The Archivist in Play? How Good is it?

[MadMaxim]

I haven't had any of my players play an Archivist (from Heroes of Horror) yet, and I was wondering if anyone would like to share impressions or experiences with it? To me it seems to completely blow both Bards and Wizards out of the water as being the "know-it-all" character (with all the Knowledge skills, Intelligence being their primary ability score and 4 + Int modifier skill points). Their dark knowledge ability seems to make them able to aid the party as a Bard and they cast (mainly) Cleric spells. What's not to like about them?

 

[smootrk]

I have wanted to play one since they were introduced but have not had a chance yet. The class is especially interesting as a lead in for the mystic theurge prc with INT being the primary stat for both Wizards and Archivists - the uber spell list being possible in such a character.

I even created a Nature oriented version (with druid spell list as the default rather than the clerical).

My next character will probably be an Archivist.

 

[Jubilee]

I play an archivist in an eberron game and she's incredibly versatile and alot of fun. Since the party doesn't have a cleric or a wizard, she has to fulfill both roles sometimes. However, I think the success of the class is highly dependant on your GM and setting - because getting all the spells to be versatile is very expensive, and it takes some cooperation from your GM if you want things like domain spells and divine bard spells (chortle). Luckily for me, in this particular campaign we have crazy stupid amounts of money, my character has the equivalent of 1/2 a boccob's blessed book (saves on scribing spells), and the GM let me take "collegiate archivist" (there's a collegiate wizard) feat, which gives me 4 cleric spells (instead of 2) per level.

With artificers around, it's relatively easy to find a 4th lvl Paladin or Ranger spell, or a 5th level Divine Bard spell, or any druid spells I want, but i imagine in a "normal" campaign, your chances of finding paladin or ranger only scrolls are alot slimmer, and finding paladins or rangers that can cast the spells to help you make a scroll even harder..

My archivist is primarily the party's healer, so I took a level of a 3rd party suppliment prestige class called "Healer" that gave me the healing domain as a 1st level ability, and then I went into combat medic - so now I can spontaneously cast the Heal spell. Now I'm back to Archivist - the dark knowledge powers are fairly useful, especially the saves vs. monster abilities, that's saved us once or twice.

Someday I'd like to play an archivist in a more normal campaign, but I think I'd be frustrated by the difficulty of finding spells and the expense, and possibly the lack of divine bards and shugenjas to get spells from.. OTOH, it would be a great deal of fun to actually get to RP the class as described in the book..

/ali

 

[Masquerade]

One of the players in my current game has an archivist using a druid-spell variant similar to smootrk's biosoph. We've only met for four sessions thusfar, but the player seems to be enjoying the class and I don't detect any balance issues either way. As a GM, be sure to give a knowledge-oriented character plenty of opportunities to put those skill points to use!

Overall, I really like the presentation of the archivist and would be interested in playing one myself eventually.


||edit|| post 300!

 

[blargney the second]

I like the archivist. Neat flavour, interesting abilities.

 

[drothgery]

I'm running an archivist in a PBP game (see .sig; Khalia ir'Indari) who's a lot of fun; she's a variant of character type I've used a lot for NPCs, but never previously as a PC.

 

[Rystil Arden]

I'm running a very-interesting Archivist in the Shackled City Adventure Path. She is far from the most powerful or effective character in the group (and we don't even have particularly strong characters anyway--the 'tank' is a Ranger, for instance). The straight-out Cleric is clearly more useful overall due to his ability to be a bandaid. Alcyone (my Archivist) focuses more on party buffs and support, playing a side role in combat.

That said, what the Archivist lacks in power, it makes up for in pure fun (though this may be a misattribution of my playstyle or this particular character, rather than the class itself), at least for me. I love having the Cleric's Vestments and convincing the Clerics of Lathander that I'm also a Cleric (I can run circles around them in religious theory and dogma discussions, and I pray with them, for show, to get my spells, so who are they to question it? ) and my Scholar's Outfit for fraternising with the Blue Crater Academy, which I managed to join at level 1 and come up with a creative roleplaying solution to some of the challenges in adventure 1 through research, innovation, and diplomacy. I had her take Draconic Archivist (the feat that lets you use Know: Arcana to Dark Knowledge constructs, dragons, etc), and her empathic affection for 'cute' constructs and pity for the poor broken ones has led to her salvaging several digging constructs from the first adventure, and she is currently working on fixing them up, good as new (she has stored them in her space as a visiting scholar at the Temple of Lathander, just for fun).

All in all, from my experience, the Archivist will not affect the balance of your game, but for the right player, it can be a great deal of fun to play. I wholeheartedly recommend it!

 

[Schmoe]

I've never played an Archivist, but I would really like to! I've got a character concept brewing on the backburner that is a Ranger/Archivist multiclass - sort of a scholarly "big game hunter" type of character who goes into the wilds, tracks down interesting specimens, and bags them. Unfortunately, the campaign I'm in right now is city-based, so the concept doesn't fit.

I'm really interested in hearing more examples of an Archivist in play.

 

[Schmoe]

Cool stuff Rystil. Has the Dark Knowledge ability been useful at all?

 

[GQuail]

One player in my group plays an Archivist who has qualified for Alienist, making for an interestuing "Cthuloid Scholar" type who uses the fiends of the Far Realm to aid in the heroic adventures. He resembles Giles from Buffy in more than a few ways. ;-)

In play the Archivist is slightly more competant in spell-less combat than a Wizard, (with Dark Knowledge and better HD) but plays much the same otherwise. The ability to pick up spells of all Divine types hasn't been heaivlly pusehd by our group, but theoretically is a big bonus. Dark Knowledge is a funky power and is a nice fusion, IMHO, of "class level based" and "skill based".