What kind of arcane archer do you want to be? Do you want to deal out as much damage as possible? Do you want to control the battlefield? Arcane archers can be as different from one another as any other class.
What are your goals? Do you want to cast level 9 spells? Do you want to get the capstone abilities of arcane archer? Do you want as high a base attack bonus as possible? Do you want a versatile skill base? All of these are possible as an arcane archer, but not all of them at once. You must chose what you want to do.
First off what is an arcane archer? An arcane archer is a full base attack, three quarter magical advancement prestige class that lets the character blend arcane spell casting and range attacks. As a prestige class, arcane archers needs to pick a base class, or often 2, to play as they level up to where they qualify for the class. The prerequisites for the arcane archer consist of:
+6 Base Attack Bonus
Ability to cast 1st level arcane spells.
The feats: Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, and Weapon Focus for their choice longbow or shortbow.
Before we decide on what base classes we want to be, lets take a look at the arcane archers special abilities and how they work with different character concepts.
"Enhance Arrows (Su): At 1st level, every nonmagical arrow an arcane archer nocks and lets fly becomes magical, gaining a +1 enhancement bonus"
This is just a precurser to the following abilities. As you will almost always have a bow with a +1 or better enhancement this will do nothing for your actual arrows. But they need the +1 to gain the next set of abilities.
"At 3rd level, every nonmagical arrow fired by an arcane archer gains one of the following elemental themed weapon qualities: flaming, frost, or shock.At level 3 all your arrows deal an extra 1d6 points of your choice of elemental damage. At 5th level you can shoot your arrows twice as far as normal. At 7th level a crit deals another 2d10 points of the chosen element. And at 9th level it becomes aligned dealing an extra 2d6 to opposing creatures.
At 5th level, every nonmagical arrow fired by an arcane archer gains the distance weapon quality.
At 7th level, every nonmagical arrow fired by an arcane archer gains one of the following elemental burst weapon qualities: flaming burst, icy burst, or shocking burst.
At 9th level, every nonmagical arrow fired by an arcane archer gains one of the following aligned weapon qualities: anarchic, axiomatic, holy, or unholy."
This means when shooting a White dragon every arrow is a flaming burst, distance, holy arrow. It will deal 1d8 + str bonus piercing damage, 1d6 fire damage, and 2d6 holy damage + any extra damage from feats/other class skills. The best way to benifite from this is to shoot as many arrows as possible by getting as high a base attack bonus as possible 16+ by the time you are done playing your character. If you go with a high base attack bonus class you can get 16 base attack bonus by level 17 as an arcane archer.
So, instead of fireing all your arrows at a target you can cast an area spell and shoot an arrow at your target. Note that this means you can use this abilty when you move unlike using a full round of attacks."Imbue Arrow (Sp): At 2nd level, an arcane archer gains the ability to place an area spell upon an arrow. When the arrow is fired, the spell's area is centered where the arrow lands, even if the spell could normally be centered only on the caster. This ability allows the archer to use the bow's range rather than the spell's range. A spell cast in this way uses its standard casting time and the arcane archer can fire the arrow as part of the casting. The arrow must be fired during the round that the casting is completed or the spell is wasted. If the arrow misses, the spell is wasted."
The first iconic area spell that comes to everyone's mind is fireball. Fireball is somewhat wasted as it can already be shot at 400 ft +40/caster level away. So a 5th level wizards (or equivilant) can shoot 600 feet away and not have to worry about attack rolls. Or an arcane archer can shoot 220 feet (this assumes distance and composite longbow) and have to meet an attack roll of 5 to hit a square. The arcane archer can shoot from further away up to 1100 feet away by taking a -8 penalty to attack (-2 for every extra 220 feet). There is a trade off here, sometimes arcane archers will want to take advantage, sometimes they will just cast fireball normally.
Fireball, evocation spells in general, is not where the strength of this ability lies. A spell like confusion has a range of 100-300 feet. Shooting a confusion arrow into a crowd of enemies will possibly cause them to start fighting each other. An arcane archer can use Imbue arrow to imbue Dispel Magic Greater into an arrow.
Arcane archer can hit with an arrow regardless of concealment. Getting off only 1 shot this round means arcane archers aren't going to use it often, but when they need it it's sure to come in handy."Seeker Arrow (Sp): At 4th level, an arcane archer can launch an arrow at a target known to him within range, and the arrow travels to the target, even around corners. Only an unavoidable obstacle or the limit of the arrow's range prevents the arrow's flight. This ability negates cover and concealment modifiers, but otherwise the attack is rolled normally. Using this ability is a standard action (and shooting the arrow is part of the action). An arcane archer can use this ability once per day at 4th level, and one additional time per day for every two levels beyond 4th, to a maximum of four times per day at 10th level."
With this an archer can shoot through walls and ignores armor and shields. Against it's not a skill to be used often, but there are situations where it will be quite useful."Phase Arrow (Sp): At 6th level, an arcane archer can launch an arrow once per day at a target known to him within range, and the arrow travels to the target in a straight path, passing through any nonmagical barrier or wall in its way. (Any magical barrier stops the arrow.) This ability negates cover, concealment, armor, and shield modifiers, but otherwise the attack is rolled normally. Using this ability is a standard action (and shooting the arrow is part of the action). An arcane archer can use this ability once per day at 6th level, and one additional time per day for every two levels beyond 6th, to a maximum of three times per day at 10th level."
Shooting 8-10 arrows in a round is great, good source of widespread AoE damage. I kind of makes me sad that it can not be used with any of the other arcane archer abilities or shoot multiple arrows at each target with it. I don't see this being used often."Hail of Arrows (Sp): In lieu of his regular attacks, once per day an arcane archer of 8th level or higher can fire an arrow at each and every target within range, to a maximum of one target for every arcane archer level she has earned. Each attack uses the archer's primary attack bonus, and each enemy may only be targeted by a single arrow."
"Arrow of Death (Sp): At 10th level, an arcane archer can create a special type of slaying arrow that forces the target, if damaged by the arrow's attack, to make a Fortitude save or be slain immediately. The DC of this save is equal to 20 + the arcane archer's Charisma modifier. It takes 1 day to make a slaying arrow, and the arrow only functions for the arcane archer who created it. The slaying arrow lasts no longer than 1 year, and the archer can only have one such arrow in existence at a time."I'm not a huge fan of save or die effects, they really turn what could be an epic fight into a cake walk. But the effect is powerful. Make sure to use Phase Arrow with this arrow.
Now that we have looked at the special abilities of the arcane archer we must decide what base class(es) we want to play before becoming an arcane archer. These core classes are important as they will add other special abilities and flavor to our arcane archers. Also after leveling in the arcane archer class we will possibly still need a few more levels in another class before we finish our careers.
Assuming an arcane archer wants to get into the class early enough to go 10 levels into Arcane Archer, There are 3 main ways to start out to become an arcane archer.
Option 1: Bard
Taking full 8 levels of bard will give you the 6 base attack bonus needed. This lets the arcane archer continue gaining spells as if they only missed 3 levels of bard or end up as a 17th level casting bard at 20. As such they will have the highest level of spell casting a bard can achieve (level 6). As a level 8 bard they have +2 to attacks and damage bonuses to all member of their party, Inspire competence +3, suggestion, and dirge of doom. Bards have a high amount of skill points and many class skills. Their abilities are all charisma based, so a bard arcane archer is likely to be the "face" of the party with high social skills. Arcane archers who want to use a lot of trick spells like confusion or illusions, and assist the party will chose to start out as a bard.
-possible archetype arcane duelist
Option 2: Magus
Again 8 levels in magus will get the 6 base attack needed to become an arcane archer. Spellstrike will let the Magus cast spells through his weapon when he needs to switch to a melee weapon. Arcane Pool allows a magus to enchant his weapon similarly to what an arcane archer does. And spell combat will let him cast and attack in the same round (check with your DM to get their interpretation on this ability). They also gain a bonus feat. Arcane archers who want to cast more damaging spells will start out as a magus.
-Possible archetype Myrmidarch
Option 3: the 2/5 option
2 levels of a spell casting class and 5 levels of a full base attack bonus class.
Arcane spell casters: (2 levels)
- Sorcerer- Sorcerers cast their spells spontaneously. They also have various bloodline abilities. They cast spells based on charisma meaning the save on slaying arrow will be higher and they can possibly be the "face" of the party
- Wizard- Wizards prepare their spells ahead of time. they get spell level earlier than the sorcerer. They are intelligence based meaning they will have more skill points to move around than a sorcerer.
- Witch- The witch is another intelligence based prepared caster. Witch has a signature of Hexes that while they give some extra options, the save for them will always be 12+int. as an arcane archer will only take 2 levels of the base spell casting class.
No option is necessarily better than another. Ask yourself if you want to cast spontaneously or prepair and if you want any special abilities like hex or a bloodline. Do you want an arcane bond or familiar?
Full attack bonus classes: (5 levels)
- Fighter-
A fighter will get 3 bonus feats, weapon training, and armor training. Weapon training will be with bows, granting you +1 damage and attack. Archers need many feats and the 3 bonus feats will let you get a jump start on collecting them. The armor training lets you use better armor, but as there is arcane spell failure on good armor you are likely to shun armor anyway. And they have a +1 against fear.
- Archer (fighter archetype)-
Same as fighter trading armor training for trick shot, and attempt to disarm, feint, or sunder from 30 feet away at a -4 penalty. Also they gain +2 perception and increases bow range by 10 feet instead of save to fear.
-Barbarian-
A barbarian can move at +10 feet. They also gain good melee abilities in case they need to drop their bow when bad guys get in close, like Rage and uncanny dodge.
-Paladin-
Paladin's can smite 2 targets per day dealing 5-10 extra damage per hit, while getting their charisma added to their attacks. They gain charisma to their saves. They can use lay on hands to heal 2d6 damage 2 times per day. Also has 1st level divine spells. They can also give their weapon a +1 enhancement or the equivalent for 5 rounds per day.
-Ranger-
A ranger gets favored enemy. This will give the arcane archer a +4 to attacks and damage against 1 target type, and +2 against a second favored enemy. They get 1 bonus feat. They can share their favored enemy with an ally for rounds = to their wisdom modifier. Rangers also gain 1st level divine spells.
I would chose archer as my first pick due to the +1 to damage/attacks and the extra feats. Paladin would be my second for their ability to smite, bonuses to saves and the ability to use cure wands when outside of combat.
Once the arcane archer who starts out with the 2/5 option is done leveling in the arcane archer class, they will finish their progression by taking a 4th class, eldritch knight. This way they can continue their full base attack bonus and almost full spell casting classes.
Thanks for reading, join me next time when I cover the Bard Arcane Archer in depth.
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