I have a Monster Summoner inquisitor with fauchard in a Rise of Runelords game. My friend has dwarf two-weapon fighting slayer. As levels go up I have noticed we need to start shoring up our defenses. Most obvious way is of course to update our rings, amulets and armor but you can only go so far with those. So I was thinking of getting our hands on the Shield spell. +4 AC is quite a boon but without multiclassing I don't see very many options on getting it.
Wand of Shield is cheap but requires UMD which is not class skill for inquisitors and the dwarf has abysmal charisma. I will invest points into it but it will be a while until I can use wands reliably. And I don't see the dwarf doing it at all.
Silver spindle ioun stone with Shield spell seems handy but it is pricey and requires me to put a point in Cha or get WIS/CHA headband.
I don't think Leadership and alchemist cohort is possible, my summons give the GM headaches already :)
Are there some other items or options?
Unfortunately Deific obediences are probaly off for the inquisitor since he follows the spirits of Mwangi (ravener hunter).
If you both take the Additional Traits feat... the Inquisitor can pick up UMD as a class skill, and the Dwarf can take the trait to put UMD on Intelligence instead of Charisma.
The Inquisitor is already proficient with medium armor, so buy Mithral heavy armor. Take the Shield Brace feat to use a shield with your reach weapon. You get a literal shield, and it requires Shield Focus [which will help your defenses, as well].
And the Slayer has Talents [Armored Marauder/Armored Swiftness] that can put them in decent armor. The Slayer could take one level of Eldritch Scrapper Sorcerer to get Martial Flexibility [Seething Hatred "that guy"], and that would also help their Will saves, too.
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Do you have any arcane casters at all in your party? A Cracked Purple Prism Ioun Stone would work for storing shield. Have your arcane caster store the spell in it, then you can use it.
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The Inquisitor is already proficient with medium armor, so buy Mithral heavy armor. Take the Shield Brace feat to use a shield with your reach weapon. You get a literal shield, and it requires Shield Focus [which will help your defenses, as well].
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This is probably not an option, as Mithril counts as lighter armor for all purposes EXCEPT proficiency, which means the inquistor will take the (reduced) ACP on pretty much everything.
Ultimate Equipment pg. 51, PRPG Core Rulebook pg. 154Source
Mithral is a rare, silvery metal that is lighter than steel but just as hard. When worked like steel, it can be used to create amazing armor, and is occasionally used for other items as well. Most mithral armors are one category lighter than normal for purposes of movement and other limitations. Heavy armors are treated as medium, and medium armors are treated as light, but light armors are still treated as light. This decrease does not apply to proficiency in wearing the armor. A character wearing mithral full plate must be proficient in wearing heavy armor to avoid adding the armor’s check penalty on all his attack rolls and skill checks that involve moving. Spell failure chances for armors and shields made from mithral are decreased by 10%, maximum Dexterity bonuses are increased by 2, and armor check penalties are decreased by 3 (to a minimum of 0).
Nice ideas here, thank you.
VoodoistMonk: We are level 9 at the moment (just finished Hook Mountain massacre), two feats is quite a lot at this point. I have been planning on taking Versatile summon monster and Divine interference as my next feats. They are not set in stone but I'd rather not use two feats for this, even though the gain in AC would be good. Have to think about it. The additional traits could work, I really like traits.
The slayer talents are a good idea, I'll pass that suggestion along.
I don't think sorcerer will do much for him with 7 charisma. Maybe with charisma headband +4 though... He could get shield spell with that. Any way to get martial flexibility with an int or wis based arcane caster? His build is more open to multiclassing, too bad the GM has banned the vivisectionist alchemist for this campaign.
Belafon: I think you need to be able to cast the spell to use the cracked stone? And the flawed and normal ones are more expensive than the Silver spindle.
Mark Hoover 330: Oils last too brief a time to be useful. Key cloak is intersting but quite pricey and has to compete with cloak of resistance for the slot. Shield cloak is cheap and handy but again has to compete for the slot. Ring of Force shield seems a good idea, I had forgotten this item completely.
I found the item Wand Key Ring , +10 to UMD would be golden. I hope there are some that are keyed to Shield for sale in Magnimar. I don't know if our crafter can craft those, upgrading amulets, cloaks, belts and headbands takes time.
Are there any other (cheapish) items to boost UMD?
Hmm, shaken enemies have -2 to attack (giving us in effect +2 AC) so Cornugon smash could be useful, but with my luck the rest of the AP all the monsters are immune to mind affecting or fear, or both :D
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Belafon: I think you need to be able to cast the spell to use the cracked stone?
I used to think so too for a very long time, but it turns out the answer is in the last sentence of the general Ioun Stone description in the CRB.
Stored spells in the vibrant purple stone must be placed by a spellcaster but can be used by anyone (see ring of minor spell storing).
And the flawed and normal ones are more expensive than the Silver spindle.
Yes, but the one you want is the cracked vibrant purple prism ioun stone. Shield is a first-level spell and that's what the cracked one can store. It only costs 2,000 gp. Way cheaper than the silver spindle. You do have to have it reloaded after each time you use it.
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This is probably not an option, as Mithril counts as lighter armor for all purposes EXCEPT proficiency, which means the inquistor will take the (reduced) ACP on pretty much everything....
The Inquisitor is already proficient with medium armor, so buy Mithral heavy armor. Take the Shield Brace feat to use a shield with your reach weapon. You get a literal shield, and it requires Shield Focus [which will help your defenses, as well].
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Correct.
However if you want to get silly there is one way to pull this off if your GM allows all the required material. And it's only useful for a character with a very specific Dex score (+5).
Nimble, mithral, full plate of comfort only has an ACP of 1. If you can take the armor expert trait - either at character creation or by taking the Extra Traits feat - then that becomes 0.
What's your attack bonus like? If your to-hit is good enough you could try just Fighting Defensively .
If you have 3 ranks in Acrobatics it's -4 to hit for +3 AC. If your attack numbers are good enough you could afford some negatives in offense to give yourself some defence.
I know everyone dumps on Combat Expertise , but my Bloodrager has ludicrously good offensive numbers, so I regularly fight defensively. After picking up CE I can do so more efficiently. Now it's probably not really worth a feat if you're exclusively going to use it instead of FD. At level 11 you'll have +8 BAB, so CE is -3/+3, which is barely better than FD , but if you fond yourself in situations where you really want to max your AC for a round or 2 then combining FD and CE is a huge increase in AC while still allowing you to attack .
Just a thought.
Wait a minute, you're a Ravener Hunter?
What Oracle Mystery do you have? There are several Revelations that can grant a scaling AC bonus.
Barring that, I'd suggest investing in a cheap Ring of Seven Lovely Colors. It'll let you turn into a songbird for 10 minutes per use (which is an insane duration for how cheap the item is).
While you're in Songbird form, you gain a +4 to AC purely from size alone. With the size bonuses to DEX on top of that, you're looking at like a +6 AC swing.
Summon Monster should still work relatively alright while in Songbird form, given the fact that SLAs and Sus don't require verbal or somatic components.
Even if the weaker PFS version of the Ring of Seven Lovely Colors is used, you're a Monster Tactician, and therefore can very easily continue to summon monsters while a Songbird. It explicitly doesn't count as an attack for the purposes of invisibility, so it won't count as an attack for this, either.
You might want to take Bonded Mind as one of your Teamwork feats, though. Being able to communicate while in Songbird form might be important.
Whew lots of good points again, thank you.
For some reason I read only the resonance option on the Ioun stone! Indeed it seems to be good for one use Shield spell per day. Thanks!
I have not invested in acrobatics but FD seems a good idea.
My AB is +14 (+6 Bab, +5 Str, +1 WF, +2 weapon) With heroism on and flanking it is +20, could get it higher if we have some time to buff just before battle (prayer, divine favor etc.) so I probably can use FD if needed. My int is not high enough for CE.
Nimble Mithral full plate, now why is it useful only if you have dex +5?
The possibility of finding an armor with such a specific combo of properties is quite small.
Shield of faith is a good reminder but since I have a protection ring it does not offer as much AC increase as Shield but, yes I'll keep that in mind.
Blinding ray, not sure if GM will allow it. It seems a bit of gamble and lasts only 1 round if successful. I usually leave debuffing to the oracle of the party, she has higher casting stat anyway.
Summon tactics: I do summon some grapplers, lions etc. and they are handy. All summons and the slayer have Outflank so +4 to attack. Since I can not communicate with animal summons I can't really order them to use aid ally, elementals could do that, will have to remember that option.
The oracle likes to use shadow trap to entangle enemies.
I took battle mystery and Weapon mastery and Maneuver mastery(trip) revelations since I wanted to try a melee inquisitor and capitalize on teamwork feats.
As nice as a songbird form is, I could not do anything else than summon in that form.
Multiclassing would be an obvious option but it will set the summons and other inquisitor goodies back and I want to avoid that.
I will how ever ask if the slayer would be interested in that.
Barkskin is good now when our amulets are low power, we have some potions and the oracle might cast it if she takes the proper spirit (she is a Spirit guide).
Bonded mind as teamwork... that might be a good idea even without songbird part. I don't think it works with animal summons though.
One tactic that has been wildly successful is the obscuring mist/ashen path combo thrown by the oracle. 20% or even 50% chance for the enemies and blocked line of sight has been really really useful.