Kiesman's page

I'm interested in seeing what can be come up with in terms of two players building characters specifically to work in tandem with each other with perfect synergy.

For the most part, I'm looking for interesting and unique sets of builds. The obvious answer is "Outflank" rogues, but that's not interesting or unique.

What have you got, Advice forum?

(P.S. Bonus points for using very few or no teamwork feats at all)

I'm building a Pack Master hunter for one of my games who won't be doing basically any fighting on his own (to prevent bogging down combat on my turns -- it will be worked into the character personality), and I am 100% going to be using an Ankylosaurus as one of my companions because it is my absolute favourite dinosaur.

However, I have no idea what to take a second animal companion to go along with it. What would compliment it well? Something with reach? Something small and high DPS? Or something beefy with lots of Hitpoints since Anky here has a high AC but only a +1 Con bonus? Perhaps something with a ranged option?

On a side note, how do I make my Ankylosaurus have more survivability? Sure it will be hard to hit, but once it GETS hit, it only has... 36 HP at level 7? That's a stiff breeze.

I don't need help building the PC (feats, skills etc), but if there's feats for the PC that will help, feel free to suggest.

Hi all!

I've created a sheet for Game Masters who like to immerse their players further in the game, by not tipping them off with a request for Perception rolls or Sense Motive rolls.

HERE!

Ask your players if they'd like to 'take 10' by default on Perception and Sense Motive situations. If they do, you're done here. If not, have them roll 6 times for each and record the results, then as the GM you can roll a simple d6 to determine (secretly) if they found that hidden door, or noticed that trap, or felt intuitively that the in-disguise BBEG was lying to their face!

It's not for everyone, but it cuts down on everyone shouting "I search the room!" every single room, and I made it for myself so I thought I'd share it.

I have a challenge, which relates to a build I want to play but cannot figure out.

A character who's main ability in combat is using non-standard weaponry and tools such as alchemist fire, fireworks, and other similar items.

Likely this will be an alchemist, I realize... But I want to see what people can come up with to optimize non-class-feature alchemical weapons and tools.

I'm wondering if anyone has or knows of an index-card (3x5 inches) character sheet for Pathfinder. I've found one for D&D 5e (which I find a lot of cool stuff for when looking for Pathfinder stuff).

Our group has gotten fairly large, but our game tables haven't so I'm trying to find ways to conserve table real estate. I was thinking of picking up one of those two-ring Index Card binders and figuring a way to fit it all into there.

In a campaign where the players have access to large-city level item availability and purchasing, what can you do to make a trading post interesting?

Not only this, one player in the party has an encyclopedic knowledge of almost everything Pathfinder, and another has a pretty good knowledge of items.

So, I've never really played a caster, especially one that uses a familiar. However, playing last night with my Bloodrager I got a boon that allows me to take a specific special familiar as an Improved Familiar option at 7th level.

I thought "This is so cool!" even if it isn't the most mechanically optimized, and remade my future character plans to incorporate it (Iron Will, Familiar Bond, Improved Familiar).

However, looking at the familiar I get... Both the feats it start with do nothing on a Familiar (Improved Initiative + Toughness), since familiar's HP is 1/2 the master's, and work off the master's initiative roll.

I tried to do some research into the matter, but I can't find any options that would work for replacing those familiar feats, if it's even possible?

Please advise.

I need some advice. A while back, I created an adventure play-order for my first attempt at DMing, HERE, and it has been going well. I've changed up some of the modules, but now the PCs are getting close to finishing 3rd level and I've realized... Shattered Star book 1 starts at 1st level.

How do you go about adapting an AP book that starts at 1st level, for 4th level PCs? Should I skim over the first parts and just have them start near the part where the book assumes they would be 4th level?

I'd planned to make the Shattered Star shards a key plot point in the story I'd fabricated and I'm not sure what to do now.

I've been trying to figure out what classes/archetypes/feat options would give me a character with the most possible expendable resource points (eg. Ki points, Power Points, Grit/Panache etc).

I want to try to make a character that just spams the use of their Ki powers or whatever relevant ability in combat, with a large variety of different effects.

I looked at the Qinggong Monk, as well as Ninja options as it seems Ki Points are the most likely to be what I'll be going for, but I'm wondering if anyone has other options? Multiclassing etc is 100% okay, as long as the character can still be at least medium powered.

Thanks!

EDIT: No Gestalt or Variant Multiclassing options please.

Hello friends,

I've been looking at the Instructor Wizard archetype as I have a silly idea for a character in a home game (two Kobolds in a trenchcoat using disguise and illusion magic), and I was trying to determine which Teamwork feats are worth using with this archetype.

I started looking at the ones like "Share Spells" and "Special Delivery" and then... I realized that you give up the familiar requirements to take those feats.

What Teamwork feats would be worth taking with this archetype?

Hi there,

I'm creating one of those "campaign websites" for the game I'm running (for consolidating my campaign data for players to access) and I've been trying to see if I can embed a couple of the forums in an iFrame so that they can be logged into and accessed off my campaign site (specifically the Rules Questions and Advice forums). However, I just can't get it to go through.

I know this used to be possible, but with recent site changes has this been disabled? If so, I'll just provide links to the respective forums but it would be nice to embed it.

Thanks!

Hi all! I was following the thread about getting as many skills off of one attribute as possible, Here, and I decided I wanted to build something like this for my local group. I decided to go with the Empiricist Investigator 3 build, and go with Inspired Blade Swashbuckler and the Elven Combat Style chain to get my Int to damage.

I've come up with two options for the build and need advice on what you guys think will be the best progression; Skills first or Combat first?

I feel like waiting until 9 to get the rest of my skills to Int is gimping the whole build idea, but also waiting until at least 4 or 5 to be effective in combat will be detrimental in general. On the other hand, I get extracts until that point.

What do you think?

EDIT: I just realized that this is now the THIRD topic discussing a similar build, and I apologize for that. I probably should have just posted this in the original thread as a build idea.

If one were to make a comparison to say that Absalom is kind of like the ancient Rome of Golarion (center of trade and the world and all that jazz), what would you compare some of the other larger cities to?

Specifically wondering about Kaer Maga, but leaving it open ended for further discussion.

I have a build concept I've been thinking about that I'd like some advice on.

The idea is to be sort of a passive buffing tactician, with as many at-will (as in not uses-per-day) abilities to help in this. It started out with me wanting to use the Orc Hornbow and researching the Ranger archetypes, coming across the Freebooter.

So, here's the build I came up with:

Tactician Ranger
Human?
Freebooter Ranger 5/Holy Tactician Paladin 3/Medium 2

(Ranger 1, Freebooter's Bane)
1a. Point Blank Shot
1b. Precise Shot
(Medium 2, Champion Spirit, Shared Seance for Seance Boon to party)
2. Exotic Weapon prof: Orc Hornbow
3. Deadly Aim
(Paladin 3, Weal's Champion, Tactical Acumen, Battlefield Presence)
5. Far Shot?
6. Outflank (probably)
(Ranger 2-5, Freebooter's Bond, Freebooter's Bane +2)
7a. Vital Strike
7b. Focused Shot
9. Improved Critical?

The idea is that I use most of my move actions to give Freebooter's Bane or Freebooter's Bond to my allies, and at the beginning of the day we all share a Seance for +2 to non-magical damage. This way I'm helping everyone out with increased damage and giving them Outflank with no listed duration, and I can do decent damage with the Orc Hornbow and Vital Strike.

I'm open to any suggestions that might be offered, the only thing I'm pretty set on is the Freebooter Ranger part of the build.

As the title says, I want to specialize in casting Lightning Bolt, as a Theologian Cleric (Lightning Domain)

Some background:
My group of friends is playing the Iron Gods campaign, and I had a Dwarf Warpriest (that I hated) for while in it. For reasons, I was unable to join the sessions for 7 whole levels. They're now at 15th level and are allowing me to rebuild my character, so I've decided to rebuild as a Theologian Cleric who's focused on Lightning Bolt.

My plan was to make use of feats like Spell Perfection, Preferred Spell, etc to maximize my usage of Lightning Bolt, filling most of my spell slots with it to be a battle cleric (Sort of based on Dark Souls miracles). I'm just having a lot of trouble wrapping my head around the different metamagic feats and which ones to take.

I would love some help with this build, thanks!

I'll be running my first game of Pathfinder soon, and I was wanting to make a chart of important data about each player's characters to have on-hand on my side of the screen for quick reference.

What would you all consider as the most important data to have? I know initiative and AC would be good, as well as perception and saves. What else should I have?

I'm playing in a campaign set in Cheliax as members of a resistance, and I've got this idea for if my current character dies: A Diabolist (PrC) that has come to realize the atrocities of the Empire and has to fight against his upbringing and addiction to devil summoning while fighting back against the Empire.

I was thinking of being a Human conjuration (Infernal Binder subschool) Wizard, focused less on the Summon Monster side of things and more on the support abilities side of things. I would probably take Transmutation and Necromancy as my opposition schools.

The main things I guess I'll need help with are...Well, the biggest issue I'm seeing is that it will be hard to be properly effective having the levels and abilities of the Diabolist without using them often or for evil purposes. So which spells/feats to use, to help me release or steal control of already bound devils, while still being effective in combat?

I'm going to be starting a new home campaign soon and my DM has declared official Paizo content only. My friend is going to be playing a healer (of some sort, undecided), and so I decided to play a Samurai that was rescued and brought back from the brink of death who pledged his life to his savior.

Originally (before the Paizo only declaration), I was going to be taking the 3rd party feat Daisho Expertise, granting my katana a 1d10(!!) damage instead of 1d8, but that's out the window.

I know that Samurai are far from the most effective martial melee class, but I'm set on playing one, partially for having the in-game-mechanic benefits of being pledged to another character.

I was thinking of using a Katana for the Iaijutsu combat opener and then dropping it and drawing a Nodachi for actual combat.

So. I require assistance in building an effective Human Samurai, preferably a Sword Saint archetype, but open to other suggestions.

I'm going to be bringing this up again because I never really got a clear vision of how this works.

Whenever you use a full-attack action or flurry of blows to make multiple attacks against a single opponent with unarmed strikes, total the damage from all hits before applying damage reduction. This ability works only with unarmed strikes, no matter what other abilities you might possess.

Does this ALWAYS add your attacks together first (thereby allowing you to effectively sunder), or does it only happen IF the target has Damage Reduction?

For example... You're fighting a basic wolf and you do 3 attacks, doing 10, 10, and 14 damage. Do you add it all together for 34 damage, and then subtract 0 for its DR, for 34 damage? Or do you do 10 damage, then 10 damage, then 14 damage?

If the latter, that means that Pummeling Style really is only effective in specific situations, not as an actual style to be used in all your combats, and also kind of ruins any sunder attempt with it. It also doesn't really make any sense to be using your style but unable to use your style just because the target doesn't have DR. When they don't have DR, are you just doing normal strikes but in the stance of your style?

What do you think is the better purchase between these two for a natural attacker using claws (Bloodrager)?

Gauntlets of Rending

Deliquescent Gloves

The character will likely not be doing much dex-based hand-requiring actions. The gauntlets have a nice steady damage increase, the gloves allow a much higher potential.

P.S. this is a PFS character

Alright, so I was reading the manga Master Keaton, and he made and used what they called a "Bullet Bow", based on a native Burmese hunting weapon. Doing some research into it (wow, is it obscure!), I found an old book where this originated.

"...and presently happened upon a native who was using a curious two-stringed bow, with which he shot clay bullets instead of arrows. I endeavoured to make him understand that...I had to 'pay my footing' with the bow, however, for on trying to use it I only succeeded in smashing the pellets against my knuckles, until I discovered that at the moment of releasing the string, the left hand should be pulled sharply to the side, so allowing the bullet to pass..."

I would love to make a custom weapon of this, and I'm wondering what you all think about how it would be different from a sling. I'd assume that the damage would be similar, but the range would be much longer? What other properties would be changed?

As the title, if I've already played a module (ie, Fugitive on the Red Planet, in this case PbP), and I want to play Starfinder Society locally with my spouse tomorrow but the only game being played is ALSO Fugitive on the Red Planet, can I still play it with a new character and get credit?

Hey there everyone.

I'm soon going to be trying my hand at GMing for the first time and the way I'm wanting to do it (for an easy introduction to GMing) is to create a decently flowing line-up of PFS and AP modules. This way once I'm comfortable enough with GMing I can stop using the modules and insert my own narrative.

Now the problem I'm having is that I REALLY don't know much about the modules that are available in order to create this campaign path. I'd like to recruit the help of the community to do this.

My core concept of the game is going to be that at some point, all magic in the world went... 'weird'. Every magic item, spell cast, and magical effect I am going to be rolling on the Quirks, Perks and Flaws tables in the magic items rules (my friend and I have already created a small program to roll and store the data for me). The eventual goal will be for the PCs to discover and solve why the magic went 'weird'.

I'm thinking that they will be members of the Pathfinder Society, and so I'd like to mostly use PFS modules that revolve around magic and artifacts, in a mostly cohesive story.

I appreciate any help that can be given, and if you have more questions I'll be here to answer them.

I've always been interested in trying to make a character focused on using Scrolls as their primary means of... well, everything. Offense, support, defense etc.

However, I'm having a lot of trouble figuring out the best way to do this. There doesn't really seem to be any good scroll-focused archetypes (that I've been able to find), and google hasn't been very helpful.

What can any of you come up with to make a character focused on scroll use?

Alright so I've been working on a build for a couple of months now, a Steel-Breaker Brawler who's entire concept is that if you need a weapon to fight, you're not "man" enough. She then proceeds to shatter your sword with her bare hands.

I started the character (human), took Improved Sunder and Power Attack. My 2nd level was SUPPOSED to be Pummeling style... And then I learned that Pummeling Style doesn't work with Sundering for ignoring the Hardness of an object, it only works with Damage Reduction specifically.

Now I need to do some rebuilding to make this all work again. 3rd level was planned to be Gate Breaker (Double strength dmg to objects).

My point buy was:
Str: 18
Dex: 15
Con: 12
Int: 10
Wis: 14
Cha: 7

Is my best bet going to be to rebuild my stats to put more into Wisdom for the Steel-Breaker 5th level ability, and just... Suffer until then?

I've been doing some google-fu for hours now trying to determine whether Pummeling Style works properly with sundering and item hardness. RAW, the text for Pummeling style states:

Whenever you use a full-attack action or flurry of blows to make multiple attacks against a single opponent with unarmed strikes, total the damage from all hits before applying damage reduction. This ability works only with unarmed strikes, no matter what other abilities you might possess.

Now, is Hardness considered a form of Damage Reduction, or is it completely different? If it's different, does Pummeling Style not work with Sundering properly, because you can't add your hits together on the object being sundered? Was the intention of Pummeling Style to work this way?

By the concept, it doesn't really make much sense for it to NOT work with Hardness and sundering. If necessary, I'd like a FAQ reply to this.

I was wondering about some help in building a Goblin PC character utilizing Roll With It. My initial thoughts for this is Scout Rogue+ with either Knife Master and Kukri, or no other archetype with Branched Spear for reach and finesse.

Hey there peeps! I've begun playing in Pathfinder Society with a Nagaji Crossblooded Rager with Abyssal/Salamander for as many natural attacks as I can get. I also like the flavour of having his legs become a tail to more closely emulate the Naga that he reveres.

Anywho, I'm having trouble figuring out what feats I should be taking. What is even good for natural attacks, feat-wise? Is it worth having the Buckler Mastery for more AC, or should I just accept 18 AC and go with Weapon Focus (Claws)?

I've been trying to figure out the legality of taking the Gate Breaker and Relic Breaker feats after reading through the Path of the Hellknight book. Directly from the book, it seems like you have to be a Hellknight to take the feats, does PFS remove that condition?

On another note, does Gate Breaker's description mean that you get to stack your Strength bonus twice when sundering?

So, to my knowledge I've only ever played one PFS character (just a week ago), but when I go to the "Create a Character" page it lists two characters with little-to-no information beyond -1 and -2. One of them says "(CORE)" beside it as well. I'm not sure if I should be deleting one of these to keep my character #s consistent for the future, or if I should just call my next character -3? Any tips?

Is it possible to wield a spiked gauntlet or a caestus on the same hand as a buckler?

If so, do both of the tools work at the same time or do you have to state which one is "active" each round?

If you DO have to state this, is there an action related to changing which is active, or is it an arbitrary choice?

I recently realized that all of the firearm weapons seem to be from the Ultimate Combat book. Does this mean that you must have Ultimate Combat in order to play a Gunslinger that uses a firearm?

So I'm going to be making a Gulch Gunner Ratfolk character and I have no idea what gun I should be using for him as I've never played with firearms. Would I be better to use a two-handed gun, a pistol? A specialized weapon like the Dragon Pistol? I really don't know.

Is there any sort of... rough census on the distributions of the different styles of characters for Pathfinder society?

Example: Non-combat/RP focused, melee tank, melee damage dealer, ranged physical, ranged caster, support/healer, hybrid

I'm curious to know what the least and most common character types are within the community.

I'm new to PFS and I've been doing some reading on the Roleplaying Guild Guide. Am I correct in the assumption that my very first character cannot be a Ratfolk? Do I have to start as something else, play through an Inner Sea campaign and unlock Ratfolk first, then start again?