I am fidling around with a bard build for PFS and am experimenting with Aid Another as a in combat tactic. The premise of the character is buff the !@#$ out of the party.
With my inspire courage / haste bump is an Aid another just a waste? I am leaning towards yes because the aid another bump would only be used on the first attack which will more than likely hit anyway.
As of now he takes power attack and arcane strike as his two combat attacking feats. My idea was to drop power attack and one other feat and try to sneak in combat reflexes and bodyguard. With the new equipment from UE you can really stack up a nice AC bump (2 + arcane strike bonus + armor enhancement bonus) for aid another.
Instead of Aid another to attack, I could use bodyguard to prevent hits to allies by bumping AC:
+2 Aid another
+3 Arcane Strike
+1-3 Benevolent Armor
+6-8 AC bump
This is much more likely to be beneficial to the party and a 6-8 AC bump has a great likelihood of preventing the attack from hitting. Built correctly I could really prevent one person from being hit at all during combat. The downside is that I loose some damage potential through trading out power attack. The up side is that with the right stats I could mitigate quite a few hits on my teammates without loosing any actions on my turn. Since this build would focus more on this I would probably drop my Str down and bump my Dex and Cha up. He would be much more of a caster like Bard and would probably use his standard each round to cast instead of attack. However, he is still very likely to hit that AC 10 for the aid.
Here is what the feat progression would look like:
1: Lingering performance
3: Arcane strike
5: Flagbearer
7: Combat Reflexes
9) Bodyguard
11) Discordant Voice
So I am thinking that with this concept Aid another to attack would be wasteful but using bodyguard may be a pretty awesome idea. What do people think? Is this concept workable?
Consider the halfling trait Helpful if you are going for bodyguard.
- Gauss
I'm just curious how you're adding Arcane Strike to Aid Another.
I'm playing a very similar ultra buffing Bard, but my party is crowded, so I opted to avoid the Aid Another stuff in exchange for more utility (the Eldritch Heritage line), since I'm the only arcane caster in this group of 7 (the other six are melee beatsticks, and there are two animal companions on top of that).
However, next campaign, I was planning on either trying a super healing Oracle of Life, a Sensei, or a support Cavalier--any of which would benefit greatly from knowing your Aid Another secrets.
Gloves of Spellstriking, I'm guessing. From UE.
Aid Another may not sound that great, but when you put some effort into it, it can be pretty devastating.
(My friend had a cavalier grant a +5 bonus to hit or to AC, which really hurt enemies. Magus went from a +11 to a +16, and never missed, and there was no ones in sight.)
Gauss: I thought about it but this build is an Aasimar. Being Aasimar gives me more than the extra +2 to Aid another for a halfling. I could get both but I am against the whole "I am one race but also this race and that race" extreme cheese.
mplindustries: Gloves of arcane striking. New item in the Ultimate equipment.
Lets you add arcane strike damage to:
-damage for aid another(attack)
-AC for aid another(AC)
-When you arcane strike an enemy adjacent enemies also take the arcane strike portion of the damage.
The first and last are not too powerful but that middle one syncs up real nice with bodyguard. All for the low low price of 5000gp.
Lab_Rat:
You do not need to be a halfling to have the trait Helpful. Helpful is eligible for the Adopted trait. Also, there are Aasimar of every humanoid race, including halfling. This is not cheese, it is by design and is listed on page 4 of Blood of Angels.
- Gauss
Thanks Cheapy, I don't know all the PFS rules etc so I just speak from a general pov. It is up to those PFS folks to filter that with PFS rules.
- Gauss
Gauss: You are right that I could do it easier than I first thought. I forgot about the adopted trait.
Mind that as a Halfling, you would also get access to Blundering Defense, which gives half of your fighting defensively/total defense bonus to adjacent allies as luck, and Cautious Fighter gives you +2 to your AC in either of those actions. Crane Style is nice to have, and so is Steel Net from the Aldori Swordlord fighter archetype, and Golden Legionnaire as a PrC is a nice direction to go into, it gives you even more juice in protecting your allies...
But I'm describing my Halfling Fighter at this point, and you're making a bard that isn't even Halfling. Ah well.