HobgoblinLiker13's page

I just really love oddball magic items, especially oddball magic items that are used for wacky shenanigans, so I figured I'd create a thread devoted to oddball magic items we've used for wacky shenanigans.

I'll start with one I haven't used yet - a frying pan with the Authorized and Flaming runes that I want my Changeling Bard Character (whose two major themes are cooking and the Cthulhu Mythos) wants to get. However, while this may not seem wacky on its own, the "wacky" part is that she doesn't even like using it for combat, instead she uses it almost exclusively to cook and has the Authorized rune on it because it's hers and she doesn't want anyone touching it.

I know it's not as out there as a lot of other people's ideas but I like it a lot.

Okay, so for those of you who don't remember my original post - which will be most of you by now - I made a few months ago talking about my plans to convert from Pathfinder 1E over to 2E and asking for advice on a character concept I was working on.

This character was at the time a Human Sorcerer with the Changeling Versatile Heritage, Aberrant Bloodline, and Cook Background, along with the Veil May Ancestry feat. I originally intended to use my skill increases to boost Deception up to Expert, Occultism to Master, and Cooking Lore and Society to legendary.

I won't go out and list all the feats I originally intended to pick up because, aside from Sorcerer class feats, they're mostly but not entirely the same and thus the list I'll provide later on will be just as good.

Now, I got a lot of feedback. The primary recommendation was to pick a new background and pick up Cooking Lore at a later date with the Additional Lore feat, which was a really good suggestion. Other suggestions included changing class from Sorcerer to Witch because Witches use Intelligence as their primary spellcasting attribute whereas Sorcerers use Charisma, and most of my character's skills would be Intelligence-based, and picking up several other lores related to cooking rather than directly buffing Cooking Lore.

Now, of course, I got distracted because I taking two classes at Community College over the summer, however I recently returned to the character concept, and while I'll only really be implementing the first suggestion, I've had a lot of time to think about the character concept and make a few changes of my own.

Now, the realization that prompted this change was that while I did have an overtly Lovecraftian character concept, that didn't necessarily necessitate going only for overtly Lovecraftian character options...

So now, my new build for this character concept, while still a Human Veil May Changeling, is now a Bard with the Teacher background instead of a Sorcerer with the Cook background. She starts off with the Enigma Muse and I intend to use the Multufarious Muse Feat to pick up the Polymath Muse as well, because her muse is the Great Race of Yith.

The skills I intend to get up to Legendary are Cooking Lore, Elder Mythos Lore, Occultism, Performance, and Society. Some people may be confused as to the shift from Sorcerer to Bard and Deception to Performance, however I realized that literally the only way I intended to use Deception was for disguises, and the Polymath Muse allows me to use Perfomance for that instead, so since Performance was a heartbreaking last cut from the original Sorcerer build, I might as well use it instead for the Bard build.

I intend to grab the Seasoned feat at 2nd Level and use Additional Lore to grab Cooking Lore at 3rd Level, and pull something similar with Elder Mythos Lore at 6th Level and Disturbing Knowledge at 7th Level. I also intend to pick up Fascinating Performance, Aura Sight, Unmistakable Lore, Quick Disguise, Doublespeak, Legendary Linguist, and Legendary Professional.

I will end by stating that, since Legendary Professional makes you known throughout the land for your Legendary Lore Skills and my character's Legendary Lore Skills are Cooking Lore and Elder Mythos Lore, my character would either be known throughout the land for both her cooking skills and vast array of terrible forbidden knowledge or be sought out by Cthulhu Mythos cults and entities for her cooking skills and I'm not sure which option is funnier. I like this character a lot.

Okay, so I missed this last time I took a look at the Additional Lore feat, but in the text it plainly says "3rd, 7th, and 15th levels, you gain an additional skill increase you can apply only to the chosen Lore subcategory"

This very neatly solves the difficulties I was having with a recent build I was talking about in another post, where I wanted to make my Aberrant Bloodline Changeling Sorcerer a master chef, but difficulties arose because I also needed her to be very proficient in Deception, Occultism, and Society.

However, I do have a less important rules question:

Let's say I'm 10th Level and I want to take Additional Lore. Do I get retroactive skill increases for 3rd and 7th Level, or only the 15th Level skill increase?

So I've been very slowly but surely adapting to second edition, and since sorcerer is my favorite class, I figured my first character would be a Sorcerer.

You can see me discussing her in other threads, but these are mostly irrelevant to this highly specific thing that I won't get access to til like 19th Level.

Basically, one idea I had, is to use one of the spells I get from the Crossblooded Evolution/Greater Crossblooded Evolution Feats on my 10th Level spell list in order to take both Alter Reality and Primal Phenomenon.

I do understand that these are the Occult and Primal equivalents to Wish, respectively, and they're redundant for spells below 7th Level, however I only get one 10th Level spell per day, so it doesn't feel like too much of a sacrifice compared to the increased flexibility and roleplay opportunities it offers.

What do y'all think?

Edit: Initially I chose Alter Reality and Miracle but after revisiting the spell list there was an incredible amount of overlap in Occult and Divine spells at 8th and 9th Level.

Okay, so I've been sticking with 1E for awhile now, but recently I decided to dip my toes into 2E.

I have not bought any books yet but I used aonprd as a resource.

Anyways, this is the outline for a PC I came up with, please let me know what you think.

Class: Aberrant Sorcerer
Ancestry: Human (Changeling Versatile Heritage)
Background: Cook
Starting Feats: Seasoned (Background Feat)Veil May (Ancestry Feat), Lie to Me (from Veil May)

I intend to use the skill increases to get Cooking Lore and Society up to Legendary, Occultism up to Master, and Deception up to Expert, and to pick up the Disturbing Knowledge, Legendary Linguist, and Legendary Professional feats among numerous others associated with these skills.

For Ancestry feats, I plan on going with Mist Child and Invoke the Elements, then using the 13th Level and 17th Level Ancestry feats to grab Advanced General Training for skillmonkeying.

For sorcerer feats, I'm definitely planning on picking out the Ancestral Blood Magic, Crossblooded Evolution, Ancestral Mage, Spell Shroud for the combo with Mist Child, and the Greater Crossblooded Evolution feats.

Am I doing it right or did I really mess up somehow?

P.S. I know the Hag Bloodline is a thing. Not going with it was deliberate.

Okay so Paladin is actually a class I really like.

I know a lot of people don't and that's fine, but I think Paladins can be a lot of fun if you play them right.

And I think the dynamic of a Paladin from a traditionally evil race such as Goblins, Drow, or Deep One Hybrids could produce some very very interesting roleplay.

So, with that being said, tell me about your monstrous-race Paladins.

I for one a Hobgoblin Holy Guide Paladin of Sarenrae. I haven't figured out much about her yet, but mechanics-wise she's mostly focused on Dex and Cha, with the Authoritative alternate race trait and Dervish Dance feat at 3rd level. I intend to play her as a very kind, yet firm maternal sort of character who obviously loves and cares for those around her but doesn't take any s$@!.

Okay so I know I'm usually asking for advice in posts like this, but I'm doing something a little different today.

See, I'm a transgender woman, and I kinda wanted to create a little thread where we can talk about trans stuff in our Pathfinder games.

I don't keep up with much of the lore for the iconics, but I know Paizo are super queer-positive and at least one iconic is trans.

I regularly incorporate trans themes into my games and characters not only cos I'm trans but also cos all of my friends are trans and it's fun for them too.

There are several canonical ways of transitioning in my campaign setting, including a feat that basically makes you able to gender swap at will. In addition, several major NPCs are trans women.

A lot of the characters I make with the intention of playing one day are also trans. My personal favorite is a Tiefling Alchemist who uses her alchemy knowledge to make her own HRT.

What about y'all?

Okay, so basically I had this idea for this good-leaning neutral aligned campaign where the PCs are a group of hobgoblin deserters on the run from their former comrades.

However, I don't want the entire adventure to just be them going to a place, encountering a band of people sent to capture or kill them, fighting them, leaving, and then rinse and repeat.

While this may get easier when my players introduce their characters, I would still prefer to have some other story hooks ready just in case.

Does anyone have any ideas? I would really really appreciate some!

I'm currently working on a crossblooded sorcerer character concept that's a hybrid of the Aberrant and Draconic Bloodlines.

At first level, this character is a human with the Mixed Heritage, Heart of the Fields, and Heart of the Streets alternate racial traits, the Affable and Courageous traits, the Rugged Northerner feat, and the Claws bloodline power.

I am unsure whether to go with the Gold or Red Dragon Bloodline, however they're mechanically identical so it doesn't really matter.

However, I'm not sure which Bloodline Powers to pick up after first level. I am definitely going to be picking up Alien Resistance, however I am unsure to go with Dragon Scales at 3rd Level, Breath Weapon at 9th Level, and Aberrant Form at 20th Level or Long Limbs at 3rd Level, Unusual Anatomy at 9th Level, and Power of Wyrms at 20th Level.

I kinda was wondering if I could get some input on which one of these two pathways would be better, as well as some feat suggestions for the character?

Okay,so I apologize if this isn't as cohesive or specific as my builds usually are, but this idea has been bouncing around in my head all day.

The race isn't actually important so long as you get a bonus to Dexterity, Intelligence, or Charisma and don't get a penalty to any of them, I just chose Hobgoblin cos they're my favorite race.

For traits, I went with Savage and Talented and I replaced Sneaky with an alternate racial trait - either Authoritative, Battle-Hardened, Engineer, or Fearsome, though this is the least important part of the build.

For stats, the first priority is Intelligence, followed by Charisma, then Dexterity, then Constitution, then Strength, with Wisdom as the dump stat.

For feats, six of them (well, technically seven cos I'm taking one of them twice) are essential to the build. These are Weapon Finesse, Dervish Dance, Skill Focus (Knowledge [Nature]), Eldritch Heritage (Stormborn Bloodline), Improved Eldritch Heritage (Stormborn Bloodline), and Greater Eldritch Heritage (Stormborn Bloodline).

It's worth noting that, while Dervish Dance applies your Dex modifier to damage rolls as well as attack rolls, Weapon Finesse does not, so your damage output will be impacted by your low strength until you pick up Dervish Dance. In addition, I am aware that at 5th level, the magus can use their arcane pool to mimic the effects of shocking and shocking burst, and it last longer usong this method than the bloodline power, thus rendering Stormborn bloodline's Thunderstaff ability may seem redundant to some people. I personally see this more as giving them a little bit of extra juice as a baseline they can always squeeze out of their sword even when completely out of arcane points.

For feats that aren't essential but which I might take, I'm considering Cosmopolitan for Knowledge (Engineering) and Survival, Deepsight for the boost to Darkvision, Elemental Spell (Electricity) for flavor, Persuasive if I decide to go with the Authoritative alternate racial trait, and Weapon Focus (Scimitar) for obvious reasons.

As always, feel free to alter and use this build however you so please if you think it's cool and want to use it in your campaign.

If anyone likes, dislikes, has commentary about, or especially has feat recommendations for this build I am eager to hear them.

Okay, so this game is fundamentally a fantasy game about escapism, however this particular post is literally nothing but pure escapism.

For context, this post is coming from a place of me having an incredibly intense depressive episode because of the real life real world news, and wishing I were this larger-than life fantasy character in a magical world where I could actually do something about all the horrible s#~# going on in the world. It is coming from a place of intense frustration and mental anguish and is pure, distilled, undiluted escapism.

With that being said - if you could be a level 20 Pathfinder 1E Character, what race and class would you want to be - in addition (optionally), what traits/feats would you like to have?

Okay, so here's a bit of a weird one

Basically, the idea is a NG cleric with the Darkness and Knowledge domains.

HOWEVER, I am not aware of any gods which grant that alignment/domain combination.

So basically my idea is this - my character worships a being known as the Gloomfather, a LG god with the domains of Darkness, Good, Knowledge, Law, and Travel - but the catch is that nobody has heard of the Gloomfather other than my Cleric.

My cleric still gets her spells when she prays to the Gloomfather every morning, but nobody really knows what's going on there - I figure that'd be a good plot hook for the GM if I ever get to play this character.

Feats I'm considering taking for this build include:
Martial Weapon Proficiency for the Gloomfather's "favored weapon", since he may not be real
Eldritch Heritage - either Umbral or Vestige
Disconcerting Knowledge

What do y'all think of this ide? Is it any good? Do you have any suggestions?

Okay, so yesterday I had an idea for a fighter build centered around Draconic Eldritch Heritage. The character concept was originally a character that's the emissary/indirect "hand" of a good-aligned blue dragon (in fact, the same one I talked about in a separate post), however I not only endorse but encourage you to create your own version of this build with any alterations to the mechanics or flavor of this character that you want.

Race: Hobgoblin (Engineer Alternate Racial Trait)
1st Level:
Feats - Catch Off-Guard, Skill Focus (Perception)
2nd Level:
Class Features - Bravery +1
Feats - Throw Anything
3rd Level
Class Features - Armor Training 1
Feats - Eldritch Heritage (Draconic Bloodline [Blue] - Claws)
4th Level
Feats - Weapon Focus (Claw)
5th Level
Class Features - Weapon Training (Natural +1)
Feats - Weapon Specialization (Claw)
6th Level
Class Features - Bravery +2
Feats - Rending Claws
7th Level
Class Features - Armor Training 2
Feats - Vital Strike
8th Level
Feats - Improvised Weapon Mastery
9th Level
Class Features - Weapon Training (Natural +2, Hammers +1)
Feats - Greater Weapon Focus
10th Level
Class Features - Bravery +3
Feats - Critical Focus
11th Level
Class Features - Armor Training 3
Feats - Improved Eldritch Heritage (Draconic Bloodline [Blue] - Draconic Resistances)
12th Level
Feats - Greater Weapon Specialization
13th Level
Class Features - Weapon Training (Natural +3, Hammers +2, Thrown +1)
Feats - Penetrating Strike
14th Level
Class Features - Bravery +4
Feats - Improved Vital Strike
15th Level
Class Features - Armor Training 4
Feats - Staggering Critical
16th Level
Feats - Greater Penetrating Strike
17th Level
Class Features - Weapon Training (Natural +4, Hammer +3, Thrown +2, Light Blades +1)
Feats - Bleeding Critical
18th Level
Class Features - Bravery +5
Feats - Greater Vital Strike
19th Level
Class Features - Armor Mastery
Feats - Deepsight
20th Level
Class Features - Weapon Mastery (Claw)
Feats - Critical Mastery

Now, at the core of this build are the surprisingly impressive claw attacks granted by the Draconic Bloodline. However, there are two major issues.

Firstly, there's the limitation to the number of time the ability can be used; secondly, there's the fact that natural weapons cannot be enchanted. I came up with a workaround for both.

The solution for the first problem is honestly a stroke of genius - Catch Off-Guard, Throw Anything, and Improvised Weapon Mastery are incredibly fun feats, but they don't see nearly as much use at higher levels - but when we combine it with our Draconic heritage, we create a fighting style where we use our limited-use claw attacks as our primary weapon, then grap whatever's nearby and use it to completely wallop any remaining enemies.

The solution to the second problem is a lot more inelegant and brute force. Basically, if the claws can't be enchanted, then we must simply find a nonmagical means of making them do as much damage as possible. This is the point of the Weapon Focus/Specialization feat chain, the Vital Strike feat chain, the Penetrating Strike feat chain, Rending Claws, and the four Critical feats. A neat side benefit to this is that Vital Strike and the Critical Feats can continue to be used even after we run out of uses for our claw attacks.

Lastly, the reason I chose Deepsight was because I wanted to create a character that was a bit more well-rounded instead of just having one gimmick (the unique fighting style). It's honestly pretty meaningless and replaceable but I like it.

Sorcerer is my favorite class, and I gotta say a huge part of the reason why is the bloodlines.

The sheer variety of different abilities and options, all with their own mostly-unique heritages and mechanics to go with them leave me starstruck in a way few other classes can match.

That being said, while I find myself charmed and drawn in by the flavor of most bloodlines, some do stand head and shoulders above others in my assessment.

My top 5 Bloodlines would have to be

1) Aberrant - One of the three big authors who primarily shaped the way I interact with fantasy, science fiction, and horror literature is Howard Phillips Lovecraft. Since I was young, I have held an intense fascination with misshapen otherness and things that should not be. The Aberrant Bloodline embodies these ideas perfectly so there's no way it's not going to the top of the list.

2) Vestige - Since I was an incredibly small child, I have always been obsessed with the distant past. Hidden away in the Blood of the Ancients Player Companion lies the perfect bloodline to bring that past to life. Also, even if one ignores the ancient past thing, having your own mindscape is just badass.

3) Draconic - Okay, I promise not all of these Bloodlines will just be "oh I really liked this thing since I was a kid so that's why this is one of my favorites" but out of the three that are, this one is actually the most so. When I was a kid, I was obsessed with dragons. I had dragon books, dragon paintings, dragon shirts, dragon stuffed animals - everything and I do mean everything was about dragons. Now, I've cooled it with the dragons by a lot but I still love them and they hold a special place in my heart.

4) Boreal - I know this is gonna be a controversial pick, cos from my admittedly limited understanding, common consensus is the Boreal Bloodline is hot garbage, and while I agree it isn't the most powerful, it is the most cohesive cold/winter-themed Bloodline in Pathfinder, and it's also got some genuinely really cool abilities (pun intended). There are a lot of things that feel magical about winter and about the extreme north and south of our world, and it seems downright tragic to me that I was born just in time to watch this magic fade.

5) Impossible - This one is a bit harder to pin down on why exactly I like it and what's so cool about it. I was immediately grabbed by the Relativity bloodline power, but even outside of that, the Impossible Bloodline is just full of weird and quirky s%!~ that does fit together in a cohesive manner but at the same time is strangely hard to describe. The name, I suppose, is fitting.

Now that I've explained what my favorite Bloodlines are and why, what are your favorite Bloodlines? Why do you like them so much?

I don't know what it is, but there's something about me that really, really genuinely loves creating good aligned characters from traditionally evil races.

I don't know whether it's my political leanings (which I will not talk about cos I don't want to start an argument), my naive desire to see good in everyone, or my general love of subversion, inversion, and deconstruction of widely held societal ideas, but I just love taking a traditionally evil creature and making a good version of it.

Now, this brings me to the actual point of this post. Blue dragons are my favorite Chromatic dragon, and I wanted to share this love with my players by having them potentially run into a Benevolent blue dragon who could potentially be an invaluable ally (I'm more of an open world sandbox DM).

Now, I've got her character mostly figured out, however I still think it'd be good to ask the internet for tips on how to portray a blue dragon who is also a genuinely good person. Like what are some ways we could recontextualize her blue dragon nature with a Lawful Good alignment or have her blue dragon-ness slip through? What kind of events would even lead to a blue dragon reconsidering her life choices and deciding to become good?

I'd love to hear your suggestions.

Okay, so Pathfinder 1E was my first TTRPG ever. I love it so much and know most of the base game books like the back of my hand.

However, even a person as stubborn as me can see when the times are changing, and while I don't like the artstyle for Pathfinder 2E, a lot of the races and feats and stuff seem legitimately really cool.

In addition, it looks like 2E will get a surge in players due to WotC's OGL shenanigans meaning I have a chance to actually play in a game instead of DMing like I literally always have to for my friends even though I know I suck at it (for some reason they disagree but I can't even do voices ffs)

However, there is still an issue - I have a character idea that I really really want to play, but this character is very heavily rooted in the rules of 1E.

This character is a Crossblooded Sorcerer with the Maestro and Aberrant Bloodlines, plus a dip into Eldritch Heritage for some Impossible Bloodline powers.

The character is heavily inspired by the video game Control, and in 1E, I intend on taking the 1st, 3rd, and 9th Level powers of the Maestro Bloodline, the 15th and 20th level powers of the Aberrant Bloodline, and using Eldritch Heritage to scoop up the 1st, 9th, and 15th level powers of the Impossible Bloodline.

Is there any way to convert this character to 2E while still retaining most of their abilities?

Okay, so considering my username, it's honestly surprising how long it took me to make a post about my favorite race in the game...

However, the time has come. This will be the first of hopefully many Hobgoblinposts from me.

Anyways, for my next game I want to play a good-aligned Hobgoblin Sorcerer, but I'm kinda stumped on what Bloodline they should be.

I want one that would make sense, flavor-wise, for a Hobgoblin who was born and raised in a fairly typical Hobgoblin society.

I do not care about optimization, I care primarily about flavor. I want something that would make sense.

It's also worth noting that I plan on taking an alternate racial trait in place of Sneaky, so if you want to do something with that, I'm using the Engineer alternate racial trait in its place.

Okay, so recently I had an idea for a truly bizarre Pathfinder character.

They are a Kitsune Crossblooded Sorcerer with the Aberrant and Vestige Bloodlines and the Gruesome Shapechanger feat.

I intend their backstory dark but not particularly edgy, but I haven't figured out the details quite yet. I'm planning to take the First, Third, and Fifteenth level powers from the Vestige Bloodline and the Ninth and Twentieth level powers from the Aberrant Bloodline.

However, I don't really know how to flavor them. Does anyone have any advice?

Exactly what it says in the title. What feats are your favorite?

Honestly I really like Cosmopolitan. It's an excellent way to make your characters a bit more flexible while also giving you two free bonus languages.

Empath is also fun if you're running an Occult game, and you can never go wrong with Skill Focus.

Splintering Weapon has limited utility at higher levels, but is really fun for lower level characters and can be a nasty surprise for the PCs when a Villainous NPC has it.

Noble Scion and Racial Heritage can be great for flavor, though I honestly dislike how the latter is limited to humans.

Gruesome Shapechanger is also really, really neat, though unfortunately it is incredibly situational and, being a horror adventures feat, is better for enemies than players. The same cannot be said for my second favorite Horror Adventures feat, Disconcerting Knowledge, which is much better for PCs than monsters in addition to having amazing flavor and can really feel like a "Oh how the tables have turned" moment if pulled off right.

When it comes to metamagic, I really like Elemental Spell. It has limited utility but a lot of flavor and can be amazing in some specific situations.

I also remember really liking a bunch of Story Feats from Ultimate Campaign but I forgot most of them.

Unfortunately, even though Hobgoblins are my favorite race, most of their feats are rather disappointing. The whip fighting feat chain (Demoralizing Lash, Taskmaster, and Terrorizing Dislpay) is decent mechanically, but incredibly narrow and only really fits with a specific build. In addition, flavor-wise it'd be a better fit for a BBEG than a PC, which kinda annoys me in this particular instance because the Advanced Race Guide felt more geared towards Players than Horror Adventures or even Ultimate Combat did.

Honestly my favorite Hobgoblin feat is the Teamwork Feat Spirit of the Corps, which was introduced in the Monster Codex but honestly feels better suited for PCs than the Hobgoblin feats introduced in the Advanced Race Guide AND doesn't require you to be a Hobgoblin to take it.