Level 13+ Bard...
Swift action: Inspire Courage (probably around +9/+9 with proper investment)
Move action: move around (mobility and positioning are important)
Standard action: cast Haste, now everyone's action economy improves...
Level 13+ Bard...
Swift action: Inspire Courage (probably around +9/+9 with proper investment)
Move action: move around (mobility and positioning are important)
Standard action: cast Haste, now everyone's action economy improves...
+9/+9????? At level 13?
I guess I don't know how to make a bard! ;)
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Really depends on how you define "action economy" and what level you are talking about.
Personally, I really like a character with 6 levels of Pathfinder Chronicler and the Battle Planner feat. Because you can give every one of your allies a free extra move action. Allowing them to position for a full-attack, use studied combat, quick channel, or anything else that takes a move action.
Oh, my apologies... Inspire Courage is only around +7/+7 at 13 (with proper investment)... that other +2/+2 is a moral bonus from Falgbearer/Banner of Ancient Kings... still comes out to +9/+9, though.
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Oh, my apologies... Inspire Courage is only around +7/+7 at 13 (with proper investment)... that other +2/+2 is a moral bonus from Falgbearer/Banner of Ancient Kings... still comes out to +9/+9, though.
Still kinda curious how you are getting that high with Inspire Courage.
At 5th level, and every six bard levels thereafter, this bonus increases by +1, to a maximum of +4 at 17th level.
Besides, it's better to go
Standard action: Haste
Move action: inspire courage (you don't lose the ability to do this as a move at 13th)
Swift action: quickened Good Hope (probably need a metamagic rod, but it's worth it)
Level 13 Bard's Inspire Courage is +3/+3...
Banner of Ancient Kings allows the Bard to count as 4 levels higher, and a level 17 Bard's Inspire Courage is +4/+4...
Dervish Sikke adds +1 for +5/+5...
Master Performer/Grand Master Performer each add +1 (they stack for +2), thus +7/+7...
This Bard doesn't ever need to cast Good Hope because Flagbearer and the Banner of Ancient Kings does the exact same thing as a constant effect.
Cool. Thanks. :)
I like my Giantslayer character's action economy:
Swift action: Arcane Pool or pop out a new wand from spring-loaded wand sheaths. Or quickened spell.
Move action: Martial Flexibility or Cackle (or move/fly)
Standard Action: Spell or Vital Strike or Slam/Grab/Constrict with Hair (Or Slam/Trip) or Protective Luck/Misfortune/Evil Eye
Immediate Action: Various spells (like feather fall)
Attack of Opportunities: Slam with my 15ft of reach Hair attack.
Free action: Turn on/off my item that gives me obscuring mist I can see through.
It is a mess of a multiclass but it works for me.
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Qinggong-Sensei-Monk of the Four Winds...
Combining Sensei's Mystic Wisdom and Monk of the Four Winds' Slow Time...
Everyone in the party has three standard actions.
Monk of the Four Winds is one of those things that sound awesome before you read it more carefully. What you can perform with those three standard actions is so restricted that allies may not even want it, especially since it "infects" your usual standard action as well.
Can't cast spells, can't use supernatural abilities, can't full-attack. It's really great for martial maneuver builds and Vital Strikers, but not much else.
Bonus points. Combine the archetype mashup further with Drunken Master and dip into Wizard for a familiar and access to the Spirit Share spell. Deep Drinker means you gain two Ki points per alcoholic drink, and through Spirit Share your familiar can now give you up to 6 Ki points per use of Slow Time.
Magical Knack and making the familiar take Spell Sponge means Spirit Share lasts 6 rounds, enough for a fight. Then buy enough Pearls of Power to last you a day.
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2 Social Talent: Social Grace
3 +1 Feat, Vig Talent: Leave an Opening
4 +1 Social Talent
5 +1 Feat Vig Talent: Up Close and Personal
Proposed class features:
Cunning Feint at Vig lv 8.
Skill Familiarity at Vig lv 9.
***
As part of a move action to move you get a swift action attack that applies hidden strike. As part of that same movement you also get to make a feint check, which allows your standard action attack to be a hidden strike when you can't flank. If the acrobatics check to avoid an AoO succeeds then that enemy provokes an AoO at the start of their turn.
High mobility, doesn't lose much even when staggered, comes online early, and has a lot of room for customization.
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Level 13 Bard's Inspire Courage is +3/+3...
Banner of Ancient Kings allows the Bard to count as 4 levels higher, and a level 17 Bard's Inspire Courage is +4/+4...
Dervish Sikke adds +1 for +5/+5...
Master Performer/Grand Master Performer each add +1 (they stack for +2), thus +7/+7...
Definitely good bonuses, though the Master Performer and Grand Master Performer feats aren't often seen in actual games. Even if the GM does allow them, the prerequisites rely on gaining prestige with the Kitharodian Academy. Which requires the GM to provide opportunities to gain prestige. Good feats, but completely up to GM discretion.
This Bard doesn't ever need to cast Good Hope because Flagbearer and the Banner of Ancient Kings does the exact same thing as a constant effect.
Not exactly the same thing. Flagbearer doesn't affect skill checks or ability checks and only gives a saving throw bonus vs. fear and charm effects. (Good Hope's bonus is to all saving throws.) But yeah, most of the time it's not going to be worth casting good hope if you have the Flagbearer/Banner of the Ancient Kings combo.
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Personally, I really like a character with 6 levels of Pathfinder Chronicler and the Battle Planner feat. Because you can give every one of your allies a free extra move action. Allowing them to position for a full-attack, use studied combat, quick channel, or anything else that takes a move action.
To expand on this, it can get really silly at the higher levels. Take this 15th level character:
Bard 7/Pathfinder Chronicler 8
Standard: haste the party
Move: Inspire Action (with Battle Planner)
Swift: Inspire Courage
Level 13 Bard's Inspire Courage is +3/+3...
Banner of Ancient Kings allows the Bard to count as 4 levels higher, and a level 17 Bard's Inspire Courage is +4/+4...
Dervish Sikke adds +1 for +5/+5...
Master Performer/Grand Master Performer each add +1 (they stack for +2), thus +7/+7...
Definitely good bonuses, though the Master Performer and Grand Master Performer feats aren't often seen in actual games. Even if the GM does allow them, the prerequisites rely on gaining prestige with the Kitharodian Academy. Which requires the GM to provide opportunities to gain prestige. Good feats, but completely up to GM discretion.
This Bard doesn't ever need to cast Good Hope because Flagbearer and the Banner of Ancient Kings does the exact same thing as a constant effect.Not exactly the same thing. Flagbearer doesn't affect skill checks or ability checks and only gives a saving throw bonus vs. fear and charm effects. (Good Hope's bonus is to all saving throws.) But yeah, most of the time it's not going to be worth casting good hope if you have the Flagbearer/Banner of the Ancient Kings combo.
Both of the Bards I have played happen to be related to Merriweather Stokes... whom happens to be THEE guy at the aforementioned Kitharodian Academy. Those "in the know" simply call it The Kith'. Syr, a human Vanilla Bard, was directly related, and grew up wandering the halls of The Kith', dreaming of becoming a Lion Blade. Though, my Noble Drow Arcane Duelist, Vash, was a b@st@rd from one of Merriweather's less proud moments in the vagabond camps below the Grand Bridge of the Empire.
A little backstory goes a long ways into "earning" Master Performer/Grand Master Performer. Actually invest a little bit into roleplaying outside of combat, and POOF. Syr probably should have invested more into combat, maybe he wouldn't have died such a grusome death at level 3... got his guts ripped out by a zombie reaching down his throat, because he only had piercing weapons. Lol.
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Both of the Bards I have played happen to be related to Merriweather Stokes... whom happens to be THEE guy at the aforementioned Kitharodian Academy. Those "in the know" simply call it The Kith'. Syr, a human Vanilla Bard, was directly related, and grew up wandering the halls of The Kith', dreaming of becoming a Lion Blade. Though, my Noble Drow Arcane Duelist, Vash, was a b@st@rd from one of Merriweather's less proud moments in the vagabond camps below the Grand Bridge of the Empire.
A little backstory goes a long ways into "earning" Master Performer/Grand Master Performer. Actually invest a little bit into roleplaying outside of combat, and POOF.
Everyone's game is different and I'm not going to tell any GM they are running their campaign wrong. But I wouldn't allow that in most of my games. That's "roleplaying" for the sake of mechanical advantage.
Not that it matters for this thread, but researching The Kith', including its leader as a family member in my backstory, engaging the GM to allow opportunity for my character to earn Predtige Award points, tracking my CPA/TPA, and actually performing side quests specific to The Kith'... just for feats that I can take at levels 3 and 5, at the absolute earliest, is hardly just "roleplaying" for a mechanical advantage. It becomes one of thee defining attributes of the character.
Syr didn't even live long enough to take either of the feats his background set him up for... he didn't even yet have the Extra Performance prerequisites met... died so young, so much potential. Sad. But he was, in fact, earning and tracking CPA/TPA. Anyways, Vash was in a homebrew world that didn't even include The Kith', and the GM figured it was easier to just let me burn feat slots on the feats, rather than adding Pretige Award points and a Bard academy to his game/story.
Vash's background was rich and deep (literally... Drow, and all that), and whilst it did have links to Merriweather Stokes (for the sake of being thorough), I did not have to do missions for The Kith', or track CPA/TPA. I did, however, still have to meet the Extra Performance prerequisite.
In both cases, I would hardly consider it BS posturing just to gain access to those feats. No more "roleplaying" for a mrchanical advantage than someone picking a race with stats that help their build. I have seen plenty of that without half the backstory or effort I put into my Bards' backstories.
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2nd level+ Ashiftah witch using the flight hex.
standard action: what ever you'd like, hexe'm or cast a spell
immidiate action: feather fall on self - trigger ghost walk
move action : Ghostwalk + 5 ft move to an other location to make it hard to pinpoint.
this work until see invisible is common. but by then you'd get the Fog of War (barrow haze at will) which is even better at hiding you since it work even against true sight...
do notice that the easiest way to get back at your ghost walk would be to simply ready an action for when you show up...
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A DEX based inquisitor wielding a high crit range weapon with the right teamwork feats and combat reflexes can get an insane number of AoO. Take combat reflexes, outflank, improved outflank, Paried opportunist and precise strike. Get a flanking buddy and now if either of you get a critical hit you get an AoO. If your flanking buddy has some of those same teamwork feats you can keep feeding each other AoO until you cannot take anymore.
I wrote up an inquisitor to Sarenrae with those feats and it works pretty well. A pair of these characters would take down just about anything they flank. Improved outflank makes it pretty easy to flank something. If you had the whole party of inquisitors it would be absolutely insane.
Assuming Leadership is allowed:
A Drunken Master Sensei Monk of the Four Winds with pounce (probably with 4 levels of weretouched shifter), rhino charge, deep drinker, one or two fighting tankards, cayden cailaen'e fighting style (and aasimar, enlightened warrior trait, and 1 level of warpriest if you care about alignment restrictions) and a constable cavalier cohort.
The turn basically looks like this:
Move action: Whatever you want, you could use this to start a bardic performance
Standard action: Full attack
Swift action: Slow time on the constable, effectively full attack, full attack, full attack
This is Level 17-18 minimum though
Assuming Leadership is allowed:
I think this should be assumed as a NO.
A DARING GENERAL CAVALIER Cavalier can get ~489 attacks per round with just their followers. Even if they need a Nat-20 to hit that's 24 per round on average . And we haven't gotten into the Cohorts with class levels yet, let alone the actual PC's actions.
It may not have the world-ending power of a 9th level caster, but in terms of breaking action economy it's pretty broken .
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Depending how specific you want to get with your actions you can do a whole lot.
I think a high level Bloodrager can break the action economy pretty hard.
16th level Arcane bloodline Primalist Bloordrager.
First: Your Improved familiar casts Longarm on you with a wand
Second: You activate Greater Bloodrage as a free action. Greater Bloodrage gives you +6 STR and +8 CON . Your 4th level bloodline power gives you Protection from Arrows. Your 8th level bloodline power gives you Haste . Finally Greater Bloodrage lets you cast a spell on yourself as a free action, and we're going to go with Cat's Grace
Third: As a free action you activate the Come And Get Me rage power that you got from your Primalist archetype. You obviously have Combat Reflexes .
Fourth: You charge an enemy in the middle of a group of enemies , preferably near some allies as well . You get a Full Attack on your charge because you took the Beast Totem line of Rage Powers, and an extra attack because you're hasted.
Fifth: You're a religious Bloodrager, so you practice the sacred technique: IOMEDAE'S INSPIRING SWORD, granting all of your allies a bonus on attacks, saves and skill checks for 1 minute after your first attack .
Sixth: Assuming you kill your target , as a free action you can intimidate all enemies within 30 feet with the DREADFUL CARNAGE you inflict on the unfortunate recipient of your wrath.
I haven't included anything for a Swift action, but Arcane Strike, Raging Brutality, or the old Cornugon Smash plus Hurtful combo could work .
I'm also a fan of Cleaving Finish, since it's an extra attack as a free action and it doesn't have the positioning requirements that Cleave has. You do have to spend a feat on Cleave, but 2 feats for a faily regular free attack seems like a pretty good deal to me. If you are using Cleaving Finish or Hurtful then Lunge increases the radius of enemies you can target.
I dunno if you can actually fit all that into 1 character, but at a minimum you can buff yourself with 5 personal buffs, move up to twice your speed, make a full attack, buff all allies within 30 feet and debuff all enemies within 30 feet - all within a single round . Then thanks to Longarm, Combat Reflexes and Come And Get Me on the enemies' turn you have a very good chance of dealing high damage to them as they either attack you or try to escape .
Assuming Leadership is allowed:I think this should be assumed as a NO.
A DARING GENERAL CAVALIER Cavalier can get ~489 attacks per round with just their followers. Even if they need a Nat-20 to hit that's 24 per round on average . And we haven't gotten into the Cohorts with class levels yet, let alone the actual PC's actions.
It may not have the world-ending power of a 9th level caster, but in terms of breaking action economy it's pretty broken .
Well, the leadership is literally only needed so that you can ready an action as an extraordinary ability.
I agree that leadership generally should be banned though.It is a broken broken feat, probably even more than sacred geometry.
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Assuming Leadership is allowed:I think this should be assumed as a NO.
A DARING GENERAL CAVALIER Cavalier can get ~489 attacks per round with just their followers. Even if they need a Nat-20 to hit that's 24 per round on average . And we haven't gotten into the Cohorts with class levels yet, let alone the actual PC's actions.
It may not have the world-ending power of a 9th level caster, but in terms of breaking action economy it's pretty broken .
Well, the leadership is literally only needed so that you can ready an action as an extraordinary ability.
I agree that leadership generally should be banned though.
It is a broken broken feat, probably even more than sacred geometry.
Leafership is waaaay less broken when played by the rules.
Specifically the one that say npc are not played or controlled (or auto enslaved) by the character. The cohort and followers are stated to be npc in the feat. Yet players keep assuming they are the ones who control not only their actions but their build as well.
Leadership get you useful employees not built-your-own extra characters.
Gm should control both the actions of ALL npc and how their character build is configured.
i consider a character with leadership as an employer looking for workers. the more specific he is the harder it will be for him to find same workers.
your looking for a human cleric? i got one for you.
oh he has to know how to craft wondrous items and shot a bow?
he can learn to do it if you convince him (in game rp) that it's the best career move for him to invest time and effort to learn these abilities.
on the other hand if you are looking for a half orc with racial heritage (goblin) with the burn burn burn feat. who is an ex-monk\bloodrager with an aethar improved familiar? yea.. that one will take a while to find.
-why don't you do something while you wait? try draining the sea with a teaspoon or something
Warpriests and Brawlers have pretty amazing action economy because they have so many options with Swift Actions, and they have the extra combat feats to support SU&S or Combat Reflexes/Greater Trip + Fortuitous weapon builds for provoking lots of AoO's. Brawlers have the additional benefit of having an easy path into Pounce/Pummeling Charge, so they could plug in 1 to 3 feats with MF as a Swift (depending on level), activate Boots of Speed as a Free, charge 120 ft and deliver a full attack, and then next round do it again. Give that Brawler Greater Trip, Vicious Stomp, Hurtful and Cornugon Smash if you really want to pile it on. If you play with Psionics, Psychic Warriors (and anyone with the Hustle power) have pretty phenomenal action economy as well; being able to Move 30ft twice and then use a Standard Action to Manifest a Power or use Attack Action is $$. Combining a double move with Up the Walls and Spring Attack is a neat trick too. Basically, you consume your Psi Focus so your Up the Walls feat lasts until the end of the round rather than just lasting for a single move action, then perform part of your 1st move, attack with spring attack, finish the 1st move, and then perform your 2nd 30ft move, all while running on a wall. Psywars also get a lot of really nifty tricks via their Paths to consume their Psi Focus + Trance to perform Maneuvers as Immediate Actions or completely free actions.
I see a lot of people post hate for leadership. But I think a lot of dms miss opportunities with the feats selection. It is a feat that can allow deeper invest into the campaign and character. Sure there are going to be munchins, but that is a entirely different problem all together.
Most people's experience with Leadership tends to be bad ones caused by players that misuse the feat, whether or not they intentionally set out to do so or not.
Personally, I have no issue with the feat because I don't let the players have any more input into the creation of that NPC aside from alignment, personality, a general skill set, and what kind of class/role they want that NPC to fill. Then they just happen to run into someone in the game that seems to fits that description. Or, they can use the feat to 'adopt' an already existing NPC in the campaign and use some downtime to help train them up (or retrain them, if needed). The later bit allows them a little bit more freedom with specific feats or skill points, but that's about it.
If it's just about the amount of actions taken, I guess summoning is hard to beat. Ideally done before combat, but even in combat you can accelerate summoning with a quicken rod. Or time stop, probably from a scroll.
Reading through the thread though, the topic rather seems to be the PC's actions. So I'll throw in some free actions and similar:
Alchemist: Spontaneous healing discovery (basically fast healing 5, but limited and you say when it happens)
Cavalier: Order of the Seal challenge (bull rush / trip on hit)
Druid: Desert domain's Heat Shimmer (free action blur + dazzle)
Fighter: Siegebreaker archetype's Breaker Momentum (bull rush on overrun)
Investigator: Inspiration, Toppling / Repositioning Strike talent (trip / reposition on studied strike hit, requires level 9 / 13 though)
Mesmerist: any (?) trick (requires standard action to implant, but only free action to activate), painful stare
Monk: Quinggong archetype (free action to activate chosen feat, but only for one round)
Monk (unchained): Knockback Strike (push maneuver on hit), Leg Sweep (same with trip), Overbearing Assault (same with reposition, but with -5)
Oracle: Elemental mystery's Sweeping Impact (trip after charge + bull rush), Hermit archetype's Fade from Memory (20% to 50% concealment, albeit only one round, needs level 7)
Rogue: Counterfeit mage's Signature Wand (free action draw wand), Rake's Bravado's Blade (free action demoralize on sacrificed sneak dice)
Rogue (unchained): Stand up rogue talent (free action, triggers AOO as usual)
Samurai: Weapon expertise (free action draw chosen samurai themed weapon)
Vigilante: Nothing can stop me vigilante talent (free action try to destroy object in your path)
Witch: White-haired witch's white hair (free action grapple, constrict, trip, pull, turn victim silent - wah, so many rider effects at level 8)
Domain users: Destruction (torture)'s Painful Smite (demoralize after nonlethal damage)
Martially inclined characters: Quick Draw, Critical feats (non-action rider effect), Awesome Charge feat (on charge hit awesome blow), Squash Flat (on bull rush also trip), Bullying Blow (demoralize on standard action attack for -2 AB), Shocking Bellow (demoralize during surprise round), Cornugon Smash (demoralize on Power Attack hit), Dreadful Carnage (demoralize all foes within 30 ft after knocking a foe out), Crossbow Mastery (free action reload any (?) crossbow)
And many more... So, the biggest group is about adding a combat maneuver or demoralize to a hit. Who knows, maybe they could even be chained together to an infinite sequence of actions, as long as you make the checks...
I see a lot of people post hate for leadership. But I think a lot of dms miss opportunities with the feats selection. It is a feat that can allow deeper invest into the campaign and character. Sure there are going to be munchins, but that is a entirely different problem all together.
Even those players are only a problem if allowed to exist in an unrealistic vacuum. Which is to say, high-level Player Characters who don’t take care to conceal their movements shouldn’t expect to wander about a realm without attracting attention—even less so when they’re accompanied by the equivalent of a free company. That’s the kind of thing that should provoke reactions and perhaps even lead to escalation.
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Yeah, I have absolutely no problem with Leadership... either way you play it. Follow the rules, the GM both makes and controls the NPC Cohort/followers. Throw caution to the wind, and give full control to the player with the Leadership feat. It doesn't even make a difference.
And, it IS absolutely going to draw a lot of attention if you have ~490 people palling around together... nations will meet you at their borders with a battalion of armed and armored soldiers/cavalary, demanding you state your purpose, intentions, and length of stay. Cities and city-states may shut their walls, completely barring your entry because they can simply not sustain that many extra mouths at one time. People may simply be put off by your BS caravan, or it may attrach near-continuous bandit ambushes... you won't be able to protect them all, and your followers will leave you for being a $#!+ leader.
Granted, not everyone that takes Leadership wears a Ring of the Ecclesiarch, and carries a Suzerian Scepter to end up with absolutely obnoxious amounts of followers. Lol.
The only time I used leadership it was fine.
Way of the wicked, the cohort was my characters elder half brother (main PC was Bloodrager, half brother was a Skald).
I had him fleshed out personality wise, as:
--Relatively intelligent
--Chaotic neutral rather then evil
--Fairly good looking
--Due to his nickname "Greasemonger" he had grease in his spell list
--Fiend totem line because this is clearly the campaign for it.
We used him to boost our mooks with the "if you are good you take damage haha" aura, he was also clearly an officer, so he did attract a lot of smites, which didnt work. This also resulted in "Greasemonger" getting captured by attractive female Paladins a lot (who were like "oi, that guy aint evil, redemption potential!"), resulting in him getting the new nickname "Dyre in Distress".
He got fond of it, resulting in him never picking up freedom of movement.