Welcome to Guidance, Private Sanctuary’s source for tips and techniques for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, written by Everyman Gamer Alexander Augunas. Today, we’re going to be looking at a build for Yami, the mysterious Pharoh of Yu-Gi-Oh!

Now, I know that some of you guessed it when I mentioned that my character was on the list I provided on Monday, but I don’t care! Yu-Gi-Oh! was a huge part of my childhood / teen years and I’m pleased as punch to bring you today’s build, the Pharaoh Yami!.

Here’s a link all about the Pharaoh. Go read it if you want; I’m too excited to give you the backstory today! TOO. EXCITED!

Build Concept

Any information important to understanding the build or its roots goes here.

• • Human: Obvious choice is obvious.
• • Psychic: So I went back and forth on whether to make Yami an occultist (because of the Millennium Puzzle) or a Psychic. Ultimately, Psychic won out because of the better spell list. “But Alex!” Die Hard Yu-Gi-Oh! fans will say, “Yami doesn’t cast spells?!” Well, I am considering EVERY SINGLE CARD IN THE GAME a spell. So take that! The other reason I made him a psychic was for the human favored class bonus. One aspect of the psychic that we didn’t mention in our review is that the psychic actually has SIGNIFICANTLY fewer spells known than the sorcerer, so you REALLY want this favored class bonus. Like, REALLY want it. REALLY. REALLY. WANT IT.

How am I going to pull this off? Let’s see for ourselves!

Early Levels (1–7)

• Classes: psychic 7
• Feats: Spell Focus: Conjuration (Bonus), Augment Summoning (1st), Harrowed (3rd), Harrowed Summoning (5th), Superior Summoning (7th)
• Abilities: detect thoughts, discipline powers, discipline spells, knacks, phrenic amplifications, phrenic pool, psychic discipline (abomination)
• Discipline Powers: dark half (1st), morphic form (5th)
• Phrenic Amplifications: conjured armor (1st), focused force (3rd), undercast surge (7th)
• Psychic 3rd-Level Spells Known (2): excruciating deformation; mind thrust I, summon monster III
• Psychic 2nd-Level Spells Known (3): alter self; enshroud thoughts, false life, summon monster II
• Psychic 1st-Level Spells Known (5): ray of enfeeblement; mage armor, shield, summon monster I, magic missile, summon minor monster
• Psychic Knacks Known (7): detect magic, detect psychic significance, read magic, stabilize, ANY THREE

So basically, Yami’s build is all about summoning. Go figure. Yami has most of the game’s summoning spells and more options than virtually any other to improve them. The conjured armor phrenic amplification gives his summoned monsters extra AC, Augment Summoning gives them extra Strength and Constitution, Superior Summoning allows him to summon more creatures, and Harrowed Summoning gives Yami a cool card draw mechanic that could end up seriously boosting the power of your summoned monsters. Yes, there’s a chance that the bonuses will do nothing because they don’t stack with Augment Summoning, but let’s face it, since when did Yami ever turn down a risk? Plus, there is the chance for some AWESOME payoffs if you’re lucky, as drawing Dex cards will give your summoned monsters an AC bonus, drawing Cha cards will increase the attack bonus from smite and spell-like abilities for creatures who have those abilities, and Wisdom improves Will saves, which is always helpful.

Yami uses spells like false life to “replenish his life points,” and spells like shield and mage armor to bolster his creature’s defenses and protect himself, sort of like setting monsters into defense position. He can also weaken enemy monsters’ attack score with ray of enfeeblement and deal bursts of damage with mind thrust. And finally, to top it off, the abomination discipline. Why abomination? C’mon folks, it has an ability called “Dark Half” that makes Yami’s spells harder to resist. Of COURSE I’m going to pick that one!

What else is in store for Yami? I’m glad you asked! Let’s move on and see.

Mid Levels (8 –14)

• Classes: psychic 14
• Feats: Spell Focus: Conjuration (Bonus), Augment Summoning (1st), Harrowed (3rd), Harrowed Summoning (5th), Superior Summoning (7th), Expanded Summon Monster (9th), Expanded Phrenic Pool (11th), Versatile Summon Monster (13th)
• Abilities: detect thoughts, discipline powers, discipline spells, knacks, major amplifications, phrenic amplifications, phrenic pool, psychic discipline (abomination), telepathic bond
• Discipline Powers: dark half (1st), morphic form (5th), psychic safeguard (13th)
• Phrenic Amplifications: conjured armor (1st), focused force (3rd), undercast surge (7th), mimic metamagic: Empower Spell, Quicken Spell (11th)
• Psychic 7th-Level Spells Known (1): insanity; psychic crush III
• Psychic 6th-Level Spells Known (2): repulsion; mind thrust VI, summon monster VI
• Psychic 5th-Level Spells Known (3): explode head; dominate person, psychic asylum, summon monster V
• Psychic 4th-Level Spells Known (4): black tentacles; create mindscape, summon monster IV; ANY TWO
• Psychic 3rd-Level Spells Known (4): excruciating deformation; mind thrust I, summon monster III; ANY TWO
• Psychic 2nd-Level Spells Known (5): alter self; enshroud thoughts, false life, summon monster II; ANY THREE
• Psychic 1st-Level Spells Known (5): ray of enfeeblement; mage armor, shield, summon monster I, magic missile, summon minor monster
• Psychic Knacks Known (9): detect magic, detect psychic significance, read magic, stabilize, ANY FIVE

The big changes in strategy here are with several new feats and the addition of the major phrenic amplification, mimic metamagic. This amplification allows you to pick two metamagic feats and pay double the feat’s level adjustment in phrenic points in order to add that feat’s effects to your spell. For free. FANTASTIC; 8 points for a quickened summon monster VI? Or 2 points for an empowered summon monster VI, which means I add 50% to the number of monsters summoned by the spell? OKAY.

Featwise, the big additions are Expanded Summon Monster, which adds TONS of awesome monsters to Yami’s deck, and Versatile Summon Monster, which allows him to pick two templates and add those templates instead of the alignment templates to his summon monsters. Personally, I’d pick fey and dark since those are the two most “Yami” creature types, but you’re free to do as you like. As a final, fun note, you can now draw people into the Shadow Realm with create mindscape and leave them as dribbling husks using your insanity discipline spell. FUN!!!

Alright, so let’s finish this build!

Endgame (15+)

• Classes: psychic 20
• Feats: Spell Focus: Conjuration (Bonus), Augment Summoning (1st), Harrowed (3rd), Harrowed Summoning (5th), Superior Summoning (7th), Expanded Summon Monster (9th), Expanded Phrenic Pool (11th), Versatile Summon Monster (13th), FREEBIE (15th), FREEBIE (17th), FREEBIE (19th)
• Abilities: detect thoughts, discipline powers, discipline spells, knacks, major amplifications, phrenic amplifications, phrenic pool, psychic discipline (abomination), remade self, telepathic bond, telepathy
• Discipline Powers: dark half (1st), morphic form (5th), psychic safeguard (13th)
• Phrenic Amplifications: conjured armor (1st), focused force (3rd), undercast surge (7th), mimic metamagic: Empower Spell, Quicken Spell (11th), subordinate spell (15th), dual amplification (19th)
• Psychic 9th-Level Spells Known (3): telekinetic storm; psychic crush V, summon monster IX, ANY ONE
• Psychic 8th-Level Spells Known (3): orb of the void; summon monster VIII, ANY TWO
• Psychic 7th-Level Spells Known (3): insanity; summon monster VII, ANY TWO
• Psychic 6th-Level Spells Known (3): repulsion; mind thrust VI, summon monster VI, ANY ONE
• Psychic 5th-Level Spells Known (4): explode head; dominate person, psychic asylum, summon monster V, ANY ONE
• Psychic 4th-Level Spells Known (4): black tentacles; create mindscape, summon monster IV; ANY TWO
• Psychic 3rd-Level Spells Known (4): excruciating deformation; mind thrust I, summon monster III; ANY TWO
• Psychic 2nd-Level Spells Known (5): alter self; enshroud thoughts, false life, summon monster II; ANY THREE
• Psychic 1st-Level Spells Known (5): ray of enfeeblement; mage armor, shield, summon monster I, magic missile, summon minor monster
• Psychic Knacks Known (9): detect magic, detect psychic significance, read magic, stabilize, ANY FIVE

Nothing to vital in the end games. You have basically every major summoning feat that you could take, so the last three feats are freebies. Extra phrenic amplifications are a good idea, as is anything that boosts your stats. Spellwise, take psychic crush and anything else you want, really; the psychic doesn’t have too much that’s a must-have in my opinion, but it has a lot that’s damn cool.

And that, my friends, is my build for Yami. What do you think? Leave your questions and commends below, and I’ve got to go to a local PFS convention that I’m going to be playing and GMing at (Unseelie Court at Redcap’s Corner in Philadelphia). If you’re going too, I’ll see you there when I storm the Diamond City on my alchemist! If not, have fun, and I’ll be back with an all-new article for Occult October on Monday. Cheers!

Alexander “Alex” Augunas has been playing roleplaying games since 2007, which isn’t nearly as long as 90% of his colleagues. Alexander is an active freelancer for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and is best known as the author of the Pact Magic Unbound series by Radiance House. Alex is the owner of Everyman Gaming, LLC and is often stylized as the Everyman Gamer in honor of Guidance’s original home. Alex also cohosts the Private Sanctuary Podcast, along with fellow blogger Anthony Li, and you can follow their exploits on Facebook in the 3.5 Private Sanctuary Group, or on Alex’s Twitter, @AlJAug.