Is the Alchemist a 'caster'? Arcane? Divine? Unique?

[Kristal Moonhand]

Firstly, this thread is 4 years old. Secondly, the FAQ telling you to ignore the "arcane caster level" thing on the Improved Familiar chart is two years old.

[Kimera757]

I'm in a group with an alchemist right now. We've given him a Wand of Cure Light Wounds (and our cleric has one too). Is that... legal?

He can certainly brew an extract of Cure Light Wounds.

[Azothath]

Kimera757 wrote:

I'm in a group with an alchemist right now. We've given him a Wand of Cure Light Wounds (and our cleric has one too). Is that... legal?

He can certainly brew an extract of Cure Light Wounds.

yes

anyone can have a wand of Cure Light Wounds, using it is the trick.

the argument about Alchemists being casters comes from the nebulous descriptive text in the APG. It leads you to believe the spell list is arcane and the Alchemist is a variant arcane caster (doesn't cast in a classical manner).

1) Alchemists are not arcane casters. This is the main RAW interpretation with this FAQ clarification about spellcasting in 2013 and applies to PFS. 2013 was some time ago... just reading the APG leads you to 2 below.

2) Home game GM rules they are arcane casters and the list becomes poachable as a non-class spell list. Mostly it's Cure Light Wounds, Barkskin, Ablative Barrier. Other Alchemist class features would make things too complex if they got out of the class framework.

either way Cure Light Wounds is on the alchemists "spell list" so it's legal for him to use the wand (by mixing in his personal aura at no cost). Using quotes and a sly wink made it all okay.
Is it confusing? somewhat. IMO designers just wanted to make Alchemists unique and have a one way interaction with Wizards. It had other impacts.

[Gisher]

Kimera757 wrote:

I'm in a group with an alchemist right now. We've given him a Wand of Cure Light Wounds (and our cleric has one too). Is that... legal?

He can certainly brew an extract of Cure Light Wounds.

While Alchemists are not casters, they can use wands that match spells on their Formulae Lists.

APG wrote:

An alchemist can utilize spell-trigger items if the spell appears on his formulae list, but not spell-completion items (unless he uses Use Magic Device to do so).

This is a special exception that doesn't apply to Investigators.

[Azothath]

Gisher wrote:

Kimera757 wrote:

I'm in a group with an alchemist right now. We've given him a Wand of Cure Light Wounds (and our cleric has one too). Is that... legal?

He can certainly brew an extract of Cure Light Wounds.

While Alchemists are not casters, they can use wands that match spells on their Formulae Lists.

APG wrote:

An alchemist can utilize spell-trigger items if the spell appears on his formulae list, but not spell-completion items (unless he uses Use Magic Device to do so).

This is a special exception that doesn't apply to Investigators.

Yep - this is why my investigator took class levels in Wizard.

[RealAlchemy]

Azothath wrote:

Gisher wrote:

Kimera757 wrote:

I'm in a group with an alchemist right now. We've given him a Wand of Cure Light Wounds (and our cleric has one too). Is that... legal?

He can certainly brew an extract of Cure Light Wounds.

While Alchemists are not casters, they can use wands that match spells on their Formulae Lists.

APG wrote:

An alchemist can utilize spell-trigger items if the spell appears on his formulae list, but not spell-completion items (unless he uses Use Magic Device to do so).

This is a special exception that doesn't apply to Investigators.

Yep - this is why my investigator took class levels in Wizard.

This is why my investigator has a bunch of ranks in UMD and is an empiricist so he can use it based on INT :)

[Ryan Freire]

So...i get that these are very loose roles, but i kind of see them as the arcane "skill" class

Thinking of the dynamic of (fighter mage cleric thief) Arcane has Magus, Alchemist, Sorceror, Wizard.

Nature has
Barbarian, Druid, Ranger, Hunter

Divine has
Paladin, Oracle, Inquisitor, Cleric

And then Martials sit sadly, only able to fill two of the roles with multiple class types.

[maouse33]

RobertTHEPerylous wrote:

But can their levels count toward arcane caster levels if they take a level of wizard for the purposes of the improved familiar feat?

Example: a 6th level Alchemist dips into Wizard for their 7th level and takes the Improved Familiar feat. Can they select a Fairy Dragon that requires a 7th level arcane caster by the chart? I could understand for creation feats, as that would infer levels of experience and practice. But for improved familiar, it's more a matter of the potential familiar being drawn to the magical power of the character in question.

No. He'd be 6th CL arcane Alchemist and 1st CL Wizard, so they wouldn't qualify that way. But they could just take one more Alchemist and have 7th CL arcane alchemist. Because they do have "effective" CL. And it doesn't say "spells" as a class feature is needed. One might even let arcane heritage or some such CL adder effect this so that a player might be able to take it earlier.