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Yeah, you need to keep DMPCs from stealing the spotlight. S'why mine tend to be busy doing other things except when they're making fun of the party for going off the rails missing the obvious clues.
 
Chloe Sullivan said:
Yeah, you need to keep DMPCs from stealing the spotlight. S'why mine tend to be busy doing other things except when they're making fun of the party for going off the rails missing the obvious clues.
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He still levels up with the party as he's making weapons and equipment (And other stuff) but yeah, keep that shit out unless they're regulated to cameos or they serve as merchants or quest givers.
 
Chloe Sullivan said:
Yeah, you need to keep DMPCs from stealing the spotlight. S'why mine tend to be busy doing other things except when they're making fun of the party for going off the rails missing the obvious clues.
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A properly balanced encounter for a party should be 3 goblins and a Balor. The party should beat the goblins at around the same time the DMPC beats the Balor, thus making everything fair.
 
So, @Serafina or anyone else who has experience with Path of War.

I am building a Privateer archetype who is going to fight with pistol and rapier, but need to trade out schools because ARGH only Eternal Guardian has the stance that lets you bypass fear and mind affecting immunities.

Which ranged Martial school is better to keep? I will probably drop one of the two.

EDIT:

while we're at it, how do scatter attacks with firearms work?

Do you just replace one of your firearm attacks with a cone?
 
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Chloe Sullivan said:
while we're at it, how do scatter attacks with firearms work?

Do you just replace one of your firearm attacks with a cone?
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Basically, if you want to use a scatter firearm like the blunderbuss or shotgun to make a scatter attack, it means that you're loading buckshot instead of ball ammo. So it's an alternate ammunition type. And yes, it uses up one of your usual attacks (insofar as it is a normal attack, just with different ammunition) and targets all creatures in a cone. (And yes, real buckshot doesn't have a spread anywhere near that wide, but D&D has never been terribly grounded in realism.)

It takes a -2 on the attack roll but ignores concealment. Oh, and you have to roll against every target in the cone individually instead of rolling once and applying the result to all targets, so I would imagine that it would slow combat down considerably. (I've played in a PF campaign that also had a gunslinger PC, but he exclusively used revolvers and never buckshot.) Not one of their better design decisions, IMHO.

Scatter weapons can also load the Dragon's Breath alchemical cartridge, which deals 2d6 fire damage to all targets in the cone and prompts a Reflex save instead.
 
The Narrator said:
Basically, if you want to use a scatter firearm like the blunderbuss or shotgun to make a scatter attack, it means that you're loading buckshot instead of ball ammo. So it's an alternate ammunition type. And yes, it uses up one of your usual attacks (insofar as it is a normal attack, just with different ammunition) and targets all creatures in a cone. (And yes, real buckshot doesn't have a spread anywhere near that wide, but D&D has never been terribly grounded in realism.)

It takes a -2 on the attack roll but ignores concealment. Oh, and you have to roll against every target in the cone individually instead of rolling once and applying the result to all targets, so I would imagine that it would slow combat down considerably. (I've played in a PF campaign that also had a gunslinger PC, but he exclusively used revolvers and never buckshot.) Not one of their better design decisions, IMHO.

Scatter weapons can also load the Dragon's Breath alchemical cartridge, which deals 2d6 fire damage to all targets in the cone and prompts a Reflex save instead.
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pft, fire damage.

I'm loading the entangling goo. I can live with having to roll for each target.

Thanks for the explanation though.

(this character was intended to be part of a recurring miniboss encounter, kinda like the turks in FF7)

Usa Kiri, The White Sword (shows up along with Azu Kiri, The Black Sword).

Should be easy to guess the inspiration.
 
Ah, I'd assumed that you were making a PC. I always like to make sure that my low-level PCs have some way of making an area attack (in case of swarms) and of setting enemy spellcasters on fire (to force them to make Concentration checks and hopefully flub their spells).
 
The Narrator said:
Ah, I'd assumed that you were making a PC. I always like to make sure that my low-level PCs have some way of making an area attack (in case of swarms) and of setting enemy spellcasters on fire (to force them to make Concentration checks and hopefully flub their spells).
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The damage for being on fire is like, really minor, so i'm skeptical about it being able to credibly interrupt spellcasting even at low levels. I guess a small chance is better than nothing.

I dollcraft for fun and have made way more characters than I could hope to play. So most of them are getting recycled as NPCs that the PCs can pick fights with.

Come to think, If i run a spellcasting game ever again, the PCs will probably hate Nida Tenroot (Counterspell Specialist with + large numbers to dispel checks).
 
@Chloe Sullivan : If you want a single thing from outside your usual disciplines, you could just grabt it via Advanced Study. Since Maneuvers count towards their own prerequisites, that'd cost you two feats - one to grab one Eternal Guardian Maneuver (requiring zero or one maneuvers as a prerequisite), the other to grab the Stance. Well, technically that'd require retraining (so that you first meet the prerequisite), but that's just a matter of gold (and thus irrelevant for an NPC).

But to answer the orginal question:
There's seven disciplines that work well with ranged attacks because their strikes can be applied to them: Elemental Flux, Riven Hourglass, Silver Crane, Sleeping Goddess, Solar Wind, Tempest Gale and Veiled Moon.
However, out of those I'd call Silver Crane, Solar Wind and Tempest Gale the main ranged ones. Elemental Flux and Sleeping Goddess only work well if you have animus and/or power points anyway.

Silver Crane has bows as a discipline weapon (which is why I sorted it here), but actually has a bunch of maneuvers that are melee-only. It offers a bunch of movement without AoOs, which is good for archery, and otherwise lots of healing, which is very nice to have if you want it.

Solar Wind adds a lot of fire-damage, which can have it's drawbacks. It has a boost to negate wind-penalties, one to increase your range (very useful for firearms, even better for scatter-weapons), and several debilitating effects that work off saves or combat maneuvers.

Tempest Gale has a lot of maneuvers based around using Sleight of Hand for ranged combat maneuvers. For negating Wind, it has a stance. It also has a 5th-level maneuver that forces flying enemies to land, which is very nice.

If you consider dropping either Solar Wind or Tempest Gale - I'd honestly rate them pretty much equal, but for Firearm-users I'd recommend Solar Wind over Tempest Gale just for that one range-increasing maneuver. Tempest Gale is great if you want lots of ranged combat maneuvers, but Solar Wind offers a bit there too and if you have a full-BAB build, you have less need for using a skill instead of your attack bonus for combat maneuvers.
 
Chloe Sullivan said:
The damage for being on fire is like, really minor, so i'm skeptical about it being able to credibly interrupt spellcasting even at low levels. I guess a small chance is better than nothing.
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I remember having some success with it in my last 3.5E game ~10 years ago. In that edition Concentration was Con-based skill, and not all spellcasting NPCs had a very good bonus to it. Plus, I was playing a thrown-weapon specialist (halfling Whisperknife PrC) so I could pelt them with three or four flasks of alchemist's fire or oil each round. Haven't tried it in PF yet.

That halfling's other favorite way of taking out spellcasters was to grapple them (size penalties aren't such a problem when their BAB is crap) and go, "Stop Vampiric Touching yourself! Stop Vampiric Touching yourself!" :D

Chloe Sullivan said:
Come to think, If i run a spellcasting game ever again, the PCs will probably hate Nida Tenroot (Counterspell Specialist with + large numbers to dispel checks).
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The wizard PC in the Pathfinder game I ran last year specialized in Counterspelling. Considering that it was an adventure path about fighting drow and a lot of the boss fights were against clerics or wizards, he was able to shut them down pretty hard. Might not work as well if your whole party are spellcasters, however, since you can only counter one spell per round.
 
Serafina said:
@Chloe Sullivan : If you want a single thing from outside your usual disciplines, you could just grabt it via Advanced Study. Since Maneuvers count towards their own prerequisites, that'd cost you two feats - one to grab one Eternal Guardian Maneuver (requiring zero or one maneuvers as a prerequisite), the other to grab the Stance. Well, technically that'd require retraining (so that you first meet the prerequisite), but that's just a matter of gold (and thus irrelevant for an NPC).
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Sadly "I bypass your silly fear and mind effecting immunities" is a 5th level stance with two prerequisite maneuvers.

Stupid Sleeping Goddess equivalent only bypassing Mind Affecting and not Fear immunity grumble grumble...


Serafina said:
If you consider dropping either Solar Wind or Tempest Gale - I'd honestly rate them pretty much equal, but for Firearm-users I'd recommend Solar Wind over Tempest Gale just for that one range-increasing maneuver. Tempest Gale is great if you want lots of ranged combat maneuvers, but Solar Wind offers a bit there too and if you have a full-BAB build, you have less need for using a skill instead of your attack bonus for combat maneuvers.
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Thanks. It's primarily a melee build which is why i want just one ranged discipline - for when she breaks out the pistol.

(Sneak Shot, baby!)

The Narrator said:
I remember having some success with it in my last 3.5E game ~10 years ago. In that edition Concentration was Con-based skill, and not all spellcasting NPCs had a very good bonus to it. Plus, I was playing a thrown-weapon specialist (halfling Whisperknife PrC) so I could pelt them with three or four flasks of alchemist's fire or oil each round. Haven't tried it in PF yet.
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SKR specifically hated potion-throwing rogues and added a PF rule to disallow them. But now that he's no longer working at Paizo, they may have walked that back.

The Narrator said:
The wizard PC in the Pathfinder game I ran last year specialized in Counterspelling. Considering that it was an adventure path about fighting drow and a lot of the boss fights were against clerics or wizards, he was able to shut them down pretty hard. Might not work as well if your whole party are spellcasters, however, since you can only counter one spell per round.
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I blame PF for being uncool. Proper 3.5 counterspellers dip a level of cleric for Divine Defiance. :p
 
Pathfinder is really lacking in good counterspell-options. There's really only four class- options, and I'd only call two of them good:

An Arcanist gets the Counterspell exploit - available right from level 1, it allows you to immediate-action counterspell any spell, but it only works if you expend a higher-level spell slot, and never ever gets any benefit or effect based off counterspelling, other than it's upgrade-exploits Greater Counterspell (now you can use a same-level spell) and Counter Drain (regain between 0 and 3 arcane reservoir points). But this is overall a ver reliably source of immediate-action counterspells, which is quite valuable.

A Spell Warrior Skald can get a song to counterspell, but it really eats performance rounds and you still have the same-level+1 limitation. A Magician Bard has a song that first needs to run for several rounds before it can dispel anything, and then only against one spell. Both of those are bad options that really won't work at all against even an equal-level full-caster.

And the Wizard Counterspell Subschool also offers immediate-action counterspells, but with the same-level+1 limitation, and only once per day at 6th level +1 use/4 levels thererafter. And while it's available via variant multiclassing, you'd only get it at 19th-level.

As for feats:
Improved Counterspell allows you to dispel spells with any spell from the same school, but with the same-level+1 limitation.
Ordered Mind allows same-school dispelling, with same-level spells, but you have to make a DC 20+spell level Spellcraft check to do so and be lawful to take it.
Parry Spell sends a countered spell back to the caster. It's only available at 15th level, and of course doesn't work with the Arcanist exploit.

Of course, Mythic immediately offers a vastly superior option - the Flexible Counterspell Archmage path ability is just an immediate-action same-level counterspell at the cost of one mythic power.
 
Chloe Sullivan said:
SKR specifically hated potion-throwing rogues and added a PF rule to disallow them. But now that he's no longer working at Paizo, they may have walked that back.
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You can quick-draw potions now if you take the mythic Quick Draw feat. :p

I don't think I've ever had a GM who didn't think that the "you can't quick-draw potions or flasks" rule was stupid and ignored it.

Chloe Sullivan said:
I blame PF for being uncool. Proper 3.5 counterspellers dip a level of cleric for Divine Defiance. :p
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You mean three levels of cleric. Which would gimp a caster of any other class pretty hard. Makes a good option for a cleric that wants to focus on defending his teammates, however.

Serafina said:
As for feats:
Improved Counterspell allows you to dispel spells with any spell from the same school, but with the same-level+1 limitation.
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Serafina said:
Parry Spell sends a countered spell back to the caster. It's only available at 15th level, and of course doesn't work with the Arcanist exploit.
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The player in my game had these two by the end of the campaign. They were sufficient to keep the 18th level cleric BBEG of the campaign from using most of her spells effectively in the final battle.
 
Serafina said:
Solar Wind adds a lot of fire-damage, which can have it's drawbacks. It has a boost to negate wind-penalties, one to increase your range (very useful for firearms, even better for scatter-weapons), and several debilitating effects that work off saves or combat maneuvers.
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Note there is a Feat in PoW Expanded to change the damage type from fire to something else, if you want something less resisted.
 
So me and my group made characters to run one of the Starfinder Society Scenarios (which will be from here on out referred to as Hisses because snakes) and the Operative seems tuned as fuck, like it gets up to four attacks per round at later levels and one of our players is playing an Elven Operative of the Ghost Specialization, with all his modifiers he has a +15 his stealth check against enemies he's trying Trick Attack at lvl 1. So he's almost guaranteed to flat-foot any enemy and an additional +1d4 damage each round and then later when he has a sufficient BAB he can make four attacks each round.
 
Operative is one of the best classes in Starfinder by far. Plenty of skill points and a bonus to all skills as well as free skill focus feats. Fast movement, bonus damage on single attacks, extra melee full attacks. And every two levels, unique talents which work really well with that package - and you even get a free advanced talent at 5th level. They don't even have a weakness at long range, thanks to being proficient with sniper rifles.

Oh, and it's really easy to just turn an Operative into a Jack-of-all-Trades. There's a talent for that - you double your Operative bonus (+1 to +6) on all untrained skills. Also take the Spacefarer theme, and you get another +2 on top of that. That ends up being +14, for really not much investment at all - and you can still be really good at 8+ skills in which you've actually put ranks.
 
The Narrator said:
You mean three levels of cleric. Which would gimp a caster of any other class pretty hard. Makes a good option for a cleric that wants to focus on defending his teammates, however.
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I see you are one of the boring people who has never heard of Practiced Spellcaster.

Or for that matter, illumians.

You need a flaw to pull if off, but a Krau-sigil Illumian with Power Sigil: Krau can go:

Cloistered Cleric 1/Abjurer 1/Master Specialist 10/Master of the Sevenfold Veil 7/Archmage 1.

That's +16 to dispell checks (inquisition domain + class bonuses) and counterspelling automatically acts as spell turning. (Oh and Abjuration spells cast at CL+4)

Might be fun to give her a Supressing weapon. :p I actually put Nida Tenroot forward for a game, but it was sadly cancelled.
 
So, looking more at Starfinder. Damage spells, while "better" at the level you get them in Starfinder, are still a subpar choice for a Technomancer, as they should just take the class ability that lets them turn spell slots into weapons. The weapons will last and do damage over more rounds than a one and done damage spell.

I like this, though. It builds a really cool gish-style class with solid weapon skills and the ability to use class abilities and spells to modify its weapons.
 
Just checked, and yep, a Warlord can take both the Privateer and Bushi templates.

At level 1, Bushi gives you EWP for Katana and Wakazishi as well as Quick Draw. You can also recover 1 maneuver per round as long you sheath your weapon that round.

At level 1, Privateer gives you an ability to recover maneuvers as a full round action that also counts as Dazzling Display for prequisite purposes. It also gives you proficiency with firearms and lets you take Privateer Ploys in places of Gambits.

One Privateer Ploy (Gun Training) gives you Amateur Gunslinger and a bonus grit feat.

If you take Weapon Focus (Dragon Pistol) as your 1st level feat, you have the prerequisites for Gun Twirling and can take it as the above mentioned bonus feat.

Since you also have Quick Draw, you can holster any 1-handed firearm as a free action.

So you basically auto-recover a maneuver every round by drawing and re-holstering your gun as free actions. (and privateers have access to both ranged weapon martial schools)

Forget the "Sea Dog"/"Samurai" flavor, you're totally THE MAN WITH NO NAME.

Also, Privateers can get alternate gambits that instead of recovering mutiple maneuvera for you, recover one maneuver for you ... and for every ally within range. So you can totally lead the Magnificent Seven.

Makes you want to run a western-themed game, doesn't it?

EDIT: you can also take the Sea Combat ploy to go full Tetragrammaton Cleric and gunpunch people.
 
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Don't forget that the recovery explicitly works with things that augment Dazzling Display, potentially giving you faster maneuver recovery.

Violent Display is the obvious way to do it, potentially giving you immediate-action recovery very reliably if you have a source of sneak attack.

Another way, if you're willing to multiclass more (or get Gestalt), would be Intimidating Performance - which just gives Dazzling Display as free action whenever you start a performance, which can be a swift action. You could also get that via Variant Multiclassing (you get to do it as a move-action at 7th-level and as a swift action at 13th), but you could also take the Argent Thaumaturge PrC (move action right away, then swift action at character level 13), get to 7th-level of Ashavic Dancer for swift-action performance,, 7th level in Sphere Singer, or (probably) 5th in Battle Herald.
Of course, at that point it's really more a Bard with maneuvers than the other way around, but it's nice to have!

And then there's Startling Shapechanger, where you get free-action Dazzling Display whenever you use Change Shape or Wild Shape. The Skingwalker, Kitsune and Vanara races get Change Shape - and Kitsune can do it both as a move-action and as a swift-action. And in case you think changing shape between human and kitsune constantly is a bit silly, there's Vulpine Pounce or Fox Shape to have a good reason for that.

Honestly out of all of those, the Sneak Attack route is the most viable for your build if you want to go with it. You can dip Vigilante Stalker for it, if you like.
 
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Serafina said:
Violent Display is the obvious way to do it, potentially giving you immediate-action recovery very reliably if you have a source of sneak attack.

Another way, if you're willing to multiclass more (or get Gestalt), would be Intimidating Performance - which just gives Dazzling Display as free action whenever you start a performance, which can be a swift action.
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If you're looking for ways to intimidate more often, then Killing Flourish will let you intimidate everyone in a 30 foot radius when you drop an enemy.
 
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