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Starting the anniversary edition of ROTRL soon, and decided I wanted to play an Arcanist (because flexible metamagic is amazeballs). Problem is, I'm super indecisive about how to build him.
The rules:
Traits are allowed, but one must be a campaign trait
As a general rule, all paizo books are legal, but most additional rule systems are not (e.g. Mythic, Hero Points, etc.).
25 point buy, or roll, player choice. I chose point buy.
The party:
Human Knife Master/Scout
Human Brawler (class, not archetype)
Halfling Bard
Whatever the heck I'm going to be
My current inclinations:
Get Quick Study ASAP, for obvious reasons. I'd take an archetype, but that would mean losing out on 1st level exploit, meaning not starting with QS. Extra Arcanist Exploit looks good for a feat, probably for Potent Magic, or maybe Dimensional Slide. For race, either Samsaran or Elf. My GM is allowing me to use Mystic Past Life to grab spells from the Summoner list at an earlier level (e.g. Summon Monster VIII as a 6th level), but the ability bonuses, FCB, and Longbow proficiency from elf are also really nice. I'm also dumping Charisma. The only thing I'd use it for is Consume Spells, anyway.
Tl;dr, Is Elf or Samsaran better? Is delaying exploits worth taking Occultist or School Savant? If not, which exploit(s) should I take? General tips for surviving low levels would be nice, too. If there's any critical information I've left out, don't hesitate to ask.
Keep in mind that you don't get many spells starting out, and Quick Study doesn't start hitting its stride until 5th level and beyond, where you begin getting spell power that's actually got mutability worth having (and isn't easily replicated with a scroll or other similar subject). Quick Study's relevance also depends on what you plan on doing with your character. Doing stuff like Enchantment or Evocation specialization (i.e. Save DC and damage/effects through Caster Levels) is where Arcanists really shine due to their features of doubling-down on such stuff.
To compare, Elf gives you more power in your spells through spell penetration and spellcraft checks. I believe there are alternate racial traits that improve it further (Arcane Focus in exchange for Weapon Familiarity is one example), so I'd look into those. It also boosts your primary casting stat, which is huge. Samsaran has less spell power stuff, but greater variety through the Mystic Past Life racial trait. You could learn Arcane versions of certain spells not on the Sorcerer/Wizard list. There aren't too many of those, however, and a lot of them aren't really that great, so unless you have absolute system mastery, I'd instead advise against it for lack of beneficial options. To be fair, Sorcerer/Wizard has the best spell list in the game, so it's no surprise.
Extra Arcanist Exploit isn't worthwhile; your base feats are precious, and without archetypes, you'll have more than enough Exploits to make use of every good Exploit that's out there.
For other exploits, look into Dimensional Slide. Its ability to add to your mobility in-combat is undeniably huge, and can let you move into areas not normally possible with a single move action. If you plan on taking Metamagic feats, there are Exploits which give you free feats; Greater Metamagic Feat is amazeballs, since it's a mutable Metamagic feat into whatever you wish/need at the start of each day that you can meet the requirements for. Which is basically everything. There will be a fair amount of downtime, so I'd also look into getting Item Crafting feats with your exploits as well.
If your Charisma is high enough (16+), look into Charisma-based abilities that have universal application across multiple levels of play. In other words, things like Acid Jet, Force Missile, and so on, are complete junk due to crap scaling with Charisma modifier garbage. However, things like School Understanding or Bloodline Development may be worthwhile depending on what sort of build you're accomplishing, and keep in mind that any option a Wizard can take with School Understanding (including subschools) or Sorcerer can take with Bloodline Development (not Wild-blooded stuff), you can take with the Arcanist. I'd advise level dipping for being able to stack your Arcanist and Sorcerer/Wizard levels though.
I'm more concerned with surviving the early levels. I can retrain the extra exploit at 3rd or so. As far as Samsaran, getting Haste at 4th level is *really* attractive, but so is a lot of stuff Elf has. If I understand your recommendations correctly, I should take Elf, focus on Enchantment and Evocation, and take Dimensional Slide? What about feat, should I take the standard Improved Initiative, or Toppling Spell for Magic Missile? (because I have Magical Lineage)
Surviving early levels is fairly easy for you to do. A 20 attribute with Potent Magic can get your save DCs as high as 17 with basic investment. Color Spraying baddies (most of which have bad Will saves) means you'll end encounters quite easily, and you can do that upwards of 4 times per day before your fellow party members even participate in combat. That isn't to say that you shouldn't use anything other than Color Spray, just that your spell list doesn't need to be so varied by 1st level.
Re-read Mystic Past Life again:
You can add spells from another spellcasting class to the spell list of your current spellcasting class. You add a number of spells equal to 1 + your spellcasting class’s key ability score bonus (Wisdom for clerics, and so on). The spells must be the same type (arcane or divine) as the spellcasting class you’re adding them to. For example, you could add divine power to your druid class spell list, but not to your wizard class spell list because divine power is a divine spell. These spells do not have to be spells you can cast as a 1st-level character. The number of spells granted by this ability is set at 1st level. Changes to your ability score do not change the number of spells gained. This racial trait replaces shards of the past.
The first sentence says you add spells from one other list to your own class list. No sane GM would permit you to have the same spell on your list twice at different level intervals. Which is to say that the Haste cheese isn't worth it and likely not allowed anyway. Even besides that point, your party is lacking a Divine spellcaster, and that is a big problem, especially in the first half of the AP, where having a Cleric is crucial. I'd instead look at spells that a divine caster can cast that is also available to an Arcane spellcaster, and select those kinds of spells instead. A lot of Cleric-like spells are on the Witch spell list, like Heal, so investing in that stuff would be really awesome for your party to have.
I stated that Arcanists are usually good with spells that are reliant on Save DCs or Caster Levels, because they have innate features to boost those attributes that other full spellcasters don't have, which makes them excel at those kinds of spells compared to other full spellcasters. Commonly, those are Evocation (for Caster Levels in regards to damage scaling via blasting) and Enchantment (a common form of Save or Suck). There are other spells from other schools that have stuff like this as well, so I'd look into investing in those also. Some Necromancy, some transmutation, etc.
You still haven't stated what sort of niche you want your spellcasting to fill. If it's blasting, then I'd recommend Blood Arcanist for Orc Bloodline, and see if the GM will permit Bloodline Mutations for you for Blood Havoc. If it's something else, then build towards that instead. If you want to be an everyman jack-of-all-trades, then I'd suggest against taking options that require you to select a certain thing (such as Magical Lineage) and instead select stuff that grants more broad benefits to your spellcasting, like Combat Casting for better concentration checks.
Improved initiative. I would say save magical lineage for a higher level spell like fireball/glitterdust. Occultist is definately worth the exploits while school savant usually is if you stick to the best schools of magic. Extra exploit is only ever useful for re arranging the order you take feats in with the feat exploits. A neat trick though is if you know you don't want extra metamagic but do want the greater metamagic exploit, is to take extra exploit: extra metamagic feat in place of just learning a metamagic. Samsaran is better particularly long term.
Early survivability. I would recommend a crossbow, a longspear, a heavy shield, and some medium armor. Carry around the heavy shield always before the fight. If you need to cast spells drop it. Your crossbow will probably be your main offense until lv6+ so feel free to go masterwork and pick up some bane bolts. Pack medium armor to use after you run out of spells. On turns you cast spells, pull out a longspear so you can get attacks of opportunity and discourage melee.
Always ask if there is cover to take advantage of even if its just soft cover(meat shields in front). Carry extra scrolls of butt saving spells like expeditious retreat. Also as a general rule stay in the middle of the party formation. Positioning is the best possible way to keep yourself safe
I too suggest Occultist archetype, and the feat summon good monster, nothing better then having aid at will from your summoned pet on the whole party, and they can tank the traps too. I say this as someone that played this path with that build it was very fun.
Currently in the middle of chapter 3 of ROTRL with an elven Arcanist (5)/Evangelist(3).
We don't use retraining...If I did I would change somethings...
The following is my thoughts on how it is going
ELF: I swapped elven weapons for elven arcane focus (+2 concentration)...mixed bag, there was a few times wish I had a sword, but overall I think it was a good swap
Feat selection: I have been doing a KS build, so almost all my feats have basically gone towards this...less than optimal, but been fun.
Traits: Magical Knack & Scholar of the ancients (TAKE SCHOLAR OF ANCIENTS...TRUST ME)
Exploits
School Understanding Universilist has been more helpful than most would believe, but long term is starting to be less useful.
Potent Magic: TAKE THIS...LEVEL 1, MUST HAVE...Cannot stress this enough...
Bloodline development: Arcane (Focus)...Building a custom focus, would have cost me two feats instead of one, so went for it...would probably of been better to go with craft weapon then craft staff...ohh well, the extra spell isn't bad...
Quick Study...just got this last night, and only used it once...but really nice...
The Evangelist levels have been useful already (Character level 6 sucked), obviously choosing the right god helps a lot (Nethys, so concentration bonus and 3/mage armors a day)