Friday, June 6, 2014

Angry Caterpillar (Summoner Build)

Angry Caterpillar
Half-Elf Synthesist Summoner
What IS that?


The Angry Caterpillar is a multi-armed, pouncing beast. He grows many, many hands equipped with falchions, and gets upwards of 10 attacks at high levels.  Note that the Synthesist is all sorts of rules weird, so your GM's interpretation of various things may vary (such as qualifying for feats through the Eidolon)


Attributes

Cha>Wis>Con>Dex>Int>Str

Dex and Str can be completely dumped, but we want high con because the Eidolon and Summoner are sharing hit points. Charisma should be at least 16, and Wisdom should be reasonable to help will saves. All level bumps should go into charisma. If Int is being dumped to 8, it may as well be dumped to 7: You can’t get fewer than 1 skill point a level.

15 Point Buy
STR: 7
DEX: 7
CON: 10
INT: 10
WIS: 16
CHA: 19 (17+2)

20 Point Buy
STR
: 7
DEX: 10
CON: 11
INT: 7
WIS: 18
CHA: 18 (16+2)

25 Point Buy
STR
: 7
DEX: 7
CON: 12
INT: 7
WIS: 18
CHA: 20

Traits
Reactionary: +2 Initiative
Indomitable Faith: +1 Will Save

Feats
1: Martial Weapon Proficiency: Falchion, Skill focus: Perception
2:
3: Multi-Weapon Fighting
4:
5: Power Attack
6:
7: Arcane Strike
8:
9: Weapon Focus: Falchion
10:
11: Improved Critical: Falchion
12:
13: Iron Will
14:
15: Improved Iron Will
16:
17: Extra Evolution
18:
19: Extra Evolution
20:

Suggested Gear
Haste doubles your attack power, and you won’t want to waste time casting it. Grab a pair or two of Boots of speed. With two pairs, you can get 20 rounds of haste a day as a free action. Nice.

You also won’t have to worry about buying expensive weapons. The Angry Caterpillar just wields a ton of falchions.


Spells
Level 1: Compel hostility, Mage Armor, and shield are all very useful. Mage armor and shield provide +8 AC.

Level 2: Barkskin, Evolution Surge Lesser (two more hands), Restore Eidolon Lesser, and Haste.

Level 3: Evolution Surge (four more hands), Restore Eidolon, Stoneskin

Level 4: Transmogrify (for changing size), Evolution Surge Greater (6 hands!)

Level 5 & 6: The usual


Eidolon

We want the quadruped eidolon for pounce. Other than that, we are piling on the armor, size, and hands. We want him kind of tanky, but most damage dealing.

First ability score increase goes into strength, second into con, third into strength.

1: Limbs (Arms), Improved Natural Armor
4: 3x Limbs (Arms), Improved Natural Armor, Pounce
8: Pounce, 4x Limbs, Large
12: Pounce, 5x Limbs, Spell Resistance, Large
16: Pounce, 5x Limbs, Spell Resistance, Large, Huge,
20: Pounce, 9x Limbs, Improved Natural Armor, Spell Resistance, Large, Huge, Wings (3 extra evolution points from Greater Aspect)


What the Build Looks Like at...

This assumes a 20 point buy and no magic items.

Level 1: Nothing special yet, just your average warrior. AC of 16, but a respectable 16 fused HP (summoner HP+Eidolon HP). Attacking at +3 (2d4+3)

Level 4: Now we’ve got 6 hands to work with. Three Falchions at +1, dealing 2d4+3, and can pounce. AC 20, 48 HP. Still not too impressive.

Level 8: This is where is gets fun. AC 23, HP 121. Attacks with +7 (x4)/+2, dealing 2d6 +20 on each hit. Large Sized with reach. Can also cast 3 level 3 spells a day.

Level 12: Oh Man oh man. AC 30, HP 201. Attacks with +11 (x5)/+6 dealing 2d6 +25 damage (critting on 15-20/x2). Spell Resistance 23. We are also large sized, which gives us reach. (DPR 54)

Level 16: Hard to beat this. AC: 34, HP: 323. Attacks with +17 (x5)/+12/+6 attacks, dealing 3d6+37 on each hit (15-20/x2). Huge sized, which gives us nice reach. Will save is 21 and we can re-roll it once a day and Spell resistance 27, making those banishment and such not so scary. Can cast 2 level 6 spells a day.

Level 20: Well now. AC: 41, HP: 403. Attacks with +21(x10)/+16/+11 attack 3d6+39 damage on each (15-20/x2). We can fly. We also have SR 31, a will save of 23, and the ability to re-roll one will save a day.


Tactics
Pounce away! Just close with enemies and they don’t have a chance. You have great AC, HP, will saves, and even spell resistance, so don’t sweat it.

Guide to the Builds
Comprehensive Guide to the Guides
Zenith Games

3 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. Some things are not quite accurate by my calculations (i could be wrong):
    1) It's not possible to take Extra Evolution feats because synthesist replaces summoner's "Eidolon class feature" with "Fused eidolon class feature".
    2) You forgot to write down the bite attack, no backsies, quadruped eidolon should have it (+18, 2d6+13 with power attack).
    3)"Evolution Surge Greater (6 hands!)" Nope, up to two evolutions, 4 hands.
    4) As i understand you should have 36 evolution points, and you spend only 35.
    5) "Transmogrify (for changing size)" Personally i would use Reduce Person than spend 2000 gp. to cast Transmogrify two times every time. Dimension Door could be even better to instantly transport to boss' throne room.
    6) At 8th level quadruped large creature shouldn't have reach.
    7) You took x9 limbs (arms) evolutions, yet you wrote x10 attacks. It seems you confused biped form with quadruped form which don't have free limbs (arms) evolution at the beggining.
    8) The damage should be 3d6+45 ((14 base str +8 level advancement + 2 eidolon's Ability score increase + 16 huge evolution = 40 str) So, 22 from Str bonus with two-handed weapons + 18 from Power Attack with two-handed weapons + 5 from Arcane Strike = 45). On the other hand the attack bonus is right (quadruped base form, not biped).
    9) Should be only 386 hp by my calculations (13 con base +1 con at 5th level + 8 con from huge evolution. So, summoner's 14 hp at 1st level + 10.5 x 19 = 213,5 hp, and eidolon's 11.5 x 15 = 172.5 hp)

    But party hates synthesist, he doesn't rely on party's abilities, which is why he was banned from Pathfinder Society. Truly, this strange archtype have none of the weaknesses of summoner or eidolon, and all of eidolon's strength plus a bit more. He don't follow tactics, often placing others in danger, or he just go exploring dungeon by himself -_- .
    Otherwise a nice build, the damage is very very nice.

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    Replies
    1. you forget the pair of arms that you have inherently

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