So my old Saturday game has fallen through and my Sunday game has all but fallen through as well, however I might have found a game to replace said games. You see a companion of mine from my Friday game GMs sometimes and he expressed interest in GMing a campaign of Carrion Crown (a very deadly AP as you all know) with a small twist, everyone would have to play as Occult Adventures classes. Nice thing we get first pick and first call for the game if and when he does decide to start it. In preparation I've been looking at the classes and am quite interested in playing as a Halfling Medium (which is where the shitty joke of a title comes from). Now as a really deadly AP I feel that if I make this character I should optimize a bit more than usual if I want to see this guy through. That being said, I've been eyeing (no pun intended) the Nexian Channeler archetype which replaces the Archmage spirit with the Spirit of Nex as well as replace "haunt channeler, location channel, connection channel, propitiation, ask the spirits, astral journey, trance of three,spacious soul, and astral beacon."
My question is, has anyone here played a Nexian Channeler and if so how did they like it? Would it be strong enough to possibly survive this campaign? How good is the Third Eye ability? One thing I should note is that he intends to change the AP slightly so more psychic based enemies show up than normal (ousting some of the non-psychics in the process).
The Nex (or Archmage) spirit looks like a 2/3 caster trying to imitate the big guys. 2/3 casters lack the required staying power to be pure casters even when the spell level difference isn't hurting them; I don't think they'd be a good choice for a deadly AP.
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The Champion makes the Medium a really strong combatant (even a small-sized one) can out-damage a fighter of the same level.
The issue I found when trying to play one was "having something useful to do in combat when you're not possessed by the Champion, since you don't have very good proficiencies at all. The primary benefit I found of the caster archetypes was that you can put on your wizard hat in levels when you're not expecting to get into fights and cast whatever you happen to need at that particular juncture, since you're unlikely going to be as effective when fighting' as the Archmage or the Hierophant than you are as the Champion. Since the Trickster also gives you max ranks in whatever skills you want, you're a terror in campaigns where you have interludes in which you do need to do other stuff, rather than just tromping through a dungeon.
Medium requires too much paperwork in my opinion.
If they ever released an archetype that, for example, makes you choose two permanent Spirits to be simultaneously active but progress slower, I'd be all up that shit.
Champion medium isn't exactly great at its job either -- saves and CMD are too low for the frontlines.
I think that the class should have allowed for two Spirits to live together eventually, so you could make your Champ + Guardian melee Medium, your Trickster + Archmage caster monkey, your Hierophant + Marshall buffmaster, and so on.
I've seen plenty of 3/4 bab, not good fort saves work on the front lines. Oracle, bard, rogue, and investigators. The medium has good will save, which is handy for a front liner. And the Medium gets a bonus to it's fort saves the others don't. Plus you can add an extra 1d6 after you fail a fort save to try and pass it.
Is a champion medium really ever going to change his spirit?
I think if you somehow acquired a proficiency in a decent weapon without being possessed, you could be a pretty effective combatant as the Trickster too (since you have a "guaranteed to work at least once" sneak attack.) It's just that the trickster is (default) only proficient with simple weapons and the Champion gives you proficiency in anything you could want, so you'll want to build around a good weapon because the Champion only gives you two floating feats. I could maybe see buying feats around the sling or the crossbow if you wanted to switch hit trickster and champion and still be able to fight some as one of the other spirits? Sling would be appropriate for a halfling. That the base damage on a small sling is bad is okay since you're getting +3-+7 to damage for every hit just from class features.
Regarding the Champion being too weak for the front lines though, don't forget that you get you spirit bonus to your fort saves if you're possessed by the Champion, so at eighth level a Champion medium would have base saves Will +6, Reflex +2, Fort +2 (+3). So one less than if you had a good fort save, which is hardly crippling. Champion medium will always have their base fort save within 1 or 2 of their base will save, and I think every fighter would love to have their will save stay within 1 or 2 of their fort save before other mods. CMD can be a problem (particularly if you're small) but that can be worked around. I think the idea of "being able to have two spirits at once" would be way too powerful though.
Agreed with PossibleCabbage: there's a reason why they removed the dual-channeling aspect of the medium between the play-test and the finalized class. Pulling two spirits, or more, is too powerful. I just wish they'd looked more at the finalized class.
One of the biggest problems I see for going caster focused with the medium, at low levels at least, is how lackluster the archmage is even with the Nexian archetype. Mediums have a low progression of spells per day and an equally slow progression of spells known. My recommendation would be to stick with the champion for the first couple levels, then switch to a caster focus if you still want to.
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Champion medium isn't exactly great at its job either -- saves and CMD are too low for the frontlines.
Wait...what? With Spirit Focus your Fort and Will Saves are both Good (+6, +2, +6 at 8th level). Your CMD isn't super high, but there are plenty of ways to deal with that.
Champion + Spirit Focus makes for a fine melee or ranged character.
EDIT: Seriously Ninja'd.
Champion + Spirit Focus makes for a fine melee or ranged character.
Only issue is that a Champion medium is especially feat-starved for a martial oriented character. Like if you want to play an archer, the basic trio of PBS, Precise Shot, and Rapid Shot takes you until level 5 to complete. You have great bonuses from the spirit, but if you want to qualify for prereqs for neat feats it's going to be tough.
Over the weekend I tried plotting out a Halfling Medium who uses Slipslinger Style as the Champion (and the Trickster to make all those alchemical weapons) but it basically doesn't come online until you get the floating feats from the champion at level 11.
You also don't get floating feats from the champion at 11; they grant floaters with their supreme, which doesn't come online until 17th– Carrion Crown ends around 16th level.
I'm currently playing a ranged focused medium in Carrion Crown (we're in Wake of the Watcher: currently level 10s): she can have up five attacks in a round (w/champion, rapid shot, and haste) but she would still lag behind for damage compared to the paladin and the swashbuckler. Ranged takes a long time to get up online and doesn't offer much room for taking 'fun' feats, or other useful feats. There's also the fact that ranged doesn't play well with many of their powers because many of the powers assume you're melee or otherwise within touch range/adjacent to your target.
A melee focused medium is a good way to go, for combat, alternatively grabbing a level in fighter can do wonders for a medium- and if you take the lore warden archetype (for your fighter dip) you keep the same number of skills/level while gaining all knowledges as class skills.