Sorry if this is the wrong thread for the following question.
I've been delving into the occultist from radiance house a bit and it's extremely intriguing. However, from the looks of it, currently there's not much to rely on at early levels spirit wise.
So I have a couple of questions.
1st - What should the occultist do early on in levels (say 1-5) in terms of combat? General Hessant seems like a solid choice for combat, but that leads to questions 2.
2nd - What are solid stats for an Occultist to have with a 20 point buy? Obviously you want your CHA to be as high as possible to better hit good pacts, yet, if you intend to wade into battle or even just range attack, you'll need solid stats there, probably some Con too. How would you stat your occultist generally?
3rd- More vaguely, how do you run your occultists?
Awesome, thanks for the link. Since the guide doesn't have any builds yet, I suppose for now I'll need to go off of what I read or fiddle around with self-play tests. It seems with the abilities given from the spirits, that the occultist wants one to go into combat over standing away, manipulating the field and such.
That being the case, I guess I'll play test it as a melee character with side abilities. Feels like it takes some focus off of the spirits doing awesome things, but if they mesh well enough, it may feel balanced.
Thanks again.
I've been delving into the occultist from radiance house a bit and it's extremely intriguing. However, from the looks of it, currently there's not much to rely on at early levels spirit wise.
Keep your eye here on the 3PP Announcement Threads, my personal Twitter page, and our Pact Magic Facebook group. Before the end of this month, Dario and I are launching a Kickstarter for our next Pact Magic product, called Pact Magic Unbound: Grimoire of Lost Souls. In it, we'll be addressing some of your concerns. For example, there will be at least 15 spirits per level for the occultist to choose from, for a ridiculous 135 spirits. (We have some more planned as stretch goals, too.) Additionally, we rewrote the occultist base class so it has more options from Levels 1 - 4 that set it apart from the low-level pact magic archetypes because we too identified that zone as a weak point for occultist characters.
In the meantime, I'll answer your questions on the current editions of our Pact Magic products as best as I can. (Which turns out is pretty good. ;-] )
1st - What should the occultist do early on in levels (say 1-5) in terms of combat? General Hessant seems like a solid choice for combat, but that leads to questions 2.
Hessant and Aza'azati are often player's favorite choices for martial offense (Hessant) and ranged offense (Aza'zati) respectively. Sevnoir is usually favored for its fear-based debuffing. Volume 2's Marat is perhaps the most defensive spirit in the game, and is favored by occultists who want a good AC.
2nd - What are solid stats for an Occultist to have with a 20 point buy? Obviously you want your CHA to be as high as possible to better hit good pacts, yet, if you intend to wade into battle or even just range attack, you'll need solid stats there, probably some Con too. How would you stat your occultist generally?
It depends if you're going to specialize or generalize. Generalized occultists want 14s in Strength and Dex while specialized ones usually emphasize one stat over the other. For instance, a dedicated Strength-based martial character often cares less about Dex, but a dedicated ranged touch attacker or finesse fighter generally cares more about Dex. Both concepts are doable by the occultist, but generally speaking Charisma is your most important stat. All of your granted abilities key off of it and you need a good Charisma in order to make good pacts with spirits, because binding checks don't scale very quickly.
3rd- More vaguely, how do you run your occultists?
In my campaigns, I run occultists as poorly-understood characters with weird, supernatural powers. I often pick spirits that have powers that other classes can't replicate and use them to great effect against my players. I enjoy their confusion when anti-spellcaster and anti-martial tactics simply don't work because of whatever combination of spirits I've given my occultists is.
Typically, I flavor cults around specific sprits and build generic stat blocks designed to use that spirit in combat in different ways.
Very informative Alexander. Thank you. This leads to one more question. The book you're releasing in kickstarter, is it going to include all the information from pact vol. 1 and 2 as well as new stuff? Or is it just new stuff?
I love the flavor of the class and I'd definitely contemplate purchasing the new book if it had all the info in one book. If not, I may still get the other books when I can.
Thanks again!
Very informative Alexander. Thank you. This leads to one more question. The book you're releasing in kickstarter, is it going to include all the information from pact vol. 1 and 2 as well as new stuff? Or is it just new stuff?
ALL OF IT.
Pact Magic Unbound: Grimoire of Lost Souls is going to be a 300+ page product that has all of our material from Volumes 1 & 2, updated and clarified to improve upon the Pact Magic experience in every possible way. We're closing loopholes, fixing poorly-worded powers, making things better where warranted and toning things down where necessary. Better still, all of our backers will get the exact Alpha Playtest document that our playtesters received so you can look through, check to see if anything doesn't make sense or might need a second look at, so we can fine-tune the product before it goes live.
Our Kickstarter isn't to fund the book's creation (that's already done), its to fund the artwork and layout design that the book needs to look its absolute best.
Awesome to hear. If I have the spare funds at the time, I may be one of those backers. Good luck!
Alright, so I figured I already made this thread, so I might as well use it for build critiques (providing people are willing).
Attributes –
STR: 8
DEX: 14
CON: 12
INT: 12
WIS: 10
CHA: 20 (+2 Racial Bonus, +1 4th lv. Bonus)
Traits –
Defensive Strategist
Eyes and Ears of the City
Feats –
1st
Capstone Binder
Weapon Finesse
3rd
Martial Weapon Proficiency
4th {Occultist Bonus Feat}
Flexible Pact Making
5th
Scribe Binder Tattoo
6th {Favored Class Bonus}
Expel Spirits
Skills –
Perception: 6 + 3 + 1 = +10
Diplomacy: 6 + 3 + 5 = +14
Bluff: 6 + 3 + 5 = +14
Sense Motive: 6 = +6
Knowledge (Arcane): 1 + 3 + 1 = +5
Knowledge (Religion): 1 + 3 + 1 = +5
Knowledge (Planes): 1 + 3 + 1 = +5
Spellcraft: 4 + 3 + 1 = +8
Perform (Oratory): 2 + 3 + 5 = +10
Linguistics [Infernal, Undercommon, Sylvan]: 3 + 3 + 1 = +7
Spirits –
1st
General Hessant, Patron of Lost Souls (DC 16)
Sevnoir, the Meandering Mastiff (DC 16)
Forash, Prince of Spirits (DC 17)
Marat, Guardian of Shields (DC 15)
Milo of Clyde, Detective of Despair (DC 14)
2nd
Lady Jarah, Mistress of Many Faces (DC 19)
Ubro, the Blind Hospitaler (DC 17)
3rd
Muse Istago, Painter of Paradox (DC 19)
Vandrae, Drowess Poisontouch (DC 20)
Other –
Tattooed Spirits:
Forash, Prince of Spirits (100gp)
Muse Istago, Painter of Paradox [300gp]
Abilities –
Bind Spirits
Constellation Aspects
1st Pact Augmentation
2nd Pact Augmentation
Bind Additional Spirit
Languages Known –
Common
Infernal
Draconic
Undercommon
Sylvan
Equipment –
Wayfinder = 500
Clear Spindle Ioun Stone = 1,000
+1 Agile Silversheen Sword Cane = 4,795
Ring of Sustenance = 2,500
Handy Haversack = 2,000
Scribe Binder Tattoo (Muse) = 300
Scribe Binder Tattoo (Forash) = 100
Stats –
Init: +2
HP: 48
AC: 16
Will: +5
Fort: +6
Refl: +4
CMD: 15
CMB: +3
To-Hit / BAB: +6 (+7 with sword cane)
Ability DC: 18
Binding Bonus: +8 (+10 w/totem)
So I still had a bit of trouble figuring out which direction I wanted to take Oath. I normally play full casters (sorcerers, wizards, etc...) but due to the exclusion of the Scribe Binder Tattoo from said archetyped classes, and those archetypes being pretty harsh on their spells, I didn't think it quite hit the nail. Which was slightly disappointing as I like battlefield control and damage spells a good deal. More than normal melee at least.
So, I decided to give a Dex fighter a try as shown above. The stats were still difficult to pinpoint, but that's more because I want a full 20 in CHA for better binding and ability DCs. The primary spirits (i.e. most often used) would be Muse (I love this guy) and Forash. Muse pushes our DEX to 16 (as well as helps our allies) and Forash gives us some summon nature ally and swift, brief invisibility. Tested this out against a Lacridaemon, something CR appropriate from what I understand and managed to kill it after quite a bit.
I did try a strength version, which is basically same numbers just switched around so that WIS is the one with the 8 and took Tyrant Cromwell over Forash. Did much better in vanquishing the Lacridaemon, even with a +1 agile silversheen sword cane (didn't bother to change them out). But I sort of wish the DEX fighter did better. Damage to the daemon was 1d6+2 with the Dex fighter, but with STR it was 1d6+10 (using power attack). Sort of wish there was a Tyrant Cromwell but for Dex fighters haha.
In any event, would anyone be able to give some build advice? Maybe tweaks to what I currently have above? Or even better, some cool tactics with the spirit?
Thanks either way.
Alright, so I figured I already made this thread, so I might as well use it for build critiques (providing people are willing).
You might want to check out Volume 2's Alton Foxglove IV. He's a 2nd-level spirit who has many finesse-based abilities, particularly Weapon Finesse itself as a granted ability.
Definitely an interesting one to keep in mind. The improved critical could help, if only a little bit. It'd make the sword cane a 19-20/x2.
I suppose it may be best to lower CHA. Go with: STR: 7, DEX 16, CON 12, INT 13, WIS 10, CHA 18. If I use Muse that would bring me to a DEX of 18. It'd drop my DCs by 1 and make good pacts that much more difficult, but it'd up my AC and to hit just a bit more. Add in Pirhanna Strike somewhere, and I might be able to deal ok damage.
Maybe I can do a caster occultist though using the Ergon Blood line Sorcerer. I tend to prefer wizard over sorcerers generally, but since the soul weaver has a pretty harsh spell stunt and the Ergon sorcerer doesn't, that may be an option. I wouldn't get the binder tattoos, but it may be worth it to cast some spells.
Sorry about the writing everyone, sometimes its best to write through ideas until you come across the best answer.
Good call on Cornelius as a possible caster substitute. Either side of his coin has solid supportive rolls and a bit of battlefield control too. Very nice.
I could see Hessant and Cromwell being a good mix for a STR martial build too. Pact augmentation definitely helps, which is why I was leaning more towards 20 CHA.
Looking at fox-glove, I have to agree. If one wants to be a dex fighter, they'd definitely have weapon finesse already, if just to have a chance in battle if they wanted to use other spirits at the time.
I know that if I go full occultist, that I'm going to have Muse tattoed for sure. He's my boy and I think will be a great option to have in tight spots.
Thanks for the thoughts.
Average level 6 monster have 70hp and 19ac. How long would it take you to kill it with +7tohit and d6+3 damage, and why are you even trying to hit things while putting more than half your pointbuy into charisma?
Feat order: isn't Flexible Pact Making two times better than Capstone Binder for, well, getting capstone empowerment?
I'd say just bind Forash, he will take care of all physical damage you need.
Indeed the damage is horribad for a DEX fighter. I decided that I could still sneak a weapon in other ways, so I'm going to go for a strength build, using Cromwell quite a bit. Going to go with a Tetsubo and STR that could get as high as 20-22. I did end up dropping CHA to 18 too.
As for feat order, in this particular instance it doesn't matter as this is the starting level of the character.
Forash is good, and I may end up using him, but it's one summon that I can't do again until 5 rounds after the summon goes away.
Thanks for the input!
but it's one summon that I can't do again until 5 rounds after the summon goes away
It's also big cat animal companion.
Very true.
Okay, another question. Sorry to use this thread again. This one is a ruling.
For researching more spirits, if under the "Pact magic is rare" sort of game, is there a set or suggested way? Or is it just the DM making stuff up that could potentially be impossible or unlikely to get (or a fun quest)?
Awesome. Thanks for the info.