Shackled City AP starting crew

[Lopke_Quasath]

Soon I'm handing the DM reins over, for a while.

I bought the Shackled City AP (only read relevant parts of starting the adventure) and will be handing that AP off to a player who'll DM.

There are only 4 of us in the group, so we have 3 players.

The AP states it was made ideally for 6 characters and is heavy on the "kill" factor.

So, we (as a group) decided to have 2 characters per player. This will help with two things: 1) Give us the recommended 6 characters, and 2) Give us a slight advantage as our "dynamic duos" can work together more effectively [i.e. slight meta-gaming in tactics, etc]

I am asking for some recommendations on my duo. I'm choosing last, because I'm happy playing whatever is left.

So far we have:

Player 1 - Fighter and Rogue
Player 2 - Cleric and Bard [my wife, she likes the support classes!]

Player 3 (me) - I'm thinking Wizard [Conjurer...I love the Summoners and can tweak them quite well], and Totemist [never played before, I think another front-line fighter would be good].

So, would Wizard and Totemist work? Other options?
I was also thinking of: Sorcerer and Duskblade, Wizard and Warlock.

I look forward to your thoughts and recommendations.

Cheers

Cheers.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

I'm running a group through the SCAP at the moment. We've only just started with our 3rd session coming up this Wednesday night.

My group consists of the following:

Dwarf Ranger 1
Human Hexblade 1
Human Favoured Soul 1
Half-Elf Cleric 1
Human Conjurer 1

Personally I think you need to cover the 4 classic roles, Fighter, Cleric, Rogue and Wizard if you want to do well in the SCAP. You should be ok with having a Sorcerer instead of a Wizard or a Ranger instead of a Fighter but ideally you should still have the classic party roles covered. You can still go through the AP ok without them but I think it is a little bit more difficult if you do.

My group is definitely missing a Rogue at the moment. There are quite a few traps in the AP and not having a Rogue around to find and deal with them means that the group has to deal with them the hard way.

I think that the party you have at the moment is a good one. 2 front line fighters are needed for all the combat. The Bard will be good at buffing the rest of the party and dealing out some healing. 2 Clerics would be better than 1 but I think that what you have is fine as it is.

Olaf the Stout

Edit: Just re-read the post and saw that you are asking specifically about your characters. A Wizard and another front-line melee guy are both good choices. In a 6 person party I really think you need 2 front-line guys. I take it that the Totemist is a Barbarian variant? An arcane caster of some sorts will make the AP a lot easier.

 

[Herobizkit]

I would think a secondary healer would help. Druid seems the best choice; you'd be an excellent back-up healer (so your Cleric could wade into combat if needed), plus you'd have instant access to Summon Nature's Ally magic.

I'd strongly consider a Monk as your second option. Battlefield mobility is important, and Monks are no slouch in the damage department. Also, if your DM is keen, consider making the Monk prestige into the Chameleon prestige class... your Monk could then be anyone you needed for the day.

If you don't want a Monk, I would also suggest Paladin, or perhaps Duskblade (they seem cool, but I don't have the relevant rulebook and thus haven't seen what they can do).

 

[Sunderstone]

I think a 5 man party is plenty for the beginning of SC as you seem to have a good mix already. Use Magic Device and some Cleric wands could be some extra healing. I would just run with the Wizard unless you are hell bent on playing 2 PCs.
The less PCs you double up on, the better the RP aspect of the game.

On a side note, my players have tried the Duskblade and Beguiler from the PH2. Niether were too useful in our combined opinion. Id probably choose the Beguiler over the Duskblade for the SCAP though due to the more urban environment.


My group (currently in the AoW) is also down to 4 (including me as a DM). As long as the DM doesnt play a Rogue, itll work out well enough.

My group...
Human Wizard 7
Dwarf Barbarian 7
Human Ranger 7 - just replaced our Bard that was killed by Mimics.
Dwarf Rogue 7 - NPC and Mute, speaks by sign language (and keeps our RPing simple ) with the Wiz and Bbn, these three have survived since level 1.
Drow Cleric 6 - my DM-PC, I usually play what class they dont want to as long as its not a Rogue.

 

[Lopke_Quasath]

Thanks for the suggestions! Keep'em coming!

I think I'll stick with a wizard then
.
My wife likes pole-arms, so her cleric will be using one [we often use the Weapon Groups variant from UA], to still get some action from the rear line.

Any other ideas for a front-line melee type?

Olaf - Totemist is from Magic of Incarnum. It's full of crunch and flavour (basically receiving various magical beast powers to augment their melee capability) and by far the easiest class to adapt to a non-incarnum game. I have wanted to play one since I read the book.

Cheers

 

[Sunderstone]

Thanks for the suggestions! Keep'em coming!

I think I'll stick with a wizard then
.
Cheers

One more thing. A balanced mix of all types arcane spells can help a ton.

The player in my group that plays the Wizard is the "Nuke em" type (hes all about damage spells). He almost never takes any utility spells which almost got us TPK'ed twice already. I see this as a potential problem in the later levels.... ymmv.

 

[billd91]

We've done pretty much the same thing with the group I'm running. They went with:

player 1: scout and paladin
player 2: swashbuckler and sorcerer
player 3: barbarian and druid

So, they were pretty short on primary healing.

They've since added a dragon shaman from a 4th player. That and copious cure moderate wound wand buying has made them pretty healing resilient.
The sorcerer has also been replaced by a war mage (whose spells that aren't affected by SR have been VERY helpful).
They've just stared Chapter 6 and have WAY fewer PC deaths than most of the people reporting in the body count thread on the Paizo boards. It doesn't hurt that the scout's player is a hard core player, not a huge min-maxer, but very good with tactical options.
Between the scout, swashbuckler, and dragon shaman, they tumble like crazy with very mobile fighting styles. It's worked pretty well for them.

As far as my recommendations to the OP, a main line fighter will be a good match with your conjurer. It gives you, as a player, a lot of options and keeps you active in most things the party will be doing.

 

[roguerouge]

I'd recommend Wizard and Druid or Wizard and Dragon Shaman. With the former pairing you've got a class you need and which you play well, along with the most powerful class in the game with animal companion, better low level summoning, and backup healing, followed by Wild shape for melee later. In the latter pairing, the dragon shaman's ability to heal people slowly up to half hit points will help your cleric be more useful and help your party go longer. With a dip into Fighter, you can tank up with AC and let his energy shield whittle away at opponents' defenses.

 

[Yair]

If your DM would allow it, I would go for two Red Wizards, each with a different specialization and orthogonal opposed schools. I'd make them twins, too. I reckon that would be amusing and highly effective.

Another option is Mage Guild and Sorcerer; the first provides utility spells, the latter artillery. Works rather well in my SCAP game, except that the Mage Guild also provides lots of artillery in the form of double-wand use. (CRAZILLY powerful, BTW, especially with the magic item that allows application of metamagic feats to wands - I strongly recommend against allowing it.)

But personally I actually like psionics and melee, so would have probably have played a kineticist (psion) to provide artillery and a psychic warrior to indulge my violent streak.

 

[Arnwyn]

More clerics is always good. And, as others have said, ensure you have the "basic four" covered before going off into the goofy classes.

Our group:
Human Ftr5
Human Clr5
Human Rog5
Human Sor5
Human Sam5
Human Shug5