Crunchy ideas for a voodoo-themed male witch

[Tim Bürgers]

Hey there,

recently, my character died and I decided to try something new. My DM let me built a new character. I really love the witch class and tried making an urban "voodoo"-priest. He gets his powers from the destructice aspect of Gozreh (Elements-Patron).

Now, I always tried to make compromises between flavor and usefulness and I like to plan ahead. This is the point were I stand at the moment:

Group
- Human Fighter (Shield, Scimitar, Tank-Type)
- Tiefling Wizard/Rogue (going for Two-Weapon-Fighting and Arcane Trickster)
- Life-Oracle (the total healing-madness)

Feats:

1 - Spell Focus (Necromancy) - obvious reasons
1 - Greater Spell Focus
3 - Improved Familiar (Resolute Raven, makes it a bit hardier, because I like him to deliver touch spells and scout ahead of the party)
5 - Craft Wand (not quite sure about this, seems a pretty good choice because it compensates for the witch´s relatively small number of spells per day)
7 - Quick Draw (for metamagic rods, so I can cackle, cast and pick the rod I want to use)
9 - Craft Rod
11 - Split Hex (this is a nearly must-have, isn´t it?)
13 - Accursed Hex (because I like to use Misfortune very often)
15 - Ability Focus (Misfortune)
17 - Heighten Spell (Blindness and Bestow Curse can be great spells, even on Level 17)
19 - Split Major Hex

Hexes:

1 - Misfortune
2 - Fortune
4 - Cackle
6 - Prehensile Hair (I have Str 6 and need it to compensate this: touch spells, lifting objects, breaking doors...)
8 - Ward ( to make my familiar even hardier)
10 - Ice Tomb (it fits the Gozreh-theme)
12 - Waxen Image (not really THAT good, but perfect for the voodoo-theme)
14 - Hag´s Eye (I´m also not sure about this)
16 - Summon Spirit (to my mind also not the best grand hex one can have, but perfect for the voodoo-theme)
18 - Dire Prophecy (not sure)

I took none of the Healing-Hexes, because I serve the "destructive" Side of Gozreh and the Oracle heals more than enough for our party.

Ability-Scores (middle-aged): Str 6, Dex 13, Con 12, Int 24 (with item), Wis 15, Cha 8

Thank you for your highly appreciated advice!

[Rubia]

Why not choose the gravewalker archetype out of UM? Then you actually get a voodoo doll to poke people with. . . .

Rubia

[Tim Bürgers]

Yeah, nice idea!

I thought about that also.

But then again, I thought about that blind Sarenrae-worshipping Life-Oracle...

Because I want to be on good terms with my party´s healer, I dropped the idea because of the undead-features.

I just flavor the waxen image like a voodoo-doll, that´s fine also.

[Sirlink]

I am also working a voodoo type build.

As for feats I find you get so much more use out of Extra Hex than just about anything else. You would get a lot more mileage with evil eye out the gate followed by cackle. A levels -2 atk, ac, skills, and saves...at first level you get the benifites of spell focus and greater just from the saves not to mention that your frontline fighters will love you for making the baddies hit less and/or easier to hit. Since you are not trying to followup spell focus with augmented summoning you free up one extra feat. If you are worried about spells per day scribe scroll would be better than craft wand. Scribe scrolls have no level restriction and since you are friviliously throwing your spellbook (aka your familiar) into danger you will want to have spell backups on hand for relearning spells when you inevitably get it killed. Since wands are capped at level 4 you could pick up the cauldron hex you can make potions up to three and anyone can use them.
Cackle as a move is a absolute must have

[Cheapy]

Have you checked out the Juju Mystery from Paizo?

You can find it here. Note that the undead it makes aren't necessarily evil.

[Sirlink]

Cheapy wrote:

Have you checked out the Juju Mystery from Paizo?

You can find it here. Note that the undead it makes aren't necessarily evil.

mysteries are for oricals and his party already has one

[Cheapy]

Sirlink wrote:

Cheapy wrote:

Have you checked out the Juju Mystery from Paizo?

You can find it here. Note that the undead it makes aren't necessarily evil.

mysteries are for oricals and his party already has one

So?

[Tim Bürgers]

Yeah, I already thought about Evil Eye. I literally love it. The only thing I don´t like is that Evil Eye is mind-affecting. I think this is a big drawback because lots of enemies will be immune to Evil Eye: Constructs, Plants, Vermin, Undead...

Maybe I could drop Quick Draw and take Evil Eye via the Extra Hex feat. Woul complicate dealing with all the rods later, but would help against a lot of enemies by reducing e.g. saves or something.

Well maybe I can drop Craft Wand for Scribe Scroll. The "back up copy"-argument is nearly unbeatable, I think. Thank you!

[Mathwei ap Niall]

Tim Bürgers wrote:

Hey there,

recently, my character died and I decided to try something new. My DM let me built a new character. I really love the witch class and tried making an urban "voodoo"-priest. He gets his powers from the destructice aspect of Gozreh (Elements-Patron).

Now, I always tried to make compromises between flavor and usefulness and I like to plan ahead. This is the point were I stand at the moment:

Group
- Human Fighter (Shield, Scimitar, Tank-Type)
- Tiefling Wizard/Rogue (going for Two-Weapon-Fighting and Arcane Trickster)
- Life-Oracle (the total healing-madness)

Feats:

1 - Spell Focus (Necromancy) - obvious reasons
1 - Greater Spell Focus
3 - Improved Familiar (Resolute Raven, makes it a bit hardier, because I like him to deliver touch spells and scout ahead of the party)
5 - Craft Wand (not quite sure about this, seems a pretty good choice because it compensates for the witch´s relatively small number of spells per day)
7 - Quick Draw (for metamagic rods, so I can cackle, cast and pick the rod I want to use)
9 - Craft Rod
11 - Split Hex (this is a nearly must-have, isn´t it?)
13 - Accursed Hex (because I like to use Misfortune very often)
15 - Ability Focus (Misfortune)
17 - Heighten Spell (Blindness and Bestow Curse can be great spells, even on Level 17)
19 - Split Major Hex

Hexes:

1 - Misfortune
2 - Fortune
4 - Cackle
6 - Prehensile Hair (I have Str 6 and need it to compensate this: touch spells, lifting objects, breaking doors...)
8 - Ward ( to make my familiar even hardier)
10 - Ice Tomb (it fits the Gozreh-theme)
12 - Waxen Image (not really THAT good, but perfect for the voodoo-theme)
14 - Hag´s Eye (I´m also not sure about this)
16 - Summon Spirit (to my mind also not the best grand hex one can have, but perfect for the voodoo-theme)
18 - Dire Prophecy (not sure)

I took none of the Healing-Hexes, because I serve the "destructive" Side of Gozreh and the Oracle heals more than enough for our party.

Ability-Scores (middle-aged): Str 6, Dex 13, Con 12, Int...

Well first things first, Drop the Quickdraw feat. It only works on weapons and you can't quickdraw rods, wands, etc so it's a wasted feat.

Second, spell focus is nice IF you intend to be throwing out damaging necromancy spells, BUT since you picked Elements as your patron it's not going to affect any of your Patron spells.
Elements Patron is all about Direct Damage spells and really tries to play like a sorcerer build and has next to know synergy with necromancy at all.

Let's back up a step and ask a few questions to clarify a few things.
Is your Witch supposed to be the voodoo priest using spirits & undead servants with mind affecting spells to bring your enemies to their knees (the standard Houngan type)

OR

Are you going for the angry god servant bringing fire, plague and destruction down on your opponents (More Loa-Horse than Houngan)

Once you clarify that then you might be able to get some more assistance.