| shroudb |
important stipulations:
a)you are playing with Bonus Archetype variant rules (we need to steal a boatload of feats from other classes/archetypes since our own are meh)
b)your GM doesn't automatically gives you access to Dragon disciple (if he does, then it's much simpler)
c)you have access to energy mutagen (not build defining, but certainly nice to have)
d)the official books have for some reason misspelled most of the thing we will be using. I'll be using those false names for ease, but you are obligated to switch them in your formula book:
Our Draconic Presence mutagen is named Silverotngue.
Dragon breath Mutagen is called Energy mutagen.
Dragon Inheritance is called Cognitive mutagen.
Dragon Might is called Bestial.
and etc
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What good is science if you cannot (slowly) tranform yourself to a dragon with it?!
In combat we simply rage and smack things with a long stick, having worse attack bonus than martials but at least keeping pace with the damage. We should be also keeping up on the HP front and have a great AC (like, REALLY great).
Out of combat we rely on cognitive + high int + a lot of trained skills for doing research/recalls/etc. We are also dispensing mutagens/elixirs to our fellow party members to shore up weaknesses/boost strengths, as needed.
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We start as a humble hobgoblin mutagenist with a dragon fetish/fascination. Heritage wise, both elfbane (to get a reaction) and smokeworker (just because it offers something unique) can work.
we go for a more frontloaded stat array since early levels alchemist is where he's hurting the most:
16/14/14/16/10/10
Boost, Str, Con, Int, Wis with level ups. Apex Strength.
You should be like 20/14/19/20/16/10 at 15th level.
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as normal, we will ignore every class feat we can until like level 12:
1st level we pick up our potion dispencer... err Familiar (manual dexterity/indipendent is nice)
Ancestry wise, i like Scholar because more recipes are neat. But you can easily pick up Weapon familiarity at this point as well.
At this level we aren't doing much. We have our medioum armor, maybe a longspear or twohanding a staff (each with it's own pros and cons) or a halberd if we picked up weapon familiarity.
Our alchemical stuff are mostly a few healing elixirs to bring back to life the actual healers, maybe a few juggernaut potions for a bit of extra padding of our hp, maybe smokesticks if we went smokeworker, a poison or two on the fighter's weapon, and etc minor things that aren't of much importance. Keep in mind that we can always spent an action to command our familiar to draw and feed us a potion even if we're twohanding.
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2nd level we pick up Barbarian (dragon instinct) dedication and revivifying (not because of the healing, the healing is terrible, 1d6 till level 11, instead we pick it up because it's the only known way to man to stop a mutagen)
We're starting on the path to the ultimate mutation -Dragon.
Rage gives us about as much HP as Juggernaut, so we should be probably be switching to something like Drakeheart, both because it's appropriate and also because it counteracts the -1 to AC from the rage.
Keep in mind that you can not command your familiar while raging, so command it before raging to feed you your mutagens and then rage. After that, leave it on his own (indipendent) to do draw and feed you whatever it feels like (probably health elixirs).
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3rd level general feat will probably be either weapon familiarity through ancestral paragon (glaive and halberd are both great options) or we will be picking more streamlined options like toughness/fleet if we picked the other one at level 1.
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4th level we're going to be picking both barbarian resiliency (as a d8 class we need as much HP as we can get) and draconic arrogance (because our will saves are terrible) or No escape (to get a reaction).
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5th level i would personally retrain ancestral paragon to toughness and pick up the weapon familiarity manually. But you can delay toughness if you want and pick up something else. The free draw may be useful depending on how you adventure. (especially if your GM allows "draw a weapon" to also include "switch from carrying your twohanded to proper grip. It does sound reasonable if you're able to draw a twohander to both hands to also be able to simply grip it with both hands.)
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6th level. Now we're talking. Like a lot of alchemist builds, the first few levels were a PITA since you couldn't do much. Now you can finally take Dragon Disciple (since you are also a dragon instanct barbarian) and Dragon Skin. Throw your armor away and go commando with your drakeheart mutagens for a pretty good AC while raging.
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8th level, we finally get our instanct ability, that more or less covers the fact that we don't have specialiazation like every other martial. So we're keeping up in damage. Due to resiliency, while we don't have barbarian level's of HP, we should still be good.
Dragon breath can also give us an AoE, but i'm not sure about the DC, since it doesn't actually specifies tradition. If the GM rules that it's Arcane (like the bloodline) then don't pick it up, if he rules that it's Class DC, pick it up. Other wise, there are a bunch of usefull level 1-4 barbarian feats to pick from.
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10th level follows the tradition of not picking alchemist feats. Instead pick up a few more barbarian feats or some more senses through Dragon disciple.
Going Mauler from here on is also a possibility to grab some nice twohanded feats (may need to pick up scent or breath from Dragon Discpile on the previous level).
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12th level... we can now start picking up alchemist feats! yay! Extend elixir is very good. As is Attack of opportunity from barbarian, as is Flight as is Dragon breath (from barbarian).
Invinsible would be neat, but we're not using Juggernaut since the HP don't stack with rage and our Will is abysmal even without tanking it even more.
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(sidenote: we can now use a 2nd mutagen. I'll probably be using Energy mutagen since it's the only one that helps with the build. A tiny bit extra damage (1d6) and a second breath weapon for more AoE coverage.
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14th... Glib is questinable. Being able to talk to everyone is neat, but not sure what it achieves if you dont understand what they are telling back yo you. Plus, at this level, having a scroll of comrehend and a caster solves any such problems. So i would skip that and pick up the two feats that you didn't pick in the previous level (or more Mauler stuff).
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16th. Persistent mutagen is a trap. Your mutagens last 2 hours each and as a mutagenist you have way more than enough of them to last you and your party for the whole day. Eternal on the other hand can save you some real action economy and reagents in the form of various small utility or combat buffs like Mistform, leaper's, speed, etc. Similarly, Genus is also a cool alternative finally giving you an all-in-one out of combat utility mutagen. 8th level Barbarian feats or Mauler stuff.