Hey everyone. My GM started something about a year ago in which the wives from our group started their own, and now we come together every couple of months for one big encounter.
Our party, as it is now, consists of 7 players, with an 8th who sometimes plays. It contains a 2H fighter, a cleric, two rogues, an Arcane Archer Fighter, a Druid and a Ranger (as the flex). My last character was a swashbuckler, but she fell in the last encounter. Because our group is so large, most of what we are facing are Mythic level challenges. Our party level is now 15.
I find myself at an impasse on the direction I should go next. Because these encounters are so hard, we struggle a lot with hitting things, with soaking and restoring the damage we are dealt, and with actually penetrating with spells.
I have a couple of ideas, but am unsure on builds or direction at this time. I've played an Arcanist in the Runelords campaign a while back, so I feel he could be a powerful party member with a lot of spell potential. I do worry over the spell penetration, however. I've also considered a skald/bloodrager combo that just powers up the fighter to ungodly proportions, but it wouldn't do much for the rest of the group, as they are all in the back line. I've also been tinkering with the idea of a shapeshifting blight druid (1 level of monk) with just beastly AC. Lastly, I've been toying with a Magus, but I feel he would die quickly like my last character.
My question is have any of you dealt with similar issues in a larger group, and if so, what steps did you take to stay relevant? Building a character for encounters 8-10 HD above our party is frustrating. I'd like to find something that can contribute without getting wiped out so easily. Thanks for any advice you can give.
Evangelist Cleric seems pretty obvious to me.
Separately, while I get where your GM is coming from, it might be worth suggesting that it would be more fun if rather than increasing the CR of monsters, he increase the number of monsters to create high CR encounters.
nah I found a couple of ideas. I can deck out a spell caster to have beastly penetration, or I can take gunslinger and just focus on touch AC to things in range.