...And I have no ideas what to chose. Basically, I'm playing a level 8 dex-magus and having quite a fun time of it. I originally planned to take ghost blade as my 9th-level magus arcana. Then I realised you had to spend an arcane point just to get the permission to use ghost touch & brilliant energy. Sigh. So now I've got a magus arcana I have no idea what to do with.
Abilities (They are high, but they where rolled 4d6 AND I found a tome of int +3. Got very lucky)(Plus, the GM let us create custom races, and I took +2 dex, +2 int and -2 cha & a bonus feat at first)
Str: 13 Dex 20+4(belt) Con 15 Int 21+2(headband) Wis 14 Cha 10
1 Weapon finesse, Intensify spell
2
3 Dervish Dance, Magus arcana: arcane accuracy
4
5 Craft Wondrous Items, Magic arms & armor
6 Magus Arcana: Spell shield
7 Craft construct
8
9 Lunge, ?
Now I'm wondering what's best. I'm really unsure. I could take familar +improved familiar (instead of lunge), but that's mainly a flavor thing. I could take spell blending, but I'd rather wait until level 12 to be honest (and take heroism & protection from energy). At this point, my high stats help compensate for my limited amount of combat feats, but that might not last forever.
Note: my Gm is open to third-party (as long as we buy him the book, he will consider it), so any ideas in that direction would not be refused (as long as they werent horribly broken)
What familiar did you favor? Seeing as I'm building constructs, I was thinking the inevitable arbiter, since he gets make whole.
Then again, maybe I should be working on my combat ability.
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My Magus is a bit Demonic in his perception of the world, and worships Rovagug, so I settled on a Quasit, which, since there was no "interim" Familiar, my character believes Rovagug himself sent to aid him in his endeavours.
I gave the Quasit Weapon Finesse and Critical Focus, and use it to deliver Shocking Grasps from invisibility. Natural invisibility makes the Quasit an excellent spy and scout, IMO. Next level I'm going to test out Monstrous Physique II on him.
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There are 2 choices that you should consider at 9th level for a melee weapon focused magus.
You'll either want to take Accurate Strikes and resolve all your weapon strikes as touch attacks or you take Hasted Assault and give yourself a swift action personal haste.
Hasted Assault is usually the best option since it saves you a spell slot (don't need to memorize Haste anymore) and you never have to wait for the other Arcane Caster to decide to cast it on you.
Yes it's selfish and doesn't last QUITE as long as the spell but it's faster to get off, immune to dispelling significantly cheaper to use.
The other option of Accurate strikes is really just to make sure your iterative attacks hit. If you are using multi-round touch spells (chill touch, frigid touch, etc) then this arcana REALLY increases your DPR if you can make sure all your iterative and secondary natural attacks connect to deliver those spell effects.
I would tend to not take hasted assault, in that our party already has a buffer that uses it liberally. On top of that, you cant use the supplmentary haste attacks in spell combat (though it may owrk with chill touch;not sure if it's eligible though, since elemental touch is not).
Accurate strike could be nice, but it does have a high cost for one turn of benefit.
Would you have a link to that? The d20pfsrd still has the FAQ specifying you cant.
Edit: Apparently it was quite a recent change, that's quite nice.
Note: Any other ideas? The GM generally doesnt send anything too murderous our way, so a flavor option could be good. (familiar has already been studied though)
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I would tend to not take hasted assault, in that our party already has a buffer that uses it liberally. On top of that, you cant use the supplmentary haste attacks in spell combat (though it may owrk with chill touch;not sure if it's eligible though, since elemental touch is not).
Accurate strike could be nice, but it does have a high cost for one turn of benefit.
As Nefreet said it does work now through the faq update.
Hasted assault is technically better for a magus then regular Haste since it can't be dispelled or stolen but if you have a dedicated buffer who can keep you hasted for every combat then skip it.Accurate strike does cost 2 arcane points but if you have enough attacks per round (usually through Monstrous Form spells) then it's and are using one of the better spells (Chill touch or Frigid Touch) then you can 1 round most targets with it making it cheaper overall.
@Mathwei- Haste now gives you an extra attack in Spell Combat? They retconned their previous FAQ? Can you link me?
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it's in the faq for ultimate magic
Magus, Spell Combat: Does spell combat count as making a full attack action for the purpose of haste and other effects?Yes.
Edit 9/9/13: This is a revised ruling about how haste interacts with effects that are essentially a full attack, even though the creature isn't specifically using the full attack action (as required by haste). The earlier ruling did not allow the extra attack from haste when using spell combat.
—Pathfinder Design Team, 04/05/13
I have trouble seeing what you think frigid touch can do... It gives you one 4d6 touch attack (which is nice) + staggered (also nice) but nothing more on a full attack.
Chill touch does give multiple attacks, but it seems very similar to elemental touch, which I know is dissalowed for spellstrike.
@ arthanthos: any good ideas at level 9 for spell blending? I would rather maximize the amount of spells to get (thus, 2 level 2 spells), but I'm not sure which would be more appropriate.
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Blargh, I always do that. Not Frigid Touch I meant frostbite, this one gives you an extra 1D6+lvl in damage for your next 9 attacks.
Channel that through a monstrous form (Charda or sahuagin Mutant) wielding your sword and you can easily get 6 or more of these off every round for an extra 60 pts of damage a round (minimum).
What familiar did you favor? Seeing as I'm building constructs, I was thinking the inevitable arbiter, since he gets make whole.
Then again, maybe I should be working on my combat ability.
Depends on your alignment.
The standard +4 int familiar (i.e. Greensting Scorpion) is quite nice. AllThe Arbiter is good because it is tremendously hard to kill, and is certainly useful with constructs. LN
The Faerie Dragon is a great scout, with some useful SLAs as well, plus telepathy is great for "silent running". Its breathweapon has a low DC, but costs nothing to use, but staggered and sickened is a very powerful debuff and sometimes the enemy rolls low. CG
The Lyrakien has an array of decent SLAs, and is an okay scout, especially useful if you have a barbarian friend. CG
The Quasit demon is a great scout, though that is most of its use. CE
Ratling. I love this creature. Decent scout, but it has the best array of special abilities of any familiar. 3 dimension doors a day (the only familiar that can use dimension door with a "passenger"), with the ability to use any scroll of 3rd level and below (higher requires a caster level roll, and a UMD roll to simulate a higher cha). This can turn into your personal taxi, or an emergency healer (scroll of remove X, dimension door to the victim, dimension door him out). Unfortunately CE only due to the text that followed it when it was introduced.
Silvanshee, decent scout, with some situational useful special abilities. NG
Tidepool Dragon, has 7 (!) obscuring mists a day, plus some other useful SLAs. CN
I think I'll probably be able to get around alignement restriction (the DM is pretty open, and I think we could probably "reflavor" various familiars). I'll look at the options you presented leisner. A reflavored ratling could be fitting, since I am going dim dervish magus.
I'll have to learn frostbite & chill touch soon.
Also, is there something that explains how monstrous physique is supposed to work? I've been checking it out, and it looks cool. I'll have to go smaller rather than larger (since I'm a dex magus) and I'm wondering which forms would be best.
Edit: FOrget about monstrous physique, since I would lose my weapons, it aint worth it, I'm a dex magus anyway and boosting my strength is an iffy proposition.
Call the void seem... wicked. If I quicken a dim door, port into a group of enemies, then cast it... it's devastation.
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Call the void seem... wicked. If I quicken a dim door, port into a group of enemies, then cast it... it's devastation.
Not really, all they have to do is take a 5' step away and they are fine. If you have step up then they have to move more than 5' to escape (a quick acrobatics check or just a move and eat the AoO).
It's a pretty trick but not a devastating one.
Call the void seem... wicked. If I quicken a dim door, port into a group of enemies, then cast it... it's devastation.
The problem with Dimension Door is this little line in the spell description:
"After using this spell, you can't take any other actions until your next turn."
One of the reasons why the Ratling is so fantastic, because it can cast Dimension Door for you, and take you along with it.
While this may not have been mentionned in the original post, I do plan on taking dimensional agility. Problem solved.