Heya.
Looks like I'm the de facto character builder for this upcoming campaign my group is having. =p
I tend to be the best at optimization around our table, so folks are coming to me asking to help them plan their builds, and I didn't really know much about a couple of the things people wanted to do, so I thought I'd send out a request for info from those wiser than I.
One friend asked for help with optimizing her Ranger - ideally flavor-wise, he'd wield a two-hander and focus on combat with his animal companions and I'm thinking the bulk of optimization would be in that area. I believe the character she's trying to replicate had at least a big cat sort of pet and a hawk scout.
Unfortunately, it looks like companions are quite a bit different in PF, and I'm not really well-versed in optimizing for them in PF (or base 3.5, for that matter). Some stuff I've read involves giving them teamwork feats? And it looks like Boon Companion is pretty much a requirement, I think? What about if we use the Beastmaster variant? The rest of the party will probably be reasonably optimized, so having this guy be as effective as possible is definitely a goal - I don't want her to feel useless.
Someone else has come to me asking for help in building a kickass oracle. So far they think they want the Life Mystery and the Tongues curse. The player likes the idea of the Life Link revelation and my first thought was like "hey, that might work neat with a Soulthief Vitalist", so I checked into that, but being, say, a psychic theurge would totally negate mystery progression and the fun soulthief stuff that would actually be good to combo with it, so no dice there.
Thing is, I can't find much of anything for optimization with Oracles. No fun combos, no powerful interactions, no interesting feat progression, cool prestige classes... =\
I did some handbook searching and pretty much only found this:
Channeling the Cosmos: A Guide to the OracleWhich, tbh, isn't terribly helpful.
For comparison, my character in this campaign:
is a craftsman and gunsmith (Spellslinger 1 / Artificer 19, using the Eberron artificer ported over). I plan on making fun toys for the rest of the group, helping out with between-combat healing and buffs (maybe passing around some wands infused with persistent spell) when possible, and blasting away with a musket and wands. There is likely to be some fun with Hunter's Mercy (on either a wand or wondrous item) + x3 crit on ranged touch wands fired through the musket (Double checked with DM that a) Hunter's Mercy works with firearms in his campaign and that b) spells cast from wands can be used with arcane gun and received an affirmative on both counts). So, he'll spend a couple turns using metamagic item / hunter's mercy - drawing a bead on some poor soul, lining up a shot and... boom, headshot. I wouldn't mind some advice for items that this guy can craft to help out the other character's we're working with here, either.
Using PF rules, plus action and craft points. Setting is Eberron-ish, in that there's a lot of magic-as-technology going on, though its a bit less grim and gritty than Eberron.
Sources open for the campaign in question include all wizards and paizo products, though PF material typically takes priority if there are conflicts.
Anyone have some pointers on building either of these guys?
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