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Feb
25th
2018

The Fifth Wheel · 9:31pm Feb 25th, 2018

It's been a while, hasn't it? Sorry for being 100% worthless for like a month, but I've got at least 3 minutes of diversion here. Yup, it's time again. Today I'll be vicariously living through the best pony ever: Pinkie Pie.



Earth Hors gets: +2 con, +2 wis, -2 dex. They get endurance, and a +2 on saves vs poison, spells, and SLAs. Bonus Feat, like a human(because you are one if you just go through the right mirror.) The dex hurts for pinkie, but we've got a way of fixing that. It would be nice if that bonus was charisma, but I guess Ponyfinder ponies aren't as cute and personable as Ponies, My Little. Bonus: you are literally fae. As in a faerie.

So, I know this is gonna cause a lot of disagreement, but I'll go out on a limb and say that Pinkie Pie is a bard. I know, I know, it's a bit off the wall, but it kinda feels right, you know?

While rummaging around trying to find some good classes to use for [REDACTED], I ran across the archetype that made me realize I could probably actually make a Pinkie Pie build: the Court Fool. Yes, it's a bard. And yes, it fits better than pure bard. It's not the best fit, mind. But it's probably the best published class fit. Or at least best fit from Paizo, DDS, or DSP.

Anyway. The court fool drops bardic knowledge (which sucks, because Pinkie Pie Knows Things,) but int return, it gets Baffoonery. Yes, a mechanic named Baffoonery. Mechanically it adds 1/2 your level to Acrobatics, Bluff, Climb, and Disguise. So we're already ready to dress as bale of hay and somehow get to the top of very tall cliffs before Rainbow can. It would only be better if there were some way to use dancing instead of actual acrobatics. Oh wait, there is.

To be fair, the opposite would be better, as a bard can use versatile performance (Dance) to cover Fly and Acrobatics, but from what James Jacobs has said about Versatile Performance, you should still get to add 1/2 your level to perform dance checks that are subbing out for acrobatics. So it's not a useless ability. Probably, check with your GM.

The Fool still gets versatile performance. VP lets you use perform in place of two other skills. Basically, you don't need ranks in those skills and you use charisma instead of whatever for them. It's a bard mainstay and I only wish you could get them earlier. So I'd say, Dance at level 2(to cover acrobatics and fly--this fixes the -2 dex horseshit,) Sing at 6 (bluff & sense motive,) and Percussion (handle animal, intimidate) at 10. For 14 and 18 just look at advanced versatile performance and pick something from that list. Getting Diplomacy or UMD on another perform is cool. The martial performance is good if you use those weapons, but the options for those three groups aren't great. I guess Sing's natural weapons work, since Earth Ponies can get hoof attacks. But meh, you lack the feats for that.

The fool swaps out countersong (which is utter shit) for a tumbling version of the same ability, but verses confusion and fascinate. If you have good saves, I guess you can prevent Confusion from creating a TPK, but it's still super niche. A lot more thematic though. The also swap inspire competence (a minor loss) for the ability to cheer her friends up and let them ignore fatigued and shaken conditions. While Inspire Courage helps keep fear effects from happening in the first place, this lets you basically ignore the least of them AND convince your friend they aren't tired. Sadly, it never escalated to frightened or exhausted and has no feat support, so it won't scale in relevance as time goes on. Still, it's a cool thematic ability that kinda sorta fits Pinkie. And things that kinda sorta fit actually really do fit. It's meta. I'm not sorry.

Of the other bardic songs, Inspire Courage (via Sing), Inspire Greatness (there is no perform: party why?,) and Inspire Heroics all fit the whole friendship theme. Distraction and Fascinate work okay for her too. Dirge of Doom, Frightening Tune, and Deadly performance can jump off a cliff. I wish it were easy to trade them out. Nothing first party offers itself, so just, don't use them without applying a flat iron to your mane first.

The last thing the Fool does is drop Lore Master (ouch. Pinkie does NOT just know things now :pinkiesad2:) for the ability to take 10 on acrobatics and bluff and to make bluff checks to create diversions (to allow stealth) as a swift action. This sucks. This sucks ass. The Dervish Sikke item is amazing for bards and allows you to take 10 on all perform checks. With what I outlined above, that's take 10 on Sing, Dance, Drums, Acrobatics, Fly, Bluff, Sense Motive, Handle Animal, and Intimidate. And you're buying this item anyway. This does give you a few auto-20s every day, but seriously, Lore Master is so much better.

Everything else about the fool is per-normal for bards. It's all pretty standard stuff. Jack of All Trades does mean you eventually can become competent at any skill, but the loss of Inspire Competence means that you're never gonna be "level appropriate" for any of those. I suggest looking to aid-another anyone in your party who does do those skills (~it was under E~.)

Now, as is the norm for these posts, I take all of Pathfinder/D&D's vancian magic history, shred it, and use it as ammo for the party cannon. We're once again, going with Spheres of Power. The Sphere Bard is a boring conversion, but it's also simple. Mid-Caster means saves are going to suffer at high levels, but we still get 17 talents total.

Wait, what? Pinkie Pie with literal magic? WTF? Calm your crotchtits, it works.

See, the cool thing about spheres is you can easily fluff something the way you want, and then stick mechanical bits into it until it works right. So for Pinkie's casting tradition, we're not taking any of the staples. Not verbal, somatic, or even display drawbacks. Nothing she does *looks* like magic. It's all internal. That isn't to say we can't have drawbacks. Depending on your feelings, Emotional, Coy, and Extended all work very well. Pinkie's magic isn't a combat-scale thing. It's going to mostly draw from Divination and be hour/level buffs. So any or all of those could work for Ponka.

Let's start with talents that are not Pinkie Sense. Warp. Yeah, I know I said stuff about it not being flashy magic, but Pinkie has the Loony Tunes/Slasher Villain ability to walkpronk and still get ahead of you. Warp does that. There isn't yet a Warp handbook, so there's not a ton of talents. From warp, you're looking at getting Extra Dimensional Space to store 10 lbs/level of stuff in your mane and tail. Yes, you have a mechanical hammer space. Other talents you want include Unseeing Teleport and maybe Distant Teleport. That last one is iffy. For Warp Drawbacks, you're definitely taking Personal Warp. If your GM lets you, the basically apply Coy Caster as a Warp-only drawback to turn it from general to Sphere Specific works really well. If not, then take the general drawback. You can't use magic while someone is looking. It keeps with the whole "Pinkie is not a unicorn" thing.

Everything else is pretty much going into Divination. Base sphere gives you detect magic and read magic. BLEH. So unthematic. Take the Hidden Magic drawback to drop those abilities and pick up one of the talents listed below. I'm not gonna link each one, but will give a quick blurb on why I like them for Pinkie.

  • Augury - This is a on-command Pinkie Sense. Will this next thing you or somepony else does result in good, bad, or mixed results? It's probably the first ability you want.
  • Detect Secrets - It adds back in a bit of the narrative power losing lore master cost us. You just finding secret, hidden things.
  • Divine Future - Literally seeing the future. More Pinkie Sense stuff.
  • Divine information - Now we're talking. Reroll a failed knowledge check and add a bonus to it. Pinkie can spout off the answer too, even if it costs her spell points.
  • Foreshadow - This is a sense. It lasts 1 hour/level. You get some defensive buffs because you're always vaguely aware of the future. Either this or Augury is your first power. Take the other after you get extra dimensional storage. You can have all 3 by second level, or first if you spend a feat on Extra Magic Talent. It's probably worth it.
  • Prescience - Another sense, another entry into Pinkie Sense. This doesn't fit as thematically because it's offensive. You have Inspire Courage, but if you want some way to bend Pinkie Sense to combat, this helps a lot. Bonus to hit and Combat Maneuvers.
  • Scent - Another sense. It's just kinda funny. Mechanically, being able to detect hidden things around you kinda plays into Pinkie Sense, but not really. It's not needed, but I laughed to imagine Ponkers the bard following tracks with scent.
  • True Sight - See through all illusions. This, in SOP, includes invisibility. It's not a super show-reinforced talent, but it's good and stays within the "I have ESP" theme I'm doing here.
  • Dowsing - This is a very powerful (in theroy) locating magic. Better if you get the range up, but being able to find and eye patch, soccer ball, or hidden eldritch abomination is pretty cool
  • See Hazard - Get free checks to see traps. Pinkie Sense talent.
  • Object reading - Okay, okay. I know. Not at all Pinkie. Except, nothing says you can't use Extended Casting and fluff this as you licking/rolling the object around in your mouth and tasting it to gain knowledge about it's history. Magic horseshoe? Tastes like Applejack's. She got it in 3rd grade. Etc. The spell says "or every 1 minute you divine the object you gain one additional piece of information found in the following order: Last owner’s race, last owner’s gender, last owner’s age, last owner’s alignment, how the last owner lost or gained the object. Upon learning this last piece of information, you may spend a spell point, if you do you begin to learn information on the owner before the last at the same rate in the same order. Should object reading be interrupted for 2 or more consecutive rounds, you must start again at the beginning unless you spend 1 spell point per past owner." So you can spend tens of minutes chewing on an ancient artifact to learn it's history. While she's never done it, it seems like the kinda thing she would do. You know?

There's also several advanced talents that could be fun, if your GM even allows them.

Discern Location is super powerful and worthy of a capstone spell. With the right trait you can qualify at 18th level instead of 20. This is narrative fiat. Unless mind blank, the unplottable (heh) protection talent, or a literal god say no, you know where someone you've seen or have something they used to have is. You know where anything you've ever touched is. It says fuck you to a whole category of annoying fetch quests.

Expansive Vision gives all your senses medium range. This is pretty good if you can swing it. Having Pinkie Sense with wider area makes you main way of not dying work better.

If you want to drop the "can only teleport when no one's watching" The Portal talent lets you show Star Swirl how it's done. Create Demiplane lets you make your own universe and create portals to it. I'll just say it: CHS.

To round off the magic section, I'll just mention that Creation can give you ability to create anvils and drop them on people and that Dark lets you paint a spot of shadow on a wall, then walk through the tunnel you just made or drop a spot of darkness under someone, and then they fall in the pit you just made. It's basically got some real portal hole/loony tunes powers. The base abilities aren't too thematic. With creation you can make things, then pull them out of your saddlebags. Pretty neat if you can find a way to overcome the limitations of creation. Dark just has no good base Pinkie abilities. It's sad, because the hole-in-the-wall and -floor abilities are funny. But you can maybe come up with a Pinkie-AU that explains why she can make bubbles of inky blackness or whatever.

This is getting long? How is this new(ish) format where I actually explain shit working?

So bards have yet another cool thing they can do/get. Bardic Masterpieces. These can take the place of a spell known or be taken as a feat. Spheres are worth more than spells known, so a decent GM should let you take them in place of spheres too. But you don't get a ton of those, so it's probably better to spend feats on them.

Cat-Step Dance. It's preemptive featherfall. Probably not worth taking, but if you DO just want to jump off of high places or worry that your pegasus companion is gonna drop you, this might have a use.

Clamor of the Heavens. Blind and Deafen evil creatures. Use those drums for good. Only works if you're pulling in EQG canon and combining it with a more at-will rainbow laser, but it does do that job pretty amazingly. I wish there were teamwork feats to support this talent. It would be bad ass.

Dance of 23 Steps. Defensive stuff! For extra cheese, attack first and then, as a free action, begin this dance. You'll only suffer the to-hit penalty for AoOs! Goes great with crackers.

Dance of Kindled Desires

Oh my.

I need a few minutes.

House of Imaginary Walls. Requires a skill you don't otherwise need. But DAMN! You mime out walls of force. YOU MIME OUT WALLS OF FORCE! Trapped in a box? I'm not trapped in a box, silly. You're tapped in a box.

Blah Blah. Call this one Faust's bargain and ignore the clumsy real title. Your music summons demons and angels and shit. If someone is going to summon an otherworldly horror with a song about cream pies, it's going to be Pinkie. Also, sorry for the cream pie joke. I'm still stuck on that last picture.

Under no circumstances should you take Lullaby of Ember the Ancient. One, calling Ember old is rude, two, if Pinkie could magic people to sleep, that Pound and Pumpkin episode wouldn't have happened.

Pagaent of the Peacock. yet another way for Ponkers to pick something to just know. This is a stupidly powerful ability. You basically can fake any int based skill. From appraise to knowledges to spellcraft. You DANCE AND FROLIC AND SUDDENLY KNOW STUFF. I can't even. It's an amazing power in Pathfinder and it makes no sense and that makes it make perfect sense for Pinkie.

Rat Quadrille. The name sucks. But you make a catchy tune your victims can't get out of their head and it distracts them. Yes, ear worm the magical song. Do I even need to explain this?

Wow. More of those were relevant than I thought.

Feats. We're almost done.

Now, a particular bit of Pre-reader canon we've held since 2011, is that Pinkie Pie is actually an alicorn. Her horn is just ingrown and her wings are at right angles to everything. If that's your taste then getting Skill Focus(Diplomacy), Eldritch Heritage and the Improved version for the 3rd level power of the Unification Pony Bloodline can grant you wings and a horn. The 9th level ability is great too, giving you 3 more sphere talents basically. The rest (including the shit-tacular first level ability) can be ignored.

Master Performer and Grand Master Performer are always good for a bard. Flagbearer if you wanna go full cheerleader is another possibility. The standard feats (imp. initiative, weapon focus, etc) are all going to serve well, but your best feat is probably Extra Magical Talent. More talents = more spheres = more pinkie sense.

Finally, skills. You get 6 + int. You need 3 perform (4, if you want to mime walls of force,) probably diplomacy (ie: friendship,) and maybe stealth. You also want perception and possibly a few ranks in disguise. Until your versatile performance covers them, you'll want bluff and sense motive too. retraining should happen automatically with VP, but it doesn't. Plan accordingly.

Welp, that was exhausting and took far longer than it should have. I hope you guys enjoyed it. I've got ideas for Twilight Sparkle and a real Rainbow Dash floating around in my head, but I also have ideas for stories there too. Expect either one when/if it lands. Until next time, have fun :pinkiecrazy:

Comments ( 4 )

I'm so using this.
Reminds me of when I played Fallout Equestria.
Unicorns get three additional stats; Versatility, Strain, and Potency.
Versatility is (INT/2)
Potency is (END/2)
Strain is... V+P*10 iirc.
There's a Trait that allows you to dump your Versatility points directly into Potency, and another Trait that allows you to learn one spell but at a rank higher than Expert/Master.
One of the cheeses built with this was Poison Ivy, who used an airgun loaded with seeds and a supercharged Growth spell to deal literally millions of hitpoints worth of damage every round.
My cheese built with it was Razzle Dazzle, who used Want It, Need It. Because of her stats it was impossible to save against and affected all targets with line of sight.

That isn't even counting Cauterize Wound the sexy Hellhound nurse or Cinnamon Sugar the hellhound-earth pony hybrid Psycho (as in BL's Krieg) who could sprint 400 yards a round (6 seconds) and deal over 500 damage guaranteed minimum per round.

4924986
If you go further off the deep end, there's several feats in DSP's Bloodforged supplement that are amazing for Fay. One lets you use Int or Cha instead of Con to fort saves. One let's you use Wis or Cha instead of Con to bonus HP/HD. There's another two that allow flight. But those first two are f*cking amazing for a cha-based build.

I need to finish twiggles' build

4925127
I don't think it gets much more broken than Cinnamon Sugar. She's 100% legal beagle and can buck a tank about forty feet. And once killed an apartment building with a Charge action.

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