More theorycrafting: the fey build

[The Berathian]

I would imagine that the multiclass of beguiler and ancient druid would give you something that most resembles a fey trickster. Vengeful forces of nature and deceptive illusions. Mind control. Afflictions. Curses! You can provide boons to your companions while blighting your enemies. 

It's a weird class combo. 

As a bonus, the Oracle of Berath is rather ominous. 

[dgray62]

I've never played an oracle; sounds like it might be very interesting. A more conventional alternative worth considering in light of this theme is an ancient/trickster pathfinder.

[The Berathian]

1 minute ago, dgray62 said:

I've never played an oracle; sounds like it might be very interesting. A more conventional alternative worth considering in light of this theme is an ancient/trickster pathfinder.

Perhaps. I thought about that as well. But the trickster lacks the sheer confoundery of a beguiler. It would be a build of similar theme, but drastically different outcome. More direct offense, I think. 

Of course, the pair of them would work rather well together. Which means that you have the start of a theme team! 

[thelee]

hey hey i have actually been thinking a lot about a fey build recently. (i even put one together in pathfinder 2end)

personally, i've settled on an enchanter/ancient. in hindsight i think i should've been an evoker to retain access to illusion magic, but several things worked against that at the time:

• being an evoker itself didn't feel "fey" enough
• illusion wizard magic in deadfire is a lot more about "scaring the pants off of people" than D&D-esque style "create tricks, deceive" and the wizard lacked the the charm/dominate angles that really make it fey-like that a cipher has, so i didn't feel *as* compelled to go with illusion magic (though here and there while actually playing it i wish i had access to mirror image, miasma, and eventually invisibility)
• losing access to essential phantom, which i wanted to have as a mid-late game niche option and felt very fey-like
• self-synergy opportunity with enchantment school in being able to be temporarily immune to all my own hobbling druid spells (and not losing my deleterious alacrity of motion buff)

in the end i thought keeping access to enchantment was preferable over illusion, since you get stuff like arkemyr's capricious hex, call to slumber--both of which are fey-like-- and great overall utility. i picked enchantment over e.g. conjuration becuse i wanted to retain access to evoker magic for its late game utility and interrupts. i didn't pick blood mage because i wanted to be able to empower spells with venombloom.

 

i picked wizard over a cipher (which i briefly considered) because being a wizard frees you up from having to use up a lot of ability points just picking up spells - past tier 3 i don't pick up a single wizard spell until wall of draining at level 19. the rest goes into druid spells and multiclass passives. it requires quite a bit of micromanagement to juggle grimoires, but it's pretty great overall.

i also did a psion/lifegiver along time ago, so i'm not against the idea of cipher/druid multiclass working, but the decision i went with this way just gave me a lot more options with my ability points.

 

so far i have a lot of fun with it. there's a fire subtheme, so i have ring of focused flame. most of the time i summon the mushrooms to help me fight, but when the situation calls for it, i create firebrand and then summon essential phantom. or in some other cases, cat form and then summon essential phantom (you get a phantom with cat laws).

i did discover a really unfortunate bug: if you switch grimoires while spiritshifted, you lose all the spells from grimoires, and can't get them back until you turn off spiritshift and switch grimoires again.

Edited May 4, 2021 by thelee

[Not So Clever Hound]

10 hours ago, thelee said:

i did discover a really unfortunate bug: if you switch grimoires while spiritshifted, you lose all the spells from grimoires, and can't get them back until you turn off spiritshift and switch grimoires again.

@thelee I recently discovered that too, it's a real bummer for certain strategies (e.g. if you want to briefly switch to the Snakeskin Grimoire to cast Draconic Fury on a spiritshifted Sorcerer about to go nuts in melee). Spiritshift still has a number of bugs and oddities attached to it.

But when you think about it, would a 9-feet tall were-animal with giant paws and claws like daggers be able to juggle between tiny grimoires? I know it's not a great explanation but personally that's how I've come to terms with this particular bug. 

EDIT: In order to have the benefit of different spells across grimoires, I'm thinking potentially this could work but it requires a lot of micro and a Blood Mage (also won't work for switching offensive damage spells). I'll try later.

1) Start combat in Kith form with Arkemyr Illuminating Discoveries and cast Brilliant departure.
2) Cast WoD from learnt spells or another grimoire on standing enemies to prolong duration of invisibility.
3) Continue to switch between grimoires to cast different buffs or potentially CC/debuff spells (invis shouldn't break) keeping the WoD up and replenishing spells if needed with Blood Sacrifice.
4) When ready, switch back to primary grimoire, turn on Spiritshift and yallah!
5) Once you're out of invisibility you can use Blood Sacrifice if Blood Mage to replenish spells, keep WoD up etc. otherwise as @Haplok pointed out below Blood Sacrifice will break invisibility.

Edited May 5, 2021 by Not So Clever Hound

[Haplok]

I have one comment/question to the above.

Doesn't Blood Sacrifice break Brilliant Departure? (I don't know it).

I know that it does break Shadowing Beyond.

 

[Not So Clever Hound]

18 minutes ago, Haplok said:

Doesn't Blood Sacrifice break Brilliant Departure? (I don't know it).

I should have double checked before posting, I just tested and it does break Brilliant Departure. It doesn't completely invalidate the strategy above (Brilliant Departure can get a long duration especially with WoD), but it limits quite a bit. Thanks for pointing it out!

Edited May 5, 2021 by Not So Clever Hound

[Boeroer]

Why the heck does Blood Sacrifice break invisibility? Wild...

[Not So Clever Hound]

Well, technically it's applying direct damage... maybe that's it. But I'm also surprised that it's breaking Brilliant Departure specifically.

As far as invisibility effects go and what they allow you to do without breaking, my understanding is:

Shadowing Beyond < Smoke Veil / Potion < Brilliant Departure < Vanishing Strike
(Withdraw doesn't really count here because it's absolute but you can't do anything. I don't know much about the Ranger ability Shadowed Hunter.)

So I would understand that Blood Sacrifice breaks with Shadowing Beyond, but Brilliant Departure... <sad face>

Edited May 5, 2021 by Not So Clever Hound

[Boeroer]

Smoke Veil doesn't break on DoT ticks, Brilliant Departure does. So it depends on what you want to do (DoT or CC) to determine what's better I think. Shadowing Beyond is stupid imo (unless TB mode bc. free action).

I tried Shadowed Hunter recently but tbh I completely forgot what the results were. Since I forgot it must have been nothing special.  I think it worked like Smoke Veil. 

Does BrillDep also break on Alacrity's self dmg?

Edited May 5, 2021 by Boeroer

[Not So Clever Hound]

22 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

Does BrillDep also break on Alacrity's self dmg?

Just tested - it doesn't break with DAoM. So it's not as much the damage part that comes into play as it might be the fact that you directly apply it (kind of attack yourself even if there is no attack roll or anything). Or maybe I'm totally mistaken which is extremely possible.  

Edited May 5, 2021 by Not So Clever Hound

[Boeroer]

Yes, the "directly damaging yourself" might be the thing that breaks it. Who know... I'm too lazy to search the game files for that.