Dapper Slapper and his Amazing Friends! (Playtest Results Ongoing)


Playtest Feedback


Going to post results for encounters as they are completed, and various musings from myself and my players. All characters were built on 20 Point Buy, with all Paizo material allowed and everything run as close to RAW + FAQs as possible.

We'll be running a few encounters for certain levels. This first batch is 5th level, then we'll be doing more batches at 10th, 15th, and 20th.

Dapper Slapper: Avenger
Psykoblade: Warlock
Blackjack: Stalker

I couldn't find anyone who wanted to play a Zealot.

Dapper Slapper is an Unarmed build using the Enforcer Feat.

Psykoblade is going for Two-Weapon Fighting with his Short Sword and a Double-Barreled Pistol.

Blackjack is a Fencing Grace wielder.

First encounter:

Two Flamebrother Salamanders (CR 3 apiece, CR 5 total) have attacked the town in the middle of the night!

The crew rolled out from their separate abodes in their Social guises.

Psykoblade fared well, casting Mage Armor in the first round, and on the second casting Vanish and dropping both Flamebrothers at once, one with a lucky Pistol critical, and the other with a poke from Friction, his sword, and a Parry/Riposte from his Amateur Swashbuckler Feat. The Startling Appearance ability was the real winner here, making the target Flatfooted and thus incredibly easy to hit.

The Dapper Slapper managed to get in one good hit, but only the incredibly low to-hit of the Flamebrothers saved him from taking quite a good bit of damage, as without being in his Vigilante persona, he lacked the Improved Unarmed Strike Feat granted from his Fist of the Avenger Talent, and thus provoked an Attack of Opportunity from every hit. As he noted, had he taken Heavy Training as well and been armored at the time, this could have been far, far worse.

Blackjack, due to rolling low on Initiative, never got to act beyond drawing his Rapier.


Second encounter:

After gathering information from random passers-by and Blackjack's criminal contacts, our intrepid trio suited up and tracked the source of the mayhem to a small house on the outskirts of town, where they disabled a dastardly arrow trap!

Inside was a human cultist (Evoker 6) and a trio of small bonfires (three Small Fire Elementals), who proceeded to heat up the situation!

The Dapper Slapper sustained the a bit of damage this fight, taking fire damage from each hit to the elementals, but succeeded in dealing a slap of justice to the unprepared cheek of our evildoer, and damaging two bonfires so they could be extinguished.

Psykoblade ended the cultist with another nasty Pistol critical from Vanish to its chest and then, like Zeus, formed a thunderbolt in his hand and punished the errant flames!

Blackjack suffered from poor rolls (Up Close and Personal failing to trigger because of a roll of 3 on his Acrobatics...and only a was needed against the bonfires) and elementals being immune to critical hits and Sneak Attack, and was nailed by a Scorching Ray from the flame worshiper.

We'll see how they fare next time in...The Cottage of Doom!


Encounter 3A:

The group descends down into the depths of the cottage, the trapdoor in its floor leading into a ave in the Plane of Fire!

There they are met by an Efreeti (CR 8) who proceeds to win Initiative, and barrage the group with Scorching Rays, followed up by Quickened Scorching Rays until everyone is quite dead.

(I misjudged both the APL of the party being 4 because of them being a man down, and an Efreeti being SUPER buff for a CR 8.)

Encounter 3B:

Blackjack awakens from the nightmare where everyone is killed, and the group faces off against a Burning Dervish (CR 7), a lesser servant of the Sultan of Efreeti.

This time, armed with his foreknowledge, Blackjack steals the show, shanking the poor Dervish before he can defend himself, and then using Leave an Opening to stab him twice. On the second round, he stabbed the Dervish again, finishing him.

The Dapper Slapper got in a pair of good slaps, softening him up for Blackjack.

Psykoblade contributed less this time around, hitting with only one Mystic Bolt.


5th level class conclusions:

Avenger:

This one actually seems to fare the least well, at least as far as unarmed combat goes. It's a martial with nothing really special about it. Most martial characters get something to increase to-hit/damage above and beyond full BaB. Weapon Training, Studied Target, Smite, Favored Enemy, etc. At the same time, 3/4 BaB characters tend to get a bunch of cool magic tricks and whatnot to make up for a generally lower base to-hit/damage. The Avenger...gets neither of these things. It has the worst of both worlds. No magic tricks because it has full baB...but no special boosters because it's bolted onto a 3/4 BaB chassis.

It also suffers the worst in social identity so far. Depending on your Talent choices you are potentially even worse in combat than the others, taking your ACP to-hit because your Heavy Armor Proficiency was lost for example, and no longer having Improved Unarmed Strike and therefore provoking an AoO for each hit and losing ALL the Feats that rely on it as well (such as Improved Grapple). Fist of the Avenger can almost be a trap option in the right circumstance.

Stalker:

So far, Up Close and Personal and Leave an Opening are the stars of the show for combat. It lends itself to a high risk, high reward playstyle that rewards using Acrobatics to flip over dudes and poke them up to three times at your full BaB, and getting hidden Strike to each.

Of course...Hidden Strike is still not the greatest booster, and this tactic will likely become less useful at higher levels once overcoming CMD+5 with an Acrobatics check becomes nigh impossible.

Warlock:

Has a bunch of neat tricks. The results are skewed a bit here because of firearm crits (which are nasty), but when he didn't get them his damage output was middling. When higher level spells or more tricks cme into play we'll see. So far, solid but unimpressive, with Mystic Bolt being a very cool option that nearly always hits.

Starting a level 10 playtest soon.


A note: Up close and personal lets you make the attack for attempting to move through an opponent's square using acrobatics, not for succeeding.

Normally I'd say it will fall off at higher levels in favor of full attacks, but 2-3 full bab attacks is probably better at 20 than 3 attacks at progressively worse bonuses (even if you have haste).


Ooh, I completely missed that. That's interesting.

But as a lightly armored, d8 HD class, that AoO is probably gonna hurt. Still, I can now see the appeal at high levels. All at full BaB plus crappy Sneak Attack is still better than (at best) three attacks at full, -5, and -10.


Its does seem that the combo of Up Close and Personal and Leave an Opening allows for one of the best mobile combat options ever put out by Paizo. It continues to hold up even against a hasted pounce.

At level 11, Frightening appearance lets you use Hurtful as part of the combo for 4 attacks at full BAB, all qualifying for Hidden Strike. Cost, 2 feats, 1 class ability, 2 talents. If you don't want to wait for 11, you can do it the normal way with Cornugon Smash at 6. And why not, as that is 4 attacks at full BAB at level 6. Really, really good, even if that full BAB is 3/4.

Or, combine Up Close and Personal with Spring Attack, fail or succeed at the acrobatics doesn't matter as you aren't taking an attack of opportunity anyways. Safer approach, but delays Cornugon Smash/hurtful combo as it takes 3 feats.

Overall, this is one of my favourite things the Stalker Vigilante can do. The main issue I have is why are these not just rogue talents. Practically all of them should be. It is sick and tiring to see classes designed to steal what the rogue can do, including gaining a talent to get rogue talents, when the rogue itself can't just steal their talents.

The Concordance

Unfortunately, Hurtful and Up Close and Personal eat up the single Swift action you get each turn.


Rynjin, I haven't had an opportunity to post up my playtest report yet but I'm curious, would you agree that the Fist of the Avenger ability should give a much higher damage bonus (or something)? I'm of the opinion it should be 1/2 Vigilante level (and full level if inflicting non-lethal). Even with Dragon Style and Power Attack, getting respectable levels of damage out of an unarmed avenger is proving difficult for us.

Off the top of my head, I think the 8th level Avenger we have is doing something like 1d3+17 when power attacking. (20 STR, Dragon Style, Power Attack, Weapon Specialization, Fist of the avenger)


I think it should either be MUCH higher, grant several Feats (the Dragon Style line, perhaps?), or grant a to-hit bonus as well.

The Dapper Slapper is actually swapping away from fist based combat because it kinda sucks for multiple reasons.

His preferred option would be to give it a Monk-like damage increase at Monk level -4 or some such.


I would like to see something other than the standard monk damage progression honestly. We already have two classes that use that mechanic. +1 Damage/Level (Same as a swashbuckler) seems right. Having it upgrade to x3 and later x4 crits with unarmed strikes could be cool as well.


Damage/Level while nice, takes the talent from being a choice, to mandatory.

Another reason monk tables work here is so it can synergize with the Vital Strike ability of the Avenger.


Okay, Yeah, I didn't think of that. Good Point.


ShieldLawrence wrote:
Unfortunately, Hurtful and Up Close and Personal eat up the single Swift action you get each turn.

I was thinking it was a free action for some reason. Still, 3 attacks at level 4 is not too shabby.

The Concordance

I plan on using still using both Up Close and Personal and Hurtful in an intimidate build that also revolves around activating Twisting Fear as often as possible. I'll go for the acrobatics if intimidate fails or I need to close on them. Basically a guaranteed second attack that will only provoke very occasionally.

It is unfortunate though that Up Close and Personal can't be combined with Spring Attack, since Up Close and Personal specifically requires a move action to activate. Spring Attack is its own special full round action.


I don't think it requires a move action. Nothing in acrobatics says it requires a move action, and I think it is something you do as part of movement, not an independent action on its own. Otherwise you would be able to take a 5 foot step, and then acrobatics out of the remaining threat areas.

The wording of Up Close and Personal does say, "When the stalker vigilante attempts an Acrobatics check to move through an opponent’s space during a move action," but I would read that as the more general rule. I could be wrong. It wouldn't be the first time anything possibly good for spring attack was disallowed.


Acrobatics to not provoke can be made as part of any movement.

You can't 5' step in the same round as any other movement, so you can't do what you describe above; the withdraw action is similar to what you describe however, and you can make acrobatics checks as part of that.

The wording probably needs to be changed, but specific>general and at the moment it reads 'during a move action,' so that's what we need to playtest.

The Concordance

Yes, whereas it says specifically "move action" in the text, I'm inclined to think the writers were being purposeful in their phrasing. Compare to feats that say "attack action" instead of "attack" or "attack rolls" (Vital Strike in one example).


Weeks later the crew has leveled up significantly. At a party in their honor, they are ambushed by 7 fiendish jesters!

Thankfully, this was a masquerade ball, so they were all in costume.

The 6 normal Jesters (Ghast Fighter 1s) and the Special Jester (Dust Ghoul) attacked, but were largely no match for our intrepid heroes.

Blackjack got the drop on one Ghast but sadly fell victim to the Dust Ghoul's Paralyzing Shriek and was out of the fight after dispatching the Ghasts after him. His AC is pretty damn good though, and protected him from any physical harm.

The Dapper slapper easily slapped down every enemy that came after him, and managed to avoid being Grappled hard as the Dust Ghoul's Dust dust mites tried. Though I feel we have yet to see his TRUE potential.

Psykoblade was the real star of this encounter, brutally taking down the Dust Ghoul with a barrage from his Vanished self with his pistol and Mystic Bolt, and a follow-up with his Shortsword once it swooped down to attack him (...and rolled a 1 on its attack roll), he then proceeded t dispatch two more Ghasts.

We'll see where their adventures lead them next time.


The crew descended into the sewers, where they were confronted by a pair of Fetid Spore Mounds.

Being unaware of their nature, Psykoblade hit one with his signature lightning bolt, empowering it to grapple and squeeze him.

After taking severe damage, he managed to wriggle free, while Blackjack and Slapper mauled the other in record time, then turned to damage the first before Psykoblade finished it off with a dagger strike.

Community / Forums / Archive / Pathfinder / Playtests & Prerelease Discussions / Ultimate Intrigue Playtest / Playtest Feedback / Dapper Slapper and his Amazing Friends! (Playtest Results Ongoing) All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.
Recent threads in Playtest Feedback
Levels 1&2