Pathfinder Pathfinder: Kingmaker Builds and Strats Thread

[LannTheStupid]

Self-deprecation leads to weird builds.

I need to fast some days and make Psychokineticist Jaethal.

 

[Desiderius]

That would be busted in half.

Now base Kineticist would be something.

 

[Cleric of Asmodeus]

I do not use summons. I accept their existence because other people like them, but I do not use them myself (and neither did I in the Baldur's Gates).

I see. Well, my plan B after summons is an arcane caster with mirror image up and a quickened displacement. I feel like this makes a better off-tank than Harrim and the likes absorbing critical hits, even with their armor. The nice thing about an AT as off-tank is they probably have really high dex, too, so practically speaking they are close to being armored anyways. False life and Aid if you can afford the slots can lower the odds of getting chunked with a lucky roll. I'm a cheesy power gamer and so I'm running an AT and a cleric of asmodeus with trickery, so between the two I have two robii who can summon up a mirror image, become invisible, etc in a pinch.

For situations where I'm surrounded, having feather step (mass) up and then using a difficult terrain spell can buy a lot of time and it doesn't have a save so that can be a nice oh shit button.

Sometimes I have dimension door memorized for getting past locked doors and I suppose that could be a plan C but it's never really come to that.

Anyways, I respect self-imposed constraints but I think there are a lot of options in this game for passive crowd control.

 

[Desiderius]

In my experience on hard, summons work even better as screeners for these types of encounters. Jaethal's skeleton harem or a druid spontaneous casting a bunch of animals will buy you a couple rounds to kill whatever and change formation.

I do not use summons. I accept their existence because other people like them, but I do not use them myself (and neither did I in the Baldur's Gates).

I already kinda feel like a cheat for using Ekun's pet.

He’s not killing things in a timely fashion.

Too much RNG to depend on that.

Summons and pets (outside of Smilodon) are well balanced. The opportunity costs are non-neglible.

Giving a xbow to an 8 DEX toon has a way of bringing the RNG into play where it need not be.

 

[Desiderius]

Best Octavia is tank Octavia.

 

[Cleric of Asmodeus]

I tried to draft up a TWF shield bashing ES. Realized I don't really know wtf I'm doing.

Human Fighter 1 / ES 11 (Only level 11 on this save)

Feats:
Two Weapon Fighting
Improved Two Weapon Fighting
Weapon Focus (Light shield)
Dazzling Display
Shatter Defenses
Outflank
Shield Bash
Shield Focus
Accomplished Sneak Attacker
Improved Critical (Light Shield)

I think next few levels would be opportunist and shield master. Would wear the combat reflexes boots.

I guess the concept would be that it gets:
Sneak attack dice
Opportunist
Finesse Training
Eventually Bashing Finish
Personal spells like Mirror Image, Sense Vitals, False Life, Dimension Door, Vampiric Touch
Debilitating Injury to make iteratives a little easier
Shield AC and special equipment effects

Rod of Quicken for Sense vitals and reupping mirror image.

At level 12, the character has level 4 arcane spells available.

Unfortunately, weapon finesse training only works with light shields so I think that might be a big record skip noise right there. I'm not sure a light shield buys much more than a shield spell. Seems like if you are going shield bash you want a tower shield? Also, does shield focus do anything for shield bashers? Finally, you can weapon focus and improved critical heavy shields (and heavy spiked shields, which I don't think I've seen a single instance of?), but not Tower Shields?

 

[Desiderius]

Yeah, I tried that.

You have the shield spell so kind of wasting your time, just dual-wield Daggers/Kukri/whatever and you'll be fine. You don't really have the feats to get there anyway.

 

[Dishonoredbr]

Why is Alchemist stupidly fun to play? I might re-roll my character just to play Grenadier. How is the Neutral Evil playthought? I'm feeling playing some Mad Tiefling Scientist because Ranger , while is insanly good , is pretty barebones. Mostly Auto Attack.

OH btw Just got Jub , he's insanely strong and his voice acting is 10/10. Might be my favorite companion so far after Regongar

 

[Trashos]

Giving a xbow to an 8 DEX toon has a way of bringing the RNG into play where it need not be.

Harrim has the Xbow so that he can do something from afar when not flinging spells. His role (other than being a priest) is to tank for the backline, not to be a damage dealer with the Xbow.

 

[LannTheStupid]

His role (other than being a priest) is to tank for the backline, not to be a damage dealer with the Xbow.

So you almost completely ignore his Touch of Chaos. Which is a touch spell.

OK.

 

[Trashos]

So you almost completely ignore his Touch of Chaos. Which is a touch spell.

OK.

Indeed. Touch of Chaos is nice, but there is other work that needs to be done, and someone has to do it.

 

[Desiderius]

I'm impressed he can handle Hard playing like this.

Then again Ekun, Jub, and Linzi could probably handle hard on their own.

 

[Cleric of Asmodeus]

Nok Nok is also stupidly powerful mid-game. So is Kalikke.

Really, I don't feel bad respeccing characters because the following party is already going to be absurd and have no trouble with Hard:

Ekun plus pet
Jub
Linzi (Build her tanky and use her as a tarpit)
Nok Nok
Kalikke/Kanerah

Regongar, Amiri (as freebooter @ lvl 2), and Octavia are really strong, too. Jaethal seems to get stronger as things go on if you keep her Inquis, and her animate dead x 3 is pretty OP for mid game. Really, the only kind of scuffed characters are Tristian (wastes Ecc) and Harim (not bad just kind of milquetoast). I didn't really find Valerie to do the tarpit role better than linzi but she could be rerolled into a CHA archetype.

Edit: Oh yeah, Kanerah is kind of scuffed but if you think of her as basically a super powerful transformation for Kalikke, who is in perhaps the strongest class in the game already, it's all good.

 

[Desiderius]

Every companion has a least one dominant build, including Tristian and Harrim.

in any event it’s fun to mix and match depending on the foe. Ekun vs Trolls and Beasts, Harrim vs Giants, etc..,

 

[Trashos]

I'm impressed he can handle Hard playing like this.

I just finished Pitax (lvl17), and I have had zero battle-related reloads ever since hitting lvl4.

My current party (Jaethal-tank, Okbo, Ekun, Sword Saint MC, Harrim, Jubilost, Octavia) has great survivability. No summons needed!

It is Hard of course, not Unfair. I haven't tried Unfair yet, I will possibly try it once I have an Eldritch Knight build I trust.

 

[Desiderius]

That’s a very solid line up, but I can see why you’re worried about Persuasion and talking about RNG since you’re missing a Bard or Freebooter.

 

[Üstad]

I'm starting to Varnhold DLC for the first time and decided to create an unholy lawful evil eccleiuesurerergee (I don't care how it's spelled) mercenary nuker, any advices? I think fire domain is a must but I'm clueless about the other domain, also I want to use negative channel.

I’ve played an Asmodeus ~Ecclesitheurge~ with Fire primary and Trickery secondary and it’s fun. Fireballs for days and trickery has the poverty mirror image and a group invis.

Too late I choosed asmodeus with fire+evil domain, I forgot about mirror image thing, she would be very good tank with it

 

[oldmanpaco]

Fireball has really satisfying haptics in this game. The bass, the pinch of screen shake, the screams and burnt corpses *kisses fingertips*

You know I don't think I've ever cast fireball in this game. Moved away from using it while playing BG2 w/ SCS over the years and just never think about it anymore.

 

[Cleric of Asmodeus]

You know I don't think I've ever cast fireball in this game. Moved away from using it while playing BG2 w/ SCS over the years and just never think about it anymore.

In RTwP it can be a giant pain in the ass but in turn based it’s so much better, particularly in the early and mid-game. There are a lot of rods of quicken, empower, maximize etc so you can go ham. And it’s sort of a quality of life boost sometimes since it will quickly end encounters that you have to kill 6 ranged thingies that will do some damage to you and take a bunch of rounds to chase down.

It’s seldom the most optimal play since stuff like stinking cloud and haste are just more lethal but it’s a fun playstyle.

Ecclesitheurge with Fire as primary domain gets to fill up as many 3rd and 4th level spell slots as it wants with them, too.

 

[Cleric of Asmodeus]

Oh, another perk of fireball is it has great range combined with its radius from AoE.

If I get the drop on them, then a my cleric plus AT can alpha strike them with 4 fireballs, two maximized, in that mini surprise turn. Even if they make all their saves, that’s like 95 damage * number of dudes on the first turn. Then rays, ekun, and single bomb jubs will clean up the aftermath.

It’s good for making short work of small nodes or crowded set pieces and everyone is screaming and dying

 

[Desiderius]

It’s funny I only started using them since I got the maximizing cloak for Tristian and they’re really handy for certain situations. Octavia just got Surprise Spells and also just got Rod of Flaming Vengeance so when I get done with my Wrath Alpha run there will be much Unfair nuking happening.

 

[oldmanpaco]

Well damn now I want to start fireballing shit like its 1998.

 

[bec de corbin]

Just make every character a kineticist, fuck it

 

[Cleric of Asmodeus]

I’m thinking about a pounce Barbarian with either Eldritch scoundrel or vivi to get some sneak attack dice and possibly mirror image. Or maybe crusader or inquis levels with trickery domain to get poverty mirror image. It’s weird but maybe it’s not bad, I don’t know.

Pounce is just so fun for melee

 

[Lawntoilet]

I’m thinking about a pounce Barbarian with either Eldritch scoundrel or vivi to get some sneak attack dice and possibly mirror image. Or maybe crusader or inquis levels with trickery domain to get poverty mirror image. It’s weird but maybe it’s not bad, I don’t know.

Pounce is just so fun for melee

MI is obviously excellent but if you're not married to it, Slayer would give you Sneak Attack (and other good stuff) without losing BAB.