Bushi Template Help

[geekintheground]

Hello Playground,

Today i got invited to a new game, and was looking around and the bushi class template caught my eye. I was immediately reminded of Himura Kenshin from Ruroni Kenshin, and knew what i wanted to play. I'm just really not sure where to start. i'm kinda looking at stalker as the base, and trying to be a bit more of a skirmisher, using mobility to quickly dispatch enemies and avoid taking damage (because from what im told, there isnt any healing currently in the party), though i may end up as a pseudo-frontliner and taking a number of blows (the DM is pretty lenient when it comes to "tanking" and will make sub-optimal strategic choices to help them play the part if thats what theyre choosing. nothing straight suicidal, or stupid. just a lot of "you've failed to hit me 3 times and are still trying? ok")

I was hoping the playground could help me w/ some ideas for what manuvers and feats would be good, as well as any other advice i can get. Usually i just look up all the guides for a class and piece it together (w/ maybe a bit of help from the playground) but there isnt really much i can find on bushi... which is understandable since its basically just an archetype, but i thought there would be enough there for at least a couple posts talking about the tradeoffs and differences between the types of bushi

thanks for your time!

[Serafina]

Well, one of the main appeals of the Bushi is that you recover maneuvers far better. Just by sheating a weapon - which you can do for free with the Mixed Combat feat, which you even get for free at 6th level. Freely recovering one maneuver every turn is really good, no matter your class.

As for the various classes:
They all get access to different martial disciplines, but since you can switch out one for Mithral Current anyway and can switch out two more (one via trait, one via belonging to it's respective organization), there's not that much difference - you can get what disciplines you like. So you ought to look at the different class features, and somewhat at the maneuver mechanics/recovery.

The Stalker has the worst chassis of those three classes, with medium BAB and only one good save. But they get the most maneuvers. For class features, their Deadly Strike can do a good amount of extra damage, Combat Insight makes up for their poor Reflex Save, and they have some decent Ki abilities. They won't get any Bushido for free - you can take it in place of Stalker Arts, which are pretty good, so it'll be hard choice.

The Warder gets the least maneuvers of the three classes, but also gets the best chassis with a D12 HD and two good saves. They also get good class features - they can threaten a huge area (and get free Combat Reflexes to help with that), protect allies with Armigers Mark, have pretty good Reflex saves and Initiative even with low Dexterity, and will get free Bushido at a good rate.
If you do pick Warder, you can combo Bushi with either the Hawkguard (for a mix of ranged and melee combat) or Zweihander Sentinel (for two-handed katana combat) archetypes, at basically no loss.

The Warlord is in-between maneuver- and chassis-wise. Their main class feature are Gambits - basically, you announce that you'll do something ahead of a roll, get a bonus to that roll, and if you succeed recover maneuvers and get a bonus. They can also grant teamwork feats to allies, make up for their poor Will-save, and are generally nice at boosting themselves or allies.

All three classes are perfectly viable. It depends on how many maneuvers you want, how durable you want to be, and maybe on whether you want to go for a Samurai Sword&Archery mix (Hawkguard Bushi Warder) or really like Warlord Gambles or if anything else like that catches your eye.