So, if you are going TWF, you need to really invest in it. Drop Improved Initiative, Toughness, and Defensive Combat Training, and buy the TWF feat tree. Go ahead and pick up Knife master as an Archetype, and use 2 Kukris
I would not pump Con, nor spend my favored class bonus on hit points. Your goal should be to avoid getting hit, not be able to take a hit. Invisible Blade makes this easy.
I agree on the use of Invisible Blade, it makes rogues a killing machine.
but I think aside from finesse rogue, the rest of your choices could be better.
As for magic items, you're obviously too interested in boosting skills. You'll have enough in those with just skill ranks, no need to waste magic items on them as well. You also list some Magic items that don't exist in Pathfinder.
I think getting improved two weapon fighting is fine, but greater twf has such low chances of ever hitting anyway, that I don't really think it's worth the feat.
Assuming you used your floating stat bonus as a half elf to boost your DEX or WIS to 18 that is a 57 point buy. That is like saying the combined wealth of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Murk Zuckerberg is a little bit of money. Are the rest of the party’s stats similar? If they are you are so far from a normal pathfinder game that giving any helpful advice is going to be difficult. . I have run a high-level Mythic campaign where the characters stats are way less than this even after factoring in magic.
Most adventure paths are not designed for characters with that high of stats. Either your characters are going to walk through the adventure path without noticing it, or the GM will have to modify it so much that any advice given based on normal expectations will be useless.
I think getting improved two weapon fighting is fine, but greater twf has such low chances of ever hitting anyway, that I don't really think it's worth the feat.
I wholeheartedly disagree, an invisible rogue, in a flanking position, would be effectively +4 to hit, versus flat footed armor class. Those 4th, 5th and 6th, even 7th attacks will hit often enough.
I think getting improved two weapon fighting is fine, but greater twf has such low chances of ever hitting anyway, that I don't really think it's worth the feat.I wholeheartedly disagree, an invisible rogue, in a flanking position, would be effectively +4 to hit, versus flat footed armor class. Those 4th, 5th and 6th, even 7th attacks will hit often enough.
That's a lot of conditionals. Regular invisibility goes away after the first attack, and greater invisibility is only rounds per level, so very expensive in gold and rounds spent activating it. And getting into a good flanking position means that you may not get to full attack anyway. Greater TWF is just too situational for what it does
That's a lot of conditionals. Regular invisibility goes away after the first attack, and greater invisibility is only rounds per level, so very expensive in gold and rounds spent activating it. And getting into a good flanking position means that you may not get to full attack anyway. Greater TWF is just too situational for what it doesI think getting improved two weapon fighting is fine, but greater twf has such low chances of ever hitting anyway, that I don't really think it's worth the feat.I wholeheartedly disagree, an invisible rogue, in a flanking position, would be effectively +4 to hit, versus flat footed armor class. Those 4th, 5th and 6th, even 7th attacks will hit often enough.
his 10th level ability, "Invisible blade", grants Greater Invisibility just for spending ki.
so after 10th level, pretty much ALL combats he will be invisible for, so all his attacks will have sneak, etc. and all it takes is 1 move action to get into a flanking position, or even if he's not into flanking, he's still at +2 to hit, versus flat footed.
so, no gold spent, lasts a minimum of 10 rounds, (activates as a swift action), and I'll admit, first round he gets 0 or 1 attack, but his next round action is a full attack with sneak, with almost a guarantee to hit with all attacks. way less situational than you think.
All Paizo material is allowed (except Unchained)
What is wrong with your GM? Allowing everything except the unchained classes makes absolutely no sense. It's possible the GM doesn't understand that he can allow only the classes from that book without being forced to use any of the optional system. Probably too late for now, but for the future, I'd recommend talking to the GM about this.
I’d like to be able to hold my own and feel like I’m contributing in a fight more than I am. [...] At this point, everything through level 5 is baked in
You aren't making this easy on us. Core Rogue is the by far weakest class in the game, and your locked-in selections, well.. they could be better. Alertness, Dodge, and Canny Observer do very little, and most importantly you can't select an archetype that would help you. Maybe ask the GM, or see if you can make use of Ultimate Campaign's retraining option.
Your exceptionally high ability scores help a bit, but your character (like almost every Rogue) still has a bunch of weaknesses. Most notably are your saving throw bonuses very weak, at least on the two important saves (fortitude and will). When in doubt, Iron Will is a good feat, and Emboldening Strike can be good, too, although it clashes with the (very good) Offensive Defense, so you'd have to chose which one to use on a given attack. Note that both Emboldening Strike and Offensive Defense stack with themself, for potentially very high bonuses on a full attack.
Be sure to always have a ranged weapon as you have no means of reaching flying enemies or opponents that you otherwise can't simply walk up to.
You're also weak agaisnt anything that's invisible, concealed, or otherwise hidden, but this, too, is not something easily fixable.
I’m looking at a combination of the two-weapon fighting and skill monkey builds, with a couple other tricks thrown in for flavor.
Just remember that "skill monkey" isn't really a thing. It's an outdated concept from when people thought you'd have to compartmentalize parties. You're already reasonably good at skills, I'd advice against further investment.
Your ability scores are good at least, and APs are generaly not that difficult, so you've got that going for you.
I think you're spreading your skill points out way too much. However, rather than giving you an 'alternative plan', I advise you to see what skils you actually use in the campaign, and improve those. On this, don't plan ahead.
I’ve seen Vanishing Trick routinely panned as not worth taking, but rarely is it commented on pairing it with Invisible Blade.
I think that's because at that point, there is very little reason to play Rogue over Ninja. Ki Pool + Vanishing Trick is actually pretty weak (due to how few attacks per day it affects), although your higher than normal wisdom helps a bit.
Plus, Ki Pool is nice for the extra innate bonuses it gives.
The what now? The only thing Ki Pool grants is the ability to waste a point on +10ft movement speed for a turn.
Most guides I’ve found recommend equipment with costs in the tens of thousands of gold each.
At later levels, you're supposed to have such wealth, and APs usually grant it. Here's a table for expected wealth per level. Even if you decrease that due to a 5th party member, you should sitll be able to afford items worth more than 4k gold at ca. 6th level...
I’ve put together a list of items for each body slot
You don't need to wear a magic item in every slot. Rather, focus on items that actually help you, like Cloak of Resistance, Belt of Incredible Dexterity, Ring of Deflection, Amulet of Natural Armor. For magic weapons and armor, straight up +x bonus is usually better than other enchantments.
I think getting improved two weapon fighting is fine, but greater twf has such low chances of ever hitting anyway, that I don't really think it's worth the feat.I wholeheartedly disagree, an invisible rogue, in a flanking position, would be effectively +4 to hit, versus flat footed armor class. Those 4th, 5th and 6th, even 7th attacks will hit often enough.
If you're flanking, and greater invisible, and the FF AC of the enemy is notably low(er), and the enemy doesn't have senses that negate invisibility, and you can make a full attack... that is the one situation in a Rogue's life where they already perform well.
Greater TWF is a pure "win more" for Rogues, it only helps when you already perform exceptionally well, and does nothing in all the other situations. The return for the investment is very low in practise.
I think getting improved two weapon fighting is fine, but greater twf has such low chances of ever hitting anyway, that I don't really think it's worth the feat.I wholeheartedly disagree, an invisible rogue, in a flanking position, would be effectively +4 to hit, versus flat footed armor class. Those 4th, 5th and 6th, even 7th attacks will hit often enough.If you're flanking, and greater invisible, and the FF AC of the enemy is notably low(er), and the enemy doesn't have senses that negate invisibility, and you can make a full attack... that is the one situation in a Rogue's life where they already perform well.
Greater TWF is a pure "win more" for Rogues, it only helps when you already perform exceptionally well, and does nothing in all the other situations. The return for the investment is very low in practise.
I guess we just play differently than you do. When I play a rogue, he quite often is dealing as much if not more damage than the other martials.
once he gets that Invisible blade ability, he's pretty much ALWAYS invisible during combat. Flanking is easy to get into with a move action, or if you build any of the dimensional builds a free action. Most bad guys have a flat footed AC lower than their normal AC, especially ones that wear armor. Very few enemies have an ability that negates invisibility, in the course of 10 AP's, I've encountered it maybe twice. And once you get into flanking, your next round attack is a full round, it can be the round you move if you build one of the dimensional builds. So yeah, All of those "situational issues" are actually quite easy to overcome. my table commonly sees TWF rogues making 5-7 hits per round with flanking and sneak attack, and dealing upwards of 300-500 damage.
in our last game, the 16th level rogues hit a bad guy for 396.
in our last game, the 16th level rogues hit a bad guy for 396.
And the average HP of a CR 19 enemy is 333. I'm not convinced the last 45 or whatever points of damage that Greater TWF added were really necessary...
Very few enemies have an ability that negates invisibility, in the course of 10 AP's, I've encountered it maybe twice.
That surprises me, because I think this should be higher. My spreadsheet has 1048 monster of CR > 8, and I've got 388 entries for lifesense, blindsight, true seeing, see invisibility, thoughtsense, or possessing True Seeing of See Invisibility as spells or SLAs. Not counted: 42 Sneak Attack-immune elementals and oozes without such senses.
If he is allowing all Paizo material except Unchained, that mean the retraining rules from Ultimate Campaign can be used. That should allow you to retrain poor choices you made in the character. Technically you can even retrain you class levels.
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in our last game, the 16th level rogues hit a bad guy for 396.And the average HP of a CR 19 enemy is 333. I'm not convinced the last 45 or whatever points of damage that Greater TWF added were really necessary...
Very few enemies have an ability that negates invisibility, in the course of 10 AP's, I've encountered it maybe twice.That surprises me, because I think this should be higher. My spreadsheet has 1048 monster of CR > 8, and I've got 388 entries for lifesense, blindsight, true seeing, see invisibility, thoughtsense, or possessing True Seeing of See Invisibility as spells or SLAs. Not counted: 42 Sneak Attack-immune elementals and oozes without such senses.
yeah, distribution is key here. The Average Paizo AP seldom uses most of those. it seems the vast majority of bad guys are little more than skeletons, goblinoids, or various human, elf etc. The ones that negate invisibility the most are Mantis Warriors (their helmet allows see invisibility), and a few undead with lifesense. But in general, it's a non-issue.
And yeah, that was close to a maxed out attack, on average the total damage is way less, usually around 180-200. Having that extra attack to help speed the combat is helpful, but again YMMV
RE: Feats
A good chunk of the replies in this thread were basically a private discussion caught up in how impactful Greater TWF is versus regular TWF. That's cool and all, but it didn't really help me figure out what to do with my build, much less explain what all is in "the whole TWF feat tree." I have rethought my plan, though, based on some of the other feedback people gave.
9 – Mobility (to help avoid getting hit while moving into position)
11 – Blind-Fight (to help against invisible enemies)
13 – Martial Weapon Proficiency (short sword)
15 – Amateur Swashbuckler / Dodging Panache (maybe it'll stack with Mobility?)
So, TWF gives you a ton of attacks. Sneak attack gives you a tons of damage, tons of attacks multiplied by tons of damage equals insane damage.
If you are even remotely thinking about going TWF, you need to go the whole tree and max out your attacks.
Ignore those who say you won't hit. They all forget that you'll be invisible (via invisible blade) so will be going against flat footed AC, AND getting a +2 because you are invisible.
As for Mobility - you'll be invisible, so this is worthless
blind fighting - doesn't really help that well against an invisible opponent - buy some glitter dust instead.
Short sword?? NO, go Knife master Archetype and use daggers or kukris, you want the d8 backstab, not a d6 weapon dice.
swashbuckler panache, the only thing worthwhile is the parry riposte, which it doesn't grant.
For the people who mocked or were aghast at my GM's decision to not allow material from Unchained, he said that he thought it wasn’t fair that only four classes got revisions
By singling out unchained classes in particular, your GM was actually being unfair to the Rogue and Monk. Every class gets nice things in different books, and it just so happened Rogue and Monk got their nice things in Pathfinder Unchained. Banning Pathfinder Unchained because only 4 classes got unchained classes is really no different from banning Weapon Master's Handbook because most of the options in that book was just for Fighters. Every class got their cool stuff in different books, and very few books had something for everyone.
The reason these four classes got unchained rework was because they had serious problems with the base class, and Paizo felt the best way to address it was to overhaul the base class. Only two of them were intended to be improvements, the other two were actually changed for unrelated reasons and their unchained classes are worse than the original class.
Rogue and Monk essentially had the same problem. They simply had too few class features for a 3/4 BAB class. In fact, they are the only 3/4 BAB classes that didn't have some form of spellcasting. They could easily struggle to find a defined niche. As a result, the Monk was changed to be a full base attack bonus class and became a proper front-liner, while the Rogue got a bunch of new class features and improvements to its existing class features to make it more reliable. The Unchained Rogue is a very well-balanced class.
The Barbarian's problem had to do with the way temporary bonuses worked. They were very confusing for beginners. Moreover, there was the issue of "sudden barbarian death syndrome" where if you were at low hit points when your rage ended, you would lose the bonus hit points and it could cause you to literally die on the spot. The Unchained Barbarian was, if anything, a little weaker than the original Barbarian but it was more beginner-friendly.
The Unchained Summoner, however, was actually intended to weaken the Summoner. It removed many spells form his spell list, increased the spell level of others, and greatly reduced the number of evolutions he could pick for his eidolon. While it did add some new options, the Summoner lost far more than he gained. I personally feel that it missed the mark, as it didn't really address the most overpowered feature of the original Summoner (his Summon Monster ability). It also didn't address that many of the more thematic evolutions were overpriced, and with the reduction in evolution points they became practically unusable. However, there is little doubt that the Summoner needed to be made weaker and that's why it got the Unchained class rework.
I still don't know what comprises "the whole tree" for TWF. Is it something more than TWF, Improved TWF, and Greater TWF? If not, that's more like a line than a "tree." I won't be eligible for Greater TWF until level 15 when my BAB is +11. That's about when we expect to end this story, so I'm inclined to use that feat for something else. Improved TWF would be fine, though.
Double Slice isn't bad if you have the STR.
Don't forget Piranha Strike, it's your second good source of damage.Two-weapon defense is good to take if you have an empty slot.
And of course, as a dex based character you'll want Weapon finesse.
So, Piranha Strike, and Weapon Finesse, combined with TWF, ITWF, and GTWF, are what I consider the essential TWF feats.
Possessed Hand and Hand’s Autonomy can both benefit TWF if you have the spare feats for them.