This is a slight deviation for me as most of the things I make are on the other side of the DM screen. But this is a level 1 through 20 build for a Pathfinder Second Edition character. The characters featured in these posts will typically be drawn from various franchises and media because I want to focus more on the building and worry less about the character. Having a character gives me an end goal to work towards to instead of getting lost along the way. It’s also a bit of a challenge for the system, seeing how close I can build to the original vision of the character. I’m gonna try to find a balance between making an effective character and mimicking the chosen character’s abilities.
Related to that, these characters are gonna be created in a vacuum – skills and the likes are picked for what seems best without the context of the adventure. Heist-type adventures might call for Stealth and Thievery on a character that otherwise wouldn’t take it, so keep that in mind. I’m also not gonna do gear, aside from real basic stuff like preferred armor and weapons. I want to focus more on the build of the character.
I’m gonna go level by level for these builds but only cover actual choices – such as skill increases, feats, and ability score boosts. Stuff that automatically increases due to level, such as an increase in saving throws, more HP, and the like, are going to go unmentioned.
So with that, let’s get into the build for Akali, the Rogue Assassin!
CHARACTER Akali, the Rogue Assassin
SOURCE League of Legends
GOAL While I may have given up League of Legends, I still like a number of the characters and wanted to try statting out one of them. Akali is an assassin who wields a kama in combat, throws shurikens, and uses smoke bombs, but lacks some of the spiritual abilities of her fellow ninjas. She used to belong to an order of ninjas before going rogue to follow her own path. She marks targets with her abilities and then increases her attack and damage against them temporarily. She also has abilities to move quickly and attempt to finish off her victims. We’re looking at a character that can move in and out of combat, uses strange weapons, and can execute her enemies.
LEVEL 1 Let’s go through our Pathfinder 2e ABC’s – ancestry, background, and class. We pick human for our ancestry along with the versatile heritage, which we use to pick up Fleet, allowing her to move and sneak faster. Her two free boosts go to Strength and Dexterity, making her stronger and more agile. For our ancestry feat, we take Natural Ambition, granting us a bonus 1st-leve class feat that I’ll cover when I get to that.
We take balance seeker (a rename of the Lost Omen World Guide’s perfection seeker background) to represent her time with the Kinkou Order. Her first boost from it goes to Dexterity and its free boost goes to Strength again. We also become trained in Acrobatics and the Warfare Lore skills, and get the Cat Fall feat, which makes it safer to fall.
Her class was a tough choice that I pondered on for a while before deciding that monk worked out best for her. We take our boost from monk in Dexterity before our four free boosts go to Strength, Constitution, Intelligence, and Wisdom. This leaves us with the following array: Str 16, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 12, Cha 10. Our higher Intelligence gives us an extra language, which Celestial or Sylvan would be good fits for given her home’s connection to the spirit world and the like. It also gives us a total of 5 other skills to become trained in, so we take Athletics, Crafting, Deception, Stealth, and Thievery, which is going to help her as an infiltrator and an assassin. Due to our Natural Ambition, we get a total of two monk feats and we take Ki Rush and Monastic Weaponry. While I mentioned that she lacked spiritual abilities, Ki Rush helps to emulate her dash while Monastic Weaponry gives us the proficiency with her preferred weapons as well as the ability to use them with monk feats and abilities that affect unarmed strikes.
LEVEL 2 For our skill feat, we grab Alchemical Crafting, which gives us four formulas for alchemical items. The important thing here is to grab lesser smokestick (allowing us to mimic her Twilight Shroud ability), but other options I would suggest, even if not entirely appropriate, would be cheetah’s elixir, giant centipede venom, lesser bottled lightning, lesser quicksilver mutagen, or lesser tanglefoot bag. We pick up Shooting Stars Stance for our class feat, which allows us to use monk abilities and feats that normally require unarmed strikes with shuriken. Through this manner, we can somewhat mimic another one of her abilities, Five Point Strike, where she throws a flurry of shuriken.
LEVEL 3 Our skill increase goes to Stealth, making us an expert in it while our general feat is Feather Step, allowing us to Step into difficult terrain, which in turn helps with the idea of hit and run tactics.
LEVEL 4 Another skill feat lets us grab Shadowmark, increasing our capability to trail targets without being noticed. Flying Kick helps emulate her dash and attack as well as give us a chance at targeting airborne foes.
LEVEL 5 Our four free boosts go to Strength, Dexterity, Wisdom, and Charisma to give us: Str 18, Dex 18, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 14, Cha 12. We get a skill increase that we’re gonna use to become an expert in Athletics. We pick up Natural Skill with our ancestry feat to become trained in Intimidation and Society.
LEVEL 6 We take Powerful Leap for our skill feat to extend any jumps. My first glance through monk feats available at 6th made me want to go for Abundant Step because it lets her teleport, but I think the better option is Assassin Dedication. The main thing this does is give us the Mark for Death ability and set us up for future feats we’re gonna take down the line.
LEVEL 7 At this point we get our first Path to Perfection, which lets us choose a saving throw to become master in. We’re gonna go with Reflex because it fits for Akali. We also get a skill increase that goes to Stealth so that we can become a master in it. We also get a general feat, which we’re gonna use to grab Incredible Initiative, which will hopefully allow us to strike first.
LEVEL 8: Now that we have master proficiency in Stealth, we can use our skill feat at this level to take Swift Sneak, allowing us to move at full speed while sneaking. We’re gonna dip deeper into the assassin dedication to pick up Sneak Attacker, giving our attacks against flat-footed enemies bonus damage. At this point and maybe even before it, an average round for us might be letting the enemy close and then using action 1 to Feint, action 2 to make two kama Strikes (hopefully at a flat-footed target), and then action 3 to retreat, forcing the enemy to come to us and eating up its actions.
LEVEL 9: The skill increase goes to Acrobatics, making it easier for us to tumble around and through our enemies. For our ancestry feat, we take Clever Improviser. My idea behind this choice is that as an assassin, you sometimes need to disguise yourself in various roles. This feat will help with that idea.
LEVEL 10: This time, the four boosts go to Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma, helping to round us out and bring us to: Str 18, Dex 18, Con 14, Int 14, Wis 16, Cha 14. The extra skill from our increase Intelligence ends up being Ninja Lore to better reflect the character’s history. For language, whichever wasn’t taken earlier seems appropriate. Pickpocket is our skill feat here, allowing us to filch keys and other important tools for infiltration. There were a couple options I was considering here for our monk feat – Pinning Fire could be cool but isn’t exactly appropriate, nor is the assassin archetype’s Poison Weapon. Ultimately, I took Surprise Attack because we should be starting as many fights as we can with Stealth, letting us dish out some nice early damage.
LEVEL 11 Our second Path to Perfection leads us to Will as that felt like an appropriate choice for Akali over Fortitude. We became an expert in Deception thanks to our skill increase, improving our chances to Feint against targets. We also take a skill feat with the general feat we’re granted at this level, gaining Lengthy Diversion to help us stay hidden while we’re sneaking about.
LEVEL 12 My thoughts behind taking Steady Balance at this point is to sneak into buildings and hide among the rafters, waiting for an opportune moment to strike out at and eliminate our target. To further help with that idea, we use our assassin archetype to take the Assassinate feat, which can potentially flat-out kill a target and deals a nice bundle of damage regardless.
LEVEL 13 Appreciating a spread of knowledge, we put our skill increase in Thievery this time around to become an expert at it. Stubborn Persistence is our ancestry feat, allowing us to attempt to shake off fatigue.
LEVEL 14 By taking Quick Disguise with our skill feat, we can assassinate our targets, slip away, and try to set up a new disguise. Dodging Roll is a monk feat that offers us some protection and can faintly be used to simulate her Shuriken Flip ability, at least in regards to flipping out of range of something.
LEVEL 15 Our ability boosts go to Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and Charisma, leaving our array looking like this: Str 19, Dex 19, Con 16, Int 14, Wis 16, Cha 16. We reach our final and third Path to Perfection and achieve legendary proficiency in Reflex saving throws. For our skill increase, we become legendary in Stealth and related directly to that, we use our general feat to pick another skill feat so that we can get Legendary Sneak, allowing us to disappear even in plain sight.
LEVEL 16 Quick Jump just feels like a natural ability for a monk or ninja along with the next skill feat we’re gonna pick up. I actually ended up changing my mind on the class feat for this due to a misunderstanding on my part regarding Monastic Weaponry. But all the sources I’ve read said that this works with it, leading me to choose Quivering Palm! By that same token, Shooting Stars Stance probably means that her shuriken now work with it as well. This is another ability that sort of helps to emulate her Perfect Execution ability and I think it works especially well because it’s a hit followed by triggering it again for more death or death.
LEVEL 17 This level’s skill increase goes to Athletics so that we can become a master in it. With our ancestry feat, we finish out the line we started with Clever Improviser and take Incredible Improvisation, granting us a 1/day reroll on a skill check we’re at least trained in.
LEVEL 18 Continuing feats that really capture the essence of ‘ninja,’ we take Wall Jump as our skill feat and then grab Diamond Fists for our class feat, which gives our attacks forceful and makes use of our numerous strikes to deal greater damage.
LEVEL 19 With the end in sight, we take our skill increase in Acrobatics, becoming a master in it. Thanks to that, we can take the Kip Up skill feat as a general feat, which allows us to stand up from prone as a free action that doesn’t trigger reactions. Again, this feat just feels very fitting for a ninja.
LEVEL 20 Finally, we come to our max level where we apply our four boosts to Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and Charisma, leaving out final array at this: Str 20, Dex 20, Con 18, Int 14, Wis 16, Cha 18. In the same theme as Wall Jump, we take Water Sprint for our skill feat, which allows us to run over water for brief distances. Meanwhile, for our monk feat, we pick up Deadly Strikes to grant all our attacks the deadly d10 trait.
CONCLUSION You made it to the end! We now have a deadly killer who strikes from the shadows before darting away, quickly becoming lost in the crowd. She’s substantially more durable here than she is in her resident video game to make her playstyle a little more viable, but I tried to keep it close. I feel like this idea could also be done with the rogue class that takes the Monk Dedication, but monk felt like a better fit for her origins.
Thanks for taking the time to check out this build and please let me know what you think. Does this build work? Does it represent the character? What would you change about it? Is it something you’d like to play?
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Have a great day!