I'm level 1, game starts tomorrow. So far in the party the only PCs I know for sure are an inquisitor and an arcanist. Here's the build I'm going with so far:
Str 12 (14 -2 racial)
Dex 18 (16 +2 racial)
Con 12
Int 10
Wis 13
Cha 12 (10 +2 racial)
Feats
B1 Weapon Focus: Sling
L1 Point Blank Shot
I'm debating whether or not to take the Divine Commander archetype which trades out blessings and feats for an Animal Companion, Teamwork feats with the ability to hand them out to allies and a Celestial template bump for the AC at 6th level. I also am looking for advice on the stats/feats. Any advice would be helpful.
For any ranged build, get Precise Shot as soon as you can (that will be 3rd level). The Air Blessing (that lets you use a ranged weapon in melee without provoking) is pretty nice, but I'm not sure if that fits your deity or not.
For the teamwork feats, it really depends on the rest of your party. The useful combat teamwork feats (Outflank, Precise Strike) require you to be flanking or adjacent (Paired Opportunists, Shake It Off, etc.). If no one else is planning to be in melee, your animal companion won't get any benefit from them.
Halflings of Golarion has some fantastic sling-feats, you should really check them out.
So I settled on the build above but changed the points around a bit for 14 Wis and 13 Cha. I'm now level 2 with the archetype Divine Commander. I get no blessings but I do get a mount. I have a wolf with the Bodyguard archetype.
The problem I'm running into is that throughout level 1 I have only 2 spells, cruddy attack bonuses and weak feats. I was barely able to make a 1/4 contribution to combat (be able to hit 50% of the time and deal 4 damage on an average hit). Basically I've devolved into the healbot.
How can I straddle the dual roles of staying competitive with ranged attacks (be able to hit at least half the time and deal 1/4 of the damage of the average to the average monsters of my level) while ALSO being somewhat useful with my meager spells.
I now have Fervor but I confess I'm completely at a loss of how to use it.
Two things are key: the alternate racial trait Warslinger and magic stone. Warslinger lets you reload a sling as a free action and magic stone counts as magic for penetrating DR and does fixed damage (not based on Small size); also, magic stone reduces the amount of ammunition you need to carry, since you can pick up random small stones to act as the material component.
You could use Refine Improvised Weapon to make your belt into a masterwork sling for 2 hours - boosting your to hit - if you don't already have masterwork.
Since you are mounted and don't need your move to "move" use it for reloading even if it isn't a free action and use the halfling sling staff - use your wolf to stay at ranged but less than 30' distance.
You can take the Mantis Zealot archtype with Divine Commander - the advantage being that small size doesn't penalize sneak attack damage like it does sacred weapon.
But why do you consider your attack bonuses cruddy? You have +4 dex +1 weapon focus +1 size +1 BAB (conditional +1 Point Blank Shot) +7 or +8 to hit isn't cruddy at 2nd level at the tables I've been at.
