Building a better Ember

[igor140]

So, I thought the Dimension Retribution mythic feat (ability?) sounded amazing!

... and now I find that it sucks.

This is something I put on enough characters that I'm actually going to reroll almost all of them... which is going to be a huge pain in the butt, but whatever. There were a couple little details I'd like to tweak anyway.

Among them is Ember. I had more or less follow the Fextralife guide for her (https://fextralife.com/ember-build-pathfinder-wrath-of-the-righteous-guide/), and while I really like the theme of it, the build isn't working out very well.

Most notably, her only useful hexes are the healing ones; every single offensive one has a less than 15% chance to hit on pretty much all enemies. The mythic that removes the time restriction from hexes means that she's my primary healer (despite my MC being an oracle).

The other problem i'm having is that her spells (and spells in general) are ****ing horrible in this game. I mean, they're really not even worth using. Almost every enemy that you would want to use spells on has a Spell Resistance of at least 25 (often as high as 30), and if you can get lucky enough to get past that, they all have Saving Throws in the 20s, meaning that it's INCREDIBLY rare for Ember to actually even successfully use a spell, despite having both Spell Penetration feats, being a full caster, the mythic feat to ignore enemy resistances, and having both "fire" related sorcerer bloodlines.

And when she does, she deals MAYBE 20 total damage to each enemy. In the meantime, my kineticist pumps out 120 per turn (close to 250 on criticals).

So for most combats, I have her stand back and use Fortune on my characters, chant to keep it up... but that's basically a waste of a character: advantage (to use the 5e terminology) on ONE attack per turn...? A bard would be far more useful.

So the obvious problem with making her a kineticist is that she EITHER looses higher level hexes or her blast dice, depending on how she multiclasses... but I'd really like to use her because I like her : /

I already had to put down another party member that I really liked... but that person was nucking futs, so it had to be done.

tl;dr
I'm wanting to use Ember with access to hexes, fire damage, and not sucking. How does that happen?

Does the Fextralife build get comparatively better later on?

Do SPELLS get comparatively better later on?

[Duder]

I made her a Dirge Bard
She has such low attack rolls that songs sounded practical, that along with her hexes

[mk11]

That build seems to lack focus.

As a witch can make, Ember a powerful fire mage, or an enchanter, but to try to do both and you will do neither well. I usually go the enchanter route and early game most of the time she is using slumber.

One thing though is that she needs items that enhance her spells (e.g. the staff from the library in Act 1) and depending who else is in your party there may be conflict for those items.

[Immortal Reaver]

Ray Caster. Make Ember focus on Touch attacks. She can get 6th level Hellfire Ray as witch and 7th level Hellfire Ray from her Blackened Curse. Get Bolster Metamagic to boost damage.
Agree with Crossblooded it boosts fire damage, but you can pick it later, to get higher level spells sooner. Also you can use Enervation that do not have saves, as long as you get past SR and hit you debuff enemies (Negative levels).
For feats get Weapon Focus Ray. Metamagic Bolster (cheap and gives a lot of damage). Do not take Spell Focus and Heighten. You can get another Metamagic like Empower or Maximize.

For Hexes, use those that even if enemy save you get 1 round duration, then Cackle it as move action, that way it will stay as long as you Cackle every turn/6 seconds. Like Evil Eye Hex, it has 1 round duration if enemy saves.

For Spell Resistance (SR) - You need feats and equipment. Spell Penetration (SP), Greater SP, Mythic SP, Allied Spellcaster, Elven Magic. In act 3 you can find robe that gives +2 to SP. (This is not needed for Merged Lich and Angel, their best spells are not affected by SR)

[Tyrendian89]

what level are you even at?
Lategame Ray Ember nukes things like no tomorrow (500dmg Hellfire without crits), Spell Resistance is a minor nuisance on all but the most powerful bosses (assuming you give her the equipment and feats she needs), and almost nothing has enough touch AC to be a challenge to hit. And you can easily fire two of those a turn with a couple of Quicken rods.

[Raikon]

I dont have a helpful take on this dicussion, but I want to say it anyways. Ember is garbage. Your better off with any other character aside from trevor in your party. Even a mercenary witch is better then ember. Still she fits thematically into a neutral good playthrough. Ive considered using a retrain mod to make her a skald or something useful.

[JacobTheViking]

Originally posted by Raikon:

I dont have a helpful take on this dicussion, but I want to say it anyways. Ember is garbage. Your better off with any other character aside from trevor in your party. Even a mercenary witch is better then ember. Still she fits thematically into a neutral good playthrough. Ive considered using a retrain mod to make her a skald or something useful.

When does she start being trash? She's been great for my team in Act III and earlier.

[Raikon]

Originally posted by JacobTheViking:

When does she start being trash? She's been great for my team in Act III and earlier.

lvl 3 onward

[Raikon]

She is a spell caster without maxed spell casting stat. She starts with -4 attack bonus, and point blank shot, her spell list is terrible, and she is not even number 1 in skills.

[JacobTheViking]

Eh, I wholeheartedly disagree.

[Raikon]

In other words, there is nothing she excels at. She sucks at everything. You can build a better merc witch, and I would suggest doing exactly that if you want the witch class in your party for whatever reason.

[Raikon]

You can disagree all you want. Thats the great thing about this game. You can play as you want. It doesnt change reality though. Everything about her is sub optimal. Whether you like her or not, doesnt change her stats, skills, or abilities. They are all objectively bad when compared to anything. Anything Ember can do, another character can do much better.

[Necropants]

Yeah I like her for story line purposes I just respec her. This seems to be a common trope with Crpg's the characters the developers give you are usually garbage. I understand having flawed characters in games but often the balance is just so out of wack you are better off doing so.

[Last Hearth]

Spell Focus evocation, great spell focus, mythic spell focus .spell penetration, greater spell penetration, mythic spell penetration. ascendant element fire. spell focus Hellfire, improved criticals Rays, mythic improved critical rays. wear the fire robe that increases all fire spell DC and a staff that increases all spell DC.
There is also a belt that adds +2d6 fire damage.
Have her blast Hell Fire Rays like a laser, with quicken spell rod you can fire twice per turn.
at level 19 and 3 rays she does several hundred damage per turn. She wrecks everything in my play through, she just about single handedly took down Baphomet at the end of Chapter 4 for me as her hand is basically a giant laser blaster.

[Zzyl_tsw]

Playing in challenging.
Ember is ok. At start she was healing and hexing, and later on i focused her on fire damage. Plus she does have AC range attack that are REALLY recommended on some monster.
The thing is my MC is a "basic" witch, so there was some redundancy and Daeran is a better healer.

However I do not min max everything. I try to have a somewhat decent party, but typically i do not multiclass (old "habit".. A character should have a real reason to change class)

And i have no bard xD (like in PFK)

[Trolleur_Durden]

Originally posted by Raikon:

She is a spell caster without maxed spell casting stat. She starts with -4 attack bonus, and point blank shot, her spell list is terrible, and she is not even number 1 in skills.

Ember starts with 17 in charisma, which means that she can reach 22 base charisma at lvl 20, the same as a character with a maxed casting stat. The -4 attack malus only applies to attacks with weapons, not touch attack spells. Point blank shot works with touch attack spells. It's not hard to deduce from that that she's supposed to blast with magic, which she does very well. So her build is far from being bad overall, especially compared to some other companions like Woljif, Regill or Arueshalae. Besides that, she has access to hexes, which are one of the most potent tools in the game, especially if you play in TB mode. I've done two playthrough on Core and brought Ember both times. First time I went for the classical raycaster build that others have recommended before, second time I made her a support character by going Loremaster + Greater enduring spells for buffs and hexes for support in combat, and both times she more than pulled her weight.