Need help with a caster build for PFS - Most likely an Oracle

[Alex Mack]

So I have a strong preference to play martials. But I wanted to try something else for a change so I'd like to build a pure caster.

I really don't like prepared casting so I was thinking Oracle.

What I want to achieve is to have high DCs (but what school to specialize on) and good action economy (different uses for Swift, move and standard actions) some skills and a bit of survivability.

So now I'm really looking for ideas regarding useful, spells, revelations and feats.

[Blave]

Possible schools to specialize in are Necromancy and Evocation.

Necromancy has some nice debuff spells like Blindness or Bestow Curse. You'd probably want reach spells for those touch attacks. Oracle's Burden can also be a mean debuff if you pick the right curse, like Blackened to give an enemyy -4 to all attacks with weapons.

Evocation can also work surprisingly well, even more so if your mystery adds some more spells like the Flames Mystery. You won't deal the most damage but you're pretty good at combining damage with debuffs. Sound Burst, Holy Smite, Dazing Spiritual Weapon (not sure if PSF allows the spiritual spells to use charisma for the attack role on an oracle). At higher levels Flame Strike and Blade Barrier deal decent damage.

[Alex Mack]

Thanks for the suggestions.

How does Oracle's burden interact with Dual Cursed? Dual Cursed seemed like a nice option for a Swift action debuffing and is strong in combination with save or suck spells.

Necromancy is an interesting option for specializing as Gnome's can also get a +1 to DCs with a race trait.

I was thinking more along the lines of Enchantment than Evocation because I'm a big fan of Murderous Command. Also Kitsune can get +1 to spell DCs from a race trait as well.

I was also thinking about going Life Oracle and pick up Quick Channel along with the below feat which could be combined with Defense Variant Channeling for a strong Move action buff.

Beacon of Hope
Your hope inspires allies in their struggles.
Prerequisites: Channel energy 3d6, worshiper of Milani.
Benefit: When you channel positive energy to heal
living creatures, those you heal gain a +2 morale bonus on
saving throws, attack rolls, ability checks, and skill checks
for a number of rounds equal to your Charisma bonus
(minimum 1 round).

I was kinda hoping that revelations might provide some good uses for Swift and move actions but haven't found too many.

[andreww]

OK, I love playing Oracles, they are one of my favourite classes and I currently have....counts....four of them in PFS from levels 8 to 16 with a fifth in the works when they finally get round to sanctioning the Healer's Handbook. All of them are casters with the exception of my Nature Oracle who charges at people with a pointy stick.

Oracle is an amazingly versatile class with loads of different options and they work extremely well as full on casters. I would think about the following:

Race
I see a reference to Gnome, while their stat bumps work for Oracle they miss one really important thing, the extra spells known FCB. This is a major boost to caster versatility on spontaneous casters and it is hard to skip it. At low levels it isn't a big issues but as you start to hit the mid levels it is pretty huge. At level 6 adding an extra level two spell is like getting a free 4k page of spell knowledge. That's 25% of your expected WBL. At level 8 adding a new third level spell is the equivalent of about 30% of your WBL. And so it goes on. Caster oracles thrive on the number of spells they have as that determines how effective they are going to be. You want spells which target all saves if possible as well as defence, utility and condition removal.

Humans, Half Orcs and Half Elves get access to the FCB and Half Elves also have access to Paragon Surge. Wayang can add illusion spells from the Wizard list but their stat mods are not ideal.

Samsaran's obviously can also get access to lots of different spells with their Mystic Past Life trait but that is a boon only race and their stat mods are all wrong or what you want.

Personally my favourite is Half Orc for Sacred Tattoo/Fate's Favoured as it helps shore up your otherwise weak fortitude save.

Archetype
There are probably two stand out archetypes for casting orientated Oracles. Dual-Cursed you mention above and it is great. It does give extra revelations (although many mysteries only really have a couple of decent options) along with Misfortune which is excellent. Ill Omen is a great debuff, especially at level 10 when you might well be quickeneing it. The drawback is largely easy to avoid as their are various curse options you can take which have little impact, especially in PFS. Legalistic is the classic one.

However, taking Dual-Cursed will lock you out of access to Spirit Guide which is the caster oracle archetype. You give up some revelations which isn't much of an issue as many mysteries only have a couple you want anyay. In exchange you get access to a shaman spirit, it's spells, a hex and some of the spirit powers. You can change this spirit each day. That is a huge increase in options. Some standout out ones include:

Ancestors - gain heroism and some force spells, hex to turn all Int skills into Charisma skills
Bones - useful spells, false life, animate dead, fear, Bone Lock and Fearful gaze are both good hex's.
Flame - add some blasting if you are concerned about swarms, hex for extra speed or fog sight and use obscuring mist
Heavens - great at 10th for overland flight, hex for short range SU teleport or light reducing down to supernatural darkness
Life - decent spells, get channel at level 7,can combine with Life mystery for all of the channels
Nature - barkskin is a great buff, spontaneous summons available as a hex
Slums - some good enchantment spells (goes well with some of the cleric enchantment stuff) and evasion and uncanny dodge in urban settings

There is a third archetype which might see quite some play but it is in the Healer's Handbook so it is uncertain if it will be PFS legal. The Pei Zin Practitioner gets paladin lay on hands and some condition removal but isn't compatible with either of the other two.

Lastly I should probably mention the Ancient Lorekeeper. This is a great archetype as it lets you poach spells from the wizard list to replace your mystery spells. Thus is great but it can only be taken by actual elves in PFS and they have terrible stat mods for an Oracle.

Next up, Mysteries and Curses

[andreww]

Mysteries

Lots of the Mysteries work well as a full caster Oracle. Some standouts include:

Heavens - probably the single strongest caster oracle, mostly due to the Awesome Display revelation which keeps Colour Spray effective as an encounter ending spell well into the late game. You will need alternate options for things immune to mind affecting spells but you have the entire cleric list to play with. The rest of the revelations aren't much good making spirit guide an easy pick.

Lore - the spells are OK for adding versatility but wont add much to your combat ability. However, Lore has some excellent revelations, Sidestep Secret gives you Cha to AC/Reflex, Lore Keeper turns all Knowledge skills in charisma based (letting them work with circlet of persuasion), Mental Acuity gives you inherent Int boosts, Focused Trance lets you demolish out of combat knowledge checks (but doesn't work with Lore Keeper, gran page-bound epiphany as an alternate spell option) and Arcane Archivist would be great if it was clearer in PFS if you can have a spellbook as a non wizard/arcanist/witch/magus type character.

Flame - this can work well if you want to blast but you are probably better off getting it as the spirit with Spirit Guide or taking the Blackened curse. Flames revelations are distinctly mediocre but it does give swift action flight.

Life - the classic healer character, channel and life link work well together. Much better if the Pei Zin archetype ends up legal, alternatively spirit guide for the life spirit gives you 2+ double your charisma mod channels per day. Quickened channel will give you move action healing. Sme of the channel feats are pretty good, Beacon of Hope, Fateful Channel and Liberation Channel being the standouts.

Bones - this makes a decent caster focused oracle, false life, animate dead and fear are all good additions to your spells, revelations will let you control undead and summon them

Lunar - this is a great casting focused Oracle. The spells are largely terrible but revelations will give you Cha to AC/Reflex, a full strength animal companion (tiger and wolf are both great) and a confusion effect tied to your inflict spells. This actually turns mass inflict light wounds into a dangerous will based confusion effect which is not mind affecting.

Nature - the spells are not great (except Barkskin) but it is worth mentioning for it is the last of the Mysteries which give you Cha to AC, this one also does CMD rather than reflex saves. Other revelations will give you spontaneous summon natures ally (and a huge boost to their saves), a full strength mount (horses and camels are surprisingly decent) and natural divination which can ensure that you pass a critical skill check or save.

Time - the spells on the list are pretty terrible but its revelations make up for it. Temporal Celerity, Time Hope, Erase from Time, Knowledge of the Ages are all useful picks.

One or two mysteries offer swift action revelations (stone, metal, probably other) but I wouldn't be too concerned about them. You may well be using your swift action for other things (misfortune, liberating command, grace, quickened spells).

[andreww]

Curses

Horror Realms has added a lot of extra curse options, most of which are legal but check additional resources. In general I would look at a curse which gives you extra spells known. They are:

Aboleth, Accursed, Blackened, Ghoul, Haunted, Lich, Lycanthropy, Possessed, Shadowbound, Vampirism, Wolfscarred Face (pretty bad unless combined with Deaf) and Wrecking Mysticism (kitsune only).

I have generally considered haunted the standout option, you add spells you wouldn't otherwise get and the drawback is pretty minimal. Blackened is OK if you want to give up any idea of making melee attacks (and if going full caster you probably do). Shadowbound is really interesting as it adds shadow evocation and conjuration to your list allowing you to duplicate whole swathes of the wizard list. it combines well with Heavens and Haunted giving more investment from stuff like spell focus (illusion) although the benefits do take a while to turn up. the drawback could be very bad for you, blind is a terrible condition for casters. It is however PFS legal.

[Targutai Minyatur]

Dual cursed oracle of life/paladin has the best action economy you can get i think. Inmediate action misfortune (use it to help your teammates) move action channel energy (with feat) swift action battlecry (another feat) move actoon to heal in elemental form, finally swift action to heal yourself with lay on hands. There you have lots of diferent actions to choose.
If you want a broken battle oracle grab ciclopean seer archetype and a scyte, choose to take a 20 in attack roll, confirm crit and you have 2d4+1,5 str x4 (more if mounted) thats once a day but you can one shot a boss without any problem.

[andreww]

Cyclopean Seer is not PFS legal.

[Alex Mack]

Wow that's like a half a guide there already...thanks andreww! Lemme try and digest all that info...

So if I'm understanding you correctly an Oracle is better off diversifying his debuffs to target WIL FORT or REF instead of just focusing on one school and investing resources into boosting DCs? Makes a certain amount of sense...also I like Half Orcs...and that would leave me with more free feats not invested in Spell Focus and the like.

The Pei Zin Practitioner is obviously super good and I've been thinking about building a casty Oradin as well. It's prolly better suited for a hulking Nagaji Oracle though.

I really wanted the Misfortune hex but after looking through the different Mysteries again yesterday I was a bit disappointed at the suckiness of many revelations and that there's only very few Mysteries that have more than 2 revelations that seem worthwhile.

So maybe I should go with Spirit guide after all...that means more reading...

Regarding curses: I was trying to find curses that would work well with Oracle's burden x2. Looks like blackened + wrecker are the best melee debuff around...

So this a rough idea of what I had been initially panning
Race: Kitsune CHA 20
Traits: There's some conditional save DC boosters
Life Mystery
Curse: Wrecker/ Blackened

Feats:
1 Spell Focus Enchantment
3 Greater Spell Focus Enchantment
5 Quicken Channel
7 Beacon of Hope
9 Varisian Tatoo
11 Extra Channel?

Revelation
1 Misfortune
3 Channel (Protection Variant Chenneling)
5 Lifelink (not impressed...)
7 Energy Body
11 Lifesense

This build might have issues when Enchantments don't work. Which in my experience is fairly often due to the wide prevalence of undead in PFS. Then you still have burning hands and buffs like bless blessing of fervor. Alternatively I really like Time or Dark Tapestry...

[andreww]

I think you might need to fit selective channel into there. If you are going with the Life Mystery then you probably want to have been raised by Pixies (Fey Foundling feat, must be taken at 1st). Lifelink is surprisingly effective at low to mid levels.

I don't think Varisian Tattoo is really doing much for you.

[Alex Mack]

andreww wrote:

I think you might need to fit selective channel into there. If you are going with the Life Mystery then you probably want to have been raised by Pixies (Fey Foundling feat, must be taken at 1st). Lifelink is surprisingly effective at low to mid levels.

I don't think Varisian Tattoo is really doing much for you.

Somehow I was thinking Varisian Tatoo further boosted spell DCs...Then selective channel is prolly better.

While Channel gives me something good to do with my move actions (was planning to get Variant Channel for possibly defense) it's super feat intensive doesn't come online until fairly late in one's career and I can only do move action channeling 3 or 4 times per day. That's an awful lot of investment for a bit of action economy. The times I've seen in combat healing be relevant in PFS are also fairly rare. Seems like as a melee interested oracle with War Sight you can get more bang for your move action...

I'm gonna look into a Dual Cursed Time and a half Orc spirit guide.

Also I thought only practitioners of Pei Zin are raised by pixies...