Pathfinder Pathfinder: Kingmaker Builds and Strats Thread

[Cael]

Valerie's backstory is that she is a fallen Paladin of Shaelin. For her to not have a high Charisma would be bad metagaming munchkinism.

 

[Yosharian]

Alright that's a fair point about the Kingdom Management role, I hadn't thought about that.

 

[Incendax]

Evasion, immunity to flanking/sneak attack and TS bonus to AC against touch attacks are at the very least worthwhile features to have. Burst Barrier is nice too if you bother to get the reflex save feats. That's like up to +9 to reflex saves which is a lot and considering that she is swimming in feats there should be no problem getting them. There are also some nice extras like moving at normal speed in heavy armor at level 7, 5/- damage reduction, etc.
As for utility, with that many feats you can easily go for dazzling display and the critical debuff series.

TSS 16 for Evasion - Rogues get it at 2.
TSS 13 for immunity to flanking - Rogues get it at 8.
Burst Barrier gives +5 Reflex - Rogues get up to +6 just for being Rogues.
TSS are swimming in feats - Rogues can take Combat Trick multiple times, with the added bonus of special rogue feats like Dispelling Strike.
TSS 7 can move at normal speed in heavy armor - But Swiftwind Boots, Manticore Boots, Onslaught, and even Haste make that irrelevant outside of the early game. Which you are leaving, since you are level 7.
TSS 19 gets DR 5/- - But that's level 19, and DR calculations are applied after difficulty damage multipliers. It's essentially nothing.
TSS can easily go for Dazzling Display - Rogues are easier. They can spend a bonus feat on Skill Focus, and Thug gets Frightening.

Let's keep it simple. TSS1/Thug19 is considerably superior to TSS20 in almost every category that Kingmaker cares about. The TS bonus to AC against touch attacks is quite nice, but definitely not worth giving up 10d6 Sneak Attack dice. The penalty to attack bonus certainly does hurt, but you can just wear the Fox Amulet and/or a Brilliant Energy weapon against most enemies. Undead are common, but there are some really great anti-undead weapons in the game.

 

[Sykar]

Evasion, immunity to flanking/sneak attack and TS bonus to AC against touch attacks are at the very least worthwhile features to have. Burst Barrier is nice too if you bother to get the reflex save feats. That's like up to +9 to reflex saves which is a lot and considering that she is swimming in feats there should be no problem getting them. There are also some nice extras like moving at normal speed in heavy armor at level 7, 5/- damage reduction, etc.
As for utility, with that many feats you can easily go for dazzling display and the critical debuff series.

TSS 16 for Evasion - Rogues get it at 2.
TSS 13 for immunity to flanking - Rogues get it at 4.
Burst Barrier gives +5 Reflex - Rogues get up to +6 just for being Rogues.
TSS are swimming in feats - Rogues can take Combat Trick multiple times, with the added bonus of special rogue feats like Dispelling Strike.
TSS 7 can move at normal speed in heavy armor - But Swiftwind Boots, Manticore Boots, Onslaught, and even Haste make that irrelevant outside of the early game. Which you are leaving, since you are level 7.
TSS 19 gets DR 5/- - But that's level 19, and DR calculations are applied after difficulty damage multipliers. It's essentially nothing.
TSS can easily go for Dazzling Display - Rogues are easier. They can spend a bonus feat on Skill Focus, and Thug gets Frightening.

Let's keep it simple. TSS1/Thug19 is considerably superior to TSS20 in almost every category that Kingmaker cares about. The TS bonus to AC against touch attacks is quite nice, but definitely not worth giving up 10d6 Sneak Attack dice. The penalty to attack bonus certainly does hurt, but you can just wear the Fox Amulet and/or a Brilliant Energy weapon against most enemies. Undead are common, but there are some really great anti-undead weapons in the game.

1.) Rogues do not get immunity to flanking at level 4. Uncanny Dodge at level 2 makes them retain their dex bonus until they act, so they are never considered flat footed even against invisible enemies. Also you can still lose your dodge bonus when you get feinted successfully. At level 8 rogues get Imp. Uncanny Dodge which gives a conditional immunity to flanking if your rogue level is not 4 levels lower than the opponents. Your TSS/Thug example would get that level 9, and the build I was talking about before you chimed in would have gotten it at 13. I checked the list of rogue talents and cannot find any talent there which gives immunity against flanking at level 4. This of course means that splashing in other classes severely reduces the reliability of Imp. Uncanny Dodge.
2.) There is no advantage one way or the other when it comes to feats. When you are swimming in that many feats you can get whatever you want. Rogue gets access to a few special feats but fighter gets a bonus feat already at level 1.
3.) Multiple bonus for movement stacks up. More importantly Haste also cannot give you more than double your speed, so the difference is 20 feet further travel distance, 40 vs 60, or in other words 50% more speed just from that and it goes on from there. Yes it does matter, the faster you get into melee the faster you get your AC bonus from defensive fighting. Movement speed also limits your charge range which is very useful when facing scattered groups of enemies.
4.) A proper tank rarely if ever gets critically hit. Having guaranteed 5 points subtracted is a noticeable reduction, even if the enemy would hit for 50 it would still be a 10% and few if any enemies hit normally for 50 damage from a single damage type, at least physically and if elemental damage is involved that is even easier to reduce.
5.) Human fighter has up to 22! feats to chose from. You can easily fit in Skill Focus: Persuasion if you feel it is needed. Not really an advantage for thug either.
6.) Base reflex save for rogue is +12 and it is essentially +11 for TSS. That means that in addition of having near rogue like base reflex saves you also have a strong con save, leaving only will save as your weak spot which is the same for rogue/thug. How is that not vastly superior?
7.) TSS has superior hit point progression which counterbalances Evasion.

No TSS1/Thug 19 is not considerably superior. It deals superior damage when flanking and adds some utility I can get from at least 4 other character, Linzi, Jubilost, Nok Nok and Octavia, that's about it. Worse HP, worse AC, Worse con save, no up to +8 bonus AC against touch attacks, far worse BAB since you lost +5 BAB and still have the tower shield penalty and do not get the weapon specialization feat series which adds to another +1 to hit and +4 to damage and of course one attack less at a much higher BAB, namely +20 instead if your +15. So just from that you now lost +8 to hit baseline and an attack in total. Congrats, want a cookie?

 

[Haplo]

If you already have 10 levels in Vivisectionist, Archeologist Bard can pick Opportunist Advanced Talent at level 2 (same level he gets Uncanny Dodge). Yay!


Also it seems the Alchemist Mutagen stacking with other sources of Natural Armor works. However Legendary Proportions Natural Armor (supposed to be size bonus) currently does not stack with other enhancement bonuses.

 

[Incendax]

1.) Rogues do not get immunity to flanking at level 4. Uncanny Dodge at level 2 makes them retain their dex bonus until they act, so they are never considered flat footed even against invisible enemies. Also you can still lose your dodge bonus when you get feinted successfully. At level 8 rogues get Imp. Uncanny Dodge which gives a conditional immunity to flanking if your rogue level is not 4 levels lower than the opponents. Your TSS/Thug example would get that level 9, and the build I was talking about before you chimed in would have gotten it at 13. I checked the list of rogue talents and cannot find any talent there which gives immunity against flanking at level 4. This of course means that splashing in other classes severely reduces the reliability of Imp. Uncanny Dodge.

Uncanny Dodge at level 4 makes them immune to being flat footed, so they only suffer sneak attacks from being flanked which you can prevent. Being flat footed is one of the biggest sources of sneak attack damage for the enemies, since it happens at the beginning of every combat if your initiative is less than an enemy. Immunity to flanking comes in at level 8, or 9 in the case of TSS1/Thug8, which is considerably earlier than TSS13.

2.) There is no advantage one way or the other when it comes to feat. When you are swimming in that many feats you can get whatever you want. Rogue gets a few extra special feats but fighter gets a bonus feat already at level 1.

No, Rogues definitely have a bigger advantage here. They can select any non-fighter specific feat, their own small selection of bonus feats, and at 10th level they can also select improved rogue talents.

3.) Multiple bonus for movement stacks up. More importantly Haste also cannot give you more than double your speed, so the difference is 20 feet further travel distance, 40 vs 60, or in other words 50% more speed just from that and it goes on from there. Yes it does matter, the faster you get into melee the faster you get your AC bonus from defensive fighting. Movement speed also limits your charge range which is very useful when facing scattered groups of enemies.

Haste gives you +30 Enhancement. Other sources of Enhancement do not stack, only the highest applies. This includes Swiftwind and Onslaught which are also Enhancement. 50 Movement is sufficient to charge across 80% of the entire screen width wise, and exceeds the screen height wise (4K). Manticore Boots are +10 [Other], so achieving 60 on your tank is common and easy beyond the early game. 60 Movement can cross an entire 4K screen with a single charge.

4.) A proper tank rarely if ever gets critically hit. Having guaranteed 5 points subtracted is a noticeable reduction, even if the enemy would hit for 50 it would still be a 10% and few if any enemies hit normally for 50 damage from a single damage type, at least physically and if elemental damage is involved that is even easier to reduce.

50+ is quite normal on Hard or higher difficulty, with crits exceeding 200+ (damn Undead Cyclops). You might have an argument if you were talking about the early game, but you don't get 5/- until Level 19. That's nothing. You literally get a helmet with 10/Cold Iron muuuuch earlier.

5.) Human fighter has up to 22! feats to chose from. You can easily fit in Skill Focus: Persuasion if you feel it is needed. Not really an advantage for thug either.

Valerie with TSS1/Thug19 also gets 22 feats, and offloading Skill Focus: Persuasion onto your Rogue side is better on her since she starts with Dodge and Toughness already consumed. You can also give her Skill Focus: Trickery without negatively impacting her basic feats if you feel so inclined.

6.) Base reflex save for rogue is +12 and it is essentially +11 for TSS. That means that in addition of having near rogue like base reflex saves you also have a strong con save, leaving only will save as your weak spot which is the same for rogue/thug. How is that not vastly superior?

Valerie already has massive con, which keeps growing with Physical Perfection belts. She almost never fails a fortitude save. Having an even higher fortitude save is unnecessary on her.

No TSS1/Thug 19 is not considerably superior. It deals superior damage when flanking and adds some utility I can get from at least 4 other character, Linzi, Jubilost, Nok Nok and Octavia, that's about it. Worse HP, worse AC, Worse con save, no up to +8 bonus AC against touch attacks, far worse BAB since you lost +5 BAB and still have the tower shield penalty and do not get the weapon specialization feat series which adds to another +1 to hit and +4 to damage and of course one attack less at a much higher BAB, namely +20 instead if your +15. So just from that you now lost +8 to hit baseline and an attack in total. Congrats, want a cookie?

You're flanking almost all the time with summons, so it's dealing superior damage almost all the time. It adds dramatically more skill points and - spoiler alert - Linzi dies. Worse HP is still higher than everyone else in the party, including Level 20 Amiri. Having lower hit DOES hurt, but with Fox Amulet and/or Brilliant Energy you hit on everything but a natural 1 against Wild Hunt (which is the dominant enemy for two entire chapters). The only thing you have any difficulty with at all is undead since constructs are incredibly rare.

So yes. I want all your cookies.
Even though they are probably oatmeal raisin.

 

[Daidre]

TSS1/Thug19 is considerably superior

Not taking at least 1 level of Monk (pref Traditional for +Will) on Valerie with Rogue and Fighter is a crime against optimization!

 

[razvedchiki]

Just take improved initiative and dont worry about flat footed any more.
Tss are nice until you get the tower ac to touch,then you can go for stalwart defender for dem ac and the stance.
Damage reduction from sd is nice when you combine it with an adamantine armor.

 

[Incendax]

TSS1/Thug19 is considerably superior

Not taking at least 1 level of Monk (pref Traditional for +Will) on Valerie with Rogue and Fighter is a crime against optimization!

Hahahah, yeah. I was just trying to keep it simple.
TSS hurt my feelings when I was a child.

 

[Sykar]

1.) Rogues do not get immunity to flanking at level 4. Uncanny Dodge at level 2 makes them retain their dex bonus until they act, so they are never considered flat footed even against invisible enemies. Also you can still lose your dodge bonus when you get feinted successfully. At level 8 rogues get Imp. Uncanny Dodge which gives a conditional immunity to flanking if your rogue level is not 4 levels lower than the opponents. Your TSS/Thug example would get that level 9, and the build I was talking about before you chimed in would have gotten it at 13. I checked the list of rogue talents and cannot find any talent there which gives immunity against flanking at level 4. This of course means that splashing in other classes severely reduces the reliability of Imp. Uncanny Dodge.

Uncanny Dodge at level 2 makes them immune to being flat footed, so they only suffer sneak attacks from being flanked which you can prevent. Being flat footed is one of the biggest sources of sneak attack damage for the enemies, since it happens at the beginning of every combat if your initiative is less than an enemy. Immunity to flanking comes in at level 8, or 9 in the case of TSS1/Thug8, which is considerably earlier than TSS13.

2.) There is no advantage one way or the other when it comes to feat. When you are swimming in that many feats you can get whatever you want. Rogue gets a few extra special feats but fighter gets a bonus feat already at level 1.

No, Rogues definitely have a bigger advantage here. They can select any non-fighter specific feat, their own small selection of bonus feats, and at 10th level they can also select improved rogue talents.

3.) Multiple bonus for movement stacks up. More importantly Haste also cannot give you more than double your speed, so the difference is 20 feet further travel distance, 40 vs 60, or in other words 50% more speed just from that and it goes on from there. Yes it does matter, the faster you get into melee the faster you get your AC bonus from defensive fighting. Movement speed also limits your charge range which is very useful when facing scattered groups of enemies.

Haste gives you +30 Enhancement. Other sources of Enhancement do not stack, only the highest applies. This includes Swiftwind and Onslaught which are also Enhancement. 50 Movement is sufficient to charge across 80% of the entire screen width wise, and exceeds the screen height wise (4K). Manticore Boots are +10 [Other], so achieving 60 on your tank is common and easy beyond the early game. 60 Movement can cross an entire 4K screen with a single charge.

4.) A proper tank rarely if ever gets critically hit. Having guaranteed 5 points subtracted is a noticeable reduction, even if the enemy would hit for 50 it would still be a 10% and few if any enemies hit normally for 50 damage from a single damage type, at least physically and if elemental damage is involved that is even easier to reduce.

50+ is quite normal on Hard or higher difficulty, with crits exceeding 200+ (damn Undead Cyclops). You might have an argument if you were talking about the early game, but you don't get 5/- until Level 19. That's nothing. You literally get a helmet with 10/Cold Iron muuuuch earlier.

5.) Human fighter has up to 22! feats to chose from. You can easily fit in Skill Focus: Persuasion if you feel it is needed. Not really an advantage for thug either.

Valerie with TSS1/Thug19 also gets 22 feats, and offloading Skill Focus: Persuasion onto your Rogue side is better on her since she starts with Dodge and Toughness already consumed. You can also give her Skill Focus: Trickery without negatively impacting her basic feats if you feel so inclined.

6.) Base reflex save for rogue is +12 and it is essentially +11 for TSS. That means that in addition of having near rogue like base reflex saves you also have a strong con save, leaving only will save as your weak spot which is the same for rogue/thug. How is that not vastly superior?

Valerie already has massive con, which keeps growing with Physical Perfection belts. She almost never fails a fortitude save. Having an even higher fortitude save is unnecessary on her.

No TSS1/Thug 19 is not considerably superior. It deals superior damage when flanking and adds some utility I can get from at least 4 other character, Linzi, Jubilost, Nok Nok and Octavia, that's about it. Worse HP, worse AC, Worse con save, no up to +8 bonus AC against touch attacks, far worse BAB since you lost +5 BAB and still have the tower shield penalty and do not get the weapon specialization feat series which adds to another +1 to hit and +4 to damage and of course one attack less at a much higher BAB, namely +20 instead if your +15. So just from that you now lost +8 to hit baseline and an attack in total. Congrats, want a cookie?

You're flanking almost all the time with summons, so it's dealing superior damage almost all the time. It adds dramatically more skill points and - spoiler alert - Linzi dies. Worse HP is still higher than everyone else in the party, including Level 20 Amiri. Having lower hit DOES hurt, but with Fox Amulet and/or Brilliant Energy you hit on everything but a natural 1 against Wild Hunt (which is the dominant enemy for two entire chapters). The only thing you have any difficulty with at all is undead since constructs are incredibly rare.

So yes. I want all your cookies.
Even though they are probably oatmeal raisin.

1.) You are flanked as soon as more than one enemy is attacking you. As a tank that happens all the time unless you are not tanking. And again, it is not immunity. It can be overcome. Summons rarely last long enough and are mere distractions.
2.) Hardly any of these feats improve tanking which TSS is all about. So no for a pure tank build the extra pool for rogue talents hardly matter.
3.) So its 50 vs 60 best case scenario. Still a noticeable advantage.
4.) More is always good and losing +6 to con save hurts even with 19 con. So regardless how you spin it, worse tanking and being more susceptible to anything requiring a fort save. I also doubt that thug Valerie saves against everything fort related.
5.) I do not talk about anything but Challenging difficulty. Anything beyond that is retarded stat bloat, not worth playing that kind of crap. Lower is too easy. Yeah you can crank difficulty up to 11 in the most retarded way possible so it does not matter one jot to me and is therefore a meaningless argument.
6.) Skill points I hardly need because I am not playing solo. Linzi dies, so what? There are still enough characters left to chose from to cover trickery which is the main point. Anything else like Perception is done better by for example Jaethal anyway.
7.) Superior damage is not as much as it seems considering you lose an entire attack and at least +4 to damage which by the way does get multiplied by critical strikes unlike SA, so the damage difference is not nearly as great as you think. On top of that you will miss more often due to the aforementioned minimum of +7 to hit difference.

And no you have not earned a cookie just because you are wanking hard on thug archetype.

 

[Daidre]

TSS hurt my feelings when I was a child.

Poor Valerie became TSS because people were hurting her feelings as a child.

Her class choice is a bit weird though. It is far from useless and easy to build around but why not to make her Aldory? It fits campaign and her background with working for them. There is tons of Dueling Swords around and no companion focused on this weapon.

Lot less reasons for people to whine how horribad TSS is on forums is a nice bonus too.

 

[Incendax]

Summons rarely last long enough and are mere distractions.

Have you passed Chapter 1?

2.) Hardly any of these feats improve tanking which TSS is all about. So no for a pure tank build the extra pool for rogue talents hardly matter.

Once enemies can only hit you with a Natural 20 vs Touch Attack, you are immune to flanking, and have a variety of resistance rings, adding more AC is fairly pointless. You're also forgetting about Crippling Strike, Dispelling Strike, etc.

3.) So its 50 vs 60 best case scenario. Still a noticeable advantage.

I'm saying the difference between 50 and 60 vanishes the moment you wear Manticore Boots. I'm also saying that 50 is enough to charge from further than enemy aggro, so it's largely irrelevant.

4.) More is always good and losing +6 to con save hurts even with 19 con. So regardless how you spin it, worse tanking and being more susceptible to anything requiring a fort save. I also doubt that thug Valerie saves against everything fort related.

No, more is not good. Because that means you have less somewhere else. Somewhere critical. Once you hit certain benchmarks, you get much bigger returns by investing elsewhere.

5.) I do not talk about anything but Challenging difficulty. Anything beyond that is retarded stat bloat, not worth playing that kind of crap. Lower is too easy. Yeah you can crank difficulty up to 11 in the most retarded way possible so it does not matter one jot to me and is therefore a meaningless argument.

There's your issue. What works on Challenging difficulty is not what works on Hard, Unfair, and Unfair + Much Tougher. Inversely, what works on Unfair + Much Tougher DOES work on Challenging.

6.) Skill points I hardly need because I am not playing solo. Linzi dies, so what? There are still enough characters left to chose from to cover trickery which is the main point. Anything else like Perception is done better by for example Jaethal anyway.

I consider beating skill challenges more important that combat. Especially those nice juicy DC40-50 ones.

7.) Superior damage is not as much as it seems considering you lose an entire attack and at least +4 to damage which by the way does get multiplied by critical strikes unlike SA, so the damage difference is not nearly as great as you think. On top of that you will miss more often due to the aforementioned minimum of +7 to hit difference.

I already told you, you hardly ever miss if you are using the Fox Amulet and/or a Brilliant Energy weapon.

 

[Incendax]

Her class choice is a bit weird though. It is far from useless and easy to build around but why not to make her Aldory? It fits campaign and her background with working for them. There is tons of Dueling Swords around and no companion focused on this weapon.

Hahaha, yeah. I really wish they had, for the reasons you mentioned. It would have made so much sense. I can only speculate that they did not want potential Aldori players to avoid it, like how some people avoid going Dragon Disciple because Regongar is already built for it.

 

[razvedchiki]

Poor Valerie became TSS because people were hurting her feelings as a child.

Her class choice is a bit weird though. It is far from useless and easy to build around but why not to make her Aldory? It fits campaign and her background with working for them. There is tons of Dueling Swords around and no companion focused on this weapon.

Lot less reasons for people to whine how horribad TSS is on forums is a nice bonus too.

To be an effective swordmaster you need high either dex or str which valerie hasnt any.

 

[Daidre]

In the game with +8 all physical stats belts and with all Fighter AB bonuses difference between STR 14 and 18 is not all this important even in ch 1 (Bull Strength and first +2 belt available right after prologue) and completely marginal later, when she gets +2 STR from her personal quest.

If STR 14-16 instead of 18 breaks build even on Hard+ then it is not very good build to begin with.

Of course, I get it to at least 16 when I respec her but cries about how 14 STR completely destroys Valerie as tank and melee always seemed bit too dramatic to me.

 

[razvedchiki]

yes,on hard the difference of 2-3 ac on many fights wins them or looses them,especially early on.
for an aldori tank low str is ok but low dex is a death sentence.

 

[Daidre]

I played Chapter 1 on Hard 30+ times and I do not remember any fights there where 2 AC will save you. Most dangerous enemies there has AB 15+ (+++) and being unhittable completely impossible for low level fighter/rogues hybrids. Even caster/monks with 30+ AC hit often there with crazy prebuff.
A played it on Unfair at least twice and 2 AC is laughable in early game. Pathetic kobolds hit you more often than not. Actually, Valerie's huge HP pool is surprisingly useful there - she is still standing after one hit. Real tanking is useless up until Ch 2 and unkillable pets and summons do all heavy lifting.
Skeletons from Animate Dead are much better tanks than any real character for this part and getting them early lets you stop worrying about tank AC for very long time.

 

[Incendax]

I played Chapter 1 on Hard 30+ times and I do not remember any fights there where 2 AC will save you. Most dangerous enemies there has AB 15+ (+++) and being unhittable completely impossible for low level fighter/rogues hybrids. Even caster/monks with 30+ AC hit surprisingly often there.
A played it on Unfair at least twice and 2 AC is laughable in early game. Even kobolds hit you more often than not. Actually, Valerie's huge HP pool is surprisingly useful there - she is still standing after one hit. Real tanking is useless up until Ch 2 and unkillable pets and summons do all heavy lifting.

This has also been my experience. Early game is the hardest part of Unfair. That said, you can really push AC hard and get about a 50% defense against trash mobs, which takes some of the pressure off, but that’s not a very efficient approach.

One interesting build I saw with her was someone who went TSS1/Sorcerer. The player wore no armor. They weapon swap the tower shield away, cast tons of buffs, weapon swap the shield back, and charged in. Worked really well after those tender first few levels.

 

[Daidre]

I can argue a bit about Hard, but imho, any build without Mirror Image is not a tank on Unfair. So yeah, it is where arcane casters in all ridiculous for lower difficulties combinations really shine in this line of work.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

I started unfair with cha monk 20 Dex, 18 CHA.
That puts you at 19AC, +1 ring, mage armor potion (monk starts with 2 mage armor potions) and you're at 24. Defensive fighting crane style and you're at 27. At level 1.
You cannot tank shit with this, sure, mobs only have like ~20% THC against you in the tutorial I guess, but they will hit (flatfooted problem) sometimes and you will die. 1 hit-> dead. Every single time. I got critted for 90 dmg with an arrow from the grp of 3 assassins in the library.
Once you have enough levels to actually have an HP pool that enables you to take a hit or two without immediately dying, once you have an AC so high you get hit only on a 20 (plus illusion spells) , only then does actually tanking shit become viable. This is around middle/end of chapter 2.

 

[Daidre]

I did beginning on Unfair as ranger once with humans as favorite enemies and other time as Sacred Huntmaster. Shooting them got me through prologue more or less ok, but Oleg Post fight was still complete hell. Most difficult battle in the game 100%.

 

[Shadenuat]

I was thinking about one other Cleric which might be interesting (except Erastil Animal+Community), also to start as one on Unfair - either Irori or Nethys Evil cleric with Negative Channeling and Rune & Knowledge domains. Runes + Channeling is damage going around AC during hardest part of the game (Ch 1.) and Knowledge later gives roll twice aura for a single attack for everyone. You also get True Stike, Protection from Arrows Communal and some other stuff like immunity to crits and a disabling rune.

Also I think with new items from DLC - an amulet and staff, which give new Profane bonuses to INT, INT casters might match DC of CHA casters now. You must be evil though. Before I'd go for Gnome Sorc CHA based with Arcane bloodline for +2, now might also go for... INT Sorc with Arcane bloodline for +2.
Yeah not a big change lol.

DLC also made me think about building Thug/Freebooter with Menacing Combat Style.

 

[Daidre]

Crossblooded Sorcerer in Eldritch Arcana gave me so many options for class that made my head spin. It works pretty nicely too in last version, I noticed no bugs.

Being evil is always big plus for conjurers - high level summon spells get you melees, not friendly firing casters with bad AI.

 

[Jarpie]

Man, necromancer gets so many cool spells, will have to play one on the next playthrough, especially as there's nice gear for them too.

 

[Chaotic_Heretic]

Guys a thematic build larping a chaotic evil crazy killer chad.

i was tired of spending dozens of hours tinkering, dipping and min-maxing insanely efficient builds. just wanted a simple strong melee fighter with self buff capabilities. And this build is lore & larp friendly as your magic bloodline and racial heritage matches.

Strong Dumb Demonic Magus Chad.

Tiefling - pitborn ( +2 str +2 cha -2 int +2 racial bonus to confirm critical hits)


You could go Aasmir - Angelkin for race and avoid the -2 int penalty and get free daily cast of lesser restoration which is fucking awesome.

but you know demonic chaotic evil chad larp.

start with 20 str 12 dex 14 con 6 int 8 wis 16 cha (yes i know one stat should be odd... didn't try too hard on 25 point buy)

16 cha is just to cast 6th level spells without cha boosting item. You could get away lowering charisma to 12,a nd putting those points in con/dex (int if you go angelkin route for a few more skills). But a chad doesn't need fancy skills and smartness.

skill: persuasion all in.

Class: eldritch scion all the way to level 20.

Bloodline: Abyssal bloodline ( +6 str bonus @ 17, 4 at 13 , 2 at 9)

Alignment: Chaotic Evil for max larp.

level up points: all in strength; the level 20 point can go where-ever (30 str naked @ level 20; 38 str with onslaught heavy armor; 44 if you get some buff bot to cast legendary proportions)

weapon: scimitar (sweet crit range for 1H martial melee weapon; and with the +5 runeblade enchantment scimitar which negates -2 atk penalty of spellcombat)

spells; focus on personal buffs mainly. shocking grasp, frigid touch etc are nice too. Avoid save or suck spells.

feats: weapon focus, improved critical, power attack, intimidating prowess, corrugan smash, outflank, imp. initiative, critical focus, weapon specialization etc.

didn't bother with meta-magic or spell penetration feats; cause building for melee damage here. they self buffs are nice (maybe get extend spell for precombat longer lasting buffing).

enduring blade, ghost blade, the arcanas which allow you to ignore dex bonus and resolve melee attacks as touch attacks are pretty sweet too.

mostly touch of fatigue is cast when foe in melee range and use that extra attack from spell strike to deliver a nice stronk additional melee hit with scimitar. power attack+ intimidating prowess (and your obscene str) + corrguan smash gives a nice side debuff to foe you are smashing. You could go skill focus persuasion for stacking more skill bonuses but eh, you aren't a fighter or rouge with tons of feats/combat tricks so feats are better used elsewhere.

Also; I found that suing the spell slots for self buffs (enlarge person, stoneskin, shield, displacement, mirror image, greater invisibility, true strike, haste, transformation etc.) are much more valuable than touch damage on the toughest foes cause spell resistance.

If it is a dodgy foe, you have arcana to ignore dex bonus.

For heavily armored foe, you have arcana to ignore armor. you also have brilliant energy and enduring blade.

If all else fails, to hit the foe use spell combat with true strike once foe is in melee range and make mince meat out of it. Reason i avoided metamagic is with spell combat you can cast standard action spells while smashing in melee if you micromanage. and most meta-magic increases cast to full round. This helps in those "lol you alone nigger with no time to prebuff yourself" fights.

To make spell combat work it is micro managey but fun to play.

Fuck tanking (use spells and heavy armor to survive), just charge and smash everyone with 6 power attacks at 1.5x str bonus (should give 1x with spell combat but eh) 3 with BaB, +1 with transformation at lv16+, + 1 with haste/speed weapon arcana, +1 with spell strike touch of fatigue. +5 full plate with shield spell, stoneskin, displacement, mirror image you will do alright on PnP difficulty.