How to Weaponize Your Intimidate Check in Pathfinder

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All right, obligatory reminder that this blog pretty much runs off your support aside, let's pop the hood and get into the gears for this week's crunch build.

The Bruiser: Weaponizing Your Intimidate Check

Intimidate is one of the most commonly used social skills in Pathfinder. If there's a guard getting in your way, or a merchant who's trying to screw you on a deal, you make a veiled (or not so veiled) threat to get them to reconsider their actions. During combat you can make an intimidate check to demoralize an enemy, leaving them shaken if you can beat a DC equal to 10 + the enemy's hit dice + the enemy's wisdom modifier. Not only that, but the duration of the shaken condition goes up by 1 round for every 5 by which you beat the enemy's DC.

Bullets are expensive. Tell me, what's your life worth?

I've talked about using intimidate in combat before with what I titled The Bullyboy build. That build was fairly rogue-centric, as it used your intimidate check to render enemies flat-footed in order to let you get your sneak attack more readily. While there are some very good suggestions and feats in there, The Bruiser does something a little different; it allows you to create fear on a level we typically reserve only for characters like Batman.

So What's The Trick?

It all starts with the humble feat Enforcer. Found on page 159 of the Advanced Player's Guide, this feat simply says that whenever you hit someone and deal non-lethal damage, you can make an intimidate check as a free action. If your check is successful, the enemy is shaken for a number of rounds equal to the damage dealt. On a critical hit they're frightened for one round, and then shaken for a number of rounds equal to the damage dealt.

That's not a bad start, eh? Say you have a Strength modifier of +3, you're swinging two handed, and you roll minimum damage. That's still a minimum of 5 rounds the enemy's shaken.

Run faster than my horse, and you may yet see another day.

Here's where the numbers get crunchy. You need to have a class that receives sneak attack as a feature. You then take the feats Sap Adept and Sap Master from page 116 of Ultimate Combat. The first feat states that when you deal non-lethal sneak attack damage with a bludgeoning weapon that you add a bonus to the dice equal to twice the number of sneak attack dice you rolled. The second states that when you deal non-lethal sneak attack damage to a flat-footed opponent that you roll the sneak attack damage twice, and total it. Add in the Bludgeoner feat, found on page 90 of Ultimate Combat, which allows you to deal non-lethal damage with a bludgeoning weapon at no penalty, and you've got a nasty trick up your sleeve.

But there's a cherry to go on top of this sundae!

The Thug archetype for the rogue automatically adds on 1 more round of shaken to anyone demoralized by your intimidate checks. Not only that, but anyone who is shaken for 5 rounds or more you can just decide to make frightened for 1 round instead.

Given the sheer number of rounds you can tack on, it's a safe bet your enemies are going to spend more time running out of the fight than they'll spend getting in your way.

EDIT: The feat Cornugon Smash (From Cheliax: Empire of Devils), allows you to make an intimidate check as a free action whenever you strike an enemy with an attack modified by the Power Attack feat. So if you really want to live up to the bruiser archetype, all you need is Power Attack, and 6 ranks of intimidate to snatch this feat.

You could also combine this with the monster feat Hurtful (Monster Codex). Hurtful says that when you intimidate a creature within your melee reach in combat that you may make a free attack on them as a swift action. If the attack misses, though, then the shaken status is removed from the creature. Useful, but only if you don't need your swift or immediate actions for other class abilities.

Tweaking The Engine

You're going to have a lot of feats leftover, especially if you decide to play a rogue/fighter combination who uses an unpleasant disposition to browbeat enemies. That's why it might be a good idea to also use the Shatter Defenses feat, found on page 133 of the Core Rulebook, to render enemies flat-footed against your incoming attacks. Also, given the sheer number of rounds you could leave enemies shaken for, Shatter Defenses is going to be sure you get your sneak attack in for pretty much the rest of the fight (it is a one-two punch, though. You hit a shaken enemy once, and it's flat-footed against you till the end of your next turn. All the more reason for those fighter levels to give you a higher bab, and more attacks).

Just remember, some enemies are too dumb to intimidate.

The Bruiser, combined with The Bullyboy, will give you a lot of options in average combat for using your intimidate skill to its best, possible effect. However, it's important to remember that there are a lot of enemies in the game that you simply cannot intimidate. Mindless undead, plants, constructs, creatures immune to mind effects, paladins, all of these and more will simply not be affected by your intimidate checks. Additionally, because of extremely high hit dice, many big bosses will simply be too high for you to effect unless you have geared your intimidate score to a ridiculous level. That's why it's important to have a backup plan in place so that when you can't brutalize your foes, you can still contribute to the fight.

That's all for this week! I hope you found this little guide to be of use, and that you hand it off to all your friends around the table. If you'd like to get more updates from Improved Initiative, just plug your email into the box on the right, or follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter.

The Bullyboy

Normally I end every article with a request for readers to help support Improved Initiative by spreading links to the articles here, and by remembering all of our funding comes from Google AdSense. This week I thought I'd try putting that at the top to see if more people saw it.

Now without further ado let us present this week's crunchy little build, The Bullyboy.

He said "what" again.

When it's time to roll initiative most skill checks go right out the window. Except for acrobatics to avoid attacks of opportunity, or the occasional bluff check to feint or hide, most players focus on swinging swords or slinging spells. The Bullyboy though is a character who uses personality like a hammer, leaving enemies unsure of themselves and flat-footed against incoming assaults.

Did You Say Flat-Footed?

I heard all the rogues in the audience squirming in their seats. Yes, the ultimate goal of the Bullyboy is to render as many enemies as possible flat-footed against your attacks. This makes the rogue a natural choice, but spellcasters and gunslingers (who use touch attacks almost exclusively) might find this strategy useful as well. This is especially true for multiclass mongrels like fighter/rogues, barbarian/rogues, etc.

What's The Trick?

The feat you're building up to is Shatter Defenses (Core Rulebook 133). It requires the character to have Weapon Focus (Core Rulebook 136), Dazzling Display (Core Rulebook 120), a base attack bonus of +6, and proficiency with the weapon you're wielding.

The way Shatter Defenses works is that any opponent you hit who is shaken, frightened, or panicked is considered flat-footed against you until the end of your next turn. In case you were wondering yes, if you have two attacks that means your enemy is flat-footed against your second attack as well as your entire next round. Take note that you don't have to use the weapon for which you have Weapon Focus, but if you took the feat for a +1 to hit, why not use it?

Crank Your Intimidate

The Bullyboy has a pretty simple, two-round setup. The first round you make your enemies afraid of you. The next round, while they're still shaken, frightened, or panicked, you attack. Once you land even a single hit on a scared enemy, regardless of your weapon, you've got an entire round where that target is flat-footed. That means a lower armor class (most times), and an inability to take attacks of opportunity against you. Unless you've got mind-affecting magic or a class ability that lets you cause a fear effect though, you're going to have to roll your intimidate check. For that roll you're aiming to get higher than the target's hit dice+Wis modifier+10. Not an easy task.

Traits

Your focus on fear should start at character creation. You get to pick two traits, and one of those should be a trait that gives you a +1 on intimidate, and which makes intimidate a class skill for you. Bully is the most popular, but others like Viking Blood have the same affect for characters that want a different background.

Recommended Feats

-Dazzling Display: This feat is required for the build to work, but it's also the easiest way to demoralize all enemies within 30 feet of you. Generally speaking, unless you're only fighting a single enemy, this is going to be the feat you lead off combat with.
-Skill Focus (Core Rulebook 134): This feat gives you a +3 on a skill, and a +6 when you have more than 10 ranks in it. That's a good place to start (hint: half-elves get this feat for free at creation).
-Intimidating Prowess (Core Rulebook 128): This feat allows you to add your Strength and Charisma modifiers both to the die roll, which is a big bonus for characters playing bruisers who might not be comfortable putting a really big stat in Charisma.
- Gory Finish (Ultimate Combat 102): This feat allows you to take an attack action (a standard action) at your highest base attack bonus. If you knock your enemy into negatives you can take a swift action to intimidate all enemies who saw and heard what you did within 30 feet. Not a necessary feat, but it is a quick and dirty way to kill two birds with one stone.
- Persuasive (Core Rulebook 131): This feat adds a +2 to your Intimidate and Diplomacy checks. If you have more than 10 ranks in these skills, it adds a +4.
- Enforcer (Advanced Player's Guide): This feat allows you to make an Intimidate check any time you deal subdual damage to an enemy with a melee weapon, and it leaves them shaken for a number of rounds equal to the damage dealt if the intimidate is successful. Best when used with high-damage weapons.

Classes and Abilities

There are a lot of class combinations that can be used to make the Bullyboy work. Some of them are more effective than others though. Here are a couple of suggestions.

Barbarian
This is the obvious choice for the bullyboy. Barbarians are big, mean, uncouth, and often naturally thuggish when it comes to battlefield tactics. They also reach the +6 base attack bonus quite quickly. With the increase to Strength provided by Rage providing a slight boost to those who take Intimidating Prowess, and the benefits of Rage Powers like Intimidating Glare (Core Rulebook 33) which leaves an opponent shaken for a number of rounds equal to 1d4+1 per every 5 by which the barbarian exceeded the check by, they're a natural fit.

Rogue
Rogues are masters of misdirection and nuanced untruth, but the best variant fit for the Bullyboy is the Thug (Advanced Players Guide). The Thug starts off strong right out of the gate with its first-level ability, Frightening. This automatically increases the duration of any shaken effect caused by the Thug by 1 round, meaning that enemies are shaken for a minimum of 2 rounds with a successful intimidate. Additionally, if the target is shaken for 4 or more rounds, the player can upgrade the effect to frightened. The rogue trick Strong Impression grants the character the feat Intimidating Prowess.

Other Classes
Other classes can have the Bullyboy's build applied to them. Sorcerers, for instance, have high charisma in addition to spells that cause fear. Fighters willing to take advantage of psychological warfare are another option. Alchemists who specialize in the feral mutagen and the beastly bonuses it offers might like to soften their opponents up mentally. Even gunslingers, whose strange, deadly weapons are a terror all by themselves (and who at higher levels can use abilities like Menacing Shot to cause fear) might find some use out of this build. Remember though, just because you can doesn't mean you should.

Keep The End Goal in Mind

As with any other build trick, the important thing with the Bullyboy is not to lose sight of the end goal; namely to knock enemies flat-footed after the first round of combat and to keep them flat-footed (in addition to shaken) for as long as possible. It is just as important to ask yourself what you're going to do once your enemies are where you want them, however.

The most obvious answer is to sneak attack them. When combined with the Thug's ability, sneak attacking any intimidated opponent is a slam dunk. That's not the only benefit of having an enemy flat-footed though. It means their armor class goes down significantly, and if one is using a touch attack from spells or firearms, then the player is likely aiming for a 10+deflection modifiers. It also means the enemy's Combat Maneuver Defense goes down, which is a blessing for those who use maneuvers to control an enemy's effectiveness. That said, you need to look at what you can do, and what that ability means in terms of effectiveness on the battlefield.

Lastly, remember that for every trick there's a counter. Constructs, undead, mindless creatures, demons, devils, paladins, and others are all immune to fear of any sort. If you find yourself fighting these creatures then you're going to have to dig deeper into your bag of tricks, because scaring them off simply is not an option for you.

Don't Forget to Roleplay

When you get too caught up in numbers it's easy to forget you still have to roleplay. So you've got to ask yourself one question; how are you intimidating?

There's a multitude of ways to do it. Do you draw your rapier and make an elaborate bow which shows off your extreme skill with the razor-sharp steel? Do you sock the head of your mace into your open palm, idly looking at which of your enemies is getting his skull cracked first? Do you smile beatifically and explain who you're going to kill and in what order? Or do you give a long speech of all the fiends who came before this sorry group of adversaries, and who ended their lives stretched dead at your feet? Ask yourself how your character is intimidating, and in what way, before you throw that die. Who knows, if you put in a good performance your storyteller might even give you a roleplaying bonus on the attempt.


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