Cav/Ftr early on then Battle Herald PRC later?
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That's what I was thinking, but I have no idea how much we will be dungeon crawling or other situations where my mount is going to be useless. Without a mount, is a Cavalier worth much?
Well, first a Large creature can squeeze a lot of places, even if you don't want to ride it there, and having a Large Wolf follow you around is hardly useless.
Second, sans Mount, a Cavalier is basicaly a Fighter with his Challenge (which can be on par with a Paladin's Smite Evil for extra damage), Tactician, and Order abilities instead Weapon and Armor Training, and a few less Feats (an 18th level Cavalier actually has 6 Bonus Feats from Cavalier, though three are Teamwork Feats). Oh, and with more skills.
It's really pretty powerful and effective, though not completely optimized.
Battle Herald? Hmm...haven't looked into that one. What book is it in? and thanks for the suggestions btw :)
It's a Prestige Class in the APG, and it requires at least a level of Bard, as well as some of Cavalier.
Its from the APG.
There was a Houndsman Cavalier (foot mounted with a hound companion) put together for the Superstar which got wide acclaim, however I have always stuck to 'official' content personally.
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Awesome, I looked it up. I love it, my only gripe is that Battle Herald doesn't add to your challenges/day. I might talk to my GM about it and see if he'll allow it to add as it seems that it was overlooked during creation (I could be very wrong).
Anyways, if you guys were to build an effective Orc Battle Herald how would you build him? We rolled our stats for this game and I rolled pretty darn well. 17 11 17 14 16 14. I would prefer to avoid mounted combat feats just because I doubt i'll be mounted much (good call on a wolf mount being worth its weight even if not being mounted ;) )
There is a feat called Warsinger. you can find it here It might help. I would suggest for stats:
STR:17DEX:14
CON:17
INT:11
WIS:16
CHA:14
Take a look at the orcs of golarion book, there are some very nice feats in there for a commanding orc that gives other orcs an addition +4 str/con to rages
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So after reading the Orcs of Golarion book, I'm totally thinking a Barbarian/Savage Skald would be freaking awesome and would fit the concept a little better...what do you guys think?
Depends on the concept you're talking about. But the Bard/Barbarian combination is both fun and awesome.
For stats I'd personally go (after Racial modifiers):
Str 21
Dex 14
Con 16
Int 12
Wis 9
Chr 15
But switching Int and Wis is at least equally viable, probably more so.
I'd also grab the Moment of Clarity Rage Power and some healing to make the maximum usage of the Orc's Ferocity.
I'm pretty sure amplified rage requires that target to already be raging as if a barbarian rage as opposed to the spell rage. Before going the amplified rage tactician route I'd check with some other party members and see how many are going to be picking up rage. On the plus side rage is no longer barbarian only.
If they are going this route then I'd seriously consider dropping a level in barbarian or two, grabbing a level of evangelist, savage skald, or sensei and then grab a few cavalier levels, possibly tactician and going battle herald. I'd probably out of all of them go evangelist or savage skald simply for moment of greatness. If you go the battle herald multi-split classes your damage will never be as high as it could have been, but you'll sky rocket party efficiency and add a very healthy boost to damage. Keep in mind that you're going to be playing a very tracking intensive character particularly after you hit battle herald 10.
This is just my two cents though.
I was thinking rage subdomain for clerics and druids as that way they could get some rage powers as well. Although hateful retort is absolutely lovely. Hmm... a druid's or cleric's animal companion if it was a wolverine could benefit from amplified rage as well.
The only problem with using savage skald to incite rage is that it will not be affected by amplified rage and it is only the rage spell which is somewhat mediocre.
Edit: At least I'm very sure that the above is RAI. Technically you could make an argument that it would work, but before I even started planning I'd ask my dm how he read it.
Also keep in mind that using savage skald you're only going to be inciting rage in one target until level 18 which doesn't leave a lot of room for multiclassing.
They've got to be raging already for amplified rage to work which means that they've got to have a true rage class feature from somewhere.
I cannot seem to find war leaders rage through google what is your source?
Edit: All giving them amplified rage does is allow them to boost their scores while raging if they are next to or flanking with someone else who is raging. If they don't have rage then they cannot make use of it.
If you're going by the assumption that the rage spell qualifies for amplified rage then you're probably better off going cleric/cavalier/barb or ranger. Clerics can cast in armor and you can grab the subdomain rage for additional raging powers as well as another domain of choice. The spell rage will work better than the incite rage power as the number of targets scales up and the range requirement is less restrictive. It also doesn't use up a performance slot. You can still use the performance ability through evangelist as well. Just flavor the evangelist's performance as an incitement to riot.
Just because it wasn´t metioned yet: what about oracle and later rage prophet ? Would fit exspecially with moment of clarity.
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Bah. Lost my long post.
If 3pp is allowed: This book has the inspiring commander cavalier archetype, which is essentially the battle herald extended out to a full class (and they can qualify for the PrC).
Disclosure: They're both mine.
Assuming 3pp is not allowed (although you went from PF Core to PF Core + Orcsish Cheese of Golarion :p)...
Most of the points have already been made here. I will point out that Savage Skalds can use their Incite Rage on *enemies* as well. And nothing ruins a spellcaster's day quite like being in a rage, unable to cast spells.
Reckless Abandon and Inspire Ferocity are a nice way to get allies to rage too. You need at least 14 Cha to make good use of it though, since otherwise it's a move action every round.
This for some reason if you having high charisma reminds me of my flagbearer feat and then shield bash npc bard fighter I built that gives everyone plus 2 hit damage at level 2 and has a lot of hit points but that was a hlaf orc to get the required charisma. But it dose take up a free hand...
The scarred rager gets scarification at 3rd level, more barb-levels you can´t really afford, maybe 5 levels, because the skald gets incite rage at 6th. Then cavalier for 7 levels at least to get the large animal companion. Extra rage and extra rage power on the way.
