Aasimar or Tiefling Paly for WotR

[Cr500cricket]

What's the best way to make a Paladin for Wrath of the Righteous with the following criteria

Aasimar or Tiefling- Only non core races allowed and I don't feel like going core

What archetype?- Something that won't clash with a vanilla, for I assure you someone is going to play one

[Kaelan Ashenveil]

Tiefling, pitborn (+2Str/Cha -2Int), and warrior of holy light/ oath of vengeance. :)

[nate lange]

angelkin aasimar.
sacred servant of Ragathiel/oath of vengeance.

take destruction[rage] for your domain. pretty decent domain spells, a 'smite' ability that he can stack with smite evil or use against neutral foes, and (eventually) the ability to rage!

definitely not a vanilla pally :)

[Cr500cricket]

Is Empyreal Knight any good?

[Wiggz]

Cr500cricket wrote:

What's the best way to make a Paladin for Wrath of the Righteous with the following criteria

Aasimar or Tiefling- Only non core races allowed and I don't feel like going core

What archetype?- Something that won't clash with a vanilla, for I assure you someone is going to play one

Just ran a Tiefling Oath of Vengeance Paladin with an Oracle dip all the way through the AP. That favored class bonus is killer.

[Nog64]

Cr500cricket wrote:

Is Empyreal Knight any good?

Long story short: No, especially if go Aasmiar

First, you lose Divine Grace for the ability to speak...Celestial. Losing a great feature for something a skill point can take care of if you're Tiefling, literally nothing for you if your Aasimar.

Next, you gain resistances. Handy (although less potential utility than Mercy) for a human, useless again for Empyreal Knights.

You lost lay on hands and Channel energy, again two great ways of keeping yourself/others alive, to Summon Monster 3-4 times/day. Summon Monster is a good spell, but if that's your plan you can play a cleric or wizard or something, rather than a largely martial class.

The bond can be nice if you want to use a mount, but you can take the Celestial servant feat and similar stats.

The capstone ability is nice I guess, but I've never played at 20.

There are a lot of good archtypes to further get to sub roles for paladins (tank, support, damage dealer, etc.). Empyreal Knight helps you with none of those.

[Zilfrel Findadur]

i approve the second and the third posts, they are good options :) i could not think in something better. also you could go sword and board.

[Cr500cricket]

Yes I've been looking at that, 2nd I would only change one thing. I'd go Angelkin Aasimar to not take the Int penalty

[EntrerisShadow]

Cr500cricket wrote:

Yes I've been looking at that, 2nd I would only change one thing. I'd go Angelkin Aasimar to not take the Int penalty

Aasimar is always the superior choice due to no penalties.

Seriously, aside from flavor, is there any reason to really take a Tiefling over an Aasimar? I mean with the vanilla Aasimar getting two mental stat boosts it sort of balanced it out but if you get to trade that for a physical stat boost with NO penalty - seems kind of unfair.

[nate lange]

some people like tiefling for the racial favored class bonus.

[Wiggz]

EntrerisShadow wrote:

Cr500cricket wrote:

Yes I've been looking at that, 2nd I would only change one thing. I'd go Angelkin Aasimar to not take the Int penalty

Aasimar is always the superior choice due to no penalties.

Seriously, aside from flavor, is there any reason to really take a Tiefling over an Aasimar? I mean with the vanilla Aasimar getting two mental stat boosts it sort of balanced it out but if you get to trade that for a physical stat boost with NO penalty - seems kind of unfair.

If you make an Aasimar Paladin and I make a Tiefling Paladin I can assure you the Tiefling would be both more powerful and more versatile. The FCB is huge, as are other little things like the Suicidal trait.

[Cr500cricket]

Speaking of FCB the vanilla Aasimar is made to be a cleric.

[Brotato]

Tiefling paladin with Fey Foundling and FCB is the single best hp battery in Pathfinder currently, and does it without sacrificing any combat potential.

[EntrerisShadow]

Cr500cricket wrote:

Speaking of FCB the vanilla Aasimar is made to be a cleric.

True, but still, two mental boosts isn't doing the Cleric as much as good as a buff to WIS and STR/CON/DEX. And certainly not as much as a Paladin getting a boost to STR and CHA. It's nice for the extra channel energy, but channel energy - while actually pretty good overall - is still fairly 'meh' among all of the Cleric's abilities.

But I do see how they could function differently. A Tiefling Paladin would definitely be a better tank - and I'm sure the party would love you for it - though, due to the way point buy works, the Aasimar would be a better damage dealer.

[Renegadeshepherd]

I got a differing idea based on taking defense to an extreme.... And is a response to a good reason to play tiefling over aasimar....

Go spite spawn tiefling divine hunter. The +2 to charisma and dex in exchange for -2 INT is excellent. Take armor of the pit ASAP and with that feat you should be easilly able to have AC of 20+ in the first 3 levels with saves that are as strong as anyone else. Touch AC is almost as good as a monk (could be better depending on which archetype). But perhaps best of all is that your favored class bonus adds +1 HP to you when you heal urself with lay on hands. That favored bonus is MUCH better than straight HP by a multiple of ur uses of lay of hands.

Bottom line, you will not be hit very often but when you do you have excellent self heal as a swift. Ur offense is not the best but smite will make sure ur still strong when u need to be. A warning, don't let yourself think the your MAD in nature. The attributes and how u allocate em isn't as important with this notion as it normally is. Your game is attrition and wearing down the enemy. If you need to it perfectly possible for you fill any hole you need in battle.

That's what I got.

[Cr500cricket]

EntrerisShadow wrote:

Cr500cricket wrote:

Speaking of FCB the vanilla Aasimar is made to be a cleric.

True, but still, two mental boosts isn't doing the Cleric as much as good as a buff to WIS and STR/CON/DEX. And certainly not as much as a Paladin getting a boost to STR and CHA. It's nice for the extra channel energy, but channel energy - while actually pretty good overall - is still fairly 'meh' among all of the Cleric's abilities.

But I do see how they could function differently. A Tiefling Paladin would definitely be a better tank - and I'm sure the party would love you for it - though, due to the way point buy works, the Aasimar would be a better damage dealer.

You haven't seen channel clerics in action.