So I keep trying to find out exactly why the exploiter wizard is so much better than the arcanist. Maybe I'm missing it but I couldn't find the exact reason why. Maybe because I usually think about the occultist archetype of the arcanist. Does anyone know if there is a guide or a good post?
In no such terminology, wizards are better at casting. They do not change casting time when using meta magic feats, and they gain access to higher spell levels one level sooner. And they have more spells per day.
And bonus feats.
Arcanists get greater exploits tho...
Dunno, but the obvious difference is the half-spell level the wizard has over the arcanist. Between the 1/5 levels wizard bonus feats/arcane discoveries and the exploiter's 1 + 1/4 levels arcanist exploits the exploiter doesn't fall behind the arcanist there either. Other than that some people can be really annoyed by having only one of their highest level spells available, which is a situation arcanists and sorcerers find themselves in regularly.
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In no such terminology, wizards are better at casting. They do not change casting time when using meta magic feats, and they gain access to higher spell levels one level sooner. And they have more spells per day.
And bonus feats.
Arcanists get greater exploits tho...
Arcanists are better at metamagic than wizards. They can memorize the spell with the metamagic same as a wizard and NOT take extra time to cast, OR can add metamagic to a spell on the fly and cast as a full round action.
Wizards do gain access to spells one level sooner.
I don't see where wizards necessarily have more spells per day. For example, at 8th level:
4/4/3/3/2 Exploiter Wizard
8/4/4/4/2 Arcanist
Both use INT. Note that the wizard do not have a bonded item (no cast any spell 1/day) and loses the school (so no extra school spell per level).
Wizard do get an advantage at odd levels due to gaining access to higher level spells one level sooner, though. For example, at 9th level:
4/4/4/3/2/1 Exploiter Wizard
8/4/4/4/3/0 Arcanist
As avr notes, the Exploiter Wizard still gets Scribe Scroll and the bonus feat every 5 levels, versus the Arcanist getting twice as many exploits, consume spells and access to greater exploits.
A personal note as I've run many wizards and quite a few arcanists is that the wizard can memorize a greater variety of spells versus the arcanist who can memorize fewer spells, but can better spam a memorized spell.
A very basic question relating to which is better for the PLAYER is whether the player prefers running a spontaneous caster or a prepared caster.
I've been playing an Occultist Arcanist through an IRL game of WotR, and with that you get your Summon Monster spells at the levels that a wizard would, plus they're abilities instead of spells taking up your slots, all those Summoner bonuses, etc.
My GM has been so dang mad at me sometimes cause I also focus on counter-summoning, and turn what demons think are backup into bombs or outright wastes of time. (Final Sacrifice is one of my favorite spells for that character)
I think that Arcanists are better than Wizards in many ways, but Wizards are still not bad at all.
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I've been playing an Occultist Arcanist through an IRL game of WotR, and with that you get your Summon Monster spells at the levels that a wizard would, plus they're abilities instead of spells taking up your slots, all those Summoner bonuses, etc.
My GM has been so dang mad at me sometimes cause I also focus on counter-summoning, and turn what demons think are backup into bombs or outright wastes of time. (Final Sacrifice is one of my favorite spells for that character)
I think that Arcanists are better than Wizards in many ways, but Wizards are still not bad at all.
Arcanists are probably the best summoners as of the occultist archetype. Its like being a master summoner without giving up something as class defining as an eidolon and being a full 9 level caster. Or if you don't want to go the obvious route, the Maagambyan Initiate gives you an aura which lets you take sacred summons for standard action summonings as well.
Arcanist casting is a lot more easy to use. Wizards get the advantage of spells a level earlier, but I feel that's not worth it at all to deal with Wizard casting. Exploiter is there for people who like the inflexible wizard casting style, I wouldn't recommend it.
Arcanists can get a school with the archetype and an arcane bond with an exploit, they make better more easy and funner to play wizards than wizards.
The exploiter wizard is less locked in to his spell choices, if he takes the quick study exploit. Which is such a great exploit that I think everyone should take it first.
Hmm so kinda where I thought it was. Personally I prefer the flexibility the arcanist offers at the cost of a slower spell gain. Granted the exploiter helps but leaning towards the arcanist. For those that played the occultist, how is it later levels...worried that the summons will eat through the arcane points real quick
Like any summoning based character, you’ll need to grab all of those associated feats. You do very quickly start burning through the points, so you’ll need some charisma to give you enough consume spells per day. But sacrificing a 3rd level spell to fit in another 4th level SLA is usually a no-brainer.
In no such terminology, wizards are better at casting. They do not change casting time when using meta magic feats, and they gain access to higher spell levels one level sooner. And they have more spells per day.
And bonus feats.
Arcanists get greater exploits tho...
The Arcanist can prepare metamagic feats which does not increase casting time, it's listed in the class. It's only applying metamagic to a spell that wasn't prepped with it originally that up's the casting time.
An exploiter wizard doesn't have more spells per day.
The big advantage of wizard is earlier spell access.
The difference in actual spellcasting is this, a wizard can prepare more potential tricks in a day, each slot can be individual.
An arcanist that has dimension door, emergency force sphere and black tentacles will rarely need to worry about not getting a use out of his 4th level spell slots.
An exploiter wizard will probably only prepare something like dimension door and emergency force sphere once each. During the day emergency force sphere could be of no use, wasted spell slot or he uses it in one dangerous situation and really wishes he had another later that day.
I'll have to revisit my idea. I could be wrong but I play in in pfs, if you can consume a magic item without it being destroyed on the sheet I'm thinking that could be a powerful trick. I would try for a min 14 cha and 18 int. Go with the occultist, possibly human for spell focus and augment summoning at 1
One thing to be aware of with the occultist archetype is that you don’t get an exploit till level 3, which can hurt, and your feats are all tied up by summoning for several levels, so the extra exploit feat isn’t a great option. So, you won’t have a lot else to do with your points for a while anyway.
Actually I find arcanist to be > exploiter wizard for the most part
Wizard- 1 level earlier spell advancement, wizard discoveries
Arcanist- greater exploits, more spell slots(consistently Lv4+), archetypable, more benefits from high point buy while still remaining SAD, better casting system, ability to add metamagic in both prepared and spontaneous method
That 1 level earlier advancement is huge but I still find arcanist to more than compensate
Depends on what you are looking for Melkiador, If I went human the the two main feats for summoning would be knocked out...superior summoning isnt huge at level 3 so I could go with the extra exploit (hence 2 at level 3) then at 5 go superior summoning. Maybe I'm missing something has the summoning tree expanded again? Points will be largely consumed for summons. Realizing even then I'm gonna be pinched on exploits and a lot of them are nice. I would probably go potent magic, quick study, familiar, consume magic items, counterspell dimensional slide...ahem wow there are a lot of nice ones
Arcane Discoveries are pretty damn powerful, IMHO. Plus you can safely dump Charisma without worry, letting you have better physical stats.
The major problem with the wizard is that while they can prepare for any situation the best, they aren't always properly prepared for the exact situation at hand. Because of this, they are forced to spend extra resources on spells that help solve an issue, rather than the one spell that definitely solves the issue.
Like having "Maximized Empowered Fireball" prepared against a horde of vampires. It will certainly put in work, but a single casting of "Sunburst" could have ended the fight instead. Thus we see the value of something like Quick Study on a Wizard. It allows you to always have the "best" spell for a situation, therefore you save on spell slots.
At least theoretically.
In practice, saving on spell slots isn't all that important, since 90% of the time, good enough is good enough, and the adventuring day ends when the spellcaster runs out of spells anyway. But, being able to tailor spells to enemy weaknesses/vulnerabilities is a pretty nifty tool to have. It combos well with the wizard having access to technically every spell ever written (and then some).
I'd say the Exploiter Wizard is best thought of as a buffed Generalist Wizard. Potent Magic is always useful, and Quick Study gives you great versatility. Even moreso if the Metamixing exploit allows you to spontaneously apply metamagic to your wizard spells. At that point you have basically all of the upsides of being a wizard AND a sorcerer, but almost none of the downsides.
I'm playing an exploiter wizard. I find the bonus feat at first level to be invaluable on many builds. (exploit:meta)
My second observation: Spells are tight. Which I believe is part of the continuing evolution of dnd: reduce spells in order to minimize the disparity between casters and martials. And to give players shiny gewgaws to entice them into reducing spells per day, or total spells known. But I digress.
As a usual specialist wizard, I always have a slot or two for "what if" spells. Exploiters feel much, much tighter.
I compensate by scrolls and wands. But it really does require more effort into: what am I going to memorize.
So far I have resisted quick study (and likely will continue to). I would rather aim to solve that via napstack.
Depends on what you are looking for Melkiador, If I went human the the two main feats for summoning would be knocked out...superior summoning isnt huge at level 3 so I could go with the extra exploit (hence 2 at level 3) then at 5 go superior summoning. Maybe I'm missing something has the summoning tree expanded again? Points will be largely consumed for summons. Realizing even then I'm gonna be pinched on exploits and a lot of them are nice. I would probably go potent magic, quick study, familiar, consume magic items, counterspell dimensional slide...ahem wow there are a lot of nice ones
I find expanded summon monster and summon spirit guardian to be pretty nice feats to have in a summoning build. And I'm not sure what you find uninteresting in superior summoning for level 3. Throwing out 1d3+1 eagles at level 3 is crazy powerful against most enemies.
And for this archetype, I don't even know if potent magic is worth taking at all. Your summons already last long enough and the DC of summons doesn't matter. Quick Study is always great though.
The other feat to look at for the summoner builds would be Versatile Summon Monster, making some traditionally meh-to-alright options into very entertaining things - aerial constrictors and primordial rhinos, for instance. An aerial dire tiger is similarly no joke.
re: exploiter vs arcanist, I think the exploiter wins if the arcanist doesn't have an archetype to get shiny, interesting things. I've been very put out by the exploiter archetype (despite playing one for an Arcane Trickster) because it did all the right things - made up for my lackluster casting progression, had the desired exploit of Dimensional Slide, etc. It's when you start getting into the archetypes for arcanist that it finally starts to do things compared to the wizard.
I like potent magic since I figure a lot of my points will go to summons and that will be the first thing I do...but I think that it would add some flexibility to cast other spells. I couldnt find summon spirit guardian and while versatile and expanded seem good, I wonder if they outweigh the other feats I will need
You couldn't find it because the name had been slightly scrambled. Summon guardian spirit.
What do you consider to be the other feats you will need?
If School Understanding lets you count as a Specialist Wizard (it does seem to grant you an actual Arcane School, albeit a nerfed one unless you pay from your resevoir), then the Exploiter could theoretically be allowed to take the Acadamae Graduate feat for quicker, longer lasting summons.
I'm thinking at least one or two extra exploits possibly improved familiar and improved init. I forgot my one hesitation of this class was you only get so many arcane points per day vs the reservoir. So at level 12 my summon would cost 6 arcane points but per day I start with 9...seems like a uphill battle. I really need to check the ruling on consume magic items..if it doesnt effect the rewards I think that would be a great ability to help with arcane points. I think I would need at least a 14 cha and pick up cha boosting items. I think the dump to 7 would be counter intuitive when I need so many arcane points. I could do a bit a filler and maybe have a level lower of summonings so I would just cast a normal summons when not in a pinch. A lot of the exploits would have to be more along the lines of augmenting me and get out of jail type effects so I have them when needed. (Sorry I'm typing as I'm thinking.) Admittedly I've typically avoided a full caster but always thought the summons would be fun
You just have to start using the in-built consume spells ability to fuel your points. Giving up a spell to cast a better spell is still a great option to have. Sure, your “free” spells per day goes down over time, but by then you have a lot more spells per day to play around with anyway.
And for adding versatility, quick study blows the small bonus from potent magic out of the water.
To help with the point buy, if you are primarily summoning your casting stat doesn't have to be an 18. 18 and higher int are basically mandatory if you're trying to get high spell DC's, but you can do just fine with a 16 if you aren't. An arcanist only gets up to 5th level spells in typical PFS play, so a 20 after item a +2 headband/level ups will get you that bonus spell.
EDIT: How does this look to you?
STR: 8 DEX: 14 CON: 14 INT: 16 WIS: 12 CHA: 14
I agree that potent magic is more or less wasted on what my impression of your build's focus is. If you aren't cranking your DC's or worried about Caster Level, I'd grab something else. With your main schtick (summoning) being always available, quick study will let you switch out spells you don't need. IMO, that is way more useful for this kind of character.
Hmm actually thought int influenced the arcane points obviously I'm wrong. My idea was basically to use the summons and burn spells when I can to get more points...but then you have all the other spells. Kinda why I was thinking the int 18 and potent (for example when you really need to get off that save or suck spell. thinking with a item to get a cha 16 that would mean I would only be able to lose 3 spells but by level 12 I would have a ton of spells left over so what would plan B be ya know?
Do you really want to play a summoning character? Because you seem more interested in doing things other than summoning.
Maybe you’d prefer playing something like a spell specialist arcanist. They can crank up the DCs even higher and aren’t as point starved as the occultist.
Umm not sure where you are getting that. At level 12 I have 5 level 1 spells, 5 level 2, 5 level 3, 5 level 4, 4 level 5 and 2 level 6..Say for some reason I used my consumes on all the level 6 and level and another of 5 that still leaves a whole lot of spells.. take out maybe the rest of level 5 for normal summons..that is still a lot...so why not have a summon up in the first round then something else following up?
In the following rounds you can cast summon spells the traditional way. Summoning eats up a lot of feats to be worth it, so summoning should be your primary option.
I have noticed that a lot of the really good summoning feats aren’t legal in PFS though, so that does free up some of your feats. Not getting evolved summon monster is so sad.
As far as feats go improved familiar is a luxury most often IMO. The base familiar and its bonus to initiative, a skill or a save can be outright more useful, never mind the feat tax. Improved initiative and an extra exploit, fine. For an occultist arcanist Spell focus (conj.) & augment summoning are non-negotiable.
Maybe SF and AS at level 1 if human, extra exploit at 3 (it's more useful early than late and 3 is the earliest you can get it), II at 5. That leaves you the feats from 7 onward free to specialise more- 9+ if non-human.