Greetings forum members I'm starting a game where in gonna be playing an unbreakable fight who uses a bastard sword I like how you can one hand it with the exotic feat( my dm has given me this feat for free because why not lol) and so I'm looking for suggestions on how I can use the sword 1 handed to my advantage. Any suggestion? I've considered using a shield but I still want to 2 hand it, if there was a buckler that could turn into a heavy steel shield that would be awsome!
I started with a bastard Sword and shield after my L2 rebuild on my tengu slayer in PFS play.
However, despite having it masterwork and in flank, etc, I never could seem to HIT with the dang thing going sword and board. Luck of the roll or whatnot. Had a better hit percentage with my *shield bash* and *beak* attacks on a full round. (Yes, you read that correctly)
Picked up a Sawtooth Sabre and am currently using it in the 'off' hand, with my main hand for bashing.
After a few levels I may go back to the bastard sword in mainhand, but the utility wasn't effective for me, unfortunately.
Your mileage may vary.
Get a Quickdraw light shield they allow you to equip the shield and unequip it as a swift action. If you get the Quick Draw feat that swift action becomes a free action.
Oh wow sorry about the grammar, I'm not very good at those kind of things my bad. Well we have a half Orc slayer who is str based, a ranged hunter, a witch with the time patron, and a um earth bender? I forget the name of the class. I'm hoping to fulfill a frontline damage dealer, I don't want to go full tank, if I get a shield I may get some shield feats but I have no intention to be bashing with it.
Well how can I remain relevant because I'm pretty settled on fighter, I was looking forward to wearing full plate
Well how can I remain relevant because I'm pretty settled on fighter, I was looking forward to wearing full plate
Trouble with the unbreakable archetype is that it trades out all of your weapon training. I recommend picking an archetype that keeps weapon training in some form or another.
EDIT: the drill sergeant archetype gives you weapon training with a single group of weapons but the bonus still increases as you level. Gives you a number of party buffs and keeps all of your Armor training intact which will make wearing full plate even more effective.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Saying that any class of character isn't "relevant" because he isn't optimised enough is just simply wrong-headed thinking. Whether you're a plain vanilla fighter or even a non-unchained rogue, you're still relevant, at any level, simply due to the fact that you are a player sitting round the same table, able to roleplay your character alongside everybody else.
It's not a competition.
And if your pal the wizard seems to outclass you that much, tell him he really needs to devote some of his vast resources to making you better at what you do. He can do it without even breaking a sweat.
This said, a fighter needs to go all out on acquiring as many magic items with as much power as possible. He needs it far more than his pals the wizards, clerics and druids, simply because they have so much innate magic at their fingertips.
I played for four years in a DD3.5 campaign with a fighter/rogue who had a 13 STR. I did great, even when my pals were dying right & left. I think I was the only PC who never died in that 4 years of gaming. Even though I would have almost prefered dying and getting to have better stats than those I was stuck with, simply because at the time we were using rolled stats, and I got unlucky where my pals had like 4 of 6 stats in the 16+ range. But I stayed "relevant". Didn't even give that a second thought.
Seconding dropping fighter. If you really want the heavy armor, then how about a Steelblood Bloodrager? It'll give you a lot more options. Also as mentioned, you're probably better off just going with a greatsword.
If I had the opportunity of a free EWP Bastard sword I'd go Magus though. Being able to freely swap hands as needed for Spell Combat or Spellstrike etc would help immensely and be a solid way of avoiding the cookiecutter scimitar dex builds.
yea, the bastard sword is really good with certain bloodlines if you can get the large size increase. impact or lead blades and vital strike dice damage for days
The Bastard Sword is best when used with a dynamic Sword & Board style. This is using Quickdraw and the Quicdraw Shields to always have the best combat style for a given opponent.
Bad melee mosher? Sword & Board.
Evil caster? - Twohand it for extra damage with STR-Bonus and bigger Powerattack value.
Bastard sword for free is also good for a strength-based magus.
With Fighter, you will eventually lose all effectiveness.
Consider Barbarian.
This is largely overstated. A well built fighter does about as well as a Barbarian for damage. The Barbarian's only real advantage is the potential to pounce. The Fighter's overall issue is from its lack of out of combat usefulness.
Samurai. Because why bastard sword when you can katana?
This is largely overstated. A well built fighter does about as well as a Barbarian for damage. The Barbarian's only real advantage is the potential to pounce. The Fighter's overall issue is from its lack of out of combat usefulness.With Fighter, you will eventually lose all effectiveness.
Consider Barbarian.
He does a little (not much, but just a little) worse for to hit & damage. A well built barbarian has better AC, though. Also, more skills and HP, which is nice.
Overall, barbarian is quite a bit better, but not enough that you go 'Oh, crap, he's taking up xp with his high-level fighter'. At least, not any more than one would think if they swapped in a high-level barbarian for said fighter.
But high levels aren't really the concern here - low level play is. And at 1st level, +7 to hit/1d10+5 damage is an unlimited use, ~50% chance to kill whatever you point it at, which is awesome.
How can the barbarian have better ac? I don't understand
1) Your fighter doesn't get a damage bonus until level 4. Every other melee class gets something starting at level 1.
2) The barb gets superstition. That means his saves against magic are incredibly better then those of a fighter.
3) The barb can take a Nat AC bonus and have a superior AC to a fighter.
4) The barb has a 40 move. You won't be able to wear full plate with a full move of 30 until level 8...so you'll always be slower then the barb.
5) The barb gets DR and has more hit points then the Fighter.
6) The barb gets a better will save while raging at early levels, but superstitious blows it away by later ones.
7) The barb's bonus from raging will apply to the shield if you chose to bash. You're going to have to wait until weapon training 2 at level 8 if you try that. More likely, you're just not going to bother and use it for AC if you run out of rage rounds or something.
8) Witch hunter is a solid damage boost against anything using magic.
9) You can potentially get pounce.
10) you can potentially learn to sunder spells.
11) You have more skills and a better skill list, which makes NO sense, but it's right there.
Take a barbarian, and play him like a smart fighter. Think of his rage as a combat buff you can use and abuse. But in terms of staying power, defenses, and offenses, he starts off much better then a fighter and stays relevant for a much longer period of time.
I advise barb over fighter unless you are playing some very specific archetypes (like the one with a familiar, martial master, or mutagen warrior...or all 3).
Seriously, not getting a melee buff until level 4 should convince you just how sad the fighter is right there.
==Aelryinth
Steelblooded Barbarian can wear heavy armor.
Little fix here. Steelblood is a Bloodrager archetype which allows heavy armor. Armored Hulk is the Barbarian archetype that allows heavy armor.
Since this isn't PFS, Bloodrager is probably the better option due to Primalist archetype.
Blergh. Good catch there. Bloodrager is steelblooded, Barbarian is armored hulk. Steelblooded stacks with the Destined bloodline as well, which can kick your AC through the roof. Beast Totem + Heavy Armor + Shield + Destined Bloodline means you'll be nigh-impossible to hit. Extra bonus if you have a good enough dex to use Mithral full plate. Defending weapon if you don't care about hitting enemies for a round.
Don't forget Fate's Favored trait with Destined bloodline.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Not gonna lie, but this is all really disheartening, after all that it seems there really is no reason to ever play a fighter, I'm still gonna stick with what I wanted to do because u really want to play around with heroic defiance/recovery and I'm not trying to optimize all out, I'm trying to fit a character idea. Thank you everyone for your advice
Another idea would be 1 level in Unbreakable Fighter, the rest in an Invulnerable Rager Barbarian. Just dare them to try to kill you. And you get more feats out of it than a regular Fighter or barbarian.
Consider looking at the weapon versatility, or equipment trick feats for actual things you can do with a bastard sword, which some folks in this thread seen to have skipped over.
Not gonna lie, but this is all really disheartening, after all that it seems there really is no reason to ever play a fighter, I'm still gonna stick with what I wanted to do because u really want to play around with heroic defiance/recovery and I'm not trying to optimize all out, I'm trying to fit a character idea. Thank you everyone for your advice
Don't forget that nearly anything can be refluffed. You don't have to be a "fighter" to be a fighter etc. That said, yea, it's unfortunate Paizo balanced fighters so poorly.
Could you give us more of an idea for what you're looking for?
If you want the flavor of the fighter, but with better abilities, you should check out the slayer.
The only thing fighter is really good at is not getting slowed down by heavy armor.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The only thing I remember about the Bastard sword at the moment is that it gets better % increase in damage from Enlarge/Impact/etc weapons than almost everything.
1d10 enlarged turns into 2d8
2d8 enlarged turns into 3d8
So if you can get Impact+Enlarge you'll be doing triple the base damage of a longsword.
As for playing different classes, people on these forums tend to be a bit too obsessed with 100% optimisation. Fighters are fine, the main problem they have is lack of versatility outside of combat.
In combat they have the advantage that the only resource that they run out of is HP, and everyone has that problem. If you can keep your HP up, you're good to go no matter how many encounters the GM throws at you. Where the wizard/barbarian/basically every other class will eventually run out of X/day abilities and become less powerful, you'll still be standing there swinging your sword at full strength till the end of time.
Well my current stat spread is 18,12,14,10,14,13 we are using automatic bonus progression and I'm making his mental bonus cha so he'll have 16 cha with a trait to get diplomacy my character is the face of the party, so with the backstory I'm having he's got nobility in his blood I'm building a character who is not dumb (that stereotypical barbarian) who is brave and heroic, honestly if I didn't have this character in mind id be playing a barbarian hands down no questions asked.
Well my current stat spread is 18,12,14,10,14,13 we are using automatic bonus progression and I'm making his mental bonus cha so he'll have 16 cha with a trait to get diplomacy my character is the face of the party, so with the backstory I'm having he's got nobility in his blood I'm building a character who is not dumb (that stereotypical barbarian) who is brave and heroic, honestly if I didn't have this character in mind id be playing a barbarian hands down no questions asked.
Remember, just because you're a barbarian doesn't mean you're some kind of illiterate savage. You can play your character however you please, especially as a Bloodrager since there is no alignment requirement either.
Same goes with if you wanted to be a "rogue". A rogue could be sooo many different things beyond the class of rogue that all accomplish the same, even better things.
Don't get hung up on the class names.
And what makes the Barb unable to fin your character concept?
Note you don't have to play a class in the stereotypical way.
With that character concept, you probably want a cavalier. But, if you weren't planning on wearing heavy armor, slayer is good for that.
Well my current stat spread is 18,12,14,10,14,13 we are using automatic bonus progression and I'm making his mental bonus cha so he'll have 16 cha with a trait to get diplomacy my character is the face of the party, so with the backstory I'm having he's got nobility in his blood I'm building a character who is not dumb (that stereotypical barbarian) who is brave and heroic, honestly if I didn't have this character in mind id be playing a barbarian hands down no questions asked.
Sounds like a paladin or Cavalier to me.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Oh, hey. Player wants to play fighter.
Awesome.
Let's try to be helpful within the framework of the fighter class. I know it's difficult (admittedly I was one of the folks that suggested slayer), but let's play-pretend that those options aren't available for Reasons, and work with the player's desire to have a fighter?
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'm not a fan of how everyone is saying go barbarian over fighter because "it's better." Anything is viable and he's doing it for flavor reasons. "But barbarian does it better!" So what? It doesn't fit the character very well, his character doesn't rage from what I understand and his character fits the "knight" trope so why min-max because "barbs are better?" In my experience if the DM doesn't suck then he won't make his players suffer from wanting to use flavor and rp more than min-maxing. At least, I don't when DMing.
I'm not a fan of how everyone is saying go barbarian over fighter because "it's better." Anything is viable and he's doing it for flavor reasons. "But barbarian does it better!" So what? It doesn't fit the character very well, his character doesn't rage from what I understand and his character fits the "knight" trope so why min-max because "barbs are better?" In my experience if the DM doesn't suck then he won't make his players suffer from wanting to use flavor and rp more than min-maxing. At least, I don't when DMing.
90% of the time Class does not equal Flavor. His concept is doable with more mechanically viable classes. So unless he specifically wants the mechanics the fighter class offers he's better off picking another class. Oh and for the record not all GMs hold your hand; assuming the campaign was built with all party roles in mind you either pull your weight or not. Oh the other party members is stealing your glory too bad. It's not their fault your class and archetype is not mechanically viable.
I'm not a fan of how everyone is saying go barbarian over fighter because "it's better." Anything is viable and he's doing it for flavor reasons. "But barbarian does it better!" So what? It doesn't fit the character very well, his character doesn't rage from what I understand and his character fits the "knight" trope so why min-max because "barbs are better?" In my experience if the DM doesn't suck then he won't make his players suffer from wanting to use flavor and rp more than min-maxing. At least, I don't when DMing.90% of the time Class does not equal Flavor. His concept is doable with more mechanically viable classes. So unless he specifically wants the mechanics the fighter class offers he's better off picking another class. Oh and for the record not all GMs hold your hand; assuming the campaign was built with all party roles in mind you either pull your weight or not. Oh the other party members is stealing your glory too bad. It's not their fault your class and archetype is not mechanically viable.
That's not exactly what I meant, you don't hold your players hands you acknowledge their choices and if one of them wants to be something less viable/min-maxy for flavor reasons there is nothing wrong with that. If he wants to be a fighter to fit his character's style then that's fine, even if it isn't optimal. Barbarian in particular, unless radically changed, is basically the opposite of his character and would be purely an optimisation. If he wants to optimize sure, go for it, but in the end flavor/rp is the key to this game.
How is a barbarian the opposite of his character? Fluff is fluff.
I'm the son of a noble, and when I see someone that needs my help or if a big problem is in my way my adrenaline get's pumping and I'm capable of pulling off feats of str that normal men couldn't. I also don't let the pain stop me from achieving my goals and can shrug off the strongest of attacks. Even the mighty mage cannot stop me from triumph!
A bloodrager or barbarian or unchained barb is this character. depending on if you want magic or no magic. Works great with his stat spread listed, and gets 2 more skills per level. You could even go Urban version to not take any penalties while raging.
I'm the son of a noble, I've spent my entire life working on my bastard sword skills. Other weapons don't feel right in my hand. I only get 2 skills per level, so I can't take as many skills as befitting my noble raising. And yeah, that's about it. I just really like bastard swords.
so unless you're going lore warden and Martial Master you don't really have skill points or flexibility, but then you're also in light armor. Or you could go Mutation Warrior, but then you have chemicals in your story. Eldritch Guardian is another pretty good one, gives you a pet.
Granted a fighter is pretty good at hitting things with a bastard sword, so if you wanted to go that route it's not like it's a core rogue or monk. You do do combat well. You just don't have much else you do.
That's not exactly what I meant, you don't hold your players hands you acknowledge their choices and if one of them wants to be something less viable/min-maxy for flavor reasons there is nothing wrong with that. If he wants to be a fighter to fit his character's style then that's fine, even if it isn't optimal. Barbarian in particular, unless radically changed, is basically the opposite of his character and would be purely an optimisation. If he wants to optimize sure, go for it, but in the end flavor/rp is the key to this game.I'm not a fan of how everyone is saying go barbarian over fighter because "it's better." Anything is viable and he's doing it for flavor reasons. "But barbarian does it better!" So what? It doesn't fit the character very well, his character doesn't rage from what I understand and his character fits the "knight" trope so why min-max because "barbs are better?" In my experience if the DM doesn't suck then he won't make his players suffer from wanting to use flavor and rp more than min-maxing. At least, I don't when DMing.90% of the time Class does not equal Flavor. His concept is doable with more mechanically viable classes. So unless he specifically wants the mechanics the fighter class offers he's better off picking another class. Oh and for the record not all GMs hold your hand; assuming the campaign was built with all party roles in mind you either pull your weight or not. Oh the other party members is stealing your glory too bad. It's not their fault your class and archetype is not mechanically viable.
I am all for rp. If I was a full optimization kind of guy I would have picked nothing but tier 1 classes with fully min-maxed builds.
But one has to recognize that most of the time class does not equal flavor. Especially in this guy's case. It has even been pointed out that a cavalier would fit his concept better. The only reason to play a fighter then is because he is going for a build that can only be done through using the fighter class.
If someone goes into a game with a weak class and archetype combination, even should the GM jump through hoops to make them feel useful they will feel they aren't even close to what their party mates can achieve, especially when th ey learn more about the game.
The people here are actually trying to help him avoid disappointment, if that isn't a positive thing I don't know what is.
For the sake of argument though let's say that he wants to pick the fighter because his build requires plenty of feats and his build is part of his concept. Fine, then why is he picking an archetype that trades out weapon training with something not even equivalent to it. Weapon Training is actually one of the class special abilities that allow the fighters to do their thing which unless heavily modified with archetypes and feats to do otherwise their thing is doing damage.