So we just started a fresh home game, and we are going for a pirate-esque campaign. My character is a gold scaled kobold who was booted from his tribe for his coloration and rejected from other societies because of what people assume of kobolds. So he has set out to simultaneously prove that kobolds can take what they want by civilized means or by force, to both break both sides' view of kobold's. Kobolds are pretty aware of how weak they are, I want to show them otherwise, other races see us as cowardly backstabbing heathens, I'll show them otherwise too. He's trying to break the mold of what Kobolds are, and hopefully inspire others to do the same.
I'm only giving some backstory because we are aiming for more role play this session.
Now to my actual dilemma! I need to be the face and the general skill monkey and stay on par in combat with a party completely composed of mental stat dumping martials and a magus who said he would cover knowledges. All while being a Kobold cuz since we've done the first sitting the character is set in stone, but I told the DM I was only told I had to cover face so I need to make some changes.
Unchained rogue sounds like my best bet here honestly, I really to work around that -4 strength.
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The -4 STR isn't really that crippling when you have dex to damage. Encumberance is an issue, but you can work around that with traits and magic items, and being small helps offset the problem.
If you are starting at first level, you may want to go with an Inspired Blade Swashbuckler so you can start with Dex to Damage on Rapiers.
There's no such things as a "skills" role. Other than social skills, what do you need to cover?
Bard probably makes the most sense. You're stuck going with a lame dex build though which means you gotta take some dumb dip to get dex to damage or you may as well be useless.
Maybe dip inspired blade swashbuckler then go archaeologist bard?
Go straight Bard. It gives a lot of skill and "face" potential while allowing you to keep up in combat with buff spells and bonuses. Use a crossbow to get around your low Str, you won't be the star of combat, but you will be a valued ally. Also don't play with people who stat dump.
I'm not sure that's gonna net me enough skill points without some serious effort.
Essentials:
Acrobatics*
Perception
Facing:
Intimidate
Diplomacy
Sense motive
Bluff
Skill monkey stuff:
Disable device
Stealth
Etc.
escape artist (crap cmd/cmd)*
1 rank swim*
1 rank climb*
The stuff with an asterisk is what I'm not expected to have maxed but I want anyway. Everything else is what I'm expected to cover.
Trying to stay mundane since that was something we went for this game was low magic. The magus is as low magic as we could get the one guy to go.
Since you are playing a home game ask your DM if you could swap spells for a (diminished) sneak attack progression. That way you keep your performances, but stay 'mundane'.
Bard. Definitely Bard. Versatile Performance will cover social skills and possibly acrobatics and you should have enough skill points for the others.
If you have a martial heavy group, you are likely to do more damage with your bard song alone than most characters will do with their attacks. Adding damage to each hit and turning misses into hits can really add up.
I'd focus the character on being 'the safety' taking things like glitterdust to help the others deal with invisibility, and stuff like that. If you are allowed to use the trapfind trait from Mummy's mask you should be good to go on traps, if not, I'd say your group will just be best off taking the odd magical trap in the face, or finding alternate means around them.
Lastly, I'd put just enough feats into archery to give you something to do when everything is going well. You won't do a ton of damage, but now and again you can probably take an enemy from almost down (but still able to do as much damage to your party) to actually down.
I'm not sure that's gonna net me enough skill points without some serious effort.
Essentials:
Acrobatics*
PerceptionFacing:
Intimidate
Diplomacy
Sense motive
BluffSkill monkey stuff:
Disable device
StealthEtc.
escape artist (crap cmd/cmd)*
1 rank swim*
1 rank climb*The stuff with an asterisk is what I'm not expected to have maxed but I want anyway. Everything else is what I'm expected to cover.
I don't think you need all three CHA social skills for Facing. Namely Intimidate is what I feel you don't need. As far as I know nothing it does that diplomacy couldn't have done.
So you're needing 9 skill points a level to do this skill listed (minus intimidate) so that's a rogue with int 12 or FCB skill point. Or a bard because of versatile performance/ other ways to get skills.
If you don't think bow damage would be enough to be useful, you could take the dazzling display feat instead. 30' demoralize is pretty impressive help in a boarding action.
Plus the Kobold Captain swinging his whip around like a boss while encouraging his crew to greater bloodlust is a pretty awesome image.
Well I was told to have all of them cuz everyone else is gonna suck at it. Almost had a sense motive buddy with the monk but the vow of truth(?) ruined that. asked who could help me with facing and what skills they could offer. I was told none take them all.
Also I he can be sneaky, that's not against the concept, it's more for it. When I say take by force I don't mean straight up combat necessarily, I could steal or get a could stab in the back in before the fight. He's no stranger to fighting dirty.
Essentially he is going to be a capable diplomat, and able to to hold his own in a scrap. Proving that a kobold can have mutually beneficial relations with other races and prove the inverse to them, while being a capable combatant to prove we aren't to be triffled with or stepped on.
You are not obligated to fit into the expectations your party wants. It's their own fault for making their characters terrible dumb fighters.
Although honestly, a "low magic" Magus is downright idiocy. Why even play the class then?
Another class that may be of interest, which I'm having a grand time with in one of my games right now, is Investigator. It can sufficiently act and be useful in nearly every situation possible.
The big question here though is this. Do you want to deal damage in melee? Ranged? Yes or No? You're small, using small weapons, which means terrible damage. Your only means of doing anything is by taking detours to grab dex to damage/finesse etc.
Rogue obviously has the most skill points. Bard with its virtual performances can get you even more skills.
If you have a bunch of martials, being a buffer is going to be really powerful. You would be a force multiplier. So if you're a bard, you can have lots of skills and utility. Also, you would be an emergency healer.
When do you ever need to use intimidate and diplomacy wouldn't work?
The only thing intimidate does as a face skill is "force" someone to be kinda nice to you for a few minutes. Or you could diplomacy to make them actually nice to you. If you want it that's fine. I'm just saying I don't think it's a needed skill for a person with other Face options.
When do you ever need to use intimidate and diplomacy wouldn't work?
The only thing intimidate does as a face skill is "force" someone to be kinda nice to you for a few minutes. Or you could diplomacy to make them actually nice to you. If you want it that's fine. I'm just saying I don't think it's a needed skill for a person with other Face options.
Especially at lower levels, the DC to make a hostile or unfriendly person help you out is a whole lot lower with intimidate.
That said, if I had to choose one, usually it would indeed be diplomacy over intimidate.
I was thinking unchained melee rogue, plenty of flanking buddies and I we have a dedicated ranged martial in the party.
Also the magus isn't low magic in that sense. That's the least magical class we could get him to take.
I haven't read the errata for slashing grace yet, but can I utilize that with a weapon and use natural attacks on the side? More attacks could help my small dice. Depending on how slashing grace works I could have a dex to attack and damage with a weapon and a tail attack.
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It depends on the natural weapon. You cannot use another hand with slashing grace
Here is the errata'd text.
You can stab your enemies with your sword or another slashing weapon.Prerequisites: Dex 13, Weapon Finesse, Weapon Focus with chosen weapon.
Benefit: Choose one kind of light or one-handed slashing weapon (such as the longsword). When wielding your chosen weapon one-handed, you can treat it as a one-handed piercing melee weapon for all feats and class abilities that require such a weapon (such as a swashbuckler’s or a duelist’s precise strike) and you can add your Dexterity modifier instead of your Strength modifier to that weapon’s damage. The weapon must be one appropriate for your size. You do not gain this benefit while fighting with two weapons or using flurry of blows, or any time another hand is otherwise occupied.
If you are going unchained rogue, just ignore slashing grace. It's too hard to qualify for, and you can take a secondary weapon for finesse training at 11th.
Dude the only feat tax there is weapon focus which isn't a bad idea anyway, I'm def ok getting that. Also it's a tail attack. There's a racial feat to get one.
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1 Inspired blade Swashbuckler/ X Empiricist Investigator. Grab fencing Grace Level 1.
Take Mutagen and fast study @ 5 HD and enjoy your massive dex and dex to damage.
Tons of Skills....if you take Student of Philosophy you can get all the right Face skills while Dumping Cha into the abyss.
Enjoy being a badass with the Swashigator Build.
1 Inspired blade Swashbuckler/ X Empiricist Investigator. Grab fencing Grace Level 1.
Take Mutagen and fast study @ 5 HD and enjoy your massive dex and dex to damage.
Tons of Skills....if you take Student of Philosophy you can get all the right Face skills while Dumping Cha into the abyss.
Enjoy being a badass with the Swashigator Build.
Recommending this. They can dish tons of damage, are excellent skill and knowledge monkeys, great faces with Student of Philosophy, can get very good AC and have the additional benefit of extracts and all the stuff that can entail such as alchemical allocation potion cheese, or just vomiting spiders for shiggles.
The swashbuckler dip isn't entirely useless either as you do gain a small bit of panache which you can use for Opportune Parry and Riposte, which will help even more with keeping you alive.
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The swashbuckler dip isn't entirely useless either as you do gain a small bit of panache which you can use for Opportune Parry and Riposte, which will help even more with keeping you alive.
You forget Darring-do + Inspiration skill synergy...Nice boosts to a good majority of your skills is always nice. =)
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The swashbuckler dip isn't entirely useless either as you do gain a small bit of panache which you can use for Opportune Parry and Riposte, which will help even more with keeping you alive.You forget Darring-do + Inspiration skill synergy...Nice boosts to a good majority of your skills is always nice. =)
Too bad Derring-do requires you to spend panache to use it. I find panache too valuable to waste on a +1d6 to a physical skill.
There's no such things as a "skills" role. Other than social skills, what do you need to cover?
Perhaps I should word it this way, if it isn't combat, I've got it covered.
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1 Inspired blade Swashbuckler/ X Empiricist Investigator. Grab fencing Grace Level 1.
Take Mutagen and fast study @ 5 HD and enjoy your massive dex and dex to damage.
Tons of Skills....if you take Student of Philosophy you can get all the right Face skills while Dumping Cha into the abyss.
Enjoy being a badass with the Swashigator Build.
I'm about to start RoRL AP and faced with a similar challenge as the OP. The other 3 members are a paladin, cleric and barbarian so I pretty much have no choice but take a skill monkey but, I have to say, I am excited to play the "1 Inspired blade Swashbuckler/ X Empiricist Investigator", I think it will be a lot of fun!
I'm about to start RoRL AP and faced with a similar challenge as the OP. The other 3 members are a paladin, cleric and barbarian so I pretty much have no choice but take a skill monkey but, I have to say, I am excited to play the "1 Inspired blade Swashbuckler/ X Empiricist Investigator", I think it will be a lot of fun!
I'd probably err more on the side of a Bard in your case since you're lacking arcane casting, but it may not be an issue.
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I'd probably err more on the side of a Bard in your case since you're lacking arcane casting, but it may not be an issue.
I'm about to start RoRL AP and faced with a similar challenge as the OP. The other 3 members are a paladin, cleric and barbarian so I pretty much have no choice but take a skill monkey but, I have to say, I am excited to play the "1 Inspired blade Swashbuckler/ X Empiricist Investigator", I think it will be a lot of fun!
I thought of that but for some reason I just can't bring myself to playing a bard... don't know what it is, just doesn't appeal to me.
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I'm about to start RoRL AP and faced with a similar challenge as the OP. The other 3 members are a paladin, cleric and barbarian so I pretty much have no choice but take a skill monkey but, I have to say, I am excited to play the "1 Inspired blade Swashbuckler/ X Empiricist Investigator", I think it will be a lot of fun!
I've Coined it Swashigator! It is a ton of fun.
But I honestly would be worried about the lack of Arcane casting and Anvil abilities of the party. Rise of the Runelords is brutal with combat more than skills. There are maybe like 3-5 traps in the first 2 books which can be avoided to triggered in other manners than Disable device. Book 3 has about 3-5 traps in it but every one of the traps are HP/Fortitude based...the barbarian can muscle through them. Book 4 has 0 traps, Book 5 has maybe 4 traps if you even do those areas, and book 6 has 0 traps. So maybe 15 traps total in the entire AP is not enough to lock someone into the made up role of "Trapfinder".
I recommend a Full arcane caster as you should reach level 17 and 9th level spells.
The paladin can handle the face skills...but most things will require fighting. And some fights have LOTs of Mooks that need controlled.
Too bad Derring-do requires you to spend panache to use it. I find panache too valuable to waste on a +1d6 to a physical skill.
Depend...I know in skulls and shackles the first few levels there is very little fighting and more skilled based...you fail a skill your hurting....Like failing a climb check you can fall 30ft and take some serious damage. Same goes for Swim (you will drowned), slight of Hand (You fail this and get a beating)....I would agree with you for the most part about panache being more important for Combat uses...luckily with this build you grab the +2 int headband first and Shoot for a +1 Adamantine Inspired Flamboyant Rapier to help in the ability department.
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I'm about to start RoRL AP and faced with a similar challenge as the OP. The other 3 members are a paladin, cleric and barbarian so I pretty much have no choice but take a skill monkey but, I have to say, I am excited to play the "1 Inspired blade Swashbuckler/ X Empiricist Investigator", I think it will be a lot of fun!I've Coined it Swashigator! It is a ton of fun.
But I honestly would be worried about the lack of Arcane casting and Anvil abilities of the party. Rise of the Runelords is brutal with combat more than skills. There are maybe like 3-5 traps in the first 2 books which can be avoided to triggered in other manners than Disable device. Book 3 has about 3-5 traps in it but every one of the traps are HP/Fortitude based...the barbarian can muscle through them. Book 4 has 0 traps, Book 5 has maybe 4 traps if you even do those areas, and book 6 has 0 traps. So maybe 15 traps total in the entire AP is not enough to lock someone into the made up role of "Trapfinder".
I recommend a Full arcane caster as you should reach level 17 and 9th level spells.
The paladin can handle the face skills...but most things will require fighting. And some fights have LOTs of Mooks that need controlled.
My secondary option was a cleric necromancer but now you have me seriously reconsidering everything... maybe an arcanist would be a better overall choice?
My secondary option was a cleric necromancer but now you have me seriously reconsidering everything... maybe an arcanist would be a better overall choice?
Go Occultist archetype Arcanist and just summon all the things forever.
We're doing a 5th Ed conversion of RotRL, and we're the most balanced party I've ever seen. I play a dwarf cleric of Life (Desna), and we have a fighter (eldritch knight), rogue (arcane trickster), wizard (diviner that blasts), ranger (hunter-archer), and later a barbarian (frenzied berserker-type) joined us. But we're pretty effective. Different system, though.
Occultist can't summon all things forever. They are now really limited by their arcane reservoir.
Occultist can't summon all things forever. They are now really limited by their arcane reservoir.
I was a bit hyperbolic but it's more than enough for the adventuring day, and going in that summoning direction works well as an alternative to his necromancer idea.
your reservoir is 3+1/2 level
at lv 1 you spend 1 per summon out of 3.
at lv 3 you spend 2 per summon out of 4.
at lv 5 you spend 3 per summon out of 5.
at lv 7 you spend 4 per summon out of 6.
Also you can only consume based on your charisma mod(min 1) times per day. So unless you have a cha 14 or higher (or increase your pool) you can get out 2 summons in a day.
@Malag: I feel ya, my rogue is and always has been my favorite class.
your reservoir is 3+1/2 level
at lv 1 you spend 1 per summon out of 3.
at lv 3 you spend 2 per summon out of 4.
at lv 5 you spend 3 per summon out of 5.
at lv 7 you spend 4 per summon out of 6.Also you can only consume based on your charisma mod(min 1) times per day. So unless you have a cha 14 or higher (or increase your pool) you can get out 2 summons in a day.
All those spells known per day slots come in handy.
your reservoir is 3+1/2 level
at lv 1 you spend 1 per summon out of 3.
at lv 3 you spend 2 per summon out of 4.
at lv 5 you spend 3 per summon out of 5.
at lv 7 you spend 4 per summon out of 6.Also you can only consume based on your charisma mod(min 1) times per day. So unless you have a cha 14 or higher (or increase your pool) you can get out 2 summons in a day.
1/2 of 1 is still 1, so the numbers would actually be 4,5,6,7. It isn't perfect, but that said, you don't always have to use the strongest level SM spell available. It's still much more open in allowing you the ability to summon precisely what you need when you need it, like a trap monkey or some such which lasts for minutes, and not seconds, while not clogging your prepared list with summon monsters.
1/2 of 1 is still 1, so the numbers would actually be 4,5,6,7. It isn't perfect, but that said, you don't always have to use the strongest level SM spell available. It's still much more open in allowing you the ability to summon precisely what you need when you need it, like a trap monkey or some such which lasts for minutes, and not seconds, while not clogging your prepared list with summon monsters.your reservoir is 3+1/2 level
at lv 1 you spend 1 per summon out of 3.
at lv 3 you spend 2 per summon out of 4.
at lv 5 you spend 3 per summon out of 5.
at lv 7 you spend 4 per summon out of 6.Also you can only consume based on your charisma mod(min 1) times per day. So unless you have a cha 14 or higher (or increase your pool) you can get out 2 summons in a day.
In pathfinder you always round down unless it specifically says otherwise. So 1/2 of 1 is 0. 1/2 of 3 is 1.
You said "other races see us as cowardly backstabbing heathens. ill show them otherwise too"
How exactly are you going to show them otherwise by playing a rogue, aka Sneaky McBackstab?
Fighting dirty doesn't make you a coward. Also this is just a quick gist of his story so some stuffs a tad off. He is basically aiming to have a reputation of that of a well accomplished privateer. I'm sure they used dirty tactics and weren't considered cowards.
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Go Occultist archetype Arcanist and just summon all the things forever.
Thanks for the tip!
I was going to mention Occultist Arcanist, Witch, or Necromancy WIzard.
I have played RotRL 2 times all the way through. First run I played a cleric.
Second play through I went as a gluttony wizard (thassilonian specialist) I was wrecking the AP...Controlling every undead I came across and beating the DM senseless. I SPecialized later into Magic Jar. During one point I Magic Jared a boss of his and Trivialized an Entire encounters so the DM gibbed me with a random giant outta nowhere who killed me instantly (no save, no attack roll, no nothing).
So outta SPite I rolled a Time Patron SLumber Hex Witch and made him regret killing the wizard off. Nothing like having your Bosses dropped to slumber for 3 books. Kind of anticlimactic...but you know do unto others....
As much as I like Occultist...missing out on 9th level spells sucks...The want for wish and time stop are great =)
But trust me an Occultist has enough summoning power to work. You have the Reservoir and your spells...you can easily get by especially since the summons last Minutes/Level...so mid levels you can get average of 2 fights per summoning hopefully. On Top of the CC you can lay down with spells like Glitterdust and create pit. What really makes it nice is if you can use your summoning AND command undead (the Spell) to make 2 seperate armies of Fodder to b$+%% smack the AP with.
Hunter!
Spellcasting, bonus Teamwork feats, 6+ skills...
Go for a Outflank/Precise Strike melee build using something with a good crit threat and you are golden (pardon the pun).
You can even wind up riding your animal companion as a mount. :D
Hmmmm, thoughts for a viable mount for a campaign with both on land and on boat battles? Something fast and nimble would be good.