Ready to try... optimization

[Aeris Fallstar]

Ok, after decades of avoiding min/maxing and optimization, I think I want to give it a try. But I am no good at it.

I have lost a beloved character at 13th level and have to bring in a replacement at 13th.

I am pretty sure I am going to bring in either a dwarf cleric (Cayden Cailean)or oracle or a ranger ( that specializes in killing large or bigger monsters).

Any advice on builds?

[J3Carlisle]

Guide to the Class Guides is a great place to look for great ideas

[calagnar]

What are you using for stats?
What are you looking for the character to do?
Dwarf Cleric focused on combat, or casting?
Do you want a casting or combat oracle?
What type of Ranger range, melee, or switch hitter?

You don't have to be min/max to be effective. You can make characters that are not min/max that are effective and fun to play. I find most people that think they need to min/max do not plan there characters out well. Having a planed path to power do not mean you need to min/max to get there. You just need to understand what the character is good at. Along with what there bad at.
Some examples that might help.
(PFSP) Dwarf Wizard (Arcane Bomber): Every one told me this was a bad idea. He has sense proved that he can survive things that will kill most wizards.
(PFSP) Human Bard: People tell me they dislike bards. For a verity of reasons. He just made level 8 and has found a way to contribute to every scenario. If only to do all the faction missions for every one, or to fill in for healer(do this a lot), or combat.

[Aeris Fallstar]

Thanks for the guides J3carlisle. It's almost overwhelming. I will go there next.

Calagnar,

Well, the numbers I rolled for stats (as yet unassigned) are:

11
12
16
13
10
14

If I went Dwarf Cleric, I wanted a combat cleric or oracle that was almost a drunken brawler, in his free time. If I went Ranger, I wanted to try a switch hitter (like a Mountaineer, inspired by the US Army's 10th Mountain Div.)

And it isn't so much that I want to be effective. I was plenty effective before, party wise. I just want to try this once and see if I enjoy it, since, at 13th level, our campaign is almost over ( we will probably be stopping at 15th level).

As an aside, I tend to play purposely weak PC's (stat-wise) that think laterally quite a bit. I specialize in using spells, in ways they were not meant to be used, much to the DM's chagrin. I also usually enjoy playing bards, wizards(Illusionists, specifically) and the odd Druid. I love playing casters that don't receive bonus spells per level and have odd stats (like an unusually high strength Illusionist with average Intelligence, for one example).

[TheSideKick]

i just wanted to clarify something for you, optimization is not the same as minmaxing or munchkining, or any other stupid term people use to label players who play powerful characters.

optimization is taking a concept and making it function as good as possible within that concept.

so what this means is if you ever took ,for instance, a rogue and said "how can i make him the best liar ever" then picked feats for that character concept, then you did in fact optimize that character. now if you mean you never optimized for damage then thats not hard at all to do.

here is what i would play out of the 2 choices you have listed

elven ranger
mighty composite long bow (archery style)
elven curved blade/great sword

16 strength
16 dex
11 con
13 int
12 wisdom
10 cha

focus on archery feats and power attack
most of the feats you will choose are from the CRB. make sure you get rapid shot and many shot for your style feats, human, evil outsider, giant, undead as your favored enemies OR if you really want to max damage, only take human as your favored enemy and focus on using instant enemy wands for combat.

[Aeris Fallstar]

Thanks Thesidekick but I don't want to play an elf anymore. My last 3 PCs were elves and I want a change of pace.

[TheSideKick]

i just told you what i would play. choose what ever race you want.

change you stats to
16
16
13
11
12
10 and play a human Horc or dwarf

[Atarlost]

A lot of optimization is knowing what weaknesses to mitigate and what to dump. If a weakness is going to get you killed you should try to mitigate it. As a dwarf cleric your main weakness is mobility. Remember the chestnut "I don't have to outrun the dragon, I just have to outrun the dwarf?" Don't be that dwarf. The other things that can kill you are weak saves and poor hitpoints, but both of those are generally strengths of the dwarven race. All of the classes you're looking at have at least one weak save. Consider Steel Soul to mitigate that. Other weaknesses like poor charisma aren't worth mitigating. You won't die of being unsociable.

If you want a dwarf (and if you're picking your race first dwarf is a great choice) then oracle is out. Oracles are charisma based and dwarves have a charisma penalty.

That leaves ranger or cleric.

Ranger is pretty straight forward. You use a longbow or two handed weapon because that's the best melee combat style. Since the two handed weapon ranger style is loaded with feats you might not want (like sunder) you may as well either go full archer or Treeantmonk style switch hitter. Either take an animal companion you can ride or plan on making extensive use of longstrider. I think Treeantmonk is still pretty much the definitive ranger guide, but don't forget furious focus for the switch hitter and (improved) snap shot and clustered shots for the pure archer.

A dwarf cleric does not channel energy effectively because of the charisma penalty. If you have access to all the hardcovers you should look for archetypes that sacrifice channel energy uses. That is the "min" part of minmax. You aren't going to be effective at it anyways so sacrifice it as much as possible. Offset your poor movement with the travel domain.

Divine Strategist doesn't channel. You only get a single domain and it must be the travel domain for mobility. Fortunately your preferred divinity offers this domain. Always going in the surprise round means getting your buffs up earlier and you won't be a great combatant until you're buffed. Caster support is a good ability if there's another divine caster in the party, especially a full divine caster. Consider a bit more intelligence than you otherwise would for the level 8 ability.

The Evangelist has reduced channeling. He also gets only one domain (which is, again, travel). He gets inspire courage like a bard, which is good, but loses medium armor proficiency, which loses you one of your major dwarven advantages. I suggest dipping one level of fighter and going for heavy armor. A first level dip will get you slightly more HP.

[DrDeth]

At 13th level cleric, it's time to put aside the puny toys like weapons, and concentrate on being a full spellcaster.

Str11-1=10
Dex-1
Con14-1+2=15 (+2 with magic?)
Int+1
wis 16+2+1+3=22 (the you can also get +4 to this with Magic items?)=26 wis.
Cha 13-2+1=12 (+2 with magic)

Taking a middle aged 100 yo dwarf, that adds +1 to all mental stats and-1 to all physical.

This enables you to take
1 Breadth of Experience (this gives you some decent Knowledge skills
3. Steel Soul +2 to saves vs magic
5.selective channel
7. Quick Channel
9 Extra channel
11 Toughness
13 Spell penetration ..or?

Stonesinger alt racial ability/trait

Cave subdomain of Earth This gives some very spiffy abilities for movement and vision, and the various Pit spells for battlefield control.

Fire? (fireball, etc)

This allows you to Channel as a Move and cast as a Std. Thus, healing during combat doesn;t take a spellslot nor a std action.

[Aeris Fallstar]

I was looking at the Ranger Guide Doc and I was Ok till I started trying to calculate TWF at 13 th level for a dwarf with 20 strength. Holy cow, maybe that's whyI wasn't an optimizer....

I was trying to calculate a table for various rolls against 3 Favored Enemies (dragons/giants/evil outsiders), taking into account dwarf abilities (core) and the Big Game Hunter Feat. Mind boggling.

Starting to lean toward Ranger rather than Cleric, now.

[Atarlost]

TWF is expensive even if level 13 is about where it finally stops being weak. Your standard attacks will be weaker than a two handed weapon build though. And the two handed build can be a competent archer on the side.

Also, don't be too impressed with favored enemy. You only have that a couple times a day with instant enemy and otherwise may rarely encounter your FE.

[Rynjin]

Not if you pick your FEs to match the campaign you're playing in.

[Aeris Fallstar]

I don't mind that it gets a bit expensive to have TWF. I like the idea of a dwarf with two weapons and the backstory I'd generate for it lets me keep a little to my old ways.

What is puzzling me, since I've never been a GM, or played a PC that had to worry about more two attacks, how do you work the multiple attacks of a higher level PC with two handed fighting?

Does the first weapon equal the first attack, the second weapon equal the second attack and then back to the first weapon? Is there a table or speared sheet to keep track of all the numbers?

[Aeris Fallstar]

Am I reading Improved Critical correctly, in terms of the Kukri? If the crit range is doubled that means it is 16-20?

[The Fox]

For a dwarf ranger, a 1-level dip into barbarian is nice for extra speed and a short burst of rage.

Edit: 15-20

Expository edit: the threat range on a Kukri is 18-20. That means there are 3 natural results that threaten a crit, namely 20, 19, and 18. Doubling this, you get 6 natural results that threaten, namely 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, and 15.

Note that, except for a natural 20, if your initial roll does not hit, it also does not threaten.

[Aeris Fallstar]

Still, 15-20? That be crazy!

[Dazaras]

Aeris Fallstar wrote:

What is puzzling me, since I've never been a GM, or played a PC that had to worry about more two attacks, how do you work the multiple attacks of a higher level PC with two handed fighting?

Does the first weapon equal the first attack, the second weapon equal the second attack and then back to the first weapon? Is there a table or speared sheet to keep track of all the numbers?

You get your full normal number of attacks with your main hand, and all attacks with your off-hand come from feats. So if you are level 13 with Two-Weapon Fighting and Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, your BAB is +13/+8/+3 so you get those three attacks with your main hand, plus two attacks with your off hand from your feats (at +13/+8).

EDIT: I agree with TheSideKick, don't confuse optimization with min/maxing or munchkining. Optimization is about making a character that is what you want it to be and is ALSO awesome, which I think everybody who plays D&D/pathfinder should be doing. Just look at characters in fiction, especially action heroes. Most of the time they are extremely competent while remaining interesting characters. In my opinion, D&D characters are supposed to be action heroes.

[Deadmoon]

Dazaras wrote:

You get your full normal number of attacks with your main hand, and all attacks with your off-hand come from feats. So if you are level 13 with Two-Weapon Fighting and Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, your BAB is +13/+8/+3 so you get those three attacks with your main hand, plus two attacks with your off hand from your feats (at +13/+8).

Actually you get the first off-hand attack just from wielding a weapon in it. The Two-Weapon Fighting feat merely reduces the stiff penalties that come from attacking with two weapons. Improved TWF and Greater TWF give you 2nd and 3rd attacks with the off-hand at the same BAB you would get them in the main hand.

[Dazaras]

Deadmoon wrote:

Dazaras wrote:

You get your full normal number of attacks with your main hand, and all attacks with your off-hand come from feats. So if you are level 13 with Two-Weapon Fighting and Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, your BAB is +13/+8/+3 so you get those three attacks with your main hand, plus two attacks with your off hand from your feats (at +13/+8).

Actually you get the first off-hand attack just from wielding a weapon in it. The Two-Weapon Fighting feat merely reduces the stiff penalties that come from attacking with two weapons. Improved TWF and Greater TWF give you 2nd and 3rd attacks with the off-hand at the same BAB you would get them in the main hand.

You are technically correct. The best kind of correct. That said, I've never seen anyone do two-weapon fighting without the feat, so it might as well come from that.