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I rather like having the right skill at hand for the given situation and not having to rely on party members to fill those roles. This is especially true in Organized Play as you are often thrown into unknown group compositions unless you have a steady roster.
With all of that in mind, I have been working on designing an Investigator who over the course of his career will wind up being legendary in six skills and expert (with ability to make checks requiring master proficiency) in the rest.
For the legendary skills I'm envisioning taking Arcana, Crafting, Medicine, Occultism, Religion, and Society for Recall Knowledge rolls, while Lore and Nature will be left at expert.
My questions come down to:
Would you suggest a different composition of Legendary skills?
What feats should be taken?
What items should be bought?
Any other advice?
Maybe Multiclass Rogue so that you can use the Skill Mastery feat to get even more skills up to Master rank.
Maybe Multiclass Rogue so that you can use the Skill Mastery feat to get even more skills up to Master rank.
I’m definitely using Multiclass Rogue’s Dedication and Skill Mastery feat to boost skill acquisition/advancement. I have four out of the five used currently built in. I was not sure about the fifth as it may be better suited to an investigator class feat.
I’m also looking at Loremaster for overall expert Lore acquisition as I feel it a less taxing and better choice thematically for the character.
That doesn't seem like a skill monkey, rather a knowledge guru who fixes people & objects. All quite useful to have in PFS play, yet it doesn't have the breadth of roles you seem to be seeking in your OP.
Which is okay given how much PFS focuses on knowledge (well, sometimes). Yet I think Thievery and one face skill (suggest Diplomacy) would serve you better as those can be more pivotal (especially when the party lacks anybody capable). Loremaster Lore can cover the Recall checks, freeing up several slots. Your proficiency will be lower, but they'll all be under Int so that's good and the Lore choices can be focused for those esoteric checks in PFS scenarios.
Separately I'd recommend Acrobatics or Athletics too, though more for combat reasons.
Familiar (witch or familiar master)
Each day, you can choose a different lore skills for it it be "trained" in.
Thanks everyone for the input.
Castilliano - Having the equivalence of expert or better in every skill with the ability to perform checks requiring master seems rather like a skill monkey + knowledge guru to me. This will allow for skill checks and the 19+ skill feats should help with filling in abilities.
The legendary skills were chosen mainly based on Decipher Writing and Recall Knowledge. Medicine is just useful.
Diplomacy and Thievery are definitely good options, which I could bump up to master by redistributing skill increases and taking that final Skill Mastery feat.
I need to look into Athletics and Acrobatics further.
gnoams - I've been considering Pathfinder Agent and Scrollmaster, but unfortunately that ability will not come in handy if the character is trained in every skill. The character is likely to only have two to four skills not trained out the gate.
Mellored - Where is that from? I'm having trouble tracking down where the familiar gets to have a different trained lore each day.
Mellored - Where is that from? I'm having trouble tracking down where the familiar gets to have a different trained lore each day.
It's not an automatic thing, it's just another ability you can give your familiar for the day---and it's in the APG not the CRB.
Skilled: Choose a skill other than Acrobatics or Stealth. Your familiar's modifier for that skill is equal to your level plus your key spellcasting ability modifier, rather than just your level. You can select this ability repeatedly, choosing a different skill each time.
Mellored is quite right that random Lore skills are eligible for it, though I bet they weren't thinking of that when they wrote it. Make sure you give it Speech and/or Touch Telepathy too so it can convey what it knows....
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The only way to build is a skill monkey is to be a tailed goblin. At least until a few more ancestries get released.
Mellored - Where is that from? I'm having trouble tracking down where the familiar gets to have a different trained lore each day.It's not an automatic thing, it's just another ability you can give your familiar for the day---and it's in the APG not the CRB.
Skilled: Choose a skill other than Acrobatics or Stealth. Your familiar's modifier for that skill is equal to your level plus your key spellcasting ability modifier, rather than just your level. You can select this ability repeatedly, choosing a different skill each time.Mellored is quite right that random Lore skills are eligible for it, though I bet they weren't thinking of that when they wrote it. Make sure you give it Speech and/or Touch Telepathy too so it can convey what it knows....
It also works nicely for deception, diplomacy, intimidation, and performance. And can cover most other non-combat parts of other skills.
They do not get any of the skill feats, but that is still a lot of utility, assuming you know in advance what you need.
You can also have them be a monkey.
i find it weak to be used on scaling offensive things like intimidation. The bonus is level+stat, but it lacks the inherent +2/+4/+6/+8 of proficiency and lacks the item bonuses that you are "expected" by level based DCs at certain levels and up.
That makes it extremely hard to, as an example, use them as intimidation machines after like level 7 or so.
Lores are nice because they are usually at -2 DC for appropriate recall knowledges, so that makes it like it's pseudo-trained in them, Static DCs are also fine, but as soon as you go to level based ones, it starts to fall off.
Yep, this is why I'm not overly excited for Skilled: IMO, it's pretty meh. Set DC's and skills you can get a reduction in work fine. Set DC's like Aid and very specific Lores [the ones you might get a -5 to the DC for] like Ancient Red Dragons that Live in this Area Lore or Person that Built this Dungeon Lore. :P
For Aid, apart from the Aid specific Familiar ability for Thievery and Deception, that they auto-suceed the check either way, the Familiar is no good, since there isn't another way to give them a Reaction to actually Aid you.
Ah, you're right. My bad. I was thinking of a houserule in a game I'm playing that allows minions to get a reaction when they used Ready and reactions where allowed to be used with Ready.
i find it weak to be used on scaling offensive things like intimidation. The bonus is level+stat, but it lacks the inherent +2/+4/+6/+8 of proficiency and lacks the item bonuses that you are "expected" by level based DCs at certain levels and up.
That makes it extremely hard to, as an example, use them as intimidation machines after like level 7 or so.
Lores are nice because they are usually at -2 DC for appropriate recall knowledges, so that makes it like it's pseudo-trained in them, Static DCs are also fine, but as soon as you go to level based ones, it starts to fall off.
it has 3 nice advantages for demoralize.
First, it is 1 action to intimidate 2 people (or "free" if your using independent).Second, It is from a different source. So both you and the familiar can do it without the 10 minute cool down.
Third, It can use Int in place of Cha. Which could be +6 for an investigator.
But yea, a single feat or 2 will not be as good as a bard. But it is still a cheap way to be reasonable good at lots of stuff.
Unified Theory, does it actually allow you to make proficiency checks for those skills that you do not normally qualify for? Such as, can I make a legendary Nature check even though I perhaps only have expert proficiency in it?
Familiar's Skilled ability seems redundant for the build since having at least expert in each skill means my character should be around or higher then the bonus the familiar has. It definitely has some interesting points to it, like rolling twice though.
It may allow you to use it in such a manner, but I don't think it is as powerful as some are making it out to be. I think it allows you to use it in place of the other skills in particular situations.
You've started to make a meaningful connection about the common underpinnings of of the four traditions of magic and magical essences, allowing you to understand them all through an arcane lens. Whenever you use an action or skill feat that requires a Nature, Occultism, or Religion check, depending on the magic tradition, you can use Arcana instead. If you would normally take a penalty or have a higher DC for using Arcana on other magic (such as when using Identify Magic), you no longer do so.
The bolded portion sticks out.
The best explanation I could find came from RPG Stack Exchange in response to the thread "Does the 'Unified Theory' skill feat have any interaction with the 'Natural Medicine' skill feat?'.
Unified Theory has three requirements:
1. That you are using an action or skill feat.
2. That whatever you are doing requires a Nature, Occultism, or Religion check.
3. That the kind of check is determined by a magical tradition.
Using Nature to Treat Wounds passes the first two conditions, but not the third. Therefore, you cannot use Unified Theory to replace the check with Arcana.
This reasoning also applies to other kinds of checks covered by these skills. For example, you can't use Unified Theory to attempt an Arcana check to issue commands to an animal as described in the Nature skill.
You had asked for a "definitive" answer. I'm not sure there is an official source or ruling to cite, but the requirement that the kind of check be determined by a magical tradition is explicitly included in the text of the feat.
Those are fair points.
The reason I'm iffy on it is the Decipher Writing and Recall Knowledge. I want my character to be able to handle just about any of those roles, so I need to take a closer look at those particular skills.
I also think having those legendary goes well with the fact he will be a Loremaster.