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View Full Version : Arcane Spontaneous Druid [3.5, WIP, PEACH!]



Morph Bark
2011-08-10, 09:58 AM
I've seen people create reworkings of Healers and Warmages, fill the gaps between Beguilers/Dread Necromancers/Warmages to cover the remaining four schools and seen some minor fixes for Wizards and Druids. Now I present to you something that came from the cauldron in which all those ideas were poured and stirred! The Blendwerker is meant to be fill in the gap left by the three specialized sorcerer classes, while at the same time introducing newfangled class features so that it mimics being a spontenous wizard or an arcane druid.




The Blendwerker

http://th08.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/f/2011/065/5/3/the_conjuration_by_cihanberk-d3b2o7d.jpg
Image by cihanberk (http://cihanberk.deviantart.com/) of DeviantART


Abilities: Intelligence and Charisma are most important to a blendwerker as those are important for its bind servant and monster shape class features, as well as its spellcasting. Furthermore, a blendwerker wants to have a good Constitution to bring up its hp if he intends to go into melee while monster shaped, or his Dexterity if he wants to use spellcasting and ranged weaponry more.
Races: Changelings and elves take well to the ways of a blendwerker, appealing with its specialized, yet fairly broad array of magic. Dwarven blendwerkers tend to focus on its melee capabilities, while gnomes go more for the binding of servants. Half-orcs and the savage races tend to be unfit due to either a penalty to Intelligence or a penalty to Charisma.
Alignment: Any. A blendwerker usually inclines to Chaotic because they have a desire to practice their magic freely and as unrestricted as possible, but they prefer to work in teams as well, being knowledge-gatherers, coordinators and buffers foremost.
Starting Gold: As Wizard.
Starting Age: As Wizard.


Class Skills: The blendwerker's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Bluff (Cha), Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Decipher Script (Int), Knowledge (any) (Int), Listen (Wis), Profession (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), Spot (Wis) and Use Magic Device (Cha).
Skill Points at 1st Level: (4 + Int modifier) x 4.
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 4 + Int modifier.
Hit Die: d6.

{table=head]Level|Base Attack Bonus|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Special|0lvl|1st|2nd|3rd|4th|5th|6th|7th|8th| 9th

1st|+0|
+0|
+0|
+2|Armored mage (light), bind servant, read magic|5|2|-|-|-|-|-|-|-|-

2nd|+1|
+0|
+0|
+3|--|6|3|-|-|-|-|-|-|-|-

3rd|+2|
+1|
+1|
+3|--|6|4|3|-|-|-|-|-|-|-

4th|+3|
+1|
+1|
+4|Armored mage (medium)|6|5|4|-|-|-|-|-|-|-

5th|+3|
+1|
+1|
+4|Monster shape (1/day, animals, humanoids)|6|6|5|2|-|-|-|-|-|-

6th|+4|
+2|
+2|
+5|Monster shape (2/day, 2nd form)|6|6|5|3|-|-|-|-|-|-

7th|+5|
+2|
+2|
+5|Monster shape (fey, monstrous humanoids)|6|6|6|4|3|-|-|-|-|-

8th|+6/+1|
+2|
+2|
+6|Monster shape (3/day, 3rd form)|6|6|6|4|4|-|-|-|-|-

9th|+6/+1|
+3|
+3|
+6|Monster shape (aberrations, giants, magical beasts, vermin)|6|6|6|6|5|3|-|-|-|-

10th|+7/+2|
+3|
+3|
+7|Bind servant (multiple), monster shape (oozes, plants)|6|6|6|5|5|4|-|-|-|-

11th|+8/+3|
+3|
+3|
+7|Monster shape (4/day, 4th form)|6|6|6|6|6|5|3|-|-|-

12th|+9/+4|
+4|
+4|
+8|Monster shape (dragons)|6|6|6|6|6|5|4|-|-|-

13th|+9/+4|
+4|
+4|
+8|Advanced learning, heighten spell|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|3|-|-

14th|+10/+5|
+4|
+4|
+9|--|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|4|-|-

15th|+11/+6/+1|
+5|
+5|
+9|Advanced learning, monster shape (5/day, 5th form)|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|3|-

16th|+12/+7/+2|
+5|
+5|
+10|--|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|4|-

17th|+12/+7/+2|
+5|
+5|
+10|Advanced learning|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|3

18th|+13/+8/+3|
+6|
+6|
+11|--|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|4

19th|+14/+9/+4|
+6|
+6|
+11|--|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|5

20th|+15/+10/+5|
+6|
+6|
+12|Bind servant (maximum), monster shape (6/day, 6th form, all day)|X|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6[/table]

Weapon and armor proficiencies: A blendwerker is proficient with all simple weapons and martial ranged weapons. A blendwerker is proficient with light and medium armor and light shields.

Spellcasting: A blendwerker is a spontaneous caster who must prepare his available spells in a spellbook like a wizard. However, he does not need to prepare his spells per day. Instead, he treats the spells in his spellbook as his spells known, as long as he is attuned to his spellbook. Attuning to a spellbook requires a ritual costing 5 gp and 8 hours of meditation during which the blendwerker burns incense and writes his name on the inside of the book's cover, crossing out the name of the previous owner if necessary. A blendwerker can only be attuned to one spellbook at a time.

If a spellbook is not full yet, a blendwerker may add spells in the same manner a wizard can add spells to his spellbook. A blendwerker may add spells drawn from the sorcerer list, as long as they belong to the abjuration, conjuration (nondamaging spells from the creation subschool only), divination and transmutation (excluding the polymorph subschool) schools and are of a level no higher than 6th. A blendwerker's spellbook may never have more than 8 spells of each level in it. 0-level spells are not affected by this limitation.

To learn or cast a spell, a blendwerker must have either an Intelligence or Charisma score (chosen at first level) equal to at least 10 + the spell level. The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a blendwerker's spell is 10 + the spell level + the blendwerker's Intelligence modifier or Charisma modifier.

A blendwerker may only attune to an empty spellbook or one which previously belonged to another blendwerker. A blendwerker's spellbook cannot be used by anyone else, not even to copy spells from, as long as it is attuned to the blendwerker. A blendwerker's spellbook remains attuned as long as the blendwerker is alive or until he performs a ritual to un-attune himself, which requires 5 gp worth of incense and the crossing out of the blendwerker's name with his own, fresh blood. This takes only 1 minute.

Armored mage: At first level a blendwerker can ignore the arcane spell failur chance of light armor and light shields. At fourth level he can ignore the arcane spell failur chance of medium armor.

Bind servant (Sp): A blendwerker can bind otherplanar creatures into his service. This functions as a summon monster spell of a level equal to the highest level spell the blendwerker can cast. He then attempts an opposed Charisma check and if this is succesful, the summoned creature becomes bound to the blendwerker, effectively giving the summon monster spell an infinite duration. A blendwerker may only bind 1 creature in this manner, even if he chooses to pick a monster from a lower-level summon monster list. The servant may be dismissed and will disappear if brough down to 0 hp. A blendwerker can only attempt to bind a servant once per month.

At 10th level a blendwerker may bind two servants if he chooses them from a lower-level summon monster list. For instance, a 10th level blendwerker may bind two servants from the summon monster I-IV lists or one servant from the summon monster V list. If one of the two servants dies, but not the other, the blendwerker may bring back the servant the next day by attempting the binding again. This use of this class ability does not go against the once-per-month limit.

At 20th level the blendwerker may bind three servants he chooses them from a summon monster list at least two levels lower than his maximum allowed level, meaning he may bind three servants from the summon monster I-VII lists, two servants from the summon monster VIII list or one servant from the summon monster IX list.

Read magic (Sp): At 1st level a blendwerker can use read magic as a spell-like ability 1/day.

Monster shape (Sp): At 5th level a blendwerker becomes able to change his shape into a specific creature once per day. He picks one creature of the animal or humanoid type that has no more HD than his caster level and may assume that creature's form. The blendwerker gains the Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution scores of the new form but retains his own Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores. He also gains all extraordinary special attacks possessed by the form but does not gain the extraordinary special qualities possessed by the new form or any supernatural or spell-like abilities. This transformation lasts for 5 minutes or until the blendwerker changes back, whichever occurs sooner, and he is incapable of casting spells during this time. The blendwerker may change what kind of creature he can change into by meditating for 8 hours. The blendwerker must be familiar with the kind of creature to be able to change into it.

At 6th level, and again at 8th, 11th, 15th and 20th, the blendwerker gains one additional daily use of this ability. He also gains an additional form at each of these levels, but he can never have more available forms than 1 + 1/2 his Intelligence modifier.

At 7th level the blendwerker may also pick fey and monstrous humanoids to change into. At 9th level the blendwerker may also pick aberrations, giants, magical beasts and vermin. At 10th level the blendwerker may also pick oozes and plants. At 12th level the blendwerker may also pick dragons.

Advanced learning: At 13th level the blendwerker learns one spell of 7th level of his allowed schools (and subschools) from the sorcerer list. He does not need to record this spell into his spellbook, it is ingrained in his mind. At 15th level the blendwerker learns one spell of 7th or 8th level of his allowed schools (and subschools) in this manner and at 17th level he learns one spell of 9th, 8th or 7th level. If the spell is of the highest level he is capable of casting, the blendwerker may cast it no more than once per day.



Reserve dump
This is basically all abilities that were taken out previously, abilities I'm thinking of adding, abilities you can use as extra class features if you like, etcetera.


Bonus feats: At 2nd, 3rd and 19th level a blendwerker gains a bonus feat. This may be any metamagic or reserve feat or any fighter bonus feat that can be used with ranged weapons.

Cantrip master (Sp): At 6th level, and again at 11th and 15th, the blendwerker may pick one 0-level spell he has in one of his spellbooks. That spell becomes a spell-like ability for him useable 3/day.

At 20th level he gains another spell-like ability in this manner, but all four of his spell-like abilities gained through this class ability become useable at-will.

Reservationist: At 14th level the blendwerker may sacrifice one available spell slot of 7th level or higher at the start of the day to enhance all of his Reserve feats with metamagic feats that together increase a spell's level by no more than 1. All these metamagic feats must be the same for all Reserve feats. If a metamagic feat is not applicable to a Reserve feat for any reason, it does not apply.

At 18th level the blendwerker may sacrifice a 9th level spell slot to enhance all of his Reserve feats with metamagic feats that together increase a spell's level by no more than 4.

ShiningStarling
2011-08-10, 06:05 PM
It looks... umm... not done :smallwink:, and already more powerful than almost anyone else, barring the big three (Wiz,Clr,Dru). It knows WAAAAAY too many spells for a spontaneous caster. I like that, but it isn't balanced. It also learns new levels on odd levels, which is again not a spontaneous modus op. It also give a lot of class features, albeit undefined. This is cool, but it alredy has so much spell power it gets out of balance quickly. I would split this into 2 classes, each getting appropriate powers and spells, it gives you a bit more freedom as well as balancing it.
Hope I helped! :smallsmile:

Morph Bark
2011-08-10, 06:09 PM
It looks... umm... not done :smallwink:

Hence the WIP in the title. :smallwink:


and already more powerful than almost anyone else, barring the big three (Wiz,Clr,Dru). It knows WAAAAAY too many spells for a spontaneous caster. I like that, but it isn't balanced. It also learns new levels on odd levels, which is again not a spontaneous modus op. It also give a lot of class features, albeit undefined. This is cool, but it alredy has so much spell power it gets out of balance quickly. I would split this into 2 classes, each getting appropriate powers and spells, it gives you a bit more freedom as well as balancing it.
Hope I helped! :smallsmile:

Thanks, it does help a bit, because I had not yet considered the implications. I figure I should limit them to an amount of pages equal to 5 x class level, or something else of the sort.

Morph Bark
2011-08-15, 06:52 PM
Es finito!

NeoSeraphi
2011-08-15, 07:02 PM
If you're excluding the conjuration (calling/summoning) then it's the warmage's schtick, isn't it?

Shadow Lord
2011-08-15, 07:18 PM
Wait, this is a summoning base class, that casts spells, that can't use Summon Monster? And it's also based on Polymorph, but it can't cast Polymorph? Wut?

Wut?

Morph Bark
2011-08-16, 03:54 AM
If you're excluding the conjuration (calling/summoning) then it's the warmage's schtick, isn't it?

I'm not sure what you mean by that. Care explain?


Wait, this is a summoning base class, that casts spells, that can't use Summon Monster? And it's also based on Polymorph, but it can't cast Polymorph? Wut?

Wut?

The base intention here was that Summon and Polymorph spells are among the most powerful and versatile spells out there and to limit them I made it so that they are automatically incorporated in the class itself, but that you basically have to prepare a single form (for polymorph) or single creature (for summon monster) to shift into/summon, rather than simply picking which at the time of casting.

NeoSeraphi
2011-08-16, 08:16 AM
Conjuration spells that aren't (call/summon) are either (create), (healing), or they're damaging spells like the orb line and acid arrow, and those are the warmage's spells. If you limited it to (create), that would be understandable, but as it is now the blendwerker could easily get most of the warmage's conjuration spells added to its spell list.

Morph Bark
2011-08-16, 07:31 PM
Hmmm, point. Besides the orb spells I didn't think there were any conjuration spells (or at least no more than a handful tops) on the warmage list, so I figured it couldn't hurt to include them, because I thought I would otherwise have to put every possible spell on a specific list.

Are there any problems like that involving the Beguiler and Dread Necromancer?

NeoSeraphi
2011-08-16, 07:36 PM
Are there any problems like that involving the Beguiler and Dread Necromancer?

Nope. Beguiler is very pointedly illlusion/enchantment and DN is very much necromancy, and you just dumped all three of those without a thought.

I just glanced at the warmage spell list and it is indeed full of conjuration spells. Maybe if you redid this class to be an abjurer/diviner/transmuter with specific bonuses...

Morph Bark
2011-08-16, 07:57 PM
Hmmm, I took another look at what specific spells are on the warmage's list... and I see a lot of conjuration (creation) spells on there indeed, but all damaging ones. As such, I've now limited the conjuration some more, and taken off healing as well, deciding to limit that to divine casters (and bards). I might just add back healing in later on though, but not now.

For the moment I've taken off some of the minor abilities that I added in only late in the class' construction to fill up the dead levels. This is to see how it looks without them progression-wise and figure out if maybe there might be better stuff to add in their place. I liked Cantrip master, but Reservationist was more something for a PrC.