A Voice of the Wild or Watersinger (use Racial Heratage; Undine) Bard can access Aqueous Orb with their spell list.
Haven't come up with anything for Create Pit though.
Magician bard archetype can get any Wizard Spell
Check out the Bardic Masterpiece Arrowsongs Lament:
Prerequisite(s): Perform (oratory) 3 ranks.
Cost: Feat or 1st-level spell known or higher (see text).
Effect: Rather than a single work, this masterpiece is a collection of poems .
When you gain this masterpiece, it becomes associated with your bard spells of a specific spell level. If you paid the masterpiece’s cost by spending a bard spell you know, the masterpiece is associated with spells of the spent spell’s level. If you paid the masterpiece’s cost by spending a feat, you choose one bard spell level that you are able to cast with which to associate the masterpiece.
In order to perform this masterpiece, you must be holding a spellbook, scroll, or a similar piece of arcane writing to consult. After completing the masterpiece, choose one arcane spell from your bard spell list or from the sorcerer/wizard spell list that is written on the arcane writing that you consulted during the masterpiece. If the spell is on your bard spell list, it must be of the same level (or lower) as the spell level associated with this masterpiece.
If the spell is not on your bard spell list, its level must be at least 2 spell levels lower than the spell level associated with this masterpiece. Add the chosen spell to the bard spell list and to your list of bard spells known until the next time that you rest and regain spells.
If you use a spellbook with a preparation ritual to perform the masterpiece, you also gain the boon associated with that spellbook, as if you had prepared a spell from it. You can add up to one spell per spell level that you have selected with this masterpiece to your list of bard spells known each day.
You can gain this masterpiece multiple times. Each time, you must apply it to a different bard spell level.
Use: 3 rounds of bardic performance per level of the spell.
Action: 1 hour of meditation.
It might help more after you gain levels. Without Spell Kenning (grrrr, pet peeve of mine!), this is the best Bards can do.
Mnemonic Vestments are the way to go, then. That, or just ask your GM. Offer to give up some similar battlefield control spells in exchange (Grease or Glitterdust are good choices to trade for Create Pit, since they're strong spells, and you can probably find something similar for the orb).
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This is the general template problem of class and level systems like PF.
Some call it a bug, others call it a feature.
Diff strokes for diff folks. PF is very much not GURPS.
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Magician bard archetype can get any Wizard SpellThis is the general template problem of class and level systems like PF.
Sure i can take Magician and lose a lot of stuff i want to keep, for a very weak "power" of gaining ONE spell from another lsit every 4 levels. No thanks.
If i want a wheel i don't switch to another car with one of the wheels i looked for. Wrong car just to get the wheel.Sorry, has nothing to do with you i just get annoyed from time to time about the unflexibility of PF compared to other systems like GURPS.
I want to change ONE thing for another thing but that's motly impossible because the systems will not let me.
It's a balance issue.
The bard has lots of good stuff, and they intentionally limited their offensive spells as part of the overall design.
You want to break that rule to get a couple of the game's best offensive spells at little to no sacrifice in other parts of the character.
Now - I'm not saying Pathfinder has perfect balance - rather far from it - but one of the advantages of a class system is that it gives you more design space to balance the classes as a whole rather than having to balance individual abilities.
Edit: Semi-ninja'd
Mnemonic Vestments are the way to go, then.
No, they don't work.
The spell must be on her spell list, the same spell level or lower than the expended spell slot, and the same type of spell (arcane or divine) as the spell slot expended.
Mnemonic Vestments let you cast a spell that you didn't learn, but it has to be one that you're ordinarily able to learn.
Mnemonic Vestments are the way to go, then.No, they don't work.
The spell must be on her spell list, the same spell level or lower than the expended spell slot, and the same type of spell (arcane or divine) as the spell slot expended.Mnemonic Vestments let you cast a spell that you didn't learn, but it has to be one that you're ordinarily able to learn.
Ah, thanks! I was going off of memory.
In the old days one could take the Eldritch Heritage feat chain and select the Arcane Bloodline, doing so would eventually get you the New Arcana ability which adds two wizard/sorcerer spells to your spells known, it was a nice trick for bards, summoners, and sorcerers to pick up new spells they otherwise didn't have access to.
It has since been ruled against, since there was an overpowered trick with Half-Elves casting Paragon Surge to give themselves 'Martial Flexibility for spells' which got hit with the nerf-bat pretty hard.
That said, just going off RAW, and ignoring the FAQ for a home game would give you what you want, the alternative is to take the sorcerer VMC.
Additionally, Metamagic Adept (the other Arcane Bloodline ability) is hella useful for any spontaneous caster. School Power isn't bad either if you wanna focus on a specific school for debuffs, and stacks with Spell Focus and Greater Spell focus.
Magician bard archetype can get any Wizard SpellThis is the general template problem of class and level systems like PF.
Sure i can take Magician and lose a lot of stuff i want to keep, for a very weak "power" of gaining ONE spell from another lsit every 4 levels. No thanks.
If i want a wheel i don't switch to another car with one of the wheels i looked for. Wrong car just to get the wheel.Sorry, has nothing to do with you i just get annoyed from time to time about the unflexibility of PF compared to other systems like GURPS.
I want to change ONE thing for another thing but that's motly impossible because the systems will not let me.
If you are open to 3pp then The Genius Guide to the Talented Bard should address this problem perfectly. I haven't had time to look through it yet, but the ones for other classes have been great at basically letting you build your own (balanced!) template as you go along.
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@TimD
I didn't know that limiting flexibility and preventing players from playing exactly what they had in mind without breaking the balance is a feature. But as you said, different strokes.
While I'd never argue that PF is an excessively balanced game, it is a class-based game, which defaults to a game which revolves around party roles. Attempting to twist a class which is THE archtypical support class into a control caster isn't something I'd call "limiting flexibility", but is very close to what I'd consider "breaking the balance".
Given that you are looking for a "battlefield control/buff" I would look into Summoner rather than Bard, which is more "buff/skill monkey".
Well, if you don't mind branching out a little, there are a few options that come to mind.
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A Voice of the Wild or Watersinger (use Racial Heratage; Undine) Bard can access Aqueous Orb with their spell list.
Haven't come up with anything for Create Pit though.
I can add in how to get Create Pit. Voice of the Wild, grabbing Expeditious Excavation as a first-level spell known so that you can put charges back in the Gravedigger's Spade staff.
- Skald is similar to Bard. Spell Kenning is a once-per-day flexible spell from the Sorcerer, Bard, or Cleric list. You do lose some skill points and will be working with a rather different basic song. However, you keep all the great Bardic skill monkey stuff, and get better armor.- Bard variant multi-classing. This is closer to the array of capabilities you mentioned. Take any class (in this case, one that can cast all the battlefield control you want) and add Bardic abilities to that instead. Definitely hurts the skill monkey side unless you go with an Int-based caster.
I find it hard to play a well rounded "person" with a role so confined in the "range" of capabilities that he actually can't do much of anything despite his "main function".
But that's just me.
Sorry, i'm not really here to argue, if that is you general opinion i respect it.
Different systems offer different things. PF is very role-oriented, rewards specialization, and has a lot of both "trap options" as well as sacred bovines, many of which are artifacts of the game system it predated and was built upon. I could rant about GURPS and bell-curve systems, or we could go over a lot of the exceptions that PF has put into its general rules but we'd be here all day :)
As with most game systems, in PF finding out the type of character(s) you want to play that will work within the system is part of both the challenge and the fun. The summoner is fairly hard-coded to the eidolon, which can be a down-side. I recommended it as it has some of the best buff spells in the game, a strangely high BAB (3/4, comparable to a Rogue or Cleric), the ability to wear light armor, and access to conjuration spells, such as the ones you were inquiring about. Frankly, if you don't want the battle eidolon, there are a lot of niche eidolon builds out there for making skill monkey assistants which can also be a lot of fun as long as you aren't stealing someone else's thunder.
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The general problem with PF that if you play adventure paths they expect a certain power curve. So while you can build nice stuff that is not really at the peak of the power-curve you will get in trouble. You will often notice that you are ill equipped to handle the new challenges and your contribution to the party diminishes significantly.
Adventure paths aren't very difficult. You don't have to make a high-end character to get through them. Most of the players in my group enjoy building somewhere between very solid & high-end characters, and our GM just about doubles every encounter in the AP to keep us challenged.
There's always the bard VMC that you could couple with the Maestro bloodline?
But now i'm intrigued: What is your general opinion about GURPS? The only things i noticed which can be problematic is the high attribute dependency of skills and that skills get high very quickly.
Interestingly enough, I tried GURPS and had a lot of trouble representing my characters. Things tended to be a little too generic, and the result felt bland. Everything was always kind of representing something else, but things were broad enough that I couldn't make any clever parallels. When I make a Pathfinder character, I can often get what I want, and when I can't, the abilities are specific enough that there will be an interesting option that mirrors what I want. (Occult Adventures and Ultimate Intrigue have definitely improved the number of characters I've been able to satisfactorily "translate" into Pathfinder.) But I generally make characters with a central, defining gimmick of some sort ("exhales a choking silence", "has oil instead of blood and they can control it", "owns Pandora's box of monsters"), so I have a goal in mind followed by a challenge to make the character useful in a fight.
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Hmm..okay..we got our asses kicked in Rise of the Runelords because we played sup-optimal but fun characters. Maybe we weren't tactical enough :)Adventure paths aren't very difficult. You don't have to make a high-end character to get through them. Most of the players in my group enjoy building somewhere between very solid & high-end characters, and our GM just about doubles every encounter in the AP to keep us challenged.
The general problem with PF that if you play adventure paths they expect a certain power curve. So while you can build nice stuff that is not really at the peak of the power-curve you will get in trouble. You will often notice that you are ill equipped to handle the new challenges and your contribution to the party diminishes significantly.
To be fair - from what I've heard that one is just about the most difficult Paizo AP.
whaaaat. Just because you get to fight something with a 30+ AC at level 6?!?
Oh, wait, they changed that encounter.
==Aelryinth
A Page of Spell Knowledge with the spell you need and a Use Magic Device skill chech should do it...
Or...
A Runestone with the spell on it, if 3rd party products are useable.
You can't UMD a Page of Spell Knowledge. Well you can, but then you still can't actually cast spells from the emulated class.
You can't UMD a Page of Spell Knowledge. Well you can, but then you still can't actually cast spells from the emulated class.
Why? If as you say "you can" activate the the page, it puts the spell on your list. You are not casting it from the page, so UMD no longer applies. You are now casting it from your list, which it is now on.
Kind of a Chicken/Egg kind of thing...
Well, if you don't mind branching out a little, there are a few options that come to mind.
-
A Voice of the Wild or Watersinger (use Racial Heratage; Undine) Bard can access Aqueous Orb with their spell list.
Haven't come up with anything for Create Pit though.
I can add in how to get Create Pit. Voice of the Wild, grabbing Expeditious Excavation as a first-level spell known so that you can put charges back in the Gravedigger's Spade staff.
Great find. That's the jewels I love pathfinder for. There's always a way.
You can't UMD a Page of Spell Knowledge. Well you can, but then you still can't actually cast spells from the emulated class.Why? If as you say "you can" activate the the page, it puts the spell on your list. You are not casting it from the page, so UMD no longer applies. You are now casting it from your list, which it is now on.
Kind of a Chicken/Egg kind of thing...
If the bearer is a spontaneous spellcaster and has that spell on her class spell list, she may use her spell slots to cast that spell as if it were one of her spells known.
If you have a Page of Spell Knowledge that isn't on your class spell list, you can't use it. Let's say you're a Bard and you get a Fireball Page of Spell Knowledge. So you use UMD to emulate being a Sorcerer, putting it on your Sorcerer class spell list (where it's the only spell on your Sorcerer class list). Ok, so now you can cast that Fireball with your Sorcerer spell slots...which you don't have.