Magic Beyond Magic:

Iluzry’s Guide to the Pathfinder 1e Arcanist

Introduction
Heyo Internet, my name is Iluzry or Polypan if you’ve seen me around! I am not what one would
call a veteran, I don’t think, but I’ve been playing this game for a longer time! This guide, and the
ones following it are all a part of my overall goal to give people more up to date content for
pathfinder players to use, because I love the game and I want to help everyone become the
ungodly kaiju monster of their DM’s dreams/nightmares.

To See My List of Guides, Go Here

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Table of Contents
Introduction
Table of Contents
Rating System
Class Overview
The Chassis
Class Features
Roles
Ability Scores
Races
(6/5) Races
(5/5) Races
(4/5) Races
(3/5) Races
(2/5) Races
(1/5) Races
Arcane Exploits and Greater Exploits
Arcane Exploits
Base Exploits
Outer Rift Exploits
Greater Exploits
Archetypes
(4/5) Aeromancer [Lord of Storms]
(1/5) Blade Adept [Wizard with Knife]
(4/5) Blood Arcanist [The Sorcerers Apprentice]
(5/5) Brown-Fur Transmuter [72 Heavenly Transformation Technique]
(4/5) Harrowed Society Student [Tarot Gambling]
(4/5) Magaambyan Initiate [Arboreal Arcana]
(5/5) Occultist [MtG:Arena]
(4.5/5) School Savant [Wizard++]
Multiclassing
(4/5) Inspired Blade Swashbuckler [1 Lvl] (Blade Adept Only)
(5/5) Crossblooded Sorcerer [1 Lvl]
Variant Multiclassing
(5/5) VMC Wizard
(4/5) VMC Cavalier
(4/5) VMC Sorcerer
(3/5) VMC Magus
Prestige Classes
(5/5) Bloatmage
(3/5) Eldritch Knight (Blade Adepts Only)
(5/5) Stargazer
(5/5) Loremaster (One Level Dip)
(5/5)* Souldrinker
(5/5)* Blackfire Adept (3-4 Levels)
(5/5) Argent Dramaturge
(4/5) Pathfinder Savant (Take Prestigious Spellcaster)
(4/5) Brewkeeper (Take Prestigious Spellcaster)
Feats
General Feats

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 Metamagic Feats
Item Creation Feats
Equipment

Rating System
All Guides use the Color Rating System and honestly? It’s a good Idea.
● Game Breaking (6/5): This feature or option is so powerful, so
useful, so unapologetically ridiculous that it very well make
snap the game in half. DM’s reading this guide are welcome to ban
these options, or are warned to somehow work around them.
Players? Use these powers carefully.
● ✰TAKE ME NOW✰ (5.9/5): If 5/5 is the best options, we don’t
really care when you take them, you should just be taking them.
Stars means that this option will be useful from when you pick it
up to level 20, and thus, you should be taking it IMMEDIATELY and
as SOON AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE. Really its a case of urgency.
● Take Me Please! (5/5): Class defining. Taking them changes the
game, or adds so much power it's insane not to.
● Fantastic (4/5): Incredibly solid, Not class breaking, but
something that can add a fair bit of power and versatility to the
character.
● Fine, I Guess (3/5): Pretty good. They'll be helpful and have
some use, but aren't likely to make things incredibly amazing.
● Maybe Don’t (2/5): Unhelpful. It probably doesn’t...do much for
you to pick these. Either they make your life slightly harder, or
the bonuses just aren't very relevant to what you do.
● Actively Bad (1/5): God why. These options are the least helpful.
They either are pointless, replaceable or completely outdated.
These are abilities that will likely never be used and make you
ask why they are there in the first place.
● Unrated: This is rare but some options are unratable. Likely a
class feature that is powered on DM fiat, in which case...ask the
DM, something that is campaign dependent or something that
literally does nothing.

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Class Overview
So the arcanist has been the topic of A MANY debate, especially since its a combination of the
wizard, the class that is known for its insane legacy within 3.5 as the first path to ascension, and
the sorcerer, which for a long time was just treated as the wizard but worse. So naturally people
had to wonder what it could be in relation to its two parent classes.

There are some people who will tell you that the arcanist is better than both classes. Others that
will tell you that the exploiter pact wizard blows it out of the water. Too many posts. I’m here to
tell you that the arcanist is its own class, is still a fullcaster, and uses the wizard sorc list, which
automatically makes it one of the best classes in the game.

You know what that means? That means from here on out, no more preconceptions or
questions. Together we are going to find out JUST how powerful this class is…or die trying…
maybe.

The Chassis
● (1/5) Hit Die - D6: Thhhhe worst HD in pathfinder. You and the wizard share this tiny itsy
bitsy baby die and will always be...pretty damn fragile. Probably invest in some
constitution unless you want to be flattened.
● (2/5) BAB - ½ (Half): WORST progression, absolutely trash. The reason it’s NOT a 1 is
because you...well you don’t have any reason to have a good BAB and you have touch
abilities that will make this...workable. Don’t get me wrong, it sucks, but at least it’s not
something you’ll really be relying on. This goes down to absolutely fucking dreadful for
Blade Adepts though.
● (2/5) Skills - 2 + Int: Yes I know you are an int based class. No that does not make this
much better. It’s still a horrible start and having you be int based just means its
RECOVERABLE, not that's favorable.
○ Class Skills Worth Paying attention to:
■ Know. Dungeoneering/Arcana/Nature/Planes/Religion (Int): Knowing
things is very useful. Sometimes critical in fact.
■ Spellcraft (Int): Identifying spells and crafting is tight and therefore, so is
this skill. It’s also used for a dizzying number of feats, abilities, and items,
so you will be WELL rewarded for having a lot of ranks. Don’t forget
counterspell, which you are a demon at!!!
■ Use Magic Device (Cha): Holy shit!!! Okay this skill can be used to
emulate basically whatever you need to cast from a scroll, wand, staff, or
other spell trigger item.
○ Non Class Skills Worth Paying Attention To:
■ Perception (Wis): Most rolled skill in the game, you will use it, no matter
the class, and not having it will get you in trouble at least once. Take it, by
any means that you can.
● (3/5) Saves - Good Will: So having a good will save is like...nice don’t get me
wrong...but you only get one save, and again, you don’t have much, if any reason to put

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 points into wisdom. ON TOP of that, some of the most deadly abilities are FORT
saves...which you aren’t great at resisting so...yeah not...not amazing.
● (1/5) Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: Only simple weapons, no armor and if you
even wear armor of any kind, you get arcane spell failure chance. God. Damnit. They
want you to be made of fucking bubbles and glass. At least you can use a long spear I
guess?

Class Features
● (6/5) Spellcasting and Cantrips [0-9, Hybrid, Arcane]: Make no mistake. Your exploits
are unique and powerful but this? This is what TRULY sets the arcanist apart from the
rest. The arcanist is the ONLY spellcaster to be BOTH a prepared caster AND a
spontaneous caster, and reap the benefits from both styles of casting. In effect, you may
prepare a certain amount of spells per day, but any spells you prepare can be cast so
long as you have spell slots. 5e players will be familiar with this.
○ Why is this amazing?
■ Metamagic: You can choose whether to prepare it or use it
spontaneously!
■ Versatility: You can change your entire spell kit every day and choose
exactly how you use it! You don’t need to predict the future perfectly!
Moreover, you aren’t limited by the wizards school specialization, so you
can have as much of anything you want, whenever you want!
■ Double The Options: In a large number of cases, you can benefit from
spells, feats, and features that would ONLY benefit people who prepare
spells or ONLY benefit people who cast them spontaneously, with the
best of both worlds.
○ What's the catch?
■ Worst of Both Worlds: You get the spell level progression of a sorcerer
and the spells per day of a wizard, meaning you have less spells than the
sorc and a slower progression than the wizard..but frankly both of those
are things you can make up for. This is literally the only reason they are
not busted….and it didn’t really work.
● (3/5) Arcane Reservoir (Su): Wizard points! This is your main resource to fuck around
with, powering your exploits and being able to be spent to either boost your CL by 1
(meh) or DC by one (Ooooo). You have a maximum number of wizard points equal to
3+lvl and every morning you get 3+½ level back. Yes that's right, it does not completely
refill. So its not a HUGE pool butttt….we have ways of making it work for us. On its own?
Its kinda a meh class feature.
● (5/5) ✰Arcane Exploits✰: NOW THIS IS THE FUCKING SPICE. This is your choose-a-
thing class feature and frankly? While your spells are what make you an arcanist, this is
why everyone wants to BE an arcanist. Teleportation, more DC boosts, familiars,
bloodline powers, school powers, metamagic and MUCH MUCH MORE. Usually I’d
mark this with a rainbow but frankly? This shit is baller and you love it. Every odd level is
christmas.

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● (4/5) Consume Spells (Su): Hey remember how we don’t get a lot of wizard points?
Well as a move action, we can sack our spell slots for more wizard points! Now you get
a number of points equal to the spell level, which usually I’d consider a raw deal, but a
majority of your exploits don’t need more than 1 point, and we have other ways of getting
points back, so in the long run its actually pretty dope, being able to trade low level spell
slots for powerful abilities
● (5/5) Greater Exploits: Takes a while to get but they are also pretty god damn good.
● Capstone: So the arcanist actually has some really good capstone options which is
surprising because casters usually don’t!!!!
○ (3/5) Magical Supremacy (Su): Spend points to cast spells! Now because of
some shenanigans, this means that we can get extra free spell slots that you
basically just have to cheese back. That said, not something you can use A LOT
in sequence and after a certain point, you have more spell slots then you know
what to do with.
○ (3/5) Deep Magics (Su): Get a spell known at each level. This would be pretty
good…if it weren’t for the fact that you can copy spells from scrolls, other spell
books, and walking library exists.
○ (4/5) Arch Familiar (Su): You ever wanted your familiar to be able to cast
miracle once a day? OR just have a small repository of buffs on hand? Very fun
capstone though I don’t think it ungodly powerful. You can take this if you got the
familiar exploit!
○ (4/5) Deep Reservoir (Su): You have SO MANY fucking magic points. This
works best for classes and archetypes that eat through your magic points quickly,
because in most cases, you will be frugal. Still, its a lot to work with.
○ (4/5) Walking Library (Ex): The character adds….100 spell levels worth of
spells to their spell book or familiar, FOR FREE and then gets a +4 bonus to all
knowledge. This is dumb. This is actually super dumb. Sure you already get a lot
of spells, and sure you can pay money for them, but getting 100 spell levels is A
LOT. At the very least that’s 11 9th level spells, which are hard as fuck to come
by.
○ (5/5) With This Sword (Ex): You gain a Noble Phantasm minor artifact!!! This is
not only powerful, but also really really cool. Love that. Even cooler because you
probably have a super holy avenger/unholy avenger by now.
○ (4/5) Won’t Stay Dead (Ex): Once per week, when you should lose, you don’t.
○ (5/5) Perfect Body, Flawless Mind (Ex): Get 8 points that can be added to any
ability score in any way. 5 to one, 3 to another. This is always helpful and people
love free stats. Incredibly powerful option.
○ (5/5) The Boss (Ex): Get super leadership! Luckily everything else is so busted
at this level, so this is fine.

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Roles
Now, it’s sort of hard to talk about what ability scores you need without talking about what roles
the Arcanist can take. So first, let’s cover the roles that they can take, and we’ll choose abilities
based on that. So to be clear, the arcanist is a fullcaster with the wizard/sorc list. Which means
they can effectively do anything that doesn’t rely on their BAB. That’s-

● Battlefield Control: You’ve got control for days! Wall of Force, Obscuring Mist, The
Works! This is what the god wizard were made of and you stole its notes and made them
better.
● Debuffing: Bestow Curse, Enervation, Shadow Baleful Polymorph, and much much
more! These spells do not play games and you will have people begging on their knees
for a mercy that will not come…until your duration ends anyway.
● Blasting: You can actually be a monster blaster, stealing powers from the sorcerer and
the wizard to become a god of destruction with relative ease!
● Buffing: From polymorphs to hastes to enlarge person, you can turn any mortal into a
god of your own making, just for shits and giggles.
● Scouting: Divination is an entire school. I figure I don’t have to explain myself.
● Summoning: Guess who gets access to all the summon monster spells and planar
binding? THIS CASTER! Not to mention the nonsense that you can get into as an
Occultist…
● Utility Bullshit: You are better than the wizard at utility. That is not an exaggeration.
You can use quick study to swap in the best spell at the best time. You can cast said
spells as many times as you want after swapping them in and then you can swap them
out for something else, just for some magic points. That is insane.

And you can swap them out every day. You will always be at least pretty solid on these things,
becoming an absolutely god with the right spells and archetype combo. You are VERY good at
these, but also, you have half bab, shit armor, and shit weapons. I know some of you want to
fight. You are not good at fight. You can TRY to be good, but you will struggle. Do not try to gish
with this if you can help it. You have other people for that.

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Ability Scores
Stats usually come in four varieties: Primary, Secondary, Tertiary and Dump. That said, the stat
spread is more or less the same for all arcanists.

● Strength (Dump): Don’t need it, don’t care about it.

● Dexterity (Tertiary Stat): Useful for AC, Initiatives, and Ranged touch attacks. Now
don’t get me wrong here, we DON’T like getting hit
● Constitution (Secondary / Tertiary Stat): Keeps you alive and keeps your fort saves
from being HORRIBLE. If you have to invest into charisma for your build, this stat
becomes tertiary, but if you don’t need a lot of charisma, consider it secondary because
again…you don’t have much health and this keeps you alive.
● Intelligence (Primary Stat): This is your god stat, you worship it, praise it, and will
shower it with advancement before all others. You are a caster and this determines what
you can cast.
● Wisdom (Tertiary Stat): Perception and will saves, but that's about it. So we don’t need
it to be amazing but we also definitely don’t want it to be negative. Woo!
● Charisma (Secondary / Dump): So your exploits DC’s and ability generally scale with
charisma! So you’d think its important right? Well only sorta. There are a lot of exploits
that give you things that don’t have a DC, or don’t really scale off of charisma at all. In
fact it is entirely possible (and actually sorta optimal) to build an arcanist that barely uses
Charisma in the first place! So if you plan on using a lot of charisma based exploits, this
is obviously secondary. If you are choosing the ones that DON'T require your charisma,
it becomes a dump stat!

Stat Legend
Stat Type Starting Value Description

Primary Stat 16-18+ Your primary stats are ones that control the majority of your class features,
should be boosted first, and are required to make your class powerful.

Secondary Stat 14-16 Your secondary stats are ones that may impact minor class features, but
aren’t required for the class to function, or are just integral to the roles the
class plays

Tertiary Stat 10-14 Tertiary are not necessary for any class features, but may provide minor
useful benefits

Dump Stat 8-10 A dump stat is one that does not benefit any of your features and provides
little to no benefits to the roles the class plays.

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Races
So here’s the thing about races. Besides ya know, flavor for your campaign and your
character… they don’t actually… matter. They are balls of stats and abilities, which is
good! If you want to play a human fighter, but you want the elf stat block, really there isn’t much
reason to deny you because again...they are just stat balls. If your dm doesn’t let you split your
flavor and your stats, that’s fine! Either way, I think its more important to rate races on what they
give you, rather than what they are. I won’t go into a lot of detail on any one race, but I’ll give
you the gist of what is worth looking at.

(6/5) Races
● Wyrwood (+2 DEX/INT, -2 CHA): So it has great stats, and being small is…whatever
but what makes it broken? SLA’s? No. Spell resistance? Nope. So why is it in the busted
category?????

Construct traits. You are a construct at level 1, which gives you immunity
to….*inhale*: all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, morale effects,
patterns, and phantasms), bleed, disease, death effects, necromancy effects, paralysis,
poison, sleep effects, stunning, ability damage, ability drain, fatigue, exhaustion, energy
drain, nonlethal damage, any effect that requires a Fortitude save (unless the effect
also works on objects, or is harmless), and suffocation or starvation effects….because
you don’t need to eat or sleep.

…That should be enough I think. Hell, even if your health is now weird, and healing you
has become a little more of a pain. If you are building an arcanist the question becomes
less why choose another race, and more, what does that race give you that a wyrwood
doesn’t?????
● Drow Noble (+4 DEX, +2 INT/WIS/CHA, -2 CON): One of the few things that can
contend with the defensive might of a wyrwood just by sheer quantity! We get the super
dumb elven FCB which boosts our magic point pool, an insane amount of SLA’s and
really powerful spell resistance which will keep a lot of the more powerful spells off of us.
YAY EVIL QUEEN CASTER!! WOOO!!!
○ Abilities Scores: You get a penalty to CON which sucks but in exchange get a
huge boost to Dex, and a boost to all of your mental stats.
○ Spell Resistance: 11+ Character Level is A LOT and there are going to be a fair
amount of spells that just fizzle out on you if your DM isn’t careful.
○ So Many Spell Like Abilities: I’m going to list them below but just know that you
get so many, your caster level is your character level, and they are all based off
of your charisma which is going to be super high anyway. This gets wilder if for
some reason you DM allows you to change some of these spells. And remember,
for every spell that you have here, that’s another spell you DON’T have to take.
■ Constant: Detect Magic (0th)

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 ■ At-Will: Dancing Lights (0th), Deeper Darkness (3rd), faerie fire (1st),
featherfall (1st), Levitate (2nd)
■ 1/day: Divine Favor (1st), Dispel Magic (3rd), Suggestion (2nd)
● Munavri (+4 Dex, +2 CON/INT/WIS/CHA, -2 STR): Munavri is a dumb race that gets a
bonus to all stats, except strength, get’s us free spell resistance that isn’t bad, telepathy,
and once per day can use spell trigger items for classes she shouldn’t be able to
so...yeah no great stuff.

(5/5) Races
● Elf (+2 DEX/INT, -2 CON) [Illustrious Urbanite / Arcane Focus]: So we have great
stats (yes the con hit sucks), +2 to overcome spell resistance which is amazing,
Immunity to sleep effects and a +2 bonus against enchantment, another +2 to
concentration checks for casting defensively, and get spell focus for illusion, divination,
or transmutation…also you your fcb boosts your arcane reservoir pool size by +1 each
level. That’s better than the CAPSTONE. Easily one of the best options.
● Human (+2 ANY): Bonus Feat, get whatever stat you want and human FCB gets you
more spells. NOW…since you are an arcanist, you can get spells from scrolls and
spellbooks, which means that its less important for you. It’s still good to get free spells
though. Oh also the free skill points are nice.
● Half Elf (+2 ANY) [Darklands Guide / Dual Mind]: Get a bonus to any stat we care
about, +2 to Will saves, the elven +2 to saves against enchantment, immunity to sleep
and fcb, along with the equally good human or elf fcb, an extra skill point or hp at each
level of the fcb, a +2 to initiative, and oh something else…oh right. Paragon Surge. Yeah
that should do it.
● Esufey (+4 DEX, +2 INT, -2 STR/CON): The con penalty hurts buuuut in exchange you
get +2 to overcome spell resistance, which is still huge, are small, completely immune to
incorporeal creatures, and get a +1 to damage per die rolled with your associated
element, which stacks with bloodline arcana nonsense. You wanna blast? This helps ya
blast. Can also pick up wings later
● Peri-Blooded Aasimar (+2 INT/CHA) [Scion of Humanity / Crusading Magic /
Exalted Resistance]: HEYy no penalties, perfect stats, human FCB, +2 to overcome
spell resistance (WHICH MATTERS), and baby spell resistance against evil outsider
spells. Also you can pick up wings later.
● Samsaran (+2 INT/WIS, -2 CON) [Mystic Past Life]: Stealing spells from other arcane
caster classes is TIGHT. Remember you can choose from ANY arcane caster, meaning
even some archetypes are on the table (Silksworn Occultist, Summoner, Bloodrager,
Witch and Bard are the top options). Remember you take these AT LEVEL, so its even
good to pick up spells you already would have chosen, just to get them earlier. Also it
has some okay spells and okay resistances.
● Wayang (+2 DEX/INT, -2 WIS) [Scion of Shadows]: Great stats, +1 DC to shadow
spells which are awesome, and 50% miss chance in dim light which is horrifying. Cast
dancing darkness, and get minutes per level displacement if they can’t see in the dark.
You are also a native outsider, which makes you immune to person spells if you don’t
want them!

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 ● Lavasoul Ifrit (+2 CON/INT, -2 DEX) [Wildfire Heart / Mostly Human]: Honestly a rare
breather were we get a BONUS to con, human fcb and a +4 to initiative! Honestly that
on its own is enough to barely pushing over into 5/5, along with the perfect stat spread
● Were-batkin Skinwalker (+2 INT/DEX, -2 WIS): +4 to perception (+6 at night),
obscuring mist 1/day, scent, and reduced fall damage. Also pick up Bloodmarked Flight
later for a free fly speed. Just enough to be in 5/5 but barely.
● Tiefling (+2 DEX/INT, -2 CHA) [Prehensile Tail / Pass For Human / Darklands
Guide]: You get great stats, a tail that can hold stuff like rods or wands, human FCB, +2
to initiative, some bonuses to skills and darkvision. It isn’t much but its enough to keep it
in the big leagues.
○ Daemon Spawn (+2 DEX/INT, -2 WIS)
● Sylph (+2 DEX/INT, -2 WIS) [Breeze Kissed / Mostly Human / Secretive]: Get a
supernatural +2 to ac against nonmagical range attacks, human FCB, good stats, and
+2 to saves against enchantment and divination effects. Again…..barely pushing it over
the edge.
● Yaddithians (+2 CON/INT, -2 WIS): Be a spooky alien that is apparently really good at
magic. Perfect stat spread, no penalty to ANY of our favorite stats, and no breath means
we are immune to cloud kill, drowning, and anything else that would require us to breath,
which is often more than you think. Also, no need to worry about insecure books now,
you can just store everything in your mind!!!

(4/5) Races
● Bonus to Primary and Secondary Stat (without a unique ability)
● Bonus to Primary stat and no penalty to Secondary Stat (unique ability)
● Powerful ability and bonus to Secondary Stat and Tertiary Stat
(3/5) Races
● Bonus to Primary Stat and no penalty to Secondary Stat
● Bonus to Tertiary Stat and Secondary Stat
(2/5) Races
● No penalty to Primary Stat
(1/5) Races
● Penalty to Primary Stat

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Arcane Exploits and Greater Exploits
Alright now we’ve gotten to the part we’ve all been waiting for: exploits! These super powered
pick me up are a fucking godsend and you’ll never feel like you have enough of these soon
enough. So if we are going to choose, we have to choose wisely. Just a few things to
remember. One, once you select an exploit, you can’t select it again. Second, the DC’s are
based on your charisma not your intelligence. Really, in practice, the second one just means
that I will rate abilities that DON’T require charisma higher than ones that do.

Anyway, let's get into it.

Arcane Exploits

Base Exploits
● (3/5) Acid Jet (Su): Range touch attack or take 1d6 per 2 levels + CHA acid damage.
Now we don’t have a lot of points, and we DO have a lot of ways of dealing damage, the
only benefit here being that its acid, supernatural, and a ranged touch attack. So not
ideal but we can work with it.
● (5/5) Lepidstadt Shifter (Su): Cast a spell while polymorphed into a form that couldn’t
do it! Works like wild shape, which is amazing, and its just as cool for you! If you plan on
shapeshifting, you NEED an ability like this, but it can get expensive.
○ (4.5/5) Altered Shifting (Su): Spend a magic point to a different form while
polymorphed. This lowers the caster level by 1, which for a lot of polymorph
spells, just means losing a bit of duration. No idea what its talking about on
minimum caster level to cast a spell but uh…otherwise, very good. If you are
going to be a polymorph main, this is another must have.
● (2/5) Arcane Barrier (Su): You get level+cha temp hp…and it gets more expensive
each time you use it. WEEE can probably just find a spell that helps us more.
● (4/5) Arcane Discovery: Alright you get ONE of these but arcane discoveries tend to
not mess around…well some of them anyway. Unfortunately, you only count as a wizard
of half your level to qualify for one, which means most of the best ones aren’t feasible for
us to pick up. I suggest picking up Balanced Summoning if you are an occultist or
summoning main, Split Slot for a little extra preparation, Psychic Preparation for a get
out of jail spell, or Multimorph if you don't want to spend arcane points on Lepidstadt
Shifter.
● (1/5) Arcane Weapon (Su): Spend a standard action and a magic point to boost your
weapon. Now if you recall…we are not good at fight. So while this might be okay on
someone who can actually use these enhancement bonuses, YOU really won’t. And I
know, the blade adepts out there are saying “But what about us? We use weapons!” and
to them I say, sure, granted…but is this the best use of your standard action? Is it?
● (3/5) Aspect of Innocence (Su): Lying is useful sometimes but not really necessary.
○ (4/5) Charmer (Su): Become super mega amazing at lying. We aren’t
● (6/5) Bloodline Development: Okay so bloodline development on its own is actually
super meh. I mean don’t get me wrong, some first level powers are really good, even at

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 first level, but not many of them. So on its own, this isn’t much to write home about.

If it wasn’t for that last little snippet. Such that if you had a bloodline (a sorcerer bloodline
specifically) your arcanist levels stack with sorc levels for determining the powers and
abilities of your bloodline. Which means that effectively, you get a fully active bloodline,
just without any of the spells. Which is…ABSURDLY powerful. Hilariously, ridiculously
absurdly powerful. Yes you will be two spell levels behind. YES its still dumb. Hell, this is
why the pact exploiter wizard is HORRIFYING because they can pick this up, and have
a full sorc bloodline, oracle curse, witch patron, and still have the same casting like a
sorc.
● (?/5) Consume Magic Items (Su): So okay my biggest issue is that this basically is just
you eating your money for sorcery points, and it isn’t really that efficient. It’s much better
late game when you can just throw money at the problem and make it go away, but early
game, you are basically throwing away life saving consumables. So I can’t really rate
this because how good it is depends on the amount of magic items your DM throws at
you and your WBL…which while it SHOULD be set, can be game dependent. More WBL
makes it good, Less makes it bad.
● (5/5) ✰Counterspell✰ (Su): HEEY counterspelling as an immediate action! 5e players
eat your heart out. You don’t even have to have the right spell prepared! You just spend
a spell slot!!!! Now, this isn’t something that you can really do in any other class with
such ease, but it can absolutely save a life. Seriously just…ask any 5e player how good
counterspell is. I’ll wait.
● (5/5) ✰Dimensional Slide✰ (Su): As PART of your move action, you can spend 1 point
to teleport 10 feet per level, just wherever, and then continue your move action, treating
the teleportation as 10 feet of movement. Repositioning is godly. Getting past walls is
godly. THIS is one of the exploits ALL arcanists should have.
● (2/5) Energy Shield (Su): Just take resist energy. Its on your spell list! You get higher
resistance earlier!!! Just take resist energy?????
● (5/5) ✰Familiar✰ (Ex): Hey remember how I wrote an entire guide on how busted
familiars are and how you should absolutely have a familiar and it’s only beneficial to do
so??? You don’t? Cool I’ll just include the guide right here and that should explain my
rating
● (1/5) Feral Shifting (Su): So…this is good if you are a natural attacker but just…as a
reminder…we don’t…we don’t like to fight? We are not fighty.
● (2/5) First World Face Thief (Su): Again! Just cast disguise self! It’s on your spell list! It
has a longer duration! It’s literally a 1st level spell!!!
○ (2/5) First World Illusion Catcher (Su): So great if you are up against a lot of
illusionists but overall probably won’t come up too often. Just hit it with a dispel
magic.
● (2/5) Flame Arc (Su): Line of fire is still fire damage and only half level so…not much.
And the reflex save is again…based on your charisma.
● (1/5) Flame Control (Su): Or hear me out, just prepare dispel magic…

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● (?/5) Focused Summoning (Su): This is VERY specific to not being on the material
plane so…for most people this is useless and then for the rare few that have games on
other planes, it can be useful for summoning meat walls.
● (1/5) Force Strike (Su): THIS IS SO FUCKING BAD. ITS JUST MAGIC MISSILE BUT
WORSE. HOW DID YOU MANAGE THAT????
● (1/5) Holy Water Jet (Su): So this would be a really cool damage move…if it wasn’t
limited to things that could be hurt by holy water. Which again, is pretty darn specific.
OBviously much better in an undead focused campaign.
● (3/5) Ice Missile (Su): Fort save stagger with a little bit of damage on the top. Not
something I’d suggest picking up often but its a neat little trick. Remember…the save is
still charisma.
● (?/5) Invoke Primal Magic (Su): Make a primal magic thing happen. Does your DM
even know what primal magic effects are???
● (4/5) Item Crafting (Su): Get a crafting feat. If you are going craft build, getting a free
feat is actually pretty nice since you need a lot of them.
● (3/5) Lightning Lance (Su): ZAKERU!!!! Blinding flash lightning is really best against
melee types but those are the ones that are likely to pass the fort save. Still, range touch
aint bad.
● (1/5) Mending Flesh (Su): Shitty healing is shitty.
● (5/5) Metamagic Knowledge (Su): WE LOVE METAMAGIC!!!
● (5/5) Metamixing (Su): Oh hey we can spend a point to spontaneously add metamagic
to our spells on the fly! Blasters love this shit, and it increases our versatility for acting on
the fly! Great shit!
● (4/5) Nidalese Shadow Veil (Su): Free action blur as far as I can tell that is
supernatural and impossible to see through because it just gives you concealment…
so…rad!!!
● (3/5) Obfuscated Spellcasting (Su): Make people think you are casting a different spell
than normal. This…probably won’t come up a lot because if you are casting a spell and
shouldn't be, most people will probably feel weird about that.
● (3/5) Orderly Casting (Su): Keeps your damage average which means its consistent.
Still…we kinda like it when the dice makes shit go boom.
● (1/5) Philanthropic Magic (Su): If I cast WISH on my ally, they get 9 temp hp.
● (5/5) Potent Magic (Su): Raise CL to get past caster level and raise DC to make sure
something sticks! It’s not a lot, but it’ll count when you need it to.
● (?/5) Primal Magic (Sp): Random Magic Table is Random and Magic. Is it cool?
Definitely? Is it reliable? Absolutely not.
● (5/5) ✰Quick Study✰ (Ex): QUICK SPELL SWAP!!!!! This is one of the cores of your
versatility as an arcanist. Remember, any spell you prepare, you can cast multiple times,
so you can prepare a good set and then switch in situational buffs as the day goes on.
This is unparalleled access to your own power, and wizards give up most of their class
features for a chance to do this and guess what? They are getting it for cheap.
● (?/5) Redirect Primal Magic (Su): More random magic powers which are random. I’m
starting to see a crazy primal magic build here…
● (?/5) Resist Primal Magic (Su): Continued primal magic stuff.

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● (5/5) ✰School Understanding✰ (Su): So this is also actually really good even at base.
There are a lot of abilities that don’t really need to scale at all which are particularly
powerful at their level, and the ones that DO scale are often worth it. Best Arcane school
powers will be included below because you know I love you all. Use Charisma for
boosted level duration
○ Divination (Diviner’s Fortune): Pass around half level buffs to d20 rolls
○ Foresight (Prescience): Roll a d20 at the beginning of your turn and use it later.
No scaling required!
○ Manipulator (Beguiling Touch): Charm monster by touching people.
○ Admixture (Versatile Evocation): Change spell damage type. Thundersphere
anyone???
○ Mage of the Veil (Face in the Crowd): Make everyone think you are obviously
supposed to be here.
○ Necromancy (Power over Undead): Command Undead and free channels for
undead!!
○ Transmutation (Physical Enhancement): Boost your shitty physical stats for
the day.
○ Air (Air Supremacy): Featherfall -> Fly. Yes we have the spell, but this is more
convenient.
○ Smoke (Smokesight): Get to see through your own fog and give other people
the ability to do so. No scaling necessary!
○ Void (Void Awareness): Insight bonus to save against spells!
○ Void (Reveal Weakness): Give other people potentially massive penalties to AC
and Saves that has no save itself! Nasty!!!!!
● (2/5) See Magic (Su): Magic item vision. Ultimately probably not worth it because most
times when you are using detect magic, you’ve got the time.
● (3/5) Sonic Blast (Su): Sonic Damage and potential deafen for a minute on a fort save.
● (1/5) Spell Disruption (Su): Ya know this can be good…if you didn’t have to get into
melee to TRY and use it.
● (2/5) Spell Resistance (Su): Baby spell resistance is still spell resistance…(tho you
probably could have just gotten it from your race im just saying. Would last longer too.)
● (4/5) Spell Tinkerer (Su): You’ve heard about extend spell. Have you heard about
omega hyper extend spell because those two stack and we are about to have buffs that
last our entire lives babyyy.
● (4/5) Swift Consume (Ex): More actions are more actions. Its not necessary but being
able to pop a first level slot and then use it to pay for dimensional slide is often much
better than what a 1st level spell can do.
● (1/5) Third Eye (Su): Don’t like the feat, don’t like the exploit.
● (1/5) Weather Sage (Su): …YOU CAN DO THIS WITH A SURVIVAL CHECK
● (2/5) Wild Stride (Su): So on its own its…kinda whatever, but you can build around it.
Woodland stride is notoriously bad and greensight only works
● (6/5) Wooden Flesh (Su)*: Okay a little bit of armor and some bad DR. That's not that
great really...but you count as a plant creature for the sake of spells and abilities. Now if
your GM rules that means you count as having the plant creature type, this can be really

15
 powerful as plants get a number of wicked nice immunities, and you are a plant creature.

IF your DM doesnt to allow you to have the plant creature type, but simply says you
count as a plant to determine what abilities you are and aren't affected by (which isn’t
what the ability says, but is a fair interpretation) this is obviously much worse.

Outer Rift Exploits

Hey there are a lot of rules for these but basically just don’t zero out using any of these abilities
okay? So long as you don’t do that you should be fine.

● (1/5) Blood Tears (Su): avoid gaze attacks and weak stagger. Edgy but next.
● (2/5) Damnation Susurrus (Su): Its effectively a force disarm for all intents and
purposes, which is nice, but nott nearly good enough.
● (5/5) ✰Fiendish Proboscis✰ (Su): Okay weird tongue thing, blah blah…OH HEY if you
lick a creature that is capable of doing magic, you get your magic points back! Which
means that you effectively never have to run out so long as you have something near by
that you can lick for spells! Summons! Familiars! Congrats, you now basically can have
a full pool of arcane reservoir after every single fight. As such, I don’t care how evil it is.
Every single arcanist should pick this up. No exceptions
● (3/5) Rift Fog (Su): Cold fog is cold, and provides baby slow which is nice but probably
not the best use.
● (2/5) Shadow Out Of Light (Su): Evil shadow that does strength damage on a failed fort
save. You shouldn’t really be threatening anyone but ya know, this can be annoying.
Better for more fighty folks of which we are not.
● (4/5) Soulrider (Su): So like they get a -2 for mind effecting but honestly? This makes a
way better team ability than it does an enemy one. Sending is a 5th level spell, so being
able to use it by only spending 1 point is pretty tops. Also just being able to know how
people are doing via status. Great for a scry build.
● (1/5) Tentacles (Su): Yeaaaah no just get prehensile from the tiefling.

Greater Exploits
So these are stronger versions of a lot of base exploits. If it has pre-reqs, I’ll put them in {braces
like this.} You can’t take these until level 11, so they are going to be rated more harshly,
because you won’t get a lot of these.

● (4/5) Alter Enhancements (Su) {Requires Arcane Weapon}: Oh hey, this doesn’t
have a limit. Have fun mix mastering weapons you find on the ground.
● (1/5) Burning Flame (Su) {Requires Flame Arc}: If you fail your save against flame arc
you catch fire. Still fire tho.
● (?/5) Consume Primal Magic (Su) {Swift Consume}: Slurp the randomness. This is
getting crazy.

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● (1/5) Convert Wand (Su): Turn wand into cure wand. OR just buy a cure wand. Seems
easier.
● (3.5/5) Counter Drain (Su) {Counterspell}: Not the most useful method of arcane point
recovery but if you are already going to be counterspelling people, its nice to get
something back for it occasionally.
● (?/5) Counterspell Primal Magic (Su) {Counterspell}: You counterspell…the random
magic even that again, probably is not going to happen.
● (?/5) Create Primal Event (Su): Create chaos zone. I feel like this is the crux of the
chaos caster build, so i mean if you wanna be a wild mage, this is how you do it???
● (2/5) Dancing Electricity (Su) {Lightning Lance}: Chain lightning attack! Half damage
is barely anything but hey, its not nothing.
● (1/5) Energy Absorption (Su) {Energy Shield}: …Nope, still not worth it.
● (5/5) Greater Counterspell (Su) {Counterspell}: You can use at level slots (we can
now counterspell wish) and you have a LOT more versatility in ruining people's day
because remember…all you need is a good spellcraft check and you win.
● (5/5) Greater Metamagic Knowledge {Metamagic Knowledge}: Another metamagic
feat, BUT you can swap it out every day by spending a magic point!!! WOOO!!! Yay
variety of builds!!!!
● (1/5) Greater Spell Disruption {Spell Disruption}: BUT I still have to touch them…
which I don’t want to be doing if I can avoid it!!!
○ (1/5) Siphon Spell (Su): Still gotta use the above ability. NOPE.
● (4/5) Greater Spell Resistance (Su) {Greater Spell Resistance}: More spell resistance
is more spell resistance! Its great for sure…but you also again, could have gotten this
just from your race and you can’t turn it off.
○ (2/5) Resistance Drain (Su): Just use the proboscis and save the exploit.
● (3/5) Hellfire Ray (Su) {Flame Arc} : Makes fire damage half unholy damage.
● (2/5) Icy Tomb (Su) {Ice Missile}: Baby dex damage and entangle. PRobably should
just hit them with a spell.
● (3/5) Lingering Acid (Su) {Acid Jet}: Makes acid hit harder for a longer time.
● (1/5) Maelstrom Jump (Su): For a greater exploit? Absolutely not.
● (3/5) Redirect Spell (Su): Rob spell. This probably won’t come up too often but can be
fun for stealing summons from people. That said, it's still pretty niche.
● (2/5) Spell Thief (Su) {Spell Tinkerer}: Heeyy its a melee touch attack which means we
want to keep it away from us.
● (4/5) Suffering Knowledge (Su): BETTER spell nom. Usually I don’t agree with
preparing around failure, but everyone likes a good *no u*

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Archetypes
Alright if you are reading this guide, you should know how I do things by now. I will not be
reviewing every archetype, only the ones I think are worth talking about. This doesn’t mean all
of the rest of them are awful, just that I don’t really think they are worth drawing attention to.

All Arcanist Archetypes: Arcanist

(4/5) Aeromancer [Lord of Storms]

What you gain What you lose

● Air Mastery (Su): Greater potent magic ● 1st, 5th, and 11th Exploits: So three
but only for windy spells. That said, if you exploits seems like a lot….but what you
take school understanding for versatile are getting is more or less worth it.
evocation, it gets even easier as you Remember…you can always trade feats
start throwing you lightning balls that are for more exploits if need be.
baseboosted to the heavens.
Remember, caster level bonuses are
hard to come by, and this gives you a
HUGE boost.
● Wind’s Embrace (Su): You can walk on
air as freely as the ground, no fly checks
required, AND a personal wind wall that
gets you immunity to arrows and miss
chance against most other things. Yeah,
it's good.
● Rebuking Wind (Su): Tornado cannon
is tornado cannon. You’ll be surprised
how often a big blast of force might be
helpful, but at the same time, its very
expensive.

Overview: So honestly? IF you are planning on being a lightning blaster, or just want to be a
wind god, this is actually a pretty strong archetype. Caster level is REALLY hard to raise and
air mastery is a straight upgrade to potent magic, and even at level 5, a +3 to caster level is
not something to scoof at. At level 10, a +4 (altogether) is MASSIVE, especially on spell
resistance checks. Winds embrace is just a cool ability. Rebuking winds is…well its not
useless but not on the same level.

Overall, I think its an excellent archetype for blasters!

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 (1/5) Blade Adept [Wizard with Knife]
What you gain What you lose

● Sword Bond: Get a sword bonded ● 1st, 3rd, 9th Exploit: So the big problem
object. As you all know, I have unique is that we trade 3 exploits to get a neat
beef with bonded objects. But this just sword..not even be a competent fighter,
means that as you level, you can just get a cool sword. We have to spend
upgrade the weapon as if you had the MORE exploits to make it viable. We don’t
appropriate feats…which is good…but… get the exploit class feature until level 5.
why…why do we have a weapon? Yeah no.
● Sentient Sword (Su): Okay you get a
black blade! That's neat! …but we don’t
automatically get spell combat. Or spell
strike. Or have the bab to really…take
advantage….of this weapon….
● Adept Exploits: You can spend exploits
to get the class features you kinda
needed anyway????

Overview: Okay lets get this out of the way. The Blade Adept is NOT a good archetype…on
its own. Giving the wizard a cool sword does not a fighter nor a magus make. You have to
lose 3 exploits to get said cool sword, which you could have spent on abilities that actually
make you a substantially better caster, than just a half assed gish. If you REALLY want to
mess around with a black blade? Play a bladebound magus. It’s better in basically every way.

That said, if you are determined to play a blade adept, there are ways to do it, and reasons to
do it. One is if you want to go into eldritch knight, and want to take 1 level of inspired blade
swashbuckler to be a rapier crit dancer. It’s also not the worst to gestalt with if you want to
play a magus with access to a black blade and use broad study to smack people with your
arcanist spells…but honestly you should just play a bladebound magus 9/10 times.

(4/5) Blood Arcanist [The Sorcerers Apprentice]

What you gain What you lose

● Bloodline: You get the bloodline arcana ● 1st, 3rd, 9th, and 15 exploits: THATS A
and bloodline power…but not the feats, LOT of exploits for this bloodline. Don’t
the skills or the bonus spells. Bloodlines get me wrong, there are some
can be really strong, they really can but a POWERFUL bloodlines but…at this point
lot of them benefit greatly from the spells why not just be a sorcerer?
they provide. ● Magical Supremacy: Its a capstone so
you probably wouldn’t notice.

Overview: So most people will only play levels 1-10, which means for most people, this

19
means not getting exploits class feature until level 5. My big question is, given that….why are
you playing an arcanist and not just playing a sorcerer? I mean sure, there are some benefits
to being an int based bloodline user but…then why not be a sage? Why do this?

That said, if you want to play an int based prepared sorcerer…well…this is how you do it
without abusing blood development. Bloodlines can be REALLY strong, and are worth picking
up if you know how to use them.

(5/5) Brown-Fur Transmuter [72 Heavenly Transformation Technique]

What you gain What you lose

● Powerful Change (Su): When you get a ● 3rd, 9th and Capstone: So this actually
buff, make the buff slightly better! Well not that bad because you still get the
that's nice! It’s not much but its useful if exploit class feature at level 1, and your
you like transmutation. 9th level ability that replaces an exploit is
● ✰Share Transformation✰ (Su): busted…so you actually don’t lose that
AHAHAHAHAHAHA This is dumb and much.
amazing and dumb. Getting to turn the
barbarian into a chimera with lazer vision
is amazing. There are so many
transformations that martials can use
that they just…don’t get access to that
you do. Absolutely 1000% why we are
taking this archetype. This gets even
sillier with reach spell metamagic.
● Transmutation Supremacy (Su): All
transmutation spells (not just
polymorphs) get extended, polymorph
buffs go up to +4 and you can now throw
transformations at a range if you didn’t
have reach.

Overview: Do you plan on being good at buffs? This person is arguably one of the best at
buffs. As you get progressively crazier, and crazier forms that would normally be personal
only, you can start throwing out truly hilarious power upon your teammates who actually have
the stats to use it, and honestly, it costs you basically just 2 exploits, 1 of which is the easiest
trade in your life. It’s honestly a strong consideration for ANY arcanist just because it makes
you SUCH a powerful support if you can get access to share transformation.

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 (4/5) Harrowed Society Student [Tarot Gambling]
What you gain What you lose

● Psychic Reader (Ex): Get psychic ● 1st and 9th Exploit: So not ideal but by
unlocks and some extra class skills. level 3 we can work on replacing them so
There are skill unlocks that are really it isn't the hugest lost.
useful like Automatic Writing ● Consume Spells: Okay this one kinda
(Linguistics), Automatic Writing sucks because consume spells is very
(Linguistics), Prognostication (Sense reliable at later levels, but we can work
Motive), Psychometry (Appraise). That around this.
said, nothing crazy.
● Harrow Reservoir (Ex): Once per day
point gamvling. Isn’t really better than
consume spells, but you can get more in
one burst. Either way, with fiendish
proboscis it should be fine.
● Divine the Mysteries (Ex): Off list
divination spells are amazing, and you
can basically have your pick from
EVERY class. Divination is a surprisingly
powerful school, so I wouldn’t overlook
this.
● Trump Card (Su): Random baby
buffs/curses are random.

Overview: You are here if you want to magic gamble and get really neato divination spells.
Thats about it. Not bad, but really, nothing crazy good here.

(4/5) Magaambyan Initiate [Arboreal Arcana]

What you gain What you lose

● Aura of Good (Su): YAY aura. Why do ● 1st,5th,9th,17th Exploits: 4 exploits is a

we care? Sacred Summons. That’s why. lot and even if we can take extra exploits,
● ✰Halcyon Spell Lore✰: EVERY LEVEL that is a hit for all the spell power we are
you get spells from the druid list (which getting. This especially hurts because
are strong) or Good spells on the cleric spell mastery on its own isn't that great
list. This is INCREDIBLY powerful, and unless you are going into the prestige
makes you a better spellcaster! Woo! class.
Still you do have to spend magic points
to cast them but…its not too expensive
● Spell Mastery: Basically you get the
spell mastery feat, and if you go into the
prestige class, it scales the reservoir
pool.

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Overview: So at the end of the day this archetype IS MADE to go into the prestige class of
the same name and entirely shines as an extension of it. On its own, its just a fun class that
gets some neato bonus spells but you lose A LOT of exploits for the chance to cast them,
which is upsetting. Still, if you wanted to be a druid/cleric/arcanist or just wanted to feel the
power of a bit of theurgy??? This is the archetype for it. They also make surprisingly good
summoners because you can get access to Summon Nature’s Ally, and can use sacred
summons to get standard action summons.

(5/5) Occultist [MtG:Arena]

What you gain What you lose

● Planar Spells: Planar ally isn’t better ● 1st, and 7th Exploits: Only two exploits
than planar binding, but plane shift early which aint bad.
is dope. ● Magical Supremacy: Easiest trade of
● Conjurer’s Focus (Sp): So this gets us your life. Shame its so late.
summon monster, at wizard progression,
as a standard action, that lasts minutes
per level. That is insanely good…but it
also is REALLY expensive. Luckily, we
have consume spell to make up the cost,
or at least, keep it from being crippling.
Combine that with the elf fcb and fiendish
proboscis, and you should be
summoning all day long in no time. Just
remember you can only have one set out
at a time.
● Planar Contact (Sp): Augury and
Contact Other Planes are know things
abilities. Contact Other Plane can
absolutely fuck you though, so…be
careful.
● ✰Perfect Summoner✰: Summons are
free and last forever. This is amazing.
Shame its at level 20.

Overview: So the main benefit we are getting her is conjure focus which allows for standard
action summons that you get level. Now, if you are taking advantage of consume spell,
basically eating a spell slot after you cast to get your standard action summons out to
minimize the cost, then it can be good, but this class will EAT UP your magic points…which
means its best used with someone with a REALLY big pool to work with. So plan to be an elf
or take extra arcane reservoir a few times just in case.

That said, so long as you are willing to burn spell slots, and take the right FCB to help expand
your pool a bit, this can effectively net you an insane amount of summoned monsters to play
around with over the course of the day.

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 (4.5/5) School Savant [Wizard++]
What you gain What you lose

● ✰School Focus✰: Pick an arcane school ● 1st, 3rd and 7th Exploits: Not ideal for
and get its powers! Not all of them are lower level play, but not impossible to
super good but there are definitely some work around? Still far from ideal.
strong things in there. The REAL benefit
though is getting to prepare 1 extra spell
per level, which gives you even more
versatility!!!! Choosing opposition schools
aint that bad anyway.

Overview: So while it costs A LOT the benefit of having an extra spell slot at every level can
not be overstated because it is a night and day difference especially at your highest spell
level. The only other way to do this is extra preparation, and that doesn’t scale with you.

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Multiclassing
So you already have sorc progression for your spell levels and you are a caster. Mutliclassing is
not what we like. We have 0 excuse for going more than one level in anything, and honestly we
should ONLY multiclass if you have a very specific build for it.

● (4/5) Inspired Blade Swashbuckler [1 Lvl] (Blade Adept Only)

○ Are you trying to make the blade adept work by going into eldritch knight? Well
great this gives you proficiency, scales your panache on int, gives you weapon
focus and weapon finesse and a free bab. Otherwise skip.
● (5/5) Crossblooded Sorcerer [1 Lvl]
○ Take it for the bloodline arcana and abuse it via bloodline development which lets
you enjoy all of the benefits with none of the drawbacks while being a level
behind anyway lmao. Still nice.

Variant Multiclassing
This is way easier to pull off because the arcanist doesn’t necessarily NEED any feats? There
are things that we can take advantage of, especially based on how we build it.

● (5/5) VMC Wizard

○ Get a familiar (which are great), A school power (Which can be really powerful
and you can still take school understanding), and eventually a fully level arcane
discovery!!! Honestly even with the shitty bonus cantrip, this is a pretty strong line
of up of abilities, and effectively lets you get more out of your exploits.
● (4/5) VMC Cavalier
○ Tactician is a really strong power, challenge is whatever damage wise, but very
nice for blade adepts trying their best. Order of the Blossom is great for save
penalties and fun SLA’s with fey lore, while Order of the Dragon is great for being
a team player with attack bonuses, and Order of the Reins makes you an animal
handling god.
● (4/5) VMC Sorcerer
○ Bloodline powers without having to take the eldritch heritage feats, and without
sacrificing 4 exploits in the long run. Yes we have blood arcanist and YES we
have bloodline development.
● (3/5) VMC Magus
○ Blade Adept + Inspire Blade and then this and congrats you can feel like you
really start feeling like you took levels in magus.

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Prestige Classes
SO on the bright side, as far as arcanists go, all you really scale is the amount of arcane points
you can have, your spells (which prestige classes can forward) and exploits…which you don’t
need to get all off. In fact plenty of exploits don’t even really scale and you don’t need them to.
So depending on the build, we can prestige pretty freely so long as we don’t lose any caster
level.

● (5/5) Bloatmage
○ Hey wanna spend 5 exploits to get a bunch of full-level bloodlines and free spell
slots? Of course you do! Sure you aren’t getting exploits, but I still think this is a
better trade than taking blood arcanist.
● (4/5) Magaambyan Arcanist (Magaambyan Initiates Only)
○ Assuming you are taking the archetype, you really do benefit a lot from going into
the prestige class, getting more spells and becoming even more of a druid wizard
hybrid. Otherwise you literally can’t take this prestige class, but it was made for
that archetype to thrive so…might as well jump in when you feel like.
● (3/5) Eldritch Knight (Blade Adepts Only) (Take Prestigious Spellcaster)
○ Look I’m going to be honest? You shouldnt be stabbing things in most cases.
You are a full caster and perfectly able to get others to do that for you. If you
want to hit things with magic, play a magus, they are GREAT at it. That said, if
you are determined to ignore me, this is a route that is well trodden. 1 inspired
swash/ 6 blade adept arcanist / Eldritch Knight 10. It won’t make you great, but
ya know, you can hit stuff.
● (5/5) Stargazer
○ We get a Hex, a Familiar, A bunch of wicked good spells known like FLY and
PLANAR BINDING (which you can be amazing at btw), oracle revelations, and a
bunch of neat little abilities...with full spellcasting progression. Yeah this prestige
class is cracked. We love it.
○ You can honestly put like 3-4 levels in this and get a bunch of cool stuff like its so
good that you can just dip and be a god.
● (5/5) Loremaster (One Level Dip)
○ 5/5 for a one level dip? Loremaster must give you something really powerful!
Nope. All it gives us is access to the Secret’s class feature, and most secrets are
incredibly lame. BUTTTTTTT you need secrets to pick up ✰Secret of Magical
Discipline✰ which allow you to cast ANY SPELL from ANY CLASS at that
classes spell level once a day. Not at it +2 or +1. Same level. This is dumb
○ Take the feat to get another use of ultimate anyspell.
● (5/5)* Souldrinker (Take Prestigious Spellcaster)
○ Old version || New Version
○ Both of them basically do the same thing, don’t go in for more than 4 levels, get
your demon familiar and start doing some fucky things with souls
○ Best for item crafters (totally can make a recycler build around Harvest Parts feat
line and this to have a person who wastes nothing).

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 ○ IF you are good or don't really have anything to do with the soul gems, skip
○ Also if you are using the new version….read this guide: On Bended Knee: A
Guide to Pathfinder's Obedience Feats
● (5/5)* Blackfire Adept (3-4 Levels) (Take Prestigious Spellcaster)
○ Specifically if you are going for an insane planar binding build and you need to
get as high of an HD as possible. Stack blackfire pact with Augmented Calling for
another 4HD which can be a vastly more powerful creature. Otherwise Skip
● (5/5) Argent Dramaturge
○ So the anti outsider performances are cute and all, and they will come in handy
sometimes but we are here for the BARDIC MASTERPIECES which we can pick
up every other level. We LOVE bardic masterpieces here, as they can often be
hilariously powerful, and godly team abilities, and unlike the bard, you don’t really
have anything that competes with them.
○ Best options Include: Blazing Rondo (Haste++), Battlesong of the People's
Revolt (Tactician??), Music Beyond The Spheres (Limited Wish for ability
damage…that you can totally heal off), Symphony of the Elysian Heart (Freedom
of Movement Mass), or Waning Bolero (Slow++)
● (4/5) Pathfinder Savant (Take Prestigious Spellcaster)
○ AYYYE adding spells from other peoples list to yours! This gets you a total of 9
neato nifty spells that you can enjoy, though their levels might be messed with a
bit. On top of that you get a bunch of cool item abilities, and the ability to cast
greater dispel magic spontaneously! THAT'S RAD.
● (4/5) Brewkeeper (Take Prestigious Spellcaster)
○ If you wanna rock the mad doctor vibe, a brewkeeper is a great choice for you!
You get a little bit of free metamagic, some fun potion debuffs, and you can hand
out your spells as draughts so that your other teammates can use them as they
need.

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Feats

General Feats
● (5/5) ✰Emergency Attunement✰: This makes otherwise situational spells really
adaptable, as you just need to make a baby spellcraft check and can just...switch it. This
makes you even more versatile, and we love that. Spell immunity? Swap that. Paragon
Surge Spells? Swap That. Resist energy? SWAP THAT. Amazing feat that makes our
spells better at the cost of duration...which is pretty easy to get a lot of.
● (5/5) Experimental Spellcaster: Get access to a little bit of wordcasting. You get all
Target words, the boost metaword and one effect word of any level you can cast. While
this system has not gotten the love it should have, there are some DEFINITE stand out
amazing words that can change the game. Moreover, there are lesser spells that can be
“boosted” into greater spells, meaning you get two spells known for the price of one!
● (5/5) Extra Arcanist Exploit: Hey we have REALLY strong exploits, and if you plan on
taking an archetype, you will probably be losing 2-4 of them. So you want this. Even if
you are a base arcanist you probably want this.
● (4/5) Extra Arcane Reservoir: More magic points is more magic points! Remember,
most powers only use 1 point, so you should only need to take this once or twice at the
absolute most, and that's only if you don’t have access to the elf FCB
● (4/5) Expanded Preparation: A bittt expensive feat wise but can get us a good amount
of slots if you find yourself at a lack of slots for a particular level.
● (4/5)* False Focus: OKAY THIS IS IT. This is what eschew materials SHOULD be. Burn
100gp on a symbol and never have to pay for any spell that costs less than that again.
Now this is only good if your DM ya know...cares about this sort of thing for anything
short of a diamond. Also, again...Alchemical Reagents are dope.
● (3/5) Skill Focus or (3/5) Exotic Heritage: Both of these are Meh feat tax pre-reqs that
you need to get to the actually juicy stuff. You take the skill you need to get into the
bloodline you want. That said, you do like certain skills a lot, like bluff, so this is less bad
for you than usual.
○ (3/5) Eldritch Heritage / (5/5) Improved / (3/5) Greater: So in effect, you get
bloodline powers! Sorcerer bloodlines can be incredibly impactful, and if chosen
wisely, can completely change how a character plays. The first feat gets you the
1st level power, the second gets you the 3rd or 9th (both of which can often be
devastatingly powerful) and the third gets you the 15th level power, but you’ll
rarely go that far. You should easily meet the pre-reqs so its really about what
power you want!
■ If you want suggestions, check out my sorcerer guide.
● (5/5) Magic Trick: So you should definitely not think of magic trick as one feat but rather
a collection of feats that all augment different spells, giving you more spell options. Each
spell has its own set of tricks, and so long as you meet the pre-reqs, they are all open to
you, and can COMPLETELY change how you interact with said spells. While I have to
rate each trick list independently, as an arcanist, simply taking a feat that makes one of

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 our spells known is much more valuable and viable is incredibly useful. I’ll list my
favorites below, as per usual:
○ Fireball: You know it, you love it, its fireball. So why is this purple? Well because
if you use the cluster bomb trick, you half the radius in exchange for removing the
dice cap...without raising the level of the spell. That’s insanely powerful and that’s
just one trick. If you combine it with concentrated fire, each individual fireball
goes from being 2d6 to 3d6, which is basically the same as empower, but instead
it basically becomes a single target attack...which ya know, is still really ouch. If
you get a Rod of Widen Metamagic, this can get even more nutty. Sculpt flames
also makes it so that you never have to worry about hitting your friends again.
So...yeah just make sure to put points into spellcraft (which you should be doing
anyway) and get Selective Spell.
○ Floating Disk: Beyond looking super cool and being integral for playing as this
guy, being able to have a pseudo fly just for having ranks in fly is really good, as
a lot of low level problems can be solved by flying. Ask your dm if this will let you
fly up walls or across ceilings, for extra radness. OH and don’t forget...this lasts
HOURS per level.
○ Obscuring Mist: Great battlefield control spell gets more options. If you have the
extend feat (which isnt a bad idea at all) you can make mist cling to people giving
your allies total concealment. Combine this with Mist Screen and you can
basically blind the entire enemy situation without much effort.
○ Shield: Spend an immediate action to turn your shield spell into a tiny wall of
force, allowing you to block spells, or attacks from one angle. This CAN be a life
saver, but otherwise is just okay.
● (4/5) Spell Penetration / (4/5) Greater Spell Penetration: So these are basically late
game feat taxes depending on how you play, each offering a +2 bonus on all spell
resistance checks. Which again...suck and we hate them.
● (4/5) Improved Initiative: Going first is amazing! It’s a pretty solid bonus.
● (5/5)* Augment Calling: Okay this is only for calling builds but getting an extra 2 HD
can be HUGE, giving you access to creatures that would be otherwise impossible to
bind, like Balors or Pit Fiends. Obviously skip if you aren’t into planar binding like that,
but if you are, even a little, this is a MUST HAVE.
● (5/5) ✰Knowledgeable Spellcaster✰: Okay so this one is hilariously powerful because
in exchange for a knowledge roll, you can get +3 to overcoming SR and then when you
have 10 ranks, its +5. That beasts out and stacks with spell penetration and all you have
to do is be decent at knowing things. 1000% worth it. You are an arcanist and therefore
mad smart!!!!

Metamagic Feats
● (6/5) Sacred Geometry: Free metamagic. FREE METAMAGIC. Combined with the right
metamagic feats, this ability is downright godly, the qualifications are dirt easy and you
can make every spell unstoppable. Why don’t most people take it! Well all of that horrible

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 math of course! If only someone had made an online easily accessible and useful
calculator...hint...hint!
● (5/5) ✰Spell Perfection✰: More free metamagic! Very late game, but its incredibly
useful, and all that it asks from you is that you take more metamagic! Can do!!! (Also
remember that it doubles ANY other feat based numerical bonuses. Caster level, DC,
anything.) This is the capstone for any blaster
● (2-6/5) Ascendant Spell: Okay so basically, ascendant spell lets you cast a spell as its
MYTHIC version which is...completely ridiculous. All mythic spells are just straight up
better versions of the base spell, and getting access to them in non mythic games is
great...or it would be if it didnt bring you up +5 spell levels. Damn. If only we had a
way, that was relatively easy, to be able to use metamagic without raising the actual
level of the spell! Then well this would be amazing wouldn’t it? Probably busted.
● (5/5) Cherry Blossom Spell: If a target takes damage from a spell (even if they
succeed their save) They take 2 ABILITY DAMAGE to either all their mental or physical
scoll. Not only is this thematic, you also have a bunch of spells that have ongoing
damage effects that make this TERRIFYING. So long as your spell has a save, they
don't get a fort save to negate it. Even for +3 spell levels, this is probably worth it.
Imagine if we didn’t have to do that?
● (4/5) Extend Spell: Doubles your duration. Short sweet, gets the job done, great for long
term buffs or other effects. Definitely worth picking up.
● (5/5) ✰Quickened Spell✰: You are probably going to get a rod of this, because its sort
of expensive BUT action economy is the name of the game. Being able to cast two
spells in one round is ridiculously powerful, don’t forget it.
● (5/5) Dazing Spell: HAHAHA IF THEY TAKE DAMAGE FROM THE SPELL THEY ARE
DAZED. DAZED. Dazed creatures can take no actions, completely removing potentially
dozens of enemies from the board. Dazing fireball is classic for a reason, and honestly
this is one of the best debuff tools in the game. Fucking terrifying.
● (4/5) Rime Spell: Ice spells entangle. Good cute debuff and you have plenty of ice
spells, and if you dont you can steal them somehow I’m sure.
● (5/5) ✰Studied Spell✰: Make a knowledge check. If you pass, you completely ignore
the targets energy resistances or DR from its race...which is what most monsters have.
Congrats, fireball now works and everyone is very angry with you. AND GUESS WHAT?
WE ARE INT BASED BABY. KNOWING THINGS IS USEFUL. BLASTERS YOU ARE
PICKING THIS UP.
● (5/5) Empowered Spell: All numerical effects...ALL OF THEM are increased by 1.5. All
of them. Thats damage dice, damage added, possibly creatures affected. It just says all.
Go off I guess. Blasters, you are also taking this.
● (4/5) Maximized Spell: All variable numeric effects are maximized. Healing is maxed,
damage is maxed yadda yadda.
● (5/5) Persistent Spell: Effectively roll twice and take the lowest for all saves involved
with the spell. For a lot of later game spells, it’s save or be absolutely destroyed, so this
can be an INCREDIBLY useful power to have. Incredibly. Very very worth picking up mid
to late game.

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 ● (4.5/5) Piercing Spell: Hey do you know that SR is the worst? Like the absolute worst?
This makes your enemies SR count as being 5 lower and only raises your spell level by
1. This can and will save your ass at least once so it’s a good pick up...possibly better as
a rod, but a good pickup nonetheless.
● (4/5) Reach Spell: There are a SURPRISING number of incredibly powerful touch
spells, and while ya know, most of them you can deal with via spectral hand, once you
get to level 10 or so you’ll definitely want to be able to cast some of your 5th or 6th level
spells at a a range.

Item Creation Feats

● (5/5) ✰Craft Wondrous Item✰: If you are going to get a feat, and you don’t know which
to pick? Pick this one. This has one of the widest array of items, they are always helpful,
AND you can ignore a lot of the pre-reqs so long as your skill checks are high enough.
● (5/5) Inscribe Magical Tattoo: Basically allows you to make a second set of magical
items but at a much higher cost. This is important because it lets you have two items in
one slot...also come on, sexy super magic tattoo’s?
● (4/5) Scribe Scroll: Lets you make scrolls of your spell list, and honestly? You have so
many ways of abusing scrolls, you might as well pick it up. AND WE CAN MAKE THEM
ON THE CHEAP LETS GO!!!
● (4/5) Craft Arms and Armor: So on its own it’s really good...for your team. Don’t get me
wrong, there is armor you can wear and this will come in handy for that but in general,
this will be a lot more useful for your party than for yourself.
○ (5-6/5) Craft Construct: So these can actually be SILLY powerful if you know
how to use them. Constructs have some of the wildest cheese, from the Tiny
God Homunculi to the Painter Wizard, this can get REALLY busted REALLY fast
if your DM isn't paying attention.
■ Also never forget: “Once the crafting process is complete, the resulting construct is ready
to receive orders. A construct recognizes its creator intuitively and obeys all commands
issued to it by that individual.”
● (6/5) Craft Fleshcrafting Poison: Stealing monster abilities is busted, and if you get
away with this, then be grateful or very afraid of your GM.
● (6/5) Creating Magical Traps*: So technically this isn’t a magic item creation feat, and
doesn’t really require a feat but these are basically in the same ballpark so I just wanted
to let you know, magical traps are busted, expensive but busted, especially with
automatic resets. You can basically have contingency whatever, and place multiple
spells on one trap and so long as you can cast it, it’s gucci so just...yeah no this is dumb.

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Equipment
SO reader I am going to level with you. I HATE EQUIPMENT SHOPPING. I hate it, I hate it, I
hate it. Least favorite part of character creation. There is too much equipment in the game, and
too many ways it can be used, and it’s EXHAUSTING. So I refused to tell you all of the best
things. Luckily, someone else has done all the work for me. So if you want to know what the
best gear is, read The Armamentarium, a guide written by Allerseelen.

Also check out Improving your class with items and Item Master List for an even wider
selection. These people have done the work, check them out.

● THE BIG SEVEN: Basically, the six items the game is expecting you to get and
something to hold everything else. Can be replaced by the Automatic Bonus Progression
System, but if not, here they are:
○ Magic Weapon
○ Magic Armor
○ Cloak of Resistance
○ Stat-boosting item (headbands for mental stats, belts for physical)
○ Ring of Protection
○ Amulet of Natural Armor
○ Bag of Holding / Handy Haversack / Portable Hole
● Mnemonic Vestment: Look I don’t usually rate items but this is DIRT CHEAP And
one of the most POWERFUL ITEMS IN YOUR KIT. Being able to keep a wall of
scrolls of all of your favorite situational spells, or options is a godsend and a game
changer. Every spontaneous caster should make this their second purchase after
something to boost their charisma. Immediately.
● Cookbook of Arcane Augmentation: AYE free persistent spell that doesn’t boost the
spell slot! Time to ruin someone's day!!!!!
● Mage’s Crossbow: Bow that can help you with spell resistance on ranged touch
attacks!!! Which is huge!!!
● Goblet of Liquified Cognition: Drink scrolls to prepare them as if they were in your
spell book! Not the hugest thing but its nice to have.
● Magical Hat: METAMAGIC SWAP!!!! METAMAGIC SWAAAP!!!!
● Mask of Conflicting Elements: Element flip!
● Robes of Xin-Bakrakhan: Give shield bonus, spell resistance, +1 caster level, and
some deep ass pockets. Its super expensive, but hey, late game gear is late game.
● Amulet of Reverse Incantation: Can warp spells to make them more versatile! Inflict
spells cure! Evil spells now affect evil people. Spells become their own reverse! Even if
its only three time per day, for a spontaneous caster, this is three times per day where
you can get some SERIOUS variety. Pairs well with emergency attunement.
● Metamagic Rods: Basically let you use some metamagic for free a couple times a day.
These are great for either situational metamagics that you don’t wanna burn a feat on or
metamagic that is super expensive, and you don’t want to burn a slot on. Below I’ll
include some fan favorites, but feel free to read through and choose your own.
○ Extend
○ Dazing
○ Quicken

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 ○ Empower
○ Persistent
○ Reach
○ Piercing
● Runestones of Power: More spells prepared is more spells spells is more spells
● Cloak of Displacement, Minor: One of the few times I would suggest a minor version
over the major version. Save yourself the second level slot, and just have the defense on
permanantly, and if things get dicey, cast displacement to become a wall of fuck off.
● Ring of Wizardry: Type III and IV are the best ones, getting you DOUBLE the spells per
day at each level...of which you already have a bazillion. Enjoy casting Paragon surge,
fly or any number of amazing spells basically as many items as you can fathom. HELL
YES
● Otherworldly Kimono: Boost to caster level checks (dispel and spell resistance) and
saving throws...also once per day vorp someone into your robes as the spell
Maze...which is often a save or lose so...yeah great item.
● Ring of Elemental Command: SUPPPPER expensive and late game but a really really
cool power items. Elementals from a specific plane can’t touch you, and if you fufill it’s
requirements, you can gain a bunch of great spell like abilities (which means more
versatility remember? We love that.) For DM’s, this would be a great gift your players
manage to impress an Elemental Lord of some kind.
● Dream Journal of the Pallid Seer: Dirt cheap but super weird uh…but it’ll probably
save you at least once.
● Numerology Cylinder: +2 against spell resistance…for like 5K. We love that here.
● Gloves of Storing: Hey if you plan on taking lets say, versatile spontaneity and the
Mnemonic Vestments, you might end up making yourself a little spellbook that you can use
to choose spells from. In that case, it’d be mighty nice to have an easy place to store it and
pop it out whenever you need it without thinking...hint hint.
● Spell and Meditation Books: Okay so if you are doing prepared casting shenanigans,
eventually you might look into spell books, most notably, preconstructed spellbooks. If you
don’t, well here it goes. Technically spell books are for prepared casters proper, and most of
these spell books come with neat things called “preparation rituals” that give you a 1/day
boon that you can use if you prepare 3 spells from said book. These things are way cheaper
than they should be and are an easy way for you to get a massive spell library without
having to work too hard.
○ Wisdom of Jatembe (Three Warriors Edition)
○ Boom of Harms
○ Erages Journeyman’s Manual
○ Grimoire of Glittering Eyes
○ Tome of the Transmuter
○ Arctic Call
○ Cyrusian Codex
○ Wisdom of Jatembe (Six Warriors Edition)
○ Guardian Grimoire
○ Master Book of Rul Thaven
○ Wisdom of Jatembe (Nine Warriords Edition)
○ Runes of Wealth

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