I've been thinking about doing a character from Dead by Daylight for a while. Initially, I had thought of building the Trapper and doing something like ranger with the Snarecrafter Dedication. After looking through it more, I then thought about taking a crack at building the Oni and while I still want to do so, I just did a barbarian build so I'll hold off on that. 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 The Trickster from Dead by Daylight!
THE TRICKSTER
CHARACTER Ji-Woon Hak
SOURCE Dead by Daylight
GOAL The Trickster is Ji-Woon Hak, a K-pop idol who used to perform knife throwing tricks at his family’s restaurant for tourists. The extra money this brought in was used to get him lessons that helped propel him into a stardom with a band called NO SPIN. However, his desire to be the center of attention drove him to allow his bandmates to die in a fire, which awoken a dark desire in him. He began a solo musical career as well as a murder spree, torturing his victims and recording their screams, subtly working them into his songs. Eventually, he was drawn into the Mist to serve the Entity as a killer. In-game, he uses a baseball with a blade affixed to it, but his special ability is the throwing of knives that he can build up to launching at astounding speed. Many of his add-ons are pretty standard with some of the more unique ones including the ability to ricochet them off walls towards targets, piercing through people, or shattering on impacting and damaging in an area. The Tricksters offers three unique perks, but none of them really translate over to Pathfinder.
LEVEL 1 The first step, as always, is to go over our ABCs – ancestry, background, and class. We’ll start with human and take the skilled heritage so that we become trained in Deception. As a human, we get two free boosts to our ability scores, which we’ll apply to Dexterity and Charisma. Our ancestry feat will be Natural Ambition, which will net us an extra class feat when we get to that.
Even going back to Ji-Woon Hak’s past is a knife thrower, he was always an entertainer. This will net us a boost to Dexterity and a free boost that we’ll apply to Strength. With this background, we become trained in Performance and Theater Lore, and also receive Fascinating Performance skill feat, allowing us to fascinate creatures with a Performance check.
Given Ji-Woon Hak’s desire to be in the spotlight and his flair, swashbuckler feels like a good fit for his class, especially when we take the battledancer style. Unfortunately, we already received Fascinating Performance from our background, so we aren’t really getting anything extra with that. We do receive an automatic boost to Dexterity as well as four other boosts that we’ll put towards Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, and Charisma (Str 14, Dex 18, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 10, Cha 14). Being a swashbuckler nets us some automatic training in Acrobatics and we’re in the same boat for Performance, but since we already have that from our background, we’ll become trained in Stealth. With the rest of our skills, we become trained in Athletics, Diplomacy, Intimidation, Society, and Thievery. We net two class feats thanks to our ancestry feat, so we’ll take Focused Fascination allowing us to fascinate a creature with a success on Fascinating Performance instead of needing a critical success. Next and more importantly, we’ll grab Flying Blade so that we can use thrown weapons, such as our knives, with our swashbuckler abilities and finishers.
LEVEL 2 Ji-Woon earned his place in NO SPIN by managing to impress their agent, so Impressive Performance feels like an appropriate skill feat for him to take, allowing him to use Performance to Make an Impression. To capture the idea of Ji-Woon’s serial killer identity as The Trickster and pick up some other useful feats, we’ll take the Vigilante Dedication.
Gear: ring of discretion
LEVEL 3 The first skill increase we receive shall go to Performance, boosting it up to expert proficiency. Ji-Woon isn’t terribly fast as killers go, but as an idol, he has to have some slick moves, so Feather Step feels appropriate. The Stylish Trick class feature nets us some Acorbatics feats, which we’ll use to get Steady Balance.
Gear: +1 throwing knife, ring of discretion, everburning torch
LEVEL 4 As long as he’s the center of attention, Ji-Woon is happy to put on a Distracting Performance while his co-stars work in the eaves. A very important feat for this build, and one that I think swashbuckler should already have, is Quick Draw so that we can draw and attack one of our throwing knives as a single action.
Gear: returning weapon rune, +1 throwing knife, +1 throwing knife, ring of discretion
LEVEL 5 We put these four ability boosts to Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and Charisma (Str 16, Dex 19, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 10, Cha 16). This time, we’ll take a skill increase to Diplomacy, bumping it up to expert proficiency and our skilled heritage automatically raises Deception to that level. For our ancestry feat, Clever Improviser lets us make better use of skills we’re untrained in, which will help The Trickster to hide his killings.
Gear: +1 striking throwing knife, returning weapon rune, doubling rings, necklace of knives, ring of discretion, everburning torch
LEVEL 6 With the Bon Mot skill feat, we can use Diplomacy to try to reduce a target’s Will save, making them more susceptible to our Fascinating Performance and the mental effects of our allies. Another feat from the Vigilante Dedication nets us Safe House, which gives us a place that we can have and be protected within, which works well for the places Ji-Woon Hak would torture his victims to capture their voice.
Gear: +1 leather armor, +1 striking throwing knife, cloak of repute, returning weapon rune, necklace of knives, hand of the mage
LEVEL 7 With this level, we can increase Performance up to master proficiency. We’ll grab Toughness for our general feat. As a killer in Dead by Daylight, The Trickster is essentially a slasher and they are famously hard to put down. We get another Acrobatics or Performance feat from Stylish Tricks, which will get us Cat Fall. A lot of these feel more like survivor feats but we don’t have much else to grab.
Gear: insistent door knocker, +1 leather armor, recording rod (reusable), +1 striking throwing knife, returning weapon rune, doubling rings
LEVEL 8 With the Virtuosic Performer – Singing, we gain a bonus on Performance checks when singing, which reflects Ji-Woon Hak’s profession as an idol. To further dive into that idea, we grab Celebrity Dedication, which gives us some renown and allows us to try to upstage foes, which will be even easier to do when they are fascinated by our performance.
Gear: greater hat of disguise, insistent door knocker, vaultbreaker’s harness, +1 leather armor, cloak of repute, +1 striking throwing knife
LEVEL 9 Deception is important for the idea of The Trickster so that he can continue his wicked ways without being caught, so we’ll be making use of this skill increase to get it up to master proficiency. We’ll continue along the line that we started with Clever Improviser to get Incredible Improvisation as our skill feat for much the same reason as the first.
Gear: +1 resilient leather armor, slippers of spider climbing, greater hat of disguise, insistent door knocker, recording rod (reuseable), +1 striking throwing knife
LEVEL 10 These ability boosts will go to Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, and Charisma (Str 18, Dex 20, Con 12, Int 14, Wis 10, Cha 18). With this increase to Intelligence, we’ll become trained in Occultism mostly as a reflection to his tie to the Entity and its otherworldly power. We also get an additional language from this. For our skill feat, we’ll pick up Hobnobber so that we can Gather Information faster, letting us scope out victims quicker. We’re finally going to be looking at swashbuckler feats again with Impaling Finisher. Unfortunately, the wording means we will still have to be adjacent to the initial target, but we can use our Flying Blade to throw our knives through people with this.
Gear: greater persona mask, +1 resilient leather armor, thundering weapon rune, greater hat of disguise, insistent door knocker, +1 striking throwing knife
LEVEL 11 This time around, we’ll increase Diplomacy to master, making our Bon Mot more effective. For our general feat, we’ll get Diehard with the same justification that I took Toughness – slashers are hard to put down, especially permanently.
Gear: +2 striking throwing knife, greater persona mask, greater shadow armor rune, +1 resilient leather armor, Greater hat of disguise, slippers of spider climbing
LEVEL 12 The other reason I picked up Hobnobber was to grab Entourage, which effectively gives us groupies. Perfect. Since injured survivors in Dead by Daylight leave trails of blood, so we’ll grab Bleeding Finisher to make our victims bleed.
Gear: +2 resilient leather armor, +2 striking throwing knife, daredevil boots, greater persona mask, thundering weapon rune, deafening music box
LEVEL 13 We can grab a skill increase to Acrobatics to get it up to expert proficiency. For our ancestry feat, we’ll grab Bounce Back so that we can come back from dying with greater ease – as is befitting a slasher.
Gear: +2 greater striking throwing knife, +2 resilient leather armor, greater doubling rings, +2 striking light mace, greater persona mask, greater shadow armor rune
LEVEL 14 With the Slippery Secrets skill feat, we can better hide our true, insidious nature from magical effects. We’ll dip back into our Celebrity Dedication to pick up Command Attention, which makes us the center of attention for a single action and gives us a way to help our allies Hide even in plain sight.
Gear: keen weapon rune, +2 greater striking throwing knife, pink rhomboid aeon stone, +2 resilient leather armor, +2 striking light mace, daredevil boots
LEVEL 15 These ability boosts will apply to Dexterity, Constitution, Wisdom, and Charisma (Str 18, Dex 21, Con 14, Int 14, Wis 12, Cha 19). We finally get Performance up to legendary proficiency with this level’s skill increase. We’ll also pick up Incredible Initiative because it’s always helpful to get the jump on enemies when we get into a fight.
Gear: +2 greater resilient leather armor, bag of holding (type IV), boots of speed, +2 greater striking throwing knife, greater doubling rings, greater goggles of night
LEVEL 16 With the Legendary Performer, we make Ji-Woon Hak into the renowned individual he was clearly always meant to be while the Deadly Grace class feat either increases the deadly trait of all our weapons or adds it to them.
Gear: greater thundering weapon rune, +2 greater resilient leather armor, greater boots of bounding, bag of holding (type IV), +2 greater striking throwing knife, +2 greater striking light mace
LEVEL 17 Another skill increase will get our proficiency in Diplomacy up to legendary. The Keep Up Appearances ancestry feat feels appropriate for Ji-Woon Hak, working past his limit just so that he can stay in the spotlight longer.
Gear: +3 greater striking throwing knife, greater thundering weapon rune, dragonscale amulet, +2 greater resilient leather armor, bag of holding (type IV), boots of speed
LEVEL 18 While Ji-Woon Hak seems to prefer more direct methods, I have little doubt that he would Sow Rumors if the opportunity arose to get ahead. With the Lethal Finisher swashbuckler feat, we can deal a huge amount of precision damage with our finisher, bringing the feel of The Trickster’s memento mori to Pathfinder.
Gear: anklets of alacrity, +3 greater striking throwing knife, +3 greater striking light mace, greater thundering weapon rune, +2 greater resilient leather armor, greater boots of bounding
LEVEL 19 Our final skill increase will get Deception up to legendary. Since Ji-Woon has reached such astounding levels of fame, he likely has A Home in Every Port that he can rest at.
Gear: +3 greater resilient leather armor, anklets of alacrity, greater daredevil boots, +3 greater striking throwing knife, greater thundering weapon rune, dragonscale amulet
LEVEL 20 We have four final ability boosts that will apply to Dexterity, Constitution, Wisdom, and Charisma (Str 18, Dex 22, Con 16, Int 14, Wis 14, Cha 20). Ji-Woon’s arrogance means that he can make the most Shameless Request without even batting an eyelid. We’ll also grab Panache Paragon so that we are permanently quickened though the extra action can only be used to gain panache.
Gear: +3 major striking throwing knife, +3 greater resilient leather armor, major goggles of night, anklets of alacrity, +3 greater striking light mace, greater thundering weapon rune
CONCLUSION I’ve been thinking about doing a couple of the Dead by Daylight characters for a while now and thought I’d give a shot at the newest killer. After having watched the great video on the rogue class by NoNat1’s, I think I could’ve gone rogue with this build but I personally feel the aspects of panache and other class features of the swashbuckler fit The Trickster better. I couldn’t figure out a way to get the effects of his unique perks into the build, but I at least managed to capture the feeling of some of his add-ons. It is worth noting that I would personally make sure to have stuff like doubling rings and the returning weapon rune on his build for all levels that we can.
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. I'm probably gonna do a druid for the next build and have received a couple requests though I do have one that I did a while back from MtG that I might post.
Have a fantastic Friday!
Comentários