Path of War Newbie questions

[Firechanter]

Hello Gang,

next week I may be able to try out a PoW character for the first time. Only for a oneshot, and at level 3, but maybe not the worst regime for a test run. I don't own the book yet, so I'll have to work from d20pfsrd, but if results look promising, I'd get the PDF.

Basically what I want to do is a character who is really good and versatile in melee. The concept I have in mind is a recreation of a character from a different system, so it might be a bit tricky. He's supposed to kick ass in melee, have a few tricks on hand, and ideally also self-heal.

From a first glance, either Warden or Warlord might do the trick, but there's so much stuff that I could use some guidance.
So, let me start off with a simple question: are there any maneuvers available at character level 3 that allow me to self-heal or lifeleech? ^^

[Swaoeaeieu]

Silver crane has healing maneuvers. look at the first and second level maneuvers there is a good thing to do for healing.

its not on the srd yet, but the medic class has a life leach archetype that drains peoples blood when you punch em.

[Castilonium]

Silver Crane (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/disciplines-and-maneuvers/silver-crane-maneuvers/) is the only discipline with reliable self healing, and it requires you to be good aligned. Enduring Crane Strike will be your bread and butter. Black Seraph (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/disciplines-and-maneuvers/black-seraph-maneuvers/) has Fear-Eating Technique. There are a tiny number of other maneuvers in Black Seraph, Riven Hourglass, and Golden Lion that heal, but not at level 3.

Warder has no inherent self-healing, and neither does warlord outside of Unbreakable Gambit. Knight Disciple Paladin is very good at healing, especially after level 4, but can't use Guardian's Shield on itself. All classes can use Martial Power (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/feats/#TOC-Martial-Power-Combat-) to gain a lot of temporary HP every round, though classes that have full BAB and use a shield are best at it.

I recommend either going with a Medic or a Knight Disciple Paladin/Zealot. The medic has been fully released, but you can find its playtest materials in this link (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?483472-Dreamscarred-Press-Presents-The-MEDIC!). Pick the Sanguinist archetype, and you will steal hitpoints from enemies whenever you punch them, and can use the healing later whenever you want. Pick tiefling as your race for the best self-healing FCB.

Aside from medic, the best self-healer is a Knight Disciple Paladin 4 / Zealot X. Since you're level 3, go with 2 levels of Knight Disciple Paladin and 1 level of Zealot, and take Practiced Initiator (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/pow-e-traits/practiced-initiator-combat/) as a trait, applied to Zealot levels. Use a move action to Aid Another and refresh Enduring Crane Strike every single round! Next, get 2 more levels of Knight Disciple to increase your healing by 50%, and go the rest of the way with Zealot. If you don't want to be a paladin, Zealot 3 is perfectly good for your oneshot adventure.

[Tuvarkz]

I'd argue against Martial Power-same issue with Combat Expertise, really.
Also, grab the Unbreakable Gambit from the Warlord's gambit if you're going that route-you basically get "Suceed at a non-harmless Fort or Will save, Heal 3xyour Cha mod and recover maneuvers".
Also, if you want tricks in melee, tell more about what kind of tricks you want, because they are sorta spread across the disciplines.

[Firechanter]

Hmmh, alright let's see, what was my old character able to do... I don't expect a PoW character to do exactly the same things, but just for reference, the original did, among other stuff, the following (one effect per turn):

- spice up attacks with Fire damage
- lifeleech (regain part of the damage inflicted as HP)
- ignore some DR
- prevent other creatures from attacking him or his current opponent, so kind of "Duel Mode"
- deal extra damage and knock the target back or prone
- prevent the target from fleeing/disengaging

There may have been more but I'd have to find my old character sheet. He mostly fought with broadsword and shield, while wearing light armour, but I'm not hell-bent on keeping the shield.

Oh, AND he rolled all of his attacks with Int rather than Str or Dex, which was awesome because he also had some Wizard spellcasting, but I guess there's no way to do that in PF. His main role was Striker. I might also build a similar character as Magus, but the original's forte was really endurance and versatility rather than going Nova. So that's why I figured PoW might be just the thing.

Edit:
The original character was a Human with some Fey (Elven) blood, so in PF I might go with Half-Elf.

Is there a table somewhere that sorts the disciplines by classes that have access to them?

[Castilonium]

I'd argue against Martial Power-same issue with Combat Expertise, really.

A 3rd level character shouldn't scoff at 6 THP every single round for the cost of -2 attack. A zealot can even use those THP with Martyrdom to conserve power points and protect teammates. Martial Power is perfectly good unless your group is playing no-holds-barred hyper rocket tag or you have a DM with an intense fetish for save-or-dies.

[Azoth]

Hmmh, alright let's see, what was my old character able to do... I don't expect a PoW character to do exactly the same things, but just for reference, the original did, among other stuff, the following (one effect per turn):

- spice up attacks with Fire damage
- lifeleech (regain part of the damage inflicted as HP)
- ignore some DR
- prevent other creatures from attacking him or his current opponent, so kind of "Duel Mode"
- deal extra damage and knock the target back or prone
- prevent the target from fleeing/disengaging

There may have been more but I'd have to find my old character sheet. He mostly fought with broadsword and shield, while wearing light armour, but I'm not hell-bent on keeping the shield.

Oh, AND he rolled all of his attacks with Int rather than Str or Dex, which was awesome because he also had some Wizard spellcasting, but I guess there's no way to do that in PF. His main role was Striker. I might also build a similar character as Magus, but the original's forte was really endurance and versatility rather than going Nova. So that's why I figured PoW might be just the thing.

Edit:
The original character was a Human with some Fey (Elven) blood, so in PF I might go with Half-Elf.

Is there a table somewhere that sorts the disciplines by classes that have access to them?

Sounds like a Harbinger/Warder multiclass. Use Amigar's Mark to apply a penalty to hit anyone but you, and then use Claim + Dark Authority to give a penalty to hit you.

Use Silver Crane to self heal.

Various disciplines can ignore DR, Broken Blade stands out the most to me.

Fire Damage could be from Elemental Flux.

Duel mode and Bullrush/Trip might be a bit harder to jam in.

*Edit* Something like Human Harbinger1/Warder2.

Feats:
Human: Grasp of Darkness
1st: Dark Authority
3rd: Powerful Mark

This gives you 1/2 Int mod to Hit (insight Bonus). Dark Authority is basically a swift action -3 to hit against you. Your Amigar's Mark will give anyone you hit a -4 to hit anyone but you.

You can either Tradition as a Cagebreaker to pick up Elemental Flux, or as an Empyreal Guardian to gain Silver Crane. The trait Unorthodox Method would let you pick up the other, but I can't remember if the discipline swap would apply to all classes or just your first class.

[Tuvarkz]

I'd say to go with Black Seraph in place of Silver Crane, grabbing Enduring Crane strike via trait, and Seraph's Wrath (+damage and trip) from Black Seraph.
Azoth does have most stuff that fits, though.
Also, @Castilonium, my bad. Totally forgot (or never checked, rather) that Martial Power scales that crazy fast-although then, I'm still leery of the attack penalty, considering that at level 3 you might still instadelete a foe with a single strike (and as such don't want to take attack roll penalties) and you can counter out of damage fairly easily.
Seems a rather interesting feat choice for higher levels, though. PT 8 stance harbinger could take that (Or Warsoul Soulknife 5 into Landsknecht, or Harb 5 into Landsknetch too) and fix the class's durability issues while retaining a considerably high attack roll.

[Firechanter]

Thanks a bunch for that info. It really helps, even though the "minuses all around" isn't the character's main shtick. But even the info on how to grab access to additional disciplines helps a lot.

By the way, which class _does_ get access to Silver Crane natively, anyway?
(Gotta say the implementation of PoW on d20pfsrd leaves a lot to be desired, but well, I guess you can't look a gift horse in the mouth)

Basically, I love everything that boosts my To Hit, and I loathe everything that decreases it. Reason being my truly atrocious luck with the dice. Regardless how many D20s I buy and how often I swap, there have been entire sessions where I never rolled higher than a 4. So I need to stack my To Hit really high. In 3.5, my favourite class is the Warblade, and I always grab a Discipline property on my weapon asap keyed to my default Stance.

That said, it's a biiiiit of a pity for me that the Warden and Warlord have their mental stats "swapped around" compared to Crusader and Warblade... I simply love the concept of an Intelligent Striker. Now I have the choice between an intelligent Defender and a charismatic Striker. Cha is not a bad fit for the original character concept anyway, it's just a bit of a pity for the skill points.

[Tuvarkz]

Thanks a bunch for that info. It really helps, even though the "minuses all around" isn't the character's main shtick. But even the info on how to grab access to additional disciplines helps a lot.

By the way, which class _does_ get access to Silver Crane natively, anyway?
(Gotta say the implementation of PoW on d20pfsrd leaves a lot to be desired, but well, I guess you can't look a gift horse in the mouth)

Basically, I love everything that boosts my To Hit, and I loathe everything that decreases it. Reason being my truly atrocious luck with the dice. Regardless how many D20s I buy and how often I swap, there have been entire sessions where I never rolled higher than a 4. So I need to stack my To Hit really high. In 3.5, my favourite class is the Warblade, and I always grab a Discipline property on my weapon asap keyed to my default Stance.

That said, it's a biiiiit of a pity for me that the Warden and Warlord have their mental stats "swapped around" compared to Crusader and Warblade... I simply love the concept of an Intelligent Striker. Now I have the choice between an intelligent Defender and a charismatic Striker. Cha is not a bad fit for the original character concept anyway, it's just a bit of a pity for the skill points.

The backup site for the pfsrd is still working fairly cleanly and orderly, here:
https://sites.google.com/site/pathfinderogc/path-of-war
Silver Crane natively (outside of PrCs) is available to Angel of Mercy Medic, good-aligned ordained defender warders, discordant crusader zealots, knight disciple paladins, warpath followers with a favored weapon that fits into the discipline weapon groups, Aegides with initiator's soul (as they can pick from anything). The tradition is fairly solid and not very restrictive on the roleplay choices, I'd reccomend grabbing it; and there's always Unorthodox Method.

Also, the Zweihander Sentinel Warder, when coupled with Sworn Protector or the Destruction Blessing of the Ordained Defender makes for a fairly solid striker. You never reach the massive numbers the Warlord can do, but greatsword+damage strike always hits really hard.

EDIT: Also, having trouble to hit? Just get a way to reliably refresh maneuvers, and a strike that replaces the attack roll with a skill check, which is far easier to pump up (And gets all the weapon, morale, competence, etc bonuses on your normal weapon strike, and penalties as well), then proceed to figure out how to reliably refresh it so that you can semi-spam it, weaving in strikes that don't rely on attack rolls.

[Firechanter]

Hmmmmm Warder really does look yummy as well with the Int synergy, I love having skills.

I could have sworn I just saw a relatively new / currently updated Warlord handbook, but now the only one I can find is 3 years old. Am I seeing ghosts or can anyone point me to the latest PoW guides?

[Azoth]

Scarlet Throne has some accuracy boosting boosts and strikes. It might help a bit with your luck at dice rolling.

[Firechanter]

A few questions concerning that:

- as I see it, Wis is a dumpstat for the Warlord. Sense Motive is a Wis skill. Won't maneuvers like that Raging Zenith Strike be like shooting my own foot? Or is there a cheap way to re-key Sense Motive to Cha?

- do the "associated weapons" mean anything? Or is it just fluff, like in ToB?

More tomorrow, time for bed.

[Azoth]

I meant more along the lines of Regal Blade boost the gives a +2 to hit.

For some disciplines the associated weapon groups are fluff, for others they are a requirement. Iron Tortoise you must be wielding a shield, Thrashing Dragon you must be TWFing, Solar Wind/Tempest Gale must use a ranger/thrown weapon, ect.

[digiman619]

Also using a discipline weapon increases any DCs of your maneuvers by +2. So it's a worthwhile bonus, but not a devastating loss if you miss out.

[Sayt]

A few questions concerning that:

- as I see it, Wis is a dumpstat for the Warlord. Sense Motive is a Wis skill. Won't maneuvers like that Raging Zenith Strike be like shooting my own foot? Or is there a cheap way to re-key Sense Motive to Cha?

- do the "associated weapons" mean anything? Or is it just fluff, like in ToB?

More tomorrow, time for bed.

Dumping stats other than cha does more harm than good on most martials, I find.

That being said, the empiricist investigator can re-key sense motive to int.

And never the less, skills are relatively east to bump: ranks+trained+Seducer's Bane (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/wondrous-items/wondrous-items/a-b/seducer-s-bane/) will keep your SM over your saves and on par with your to hit. Throw in other to hit bonuses (Ie Regal blade et al.) and you should be fine.

[Tuvarkz]

A few questions concerning that:

- as I see it, Wis is a dumpstat for the Warlord. Sense Motive is a Wis skill. Won't maneuvers like that Raging Zenith Strike be like shooting my own foot? Or is there a cheap way to re-key Sense Motive to Cha?

- do the "associated weapons" mean anything? Or is it just fluff, like in ToB?

More tomorrow, time for bed.

You're never getting more than 10 on Wis (Unless you have 30 PB+ to throw around), which means that the reasonable wis dumping will just cost you a -1 or -2 to the skill. Alertness via familiar, skill focus, magic items,etc will correct that flaw asap.

Associated Weapons: When initiating a strike with an associated weapon to the discipline, you get a +2 to the DC of the maneuver. Also for discipline focus purposes. Some disciplines have weapon choice limits that require you to wield discipline weapons (or mostly them). You also get a +2 bonus to damage when using Broken Blade with discipline weapons, although that discipline already deals far more than enough damage without that bonus.

[Firechanter]

Okay, I've been browsing the maneuver section, and I think I'm sloooowly getting an idea of the possibilities.
Both Silver Crane and Elemental Flux sound pretty awesome to achieve what I'm looking for, so it's a good thing I can pick these up along the way.

Question:
I thought I read about an option that allows me to make a Full Attack with weapon and shield (bash) without TWF feat or penalties; or at least ignoring the Dex prereq, but I can't seem to find it again. Any idea what I'm talking about?

Also, I have now dug out my old character sheet.
If you care to know, the system was Dungeon World, and we're looking at the Arcane Duelist class, and the maneuvers ("Techniques") I used most often were these:
- Soul-Siphoning: lifeleech
- Burst: extra damage and knocks target back or prone
- Burning: add Fire damage

and later I picked up a few more, but didn't use these so often, so never mind.
If the Knockback thing is too difficult to pick up, I can also live without it. It would just be nice if the character as such - and his style - was recognizable, because it's the same DM and same setting as before.

As I said, the character mostly fought with Sword and Shield. The damage per hit wasn't spectacular, but very consistent, and he didn't get hit very often due to his combat skill. (Ofc you cant compare DW and PF combat directly). I generally fluffed the aforementioned "Burst" attacks as shield bashes.
(Unfortunately, in PF you'd need Shield Slam and be 6th level to pull that off; in DW he could do that right from level 1)

He attacked with Int rather than Str or Dex, though his Dex was decent, but Str was a dump stat.
However, I really hate the idea of having to pay two or three feats tax just to build a halfway functional Dex character.

I know that Warder is the Int-based class in PoW, but the entire class doesn't really reflect the character. Warlord seems to be a much better match, and I have no problem shuffling the stats around.

[Firechanter]

Update:

I have toyed around with various difference concepts. For a while it looked like a Harbinger was making the cut, what with his 1/2 Int to Attack and Disci Focus and whatnot. However, two problems: 1, most of the Harb's new Disciplines aren't on D20PFSRD yet, and more importantly: Melee Dex simply doesn't work in PF. -.- I _thought_ I had everything covered with Weapon Finesse and Deadly Agility, then I remembered that only a handful of weapons work with Finesse, and none of them fit my RP concept.

Long story short, I junked all that stuff and now I'm gonna play a Str-based Warlord; despite PB25 he's rather stat starved, but now I can't help it anymore (and tomorrow is Game Night).

As a level 3 Human, I have decided to go with Prodigious TWF, TWF, Improved Shield Bash and Dual Slice. Stats are 18 14 14 10 10 14. This could probably optimized a bit more, but I hope I won't need every inch of op-fu for this minicampaign.
For RP reasons, I am taking the Fey Magic alternate racial trait, but so far I haven't decided on what Druid spells to pick. My skills suck due to Int 10 and giving up the Skilled trait, but tough luck.

The native Warlord Disciplines don't like Sword&Board very much, I'm afraid. I am currently in the process of picking maneuvers, and I reckon I'll pick more Boosts and Counters than Strikes (although level 1 doesn't have a lot of Counters).
For my Gambits, I'm picking Flanking (easy peasy, and synergizes with Precise Strike) and Sweeping (should be reliable with that Dragon Tail maneuver).

[digiman619]

Umm.. the new disciplines are on the PFSRD... in the maneuver section... with a bold lettering that reads "New Disciplines"...

[Firechanter]

Duh. I hadn't realized the full descriptions are actually on the same page as the summaries. I just saw that the maneuvers in the summary tables are not hyperlinked and thought the full descriptions weren't online yet. So thanks for pointing that out to me.

That said, my Warlord is now finished. Can't be bothered to re-do all the work for the Harbinger now. ^^

[digiman619]

Well, at least you know for next time.

[Firechanter]

Just returned from the first test run with the new character.
He functioned mostly as intended. :)

Damage in the first round of combat: 27 - slightly sub-average roll. Not bad for level 3, I'd say. ^^

--

So, would I play this character in a regular campaign, the DM permitting?
Probably not quite in this form. But I do see potential.

Biggest shortcomings of the Warlord class, as I perceive them:
- as usual in PF, Dexers get the shaft. This is less a failing of the class, but of PF in general and the lack of decent Martial Finesse weapons in particular.
- Saving Throws are just so-so. You can shore them up with stances and maneuvers somewhat, but that's a high opportunity cost.
- Poor skills. The skill list is lackluster, you get none of the Knowledge Skills that count, and without Int synergy you couldn't afford them anyway.

Of course all of these are rather luxury problems compared to the Fighter, who has even worse saves and crappier skills, but PoW classes are shooting for a different league.

[Tuvarkz]

Biggest shortcomings of the Warlord class, as I perceive them:
- as usual in PF, Dexers get the shaft. This is less a failing of the class, but of PF in general and the lack of decent Martial Finesse weapons in particular.

Not really. You can start up with Weapon Finesse (Or Polearm Dancing)+Deadly Agility at level 1. The Rapier and the Nodachi are quite excellent weapons for dex to damage, and considering that starting with 18 dex as opposted to 18 strength is +4 AC +4 Init +4 Reflex versus 2 damage plus two feats, which comparably could be Improved Initiative and Power Attack. Which compares +4 AC +4 Reflex vs +5 damage -1 attack (Assuming a Nodachi on both builds), bonuses to the skills not being particularly relevant nor carrying capacity if you can play around it.
The Rapier is a light blade, which has some of the more solid disciplines keyed to it, namely Cursed Razor, Elemental Flux, Riven Hourglass, Scarlet Throne, and Shattered Mirror, plus some others.
The Nodachi is both heavy blade and polearms, meaning it gets a really big list, with Black Seraph, Cursed Razor, Eternal Guardian, Piercing Thunder, Primal Fury, Shattered Mirror, plus some others.
Damage wise, I'm fairly certain some strikes can more than do enough to make the difference nearly insignificant.



- Saving Throws are just so-so. You can shore them up with stances and maneuvers somewhat, but that's a high opportunity cost.

You can get Unbreakable Gambit early on, and you get some crazy benefits via getting Fate's Favored and a high Charisma modifier. Rallying Presence will cover most will-targetting effects. You got no in-class way to deal with poor Reflex saves unless you heavily invest Dex, but picking up a counter is always easy at hand, Thrashing Dragon having a low-level Reflex save replacer and Scarlet Throne having Sanguine Perseverance.
And honestly, it's not really a low opportunity cost to get plenty of maneuvers. As a Warlord, you get 5 bonus feats from class levels, and another 3-4 from favored class bonus. You can afford to grab Advanced Study multiple times, and the same with Extra Readied Maneuver.



- Poor skills. The skill list is lackluster, you get none of the Knowledge Skills that count, and without Int synergy you couldn't afford them anyway.

Eh, the Warlord's social job is to go face, and with 12 int (or 14 if you have a high PB) you can probably smack around enough skills to keep Diplomacy, Sense Motive, and Perception afloat, with maybe a sprinkling of Bluff and Intimidate. You can also get Knowledge Religion for free since Unquiet Grave is a free trade for the Warlord, and there's a larger list of other skills available through martial traditions.

[ghanjrho]

Nodachi isn't a finesse weapon, last I checked. Some other good options, that admittedly require more feats are:
Elven Curve Blade/Elven Branched Spear. Play an elf or pay the EWP (or the 1500 gp for a Cracked Opalescent White Pyramid ioun stone). ECB has most of a nodachi's statline, while EBS has reach.
Katana. Requires proficiency and the Daisho Expertise feat (though DE covers Weapon Finesse). Another 1d10 18-20/x2 weapon, that can even be one-handed (with EWP).

[Castilonium]

Nodachi isn't a finesse weapon, last I checked.

Tuvarkz mentioned Polearm Dancer (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/pow-e-feats/), a feat from PoW:E. The nodachi is a polearm.

[ghanjrho]

(Rereads post) Ah, my apologies.
So that's 3 different ways to get 1d10 18-30/x2 on a two-handable finesse weapon. I'm sensing a theme here...

[Florian]

@Firechanter:

You know, I can´t really understand you. I do get that you want to create a self-reliant character that can hold his own, but what I won´t get is why you want o force it being on the martial side.

IIRC, you had fun playing a PF Paladin, so I´m a bit stumped as of why you´re not going into a Lifelink-Oracle (Pei Zin Practitioner)/Warder (Golden Lion, Crimson Throne) into Battle Templar. Should be more your cup of tea than fooling around with Silver Crane.

[Firechanter]

Not really. You can start up with Weapon Finesse (Or Polearm Dancing)+Deadly Agility at level 1. The Rapier and the Nodachi are quite excellent weapons for dex to damage, and considering that starting with 18 dex as opposted to 18 strength is +4 AC +4 Init +4 Reflex versus 2 damage plus two feats, which comparably could be Improved Initiative and Power Attack.

I only have access to online sources atm, but neither on PFSRD, AoN or Ultimate Equipment is there any mention of the Nodachi being a Finesse weapon.
The only two-handed Finesse weapon I was able to find was the Elven Curve Blade, and that one is Exotic - so mark the Feat Tax up another notch. Not to mention that you will still suck at combat maneuvers unless you invest _yet another_ feat -- the fourth, by this reckoning.


You can get Unbreakable Gambit early on, and you get some crazy benefits via getting Fate's Favored and a high Charisma modifier.

I decided against Unbreakable Gambit, for the simple reason that you can't re-use any one Gambit until you have used all of them. What do you do when you simply don't get targeted with a Fort or Will Save? You can never trigger your Gambit, therefore never refresh the other ones, therefore quickly run out of ways to (efficiently) recover your maneuvers.


Eh, the Warlord's social job is to go face, and with 12 int (or 14 if you have a high PB) you can probably smack around enough skills to keep Diplomacy, Sense Motive, and Perception afloat, with maybe a sprinkling of Bluff and Intimidate. You can also get Knowledge Religion for free since Unquiet Grave is a free trade for the Warlord, and there's a larger list of other skills available through martial traditions.

I wouldn't know where to shave off PB points to invest into Int. A poor Will progression means dumping Wis is a bad idea, Cha-to-Will or no. Skimping on Con is almost never a good idea. If I could get a Dex build to work with Str 10, I'd rather invest the free points to pump Cha to 16.

More later, back to work.

[Firechanter]

Ah, I missed that bit about Polearm Dancing. Okay, that actually makes it more viable - but the combat maneuver problem (another feat tax) remains.

Florian: various reasons, most importantly BC this was a level 3 oneshot. Secondly, because I want to assess what PoW classes can do on their own, so multiclassing with standard ones would defeat the purpose.

[Castilonium]

I decided against Unbreakable Gambit, for the simple reason that you can't re-use any one Gambit until you have used all of them. What do you do when you simply don't get targeted with a Fort or Will Save? You can never trigger your Gambit, therefore never refresh the other ones, therefore quickly run out of ways to (efficiently) recover your maneuvers.

That is just completely incorrect. There's nothing in the description of Warlord's Gambit that says that. What gives you that impression?

[Firechanter]

That is just completely incorrect. There's nothing in the description of Warlord's Gambit that says that. What gives you that impression?

Hm!
Now that I read it again line by line, I can't find anything to that extent, either. So good question, why did I get that impression in the first place?

Edit:
Ah, and here we are: I simply trusted the Leading The Battle guide found in this very forum:
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?334608-PF-Leading-the-Battle-A-Guide-to-the-PoW-Warlord
>>
Each Gambit can only be used once per encounter until they've all been used, at which point all of the Warlord's Gambits become useable again.
<<

[Ninjaxenomorph]

Hmm. I fell into that as well, but I was just going to suck it up if my warlord was going to be in an extended battle with something that didn't use anything requiring saves.

[Tuvarkz]

Why would the build not work with Str 10
Carrying capacity is 33, which, while limiting at level 1; by level 3 is something you can bypass via a minor bag of holding. Minor BoH is 3 lbs, Nodachi is 8, leaving you with 22. Let's say you'll need at least 5 free for gear, which means you'll have to do with Leather for a while, but it's not a gamekiller to have 16 AC at level 3. You can later get a Mithral Weapon and/or darkleaf cloth (or mithral) armor to work with this (Or a pair of Muleback cords if you have access to Steelforge and a corset of resistance; or added to your cloak of resistance through DM ruling).
You get Dex to damage at level 1. Not that stances and maneuvers can't already compensate for it, particularly with PoW being overtuned for damage at low levels.

You can afford to go as low as 8 Wis. With unbreakable gambit, you have effective 2xCha to Will, and later on you can grab Rallying Presence which effectively nets you 3xCha to will saves against the majority of effects that target it (more or less). And even if Sense Motive is Wis-based, it's a matter of gold investment on items to get its modifier rolling sky high for the sanguine perseverance auto-pass (Or the take 10 in combat feat)

[Florian]

@Feuersänger:

You know my stance on this: Something that should replace another thing should work on either a similar level or utilize a similar but recognizable mechanic that´ll end up with roughly the same result.

[Firechanter]

Some general comments:
At level 3, I'd rather invest in a Mithral Chainshirt than a Minor BoH -- 10 lbs, and you should be set with your base armour for a very long time, if not forever.

However, either approach assumes equipment à la carte. So depending on group / playstyle this may simply not be available. Particularly if you play a Paizo Adventure Path, you are typically undergeared and poor as a temple mouse for the first one or two books, dumped in some backwater where you can consider yourself lucky to find any merchant at all.
(My personal "negative record" is one game where I hit level _6_ without any gear worth mentioning - not even a Masterwork weapon. I left the game at that point.)

Also, I have found that particularly in the low levels, Strength and Strength-skills are quite often crucial for Adventuring / non-combat tasks and encounters, often more so than Dex. Of course, ideally you have at least one of each in the party -- but if absolutely no-one has Str >10, the party will very likely fail quite a few tasks and miss out on opportunities. The same is probably true for a party without any Dexers, but that is much less likely since almost every non-Heavy Armour character will have some amount of Dex. Later on, of course, all of that is trivialized by Magic, but you have to get that far first.

[Tuvarkz]

Some general comments:
At level 3, I'd rather invest in a Mithral Chainshirt than a Minor BoH -- 10 lbs, and you should be set with your base armour for a very long time, if not forever.

However, either approach assumes equipment à la carte. So depending on group / playstyle this may simply not be available. Particularly if you play a Paizo Adventure Path, you are typically undergeared and poor as a temple mouse for the first one or two books, dumped in some backwater where you can consider yourself lucky to find any merchant at all.
(My personal "negative record" is one game where I hit level _6_ without any gear worth mentioning - not even a Masterwork weapon. I left the game at that point.)

Also, I have found that particularly in the low levels, Strength and Strength-skills are quite often crucial for Adventuring / non-combat tasks and encounters, often more so than Dex. Of course, ideally you have at least one of each in the party -- but if absolutely no-one has Str >10, the party will very likely fail quite a few tasks and miss out on opportunities. The same is probably true for a party without any Dexers, but that is much less likely since almost every non-Heavy Armour character will have some amount of Dex. Later on, of course, all of that is trivialized by Magic, but you have to get that far first.

"equipment à la carte" or how I hear it called elsewhere "Magic mart" is the standard, though. Can't exactly rate a class based on each table's preferences.

Well, if you're running Dex-based, it won't exactly kill you either to alternatively delay your Cloak of Resistance +1 for one level. And Paizo APs are quite low in difficulty, considering they're tuned only slightly harder than PFS scenarios.

Skill checks wise, a +5 on both climb and swim is 3 from CS +2 ranks, and the DCs generally don't go past 15 so take 10 will do most of the time. Even at level 1 you have a 50 50 chance. And there's significantly very many more Dex-based skills than Strength-based ones. And stuff that depends on strength checks and carrying capacity can indeed be handled by low level magic spells. Might take a while to do due to needing to prepare and stuff, but it can be done. Plus, as you said, you can always coordinate with the party for this stuff, particularly because a character with a solid climb modifier getting up and throwing a rope down reduces the check to a simple DC 5.

[Firechanter]

Well, such are often the fine but significant differences between theorycrafting and actual play. Concerning gear, I think it's fair to assume access to "standard" gear and properties, like +X weapons and AC / Save boosters, etc. But hinging a build on the availability of a particular wondrous item would be too risky for my liking. Also, when you specialize in a particular, atypical weapon, better don't expect to be able to use any of the AP-scripted loot, unless your DM has promised you to adapt the drops.
(However, Paizo authors seem to derive fiendish pleasure from scripting weapons that are either useless for or unusable by the PCs, so you're not necessarily losing out.)

Alright, so, anyway. So I understand that there are a couple of two-handed weapons that can be Dexed, giving you the advantage of bigger damage die and/or high threat range, or Reach.
So, assuming a Human with stats 10 18 14 10 10 16, let's have a look at our options:

- with No-Dachi or ECB, we should probably shoot for Crit-Fishing. We'll prefer maneuvers that give static bonuses rather than dice, because of the critical hit rules. Starting with that Primal Fury maneuver that gives +6 to damage with a 2-Handed Weapon. Primal Fury seems to be the best Disci for two-handed anyway.
- alternatively, a Reach weapon ofc would lend itself to a Combat Reflexes build -- plenty of AoOs available. Could be combined with Piercing Thunder.
(Note: Might want to be a Warder instead for this, or at least dip into Warder a bit.)

Hmmmh, I'll toy around with this some more. I found the damage output of my Strength-TWFer pretty awesome for a level 3. (However, truth be told even that damage was dwarfed by that of another player's White-Haired Witch -- but please don't ask me how he did that.) Sure, considering the 4 feats investment that were necessary to pull that off, a Dexer probably could have achieved about the same - I just was determined to use a good honest Viking Sword and Large Shield rather than dual shortswords or somesuch. ^^

[Tuvarkz]

Alright, so, anyway. So I understand that there are a couple of two-handed weapons that can be Dexed, giving you the advantage of bigger damage die and/or high threat range, or Reach.
So, assuming a Human with stats 10 18 14 10 10 16, let's have a look at our options:

- with No-Dachi or ECB, we should probably shoot for Crit-Fishing. We'll prefer maneuvers that give static bonuses rather than dice, because of the critical hit rules. Starting with that Primal Fury maneuver that gives +6 to damage with a 2-Handed Weapon. Primal Fury seems to be the best Disci for two-handed anyway.


I'd suggest 10 17 14 13 10 16 instead, but if you aren't getting the levelup to 4, it's fine too.
Strike bonus damage doesn't multiply on a crit, even if it's static and not just bonus dice (This is on the systems and use). I just suggested a Nodachi because it's pretty solid as a weapon in terms of disciplines and the critical range is neat.
Primal Fury works far better with natural attacks than it does with two-handing. What does the real crazy damage is the damage-multiplying Scarlet Throne strikes, although iirc latest dev decision is those can't crit anymore. But then, I'm more of a fan of getting strikes that throw in hard disables and stuff.

[Firechanter]

Right, of course dishing out rider effects is lovely, too. I am a simple man - I like high damage and attack bonuses.

Gotta admit I'm a bit stumped -- what Disci _does_ offer good support for two-handed fighting, then? Scarlet Throne requires you to have a hand free, TD is for TWF, GL is about giving your buddies a legst up, PT makes 2H-weapons one-handed... anything else?
I guess PT will work for Nodachi or a proper polearm, but what if you want to go, say, Elven Curve Blade? Or, in the case of a regular Str fighter, the usual stuff like Greatsword?

[Sayt]

Regarding unbreakable Gambit: The "Have to cycle through all of your gambits" rule was scrapped in playtest, it's no longer a rule.

And Scarlet Throne Maneuvers can be used two handed: This also changed in playtest. Scarlet Throne Maneuver's and stances can't be used with any kind of physical shield shield other than a buckler, and his off-hand must be either empty, or usinga two handed weapon. This is in the latest version of Path of War.

Piercing Thunder has some maneuvers that make 2h weapons one handed, but those are not integral and only serve to allow niche builds.

And from a design standpoint, the PoW team fealt, IIRC, that Two-handed was honestly served well enough, and didn't need as much help as, say, TWFing.

[Florian]

A bit feat-intensive, but the best solution would be following Shelyn and getting the Bladed Brush feat, allowing you to be pretty flexible with a glaive and qualifying for multiple styles.

[Firechanter]

Hm!
So PFSRD simply hasn't been updated properly. It still reads ST requires your off-hand free.
Good to know, though.

Bladed Brush is an option, I guess.
BTW, is there _any_ weapon in PF that natively does that Reach&Adjacent thing, like the 3.5 Spiked Chain, without any of those "once per round as an x action" shenanigans? So I could hit an adjacent opponent and _still_ threaten at 10'?

Oh and btw -- I thought that by now, since the release of Shield Master, Sword&Board was _the_ most damaging manufactured weapon combo in PF anyway?
(Or, if you have had any trace of good taste surgically removed, Dual Board. Personally as a DM, I'd houserule a -4 to everything if anyone tried waving around two shields. But that just as an aside.)

[Florian]

Dual Shield is actually not that good past mid-levels when crit-feats start to crop up and you want to apply more riders to your attack. Large shield and scimitar´re still the better combo. With Shield Brace, you could substitute a reach weapon and the Haft Bash weapon trick would allow to use a reach weapon as a club without switching.

[Tuvarkz]

Honestly, you can 2-hand damage well enough with most disciplines short of Thrashing Dragon, Solar Wind, and Tempest Gale.
Black Seraph does give you some really high power maneuvers to work with, for example.
To do reach+adjacent, Zweihander Sentinel Warder and Fiendbound Marauder Warder can both do it, and there's the Haft Strike feat, which makes you take a -2 penalty to AC but lets you hit adjacent with polearms.

[Firechanter]

Excellent. I'll try building a ZHS Warder next, then. ^^

[Castilonium]

Firechanter, that thread you linked is out of date. Here's the most recently updated one with Elricaltovilla's guides for every PoW class: [Link] (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?380631-All-the-Path-of-War-Guides-in-One-Place!). Some are still out of date and reference playtest material, like his Zealot guide.

Also, another way to do reach+adjacent is to wear armor spikes or a spiked gauntlet.

[Firechanter]

Right, thanks!

Reach+Spikes: yes I know, but ofc those typically count as Light weapons with poor damage and none of the enhancements you have on your Main weapon.

About the ZHS... Hmmm... Warder replaces Dex with Int, so Str build I guess... Would you put Str higher than Int or vice versa? ^^
In spite of the guide, I don't want to put Con higher than Str. As the ZHS description says, the best defense is a strong offense.
Power Attack - yes or no?

A dip into Harbinger might prove useful at some point. How do multiclass Initiator levels stack? 1/2 as in ToB?

[ghanjrho]

Right, thanks!

Reach+Spikes: yes I know, but ofc those typically count as Light weapons with poor damage and none of the enhancements you have on your Main weapon.

About the ZHS... Hmmm... Warder replaces Dex with Int, so Str build I guess... Would you put Str higher than Int or vice versa? ^^
In spite of the guide, I don't want to put Con higher than Str. As the ZHS description says, the best defense is a strong offense.
Power Attack - yes or no?

A dip into Harbinger might prove useful at some point. How do multiclass Initiator levels stack? 1/2 as in ToB?

Reach+Spikes: true, but a friendly casting of Greater Magic Weapon will keep it at a decent level. Additionally, the "move through threatened area" AoO's are provoked when they try to leave your reach weapons range, so yoiu still make the attack with your reach weapon. Not to mention, at 6th level the Zweihander Sentinel gains reach inside (on reach weapons), or reach on AoO's/counterattacks (for non-reach).

I usually go STR=INT>CON or STR>INT=CON. Power Attack - generally yes, but you don't need it. If you also have the feat space to take Furious Focus, then do so, as many of your strikes are single hit, and with FF you take no penalty on the first attack.

Yes, multiclass levels progress initiator level at 1/2, and yes, each initiating class has it's own IL, and it's own stock of maneuvers known/readied/recovered. Additionally, know that you cannot prepare the same maneuver twice, even on two different classes.

[digiman619]

Reach+Spikes: true, but a friendly casting of Greater Magic Weapon will keep it at a decent level. Additionally, the "move through threatened area" AoO's are provoked when they try to leave your reach weapons range, so yoiu still make the attack with your reach weapon. Not to mention, at 6th level the Zweihander Sentinel gains reach inside (on reach weapons), or reach on AoO's/counterattacks (for non-reach).

I usually go STR=INT>CON or STR>INT=CON. Power Attack - generally yes, but you don't need it. If you also have the feat space to take Furious Focus, then do so, as many of your strikes are single hit, and with FF you take no penalty on the first attack.

Yes, multiclass levels progress initiator level at 1/2, and yes, each initiating class has it's own IL, and it's own stock of maneuvers known/readied/recovered. Additionally, know that you cannot prepare the same maneuver twice, even on two different classes.

Do maneuvers from a second class qualify you for higher level maneuvers? If a Soulknife [War Soul] 3/Zealot X chooses 3 maneuvers of, say Fool's Errand, as part of their 5 maneuvers known. Do they qualify for 8th level Fool's Errand maneuvers when they hit IL 15?

[Sagetim]

I find it odd that I don't think any of you mentioned Weapon Group Adaptation as a feat. It's quite handy for getting around that discipline weapon requirement in using maneuvers. I used it on a warder specifically to use Bronze Knuckle with my character's longsword. And, you know, stack it on top of silver knight's blade, and Silver Strike, Iron Axe Kick, etc.

I found my Warder (who started at 3 and leveled up to 7 in the campaign he was in). And between things like Shield Focus, Defender of the Order (trait), full plate, a steel shield, and a ring of protection his ac was at 28. This character is, in fact, the reason that the dnd group he was deployed in no longer allows the Warder specifically. Too much AC, too much damage output, too much ability to frighteningly take out entire encounters basically solo.

Anyway, Weapon Group Adaptation is handy, because Silver Crane doesn't include heavy blades in it's weapon categories. Neither does Broken Blade. And using both of those together is sooooo delicious. Feats like Defensive Expertise and Missile Shield come in super handy for not dying to ranged attacks, and Advanced Study is a great way to inflate your maneuvers known so that you can adjust your loadout to suit the kinds of fighting you'll be doing if you know in advance.

[Tuvarkz]

I find it odd that I don't think any of you mentioned Weapon Group Adaptation as a feat. It's quite handy for getting around that discipline weapon requirement in using maneuvers. I used it on a warder specifically to use Bronze Knuckle with my character's longsword. And, you know, stack it on top of silver knight's blade, and Silver Strike, Iron Axe Kick, etc.

I found my Warder (who started at 3 and leveled up to 7 in the campaign he was in). And between things like Shield Focus, Defender of the Order (trait), full plate, a steel shield, and a ring of protection his ac was at 28. This character is, in fact, the reason that the dnd group he was deployed in no longer allows the Warder specifically. Too much AC, too much damage output, too much ability to frighteningly take out entire encounters basically solo.

Anyway, Weapon Group Adaptation is handy, because Silver Crane doesn't include heavy blades in it's weapon categories. Neither does Broken Blade. And using both of those together is sooooo delicious. Feats like Defensive Expertise and Missile Shield come in super handy for not dying to ranged attacks, and Advanced Study is a great way to inflate your maneuvers known so that you can adjust your loadout to suit the kinds of fighting you'll be doing if you know in advance.


Broken Blade is aknowledgely overtuned, and as its name says, Broken; and it's just outright bad taste to go to town with 2h and flurry maneuvers. Also, you don't really need Weapon Group adaptation for Silver Crane-there's not much in the way of maneuvers that inflict save or suck effects.

[Castilonium]

I find it odd that I don't think any of you mentioned Weapon Group Adaptation as a feat. It's quite handy for getting around that discipline weapon requirement in using maneuvers. I used it on a warder specifically to use Bronze Knuckle with my character's longsword. And, you know, stack it on top of silver knight's blade, and Silver Strike, Iron Axe Kick, etc.

I found my Warder (who started at 3 and leveled up to 7 in the campaign he was in). And between things like Shield Focus, Defender of the Order (trait), full plate, a steel shield, and a ring of protection his ac was at 28. This character is, in fact, the reason that the dnd group he was deployed in no longer allows the Warder specifically. Too much AC, too much damage output, too much ability to frighteningly take out entire encounters basically solo.

Anyway, Weapon Group Adaptation is handy, because Silver Crane doesn't include heavy blades in it's weapon categories. Neither does Broken Blade. And using both of those together is sooooo delicious. Feats like Defensive Expertise and Missile Shield come in super handy for not dying to ranged attacks, and Advanced Study is a great way to inflate your maneuvers known so that you can adjust your loadout to suit the kinds of fighting you'll be doing if you know in advance.

Sorry to say, but your group banned the warder for the wrong reasons. The warder isn't overpowered. I'll use math to explain why.

First, let's talk about your offense. You're using Broken Blade. It, along with Primal Fury, is widely considered the most powerful, overtuned discipline in all of PoW, and people have been asking about errata for it for years. Bronze Knuckle in particular is simply ridiculous, as is Steel Flurry Strike. Don't forget the free +2 damage you get for using Broken Blade strikes. All by itself, at an absolute minimum with an unarmed strike, Steel Flurry Strike deals 3d3+9d6+6 damage, or 43.5 average damage. With 18 strength, a tri-pointed double-edged sword, Pugilist Stance, and Bronze Knuckle, that’s a standard action strike that deals 3d10+18d6+18 damage, or 97.5 damage average, which ignores DR. And that’s before other damage bonuses like buffs, Power Attack, or your weapon’s enhancement bonus. Warders have no class features that aid their attack or damage. Your damage is coming purely from Broken Blade.

Now, let's talk about your defense. It sounds like you spent several feats to raise your own defense, as well as a significant chunk of your wealth. You also used a trait which is only usable by fighters in Pathfinder Society (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/combat-traits/defender-of-the-society-fighter-pathfinder-society/), but we'll overlook that. Let's calculate your AC. 10 base + 1 dexterity + 10 full plate + 3 heavy shield + 1 shield focus + 1 defender of the society + 1 ring of protection + 1 amulet of natural armor = 28 AC. It can go higher with a stance. The warder does not receive the bonus of their own aegis. Other than the bonus feat at level 3 and Clad in Steel to benefit from slightly higher dexterity, a level 7 warder has absolutely no class features that improve AC. All of your AC is from things completely unrelated to a warder.

Side note, the only thing that making a longsword a discipline weapon for Silver Crane does is improve your save DCs by +2. If you're using Silver Crane's healing strikes and not strikes that use saves, it's pointless.

TL;DR: All of your power is coming from maneuvers, feats, and equipment that has nothing inherently to do with the warder class. You simply had better system mastery than your group and optimized a bit, and they incorrectly blamed your power on the warder.

[Firechanter]

Not to mention, at 6th level the Zweihander Sentinel gains reach inside (on reach weapons), or reach on AoO's/counterattacks (for non-reach).

Yeah, that's what really sold me on the ZHS archetype. Right up my alley. ^^ Even though, unfortunately, it trades away the rather awesome Broken Blade for the - as far as I can tell right now - rather mediocre Scarlet Throne disci.


I find it odd that I don't think any of you mentioned Weapon Group Adaptation as a feat.

Yep, just "discovered" that one yesterday. Definitely looks tasty, especially for Broken Blade.


Sorry to say, but your group banned the warder for the wrong reasons. The warder isn't overpowered. I'll use math to explain why.
<snip>
TL;DR: All of your power is coming from maneuvers, feats, and equipment that has nothing inherently to do with the warder class. You simply had better system mastery than your group and optimized a bit, and they incorrectly blamed your power on the warder.

I fully agree, but isn't this business as usual? Ever since "Sneak Attack is Overpowered", people have been banning all the wrong stuff for all the wrong reasons. Ofc people with little system mastery are the most susceptible to this pattern, but even system-savvy players aren't immune to it. It can be very frustrating. -.-

[Sagetim]

Sorry to say, but your group banned the warder for the wrong reasons. The warder isn't overpowered. I'll use math to explain why.

First, let's talk about your offense. You're using Broken Blade. It, along with Primal Fury, is widely considered the most powerful, overtuned discipline in all of PoW, and people have been asking about errata for it for years. Bronze Knuckle in particular is simply ridiculous, as is Steel Flurry Strike. Don't forget the free +2 damage you get for using Broken Blade strikes. All by itself, at an absolute minimum with an unarmed strike, Steel Flurry Strike deals 3d3+9d6+6 damage, or 43.5 average damage. With 18 strength, a tri-pointed double-edged sword, Pugilist Stance, and Bronze Knuckle, that’s a standard action strike that deals 3d10+18d6+18 damage, or 97.5 damage average, which ignores DR. And that’s before other damage bonuses like buffs, Power Attack, or your weapon’s enhancement bonus. Warders have no class features that aid their attack or damage. Your damage is coming purely from Broken Blade.

Now, let's talk about your defense. It sounds like you spent several feats to raise your own defense, as well as a significant chunk of your wealth. You also used a trait which is only usable by fighters in Pathfinder Society (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/combat-traits/defender-of-the-society-fighter-pathfinder-society/), but we'll overlook that. Let's calculate your AC. 10 base + 1 dexterity + 10 full plate + 3 heavy shield + 1 shield focus + 1 defender of the society + 1 ring of protection + 1 amulet of natural armor = 28 AC. It can go higher with a stance. The warder does not receive the bonus of their own aegis. Other than the bonus feat at level 3 and Clad in Steel to benefit from slightly higher dexterity, a level 7 warder has absolutely no class features that improve AC. All of your AC is from things completely unrelated to a warder.

Side note, the only thing that making a longsword a discipline weapon for Silver Crane does is improve your save DCs by +2. If you're using Silver Crane's healing strikes and not strikes that use saves, it's pointless.

TL;DR: All of your power is coming from maneuvers, feats, and equipment that has nothing inherently to do with the warder class. You simply had better system mastery than your group and optimized a bit, and they incorrectly blamed your power on the warder.


Oh? The way that I was reading maneuvers and their requirements, it seemed like you needed to use a discipline weapon appropriate to the strikes in question to utilize them at all. So, that's why I thought Weapon Group Adaptation was, you know, the thing to do. And we kind of overlooked the trait thing, because I don't think the DM or anyone else cared.

Well, if nothing else, weapon group adaptation gives you a +2 to damage with broken blade maneuvers, which is like weapon specialization for the broken blade maneuvers. Except it would stack if you had weapon specialization from being a level 4 fighter. And that's not necessarily a bad a multi-class, with the bonus feats enabling you to grab weapon focus, weapon specialization, power attack, etc.

[Firechanter]

Re Weapon Groups: this very much depends.

For _most_ Disciplines, using a keyed weapon is not required, and only adds the benefit of higher DCs. And of course many maneuvers don't have DCs, so for these it makes no difference at all.

_Some_ Disciplines, however, can only be used when wielding associated weapons, or a particular combat style (like weapon and shield or whatever).
Broken Blade is one of the latter. You can only benefit from BB stances and maneuvers with associated weapons.
So, if you want to use BB with a Greatsword, Falchion, Polearm or somesuch, you must have this feat.

[digiman619]

If you're worried that Broken Blade is being too powerful, you can check out the new Fool's Errand. It's also an unarmed focused discipline.