So, I still disagree with you. You can't speak about the occurence of reactions basing yourself on a team that is specifically designed to trigger these reactions. AoOs aren't trigger that often and Opportune Backstab is not a given every round in most 4-character teams.My point is that optimisation in this game is part build and part well built team. Leave an Opening is also helping the rogue combo off the fighter. If the rogue crits his Strike, the fighter can attack op which lets the rogue backstab. It’s not a purely “I took this just to support the fighter” thing.
The Barbarian doesn’t really have any complimentary classes that are particularly better for them than anyone else, so their ceiling is lower.
And also why is everyone building their characters independent of each other? Is it strange for people to ask each other what their characters do and how they can compliment each other? I guess in PFS it might be, but in home games that sounds weird.
Why would a barbarian with an AoO not be able to take advantage of Leave an Opening? In fact, a barbarian strike would be immensely hard from Leave an Opening.
Trash gets destroyed by casters. So if your fishing for reactions from trash, not what I consider optimized. My experience with equal level or lower monsters is they are high level caster fodder. You want to see damage, watch a high level caster hitting trash and up to equal level monsters with AoE spells. Makes the martials look like clowns.
In the lvl 16 campaign I play my barbarian in, we have a storm druid. In most fights not against boss monsters, she is easily the top damage dealer. Just unloads a big AoE spell, uses a focus point to change into a dragon, then unleashes a breath weapon and starts to melee. None of the other martials can match her range or mobility in dragon form.
But as is usual, the saves are super high against boss monsters. So she has to do more support and healing against them. Still does some damage, but more keeping people alive and making sure things go smooth.
An optimized group will just be sweeping up hit points at high level after caster decimation of trash.
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I don't know how you can honestly say this. You can optimize a barbarian with feats and gear to make them brutal. It seems you haven't even tried and don't understand how to optimize them.
The barbarian doesn't look impressive in a vacuum. In fact, in a vacuum and using white room math, the barbarian looks less impressive. It's in real play in a group where the barbarian shines.
The exact same feats and gear I use on almost every other melee character. That's not a point in the barbarian's favour. Heroism scrolls, an item for flight, your standard +3 major striking flaming, frost, holy/speed flail/hammer weapon with reach.
I made a Giant Instinct Barbarian for fun thinking this might be fun. I wasn't expecting much from the class. I had read the forums claiming the Giant Instinct Barbarian was just ok.
I had seen a ranger archer, strength and dex based rogue, Power Attacking Fighter, flurry ranger, two weapon fighter, and sword and board champion in action. No one had played a barbarian.
But once you play a Giant Instinct Barbarian optimized and backed up by a group, it is a site to behold. I don't like being dishonest myself, which is why I put them on par for damage with a rogue.
Power Attacking fighter should never be considered an optimised build or even close to one. Power Attack is specific in application.
Same with archer ranger, it starts out strong but peters out in terms of damage output.
S&B Champ isn't primarily meant to do damage, though can be specced to do so if you go Paladin and take Divine Reflexes. At no point should Blade Ally ever be considered.
Rogues deal a lot of damage. It isn't big spike damage like a barbarian, but it's very powerful, consistently high damage over the course of many battles.
The fighter is also more of a consistent damage dealer. The +2 to hit makes it so their strikes land more often. It is born out by the data.
The barbarian is what I call a big spike damage dealer that over time will average out to a rogue with rounds so brutal that fights end quickly. You can go a few rounds where your landing your standard 50 point hits. Then you'll suddenly get a crit, then a hit, then activate an AoO, and suddenly your damage spikes up to nutty levels. The ceiling on a barbarian strike is much higher than the ceiling on other martial classes if optimized for damage dealing.
Yes, the Barbarian is spikey. If you roll high twice, crit twice, you do a lot of damage. With the same setup I end up using for the rogue and fighter (+2 heroism, flat-footed from flanking, and -2/3 enemy AC from a debuff) you can crit about 30-35% of the time as a Barbarian vs a +2 monster. Lets say level+0 or less mobs are irrelevant, because I agree with you, that's what casters (and scare to death) are there for. My experiences and assumptions were against level+ monsters.
Saying a class is good when it rolls really well makes the playtest magus seem like the best class in the game. It can just instantly kill a lot of bosses if it rolls really well twice in a row, something I have done a few times by now. But I wouldn't call playtest magus good, or anywhere near an optimal class even with a good build and good support. For the amount you have to dump into making it work, the reward just isn't there. I feel a similar way about the barbarian.
I have to say it sounds to me like you haven't even tried to optimize a barbarian. Your stuck in this mindset which I can only surmise is a white room mind set where multiple reactions are easy to set up and your DM doesn't appear to play enemies in a very tactical manner. Not really how it goes on a battlefield or with a DM actively using enemies in an intelligent and tactical fashion. But hey if your DM likes the tactics one-sided and that's how your group likes to play, then have at it.
I know with absolutely certain you are wrong about the giant instinct barbarian. They are a top tier damage dealer. Even with your optimization and tactics, I'd put my money on an optimized giant instinct barbarian being a top tier damage dealer that equals or exceeds anyone but an optimized rogue or fighter in a group.
I have definitely tried to optimise a barbarian. There isn't many levers to pull on them in terms of optimisation. You:
1) Get a reaction, attack op or champion reaction, doesn't matter.
2) Get heavy armor so you can go cha (for intimidation) and leave dex at 10.
3) Use Silencing Strike as your main attack, because it's one of the only Strike+Xs the class has, until you get Whirlwind Strike.
4) Take certain strike at level 20.
Then you get all the standard melee gear support. That's it. That's as far as barbarian optimisation goes because their feats don't help them, and beyond basic buffs a party composition doesn't help them.
I can for certain, however, say you haven't tried running with an optimised swashbuckler/champion with the other players playing well. Even if the damage numbers may not look great when the DM is playing around your reactions, that's fine, because the resiliency of your party goes up by quite a bit when that happens. The Swashbuckler wants to be attacked to get off ripostes, but that isn't as essential for them. Dual/Bleeding Finisher (I use flying blade so enemy setup isn't a consideration) + OFA add a lot of damage to the party.
The Champion wants their allies to be attacked, but they're also fine being attacked because they're harder to hit than the rest of the party. You can even TMI an invisibility (4) scroll (or a disappearance scroll) at later levels to make it absolutely terrible for the monsters to be attacking you. In rounds where the GM is playing around your reactions, the monsters are also doing minimal damage.
That's why I rate them higher than the Barbarian in terms of ceiling.
Why would a barbarian with an AoO not be able to take advantage of Leave an Opening? In fact, a barbarian strike would be immensely hard from Leave an Opening.
Trash gets destroyed by casters. So if your fishing for reactions from trash, not what I consider optimized. My experience with equal level or lower monsters is they are high level caster fodder. You want to see damage, watch a high level caster hitting trash and up to equal level monsters with AoE spells. Makes the martials look like clowns.
In the lvl 16 campaign I play my barbarian in, we have a storm druid. In most fights not against boss monsters, she is easily the top damage dealer. Just unloads a big AoE spell, uses a focus point to change into a dragon, then unleashes a breath weapon and starts to melee. None of the other martials can match her range or mobility in dragon form.
But as is usual, the saves are super high against boss monsters. So she has to do more support and healing against them. Still does some damage, but more keeping people alive and making sure things go smooth.
An optimized group will just be sweeping up hit points at high level after caster decimation of trash.
They would be able to take advantage of Leave an Opening, just not as much as a fighter can.
Yes, Trash does get destroyed by casters, that's why my quoted 90-95% hit rate was against level+2 enemies, i.e. the ones that don't get destroyed by AoE incapacitation or scare to death. Even then, at high enough levels, enough trash can still overwhelm a caster. 12-16 level-4s with aoe/casting themselves is actually an extremely difficult encounter at high levels. No martial is really going to be any good in that situation though, because the problem is the quantity of dice rolls you have to make - even with good stats, something is going to turn up a 1 or a 2. Whirlwind Strike won't help because by high levels enemies just have too many hit points, a Barbarian crit is likely only taking out 33-40% of their HP.
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To the OP, in my experience playing a Swashbuckler, Opportune Riposte usually doesn't fire, and a Strike from a Swashbuckler doesn't do much damage compared to a Finisher. Attack of Opportunity would have the same problem. One for All is a better use of a Reaction.
I did take Attack of Opportunity for my Giant Barbarian, but his Strikes are completely different from my Braggart Swashbuckler's, plus he has reach.
I don't know how you can honestly say this. You can optimize a barbarian with feats and gear to make them brutal. It seems you haven't even tried and don't understand how to optimize them.
The barbarian doesn't look impressive in a vacuum. In fact, in a vacuum and using white room math, the barbarian looks less impressive. It's in real play in a group where the barbarian shines.
The exact same feats and gear I use on almost every other melee character. That's not a point in the barbarian's favour. Heroism scrolls, an item for flight, your standard +3 major striking flaming, frost, holy/speed flail/hammer weapon with reach.
I made a Giant Instinct Barbarian for fun thinking this might be fun. I wasn't expecting much from the class. I had read the forums claiming the Giant Instinct Barbarian was just ok.
I had seen a ranger archer, strength and dex based rogue, Power Attacking Fighter, flurry ranger, two weapon fighter, and sword and board champion in action. No one had played a barbarian.
But once you play a Giant Instinct Barbarian optimized and backed up by a group, it is a site to behold. I don't like being dishonest myself, which is why I put them on par for damage with a rogue.
Power Attacking fighter should never be considered an optimised build or even close to one. Power Attack is specific in application.
Same with archer ranger, it starts out strong but peters out in terms of damage output.
S&B Champ isn't primarily meant to do damage, though can be specced to do so if you go Paladin and take Divine Reflexes. At no point should Blade Ally ever be considered.
...Rogues deal a lot of damage. It isn't big spike damage like a barbarian, but it's very powerful, consistently high damage over the course of many battles.
The fighter is also more of a consistent damage dealer. The +2 to hit makes it so their strikes land more often. It is born out by the data.
The barbarian is what
So your rating is based less on pure damage and more on overall effectiveness including all possible abilities? That makes more sense now.
My rating is based on pure damage dealing and striking in a group environment. Barbarians drop the hammer hard dealing damage. Damage is their primary contribution with some durability.
It doesn't include all the other capabilities. I know a Champion is better for an overall group using teamwork. They will not at all match a barbarian in the damage dealing department unless there is a very exploitable weakness versus good, but they will definitely improve the overall group survivability and that can lead to an overall increase in group effectiveness. Their defensive and utility abilities far exceed a barbarian.
I played a barbarian once because it was fun to do that insane spikey damage. But I haven't played another because they pretty much do insane spikey damage and not much else. I imagine you could build an unarmed grappling/trip barbarian and do better at battlefield control, but not near as much damage.
But the other martial classes bring more to the table than a barbarian who is almost solely a damage hammer with some durability. It's effective in a raw and brutal way that kills fast, but it doesn't bring stuff like Legendary Perception, skills, damage resistance to allies, high defensive abilities, incredible mobility, and the like.
If we constructed a martial tier list, I think I would do it with more categories than an overall. Give a better idea of what each martial is bringing to the table.
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@Exocist: It looks like the level of party optimization that you experience is far from the one I experience, which may lead to very different vision of class efficiency.
I play PFS (but not only), I play with players who don't even manage to flank properly and clearly the level of optimization needed to build your Rogue and your Fighter is above what I'll ever expect to see.
As such, your "ceiling" is way beyond my ceiling. Which is certainly why I consider a far lower % of trigger for reactions, as I don't expect another player to help me trigger them.
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At no point should Blade Ally ever be considered.
What are you taking at 10th over Radiant Blade Spirit? Having a double flaming weapon seems good for any Champion playstyle.
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At no point should Blade Ally ever be considered.What are you taking at 10th over Radiant Blade Spirit? Having a double flaming weapon seems good for any Champion playstyle.
Shield of Reckoning because I almost always go shield ally. My second choice is Devoted Focus.
Shield of Reckoning is difficult to trigger (ally has to be adjacent to you, enemy has to be in champion reaction range and the enemy has to attack the ally) but very powerful when it goes off. I've seen it reduce a 70 damage hit to single digits.
Double flaming, by contrast, isn't that amazing in my view. Lots of creatures are weak to fire (about 100/2200 total monsters) so a single instance of fire damage is good enough to trigger weakness. An extra d6, while a decent damage buff, and I almost always max out my weapon with d6 property runes unless Speed is available, there's also a second thing to say about them in that 500 gold is not a scaling cost - the % of your wealth that a property rune requires goes down while the effect remains quite relevant (even if it does get worse as all damage does). A 10th level feat's cost doesn't go down, you only get one of those, and you're buying a descaling benefit for it.
In terms of weakness triggering, I go Frost, then Flaming, then Holy and would probably stop there. No other type has enough creatures weak to it to be relevant. If I had a free Flaming from divine ally, I wouldn't go double flaming, I'd go Thundering for a guaranteed d6.
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@Exocist: It looks like the level of party optimization that you experience is far from the one I experience, which may lead to very different vision of class efficiency.
I play PFS (but not only), I play with players who don't even manage to flank properly and clearly the level of optimization needed to build your Rogue and your Fighter is above what I'll ever expect to see.
As such, your "ceiling" is way beyond my ceiling. Which is certainly why I consider a far lower % of trigger for reactions, as I don't expect another player to help me trigger them.
That's certainly fair, I'm lucky enough to have had a group of players that gel together well enough to support each other to be the best (particularly because I found them all online as well and we had never played together before), and I certainly wouldn't expect such a thing in org play. But that is what I am talking about when I talk about a high level of optimisation, and why I don't think the Barb is that good at that level.
That being said, I'm also not expecting advanced GM tactics to counter your build in org play, so the probability of triggering reactions probably goes up there as well.
Org play afaik only goes to 8th level (maybe 10th now?) so the extra reaction stuff isn't that relevant for it anyway.
I did the math over about 20 fights. The giant instinct barbarian outdamaged the swashbuckler by about 13%.
Perfect Finisher was a real game changer in closing the gap in damage. Once he picked up that feat, his damage started to increase substantially. He missed against high AC targets far less after picking up Perfect Finisher.
If that campaign had continued on, Perfect Finisher combined with the other abilities may well have completely closed the gap. True Strike every finisher is nasty.
Though that is including the House Rule I allow that let's the Swashbuckler attack again after using a finisher. I felt bad for the Swashbuckler, so decided to remove the limit on attacking after using the finisher and let them start the fight with Panache. It was a terrible feeling starting a fight failing a Panache roll.
Finishers miss sometimes and Panache rolls miss sometimes. So the additional failure chances really put a damper on the Swashbuckler that demoralized the player. The House Rule smoothed over the frustration of failure and the limitation on finishers. Finishers didn't do so much damage to justify not attacking the rest of the round, especially considering how much damage the barbarian did on a per hit basis.
Bleeding Finisher wasn't terribly useful with a giant instinct barbarian in the group. Fights ended way too fast. Persistent damage is nice in longer fights, but not so great in fights with an ally that kills so fast.
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I did the math over about 20 fights. The giant instinct barbarian outdamaged the swashbuckler by about 13%.
Perfect Finisher was a real game changer in closing the gap in damage. Once he picked up that feat, his damage started to increase substantially. He missed against high AC targets far less after picking up Perfect Finisher.
If that campaign had continued on, Perfect Finisher combined with the other abilities may well have completely closed the gap. True Strike every finisher is nasty.
Though that is including the House Rule I allow that let's the Swashbuckler attack again after using a finisher. I felt bad for the Swashbuckler, so decided to remove the limit on attacking after using the finisher and let them start the fight with Panache. It was a terrible feeling starting a fight failing a Panache roll.
Finishers miss sometimes and Panache rolls miss sometimes. So the additional failure chances really put a damper on the Swashbuckler that demoralized the player. The House Rule smoothed over the frustration of failure and the limitation on finishers. Finishers didn't do so much damage to justify not attacking the rest of the round, especially considering how much damage the barbarian did on a per hit basis.
Bleeding Finisher wasn't terribly useful with a giant instinct barbarian in the group. Fights ended way too fast. Persistent damage is nice in longer fights, but not so great in fights with an ally that kills so fast.
Swashbucklers are more of a late-game martial than an early game one in my experience. They have a lot of struggles in the early game with the consistency of getting panache, and their finishers aren't really that great early either (confident finisher is just ok, but for the work you have to put in to get it early it definitely isn't worth the payoff).
Once you get to later in the game, when skill scaling means that you get panache far more easily (going from the 9-10+ you might be expecting at level 1 to like a 3+), you have better finishers (bleeding/dual, some people like Perfect, I'm personally not a fan but I can see the appeal), double ripostes and eventually parry and riposte, they do quite a lot of damage.
One for All is another example of such scaling. It starts out very weak (because Aid starts out very weak). At best, +10 against DC20, consuming an action and a reaction to give +1. But by later in the game, it's a 95% chance to give +4, which is incredible, and also can give you panache on a 5+.
At no point should Blade Ally ever be considered.What are you taking at 10th over Radiant Blade Spirit? Having a double flaming weapon seems good for any Champion playstyle.Shield of Reckoning because I almost always go shield ally. My second choice is Devoted Focus.
Shield of Reckoning is difficult to trigger (ally has to be adjacent to you, enemy has to be in champion reaction range and the enemy has to attack the ally) but very powerful when it goes off. I've seen it reduce a 70 damage hit to single digits.
Double flaming, by contrast, isn't that amazing in my view. Lots of creatures are weak to fire (about 100/2200 total monsters) so a single instance of fire damage is good enough to trigger weakness. An extra d6, while a decent damage buff, and I almost always max out my weapon with d6 property runes unless Speed is available, there's also a second thing to say about them in that 500 gold is not a scaling cost - the % of your wealth that a property rune requires goes down while the effect remains quite relevant (even if it does get worse as all damage does). A 10th level feat's cost doesn't go down, you only get one of those, and you're buying a descaling benefit for it.
Honestly if I'm going for a shield build I'd probably still grab second ally and Radiant Blade Spirit with the 12th level feat. It's pretty rare to get straight up additional damage, and double flaming has good synergy once you get the Greater rune which makes it all ignore resistance.
If you're a Paladin then getting the Blade Ally for the Instrument of Zeal prerequisite is good. I don't know, I think there are quite a few builds that should consider the Blade Ally, at the very least as a second Ally. Flexing Ghost Touch or Disrupting in the morning is very good in a lot of campaigns, and can scale very late for the cost of an 8th level feat if you're going Shield Ally.
I did the math over about 20 fights. The giant instinct barbarian outdamaged the swashbuckler by about 13%.
Perfect Finisher was a real game changer in closing the gap in damage. Once he picked up that feat, his damage started to increase substantially. He missed against high AC targets far less after picking up Perfect Finisher.
If that campaign had continued on, Perfect Finisher combined with the other abilities may well have completely closed the gap. True Strike every finisher is nasty.
Though that is including the House Rule I allow that let's the Swashbuckler attack again after using a finisher. I felt bad for the Swashbuckler, so decided to remove the limit on attacking after using the finisher and let them start the fight with Panache. It was a terrible feeling starting a fight failing a Panache roll.
Finishers miss sometimes and Panache rolls miss sometimes. So the additional failure chances really put a damper on the Swashbuckler that demoralized the player. The House Rule smoothed over the frustration of failure and the limitation on finishers. Finishers didn't do so much damage to justify not attacking the rest of the round, especially considering how much damage the barbarian did on a per hit basis.
Bleeding Finisher wasn't terribly useful with a giant instinct barbarian in the group. Fights ended way too fast. Persistent damage is nice in longer fights, but not so great in fights with an ally that kills so fast.
Swashbucklers are more of a late-game martial than an early game one in my experience. They have a lot of struggles in the early game with the consistency of getting panache, and their finishers aren't really that great early either (confident finisher is just ok, but for the work you have to put in to get it early it definitely isn't worth the payoff).
Once you get to later in the game, when skill scaling means that you get panache far more easily (going from the 9-10+ you might be expecting at level 1 to like a 3+), you have...
The finishers became tools to use against different targets with different traits. Using them optimally was what maximized damage. Perfect Finisher is very good against high AC targets.
The Swashbuckler did start activating Opportune Riposte more often at higher level against equal level or lower opponents. That boosted his damage as well. He didn't get many AoOs against single target tough creatures because their base attack is generally set at only critical missing on a 1 and only missing its first attack on a very low roll. They also often have attacks that allow them to do multiple attacks at maximum bonus. They also tend to focus on the bigger threat unless you can draw their attention like a champion and the barbarian or a healer is a bigger problem than a swashbuckler in that particular group.
Bleeding Finisher is not great in play. I'm not sure why people like it. My buddy read how good it was on the forums and picked it up and gave it a run. Very occasionally it lasted more than a round, but mostly it did not last long enough to justify not using another type of finisher. The swashbuckler, barbarian, and archer kill things too fast. If on a single target, a group attacking kills it too fast. Against weak targets the hits and crits kill too fast. He got rid of it and picked up something else. It wasn't working well.
Bleeding Finisher would probably work better in our other group with a ranger archer, champion, and strength rogue replacing the rogue or ranger as the fights lasted longer against powerful opponents or groups.
People like Bleeding Finisher because it's the theoretical highest damage finisher. On average, it takes around 3 turns for Persistent Damage to end. So that's a bunch of extra damage potential. It also only requires one hit on a boss to get rolling, then you can Confident Finisher or whatever you want to use while that's ticking.
Obviously it's not as good when stuff dies quickly.
It does look good in theory. The few times it did work for more than a round, it was pretty good. I remember one time versus a T-rex that the Swashbuckler took on solo, it lasted probably 4 rounds and did quite good damage.
But it had a lot failure chances from just missing the hit and not being applied. Creatures that were immune to bleed like golems or undead with no blood. A lucky persistent damage roll to get rid of it. Or killing stuff so fast the monster didn't survive long enough for it to take much damage. Abilities that can be disrupted for a variety of reasons tend to disappoint in real play.
Even if the target succeeds the first check, it still does as much damage as Confident Finisher. The main risks are that things die too fast or you miss.
I should really try a Swashbuckler myself. My buddy optimizes fairly well, but I think I could push the Swashbuckler Optimization a little farther.
So far I've avoided them due the Panache issues I've seen. I would get pretty pissed missing a bunch of panache rolls. Really frustrating for a lot of levels.
The Bouncy Goblin feat giving a +2 circumstance bonus for tumble through that's on 100% of the time from level 1 is nice for low level swashbucklers. You have to be an unbreakable goblin though.
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Battledancers easily gain Panache as they roll against the Will of every enemies.
Taking the Acrobat archetype allows you to be Expert right at level 2, making things a bit easier in the beginning.
Now, if you play a Gymnast, you'll suffer to gain Panache.
Battledancers easily gain Panache as they roll against the Will of every enemies.
Taking the Acrobat archetype allows you to be Expert right at level 2, making things a bit easier in the beginning.Now, if you play a Gymnast, you'll suffer to gain Panache.
I was looking at the Battledancer. It does seem the easiest to gain Panache as it doesn't require a the creature be fascinated. But it does require I invest in Charisma. It doesn't do much else but gain Panache.
I really like Wit or Braggart. Those actions are pretty useful for the entire group.
I was thinking of a D'artagnan type with a Paladin Multiclass or Gunslinger if that book is out.
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Even if the target succeeds the first check, it still does as much damage as Confident Finisher. The main risks are that things die too fast or you miss.
Does more. Bleeding finisher doesn’t lose the precise strike damage, so a 1 tick Bleeding Finisher does precise strike+strike on hit, and then precise strike on the tick. I think that averages out to better than confident finisher with the “full damage on miss” feat, though of course depends on hit chance
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Even if the target succeeds the first check, it still does as much damage as Confident Finisher. The main risks are that things die too fast or you miss.I should really try a Swashbuckler myself. My buddy optimizes fairly well, but I think I could push the Swashbuckler Optimization a little farther.
So far I've avoided them due the Panache issues I've seen. I would get pretty pissed missing a bunch of panache rolls. Really frustrating for a lot of levels.
Yeah I don’t think they are great until they start scaling, can be frustrating in the early levels. Would recommend Wit as the best one, simply for One for All. Play a human so you can get a +4 circumstance bonus to Aid, which will consistently give you panache against solo enemies (something swashbucklers struggle with).
IMO the second best swashbuckler is Gymnast, though it’s quite hard to play. You really need to manage finishers vs athletics maneuvers well to play it, and it’s more support-y than the others.
Otherwise, Goblin is decent for a +2 circumstance to tumble through.
My Swashbuckler in Extinction Curse uses Bleeding Finisher and it has generally been really good. Our group is rolling with Braggart Swashbuckler, Maestro Bard, Dragon Stance Monk, and an Animal Druid. Lots of positional goodness but my group does not optimize to a significant degree. Being able to impose Frightened on so many things so often has been incredibly helpful in taking down some of the rough fights in that AP.
Really, the only time my Braggart has struggled has been against things immune to Frightened. Does it kind of suck when the Finisher doesn't land? Sure, but it hardly ruins my experience of the class overall. Generating Panache has been fine after the first couple levels (we are 10 now).
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Battledancers easily gain Panache as they roll against the Will of every enemies.
Taking the Acrobat archetype allows you to be Expert right at level 2, making things a bit easier in the beginning.Now, if you play a Gymnast, you'll suffer to gain Panache.
I was looking at the Battledancer. It does seem the easiest to gain Panache as it doesn't require a the creature be fascinated. But it does require I invest in Charisma. It doesn't do much else but gain Panache.
Leading Dance is very nice for Battledancers imo, instead of gaining Panache for no benefit you are instead repositioning your target which makes setting up Dual Finisher much better.
Yeah, though before that you can still use it for stuff like setting up flanking or moving an enemy away from an ally which is still decently useful.
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You can also use Impaling Finisher earlier. It's the only way to use Impaling Finisher in my opinion, but it's a strong one.
And Impaling Finisher can be quite nice if you have access to a reroll (or a Hero Point) and any way to increase the damage of a single Strike.
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Leading Dance is very nice for Battledancers imo, instead of gaining Panache for no benefit you are instead repositioning your target which makes setting up Dual Finisher much better.Battledancers easily gain Panache as they roll against the Will of every enemies.
Taking the Acrobat archetype allows you to be Expert right at level 2, making things a bit easier in the beginning.Now, if you play a Gymnast, you'll suffer to gain Panache.
I was looking at the Battledancer. It does seem the easiest to gain Panache as it doesn't require a the creature be fascinated. But it does require I invest in Charisma. It doesn't do much else but gain Panache.
If you’re playing with ABP, you can use Flying Blade to make dual finisher much easier to hit 2 people with. Without ABP, having two runed up thrown weapons is prohibitively expensive.
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My Swashbuckler in Extinction Curse uses Bleeding Finisher and it has generally been really good. Our group is rolling with Braggart Swashbuckler, Maestro Bard, Dragon Stance Monk, and an Animal Druid. Lots of positional goodness but my group does not optimize to a significant degree. Being able to impose Frightened on so many things so often has been incredibly helpful in taking down some of the rough fights in that AP.
Really, the only time my Braggart has struggled has been against things immune to Frightened. Does it kind of suck when the Finisher doesn't land? Sure, but it hardly ruins my experience of the class overall. Generating Panache has been fine after the first couple levels (we are 10 now).
I can see bleeding finisher being good in that group.
Mathematically it should be very good against creatures that bleed. Though PF2 module designers do seem to love golems. Nothing annoys most classes other than a Barbarian or Power Attack fighter more than golems. They also seem to love oozes. That annoys precision attackers.
My Swashbuckler in Extinction Curse uses Bleeding Finisher and it has generally been really good. Our group is rolling with Braggart Swashbuckler, Maestro Bard, Dragon Stance Monk, and an Animal Druid. Lots of positional goodness but my group does not optimize to a significant degree. Being able to impose Frightened on so many things so often has been incredibly helpful in taking down some of the rough fights in that AP.
Really, the only time my Braggart has struggled has been against things immune to Frightened. Does it kind of suck when the Finisher doesn't land? Sure, but it hardly ruins my experience of the class overall. Generating Panache has been fine after the first couple levels (we are 10 now).
I can see bleeding finisher being good in that group.
Mathematically it should be very good against creatures that bleed. Though PF2 module designers do seem to love golems. Nothing annoys most classes other than a Barbarian or Power Attack fighter more than golems. They also seem to love oozes. That annoys precision attackers.
So. Many. Golems.
My Swashbuckler in Extinction Curse uses Bleeding Finisher and it has generally been really good. Our group is rolling with Braggart Swashbuckler, Maestro Bard, Dragon Stance Monk, and an Animal Druid. Lots of positional goodness but my group does not optimize to a significant degree. Being able to impose Frightened on so many things so often has been incredibly helpful in taking down some of the rough fights in that AP.
Really, the only time my Braggart has struggled has been against things immune to Frightened. Does it kind of suck when the Finisher doesn't land? Sure, but it hardly ruins my experience of the class overall. Generating Panache has been fine after the first couple levels (we are 10 now).
I can see bleeding finisher being good in that group.
Mathematically it should be very good against creatures that bleed. Though PF2 module designers do seem to love golems. Nothing annoys most classes other than a Barbarian or Power Attack fighter more than golems. They also seem to love oozes. That annoys precision attackers.
That group is basically balanced, except that it is missing a class with that real edge in offensive firepower. The Swashbuckler will need to land his finishers.
So. Many. Golems.My Swashbuckler in Extinction Curse uses Bleeding Finisher and it has generally been really good. Our group is rolling with Braggart Swashbuckler, Maestro Bard, Dragon Stance Monk, and an Animal Druid. Lots of positional goodness but my group does not optimize to a significant degree. Being able to impose Frightened on so many things so often has been incredibly helpful in taking down some of the rough fights in that AP.
Really, the only time my Braggart has struggled has been against things immune to Frightened. Does it kind of suck when the Finisher doesn't land? Sure, but it hardly ruins my experience of the class overall. Generating Panache has been fine after the first couple levels (we are 10 now).
I can see bleeding finisher being good in that group.
Mathematically it should be very good against creatures that bleed. Though PF2 module designers do seem to love golems. Nothing annoys most classes other than a Barbarian or Power Attack fighter more than golems. They also seem to love oozes. That annoys precision attackers.
Definitely one of the advantages of Giant Instinct Barbarians is your damage works against everything with rare exception. You pound right through DR and no concerns about immunity to precision.
If you’re playing with ABP, you can use Flying Blade to make dual finisher much easier to hit 2 people with. Without ABP, having two runed up thrown weapons is prohibitively expensive.Leading Dance is very nice for Battledancers imo, instead of gaining Panache for no benefit you are instead repositioning your target which makes setting up Dual Finisher much better.Battledancers easily gain Panache as they roll against the Will of every enemies.
Taking the Acrobat archetype allows you to be Expert right at level 2, making things a bit easier in the beginning.Now, if you play a Gymnast, you'll suffer to gain Panache.
I was looking at the Battledancer. It does seem the easiest to gain Panache as it doesn't require a the creature be fascinated. But it does require I invest in Charisma. It doesn't do much else but gain Panache.
Unlike most Finishers, Dual Finisher asks for melee weapons and melee Strikes. So it doesn't work for Flying Blades (luckily, it would be really too strong).
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Unlike most Finishers, Dual Finisher asks for melee weapons and melee Strikes. So it doesn't work for Flying Blades (luckily, it would be really too strong).If you’re playing with ABP, you can use Flying Blade to make dual finisher much easier to hit 2 people with. Without ABP, having two runed up thrown weapons is prohibitively expensive.Leading Dance is very nice for Battledancers imo, instead of gaining Panache for no benefit you are instead repositioning your target which makes setting up Dual Finisher much better.Battledancers easily gain Panache as they roll against the Will of every enemies.
Taking the Acrobat archetype allows you to be Expert right at level 2, making things a bit easier in the beginning.Now, if you play a Gymnast, you'll suffer to gain Panache.
I was looking at the Battledancer. It does seem the easiest to gain Panache as it doesn't require a the creature be fascinated. But it does require I invest in Charisma. It doesn't do much else but gain Panache.
Flying Blade allows it to work
You've learned to apply your flashy techniques to thrown weapons as easily as melee attacks. When you have panache, you apply your precise strike damage on ranged Strikes you make with a thrown weapon within that weapon's first range increment. The thrown weapon must be an agile or finesse weapon. This also allows you to make a thrown weapon ranged Strike for Confident Finisher and any other finisher that includes a Strike that can benefit from your precise strike.
Dual finisher included a Strike that can benefit from your precise strike, so Flying Blade lets you use a thrown weapon ranged Strike for it.
Yeah, but you don't get the prerequisite of "You wield two melee weapons, one in each hand." and even if Flying Blade allows you to make the Strike, it's still a melee Strike.
Anyway, 2 good reasons for it not to work seems to clearly show that they are not supposed to interact together. RAW seems in line with RAI on this one.
Dual finisher included a Strike that can benefit from your precise strike, so Flying Blade lets you use a thrown weapon ranged Strike for it.
Not exactly, Confident Finisher and Bleeding Finisher as an example says "Make a Strike with a weapon or unarmed attack that would apply your precise strike damage" or "Make a slashing or piercing Strike with a weapon or unarmed attack that allows you to add your precise strike damage."
Flying Blade allows you to fulfill the "weapon that allows you to add your precise strike damage" requirement but not other requirements such as being as Impaling Finisher requiring an adjacent foe or Dual Finisher requiring a melee strike.
At least the way I read it.
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Yeah, but you don't get the prerequisite of "You wield two melee weapons, one in each hand." and even if Flying Blade allows you to make the Strike, it's still a melee Strike.
Anyway, 2 good reasons for it not to work seems to clearly show that they are not supposed to interact together. RAW seems in line with RAI on this one.
You are wielding 2 melee weapons - melee thrown weapons (like starknives) are melee weapons when wielded, and only ranged weapons when thrown.
And the last sentence of Flying Blade clearly allows them to be used to make the ranged Strike.
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Come on the whole point of the Flying Blade is to replace melee strikes with thrown strikes in finishers. You can't let any wording about melee stop it. Dual Finisher has to work with Flying Strike.
I do get that Impaling Finisher has some extra adjacency wording. I would allow it to work but that would be an interpretation.
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Yeah, but you don't get the prerequisite of "You wield two melee weapons, one in each hand." and even if Flying Blade allows you to make the Strike, it's still a melee Strike.
Anyway, 2 good reasons for it not to work seems to clearly show that they are not supposed to interact together. RAW seems in line with RAI on this one.You are wielding 2 melee weapons - melee thrown weapons (like starknives) are melee weapons when wielded, and only ranged weapons when thrown.
And the last sentence of Flying Blade clearly allows them to be used to make the ranged Strike.
Thrown weapons have been specifically errated to avoid that. If you throw thrown weapons, you no more meet the "You wield 2 melee weapons" prerequisite.
The last sentence of Flying Blade is not enough. Finishers can only be used with melee weapons, it comes from the class feature Precise Strike. Nothing says that Flying Blade also removes the condition inside Finishers.
The fact that every other Finishers but Impaling Finisher doesn't speak about melee Strike is strong information about the intent here. The only 2 Finishers with positioning limitations speak about melee Strikes.
There are too many hoops you have to jump through to make them work together.
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Yeah, but you don't get the prerequisite of "You wield two melee weapons, one in each hand." and even if Flying Blade allows you to make the Strike, it's still a melee Strike.
Anyway, 2 good reasons for it not to work seems to clearly show that they are not supposed to interact together. RAW seems in line with RAI on this one.You are wielding 2 melee weapons - melee thrown weapons (like starknives) are melee weapons when wielded, and only ranged weapons when thrown.
And the last sentence of Flying Blade clearly allows them to be used to make the ranged Strike.
Thrown weapons have been specifically errated to avoid that. If you throw thrown weapons, you no more meet the "You wield 2 melee weapons" prerequisite.
The last sentence of Flying Blade is not enough. Finishers can only be used with melee weapons, it comes from the class feature Precise Strike. Nothing says that Flying Blade also removes the condition inside Finishers.
The fact that every other Finishers but Impaling Finisher doesn't speak about melee Strike is strong information about the intent here. The only 2 Finishers with positioning limitations speak about melee Strikes.There are too many hoops you have to jump through to make them work together.
Unbalancing finisher also says “make a melee Strike”. The last sentence of flying blade is the specific that overrides the general of “only melee strikes”.
And there has never been such an errata because it would involve “intent of weapon use”. Thrown weapons are still melee weapons when held, and therefore meet the requirements to use dual finisher. The rules about thrown weapons (which really should be errata’d be now because it causes no end of headaches to what does and doesn’t work with them) are that they are melee weapons when held (unless they are incapable of making a melee attack like javelins and darts). The reason you can’t use Double Slice with 2 thrown strikes is because it specifies melee strikes, and thrown weapons are ranged weapons when thrown. Under your interpretation, Dual Thrower wouldn’t work with thrown weapons because you wouldn’t meet the requirements of Double Slice still (there’s no text that gets around that). Flying Blade is just a more generally worded Dual Thrower because finisher text is all over the place - some specifying melee strike, some specifying strike and some specifying weapon or unarmed attack that adds your precise strike damage. But the replacement text still functions, same as Dual Thrower.
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Yeah, but you don't get the prerequisite of "You wield two melee weapons, one in each hand." and even if Flying Blade allows you to make the Strike, it's still a melee Strike.
Anyway, 2 good reasons for it not to work seems to clearly show that they are not supposed to interact together. RAW seems in line with RAI on this one.You are wielding 2 melee weapons - melee thrown weapons (like starknives) are melee weapons when wielded, and only ranged weapons when thrown.
And the last sentence of Flying Blade clearly allows them to be used to make the ranged Strike.
Thrown weapons have been specifically errated to avoid that. If you throw thrown weapons, you no more meet the "You wield 2 melee weapons" prerequisite.
The last sentence of Flying Blade is not enough. Finishers can only be used with melee weapons, it comes from the class feature Precise Strike. Nothing says that Flying Blade also removes the condition inside Finishers.
The fact that every other Finishers but Impaling Finisher doesn't speak about melee Strike is strong information about the intent here. The only 2 Finishers with positioning limitations speak about melee Strikes.There are too many hoops you have to jump through to make them work together.
Disagree. Flying balde opens up range in a very broad way.
Many thrown weapons are melee weapons. It doesn't matter what they are when you are already in the action.
Aside from which the errata does not remove the melee characteristics of a weapon. Just because it becomes a ranged weapon when it is thrown. Technically doesn't remove the fact that it is a melee weapon. It is just also a ranged weapon.
But either way its a perverse way to stop a power working that is specifically about replacing melee strikes with ranged strikes, because it mentions the word melee. What else do you think the point of flying blade is?
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Well, I see intent in the "melee" word, you don't. Just expect table variation on this one.
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I see no reason not allow to dual finisher to work with flying blade. There is no balance issue and it will give no real advantage to the Swashbuckler. It will just look cool.