Help building Archer fom the Fate series

[Nosta]

so I've always wanted to play an Archer like character. some one who can create weapons with amazing abilities I would like the character to have lots of knowledge's and be able to figure out what sword or arrow he needs to best his foe.

I can see this being a build based around Dex but I just can't figure out how to replicate his ability to summon forth weapons and such

any one have a build idea that could help?

this is a geaslt build and up to level 15

[mabriss lethe]

Psychic warrior with the spiritual weapon acf would allow you to summon a single type of weapon and customize it's properties with each summoning. Part of the acf makes you choose the summon weapon power, which will allow you to pull out any other weapon you might need.

You could also construct a melee weapon out of bloodglass for an extra 500 (not a masterwork material), adding a straight 3000gp surcharge to its enchantment cost allows you to add a property (shifting?) That will allow the weapon to become any other weapon of its size and category (ex: medium, one handed) while retaining its powers, (enhancements will go dormant, though if the new form is incompatible.)

Shapesand is cheap at 100gp a jug, and can take one whatever form or function you like with a wisdom check. Enchanting it is a bit of a problem, though.

[Flickerdart]

Psychic warrior with the spiritual weapon acf would allow you to summon a single type of weapon and customize it's properties with each summoning. Part of the acf makes you choose the summon weapon power, which will allow you to pull out any other weapon you might need.
Soulbound weapon is explicitly useless for you, as it is the same weapon every time it is summoned. However, the normal call weapon power works fine.

But Archer isn't about making one weapon. He's about making butt-tons of weapons and chucking them at his enemy. Psionics can sort of do that using psychic scimitar but you really want to go for plain ol' magic. There are many spells that allow you to summon flying magic weapons or do something similar - spiritual weapon, mordenkainen's sword, black blade of disaster, persistent blade, fire shuriken. There are many more spells such as melf's magic arrow or produce flame that create magical projectiles that aren't usually weapons but could be fluffed as such. You can use animate weapon or the dancing weapon property to take normal weapons and make them fly.

[AmberVael]

Is this pathfinder or 3.5? Is third party material allowed? How closely do you want to mimic Archer - do you want to be flinging weapons at people, or would you be fine with a melee combatant who just summons weapons and possibly other items?

[Zancloufer]

By Archer I assume you mean the original Archer that Rin summons?

I suppose the first thing to look at is WHAT he can do:

1) Make swords with magic. Well anything that is sharp and/or pointy and a whole bunch of simple mundane items as well. So you want the ability to summon/create swords EVERYWHERE. If your character can't create at least 10 different magic swords it's not Archer.

2) Use said swords. It's not so much that he creates a weapon rack of borderline artifact level weapons, he can also USE THEM. Martial Weapon proficiency is critical here.

3) Use a bow. You know, because he is Archer. Martial weapon proficiency would probably be fine here, so see #2.

How I would build him: Something like Sorcerer X/Full BaB class 1/Gish PrCs is best idea here. At the end of the day I would say Charisma would be his best metal stat. While not unintelligent or completely lacking in common sense he gets by mostly on willpower. Also sorcerer makes sense as he has a very small selection of magic known.

Also remember, Archer is an incredibly powerful, but niche, spell-caster that (ab)uses swords. At his core in Fate he is a Magi that specialized in 'casting sword' so much that he achieved the second most powerful type of magic (even by D&D standards his ultimate spell/Noble Phantasm would probably be an Epic Spell).

Spell selection? Personal buffs and SWORDS. Spells that make them (like fabricate, Greater magic weapon) spells that summon swords, spells that summon items, heck even spells that make it rain swords (telekinesis is a must).

[AnimeTheCat]

Since this is gestalt, why not soul knife 5/Sorcerer X to soul bow 10/Sorcerer (or other PrC) X. It gives you the ability to create weapons with varying magic properties as well as casting ability. Possibly take the Battle Sorcerer ACF to get spells in armor. That seems to cover all the bases pretty well, that is assuming you're not playing a hugely powerful campaign. Soul Knife is kinda weak when it comes to that...

[zergling.exe]

Soulknife/Soulbow is definitely the closest thing to Archer that I can think of. He only does two things that are beyond them, his perfect shield and when he killed Caster, otherwise he only uses one (or two) weapons at a time (I haven't gone through Heaven's Feel so he may do something crazy there I'm not aware of).

The biggest problem with this combo is its lack of synergy, as neither boosts the other, despite needing to be at least a level 2 Soulknife for Soulbow. They also have a problem of the developers being afraid to give them enough +s to their weapons to effectively work at high levels.

[Tohsaka Rin]

Soulknife/soulbow on one side, and battlesorc/arcane archer on the other side.

Taking a turn or two to buff up with True Strike, and Improved Psionic Shot, and putting a maximized fireball into your arrow from a long range is pretty much Archer's Broken Phantasm trick. Throwing spell storing in there (somehow) will let you double your k-boomness.

If you can convince your DM to wrangle the Arcane Archer into Psionic Archer instead, dump battlesorc for Psion.

[Fizban]

Oh buddy, have I got the thread for you: Tome of the Holy Grail: Draw Power From Legends (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?362608).

You can try to make a gish build that has lots of swords, but it's just not gonna be the same thing. It's not gonna do what Archer does, it's gonna be a spell or attack that's vaguely similar, probably run through several layers of meta-op to make it function in the right time frame. Or you could play a Servant Soul and literally summon the weapons and copy the abilities of fate series characters as your main class feature, including up to two versions of the exact character you're trying to emulate.

The class itself is balanced to extreme precision, bekeleven knows what he's doing and has tuned it to exacting standards. I played one myself and could clearly see the limits on my power even if it was higher than the rest of the party (AC tank, rogue who hardly sneak attacked, bard who didn't like her main class features-not exactly optimized gestalt here). If it's a gestalt game there's really no business complaining about it being homebrew on grounds of balance.

Accept no substitutes. You want to play as Archer, then play a character who is playing as Archer. It's the only way to be sure.

[khadgar567]

You want archer right the guy with unlimited blade work and tsundere girlfriend budy he is armorist 20 withfollowing speres creation warp and if you want time( his daddy died before crest thing transfer so in gestalt build use armorist in one side then some class to get more feats

[Chronikoce]

I also suggest spheres of power armorist class for this. It's third party for pathfinder but excellently done.

[MisterKaws]

Silverbrow Human

Side 1: Sorcerer 6/Spellsword 1/ Abjurant Champion 5/Eldritch Knight 3
Side 2: Duskblade 1/Psionic Warrior 2/Ardent 12(Dominant Ideal: Justice)

Final BAB: +12 or +13 partial

Rho Aias: Wings of Cover.
Unlimited Blade Works: Call Weaponry on Metapower cheese. Use Twin Quickened Linked Call Weaponry to spam creation and then Telekinesis per Sorcerer on Violent Thrust mode. Use Brilliant Aura if you want to improve the ranged hit chance, otherwise use Wraithstrike. There aren't any abilities that really replicate the active portion of it, so just get your favorite area debuff and slap a UBW sticker on it.
Bow: Normal(non-soulbound) Call Weaponry and Smiting Spells, plus some of those arrow-boosting feats or true strike.

[Rater202]

Um, just to be sure-which Archer?

There are Dozens of servants with that tittle in the Fate series.

Most people seem to be going on the assumption that you mean EMIYA, but, we need to be clear on that.

[MisterKaws]

Um, just to be sure-which Archer?

There are Dozens of servants with that tittle in the Fate series.

Most people seem to be going on the assumption that you mean EMIYA, but, we need to be clear on that.

Errm...


So I've always wanted to play an Archer-like character, someone who can create weapons with amazing abilities.

Yeah, it's EMIYA.

[Flickerdart]

Errm...



Yeah, it's EMIYA.

I was thinking Gilgamesh. Surely his various artifacts count for "weapons with amazing abilities."

[zergling.exe]

I was thinking Gilgamesh. Surely his various artifacts count for "weapons with amazing abilities."

Yeah, but Gilgamesh doesn't CREATE them. He merely summons them.

[Flickerdart]

Yeah, but Gilgamesh doesn't CREATE them. He merely summons them.
The practical difference is lost on me.

[zergling.exe]

The practical difference is lost on me.

Well the build for Gilgamesh would be a ring of telekinesis with CL of 15 (or perhaps some greater telekinesis ability) and a sword that can make a gate to the elemental plane of weapons.

[Flickerdart]

Well the build for Gilgamesh would be a ring of telekinesis with CL of 15 (or perhaps some greater telekinesis ability) and a sword that can make a gate to the elemental plane of weapons.
Why? Call weaponry (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/callWeaponry.htm) accomplishes the same thing, with the benefit of being an actual thing.

But for practical purposes, there's no distinction between creating something from nothing, and teleporting something from somewhere far away to you, for this case. In D&D the distinction is between summoning and calling, and the only meaningful distinction is whether or not there's a corpse when the thing dies. Swords don't really have this problem.

[zergling.exe]

Why? Call weaponry (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/callWeaponry.htm) accomplishes the same thing, with the benefit of being an actual thing.

But for practical purposes, there's no distinction between creating something from nothing, and teleporting something from somewhere far away to you, for this case. In D&D the distinction is between summoning and calling, and the only meaningful distinction is whether or not there's a corpse when the thing dies. Swords don't really have this problem.

Because you can't launch dozens of weapons each turn with call weaponry, which is what Gilgamesh is all about. Plus you can't call for Ea or Gram or Durandal, you can only call a longsword; and Gilgamesh is all about having the original Noble Phantasms of all heroes.

[MisterKaws]

The practical difference is lost on me.

The practical difference is what makes EMIYA the natural counter against Gilgamesh: one of them has a limit(though not really in D&D).

[Flickerdart]

Because you can't launch dozens of weapons each turn with call weaponry, which is what Gilgamesh is all about.
You can. Someone's already posted how to do it in this very thread.



Plus you can't call for Ea or Gram or Durandal, you can only call a longsword; and Gilgamesh is all about having the original Noble Phantasms of all heroes.
You can call it whatever you want when you summon it and chuck it at the enemy.

[zergling.exe]

You can. Someone's already posted how to do it in this very thread.

You get two the first round and 4 on subsequent rounds until you run out of PP. Meanwhile my way gives you at least 7 every round all day.


You can call it whatever you want when you summon it and chuck it at the enemy.

But it doesn't have any of the magical properties of the weapon, and would only deal 1d8 (depending on weapon) damage. You also can't get Ea's reality destruction through call weaponry either. Part of what makes Gilgamesh OP is that he can throw weapons at his enemy till he throws one that is their bane and just straight up kills them.

[Ramza00]

You did not say if you were doing 3.5 or pathfinder. I am assuming pathfinder not because pathfinder is better but because they have a premade class which is effectively archer, and since this is gestalt you can easily put something on the second side to further add to the similarities.

(note I am not that familiar with pathfinder, so feel free to elaborate on my points if you are more familiar with the system)

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Magus has an ability called Arcane Pool which as a swift action allows you to for 10 rounds grant +1 to +5 enhancement bonuses or equivalent abilities from a a list. The strength of this ability goes up every 4 levels at 1, 5, 9, 13, and 17. You can use this ability 1/2 Magus Level+Int times per day.

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Magus have an ability that allows you to do a full attack action as well as cast a spell which has a standard action or less casting time as a single full round action. Flavorwise you are casting a spell with your off hand such as your left hand, while using your right hand to do a normal amount of attacks. Now all your attacks get -2 during this ability, just like you get a -2 penalty for two weapon fighting. This ability is called spell combat

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A different ability of an archer is called spellstrike. It is kinda like channeling a spell in your weapon. Whenever you melee attack, you can have the spell automatically go off, in addition to the normal damage for the melee attack.

One cool thing is that you can combine spell combat and spell strike. Thus you can channel a touch spell with spell strike and still get the extra attack with spell combat. Now you also get infinite catnips in pathfinder and magus has various touch spells you can use and thus no matter what you can always choose to get a second attack for a -2 even at level 2. It is like a rapid shot but with melee.

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You get something called magic arcana which are unique class abilities of a magus that you get to pick off a list every 3 levels. Effectively think of them as magus bonus feats but only from a selected list.

They also get a different pool of bonus feats for a total of 3 extra feats at levels 5, 11, and 17. This 2nd pool of bonus feats are fighter feats, or item creation feats, or metamagic feats.

Now one of the magic arcannas you can select which is awesome in gestalt is now you can use other classes spells with spell strike and spell combat. Thus if you want you can throw out a 9th level spell, plus a quicken spell, plus a full attack action due to all of this. Effectively you get more actions in combat due to this specific magic arcanna combine with the unique magus abilities.

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Plus a couple more abilities including the ability to recall spells using his arcane pool (the thing he uses to give his weapon attack bonuses).

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You are a 2/3rds caster with up to 6 levels of casting, have a good fort and will save, 3/4s BAB,

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/magus






Now a recent new archetype for Magus is called the Eldritch Archer. Effectively you are now an arcane archer but with better abilities for it changes pretty much anytime that says melee with things like spell combat and spell strike to ranged and thus now you can do stuff such as get 5 attacks with a bow at level 8 (2 from BAB, 1 from haste, 1 from rapid shot, 1 from spell combat with a catnip) or you can do stuff like cast a normal spell, and still do a full attack

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On the other side

convince your DM to allow you to do psionic (especially many of Archers sword barrages are effectively the psionic power hail of crystal / amethyst burst / crystal shard)

or do wizard, and convince your DM to allow you to create a couple new spells such as a new version of fireball that instead of doing 10d6 fire damage does 10d4 slashing damage and so on.

or one of the many other full casting classes

or do the updated dreamscarred press soulknife and possible the soulbolt prestige class.

[Zancloufer]

Why? Call weaponry (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/callWeaponry.htm) accomplishes the same thing, with the benefit of being an actual thing.

But for practical purposes, there's no distinction between creating something from nothing, and teleporting something from somewhere far away to you, for this case. In D&D the distinction is between summoning and calling, and the only meaningful distinction is whether or not there's a corpse when the thing dies. Swords don't really have this problem.

Except they kind of do. All of EMIYA's weapons are 'temporary summons' that he creates, while Gilgamesh's weapons are actual epic swords.

The entirety of Gilgamesh is pretty much infinite WBL (One of EVERY (MAGIC) ITEM EVER) stored on a demi-plane whcih he then chucks at people in a telekinesis style barrage. If Telekenises allowed more than 15 attacks per round. He literally solves his probably by throwing money at it. Well priceless treasures launched at deadly velocities, but it's pretty much the same to him.

Also in both their cases they have to have actually powerful swords, artifact level ones if possible. I mean one of the weaker ones can essentially cast on-contact Disjunction. Bit more than your 1d8 damage called weapon.


Also second the Magus/Full caster idea. Would go sorcerer instead of Wizard IMHO as his spell selection doesn't need to be that big and it fits him more thematically.

[Ramza00]

or one of the many other full casting classes



Also second the Magus/Full caster idea. Would go sorcerer instead of Wizard IMHO as his spell selection doesn't need to be that big and it fits him more thematically.

Sorcerer would probably be a good fit mechanically and flavor wise if you want to go that route instead of Arcanist or Wizard, but ARCHER Emiya high point is not charisma but intelligence and tactics thus you should make it Sage Sorcerer Archetype so his casting is based off Intelligence.

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/sorcerer/archetypes/paizo---sorcerer-archetypes/wildblooded/mutated-bloodlines---paizo/sage

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Now there may be other good fit for Archer on the full caster side that I am not familiar with, for I am not a pathfinder expert and only know the basics.

[Fizban]

Oh, if you were looking for Archer: Gilgamesh it's further down the page under Legacy Gatekeeper. They can summon anyone's weapon but since they can't install anyone but Gligamesh they only get the access to the first phantasm instead of the second.