Build guides for Call of the Wild mod

[russjac2000]

Anyone know where there are some build guides for the COTW mod, some like Hunter and Warpriest are cool, but some of the others i have no idea how they are supposed to be used.

[Stink Bug]

If you’re looking for level by level guides, you might have to go sifting through Paizo forums for PnP ones. In my amateur opinion most of the new classes don’t multi class well (witches and shamans lose hex DC, Summoners and Spirituslists loose eidolon progression, psychic classes loose spell progression and phrenics Etc). I have found bloodrager synergizes well with dragon disciple, and skald (other than court poet) doesn’t benefit caster heavy parties well.

If you’re just trying to understand the classes I’ve found reading the pathfinder SRD has given me a good general idea of how they operate.

https://www.d20pfsrd.com/

[vitorbauml2]

I'm interested too

[InEffect]

The only fun one is oracle life spirit vindicator with dragon secrets for the mirror. Not spectacular, but at least it's miles better than any melee clerics vanilla has. As in it's not detrimental to have one.
Urban rager is ok, but ends up being just a retarded cousin of abyssal/saint/melee sorc.

[razvedchiki]

i tried a skald in varnhold and it was fun, biggest difference from the bard is the spell kenning where you can cast spells you normally dont have acess too. prob can be used to replace a cleric in the party.
warpriest is a combat cleric with lots of swift buffs to tank the front line, if you dont want to bring harrim/tristan along you can play one and be both a tank/healer.

[thorsson64]

There are some additional options with Tweak or Treat, Touch of Magic and Derring-do (which are add-ons to Cotw). Some of the former look like they might be reasonable, e.g. the Echo Oracle, but I haven't tried them. Touch of Magic adds Arcane Archer and Deadeye Devotee; these give a decent alternative to Ekun for Ranged Attackers IMO, possibly with Arrowsong Minstrel from CotW for AA.

[russjac2000]

I love the Hunter, sacred huntsman on steroids
My curent MP is a 1ScaledFist/Ninja and i am having a lot of fun with her
the warpriest is a great option for Harrim, although i dont know why the mod authors made him a Sacred fist, i respeced him to normal warpriest
Jathel is a must have now, +8 total stats, immunities, nat armour, cant die, can be literally anything (although still tied to crappy god if you care about lore)
bloodrager is a great choice for Regongar
Vindictive bastard is a lore friendly class for Valerie, but is a crappy bargain basement paladin,luckily i hate her and never use her.

But I dont know wtf you are supposed to do with the Spiritualist, Shaman, Witch,or Psychic
Oracle looks like it could be interesting, a CHR base cleric with a psuedobloodline instead of domains
the summoner looks like a gimped sorceror with a buffed pet, ..so you want to be the pet's sidekick?
the investigator looks like a skill monkey, which might be good in PNP, but i think it sucks in the context of this game
Skald looks great if you prebuff and dont cast in combat, but completely gimps your party if you want to cast
Some of the new variants look interesting,
Zen archer a monk with a bow ( wish they would make an 2e Style Kensai)
monk of the mantis, a monk with sneak attacks
evagelist a cleric with bardsong

[jsaving]

Originally posted by russjac2000:

Anyone know where there are some build guides for the COTW mod, some like Hunter and Warpriest are cool, but some of the others i have no idea how they are supposed to be used.

There aren't any build guides for CotW. However, feel free to make and post some as you gain experience with the mod!

[thorsson64]

I would note that you can turn off the changes to the companions by editing settings.json.

[gronkinator]

Originally posted by russjac2000:

I love the Hunter, sacred huntsman on steroids


But I dont know wtf you are supposed to do with the Spiritualist, Shaman, Witch,or Psychic
Oracle looks like it could be interesting, a CHR base cleric with a psuedobloodline instead of domains
the summoner looks like a gimped sorceror with a buffed pet, ..so you want to be the pet's sidekick?
the investigator looks like a skill monkey, which might be good in PNP, but i think it sucks in the context of this game
Skald looks great if you prebuff and dont cast in combat, but completely gimps your party if you want to cast
Some of the new variants look interesting,
Zen archer a monk with a bow ( wish they would make an 2e Style Kensai)
monk of the mantis, a monk with sneak attacks
evagelist a cleric with bardsong

Summoner is about 2 things-
1. the pet, which is pretty broken; Paizo had to seriously revamp the class because it was overpowering everything (I like the new summoner, and it is not a week class by any means). You can make a tank or a controller or a damage dealer pretty easily. It's basically an animal companion on steroids, with a lot more customizability

2. the fact that your summon monster SLA is cast as a standard action, lasts a minute per level, and scales the same way a wizard's would- with augment summoning, you're a better summoner than a wizard. The summoner that I use in the PnP, I actually don't use the pet often because there are so many great options for the SLA. Summoning elementals vs rogues or hound archons vs something evil and having it pop up on your turn is incredibly useful.

Oracles can be better healers than a cleric depending on what you go for, but they tend to be more narrowly focused. Basically a cross between a cleric and a sorcerer.

The witch is basically a wizard but with a spell list that includes some healing and revolves around control, and their hexes generally aid with control. They are fun, but there is probably no reason to take one over a wizard. Psychic is similar, from what I understand.

Shaman is somewhere between a witch and a cleric- basically a cleric with witch hexes instead of domains. So a bit more control, a bit less buffing. But like, for me, unless someone in the party is dying, my cleric ends up not doing much anyways, and I hardly ever use domains, so having a steady source of offensive capability could be really useful for the party healer.

Investigator, yeah, has almost no combat ability. In the PnP game, you can do shenanigans to get ridiculously good at skills, which is handy (I have a level 8 investigator/alchemist that has +16 to every knowledge skill that he doesn't have ranks in).

But in this game the main thing would be to take a 1-4 level dip for inspiration, a rogue ability, and maybe 2nd level spells, and then move on. They have a pseudo sneak-attack, but it's complicated and takes time to get off, and you're better off with just taking levels of rogue.

Spiritualist, I have never even looked at. The Occult book is full of classes that involve a lot of new rules, so I just put that one to the side.

[jsaving]

In this thread we discussed Call of the Wild.

[Stink Bug]

Originally posted by gronkinator:

Summoner is about 2 things-
1. the pet, which is pretty broken; Paizo had to seriously revamp the class because it was overpowering everything (I like the new summoner, and it is not a week class by any means). You can make a tank or a controller or a damage dealer pretty easily. It's basically an animal companion on steroids, with a lot more customizability

Investigator, yeah, has almost no combat ability. In the PnP game, you can do shenanigans to get ridiculously good at skills, which is handy (I have a level 8 investigator/alchemist that has +16 to every knowledge skill that he doesn't have ranks in).

But in this game the main thing would be to take a 1-4 level dip for inspiration, a rogue ability, and maybe 2nd level spells, and then move on. They have a pseudo sneak-attack, but it's complicated and takes time to get off, and you're better off with just taking levels of rogue.

Spiritualist, I have never even looked at. The Occult book is full of classes that involve a lot of new rules, so I just put that one to the side.

CotW uses the weaker unchained summoner, which is further weakened in this game by the plethora of overpowered magic items (the summoner and eidolon can't both benefit from items in the same slots). Still fun like you said, with all the evolutions available, but nothing earth shattering.

Investigator works better in turn-based mode where you can micromanage more effectively. Half your class level in Insight bonus is pretty nice, with the option of using inspiration for even more accuracy when you really need it. Save scumming does cheapens the skill boosts you get, but I was also happy to pretty much never fail a skill roll when I played one. I think if the vivisectionist didn't exist (it should have had eldritch scoundrel sneak and talent progression, IMO) this class would look more favorable.

I'm interested in trying the spiritualist too but on paper it seems like a weaker, psychic summoner with a spell-list less tailored to the pet.

[LordSerion]

I haven't tried the mod yet but I want to try Arcanist.

[jsaving]

In tabletop, you really benefit from the arcanist's broader spellbook so you would often choose arcanist over sorcerer. In Kingmaker. you don't really need a broader spellbook so there isn't a compelling reason to go arcanist rather than sorcerer.

The exception is if you don't want to carry a divine caster but do want someone who can handle condition removal and (later) bestow grace of the champion. In that case the Magaambyan arcanist may be a great choice for your party.

[gronkinator]

Originally posted by LordSerion:

I haven't tried the mod yet but I want to try Arcanist.

Arcanist is one of the best classes in the game, at least on PnP. You have ways to boost the DCs of spells on the fly without raising the spell level, with is really, really hard to do in PF. And you get basically the versatility of a wizard with about the same sustain as a sorcerer.

One of the exploits lets you swap out spells as a full round action. This is probably a bigger deal in the PnP game, where a situation comes up that you really need one particular spell to get around.

[InEffect]

Thing is we don't need either. Sorc gets all the spells we'd care to cast. Number of spells known is not valuable in the crpg, much unlike pnp - casts per day are. It's very easy to create a cookie-cutter spellbook that will have a tool for every encounter in the game.