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By 7th level of warpriest I can have the following feats, Channel Smite, Cleave, Great Cleave, Guided Hand, Heightened spell, Power Attack, Preferred Spell, Weapon Focus, and Weapon Specialization. This allows me to cast Divine Favor as a swift action and still attack. When I attack with a bastard sword, I will have a +14 to hit and be doing 1d10+15 damage. I also did not have to spend a feat to get proficiency in heavy armor.

The 7th level cleric takes the following feats, Armor Proficiency (Heavy), Channel Smite, Combat Casting, Guided Hand, and power attack. That gives him a +9 to hit and doing 1d10+9 for damage. He cannot spontaneously cast Divine Favor so has to memorize it using 1 spell slot for each use he plans on using. That means he will probably not have it available for every combat.

On round 1 the warpriest uses fervor to cast divine favor as a swift action and uses great cleave. When attacking a creature with an AC of 22 (15 + his level) he has a DPR of 12.3 without factoring in cleave. The cleric attacking the same target has a DPR of 5.075. If the cleric casts Divine Favor or any other spell for that matter they do not get to attack on the first round and his DPR goes to 10.175 on the second round but does not have the ability to attack more than a single target.

This also means the cleric is not using his feats to boost his spell casting. A spell focused cleric should be using his feats for things like spell focus, spell penetration, and maybe some metamagic feats instead of combat feats.

As the warpriest levels up there are still a lot more feats he can take to improve his combat ability. By 12th level the warpriest will have picked up greater weapon focus, greater weapon specialization, Vital Strike, Improved Vital Strike and Weapon Trick (two handed). This would allow him to be doing 3d10+20 when using cleave and greater cleave. This is without figuring in sacred weapon or other magic items.

That would be 12 HP OR 12 skill ranks for 2 feats. To get both requires a feat which would put the warpriest up by 3 feats. If I really want those skill points and HP I can simply take toughness and cunning. So, trading 12 HP or 12 skill ranks for 2 feats basically breaks even. If the character manages to get to 18th level he will get a 3rd feat.

As a human cleric the character gets 9 feats, as a warpriest he gets 15. Don’t forget that a warpriest gets proficiency in heavy armor and martial weapons. The human FCB as a cleric is a bonus to overcome spell resistance of an outsider, as a warpriest it is 1/6 of a combat feat. As a cleric he gets 2 channel energy per day, as a warpriest he gets 4. By 12th level the cleric will have 11 feats, the warpriest will have 20 feats. The cleric will still have 2 channel energies, compared to the 6 of the warpriest. The warpriest will also have sacred armor and sacred weapon so can add enchantments to his armor and weapons. The warpriest also gets access to fighter only feats.

With the build I am suggesting the character can get divine favor up as a swift action in every combat and that gives him a +4 to hit and damage. While this does not increase his BAB it does put his attack bonus on par with a full BAB class and gives him and extra +4 to damage.

The player is also a new player so probably does not have a lot of system mastery and is probably unfamiliar with a lot of the more obscure cleric spells. Playing a full caster-based cleric takes a lot of knowledge and I do not recommend that for a new player. So, in this instance the cleric may have on paper a higher potential, but in play is probably not going to be realized.

The extra feats take less system mastery because you only need to understand how the feats you have work. With spells you have to understand how all of them work and have enough information to choose appropriate spells. The spells the warpriest will be using will for the most part be self-buff spells, that makes it easier to focus on a smaller portion of the spell list. But since he still has access to the full list it gives him the opportunity to learn them for the next character he plays.

My advice is based on what the OP said he wanted. He expressed interest in playing a melee focused character and a warpriest can do that better than a cleric.

Ropers were almost specifically designed to ignore the entire enchantment school. Will saves is their one good save and they have Iron will on top of that. Not every creature will have the same weakness.

By the way Chains of Light is also a 6th level sorcerer/wizard spell so they can do the exact same thing.

Normally I would agree with Azothath about STR, but in this case the character has already invested heavily in WIS, so it is a little late now. As far as the guided property I doubt the character can replace his equipment right away. Relying solely on an enchantment for a combat focused characters combat ability can be dangerous. If he loses the weapon or it is otherwise rendered non-magical it makes the character worthless. Using feats may seem wasteful, but the character has lots of feats. If he is human, he gets a bonus feat at 1st level and can use his favored class bonus to gain an extra feat every 6 levels. This is in addition to the bonus feats of the warpriest. At 7th level the character has 7 feats.

What the character should do is to continue to advance WIS but also advance STR with magic items. Focus more on WIS to increase his chance to hit and gain more uses of fervor as well as some extra spells.

If the character could be completely rewritten, I would be giving different advice, but given the constraints of what can be done I think the advice I am giving is the best way to rebuild the character.

The most important thing is to be familiar with your spells and abilities. Assuming your GM is allowing all the material from the various expansion books you have a huge spell list. There are around 150 1st level cleric spells (warpreists use the cleric spell list). Warpriest also allows you to add enchantments to your weapons and armor. Become familiar with those as well.

If possible, I would switch to using the bastard sword two handed. I am not sure why your character cannot do so.

Fervor is your most important ability. Not only does it let you heal yourself in combat as a swift action, it also allows you to cast buff spells on yourself as a swift action. It also allows you to ignore somatic components, does not require a free hand and does not provoke AoO. But those spells only affect your character even if they would normally affect others. This means you may not be able to buff the whole party quickly but can boost your own abilities and still get be able to attack in the same round. If you know you are about to encounter something, consider casting some of the party wide buffs before combat starts and use fervor for personal buffs.

One spell I would really recommend for buffing the whole party is Blessing of Fervor. It has a list of benefits that each target can choose from, and the benefit can be changed from round to round.

As I mentioned take greater weapon focus and greater weapon specialization as you level up. Boosting your bonus to hit and damage keeps you closer to a full martial character.

Chains of Light is a 6th level spell that only affects one target. While it does make it easier to kill the target it still requires an extra round to do so. Save or die spells are not that uncommon at this level. This is something the GM needs to be prepared for.Circle of Death cast by a 12th level caster can kill 3-4 9 HD creatures or even more of less HD. Circle of death also kills the creatures not just render it helpless.

You are reading too much into Spiritual Ally. It does not act as a wall of force all it does is prevent opponents from moving through the square. It does not block line of sight or anything else.

Chains of light is also not that bad. Hold Person is only 2nd level and also paralyzes a single humanoid target. While it does not block extra dimensional movement like chains of light it does prevent the target for performing any action including using spells or spell like abilities.

In all honesty without the vexing dodger archetype any character trying this is going to hit with an AoO and be denied their DEX bonus to AC for that AoO. Climbing on a character would be considered moving through his opponent's square. The DC of the acrobatics check to pull this off is going to be impossible for the character to make at this level. The DC would be the wyverns 5 + wyverns CMD (23) plus an additional 10 for the wyvern moving in combat being a very unstable surface. I doubt the rogue can pull off a DC 38 acrobatics check. This is in addition to the acrobatics check to jump on the wyvern and the climb check to stay on.

Warpriest would work even with the WIS focus. Normally I would not recommend guided hand, but it can work on this build. Your high WIS gives you enough bonus to hit you can afford the penalty for power attack even if you are using it one handed it still boost your damage. That and the extra feats warpriest gets make for a better melee focused character. Make sure to pick up weapon specialization and latter get greater weapon focus and weapon specialization. If you are human, the FCB of warpriest will give you and extra feat ever 6 levels.

WIS also gives you more uses of Fervor and that allows more uses of channel energy More Fervor also allows you to cast self-buffs on yourself as a swift action. This reduces the need for combat casting.

Take Fates Favored and load up on divine favor. Being able to get a +4 to hit and damage as a swift action is really good. This might even be worth taking heightened spell and preferred spell for.

If your GM will let you take Fey Foundling as one of your 1st level feats. It works really well with Fervor when healing yourself. Your GM might not go for it, but it does not hurt to ask. The fact you are not starting at 1st level means you can don’t have to sit through waiting for your build to become functional.

DO NOT MULTICLASS.

Ouch this is going to be fairly difficult to pull off. Clerics are an incredibly versatile class and can be built to do almost anything, but they cannot do everything. That is one reason that makes the class difficult for a beginner. In all honesty I normally recommend beginners avoid clerics. As a divine prepared caster they have access to every spell on their list they are high enough level to cast. Their spell list also has a lot of very situational spells. Those spells tend to be either incredibly useful or completely worthless depending on the situation. That means the player has to be familiar with all his spells which most beginners are not. But you are playing a cleric so the only thing to do is to make the best of it. I would recommend spending a lot of time going over all your spells especially the more obscure ones.

The most important thing when building a cleric is to figure out what you want the character to do and focus on that. If you try to do everything you end up doing nothing well. The role of a melee cleric can be done, but honestly a warpriest is much better at this than the cleric. You also focused mostly on WIS so that is going to make it even more difficult. With the constraints of your stats, I am not sure that is a wise choice. Guided Hand requires two feats and will boost your chance to hit but does nothing for your damage.

If you are going to go with a melee cleric you need to be able to do damage when you hit. Since your stats are already fixed, we need to look at other ways to get your damage up. Ditch Heightened Spell and Preferred spell and take power attack. Ditch the shield and use the sword two handed for the extra damage.

Since you are focusing on melee combat that means you will often be on the front line when casting spells. Casting spells provokes AoO unless you cast defensively which requires a concentration check. As it stands your chance of casting defensively will very low. You have a 15% chance to fail casting defensively when you cast a 1st level spell that goes up to a 45% chance for your 4th level spells. Take Combat Casting to reduce this so your character can actually cast spells on the front line. With Combat Casting you have no chance of failing on a 1st level spell, and only a 25% chance of failing on a 4th level spell. If you are using traits and they can be changed you can take a trait like focused mind to give you an additional +2 on your concentration to reduce those numbers by 10%. At that point you no chance of failure on a 1st or 2nd level spells, a 5% on a 3rd level spell and a 15% on a 4th level spell.

With your stats and the constraints on what you can change you might want to focus less on melee and more on casting. Even with this build you are probably going to fall behind the inquisitor and swashbuckler. That would require completely different feats, and your combat ability would be much less.

If your GM would allow you to swap to a warpriest we could do a lot better.

One of the most important parts of being a GM is being able to keep the game in balance. Often a player may want to do something that runs counter to keeping the game in balance and the GM needs to reign in the player. It is one thing when a player wants to build his character to do certain things. When the character is taking feats or archetypes, he should be able to do something most if not all other characters cannot. But when he wants a vanilla character to be able to do the same thing that is something that the GM needs to address.

I’m trying to hav other things attack w the poison instead of myself so I can focus on other things

Use a quickened telekinetic volley then. What you are trying to do is to circumvent the action economy. This is purposely made difficult for game balance. Any way to do that is going to be difficult and probably require a high-level character.

If you are looking for a way to attack with poisoned item Telekinetic Volley would work. It would be best to have poison use so you don’t accidentally poison yourself.

Unseen Servant specifically states in cannot attack in any way. That would prevent it from poring poison directly on someone. They could however poor an ingested poison into food or drink.

No, because running into a target would require an attack roll, and unseen servants cannot make attack rolls of any kind.

Unseen servants are also shapeless which would make it impossible to apply poison to.

The skills used in combat will be the same skills used out of combat. If the character is climbing the skill used is climbing, if they are jumping the skill used is acrobatics. That being said not everything the player wants to try should be allowed. If what the character is attempting to do is covered by a class feature or feat, they do not have the character should not be able to do it.

Trying to jump on the wyvern and climb it is a class ability of the vexing dodger so unless the rogue has that archetype, they should not be allowed to do it. If this is something you want a character to be able to do the GM could make a custom feat or rogue talent that would grant the ability.

Another thing to make sure is that you are applying all the negative aspects of what the character is trying to do. Moving through a threatened square usually provokes an AoO. He could use acrobatics to avoid that but that would require a separate acrobatics check. By climbing on the wyvern, he was considered moving through his opponent's square, which increases the DC of the acrobatics check. Looking up the Wyvern the DC for the acrobatics check would be 28 (5+ CMD of 23), or the rogue provokes an AoO. The wyvern is in combat so probably counts as a severely unstable surface, that raises the DC of the acrobatics check to 38. When climbing the character moves at ¼ speed and loses DEX to AC, considering this is rouge that probably means he is losing a lot of AC when he gets hit with the AoO. If the character has the vexing dodger archetype, they do not have to worry about the AoO he does lose AC, but that will probably be offset by penalty to attack the wyvern suffers because of limb climber.

You are correct about spells cast within the previous 8 hours counting against the number of spells that can be prepared, but there is not requirement that a divine spell caster has to rest before preparing his spells. They could be doing other things besides resting during those 8 hours including being involved in combat. They do however have to have a relatively peaceful environment for the hour they are preparing spells.

Cure spells may not be worth memorizing but using them when you know you are going to need the spell slots is a different thing. Casting cure spells when in downtime or in a safe location saves the cost of the wand and stretches it out further. Those charges on the wand of cure light wounds can add up.

It's all about utilizing your resources wisely.

One thing I have not seen mentioned is spell books from defeated wizards. If you kill or otherwise defeat to the point you are taking all his equipment taking his spell book can give the wizard in the party a lot of extra spells. This is better than finding scrolls, because most wizards will have more spells in their books than they do in scrolls.

Druids and clerics both have the ability to convert their prepared spells to other spells. This means that even if they prepare the wrong spells, they can still often use these slots productively. The druid's ability to spontaneously cast summoning spells means they can still use their spell slots in combat even if all their spell choices are wrong.

The Herald Caller archetype gives the cleric the ability to spontaneously cast summon monster spells in addition to healing spells. That means the Herald Caller always has 3 choices of what to use his spell slots for. He can cast the prepared spell, a summon monster or a cure spell. The archetype also gets augmented summoning and superior summoning without having to actually spend the feats. About the only summoning feat they need to actually take would be sacred summons. With this archetype you might not even need to actually cast most of the spells you actually memorized.

Rangers and Paladins actually have it easier than full casters for this. Their spell casting is very limited and is gained late. Because they are so far behind other casters most of their offensive spells are not that powerful. Between their lower level and lower casting stat the DC of their offensive spells are often so low that most level appropriate monsters can easily make the save. But their spell list also has a lot of combat buffs that can boost their already good combat even higher. Most of those spells tend to focus on the caster so knowing what you are facing is less important. An archer focused ranger casting gravity bow will get the benefit no matter what they are facing. Likewise, a paladin will be able to use heroic defiance in any combat he takes damage in.

They are on AON which list the source as the Advanced Race Guide pg 216. Special Sub-type

No, you do not have the class feature if it has been replaced.

Personally, I would consider this as falling under the holding a charge rules. Those rules state that if you touch anything else while holding a charge the spell dissipates. Flame Blade is a touch spell but has a set duration so cannot be held indefinably, but other than that should follow the rules on touch spells.

What the feat probably means is that when you are hit with the attack you take the normal damage form the attack and an additional 1d6 bleed damage. After the first round you take 1d6 bleed damage until someone succeeds at a DC 15 heal check or you receive magical healing. That is the way bleed damage usually works.

The feat is so poorly written that it is anyone’s guess as to how it is supposed to work. Talk to your GM about how he will handle it, if he even allows it. Personally, I would be tempted to simply ban the feat to avoid arguments on how it works.

Bound is not a game term, the book is using term as defined by the English language. Is English your native language? I don’t mean to be offensive but I have noticed you seem to have some trouble with the common usage some terms.

Not in combat. Outside of combat you could tie someone up, but that would take longer than a round. Other than the target already being tied up this feat will only work on pinned or helpless targets.

Bound means that the target is tied up. For the most part the only time this feat is only applies to a bound target is if the creature is already tied up. Tying up a character requires grapple maneuver and can only be done on a pinned, unconscious or otherwise restrained target. Since a grapple check is a standard maneuver means you cannot use the feat in the same round you are tying someone up, because you can only perform one standard maneuver per round.

If the target is already pinned or otherwise helpless, you can still perform a coup de grace as a full round action without needing the feat. You could use one round to tie up the target, and on the next round use a standard action to perform the coup de grace, but that would take longer than simply taking a full round action.

If a GM has problems with a build a player would be better off working with the GM to tone down the build. The GM has control over what is allowed in the campaign and can simply say no to a feat especially one from an obscure book. If I were the GM and this was giving me problems that would be what my response would be.

Personally, I don’t see this of being that big of a problem, but I am pretty well versed in the game and all my game are of my own creation so I can tailor the campaign to the players. If the GM is running a published AP and does not have complete mastery over the game or the time required to create a campaign from scratch it can be a lot more difficult.

From the sound of it the character is a one trick pony and that can be dangerous. Once your trick is nullified your character often becomes useless. Combat maneuvers tend to be fairly good at low level but become a lot less effective at higher level. Not only does the HD increase but so does the size. Trying to overrun a humanoid target at low level is not difficult but try doing that on a huge 4-legged creature and it is another story.

If it is for a PC, I go with the 1.5 cost to scribe it into the book. If it is for an NPC Hero Labs has some prewritten spell books that I often use for this especially if the NPC is not a significant character and I don’t want to spend a lot of time creating them.

The damage from shifters edge is lower in the beginning but eventually exceeds the STR based damage at higher levels. But the thing to consider is that it takes two feats that the STR based character does not need to take. If you are playing a human it takes all your 1st level feats, if you are not human it does not come online until 3rd level.

The STR based character can spend those feats on other things. At 1st level the STR based character could have power attack and weapon focus. At that point he will be doing significantly more damage than the DEX based shifter. Eventually the DEX based character can pick up power attack or piranha strike and get more damage, but the STR based character will still have two extra feats. This means he can get more abilities earlier than the DEX based character.

If you are using faith magic, make sure to select Death Knell for the spell. It grants a +1 effective caster level.

If you are using mythic the 3rd tier Hierophant ability Enduring Blessing allows you to increase the duration of a spell with 10 minutes per level to 24 hours. If you used this on Death Knell or other spells that increase your caster level it should count for crafting. This might require taking dual path. You can use the trickster path and take Path Dabbling instead of the Hierophant path.

If you are a necromancer and want to increase the CL of necromancy spells Necromantic Master allows you to spend a mythic point to increase your caster level by your tier (minimum of 2). That would not help with crafting but will work to increase the duration of necromantic spells.

Arcane Endurance increases your caster level by 4 for purpose of duration.

Combine Necromantic Master, Arcane Endurance with Wild Arcana and you can raise your caster level by 16 for calculating the duration of necromantic spells. For spells other than necromancy that would be a +6-caster level. Add in Death Knell and Prayer beads and you can raise your caster level by +21 for necromantic spells, and +11 for all others for the duration.

Inquisitors have access to more fire spells than you realize once you get past 1st level spells. Second level gives them Blistering Invective, Flames of the Faithful. 3 Rd gives you flame Blade, Shield of Wings, Trial by Fire. 4th level gives you Cleansing Fire, Healing Flames, 5th Level has flame Strike, If you expand it out to include light spells they get even more. Inquisitors don’t really need a lot of direct combat spells. Usually they focus on combat buff spells and their abilities. Being a spontaneous caster you are not going to want a lot of direct damage spells.

All Ifrit gives you is burning hands once per day. Devil Spawn replaces darkness with Pyrotechnics so you still gain a fire based spell like ability. Ifrit takes a penalty to WIS which is the last thing you want with a inquisitor. Gaining a 1st level spell like ability is a poor trade for lowering the DC of all your other spells by 1 and taking a hit on most class abilities.

I usually create my own campaign instead of using published material. What I usually do is to have a couple of ideas for encounters worked out in advance that I can use when I need something. You don’t have to work out everything in advance but get the majority of the details down. Doing so allows you to tailor the encounter to the party. The big problem with random encounters is all parties have different strengths and weaknesses. What may be an easy encounter for on party may end with a TPK for another party of the same level.

My suggestion would be to look at the party and create a few generic encounters designed to challenge them. When you need to, plug those prepared encounters into the story as appropriate. To the players they will appear to be random encounters but in reality, they are not. This also gives you as the GM the ability to become familiar with the creature and its abilities.

Black Dragons live in swamps and its lair was nearby, from that I am assuming the encounter took place in a swamp. If that is the case the dragon should have been using the terrain to his advantage. Black Dragons have swamp stride which means they move through quicksand and bogs at normal speed. The dragon should have used that to his advantage and approached through terrain the players have difficulty with. You cannot charge through difficult terrain, so that would shut down the monk’s lance charge. It would also make the dragon difficult to approach by the rest of the party. The dragon could be attacking with its breath weapon without the party being able to attack back for at least a round. The dragon also flies so could easily take to the air and attack the spell caster or ranged combat characters first. After that all he has to do is to circle around blasting the other characters every 1 -4 rounds while their attacks don’t do much. And finally, if the dragon is taking too much damage he can simply fly away. Again, this is water under the bridge but keep this type of thing in mind in the next encounter.

Play an Arcainist or an Exploiter Wizard. Both can use a point from their Arcane Reservoir to increase their CL by 1. The Potent Magi exploit increases that to 2.

Spell Specialization increases the CL for all level variable of the spell.

Varisian Tattoo increases the caster level for one school other than divination.

Mythic has several ways to increase your caster level but are often highly focused.

Summoning spells have a casting time of 1 round. That means it is a full round action and comes into effect on your next turn just before the beginning of your turn. So, if you cast the summoning spell in round 1 the monster appears in round 2 just before you go and can act when it appears. If you can communicate with the creature (fee action) you can give it orders including to delay until you have gone. After the first round the normal rules for initiative apply. If the monster acted when it first appeared its initiative will be just before the caster, if it delayed it will go based on that.

People are paying too much attention to the word immediate. Immediate has both a game mechanics meaning and a common English meaning. Technically the game term is an immediate action, not just immediate by itself. The description in summon monster looks to be using the common English meaning not the game term.

If you are using an ability that allows you to summon as a standard action, then your character should be able to act normally. One thing to keep in mind is that both the caster and the summoned monster can delay actions. So as long as the caster can communicate with the summoned creature, they can act in any order they want.

If the dragon was chased out of its previous territory and only recently came to the area chances, are it does not have any significant treasure. If the story does not support the dragon having treasure it should not have it. This is one reason I have always disliked “Random” encounters. Something like a dragon should never be a random encounter. If you are going to use random encounters, they should mostly ordinary creatures that could inhabit the area, not unique creatures.

The race builder rules are too easily broken, and most GM's do not allow a PC to use them. For the most part they are designed to be used by the GM not players.

This spell summons an extraplanar creature (typically an outsider, elemental, or magical beast native to another plane). It appears where you designate and acts immediately, on your turn. It attacks your opponents to the best of its ability. If you can communicate with the creature, you can direct it not to attack, to attack particular enemies, or to perform other actions.

In order to give the summoned creatures, order you have to be able to communicate with them. Talking is a free action so controlling the creature will be a free action. There is no reason you instruction cannot be to attack after I do X, assuming you can in fact communicate with the summoned creature. That usually means you need to have a shared language.

Just out of curiosity why did you not go with tiefling for your race? Devil Spawn tiefling make excellent inquisitors. CHA does not do much for an inquisitor especially with the right inquisition. Their favored class bonus is similar but the tieflings is actually much better.

Honor divorced from morality would focus more on reputation and reliability. Keeping your word is important because it allows mutual beneficent deals. When both parties know that the deal will be honored cooperation become possible. In cases like this the letter of the law is usually more important than the spirit.

Even protecting other can be seen as beneficial to the person doing the protecting because it often leads to rewards latter. Which is better taking the peasant’s last gold and having them starve or collecting a lesser amount each year for decades? The trick is to leave them enough to thrive but still getting the most out of them. The lawful good character will take enough taxes to support the state but still leave the peasant enough to thrive. The lawful evil will take as much as they can but leave the peasant enough to survive. The lawful neutral will take somewhere in the middle. They want as much as they can get but also want the peasant to produce more so they get more over the long run.

What the real difference between lawful good and lawful neutral are often the reasons behind the actions instead of the actions themselves. The good character actually cares about others and wants everyone to prosper and be happy. The neutral character is more concerned with the results.

Because of the blurring of reality between the Plane of Shadow and the Material Plane, you can't make out details of the terrain or areas you pass over during transit, nor can you predict perfectly where your travel will end. It's impossible to judge distances accurately, making the spell virtually useless for scouting or spying. Furthermore, when the spell effect ends, you are shunted 1d10 × 100 feet in a random horizontal direction from your desired endpoint. If this would place you within a solid object, you are shunted 1d10 × 1,000 feet in the same direction. If this would still place you within a solid object, you (and any creatures with you) are shunted to the nearest empty space available, but the strain of this activity renders each creature fatigued (no save).

The bolded sections show that you cannot place yourself where you want or even make out where the players are. That means you are not going to be able to attack the players when exiting the shadow walk. You will not even be able to reach the players for several rounds. Assuming you did manage to place yourself correctly you will be at least 100 feet away in random direction.

Shadow walk is a spell like ability which means it requires concentration and can be disrupted. Black Tentacles gives the grappled condition and in order to use shadow walk you need to roll a concentration check equal to (10 + CMB of the spell). The CMB of the spell is equal to the caster level +5. Assuming the player is 7th level (minimum level for a wizard to cast the spell) that means the DC is 22 and the Ettercap needs to roll a 17. If the caster is higher level (or a sorcerer due to minimum level being 8) the DC increases. Failure to make the roll still uses the spell like 1/day use of Shadow Walk.

If you get lucky the Ettercap may be able to escape the black tentacles but probably will not. Even if he does, he is not going to be able to attack the party for at least several rounds if at all.

What special materials are best is going to depend a lot on your characters build and the campaign. A mithral breastplate is great for a character with a high DEX but for a low DEX character it may not be the best. If the campaign will have a lot of undead spiresteel may be a better material for a lower DEX character.

For weapons consider mithral instead of silver. It overcomes DR as if it is silver but does not reduce the damage.

Its water under the bridge, but it looks like you did not take all the factors into account. The dragon has a +16 bonus of stealth and a breath weapon that has a 60-foot range. If the ambush took place in the middle of the night most of the characters should have been sleeping. Perception rolls while sleeping have their DC increased by 10. There is also a +1 increase to the perception roll for every 10 feet. Unless the dragon came within 10 feet of the party the DC to spot the dragon should have taken range into account. That should have meant at least a +4 to the DC of the perception roll. So, the minimum DC (assuming the dragon rolled a 1) is 21 for those that are awake, and 31 for those that are asleep. Unless the druid and monk have a WIS of higher than 20 or some other bonus to perception their maximum bonus should be +9. Skills do not automatically fail or succeed on 1 or 20. That means it is impossible for them to have made the perception roll if they were sleeping.

Likewise with the tracking roll. The dragon flies and has a swim speed. The DC to track it to its lair should have been out of the reach of the characters unless they had some sort of magic to allow them to do so.

If the party is able to do this at 2nd level, there seems to be a serious imbalance with the party, and they probably already have too much treasure or abilities. If that is the case giving them more is only going to worsen the situation. That being not giving them any treasure would be the right decision.

Scrolls are spell completion items so you are actually casting the spell. The book states you to cast the spell as if you prepared and cast it. Therefore you can make any decisions on how it acts that you would if you cast the spell.

Potions specifically state the maker of the potion decides how it works when the potion is created.

Wands are spell trigger items which means you are not actually casting the spell. The rule book does not specify on way or another if you can make the decision on how the spell operates. Considering the nature of some of the wands listed in the book it would seem you can control the effects of the spell. A wand of suggestion is kind of useless if you cannot control what the suggestion is.

Like anything there is exception to the idea that healing in combat is not effective. What it really comes down to is the action economy.

A life Oracle using life link takes a standard action to start, but after that does not require any actions. It also for the most part last until the Oracle dismisses it, or he dies. The healing does not prevent the oracle from performing other actions. The oracle may need to spend an action to heal himself if the cumulative damage puts him in danger but otherwise can still do other things. This minimizes the impact of healing has on the action economy. A paladin using lay on hands on himself is another in combat healing that is highly effective. Outside those there are very few times when healing in combat is effective.

Condition removal might be the one time where healing in combat is necessary, but that really depends on the severity of the condition and the situation. Minor condition like dazzled or shaken can wait till after combat to be dealt with. Condition that takes the other character out of the combat might need to be dealt with immediately especially if the character in question in in danger of being killed. In cases where the impaired character is not in danger of dying the cleric should evaluate who is more effective at dealing with the problem at hand before deciding to heal in combat. When done this way condition removal is no longer the boring second-string action.

I can understand the reluctance to tell another player how to play their character, but that does not change the fact they are doing a poor job of supporting the rest of the party. At that point the problem is not with the cleric’s class, the problem is the cleric’s player.

Bless weapon does not say you cannot roll for a conformation of the critical. What is says is that every critical hit roll against an evil target is automatically successful. That means you still get a critical hit even if you roll a 1. That means you do not really need to make the roll, but nothing in the spell prevents you from doing so. If you have sundering strike you roll to see if you get to sunder your opponent’s weapon. As to the CMD being higher Critical Focus will help with that. You get that bonus even if you automatically are successful on the conformation roll.

Too much of this build is focused on critical hits, as per what the OP wanted. It makes more sense to have the ability all the time regardless of circumstances. Using an enchantment or weapon bond leaves the possibility of something like an antimagic shell or even a dispel magic from reducing your chance to get a critical hit.

Without improved critical the characters normal combat effectiveness take a big hit. While he can use divine bond to gain keen that is also limited use ability. The paladin at peak deals a huge amount of damage, but in normal circumstances tends to fall behind other martials with more consistent bonuses. At higher level critical hits become a huge part of this build so reducing the chance of those occurring really weakens the build.

At 15th level the character gets 3 attacks per round. With improved critical the character has a 65.7% chance of at least one of the attacks being a threat. Without improved critical the chance of one being a threat drops to 38.95%. So, at 15th level the character is about 27% more likely be able to destroy his opponent’s weapon and stagger him. This is not factoring in any other abilities like smite evil, weapon bond or spells. That is a 27% chance in every round of combat.

As strong as this build is it can be improved with more feats. Greater Sunder would mean when he sunders the opponents weapon any extra damage over what is required to break the weapon is applied to the target. Cornugun Smash would allow him to demoralize his foe, which would impose a -2 on the save to avoid being staggered for longer than one round. If the character is a half orc, he could take Ferocious Resolve to give him Orc Ferocity. A paladin with ferocity is incredibly hard to put down, you literary have to kill them outright to stop them. With Heroic Resolve and Fey Foundling that is easier said than done. Usually when that happens, the rest of the party is long dead, or the paladin sacrificed himself to save them.

If you want to take on the role of the rouge the Archaeologist Bard would be perfect. They trade out bardic performances for rouge abilities. Ignore the bard label and build the character like you would a charismatic rouge. For Traits you will want fates favored and criminal. The archetype does not give disable device as a class skill, but criminal will fix that. Fates favored boost your archaeologist’s luck by +1. Luck bonuses are incredibly rare so Archaeologist’s Luck usually stacks with everything. You will want the following feats weapon finesse, lingering performance and a feat to get you DEX to damage. Make sure to take heroism as one of your second level spells ASAP. By 5th level the combination of Archaeologist’s Luck and Heroism will give you a +5 to nearly everything.

Instead of the heir to the throne you are second son. You preferred the company of rogues and whores because you thought they were more honest than the nobles. Your luck bonus is actually due to a vestige of divine right. The gods have plans for your character, but your character has no clue about that. You just want to live your life as you see fit, so left home to get away from it all. A time will come when your character saves the kingdom from doom, but this is not something you are aware of yet.

I have built similar characters without the royal aspect, and they have always been fun to play. If you focus most of your spells on boosting your “thief” abilities, you don’t need a sky-high CHA. The bard spell list has a lot of spells that work for this. If you think a normal rouge is good try one that can change his appearance with illusion, turn invisible, assume a gaseous form and teleport short distances.

Even though you are technically a bard you don’t have to put a single rank into any performance skills.

There is also no reason to take any levels in aristocrat.

When I said I had not seen anything that did not really add something that the paladin cannot already do was in response to what had been posted. Obviously, there are things on other spell lists that do things the paladin cannot do. What I should have said was that I have not seen anything that is worth the feat for what the OP wanted out of the character.

Even with that list that is something I will still stand by. What feat on my build is worth giving up for those for spells? Fey Foundling is often considered the absolute best feat for a paladin, giving that up would be a mistake. Power Attack is feat that any full BAB class that is using a two-handed weapon need. Improved Sunder is required for the build. We already established the benefit of improved critical with bless weapon. The OP also wanted to focus on massive damage from critical hits so improved critical is pretty much required. Weapon Bond can grant keen but has a limited duration. Sundering Strike can shut down an opponent’s offense. Critical Focus is required for Staggering Critical. Staggering Critical means his target can no longer perform a full attack and cannot take more than a 5 footstep and still attack. It also prevents the target from drawing another weapon and attacking. Smite Evil Magic can bring down a wall of force if cast by an evil creature. So, which of these abilities is worth losing to gain access to 4 spells?

Bladed Dash takes a standard action and only allows a single attack. So, all this really does is give the paladin a slight increase in movement and prevent AoO. If the paladin is using Smite Evil on the target, he does not get the bonus to hit because you cannot add CHA to hit twice. Paladins usually have decent AC especially when adding CHA to AC, so the AoO is not that big of a deal. They can also simply heal the damage with lay on hands. So, this spell is definitely not worth the feat.

Galant Inspiration is a great spell for a bard but horrible for a paladin. Casting the spell will prevent the paladin from using lay on hands to heal himself. It will also prevent him from using Hero’s Defiance or other spells that take an immediate action such as Litany of Righteousness. The paladin is also a prepared caster, so he has to memorize the spell which prevents him from filling the spell slot with another spell.

I would strongly discourage the Noble Scion. Prestige classes are usually a trap in Pathfinder especially for spell casting classes. Noble Scion is worse than most in that respect. All it really gives you is some wealth related benefits and improved followers. If you are a sell caster you are sacrificing 8 caster levels which is way too high. If you are a martial you the medium BAB is really going to hamper your combat ability.

From what you have said it sounds like what you are looking for is a CHA based character with some magic ability and decent skills.

I am not familiar enough with the mesmerist to give you any useful advice.

The Courtly Hunter at first seems like it might work, but it is not a CHA based class. Its spells are WIS based and is also fairly combat oriented. That means you will probably want decent physical stats and will need a good WIS to cast your spells. Most of its spells are nature themed and do not lend themselves to your concept. If you are ok with reducing the characters leadership qualities this could work, but if you really want to play a leader this may prove difficult.

There are some spell casting vigilante archetypes. The magical child is the only CHA based caster for vigilante, but they use the summoners spell list, which does not have much in the way of enchantment. They also only get 4 skill points per level. The warlock is an INT based caster that uses the wizard’s spell list. This would give you access to enchantment spells for control. They also only get 4 skill points per level but as an being an INT based caster; they will actually have more than that. Unlike the Hunter they also get mystic bolts so don’t need to use weapons for combat. This means they don’t need to worry about STR as much so can still get some CHA.

The real question is what type of character do you want t play? Saying you want to be royal is really no help. Are you looking for something that would be an effective ruler, or something that is more heir to the throne? Do you want more of a martial character or more casters? My recommendation of bard was because they make incredibly good rulers

Another option would be paladin. This would work really well for an heir to the throne character that is a champion of the people. If the current king is less than scrupulous but not outright evil, this could be a form of rebellion. Your character could stand up to his father when his father is being less than noble. A good example of this would be Arthur Your paladin's powers could be more from divine right than training. If you want a pure martial a cavalier would be another option. This character would be similar to the paladin, but without the religious and alignment restrictions.

What is the culture of the campaign? If it is a more medieval culture than renaissance the swashbuckler types may not fit as well. If the campaign does have a culture similar to the renaissance those may fit.

If the swashbuckler types fit the dandy ranger would be very good. It has plenty of skill points and the right class skills. The bard spell list as I mentioned is quite good for a royal so that is another plus for the archetype. If your GM allows it the Cayden Caliean style would work really well. Use your normal feats to get weapon finesse, weapon focus and fencing grace and the style feats to pick up combat expertise, improved disarm and disarming strike without needing the 13 INT.