I am going to be in a King Maker campaign starting on Tuesday. Since the party was in lack of a healer, and I didnt want to pick the classic Cleric for healing, I decided looking into alternate classes for healing. I thought a witch healer might be pretty fun, but I've never played a witch so I seek advice.
I plan on doing the Hedgewitch archetype since it seems well suited to healing. I also plan to use the Healing patron. I'm a human and we get two traits (havent decided on them yet) and one has to be from the campaign traits.
We did random roll for ability scores, and I'm not sure if I picked my score assignments best:
STR: 10 - figured this wont be needed much since Im casting spells.
DEX: 13 - +1 to init and a little extra AC never hurts, plan to take this to 14 at most.
CON: 15 - Wanted some bonus starting HP to offset the frailness of the class.
INT: 19 - High int just seems logical on an int based spell caster. It's actually 17 int with +2 from Human bonus.
WIS: 12
CHA: 12 - Last two just happened to be the abilities I considered least important so I gave them my 12's, was I wrong to do this?
If you have suggestions of improving my ability scores I'd love to hear them.
For my feats, I chose extra hex because more hexes cant be a bad thing I assume. I also picked up Dodge so I could get a little more AC to offset the fact that I will be using basic cloth armor at the start with no bonuses.
I should add that we are using all books from Pazio, CRB, ARB, UC, and UM. So feats can come from any of them so I could easily have overlooked something better than what I chose. Any improvements are welcome to be suggested.
Finally for skills I chose to train in the following:
Alchemy: 12 (+4 from cauldron hex bonus) - I plan to be making potions for the party so I figured this will need to be rather high.
Heal: 5 - Not sure if I'll need this or not. Looks like I get a lot of spells that can make this obsolete.
KN: Arcana: 8
KN: Nature: 8
KN: History: 8 - Knowledges are always helpful!
Spellcraft: 8 - For Obvious reasons.
UMD: 6 - Wands and Scrolls will come in handy Im sure
I only get 7 skill points, 8 if I use favored class bonus but I really wanna use that for HP because of how squishy the witch is. The only skill Im really considering changing is Heal, but Im not sure what Id change it out for. Any advice on this is also appreciated!
Wait and see what everyone else does. If you get a Druid or Ranger, you can let Knowledge Nature go.
You can live without UMD. You're an arcane caster with healing spells, what else do you want?
Kingmaker is outside a lot. A rank in swim, climb, survival, or perception would work fine.
And yes, potions are genius.
Thanks for that advice. Since Im the only caster in the group, I figured wands and scrolls will help. If Im using mostly healing a supportive spells then maybe a wand with an offensive spell might help. I could drop UMD for another knowledge.
I should have mentioned the party classes have all been decided. We have a ninja, a samurai, and a gunslinger along with me being the witch. I know the ninja is taking knowledge local, the samurai is not taking any knowledges just yet, and the gunslinger is undecided on that.
Thanks for the advice so far.
In that case, I'd lose UMD and history, and take nature. Use the other skill to put one rank in a bunch of things over time. You're smart, so even one rank will give you a chance to know things.
Linguistics won't hurt either.
See if the ninja or samurai will take the social skills. It's kingmaker, and that means occasional politics.
Samurai is taking diplomacy for sure. Ninja is likely to take bluff and sense motive which Im sure will help in politics. Any specific reason I should drop both UMD and history? I tend to agree with you on UMD but is History not as useful in kingmaker?
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You will never have a good ac. Why bother wasting a feat on a negligible bonus that will almost never matter? You would be much better off taking improved initiative and going before the enemies. That will help you get the jump on taking care of them before they take car of you. While you are at it, pick up a trait for more init, reactionary can be takenby anyone.
Put the 12 from cha into str. You have great touch spells which you can deliver via spectral hand and the +1 will help.
Dodge is a waste - improved initiative is way better.
Take the Trickery patron for mirror image, it will save your life many times.
Use scrolls for the other stuff via UMD, or potions.
Sure, history is good. But nature is better, especially at first. Switch at 2nd level, if you want.
I stand by healing patron, your group needs it.
Alright thanks for the advice guys. I think I got my character how I like it. I swapped my STR and CHA as suggested and swapped Dodge for Improved initiative. I also dropped History for Perception and dropped Heal for Linguistics since I get stabilize cantrip and can make anti poison potions so I dont think heal will really be worth much to the group. I may make more changes later but I think Im happy with the changes I've made and just wanna see how it fairs in play. Thanks again guys!
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Consider as you develop to pick up hexes that grant your allies two rolls maybe even cackle so you can keep any buff you drop (which can come from hexes AND spells) for extra rounds. You'll be able to juggle ongoing buff longer by spending move actions as long as you sit in the 30 foot range.
You can do the inverse and go Misfortune/Cackle to basically ruin your foes in battle but if you are playing a healer/buffer witch focus on keeping sustained effects up.
Good choice on Cauldron. Nothing like pulling out the cook pot to crank out potions.