With the massive flexibility of the sorcerer class, we might need a bit more to go on if you want any solid advice.
Just play a Heavy Metal Sorcerer, which will be very strong & thematic.
Ancestry/Heritage: whatever you want¹
Background: Osprey Spellcaster (or Osprey Scribe)
Class: Sorcerer (Elemental bloodline, Metal)
Cantrips: Electric Arc [bloodline], Frostbite, Live Wire, Slashing Gust, Glass Shield
Spells: Thunderstrike [bloodline], Heal, Conductive Weapon/Mystic Weapon²
Skills: Nature & Intimidation [bloodline], Diplomacy, Athletics, Occultism, Religion
Equipment (standard): Adventurer's Pack, Climbing Kit, Explorer's Clothing, Dagger, Light Mace, Wooden Shield, Elixir of Life/Healing Potion
1: I do suggest an ancestry with an arcane/divine/occult cantrip, so you can get Shield (and replace Glass Shield with something else, like Guidance or Needle Darts).
2: If your strikers have at most a d6 weapon, then I suggest Conductive Weapon over Mystic Weapon, or just for the flair.
Check out this blaster build I just put together.
Works great with a metal element sorcerer or imperial sorcerer as well!
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With the massive flexibility of the sorcerer class, we might need a bit more to go on if you want any solid advice.The party consists of a fighter, rogue, cleric and a kineticist.
I've always like playing combat style arcane casters and was interested in either a Draconic or Imperial bloodline.
I also painted up a mini for a human, which I'm keen to use.
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Check out this blaster build I just put together.
Works great with a metal element sorcerer or imperial sorcerer as well!
Thanks Mate, I'll have a look now.
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Here's an example build of a pretty optimized human imperial sorcerer I made that goes up to level 12:
https://pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=833653.
Picks up some of the strongest arcane spells available, and should be able to cover most grounds in combat. I think it's overall one of the strongest ways you can play an offensive spellcaster right now.
Some notes on choices:
- Dip into psychic dedication at level 2 because sorcerer feats at that level are not the greatest, although Propelling Sorcery could be very good in some circumstances. Also because amped guidance, an extra focus point (which can also be used on Ancestral Memories) and trained occultism is too good to pass on.- Robust health assuming your cleric or someone else will be using Battle Medicine. Canny acumen is going to better than Incredible Initiative until level 11 assuming you roll perception for initiative most of the time. But you could pick up both of them and retrain Canny Acumen to Robust Health once you hit level 11. You could also opt for light armor via Armor Proficiency.
- Live wire cantrip has incredible scaling but is not that great until level 5 or so and can be swapped in once u get there. You will want to swap out spells in general as you level in favor of more utility, examples being Runic Weapon for something like Gentle Landing, Fireball for Time Jump, etc.
- Magical shorthand to make learning spells for Arcane Evolution cheaper / more reliable
- Crossblooded evolution with Elemental for the damage or intimidation buff. Between this and Sorcerous Potency, your Arcane Missiles will hurt a lot. That's why I don't think there's a need for another single target blast besides Disintegrate (which has utility use).
- I didn't opt for Tap Into Blood because it, while looking great on paper, does not function that well in practice in my opinion because:
a) your arcana skill increases will lag behind due to wanting to prioritize...
Thank you very much, I will have a look into that build. I really appreciate you taking the time to respond.
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- I didn't opt for Tap Into Blood because it, while looking great on paper, does not function that well in practice in my opinion because:
a) your arcana skill increases will lag behind due to wanting to prioritize intimidation for demoralize (and likely diplomacy as well), as well as due to a lack of INT
A little lagging behind or lower ability score is offset by the fact that you can use Arcana to roll Recall Knowledge with any skill.
To emphasize this point: If you're encountering a Zombie Shambler, don't Recall Knowledge with Arcana instead of Religion, but Recall Knowledge with Arcana instead of Zombie Shambler Lore.
You're now using Arcana instead of a specific Lore skill, which has a much lower DC. Because, you know, Imperial Sorcerers just ridiculed Bardic Knowledge! :D
While Imperial Sorcerer is an amazing caster, if you are starting at lvl 1 I would actually go Draconic, Fortune per example have some really good sorcerous gifts. Why I say that? Ancestral Memories requires another spell to be good, and at lower levels you don't have many of those, so the Flurry of Claws starts better in my opinion.
If you go Dragonic maybe pick the Dragonblooded versatile with Dragon Hide as it's thematic for the character as well.
I suppose it is very powerful given you can target lower DCs, and with it not being able to crit fail you could combine it with Dubious Knowledge to always learn something. Could also pick up Automatic Knowledge to guarantee successes on mooks as a free action. Any recommendations on how you would fit it into your action economy at lower levels? I guess you could pick up Bleed Out at level 2 and do Ancestral Memories > Recall Knowledge > Bleed Out for a decent 60 feet opener to a fight, potentially applying persistent bleed to the BBEG and learning about its weaknesses.
Yeah, if you use highly specific lore skills, Assurance will auto succeed even on non-mooks. It's basically a permanent +5 untyped bonus to all your Recall Knowledge checks. Even a -1 INT Sorcerer could then outdo a Wizard.
The action economy is the only thing that's weak about this ability. It's hard to pull of without wasting the rest of the round; your option is a good one (though you'd have to do Bleed Out before Tap Into Blood).
It's best if you have the ability to scout ahead and you're not pressed for useful actions.
And maybe Tap Into Blood gets an errata or something that changes its action cost, as it is a little weird not being a reaction or free action, especially if you suspect that the divine option to Step should make sense somehow.
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Frankly, I don't know anyone who gives the hyper-specific lore DC reduction with any ability that lets you make any recall knowledge check with a single skill. It's a pretty silly interpretation, both narratively (you're supposed to get the benefit for focusing your studies in a niche area, which you've done the exact opposite of if you've invested all your RK capabilities in one check) and mechanically (it's a huge boost, completely incomparable to anything else in the game). I don't particularly care if the wording on something like bardic lore or esoteric lore is that you make a check with those lores, whereas Tap Into Blood lets you make a specific check with your arcana modifier (that seems to be how people are treating it, I don't have access to the text). It's a nonsensical outcome, clearly unintended, and neither I nor anyone I know will be running it that way. I do not think it is an intended part of the power budget, to say the least.
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Frankly, I don't know anyone who gives the hyper-specific lore DC reduction with any ability that lets you make any recall knowledge check with a single skill. It's a pretty silly interpretation, both narratively (you're supposed to get the benefit for focusing your studies in a niche area, which you've done the exact opposite of if you've invested all your RK capabilities in one check) and mechanically (it's a huge boost, completely incomparable to anything else in the game). I don't particularly care if the wording on something like bardic lore or esoteric lore is that you make a check with those lores, whereas Tap Into Blood lets you make a specific check with your arcana modifier (that seems to be how people are treating it, I don't have access to the text). It's a nonsensical outcome, clearly unintended, and neither I nor anyone I know will be running it that way. I do not think it is an intended part of the power budget, to say the least.
I would allow it. Every monster lists multiple lore types. If the particular RK knowledge challenge allows multiple lore types, why wouldn't you be able to use the most favorable? Nothing in the ability says you can't say, "I access Undead Lore with my Tap the Blood ability." It would be GM Fiat disallowing it and a GM is fine to do so if they don't like allowing the favorable use of an ability.
I would allow it myself. I would consider that intelligent play and if Paizo intended otherwise, then it should have been written more clearly than to be exploitable in that fashion.
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Frankly, I don't know anyone who gives the hyper-specific lore DC reduction with any ability that lets you make any recall knowledge check with a single skill. It's a pretty silly interpretation, both narratively (you're supposed to get the benefit for focusing your studies in a niche area, which you've done the exact opposite of if you've invested all your RK capabilities in one check) and mechanically (it's a huge boost, completely incomparable to anything else in the game). I don't particularly care if the wording on something like bardic lore or esoteric lore is that you make a check with those lores, whereas Tap Into Blood lets you make a specific check with your arcana modifier (that seems to be how people are treating it, I don't have access to the text). It's a nonsensical outcome, clearly unintended, and neither I nor anyone I know will be running it that way. I do not think it is an intended part of the power budget, to say the least.I would allow it. Every monster lists multiple lore types. If the particular RK knowledge challenge allows multiple lore types, why wouldn't you be able to use the most favorable? Nothing in the ability says you can't say, "I access Undead Lore with my Tap the Blood ability." It would be GM Fiat disallowing it and a GM is fine to do so if they don't like allowing the favorable use of an ability.
I would allow it myself. I would consider that intelligent play and if Paizo intended otherwise, then it should have been written more clearly than to be exploitable in that fashion.
Monsters don't list any lore types at all actually - only Archives of Nethys does. I wouldn't allow the most favourable because, again, it's meant to represent the benefit you get from constraining your studies to a very limited set of topics both mechanically and narratively. If you're using only Arcana to make all Recall Knowledge checks, you have absolutely not done that. The wording from Recall Knowledge in Player Core is :
Using an applicable Lore to Recall Knowledge about a topic, such as Engineering Lore instead of Crafting to find structural weaknesses in a bridge, typically comes with a lower DC. Your special interests can pay off!
Using the applicable Lore usually has an easy or very easy DC (before adjusting for rarity).
Sure, if a mechanic says "whenever you recall knowledge, you can use your Arcana modifier instead of the modifier of the skill", there's a reasonable rules argument to be said that you should get the easy or very easy DC. But for one, it's much more up-to-GM-discretion than AoN makes it look, and two, it's actively working against the narrative that this mechanic is trying to do to give a huge boost that is pretty clearly (imo) not budgeted into the ability. You call it intelligent play, but it's incredibly straightforward - you just say "I want a free -5 to the DC when rolling this check please!" on literally every RK you ever make. There's no decision making there, there's nothing to be intelligent with - it's just getting a bonus. And the bonus is large enough that you'll have the same chance of success as someone who has +5 int and is a Legendary in the skill when you are only +4 int and an expert in the skill! And you only need to invest in one skill! It's clearly out of budget, IMO, and pretending that it's somehow intelligent play to exploit this seems absurd to me.
Also it'd be lovely if someone could confirm the actual text of the ability, as almost all the equivalent abilities in the game say 'You can Recall Knowledge with [x] skill check to Recall Knowledge about any topic', which does prevent all of this from coming up, as you're not rolling an appropriate Lore check for the difficulty reduction.
That Reflect Harm feat seems kind of harsh. Couldn't you do something like Blood Rising, get targeted by a spell of the same tradition as your sorcerer spells, then as a reaction turn the damage back on the target as an attack roll by activating the Blood Magic Effect Reflect Harm? How would that work?
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I actually just started a sorcerer, dragonblood draconic (arcane). I was checking how to use the blood magic effect as often as possible, and last dungeon I actually used the propelling sorcery option quite often to move the enemy back. Flurry of claws is quite good, fear and blazing bolt are also spells you can use quite often to trigger blood magic. Psychic archetype for Infinite eye, because flurry of claws is already offensive, the guidance spell is a nice added support option.
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Frankly, I don't know anyone who gives the hyper-specific lore DC reduction with any ability that lets you make any recall knowledge check with a single skill. It's a pretty silly interpretation, both narratively (you're supposed to get the benefit for focusing your studies in a niche area, which you've done the exact opposite of if you've invested all your RK capabilities in one check) and mechanically (it's a huge boost, completely incomparable to anything else in the game). I don't particularly care if the wording on something like bardic lore or esoteric lore is that you make a check with those lores, whereas Tap Into Blood lets you make a specific check with your arcana modifier (that seems to be how people are treating it, I don't have access to the text). It's a nonsensical outcome, clearly unintended, and neither I nor anyone I know will be running it that way. I do not think it is an intended part of the power budget, to say the least.
Agreed, I'd never allow this. Tap Into Blood lets you use another skill, so you'd be rolling Arcana in place of Religion. You're not rolling Arcana in place of "This Specific Named NPC Lore" for literally every NPC on Golarian.
If you want that, take the appropriate Lore. The investment required in something that specific is why the benefit is so significant: it's for a specialist in a subject.
Its not like Tap Into Blood is bad even if thats the case: if your Arcana is good you're able to roll on a LOT of subjects with your best skill and invest skill boosts elsewhere. That's a lot of value even if you don't let it get silly.
Frankly, I don't know anyone who gives the hyper-specific lore DC reduction with any ability that lets you make any recall knowledge check with a single skill. It's a pretty silly interpretation, both narratively (you're supposed to get the benefit for focusing your studies in a niche area, which you've done the exact opposite of if you've invested all your RK capabilities in one check) and mechanically (it's a huge boost, completely incomparable to anything else in the game). I don't particularly care if the wording on something like bardic lore or esoteric lore is that you make a check with those lores, whereas Tap Into Blood lets you make a specific check with your arcana modifier (that seems to be how people are treating it, I don't have access to the text). It's a nonsensical outcome, clearly unintended, and neither I nor anyone I know will be running it that way. I do not think it is an intended part of the power budget, to say the least.Agreed, I'd never allow this. Tap Into Blood lets you use another skill, so you'd be rolling Arcana in place of Religion. You're not rolling Arcana in place of "This Specific Named NPC Lore" for literally every NPC on Golarian.
If you want that, take the appropriate Lore. The investment required in something that specific is why the benefit is so significant: it's for a specialist in a subject.
Its not like Tap Into Blood is bad even if thats the case: if your Arcana is good you're able to roll on a LOT of subjects with your best skill and invest skill boosts elsewhere. That's a lot of value even if you don't let it get silly.
I agree it is a terrible outcome it is however what the rules say. Unfortuantely it is because everyone wants something different that we need to agree to the rules of the game. Most GMs have limited bandwidth to customise the game. So the rules matter.
Actual wording:
TAP INTO BLOOD �
FEAT 1
CONCENTRATE
SORCERER
Requirements You are benefiting from a blood magic effect
The power in your blood allows you to perform minor feats of
magic. You can perform one of the following actions depending
on the tradition of your bloodline.
• Arcane Your mind temporarily opens to the secrets of the
world. Attempt to Recall Knowledge; you can use Arcana
instead of the skill normally needed for that subject. If
you critically fail at this check, you get a failure instead.
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Frankly, I don't know anyone who gives the hyper-specific lore DC reduction with any ability that lets you make any recall knowledge check with a single skill. It's a pretty silly interpretation, both narratively (you're supposed to get the benefit for focusing your studies in a niche area, which you've done the exact opposite of if you've invested all your RK capabilities in one check) and mechanically (it's a huge boost, completely incomparable to anything else in the game). I don't particularly care if the wording on something like bardic lore or esoteric lore is that you make a check with those lores, whereas Tap Into Blood lets you make a specific check with your arcana modifier (that seems to be how people are treating it, I don't have access to the text). It's a nonsensical outcome, clearly unintended, and neither I nor anyone I know will be running it that way. I do not think it is an intended part of the power budget, to say the least.Agreed, I'd never allow this. Tap Into Blood lets you use another skill, so you'd be rolling Arcana in place of Religion. You're not rolling Arcana in place of "This Specific Named NPC Lore" for literally every NPC on Golarian.
If you want that, take the appropriate Lore. The investment required in something that specific is why the benefit is so significant: it's for a specialist in a subject.
Its not like Tap Into Blood is bad even if thats the case: if your Arcana is good you're able to roll on a LOT of subjects with your best skill and invest skill boosts elsewhere. That's a lot of value even if you don't let it get silly.
I agree it is a terrible outcome it is however what the rules say. Unfortuantely it is because everyone wants something different that we need to agree to the rules of the game. Most GMs have limited bandwidth to customise the game. So the rules matter.
Actual wording:
TAP INTO BLOOD �
FEAT 1
CONCENTRATE
SORCERER
Requirements You are benefiting from a blood magic effect
The power in your blood allows you to perform minor feats of
magic. You can perform one of the following actions depending
on the tradition of your bloodline.
• Arcane Your mind temporarily opens to the secrets of the
world. Attempt to Recall Knowledge; you can use Arcana
instead of the skill normally needed for that subject. If
you critically fail at this check, you get a failure instead.
No, the rules don't say that. The spell says "Attempt to Recall Knowledge; you can use Arcana instead of the skill normally needed for that subject."
The skill normally needed for that subject is one of the high level recall ones Arcana/Religion/etc (there's even a helpful RAW list for Creature Identification and Lore is never on it). You don't NEED a Lore to do this, so there's nothing in there that actually says "you get to pick the most specific Lore possible and use that instead."
People are inferring that the player gets to pick which skill they get to use and can make it hyper-specific, but nothing actually says that RAW.
I agree it is a terrible outcome it is however what the rules say.Rules also say GMs choose skills, their applicability, DCs and bonuses for Recall Knowledge. So it's definitely in GM's power from the start.
No one said otherwise. The GM can fix anything. PF2 is supposed to have explicit defined rules. Do you really want your GM making balance fixes for classes?
And deciding that such general lores are never specific (duh) and are actually on the DC level of general skills is nothing special at all.
That is a house rule. Reasonable for sure.
But the distinction between general skills and lore skills is not made in the rules. Lore skills are just the same as other skills for the purposes of recall knowledge. In fact there are other rules like say Diverse Lore where they do apply a -2 penalty for any topic. They didn't do this for Tap into Blood.
The skill normally needed for that subject is one of the high level recall ones Arcana/Religion/etc (there's even a helpful RAW list for Creature Identification and Lore is never on it). You don't NEED a Lore to do this, so there's nothing in there that actually says "you get to pick the most specific Lore possible and use that instead."
This is not about Creature Identification but the more general Recall Knowledge.
Lore is one of the skills you can use and it is listed under the Recall Knowledge action. Mixed in with all the other skills.
AFAICT your point is just not in the rules.
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The skill normally needed for that subject is one of the high level recall ones Arcana/Religion/etc (there's even a helpful RAW list for Creature Identification and Lore is never on it). You don't NEED a Lore to do this, so there's nothing in there that actually says "you get to pick the most specific Lore possible and use that instead."This is not about Creature Identification but the more general Recall Knowledge.
Lore is one of the skills you can use and it is listed under the Recall Knowledge action. Mixed in with all the other skills.
AFAICT your point is just not in the rules.
Yeah, I don't agree. And even beside that, nothing there says you also get to use the reduced Lore DC since you're not using a Lore: you're using Arcana. All this spell is doing is making Arcana valid for this check so you can use it, its not conveying any benefit that would be given by using another skill.
This is an issue when people are using things like Esoteric Lore and just how much of a benefit that should get. It's absolutely not a thing in this case at all without a tremendous amount of reaching that isn't supported by the rules.
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No one said otherwise. The GM can fix anything. PF2 is supposed to have explicit defined rules.I agree it is a terrible outcome it is however what the rules say.Rules also say GMs choose skills, their applicability, DCs and bonuses for Recall Knowledge. So it's definitely in GM's power from the start.
This isn't a matter of a GM fixing something broken with a houserule though. The GM choosing literally is the explicitly defined rule.
The GM choosing literally is the explicitly defined rule.
Care to quote that rule, so I know explicitly which point you are trying to make?
Ah so you insist on going back to the general rule, and insisting that Tap into Blood can't give you the more specific lore.
That is just not what the Tap into Blood says.
You are making assumption and reading in rules that aren't there.
Tap into Blood can give you "the skill normally needed for that subject".
Lore skills are skills like everything else. They are explicitly listed as skills under Recall Knowledge.
You are making a loose natural language argument when there is simple explicit wording in the rules. Maybe it feels right to you, but it is just not what the rules say.
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But a specific lore skill is never the skill NEEDED to make a recall knowledge check. It is a skill you can use, and the GM might give you a lower target DC for having the specific lore skill relevant to the topic.
So the question is whether Tap into Blood lets the player just pick the skill they want to use to recall knowledge, or if it just lets arcana substitute in for whatever skill covers the basic recall knowledge check. Nothing in the feat seems to imply that the player gets to just pick whatever skill they could possibly want to use.
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But a specific lore skill is never the skill NEEDED to make a recall knowledge check.
If you argue this way, then no single skill is ever NEEDED as there are multiple skills that CAN be used: NEED would mean only one single skill is required for the roll. For instance, if you CAN roll Vampire Lore for a Recall check on a Vampire, you can't then say that a Religion check is NEEDED. As such, I don't find this kind of argument compelling as you'll never NEED the 'basic' skill and as such, you'll never NEED to roll the 'basic' DC roll. This then means it falls back on a more natural meaning, and that's a skill you'd normally be able to make a roll with, and there are multiple ones and no guidance on which you have to pick.
Oh course, the DM sets the DC's and Lore rolls aren't required to have a lower DC so if they don't want this to work, it isn't going to.
But a specific lore skill is never the skill NEEDED to make a recall knowledge check.If you argue this way, then no single skill is ever NEEDED as there are multiple skills that CAN be used: NEED would mean only one single skill is required for the roll. For instance, if you CAN roll Vampire Lore for a Recall check on a Vampire, you can't then say that a Religion check is NEEDED. As such, I don't find this kind of argument compelling as you'll never NEED the 'basic' skill and as such, you'll never NEED to roll the 'basic' DC roll. This then means it falls back on a more natural meaning, and that's a skill you'd normally be able to make a roll with, and there are multiple ones and no guidance on which you have to pick.
Oh course, the DM sets the DC's and Lore rolls aren't required to have a lower DC so if they don't want this to work, it isn't going to.
I don't find it particularly compelling either. I see adventure paths and PFS scenarios call for specific Lore checks all the time. In such cases you need said skill in order to take advantage.
Obviously you have to succeed at a recall knowledge check with a skill you already have to identify the creature before you know what specific lore you would want to pick and use on it for future easier check.
Or play the "I think I know based on initial description" game.
GM: "You see a foul, dirty, stinking creature covered in rotting flesh."
PC: "I pick undead (or live dangerously and go ghoul) lore and do RK."
GM: "This uncouth orc barbarian wearing parts of his recent kills and with terrible hygiene has nothing important for you to discover."
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Obviously you have to succeed at a recall knowledge check with a skill you already have to identify the creature before you know what specific lore you would want to pick and use on it for future easier check.
Or play the "I think I know based on initial description" game.
GM: "You see a foul, dirty, stinking creature covered in rotting flesh."
PC: "I pick undead (or live dangerously and go ghoul) lore and do RK."
GM: "This uncouth orc barbarian wearing parts of his recent kills and with terrible hygiene has nothing important for you to discover."
Pretty sure it doesn't work like that anymore, post remaster.
All RK checks look like this now.
Players asks a question. GM sets the DC for the answer, looks at the character sheet for a relevant skill (normally using the one with the best chance of success), rolls a secret check to determine the outcome, provides the an answer(s) or no info based on the outcome.
When a player uses tap into blood i need a player to make a compelling argument for getting a specific bonus rather than a general one. If they give no reasonable thing that connects their blood specifically to a more specific bonus they are getting the general on.
That is not a house rule because i am not changing any written rules. It is determining how best to apply the written rules in a fair and consistent manner.
An example of connecting their blood would be getting the benefit of lich lore if their blood is connected to Tar Baphon somehow.
But I wouldnt give that same character the benefit of lets say engineering lore just because.
I would think the rest of the party would get pretty upset with that kind of favoritism in adjudicating an ability with such a broad and unwarranted read. I know my players each want their chosen skills to matter and not be overshadowed by a one feat.
I don't find it particularly compelling either. I see adventure paths and PFS scenarios call for specific Lore checks all the time. In such cases you need said skill in order to take advantage.But a specific lore skill is never the skill NEEDED to make a recall knowledge check.If you argue this way, then no single skill is ever NEEDED as there are multiple skills that CAN be used: NEED would mean only one single skill is required for the roll. For instance, if you CAN roll Vampire Lore for a Recall check on a Vampire, you can't then say that a Religion check is NEEDED. As such, I don't find this kind of argument compelling as you'll never NEED the 'basic' skill and as such, you'll never NEED to roll the 'basic' DC roll. This then means it falls back on a more natural meaning, and that's a skill you'd normally be able to make a roll with, and there are multiple ones and no guidance on which you have to pick.
Oh course, the DM sets the DC's and Lore rolls aren't required to have a lower DC so if they don't want this to work, it isn't going to.
That doesn't follow either. For instance, you're rolling to see if you can figure out a constellation. The adventure might list Star Lore, but Sailing Lore, Fortune-Telling Lore, Astrology Lore or Desna Lore could work as well at that DC.