Hey InEffect, why are you taking Crane wing in the slayer build? It says you need at least one hand free, which you have none with shield and a weapon.
Oversight? or am i missing something?

Don't believe everything the game tells you.

so why Valerie's build not taking them, could boost the AC further.

Because that one gets enough AC without it. Bard Valerie does take it.
There is no point ramping AC past 70-ish. It's not impossible to build a 90+AC character. It just won't be any better than 70.

InEffect, can you make build perfect ruler and leader? More for RP reason but still good in combat. With evil aligment). Smart dictator type. I only begun game and cannot choose right class. Sorry if my english not good, its not my native. Thank you.
P.S. I find the answer. You not building for this game anymore. Ok.

Your kingdom development isn't really affected by PC build except for alignment. If you are lawful, that makes it a bit easier, and also lawful evil is more appropriate for a "smart dictator". Take any class/build you like based on either RP characteristics or combat abilities.

InEffect, any interesting sensei build? I heard some people have great success of it. I imagine the main purpose would be a buffer + tank with relatively pure class.

Well, yeah. Though "interesting" is not how I'd describe it. Sure, mass restoration for free is ok and mass true strike is as well, but I can't find a compelling reason to fit it into any comp. Mostly because your front-line must have mirror image and sensei doesn't do that. For unfair that is. For casual difficulties it's fine. Basically, sensei is pigeonholed into an immovable object role and that's not enough.
As to the build it's probably sensei15/tss5 with sai or something like that. Because the game is totally fine and that's why monk AC works with shields.

Hi,

I like your work on individual builds. I'm looking for a critique on my full custom party setup if you're interested in such a thing.

I just recently switched to turn-based (with the mod) so some decisions were made with real-time in mind and others with turn-based. What it basically comes down to is that I am trying an all-ranged party to best abuse the enemy having to close the distance first.

For CC I currently have:
- a trip-based kineticist
- a thunder caller bard. Inspire courage. Relies heavily on thunder call. Also throws down a grease at the spot the whole party is standing (flying actually, 6 aasimar) to make it harder for them to be meleed. Can dimension door the whole party away so they can full attack without to move themselves.

3 composite bow users
- Inquisitor Tactical leader (with bow) to share teamwork feats. My worst performer maybe, I started this whole thing to make use of Volley Fire only to find it isn't in the game.
- Paladin (/scaled fist) to share Mark of Justice (or whatever the team-based smite is called). Dreadful Carnage. Also scroll-healer and if really needed mass lay on hands (although I prefer to heal out of combat).
- A 15 ranger (freebooter) build (unsure about the last classes). Good but not unfair either.

In the last slot I wanted a raw damage dealer. I've tried raycaster (but they don't synergize well with the shared damage bonuses as most only seem to work on regular attacks).
Pure fighter surprisingly worked best for me so far.

I really wanted a conjuration sorcerer as well (slightly higher crowd control DC than my bard, although the thunder calls are landing nicely).

What can I change to turn this from fine into overpowered? I feel like I'm missing out on some of the more broken stuff, but also can't find that perfect fit. I know I'm giving up on the power of summons and Outflank abuse. But all-ranged got a certain charm and I want to see how effective it can be.

Does anyone have advice on how to best build such a party? I feel like a lot of things that looked good on paper didn't quite click.
The bard's thunder call didn't turn out to be swift. The plan was to throw two CC spells per turn to make sure everything was standing still, but now I have to do it the other way around with a quickened spell and an standard action thundercall and it's not nearly as effective (if this is the only reason this party is not going to work I'm willing to go find or make a mod for swift thunder call performance)
I expected teamwork feats to be quite powerful with a full custom party, so sharing 3 with inquisitor I thought would be nice as his personal damage looked good. But the BAB progression hurts and he's not dishing out damage like I hoped he would. Also no volley fire :(
The paladin encounters much more non-evil enemies than I expected. The +12 or so attack and +18 to damage and ignore DR to 4 party members with 6ish attacks sounded great... but if there is no real boss monster or if it's neutral than the 500 or so extra DPR falls away.

One of the problems I run into is that I can't decided on if I want to go for sneak damaged or not at all.

Any advice?

Too much range and no front-line to speak of. At all.
If we are talking unfair you should have some things locked in place no matter what:
1. Ecclesi(Community, preferably)
2. Bard 5+
3. 2 Melee characters with good AC ramp and (preferably) access to mirror image.
4. Stinking cloud DC caster with bells and whistles
5. 1+ Pet for fodder and encounter triggering.

In conclusion: I would drop thundercaller for a melee bard and add proper melee gish of some sort. Tactical Leader is a waste off space. There are not many useful team feats, especially for a range-heavy party and ones that are useful on any given character are better used being online all the time. Paladin is too squishy and doesn't offer much, Booter is rather unwieldy to use as well.

If we are talking as OP unfair comp as it gets it would be along the lines of
bard6/RDD4/TSS5/EK5 Val
melee gish MC for frontline
Community+Animal erastil ecclesi18/V2(+13AC/AB when it counts can't be underestimated)
Sylvan sorc/V2(arcane sorc will do as well, but pet is too good early)
Kineticist/thug(might use horny sisters)
Grenadier(can be jubi for camping ability that is pretty much 15% rest efficiency)
That would cover all bases, have loads of touch attacks, all CC in the world and all that.

You also could go gozreh water+animal and free up the sorc slot for whatever you want or drop alchemist for something. I, personally, don't run kineticists as it trivializes everything past level 13, so I refuse to use them.

as to turn-based vs RT for unfair TB will be a huge disadvantage as you can't cheese initiative there and will likely be murdered turn 1 more times than what is remotely reasonable.

Val is pretty optimal. I mean you could do better with 25PB, but that is not the case with mercs. You could up the STR a notch, but that's about it and it won't make a big difference as she's gonna go with arcane protector and hotswapping bladed plate for buffing to ignore ASF for most of the game.
Val in general is probably the best companion out there due to versatility. Whatever you want her to be - she can do competently so long as it involves stacking AC and being on the frontline. And her huge HP is not wasted on unfair either as it allows her to survive an extra hit(or survive at all) and given healing in combat on unfair is grossly inefficient big starting HP pool goes a long way.

Thanks for the thoughts. I will make that exact party to have a good baseline to compare to, and continue my quest to find the best all-ranged party I can produce, just to see how it stacks up against that.

Maybe I'll try out 5 kineticist or something and see how I can improve from there. I'll take it from you that at some point the only way forward is to add a melee frontline, but I'd love to see where I end up given the no-melee constraint, and see how far I'll get in relative power level.

Solo kineticist/thug and solo sylvan sorc are doable on unfair, so there's that. Could count as a ranged only party xD
Really, though, the game is beatable with no front-line with enough fodder like pets and summons. It's just going to be tedious as all hell with all the pre-summoning required. I would also concentrate on CC heavily for that one(even more so than for a standard unfair party and that one is not exactly light on CC either).

The Melee Sorc guide says to pick Crane Wing at lvl1, is that supposed to be Crane Style?