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Pathfinder Eats Scared Bab's WIS Score, News at 11

Feb 13th, 2019
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  1. Hello, if someone could make my decisions for me so I can stop thinking about Pathfinder when I ought to focus on catching up with schoolwork, I'd appreciate that. If not, don't fret, and maybe reading this will be of vague interest anyway!
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  3. A little campaign we were playing in Pathfinder 2e Playtest recently converted over to Pathfinder 1e, using Elephant in the Room feat tax rules and Unchained Action Economy. There might be some sort of automatic advancement to account for the fact that we're a poor and slightly stupid party who may not be able to eat magic items for dinner, but we'll see. I played a harpy named Wren who was a monk with no ki and a DEX emphasis. So, there are a few considerations when traveling back in edition.
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  5. ★The other party members are a kobold Sorcerer and a goblin Bard. So, as the only martial, Wren has to be able to do martial things like maneuvers, and consistent damage, and not dying. I don't have a gameplay goal or theme for her besides 1) those things, which means she needs decent enough AC and probably a Will boost, 2) being a purely unarmed/somewhat feral fighter (preferably unarmored as well but light is fine, though the Brawling enchantment isn't happening anytime soon), and 3) the fact that she used Tiger Stance and a bit of grappling in the playtest. Neither the Sorcerer nor Bard have particularly good Wisdom, and it makes sense for Wren to be more informally educated/intuitive, so she handles Perception and Survival too (she used to be trained in Medicine but critically failed 2/3 out of 5/6 Treat Wounds checks, forcing us to rely on generous potions we found, and now Heal isn't as useful, sooo Wands of CLW time).
  6. ★Because she has no ki/magic, having specifically avoided those feats in the playtest, Unchained Monk is right out, while Chained Monk's martial archetypes get to deal with 3/4 BAB and infamously poor efficacy. Being purely unarmed, it was suggested by my DM that she take Brawler, which means needing light armor - but I can flavor that away, and Brawler is neat and good, even if I have to write down a bunch of things to flex into.
  7. The trouble is that I can't shake the feeling that the various unarmed Fighter archetypes might be good alternatives, or that the Master of Many Styles archetype might be a good dip, or even that I should ask to dip UnMonk with MoMS bolted onto it. Even UnRogue is on my mind for Finesse Training despite the fact that we have a Bard to be good at most things. We're only Lv 3 - pure Brawler is what I should stick with for now, right? She'd get WIS to unarmored AC and maybe bonuses to maneuvers with a monk dip, but ChMonk would more or less ruin her BAB for feat qualifying, and UnMonk wouldn't do anything for her Will save, and multiclassing in general is probably a bad idea at such a low level for such a new player. And yet it weighs on me. (Oh and she's Neutral (though my GM would probably allow Monk anyway), and it was ruled that her favored class bonus for Brawler could be 1/5 of a Fleet feat, and I was vaguely considering Cleric way in the future depending on how story goes, even though I should probably just roleplay faith rather than multiclassing, because I'm dumb)
  8. ★She's DEX-based (16+2) with middling STR, CON and WIS (14, 16-2, 14), average INT (9+1) to not lose skills, and bad CHA (7+1). But even though I value skills and not being too much of a dumb RP-wise, Brawler being able to ignore INT 13 requirements for feats and the possibility of getting DEX to damage through the Agile enchantment (much) later makes me itch to lower it and/or her STR. That stat spread should be okay, right? Because I can't really justify removing the racial CHA drop, and 25 point buy only stretches so far. (Race in the middle, for the curious. Yes, my GM is okay with a fly speed. https://docs.google.com/document/d/154Lfg-5r8eZxfOhrnsXBvCJzPhLhjHrg4La2TF7rn94 )
  9. ★Wren fights with her talon/claws. Mechanically, her race as I figured it gets two claw natural attacks and they deal the same damage as talons: 1d4. I'm pretty sure they don't scale like her unarmed strikes do, they can't be included in Brawler's Flurry except with Feral Combat Training (not RAW but again, GM isn't a stickler), they're secondary to unarmed strikes except with a feat...etc, etc. They're bad, and even worse in Unchained Action Economy, and I asked to simply count my unarmed strikes as having the option to deal slash damage so her main/only weapons are useful mechanically, which was accepted. But for some reason I can't help but continue to wonder how I could include natural attacks along with "real" unarmed strikes using feats and full attacks or whatever, even though everything suggests I should just stick to unarmed. So tell me I'm not throwing away a super useful boon when I treat her talons as unarmed strikes and give up the natural attacks, I guess?
  10. ★Elephant in the Room means I get a bunch of feats for free - Power Attack, Combat Expertise, Weapon Finesse, Improved Grapple tied to Improved Unarmed Strike, and Mobility (if I take Dodge for the first bonus feat, which I likely will). Other than that first bonus feat, she gets two from level, I believe. The new Deft/Powerful Maneuvers feats are a decent bargain for a Brawler since she can flex into one of the Greater maneuvers on a whim, but Pummeling(/Jabbing?) Style and Crane Style are important too, Agile Maneuvers is a thing, and people I asked before kept throwing new things like Piranha Strike and Throat Slicer on the pile, and then there's general helpful defensive "we are a small party" things like Iron Will and Combat Reflexes. Oh, and knowing what to actually *take* and what to save for Martial Flexibility. It's a little overwhelming.
  11. ★Oh yeah, traits. She was raised by at least one dwarf, possibly also others, all in slight poverty in a tiny village, so Adopted (Hardy) and Survival proficiency is a no-brainer. She's also bad at improving people's opinions of her because that's her goal through actions, she has bad CHA anyway, and her upbringing had other things to worry about.
  12. Last one's a slight mystery, though. I should probably improve her Will save but it feels a little cheap/powergamey to do so, even though there's a slight religious element to her backstory (she vaguely follows Sarenrae for the hope of "redemption" from being a monster in the eyes of most people, and willingly joined an Iomedean priestess in town to help her out, being given robes and everything - she's not a savage, just a little brash and unaware of certain conventions). Also there are apparently traits which help with flat-footedness when surprised, or other combat things, or maybe those were feats, or not that important anyway?? Is reflavoring traits gross? Should I prioritize her Will or combat stuff?
  13. ★And oh yeah, she has +1 wraps of mighty strikes carried over from 2e, which are helpful but a lot less powerful now. There are certain feats which add more of your STR to damage or make your unarmed damage die improve, just to make the question of feats a little more of a thonker. She might have the WIS to make Stunning Fist work? Maybe not??
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  15. So yeah please tell me to just do what I know I could do but am too indecisive/munchkiny to accept. Or tell me that what I'm doing is dumb or done without the knowledge of x better alternatives I should take as a newish player. Or don't tell me anything! Any of that's fine! Hope y'all have a lovely day, I might answer a question or two if those come up but I'll try to push Pathfinder out of my mind and actually work now. Sorry for being bad. ~w~;
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