Best Manticore Shifter Build in Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous

The DLC The Last Sarkorians DLC brought several new additions to Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, including the romanceable Ulbrig Olesk. One of them is the new class called Shifter with 10 available animal forms and 6 archetypes: Child of the Manticore, Feyform Shifter, Dragonblood Shifter, Rageshaper, Fiendish Shifter, and Wild Effigy.

Deciding on a Manticore Shifter proves to be quite useful, as it allows you to become a powerful ranged attacker, thanks to the spikes your manticore form grows. The spike damage from four natural ranged attacks you get when transformed gets higher as you progress through levels, and you also get the Scent ability, a +10 feet speed bonus, and, at level 9, immunity to ground-based effects.

If you want to get the most out of this class and archetype, here is the best Manticore Shifter build in Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous.

Best Manticore Shifter build in Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous

The number of options that open as you level up in Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous can get downright overwhelming. To make sure you’re getting the best stats that match the unique advantages of a Manticore Shifter, here is a guide on how to create your character, which feats to choose as you level up, and which equipment to use.

Character creation for the best Manticore Shifter build

As you start creating your character, you should know that race doesn’t matter that much for this build, but we still advise you to go with a human due to unique perks that work well with this build. For Background, you can select Street Urchin/Pickpocket for the +2 bonus on initiative rolls.

You should invest most of your ability points into Dexterity (to maximize your spike attacks) and Strength, so the distribution should follow this pattern more or less:

• Strength: 16
• Dexterity: 20
• Intelligence: 8
• Charisma: 7
• Constitution: 12
• Wisdom: 12

When it comes to skill points, you should keep your focus on Dexterity again, so pick something like Mobility, Trickery, and Stealth. For the alignment, you should go for Chaotic Neutral and pick a deity like Gorum, Gozreh, or Cayden Cailean.

Leveling up and feats for the best Manticore Shifter build

To maximize the gains of this build, you should to follow this leveling-up table when choosing feats as you progress. Keep in mind that after you cap Child of the Manticore at level 20, you should progress into the secondary class Fighter – Mutation Warrior.

Mythic progression for the best Manticore Shifter build

For your First Ascension, you should go for either Bit of Fun or Close to the Heavens and choose the mythic ability Master Shapeshifter or Cleaving Shot. At level 2, pick Deadly Aim, and at levels 3 and 4, go for Master Shapeshifter (if not chosen previously) and Mythic Critical. Moving further, fire at will, because the mythical feats you choose from level 5 onwards don’t matter that much.

Equipment for the best Manticore Shifter build

Now, when it comes to weapons, you don’t need any, as you have your spikes, but do try to buff them so you have the following qualities—Strength, Cold Iron, and Good-aligned.

You can do more enhancing with proper armor and other accessories, so here are our recommendations:

• Amulet: Amulet of Mighty Fists (bonus on attack and damage rolls with unarmed attacks)
• Armor: unequipped
• Shirts: Bestial Rags
• Belt: Belt of Physical Perfection or Mangling Frenzy
• Gloves: Gloves of Dueling
• Boots: Ronneck’s Sacrifice
• Helmet: Owl’s Cowl
• Glasses: Goggles of Piercing Gaze
• Cloaks: Cloak of Resistance or Lone Wolf’s Cloak
• Rings: Ring of Triumphant Advance and Ring of Guiding Star
• Bracers: Bracers of Armor

And that pretty much covers the best Manticore Shifter build that we have for you. With this configuration, you should be able to deal amazing ranged damage. Let us know if you have any improvement ideas, and check out more useful guides in our dedicated Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous section.