Pathfinder WOTR | Charade Crusade | 02 | Shield Maze: Companion Builds. Optimizing Early Game Party.
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- čas přidán 14. 07. 2024
- I discuss my Shield Maze party and go over the builds used as well as some variations.
Edit: forgot to remove regular (non vital force) sneak from the damage vs LWE graphs.
Will post updated corrected graphs with some additions (outflank for melee) and extra explanations
as well as the actual calculation and numbers once I finish the Shield Maze, might do a
'SM companion builds revisited' episode too, have some more thoughts.
Link to the Map and Map Legend:
drive.google.com/drive/folder...
Link to the Slides:
drive.google.com/drive/folder...
00:00 Opening Animation
00:05 Introduction
02:24 Camellia
06:48 Wenduag
11:28 Hitting high AC targets
13:57 Seelah
16:25 Djali (MC)
Note: In the video clips, I used footage from both the real run and a test save. The latter can be identified by the different character portrait and the presence of a boar as the animal companion.
In the (hastily made) Camellia demoralize clip, the buffs were badly applied. Using Magic Weapon on a masterwork weapon, especially for a Vital Striker, is an utter waste of a spell. Meanwhile, my main character would have benefited a lot from the +1 to AB. - Hry
Love the art and the info. Look forward to your next videos
Would love to see a bit more explanation of the charts. Awesome detail and script.
I plan to correct and update the graphs, as I found a mistake. Once done, I'll post them in the video description and add explanatory notes.
Amazing level of detail in this video, very interesting. I hope you can find the time to continue the series, it must be a lot of work to put it all together!
Very interesting video.
I love it when people go into depth, explaining why and how they made their decisions.
Clearly a lot of effort went into creating all those spreadsheets!
Horses are certainly not the best animal companions overall, but they arguably are the best for mounting. The issue with riders on mounts whose starting size is medium is that the size increase applied at level 7 is applied as a size modifier, not a base size increase. This modifier does not stack with other modifiers. You will notice casting animal growth on a level 7 dog, for example, does not change its size, whereas it will increase the size of a horse.
Consequently, if you ride anything other than a horse and use a size increasing spell, you have to have a size modifier on the spell 1 category larger than on the rider, so legendary proportions on the companion and enlarge person on the rider for example. This obviously means you can never ride a non horse using legendary proportions on the rider, which adds significant damage between the strength increase and increase in base weapon damage.
Fair point. I focused on early-game, so I didn't go in depth into late-game considerations, but this is something well worth mentioning.
Honestly, with all the changes in the last patch, I might make a new, more general video sometime in the future. Maybe when I get to selecting a mount for Seelah (I decided to keep her full paladin for the Shield Maze after all, to keep the choice flexible). (Edit: I thought this reply was to the Animal Companion video).
As for being the best, it’s a trade-off: tankiness and auto-trip on the animal companion versus more damage on the rider.
Also if you already use Frightful Aspect over Legendary Proportions on the rider, there’s obviously no issue.
So it depends.
If I have the ability to buff the rider with Frightful Aspect, I would in many cases prefer the Riding Dog on the current patch (or Boar in the last one). Trip is good, and the Frightful Aspect and Dirge auras can be (or used to be) unreliable* in some dungeons; having Frightful Aspect on the Shatter Defenses melee character themselves guarantees it’s applied to the enemy they're targeting.
*Corners and elevation changes can prevent the aura from applying correctly, sometimes only working when right next to the enemy. This issue affects not just Dirge of Doom, which requires line of sight, but also sometimes Frightful Aspect. At least, that was my experience when I played about two years ago. It would need further testing.
Can you put full sohei build i was thinking of playing it in my unfair run i have not seen any mc builds for unfair that are not oracle/witch/divine hound/mutation warrior and what mythic path would you go for sohei thanks.
I planned a standard ranged Sohei build with some tech in Act 1, which I'll discuss later in my actual playthrough.
The key breakpoints for Sohei are levels 6, 11, and 12:
At level 6, you can use Flurry of Blows with weapons from your Weapon Training group, gaining +1 attack at full BAB, +2 with Ki: Extra Attack.
At level 11, you get an additional attack from Flurry of Blows.
At level 12, you gain another Weapon Training group.
After this, switch to a different class that boosts attack bonus and damage for your extra attacks. Demonslayer and Mutation Warrior are common choices. A three-level dip into Sacred Huntmaster can also be good for Outflank, Hunter's Tactics, pet continuation, and extra initiative.
For mythic paths, Aeon, Demon, and Trickster are viable options, with Trickster into Legend being optimal. If you go Legend, ensure you take Mythic Deadly Aim at your second mythic rank, as you lose all other Mythic Abilties and Mythic Deadly Aim is a ton of damage with Legend BAB.
For class progression, a likely pattern is:
11/12 Sohei > 3 Huntmaster > 1 Demonslayer > 5 Mutation Warrior > remaining levels in Demonslayer (> 1 flex level.}
Choosing between level 11 or 12 depends on your weapon choice. I considered three paths:
Composite Longbow:
Least feat-intensive and thus best early on.
High cap with Killing Blow (half mobility to damage Longbow). Legend get's 20 extra levels of skill points after all.
Throwing Axes:
Works with Skald's Lethal Stance and Lethal Accuracy, synergizing with Trickster Feats.
More feat-intensive, requiring both ranged and two-weapon fighting feats.
Suggested path: pick Weapon Training (Bow) at level 6, then pick Weapon Training (Throwing Weapons) at Sohei 12 or MW 5. (Level pattern 6 Sohei > 5 MW > 5 Sohei)
Afterward, focus on crit feats and remaining two-weapon fighting and ranged feats. Once your Legend you can get everything and cap out.
Javelins:
Requires Advanced Weapon Training: Effortless Dual Wielding to use two-weapon fighting with Javelins, available as a feat once you reach MW 5.
Advantage: Bane Javelin available in Drezen, which synergizes with multiple attacks.
Race and Background:
Normally, choose Pickpocket or Mhanwi Hunter if you use Throwing Weapons.
Kitsune used to be good for Master Shapeshifter interaction, but now it's any polymorph spell will proc it (like Animal Aspect). So no reason to go Kitsune unless you already made character art for it.
Human is (as always) superior: dump CHA and INT (Human gets a free extra skill), and aim for 16 STR, 19 DEX, 12 CON, and 14 WIS (or mb it's 12 WIS and CON, to lazy to count).
Another interesting build:
Child of the Manticore (4) into Sohei (11) into Mutation Warrior. Tehnically a ranged Sohei build. Haven't looked deep into this.
@@DjaliPlays Thanks will do.