| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I have been brainstorming a BBEG and have sort of fallen in love with the idea of a dueling nobleman with a little extra punch behind his rapier. Now, dueling with a rapier screams Duelist, and magic+swordfighting is the whole concept of a Magus (roughly). My question is; can this character be an effective threat?
For stats, I was thinking human dual talent, giving him 18 in both Dex and Int, on a 25 point build.
Now, I had a couple of ideas in his Magus build. I was thinking, him being a rich noble and a BBEG, that I would load him up with magic. He has a house wizard that could craft him all sorts of goodies, so I was thinking of a Wand Wielder arcana (perhaps combined with Wand Mastery?) so he could spam whatever spell he chose, plus be a very versatile "caster". I also like the idea of the Familiar arcana for a Greensting Scorpion for the +4 Init (although the optics of a refined gentleman carrying around a bug doesn't sit right...) and maybe the Spell Shield for some fast AC, brings me to about level 9-ish.
From there, I was thinking head into Duelist territory. The first few levels seem made to pair with Magus. Good Ref saves, more Init bonuses, more AC, Combat Reflexes, static damage bonuses. I tell you, it's like Christmas in June! I love Duelist all the way to 10th, but I could live without the stuff after 5th if there's better levels out there to dip into.
So, I was looking at creating this bad-boy to be about the 15-16th level range. Originally, I was thinking of tossing in a few levels of Aristocrat for flavour purposes, but I am ok with dumping that idea for a short dip into something that would fit the motif I'm heading towards here. Gear, feat and archetype suggestions are welcome. I'll post my working build once I get it roughed out.
Losing higher level casting is a much smaller issue for an NPC enemy than it is for a PC. Magi are great at novaing, which is even more useful for an enemy that's only going to be around for a few rounds of combat than it is for a PC.
The only prestige class I can think of that would fit the character thematically would be Noble Scion - but it honestly seems useless to an NPC.
Ideally, you want to have caster level 10 before ducking out of Magus to maximize the effectiveness of Intense Shocking Grasp. With traits, that can be done by 7th level (but is better done at 8th so that one trait can be used to keep Intense Shocking Grasp at level 1).
Without traits, I'm not sure if there's anything you can do to increase your caster level. It may be that an NPC Magus is better off just getting out right at level 5, and not even worrying about Intensified SG.
I'd say go Magus 5 / Duellist 10 with Quicken, Empower, Intensify, and Spell Perfection (SG). You won't actually *use* Intensify unless you build him higher than 15th, but you need it for Perfection. After your Duelist requirements, that leaves you with only three feats. I'd say Spell Pen (just in case some pesky adventurer thinks has SR), Piranha Strike and Dervish Dance (the last two are assuming dumped Strength).
Ok, I think you missed the rapier part of the equation, which negates both Piranha Strike and Dervish Dance. Also, I don't think Spell Perfection would work with a Wand Wielder Magus, would it? If the majority of his attack spells came from wands, that shoots that idea down. Unless you can metamagic the spell in the wand? Wand of Empowered SG? I seem to recall that's a no-no though...
I see what you're suggesting here, an optimized SG-spamming Magus with Duelist tacked on. I was thinking more of a way to blend the two, though.
I glanced at it, but I going back now and taking a closer look at it. I see some overlap with the Duelist here, checking to see if this is a bad thing, please hold...
Good Gravy! Just a quick read gave me one duplicate ability (which I would LOVE if they stacked, but I doubt it), but the rest blends like cream into coffee! And my count gives a total (before magic) of +20 to Init (+4 each from Dex, GS Scorp, Imp Init, Kensai and Duelist) and 8 AoO! Slap Keen and Agile on that rapier and OUCH! Now, how to make melee combatants provoke AoOs. I know I read that in a thread somewhere...
*EDIT* Duelist ability gives AoO against people he parries. This just gets better and better!
What is the purpose of this NPC in your campaign?
What is the level and composition of the party he will oppose?
Six PCs, about level 12-14 by the time they face off against him. Party is a Kitsune Sorc/Dragon Disciple, Human Druid(Earth), 1/2Elf Rogue/Shadow Dancer, 1/2Elf Fighter, 1/2Elf Inquisitor and 1/2Ogre Arminger.
BBEG will have a couple of lackeys as backup. One I'm thinking will be a Cavalier(Hounds Master) and the other(s) I'm not sure of yet. Possibly a lower level wizard, maybe a Drow priestess.
The BBEG is a power-mad ruler that is using local unrest (mainly caused by him and his underlings) to consolidate power in his hands. Being a rich noble, money is no object. I'm thinking of giving him x1.5 or even x2 WBL in magic items, I'm still pondering on that.
As for right now, bed beckons...
Also, I don't think Spell Perfection would work with a Wand Wielder Magus, would it? If the majority of his attack spells came from wands, that shoots that idea down.
Well no, it wouldn't. But you can't Spellstrike with a wand in the first place, so it would seem to defeat the purpose of him being a Magus if he's just going to zap people with wands anyhow.
The usefulness of wand wielder is for a bad touch Magus who has more than two rounds worth of chill touch or frostbite charges. Start round 1 spell combat with your bad touch spell, make your full attack. Try and get an attack of opportunity. For round 2 spell combat, start with your full attack. If there are charges left of your spell (depending on how many times you successfully hit and how many attacks of opportunity you pulled off, there probably will be) then activate a wand of any non-touch attack spell so that you don't dissipate the remaining charges.
But that entire idea is the antithesis of a high burst damage low-equipment cost NPC. NPCs don't have the financial resources to be burning through wands and don't have any need to conserve their spell resources by focusing on multiple charge bad touch spells instead of shocking grasp.
Also, I don't think Spell Perfection would work with a Wand Wielder Magus, would it? If the majority of his attack spells came from wands, that shoots that idea down.Well no, it wouldn't. But you can't Spellstrike with a wand in the first place, so it would seem to defeat the purpose of him being a Magus if he's just going to zap people with wands anyhow.
The usefulness of wand wielder is for a bad touch Magus who has more than two rounds worth of chill touch or frostbite charges. Start round 1 spell combat with your bad touch spell, make your full attack. Try and get an attack of opportunity. For round 2 spell combat, start with your full attack. If there are charges left of your spell (depending on how many times you successfully hit and how many attacks of opportunity you pulled off, there probably will be) then activate a wand of any non-touch attack spell so that you don't dissipate the remaining charges.
But that entire idea is the antithesis of a high burst damage low-equipment cost NPC. NPCs don't have the financial resources to be burning through wands and don't have any need to conserve their spell resources by focusing on multiple charge bad touch spells instead of shocking grasp.
I misread the rules there, I thought you could use wands with Spellstrike, so thanks for clarifying that. So, he should stock up on wands that give him multi-round touch spells. I'll look into that. Although with 8+ AoO and Parry/Riposte, I'm not sure how likely it is that he will have any charges left at the beginning of his next round. ;-)
But other then that, he's not going to be a vanilla Magus, he's going to be blended with Duelist. I realize that your advice would work well to build that burst-type Magus, but that's not what I'm looking for. And I specifically said earlier that he was a rich noble that spared no expense. So yes, he IS the antithesis of a high-burst low-equipment Magus. I'm trying something new here. It may work, it may not, but it WON'T be a standard Magus. Now, with that knowledge firmly in mind, do you have any ideas for the build I am looking for? :-)
Good Gravy! Just a quick read gave me one duplicate ability (which I would LOVE if they stacked, but I doubt it)You're the GM. You can rule that they stack.
True, but then I can also rule that he can spit lightning loogies and fart stinking clouds, but that wouldn't be much fun, would it? ;-)
Seriously, I like to play as close to the rules as I can. If the two bonuses stack, great. Dodge bonuses stack, but since they are both the exact same ability just from two different classes, I'm not sure if their dodge bonuses would stack. Perhaps I'll start a different thread to answer that.
Well, given that you want to do a low-dpr, high cost build, I'd say focus on Frostbite instead of Shocking Grasp. Get Rime instead of Empower. Fill his first level slots with regular Frostbites, and his second level slots with Rimed Frostbites. Buy lots of wands of everything except touch attack spells. Start Spell combat with Frostbite, take your full attack with it. Try to get some attacks of opportunity. If there's any charges left (and the NPC is still alive) for the new round, start a new Spell Combat with the attacks first, and then end with a either a new Frostbite (if the last one is used up) or a buff/debuff/utility spell from a wand. Again try to get AoOs. At the start of a round where there aren't any charges left of Frostbite, start back at round 1.
But honestly I think that instead of an interesting NPC, what I'm helping you with is an easy source of free wands for your players because I think they're going to trounce him.
I'm intrigued with the idea of a Magus(Kensai/Tovenaar)/Duelist. I'm surfing on my phone so it's hard to be sure, but it looks like those archetypes can be paired. Combined with a conductive rapier, that should almost be equivalent to Spellstrike, but with SLA and SU abilities instead of spells. I need to look at a lot more inquisitions before I decide, but Justice and Imprisonment look like a good start.
|
Since this character is an antagonist, why not make him a Hexcrafter? The witch curses will make him more villainous, but the best reason for this is to use the Brand cantrip on your PCs. As a rapier wielding Hexcrafter, he can use brand each round to use the Mark of Zorro on the offending PCs. Having a permanentish scar will really be a goad for the PCs to finsh this guy.
That is an awesome idea and I'm going to find a way to incorporate it, but Duelist and Kensai just work too well together to pass up. Perhaps that other lackey will be a witch. I'm seeing some serious Shakespeare in this guy as he coalesces. Power mad ruler with a witch advisor...
two classes with canny defense just progress canny defense at the normal rate. You will probably max out the bonus from your kensai levels anyway.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The Kensai Magus can easily dip into the Aldori dueling lord PrC and easily benefit from it if that's something you'd find to work well fluff wise.
The Kensai Magus can easily dip into the Aldori dueling lord PrC and easily benefit from it if that's something you'd find to work well fluff wise.
I'll look into it, but I'm just not sure if I'll have the levels. I'm already considering upping his level just to get more Magus/Kensai, but I'll see if there's anything there I need to have.
There's nothing there that gets me fired up, plus the dueling sword doesn't work with a Duelist, oddly enough. I find that bizarre and slightly amusing...
* edit *
Scratch that, found the clause in Dueling Mastery that allows it to work with Duelist. Still not sure if I like it, bmut I'll take a closer look.
kensai/hexcrafter magus 10 / duelist X would be a very nasty one-on-one opponent--a few suggestions:
get the lunge feat when he can (9th level for him, iirc). it's nuts and increases his range without harm to himself, which can help him avoid having to walk within full attack range of the heavy hitters (or go the bladed dash+DD/dimensional savant feats for Bleach level teleporty attackspam craziness)
keeping a few things like vampiric or calcific touch would be smart, especially when paired with evil eye and misfortune hexes, and general useful spells to slow or even shut down folks entirely
EX: glitterdust--or better yet, blindness/deafness from the hexcrafter additions--makes attackers hate him (he can also spellstrike with it, if memory serves), wind wall too, acid arrow and the like is amazing against enemy casties because concentration checks for ongoing damage.
misfortune + evil eye + blindness is MEAN.
*gah!*
i'm getting so sick of surfing on my phone here, I need a keyboard and screen to put this build together and see what I have!
Well no, it wouldn't. But you can't Spellstrike with a wand in the first place, so it would seem to defeat the purpose of him being a Magus if he's just going to zap people with wands anyhow.
Are you sure about the Spellstrike part? Is that your interpretation, or has that been clarified in a FAQ?
There's not been any FAQ that I know of. But the RAW would seem to be reasonably clear:
Wand Wielder (Su): The magus can activate a wand or staff in place of casting a spell when using spell combat.
Nothing is mentioned in there about Spellstrike, and since activating a wand is not "cast[ing] a spell with a range of “touch” from the magus spell list" (since it isn't casting a spell at all), then you can't Spellstrike with one.
There was a rather detailed thread in Rules Questions about this a few weeks ago.
Ok, here's what I put together so far. Since I stated that he was both rich and had a pet crafting wizard, I gave him all but a few of his items at creation cost, so he has more items then normal. It's late and I'm going camping in the morning, so rough draft. It's mostly copied from the Pathfinder Tools app off my phone, so details might be missing. (And I LOVE that app!)
And on closer inspection, Kensai and Tovenaar had overlap, no combining. :(
25 point buy
Str 10 +0
Dex 26 +8(16,+2 human,+2 level,+6 belt)
Con 18 +4(11,+1 level,+6 belt)
Int 24 +7(16,+2 human,+6 belt)
Wis 18 +4(12,+6 belt)
Cha 12 +0
Human Magus(Kensai) 9/Duelist 6
LE Medium Humanoid(human)
Initiative: +21 (+8 Dex,+4 Imp.Init.,+2 Duelist,+7 Kensai)
------------
AC: 33, 40 while wielding a melee weapon (10,+9 Armor,+8 Dex,+5 Natural,+1 Dodge,+7 Int[While wielding melee weapon])
HP: 161 (9d8+6d10+60)
Touch: 25 Flat Footed: 24 SR: 0
-------------
Speed: 30
Melee: +3 Agile Keen Mithral Rapier +22/+17/+12 (1d6+11/15-20)
Ranged: mwk adamantine dagger
-------------
Base Atk: +13 CMB: 21 CMD: 34
Feats: Combat Expertise, Combat Reflexes(b-Duelist), Dodge, Following Step, Greater Trip, Improved Initiative, Improved Trip, Mobility, Step Up, Step up and Strike, Weapon Focus(Rapier)(b-Kensai), Weapon Finesse
Fort: +17 Ref: +21 Will: +17
Items: +3 Mithral Celestial Armor(No ACP, 5% Spell Fail and +10 Dex allowance, so he can wear it with minimal hindrance even without proficiency, right?), Belt +6(Dex/Con), Cloak Resist +5, Efficient Quiver(For wands, draw as free action, no?), Eyes of Charming, Handy Haversack, Headband +6(Int/wis), Ring of Mind Shielding, Ring of Returning, Seducer's Bane, Shoes of Lightning Leap. Assorted wands, potions, scrolls and slotless wondrous items.
A few of these items are for story purposes, not combat related. I'm off to bed, leave me comments, errata, suggestions, critics, etc. and I'll look at them Monday.
P.S. I know I didn't list spells. I'll get to those later. I've already got a couple in mind and a couple more (FrostBite, SG) suggested. List any you think would be interesting/work well with build/piss off my players. ;)
Celestial Armor is already Mithral, max dex +8. It says it counts as a light armor.
I've reread the entry repeatedly and it makes no mention of mithral. I take that to mean the construction and enchantment account for the properties, not it's material, since it would be so simple to say that it was a mithral shirt, no? Of course, wouldn't be the first time something simple wasn't explained properly. What's the concensus here?
celestial armor is not mithral and makes no mention of using the material anywhere.
There's not been any FAQ that I know of. But the RAW would seem to be reasonably clear:
Wand Wielder (Su): The magus can activate a wand or staff in place of casting a spell when using spell combat.Nothing is mentioned in there about Spellstrike, and since activating a wand is not "cast[ing] a spell with a range of “touch” from the magus spell list" (since it isn't casting a spell at all), then you can't Spellstrike with one.
There was a rather detailed thread in Rules Questions about this a few weeks ago.
Thanks, Zan.