Nik Gervae's page

Hello...been away a while after my Pathfinder group fell apart and I guess these charts went away with my group stuff! Sorry about that. John R asked me to put the charts back up, so here you go. Please use this new thread to post requests & error reports. And I'm sure you will find errors! (Archives of Nethys stopped loading http links so I had to change all those to https.)

Pathfinder 2 Class Feat Charts

The idea of these charts is to show at a glance how class feats are related, by dependency and functional area, along with useful notes and keywords.

Most charts include ratings from particular class guides. You can click on any feat to look up its full description at the Archives of Nethys, and the ratings citation at top right to open the cited guide. There are lots more class guides now so I doubt I'll be incorporating them all on the charts themselves, it just gets crazy. I could link to each class's guides on the individual charts, but it might be best to just link to Zenith's Guide to the Guides. If there's a particular guide's ratings you really really want incorporated, feel free to ask.

I could also publish the charts without any guide ratings at all, if you would prefer that. Note that my OmniGraffle Pro source document is in the folder, so if you have that app you can muck with a personal copy of the charts or make your own for particular classes I haven't gotten to yet. (I'm doing new classes as I have time & interest, but I don't expect to cram in every new supplemental feat outside of core books.)

Please do report any errors you find here.

In hopes I might find a chance to playtest this class, I'm thinking about building up a dwarf inventor, with a weapon innovation but also a construct companion that will become a mount when it's advanced. I'd be taking ancestry & other feats to boost survivability to cover the defense side of things.

I usually play caster classes, though, so I'm not terribly up to speed on melee weapons., I'm going to be looking over the weapons but if you have any advice for someone new to that aspect of the game, I'd love to hear it.

Anvil Dwarf heritage and Tinker background are pretty obvious, although that winds up doubling the Specialty Crafting feat and I don't recall if you can replace one of those like you can a skill training.

Likely starting stats: STR 14, DEX 12, CON 14, INT 18, WIS 12, CHA 8

If dropping INT for STR is viable I might do that. Or I might do a ranged-weapon build with DEX, although that's not really how dwarves roll.

I can post more about the build when I have it figured out.

I know that you can swap out a duplicate skill from a background, but do you do that with skill feats as well? For example, I am thinking of making an Anvil Dwarf with the Tinker background. Both of those grant the Specialty Crafting skill feat. Can I change one of them because they are both the same? If not I can go with some other background I guess, but the Engineering Lore is quite apt for the concept.

This must be an editorial oversight, yeah? You just get a construct as one of your three innovation choices at first level. Or do you suppose the intent is that you can have two constructs?

I've had a bit of a time taking advantage of the Storm Born druid class feat, what with my teammates not being able to see through clouds of mist and such. It doesn't help that several such spells are 3-action casts. I got a Horn of Fog, which has a 2-action activation, but of course you have to spend an action to grab the darn thing anyhow....

I'm wondering if the best thing is to just reserve such things for casting on myself so foes have trouble targeting me, rather than trying to place things out on the shifting battlefleld where they'll as likely be obstacles for my allies as my enemies.

Any tips?

It's not a thing in 2e, is it? To craft a magic item with specific abilities, say a staff with a particular set of spells? It looks to me like you can only go by listed items/formulas and not come up with your own. The Inventor skill feat says you "invent" a "common formula"—well if it's already common, you aren't inventing it, you're re-inventing it. Or am I missing some special subclause or sidebar somewhere?

I've been reading a fair number of threads about groups (and individuals) having trouble with 2e-style tactics and such, and am beginning to wonder if the books could have conveyed things better, or if anybody runs educational sessions where the GM and/or experienced players walk the newer players through their options, possibly with rewinds/replays to see how the different choices pan out. I would find this very helpful, and I bet I'm not alone in that. Is anybody doing this, or would anybody be interested in doing it?

In all the fuss I've read over how bad incapacitation spells are, it's easy to see that you can heighten the spell level to overcome the problem. In fact, I've never seen that mentioned in the various guides and discussions. Now I'm sure it'll depend on the specific spell, but since incapacitation spells are acknowledged to be very powerful, are there some you think it's well worth heightening for use against higher-level foes, and are there some you think aren't worth heightening?

If you take Clever Improviser and Incredible Improvisation, you have the equivalent of Expert proficiency in all untrained skills, and can use them for actions that require training. Say you're playing a Wizard, who, with high Intelligence, could be trained in many skills but better than Expert in only a few. Depending on how long your career will be, you might be better off just not training in those extra skills and getting only the ones you're taking to Master or Expert: You'll start out behind, but by 9th level it seems like you'll have more than caught up in everything.

Now, the +4 bonus from Incredible Improvisation is circumstantial,so you can't benefit from any additional circumstantial bonuses, but I'd guess that doesn't come up very often.

There must be something else I'm missing, so please point it out. Maybe not taking skills you're entitled to isn't an option.

The feats that grant halcyon spells specify that they must be common halcyon spells, but, after you take the feat, can you use Learn a Spell to replace one with a halsyon spell that's uncommon?

The introduction to halcyon spells says that if you are a prepared caster, then your halcyon spells are treated the same way: they go in your spellbook/list, but then under the feats, it says you can use your halcyon spell slots to spontaneously cast your halcyon spells. Well, wizards and druids don't add leveled spells to their lists, so does that mean you can spontaneously cast a heightened heal (for example) at whatever level you want? Because the same introduction to halcyon spells says you can't designate them as signature spells—but wizards don't even have signature spells. Or are a prepared caster's known halcyon spells actually fixed at a level, in contradiction to the general description of halcyon spells?

Some feats say "You gain access to a cantrip", others say, "You gain a cantrip". Is there a difference? Does gaining a cantrip mean that you get another cantrip "slot", or just add a cantrip to the list of cantrips you know?

Another feat I'm looking at is quite explicit, saying, "You gain the ability to cast a ... cantrip".

So after reading BlueFrog's Hideously Biased Guide to the (Spell Blending) Wizard, I decided to start building one out. Goals:

• Spell Blending thesis for more high-level spell slots.
  
• Halcyon Speaker for even more spells and slots from all traditions.
  
• Heavy investment in Magical Crafting with staves & wands in mind, scrolls to fill in low-level slots, maybe basic alchemy too.
  
• Some connection to the criminal element for RP fun.
  
• Generally aim for versatility in spells, skills, and such.
  

This being Pathfinder 2, and me still being pretty new to it, things got complicated, of course. I've got more trained skills than I know what to do with, but I'm not sure what order to take skill rises or secondary ability boosts in; whether to get more (Lore?) skills just at trained; I don't know what to pick for some high-level skill & general feats after I've gotten the essentials; what might I retrain out later; and so on. I'm doing this exercise in a vaccuum, of course, so details would change depending on party, but I would like to have a coherent build regardless to feel I have a grip on the process.

Here are the details, with likely halcyon spell picks based on what looks interesting/effective/useful. Let me know what you think.

Key
b) ability start/boost
a) ancestry/background feature/feat
f) class feature
c) class feat
g) general or skill feet
s) skill feat
t) skill training (master available at 7, legendary at 15)

Versatile Human, Artisan background, Wizard
I might go Half-Elf instead, it's always been my favorite for RP reasons, but I'm not planning on taking any Elf ancestry feats, so all I'd get is low-light vision in exchange for an early general feat. (I actually started this build with a dwarf but when I decided not to dump charisma I abandoned that.)

Build Choices
1b) STR 10, DEX 12, CON 12, INT 18, WIS 14, CHA 12
Secondary abilities not min/maxed, I'd like a bit of breadth for RP, but might need some tuning, or advice on later spell/feat selections to compensate.

1a) Natural Ambition (1st-level class feat) - 1c) Familiar
Feat budget doesn't allow for Enhanced Familiar, but I'd still like to have one.

1a) Versatile Human (general feat) - 1g) Canny Acumen: Expert Perception
Boosting Fortitude, Reflex, or Will might be better.

1a) Languages: Common, Draconic, Goblin, Jotun, Orcish, Sylvan
I went for the languages of folks who often don't speak Common.

1a) Background: Artisan - 1t) Crafting, Guild Lore; 1s) Specialty Crafting (wood)
1t) Arcana, Deception, Diplomacy, Intimidation, Occultism, Religion, Society
1f) Wizard School: Enchantment (probably)
1f) Arcane Thesis: Spell Blending

2c) Magaambyan Attendant Dedication (Cascade Bearers) - primal cantrip: Guidance; 2t) trained in Nature, Primal spell attack & DC
2s) Magical Crafting
Is this worth taking so early?

3g) Incredible Initiative -OR- Fleet -OR- Toughness
These three general feats seem to outshine all others by far, but I don't know about ordering them.

3t) Expert Arcana
4c) Reach Spell
4s) Assurance (Crafting)
I hear this is important at lower levels, might retrain out later.

5b) INT 19, ???
5f) Expert Reflex saves
5a) Clever Improviser
5t) Expert Crafting
6c) Halcyon Speaker Dedication (2 cantrip/1st-level) - halcyon spells: Know Direction, Stabilize, Heal, ???
I could just get more Arcane cantrips here of course.

6s) Society - Streetwise
7f) Expert Arcane spell attack and DC
7g) Incredible Initiative -OR- Fleet -OR- Toughness
7t) Expert Society
I could get Master proficiencies starting now and let Society lag behind.

8f) Expert Fortitude saves
8c) Spell Penetration
8s) Impeccable Crafter
9a) Incredible Improvisation -OR-Multitalented (Alchemist, or Champion if I want armor, req STR 14, CHA 14)
Incredible Improvisation won't make me the party skill monkey, but it might save me in a pinch. Then again, making alchemy could be useful/lucrative. I don't see meeting the reqs for Champion but it's a survivability option.

9t) Master Arcana
10b) INT 20, ???
10c) Cascade Bearer's Spellcasting (all traditions! 1 cantrip/1st-level) - halcyon spells: Join Pasts (or Forbidding Ward), Phantom Pain
10s) Assured Identification
11f) Expert Perception, Expert wizard weapons
11g) Incredible Initiative -OR- Fleet -OR- Toughness
11t) Master Crafting
12c) Halcyon Spellcasting Initiate (2 2nd/3rd level) - halcyon spells: Faerie Fire, Sudden Blight, Heroism, Hypercognition
12s) Society - Criminal Connections (req Streetwise)
13a) Advanced General Training -or- something lower-level
13f) Expert unarmored defense
13f) +2 damage with expert weapons, +3/+4 if master/legendary
13t) Master Society
14c) Halcyon Spellcasting Adept (4th/5th level) - halcyon spells: Chroma Leech, Holy Cascade (maybe Spiritual Anamnesis), Breath of Life, Shadow Blast (or Synesthesia)
14s) ??? - I think I've met my available build goals so far, so what would fit well here?
15b) INT 21, ???
15f) Master Arcane spell attack and DC
15g) Incredible Investiture? (req CHA 16)
Having gobs of invested items seems like a nice thing for a wizard.

15t) Legendary Crafting -OR- Arcana
16c) Flexible Halcyon Spellcasting (additional slots)
Not sure if this takes effect when chosen and freezes there, or if I wil get an additional 6th-level slot when I get the next dedication feat. Not that I would give up my level 20 class feat for it!

16s) Crafting - Craft Anything
Since I'll have access to all spell traditions, I'm not sure I need this.!

17a) Heroic Presence
17f) Master Will saves
17g) Canny Acumen (from level 1): Master Perception
17t) Legendary Crafting -OR- Arcana
18c) Halcyon Spellcasting Sage (6th/7th level) halcyon spells: Blanket of Stars (or Stone Tell), Spirit Blast, Regenerate, Finger of Death (or Retrocognition, or Sunburst)
18s) Arcana - Unified Theory
Oh, I was worried earlier about training some other skills, wasn't I? :-)

19g) ???
19t) Legendary Society
20b) INT 22, ???
20c) Spell Mastery
You can never have too many spell slots!

20s) ???
I have no idea what would be useful at final level.

If you don't take Wild Order as a druid, you still have all the X Shape spells on the primal list to choose from for your spell slots. Even as a Wild Order druid, of course, you can prepare those spells, and since you only have 1 Focus Point unless you went Leaf/Storm first, you might even want to. (I don't know if there are any functional differences between using the focus spell and a prepared spell.)

How often do you take advantage of non-focus shapeshifting, and what are your favorite uses?

I am a day away from my first Pathfinder 2 session! I had created a Storm Druid with a whole Concept about being initiated when a nearby tree got struck by lightning and now he carries a staff made from that tree. But then my group said well we are all level 7 so you have to skip up to that and buy gear. Oh and you should get a magic staff.

There are so many staves, for fire, illusions, summoning animals, doing plant things. But there's nothing for storms.

So I looked up item creation. Hm, INT based. Needs a skill and a feat. Oh and formulas, which apparently are only for items...already in the catalog.

Well that rained on my parade a little. Unless I'm wrong and you can craft a staff with custom spells. The skill & feat investments are way hefty just for a single item anyhow.

For the heck of it, here are all the low-level spells I found that would be in theme:

Cantrip: Electric Arc, Ray of Frost
1st Level: Chilling Spray, Gust of Wind, Personal Rain Cloud, Shocking Grasp
2nd Level: Obscuring Mist, Rime Slick, Sudden Bolt

That's way more spells than a 6th level staff normally gets, so further tightening the theme would probably focus on either cold or electricity.

I can't think of a suitable item bonus, those are usually quite modest or involve identifying things.

As a Tiny creature, a familiar can hitch a ride on a player character. Would you say it can also hitch a ride on a Small or Medium animal companion?

Do you feel a need to push your key ability to the limit, or, since ability boost above 18 only add 1, do you prefer to get more bang for your boost buck by gaining a full +1 to all boosted attributes, even if they're perhaps less frequently used?

Perception seems to be treated like a skill, in that it has training levels, but it's not listed as a skill or mentioned as something you can use skill training increases on. The only ways I've found, so far, to raise it, are:

• • Automatically as a class feature
  
• • Using the Canny Acumen feat, which you can only take once
  

Can you use skill training increases on Perception? If so, where is that stated?

(Edit: Sure would be nice if the rudimentary formatting codes worked.)

I've asked some questions about some specific topics but I figured since this is for my actual first character I'd make a thread covering the whole build. I've got the theme worked out pretty well—a Tengu storm-caller with a pet vulture—but there are still some feat choices I'm unsure about. I am joining a group that has a few sessions done already, in Age of Ashes. It's one of those weird parties, with a cleric focused more on damage, and no thiefy type, so I might have to fill those gaps a bit. :-P

Anyhow here's the deets:

Ancestry, Heritage Background: Tengu, Skyborn (no falling damage), Nomad

Abilities: STR 10, DEX 14, CON 14, INT 10, WIS 18, CHA 12

This should be pretty straightforward. I could shuffle 2 points for DEX 16, CON 12 (or vice versa), depending on how I want to balance AC & skills vs. hit points & Fortitude saves. I might be able to grow into something of a party face with ability boosts.

Ancestry Feats
Level 1 is the tough choice, since I need to make it now and there are a couple so-so options.

Storm's Lash would be an extra, thematic cantrip, but based on Charisma, which isn't my high stat (to start). Still might be useful against low-Reflex foes, and if needed I could always prepare electric arc as a druid cantrip.

Tengu Lore would get me Society, Tengu Lore, and a skill of my choice, since my background in Nomad gives me Survival. This is my inclination, as skills are hard to come by.

Tengu Weapon Familiarity would get me a khakkara, which is kinda cool and does more damage than a plain old staff, although I have no strength bonus so, as with Storm's Lash, I'm not sure it's worth the bother. As a Tengu I have an unarmed finesse beak attack anyhow, for when I get stuck in melee.

Squawk! sounds fun, but doesn't seem worth it unless I have good CHA skills.

Level 5 would be Eat Fortune, pretty clearly, and level 9 definitely Soaring Flight. But then at 13th level, the only choice is Tengu Weapon Expertise, for which I would need Tengu Weapon Familiarity from level 1. I'd probably take Long-Nosed Form instead just to qualify for Great Tengu Form at 17 (assuming my group levels that high).

About Those Skills: Current plan is

• Nomad background - Survival (Assured), Forest Lore
• Tengu Lore feat - Society, Tengu Lore, Thievery (since I already have Survival)
• Druid class - Nature, Acrobatics (Storm Order); Medicine, Stealth (free choices)

Thievery & Stealth are thematic for a corvid and I hope to have some fun with them. With ability boosts as I level up, I would probably get more CHA skills.

Druid Class Feats
My group is playing Age of Ashes, I don't know how far in level that will take us. Storm has the fewest feats of the four orders, and from what I read, Animal needs to take particular feats to keep the companion viable, but that still leaves a few open choices.

1: Shield Block (free) - not sure how much I'll actually use it, as a caster, but it's there
1: Storm Born
2: Order Explorer (Animal - Vulture companion) - Vulture's support benefit doesn't rely on Strikes and seems useful, and its advanced move is a self-heal. Plus, a fellow scavenger bird seems a great thematic companion! (Corvids hate birds of prey.) Wolf would be a second thematic choice.
4: Mature Animal Companion
6: Nothing at 6- appeals, so I was gonna just take Order Explorer (Leaf) to get a leshy familiar for some flexibility. Storm Retribution is pretty narrow, and I could prepare spells to get a foe out of my face if that comes up often.
8: Incredible Companion (Nimble) - forum consensus is clear on this. Wind Caller is also available (see below), so I might put this off till 10. Depends on how my pet's doing I guess.
10: Wind Caller - from level 9 I'll be flying 1/day, and for longer, as a Tengu. Given that, I might even be able to skip this for a different feat. But it does get me that 3rd focus point.
12: Overwhelming Energy, or Primal Focus. If I have a familiar I can regain 1 extra focus, 1/day, so I'm learning toward Overwhelming Energy.
14: Specialized Companion (Ambusher) - get that AC up to keep the pet alive.
16: Several strong feats compete at 10-16. Specialized Companion (Daredevil)? Effortless Concentration? Something lower level?
18: With my companion potentially taking up my 3rd action, I figured I'd skip Invoke Disaster (fun as it sounds) and go for Primal Aegis.
20: Hierophant's Power would seem the obvious choice here, unless I find I'm burning through low-level spells all the time.

I won't go fully into general & skill feats, but if you've got any particular recommendations I'm happy to hear them. I'll probably take Battle Medicine and Continual Recovery to shore up our healing, beyond that, nothing's decided. Spells are going to prioriize air, lightning, and other weather stuff, with healing as needed.

I'll be playing a storm order druid that's getting an animal companion via order explorer. Initially I was gonna get a bird, but its support benefit only helps my melee strikes, which, as a caster, I don't expect to be doing a lot. The guides I've read generally assume an animal companion is supporting a melee combatant, so I figured I'd see here what people think would be a better option for a caster.

If you are starting with Leaf, Storm, or Wild order, and want to branch out into having an animal companion, it seems like Beastmaster is a great alternative to Order Explorer. You miss out on one Animal Order class feat—Side by Side—but get improved equivalents of every other Animal Order class feat, good for all the companions in your menagerie. Even if you stick with a single animal companion, you have access to feats like Beastmaster's Trance and Beastmaster Bond that Druid doesn't have at all.

if you're going Animal Order out the gate of course, you get Heal Animal for free, so adding Beastmaster is a good option instead of going for Order Explorer too. You can get Side by Side plus all the enhanced and additional feats from Beastmaster.

Thoughts?

Hello folks! Last week I posted a class feat chart for the character class I was considering, and even though I haven't even finished making that character yet, the chart project grabbed my interest to the point that I've now finished up all the classes from the Core Rulebook and the Advanced Player's Guide. You can view them here:

Pathfinder 2E Class Feat Charts Folder

The idea is to show, at a glance, how feats are related, by dependency and function, along with useful notes and keywords. I also include ratings from particular class guides. You can click on any feat to look up its full description at the Archives of Nethys, and the ratings citation to open the cited guide.

I am looking for corrections and comments. These are still drafts, so I have (hopefully) disabled downloading until I have checked them to my satisfaction. Comments are enabled, so you can post directly in the documents, or here on the this topic. Read the Intro, and the Design & Proofreading notes.

Now I just need to find some people to make up characters with, maybe even play out some encounters to kick the tires.... :-)

(Note: Since these forums don't allow editing of posts later on, when I do publish the files, the link may stop working. I'll make a note in this topic and start a new one.)

The description for this feat says it triggers when you critically hit, but then the text refers to you having made a blow, which implies you have to critically hit with a weapon, and not a spell. Which is it?

One of the things I immediately found odd/confusing with second edition is there are all these feats—so many feats!—but I only get this many ancestry feats, that many general/skill feats, that many class feats. Why can't I just get feats and take them from any bucket? If I want to be pathetic at skills and focus on being a paragon of my ancestry, why not?

The obvious answer is that the system wasn't designed that way and you could be brokenly powerful if you were able to take 30 druid class feats (for example), but that leaves the question of why the system was designed the way it is. Maybe it just wouldn't be possible to balance things around an open feat pool.

I am a visuospatial thinker, so I figured it might help me figure out what class feats I can fit into a build if I laid them all out graphically. Here is the result:

PF2E Ranger Class Feat Chart - paginated - paginated for printing

PF2E Ranger Class Feat Chart - single - one big PDF image

I tried to keep things as simple as possible, without requiring a lot of comments or a key. Feats are grouped into broad categories. Now you can just look across a given level to see what feats are competing, and see prerequisite dependencies at the same time.

The chart makes minimal use of shading & color, so you can print it without using a ton of ink and shuffle the sheets around if you need to. Or you can slice & dice it with your favorite image-editing software, of course.

These files might need to find a new home but they're here for now! Feedback welcome.

I am trying to make a character for the first time and the character sheet is confusing.

There is a "Special" feat slot for 1st level under Ancestry Feats & Abilities. Is that for the various vision-related abilities? They aren't described in the book as either feats or abilities (or special), they are just there, after the Traits. I would have expected a little header, "Special Abilities", like for all the other things above.

And then, under Class Feats and Abilities, while there are two Features listed for 1st level, every other level has only one box for a Feature, but already at 5th level for my Ranger I see two things that could be class features, Trackless Step and Weapon Expertise; at 7th level there's Evasion, Vigilant Senses, and Weapon Specialization; with similar multiples at higher levels. Where do I put these things when there's only one box?

I was really disappointed to see that the PDF offers little navigation help. No hyperlinks on TOC/index entries, cross-references, or the chapter tabs that got so much praise in reviews I've read. Having hit a couple cases where I have to follow chains of cross-references, I think this is a real problem with the PDF. At least it has a PDF table of contents.

I sure hope they put out an update that adds these in.