Forums: Advice: Laranja's Guide to the Shield-Bashing Brawler (2024)

There it is, guys

Laranja's Guide to the Shield-Bashing Brawler

This is my very first guide so please be gentle.

Suggestions and criticism can be posted here or forwarded me through PM or e-mail at laranja.rpg@gmail.com

Thanks!

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Since I got a vested interest with shield bashing brawlers (been happily playing one in PFS for a while), I look forward to going over your guide.

Protoman wrote:

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Since I got a vested interest with shield bashing brawlers (been happily playing one in PFS for a while), I look forward to going over your guide.

Hey!

Thanks a lot!

fixd :D

While there's still plenty of debate between bashing and shield spikes (shield spikes and bashing both act as "effective size changes"), there isn't as much when it comes to stacking brawler's close weapon mastery with the bashing and or shield spikes. You can't.

Close Weapon Mastery wrote:

At 5th level, a brawler's damage with close weapons increases. When wielding a close weapon, she uses the unarmed strike damage of a brawler 4 levels lower instead of the base damage for that weapon (for example, a 5th-level Medium brawler wielding a punching dagger deals 1d6 points of damage instead of the weapon's normal 1d4). If the weapon normally deals more damage than this, its damage is unchanged. This ability does not affect any other aspect of the weapon. The brawler can decide to use the weapon's base damage instead of her adjusted unarmed strike damage—this must be declared before the attack roll is made.

If for whatever reason the shield does 2d8 damage (it shouldn't if it's still sized for medium character), that's the base damage of the close weapon. You use that base damage OR the close weapon mastery unarmed strike damage; a level 5 brawler's close weapon mastery would only do 1d6 damage (the level of a level 1 brawler's unarmed strike).

You also stacked impact with the bashing/shield spikes, and that's also another "effective size changes" that doesn't stack.

EDIT: Also I'd probably refer to this as simply a specific build that only uses material from the Core RPG line of materials (from what I can tell, just Core rulebook, APG, ACG, and UC). It's not so much a guide as it doesn't really go over other options (sticking with just the non-Golarion RPG stuff) such as regular fighter with regular Weapon Training + gloves of dueling, Ultimate Intrigue's Vigilante + lethal grace while finessing a light shield, straight brawler (with armor proficiency feats if that's deemed more viable than simply buying magic AC-enhancing items), warpriest with a shield as a sacred weapon, raging barbarian, etc.

Your human stats aren't actually that good.
Example:
Your 20pt buy. (not sure where your human +2 is)
High Fantasy (20 Points): Str 18, Dex 16, Con 12, Wis 11, Int 7, Cha 7
my 20pt buy
Str 16+2, Dex 16, Con 14, Wis 13, Int 7, Cha 7

Also your Nagaji's stats are your Oread's, not actually what the nagaji would have.

I'd also recommend adding Half-Orcs, or at least mentioning that they are equal to the Humans and Half-elfs.

Your equipment says to start off with scale mail and Brawler, but you're not proficient with the medium armor yet.

"Gloves of Dueling" is misspelled and don't benefit you at all as you don't have weapon training and the fighter-brawler's Close Combatant doesn't count since it doesn't reference weapon training.

Don't forget that half orc followers of gorum who are ulfen can get the Shield Bearer and Shield Trained traits, which treat heavy shields as light weapons and add 1 damage to shield bashes. This is integral to my own Warpriest X/Siegebreaker 2/Inquisitor 3 and Slayer X/Siegebreaker 2/Inquisitor 3 builds.

By the way, the Siegebreaker and Inquisitor classes allow for a free overrun with bullrushes, and dealing damage with bullrush and overruns, as well as treating allies as having paired opportunist, which triggers an AoO loop for yourself.

Not entirely related to the "guide's" build (since it's not that relevant due to lack of things stacking), besides highlighting a misunderstanding of when scaling damage to higher size from a small damage die:

Quote:

If the size increases by one step, look up the original damage on the chart and increase the damage by two steps. If the initial size is Small or lower (or is treated as Small or lower) or the initial damage is 1d6 or less, instead increase the damage by one step.

Damage Dice Progression Chart
1
1d2
1d3
1d4
1d6
1d8
1d10
2d6
2d8
3d6
3d8
4d6
4d8
6d6
6d8
8d6
8d8
12d6
12d8
16d6

So 1d6 going up one size larger becomes 1d8, then 2d6. Not 1d6 -> 1d10 -> 2d8.

Oxylepy wrote:

Right, so my WP build at 20th level with bashing spiked heavy shields does 3d6 and not the theoretocal 4d6, because spiked doesn't actually change the size and if it did it wouldn't stack with bashing. Useful.

Wasn't addressing your build as I didn't know what damage you were expecting to do by what level (X is not specific enough of a level number lol), but rather the build in the guide's table of expected damage. The advancement of 1d6 to 2d8 was incorrect even with the assumption that shield spikes stacked with bashing.

Thanks everyone

Done some corrections already
My ignorance of the non stackability of size increacing emulations made me really overblow the potential for this build.

Still, it is a very interesting concept and thanks for the inputs

Oh, I was just commenting that your advice covered something which is actually really useful to me, thanks. When I said X I meant rest of the levels, but in that case I was skipping to 20th level character, which is really good to know since the 4d6 had they stacked was pretty intense.

Regrettably your comments also knocked my slayer down in damage, but in any case for both builds, the 11ish damage/combat maneuver (assuming success) is enough to greatly overshadow weapon damage (if both are successful on the 6 full attack bonus attacks it's like 132damage to 6d8)

Woops, forgot bashing was 2 size categories, so the damage is a bit more, but a bit less than the old theoretical damage (I had thought it had been 6d6 each for the WP's attacks, lol) regardless, it still pales in comparison to the Siegebreaker CM damage

Protoman wrote:

While there's still plenty of debate between bashing and shield spikes (shield spikes and bashing both act as "effective size changes"), there isn't as much when it comes to stacking brawler's close weapon mastery with the bashing and or shield spikes. You can't.

Close Weapon Mastery wrote:

At 5th level, a brawler's damage with close weapons increases. When wielding a close weapon, she uses the unarmed strike damage of a brawler 4 levels lower instead of the base damage for that weapon (for example, a 5th-level Medium brawler wielding a punching dagger deals 1d6 points of damage instead of the weapon's normal 1d4). If the weapon normally deals more damage than this, its damage is unchanged. This ability does not affect any other aspect of the weapon. The brawler can decide to use the weapon's base damage instead of her adjusted unarmed strike damage—this must be declared before the attack roll is made.

If for whatever reason the shield does 2d8 damage (it shouldn't if it's still sized for medium character), that's the base damage of the close weapon. You use that base damage OR the close weapon mastery unarmed strike damage; a level 5 brawler's close weapon mastery would only do 1d6 damage (the level of a level 1 brawler's unarmed strike).

You also stacked impact with the bashing/shield spikes, and that's also another "effective size changes" that doesn't stack.

EDIT: Also I'd probably refer to this as simply a specific build that only uses material from the Core RPG line of materials (from what I can tell, just Core rulebook, APG, ACG, and UC). It's not so much a guide as it doesn't really go over other options (sticking with just the non-Golarion RPG stuff) such as regular fighter with regular Weapon Training + gloves of dueling, Ultimate Intrigue's Vigilante + lethal grace while finessing a light shield, straight...

I'm not sure if I agree the jury is out on the close weapon fighting not being augumented by the bashing property.

would you further explain why you would think so?

Sure. Bashing large shield = 1d8 weapon.

That's the new base damage of the shield that anyone picking it up would benefit from.

Close Weapon Mastery lets you swap the base damage of the shield (1d8) for level-scaling unarmed damage of the the brawler (with effective level-4) = 1d6 > 1d8 > 1d10 > 2d6 > 2d8 by level 20.

Close weapon mastery wouldn't interact with the bashing enchantment/shield spikes/impact shield because those are all effective size changes to the shield. Close weapon mastery doesn't care at all what happens to the shield, and uses its damage progression and replaces it altogether (if the brawler chooses to do so; could stick with the effective size changed shield instead of the unarmed damage).

It's more iffy when the shield is a Large (or bigger) sized shield, an actual size increase to the weapon. Would that count for using "Large brawler" damage? If so, then the weapon might have to use the Small or Large Brawler Unarmed Damage table in the brawler's Unarmed Strike class feature section. Such a case still needs to be clarified.

It looks like in the FAQ it says that only the largest size change would count (bashing), as they do not stack.

However Shield Spikes may because the wording treats it as if designed for a creature a size category larger, while bashing increases the size by 2 steps (different wording may allow stacking).

But as for the enchantment combined with the Brawlers Unarmed or the Warpriest's Sacred Weapon, I think they would stack, as they increase the base damage of the weapon, and their change would thrn be affected by the size increase. Or am I wrong there?

My problem with your argument is the wording in "Close Weapon Mastery"
It talks about the unarmed damage replacing the BASE damage of the shield, which is 1d4. Furthermore, it said that if the shield NORMALLY deals more damage, it won't replace it. However, what does "normally" mean? Is it "in a regular hit with no Close Weapon Mastery" or is it "The normal damage by an unenhanced shield of that kind"?

finally, I found a post that might clarify the shield spikes thing

You're replacing the base damage. My real confusion on this is how it interacts with bashing or impact, as both of these are magical effects. I wouldn't think they would be invalidated by/stop from stacking with the class ability which would be altering the mundane

As an aside: What a wonderful day to teach my girlfriend Pathfinder. I get to leave this and a couple other heady discussions and work on the absolute fundamentals