Orc/Elemental Sorcerer with Blood Havoc: Legal?

[TheFederalist]

Basically the title. Not that I'm a big fan of the idea but would it add up to +3 damage per die?

(Crossblood Orc and elemental bloodlines and take the Blood Havoc power for your 1st level replacement)

[AvatarVecna]

Basically the title. Not that I'm a big fan of the idea but would it add up to +3 damage per die?

(Crossblood Orc and elemental bloodlines and take the Blood Havoc power for your 1st level replacement)

No, because the Elemental Bloodline power is "sub fire for any energy" not "+1 damage per die". You're thinking of the Draconic Bloodline for the other side of it, I think.

[TheFederalist]

Oops, my bad, that's correct. I had just checked, but I dunno why I made that mistake. So would it work with the draconic bloodline then?

[Calthropstu]

No, because the Elemental Bloodline power is "sub fire for any energy" not "+1 damage per die". You're thinking of the Draconic Bloodline for the other side of it, I think.

Actually, the primal archetype for elemental IS, in fact, +1 damage per die.

[Psyren]

Oops, my bad, that's correct. I had just checked, but I dunno why I made that mistake. So would it work with the draconic bloodline then?

Yes, but the list of spells that get to triple dip like this is narrow. You need spells that deal damage (of course), match your energy type, and are either bloodline spells or Spell Focused.

[AvatarVecna]

Actually, the primal archetype for elemental IS, in fact, +1 damage per die.

I'm aware of that, but I'm also aware that whether or not you can legally combine Crossblooded with Wildblooded is generally debatable, so I prefer starting out assuming that it's not an option that's on the table unless it's explicitly mentioned that it is.


Yes, but the list of spells that get to triple dip like this is narrow. You need spells that deal damage (of course), match your energy type, and are either bloodline spells or Spell Focused.

I'm currently playing a cohort with this set-up: Orc/Draconic (Fire) with 6 levels of the Half-Orc FCB and the Elemental Scion (Fire) trait. Spell Focus (Evocation), along with both Elemental Focus (Fire) and Greater Elemental Focus (Fire) are giving me a 6d6+22 damage Fireball, DC 21 Reflex for half. I chose fire as the element because 1) the Half-Orc FCB is for fire, 2) fire spells tend to focus more on lot of damage dice than other elemental spells, and 3) most of the really good blasting fire spells are in the evocation school of magic, which is good for getting my havoc on. The major downside, as both the DM and I are aware, is that due to limited spells known and such a hyper-focus on fire, creatures that are resistant/immune to fire shut down the build completely right now, and I don't really have a way around that until I pick up Elemental Spell (at which point I'll essentially be upping the spell level to deal a lot less damage, in exchange for being able to get around immunities; why this is +1 now instead of the +0 it was in 3.5, I dunno). The only thing keeping that character from feeling overpowered is that the main character tends to cast BFC and buff spells (particularly Haste on our warrior-heavy party), and they thus tend to do a lot more effective damage with their spells than the heavily-fire-focused blaster sorcerer.

[Psyren]

By RAW they cannot be combined (http://paizo.com/paizo/faq/v5748nruor1fz#v5748eaic9rai), though the devs aren't against this as a houserule.

You're correct, the buffer is going to result in more overall throughput for the party, but sometimes a good blast is what you need. Hasting the fighter wont help him deal with a swarm or sink an enemy ship, whereas fireball can do both.

For Elemental Spell, since it's such a small adjustment I'd consider grabbing a rod or two.

[eldskald]

Yeah, that can be done. You can even be an arcane trickster to add in more dice and more numbers to that and so forth. But don't be fooled, it's not that big deal. As you pointed out, you end up sacrificing a lot to do all that damage and can be hard countered by immunities and etc. Even then, other classes can do even more damage or similar damage without sacrificing much. For instance, a lv 6 abyssal bloodrager with power attack can outdamage this by a 2 or 4 points of damage if he can land the second iterative attack. With a bit of optimizing, he can easily outdamage this. At level 8, an alchemist with fast bombs, rapid shot and TWF can do around 40+16d6 against touch, no SR or saves and dealing damage of any energy type he wants. Even if you try to blood havoc + orc arcana + arcane trickster with spells like disintegrate, martials will still outdamage you with little to no downside or sacrifice.

[Psyren]

Having said that, there's certainly nothing wrong with building/optimizing a blaster. And if you're getting squeezed on spells known, there are solutions to that, like Page of Spell Knowledge and staves.