Skald Build Advice Bloodrager 1 / Skald (Fated Champion) X


Advice

Dark Archive

My group is starting a new party as we have some members leaving and new ones joining. I wanted to build a well rounded Skald that will act primarily as a tank, provide utility spells, and act as a competent face/Secondary Skill Monkey. Ideally I want some other to take my raging song, but I don't know the party composition so I want to be as self sufficient as possible.

The persona of the character is a seemingly well mannered intellectual southern gentleman with a great mind and yearning for human literature, culture, and the theater. However, he believes fate dealt him the cruelest of hands as he was born a half-orc whelp in a slavers northern tribe. Ultimately, he was able to escape his imbred torture filled childhood by murdering his captures in their sleep after being pushed to far one day. He's come as south as possible to educate himself, but is extremely sensitive about his origins. If anyone mentions his orcish features, lack of manners, or talks about slavery in a favorable light he is prone to fly off the handle, blackout, and go full tilt into a rage humming one of the songs he sang as he murdered his captures. His current persona would come off similar to Beast from X-men or Calvin Candy/Leonardo DiCaprio from Django (minus the origin story and more anti slavery instead of pro slavery).

I need some help building it because I realized there are so many awesome feats/rage powers that are available to a Skald. To reduce the MAD issue I've gone with the 1 level bloodrager dip/amplified rage build that is common on the forums, but I wanted to get people's advice on the full build and whether I should swap build order or selections.

Bloodrager 1 / Skald (Fated Champion) X

Race:
1 - Half Orc

Alternate Racial Traits:
1 - Sacred Tattoo (+1 Luck to saves)
2 - Shaman's Apprentice (Endurance Feat)
3 - City-Raised (+2 Knowledge Local)

Traits:
1 - Fate Favored (+1 to Luck Bonuses)
2 - Community Minded (Morale Bonuses Last 2 Rounds after end of performance)

Diety:
1 - Irori (for Deific Obedience)

Stats (Level 1):
STR - 16 (14 +2 race)
DEX - 14
CON - 14
INT - 12
WIS - 7
CHA - 15

Stats (Level 11):
STR - 18 (14 +2 race + 2 Belt)
DEX - 16 (14 + 2 Belt)
CON - 16 (14 + 2 Belt)
INT - 14 (12 + 2 Headband)
WIS - 10 (7 +1 at Lev. 8 + 2 Headband)
CHA - 18 (15 +1 at Lev. 4 + 2 Headband)

Bloodrager 1 Level Dip:
1 - Bloodline Familiar (Aberrant) - Select Greensting Scorpion (Valet Archetype) for +4 Initiative, Scouting Abilities, Shared Teamwork Feats
2 - (OPTIONAL) Take the Steelblood Archetype with the ultimate goal of sitting in Mithral Heavy Armour vs. fast Movement.

Feats:
1 - Amplified Rage (Starts Working at Level 2)
1 - Extra Performance (PFS Swap for Scribe Scroll Feat)
3 - Skald's Vigor (Gain Fast Healing Equivalent to STR Bonus from Raging Song)
5 - Deific Obedience - Irori (+ 4 Profane or Sacred Bonus on all Knowledge Skills)
7 - Extra Rage Power (Guarded Stance gives me more AC)
9 - Extra Rage Power (Superstitious)
11 - Greater Skald's Vigour (or Discordant Voice if the fast healing isn't impressive)

Rage Powers:
4 - Lesser Spirit Totem
7 - Spirit Totem
7 - Guarded Stance (Feat)
9 - Superstitious (Feat)
10 - Greater Spirit Totem

Items
- +2/+2/+2 Headband (UMD)
- +2/+2/+2 Belt
- +2 Agile Mithral Breatplate (Light Fortification) (+8 AC, +3 from DEX)
- Circlet of Persuasion (+3 to CHA checks like)
- AoNA (+2 AC)
- RoP (+2 AC)
- Handy Haversack
- Eyes of the Eagle (+5 on Perception Checks)
- Cloak of Resistance (+2)
- Ring of Force Shield (+2 AC)
- Clear Spindle Ioun Stone
- Dusty Rose Cracked Ioun Stone
- Travelers Any Tool
- Wayfinder
- Adamantine +1 BloodSong Nodachi
- Sleeves of many garments
- Slippers of Spider Climb
- Msw Darkwood Longbow (+3 Str)

Alternate Feats
1 - Battle Cry (Level 5) - +1 morale to hit/+4 morale to saves vs. fear
2 - Escape Route (Teamwork - move through your own adjacent squar without giving an AoO)
3 - lookout (Act in a surprise round if your ally can)
4 - Scion of the Last Empire (+2 competence bonus on attack roll, save, ability check, or skill check as an immediate action)
5 - Shake It Off (+1 total saving throws per adjacent ally)
6 - Discordant Voice
7 - Stealth Synergy (works great with the scorpion familiar)
8 - Power Attack
9 - Phalanx Formation (If using reach weapons)

Alternate Rage Progression:
4 - Superstitious
7 - Guarded Stance
7 - Extra Rage Power (Surprise Accuracy)
9 - Extra Rage Power (Sharpened Accuracy)
10 - Savage Dirty Trick

Alternate Items:
Dragonbone Divination Sticks (+3 Luck to 1 save or +4 with Trait +5% for Divination/Augury)
Driftgwood Icon (1 hour of +1 Luck to AC against Ranged)
Poets Cloak (Ghost Rager)
Songs of the Linnorm Kings
+1 Furious Weapon vs. Bloodsong


Bloodrager's Rage effects will not stack with the Skald's Raging Song, since both offer the same bonus type (Morale) to the same statistics (Strength, Constitution, Will Saves).

However, you could go Urban Bloodrager, to boost Dexterity while also using Raging Song, which is actually amazing for you; Morale bonuses to all physical attributes is a huge power boost, perhaps something that I should've thought of before.

I'd personally suggest swapping Extra Performance with either Lingering Performance (and therefore substitute your Community Minded character trait for something better), or Extra Rage (if you take the Bloodrager level first, since you won't get scaling Bloodrage rounds per day for your Skald levels); the 6 bonus rounds of Rage will be more useful than the Extra Performance rounds, which scale via Skald levels, and Lingering Performance will work with your Raging Song, which means you don't have to spend rounds all the time (which means Extra Performance is no big deal).

Remember that your Rage Powers affect all allies that you affect with Raging Song; some of them may not want Superstitious, because being denied the ability to buff/heal others can make or break a character's adventuring career.

Of course, other Rage Powers (i.e. the Beast Totem chain) are certainly valuable and can be conveyed to your fellow martial PCs.

**EDIT**

Don't forget, while Bloodraging, you cannot cast Skald spells. Raging Song lets you cast Skald spells, but Bloodrage denies your ability to do that. So, only stack the two of them if you are not going to be casting any more spells.

Grand Lodge

Anger management: If I am in a rage, or an Unchained rage, or a bloodrage, or some similar form of rage, can I stack up as many benefits as possible?
No. When you either activate or are affected by a new form of rage (such as a barbarian’s rage, a skald’s raging song, a bloodrager’s bloodrage, and the rage spell), you can choose whether to keep your current rage or to accept the new rage instead, much like a creature affected by multiple polymorph effects. If you are in the throes of a rage that you could not automatically end on your own, such as a wild rager’s wild rage, you may not choose to replace it with a new rage effect. The exception to this rule is the skald’s master skald ability, which explicitly allows the skald’s raging song to stack with other rage effects.

Dark Archive

The intended first round action of my build is to start a Raging song/Inspired Rage then use the Bloodrager +4 STR/+4 CON/-2AC/+2 Will along with the Amplified Rage Feat/Valet Familiar who will accept my rage to give me an adjacent ally that nets me +8 STR/+8 CON/-2AC/+2 Will at level 2 (1st level Bloodrager/ 1st level Skald).

I don't have an intention to rage as a Bloodrager ever (except as a backup option if run out of performance) since my familiar won't get the rage and thus I will miss out on the Amplified Rage Feat bonus. I'm not sure where I may have miscommunication this but this is based off the following text (bolded emphasis is my own):

Quote:
"If an ally [NOTE: I am my own ally] has her own rage class ability (such as barbarian’s rage, bloodrager’s bloodrage, or skald’s inspired rage), she may use the Strength, Constitution, and Will saving throw bonuses, as well as AC penalties, based on her own ability and level instead of those from the skald (still suffering no fatigue afterward). However, inspired rage does not allow the ally to activate abilities dependent on other rage class abilities, such as rage powers, blood casting, or bloodrager bloodlines; the ally must activate her own rage class ability in order to use these features."

Does being getting +4 Dex from an Urban bloodrager still work with amplified rage to get me +4/+4/+4 from my song? The feat says:

Quote:
"Whenever you are raging and adjacent to a raging ally who also has this feat or flanking the same opponent as a raging ally with this feat, your morale bonuses to Strength and Constitution increase by +4. This feat does not stack with itself (you only gain this bonus from one qualifying ally, regardless of how many are adjacent to you)."

I could see some people saying that since you don't get a morale bonus to STR/CON as a DEX Urban Rager that you don't get anything from Amplified Rage. If it does work I like that it would give a +2AC bonus to everyone and still allow spell casting for everyone.

That being said the Community Minded Trait will maintain your morale bonuses from the song. So you'll still get the +8/+8 or +4/+4/+4 in the urban rager case for 2 more rounds without any of the downsides, which are maintained from a lingering performance (you won't keep the rage powers, but you lose the AC penalty while keeping the stats). It lets me use all of those immediate finale spells to give people re-rolls and what not without worrying about

Extra Performance isn't swap-able since it is mandated in PFS.

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