Elf Oradin - A Foolish Proposal?

[Duskmonk]

Hi all.

TL;DR
I'll be trying to play a dex-focused, elf oradin with a starting constitution of 14 in a party full of squishies. I'll be the only frontliner unless a caster summons me a friend. Is this viable for the Return of the Runelords adventure path? See proposed build progression below.

Longer version:
I'm one of four players in a group preparing to play through Return of the Runelords. Unfortunately I came into the discussion after the other three players had picked out classes, leaving me tasked with providing healing, tanking, and some amount of damage. The party consists of a ranged rogue, a seductress archetype witch who's into enchantments and other mind-affecting crowd control options, an illusionist wizard, and me.

So! Oradin seemed like a fair path to take and I read up the mini-guide like many others before me. Due to roleplaying reasons I'm trying to make this work as an elf. I figured I might as well lean into the dex bonus with agile finesse weapons. The GM lets us have some free feats, so I should be able to do mildly-respectable damage when not smiting. Our party seems more geared towards pacifism--which is nice--but eventually we'll need to fight something. I'm also the only reliable source of healing. I doubt the witch will contribute much in that capacity.

I chose to multi-class instead of going straight Pei Zin Practitioner oracle because mono-PZP seems squishier, and the paladin BAB will become invaluable as the only frontliner the group has. Ideally I'll be eating the ire of whatever gets past the mages' crowd control, plus life link procs, so every hit point counts.

I keep going back and forth on the archetypes for both classes. Either way I'm planning 4 Life Oracle, 16 Paladin.
Oracle or Pei Zin Practitioner) Vanilla oracle's main draw to me is the extra pool of channel energy, but PZP's Lay On Hands-equivalent benefits from my planned feats so much better. Also the PZP's narrative flavor is more fun for the character.
Hospitaler or Warrior of Holy Light) Hospitaler has the greater capacity for heals with its dedicated pool of channel energy, but having fewer smites seems painful in a low-damage party, hence the consideration for Warrior of Holy Light.

Starting Stats w/ 25-pt buy elf:
STR) 13 --> To get access to power attack
DEX) 16
CON) 14
INT) 10 --> Dumped to pump CON.
WIS) 9 --> Dumped to pump CON. I know it's tradition for oradins to drop this to 7, but such a low WIS wouldn't make sense for this character's backstory.
CHA) 16

Traits:
-) Spirit-touched (campaign)
-) Warrior of Old --> I've seen Blessed Touch get praise, but 1 bonus HP per heal seems underwhelming in the long run (despite my saying every HP counts).

Racial abilities:
-) Swap Elven Magic for Fey-Sighted. I will almost certainly never need to make a spell resistance check.

Relevant GM-given Feats:
-) Combat Expertise
-) Martial Versatility
-) Piranha Strike
-) Point-blank Shot
-) Power Attack
-) Weapon Finesse

Items
No need to worry about this right now. Rest assured that I'll be looking for Bracers of the Merciful Knight and a Phylactery of Positive Channeling.

Progression - After Ultimate Mercy I feel like the core is complete, so I've left the last 3 feats open for whatever's needed at the time.
Lvl 1) Paladin [Hospitaler]. Fey Foundling feat
Lvl 2) Pal.
Lvl 3) Oracle [Pei Zin practitioner, Life mystery]. Extra Lay On Hands feat
Lvl 4) Oracle. +1 CHA (17 CHA)
Lvl 5) Oracle. Selective Channel feat. Life Link revelation
Lvl 6) Oracle.
Lvl 7) Pal. Greater Mercy feat
Lvl 8) Pal. +1 CHA (18 CHA)
Lvl 9) Pal. Quick Channel feat
Lvl 10) Pal.
Lvl 11) Pal. Reactive Healing feat
Lvl 12) Pal. +1 CHA (19 CHA)
Lvl 13) Pal. Utlimate Mercy feat
Lvl 14) Pal.
Lvl 15) Pal. Combat Reflexes?
Lvl 16) Pal. +1 CHA (20 CHA)
Lvl 17) Pal. Toughness?
Lvl 18) Pal.
Lvl 19) Pal. Lunge?
Lvl 20) Pal. +1 STR (14 STR)

So what do y'all think? Are there better ways to go about elf oradin-ing?
Thanks in advance! I'll be responding in the morning.

[Scavion]

Elven Branched Spear is your friend, you need to discourage enemies from just walking past your paper thin party and killing everyone. Combat Reflexes and Attacks of Opportunity are your friend here. Honestly, I'm more concerned that you guys are gonna lack the firepower to actually kill anything.

[gnoams]

That's different. The usual point of adding oracle levels to a paladin build is so you can dump dex completely. Personally I'd stick to straight paladin for a dex build like you're doing there. The oracle levels are giving you some piddly 2d6 channels, low level spells, and reducing your paladin progression for loh and everything else. I'm missing seeing the benefit there.

[avr]

Paladin / life oracle isn't going to stack channeling dice of effect. You'll have two separate pools since they're powered by different things. Which makes using channeling at all, much less spending feats on it pretty dubious.

As a paladin you can cast shield other from level 7 if you want to take damage for them. To some extent the job of the illusionist and the seducer is to keep the enemies tangled up though - keeping the back line safe is more their job than yours. Like gnoams I'd suggest not multiclassing here.

[SheepishEidolon]

I tinkered with elven melee characters lately, and found little but at least some rule support for them:

Vigilance alternate racial trait provides +2 AC vs. chaotic creatures (assuming they make up 1/3 of your encounters that's nearly +1 AC in average)

Elven branched spear (already mentioned) as a finessable reach weapon

Elven thornblade / leafblade as finessable weapons with +2 to crit confirmation, count as martial weapons for elves

Reduce person increases your AC and AB by another 2 points without affecting your reach, and can be made permanent for (relatively) little gold

Elven Battle Style and its follow-up feats allow you maneuvers without AOO, Int for damage and strike back if missed by your foe - but they come with some strings attached

Beyond that, I recommend taking Toughness as early as possible.

Quote:

Unfortunately I came into the discussion after the other three players had picked out classes, leaving me tasked with providing healing, tanking, and some amount of damage.

Well, a warpriest would be another option. Or an alchemist with some defensive discoveries. Or a battle oracle with combat healer revelation, for emergencies. Or a wizard + fighter + eldritch knight, using (greater) false life and (greater) infernal healing, at least until mid level.

If you don't want to rely on class features for healing, there is the Combat Vigor line and the Healer's Hand feat.

[Duskmonk]

Thanks for the responses, everyone!

My main takeaways/follow-up questions are:

1) Multiclassing could dilute me too much, hampering my damage and healing capabilities.
--> Is the Life Link not worth the dip in this party composition? It seems like the most straightforward way to heal everyone else with a good action economy, but with all the crowd control we'll have maybe that's unnecessary? The minimum investment seems like 3 levels to be able link with my other party members. At that point I figured I might as well go for level 4 for the 2nd-level spells without further hindering BAB progression. That would cost me a level 17 paladin feature, though.

2) Damage is too low.
--> Would the Warrior of the Holy Light paladin archetype be preferable to the Hospitaler, then? I'd still get additional healing in the form of 4 bonus LOH uses across 16 paladin levels, but I wouldn't lose out on smites per day like a Hospitaler would.

3) Being a threat that enemies don't just rush by requires more feat investment.
--> Would a warpriest be able to keep the party healthy during combat in addition to themselves? It'd definitely be too deadly for the opponent to ignore (Side note: I played an Arsenal Chaplain for a few levels last campaign. Good times!).

[Lelomenia]

Life Link seems very...not good. Certainly not remotely worth dipping for.

I do really think you are crippling this character to compensate for the Con penalty; painful to watch. I strongly encourage either (1) ask GM for a different set of ability modifiers (e.g., +2 to one ability) to support RP of this character or (2) live with a low con. Paladins need con less than any other front liner; you can give yourself extra HP whenever you need and your Fort scales with Cha.

[Artofregicide]

The traditional oradin build is a big wall of hp who can heal allies at their own expense as a few action (life link) and heal themselves as a swift (lay on hands).

I've heard plenty of theorycraft on it, but never seen one at a table.

I've played a CHA focused, DEX dumping oracle 1/paladin x who was... honestly basically just a paladin. I'm unsure whether the dip was worth it - it came out about even.

[Mysterious Stranger]

I see a couple of problems with this character.

First is your plan to use life link to heal. The problem with that is that your party consist of 2 casters and a ranged focused rouge. If any of these characters get into melee combat they are already screwed and healing the amount of healing you can provide is not going to do much good. There is a good chance that the other characters are going to die In a round or two. Even if they are not killed they may get shut down. Life links works best in a party with multiple frontline combatants and even then the healer should not be one of them.

You are also playing an Elf which means you get a penalty to CON and no CHA bonus. Would half elf fit the concept? If the GM will allow it Drow could also work. The alternative racial trait Surface Infiltrator would get rid of the light blindness and replace dark vision with low light vision.

Multiclassing is also lowering your BAB and your primary combat STAT is only a 16. That means your chances to hit when you are not using smite evil are lower than they should be. It is also diluting both classes abilities.

In short you are trying to be everything the party needs and that is too much for a single character to do. The way I see it you need to do one of two things. First would be to build a character strong enough protect the whole party that is able to heal. A straight paladin may work for this. The second thing would be to embrace the squishiness of the rest of party. Go for a third full caster and make sure all characters in the party are good at sneaking around. A Herald caller cleric could work for this.

[Theaitetos]

If you're going for a CHA build and want to play an Elf for rp reasons... would a Drow or Half-Elf work, too? The Elf's INT bonus is a total waste and the penalty to CON is bad on a tanky guy. The Drow at least changes INT to CHA, while you have neither on a Half-Elf.

Healing during combat is usually inefficient (except status removals). It's good to have an "emergency heal" of some sort available - crit happens - but in general it's best to do normal healing outside of combat. Focusing more on taking down enemies is important: the faster they go down, the less damage they deal.

Life Link isn't worth much. At low levels your own HP aren't high enough to sustain 3 links, and at higher levels 5hp don't do much. It's not worth going 3 oracle levels just to get it.

[Firebug]

A slightly different take (since the party could actually run as a stealth party with a rogue and an illusionist) is to consider 2 levels of Ninja.

Yeah, Ninja.

The idea is to use Ki Channel to give yourself more Ki Pool and then use Tea of Transference to convert the Ki Pool into Lay on Hands (or more Channels). Bonus is that you can also convert the Ki into a Smite Evil... giving you more Smites per day as a Hospitaler than a Oath of Vengeance Paladin. You could also use a Meditation Crystal to convert Channels into Lay on Hands directly if you don't want to spend gold, but its slower and doesn't let you repeat it all day.

Effectively, you turn one channel into 2-5 Ki Points(depending on how many dice your Channel is) and then turn those Ki Points back into 2-5 Channels (or Lay on Hands, or Smites, etc).

It ends up being a bit more selfish, in that you aren't siphoning off damage from the party to yourself ... in combat. But out of combat you can go all day as long as you have Tea.

Why are you spending point buy on Power Attack? You already get Piranha Strike for free as well. Sure, it's less damage, and requires a light weapon, but you were going dex-based anyway.

If you were looking for a frontline Melee Paladin, consider the 2 level dip in Ninja I mentioned, and then the Virtuous Bravo Archetype. It doesn't stack with Hospitaler and it doesn't get spells, but it does the Frontline Dex Fighter pretty well. It gets Weapon Finesse for free and gets +level to damage with light piercing weapons (precise strike). It will take longer before the Ki Channel loop takes of (since you need to spend 2 lay on hands for each channel), but its doable, though more expensive Tea-wise.

If you are planning on Channeling in combat, get Purifying Channel. Its not a lot of damage, but being able to do some while healing everyone else is nice. Free damage, even if they save for half.

[Derek Dalton]

This is why I like session zero. You arrived late and everyone decided to leave you hanging with what the party needs not with what you want to play. The biggest issue is you have to serve as frontline and healer.
Why elf? I like the race and all but for what you are trying to do the elf isn't the perfect race for it. The only reason to play an elf in this case is a Calamity archtype Warpriest. I have a cohort one currently in Rise and he's a blast to play. He isn't a frontliner but he can tank up enough to stand there to protect his allies.

[Duskmonk]

Thanks again for the feedback, folks. It’s pretty clear to me now that I’m trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. I was hoping to use elf for a backstory I had in mind that spans 150+ years without suffering age penalties, but I’ll shelve it for a different campaign.

I’ll focus the goals of the build to destroying the opposition as quickly as possible and being alive to patch up the party afterward, whether that’s through LOH, fervor, or a quiver full of cure light wounds wands. I’ll also try to stick to just one class. Return of the Runelords is supposed to get the players to level 20 and it’d be cool to use a capstone ability for once. :)

(I'm alright letting the discussion end here)

[David knott 242]

If you want to play a background that has an advanced starting age, take a look at the geniekin races (ifrit, oread, sylph, undine). Of these four races, ifrit has the best stat combination (+2 Dex and Cha, -2 Wis).