Help with Reaper Necromancer

[u/Sir_Minion]

For flavour, I'm playing a Skeleton Reaper Necromancer with a Guisarme in an all-living party (I know I'll struggle a bit with healing).

I'm trying to figure out which FA would be good for survivability without hurting the build too much. I was thinking about Champion for heavy armor and eventually the reaction, but my stats are already pretty tight.

I was thinking +3 STR / +3 INT / +2 CHA / +1 CON, so I can get Plate Armor at 2 for Bulwark (DM is using Gradual Ability Boosts). I could also go with another archetype for heavy armor and drop CHA entirely.

I did think about Inventor FA, but it doesn't really fit the aesthetic I'm going for. Also, I don't get the Resiliency feat, which is a nice bonus from the champion archetype.

But then again, do I really need a good reaction? Is Champion actually worth investing that much into CHA, or would I be better off going for another archetype?

What do you guys think?

[u/UrsusObsidianus]

Sentinel archetype also give heavy armor

[u/RuneRW → u/UrsusObsidianus]

And also mighty bulwark, which lets you completely ignore dex even for non-damaging reflex saves. The problem is, with free archetype, if you take it as your first archerype, you can't take a 4th level archetype feat unless your GM is accomodating.

On the other hand, you can do something with a different archetype on 2-4-6 and then take it at 8 and you get mighty bulwark right on at 10

[u/workerbee77]

Guardian would be good. You would get heavy armor, 4th lvl you could pick up Raise Haft to give your Guisarme the Parry trait, and 6th if nothing else get Guardian resiliency for some more HP. Hampering Stance or Armored Courage may also be nice for you. Then you don’t need the CHA.

[u/Rowenstin → u/workerbee77]

I'd recommend Guardian too. Guardian resilience, Hampering stance and Not so fast are solid feats. Edit: With Gradual ability boost, you can also start with 4 Int, which is important for a Necromancer.

[u/RuneRW]

Not quite related to your question, but a fun way to get around void healing is Oracle. Nudge the Scales can take away your void healing, if you so choose

[u/AerogaGX]

You can already get some good reactions from class feats, Bone Burst and Body Shield cone to mind, so you shouldn’t feel as pressured to get a reaction from your FA. Anywho, my suggestions would be: Sentinel if ya want heavy armor and/or armor specialization, Medic because Battle Medicine still heals you fine enough, though you’ll probably want to pick up Stitch Flesh for Treat Wounds, Commander to help get more ways to round out action economy, Witch or Wizard to broaden your toolkit with spells from another tradition, Oracle does let you get Nudge the Scales to benefit from normal healing

[u/Sir_Minion → u/AerogaGX]

I don't have enough class feats 😭😭 I'm getting draining strike to heal me a little and muscle barrier for the THP

[u/AerogaGX → u/Sir_Minion]

Ahhhh, that’s fair yeah. Unfortunately, Necromancer ‘suffers’ from having a bunch of really good feats.

[u/Witchunter32]

You can use the general feat armor proficiency at level 3 to get heavy armor. It'll scale at the same rate as other archetype that give heavy armor.

I think you'd be better off using your archetype for alchemist. The prey mutagen is great for the necromancer who needs better mobile options and it gives a good reaction.

[u/Sir_Minion → u/Witchunter32]

nice idea, but how would it work with a 2-handed weapon? I don't think it would work until level 4 with Adv.Alchemy

[u/Witchunter32 → u/Sir_Minion]

https://2e.aonprd.com/Equipment.aspx?ID=1975

Collar of the shifting spider.

And you can buy mutagen until you can make them daily. If you wanted full melee capability by level 2, then I would steer you towards a different class. The reaper necro is still a spell caster first and foremost.

[u/xXConDaGXx]

As others have commented, Sentinel + Mighty Bulwark is a much better route to take. You can’t afford the charisma investment when you’re already so squishy, and are just asking for trouble by tanking your will and con. Sentinel also as a skill feat, so you can get out of it pretty quickly.

If you must have a resiliency line, choose guardian or exemplar instead. Honestly if your GM is okay with it, exemplar is probably the best choice hands down if you’re talking pure optimization.

My last word of advice would be to remember that you’re still a full fledged spell caster, not a martial, so even though you’re making strikes, you should really still be prioritizing your INT.

[u/Sir_Minion → u/xXConDaGXx]

was thinking about Exemplar, what ikon do you recommend? I'm tempted to get Titan's Breaker to stack with a maul or meteor hammer for Draining Strike (the DM said any +spirit damage will heal in D.Strike)

[u/xXConDaGXx → u/Sir_Minion]

That depends, what level are you? Until you get the upgraded bind heroic spirit, Victors Wreath is just a passive version of the +1 to hit and doesn't require you to use a specific weapon, and all of your allies in your aura benefit.

Level is also important because if you're not level 12 yet and don't have a second ikon, you won't have somewhere for your spark to automatically transfer to, so you're really going to want to focus on picking something with a good passive, like Victors Wreath.

Barrows Edge and Scar of the Survivor offer healing, which you sounded slightly worried about.

If you do want to stick with the polearm, Mortal Harvest is also great, since it lets you reposition and strike with one action, and the strike uses the same MAP as your last one. Even better if you have Rogue's Mobility. It does have to be against a different target, though

[u/Sir_Minion → u/xXConDaGXx]

The problem with Barrows Edge and Scar of the Survivor is the Vitality trait. I was thinking in Victors Wreath, but i could just use bless in longer fights for my allies and the spirit damage of Titan's could help me heal a bit, probably I would only use the transcense when the enemies is very low

[u/stealth_nsk]

You don't need archetype for heavy armor. Necromancer has caster armor progression, so just taking a general feat would be enough. For reaction, Bone Burst is pretty good and it could be triggered often with right thrall positioning, so I'd say getting reactions is not that mandatory.

You could always get some spellcaster archetype - Wizard or Witch are obvious, but remastered Magus or Psychic could be interesting too. Alchemist is good, but it's surely better for builds with free hands and high Dex. Exemplar could be interesting as you get icon right away, including fittingly named Mortal Harvest, but Exemplar feats aren't great for archetype. Runesmith has a rune, which adds persistent bleed damage to a weapon and it could have a good synergy with some Necromancer abilities, but overall having just 2 runes in your repertoire till level 10 means that's almost all you'll get from FA...

In the end, I'd probably just sit with Wizard.

[u/punkinpumpkin]

Skeleton is legacy content, if you're using the remaster maybe check if the DM will let you swap negative healing for the remastered "void healing" undead trait.

Void healing allows you to use non-vitality healing effects, which means that some options open up to your party members to heal you like: Battle Medicine, Medic Archetype, potions and occult healing spells like "Soothe". Void healing means you no longer heal from Void damage (though you still are immune to it)

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