Get ALL The Skill Points in Pathfinder With This Handy Trick

One of the most common complaints heard round any Pathfinder table is that characters never have enough skill points to go around. Even classes like the rogue, the bard, and the investigator, which were built for the skill monkey role in the game world, never seem to offer enough points for everything a player wants to do. And if you're playing a fighter? Or a sorcerer? Forget it... you're good at, like, two things. Three, tops.

Being an asshole is something any class can do, though.

It makes sense, though, from a game balance perspective. After all, skill points are a resource, and they have to be spent to achieve certain results. The classes that get fewer skill points, well, they get other resources to make up for it. Fighters get full BAB, proficiency in most weapons and armors, and more feats than a mutant centipede. Sorcerers? They get bloodline powers, bonus feats, and, in case you forgot, SPELLS! So limiting the skill points these classes get can be seen as a way to prevent any one character from getting a bigger piece of the resource pie.

If you want to widen your slice a little, though, try this tip on for size.

Humans, Traits, and Feats

Now, the easiest way to get more skill points is to play a human. After all, that bonus feat at creation, and the bonus skill point every level, is one of the reasons so many games are human dominated. If you combine that with the bonus skill point option for taking a level in your favored class, then that's two extra skill points per level, on top of your class plus your Intelligence modifier.

But who needs a bonus skill point instead of a bonus hit point from your favored class? After all, if you're dead, it doesn't matter how skilled you are. If you're rolling for hit points, then that bonus one can be the literal difference between life and death.

Though some characters are squishier than others.

Don't worry, though, because Improved Initiative has you covered. What you need to do is take a look at the trait Finding Your Kin, and the feat Fast Learner. The trait lets you select a favored class, and gain +1 hit point as well as +1 skill point when you gain a new level. The feat does the same thing.

What's great about these two is that they both provide untyped bonuses, which are one of the only varieties that stack. So as long as you're playing a human with both of these items on your sheet, and you're taking levels in your favored class, you gain +2 hit points, and +3 skill points every level (that's with your human bonus). That's not bad.

It's also important to remember that half-elves count as human for any effect related to race, and that they can pick two favored classes. So adding Fast Learner on top of that will ensure you always get a bonus skill point and a bonus hit point. Finding Your Kin only allows you to pick a single class, so if you're going to make use of it, make sure your favored class is the one you have the most levels in.

EDIT: Due to arguments, I felt I should add an additional warning here. This trait, originally titled "Finding Helene" comes from the Legacy of Fire adventure path. This path was released during the awkward transition from DND 3.5 to Pathfinder, and it is also a campaign trait. For these reasons, many DMs may ban its use outside of that campaign, and when playing with the rules from that time.

Even Small Numbers Add Up

A +1 here, and a +1 there doesn't seem like very much, but those are the things powerful character concepts are built from. Ask yourself what you would do if you have 30 bonus skill points and 20 bonus hit points by level 10. How would you spend them? More to the point, would you be able to achieve your concept without those bonus resources to spend?

Not every character concept needs them. But if you have a concept that does need a slightly larger slice of the pie, well, I won't tell if you don't.

That's all for this week's Crunch topic. Hopefully there are some folks out there who find it helpful when they next sit down to build a character, and they want a few more skill points to throw around. If you'd like to support Improved Initiative so I can keep making posts just like this one, go to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page, and become a patron today. All it takes is $1 a month to buy my everlasting gratitude, and to get yourself some sweet swag as a thank you from me. Lastly, if you haven't followed me on Facebook, Tumblr, or Twitter yet, well, today's a great day to start!

Bored Playing Regular Humans? Try Racial Heritage on For Size

Humans are, without a doubt, one of the most common race choices in Pathfinder. It's hard to beat a bonus skill point and a bonus feat at first level. This is especially true in games where you're limited to the core races, where humans tend to win out more often than not. However, just because you might favor humans, there's no reason to play a vanilla human, especially in such a rich, varied world as Golarion where you can do (and be) almost anything you want.

Lord Bearington approves this message.

I mentioned a while back in How To Power Up Your Pathfinder Characters With The Eldritch Heritage Feats, that giving your character an unknown, or bizarre, heritage can lend you mechanical power, in addition to making your story that much more compelling. However, as I mentioned in that article, the Eldritch Heritage feats have both a feat tax (they require Skill Focus in the bloodline's skill), and they're only of use to character who benefit from a high Charisma. So if you're not a paladin, a swashbuckler, or one of the other charismatic classes, then you're going to find those feats aren't nearly as helpful for you, even if you love the flavor.

Racial Heritage (Advanced Player's Guide 168) doesn't have that kind of tax. All it requires is that your character is human (which means that half-elves and half-orcs qualify as well). This means you qualify as your race, and the humanoid race your heritage is linked to for the purposes of feats, traits, spell effects, magic items, etc.

What Good Does That Do You?

Well, that depends on what you're looking for. For example, say you're a first-level human, but you want to do a Tarzan concept as the human baby raised by orcs. Maybe you have a little orc blood in you, but not enough to matter. So, your first two feats are Racial Heritage, and Keen Scent. Then, when you take your traits, you might select Finish The Fight, which is typically for half-orcs raised by orcs, but fits right into your story.

Note: You may have to take the feat Additional Traits feat in order to gain the traits you want.

That is, of course, one of the tamer ways you could use this feat.

How ridiculous can this get?

Well, some of the possibilities can get pretty damn ridiculous.

For example, as I said in For A Change of Pace, Give Your Pathfinder PC Some Monster Feats, there are a lot of monster feats that require you to be a certain monstrous race. For example, you might take Racial Heritage (Storm Giant) in order to take the feat Storm Soul, which grants you immunity to electricity (and which is ideal for a Thor concept). You might, instead, take Racial Heritage (Stone Giant) in order to take the feat Stone Awareness, which grants you tremorsense out to 15 feet when in contact with earth or stone.

And if you have a DM that says you only gain the general subtype of a creature, you could take Racial Heritage (Giant), and take the feat Will of Giants, which makes you immune to enchantment effects that only target humanoids like charm person or hold person.

Giants are just one of the ridiculous options, though. You could combine goblin feats with a barbarian's fighting style, gaining benefits of the small race's tactics, while remaining a Medium-sized brute. Something like Burn! Burn! Burn!, which grants you bonuses on non-magical forms of damage would be ideal for a build that utilizes the Underground Chemist archetype, letting you tack a little more damage onto your alchemical attacks, over and above being able to deal sneak attack damage with them.

The combinations, while not endless, are pretty varied, and there is a lot of potential for discovering abilities you never knew you could bring to the table.

It's Not For Everyone

While a post like this shouldn't require this disclaimer, I'm putting it here because if I don't there will be brush fires all over the comments both here, and on social media. So, please, pay attention. And, if you want to, apply this to any other Crunch post I've made that focuses on potential combinations in any game.

Are you listening?

What I propose are only possible options. I'm going through the gigantic tool box that is the game system, and pointing out where little-known or less-used tools have been set aside, and showing that you can use them to achieve your goals. Can is, of course, different than saying you should use them, or that anyone who doesn't use them is somehow guilty of playing the game wrong. I'm just saying these are things you can do. If you like them, and want to use them in your game, more power to you. If you feel this doesn't fit your concept, or your gaming style, then don't. It's no skin off my nose. All I care about is that as many gamers know as many of their options as possible.

There now, with that said, thanks for checking out this week's Crunch post. As always, if you'd like to help support Improved Initiative, then I'd ask you to please go to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a patron. As little as $1 a month gives you some sweet swag, and it helps me keep writing posts that will (I hope) improve your game. Lastly, if you haven't done it already, why not follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter?

For A Change of Pace, Give Your Pathfinder PC Some Monster Feats

Anyone who's played Pathfinder knows that feats are often the key to an effective character build. Whether you want to smash through an enemy's spell resistance, cut foes in half with a single swing of your sword, or bullseye someone the wrong way through an arrow slit, feats are one of the biggest investments you're going to make.

Which is why it's so funny most players completely ignore the monster feats in the Bestiary.

The what feats, now?

If you've never been behind the screen, in the back of the Bestiary, there's a list of monster feats. These are feats that are typically available only to monsters; things like Awesome Blow, or Snatch which can give creatures the advantage in a fight. However, if you look at this list of monster feats, you'll notice something unique. Put simply, it isn't too hard for PCs to meet the prerequisites for a lot of these feats.

Who Needs Monster Feats?

Adventurers are a diverse lot, and some parties are made up entirely of characters who would be called monsters in most civilized places. The answer to the question, though, is that monster feats are often overlooked tools that can help you accomplish what you're trying to do with a little extra zing.

For example, say you were playing a half-orc with a bite attack (either through the Toothy trait, or by taking the feat Razortusk). You like being able to bite people, but you want more. So you decide to take the monster feat Improved Natural Attack to up your bite damage from 1d4 to 1d6. That's more like it. Then you decide to play a druid, and you take the feat Aspect of the Beast, which gives you 2 claw attacks. Now you have a 1d6 bite, and 2 claws that each do 1d4. But you want to beef them up, too, so you take Improved Natural Attack a second time, so all of them now do 1d6 damage. Now, if you want to fight with both weapons and natural attacks (something I covered in Natural Attacks Can Turn Your Pathfinder Character Into A Monster), you simply take Multiattack so that the penalty to your natural attacks is -2 instead of -5 per attack.

You now have an angry, orcish thresher. And we haven't even started statting out her bear.

Not pictured: The remains of the last encounter this smiling creature wiped.

But are monster feats good for more than just natural attacks? Well, what if your character gains a fly speed? Whether you have it as a racial benefit like a Wyveran, or you get it through a feat like the Bloodmarked Skinwalkers can, feats like Hover or Flyby Attack are great tricks to have up your sleeve if you want to keep the advantage against ground-borne targets. If you've ever said to yourself, "I want to build golems!" then you need to take the Craft Construct feat off the monster feats list.

It's not a small list, either, which is why I'd recommend giving it a long, hard look to see what tasty treats catch your eye, and open up entirely new concepts to you.

Some of My Favorite Monster Feats

I love the monster feats list, especially because it helps me create unique, unusual concepts. Some of my favorites off the list include:

- Scent of Fear: You automatically know the location of enemies within 30 feet of you, you gain bonuses to attacking creatures with a fear condition, and you gain a +2 on Will saves as long as someone shaken is nearby. Excellent feat for all those Intimidation lovers who have the Scent ability (Keen Scent feat will give it to a half-orc... just saying).

- Sow Terror: Anytime you win an opposed Stealth check by 5 or more, you can make subtle creakings and scratchings that worry away in someone's mind. If they fail a Will save, they're shaken for 1d4 rounds.

- Storm Soul: You gain immunity to electricity. This feat requires that you be considered a cloud or storm giant, both of which are humanoid races, and thus you could gain their subtype for prerequisites and effects with the feat Racial Heritage.

- Multiweapon Fighting: This is the feat that replaces two weapon fighting when you have more than two arms.

There are, of course, so many more monster feats that can supercharge a concept. Especially if your DM is allowing you a goblin, a tiefling, or other traditionally monstrous races like bugbears, hobgoblins, and even gnolls. There are no guarantees, but it can't hurt to look at some of those tools that occasionally slide to the back of your box, forgotten, but no less useful.

As always, thanks for stopping in to check out this week's Crunch Section update. If you'd like to help support Improved Initiative, then why not stop by The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a patron today? All it takes to keep the content you love coming is $1 a month. Also, if you haven't done so yet, why not follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter so you never miss an update?