Anachrony, is your character pfs legal, and would you mind sharing your build with me. I am looking at the archetype right now, and I'm considering what I can do.
I'm looking into pfs legal build where lore warden is taken level 1 then 3+, and flowing monk is taken at level two. I'm not sure if flowing is legal, but if it is, anyone care to help me figure the feats to take?
I'm a stranger to style feats, so maybe there is some advice on those to give me.
The flurry could come in handy to get two trip attempts against an opponent right next to me before taking a 5ft step away, and the first level flowing monk ability is great because I get to react to someone attacking me before they attack, and it doesn't use up an aoo. Immediate action is only once, but it's still great, and if need be, I could always attempt a reposition to remove someone from even having their attack action being legal.
Whirlwind is another awesome option for a reach trip fighter, like galahad mentions. But both whirlwind and wolf style are a lot of investment, so you have to make choices about what to prioritize. You can only have both at very high levels. But if I ever got high enough I would have both for sure. Certain critical feats are also nice with the right weapons.
Anachrony, is your character pfs legal, and would you mind sharing your build with me. I am looking at the archetype right now, and I'm considering what I can do.
I don't know the ins and outs of PFS, I'm afraid. I don't use third party sources, and as far as I know everything is valid by RAW.
Half-Elf, level 9, 5 levels Lore Warden, 4 levels Flowing Monk, future levels Lore Warden. Lawful Good, worships Sarenrae.
25 point buy starting stats: str 15, dex 17 (15+2 racial), con 14, int 14, wis 14, cha 7. +1 dex and +1 str at levels 4 and 8.
Ancestral Arms(Fauchard)
First two weapon trainings in polearms and unarmed (the order is optional).
Traits: Blade of Mercy, Bred For War, others optional
Feats: Combat Reflexes, Enforcer, Improved Trip (Monk Bonus), Ki Throw, Vicious Stomp, Greater Trip, Wolf Style, Wolf Trip, Wolf Savage
Skills: Max Intimidate (for Enforcer), Acrobatics (for Lore Warden's ability), Perception (good for everyone). Max Knowledge(Nature) until level 9 for Wolf Savage. Put at least 1 rank in most of the knowledge skills that a lore warden might use to identify an opponent.
Equipment:
No armor.
+1 keen Horacalcum fauchard. The keen is essential for a fauchard. The material is a bit expensive for now, but it's a forward looking investment since you can easily upgrade the bonus but not change the material.
+4 headband of inspired wisdom. Major investment for this level, but required to qualify for Wolf Savage at level 9. Helps with AC and monk abilities.
+2 belt of giant strength
+2 bracers of armor
Maidens Helm. Affordable +5 intimidate, helps a ton with Enforcer with charisma as dump stat.
Key features here are that Flowing Monk redirection lets you interrupt attacks on you or your allies within reach, with a trip attack. Wolf Trip allows you to reposition them anywhere adjacent to yourself. If someone attacks your ally you can reposition them far enough away from that ally that they can't complete their full attack and it ruins their turn.
Similarly, if you trip someone up close, Ki Throw allows you to reposition them further away (RAW suggests this interacts favorably with your threat from reach, but this part is debatable). Regardless, if you are enlarged (which with a reach heavy build you'll want to be as much as possible), and someone attacks you, you can interrupt that and Ki Throw them at least to at least 10 feet away (if not further), interrupting their attack if they don't have sufficient reach.
When you trip someone with your polearm, you get an attack of opportunity on them with the polearm from greater trip. Then with wolf trip you reposition them adjacent to you before they hit the ground. With vicious stomp you get an unarmed strike attack of opportunity. And with wolf savage each unarmed attack on a prone opponent has a chance of applying bestow curse, which is an awesome debuff with a lot of options. And bestow curse allows you to stack different debuffs on the same target as long as you pick a different one each time.
Another aspect of this is that you can do non-lethal damage at no penalty with either your polearm or your unarmed strike thanks to your trait (actually you even get a +1 damage to non-lethal with the polearm). This allows you to easily take advantage of Enforcer during all your attacks of opportunity. You will have a good chance of shaking them for multiple rounds, which is another helpful debuff. But even better, with your high crit chance build, this will frequently be frightening them.
Frighten is a nice effect for a trip build, because they'll be force to flee and trigger two attacks of opportunity from you (maybe more from allies). One for standing, one for moving. They don't have the option of withdrawing because they are starting out prone from being tripped. Your second attack of opportunity, the one where they have already stood up but are trying to move, can be another trip attack, allowing you to stop them from fleeing and another two attacks of opportunity.
This isn't the build for me, but the benefits of one level of monk with that level one ability are tempting.
I know it's debatable, but I say that a successful trip is indeed a prone target, which gains the benefits to having the enemy take their ac penalty to your aoo follow up attack.
If I take one level my bab will be one slower, and my fighter bonus feats will happen at the same time as my odd level general feats, so I need to replan my feats.
I think if I did take flowing monk, it would be one level at second level, especially to keep my hp high from level one being all the hp on their hd.
If anyone could tell me if flowing monk is pfs legal, it'd appreciate it
This isn't the build for me, but the benefits of one level of monk with that level one ability are tempting.
I know it's debatable, but I say that a successful trip is indeed a prone target, which gains the benefits to having the enemy take their ac penalty to your aoo follow up attack.
If I take one level my bab will be one slower, and my fighter bonus feats will happen at the same time as my odd level general feats, so I need to replan my feats.
It's not really debateable. The greater trip AoO happens before they fall. The attack is really part of the original trip action, not something you do afterwards, even though mechanically you're rolling for it after. Vicious Stomp (which you won't be able to get without Wolf Trip) happens after.
That level 1 ability only lets you do it once per day, and only if they attack you. Which kind of defeats the purpose for a reach build since you won't be threatening adjacent with your weapon unless you go whip (which is expensive in feats and other costs and takes away a big part of the reason for choosing monk), and you don't stop them from attacking and prevent yourself taking damage just by tripping them (that's what Ki Throw would do), though they do take a -4 to attack. The level 4 ability lets you use it to disrupt an attack on an ally, and do it 4 times a day. Also at level 4 this ability is guaranteed to sicken them even if they pass their save, which is not true at level 1. 4 levels of monk is the same BAB cost as 1 level. Monk gets 1 bonus feat (including improved trip) plus unarmed strike, so that gives you the same number of feats as 4 levels of fighter would have assuming you wanted improved unarmed strike (which is an excellent option for a reach fighter to threaten nearby targets, and fewer feats than something like whip).
The point of taking flowing monk with a reach weapon is to ruin enemies turns. It's a very powerful and rare defensive control ability. It sounds like you don't want that, so I don't see much point in flowing monk.
If enemies get through, or large are within reach of me, I'll be able to do the immediate action and react. I would be threatening with improved unarmed while holding my reach weapon too.
The one level would increase all my saves, make skills class skills that I plan to use, give improved unarmed, and that ability to react to one attack before it's made against me.
I suggest you look up threads that even happened last month about when the aoo happens on a trip in regards to at what point they're prone. I assure you, it's VERY debatable. I don't know if it was ever resolved, but if you feel certain it's not, then I suggest you offer them your help in figuring out a solid conclusion.
I want to keep the enemy away, and deal damage with my character. Boosting my cmb land assuring my safety seems like higher priority than damage though, because in pfs, I'm dealing with a team.
You need to fail by ten or more, and usually on a 1 I can't get that applied. I ask about the number of legs before attempting my trips to avoid this situation.
Is flowing monk pfs legal?
If you decide to use a whip a level 1 dip in Kensai Magus alleviates much of the pain of whip mastery. Memorize some True Strikes and being in armor isn't a problem for spells.
Is flowing monk pfs legal?
Yes, assuming you have access to the source material.
I will not be doing anything with a whip.
I might take improved reposition sometime, so when the monk ability triggers, I can push away or even move into another square then push away the enemy, making them waste an attack or entire turn.
I had decided awhile ago i wanted to build a straight fighter for PFS. Eventually I decided on a whirlwind tripper. Here is what he currently looks like at level 1. (Currently playing Godsmouth Hersey.
Below is my current thoughts on his build skeleton.
(Note, something about playing a fighter who gets 7 skill points a level is pretty awesome)
Lore Warden Fighter 11
Level Class BAB Feats
1 Fighter 1 Combat Reflexes Dodge Mobility
2 Fighter 2 Combat Expertise Improved Trip
3 Fighter 3 Fury's Fall
4 Fighter 4 Spring Attack
5 Fighter 5 Whirlwind Attack
6 Fighter 6 Greater Trip
7 Fighter 7 Lunge
8 Fighter 8 Improved Critical
9 Fighter 9 Weapon Focus
10 Fighter 10 Weapon Specialization
11 Fighter 11 Greater Weapon Focus
12 Fighter 12 Greater Weapon Specialization
Traits: Reactionary / Heirloom Weapon
17 Str *lvl4
16 Dex
12 Con
13 Int *lvl 8
12 Wis
7 Cha
Fighter (lore warden)
1. Weapon focus, combat reflexes
Monk (flowing monk)
2. Improved trip
Fighter (lore warden)
3. (Combat expertise), power attack, furys fall
4. -
5. Weapon specialization, ???
6. -
7. Greater trip, ???
8. -
9. Greater weapon focus?
I'm thinking for level three to take improved reposition, and at 5 either lunge or greater reposition. Anyone suggest better options, even over greater weapon focus at 9?
Correction, I meant five and seven
Power Attack also lowers your CMB.
Monkey Style removes penalties for being prone, so is always handy for a trip build.
Prerequisite: Wis 13, Improved Unarmed Strike, Acrobatics 5 ranks, Climb 5 ranks.
Benefit: You add your Wisdom bonus on Acrobatics checks. While using this style, you take no penalty on melee attack rolls or to AC while prone. Further, you can crawl and stand up from lying prone without provoking attacks of opportunity, and you can stand up as a swift action if you succeed at a DC 20 Acrobatics check.
I don't plan to be tripped from my cmd being so high to ever use that, and also I won't have a wis bonus.
I'm aware to be careful of when I activate power attack, but thank you for the reminder anyway.
I played a similar build using the phalanx fighter archetype (treat 2h reach weapon as one handed) in order to use a shield with my trip build. He was uber awesome.
Some thoughts:
Enlarge Person and Combat Reflexes really pay off.
The Cleave and Cleaving Finish feats were super helpful. The latter with a reach weapon is almost OP.
Threatening Defender trait is worth a look.
Ran with Felling Smash and Pushing Assault for a while but they didn't really pay back.
A dip into Barbarian or Alchemist helped for stat bumps. I went with both (vivisectionist and wild rager for sneak damage and an extra attack). Barbarian of the Society trait helped maximize the rage round count.
Honorable mention for Tripping Strike and Lunge feats, but Greater Trip is the biggest winner for feats.
Bladed Belt made keen! Great for swapping to any other P,S weapon when they get base to base. The Lethal Bola weapon was a good ranged trip weapon to prevent fleeing.
The attack routine I used:
Ready action to attack 10' in front
When they enter threatened square, attack
When they exit threatened square, Trip
5' step back.
Good for crowd control.
I often delayed action to Greater Trip targets engaged with a party member to grant free AoO to everyone in threat range.
I recently switch to a smaller quickdraw shield and picked up Shield of Swings so I can use the bladed belt to make a keen Greatsword (the extra damage has great situational benefit for mopping up). During this, I use the an alchemist extract to throw up a shield spell and a Dex mutagen to get a 30+ AC (agile mithril breastplate equipped). Note that the bladed belt as a kopesh improves your base-to-base effectivity - even without an exotic weapon feat, your trip bonus is so high you can trip, 5'ft back, convert it to fauchard, granting your allies the greater trip AoO.
As I progress him I am thinking of tacking on Imp/Greater Overrun to maximize my crowd control.
Finally, there I use a Cloak of Free Will and Bloody Scarab. The first is a cloak of resistance +1 w/ +2 on Will saves, and allows a re-roll of failed Will checks. The second allows you to take d6 dam in order to auto-confirm crits.
Hope this helps.
Here is the trippy fighter build I am working on in PFS, granted it doesn't come online till a bit late, until then you just hurt things.
No archetype applied, but could use Lore Warden or Two-Handed. I did core fighter for heavier armor.
str 17
dex 14
con 14
int 14
wis 8
cha 10
Traits - bluff skill increase (take your pick, there are several), threatening defender
1 Fighter- Combat Expertise, Power Attack, Improved Feint
2 Fighter- Weapon Focus (or cleave - if cleave, swap at 4)
3 Fighter- Furious Focus
4 Fighter- Combat Reflexes
5 Fighter- Improved Trip
6 Fighter- Felling Smash
7 Fighter- Greater Trip
8 Fighter- Greater Feint
9 Monk (Flowing/Master of Many styles) - Vicious Stomp, Style Feat
10 Fighter -
11 Fighter - Dragon style, Greater Weapon Focus