There are times I'll be flipping through a book and find a single feat or ability and be like 'I can build x character with this.' That happened with this character, but even after the idea sparked, I had to wait on it for a little bit because Pathfinder at that time didn't have the ancestry I needed to build it. With the release of Lost Omens Ancestry Guide, I got the ancestry to build Tekhartha Zenyatta. This build goes level-by-level and is created in a vacuum - skills and feats are chosen for what I think fits the character best, not what would work in a specific campaign. It also features items based off of the magical items a character should have at their level.
With that out of the way, let's get into the build of Tekhartha Zenyatta from Overwatch!
ZENYATTA
CHARACTER Tekhartha Zenyatta
SOURCE Overwatch
GOAL An omnic, an artificially intelligent robot, from the world of Overwatch, Tekhartha Zenyatta is a wandering guru who once associated with the Shambali, a religious order of robotic monks. He left the Shambali Monastery to wander the world in search of enlightenment, using his carved orbs, which can channel omnic energy, to defend himself and others. In-game, he fills the support role and his main attack is the Orb of Destruction, where he launches an orb at a foe. He can also charge up his Orb of Destruction to unleash a flurry of them at once. With Orb of Harmony, he sends out one of his orbs, attaching it to an ally to heal them over time. Conversely, Orb of Discord attaches to an enemy and amplifies all damage dealt to them. Finally, Zenyatta can use Transcendence to become temporarily immune to damage and heal allies around him. While under the effects of Transcendence, he is able to move faster. Having only a small pool of health, most of it is shield, which regenerates after a short period.
LEVEL 1 We start, as always, with our ABCs – ancestry, background, and class. I think the ancestry is rather fun as we’ll be picking up android as our ancestry and then adding a bit of a divine bent to it with the aasimar heritage. This improves our low-light vision to darkvision and grants us access to aasimar feats. We receive automatic boosts to Dexterity and Intelligence but take a flaw to Charisma as an android. We’re gonna try to balance that out since Zenyatta is a pretty congenial dude and apply our free boost to Charisma. With the Halo ancestry feat, we gain a constant light effect that we can activate or deactivate as a single action. I like flavoring this halo as his floating spheres, and while not entirely necessary since we have darkvision, we can use it to help our allies.
There were a couple options that seemed like a decent feat for Zenyatta, but I decided on the pilgrim background to represent his wandering. The first boost from this will go to Wisdom while the free boost from it will pump up our Dexterity. This makes us trained in Religion and we’ll take Aurora Lore with Aurora being the omnic who sacrificed herself to grant sentience to her kin. This can easily be changed to fit the setting, and maybe should be Shambali Lore instead as it’s more of a philosophic belief that Zenyatta follows rather than a deity. For our skill feat, we’ll receive Pilgrim’s Token, which allows us to act first when we tie on initiative.
I took a look into several classes before settling on monk for Zenyatta because it has the feat that made me first consider trying this build. Our key ability will be Dexterity since Zenyatta is more spry than strong and we’ll get a boost to that ability. We then get four more boosts that we’ll apply to Strength, Dexterity, Wisdom, and Charisma (Str 12, Dex 18, Con 10, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 14). We only get trained in four skills, which will be Acrobatics, Athletics, Diplomacy, and Medicine. For our class feat, we’ll pick up Ki Strike, encompassing the sort of mystical feel that Zenyatta has an upping his damage, helping to capture the feel of charging up his Orb of Destruction.
LEVEL 2 Zenyatta can use Group Impression to make a speech to several people and try to Make an Impression like he’s acting as a teacher. For our class feat, we’re instead going to step away from monk for the time being to take the Cleric Dedication. As noted, Zenyatta follows more of a philosophy rather than a deity, so we’re kinda going to make some stuff up here. The skills we’ll become trained in, since we were already trained in Religion, will be Society to reflect the variety of people he’s met, and Crafting, since monks of the Shambali learn to cook despite not needing to eat themselves.
Gear: everburning torch
LEVEL 3 To go along with our Cleric Dedication, we’ll be taking our first skill increase in Religion to increase it to expert. As Zenyatta constantly hovers, Feather Step makes sense to me as a general feat even if the actual effects of a constant hover are hard for us to accomplish within the rules of Pathfinder.
Gear: +1 handwraps of mighty blows, everburning torch, dull grey aeon stone
LEVEL 4 I don’t imagine Zenyatta will use Athletics too often, but it covers a lot of good, base adventuring things and I like Quick Jump, so that he can jump as a single action. Basic Cleric Spellcasting, hailing from our cleric dedication, gives us some low-leveled divine spells, such as heal that helps capture the feel of his Orb of Harmony. A spell that grants fast healing would be the most exact way of doing this, but those are a little harder to come by.
Gear: lesser thurible of revelation, +1 handwraps of mighty blows, brooch of shielding, dull grey aeon stone
LEVEL 5 We receive four ability boosts that we’ll put towards Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, and Wisdom (Str 14, Dex 19, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 14). With an increased Intelligence, we’ll become trained in Stealth and gain another language. This level’s skill increase will put Medicine at expert proficiency so that we can better treat the wounds of our allies. We also receive the payoff from taking Halo as our first level ancestry feat – Healer’s Halo is a reaction that lets us buff the healing we grant to allies with positive effects.
Gear: +1 striking handwraps of mighty blows, lesser thurible of revelation, bracelet of dashing, brooch of shielding, dull grey aeon stone, everburning torch
LEVEL 6 Since we just got Medicine up to expert proficiency, we’ll take Battle Medicine so that we can heal our allies without needing magic in the midst of battle. Another feat from the Cleric Dedication will snag us Basic Dogma, granting us a 1st or 2nd-level cleric feat. We’ll take Domain Initiate with that to gain the Destruction domain. This gives us another focus spell, cry of destruction, and another Focus Point, but that’s not a terribly great fit for Zenyatta. However, further down the line is the destructive aura domain spell, which we can use to reduce the resistance of other creatures and making them more susceptible to damage, which is the closest we’re going to get to his Orb of Discord.
Gear: +1 explorer’s clothing, +1 striking handwraps of mighty blows, healer’s gloves, lesser thurible of revelation, brooch of shielding, hand of the mage
LEVEL 7 Another skill increase to Religion, getting us to master, sets us up for some future cleric feats. There aren’t any general feats that really speak to me at this level, so we’re going to grab a skill feat instead. The Continual Recovery skill feat allows us to treat wounds more regularly to get our allies back on their feet after the fight.
Gear: lantern of empty light, diplomat’s badge, +1 explorer’s clothing, +1 striking handwraps of mighty blows, thurible of revelation, bracelet of dashing
LEVEL 8 To further make use of our Medicine skill, we grab Ward Medic so that we can treat multiple diseased or poisoned patients at once. We also finally get the feat that originally made me think of trying this build – Wild Winds Initiate. This monk class feat is a focus spell that lets us enter a stance and gives us a ranged unarmed attack that we can flavor as our orbs flying out to strike people.
Gear: clear spindle aeon stone, lantern of empty light, choker of elocution, +1 explorer’s clothing, +1 striking handwraps of mighty blows, staff of healing
LEVEL 9 Another skill increase to Medicine gets it up to master proficiency. The Cleansing Subroutine from our android ancestry feels very appropriate for an ascetic type like Zenyatta and makes us better at recovering from diseases and poisons.
Gear: +1 resilient explorer’s clothing, clear spindle aeon stone, boots of bounding, lantern of empty light, diplomat’s badge, +1 striking handwraps of mighty blows
LEVEL 10 Another set of ability boosts go towards Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and Wisdom (Str 16, Dex 20, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 18, Cha 14). The last skill feat we’ll pick from the Medicine line of feats is Robust Recovery, which improves the effectiveness of our Treat Disease and Treat Poison skill uses. Back to the cleric dedication will net us Divine Breadth to increase the number of spells we’ll receive at all levels from our dedication.
Gear: greater bracers of missile deflection, +1 resilient explorer’s clothing, greater staff of healing, clear spindle aeon stone, lantern of empty light, +1 striking handwraps of mighty blows
LEVEL 11 With Medicine as high as I want it to be, we now turn our attention towards Diplomacy and increase it to expert proficiency. Fleet is a general feat that increases our Speed and stacks with our Incredible Movement from being a monk.
Gear: +2 striking handwraps of mighty blows, greater bracers of missile deflection, greater healer’s gloves, +1 resilient explorer’s clothing, clear spindle aeon stone, boots of bounding
LEVEL 12 With the Glad-Hand skill feat, we can Make an Impression much quicker than usual in an attempt to soothe folks over before a situation escalates. From the Cleric Dedication, we will gain Expert Cleric Spellcasting, which will end up giving us divine spells up to sixth-level. The main thing with this is that it will give us globe of invulnerability, a spell that will help us mimic the effects of Transcendence.
Gear: +2 resilient explorer’s clothing, +2 striking handwraps of mighty blows, moderate thurible of revelation, greater bracers of missile deflection, greater staff of healing, shock weapon rune
LEVEL 13 This time around, we’ll take a skill increase to Diplomacy and reach master proficiency in it. With the Revivification Protocol ancestry feat, we can come back from Dying once per day as a free action, which helps with the invulnerability idea of Zenyatta’s ult.
Gear: +2 greater striking handwraps of mighty blows, +2 resilient explorer’s clothing, cassock of devotion, moderate thurible of revelation, greater bracers of missile deflection, greater healer’s gloves
LEVEL 14 To fit with Zenyatta’s adherence to his faith and philosophy, we’ll pick up Evangelize, which actually allows us to try to stupefy and confuse enemies as we pontificate on the tenets of our philosophy. We’ll also build from Wild Winds Initiate into Wild Winds Gust so that we can unleash a flurry of strikes in a line or a cone, replicating the charging of Zenyatta’s Orb of Destruction.
Gear: boots of speed, +2 greater striking handwraps of mighty blows, pink rhomboid aeon stone, +2 resilient explorer’s clothing, moderate thurible of revelation, miter of communion
LEVEL 15 At this level, we’ll take our ability boosts to Strength, Dexterity, Wisdom, and Charisma (Str 18, Dex 21, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 19, Cha 16). Since we can get our skills up to legendary proficiency, we’ll be doing that with Religion. Zenyatta is a friendly figure connected to a wide philosophy and is also part of a global organization. A Home in Every Port feels appropriate as he should always be able to find some people willing to welcome him into their home for a time.
Gear: +2 greater resilient explorer’s clothing, bag of holding (type IV), boots of speed, +2 greater striking handwraps of mighty blows, cassock of devotion, holy weapon rune
LEVEL 16 With the legendary proficiency in Religion, we can pick up Divine Guidance, allowing Zenyatta to meditate and receive a hint to a mystery or subject that he ponders on. We finally get the chance to take Advanced Dogma from our Cleric Dedication so that we can pick up Advanced Domain and get destructive aura as I previously mentioned.
Gear: dragonscale amulet, +2 greater resilient explorer’s clothing, greater boots of bounding, bag of holding (type IV), +2 greater striking handwraps of mighty blows, pink rhomboid aeon stone
LEVEL 17 We get another skill up to legendary proficiency, which will be Diplomacy. With the Internal Respirator ancestry feat, we can go longer without needing to breathe, making us more robotic as omnics in general are more mechanical than androids in Pathfinder are.
Gear: +3 greater striking handwraps of mighty blows, dragonscale amulet, greater shock weapon rune, +2 greater resilient explorer’s clothing, bag of holding (type IV), boots of speed
LEVEL 18 With the Legendary Negotiation skill feat, Zenyatta can try to broker peace even in the midst of combat. We have quite a few focus spells at this point that we’re probably gonna be using, so we’ll pick up Meditative Focus so that we regain two Focus Points when we Refocus.
Gear: anklets of alacrity, +3 greater striking handwraps of mighty blows, true staff of healing, dragonscale amulet, +2 greater resilient explorer’s clothing, greater boots of bounding
LEVEL 19 Our final skill increase will go to Athletics so that we can achieve expert proficiency in it. Finally, we’ll also pick up Incredible Initiative, which is always a handy feat that helps us act sooner in combat.
Gear: +3 greater resilient explorer’s clothing, anklets of alacrity, greater armbands of athleticism, +3 greater striking handwraps of mighty blows, greater shock weapon rune, dragonscale amulet
LEVEL 20 The final ability boosts we receive will increase Dexterity, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma (Str 18, Dex 22, Con 12, Int 14, Wis 20, Cha 18). Once more, we get another trained in another skill due to increasing our Intelligence, which we’ll use to bump up Survival and then receive another language. While it’s rather unexciting, we’ll take Powerful Leap to extend the range of our leaps. We will be taking a feat from our monk class as our final feat – Golden Body. This makes Zenyatta’s fists more powerful and gives him permanent fast healing, which kinda captures the feel of much of his health in Overwatch being a shield.
Gear: +3 major striking handwraps of mighty blows, +3 greater resilient explorer’s clothing, greater thurible of revelation, anklets of alacrity, true staff of healing, speed weapon rune
CONCLUSION There we have it, a holy robot able to fight from afar while sustaining his allies. We are able to capture the feel of the Orb of Destruction through Wild Winds Initiate and Gust as well as Ki Strike while we can replicate the effects of an Orb of Harmony through divine magic and healing spells. The Orb of Discord is the hardest part to get right, but destructive aura reduces resistances and thereby buffs damage somewhat. I was considering sorcerer to get celestial brand, but it just didn’t feel right for Zen. Finally, we’re able to achieve Transcendence through spells like globe of invulnerability.
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?
I've got myself a nice little list set up with some exciting characters on it that'll let me explore the LOAG a bit, but first I have a request for next week's build.
Have a Fantastic Friday!
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