If I wanted to make someone who specialized in Shouts (Words of Power) what would you suggest?


Advice


The concept is exactly what you're thinking, it's the Dragonborn, (Dovahkiin). I had first looked to bard as I feel the class should be a mix a martial, and magical ability, as well as the option to be Stealthy and or to mess around with alchemy. Luckily the last two things are more skill based than class feature oriented. Still I looked at the Thundercaller and the Sound Striker but they seemed to be either two weak with their signature abilities (Sounder Striker), or kind of varied off course in terms of theme (Thundercaller).

What would you guys suggest in order to make this newly found iconic character archetype come to life?

Paizo Employee Pathfinder Society Lead Developer

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As I'm currently doing another play-through of Skyrim right now, this is an especially fun question for me.

The bard concept is pretty solid. In order to really hit the dovahkiin concept, I'd check with your GM about making two adjustments—perhaps better represented by an archetype. First, it's worth looking at the list of bard Words (capitalized for clarity), which do a nice job of covering some of the "softer" thu'ums but completely skip over the rawer, more elemental shouts that would replicate fire breath and lightning storms. Ideally, such an archetype would expand the range of bard Words.

Second, I really like the idea of being able to channel rounds of bardic performance to augment the words of power, whether that be sacrificing performance rounds to avoid burning a spell slot or in order to stack a little more oomph into a spell (perhaps simulating some degree of 9-level spellcasting a few times a day at the cost of most other performance potential). After all, a bard is a master of speech and performance, and the thu'um is an expression of both.

Best of luck!


Skald might also be an appropriate option, at least from a flavor standpoint. Plus you could take some of the Linnorm curse rage powers to really ramp up the dragon-y goodness.

Paizo Employee Pathfinder Society Lead Developer

Mjolbeard89 wrote:
Skald might also be an appropriate option, at least from a flavor standpoint. Plus you could take some of the Linnorm curse rage powers to really ramp up the dragon-y goodness.

Wow, for some reason skald had not crossed my mind. Yeah, that would be pretty cool.

*Begins thinking about this too much and might draw up a fan-made archetype later*


There is no WoP support for it, (Shocker...) but the Mesmerist Vox archetype is exactly what you are asking for.

Dark Archive

You could try Spheres of Power instead. It's a third party product, but it's a great alternative spellcasting system that is somewhat similar to words of power. There are plenty of new classes to choose from, or you can use an archetype to turn a bard or a skald into a spherecaster. Spheres of Power doesn't limit you with somatic, material or verbal components but instead presents them as drawbacks allowing you to mix and match in exchange for a boon or extra spell points.


Spheres of Power wiki


Sound Striker fine, it was changed so that it's 5th level ability does 4d6+chr every 4 levels.

Also look at kineticist and simply reflavor your abilities.


In my homebrew setting, I actually created a Tradition for just that sort of thing using Spheres of Power.

Go Skald if you want to keep strictly with Paizo stuff. If you don't mind trying Spheres of Power, do that.

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