[PF] Making sure my level 5 halfing UnRogue//UnSummoner is viable

[puzzler7]

Sheet: https://www.myth-weavers.com/sheet.html#id=1326825
Eidolon sheet: https://www.myth-weavers.com/sheet.html#id=1328194

Preface: I have a little bit of experience with 5e, none with 3.5 or PF.

I'm building this character for a PbP game. I felt good about my 19 AC until it was mentioned in the chat that a good AC at this level is between 20-25, and anything lower is likely unviable. I shifted some things around, and now my eidolon and I both have AC 20, and I get +2 AC when within its reach. I'm planning on filling the role of party face, skill monkey, and scout, while still maintaining good DPR. Most of the time, I'll be riding my eidolon. We both have pack flanking, so any melee target gets automatically sneak attacked. Right now, a full attack averages 56.5 damage if everything hits, and assuming an enemy AC of 16, an average full-round DPR of about 42 damage. My standard action average against AC 16 is about 17.5 damage. In addition, my keen rapier crits 15-20, and next level, if it crits, my eidolon gets an AoO. My frailty is somewhat mitigated by compel hostility and mounted combat; I can compel a creature attacking me to attack my mount instead, then negate the hit with a Ride check (+12).

However, I'm worried about a few things. One, is AC 20 viable for this build? I'll be in melee a lot, and while 42 damage can probably take out any given enemy at this level (based on my extremely limited experience), I'll be taking several hits when fighting 4+ enemies. Two, I'm reliant on my eidolon for everything. With small size and STR 10, I can barely carry my weapons and armor without being even slower than my normal 20 speed, let alone my gear. In combat, the vast majority of my DPR is dependent on my eidolon; without it, I lose sneak attack and most my damage. Three, is a skill monkey and scout a useful role to a PF party? There's another character that could serve as a party face. Four, is that a good DPR for my planned role and level? It spends no resources, but again, is heavily reliant on my eidolon.

I've got about a 2000 gp budget for magic items/stat boosting items to fix any problems I might have, or make my character stronger if there are no glaring issues.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

[Geddy2112]

Keep in mind that at very high levels, AC is a losing man's game. The bare minimum for AC is generally 10+ level, 15+level for most characters, and 20+level or more starts to get into tanking and frontline heavy builds.

Your AC is effectively 22, if you are riding on your eidolon in combat, and you generally always will be. Likewise, you have a +1 heavy shield increasing your AC by another 2, for a total of 24, which is plenty fine. You don't have tons of HP, but your build is a glass cannon striker anyways-don't engage large hordes, instead use speed and maneuverability to pick off solo key targets(casters). If you really need defense, fight defensively. I see you have combat expertise, but unless you need it as a prerequisite you will never use it. Put three ranks in acrobatics, and you have almost the same benefit for a poor man's version. You can't take combat trick twice, so you need to drop a feat to make room for pack flanking or outflank anyways.

You do need your eidolon for everything, but if it does die you are not hosed. You might want to run back and summon. Keep in mind you can flank with your summons, but drowning the combat in even level 1 monsters buys time and gives action economy to the party. You can always cast invisibility before you start summoning, as it won't break your invis. Against a horde, maybe open up with glitterdust. You need a way to heal your eidolon, as it won't heal normally and if it dies it comes back with half HP, so heal eidolon might be a good swap for a first level spell.

Your eidolon is a pack mule for a reason. Don't worry about carrying capacity, it won't matter at this level or anything past. If you really want to make sure you are find, spend 2k on a handy haversack and never worry again. Also, your eidolon has an extra evolution point it gained at level 4, and you have only spent 4 points. I would maybe give it the grab ability, or put claws on its arms for better damage. Elemental resistance is not bad, but consider dropping the arms and spending 2 points for flight. Flight at level 5 is pretty boss.

Skillmonkey and face are needed roles in most parties, and rogues are a skill class to begin with. Scouting is useful as well, and if you are going down that road you might want survival as a class skill with a few ranks so you can track things. Your eidolon can do this too.

[puzzler7]

First off, thanks for the response!


Keep in mind that at very high levels, AC is a losing man's game. The bare minimum for AC is generally 10+ level, 15+level for most characters, and 20+level or more starts to get into tanking and frontline heavy builds.

Good to know.



Your AC is effectively 22, if you are riding on your eidolon in combat, and you generally always will be. Likewise, you have a +1 heavy shield increasing your AC by another 2, for a total of 24, which is plenty fine.

The shield is for my eidolon, as I'll be twoweaponing for extra sneak attack dice. But it seems like you're saying AC 22 is still good, right?


You don't have tons of HP, but your build is a glass cannon striker anyways-don't engage large hordes, instead use speed and maneuverability to pick off solo key targets(casters). If you really need defense, fight defensively. I see you have combat expertise, but unless you need it as a prerequisite you will never use it. Put three ranks in acrobatics, and you have almost the same benefit for a poor man's version. You can't take combat trick twice, so you need to drop a feat to make room for pack flanking or outflank anyways.

Good advice that I'll definitely keep in mind. Combat Expertise is a prerequisite for Pack Flanking, which is essential to this build, so unfortunately I'm stuck with it. I'll probably have to drop Mounted Combat, as I can't combat trick twice, but that means I no longer have a reason to use Compel Hostility. Not taking combat trick means I can also take the survivalist rogue talent, making every skill a class skills.


You do need your eidolon for everything, but if it does die you are not hosed. You might want to run back and summon. Keep in mind you can flank with your summons, but drowning the combat in even level 1 monsters buys time and gives action economy to the party. You can always cast invisibility before you start summoning, as it won't break your invis. Against a horde, maybe open up with glitterdust. You need a way to heal your eidolon, as it won't heal normally and if it dies it comes back with half HP, so heal eidolon might be a good swap for a first level spell.

As noted earlier, I'll swap Compel Hostility with Rejuvenate Eidolon. I didn't really think about using my summons, as I'd have my eidolon out nearly all of the time. Definitely more good advice.


Your eidolon is a pack mule for a reason. Don't worry about carrying capacity, it won't matter at this level or anything past. If you really want to make sure you are find, spend 2k on a handy haversack and never worry again. Also, your eidolon has an extra evolution point it gained at level 4, and you have only spent 4 points. I would maybe give it the grab ability, or put claws on its arms for better damage. Elemental resistance is not bad, but consider dropping the arms and spending 2 points for flight. Flight at level 5 is pretty boss.

I am currently using all my points. Mount, skilled, and claws are 1 point each, and Limbs is 2 points. The arms were going to be used for the shield and a weapon, but a -4 penalty is pretty significant, and I'm not sure if eidolons are allowed to use a shield; they're not allowed to wear armor because it interferes with the connection. I was also planning on having my eidolon be able to steal items and manipulate objects, but I can just do that myself. I'll probably drop the arms, and replace it with something else, maybe flight.


Skillmonkey and face are needed roles in most parties, and rogues are a skill class to begin with. Scouting is useful as well, and if you are going down that road you might want survival as a class skill with a few ranks so you can track things. Your eidolon can do this too.

Good to know. I may have my eidolon drop ranks in Heal and Survival, freeing up my rogue talent.

And again, thanks!

[Geddy2112]

Eidolons can use shields, as they are not armor. However, they are not proficient with shields so take the armor check penalty to attack rolls. I would probably can the shield and grab a ring of protection. AC22 is good, and you can combat expertise/acrobatics it if you really need. You could drop the shield and spend it plus your extra gold on a belt of dex +2.

Mounted combat is still really good, as things will periodically attack your eidolon and being able to negate attacks is always nice. It is a prerequisite for a ton of mounted feats. The downside is that is a skillsuck, meaning you have to continue maxing out ride. Without it, you can get a +14 in ride and call it a day, as most of the uses are DC15. If you wanna always pass fast mount/dismount then a +19 will have you set.

Heal is kind of a garbage skill, at higher levels magic healing is simply so much more powerful. You can summon higher level monsters at the end of the day and have them cast cure spells. A rank to help stabilize people is fine, and again the top DC is 25, on a check you can always take 10 on(treat deadly wounds) so a +15 is fine, and really it only adds your wis mod to treat deadly wounds, so its really DC20(+10, take 10). A +14 passes stabilizing in combat, which is handy. Your UMD is pretty good so investing in a wand of cure light wounds might be worth it to top off at the end of the day. Share it with the party and if one person has CLW on their list the party should have one. You might want a wand of rejuv eidolon too.

Survival tracking DC's can get really hard, and magic(pass without trace) can negate the skill entirely, but not all enemies have access to it. If you want your eidolon to track, consider the scent evolution as well.

[puzzler7]

I decided on flight for my eidolon, as it basically negates any need for acrobatics, swim, or climb. Unobstructed 40 ft/round is pretty good. It also has Fly +14, so I can just hover over an opponent and strike. The downside is it now has AC17, but I can always have it take the total defense action while I attack; the vast majority of my damage comes from the 2x 3d6 sneak attack.

As far as healing, I can summon 1d3 small positive energy elementals and have the party bludgeon them to death; their only attack is 1d4 damage + 1d4 heal, and when they die, they explode and heal everything around for 2d8. This won't work in combat, but it will work whenever we have a short break.

I think I'm pretty much set; I haven't bought my 2000gp of magic items yet, but those shouldn't change my strategy too much. The one thing I'm missing is my second rogue talent. I'm waiting for DM approval/denial on harvesting poisons from my summoned creatures; I can summon 1d4+1 poisonous frogs 7 times a day, among many other poisonous creatures, so I should always have plenty of material on hand.

However, I'm not sure how good poison will be, even if I have an ample supply. The poison only lasts one round, and it takes an action to recoat (both of these things are fixed by rogue talents). But even with plenty of poison, most poisons (and all of the ones I have access to) deal ability damage over time, rather than immediate damage. If I'm letting something live long enough for the poison to have a noticeable effect, I'm probably doing something wrong. (Although the idea of hitting someone with 4 doses of 1d2 Con damage and watching them try to make a fort save is amusing.)

So, is poisoning a helpful strategy that's worth spending time crafting? If not, what rogue talent should I choose?

[Geddy2112]

Acrobatics is still handy to have 3 ranks in for the defensive fighting/total defense trick(if you don't have combat expertise) and moving through threatened squares, but you need to max it out to even have a chance of passing the tumble DC=creature's CMD.

With poison, the only way it will matter in combat is if it has an instantaneous effect/no onset time. The best ability score to damage is con, as this is basically indirect HP damage and it lowers the creature's fortitude saves. Damaging dex is pretty good too, extra if you can get the strike in before initiative is rolled, as it will damage initiative, AC, and reflex saves. If you have a caster in the party that targets will, doing wis damage is okay but not great. Strength damage is a mild debuff, but again not great. You won't ever get a caster to lose casting hitting INT/CHA with poison before you just kill them. Overall, most poisons are not great as their DC's are comically low, they target useless stats, take too long to work, and lots of monsters are just immune. If you have a free source of decent quality poison then go for it.

As for other rogue talents, I like bleeding attack and iron guts personally. Stand up is okay, but you won't be failing the ride check to soft fall in a couple more levels. For your build, I would suggest assault leader-it is a once a day free attack for your eidolon(or anyone flanking your target). Trap spotter is a decent one to speed run dungeons so you don't have to constantly look for traps, but depending on how they DM it might be useless.

[puzzler7]

I do have a few good poisons available, so pending the DM's answer about crafting it, I'll probably choose swift poison as my rogue talent; I shouldn't be using my move action much while on my eidolon. If he's not okay with poison for whatever reason, I'll probably take assault leader. Thanks!