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So I recently came up with a fun Witch concept. A kitsune who was training to be a priestess very much in the vein of a Shinto Priestess, as her family line had all been blessed to be chosen as oracles. For some reason she wasn’t chosen to be an Oracle and her family turns toxic quick, blaming her for not being chosen. Alone and with nowhere to go, a powerful “something” takes pity on her and sends her a bit of power in the form of a familiar and, well, witch.
I basically want her to be a non-cleric healer. She’s essentially a sinto-esque priest that is finding power another way. I’m certainly going to take things like lesson of life!
Thing is, I mean, I like the concept but I can’t seem to figure out how to build her. At first I was thinking fervor witch devoted to Milani, which is fine as stoke the heart is an AWESOME buff, but the primal spell list is nice too. Do I go high strength and go into sentinel dedication for breastplate, or do I just run with high dex for defense and hope for the best? I’d like to be able to whack people with my Shinto staff every once in a while, but I guess that insn’t required.
Any thoughts?
If you have access to the Baba Yaga patron, that could be an interesting direction to go with your concept.
Otherwise, I like the fervor patron a lot. That damage boost gives you some more freedom to run with high dex if you don't mind picking up a finesse weapon.
Life Boost is fantastic for out of combat healing. It even works marginally well in combat since it doesn't need to be sustained.
Fervor witch works quite well for the healer concept. Like you mentioned, Stoke the Heart is one of the best Hex Cantrips available.
Going with primal spell list also works for the healer concept and provides a lot more direct damage spells - and battle form spells. If you want to be able to fill in with melee damage every once in a while, that might be effective. Just remember that battle form spells don't increase your HP, though they often do give some temporary HP when first cast. Of the options, Winter witch with Clinging Ice is the better of the two choices.
Typically I go with high DEX and HP boosting (like Toughness) and hope for the best. High DEX AC can be just as high as light/medium armor for classes that don't get any scaling armor proficiency. And with the low HP of a Witch, you won't want to be staying in melee for very long in either case - armor or not. Personally, I think that the feat cost of getting armor is better spent elsewhere, but the benefits of high DEX are useful generally.
Personally I'd go Primal, take life boost and grab a staff of healing later to supplement healing. As a non-cleric you really don't want to be losing more than 1 or 2 slots of your top 2 spell levels to heal. Fortunately, life boost should cover all moderate or weaker encounters and supplement your healing enough to not need too many slotted heals in severe-extreme.
Primal has a few benefits over Divine as a list. You don't need to do anything extra to get electric arc, you have decent CC, battleforms starting at level 3 help alleviate how bad casters feel until level 7ish and shores up lopsided magic party comps if necessary.
I don't include blasting as a benefit since it isn't really that good mathematically, but that's also something it has over Divine (Though since you are a witch even Divine can throw their familiar or star orb and detonate it with final sacrifice.)
There aren't really any major downsides to picking Primal over Divine. However, you don't get remove curse and you don't have magic weapon for the early game.
I wouldn't bother with sentinel since you aren't human. Human can cheese out two general feats at level 1 for medium armor prof before getting heavy with sentinel at 2. Since you can't, you're probably best off with a typical 8/16/14/18/12/8 statline. If you have time to retrain, you can consider light armor general feat at level 3 and retrain it once proficiency scaling makes it useless at 13.
Though since you are a witch even Divine can throw their familiar or star orb and detonate it with final sacrifice.
I would never do that to Farien. It means that I would not be able to refocus for the rest of the day. Also, I have been told that it may be an evil thing to do. But I suppose that depends on how your familiar feels about it.
As for armor, another option that I have seen other Witches do that seems to work reasonably well is take Rogue archetype. It gives light armor proficiency with the dedication - though the proficiency doesn't improve at higher levels. Then also pick up Nimble Dodge. It lets you use your reaction to improve your AC against one attack. It isn't great for a lot of characters - especially ones that already have good reactions. But I often find that I have no use for my reaction. Using it to boost AC every round seems like a fantastic use of a reaction. The best I have come up with is Nanite Surge with Protective Subroutine. But that is only usable once per hour.
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Personally I'd go Primal, take life boost and grab a staff of healing later to supplement healing. As a non-cleric you really don't want to be losing more than 1 or 2 slots of your top 2 spell levels to heal. Fortunately, life boost should cover all moderate or weaker encounters and supplement your healing enough to not need too many slotted heals in severe-extreme.
Primal has a few benefits over Divine as a list. You don't need to do anything extra to get electric arc, you have decent CC, battleforms starting at level 3 help alleviate how bad casters feel until level 7ish and shores up lopsided magic party comps if necessary.
I don't include blasting as a benefit since it isn't really that good mathematically, but that's also something it has over Divine (Though since you are a witch even Divine can throw their familiar or star orb and detonate it with final sacrifice.)
There aren't really any major downsides to picking Primal over Divine. However, you don't get remove curse and you don't have magic weapon for the early game.
I wouldn't bother with sentinel since you aren't human. Human can cheese out two general feats at level 1 for medium armor prof before getting heavy with sentinel at 2. Since you can't, you're probably best off with a typical 8/16/14/18/12/8 statline. If you have time to retrain, you can consider light armor general feat at level 3 and retrain it once proficiency scaling makes it useless at 13.
Yeah, I know what the optimal tactics are. I just wish I had an option where I didn't have a character that has an option other than 'curl up into the fetal position' if melee so much as glances my way, even if it is a suboptimal build.
Plus, stoke the heart is so good!
I just wish I had an option where I didn't have a character that has an option other than 'curl up into the fetal position' if melee so much as glances my way, even if it is a suboptimal build.
Plus, stoke the heart is so good!
The most limiting part of melee combat that a Witch is lacking is actually the HP. To improve that, maybe consider one of the multiclass archetypes that have a Resiliency feat to increase your HP that way. Ranger and Champion would be good choices and would fit thematically with the character. Champion would probably be mechanically better for a Divine Witch healer, but is harder to get - STR and CHA are great in general, but not very useful stats for a Witch. Ranger is much easier since you probably need to boost DEX anyway.
I would personally reflavor bard and muse as witch and patron and pick up a familiar from another source, then use suzu as the instrument for inspiring courage.