My players and I recently did a playtest involving an Alchemist, Witch, Cavalier and Inquisitor, all level 8. Here’s the lineup:
Kwiz the Inquisitor 8, who had the Travel domain.
Witch the Witch 8 (creative bunch, eh?), with the cackle, slumber (wasn’t used), fortune, misfortune and evil eye Hexes, and a bat familiar.
Al the Alchemist 8, with the sticky poison and shock bomb discoveries (didn’t get to take advantage of sticky poison simply because he forgot… whoops?).
Calvin the Cavalier 8, Cockatrice Order, didn’t get to challenge or use a mount.
Now, allow me to explain something: We only did one battle, against a group of 4 Bearded Devils (CR 5). The intent was to have that fight lead up to the vampire (CR 9) at the end, but due to some players arriving late, we could only get through the Bearded Devils. As such, we only really got to see them in action once. Thus, I’ll be presenting my (and my players’) opinions about them so far, but it doesn’t mean they’re set in stone; they’re just what we’ve observed in this specific instance, and I didn’t see much playtesting being posted so I figured this couldn’t hurt. Tomorrow, we’ll be definitely continuing with other combats.
Anyways, the setup was that the bearded devils (disguised under magic to appear as bearded humans), were keeping watch for their leader, a vampire who has taken the role as a political figure intending to destroy the city… or something. Whatever. Point is, it’s inside amidst a handful of corridors where the cavalier couldn’t take advantage of his big wolf mount (I gave them the option of doing this or a battle that took place in an open field, and they chose this). The corridors they fought in had a couple areas that opened up into 15 by 15 squares, but were otherwise separated by 5-foot gaps and a few short stairways.
It started out with them surprise rounding the devils, mostly consisting of them moving into positions to get a combative edge (flanking, making it so they couldn’t touch Witch or Al, etc.). The goal of the devils was to simply cut them up and use their “infernal wounds” ability to soften them for their vampire leader, who was alerted to their presence just through the noise.
Overall, Kwiz the Inquisitor was the MVP. Utilizing Solo Tactics and the Outflank and Precise Strike tactical feats as well as his Bane ability to put the hook where it hurts most alongside Calvin, our Cavalier. Calvin was runner up for MVP position, surprisingly, and performed quite well without his mount or charging. Calvin, wielding a greatsword with flaming burst (a large portion of his money was spent on barding and enchantments for his mount), managed to put the heat on the Devils, getting hit only on a few occasions and having the HP to back it up. Kwiz did more damage, but Calvin was nothing to shrug at either.
Kwiz also had a great use of his travel domain power, where he teleported behind a retreating devil and used his shield to bash it down some stairs for great cinematic effect.
Witch the Witch and Al the Alchemist were… interesting. First, Witch. Witch was a little boring, to be honest, but wasn’t bad. Fortune saved both Calvin and Kwiz several occasions, and Cackle kept it going for many rounds (thumbs up on that ability, very cool). Evil Eye also saved Al from getting hit a lot, so that was good too. So, yes, Witch was benefitting the party, but his turns were relatively uneventful, consisting largely of spending a move action to Cackle and occasionally casting a spell (perhaps the environment limited that, this is just what we observed so far). Otherwise, it seems that more playtesting will have to be enacted to truly judge what the witch is capable of.
Al was weird. Al seems to be a class that just can’t decide on what its trying to do. During the character generation process, Al had a tough time deciding what exactly he wanted to do: he wanted to try focusing on bombs, but they could only be taken so far with his limited discoveries. He wanted to try mutagens, but he would have to wait until level 12 to really get another boost, so that wasn’t too appealing. Maybe being a buffer, then… but he could only really buff himself (largely unappealing for my player). He ended up at some weird dual-dagger using guy with wounding enchantments who was supposed to use poison, but FORGOT. Sweet. But it wasn’t all bad, actually. He went toe-to-toe with a devil and, despite its damage reduction, dished out enough damage to have the Witch nuke it with a lightning bolt. All in all, Al didn’t look or feel much like an Alchemist, but he did throw a lightning bomb once to good use, and drank a couple potions in his time.
QUESTION: Does damage reduction stop bleed? Under DR, it says:
“whenever damage reduction completely negates the damage from an attack, it also negates most special effects that accompany the attack, such as injury poison, a monk’s stunning, and injury-based disease.”
So, when Al was dealing 2-3 overall points of damage with his daggers after DR, would it still cause the full bleed damage, since it doesn’t seem to negate it? At first I said no, then after reading it, I let it happen, but it felt strange to me. Could I get a clarification?
POSITIVES AND NEGATIVES
Witch: Its really great that Hexes can be used indefinitely, and Cackle is really neat as well. We were of the opinion that more Hexes should be ranged than melee, and that maybe it should have something more to do. But it’s only been one combat, and the Witch was actually pretty sweet in retrospect.
Alchemist: We think this class needs the most work. Your potions would be sweet if you could give them to other people (without having to pick a discovery to do so), mutagens should have a better progression (as in, not so clumped around late game), and yeah. I dunno, we’ll have to see more.
Cavalier: Not much to say on this one. Seems really solid even without its schtick… even though it occurs to me that I have no idea what good ol Calvin did with his mount while he was inside fighting… The true test will be tomorrow, when they fight a giant outside.
Inquisitor: Very cool class. My player really enjoyed it, the judgements proved to be quite nice (Healing and Destruction), Bane was great, and Solo Tactics proved invaluable. He went a sort of shield-bashing spear build, and it seemed pretty awesome for him. Good times were had. We don’t think it needs really anything, but again, this was just one combat that he shone in.
OVERALL: Great job Paizo! The Alchemist is our least favorite so far, but the player didn’t have a bad time by any means. He got in his moments by guzzling potions and occasionally flailing around with his daggers. We had a lot of laughs and a great time. The Inquisitor fell in love with his class, and the Cavalier can’t wait to see what he can do out in the open. The Witch was also very pleased, but not to their extent, enjoying their bat familiar and repeatedly cackling like a madman. We hope to get way more done tomorrow and post our findings.
Alright, day 2. They fought 3 Cloud Giants, all still level 8. Also, we have a new member:
An Oracle of Stone
The plan was for them to fight a single giant (CR 11), but after defeating it, they insisted on fighting two more immediately. I obliged. The first fight took place over a large, open field, where Calvin could take full advantage of his dire wolf mount and dish out the damage to the Giants. He was a huge factor in taking it down, but the real MVP was...
THE ALCHEMIST! Surprisingly, the Alchemist actually made the difference between success and defeat in both battles, utilizing his bombs and a single potion of Fox's Cunning and Force/Explosive Bombs. The force bombs never failed to knock the giants over, where the Cavalier, Inquisitor, Witch and Oracle surrounded them and took their full attacks and AoO's.
The giant was no push-over, though (pun). When he attacked, he hit, and he hit hard (it was supposed to test their limits). The Cavalier suffered large amounts of damage, but managed to stay alive thanks to the Inquisitors occasional healing spell. The Cavalier's charge and challenge were both excellent in play, and we're very satisfied with the class so far... though we haven't really touched on Oaths.
The Witch didn't really do much the first fight (mainly throwing an occasional lightning bolt out and Fortune-ing the Cavalier to hit), but was a real help during the second one.
The Oracle player had a LOT of fun with this class. He loved the earthglide ability, and the crystal sight revelation to see his enemies "above" him. He summoned a group of small earth elementals to help surround the giant, which really didn't end up doing much but help the Inquisitor flank, and would sometimes go in for an attack or two when he felt safe enough.
QUESTION
How does splash damage work with creatures larger than medium size? Are they treated as a single, big square in which the splash emanates from? Or does the alchemist "choose" some sort of square to hit that they occupy and have the splash emanate from there? Something else? Clarification would be helpful :].
THE SECOND FIGHT
After they brought down the first giant (ended with a crit from the cavalier), I had two more appear at their request. If it weren't for the force bombs of the alchemist, they would have died.
One entered behind them and moved in to awesome blow the alchemist onto the ground, hoping to keep him from making his bombs, and the other appeared far in front of them to hurl rocks.
The first half of the fight consisted of the Cavalier using ride-by attack to zig and zag around it, landing many successful hits with his challenge and helping others hit with his order ability. His mobility was key in him surviving.
The Oracle started going underground and using his Shard Explosion to damage it from below, keeping his summons moving around on top for flanking positions. Though he didn't contribute as much as the others, he was an invaluable support character and the player loved it.
The Inquisitor almost died, but thanks to the Alchemist, survived long enough to deal the final blow. He got hit by a ranged rock and an occasional morning star, but managed to stay up. As expected, he wasn't nearly as effective as the combat with the devils, but he remained a standing force to be reckoned with, thanks to his giant-bane spear.
The Witch was pretty important this time around, using his evil-eye hex to reduce their attack output and enervation to debuff them further. He Cackled to keep his Fortune on the Cavalier as long as he could, but eventually dropped it begin throwing more lightning bolts. The Witch was never touched during both combats.
Again, the Alchemist meant the difference between life and death, and knocked the giants prone. Using his boots of haste, he also managed to stay mobile enough to keep out of range of the giants, taking only a two hits from a morning star (he drank a cure potion he made after those), and once from a rock throw. The Inquisitor and the Cavalier, as well as the Oracle, to some degree, kept the two giants off of him.
When the first giant went down, the other levitated upwards and attempted to rain rocks down upon them, despite the fact that the penalties would stack against him overtime. That strategy failed. The Witch Evil-Eyed him for his saves, and threw a Hold Person on him. I rolled abysmally and he consistently failed. Meanwhile, the Alchemist threw some explosive bombs and set the Giant on fire for extra damage. The Inquisitor whipped out a bow and dished out some damage, and the Cavalier didn't have a ranged weapon, so just sat around yelling "BRING HIM DOOOOOWN!" He still had fun. The Oracle cast acid arrow, but by the time his next turn came, the Giant was down.
OVERALL
Our opinions have changed on the Alchemist; it was very fun this combat and seemed alchemist-y. The Witch was also brought up in opinion, being far more useful this combat. We still wish for more melee Hexes, but so far so good. The Inquisitor and Cavalier are still excellent, and we don't think they need a change so far.
More to come, we're losing the Cavalier and the Witch and adding a Summoner and a new Inquisitor (the old player is picking up the Summoner). We figured it would be good to see how other players would build up their classes to get a more generalized opinion.
I didn't seem to get much "question-answering" action, so I posted them in a new thread, here.
I didn't seem to get much "question-answering" action, so I posted them in a new thread, here.
Thanks for listing all that...it was amsuing to read and insightful.