Niels Christensen's page

We have been getting ready to try our first game of the new addition and a player wanted to try the new multi-classing. He wanted to make something similar to a skald or bloodrager, and at first it seemed easy because no spells had the concentration tag on them until we found out that the verbal spell action carried that tag.

Then we saw that you could take the Moment of Clarity would actually be needed, but found that it was an action to use for every round. This means that the first level ability cantrip of the elf he picked would be 2 actions each round for just shield spell. Or spend a whole round for a cantrip or later spell, which in most cases gets no bonuses but penalties for being in a rage.

If we decided to go the bard route instead, this would cost two actions a turn for inspiration cantrips.

Anyone found a reason that this action should be each turn?
If not I might already house rule it from choice of: Make it just a feature of rage with this feat and not an action; Make it similar to a stance where you use the action once and lasts for the rest of the rage; or make a new later feat requiring moment of clarity doing 1 of the above.

Its still not great but it would lose less levels, 3 level dip into Divine Champion Warpriest switches the feat to Sentinel boons.

There is also the Divine Paragon Cleric which gives you the choice for what boons you get and might only need a 1 level dip. If the rules require the Divine Paragon Cleric bonus to be based on domain, which I'm uncertain, you can be a Sacred Servant Paladin to advance the domain.

I also don't see anything stopping a 1 level dip in sentinel for access to those boons as all I see about it is " If you later take levels in sentinel or evangelist, you lose access to the exalted boons and gain access to the new boons appropriate to your class."

Double Slice requires two weapon fighting and its strong for the actions, at 14th level a fighter can get two-weapon flurry(also requiring 2 weapons) to gain 2 swings with both weapons in 1 press action. Combined with Graceful Poise Fighter style at level 16 they can use Double slice for their first two actions, take no multiattack penalties than use Two-weapon flurry for 4 attacks all at max attack bonus if i'm interpreting it correctly, and thats without haste. You can also then get the ability desperate finisher to do two-weapon flurry again for another two attacks at the end of your turn forgoing reactions, but im not sure if multi-attack penalties apply to that or not.

I think one thing that I don't think you have in your scenario is that a character only has one source of spell points, so getting some of the abilities from the cleric and monk together would add some their spellpoints together, and you can maybe get some abilities from the cleric at the levels that monk has fairly weak powers?

Unarmed strikes are iffy with what they function with. There are many fight feats that specify that you are wielding a weapon or have a hand free. The description of Unarmed before weapons says that it is treated as a simple weapon, than after the weapons table it says that the unarmed trait means that it isn't a weapon. But then an ability like Double Slice says it requires wielding two weapons, but its upgrade Graceful Poise says that Double Slice can work with agile unarmed strikes. So do they count as both wielding and a hand free? And what does a bite attack/horn attack count toward for something like an Animal totem barbarian?

For a martial class it seems pretty strong, by level 16 a fighter can pick up Graceful Poise "While in this stance, if you make your second Strike from Double Slice with an agile weapon or agile unarmed attack, it doesn’t count toward your multiple attack penalty for the turn." If you attack with double strike first than follow up with the level 14 feat 1 action Two-weapon flurry "Strike twice, once with each weapon. These do not count toward the multiple attack penalty until the second Strike." You can get 4 attacks in the turn all at full attack bonus without some form of haste.

Another use of Double Slice is in a grey area, but due to Graceful Poises wording, it seems as if Double Slice works with Unarmed attacks (unless Graceful Poise is what allows it), even though unarmed section contradicts itself, one saying it acts as a simple weapon and the trait says it isn't a weapon. this potentially allows a Monk or barbarian to use Double Slice with fighter multi-class with d10 weapons, though it is seems still bad for the monk. An even more grey area is if an Animal totem barbarian can use Double slice with a 2h and something like a bite or horn attack, although if allowed on average it would only be a minor upgrade to just using the 2h.

Theres a few things going for it but on average it is probably worse or alot more hassle than to be a more generic 2h barbarian. The totems first are slightly different from each other based on the resistance they eventually apply, and the same goes for the animals, different attacks are piercing slashing or bludgeoning for fighting weak or resistant enemies. Another benefit is some of these attacks are agile for some secondary attack work or don't use up a hand so they can be used for maneuvers or attacks when your hands are free. Also later transformations can give you a few more perks like movement or scent ect.

While its not great, the other totems don't seem great either or greatly balanced for eachother, and rage totem will probably be really strong when theres more splat books but right now also seems weak just because there is so few options outside of the totem powers.

Potential interesting things about animal totem though, dip into fighter for duel strike/duelwielding abilies. Does holding a 1d12 greatsword and having a d10 bite attack count for having two weapons ? Otherwise two d10s for higher 1h damage than most other classes can currently get.
Animal hide gives 2 ac over barbarian during rage, or would have if you weren't still untrained in unarmored defense so you are still the same ac and even worse outside of raging and fatigued.

Doing terrible dipping into fighter and then Grey Maiden can eventually let you use that d10 "1h" with a shield, though it would probably still be better to just get the dueling feat from fighter for +2ac.

The number of dice forceful refers to is most often from magic runes adding more weapon dice and a few abilities with power attack. So with a base forceful weapon your second attack with it on the turn would add +1 damage and any more would add +2. If you instead have a +3 magic weapon for 4 damage dice, your 2nd attack with it would gain a +4 damage and any subsequent attacks would gain +8 damage.

Trying some napkin math, without abilities like haste and agile, it is close to but generally always weaker than a dice step (1d12>1d10 forceful), and abilities like attacks of opportunity favor a dice step over forceful even more.

Now that two handers no longer get 1.5x ability modifier to damage, to make 2hs better they made them currently the only way to get 1d10s-1d12s outside of something like a monk or barbarian unarmed styles. So if magic is going to increase dice to 4d10 or 4d12 for a 2h is still vs a sneak attacking rogue with a 8d6 or 4d8+4d6 which is still about the same if not more damage in some cases. So I don't see why they should still get about equivalent damage and way more skills for just a little less in the defense department .If they kept 9-10d6 or used a bigger weapon, it would be way overkill for how much other bonuses they seem to already get.