Rename Azata 'chain lightning'

[Princess Pilfer]

Because that's almost literally all it's good for. People abused bugs with Zippy Magic and relied heavily on Aivu because *everything else it has is bad* compared to what other paths offer, and now you've taken that away.

Everything except zippy magic ranges from 'mediocre' to 'worthless' and the newly weakned Aviu can't even make up the difference for melee azata by reliably stripping enemies of their buffs.

And it's not even the best for chain lightning/hellfire ray spam. Demon is. Then Lich. Then Azata.

[MjKorz]

Zippy magic is completely irrelevant on an Azata, because the strongest Azata build is an Illusion or Enchantment DC caster. The only superpower that matters is Favorable Magic, everything else is just flavor.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2778176382

Moreover, Azata blows lich out of the water as a caster, because Lich has no access to powers that grant its spells advantage when trying to beat enemy saving throws (i.e. enemy rolls twice and takes the worse result) and because lich gets no DC bonuses from its mythic path up until chapter 5 where it finally gets its transformation and even then the total DC bonus is lower relative to Azata (5 for lich vs 7 for Azata).

And even though Aivu CL30+ dispel was quite powerful, it is not needed on a proper Azata DC caster build. Azata has enough juice to bruteforce all saves in the game on unfair difficulty.

EDIT: After the Lord Beyond the Grave nerf yesterday, Azata blows Lich out of the water so hard it's no longer funny. Lich lost its +10 Charisma bonus which is equivalent to +5 spell DC. Which means that Azata now has a +7 DC and "enemy rolls saves twice and takes the worse result" advantages over the Lich. Lich is now completely and utterly irrelevant as a spellcaster.

[Princess Pilfer]

Uber late game immunity bypassing favorable magic does not represent the overwhelming majority of the caster azata experience even if you're specifically building for it.

You also have no need whatsoever of DC bonuses when you can just 1shot everything with rays or battering blast.

Also, and I can't stress this enough, that doesn't actually address the core issue.

[Applied Mediocrity]

Allow me to disagree. I beat the Vavakia bigshots mostly thanks to a well-timed Water Torrent.

[MjKorz]

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

Uber late game immunity bypassing favorable magic does not represent the overwhelming majority of the caster azata experience even if you're specifically building for it.

Correct. It does not. Do you know why? Because Azata DC caster gets its Favorable Magic online at the very start of Chapter 3, which grants the Azata a 1.05-1.95 multiplier on its chance to beat the enemy saving throw.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2778220960

Thus, you're playing a Favorable Magic caster Azata for more than 50% of the game.

However, even before you get Favorable Magic, you're perfectly unfair viable as a DC caster at any of the mythic ranks starting from 0. Earliest "Azata Caster experience" you can get is right after you hang the Sword of Valor from the castle ramparts and fight Minagho+Staunton.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2778223350

As you can see, even in the early game, Azata DC caster crushes enemy boss saves on unfair difficulty.

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

You also have no need whatsoever of DC bonuses when you can just 1shot everything with rays or battering blast.

You cannot. Please provide proof of you one-shotting Vescavor Queen as a ray caster on Unfair difficulty.

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

Also, and I can't stress this enough, that doesn't actually address the core issue.

It does. Your "core issue" is that Azata is a one trick pony that has to rely on chain lightning to be powerful. It does not. A DC caster Azata can take literally any offensive school of magic it wants and make it work: Illusion, Enchantment, Evocation, Conjuration, Necromancy, Transmutation. Azata can make ALL of these schools work very well on unfair difficulty. You mentioned Chain Lightining which is an Evocation spell, but the strongest spells in the Evocation school are crowd control spells: Icy Prison, Sirocco, Stormbolts, Mass Icy Prison and even Prismatic Spray. You can very well play an Azata Evocation DC caster that will have access to all of these crowd control spells that lock down entire encounters AND cast your chain lightning on top, because you can take BOTH Favorable and Zippy Magic.

My conclusion: you do not have proper understanding how to build an Azata.

[jutschi78]

@MjMorz: how did you get a spell DC of 64???

I never beat dc around 40

[MjKorz]

Originally posted by jutschi78:

@MjMorz: how did you get a spell DC of 64???

I never beat dc around 40

I'm using an expanded arsenal build. Builds like that can reach DCs in the 80s when min-maxed.

[Princess Pilfer]

The 'Core issue' is that all non-caster Azata are hot garbage because it doesn't offer them anything you can't easily replicate (or replicate the majority/most important parts of) in some other way, with a different mythic path that offers you more.

Also Verscavor queen is a very bad example? That's before you have any path-specific mythic abilites. Your mythic path has almost no bearing on that fight.

Be less of an ass please.

[MjKorz]

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

The 'Core issue' is that all non-caster Azata are hot garbage

While I consider myself mostly a caster player, I can assure you that this is not true. Azata has at least one synergy with martial Classes: any mutagen class + Second Breath. This allows the Azata to stack 36 natural armor bonus from mutagens (30 higher than any other mythic) and become virtually unhittable in melee on unfair difficulty. Since Azata also gets Incredible Might superpower, you can build an amazing Strength-based Mutation Warrior that uses a 2h weapon like Grave Singer for massive damage potential while also having untouchable AC.

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

Also Verscavor queen is a very bad example?

You said "all" and you got a proper challenge.

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

That's before you have any path-specific mythic abilites. Your mythic path has almost no bearing on that fight.

I challenge you to one-shot unfair Staunton as a ray caster. The fight right after you hang the Sword of Valor in chapter 2.

Fact-based argumentation is insulting only to those who refuse to learn.

[jutschi78]

Originally posted by MjKorz:

Originally posted by jutschi78:

@MjMorz: how did you get a spell DC of 64???

I never beat dc around 40

I'm using an expanded arsenal build. Builds like that can reach DCs in the 80s when min-maxed.

What? ALL spellfocus feats in all other schools stack?

[MjKorz]

Originally posted by jutschi78:

Originally posted by MjKorz:

I'm using an expanded arsenal build. Builds like that can reach DCs in the 80s when min-maxed.

What? ALL spellfocus feats in all other schools stack?

Not all. I already explained this in another thread:

Originally posted by MjKorz:

Originally posted by jutschi78:

Wow, but what is the highest save throw?

And what is the

+12 from 12 heroic spell focus feats

Bonus?

That's the expanded arsenal contribution. Expanded Arsenal: X converts the DC bonuses from Spell Focus, Greater Spell Focus and Spell Focus (Mythic) for schools that are not X into a DC bonus for a school that is X.

Important note: you cannot have spell focus in school X when you want to use expanded arsenal to boost school X.

[Princess Pilfer]

Second breath is not supposed to restore your abilities. But lets assume it does or I read the description wrong, or the description lies, doesn't matter.

AC is comparatively easy to come by, you can get well over 80 without involving mythic anything on a wide variety of class combinations. And Incredible Might is...less than impressive. It's a morale bonus. It's a strong morale bonus, but the most important part of it (the attack) you can get some or all of (depending on where you are in the game and how much side content you did) from heroism or greater heroism. The 3-8 damage is nice but when you're using grave singer and getting a bazillion damage from the 5x crits anyways, +/- 15-40 doesn't...really make a huge difference, whatever you just full attacked is dead anyways.

No, you're just deliberately being an ass, and you know it.

[MjKorz]

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

Second breath is not supposed to restore your abilities. But lets assume it does or I read the description wrong, or the description lies, doesn't matter.

AC is comparatively easy to come by, you can get well over 80 without involving mythic anything on a wide variety of class combinations. And Incredible Might is...less than impressive. It's a morale bonus. It's a strong morale bonus, but the most important part of it (the attack) you can get some or all of (depending on where you are in the game and how much side content you did) from heroism or greater heroism. The 3-8 damage is nice but when you're using grave singer and getting a bazillion damage from the 5x crits anyways, +/- 15-40 doesn't...really make a huge difference, whatever you just full attacked is dead anyways.

No, you're just deliberately being an ass, and you know it.

First of all, it works. Or at least it used to work. I have tested it in-game some time ago. You get 36 Natural AC by stacking 6 different mutagens.

Secondly, only way you can get +30 AC out of thin air is by performing double (triple?) CHA into AC conversion which requires very specific oracle-paladin multiclass build that sacrifices BAB and foregoes Mutation Warrior's other mutagen and fighter related offensive bonuses including the bonus +1x critical multiplier.

Incredible Might is a great offensive bonus and the total result is that you end up with a martial that will steamroll the game on unfair without being hit in the later stages of the game. This might not be the absolute most powerful martial build out there since Trcikster and Legend exist, but it's 100% unfair viable and thus contributes to the total pool of viable Azata builds.

Thus, your statements about Azata being a Chain Lightning one trick pony and Azata being a caster only mythic path are false. Whether that's insulting to you or not is not my problem.

[Princess Pilfer]

That's moving the goalposts.
You don't have to get 30 AC "out of thin air." There are quite a lot of martial builds that can get 80+ AC. I've seen upwards of 116. I can get to 75 even on a 18 Kinetic Knight 2 Rogue. There are *so many* sources of AC, 1-3 levels of dipping and the relevant defensive feats is all you need to bump most martials AC into the 75+ range.

Patch 1.2, the patch that fixed a lot of the azata bugs? Is the one I'm complaing about. Just, you know, a thing to consider, maybe your old information is old.
The viability of Mutation Warrior has almost nothing to do with Azata. It's just a really good class. (probably still better as oracle or lich just because they get a massive pile of immunities, and with enough damage Last Stand can make up for any difference in AC)

Also, no. The point, which I have clarified, is that the number of builds azata supports is *extremely* low. People abused zippy magic for kinetic blast and vital strike not because it was the best (it wasn't) but because they wanted to play Azata and Azata supports so few playstyles.
Just because you're too busy screeching FACTS AND LOGIC to understand that doesn't change that it was my point.

[jutschi78]

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

Second breath is not supposed to restore your abilities. But lets assume it does or I read the description wrong, or the description lies, doesn't matter.

AC is comparatively easy to come by, you can get well over 80 without involving mythic anything on a wide variety of class combinations. And Incredible Might is...less than impressive. It's a morale bonus. It's a strong morale bonus, but the most important part of it (the attack) you can get some or all of (depending on where you are in the game and how much side content you did) from heroism or greater heroism. The 3-8 damage is nice but when you're using grave singer and getting a bazillion damage from the 5x crits anyways, +/- 15-40 doesn't...really make a huge difference, whatever you just full attacked is dead anyways.

No, you're just deliberately being an ass, and you know it.

Hey, no insults! MjKorz shows here plenty ways, what the Azata path can do more than chain-ligthning and zippy magic.

I am surprised, that you can stack 6 mutagens. Never thougt to try that (well, know the pnp rules and i am quite sure, that it was intended to have only one mutagen active at time). But that it i working here is good to know. Well i propably will not do this,

Btw: what about supersonic speed? Perma haste don't seem that impressive, because it only works to yourself and you have plenty ways, to gain haste. So that leaves the 20 % against attacks and 10 % against spells.

Is that worh to get that superpower?

[MjKorz]

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

You don't have to get 30 AC "out of thin air." There are quite a lot of martial builds that can get 80+ AC. I've seen upwards of 116.

You do get the AC bonus literally out of thin air, because Second Breath is a spell inherent to Azata. You sacrifice nothing for it. With this bonus you can easily break 100 AC on a purely offense focused 2h build that invests virtually nothing into defense and gets an extra +1x crit multiplier on a crit focused build.

Originally posted by Princess Pilfer:

The viability of Mutation Warrior has almost nothing to do with Azata. It's just a really good class. (probably still better as oracle or lich just because they get a massive pile of immunities, and with enough damage Last Stand can make up for any difference in AC)

Also, no. The point, which I have clarified, is that the number of builds azata supports is *extremely* low.

First we had: "Azata is a chain lightning one-trick pony". Then we had: "Azata only works as a caster". Now we have: "number of supported Azata builds is extremely low". You've moved the goalposts so far they're no longer in the same dimension.

Mutation Warrior is indeed viable in and of itself, it's arguably the best pure martial class in the game. Azata inarguably offers very significant and unique synergy to Mutation Warrior that no other mythic path offers. Azata inarguably offers a choice between very powerful caster builds and at least one very powerful martial build. I'm sure there are more martial builds for Azata, but I do not specialize in martial builds.

Conclusion: you've made 3 statements about Azata, all of them were proven false. You have proven that you do not know how to build either casters or martials, so your opinions have no value to me. You can learn from this or you can keep being ignorant, to me it matters not.