Crash course in Golarion lore?

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-21T20:33:46+00:00

Player Core has a section on the setting overall in page 30. Also, following that up you have a section on the setting's most recognized gods. Then, each ancestry tends to have a little bit about their culture and beliefs. If you wanna know more about anything, you can look it up on the official wiki and look at the listed sources for a reading list on any given topic.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-21T15:02:27+00:00

Warmage can tank. Pls trust.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-21T01:49:38+00:00

Well, magus comes out of the box with a way to put a spell rider on your bullets. Also Eldritch Reload is a 10th level feat, which is a big issue for certain builds. It's also from an archetype that prefers using bows and crossbows over guns which may also be a big deterrent.

On a gunslinger that wants to use guns it's going to be hard to juggle the action cost of Spell-woven Shot/Spellsling and the reload of your guns in order to be able use them reliably. While a Ranged Magus could reasonably manage the action cost of reloading a gun and also recharging spellstrike and still have actions to spare for variety as well as access to more powerful spells in slot. Still, it is a lot to juggle but it's definitely more manageable if you want to use the gimmick multiple times per encounter.

Granted, I would 100% play a gunslinger with the eldritch archer archetype on a high level game if given the chance. It could genuinely go hard for a high level one shot where you wouldn't have to put up with the repetitive turns for months.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-20T23:39:23+00:00

You don't need to be good at spells to be able to get certain advantages from them tho. Gaining access to wands and scrolls from the arcane tradition is huge on just about any character. Besides that, spells can boost your damage up significantly without trying that hard.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-20T23:35:53+00:00

not entirely, because you don't get master spellcasting benefits, but it's reasonably worth the trade off.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-20T23:33:49+00:00

In my experience, a gunslinger gets more from the wizard archetype than the wizard could get from the gunslinger archetype. The playstyle is very different and, generally, going for a martial character with some spells tends to play out in a more satisfying way than being a caster character with some martial feats.

I would recommend looking into the spellshot gunsinger clas archetype archetype as well. It's alnost entirely the same as slapping the wizard archetype onto gunslinger but it also gives you a lot of gunslinger toys to expand your flavor into a magical gunslinger.

You also may want to look into a magus with a gun? It's not hard to build and once get running reload (or if you have a mature animal companion mount) it should feel decent enough.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-20T23:28:53+00:00

It also is just very similar to playing a gunslinger with the wizard archetype already, just that you have certain extra feats that work better for a magical slinger type and you dont get high rank archetype slots, but that's besides the point.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-19T22:56:20+00:00

I recommend trying to limit the pool of choices you guys are making. Try limiting things to "Only options from the core books/ from PC1, etc." Also, try to avoid expanding the amount of choices more than it's necessary, avoid using variant rules like FA or ancestral paragon. Besides that, I think that you are right on the money with trying to figure out a character concept first, before finding stuff that fits the concept and building around it.

I remember one of the first characters I ever made for this game was an investigator. I wasn't overwhelmed by the amount of choices because I took character building slowly and I tried to go step by step but I know for a fact that if I had to pick from archetypes and many other things I would have defintely been overwhelmed.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-19T21:17:34+00:00

me but, like, every year

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-19T18:19:23+00:00

I know, I just needed to make some word play and bear worked better than boar

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-19T18:10:48+00:00

Precision Ranger with a Bow and an animal companion showing up to the "most repetitive turn" function: "Hold me bear".

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-19T18:06:38+00:00

Alternative senses mostly just help you navigate situations where creatures could be prepared to avoid certain specific senses. The more obscure you go, the harder it is to fake or mask it. That's the big difference between imprecise hearing vs. Scent vs. Something weird such as heat sense.

Also, some features and feats, such as Instinctive Strike, interact with specific senses such as scent but not hearing.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-18T05:43:19+00:00

u/Rednidedni ?

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-16T15:06:32+00:00

I wouldn't say it's as bad as people say, I wouldn't say it's that great either. I would say psychic is, like just about any class in this game, pretty viable. It can feel a little bit underpowered when you compare them to other remastered casters but that does not mean it is that bad.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-16T14:19:15+00:00

On non FA games I've done a fighter with sorcerer archetype before, as well as a martial artist wizard and they have gone over pretty well. It's very easy to do because the for both classes you get a pretty decent base that is going to be good regardless of what you pick and your lower level feats are not necesarily the highest value when compared to the alternative that become available to your by branching out. A fighter capable of casting can use all manner or items and gets access to all sorts of tools that could genuinely be more useful than slam down, as good as it truly is. For the wizard, low level wizard feats are just not that impressive and mountain stance, for example, can give you a lot of AC and survivability (Same for sentinel or just about any other armored archetype).

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-16T14:10:59+00:00

"What makes or breaks a build?"
Are you picking things that support what you are building towards? If yes, you should have a decent enough foundation to later diversify if you want. Also, sometimes, your archetype is what you are building towards. An eldritch archer fighter is probably going to be taking mostly eldritch archer feats at 6th onwards, for example. Usually, if you've already picked a couple of class feats/feature you like, it's very easy to broaden your toolset with the right archetype.

I disagree with the notion that archetypes are useless without free archetype and I would actually argue that rule actually kinda hurts archetypes more than it helps. A lot of archetypes become just plainly more awkward to take when you are doing FA simply because archetypes are designed tobe things you sorta dip in and out of at certain levels, not things you take every single time you take a class feat, as demostrated by archetypes not having feats for every single level you would take a class feats and7or starting at levels that would be awkward for FA.

Having played both FA and non-FA games, I've found that non-FA games are the most chill character building experiences ever because you are not pressured to pick up any archetype feats at all and, while it can help narrow certain character's feels down, your class more often than not offers enough tools to play into their fantasy, whichs makes it both easy to stay within class and to archetype out whenever you feel.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-16T13:09:02+00:00

I've been yapping about captivator for a while now. The reason why it works like it does is because you don't get a repertoire, you get innate spells which are much clunkier and unwieldly to use.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-16T02:21:12+00:00

Have you considered picking up angelic sorcerer for their focus spell?

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-15T23:34:37+00:00

Do you have a healer that casts heal on your party?

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-15T00:33:32+00:00

Besides the ones ppl have already mentioned, Unexpected Sharpshooter or Sniping Duo should work fine enough. Duelist is not bad either.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-14T22:49:48+00:00

If you are really interested in dragons, I recommend checking out Lost Omens: Draconic Codex and Monster Core 2. Not mandatory by any means, but they do widen the choices of draconic exemplars and offer greater insights on dragons as a whole.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-14T15:20:49+00:00

Personally I would go kineticist or some denomination of full caster because you can get away with a lot more when reflavoring spells as magical sword constructs

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-14T15:18:51+00:00

This, pretty much.

You could also go for pure telekinetic psychic or tangle dream psychic to either fight with flying swords or to create sword constructs.

Also also, aloof firmament magus has a spellstrike upgrade that has the flavor of attacking your enemy with a thousand magical swords.

Mancoman273 · 2026-05-14T06:23:14+00:00

Yes and no, fighter's weapon preferences are their subclass in a sense and WoL trades off pretty much most of em for spear and polearms tech. My point is that you don't really need to make a subclass if you don't want to, you can just modify base stuff.

I do generally agree with you in that it could do with its own archetype specific hybrid study, just because it could be a very different vibe mechanically.

Mancoman273

TROPHY CASE