[PF] Pathfinder Samurai, what can you do with it??

[Kyuu Himura]

Hello Playground, I just grabbed a copy of Ultimate Combat and it comes with a Samurai class, basically a Cavalier archetype. The thing is, while I was trying to come up with something unique and cool to do with it, I couldn't, so, I entrust my hopes into you.

What can we do with the Samurai? What options are good, what options are traps? what are his strenghts and weaknesses? what class features are worse than they sound, what class features are better that I imagined?

And, just because I want to get this out of the way, I know that a Warblade is the best Samurai out there (therefore I don't need to be told that I should talk my DM into letting me play a Warblade, and I love ToB, but this is not there), I know Druids are better melee than anything and I know Barbarians are probable the best melee class without ToB or full Spellcasting, so consider me aware of this and, if at all possible, humor my request.

Thank you all in advance.

[Greenish]

Going by the playtest version…

If you could get Challenge to work on ranged attacks, you could make a decent mounted archer. Even without, you'll have decent tools for it.

[Starbuck_II]

Hello Playground, I just grabbed a copy of Ultimate Combat and it comes with a Samurai class, basically a Cavalier archetype. The thing is, while I was trying to come up with something unique and cool to do with it, I couldn't, so, I entrust my hopes into you.

What can we do with the Samurai? What options are good, what options are traps? what are his strenghts and weaknesses? what class features are worse than they sound, what class features are better that I imagined?

And, just because I want to get this out of the way, I know that a Warblade is the best Samurai out there (therefore I don't need to be told that I should talk my DM into letting me play a Warblade, and I love ToB, but this is not there), I know Druids are better melee than anything and I know Barbarians are probable the best melee class without ToB or full Spellcasting, so consider me aware of this and, if at all possible, humor my request.

Thank you all in advance.

First, PF isn't good at naming. The Samurai isn't the best Samurai. But it is a good archetype.

The good; you get all the old cavalier orders and new samurai ones.
The naginata isn't a bad exotic for free.
Resolve: Removes conditions. Reroll Fort/will saves. Unstoppable (super diehard). And it is rechargable (by making enemy surrender, knocking to 0, or enemy flees).
Basically, Samurai are PF version of ToB Crusaders (minus maneuvers). Really hard to kill easily.

[The Gilded Duke]

One of the nicest parts about animal companions in pathfinder is that you get to choose their feats from a set list. With the default options, horses are the most powerful. Get them Power Attack, Improved Bull Rush etc and they are good at moving people around the battlefield. Eventually get them greater bull rush, and their bull rushes can provoke attacks of opportunity.

I have a Samurai at level 3 so far, the horse is going Power Attack, Bull Rush, Overrun line, where as the Samurai himself is going combat expertise disarm, steal etc line. Between the two of them, and the bonus feats Samurai get they have lots of options.

If your dm counts being mounted as "high ground" there is a feat in ultimate combat that changes the high ground bonus to +5.

Like with a cavalier, the spirited charge route is a good strategy.
Use your resolve to stay alive.
Order of the Warrior and Order of the Ronin both have their advantages, and are both more powerful then any of the cavalier orders.

With my sam I'm going a mix of combat expertise route and Master Craftsman, Craft Magic Arms and Armor.

[Kyuu Himura]

well, looking at the eastern weapons, how would a Daisho crit fisher build look?? Katanas and Wakizashis have 18-20 crit range, so if you get the keen enchantment for both and a few critical feats you should be able to get some nice damage/debuffing...

Of course, it kinda loses effectiveness against crit-immune enemies and you can't move and full attack (and every other obvios probles with TWF)

Opinions on this??

Also, the mount works like a druid's animal companion minus share spells, so you get the ability to direct it as a free action... does that mean that you can make it move with a free action, allowing you to full attack?? (I think I'm getting it wrong, but maybe not)

That would be quite cool, get in, hoof someone, challenge, full attack...

Did I hit something good here?

[Rixx]

You can direct it to move, but you still have to wait out the time for it to move, which prevents you from taking your melee full attack. You can full attack with a ranged weapon and move.


If your mount moves more than 5 feet, you can only make a single melee attack. Essentially, you have to wait until the mount gets to your enemy before attacking, so you can't make a full attack.

[stack]

Mounted skirmisher (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/mounted-skirmisher-combat),

Prerequisites: Ride rank 14, Mounted Combat, Trick Riding.

Benefit: If your mount moves its speed or less, you can still take a full-attack action.

Normal: If your mount moves more than 5 feet, you can only take an attack action.

Works better for a ranger, who can get it sans prereq's at lvl 10.

[Kyuu Himura]

Mounted skirmisher,

Prerequisites: Ride rank 14, Mounted Combat, Trick Riding.

Benefit: If your mount moves its speed or less, you can still take a full-attack action.

Normal: If your mount moves more than 5 feet, you can only take an attack action.

Works better for a ranger, who can get it sans prereq's at lvl 10.

This is golden, too bad you have to wait till 14th level....

[Luckmann]

For those of us *not* interested in Mounted Combat, is any of the Cavalier archetypes suitable for use with the Samurai, allowing you to exchange the relevant Mount feats/class features?

For some reason, the Cavalier Archetypes on the PFSRD is gone.


This is golden, too bad you have to wait till 14th level....

There has to be some shenanigan you can pull for "early entry".

[Archpaladin Zousha]

For those of us *not* interested in Mounted Combat, is any of the Cavalier archetypes suitable for use with the Samurai, allowing you to exchange the relevant Mount feats/class features?
Unfortunately, upon first glance I'm unsure if samurai may take any of them. Musketeer and the other mount-replacing features require you to give up BOTH your mount and the Expert Trainer feature, which samurai do not get. I think if I were GMing a game and you wanted to play a non-mounted samurai I'd just swing it by saying the free Mounted Archery feat you get is the samurai's equivalent to Expert Trainer, but I have no clue if that's an even trade.

In summary, at first glance, no. But further examination and some GM interpretation may allow it.

[Luckmann]

Unfortunately, upon first glance I'm unsure if samurai may take any of them. Musketeer and the other mount-replacing features require you to give up BOTH your mount and the Expert Trainer feature, which samurai do not get. I think if I were GMing a game and you wanted to play a non-mounted samurai I'd just swing it by saying the free Mounted Archery feat you get is the samurai's equivalent to Expert Trainer, but I have no clue if that's an even trade.

In summary, at first glance, no. But further examination and some GM interpretation may allow it.That's what I was afraid of. But as you say, I doubt that any reasonable DM wouldn't allow one to equate Mounted Archery to Expert Trainer for the purpose of Archetypes.

After all, the whole point is to trade away the mount capabilities to begin with.

[CTrees]

AFB, but if I'm remembering correctly, a Samurai can take Beast Rider. Don't tnink anything else, unfortunately, and Beast Rider just gives more interesting mounts (though a moose (megaloceros) riding samurai amuses me, just by concept)

[The Gilded Duke]

It needs expert trainer, which Samurai doesn't seem to have. Might try and convince my gm to swap out mounted archery for it. Would love to have a Rhino, or any other sort of mount with powerful charge as an ability. Would build nicely with Minotaur's Charge. Maybe a nice Ram? Would probably fit better then a horse for my dwarf.

[Greenish]

Would love to have a RhinoSomething like this?

http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/4096/shigerusanbynefar007.jpg

[Archpaladin Zousha]

AFB, but if I'm remembering correctly, a Samurai can take Beast Rider. Don't tnink anything else, unfortunately, and Beast Rider just gives more interesting mounts (though a moose (megaloceros) riding samurai amuses me, just by concept)
Musketeer works as well, since it just replaces Mount and Expert Trainer. You're right that all the other ones wouldn't work, though.

[deuxhero]

Well, I give it one thing, PF Samurai is better than the CW one :)

[Luckmann]

AFB, but if I'm remembering correctly, a Samurai can take Beast Rider. Don't tnink anything else, unfortunately, and Beast Rider just gives more interesting mounts (though a moose (megaloceros) riding samurai amuses me, just by concept)

Beast Rider also replaces Expert Trainer, so not by RAW, unfortunately. Again, though, I think that any reasonable DM would allow you to switch Expert Trainer for Mounter Archery, allowing you to use the mount-replacing Archetypes (or Beast Rider, as it were).

[CTrees]

Huh, I thought I remembered Beast Rider not replacing Expert Trainer. Looking back, I think I was conflating that with Gendarme not replacing it (because I was looking at doing a Gendarme/Beast Rider build for... amusement value, really).

Yeah, kinda sucks that the Samurai can't use archetypes.