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Greetings!
I have a PFS Order of the Cockatrice Intimidation build tiefling Samurai X/Ranger 1/Bloodrager 1.
Main reason for the level dips were:
Ranger| lead blades (wand), favored enemy (humans), situational buffs (wands, scrolls)
Infernal Bloodrager| hellstrike (more for flavor), shield (wand), long arm(wand), bloodrage, enlarge person (wand, before I learned that it doesn't work on tieflings), and more situational buffs (wands, scrolls).
(And then I learned about what-a-p.i.t.a. it is to use scrolls vs wands...with one level dips...while wearing armor...anywho)
My samurai is close to picking up cornugon smash and the cruel weapon enchantment. He will finish out with Shattered Defenses and either Furious Focus/Dreadful Carnage or Hurtful/Raging Deathblow.
I am really enjoying this character, despite the learning curve :), however, he relies heavily on "1 minute per level" buffs from wands; so, unless I can anticipate combat via buying gloves of recon or arguably meta-gaming, I am running at less than full potential. I typically just tap shield and go.
Any advice out there on how to improve action economy for buffs?
I'm aware of accelerated drinker but would lose the gold efficiency of using wands over potions. Someone had mentioned familiars would help and yesterday I just learned about the bloodline familiar option but only select improved familiars can use wands and they require CL7 and a feat to get. Unfortunately, magical knack on a 1 level dip will not get me there. I was thinking of picking up a spell-storing item but that only frees up move actions, not standards, and they're very expensive.
After spending an entire evening looking into it, I ashamedly admit, the best I could come up with is using Anthropomorphic Animal on a base familiar and pray that a GM will allow it to use wands, understanding that this is not RAW.
Any PFS legal advice would be most welcome, including YMMV ideas. Ideally, I would like to finish out with levels in samurai to hit greater resolve and continue buffing challenge damage.
Thanks!
Can a familiar use a wand spell with a range of 'Personal' on its master?
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Can a familiar use a wand spell with a range of 'Personal' on its master?
Haha, glad I asked before using up any boons or rebuilds. Good catch Matthew. There are still plenty of non-personal handy wands to use but I would still be facing the same primary problem for lead blades, shield, and long arm; the latter not being as important.
I am eager to see if there are other ideas out there.
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He will finish out with Shattered Defenses and either Furious Focus/Dreadful Carnage or Hurtful/Raging Deathblow.
Hurtful is not PFS legal so I'd advise against that choice ;).
How would you keep an animal anthropomorphised all the time to have it use wands on you? It seems to me like you'll have the same problem with cost that you're trying to avoid with potions/scrolls. The animal would also need Use Magic Device trained because it doesn't have a spell list to pull from. So you would need to dip another class to get an animal companion, take Boon Companion to get it to go up to lvl 5, and use its fourth hit die ability score increase to bump its int to 3 so it could put ranks into UMD. This would give it a total of 2 in its UMD (not including charisma bonus/penalty), assuming you put its 4th hd and 5th hd skills into UMD. If you go through all that then you can. Regardless of how much praying you do, no GM should let your animal just "use wands" because he doesn't have a spell list.
This is super expensive, requires you to be NN and worship an evil deity, and uses up a feat, but if you buy a glove of storing, worship Urgathoa, and take Potion Glutton, then you can drink a potion as a swift action (assuming your glove has the potion you want in it). I do something similar, but use my move action to retrieve the potion instead of a glove of storing. This leaves me with my standard to do something else with (usually vital strike).
Gloves of Reconnaissance are actually very inexpensive and seem to be the best way to accomplish what you want. But with four spells going up from wands, your first one is nearly half done by the time you're ready to open the door (and then it is half done).
But really, you should just not rely on those buffs being up for your character to work. You've listed four buffs that you want each combat. By then combat will be over.
@Matthew, no.
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Hurtful is not PFS legal so I'd advise against that choice ;).
Bugbears: all feats on pages 20-21 are legal for play except Hurtful and Pile On; these were removed as legal options on July 29, 2015.
Nooooo! Oh well, I appreciate being let down gently. :)
Re: Anthro Animal, I envisioned burning 2pp to pick up a scroll with 2 casts. At SL3 I believe it should last for 5 hours. I thought about having it primed in a spell storing item. Note that this would be used on a bloodline familiar so it would be drawing on my skill ranks in UMD, but yeah, very clunky, costly, and possibly disfunctional ... at best. This would also be reserved for emergency situations where I was unable to pre-buff.
This is super expensive, requires you to be NN and worship an evil deity, and uses up a feat, but if you buy a glove of storing, worship Urgathoa, and take Potion Glutton, then you can drink a potion as a swift action (assuming your glove has the potion you want in it). I do something similar, but use my move action to retrieve the potion instead of a glove of storing. This leaves me with my standard to do something else with (usually vital strike).
Interesting idea. My sammy currently worships Yaezhing (LE) so there wouldn't be opposition there. Combined with accelerated drinker that could get 3 buffs up in 1 round assuming he walks through dungeons carrying two potions in hand and 1 in a glove of storing.
Gloves of Reconnaissance are actually very inexpensive and seem to be the best way to accomplish what you want. But with four spells going up from wands, your first one is nearly half done by the time you're ready to open the door (and then it is half done).
But really, you should just not rely on those buffs being up for your character to work. You've listed four buffs that you want each combat. By then combat will be over.
3 buffs (can't use enlarge person) but yeah that is true. The only 'must have' right now is shield because his AC is incredibly low (18). Lead blades was more a leftover from when I was planning to enlarge, 2d6 vs 1d8 is a 'nice to have' but not necessarily worth a standard action in combat, especially at higher levels. The intended 1d8 -> 2d6 -> 3d6 might have been a slightly different story with my, eventually keened, katana.
Thanks for the feedback (and corrections) Claude! Any other ideas out there?