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Vaynor
2010-05-23, 02:16 AM
BARBARIAN

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs50/f/2009/272/2/b/Barbarian_by_bopchara.jpg

”I am unbeatable! Entire armies fear my strength! Come at me if you must, but do not expect mercy!”
~Gruth, human barbarian~

The barbarian is the epitome of strength and brutal combat. Unleashing their power in the form of a deadly frenzy, the barbarian fears no enemy. The barbarian is the ultimate savage warrior, sacrificing his mental faculties in order to gain physical might. Abandoning training and discipline, the barbarian becomes a ruthless warrior. Barbarians are not at home in civilization, and tend to find their place in the wilderness or battlefield. A barbarian might be a tribal warlord, a brutal mercenary, or a battle-hardened soldier.

Alignment: Any nonlawful.

Hit Die: d12.

Starting Gold: As barbarian.

Class Skills: The barbarian's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Handle Animal (Cha), Intimidate (Cha), Jump (Str), Listen (Wis), Martial Lore (Int), Ride (Dex), Survival (Wis), and Swim (Str).

Skill Points at First Level: (4 + Int modifier) x4.
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 4 + Int modifier.



Level

BAB
Fort Save
Ref Save
Will Save
Special
Maneuvers Known
Maneuvers Readied
Stances Known


1st

+1

+2

+0

+0
Preferred discipline, fast movement, illiteracy, frenzy 1/day

4

3

1


2nd

+2

+3

+0

+0
Uncanny dodge

5

3

1


3rd

+3

+3

+1

+1


5

4

1


4th

+4

+4

+1

+1
Frenzy 2/day

6

4

2


5th

+5

+4

+1

+1
Improved uncanny dodge

6

4

2


6th

+6/+1

+5

+2

+2


7

5

2


7th

+7/+2

+5

+2

+2
Damage reduction 1/-

8

5

2


8th

+8/+3

+6

+2

+2
Frenzy 3/day

8

5

2


9th

+9/+4

+6

+3

+3


9

6

3


10th

+10/+5

+7

+3

+3
Damage reduction 2/-

10

6

3


11th

+11/+6/+1

+7

+3

+3
Greater frenzy

10

6

3


12th

+12/+7/+2

+8

+4

+4
Frenzy 4/day

11

7

3


13th

+13/+8/+3

+8

+4

+4
Damage reduction 3/-

12

7

3


14th

+14/+9/+4

+9

+4

+4
Indomitable will

12

7

4


15th

+15/+10/+5

+9

+5

+5


13

8

4


16th

+16/+11/+6/+1

+10

+5

+5
Damage reduction 4/-, frenzy 5/day

14

8

4


17th

+17/+12/+7/+2

+10

+5

+5
Tireless frenzy

14

8

4


18th

+18/+13/+8/+3

+11

+6

+6


15

9

4


19th

+19/+14/+9/+4

+11

+6

+6
Damage reduction 5/-

16

9

5


20th

+20/+15/+10/+5

+12

+6

+6
Mighty frenzy, frenzy 6/day

16

9

5



Class Features

Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: The barbarian is proficient with all simple and martial weapons, light armor, medium armor, and shields (except tower shields).

Maneuvers: The barbarian has access to the Army of One (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=5710173), Fool’s Grip (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=67879), Setting Sun, Stone Dragon, and Tiger Claw disciplines. The barbarian begins with knowledge of 4 maneuvers from any of these disciplines.

Once you know a maneuver, you must ready it before you can use it (see Maneuvers Readied below). A maneuver usable by barbarians is considered an extraordinary ability unless noted otherwise in its description. Your maneuvers are not affected by spell resistance, and you do not provoke attacks of opportunity when you initiate one.

You learn additional maneuvers at higher levels, as shown on the table above. You must meet a maneuver’s prerequisite in order to learn it. See the table on page 39 of the Tome of Battle to determine the highest-level maneuvers you can learn.

Upon reaching 4th level, and at every even-numbered barbarian level after that (6th, 8th, 10th, and so on), you can choose to learn a new maneuver in place of one you already know. In effect, you can lose the old maneuver in exchange for the new one. You can chose a new maneuver of any level you like, as long as you observe your restriction on the highest-level maneuvers you know; you need not replace the old maneuver with a maneuver of the same level. For example, upon reaching 10th level, you could trade in a single 1st-, 2nd-, 3rd-, or 4th-level maneuver for a maneuver of 5th-level or lower, as long as you meet the prerequisite of the new maneuver. You can swap only a single maneuver at any given level.

Maneuvers Readied: You can ready three of your 4 maneuvers known at 1st level, and as you advance in level and learn more maneuvers, you are able to ready more, but you must still choose which maneuvers to ready. Your ready your maneuvers by exercising for 5 minutes. The maneuvers you choose remain readied until you decide to meditate again and change them. You need not sleep or rest for any long period of time to ready your maneuvers; any time you spend 5 minutes in meditation, you can change your readied maneuvers.

You begin an encounter with all of your readied maneuvers unexpended, regardless of how many times you might have already used them since you chose them. When you initiate a maneuver, you expend it for the current encounter, so each of your readied maneuvers can be used once per encounter (unless you recover them, as described below).

You can recover an expended maneuver by using a standard action to let loose a roar of primal might. Doing this does not provoke attacks of opportunity. Once you have roared, you can choose one expended maneuver to refresh. It is now available for use in a subsequent round.

Stances Known: You begin play with knowledge of one 1st-level stance from any discipline you have access to. At 4th, 9th, 14th, and 19th level, you can choose additional stances. Unlike maneuvers, stances are not expended, and you do not have to ready them. All the stances you know are available to you at all times and you can change the stance you currently use as a swift action. A stance is an extraordinary ability unless noted otherwise in the stance description.

Unlike with new maneuvers you cannot learn a new stance at higher levels in place of one you already know.

Preferred Discipline: At level one, a barbarian may select a single discipline from the disciplines available to him. This discipline becomes his preferred discipline. The frenzy stance counts as a stance of the barbarian’s preferred discipline for all effects and purposes. Whenever he uses a boost, counter, or strike from his preferred discipline the barbarian may let loose a bestial roar as a free action to immediately recover the maneuver used. Any maneuver recovered in this fashion cannot be used again until the following round. The barbarian may only recover one maneuver per round in this fashion (if more than 1 maneuver of his preferred discipline is used, he may choose which to recover). Additionally, the barbarian gains the key skill of his preferred discipline as a class skill if he does not have it already. Whenever the Barbarian gains a new use of frenzy he may alter his existing preferred discipline to that of any other discipline he has access to from the barbarian class.

Fast Movement (Ex): A barbarian is quicker on his feet than the average member of his race. The barbarian’s land speed increases by +10 feet. The barbarian only benefits from this ability when wearing no armor, light armor, or medium armor and not carrying a heavy load. Additionally, the barbarian must be in a stance of his preferred discipline to gain this bonus. Apply this bonus before modifying the barbarian’s speed due to encumbrance or armor.

Illiteracy: Barbarians do not automatically gain the ability to read and write. To become literate, a barbarian must either spend 2 skill points or gain a level in another class (as long as that class does not also have the Illiteracy class feature).

Frenzy (Ex): A barbarian is a wild and unpredictable warrior. His wild nature allows him to enter a frenzy, boosting his physical might but dulling his intellect. While you are in a martial stance, you may, as a swift action, forgo its normal benefit to gain the effects of the frenzy stance. You can also end the frenzy stance and resume the normal benefit of the stance you were in as a swift action. While in the frenzy stance, you gain the following benefits and restrictions. A barbarian may enter a frenzy a number of times per day as specified on the table above. When frenzying, a barbarian gains a +4 bonus to his Strength and Constitution scores, a +2 morale bonus on Will saves, and a -2 penalty to Armor Class. The barbarian’s resilience increases in a frenzy, causing him to gain 2 hit points per level. These extra hit points dissipate when the frenzy ends, and are not lost first as with temporary hit points. The barbarian’s frenzy removes his ability to use Charisma, Dexterity, or Intelligence based skills (except for Balance, Escape Artist, Intimidate, and Ride), the Concentration skill, any abilities that require patience or concentration. The barbarian cannot cast spells or activate magic items that require a command word, a spell trigger, or spell completion to function when in a frenzy. The barbarian can use any feat he has except Combat Expertise, item creation feats, and metamagic feats. A frenzy is taxing on the barbarian, and can only be sustained for a number of rounds equal to the character’s (newly improved) Constitution modifier. At the end of the frenzy, the barbarian loses all bonuses and penalties associated with the frenzy stance, resumes his previous stance, and becomes fatigued until the end of the current encounter.

A barbarian may only enter a frenzy once per encounter. At 1st level, the barbarian may enter the frenzy stance once per day. At 4th level and every 4 levels thereafter, the barbarian may enter the frenzy stance an additional time per day. The barbarian’s frenzy ability functions as the standard barbarian’s rage ability for the purpose of gaining feats, access to prestige classes, etc.

Uncanny Dodge (Ex): The barbarian has keen perception, allowing him to react swiftly to sudden danger. At level 2, when in a stance of his preferred discipline, the barbarian retains his Dexterity bonus to Armor Class (if any) even when caught flat-footed or struck by an invisible attacker. However, he still loses his Dexterity bonus to AC if immobilized. If the barbarian already has uncanny dodge from a different class, he automatically gains improved uncanny dodge instead.

Improved Uncanny Dodge (Ex): The barbarian’s reaction time improves further, allowing him to evade attacks normally even when being attacked by multiple assailants. At level 5, when in a stance of his preferred discipline, the barbarian can no longer be flanked. The barbarian cannot be sneak attacked unless the attacker has four more effective rogue levels than the barbarian has effective barbarian levels. If the barbarian already has uncanny dodge from a different class, he automatically gains improved uncanny dodge instead, and the levels from the classes that grant uncanny dodge stack to determine the minimum effective rogue level an attacker must have to flank the character.

Damage Reduction (Ex): The barbarian’s skin becomes toughened with the scars of many battles. At 7th level, when in a stance of his preferred discipline, the barbarian gains DR 1/-. This damage reduction improves by 1 point at level 10 and every 3 levels thereafter.

Greater Frenzy (Ex): The barbarian gains increased mastery over his wild frenzies, increasing his physical power. At level 11, the Strength and Constitution bonuses from the frenzy stance increase to +6, and his morale bonus to Will saves increases to +3. Otherwise, the stance is unchanged.

Indomitable Will (Ex): When in a frenzy, the barbarian’s mind becomes resistant to compulsion. At level 14, the barbarian gains a +4 bonus to Will saves to resist enchantment spells and effects when in a frenzy. This bonus stacks with all other modifiers, including the morale bonus on Will saves he receives from the frenzy stance.

Tireless Frenzy (Ex): The barbarian’s frenzy no longer tires him. Whenever the barbarian loses the effects of the frenzy stance, he no longer becomes fatigued as normal.

Mighty Frenzy (Ex): The barbarian’s power reaches its peak when in a frenzy. At level 20, the bonuses to Strength and Constitution when in the frenzy stance increase to +8, and his morale bonus on Will saves increases to +4. Additionally, once per day, when in the frenzy stance, the barbarian may activate two strikes simultaneously. Both strikes must require require a standard action (or quicker action) to complete. When activating a strike, the barbarian may immediately activate any other strike he knows as a free action. Both strikes are expended normally.

Ex-Barbarians

A barbarian who becomes lawful loses the benefits and ability to enter/use martial stances and maneuvers (including the barbarian’s frenzy stance) and cannot gain additional levels in the barbarian class. All other benefits of the class are retained.


I'm sure this has been done before, but here it is, a ToB barbarian. Any comments/criticism would be helpful.

Anyone? Just need to know if this would be balanced among other ToB classes.

Vaynor
2010-05-24, 08:48 AM
Any critique before I let this thing die?

demidracolich
2010-05-24, 08:53 AM
Yay, the barbarian is more balanced now, adding maneuvers make most melee classes better. The only problem I have with it is that the recovery method makes adaptive style a pretty much must take like with swordsage.

Tome
2010-06-15, 07:05 PM
The recovering Preferred Discipline Manoeuvres with a Swift action thing? Yeah, almost every Boost is a Swift action already, making it incompatible with them. Counters are mostly Immediate actions, which makes them incompatible as well. So it only works with Strikes. Might want to tweak the text regarding that.

Other than that? Awesome. :smallbiggrin:

Vaynor
2010-06-15, 07:07 PM
I'll change it to a free action but only one per round.

Thanks!

Tome
2010-06-15, 07:09 PM
Might wanna reduce the number of Manoeuvres/Stances Known/Readied as well. He gets significantly more than the Warblade and Crusader whilst also having better class features at the moment.

Take a look at the progression for the Crusader/Warblade if you want a rough guide for that. I'd advise maybe going one lower, but not below that.

Vaynor
2010-06-15, 08:39 PM
I tried to put it between the Warblade and Swordsage for maneuvers known/readied, stances known, as well as the maneuver recovery method. Do you think it would be more balanced if I just removed the DR?

Tome
2010-06-16, 04:59 AM
I tried to put it between the Warblade and Swordsage for maneuvers known/readied, stances known, as well as the maneuver recovery method. Do you think it would be more balanced if I just removed the DR?

Not really. DR isn't all that valuable that late and in those amounts.

Is there any reason you felt it needed more Manoeuvres than a Warblade?

Vaynor
2010-06-16, 05:18 AM
It's harder for them to recover maneuvers, so they get more known/readied. Also, I didn't feel like making them just a copy of another ToB class with a few different class features.

Tome
2010-06-16, 05:34 AM
The Swordsage has a few other things that push it towards having more Known/Readied/Stances. What with the Preferred Discipline recovery mechanic, I'd say tweak the progression to be only slightly better than the Warblade.

The Stances could probably be tuned down to only 4, since that's what Crusaders/Warblades get and he's not got anything making his stances worse than theirs. Known Maneuvers should probably be lower as well, for similar reasons. Maneuvers Readied... Yeah, if the Stances/Known get turned down a bit, I can see that being a decent amount of Maneuvers, what with the recovery mechanic. Of course, you should bear in mind that most folks are going to want to take Adaptive Style to get around the recovery problem, just like with the Swordsage.

Vaynor
2010-06-16, 05:43 AM
The Swordsage has a few other things that push it towards having more Known/Readied/Stances. What with the Preferred Discipline recovery mechanic, I'd say tweak the progression to be only slightly better than the Warblade.

I'll tone it down slightly.

Tome
2010-06-16, 07:36 AM
That looks much better. :smallbiggrin:

This class is now replacing the PHB Barbarian in every game I DM.

Vaynor
2010-06-16, 01:58 PM
Awesome! Let me know how it goes if you end up using it.

Pechvarry
2010-06-16, 02:22 PM
I'm a few months late to the party, as usual. ><

If I'm to understand this correctly, the rage is basically a martial stance with small uses/day. This means that while you can end it at any time, in practice, you never ever ever want to drop out of your frenzy stance. Even aside from the being winded thing, the moment you drop out of your frenzy stance, you cannot drop back into it due to once/encounter limitation.

Ergo, if you want the class to have such a good reason to never ever end their frenzy for the duration, you should seriously consider ditching uses/day altogether. In fact, if you replaced those with uses/encounter, you would create a scenario where higher leveled martial barbarians are increasingly more tactical. "Anger management", so to speak. You could also consider making the Frenzy stance's duration non-consecutive. This is to say, give Barbarians 3+con mod rounds/fight of frenzy. So if you have a 20 con while raging, that's 8 rounds/combat. If you're willing to spend the swift actions to drop in and out of stance, then you can extend your rage. No matter what, this has issues with the fatigue.

Something I've seen with other variant barbarians you might consider: instead of being fatigued until end of encounter, you could make it "fatigued for as many rounds spent raging". If you combine this with non-sequential frenzy stance, you can have a character spending some, but not all, of his combat actions fatigued. (In this instance, I'd have the fatigue effect pause when they re-enter stance. Jumping back into Frenzy while fatigued would be crappy)

Vaynor
2010-06-16, 02:29 PM
I'm a few months late to the party, as usual. ><

If I'm to understand this correctly, the rage is basically a martial stance with small uses/day. This means that while you can end it at any time, in practice, you never ever ever want to drop out of your frenzy stance. Even aside from the being winded thing, the moment you drop out of your frenzy stance, you cannot drop back into it due to once/encounter limitation.

Ergo, if you want the class to have such a good reason to never ever end their frenzy for the duration, you should seriously consider ditching uses/day altogether. In fact, if you replaced those with uses/encounter, you would create a scenario where higher leveled martial barbarians are increasingly more tactical. "Anger management", so to speak. You could also consider making the Frenzy stance's duration non-consecutive. This is to say, give Barbarians 3+con mod rounds/fight of frenzy. So if you have a 20 con while raging, that's 8 rounds/combat. If you're willing to spend the swift actions to drop in and out of stance, then you can extend your rage. No matter what, this has issues with the fatigue.

Something I've seen with other variant barbarians you might consider: instead of being fatigued until end of encounter, you could make it "fatigued for as many rounds spent raging". If you combine this with non-sequential frenzy stance, you can have a character spending some, but not all, of his combat actions fatigued.

Yes, basically, I made it a stance to balance them. I figured if they were able to have a stance and rage it would push them too far ahead of other martial classes. And rage is not meant to be some kind of tactical ability, it's 1/encounter because you're entering a combat-inspired rage. You don't just turn a rage on and off. The whole point of the barbarian is that he's not tactical. Entering a rage isn't something that you do willy nilly, it's hard on the body (thus the limit based on Constitution, aka endurance), and is very tiring. I think what you're looking for is a warblade with a stat-increasing stance.

As far as the fatigued for as long as you raged thing, if you're going into a rage for less than half of an encounter, you're doing it wrong.

Pechvarry
2010-06-16, 08:17 PM
That's pretty much the response I was expecting.

So my only problems are thus:
a) stances are worth almost exactly nothing to this character.
b) uses/day are still quite moot, though the same could be said of core barbarian.

Vaynor
2010-06-16, 08:22 PM
That's why I gave them a lot of stances known, so they get a better choice. Entering a frenzy isn't going to be the best choice for every encounter, and it won't always last all of the encounter. Another reason why I gave them the instant recovery mechanic, they get less versatility out of their stances because frenzy will most likely be used more often than not.