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Hey guys, I'm relatively new to pathfinder and I have a question.. Is Wisdom important for paladins? I'm going as an Archer Paladin and my stat build is Str 15, Dex 16, Con 10, Int 10, Wis 7, Cha 15. Would I be a fool to not get Wisdom on a paladin? i've been reading alot of guides and alot of them actually say Wisdom is the least important stat for a paladin to have. Is this true?
Yes and no. If you're going for an optimized build then yes wisdom is definitely a dump stat. I would say no if you want good perception, sense motive and heal skills and boost your will save.
Based on your abilities I would definitely boost your Con more, or take the toughness feat. Despite being an archer you will need HP.
Also, have you considered the Divine Hunter archetype? Instead of Heavy Armor Proficiency you get, at first level, Precise Shot and other neat abilities.
I think your stats look good, I would even have int at 8 and con of 12.Make sure to have a back up weapon and shield. There will be random groups likely where you may be forced to play lead.
If you are human I would go skill point for a favored class bonus. Paladins are fun to play, I would play the character without a long term build. Just see how it goes at low levels.
Wisdom is pretty far down there. You can make up a will save with the class's good will save and your charisma bonus. You only have one skill point per level, so either it won't affect your perception score much (because +1-2 is irrelevant vs your level) or it won't affect it at all (because if you're not putting points into perception you won't see anything anyway)
Int i would say is really far down there too. An int of 7 would give you 4 points and only cost you 1 skill point-4 pts for 1 skill point is kind of expensive if you don't mind playing forest gump the paladin.
For your first adventure you're better off with a sling than a bow(1d4+2=4.5 damage vs bow=1d8=4.5): just save up 2 PP and buy yourself a strength bow after your first adventure.
Agile breastplate is fantastic for all those silly acrobatic checks that ACP hurts. You want a composite longbow to deal some damage with your bow if the one you have isn't.
You can always carry a melee for backup. Armor spikes are cheap if you don't want to drop your weapon. You can usually 5 foot step back and full attack if something gets up in your face, and full attacks while smiting drops things pretty fast so hopefully you won't need it often if ever.
You might want to switch out toughness for another archery feat. Archers have a very feat heavy build.
If you want to min max you can drop your int to 7. if your human and you put favored class in you still get +1 skillpoints per level and you can get 4 points to put into your others tats. You usually drop wisdom because divine grace makes up for the lost will and skillpoints are cheap. You drop int because you can get 4 points for the loss of one skillpoint per level. None of its mandatory though.
For your first adventure you're better off with a sling than a bow(1d4+2=4.5 damage vs bow=1d8=4.5): just save up 2 PP and buy yourself a strength bow after your first adventure.
This is so true. You may also want to consider chakrams for 5 gold each. (1d8+2=6.5 damage, +1 more if sharpened with whetstone)
Intellegence determines your skillpoints per level. If you have 8 you only get one skillpoints per level because you have a negative modifier. However if you bring it down to 7 you get 2 points in point buy, but no less skillpoints. Its not uncommon to see people playing clerics or paladins to drop it to 7 to boost their other stats.
Where you put your points is up to you. As an archer you need alright strength for damage, decent charisma for paladin skills, and a good dex to hit things and dodge.
Edit: Minimum 1 skillpoint.
Note that less skill points will often lead to less completed faction missions, as around 80% of them seem to revolve around making skill checks of some kind. You will have to rely on other people for a lot of your faction missions, IF they are shareable.
I play a now level 14 Paladin with 7 wis, but I decided not to dump int (left it at 10). My sacred bond is a mount, so you will need skill ranks for handle animal and ride in that case. For a bonded weapon paladin, skill points are less important I suppose.
Players shouldn't be teasing you for looking at your character sheet. Its all numbers and you come there for fun. I rarely show a character sheet anymore because of things like that.
Its really up to you what you do. You have a better stat array than the last paladin I met if that means anything. I'd suggest you find a way to boost HP at some point because 12 con is a good minimum for any character.
Ahh.. I actually think I'll keep where I am. 15, 16, 10, 10, 7, 16. I'd rather not be called the dumb paladin anymore. And the int helps for Knowledge and the such, No? Or would the extra 4 points be just waaay more useful in other stats?
That looks perfectly fine for an archer paly. Especially if you have toughness and/or putting favored class bonuses on hp.
Really though, don't take that as an attack. Its advice. If you disagree just do so and give some reasons. Don't agressively attack me over suggesting someone do something. There are definitely ways to stack DR, AC, or negate attacks altogether. If that was something in the immidiate I would suggest it, but he's just a level 1 paladin.
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How are you generating that stat spread? I only see 18 points spent:
Str 15 (7)
Dex 16 (10)
Con 10 (0)
Int 10 (0)
Wis 7 (-4)
Cha 14+2 (5)
You could raise Wisdom back up to 8, or bump constitution or intelligence to 12. I would argue as well that a 15 strength isn't strictly necessary, as you're likely to want to increase your dexterity with level bumps. Dropping it to 14 would let you have a constitution and intelligence of 12.
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If I may, as a fellow min-maxer sort I'd be happy to offer you some suggestions.
If you have access to the blood of angels supplement, I would suggest an azata-blooded aasimar.
+2 Dex, +2 Cha
+2 diplomacy and perform
glitterdust as a SLA 1/day
darkvision, resistances, and all the extra goodies
For stat spread, I might suggest base buys of str 16, dex 14, con 12, int 10, wis 8, cha 14. After racial bumps that becomes str, dex, and cha of 16. You can mix-max that further if you do not mind dumping mental stats - I personally try to avoid this in general.
For feats, the usual suspects work perfectly - point blank shot, precise shot, rapid shot, deadly aim, ect.
Hope that helps!
I've seen people with high AC die. I've seen people with low AC survive. Same with HPs. I like crane wing or stacking DR for survivability myself, but 2 con is cheap in a point buy and it can go a long way to helping you survive. A wizard of mine was saved by con during the last scenario I played only because he had 14 con.
Nosig,
Also remember that if your 1 character dies at level 3 you can just whip out another level three to play next week. You could repeat this process until the party could hide behind your pile of dead bards :).
If the OPs character dies at level 3, he's flat out of luck for keeping up with the rest of the party or hitting the planned events at the con.
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But what of the extra feat and skill points Lormyr?
Human is still a strong option because of those.
For myself personally though, for characters that rely pretty equally on more than 2 stats to function excellently (key word excellently, not just well), I find the extra +2 stat combined with impressive package of goodies to typically be more valuable than the skills/feat. And I have found darkvision to be flat out invaluable in PFS.
I would keep diplomacy maxed to serve as party face (+9 out the gate is very solid), and use the other 1 point/level to personal taste.
+2 Dex, +2 Cha
+2 diplomacy, +2 perform
glitterdust 1/day
darkvision 60 ft.
resistance to acid 5, cold 5, and electricity 5
begin speaking celestial and common
native outsider (which means many "common" humanoid spells, such as hold person and charm person, will not function against you)
There are also two variations I enjoy:
deathless spirit (replaces resistances): you gain negative energy resistance 5, and gain a +2 bonus on all saves against death effects, negative energy, energy drain, and spells of the necromancy school.
truespeaker (replaces skill bonuses): you gain +2 linguistics and sense motive, and each rank spent in linguistics provides 2 languages instead of 1.
The latter could allow you to still be a very compelling face character, as well as a scholar of languages. Good stuff
Assimar, Tiefling, and Tengu and all their variants are legal for PFS play yes. Without racial boons they're the only ones outside of core, unless somethings changed since I last played.
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Are those allowed in PFS play?
Yep. All you need is to have a physical copy of blood of angels, or a watermarked pdf, or pages printed from a physical copy or watermarked pdf.
Fair warning though, while most GMs are very layed back about the above copies, some are extremely...yeah, I am actually going to go ahead and say jerkish about them. I know a fellow who took a printed page from a physical book to a game once and got refused from the table because there was "no proof" he actually owned the book.
I think those instances will be very rare, but just bringing the potential to your attention. A printed page from physical book is a legal source, however.
Composite bows are limited in how much strength you can put into them. If you drop below the minimum you take a -2 penalty to attack rolls. This explains it better than I will.
It will add 200 gold to the base cost, yes. Another option is to get the adaptive ability, but you probably won't need that, or as norsewolf pointed out buy one with PP. 2 PP can buy a 750 gold item, which is also the price of a lvl one wand(50 charges). At a later level you can get the adaaptive propery instead of buying a new bow if you really want the bonus, and adapative helps in case you ever lose some strength for some reason.
The problem with a sling is that loading it requires a move action. Same damage, less actions, go with the bow.
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I would make int my dump stat. Why punish yourself with a low will save?Because paladins get to add Cha bonus to all saves so it will only be low relative to other paladins.
Yea, but you are still gonna take the negative, making you less than awesome. Are you that married to skill points that you would choose some skills over will save for a tank???