Pharmalade's page

A dwarf TWFing with two Longaxes! Ye gods! That'd be hilarious!

The penalties would be steep. -6 for each hand? Ouch. Add in power attack... or don't.

The cleaving idea is pretty good and works well from low levels.

I think Wild Rager for 2 levels with a really low Charisma score to offset the will save when I drop a bloke. It allows me to full attack with an extra axe and only costs a -2 to attack rolls (and -4 to AC). Then take fighter levels. Vital strike feats, Improved Crit, Weapon Focus, all good stuff.

Could a mounted duelist use a lance to qualify for most of its class features, like parry? (Assuming it leaves its other hand free.)

I've been looking for this in searches, but other more niche questions keep coming up.

Can you use Spring Attack while mounted? The (vague) mounted combat rules state "You move at its (the mount's) speed, but the mount uses its action to move."

This leads me to believe that if I am mounted and I have the SA feat, even if my mount doesn't, I can spring attack as a full round action.

Confirmation or evidence to the contrary?

The stock cavalier class features allow a cavalier to be pretty darn good at Charging with Lance even without Spirited Charge and Ride-By. If you're worried about there being no space for a charging cavalier most of the time, you don't NEED to go down that route. I mean, working up from ONLY double damage to triple only makes sense if you can do it a lot. Otherwise its a feat you may not really need to use.

(That said, if you can continuously ride-by attack and charge, all those banner bonuses and damage multipliers... yipe!)

Keep in mind, the Mount gets feats too. If you give the mount enough Smarts to learn some handy feats, even some of the teamwork feats you may already have, you will always have an "adjacent ally" handy. Pack attack is one of my faves; allows free movement to possibly get into flanking position and doesn't have a dex requirement that Precise Strikes does.
If he will in fact spend time mounted, you can give your mount the Bodyguard and In Harms Way feats (intelligence pending) and then negate an attack ON YOURSELF with a ride check. (Creature attacks you, Mount uses immediate action to use In Harms Way, you ride check to make that attack miss using Mounted Combat as an immediate action.)

The feats you have are fine and dandy. They are simple and easy to remember. He may end up feeling a little lackluster if he doesn't get to charge.

Out of Ultimate Equipment, you can get Pokeball armor (Hosteling Property) which allows you to store your horse in your heavy armor.

Order of the Dragon is a fan-diddly-an-TASTIC order. Just by being there, you make people better. The challenge ability makes EVERYONE better while facing the big bad; not a case of charge in, but a case of sit next to him to keep him threatened and all your pals get to-hit bonuses.

As a possible alternative, consider the Honor Guard archetype in UC. You swap out some of the strictly mounted combat abilities for abilities that are more generally useful in close quarters melee. It also works REALLLLLY WELL with the order of the dragon (aid another abilities get better and better by level, and the Honor Guard archetype gives you free Bodyguard feat, which you can use to aid another for AC as an AOO, give at LEAST a +4 bonus and it gets better every 6 levels.)

Its a fair bit more complicated a build than what you have. It seems to me as though you're working to make a simple, easy to use character right-out-of-the-box. The ones I'm suggesting encourage a player to stay close to the centre of melee rather than charging all about, aid the buddies on the front lines, all the while being a full bab character that can be Large sized with huge speed if there's the space for it.

There are a few reasons I'm going with greatsword.

1. It's more badass.
2. It uses 2d6, a common type of die of which I have plenty and in many colors easily paired with complimentary d20's.
3. d4's are awkward to roll. I'd rather not have to roll them often.
4. It's more badass.
5. It's the weapon of my GOD, and it is by his divine majesty I stride into battle!
6. When I'm large (which will be often), it's easier to change the damage my weapon deals: Just add 1d6! Otherwise, I'd be switching from 2d4 to 2d6 anyway, so why not start there?
7. It's more badass.

So, Simplicity, Roleplay, and Badass would have to be my reasons.

At a game where I sadly couldn't attend, there was a big huge fight in a lich's phylactery lair. It was guarded by some big, bad, evil, spellcasting beastie. She was killing a player a round. The rogue/bard fellow said "nuts to this" and raided the treasure vault prematurely. Appraised successfully a ring of wishes among the treasure, picked it up and said, "I wish she didn't show up today." Time rewinds. The other players break into the vault to see the rogue/bard standing inside the treasure vault already. "Hi guys!" "How did you get in here?" "Nevermind that, wanna help with the treasure?"

Here are the things they got that I like: That bard archetype, and the Fell Magic racial ability. (Some of the favored class bonuses are nice too, like the witch and cavalier.)
The Gunslinger is interesting but powered down relative to the damage output of the normal class. This changes the meaning of the class to something that others do more reliably. Not saying it wouldn't be fun, but I am saying it won't be easy to use to specific effect as the normal class.
The Saboteur Alchemist gains abilities that change the way the alchemist runs. Blowing things up is a hard thing to plan for in any game and the majority of architectures have such a fierce story element that bypassing things by destroying them will likely give a DM pause.
The bard is neat.
The fourth class they get is worse than EVERYTHING else the other races get in that it doesn't exist. A class that makes things worse is still an option you can take. This option does not exist for Gnomes. (Technically speaking humans get a bloodline and halflings get an order. This still presents an option that gnomes have no access to.)
The gnome feats amplify only core race abilities. Halflings got some interesting feats. Dwarves and Half-Orcs got very interesting feats. Humans got great feats, not surprisingly. Gnomes got feats that are narrow to the point of uselessness and the majority of them amplify abilities you would like to trade out at character creation. One of which is a weapon focus feat specific to only one weapon in the hardcovers: The Gnome Hooked Hammer.
The illusionary object creation spells do not function as written as you automatically disbelieve your own spells. Meanwhile half-elves can use a spell and gain a feat.

The gnomes got very little love in that book and the fact that they are the only race in the entire book with only three archetypes or other class options leads me to believe that there was a broken one that was discovered in playtesting that was replaced by padding the Gunslinger or adding fluff. Note that the Gnomes have more fluff than any of the other races. The next closest is Elves and they got the full four archetypes.

I love gnomes because they are fun to roleplay. It seems that being fun to roleplay has a cost in that you cannot be as effective in combat and you cannot have the nice things the other races do.

If I sound bitter it's because I am. I love gnomes, but the game doesn't support them to the extent that the other races have support.

Incidentally, here's a fighter ENTIRELY focused on cleaving to level 12... (Almost. Just missing feats for 9th and 10th level pertaining to cleave.)

Basic Charger Cavalier, Small Size

Gnome Emissary

Play Notes

You also have access to the Beast Rider feat out of ARG, available to both half-orcs and orcs. This allows your options to expand at 7th level. Dinosaurs mostly, but also an Elephant and a Pteranodon which allows for rudimentary flight. This opens up non Beast Rider archetypes for your use with neat mounts, including the Samurai.

Of course, if you have leadership access, you can get yourself a fancy mount at GM discretion.

This leads me to ask, can you decline to roll confirmation on a critical?

The haters are there, but so are the lovers of the Crossbowman archetype.

At later levels, the Crossbowman gets some really interesting mechanics and they do what you want quite well.

The best feat for a Crossbowman unfortunately requires a chain of feats that go against archetype. That feat is Deadly Stroke. It's in the core rulebook. You can take it at 11th, and the ability you get at 9th to make all of your attacks hit as though the target was flat-footed means once each round you can make a ranged attack that deals double damage and CON bleed. Now every single shot you make will kill the target unless the get medical attention or magical healing in a number of rounds equal to twice their CON score.
Unfortunately this requires taking the Dazzling Display feat. That is the opposite of what you want to do when you're sniping. I recommend you take any other low-level useful Combat bonus feat in its place and retrain it to Dazzling Display at 8th. Also, Shatter Defenses is nearly useless as you do most of it already. It's the capstone of the chain that's the beauty of it. And you have to wait to 11th or 12th to get it (12th if you're planning to retrain.)
One such feat I'd recommend is Focused Shot. It allows you to add your Intelligence mod to damage on your standard action shots. It won't stack with Deadly Stroke, so it's one of the feats you can train out as you get better with your standard actions.

If you feel like adding poison to your shots, all the better as their Fort save will drop. Assuming you can remain hidden, you can take a shot at them, hide again, apply some poison to your next bolt, wait for them to bleed a bit, then take another shot and they'll have a reduced fortitude with which to save.
Not that you don't have enough feats to take, but the Master Alchemist feat [APG] will let you make poison on the cheap.

Small races get a sizable boost to Stealth. The Human race gets a bonus feat that you can spend on Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Double Crossbow) [which is listed in the APG.] Double crossbow can fire two bolts at once, still at a standard action, and you'll apply the bonuses from the Crossbowman class features to each bolt.
Another crossbow worth considering is the heavy repeating crossbow, which lets you skip the Rapid Reload feat, assuming you don't mind exchanging the cartridge which greatly reduces your time. In an average combat, if you're doing every shot as a standard action, five shots with a move action available may be more valuable to you.

Starting at 2nd level, you will probably be left behind in damage until you start delivering stat damage at 80 to 120ft range at 9th.

A crossbow also has a higher critical threat range than a bow, so critical feats are fair game to be applied at range. Impact Critical is pretty funny.

Also, these are only available at low levels. At early levels, you are merely attempting to overcome the handicaps of using a Crossbow. Don't lose hope!
If you need to make a full attack, you still have a lot of the associated feats so you can use a Bow in the meanwhile.

If you aren't going to get to the higher levels, you may find it not worth your while. Always have a back-up weapon, including a bow and your golf-bag.

Here's some particularly strange ones I've imagined.

History's Trace (Su): With a successful Kn: History check (DC 15 plus X for each # years/decades/centuries back) and a point of mythic power, you can view events as they transpired in your current location as though you were present. This viewing lasts for 1 minute per mythic tier. You must be at least 5th tier to select this power. At 8th tier, you may spend an additional point of mythic power to preform a steal combat maneuver check on anyone viewed and return to the present immediately. The stolen item returns with you to the present, but returns to the past in a number of days equal to your mythic tier unless used or destroyed. (Effects of a destroyed item returning to history are best left up to the GM.)

Arrow Leaping (Ex): If you would be hit by a ranged attack, you may spend a point of mythic power to attempt an Acrobatics check, DC = the attack roll. If you succeed, you appear next to the attacker and may make an attack of opportunity. The attacker is flat-footed against this attack. You must be at least 3rd tier to select this ability. At 6th tier, you may use it on ranged spells.

(Based off what someone said earlier in the thread.)

Costume Swap (Ex): You may spend a point of mythic power to make a Disguise check as a Disarm combat maneuver. If you are successful, you swap clothes and all possessions with the target of the maneuver.

Improbable Hiding (Su): You may spend a point of mythic power to make Stealth check to hide in any location down to the size of a thimble. You may hide under rocks, within knotholes of trees, or even inside an ally's nostril. If you are hiding inside a hostile creature, you must make a successful tumble as though going through that creature's square. If you attack a creature you are hiding in, you are immediately discovered and provoke an attack of opportunity. You must be ?th tier to select this ability.

I would very much like to see a mythic flaw related to sleep, along the lines of Rip Van Winkle or sleeping beauty or any immortal being that took a nap and woke up in another era.

Epic Slumber (Ex and Su): You require sleep in order to function. You do not wake during the night and cannot have your requirement for sleep reduced. You also treat the fatigued condition as exhausted and any effect that would make you exhausted instead causes you to sleep. While sleeping, you do not age. Illusion protects you while you slumber. Attempts to notice you while sleeping require a will save (fnuh) and attempts to attack you require a second will save (fnuh) lest the attacker fall asleep until the moment after you wake. If you are reduced to 0 or fewer hit points, you fall asleep after stabilizing.

Something along those lines, I have a feeling you could do better. I would like to have some niche way to have someone fall asleep for a century or longer, but this doesn't work well in an adventuring game. I'm sure you could make improvements Lucent. I think there needs to be some stopgap to prevent the sleeping illusion from being abused.

Though I wouldn't know how to do it mechanically, having a weak-spot is very mythic. Achilles had his heel, did he not? Perhaps a weakness to precision damage and/or critical hits? (I'd pick mine as right between the eyes.)

Weak Point (Ex): Choose a spot on your body. That spot is your weak point. Any time you are struck by an attack that would be a critical hit, sneak attack, or cause other precision damage (even if you are normally immune to those conditions or to being denied your dexterity bonus, flat-footed, or flanked) it has a 20% chance of striking your weak point. If the attacker knows your weak point, it has a 50% chance. If it strikes your weak point, double all non-sneak attack precision damage dealt, the attacker rolls sneak attack damage dice twice, and treat the weapon's critical modifer as 1 higher (to a maximum of x5.) You also become sickened for 1d4 rounds. This attack ignores all damage reduction you may have. If an attacker hits your weak point once, they learn its location. If you would normally be immune, you only take this damage if your weak point is struck. Covering the weak point causes you to lose your mythic powers until it remains uncovered for 24 hours. Hits that strike your weak point can't be negated by any effect, such as Light Fortification, although such abilities do not necessarily count as covering your weak point.

I'm sure you'll be able to clean these up, if they're at all usable.

Edit: Thought of another flaw...

Arch-nemesis [Su]: Some heros will meet their match. A hero with this ability receives an arch-nemesis of the GM's choosing. A player takes a -4 penalty to AC and saving throws to attacks and abilities of the arch-nemesis and all damage rolls deal an additional 4 damage to the player and ignores any DR or energy resistance. Any of the arch-nemesis' animal companions or other cohorts receive half these bonuses and penalties. An arch-nemesis has an awareness as to the location of the player to within ten miles. If the arch-nemesis is defeated, a new one is appointed within a week. The CR/MR of the player should be for APL +2/+1. Players may share the same arch-nemesis, increasing the CR/MR accordingly.

I really enjoy fighters. I love feats. I love the anticipation of attaining that next feat. I love getting to even levels and saying, "I wonder what feat I'll take" and the GM says, "You don't get a feat at 6th" and I say, "yes I do. I'm I fighter. I get a feat at every level."

My GM doesn't play fighters.

Most of my usual group doesn't play fighters.

My favourite thing to play is badass. And fighters... they are badass.

So, I've been loking at whips and their assciated feats. Whip mastery appears to be the only one that's mandatory. The progression also looks slated for a 3/4 bab class like the bard (as they are proficient.)

The keen thing is the whole 15' reach business. I could see going several directions with a fighters feats on a whip. I'd use a half orc for the racial proficiency, but what then?

TWF: Taking a -4 to attack is steep, but that reach! Get two shocking whips and you're an irn man villain.

Whirlwind attack: Steep feat tax, but hitting everone within 15 feet of you makes you ground zero of a walking fireball.. This assumes damage feats like weapn spec and power attack.

Greater trip: Aoo's for all! I have recently made a tripping build with nobody to take the aoos, so this seems lackluster to me.

Whip mastery chain: Is this any good?

Other or any combo thereof: Fighters get lots of feats for a reason.

Any advice or suggestions? Preferably hardcovers only. If it isn't hardcover let me know before I get my hopes up.

I'm trying to make a really, really gross monk. He's a dwarf Drunken Master at the core of his build (hardcovers only). I'm really looking to make him absolutely disgusting to be around to play up his 6 CHA.

I suppose anything other than altering the race and the Drunken monk is up for review. (Hardcovers only.)
Here's a few things I've come up with...

Dragon Style: With the Roaring capstone with an acid based Elemental Fist, he can belch or vomit over his enemies.

Throw Anything: Perfectly emulate the behaviour of aggressive male chimps. I hope I don't have to draw you a picture here. Also involves kilt lifting. Add monkey style in this case for the theme.

Qinggong Powers:
Hydraulic Torrent: Lift kilt to push back your foes with a forceful stream of slightly used alcoholic beverages.
Dragon's Breath: See Dragon Style.
Scorching Ray: Perhaps it would be too far to skin this as combustible flatulence. Could also apply to Dragon's Breath.

These are just a few ideas. If you have any more I'd like to hear them. Bonus points if you can skin the same thing in different ways to prevent RP redundancy.

I'd like for them to be good abilities, but lets have flavor trump function for now and let the good (bad?) ideas froth to the top.

Hardcovers only please.

Order of the Blue Rose Cavalier specializes in nonlethal damage. It even gets bonuses to nonlethal damage.

Adventure Capitalists

Say a Gunslinger scores a critical threat on a Dead Shot at 7th level and both "attacks" hit (only one threat). You confirm the critical once (at a -5 penalty). Assuming a basic pistol, do you roll 5d8 or 8d8 for damage? (Or even some other permutation I'm not seeing.)

Mysterious Stranger is not a dex based class. It is entirely Cha based.

Whereas the standard slinger and the main archetypes add their To-Hit stat to damage a la Str for a melee fighter, the Stranger adds their Grit stat to damage.

This means you will want LOTS of grit. Max your Cha. It's not useless, it's your damage stat.

One thing the Stranger can do that the others can't do is COMPLETELY IGNORE a misfire. Guess which stat matters for that? That's right, it's also your damage and grit stat. The un-misfire ability isn't Grit dependent. While that means you won't be able to reclaim grit to recharge it, it also means you've got to use them wisely.

This makes the Dead Shot deed all the more appealing. You minimize your misfires on a deadshot by a long way.

Having a high charisma makes UMD much more worth your while. Pick up a wand of one of those fancy Firearms based spells. Jury-Rig can also be useful if you intend to stretch yourself thin. Clever use of the reloading spells can allow you to Dead shot with a musket.

How would you like to full attack with Burning Hands? With a Mysterious Stranger, you can. Just use a Dragon Pistol and use Dragonsbreath Alchemical rounds. Normally these would misfire just under 1/3rd of the time, but you don't care, because you ignore misfires. This is the only class that can use Dragonsbreath rounds with any degree of reliability. I recommend this on a Flaming weapon, some other similar burst.

You don't have a single bad save. Your bonus to AC changes to a Will save bonus. You become tailor made to take out casters. Though it won't grow at exactly the same rate, they eventually even out rather well.

As a Gnome, you should take the race trait that allows you to reroll 1's for the purposes of ignoring misfires. You get your Charisma boon, which you NEED, and a Con Boon. Given that your AC doesn't get any boosts, some additional HP will help cushion the blows.

A note on ignoring misfires: Considering you aim on touch AC, you'll get to the point where a 2 will be all you need to hit. If you ignore the misfire, you will hit and only actually miss on a 1. At 11th level, you do half-damage on a miss. This makes the Mysterious Stranger the never-miss class. Considering you can just ignore misfires, you can keep making your full attack as opposed to every other gunslinger who must stop a full-round attack in order to use the quick clear deed.

Max out your Charisma, and take Dex and Con as your next two most important stats. Dragon Pistol and the Pepperbox will be your friends. The Deft Shootist Deed feat will be very important.

I'm not terribly fond of the Gnome favoured class bonus ability; The Gunsmithing feat takes 5 minutes less time, and the best you get at 10th level makes it the equivalent of a Mending spell. If any other member of the party has Mending you'd be better off with that.

Medicine. Does that have enough of a neutral tone or were you hoping for more?

Prerequisite: Grit class feature or Amateur Gunslinger feat, Blind-Fight.

Benefit: You can fire a shot at a wall or piece of solid terrain, and have it ricochet off. When you do, use the square immediately in front of the wall or piece of solid terrain to determine line of sight to a target, and this square is considered the new origin square of the attack. Use that square to determine the effects of cover, and your own square to determine the effects of concealment. You can make this shot as long as you have at least 1 grit point. When making this shot, you can spend 1 grit point to ignore the effects of all cover or concealment. You must choose to spend the grit point before you make the attack roll.

That last point about spending grit to "ignore the effects of all cover or concealment" has me thinking, what are the limits of that?

Thanks very much.

Hello, I'm planning for a Dwarf Gunslinger that focuses on the advantages on the Blunderbuss, that is the Scatter weapon quality.

Pros:
* Touch AC -2
* Potential to hit multiple enemies
* Misfire potential decreases with each additional target (odd, but true)
* Can fire the weapon in pitch dark, in foggy conditions, even with using a smokestick: Do not need to aim the weapon, you just need to know roughly where the target is and point the cone their way.
* Musket Master's weapon training applies bonuses to damage rolls.

Cons:
* A d8 damage die (vs Musket's dd12)
* No special archetype: Musket master is the best option
* No damage dealing feats work, like deadly aim or the bonus damage to Point-Blank Shot
* Focus on short range combat, with all the risks that entails
- A greater target for getting hit
- Potential to provoke AOO's without the appropriate feats

So my plan is to go Dwarf Musket Master variant Gunslinger, focus on Blunderbuss with a Musket as a backup. The racial traits would be along the theme of a deep gnome, fighting Abberations, extended darkvision, possibly the magic resistance over the bonuses to saves. (Your wisdom wanted here.) Dex and Wis ranked high, of course. Unsure of which point buy system we're using yet, could be 15 could be 20.

First few feats...

1. Rapid Reload (Musket: Bonus feat), Rapid Reload: Blunderbuss.
3. Point-Blank Shot
4. Rapid Shot

And then I can see things branching off...

Here's the pool of feats I'd like to collect over time.
Deft Shootist: It unfortunately requires Dodge AND Mobility, but it is so necessary to avoid AOOs, and in later levels most of the creatures with be able to reach me if I'm close enough to hit whenever I reload. Very necessary and requires three feats.
Blind-Fight: I'm pretty sure this would be necessary in a smoke cloud. I'm out of combat pretty quick if I lose my dex to AC. Also leads to the Ricochet Shot deed (see next.)
Deadly Aim and other ranged weapon damage deeds/feats: I'm not going to get rid of the Musket, just use it as a backup for when the scatter weapon condition isn't needed.

Totaling: Dodge, Mobility, Deft Shootist, Blind-Fight, Deadly Aim, Ricochet Shot.

Which order should I take these? I think Deft Shootist is really key, and I'd take that sooner if Rapid Shot wasn't so very necessary.

Thank you very much for your help and input.

-P

I'm making a fighter hoping to take advantage of the fun concealment feats with Haunted Gnome Shroud.

Gnome Fighter - Level 9
20 Pt Buy
Str 12 (5pt -2)
Dex 17 (10pt +1 lv4)
Con 14 (1pt +2, +1 lv8)
Int 13 (3pt)
Wis 10
Cha 13 (1pt, +2)
Books Allowed: Core, APG, UC, UM, and the beasty books.
Weapon: Gnome Hooked Hammer
Relevant Skills: Bluff 9+, Kn: Arcana 6+
Feats
1: Two-Weapon Fighting?, Haunted Gnome
2: Combat Expertise
3: Haunted Gnome Assault
4: Blind-Fight
5: Moonlight Stalker
6: Haunted Gnome Shroud
7: Improved Feint (>_<)
8: Moonlight Stalker Feint
9: Moonlight Stalker Master

And... I'm not sure where to go from here. Power Attack? Weapon Focus? Improved Critical? (Only way to get the hammer part of the weapon keen)
Should I focus on an archetype? What kind of magic gear should I look out for? I'm not entirely sure that TWF is a good way to go, although I do like the GHH. Would you do anything differently? Pick a different weapon? Improved Feint is something of a blank feat with TWF and it's makes it very feat-dense before I can get ITWF or wait until 10th level.

Thanks for your input!

So I'm looking to build a Cad fighter archetype. Dirty tricks are fantastically open ended thematically which I find particularly attractive. I'm wondering what could be done with them while grappling. Rather than just going "pocket sand" every encounter, I'd like to be able to do things like...

1. Step on someones toes and then toss a lit cigar in their open mouth.
2. Stick a cigar ember in their eye. (Yes, he smokes.)
3. Hold a knife to an opponent's neck/vulnerables while grappling and make demands/threats. I'm not sure how to execute this one mechanically.
4. Box the ears of spellcasters, intending to deafen.
5. Disarm them with by feigning death at their hand, then springing up to attack.

I've got plenty of ideas which seem to encompass all sorts of combat trickery, from grappling to disarming, to feinting. They seem like dirty-trick plus one of these others in many circumstances. (Although boxing ears and cigar-to-the-eye are pretty straightforward in the dirty-trick zone.)

I've never really seen the dirty trick used in game, and haven't had characters yet that would realistically use it. Any advise from the dirty tricksters here?