Pathfinder Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Enhanced Plus Edition - now with turn-based combat

[KateMicucci]

First the guy telling me that I didn't get ambushed seven times in a row and now you're telling me oleg has shit he doesn't.

First time I went to the trading post he literally had nothing but one of each kind of masterwork weapon, a few basic suits of armor, a food recipe, a book and a metamagic wand.

Second time I specifically went there to see if he had rations. He has the same inventory as before except for a few new magic weapons and armor and a couple more wands. Definitely no rations.

 

[The_Mask]

now you're telling me oleg has shit he doesn't.

Click on the last tab, and printscreen his inventory, and post it here. I'm curious about this Oleg without rations.

 

[KateMicucci]

Click on the last tab, and printscreen his inventory, and post it here. I'm curious about this Oleg without rations.

Well, when I restarted the game now he has them and some food and a bag of holding. I was sure that I'd looked through his entire inventory before but I'm gonna admit that I probably just didn't see them.

He does, fucktard, and the big Centipede is level 7 and the Priests are lvl 3 and there’s no reason to fight either one.

Has no one ever called you out on your bullshit in your entire life?

I'm sure you're right. Whether its level 7 or 8 makes no difference to me when my guys are only level 3. I might be confusing the levels on the priests with the fighter 4/rogue 1 or whatever they are guys.

I've let this game get to me too much today. I think most of my frustrations were from the enemy stat boosts, which when I looked it up turn out to be a lot higher than I thought. The 7 ambushes seems to have been an RNG fluke also and I haven't been attacked in camp since then.

 

[Yosharian]

This game was fun for a few hours but now its bullshit. Just gobs and gobs of trash enemies wearing me down. I got attacked 7 times in a row while trying to camp.

That's interesting, in my latest playthrough I've not been attacked while camping once. Your Stealth rolls are probably failing.

The heavy emphasis on trash mobs in this game is a big part of why I build my characters the way I do.

The first iteration of my Merc team had an awesome Bestow Curse-focused Cleric build based on an infamous Madness domain PnP build.

Then I played the game and realised he was spending 95% of the game either out of spells, or seeing the monster he'd just cursed die instantly anyway.

 

[Yosharian]

Yeah, the Sycamore has had me in the past too. It's fine... just use consumables. What doesn't kill you, only makes you stronger. You ought to be fine.

I gave up on sycamore after finding a level 8 centipede on one end and level 5 mite priests on the other.

I just had the slaver ambush and had to turn down the enemy stat boosts to beat them. After I did they died really easily and only managed to hit my guys twice.

Combat seems to be all about figuring out which CC spells are the most retarded and then abusing them.

If you need some help just pop into the Owlcat discord and ping me. I'd be happy to help you out with some strategies. The game gets a lot easier once you make it past that initial hump at the beginning.

 

[NJClaw]

First the guy telling me that I didn't get ambushed seven times in a row and now you're telling me oleg has shit he doesn't.

I won't tell you that you didn't get ambushed, but what I can tell you is that I didn't get ambushed that much in my entire time with the game, so either (a) you picked a very unlucky area to make camp or (b) you aren't using a Stealth-focused character to camouflage. There are very few skills in this game, no reason not to master all of them distributing them between your party members. For some skills it's also better to have them on more than one character (mainly Trickery and Perception).

If you feel uncomfortable with the difficulty you picked, just change it to a more pleasant one. There's no reason to play the game in a way that makes you feel miserable, especially since there are alternatives available.

 

[LannTheStupid]

Has no one ever called you out on your bullshit in your entire life?

It would have been dead if that had happened.

Also, is it a reddit day again?

(a) you picked a very unlucky area to make camp or (b) you aren't using a Stealth-focused character to camouflage.

Well, it's actually both. S/he is resting in Old Sycamore, which is one big EXP (and death) harvesting ground; and s/he does not have Octavia which is the first character who has high Stealth.

 

[Desiderius]

I've let this game get to me too much today

At least you had me wake up in a cold sweat wondering whether that Centipede really is level eight.

Once you know the game better you can probably take it on earlier, but there's no quest for it so just as well leave it for when you've leveled up some more.

Also, is it a reddit day again?

What's a reddit day. Colorful language is substitute for missing body language.

 

[Haplo]

As someone who really wants to play a game with wild multiclassing as a highly viable strategy, Pathfinder is not the system to do it in. At best you might autistically maximize a full skill monkey but it is probably more effective to just split skills over characters anyways.

Well, my Frankenstein Vivi build begs to disagree.


Although some classes make more sense to stay (mostly) pure. Such as a Sword Saint.

 

[Haplo]

I made a gimmick build to capitalize on all of the stat bloat. Sword Saint 9/Duelist 7/Paladin 2/Scaled Fist 2. With all of the items in this game, the loss of a couple spells and a capstone ability I would never enjoy wasn't an issue. It's the archetype abilities of the SS that make it powerful. The spells are secondary as with any Gish. Nine (9) levels of SS give you everything important from the class. Beyond that it's 1 Mirror Image and a few "win more" features. The build never suffered and was matured by character level 12. Stat bloat is a real thing in KM, and outside of full-casters there are some instances where a dip can be extremely powerful. They are few, and I agree that the overwhelming amount of characters will not benefit. That's different from saying they don't exist though.

A Sword Saint gains everything important at level 9? HERESY!

What about adding Intelligence to damage at level 13? Permanent when using Shatter Defenses.
What about Bane Weapon for +2 AB and +2d6 damage?
What about Hole/Axiomatic Weapon for +2d6 vs most enemies, +4d6 vs some?
What about Ghost Touch vs those annoying Ghastly Guardians? ...even Brilliant Energy is situationally useful in Pitax.
What about always rolling 20 on your Initiative - never being flat-footed and always catching enemies flat-footed?
Possibly increasing crit multiplier?
Higher level spells, you know, like Transformation, True Seeing... maybe full power Sense Vitals and Echolocation with Spell Blending Arcana? (last 2 need a mod)
What about having a Combat Reflexes-similar feat?
Absolutely destroying enemy casters in melee range with AoOs?
Lastly what about substituting full SS level for BAB to meet feat requirements (such as Greater Vital Strike)?

 

[Haplo]

Yeah I figured that would be your response.

Your options if you want to wear heavy armour are Magus/Eldritch Scion or Cleric, Magus is a 2/3 spellcaster with a limited arcane spell list and combat abilities, Cleric is a Divine spellcaster with some powerful offensive spells and one of the best support/buff spell selections in the game. Cleric also has very strong healing in the form of Channel Energy.

There's also the Vivisectionist Alchemist archetype, capable of casting in heavy armor. Awesome buffer (including Legendary Proportions and Transformation), can even provide personal-only buffs to other party members (via Infusion Discovery), has access to unique Mutagens that make him the King of Attributes and Natural Armor, gets full sneak attack progression and many rogue advanced talents, such as Crippling Strike and Opportunist.
Really strong martial caster, if you don't insist on fireballing the enemy.

 

[Yosharian]

Yeah I figured that would be your response.

Your options if you want to wear heavy armour are Magus/Eldritch Scion or Cleric, Magus is a 2/3 spellcaster with a limited arcane spell list and combat abilities, Cleric is a Divine spellcaster with some powerful offensive spells and one of the best support/buff spell selections in the game. Cleric also has very strong healing in the form of Channel Energy.

There's also the Vivisectionist Alchemist archetype, capable of casting in heavy armor. Awesome buffer (including Legendary Proportions and Transformation), can even provide personal-only buffs to other party members (via Infusion Discovery), has access to unique Mutagens that make him the King of Attributes and Natural Armor, gets full sneak attack progression and many rogue advanced talents, such as Crippling Strike and Opportunist.
Really strong martial caster, if you don't insist on fireballing the enemy.

Oh right yeah. Keep forgetting that they can cast in whatever armour as long as they have proficiency.

 

[Yosharian]

A Sword Saint gains everything important at level 9? HERESY!

What about adding Intelligence to damage at level 13? Permanent when using Shatter Defenses.
What about Bane Weapon for +2 AB and +2d6 damage?
What about Hole/Axiomatic Weapon for +2d6 vs most enemies, +4d6 vs some?
What about Ghost Touch vs those annoying Ghastly Guardians? ...even Brilliant Energy is situationally useful in Pitax.
What about always rolling 20 on your Initiative - never being flat-footed and always catching enemies flat-footed?
Possibly increasing crit multiplier?
Higher level spells, you know, like Transformation, True Seeing... maybe full power Sense Vitals and Echolocation with Spell Blending Arcana? (last 2 need a mod)
What about having a Combat Reflexes-similar feat?
Absolutely destroying enemy casters in melee range with AoOs?
Lastly what about substituting full SS level for BAB to meet feat requirements (such as Greater Vital Strike)?

Not that I disagree that these are good features, just offering some counterpoints explaining why I chose other classes over getting these:

INT to dmg is just dmg at the end of the day. +7 dmg (which is likely what it will cap out at) is the same as +2d6 sneak dice.

Bane is really good but there are weapons with it on so if you use those then it won't stack.

Holy can be obtained by a min/level Cleric/Inq buff.

Axiomatic is really good though and quite hard to obtain, that's one of the best things you get for sure.

Ghost Touch can be gotten on certain weapons and is situational.

Brilliant Energy is really situational.

Uncanny Dodge is just as good as roll-20-on-initiative and can be gotten faster.

Most buffs on the spell list at later levels can be cast by other party members.

Combat Reflexes is enough, that ability is just saving you a feat really.

Enemy casters are only situationally problematic and I have other tools to solve problems like that, I don't need to destroy casters in melee because I already destroy everything in melee.

I already have fairly high BAB and don't need to qualify for any feats like that.

 

[Alrik]

Lastly what about substituting full SS level for BAB to meet feat requirements (such as Greater Vital Strike)?

I've seen this posted many times, but I've yet to find in-game text that supports it. The lv7 Fighter Training states that it's SS lv -3 which doesn't effectively kick in until lv13. So GVS should be lv19 at the earliest, but at least you can get it unlike other 3/4 classes.

Haven't gotten to that point yet so it might be the case where the implementation and the text differs.

 

[Alrik]

A Sword Saint gains everything important at level 9? HERESY!

What about adding Intelligence to damage at level 13? Permanent when using Shatter Defenses.
What about Bane Weapon for +2 AB and +2d6 damage?
What about Hole/Axiomatic Weapon for +2d6 vs most enemies, +4d6 vs some?
What about Ghost Touch vs those annoying Ghastly Guardians? ...even Brilliant Energy is situationally useful in Pitax.
What about always rolling 20 on your Initiative - never being flat-footed and always catching enemies flat-footed?
Possibly increasing crit multiplier?
Higher level spells, you know, like Transformation, True Seeing... maybe full power Sense Vitals and Echolocation with Spell Blending Arcana? (last 2 need a mod)
What about having a Combat Reflexes-similar feat?
Absolutely destroying enemy casters in melee range with AoOs?
Lastly what about substituting full SS level for BAB to meet feat requirements (such as Greater Vital Strike)?

Not that I disagree that these are good features, most offering some counterpoints explaining why I chose other classes over getting these:

INT to dmg is just dmg at the end of the day. +7 dmg (which is likely what it will cap out at) is the same as +2d6 sneak dice.

Bane is really good but there are weapons with it on so if you use those then it won't stack.

Holy can be obtained by a min/level Cleric/Inq buff.

Axiomatic is really good though and quite hard to obtain, that's of the best things you get for sure.

Ghost Touch can be gotten on certain weapons and is situational.

Brilliant Energy is really situational.

Uncanny Dodge is just as good as roll-20-on-initiative and can be gotten faster.

Most buffs on the spell list at later levels can be cast by other party members.

Combat Reflexes is enough, that ability is just saving you a feat really.

Enemy casters are only situationally problematic and I have other tools to solve problems like that, I don't need to destroy casters in melee because I already destroy everything in melee.

I already have fairly high BAB and don't need to qualify for any feats like that.

Sneak dice don't multiply on crit, which are the bread and butter of a SS.

Uncanny dodge being equivalent to roll 20 initiative sounds like a baffling statement in general and especially so on a SS with their ability to deal upfront damage. To me initiative is not about avoiding being caught flat footed, it's about taking control of the battle and eliminating threats.

"Saving a feat" seems pretty huge on a SS specifically since they can do so much with them and are definitely starved compared to what they could make great use of.

 

[Yosharian]

Sneak dice don't multiply on crit, sure, but the difference in effective damage per round this ends up being varies a lot and generally isn't all that significant.

I don't find that actually winning initiative is a game changer for my MC, but maybe that's a playstyle thing. For me all I care about on my MC is not being caught flatfooted, if it's a fight where I must interrupt a target (e.g. Farnirras) then my Sorc deals with that, far more reliably than my MC ever could.

Saving a feat = effectively you just got a bonus feat, hence it can be compared against classes that simply give you a feat, such as Rogue.

 

[Haplo]

Lastly what about substituting full SS level for BAB to meet feat requirements (such as Greater Vital Strike)?

I've seen this posted many times, but I've yet to find in-game text that supports it. The lv7 Fighter Training states that it's SS lv -3 which doesn't effectively kick in until lv13. So GVS should be lv19 at the earliest, but at least you can get it unlike other 3/4 classes.

Haven't gotten to that point yet so it might be the case where the implementation and the text differs.

The feat you cite refers to Fighter specific feats, such as Weapon Specialization/Greater, WF Greater.

Its the next special feat:
"Critical Perfection
At 9th level, a sword saint adds his Intelligence bonus (minimum 0) on critical hit confirmation rolls with his favored weapon.

In addition, the sword saint may use his magus levels in place of his base attack bonuses to qualify for any feat for which it is a prerequisite."

It appears to work for all feats with BAB requirements.

 

[Yosharian]

Critical Mastery shenanigans might be a good reason to pursue that avenue I guess, I don't fuck with Vital Strike personally

 

[Haplo]

Sneak dice don't multiply on crit, sure, but the difference in effective damage per round this ends up being varies a lot and generally isn't all that significant.

Its a pretty huge difference, actually. First of all, if you powergame properly, that's +9 damage, not +7 (you're forgetting the Bokken's pot and Ring of Circumstances perhaps?).
Secondly, its part of the main weapon damage, not only multiplied on crits (x3 thats +27 damage), but also testing DR and such together with weapon damage Str bonuses, PA bonuses etc.
Enemy fortification or sneak attack resistance (quite common late game) won't block any part of this damage.

Anyway, even if you were to compare it with a sneak attack class.... that one feature gives as much bonus damage as 5 levels.... then you get another 2 levels from Holy/Axiomatic and another 2 from Bane (come on, best weapons don't have this property and most are limited in enemy type they affect).

Ghost Touch is situational, yes. But fighting ghosts without that or heavy nuking is extremely annoying... and there are very few weapons with this property (2?).


Perfect Reflexes vs Uncanny Dodge is a bit personal preference, I guess. I do like to charge with my MC headfirst and draw enemy attention while smashing heads. Perfect Reflexes are great for that, although comes late. Uncanny Dodge is available early and is good also - but getting it would dilute the SS features more then I'm willing to accept.

 

[Nano]

Damage is everything, you dumb bitch. It's the thing that makes enemies die.

 

[Alrik]

Lastly what about substituting full SS level for BAB to meet feat requirements (such as Greater Vital Strike)?

I've seen this posted many times, but I've yet to find in-game text that supports it. The lv7 Fighter Training states that it's SS lv -3 which doesn't effectively kick in until lv13. So GVS should be lv19 at the earliest, but at least you can get it unlike other 3/4 classes.

Haven't gotten to that point yet so it might be the case where the implementation and the text differs.

The feat you cite refers to Fighter specific feats, such as Weapon Specialization/Greater, WF Greater.

Its the next special feat:
"Critical Perfection
At 9th level, a sword saint adds his Intelligence bonus (minimum 0) on critical hit confirmation rolls with his favored weapon.

In addition, the sword saint may use his magus levels in place of his base attack bonuses to qualify for any feat for which it is a prerequisite."

It appears to work for all feats with BAB requirements.

I'll admit I completely missed there was more text after the INT bonus, that's a great boon.

 

[The_Mask]

Damage is everything, you dumb bitch. It's the thing that makes enemies die.

Depends on how you look at things.

If the enemy can be rendered helpless, then no. Because even a wizard can CdG.

If the enemy can't be, then you're correct.

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

Haplo Yes, the Sword Saint is OP. A veritable KenSage from BG2 on steroids. The Level 13 ability is cool, but the rest I can live without. You already have INT to initiative, so you're not losing that. The combat reflexes thing comes really late. If you've got the monk dip, you're not getting flat-footed and you get combat reflexes as a bonus feat much earlier. The Magus arcane pool stuff doesn't really do it for me, though I understand the appeal. I did not realize they can substitute class level for BAB on feat selection. That's actually pretty nice.

What I was intending to illustrate was the absurdity of the stat bloat and how they can enable dips. SS is OP, so it was probably a bad idea to use it as an example. I haven't heard any arguments against my Slayer/Scaled Fist/Paladin. At best, the retort is that you'll delay some class features. This is a resounding "MEH", as the tradeoffs are generally considered worth it by those dipping. Not every class needs 100% of it's features to be useful. Slayer benefits from some defensive splashing. SS is blitzkrieg incarnate. they are different beasts. It's also a philosophical difference. Some people see martial characters as AC, BAB, Saves first, all other things second--even initiative and DPS. With Kingmaker's absent AI, that's not a faulty perspective. It's equivalent to how full casters prioritize Caster Level, DC, and Spell slots--all other things second. Those features on the SS are cool--but do you need them? Is the loss of some offensive power worth being practically invulnerable? People have different tastes.

 

[Yosharian]

Sneak dice don't multiply on crit, sure, but the difference in effective damage per round this ends up being varies a lot and generally isn't all that significant.

Its a pretty huge difference, actually. First of all, if you powergame properly, that's +9 damage, not +7 (you're forgetting the Bokken's pot and Ring of Circumstances perhaps?).
Secondly, its part of the main weapon damage, not only multiplied on crits (x3 thats +27 damage), but also testing DR and such together with weapon damage Str bonuses, PA bonuses etc.
Enemy fortification or sneak attack resistance (quite common late game) won't block any part of this damage.

Anyway, even if you were to compare it with a sneak attack class.... that one feature gives as much bonus damage as 5 levels.... then you get another 2 levels from Holy/Axiomatic and another 2 from Bane (come on, best weapons don't have this property and most are limited in enemy type they affect).

Ghost Touch is situational, yes. But fighting ghosts without that or heavy nuking is extremely annoying... and there are very few weapons with this property (2?).

So you made the point that very few weapons have a bane or ghost touch, but my chosen weapon is Elven Curve Blade, which has two very decent weapons with these exact properties. BotL is top tier against anything living. Holy is easy to get as I explained. So really all you have here is +Axiomatic, and maybe some ease of use having ghost touch on demand rather than having to switch weapons.

Ring of Circumstances is better on my primary caster, and I'm double dipping mental ability scores with a CHA bonus so 14 INT is more optimal than 16. That's why +7 vs +9. But my point still stands, it's just damage, and there are other sources of damage.

I'm not convinced that Sneak dice are significantly inferior to straight damage bonuses even taking into consideration all the things you mentioned.

Ultimately all I'm saying is that going straight SS isn't straight up better than other options, and there are things those other options provide that make them more attractive from certain points of view

 

[Desiderius]

do you need them?

Yes you need them. The class features are what make the game fun to play and in general they end up blowing away the effect of BAB or whatever because of the stat bloat. Still don't get the idea of "stats are so bloated I'm playing the whole game underleveled for even more stats I don't need."

Initiative substitutes for Uncanny Dodge because if you’re acting first every round you’re never flat-footed. You notice this especially when opening with a Charge because you act first in the Surprise Round but if you don’t have high initiative or Uncanny Ddoge you get ganked not only by the guy you attacked but everyone close by if you're using the initial Charge as a taunt. That you don't understand this dynamic means you're still missing half the appeal of the class. And yes rolling 20 on top of that is great late game where foes often start with 20 base initiative or more themselves.

Saying Monk splash means you're never flat-footed means you’re leaning awfully hard on that Monk off-stat to AC which isn’t as big as you think it is and to make it relevant at all you then break a quest and waste the best equipment for AC you don’t need.