Pathfinder Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Enhanced Plus Edition - now with turn-based combat

[Average Manatee]

In general you're better off just staying STR/DEX/CHA-heavy rather than trying to get DEX to replace STR. Reasons:

- STR is generally boostable higher than DEX anyway.
- Going for 3 high stats rather than just 2 only barely lowers your stat bonus by 1 or 2 points, which is meaningless when by the midgame we're boosting everything to at least mid 20s.
- Two handed weapons which you generally can't DEX with give 1.5x damage modifier and 1.5x power attack. The one exception is elven curved sword which is a very nice exotic 18-20/x2 finessable weapon. But if you're willing to drop a feat on exotic weapon you could have taken fauchards for reach.

Dumping STR just doesn't buy you much more DEX and the price of feats to accommodate it is too costly.

yup lawful, some degenerate builds just change alignment with dialogue choices after character creation to get some nonlawful stuff

There are some very good lategame robes that require lawful good alignment though.

 

[Max Damage]

Dexterity also has negative synergy with spells that increase your size, which further limits reach and damage.

 

[Desiderius]

Item slots are good. Dips are bad (90% of progression is tied to class). Play the game as designed and you'll pwn the powergheymer idiots.

AC is mostly for retards who are trying to solo or haven't figured out basic tactics anyway.

I don't understand - you get the full monk dip bonus for one point. The solution is pretty obvious, make it scale based on points depth in the tree rather than making it a one class level dip that scales infinitely with wis.

Add that to multi stat boosting items, and you effectively get to double dip stat point modifiers.

Is that worth a level 20 spell/ability?

Why does a bracer give as much armor as plate mail? At least cap it to the +5 value of the BiS modifier, then you'd at least have to have +9 combined attribute bonus to equate to the AC value.

I have a similar problem with D&D 5e where damage and to hit with finesse weapons doesn't even require a feat.

It's not about losing a lvl 20 ability it's about what you lose at lvl 2,3,4,5...etc. Most class abilities scale with levels in the class and AC is, well just AC. You fundamentally do not need more than one char with high AC unless you want to make some kind of right-click and watch comp.
The armor bracers that rival plate armor come late, by that time you can get mithral full plate and fighter's armor training gets their dex bonus to AC quite high, on top of being able to carry a tower or heavy shield with a +5 enhancement bonus. What makes unarmored good in KM is more the crazy good monk robes and the abundance of headpiece with mental stats but still, I would say for the most part it is overkill.
Dex to dmg isn't all that great. Unless you're a rogue you have to pay two feats just to function properly. And that comes with limitations, : being limited to 1 weapon type, not being allowed to use a shield or to two-hand your weapon for 1.5 modifier to damage (not applying to rogue again). So it isn't free that's a pretty steep opportunity cost. A strength build that wouldn't bother about AC would be two feats ahead and dishing out a ton more damage.

I think his reasoning is :why do you waste your MC on stacking AC when Valerie is set up to be your tank bitch from the start? If you'd want to sacrifice some scaling for early game AC that would be her - and she can ramp to late game level AC just fine.
There is also the fact that AC's value lowers as the game goes on : your caster get better spells so your ability to control the battlefield gets stronger and stronger, your crew gets higher dmg which means fewer things get to live/act many rounds, you have more HP and can start taking hits more regularly even on unfair etc, etc.

I am not as autistic as Desiderius, I think dipping can be fine in some circumstances but it is definitely that the more you play this game the less attractive dipping becomes. And a certain builder of owlcat PF games kinda managed to drill in the mind of half the people playing this game that a melee char NEEDS to reach nie untouchable AC or is basically shit. Which is utterly retarded.

I give them shit about the powergheyming because *they're* being autistic but lacking our superpowers are bad at it.

Ironically just playing the game as you would have out of the box in 1993 will put you well ahead of the munchkins.

Great summary BTW, I'd only add that credit goes to Haplo for breaking the stranglehold of DEX-based on the meta with his awesome pics of damage dice multiplying using STR-based (which also gets the benefit of size and polymorph bonuses). People think I'm bragging or whatever but 90% of the shit I drag people for I was doing myself for at least a year after release. Haplo plus reading about the design philosophy got me to test the alternative or I never would have.

 

[Desiderius]

Item slots are good. Dips are bad (90% of progression is tied to class). Play the game as designed and you'll pwn the powergheymer idiots.

AC is mostly for retards who are trying to solo or haven't figured out basic tactics anyway.

If AC - one of the most basic mechanics in D&D(-likes) - "is mostly for retards" in this game, then what does it say about the quality of mechanics and/or balance of this game?

That's obviously an exagerration.

My casters usually have more AC than most people's off-tanks because I build for resilience and minimizing reloads. That isn't what the powergheymers are doing. You can establish aggro with your tanks(s) and AC on other toons doesn't come into play much, especially if you're zerging in RTwP or focusing on taking out enemy casters/archers while maintaining proper spacing/control on your end.

Debatable how valuable a Monk splash is on Val/Seelah. A lot of ways to go with Val, but main feature is high CHR and CON along with enough AC to tank on any difficulty. TSS is a fun class on its own. I've gone Bard, Feyspeaker Druid, and Kinetic Knight with the one TSS level to start as well, picking up Proficiencies and the Bonus Feat. I'm fine picking up a Monk level to turn on Shirt slot on Seelah, but only after picking up Mark of Justice and would prefer to unlock Brilliant Energy Bond ASAP too.

On MC dip just isn't necessary in 90% of cases (Harrim can tank Trobold/VTomb with AC bonus vs Giants in place of Val too) and any dip leaves you underleveled in main class.

 

[Yosharian]

Dexterity also has negative synergy with spells that increase your size, which further limits reach and damage.

You don't have to be a DEX character to be a pyjama tank, big misconception

 

[Average Manatee]

You should *have* DEX as opposed to dumping it, you just get enough on your own with normal investment + buffing and don't need to push it sky high as your main stat.

Well really no melee should be dumping DEX since combat reflexes exist, pretty much all melee characters should have 12 or 14.

 

[Haplo]

Dexterity also has negative synergy with spells that increase your size, which further limits reach and damage.

You don't have to be a DEX character to be a pyjama tank, big misconception

Exactly.
Pajama tank. Old and hardly optimized, but whatever

 

[razvedchiki]

can you tank with DR on hard?

 

[Incognito]

Dexterity also has negative synergy with spells that increase your size, which further limits reach and damage.

You don't have to be a DEX character to be a pyjama tank, big misconception

Exactly.
Pajama tank. Old and hardly optimized, but whatever

Your motherfucker has the least Lawful Good look ever. In fact he looks like he will kill and neck rape everyone in your party on the first camp night.

 

[Desiderius]

can you tank with DR on hard?

My guess is you can now on Unfair with the new Wrath Mythics. Would be harder in P:K. Would depend on stacking rules, but DR precedes the Unfair doubling.

 

[Average Manatee]

Too much stat bloat for DR tanking anything serious I think. As soon as something with a +30 damage from strength and power attack (which is... like chapter 2 trolls I think) looks at you you're going down if they can hit all their APR. Nevermind crits. Crit immunity would be basically required. Otherwise low AC means that every crit is also confirmed, and I'm guessing those troll weapons are like x3 crit multiplier.

 

[volklore]

I mean that's if you absolutely want to tank everything. Things with crazy damage are pretty easy to identify, just Control those and tank the rest. DR applies before difficulty modifiers so it's still good on unfair, lots of fights in KM are a lot of trash mobs. With high con and temp HP you can get good HP pool and tank quite a lot, just have to deal with really threatening things with the rest of your party.

 

[Cyberarmy]

-/DR tanking isn't viable in Kingmaker, especially on harder difficulties. I think max you can get is 15 or 16 (11 from Invulnarable Rager)

 

[volklore]

Regarding stacking in wrath, didn't owlcat end up fixing Lich DR stacking with class based DR (like barb)?

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Take a wild guess. Like many things in wrath, only god knows, but one thing's for sure - it doesn't work the way it should. Most DR items were bugged when I was still trying to play the game. Then there was some butthurt about them removing stacking, but they've probably fucked it up in more ways than one.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Regarding stacking in wrath, didn't owlcat end up fixing Lich DR stacking with class based DR (like barb)?

Oh, they "fixed" that in WotR? No fun allow indeed. It was only, remotely usable as a lich and bloodrager and now they killed another build type. While pyjama tanking is still the king without effort.

 

[Yosharian]

-/DR tanking isn't viable in Kingmaker, especially on harder difficulties. I think max you can get is 15 or 16 (11 from Invulnarable Rager)

You can get up to about 29/- but it takes a while to get there

The big problem with DR tanking is you still get hit by nasty stuff like ability damage/drain and other things, ideally you'd use Jaethal for this, or get some items like Swamp Boots via mods

 

[volklore]

Regarding stacking in wrath, didn't owlcat end up fixing Lich DR stacking with class based DR (like barb)?

Oh, they "fixed" that in WotR? No fun allow indeed. It was only, remotely usable as a lich and bloodrager and now they killed another build type. While pyjama tanking is still the king without effort.

Make riddiculous spellbook merging rules that autowin the game at lvl 11 but god forbid would you be able to stack DR between class abilities and mythic path amirite.

 

[Yosharian]

Dexterity also has negative synergy with spells that increase your size, which further limits reach and damage.

You don't have to be a DEX character to be a pyjama tank, big misconception

Exactly.
Pajama tank. Old and hardly optimized, but whatever

Yep. My STR-based build can hit up to 99 AC, hell that's enough to tank in Wrath let alone KM

 

[volklore]

They even added in mythic armour abilities/feats in Wrath and still didn't fix the problem because they are almost all garbage

The heavy armor avoidance one is extremely good seeing how insanely high you can stack strength, and you get the whole extra AC right of the bat rather than scaling with mythic ranks.
I just hate the fact it's making mutation warrior into a tank when it's supposed to be an archetype that gives up defense (armor training) for more dmg and a static ac buff from mutagen compounded by the fact owlcat implementation of fighter is horrendously incomplete - no advanced armor training, missing a lot of advanced weapon training etc...)

 

[Yosharian]

Meh perhaps, I just found them to be very underwhelming

 

[volklore]

if you start with 19 STR you're at lvl 8 or by M2, that 5 STR bonus + 2 enhance + 2 mutagen + 1 size (cancels the penalty but still) i.e 5 AC right off the bat. You can get some more if you have a way to trigger master shapeshifter, having a BFT or other ways to buff STR higher. That's a lot better than Archmage armor which almost every pajama tank uses.
And will keep getting better as mutagen improves, as you get better spells/gear to buff STR, and you get more bonus to STR through various means. At the end it ends roughly equivalent but heavy focus comes up better than archmage armor for the majority of the game.

 

[Average Manatee]

I mean that's if you absolutely want to tank everything. Things with crazy damage are pretty easy to identify, just Control those and tank the rest. DR applies before difficulty modifiers so it's still good on unfair, lots of fights in KM are a lot of trash mobs. With high con and temp HP you can get good HP pool and tank quite a lot, just have to deal with really threatening things with the rest of your party.

The things that hit hard with crazy damage are also the bosses that tend to be hardest to control and with the highest AB. "the rest" tends to be crap that can be tanked by a half assed AC character.

 

[Desiderius]

They even added in mythic armour abilities/feats in Wrath and still didn't fix the problem because they are almost all garbage

The heavy armor avoidance one is extremely good seeing how insanely high you can stack strength, and you get the whole extra AC right of the bat rather than scaling with mythic ranks.
I just hate the fact it's making mutation warrior into a tank when it's supposed to be an archetype that gives up defense (armor training) for more dmg and a static ac buff from mutagen compounded by the fact owlcat implementation of fighter is horrendously incomplete - no advanced armor training, missing a lot of advanced weapon training etc...)

There's more there than meets the eye. Advanced Weapon Training was implemented with last P:K DLC.

Mut Warrior has always been highly overrated. Hangover from the Vivi hype and Mut gets the Vivi stuff on a heavy delay.

Standard free Dazzling + Bloodline on Scion, TSS, and even Aldori are just more interesting.

 

[Desiderius]

Meh perhaps, I just found them to be very underwhelming

It's a lot of AC but AC was never really the limiting issue.

The amount of DR/- stacking you can do now gives you another option (it's on Heavy/Tower so that character will already have good AC) along with things like AB bonus on Light and some Saves stuff.

The Heavy Shield one is the most dissappointing, and the implementation on Bucklers is borken.