Pathfinder Vigilante Class

[AnimeTheCat]

Is vigilante any good? I seem to recall a lot of hate towards it

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[Ssalarn]

It depends on build and level. Avenger is pretty amazing, especially from about 6th level on, while Stalker is a bit weaker overall outside of campaigns that really allow it to leverage hidden strike and similarly situational abilities like the "appearance" line of feats. You also want to build into the fighting styles offered by the vigilante talents instead of around them; vigilante really masters the smaller number of fighting styles it has custom-built for it but doesn't branch out of those as well.

[AvatarVecna]

Is vigilante any good? I seem to recall a lot of hate towards it

.

"You got your superhero in my magic elf game!"
"You got your magic elf game in my superhero!"

*world's lamest slap-fight ensues*

[Treblain]

I think the hate is mostly that they frequently clash with with the average party/campaign or they'll have abilities that never come up unless it's an intrigue-focused campaign. However, since some vigilante talents improve certain combat styles in ways that no other class can get (Shield of Blades, Lethal Grace, Vital Punishment), there are reasons to play one even the social talents/social identities won't be used as frequently. And similarly, some of the archetypes borrow aspects of other classes so you can take advantage of some unusual combinations of class features and play in ways those classes normally wouldn't.

[Geddy2112]

I will second that a lot of the vigilante does not fit the adventuring lifestyle. Either the majority of the class features are wasted, or they overshadow in an intrigue featured campaign. That said, you can build a vigilante to fit into most styles of campaign, particularly with archetypes and the option to go with anonymity instead of renown.

The stalker is subpar as mentioned, unless you go the serial killer archetype which requires evil alignment and won't always fit into groups.

[Psyren]

"You got your superhero in my magic elf game!"
"You got your magic elf game in my superhero!"

*world's lamest slap-fight ensues*

"Hey! They taste overly restrictive/complicated together!"

I think "secret identity" and "social mode/combat mode" are concepts that didn't need to be tied to a specific class, myself. I like some of its archetypes though, like Warlock, Teisatsu, and Magical Child.

[Florian]

Is vigilante any good? I seem to recall a lot of hate towards it.

Well, the "hate" is mostly based on the whole "secret identity" and switching between social and combat mode. A Vigilante in a regular party doing the usual PF stuff, like dungeon crawling, or playing most of the adventure paths, will most often either not fit it, or nearly next to never switch modes.

What I actually want to try is playing one of the more social adventure path with an all vigilante party, either Hell´s Rebels or Crownfall.

The mechanical side is a bit different to judge. Vigilante more or less crams two distinct classes into one framework, so the individual class features and supporting feats come across as more powerful than their non-Vigilante counterparts, because you only ever have half of them. The Vigilante also has a serious MADness and WBL problem. Basic Vigilante more or less needs the same spread like a Regular Paladin, so either high STR or DEX and medium CON und CHA, with WBL going to 2/3 combat, 1/3 "face". Now a good number of the more interesting Vigilante archetypes come as half casters with very varying casting stats and spell lists. As far as I see it, Magical Girl is the only one that's running on pure CHA. So, that spreads out the attributes even more and you now also need to shuffle WBL from raw combat over to supporting the casting side.

When it comes to archetypes, the only two that I actually find interesting are more or less polar opposites: Cabalist and Zealot.

[Hunter Noventa]

I think the nail has already been hit on the head. The disparate sides of the class are difficult to get to work together mechanically, and there's the meta-issue of how to handle the rest of the players knowing you have two identities without that bleeding over to the in-character knowledge. The only saving grace is that well, you could in fact have a party made entirely of Vigilantes thanks to archetypes.

I think another big problem is that you basically have two routes to go with the social talents (disguise or celebrity) and there are no archetypes that provide much meaningful change on that side of the fence.

[AnimeTheCat]

hmm... Ok, so my thoughts when I was reading through the class, was to have the social side be the son/daughter of a noble family and that is the "real" identity.

In the game I am conceptualizing, the party are conscripts in the Cheliax Military (Link to thread here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?563844-Pathfinder-First-Build-Help)), and my idea is that the social identity is the son or daughter (haven't decided yet) of a noble family while the vigilante identity is someone who joined the military. Any time the party needs an in, my character would bring up that "I have a contact in a noble house" when, in fact, that contact is them. Taking other social talents like the Anyman (I think?) talent could give me access to more "Contacts" which are really just me. By doing this, I feel like I could easily keep in fun in the party without the OOC dual identity becoming a problem.

This isn't a finalized character, just a concept to bring to the session 0 tomorrow and I wanted to learn more about Vigiliante specifically (Hence the new thread).

[Kurald Galain]

If you're into a combat-based or dungeoncrawling campaign and you ignore the social half of the vigilante, then... its action half actually works pretty well, and gets numerous abilities that nobody else gets.

Sure, it's not the most optimized concept, but it works well enough. At least it won't be a one-trick pony like most swashbucklers and gunslingers, and it won't be a drag on the party like most shifter and kinny builds.

And if your campaign does have social parts, hey, bonus! :smallbiggrin:

[Dr_Dinosaur]

It’s great if you want to play a Fighter that trades armor/weapon training for out-of-combat options or a non-DPR Rogue/Slayer. People just get hung up on the completely optional alter ego mechanic, despite the fact that you can completely ignore it and function better than some core classes.

That said, it is *easier* to play in campaigns that stay mostly in one place for long stretches, since Renown takes time to build up in new places.