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The good part of courageous assault and onslaught is that the reaction attack uses the ally's full dicepool.
So hitting and even critting are part of the action.
My party has a rogue, barbarian and a fighter.(and an archer ranger and cleric)(but not everyone can make it all the time so there are usually 1 or 2 players missing).
I recently respecced by bard into getting courageous onslaught and I have had 2 fights with the new build.
I had fun casting harmonic dirges of doom and inspire courage to spurr the barbarian into extra actions.He critted multiple times during that fight.
(I also have eternal composition, so 4 actions per round)

I am trying to evualate the couragous onslaught feat.
It is a good feat but the feat tags for the prerequisite feats seem rather high.
For non warrior bards it effectively 4 feats
Multifarious bard
Courageos advance
Courageous assault
and Couragous onslaught.
What are the general experiences with this feat?

If I understand the rules correctly prepared spellcasters can change their cantrips every day when they pick their daily spellswhile spontaneous spellcasters can only change their cantrips by spending lots of downtime.

So prepared spellcasters seem alot more flexible with their cantrips then their spontaneous counterparts.
So I am trying to figure out what options spontaneous spellcasters have to compensate for that disadvantage.
Spend class feats to learn more cantrips or multiclass and get more cantrips.
Carry multiple staffs with an different cantrips and pick a different staff during the daily preparations depending on the cantrip you need.
are there any other options?
or shouldn't I be worried about cantrips that much?

another question, can you trip a prone creature?

I made a level 6 tailed goblin ruffian rogue with the level 5 racial tail spin feat and the level 4 rogue feat the harder they fall.
tail spin
"You excel at using your tail as a weapon to upend your foes. Attempt a single Athletics check to Trip up to two adjacent creatures. If you roll a success against a target, you get a critical success against that target instead."
the harder they fall
"You make your foes fall painfully when you trip them. When you successfully Trip a flat-footed foe, your target takes 1d6 bludgeoning damage. On a critical success, the target takes 1d6 bludgeoning damage plus your sneak attack damage."

I have 2 questions about the tail spin feat.

1.how does using it count for multiple attack penalties if I try to trip 2 enemies with it?

2.Does it combine with the harder they fall level 4 rogue feat the way I think it does?
If I use tail spin against a flat footed enemy and I succeed, that success is turned into a crit and I do 1d6 bludgeoning damage +sneak damage.

I think the interrogator can have his use for the investigator.
taking charisma as 2nd stat and using social skills to support or debuffs with you roll bad for your strategem, or use a demoralize so your strategic strike would hit or crit should be quite effective.
But keeping up int and charisma would mean that dex,con or wis will suffer costing a defense.
The interrogator charisma build wouldn't combine that well with the archer I want to make right now.

I was wondering about something else
Parting shot vs archer's aim.
Both feats can help with hitting/critting a strategic strike if you know what ac you need to hit.
with parting shot giving an extra step and archer's aim helping against concelment
How redundant would taking both be?
And if you'd have to pick which one would people consider the better one?

I am trying to build an investigator.
I am considering the archer archetype because of the weapon crit that the archer archtype gives the investigator doesn´t seem to get on his own.
And the level 8 feat archer´s aim seem to be really good for the investigator.
Point blank shot feat seems like a good stance.
And the parting shot feat seems like a good action to get out melee range and get advantage at the same time.

Are there any other archer feats I should consider? Are there any good investigator feats I have overlooked?

Startin out as a level 5 or 6 character
my probable stats:
Str 10, Dex 18, Con 14, Int 19, Wis 14, Cha 10.
or
Str 10, Dex 18,con 12, Int 19, Wis 16, cha 10. on races with con/str/cha penalties
But I might swap some stats around to get cha 14 if I want to play around with more social skils.
I am not entirely sure which race or methodology I want to pick.
Alchemical sciences gives me 4 versitile vials per day (5 at level 10)
healing potions are always nice, I have no idea where I can find a good list for alchemical tools.
empiricism looks nice for being a good investigator
forensic medicine looks good fpr being an extra medic. But I think the group already has good healing options.

Level 2 is kind of iffy, but Parting Shot at 4 is nasty, automatic flat-footed against your attack... (also wow rogues would love to steal this at level 8).

I don't know that you really need a ton of spell slots for the setup - another option would be to look at archetypes that have skill feats available. As an example, you could take Medic Dedication at 2, then Doctor's Visitation and Treat Condition both at 4 since the latter is a skill feat instead of a class feat, and then you're free to take Eldritch Archer at 6.

Medic plays nice with an archer too since bows leave a hand free while not shooting for use of healing actions.

Ah yeah archtypes with skill feats, that would also work

hmm getting the spellcasting at level 4 would save me the trouble of getting it at level 8.
And the eldritch archer does seem to be lacking a breadth feat to double the spells

But the breatdth feat would only give a level 1 spell until you get the expert spellcasting feat at level 12. Not really sure if it's worth a feat before that.

Hmmm a human
level 2: sorcerer dedication
level 4: sorcerer spellcasting
level 6: some sorcerer feat
level 8: arcane archer dedication
level 9: multitalented: bardic dedication
level 10: bardic spellcasting

But I think I'd sto;; prefer taking the eldritch archer dedication feat at level 6.
having a cool 3 action arrow spell and 1 cantrip and a couple of fighter feats seems way cooler then having 2 cantrips, 1 level 1 spell and 1 level 2 spell.

At level 8 I could do a complete character revamp with level 2 multiclass or just take the eldritch archer spellcasting feat. Either way I'd end up with a level 1,2,3 spells.

Or I could just mostly ingnore spells, take eldritch archer at level 6 and enchanting arrow at level 8. perhaps take spellcasting at level 10 for true strike or haste spells

Hammerspace wrote:

I am playing a bard and I am considering to retrain my inspire competence and some other feat into the swashbuckler´s dedication and to get the one for all feat.

One for all seems to be better in most ways:
1. It's not a 'song' so it doesn't disrupt other compositions like inspired courage.
2. It's not limited to skills, so it can be used to aid an attack of an ally
3. it uses diplomacy instead of performance. Diplomacy seems more usefull to me then performance.

Ok it has 30 foot range instead of 60.
And it doesn't have the change failure into success effect.
and autocrit at legendary

Am I missing something in my analysis?

As I was also interested in Bon Mot on my bard, I did just that.

yeah I also saw that feat. It reminded me of the monkey island game.

I am trying to build an eldritch archer just for fun.
I think I'd prefer a fighter as starting class because of the better weapon proficiancy.
But the fighter doesn't seem to have that many low level archery support feats.

level 1. point blank shot
level 2. Either exacing strike or assisting shot. but neither seem that aluring to me.
Level 4. double shot
level 6: Eldritch archer dedication
level 8: so many good choices there: basic eldritch spell casting, enchanting arrow, magic arrow.
level 9: combat flexibility:flexible fighter feat :)
level 10: see level 8
level 12: expert eldritch archer spellcasting

archer fighters can be pretty good.
I would expect an archer fighter would have dex as prime stat.
So for melee he'd probably want a finesse weapon.
I don't think I have seen any 2-handed finesse weapons.
SO I'd pick a good one handed finesse weapon like the rapier. And perhaps add a shield.

There are 2 good fighter guides on the guide to guides page.
both use categories for fighter feats, it would be easy to select the fighter archer feats from there.
Tarondor's guide has a sample archer build.

I like using 2-handed hammers and flails for the prone crit effect.
Combined with the reach from grasping reach and attack of opportunity from the fighter.
Ok, getting crits might be relatively rare, but having a chance to prone a melee opponent before he can reach you is quite nice.

I am talking about inspire COMPETENCE not inspire courage.

inspire competence has target 1 ally.

I am playing a bard and I am considering to retrain my inspire competence and some other feat into the swashbuckler´s dedication and to get the one for all feat.

One for all seems to be better in most ways:
1. It's not a 'song' so it doesn't disrupt other compositions like inspired courage.
2. It's not limited to skills, so it can be used to aid an attack of an ally
3. it uses diplomacy instead of performance. Diplomacy seems more usefull to me then performance.

Ok it has 30 foot range instead of 60.
And it doesn't have the change failure into success effect.
and autocrit at legendary

Am I missing something in my analysis?

the point that I was trying to make was with normal spells
sponaneous spells are more flexible
prepared spells allow you to select a new variaty each day.
While with cantrips:
spontaneous cantrips do nothing
prepared cantrips can be reselected every day.

Making the spontaneous cantrips strickly inferior compared to prepared cantrips.

yes but there is no in the moment for cantrips

Spontaneous casters seem to be disadvantaged in how their cantrips are handled compared to the cantrips of prepared casters.
perpared casters can change their cantrips every day while spontaneous casters can only change their cantrips when they level up or spend downtime to do so.
That makes a spontaneous caster a lot less flexible then a prepared caster.

Hammerspace wrote:

I agree with your point.

Spontaneous caster archetypes seem extreme limited to me as well.
I don't think the archtypes give signature spells.
So basicly until you get bloodline breadth there are no benfits from being a spontaneous caster.
And bloodline breadth is 2 spell levels behind on your highest spell level.
So a level 8 character multiclassing to sorcerer with basic spell cast and bloodline breadth has a repetoir of 2 level 1 spells, 1 level 2 spell and 1 level 3 spell and 2 cantrips he can't change without spending downtime. And can cast 2 level 1 spells, 1 level 2 spell and 1 level 3 spell.
While his wizard counterpart can cast the same number of spells, but can choose his 2 cantrips out of 4 cantrips in his spellbook each day.
and He will have 4 levei 1 spells in his spellbook, 2 level 2 spells, and 2 level 3 spells without spending any extra money.
Having a repetoire has no meaning if you have only 1 spell per spell level.

The errata improved Spontaneous Caster Archetypes considerably.

Quote:

Page 219: Under Spellcasting Archetypes, in the Basic Spellcasting Feat, change the second sentence to “At 6th level, they grant you a 2nd-level spell slot, and if you have a spell repertoire, you can select one spell from your repertoire as a signature spell.” In the Expert Spellcasting Feat, after the first sentence, add “If you have a spell repertoire, you can select a second spell from your repertoire as a signature spell.” In the Master Spellcasting Feat, after the first sentence, add “If you have a spell repertoire, you can select a third spell from your repertoire as a signature spell.”

Spellcasting Dedication Feats (pages 222, 224, 225, and 230) In the spellcasting dedication feats, you can prepare or add to your repertoire common cantrips of your spellcasting tradition, whether from this book or other cantrips of that tradition you learn or discover.

Page 230: In the Sorcerer Dedication feat, replace the second sentence

...

oh errata that improves it a bit. Where can I find this errata?

I agree with your point.
Spontaneous caster archetypes seem extreme limited to me as well.
I don't think the archtypes give signature spells.
So basicly until you get bloodline breadth there are no benfits from being a spontaneous caster.
And bloodline breadth is 2 spell levels behind on your highest spell level.
So a level 8 character multiclassing to sorcerer with basic spell cast and bloodline breadth has a repetoir of 2 level 1 spells, 1 level 2 spell and 1 level 3 spell and 2 cantrips he can't change without spending downtime. And can cast 2 level 1 spells, 1 level 2 spell and 1 level 3 spell.
While his wizard counterpart can cast the same number of spells, but can choose his 2 cantrips out of 4 cantrips in his spellbook each day.
and He will have 4 levei 1 spells in his spellbook, 2 level 2 spells, and 2 level 3 spells without spending any extra money.
Having a repetoire has no meaning if you have only 1 spell per spell level.

Why do you say that spirit rage deals 2 damage types?
It cleary says it does positive or negative instead of normal damage.
so you only have to deal with positive or negative damage resistance while raging. And postive and negative damage resistance is relatively rare as far as I know.

When you are raging, you can increase your damage from Rage from 2 to 3 and deal negative or positive damage, instead of the normal damage type for your weapon or unarmed attack (choose each time you Rage).

I just wanted to be sure that I understand the modifications of the armored skirt correctly.
are these the right stats for the armors modified by the armored skirt?

medium
chain shirt AC +3 DEX cap 2 armor check -2 STR 14

heavy:
scale mail AC +4 DEX cap 1 armor check -3 Str 16
chain mail AC +5 DEX cap 0 armor check -3 STR 18
breastplate AC +5 DEX cap 0 armor check -3 STR 18
Halfplate AC +4 DEX cap 2 armor check -2 STR 14
Full plate AC +5 DEX cap 1 armor check -2 STR 16

How do staffs work for characters that use both spontaneous and prepared spells?
Can you use both features?

How do staffs work for characters that use both spontaneous and prepared spells?
Can you use both features?

Ok retrain the level 5 feat into something usefull while taking the level 13 feat. I am kinda used to 4th edition D&D.

Critting can be a bit random, so you're probably right about there being other usefull racial feats.

Kerobelis wrote:

With an elf I could go

STR / DEX / INT = 16
CON / CHA / WIS = 10

or as a human I could go

INT / STR = 16
DEX = 14
CON = 12
WIS / CHA = 10

Not sure which is better. Would also depend on looking at the ancestor feats (which I haven't really). I do like the idea of a half orc feral alchemist....

How did you manage to get two 16 an one 14 and a 12 as a human? Try as i may, im not able to figure out how. Or maybe im just dumb...

I think like this:

Lots of responses, good idea's and some minor derailment.
I wasn't expeciting this much :)
the shapeshifting staff seems like an interesting item. But I'm pretty sure my GM would rule against that one. I think I would rule against it if I was the GM unless the player made a really good case and the other players agree. No spellcasting with a staff when it's shaped like a sword.

a small question, can you put true strike in a level 2 or higher slot?

most races have their racial weapon feats.
level 1: easier access to racial weapons.
level 5: crits
level 13: proficiancy equal to highest proficiacy.

at first I thought that only the level 1 feat might be usefull for fighters.
But then looked more carefully at how fighters work.
at level 5 the fighters picks a weapon type and gets mastery with that one.
And gains the ability to get the crit special from weapons he mastered.

So if I understand the rules correctly and I want to play a fighter that likes to swap weapons there is good value in the level 5 and 13 weapon feats.

If I want to play an elven fighter that specializes in swords, but still likes to use a bow, he can take the level 1 and level 5 feat so he can also crit with the bow.
at level 13 I can replace the level 5 feat with the level 13 feat and become legendary with all my racial weapons.(removing the need for the level 5 feat)

I am thinking about creating a fighter with the wizard archetype.
Using the staff of divination to cast true strike when needed.
level 2 wizard dedication
level 4 basic wizard spell casting
level 6 basic arcana (not quite sure which wizard feat, probably familiar)
level 8 advanced arcana: bespell weapon.

I'm not sure which weapon would work best, thinking about the gnomish flickmace.
using my 3rd level spell to charge the staff of divination should allow me to cast true strike 7 times a day. 1 from wizard, 6 from the charged staff.

would this build work?
or am I sacrificing to many class feats for a limited use trick?

Somatic components don't require a free hand. Only material components do.

So are there any spells where a bard actually needs to use a musical instrument?

btw what kind of armor are you using?
chain or studded leather would require str 12 or you'll get an armor check penalty.
Or do you plan on wearing leather?

How do you combine shield whip and instrument? or aren't you planning to cast any spells requiring somatic or material components?

I am trying to build a bard myself, and trying to figure out how place my stats.

Have been playing in Plaguestone with a Bomber in my party.

Your concerns are very valid
Because the alchemist has no equivalent to cantrips, our alchemist has always run out of resources before the boss fights, so you need something you can do on lead up combats not using bombs for minor combats
The bomb damage does not get any stat boost to damage so it is way below normal combat effectiveness.
The alchemist bombs special effects generally only apply on critical hits, so all the bombs tend to do is a little damage.
Our alchemist has not used any of the other smoke sticks etc so don’t know how effective they are.
I have to rate the alchemist as borderline ineffective and you have a real risk of not contributing effectively
If you played Alchemists in first edition you need to forget everything you know and play with a very open mind
Good luck!

I think the rules claim that splash damage is to make up for not doing any stat damage. Being able to do some damage even on a miss and to the area of the target.

But how many combat rounds are there in an average adventure day?
btw can you just throw bombs at a specific floor tile to do just splash damage (and is that effective enough?)(or the deafening effect of a thunderstone.

I think frost vial and acid flask are likely to be my choices for perputual infusions.

Your analysis isn't going to help much unless you also know how the enemy ACs scale with level or compare it to other classes.

I think it's generally agreed that alchemist damage doesn't scale well relative to enemy ACs or other classes. I've only seen a little bit personally but I more or less agree.

If you're looking for a combat monster, I don't think alchemist bomber is a good choice.

If you're looking for an okay combatant who is full of skills and fits into almost any party (I like this last bit for PFS play because I never know what the party will be like), it's a fine choice. Every once in a while, you get those "a single thunderstone would be epic right now" moments and your alchemist gets to shine.

I was planning to make a comparing list for the fighting classes to hit and the casters

I am not looking for a combat monster. But I like to have a character that can give a usefull contribution to the group.

Things I am slightly worried about: no cantrips until level 7
So how limited are reagents as a resource?
I have no idea how long combats will last or how many combats per day is usual.
SO what should be my combat action when I run out of bombs?
Pick up a weapon/ multiclass wizard at level 2 for cantrips?

How usefull are bombs compared to what my party members can do.
WHat other kind of alchemical items can be usefull for the party.(smoke sticks, poisons)
Should I give poisons to my allies or poison their weapons before combat.(since their to hit will most likely be better then mine)

Alchemist goggles help with bombs too. +1 at level 4, for 100gp.

I'm pretty sure item bonuses don't stack.

No Idea why I added 10, I guess I shouldn't post stuff when I don't have time to properly do think them through.
Hmm I can't seem to edit my old post.

So their to hit bonus is 3dex +2 trained+level+item bonus
level 1 6 dex 3 + trained 2
level 2 7
level 3 9 dex 3 + 1 item + trained 2
level 4 10
level 5 12 dex 4 + 1 item + trained 2
level 6 13
level 7 16 dex 4+ 1 item + expert 4
level 8 17
level 9 18
level 10 19
level 11 21 dex 4+ 2 item + expert 4
level 12 22
level 13 23
level 14 24
level 15 26 dex 5+ 2 item + expert 4
level 16 27
level 17 29 dex 5+ 3 item + expert 4
level 18 30
level 19 31
level 20 32

I will be playing in a new pathfinder 2 campaign starting at level 1 and I am considering playing an alchemist.

There are a couple of things I am wondering about concerning the alchemist.
But first my analysis of the alchemist

from a mechanical point of view alchemist are effectively casters with a slighly different flavor.
They get int+level reagents per day
So that's 5 reagents at level 1.
So potentially 10 'perpared spells' with advanced alchemy
or 6 advanced alchemy items and 2 quick alchemy uses later
or 5 quick alchemy uses.

Alchemists get their 'cantrip' at level 7 (perpetual infusions)

Alchemists use dex to make their bomb attacks.
So their to hit bonus is 10+ 3dex +2 trained+level+item bonus
level 1 16 dex 3 + trained 2
level 2 17
level 3 19 dex 3 + 1 item + trained 2
level 4 20
level 5 22 dex 4 + 1 item + trained 2
level 6 23
level 7 26 dex 4+ 1 item + expert 4
level 8 27
level 9 28
level 10 29
level 11 31 dex 4+ 2 item + expert 4
level 12 32
level 13 33
level 14 34
level 15 36 dex 5+ 2 item + expert 4
level 16 37
level 17 39 dex 5+ 3 item + expert 4
level 18 40
level 19 41
level 20 42

Not quite finished I'll add to this post later