So, I really want to build a Mutation Warrior. Conceptually, it's awesome, and I feel like it's a good way to make the Fighter more interesting in general.
My basic problem is that I've never built a Fighter before, and I'm not really sure about what to do with all these feats. This is what I have so far.
Strix Mutation Warrior (I'm debating between stacking on their racial archetype; some abilities are good but I'm not sure if they're worth sacrificing Weapon Training)
1 Precise Shot, Point-Blank Shot
2 Rapid Shot
3 Weapon Focus (Longbow)
4 Weapon Specialization (Longbow)
5 Two-Weapon Fighting
6 Clustered Shots
7 Vestigial Arm, Improved Two-Weapon Fighting
8 Greater Weapon Focus (Longbow)
9 Manyshot
10 Double Slice
11 Vestigial Arm/Feral Mutagen, Greater Two-Weapon Fighting
12 Two-Weapon Rend
13 Extra Discovery: Greater Mutagen
14 Point-Blank Master
15 Spontaneous Healing, Iron Will
16 Far Shot
17 Extra Discovery: Grand Mutagen
18 Greater Weapon Specialization (Longbow)
19 Infuse Mutagen, Greater Iron Will
20 Improved Precise Shot
Fly and rain down death on the poor mortals below you. At level 7, I pick up Vestigial Arm-- that'll let me break out Two-Weapon Fighting with a pair of longbows. If the GM thinks I need an extra arm for each bow, I can take a crossbow until level 11 when I can get that second arm. If the GM is okay with one arm reloading two bows, I take Feral Mutagen at 11th to give me some backup weapons.
The big advantage to the build, aside from flying all the time, is the staggering number of attacks I can break out. I'm going to cap at nine: four off the main longbow, three off the secondary longbow, one off Rapid Shot, one off Manyshot-- and a Rend on top of that. Clustered Shots lets me all but ignore DR. The Mutagen is used to patch up my AC as well as wherever my problem lies: damage, to-hit, or HP as needed. Later on it's used to patch up two or three of those.
Things I'm debating/wondering/curious about in general:
1. Is the Two-Weapon Fighting chain worthwhile, or am I trying too hard to be fancy?
2. Do I need the Snap Shot chain + Combat Reflexes? Since I plan to be in the air I avoided it; I really don't want to be next to targets.
3. Do I want Deadly Aim? On the one hand, I like the thought. On the other hand, with Rapid Shot, Two-Weapon Fighting, and (Greater) Weapon Focus, I'm looking at -4/-4 as my baseline to-hit. Adding Deadly Aim on top of that seems like it could go south. On the flip side, nine attacks makes Deadly Aim mighty appealing.
4. Should I reshuffle the order of some feats? This is my biggest worry; having never done a Fighter (or an archer), I'm not sure my priorities are straight.
A GM will let you play a Strix? Have fun.
Well, at the moment this is really just a concept build.
Honestly shuffling feats would make it doable with almost any race. The Mutation Warrior can grow wings for level*minute/day with one of their Discoveries. Since it's not available until 7th level, that gives you 70 rounds of flight-- should be plenty for combat.
All that would be needed to make that work is snagging the Vestigial Arm at level 11, shuffling the TWF stuff back and the other archery-oriented feats forward. Strix just lets it come online sooner. Or just not taking Wings until 11th level, but I like flying.
You are not doing it the right way. The right way combines Fly-by Attack and Death from Above and uses a big fricking spear.
Secret Wizard wrote: You are not doing it the right way. The right way combines Fly-by Attack and Death from Above and uses a big fricking spear. I actually considered breaking out Death From Above, but I settled on the Archery setup over two-handing (or two-weaponing, or via Vestigial Arms two-weaponing two-handed weapons). Part of that is because Flyby Attack is a Monster feat, so unless I do add in the Stryx racial archetype (which explicitly lets me take it), it's a grey area.
But it is really, really funny.
I am unsure if it is possible to TWF using bows using vestigial arms. This is because of a a FAQ that pretty much said 'no extra attacks' means 'no extra attacks'. While there may be arguments about the exact nature of this (are bows technically listed as 2 handed weapons?), it is at least safe to say that there is table variation.
Of course, that doesn't mean that all hope is lost for this general style. Switching to crossbows, particularly the hand crossbow, could allow you to do TWF, and then just have a single vestigial hand for reloading. Taking a 5 level dip into the new bolt ace archetype for gunslingers would allow you to get Dex to damage with those crossbows... which is pretty sweet in itself, and could serve as reason enough to switch builds even if your table allows twin bows.
Oh, and thanks secret wizard. I was wondering what feats to take for the reach fighter that I was planning which suddenly sprouted wings after ACG came out.
Well. The Vestigial Arms explicitly call out that they don't grant extra attacks, but can freely hold things. So I rolled with that. Basically, I can't use two Vestigial Arms to hold four different weapons and make off-hand attacks with three of them. But all the extra arm is doing is reloading a bow, the actual hand holding the bow is still a primary hand.
To put it another way: Three-four hands, but still making two hands worth of attacks. No extra attacks are coming from the extra arm, it's just expanding what I can do with the two that I have.
The extra arm is not dominant, so it cannot be used to aim a bow.
Kasathas have four arms and they STILL need to take a specific archetype to use two bows simultaneously.
A bow uses two hands to wield, thus it's using up your main and off hand, leaving you unable to two weapon fight with it. If you can't make those attacks with two hands you can't make those attacks with vestigial arms.
Secret Wizard wrote: The extra arm is not dominant, so it cannot be used to aim a bow.
Kasathas have four arms and they STILL need to take a specific archetype to use two bows simultaneously.
And their arms do not come with the ton of clauses and restrictions.
Anyway, I still think a mutagenic warrior 15/ bolt ace 5 is stronger, without any of the rules concerns.
Secret Wizard wrote: The extra arm is not dominant, so it cannot be used to aim a bow.
Kasathas have four arms and they STILL need to take a specific archetype to use two bows simultaneously.
The extra arm is never aiming a bow. It's drawing and knocking arrows. The idea behind it being legal, in fact, relies on the fact that the extra arm not being dominant. It's never being used to make its own attacks.
Also, can you name or link the archetype you speak of? I can't find it.
Chess Pwn wrote: A bow uses two hands to wield, thus it's using up your main and off hand, leaving you unable to two weapon fight with it. If you can't make those attacks with two hands you can't make those attacks with vestigial arms. The bow would actually be using up main hand/vestigial arm. Since one wouldn't need two hands at any point except to fire it, I'm not sure if it'd be necessary to have two vestigial arms or not, but after re-reading the longbow I'm going to assume so. That's going to require a somewhat irritating amount of shuffling, but it can be made to work.
Basically, what I'm relying on here is that the restriction on Vestigial Arms is "you get no extra attacks" and absolutely nothing else. The difference in number of attacks between this build and someone using TWF with a pair of shortswords is zero*.
I certainly can't carry a shortsword in all four hands and use all four; that's beyond the scope of Vestigial Arm since at that point it is granting an extra attack. I also can't put Claws on the Arms and use them at the same time I use the longbows (though according to that FAQ I can use them instead of the bows, which is pretty cool and not at all what I'd assumed). But if I'm not gaining attacks, it seems that the only restriction present in Vestigial Arms is duly fulfilled.
Looking at the FAQ, note that it says nothing about using Vestigial Arms to hold things-- and holding things is explicitly called out as legal in the Arms themselves. This is functionally identical to using a Vestigial Arm to reload a gun or a crossbow, which I've seen players pulling for a good while now.
*Shrug* I'd certainly expect table variation, and I'd never bring it to PFS (which I believe I can't do anyway for like three different reasons). But I'm fairly certain any GM I'd try it under would allow it.
That said, even if you don't agree about the TWF legality question, how do you feel about the rest of the questions? Should I find a way to slot in Deadly Aim or Snap Shot, and would you do any re-ordering of feats? Solving the two-arms-per-bow thing means taking Extra Dicovery: Vestigial Arm at level 7, dropping Improved TWF down to 8, Greater Weapon Focus can fit in at 10, Double Slice at 12, and Two-Weapon Rend at 14. Slows me down a bit, but it'll more-or-less work.
*Okay, technically the difference is two attacks, but that's from a pair of feats totally unrelated to Vestigial Arms.
Thing is you can't dual wield Greatswords with vestigial arms, because they take two hand to wield. A bow also takes two hands to wield, you're still using 1 hand to hold the bow and anther to hold the arrow and pull it back. That is two hands. Thus two hands are being used and you have no more hands to offhand with. Your example of shortswords is bad because of the class of the weapons. You'd need to use greatswords or bows to make your example work of not getting extra attacks.
Now if it's a home game and your GM is fine changing that rule then cool, but it's not in the rules.
Chess Pwn wrote: Thing is you can't dual wield Greatswords with vestigial arms, because they take two hand to wield. A bow also takes two hands to wield, you're still using 1 hand to hold the bow and anther to hold the arrow and pull it back. That is two hands. Thus two hands are being used and you have no more hands to offhand with. Your example of shortswords is bad because of the class of the weapons. You'd need to use greatswords or bows to make your example work of not getting extra attacks.
Now if it's a home game and your GM is fine changing that rule then cool, but it's not in the rules.
I'm curious if you have a rules quote on that? Because by a strict reading of Vestigial Arms that's not the case, and the FAQ doesn't specify anything beyond "no extra attacks, which means no more than you can get by two-weapon fighting normally", which is very much not what I'm doing-- I have no more attacks than what I can get by two-weapon fighting normally, I just have a different list of weapons to pick from.
The example of shortswords was very intentional: compare the number of attacks I have because of Vestigial Arms + Two-Weapon Fighting to that of a Human Fighter with a pair of Short Swords and TWF. Seven vs. seven. No extra attacks are gained. Unless you mean the other example of shortswords, which was merely a contrast with what I can explicitly not do.
It's certainly a grey area. I'd certainly expect table variation. I would never bring it to a game without talking to my GM up front and saying "Hey, this character is going to start dual-wielding longbows at level 7, this is how I plan to do it, this is why I think it's legal, is that cool with you?". And if they say no, I go and play my Daring Champion or finally get around to building that Warpriest I've been staring at for forever.
Preface, I've explained this before in other threads, so I'm not going to discuss it beyond this. If you want to see discussion look here. but I will share the reasoning why right now and be done.
the faq
"you are using both of your hands to wield your two-handed weapon, therefore your off-hand is unavailable to make any attacks."
Longbow Description: You need two hands to use a bow.
So, since you are using two hands to wield/use your weapon your off-hand is unavailable to make any attacks. This is the stance of why you cannot. Again if you have further questions look to the other thread where it was hashed out for 281 posts.
kestral287 wrote: Secret Wizard wrote: The extra arm is not dominant, so it cannot be used to aim a bow.
Kasathas have four arms and they STILL need to take a specific archetype to use two bows simultaneously.
The extra arm is never aiming a bow. It's drawing and knocking arrows. The idea behind it being legal, in fact, relies on the fact that the extra arm not being dominant. It's never being used to make its own attacks.
Also, can you name or link the archetype you speak of? I can't find it Yeah, Bow Nomad is a weird side thing because Kasathas are weird side thing. Because they are aliens, which, while perfectly fine to have them, are simply not that prevalent in a Golarion based setting due to simple logistics and how far the GM has to stretch to get them.
Plus, I don't know about you, but I find the practice of using a bow and arrow tends to require effort from both arms, particularly the long bow, which is infamous for requiring a lifetime of specialized training and conditioning.
I am not here to get into a big argument about handedness and how it interacts with TWF and specialized, near crippled limbs. I was just putting out the problems you could face as a possibility, and gave options (which might be even more attractive than regular bows) that would avoid this issue. If nothing else, the argument that spawned in this thread should serve as an example of the potential arguments it might cause.
And even if those arguments are not exactly fair....you have to admit that a GM faced with a flying machine gun might turn towards them. Don't give him the ammo.
Also if you clear it with your GM you might want to clear it with the party too. I know even it the GM says something, I kinda can still have an issue with it. One that I play with and can't do anything about, but I still wish they hadn't done something that needed a GM rule change.
lemeres wrote: And even if those arguments are not exactly fair....you have to admit that a GM faced with a flying machine gun might turn towards them. Don't give him the ammo. My current GM is a very permissive one, who's pretty much willing to let us do what we want so long as it isn't earth-shattering, we can put some kind of justification on it, and it's interesting. Case in point: I just swapped my Kensai to being a Spontaneous Int caster, and he was cool with it once I laid out my thoughts on how it would work and he pondered the implications (it's pretty much a nerf for a Magus, for the record).
He's this permissive because he has more RPG experience than everyone else currently at the table combined. I don't need to give him ammo, he already has a fully stocked armory just waiting to be unleashed. But if he's letting me play with fun toys, I'm more than willing to let him do the same-- that's what having fun is, right?
Chess Pwn wrote: Also if you clear it with your GM you might want to clear it with the party too. I know even it the GM says something, I kinda can still have an issue with it. One that I play with and can't do anything about, but I still wish they hadn't done something that needed a GM rule change. Fair. The most probable party member was smiling at the idea and helping me do research to make sure I wasn't missing anything that would move it from grey to black, so I'm likely good on that end. But it's worth doing. I tend to have GM conversations like that in the public room we use so anybody can chime in, but I could certainly make sure I did it for this one.
The final note I'll say on the Vestigial Arms thing, because I typed it before the above two posts:
That Armor Spikes FAQ is based on characters with two hands, not four. Adding that wrinkle changes things immensely. I am, however, satisfying the letter of the written rule (no extra attacks via Vestigial Arms), the idea of the unwritten rule regarding Str bonuses (1.5x Str, until I get Double Slice but that functions for any TWF character), and the base requirements to use a longbow (two available hands). It's certainly got some queso to it, but so far as I can tell my bases are covered.
The problem is that most posts on the subject say something entirely irrelevant given that I'm only using one of the two non-Vestigial arms for each bow. I have a main hand, an off-hand, and two Vestigial hands. I cannot wield a bow with the main hand and off hand and another bow with both Vestigial hands. But I can wield a bow with the main hand and one Vestigial hand (this is basically spelled out in the FAQ actually about Vestigial Arms as well as the wording of the Arms themselves; they can hold weapons just fine). And then I hold a second bow in the off hand and the other vestigial hand. One main hand providing attacks, one off hand providing attacks. FAQs frequently referencing two-handed characters and rules that refer to two-handed characters don't really help in a discussion regarding four-handed characters. I've now read through the other thread and... I'm not convinced on anything, really. That thread was largely about two-armed characters and never dropped was any actual written FAQ or rule stated for those who were discussing four arms.
And that, I hope, is that.
Kestral287 wrote: That said, even if you don't agree about the TWF legality question, how do you feel about the rest of the questions? Should I find a way to slot in Deadly Aim or Snap Shot, and would you do any re-ordering of feats? Solving the two-arms-per-bow thing means taking Extra Dicovery: Vestigial Arm at level 7, dropping Improved TWF down to 8, Greater Weapon Focus can fit in at 10, Double Slice at 12, and Two-Weapon Rend at 14, with Point-Blank Master going away entirely. Slows me down a bit, but it'll more-or-less work. Sea-Knives have been pointed out to me, and might be worth my consideration. I'm definitely doing without the Strix racial archetype-- it doesn't really do anything helpful besides give me access to Hover, which is not really a great feat. That means I get Weapon Trainings. The first one is obviously going to Bows. The second, I'd need to figure out if Natural is legal since I wouldn't actually get Natural weapons for two more levels. Nothing says I can't but that's weird. The third would probably be whatever I can finagle Sea-Knives into, if I decide to roll with them (working with four weapons is a huge pain). The fourth... isn't really relevant, so mreh.
Knowing I'll have Weapon Training makes Deadly Aim more palatable, so I need to figure out which feats I don't need. Getting it at a reasonable level is being a pain, so thoughts on that would be appreciated. It's probably going to mandate using the Mutagen exclusively for Dex until the middle levels-- and possibly all the way out until level 13-- but the damage increase is worthwhile, working off raw numbers. Just need to make things fit together.
The thing is, regardless of how many hands you have you only have two hands worth of action you can do. The line in vestigial is saying that, this doesn't grant more hands for combat. So yes they can hold things, like a bow. But you can't use two bows because they use your two hands. 4 armed or not you only have two-hands of actions to use. and a bow uses both of them. So you're free to hold 4 bows, but holding doesn't equal wielding and using.
There's a FAQ or something official saying vestigial arms can't two weapon fight with greatswords, because they use up "both" of the hands you have to use, your main and off-hand. And then you go and say, but a bow isn't a greatsword so I can two-weapon fight with it. I just don't understand how people actually accept that without knowing they're going against the rule to try and something not allowed. I'm all for abusing the rules doing anything that's allowed, but not breaking them.
kestral287 wrote: I cannot wield a bow with the main hand and off hand and another bow with both Vestigial hands. If this isn't allowed than "changing the hands" doesn't change if it's allowed or not.
Your arms won't work like that. I researched something similar with the alchemist a few months ago.
What you can do is wield and bow and a melee weapon at the same time. For your attack action you can freely choose which one you attack with and not need to switch them between hands. I used this feature to get an alchemist that simultaneously threatens at 10 feet and 5 feet by using their four arms to wield a Great axe and a Lucerne Hammer.
If I used all the arms to wield a great axe, I would not be able to Two-Weapon-Fight, RAW, because my extra arms can wield weapons, but cannot grant extra attacks.
No less, this is a build that I'm using in PFS. It's fairly balanced, as you can also get a character that threatens both 10 and 5 foot increments by using a reach weapon combined with bite or gore natural attacks. Barbarians and Lunar/Wolf-scarred Oracles come to mind with these other options. My present set up costs two discoveries and a feat (combat reflexes) to be viable, while the Barbarian and Oracle each must expend a feat on combat reflexes and a rage power/revelation respectively. Perhaps the most ubiquitous one however is to wield a reach weapon while riding something with a number of natural attacks, which druids, rangers, cavaliers, summoners, animal domain clerics/inquisitors and likely a few others can manage to do with varying degrees of success.
Ignoring the legality issues, what are your thoughts on switching to hand crossbows and maybe grabbing some bolt slinger levels for dex to damage?
I am focused on hand crossbows, since they actually have rules for using them in TWF (they act like light weapons). In comparison, regular bows are called out as having -4/-4 penalties due to the rules set up by bow nomad.
Admittedly, as far as attack rolls go, it is 6 of one and half dozen of the other if you multiclass. The lost fighter levels restricts higher level mutagens and makes you lose the last bit of weapon training. So that is a net of -1 to attack in the switch.... in return for dex to damage with bolt slinger (which makes you a very SAD class).
You will also lose feats...but hey, you only need 1 vestigial arm for reloading with crossbows. Plus, I am fairly sure that you won't need double slice either, since bolt slinger just gives the bonus straight without any offhand language
Westphalian_Musketeer wrote: Your arms won't work like that. I researched something similar with the alchemist a few months ago.
What you can do is wield and bow and a melee weapon at the same time. For your attack action you can freely choose which one you attack with and not need to switch them between hands. I used this feature to get an alchemist that simultaneously threatens at 10 feet and 5 feet by using their four arms to wield a Great axe and a Lucerne Hammer.
If I used all the arms to wield a great axe, I would not be able to Two-Weapon-Fight, RAW, because my extra arms can wield weapons, but cannot grant extra attacks.
No less, this is a build that I'm using in PFS. It's fairly balanced, as you can also get a character that threatens both 10 and 5 foot increments by using a reach weapon combined with bite or gore natural attacks. Barbarians and Lunar/Wolf-scarred Oracles come to mind with these other options. My present set up costs two discoveries and a feat (combat reflexes) to be viable, while the Barbarian and Oracle each must expend a feat on combat reflexes and a rage power/revelation respectively. Perhaps the most ubiquitous one however is to wield a reach weapon while riding something with a number of natural attacks, which druids, rangers, cavaliers, summoners, animal domain clerics/inquisitors and likely a few others can manage to do with varying degrees of success.
Frankly... I'd like your research to be backed by rules text. I'm not concerned about PFS since I believe I am already at least two kinds of illegal there. I already have two different options to threaten in melee so that is not a concern either.
On hand crossbows: Bolt Ace is nice, but it doesn't slot in well. I need 7th level Mutation Warrior as quickly as possible for the arm. That means my best option is taking the Gunslinger levels after 7, which is kind of the worst time for me because that's when feats are the tightest.
I was actually looking into building something quite similar, if you could link the official statement that the dual Greatsword thing doesn't work, Chess, that would be appreciated.
here is SKR saying that it's not to give you access to two greatswords. There might be other places where he or a developer say this, but here is one.
Chess Pwn wrote: here is SKR saying that it's not to give you access to two greatswords. There might be other places where he or a developer say this, but here is one. A one off statement that isn't elaborated on, isn't the point of the post, and isn't really supported anywhere-and contradicts a build I was just given as pfs legal.
That said... can we please move along? It's grey. We all realize this. The purpose of this thread is to discuss the build. I would appreciate if we could do that.
It doesn't stop Westphalian_Musketeer build. He even says in his post that I'm right.
Westphalian_Musketeer wrote:
If I used all the arms to wield a great axe, I would not be able to Two-Weapon-Fight, RAW, because my extra arms can wield weapons, but cannot grant extra attacks.
You're fine to hold as many weapons as you want, and attack when any of them as your allowed to. If you have BAB 6 you can make 1 with 1 THW and 1 with the other THW. So use a bow to shoot an arrow, and then use your greatsword that in your other hands. But if you try to TWF with a weapon that needs two hands to wield for use it when you're getting illegal.
So it's not grey, it's clear. Some people just refuse to accept that it's not grey and that their build isn't legal. And I feel that it's pertinent to your build, because if it's not legal, then you can sub those feats for legal options.
*Sigh*
Okay. Let's be blunt then.
1. There has been no refutation of the repeated point I brought up that I am gaining zero attacks. Apply the same feats to a pair of short swords, my number of attacks remains constant. The short swords represent my baseline number of attacks without the extra arms, which is the same as my bow attacks.
2. I do not think any GM I am likely to play under cares, especially when the build follows the letter of the rules.
3. You are, at this point, well aware of my opinion on this matter.
4. You, Chess, have stated in this thread that you are not going to discuss this point. So why are you discussing it?
5. To be more specific, I would appreciate help and advise in response to the questions I actually asked. I didn't think I had to be that specific. Now I know.
So. Deadly Aim, do I care about Snap Shot, should I reorder feats. Helpful advice is appreciated. Everything save the Bolt Ace suggestion has been far from helpful. I am honestly wondering if I am actually in the Advice section.
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