Hey everyone, I know that I'm sort of late to the party on this, but I've been looking into building a sacred fist warpriest, but it appears that some recent errata has changed the way the archetype functions.
I have the ACG, but I'm a little behind on the effect of the errata -- can someone clarify the following things for me:
1) Sacred fists can no longer flurry in armor, right? (Could they ever?)
2) Sacred fists now use 3/4 BAB progression instead of their class level for flurry of blows?
3) I've been reading some stuff about the sacred fist's AC bonus being a deflection bonus, but PFSRD and my book disagree about this.
Finally, if all of the above is true, can someone help me figure out how to salvage this archetype? I love the idea and feel of a unarmed holy warrior-priest, but even my best attempts at optimization leave me with a crap defenses and mediocre damage.
Thanks!
1 & 2: yes
3: the wisdom bonus to AC is untyped & applies to touch & FF AC, the +1/4 levels is a dodge bonus.
I can't see how you'd compete directly in damage with a normal warpriest; even unarmed, if they appled sacred weapon to their unarmed strike, and used their feat advantage for TWF, and got brawling armor.
You might be able to do something with ki, which is your main point of distinction from a normal warpriest. I can't think of anything off the top of my head, but it crops up in some odd places.
Are you more interested in playing the concept or the actual archetype?
The actual archetype. I'm aware that I can replicate a sacred fist with judicious multiclassing, but what was appealing about the sacred fist was that it could do its thing from level one onward.
This is a character I'll be starting at level one, and I'd rather not play an incomplete version of my concept for 4-6 levels before it all comes together.
I think he's saying why not play the normal warpriest as an unarmed warpriest? not getting full bab and no armor opposed to same bab and armor. take the 2wf feat and that's the same as flurry.
Ok, that makes sense, but it's a minimum of two feats to be able to replicate flurry and that seems pretty silly on the face of it.
More than two, actually, since flurry gets full STR bonus on attacks and you need Dual Slice for that.
you get IUS at lv1 if you worship a God with that as their weapon. So you only need 1 feat to 2wf which is 2wf. Then double slice, which you can pick up at lv3 unless you're human, then lv1. And you can get I2wf at lv6, faster than the sacred fist. Your AC will be much higher as you can use armor and a shield instead of relying on your wis. And the accuracy from brawling armor makes you more accurate than the sacred fist could be.
Or start your first level as unchained monk and then the rest as a warpriest, this makes it easy to qualify for dragon style and dragon ferocity.
Put it together and see if you like it. E,g.
Human warpriest of Irori (base archetype)
1: Improved Unarmed Strike, Weapon Focus (unarmed), TWF, Double Slice
3: Dragon Style, Power Attack
5: Step Up
6: Weapon Spec (unarmed), Following Step
Effective from level 1. What did you want to do with your feats as a sacred fist which this couldn't?
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Really the only things that Sacred Fist has over a base warpriest for going unarmed is
1: The ability to take Pummeling Style at 1st level instead of 9th. (You still have to wait until 12th level for Charge though)
2: The ability to be unarmored if that appeals to you.
3: A Ki Pool.
4: Evasion for fortitude. This is very nice, even though it doesn't make you a better unarmed combatant.
However, none of those abilities are worth the opportunity cost of losing bonus feats, sacred weapon, and sacred armor imo.
Put it together and see if you like it. E,g.
Human warpriest of Irori (base archetype)
1: Improved Unarmed Strike, Weapon Focus (unarmed), TWF, Double Slice
3: Dragon Style, Power Attack
5: Step Up
6: Weapon Spec (unarmed), Following Step
Effective from level 1. What did you want to do with your feats as a sacred fist which this couldn't?
Well, when you put it that way it does make a lot of sense. I guess I forgot about how many bonus feats warpriests got.
Plus, brawling and weapon spec are pretty tasty.
Thanks for the build help everyone, I think I was just overthinking things a bit.