So, I'm running a Rise of the Runelords campaign for some friends and one of my players is playing a gnomish bard. They're just now level 8 and they're about to head off and start the Hook Mountain Massacre but they have time and some funds to gear up in Magnimar before I kick everything off.
Now my friend loves gaming but she isn't the most self aware in making characters, nor is she or I ultra familiar with everything that Pathfinder has to offer from an equipment and gearing standpoint. Basically I want to find some things to help her be more viable in combat scenarios. Currently she buffs the party in combat with her songs and then offers little else outside the occasionally lucky spell...even then most of her spells are of the buff variety (which is fine...Heroism and the like).
She currently has a +1 bow but nothing else outside of some armor and knickknacks but nothing substantial or that takes up an EQ slot. I'm thinking the best thing would be some wands to help her as on the exceptionally rare occasion she hits with her bow (a +7 or 8 to hit isn't lighting the world on fire when opponent ACs are climbing into the solid mid 20's) she's only doing a straight up d4 damage. So I'm hoping the community can help me come up with some equipment ideas to help her out. She is maxed in Use Magical Device with a 20 Cha and I believe a 16 Dex for her 2 main stats.
ANY suggestions across any and every slot would be wonderfully helpful. Basically the most bang for your buck items to help her across any and all areas would be of great benefit...even suggestions on future purchases as well. Currently my best guess is she's sitting on 4-5K to spend at this point, but prepping with the future in mind would also be of great help. Thank you all.
~bumping for help.
Pearl of power to supplement the 1 level spells (they are cheap, especially if constructed by yourself).
Perhaps a handy haversack.
Special ammunition, flare arrows (handy if you want to cause a fire), cold iron arrows, alchemical silver arrows (although I consider that a waste because of the -1 to dam), message arrow.
Perhaps a wand of level 1 spells.
Perhaps constructing an item that will allow her to cast a spell she often casts or needs for a couple of times per day. It frees up slots for more needed spells. Or an item giving a competence bonus on a skill (relatively cheap).
Silk rope perhaps or spider-silk rope.
Think of alchemist fire and/or acid flask.
Calltrops (heavy, but reusable)
If she crafts get Masterwork artisan tools (+2 circumstance bonus, that stacks with competence bonus).
If you allow the master transformation spell from ultimate magic (about the only spell our GM allows from the ultimate series), she could spend some gold to upgrade weapons, armor to their masterwork variant so they can be enchanted (later).
You mentioned a +1 bow, but maybe a masterwork strength bow can get some extra damage or doesn't she have any strength bonus??
I assume her strength is not too high so any combination with a handy haversack allows her to get a significant ammount of storage space for extra mundane surprises, like heavy callthrops, ropes, vials, grappling hooks, mountain climbing gear, pytons (really heavy but usefull).
Cheaper potions are viable as well.
A masterwork musical instrument?
When you have 4-5k investing in cheap magical storage equipment and expensive and heavy mundane equipment is a good choice.
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If she's only doing 1d4 damage at a time, even alchemist's fire would be an improvement, since that's 1d6 for two rounds. I'll second the Handy Haversack suggestion, to be able to carry lots of these, holy waters, caltrops, tanglefoot bags, scrolls, potions, etc without worrying about encumbrance.
But really, she should probably be focusing more on spells in combat. At that level, she should have enough per day to use them almost every round of combat, except the first round when she's starting her bardic performance. What offensive spells does she have? And does she have a charisma boosting headband yet, to make the saving throws harder on those spells?
Some scrolls of spells that don't care about save DCs could be good, too. She should have a library of utility scrolls by now (Comprehend Languages, Identify, Tongues, Remove Curse, See Invisibility, etc).
I'm going to assume she wants to stay at a distance, in which case her best bet is getting a fr superior bow. I think it wouldn't be the end of the world if she found herself a +3 masterwork bow of keen flaming burst. This doubles the bow's crit threat, adds +2 more to hit/damage on top of the d10 I think it is to damage. Stack that with flaming arrows for an additional d6 and she's hitting for something decent every once in a while instead of a piddly d4.
You could even sell it to her on the cheap by making it partially broken, which can be saved by purchasing some mending scrolls.
With a +1 bow she should deal d4+1 damage. Not too much of a difference but it's a start.
And when she's using inspire courage her own damage is buffed as well as the party's.
With a high Cha and the skillpoints of a bard she could invest into intimidate. That might be more worthwhile than doing little to no damage.
If she wants to go that route there is the battle mask that gives an antyped +1 bonus to intimidate for 50gp. And a cracked pink and green sphere ioun stone (intimidate) gives a +1 competence bonus to intimidate for 1000gp.
If she goes intimidate you should allow her to use blistering invective, a spell that miimmicks the dazzling display feat demoralizing all within 30ft while also dealing d10 dmg to those who are effected.
She does have a handy haversack already. As to her strength, it's 10, so no strength bow there. As to offensive spells...she has almost none.
Spells I know for a fact she has:
Cure Light Wounds
Grease
Feather Fall
Hideous Laughter
Heroism
Cure Moderate Wounds
Gallant Inspiration.
One of the reasons I thought supplementing her combat abilities with wands via UMD would be useful...just not sure on what the best wands would be? Thank you all for the advice so far though.
Is going the bow route as opposed to offensive wands worth it overall for her? I worry because of her chance to hit. At level 8 she's looking at a +6 BAB, +3 Dex, +2 Inspire Courage....so Investing in a better bow with her money would still give her..+12?
Not too bad...but that's still a 60% mischance on a 25AC opponent and a 85% on her second attack...which would make her pretty bad against anything that's not trash mob oriented.
Well the +3 bow I mentioned puts it at +14 and if anything some dex gear or a wand of true sight (+20 to hit) could make things a lot more worthwhile.
True to the bow you mentioned...except that bow you mentioned would cost 72,00 gold pieces...and she just hit level 8 with about 4k in cash.
Ah, that's an important detail. ;)
I suppose her only viable option would be scrolls. If its a big town, she could also buy alchemists fires and acid flasks and have them combined via an alchemist which combines the damage and splash (2d6+2) but it has to be one of each. You can't combine two alch fires for the same effect.
EDIT: Scrolls:
Enlarge Person
Entangle Person
Mass Cure Light Wounds
Mass Slumber
I'll come back with more after work, haha.
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@OP: It sounds like this character will never be able to deal substantial damage in combat. It's probably best not to try. There's still plenty she can do:
A. At 8th level starting Inspire Courage is a Move action, so she now gets her Standard Action on Round One.
B. She can carry and throw a net to entangle foes. Net is a ranged touch attack. She takes -4 to hit for non-proficiency, but she'll still usually hit with a ranged touch attack.
C. She doesn't have much variation on her known spells: mostly healing and buff. She should learn a solid offensive spell at her earliest opportunity. Glitterdust is a good one. Use it vs. weak-willed foes.
D. She should always consider innovative uses for Grease. That's a very powerful spell, if she's clever enough to use it in a way that hinders the foe without hindering allies. Use it vs. clumsy foes.
E. She should load up alchemist fire, acid, and other thrown weapons that do not require Strength.
F. She might look into the few magic items that enhance Inspire Courage: Banner of the Ancient Kings and a few others.
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Is the bard skilled in Intimidate? If so, pick up Blistering Invective and add the Cruel property to her bow. The penalties that she'll be applying to her enemies in conjunction with the bonuses that she'll be providing to her allies will ensure success. Being able to sicked people she hits for a round on top of the shaken condition will be very effective. And she could maybe focus on fear spells instead of charm spells on top of that.
Not skilled in intimidate I'm afraid. We are in Varisia so the Tribal War Paint could work....I might just hand her a 9th level wand of MM for 6K or so for free to help her out on occasional guaranteed damage and have her concentrate on gaining some true offensive spells to help her out in other areas. I was off on money...I recalculated last night on what they would wind up with after selling the items they just gained...it's closer to 10K apiece.
I have to ask why so many people like Glitterdust? I don't understand it. I come from the oldschool world of gaming....save or nothing spells were always considered to be garbage. Unless you're using player knowledge...you rarely ever know that you're dealing with something with a low save per se'. And even if you figure it out...there's still always generally a 30% chance you waste a spell...or much higher if you mis-gauge your opponent. Guess I just always figured spells with guaranteed effects, even on saves, were better all around. What am I missing?
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Glitterdust is great against groups of enemies. If you can target 2 or 3 enemies at once, chances are at least one will fail the save, so you've just practically removed an enemy from the fight.
Against a single tough monster, chances are it has higher saves, so save or suck spells are less likely to be effective. I had that problem last night with my sorcerer who doesn't have many offensive spells. I threw a Haste out for my allies, then tried Glitterdust on the same succubus 4 times, because I had nothing better to do. It worked once, but then she shrugged it off the following round. The GM was rolling hot in making 4 out of 5 of the saves - he told me afterward that statistically, she should have failed roughly half the time (+10 Will vs my 19 DC).
And there are things like the Spell Focus feats to increase save DCs. And I like to have different spells that target all 3 of the save types, so hopefully someone in my group can make the knowledge check to know which save is their worst, or I can just spend 3 rounds in a row trying 3 different spells that target different saves, hoping one will get through. But most bard stuff is Will saves only, so that probably doesn't help you.
Speaking of offensive bard spells, Silent Image is a nice one. Great for putting up fake walls to control the flow of the battlefield, if nothing else. Even if enemies make their save, they'll probably waste a round interacting with the illusion to figure out that it's not real. And it can provide cover against enemies that don't know it's fake, so they won't try to shoot through it with ranged attacks.
Glitterdust is great against groups of enemies. If you can target 2 or 3 enemies at once, chances are at least one will fail the save, so you've just practically removed an enemy from the fight.
Against a single tough monster, chances are it has higher saves, so save or suck spells are less likely to be effective. I had that problem last night with my sorcerer who doesn't have many offensive spells. I threw a Haste out for my allies, then tried Glitterdust on the same succubus 4 times, because I had nothing better to do. It worked once, but then she shrugged it off the following round. The GM was rolling hot in making 4 out of 5 of the saves - he told me afterward that statistically, she should have failed roughly half the time (+10 Will vs my 19 DC).
And there are things like the Spell Focus feats to increase save DCs. And I like to have different spells that target all 3 of the save types, so hopefully someone in my group can make the knowledge check to know which save is their worst, or I can just spend 3 rounds in a row trying 3 different spells that target different saves, hoping one will get through. But most bard stuff is Will saves only, so that probably doesn't help you.
Speaking of offensive bard spells, Silent Image is a nice one. Great for putting up fake walls to control the flow of the battlefield, if nothing else. Even if enemies make their save, they'll probably waste a round interacting with the illusion to figure out that it's not real. And it can provide cover against enemies that don't know it's fake, so they won't try to shoot through it with ranged attacks.
Good point on the multiple target part, wasn't really considering that. I'm having a meeting with her tonight to figure out exactly where she wants her character to go...will give me more of an idea of exactly where and how to help her.
Interesting on the lesser persistent rod...I'll look into it. Thank you for the suggestion. :)
It turns out her dex is even lower than I thought at a 14..though that is notably her second best stat next to her 20 cha. So she's decided to embrace the buffer/healer role. So she's going to focus on a few fun specific wands to help the party as well as concentrate on a couple of different type of spells to help out.
Thank you all for the advice. If anyone has a suggestion on great bang for your buck wands and or third level spells...by all means toss them out there.
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I've found Bracers of the Glib Entertainer to be absolutely bonkers when my bard started substituting perform checks for many other skills, but that's too expensive and not combat related.
As far as spells go, I've combined Silence and Invisibility Sphere to make the entire party virtually undetectable a few times. Dispel Magic has made my DM curse the counterspell action. Getting Good Hope and Haste (alongside Inspire Courage) in the first two rounds of combat has made a friend go from thinking bards were the worst class to thinking they were absolutely broken, but that was with a fairly sizable party. Glitterdust has made my GM question the point of spell immunity when I blinded a powerful golem. You can also consider using suggestion to outright remove enemies from the fight (GMs will probably rule that a request not to attack the party is a reasonable request).
I guess overall I prefer to play my bards as support characters than combat characters.