Armorist
Armorist is one of the classes introduced in Spheres of Power, being a Low-Caster Full BAB class. Their primary mechanics revolve around the ability to summon equipment, bonding with certain pieces of their equipment and enhancing that equipment.
To a large extent, this makes the class a little strange and its enhancement abilities easily give it comparisons to a Magus's Arcane Pool. However, its ability to summon allows it to pull things completely from the ether. They can trade enhancement bonuses for special qualities since their leveling would put them with at least +6 enhancement, a no-no in Pathfinder's magic weapon and armor rules. As an Armorist levels up, they gain various class talents called Arsenal Tricks, which lets them bind with more pieces of equipment, obtaining animal companions, get extra feats, add more weapon abilities, and boost their equipment further. From there, the get Armor Training (like a Fighter), the ability to boost equipment for free, speedier summoning of equipment and can summon equipment for absolutely free.
Since they use summoned equipment rather than having to buy gear, taking the Oath of Poverty as an Armorist is a great way to get a nice big chunk of cheese (or a book) thrown at your head. However, one of the absolute most hilarious things an Armorist can do is take the Spirit Blade archetype, and become a sentient weapon.
As a mostly basic martial class, the various archetypes available usually provide alternate ways to create their gear.
- Blaster locks the Armorist into an arm cannon that's powered by the Destruction sphere. On top of new Arsenal Tricks that make use of this cannon (such as turning it into a turret or a shield), you also get bonus Destruction talents to improve the cannon's versatility.
- Bloodbinder is a Champion archetype, but they use blood sphere to summon and bind their equipment, gain Blacksmith talents, gain free Natural Armor and Toughness, and gain some useful bonus arsenal tricks including Stalwart and some Blood and Duelist talents; making them almost a Crimson Dancer-lite.
- Collector doesn't summon equipment so much as it does shove preferred pieces of equipment into a pocket dimension to then enhance and summon as they see fit. Amusingly, this does also allow the Collector to shoot out equipment from this pocket dimension like a cannon, a trick that can be improved on using arsenal tricks.
- Inventioneer is a Champion archetype that hybridizes the Armorist with the Technician, for all your steampunk power armour needs. You summon weapons and armor with technological upgrades and get access to technical insights, gadgets and martial spheres, at the cost of not being able to summon any piece of equipment for any possible situation.
- Lingchi Warrior lets them rain down entire fields of weapons on unsuspecting enemies before grabbing whatever you need to smack the enemy up. While this costs training in medium and heavy armor, they instead get a dodge bonus to AC.
- Living Weapon sacrifices the class' ability to summon armor and instead replaces it with the ability to summon magical armor using the Protection Sphere. This instead gives the Armorist the fighter's Weapon Training feature.
- Martial Armorist is the barebones Champion archetype, giving access to Spheres of Might without any hassle, meaning it can be used with any other archetypes as they see fit.
- Spirit Weapon, as mentioned above, lets them turn into a weapon that can possess its owner. It also happens to be a Champions archetype, letting you take martial talents on top of magical ones.
- Symbiotic Knight pretty much makes them Venom, using some living creature in place of armor and weapons. Wearing this creature also gains certain features from the Alteration sphere.
- Whitesmith sacrifices the cool summoning powers, but they're instead super-efficient with improving the aspects of their gear and that of their allies.
| The Third Party Classes of Pathfinder | |
|---|---|
| Psionics: | Psion - Psychic Warrior - Soulknife - Wilder Aegis - Cryptic - Dread - Marksman - Tactician - Vitalist |
| Path of War: | Stalker - Warder - Warlord - Harbinger - Mystic - Zealot |
| Akashic Mysteries: | Daevic - Eclipse - Guru - Nexus - Radiant - Rajah - Stormbound - Vizier - Zodiac |
| Spheres of Power: | Armorist - Elementalist - Eliciter - Fey Adept - Hedgewitch - Incanter Mageknight - Shifter - Soul Weaver - Symbiat - Thaumaturge - Wraith |
| Spheres of Might: | Armiger - Blacksmith - Commander - Conscript Savant - Scholar - Sentinel - Striker - Technician |
| Spheres of Guile: | Agent - Courser - Envoy - Mastermind - Professional |
| Champions of the Spheres: | Prodigy - Sage - Troubadour - Dragoon - Mountebank - Necros - Reaper Warden - Crimson Dancer |
| Pact Magic: | Pactmaker (formerly known as Medium) |