Yeah +2 damage per turn due to Thaum weakness + persistent is not that good especially at higher level. It can probably stay, and is not that amazing if you think about it (and all the other flat damage source you can deal as you keep leveling up). It is not game breaking.
Elaborating on the Summoner -> Champion Build, your Eidolon should be the Devotion Phantom. This is because it has Dutiful Retaliation, the ability to make a Reaction Attack against enemies who attack you. You will also want your Summoner to have the Paladin Champion’s Retributive Strike, which lets you strike an enemy that attacks your ally. If the enemy attacks you, your Eidolon strikes them. If the enemy attacks your Eidolon, you strike them. You’re basically a tag team that’s going to get a reaction attack fairly often. Just make sure you also get Lay on Hands too, since you will be in danger.
Wisdom is NOT useless. It affects Will, Perception, and three skills that can be used for Recall Knowledge. In every single adventure path paizo has put out for 2nd edition, being able to Recall Knowledge with Nature or Religion has been useful in numerous combat encounters.
Thaumaturge as a multiclass for the Mirror implement for Rogue is also incredible. Fits the trickery idea, gives you a minor infinite teleport, and gives you flanking. Flavor win all around. 👌
Honestly I think the rogue with the monk dedication is it’s strongest multi class option. Sneak attack encourages multiple strikes per turn so if you use flurry of blows with like stumbling stance which is stronger than most weapons the rogue gets access to AND gives easy ways to make a target flat footed? It’s a huge chunk of damage
Honestly, I think that for Magus -> Psychic might be the best archetype for Magus. Focusing on focus spells instead of spell slots (while still being able to get a lot of those, including very good buffs) stuff like either Imaginary Weapon or the Psi Produce Flame are wonderful on a Magus
Maguses want to use their class focus spells to recharge their spellstrike though. And besides that, the necromancy wizard's focus spell, call of the grave, is arguable the BEST focus spell to spellstrike with. Maguses aren't just about damage. There is also the fact that psychics don't have the breadth feat that gives you extra lover level slots, they are occult instead of arcane which may lead to very low DC's if youre using versitile spellstrike, and you can copy the spells you already know as a magus to your wizard book, which is another reason why wizard is better imo.
@@professionalsleeper6281 The extra focus points also help with recharging the spellstrike, and while you don't get breadth and it's occult, it's mainly useful for buffs and utility too.
If you've never done a Versatile Human Rogue and used your Multiclass ancestry feat as a Psychic of the unbound step with warp step... I highly recommend. You get about 80ft of a one action teleport per combat which pairs with surprise attack to make you get 2 sneak attacks on the first turn of combat and, if you are a thief with precise debilitations you can apply the flat footed status until the end of your next turn as well, allowing you to constantly back stab the same opponent without needing to position with another player. Reactive reposition allows you to chase them as they try to regain the distance as well. Target the casters and they will die in the back line before their protection even knows you've moved. Or target the big solo monster and give everybody a passive +2 to hit bonus from the start of combat. Remember kids, combat is determined in the first 3 turns of the game. Hit hard and use all of your action economy as efficently as possible and your opponent can't win.
Something to note about the Alchemist Dedication (unless I have been reading it wrong on my own character) is that you get a number of infused reagents equal to your character level, not level + Intelligence Modifier like the base class gets.
That's correct, I have read it few times, and alchemical dedication only gives infused reagents equal to your character level, where as alchemical class itself gives level + intelligence modifier.
this, and unless I have read it wrong, they don't get Advanced Alchemy, so they don't get to make 2 items for each infusion, which makes Alchemist dedication way less useful.
In my opinion, Monk's best multiclass archetype is Alchemist. The reason is that Drakeheart Mutagen is basically a medium armor that scales off of your unarmored defense proficiency, so you can achieve some really silly AC values starting at level 2. A level 2 Monk with +2 Dex and a level 1 Drakeheart Mutagen has 22 AC, which is equivalent to a level 2 Champion that already has their shield raised. The Monk can even get an additional +1 AC through Crane Stance. Also, the potential double-stride that the Drakeheart Mutagen enables is situationally pretty sweet with the Monk's high speed. On an unrelated note, Thaumaturge / Monk isn't as great of a combination as you think because the two hits of Flurry of Blows combine damage for the purposes of weaknesses if they hit the same target. The Thaumaturge still benefits from getting to try twice, and you still get Implements Empowerment bonuses on both attacks, but you only get to apply the weakness once.
With Kineticist out, do you feel the same? I like Air with Monk alot due to Monks movement synergizing with Air's initial Junction. So that even if you use a 2 action Air impulse, your movement from it is still eventually better than your parties. The base movement of a Monk also plays interestingly with Air's flight options. Though this isn't all good, I have fought with myself on how to handle the "stance issues" as both classes want to be in their respective stances, though maybe Fuse Stance eventually becomes the savior there, albeit incredibly late in the game. I'm still new to Pathfinder, so this is a genuine question lol.
As someone who's more into interesting character concepts than solid builds (but still appreciates being effective), I like how a lot of these also feel like the synergize well as character concepts. Barbarian/Alchemist can be somewhere between Jekyll/Hyde and the Hulk; Champion/Monk could make a great Paladin of Irori; Swashbuckler/Monk could be a performing boxer, etc.
Gunslinger can be pretty good with the fencer swashbuckler. You can pistol twirl to feint at a distance, now you got panache and your enemy is flatfooted which will help you crit.
I actually recently made Swashbuckler/Monk. Went Fencer for the focus on feinting and also Stumbling Stance and every turn I can open with Flurry of Blows with a free feint action prior to it, gaining panache, feint again, and use my finisher with my final action. I even took Goading Feint at level 1 so I can choose to reduce my opponent's attack rolls instead, thus opening up more opportunities for Opportune Riposte.
Not gonna lie, I thought based on the title you found A multiclass archetype that makes EVERY other class significantly better. That being said after understanding. I am 1000% down for this video.
Monk/Barb is also pretty broken because of monks start with naturally higher AC (neutralizing the AC penalty from rage). Take animal instinct and get the rage benefit, giving you the ability to flurry of blows with d10s + your rage damage
I still think Fighter/Champion is the best for fighter because of how well a one handed fighter synergizes with lay on hands and you get retributive strike on a fighter’s attack bonus. But I think how bad shields feel to use are worthy a video.
How useful is retributive strike on a fighter? Sure the attack bonus is nice, but you already have a lot of reactions for your fighter. I guess it's another option to trigger though.
On note of persistent damage and damage bonuses, I don't believe they'd apply. This kinda thing's been present in other systems; it's just the initial weapon attack that counts, everything else is a secondary effect. Considering that PF2 makes an exception for persistent damage for critical hits, it's most likely that glimpse vulnerability doesn't apply to that. Glimpse vulnerability also specifies a Strike, and persistent damage isn't part of a strike (even if it's applied by one), it's more a condition or status effect. Weaknesses CAN apply to persistent damage IIRC if it's a type that lines up, but in Glimpse's case, it specifies it has to be to your unarmed strike/weapon, not a specific damage type.
I'm working on an inventor with rogue dedication. Assurance: crafting at level 1 is insane. Subterfuge armor with the camouflage ability with rogue abilities are amazing. Plus you're skill heavy and can make and disable traps.
The war blood mutagen gives an item bonus to your attacks, which does not stack with the potency rune on your weapon. With the lower effective alchemist level you get, its generally pretty useless for most levels if you have been keeping up with your weapon at all. You never get the ability to make those juicy +4 bonus mutagens either because its level 17 and your max is 15.
Investigator into magus is something I'd suggest. Int cantrips/spells on a int based melee, you can know if you hit or crit before choosing when to waste spells with spell strike, seems pretty busted.
i played with a shooting star Magus who had investigator archetype. they were about to roll a crit? cast their highest level attack spell and just murder whatever they targeted. just gonna get a normal hit? gouging claw still does a bunch of damage.
Thaumaturge / Champion is amazing. Having a ranged option is necessary to mitigate action economy issues with the thaumaturge and they have a bad reflex save progression so a finesse/thrown weapon makes great sense. So L2 Champion gets skills + heavy armour (good for like 10 levels), L4 you can take lay on hands (chalice implement simulation), L6 - Champion Reaction (amulet implement simulation), and L8 - Blade Ally (free returning rune on thrown weapons at the same level the first damage runes come online).(take it at L8) comes online when all the damage runes come. Thrown weapons get full STR to damage as well. Magus / Psychic I think is the new meta at this point for extra focus points, better base cantrips for spell strike, and amped cantrip nova damage. Magus / Witch is also good. Fighter / Thaumaturge gets the same bonuses you're talking about. Wizard / Alchemist can really diversify your support offerings with various alchemical items to hand out to others (including healing potions).
I've been tooling around with barbarian archetype on thaumaterge as just the king of flat damage. It doesn't even really hurt your action economy, since rage is one action one time, and it turns out that almost none of the thaumaterge actions have the concentrate trait.
I will say that for a TWF Flurry Ranger any spellcasting class with access to Haste is a worthy investment on the way to Impossible Flurry, that way you can bring your own Haste to the party which is *stupid* good for the build. I highly recommend Primal for access to both good healing and good ranged attacks, letting you play support or blaster when out of your element. Lightning Storm and Field of Life were personal favorites for her, the former even getting use after she got to Impossible Flurry level. By the time you hit level 20 you can also throw that haste onto everyone in the party twice per day. Sure the other people can do this too, but if you're doing that then it frees up high level slots for them instead.
Cleric / Champion is a cool idea, when choosing Warpriest, as you get Heavy Armor proficiency and Lay On Hands for further healing. Really cool. For Monk I like Barbarbian archetype if you go for strength, so more rage fueled strikes.
I must say, I am a huge fan of the Cleric/Bard as well, since a dedicated healer might want Charisma for bonus heal slots, 2 actions for a ranged heal + 1 action for a +1+1 at level 4 if the party doesn't have a bard is fun too.
Persistent Damage happens at the end of the affected characters turn so it is not part of a strike. It's more like a condition that does damage, like bleeding. On Rouge I would have gone with Ranger or Druid for flanking animal companion because Summoners share HP with their summons. Also the animal companions have Support effects they can apply when you hit. There are a ton of goods ones like Ape frightens 1, Bats give -1 Circ Attack to adj enemies, bird 1d4 bleed plus dazzled, boar 1d6 persist dmg, cat flat-foot, crocodile grabs enemy, and so on.
As a fan of the Owlcat's Kingmaker and Wrath of the Rigteous CRPGs, I am really looking forward to the day that they or somebody makes a 2e computer game.
oooh I like those! Alchemist/Ranger: it is prob my favorite, Hunt Prey doubles your range with bombs, Gravity Weapon works with bombs as well as Quick Draw and Monster Hunter/Monster Warden are great for a INT based class. Champion/Barbarian: solve the one thing Champions lack in comparison to most other martials: more power to their offense. Cool option: Dex Champion with Blade Ally, getting a free Returning Rune and Raging Thrower with a Chakram. Cleric/Witch: a Familiar for the Cleric! with a new cool option, Divine Emmissary, for your little friend! Also Witch's Charge, which is great when combined with Heal. Now you can cast a 2 action spell and heal an injured ally! Sorcerer/Rogue: Light armor, skill feats, Minor Magic, Mobility, good reactions like Nimble Dodge or You're Next and of course, Magical Trickster to add a bit of damage to attack spells... and Evasiveness later on.
I would argue for investigator archetype for the magus. You don't want to waste your spell slots, and investigator device stratagem ensures that you know when your spells will land.
The only issue with that is that the Magus class features alone take a huge toll on your action economy. idk if I'm willing to take a dedication that gives me _another_ action's worth of setup, y'know?
I now really wanna run that western themed campaign and recommend the bard gunslinger and gunslinger investigator for party slots. Just imagining Texas Red the Bard with a harmonica Western Cole Phelps from LA Noir as the investigating killer doing that campaign... Mm, so good
A gunslinger investigator has been in my Pathbuilder folder for months now waiting for a chance to play them. Risky reload is free reload and shoot for one action after a good devise stratagem check.
For a fighter class the best match is something in a magical context because when you're dealing with other magic base opponents magic gives you away to counter their attacks it gives you protection from their attacks it also allows you to ability to gain information to go places that a fire would have trouble going The extra spells can enhance the rangers abilities can make up for other skills they don't have.
This is my favorite video of yours not just because of the multiclassing advice, but because it really looks at the essential weaknesses and fantasies of each of the classes.
Since psychic can either be intelligence or charisma based I think a decent option for intelligence builds would probably be witch or maybe alchemist just for the intelligence stacking and mixing up spell lists* with witch letting you pick your secondary spell list either diversifying it to add some extra options for you to have or just focusing hard on occult spells if you want to and alchemist providing entirely new options for you to use while also multiclassing well.
Weapon Inventor with Magus archetype seems like a super fun and effective build. Getting a suped up weapon to do magus things and having the combined versatility of what ever magus focus spell fits you, inventor unstable actions, spells in general, spellstrike, crafting literally anything. In addition to both classes depending on each others sub stats makes it a super easy and clean build! Just str and int with a dash of dex for AC and youre going! It can put out some decent damage consistently, a nuke here or there with unstable actions and spellstrike, plus give itself survivability! Need something else? You can probably make it with your crafting being as high as itll be!
Sometimes it's not about the amount of damage you can do It's the ability to survive the obstacles you face, being able to summon something to assist you being able to gather intelligence for the group being able to defend yourself against an unexpected magical attack.
I'm playing a Warpriest Cleric in a Kingmaker 2e game an old GM buddy of one of my tablemates just started, she'll be archetyping into Champion at 2nd (16, 10, 12, 10, 16, 14 is her stat spread, so the prerequisites are met). I'm really jazzed- she'll be running combat support for the party's Fighter and Rogue, so buffs and sturdiness are the orders of the day. If she manages to land a hit every now and then? Hey, bonus. (Last two PCs are a Psychic and a Gunslinger, for context)
Been playing an ancestors oracle/swashbuckler and frankly its been a lot of fun. doing a little extra damage and panache skill actions mesh pretty well with the martial and skill ancestor curses - plus once you’re at your moderate curse it stacks with panache bonuses. Super fun if you’re down to play a pretty unpredictable character
I've got a couple. Orc or Half Orc Animal Instinct (Deer) Barbarian/Witch. Familiar is helpful in scouting. Take living hair as your second witch feat along with the Iron Fists Orc feat. While raging you can Trip, Disarm, Shove, and Grapple. The hair and fists mean that even if you're caught between rages for any reason, you still have solid options. If you want to go whole hog on casting, with occult casting you can eventually enlarge yourself to huge with enlarge, give yourself +2 to attack rolls and skill checks with heroism, haste yourself, and heal yourself with sooth. With a normally nearly useless feat like Moment of Clarity you can even do this in the middle of a rage. Add in the fact that you only need handwraps to handle almost all your attacking needs and it's a decent build. Sub witch with living hair works pretty well with standard 2hander fighter as well since you can go with a weapon that is only for damage and still trip and disarm with the hair. If the DM gives you permission, you can even upgrade the hair to grapple, trip, and disarm, potentially with reach. Charisma Psychic with Champion archetype works well too. Pump strength and tank dex and you've got a decently high AC blaster. Add in various champion feats and you can get a champion's reaction, lay on hands, and/or a divine ally. If you don't want to wait to multiclass for the AC just go ancient elf and start at level 1 with it.
I really like the Barbarian Archetype on champions. A -1 to AC isn't that big a deal to one of the most defensive classes in the game. Rage damage and Barb feats help with the low offense of Champion. And Lay on hands doesn't need concentration.
There is a huge problem with the spellcasting archetypes that can be worked around. But they aren't worked around in this video. That problem being *tradition proficiency.* Unless you're a magus or battle cleric or whatever that already scales at master proficiency for their primary spellcasting tradition. Every spell you cast from your dedication tradition will be at a -2 if it's a save or attack roll. *Unless* the dedication tradition is the same as your main tradition. So I agree that witch is a good archetype for wizard but I would ALWAYS pick rune patron for more spells with full spellcasting bonuses. The arcane spell list is already the most diverse imo. This is why I would actually pick spells that synergize with the playstyle without requiring any rolls. True strike, heroism and haste for martials (occult spell list is amazing for martials). That's also why I wouldn't pick druid for clerics. The offensive cantrips are a lot less useful when they are at a -2. I'd instead choose something like rogue for mobility and defensive options, or something else that makes them safer in their spellcasting or gives them low action economy cost abilities that synergize with them, such as sorcerer focus spells.
The -2 is brutal on casters already but atleast a druid would still use the same key ability, a wizard that is also 1 or 2 behind on their wisdom in comparison to their intelligence would just be abysmal. Like yeah that vampire will probably take a lot of damage if you can whip out that searing light but at -3 or -4 the odds of you getting that cool hit on a challenging encounter is so very very low. Bless, Guidance and Heroism are wonderful on any character though, even if you only affect yourself that +1 goes a long way on a telekinetic projectile or horizon thunder sphere lol.
Not sure if stated already but another good multiclass archetype is int psychic. While it doesn't give extra spells as much wizard but it offers more interesting damage options and other things. Giving the shooting star magus the tangible dream shield thus giving a reaction to them. Also gives the magus a really good scaling cantrip of imaginary weapon which is normally an alright cantrip for psychic but magus can make good use of its normal and amped form
Nonat1s, appreciate your careful and thoughtful walkthroughs - invaluable perspective and excellent presentation. This channel is super useful in helping me build a character in 2E!
thing to keep in mind with alchemist multiclass is needing a hand to draw and hold potion's for martials, You know what's a better multiclass for barbarian.. fighter (two weapon warrior architype if available) OH no you cant get full rage damage with an agile weapon.. sooo dont use them! take the penalty and rock the double slice every encounter into the ground with only a -2 on the second attack! Ranger/ barb is good but the issue you will run into is action economy having to hunt target multiple time's, raging, moving. I made a ranger/ barb with the raging thrower with a barrel of javelin's on my back.
0:39 I think that it's also because more often than not a multiclass archetype feat is weaker than taking a class feat (or there's a non-multiclass archetype that does what you want from the multiclass but does it *better*, for example Bastion archetype vs Champion if you want to get heavy armor. Tho tbf the Champion archetype gives you the Lay on Hands and other things. I guess it's more about "doing one thing very well" or "Doing different things but not as well")
Counterpoint to sorcerer dedication for fighters BARD dedication. They get inspire courage at level 8, but if this is a demoralize fighter with shatter defenses and such, more importantly *you can get dirge of doom at level 12* Also heroism, heroism is on the occult spell list as well
Saying Wisdom is useless is... Really dumb. It's good for medicine checks as mentioned, but it's also tied to perception, which is tied to detecting traps, finding shinies, and sensing motives of NPCs and if that's all not enough, nine times out of 10, you're rolling perception for initiative and going sooner in combat is never a bad thing.
Magus + Psychic (oscillating wave, or distant grasp if you want an area damage option). 2 focus spells you can spellstrike with that can be refreshed after combat for only a 2 feat investment beats anything a wizard can give. The standard cantrip versions of the spells are also useful.
hand crossbow thaumaturge with ranger's crossbow ace feat is insanely good damage; weakness+implements empowerment+crossbow ace stepping up the damage die. by level 6 I was doing 2d8+6+weakness on my thaumaturge after reloading
Here's the thing with oracle, if anyone talk about oracle there's always this question that comes to my mind... "which oracle are you talking about? no, seriously, which one?" XD. They play very different jobs on the party from each other and is kinda hard to find an multiclass archetype that helps all of them, despite that, I really think psychic is a good pic for two reasons: As an oracle until Lv 11 is kinda useless to have 3 focus points if you dont have other ways of expending them(if you use them 3 times you're fucked), and the other is that not every oracle wants to progress their curse, pick cosmos for example, they have 2+half their lv on physical resistance ALL TIME, they will be fine with not progressing their curse. So yeah, i think psychic is a good pic.
I have also been thinking hard about the whole idea of the fighter with wyrm-blessed sorcerer dedication. It's a really interesting idea, especially since I already have a family of sylph gnomes descended from cloud dragons in the mwangi expanse as a character concept. Giving one of my characters a twin brother who is a gnome fighter (with that flickmace, of course) and that sorcerer dedication is kind of a cool idea!
I'm playing a Laughing Shadow Magus with Distant Grasp Psychic as a free archetype. Super fun, tons of abilities that care about battlefield position, and synergizes with our party's rogue quite well.
I'm debating in my character, initially was an Air Kinetict/Rogue, although my table went "oops all ranged" lol. So trading out Rogue for Monk, with the promise Fuse Stance has potential. As well as 1 action Flurry, 2 action impulse to trigger my junction, which has synergy with Monk movement. Though still trying to fine tune lol.
Rogue -> Monk with Stumbling stance. Bonus to feint + if they succeed in hitting you (unfortunately), you at least guarantee them flat footed against our next attack.
Monk/Rogue is great monks can get sneak damage with a lot of stances and a lot of rogue feat make the monk even more mobile like Mobility from the rogue
Oracles don’t always want to progress their curse so actually getting focus spells that don’t advance their curse is very good. The Psychic is especially good because you instantly get a focus point that isn’t cursebound for one feat.
Battle Oracle also plays really well with the Monk Archetype. Peafowl Stance and Monastic Weaponry for a Temple Sword paired with Flurry of Blows gives you incredible action economy. Every turn is easily 2 Strikes, a free Step if one lands, followed by a spell of choice. Can get even more fun with Bastion (raise a shield as a reaction and get an extra reaction for blocking) and Sixth Pillar (another free Step before or after casting a spell via Maneuvering Spell)
For Gunslinger. If you want a better chance to hit be a Sniper with Sniper's Aim for +2 Status bonus on your Fighter lvl attacks. Multiclass for Gunslinger is RANGER! at 2nd lvl. 4th lvl get Basic Hunter's Trick: Gravity Weapon for extra damage on your first attack! 8th lvl get Advanced Hunter's Trick: Far Shot, this DOUBLES the range increment of your guns!!!
One thing I love about how absolutely horrible most of the Witch feats are is how customizable it is. It can be tough to fit in more than one or two archetypes (of any kind) into many PF2e class builds. But 10th level spellcasters (except the Bard) often have boring or straight up bad feat options at certain levels. The Witch is the worst of that bunch, but it allows so much customization from other classes. You can fit in several three & out Archetypes just using normal Witch class feats, or focus on one specific one. That leaves the entirety of the Free Archetype (as any DM worth their salt should be allowing their players to use it) to customize even more. Maybe, as you suggest, the Witch can go the Champion route using a couple Witch feats. She can then use some more Witch feats for something else, perhaps focusing on a few Charisma-based feats using the points saved from Dex. Then Free Archetype is spent soaking up extra spell slots in another caster class. Or maybe the Witch also embraces Loremaster, or something else on theme. I know you like Wizards, but the next time you get to play I suggest trying out a Witch/Champion/Bard. You spend the resources saved from Dex and put them into Charisma. You have the skills to be a party face, if necessary. You also get to utilize Occultism & Bardic Lore to higher potential, while also picking up the utility/buff spells you need with the spontaneous Charisma Occult casting. If you don’t already have a Bard, you can grab Inspire Courage. Alternatively, if you do have one in the party, you can take Inspire Defense or something more situational, to be used in specific occasions. Even using Dirge of Doom will let the Bard spend his combat time Inspiring (which he should as he will have a better chance of fully utilizing Inspire Heroics). I’ve got a situation like this going on in one of my campaigns, and everyone is absolutely loving it. The Bard gets to do so much more with his resources, and the Witch gets to juggle between Hexes, Dirge of Doom, and even buff spells, all while using her prepared spells a bit more offensively. The two also have a friendly competition going over who can be the better face. It helps that out of game the players are a married couple, and are hilarious. Still, give it a try if you can!
Leaving a comment before watching to have some thoughts: I've started a Fists of the Ruby Phoenix AP recently and we're playing with Free Archetype, and one thing I've seen a lot of that Rogue continues to be that great skill monkey for nearly any class. Skill feats will always have nice utility and enable some more broken skill trees (like the general usefulness of Athletics and Acrobatics, or the brokenness of Intimidation) so I feel like Rogue should hopefully appear pretty often for its general usefulness. Edit: interesting niches for many of these choices, though I feel like just taking 2 feat dip in some of these just feels kind of pointless? It feels like coming up with an idea for the sake of it, rather than a fun multiclassing idea, but still a great video!
Also playing Fists and my gnome summoner with adopted human ancestry picked up the rogue dedication at 9 and skill mastery at 10 and it has made a huge difference with the number of skills I feel confident in using inside and outside of combat. It also really helps with shoring up skills the party might be lacking by that time that were less important before but now are more common as the adventure advances.
Alchemist/Thaumaturge: Glimpse Vulnerability (and Exploit for Thau/Alch) gives weakness to your Strikes. Won't apply to persistent damage Barbarian/Alchemist: You need to spend feats to level up your free consumables, if you want AC get Sentinel dedication at lvl2 and wear Heavy Armor. If you don't like the speed penalty get Fast Movement barb feat. And for animal instict barb remember you can just take Animal Skin at lvl 6 for a very nice AC boost of +2/+1 compared to other barbs. Gunslinger/Investigator: I love it! Inventor/Alchemist: Alchemist dedication only gets lvl reagents not lvl+Int. It works but you do need to use feats to keep increasing the alchemy lvl Monk/Swash: Good option, just the bonus Speed from Panache won't stack with what you already get from monk. Rogue/Summoner: Just remember your eidolon will share hp, an animal companion might be better but takes more feats (2,12 for eidolon vs 2,4,8,12 for animal) Summoner/Champion: I like this one a lot. I had not considered it before but it just works! Although remember Eidolon shares MAP and they will probably hit better than you so STR is not great. Swashbuckler/Monk: 10/10 Stumbling stance will let you keep your armor and works great with feinting Swash. Witch/Champion: If the suggestion is to dump STR and DEX with the -10 speed penalty, consider a Small ancestry to make sure you can keep your mount in 5' hallways common in dungeons. Or you can wear chainmail to ignore STR and DEX without almost any penalty.
I am shocked Thamaturge / Magus didn't get a mention. I mean seriously, spell strike, expansive spell strike, and scroll striker along with all the scroll feats on a Thamaturge means once per combat you can spell strike ANY VIABLE SPELL IN THE GAME. Not to mention with using the setup action for enhance vulnerability on your weapon you get fighter level proficiency with it. Add to this the elemental capability to weakness hunt (cough THAMATURGE cough). plus what happens when you know a target has an elemental weakness so you use personal antithesis instead and try to hit 2 weaknesses at once.
Playing an Angelic Bloodline Sorceress of the Summoner Archetype. The idea was to have my sorceress be a menace from a safe distance while her succubus... yup, her succubus eidolon is a menace on the front lines. Didn't work out quite the way I imagined, but she is still provides DPS contribution for one action while I use one or two to play a more supportive role at the same time, hiding behind the fighter and healing for absurd amounts or casting Bless, Heroism, etc. With the right party, this can be really fun. Gunslinger and FIghter provide the damage, while my succubus is being a thorn in something's side, I'm making my new favorite meatshield basically immortal with absurd heals, and we have Bard providing his inspiration shenanigans. Eventually, I will have a higher Attack Bonus and AC than my poor succubus, but that's not going to stop me from using her, lol. And in the early game, before we had a proper party and more than three players, my character was a combat utility beast. I love her and her pet succubus to death. XD
For Mutagens the best bonus the warblood mutagen will give is a +1 functionnal bonus (item bonus to hit so doesn't stack with potency rune, the mutagen is designed to be at a functional +1 over the expected wealth value) Same thing with Drakeheart, it will give you AC equivalent to a Full Plate of the same level for its duration, nice, but for a Barb that's still only +1, sometimes. Vs the Champion archetype which has easier stat synergy than alchemist (STR and CHA) and will give Barbarian scaling heavy armor proficiency (basically permanent drakeheart) and access to the paladin reaction, but on a Barbarian, so incredibly good.
One of my favorite characters I have is my barbarian dragon instinct monk dragon stance charecter because the dragon stance is a d10 and losses the agile trait meaning the bonus to damage from dragon instinct still happens
I wouldnt've thought of all these subclass archetypes, nice! It's not every day that I rethink how some of the game works/classes interact with each other, thank you. As always, your music selection is great
I was in a campaign with a sorcerer with the free archetype that used swashbuckler. She often used dueling parry for extra AC or intimidate to gain panache. Sometimes the extra 5 feet of movement from getting panache helped. Was it the strongest... no, but it was interesting. Ifrit sorcerer with elemental bloodline, and the bloodline effect gave a bonus to intimidate, which helped her gain panache.
Anyone multiclassed whilst playing a Kineticist, if so what ones worked? I know it's still only playtest material but ideas are welcome (currently playing a Kineticist).
Here is my personal fav Monk multi-class and fav Monk build. (This assumes we're using the free Archetype rule) Monk/Champion Step 1: Pick up Monastic Weapons. Step 2: Get ourselves a staff. Thanks to Monastic Weapons we Flurry of Blows, and other things, with our staff. Step 3: Pick up Stunning Fist. We can now stun, from 5 ft away, using our staff. This gives us the following rotation. Trip, Flurry of Blows on tripped foe, and Step. If everything procced successfully then: -Our foe has lost 1 action (2 actions left) -Our foe has to use another action to stand up unless they want to risk higher chances of being hit and critically hit (1 action left) -Our foe has to use another action to get within melee range to hit us (0 actions left) Obviously various enemies have protections against some of this, but generally speaking, with just two starting feats, you can ruin the day of most enemies. Step 4: Grab the Champion Dedication (Liberator) Step 5: Champion's Reaction Let's say we and an ally are adjacent to a foe. We did our rotation, which ended in a Step. We are now too far away for enemy to attack us without spending an action to move. If they move however they won't have any actions left to attack with. So they opt to attack our adjacent ally instead. In response we use our Champion reaction, which reduces the damage. Even when our foe targets someone else they can't get a full attack in. But maybe they have 2 actions left, instead of 1, or have an ability that lets them attack twice while using only 1 action. Well that's where the rest of our reaction comes in. Our foe makes their first attack, we use our Champion reaction, the damage is reduced and our ally gets to make a free Step. Unless they have reach they can no longer follow up with that second attack. So, no matter who they target, in situations where this build isn't hard countered, our foe is constantly reduced to 0-1 attack per turn. Meanwhile we're attacking them for two and giving all our melee party members bonuses to hit/crit. This build, even without the free Archetype rule, can be completed by level 6 (the earliest one could get the build up and running). However, with the free archetype rule we can follow this up more by taking the Staff Acrobat Archetype line. All of a sudden you get the ability to trip people 2 to 3 sizes larger than you, can trip multiple people in a single action, and can use your staff as a shield in situations where you wanted to raise a shield.
I personally really like the barbarian with the inventor subclass. If you choose the armor invention, you can get a nice type resistance, or additional speed boost (sadly the power suit's bonuses to athletics don't apply since you can't overdrive), and if you choose weapon, you can add something like trip or grapple to your weapon, allowing that 2H barbarian to put their amazing athletics check to good use where they otherwise couldn't. Also, explosion is a great AOE option, and you can even heal yourself with it at lvl 4. There's also other great stuff here: megaton strike is just power attack with furious focus as a feat, megavolt for more AOE options, gadgets because why not, etc.
Wait, why is wisdom an unimportant character stat? Will save, perception, initiative, medicine and survival. The Battle medicine and continual recovery skill feats make great use of the medicine skill.
I think PF2 needs to stop making new classes and make an advanced players guide part 2 where they literally just give all of the existing classes extra content to their core class
I like swashbuckler archetype for rogue. If you go with the fencer style you can gain panache and render an enemy flatfooted for sneak attack. Do a finisher and now that is added to your sneak attack damage dice.
I'm not sure about ranger/barbarian. Rage is concentration, and Flurry does not have the rage trait, and Hunt prey of the ranger does not have the rage trait, so they cannot be used together I think.
I think Sorcerer is the best Multiclass for Summoner, more spells for the class defined by having few but you make an excellent point that Champion might be better. Fighter would be best for Sorcerer but only because Weapon Expertise at level 12 makes it possible to get Eldritch Archer as a caster but I get that this undermines the point of this video. HOWEVER since Eldritch Archer is a spontaneous caster archetype it has all of the benefits of your suggestion as well as Eldritch Shot (imagine using that with a 9th level spell)
I'm really not sure why a Bard would want to shoot and reload a gun, foregoing an instrument and its bonus, when they could instead just cast Telekinetic Projectile. Druid and Fighter is great because Wild Shape. Same with Druid and Champion, my wife is playing that and the reaction helps other people out a ton, especially since that groups other melee is an Eidolon.
I played the Barbarian/Alchemist build with a hobgoblin since they get a bonus to intelligence and Alchemical Scholar for the extra recipes. Barbarian also has really good synergy with fear effects which synergizes with Remorseless Lash and Agonizing Rebuke very well, and the Cantorian line of feats really help with tankiness. We did play with free archetype so it was a little easier to get all the parts working. Otherwise I probably would have had to neglect the fear part of the build but even without it the combo is super strong. Another cool multiclass archetype build I did was also with hobgoblin, but this time leaning fully in to the fear strategy with ruffian rogue. Going strength based was super beneficial for damage and got me access to Intimidating Prowess. I also went with fighter dedication to get all of the fear synergy feats like Intimidating Strike and Shatter Defenses. Pair that with Remorseless Lash, Agonizing Rebuke, and the plethora of rogue fear synergy feats as well as all of the intimidation skill feats and I was able to keep nearly all of the enemies in a given combat at frightened 1 and constantly taking persistent mental damage and other debuffs while also dealing some really good damage with the strength bonus to damage and sneak attack. Additionally, the other fighter stuff like Power Attack, Opportunist, and Resiliency as well as the Cantorian stuff just made me a much better front liner in general. And unlike the barbarian/alchemist build, you don't need to worry about intelligence so you can fully spec into Charisma as your secondary ability score. Super fun build utilizing the most broken skill in the game.
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Yeah +2 damage per turn due to Thaum weakness + persistent is not that good especially at higher level. It can probably stay, and is not that amazing if you think about it (and all the other flat damage source you can deal as you keep leveling up). It is not game breaking.
Elaborating on the Summoner -> Champion Build, your Eidolon should be the Devotion Phantom. This is because it has Dutiful Retaliation, the ability to make a Reaction Attack against enemies who attack you. You will also want your Summoner to have the Paladin Champion’s Retributive Strike, which lets you strike an enemy that attacks your ally.
If the enemy attacks you, your Eidolon strikes them. If the enemy attacks your Eidolon, you strike them. You’re basically a tag team that’s going to get a reaction attack fairly often. Just make sure you also get Lay on Hands too, since you will be in danger.
So it's basically that scene in Captain America Civil War where Steve and Bucky are clowning on Iron Man.
Wisdom is NOT useless. It affects Will, Perception, and three skills that can be used for Recall Knowledge. In every single adventure path paizo has put out for 2nd edition, being able to Recall Knowledge with Nature or Religion has been useful in numerous combat encounters.
Everyone thinks Wisdom is useless until the barbarian gets mind controlled.
Thaumaturge as a multiclass for the Mirror implement for Rogue is also incredible. Fits the trickery idea, gives you a minor infinite teleport, and gives you flanking. Flavor win all around. 👌
Also I really like an intelligence Psychic on Magus. Additional focus point at level 1, and some interesting new cantrip options.
Congrats you invented Loki.
One issue with Ranger x Barbarian: Hunt Prey has the Concentrate trait, so cannot be used whilst Raging.
Honestly I think the rogue with the monk dedication is it’s strongest multi class option. Sneak attack encourages multiple strikes per turn so if you use flurry of blows with like stumbling stance which is stronger than most weapons the rogue gets access to AND gives easy ways to make a target flat footed? It’s a huge chunk of damage
Honestly, I think that for Magus -> Psychic might be the best archetype for Magus. Focusing on focus spells instead of spell slots (while still being able to get a lot of those, including very good buffs) stuff like either Imaginary Weapon or the Psi Produce Flame are wonderful on a Magus
Doing this in my current run of Kingmaker, very synergistic.
Maguses want to use their class focus spells to recharge their spellstrike though.
And besides that, the necromancy wizard's focus spell, call of the grave, is arguable the BEST focus spell to spellstrike with. Maguses aren't just about damage.
There is also the fact that psychics don't have the breadth feat that gives you extra lover level slots, they are occult instead of arcane which may lead to very low DC's if youre using versitile spellstrike, and you can copy the spells you already know as a magus to your wizard book, which is another reason why wizard is better imo.
@@professionalsleeper6281 The extra focus points also help with recharging the spellstrike, and while you don't get breadth and it's occult, it's mainly useful for buffs and utility too.
Yes, Imaginary Weapon Magus kinda beats any other Magus by a pretty large margin
Agree imaginary weapon makes it not even close
I've actually had really good time with a cleric/sorcerer build, since the number of extra heal spells you get is based on Cha.
If you've never done a Versatile Human Rogue and used your Multiclass ancestry feat as a Psychic of the unbound step with warp step... I highly recommend. You get about 80ft of a one action teleport per combat which pairs with surprise attack to make you get 2 sneak attacks on the first turn of combat and, if you are a thief with precise debilitations you can apply the flat footed status until the end of your next turn as well, allowing you to constantly back stab the same opponent without needing to position with another player. Reactive reposition allows you to chase them as they try to regain the distance as well.
Target the casters and they will die in the back line before their protection even knows you've moved. Or target the big solo monster and give everybody a passive +2 to hit bonus from the start of combat. Remember kids, combat is determined in the first 3 turns of the game. Hit hard and use all of your action economy as efficently as possible and your opponent can't win.
Something to note about the Alchemist Dedication (unless I have been reading it wrong on my own character) is that you get a number of infused reagents equal to your character level, not level + Intelligence Modifier like the base class gets.
That's correct, I have read it few times, and alchemical dedication only gives infused reagents equal to your character level, where as alchemical class itself gives level + intelligence modifier.
this, and unless I have read it wrong, they don't get Advanced Alchemy, so they don't get to make 2 items for each infusion, which makes Alchemist dedication way less useful.
@@MrSmokinDragon It says your Advanced Alchemy item is level 1 so I believe that is untrue.
@@snarkmcclark4403 ah right, good catch. Thanks.
In my opinion, Monk's best multiclass archetype is Alchemist. The reason is that Drakeheart Mutagen is basically a medium armor that scales off of your unarmored defense proficiency, so you can achieve some really silly AC values starting at level 2. A level 2 Monk with +2 Dex and a level 1 Drakeheart Mutagen has 22 AC, which is equivalent to a level 2 Champion that already has their shield raised. The Monk can even get an additional +1 AC through Crane Stance. Also, the potential double-stride that the Drakeheart Mutagen enables is situationally pretty sweet with the Monk's high speed.
On an unrelated note, Thaumaturge / Monk isn't as great of a combination as you think because the two hits of Flurry of Blows combine damage for the purposes of weaknesses if they hit the same target. The Thaumaturge still benefits from getting to try twice, and you still get Implements Empowerment bonuses on both attacks, but you only get to apply the weakness once.
With Kineticist out, do you feel the same? I like Air with Monk alot due to Monks movement synergizing with Air's initial Junction. So that even if you use a 2 action Air impulse, your movement from it is still eventually better than your parties. The base movement of a Monk also plays interestingly with Air's flight options. Though this isn't all good, I have fought with myself on how to handle the "stance issues" as both classes want to be in their respective stances, though maybe Fuse Stance eventually becomes the savior there, albeit incredibly late in the game. I'm still new to Pathfinder, so this is a genuine question lol.
As someone who's more into interesting character concepts than solid builds (but still appreciates being effective), I like how a lot of these also feel like the synergize well as character concepts. Barbarian/Alchemist can be somewhere between Jekyll/Hyde and the Hulk; Champion/Monk could make a great Paladin of Irori; Swashbuckler/Monk could be a performing boxer, etc.
Swashbuckler/Monk reminds me a lot of capeoria. A lot of fast strikes, a lot of performative aspects and the martial art was originally an armed one.
Gunslinger can be pretty good with the fencer swashbuckler. You can pistol twirl to feint at a distance, now you got panache and your enemy is flatfooted which will help you crit.
Not going to lie, Bardgunner is just really interesting aesthetically
"That's a mighty fine tune you got there, partner."
The Slinger
Depicted in the movie Desperado
The Buster Scruggs build.
I actually recently made Swashbuckler/Monk. Went Fencer for the focus on feinting and also Stumbling Stance and every turn I can open with Flurry of Blows with a free feint action prior to it, gaining panache, feint again, and use my finisher with my final action. I even took Goading Feint at level 1 so I can choose to reduce my opponent's attack rolls instead, thus opening up more opportunities for Opportune Riposte.
Not gonna lie, I thought based on the title you found A multiclass archetype that makes EVERY other class significantly better. That being said after understanding. I am 1000% down for this video.
Monk/Barb is also pretty broken because of monks start with naturally higher AC (neutralizing the AC penalty from rage). Take animal instinct and get the rage benefit, giving you the ability to flurry of blows with d10s + your rage damage
Going into a rage and a stance probably feels really cool too
Would be interesting to have a peaceful monk fall into a rage. Great for rp
I still think Fighter/Champion is the best for fighter because of how well a one handed fighter synergizes with lay on hands and you get retributive strike on a fighter’s attack bonus.
But I think how bad shields feel to use are worthy a video.
lays of hand can be use with a two-handed weapon.
@@9652769 I never knew that. I thought you had to spend an action to take a hand off a weapon.
I've played a one handed flick mace fighter paladin.
GM told me to nerf the character as it was too strong...
How useful is retributive strike on a fighter? Sure the attack bonus is nice, but you already have a lot of reactions for your fighter. I guess it's another option to trigger though.
On note of persistent damage and damage bonuses, I don't believe they'd apply. This kinda thing's been present in other systems; it's just the initial weapon attack that counts, everything else is a secondary effect. Considering that PF2 makes an exception for persistent damage for critical hits, it's most likely that glimpse vulnerability doesn't apply to that.
Glimpse vulnerability also specifies a Strike, and persistent damage isn't part of a strike (even if it's applied by one), it's more a condition or status effect.
Weaknesses CAN apply to persistent damage IIRC if it's a type that lines up, but in Glimpse's case, it specifies it has to be to your unarmed strike/weapon, not a specific damage type.
I had a luchador themed character and I used Swashbuckler with the monk archetype. It was amazing. Highly recommend.
I'm working on an inventor with rogue dedication. Assurance: crafting at level 1 is insane. Subterfuge armor with the camouflage ability with rogue abilities are amazing. Plus you're skill heavy and can make and disable traps.
The war blood mutagen gives an item bonus to your attacks, which does not stack with the potency rune on your weapon. With the lower effective alchemist level you get, its generally pretty useless for most levels if you have been keeping up with your weapon at all. You never get the ability to make those juicy +4 bonus mutagens either because its level 17 and your max is 15.
Investigator into magus is something I'd suggest. Int cantrips/spells on a int based melee, you can know if you hit or crit before choosing when to waste spells with spell strike, seems pretty busted.
i played with a shooting star Magus who had investigator archetype. they were about to roll a crit? cast their highest level attack spell and just murder whatever they targeted. just gonna get a normal hit? gouging claw still does a bunch of damage.
Downside is you can only spell strike once per combat
Thaumaturge / Champion is amazing. Having a ranged option is necessary to mitigate action economy issues with the thaumaturge and they have a bad reflex save progression so a finesse/thrown weapon makes great sense. So L2 Champion gets skills + heavy armour (good for like 10 levels), L4 you can take lay on hands (chalice implement simulation), L6 - Champion Reaction (amulet implement simulation), and L8 - Blade Ally (free returning rune on thrown weapons at the same level the first damage runes come online).(take it at L8) comes online when all the damage runes come. Thrown weapons get full STR to damage as well.
Magus / Psychic I think is the new meta at this point for extra focus points, better base cantrips for spell strike, and amped cantrip nova damage. Magus / Witch is also good.
Fighter / Thaumaturge gets the same bonuses you're talking about.
Wizard / Alchemist can really diversify your support offerings with various alchemical items to hand out to others (including healing potions).
17:14 Me, running an INT Psychic: "Well fuck you too"
I've been tooling around with barbarian archetype on thaumaterge as just the king of flat damage. It doesn't even really hurt your action economy, since rage is one action one time, and it turns out that almost none of the thaumaterge actions have the concentrate trait.
I will say that for a TWF Flurry Ranger any spellcasting class with access to Haste is a worthy investment on the way to Impossible Flurry, that way you can bring your own Haste to the party which is *stupid* good for the build. I highly recommend Primal for access to both good healing and good ranged attacks, letting you play support or blaster when out of your element. Lightning Storm and Field of Life were personal favorites for her, the former even getting use after she got to Impossible Flurry level.
By the time you hit level 20 you can also throw that haste onto everyone in the party twice per day. Sure the other people can do this too, but if you're doing that then it frees up high level slots for them instead.
Cleric / Champion is a cool idea, when choosing Warpriest, as you get Heavy Armor proficiency and Lay On Hands for further healing. Really cool.
For Monk I like Barbarbian archetype if you go for strength, so more rage fueled strikes.
As a man who played a summoner with a sorcerer archetype and fey eidolon and just had…ALL the spells…it was indeed awesome.
I must say, I am a huge fan of the Cleric/Bard as well, since a dedicated healer might want Charisma for bonus heal slots, 2 actions for a ranged heal + 1 action for a +1+1 at level 4 if the party doesn't have a bard is fun too.
Persistent Damage happens at the end of the affected characters turn so it is not part of a strike. It's more like a condition that does damage, like bleeding.
On Rouge I would have gone with Ranger or Druid for flanking animal companion because Summoners share HP with their summons. Also the animal companions have Support effects they can apply when you hit. There are a ton of goods ones like Ape frightens 1, Bats give -1 Circ Attack to adj enemies, bird 1d4 bleed plus dazzled, boar 1d6 persist dmg, cat flat-foot, crocodile grabs enemy, and so on.
As a fan of the Owlcat's Kingmaker and Wrath of the Rigteous CRPGs, I am really looking forward to the day that they or somebody makes a 2e computer game.
oooh I like those!
Alchemist/Ranger: it is prob my favorite, Hunt Prey doubles your range with bombs, Gravity Weapon works with bombs as well as Quick Draw and Monster Hunter/Monster Warden are great for a INT based class.
Champion/Barbarian: solve the one thing Champions lack in comparison to most other martials: more power to their offense. Cool option: Dex Champion with Blade Ally, getting a free Returning Rune and Raging Thrower with a Chakram.
Cleric/Witch: a Familiar for the Cleric! with a new cool option, Divine Emmissary, for your little friend! Also Witch's Charge, which is great when combined with Heal. Now you can cast a 2 action spell and heal an injured ally!
Sorcerer/Rogue: Light armor, skill feats, Minor Magic, Mobility, good reactions like Nimble Dodge or You're Next and of course, Magical Trickster to add a bit of damage to attack spells... and Evasiveness later on.
That why i have an ranger/alchemist. She will have the attack progression of the ranger.
A charisma class is a good choice for cleric as they want a high charisma for there divine font.
I would argue for investigator archetype for the magus. You don't want to waste your spell slots, and investigator device stratagem ensures that you know when your spells will land.
The only issue with that is that the Magus class features alone take a huge toll on your action economy. idk if I'm willing to take a dedication that gives me _another_ action's worth of setup, y'know?
I now really wanna run that western themed campaign and recommend the bard gunslinger and gunslinger investigator for party slots. Just imagining Texas Red the Bard with a harmonica Western Cole Phelps from LA Noir as the investigating killer doing that campaign... Mm, so good
A gunslinger investigator has been in my Pathbuilder folder for months now waiting for a chance to play them. Risky reload is free reload and shoot for one action after a good devise stratagem check.
Nothing about stuff in the CRB going under utilized surprises me.
People actually finding things in the mess called CRB is the real surprise.
8:43 there is Martial Artist archetype which is ki-less monk and has gorila stance as a extra feat. And dedicatication has no prerequisites.
For a fighter class the best match is something in a magical context because when you're dealing with other magic base opponents magic gives you away to counter their attacks it gives you protection from their attacks it also allows you to ability to gain information to go places that a fire would have trouble going The extra spells can enhance the rangers abilities can make up for other skills they don't have.
This is my favorite video of yours not just because of the multiclassing advice, but because it really looks at the essential weaknesses and fantasies of each of the classes.
Wizard dedication on a INT based Psychic is what a player of mine is planning to play and I like it. Psychic really needs extra spell slots...
Since psychic can either be intelligence or charisma based I think a decent option for intelligence builds would probably be witch or maybe alchemist just for the intelligence stacking and mixing up spell lists* with witch letting you pick your secondary spell list either diversifying it to add some extra options for you to have or just focusing hard on occult spells if you want to and alchemist providing entirely new options for you to use while also multiclassing well.
Weapon Inventor with Magus archetype seems like a super fun and effective build. Getting a suped up weapon to do magus things and having the combined versatility of what ever magus focus spell fits you, inventor unstable actions, spells in general, spellstrike, crafting literally anything. In addition to both classes depending on each others sub stats makes it a super easy and clean build! Just str and int with a dash of dex for AC and youre going! It can put out some decent damage consistently, a nuke here or there with unstable actions and spellstrike, plus give itself survivability! Need something else? You can probably make it with your crafting being as high as itll be!
"Warrior Muse isn't a good subclass"
>:(
20:51 Between Monk+Swashbucklers and Swashbuckler+Monks I can't believe they're girlfriends
Sometimes it's not about the amount of damage you can do It's the ability to survive the obstacles you face, being able to summon something to assist you being able to gather intelligence for the group being able to defend yourself against an unexpected magical attack.
I'm playing a Warpriest Cleric in a Kingmaker 2e game an old GM buddy of one of my tablemates just started, she'll be archetyping into Champion at 2nd (16, 10, 12, 10, 16, 14 is her stat spread, so the prerequisites are met). I'm really jazzed- she'll be running combat support for the party's Fighter and Rogue, so buffs and sturdiness are the orders of the day. If she manages to land a hit every now and then? Hey, bonus. (Last two PCs are a Psychic and a Gunslinger, for context)
Been playing an ancestors oracle/swashbuckler and frankly its been a lot of fun. doing a little extra damage and panache skill actions mesh pretty well with the martial and skill ancestor curses - plus once you’re at your moderate curse it stacks with panache bonuses. Super fun if you’re down to play a pretty unpredictable character
I've got a couple.
Orc or Half Orc Animal Instinct (Deer) Barbarian/Witch. Familiar is helpful in scouting. Take living hair as your second witch feat along with the Iron Fists Orc feat. While raging you can Trip, Disarm, Shove, and Grapple. The hair and fists mean that even if you're caught between rages for any reason, you still have solid options. If you want to go whole hog on casting, with occult casting you can eventually enlarge yourself to huge with enlarge, give yourself +2 to attack rolls and skill checks with heroism, haste yourself, and heal yourself with sooth. With a normally nearly useless feat like Moment of Clarity you can even do this in the middle of a rage. Add in the fact that you only need handwraps to handle almost all your attacking needs and it's a decent build.
Sub witch with living hair works pretty well with standard 2hander fighter as well since you can go with a weapon that is only for damage and still trip and disarm with the hair. If the DM gives you permission, you can even upgrade the hair to grapple, trip, and disarm, potentially with reach.
Charisma Psychic with Champion archetype works well too. Pump strength and tank dex and you've got a decently high AC blaster. Add in various champion feats and you can get a champion's reaction, lay on hands, and/or a divine ally. If you don't want to wait to multiclass for the AC just go ancient elf and start at level 1 with it.
Tell me more of this Antler Hair Orc Witch...
I really like the Barbarian Archetype on champions. A -1 to AC isn't that big a deal to one of the most defensive classes in the game. Rage damage and Barb feats help with the low offense of Champion. And Lay on hands doesn't need concentration.
There is a huge problem with the spellcasting archetypes that can be worked around. But they aren't worked around in this video. That problem being *tradition proficiency.*
Unless you're a magus or battle cleric or whatever that already scales at master proficiency for their primary spellcasting tradition. Every spell you cast from your dedication tradition will be at a -2 if it's a save or attack roll. *Unless* the dedication tradition is the same as your main tradition. So I agree that witch is a good archetype for wizard but I would ALWAYS pick rune patron for more spells with full spellcasting bonuses. The arcane spell list is already the most diverse imo.
This is why I would actually pick spells that synergize with the playstyle without requiring any rolls. True strike, heroism and haste for martials (occult spell list is amazing for martials).
That's also why I wouldn't pick druid for clerics. The offensive cantrips are a lot less useful when they are at a -2. I'd instead choose something like rogue for mobility and defensive options, or something else that makes them safer in their spellcasting or gives them low action economy cost abilities that synergize with them, such as sorcerer focus spells.
The -2 is brutal on casters already but atleast a druid would still use the same key ability, a wizard that is also 1 or 2 behind on their wisdom in comparison to their intelligence would just be abysmal. Like yeah that vampire will probably take a lot of damage if you can whip out that searing light but at -3 or -4 the odds of you getting that cool hit on a challenging encounter is so very very low. Bless, Guidance and Heroism are wonderful on any character though, even if you only affect yourself that +1 goes a long way on a telekinetic projectile or horizon thunder sphere lol.
Nonat out here trying to get a copyright takedown from Nintendo.
i wouldn't even be able to fight them. I'd just bow my head and admit defeat lol
Not sure if stated already but another good multiclass archetype is int psychic. While it doesn't give extra spells as much wizard but it offers more interesting damage options and other things. Giving the shooting star magus the tangible dream shield thus giving a reaction to them. Also gives the magus a really good scaling cantrip of imaginary weapon which is normally an alright cantrip for psychic but magus can make good use of its normal and amped form
Nonat1s, appreciate your careful and thoughtful walkthroughs - invaluable perspective and excellent presentation. This channel is super useful in helping me build a character in 2E!
thing to keep in mind with alchemist multiclass is needing a hand to draw and hold potion's for martials, You know what's a better multiclass for barbarian.. fighter (two weapon warrior architype if available) OH no you cant get full rage damage with an agile weapon.. sooo dont use them! take the penalty and rock the double slice every encounter into the ground with only a -2 on the second attack! Ranger/ barb is good but the issue you will run into is action economy having to hunt target multiple time's, raging, moving. I made a ranger/ barb with the raging thrower with a barrel of javelin's on my back.
0:39 I think that it's also because more often than not a multiclass archetype feat is weaker than taking a class feat (or there's a non-multiclass archetype that does what you want from the multiclass but does it *better*, for example Bastion archetype vs Champion if you want to get heavy armor. Tho tbf the Champion archetype gives you the Lay on Hands and other things. I guess it's more about "doing one thing very well" or "Doing different things but not as well")
Counterpoint to sorcerer dedication for fighters
BARD dedication.
They get inspire courage at level 8, but if this is a demoralize fighter with shatter defenses and such, more importantly *you can get dirge of doom at level 12*
Also heroism, heroism is on the occult spell list as well
As soon as you mentioned Bard +Gunslinger, I pictured Buster Scruggs, and am surprised that wasn't mentioned lol
Why do you have fangs?
Saying Wisdom is useless is... Really dumb. It's good for medicine checks as mentioned, but it's also tied to perception, which is tied to detecting traps, finding shinies, and sensing motives of NPCs and if that's all not enough, nine times out of 10, you're rolling perception for initiative and going sooner in combat is never a bad thing.
Magus + Psychic (oscillating wave, or distant grasp if you want an area damage option). 2 focus spells you can spellstrike with that can be refreshed after combat for only a 2 feat investment beats anything a wizard can give. The standard cantrip versions of the spells are also useful.
Thaumaturge is like the king of multiclass. I made a space marine inventor with the Amulet implenent reflavored as a protective bubble shield.
hand crossbow thaumaturge with ranger's crossbow ace feat is insanely good damage; weakness+implements empowerment+crossbow ace stepping up the damage die. by level 6 I was doing 2d8+6+weakness on my thaumaturge after reloading
Oh man, I saw Searing Light on the Devil at a music festival once. Hearing "Flame Strike My Sadness, Jesus" live was bonkers
Here's the thing with oracle, if anyone talk about oracle there's always this question that comes to my mind...
"which oracle are you talking about? no, seriously, which one?" XD. They play very different jobs on the party from each other and is kinda hard to find an multiclass archetype that helps all of them, despite that, I really think psychic is a good pic for two reasons: As an oracle until Lv 11 is kinda useless to have 3 focus points if you dont have other ways of expending them(if you use them 3 times you're fucked), and the other is that not every oracle wants to progress their curse, pick cosmos for example, they have 2+half their lv on physical resistance ALL TIME, they will be fine with not progressing their curse.
So yeah, i think psychic is a good pic.
and also yeah oracle as a multiclass option is kinda shit
Fighter with Wild Druid dedication is too obvious pair? Because, you know, +2 stat bonus to attack rolls
I have also been thinking hard about the whole idea of the fighter with wyrm-blessed sorcerer dedication. It's a really interesting idea, especially since I already have a family of sylph gnomes descended from cloud dragons in the mwangi expanse as a character concept. Giving one of my characters a twin brother who is a gnome fighter (with that flickmace, of course) and that sorcerer dedication is kind of a cool idea!
I'm playing a Laughing Shadow Magus with Distant Grasp Psychic as a free archetype. Super fun, tons of abilities that care about battlefield position, and synergizes with our party's rogue quite well.
I'm debating in my character, initially was an Air Kinetict/Rogue, although my table went "oops all ranged" lol. So trading out Rogue for Monk, with the promise Fuse Stance has potential. As well as 1 action Flurry, 2 action impulse to trigger my junction, which has synergy with Monk movement. Though still trying to fine tune lol.
Rogue -> Monk with Stumbling stance.
Bonus to feint + if they succeed in hitting you (unfortunately), you at least guarantee them flat footed against our next attack.
Monk/Rogue is great monks can get sneak damage with a lot of stances and a lot of rogue feat make the monk even more mobile like Mobility from the rogue
Oracles don’t always want to progress their curse so actually getting focus spells that don’t advance their curse is very good.
The Psychic is especially good because you instantly get a focus point that isn’t cursebound for one feat.
thank you, it's good to know there's at least one other person out there who understands the oracle class.
Battle Oracle also plays really well with the Monk Archetype. Peafowl Stance and Monastic Weaponry for a Temple Sword paired with Flurry of Blows gives you incredible action economy.
Every turn is easily 2 Strikes, a free Step if one lands, followed by a spell of choice.
Can get even more fun with Bastion (raise a shield as a reaction and get an extra reaction for blocking) and Sixth Pillar (another free Step before or after casting a spell via Maneuvering Spell)
For Gunslinger. If you want a better chance to hit be a Sniper with Sniper's Aim for +2 Status bonus on your Fighter lvl attacks.
Multiclass for Gunslinger is RANGER! at 2nd lvl.
4th lvl get Basic Hunter's Trick: Gravity Weapon for extra damage on your first attack!
8th lvl get Advanced Hunter's Trick: Far Shot, this DOUBLES the range increment of your guns!!!
One thing I love about how absolutely horrible most of the Witch feats are is how customizable it is. It can be tough to fit in more than one or two archetypes (of any kind) into many PF2e class builds. But 10th level spellcasters (except the Bard) often have boring or straight up bad feat options at certain levels. The Witch is the worst of that bunch, but it allows so much customization from other classes. You can fit in several three & out Archetypes just using normal Witch class feats, or focus on one specific one. That leaves the entirety of the Free Archetype (as any DM worth their salt should be allowing their players to use it) to customize even more. Maybe, as you suggest, the Witch can go the Champion route using a couple Witch feats. She can then use some more Witch feats for something else, perhaps focusing on a few Charisma-based feats using the points saved from Dex. Then Free Archetype is spent soaking up extra spell slots in another caster class. Or maybe the Witch also embraces Loremaster, or something else on theme.
I know you like Wizards, but the next time you get to play I suggest trying out a Witch/Champion/Bard. You spend the resources saved from Dex and put them into Charisma. You have the skills to be a party face, if necessary. You also get to utilize Occultism & Bardic Lore to higher potential, while also picking up the utility/buff spells you need with the spontaneous Charisma Occult casting. If you don’t already have a Bard, you can grab Inspire Courage. Alternatively, if you do have one in the party, you can take Inspire Defense or something more situational, to be used in specific occasions. Even using Dirge of Doom will let the Bard spend his combat time Inspiring (which he should as he will have a better chance of fully utilizing Inspire Heroics). I’ve got a situation like this going on in one of my campaigns, and everyone is absolutely loving it. The Bard gets to do so much more with his resources, and the Witch gets to juggle between Hexes, Dirge of Doom, and even buff spells, all while using her prepared spells a bit more offensively. The two also have a friendly competition going over who can be the better face. It helps that out of game the players are a married couple, and are hilarious. Still, give it a try if you can!
Great video! Would you consider doing your list of the best archetypes in general for every class?
My house has heat come play pf2e at my place
Leaving a comment before watching to have some thoughts: I've started a Fists of the Ruby Phoenix AP recently and we're playing with Free Archetype, and one thing I've seen a lot of that Rogue continues to be that great skill monkey for nearly any class. Skill feats will always have nice utility and enable some more broken skill trees (like the general usefulness of Athletics and Acrobatics, or the brokenness of Intimidation) so I feel like Rogue should hopefully appear pretty often for its general usefulness.
Edit: interesting niches for many of these choices, though I feel like just taking 2 feat dip in some of these just feels kind of pointless? It feels like coming up with an idea for the sake of it, rather than a fun multiclassing idea, but still a great video!
Also playing Fists and my gnome summoner with adopted human ancestry picked up the rogue dedication at 9 and skill mastery at 10 and it has made a huge difference with the number of skills I feel confident in using inside and outside of combat. It also really helps with shoring up skills the party might be lacking by that time that were less important before but now are more common as the adventure advances.
Alchemist/Thaumaturge: Glimpse Vulnerability (and Exploit for Thau/Alch) gives weakness to your Strikes. Won't apply to persistent damage
Barbarian/Alchemist: You need to spend feats to level up your free consumables, if you want AC get Sentinel dedication at lvl2 and wear Heavy Armor. If you don't like the speed penalty get Fast Movement barb feat. And for animal instict barb remember you can just take Animal Skin at lvl 6 for a very nice AC boost of +2/+1 compared to other barbs.
Gunslinger/Investigator: I love it!
Inventor/Alchemist: Alchemist dedication only gets lvl reagents not lvl+Int. It works but you do need to use feats to keep increasing the alchemy lvl
Monk/Swash: Good option, just the bonus Speed from Panache won't stack with what you already get from monk.
Rogue/Summoner: Just remember your eidolon will share hp, an animal companion might be better but takes more feats (2,12 for eidolon vs 2,4,8,12 for animal)
Summoner/Champion: I like this one a lot. I had not considered it before but it just works! Although remember Eidolon shares MAP and they will probably hit better than you so STR is not great.
Swashbuckler/Monk: 10/10 Stumbling stance will let you keep your armor and works great with feinting Swash.
Witch/Champion: If the suggestion is to dump STR and DEX with the -10 speed penalty, consider a Small ancestry to make sure you can keep your mount in 5' hallways common in dungeons. Or you can wear chainmail to ignore STR and DEX without almost any penalty.
I am shocked Thamaturge / Magus didn't get a mention. I mean seriously, spell strike, expansive spell strike, and scroll striker along with all the scroll feats on a Thamaturge means once per combat you can spell strike ANY VIABLE SPELL IN THE GAME. Not to mention with using the setup action for enhance vulnerability on your weapon you get fighter level proficiency with it. Add to this the elemental capability to weakness hunt (cough THAMATURGE cough). plus what happens when you know a target has an elemental weakness so you use personal antithesis instead and try to hit 2 weaknesses at once.
Playing an Angelic Bloodline Sorceress of the Summoner Archetype. The idea was to have my sorceress be a menace from a safe distance while her succubus... yup, her succubus eidolon is a menace on the front lines. Didn't work out quite the way I imagined, but she is still provides DPS contribution for one action while I use one or two to play a more supportive role at the same time, hiding behind the fighter and healing for absurd amounts or casting Bless, Heroism, etc.
With the right party, this can be really fun. Gunslinger and FIghter provide the damage, while my succubus is being a thorn in something's side, I'm making my new favorite meatshield basically immortal with absurd heals, and we have Bard providing his inspiration shenanigans.
Eventually, I will have a higher Attack Bonus and AC than my poor succubus, but that's not going to stop me from using her, lol. And in the early game, before we had a proper party and more than three players, my character was a combat utility beast. I love her and her pet succubus to death. XD
Love your videos so much. They help me and my whole play group out so much. They are entertaining and informative.
For Mutagens the best bonus the warblood mutagen will give is a +1 functionnal bonus (item bonus to hit so doesn't stack with potency rune, the mutagen is designed to be at a functional +1 over the expected wealth value)
Same thing with Drakeheart, it will give you AC equivalent to a Full Plate of the same level for its duration, nice, but for a Barb that's still only +1, sometimes.
Vs the Champion archetype which has easier stat synergy than alchemist (STR and CHA) and will give Barbarian scaling heavy armor proficiency (basically permanent drakeheart) and access to the paladin reaction, but on a Barbarian, so incredibly good.
I thought he was talking about the dual class variant until he opened his mouth... Can't imagine playing without it now.
One of my favorite characters I have is my barbarian dragon instinct monk dragon stance charecter because the dragon stance is a d10 and losses the agile trait meaning the bonus to damage from dragon instinct still happens
I wouldnt've thought of all these subclass archetypes, nice! It's not every day that I rethink how some of the game works/classes interact with each other, thank you.
As always, your music selection is great
Here's a slight problem with the ranger barbarian you can't Concentrate when you rage so you can't hunt prey which means you can't flurry
I imagined a Swashbuckler being disarmed from his blade and gun and just punching his enemy, cracking his knuckles and grinning . . . . Yes
I was in a campaign with a sorcerer with the free archetype that used swashbuckler. She often used dueling parry for extra AC or intimidate to gain panache. Sometimes the extra 5 feet of movement from getting panache helped. Was it the strongest... no, but it was interesting. Ifrit sorcerer with elemental bloodline, and the bloodline effect gave a bonus to intimidate, which helped her gain panache.
Anyone multiclassed whilst playing a Kineticist, if so what ones worked? I know it's still only playtest material but ideas are welcome (currently playing a Kineticist).
Here is my personal fav Monk multi-class and fav Monk build. (This assumes we're using the free Archetype rule)
Monk/Champion
Step 1: Pick up Monastic Weapons.
Step 2: Get ourselves a staff. Thanks to Monastic Weapons we Flurry of Blows, and other things, with our staff.
Step 3: Pick up Stunning Fist. We can now stun, from 5 ft away, using our staff.
This gives us the following rotation. Trip, Flurry of Blows on tripped foe, and Step.
If everything procced successfully then:
-Our foe has lost 1 action (2 actions left)
-Our foe has to use another action to stand up unless they want to risk higher chances of being hit and critically hit (1 action left)
-Our foe has to use another action to get within melee range to hit us (0 actions left)
Obviously various enemies have protections against some of this, but generally speaking, with just two starting feats, you can ruin the day of most enemies.
Step 4: Grab the Champion Dedication (Liberator)
Step 5: Champion's Reaction
Let's say we and an ally are adjacent to a foe. We did our rotation, which ended in a Step. We are now too far away for enemy to attack us without spending an action to move. If they move however they won't have any actions left to attack with. So they opt to attack our adjacent ally instead.
In response we use our Champion reaction, which reduces the damage. Even when our foe targets someone else they can't get a full attack in.
But maybe they have 2 actions left, instead of 1, or have an ability that lets them attack twice while using only 1 action.
Well that's where the rest of our reaction comes in.
Our foe makes their first attack, we use our Champion reaction, the damage is reduced and our ally gets to make a free Step. Unless they have reach they can no longer follow up with that second attack.
So, no matter who they target, in situations where this build isn't hard countered, our foe is constantly reduced to 0-1 attack per turn. Meanwhile we're attacking them for two and giving all our melee party members bonuses to hit/crit.
This build, even without the free Archetype rule, can be completed by level 6 (the earliest one could get the build up and running). However, with the free archetype rule we can follow this up more by taking the Staff Acrobat Archetype line.
All of a sudden you get the ability to trip people 2 to 3 sizes larger than you, can trip multiple people in a single action, and can use your staff as a shield in situations where you wanted to raise a shield.
Searing Light On The Devil sounds like a Baptist Death Metal band specifically somehow.
I personally really like the barbarian with the inventor subclass. If you choose the armor invention, you can get a nice type resistance, or additional speed boost (sadly the power suit's bonuses to athletics don't apply since you can't overdrive), and if you choose weapon, you can add something like trip or grapple to your weapon, allowing that 2H barbarian to put their amazing athletics check to good use where they otherwise couldn't. Also, explosion is a great AOE option, and you can even heal yourself with it at lvl 4. There's also other great stuff here: megaton strike is just power attack with furious focus as a feat, megavolt for more AOE options, gadgets because why not, etc.
Also your reasoning for gunslinger/investigator also applies for magus/investigator, and inventor/investigator (megaton strike).
Wait, why is wisdom an unimportant character stat? Will save, perception, initiative, medicine and survival. The Battle medicine and continual recovery skill feats make great use of the medicine skill.
Another cool thing about the champion summoner is now that you have a respectable ac you can now fight alongside your eidolon
I think PF2 needs to stop making new classes and make an advanced players guide part 2 where they literally just give all of the existing classes extra content to their core class
I like swashbuckler archetype for rogue. If you go with the fencer style you can gain panache and render an enemy flatfooted for sneak attack. Do a finisher and now that is added to your sneak attack damage dice.
I'm not sure about ranger/barbarian. Rage is concentration, and Flurry does not have the rage trait, and Hunt prey of the ranger does not have the rage trait, so they cannot be used together I think.
Only half way through the video and I’m already coming up with character ideas
I think Sorcerer is the best Multiclass for Summoner, more spells for the class defined by having few but you make an excellent point that Champion might be better.
Fighter would be best for Sorcerer but only because Weapon Expertise at level 12 makes it possible to get Eldritch Archer as a caster but I get that this undermines the point of this video. HOWEVER since Eldritch Archer is a spontaneous caster archetype it has all of the benefits of your suggestion as well as Eldritch Shot (imagine using that with a 9th level spell)
I'm really not sure why a Bard would want to shoot and reload a gun, foregoing an instrument and its bonus, when they could instead just cast Telekinetic Projectile.
Druid and Fighter is great because Wild Shape. Same with Druid and Champion, my wife is playing that and the reaction helps other people out a ton, especially since that groups other melee is an Eidolon.
I played the Barbarian/Alchemist build with a hobgoblin since they get a bonus to intelligence and Alchemical Scholar for the extra recipes. Barbarian also has really good synergy with fear effects which synergizes with Remorseless Lash and Agonizing Rebuke very well, and the Cantorian line of feats really help with tankiness. We did play with free archetype so it was a little easier to get all the parts working. Otherwise I probably would have had to neglect the fear part of the build but even without it the combo is super strong.
Another cool multiclass archetype build I did was also with hobgoblin, but this time leaning fully in to the fear strategy with ruffian rogue. Going strength based was super beneficial for damage and got me access to Intimidating Prowess. I also went with fighter dedication to get all of the fear synergy feats like Intimidating Strike and Shatter Defenses. Pair that with Remorseless Lash, Agonizing Rebuke, and the plethora of rogue fear synergy feats as well as all of the intimidation skill feats and I was able to keep nearly all of the enemies in a given combat at frightened 1 and constantly taking persistent mental damage and other debuffs while also dealing some really good damage with the strength bonus to damage and sneak attack. Additionally, the other fighter stuff like Power Attack, Opportunist, and Resiliency as well as the Cantorian stuff just made me a much better front liner in general. And unlike the barbarian/alchemist build, you don't need to worry about intelligence so you can fully spec into Charisma as your secondary ability score. Super fun build utilizing the most broken skill in the game.