Hi!
For an upcoming campaign I am thinking of making a noble based character. I was thinking of taking one level in aristocrat and then normal levels in another class. I was wondering what you guys think might be a good class to take levels in but keep the noble kind of fluff. Plz do not suggest bard because I am not interested in playing them. A bard is someone who serves a noble not a noble.
Thank you!
I could make a case for a bunch of classes. What do you want the noble to be capable of? Even if a class is not a perfect fit, a bit of multiclassing or the right traits can round the character out.
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A bard is someone who serves a noble not a noble.
A lot of assumptions here
for a noble I imagine highly social, smart, has good leadership skills, and Looks well dressed, they should also be able to do some swordsman ship.
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Someone who can deliver a speech to quiet a whole room?
Who can befriend you at the snap of a finger, and whose comands you just feel compelled to follow?
Someone who, without reaching the level of a profesional warior, still knwos his way around the battlefield?
Someone you'd define firstly by the way his presence fills the room, and the grace he moves with, more than his bulging muscles?
Sounds like a 3/4ths BAB class, with primarly Cha and Dex, able to cast Charm and Command, and fascinate... mechanicaly, a Bard. In game, the most charismatic prince anyone will ever come across.
Imperilous Bloodline Sorcerer
good point on the speeches I might rethink bard
Class mechanics do not have anything to do with nobility, though some skills might more accurately represent being a good ruler (not good as in alignment but good as in capable).
Divorce your preconceived notions of class mechanics and fluff, they are not a requirement. You can reflavor a class to fit many many concepts.
All an aristocrat has is 4 + int skill points per level and the following as class skills:
The aristocrat's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Appraise (Int), Bluff (Cha), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Disguise (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Intimidate (Cha), Knowledge (all skills taken individually) (Int), Linguistics (Int), Perception (Wis), Perform (Cha), Profession (Wis), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Swim (Str), and Survival (Wis).
Personally, if you want to represent nobility I would choose from:
BluffDiplomacy
Intimidate
Knowledge (local, history, geography, nobility, religion)
Sense Motive
A capable ruler would have some, though probably not all of those skills. They need not even be class skills necessarily.
A harsh evil ruler might use bluff and intimidate while a benevolent rule might use diplomacy instead.
I think any class that has a decent number of skill points would do just fine as a nobleman. After that, the rest is up to you.
And for what it's worth, a bard is mechanically quite a good fit for playing a king.
Rallying the troops (with bardic performance), giving good speeches (with magic to further improve skills like Honeyed Tongue or Glibness), being knowledgeable (bardic knowledge), and even being able to entertain and field social occasion like the kingdom's Grand Ball where he can out dance everyone else.
A cavalier or samurai can certainly fit the theme of classes held by the nobility, without the need to include the aristocrat NPC class. I'd think it could easily be true for fighter, paladin, even cleric, with the latter two in where the noble is also head of the church, at least a bishop's rank.
There's a 3PP prestige class, called the Bugyo designed to be stacked onto a samurai, though the requirements allow for many possible classes that is very much a ranking noble with abilities to match the job of an aristocrat.
Depending on your specific setting I could see druids, barbarians, bloodragers, sorcerers all fitting classes possessed by the aristocracy, though such would be for barbarian kingdoms.
Fighter/rogue with some traits. Covers the fighting ability, nearly all of the skills, plus a bag of tricks.
Swashbuckler. About the same.
Cleric, paladin or warpriest. Skill list less diverse but could be appropriate. Depends on the country though, I suppose.
Slayer. Same as cleric.
Oracle. The mysteries allow for a lot of customization.
But as I alluded to before, I could make a case for at least of the combined list of core, base, and hybrid classes.
I am not really thinking cleric as noble they seem to zealous
Could be, but it depends on how you choose to role play the character.
One about a king who is zealously dedicated to a deity?
What would you consider some of the Popes throughout history?
Why are you taking levels in Aristocrat? It is an NPC class. That is; it is strictly worse than any other player class. If you are playing with other people that did not take an npc class, you will just always be behind them. Not very noble.
Not only that you are proficient in the sword cane, a noble's weapon if there ever was one.
Eh, I think a long sword is the traditional noble weapon throughout the entirety of European history, and is true for most non-European nobility as well. An actual sword cane holds a very small place in history, and I cannot think of a single nobleman known for sword canes. Why you'd suggest a sword cane as a noble weapon, I have no idea.
Might suggest taking a look at Investigator. Will be able to rock quite a few of those social skills. Inspiration can re-flavored as noble upbringing. Not only that you are proficient in the sword cane, a noble's weapon if there ever was one.
If you are not a fan of the alchemy/extracts side of it, sleuth archetype replaces it with a pool of luck that again fits your flavor better.
I was just going to suggest the same thing.
Pathfinder has been missing a "noble" class. I liked the one that was in Dragonlance and Star Wars d20.
Why are you taking levels in Aristocrat? It is an NPC class. That is; it is strictly worse than any other player class. If you are playing with other people that did not take an npc class, you will just always be behind them. Not very noble.
Fluff
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A bard is someone who serves a noble not a noble.A lot of assumptions here
"A wand'ring minstrel I, a thing of rags and tatters..."
On another thread like this one, somebody mentioned sorcerer as being an ideal arcane caster applying to the nobility, afterall, sorcerers have a notable "bloodline". Since wizards require education and research to cast spells, this suggests a learned commoner and not nobility. Sorcerers like nobles are born into their class/social position. In fact each sorcerer bloodline could equate to a different noble house. Sorcerers being nobles, and wizards not, make lots of sense.
Ultimately I'd say it depends on the magic level in the campaign, and what sort of nation he's a noble of.
Sorcerers being nobles, and wizards not, make lots of sense.
No, not even a little. They both make equal sense for being born from noble families or not.
A noble family that has intertwined its blood with that of powerful outsiders might express that in an innate magical way.
While plenty of powerful wizards like Geb and Nex have ruled countries as well. Though they do not have descendants to carry on their lineage, it is easy to imagine a country where every ruler is trained in wizardry as their parent was before them.
Not to mention that common peasants and serfs largely wouldn't have the money to learn to become a wizard. They could not afford to pay it, and their families could not afford to have them not work. I would say that wizards would most likely come from wealthy affluent people, including noble houses. Let's face it, it takes 2d6 years to become a wizard. Meaning someone could be training for 12 years, before they become a level 1 wizard. No peasant family could handle that.
But isn't the old wizard trope that wizards don't give two s+#@s about money and choose their apprentices purely on talent and whether they can keep it together in the summoning chamber.
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That is a trope, but there are plenty of wizard academies noted in Golarion. It's a school for teaching people to be wizards. Maybe random individual wizards will decide to take on an apprentice who basically serves them day in and day out, and in doing so effectively pays the debt for being taught magic.
But it's just as valid to say that there is no wizard around willing to do that. Or that they already have 1 or more apprentices and aren't interested in more. Or think that you don't have the right stuff to become a promising wizard.
My point is that there are many possibilities. So to shoehorn a whole class to say that "only sorcerers could possibly be nobles and wizards are just silly commoners that have to learn magic"...well it's just blatantly wrong. You can't make those kinds of generalizations because the limit is how creatively plausible you can be.
And really, wizards give lots of sh*ts about money since scrolls, wands, other gear, spell components, spell research, etc are all very expensive things. In fact, most wizards I've seen in games are incredibly greedy people. Of course, this probably has something to do with the individuals playing them ;)
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Well all adventurers are greedy immoral murderers out for the quickest score:-D
I agree a whole class shouldn't be generalized, just wanted to get my trope bit out there.
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A bard is someone who serves a noble not a noble.
Ahem... Time to get back to your history lessons... Bard class is not only minstrels but also:
Minnesingers (Henry VI, Holy Roman Emperor no less being the most exalted of noble minnesingers) and Troubadours (who, among many aristocrats included William IX of Aquitaine, Duke of Aquitaine).
While plenty of powerful wizards like Geb and Nex have ruled countries as well. Though they do not have descendants to carry on their lineage, it is easy to imagine a country where every ruler is trained in wizardry as their parent was before them.
There's no actionable proof that Geb and Nex were actually wizards as defined by D&D/PF, though some kind of spellcaster for certain. Thus one cannot claim that they were wizards and not sorcerers or some other kind of spellcaster.
Regarding PF and sorcery, however, just because sorcery is in your bloodline, doesn't guarantee that the powers will manifest in your direct descendant, it may skip generations or appear in one sibling and not another.
Besides, I'm not saying that wizards cannot be nobles, rather that sorcery bloodlines being equivalent to noble bloodlines, makes lots of sense (but not the only possibility).
Not to mention that common peasants and serfs largely wouldn't have the money to learn to become a wizard. They could not afford to pay it, and their families could not afford to have them not work. I would say that wizards would most likely come from wealthy affluent people, including noble houses. Let's face it, it takes 2d6 years to become a wizard. Meaning someone could be training for 12 years, before they become a level 1 wizard. No peasant family could handle that.
When I stated learned commoner, I was meaning a person without noble blood, but not necessarily meaning peasant, more likely someone sponsored by the gentry working in the household of a noble. There were plenty of people who weren't of noble blood who also weren't peasants (though the majority certainly were).
Also you're making an assumption that discussions of noble inheritance is father to son, and while this has been the state in various cultures and periods of history, there are many alternative practices of noble inheritance. Celtic tannistry was the practice that inheritance went to the most capable male relative which could be a brother, a cousin, a nephew, or a son (or daughter for that matter). Frankish inheritance split the kingdom between all sons fairly equally, there was no direct inheritance between king and eldest son. These Celtic and Frankish practices occupied a couple thousand years of history. So one cannot make the argument that father to son inheritance is the major or most common method of inheritance.
In the end, education is expensive, and without noble sponsorship a commoner could not become wizard due to cost, so peasants becoming wizards would be a rarest of opportunities, so the idea of a noble attending a wizard academy certainly makes sense. Also worth considering that from the dark ages well into the medieval period, nobles didn't have scholarly education either, only the religious monks had (who were often noble sons, but not exclusively).
However, the idea that noble bloodlines have some special meaning that defines them as being noble and not commoner, as originating from some mythic source coincides easily to the possibility that a sorcery bloodline is the same thing. Nobility is a birthright, not something attained through education. This is where my train of thought comes from.
A bard is someone who serves a noble not a noble.Ahem... Time to get back to your history lessons... Bard class is not only minstrels but also:
Minnesingers (Henry VI, Holy Roman Emperor no less being the most exalted of noble minnesingers) and Troubadours (who, among many aristocrats included William IX of Aquitaine, Duke of Aquitaine).
Not only that, but consider that Celtic bards were from the noble caste, in that Celtic chieftans were appointed from the druid caste, which included trained warriors, druids, bards, priests and law experts. A Celtic King most certainly could have been a bard prior to his or her appointment.
There's no actionable proof that Geb and Nex were actually wizards as defined by D&D/PF, though some kind of spellcaster for certain. Thus one cannot claim that they were wizards and not sorcerers or some other kind of spellcaster.
Regarding PF and sorcery, however, just because sorcery is in your bloodline, doesn't guarantee that the powers will manifest in your direct descendant, it may skip generations or appear in one sibling and not another.
Besides, I'm not saying that wizards cannot be nobles, rather that sorcery bloodlines being equivalent to noble bloodlines, makes lots of sense (but not the only possibility).
If by actionable proof you mean stat blocks, then you are right. But there are plenty of references to Nex as a wizard. But honestly, they served only as an example of rulers of countries (who were very probably wizards) and thus would be considered nobility.
Nobility in Pathfinder/D&D is a mutable thing, where righteous action in the service of a king could see it granted just as well slaying a kingdom and claiming it for your own. There is not a single specific thing that being a noble entails or requires, but mostly just means you have some benefits of usually being granted wealth and importance.
As for who sorcerous power appears in, I'm not sure why you bring it up. I only said a bloodline might express itself with innate magical power (a sorcerer), but such a thing doesn't even necessarily relate to nobility. It just a sign of ancestry, though it makes for a good tale when the djinni king has his descendant express the djinni sorcerer bloodline 20 generations later. It would illustrate such a person as a possible legitimate heir to a throne and land in turmoil.
Also you're making an assumption that discussions of noble inheritance is father to son... So one cannot make the argument that father to son inheritance is the major or most common method of inheritance.
The method of inheritance truly isn't important for this discussion. I don't know why you brought it up. I also never stated that it was a common method, but it is the one people are most familiar with typically.
Overall, your previous post basically read to me as wizards can't be nobles, though it seems that's not what you meant to say.
Yeah, I was stating that it made sense, but not the only sense it could be.
I wasn't implying that father-son inheritance was your point of view, rather it has been repeatly mentioned in several posts in this thread (I should have been more clear). I'm often one to enlighten all the facts that I can in any discussion that looks at real world history as a part. Too often those with limited exposure to historical practices base arguments on one historical aspect, but not looking at the entire picture. I prefer to look at all possibilities, not just one.
As an aside, when I was developing the onmyoji (wizard archetype) for Kaidan, since onmyoji were officially taught at the Ministry of Onmyodo (a branch of the imperial government) I declared them to be wizards, but really the D&D/PF definitions of magic and its practitioners cannot be automatically applied to any historical spellcaster, as D&D/PF definitions cannot be stated as real or a proper division on how magic works (nor the belief of such), since each culture may view magic differently. Onmyoji seemed to practice both arcane and divine magic, since feudal Japan didn't differentiate the two, both were magic, thus both were the same thing. Its funny how we RPG developers try to define historical examples within our game rule systems when the definitions aren't necessarily congruent. (This latter paragraph is my point regarding Geb and Nex).
Just saying that most rulers/kings/final bosses in campaigns are wizards
No class is inherently noble or common. There are examples in fiction of almost every kind of class being a ruler of some kind, I'm sure.
What you asked for in your opening post was basically a Bard. Use Perform (Oratory), or use an archetype that trades out performances entirely.
Going back to my premise, I could see a campaign setting where sorcery bloodlines denote who are the nobility and who are not. In such a setting, those that must learn to become arcane spellcasters as witches, wizards and magi could be seen as a threat to the nobility and the nobles would consider non-sorcerer arcane casters as criminal, they'd sponsor witchhunters and wizard slayers to keep such "criminals" in check. This would also mean that any wizard academies would have to operate in secret, so the likelihood of existing wizards with more than one apprentice working in secret would be the norm and not actual academies.
In such a setting the PCs might include wizards, magi, even a sorcerer whose bloodline hasn't manifested in a dozen generations making that individual a lost noble house, not currently recognized by the existing nobility.
Again, not suggesting that this is the norm in PF settings, but it would provide for a very interesting setting to play in.
I second the fighter/rogue combo, then move into the Noble Scion prestige class. I have this very same build in Rise of the Runelords.
He is a Rogue (Charlatan/Scout)/Fighter (Lorewarden)/Noble Scion. It works out very well!
Just saying that most rulers/kings/final bosses in campaigns are wizards
Try paladin. There is a dex based archetype for Paladin and its definitely a noble, and definitely charismatic one.
if I were to do bard any archetypes you guys might reccomend.
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Any class you want. Remember, character class is not character concept. All a class is is a bundle of mechanical abilities. While these can certainly tend towards certain concepts, but any class could be from a noble background.
A barbarian, for example, could represent a huge, bluff nobleman more at home on extravagant hunting expeditions than his throne, and noted for his legendary anger. Think a young Robert Baratheon.
Clerics? The term Lords Temporal and Spiritual exists for a reason. The Church was a popular destination for sons with little chance to inherit, or to prevent their inheritance in the case of gavelkind style successions. Not to mention the existence of Prince-Bishops who ruled secular territory in addition to their pulpits (check out the history of the HRE. Places like Mainz or Cologne). And even today Catholic Cardinals are given the title Prince of the Church.
Bards have such wonderful class features for the nobility. They're proficient with Long swords and Rapiers, weapons long associated with the upper crust. Bardic Knowledge is perfect for someone who's dabbled in various scholastic topics. Not a true scholar, but able to converse intelligently on a bewildering number of topics. Archetypes like the Arcane duelist, granting increasing armor proficiency, makes for a more "knightly" approach to the class. And let's face it, the Saint Crispin's day speech is probably the most famous use of a perform (orator) based Inspire Courage in the Western World. Or my personal favorite, William de Normandie's personal minstrel Taillefer, a knight-troubadour who lead the first Norman cavalry charge at Hastings, tossing and catching his lance and singing verses from the Song of Roland as he went.
A wizard can be the rough scrabble apprentice of some hedge-mage, true. Or he could be the scion of a mighty noble house, tutored in the arcane arts by at the finest magical academies in the world, using a scepter (rod) as a bonded object.
Or a Magus, tutored in the arts arcane and martial, equally at home staring down a summoned demon with imperious confidence, or crossing blades with the dreaded Black Knight of Conningvale.
Even a Rogue could be less a cut-purse, and more a bored courtier, who's turned to larcancy to escape the crushing ennui of the King's court. Or, more heroically, donning a mask and blade to sneak the innocent out of the grasp of the tyrannical revolutionary regime, a la the Scarlet Pimpernel.
As a final note, given that class isn't concept I'd avoid Aristocrat. Aside from the name, it has nothing inherently "noble" about it, and could even be used to represent completely non-noble individuals, such as the scion of a wealthy merchant family, landed gentry (property, but not noble) or even the average citizens of more cosmopolitan cities and states (it actually strikes a good midpoint between commoner, who mainly represent more rural or lower class individuals, and the expert who really represents more of a full time scholar, or a non-magical minstrel/thief).
Fluff like that is really better handled via backstory, or if you must have an in game representation, the use of traits or feats like Noble Scion.
Bloodrager could be really cool for a noble if you were the shaman-prince of a wilderness tribe.
Hell, do the Marquis of Queensbury as a Brawler.