PF: Reducing a Caster's Will Save?

[SangoProduction]

So, as we know, casters have innately high base will saves. They also rarely have to invest too many points in to half the attributes (the physical ones), leaving even more room for Wisdom bonuses, even if they aren't primary wisdom casters.

This is rather annoying when the majority of your offense comes from Will saves, such as an Eliciter using the Mind sphere (SoP).

So, here's a list of conditions that affect will saves.
Frightened (-2), Panicked (-2), Shaken (-2), Sickened (-2).

And of course, 3/4 of those conditions don't stack with each other (for this purpose), and the easiest ways of achieving those are in themselves will saves, which defeats the purpose of lowering will saves. (Although intimidate is a nice option, if you're pumping Cha already.)

Sickened though...that's often a fortitude save. And yes, many casters don't dump fortitude, but they rarely have melee-levels of it, and arcane casters don't often have innate bonuses. Are there easy ways of inflicting Sickened on others?

Are there any other relatively easy ways of inflicting will save penalties on people?

[Barstro]

Witch hexes. Even making a save on Evil Eye is a -2 or -4 for a round.

Ill Omen is a forced reroll as well.

I'd mention Misfortune, but that's a Will save.

[Eldaran]

There's just dealing Wisdom damage, several ways to do that.

[Septimus]

We have such a tactic in my Jade's Regent group: a mesmerist with hypnotic stare (-2 Will, -3 at level 8 as swift action), a witch with Evil Eye (-2 save, -4 at level 8), an investigator with sickening offensive (sickened no save for a round if hit, investigator level 7) and a samurai with cornugon smash and +30 in intimidate for shaken status.
Actually, it is kind of an overkill as most of us don't have will attack to follow :smallredface:

[Florian]

Are there any other relatively easy ways of inflicting will save penalties on people?

Drugs and poisons are a simply but a little bit costly way to do it, ability damage is a brutal way to do it (look up Nightmare Fist Style), an intimidate-based Slayer build is the mass way of stacking shaken and sickened up and an intimidate-based Fighter can be a casters nightmare...

[stack]

Greater serendipity from the fate sphere is a no save AOE -1 on saves. The curse word talent from fate forces a roll twice, take worst, no save.

Drain ghost strike from death inflicts negative levels.

Getting all those eats talents, which will be tight on an eliciter progression. Of course, the big DC bonus from your class helps a fair bit too.

Reduced CL in other spheres plus your class bonus and almost certain sphere focus (mind) feat means a save difference of 9 between mind and secondary spheres (barring significant investment), and that gap gets bigger if you don't have a staff of the secondary sphere.

Are you able to count on allies for support?

[Long_shanks]

Vision of Madness from the Madness domain is my favorite debuff in the game: 1/2 your level as a penalty, NO SAVE, to saves and attack usually results in a win. Slap this on an Inquisitor focussed on melee and it's pretty fun.

[SangoProduction]

Vision of Madness from the Madness domain is my favorite debuff in the game: 1/2 your level as a penalty, NO SAVE, to saves and attack usually results in a win. Slap this on an Inquisitor focussed on melee and it's pretty fun.

shockingly effective, and easy to obtain, if slightly harder to pull off as a caster.


(stuff)

Are you able to count on allies for support?

While I do tend to play a supportive role, as a general rule, I don't expect anyone to do much more than magic missile or hit it with a broad sword.

Also, useful ways of getting sphere dips.


We have such a tactic in my Jade's Regent group: a mesmerist with hypnotic stare (-2 Will, -3 at level 8 as swift action), a witch with Evil Eye (-2 save, -4 at level 8), an investigator with sickening offensive (sickened no save for a round if hit, investigator level 7) and a samurai with cornugon smash and +30 in intimidate for shaken status.
Actually, it is kind of an overkill as most of us don't have will attack to follow :smallredface:
amusing,


Witch hexes. Even making a save on Evil Eye is a -2 or -4 for a round.

Ill Omen is a forced reroll as well.

I'd mention Misfortune, but that's a Will save.

could be quite useful.

[jmelesky]

The Void arcane school (http://www.archivesofnethys.com/SchoolDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Void) has the Reveal Weakness power which reduces AC and all Saves by 1/2 the caster level, with no save. It takes a standard action, and only lasts a round, so the wizard doing it can't take advantage (except with swift or immediate spells), but it's dead handy for everyone else.

It stacks with other debuffs, too, of course, so you can have a mesmerist in your party use their Hypnotic Stare, start up Reveal Weakness, which also lowers AC, making the target easier to hit, which makes it easier to trigger Painful Stare, which makes it easier to trigger Stare feat abilities (and more likely for those to stick, since the saves are so debuffed).

You still need someone in the party to actually take the bad guy out, of course, but a save-or-die caster becomes much more powerful with a Void Wizard and a Mesmerist in the party.

Edited to add: This sounds like a less-good Visions of Madness, but it happens at range, without an attack roll, and affects AC and all saves, not debuffing two selectively.

[jmelesky]

Apologies for the double reply, but the sickened condition is actually easy as long as you've got an Intimidate character in the group (and enough money for +2 weapons). Just slap Cruel (http://www.archivesofnethys.com/MagicWeaponsDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Cruel) on somebody's weapon, and you'll be stacking shaken and sickened in no time.

[Zanos]

So, as we know, casters have innately high base will saves. They also rarely have to invest too many points in to half the attributes (the physical ones), leaving even more room for Wisdom bonuses, even if they aren't primary wisdom casters.
This hasn't been the case in my experience, most wizard/witch/sorcerer builds are 14 dex 14 con 18 int/cha, and then whatever's leftover mightbe used to make other stats not have negative modifiers.

Doubly true in PF where you can't just polymorph to make your physicals irrelevant (but can possess something for hour/level, because Paizo).

[Elder_Basilisk]

There's also the archon domain (lvl 8) aura of menace which is a flat -2 to saves (and attacks and armor class, etc) for enemies near the cleric. Genuine archons have an aura of menace but that grants a save so it will usually be less effective.