|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
The disadvantage to both oracle and sorcerer is the slightly slow spell progression. To overcome this you have to be very careful in your spell selection, because you'll always be behind the cleric or wizard in your highest level spells. Your mystery and bloodline abilities don't really help to make up for this; so to keep up as an oracle or sorcerer it really helps to know your GM if possible. Knowing what types of encounters and what style of play your GM has helps a lot.
I have long thought that both oracle and sorcerer should have a 0 in the next level of spells in odd levels after 1st. They don't know any spells of those levels, but should get their bonus spell slot for those levels. That would let them use metamagic feats to bump up lower level spells and keep up with wizards, and clerics.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
It's very strong
Why do you think they're underpowered? They have a medium BAB, 9-level spellcasting, good proficiencies, and mysteries are pretty cool. The only thing I don't like about them is that the cleric spell list is kind of "meh" for a spontaneous caster. Overall, I think they're a well balanced class.
|
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
It can be very powerful depending on mystery, curse and racial FCBs. Aasimar or Elf in particular.
The problem is that the cleric list doesn't work well with spontaneous casters, forcing you to specialize. But pathfinder rewards specialization.
A heavens oracle can shut down almost every encounter.
A battle, metal, or wood oracle is as strong a meleer as a full BAB and has full casting on top of it.
A flame/blackened oracle is one of the better blasting builds you can make.
A lunar or nature oracle can have a stronger animal companion than a druid.
A Dark Tapestry or Wood oracle can be better at wild shaping than a druid (if for less time).
A life oracle is one of the best healers in the game and is the best in-combat healer.
If you try to play them as a generalist, you're gonna have a bad time.
It's very strong.
Overpowered depends on your starting point of reference, though.
More powerful than a Paladin, Ranger, Bloodrager, or Barbarian?
Technically, yes, because 9th level spellcasting trumps pretty much everything else.
More Powerful than Bard, Inquisitor, Warpriest, or Magus?
See the above.
If you think that defines Overpowered, then there you go.
Is it more powerful than the Sorcerer, Druid, or Witch?
Eh, it's about the equal to them.
It's not as powerful as the Arcanist or Shaman.
And it's definitely not even close to either the Wizard or Cleric.
That's not to say it's bad at all - none of the 9-level spellcasters are bad, especially after the Sorcerer's beefy upgrade from 3.5.
Nothing is more powerful than the Wizard, save for the Cleric who is arguably as powerful as the Wizard, and Oracle isn't on their level of absurdity.
Wait - the thread is UNDERpowered?
Sweet jesus-mama, no.
Oracle is a 9th level spellcasting class; by that alone that puts it in the highest categories of powergaming.
Like I said, it's on the same tier of strength as the Sorcerer, Druid, and Witch, so the Shaman, Arcanist, Wizard, and Cleric sit above it, but everything else is below it.
That means that you're playing one of the top 8 classes out of 32.
Unless you're in a campaign where EVERYTHING that's at least Level 1 has Spell Resistance 20 and it all goes up from there, you're going to still be a very useful member of your team.
|
If one hasn't read the Oracle guides, and doesn't know how to build a strong and effective Oracle, the class might seem under-powered. Once one understands how the class works, and is familiar with the guides, one realizes Oracle is a very strong class.
For example, it's possible to build a weak Oracle, where it's not really possible to build a weak generic Summoner.
What heals better than a life oracle?
Oracles can start slow, depending on your character and your mystery. Levels 1-3 in particular for some Oracles.
They mature very well, though.
Yeah, no. For all of the reasons above.
What heals better than a life oracle?
The question isn't really "What heals better?" but "What else can I make my healer do?". Knowing about Fateful Channel or Beacon of Hope for Life Oracles isn't something every player is born with.
Building a strong Oracle actually takes a decent amount of system mastery to pick out the best feats and traits.
The disadvantage to both oracle and sorcerer is the slightly slow spell progression.
In my experience, the low number of spells known is more painful than the one level lag in getting new spell levels. Also, I found that the oracle is even worse off than the sorcerer in the sense that there are more flashy arcane spells that are fun to cast over and over again than there are flashy divine spells that are fun to spam in combat.
On the other hand, the various oracle revelations vary wildly in terms of usefulness; if you cherry-pick the powerful revelations, you can end up with a powerful character.
In my experience, spontaneous casters like the oracle suffer particularly badly from poor build choices. Experienced optimisers like Andreww find the idea that oracles could be 'weak' ludicrous (which is fair enough, they are a very powerful class when optimised) but your average joe has probably taken cure x wounds and a bunch of questionable utility/buff spells like sun metal and decompose corpse, which they then proceed to waste turns on at the beginning of every combat.
Prepared casters at least can correct their awful spells in a day. New players often have little no understanding of how useful a spell is actually going to be, which means the upfront nature of spell selection on the oracle and sorc can be really punishing for them.
I'm playing a melee oracle in my current campaign - my first spontaneous caster ever! It's challenging picking spells but the larger number of spells per day make things easier. The only downside I am experiencing is that with strength and charisma as my best ability scores I have mediocre saving throws. Not a single one stands out.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Let me put it like this... Oracle is the only class I know of that can cast arcane and divine level 9 spells without a dip in anything.
Spell Sage Wizard. The more you know.
I have found it to be very weak, thoughts?I have found it to be very strong. It's about my favorite class, even more than the cleric sometimes.
I like Oracle so much better than the Cleric. Oracle gets actual class features, and choices. Cleric domains and channel energy bore me.
Also, I prefer spontaneous casters.
Let me put it like this... Oracle is the only class I know of that can cast arcane and divine level 9 spells without a dip in anything. Furthermore oracle had the most X to Y features than any other class and that's usually top tier. Finally, two words .... Divine Protection!! +4 to all saves is ridiculous.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but post Spells Known FAQ, the best Oracles can do is all access to all Cleric/Oracle spells (thanks to Paragon Surge and not all at once) and 1 arcane spell of each level thanks to Ancient Lorekeeper.
I have found it to be very weak, thoughts?
Wait, so Oracles are weak because they are the most SAD class in the game? AND they get ~full spell progression, which trumps basically every damn thing you can think of?
Not sure if unknowledgable of potential or purposeful bait thread.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Whenever I sit down to make an Oracle I end up making a Cleric.
I just don't think the spell list suits spontaneous casting particularly well. Trying to select spells I'm always left with too many I regret not having room for.
That being said, as people have noted up thread there's not really such a thing as an underpowered 9 level spell casting class and with sufficient system mastery there are a number of frighteningly powerful Oracle builds.
... I still end up with a cleric though.
- Torger
*edit* or an inquisitor, I ended up with an inquisitor once.
If you try to build a Cleric using the Oracle then you'll just end up with an inferior Cleric. Use the strengths of its mysteries and the Oracle is an incredibly powerful class.
The oracle lacks the spell access required of a real healer. The cleric list is full of spells that have both narrow application and no substitute. The oracle simply doesn't have enough spells known to get remove blindness/deafness and remove disease and remove curse and neutralize poison and restoration and breath of life and raise dead and so on and so forth.
So? Carry scrolls for the ones you don't have.
The oracle lacks a front liner's traditional fortitude.
They have 3/4 BAB, good proficiencies, and access to a plethora of excellent self-buffing spells. If you don't build your Oracle for front-lining then you won't get much in that regard, but if you do it's excellent in that role.
The oracle lacks the spell access required of a real healer. The cleric list is full of spells that have both narrow application and no substitute. The oracle simply doesn't have enough spells known to get remove blindness/deafness and remove disease and remove curse and neutralize poison and restoration and breath of life and raise dead and so on and so forth.
Human/half elf/half orc favored class bonus helps a TON to remedy this. Carrying wands and scrolls helps cover what you don't have on hand too. I'm playing a life oracle right now, and I rarely, if ever, end up not having the spell I need. It's easy to get access to a ton of other non-divine stuff through UMD as well, since your main (really the only absolutely necessary) stat buffs Use Magic Device.
If you're looking for an extremely generalist character, I'd definitely say cleric over oracle - they can do that little bit of everything and change out as needed. But if you know what role you're going for and choose a mystery to help with it, oracles can be amazing. Plus, some people (like me) simply prefer spontaneous casting over prepared, so oracle covers that niche as well.
I'm playing a melee oracle in my current campaign - my first spontaneous caster ever! It's challenging picking spells but the larger number of spells per day make things easier. The only downside I am experiencing is that with strength and charisma as my best ability scores I have mediocre saving throws. Not a single one stands out.Take Divine Protection?
I didn't know about that feat. Guess I know where most of my skill points are going when I level up. :)
|
I have found it to be very weak, thoughts?
AHAHAHAHAHAHA! Oh wait, you're serious, let me laugh even harder!
If you pick the wrong feat and the wrong class choice, everything seems weak. Optimization is the name of this game (or, finding the right path to power, shortened in pathfinder) and if you don't do your math right you can end up screwing your char.
That been said, oracle has one of the highest optimization ceiling and is clearly one of the strongest class in the game.
It's a little weaker than a cleric but that doesn't mean that it's a weak class.
Spirit guide gives access to a bunch more.Let me put it like this... Oracle is the only class I know of that can cast arcane and divine level 9 spells without a dip in anything. Furthermore oracle had the most X to Y features than any other class and that's usually top tier. Finally, two words .... Divine Protection!! +4 to all saves is ridiculous.I hate to be the bearer of bad news but post Spells Known FAQ, the best Oracles can do is all access to all Cleric/Oracle spells (thanks to Paragon Surge and not all at once) and 1 arcane spell of each level thanks to Ancient Lorekeeper.
RAW, Arcane Enlightenment will do nothing to help an oracle as it only adds spells to the list of spells you can prepare. Since Oracles don't prepare spells it sadly does nothing. I truly wish I could make an argument otherwise. Unless you mean spirit spells?
Spirit spells are still a list of spells you can change on a daily basis. They do contain some pretty powerful spells, as well as letting you change role on a daily basis. Even the most Blast or Melee focused Spirit Guide can choose to take the Life spirit today to cast Restoration and Heal, or Lore to use Time Stop.
Yeah, Shamans get to do that naturally. They're another complex and powerful class that rewards systems mastery and punishes suboptimal choices.
Oracle? - Strongest class in Pathfinder.
That's going a bit far.
Yeah what about the rogue Guru? What about the rogue?
(replace rogue with summoner in that statement for the non sarcastic version)
You find it weak because the Divine spell list is very unexciting, and because even though everyone and their mother is on the, "It gets 9th level spells!" bandwagon, everyone and their mother is also ignoring that a HUGE majority of PF players will never reach levels capable of 8th or 9th level casting.
You're not entirely right, OP, but you're not wrong either.
"It gets 9th level spells!" bandwagon, everyone and their mother is also ignoring that a HUGE majority of PF players will never reach levels capable of 8th or 9th level casting.
You're ignoring a few things yourself, though:
9th-level spellcasters gain spell levels the fastest. Sorcerers, Oracles, and Arcanists gain 6th level spells at level 12, and and Wizards, Druids, Shamans, Witches, and Clerics gain them at level 11. The strongest spells that other classes gain are at-most 4th level.
This means that characters the Sorcerer, Wizard, and Arcanist are able to launch spells like Disintegrate and tons of other spells when other classes are limited to things like Divine Power (still strong, but not on the level of Disintegrate).
Clerics, Druids, and Oracles are able to cast spells like Antilife Shell, Planar Ally, and Harm.
And they're (almost) all able to cast things like Greater Dispel Magic and Spellcrash, or other equivalent spells.
They're ALSO able to cast a lot more spells - at 12th level the Cleric, Oracle, and Sorcerer cast 26 spells per day, Wizards, Shamans, Witches, and Druids get 20, and the Arcanist gets 22.
An Inquisitor, Warpriest, Magus, Bard, Skald, Summoner, Alchemist, or Investigator get 17 spells per day at the same level.
---
tl;dr - Saying "9th-level casting" is still entirely relevant, because more spells + higher-level & more-powerful spells means that, excepting the earliest levels, full-casters have major advantages over other classes, and it only gets more pronounced the higher you get.
The main difference between Divine and Arcane full-casters is that Arcane Casters have a much-wider and superior list of spells, while Divine Casters have a decent BAB & Hit Dice, but both categories are more potent than all other classes at the end of the day regardless (with the exception of maybe the Summoner, who is a half-full-caster in its own right).