Best Arcane Utility


Advice


Hey everyone,

Just a quick question about the best way to go about getting arcane utility via a cohort.

Our party is melee heavy and the group has an aversion to magic for some reason. We have a blaster magus who gleefully blasts and would scoff at doing anything else, but that's about it. We're running RotRL and I'm thinking that our lack of long-range communication, healing, escape routes and rapid travel is going to hurt us down the road.

Assuming an APL of 6 for a four person party (Blaster Magus, monk, archer fighter, and a Barbarian), what sort of cohort would you take at level 7 that provided arcane utility and magical convenience best?

Ideally, he would not be around all the time but be available when necessary (for example, he'll be guarding the horses and wagons while we're in the ruins, or riding in the carriage while we're traveling fast asleep when bandits attack) so as not to contribute to the "broken" perception of leadership and slow the turn order.

Essentially I want the magical swiss army knife that we have when necessary and gives us some healing, teleportation (or at least a faster form of travel than riding by horse for 4 weeks) and communication with "home base" while away on adventures with additional support services as needed.

I'm thinking wizard is a good bet as he has the best spell selection, but would a spontaneous caster be better to cover off those "Why didn't I think of x!" moments? That said, I've read witches and Oracles could be powerful contributors. I'm lost in the world of magic though. I'm also hoping this exercise will highlight to the magus that sometimes spells can be useful without involving a handful of D6s :S


For utility? Wizard.


I'd look at a healing patron hedge witch. The witch gets most of the most critical utility stuff and cures and the healing patron gets most of the rest of the healing stuff. Hedge witch lets you trade out unused spells for cures like a cleric.


+1 for hedge witch, the combo of utility plus healing is a big plus.

Plus, you've got a built-in potion factory, which will be useful for sure...


For a melee heavy party? Bard.


Travel and Liberation Domains Cleric. Youve got teleport, heals and good buffs right there.


Bards don't have a lot of the higher level wizard utility spells. I'd go wizard for the toolbox factor.

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