Hybrid class ramblings

Pathfinder: WotR Class Builds
#1

So, I had not played TT Pathfinder till Kingmaker so I was instantly in love with the hybrid classes.
These are my ramblings, and some of you have great ideas that I have not had to feel free to correct me where I am wrong, I will not mind.
It might help newer players as well.

!. Magus. Gods. They do exactly what is on the tin, burst DPS. They can hit with their arcane enhancement and arcane accuracy, they have piles of feats and feat analogs (Magus Arcaana), their spell list is focused.

  1. War Priests. I have less experience with them but they may be better than a Magus. They are what the Crusader archetype wishes it was. They can hit, and their spell list has a great deal of buffs so no worries on DC checks.

  2. Bard. I love bards, I think the old 1.5 edition idea for a bard was better than what we ended up with in 3e/3.5e/Pathfinder but they are still excellent. Again, they can hit, support like no ones business, and still have enough feats to debuff enemies. Dirge bard is your friend. If you want to do everything yourself a bard may not be your class but make no mistake a bard makes everyone around them better.

4.Back in my playing days, aprox 153 years ago, I loved playing a Ranger, but lets be honest, if you never use a Ranger or Paladin spell you are not losing anything. They were a poorly added on part of those classes that did not add anything to your class power and with the adding of spell DC they are even weaker.

So, Bloodrager. Mmmm. Bloodrager may actually be overpowered except that it is so MAD. The spells a Bloodrager gets actually work within that class, a first for a 4 level caster. Also, for newbs, Primal has no downside, always choose Primal. Ton of fun to play, good abilities.

  1. Skald. Sounds great, but Paizo basically just gives you a slightly weaker Bard. There is not much to say and their only redeeming factor is their Spell Kenning. They are fine, but probably a sub-par Bard.

  2. Inquisitor. First I want to say I like the Inquisitor, I am not trying to hate your favorite class! Really!

    But they suck.

    They are MAD. They have no bonus feats. Their class abilities scream physical combat, but if you use all of your feats on helping you hit etc, you have no feats for spell focus, spell pen etc.
    Also, if you give yourself good combat stats (Str, Dex, maybe some Con) your Wis and Cha will be low and your DC will be terrible.
    I want to love them but wow, it seems to be a weak class. It is a burst damage hitter like the Magus, so probably flanking and teamwork feats would be your best friend.

Anything else? Anyone have any questions or comments?

#2

Bards are kinda bad atm… most stuff is immun vs mindaffecting
Personaly i think Inquisitor is better then Warpriest, because of also only buff spells, and depending, animal companion/solo tactics, lots of teamwork feats (outflank is kinda a must have) or the kinda OP monster tactican…
now think of monster tactican with the Mythical summon feats and animal domain

Magus is kinda cheesy… but so are manny other builds

Also
Ranger and Paladin both get Animal companios… which are strong…
and you can mount them now
60ft movement charge pounce and you attack from the back of your Smilodon
or shoot arrows from the back of a mastadon while it trampls throu your enemys
and for the spells… get Abundant spells enduring spells and greater enduring spells
and most of the Ranger/Pala spells last for 24hours now… which is kinda insane
Hurrican Bow/Lead Blades 24h… yes please… same for some of the Paladin spells

the Mythic stuff is just fun…

#3

  1. Magus/Monk multi class will be great if you choose lawful alignment. Boost AC through CHA. Later you can go to DD if you need to.

  2. Pure magus will also be good.

  3. I have tried Warpriest specially Proclaimer. But even after 5/6 hrs and midst of ACT I, I decide to ditch it. Its going nowhere. I cannot full fill any role properly, not a Melee DPS, Not a tank, not a good support. I do not know what I have been doing wrong.

  4. I tried to love Inquisitor in Kingmaker and failed sadly. Same here in WOTR. You cannot make anything out of it. You can go for Sacred Huntmaster if paired with Ranger/Hunter for pet. Thats it. It seems there has been no build I have seen so far close to thematic Inquisitor ie Demon Hunter. Again I have seen everything. I may be wrong.

  5. Bards are good, atleast with Linzi in Kingmaker. I have tried Bard with Eldritch Knight Prestige class later on and it was manageable.

#4

Inquisitors are great, kind of a jack of all trades but can do some things no other class can. Monster tactician is very powerful, and with animal domain you can have a pet too. Not to mention their potential as a skill monkey.

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#5

Magus has some potentially powerful options by way of the base class, as well as Eldritch Archer, Sword Saint, and Hexcrafter. It could potentially go well with the Lich mythic, since I think there are some bonuses to touch attacks in that tree, but I haven’t really messed around with it yet. Consensus in the table-top community seems to indicate that this is probably the most “realized” hybrid.

War Priests are basically selfish Clerics with fast self-buffs, scaling damage, and some fun flavor in the way of blessings. It sits somewhere between Paladin and Cleric. I haven’t played a bunch of one yet, but it could make for some interesting builds around weapons that usually have lower damage rolls (looking at you, Kukri). Shieldbearer also looks like fun, since it essentially gives you scaling Shield Bash damage instead.
EDIT: Also, the 24-hour self buffs from Mythic Feats/Abilities are probably going to make this class a monster.

I can’t stand Bards; it’s not really my play style, so I can’t really comment.

Arcanist gives some fun options with exploits and Swift Consume is great (and only available to this class; archetypes for other classes built off of Arcanist do not get access to it).

Ranger is a strong ranged martial and that’s about it; the good news is that martial classes tend to do well in CRPGs due to there being a lot of combat.

Slayer is probably better than Ranger when it’s working properly if you don’t care about casting or having a companion.

Hunter could be interesting, since it’s a companion-based hybrid. Divine Hunter gets a domain and an improved companion in place of teamwork feats.

Paladin is probably going to be strong in this campaign due to the majority of the enemies being opposed to the Lawful Good alignment, but, apart from the crazy saves, it’s basically a flavor of Fighter. You give up some feats for some basic spellcasting, saves, and Smite.

Bloodrager with Primalist or Bloodrider (depending on how Mounted Combat is implemented) could be fun. Also, probably the best candidate for the Dragon Disciple prestige class, given it’s already heavily martial focused.

Never bothered with Skald, but since they’re a flavor of Bard, I probably never will.

As others have mentioned, Inquisitor tends towards the skill monkey, jack-of-all trades sort of play style. You’ve got some casting, decent skills, and passable combat. Monster Tactician is probably the best “summoner” archetype in the game at the moment and Sacred Huntsmaster gets a companion. The base class’ Judgment ability could also be pretty good with the right Mythic feats (there’s one that gives unlimited uses per day) and Bane apparently stacks with the Bane that Aeon gives. Faith Hunter (grants non-Charisma Smite in place of a Domain) could also be good, but the bonus ability doesn’t have text at the moment, so it’s hard to say.
Sanctified Slayer is probably not worth it because of the lack of feats and poor sneak attack die progression; you’ll probably get more out of effective use of Judgment (especially if it’s unlimited). As an addendum, Studied Target is also broken at the moment where it’s perpetually 1 bonus lower than where it should be. You may as well drop the pretense and just go Slayer, if you’re looking for efficacy rather than flavor.

Shaman is also a hybrid of Oracle and Witch, but I can’t really speak much to it, since I’ve only really messed with the companion’s build.

#6

@OP: Why do you call bloodragers MAD? (I guess you mean Multiple Ability Dependency)
Get tons of str and enough cha to cast spells, thats it. Wis and int do not help you with the class. Dex and con are nice for everyone, but it should be no problem to use max dex bonus of armor (with items) and you get mystic for infinite rage.

Usually MAD is used for chars that add several stats for defense (e.g. monk or sword saint) or if you have abilities with DC that depend on several stats.

Why would you give EK to bards?
They get great abilities as they level up, they are great skill monkies and inspire courage alone gives the whole party a bonus to AB and damage.

If you do not want to cast spells or have a pet there is no reason to be a ranger in the first place.
This is like saying “Fighter is better than wizard if you do not care about spells.”
Just to be sure: Slayer is a good class with high BAB, sneak attacks and lots of feats (including combat style and rogue feats)

Shaman looks good.
You are a full divine caster and you get hexes. Hexes can be used to get class specific bonusses dependent on your spirit (e.g. air shield from wind spirit or weapon specialisation from war spirit) or you can use them as cantrips that scale with level, so they remain useful the whole game.

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#7

It was meant to imply that Ranger is not a terribly strong class in general outside of its martial prowess. There are other classes that can do nearly everything it does better (for example, Druid). It’s not a terrible class; it’s just very situational, whereas other classes tend to perform more consistently. A dedicated Archery Ranger is going to be strong, but that’s mostly because Archery is strong.

I will concede, however, that a Ranger with Outsider as a favored enemy will probably be a monster in this campaign.

#8

Archeologist 2/TSS X/EK 10/DD 4/Scaled Fist 1
Is great build for Val on unfair in Kingmaker.

#9

For inquisitors in WOTR, I can only defend monster tactician. They trade in the rather useless (for a 3/4 BAB, medium armor character) judgement ability for a super-duration summon ability that has good feat support and that can benefit from all of the inquisitor’s teamwork feats. Specifically in WOTR, you can pick up a single mythic ability that then makes all of your summons cut through all DR and get a huge stat buff. You could also pick up animal domain and rock an animal companion in additional to all of this.

Also [mild spoilers] there is some good item support in Act III.

#10

I think you might be sleeping on Judgement a bit (especially since you can make it unlimited and if you’re single-classing it), but the super-summons are a very fair trade, which is why Monster Tactician is a great archetype.

Justice basically makes you full BAB, Purity gives you great saves, Healing’s a good back-up heal, Resiliency, Protection, and Resistance are decent situational defensive options, and Smiting will likely get a lot of use in this campaign due to the amount of outsiders with DR. Destruction is replaceable and Piercing’s sort of garbage due to low DC.

Having any three of the most helpful of those active at one time is a massive self-buff, especially alongside Bane. It might not be quite as good as a super-summoner with summon teamwork feats, but it’s still pretty good.

Also, Faith Hunter has been modified a bit from the base archetype and still lets you Bane everything. It, instead, gives you Smite based off of your Inquisitor level, which is even more +AB (albeit situational). So a Lawful or Good Inquisitor will likely get some mileage out of that for this campaign.

#11

I think my main issue with judgement in WOTR is that it generally encourages putting your inquisitor in harm’s way and there are just so many half-fiend minotaurs with a billion attack that make mincemeat even of dedicated defensive characters! I’d much rather my summons eat that guy’s charge than my PC.