what the safe amount is to shoot into the patient in shorter intervals.

Yes that is the basic comparison. But with additional attacks, damage starts to count with extra (status) damage and dice. Haste works better for the ranger. Extra damage and extra dice work better for the ranger. Switch hitting works better for the ranger. And hunt prey isn't a combat action, so you can get into combat with a prey, or later on you have feats like double prey, which becomes even better with master monster hunter.

At lvl 17 & 18, if you ever get so high, the difference becomes bigger.

The flurry ranger is indeed very good. Depending on party composition it can be devastating. Things to look out for with a flurry ranger: dogslicers or sawtooths. Extra status damage (stoke the heart), extra damage from runes, sneak attack, feats like double prey (less actions lost), further lowering of MAP (sweep: tiger menuki, bards, heroism). They really start to shine @L10, when you can get the second damage rune.

Combine a flurry ranger with a (dual wielding) rogue for awesome damage with shared prey.

If your looking for guides, builds, other stuff, you can find a lot here: Pathfinder 2e Resources.

If you don't mind the heavy armor: A Champion/Marshal can be an excellent military leader. Not sure if Paladin, what you suggest would be the best choice, depends on the rest of the group. Liberator is quite nice, allowing allies to step away if they are in trouble.

That describes my last months: work got in the way....

As for a suggestion for your guide: For each of the Innovations, how would you build it, with some explanations as to why. And maybe add some thoughts on how those builds could use archetypes.

I actually like the combination of Bless and Circle of Protection on my bard, in combination with Dirge of Doom. I've thought about Marshal, to replace the bless.

I'm not to concerned about being close to the martials, that is fine. With the extra buffs, the bard is just an extra target with a decent AC, and we have a Liberator in the party, preventing damage and the option to step away after a first attack. With the Guardian Deflection reaction from Swashbuckler, it's useful to be close to martials without another circumstance bonus.

To go for Marshal: @lvl10, max CHA, max Dipl, +2 skill item, standard DC is 27, you need to roll a 4 for a success, and a 14 for a crit. Not to bad.

Diplomacy is actually the main skill for my bard. I didn't go for Marshal, as the bless can do the same. Also, there isn't always time to spend the extra action on a double buff. CoP @lvl4 has the advantage of lasting an hour. Thinking of retraining into it, but that if more for RP purposes.

So it's certainly a very valid option, even for a bard who has lots of other buffs and action to perform.

Hi everyone,

As there are no guide to the Inventor yet, I've written a quick guide (well, with Modifications, it ended up being quite big).

Finally added to my site.

So I've actually got to use the spell ingame, casting it for the full two rounds. Two targets. A bit over average damage @6th level. But the investment is high. Haste cast the round before casting IRT, to reposition if needed. One save, one fail. So around 160 damage. Not sure if that is worth the investment for three rounds.

I don't think this spells needs to be changed. Reducing the damage will mean it won't be used, I think.

Yes, my next char is going to be a Kobold Dragon Disciple Cosmos Oracle, with Fire, Poison and Physical resistance!

One for all is an action that allows you to get excellent results on your Aid reaction.

Especially if Human with Cooperative Nature.

Indeed. One for All is almost worth the swashbuckler ded alone. But guardians deflectiom adds a nice defensive reaction on top of that, for a bard not afraid to stay close to the front. Combine with a whip for maximized effect.

@DonKalleOne: I meant Bless, as a first level spell, stays effective, no need to heighten it as with lots of other spells. A spontaneous caster needs signature spells, but also non-signature spells that can be used on their own level. Bless, Command, hideous laughter, etc.

Playing bard @12 now, and I never use Inspire Courage. Neither do I have Inspire Heroics (which only works with Insp Courage/Defense, not with Dirge). Dirge is my main tool, followed by Insp. defense, and Lingering is often used for action economy. Heroics is a waste in my opinion.

Bless is good and will stay good, no need to heighten it later on. Bards should not be afraid to get hit, they have HP and AC is pretty good. Bless, Circle of Protection and Dirge of Doom together can be an awesome boost (add Synesthesia where needed).

As for Marshal, that can be very useful. But the Aura is also small, so there is not much difference with Bless. And you need to invest in diplomacy a lot. If you want Marshal just for the Aura, not sure if that is worth it.

A caster dedication can be useful for those spells that don't require heightening. If you choose the occult list, they can be offensively used, if you choose another list, there is little sense using it offensively. So that would mean buffs and heals. The cost is high, for those extra spells, In my opinion. There are a lot of very nice dedication a bard can use. Swashbuckler, dandy, linguist, champion. MOst of them are more useful than a caster dedication. A bard has enough spells, and a lot of other action that can be done when not casting. Believe me, you can use 5 actions per round if you want.