Tiering the Pathfinder Classes - Arcanist, Oracle, Shaman and Witch

[pabelfly]

I'm interested in starting work on a tier list for Pathfinder, in the same way that we have a tier list for 3.5 (link) (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?600635-Why-each-class-is-in-its-tier-2019-update!). This link is a collection of discussions about the power and versatility of all the base classes of 3.5 DnD, and it’s quite a useful resource. I think Pathfinder could do with a similar resource as a point of information and discussion.

There has been an informal attempt to do a tier list for Pathfinder, which I've also used as part of the reference to this thread: (link) (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?649283-%85-And-What-Is-the-*Deal*-with-Pathfinder-Tiers). But this lacks discussion on the classes and a shared consensus on how scoring works, both of which are as important as the tier number itself.

The current, work-in-progress thread for Pathfinder Tiers version of this thread is here (link) (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?650140-Why-Each-Class-is-in-its-Tier-Pathfinder-Edition-(Work-in-Progress)). This thread has links to previous tiering threads and short summaries of thread discussions for those who missed them when they were posted. Contributions and votes for older threads are still welcome and your votes still count.

This time, we’ll tier the Arcanist, Oracle, Shaman and Witch. For reference, in the informal thread:

Arcanist is tiered at 1
Oracle is tiered at 1.5
Shaman is tiered at 1.25
Witch is tiered at 1

So, the questions are: what should each of these be tiered at? Are any of these options notably more or less powerful than the rest? And are there any notable archetypes for these classes that deserve separate tiering? I guess a discussion thread is the way to find out.





What are the tiers?

The simple answer here is that tier one is the best, the home of things on the approximate problem solving scale of wizards, and tier six is the worst, land of commoners. And problem solving capacity is what's being measured here. Considering the massive range of challenges a character is liable to be presented with across the levels, how much and how often does that character's class contribute to the defeat of those challenges? This value should be considered as a rough averaging across all levels, the center of the level range somewhat more than really low and really high level characters, and across all optimization levels (considering DM restrictiveness as a plausible downward acting factor on how optimized a character is), prioritizing moderate optimization somewhat more than low or high.

A big issue with the original tier system is that, if anything, it was too specific, generating inflexible definitions for allowance into a tier which did not cover the broad spectrum of ways a class can operate. When an increase in versatility would seem to represent a decrease in tier, because tier two is supposed to be low versatility, it's obvious that we've become mired in something that'd be pointless to anyone trying to glean information from the tier system. Thus, I will be uncharacteristically word light here. The original tier system's tier descriptions are still good guidelines here, but they shouldn't be assumed to be the end all and be all for how classes get ranked.

Consistent throughout these tiers is the notion of problems and the solving thereof. For the purposes of this tier system, the problem space can be said to be inclusive of combat, social interaction, and exploration, with the heaviest emphasis placed on combat. A problem could theoretically fall outside of that space, but things inside that space are definitely problems. Another way to view the idea of problem solving is through the lens of the niche ranking system. A niche filled tends to imply the capacity to solve a type of problem, whether it's a status condition in the case of healing, or an enemy that just has too many hit points in the case of melee combat. It's not a perfect measure, both because some niches have a lot of overlap in the kinds of problems they can solve and because, again, the niches aren't necessarily all inclusive, but they can act as a good tool for class evaluation.

Tier one: Incredibly good at solving nearly all problems. This is the realm of Clerics, Druids, and Wizards, classes that open up with strong combat spells backed up by utility, and then get massively stronger from there. If you're not keeping up with that core trio of tier one casters, then you probably don't belong here.

Tier two: We're just a step below tier one here, in the land of classes around the Sorcerer and Chained Summoner level of power. Generally speaking, this means relaxing one of the two tier one assumptions, either getting us to very good at solving nearly all problems, or incredibly good at solving most problems. But, as will continue to be the case as these tiers go on, there aren't necessarily these two simple categories for this tier. You gotta lose something compared to the tier one casters, but what you lose doesn't have to be in some really specific proportions.

Tier three: Again, we gotta sacrifice something compared to tier two, here taking us to around the level of a Bard, Skald, Unchained Summoner and Inquisitor. The usual outcome is that you are very good at solving a couple of problems and competent at solving a few more. Of course, there are other possibilities, for example that you might instead be competent at solving nearly all problems.

Tier four: Here we're in Fighter and Barbarian territory. Starting from that standard tier three position, the usual sweet spots here are very good at solving a few problems, or alright at solving many problems.

Tier five: We're heading close to the dregs here. Tier five is the tier of chained Monk, classes that are as bad as you can be without being an Aristocrat or a Commoner. Classes here are sometimes very good at solving nearly no problems, or alright at solving a few, or some other function thereof. It's weak, is the point.

Tier six: And here we have commoner tier. Or, the bottom is commoner. The top is approximately aristocrat. You don't necessarily have nothing in this tier, but you have close enough to it.

[exelsisxax]

Arcanist and witch: T1
prepared fullcasters from very broad arcane lists, clearly T1. witch trades out some of the wizard repertoire for a bunch of spells from divine lists, arcanist is a bit weird in preparing spells known each day. Nothing interferes with the standard T1 definition, they can solve any problem and do anything if they prepared for it that day.

Oracle: T2
spontaneous cleric casting, but with other class features! this should be the new T2 yardstick in both description and design, because the oracle class is inherently flexible across builds but can't rebuild every day like a prepared caster.

Shaman: T0.75
Shaman is a cleric with a mostly worse list in most ways. With that you'd think it would be a contender for worst T1 verging on high T2, except spirits are good, hexes are nice, and wandering spirit/wandering hex is stupidly good. Changing out a small section of your talent selections and extra spells known would be good enough, but some of those spirits are insane. Take lore spirit: prepare a handful of any wizard spells you want every day which verges on "prepare spells daily from the entire wizard list" levels of good - and you can just pick something else tomorrow! You can't hit true schrodinger wizard capability inside the day, but you can prepare literally any wizard spell and be a ripoff wizard with an infinite spellbook.

Unsworn shaman: T0.5
shaman, but even more flexibility. This is peak prepared: an unsworn shaman does not make any permanent choices - every class feature becomes a daily selection of whatever you feel like that day. Alone this would be fantastic, but unsworn's hex selections are also all daily selections! So now when you're done crafting the big 6 for your party you can switch it out for craft potion to burn more downtime, or back to flight or evil eye on adventuring days. Want a different spirit bonus? change it any morning! including some extra saucy options like getting a fresh animal companion, chosen anew every morning. that's some gross stuff.
unsworn is a really stupid upgrade in flexibility with no lost features, it just delays your second spirit slightly. obscenely powerful, very clunky, and needs to be piloted very well to actually pull any of this off properly.

[Thunder999]

Arcanist is definitely tier 1, while the slower spell progression hurts, it's got the best casting mechanic. Few things quite say Tier 1 like Quick Study just pulling whatever spell you need out. At even levels it's arguably a better wizard, at odd levels it's obviously worse.
1.1, a little below wizard to account for those even levels, but still close.

Oracle is Tier 2, for much the same reason as sorcerer really, strong class features paired with spontaneous 9th level casting. The list is substantially worse than the sorcerer's, and definitely designed with cleric style prepaared access in mind, but there's good enough spells to still be tier 2.
2.0, a fair bit below sorcerer.

Witch has a worse spell list than a wizard, with a lot less utility and buffing, but does have some very nice debuffs like Ill Omen and of course the hexes are very strong, well the good ones anyway, At-Will save or lose, some utility, buffs, debuffs. The right Patron can get you some of the big spells you're missing.
Tier 1.3, prepared casting with some solid class features.

Shaman is very similar to Witch, good prepared casting mechanic, hexes and a somewhat weaker spell list than other full casters. The main difference is that with the right, admittedly quite MAD, build you can be getting your pick of sorcerer/wizard spells each day and they can grab cleric spells as a favoured class bonus, so they're really good at expanding the list.
It's only a few spells each day, a much weaker base list, and Arcane Enlightenment means you need int and cha on top of your wis, it sounds good in theory, but you're not actually going to oudo the wizard who potentially has his entire list to pick from (and functionally has most of the actually good spells) every day and can easily just fill an empty slot later.
It's really not much better than Paragon Surge+Emergency attunement to grab spells known on a sorcerer.
Tier 1.3 normally, Tier 1.1 with wandering arcane enlightenment hex to grab a few sorcerer/wizard spells each day

[Maat Mons]

As I said in an earlier thread:
Arcanist: Tier 1.0
Witch: Tier 1.1
Shaman: Tier 1.4

I’ve heard it argued that the Shaman spell list doesn’t have enough good spells to be Tier 1. I think there are enough to be more versatile than a baseline spontaneous caster. The base Shaman spell list is probably outshone by a Sorcerer with +17 spells known from FCB. But if we’re counting FCB, the Shaman can get spells from the Cleric list (half-elf, half-orc, human), spells from the Druid list (gathlain, ghoran, grippli, vine leshy), spells from the Psychic spell list (shabti), or Enchantment spells from the Sorcerer/Wizard spell list (kitsune).

Arcane Enlightenment is nice, but then again, as a divine caster, you have access to Dreamed Secrets (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/dreamed-secrets/) anyway. Arcane Enlightenment comes online at 6th level, and Dreamed Secrets at 7th, so not much of a difference.

As an anecdote, the only time I built a Shaman, I went with Ancestral Speaker, for theme, so I didn’t even have access to Wandering Spirit or Wandering Hex. I took Arcane Enlightenment anyway, even though I was locked into the same spell selection every day. I only had the ability scores to manage a single 1st-level spell. I went with Blood Money, also for theme.

For oracle, I think I’ll go with 2.2.

[vasilidor]

Arcanist: Tier 1 all the way here.
Shaman: Not sure. I want to say tier 2, but some builds can get it up to tier 1. It has a lower floor than most divine castors.
Oracle: Tier 2. The sorcerer of Divine Casting.
Witch: Tier 1.

[pabelfly]

Vote Update:

Arcanist
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Maat Mons, Vasilidor – 1

Average – 1



Witch
Exelsisxax, Vasilidor – 1
Maat Mons – 1.1
Thunder999 – 1.3

Average – 1.13



Oracle
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Vasilidor – 2
Maat Mons – 2.2

Average – 2.05



Shaman
Exelsisxax – 0.75
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4

Average – 1.15



Shaman (Unsworn Archetype)
Exelsisxax – 0.5
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4

Average – 1.06

[Kurald Galain]

Arcanist is a wizard/sorcerer hybrid, so it makes sense to tier it right between those two other classes. Compared to a wizard, it has a number of tradeoffs, such as less spells per day but flexible casting; and no arcane school but a good DC boost numerous times per day. I'd call this a draw, except that arcanist gets each spell level one level later than wizard. Being one spell level behind for roughly 40% of the game is a notable drawback; so I'd place him at Tier 1.5. Note that the wizard archetype Exploiter is, in practice, a better arcanist than the arcanist.

Oracle is the spontaneous divine caster; a sorcerer with the cleric's spell list. It also gets revelation powers that are thematic, but less powerful than cleric domains or wizard schools; and a mandatory drawback in the form of a curse. As noted in threads on the cleric and warpriest, the downside is that the cleric list is noticeably weaker than the wizard list, and in particular pretty bad at low levels. Overall, a solid class but not quite as good a sorcerer, so Tier 2.5.

Witch is a popular caster that has less spells per day in exchange for infinite-use hexes. It should be obvious that spells are stronger than hexes; that's why you get limited spells and unlimited hexes - e.g. the Evil Eye hex (one target gets -4 to hit) is weaker than multitarget debuffs like Glitterdust or Slow. However, the witch spell list is markedly weaker than the wizard's; the combo of less spells per day and weaker spell list and weaker-than-spell hexes is a downgrade compared to a wizard.
The most popular hexes (Evil Eye and Slumber) are mind-affecting, a common immunity. Aside from that, wizards and sorcerers have crappy defenses, and need spells like Mirror Image or Stoneskin to compensate - and the witch doesn't get these, making the class decidedly squishy. Overall, witches are good but clearly no match for a wizard or sorcerer, making them Tier 2.
In practice, the witch attracts players that like unlimited-use abilities (because otherwise, why play one?), so a common playstyle is to ignore spells and rely almost exclusively on hexes. Such witches spend most combats using only Evil Eye and Cackle, and this playstyle is at least a tier lower. It's unfortunate that what attracts players to the witch is not what makes the class good.

Notable archetype: the White-Haired Witch has no hexes and uses hair as a reach melee weapon, but still has lousy AC, HP, and BAB, and the aforementioned lack of defense spells. This is a pretty ineffective way to create a frontliner, and should be considered tier 3, or frankly even lower if it uses standard actions on its hair-based melee attacks.

Finally, Shaman is a rarely-played hybrid that combines the witch's hexes (but doesn't get the more powerful Major Hexes) with a watered-down version of the cleric spell list (which was not the strongest list in the first place) and some flavorful but not very impressive familiar abilities. This ends up as clearly the weakest of all 9-level casters; I'd rate it Tier 2.5 but it arguably deserves to be lower. (edit) except if you poach spells from other lists, in which case see below.

[Kurald Galain]

Take lore spirit: prepare a handful of any wizard spells you want every day which verges on "prepare spells daily from the entire wizard list" levels of good
That's certainly a good trick, but this should really be rated separately. The lore spirit is not an example of a spirit that has such tricks, but literally the only spirit that does that.

In addition, lore spirit gives you a number of spells based on charisma, if you have the minimum intelligence for the spell on a wisdom-based caster. This is very awkwardly MAD, and not nearly as impressive in practice as in theory. And, well, if you want to be able to take your pick of wizard spells each day, why not play a wizard in the first place?


if we’re counting FCB, the Shaman can get spells from the Cleric list (half-elf, half-orc, human), spells from the Druid list (gathlain, ghoran, grippli, vine leshy), spells from the Psychic spell list (shabti), or Enchantment spells from the Sorcerer/Wizard spell list (kitsune).
Yes, and since these are all races, any individual shaman can get only one of those. But if you want spells from the druid list, why not just play a druid? The pattern I'm seeing is that shaman needs to poach spells from other lists to be good; and that is not a good sign for the baseline shaman.

[Serafina]

A Shaman actually using a Shamans ability to grab spells from other lists, such as a Lore Wandering Spirit (Arcane Enlightenment), certainly deserves a Tier 1 rating. Whether 1 or 1.5 I do not care. But it certainly fulfills the T 1 criteria - it can have any tool needed for any job.

There's one argument to be made for rating the Lore seperately - the need for Charisma and Intelligence to make it work.
But in effect, that means that you progress your Wisdom a bit slower to get Headbands that also boost one or both of those stats, and are either fine with lower-level spells (which are often still perfectly fine for problem solving) or lower Charisma (which means weaker Hex-DCs but that can be fine).

That is certainly important to keep in mind, since it heavily screws over the Shaman with lower point-buys. But it is a capability the Shaman has.

So a Shaman using a (Wandering) Lore Spirit is certainly Tier 1 or 1.5. They may have somewhat worse stats compared to e.g. a Cleric, but they have a greater variety of spells. And if you rate the Cleric at that tier, the Shaman certainly deserves that rating.

[exelsisxax]

As I said in an earlier thread:
Arcanist: Tier 1.0
Witch: Tier 1.1
Shaman: Tier 1.4

I’ve heard it argued that the Shaman spell list doesn’t have enough good spells to be Tier 1. I think there are enough to be more versatile than a baseline spontaneous caster. The base Shaman spell list is probably outshone by a Sorcerer with +17 spells known from FCB. But if we’re counting FCB, the Shaman can get spells from the Cleric list (half-elf, half-orc, human), spells from the Druid list (gathlain, ghoran, grippli, vine leshy), spells from the Psychic spell list (shabti), or Enchantment spells from the Sorcerer/Wizard spell list (kitsune).

Arcane Enlightenment is nice, but then again, as a divine caster, you have access to Dreamed Secrets (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/dreamed-secrets/) anyway. Arcane Enlightenment comes online at 6th level, and Dreamed Secrets at 7th, so not much of a difference.

As an anecdote, the only time I built a Shaman, I went with Ancestral Speaker, for theme, so I didn’t even have access to Wandering Spirit or Wandering Hex. I took Arcane Enlightenment anyway, even though I was locked into the same spell selection every day. I only had the ability scores to manage a single 1st-level spell. I went with Blood Money, also for theme.

For oracle, I think I’ll go with 2.2.

You appear to misunderstand the things dreamed secrets can actually do. It cannot provide any caster with any spells outside their existing list, making it virtually useless for divine prepared casters (as they cannot prepare spells during the day) and just 2 lower-level swappable spells know for spontaneous casters from a subset of their existing list.
Relevant FAQ thread: https://paizo.com/threads/rzs2r93x&page=1?New-FAQ-New-Spells-Known
Yeah, it kind of sucks once interpreted how the spell rules actually work rather than what I can only presume to be the author's intent. This is the same reason that paragon surge arcane eldritch heritage is mostly crap.

Lore spirit is dramatically far and away superior. It remains one of the only ways of poaching spells flexibly, because it explicitly does add them.

[pabelfly]

Vote Update:

Arcanist
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Maat Mons, Vasilidor – 1
Kurald Galain – 1.5

Average – 1



Oracle
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Vasilidor – 2
Maat Mons – 2.2
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 2.14



Shaman
Exelsisxax – 0.75
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.49



Shaman (Unsworn Archetype)
Exelsisxax – 0.5
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.42



Witch
Exelsisxax, Vasilidor – 1
Maat Mons – 1.1
Thunder999 – 1.3
Kurald Galain – 2

Average – 1.28

[Kurald Galain]

You appear to misunderstand the things dreamed secrets can actually do. It cannot provide any caster with any spells outside their existing list,
It's overall much more likely that a GM will let you cast wizard spells with Dreamed Secrets (because that's what the feat is for, and that's what Paizo's designer suggests in the thread you've linked) then that you'll get high enough int/cha scores to get a meaningful amount of extra spells out of Lore Spirit (standard point buy is 15, good luck with that). The former is practical gameplay, the latter is a schrodinger build.

[pabelfly]

I had a private complaint about the votes outside of the 1-6 scale for Shaman. I’m inclined to agree – the voting scale was created years before the Pathfinder tiering project and these set of threads have been set up based on that scale. Even if we had a class that everyone accepted was better than Pathfinder Wizard, they would both still fundamentally be the same in being able to “solve nearly all problems”.

I’ve thus adjusted the two votes that were less than 1 for the Shaman class so that they’re 1. Apologies to Exelsisxax for this. After the vote change and adding my vote, Shaman is still at the bottom of Tier 1, so nothing has really changed.

Vote Update:

Arcanist
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Maat Mons, Vasilidor – 1
Kurald Galain – 1.5

Average – 1.1



Oracle
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Vasilidor – 2
Maat Mons – 2.2
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 2.14



Shaman
Exelsisxax – 1
Pabelfly – 1.2
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.55



Shaman (Lore Spirit)
Exelsisxax, Serafina, Pabelfly – 1
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.36

Shaman (Unsworn Archetype)
Exelsisxax, Pabelfly – 1
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.44



Witch
Exelsisxax, Vasilidor – 1
Maat Mons – 1.1
Thunder999 – 1.3
Kurald Galain – 2

Average – 1.28

White-Haired Witch
Exelsisxax, Vasilidor – 1
Maat Mons – 1.1
Thunder999 – 1.3
Kurald Galain – 3

Average – 1.48

[Ramza00]

I am curious what are peoples opinion of Unlettered Arcanist (aka the Arcanist / witch hybrid which uses the witch spell list, does not get hexes, for it keeps the Arcanist exploits.)

Tier 1 still or something between 1 and 2?

[Rynjin]

I am curious what are peoples opinion of Unlettered Arcanist (aka the Arcanist / witch hybrid which uses the witch spell list, does not get hexes, for it keeps the Arcanist exploits.)

Tier 1 still or something between 1 and 2?

It's definitely a downgrade (given that the Witch spell list is weaker than the Sor/Wiz list, and Exploits are weaker than Hexes), but not a full tier.

[Thunder999]

Unlettered Arcanist is without question the worst prepared 9th level caster in the game, it's got a relatively weak spell list, the worst possible BAB, worst possible HD, slow spell progression, not that great class features (quick study is only as good as your spellbook, and the witch list isn't nearly so filled with niche instant solutions as the wizard one, potent magic is also only as good as the spells your boosting the DC or CL of and they're the two big exploits, still not bad, but not nearly as good as Hexes, Animal Companions or the really good domain powers, school powers and bloodlines).

If any prepared caster is tier 2 it's Unlettered Arcanist.

Normal Arcanist, much like the Wizard and Sorcerer, gets a lot of its power from the fact that the Sorcerer/Wizard spell list is the best in the game.

[Kurald Galain]

Exploits are weaker than Hexes
I'd say exploits are stronger than hexes, and the reason is action economy. A hex is something you do instead of a spell, whereas numerous good exploits can be used in addition to a spell. The arcanist can teleport as part of a move action, counterspell as an immediate (without having to ready it first), and boost his spell DC as a free action.

(to be fair, arcanist has a number of "direct damage" exploits, all of which are rather ineffective)

Spell with exploit > spell > hex > direct damage exploit.

[Coeruleum]

I'd say exploits are stronger than hexes, and the reason is action economy. A hex is something you do instead of a spell, whereas numerous good exploits can be used in addition to a spell. The arcanist can teleport as part of a move action, counterspell as an immediate (without having to ready it first), and boost his spell DC as a free action.

(to be fair, arcanist has a number of "direct damage" exploits, all of which are rather ineffective)

Spell with exploit > spell > hex > direct damage exploit.

I don't think action economy matters that much when many witch hexes are long-game things that can seemingly compete with any spell that doesn't include Miracle, Wish, or Demiplane in its name. Witch hexes seem like Paizo's attempt to replicate spirit binding from 3.5e like psychic magic is Paizo's attempt to replicate psionics (complete with various sorts of powers and point pools.) Most arcanist exploits can be replicated by other features such as oracle revelations, sorcerer bloodlines, races, and feats, so it seems more viable to play a class with a better spell list if you're giving up witch hexes, which are the only thing that I think makes witches and many archetypes that get hexes such as spirit guide oracles and pact wizards tier 1 at all to begin with. In fact, going for hexes and a better spell list is a no-brainer. I think shaman is generally rated above witch because they get hexes and they get a better spell list.


It's definitely a downgrade (given that the Witch spell list is weaker than the Sor/Wiz list, and Exploits are weaker than Hexes), but not a full tier.

I think the unlettered arcanist is worse than the sorcerer, way worse than the oracle, and possibly even worse than some 6th-level casters like the occultist (the occultist effectively has 9th-level spell-like abilities and supernatural abilities that are probably better than anything on the witch list once you remove their hexes and patron and archetype spells) because the witch spell list is such a downgrade. The sorcerer is spontaneous, but between being able to pack their list full of Anyspells that aren't even on the witch list, their bloodlines, and some of the archetypes, they would be able to completely outperform an unlettered arcanist any day, especially the good sorcerer bloodlines like Arcane, Psychic, Fey, and Efreeti.

[Kurald Galain]

I don't think action economy matters that much when many witch hexes are long-game things that can seemingly compete with any spell

It would help if you mention which hexes, specifically, you're talking about. The most popular ones in my area are Slumber, Evil Eye, Cackle, and Healing; none of which are "long-game things that can seemingly compete".

[Coeruleum]

It would help if you mention which hexes, specifically, you're talking about. The most popular ones in my area are Slumber, Evil Eye, Cackle, and Healing; none of which are "long-game things that can seemingly compete".

Coven, Flight, Cauldron (only as prerequisite for some other hexes,) Cook People, and basically all of the grand hexes. The grand hexes basically function like 9th-level spells but without the limits. Hexes like Coven and Flight are basically a class feature. Things like Cook People won't be used by non-evil characters generally, and lots of long-game stuff probably won't function in Pathfinder Society play since that's basically just crawl into the dungeon with random strangers, hit things with your sword four times or throw fire at it, and leave. The debuffing hexes are your combat hexes and those are extremely important in a wargame and healing is important if you don't have a healer, but without being able to destroy the village with grand hexes I don't think the witch would even be tier 1, just a really good tier 2 specialized debuffer with some healing ability who is probably made irrelevant as soon as even the generally-considered-tier-2 sorcerer can cast Wish, Limited Wish, Greater Shadow Conjuration, Shadow Conjuration and those kinds of things while the witch only has Shadow Transmutation and Greater Shadow Transmutation on a non-gish and Create Demiplane, Greater/Lesser when the only real source of minions or followers for a witch is their hexes such as Coven, Charm, and Summon Spirit, or the same Leadership feat anyone else including wizards, sorcerers, and psychics who are better-poised to use it and can also cast Demiplane spells can get.


Yes, and since these are all races, any individual shaman can get only one of those. But if you want spells from the druid list, why not just play a druid? The pattern I'm seeing is that shaman needs to poach spells from other lists to be good; and that is not a good sign for the baseline shaman.

The baseline shaman is rather poorly-designed, but these threads are asking about strength, not how pristine or clunky it is. And playing a shaman over a druid makes a lot of sense if you want the spirit and the hexes more than you want wildshape and an animal companion, so it's mostly just wildshape. Lots of people would probably like to play a nature-based person who has a shtick other than turning into animals, but forcing people to play specific races to do that seems extremely clunky to me, just like the Paizo port of a telepath obligatorily being a shapeshifting fox person from East Asian mythology just so you can get passable DCs on your mind control, debuffs, and buffs.

[Kurald Galain]

Coven, Flight, Cauldron (only as prerequisite for some other hexes,) Cook People, and basically all of the grand hexes.
While I agree with your point about grand hexes, I see that Coven takes a standard action and lasts one round; Flight takes a standard action and lasts one minute; and Cook People takes an hour to activate and lasts an hour. I don't really consider that long-term.


I don't think the witch would even be tier 1, just a really good tier 2 specialized debuffer with some healing ability who is probably made irrelevant as soon as even the generally-considered-tier-2 sorcerer can cast Wish, Limited Wish, Greater Shadow Conjuration, Shadow Conjuration and those kinds of things
I completely agree.


And playing a shaman over a druid makes a lot of sense if you want the spirit and the hexes more than you want wildshape and an animal companion
Unfortunately, shaman doesn't get major and grand hexes.

[Coeruleum]

While I agree with your point about grand hexes, I see that Coven takes a standard action and lasts one round; Flight takes a standard action and lasts one minute; and Cook People takes an hour to activate and lasts an hour. I don't really consider that long-term.

Coven makes a permanent coven that you can engage with other witches, hags, and people who have used certain jank with to empower your hexes and spells. Flight is more important for the at-will Feather Fall and the static bonuses since that's basically kineticist, warlock, etc. level stuff and now you're basically immune to gravity as long as you can take mental actions. Being able to make potions and buffs with Cauldron, Cook People, and those kinds of hexes lets you play the long game as long as you can plan it out right and have ways to automate production even if you have to wait or speed it up.


Unfortunately, shaman doesn't get major and grand hexes.

Yes, but it gets to poach spells of pretty much whatever list it wants even if doing that is über jank. There are some sorcerer and oracle builds I might personally consider T1 and thus put the class as a whole at T1 even though I'm not voting on sorcerer right now. Shaman way outdoes that since it can just take spells from any list but it also has good features. I think that's extremely bad game design, which is why I mostly play 3.5e, but not low-powered by any means. Pretty much the same issues as how I think occultist is T2... taking things from other classes is jank and doesn't reflect well on game design, but doesn't mean you should rate the class by the weakest base version when that's not what people will be playing in practice. If I were to rate any sorcerer builds as T1 they'd also be jank that take things from other classes, and the faith and rebirth discipline psychics, especially with an archetype that's just a straight buff like formless adept, are arguably better than the oracle so I'd probably rate those as T1 but again only for the subclasses and archetypes that makes them the least like the base class. This seems like a Pathfinder game design issue in general to me.

[Kurald Galain]

On the topic of the Oracle: we should have a separate rating for the Wolf-scarred Face curse (who gets 20% spell failure chance, a horrible drawback on any spellcaster), and the Site-Bound curse (who must stay within a couple thousand feet of one particular spot, FOREVER, or become nauseated and take con damage). I suggest the former is a full tier lower because of its high impractibility in combat; and rate the latter as tier 5 for being utterly unplayable (as your action radius is way too small even in a city campaign).

Then for the Witch, I'd like to add Hagbound at the same rating as White-Haired Witch, i.e. losing your hexes in exchange for being a melee warrior with low BAB, low AC, and low hit points; simply a terrible idea. Then there is the Putrefactor, which loses most hexes in exchange for pretty bad abilities; the Havocker, which loses all hexes in exchange for mediocre at-will blasting; and the Ley Line Guardian, a spontaneous caster akin to the sorcerer. I welcome discussion which of these (if any) should be considered lower tier.

Finally, the Shaman has the Primal Warden archetype... whenever he casts a spell from one of his bonus slots, it instead becomes a completely random spell of one level higher. This is not a tier change since you can just not use that, but the ability is so utterly bizarre (as well as useless) that I felt like mentioning it.

[Arkain]

On the topic of the Oracle: we should have a separate rating for the Wolf-scarred Face curse (who gets 20% spell failure chance, a horrible drawback on any spellcaster), and the Site-Bound curse (who must stay within a couple thousand feet of one particular spot, FOREVER, or become nauseated and take con damage). I suggest the former is a full tier lower because of its high impractibility in combat; and rate the latter as tier 5 for being utterly unplayable (as your action radius is way too small even in a city campaign).

Then for the Witch, I'd like to add Hagbound at the same rating as White-Haired Witch, i.e. losing your hexes in exchange for being a melee warrior with low BAB, low AC, and low hit points; simply a terrible idea. Then there is the Putrefactor, which loses most hexes in exchange for pretty bad abilities; the Havocker, which loses all hexes in exchange for mediocre at-will blasting; and the Ley Line Guardian, a spontaneous caster akin to the sorcerer. I welcome discussion which of these (if any) should be considered lower tier.

Finally, the Shaman has the Primal Warden archetype... whenever he casts a spell from one of his bonus slots, it instead becomes a completely random spell of one level higher. This is not a tier change since you can just not use that, but the ability is so utterly bizarre (as well as useless) that I felt like mentioning it.

Hagbound does not trade away all your hexes, as you keep the ones at 6, 16 and 18. So technically speaking you can at least try to patch up your hex progression with feats. At any rate, you're trapped in the class until you either lose it or become a monster at 20 (I don't think you necessarily become an NPC, though). There's some weird language there, too, as it says "immunity to charm, fear, and spell effects" which is probably not meant in a literal sense. It's certainly more of an NPC archetype, though I'd rate it higher than White-Haired Witch, simply because the latter explicitly trades away the Hex class features in all forms and shapes and as such can't even be patched up anymore with Extra Hex. There might be a weird gish build possible with it, but on its own, White-Haired Witch is really weak.

Primal Warden might actually warrant a much lower rating as well. Sure, there's the plain weird ability you mentioned (also very troublesome to use, jeez), but it offers some more sucktastic stuff with glorious RNG in case you want to interrupt the game's flow even more. First you lose two hexes and in their stead gain the ability to roll a die. A d4 until level 12 with a wonderful 25% chance to just inflict a -2 penalty to attacks/skills/saves, randomly enlarge or reduce by one size category, gain an enhancement bonus to land speed or a 20% miss chance (that one's actually decent I'd say). Later it's a d6 with the additional option to add a luck bonus to things, including AC which is rare or Haste. At level 12 I'd say it's a 50% chance to be decent, but before that it's a 75% to be irrelevant or a hindrance for your party and a dangerous chance to possibly buff an enemy. It's just bad on its own, costs you hexes and in addition you gain the privilege of "A primal warden shaman cannot select the chant hex, the evil eye hex, the misfortune hex, or any witch hexes.", which is to say no Slumber, Cackle or whatever for you. No extending Fortune either. You're stuck with a reduced hex list, reduced number of hexes, locked out of some of the best ones and get a cumbersome and mostly bad ability in return. I'd say together with the awkward unstable casting thing that's around a tier lower.

[Thunder999]

At a guess I'd probably put those witch archetypes somewhere in tier 2.
The spontaneous one is just the usual Sorcerer/Oracle setup, it's tier 2 because you don't get to change your spells daily, and have slower spell progression, but still have all the same actual spells you could know and the power that means.
Witch isn't the best spell list, but I think it's good enough to be tier 2 even with bad class features, you still get to go arround save or lose-ing things, flying, teleporting, magic jar-ing etc. Might even still be bottom tier 1 since you've at least got the good spell progression and versatility of a prepared caster.

Wolf scarred is probably tier 3, you can take Silent Spell, slap it on everything and be the game's only 8/9 caster.

Site Bound is tier 6, literally unplayable as a PC, an option that solely exists for NPCs.

[Maat Mons]

I'd advocate for only Tiering an archetype separately if it's higher-tier than the baseline class.

[Bucky]

Site-Bound Oracle is an NPC tool. It's an almost free +1 CL for many one-off encounters, and it supplies a ready excuse for why the high level resurrection provider won't solve the quest herself.

[Ramza00]

I'd advocate for only Tiering an archetype separately if it's higher-tier than the baseline class.

Oh that is no fun 😆 Some of the other archetypes may lower the tier yet are still fun even if it’s a power decrease. Likewise it may fundamentally change the style of play. Yet people still want to play them.

Other archetypes do the exact same thing but are not fun to play and there is nothing there to induce the desire to play them.

Yet while I am disagreeing I hear you Maat for 80% of material is often not worth it / not fun to play, but 20% of it is interesting with the general now D&D 80-20 rule.

[pabelfly]

Oh that is no fun 😆 Some of the other archetypes may lower the tier yet are still fun even if it’s a power decrease. Likewise it may fundamentally change the style of play. Yet people still want to play them.

Other archetypes do the exact same thing but are not fun to play and there is nothing there to induce the desire to play them.

Yet while I am disagreeing I hear you Maat for 80% of material is often not worth it / not fun to play, but 20% of it is interesting with the general now D&D 80-20 rule.

Im personally a fan of mixing garbage and cheese to try to come up with something playable and interesting mechanically without being too OP.

[TotallyNotEvil]

Arcanist and Witch are clearly 1s, Oracle is staple T2.

Shaman, tho, has a stupidly restricted spell list. I'd say it's the weakest T1, so something like 1.9.

[Thunder999]

Arcanist and Witch are clearly 1s, Oracle is staple T2.

Shaman, tho, has a stupidly restricted spell list. I'd say it's the weakest T1, so something like 1.9.

That'd be in tier 2, we're doing within 0.5 of a tier is that tier, but since tier 1 is the top it's only 1.0-1.5 (since nothing can be better than 1.0)

[Aquillion]

Arcanist is definitely tier 1, while the slower spell progression hurts, it's got the best casting mechanic. Few things quite say Tier 1 like Quick Study just pulling whatever spell you need out. At even levels it's arguably a better wizard, at odd levels it's obviously worse.
1.1, a little below wizard to account for those even levels, but still close.
Keep in mind, though, that Exploiter Wizards are also a thing - with that you can get the most important Exploits and Wizard spell progression. You delay your exploits a bit, but let's be real, your spells are more important than your exploits, especially since there are really just a few high-powered exploits


I'd advocate for only Tiering an archetype separately if it's higher-tier than the baseline class.

That was my initial reaction when I saw that post - there's a lot of them out there and I think we've mostly been ignoring them (especially for lower-tier classes; it's rare for an archetype to actually wreck a T1 caster, since even the most careless archetype author is going to realize that trading away full casting is a nonstarter, whereas other classes can trade away absolutely vital key features and get nothing of value back. Regardless of people's debates over Occultist archetypes in the last thread, there are certainly plenty of archetypes that make them utterly terrible.)

That said, bad archetypes could be useful if you want the entire party to be at the same tier and someone wants to play a high-powered class. And besides, this thread is mostly for fun and discussing bad archetypes can be fun.

[Kurald Galain]

And besides, this thread is mostly for fun and discussing bad archetypes can be fun.

I agree with that. If you know of any really bad archetypes, please bring them up in their respective threads. Almost all of them are fairly evenly balanced, but there's always a few that make you go "what?!" :smallamused:

[pabelfly]

I agree with that. If you know of any really bad archetypes, please bring them up in their respective threads. Almost all of them are fairly evenly balanced, but there's always a few that make you go "what?!" :smallamused:

IMaybe we can do a worst PF archetypes thread at the end as a bonus thread and rate individually these archetypes and add them to the main thread in their own section.

[Arkain]

IMaybe we can do a worst PF archetypes thread at the end as a bonus thread and rate individually these archetypes and add them to the main thread in their own section.

Actually, you already did that. (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?649985-Worst-Pathfinder-Archetypes)

[pabelfly]

Actually, you already did that. (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?649985-Worst-Pathfinder-Archetypes)

Yes, and next time we can add tier ratings for our picks and add it as a sub note to the tiering thread, along with all our knowledge of PF tiers

[Thunder999]

Keep in mind, though, that Exploiter Wizards are also a thing - with that you can get the most important Exploits and Wizard spell progression. You delay your exploits a bit, but let's be real, your spells are more important than your exploits, especially since there are really just a few high-powered exploits

I'd still say Arcanist wins at even levels, the casting mechanic is superior and you can have a wizard school or sorcerer bloodline from an archetype on top of exploits.

[pabelfly]

I’ll do class writeups soon. For now, vote update and a link to the new thread, where you can tier Gunslinger, Swashbuckler, Slayer and Shifter: https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?652188-Tiering-the-Pathfinder-Classes-Gunslinger-Slayer-Swashbuckler-and-Shifter


Vote Update:

Arcanist
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Maat Mons, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Rynjin – 1
Kurald Galain – 1.5

Average – 1.07



Oracle
Rynjin – 1.8
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil – 2
Maat Mons – 2.2
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 2.07



Shaman
Exelsisxax – 1
Pabelfly, Rynjin – 1.2
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
TotallyNotEvil – 1.9
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.5



Shaman (Lore Spirit)
Exelsisxax, Serafina, Pabelfly – 1
Rynjin – 1.2
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
TotallyNotEvil – 1.9
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.41



Shaman (Unsworn Archetype)
Exelsisxax, Pabelfly – 1
Rynjin – 1.2
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
TotallyNotEvil – 1.9
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.47



Witch
Exelsisxax, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Rynjin – 1
Maat Mons – 1.1
Thunder999 – 1.3
Kurald Galain – 2

Average – 1.2



Witch (White-Haired)
Exelsisxax, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Rynjin – 1
Maat Mons – 1.1
Thunder999 – 1.3
Kurald Galain – 3

Average – 1.34

[Rynjin]

Oh yeah I should probably get my votes in. T1 Witch, T1.2 Shaman, T1.8 Oracle (the shenanigans you can pull off with some Mysteries actually makes the class stronger in some ways than Sorcerer IMO, despite the weaker spell list), T1 Arcanist.

[pabelfly]

Oh yeah I should probably get my votes in. T1 Witch, T1.2 Shaman, T1.8 Oracle (the shenanigans you can pull off with some Mysteries actually makes the class stronger in some ways than Sorcerer IMO, despite the weaker spell list), T1 Arcanist.

Added your votes in.

[Kurald Galain]

An oracle archetype that hasn't been mentioned yet is the Ancient Lorekeeper, for elves only, which can poach spells from the wizard list. As the wizard list is generally stronger than the cleric list, this should arguably rate higher. I'd give it a 2.0.

[Ramza00]

An oracle archetype that hasn't been mentioned yet is the Ancient Lorekeeper, for elves only, which can poach spells from the wizard list. As the wizard list is generally stronger than the cleric list, this should arguably rate higher. I'd give it a 2.0.

Also available for elvish subtype races like half-elf, aasimar, tiefling, etc. I bring this up for half-elves get the good favoured class benefit.

[Thunder999]

Technically a human could do it with racial heritage, though since that eats your bonus feat it's probably a terrible choice unless you're truly desperate for an extra skill point per level.

[pabelfly]

Comments and critiques welcome for these. Votes on various archetypes also welcome.

Arcanist (1.07)
Arcanist is great for mostly the same reasons Wizard is great. You get to choose from all spells Wizard gets, so you can take up blasting, buffing, debuffing, summoning or crowd control. While you do have to prepare spells in advance, you get the advantage of getting to choose from that list as Sorcerer, which can give extra flexibility. Arcanists also get Exploits, many of which can be used in addition to spells each round, which is some great action economy. The one notable downside that Arcanist has is that it's one spell level behind Wizard, but all up, it's a great T1 class and definitely worth comparing to a Wizard.

Witch (1.2)
The Witch mixes parts of the Arcane and Divine spell lists. While this combined list is weaker than, say, Wizard, with less access to utility, buffing and defensive spells, it’s still a solid list. As a prepared spellcaster you’ll have plenty of utility and can change your spell list to suit the particular challenges of the day. Lastly, hexes are generally less potent than spells, but this gives you extra options when your spell list doesn’t have a suitable option for a particular situation. There are a few really good hex options though, especially at higher level. While it isn’t the quite the strongest T1 caster, it’s still earns a spot in the top tier.

I'll write up Oracle (2.07) and Shaman (1.5) later.

[Kurald Galain]

Arcanist (1.07)
I suggest mentioning they do get all spell levels one level later than wizard.


Witch (1.2)
I'd drop the word "slightly", no need to tip toe around the issue :smalltongue:
I'm not aware of any easy ways to expand the witch list (that's the shaman's shtick). Notably, the witch lacks good self-defense spells and is thus squishier than other arcane casters.

[pabelfly]

I suggest mentioning they do get all spell levels one level later than wizard.


I'd drop the word "slightly", no need to tip toe around the issue :smalltongue:
I'm not aware of any easy ways to expand the witch list (that's the shaman's shtick). Notably, the witch lacks good self-defense spells and is thus squishier than other arcane casters.

Okay, fixed these up. Thanks for the suggestions.

[thompur]

I think Witches are solidly tier 1, certainly in the 1.25-1,50 range. One important thing to remember is that most Hexes are Supernatural abilities, so ignore SR.
So, while, for example, Slumber, won't work on Dragons, Elves, Consructs, Plants, Oozes, or Undead, it will work on most Outsiders, and just about everything else.
My Witch, who is 16th level, has gotten a lot of milage out of Slumber, Ice Tomb, Misfortune, Flight, Healing, and, of course, Evil Eye.
Also, spells like Ill Omen(I give my Faerie Dragon Familiar a wand), Particulate form, and, when I really just want to blast something, Lightning Bolt.
It may not be as good as the wizard's list, but there are plenty of good, useful spells to be very versatile.
Oracle is definitely a solid tier 2.
I haven't played either of the others, but I am in a game with a Shaman, and he seems really strong, so 1.75.

[pabelfly]

I think Witches are solidly tier 1, certainly in the 1.25-1,50 range.

I can't really add this vote until you narrow it down to a specific number, rather than a ranger.

[Thunder999]

It's not just the high level hexes that are strong, Slumber is pretty amazing, and arguably makes every single target mind affecting spell (other than Dominate person/monster) on your list redundant, because it's will save or lose with a DC on par with your best spells.

[Kurald Galain]

It's not just the high level hexes that are strong, Slumber is pretty amazing, and arguably makes every single target mind affecting spell (other than Dominate person/monster) on your list redundant, because it's will save or lose with a DC on par with your best spells.
The witch is an odd case, in that Slumber and Ice Tomb are so good that using them tends to get very negative reactions from other players (I'm not saying this is at all justified, but it's a common pattern); but most other hexes are much less impressive.

This does lead to a weird discrepancy between the witch's tier-in-forum-debate and tier-in-actual-gameplay. Perhaps we should have a separate rating for witch with Slumber and Ice Tomb, and witch without.

[Rynjin]

The witch is an odd case, in that Slumber and Ice Tomb are so good that using them tends to get very negative reactions from other players (I'm not saying this is at all justified, but it's a common pattern); but most other hexes are much less impressive.

This does lead to a weird discrepancy between the witch's tier-in-forum-debate and tier-in-actual-gameplay. Perhaps we should have a separate rating for witch with Slumber and Ice Tomb, and witch without.

I don't particularly see the value in rating classes based on access to universal options. It would be like giving Wizard a different tier based on whether they take Spell Perfection or not. We're rating a class, not a build.

[Gnaeus]

I don't particularly see the value in rating classes based on access to universal options. It would be like giving Wizard a different tier based on whether they take Spell Perfection or not. We're rating a class, not a build.

Or more appropriately perhaps, with or without planar binding. Which has the exact same problem as the better witch hexes. Is it allowed? Nerfed? If anything it's a bigger power difference. Do you have one particular SOL versus do you have access to a functionally endless army of functionally free spellcasting minions.

[Kurald Galain]

I don't particularly see the value in rating classes based on access to universal options. It would be like giving Wizard a different tier based on whether they take Spell Perfection or not. We're rating a class, not a build.
That's true, it would make threads like these too complicated. It does bother me about the witch in particular that most players (in my area at least) play it as a tier-4 class, i.e. by doing Evil Eye + Cackle and pretty much nothing else. I don't think any other class has that problem.

[thompur]

i can't really add this vote until you narrow it down to a specific number, rather than a ranger.
ok........1.25.

[Rynjin]

That's true, it would make threads like these too complicated. It does bother me about the witch in particular that most players (in my area at least) play it as a tier-4 class, i.e. by doing Evil Eye + Cackle and pretty much nothing else. I don't think any other class has that problem.

Plenty of classes have people playing them nonoptimally, and all full casters end up getting it the worst. It's no different than someone who plays a pure Blaster Sorcerer (with none of the extras that makes that at least do astounding damage) with zero utility or otherwise non-damage options.

[Kurald Galain]

Plenty of classes have people playing them nonoptimally

Sure, but I'm not talking about people playing nonoptimally, but about people playing ineffectively. That's several steps below nonoptimal. In my experience, there is very much a difference between classes in this aspect, and there are only very few classes that are commonly played ineffectively.

[Rynjin]

Eh, maybe. it's just a thing with high skill ceiling classes, like full casters. Most of the horror stories you hear about "unplayable" characters are full casters.

[AvatarVecna]

Arcanist T1
Oracle T2
Witch T1

Not familiar enough with Shaman to feel comfortable rating it.

[Ramza00]

Shaman is easily tier 1.0 to 1.5 (so round and call it tier 1) due to it being a 9th level spellcaster…but let me explain…let me try to be brief and fun.

So I my mind any 9th level pathfinder class is Tier 3 minimum and Tier 1 maximum. This depends on the spell list itself and the player’s system mastery to recognize good options and to want to play those good options. But since we are not talking the player’s system mastery with tier systems I am semi dropping this point.

The shaman is a divine Wis based prepared witch like spell class with lots of cleric / oracle spells thrown in, and some Druid as well but less so druid. People will argue how good this list is and I am going to bypass the arguements and say it is at least good enough to make the class tier 2 by itself before other class features and feats / character options. But there are so many options with Shaman by designed to poach other class spells list.


The Favored Class Benefit allows you to grab 2 more spells of every spell level from the Cleric list filling in the holes.
The Lore’s spirit Arcane Enlightenment is a bad way to poach Wizard / Sorcerer Spells for it is “limited” due to its triple casting situation. Yet it works well enough for non combat utility spells especially when combined with Wandering Spirit+Wandering Hex, or Spirit Talkeraka Wandering Hex as a feat for 1 hour, and I think one more way I am forgetting. Edit1: I am forgetting the awesome feat Ritual Hex aka Spirit Talker's big brother that came later. You make two knowledge checks to hit a DC20 one know arcana, one know history. You can grab another hex in general, from the general pile, your patron pile, or the wandering hex pile. Pretty much this is awesome with Arcane Enlightenment for you can choose your spells you need at the start of the day or with 1 hour of preparation for a specific encounter.
The Dreamed Secrets feat is the Druid Natural Spell equivalent for Shaman allowing you more Wizard / Sorcerer spell poaching. And it uses Wisdom and Will Saves as the limiting factor and not your Int/Wis/Cha situation that Arcane Enlightenment. The only better feat for a Shaman is Leadership, it is that good.


Each of these poaching mechanisms have limits, and by themselves will not move a Shaman up a tier, but they work together in combination and easily make Shaman a tier 1 to 1.5 just on their spell list and the ability to poach other class spells. If a Cleric is Tier 1 so is a Shaman.

Edit2: Other things I forgot earlier
Wandering Hex allows you to change your Wandering Hex once a day, thus more Arcane Enlightenment or other Goodies.


=====

Furthermore you get other class features such as Hexes.

=====

Now is a Shaman a fun class, and/or is it bad game design? Well that is a fundamental different question than it’s power and tier rating.

[AvatarVecna]

But since we are not talking the player’s system mastery with tier systems I am semi dropping this point.

I don't disagree that a particular player's system mastery will make a big difference at the table. After all, player>build>class. You could hand Pun-Pun to someone and it doesn't matter if they play him like a commoner. At the same time, floors and ceilings matter. You could build or play a wizard so badly that they're (effectively) T5. You couldn't build/play a fighter so good that they're T1 tho. And most methods of building/playing wizard are gonna be much closer to T1 than T5.

[Ramza00]

Agreed AvatarVecna, does a hand-wave in the air allowing you to preach instead of me speaking over you for we are saying the same vibe.

[pabelfly]

New procedural update:
Archetypes are tiered separately from classes. Three votes are required for an archetype for it to make it to the master list, and the archetype needs to be more than half a tier stronger or weaker than the base class to be added to the list.

Vote Update:

Arcanist
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Maat Mons, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Rynjin, AvatarVecna – 1
Kurald Galain – 1.5

Average – 1.06



Oracle
Rynjin – 1.8
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Thompur, AvatarVecna – 2
Maat Mons – 2.2
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 2.06



Oracle (Ancient Lorekeeper)
Kurald Galain – 2



Shaman
Exelsisxax, Ramza00 – 1
Pabelfly, Rynjin – 1.2
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
Thompur – 1.75
TotallyNotEvil – 1.9
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.47



Shaman (Lore Spirit)
Serafina, Pabelfly – 1

Average – 1



Shaman (Unsworn Archetype)
Exelsisxax, Pabelfly – 1

Average – 1



Witch
Exelsisxax, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Rynjin, AvatarVecna – 1
Maat Mons – 1.1
Thompur – 1.25
Thunder999 – 1.3
Kurald Galain – 2

Average – 1.18



Witch (White-Haired)
Kurald Galain – 3

[Elvensilver]

While I can't say to much to the other classes, I'd like to weight in my vote for Witch after having played one and having another in the party:

Going from the tier description:
"Tier one: Incredibly good at solving nearly all problems. This is the realm of Clerics, Druids, and Wizards, classes that open up with strong combat spells backed up by utility, and then get massively stronger from there. If you're not keeping up with that core trio of tier one casters, then you probably don't belong here."

To split up problems into different common categories: Social, Investigation, Exploration and Travel, and Combat.

The witch can be really good at social with just a few spells, as an Int-based, prepared caster, she absolutely smashes investigation-challenges with high knowledge skills and spells the same way the wizard does; exploration - eh, the witch spell has quite enough spells for that.
Now for combat: I don't really feal like the wich can contribute quite as much as the other T1-classes there. Sure, hexes and the spell selection lend themselves well to debuffing and some are good for buffing - but the witch lacks standard defensive spells, has only a few area controll spells and is bad at damaging enemies. The cleric can cast Divine Power and go to town, wizards and arcanists can blast, the druid can wildshape or blast... While the witch only has very few blasting spells and no real other ways to step up there.

But they do have hexes!
Lastly, hexes are generally less potent than spells, but this gives you extra options when your spell list doesn’t have a suitable option for a particular situation. There are a few really good hex options though, especially at higher level. While it isn’t the quite the strongest T1 caster, it’s still earns a spot in the top tier. I do disagree with the statement about hexes.

There are enough really great ones that can accomplish things you can't or only very rarely per day do with spells you have at the same level, or do si cheaper. Think of Slumber, Protective Luck (5e-style disadvantage a monster attacking your fighter-buddy without a save), Fortune (now advantage for the fighter-buddy), Animal-Skin (unlimited wildshape like a 6-level druid as long as you have furs), Retribution (now you really don't want to hurt that fighter-buddy), Disrupt Dead (Free basically unlimited Resurrection without level-losses), Forced Reincarnation or Ice Tomb.

So, hexes are great. Still, the witch as a whole has some small weaknesses, and thus, I'd place her at the lower end of the T1-pack: T 1,5.

[Rynjin]

What the Witch does have, however, is save or lose effects. That's worth effectively infinite points of damage from blasting.

[Thunder999]

Honestly damage is really only important for martials, and that's only because it's usually the only combat contribution they can excel at, your average tier 1 wizard is unlikely to actually use any blasting spells except on rare occasions like fighting swarms.

Save or Lose makes it irrelevant, or if you really want to drop hp, just summon something and have that beat your enemy to death, a few Aether Elementals are solid ranged damage, there's no shortage of pouncing melee options etc.

[AnonymousPepper]

I'm going to drop a thermonuclear take: Quick Study in particular makes baseline Arcanist superior to baseline Wizard (you can of course take Exploiter Wizard, but just base vs base and that isn't free anyway) here. 0.6. It's not tier zero, as I genuinely don't think that exists in Pathfinder, but Arcanist, even with being relegated to the sorcerer spell progression, is as strong as a primary caster can get.

[Thunder999]

Quick Study is nice, but you're still a level behind on casting and it's not that much better than leaving a slot open, sure you could do it in combat, but then you've given up an entire turn to do so and combat spells are usually the ones you don't need to change up as much.

[Gnaeus]

Quick Study is nice, but you're still a level behind on casting and it's not that much better than leaving a slot open, sure you could do it in combat, but then you've given up an entire turn to do so and combat spells are usually the ones you don't need to change up as much.

I think I'm saying the same thing but phrasing slightly differently, but...
The difference between the best combat spell for a particular combat and just a solid generalist combat spell is rarely significant. The best spell for a particular combat is almost never worth 2 good spells.

[Aquillion]

It raises an interesting question. In the other thread I defined the hypothetical Tier 0 as "like a wizard, but with unlimited spell slots and every spell that exists always prepared at all times."

But there's really two parts to that, and most archetypes require sacrificing one for the other, so the real question is - which of those is more powerful? Is it more valuable to have extra spell slots, or to always have the right spell?

This is partially going to vary from game to game - games with sorter adventuring days and more strange challenges are going to value having the right spell more, whereas games with longer adventuring days filled with "normal" combat are going to value having more spell slots.

[Bucky]

I said in the Wizard/Druid/Cleric thread that in my experience Wizards are best at breaking campaigns and Clerics are best at breaking encounters. Oracles round out the set by being the best at warping encounter balance around themselves. Where a cleric would frequently surprise the GM with an encounter-ruining spell, an oracle puts all the ways he can ruin the encounter up front and forces the GM to plan around all of them.

[Kurald Galain]

Finally got around to writing up summaries for Oracle and Shaman, so any critiques are appreciated.
Oracle looks good if a bit verbose. I'd drop the word "slightly" given how far they are rated below the sorc.

Shaman should note that the multiple ways of adding spells known depend on either the Lore Spirit or on your GM allowing unusual races.

Finally, for witch we should consider that the Leyline Guardian archetype uses sorcerer casting, and is therefore lower tier.

[ahyangyi]

It raises an interesting question. In the other thread I defined the hypothetical Tier 0 as "like a wizard, but with unlimited spell slots and every spell that exists always prepared at all times."

But there's really two parts to that, and most archetypes require sacrificing one for the other, so the real question is - which of those is more powerful? Is it more valuable to have extra spell slots, or to always have the right spell?

This is partially going to vary from game to game - games with sorter adventuring days and more strange challenges are going to value having the right spell more, whereas games with longer adventuring days filled with "normal" combat are going to value having more spell slots.

Well, unlimited level-9 slots equals all level 0-8 spells always prepared all the time, due to Wish.

[Rynjin]

Finally, for witch we should consider that the Leyline Guardian archetype uses sorcerer casting, and is therefore lower tier.

It IS worth noting that Leyline Guardians also get a massive (if slightly random) caster level boost in exchange for the reduced flexibility, so I wouldn't give it a huge bump down.

[Kurald Galain]

It IS worth noting that Leyline Guardians also get a massive (if slightly random) caster level boost in exchange for the reduced flexibility,
One-and-a-half caster levels is massive now? Really, aside from blasting spells (which the witch largely doesn't get) that basically means getting +1.5 on concentration and dispel checks; clearly below a basic feat like Combat Caster or a trait like Spell Duel Prodigy. Color me unimpressed.

[Rynjin]

One-and-a-half caster levels is massive now? Really, aside from blasting spells (which the witch largely doesn't get) that basically means getting +1.5 on concentration and dispel checks; clearly below a basic feat like Combat Caster or a trait like Spell Duel Prodigy. Color me unimpressed.

I...genuinely don't know how you can hold the opinion that an untyped CL boost for any spell you choose to cast is somehow worse than Combat Caster of all Feats.

Basically the only thing it doesn't affect on most spells is the DC. Duration, targets, damage (sometimes), other scaling effects; all boosted by CL.

Like, I get saying "it's not enough to prevent a tier bump", but I think you're seriously downplaying the value of CL boosts.

[Kurald Galain]

Basically the only thing it doesn't affect on most spells is the DC. Duration, targets, damage (sometimes), other scaling effects; all boosted by CL.
Because in gameplay, a caster level boost usually moves range and/or duration from "enough" to "enough plus one"; or targets from "every enemy" to "every enemy plus one". It's just vanishingly unlikely that, say, your target is exactly within 180' but not within 170'. Outside of damage-per-level spells and a few outliers like Holy Word, optimizing for save DC is way more important than optimizing for caster level.

...meaning the witch to watch out for is the Invoker (+2 on save DC) or the Gnome or Kitsune one (+1 more, and that stacks). Stacks with Greater Spell Focus, too.

[Thunder999]

CL just doesn't do anything that matters for most spells, there's very few spells that can't target your whole party or every enemy in range by default, but will with a small CL boost, even when duration matters it's rare another minute/round/hour etc. would be enough, Extend spell exists and is nice, but hardly a game changer for most spells (the exception being the 24 hour spells and 1 or 2 hour/level spells at very high level when it can be a cast it yesterday deal), there's a few times being pushed over a specific poing is make or break, but that makes an unreliably buff less useful (Rope Trick and variants are the big one, if you can fit a whole rest in there it's great, if not it's almost useless).

DC is the most important thing by far, it's what decides whether offensive spells work or not.

[AvatarVecna]

Ley Line Guardian changes Witch from a prepared caster to a spontaneous caster. T2, easy peasy. Nothing else it's doing matters anywhere close to that.

Like, I am sure that on any given adventuring day, if you took a blaster Witch and a blaster LLG and put them side by side, the latter would be better. Same for if they were both support focused, or utility focused, or investigation focused, or social focused, or summoning focused. That's the strength of spontaneous casters. But if you're making a character, someone with better day-to-day flexibility is more valuable than somebody who can absolutely positively break one kind of problem over their knee but can't do much else. A Witch 5 has 3rd lvl spells. An LLG 5 does not. A Witch can spend a bit of money learning a new spell (altho it's more expensive for her than for a Wizard). An LLG has to spend a small fortune to do the same.

But let's stop talking about the downside and start talking about the benefit, Conduit Surge. CS is a [3+Cha mod]/day ability, on an Int-focused class, but whatever. How it works is, you spend one charge in order to add +0 CL and stagger yourself for 1-9 minutes. Okay, sure, you could potentially add as much as 3 to CL, and there's a save to resist the stagger! And that save is easier to make the less benefit this ability was actually giving you, so that's...a silver lining? And it becomes 1-4 instead of 0-3 once you hit 8th lvl?

Prior to lvl 7, you're gonna be rolling a goose egg sometimes. 25% chance of it happening - and because this is a limited-use CL boost, you're probably using this when you really need it. A 25% chance that it does nothing good for you sucks. The fact that it then forces you to make a save vs being staggered for at least 1 minute makes it even worse. This is the benefit you gave up prepared casting and early spell access for.

But like...all that hemming and hawing about how bad this "upside" is doesn't matter. Let's suppose it didn't exist at all, does nothing good or bad for you. It's still T2, because spontaneous 9th lvl casting. Let's say that it just read "you have +4 CL with witch spells". It's still T2, because 9th lvl spontaneous casting. It doesn't matter. It is not so good as to make late spell access T1. It is not so good as to make 9th lvl casting T3. Arcanist gets to be T1 despite late spell access by virtue of having the best casting setup in the game. Warmage gets to be T3 despite being 9th lvl spontaneous because its list is so unbelievably typecast. +4 to CL is not good enough. "Lol stagger yourself for no reason" is not bad enough.

T2.

[Thunder999]

Actually a witch can add spells for free if you can find another witch and have your familiars just teach each other spells.

[AvatarVecna]

Actually a witch can add spells for free if you can find another witch and have your familiars just teach each other spells.

I was about to be like "oh so both of them can theoretically have as many spells off the list as they want? easy T1 for LLG", but then remembered LLG doesn't have a familiar.

[Elvensilver]

@pabelfly: could you count my vote on the Witch?

[pabelfly]

@pabelfly: could you count my vote on the Witch?

Sure.


I'm going to drop a thermonuclear take: Quick Study in particular makes baseline Arcanist superior to baseline Wizard (you can of course take Exploiter Wizard, but just base vs base and that isn't free anyway) here. 0.6. It's not tier zero, as I genuinely don't think that exists in Pathfinder, but Arcanist, even with being relegated to the sorcerer spell progression, is as strong as a primary caster can get.

Sorry, we're limiting the scale from 1-6. But I'll add you as a 1 for Arcanist.


Oracle looks good if a bit verbose. I'd drop the word "slightly" given how far they are rated below the sorc.

Shaman should note that the multiple ways of adding spells known depend on either the Lore Spirit or on your GM allowing unusual races.

Finally, for witch we should consider that the Leyline Guardian archetype uses sorcerer casting, and is therefore lower tier.

Quoting this so I remember to fix this up later.

VOTE UPDATE

Arcanist
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Maat Mons, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Rynjin, AvatarVecna, AnonymousPepper – 1
Kurald Galain – 1.5

Average – 1.06



Oracle
Rynjin – 1.8
Exelsisxax, Thunder999, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Thompur, AvatarVecna – 2
Maat Mons – 2.2
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 2.06



Oracle (Ancient Lorekeeper)
Kurald Galain – 2



Shaman
Exelsisxax, Ramza00 – 1
Pabelfly, Rynjin – 1.2
Thunder999 – 1.3
Maat Mons – 1.4
Thompur – 1.75
TotallyNotEvil – 1.9
Kurald Galain – 2.5

Average – 1.47



Shaman (Lore Spirit)
Serafina, Pabelfly – 1

Average – 1



Shaman (Unsworn Archetype)
Exelsisxax, Pabelfly – 1

Average – 1



Witch
Exelsisxax, Vasilidor, TotallyNotEvil, Rynjin, AvatarVecna – 1
Maat Mons – 1.1
Thompur – 1.25
Thunder999 – 1.3
Elvensilver – 1.5
Kurald Galain – 2

Average – 1.22



Witch (White-Haired)
Kurald Galain – 3


Witch (Ley-Line Guardian)
AvatarVecna – 2