You should check out the Clerics+ warpriest doctrine on infinite. Their stuff is balanced and they beat paizo by a Longshot on publishing a non cha font class archetype that truly captures the divine bounded caster fantasy and is particularly good at the self buff action compression that the PF1E warpriest was known for. Their content on this class is far more compelling than paizos remaster warpriest because the doctrines give real abilities (not just proficiency bumps) and you are able to invest in casting other spells from your font. Beyond that it's pretty clear paizo cribbed some of their remaster feats from the Clerics+ teams content so clearly they're doing something right. They also have their modules in pathbuilder and I believe foundry (that last one might be a lie if my memory is just making stuff up) so it is essentially frictionless with the most common community tools.
Beyond the warpriest they also have an inquisitor archetype that is a cross between cleric and investigator. I think it's a great hybrid option that is sorely missing from the PF2E multiclass framework and I love seeing more of that in thei products (e.g., hey have a barbarian alchemist instinct for a real mutagen melee martial in Barbarians+)
If I ever find a home game I can commit to that’s a really good idea to save in my pocket to bring up to the GM.
As far as the living world I’m currently participating in I think we run as close to RAW on everything as possible with no homebrew.
I haven’t had much luck with regular campaigns mostly in this living world or Pathfinder Society. Even as a GM I can’t find players to test some dungeons out on.
It just gets so tricky as a martial. The action economy is so tight. If you don’t start near your target you want to stride. So any number of actions may look like:
- get bless out
- stride into position
- strike
- heal a wounded ally
- cast protection or some other buff
Then with wands and scrolls etc
- draw the wand or scroll
- use the wand or scroll
- in the case of the wand or staff drop or stow it after use
And I find at least at level 1 I’m a bit frustrated with my action economy
I also would like to see more versions of the Magus chassis. I'd love to see a Charisma/Spontaneous version, to better align with a Sorcerer-type mix of martial and caster rather than Wizard. If we were going that route, a Divine blooded sorcerer half of the caster-martial equation is already really close. However, I wouldn't mind seeing a Wisdom based Wave Casting class, one way or another.
I do generally discourage doing a 1:1 feature comparison across game systems, and especially from video games to TTRPGs. It's usually much better to nail down the underlying story you're trying to tell with a character, rather than matching mechanical elements, because often the end result isn't going to actually play the way you hope.
I'm wondering why you didn't consider Champion multiclassed into Cleric, though. Champions advance Divine spellcasting at a pretty good rate, and you can get a lot of spells through multiclassing, scrolls, staves, wands etc if you want to fill out your list of features.
It's a bit difficult to express, I think. The underlying story is my take on an actual good and righteous person, who always tries to do what they believe is the right thing within their religion (The Light, i guess). They're a warrior AND a priest.
The way this plays out in WoW, the feeling of playing a Paladin, is that of a DPS class but that has incredibly helpful utility and support tools that, if keybound correct (and if you're really good), you can execute your rotation (output damage) and still heal people when they're low, protect someone about to die, share a tank buster with the tank so they don't get annihilated and basically rotate cooldowns and abilities to heal and really bring the team up.
Of course you can faceroll your keyboard and crap damage everywhere and just ignore half your buttons, but I think there's fulfilment in "not just being a DPS" and sort of taking the burden off of the healer.
So it's kind of both the gameplay aspect and the story aspect combined into one.
And I did actually consider doing a champion first, haha. Someone convinced me to swap to flex casting warpriest.
Why a Lizardfolk vs Human (and/or Orc) Nephilim? Ultimately was inspired by the Draenei. In D&D 5e Dragonborn felt very close to Draenei aesthetically, and now with mixed heritage a lizardfolk + kobold is pretty close. Otherwise I think a Draenei is a human or Orc with Nephilim stuff.
My current "campaign" is less a campaign, and more a living world with 2-3 hour "bounties" very similar to Pathfinder Society, except for a few rules:
- No Ressurrection.
- No Rare stuff
- No AP stuff (they don't want to get sued by Paizo as AP's are strictly Paizo property)
- Free Archetype is turned on
- Paragon Ancestry feature is turned on
- No Guns & Gears
- No Organization feats (Firebrands, Knights of Lastwall, Hellknights, etc..)
I would really like to see a Divine Tradition Magus, or just the choice to pick Strength as the main class stat with a Warpriest. I think it could open up a lot of fantasy archetypes. They're still possible, with a regular warpriest, I think, but I have been playing a lot of off-the-wall concepts, such as a "martial" Summoner with Sentinal for Medium Armor and a Greatsword focused on self buffing with a Dragon Eidolon, and it's been fun, but after awhile you do begin to really feel that math as a pseudo-martial.
I would really like to capture the fantasy of a more Warcraft Paladin than PF2E's almost no magic Champion. I think with Warpriest you can get really close, but I think just being able to push Strength to +4 at level 1, or simply a Divine Magus would take it all the way. Especially if the Magus's extra given spell slots at later levels could be filled with Heal, similar to Cleric Divine Font, or Sound Body/Cleanse Affliction, etc.
Almost all of the pieces are there to pull off at least a Wrath of the Lich King era Level 80 Paladin. I've personally chosen Warpriest anyway with a Maul to try my hand at it.
I don't think anything really captures seals, but the closest is probably:
Seal of Light -> Divine Weapon or Emblazon Armanents
Judgement -> Spiritual Weapon
Blessing of Might -> Bless
Blessing of Wisdom -> Divine Inspiration, Moment of Renewal (get those spell slots back)
Blessing of Kings -> Heroism roughly (raises several "stats")
I don't think there's much to say for auras, not a lot of interlap here (or I didn't look well enough, and it doesn't matter that much)
Hand of Freedom -> Unfettered Movement
Divine Protection -> Protection, roughly. No way to just cut damage in half that I know of.
Hand of Protection -> Sanctuary (the version where you couldn't keep attacking with it on you)
Divine Sacrifice/Hand of Sacrifice -> Share Life (there's a few others, like life pact)
Divine Shield -> Indestructability (roughly)
Avenging Wrath -> Avatar(?)
Holy Light/Flash of Light -> Heal
Crusader's Strike -> Channel Smiteish
Divine Storm -> Mauler Archetype Avalanche Strike
Purify -> Stuff like Sound Body, Clear Affliction and basically status effect removal spells
Sense Undead -> I believe there's a spell called Sense Spirits around level 5ish
Exorcism -> Searing Light or whatever it's called in the new remaster
Holy Wrath -> Divine Immolation or Divine Wrath
Redemption is 100% raise dead or revival but in the campaign I'm participating in resurrection is disabled and not allowed. Nobody can come back to life. Dead is dead.
As for stuff like Consecration or Hammer of Justice there's nothing I can really find, but honestly I got 80% of the class in divine spells and it fits really well IMO.
So then it's just a matter of how to execute the vision
Turns out I learned you can use touch spells with your hands full so Maul works perfectly fine. I was worried about hand economy and my actions, incase I needed to one action heal or use some other touch spell while using a 2-handed weapon.
What do we do about weapons that came out after Gods and Magic and the Core Rulebook, like those in treasure vaults, that aren't associated with deities?
Well my build is with a Starknife and a Goblin Dogslicer (I am a goblin) but I found some super cool art of a goblin with a torch and a hatchet. (Small axe).
I use the Starknife to throw it, and my Dex is my primary stat, with a 16 in strength now (level 5). I use Twin-Takedown for melee attacking with my Dogslicer and Starknife.
I have +1 Striking Dogslicer with Ghost Touch and +1 Striking Starknife with Returning Runes.
It would just be cool to match my art with a hatchet.
Why would anyone bother producing a ttrpg that is "just a copy" of another one? Even aside from Intellectual Property theft considerations?
I don't think such an assumption is too unreasonable. Pathfinder 1e was a modestly-patched replica of D&D 3.5, after all, so maybe they figured that Pathfinder 2e was a modestly-patched replica of D&D 5e?
I would argue more of a modest spiritual successor to 4th edition D&D personally. I find way more 4E DNA than I find 5e. It feels like this game has very little in common with 5e aside from commonly named Classes and uses a d20.
I like a ton of things in the Remaster, but some things I dislike:
1. The change to the dying & wounded interaction rules. I also dislike that there has been no advance discussion, no player surveys, and no explanations about why they have done this.
Everything about the Remaster was great to 'sure fine' for me. Mostly great. Until I hit this change.
It's totally unexpected.
Previously we had a lot of talk of it being in the old playtest from 2018 but it's not - I happen to have a print copy of that I bought in a store back in 2018, and also have a print copy of the first and second printings of 2.0 (bought it a second time on accident during the pandemic, didn't realize I already had it until I found the first printing sitting under a pile of books and discovered I'd bought it a year prior on Amazon).
Also: It's NOT in the beginner box - checked that last night.
This new rule apparently DID come from the GM Screen. I lack this so it's something I cannot verify.
But the idea that it was a copy-paste error as we were floating last night appears to be incorrect.
That noted...
This change has a severe impact on game survivability. Folks running the numbers over on reddit seem to come back with a near doubling at each level of dying in the chance of PC death after going down.
Dying 3 seems to be more or less skipped. You're usually dying 1, 2 if you go down a second time, or jump straight to 4.
I find this a very bad change. One of the worst tRPG game design moves I've seen since the first version of GURPS Super's. Granted I missed most of the D&D 4E/5E eras so maybe there are things others experienced I didn't...
But this single untested and unannounced change has so severe an impact on gameplay that's its currently "taken the wind out" of my enthusiasm over remaster. While I don't have to use it myself, it makes 'Society' a non-option for me.
I just don't understand how this got in there without comment.
It maybe be one tiny change in...
It's toxic for monsters to want to kill you? Change in GM Style? All the stories I heard of early D&D was "make 20 characters, you'll run through 19 of them til you get one that manages to survive." And now literally Dungeon Crawl Classics does that too. Oldschool is a billion times more deadly.
From experience, a FF14 Black mage is better done with an Oscillating Wave Psychic with electric arc. I refuse to believe that it wasn't at least one of many inspirations for the mechanical implementation of the subclass.
As for a traditional fire, lightning and ice black mage, kineticist could do the trick, but it would be a little lackluster until very high levels most likely. At baseline you need level 5 to even get all those 3 damage tipes through normal impulses (you can start as a fire/air kineticist and pick versatile blast for cold damage, but you would only get the cold blast and nothing else for that element til lvl 5).
If you really want to go full DPS mode, spreading this thin is not the best of ideas. Fire is a very selfish element that wants a lot of investment, Air damage-wise needs the air/earth stance to reach good numbers and water is more of a support element.
If you still want to go for it, I would probably go for something like:
Dual gate Air/Fire
lvl 1 Flying Flame
lvl 1 Versatile Blast (It can be retrained after lvl 5)
lvl 1 Four Winds (I guess? There is no lightning damage until way later)
lvl 2 Kinetic activation
lvl 4 Thermal Nimbus
Fork the path (Water)
lvl 5 Winter's Clutch
lvl 6 Lightning Dash
lvl 8 Ciclonic Ascent
Expand the portal (fire aura junction or base junction)
lvl 9 Storm Spiral
lvl 10 Aura Shaping
lvl 12 Effortless Impulse (can pick Glacial Prison first and then retrain after)
Expand the portal (Fire Resistances)
lvl 13 Glacial Prison (look, this one is kinda bad, but there are little sources of ice magic in water for some reason)
lvl 14 Barrier of Boreal Frost
lvl 16 Clear as Air
Expand the portal (Air resistances)
lvl 17 Architect of Flame
lvl 18 Ignite the sun
lvl 20 Kinetic Pinnacle
With this, both Fire and Ice would have a stance playstile, while lightning would go for blast and overflow. Nothing remarkable damage-wise, but looks functional and fun to me. I'd probably try to sneak Furnace form in if possible too.
If you want...
Honestly that sounds really fun and versatile. Against monster who resist Fire? Cold aura playstyle or lightning builder spender playstyle. Against stuff resistant to cold? Fire Aura playstyle or builder spender electric. Etc. I think having multiple toolkits, and versatility and the ability to debuff with the ice and slow enemies, or just do raw damage, or move around a lot as air is really good. I've found versatility in real life play is king over white room DPR optimization.
Imagine going all in on a fighter two-handed weapon build completely only to face a single flying enemy without a way to close the distance meaningfully. I'd rather have a bit of ranged, melee, and mobility or something.
I just have come to truly value having more than 1 playstyle on a character. This is especially true as alternating things to do in combat makes it more fun than doing the same 1 thing over and over. This build sounds really good to me.
I think that Winter's Clutch works out okay if you're trying to maintain an aura off-turn due to being non-overflow. I'd probably mainly use Lightning Dash and blasts for electric damage. Winter Sleet is a good debuff aura but Thermal Nimbus covers both cold and fire damage (yes, everyone wants to use it for fire because of how it stacks with the aura junction, but it has a cold mode) and doesn't need Safe Elements to function.
I'd probably start fire/water with Winter's Clutch and Flying Flame. (If I wasn't keeping to the theme I'd do Ocean's Balm for the utility) For the class feat slot, you don't need versatile blasts because water gives you cold already and fire/cold/bludgeoning covers basically anything that isn't resist all anyways. Weapon Infusion would let you pick up range, or you can take another level 1 impulse (you're not hurting for options here).
Level 2 is a wild card, level 4 you take Thermal Nimbus and level 5 you fork the path to Air and take Lightning Dash, which lets you reposition pretty easily at the cost of overflow (but you're probably doing Dash>Channel+Nimbus/Blast).
After that you pick up new impulses as desired to add utility and such. Depending on the exact game, black magic has included Water and Aero, so you can justify some other pickups that are useful (even if your character's name is obviously XIV)
Does the rest of the build look okay? I really don't know what to do with the free archetype but it's just part of the setting I am playing in. Are my stats okay? Skills?
If not on PC and/or Android then I guess highlights are:
Level 1 Dual Gate Air [Electric Blast]/Fire
Level 1 Versatile Blasts [Cold on Fire]
Level 1 Four Winds and Scorching Column
Level 2 Kinetic Activation (To hopefully make an electricity staff? Maybe?)
Free Archetype I went with Beastmaster because I didn't know what else to do but I like the Sorcerer idea to grab haste and slow and stuff
Level 4 Thermal Nimbus
Level 5 Expand the Portal: Fire Impulse Junction
Level 5 Lightning Dash
Level 6: Blazing Wave
Level 8: Storm Spiral
Level 9: Expand the Gate: Fire Junction Fire Aura
Level 9: Solar Detonation
Level 10: Aura Shaping
Level 12: Architect of Flame
Level 13: Fork the Path - Water
Level 13: Winter's Clutch
Level 14: Glacial Prison
Level 16: Imperious Aura
Level 17: Expand the Portal - Fire Gate Skill Junction
level 17: Barrier of Boreal Frost
I would like to build a blaster DPS character that focuses on Fire, Electric and Ice damage. I thought the kineticist would be a nice way to do it, potentially.
Air looks like it has some electric damage, fire is fire, and with versatile blasts and water there's some ice damage attacks.
I also don't mean only Final Fantasy 14, but like all the games, including one's not specifically named like Lulu from FFX was a "black mage" in all but name.
Just the concept you know?
Edit: The game I am in does not allow RARE options at all (no rare races, no rare feats, no rare archetypes, nothing with rare tag)
Finesse on Hatchet. I know Sweep is the "axe thing" but please. Throwing Axes, Tomahawks, all of that are real life weapons with no way to fulfill the fantasy of a throwing axe. So just...finesse Hatchet. Otherwise it's really MAD to pull off. Something like 18 Str, 16 Dex, still always less accurate when throwing. Besides everyone poo-poos finesse melee unless you're a thief anyway.
So you postpone Heavy Armor to level 12. Why not (I fully understand disliking retraining, even if I think moving from Armor Proficiency to Sentinel should nearly not be a case of retraining considering that one is just the evolution of the other).
Well I suppose there's always Drakeheart Mutagen haha. As well as the Monk dedication to give 1d6 fists.
Also, since this has been bumped, I'll point out that the question of using Assurance has been answered in the 3rd printing errata.
3rd printing wrote:
Page 500: Since people have been specifically asking about Assurance with respect to downtime, after "If something could apply constantly, or so often that it might as well be constant, it’s more likely to be used for downtime checks;" we added "for instance Assurance could apply." to show that it's something that could apply constantly.
You don't need Sentinel Dedication that early, you can grab Armor Proficiency through a General Feat and wait for higher levels to retrain it.
It allows you to go for Monk Dedication at level 2, add Ki Strike (that should help a lot at low level) and Monk Flurry at level 10 for Sentinel Dedication at level 12.
For the level 6 feat... I don't know, your call, but Monk Resiliency should help a lot at that level (and give overall more hit points than the resistance from Armor Specialization).
It causes a bit of issue stat wise, but you really don't need much Intelligence as a Mutagenist, a starting 14 should be fine.
Thanks for the feedback I'll adjust my character sheet.
Well for me damage isn't such a big deal. I'm okay with not doing tons of damage as long as the thing does the thing I want it to do: In this case wolf out, feel like a chemically induced werewolf and make basic strikes in melee to at least standard proficiency, which means to me: hitting more often than missing and getting to roll my attack dice even if there aren't massive damage boosts on top of that.
Basically I just care about rolling dice more often than not, not the numbers themselves. Death by a thousand cuts and all yeah?
Barbarian Dedication doesn't work at all with Mutagenist. Most Mutagens are reducing your defenses and very often AC (especially Bestial Mutagen). On top of it you don't take Sentinel Dedication or Bastion Dedication so you'll end up victimized by enemies.
I also strongly discourage you to go for a Bestial Mutagenist unless you start playing at level 11+. This is a very high level build as it's mostly unplayable before 2-digit levels.
I'm in the process of writing a guide on the Mutagenist because I feel there's a lot to say after Treasure Vault, but I don't know if I'll have the courage to get it finished (it's a lot of work, and I don't know if people would be that interested, I feel the Mutagenist is a tough subject). But if you want I can give you a link to my WIP version through PMs.
Sure that would be great. I think I can spare a feat or two in a non-free archetype to go sentinel if needed. I just kept getting told basically mutagen doesn't have any damage steroids like all the other martials, and therefore will always be behind damage, much like a Warpriest actually, and so I was looking for ways to solve this problem. I was also considering Rogue for sneak attack dice. Although it seems there is not very many ways to boost damage via archetypes.
But generally I lean towards blasting, debuffing, buffing, controlling or weird utility in my character creation.
So my question is, within PF2 what sort of character creation direction do you think might suit me?
Alchemist. “Blasting” (AoE damage) from bombs. Ability to create tailor made bombs to the unique situation to exploit weaknesses and debuff enemies either by the bombs default effect or the feat Debilitating Bombs.
Buffing in the form of Mutagens and Foods/Tonics as well as the ability to heal. Situational utility buffs such as buffing crafting or face skills or simply effective combat buffs. Buffs to perception or the ability to see invisible creatures easier or simply not get hit as much.
I don’t know of too many controlling stuff from alchemist. I suppose depends on what you mean. I don’t think they have hard CC but they can to strength and trip or grapple and I think some bombs have soft CC like Tanglefoot slowing and there may be options to create difficult terrain.
They are the class of weird utility. Look into the PubChem Guide for all the items. Tons of strange niche items waiting to the right moment to be used.
It’s kind of like being a martial wizard and your formula book is your spell book and your infused reagents are your spell slots.
The main thing is that I realize Animal Barbarian would "do it better" but I just wanted to make a good mutagenist because I want an alchemist of each research field. This is the mutagenist I am trying to build.
It's less effective than in PF1, but bestial/feral mutagen builds are remarkably competitive in terms of damage output (the biggest problem is you need to archetype out for goodies like AoO) while also being the most resource efficient way to play an alchemist (which means they also get the best utility just by existing).
I keep trying to build a hobgoblin Werewolf based on Warwick from League of Legends who in most of his backstories (he's had 3) became a Werewolf due to alchemy. So I am trying to do the whole "class fantasy" of injecting myself with a serum and beasting out then going ham in melee.
Everyone has basically told me this is pointless and bad and I should never do this and feral mutagen is a trap and should never be picked and in fact if I want to do this just actually go play animal barbarian with maybe alchemist dedication.
However my entire point is that I like the Alchemist so much I want all 4 research fields and to build characters around them.
I have a Dwarven Bomber, a Goblin Chirurgeon I am actively playing in Abomination Vaults, a Ratfolk Toxicologist based on Twitch from League with a hand crossbow. I thought I had figured out a way to quickly apply pepertual poisons mid-combat with the help of a familiar (who would quick alchemy poisons then hand them to me and i'd apply to the bolt and strike) but it doesn't work how I thought it did.
So the last is a Mutagen and I wanted a ferocious melee combatant who used mutagens to become a savage beast with the beastkin heritage too, but apparently this is the worst thing in PF2E you can do according to some.
An additional factor at play is backmatter player options in APs being marked with rarity tags by default, while also more prone to being too strong due to having less time to bake.
So it's not just options like teleportation that are orthogonal to adventure design but (in theory) balanced against the level they're given, but options like Pin to the Spot that are just straight-up stronger than they should be.
I imagine this would make me quite an unpopular DM...but I would personally, for my games, prefer to probably just Ban AP Specific Feats and stuff. Like Drow Shootist Dedication is specific to an AP, and probably designed around and intended for that specific campaign/setting/AP.
I'm not sure it should be in "any old game" or another AP. Just my opinion.
The Drow Shootist has little to do with AV’s plot and isn’t especially tailored to any content within… plus, players only get access to it in the final book, which makes it pretty useless for that campaign.
Backmatter Archetypes are never “specific to an AP.”
I have only GMed three times and I have never played an AP until now. I got dropped into the middle of AV at level 6. I don't know what book we are in or what's going on, really.
I've never played any published content before except for a few Pathfinder Seciond Edition Society Scenarios and Bounties. All of my experience with TTRPGs has been GMs making up their own homebrew worlds and settings.
So honestly I was just guessing about AP specific stuff.
An additional factor at play is backmatter player options in APs being marked with rarity tags by default, while also more prone to being too strong due to having less time to bake.
So it's not just options like teleportation that are orthogonal to adventure design but (in theory) balanced against the level they're given, but options like Pin to the Spot that are just straight-up stronger than they should be.
I imagine this would make me quite an unpopular DM...but I would personally, for my games, prefer to probably just Ban AP Specific Feats and stuff. Like Drow Shootist Dedication is specific to an AP, and probably designed around and intended for that specific campaign/setting/AP.
I'm not sure it should be in "any old game" or another AP. Just my opinion.
Hmmm based on that description I think I prefer 2E’s. Haven’t gotten to play yet but did have my Barbarian die in abomination vaults and wanted to play a goblin Chirurgeon alchemist, looking forward to the versatility and utility. I hand picked all my mutagens for the benefits of the party. I picked bombs with nice debuffs to cripple enemies. I have some neat toxins for the melee guys to apply to their weapons. I’ve got loads of healing and the medic dedication. Excited to support the party and continue researching alchemical items. I liked making this character so much I have ended up trying to make an alchemist for each subclass. I have a Dwarven bomber, a Ratfolk toxicologist with a hand crossbow looking at Drow shootist archetype and trying to figure out how to make a hobgoblin mutagenist with the bestial mutagen to be a sort of chemically imbued werewolf.
Yeah, so the Deep Gnomes are just a subset of one heritage of Gnomes as a whole.
I don't see why the Duergar couldn't be likewise a Dwarf heritage and I've long been mystified as to why there's so much resistance to making Drow an elf heritage.
Doesn't bother me any. Although I am not sure if there is currently a good Dwarven heritage that represents Duergar. Maybe the one that grants fire resistance. Live close to lava or something idk.
I guess I asked because I have special interest in Darklands (Underdark) ancestries. I, personally, absolutely love Dark Iron Dwarves in World of Warcraft, and very much enjoy Duergar. I also think Gnomes are super cool in PF2E and have recently fell in love with creating gnome characters and I think that while I don't know a lot about the gnomes whose names I can't spell who live underground, I hope they don't go away so I can explore more cool characters :)
Also yes I like Drow too. Pretty much everything in the Underdark (Darklands). Although a big part of me is sad we don't have things like Beholders, Illithids (mindflayers) Umberhulks and all that cool underground stuff because copyright.
Wouldn't it be neat to play 100% of all the Underdark in TTRPG with the PF2E ruleset and monster building rules?
I'd like to see it was a wave caster with some limited spell casting or around the level of a spellcaster multiclass but the ability to be a meaningful martial with stuff like Rogue debilitations like bleeds and being able to be a medium sized animal up to level 20.
Like a feral druid in WoW. I basically want a feral druid in WoW: Bleeds and direct damage with some ability to shift out and apply an entangling roots, or a heal or an emergency battle-rez real quick, then back into cat form and back to doing DPS. 80% DPS, 20% spellcaster.
I want that as a different thing that is not the shifter. Specifically, I want it as a major class archetype on the druid. Downshifts the casting to wave caster in return for getting various bonuses to wild shape, specifically including further combat buffs. Give the people who really like battle forms something to seriously sink their teeth into that isn't the shifter, so they stop trying to get their icky spell slots all over the nifty thing.
I'd like to see it was a wave caster with some limited spell casting or around the level of a spellcaster multiclass but the ability to be a meaningful martial with stuff like Rogue debilitations like bleeds and being able to be a medium sized animal up to level 20.
Like a feral druid in WoW. I basically want a feral druid in WoW: Bleeds and direct damage with some ability to shift out and apply an entangling roots, or a heal or an emergency battle-rez real quick, then back into cat form and back to doing DPS. 80% DPS, 20% spellcaster.
About Etienne Nevar
Old Stats
Spoiler:
Male human (Chelaxian) paladin of Iomadae 2
LG Medium humanoid
Init +5; Spot +2, Listen +2
Language Common
Spd 20 ft. (due to armor)
Melee longsword +5 (1d8+2/19-20) or dagger +3 (1d4+2/19-20)
Ranged dagger +3, (1d4+2/19-20)
Space 5 ft. Reach 5 ft.
Base Atk +2; Grp +4
Atk Option Smite Evil 1/day (+2 to atk rolls, +2 to dmg rolls)
Abilities Str 14, Dex 12, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 14
SQ Aura of Good, Detect Evil At Will, Divine Grace, Lay on Hands
Feats Cityborn (from Magnimar, +2 to Diplomacy Checks and +1 to Reflex saves), Improved Initiative, Weapon Focus (longsword)
Etienne was the only son of Arturus Nevar, the proud and successful owner of the Magnimaran merchant house, Nevar and Son. His mother, Jieline d'Or died tragically while giving birth to Etienne, which event devastated his father.
His father thereafter devoted more and more of his time to his thriving business. Etienne, on the other hand, starved for the love of his parents, dabbled more and more into drink, alcohol, women, gambling and all manner of debauchery. In short, Etienne fell in with a bad crowd. In fact, Etienne was about to be sacrificed in a foul ritual by unnamed cultists when he was timely rescued by adventurers hired by his father.
These adventurers immediately delivered Etienne to the hands of the Holy Sepulchre of Light, a small order of holy warriors devoted to Iomedae, Goddess of Valor. There, he was cleansed of the taint of his past.
While Etienne was recuperating, tragedy struck. The cultists took their revenge on his father, killing him in the most gruesome manner, while burning the Nevar family home.
Brother-Captain Jonas Stern delivered the news to Etienne together with a sealed letter left by his father. With tears streaming from his eyes, Etienne read the letter.
My son, if you are reading this letter it means I am already dead. I know I have not been the most dutiful of fathers, for that I ask your forgiveness.
Please take this second chance and live a life that your mother can be proud of.
Thereafter, Etienne devoted his time to the study of Iomedae's Holy Word, the practice of arms and self-denial.
It was during one fasting session that Etienne received a vision from Iomedae, asking him to go out into the world and to spread Her Message. The sins of the past cannot be forgotten if the present and the future are left to the hands of evil men. Etienne, you must do your part.
Seeking permission from the leader of his Order, Etienne was granted leave to go out into the world.
Appearance
Spoiler:
Etienne is not unattractive, what with his hawk-like nose and dark piercing eyes, above-average height and built. But his years of self-denial have marked his face, so now his expression is always one of seriousness.
Etienne wears a white tabard over his armor with the symbol of Iomedae and the coat of arms of his order embroidered.
