1 level in oracle, select nature's whisper's which turns your dex AC to charisma AC, it stacks with scaled fist. 1 level of stigmatized witch for iceplant +2AC and familiar +1AC 1 level in barbarian, get the rage greatsword that gives AC when enraged. Not the ability, the sword. Or skip barbarian and get the monk kama that gives +1 AC
Not sure if you are aware of the scaled fist, rogue paladin build (usually then taking duelist), but you get charisma to save conversion from 2 levels of paladin + can smite to add charisma to AC against one tough enemy, on top of the scaled fist bonus. Rogue allows debilitating strike to boost your effective AC by 4, and doesnt rely on a full attack action, and also gives uncanny dodge, which is extremely important to not being very killable if you lose the initiative role. Weapon finesse and finesse training also allows you dump strength as you use dex for AB damage instead. Still use scaled fist for adding charisma to AC, and to unlock crane style feats. All this requires only 7 levels, you can then do a variety of things, but duelist is popular for additional bonuses to defensive fighting and for int to armour conversion. Sword saint offers shield at a much higher caster level, mirror image and other useful personal buffs, and cast their own mage armour (again, much higher level than pots or scrolls), as well as int to AC conversion. Halflings also get dex and charisma modifiers, + 1 size bonus, + a racial feat that with no level requirement that adds +2 to defensive fighting, and unlike wings applies to all attacks AND gets some nice save bonuses. Also, not sure alchemist dip adds much in practice. A level 1 casting of shield will last 1 minute only, and be extremely easy to dispel. The mutagen lasts 10 minutes. This will require ALOT of additional rest spam to keep these bonuses up all the time, especially when travelling on the world map. Also, you definitely want to take weapon finesse in your build, you are leaving a silly amount of AB on the table, and your AC bonus from style strike requires you to actually hit the target.
just a tip, at only +8 to will saves you will end up taking nasty debuffs quite a lot and lose all of your dodge bonus regularly to quite a lot of enemies in the game, recommend dipping into monk and going paladin or armored oracle with nature revelation for charisma stacking to AC which stacks with scaled fist monk AC. can dip paladin or dip oracle on top of monk dip and stick to paladins to also add charisma modifier to saves and become immune to some annoying debuffs from pure paladin bonusses. paladin gets most of their goodies by level 15 so you can dip quite a bit, on top of which paladins get a lot of useful self buffs and are almost tailor made for this campaign full of demons. when you stack angel buffs on top of it later on you become a complete melee wrecking ball once sword of heaven is up. a melee wrecking ball that's really hard to kill as well.
Dip Oracle nature path for the natural whispers to use cha instead of dex for ac with scaled fist you get your cha twice so you can focus more on cha instead
This plus some paladin dips and 1 HK dip, you will get CHA to AC 4 times. With archmage armor, mirror image and displacement, this guy can become a dedicated boss hugger who drinks cup of tea while the boss tries to kill him.
One way that the same character you built could have more AC, would be to take the trickster path and go for the Use Items greater mythic trick. This would give you a full wizard spellbook, allowing you to cast things like Seamantle on yourself. Seamantle alone would give you another +8 AC, and you could also use ice body or fiery body, and/ or Dragonkind III for another boost (and also would be able to properly cast mage armor without needing a wand or potion).
Instead of dipping into paladin and/or vivisectionist, a cheesy build to get even higher AC on a permanent basis would be to embrace chaotic decisions, and as soon as you leave behind lawfulness, you take two levels of Instinctual Warrior barbarian (you can always go back to your original alignment with a scroll of atonement). That way dexterity, charisma AND wisdom add to your AC - Cat's Grace, Eagle's Splendor and Owl's Wisdom buffs will really help you out not getting hit. ;) OFC you can also do it the other way around, and go lawful from a neutral alignment, to grab one level of scaled fist, if you prefer a more chaotic, weapon-reliant, focussed rage lifestyle. WIS-monk and instinctual warrior AC bonus do not stack, but with scaled fist CHA bonus the multi-class works like a charm, but it involves alignment cheesing.
Idk if Profane is bugged but it seems to always give +6 to your 2nd highest stat and +4 to your highest It does say it gives a bonus to your highest stat, and I have never been able to choose the stats from that buff specifically, during a quest you are rewarded with the ability to obtain a selectable buff but that is through an ability gifted to you which is togglable
You can use another trick, which I am uncertain if it is considered abuse. You can start neutral alignment and pick barb instinctual warrior, to get wisdom to AC, then alwasy pick lawful choices and fairly quickly alignment will shift to lawful neutral, at which point we can put levels in monk traditional for example. The wis to dex from inst. warrior and monk stack! So if you have +5 wisdom you will get +10 AC the moment you make the dip...
@@D4l4m4r I haven't personally tested it, but I saw it in a guide online, so I assume it is correct. I mean the guy boasted about having 108 AC build and this was his way. Now this could've been patched or somthing idk. Needs test I guess. However canny defence from swordsaint and canny defence from duelist stack 100% But this is hard to abuse, since you need high level on both of those clases
The highest AC builds that you can get revolves around a sword saint/duelist/monk/oracle build. You basically stack int and tripple dip that into AC: convert dex bonus to int bonus instead from oracle and double dipping into int bonus to AC through duelist and sword saint. Scaled fist (or any monk) gives you cheapest way to crane feats plus any charisma bonus to ac. If the only thing you care about is AC, the build would be something like: 1 scaled fist, 1 vivisectionist, 2 oracle, 1 duelist, (at least 1 stallwart defender), 14 sword saint. You can get 2 levels of paladin in there too for amazing save throws and smite evil like you mentioned. Be way though since the ac you get from sword saint is based off the ranks you have into the class. What this means is you can dump dex and wisdom at character creation, scale your AC off mainly INT + charisma, and scale strength for damage.
I had a similar idea for my build, Oracle Revelation under Nature Mystery called "Nature's Whispers" seems pretty good. Dumping DEX, and focusing on CHA. But now I've had second thoughts since you won't suffer AC penalty while wearing armour I wasn't sure which would be better, Scaled Fist or Heavy Armour/Shield. Given I'm planning a build for LG Angel playthrough for unfair, and I probably won't go SS since I want to combine Angel spellbooks with a divine class, so my idea is something ending up like this: 16 Oracle, 1 SF monk, 2 Paladin, 1 Stig Witch. You get max level pet and can combine spellbooks. Big problem I'm having is deciding between armour or monk since you need monk to learn dodge feat since you can't take it normally with dumped dex. If I choose to go with Heavy Armour I'd probably go a level in Thug instead of the monk and just be a Fear bot with max CHA spamming Dazzling display
that's a really bad build, you just need a dip into SF and paladin for oracle seeker , the most important thing with oracle is we can stack AC pretty much in cheaper cost, and smith to hit the boss on unfair and lastly merged our spell book with angel. You lose too much BAB and talents by dipping into several classes, also ss without perfect strike/high saves will die before you can even hit the special demons or bosses. i have several runs on solo unfair, can confirm that sf/divine guardian and then the rest oracle seeker is the best melee/tank class on highest difficulty, high BAB/AC/saves and some good spells, strong at early game, it can be online quicker than any saint or vivi build, you gotta remember, most of your struggles will come at act 3-4, then final act.
Since Owlcat overlooked some Paizo rules, you could have added a bunch of other archetypes and double or even triple-dipped Stat-to-AC. I don't like to play like that but at that point heavy armor builds are so far behind on AC even the bonuses on the gear and the need for less dips don't make up for it. TTT by Vex from the Discord helps to read some stuff Owlcat missed but I prefer to play Vanilla. EDIT: Went to see if you replied to this comment and noticed on the description you purposefully only dipped once. Well that does explain it.
@@justinadams1006 i know, and that is a long lasting bug, because it shouldn't. i just wanted to make the distinction, between crane style and the other crane feats, because i've seen a lot of people making the claim, that all 3 should only work with one single one handed weapon only.
Stack your attack stat (Str or Dex) Enhancement Bonus from belts/Bull's str, Size bonus from Enlarge/reduce person get Weapon Focus, Greater WF, Mythic Weapon Focus Two Weapon Fighting, Improved TWF, Mythic TWF Flawless Attack Mythic feat Use Bless/Prayer, Greater Magic Weapon, Heroism Battle Meditation Mythic Ability for your buffbot (that isn't really doing anything in fights anyways. looking at you Daeran) Distracting Shots for one of your characters with ranged attacks Ranging Shots and The Bigger They Are Mythic Abilities for archers Get Ember in there and use her Hexes: Evil Eye -2 AC, Misfortune makes them roll twice and take the worst, Fortune makes you roll twice and take the best. Use the Cackle Hex to prolong these other hexes as a move action. You can prehex your party members before engaging a fight with Defensive luck and Fortune, just use them on your party members and spam cackle like 10 times and they will have the buffs for 1+ minute In addition to all of that, the best tip I can give you is to roll a Brown Fur Transmuter Arcanist merc. The BFT can add a +2 bonus on any spell that modifies ability scores (+4 at lvl 20) meaning that your Bull's Strength now gives +6 Str and your Enlarge Person gives +4 str. Additionally at level 9 he can cast his self only Transmutation buffs on party members which opens up a whole world of ridiculous buffs to give to your attackers: Transformation gives them full a Base Attack Bonus just like if they were a fighter (this will give Camelia or Woljiff and extra 5 BAB at level 20 in addition to getting extra attacks), Hurricane Bow gives your bow a larger size dice. Form of the Dragon, Beast Shape and Elemental Body give huge boosts to stats. Angelic Aspect, Ice Body, Frightful Aspect, Flame Body are all amazing buffs you can cast on your buddies too
you can abuse domain zealot on your cleric. Making domain abilities swift action is redicilous. Combine with impossible domain. For example Sosiel can get domain zealot and impossible domain madness. Before the fight you can quickly apply touch of good visions of madness and fortune (I mean literally in 1 second) This is 6 + 6 + advantage on roll, on level 12... Buff and just charge with enchanted unit.. On level 20 this combo is +20 to hit with advantage on every hit for the round. You can add additional domain spells to this later ofc. My level 14 arushalae fully buffed has +42 to hit with deadly aim...
Hey @lorepsire can you make a video showing how all the mystic level 8/9 final transformation looks? (the extra visual effect that gets added when you confirm to stay with your respective mystic path, like the wings for the azada etc). I am thinking of taking the lich path, but right now i have no clue how the final effect makes my char look (and i dont want them to become ugly).
How does "threat" work in Pathfinder?? I've never actually learned. Base attack bonus is plus 12, on your dude. That won't hit a single demon in Act 6 unless it's a crit.
Anyone got a high AC build for a paladin character? It seems that just doing a standard paladin build with heavy armor wont net you too much AC compared to some of these other builds.
off of the top of my head..... if you want a straight 20 levels of paladin and you want to be able to tank on higher difficulties ( i think this would work on core but probably not for hard and almost certainly not for unfair) the best thing you can do is use mage armor instead of heavy armor, max out your dexterity/Charisma and take archmage armor (you will have to cast mage armor on yourself via scroll or potion to get the benefit of archmage armor).... put points into use magic device so you can use scrolls of shield and mirror image ( you can use an alchemist character w/infusion to provide shield but not mirror image). For feats take combat expertise, back to back (if you will have other melee party members) crane style (unless you decide to take a level of monk you will want the martial disciple background to get this), crane wing, crane riposte, dodge, and mythic dodge and wings (need to be aasimar for this). If you take the aeon mythic path the relativity gaze will help alot with tanking. Also if you use a witch and a shaman (or one character that multiclasses into both) you can double protective luck yourself.... I may be forgetting a couple of other things that could be helpful but all of this should give you quite a bit of ac and make it very difficult for enemies to hit you. You probably won't have alot of damage but if you take destructive shockwave then you will at least always deal your strength bonus in damage to smited enemies. Also, if you take the kitsune race and the master shapeshifter mythic ability you can get plus four to all physical stat scores which is probably more helpful than taking aasimar for the wings feat but that's up to you... If you dont mind level dipping then you can do all of this and also put 1 level into scaled fist monk and 1 level into oracle taking natures whisper to get double your charisma modifier as a bonus to your ac... if you take the level dip path then you don't need dex at all... you'll just want to max your charisma... this will definitely get you more survivability than the 20 levels of paladin.... if you want to stay more true to what a paladin is actually supposed to be then i think your best bet is to use a tower shield and light/medium/or no armor, max out your mobility skill, take all of the mount feats (except trample and maybe spirited charge), take shield focus, greater shield focus, mythic shield focus and get your dex as high as you can without exceeding the armor check penalty for whatever armor you plan to use.... Then tank while riding your mount which essentially makes your mount the tank but you'll be adding armor from your shield to your mount and you'll be negating damage your mount would take with your mobility checks.... These are the best options I'm aware of for tanking as a paladin. Hope this helped... if you want to tank on foot in heavy armor then check out this video - ruclips.net/video/6Kut1tigFYo/видео.html It for a tower shield specialist but i thin most everything in the video applies to a paladin as well except that you wont benefit nearly as much from dexterity so you can kep that at 10 or 12 instead of the 18 (i think) that we use in the video... also you'll want to max charisma as much as you can so that you get a bigger ac bonus from smite... also aeon may be the better mythic path choice for straight up melee survivability. bonus tip - if you use a brownfur transmuter you can cast legendary proportions on your tank for a sizeable ac boost from natural armor and if you do take the aeon mythic path you can use the size gaze to eliminate the size penalty it gives. again, hope all this helped
How does dipping in Paladin works for Mythics like Lich? I heard that if you pick your mythic class, alignment restriction doesn't count anymore, is this true? Or can you change your alignment after you picked all Mythic ranks and then revert back to Lawful Good, despite beeing a lich etc.?
@@rwulf Actually a good scaled fist tank build is viable to play from level 1, though are a bit of a liability for the shield maze. Basically, you dump strength, take 1 level scaled fist for access to crane style feats and AC from charisma, take 4 levels rogue to get weapon finesse and finesse training so you use dexterity in place of strength, and some sneak attack die. By level 4, you can actually melee for OK damage (use finean as a monk weapon and take finesse training in this for flurry of blows). Level 4 rogue gives bewildering injury and uncanny dodge, making you excellent against physical attacks. 2 levels pally then give you Charisma to saves and smite once per day, adding Charisma to AC twice and to AB, which is excellent for tough bosses. 7 levels, and you have all the tools you need to tank effectively. In wotr with archmage armour, you should probably then go sword saint for mage armour, shield and some other useful personal buffs, plus some nice enhancements to weapon damage and int bonus added to AC.
@@notalefty999 I said scaled fist combo, not scaled fist. Scaled fist pure build is pretty fun. it's the weird duelist+vivisectionist+random class here combos that you see everywhere are trash for actual play.
That magical vestments shouldn't stack with the mage armor bonus. It's an enhancment to armor bonus and you cant the Male armor spell and so if you enhance you shit increasing its armor bonus you cant stack two armor bonus. I can see them patching that.
Magic Vestements is an Enhancement bonus to armor, not another Armor bonus, it's functioning because you have an armor bonus. It's like how you can have an amulet of Natural armor & Barkskin [barkskin is an enhancement bonus to natural armor]
@@Zeusgodofstorms magic vestment doesnt work on mage armor. And it looks like they already patched it because it no longer works. Also it's an enhancement bonus to armor. Enhancment bonus arwnt a thing on their own. If you put a +5 enhancment bonus on a chain shirt you now have a 9 armor bonus. 4 from chain shirts base and 5 from the enhancment.
Interesting, but being able to use "Magical Vestment, Armor", when you are not actually wearing any armor seems like a bug... Edit: Well, actually looking it up, the spell can be cast on regular clothing, but if that is the case it should not stack with mage armor
@@justinadams1006 It is not that simple. Magical Vestment is an enhancement bonus to armor, not an enhancement bonus to AC (those do not exist). That means that it increase the armor bonus to AC, just like a magic armor (like a +2 leather) do. It is not a separate bonus to AC. Since it just increase the AC bonus of a piece of armor, it wont stack with mage armor, which don't track with other armor bonusus to AC. It also should not stack with the enhancement bonusus from magic armor (+x armor), like it currently do in the game. Or as quoted from the rules: "Enhancement bonuses apply to your armor to increase the armor bonus it provides."
@@Kris_Lighthawk That is the thing. Mage armor actually creates armor around the body. Armor of magic... Don't ask D&D logic. The same goes for the magic vestment shield with shield spell, while not having an actual item shield
@@zyfryth No, mage armor dont create actual armor around the body it makes "An invisible but tangible field of force" There is no way you can cast magic vestment on that. Same goes for the shield spell.
@@Kris_Lighthawk I am not that much into the ruleset. Maybe you are right, but that has always been the case in Pathfidner Kingmaker. And this one has Definitive edition, supposedly this is not a bug, but idk
Crazy bosses have like a +60 and more to attack , so they can hit you at AC 80+, but mostly you are just invulnerable to normal attacks, especially with more buffs, like Displacement / Mirror Image and so on.
@@doellison As someone who plays Hard/unfair it definitely takes prebuffing to make boss or even harder fights possible even with meta builds. Best thing I find with meta builds is how little resources it takes to clear the smaller fights.
@@WompWompNootNoot Hey newbie here, what's the play for harder difficulty to get through the content is it going full on dmg party and kill them before they kill you or is it with high ac tank with the rest of your party being supps/dmg/healer?
So with Legendary I was able to get to 98 AC, but I took a few random levels at the end for only about a 3 AC extra boost. With Legendary you get 40 levels +3 Mythic (but only 2 mythic feats) I was the Aasimar that gives +2 to Dexterity and Wisdom (I don't know why you want the Charisma Monk, Will saves are Wisdom based) went 20 Levels Monk, then I went mixed blood Sorcerer (Picking up the Serpentine bloodline for +1 natural armor) and then Dragon Disciple 7 levels. I finished up mostly with sorcerer till I got Elemental Body IV for More Dex boost. I took some random levels at the end, Witch was the only helpful one (Lizard familiar gives +1, Ice hex for +2 Natural Armor) I then had the party cast buff spells like Legendary proportions Mythic abilities were Mage armor one and Master Shapeshifter (+4 dex is better than the +1 from mythic dodge) In regards to what I think I understand now, I do think trying to get an armor Class of around 70 is ideal, but 60 is workable. I think Monk 20 Slayer 19, and maybe Wizard/Sorcerer for some shield/mage armor casting would be ideal for the last battle/Area with legendary. If you are a fighter, range or melee class make sure to invest in blindfighting for the final battle, truesight is not sufficient. Also there is a handaxe you could get improved critical for (which would then crit on 15-20) called Peacemaker or something that denies enemies dexterity to their AC that could be amazing for fighter build main characters to help their allies hit the high AC enemies. Haven't tried it yet though.
awesome!! thanks for adding that Kaylan... yeah this could definitely be updated to add alot more ac.. I've learned alot of tricks since I put this out, but what is shown here is more than enough AC for most people. Also, THanks for the supports!
whats the third sylvan trickster level for? finesse training or the additional sneak attack dice? or is there another reason? 2 levels are enough for the hex ac bonus.
@@MuppetLord1 okay. i was thinking about a natural attack build with this combination, so that i can ignore the two weapon fighting line and instead go the intimidation line. but then i couldn't use finesse training... but going kukri with elemental barrage would further increase the damage output... but mutation warrior instead of vivi could give me more accuracy and bab...
@@mahe4 Aye, I prefer mutation warrior as a pure 20 build tho for the increased critical multiplier at the end + mutation warrior gets its upgrades to mutagens later than normal vivi anyways so would feel very slow to get better mutagens if multiclassing as well. :)
You have to remember, of course you'll get more AC by dipping or multiclassing build, but you have to considerate what'll you get from sacrificing class progression/talent, most importantly, BA progression. and then, having high AC important, but AC it's useless if you dont have enough saves or cant damage/hit the demons.
Why would you build for stupidly high AC though? UI mean, a solo run, sure, but any run where you have anybody else with your character... after 3 rounds, the enemy instantly abandons you and heads for somebody they can actually hit. You want them hitting less than 15% of the time, and to have as high a DR as possible with easy regeneration.
Probably just to see how far they can go. I did similar in 5e with Tabaxis and speed buffs. My Tabaxi Sorcerer/Warlock ended up with a speed of 320 ft per move and could move 2-3 times a round while still casting spells. Now realistically would you ever need that much speed? Nope. Never went more than 300 ft. But is it fun to say you can move 1,460 ft (dimension door after moving) in one round? Yes, it is.
Step 1: dont wear any type of armor... Step 2: monk dip and profit I mean come on, why heavy armor is so shity in this game, armored guy with shield will never be better than a stupid naked guy, is just not immersive
supposedly there's a mod that adds some AC ramp feats for actual armor so you're not just taking archmage and armor potions on everybody. Tabletop tweaks I think. Not sure what else it changes.
Why should bulky heavy armor be better in a fantasy world full of magic and supernatural stuff? I guess since they have the mythic ability for mage armor they can add one that give you unlimed dex bonus in any armor. That would mythic fullplate on equal footing with mythic mage armor.
Because Owlcat never bother to implement Pathfinder rules correctly lots of feats are missing for armor buffs -Master Armorer -Critical Deflection -Armored Master -Armored Sacrifice -Armor Specialization etc. thats why a naked chimp can outtank a full plate knight...
In kingmaker already played way to many naked chimp tanks, wanted to try something else and also i really enjoy how armor changes the characters looks or that they have special abilities, the sad thing of naked tanks is that you are no longer excited for new loot (except for rings or amulets that just add numbers to ac and can not be seen)
He already mentioned dipping into Paladin for extra Smite Evil AC, & even 2 levels of Paladin allows you to add your Charisma modifier to all saving throws. If you’re already stacking Charisma for the AC boost & already a Lawful alignment for monk, you may as well take the 2 levels in Paladin.
1 level in oracle, select nature's whisper's which turns your dex AC to charisma AC, it stacks with scaled fist.
1 level of stigmatized witch for iceplant +2AC and familiar +1AC
1 level in barbarian, get the rage greatsword that gives AC when enraged. Not the ability, the sword. Or skip barbarian and get the monk kama that gives +1 AC
Do you know if this Oracle trick still works? It's not seeming to when I select the feat?
actually, 1 level dip of stigmatized witch gives you a total of 5AC with that ring from chapter 1, and you get to cast mage armor on yourself.
Not sure if you are aware of the scaled fist, rogue paladin build (usually then taking duelist), but you get charisma to save conversion from 2 levels of paladin + can smite to add charisma to AC against one tough enemy, on top of the scaled fist bonus. Rogue allows debilitating strike to boost your effective AC by 4, and doesnt rely on a full attack action, and also gives uncanny dodge, which is extremely important to not being very killable if you lose the initiative role. Weapon finesse and finesse training also allows you dump strength as you use dex for AB damage instead. Still use scaled fist for adding charisma to AC, and to unlock crane style feats. All this requires only 7 levels, you can then do a variety of things, but duelist is popular for additional bonuses to defensive fighting and for int to armour conversion. Sword saint offers shield at a much higher caster level, mirror image and other useful personal buffs, and cast their own mage armour (again, much higher level than pots or scrolls), as well as int to AC conversion.
Halflings also get dex and charisma modifiers, + 1 size bonus, + a racial feat that with no level requirement that adds +2 to defensive fighting, and unlike wings applies to all attacks AND gets some nice save bonuses.
Also, not sure alchemist dip adds much in practice. A level 1 casting of shield will last 1 minute only, and be extremely easy to dispel. The mutagen lasts 10 minutes. This will require ALOT of additional rest spam to keep these bonuses up all the time, especially when travelling on the world map. Also, you definitely want to take weapon finesse in your build, you are leaving a silly amount of AB on the table, and your AC bonus from style strike requires you to actually hit the target.
just a tip, at only +8 to will saves you will end up taking nasty debuffs quite a lot and lose all of your dodge bonus regularly to quite a lot of enemies in the game, recommend dipping into monk and going paladin or armored oracle with nature revelation for charisma stacking to AC which stacks with scaled fist monk AC. can dip paladin or dip oracle on top of monk dip and stick to paladins to also add charisma modifier to saves and become immune to some annoying debuffs from pure paladin bonusses. paladin gets most of their goodies by level 15 so you can dip quite a bit, on top of which paladins get a lot of useful self buffs and are almost tailor made for this campaign full of demons. when you stack angel buffs on top of it later on you become a complete melee wrecking ball once sword of heaven is up. a melee wrecking ball that's really hard to kill as well.
Dip Oracle nature path for the natural whispers to use cha instead of dex for ac with scaled fist you get your cha twice so you can focus more on cha instead
This plus some paladin dips and 1 HK dip, you will get CHA to AC 4 times. With archmage armor, mirror image and displacement, this guy can become a dedicated boss hugger who drinks cup of tea while the boss tries to kill him.
One way that the same character you built could have more AC, would be to take the trickster path and go for the Use Items greater mythic trick. This would give you a full wizard spellbook, allowing you to cast things like Seamantle on yourself. Seamantle alone would give you another +8 AC, and you could also use ice body or fiery body, and/ or Dragonkind III for another boost (and also would be able to properly cast mage armor without needing a wand or potion).
Trickster path as a monk. Seems innovative.
Dont you need to be lawful for scaled fist ? trickster is limited to chaotic alignements.
Instead of dipping into paladin and/or vivisectionist, a cheesy build to get even higher AC on a permanent basis would be to embrace chaotic decisions, and as soon as you leave behind lawfulness, you take two levels of Instinctual Warrior barbarian (you can always go back to your original alignment with a scroll of atonement). That way dexterity, charisma AND wisdom add to your AC - Cat's Grace, Eagle's Splendor and Owl's Wisdom buffs will really help you out not getting hit. ;) OFC you can also do it the other way around, and go lawful from a neutral alignment, to grab one level of scaled fist, if you prefer a more chaotic, weapon-reliant, focussed rage lifestyle. WIS-monk and instinctual warrior AC bonus do not stack, but with scaled fist CHA bonus the multi-class works like a charm, but it involves alignment cheesing.
Idk if Profane is bugged but it seems to always give +6 to your 2nd highest stat and +4 to your highest
It does say it gives a bonus to your highest stat, and I have never been able to choose the stats from that buff specifically, during a quest you are rewarded with the ability to obtain a selectable buff but that is through an ability gifted to you which is togglable
You can use another trick, which I am uncertain if it is considered abuse. You can start neutral alignment and pick barb instinctual warrior, to get wisdom to AC, then alwasy pick lawful choices and fairly quickly alignment will shift to lawful neutral, at which point we can put levels in monk traditional for example. The wis to dex from inst. warrior and monk stack! So if you have +5 wisdom you will get +10 AC the moment you make the dip...
WIs to AC from Instictual warrior does to my knowledge not stack with Wis to AC form Monk. Have you tested that?
@@D4l4m4r I haven't personally tested it, but I saw it in a guide online, so I assume it is correct. I mean the guy boasted about having 108 AC build and this was his way. Now this could've been patched or somthing idk. Needs test I guess. However canny defence from swordsaint and canny defence from duelist stack 100% But this is hard to abuse, since you need high level on both of those clases
@@D4l4m4r I have and it does
The highest AC builds that you can get revolves around a sword saint/duelist/monk/oracle build.
You basically stack int and tripple dip that into AC: convert dex bonus to int bonus instead from oracle and double dipping into int bonus to AC through duelist and sword saint.
Scaled fist (or any monk) gives you cheapest way to crane feats plus any charisma bonus to ac.
If the only thing you care about is AC, the build would be something like: 1 scaled fist, 1 vivisectionist, 2 oracle, 1 duelist, (at least 1 stallwart defender), 14 sword saint.
You can get 2 levels of paladin in there too for amazing save throws and smite evil like you mentioned. Be way though since the ac you get from sword saint is based off the ranks you have into the class.
What this means is you can dump dex and wisdom at character creation, scale your AC off mainly INT + charisma, and scale strength for damage.
I had a similar idea for my build, Oracle Revelation under Nature Mystery called "Nature's Whispers" seems pretty good. Dumping DEX, and focusing on CHA. But now I've had second thoughts since you won't suffer AC penalty while wearing armour I wasn't sure which would be better, Scaled Fist or Heavy Armour/Shield.
Given I'm planning a build for LG Angel playthrough for unfair, and I probably won't go SS since I want to combine Angel spellbooks with a divine class, so my idea is something ending up like this: 16 Oracle, 1 SF monk, 2 Paladin, 1 Stig Witch.
You get max level pet and can combine spellbooks.
Big problem I'm having is deciding between armour or monk since you need monk to learn dodge feat since you can't take it normally with dumped dex. If I choose to go with Heavy Armour I'd probably go a level in Thug instead of the monk and just be a Fear bot with max CHA spamming Dazzling display
that's a really bad build, you just need a dip into SF and paladin for oracle seeker , the most important thing with oracle is we can stack AC pretty much in cheaper cost, and smith to hit the boss on unfair and lastly merged our spell book with angel. You lose too much BAB and talents by dipping into several classes, also ss without perfect strike/high saves will die before you can even hit the special demons or bosses. i have several runs on solo unfair, can confirm that sf/divine guardian and then the rest oracle seeker is the best melee/tank class on highest difficulty, high BAB/AC/saves and some good spells, strong at early game, it can be online quicker than any saint or vivi build, you gotta remember, most of your struggles will come at act 3-4, then final act.
1 level dip into oracle can replace charisma with dexterity for AC which stacks with AC from scaled fist. Less MAD build.
Solid guide, good explanation of all stuff to get bonuses
Since Owlcat overlooked some Paizo rules, you could have added a bunch of other archetypes and double or even triple-dipped Stat-to-AC. I don't like to play like that but at that point heavy armor builds are so far behind on AC even the bonuses on the gear and the need for less dips don't make up for it. TTT by Vex from the Discord helps to read some stuff Owlcat missed but I prefer to play Vanilla.
EDIT: Went to see if you replied to this comment and noticed on the description you purposefully only dipped once. Well that does explain it.
I believe crane wing actually works with 2 handed weapons, it was that way in kingmaker and I've heard it hasn't changed.
It works even if you’re using two weapons. Like a sword and a shield…
crane style should work with or without bugs.
the followup crane feats shouldn't
@@mahe4 Crane Wing (currently) works with both a two-handed weapon, and when wielding a shield. Including a tower-shield.
@@justinadams1006 i know, and that is a long lasting bug, because it shouldn't.
i just wanted to make the distinction, between crane style and the other crane feats, because i've seen a lot of people making the claim, that all 3 should only work with one single one handed weapon only.
I love your portrait
What id like to know is how to build +hit.
Seriously whats the point of having 6 attacks when 4-5 always miss.
Stack your attack stat (Str or Dex) Enhancement Bonus from belts/Bull's str, Size bonus from Enlarge/reduce person
get Weapon Focus, Greater WF, Mythic Weapon Focus
Two Weapon Fighting, Improved TWF, Mythic TWF
Flawless Attack Mythic feat
Use Bless/Prayer, Greater Magic Weapon, Heroism
Battle Meditation Mythic Ability for your buffbot (that isn't really doing anything in fights anyways. looking at you Daeran)
Distracting Shots for one of your characters with ranged attacks
Ranging Shots and The Bigger They Are Mythic Abilities for archers
Get Ember in there and use her Hexes: Evil Eye -2 AC, Misfortune makes them roll twice and take the worst, Fortune makes you roll twice and take the best. Use the Cackle Hex to prolong these other hexes as a move action. You can prehex your party members before engaging a fight with Defensive luck and Fortune, just use them on your party members and spam cackle like 10 times and they will have the buffs for 1+ minute
In addition to all of that, the best tip I can give you is to roll a Brown Fur Transmuter Arcanist merc. The BFT can add a +2 bonus on any spell that modifies ability scores (+4 at lvl 20) meaning that your Bull's Strength now gives +6 Str and your Enlarge Person gives +4 str.
Additionally at level 9 he can cast his self only Transmutation buffs on party members which opens up a whole world of ridiculous buffs to give to your attackers: Transformation gives them full a Base Attack Bonus just like if they were a fighter (this will give Camelia or Woljiff and extra 5 BAB at level 20 in addition to getting extra attacks), Hurricane Bow gives your bow a larger size dice. Form of the Dragon, Beast Shape and Elemental Body give huge boosts to stats. Angelic Aspect, Ice Body, Frightful Aspect, Flame Body are all amazing buffs you can cast on your buddies too
you can abuse domain zealot on your cleric. Making domain abilities swift action is redicilous. Combine with impossible domain. For example Sosiel can get domain zealot and impossible domain madness. Before the fight you can quickly apply touch of good visions of madness and fortune (I mean literally in 1 second) This is 6 + 6 + advantage on roll, on level 12... Buff and just charge with enchanted unit.. On level 20 this combo is +20 to hit with advantage on every hit for the round. You can add additional domain spells to this later ofc. My level 14 arushalae fully buffed has +42 to hit with deadly aim...
Hey @lorepsire can you make a video showing how all the mystic level 8/9 final transformation looks? (the extra visual effect that gets added when you confirm to stay with your respective mystic path, like the wings for the azada etc). I am thinking of taking the lich path, but right now i have no clue how the final effect makes my char look (and i dont want them to become ugly).
It look just like the portrait: a floating skeleton with a big brown robe.
I personally prefer pre-transform look.
How does "threat" work in Pathfinder?? I've never actually learned. Base attack bonus is plus 12, on your dude. That won't hit a single demon in Act 6 unless it's a crit.
Closing Deeran's door at the trap gives you a buff for cha to AC too... Not sure if it double dips tho
Why does this work for Charisma but not wisdom I dont get it...?
Anyone got a high AC build for a paladin character? It seems that just doing a standard paladin build with heavy armor wont net you too much AC compared to some of these other builds.
off of the top of my head..... if you want a straight 20 levels of paladin and you want to be able to tank on higher difficulties ( i think this would work on core but probably not for hard and almost certainly not for unfair) the best thing you can do is use mage armor instead of heavy armor, max out your dexterity/Charisma and take archmage armor (you will have to cast mage armor on yourself via scroll or potion to get the benefit of archmage armor).... put points into use magic device so you can use scrolls of shield and mirror image ( you can use an alchemist character w/infusion to provide shield but not mirror image). For feats take combat expertise, back to back (if you will have other melee party members) crane style (unless you decide to take a level of monk you will want the martial disciple background to get this), crane wing, crane riposte, dodge, and mythic dodge and wings (need to be aasimar for this). If you take the aeon mythic path the relativity gaze will help alot with tanking. Also if you use a witch and a shaman (or one character that multiclasses into both) you can double protective luck yourself.... I may be forgetting a couple of other things that could be helpful but all of this should give you quite a bit of ac and make it very difficult for enemies to hit you. You probably won't have alot of damage but if you take destructive shockwave then you will at least always deal your strength bonus in damage to smited enemies. Also, if you take the kitsune race and the master shapeshifter mythic ability you can get plus four to all physical stat scores which is probably more helpful than taking aasimar for the wings feat but that's up to you...
If you dont mind level dipping then you can do all of this and also put 1 level into scaled fist monk and 1 level into oracle taking natures whisper to get double your charisma modifier as a bonus to your ac... if you take the level dip path then you don't need dex at all... you'll just want to max your charisma... this will definitely get you more survivability than the 20 levels of paladin....
if you want to stay more true to what a paladin is actually supposed to be then i think your best bet is to use a tower shield and light/medium/or no armor, max out your mobility skill, take all of the mount feats (except trample and maybe spirited charge), take shield focus, greater shield focus, mythic shield focus and get your dex as high as you can without exceeding the armor check penalty for whatever armor you plan to use.... Then tank while riding your mount which essentially makes your mount the tank but you'll be adding armor from your shield to your mount and you'll be negating damage your mount would take with your mobility checks....
These are the best options I'm aware of for tanking as a paladin. Hope this helped... if you want to tank on foot in heavy armor then check out this video - ruclips.net/video/6Kut1tigFYo/видео.html
It for a tower shield specialist but i thin most everything in the video applies to a paladin as well except that you wont benefit nearly as much from dexterity so you can kep that at 10 or 12 instead of the 18 (i think) that we use in the video... also you'll want to max charisma as much as you can so that you get a bigger ac bonus from smite... also aeon may be the better mythic path choice for straight up melee survivability.
bonus tip - if you use a brownfur transmuter you can cast legendary proportions on your tank for a sizeable ac boost from natural armor and if you do take the aeon mythic path you can use the size gaze to eliminate the size penalty it gives.
again, hope all this helped
Why not use 1 level of Oracle with wispers of nature? :)
How does dipping in Paladin works for Mythics like Lich?
I heard that if you pick your mythic class, alignment restriction doesn't count anymore, is this true? Or can you change your alignment after you picked all Mythic ranks and then revert back to Lawful Good, despite beeing a lich etc.?
If you go Lich your alignment gets locked into evil so probably will lose all pally abilities
There's a mythic... power I think that let's you dance around alignment restrictions
@@Zeusgodofstorms
Is it tricky?
Isn't halfling with halfling caution + size bonus a better choice, as I think wings is melee only, and much later on?
@@rwulf Actually a good scaled fist tank build is viable to play from level 1, though are a bit of a liability for the shield maze. Basically, you dump strength, take 1 level scaled fist for access to crane style feats and AC from charisma, take 4 levels rogue to get weapon finesse and finesse training so you use dexterity in place of strength, and some sneak attack die. By level 4, you can actually melee for OK damage (use finean as a monk weapon and take finesse training in this for flurry of blows). Level 4 rogue gives bewildering injury and uncanny dodge, making you excellent against physical attacks. 2 levels pally then give you Charisma to saves and smite once per day, adding Charisma to AC twice and to AB, which is excellent for tough bosses. 7 levels, and you have all the tools you need to tank effectively.
In wotr with archmage armour, you should probably then go sword saint for mage armour, shield and some other useful personal buffs, plus some nice enhancements to weapon damage and int bonus added to AC.
@@notalefty999 I said scaled fist combo, not scaled fist. Scaled fist pure build is pretty fun. it's the weird duelist+vivisectionist+random class here combos that you see everywhere are trash for actual play.
That magical vestments shouldn't stack with the mage armor bonus. It's an enhancment to armor bonus and you cant the Male armor spell and so if you enhance you shit increasing its armor bonus you cant stack two armor bonus.
I can see them patching that.
Magic Vestements is an Enhancement bonus to armor, not another Armor bonus, it's functioning because you have an armor bonus.
It's like how you can have an amulet of Natural armor & Barkskin [barkskin is an enhancement bonus to natural armor]
@@Zeusgodofstorms magic vestment doesnt work on mage armor. And it looks like they already patched it because it no longer works.
Also it's an enhancement bonus to armor. Enhancment bonus arwnt a thing on their own. If you put a +5 enhancment bonus on a chain shirt you now have a 9 armor bonus. 4 from chain shirts base and 5 from the enhancment.
Interesting, but being able to use "Magical Vestment, Armor", when you are not actually wearing any armor seems like a bug...
Edit: Well, actually looking it up, the spell can be cast on regular clothing, but if that is the case it should not stack with mage armor
mage armor is an armor bonus. Magical Vestment is an enhancement bonus. bonuses of different named types stack. Pretty standard.
@@justinadams1006 It is not that simple. Magical Vestment is an enhancement bonus to armor, not an enhancement bonus to AC (those do not exist). That means that it increase the armor bonus to AC, just like a magic armor (like a +2 leather) do. It is not a separate bonus to AC. Since it just increase the AC bonus of a piece of armor, it wont stack with mage armor, which don't track with other armor bonusus to AC. It also should not stack with the enhancement bonusus from magic armor (+x armor), like it currently do in the game.
Or as quoted from the rules: "Enhancement bonuses apply to your armor to increase the armor bonus it provides."
@@Kris_Lighthawk That is the thing. Mage armor actually creates armor around the body. Armor of magic... Don't ask D&D logic. The same goes for the magic vestment shield with shield spell, while not having an actual item shield
@@zyfryth No, mage armor dont create actual armor around the body it makes "An invisible but tangible field of force" There is no way you can cast magic vestment on that. Same goes for the shield spell.
@@Kris_Lighthawk I am not that much into the ruleset. Maybe you are right, but that has always been the case in Pathfidner Kingmaker. And this one has Definitive edition, supposedly this is not a bug, but idk
And here i'am being proud of my AC 54 character thinking that would be crazy high. Thanks for destroying my believes :-(
How much AC do you need to get through Hard? This is awesome but it seems more of a studying curve than a learning curve through playing.
Crazy bosses have like a +60 and more to attack , so they can hit you at AC 80+, but mostly you are just invulnerable to normal attacks, especially with more buffs, like Displacement / Mirror Image and so on.
@@ThisNameIsBanned Do you have to be invulnerable to be successful?
@@doellison As someone who plays Hard/unfair it definitely takes prebuffing to make boss or even harder fights possible even with meta builds. Best thing I find with meta builds is how little resources it takes to clear the smaller fights.
@@WompWompNootNoot Hey newbie here, what's the play for harder difficulty to get through the content is it going full on dmg party and kill them before they kill you or is it with high ac tank with the rest of your party being supps/dmg/healer?
@@WompWompNootNoot that's why I don't play on unfair, it stops being fun
Can anyone overcome the DC and actually do damage?
So with Legendary I was able to get to 98 AC, but I took a few random levels at the end for only about a 3 AC extra boost. With Legendary you get 40 levels +3 Mythic (but only 2 mythic feats)
I was the Aasimar that gives +2 to Dexterity and Wisdom (I don't know why you want the Charisma Monk, Will saves are Wisdom based) went 20 Levels Monk, then I went mixed blood Sorcerer (Picking up the Serpentine bloodline for +1 natural armor) and then Dragon Disciple 7 levels. I finished up mostly with sorcerer till I got Elemental Body IV for More Dex boost. I took some random levels at the end, Witch was the only helpful one (Lizard familiar gives +1, Ice hex for +2 Natural Armor) I then had the party cast buff spells like Legendary proportions
Mythic abilities were Mage armor one and Master Shapeshifter (+4 dex is better than the +1 from mythic dodge)
In regards to what I think I understand now, I do think trying to get an armor Class of around 70 is ideal, but 60 is workable.
I think Monk 20 Slayer 19, and maybe Wizard/Sorcerer for some shield/mage armor casting would be ideal for the last battle/Area with legendary. If you are a fighter, range or melee class make sure to invest in blindfighting for the final battle, truesight is not sufficient. Also there is a handaxe you could get improved critical for (which would then crit on 15-20) called Peacemaker or something that denies enemies dexterity to their AC that could be amazing for fighter build main characters to help their allies hit the high AC enemies. Haven't tried it yet though.
ac shirt for monks of good aligment sold by storyteller in mage tower act 4 2 more ac
awesome!! thanks for adding that Kaylan... yeah this could definitely be updated to add alot more ac.. I've learned alot of tricks since I put this out, but what is shown here is more than enough AC for most people. Also, THanks for the supports!
1 traditional monk, 3 sylvan trickster, 16 Vivisectionist would make for an AC monster too with great offensive capabilities. :)
whats the third sylvan trickster level for? finesse training or the additional sneak attack dice?
or is there another reason? 2 levels are enough for the hex ac bonus.
@@mahe4 Both, lets you fully dump STR without any consequense but party carry weight. :)
@@MuppetLord1 okay. i was thinking about a natural attack build with this combination, so that i can ignore the two weapon fighting line and instead go the intimidation line.
but then i couldn't use finesse training...
but going kukri with elemental barrage would further increase the damage output...
but mutation warrior instead of vivi could give me more accuracy and bab...
@@mahe4 Aye, I prefer mutation warrior as a pure 20 build tho for the increased critical multiplier at the end + mutation warrior gets its upgrades to mutagens later than normal vivi anyways so would feel very slow to get better mutagens if multiclassing as well. :)
You have to remember, of course you'll get more AC by dipping or multiclassing build, but you have to considerate what'll you get from sacrificing class progression/talent, most importantly, BA progression. and then, having high AC important, but AC it's useless if you dont have enough saves or cant damage/hit the demons.
Why would you build for stupidly high AC though? UI mean, a solo run, sure, but any run where you have anybody else with your character... after 3 rounds, the enemy instantly abandons you and heads for somebody they can actually hit.
You want them hitting less than 15% of the time, and to have as high a DR as possible with easy regeneration.
Probably just to see how far they can go. I did similar in 5e with Tabaxis and speed buffs. My Tabaxi Sorcerer/Warlock ended up with a speed of 320 ft per move and could move 2-3 times a round while still casting spells.
Now realistically would you ever need that much speed? Nope. Never went more than 300 ft.
But is it fun to say you can move 1,460 ft (dimension door after moving) in one round? Yes, it is.
+8 Will save lol. At that point don't bother playing the game anymore since you won't get a turn if you play this build in higher difficulties.
Intriguing...
1 lvl witch give us 3 AC
Step 1: dont wear any type of armor...
Step 2: monk dip and profit
I mean come on, why heavy armor is so shity in this game, armored guy with shield will never be better than a stupid naked guy, is just not immersive
Welcome to Owlcat's Pathfinder! A universe with 1000 feats, spells and options to choose from, 990 of which suck.
supposedly there's a mod that adds some AC ramp feats for actual armor so you're not just taking archmage and armor potions on everybody. Tabletop tweaks I think. Not sure what else it changes.
Why should bulky heavy armor be better in a fantasy world full of magic and supernatural stuff?
I guess since they have the mythic ability for mage armor they can add one that give you unlimed dex bonus in any armor. That would mythic fullplate on equal footing with mythic mage armor.
Because Owlcat never bother to implement Pathfinder rules correctly
lots of feats are missing for armor buffs
-Master Armorer
-Critical Deflection
-Armored Master
-Armored Sacrifice
-Armor Specialization
etc.
thats why a naked chimp can outtank a full plate knight...
In kingmaker already played way to many naked chimp tanks, wanted to try something else and also i really enjoy how armor changes the characters looks or that they have special abilities, the sad thing of naked tanks is that you are no longer excited for new loot (except for rings or amulets that just add numbers to ac and can not be seen)
Actually, the easiest way would be to use a game trainer to increase your DEX to absurd level.
Before watching I guess this die to AOE and losing every single saving throw.
That look fun. I will try respecting Seelah to be the tanker
AOE damage is reflex saves for the most part so it's fine. But 8 will. Be prepared to be mind controlled, debuffed and feared your whole life.
He already mentioned dipping into Paladin for extra Smite Evil AC, & even 2 levels of Paladin allows you to add your Charisma modifier to all saving throws.
If you’re already stacking Charisma for the AC boost & already a Lawful alignment for monk, you may as well take the 2 levels in Paladin.
I can push things far further than this there's honeslty a lot of things you could take that are missed here
ou got a piece of shit in which 15 attack.