Pathfinder Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous - Game of the Year Edition

[Yosharian]

> Seems like all the new archetypes are intentionally busted so people get tempted to start a new run and potentially get the DLC.

Are they though?

Sable Marine really good as 1 or 3 dip to get a flying attack (especialy good once the hot fix let you use Mythic charge and other charge feats/abilities)

Bloodseeker okay as full class. Good as a 2 level dip for a extra bite attack.

Drunken Master. Good level 20 class.

Magic deceiver idk.. seems good with Azata Zip magic.

Fighter. Good class , good dip.

Mantis Zealot, Good class. The best for War Cleric.

Inciter. Broken. Better Skald.

The rest is subpar or okay.

Inciter is nowhere near broken

 

[Desiderius]

I'm sorry you've confused sucking at the game with the game itself.

Spell Pen? Are you familiar with how Allied Spellcaster works with Solo Tactics? LG gets *six* free Teamwork Feats. All of them trigger on any other friendly close by. Pet, summon, whatever.

Even if they fixed it the Concentration bonus is nice and that's two, Wolj robe is two, Galfrey Relic is two, any random CL boosts is two, etc... There are so many sources* now I'm temped to just not take the Feat(s) and the Mythic. Focus, Greater Focus, and Mythic is a total of +4 DC. Can get that now from Abuscading Spell and the Bane DC Feat. Or if you're playing Unfair and don't want to go with Favorable Magic you can do both. Two Feats for Pen, two for Focus, and two more for additional DCs. Six Feats by lvl 11. M2 and M4 for Mythic Spell Pen and Focus.

If I'm doing that I'll just fight with the Book in main-hand and Shield in the other, since I'm mainly concerned with the DC boost over damage.

* - new TW Feat gives advantage on Spell Pen checks to Inq w/ Solo Tactics if adjacent character makes one, and Inq has TW Feats coming out it's ears.

If I want to lean on melee and put the Book in off-hand that's one Feat for Two-weapon fighting and another eventually for Vulpine Pounce. What else do I need? Improved Two-weapon? Outflank is a TW Feat. Can always Demoralize if fighting something superhard early on with scaling Intimidate bonus and WIS-to-Persuasion background.

 

[Average Manatee]

Spell Pen? Are you familiar with how Allied Spellcaster works with Solo Tactics? LG gets *six* free Teamwork Feats. All of them trigger on any other friendly close by. Pet, summon, whatever.

Sorry I don't have every stupid exploit memorized.

Even if they fixed it the Concentration bonus is nice and that's two, Wolj robe is two, Galfrey Relic is two, any random CL boosts is two, etc... There are so many sources* now I'm temped to just not take the Feat(s) and the Mythic. Focus, Greater Focus, and Mythic is a total of +4 DC. Can get that now from Abuscading Spell and the Bane DC Feat. Or if you're playing Unfair and don't want to go with Favorable Magic you can do both. Two Feats for Pen, two for Focus, and two more for additional DCs. Six Feats by lvl 11. M2 and M4 for Mythic Spell Pen and Focus.

Ahh yes just stack every spell pen item and a bunch of feats on one of your weakest casters. That makes sense. Not. You stack these things on characters that are already good to great casters with 10 levels of awesome shit to spam all day.

This goes double for a class that you're using for the inherent "bonus" of only being able to cast every other round if you want that DC bonus from hitting something with the grimoire.

If I want to lean on melee and put the Book in off-hand that's one Feat for Two-weapon fighting and another eventually for Vulpine Pounce. What else do I need?

Go back a few pages where I detail the feats you want to be competent in melee.

 

[Desiderius]

Spell Descriptors: Mind-Affecting, Fear, Compulsion, Emotion, Negative Emotion.

So many ways for enemies to be immune to this.

No shit. That's where the Divine self-buffs, growing dice, weapon-enchanting, and passive Bane activation come into play. Prayer will be the main thing that turns that on.

If that scares you too much then choose another school.

So Living Grimoire's DC boost is worthless.

It does also kick up the crit multiplier to x3 at lvl 12, and apply no save Crushing Despair at lvl 16.

"You force an evil creature that does not have the evil subtype..."

Great so it works against fucking nothing relevant again.

There are quite a few relevant creatures that this applies to in this setting. The advantage is that it's save or die because there is no save each round.

If it was a swift action it'd be good. How often do you want to spend your entire 2nd turn casting a spell with a chance to beat their save, a chance to beat their spell resistance, when you could just hit them and kill them?

Spell is Medium Range and casting it a Standard Action. Are you just randomly offing shit with your Standard Action from 30 ft away on Sanctified Slayer? Can combine with Reach Rod to get to stuff way over there in the back. I'm not doing that particular thing probably without access to Favorable Magic getting success rate up in the high 80s, but If I'm choosing Enchantment School that is probably exactly what I'm doing.

Decent again considering its at least likely to hit something. Again though, you're using it turn 2. How often do you spend time casting general crowd control spells on turn 2? The chaff dies off on turn 1.

Turn 2? Depends on the situation. Can open combat with it to turn on Ambuscading Spell. Alternatively open with Prayer instead to Turn on Bane Weapon, Swift Dimensional Hop for full attack if all I'm fighting is chaff. With caster set-up can open with Charge to turn on DC boost and cast before enemy can act (also triggering Ambuscading) with help from Cunning Initiative.

Fighting non-chaff may need to cast it turn 4 or 5 to pull my shit out of the fire. Likewise if ambushed.

Split cold/negative energy damage, so its actually 2x 10d6. At least half the cold will be eaten up by everything, so its a 15d6 = 45 damage spell you wasted a full standard action on at level 20. wat.

I could keep going, but I won't

As with Blade Barrier I've never cast an Umbral Strike in my life. You may not have noticed but I listed each spell for completeness outside a couple low-level clunkers.

There *are* a couple relevant creatures vulnerable to Cold (Devarra) and items that apply Cold Vulnerability so it could be of interest there if you're already set up to apply the Blind. Damage + Control spells are nice in that they always at least do something even if the target lucks out on the effect save. It is very helpful of you to share that you haven't figured out how to use Metamagic yet while you're desperately scraping the bottom of the barrel to find something to dunk on.

Many such cases!

Also, the Expected Value of 15d6 is 15 x 3.5 = 52.5, since expected value of a d6 roll is 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 = 21 then divide by 6 to get 3.5

Bruh Dispel isn't a DC check it gets nothing from grimoire.

Yes, that was the point. The practicality of simply using an Abjurer as your party Dispeller is more viable now with the Dispel Focus Feats in-game (and additional means of boosting CL) where before it took Mythic abilities to reliably get there. That being the case there are some Abjuration spells worth looking at if you already have the Focus as a pre-req.

 

[Desiderius]

You stack these things on characters that are already good to great casters with 10 levels of awesome shit to spam all day.

In that case Spell Chain turned on - all good! Somehow I've managed to penetrate SR just fine with four different casters in multiple playthroughs after getting over the Gargoyle hump. Did they scar you for life?

one of your weakest caster

(this is called begging the question, for those curious for an example)

Go back a few pages where I detail the feats you want to be competent in melee.

Competence in melee? Didn't have to choose any melee Feats on this bad boy:

Pls, instruct me further.

 

[Daidre]

Spell Pen? Are you familiar with how Allied Spellcaster works with Solo Tactics? LG gets *six* free Teamwork Feats. All of them trigger on any other friendly close by. Pet, summon, whatever.

It just +2 bonus, not +2 for each creature around. Nice, but nothing to write home about. If you had some grand idea about Inq's spell casting power built around abuse of one bugged teamwork feat - I had bad news for you, it was fixed.

 

[Desiderius]

Spell Pen? Are you familiar with how Allied Spellcaster works with Solo Tactics? LG gets *six* free Teamwork Feats. All of them trigger on any other friendly close by. Pet, summon, whatever.

It just +2 bonus, not +2 for each creature around. Nice, but nothing to write home about. If you had some grand idea about Inq's spell casting power built around abuse of one bugged teamwork feat - I had bad news for you, it was fixed.

No, that was widely know exploit*. Just brought it up half-jokingly since feature of most Inq archetypes is having teamwork feats coming out one’s ears with Solo Tactics making even all the otherwise bad ones the equivalent of a regular feat.

* - no inherent reason it shouldn’t stack, so not really an exploit

 

[Desiderius]

Detainer confirmed to proc on Kinetic Sharpshooter. Large knockback + Slow.

Kinetic Diadem from Atelier in Kenabres kicks up damage on Energy Blasts to 3d6+6 vs Touch AC with +2 to hit from XBow at lvl3. Detainer has +2 base - not sure what this is, +2 enhancement, +2 Overflow on damage. Can add Deadly Aim but need Spell Pen more I think. Likewise Weapon Focus XBow adds +1 to hit. No difference in damage between Light and Heavy, STR does nothing even on Composite Bow so XBow better for wider crit range.

Ember's Vulnerability Curse cancels Resist if you want, but damage powers through most of it pretty fast.



Still playing around with the effects of Infusion Specialization, but the Blast icon doesn't show accurate Burn cost if you have enough in the Quiver to cover it.



This shot used up three Quiver pts at lvl 5 (despite Infusion Specialization) using Empower and Exploding. Usually Blast icon will show burn cost but it just shows zero whatever you do because Quiver.

The Detainer proc save is way up at the top there so I think that triggers first, which took him out of Exploding range to hit the Evoker. Lann also has Foxfire for zero burn that can reveal the Conjurer once it casts Invisibility, but Detainer applies Slow to keep him from running away like he usually does. Foxfire (Faerie Fire) removes Concealment miss chance, on for instance Zach the Lich.

Will take Fire Bonus Feat Dazzling to set up Shatter and (TTT) Shatter Mythic. Not available until lvl 9 though since 3/4 BAB class.

Reduce Person has no downside. Don't have Cat's Grace up yet here. Should be able to reliably apply Shatter to anything not Fear Immune.

Accepting Inciter Rage prevented Bloodseeker Cam from Summoning her Dire Wolves in this fight BTW.

(little 7hp lvl 1 Bismuth from Random loot mod - 5%/10% chance to get anything, usually junk. Somehow gave me Bismuth this run).

 

[Mauman]

I've decided to not use Sable marine. Not because it's bugged and despite the flat footed attacks.

Why?

The Griffon is too fucking big. And God help you if you cast animal growth.

With animal growth he's four times the size of Bismuth! And Bismuth is already quite the chunky boi.

It's funny how I've come to appreciate how most animal companions can't grow in size from animal growth.

For bonus fun, cast legendary proportions on a Griffon (also say goodbye to seeing anything else).

 

[Dishonoredbr]

Accepting Inciter Rage prevented Bloodseeker Cam from Summoning her Dire Wolves in this fight BTW.

Unrelated but fuck, I couldn't seen how sick Bloodseeker camellia sounds.. Nice idea to do in my Trickster run.

 

[Desiderius]

Blazing Rondo on Chelaxian Diva is +1/+1 AB/AC AoE (60ft!) untyped per five Bard lvls (plus Haste of course). This is probably the buildaround. Bard doesn't usually buff AC. Guarded Hearth is Competence so now Bard has effect that stacks with it.

Downside is keeping it to 3 rnds (maybe, can always let hangover wear off after the fight). The damage add-on ability isn't much but it is passive (no Action required) and persistent. Once you have infinite performance rounds can tack on +2 DC for the save too. As fight goes on that save will naturally be debuffed. Any damage triggers concentration checks for casting. Diva Style could be interesting with Final Feint vs bosses/tougher enemies depending on how activating the performance add-ons works with triggering Free Feint.

 

[Desiderius]

Accepting Inciter Rage prevented Bloodseeker Cam from Summoning her Dire Wolves in this fight BTW.

Unrelated but fuck, I couldn't seen how sick Bloodseeker camellia sounds.. Nice idea to do in my Trickster run.

Mantis Daeran also nice fit.

Deadly Fascination is... pretty good with the built-in DC boosts.

 

[Desiderius]

I've decided to not use Sable marine. Not because it's bugged and despite the flat footed attacks.

Why?

The Griffon is too fucking big. And God help you if you cast animal growth.

With animal growth he's four times the size of Bismuth! And Bismuth is already quite the chunky boi.

It's funny how I've come to appreciate how most animal companions can't grow in size from animal growth.

For bonus fun, cast legendary proportions on a Griffon (also say goodbye to seeing anything else).

Pathing/blocking has been largely fixed so no big deal. Once it does first flight it's usually out of the way even if it were an issue.

 

[Average Manatee]

I've decided to not use Sable marine. Not because it's bugged and despite the flat footed attacks.

Why?

The Griffon is too fucking big. And God help you if you cast animal growth.

With animal growth he's four times the size of Bismuth! And Bismuth is already quite the chunky boi.

It's funny how I've come to appreciate how most animal companions can't grow in size from animal growth.

For bonus fun, cast legendary proportions on a Griffon (also say goodbye to seeing anything else).

Does the AoE trip effect of the charge scale up with their size? Because size also makes the tripping easier, along with the enemy already being flatfooted to the attack and getting additional bonuses to the trip.

Also I wonder if legendary proportions would be enough that just 5' stepping away would let you charge again. Meaning it'd be easy to charge the same target every round, tripping half the screen with massively broken trip checks.

 

[Mauman]

Pathing/blocking has been largely fixed so no big deal. Once it does first flight it's usually out of the way even if it were an issue.

It's just getting around that's the issue. Also, selecting other characters, or looting chests. It was getting insufferable. For combat, yeah it's not really an issue.....mostly. It's the everything else that was driving me nuts.

Also, it was a giant eyesore in general.

Does the AoE trip effect of the charge scale up with their size? Because size also makes the tripping easier, along with the enemy already being flatfooted to the attack and getting additional bonuses to the trip.

Also I wonder if legendary proportions would be enough that just 5' stepping away would let you charge again. Meaning it'd be easy to charge the same target every round, tripping half the screen with massively broken trip checks.

It doesn't scale the trip. The trip doesn't happen around the Griffon, it happens around your first target.

Yes, it's weird.

 

[Desiderius]

The interaction pathing is known issue on all mounts. Really bad on Order of the Paw (Halfling Rider). Can just select another character or make a companion the Sable Company Rider.

I like Mounted Ranged and Sable gets Point-Blank at level 6. TTT removes the Full Attack after Mount moves (unless you invest two more Mounted Feats to get it) so introduces some more strategy into it.

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Desiderius]

There are some subtle gameplay changes that suggest the pros are back for awhile from RT tweaking their game.

 

[Desiderius]

Armored Battlemage (AB) has finally been implemented. A brief look.

The intended play with AB is a better fit with how many already use Magus (whacking with a big two-hander) than the base class or many of the other archetypes. It doesn't have the Spell Combat that isn't used with two-handing anyway and in exchange gets armor proficiency much earlier and Armor Training to work with it.

Early game:

It has Medium Armor Proficiency from the start and Armor training at lvl 3 removes the speed penalty and raises the max DEX bonus. With 14 starting DEX and Cat's Grace (pot) that's 4 DEX on top of the 7 AC from Breastplate +1, add in Shield Spell, prot Evil, and the Armor Enchanting AB gets in place of the usual Weapon Enchant and it's a lot less of a pincushion than a usual Magus.

On offense the Martial prof allows it to use the +1 Glaive bonus from the first book you find in the Maze and Marching Terror (or the Necromancer's Glaive if you want Cold Iron). For casting it can Spellstrike with Touch of Fatigue or the early Touch damage spells if you want some additional oomph (Shocking Grasp good vs Undead) or use them to attack Touch AC vs targets that are hard to hit otherwise. Mostly though you're a utility caster until midgame.

Midgame:

Heavy Prof shows up with the second Armor Training that removes the Speed penalty at lvl 7. Full Plate + two Armor Trainings allows a DEX bonus of 3 that goes up to 5 with Staunton's Armor when you get it. Once you get Empower Arcana it can be stacked with a Maximize Rod and Bolster Metamagic to perform some very large Spellstrikes. Falchion with Improved crit can double them with some frequency. Frigid Touch applies a round of Stagger with no save against the toughest foes, that can be applied vs Touch AC as needed.

Endgame:

The Armor Enchanting switches to Fortification once +5 Armors show up. DEX bonus goes up to 7 on Full Plate which means DEX-based with Elven Curve Blade is even an option (Elves get bonuses to INT/DEX and ECB as a Martial weapon). Favorite Meta on Maximize and Empower means every Touch is maxxed by some combination of the three (Rods + Arcana + Meta). Can get enough DC to do Cones where needed for AoE.

Mods (TTT/Dark Codex) allow key options like Rime and Intensified Metamagic.

The nice thing about the class is like a Vital Strike build it's using it's Standard Action so isn't reliant on Full Attacks, which means not having to figure out a way to get Pounce and/or less spending a whole turn standing next to a mob until you can full attack it. That is its own sort of defense. Unlike say, a Rowdy, it provides a source of Arcane utility spells like an Eldritch Scoundrel, albeit with a smaller spellbook, and can cover INT-based skill checks or if DEX-based even the DEX ones with help from Armor Training, likewise Athletics if STR-based.

 

[Dishonoredbr]

Armored Battlemage (AB) has finally been implemented. A brief look.

The intended play with AB is a better fit with how many already use Magus (whacking with a big two-hander) than the base class or many of the other archetypes. It doesn't have the Spell Combat that isn't used with two-handing anyway and in exchange gets armor proficiency much earlier and Armor Training to work with it.

Early game:

It has Medium Armor Proficiency from the start and Armor training at lvl 3 removes the speed penalty and raises the max DEX bonus. With 14 starting DEX and Cat's Grace (pot) that's 4 DEX on top of the 7 AC from Breastplate +1, add in Shield Spell, prot Evil, and the Armor Enchanting AB gets in place of the usual Weapon Enchant and it's a lot less of a pincushion than a usual Magus.

On offense the Martial prof allows it to use the +1 Glaive bonus from the first book you find in the Maze and Marching Terror (or the Necromancer's Glaive if you want Cold Iron). For casting it can Spellstrike with Touch of Fatigue or the early Touch damage spells if you want some additional oomph (Shocking Grasp good vs Undead) or use them to attack Touch AC vs targets that are hard to hit otherwise. Mostly though you're a utility caster until midgame.

Midgame:

Heavy Prof shows up with the second Armor Training that removes the Speed penalty at lvl 7. Full Plate + two Armor Trainings allows a DEX bonus of 3 that goes up to 5 with Staunton's Armor when you get it. Once you get Empower Arcana it can be stacked with a Maximize Rod and Bolster Metamagic to perform some very large Spellstrikes. Falchion with Improved crit can double them with some frequency. Frigid Touch applies a round of Stagger with no save against the toughest foes, that can be applied vs Touch AC as needed.

Endgame:

The Armor Enchanting switches to Fortification once +5 Armors show up. DEX bonus goes up to 7 on Full Plate which means DEX-based with Elven Curve Blade is even an option (Elves get bonuses to INT/DEX and ECB as a Martial weapon). Favorite Meta on Maximize and Empower means every Touch is maxxed by some combination of the three (Rods + Arcana + Meta). Can get enough DC to do Cones where needed for AoE.

Mods (TTT/Dark Codex) allow key options like Rime and Intensified Metamagic.

The nice thing about the class is like a Vital Strike build it's using it's Standard Action so isn't reliant on Full Attacks, which means not having to figure out a way to get Pounce and/or less spending a whole turn standing next to a mob until you can full attack it. That is its own sort of defense. Unlike say, a Rowdy, it provides a source of Arcane utility spells like an Eldritch Scoundrel, albeit with a smaller spellbook, and can cover INT-based skill checks or if DEX-based even the DEX ones with help from Armor Training, likewise Athletics if STR-based.

Is this a mod or new patch ?

 

[Daidre]

It has Medium Armor Proficiency from the start and Armor training at lvl 3 removes the speed penalty and raises the max DEX bonus. With 14 starting DEX and Cat's Grace (pot) that's 4 DEX on top of the 7 AC from Breastplate +1, add in Shield Spell, prot Evil, and the Armor Enchanting AB gets in place of the usual Weapon Enchant and it's a lot less of a pincushion than a usual Magus.

Question is not what Armored Battlemage gets, but what he loses - who in the hell will give up Weapon Enchant on Magus? One of the biggest attractions of the class is to stack Holy, Axiomatic, Ghost, Brilliant Energy and Bane on weapon. But without it, he is just a mix of mid bab and mid spellcasting with limited book, and without some pet, domains or teamwork like Hunters/Inquisitors. Dimension Strike is nice, but not enough to play Magus who lost everything that made him Magus for some AC and armour enchants.

It is like a bunch of shitty paladin archetypes that give up Smite and Mark of Justice.

 

[Forest Dweller]

Just finished The Lord of Nothing. After the pretty abrupt and unsatisfying ending, I looked up some things and found out there's apparently an angel called Stalhmer who shows up and does a ritual, but this never happened in my playthrough. Did anyone else not have him in their playthrough? Is there some hidden check involving this? Or is this just a bug?

Also do any of the choices involving the different settlements (i.e. helping the villagers leave the jungle, getting that AI a body, etc.) have any impact on the main game?

 

[Desiderius]

Armored Battlemage (AB) has finally been implemented. A brief look.

The intended play with AB is a better fit with how many already use Magus (whacking with a big two-hander) than the base class or many of the other archetypes. It doesn't have the Spell Combat that isn't used with two-handing anyway and in exchange gets armor proficiency much earlier and Armor Training to work with it.

Early game:

It has Medium Armor Proficiency from the start and Armor training at lvl 3 removes the speed penalty and raises the max DEX bonus. With 14 starting DEX and Cat's Grace (pot) that's 4 DEX on top of the 7 AC from Breastplate +1, add in Shield Spell, prot Evil, and the Armor Enchanting AB gets in place of the usual Weapon Enchant and it's a lot less of a pincushion than a usual Magus.

On offense the Martial prof allows it to use the +1 Glaive bonus from the first book you find in the Maze and Marching Terror (or the Necromancer's Glaive if you want Cold Iron). For casting it can Spellstrike with Touch of Fatigue or the early Touch damage spells if you want some additional oomph (Shocking Grasp good vs Undead) or use them to attack Touch AC vs targets that are hard to hit otherwise. Mostly though you're a utility caster until midgame.

Midgame:

Heavy Prof shows up with the second Armor Training that removes the Speed penalty at lvl 7. Full Plate + two Armor Trainings allows a DEX bonus of 3 that goes up to 5 with Staunton's Armor when you get it. Once you get Empower Arcana it can be stacked with a Maximize Rod and Bolster Metamagic to perform some very large Spellstrikes. Falchion with Improved crit can double them with some frequency. Frigid Touch applies a round of Stagger with no save against the toughest foes, that can be applied vs Touch AC as needed.

Endgame:

The Armor Enchanting switches to Fortification once +5 Armors show up. DEX bonus goes up to 7 on Full Plate which means DEX-based with Elven Curve Blade is even an option (Elves get bonuses to INT/DEX and ECB as a Martial weapon). Favorite Meta on Maximize and Empower means every Touch is maxxed by some combination of the three (Rods + Arcana + Meta). Can get enough DC to do Cones where needed for AoE.

Mods (TTT/Dark Codex) allow key options like Rime and Intensified Metamagic.

The nice thing about the class is like a Vital Strike build it's using it's Standard Action so isn't reliant on Full Attacks, which means not having to figure out a way to get Pounce and/or less spending a whole turn standing next to a mob until you can full attack it. That is its own sort of defense. Unlike say, a Rowdy, it provides a source of Arcane utility spells like an Eldritch Scoundrel, albeit with a smaller spellbook, and can cover INT-based skill checks or if DEX-based even the DEX ones with help from Armor Training, likewise Athletics if STR-based.

Is this a mod or new patch ?

They finally fixed the missing class features from original release.

 

[Desiderius]

It has Medium Armor Proficiency from the start and Armor training at lvl 3 removes the speed penalty and raises the max DEX bonus. With 14 starting DEX and Cat's Grace (pot) that's 4 DEX on top of the 7 AC from Breastplate +1, add in Shield Spell, prot Evil, and the Armor Enchanting AB gets in place of the usual Weapon Enchant and it's a lot less of a pincushion than a usual Magus.

Question is not what Armored Battlemage gets, but what he loses - who in the hell will give up Weapon Enchant on Magus? One of the biggest attractions of the class is to stack Holy, Axiomatic, Ghost, Brilliant Energy and Bane on weapon. But without it, he is just a mix of mid bab and mid spellcasting with limited book, and without some pet, domains or teamwork like Hunters/Inquisitors. Dimension Strike is nice, but not enough to play Magus who lost everything that made him Magus for some AC and armour enchants.

It is like a bunch of shitty paladin archetypes that give up Smite and Mark of Justice.

That’s the downside. Trading it for 5-10 more AC from the get go, Fortification on Armor to prevent crits/sneaks, and the ability to take full advantage of Medium/Heavy Armors in parties that may be unable otherwise to do so.

Armor Training makes some of the good Banded Mail and Half-Plates playable that otherwise wouldn’t be. So you get those bonuses in lieu of Weapon Enchanting.

I’m taking Meta Arcana instead of the Enchanting stuff anyway. The biggest reason to play the class in general that people evidently still haven’t figured out yet is the unique additional layer of metamagic available via Arcana.

 

[Desiderius]

Yes I know that many think that Unfair makes AC irrelevant, but there are many sources* of AoE AC and debuffing of opponents that bring it very much back into play. Not everybody can tank bosses, but it’s more often about being free of worry about getting picked off by everything else.

* - including new ones from DLCs