Melee combat centered Magical Child?

[Silus]

So with the release of Ultimate Intrigue and my own fascination with anime (in this case Madoka Magica, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, and Princess Tutu), I got to thinking. "Hey, I wonder if I can take the Magical Child archetype for Vigilante and make it work as a melee character".

So all I really know about the Magical Child archetype is this:
1) Charisma based caster using Unchained Summoner spells
2) Gets a Familiar and free Improved Familiar at level 3
3) Light armor (no medium)
4) Limited on Vigilante Talents due to not being an Avenger or Stalker and giving up half their talents as part of the archetype
5) Quick identity change (down to a Swift action)

So with all this in mind (and with the new Rapier feat) I was thinking that a simple support Dex build with a Rapier. Was thinking (as far as the Feats and Vigilante Talents are concerned) doing something like this:

Human
1) Weapon Finesse, Weapon Focus (Rapier)
2) Lethal Grace Vigilante Talent, replace Weapon Finesse for Fencing Grace
3) Arcane Armor Training (In conjunction with Mithril Chain)
5) Agile Maneuvers
6) Favored Maneuver (Dirty Trick)(Vig Talent)
7) Combat Casting
9) Combat Expertise
11) Quick Dirty Trick
12) Cunning Feint (Vig Talent)
13) Greater Dirty Trick
15) Dazzling Display
17) Dramatic Display
18) Shadow's Sight (Vig Talent)
19) Uncanny Concentration
20) Close the Gap (Vig Talent)

It's not the best makeup for feats and talents but it's kinda the best I got at the moment. Idea is to get in, feint and Dirty Trick all up in the enemy (or fire off some control or support spells then get stuck in) and just dismantle and debuff the enemy, making it easier for the party.

Edit: I also wonder if it would be easier to just do a straight Vigilante and just fluff it the way I want.

[Michael_Hopkins]

Silus wrote:

So with the release of Ultimate Intrigue and my own fascination with anime (in this case Madoka Magica, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, and Princess Tutu), I got to thinking. "Hey, I wonder if I can take the Magical Child archetype for Vigilante and make it work as a melee character".

So all I really know about the Magical Child archetype is this:
1) Charisma based caster using Unchained Summoner spells
2) Gets a Familiar and free Improved Familiar at level 3
3) Light armor (no medium)
4) Limited on Vigilante Talents due to not being an Avenger or Stalker and giving up half their talents as part of the archetype
5) Quick identity change (down to a Swift action)

So with all this in mind (and with the new Rapier feat) I was thinking that a simple support Dex build with a Rapier. Was thinking (as far as the Feats and Vigilante Talents are concerned) doing something like this:

Human
1) Weapon Finesse, Weapon Focus (Rapier)
2) Lethal Grace Vigilante Talent, replace Weapon Finesse for Fencing Grace
3) Arcane Armor Training (In conjunction with Mithril Chain)
5) Agile Maneuvers
6) Favored Maneuver (Dirty Trick)(Vig Talent)
7) Combat Casting
9) Combat Expertise
11) Quick Dirty Trick
12) Cunning Feint (Vig Talent)
13) Greater Dirty Trick
15) Dazzling Display
17) Dramatic Display
18) Shadow's Sight (Vig Talent)
19) Uncanny Concentration
20) Close the Gap (Vig Talent)

It's not the best makeup for feats and talents but it's kinda the best I got at the moment. Idea is to get in, feint and Dirty Trick all up in the enemy (or fire off some control or support spells then get stuck in) and just dismantle and debuff the enemy, making it easier for the party.

Edit: I also wonder if it would be easier to just do a straight Vigilante and just fluff it the way I want.

just as a side note, lethal grace and Fencing Grace don't stack with eachother. As for freeing up two feats, one could take a level of Inspired Blade Swashbuckler for weapon finesse (rapier) and weapon focus (rapier) to help with your feats....

[Lucy_Valentine]

Silus wrote:

1) Weapon Finesse, Weapon Focus (Rapier)

2) Lethal Grace Vigilante Talent, replace Weapon Finesse for Fencing Grace

Immediate problem: you can't have fencing grace as your swap feat because you didn't qualify for it at level 1 without the finesse:

vigilante wrote:

...and if he already has the Weapon Finesse feat, he can immediately swap it for another feat for which he qualified at the level he chose Weapon Finesse.

Mind you, you might not need it - the bonus damage from Lethal Grace doesn't stack with Fencing Grace, and might eventually surpass Fencing Grace depending on your stats/buffs and whether you TWF. Also it lets you change weapons.

Silus wrote:

3) Arcane Armor Training (In conjunction with Mithril Chain)

If you mean a mithral chain shirt, then you don't need AAT, and if you mean mithral chain the medium armour AAT won't eliminate the failure chance. Chain has a 30% failure chance, so mithral chain is 20% and with AAT that drops to 10%.

There's also a proficiency issue - lacking proficiency means the armour check penalty gets applied to attacks. Chain starts at -5. Mithral + masterwork gets that down to -1, but it's still there.

A mithral kikko works with AAT and has zero penalty, but it's only one better armour than light, so is that really worth a feat?

I'm not really sure what Magical Child is giving you, apart from fluff.

[Neils Bohr]

As Lucy_valentine said you don't need arcane armor training for a chain shirt, which I hope is what you'll be wearing since you're going for a dex build. beyond that it takes a swift action to use, so no quickened spells for you.

I would shift combat casting into that spot, since your plan is to be in melee.

[avr]

Dirty Trick can be done with a weapon, at least if your descriptive skills are up to it, which lets you drop Agile Maneuvers.

& yes - if you aren't focusing on the familiar adding magic girl fluff to another archetype is almost certainly a better way of getting what you're after. The fancy familiar is this archetypes' thing.