Tailiat's page

I've opened most combats with wooden palisade as the ability to block off parts of the battlefield (especially corridors and doors) has been amazing. Every action wasted trying to break through is an action not used against your team. Maybe the monsters have been unlucky, but it often takes several actions for enemies to break through.

I've even managed to get some use out of the ladders/platforms as you can use it as a kind of battle tower. My GM counts it as being behind standard cover giving us a decent edge against ranged enemies. If they try to destroy the bit you are standing on the grab a ledge action (or cat fall) can mitigate the fall risk.

The utility is pretty unique as well because unlike a caster with spell slots I can use palisade in every single combat without ever worrying about the opportunity cost or running out of spells.

Dash of herbs is undoubtably good too, but I don't find it nearly as fun as wooden palisade. One fun combo I found with dash is creating emergency ration snacks treated with dash. This creates everyone a mini-combat potion that lasts an hour. I had originally made meals pureed into glass bottles labelled herb tonic, but my party found this objectionable for some reason.

I'm slightly hijacking my own thread, but I was also wondering how important getting Darkvision at baseline is or if I can just rely on elixirs/items?

I was planning to go human and pick the halfling luck feats via adopted ancestry as my level 1 general feat. However another option is to go half-elf with elf atavism to get Darkvision.

I'm also tempted by goblin as that gets me an extra boost to charisma I can't get as a human because I need 14 strength to qualify for the champion dedication feat at level 2.

Throwers Bandolier sounds interesting although I'm not sure how that will work if I go with weapon implement. Being able to flexibly switch between ranges and damage types would be very in keeping with how my Thaumaturge would play. Maybe my GM would let me make the Bandolier my "weapon" but that seems to be stretching things a bit. I assume Quick Draw would basically be mandatory if I wanted to use a bandolier effectively?

I was thinking that initially I would start with a hand crossbow as my weapon implement and then reload it every turn until I could get a retuning rune. After that I'd starting using either a trident, starknife or rungu and playing a kind of skirmishing role near enough to support my allies, but hopefully far enough that I don't get squashed. I thought about sticking with the hand crossbow, but the reload mechanic seems like it would severely limit how effective that could be long term.

Having played a few of the implements:

Regalia and Tome are relatively weak in the low levels. They get good when you get Implement Adept at level 7, so you might consider picking either of those as your second implement at level 5.
Weapon is always really strong, and one of the strongest at level 1.
Amulet isn't flashy, but your allies will thank you for it. Chalice too, but it's a bit harder to use since it's melee. But it's good out of combat healing if you don't have another form of it already.

Depending on party comp, Scroll Esoterica can be a godsend, if your allies don't cover most of the magical traditions.

(I love the funny, flavor-text explanations we've had for personal antithesis. Recently we fought an orc warleader with a weakness of "commitment")

Weakness to commitment! I am definitely going to have to use that one. I shall imbue my attacks with the essence of my wedding ring.

I really wish I could see a way of making Tome and Regalia work at the same time, but unless I want to use no weapon at all it seems like I'm stuck with picking one or the other.

I agree with taking them at level 5 as the initial benefits seem pretty limited.

I also agree about the amulet, in many ways I actually prefer it over the weapon reaction because I plan to fight at range wherever possible so I think the attack of opportunity will come up less than the chance to protect myself or my allies. However if I end up taking the Champion archetype then I'll have access to Champion's reaction and Lay on Hands which makes the amulet somewhat less useful.

Tailiat wrote:

Happy for any advice regarding skills/feats. I mostly picked what looked fun and fitted my character concept.

That would be my advice, so it looks like you already have that covered.

You are right that the Amulet reaction is mostly a duplicate of the Champion reaction. So if you go with Amulet Implement, use Marshal archetype instead.

Scroll esoterica and their whacky belief based "magic" is what drew me to the Thaumaturge in the first place.

I imagine coming up with the most elaborate/impossible explanations for what a creature might be vulnerable to is going to be a fun challenge.

"Look to you to learn the weaknesses of a supernatural threat when one rears its head. Even when your explanations are invented on the fly, they just seem to work."

My idea for my first PF2e character is a Thaumaturge "master of mystic arts" who uses their knowledge to fight monsters and aid their allies. However I am going for more of a redeemer vibe as someone who empathises with creatures that others might regard as inherently evil. As part of this my own character will have a Tiefling ancestry (if allowed by the GM).

I'm planning to play predominantly as a ranged character and make use of thrown weapons (with the returning rune) and take either the champion or marshal archetype to build on the supportive vibe. I don't know yet if the game will have free archetype rules, but I'm planning to take an archetype either way.

I'm struggling to pick which implements to go with as I don't really have much of a bases of experience to compare them in terms of what would be useful in an actual game.

The basic outline is here: https://pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=305989

Happy for any advice regarding skills/feats. I mostly picked what looked fun and fitted my character concept. My choices might change if we really need someone with a particular skill.

Build 1
Weapon first, then Tome, then Chalice
This seems the most solid as I can have the weapon in one hand and the tome in the other with the chalice as a backup emergency heal if the game reaches higher levels.

Build 2
Regalia, then Tome, then Weapon
Regalia and Tome seem to have some great party synergy, but based on how I read the rules it would be difficult to benefit from both of them at the same time. The Tome has to be in your hand at the start of your turn for the free knowledge check and the Regalia wants to be in your hand the rest of the time to benefit from the passive auras.

Build 3
Amulet, then Tome, then Weapon
I like the amulet for the ability to protect myself although there is a lot of competition for my reaction in this build (especially if I pick up champions reaction as well).

Thank you for any advice!

PossibleCabbage wrote:

I feel like the "free interact action" describes how, for example, if your two implements are a spear (weapon) with a flag (regalia) on it, you present the thing differently depending on which implement you're using.

Worth noting that RAW is that you can't free switch from weapon (or any other implement) to regalia because Regalia has no implement action.

Right now you either drop the weapon and draw the regalia (1 action) or stow the weapon and draw the regalia (2 actions). So in the two-for-one scenario you'd have to spend two actions to 'reconfigure' your weapon into regalia mode, which feels a little awkward and bad but I guess works.

Could you use intensify vulnerability as an implement action to allow you to switch to regalia in combat? Admittedly you are kind of stuck before level 9 if you want to start with two passive implements.