Been working on trying to make a character for a game who is something of a potion maker/occult object collector. I'm most likely going normal alchemy (Not class alchemist) and occultist. I noticed the Curator archetype that seems to be pretty good.
Likely I plan on taking Divination/Abjuration/?? as normal implements but then taking Illusion, enchantment, necromancy, and evocation as the relic ones.
None of the guides out there I've seen really talk about the curator though.
I've never looked at the archetype before, but my first impression is that it's weird and interesting, but not great.
The main issue I see is that your resonant powers are going to be exceedingly nerfed. Your relics from your Extensive Collection don't give you any resonant powers at all, it seems like. Not 100% sure on this (it only says you get the base focus power from your relics), but even if they do, you only have your Int modifier worth of resonant powers which isn't much and you also only have 10 minutes. Not only that, but the resonant powers of your actual implements are going to be super weak, too, since you have way less mental focus to invest.
'cause here's what's gonna happen: Your normal implements are going to be the ones where you want the resonant powers at all times, so naturally the ones where you want to invest a lot of focus in while the relics are going to be ones where you don't really care. But that's your Int modifier worth of mental focus that you're not able to put into the actually useful implements.
Divination, Transmutation and Abjuration are fantastic implements, but very focus-greedy. Filling those up to make good use of them with just your Occultist level (and +2 from Extra Mental Focus) worth of mental focus is hardly doable. And I think resonant powers are the most powerful aspect of the Occultist.
Sure, you get a good amount of versatility from your Extensive Collection, but you can only use it so very rarely. And especially only being able to get the spells of a single school from your Extensive Collection at a time until level 8 is pretty crippling. It doesn't say whether that takes two uses of Extensive Collection (since you're empowering two relics) or just one, either. And I'm not even sure what "activating this ability a second time ends any other relic’s ongoing benefits" means, but I assume this means at least that all effects from the focus powers of your empowered relic are dismissed.
Look at it this way: At level 6, a vanilla Occultist has access to four schools of magic at all times. A Curator has access to two schools of magic at all times and a third wild-card school that they can choose thrice a day, but only gets those for 10 minutes.
Sure, you can choose that third school from a list of four schools, but I'd much rather just have more spells at my disposal at all times.
You might disagree with me on the last point and I can totally see why. For example, if you chose, say, Necromancy twice with your relics, you could have one set of zombiemancy and one set of curse and fear spells and choose which set you pick depending on the situation. It's definitely a super cool concept, but you still only get those for 10 minutes. And the nerf on resonant powers is pretty massive.
Hmm, the more I look at it, the less I'm sure about my initial reaction. Obviously, this archetype is geared towards a full-on caster Occultist. A martial Occultist is probably going to want to use a few favorite schools to buff up and they're less about versatile spellcasting.
But how good is it for a caster? Well, at level 6, you have 2 implements and 4 relics, so essentially 6 schools worth of "spells potentially known". At level 7, that's 24 spells, more than a Sorcerer! And look at level 18. That's 4 implements, 6 relics, adding up to 70 spells known (one each of spell levels 0 to 6). That is a huge number of spells!
This allows you to be potentially one of the most versatile spontaneous casters in the entire game. Sure, it only goes up to level 6, but the Occultist has a very nice spell list. You have so many spells you can potentially know that you can take spells no other spontaneous caster (including other Occultists) would ever even look at because they're too situational.
One of the downsides, however, is that many of the weirder spells have very long casting times, much longer than 10 minutes. No Legend Lore or Create Demiplane for you. And if you often need spells of this relic school, then spells of another one, then maybe yet another one, you'll quickly run out of uses for Extensive Collection, leaving you with just a handful of implement schools, even if you have a ton of spell slots left. So, not only do you need to balance what Resonant Powers you always want online, but also which spells you always want to have available. This is a tough balancing act as many great spell schools have mediocre resonant powers and vice versa.
So, is it good? I don't know. I definitely don't think it's that bad anymore. I do think it could be incredibly fun, although the nerfed resonant powers are still rough.
Ouch. Didnt realize the resonate powers might not be usable.
Was thinking you could cheat with the use of the mutischool implements or the holy relic ones.
Ouch. Didnt realize the resonate powers might not be usable.
Was thinking you could cheat with the use of the mutischool implements or the holy relic ones.
You mean getting a panoply as a relic? Yeah, I was wondering about that, too, but I don't know if that's allowed. I suppose it depends on whether you think panoplies replace your implement schools or if it they're a subset of implement schools.
If it's the former, then no dice, as both relics and panoplies replace your implement schools. It's like picking two archetypes that replace the same thing, it's simply not allowed.If it's the latter, then you might be able to do it, as you pick relics associated with an implement school and a panoply is just one of those implement schools. But you would need to choose the panoply's associated schools as real implements at least once beforehand.
What you can very definitely not do is pick the panoply's associated implement schools as relics and pick the panoply as your real implement school (or another relic) because relics are not implements. The other way around might work, but that strikes me as really cheaty.
And as I said, I don't know if you get the resonant powers from your relics while they're empowered. But here's the relevant text:
As a move action, the curator can empower a single piece of his collection, choosing one of the two selected schools, gaining that school’s focus power, and accessing the selected spells for 10 minutes.
It's very clear in what empowering a relic gives you and it specifically does not state that it works just like an implement. And since the implement school's resonant power is not listed, I'm fairly sure you don't get it from your empowered relic.
Assuming the Resonant powers don't work, the Curator does in the end get more mental focus than normal (4 points, not much more, but it could help)
So you'd want
Necromancy - The focus power is kinda bleh as there is a lot of ways of being immune to fear. But you'd use it for Necromatic Servant which doesn't need your implement to keep up with its duration, or Soul Bound Puppet. Maybe even Spirit Shroud.
Conjuration - Resonant power is also pretty bleh, But the focus power is pretty good. Could also be used for an emergency or out of combat healing effect
Then I'd say Illusion/Enchantment Evocation/???
For base Abjuration/Transmutation/Divination - then whatever else you'd need.
Caster occultist - can't beat a silksworn. Combat occultist - haunt collector is the best archetype.
Hmm, yeah, looking at it, Silksworn seems way better than a Curator for a caster. Sure, Curator gets one additional school, but it takes until level 14 for the Curator to have more than the Silksworn. And the Silksworn has no limitations on how you can split up your Mental Focus, doesn't lose any resonant powers and has all schools available at all times. And the extra Mental Focus you get from being a Curator of level 8+ is replaced by you getting extra Mental Focus from your Charisma modifier as a Silksworn from level 1. You also get to hide your spellcasting, even in battle which is insanely good and you're one hell of a face.
However, a Silksworn loses weapon and armor proficiencies which the Curator does not. So, the Curator could be a decent martial Occultist who has a lot of magical tricks up their sleeve if things go south. But if that's what you want to play, the normal Occultist is perfectly fine.
Silksworn is a pretty powerful archetype but it does rather force you into focusing on being a caster. It lets you do it well though so I wouldn't call that a problem
The reason I feel the curator is weaker than the base occultist is that while the relic is flexible, you only get it a limited number of collection uses per day.
So I feel it's weaker spellcasting, because you lose access to relic lists unless you burn a collection use to cast a spell from it.
It does extremely well in novaing a focus power over and over in the 10 minute span. I don't know if that makes up for the less flexible spellcasting.
I suspect that at low levels it will play poorly, because most of your mental focus is tied to your INT and the curator only has it 1/day at level 1 and 2/day at level 2. At level 6, it probably will begin to feel decent with 3/day.
Aye. If it gave the resonant powers I think it would be a lot better too especially if it was worded in a way that would allow the Panoplies to work.
Overall, the class is kinda cool, but it just feels too clumsy.
Like the Magic Circle thing is pretty b#!*&##s, which is why I was looking at getting the curator, but wanted to keep the physic magic