Could someone please explain to me why the Witch is a "good" thing? I've looked over the Witch and even with the hexes I just don't see why people refer to it as a powerful class. I'm not sure what I'm missing.
At will (meaning unlimited) supernatural abilities.
1) Some aren't obtainable by spells2) None have SR/some have no save
Spells up to 9th
Wizards only get the spells up to 9th (wizards have no unlimited powers except cantrips that everyone has unlimited).
So basically it is Wizard ++ (yes wizards get a benefit from school specialization that witches don't get but witches have no spellbook to be stolen).
Witches trade a massive and varied spell list for abilities like being able to fly for minutes/level per day or being able to disguise self for minutes/level per day. They also have the ability to make an enemy indefinitely make every d20 roll they roll as roll two take the lower... with a -2 penalty.
As an aside, I wrote up a quick explanation using dice on how rolling twice taking the lower is fantastic for making the enemy fail saves, miss attacks and be unable to escape from grapples, but...
Wish I played in a PBP right about now.
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Could someone please explain to me why the Witch is a "good" thing? I've looked over the Witch and even with the hexes I just don't see why people refer to it as a powerful class. I'm not sure what I'm missing.
Depends what you mean by powerful, honestly I think it is one of the weaker full casting classes but even a weak full casting class is above average class. One of the strongest parts of the witch is versitality. They are not great at anything, except debuffing the every living hell out of a single mob, that they rule on. But other than that they are not great at anything but they are pretty good at a whole lot of stuff.
Could someone please explain to me why the Witch is a "good" thing? I've looked over the Witch and even with the hexes I just don't see why people refer to it as a powerful class. I'm not sure what I'm missing.
Witch never runs out of spells to cast due to hexes and their spell list has both healing, damage, defense and control spells... aka pretty much everything and no limit to how much of it they can learn.
They are kind of a casters caster with all the tools you need to grow into a powerhouse. Though they require good knowledge of spells to play well, much like a wizard does.
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Could someone please explain to me why the Witch is a "good" thing? I've looked over the Witch and even with the hexes I just don't see why people refer to it as a powerful class. I'm not sure what I'm missing.Depends what you mean by powerful, honestly I think it is one of the weaker full casting classes but even a weak full casting class is above average class. One of the strongest parts of the witch is versitality. They are not great at anything, except debuffing the every living hell out of a single mob, that they rule on. But other than that they are not great at anything but they are pretty good at a whole lot of stuff.
Pretty much what the Dark one said. Witch is the best class added since the bard!
Hexes offer massive utility. Very few things a witch cant overcome
They are very 'busy' and playing one can get a bit overwhelming
very rarely have time to cast spells in battle as there is loads you can do so mine mostly has duration spells...which is fine as you mostly need to be fairly close to your enemies so mage armour, false life etc is no bad thing
dungeon rooms are a witches dream.....party members and baddies quite close
she likes to be in big parties
mine also has pretty high UMD (i didnt dump stat Cha as she is a pretty witch), to add even more variety
there is never a moment in any round where you having nothing to do
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I've found that especially at low levels, Action economy and survival are the biggest problems facing a witch, With your hexes you may be tempted to buff, debuff, cast spells, and move to keep yourself safe, which may conflict with each other.
However I love the class, It marries a lot of flavourful options with a decent level of power. I just hope we keep getting a steady trickle of new hexes.
Witch is freakin awesome-balanced against thier squishyness.
Why? You class abilities encourage you to not move. This is mostly because of Cackle. It's a move action to make all active hexes (particularly evil eye and Misfortune- both wicked good debuffs).
IF you choose to use a standard to cast/hex while cackling, then you just stood still while the enemy closes with you.
Now this isn't a big problem for a few reasons:
1.Your party beatsticks SHOULD be blocking the enemy (by getting in their face and pounding on that lowered-evil eye-AC)
2. A lot of your hexes persist for 1d4 rounds on a failed save, so it's not always necessary to Cackle.
3. A couple of the patrons do give you either mirror image or invisiblity as patron spells.
4. Flight Hex can put you out of reach for some foes.
Now, with mitigating the whole not moving issue, what's good about them has already been touched on.
I WILL, however, point out many say that Sleep Hex and now, possibly Icy prison are Overpowered because they are a Will and Fort save or Lose with unlimited uses (once per target) that ignore SR.
Even Evil Eye,Misfortune, Cackle is incredibly potent.
Any of these can OWNa BBEG encounter.
Now, with Split hex it's even better (or worse from you Dm's view) since you can apply hexes to 2 foes at once.
Rd1. Misfortune 2targets (BBEG and Minion) so theyroll twice and take the worst result.
Rd2 Cackle and Either Sleep or Icy Prison.
Fight Over.
I understand why they called it cackle, but I hate the sound of it. If I rolled a debuff-focused witch, she would look like a young girl and would giggle innocently while her allies tore hexed enemies into pieces. ("Tee-hee! Orc go bye-bye!") EDIT: Any League of Legends players? Think Annie.
Far more creep factor in that than in some old bag laughing her posterior off like she's high.
Alternatively, you could go for the evil queen archetype and say she laughs maniacally in her shrill, bat-guano crazy tone. Still not so creepy.
I understand why they called it cackle, but I hate the sound of it. If I rolled a debuff-focused witch, she would look like a young girl and would giggle innocently while her allies tore hexed enemies into pieces. ("Tee-hee! Orc go bye-bye!") EDIT: Any League of Legends players? Think Annie.
Far more creep factor in that than in some old bag laughing her posterior off like she's high.
Alternatively, you could go for the evil queen archetype and say she laughs maniacally in her shrill, bat-guano crazy tone. Still not so creepy.
With your DM's approval you can refluff it into almost anything. I like the idea of whistling eerily to keep the hexes going myself.
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The witch is the best debuffer in the game. However, it takes a big hit to survivability to do that. Most of your hexes are 30 ft range. You are a single charge from dead. In addition the Witch has very few defensive spells, unlike the Wizard.
Yes.
Unfortunately at higher levels this is a BIG problem. I can't really risk using a move action every round to continue my Misfortune, and I'm not going to stop casting spells. Plus right now I'm fighting ONLY vampires, so my witch was really really limited. Not many buffs to cast, not much I can hex (except Misfortune), vampires fly, so I can't take to the air to avoid them, they have energy resistance for lightning and cold, the 2 elemental evocations the witch has, immune to mind affecting (immune to many many hexes and spells), and I didn't take any of the Summon Monsters because I didn't want to slow down the table any more than it already does (5 players, everybody with cohorts and hirelings...). At higher levels, the saves do become a bigger problem as the witch either wins or does nothing for the action basically at a slightly less than 40% chance with hexes.
My main issues with the witch lack of buffs and utility spells. Most of them are all low levels. Beyond level 3 the witch has extremely specific and narrow spells.
The overall combo of wizard and lightweight-druid for the witch is very interesting, but it seems to lack the best of both worlds. This wouldn't bother me as much except that a wizard or druid in the same party would probably outshine the witch, and the witch has trouble replacing both.
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The witch is truly freaking awesome class but very light on the defenses.
And as everyone has said once the get cackle they CAN be a stationary target begging to be beaten on by the big nasty's. but that's really not a big deal if you remember something very important.
You can buy or summon or create a mount and ride that thing around the battlefield using it's move action to get you into range to cackle and hex then carry you to safety after you've done what you want. Get to using a flying mount as quick as you can.
At low levels use a horse (or Riding Dog if small) then upgrade to something tougher and/or flying around 5th level like an Ogre or Roc and at 10th switch to animated objects that fly.
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A lot of the posters in this thread have mentioned the importance of the Witch's hexes. Which hexes do you believe are most worth taking for the Witch?
I think Misfortune is overall the strongest normal hex. Paizo did a good job of actually limiting it to 1 round, and 3 round at max without Cackle. It starts off weaker, as Slumber and Evil Eye are more outright useful, but Misfortune scales far better at higher levels.
Agony is really great for major hexes, but the increasing Will saves makes it come just a bit later than it wants to.
Cauldron is of course rock solid. Brewing Enlarge Person for melee is never bad.
Prehensile Hair could be really good if the DM doesn't nerf it into uselessness. 3 hands are better than 2.
With the right hexes and right power source the witch is awesome and as powerful as the wizard.
Trickery (mirror image, mislead, reverse gravity, time stop)
Sleep (save or loose with Sr allowed, ofcourse its mind affecting and allows the enemy to wake up the target)
Misfortune (excellent debuff especially with
Cackle
Fortune
Flight (min per day split in 1 min increments and let the wizard waste 3rd level spell slots and still have fly fewer timer per day than you)
Agony (no SR fortitude save or suck)
Retribution (against golems and brute style opponents this is great)
Evil eye (to complete the cackle, fortune, misfortune evil eyes circle)
Hidden Home (neat but not very useful, nothing else is really pick worthy here though)
Life giver ( Ressurection with 1 full round casting time and no components? Perhaps almost broken ability)
With these hexes you can focus on survivability spells while still contributing greatly in combat.
Pick the typical wizard feats plus accursed hex and split hex and you are set.
Ofcourse you could pick hexes like nails, child scent and prehensive hair and a power source like plague and be much much worse than a wizard.
