Pathfinder Gnome Bomber.

[Snig]

So i'm trying to create a gnome similar to a gnome engineer in warcraft. The closest I can come to that is a Gnome Alchemist who focuses on bombs and maybe take craft seige engine?

Anyhow I was wondering, if i'm going to focus on my bombs, should I go with fastbombs / Rapid Shot / Precise Shot / Point Blank Shot? And should I use a crossbow for my backup weapon, and if so do I need rapid reload? What type of crossbow would be best?

I was considering using a launching crossbow? I think it would be neat to refluff it as a grenade launcher? But i'm not sure if its worth giving up ranged touch attack?

Any ideas or suggestions would be great.

[Almarck]

I'm assuming Third Party is outright banned. There's quite a few 3rd party supplements that do focus on technology use, some of them good, some of them bad.

In the PFsrd though, there's a couple of things that might interest you. There's the Technomancer, basically a spellcaster prestige class that focuses on applying magic and technology together. There's also archetypes that encourage using technological weapons for Gunslinger and Fighter.

But none of that answers the question of Alchemist bombs. So obviously, you'll want to get Fast Bombs. You can by the way "dualweild" bombs as light weapons, using the TWF tree in addition to haste and other bonus attacks. Just remember doing this is risky as you only have so many bombs and you'll probably overkill an enemy several times over, wasting bombs.

Now, as for your backup weapon, have you thought about going for melee with an Agile weapon and weapon finesse. It'd be less feat intensive than going with rapid shot, but on the otherhand, dual weilding daggers to go into melee is a typical thing to do.

[Snig]

I'm assuming Third Party is outright banned. There's quite a few 3rd party supplements that do focus on technology use, some of them good, some of them bad.

In the PFsrd though, there's a couple of things that might interest you. There's the Technomancer, basically a spellcaster prestige class that focuses on applying magic and technology together. There's also archetypes that encourage using technological weapons for Gunslinger and Fighter.

But none of that answers the question of Alchemist bombs. So obviously, you'll want to get Fast Bombs. You can by the way "dualweild" bombs as light weapons, using the TWF tree in addition to haste and other bonus attacks. Just remember doing this is risky as you only have so many bombs and you'll probably overkill an enemy several times over, wasting bombs.

Now, as for your backup weapon, have you thought about going for melee with an Agile weapon and weapon finesse. It'd be less feat intensive than going with rapid shot, but on the otherhand, dual weilding daggers to go into melee is a typical thing to do.

Well I just assumed that since I would be bombing I would want most of the ranged feats. Using a crossbow would take advantage of these feats when I wasn't throwing bombs?

[Almarck]

Well, if you want, it'd be certainly allow you to make your attacks. Take Crossbow mastery (free action reloads) as soon as you can, but I will warn you, it's pretty hard to get to that point without bonus feats.

[Psyren]

Alternatively, just use a repeating crossbow - by the time you need to reload it the fight will likely be over.

[Snig]

so if you guys were going to make a gnomish engineer who specializes in bombs, traps, gadgets etc. how would you build it? Does anyone have and suggestions or sample builds?

[Ravens_cry]

Maybe go ninja instead? They get bomb chucking tricks as well, and the stats for a ninja are better suited for a gnome.
Also, your name must be 'Evil-Midnight-Bomber-what-Bombs-at-Midnight!' Yeah Baby!

[Snig]

Should have mentioned that i'm allowed to take the tinker gnome race from 3.5 so +2 dex, +2 int, -2 str, -2 wis.

Pretty good for a alchemist!

[Ashes]

Don't gnomes get an absurd amount of bombs as an alternate FCB as well?
As far as I know, gnomes are great for alchemists.