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. At a friend's suggestion, I'm gonna start including gear in these builds but I'm gonna keep it basic - just picking magical gear based on what level of equipment a character should have at that level.
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 Ink-Eyes, Servant of the Oni!
CHARACTER Ink-Eyes, Servant of the Oni
SOURCE Magic the Gathering
GOAL Ink-Eyes is a nezumi ninja from the plane of Kamigawa. She is a 5/4 mono-black card that has the ninjutsu keyword as well as the ability to bring back a creature from an opponent’s graveyard to your side of the battlefield when you damage them. Ink-Eyes is also able to regenerate if you spend some mana to save her. As revealed in the story ‘A Servant’s Mission,’ Ink-Eyes was raised by the ogre Muzan, a servant of a demon, after she had been cast out by her own people. She eventually murdered Muzan at the behest of the demon Kuro, who infused her with dark powers to command the dead.
LEVEL 1 Step one is, as always, our ABCs – ancestry, background, and class. Since Ink-Eyes is a nezumi, we’re going to take ratfolk as our ancestry and then take the deep ancestry – she lived in caves and a darkened swamp and adapted to those environs. As a ratfolk, we get a boost to Dexterity and Intelligence, but take a flaw to Strength. Our free boost is going towards Charisma, to help set up for some of our other choices down the line. We receive an ancestry feat at first level, which we will use to gain Vicious Incisors, giving us a something to defend ourselves with even when divested of all other equipment.
Ink-Eyes was raised by a demon-worshipping ogre until she herself was chosen as the demon’s primary servant. That feels like the cultist background to me, which will get its first boost to Charisma and its free boost will go to Dexterity. We become trained in Occultism and the Demon Lore skill and then receive the Schooled in Secrets skill feat, allowing us to use Occultism to Gather Information about secret societies.
There’s a variety of ways I feel like you could take Ink-Eyes, but with powers granted by a demon lord and the ability to bring back the dead, oracle feels like an appropriate fit to me. This will grant us a boost to Charisma before we receive our four other boosts, which we will put towards Strength, Dexterity, Wisdom, and Charisma to give us this as our starting array: Str 10, Dex 16, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 12, Cha 18. We automatically become trained in Religion and will receive another trained skill based on the mystery we pick. For the skills we actually get to pick, we’ll take Acrobatics, Stealth, Survival, and Thievery. Given Ink-Eyes dancing in her background story, you could probably replace Thievery with Performance if you so desire. As a caster, we don’t receive a feat, but there are still some choices to make as a 1st-level oracle – largely what mystery we tap into. As a necromancer type character, the bones mystery is the obvious choice, which will make us trained in the Medicine skill.
Spells: Cantrips – chill touch, detect magic, guidance, read magic, shield; 1st – animate dead, harm
LEVEL 2 Ink-Eyes has undoubtedly learned some strange rituals and magic that she can use in Root Magic, a skill feat, to create a protective fetish for her allies that crumbles after its use. Since Ink-Eyes is defined as a ninja on her very card, we use this class feat to take the Rogue Dedication, which isn’t hugely useful right off the bat, but lets us become trained in another skill. My first pick for it is Deception, but you may want to swap that out with Performance if you decided to keep Thievery.
Spells: 1st – bane
Gear: ring of discretion
LEVEL 3 I feel one of the best ways to represent Ink-Eyes ninjutsu keyword is Stealth, at least thematically, so with this skill increase, we’ll bump our proficiency in Stealth to expert. Then we also grab Incredible Initiative so that we can get the jump on our enemies.
Spells: 2nd – death knell, final sacrifice
Signature Spell: animate dead, final sacrifice
Gear: +1 spear, ring of discretion, dull grey aeon stone
LEVEL 4 If you want to swap a skill out for Performance, I think Thievery is the better choice, because I like keeping the trained proficiency in Deception so that we can take Lengthy Diversion as a skill feat that increases the effectiveness of Create a Diversion. From our Rogue Dedication, we can get Sneak Attacker so we can dish out some extra damage to foes that we have an advantage over.
Spells: 2nd – sudden blight
Gear: bracelets of dashing, +1 spear, +1 dagger, ring of discretion
LEVEL 5 We receive a series of ability boosts that we can plug into Strength, Dexterity, Wisdom, and Charisma, putting us at this set: Str 12, Dex 18, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 14, Cha 19. So that we can reposition around the battlefield easier, we take this skill increase to Acrobatics to achieve expert proficiency in it. As a ninja, I feel like Ink-Eyes would be familiar with poisons and harmful elixirs, making Lab Rat feel like an appropriate ancestry feat to take to increase her resilience to them.
Spells: 3rd – bind undead, blindness
Signature Spell: bind undead
Gear: +1 striking spear, bracelets of dashing, pearly white spindle aeon stone, +1 spear, ring of discretion, dull grey aeon stone
LEVEL 6 When sneaking through the swamp, Ink-Eyes can use Nimble Crawl so that she can move with surprising speed even while staying prone. We will actually take an oracle feat this time to gain Advanced Revelation, which grants us the armor of bones focus spell.
Spells: 3rd – agonizing despair
Gear: +1 leather armor, +1 striking spear, +1 striking dagger (or occult scroll case of simplicity), bracelets of dashing, necklace of knives, hand of the mage
LEVEL 7 Mainly because she might need to perform feints in combat, we increase Deception to expert proficiency. We receive a general feat at this level, which we’ll use to grab Fleet, increasing our Speed.
Spells: 4th – divine wrath, enervation
Signature Spell: divine wrath
Gear: clandestine cloak, +1 leather armor, skeleton key, +1 striking spear, bracelets of dashing, pearly white spindle aeon stone
LEVEL 8 Since we have the trained proficiency in Medicine from our mystery, we can take Battle Medicine, which will let us patch up people even in the middle of combat. With our Rogue Dedication, we pick up Skill Mastery, a nifty feat that lets us achieve master proficiency in Stealth and expert in Religion as well as the Swift Sneak skill feat, allowing us to Sneak at our full Speed.
Spells: 4th – talking corpse
Gear: slippers of spider climbing, clandestine cloak, staff of necromancy, +1 leather armor, +1 striking spear, +1 striking dagger
LEVEL 9 We take a skill increase to Thievery (or Performance if you took that) to become an expert in it. With the ancestry feat at this level, we grab Warren Navigator, which makes it easier for us to Sense Direction, a handy ability for living in the swamp.
Spells: 5th – spiritual guardian, wall of flesh
Signature Spell: spiritual guardian
Gear: +1 resilient leather armor, slippers of spider climbing, wand of continuation (2nd-level), clandestine cloak, +1 striking spear, +1 striking dagger
LEVEL 10 These ability boosts will go to Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and Charisma, giving us this set of stats: Str 14, Dex 19, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 14, Cha 20. We take Recognize Spell as our skill feat, so that we can figure out what spell is being cast as a reaction. Then, since we have two feats from our Rogue Dedication, we can take a new one, which we’ll use to grab the Fighter Dedication, making us trained in all martial weapons so that we can use the wakizashi as seen in her card.
Spells: 5th – banishment
Gear: greater pendant of the occult, +1 resilient leather armor, wand of teeming ghosts (3rd-level), slippers of spider climbing, +1 striking spear, +1 striking wakizashi
LEVEL 11 This skill increase will go towards Deception, making us a master in it. For our general feat, we look to Incredible Investiture, allowing us to invest in twelve items rather than ten. With how I do gear, that isn’t super useful, but it feels appropriate.
Spells: 6th – spirit blast, vampiric exsanguination
Signature Spell: spirit blast
Gear: +2 striking wakizashi, greater pendant of the occult, urn of ashes, +1 resilient leather armor, slippers of spider climbing, +1 striking spear
LEVEL 12 With the Slippery Secrets skill feat, we are able to deceive even mind-reading spells. To bring our wakizashi more in line with our simple weapons, we take Diverse Weapon Expert to achieve expert proficiency in martial weapons.
Spells: 6th – blinding fury
Gear: +2 resilient leather armor, +2 striking wakizashi, greater clandestine cloak, greater pendant of the occult, wand of teeming ghosts (3rd-level), +1 striking spear
LEVEL 13 A skill increase to Acrobatics sees us reach master in it while the Warren Digger ancestry feat gives us a 15-foot burrow Speed. While not an exact fit for the character, it feels like a handy ability useful in a variety of situations.
Spells: 7th – eclipse burst, finger of death
Signature Spell: finger of death
Gear: +2 greater striking wakizashi, +2 resilient leather armor, greater skeleton key, +2 striking spear, greater pendant of the occult, urn of ashes
LEVEL 14 With our master proficiency in Acrobatics, we can grab Kip Up, so that we can stand up as a free action without provoking reactions. For our class feat, we take Greater Revelation to gain our mystery’s claim undead revelation spell, which feels like Ink-Eyes’s ability to steal the dead creatures of our opponents.
Spells: 7th – regenerate
Gear: pale lavender ellipsoid aeon stone, +2 greater striking wakizashi, +2 greater striking spear, +2 resilient leather armor, greater clandestine cloak, wand of teeming ghosts (4th-level)
LEVEL 15 Another quartet of ability boosts will go to Strength, Dexterity, Wisdom, and Charisma, giving us this set of scores: Str 16, Dex 20, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 21. Since we can now increase it to this point, we’ll become legendary in Stealth and then pick up the Toughness general feat. Since we’re looking to play a melee oracle, the extra Hit Points from that feat will help us survive in combat.
Spells: 8th – devour life, divine inspiration
Signature Spell: devour life
Gear: +2 greater resilient leather armor, pale lavender ellipsoid aeon stone, boots of speed, +2 greater striking wakizashi, greater skeleton key, +2 striking spear
LEVEL 16 We can now grab Legendary Sneak, so that we can Hide or Sneak even without cover or concealment. I was considering taking Fighter Resiliency at this level, but I really love the flavor of Bespell Weapon and it helps with our damage a little bit.
Spells: 8th – spiritual endemic
Gear: selenite crystal ball, +2 greater resilient leather armor, wand of teeming ghosts (6th-level), pale lavender ellipsoid aeon stone, +2 greater striking wakizashi, +2 greater striking spear
LEVEL 17 We take this skill increase to become legendary in Deception. Ratfolk don’t have a 17th-level ancestry feat yet, but we’ll take Rat Familiar as our final ancestry feat, mostly because I think the flavor feels appropriate for a demon-worshipping rat-gal.
Spells: 9th – bind soul, massacre
Signature Spell: massacre
Gear: +3 greater striking wakizashi, selenite crystal ball, dragonscale amulet, +2 greater resilient leather armor, pale lavender ellipsoid aeon stone, +2 greater striking spear
LEVEL 18 With the Reveal Machinations skill feat, we can convince a creature we are behind a number of events in their life to frighten them and gain knowledge about them. For our class feat, I like the look of Quickened Casting, allowing us to reduce the number of actions required to cast a spell once per day.
Spells: 9th – wail of the banshee
Gear: circlet of persuasion, +3 greater striking spear, +3 greater striking wakizashi, selenite crystal ball, +2 greater resilient leather armor, wand of teeming ghosts (6th-level)
LEVEL 19 A skill increase to Religion gets us to master proficiency. Then we grab Feather Step so that we can Step into difficult terrain.
Spells: 10th – indestructibility, revival
Gear: +3 greater resilient leather armor, circlet of persuasion, major insistent door knocker, +3 greater striking wakizashi, selenite crystal ball, +2 greater striking spear
LEVEL 20 Our final ability boosts will go to Strength, Constitution, Wisdom, and Charisma, leaving us with this as our final array: Str 18, Dex 20, Con 14, Int 12, Wis 18, Cha 22. With Battle Prayer, Ink-Eyes can offer up a prayer to her master Kuro to scour the battlefield. Our final class feat will be Mystery Conduit, which allows us to advance our curse instead of using a spell slot to cast a spell of 5th-level or lower.
Spells: weapon of judgement
Gear: +3 major striking wakizashi, +3 greater resilient leather armor, wand of teeming ghosts (8th-level), circlet of persuasion, +3 greater striking spear, orange prism aeon stone
CONCLUSION This was an interesting way to go with the character and while fun, and I feel a decent representation of the card, I’m not sure how effective she would be. We are left with a stealthy spellcaster able to command the dead and deal decent damage when she holds an advantage over her foes. I looked for spells about bringing the dead back as her own servants and ended up with a decent list of them though her other spells are largely damage focused, which is probably not the best choice as a caster. I really wished there was some sort of spear or polearm that had finesse to better fit the character, but I’ll settle for the wakizashi.
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?
Lemme know what other characters you might like to see and if you’re so inclined, join the blog’s Discord server or can watch some guys beat up my monsters on my Twitch, where I usually stream Friday and Saturday nights.
Have a Fantastic Friday!
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