I'd like to play a caster, but we really only have one martial besides my barbarian. I'm looking for ideas! I've got a craving to do some blasting given the recent discussion on these boards about this playstyle (thanks SUPERBIDI and DERIVEN)!
Campaign: Kingmaker
Current Level: 10
Free Archetype: Yes
- Rogue (thief...but pretty much just rolls RK checks and casts spells, unsure of casting archetype)
- Druid (animal order and blasts a lot, unsure of archetype)
- Bard (marshal archetype, likes phantasmal killer)
- Wizard (skilled player, sneaks and uses subtle spell a lot)
- Sorcerer (fey bloodline, unsure of archetype, fairly skilled, likes mad monkeys)
- (ME) Barbarian (deer instinct, fighter/bastion/monk archetypes for reactive strike, reactive shield, quick shield block, and flurry of blows...I just find the character boring)
Some melee-ish options under consideration: Cast down Warpriest w/ Reactive Strike, Summoner w/ Melee Eidolon, Inexorable Iron Magus
Some blaster casters under consideration: Cloistered Cleric, Silent Whisper Psychic, Imperial or Elemental Sorcerer
I'd rather play something from the latter list...can I make it work? Or is there an idea I'm missing?
Kineticist?
Lots of combinations, and easy enough to build for melee and blasting.
Perhaps fire/wood to blast, support the fighter, and still have a shield block if you find yourself up front.
Barbarian is very hard to build a caster with.
If you want to slam hard, do a Magus Starlit Span or Magus Inexorable Iron with an intelligence based casting archetype like a wizard or witch to add more spell options. Magus gets innate spellcasting progression. You can combine martial and casting very well to hammer super hard. With the casting archetype you can mix in blasting.
Starlit Span is the hardest hitting archer in the game. It feels like blasting because it is ranged. May want to try a Starlift Span magus. Take psychic intel-based archetype and get imaginary weapon. Go to town crushing your enemies.
Barbarian is very hard to build a caster with.
It may not have been clear, but the plan is to quit playing my Barbarian and take up a caster instead.
If you want to slam hard, do a Magus Starlit Span or Magus Inexorable Iron.
I guess a martial-caster hybrid might be best. But if I were to play a ranged Magus, I may as well play a full caster in my mind.
I'll look at Inexorable Iron.
Barbarian is very hard to build a caster with.It may not have been clear, but the plan is to quit playing my Barbarian and take up a caster instead.
If you want to slam hard, do a Magus Starlit Span or Magus Inexorable Iron.I guess a martial-caster hybrid might be best. But if I were to play a ranged Magus, I may as well play a full caster in my mind.
I'll look at Inexorable Iron.
Sorcerer blaster is always good. Psychic if you can manage the focus points and cantrips.
If you want brutal damage since you are using free archetype, a starlit span magus can do the job. I played one and it was one of the most brutal damage dealers I've seen in the game.
With free archetype, you can take blasting.
I took crafting and made scrolls for blasting attached to my arrows using Striker's Scroll with Expansive Spellstrike. If you're getting free archetype, you can add in an intel caster for blasting and spell variation.
Let's you do pretty amazing, top level single target damage with good AoE blasting as well with the free archetype and the scrolls.
If there wasn't already a druid in the group, a druid would have made for a good blaster. Storm Druid, sorcerer, and wizard are the probably the best pure blasters. Though you could try the new witch as well since the other classes seem covered. Witch has some interesting new feats that may make blasting way better. They are an intel based class to build up crafting so you can make scrolls. The familiar might do something cool.
It may not have been clear, but the plan is to quit playing my Barbarian and take up a caster instead.
The best options are probably to take a WarPriest and focus on Bastion and the Shield feats so you can be tough at least.
Another option would be take the caster you want but pair it up with Beastmaster or eqivalent so you can have something to stand between you and the enemy.
Summoner works.
I second Gortle: If your frontline is a little light, go for an Animal Companion. If you take a Sorcerer, you should also consider Blood Component Substitution at level 12, it allows you to avoid Reactive Strikes that should be deadly to your party if you have so many casters.
Metal kineticist has higher damage and moderate defense.
The theme of it is... different. But maybe your looking for different.
I look at your party.
- Fighter (sword n' board w/ rogue archetype...plays recklessly and goes down a lot)
- Rogue (thief...but pretty much just rolls RK checks and casts spells, unsure of casting archetype)
- Druid (animal order and blasts a lot, unsure of archetype)
- Bard (marshal archetype, likes phantasmal killer)
- Wizard (skilled player, sneaks and uses subtle spell a lot)
- Sorcerer (fey bloodline, unsure of archetype, fairly skilled, likes mad monkeys)
- (ME) Barbarian (deer instinct, fighter/bastion/monk archetypes for reactive strike, reactive shield, quick shield block, and flurry of blows...I just find the character boring)
I notice...
- You have two martials other than yourself. One of them goes down a lot, and the other is... pretending that he's not a martial?- You have a bard who's leaning even further into "buff the martials" support.
- It doesn't sound like you really have anyone who's invested heavily into being a healer.
You've also said that you'd prefer to be a blaster.
So taking yourself off the front line is going to make the fighter that much more likely to go down, and when they do you'll have *no* front line. Also, you're marginalizing the bard's buffign abilities pretty hard at that point.
Now, a party that's all-caster or nearly so, who's all about blasting plus some debuffs and battlefield control to slow the enemy down long enough to be blasted? That can work. Unfortunately, it's not what you have. So... I'd suggest you talk with your fellow players.
One answer is just to have a bunch of you spend some archetype feats and sprout animal companions. Having a front line composed of animal companions isn't amazing, but it should be workable. It's just that it's going to take more than just your own contribution to replace the absolute unit you're pulling off that front line by making the change.
Alternately, having one or two of them decide to switch to martials would probably help.
Your rogue should probably respec into a caster regardless. They play like they're a caster, but having it on a rogue chassis rather than a caster chassis is making them understrength. "Do the thing you're doing, but better" seems like it should be an easy sell?
Your bard's probably going to want to respec too, at least somewhat. If everyone sprouts animal companions then their general plan might still be workable but if not, then the thing they do is about to be pretty meaningless. Possibly they'd be better as a psychic?
Jeez, 7 players? Why do people do this? Play whatever you want, your party is going to have redundancies. Otherwise, from your bottom list go cloistered cleric of Erastil. Longbow + sure strike is a great way to supplement your blaster damage, especially when combined with bard buffs and feats like Divine Weapon. You cover the only missing magical tradition and have access to your entire spell list for condition removal. You have big heals if needed. You also get Divine Wrath which is incredibly good in a party this big, both because it doesn't hurt allies and the sickened condition it inflicts will help all of your allies further pour on the damage.
Multiclass into sorcerer for dangerous sorcery to improve blasting, and eventually Bespell Weapon to further boost your bow.
You could also go Cleric of Saranrae for Fire Ray and Fireball. The former is pretty solid, but the latter can be replaced with Divine Immolation at this level of play. AoE persistent ain't bad. If your GM is increasing the number of enemies, you'll probably be focus firing creatures one at a time which creates more time for damage ticks on the ones you don't target.
If you need more reflex options, look into Inner Radiance Torrent and talk to your GM about it. According to Mark Seifter the heightening damage should have been errata'ed to be lower. But Paizo never actually errata'ed it. If your GM allows the printed version, it scales insanely well and will give you the reflex coverage you otherwise lack.
I want to see what their party does if they play a min-maxed Starlit Span Magus and starts doing that nutty damage.
Min-maxed in that particular group would be a Starlit Span Magus with Psychic Archetype to get Imaginary weapon, then use his four slots and scroll striker for AoE blasting. See what the other members in his group do when he starts doing the nutball crits.
7 players? Why do people do this? Play whatever you want, your party is going to have redundancies.
It seems to me that 7 player parties are going to have trouble with crampt dungeon corridors.
So that sort of party wants more ranged fire so that they can better focus fire. Also because you will be facing more enemies - then area attack powers will be better.
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7 players? Why do people do this? Play whatever you want, your party is going to have redundancies.It seems to me that 7 player parties are going to have trouble with crampt dungeon corridors.
So that sort of party wants more ranged fire so that they can better focus fire. Also because you will be facing more enemies - then area attack powers will be better.
Luckily, Kingmaker seems pretty low on cramped dungeon corridors. My objection to seven players is how much it slows the game down.
My problem with 7 players is when either the published adventure or the GM don't follow the guidelines in Encounters with different party sizes and buff up the enemies in the encounter rather than adding more of the same level enemies.
Usually with the justification of trying to mitigate the problems that Gortle and Captain Morgan mention. Fewer enemies will take up less space in the cramped dungeons and will be faster for the GM to run. The fact that it makes the encounter quadratically more difficult rather than linearly more difficult is less noticeable.
I have 6 players and one big challenge so for for us has been scheduling conflicts.
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I've personally found any bigger than 5 and it starts becoming less fun for me.
Its interesting.
I have 1 player that is more comfortable listening watching and letting the others decide what to do.
I also didnt want people going off and doing their own thing, with larger parties its a great way for everyone else to get bored. For that i made a rule at the start that the party makes decisions of where to go as a party. Just accepting the party stays together usually for the sake of keeping everyone together for the action. This restriction loosens up for downtime.