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Tarowin
Human Male Fighter 4/Evoker 8
NG Medium Humanoid (Human)
Init: +7, Senses: Perception +5
AC: 21, Touch: 15, Flat footed: 19
(+7 Armor, +2 Dex, +1 natural, +1 deflection)
hp: 84 (4d10 plus 8d6+24)
Fort +7, Ref +5, Will +8
Melee: +1 shocking cold iron greatsword +10 (2d6+2/19-20)
Ranged: Masterwork +1 compound longbow +11 (1d8+1/x3)
Special Attacks: Force Missile (7/day)
Spells Prepared: 4th: Fire Shield, Ice Storm (x2), Stoneskin
3rd: Daylight, Dispel Magic, Fireball (x2), Rage
2nd: Acid Arrow, Darkness, Glitterdust, Scorching Ray (x2)
1st: Alarm, Burning Hands (x2) Disguise Self, Mage Armor (x2)
0: Acid Splash, Light, Ray of Frost, Touch of Fatigue
Str: 12, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 19, Wis 12, Cha 12
Base Atk: +8, CMB: +13, CMD: 26
Feats: Arcane Armor Mastery, Arcane Armor Training, Arcane Strike, Combat Casting, Defensive Combat Training, Improved Initative, Magical Aptitude, Maximize Spell, Toughness, Widen Spell
Skills: Craft (Weaponsmith) +18, Knowledge (Arcana) +14, Knowledge (Dungeneering) +18, Knowledge (History) +14, Intimidate +8, Perception +5, Spellcraft +17, Survival +8
SQ: Arcane Bond (Ring), Armor Training, Bravery +1, Cantrips, Elemental Wall
Spellbook: Spells prepared plus 0 except divination and necromancy, 1st-Charm Person, Shocking Grasp, 2nd-Summon Swarm, Web, 4th-Black Tenticles
Languages: Common, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Ignan
Combat Gear: 3 Potion of Cure Moderate Wounds, 2 Potion of Cat's Grace, Ring of Protection +1, Amulet of Natural Armor +1; Other Gear: +1 mitheral chainmail, +1 shocking cold iron greatsword, masterwork +1 compound longbow with 20 arrows, other gear.
May I ask why you chose to go 8 levels of evoker instead of branching off into eldritch knight?
If you go fighter 1, evoker 5 and eldritch knight 6 you'll have the same BAB (+8) The same number of bonus feats (3 combat and 1 from wizard). And a caster level 3 levels higher. The only thing you give up really is armor training 1 and elemental wall. For 3 caster levels? Thats a good trade in my book.
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Interesting
as he stands, he's 2 HP behind a bard with the same con (assuming he started at ftr 1) like you said, BAB is lower by one (no biggie) caster level is 4 lower (good luck with CR equal SR) Spells per day come out a little better, but that caster level hurts.
(I know you already know this David, but you did ask for thoughts!) ;)
If you trade in one of your feats (No suggestions as to which one, there are no bad choices in there) for Practiced Caster, that would raise your actual Caster Level up by 4.
You would still select spells as an Evoker 8, but would cast them at Evoker 12.
I don't know what you were going for exactly, but I'm a big fan of the Practiced Caster feat for Multi class PC's!
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I spent several hours agonizing over using Practiced Caster or not, and ultimately decided that While I would love to use it with this character, I was going to build him using only core feats. If I ever end up playing him in a RL game, I will drop one of the metamagic feats for it, I can assure you af that.
I am curious, lets say you were playing this guy up from level 1 to 12. How would you proceed? IE 1-Fighter, 2-wizard, 3-fighter etc. Which levels would you take which feats? I think my bigest problem with multiclassing to get the fighter mage is lower levels so I'd like to know how you would handle it.
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Level 1-Fighter, with Toughness, Improved Initative and Defensive Combat Training.
Level 2-4: Wizard taking Arcane strike at level 3
Levels 5-6: Fighter taking Arcane Armor Training and Combat Casting at 5th level
Level 7-11: Wizard taking Magical Aptitude at 7, and Maximize Spell at 9th, and Widen Spell at 11.
Level 12 12: Fighter, taking Arcane Armor Mastery as my bonus feat.
Not bad.
I understand the intent behind why you're making this as an example of what can be done with a multi-class fighter/evoker. But Matthew pointed it out: it severely lacks in caster level. I know when I multiclass, I could afford a -1 or a -2 in the caster level if I could make it up for using a 3.5 feat (Practised Spellcaster). But since I believe the exercise is for Pathfinder-only, that feat isn't available. But if I were to play a blaster, I wouldn't be a front-line Ftr-MU and instead take the drop in BAB because I can afford doing so with touch attacks at range versus melee attacks.
Also, some of us may not be participating in campaigns where we're handed those nice magical trinkets. Most of the campaigns I participate in are very anti-monty haul. Not necessarily implying that this character may have come from one as you're statting him from scratch, but the magical items are wholly dependent on the whims of the DM running that campaign whereas the PC has more control on building their character's abilities, skills, feats, spells, etc.
But don't take this away from your build; it is something I'll definitely keep in mind when I'm making options for my own player characters down the line.
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This is a joke right? A +10 to hit at 12th level? He ain't gonna hit crap at 12th level with that! I have 7th level dudes with a higher 'to hit' modifier. You made a caster that can pretend to fight once in a while and will get clobbered when the monster hits him because his hps are horribly low for someone intended to be an arcane fighter.
All that was proven to me with this is that there is a desperate need for a 'mystic warrior' base class.
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This is a joke right? A +10 to hit at 12th level? He ain't gonna hit crap at 12th level with that! I have 7th level dudes with a higher 'to hit' modifier.
Your be Wizard at this point has a BAB of +6 at this point, a rogue has a BAB of +9 at this level, in fact there are only four of the eleven base classes that have a significantly higher BAB than Tarowin does at this particular level and two have lower BAB. Looking through the bestiary a level equivilant challenge for a 12th level party has an AC betwen 22 and 28. By comparison, the AC range for CR 1 creatures run from 13 to 17, which means that he has the same chance of hitting a CR 12 creature as a 1st level fighter has of hitting a CR 1 creature.
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I specifically chose too stay away from Eldritch Knight because I wanted to show what could be done using just the base classes. If I have thetime and energy later, I may rework him to take advantage of the Eldritch Knight's abilities.
I think you’re selling this character concept short by demonstrating a fighter/wizard multiclass when fighter/wizard/eldritch knight will likely give you a more effective character. I understand your stated aim, but I think that realistically most players going for this type of build (if using core rules only) would take the PrC. I don’t think it really undermines your stated aim – after all, without an arcane warrior base class you are needing to multiclass anyway, and Eldritch Knight is a class in the core rule book rather than some obscure or unbalanced PrC.
I don’t think all the people clamouring for an arcane warrior base class agree what they want from it, but I think most would agree that anything under ¾ BAB progression and caster level of, say, character level –3 is not going to do it for them. By demonstrating a character that doesn’t achieve this, it kind of adds fuel to their fire.
I think it’s a nice build, and I appreciate what you’re trying to do. I would certainly go for this type of character, but I would take Eldritch Knight or some other PrC as soon as I could.
Be nice to see how a F/W/EK stacks up against a bard of same level (bard being a decent arcane warrior base class in the core rules).
(Having said all that, I don’t have the time or inclination to crunch the numbers myself, so maybe I’m talking out of my butt).
EDIT: A F2/W5/EK5 Would have a BAB same as bard, more hit points on average and a caster level of 9.
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I could probably do more, but I'm getting tired. I do want to point out that half of the problem is that he has a wicked awful spellbook and some really poor gear with no backup weapon.
I just don't see what this guy does to CR 12 foes.
To be fair, in every example you proposed I could see the same thing (pretty much) happening to an equally equipped 12th level bard, barbarian, cleric, monk, druid...hell you get the idea.
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To be fair, in every example you proposed I could see the same thing (pretty much) happening to an equally equipped 12th level bard, barbarian, cleric, monk, druid...hell you get the idea.The bard fascinates or save-or-dies the purple worm. Seriously, they have a +4 will mod. Likely win. He summons a pair of bruisers to storm the lich's room and puts up an invisibility sphere, and opens with a dispel magic to strip the lich's buffs. If he gets the see invisibility or the lich doesn't cast it, that's a split fight. Could go either way. The bard/succubus fight is hard but I notice their invisibility counter is really weak. Could go either way. The bard completely owns the bears with Fascinate. Definite win.
Do you want me to do the other classes? I can, but I'm, like, super lazy.
You have completely ignored the jist of what was being said. I said an "equally equipped" class. You yourself said the spell list and equipment list of the fighter/mage was terrible. If you're talking a bard who knows equally bad spells (no invisibility, no invisibility sphere, no dispel magic but instead having such combat gems as legend lore) you're going to suffer a similar defeat. For example, let's go back to your original Purple Worm fight. Pretty much any class is going to be completely surprised when the big 'ol worm (they can't sense) pops out in front of them and takes a surprise round bite and probably succeeds in a grapple. I realize some classes might have a chance a resisting, but a lot are just going to stand there and get eaten in two rounds equally as well as the fighter/mage. Also at my table (and I think many tables) fascinate doesn't work if the creature involved is in combat, and even if it would work, the bard can do nothing but maintain the fascination which hardly equates to an automatic win.
That's the point being made. I can take any poorly equipped example of any class and watch them get eaten alive in a 1:1 fight with most CR12 creatures (since the CRs are designed to be run against a 4 person group). Let's come up with a more reasonable comparison, such as how a four person group with three identical players AND a fighter/mage vs. other options would fare. I realize this thought experiment is far more difficult, but it's also far more reasonable.
Less reason, more POWER!
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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To be fair, in every example you proposed I could see the same thing (pretty much) happening to an equally equipped 12th level bard, barbarian, cleric, monk, druid...hell you get the idea.The bard fascinates or save-or-dies the purple worm. Seriously, they have a +4 will mod. Likely win. He summons a pair of bruisers to storm the lich's room and puts up an invisibility sphere, and opens with a dispel magic to strip the lich's buffs. If he gets the see invisibility or the lich doesn't cast it, that's a split fight. Could go either way. The bard/succubus fight is hard but I notice their invisibility counter is really weak. Could go either way. The bard completely owns the bears with Fascinate. Definite win.
Purple worm's already in combat, so much for facinate, on the surprise round, the purple worm eats him.
bard facinates 5 bears, the other 7 eat him (their five friends join in when the screaming starts)
His summoned monster wink out when they hit the lich's globe of invulnerability, meanwhile the lich hits him with acid arrow to hamper casting, and starts with circle of death.
I do not think you're seeing the same fights I am
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The problem with SGTs isthat they were designed by optimizers, for optimizers. Seriously putting one 12th level character against a CR 12 creature is not a fair test becasue a CR 12 creature is supposed to challance four level 12 characters. I would put more stock in the results of at table play over SGTs any day, simply because the whole point of PFRPG is to play a game, not to engage in game theory.
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Let's look at what I did. I sat down with this character last night, and played. First off I had fun playing this character, and since this is a game that is the optimal result. More importantly, I had my DM through several scenarios at me. Sure we didn't use things like swarms of bears, can bears even have the swarm subtype, but in actual game play conditions he defeated an adult copper dragon, a storm giant, a ice demon, and a hezrou. He only just missed killing an adult blue dragon. He got whomped on by a dread wraith, a rakshasa, a roper, and a retriever. That is how the results turned out in actual game play, which in the end is all that counts. And for the record, whether you agree that he is optimal or not, he is a fighter/wizard, so I don't see how you think it's not an example of how such can be made.
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David,
One of my concerns centers around making him an evoker. Without direct access some kind of power like the old spellswords received (where they cast through a weapon on hits), I'd think his magical talents would be better served as a conjurer or transmuter (with a slightly different, less blast-oriented spell selection). Have you considered going this route?
Removed a flaming post.
Edit: I should add that other parts of this thread are heading south rapidly. Take a breath and calm down.