Allow me to preface this with an apology that I did not sort this out by level, I built this character a while back and decided I would ask for advice to see if anyone has improvements for me. The character built is a 17th level Barbarian.
Race: Human - Favored class bonus - +1/3 to Superstition
Weapon: Though not really part of the build, he will use a +5 Adamantine Nodachi with the Furious, Courageous, Impact, and Dueling weapon enhancements. Please note this is the Dueling enchant from the Pathfinder SOciety Guide which provides a bonus to Combat Maneuvers the weapon is used in equal to double the enhancement bonus.
Feats:
Combat Reflexes
Critical Focus
Extra Rage Power
Improved Critical (Nodachi)
Improved Sunder
Power Attack
Raging Brutality
Raging Vitality
Staggering Critical
Stunning Critical
Rage Powers:
Beast Totem; Lesser, Normal, & Greater
Come and Get Me
Eater of Magic
Reckless Abandon
Spell Sunder
Superstition
Witch Hunter
Yes, this build is very dependent on rage cycling and doesn't really work until you reach 17. Yes you could also do a dip into Oracle and Rage Prophet with the Lame curse, but this campaign is high level to start with so no need.
Please let me know what you think and if you believe that I have overlooked something that would add, or is subtracting, significantly from the character. Thanks.
My suggestions:
Remove Staggering Critical
Remove Stunning Critical
Remove Raging Brutality
Add Furious Focus so that you can get Dreadful Carnage
Add Dreadful Carnage
Add Stunning Assault
Reasons being:
1 - You aren't a fighter so you can't take the feat to stack your critical effects.
2 - Raging Brutality is just meh especially at the higher levels.
3 - If you are using Come and Get me with your Stunning Assault, you will be stunning them as they try to hit you and if you kill them (while Power Attacking) you also get free intimidate checks on every enemy within 30 feet of you. It's just a really nice combo and makes you even more deadly in combat.
I'm a big fan of Raging Brutality for the damage bonus, especially when you have a big con. The fact that it scales for 2handed weapon makes it even better. Though I admit, you can't use it all the time or else you will burn off rounds of rage incredibly fast. I still think the extra +9 points of damage per attack I can get from it are good.
I was considering getting rid of Stunning and Staggering Critical, and swapping for Stunning Assault and Extra Rage Power(Strength Surge). Just so absolutley every combat maneuver check can be won. The only reason I had both Stunning/Staggering Critical feats before was because one was a prereq for the other.
Mechanically, do you really think that causing the shaken conditions (-2 to stuff) is really all that good? It's not bad, but its not great IMO either. With a meh charisma and without the ability to add Str Mod to Intimidate, I'm not sure my character would even succeed often. Combine that with the other players in the party who on average will kill 1 combatant each round on their own and I'm not sure it pays off.
Yeah just reading the Raging Brutality and I'm thinking it's a complete waste of rage rounds. 3 rage rounds to get a few extra hps of damage? No thanks, I'd rather be able to rage longer.
At level 17 those few hit points of damage you do with the brutality are pretty much chump change for you.
The thing is that the Dreadful Carnage is nice because it is a free action, it happens every time you knock something to 0 hps, you are debuffing every enemy within 30 feet of you, this makes them easier to kill and you don't have to invest in intimidate unless you really want to. It's not the premier part of the build for you.
The premier part is you using Stunning Assault in conjunction with Come and Get Me along with your combat reflexes. You resolve your attacks before they get to you and when you add in that it's at a -5 (because you hit at your highest BAB and add in furious focus cancels out the power attack penalty as it's the first hit per creature during your turn) then you stun them if you hit them (if they fail the fort save of 10+BAB), they don't even get a chance to attack you and you can pick them off quickly. If you kill some of them, each time you do, the dreadful carnage kicks in as a free action to demoralize.
Up to you if you like it or not, just giving my personal opinion of the build and what I'd go with, but we all play our characters differently so as long as you are having fun that's all the matters.
Well, I should add there are a lot of shenanigans in this campaign anyways. One player is playing some sort of undead spider lich thing with either levels in wizard or sorcerer. Another is playing a vampire monk that has some sort of magical items that give him pounce and has stacked bonuses to weapon size and his size to end up with his damage die being 8d6 weapon damage. I've talked to the DM about these issues and other issues I've had, but now I've reached a point where I've just decided if you can't reason them into something that is a semblance of sense, then I should just break my character as much a possible as well.
To that end, my character is taking the elemental kin archetype and using a combination of items to cause elemental damage to himself, and using a item that has the heal spell as an unlimited use. So rounds of rage aren't a big concern to me.
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This is the best martial character I've ever created - it incorporates some of your concepts but introduces others. It was designed as an utterly unkillable tank capable of doing some serious damage, remain effective at range and have skills enough to contribute out of combat.
By 9th level he has DR 8/- which improves to 14/- by 12th level and 18/- by 16th, eventually topping out at 20/- at 19th level. He gets the Dazing Assault/Come and Get Me trick by 13th level and has a few other tricks up his sleeve along the way...
Human 2nd level Unbreakable Fighter / 18th level Invulnerable Rager & Urban Barbarian
Heart of the Fields alternate racial trait, Human favored class option for Barbarians
Attributes: (20 point buy)
STR - 15 (+2 racial bonus, +1 at 4th, 8th, 12th, 16th and 20th level)
DEX - 14
CON - 14
INT - 14
WIS - 12
CHA - 7
Traits:
Threatening Defender (reduce Combat Expertise penalties by 1)
Superstitious (+1 saves vs. Arcane Spells)
Feats & Rage Powers:
1st - Combat Expertise
1st - Power Attack
2nd - Superstition*
3rd - Combat Reflexes
4th - Lesser Beast Totem*
5th - Stalwart
5th - Diehard
5th - Endurance
7th - Deadly Aim
7th - Reckless Abandon*
9th - Extra RP: Extra DR
9th - Beast Totem*
11th - Improved Stalwart
11th - Greater Beast Totem*
13th - Dazing Assault
13th - Come and Get Me*
15th - Extra RP: Guarded Life
15th - Greater Guarded Life*
17th - Extra RP: Eater of Magic
17th - Witch Hunter*
19th - Extra RP: Strength Surge
19th - Auspicious Mark*
20th - Improved Initiative
* - Rage power selections
Skills:
6 ranks/ level
The two Unbreakable Fighter levels are take at 5th and 20th, the first providing the pre-requisites to take full advantage of Stalwart and Improved Stalwart. Focused Rage is, in my opinion, far superior to standard Rage, allowing you to burn Rage for a variety of skill checks (for instance) and boosting Dex, tossing in Reckless Abandon and Deadly Aim with a decent composite bow makes you a credible ranged threat should the situation call for it. The character weilds a reach weapon (probably a Bardiche) for the first 12 levels before adding a two-handed weapon like a Greatsword or Falchion once he gets Come and Get Me so that he can fight effectively vs. creatures both large and small.
Greater Guarded Life makes him essentially unkillable in combat, and the human favored option gives him saves against spells that are almost impossible to overcome. His AC is higher than average for a Barbarian and of course starting at 18th level he has all the Rage-cycling tricks available.
Raging Brutality is a very nice feat, but not one really appropriate for this character. By and large I find combat manuevers to be highly over-rated in Pathfinder, often resulting in wasted feats when you're not facing humanoid opponents (in the case of Sunder humanoid opponents weilding melee weapons) - but should you absolutely need to make one, Strength Surge should give you all the oomph you need.
And for the record he's 100% shenannigan free ;)
Yeah just reading the Raging Brutality and I'm thinking it's a complete waste of rage rounds. 3 rage rounds to get a few extra hps of damage? No thanks, I'd rather be able to rage longer.
Seriously?
If he's looking at 9 damage added from Raging Brutality (a raging Con of 22), that's an extra 9 PER HIT on his turn. If you're looking at actually hitting level 16, that's potentially an extra 45 damage for 3 rounds of rage (assuming Haste or a similar +1 attack ability). That's pretty good.
And how many rounds of rage do you NEED anyway? At level 16 you'd be looking at 40/day. Are you really in combat (and in situations where you want the extra Str) for that many rounds each day?
Consider that that for this campaign DR is mostly irrelevant. As long as the barbarian survives the fight he has full hp moments after. To me, the most broken item my group has allowed is an item that will allow ifinite use of the heal spell. It heals for a 110hp a round. DR is irrelevant when all you have to do is survive, and with ~400 hp and still being able to heal mid combat if necessary, it just isn't an issue.
The barbarian I want is a barbarian with ALL THE OFFENSE! All the tricks he can take mid combat to keep swinging and putting up big DPR or otherwise screwing over the enemy. The only defense I care about is against spells because a big hp pool and hitting hard wont be awesome if I get mind controlled into splatting members of the group.
Yeah just reading the Raging Brutality and I'm thinking it's a complete waste of rage rounds. 3 rage rounds to get a few extra hps of damage? No thanks, I'd rather be able to rage longer.
Seriously?
If he's looking at 9 damage added from Raging Brutality (a raging Con of 22), that's an extra 9 PER HIT on his turn. If you're looking at actually hitting level 16, that's potentially an extra 45 damage for 3 rounds of rage (assuming Haste or a similar +1 attack ability). That's pretty good.
And how many rounds of rage do you NEED anyway? At level 16 you'd be looking at 40/day. Are you really in combat (and in situations where you want the extra Str) for that many rounds each day?
My only beef with the above build is that he's missing out on getting Spell Sunder early. Which is just an incredibly amazing/invaluable/awesome tool in mid to late levels.
Edit:
That is a really commendably smooth build, though. No real power spikes or drop-offs. But think of the price you're paying: The difference between you and an invulnerable rager 20 is that you've spent 5 feat-equivalents (Expertise, Stalwart+Imp., Guarded Life + Imp) and two levels (5 and 20) for the following tradeoff vs. a Barbarian who went straight Invul Rager and picked up Imp. DR 3 times (to your one, making the feat-difference 3)
-6 to all attacks (Combat Expertise)
+7 DR (13/- on the rager, 20/- here)
Some abilities that kick in when you're at 0 health or less.Given that a barbarian has a surplus of offense, that's probably a smart tradeoff! But I prefer a straighter damage barbarian myself.
-Cross
-Cross
Its actually much more carefully crafted than that - Reckless Abandon gives me back the attack bonus I'm losing at the cost of AC and Beast Totem gives me back that AC at the cost of nothing. At the end of the day the net result is all that DR for no loss in attack bonus whatsoever. And I get to use those Imp. DR feats for more useful options. Guarded Life and Imp. guarded Life don't figure into it at all - they are much less necessary for this build than they are for most Barbarians... I just happen to like the unkillable trick they create for Invulnerable Ragers (double DR vs. non-lethal).
Yeah just reading the Raging Brutality and I'm thinking it's a complete waste of rage rounds. 3 rage rounds to get a few extra hps of damage? No thanks, I'd rather be able to rage longer.
Seriously?
If he's looking at 9 damage added from Raging Brutality (a raging Con of 22), that's an extra 9 PER HIT on his turn. If you're looking at actually hitting level 16, that's potentially an extra 45 damage for 3 rounds of rage (assuming Haste or a similar +1 attack ability). That's pretty good.
And how many rounds of rage do you NEED anyway? At level 16 you'd be looking at 40/day. Are you really in combat (and in situations where you want the extra Str) for that many rounds each day?
At level 16 the barbarian is doing enough damage to kill most things during his full attack action anyhow. The way I figure it, that extra 45 damage is just overkill and a waste of a feat when in normal circumstances I'd rather be prepared to keep on raging and fighting longer throughout the day rather than expend 3 rage rounds for the little bit of extra damage. In order for me to justify doing that feat, I'd have to be doing 15-20 damage per hit extra. It's just my opinion and you have your own, but mine is just as valid as yours is. We'll agree to disagree and move on to other build suggestions.
If you want to stick with the crit feat method, I would alternate to tiring critical and exhausting critical. Since you cannot get critical mastery as a Barbarian, you will only be using a single crit power at a time. Personally I think exhausting critical is the best of the lot. No save given, and you drop a -6 str -6 dex on the target (providing it can be affected, so undead are out).
At level 16 the barbarian is doing enough damage to kill most things during his full attack action anyhow. The way I figure it, that extra 45 damage is just overkill and a waste of a feat when in normal circumstances I'd rather be prepared to keep on raging and fighting longer throughout the day rather than expend 3 rage rounds for the little bit of extra damage. In order for me to justify doing that feat, I'd have to be doing 15-20 damage per hit extra. It's just my opinion and you have your own, but mine is just as valid as yours is. We'll agree to disagree and move on to other build suggestions.Yeah just reading the Raging Brutality and I'm thinking it's a complete waste of rage rounds. 3 rage rounds to get a few extra hps of damage? No thanks, I'd rather be able to rage longer.
Seriously?
If he's looking at 9 damage added from Raging Brutality (a raging Con of 22), that's an extra 9 PER HIT on his turn. If you're looking at actually hitting level 16, that's potentially an extra 45 damage for 3 rounds of rage (assuming Haste or a similar +1 attack ability). That's pretty good.
And how many rounds of rage do you NEED anyway? At level 16 you'd be looking at 40/day. Are you really in combat (and in situations where you want the extra Str) for that many rounds each day?
I can certainly see its value.
First off, its not something you lock into and use all of the time - its an option that might let you take out a dangerous foe to open combat (when combined with Pounce for instance), or something you'd use in a desperate moment to turn the tide. The price of 3 rounds of Rage, when used judiciously, seems well worth it.
Secondly, I don't think you're giving it the credit it deserves damage-wise. A Barbarian with a Constitution of 16, Greater Rage and a Belt of +4 Con (for instance) would deal an additional +12 damage with a two-handed weapon with every hit. Now it doesn't multiply on a critical and it doesn't stay with you during the rest of the round, but when you consider a Fighter staple (Weapon Specialization) only grants a +2 damage bonus and then only with a specific weapon, I can easily see the argument for taking it.
@Wiggz - Still overkill to me unless you have basically unlimited rage like the OP said he has with their home-brew stuff. I'd still (personally) rather be able to save my rage rounds for when I need them especially if you have a GM that likes to throw a lot of fights at you during the day. Those extra rounds of rage can literally mean the difference between life and death from the amount of bonus damage you do, the bonuses to saves, and the bonus to health. Sure a lot of people think the bonus to damage is better than the defense, but I'm thinking long run longevity in a long adventuring day which I think comes up more often in my games. So to each their own, different builds work for different groups and different adventurers.
@Wiggz - Still overkill to me unless you have basically unlimited rage like the OP said he has with their home-brew stuff. I'd still (personally) rather be able to save my rage rounds for when I need them especially if you have a GM that likes to throw a lot of fights at you during the day. Those extra rounds of rage can literally mean the difference between life and death from the amount of bonus damage you do, the bonuses to saves, and the bonus to health. Sure a lot of people think the bonus to damage is better than the defense, but I'm thinking long run longevity in a long adventuring day which I think comes up more often in my games. So to each their own, different builds work for different groups and different adventurers.
If you're killing something in one round, then it doesn't much matter, unless it pushes you high enough to kill TWO somethings in one round, in which case, it's almost definitely better than spending a round of rage on your next turn since it's denying another of your foes a chance to act. If it moves you from not being able to kill something in one round to killing it in one round, it is similarly better.
Yes, you want to be raging for all of your rounds of combat if you can, but killing things NOW is better than allowing them their actions.
And again, it isn't something you use all the time. When was the last time you ran out of rage on a high level barbarian?
This is the best martial character I've ever created - it incorporates some of your concepts but introduces others. It was designed as an utterly unkillable tank capable of doing some serious damage, remain effective at range and have skills enough to contribute out of combat.
By 9th level he has DR 8/- which improves to 14/- by 12th level and 18/- by 16th, eventually topping out at 20/- at 19th level. He gets the Dazing Assault/Come and Get Me trick by 13th level and has a few other tricks up his sleeve along the way...
Human 2nd level Unbreakable Fighter / 18th level Invulnerable Rager & Urban Barbarian
Heart of the Fields alternate racial trait, Human favored class option for BarbariansAttributes: (20 point buy)
STR - 15 (+2 racial bonus, +1 at 4th, 8th, 12th, 16th and 20th level)
DEX - 14
CON - 14
INT - 14
WIS - 12
CHA - 7Traits:
Threatening Defender (reduce Combat Expertise penalties by 1)
Superstitious (+1 saves vs. Arcane Spells)Feats & Rage Powers:
1st - Combat Expertise
1st - Power Attack
2nd - Superstition*
3rd - Combat Reflexes
4th - Lesser Beast Totem*
5th - Stalwart
5th - Diehard
5th - Endurance
7th - Deadly Aim
7th - Reckless Abandon*
9th - Extra RP: Extra DR
9th - Beast Totem*
11th - Improved Stalwart
11th - Greater Beast Totem*
13th - Dazing Assault
13th - Come and Get Me*
15th - Extra RP: Guarded Life
15th - Greater Guarded Life*
17th - Extra RP: Eater of Magic
17th - Witch Hunter*
19th - Extra RP: Strength Surge
19th - Auspicious Mark*
20th - Improved Initiative* - Rage power selections
The two Unbreakable Fighter levels are take at 5th and 20th, the first providing the pre-requisites to take full advantage of Stalwart and Improved Stalwart.
If you can spare a feat, you could instead take Unarmed Fighter to pick up Crane Style, rather than Combat Expertise (drop CE, take Endurance and Die Hard with your standard feats, pick up Crane without meeting the prerequisites with the fighter level), and change over to -2 attack for +4 DR (3 ranks of Acrobatics). You end up with more to-hit, which means you aren't hurting so much when also using Power Attack and/or Dazing Assault.