Public Pastes
BitBucket - Backup your code in the cloud! Host unlimited private projects, for free. SIGN UP takes 10 seconds, and it's free!
SHARE
TWEET

Why Pathfinder Gunslingers suck

a guest Aug 21st, 2015 214 Never
  1. Gunslingers as a concept are pretty bitchin', but as a class are not so much. Before I go into the Cons of thw Gunslinger, allow me to list its Pros.
  2.  
  3. Pros:
  4. You can be any alignment (roleplay to your heart's content)
  5. Full BAB class.
  6. D10 hit dice
  7. 2 good saves (Fortitude and Reflex)
  8. Only 2 important Ability scores needed (Dexterity and Wisdom, the latter of which helps make up for the poor Will save)
  9. Start with a free weapon
  10. Good average starting wealth
  11. Proficient in all Simple, Martial weapons and Firearms
  12. Proficient in light armors
  13. You can use bucklers without penalty when shooting one- or two-handed firearms
  14. Nimble dodge bonuses
  15. Bonus Feats
  16. Nice variety of skills and decent Skill ranks per level
  17.  
  18. And now we get to the
  19.  
  20. Cons:
  21.  
  22. Guns. Guns are fucking atrocious in Pathfinder. The main, nay, /only/ reason to play as a Gunslinger, and it sucks. Let me count the ways...
  23. * guns are expensive. A basic pistol costs 1000 gold pieces, 500 gp to build. You can get a composite longbow of +4 Strength for the build price, or +9 strength for the buy cost.
  24. * ammo is expensive. With the Gunsmithing feat and Gunsmith's kit, you're looking at 11 gp to make 10 bullets. If you have Craft:Alchemy you can make 10 paper cartridges which reload faster (and increase misfire chance, more on that later) for 60 gp. 10 arrows costs 5 sp to buy, 10 crossbow bolts cost 1 gp.
  25. * guns do flat damage. Unless it's the one specific type of gun you choose for Gun training (which adds Dex mod to damage), or pick the Pistolero/Musket Master archetypes, which get Dex mod to damage +1 damage every few levels.
  26. * guns have piss-poor range. No seriously, 20 ft range increments for a basic pistol. That's lower than most races can move in a round. The range increment for a Composite Longbow is 110 ft. Early firearms also only have 5 increments total, as opposed to the normal 10. If you're lucky you can have Advanced firearms which have 10 increments.
  27. * guns target touch AC, but only in the first range increment. As mentioned above, with the piss-poor range you're likely targeting normal AC along with all applicable range-based penalties. Advanced firearms do, however, target Touch AC out to 5 increments.
  28. * misfire chance. It's not enough to only auto fail attacks on a Nat 1, oh no, some guns have to auto fail on a number of natural rolls. And even those that do only Misfire on a Nat 1, well, I hope you didn't use an alchemical cartridge, cuz those increase misfire chances. If you misfire once it also increases the misfire chance. If you have Gun Training in that /one particular/ kind of gun it only goes up by 2. Otherwise it now goes up 4. So suppose you had a Double-Barreled musket, which has a natural misfire chance of 1-3, used a paper cartridge, had already misfired and did not have gun training on the Double-Barreled musket. Now a roll of 1-8 misfires. And since in this example it had previously misfired, it causes your gun to...
  29. * Explode. Yup, your gun can explode. And not just in a "well now it's useless" explosion. Nope, it hurts you and everything else in the listed radius. And then is useless. Magic guns are not exempt from exploding, oh no, they still do, but at least they don't get destroyed. Just need to cast a "Make Whole" spell or spending an hour fixing it.
  30. * feats/abilities/ etc. only apply to a single specific type of Firearm. Gun training? Better choose between that dagger pistol and pepperbox which one you want extra damage in. Want to Weapon Focus on the Coat Pistol and Double-Barreled pistol? Spend 2 feats. Want to Rapid Reload a musket and Double-Barreled musket? Spend 2 feats. It's amazing that the addition of a barrel slows my ability to reload said barrel. Not even crossbows are this ridiculous. Rapid Reload (Light Crossbow) let's me rapidly reload normal, underwater and repeating light crossbows. And speaking of Rapid Reload...
  31. * Rapid Reload doesn't work on Advanced Firearms. They always take a move action to reload. Always.
  32. * because there are no "light" firearms, by RAW if you dual-wield two one-handed firearms, even with Two Weapon Fighting, you will be, at best, a -4 penalty on each attack.
  33.  
  34. If you were thinking of playing a Gunslinger, don't. Play something useful instead, like a Zen Archer.
RAW Paste Data
Top