Indeed, Arcanists get less spells per day than most wizards and definatly sorcs so they probably feel it first.
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I think the best thing about Arcanists is flexibility. Quick study is a seriously strong ability *if* the Arcanist has a wide selection of spells. The occultist archetype seems strong, the summons are a swiss army knife, although in hindsight I'm not sure it was worth investing quite so many feats into improving them instead of getting more exploits. I note you could make a decent blaster arcanist but I feel they would quickly run out of spells. In terms of overall power I'd say they where roughly equal with wizards (I.e. weak to begin with, then masters of the universe at higher level) and strictly above sorcerers. How to challenge an arcanist? Have long adventuring days.
"Um wow. I err have never seen anything like that bug, you killed it with your bare hands!"
Well I guess it takes a couple of rounds.
The Mephit will attempt to withdraw down the tunnel hopefully ending up nearish Quiz.
The tentacles do nothing.
Can Quiz see the mephit?
Tentacles have been singularly useless tbh.
I wish I'd had a haste left, that probably would have helped.
Not knowing what else to do, Quiz blasts the dragon yet again.
'I hope that mephit finds something soon... I need to move, don't want the mephit to walk past that thing!'
The tentacles try to latch onto something...
Quiz blasts again.
The tentacles continue to flail uselessly.
The sharp eyed Mephit spots something! But what?
Quiz again blasts the undead monstrosity but its all a bit pro forma. Soon he would join the warpriest in death.
It would have been better if you'd run like Quiz suggested ;)
The mephit has seen many shiny things, but which one is the amulet?
"This thing is resistant to fire and acid. Oh it has a breath weapon, we should spread out..."
'None of my memorised spells will help here, and I may need to move fast to pick up the amulet so I'll convert another spell.'
Standard action: Use wand of Magic Missiles.
'Fighting this thing feels like madness, but everything is vulnerable to *something*, it must have a weakness', Quiz wracks his brain.
Not wanting to stand back and watch while his friends battle the creature, Quiz does the only thing he can think of and casts Black tentacles in the shallow water near where the creature is (but not impeding Bug or Xavier) hoping to slow it down.
The little mephit goes searching...
Quiz picks himself up and replies, "Yeah we can't fight that! We need the amulet, but that thing will probably escape before the mephit can find it..." He sounds scared as he suggests, "I've got to stay. I'm small and I know how to hide which most of you can't. You should run." Quiz casts Vanish, which gives him 8 rounds of invisibility.
As described above Quiz summons a mephit and bids it to find and retrieve the amulet while staying hidden.
Quiz looks at Rena for a moment and slowly a grin forms, "Actually that's not a bad idea. Only thing is I need to be able to communicate with whatever I summon otherwise it'll just go on a mindless rampage. Rules out dolphins and elementals." The smile fades and with a sigh Quiz explains, "It's got to be a water mephit, that's about the only thing that can swim really well that I can talk to. They're smart enough to speak common but they're a nuisance, you see they think they're funny..." Quiz takes one look at the state of the ceiling and gets to it. First he must convert more spell energy into a form he can use for the summoning. The process looks painful but it mercifully fast. Then he begins the summoning process chanting strange non nonsensical words while weaving an abstract design with one finger. With slight splash, a small watery humanoid creature with thin, leathery wings, small horns, and a mischievous smile appears. Before the creature can act, Quiz tells it, "Somewhere at the bottom of this oubliette is an amulet, bring it to me. There's also a creature down there, avoid it at all costs!"
The mephit shrugs and submerges into the water without a ripple, and descends cautiously, searching for an amulet.
Dangerously calm, Quiz retorts, "Unless we help you find the amulet, yeah not happening. This is danger you put everyone in."
'He seemed immune to my spell last time. I want to know why, let's just hope the background enchantments don't blot out the ones on him...' Quiz casts detect magic and studies Poltur.
Quiz shakes his head, converts a lvl 1 spell to 1 arcane reservoir point and ports himself back over with an eloquent sigh.
Consume Spells:
At 1st level, an arcanist can expend an available arcanist spell slot as a move action, making it unavailable for the rest of the day, just as if she had used it to cast a spell. Doing this adds a number of points to her arcane reservoir equal to the level of the spell slot consumed. She cannot consume cantrips (0 level spells) in this way. Points gained in excess of the reservoir's maximum are lost. Quiz shackles his head and says "I don't know what to do, can anyone see where Poultr is?"
Tentacles didn't help, I'm getting rid of them.
"What was that?! Oh gods the Teraken..."
For Round 4: Quiz dismisses the spell (that's apparently a standard action). The Hound Archon tries to follow Poltur and if possible it takes a powerful swipe at him, which (assuming it hits) would have left a grievous wound if not for the resistance of the water.
"Drat he got past, must have Freedom of Movement or some similar effect on him," shouts Quiz.
The Hound Archon doesn't hesitate and it jumps after Poltur, and tries to attack, but it's hampered by the water.
Quiz also doesn't hesitate, using the last vestiges of his arcane reservoir he dimensionally slides over to where the Hound Archon was (AC39). If he can see Poltur, then he starts casting a powerful spell, with his arms moving sinuously leaving trails of black energies that hiss and fizzle!
Tracked Spells and HP: Quiz HP: 44/44 Archon HP:35/51 or 51/51 if DR wasn't breached Haste: 3/8 Black Tentacles: 1/8
Didn't want to clutter the gameplay thread, but unless Poltur has natural attacks he needs a weapon with an evil alignment (which he could well have) to overcome the DR: Overcoming DR Damage Reduction may be overcome by special materials, magic weapons (any weapon with a +1 or higher enhancement bonus, not counting the enhancement from masterwork quality), certain types of weapons (such as slashing or bludgeoning), and weapons imbued with an alignment.
Forgot to mention Polutr and probably other stuff needs to make a DC16 will save vs Aura of Menace (Su): A righteous aura surrounds archons that fight or get angry. Any hostile creature within a 20-foot radius of an archon must succeed on a Will save to resist its effects. The save DC varies with the type of archon, is Charisma-based, and includes a +2 racial bonus. Those who fail take a –2 penalty on attacks, AC, and saves for 24 hours or until they successfully hit the archon that generated the aura. A creature that has resisted or broken the effect cannot be affected again by the same archon's aura for 24 hours.
Quiz defers until the others have made room for him to advance a bit. He then moves forwards until he can see Poltur and starts a summoning chant. His hand move in strange patters leaving scintillating trails and his eyes flare briefly with eldritch power as he shouts, "A little help down here please! Send Lemmy 'Longarms' if you can."
Hound-archon stat-block with Augment Summoning and Reach (greatsword):
Hound Archon CR 4 XP 1,200 LG Medium outsider (archon, extraplanar, good, lawful) Init +4; Senses darkvision 60 ft., detect evil, low-light vision, scent; Perception +10 Aura aura of menace (DC 16), magic circle against evil DEFENSE
OFFENSE
Constant—detect evil, magic circle against evil
STATISTICS
SPECIAL ABILITIES
A hound archon can assume any canine form of Small to Large size, as if using beast shape II. While in canine form, the hound archon loses its bite, slam, and greatsword attacks, but gains the bite attack of the form it chooses. For the purposes of this ability, canines include any dog-like or wolf-like creature of the animal type.
The archon snarls ferociously and immediately attacks Poltur with a flurry of powerful blows!
Tracked spells and HP: Quiz HP 44/44 Hound archon HP 51/51 Haste round 2/8
Quiz can't see anything from here, thinking 'I hope they get a move on.' "Be careful! And be fast!", mutters Quiz as he incants a now familiar spell...
Tracked Spells & HP: Haste: 8/8
Can we see the scrying pool from here? Is there anyone there?
As does Quiz, who tries to keep his eyes and ears open...
Quiz laughs and replies, "Honestly you can second guess divination 'answers' in so many ways. I'm not going to over think it. Either the powers that be are trying to kill us, in which case we're doomed anyway, or they're not. Call me naive but I'm gonna trust them. Anyway, lets get a move on, we've got an insane mage to catch, and after that I want breakfast."
Quiz smiles ironically and replies, "I don't suppose he'd be kind enough to stay put somewhere we can find him easily. I think we should try and find Poltur ourselves. If we have trouble, there's this hound archon I know of, an amazing tracker, like really amazing. Of course he's busy so we'd only get a few minutes of his time, still he would likely ferret Poltur out if close." Quiz stands up and suggests, "I think we'd better go back to the room with the elemental and that snake and see if we missed something."
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