I mentioned that I wanted to do this build back when I first did the build for the Trickster and I feel like there's been enough time since I did that build or another barbarian build to post this one. As I was building this, I ended up realizing that this would be similar to a build for Aatrox from League of Legends with some modifications, so that might be a build I don't have to address when I get around to it. These Dead by Daylight builds are fun to attempt, but I don't think they translate super well into Pathfinder builds, so they may be the last one I do unless people end up the liking them. As always, it's worth noting that this build and the gear for it is picked in a vacuum without consideration for what adventure it may be in, so certain options might be better in specific situations.
With that out of the way, let's get into the build for Yamaoka Kazan, the Oni, from Dead by Daylight!
THE ONI
CHARACTER Yamaoka Kazan
SOURCE Dead by Daylight
GOAL A monstrous killer who absorbs blood to become a fearsome demon, Yamaoka Kazan was a samurai who suffered extreme anger issues. In life, he specifically hunted and slaughtered farmers and peasants who masqueraded as samurai, believing that brought a bad name to them. His habits earned him cruel nicknames, the worst of which came from a local lord who called him Oni-Yamaoka and the wrathful samurai turned his attention to the lord. In journeying to slay him, Kazan mistakenly murdered his own father who sought to stop him. This further broke him and he slaughtered his way to the lord, ripping out the tongue that had once mocked him with his bare hand. While leaving the estate, he was overwhelmed by a horde of peasants and slain though his body disappeared afterwards, drawn to The Entity. His Zenshin Tactics makes him more aware of his surroundings, revealing the auras of breakable walls, pallets, and windows. Blood Echo afflicts other survivors with Hemorrhage and Exhausted when he hangs another survivor on a hook. Nemesis causes survivors that blind or stun him to become his obsession, making them oblivious and revealing their aura to him. Finally, his power is Yamaoka’s Wrath, which allows him to absorb blood left by survivors to activate his Blood Fury, which grants him the ability to activate Demon Dash to sprint suddenly and Demon Strike immediately puts targets into a dying state.
LEVEL 1 We’re gonna start the same place that we always do, with our ABCs – ancestry, background, and class. I want to start with human for our ancestry because that is indeed what Kazan started as, but we’re going to dip into his namesake and take tiefling for his heritage, which just gives us darkvision for now. Humans receive two free boosts, which we will put towards Strength and Constitution, making Kazan hardy and strong. Our first ancestry feat will make use of our heritage and net us Fiendish Eyes, granting us darkvision so that we can better stalk our prey in the night.
Since Kazan was born as a samurai in feudal Japan, we’ll take the noble background to reflect the standing of his family. The first boost from that will go to Charisma, more to represent Kazan’s sheer force of will when it comes to commanding others. For the free boost, we’ll put that towards Strength to make him a more fearsome warrior. As a noble, we become trained in Society and Heraldry Lore, and then also receive the Courtly Graces skill feat, allowing us to use our Society skill to get along in high society.
Kazan’s anger issues and his ability to turn into a demonic warrior make barbarian feel like a good pick for him, and I like spirit instinct for him because I’m tired of taking the fury instinct and Kazan is highly focused on his family. It’s also a fun reference to Kazan’s only descendant featured in Dead by Daylight – Yamaoka Rin, the Spirit. As a barbarian, we’ll receive a boost to Strength and then have four more boosts that we’ll slot into Strength, Constitution, Wisdom, and Charisma (Str 18, Dex 10, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 14). For our skills, we automatically become trained in Athletics and then become trained in three more skills, which will be Acrobatics, Intimidation, and Survival. With the Sudden Charge class feat, we can Stride twice and Strike at the end of our movement as two actions, which is good for Kazan’s Demon Dash while he’s in his Blood Fury. The kanabo haven’t made their way into PF2e, though PF1e had the tetsubo as a weapon, which is similar, so maybe we’ll get there someday. Until then, we’ll be using a greatclub in place of his kanabo.
LEVEL 2 While not particularly related to any of his abilities, the Armor Assist skill feat allows Kazan to don his armor quicker. No class feats really jump out at me at this level, but Furious Finish feels like it kinda makes sense to me, channeling the last of your rage into a more powerful strike similar to timing an attack with Kazan’s Blood Fury ending.
Gear: predictable silver piece
LEVEL 3 So that we can better bully people around, we’ll place our first skill increase to Athletics, raising it to expert proficiency. Kazan’s background has him surviving extraordinary punishment in his final rampage that I feel like Diehard is a good general feat for him to take, increasing the dying value he needs to die at.
Gear: +1 greatclub, predictable silver piece, dull grey aeon stone
LEVEL 4 With the Intimidating Glare skill feat, we no longer have to rely on our words to scare people around us, allowing Kazan to descend into wordless fury. Though not actually because we don’t have the Raging Intimidation class feat – we need to make sure we Demoralize before we Rage. Instead, our class feat will be Spiritual Guides, making use of our instinct and allowing Kazan to seek the guidance of his ancestors.
Gear: golden legion epaulet, +1 greatclub, +1 katana, predictable silver piece
LEVEL 5 The four boosts that we get will go to Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and Wisdom (Str 19, Dex 12, Con 16, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 14). This skill increase will bump Society up to expert proficiency so that Kazan can better navigate the courts – even if he was more interested in combat than politics. For our ancestry feat, we’ll take Malicious Bane, allowing us to cast bane as an innate spell once per day, weakening foes around us. This allows us to somewhat mimic Kazan’s Blood Echo with its ability to make his victims more vulnerable.
Gear: +1 striking greatclub, golden legion epaulet, bracelet of dashing, +1 katana, predictable silver piece, dull grey aeon stone
LEVEL 6 The Connections skill feat builds out of Courtly Graces, letting us leverage our standing as a samurai. Attack of Opportunity is an appropriate class feat for a killer like Kazan to grab, striking out at foes when they try to escape him.
Gear: +1 breastplate, +1 striking greatclub, demon mask, golden legion epaulet, +1 katana, brooch of shielding
LEVEL 7 Another skill increase pumps Intimidation up to expert, netting our trifecta of Kazan’s primary skills. For our general feat, we’ll grab Toughness for much the same reason as Diehard, making us much harder to kill.
Gear: lantern of empty light, +1 breastplate, fearsome property rune, +1 striking greatclub, golden legion epaulet, bracelet of dashing
LEVEL 8 There’s nothing that really correlates to Kazan’s skill for Quick Jump, but it lets us jump as a single action, which is handy. We’ll keep picking up our spirit instinct feats, with the next one being Spirits’ Interference. While Rage makes us more susceptible to attacks through our lowered AC, we can get some protection from this feat as after spending an action to activate it, all ranged attacks must succeed at a DC 5 flat check to hit us for the remainder of our rage.
Gear: boots of bounding, lantern of empty light, ready armor rune, +1 breastplate, +1 striking greatclub, +1 striking katana
LEVEL 9 We could have increased a skill to master proficiency at seventh level, but I wanted to get Intimidation up to expert first. This time around, we’ll get Athletics to master proficiency. I had a hard time picking out an ancestry feat for this level and ended up settling on Fiendish Resistance – Fire to make Kazan a little sturdier.
Gear: +1 resilient breastplate, boots of bounding, ethersight ring, lantern of empty light, fearsome property rune, +1 striking greatclub
LEVEL 10 With these ability boosts, we’ll increase Strength, Constitution, Intelligence, and Wisdom (Str 20, Dex 12, Con 18, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 14). Our increased Intelligence makes us trained in Occultism and grants us an additional language. Thinking along the line of Quick Jump, we’ll go ahead and grab Powerful Leap to increase the distance of our jump. Or, as another great samurai said, ‘Jump good.’ Our class feat is very appropriate in regards to how Kazan murdered the lord that insulted him – Silencing Strike.
Gear: armbands of athleticism, +1 resilient breastplate, thundering weapon rune, boots of bounding, lantern of empty light, +1 striking greatclub
LEVEL 11 We’ll take our skill increase to Intimidation this time to get it to master proficiency. This next general feat is going completely based off of Kazan’s lore where he died and then disappeared – Numb to Death. There is a whole possibility that Kazan might not actually meet the prerequisites, so you’d have to run it by your GM.
Gear: +2 striking greatclub, armbands of athleticism, grievous weapon rune, +1 resilient breastplate, boots of bounding, ethersight ring
LEVEL 12 With the Battle Cry skill feat, we can Demoralize as a free action when we roll for initiative, which is handy because we can get that action out before we Rage. I’m taking Come and Get Me because it gives me feelings of his Nemesis where after getting hit, he can hit back harder.
Gear: +2 resilient breastplate, +2 striking greatclub, +2 striking katana, grievous weapon rune, thundering weapon rune, cold-resistant armor rune
LEVEL 13 We increase the final skill of our focus trio, putting Society at master proficiency. We’ll take Fiendish Strikes as our ancestry feat, infusing our attacks with evil damage.
Gear: +2 greater striking greatclub, +2 resilient breastplate, unholy weapon rune, +2 striking katana, grievous weapon rune, armbands of athleticism
LEVEL 14 I will admit that not a lot of skill feats seem like good picks for Kazan, so we’ll take some stuff that helps us fight in different situations – like Combat Climber. Admittedly, we’ll be using our katana for such fights since we will still need one free hand. Building out of Come and Get Me, we’ll grab Vengeful Strike for when our opponents aren’t doing anything else to provoke Attacks of Opportunity.
Gear: hellfire boots, +2 greater striking greatclub, +2 greater striking katana, +2 resilient breastplate, greater demon mask, grievous weapon rune
LEVEL 15 These ability boosts increase Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and Charisma (Str 21, Dex 14, Con 19, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 16). Now that we have the ability to increase skills to legendary proficiency, we’ll put Athletics there with this skill increase. Incredible Initiative will be a general feat that gives us a jump on our foes.
Gear: +2 greater resilient breastplate, hellfire boots, bag of holding (type IV), +2 greater striking greatclub, unholy weapon rune, +2 striking katana
LEVEL 16 For the same reason that we took Combat Climber, we’ll also grab Underwater Marauder so that we can fight even in aquatic environments. Just to nab some more stuff from our instinct, we’ll use Spirit’s Wrath to finally get us a ranged attack though we can only use it when raging.
Gear: greater thundering weapon rune, +2 greater resilient breastplate, greater boots of bounding, hellfire boots, +2 greater striking greatclub, +2 greater striking katana
LEVEL 17 Another skill increase gets Intimidation up to legendary proficiency. To really help capture the feel of Blood Fury because I don’t feel like Rage quite goes far enough, our last ancestry feat will be Final Form that allows us to draw upon a well of demonic power.
Gear: +3 greater striking greatclub, greater thundering weapon rune, antimagic armor rune, +2 greater resilient breastplate, hellfire boots, +2 greater striking katana
LEVEL 18 Looking back to some Intimidation skill feats, we’ll snatch up Terrified Retreat so that we can send foes into a panic when we Demoralize them. With the Vicious Evisceration class feat, we can leave a creature maimed on a hit, much like the attacks that he regularly inflicts or as an equivalent of his Demon Strikes that immediately puts targets in the dying state in Dead by Daylight.
Gear: belt of giant strength, +3 greater striking greatclub, +3 greater striking katana, greater thundering weapon rune, +2 greater resilient breastplate, greater boots of bounding
LEVEL 19 This last skill increase puts Society at legendary proficiency while the Fleet general feat increases our Speed so that we can better chase down our foes.
Gear: +3 greater resilient breastplate, belt of giant strength, greater armbands of athleticism, +3 greater striking greatclub, greater thundering weapon rune, antimagic armor rune
LEVEL 20 Our final level sees us gain one last set of ability boosts that we’ll apply to Strength, Constitution, Intelligence, and Wisdom (Str 22, Dex 14, Con 20, Int 14, Wis 18, Cha 16). With this increase to Intelligence, we’ll pick up the trained proficiency in Nature and get ourselves another language. Surprising nobody’s that has seen me do these for a while, we’ll take Scare to Death so that we can try to kill creatures through fear alone. The Invulnerable Juggernaut class feat doesn’t feel like a good fit for The Oni, so instead we’ll take Annihilating Swing to destroy any obstacles in our way – such as pallets.
Gear: +3 major striking greatclub, +3 greater resilient breastplate, greater fortification armor rune, belt of giant strength, +3 greater striking katana, speed weapon rune
CONCLUSION This build gives us a demonic berserker who keeps a wields a hair-trigger rage to devastate all foes in his way. I feel like I actually came closer with this build to the character than I did with the Trickster - Vengeful Strike covers Nemesis, Malicious Bane captures the general feat of Blood Echo, and the naturally high Perception of a barbarian, though no ranger, gets us the feel of Zenshin Tactics. His power is replicated through the rage of the barbarian while his demonic namesake is covered by his heritage. We even reference his in-game relative the Spirit through his instinct. Overall, I think I'm much happier with this build than I am with the Trickster in comparison to replicating the character though I do think The Trickster was more unique overall.
Be sure to lemme know what you think of the build. Does it work? Does it represent the character? Would you ever use it? What other characters should I build?
If you want to join in on the discussion of these builds and the ones I do for monsters or just hang out with a bunch of fellow TTRPG nerd, check out the Discord server. We also have a Twitter where we try to post teasers for the blog and are trying to get some milestones made up for. Next week, we're looking at a build for a character from DC!
Have a fantastic Friday!
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