Need help with a "not a mage"

Hi all, I'm new to this forum and this is my first post so I apologize if this is in the wrong place. Let me know if i'm messing up any rules or anything with this post and i'll move it or delete it. Also i'm sorry this post is so long but i think i really need to put the background out there.

On to the thing i need help with. I'm playing Pathfinder 1e and my character is a Slayer. He comes from a long line of powerful magic users. His parents and two siblings are widely known and respected for their mastery of different magical abilities. However, unlike his family, Fenris has no magical ability. This has caused him to feel like an outcast and constantly struggle to find his place in the magical world. He feels the constant pressure to live up to their legacy but lacks the innate magical abilities to do so. While his younger siblings were casting spells and manipulating the elements, Fenris could only watch helplessly.

Deep down, Fenris believed that he could do magic too, and it became his biggest motivation and goal in life. He practiced for hours every day, trying to cast spells and make objects move with his mind, but to no avail. His frustration only grew each year as his younger sister and brother became more proficient in their powers, overshadowing him even further. Despite his struggles, Fenris remained determined and refused to give up. He became obsessed with finding a way to unlock his magic, reading every book and seeking out every possible teacher, but nothing seemed to work.

As he grew older and no magical ability manifested, he became increasingly delusional. Fenris refused to accept the fact that he was not gifted with magic and instead convinced himself that he could perform spells and control the elements through his trusty bow and arrows (he's Sniper Archetype). Fenris' journey to prove himself as a magic user has led him down a dangerous and delusional path.

So that's a bit of the backstory. I play him as though he THINKS he has magic powers. I use components and do somatic actions, etc while attacking with the bow, but of course nothing happens. So my quandary is this: My DM has suggested that he has some sort of magic and told me to think of some way for it to manifest. We thought maybe he has some spell resistance (maybe his parents bestowed it on him before he left home because they knew he wouldn't be able to defend himself) or maybe he can drain magic items and use their magic to heal himself. I think these two things are kind of boring and i don't really want to use them. I am looking for suggestions as to how to keep him delusional and still manifest some kind of magic. Any advice or ideas would be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

Quick answer: Add ONE level of Sorcerer... or a Psionic Class. Continue to follow the Slayer Path.

More generally: Why is your GM offering to let your PC have magic, and how under game rules has he stated this will work? By the sounds of things, you're doing fine with the way you play the character as is. Unless YOU actually want to "suddenly" have something magical manifest, why change. If you do want to introduce something, a magic item could be a good way of doing this - particularly something that otherwise appears normal and your character would use. Make it X/times per day, and then every now and then something magical DOES happen. You can ignore the item part of things, and act as if 'you' made the effect happen.

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Originally Posted by cheever8

Hi all, I'm new to this forum and this is my first post so I apologize if this is in the wrong place. Let me know if i'm messing up any rules or anything with this post and i'll move it or delete it. Also i'm sorry this post is so long but i think i really need to put the background out there.

On to the thing i need help with. I'm playing Pathfinder 1e and my character is a Slayer. He comes from a long line of powerful magic users. His parents and two siblings are widely known and respected for their mastery of different magical abilities. However, unlike his family, Fenris has no magical ability. This has caused him to feel like an outcast and constantly struggle to find his place in the magical world. He feels the constant pressure to live up to their legacy but lacks the innate magical abilities to do so. While his younger siblings were casting spells and manipulating the elements, Fenris could only watch helplessly.

Deep down, Fenris believed that he could do magic too, and it became his biggest motivation and goal in life. He practiced for hours every day, trying to cast spells and make objects move with his mind, but to no avail. His frustration only grew each year as his younger sister and brother became more proficient in their powers, overshadowing him even further. Despite his struggles, Fenris remained determined and refused to give up. He became obsessed with finding a way to unlock his magic, reading every book and seeking out every possible teacher, but nothing seemed to work.

As he grew older and no magical ability manifested, he became increasingly delusional. Fenris refused to accept the fact that he was not gifted with magic and instead convinced himself that he could perform spells and control the elements through his trusty bow and arrows (he's Sniper Archetype). Fenris' journey to prove himself as a magic user has led him down a dangerous and delusional path.

So that's a bit of the backstory. I play him as though he THINKS he has magic powers. I use components and do somatic actions, etc while attacking with the bow, but of course nothing happens. So my quandary is this: My DM has suggested that he has some sort of magic and told me to think of some way for it to manifest. We thought maybe he has some spell resistance (maybe his parents bestowed it on him before he left home because they knew he wouldn't be able to defend himself) or maybe he can drain magic items and use their magic to heal himself. I think these two things are kind of boring and i don't really want to use them. I am looking for suggestions as to how to keep him delusional and still manifest some kind of magic. Any advice or ideas would be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

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This may give you ideas on how to think you have magic without having magic: korg the magical, the barbarian who believes he's a wizard

https://forums.giantitp.com/showthre...rbarian-Wizard

Check in particular his "spellbook", containing gems such as "lesser flight: jumps" or "shrink item: folds item in two" for ways to claim magic effects while being purely mundane.
Requires some level of brain damage to be a believable concept

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Originally Posted by cheever8

My DM has suggested that he has some sort of magic and told me to think of some way for it to manifest. We thought maybe he has some spell resistance (maybe his parents bestowed it on him before he left home because they knew he wouldn't be able to defend himself) or maybe he can drain magic items and use their magic to heal himself. I think these two things are kind of boring and i don't really want to use them.

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I suggest taking a small number of immediate-action spells (for instance, Stone Shield or Windy Escape) and decide that these trigger automatically when REALLY needed, or sometimes just randomly, but your character has no conscious control over them. Like, if an attack would drop you OR 10% of the time when you're hit, the spell activates.

And mechanically, take one level of sorcerer or oracle or spontaneous-druid for that.

The Mod on the Silver Mountain: Moved to 3.5/Pathfinder sub-forum.

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Originally Posted by cheever8

So that's a bit of the backstory. I play him as though he THINKS he has magic powers. I use components and do somatic actions, etc while attacking with the bow, but of course nothing happens. So my quandary is this: My DM has suggested that he has some sort of magic and told me to think of some way for it to manifest. We thought maybe he has some spell resistance (maybe his parents bestowed it on him before he left home because they knew he wouldn't be able to defend himself) or maybe he can drain magic items and use their magic to heal himself. I think these two things are kind of boring and i don't really want to use them. I am looking for suggestions as to how to keep him delusional and still manifest some kind of magic. Any advice or ideas would be much appreciated.

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This is an interesting one, if you want him to keep being delusional while still having magic powers, I'd suggest having the magic be in a different field than his illusions. He thinks he's casting spells with his bow and arrows, casting "Greater Mundane Damage" by waving his arrow around before firing it. So his actual magic can't be that, otherwise he wouldn't be delusional anymore. In fact it should probably be something he somehow fails to notice at all, even though it's kind of noticable to other people. (If it's not noticable by anyone it isn't funny.)

Damage resistance would work actually, if indeed a bit boring to play. Maybe healing magic? He restores his health by taking a deap breath, and restores other people's health by unknowingly casting while trying to perform first aid, or by screaming "Vivian, Noooooo!"? Maybe some sort of rage magic??? As in, take a level of druid for wildshape, but every time you want to use it say he goes completely mad and when he comes back out of it he doesn't remember it and everyone who says he was a wolf clearly has to be mad? Or a bit less out there, maybe spells make him better in melee, like Magic Weapon or Shillelagh?

If he's allowed to slowly discover his powers and start using them, maybe some form of alchemy? Take ranks in Craft (alchemy), maaaaaybe get the Eschew Materials feat and start crafting things, then doing spontaneous alchemy and maybe eventually even alchemical archery?

Mmh, it's a puzzle......

There are a couple different ways to handle this:

1) Using Slayer Talents, you can take certain Rogue Talents. Gloom Magic would let you cast a version of Darkness that doesn't impact your vision twice a day. Shadow Duplicate would allow you to make a shadow Duplicate of yourself. Umbral gear would allow you to craft shadows into things like rope and crowbars in dim light.


2) Multi-class into an arcane caster as others have suggested. It would open up Arcane archer, which isn't really a great class, but you would have magic that really only applied to your arrows, which seems to fit the theme you're going for.
Bloodrager: You'd need to take four levels to get any spells, but you wouldn't lose any BAB, and it fits the theme of ancestral magic, but your bloodline only expresses when you're raging.

Other classes... it depends on how your family gets their magic. If they're sorcerers, you could take a level of wizard. You don't know that you need a magic book and that's why you've never been able to do magic properly. Arcanist would work the same way but you'd get an Arcane Reservoir and an Arcane Exploit, so you'd actually have some stuff you can do with those spell slots you don't know how to cast spells with.

If your family was all wizards, you could be a witch, and since you've never had a pet, you've never been able to cast magic.

Then there's the option of Magus. If your family is spontaneous casters, you can do a prepared magus, if your family is prepared caster then go the Eldritch Scion archetype.

3) Craft Alchemy. You can make things like Incendiary Arrows Smoke Arrows, Splintercloud arrows. Just flavor it as "I need to take some time every day preparing my magic arrows"

4) The Feat Master Craftsman allows you to use your craft level in place of caster level for Craft Magic Arms and Armour and Craft Wondrous Item. So you'll be able to make magic items while not being able to do any magic. But you can think you're doing magic.

There are more options, but some of them are race specific, so I'm not going to spend any more time on this at the moment.

I suggest pump use magic device skill . Doing magic with wands or scrolls sometimes it blowing up . Yet still not magical .

Some 3.5e material for inspiration:

• The Karsite race from Tome of Magic: Humans born at random among the population who cannot cast spells by any means, they have distinctive features showing that the blood of Karsus flows strongly in them - an ancient wizard who died trying to steal the power of a god of magic. Gets human traits plus an extra +2 Con and Cha, damage reduction 5/magic, and a form of spell resistance that heals them whenever it negates something. Also minor dispelling properties on their attacks which force targets to make a Will save or have one of their magic items suppressed for 1 round. Has a Level Adjustment of +2 - i.e. the extra powers make you about as strong as a character 2 levels higher.
• Binders who channel the remains of Karsus's spirit (which karsites can do since it's not a spell) gain the ability to use spell trigger items (wands and staves) as if they were wizards, with a +2 bonus to their save DCs. They can also "see" magic auras as long as they're not blinded, and use a touch range version of dispel magic.
• Characters with the Spellfire Wielder feat can ready an action to absorb spells cast at them, negating their effect and allowing them to expel the energy later in the form of healing or a ray of raw energy. Some archmages have learned to imitate the rays through training (mainly as a party trick, they're not very strong), but those who can do it innately are very rare.
• The Spellthief class can use a sneak attack to steal another creature's buff spells, or temporarily steal some of their spell slots or spell-like abilities for their own use.
• Quorbred creatures are unable to use psionics; they have a bunch of abilities including resistance to divinations (must succeed on a caster level check at DC 20 + level), a bonus on saves against illusion and mind-affecting effects, and immunity to fear; their melee attacks also force the target to make a Fort save or be unable to use magic for 1 round.

As an alternative, what about a familiar with the Figment archetype? Or some other way that his magic manifested as a separate creature.

Since the character thinks they cast magic, but no one else agrees, how about some of the non-obvious magical abilities like detect magic.

Is it really happening, or all in your head...

Wow, thank you everyone for the quick replies and great ideas. This is awesome!!

Here’s a little more info (and I should have mentioned this):

I don’t want him to take any spellcasting classes as I don’t really want magical abilities.

I have taken “Artifact Hunter” as a trait (using Herolab; the feat comes from Giant Hunter’s Handbook, Giantslayer)

Without putting in the flavor text: +1 to spellcraft to identify magic items, +1 UMD and one of these skills becomes a class skill (I chose UMD); also whenever encountering an artifact there’s 50% chance (+1% per level) that you recognize the artifact and know name, origin, etc. (figured it was appropriate since he grew up in a powerful magical family).

For Drawback I took “Magical Klutz”. Roll twice and take the lower result on UMD and Ref Sv vs effects produced by magic items. (figured appropriate considering he grew up with no magical abilities but he did see family using items)

TARMOR, I’m not sure why he wants me to be “magical”. I’ll have to ask him and then I may just continue as I am depending on his answer.

KING - Thank you for pointing me to the barbarian wizard!!! I’ll take a closer look at that as soon as I’m able. On first glance it seems like we are basically trying to do the same thing and these posts are hilarious. I may have to nip a couple of these things.

KURALD – I also like this suggestion. If my DM is adamant on me taking something magical, I might have to use this.

LVL 2 – I also like this. I may end up using yours and KURALD’s suggestion together.

BARON – I am taking rogue stuff for the slayer talents. I also really like the crafting stuff. I’ll think about that.

PUG – UMD is pumped and I have the “magical klutz” drawback (see above) so I think we have this one covered. Thanks for the advice.

PRIME – I really like this!! This is a great starting point and I really want to explore this. I also love the figment familiar. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it!!

REL – I agree. I’m going to play this up and talk to the DM.

I think I’m going to research the links y’all gave me and I suspect I’ll probably put a lot of these ideas together. Thank you all for answering me!!! These are all great ideas and really does help. Y'all are awesome!!

If you want a magical effect that mightn't be obvious but beneficial, how about the ability to use two dice instead of one and take the higher roll, say, five times a day? On a d20, that's roughly the equivalent of a +4 to your roll. This would mean your character is slightly more lucky and might get some slightly better skill checks, attack rolls or damage rolls when they really need it without being super obvious in how it manifests.

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Originally Posted by pabelfly

If you want a magical effect that mightn't be obvious but beneficial, how about the ability to use two dice instead of one and take the higher roll, say, five times a day? On a d20, that's roughly the equivalent of a +4 to your roll. This would mean your character is slightly more lucky and might get some slightly better skill checks, attack rolls or damage rolls when they really need it without being super obvious in how it manifests.

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I love this idea too. Gonna run it by my DM. Thanks everyone!

You could also give him the Invisible Spell feat. He actually can cast magic. It's just completely invisible.

Maybe go arcane archer 2?