Greetings all,
I need some brainstorming help for my upcoming Gunslinger. He'll join a melee-heavy group of 5 in about a week and starts at level 5. No free archetype.
He's a Halfling Duskwalker. Halfling mostly for Distracting Shadows, Duskwalker mostly because I think they are cool and always wanted to play one.
I'll go with the Way of the Sniper, since the only other way I'm interested in is the half-melee Drifter and I think that would be too crowded. His weapon of choice is an arquebus.
What I can't quite decide on are my class feats. I'll definitely get Munitions Crafter for convenience at level 1 and Sniper's Aim at 6. Everything else is still up in the air.
My first thought was going Rogue Dedication for Sneak Attacker since I'll usually try to use Hide and hit my target flat-footed. A frequent +1d6 damage is nice but I'll rarely shoot more than once per turn. Not sure that extra damage is worth two feats. I would probably not get too many (if any) additional rogue feats.
Alternatively, I thought about getting the Gunslinger's various Alchemy feats.
- Alchemical Shot seems nice if you can hit a weakness with it but if I REALLY need to exploit a weakness I can always just throw a bomb, which also deals splash damage on a miss and doesn't risk a misfire. The Shot does trigger the Weakness twice, of course, which is a nice upside.
- Munitions Machinist seems decent to fuel Alchemical Shot. Alchemical Ammunition is also nice, but there's very few of them so far and I'm not sure the extra action for their activation is quite worth the investment. There's also the question if alchemical ammunition surpresses property runes of the weapon like magical ammunition does.
- Precious Munitions seems a bit pointless. Getting a few special metal rounds for the right occasion shouldn't be too expensive at that level.
- Shattering Shot seems nearly pointless with it's low damage unless you hit at least 4 enemies with it that are weak to the damage type.
The third version would be a wild mix, going for various gunslinger firearm feats like Cover Fire, Fake Out, Penetrating Fire and other "Special Attacks". But adding all those onto Sniper's Aim and the special shots granted by the Way of the Sniper seems a bit overkill. I'd probably end up not using half of them most of the time.
I've never really played or played alongside a ranged character in PF2 so far so I'm a bit at a loss. How many special attacks are too many? Is occasionally hitting weaknesses really worth the misfire chance (and losing our on the additional +2 attack from Sniper's Aim)?
Any help is appreciated!
Greetings all,
I need some brainstorming help for my upcoming Gunslinger. He'll join a melee-heavy group of 5 in about a week and starts at level 5. No free archetype.
He's a Halfling Duskwalker. Halfling mostly for Distracting Shadows, Duskwalker mostly because I think they are cool and always wanted to play one.
I'll go with the Way of the Sniper, since the only other way I'm interested in is the half-melee Drifter and I think that would be too crowded. His weapon of choice is an arquebus.
What I can't quite decide on are my class feats. I'll definitely get Munitions Crafter for convenience at level 1 and Sniper's Aim at 6. Everything else is still up in the air.
My first thought was going Rogue Dedication for Sneak Attacker since I'll usually try to use Hide and hit my target flat-footed. A frequent +1d6 damage is nice but I'll rarely shoot more than once per turn. Not sure that extra damage is worth two feats. I would probably not get too many (if any) additional rogue feats.
Alternatively, I thought about getting the Gunslinger's various Alchemy feats.
- Alchemical Shot seems nice if you can hit a weakness with it but if I REALLY need to exploit a weakness I can always just throw a bomb, which also deals splash damage on a miss and doesn't risk a misfire. The Shot does trigger the Weakness twice, of course, which is a nice upside.
- Munitions Machinist seems decent to fuel Alchemical Shot. Alchemical Ammunition is also nice, but there's very few of them so far and I'm not sure the extra action for their activation is quite worth the investment. There's also the question if alchemical ammunition surpresses property runes of the weapon like magical ammunition does.
- Precious Munitions seems a bit pointless. Getting a few special metal rounds for the right occasion shouldn't be too expensive at that level.
- Shattering Shot seems nearly pointless with it's low damage unless you hit at least 4 enemies with it that are weak to the damage type.The third version would be a wild mix,...
Rogue is a very strong dedication IMO, as it has some very neat utility feats as well as some skill benefits. Even the base dedication feat alone gives up to 2 trained skills plus a skill feat, which is more than most other dedications in the game. The Sneak Attacker feat is nice for you for added damage (multiplied on a crit), Mobility is good if you need to escape without triggering reactions, Skill Mastery is useful if you need more training in skills for the group, among other things.
Another one to consider (that I have seen in actual play) is Ranger dedication for the Gravity Weapon power (also only triggers on first attack in a round), and other useful feats like Quick Draw, Running Reload, etc.
One benefit to appropriately graded ammunition is that you actually get to apply higher runes to it. Firing low grade ammunition from a +2 Greater Striking weapon doesn't transfer those runes, for example.
I thought about getting the Gunslinger's various Alchemy feats.
One drawback of the Alchemist approach to note is that the level progression of the ammunition/bombs you can make is slower than the one you get with Munitions Machinist. That's a non-trivial cost.
The other (bigger) drawback is that the Munitions Crafter & Munitions Machinist route only costs two class feats, one of which is a level 1 class feat which is very cheap (the competition isn't very fierce). So really, just one feat with viable competitors. The Alchemical Route, by contrast, requires at least three class feats, at levels 2, 8, and 12. All of those have much fiercer competition, feat-wise, and you’re still behind with respect to what level items you can make.
That’s not to say that the Alchemist dip isn’t viable - the ability to produce a much wider range of alchemical items is pretty appealing. But unless you have some explicit thoughts in mind about what those are, it doesn’t seem worth it to me.
(One thing I’ll note about Alchemical Shot is that it’s actually relatively attractive even if you don’t get the Munitions feats. All you really want is to trigger weaknesses, and you only need a single point of damage of the relevant type to do that. So just buying the (very cheap) low level bombs and carrying them around is totally viable.)
A lot of other special attacks will competing. I found myself having to use citricking’s expected damage tool to evaluate various attack routines using different attack feats:
https://bahalbach.github.io/PF2Calculator/#routine-activity-list
Not sure what advice to give here other than to work it out. The results of various comparisons certainly weren’t intuitively obvious! (For example, the Sniper's Vital Shot ended up being clearly better than Sniper's Aim in cases in which you get to use it, which wasn't obvious to me beforehand.)
@The Raven Black
Assassin is not really interesting. Mark for Death isn't great, I'd much rather have the skill bonuses and especially Surprise Attack from the rogue dedication. Delaying Sneak Attacker to level 6 is also bad since it competes with (and loses against) Sniper's Aim at that level.
But thanks for the suggestion. :)
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@Darksol the Painbringer
I don't really have feats to spare for more rogue stuff. The best part of the dedication is Surprise Attack since I'll be nearly always Avoiding Notice to trigger One Shot, One Kill. Sneak Attacker is great, too, but adding a non-scaling d6 to a character who only attacks once per turn might not be worth a feat. I'd definitely go rogue if I had Free Archetye to play with. But I don't so I'll have to weight it carefully against my class feats.
Ranger Dedication isn't great and mostly a dead feat. Hunt Prey is mostly useless because I simply don't have the action for it. Gravity Weapon is quite nice (I used it on my 2handed Ranger) but yet another thing that takes an action. Quick Draw and Runing Reload are available as Gunslinger Feats and I'm not even planning to take them there. Again, I don't really have feats to spare to get more than Dedication + one feat from an Archetype.
The bit about graded ammunition is good to know, thank you! I read the special material rules once when the game was released and have not yet had a reason to do so again.
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@Porridge
I think you misread my post (or I wrote it badly). I'm not considering going Alchemist Dedication. I'm thinking about how valuable the Munition Crafter feats, Alchemical Shot and Shattering Shot are.
Still, it's good to know that your assessment of those feats are similar to mine. Thanks!
But I'm not going near that tool. I don't have the mental capacity to learn using it right now.
@Porridge
I think you misread my post (or I wrote it badly). I'm not considering going Alchemist Dedication. I'm thinking about how valuable the Munition Crafter feats, Alchemical Shot and Shattering Shot are.
Still, it's good to know that your assessment of those feats are similar to mine. Thanks!
But I'm not going near that tool. I don't have the mental capacity to learn using it right now.
I somehow misread that part of your post, and slipped into thinking you were considering the same thing I was (whether an Alchemist dip is worth it). My apologies!
I've never really played or played alongside a ranged character in PF2 so far so I'm a bit at a loss. How many special attacks are too many? Is occasionally hitting weaknesses really worth the misfire chance (and losing our on the additional +2 attack from Sniper's Aim)?
Regarding particular feats it's worth considering, here are some thoughts:
I think Called Shot is a nice tool to have in your kit, as it gives a lot of situational abilities it can be nice to have: a way to debuff spellcasters, a way to help the party kite an enemy, a way to help your tank survive a terrifying melee opponent, and so on.
As I mentioned above, Penetrating Fire is a nice situational option too when facing multiple enemies. And since the opponents only have to be in a line (not adjacent), it's not even that situational if you have a good move speed.
Flesh Wound is a nice feat in that it's basically a strict upgrade to a basic ranged Strike. So if you're going to be making those, it's nice. But it conflicts with any other kind of strike - Sniper's Aim, Vital Shot, Penetrating Shot, Rapid Reload, etc. So if you're planning on using those other options, it's not worth it.
I think Alchemical Shot over Sniper's Aim can be worth it. Using the calculator, gainst an on-level enemy with a weakness you're targeting, the Alchemical Shot looks to yield an expected damage that's about 5 points higher than Sniper's Aim (using an Arquebus as the base weapon) during the mid-level range. That's decent increase, percentage-wise (about 30% at level 10). This doesn't factor in the chance of misfires, though, which makes the comparison more complicated. And, of course, if you need some energy damage to stop regeneration or something, Alchemical Shot is really good.
The other "special shot" feats available to an Arquebus user, like Trick Shot and Ricochet Shot, seem pretty niche to me; I think I've gone through campaigns without a situation where either would be useful. So unless you have reason to think your campaign will make these situations come up a lot, I'd be inclined to give them a pass.
Ok, here's what I've come up with (skills and skill feats not final):
https://pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=106233
1: Munitions Crafter - for convenience and to fuel Alchemical Shot
2: Fake Out - powerful use of a reaction
4: Alchemical Shot - to target weaknesses to to convert my attack to energy damage against foes with high physical resistance
6: Sniper's Aim - Against concealment and hard to hit tragets - or for crit-fishing in emergencies
8: Stab and Blast - for when things get a bit too close and personal
10: Penetrating Fire - basically two attacks without MAP on legendary proficiency? Yes, please!
12: Called Shot - Mosty to debuff casters
14: Munitions Machinist - didn't really find a better feat at this level and advanced alchemy at level-3 allows me to craft infused level 11 bombs which improve Alchemical Shot's damage.
16: Hair Trigger - Free shot? Free shot!
18: Unerring Shot - Finally ignoring lesser cover granted by allies!
20: Slinger's Reflexes - Fake out now twice as good!
Any glaring omissions/mistakes in there?
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Oh man, you're right. Slinger's Reflexes is actually useless. I somehow thought it was just giving you an extra reaction to spend on any Gunslinger Reflexes. Thanks for the heads up! I really need to start reading newer feats more frequently when building characters.
Unerring Shot does look a bit pointless, if you put it that way. Especially since I can already attack at 450 without penalties at that level thanks to Shootist's Edge.
Ok, with those two feats out of the picture I think I might pick up Risky Reload at 18 and Perfect Readiness at 20. I avoid Risky earlier because it's mostly good for making two attacks per turn. But that leaves me without a loaded weapon for my reaction (unless hasted, but I don't build around buffs I can't provide myself). Perfect Readiness gets rid of that weakness.
Deflecting shot is the best add AC on reaction abilities in the game, it only triggers when you would turn a hit into a miss. If you can work around a shoot then reload routine every round, it can come in handy.
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I'm toying with the idea of an Anadi sniper myself, and I'm thinking of taking a rogue dedication. It won't do much, but that guaranteed flat-footed means that I'll be sure to deal heavy damage on my opening strike every turn. Plus, the extra skills are generally useful.
The extra 1d6 sneak attack isn't great but free damage is free damage.