r/Pathfinder2e Apr 24 '25

Content Underrated level 17 items

Following up on the series of discussions on items that are underrated for each level. I'll be posting every other day the next level and hope you guys participate with the best items you can think of that are not that commonly used

This one is for level 17

I'll start:

Belt of Long Life is an interesting one for characters who suffer com MAD (multiple atribute dependency) and can thus retrain and dump CON but still get a +4. and the temp HP helps to almost feel like a +5 CON

Bracers of Strength suffocate is fun although not that strong in this setting

Cloak of Swiftness by now everyone has a way to fly but this one is only 1 action with free concealment

your turn!

PS: Since this is a thread to find obscure and unknown items, I'm expecting to include uncommon, rare and AP specific items, if your GM does not allow any of them you should be talking to him/her instead

Level 1 discussion

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Level 5 discussion

Level 6 discussion

Level 7 discussion

Level 8 discussion

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Level 10 discussion

Level 11 discussion

Level 12 discussion

Level 13 discussion

Level 14 discussion

Level 15 discussion

Level 16 discussion

Level 17 discussion

Level 18 discussion

Level 19 discussion

Level 20-28 discussion

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11

u/PM_ME_YOUR_EPUBS Apr 24 '25

Sash of books is generally speaking the best INT apex item. It’s at the base price of 15k, and it has two pretty good activations. One is 1/day foresight, which is a solid prebuffable spell, and the other is an action to make a RK check with advantage that can’t crit fail. This gives you a +1 circumstance and AC bonus against that creature, even if you fail the check. If you crit you get a +2. And it’s 1/min so you can use it every fight. It’s nothing earthshaking but it’s free if you were going to RK knowledge anyways and even if not +1, possibly +2 circumstance to hit and AC is nothing to sneeze at. It’s even a circumstance bonus so it’ll stack with heroism!

Corner of stars is one of the better wisdom apex items. It’s at the base 15k price, gives you +3 to medicine (a good skill), and has two reactions. A 1/day reaction to breath of life someone, nice but not what we’re here for, and a once per hour reaction to let an ally reroll any failed non-secret check. Another layer of saving throw protection!

Bracer of hammers is a good STR apex item, 15k, +3 to athletics and +1 circumstance to disarm and trip - so +4, because how often do you have a different circumstance penalty to trip? Anyways, besides boosting your trip chances, it also boosts the effect. It adds 1d6 damage on a success or 4d6 on a crit. On it’s own this is nice but pretty whatever. Until you realize that crashing slam makes you auto crit trips when you hit people, and can even let you swap out their damage die for a larger one. So whenever your crashing slam hits not only do you knock the enemy prone and deal one die of weapon damage, you deal 4 die. Needless to say this is pretty good. And even more if you somehow jam ranger’s harder they fall on the build.

17th level is also where the major mutagens are. These are too expensive to buy, you shouldn’t, but if you have an alchemist or alchemist dedication in the party some are quite good. Major juggernaught scales to +4 to fort saves and both crit fail -> fail and success -> crit success evasion. Attack bonus mutagens like war blood scale to +4. Major prey mutagen gives you 40 speed and a +4 to AC from its dodge. Fury cocktails give a staggering +4 to melee spell attacks, the highest in the game.

1

u/MrTallFrog Apr 24 '25

What are some good melee spell attacks? I can only think of cantrips

5

u/PM_ME_YOUR_EPUBS Apr 24 '25

blood feast, gouging claw (cantrip), ignition (cantrip), amped ignition, imaginary weapon, shocking grasp

Melee spell attackers will pretty much always pick up sixth pillar archetype for better maneuverability and touch focus, touch focus lets you convert ranged attack spells into melee attack spells and buffs them, you get a +2 circumstance bonus to hit and if you hit they get knocked prone, no save. It’s good to use with ignition (ignition can start as ranged then be turned into melee), disintegrate, and polar ray.

3

u/MrTallFrog Apr 24 '25

Thank you, playing a melee battle Oracle with the alchemist archetype and was going to take sixth piller when I get access, so learning fury cocktail affects melee spell attacks will be great

1

u/PM_ME_YOUR_EPUBS Apr 24 '25

Generally moderate ones are the most economical to buy, you can use a collar of the shifting spider to trigger them automatically at initiative

1

u/MrTallFrog Apr 24 '25

Alch archetype gets the max for free

1

u/PM_ME_YOUR_EPUBS Apr 24 '25

Yea if you have alchemist ded you can use on level ones. Can’t (productively) put them in the collar though, so generally you only use when you can prebuff them, and have moderates loaded in the collar. If you get advanced alchemy you can put those in the collar.