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So I died to the slippery dip of doom today in the rise of the runelords, I was half HP, he fell down it with a -10 acrobatics and got max damage from 7d6 fall damage, so I need a hand with a new character
My idea was a Sorceror or Wizard blaster air elemental, or a Tiefling bomber, I have not played a Major spellcaster before, so I'm bit iffy on a the Blaster, but I like them both so I need a bit of help with both of them, my scores are:
18,17,13,14,12 and 7 as you can see pretty average
So pazio fourms please a poor dead adventure out with there next character
What level?
Also, those aren't even close to "average" scores. That's a 36 point buy.
If you want a blaster, I prefer one level as a crossblooded sorcerer (orc, red dragon) and then follow up with a wizard (admixture). Burning Hands, Scorching Ray, and Fireball are your friends. Go with an elf for a bonus against SR plus the +2 to int.
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Oh sorry, we are level 5, in order we have
Martial Artist(Monk)/Mad Dog(Barb)
Thunderstriker(Bard)
Paladin(Plain)
Cleric(Plain)
Swashbuckler(Plain)
Investigator(Plain)
And I was the quote unquote tank till I died, the cleric and the monk are optimised, the bard had crap stats but does good sonic damage, the paladin just smashes stuff and the swashbuckler had a total of like 42 point buy from his rolls, and the investigator is strange just does trap removal and door openning and does strange spells.
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Don't know why the Barbarian wouldn't be happy about having a Skald. They basically get a free source of rage that doesn't fatigue them, but still uses their Str/Con and will bonuses. Barbarians and Skalds are great teammates, especially at low level where you can easily run out of Rage rounds (and an unconscious barbarian under the raging song effect continues to rage).
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So I think some people missed, the barb is a multiclassing with 1 level of barb and the archtype does not give rage, also the bard is the buffer, the Sonic damage is just a added bonus, that's why I'm so open on being able to play a blaster, as the cleric is mainly ranged with buff spells, he is the travel domain, but the thing our party seems to be missing is elemental damage, also I'm not allowed the Orc Bloodline as our DM allows nothing to do with Monster races e.g Orc,Goblin, Drow, that's why I was thinking about a Blaster, as say a Djinni blooded Sylph or a Tiefling Bomber we mainly need elemental damage.
You might want to look at an elementalist wizard then. (Otherwise, if you're playing a blaster wizard you should probably take the admixture school. I'd also recommend you check out the Guide to the Blockbuster Wizard in the Class Guide section of these message boards). I'd also suggest that the 18 stat be assigned to Int(or Cha if you go with the sorceror option), with the other two high stats assigned to Con & Dex. (Str should be your dump stat, regardless of whether you're playing a wizard or sorceror).
Also, assuming your new character is also 5th level, I'd suggest taking the wizard class. Otherwise your character will be casting flaming sphere instead of fireballs at least until he (or she) reaches 6th level. Also, wizards have an easier time learning new spells than sorcerors.
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Thank you Morgan for Answer on what I wanted to actual do and not recommendations of other class, because I'm not being a b&$## but I was set on a Elemental Damage, Wizard seems to be the best choose anyway, cause it can then use spell books as I played a Orcale in one game and spell known can be restrictive...
What level?
Also, those aren't even close to "average" scores. That's a 36 point buy.
If you're counting racials that's a 21pt buy with a Dual Talent Human, so a bit above average but nothing too crazy. Preracial though? Yeah, that's a lot.
I played a blaster wizard in a Rise of the Runelords AP. I took one level of cross-blooded sorcerer (Orc/Draconic) and specialized in fire, but that isn't necessary.
For any higher level spellcaster, spell penetration feats are crtical for getting past SR. At lower levels you will want Improved Initiative, so you can swing battles using AoE blasts before the enemy closes.
Sorcerer can be fun, as with human favored class bonus of 1 spell known and Mnemonic Vestments you can wind up with a large repertoire of spells, plus lots of spammable slots to use.
You'll be 1 level behind a wizard, which is a 'con'. Number of spells per day is a 'pro'. Spontaneous casting is a big 'pro' for a blaster.
Standard blaster builds rely on at least one damage add feature, which the Sorcerer bloodlines can provide. Orc is acknowledged as the best, but I'd caution against going cross-blooded to get two bumps, as the drawbacks are too severe. Others can work - but element specific bumps should be paired with the Elemental Spell metamagic feat or some other way of switching Energy types like the Djinni Bloodline. As mentioned by Thac20, you'll also want feats to boost your ability to overcome SR.
Some bloodline examples:
like
This is the pretty standard blow stuff up build that I have tested out before and is likely very similar to Thac20's build. Chose useful buff spells for your 1 level of sorcerer. Go dragon-blooded to avoid the no monster race thing.
http://zenithgames.blogspot.com/2014/02/admixture-blaster-wizard-build.html ?_sm_au_=iVV37PRqFWsNRQ2q
Oh sorry, we are level 5, in order we have
Martial Artist(Monk)/Mad Dog(Barb)
Thunderstriker(Bard)
Paladin(Plain)
Cleric(Plain)
Swashbuckler(Plain)
Investigator(Plain)And I was the quote unquote tank till I died, the cleric and the monk are optimised, the bard had crap stats but does good sonic damage, the paladin just smashes stuff and the swashbuckler had a total of like 42 point buy from his rolls, and the investigator is strange just does trap removal and door openning and does strange spells.
Hmm. If this is going to be your first spellcaster, I'd suggest keeping it simple and fun. If your goal is to blast a lot, then going for a Sylph Elemental (Air) Sorcerer sounds like a perfect idea.
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Well, if you're going to focus on blasting, there are a few things to consider.
Tattooed Sorcerer archetype from Inner Sea Magic gives you the Varisian Tattoo feat, which adds +1 caster level to one school of magic, so that would add an extra die of damage to many evocation spells (fireball, etc). It also gives you an extra magic missile a level early. So you could consider that archetype or just the feat.
Magical Lineage is a good trait. Pick a spell you're likely to use a lot (usually fireball), and you can cut down the cost of adding metamagic to it.
Improved Initiative is worth considering as a feat, for both offensive and defensive purposes. If you happen to start a combat too close to the enemies, going early will let you run away, which is nice for a squishy caster. And being able to fireball the enemies before they spread out and/or intermingle with your allies is always good.
Generally speaking, the Core Rulebook metamagic feats tend to be too expensive in levels added to be worth it. There are better options in the Advanced Players Guide, Ultimate Magic, etc.
Dang, you already committed to sorcerer. Remember, thou art squishy. But you do have all those meat-shie... err... companions with you.
Oracle would keep you more durable because now you are as protected as the cleric and still be Tier-9 caster happy. Cleric wouldn't mind the help in heals either should you be good/neutral aligned. Eventually, should you reach Hierophant, Faith's Reach gives you that ranged touch attack fun with your touch divine spells. Half-health? You can heal yourself without any of the begging involved. Oh, and two extra skill points is nice too. Just find a trait that still gives you full class access to wands.
Sorcerer would be best as vanilla.
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Dang, you already committed to sorcerer. Remember, thou art squishy. But you do have all those meat-shie... err... companions with you.
Oracle would keep you more durable because now you are as protected as the cleric and still be Tier-9 caster happy. Cleric wouldn't mind the help in heals either should you be good/neutral aligned. Eventually, should you reach Hierophant, Faith's Reach gives you that ranged touch attack fun with your touch divine spells. Half-health? You can heal yourself without any of the begging involved. Oh, and two extra skill points is nice too. Just find a trait that still gives you full class access to wands.
Sorcerer would be best as vanilla.
I played a Orcale before and I found them to be very very boring, I want to basically shot lightning at people, everything else is covered the paladin has good heals and the cleric has heals as does the investigator.
Ah, elemental options all the way, I understand -I love Force personally. Enjoy the Sorcerer -focus on some defensive/evasive options too in your build instead of pure offense during those times that you have to make those save or suck checks, and whenever the random mook gets to you; the only stat you need is what... CHA, maybe splash DEX/CON? Once you pad the utility spells, the rest is blasting fun.
It depends too on how many fights y'all get into in an average day; till you get Tier-4 spells and up, every slot really matters when you spend not just on Mage Armor but effects like Shield and gamechangers like grease, glitterdust, and all the fun disruptive stuff a spontaneous caster can pull out of their limited selection. It'll take teamwork too since your team will need to corral targets for you in order for you to really up the damage you deal for the team versus single-target attacks.
Your scores by the way only have one gap, even the tertiary scores are positive, and I assume you are going to dump into STR? 36PTs is very powerful, and if its that "average" in your group, y'all are going to have a very easy time as a plus-sized party with great attributes.
Since you are reseeding as a Level 5, yay Fireball! Tier-2 spells were very lean for me as a Sorcerer and ended up being a utility level. Flaming Sphere was a chore to use. Strongly suggest that with your good stats that you have a backup option in the form of a crossbow or heck, even a regular bow for sustained DPS in long sessions where you might want to conserve (or are unsure about enemy capabilities/waiting for them to mass for your template hits) spell slots or you ran out.
Mage Armor lasts me most of the session, and yeah, I was the wimp that rocked a Shield spell active during encounters I felt that I was going to get into melee or nailed by a ranged opponent.
Wayang Spellhunter is another great trait that can reduce the metamagic cost of a signature spell as well. Heighten Spell isn't very unreasonable as a multiplier, I believe it would keep your spells at even cost (+1 Heighten, -1 Wayang Spellhunter/Magical Lineage). Any of the Perception-granting traits are nice as well. Or maybe one that grants you a Fort/Ref save +1.
Beyond that, anything that can boost your caster level (I did it with Martyr bloodline), save DC, in addition to your desired accuracy with ranged touch would be great.
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Ah, elemental options all the way, I understand -I love Force personally. Enjoy the Sorcerer -focus on some defensive/evasive options too in your build instead of pure offense during those times that you have to make those save or suck checks, and whenever the random mook gets to you; the only stat you need is what... CHA, maybe splash DEX/CON? Once you pad the utility spells, the rest is blasting fun.
It depends too on how many fights y'all get into in an average day; till you get Tier-4 spells and up, every slot really matters when you spend not just on Mage Armor but effects like Shield and gamechangers like grease, glitterdust, and all the fun disruptive stuff a spontaneous caster can pull out of their limited selection. It'll take teamwork too since your team will need to corral targets for you in order for you to really up the damage you deal for the team versus single-target attacks.
Your scores by the way only have one gap, even the tertiary scores are positive, and I assume you are going to dump into STR? 36PTs is very powerful, and if its that "average" in your group, y'all are going to have a very easy time as a plus-sized party with great attributes.
Since you are reseeding as a Level 5, yay Fireball! Tier-2 spells were very lean for me as a Sorcerer and ended up being a utility level. Flaming Sphere was a chore to use. Strongly suggest that with your good stats that you have a backup option in the form of a crossbow or heck, even a regular bow for sustained DPS in long sessions where you might want to conserve (or are unsure about enemy capabilities/waiting for them to mass for your template hits) spell slots or you ran out.
Mage Armor lasts me most of the session, and yeah, I was the wimp that rocked a Shield spell active during encounters I felt that I was going to get into melee or nailed by a ranged opponent.
Wayang Spellhunter is another great trait that can reduce the metamagic cost of a signature spell as well. Heighten Spell isn't very unreasonable as a multiplier, I believe...
Yes I can see what your saying, I was more then likely going to go 75% Blaster and 25% Control and use Str as dump, have Dex as second highest and Cha as highest skill and I always carry a Ranged weapon on Caster ALWAYS. I was more then likely going to play a tattooed Sorceror after I seen how good they are to use, kinda feel in love with the fact Tattoos suit the characters story.
I really like sorcerers as blasters. They can be great.
The Djinni bloodline arcana means you are trading the punch of extra damage bloodlines like draconic in exchange for the versatility of switching energy types. This is good, especially at high levels. It also means that you want to take blasting spells that do NOT do electrical damage, so you have a choice of 2 types when you cast them.
My go-to blaster spell list is:
Acid Splash
Burning Hands
Ear-Piercing Scream (for the status effect)
Burning Arc
Fireball
If you get one of these: Mask of Conflicting Energies you can take a fire or cold spell and get it to any element type (except sonic) using the mask and/or your ability.
The trick to using sorcerers as blasters is that you only need a small number of spells for your blasts. You then use metamagic to boost them. Most of your blasting spells should be level 3 or less as that allows you to use lesser metamagic rods on them. The trait Magical Lineage gives you 1 level of metamagic boosting for free, so put it on the blasting spell you think you will use most often. At 15th level Spell Perfection should be applied to the same spell.
The other trick is to try to get feats and items that boost your caster level. For most blasting spells, the damage dealt is 1d6 per CL. Make sure your INT is at least 13 so you can take the Spell Specialization feat. Likewise, Varisian Tattoo is very useful. If your GM allows the Campaign Trait Lore Seeker that is also good.
Most blasting spells cap out at a certain number of dice, but Intensified Spell will let you get around that a bit. And intensified spell stacks with empowered and maximized spell.
BTW, you might want to play a Sylph if your GM will let you apply the air affinity ability to the Djinni bloodline instead. Show him the favored class bonus for sorcerers below and he might buy that. You will want to take either the Like the Wind or the Thunderous Resistance alternate traits because your bloodline will give you electrical resistance which won't stack with the racial ability.
If you went with Sylph I would probably do this with ability scores:
STR 7, DEX 19 (17+2), CON 12 (14-2), INT 15 (13+2), WIS 12, CHA 18
or
STR 7, DEX 16 (14+2), CON 15 (17-2), INT 15 (13+2), WIS 12, CHA 18
Remember that if the air affinity ability applies your CHA will count as 20 for your sorcerer class stuff.
Definitely read this guide: The Inner Power. A Guide for Sorcerers (Core, APG, UM, UC)
This guide inspired me to play sorcerers and I am happy to say that it was worth it.
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I really like sorcerers as blasters. They can be great.
The Djinni bloodline arcana means you are trading the punch of extra damage bloodlines like draconic in exchange for the versatility of switching energy types. This is good, especially at high levels. It also means that you want to take blasting spells that do NOT do electrical damage, so you have a choice of 2 types when you cast them.
My go-to blaster spell list is:
Acid Splash
Burning Hands
Ear-Piercing Scream (for the status effect)
Burning Arc
FireballIf you get one of these: Mask of Conflicting Energies you can take a fire or cold spell and get it to any element type (except sonic) using the mask and/or your ability.
The trick to using sorcerers as blasters is that you only need a small number of spells for your blasts. You then use metamagic to boost them. Most of your blasting spells should be level 3 or less as that allows you to use lesser metamagic rods on them. The trait Magical Lineage gives you 1 level of metamagic boosting for free, so put it on the blasting spell you think you will use most often. At 15th level Spell Perfection should be applied to the same spell.
The other trick is to try to get feats and items that boost your caster level. For most blasting spells, the damage dealt is 1d6 per CL. Make sure your INT is at least 13 so you can take the Spell Specialization feat. Likewise, Varisian Tattoo is very useful. If your GM allows the Campaign Trait...
Peet that Guide was amazing, I think I feel in love, thanks for that Peet, I'm doing a Sorceror now no doubt, but now after seeing that I'm tempted to do a Human Sorceror now over a Sylph.
I was a little concerned about weather you are resolving what killed the previous character. Perhaps an air based dijin can avoid falling down a hole, but you should either have more hit points, or prevent losing them.
If you are trying to hang back, perhaps the meta magic feat that increases range would help.
Peet that Guide was amazing, I think I feel in love, thanks for that Peet, I'm doing a Sorceror now no doubt, but now after seeing that I'm tempted to do a Human Sorceror now over a Sylph.
The guide I linked to is definitely in love with human sorcerers because of the favored class bonus. Keep in mind though that half-elves and half-orcs also count as humans and can use the human favored class bonus instead of their normal ones.
Drow, Gillmen, and Goblins also get a version of the human ability, though it is less powerful fro drow or goblins than it is for humans
If your game allows item crafting though you can make a Spell Lattice (in Ultimate Equipment this was called a Page of Spell Knowledge) to increase your spells known. There's also the mnemonic vestment that lets you use your spell slots to power spells from scrolls or spellbooks. So there are more options now for sorcerers than when the guide was written.
I prefer playing nonhuman sorcerers and while you always wish you had access to more spells I am living with it.
Sylphs aren't an especially powerful race but they do get access to windy escape which is a great defensive spell at low levels.
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Sylphs aren't an especially powerful race but they do get access to windy escape which is a great defensive spell at low levels.
Well, as long as you brought it up, I have a question about this spell. I've asked this before, but didn't get an answer that I'd consider definitive.
When a sylph with Windy Escape is attacked, do they have to declare that they're using the spell before the GM rolls and/or declares the result, or can they wait to see if they get hit before casting it?
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Strangely enough, I decided to change to a Human Sorceror with the Arcane Bloodline and have geared myself towards late game, I do decent damage now, but later on I think I will be able to wreck some serious face later on, cause I asked everyone no that said later they profer someone who can end encounters with a flick of there finger so I went with that, I liked to think our group is a team with everything covered and now with me being a Sorceror we have a major arcane caster with massive nukes and side control for later when it is needed most, I decided that only my 4th and lower spells are my blasting spells, I'm still getting that mask I loved it quite a lot, I'm almost there too which is a extra bonus.
When a sylph with Windy Escape is attacked, do they have to declare that they're using the spell before the GM rolls and/or declares the result, or can they wait to see if they get hit before casting it?
I think that you ought to be allowed to find out that you have been hit before deciding to cast the spell. It would negate most of the utility of the spell if you had to cast it on a "you might be hit."
It comes down to how immediate actions are resolved and there is a lot of vagueness there, but the spell is very weak if you have to declare it before finding out if you are hit. How many of these is a wizard likely to have prepared? Forcing you to use a spell up in a way that might be totally unnecessary is cheap GMing in my books.