Looking for something fun to do

[Violinist]

I'm looking to make some new characters for PFS.

Problem is, everything looks dull and straightforward. Anything else (Blackfire Adept caught my eye) is banned.

So I come to the community. Anybody got some juicy builds? Fun concepts? Neat spells? Some obscure or rare bit of trickery? Something that doesn't take 8 levels to get interesting, maybe?

[MrSin]

I suppose that depends on your taste. Can I ask what you enjoy and what you've done before?

[Violinist]

Personally I tend to lean towards things outside the box, things that have impressive effects, things that are mechanically flavorful, or some combination of the three.

Straight up summoners are boring. Blackfire Adept sounds like something you could spraypaint on the side of a van or see on a heavy metal album cover.

Everyone and their grandmother has a barbarian. A barbarian who can consistently use that one rage power to hit people with other people is right up my alley.

Druids are sorta interesting, but I can't play Sky Druid and Dragon Shaman is only tangentially related to actual dragons, so...

I've got a Bladebound Kapenia Dancer Magus brewing, waiting on enough GM credit to start playing at level 3.

Got some good fluff in mind for a cleric of Zon Kuthon, just not entirely sure what to build her crunch around.

Would probably enjoy playing some kind of Batman/007 type thing but all the neat wondrous items are prohibitively expensive and being primarily consumable-based would probably send the complexity out the wazoo even for me. :(

[Mortag1981]

I really like the flavor of an Oracle with the Wrecker curse. Make it a Pit-Born Tiefling so you get Shatter 1/day instead of Darkness, and focus on just breaking everything in sight.

Even at level 1 your curse let's you be a great trap remover, and while you're always using a broken weapon, you could off-set that by taking levels of Barbarian with the Breaker Archtype, and maybe work up to Spell Sunder, so you not only break items, but the very fabric of magic as it comes at you.

[DrSwordopolis]

Just a heads up: Blackfire Adept isn't legal. Unless there's a boon out there running around that I don't know about.

Additional Resources wrote:

Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Paths of Prestige

Presige Classes: Aldori Swordlord, Bellflower Tiller, Brother of the Seal, Champion of Irori, Dawnflower Dissident, Golden Legionnaire, Green Faith Acolyte, Hellknight Signifier, Knight of Ozem, Lantern Bearer, Magaambyan Arcanist, Mammoth Rider, Prophet of Kalistrade, Riftwarden, Shieldmarshal, Skyseeker, Sleepless Detective, Storm Kindler, Tattooed Mystic, Veiled Illusionist, and Winter Witch are legal for play.

When I get stuck looking for ideas, I'll either pick a rarely played prestige class, spell, or combat maneuver to form the seed of a concept. That or an image comes to my mind of something funny happening and I build around that. Here's some that have been bouncing around and currently only exist as GM babies for me.

• Travel Agent cleric of Desna with a penchant for solving disagreements with Plane Shift.
• Arcane Duelist bard using dazzling blade, feint, and disarm
• Green faith druid (archetype, prestige class optional) focusing on making entangle/wall of thorns/etc powerful.

They may not be your style, but maybe they'll spark some ideas.

[Netopalis]

I really like Oracles. You can build an oracle to do anything. Oracles are great casters, tanks, healers or support characters, if you pick the right combination of mysteries and curses. As an added bonus, they are dripping with flavor.

Sorcerers have some fun builds. One of my favorite low-level combos is taking Magical Lineage (Magic Missile), Arcane Bloodline and Toppling Spell. Throwing out magic missiles that trip enemies is a lot of fun.

Right now, I am working on a very weird build. A variant versatile channeler cleric of Sun Wukong, who channels Ale/Wine. Clear this with your regular GMs, though, as you should expect table variation. Some Gms will allow this, some will not. A more universally accepted build would be a variant channeler of Calistria who channels Luck.

Bards can be very powerful, especially at low levels. A well-built support Bard can have some very interesting effects. Remember, it's only a free action to maintain bardic performance now, so you can do a lot of things while singing. Some of my favorites include:
Throwing nets at things. The mental image of an entangled bullette with its toenail caught in a net is hilarious.
Making intimidate checks to cause the shaken condition.
Using whips to trip or disarm.
Using spells like Pilfering Hand that can make opponents significantly less effective.
And, of course, you could simply do damage.

Finally, don't write Fighters off too easily. Tactician fighters can really sway the course of a battle.

[MrSin]

Sylvan Sorcerer maybe? All the ultimate arcane power you want, with some druid on the side. Later on you can even turn you beasty friend into a big buffed up dragon. You also don't have any connection to druidism and can come up with any backstory you want, and charisma based is awesome for talking and making a show, aye.

[RainyDayNinja]

A Dervish-Dancing, Channel-Smiting, halfling cleric of Asmodeus.

[MrSin]

RainyDayNinja wrote:

A Dervish-Dancing, Channel-Smiting, halfling cleric of Asmodeus.

Hmm... Make it of Saranrae. Blade of Mercy + Enforcer is a sexy combo. Also make it a Bard. No one ever expects the bard to cut you to ribbons and scare you while doing it.

[Matthew Pittard]

No more Dervish Dancers. Im danced out!

No
more
Devish
Dancers

Please

[pH unbalanced]

When I'm looking for inspiration, I either look through lists of obscure deities (not necessarily for a Cleric/Inquisitor, more from the point of view of what an average worshipper would look like) or look at odd ways to enter Prestige Classes.

[Þórarinn Sigurðsson]

If you want to play Batman and avoid spending all your money on consumables an Alchemist might work. Or an Alchemist/something multiclass combo.

I also find summoners a bit boring and but you can make a fun summoning specialized oracle ( nature for example ) or a wizard that can do other things beside watch your Eidolon beat things to a pulp.

And if Barbarians beating people with other people sounds fun then maybe you should look into Monk´s , Maneuver masters or similar Archetypes.

[MrSin]

Þórarinn Sigurðsson wrote:

If you want to play Batman and avoid spending all your money on consumables an Alchemist might work. Or an Alchemist/something multiclass combo.

Vivisectionist/beastmorph or Vivisectionist/Chirurgeon alchemist is absolutely wicked mechanically and flavorful. Society looks down upon vivisectionist though(Banned).

[Cameron Ackerman]

I have this really fun deaf Time Oracle. He has a bunch of funny tricks:

1. Erase from time to get himself out of tight spots or (if he's feeling ballsy) remove a combatant from play.
2. Time hop for a similar effect. Teleporting out of grapple is really strong!
3. Because he's deaf he can run around with silence on himself and still cast.
4. Temporal celerity lets him roll a lot of dice for initiative so he usually goes first. And he always acts in surprise round. With sandals of quick reaction he can take a standard and move.

I took a bunch of spells that were intended to mostly disrupt the opponent or just seemed like really mean spells to cast (bone shatter, murderous command). In the late game he has disintegrate, temporal stasis, destruction. Contingency is awesome because I can have contingency breath of life (also in late game). He also has a greater persistent metamagic rod. And a ring of invisibility just to be an even funnier mobile silence dome. But that's diminished in usefulness lately.

He's a huge troll. It's awesome.