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After dealing with 1 too many novaing, shocking grasp Magus who only work with the 15 minute adventuring day I wanted to try and build something with a bit more staying power.
We used Elf as the basis for those tasty Elven racial bonuses but you can also build it with Human to get to combat Reflexes a bit earlier.
We've also built it at 5th level which is really where the build comes together and gets all of it's benefits going at once.
This build SHOULD last easily till the early teens (well through PFS lifespan) before it stops being as effective but if anyone has any ideas on how to lengthen/improve it's effectiveness it would definately be appreciated.
The point is to use the high regular damage and hit chance from the Hex and augment it once or twice a fight with a low level spell while really keeping all your opponents from ever being able to do anything to you or your party.
This should seriously cut back on the need to nova every fight and allow you to contribute significantly more to your other party members.
Hairy the Hexcrafter
5th level Elven Magus
Str: 13
Dex: 14
Con: 12
Int: 19 (18 + 4th level bump)
Wis: 10
Cha: 10
HP: 38 AC: 18 (elven chain) Initiative: +4
Traits: Reactionary, Magical Lineage (Frostbite)
Skills: Intimidate +10 (+2 tools/mask), UMD: 8, Spellcraft: 13
Feats: Enforcer, Rime Spell, Power Attack
Arcana: Arcane Accuracy
Hexes: Prehensile Hair, Flight
Scimitar +1
This build functions like the normal basic magus build but uses Frostbite as it's default spell for longevity and focuses on Debuffing and Battlefield control instead.
Each combat begins like this:
Standard action: Activate Prehensile Hair
Swift Action: Arcane Pool +1 to beard
Move action: Move magus to take advantage of his 10' reach
2nd round use spell combat/spellstrike to channel (Rime Spell) Frostbite and make trip attacks against 1 or 2 targets within reach with Arcane Accuracy to guarantee a hit.
Since held charges are discharged on contact with anything as soon as the trip is attempted the target is affected by the 1D6+5 non-lethal damage from the Frostbite with the fatigue condition (no save) and the Entangled condition (no save) from the Rime spell metamagic. This also triggers the free intimidate check from Enforcer (at +10 the magus has a very good chance of succeeding) for the shaken penalty.
Depending on your GM all of this should be resolved before the actual trip attempt is resolved but YMMV.
The target(s) should be at -2 Strength & -6 Dexterity dropping his CMD by 4, vs Hairy's minimum of +8 CMB (+3 BaB +5 Int Bonus +1 weapon enhancement +4 Arcane Accuracy, -5 natural attacks mixed with manufactured weapons).
Against a single target The Magus follows up immediately with a regular attack with his beard for 1D3 +1D6+5 (frostbite) +4 (1.5*Int bonus) +1 (arcane Pool enhancement) then a 5' step to hit with the Scimitar for 1D6+1 (weapon damage + str) +1D6+5 {Frostbite {Spellstrike specifically states ANY weapon you are wielding not just one} and critting on a 18-20 (15-20 if you had the chance to arcane pool or cash to Keen the blade).
Routinely he'll also get an additional AoO when that target tries to stand or crawl away or someone else comes to help it.
Against multiple targets he'll do the trip attack on 2 of them but since he'll only have a +8 CMB (natural attacks mixed with manufactured weapons) he'll 5' step to the weakest one and use his Scimitar (keened as soon as possible) to attack. The target should be at -7 AC, -(9 to 12) to hit so hitting should not be a problem. He'll be doing 1D6+1 (weapon damage + str) +1D6+5 {Frostbite {Spellstrike specifically states ANY weapon you are wielding not just one} and critting on a 18-20 (15-20 if you had the chance to arcane pool or cash to Keen the
blade).
The target will NOT be able to hit you back with a -9 to 12 to hit so your own AC is not that important.
Routinely he'll also get an additional AoO when that target tries to stand or crawl away or someone else comes to help it.
The following round is all about bringing the pain, the target is prone, shaken and fatigued and probably been beaten on by your party members so you invoke Power Attack and spellstrike (Brand, Frostbite or Shocking Grasp depending on how much damage and available targets you need).
1D3 + 9 (int bonus *1.5) +3 (Power attack) + spell damage (+1 brand or +1D6+5 Frostbite) PLUS
1D3 + 9 (int bonus *1.5) +3 (Power attack) + spell damage (+1 brand or +1D6+5 Frostbite)
Is a LOT of damage to drop on a target that can't really be missed and he'll still probably be getting an extra attack via AoO since he threatens such a large area filled with prone targets.
In general your scimitar sees very little use and is more of a backup for when Prehensile hair is unavailable or the challenge is too minor to waste any of your daily uses on and may be replaced with something like a razor whip if you can find a way of getting proficiency in it.
The downside of this build is it will need Combat Reflexes to take advantage of it's reach to deliver AoO's and to avoid losing charges from Frostbite but won't be able to take it until 7th level (unless you play human which would cost you the excellent elven racials)
A fatigued, prone, entangled target is the best gift you can give to a melee character (while if you can put him to sleep sitting on on the toilet with his back turned that would be better but that's a little tricky to pull off), and I know all the Barbarians and Rogues I play with would be ecstatic at this gift.
I see a few issues in the build using the Prehensile Hair hex in conjunction with arcane pool and strike and use of the touch attack.
Arcane pool and spellstrike require a weapon to enhance. Prehensile hair is a secondary natural attack. A secondary natural attack works under different rules to regular weapon combat. Prehensile hair would not be considered a weapon for the purposes of arcane pool or spellstrike.
Another issue is using spellstrike to trip and still treating frostbite as a touch attack. when you use spellstrike you must score a normal hit to deliver the spell. A trip attack is a combat maneuver and its success uses a different defense value. Even if it was a touch attack it is still a grey area and as a GM I would say no but others might be ok with it.
I think that using a whip to perform the attack would provide you with the range your looking for but would still leave you with the problem of no trip. You could use your second attack from spellstrike to trip with the multiple penalties and status effects it would make the secondary trip attempt more likely.
An alternative could be to just use your beard as the limb for the touch attack for frostbite allowing an extra touch with a -5 to hit isn't bad. Carrying a flail as a secondary weapon when you are focusing on using this plan of attack would give you an edge on performing trips against enemies with your normal attack.
I really like the concept I just think it needs a little more finessing to get it where you want it.
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and...elves dont have facial hair
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Check the clarification from the combat maneuvers blog post here:
Combat Maneuver rulings
which specifically states "Disarm, sunder, and trip are normally the only kinds of combat maneuvers in which you’re actually using a weapon (natural weapons and unarmed strikes are considered weapons for this purpose) to perform the maneuver, and therefore the weapon’s bonuses (enhancement bonuses, feats such as Weapon Focus, fighter weapon training, and so on) apply to the roll.".
Now since natural attacks == natural weapon (this you may argue with but we can definitely find places where the Devs have used the terms interchangeably), your Hair is a valid weapon for performing Combat Maneuvers and being enhanced by your arcane pool.
2.Page 199 of the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook says, “When you attempt to perform a combat maneuver, make an attack roll and add your CMB in place of your normal attack bonus.
By that statement any combat maneuver is a normal attack roll it just uses different modifiers.
The whip is a sub-par weapon choice and strictly inferior to the beard in all ways. Biggest issue with it is it can't attack adjacent squares and requires an exotic weapon proficiency to use it.
Since the melee Magus is such a MAD class the main goal of this build is to focus on using 1 stat (Intelligence) to maximize damage and attacks while keeping your defense and spellcasting as high as possible.
This build does touch on three routinely misunderstood rulings in Pathfinder (Natural Attacks, Spellstrike & Combat Maneuvers) which is where most everyone stumbles when looking at the build. I'm thinking I'm going to have to print out the blog posts that clarify this problems every time I whip this build out.
@Ismodai Elves have all kind of issues but do a mental find & replace "beard" with "hair on head".
Though it does look like I'm going to have to re-build this as a Human Magus instead. The Human perks are just slightly better then the Elf in terms of speed to concept.
and humans do grow facial hair :P
i know i know im just joking
Disarm, sunder, and trip are normally the only kinds of combat maneuvers in which you’re actually using a weapon (natural weapons and unarmed strikes are considered weapons for this purpose) to perform the maneuver, and therefore the weapon’s bonuses (enhancement bonuses, feats such as Weapon Focus, fighter weapon training, and so on) apply to the roll.
It doesn't make them a manufactured weapon for all purposes so they would have to be a legal target to begin with.
You can use natural attacks to perform maneuvers I agree. I also agree you can add any bonuses you would normally get from using a weapon to perform the maneuver such as the trip feats or if you had weapon focus beard (that sounds so silly). However you can't use abilities and spells that specifically target manufactured weapons on natural weapons. It is why a monk has a note under their unarmed attacks that states it is considered a natural as well as a manufactured weapon for spells abilities etc.
The whip would require some more feats to prevent AoO but it does have the advantage of providing an extra 5'. I have seen a Magus build that focused on the whip to deliver its spells for the extra range this would likely be a nice addition to that build.
Arcane Pool does not specify manufactured weapon. In fact, it's not even in the magus class description anywhere.
Natural weapons are always weapons. This is indisputable. The only issue with natural attacks and arcane pool is that arcane pool specifies "any weapon he is holding". This is more of an issue for Claws, since you can easily hold your hair, but I am certain the intent is that it will work on natural attacks too, since Haste had that same text but the intent had always been to work with natural attacks. In the last errata, it was modified.
The game does make a distinction between manufactured weapons and natural attacks. Such as with magic fang and magic weapon. Haste was changed with errata but arcane pool wasn't at least as far a I am aware.
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The game does make a distinction between manufactured weapons and natural attacks. Such as with magic fang and magic weapon. Haste was changed with errata but arcane pool wasn't at least as far a I am aware.
The ONLY place where the game makes that distinction is those 2 spells (Haste was errated because of the changes to natural attacks not because of the spell itself).
Now even if the games does make a distinction there is NOTHING in the arcane pool description that cares about it.
At 1st level, a magus can expend 1 point from his arcane pool as a swift action to grant any weapon he is holding a
+1 enhancement bonus for 1 minute.
Now if you can show me anywhere in the above statement that says it needs to be a manufactured weapon I'd really like to see it.
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2nd round use spell combat/spellstrike to channel (Rime Spell) Frostbite and make trip attacks against 1 or 2 targets within reach with Arcane Accuracy to guarantee a hit.
Since held charges are discharged on contact with anything as soon as the trip is attempted the target is affected by the 1D6+5 non-lethal damage from the Frostbite with the fatigue condition (no save) and the Entangled condition (no save) from the Rime spell metamagic. This also triggers the free intimidate check from Enforcer (at +10 the magus has a very good chance of succeeding) for the shaken penalty.
Two things.
1: By the second round it to late. It should be dead or it's way to strong for this to be effective tactic. There AC or CMB will be way to high for this to work.2: Trip dose not discharge the spell effect, because it is not a attack. Thus you can use your hair to trip, or attack. You can not deliver a touch spell as part of a trip combat maneuver.
Attack Roll
An attack roll represents your attempt to strike your opponent on your turn in a round.
Trip
You can attempt to trip your opponent in place of a mêlée attack.
Can you tell me anywhere it says the arcane pool allows the Magus to enchant a natural attack?
The ability affects a weapon. A natural attack isn't a weapon. It is an extension of the creature A limb, wings, tail, hair etc. Unless the ability would target the creature as a whole it does not work.
By your thinking I could grab an enemies hand enchant it and use it to slap him while repeating stop hitting yourself, stop hitting yourself. As funny as that image is I would have to say no.
At the very least, narrater, it would be an improvised weapon, and hence completely allowed by the rules. And I would definately award bonus XP to any magus that did exactly that.
Master Arminas
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2nd round use spell combat/spellstrike to channel (Rime Spell) Frostbite and make trip attacks against 1 or 2 targets within reach with Arcane Accuracy to guarantee a hit.
Since held charges are discharged on contact with anything as soon as the trip is attempted the target is affected by the 1D6+5 non-lethal damage from the Frostbite with the fatigue condition (no save) and the Entangled condition (no save) from the Rime spell metamagic. This also triggers the free intimidate check from Enforcer (at +10 the magus has a very good chance of succeeding) for the shaken penalty.Two things.
1: By the second round it to late. It should be dead or it's way to strong for this to be effective tactic. There AC or CMB will be way to high for this to work.
2: Trip dose not discharge the spell effect, because it is not a attack. Thus you can use your hair to trip, or attack. You can not deliver a touch spell as part of a trip combat maneuver.Attack Roll
An attack roll represents your attempt to strike your opponent on your turn in a round.Trip
You can attempt to trip your opponent in place of a mêlée attack.
Well now you're just making things up. You do not NEED to make an attack roll to discharge a touch spell.
If you actually read the Holding the charge rules for touch spells you'll see attacking is just one way to use the charge.If you touch anything or anyone while holding a charge, even unintentionally, the spell discharges.
also if you had read the post I made above you will see that:
Page 199 of the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook says, “When you attempt to perform a combat maneuver, make an attack roll and add your CMB in place of your normal attack bonus.Trip combat maneuver is an attack, so it is legal.
Also if you expect to kill everything you face in 1 round you are obviously not being challenged enough or playing at a REALLY low level.
@Narrater, Technically you could but you'd provoke a massive number of AoO's and need to succeed on multiple Combat maneuvers to do it.
And as several of us have already told you Natural attacks are ALWAYS considered weapons and valid for this spell.
If you bother to actually read the Touch spells entry in your CRB you will see it says in bold print all natural weapons are valid to deliver touch spells.
If you read my previous post you would see that I never claimed you could not use the beard to make touch attacks. I stated you could not use arcane pool or spellstrike with your beard it is a natural attack not a weapon. You can play that it is in your own games but it is not RAW.
I did claim that even if you used spellstrike in conjunction with frostbite the extra attacks used to deliver frostbite are no longer touch attacks. They become regular attacks and even use the threat range of the weapon that is the trade off. Harder to hit but you get more damage and a better chance to critical.
You are able to use spell combat with your beard but it is a secondary attack that has an inherent -5 to your to hit for being a secondary natural attack.
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If you read my previous post you would see that I never claimed you could not use the beard to make touch attacks. I stated you could not use arcane pool or spellstrike with your beard it is a natural attack not a weapon. You can play that it is in your own games but it is not RAW.
I did claim that even if you used spellstrike in conjunction with frostbite the extra attacks used to deliver frostbite are no longer touch attacks. They become regular attacks and even use the threat range of the weapon that is the trade off. Harder to hit but you get more damage and a better chance to critical.
You are able to use spell combat with your beard but it is a secondary attack that has an inherent -5 to your to hit for being a secondary natural attack.
And as you've been told by multiple commenters in this thread ALL NATURAL ATTACKS ARE CONSIDERED WEAPONS!!
Take a look at the weapon finesse feat it spells it out in black and white thereSpecial: Natural weapons are considered light weapons.
As for the secondary attack penalty that only applies if you use other attacks in the same round.
If a creature has only one natural attack, it is always made using the creature’s full base attack bonus and adds 1-1/2 the creature’s Strength bonus on attack rolls.
The rules are there, please read them before perpetuating incorrect information, you are doing this hobby a great disservice everytime you quote a falsehood.
I love how you pull things from different sources that are for specific instances and claim they are universal. The special side tag are for special considerations in this case specifically allows for weapon finesse with unarmed attacks. It might have had some relevance if it had the normal tag witch explains the normal unadjusted use of the rules.
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I love how you pull things from different sources that are for specific instances and claim they are universal. The special side tag are for special considerations in this case specifically allows for weapon finesse with unarmed attacks. It might have had some relevance if it had the normal tag witch explains the normal unadjusted use of the rules.
And I really love how you make all these grandiose assumptions on how the rules work without ever quoting anything proving that.
This is a discussion regarding RAW (if you don't know what that is it means RULES AS WRITTEN), so unless you can show in writing that your interpretation is how it works you have no place in this discussion.
You are perfectly free to believe anything you want about this build but unless you can quote something showing you are correct please, go disrupt another topic.
Good Day to you.
Oh man, now I've seen it all. Natural weapons aren't weapons.
/boggle
Natural weapons are one of two meta-categories of weapons: natural and manufactured. If rules text reads "any weapon" I don't know how that can be construed to not mean...ya know...any weapon.
Your right there is no point in continuing the conversation as neither of us will change our stance. Happy gaming to you.