for a while now, my default idea of making an awesome white-haired witch revolves around 2 ideas
1. figuring out a way to attack more than once a round with your hair
2. having a good base attack bonus
all while still being good at, you know, spellcasting. This more or less dictated trying to use the Eldritch Knight prestige class. Here's a build
white-haired witch 4/sohei monk 1/white-haired witch 1/eldritch knight 6
traits: Fate's Favored, Magical Knack
patron: Strength (for divine favor)
feats
1: Weapon Finesse
3: Weapon Focus (hair)
5: Improved Unarmed Strike, Improved Grapple, Feral Combat Training (hair)
7: Boar Style, Boar Ferocity
9: Boar Shred
11: Greater Grapple, Weapon Specialization (hair)
however, I recently turned my eye to the evangelist prestige class, because
a) this way you get longer hair, strangling grappling, and divine power
b) the above build means you need to be lawful alignment (to satisfy requirements for sohei), and the original movie the Bride with White Hair is very much a Calistria sort of deal. Here's a new build
white-haired witch 3/snakebite striker brawler 2/evangelist of Calistria 7 (aligned class: witch)
traits: Fate's Favored, Magical Knack
patron: Strength
feats
1: Weapon Finesse
3: Deific Obedience (Calistria)
4: Improved Unarmed Strike
5: Weapon Focus (hair), Feral Combat Training (hair)
Note: Feral Combat Training with brawler's flurry is probably okay, but I'm not 100% convinced it's kosher
7: Boar Style
9: Boar Ferocity
11: Boar Shred
1. You lose the grapple feats. Not a huge loss, because you still have a crab familiar, extreme flexibility, a brawling haramaki, and your amulet of mighty fists (grappling with a weapon is beautiful)
2. You lose Weapon Specialization.
3. You gain divine power.
4. You can use a mithral buckler
5. You lose 1 level of spellcasting.
6. You gain all the boon goodies. Calistria's aren't terrible, but saving finale or a Cha-based rainbow pattern does you no favors
9. Your base attack bonus (at least at level 12) is the same: +8
...I think this build is worth it. What do you think?
I would get power attack in there somewhere. I am unsure of the exact nature of how the 1 natural weapon rule interacts with feral combat training and flurry...
But there is a rule that you get 1.5x STR (or Int, in this case) and power attack damage when you only have 1 natural weapon. So if that carries over, you are getting a ton of extra damage across your whole flurry of blows/brawler's flurry. x3 power attack across your fake TWF- plus, you hit as hard as a 2 hander, which is great for DR.
I know it is hard to fit into your build, but it seems worth it.
Oh, another method- Magus. You have to spend an arcana to get your spell strike to work with hair, but it is an option. So 1 natural attack+ 1 spell strike + 1 (haste- various ways to get it). Again, your hair hits like a 2 handed weapon, so this is still fairly good. Add in the nova power of magus, and you are set.
Another option is white haired witch 2 or 4 / sacred fist x. Flurry + fervor is hard to beat.
You can also do it with WHW and something like a Natural Attacking Alchemist. It especially works well with a Vivesectionist if you can get your hair to Pin them since that will leave you free to claw/claw/bite them WITH sneak attack.
WHW 1-2/Alchemist X
ShroudedInLight wrote: You can also do it with WHW and something like a Natural Attacking Alchemist. It especially works well with a Vivesectionist if you can get your hair to Pin them since that will leave you free to claw/claw/bite them WITH sneak attack.
WHW 1-2/Alchemist X
I like that little loophole…
I think the problem with that is having a good enough CMB to actually pin anything that's not a spell casting pixie.
I think WHW should have been a hybrid class…kinda like a bloodrager, full BAB, limited spell casting, white hair abilities… then it would work as intended.
as it is it's still handy for Mooks and other casters, but not as a front line ability.
The WHW as written is a full caster who can look cool
Yeah, I got on a WHW kick at one point. It is a really cool idea, I really wanted it to work, I loved that Alchemist and Witch both use Int as a casting stat and that the White Hair uses Int in place of strength for BAB...
I just wish I could have boosted the CMB a little more on it. I ended up abandoning the concept. It could make a half-decent boss character though if you put a WHW/Alchemist up against some characters of slightly lower level.
I guess you could combine it with a Strangler Brawler of some sort for double grappling nonsense...maybe a Tetori?
If you go with the vivisectionist alchemist, there's a really nice CMB booster called Surprise Maneuvers now. You still need to get sneak-attack position somehow, but it can boost your CMB something fierce.
lemeres wrote: I would get power attack in there somewhere. I am unsure of the exact nature of how the 1 natural weapon rule interacts with feral combat training and flurry...
But there is a rule that you get 1.5x STR (or Int, in this case) and power attack damage when you only have 1 natural weapon. So if that carries over, you are getting a ton of extra damage across your whole flurry of blows/brawler's flurry. x3 power attack across your fake TWF- plus, you hit as hard as a 2 hander, which is great for DR.
I know it is hard to fit into your build, but it seems worth it.
Oh, another method- Magus. You have to spend an arcana to get your spell strike to work with hair, but it is an option. So 1 natural attack+ 1 spell strike + 1 (haste- various ways to get it). Again, your hair hits like a 2 handed weapon, so this is still fairly good. Add in the nova power of magus, and you are set.
Pretty sure the flurry +Str to damage rule overrides the 1 natural attack rule. It's +Str to damage (or in the WHW's case, +Int) across the board, no modifiers. Plus I'm pretty sure that even if you do get +1.5xStr to a natural attack, you're only getting a -1/+2 trade with it, not -1/+3.
It's an idea that I hadn't considered. I'm not entirely sure that I want to trade attack bonus for anything, but it's certainly an idea.
ohako wrote: Pretty sure the flurry +Str to damage rule overrides the 1 natural attack rule. It's +Str to damage (or in the WHW's case, +Int) across the board, no modifiers. Plus I'm pretty sure that even if you do get +1.5xStr to a natural attack, you're only getting a -1/+2 trade with it, not -1/+3.
It's an idea that I hadn't considered. I'm not entirely sure that I want to trade attack bonus for anything, but it's certainly an idea.
No, power attack itself addresses what happens with natural attacks. If you get x1.5 str (seen with dragon bites, for example), you get x1.5 power attack. If you are using a secondary natural attack (which would get x0.5 str), you get x0.5 power attack.
This is all detailed in the same lines for 2handing and offhand attacks respectively.
So the question comes down to- does it still count as '1 natural weapon', and do you feel power attack is worth it? And does flurry mess it up (I know that 2 handed weapons keep 2 handed power attack, but the natural attack thing is defined by str modifier).
If it is x1.5 damage, then personally, I would like up to another 15 damage on each hit while doing the ton of attacks from flurry. But I usually try to do damage builds, and you seem to be going more 'grappling+ other stuff', so your priorities may be different.
Still, getting power attack somewhere along the line seems like a good idea, if only to have the option.
At level 2 White Haired Witch, you get Constrict. With that, you qualify for the Final Embrace Feat which gives you Constrict and Grab on all your natural attacks.
So then get lots of natural attacks. Start off as a Tengu, catgirl or half orc and get claws and/or bites. Dip into Alchemist and get the Feral Mutagen Discovery. Get a Mammoth Helm and the Tentacle Cloak. Wear armor with Spikes.
Scott Wilhelm wrote: At level 2 White Haired Witch, you get Constrict. With that, you qualify for the Final Embrace Feat which gives you Constrict and Grab on all your natural attacks.
So then get lots of natural attacks. Start off as a Tengu, catgirl or half orc and get claws and/or bites. Dip into Alchemist and get the Feral Mutagen Discovery. Get a Mammoth Helm and the Tentacle Cloak. Wear armor with Spikes.
Ehhhhh....
All of those attacks will key off of a different stat for damage than the hair.
Also, throwing in spikes causes all of the natural attacks to drop down to x0.5 modifier and power attack damage. This is mostly an option if you have some method to get a lot of bonus damage just for hitting (vivisectionist alchemist with sneak attack, if we looked for an example that meshed well with your suggestions). Then it can be...somewhat alright. I also this like mixing natural and manufactured attacks, since they are enhanced differently (and it costs a lot to do both while still aiming for a decent bonus)
lemeres wrote: Scott Wilhelm wrote: At level 2 White Haired Witch, you get Constrict. With that, you qualify for the Final Embrace Feat which gives you Constrict and Grab on all your natural attacks.
So then get lots of natural attacks. Start off as a Tengu, catgirl or half orc and get claws and/or bites. Dip into Alchemist and get the Feral Mutagen Discovery. Get a Mammoth Helm and the Tentacle Cloak. Wear armor with Spikes.
Ehhhhh....
All of those attacks will key off of a different stat for damage than the hair.
Also, throwing in spikes causes all of the natural attacks to drop down to x0.5 modifier and power attack damage. This is mostly an option if you have some method to get a lot of bonus damage just for hitting (vivisectionist alchemist with sneak attack, if we looked for an example that meshed well with your suggestions). Then it can be...somewhat alright. I also this like mixing natural and manufactured attacks, since they are enhanced differently (and it costs a lot to do both while still aiming for a decent bonus) Each natural attack will have do a different amount of damage, true, but the Constrict Damage will be the damage of your primary natural attack.
I don't see how using the armor spikes the way I am intending to use them adversely affects any other natural attacks. I am not proposing making melee attacks with them. The armor spikes will just do additional damage on every successful Grapple Check.
My plan for my suggestion is to develop a PFS Tengu with Claws. The Claws will be further enhanced by Feral Combat Training, Monastic Training, and Improved Natural Weapon. When this character takes the Final Embrace Feat, the Hair (the Plume?), the Bite, the Claws, and the Monk Unarmed Strike will all gain both Grab and Constrict. The Constrict Damage will be equal to the Claw Damage: base 2d6 by level 6. In this case each natural attack will indeed get a lot of bonus damage just for hitting because each hit with each of those natural weapons will yield a free Grapple check with the Grab Ability and bonus damage with constrict and more bonus damage via the armor spikes.
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