Friendship Through Superior Firepower! Magical Girl Base Class, Set Up! [3.5]

[Owrtho]

Technically they should, just like you can take variant domains if you get domains. Still, i'll add a mention of it in my next edit.

Given they specifically state only bards can take them, meaning that a Deadly Courtesan Rouge likely couldn't qualify. In such a situation, the same would seem to apply to other classes granting bardic performances.

Owrtho

[Serafina]

I worked a bit on the wording, and added a paragraph that explicitly allows you to take Bardic Archetypes that swap out Performances, as well as Masterpieces.
I also ensured that you can use your Performance as a Move and later Swift action - Bards do get that eventually anyway, now you get it without Bard levels.

[userpay]

Heh, I just now noticed that Magical Girl gets no knowledge skills whatsoever. I know in most cases they're going to be young and not know that much but surely at least one or two knowledge skills whether due to upbringing or later adventuring experience would be relevant?

[Serafina]

You can always take the Mentor Animal Archetype - which effectively grants you one rank in ALL knowledge skills every two levels and your Charisma-bonus to them.
Or play a Stargazer with high Intelligence and all Knowledge skills.

[userpay]

You can always take the Mentor Animal Archetype - which effectively grants you one rank in ALL knowledge skills every two levels and your Charisma-bonus to them.
Or play a Stargazer with high Intelligence and all Knowledge skills.

Eh, maybe. Still think that a couple of knowledge skills, maybe along the lines of choose x (a function of int mod maybe) knowledge skills to be class skills, would be doable. I'm pretty sure there's been some bookworm magical girls.

Another thing I noticed. Weightless doesn't take into account if you already have, or obtain from another source, a flight speed. Some other sources account for this but not all of them. Maybe for every 30ft of flight from sources other than Weightless reduce the number of points needed to access the later parts? Probably by a max of 3 points or something like that.

[userpay]

I'm curious, what would you guys consider to be some good wands for an Elven Courtblade elf using this class? Particularly ones for use during combat if any.

[Serafina]

Honestly, using wands in combat is generally not the best of ideas. If we are talking about buff-spells it can work, but then you're just going with the usual suspects here.


I combined feats and prestige class into one post, and added spoilers to comment on class-features again.

I also changed the Formatting of Swan song, it's not much more easy to read and isn't a giant, long wall of text anymore. I also switched the Entangling-effect to the first round, making it easier to affect enemies. The negative levels also can't kill anymore, though they'll certainly be crippling. Last but not least, immunities don't work anymore against the effects, though that may be too strong.

[userpay]

Honestly, using wands in combat is generally not the best of ideas. If we are talking about buff-spells it can work, but then you're just going with the usual suspects here.

True, which is why I was asking. I was looking to stick a wand chamber in my device angling towards ones that wouldn't be broken so to speak (ie wraithstrike). I was primarily looking at swift action ones though I'll probably take another look at illuminations to see if standard action buffing is really something that I'll need.

Also I think I know what I'm going to do for a magical girl down the line. Split personality. Any particular thoughts on how to do this? I was thinking along the lines of intelligent device with maybe a flaw to switch personalities.

[Serafina]

Mechanically? Absolutely no idea at all.
How to do it? Well, roleplaying, of course.


As for Wand Chambers:
As of now it is impossible to apply mundane modifications or special materials to your Device. You can enchant it because it says so, but adding wand chambers of having an Adamantine Device is currently impossible.

[userpay]

Mechanically? Absolutely no idea at all.
How to do it? Well, roleplaying, of course.


As for Wand Chambers:
As of now it is impossible to apply mundane modifications or special materials to your Device. You can enchant it because it says so, but adding wand chambers of having an Adamantine Device is currently impossible.

Again true.

Aaah... I can see that now that I've gone back and read it myself. Oh well I suppose that takes care of a good chunk of my indecisiveness until that option to combine wands and staves into the device becomes official.

[Qwertystop]

I have a homebrew for split personalities.

[Serafina]

You know, there isn't really any feat-support for the Defender-side of the Magical Girl. Hence, some suggestions:
(By the way, all of those are Combat/Fighter feats, and i think quite a few other Magical Girl feats should be tagged as Combat feats as well).

Protective Reflexes
Benefits: You may make a number of additional attacks of opportunity per round equal to your Constitution bonus. With this feat, you may also make attacks of opportunity while flat-footed.
Special: You can use this feat as a prerequisite instead of Combat Reflexes.
Simple and straight-forward. Makes Constitution more useful for a Defender Magical Girl (basing it off Charisma would probably be too powerful anyway).

Stay away from them!
Prerequisite: Shrug it Off
Benefit: You can increase your threatened area by 5 feet per 5 levels of your Evoker level.
You can not attack enemies within your threatened area beyond your normal reach, but you can force them to stop their movement as an Attack of Opportunity. This works like a Trip Combat Maneuver with a +2 bonus (including all your boni and benefits with to such), but you may ignore an opponents size or number of legs, you can use it against flying enemies and enemies are forced to stop their movement and do not fall prone. You can not use this if the enemy is charging or moving adjacent to you.
Special: You can take this feat as a Bonus feat when you would gain Improved Trip as a bonus feat. You can also use this feat to fulfill any Prerequisites that require Improved trip, and you do not need to fulfil any attribute-requirements for feats that require Improved Trip.
Special: You can take this feat if you have any Archetype feature that replaces Shrug it Off
Your first tool to protect your friends: Limit enemy movement. This should get the job done just fine. The wording should make this work for both 3.5 and Pathfinder. Also, you can't use this to prevent enemies from attacking you, because thats not the point of being a defender.

Shield of Light
Prerequisite: Costume class feature
Benefit: By spending one mote part of an attack, you can choose to take a –1 penalty on melee attack rolls and combat maneuver checks to grant adjacent allies a +1 dodge bonus to their Armor Class and reflex saves. When your base attack bonus reaches +4, and every +4 thereafter, the penalty increases by –1 and the dodge bonus increases by +1. You can only choose to use this feat when you declare that you are making an attack or a full-attack action with a melee weapon. The effects of this feat last until your next turn.
When you have a One-handed device, you can designate a shield (including exotic shields such as Battle Cloaks or Shield Gauntlets) as part of your costume, and you are automatically proficient with it. Your shields armor check penalty and maximum dexterity bonus are modified by your costume features, and it benefits from the Oversized costume feature. While wielding a shield, you can use Shield of Light without spending a mote, it affects all allies within 10 feet of you and the granted dodge-boni are increased by half your shield bonus to AC (rounded up).
While you wear a shield, you can spend a mote to grant yourself or one ally affected by your Shield of Light damage reduction equal to your Shield-bonus to AC for one round. This counts as an attack of opportunity.
Special: You can use this feat as a prerequisite instead of Combat Expertise, or take it instead of Combat Expertise when you would get it as a bonus feat. In addition, you no longer need to fulfill any Intelligence-prerequisites for any feat that has Combat Expertise as a prerequisite.
Because right now there is no good way for a Magical Girl to use a shield. Granted, that doesn't happen all that often in Magical Girl shows, but that shield could just look like a vembrance you use to block or such. Also works like Combat Expertise, but you can actually use it to defend others.

I altered the feat so that it can be taken by those who don't want to use a shield. Taking it while you do is still way better though.

How DARE you!
Your fury about your friends getting hurt shakes your enemies to their very core.
Prerequisites:Protective Reflexes
Benefit: You treat Intimidate as a class skill. You can use the Demoralize-action against enemies that would normally be immune to it, and you ignore size-modifiers on your Intimidate-check.
Whenever an enemy within your line of sight attacks one of your allies or cast a spell on them, you can use the Demoralize-option against that enemy as an attack of opportunity. That enemy must also make a Will saving throw with a DC equal to the results of your Intimidate-check, if they fail this save they can not attack or cast spells against the ally they just attacked as long as they are shaken or until they direct an attack or spell against you.
Hooray, a way to actually compel your enemies to attack you! Not force them to, mind you - they can still attack others, aid their own allies, run away and so on. Don't tell me Magical Girls can't be scary!

[Serafina]

Also, a Multiclass-feat with the Pathfinder-fighter, because hey why not? I'm not going to bother with one for the 3.5-Fighter, because he doesn't get anything but Bonus Feats anyway.

Defender of Light
Prerequisite: Costume class feature, Bravery or alternate class feature
Benefits: You add your Bravery (or equivalent alternate class feature) bonus to attack rolls and combat maneuver checks with your attacks of opportunity, in addition to your normal benefits. You can add your Magical Girl levels to your Fighter levels to determine the effects of your Armor Training class feature (or equivalent alternate class feature). You add your Fighter-levels to your Magical Girl levels to determine your mote and Evoker level. You may use your Magical Girl levels instead of your Base Attack Bonus from Magical Girl levels to determine your Combat Maneuver Bonus.

Okay, so you get a small (+1 or +2, most likely) bonus to your attacks of opportunity, full motes and evoker level and a better MDex/ACP if you take Fighter levels. The real boon is using your Magical Girl levels for your CMB, which means that you actually have a solid chance on succeeding there (the Monk gets a similar class feature by the way).

[Story Time]

...some good ideas...

...I wonder what Selinia will think with the number of posts... :smalleek:

[Serafina]

...some good ideas...

...I wonder what Selinia will think with the number of posts... :smalleek:Hopefully "hey, thanks for all the ideas" instead of "damn, look at all the work i have to do!"

Speaking of posts, i was not yet finished, because i have some ideas on changing costume elements! Changes are marked in italics.

Protective [Device]
A common costume effect among magical girls with less-than-durable friends, a Protective device is the bane of those who would try and ignore its wielder. Each point allocated to this effect gives the magical girl +1 to the attack roll on attacks of opportunity, and increases the tumble DC to ignore attacks of opportunity from her by 3. For each point allocated to this effect beyond the second, the magical girl gains an additional attack of opportunity.
Points spent on the Protective quality tend to make a device sleeker and more rounded, better to deflect incoming attacks. At high values, it can easily seem that the entire Device is formed of a single flawlessly crafted piece of whatever it happens to be made of.
Because honestly, most other costume effects give you more when you invest a certain amount into them. This one is supposed to increase your affinity to attacks of opportunity, yet it doesn't grant any? Well now it does, with the same mechanism that Heavy provides hitpoints.

Oversized [Device]
Simply put, the ‘business end’ of the magical girl’s weapon is abnormally large – yet somehow, this doesn’t impact its balance in the slightest. Each point allocated to this effect adds +3 to weapon damage rolls (including strikes). If the Magical Girl uses a two-handed device, that bonus increases to +4, if she is using a light device it is reduced to +2. If the Magical Girl spends at least three points on this and she has the Shield of Light feat, her shield-bonus to AC applies applies to her Touch-AC and the bonus from Shield of Light increases by one for every point beyond the second. The cosmetic effect of this should be fairly obvious, but one should be warned that engaging limit mode (or worse, Megaton Smackdown) when the magical girl’s device is already this big is likely to have some very silly results.
Because right now TWF is just plain better than using one big weapon. And because bonus damage during TWF is supposed to be negatable somehow (such as Sneak Attacks), and Prismatic Damage is, so making Prismatic more attractive over Oversized is a good thing IMO. Also applies a benefit to shield-wielding Magical Girls, though that may fit better into the feat or into some other quality.

[Owrtho]

Because right now there is no good way for a Magical Girl to use a shield. Granted, that doesn't happen all that often in Magical Girl shows, but that shield could just look like a vembrance you use to block or such. Also works like Combat Expertise, but you can actually use it to defend others.

Well, technically a magical girl can make a spike shield her device since they count as martial weapons. If she wanted another weapon, she could then make use of the twinned device and evolved device feats. Alternatively, use the shielding property from Magic Item Compendium to let your device transform into a heavy shield as a swift action (likely paired with the twinned device feat).

Edit: Or if going with pathfinder, you could enchant a spiked shield device with the transformative property to have it become a normal weapon. Then grab the twinned device feat.

Owrtho

[Serafina]

Okay, that would work, i guess. Still plenty of justification for that feat.
However, i wonder whether i should allow you to put Device-qualities on the shield, for those who like shield-bashing, and then tie the defender-bonus to using your shield for that purpose. Hmmm...

[Owrtho]

Okay, that would work, i guess. Still plenty of justification for that feat.
However, i wonder whether i should allow you to put Device-qualities on the shield, for those who like shield-bashing, and then tie the defender-bonus to using your shield for that purpose. Hmmm...

Not saying the feat is a bad idea, just noting that there are ways to gain a shield already. Possibly make the shield be treated akin to a device, or even gained as one. Then list what costume properties apply to it, making note that points in enhancement need to be clarified if they are for the shield aspect of the bashing aspect.

Owrtho

[Serafina]

Hooray, inspiration. Seems like today is either your birthday, or just a very good day for you!


Archetype Edit: Mistbreaker:

Blazing Spirit:....A Mistbreaker may count her levels in Magical Girl as Monk levels when taking any feats that have Monk-levels as prerequisite. She may also use her Charisma instead of her Wisdom for any feats that have Improved Unarmed Strike as a prerequisite, for both prerequisites and determining their benefits.
There, now the Mistbreaker can take all the cool stuff that Monks can. Most of it may not be particulary good, but it's certainly cool!

Feats:

Radiant Mind, Luminous Body
Prerequisite: Costume, Still Mind
Benefits: You may use either your Charisma or your Wisdom for any Monk- or Magical Girl class features that are based off either, other than Illuminations and your Bonus to AC. You gain your Bonus to AC while wearing your Costume. You can replace one melee attack with a standard-action Strike-Illumination (but not a Blast you prepared as a Mistbreaker) when executing a Flurry of Blows.
You may add your Magical Girl class levels to your Monk class levels to determine your AC Bonus, Fast Movement, Slow Fall, High Jump, Wholeness of Body and Diamond Soul class features, if you have them. You may add your Monk class levels to your Magical Girl class levels to determine your number of Motes and Evoker level.
There, a Monk multiclass feat. Not just for Mistbreakers either, though they will obviously profit the most. I refrained from allowing you to use Charisma or Wisdom for AC or Illuminations, since i think you'd just use either for way to many things. Taking Standard-action as part of a Flurry of Blows gives Mistbreakers a good reason to use them instead of full-attacking for massive damage. The list of advanced Monk-features is long, but most of them are rather weak so no harm in that.

Radiant Mist Style
Prerequisites: Improved Unarmed Strike, 5 ranks in Sense Motive, Wisdom 13
Benefits: Your unarmed attack can deal force damage as a free action. If you choose to do so all your damage for that round is nonlethal damage (as per the Merciful class feature). While using this style, once per round when you hit a single foe with two or more unarmed strikes, you can surround him with mist. When you do, all his attacks have a 20% miss chance for one round and all attack against him ignore concealment.

Radiant Rinsing
Prerequisite: Improved Unarmed Strike, Radiant Mist Style, 7 ranks in Sense Motive, Wisdom 15
Benefit: Your gain a +2 bonus to Sense Motive checks, and you can use your Charisma in place of Wisdom for Sense Motive. Whenever you surround an enemy with mist, you can make a targeted dispel as per Dispel Magic, using a Sense Motive check instead of a Caster level check.

Revealing Mist
Prerequisite: Improved Unarmed Strike, Radiant Mist Style, 9 ranks in Sense Motive, Wisdom 17
Benefit: You can always take 10 on a Sense Motive check. If you surround an enemy with mist, all enemies within 20 feet of that enemy are revealed as if all who look at them had Truesight for one round.

So, a new unarmed style. Which works of Sense Motive, and is all about piercing obfuscations - by using some yourself. Get rid of concealment and other miss chances, as well as other enemy buffs, and fight your true (i.e. weaker :smallwink: ) enemy. And you're pretty good at discerning lies yourself.
Oh, and this works for Monks as well - Mistbreakers can take it due to my proposed class feature change where they may take Charisma for the prerequisite instead.

[Lix Lorn]

I don't think you can deal nonlethal force damage. Think it's one or the other.

[Serafina]

I don't think you can deal nonlethal force damage. Think it's one or the other.Are you sure? There seems to be nothing that precludes nothlethal damage from being typed damage, at least in Pathfinder.

The main intent is to have an effect on incorporeal creatures, bypass resistances etc. Just plain giving out Force damage on all attacks seems a bit too much, so i forced nonlethal damage on it.

[Lix Lorn]

...well, I may be wrong, especially in pathfinder. I just thought nonlethal WAS a type of damage.

[radmelon]

Well, brown mold does nonlethal cold damage, so there is a precedent.

[Draken]

Rules compendium lists some of the types of damage that exist in a specific entry and in a completely separate entry lists damage as being lethal or nonlethal. So yes, nonlethal force damage can exist in 3.5. This can happen because technically these two factors are relevant in separate parts of the damaging process.

For instance, if a Half-Fire Dragon Troll gets shot with a polar ray, it will take 50% more damage, and then all that damage will become non-lethal. The cold aspect is relevant due to the weakness, and then it is applied to the non-lethal damage track due to the troll's regeneration ability, otherwise it would go into the lethal damage track.*

*Let's not forget, non-lethal and lethal damage are tracked separately.

[Serafina]

Thanks for that.
I was certain it was possible in Pathfinder, and had a gut feeling that it was in 3.5 as well - since there's really nothing that leads to contradictions if you mix nonlethal or elemental damage.

[Lix Lorn]

Oooh. My mistake!
This is useful!

[Princess Tracy]

I have a question, real quick. The Enhanced Costume quality says it applies to both armour and device simultaneously. Does that mean you have to take it once each for Device and Costume or does a single buying of the quality automatically apply to both?

[Serafina]

Unlike other effects, points allocated in Enhanced give their benefits to both costume and device simultaneously.So yeah, it applies to both. Otherwise it'd be even worse than it is currently - IMO costume points are far to valuable to spend them on something you can replicate easily with WBL.

[Lix Lorn]

I may have made some feats... the first one is basically a Quicken for Illuminations, but the last three are for a specific NPC character who is a Dark Magical Girl//Sempai.

Lightning Flashes
Prerequisites: Ability to use at least one blast illumination
Benefits: Once a round, you may use a blast illumination that normally requires a standard action to use as a swift action. Doing so increases its mote cost by half its standard cost.
Normal: You can't make a blast after a full attack.

I Remember the Words
Prerequisites: Trainees class feature, at least one of which is a Magical Girl who has not lost her innocence, Rage of Tears class feature
Benefits: Your student helps you remember what the world used to be like, and you can't bear to explain it to her.
Select one type of Illumination (Blast, Strike, Aura, Burst, Barrier). You can use this kind of Illumination whenever at least one of your trainees with the Illumiantion class feature is present.
You have a Mote pool while outside of your Rage of Tears, but can only use Illuminations granted by this feat unless you are raging. When you are raging, you can only use Blast or Strike Illuminations, regardless of source.
You can select this feat multiple times, each time you can select a new type of Illumination.
Special: Your starting mote pool and mote regen rates are equal to a magical girl of half your (Magical Girl+Dark Magical Girl) level, while your maximum pool is your full (Magical Girl+Dark Magical Girl+Sempai) level. Your mote regen is increased by Rage of Tears as normal.
Normal: You forgot how to throw light when he died in front of you.

You Remind Me Of Me
Prerequisites: I Remember the Words
Benefits: In the presence of your Trainees, the world seems just a little brighter-and that much darker when things go wrong. The broken state caused by the end of a Rage of Tears is halved to a -1 penalty, and the benefits of a Rage are increased by two, to +6 Cha, +4 Str, +4 Dex
Special: Your Bleak Revelations aren't also boosted. Sorry.
Normal: You don't like to think about the days when you had hope.

I Remember How It Feels
Prerequisites: You Remind Me Of Me, Follow My Lead a Trainee who has stood up to a situation similar to that which broke your innocence, and moved past it OR subject to 'Come Back!' as used by one of your Trainees.
Benefits: Your Trainee can take what you couldn't, and while they may not need you anymore, you feel you can learn something from them.
While you lose your Sad Eyes class ability, and halve your bonus mote gain while suppressing emotions, you regain some of your Magical Girl abilities. You regain the ability to use Illuminations, and your Dark Magical Girl levels stack with your Magical Girl levels to determine the level of Illuminations you can use, your evoker level, and your mote regen. She regains her Power of Friendship and her Voice of Light, having seen first hand that hope and friendship can redeem the lost. She may even use Come Back! if she has it, but only to target her Trainees. She will not lose her second chance.

As a final benefit, she gains a new Revelation for use with her Rage of Tears-the Revelation of Hope. Her Revelations are also changed; to get the benefits of additional motes when ending her rage, she must spend the additional motes. (This is because she can now use motes when not in her rage.)

Hope

With this feat, the magical girl realises that the darkness of the world is no reason to stop shining her light. When channeling the revelation of hope, any enemy that damages the magical girl in melee causes a healing effect-one ally within 30ft, who must be a Trainee if there is a wounded one, regains hitpoints equal to the magical girl's charisma modifier. Ending her rage of tears while channeling the revelation of hope allows a magical girl to radiate her joyous redemption to those around her-all allies within 30ft are healed by 10 points per point of charisma modifier, +10 for each three motes the magical girl chooses to spend when she ends her rage.
Special: Yes, that's a roleplay requirement for a feat. Deal with it.
Normal: There's no coming back from that spiral.

[Draken]

The numerical benefit of You Remember Me of Me is... Well, factually non-existant. Sometimes it can happen, often it won't. This is the same reason races don't have odd number modifiers.

I think taking the feat requires jumping through enough hoops (two kinda unrelated prestige classes and some rp requirements) that the feat earned the right to be... Better. Make it give a full +2 to all the stats.

[Serafina]

Some nice ideas, and the Sempai can really use a boost, but for that very reason the feats need a boost as well.


I altered Shield of Light so that it can now be taken by any Magical Girl. However, you only get a shield when you actually use a one-handed device.
And when you do, the feat is substantially better - it is free to use instead of costing a mote every time, it covers a wider area and you can grant people some damage reduction. And the shield profits from oversized, so shield-bashing is more attractive.

[Lix Lorn]

The numerical benefit of You Remember Me of Me is... Well, factually non-existant. Sometimes it can happen, often it won't. This is the same reason races don't have odd number modifiers.

I think taking the feat requires jumping through enough hoops (two kinda unrelated prestige classes and some rp requirements) that the feat earned the right to be... Better. Make it give a full +2 to all the stats.


Some nice ideas, and the Sempai can really use a boost, but for that very reason the feats need a boost as well.
Oh wow, I was worried I was making them too big of an advantage. It's hard to balance around rp requirements. I also meant to put a note saying 'Watch this in gestalt'...

[Draken]

Oh wow, I was worried I was making them too big of an advantage. It's hard to balance around rp requirements. I also meant to put a note saying 'Watch this in gestalt'...

Irrelevant barring houserules, since by all means the two PrCs will be taken alternatively, never jointly. And only after the required levels of Magical Girl to boot.

If the PrC limit is houseruled away. Well, that is a whole can of purple worms the DM opened.

[Serafina]

"Is this too strong in a Polystalt-game" shouldn't really be your first design priority.

Now, my takes on the feats:

I remember the Words: To achieve your design purpose, i would just go with
Select one type of Illumination (Blast, Strike, Aura, Burst, Barrier). You can use this kind of Illumination whenever at least one of your trainees with the Illumiantion class feature is present.
You have a Mote pool while outside of your Rage of Tears, but can only use Illuminations granted by this feat unless you are raging. When you are raging, you can only use Illuminations granted by your Rage of Tears, not those granted by this feat.
You can select this feat multiple times, each time you can select a new type of Illumination.

That way you don't have to keep track of two separate mote pools.



You remind me of me: Now that the feat gives a +2 to three stats, as well as reduced rage-ending penalties, i'd say that it is pretty solid.

I Remember How It Feels I would honestly boost the Sempai-level requirement a bit here. As it is you only need a single level of Sempai to regain your Magical Girl class features. I'm fine with the roleplaying-requirement, especially since the Dark Magical Girl is already build around one anyway.

[Lix Lorn]

Irrelevant barring houserules, since by all means the two PrCs will be taken alternatively, never jointly. And only after the required levels of Magical Girl to boot.

If the PrC limit is houseruled away. Well, that is a whole can of purple worms the DM opened.
I forgot that that was a houserule. O_o It only seems problematic if they let you use two PrCs to progress the same features, and then don't cap them at CL... which is kinda dumb if they do.
(Theurge classes also get ridiculous, but that's not a bug, it's a feature!)


"Is this too strong in a Polystalt-game" shouldn't really be your first design priority.

Now, my takes on the feats:

I remember the Words: To achieve your design purpose, i would just go with
Select one type of Illumination (Blast, Strike, Aura, Burst, Barrier). You can use this kind of Illumination whenever at least one of your trainees with the Illumiantion class feature is present.
You have a Mote pool while outside of your Rage of Tears, but can only use Illuminations granted by this feat unless you are raging. When you are raging, you can only use Illuminations granted by your Rage of Tears, not those granted by this feat.
You can select this feat multiple times, each time you can select a new type of Illumination.

That way you don't have to keep track of two separate mote pools.
Hmm. Not that fond of only having one type, but you're probably right in suggesting it. They were only intended to have one mote pool, I should have said that.


You remind me of me: Now that the feat gives a +2 to three stats, as well as reduced rage-ending penalties, i'd say that it is pretty solid.

I Remember How It Feels I would honestly boost the Sempai-level requirement a bit here. As it is you only need a single level of Sempai to regain your Magical Girl class features. I'm fine with the roleplaying-requirement, especially since the Dark Magical Girl is already build around one anyway.
Cool and good idea.

Sempai has a class ability in the table called Trounce Them Together, which is presumably Fight as a Team?

[Serafina]

And yet another feat. It's mostly inspired by Reinforce II and Agito from Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, but it fits some other shows as well.

Unison Bound
You have formed a symbiotic relationship with a Unison-creature
Prerequisites: Evoker Level 10, Radiant Soul
Benefits: You gain a Unison-creature, which can look any way you want - from a small kitten to a tiny humanoid. It is a Tiny Fey with Hitdice equal to your own, but only gains 2 skill points per HD and no feats. It has a Strength of 6, a Dexterity of 16 and a Constitution of 10. It's Intelligence is equal to your own, its Wisdom equal to your Charisma and its Charisma equal to your Wisdom. It has a speed of 30 feet and a fly speed of 60 feet with perfect maneuverability.
It can act completely independent of you, but always obeys your commands and acts in your best interest.
A Unison-Creature gains abilities and spells (drawn from the Cleric spell list and using Wisdom) per day according to the following table
{table=head] Character Level | Abilities | 0th | 1st | 2nd | 3rd
10th | Unison, Evasion | 3 | 2 | 1
11th | Metamagic 1/day | 3 | 2 | 1
12th | Empower 1/day | 3 | 3 | 2
13th | Metamagic 2/day | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1
14th | Humanoid Form | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1
15th | Metamagic 3/day | 3 | 3 | 2 | 2
16th | Empower 2/day | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2
17th | Metamagic 4/day | 3 | 4 | 3 | 2
18th | | 3 | 4 | 3 | 2
19th | Empower 3/day | 3 | 4 | 3 | 3
20th | Metamagic 5/day | 3 | 4 | 3 | 3 [/table]
Unison: By both yourself and your Unison creature taking a move action, you can merge into a single entity. This typically alters your appearance into a mixture of both of your features. Your Unison-creature always occupies the same space and acts at the same Initiative as you while in Unison and can not be targeted by any spells or attacks. However, it also takes half the damage you do. It can still take separate actions from you, but can only perceive the world with your senses. Spells cast by your Unison-creature affect you, and you can choose to let spells that affect you affect your Unison-creature as well.
Evasion: Your Unison-creature gains Evasion.
Empower Illumination: While in Unison, your Unison-creature can spend a full-round action to increase all damage of your next Illumination by 50%. It must sacrifice a spell of equal level as the Illumination affected.
Metamagic Illumination: While in Unison, your Unison-creature can spend a full-round action to apply the effects of any metamagic feat you have taken to your next Illumination. The Illumination is affected as if it were a spell, but can not have its duration increased. Your Unison-creature must sacrifice a spell equal to the modifier of the applied Metamagic, and can only do so a number of times per day indicated on the table.
Humanoid Form: At 14th-level, your Unison-creature can take the form of a Medium- or small-sized humanoid as a full-round action. This increases its strength to 10.
Special: You do not need to fulfill any casting- or caster-level requirements to take any Metamagic feats if you take this feat.

Okay, this is a seriously beefed-up version of the Magical Mentor feat. The spell-casting is about the same, except that i based it off the Paladin spell progression with the 4th-level spells cut out. It also doesn't require the mentor-animal archetype.
The two advantages are that you can Empower your Illuminations this way, apply other Metamagic if you spend extra feats and you can have spells with a range of personal affect you. The Empowering may be a bit too strong though, i may cut down the usage per day.

[Serafina]

I am currently contemplating a way to Augment Illumintions by spending extra motes, similar to Psionic Augmentation.
It's not intended to be used by every Illumination, but rather by a select few that currently scale very badly and are supposed to be simple, basic ones.

The premier example is Divine Buster, which i intend to deliver more damage at a similar cost than the other Illuminations if it gets augmented. It will still lack their special features, so they'll hardly be worthless though.

[userpay]

I am currently contemplating a way to Augment Illumintions by spending extra motes, similar to Psionic Augmentation.
It's not intended to be used by every Illumination, but rather by a select few that currently scale very badly and are supposed to be simple, basic ones.

The premier example is Divine Buster, which i intend to deliver more damage at a similar cost than the other Illuminations if it gets augmented. It will still lack their special features, so they'll hardly be worthless though.

I did find it kind of strange that Divine Buster didn't scale at all given that (at least fluff wise) its suppose to be the mainstay of magical girls. Maybe allow iterative attacks with it? Or maybe add a small scaling effect so damage wise it won't eclipse later blasts but will still be a worthwhile blast to take at later levels and fire off for its mote cost? I mean seriously, at high levels Homing Shot is much better than Divine Buster.

[Serafina]

Illumination Augmentation
Suggested Content, not yet supposed to be implemented!

Right now there is no way of boosting low-level Illuminations by spending more motes on them. For Strikes that is not a huge issue, since they scale with your melee attack and offer a variety of effects, as do Auras. However, Blasts in particular and some Bursts do scale very badly while offering unique effects.
The best solution to that problem is to allow these Illuminations to become stronger by spending more motes on them, similar to how you can augment psionic powers.

Illuminations......
Some Illuminations can be augmented by spending additional Motes during their activation. You only augment Illuminations by a number of motes equal to your mote regeneration per round.


Divine Buster: ....
Augment: You can augment this Illumination if your Evoker level is 6 or higher. By spending one Mote you increase the damage to 3D6. For each additional Mote spent you increase the damage by 4D6.
Divine Buster is supposed to be a simple, pure-damage illumination. Right now it gets outclassed by every other Blast-Illumination, so it really needs a buff.
With this you deal pretty much the same damage as your highest-level Blast, but at a slightly lower cost. At 20th level this is actually your most damaging Blast.

Blinding Buster ...
Augment: If your Evoker-level is 11 or higher you can increase the damage by 3D6 and the Save-DC by one for one mote, if it is 16 or higher you can increase it by 6D6 and the Save-DC by two for two motes.
Far less efficient than Divine Buster, but you gain blinding in addition

Angel Buster...
Augment: If your Evoker-level is 11 or higher you can increase the damage by 3D6 and change all maximized damage die to D8, if it is 16 or higher you can increase it by 6D6 and change all maximized damage die to D10.
Same damage as Blinding Buster if you augment it, but now even better against certain foes.

Fountain&Swallow Buster
Augment: If your Evoker Level is 16 or higher, you can augment this Illumination. If you spend one mote, you gain 3D6 extra damage. If you spend two motes, the Save-DC increases by 2. If your Evoker level is 20, you can spend three motes to gain the effects above, another 3D6 damage and increase the knockdown-area to 10 feet.
Same damage scaling, but cost-wise on par with Divine Buster. Obviously Swallow Buster only need the damage-part, i'm saving space here.

Bunker Buster ...
Augment: For each mote you spend you can increase the Save-DC by 2 and the damage by 1D6.
Very in-efficient damage-wise, but you can raise the DC a lot, if you have the motes to spare.

Homing Shot: ...
Augment: If your Evoker Level is 6 or higher, you can spend two motes to use this as a swift action, but only produce half the shots. This does not increase the cost of holding the shots.
Because hey why not? This already scales very well, but using it swiftly seems fitting.


Okay, that covers Blast Illuminations. The damage doesn't increase except for Divine Buster, but that's pure damage and does nothing else. But you can now use lower-level Illuminations to do respectable damage, especially Divine Buster.


On to Bursts. Here it's mostly the low-level Illuminations that need scaling with Charisma, that should be easy to fix!

Luminous Rain: ...
Augment: You can spend 1 Mote to use your Charisma-modifier instead of +3 for the modifier.
Pretty straight-forward, and i think it should be balanced.

Vigil of Candles: ...
Augment: If your Evoker-level is 6 or higher, you can increase the cost of this Aura (including its upkeep) by one to increase the modifier to -6. You can increase the cost by two to replace it with (2+your Charisma-modifer).
Vigil of Stars, plus a median step.




Well there we go. Criticism is very welcome (and probably needed), given that this alters the way Illumination work quite a bit. Notably it really reduces the value of prepared-Illumination-slots, because you can now often do something equally effective with a lower-level one that you augment. Then again more options aren't really a bad thing, and the number of Illuminations is steadily growing. Still, maybe the number of prepared Illuminations has to be reduced if this is implemented, i am not certain.

[Serafina]

I am aiming to put all Blast-Illuminations on roughly equal footing in regards to their damage.
So that, when you can typically select a 3rd-level Illumination (9D6 damage), you can boost a 2nd-level Illumination to do the same damage for the same basic cost.
Higher-level Illuminations should then get better effects and maybe cost 1 or 2 motes more than their damage justifies, depending on how good the effect is.

That's essentially how Strikes work right now - the base damage for your Standard-action is always the same, while the effect for which you pay your motes becomes increasingly better.

If designed that way lower-level Blast-Illuminations stay useful at higher levels, which allows you more diversity in your applied effects.


The easiest way to do this would simply be to give Magical Girls a base damage for their blasts similar to Eldritch Blasts, and then maybe modify the damage die size depending on the specific Blast.
However, if done as an Augmentation, you have more flexibility and can use lower-powered blasts in order to conserve Motes, which i think is the more interesting dynamic, so thats what i proposed.

[Serafina]

Well, time to commit another idea. A lot of inspiration was taken from the Aerial Ace (http://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Aerial_Ace_(3.5e_Martial_Discipline)) Martial Discipline


The Aerial Mage

http://img840.imageshack.us/img840/6510/aerialmage.jpg

The wind is in the sky and the stars are in the heavens and a resolute heart beats within my chest!
Nanoha Takamachi, Aerial Mage

Many Magical Girls represent freedom, and what could be more free than the skies?

The ability to fly is often the most cherished ability of Magical Girls that become Aerial Mages. They embrace it and train hard to move trough the air with utmost grace and speed.

Requirements:
To become an Aerial Mage, you must meed the following requirements:
Skills: 9 Ranks in Fly OR 12 ranks in Tumble
Special: You must be able to invest at least three points into the Weightless Costume effect.
You're supposed to be a good flyer. Thus these prerequisites - note that Tumble is supposed to be used for 3.5 and Fly for Pathfinder.

Class Skill List (3.5): Concentration (Con), Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Gather Information (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Heal (Wis), Jump (Str), Knowledge [Arcana] (Int), Knowledge [The Planes] (Int), Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Search (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), Spot (Wis) Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha)
Class Skill List (Pathfinder): Fly, Perception
Like the Magical Girl, but with added Spot and Search because doing so from the air is beneficial, but hard.
Skill poins per level: 4

Aerial Mage
Hit Dice: D8
{table=head] Level | BAB | Fort | Ref | Will | Special | Illumination
1st | +0 | +0 | +1 | +1 | Themed Costume +1, Nimble Flyer | +1 Illumination
2nd | +1 | +1 | +1 | +1 | Aerial Evasion, Aerial Maneuver (1) Winged Speed +10 |
3rd | +2 | +1 | +2 | +2 | Aerial Maneuver (2), Supersonic Flight, Themed Costume +2 | +1 Illumination
4th | +3 | +1 | +2 | +2 | Aerial Maneuver (3), Improved Aerial Evasion, Winged Speed +20 |
5th | +3 | +2 | +3 | +3 | Aerial Maneuver (4), Freedom of the Skies, Themed Costume +3 | +1 Illumination[/table]
Same Chassis as the Magical Girl, but using Pathfinder-prestige class progression (which mostly reduces the gap betwen good and bad saves.

Themed Costume: An Aerial Mage does not gain costume points or increase the investment limit for her costume effects. At 1st, 3rd and 5th level, she she permanently ingrains one point of the Weightless effect into her Costume. This does not consume costume points or count against the maximum number of costume.
3 Costume points in 5 levels are a very good deal, but the rest of your costume will be weaker.

Illuminations: At 1st, 3rd and 5th level, the Aerial Mage increases all aspects of her Illumination class feature by one.

Nimble Flyer (Ex): You can use your Charisma-modifier instead of your Dexterity-modifier for Fly- or Tumble-skill checks. You can also use your Fly-skill to move trough threatened squares as with the Acrobatics-skill.
The Grace-part of an Aerial Mages flight. Worder that way to be compatible with both Pathfinder and 3.5

Aerial Evasion (Ex): You gain Evasion. If you already have Evasion it becomes Improved Evasion instead.
Because its much easier to dodge a fireball when you can fly.

Winged Speed (Su): At 2nd and again at 4th-level, your Fly speed increases by 10 feet. This is doubled if you have 6 points in the Weightless costume effect.
The speed-part of an Aerial Mages flight.

Aerial Maneuver (Su): At every level beyond 1st, you learn one Aerial Maneuver from the following list. You can swap out these maneuvers whenever you select new Illuminations.
Radiant Tornado: As a full-round action and by paying two additional motes, you can move your speed in a straight line. Each enemy that is within your reach of the squares you move trough is attacked by your Strike-Illumination. You must make Tumble- or Fly-checks as normal to avoid attacks of Opportunity or move trough enemy squares.
Barrel Roll: Once per round as an immediate action, you can pay one mote to make a Fly- or Tumble-check. Treat the result as your new AC and Touch-AC against ranged attacks and ranged touch attacks (including those with spells and illuminations) until the beginning of your next round.
Sonic Charge: When you make a Charge, you can pay a mote to move three times your speed (or twice your speed if the charge was made as a standard-action). Your immense speed produces a sonic boom - enemies within 15 feet of the squares you pass trough during your charge take 1D6 damage per point in the Weightless costume effect and must make a Fortitude-save (DC equal to your illuminations) or be deafened for 1 round per damage die.
Rays from Above: When you use a Blast-illumination, you can pay one mote to increase its damage die by one size if you have a higher elevation that the target If you are directly above the target, the damage die increase by two sizes.
Radiant Shockwave: Your movement produces a brilliant display of light, making it harder to target those near you. Whenever you move at least your fly speed, you can pay one mote to grant yourself and everyone within 15 feet 20% concealment. If you have moved more than your fly speed, this increases to 50%.
Sonic Move: As a swift action, you can pay one mote to move your fly speed without provoking attacks of opportunity.
The reason why you take this Prestige class. Something for everyone, and more may be added.

Supersonic Flight (Su): All Aerial Mages are renowned for their speed, but only the best manage to surpass the sound barrier.
Over the course of five rounds (all spent moving forward in a straight line at your running speed) you can accelerate to supersonic speed. While at Supersonic Speed, your maneuverability drops to clumsy and you move two miles (about 15000 feet) in a straight line per round, and all attacks have a 50% miss chance against you. If you collide with any obstacle, you take 10D10 damage and are stunned for 1D6 rounds. You can drop out of supersonic speed at the beginning of your round, but you must spend the next three rounds moving forward in a straight lineat your running speed in order to slow down.
A way to cross large distances quickly. Obviously not supposed to be used in combat, unless you have an enemy that is just as quick.

Improved Aerial Evasion (Ex): At 4th-level, you gain Improved Evasion.

Freedom of the Skies (Su): If any effect (such as an Antimagic Field) would disrupt your Weightless Costume effect or stop your from moving, you can make a Fly- or Tumble-check. If the result of your check is higher than the caster (or Initiatior, Evoker or similar) level of the disrupting effect, it does not stop you from flying (but affects you normally otherwise). This does not work against combat maneuvers only works if your limbs are free (though you can use it to prevent your limbs from becoming bound)
You love flying, and this class revolves around flying - so its hard to stop you from flying. Yes, you can fly in an Antimagic Field.


Adaption: Some Magical Girls move with equal speed and grace as Aerial Mages, but on the ground rather than in the air. Change all references to the Fly-skill to Acrobatics, all references to Weightless to Quick, all references to fly-speed to land-speed and replace Supersonic Flight with the following ability
Magical Parkour (Su): By gathering speed for two rounds (running in a straight line at your run-speed) you can being a Magical Parkour run. During your Parcours, you can multiply all jump-distances by 10, and your jump-distances are limited by your run-speed instead of your normal land-speed. You do not take damage from falling during your Parkour, but you can not avoid attacks of opportunity. You can also run on any solid or liquid surface, including vertical ones, and are not hindered by difficult terrain. You must move at least double your speed during your Parkour, and can end it by spending a full-round action to land.

[Owrtho]

Aerial Mage looks quite interesting. I can't help but notice if it was just changed to tumble, had the flying aspects changed to land speed ones, and had weightless replaced with quick for costume elements, you'd have a decent speedster type magical girl PRC.

As a minor note though, it strikes me as odd that Radiant Cyclone consists of moving in a strait line. It also seems like it should state if you gain the benefits of the strike illumination against every enemy you attack on your path, or just one with the others being normal attacks.

Owrtho

[Serafina]

Good point. Though of course flying is ever so much better for speedsters (no terrain in the way) or people who maneuver all over the battlefield. Still, if someone wants it, why the hell not?

Changed the name to Radiant Tornado and cleared up the wording - it only works with standard-action strike, but that strike affects everything within range along your line of movement.

Changed supersonic flight to include a miss chance, because you can't really relibably hit anything moving at those speeds anyway.

Aerial Evasion now works while on the ground, and you gain Improved Evasion when you already have it.

Freedom of the Skies does NOT work against combat maneuvers or just being bound with rope. Grappling already gets screwed over by Freedom of Movement as it is, no need to replicate that.

Added an Adaptation-section. Ortwho already laid out the changes needed, and i made up something real quick to replac supersonic flight - now you can leap from Scyscraper to Scyscraper. Not sure how good it is though.

[Owrtho]

Well tornado still tends to imply a circular movement, but does seem better. As for the running adaptation, Magical Parcours should grant the ability to run on any surface (vertical, upside down, or liquid), provided they don't stop on that surface (at which point they would fall as normal). While it may sound strong, given they could have just as easily gained the ability to fly it isn't much. It also allows them to get to the tops of those skyscrapers to start leaping from. Might also change the name to Magical Parkour given it is the modern term.

Owrtho

[Serafina]

Well if you can come up with a better name - something that symbolizes something from the air that leaves a trail of devastation - feel free to name it. I've got nothing right now.

Made the change to Magical Parkour, because its supposed to be a travel-ability anyway, so circumventing terrain is a good idea.

[Serafina]

Okay, how strong would the fact that sonic move allows easy multicharging (move away as a swift action after or before charging) be for a charger-build? I'm utterly unfamiliar with them, how stong is such an ability for them?

Given that Sonic Move also gives pseudopounce (move as swift, then full attack) i think i may need to tone it down or make it more expensive. Any opinions?

[NineThePuma]

First off, every charger is going to have Travel Devotion or Pounce anyway, often both.

Also, "multicharging" refers to multiple charges in a turn, AFAIK.


This is fine.

[Serafina]

Well, thats good to know - and melee can use nice things anyway.

Also, i used "multicharge" to refer to a setup where the character can easily charge every round, even against the same enemy.

[Owrtho]

Huh, something I just noticed, but Reverbing Light (which I think is intended to be Reverberating Light), only works when using standard action strike illuminations. Any particular reason it couldn't be used when you make a full round action strike? Or for that matter when just making a normal attack or spirit shot? As it is a Spirit Shoot essentially can't use it without an ability to turn her device into a melee weapon, since you can't use strikes with ranged attack, while magical girls who like to make full attacks with illuminations similarly can't make use of it (for example using heartbreaker).

Owrtho

[Serafina]

Well, the intent was to ensure that you only get the damage one time.
Changed it so that it applies to every Illumination.
It also applies to Homing Shot in the same way Prismatic Calling does.


I also made an addition to Swan Song in honor of Yukine Chris.

[Selinia]

Well, just got back from vacation, so I can finally get a chance to look at the thread. I'm sure I can just-


http://i1080.photobucket.com/albums/j326/Selinia-the-Mad/ninafreakout.jpg

[Princess Tracy]

Okay, let me take a swing at this.

First draft of my Magical Girl Archetype, GO! By the by, it may be appropriate to add a note to original base class saying Fly is a class skill in Pathfinder, since it seems to fit, you know?

Anyway, the class as a whole is based around evasion and deception, including contingencies to avoid even magic missiles. I'm also working on something to replace their device with, making them more illumination focussed and keeping their hands free to snatch loot

VERY WIP. I'm just posting this mostly as a template since I haven't added in the abilities yet; mostly it's just here to motivate me to finish the archetype. Also note this is Pathfinder focussed. I'll add notes for 3.5 backwards conversion when I'm done

Greedy Magician
Version 0.1 - Unfinished, In-Progress

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs31/f/2008/209/4/c/Touhou__Marisa_Kirisame_by_Pokey_Chan.png
"I know what you ghosts are up to! Give us back Spring before I steal it back!"
-Marisa Kirisame, paragon of an Ordinary Black, Greedy Magician

Dispensing with the image of magical girls as frail paragons of goodness, Greedy Magicians tend to be self-serving to a degree - not so bad you'd choose the villains over them, but certainly in the habit of occasionally 'borrowing' some things and forgetting to bring them back. They have a drive that either fortifies their sloth or puts them on the path to the top, if only they walk it. Assuming of course the many explosions thrown about because of misunderstandings with their lenders don't get in their way too much; never let someone tell you being a Greedy Magician is easy. It takes a keen mastery of the art of Bullet Hell, but a Greedy Magician is the first person you go to when you want something returned that's rightfully yours. Assuming you didn't forget you already lent it to the magician in question.

Skills: Remove Diplomacy, Ride, Handle Animal and Heal from the list of class skills. Add Appraise, Bluff, Stealth, Escape Artist, Sleight of Hand, Disable Device, Perception and Spellcraft to list of class skills. Greedy Magicians tend to be more disagreeable than average magical girl, but more cunning and knowledgeable.

HD and Skills: Change Hit Dice to d6 and number of skills per level to 8+intelligence modifier. You're good at evasion and craftiness, but taking hits is another thing altogether

Proficiencies: Greedy Magicians are not proficient with any armour and must instead select a regular suit as their costume, or take Armour Proficiency separately, either from another class or the corresponding feats. They only have proficiency with clubs, daggers, quarterstaffs and light crossbows, and as usual no shield proficiency.

Illuminations: You use your illuminations slightly different from other magical girls. You are not well built for melee, so when you prepare illuminations, you treat strikes as if they were one level higher (so a level 1 strike must be prepared with a level 2 slot).

To add: Evasion, Uncanny Dodge, ability to add Charisma bonus to reflex saves. Also replace Device and Limit form with something cool - Master Spark for the latter

[Serafina]

+4 skill points is a fair trade for the loss of HP, i guess.

Proficiency doesn't matter to a Magical Girl, item selection does. Change it to "can only select a simple device", unless you throw out the device altogether.

Graze (Grace?) is really really powerful. ESPECIALLY since you can already do that with Nimble. Getting your main stat TWICE to AC&Touch-AC is just insane, even if it's just for ranged attacks.
I'd change it thusly: Have it replace Shrug it Off. High Con doesn't seem like something that suits this archetype anyway. Make it non-stackable with Nimble (even if its technically a different bonus type), thus having the archetype profit from high dexterity (which suits it) without making it mandatory (nimble would still give you protection against melee).

Evasion instead of Mettle? It would kick in rather late that way though. If you want it early, have it replace Not without Fear (pure determination doesn't seem fitting for the archetype either) and give Improved Evasion in place of Mettle.

You can pay for Uncanny Dodge with a costume point or two, me thinks.



By the way, i am interested in making an archetype for blast-illumination focussed magical girls. No, Spirit Shooters aren't it - they use ranged weapons. I'm thinking "simple weapons only" or "staff-like weapons only" (not sure which is better), but for now i don't really have any good boni to give them.

[Snowfire]

By the way, i am interested in making an archetype for blast-illumination focussed magical girls. No, Spirit Shooters aren't it - they use ranged weapons. I'm thinking "simple weapons only" or "staff-like weapons only" (not sure which is better), but for now i don't really have any good boni to give them.

Go with blast amplification effects like what you did with Unison-Bound. Basically let them apply metamagic effects to their blasts for certain mote costs - without the need for the feat or give them some bonus ones ala wizard. Give them a steadily increasing range increment on their blasts so that they can eventually start firing at things miles away (fits), as well as the ability to use in-device targeting or something similar so that they can see that far without the need for absurd perception checks.

Evasion instead of Mettle I think - the pure shooters generally don't mix it up in close combat. Or you could let them choose (not sure about that though). I'd go with polearms only personally, but that's me. Um...I think that's about all you'd need for it...

[Princess Tracy]

I consiered a 6+int skill points, but then I realised that the 3.5 version would need more skill points with stealth being a split skill of hide and m.s. and I wanted to be a litle fair. This way they make good skill monkeys, you know?. Yeah, I was going to trade off Shrug it Off, don't worry. Also the fear-resisting abilites. I was considering making some of the abilities like Graze (and yeah, it's called Graze, not Grace - in Touhou it's when something essentially hits you but misses your hit box [an invisible point on the character sprite at its centre that must be struck for you to take damage]) be based off intelligence. It wouldn't be to far out, would it? I'm also considering something like this... (These could be feats instead of class features, by the way)

Magical Thief: Greedy Magicians snatch all sort of things up, among them magical trinkets that they have a knack for exploiting. For the purposes of using spell trigger magic items such as staves or scrolls, Greedy Magicians are considered a Sorcerer/Wizard (undecided, but leaning towards wizard) of their evoker level, treating spells on the Wizard spell list as being on their own, and their evoker level as their caster level.

Bullet Hell Flame Dodge: you gain a rhythm for dodging attacks, a mantra as combat progresses. Every time you succeed on a reflex save against an affect caused by an opponent, or that opponent misses you, gain a cumilative +2 insight bonus to AC and reflex saves against that opponent for 1 round.

And yeah, device is getting replaced with something, possibly Magical Thief. And I will make this archetype a bit more blasting focussed, since they don't have devices to use in combat instead. That additionally means I may bump their skills back down to 6 instead of 8.

Higher level abilities are set to include some freedom of movement like affect and other cool things.

Will think over proficiencies once I get back from the shops. I know it's a minor gripe. I think originally I had them have all the wizard proficiencies with weapons and nothing else, but I couldn't remember what weapons wizards were proficient with so I just stuck to saying simple weapons. I think I'm gonna add in some sort of scaling dodge bonus ability to make up for teh loss of armour.

[Serafina]

Sorry Seli, but when inspiration strikes you gotta use it^^
Archetype is of course still WIP.


Bombardment Mage
http://desmond.imageshack.us/Himg196/scaled.php?server=196&filename=nanohamovie1st06.jpg&res=landing

Some Magical Girls prefer to use their magic while they keep their distance. They are no less courageous or determined, nor less effective.

Class Features:

A Bombardment Mage gains all of the following class features.

Device: You can only pick a simple weapon as your device. You can still take the Devicer-Archetype (despite both altering this class feature), but you do not gain the ability to take Exotic or Martial Weapons for your device. Your Device can have enchantments for ranged weapons, despite being a melee-weapon.

Ranged Specialist (Su): You can only prepare Strike-Illuminations of one level lower than the highest-level Illumination you can prepare. You must always prepare a Blast-Illumination of the highest level you can prepare. Your Devices Enhancement Bonus and Enchantments that apply to ranged attacks apply to your Blast-Illuminations.

Bombardment Spell: At Level 5, you learn how to use any Blast-Illumination you have as a full-round action. This doubles its range, and you can apply the following effects:

Multishot: By paying two motes, the Illumination targets two different enemies.

Empower: By paying one mote, the damage die of the Illumination and its Save-DC increase by one, by paying two motes they increase by two.

Disruptive: By paying two motes, enemies affected by your Illumination must make a Fortitude to use any supernatural, spell-like or spell-abilities for one round. If they fail their check the ability still counts as used, but does not produce any effect.

Area: By paying two motes, any Blast can affect an area.
Make a single attack roll, you hit anyone whose touch-AC you exceed within 15 feet of your original target.

Concussive: By paying two motes, enemies affected by your Illumination must make a Fortitude-save. If they fail, all movement speeds during their next turn are halved and they can not make more than one attack during their next turn, regardless of their number or iterative attacks, natural attacks of other effects (though they can still make Attacks of Opportunity normally).

[Snowfire]

Snip

I was looking for pictures for an archetype like this and found some nice ones.

http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/8206/divinebuster.jpg

http://img251.imageshack.us/img251/7669/nanohaplanetblast.png

And yes, that is a planet.

Nice work though.

Also, I have some ideas on this point. If I have the time between everything else, I'll see about throwing them up here at some point.

[Princess Tracy]

Well, I was going to base the archetype around the exploits of Marisa, so would you be willing to like combine these two archetypes into one? Or better yet take those ability and turn them into some sort of meta-invocation feats. Actually there's not so much there taht i couldn't use it all... either way, Marisa is known for her own massive explosion, the Master Spark, which I'm making a class feature to replace the Device Limit Form and will amp the hell up out of any blast invocation. It's not good to have two archetypes floating around that do teh same thing after all. Actually, looking at what you've got so far it's fairly compatible save for my proposition to scrap Devices in my archetype.

Oh an image war, is it? We'll see about THAT!
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs21/f/2007/243/e/e/Marisa_by_Vixen9.jpg
http://detarame.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/marisa.jpg

[Snowfire]

You know, I never meant to start this. But anyway.
http://www.forevergeek.com/wp-content/media/2012/02/nanoha-01-470x331.jpg

http://media.animevice.com/uploads/0/5934/242799-8378952_m_super.jpg

http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s52/Kichigai_neko_nyo/harem/1182636719910.jpg

Too much fun finding these...

[Princess Tracy]

Let's see, things to be traded off or altered for this archetype... Not all things marked removed will necessarily be so, but they are on teh list of things I may replace if I feel it appropriate to the Greedy Magician
..
Pure of Heart: alter sense of justice to include occasional 'liberating' of shiny things from opponent, and for 'borrowing' things from allies.

Device: remove or downgrade to simple weapons

Illuminations: prohibit access to strike illuminations (only use them at their normal level +1), mandatory blast prepared

Merciful + Power of Friendship (?) - may just keep as is. Just because they're thieves and a tad antisocial doesn't make them violent or opposed to making pals.

Shrug it Off: removed

Not Without Fear: Probably removed and replaced with, say, Evasion

Stubborn: removed (?)

Meaning of Courage: removed

Device Limit Form: replaced with an ability to greatly power up blasts (master spark?)

Mettle: probably removed, perhaps altered to only work with will effects?

Voice of Light: altered and renamed; those enhanced skills aren't on her class skill list anymore, after all

Come Back: Too sappy

...

Ooh, speaking of, check it.

Calling Card: You can use arcane mark at will to create your own stylised mark. Only one design is available to you, chosen at time you gain this ability. You can also use this to create an image of your seal that floats and glows in midair - with a maximum radius of 1 meter per evoker level, to no effect except style. It is apparent even in darkness (except magical), but it itself does not shed enough light to illuminate other objects.

I also figured by placing your calling card upon items you can bond them to you - using them as a focus for your blasts or easier activating as a magic device. Haven't decided on the exact mechanics yet.

Ooh, here's something to replace Merciful with, i think, if I need it
Broker's Cunning: you can use Bluff to gather information in place of diplomacy... [and some stuff about selling things at unreasonable prices]

[Lix Lorn]

Poooor Selinia. xD

[Owrtho]

Ooh, here's something to replace Merciful with, i think, if I need it
Broker's Cunning: you can use Bluff to gather information in place of diplomacy... [and some stuff about selling things at unreasonable prices]

Just thought I'd note, if you're planning to base the archetype off Marisa, you shouldn't remove or replace merciful. After all, in all the Touhou games they don't actually kill each other, despite the massive amounts of power used.

Owrtho

[Selinia]

I'll note that I am working on sorting through the insane amount of contributions that piled up in my absence, but while I do that there's a bit of a dilemma I thought I'd toss out to all of you.

Currently, the Magical Girl is a bizzare patchwork of editions - with a core class that is 3.5, feats (and now, entire PrCs and archetypes) that reference Pathfinder, and endless confusion for anyone not running a full-blown 3.P game. While the two systems are compatible to a great extent, someone is ultimately going to be running one or the other - either 3.5 rules with pathfinder content allowed, or pathfinder rules with 3.5 content allowed. As-is, the Magical Girl's periphery material is a messy glob of partitions and conflicts, sloppily put together no matter what system you use.

Thus, as one part of my Great Normalization Campaign, I'm strongly considering a blanket revision of the Magical Girl class and all associated content to conform to a single version of the game, moving any content specific to another edition into a concentrated sidebar. Which brings me to my question to everyone following this:


Would you prefer the Magical Girl as a 3.5 class, or a Pathfinder class?

[The-Mage-King]

Would you prefer the Magical Girl as a 3.5 class, or a Pathfinder class?

Go with 3.5, PF conversion in a sidebar/spoiler. It's what I did for Sentai, and it's simpler to convert forwards than it is to go backwards.

[userpay]

I find 3.5 more prevalent but mentioning specific changes with a pathfinder sidebar would be good.

[Serafina]

I personally prefer Pathfinder - but its easier to convert to PF from 3.5 than the other way around, and 3.5 is more prevalent.

You can still embrace some PF design philosophies (such as "no dead levels") though, and so far you did.

Skills: Simply list "Skills (3.5) and "Skills (PF)
In case of Concentration-checks, it might be best to explain what skill you use instead (because Concentration is no longer a skill in PF). Perform is IMO a good option, because it does nothing else for the Magical Girl right now.

Feats: Some feats don't exist in Pathfinder anymore (such as Bounding Assault if you take a Quick costume). That's no big deal - if its in the SRD you can still apply it in some cases. Some feats interact weirdly with PF, so in that case its best to provide an alternative, or accept that taking that is pointless in PF.


Really i don't see a lot of compatibility problems with PF. A few costume-granted feats that don't make much sense, the uncertainty about concentration-checks and what skill-list you have, and thats it.


Oh, and some feats just have to stay marked (PF), because they reference pathfinder-material. Such as the Magus- or Oracle-multiclass feat. The Intelligent Item feat can actually work with either the PF-rules or the Intelligent Itme rules from the Arms&Equipment-guide.

[caledscratcher]

I've beer following this for a while, and supposed that I might as well put in my 2 cents. I really want it to be 3.5 (Mainly because that's all I know), plus, that's where the roots are, y'know?

Just my opinion. :3

EDIT: One random idea for an Archetype: Some manner of Burst-centric thing, perhaps? Or Aura. Or Barrier! We already have a quasi-Strike-Centric Archetype in the form of the Mistbreaker, and people are already working on Blast-Centric Archetypes, yet there's so little love for everything else! :3

[Serafina]

Specific parts that need adressing. I would put everything but the skiill list in spoiler tags beneath the ability.

Skill list: One for 3.5, one for Pathfinder.

Radiant Focus: Needs a skill that it uses for Pathfinder.

Chains of Concordance: Maybe a different Grapple-modifier for PF, because it works differently there. But thats not necessary

Dance of Lights: Improved Mettle doesn't have a definition in PF, but it is very very rare in 3.5 as well, so one would be nice anyway.

Shining Proclamation: Actually works, because Concentration-checks when taking damage still exist in Pathfinder, so no change needed.

Costume Abilities: Some need their skill-boni changed (from Move Silently/Hide to Stealth, for example).

Quick: Bounding Assault doesn't exist in Pathfinder, though its function is easily integrated.

Weightless: Improved Flyby Attack doesn't exist, but is easily integrated into Pathfinder.


Awaken Device: can work with the Arms&Equipment-guide Intelligent Items, maybe.

Magical Mentor: Archivist doesn't exist in Pathfinder. Int-based Cleric casting works though.

Right Makes Might: works much less well in PF (with fixed scaling PA) than it does in 3.5, but it still works.

Multiclass feats should stay as they are.

Mentor Animal: It really needs Intelligence=Charisma back if its going to be of any use with Pathfinder Bardic Knowledge (which is a bonus to Int-checks, not a seperate check). Taht doesn't even need to be a sidebar though, as long as one is aware that it'll work quite differnetly in 3.5 than in PF.

Spirit Shooter: Needs Composite Bows for PF, and a reference to Firearms for 3.5

The Prestige Classes need skill tables and PF prestige class progression for BAB and Saves. They also need prerequisite-adjustments for PF (-3 for skill requirements, different skill in place of concentration, but other than that they seem to work fine.




Soo - its really not that much that needs to be adjusted.

[Serafina]

I've beer following this for a while, and supposed that I might as well put in my 2 cents. I really want it to be 3.5 (Mainly because that's all I know), plus, that's where the roots are, y'know?

Just my opinion. :3

EDIT: One random idea for an Archetype: Some manner of Burst-centric thing, perhaps? Or Aura. Or Barrier! We already have a quasi-Strike-Centric Archetype in the form of the Mistbreaker, and people are already working on Blast-Centric Archetypes, yet there's so little love for everything else! :3I don't really see those as seperate combat-styles for Magical Girsl.
However, an Aura-boost could work well for a Defender-Archetype, which the Magical Girl could really use!

[Story Time]

Would you prefer the Magical Girl as a 3.5 class, or a Pathfinder class?

I would like to request a Love Conquers All manual in Third Edition format, commonly referred to as three-point-five. :smallsmile: I have less personal experience with Pathfinder, but from many comments that I have read on the forum it is not difficult to make the transition.

My request is made in the spirit that I plan to use the manual that results from this project in an actual game. Thank you, Selinia, for asking the question. :smallsmile:

[Serafina]

A Manual? As in, how to do a campaign that revolves around Magical Girls? Magic Items and other support that isn't already part of this class?

I've already been working on a handbook, though i haven't for quite a while.

[AuraTwilight]

As a long-time lurker of this thread, I'll pitch in a vote for 3.5. I find that it's generally easier to convert 3.5 to Pathfinder than the other way around.

[Owrtho]

Spirit Shooter: Needs Composite Bows for PF...

Just thought I'd note that, no it doesn't. Composite bows are all either long or short bows, and not a distinct type of bow on their own. Thus they are already included in the part referring to long and short bows.

Owrtho

[Serafina]

They are listed as separate weapons in Pathfinder, so i'd list them additionally just to be safe.

[Story Time]

A Manual?

A manual. A document. Not a guide.

You know, for after Selinia has made the classes and balanced them to satisfaction, it might be nice to have a Presentation Document File as a handy catalog for them.

[Serafina]

How about some bonus combat feats for the Magical Girl?

As it is right now it is REALLY hard to pull of a lot of combat styles with her unless you multiclass into Fighter or something. You can, but then you discard a lot of the really flavorful Magical Girl feats you could take.
A few early combat bonus feats (say, at 1st, 3rd and 4th level) would solve that problem nicely.

And while the Magical Girl gets a class feature at every level,a few of the later class features are repetitive - Stubborn makes Not Without Fear almost pointless, and it in turn gets outdone by Meaning of Courage. Some more feats at those levels would also be very nice (say, at 7th and 10th).


Generally, bonus feats add a lot of customization without making the class too strong.
Furthermore, they actually open up more possibilities for Archetypes - because an Archetype could then replace the bonus feats gained at certain levels, thus adding more of a drawback. The two latest archetypes by Trace and me are good examples - we can't really replace most of the current class features because removing them doesn't fit (Nanoha is definetly a Bombardment Mage, but also fearless), prevents combinations with other Archetypes or the class features are flavor (such as Power of Friendship).


Hence, i am very much in favor of some bonus feats.

[Princess Tracy]

Well, most archetypes aren't really meant to stack like that so I won't get too annoyed over not being able to make a Mistbreaker/Greedy Mage

[Selinia]

Mentor Animal

"Now, how could you go and forget about a handsome cat like me?"
-Artemis, a Mentor Animal

Not all magical girls stumble upon their calling on their own. Sometimes, the powers-that-be need to give them a little nudge. Often, this comes in the form of a mentor animal - a diminutive companion for the magical girl, to aid and advise her on her journeys. These knowledgeable creatures take the form of common animals, and can provide invaluable advice to a magical girl... but constantly being under their tutelage can leave her much less self-assured than her peers who discovered their powers through their own efforts.

Class Features:

A magical girl with an mentor animal gains all of the class features listed below.

Mentor: At first level, the magical girl finds herself accompanied by a talkative animal, who provides advice and guidance however it may. This mentor may take the form of any animal on the list of animals that can become familiars, and calculates its base attributes as described under Familiar Basics. Finally, all mentor animals are capable of speaking and understanding any language the magical girl can speak.

If the magical girl already has a familiar, or if she gains one from another source, she may designate her mentor animal as her familiar as well. Doing so causes her levels in magical girl and any familiar-granting classes she might take to stack for the purposes of determining its base familiar abilities - but not for the special mentor abilities granted by this class feature. Should the mentor animal be killed, it will show up a week later; unharmed, but likely with a scolding ready at hand.

Starting at 1st level, the mentor animal will share some of its vast collection of knowledge with the magical girl. The mentor gains the bardic knowledge ability, as a bard of the magical girl's class level.

Starting at 4th level, the mentor animal gains some insight into the eccentricities of its particular ward. Once per day, it can advise the magical girl as to the most likely result of a proposed course of action. This functions as if the mentor animal had cast Augury, but no material component is required and the mentor animal is aware if the spell fails (if this happens, it will likely tell the magical girl some variation of the phrase 'I don't know'). For the purpose of the spell, consider the mentor animal to have a caster level equal to the magical girl's class level.

A magical girl's mentor animal may use this ability an additional time per day at 7th level, and gains an additional use every three levels thereafter.

Starting at 10th level, the magical girl's mentor animal has come to trust and respect her for what she has done. Once per day, it may attempt to recall information on a person, place, or thing it is presented with, delving into areas of its mind even it is uneasy with. This functions as the Legend Lore spell, but no material component is required.

Starting at 15th level, a magical girl's mentor has finally begun to see her less as a student and more as a comrade and peer. Its insight into her behavior is peerless, and it likely understands her better than she does. When she asks its advice, it gives a much more complete and coherent answer - treat it as getting its results from the Divination spell, rather than Augury.

Mentor replaces a magical girl's Not Without Fear, The Meaning of Courage, and Voice of Light class features.

[Selinia]

Kofū Shōjo

"Eternal Radiance, grant me thy power this day!"
-Rei, a Kofū Shōjo

Nothing really stays the same forever. Even the most immortal of causes and ideals has to change with the times or risk being swept away. Magical girls are no exception, and it is undeniable that modern magical girls are in many ways a far cry from their counterparts in prior eras. They're loud, stubborn, and full of more fire and passion than they know what to do with.

There are, however, plenty of exceptions. Some magical girl take a more traditional pursuit of their calling, emphasizing grace and a healthy respect for the power they wield over hot blood and zeal. Such old-fashioned magical girls undeniably have a more direct bond to the light that infuses them, but they tend to lack the grit-toothed determination and self-sufficiency of more modern girls.

Class Features:

A kofū shōjo gains all of the class features listed below.

Merciful: A kofū shōjo's sense of pacifism goes beyond that of a normal magical girl, and she has difficulty bringing herself to use her powers to inflict lasting harm on anyone. When the kofū shōjo deals lethal damage with a melee attack or an Illumination, she must make a Will saving throw against DC [10 + her Cha modifier]. If she succeeds, her attack resolves normally and she does not need to make this save against that specific target for the remainder of the encounter. If she fails the save, she finds herself involuntarily pulling her attack at the last moment, forcing the attack to deal non-lethal damage anyway.

A kofū shōjo does not need to make this save against creatures immune to non-lethal damage.

Trinket (Su): At 1st level, a kofū shōjo acquires a powerful trinket, which serves as the symbol and focus of her power. The exact form of this trinket varies, but it is always small, ornate, and easily kept on one's person - jewelry is the most common form of trinket by far, but it could be anything from a book of prayer strips to a fancy hat. A kofū shōjo must be wearing or holding her trinket to be able to cast illuminations.

A kofū shōjo may use her trinket to amplify her magic. Doing so requires both hands be free to clasp the trinket. As a full round action, she may evoke a blast or burst illumination, treating her charisma modifier (not her charisma score) as two higher for all purposes relating to the resolution of that illumination. At 6th level, and every six levels thereafter, illuminations she evokes in this manner count as an having an additional +1 charisma modifier (to a maximum increase of +5 at 18th level).

This ability replaces Device and Device - Limit Form.

Costume: A kofū shōjo gains her second costume point at 5th level, and gains an additional costume point at every third level. She may never designate a weapon as part of her costume, and does not own a device.

Bliss (Su): For a kofū shōjo, channeling the full power of an illumination is a rapturous experience before which all else seems numb. Filled with the power of light, she can happily ignore the blows of her enemies. The kofū shōjo gains DR X/- against attacks of opportunity provoked by her blasts or bursts equal to three times the level of the illumination used.

This ability replaces Not without Fear and The Meaning of Courage.

Barrier Maiden (Su): At 7th level, the kofū shōjo may add her Wis modifier as a shield bonus to AC. Since this relies on a kofū shōjo’s ability to direct her energies against incoming blows, she loses this bonus any time she would lose her Dex bonus to AC. Whenever the kofū shōjo is maintaining an aura, she may grant this bonus to any ally within that aura's radius of effect. Whenever she uses any Illumination other than an aura, the AC bonus granted by this ability increases by amount equal to the illumination's level until the beginning of her next turn. If she uses multiple illuminations in a single turn, only the highest level applies.

Additionally, the kofū shōjo may add her Wis modifier to her Cha modifier when calculating the effects of her Barrier illuminations.

This ability replaces Shrug it Off.

Evasion (Ex): At 13th level and higher, a kofū shōjo can avoid even magical and unusual attacks with great agility. If she makes a successful Reflex saving throw against an attack that normally deals half damage on a successful save, she instead takes no damage. Evasion can be used only if the kofū shōjo is wearing light armor, her costume, or no armor. A helpless kofū shōjo does not gain the benefit of evasion.

This ability replaces Mettle.

[Selinia]

Spirit Shooter

"Silver cartridge load! SHOOT!"
-Natsuki, a Spirit Shooter

Most magical girls have a certain fondness for melee. Even if the violence itself appalls them, there is something deeply personal about a face-to-face duel. Much can be discerned about someone from the manner in which they fight, and magical girls have often been heard to describe fighting as an abstract (and dangerous) conversation of sorts.

Those who break from this trend are often referred to as spirit shooters. While in truth as diverse as any other group of magical girls, Spirit Shooters have a tendency to be stereotyped as calm and level-headed in comparison to their boisterous comrades. This has a grain of truth to it, the only blanket statement that can really be made about these individuals is that they are no less effective for their weapon of choice. While they may be less suited for an up-close brawl, their magic is perfectly capable of striking down opponents like a shower of shooting stars.

Class Features:

A spirit shooter gains all of the class features listed below.

Ranged Device (Su): A Device is the symbol of a Magical Girl’s power – a peerless tool, suffused with the power of light and good. At 1st level, a spirit shooter acquires her device, which appears in the form of a longbow, shortbow, heavy crossbow, light crossbow, pistol, or musket. The Device is always of Masterwork quality (and usually appears quite ornate), and otherwise functions as a normal weapon of its type. A spirit shooter is always proficient with her Device, but if it is a martial weapon or a firearm she is still not proficient with the mundane weapon it is modeled after.

If the magical girl chooses a firearm as her ranged device, she may repair it as if she had the Gunsmithing feat. The Spirit Shooter archetype assumes use of the Pathfinder firearm system (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/firearms).

This ability replaces Device and Device - Limit Form.

Focused Illuminations: Unlike an ordinary magical girl, a spirit shooter's weapon of choice is complex to the point where natural fighting instinct simply isn't enough to be be effective in battle. She can overcome this with training, but splitting her time like this comes to the detriment of her ability to harness more esoteric Illuminations. A spirit shooter must always ready at least one Blast illumination of every level she can access, before she chooses what other illuminations to ready.

Merciful: A spirit shooter can choose to deal non-lethal damage with ranged attacks, in addition to melee attacks and illuminations.

Spirit Shot (Su): The signature ability of a spirit shooter allows them to collect and unleash radiant energy in an attack not dissimilar to a more controlled Blast. Whenever she makes an attack with her device, including as part of a full attack, she may replace the normal attack with a spirit shot by paying a number of motes.

If the spirit shooter is wielding a weapon that she can reload as a free or swift action, this ability costs one mote. If she is wielding a weapon that she can reload as a move action, this ability costs two motes. If she is wielding a weapon that can be reloaded as a standard or full-round action, this ability costs three motes. Load time reductions from character abilities (such as Rapid Reload) will reduce the cost of a spirit shot, but those from items (such as alchemical cartridges) will not.

Regardless of what weapon is used, a spirit shot uses no ammunition (and can be used even with an unloaded or broken weapon) and targets touch AC. If the weapon firing them is a firearm, spirit shots will never cause it to risk a misfire. Additionally, a spirit shot cannot be used on any target more than three range increments away. If all attacks are converted to spirit shots, it is possible to make a full attack with the weapon regardless of normal reload times. For all other purposes, a spirit shot is considered a normal ranged attack.

At 5th level, a spirit shooter's spirit shot begins to gain additional effects based on her ranged device's weapon type.

If she wields a long or short bow, whenever the spirit shooter makes a full attack comprised entirely of spirit shots, she may make an additional spirit shot at her full base attack bonus. This additional spirit shot must be paid for normally, and its effects stack with the effects of the Rapid Shot feat. At 10th level, when making a full attack, she may fire an additional spirit shot for each iterative attack she makes, (this stacks with the extra shot granted at 7th level, meaning she can make three spirit shots at her highest BAB), paying for each one normally. Thus, a spirit shooter of 10th level could make up to five spirit shots in a full attack, with base attack bonuses of +7/+7/+7/+2/+2. At 15th level, the spirit shooter may use her Radiant Focus ability at the end of an attack or full attack: however, the DC of the concentration check is equal to 10 + (5 * the number of attacks the spirit shooter is making this turn), rather than the habitual DC.

If she wields a light or heavy crossbow, she may attach a blast or burst illumination to any of her spirit shots as a free action. Doing so requires that she pay the normal mote cost of the illumination, along with the cost of the spirit shot itself. If the attack is successful, the target suffers the effects of the illumination as well as those of the shot. At 10th level, when the spirit shooter makes iterative attacks with her spirit shot, she always uses her highest base attack bonus. Further, blast illuminations delivered through her spirit shot are considered to be Empowered, as the metamagic ability, and burst illuminations gain a bonus to their save DC equal to the illumination's level. At 15th level, the range increment of her spirit shots is doubled, and her spirit shots ignore all forms of miss chance or cover - even total cover - so long as you are able to target the correct square.

If she wields a firearm, she may add her Cha modifier to the damage of each spirit shot. Further, each additional spirit shot to strike a target within one turn causes this damage to be dealt again. Thus, the first spirit shot to hit a target in a turn deals a spirit shooter's Cha modifier in damage, the second shot deals twice her Cha modifier, and so on. At 10th level, any creature that sustains damage from her spirit shots must make a fortitude saving throw of a DC is equal to [10 + half the magical girl’s evoker level + her Cha modifier] or be considered flat-footed until the beginning of their next turn. At 15th level, whenever the spirit shooter deals her Cha-derived extra damage with her spirit shot, an equal amount of damage is dealt to any enemy within ten feet of her target (though these additional targets do not risk becoming flat-footed).

A spirit shooter may count half of her levels in any class that grants the Illuminations or Unfocused Illuminations class feature as spirit shooter levels for the purpose of determining the abilities granted by her spirit shot.

This ability replaces Shrug it Off, Stubborn, and Mettle.

[Selinia]

Mistbreaker

"Of course I'm still looking! Do you really think this is all there is to see?"
-Chie Sakonata, a Mistbreaker

There is light in everything. In everyone. It can be hard to see at times - people build up barriers to protect their precious light, hiding it from the world. Barriers of fear, of pain, of mistrust and doubt... all floating idly, a dour mist that cuts off one's inner fire just as surely as it protects it. Most people never even realize how little of the world they see.

Mistbreakers seek to grasp tight the light at their core and bring it blazing forth into the world, bringing vivid life to all the vivid corners they would normally never look to. They revel in new experiences and new ideas, eager to drink in the endless wonders of the world. Mistbreakers tend to be rather more introspective than many magical girls, and their adventure is often as much one of self-discovery as it is one of blades and magic.

The light they carry is not a tool, or a gift - it is a part of them, and it grows brighter every day.

Class Features:

A mistbreaker gains all of the class features listed below.

Blazing Spirit (Su): As a mistbreaker takes the first steps upon her path, her inner radiance begins to shine through to her physical form to give her a power disproportionate to her mundane strength. Refusing to work through an intermediary device, she pours her spirit directly into her every blow, setting her body ablaze with an aura of light. A mistbreaker treats her unarmed attacks as her device, gaining all the benefits associated with a device. Thus, she may allocate Costume Points to them, gains a +1 attack bonus when using them as if they were a masterwork weapon, and may even enhance them with Limit Break. Further, when using unarmed attacks, a mistbreaker may use her Charisma modifier to calculate her attack and damage rolls, rather than her Strength modifier.

A mistbreaker's deals unarmed strike damage as a monk of her class level. A mistbreaker’s attacks may be with either fist interchangeably or even from elbows, knees, and feet. This means that a mistbreaker may even make unarmed strikes with her hands full. There is no such thing as an off-hand attack for a mistbreaker striking unarmed. She may thus apply her full Charisma bonus on damage rolls for all her unarmed strikes.

This ability replaces Device.

Unarmed Strike: At 1st level, mistbreaker gains Improved Unarmed Strike as a bonus feat.

Illuminations: A mistbreaker's inward-channeled energy makes her a veritable fountain of luminous power, but that energy is much more closely bound to her personal essence than the motes of a normal magical girl. When a mistbreaker prepares a Blast illumination, it functions as a Strike rather than a Blast. She must succeed on a melee attack to deliver the blast, and adds the damage of that attack to the effects of the blast. For effects referring to illumination type, a mistbreaker's blasts are treated as strikes for all purposes.

Body of Light (Su): As she grows in power, the line between a mistbreaker's body and spirit continues to blur. At the end of each turn, a mistbreaker of at least 7th level gains a number of temporary hit points equal to her current number of motes. These temporary hit points do not stack.

This ability replaces Shrug it Off.

Seek out the Truth (Ex): There is no fog thicker than that shrouding one's own heart. Having braved that perilous journey, the obfuscations of the mundane world often seem crystal-clear in comparison. At 9th level, a mistbreaker may add her Cha modifier to Will saving throws to disbelieve illusions. Further, she may immediately attempt to disbelieve an illusion upon first perceiving it - she does not first need to interact with it to cast its authenticity into doubt.

This ability replaces Stubborn.

[Serafina]

An addition to Awaken Device that i'd like to see:

Special: If you have a Mentor Animal, you can combine it and your Awakened Device into a single entity. It retains the ability of both and uses the higher mental ability scores.

Also, the feat could use some clarification on whether or not you can give your Device abilities beyond the limit set by the feat by spending WBL.


Also:
Since Greater Magic Weapon allows people to bypass the +10 Limit on Magical Weapons, why not allow the same for Cartridge Boost? Sure, the Magus who inspired the ability can't do it - but i don't really see a reason not to allow it, given that spellcasters can do it.
Hence:
These qualities do not stack with qualities of the same name already on the weapon. You can not have more than +10 of weapon qualities, but you do not have your weapons Enhancement bonus against that when you use this ability (similar to Greater Magic Weapon).

That would remove the need to have spellcasters cast that spell for you (or do it yourself by scroll or wand), which is always a plus. It also prevents the ability to become less useful at higher levels - where you could afford a +5 weapon easily, and it becomes tempting to put the abilities you want on the weapon as well to save cartridges and swift actions.

[Serafina]

Another feat that i think needs changing: Heavy Costume

Proposed changes:
Heavy Costume
You have learned to feel even your bulkier equipment as a part of you, and can begin to channel energy through it no differently than your lighter attire.
Prerequisites: Costume +1, Medium Armor Proficiency or Heavy Armor Proficiency
Benefit: You may designate as your costume any suit of armor you are proficient with, not just light armor. Medium or Heavy armor designated as a costume counts as one category lighter for all purposes - this stacks with the effect of mithril armor. You may apply half your costumes bonus to AC (including its enhancement bonus) against touch-attacks.

Why that change?
Right now, taking that feat requires either a heavy (one or two) feat investment, or mutliclassing. Feats are currently a scarce resource for the Magical Girl, and this feat provides little in exchange.
At low levels it can indeed increase her AC, provided she doesn't have a high Dexterity. But as soon as three points in Nimble come into play, her AC will be about equal to that of other Magical Girls - and her Touch-AC will be much lower (about 3-4 points, potentially more). Sure, she has the advantage that she has less need for Nimble - but if she does that, her overall AC AND her Touch-AC will be really low.

Now think of all the Magical Girls who tend to wear something akin to heavy armor. They often face the ranged attacks of other Magical Girls head-on and just shrug them off. Right now this just doesn't work, because Blasts go against Touch-AC. Similar attacks (such as ranged touch spells) work likewise.
In fact, because her Dexterity (resp. Charisma) bonus to AC is limited by her armor, it is even easier to hit someone in a Heavy Costume.


There are already some ways in 3.5 to apply armor to touch AC.
Making an Armor out of Riverine provides half that armors AC as a Deflection bonus. However, that doesn'st stack with other Deflection Boni (which a defender will want) and is very very costly (25000 GP)
Ghost Ward armor provides the Enhancement bonus vs. touch-attacks. However, that works just as well in a light armor than in heavy armor.
The Deflective Armor feat does provide the full armor bonus to touch-AC. However, it requires psionic focus (thus not available to Magical Girls without multiclassing) and a feat tax (Heavy Armor Specialization, which just gives +1 AC), and as i said feats are scarce.
Shield Ward and Parrying Shield feats apply a shields AC vs. Touch-Attacks.

So there is plenty of precedent for feats doing that, and i think a feat (especially one with prerequisites or multiclass requirement) should provide a real benefit instead of such a mixed bag.


Possible Alternatives to that change, if you think it doesn't work or is too powerful:
- apply full armor bonus as a deflection bonus. Will have the disadvantage of lowering overall AC though, in exchange for better touch-AC.
- only apply it against ranged touch attacks.
- make it an extra feat with Heavy Costume as a prerequisite. Again, feats are scarce so that may not be the best idea. It would certainly warrant applying the full bonus.



Or, completely different:
Increase the Maximum Dexterity Bonus by tow or such if you have that feat. It would improve the overall protection, but evading doesn't really fit the image one has from a heavy costume user.

[Serafina]

FYI, i am working on a Ritual Magic system for Magical Girls.

It's effectively supposed to represent the various non-combat magics magical girls can pull off. Strictly out-of-combat utility magic though, and nothing gamebreaking anyway.
Each would require skill-checks and be linked to a particular skill. Perform could be used in place of any skill, but at a penalty (giving it a usage for Magical Girls). The casting time would be long (about a minute), to keep it strictly out of combat.
Currently i am planning five types of magic: Healing (Heal), Animal/Nature Interaction (Handle Animals), Locating Objects and people (Gather Information), Transportation/Teleportation (Use Magic Device) and Communication Magic (Sense Motive).
Some would only come online at a higher Evoker level (such as teleport), about at the time mages get access to these spells.


Generally, those types of Magic can be expected to be present in a campaign anyway - either supplied by T1/T2-classes, or via scrolls. And i just thought "well why the hell shouldn't a Magical Girl be able to do that as well"? It solely benefits the group and doesn't make one character stand out, it reduces the need for T1/T2-classes (always a good thing in my book) and i intend to write them in a way that they don't ruin a campaign - such as making it very hard to teleport to unfamiliar places.


So - what do you think of that idea, and are there any other types of utility magic that would fit into this?

[Princess Tracy]

I've been working on some feats tooled towards using Magical Girls for traditional tanking. Here's what I've got first of all...

Last Stand
By pouring everything you have into making a last stand, you can keep on fighting impossible odds.
Prerequisite: Radiant Focus class feature, Radiant Soul feat
Benefit: Add your charisma score to the number of negative hit points you can accumulate before dying. When you are reduced to 0 or lower hit points, you can choose to continue fighting as normal by entering the Last Stand state. When in a Last Stand, your motes do not regenerate each turn as they normally would, you do not fall unconscious from hit point damage (though you can certainly still die from hit point damage) and you are immune to nonlethal damage. On each turn you make a strenuous action, including attacking or using an illumination, you lose 1 mote. When you are out of motes, you leave the Last Stand, falling unconscious if you are still at negative hit points, and stabilize.
Special: This feat can be used as a prerequisite in place of Endurance and Diehard.

---

On an unrelated note, a thought on how to make a healer Magical Girl - since it's hardly an uncommon trope. I don't know every little nuance of the class but I do know not having long term healing is a bit odd. I was thinking some sort of dedicated archetype with at least a healing pool, like a Paladin's lay on hands. The whole basis for their not being a healer magical girl is taht the general balance of the game assumes limited resources for a day - a Cleric can only cast Cure spells so many times per day before running out, generally around the same time the Fighter will propose sleeping for the night to regain spells before something happens to his meat shielding self. However, very few things about the class are limited - motes regenerate, so if one made a straight up healing illumination they could cast it endlessly, healing up the party with a few minutes and no additional resources, whereas the classic healer, the cleric, has to invest a lot into effectively healing. A DM would have to seriously consider a magical girl's potential to completely overturn assumed elements of the game's balance before EVER allowing the class. So I'll try working on some sort of solution. So far, what I've got is a feat that would expend resources - giving up points from your maximum pool of motes to perform healing, bu the maths seems a little off and impractical at lower levels, so an archetype may be in order. I'll see what I can do. I should probably finish that other archetype I started nearly a week ago too

Edit: Ah, didn't see that last post from Ser there. Sounds like you may be thinking along similar lines to me here. Want to team up to do some awesome?

[Owrtho]

On an unrelated note, a thought on how to make a healer Magical Girl - since it's hardly an uncommon trope. I don't know every little nuance of the class but I do know not having long term healing is a bit odd. I was thinking some sort of dedicated archetype with at least a healing pool, like a Paladin's lay on hands. The whole basis for their not being a healer magical girl is taht the general balance of the game assumes limited resources for a day - a Cleric can only cast Cure spells so many times per day before running out, generally around the same time the Fighter will propose sleeping for the night to regain spells before something happens to his meat shielding self. However, very few things about the class are limited - motes regenerate, so if one made a straight up healing illumination they could cast it endlessly, healing up the party with a few minutes and no additional resources, whereas the classic healer, the cleric, has to invest a lot into effectively healing.

Thought I'd mention something here. The italicized part is not entirely accurate. Specifically, motes are only available in combat, and the pool is empty at all other times. This mean illuminations or other things that make use of motes can only be done while fighting. Thus a mote costing heal ability for magical girls would only allow unlimited in combat healing, which is far from broken (for one thing in combat healing is considered rather inefficient, and it would be even worse when your not just using up your actions but also your points to use better abilities). Unlimited healing is only considered possibly broken if available out of combat (which is where most healing is done, and even then there are plenty of games that assume unlimited out of combat healing and can run fine with it, they just can't rely on slowly wearing down the party).

That said, if a healer archetype were done, it could likely get a handful of little abilities like pseudo-illuminations that cost motes to heal (possibly getting better forms that either heal more per mote, or cost lesser actions from full-round, to standard, to move, to swift), and a few per day use abilities to heal out of combat as well as some ways to clear up status effects. In exchange, they could give up some of the more self defensive type abilities, and powerful offense abilities (such as shrug it off and limit form). Might even at some point gain the ability to tack on minor healing to any illumination used.

Owrtho

[Serafina]

Rituals of Light

A Magical Girls radiant power is good for more than just combat. With the right skills, she can achieve miraculous effects.


Rituals are spell-like abilities. Instead of preparing them in advance or being limited to only a few uses per day, a Magical Girl accomplishes rituals by spending time and using her skills. Therefore Rituals have a long casting time and always require a skill check to accomplish their effects. A Magical Girl can always perform a ritual as long as she is able to freely move and speak to perform its verbal and somatic components. Arcane Spell Failure does not apply to Rituals, but a Magical Girl must have access to her device (or alternate class feature to it) to perform a Ritual.
Being able to use a ritual can never qualify you for any feats, prestige classes or other things you could qualify for by being able to replicate spells or other effects via rituals.

Reading a Ritual:
Prerequisite: A Magical Girl must fulfill all prerequisites to use a ritual.
Casting Time: How long it takes to accomplish a Ritual.
Skill: The Skill the Ritual requires to accomplish its effects. Note that Perform may be substituted for any skill, as described below.
Range: Who is affected by the Ritual. Your target must stay in range for the entire duration of the ritual.
Effect: The possible effects of the ritual. Some have a minimum DC that must be reached with the skill checks, if you fail to do so no effect occurs. Others work like normal skill checks, and a higher result brings greater effects. And some modify the DCs of other effects.
If a effect replicates a skill, your Evoker level counts as your caster level to determine the effects of the Ritual.

Skill check: When you finish casting a ritual, you make a skill-check with the skill noted in the rituals description. You gain all boni you normally gain to this skill, and an extra untyped +5 bonus to it. The results determine if and what effects you achieve. You must be trained in the skill to use it for a ritual.
Perform skill: In place of the skill noted in the rituals description, you can use any Perform-skill you have. You gain all boni you normally gain to Perform-checks if you do so, but you do not gain the +5 bonus you normally gain when using the appropriate skill. You must be trained in Perform to do this, but you do not need to be trained in the skill normally required for the Ritual.
Taking 10: You can take 10 when performing a Ritual by doubling its casting time. You can never take 20 on a Ritual.
Additional uses for your skills. Always a nice thing. Also, Perform now actually does something for Magical Girls, and after all a lot of them do their magic by chanting, singing or even dancing.

Kofū Shōjos: A Kofū Shōjo can add her Wisdom-modifier to all skill-checks related to Rituals (even if the skill is keyed of Wisdom, in which case she adds it twice).
Stargazers: A Stargazer can use Knowledge-skills in place of the skills normally required for rituals (and still gain the +5 bonus). Knowledge (Arcane) replaces Use Magic Device, Knowledge (Local) replaces Gather Information and Sense Motive, Knowledge (Nature) replaces Handle Animal and Knowledge (Religion) replaces Heal.
The Kofu Shojo is just the kind of Magical Girl that would perform such rituals. The Stargazer on the other hand relies on Intelligence, and none of the skills used here uses Intelligence - hence, she can use Knowledge-skills instead.

Pathfinder
Use Diplomacy in place of Gather Information


Healing Mercy
Prerequisite: Evoker Level 1
Casting Time: One Minute (10 rounds)
Skill: Heal
Range: Touch
Effect: As soon as you begin casting this ritual, the target becomes stabilized until you finish casting. When you finish casting the Ritual, you heal hitpoints equal to your check result.

You can aim to remove the following conditions from the target. If you fail to meet the DC you can try again and still restore the targets hitpoints. You can attempt to remove multiple conditions by increasing the highest DC of all conditions you wish to remove by 5 per additional condition.
DC 10: Fatigued, Stunned, Sickened
DC 15: Dazed or Staggered
DC 20: Exhausted, Nauseated or Frightened. You can also attempt to remove disease (as the spell) or neutralize poison (as per the spell)
DC 25: Blinded, Deafened, Paralyzed or Stunned. You can also attempt to remove a curse (as the spell).

In addition, you can heal two points of ability damage and one point of ability drain per 5 points of your check result instead of curing hitpoint damage.

You can also restore Negative Levels instead of any of the other functions of this Ritual. This has a DC of 15 and restores one negative level, plus one additional negative level per 10 points you exceed the DC. A subject can only profit from this once per day.
Pathfinder: You can also restore all permanent negative levels by using material components worth 1000 GP. This has a DC of 25, but does not consume the material components if you do not succeed on the check. However, you can only try this once per day.

The whole healing package. Impossible to do (practically) in combat due to the casting time, and attribute damage etc. still needs time to heal. But you're very good at patching up people after combat without using up Wands of Cure Light Wounds or Lesser Restoration (which you could use thanks to UMD anyway).


Dimensional Transport
Prerequisite: Evoker Level 10
Casting Time: One Minute (10 rounds), see text
Skill: Use Magic Device
Range Personal or close (see text)
Effect: As soon as you finish this ritual, you teleport yourself to another location (as Teleport, but only yourself and see below). However, you must meed the DC based on the familiarity you have with the target location, if you fail you are not transported and can not try again for 24 hours. You can arrive off destination, but there is no chance of mishap with this ritual
{table=head] Familiarity | DC | on target | Off Target | Similar Area
Very familiar | 15 | 01–99 | 100
Studied Carefully | 20 | 01–94 | 95–97 | 98–100
Seen casually | 25 | 01–88 | 89–94 | 95–100
Viewed once | 30 | 01–76 | 77–88 | 89-100[/table]

You can include up to one additional willing creature per 3 Evoker levels within close range (25 ft. + 5 feet per evoker level) in your teleport by increasing the DC by 5.
You can arrive on another plane (as per Plane Shift) by increasing the DC by 5. You arrive with the same precision as above if you are very familiar or have studied a place on that plane carefully, otherwise you arrive 5-100 miles off target.
You can use an Emergency Teleport while in combat. This increases the DC by 10, and you can only attempt to do so once per day, but it reduces the casting time to two standard actions.

Basically, Plane Shift and Teleport in one package. Someone has to do it eventually anyway - and in most cases that is a reason to play a Tier 1 or Tier 2 class, to hire NPCs or to buy expensive scrolls. If a Magical Girl is around, she can do it instead.
I am not certain whether the Emergency-option will stay - we see it in several Magical Girl shows, and i made it difficult and easy to interrupt.



Speak with Nature
Prerequisite: Evoker Level 5
Casting Time: 3 Full-round actions
Skill: Handle Animal
Range: As spell or personal
Effect: You can replicate the effects of several spells by meeting the required DC.
Speak With Animals (DC 10), Speak with Plants (DC 15), Calm Animal (DC 15). Charm Animal (DC 15), Detect Animals and Plants (DC 20). Endure Elements (DC 20)
You can also Awaken an Animal or Plant (as the spell, DC 30), but that increases the casting time to 24 hours. You can also control Weather (as the spell, DC 40), but that increases the casting time to 10 minutes.

You can also replicate a Survival-check by doubling it's DC and taking either the time required for the survival-check or the ritual, whichever is longer.
All you need if you want to commune with nature. The only Ritual that can be used "offensively" - either by calming and befriending animals, or by creating favorable weather for you.



Mystic Knowledge
Prerequisite: Evoker Level 7
Casting Time: 5 Minutes
Skill: Gather Information
Range: long (400+40 ft./evoker level), see text
Effect: You can use this ritual to sense the direction of an object or person. You must meet a DC based on your familiarity with the target, and looking for a person increases the DC by 5. Looking for a target you are very familiar with is easy (DC 10), looking for a target that you have only seen once or a few times is harder (DC 20) and looking for a target you have only a description of is extremely difficult (DC 30). You can search for multiple targets that fit the same description (only physical attributes are valid for this) by increasing the DC by 5. If you succeed you learn the direction and rough distance to the target (within 5 feet if the target is within 100 feet, within 100 feet if the target is within a mile, within a mile if the target is further away). You can double the range of this application by increasing the DC by 5, increase the range to 1 mile per Evoker level by increasing the DC by 10 and increase the range to anywhere on the same plane by increasing the DC by 15. If the target is shielded against scrying, you receive no information.

You can shift your senses to perceive a location within range (DC 25). If you succeed you perceive everything as if you were standing in a square of your choice within range.

You can identify the properties of a Magic Item. This has a DC of 10+the items caster level, and range of touch. If you succeed you learn all functions of the item, but not how to activate it and how many charges it has left. If you exceed the DC by 5, you also learn that information.

You can not take 10 on any application of this Ritual.

Sense Object, Sense Person, Clairvoyance and Identify/Analyze Dweomer. Again, someone has to do it eventually anyway, so why not the Magical Girl?



Magic of Friendship
Prerequisite: Evoker Level 3
Casting Time: 2 move actions
Skill: Sense Motive
Range: see text
Effect: You can establish telepathic communication with other intelligent creatures. Once this connection is established, you can maintain it as a free action (it ends when you fall unconscious) and the range is not limited. If you can perceive the target directly, this has a DC of 10. If you know the target this has a DC of 15, and if you have a description of the target this has a DC of 20. If the target is not on the same plane as you are, the DC increases by 5.
Such a telepathic link goes only in one direction and only carries words, not images - but you can increase the DC by 5 each to establish a two-way communication or send images or other information. The target must understand your language, but increasing the DC by 5 allows you to communicate as if you two shared a language.
You can communicate with an unwilling target, but this can not in any way be used to distract them.

You can also broadcast a telepathic message. This has a DC of 15 and a long range (400+40ft/Evoker level). You can double the range by increasing the DC by 5, increase the range to 1 mile per Evoker level by increasing the DC by 10 and increase the range to anywhere on the same plane by increasing the DC by 15. This message can carry a single sentence (as much as you can reasonably say with one free action), and you can specify a kind of target that can receive it (such as "all my friends" or "any person capable of magic").

Neither application of this ritual can reach targets in areas warded against teleportation or scrying, or if you are yourself within such an area (but if the individual itself is warded, you can still reach it). You also do not learn anything about the targets location, distance or condition unless it shares such information willingly.

Well - Telepathy. It happens. A lot of Magical Girls are capable of it sooner or later. It is really annoying if players are unable to communicate, and this does just that without range-limitations or needing high-level spells. If the DM wants to cut off someone from communication, it's still possible via common means.

[Serafina]

Well there we go - another proposed addition to Magical Girls. This time it's a huge one, and would affect every single one of them. As stated earlier, i think you shouldn't have to carry around a T1-spellcaster or use expensive scrolls to fulfill functions that can be necessary to advance the plot after a certain point. And we see Magical Girls performing all of the above, though not necessarily all of them.

[Princess Tracy]

Here's a feat to make teh Magical Girl a bit more competent at basic combat. To convert from Pathfinder to 3.5, just give the bonus to opposed checks for maneuvres (trip, bull rush, etc.) that CMD is used for defending against. Haven't quite determined prerequisite yet - I figured I'd make it based on a specific feat or class ability, but all I came up at this juncture was, well...

Stylish Combatant
Prerequisite: Magical Girl
Benefit: Add your charisma bonus to CMD and to initiative checks.
Special: If you possess the Improved feat corresponding to a combat manoeuvre, such as Improved Grapple, you gain a charisma bonus to CMB for these checks.

Too much? It is intended for higher levels of play. I was thinking in a pinch it woudl simply replace to normal modifiers - supplanting dexterity for initiative and either dexterity or strength with charisma. But the campaign I'm in is fairly high level, so I figured it may not be such a big deal.

[Edog]

Wow...I just found this yesterday, and it looks awesome. You seem to have put the concept together really nicely; everything seems to work together pretty well. At least, it does in the base class; I haven't looked at the PrCs or anything yet. Well done; I'll be sure to use this in the next game I run. Thank you~

As for the question you asked earlier, about whether to make it a 3.5 or PF class: I'd prefer it if you stick with 3.5. It's the only edition I know, and from what I've heard, converting 3.5 content for a PF game is not too difficult.

By the way...


This isn't a 'joke class'. It's light-hearted, yes, but it is intended to be something you could actually drop into a serious fantasy setting without issue.
Is it strange at all that I find myself completely agreeing, despite the fact that my games tend to be a little on the dark side?


And before I leave, one last thing:


Starlight Breaker

>Area: 160 ft. by 15 ft. line

>a tactical nuke made of love
Found a picture for you :smallwink: (spoilered for size)
http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/edog18/Misc/MASTERSPAAAAARK.jpg
Were the similarities deliberate, or just a coincidence? If you have no idea what I'm on about, it's the latter.

[Serafina]

A lot of the names (including Starlight Breaker) are taken from Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha.
Which you should totally watch if you don't know it yet - the first season is a bit slow, but there is a move (Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Movie 1st" that conveys the plot in a much better fashion, and is better animated to boot. Then there are two other seasons - A's and Strikers, which have much better pacing and are very good.

http://desmond.imageshack.us/Himg28/scaled.php?server=28&filename=coalgirlsmahoushoujolyr.png&res=landing
Now there is a city
http://desmond.imageshack.us/Himg838/scaled.php?server=838&filename=coalgirlsmahoushoujolyr.png&res=landing
And now there isn't.

Speaking of which, i really think we need a few more area-blasts for the Magical Girl. My unfinished "Bombardment Mage" (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=13648815&postcount=306) Archetype does something about that, but it would be nice to have more optioons IMO.

Speaking of which, i make a few changes to that.
Their Device can not take and apply ranged-weapon enchantments and applies its Enhancement Bonus to Hit and Damage. I tweaked the Bombardment-Spell options a bit (Fort-saves instead of Concentration-checks, because not everyone with Supernatural Abilities has ranks in concentration, clarified the Area-option) and added one that affects melee-characters.

[Edog]

I probably won't be watching it for a while yet, unfortunately; there are a couple of other series that my friends have been telling me to watch. Besides, watching a magical girl anime would probably attract a few funny looks--my friends aren't quite as different as me.

Anyway, I'll look through the PrCs and all the other extra stuff, and have a think about balance. I may well need to tone the abilities up, since my group tends to play fairly high-op characters, but maybe there's something in there to give her the edge she'll need.

[jamieth]

"But Nanoha isn't a Magical Girl anime! If anything, it's Shounen that just happens to have a Magical Girl as a protagonist!"
Yep, try that excuse. It might actually work.

By the way, can anyone tell me what exactly the Stargazer archetype was based on? I know most of the others, but that one...

[Serafina]

Well, the main character does have a female love interest, insofar it might count as Shonen :smalltongue:
Other than that, not really though.

[jamieth]

Oh. really? But what about that line from the first season, "And if she won't listen to me... than, I have to become stronger, and MAKE her listen!" Really, that's as shonen as is gets. Besides, Nanoha exemplifies "Defeat means friendship", which is a shounen trope in the first place.:smallwink:

[DracoDei]

FYI, i am working on a Ritual Magic system for Magical Girls.

It's effectively supposed to represent the various non-combat magics magical girls can pull off. Strictly out-of-combat utility magic though, and nothing gamebreaking anyway.
Each would require skill-checks and be linked to a particular skill. Perform could be used in place of any skill, but at a penalty (giving it a usage for Magical Girls). The casting time would be long (about a minute), to keep it strictly out of combat.
Currently i am planning five types of magic: Healing (Heal), Animal/Nature Interaction (Handle Animals), Locating Objects and people (Gather Information), Transportation/Teleportation (Use Magic Device) and Communication Magic (Sense Motive).
Some would only come online at a higher Evoker level (such as teleport), about at the time mages get access to these spells.


Doesn't feel very true to the source materials.
That said, feel free to raid my Grace-Gift (specifically "Hands of the Healer") for ideas. There is some sort of feat in there with a massive table that should give ideas of how I intend to accelerate things (I need to make it a part of Hands of the Healer, NOT a feat).

[Serafina]

I fail to see how it doesn't fit the source-material - could you please point it out?

Sure, not every Magical Girl can do all of these things. That's partially represented by the need to have certain skills, and partially ignored because we still need to fit it into a D&D-ruleset.
But Magical Girls tend to do a lot of chanting, fancy lightshows and such - all of which takes a while - when they do their magic. So i figured that would be appropriate.
And they also do the kind of magic effects i represented (again, not in every show).

Hands of the Healer is a nice ability - but only does healing, so it doesn't provide the support of the other rituals. I might go for the longer treatment-period though, if only for a few severe afflictions. I'd make it 8 hours though, because then it fits into the standard party rest.

[Serafina]

A slightly altered version of Starlight breaker. First it can now be used as a long-range area spell. Second, i was trying to replicate the "fueled by others magic"-aspect of it - the more magic there is on the battlefield, the more powerful it gets (though i capped the Save-DC increase). Last but not least it affects targets that are immune to non-lethal damage - including unattended objects such as walls.

Starlight Breaker
Mote Cost: 14
Evocation Action: 1 Full-Round action
Range: Line [B]or Long Range (400 + 40/evoker level ft.)
Area: 160 ft. by 15 ft. line or 50 ft. spread
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: See below

Some people might say that the key to a successful ranged attack lay in such subtleties as aiming, or precision. Those people do not have the power to conjure a tactical nuke made of love. You draw all magical energy on the battlefield into a large final attack.
You make a dispel attempt, as per the area dispel option of Greater Dispel Magic but within a 60 ft. burst centered on you, and it affects supernatural effects as well (using their creators HD for their caster level). You can exclude yourself and other creatures of your choosing, and use your Evoker Level as your caster level. Each spell dispelled in this manner increases the Save-DC by 1 (to a maximum of +5) and the damage by 10 (no limit).
Targets of the ability take 100 damage. Additionally, they must make a Reflex, Will, and Fortitude save. If they fail the Reflex save, they are dazed for one round. If they fail the Will save, they are blinded and deafened until the end of the encounter. If they fail the fortitude save, they are exhausted until the end of the encounter. If they fail all three, they immediately take sufficient nonlethal damage to fall unconscious, regardless of their current level of health. Unlike most illuminations, Starlight Breaker always deals nonlethal damage (but deals lethal damage against targets that are immune to non-lethal damage) , and requires no ranged touch attack.

[DracoDei]

I fail to see how it doesn't fit the source-material - could you please point it out?

Sure, not every Magical Girl can do all of these things.
Never said anything about "every magical girl".

I'm not much of an otaku, but I can only recall one instance of any such character in an anime, namely in "Kiki's Delivery Service" when Kiki's mother is making the potions. Granted in D&D that would be item creation (as would the broom-making, but that is more of a spell-focus than a utility effect in and of itself).



That's partially represented by the need to have certain skills, and partially ignored because we still need to fit it into a D&D-ruleset.
But Magical Girls tend to do a lot of chanting, fancy lightshows and such - all of which takes a while - when they do their magic. So i figured that would be appropriate.
Yes, but those fall under "transformation sequences are standard actions that happen to take 30 seconds of screen time" sort of rules. When was it a matter of "gotta get these badguys defeated so i can focus properly on the poison-removal ritual for my buddy they just took down?

And they also do the kind of magic effects i represented (again, not in every show).
Not saying it has to be "every show". 5% would be more than enough. What sorts of specific events/shows were you thinking of?
Again, not MUCH of an otaku here.

Hands of the Healer is a nice ability - but only does healing, so it doesn't provide the support of the other rituals. I might go for the longer treatment-period though, if only for a few severe afflictions. I'd make it 8 hours though, because then it fits into the standard party rest.
I just meant for the Healing part of things, and some idea of how to handle the DCs. The static numbers may be off, but should be vaguely in the ball-park, but the "use the DC of the original attack" parts should be fairly good, as should the levels they get access to them (although maybe high by 1 or 2 since they take longer than a cleric to do their thing and require a skill-check).

The 24 hour base was because that is what "Treat Disease" and "Provide Long-term care" aspects of the heal skill are based on and I was trying to go for something that felt more mystical than flashily magical. 8 hour basis for the hard stuff should work fine for this since it SHOULD feel more overtly magical.

[Serafina]

Well, if you don't object to the skill-based system, i can always reduce the cast-time for the rituals. I just didn't wan to hand them all of that as in-combat magic - it's intended to be support, to allow he Magical Girl to fill a niche normally occupied by T1/T2-classes (unless you happen to have a lower-tier specialist for it in the group) or by items. So it's a feature, not a bug.

Basically: The long casting times are due to game design.

My design goals were
- do not cut into other, dedicated classes territory. The Magical Girl is not supposed to be better at X than a class who specializes at X just due to rituals.
- do not enhance their combat ability. That's why there are no buffs-spells or such.
- do not make this usable in combat. This is a corollary of the above, since it's not supposed to make the Magical Girl stronger in combat.
- provide abilities that a party is expected to have anyway.

Healing is an obvious necessity in any party, but we all know that focusing on it doesn't make a good class and that you normally don't do much of it in combat anyway. In-combat healing would be much better represented by Illuminations. If someone wants to play a healer, he will still be better at in-combat healing.
This can represent anything from carefully tending to wounds after battle, chanting a healing hymn or even just crying over a wounded friend.

Teleportation and Planeshift are just expected at a certain level. The only question is whether you do it by NPC, Item or T1/T2-caster. Okay, some campaigns don't need or want it, but then you have to ban all of those other ways too. Also, clases aren't exactly focussed on these things - you don't build a class around 2-3 high-level spells - so you are not cutting into anyones territory.
But you don't need those functions in-combat - they are used on a strategic scale. This way, you can do it.

Commune with Nature covers a wide range of abilities. I just like the idea of nature-friendly magical girls, and the class has currently no use for Handle Animal. Admittedly this is cutting into nature-classes territory, but those usually get more spells and class abilities as well so it shouldnt be too bad.
Again, none of those spells find much use in combat anyway (other than Charm or maybe Calm Animal).

Mystic Knowledge is Divination-lite. Again, a a certain level the party is simply expected to have access to Divination, and its not something you do in combat. Now there are plenty of classes that focus on Divination, but those can do actual scrying, you just get locate object-person.
Identifying Items is just another chore that needs to be done.

Magic of Friendship removes one of my pet-peeves in D&D - that there are no good ways to communicate telepathically. All spells that allow it suffer from high level, low range or short duration. And all it leads to is characters not being able to communicate with each other - which is either ignored, or annoys the players. It doesn't intrude upon any classes territory or provides combat boni (other than maybe being able to communicate without the enemy listening in).

[Garryl]

Telepathic communication is definitely rarer than it needs to be. However, psionics gets it at level 1 for 10 minutes/level with the Mindlink power or relayed through a psicrystal at level 5, and a great many arcane caster builds dip 1 level into Mindbender for all day 100' telepathy (usually for use with the Mindsight feat).

I'd change the name of Commune with Nature to avoid confusion with the spell by the same name. Maybe Nature's Boon or Speak with Nature?

[Edog]

"But Nanoha isn't a Magical Girl anime! If anything, it's Shounen that just happens to have a Magical Girl as a protagonist!"
Yep, try that excuse. It might actually work.
I'm sure that would be helpful...If any of them knew what shonen meant :smalltongue:. I'm still kind of new to Japanese works--in fact, I had to look that word up just now--and the total experience my friends have with them is that one of them has read The Liar Game. I'm working on fixing that, but it'll take a while. Thanks for trying, though.


A slightly altered version of Starlight breaker. First it can now be used as a long-range area spell. Second, i was trying to replicate the "fueled by others magic"-aspect of it - the more magic there is on the battlefield, the more powerful it gets (though i capped the Save-DC increase). Last but not least it affects targets that are immune to non-lethal damage - including unattended objects such as walls.
Ah, that's much better. I was actually going to point out that it didn't work on undead, trolls etc. but it looks like you beat me to it. The increased motes cost (from 12 to 14) hurts a little, but considering the increased power and dispelling effects, it's definitely necessary. Also, blasting through walls with it is fun :smallbiggrin:


Stuff on magic rituals
It's definitely best not to give them that stuff in combat, and I like the whole "skill-based" idea--it gives the skills, and the class in general, more out-of-combat utility, which is always handy (especially for heal, since it kinda sucks). And it doesn't tread on anyone's toes; even the T1/T2 classes who'd normally be doing that stuff won't care, because a) they'll just take other spells, and b) because they're all-powerful T1/T2's. All in all, they seem pretty nice.

Edit: Forgot to mention, I approve of Defeat Means Friendship as a (sort of) game mechanic.

[Serafina]

How about some more bind-illuminations? We already have Chains of Concordance, which works fine, but i'll propose some variety.

Hindering Bind (1st-Level Burst)
Mote Cost: 1
Evocation Action: 1 Swift Action
Range: Short Range (25 + 5/two evoker levels ft.)
Duration: Instantaneous
Target: One Creature
Save: Reflex negates

If the target fails its reflex saving throw, it is entangled for a number of rounds equal to your charisma modifier. It can spend a move-action each round to break free with a new reflex-save or an Escape Artist check.

Well, single-target entanglement. Which means half movement, no charge, -2 to attack, -4 to dexterity and concentration checks when casting. But hey, people can also buy tanglefoot-bags for this.


Elemental Bind (3rd-level Burst)
Mote Cost: 3
Evocation Action: 1 Swift Action
Range: Short Range (25 + 5/two evoker levels ft.)
Duration: Instantaneous
Save: Reflex negages

If the target fails its saving throw, it becomes flat-footed and it takes 1D6 acid, electricity, fire, cold or sonic (your choice) damage each round, for a number of rounds equal to your charisma modifier.. All attacks that deal damage of that element deal an additional point of damage per damage die. The target can spend a move-action each round to break free with a new reflex-save or an Escape Artist check.

Flat-footed with all the juicy stuff that implies. The damage isn't huge, but if you like elemental attacks its a nice boost.

Prison of Magic (4th-level Burst
Mote Cost: 4
Evocation Action: 1 Swift Action
Range: Short Range (25 + 5/two evoker levels ft.)
Duration: Instantaneous
Save: Reflex negages

If the target fails its saving throw, you can make a target dispel attempt against it, as per Greater Dispel Magic, using your Evoker level as your caster level. Each round the target is affected by this bind, you can make a new dispel attempt as a free action. While it is affected, you automatically make a counter-spell-attempt as per Greater Dispel Magic whenever the target tries to cast a spell or use a spell-like ability. You gain a cumulative +3 bonus to your dispel- and counterspell-attempts for each such make you have already made.
This bind lasts for a number of rounds equal to your charisma modifier, and the target can attempt to escape by spending a move-action to make a new Reflex-save or an Escape Artist check.

Something to counter magic. Weaken buffed casters, and make it hard for them to cast to boot! Very hard, if you can maintain thi bind.

[NineThePuma]

Ahem.

I believe the appropriate response is as follows:


Luuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!


:P

(Seriously though, all we need is some equivalent to her E and I think we have her)

[LoneMage210]

Here's something to think when screwing around in a Gestalt format game: The Device replacement of Stargazer CANNOT be used to deliver Manuvers to your victim under any circumstances right? The reason of bringing that up was because of me screwing around in making a Stargazer and well, thought to take Warblade levels for extra HP, then forgot to factor in the Manuvers so here I am

[Selinia]

The Power of Teamwork Update [Part 1/4]

Well, here I am again, with a proper update! It's taken longer than I'd like to get back into my schedule, but you guys have been quite the help with all the content you've supplied! So this particular update is dedicated to all the contributors in the thread - thanks for keeping things going while I was away!

To keep this enormous pile of stuff manageable, I'll be posting it up in blocks. Today, we dig into Block 1/4 - a selection of Feats! It's the lightest of the blocks, but there's some good stuff here nonetheless.

Changelog:

Defensive Feats from Serafina! Protective Reflexes now has a modest Con prereq and serves as the root of its own feat tree, rather than subbing in for Combat Reflexes. Shield of Light now requires either a free hand or a shield to use its active ability, helping to differentiate shielded MGs from their 2-Her and dual-wielding cousins. How DARE You has been renamed Indignant Glare, and has picked up both buffs and restrictions: on one hand, it now lets you directly inflict Frightened, which is a much stronger condition than Shaken. On the other, you need to be threatening the foe you wish to intimidate, because locking nearly everyone in a room into attacking you is far too much for a single feat. Impassioned Gambit is new - my attempt to help flesh out the fledgling Protective Reflexes tree. Expect more feats in its vein once this monster of an update cluster is finished.
Magical Style Feats from Serafina! Radiant Mind, Luminous Body no longer axes MAD - the magical girl (and especially the Mistbreaker, to whom this feat appeals most) is already quite focused with their attributes, and the style feats related to this one all have Wis prereqs anyway. Also applied the Flurry penalty to the save DC of a strike you weave into one. Radiant Mist Style, Radiant Rinsing and Revealing Mist have been renamed (as Morning Mist Style, Cleansing Mist, and Blazing Mist, respectively) to reduce the number of occurrences of the word 'Radiant' in the class. The only non-semantic change was to Cleansing Mist - rather than give a +2 bonus to Sense Motive and replace Wis with Cha, the feat now simply allows the user to add her Cha directly to sense motive checks. This makes it a mite more useful to high-Charisma characters.


Other questions, please stand by as I reboot my question-answering gears and get back in the swing of things here! :smallsmile:

[Snowfire]

Pre-reqs for Blazing Mist and Cleansing Mist still reference Radiant Mist Style instead of Morning Mist Style.

Other than that, loving it so far and can't wait to see part 2 :smallsmile:

[Serafina]

Yay :smallbiggrin:

Blazing Mist needs an errata:

all enemies within 20 feet of that enemy are revealed AS if being viewed by a Truesight spell. - it's supposed to make enemies visible, without the "as" in there it doesn't really work.

I also like the new feat. It gives a good use for AoOs, and enticing the enemy to attack in return is a good idea.

[Qwertystop]

How long does the mist from Morning Mist last?

[Serafina]

A single round, so until the start of your next turn. At least thats the way i wrote that ability.

[Princess Tracy]

Here's some feats.

Element Focus
You embody a certain ideal in your costume beyond the abilities of most of your peer magical girls
Prerequisite: Costume Class Feature
Benefit: Select one costume element you are capable of using. While in costume, you are treated as always having one more costume point invested into that element than you do (1 if no points are invested).
Special: You can select this feat multiple times. It's effects do not stack. Each time you select this feat, choose a different costume element.

Last Stand
You can use the pure power of light to keep yourself on your feet even when you would be overwhelmed
Prerequisite: Radiant Soul
Benefit: You add your Magical Girl level to the maximum number of negative HP you can fall you before dying. For instance, if you would normally die at -10 HP and you have 7 levels in magical girl, you instead die at -17 HP. In addition, when you would be reduced to or below 0HP, you can avoid falling unconscious by entering a Last Stand. While in a Last Stand, you do not fall unconscious when at negative HP, but do not regenerate motes every turn. If you run out of motes, you can no longer maintain the Last Stand, and may fall unconscious as normal. This feat does not stop you from dying from hit point damage. When in a Last Stand, you can act as if staggered at no cost, but to ignore that condition for a round you must pay 1 mote. You can leave Last Stand at any time, dropping your current mote pool down to 0 and falling unconscious if still at negative HP, as normal. If you do this, you automatically succeed at stabilizing.

[Selinia]

The Magical Idol

Contributed by Serafina

"Crank up the volume and listen real close - this is my song, and the whole world is gonna hear it loud and clear!"
-Iwasawa, a Magical Idol
[/CENTER]
Requirements
To become a magical idol, you must fulfill all the following criteria.
Feats: Luminous Symphony
Skills: Perform (Any) 8 ranks
Special: Bardic Music class feature, Costume class feature

Despite being named Magical Idol Singer, there is no real reason to restrict her to just Singing, so you can use any sort of performance.

I've left Serafina's author's notes here - they'll be in the black text like up above. If I have something to add to it, it'll be in teal, like this. For now, all I'll note is that per general thread consensus, 3.5 is the default system for a magical girl. As such, I'll be going through and converting anything that needs an edition shift - like the prerequisites here.


Skills: Concentration (Con), Bluff (Cha), Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Gather Information (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Heal (Wis), Jump (Str), Knowledge [History], Knowledge [Local], Knowledge [Nobility and Royalty], Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha)
Skill Points at Each Level: 6 + Int modifier


You're still a Magical Girl, but your abilities lend themselves more towards your social site. The Knowledge skills are mostly for flavor though.

Magical Idols are half-bard, and they've got a lot of skills to work with. So they get a few more points to spend than a run of the mill magical girl - particularly useful if they want to start building up on some of their new skills without neglecting old ones.

Hit Die: D8
{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special | Spellcasting

1st|+0|+0|+1|+1| Voice of Light, Costume, Illuminations, Inspire Courage | +1 level of existing bard spellcasting

2nd|+1|+1|+1|+1| Rapture of the Song (+2 AC) | +1 level of existing illumination-using class, +1 level of existing bard spellcasting

3rd|+1|+1|+2|+2| Song of Sorrow | +1 level of existing bard spellcasting

4th|+2|+1|+2|+2| Rapture of the Song (+2 Saves), Arcane Performance| +1 level of existing illumination-using class, +1 level of existing bard spellcasting

5th|+2|+2|+3|+3| Ballad of Friendship |
---

6th|+3|+2|+3|+3| Chorus of Light | +1 level of existing illumination-using class, +1 level of existing bard spellcasting

7th|+3|+2|+4|+4| Lyrics of Light | +1 level of existing bard spellcasting

8th|+4|+3|+4|+4| Rapture of the Song (Freedom of Movement) | +1 level of existing illumination-using class, +1 level of existing bard spellcasting

9th|+4|+3|+5|+5| Melody of Magic | +1 level of existing bard spellcasting

10th|+5|+3|+5|+5| Perfect Chorus | +1 level of existing illumination-using class[/table]

The same chassis as the Magical Girl, plus half Bardic Spellcasting, full Costume and half Illumination progression, in addition to boni while singing and lots of new songs.

A fairly major chassis alteration - Illuminations now progress at 5/10ths, and Bard spellcasting progresses at 8/10ths. It's an unusual progression, but the buff is a bit of payback for the slightly beefed requirements. It also makes entering as a bard primary a bit less painful! On the other hand, the class now rolls with Low BAB.She can probably still front-line purely based on how much of her power a magical girl draws from a costume, but she's not a melee powerhouse.

Costume: This functions identically to the magical girl class feature of the same name, and magical girl and magical idol levels stack to determine how many costume points she may allocate to her costume. To determine the maximum point value for her costume’s features, add together the maximum values granted by all her instances of this class feature.

Because who has ever heard of a Idol Singer without a fancy dress?

Illuminations: At 2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th and 10th levels, the magical idol gains an increase in all aspects of her illuminations class feature, as if she had gained a level in magical girl. At 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th ad 9th levels, and for each bard level she has, she gains a +1 bonus to her evoker level and increases the size of her mote pool by one.

You can use Motes for your Bardic Performance, so they advance fully. You also get new Illuminations, because you're still supposed to be a Magical Girl, just one with a different style.

Follows the New Standard Template - her mote pool and evoker level rise constantly, but her other benefits get a much less prestigious progression.

Spellcasting: At each level except 5th and 10th, a magical idol gains new spells per day, spells known, and an increase in caster level as if she had gained a level in bard.

Bardic spellcasting is mostly Utility-casting, so this doesn't make you much stronger in Combat. However, you CAN use it to fuel your Arcane Performances. And you still don't need a single level in Bard.

Not to sound contradictory, but you need levels in bard now! This is a theurge class, at heart, and despite tighter requirements I think this is ultimately a buff. Bard spells are unappreciated - keep their level up, and there's a lot you can do.

Idol Music: A magical idol can produce incredible effects with her performances, stirring hearts and moving bodies to action. Idol music follows the same rules as bardic music. Each use of idol music costs one daily use of bardic music to activate. Magical idol levels stack with bard levels for purposes of determining how many daily uses of bardic music and idol music the character has. The Save-DC for all idol music that allows a save is equal to [10 + 1/2 * her level in classes that advance your idol music + her Charisma modifier]. The targets of your performance must be able to perceive it just like with normal Bardic Performances.

Some idol music effects include a secondary effect, called a refrain. In any round when a seeker concentrates on an idol music effect and expends a number of motes (specified in the effect), she can activate the refrain associated with that idol music effect. The action used to trigger a refrain varies with effect. The original effects of the song do not end; the idol can maintain the song and activate the refrain simultaneously.

As a free action, you can spend three Motes to gain one virtual use of bardic music. You can do so multiple times per encounter, but each time you do so during the same encounter the mote cost increases by one. Uses of bardic music accumulated by this ability may be used exactly as normal uses are, but vanish at the end of an encounter if not expended.

So you get and advance Bardic Performance, regardless of whether you're already a Bard or not. And since you're supposed to do something other than Perform (and for all those who don't take Bard-levels for this Archetype), you can use it as a Move-Action right away.

A limitation to rounds/day is a pain in the ass. This ability fixes that, and you can perform all day long, eventually at the cost of not regenerating any motes.

The same in spirit, somewhat different in text! This effectively merges idol and bardic performances together, using verbiage that is probably familiar to anyone who knows their bard prestige classes. Music uses are fairly pricy, but they're still there if you want them.
Songs:
Inspire Courage: A magical idol's voice fills all who hear it with vibrant joy. This functions identically to the bardic music of the same name, and levels in magical idol and bard stack to determine the bonuses it grants.

It's Inspire Courage, except that it stacks with other boni. Such as Heroism. You also get Countersong, except that it's actually reactive and works against every type of spell - in other words, you'll actually use it.

It's inspire courage, literally! This is a mixed blessing, but ultimately a buff, I think. Yes, Joy was slightly stronger, but Inspire courage has an insane amount of support. I'd hate to deny the awesomeness of the ability with an incompatible name.

Song of Sorrow (Su): Not all music is joyous - a magical idol's song expresses her sorrow at the violence to which she has been forced. Enemies affected must make a Will saving throw or take penalties to attack and damage rolls equal to the bonuses granted by your inspire courage idol music. This is a fear-based effect.

Song of Sorrow, Refrain (Su): As a move action that consumes three motes, the magical idol can weave a melody that weighs her enemies down with guilt and despair. Enemies within 60 feet who fail a Will saving throw treat all terrain as difficult for two rounds. This is a fear-based effect.

A wide-area debuff. Unless you are up against a large number of enemies OR your group doesn't need Inspire Courage (maybe they hit anyway, maybe they are spellcasters), Song of Joy is better though. The Refrain however allows you to keep enemies from maneuvering, and we all know how powerful that can be.

Not much to add or change here! The defensive counterpart to Inspire Courage. Niche, but useful, and very fitting to a magical girl's traditionally defensive role.

Ballad of Friendship (Su): Affected allies automatically succeed on aid another attempts. The bonuses granted by aid another are increased by the idol's Inspire Courage bonus, adding to the bonus usually granted by the aid another action.

Ballad of Friendship, Refrain (Su): As a swift action that consumes two motes, you allow all allies to use aid another as a move action until the beginning of your next turn.
If you really really need to succeed at something, use this. It's situational, but it can grant a larger increase than Inspire Courage.

Lyrics of Light (Su): Your song brings forth a brilliant display of light that seems to wash away all problems. Affected allies gain Fast Healing equal to twice your Inspire Courage Bonus.

Lyrics of Light, Refrain (Su): As a full-round action that consumes seven motes, you can make a Perform Check. Affected allies within 60 feet are healed by an amount equal to your perform check, while affected enemies within 60 feet take damage equal to your perform check. A successful will save halves this damage.

You'll really use this for the refrain. It's probably amongst the strongest option against hordes, though spamming it will be expensive

As a nice side effect, you make wands of CLW obsolete! An excellent source of out-of-combat healing, though in combat usefulness is really limited to the refrain.

Melody of Magic (Su): Music and Magic are one and the same to a magical idol, and her magic is intrinsically tied to to her song. Affected allies add +2 to the save DC of all their abilities, and +4 to all saving throws.

This buffs everything that matters at higher levels. And remember that you can sing two songs by now, so you don't even have to choose and will probably keep this running all the time.

The refrain was... difficult to manage, balance wise. Ultimately, it got the axe as unnecessary. But even without it, this is still arguably the best effect an idol gets - esoteric inspire courage, if you will.

Arcane Performance (Su): When a magical idol initiates idol music or bardic music she may, as a free action, sacrifice an arcane spell to add one of the following effects to those of her performance. A magical idol can sacrifice multiple spells to activate multiple options simultaneously, and each option performs at the level of the spell she sacrificed to gain it.

All effects last as long as the idol continues to perform, or for one minute, whichever comes first. If she switches from one kind of performance to another, the effects do not end - they cease only when she ceases to perform a Bardic Performance altogether. The magical idol can end individual arcane performances whenever she wishes as a free action.

All effects that mirror spells use the magical idol's bard level to determine her caster level.

Dancing Spotlights: The magical idol creates four narrow pillars of light per level of the sacrificed spell, each filling a single square and casting light as a torch. She may place as many pillars in a single square as she wishes and may move all of them simultaneously with a single move action, with a fly speed of 30 ft and a maneuverability of perfect. A creature who shares a space with those lights gains a +1 competence bonus to charisma-based skill checks for each pillar in its square, up to twice the level of the sacrificed spell. It also gains a +1 morale bonus to attack rolls for every four pillars (rounded down) in its square.

Arcane Amplifiers: The idol can choose one square per level of the spell sacrificed - she must have line of sight to the square, but the range of this ability is otherwise unlimited. The magical idol's performance can be perceived as if she were standing in those squares in addition to her own square. Creatures in that square are deafened or blinded (the effect is chosen when activating this ability) for as long as they remain in that square if they fail a fortitude save against her idol music.

Luminous Choreography: Each time the magical idol takes a Move action during her turn and moves at least ten feet, she creates one Mirror Image, which functions identically to those created by the spell of the same name. The idol can have a number of Mirror Images equal to the level of the spell sacrificed. She gains a +2 bonus to perform checks for each Mirror Image you have.

Ocean of Cheers: One ally per level of the sacrificed spell can make an Aid Another Perform check as an immediate reaction. They gain a +2 bonus to their perform checks for each level of the spell sacrificed. For each ally that succeeds, the save DC of the magical idol's idol music increases by one.

Radiant Fog: Fog spreads around the idol, covering a radius centered on her equal to 5 ft per level of spell sacrificed. This fog functions identically to that produced by the Obscuring Mist spell, but never impedes perception of the magical idol's performance. Allies within the fog receive a +5 bonus to their Acrobatics checks to move trough threatened squares per level of spell sacrificed, and enemies receive an equal penalty. The fog cloud does not move with the idol, remaining stationary on the place of its creation.

You are your own rock-concert! And you get a way to effectively use those low-level spellslots you have.

Battlefield control like a rock-star! This isn't always going to be a good way to spend your precious spell slots, but there are certainly worse ones. As a spontaneous caster, more options are always welcome!

Rapture of the Song: While maintaining any idol music or bardic music, a magical idol gains a +2 Dodge Bonus to her AC. At 4th-level, she also gains a +2 sacred Bonus to her saving throws. At 8th-level, she gains Freedom of Movement while performing.

This is blatantly stolen from the Seeker of the Song, except that it stacks with everything else.

Defenses and mobility. 'Nuff said.

Luminous Chorus: At 6th-level, a magical idol can maintain two idol music or bardic music effects at the same time. This second performance is initiated as normal, but each round she wishes to sustain it the magical idol must make a concentration check against a DC of 25. Failure on this check results in the second performance immediately ending unless the magical idol spends a standard action to focus herself completely on maintaining the complex performance.

You can maintain two songs at the same time, but at the risk of constantly needing to spend actions to do so.

Perfect Chorus: The magical idol no longer needs to make concentration checks to a second performance.

Your Capstone. Combine two buffs at your leisure.

[Selinia]

The Aerial Mage
Contributed by Serafina

"The wind is in the sky and the stars are in the heavens and a resolute heart beats within my chest!"
-Nanoha Takamachi, Aerial Mage

Many Magical Girls represent freedom, and what could be more free than the skies?

The ability to fly is often the most cherished ability of Magical Girls that become Aerial Mages. They embrace it and train hard to move trough the air with utmost grace and speed.

Requirements:
To become an Aerial Mage, you must meed the following requirements:
Skills: 12 ranks in Tumble
Special: Must be able to invest at least three points into the Weightless Costume effect
Special: Must have defeated a flying foe with a challenge rating equal to or greater than your HD without touching the ground for the duration of the combat

You're supposed to be a good flyer. Thus these prerequisites - note that Tumble is supposed to be used for 3.5 and Fly for Pathfinder.

As with the Magical Idol, I'll be making my comments in teal, Serafina's will be in black! Here, a minor added fluff requirement - calling back to the Ace Pilots of bygone days, an aerial mage can't really call herself that until she's won a proper dogfight!

Class Skill List: Concentration (Con), Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Gather Information (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Heal (Wis), Jump (Str), Knowledge [Arcana] (Int), Knowledge [The Planes] (Int), Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Search (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), Spot (Wis) Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha)
Skill Points at Each Level: 4 + Int modifier

Like the Magical Girl, but with added Spot and Search because doing so from the air is beneficial, but hard.

Aerial Mage
Hit Dice: D8
{table=head] Level | BAB | Fort | Ref | Will | Special | Illumination
1st | +1 | +0 | +1 | +1 | Themed Costume (+1), Nimble Flyer | +1 level of existing illumination-using class

2nd | +2 | +1 | +1 | +1 | Aerial Evasion, Aerial Maneuver (1) Winged Speed +10 |
---

3rd | +3 | +1 | +2 | +2 | Aerial Maneuver (2), Supersonic Flight, Themed Costume (+2) | +1 level of existing illumination-using class

4th | +4 | +1 | +2 | +2 | Aerial Maneuver (3), Improved Aerial Evasion, Winged Speed +20 |
---

5th | +5 | +2 | +3 | +3 | Aerial Maneuver (4), Freedom of the Skies, Themed Costume (+3) | +1 level of existing illumination-using class[/table]

Same Chassis as the Magical Girl, but using Pathfinder-prestige class progression (which mostly reduces the gap betwen good and bad saves.

Left the same, save for bumping BAB to full. The aerial mage seems martially-focused enough that she'd pick up some honest combat prowess in the midst of all those fancy tricks.

Themed Costume: An aerial mage does not gain costume points or increase the investment limit for her costume effects. At 1st level, and again at 4th level, she permanently ingrains one point into the weightless effect into her costume. These permanent effects cannot be reallocated, do not consume costume points, and do not count against the maximum number of costume points the aerial mage may invest in any given effect.

3 Costume points in 5 levels are a very good deal, but the rest of your costume will be weaker.

Reworded slightly to mesh with the Prism Knight feature of the same name.

Illuminations: At 1st, 3rd and 5th level, the Aerial Mage increases all aspects of her Illumination class feature by one. At 2nd and 4th levels, she gains a +1 bonus to her evoker level and increases the size of her mote pool by one.

Nimble Flyer (Ex): The aerial mage can use her Charisma modifier instead of her Dexterity modifier for tumble skill checks.

The Grace-part of an Aerial Mages flight. Worded that way to be compatible with both Pathfinder and 3.5

Aerial Evasion (Ex): So long as the aerial mage remains airborne, she gains all the benefits of the Evasion class feature. If she already have evasion, she gains the benefits of Improved Evasion instead.

Because its much easier to dodge a fireball when you can fly.

Winged Speed (Su): At 2nd level, and again at 4th level, an aerial mage's fly speed increases by 10 feet. This is doubled as usual if she has 6 or more points in the Weightless costume effect.

The speed-part of an Aerial Mages flight.

Aerial Maneuver (Su): At each level beyond 1st, the mage learns a single Aerial Maneuver from the following list. The aerial mage may alter her selections freely whenever she would be able to reallocate her costume points.

Radiant Tornado: As a full-round action that consumes two motes, the aerial mage can move her speed in a straight line. She may make a melee attack at her full base attack bonus against each enemy adjacent to any point along her path. If she wishes, the aerial mage can replace any number of these attacks with standard-action Strike illuminations, but she must pay the full mote cost for each strike used. Movement from this maneuver provokes attacks of opportunity, though tumble checks can be used to negate it as normal.

Barrel Roll: Once per round as an immediate reaction to being hit by a ranged attack, the aerial mage can pay two motes to make a tumble check. Treat the result as her new AC and Touch AC against ranged attacks and ranged touch attacks until the beginning of her next turn.

Sonic Charge: When the aerial mage makes a charge attack, she can pay a mote to move three times her speed (rather than twice her speed, as usual for such an action). This immense speed produces a sonic boom - enemies within 5 feet of the squares through which she passes during her charge take 1D6 sonic damage per point in the Weightless costume effect and must make a Fortitude save (with a save DC equal to that of her illuminations) or be knocked prone by the blast.

Rays from Above: When the aerial mage uses a Blast illumination and is targeting a creature at a lower altitude, she can pay one mote to increase the size of its damage die by one step (in most cases, converting d6s to d8s). If she is directly above her target, the damage die grow by two sizes (usually from d6s to 2d6s).

Radiant Shockwave: The aerial mage's movement produces a brilliant nimbus of light, making it harder to accurately target those near her. Whenever she moves at least 30 ft in one round, the aerial mage can pay one mote to grant herself and any allies adjacent to her at the end of her movement 20% concealment against incoming attacks. If she moved a distance greater than her fly speed, this concealment increases to 50%.

Sonic Sprint: As a swift action that consumes two motes, the aerial mage can move up to her fly speed without provoking attacks of opportunity. This movement must be in a straight line.

The reason why you take this Prestige class. Something for everyone, and more may be added.

I have little to add here. These are excellent! Take them!

Supersonic Flight (Su): All Aerial Mages are renowned for their speed, but only the best manage to surpass the sound barrier.

Over the course of five rounds (all spent moving forward in a straight line at your running speed) the aerial mage can accelerate to supersonic speed. While at Supersonic Speed, her maneuverability drops to clumsy and she moves two miles (approximately 15,000 feet, or 3,000 squares) in a straight line each round. If the aerial mage collides with any obstacle while moving at such a prodigeous speed, she takes 10D10 bludgeoning damage and are stunned for 1D6 rounds. She can drop out of supersonic speed at the beginning of her round, but the aerial mage must spend the next three rounds moving forward in a straight line at her running speed in order to slow down safely.

A way to cross large distances quickly. Obviously not supposed to be used in combat, unless you have an enemy that is just as quick.

Aerial mages are the fastest. The fastest. In theory, this ability could be used to turn a reckless magical girl into a living battering ram, but that is something I leave to GM discretion!

Improved Aerial Evasion (Ex): At 4th-level, So long as the aerial mage remains airborne, she gains the benefits of the Improved Evasion class feature.

Freedom of the Skies (Su): If any effect (such as an Antimagic Field) would disrupt an aerial mage's Weightless costume effect or stop her from moving, you can make a tumble check as a free action. If the result of this check is higher than [10 + the caster level of the disrupting effect], it does not interfere with the aerial mage's flight speed or ability to fly in any manner, though it affects her normally in all other respects.

You love flying, and this class revolves around flying - so its hard to stop you from flying. Yes, you can fly in an Antimagic Field.

* * * * * * *


Some Magical Girls move with equal speed and grace as Aerial Mages, but on the ground rather than in the air. Change all references of Weightless to Quick, all references of fly speed to base land speed and replace Supersonic Flight with the following ability.

Magical Parkour (Su): By gathering speed for two rounds (running in a straight line at your run speed) you can being a Magical Parkour run. During this run you automatically move double your base land speed at the beginning of each of your turns, and do not gain a move action (only a standard and a swift). Further, you can multiply all jump-distances by 10, and your jump distances are limited by your run-speed instead of your normal land speed. You do not take damage from falling during your Parkour, but you can not avoid attacks of opportunity. You can also run on any solid or liquid surface, including vertical ones, and are not hindered by difficult terrain. You must move at least double your speed during your Parkour, and can end it by spending a standard action to decelerate.



To convert the aerial mage for use in the Pathfinder system, convert all instances of the Tumble skill to Fly. In addition, the aerial mage may use fly checks in place of acrobatics checks when attempting to move without provoking attacks of opportunity.

The Pathfinder aerial mage requires only 9 ranks in fly as a prequisite, not 12.

The Pathfinder aerial mage's class skill list consists only of Fly and Perception.

[Selinia]

Errata!

Thank you! These should be fixed now.


Magical Girl is/is not reflective of the genre for which it is named!

I would like to mention that the magical girl, despite her name, is basically a deranged genre smoothie. She has elements of a ton of different subgenres, and not all of them are even magical girl shows. Stargazer, perhaps her oddest archetype, is essentially a Pokemon trainer and Lain jammed into a blender and whipped into a mindraping abomination of adorableness who eats people memories with a ghost puppy. By this point, magical girls are tied together more by mechanics than source material - its an homage to the genre of magical girls, and action-oriented ones like Nanoha in particular, but I'm not using 'how accurate it this to show X, Y, or Z' as a major metric in development.

Speaking of development, something that took me slightly longer than expected!

The Power of Teamwork Update [Part 2/4]

This time, the focus in on the class's various Prestige classes! With a couple exceptions, these have tended to be overshadowed by the main class, but a few tweaks have helped them onto a more manageable track, in my opinon. Not to mention to entirely new classes the thread has submitted!

Changelog:

The Costumed Crusader, Prism Knight, and Sempai have been converted to a new model of illumination advancement - one that I intend to use for future PrCs as well. Evoker level and mote pool increase every level, while all other illumination-related features (such as mote regeneration, illuminations readied, and the like) advance only on 'beat' levels, not dissimilar to a casting progression class. This keeps a stable resource pool and maintains save DCs (which often lag behind saves anyway) while still limiting access to more powerful illuminations. I'd like to give a shout-out here to Draken, who devised this rather superb solution and saved me much dithering.
The Sempai has experienced significant buffs - notably, she now gains access to Pep Talk a level earlier, advances it a point further, and enjoys much less situational buffs from it. She also benefits greatly from the new progression system, with a solid 8/10 progression.
The Prism Knight has picked up a handful of new Prisms.
The Magical Idol, contributed by Serafina, has been added to the PrC roster! While I did my best to keep the heart of the class intact, I made a single fairly major change to it - it now requires Bard to enter, and advances its bard side considerably more vigorously. While she may not be the powerhouse some of her sisters are, the magical idol is one of the most potent dedicated support units you could see on a battlefield, meshing together two classes known for the role into something quite powerful.
Two new idol-related feats have been added to the core list! Luminous Symphony helps economize radiant focus, while Reverberating Light is a boon to blasters everywhere.
The Aerial Mage, also contributed by Serafina, has been added to the PrC roster! A precise, agile, and insanely mobile fighter capable of filling a number of different combat roles - she has less brute force than a costumed crusader, but the aerial mage has a definite niche for those who prefer finesse to firepower!


Coming up next - archetypes!

[Owrtho]

Yay, update. Anyway, first thought I'd note that on the Aerial Mage, for pathfinder conversion you note it only has Fly and Perception as class skills. It seems that it should still have things like Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Handle Animal (Cha), Heal (Wis), Knowledge [Arcana] (Int), Knowledge [The Planes] (Int), Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), and Use Magic Device (Cha) in addition to those two.

Anyway, is it intended that Luminous Symphony (and consequently the Magical Idol) is not accessible to Devicers due to their lack of the Radiant Focus class feature?

Otherwise, the addition of bard being required for the Magical Idol is a shame (it would be nice to have a music themed magical girl prc that didn't require multiclassing), but understandable. That said, Arcane Performance should allow the magical girl to sacrifice multiple spells to the same performance, having the sum of the spell levels used in such an event.

Owrtho

[jamieth]

Yay, update. Anyway, first thought I'd note that on the Aerial Mage, for pathfinder conversion you note it only has Fly and Perception as class skills. It seems that it should still have things like Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Handle Animal (Cha), Heal (Wis), Knowledge [Arcana] (Int), Knowledge [The Planes] (Int), Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), and Use Magic Device (Cha) in addition to those two.
Owrtho

Well, first of all, some of these skills do not exist in Pathfinder at all (for example, Escape Artist is a subset of Acrobatics, I believe), but, more importantly, as far as I remember, in Pathfinder, all skills cost the same 1 point/rank anyway, and class skills only provide an additional +3 while trained; therefore, a skill that is class skill for one of your classes is always a class skill for you. Since you can't enter Aerial Mage without having levels in MG, those skills would be class for you anyway.

Unless, of course, I'm missing something.

[Princess Tracy]

You got it mostly right, except Escape Artist is still it's own skill. In fact.. yeah, all those skills exist. But yeah the 'once a class skill, always a class skill' clause still stands

[sajuuk]

All right, so I've been convinced by one of my DMs (who has no account here) to end my lurking and post his feedback on this class. Why he won't do it himself, I have no idea.


To the creator: please look back over and reconsider your illuminations list. They're so unbalanced they teeter on the side of insanity.

I was introduced to this class by one of my players and fellow GMs. Inspired by the sheer creativity in mechanics shown in this class I quickly grew to become a fan advocating its use. It's unique and really merged all the best aspects of both Incarnum and Tome of Battle combat mechanics, even putting aside that I am a Nanoha fan (awaiting the 2nd movie!). I also found the base class rather balanced in advancement, although I won't speak of the PrCs (all of the 5lvl ones are too crammed and OP imo, and sempai is positively broken as it boosts a small squad even better than the best Marshal design), but that's for other GMs to decide...

But the illuminations... there is so much overpoweredness that I had to say something. Let me raise some examples:

Lvl1s:

Beacon of Serenity - swift action to gain level+CHA temporary HP per round for a mote cost that regenerates every turn. This, alone, makes any melee magical girl build the best tank in the game as they can continuously create a buffer of HP that has to be worn down. Since the duration is until end of encounter, the magical girl can go full-offense until the opponent does take down that buffer.
Comparison: Cleric's basic Aid spell (SpLvl2) gives only 1d8+CL temporary HP, as a standard action.
Suggestion: make this just tempHP = Charisma mod. As a swift action, single mote ability in a CHA-class, that's already extremely powerful.

Fragile Shell - swift action to make a wall that blocks movement, no matter how fragile, is ridiculous. The enemy has to spend an attack (or multiple attacks at low lvls, given the HP here) taking down a wall that you can raise as swift actions before they get to you? Instantly the best field-control (divide and conquer!) and rear guard character.
Comparison: Solid wall spells, by and most aren't available until SpLvl4+ (although Spell Compendium's Dark Way is lvl2).
Suggestion: actually this is so abusable I don't know where to start. Recommend making it standard action for starters, with either (1) and upkeep or (2) ability for enemy to break through with a strength check so they don't have to spend actions attacking it.

Heartbreaker - -4xhit dmg isn't too bad, but... +1roll/turn is too many for already overloaded GMs. Tracking fluctuating penalties is even more annoying. I can see most GMs banning this out of sheer annoyance after a few encounters (I know I would!)

Homing Shot - low damage multi-shot spell is fine, and I love the Accel Shooter concept too, but this is way too powerful at lower lvls --- when mages can't consistently make Concentration checks (they need to hit med-lvl for that), a rapid barrage of shots at them in response to any cast is very liking to disrupt spellcasting, making this an extremely overpowered low-lvl counterspell. At higher lvls, the right build to increase output damage can still keep this useful (and abusable).
Comparison: what comparison, there is NO immediate action target-anyone-you-want-in-range attack spells at lower lvls.

Spotlight - this spell need clarification on how it works against magical darkness. The ability to clear any magical darkness, even say, SpLvl9 Utterdark (BoVD?) with just a lvl1 swift action is over the bounds of insanity. -1 penalty to enemies and +1 bonus to allies makes this equivalent to a Prayer (Cleric SpLvl4) spell, except also clearing darkness + reposition at will + swift action cast? This is the equivalent of a SpLvl7+ ability if I've seen one.



Lvl2s:

Angel / Blinding Buster - at class level 6 when this is first gained, it costs 3 motes while one regens 2/round. With Radiant Focus that easily meaning this is a 1/round spammable action, at 6d6+Charisma damage, at medium range, double the damage of Warlocks and without burning slots like Wizards... wut? Max damage vs all those creature types make the Paladin look useless in comparison at med levels.

Chains of Concordance - lvl+CHA grapple mod is already equal to Fighter builds (meaning Wizards have no chance, and Rogues little unless they invested Escape Artist). Add a +4 on top and SWIFT action cast... seriously, just spam.
Comparison: Telekinesis is a CL + casting mod grapple, but takes a standard action to cast AND requires concentration to use AND burns a SpLvl5 slot.

...and on...



I hope the creators consider this message and reconsider their designs. It would be a shame for many a GM to ban this class purely because they, as I did, opened up the illumination list and realized how much abusable potential over half the list had that easily allow a magical girl to outdo the rest of the party.

[Chronologist]

The Exemplar of Harmony

http://img855.imageshack.us/img855/5299/mlpsailorsenshibyyoukai.jpg

"You think you can destroy the Elements of Harmony just like that? Well you're wrong! Because the spirits of the Elements of Harmony... are RIGHT HERE!" T. Sparkle, Exemplar of Magic/Hope



There comes a point where a magical girl ceases to simply exemplify the forces of good and light – she becomes them. This transition is rare and unconventional for a Magical Girl, but allows them to expand the subtle influence of their powers, as well as transcend mortality itself in time. Though there are only six Elements, the number of potential Exemplar of Harmony is not so limited - each character is simply a manifestation of that concept.

Requirements:
To become an Exemplar of Harmony, you must meet the following prerequisites:
Skills: 18 ranks in Diplomacy
Feat: Harmonic Resonance
Special: Pure of Heart class feature, 10 or more levels of classes and prestige classes that grant Illuminations

Class Skill List: Concentration (Con), Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Gather Information (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Heal (Wis), Jump (Str), Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha)

Skill Points at Each Level: 4 + Int modifier

Exemplar of Harmony
Hit Dice: d6

{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special|Illuminations
1|+0|+0|+0|+2|Anthropomorphic Personification, Illumination Mastery|+1 level
2|+1|+0|+0|+3|Illumination Mastery|+1 level
3|+1|+1|+1|+3|Illumination Mastery, Costume +1|+1 level
4|+2|+1|+1|+4|Illumination Mastery|+1 level
5|+2|+1|+1|+4|Illumination Mastery, Becoming Hope|+1 level[/table]


Weapons and Armor Proficiencies: An Exemplar of Harmony gains no additional proficiency with any kind of weapon or armor.

Anthropomorphic Personification (Su): At 1st level, an Exemplar of Harmony selects one of the following, each an exemplary quality that Magical Girls hold dear. It must match her Harmony selected by the Harmonic Resonance feat. As a full-round action, she can temporarily shed her mortality and become an anthropomorphic personification of her chosen element. Each element grants a number of special benefits, but they all share the same following benefits:

- Gains the Outsider (Native) type and subtype, replacing her own for the duration, with all the benefits that grants.

- Incorporeal for the duration, though the Exemplar of Harmony may concentrate as a free action to lower this quality until the beginning of their next turn.

- Gain a Fly speed equal to her base land speed. If she already possessed a fly speed, her speed increases by 30 feet.

- The number of Motes you recover each round and the save DC of your Illuminations, if any, is increased by 2.

In addition, each Exemplar of Harmony in this state radiates an aura reaching out 100 feet per Exemplar of Harmony level, which forces all creatures within the radius to act as if they had your Harmonic Resonance feat, except they get a Will save DC is 20 + your Charisma modifier in order to resist the cumulative penalty. Only good creatures, however, gain the benefits of your feat.

An Exemplar of Harmony can maintain this state for a number of minutes per day equal to their class level plus their Charisma modifier. They can deactivate the state as a free action, but they can only spend time in this state in 1-minute increments.

Illumination Mastery: At 1st level and every level thereafter, an Exemplar of Harmony gains an Illumination Mastery from the list below. Once learned, an Illumination Mastery cannot be changed.

Illumination Masteries:
Blast of Power: As a standard action, an Exemplar of Harmony may fire a number of magical bolts, just like a Blast Illumination. She fires one bolt per Element of Harmony level, plus two per Mote spent, and they have a range of Medium. She cannot spend more motes than her class level in this way. Each bolt inflicts 1d6 damage, and functions as a Magic Missile spell for all intents and purposes (i.e. it hits automatically, can be distributed among any number of targets within range, but can be blocked with Shield spells and the like)

Augmented Reach: Select a single Strike Illumination you know. You may make attacks with that Strike Illumination as ranged touch attacks with a 30-foot range. This ability may be taken more than once, each time, select a different Strike Illumination.

Prismatic Shift: Select a single Illumination you know that inflicts damage. As a free action when you use that Illumination, you may choose to have it deal fire, electricity, cold, or electricity damage instead of its normal damage. This ability can be taken more than once, each time, select a different Illumination.

Shaping Mastery: Select a single Illumination you know with an burst, cone, cylinder, emanation, or spread shape. When you use that Illumination, you may choose to exclude a number of squares within the area from being affected by the Illumination. You may take this ability more than once, each time you select a different Illumination.

Off the Walls: Select a single Illumination you know with a line of effect. When you use that Illumination, you may have the line make as many 90-degree turns as you wish, in the direction you wish, until its range runs out. This effectively allows you to fire lines around corners, in circles, and around allies. You may take this ability more than once, each time you select a different Illumination.

Expanded Radius: Select an Aura Illumination that you know. That Aura’s range is doubled. You may take this ability more than once, each time you select a different Illumination.

Favored Illumination: Select a single Illumination you know. When you enter combat, you may choose to remove a number of Motes from your pool equal to that Illumination’s mote cost. If you do, you may use that Illumination for free up to 2 times during that encounter. You may take this ability more than once, each time you select a different Illumination.



Illuminations: At 1st level and every level thereafter, an Exemplar of Harmony improves her ability to use Illuminations as though she gained a level in Magical Girl.

Costume: At 3rd level, an Exemplar of Harmony gains an additional +1 to her Costume bonus.

Becoming Hope: At 5th level, an Exemplar of Harmony is constantly an Anthropomorphic Personification, as the class feature, and instead can lower the ability for a number of minutes per day equal to her class level plus her Charisma modifier, spent in 1-minute increments. In addition, the Exemplar of Harmony ceases to age and is functionally immortal - so long as she remains in her anthropomorphic state, if slain she rises from the grave 1 week later in a random place on the material plane up to 5d% from her last location on that plane. Each time after the first each year she rises, she loses one level, as the spell Resurrection. If brought down to her human state by her own will, she can be killed and raised normally.

Harmonic Resonance (General Feat)
Prerequisites: Pure of Heart, 6th level
Benefit: Select one of the following Elements of Harmony. You must follow the code associated with that element. If you break your Code, you take a cumulative -1 penalty to attack rolls, saving throws, and skill checks for 24 hours. Each infraction resets the duration. If you penalty is as large as your Illuminator level, you immediately lose your Magical Girl abilities and must make atonement for your actions. You also know inherently whether performing a certain action would violate your code. In return, you gain a +3 bonus to your Will saves and checks to resist Intimidate checks.

{table=head]Element|Code
Honesty|You cannot lie or intentionally conceal information for any reason
Kindness|You cannot attack enemies unprovoked or deal lethal damage
Laughter|You must treat others fairly and you cannot attempt to intimidate or attack the character of others
Generosity|You cannot refuse to lend aid to one in genuine need
Loyalty|You cannot break any oaths or promises, or refuse the call to aid of a friend
Hope/Magic|You cannot lose faith in yourself or your friends or give up in the face of adversity[/table]


So, what do you think? The source material is pretty obvious, but I was considering what would be a good end-game prestige class for Magical Girls. The class is functionally very similar to the Archmage, from which I took several of the abilities, but I think it has its own unique flair.

You can also sort of see Luna as a Dark Magical Girl, Celestia as a Sempai, the Mysterious Mare-Do-Well as a Costumed Crusader, Twilight has a Mentor Animal (though it's the other way around), Applejack is a Mistbreaker, Pinkie Pie is a Magical Idol, Rarity is perhaps a Prism Knight (gems and all that), and Fluttershy is a mix of the Stargazer and Kofu Shojo (though I know the two are incompatible).

Rainbow Dash is totally a Magical Girl / Aerial Mage / Exemplar of Harmony :) I totally decided to do this when I read the Aereal Mage and went "Huh, that capstone is totally a Sonic Rainboom".

If you like it, I'm sure I could easily adapt the class to also work for Dark Magical Girls - perhaps the Exemplar of Discord (Fabrication, Malice, Cynicism, Greed, Apathy, and Isolation, as a Deviantart user puts them) . The Dark Magical Girl could use a fun capstone class for those last 5 levels.

Great work Selenia, I'm very excited to contribute something to this wonderful homebrew.

Edit: Put things in bold, reduced range of Anthropomorphic Personification's ability to impose its Harmonic Resonance.

[Snowfire]

Chrono?

That. Is. Awesome.

Also finally gives me a way to do something I've been struggling on a mechanical way to do for weeks now in the magical girl game I'm running.

So...what I think I'm trying to say here is...

Thank you!

*vanishes into the distance, followed by crazed, gleeful laughter*

[radmelon]

http://scranton.mylittlefacewhen.com/media/f/rsz/mlfw6245_small.jpg

Congratulations [poster name here], you have won one(1) internet! Please proceed to the registry to collect your prize!

[Chronologist]

http://scranton.mylittlefacewhen.com/media/f/rsz/mlfw6245_small.jpg

Congratulations [poster name here], you have won one(1) internet! Please proceed to the registry to collect your prize!

So, I take it you like it then? :smallbiggrin: As a wise man once told me, ponies go with everything.

Any comments on the balance? I reduced hit points, BAB, and reflex saves in order to fortify that the class is much less of a bruiser and more like a walking GOD. It can do things with Illuminations that other Magical Girls gape openly at... and then it turns on its main feature, and everything goes to hell.

Anthropomorphic Personification expands the class' abilities; Incorporeal is an extraordinarily useful ability to have, especially in the "minutes" category instead of rounds. The increased mote recovery and DCs aren't particularly outrageous, especially at higher levels when you're going to want to be using powerful Strikes and Blasts one after another.

The Illumination Mastery abilities are basically just cribbed from the Archmage with minor modifications.

Becoming Hope might be a bit too powerful, but it's essentially the same thing as the capstone for the Uncarnate (Expanded Psionics Handbook). The resurrection ability is potent, but then again, your character is the embodiment of laughter. How do you kill the concept of laughter? I DID insert the clause that if an Exemplar of Harmony is killed when in her "depowered" minutes per day, she's dead for real, so the villains can easily just capture her friends and threaten to kill them if the Exemplar doesn't "depower" and let them kill her.

Honestly, my favorite mechanic is being able to impose your Harmonic Resonance feat on people within miles of your location. The physical embodiment of truth is upstairs, of course you're going to have a tough time lying anywhere near her. I can see a lot of characters choosing Kindness, going into a dungeon, being attacked by powerful enemies, going Exemplar, and just walking past them "Oh, where we fighting? I'm sorry, I didn't notice".

I'm going to start working on the Exemplar of Discord now. Dark Magician Girls need love too!

[Chronologist]

The Paragon of Discord

(spoiler for image size and ponies :smallwink:)


http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2011/334/2/7/my_little_pony__discord_is_magic_by_discordthetrol lest-d4hs9u8.png

”Mine! MINE!!" "Stop laughing at me!" "It's hopeless" "Your FACE!" "Whatever, I don't care" "I don't see nopony! Nopony at all!" - the last recorded meeting of the Paragons of Avarice, Fear, Despair, Cruelty, Betrayal, and Deceit, left to right



Where there is light, there is darkness. Where some find compassion, other seek only more hatred. In the same way, where there are Exemplars of Harmony, there are the Paragons of Discord, fallen Magical Girls who have stopped seeking the light, and now revel in their own darkness.

Requirements:
To become a Paragon of Discord, you must meet the following prerequisites:
Skills: 18 ranks in Intimidate
Feat: Discordant Echoes
Special: Rage of Tears class feature, at least 10 levels in classes that grant or improve Illuminations

Class Skill List: Bluff (Cha), Concentration (Con), Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Gather Information (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Intimidate (Cha), Heal (Wis), Jump (Str), Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Sleight of Hand (Dex), Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha)

Skill Points at Each Level: 4 + Int modifier

Paragon of Discord
Hit Dice: d8

{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special|Illuminations
1|+1|+0|+0|+2|Anthropomorphic Personification, Fury and Tears, Judgment|---
2|+2|+0|+0|+3|Judgment|+1 level
3|+3|+1|+1|+3|Judgment, Costume +1|+1 level
4|+4|+1|+1|+4|Judgment|+1 level
5|+5|+1|+1|+4|Judgment, Becoming Despair|---[/table]


Weapons and Armor Proficiencies: A Paragon of Discord gains no additional proficiency with any kind of weapon or armor.

Anthropomorphic Personification (Su): At 1st level, a Paragon of Discord selects one of the following, each an exemplary quality that Magical Girls hold dear. It must match her Discord selected by the Discordant Echoes feat. As a full-round action, she can temporarily shed her mortality and become an anthropomorphic personification of her chosen element. Each element grants a number of special benefits, but they all share the same following benefits:

- Gains the Outsider (Native) type and subtype, replacing her own for the duration, with all the benefits that grants.

- Incorporeal for the duration, though the Paragon of Discord may concentrate as a free action to lower this quality until the beginning of their next turn.

- Gain a Fly speed equal to her base land speed. If she already possessed a fly speed, her speed increases by 30 feet.

- While in a Rage of Tears, you gain a +6 total bonus to Charisma, a +4 total bonus to Dexterity, and a +4 total bonus to Constitution.

In addition, each Paragon of Discord in this state radiates an aura reaching out 100 feet per Paragon of Discord level, which forces all creatures within the radius to act as if they had your Harmonic Resonance feat, except they get a Will save DC is 20 + your Charisma modifier in order to resist the cumulative penalty. Only evil creatures, however, gain the benefits of your feat.

A Paragon of Discord can maintain this state for a number of minutes per day equal to their class level plus their Charisma modifier. They can deactivate the state as a free action, but they can only spend time in this state in 1-minute increments.

Judgment (Su): At 1st level and every level thereafter, a Paragon of Discord learns a technique that allows them to drastically improve their attack Illuminations. These judgments can only be performed while in a Rage of Tears, and once learned, they cannot be changed. Each Judgment can only be used once per Rage of Tears, unless otherwise noted, and you cannot apply more than one Judgment to the same attack.


Judgments
Feel My Pain: You may activate this Judgment if you suffered damage sunce the end of your last turn. The next Illumination you use before the end of your turn that inflicts damage inflicts additional damage equal to 5 times the Illumination’s level, up to a maximum equal to the damage you suffered in the previous round. If your Discord is Cruelty, the limit of damage is instead 10 times the Illumination’s level, and the limit is increased to twice the damage you suffered since last round.

Your Dreams are Dead: Before using an illumination which deals damage and requires an attack roll, you may declare that you are using this Judgment. Your Illumination effectively gains a critical threat range equal to your Charisma modifier, with a x2 critical. So, if you have a Charisma modifier of +7, the attack threatens a critical hit on a roll of 14-20. You still need to confirm the critical, but if it hits, all damage from the Illumination is doubled, and you gain a +2 to the save DCs of any effects included in the Illumination. If your Discord is Despair/Sorcery, the additional dice from the critical hit are automatically maximized.

It’s Mine: Before you attack with an Illumination, you may declare that you are using this Judgment. If so, if your attack hits, you may attempt to take an object held or worn by the subject that you can feasibly remove in one smooth motion. Make an opposed level + cha check versus your opponent’s level + dex check, if you succeed, you take the item in one of your hands. If your Discord is Avarice, you gain a +4 bonus to the check, and if you hit with the Judgment but fail to take the object, you may deal your Judgment’s damage directly to that item, in addition to your opponent.

Lies! All Lies!: Whenever you fail a save against an effect that granted a Fortitude or Will saving throw, you may spend an immediate action to declare you are activating this judgment. At the beginning of your next turn you may reroll your save, if you succeed, you shake off the effect. If your Discord is Deceit, you gain a +4 bonus to your save, and if you make an attack with an illumination before the end of that turn, the target must make a Fortitude or Will save at the same DC as the effect you threw off, or else be affected by it.

No Time for Fun and Games: When you hit with this Illumination, you immediately learn the name and effect of every spell, power, or other supernatural ability affecting your target, as well as martial stances. You may then make an opposed Illuminator level + charisma modifier check against a number of those effects equal to your Charisma modifier. If you beat the caster level + attribute modifier of the effect, it is suppressed for 1d4 rounds. If your Discord is Fear, increase your bonus to the check by your Paragon of Discord level, and suppressed effects are instead dispelled.

Your Bonds are Broken: When you hit with an illumination, you may declare the use of this Judgment. Your target must make a DC 15 + your Paragon of Discord level + your Charisma modifier Will save or lose the ability to distinguish friend and foe on the battlefield. Other characters cannot help the affected target distinguish properly, but the target may spend a full-round action attempting to clear their head; each time they do so they gain a cumulative +1 bonus to that save. This ability lasts for 1 minute, or until shaken off. If your Discord is Betrayal, you may instead choose for the target to see you as an ally, and all others as enemies. If you choose this option, they instead gain a Will save as a free action at the end of each of their turns, but they take a penalty to saves equal to your Paragon of Discord level, and gain a +2 cumulative bonus to that save each round after the first.

Extra Judgment: Select one of your known Judgments. You may use that Judgment one additional time each time you use Rage of Tears. You can select this feat more than once, each time you select a different known judgment. Your Rage of Tears lasts one more round than normal.

Furious Sacrifice: At the beginning of your turn, you may expend two rounds of your Rage of Tears as a Move action in order to recover the use of one of your expended judgments. You may instead choose to recover that judgment as a free action by spending three rounds of Rage of Tears. Your Rage of Tears lasts one more round.

Feed the Furnace: You may choose to sacrifice the use of a known judgment as a swift action, if you do, your Rage of Tears lasts 1 more round. In addition, your Rage of Tears lasts an additional round normally.


Illuminations: At 2nd, 3rd, and 4th level, your Illuminations improve as if you gained another level of Dark Magical Girl. At 1st and 5th level, you gain a +1 bonus to your effective Illuminator level and 1 mote, but you do not gain access to more powerful Illuminations.

Fury and Tears: Paragon of Discord levels stack with Dark Magical Girl levels in order to determine the number of motes gained while in a Rage of Tears, and a Paragon of Discord may add her class levels to the number of rounds she can maintain a Rage of Tears.

Costume: At 3rd level, a Paragon of Discord gains an additional +1 to her Costume bonus.

Becoming Despair: At 5th level, a Paragon of Discord is constantly an Anthropomorphic Personification, as the class feature, and instead can lower the ability for a number of minutes per day equal to her class level plus her Charisma modifier, spent in 1-minute increments. In addition, the Paragon of Discord ceases to age and is functionally immortal - so long as she remains in her anthropomorphic state, if slain she rises from the grave 1 week later in a random place on the material plane up to 5d% from her last location on that plane. Each time after the first each year she rises, she loses one level, as the spell Resurrection. If brought down to her human state by her own will, she can be killed and raised normally.

Discordant Echoes (General Feat)
Prerequisites: Rage of Tears 6th level
Benefit: Select one of the following Elements of Discord. You must follow the code associated with that element. If you break your Code, you take a cumulative -1 penalty to attack rolls, saving throws, and skill checks for 24 hours. Each infraction resets the duration. If you penalty is as large as your Illuminator level, you immediately lose your Dark Magical Girl abilities and must make atonement for your actions. You also know inherently whether performing a certain action would violate your code. In return, you gain a +3 bonus to your Will saves and Intimidate checks.

{table=head]Element|Code
Deceit|You must lie at all times, constantly altering or omitting information from what you say
Cruelty|You MUST inflict lethal damage with your attacks, and must make a Will save (DC 15 + 1/2 your class level) when provoked in any way, or else attack that creature
Fear|You must intimidate in or out of combat when given the opportunity
Avarice|You cannot perform the aid another action, give anything away without appropriate compensation, and you are Hostile to any creature that attempts to take one of your possessions
Betrayal|You cannot honor any agreement you make, you MUST somehow
Despair/Sorcery|You must sow the seeds of despair in everyone you meet, making them think their goals are impossible[/table]



The class is designed to be as powerful as, but functionally very different from the Exemplar of Harmony. It shares basically the same core qualities (Anthropomorphic Personification, Becoming X, requires similar skills and feats, etc) but their approach to combat is vastly different. An Exemplar of Harmony is versatile, has (probably) the highest level and most powerful Illuminations, and recovers them extremely quickly. She's a steadfast, versatile warrior with plenty of versatility (especially since she has 10 more class levels and prestige class levels to play around with and customize her approach to battle).

The Paragon of Discord is totally different. They've finished Dark Magical Girl, and they have a ton of defensive boosts from that. They don't have nearly as much staying power, so what do they do? They become shock troopers. They come in fast, ignore your attacks, and hit like a truck, and that's exactly what Judgments are supposed to help with. Extended Rage of Tears is just so they can recover some of their Judgments, or trade that for longer staying power. At very high levels, fights can sometimes get quite ridiculous, and having two or three more rounds before you're out of mojo can turn the tide of battle.

I made the judgments open to any Discord, but certain discords can use them better. It makes them different from the Exemplars of Harmony; I don't want it to be a single class with alternate class features, I want them to feel very different from each other.

What do you think?

Edit: Minor changes in formatting and content, altered two of the judgments and one of the Discords.

[radmelon]

I'm the spirit of chaos
The image of evil, don't deny
I'm gonna turn your world around and then I'll watch you cry
Don't fight it
Just look at the chaos rising everywhere
Game over
I'm plunging your world into everlasting despair
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFKcpbfAXMw)

[Chronologist]

So, any comments on the abilities? I haven't exactly tested out their power, but I think they're within the boundaries for what a character should get around levels 16-20.

I'm a bit concerned with the fact that the Dark Magical Girl requires BAB +4 to gain entry, meaning you either need to multiclass into something with full BAB somewhere in your first 5 levels, or else you can't take every level of both Dark Magical Girl and Paragon of Discord. I was kind of hoping you could go Magical Girl 5 / Dark Magical Girl 10 / Paragon of Discord 5.

I would personally change the prerequisites for Dark Magical Girl to BAB +4 OR Costume +2. That way, you can get in with a few levels of Magical Girl and some martial classes, or you can go 5 levels of Magical Girl and then gain entry.

Now, I think I'm going to start stating out the Mane 6, just for fun.

[vasharanpaladin]

My wubs, take them. @_@

[jamieth]

A couple of quick questions: one, was it ever agreed on what skill should Radiant Focus use in Pathfinder?
And two, trying to both convert the class to PF and format it for print, I notices one thing - Costume max bonuses are increased every 3 levels, which should make Costume+7 available on level 20. Would it be too much a boost to justify breaking the pattern? I doubt it, honestly.

(Oh, and also, does Spirit Shooter gain the ability to Spirit Shot right at level one, despite the abilities it replaces are significantly higher level?)

[Snowfire]

1.

Concentration Checks and Casting Spells

To cast a spell, you must concentrate. If something interrupts your concentration while you're casting, you must make a concentration check or lose the spell. When you make a concentration check, you roll d20 and add your caster level and the ability score modifier used to determine bonus spells of the same type. clerics, druids, and rangers add their Wisdom modifier. Bards, paladins, and sorcerers add their Charisma modifier. Finally, wizards add their Intelligence modifier. The more distracting the interruption and the higher the level of the spell you are trying to cast, the higher the DC (see Table: Concentration Check DCs). If you fail the check, you lose the spell just as if you had cast it to no effect.

2. Probably not worth breaking the pattern.

And yes, basic Spirit shot is gained at level 1. The more powerful abilities in the entry are gained at the points stated in the entry.

[jamieth]

Thanks! One more thing on the Spirit Shooter, then, namely, its bow version: How exactly does she gain three shots at the max bonus on 10th level? Is it "One additional best attack at 5th" plus "one additional to each attack, including the best, at 10th"? And, if so, would Rapid Reload allow for FOUR attacks at BAB -2 and, it seems, EIGHT attacks total by lv20? (+13/+13/+13/+13/+8/+8/+3/+3/+regain 5 motes... now, THAT's a full-round action...)

[Snowfire]

Um...rapid reload doesn't work that way. You can't even take it for a bow.

A level 20 Spirit Shooter would be able to pump out +13/+13/+13/+8/+8/+3/+3 in a full attack - but each one would be a spirit shot, putting the mote cost rather high. The extra attack ability only works on the iterative attacks gained from the class - no others. And the Radiant Focus concentration check would be 45 "10 + (5 * the number of attacks the spirit shooter is making this turn" as stated at the end of the paragraph you quoted.

Not impossible - nor hard if you've done your build right - but not an auto pass either by level 20 unless you're doing some serious optimising.

And I'll admit, I kinda fail to see how that's a problem when a Zen Archer can blast out +18/+18/+13/+13/+8/+8/+3, base each doing unarmed strike damage (2d10 at that point) with ki benefits (1 point of ki spent) and using Wis instead of Dex for his attack bonus.

[NineThePuma]

I think he meant rapid shot.

[Snowfire]

Prismatic Shift: Select a single Illumination you know that inflicts damage. As a free action when you use that Illumination, you may choose to have it deal fire, electricity, cold, or electricity damage instead of its normal damage. This ability can be taken more than once, each time, select a different Illumination.

After a look through, this is the only flaw I can find. As prismatic calling kinda makes it...a little underwhelming. Sure, it functions on any illumination, but it doesn't add in the power of Prismatic elements like Prismatic Calling and it's also heavily limited compared to the feat - which lets you do this with all of your blasts for the one feat.

@NineThePuma, Ah, point. Missed that somehow. However the point still stands that that attack would cost you eight motes - with a concentration check of 50 to regain any with Radiant Focus (which will be difficult any way you slice it).

[Princess Tracy]

Fffffff.... Dammit, Chrono. How are you psychic? I was gonna do something like... eh, I guess the idea isn't that similar. There may be room in the world for both our ideas! If I can be bothered recording them.

[jamieth]

Um...rapid reload doesn't work that way. You can't even take it for a bow.

A level 20 Spirit Shooter would be able to pump out +13/+13/+13/+8/+8/+3/+3 in a full attack - but each one would be a spirit shot, putting the mote cost rather high. The extra attack ability only works on the iterative attacks gained from the class - no others. And the Radiant Focus concentration check would be 45 "10 + (5 * the number of attacks the spirit shooter is making this turn" as stated at the end of the paragraph you quoted.

Not impossible - nor hard if you've done your build right - but not an auto pass either by level 20 unless you're doing some serious optimising.

And I'll admit, I kinda fail to see how that's a problem when a Zen Archer can blast out +18/+18/+13/+13/+8/+8/+3, base each doing unarmed strike damage (2d10 at that point) with ki benefits (1 point of ki spent) and using Wis instead of Dex for his attack bonus.

Oh, I don't say there's any problems with that, just making sure I understand how the ability works. And, yes, I meant Rapid Shot, of course. Thanks again!

[Chronologist]

After a look through, this is the only flaw I can find. As prismatic calling kinda makes it...a little underwhelming. Sure, it functions on any illumination, but it doesn't add in the power of Prismatic elements like Prismatic Calling and it's also heavily limited compared to the feat - which lets you do this with all of your blasts for the one feat

I actually missed Prismatic Calling, my bad. It IS underwhelming when compared to that feat, although Prismatic Shift is free. It would be cool if Prismatic Shift allowed you to divide the damage as you wished among any number of energy types, but that would just reduce its power, especially against creatures like Outsiders which have several kinds of energy resistance.

How about these three Illumination Masteries then? I think they more than compensate.

Forceful Illuminations: Illuminations you use may instead deal Force damage instead of their normal damage, thus becoming more effective against objects and incorporeal targets. In addition, you may subtract your Magical Girl level from the effective Harness of any object you strike with a Forceful Illumination.

Exalted Illuminations: Illuminations you use inflict small quantities of Exalted damage whenever they hit. The first X points of damage inflicted each round with Illuminations are considered Exalted damage, where X is equal to your Charisma modifier plus your Exemplar of Harmony class level. If you deal damage to multiple targets, you decide which target takes the Exalted damage, and you divide this damage as you see fit among the affected targets.

Unstoppable Illuminations: Ranged Illuminations you use cannot be stopped by any force, be it physical objects, Walls of Force, or even Anitmagic fields. Your Illuminations may pass through these barriers without effort, as if they simply didn't exist, and ignore effects that would stop the Illumination from resolving (such as the aforementionned Wall of Force, or Antimagic Field). Using this ability reduces the damage the Illumination would otherwise inflict on objects to 0, and it does not remove magical barriers and effects it ignores, it simply ignores them.


TraceHyde, I'm sure there's a middle-ground we can look for here. There's plenty of room for more Illumination Masteries and Judgments, and the beauty of the Magical Girl is how versatile her prestige classes can be.

[Serafina]

You just combined two of my favorite things - ponies and magical girls :smallbiggrin: Yay!


@Sajuuks criticism:
I think its really really unfair to compare Illuminations to spells, given that they work very differently. Furthermore, Illuminations do not get anything near as gamebreaking as higher-level spells - who aren't so good due to damage or such, but due to utility and control effects.

I agree on the scaling of Beacon of Serenity. At low levels its really really strong - at medium levels it stops to matter. Which brings back the general issue that Illuminations do not scale well - their scaling should be more similar to Psionics (option to spend more motes at higher levels for improved effects).

Breaking trough Fragile Shell with a Strenght-check is actually a pretty good idea IMO! It still makes it an obstacle and it would remain useful, but it'd be more appropriate for a low-level illumination (and at higher levels you could make it less fragile).

Homing Shot is fine, and spellcasters really get more than enough good things already. You still have to trigger it as a standard action, and it does nothing that a readied action with a bow doesn't do (except also eat up your swift action next turn).

Spotlight should be resolved as a caster level check, not by spell level. A third-level Magical Girl shouldn't be able to dispel a CL 18 darkness spell, obviously.

Busters are relatively weak damage options right now. Compare it to a dedicated archer or a blaster wizard (who will also be able to spam his spells, or he wont be a blaster) - and keep in mind that you also need your motes for other things.
Furhtermore, having something potentially all day long is nice - but not gamebreaking. The five-minute adventuring day is something to be abhorred anyway, so saying "well she can do it all day long" isn't valid design criticism IMO.

Yup, Chains of Concordance is very strong. Of course comparing it to Fighter Builds (Tier 5) is rather weak.
However, it definetly needs an overhaul. I'd go with eating up 1 mote and your swift action ever turn - and actually giving it something to do with the grapple, such as inflicting a bit of damage (1D8+cha or such). Because right now it only inflicts the "grappled" condition, which doesn't actually do much compared to what you actively do as a grappler.

[sajuuk]

Thanks, Serafina, I'm forwarding along your responses to him. And I agree with you on comparing Illuminations to Spells. The way I see it, they should be compared to Tome of Battle maneuvers since that's closer to how they work mechanics-wise.

[Serafina]

Sorry, i failed to grasp that you posted that for someone else.

By the way, he himself points out that the class combines aspects of Incarnum and Tome of Battle - yet he still compares Illuminations to spells. Something to point out, i think.

Also - how is "this buffs a group better than a Marshal" in any way broken? The Marshal is hardly a very good class - yes, the Sempai is very good at buffing allies, but compared to what she is giving up and a spellcaster can do, its not broken.

[sajuuk]

I'm thinking he's referring to the fact that the Sempai's boosts exceed the level of what a Marshal can do, while at the same time advancing Illuminations and Costume. To quote him exactly, "+5 bonus on higher lvls with no per day limit? even Marshals dont have that!"

I do have a clarification question about Sempai: Do all FOLLOWERS from Leadership gain the trainees bonuses as well? Because that can get really insane.

[NineThePuma]

Leadership itself is broken. Saying that something else makes it more broken is facepalm inducing.

Of course, it specifies Cohort in the example, so chances are followers wouldn't be affected.

[Snowfire]

Cohort, yes. Follower, no.

And I'll admit, whilst I've never read the Marshall class, I would place pep-talk as well below Bard Song in terms of both ability and versatility. A bard can - with the right work - give themselves effectively endless bard song (in as much as it ever matters on the x number of encounters per rest that most campaigns run on).

And bards have spellcasting - which you can push to level 9 if you take a particular class (I'm looking at you Sublime Chord).

That was the balance point Selenia was shooting for. Where she's still shooting for. And, IMHO, she's nailed her target to the wall. Marshall is - from everything I have read - a very bad class. Tier 4/5 that - with a great deal of work - can be pushed to tier 3 (just).

Sempai is mid Tier 3 at best. It can swing the balance in a party's favour - but then so can bard song if you know when to kick it in and what to use. And Pep Talk takes 10 minutes to prep or change. It's not versatile. Even Pose as a Team can only give a limited number of effects (all of which can be done - in most cases better - by a full/bard spellcaster).

I'm sorry, but...I'm really not seeing a balance issue here.

[Serafina]

You best gauge a classes tier by looking for "what does this for me in the game, and how desirable is a class in a group". Afterwards you MAY compare it to other classes, but its really about "how versatile and powerful is a class by itself" (incl. prestige and multiclass).

Also, keep in mind that Peptalk expires after the next encounter and takes 10 minutes to apply again. Have another encounter after two minutes? Too bad!

[Owrtho]

First, Chronologist, you should use bold and italics to make your classes easier to read.

Also, on the Paragon of Discord, I'd suggest using something else for apathy, since apathy is not at all the counter to loyalty. Apathy is a lack of emotion, passion, opinion, etc. It could be described as a lack of caring. While this does mean a being of pure apathy wouldn't have loyalty, it doesn't mean they would be counter to it. They would simply not care one way or the other, and would behave loyally or disloyally based on other factors (such as logic, ease of action, random selection, etc.). Looking at the specific abilities keyed to it I'd note the following.


Why Bother: When you hit with an Illumination, you may declare that you are using this Judgment. The target must make a Fortitude save DC 15 + your Paragon of Discord level + your Charisma modifier or become both fatigued for 1d4 rounds, then they must make a Will save DC 15 + your Paragon of Discord level + your charisma modifier or become sickened for 1d4 rounds. If your Discord is Apathy, then instead of fatigued and sickened, the target is exhausted and nauseated, respectively, and the duration increases by your Paragon of Discord level.

This is far more sloth than apathy. While often linked together (including the modern incarnation of the seven deadly sins having combine the two into one slot), they are quite distinct. Sloth might feel passion or emotion, but be to lazy to act on it. Apathy may act on something but feel no emotions regarding it. This can only slightly fit with apathy if one is of the view that not having an opinion on things or being unemotional means one must be lazy.


{table=head]Element|Code
Apathy|You cannot honor any agreement you make, and are loathe to make such agreements. You refuse to follow any rules. [/table]

This doesn't fit with apathy at all, being more anarchy than anything other term I can think of off hand. Apathy simply doesn't care about agreements, and might honour them as easily as not. It also wouldn't be loathe anything as that would require emotion or opinion.

Anyway, not wanting to seem too harsh, as I like the rest of it. That part just bugs me considerably so I thought it best to make note of it in hopes that the end result can be made better.

Owrtho

[Selinia]

This is, sadly, not part 3/4 of the Power of Teamwork update. I can't really point the blame here to anything but the fact that I have a nasty autumn cold, and its seriously putting a damper on the creative parts of my brain.

Still, some important stuff to respond to.


To the creator: please look back over and reconsider your illuminations list. They're so unbalanced they teeter on the side of insanity.

I was introduced to this class by one of my players and fellow GMs. Inspired by the sheer creativity in mechanics shown in this class I quickly grew to become a fan advocating its use. It's unique and really merged all the best aspects of both Incarnum and Tome of Battle combat mechanics, even putting aside that I am a Nanoha fan (awaiting the 2nd movie!). I also found the base class rather balanced in advancement, although I won't speak of the PrCs (all of the 5lvl ones are too crammed and OP imo, and sempai is positively broken as it boosts a small squad even better than the best Marshal design), but that's for other GMs to decide...

But the illuminations... there is so much overpoweredness that I had to say something. Let me raise some examples:

Lvl1s:

Beacon of Serenity - swift action to gain level+CHA temporary HP per round for a mote cost that regenerates every turn. This, alone, makes any melee magical girl build the best tank in the game as they can continuously create a buffer of HP that has to be worn down. Since the duration is until end of encounter, the magical girl can go full-offense until the opponent does take down that buffer.
Comparison: Cleric's basic Aid spell (SpLvl2) gives only 1d8+CL temporary HP, as a standard action.
Suggestion: make this just tempHP = Charisma mod. As a swift action, single mote ability in a CHA-class, that's already extremely powerful.

Fragile Shell - swift action to make a wall that blocks movement, no matter how fragile, is ridiculous. The enemy has to spend an attack (or multiple attacks at low lvls, given the HP here) taking down a wall that you can raise as swift actions before they get to you? Instantly the best field-control (divide and conquer!) and rear guard character.
Comparison: Solid wall spells, by and most aren't available until SpLvl4+ (although Spell Compendium's Dark Way is lvl2).
Suggestion: actually this is so abusable I don't know where to start. Recommend making it standard action for starters, with either (1) and upkeep or (2) ability for enemy to break through with a strength check so they don't have to spend actions attacking it.

Heartbreaker - -4xhit dmg isn't too bad, but... +1roll/turn is too many for already overloaded GMs. Tracking fluctuating penalties is even more annoying. I can see most GMs banning this out of sheer annoyance after a few encounters (I know I would!)

Homing Shot - low damage multi-shot spell is fine, and I love the Accel Shooter concept too, but this is way too powerful at lower lvls --- when mages can't consistently make Concentration checks (they need to hit med-lvl for that), a rapid barrage of shots at them in response to any cast is very liking to disrupt spellcasting, making this an extremely overpowered low-lvl counterspell. At higher lvls, the right build to increase output damage can still keep this useful (and abusable).
Comparison: what comparison, there is NO immediate action target-anyone-you-want-in-range attack spells at lower lvls.

Spotlight - this spell need clarification on how it works against magical darkness. The ability to clear any magical darkness, even say, SpLvl9 Utterdark (BoVD?) with just a lvl1 swift action is over the bounds of insanity. -1 penalty to enemies and +1 bonus to allies makes this equivalent to a Prayer (Cleric SpLvl4) spell, except also clearing darkness + reposition at will + swift action cast? This is the equivalent of a SpLvl7+ ability if I've seen one.



Lvl2s:

Angel / Blinding Buster - at class level 6 when this is first gained, it costs 3 motes while one regens 2/round. With Radiant Focus that easily meaning this is a 1/round spammable action, at 6d6+Charisma damage, at medium range, double the damage of Warlocks and without burning slots like Wizards... wut? Max damage vs all those creature types make the Paladin look useless in comparison at med levels.

Chains of Concordance - lvl+CHA grapple mod is already equal to Fighter builds (meaning Wizards have no chance, and Rogues little unless they invested Escape Artist). Add a +4 on top and SWIFT action cast... seriously, just spam.
Comparison: Telekinesis is a CL + casting mod grapple, but takes a standard action to cast AND requires concentration to use AND burns a SpLvl5 slot.

...and on...



I hope the creators consider this message and reconsider their designs. It would be a shame for many a GM to ban this class purely because they, as I did, opened up the illumination list and realized how much abusable potential over half the list had that easily allow a magical girl to outdo the rest of the party.

To begin with, I will state that the target tier for Magical Girl is Tier 3. She is good at what she does - extremely so, with the right build or circumstances. Like any tier 3, she can pulls weight with the best in her realm of expertise - bards have their well-known level 9 spell PrC, or their infamously potent Inspire Courage. I like those things. I like tier 3. So if something says, "The magical girl is better than the marshal/fighter/warlock", I really have no argument for that. I don't try to balance with the samurai any more than I try to balance with the druid.

That said, magical girl design is far from perfect. The class is almost a year old now, and was literally the first thing I'd ever seriously homebrewed. It was absurdly over-ambitious, and nowhere does this show more clearly than in the Illumination list. Even with lots of tweak, redesigns, and rebalancing, I am still not happy with it. I like the basic mechanic. I like some of the abilities, even! But I do not pretend they are balanced.

I am trying to make them balanced.

That is why discussion like this is very, very useful to me.

I am currently in the process of performing some heavy redesign on illuminations (said redesign is responsible for a good chunk of my slowdown since starting the Power of Teamwork update), and believe me, this set of comparisons really helped. Serafina's augumentation suggestions have also influenced me heavily. At some point in the not-distant future, expect a lot of shuffling in illuminations - in particular, a lot of effects that are 'baseline' now requiring augumentation to receive. I'm currently playing in a magical girl playtest game, and have a player running one in another, and it is becoming abundantly clear that most magical girls have too many motes. Past the first few levels, they become less something to be spent than something to be thrown away as quickly as possible, and actually running dry is rarely a serious concern. Motes should be valuable. Expendable, but valuable.

And yes. Balanceposts are always welcome.



The Exemplar of Harmony

http://img855.imageshack.us/img855/5299/mlpsailorsenshibyyoukai.jpg

"You think you can destroy the Elements of Harmony just like that? Well you're wrong! Because the spirits of the Elements of Harmony... are RIGHT HERE!" T. Sparkle, Exemplar of Magic/Hope



There comes a point where a magical girl ceases to simply exemplify the forces of good and light – she becomes them. This transition is rare and unconventional for a Magical Girl, but allows them to expand the subtle influence of their powers, as well as transcend mortality itself in time. Though there are only six Elements, the number of potential Exemplar of Harmony is not so limited - each character is simply a manifestation of that concept.

Requirements:
To become an Exemplar of Harmony, you must meet the following prerequisites:
Skills: 18 ranks in Diplomacy
Feat: Harmonic Resonance
Special: Pure of Heart class feature, 10 or more levels of classes and prestige classes that grant Illuminations

Class Skill List: Concentration (Con), Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Gather Information (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Heal (Wis), Jump (Str), Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha)

Skill Points at Each Level: 4 + Int modifier

Exemplar of Harmony
Hit Dice: d6

{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special|Illuminations
1|+0|+0|+0|+2|Anthropomorphic Personification, Illumination Mastery|+1 level
2|+1|+0|+0|+3|Illumination Mastery|+1 level
3|+1|+1|+1|+3|Illumination Mastery, Costume +1|+1 level
4|+2|+1|+1|+4|Illumination Mastery|+1 level
5|+2|+1|+1|+4|Illumination Mastery, Becoming Hope|+1 level[/table]


Weapons and Armor Proficiencies: An Exemplar of Harmony gains no additional proficiency with any kind of weapon or armor.

Anthropomorphic Personification (Su): At 1st level, an Exemplar of Harmony selects one of the following, each an exemplary quality that Magical Girls hold dear. It must match her Harmony selected by the Harmonic Resonance feat. As a full-round action, she can temporarily shed her mortality and become an anthropomorphic personification of her chosen element. Each element grants a number of special benefits, but they all share the same following benefits:

- Gains the Outsider (Native) type and subtype, replacing her own for the duration, with all the benefits that grants.

- Incorporeal for the duration, though the Exemplar of Harmony may concentrate as a free action to lower this quality until the beginning of their next turn.

- Gain a Fly speed equal to her base land speed. If she already possessed a fly speed, her speed increases by 30 feet.

- The number of Motes you recover each round and the save DC of your Illuminations, if any, is increased by 2.

In addition, each Exemplar of Harmony in this state radiates an aura reaching out 1 mile per Exemplar of Harmony level, which forces all creatures within the radius to act as if they had your Harmonic Resonance feat, except they get a Will save DC is 20 + your Charisma modifier in order to resist the cumulative penalty. Only good creatures, however, gain the benefits of your feat.

An Exemplar of Harmony can maintain this state for a number of minutes per day equal to their class level plus their Charisma modifier. They can deactivate the state as a free action, but they can only spend time in this state in 1-minute increments.

Illumination Mastery: At 1st level and every level thereafter, an Exemplar of Harmony gains an Illumination Mastery from the list below. Once learned, an Illumination Mastery cannot be changed.

Illumination Masteries:
Blast of Power: As a standard action, an Exemplar of Harmony may fire a number of magical bolts, just like a Blast Illumination. She fires one bolt per Element of Harmony level, plus two per Mote spent, and they have a range of Medium. She cannot spend more motes than her class level in this way. Each bolt inflicts 1d6 damage, and functions as a Magic Missile spell for all intents and purposes (i.e. it hits automatically, can be distributed among any number of targets within range, but can be blocked with Shield spells and the like)

Augmented Reach: Select a single Strike Illumination you know. You may make attacks with that Strike Illumination as ranged touch attacks with a 30-foot range. This ability may be taken more than once, each time, select a different Strike Illumination.

Prismatic Shift: Select a single Illumination you know that inflicts damage. As a free action when you use that Illumination, you may choose to have it deal fire, electricity, cold, or electricity damage instead of its normal damage. This ability can be taken more than once, each time, select a different Illumination.

Shaping Mastery: Select a single Illumination you know with an burst, cone, cylinder, emanation, or spread shape. When you use that Illumination, you may choose to exclude a number of squares within the area from being affected by the Illumination. You may take this ability more than once, each time you select a different Illumination.

Off the Walls: Select a single Illumination you know with a line of effect. When you use that Illumination, you may have the line make as many 90-degree turns as you wish, in the direction you wish, until its range runs out. This effectively allows you to fire lines around corners, in circles, and around allies. You may take this ability more than once, each time you select a different Illumination.

Expanded Radius: Select an Aura Illumination that you know. That Aura’s range is doubled. You may take this ability more than once, each time you select a different Illumination.

Favored Illumination: Select a single Illumination you know. When you enter combat, you may choose to remove a number of Motes from your pool equal to that Illumination’s mote cost. If you do, you may use that Illumination for free up to 2 times during that encounter. You may take this ability more than once, each time you select a different Illumination.



Illuminations: At 1st level and every level thereafter, an Exemplar of Harmony improves her ability to use Illuminations as though she gained a level in Magical Girl.

Costume: At 3rd level, an Exemplar of Harmony gains an additional +1 to her Costume bonus.

Becoming Hope: At 5th level, an Exemplar of Harmony is constantly an Anthropomorphic Personification, as the class feature, and instead can lower the ability for a number of minutes per day equal to her class level plus her Charisma modifier, spent in 1-minute increments. In addition, the Exemplar of Harmony ceases to age and is functionally immortal - so long as she remains in her anthropomorphic state, if slain she rises from the grave 1 week later in a random place on the material plane up to 5d% from her last location on that plane. Each time after the first each year she rises, she loses one level, as the spell Resurrection. If brought down to her human state by her own will, she can be killed and raised normally.

Harmonic Resonance (General Feat)
Prerequisites: Pure of Heart, 6th level
Benefit: Select one of the following Elements of Harmony. You must follow the code associated with that element. If you break your Code, you take a cumulative -1 penalty to attack rolls, saving throws, and skill checks for 24 hours. Each infraction resets the duration. If you penalty is as large as your Illuminator level, you immediately lose your Magical Girl abilities and must make atonement for your actions. You also know inherently whether performing a certain action would violate your code. In return, you gain a +3 bonus to your Will saves and checks to resist Intimidate checks.

{table=head]Element|Code
Honesty|You cannot lie or intentionally conceal information for any reason
Kindness|You cannot attack enemies unprovoked or deal lethal damage
Laughter|You must treat others fairly and you cannot attempt to intimidate or attack the character of others
Generosity|You cannot refuse to lend aid to one in genuine need
Loyalty|You cannot break any oaths or promises, or refuse the call to aid of a friend
Hope/Magic|You cannot lose faith in yourself or your friends or give up in the face of adversity[/table]


So, what do you think? The source material is pretty obvious, but I was considering what would be a good end-game prestige class for Magical Girls. The class is functionally very similar to the Archmage, from which I took several of the abilities, but I think it has its own unique flair.

You can also sort of see Luna as a Dark Magical Girl, Celestia as a Sempai, the Mysterious Mare-Do-Well as a Costumed Crusader, Twilight has a Mentor Animal (though it's the other way around), Applejack is a Mistbreaker, Pinkie Pie is a Magical Idol, Rarity is perhaps a Prism Knight (gems and all that), and Fluttershy is a mix of the Stargazer and Kofu Shojo (though I know the two are incompatible).

Rainbow Dash is totally a Magical Girl / Aerial Mage / Exemplar of Harmony :) I totally decided to do this when I read the Aereal Mage and went "Huh, that capstone is totally a Sonic Rainboom".

If you like it, I'm sure I could easily adapt the class to also work for Dark Magical Girls - perhaps the Exemplar of Discord (Fabrication, Malice, Cynicism, Greed, Apathy, and Isolation, as a Deviantart user puts them) . The Dark Magical Girl could use a fun capstone class for those last 5 levels.

Great work Selenia, I'm very excited to contribute something to this wonderful homebrew.



The Paragon of Discord

(spoiler for image size and ponies :smallwink:)


http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2011/334/2/7/my_little_pony__discord_is_magic_by_discordthetrol lest-d4hs9u8.png

”Mine! MINE!!" "Stop laughing at me!" "It's hopeless" "Your FACE!" "Whatever, I don't care" "I don't see nopony! Nopony at all!" - the last recorded meeting of the Paragons of Avarice, Fear, Despair, Cruelty, Apathy, and Deceit, left to right



Where there is light, there is darkness. Where some find compassion, other seek only more hatred. In the same way, where there are Exemplars of Harmony, there are the Paragons of Discord, fallen Magical Girls who have stopped seeking the light, and now revel in their own darkness.

Requirements:
To become a Paragon of Discord, you must meet the following prerequisites:
Skills: 18 ranks in Intimidate
Feat: Discordant Echoes
Special: Rage of Tears class feature, at least 10 levels in classes that grant or improve Illuminations

Class Skill List: Bluff (Cha), Concentration (Con), Diplomacy (Cha), Escape Artist (Dex), Gather Information (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Intimidate (Cha), Heal (Wis), Jump (Str), Perform (Cha), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Sleight of Hand (Dex), Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha)

Skill Points at Each Level: 4 + Int modifier

Paragon of Discord
Hit Dice: d8

{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special|Illuminations
1|+1|+0|+0|+2|Anthropomorphic Personification, Fury and Tears, Judgment|---
2|+2|+0|+0|+3|Judgment|+1 level
3|+3|+1|+1|+3|Judgment, Costume +1|+1 level
4|+4|+1|+1|+4|Judgment|+1 level
5|+5|+1|+1|+4|Judgment, Becoming Despair|---[/table]


Weapons and Armor Proficiencies: A Paragon of Discord gains no additional proficiency with any kind of weapon or armor.

Anthropomorphic Personification (Su): At 1st level, a Paragon of Discord selects one of the following, each an exemplary quality that Magical Girls hold dear. It must match her Discord selected by the Discordant Echoes feat. As a full-round action, she can temporarily shed her mortality and become an anthropomorphic personification of her chosen element. Each element grants a number of special benefits, but they all share the same following benefits:

- Gains the Outsider (Native) type and subtype, replacing her own for the duration, with all the benefits that grants.

- Incorporeal for the duration, though the Paragon of Discord may concentrate as a free action to lower this quality until the beginning of their next turn.

- Gain a Fly speed equal to her base land speed. If she already possessed a fly speed, her speed increases by 30 feet.

- While in a Rage of Tears, you gain a +6 total bonus to Charisma, a +4 total bonus to Dexterity, and a +4 total bonus to Constitution.

In addition, each Paragon of Discord in this state radiates an aura reaching out 1 mile per Paragon of Discord level, which forces all creatures within the radius to act as if they had your Harmonic Resonance feat, except they get a Will save DC is 20 + your Charisma modifier in order to resist the cumulative penalty. Only evil creatures, however, gain the benefits of your feat.

A Paragon of Discord can maintain this state for a number of minutes per day equal to their class level plus their Charisma modifier. They can deactivate the state as a free action, but they can only spend time in this state in 1-minute increments.

Judgment: At 1st level and every level thereafter, a Paragon of Discord learns a technique that allows them to drastically improve their attack Illuminations. These judgments can only be performed while in a Rage of Tears, and once learned, they cannot be changed. Each Judgment can only be used once per Rage of Tears, unless otherwise noted, and you cannot apply more than one Judgment to the same attack.



Judgments:
Feel My Pain: You may activate this Judgment if you suffered damage sunce the end of your last turn. The next Illumination you use before the end of your turn that inflicts damage inflicts additional damage equal to 5 times the Illumination’s level, up to a maximum equal to the damage you suffered in the previous round. If your Discord is Cruelty, the limit of damage is instead 10 times the Illumination’s level, and the limit is increased to twice the damage you suffered since last round.

Your Dreams are Dead: Before using an illumination which deals damage and requires an attack roll, you may declare that you are using this Judgment. Your Illumination effectively gains a critical threat range equal to your Charisma modifier, with a x2 critical. So, if you have a Charisma modifier of +7, the attack threatens a critical hit on a roll of 14-20. You still need to confirm the critical, but if it hits, all damage from the Illumination is doubled, and you gain a +2 to the save DCs of any effects included in the Illumination. If your Discord is Despair/Sorcery, the additional dice from the critical hit are automatically maximized.

It’s Mine: Before you attack with an Illumination, you may declare that you are using this Judgment. If so, if your attack hits, you may attempt to take an object held or worn by the subject that you can feasibly remove in one smooth motion. Make an opposed level + cha check versus your opponent’s level + dex check, if you succeed, you take the item in one of your hands. If your Discord is Avarice, you gain a +4 bonus to the check, and if you hit with the Judgment but fail to take the object, you may deal your Judgment’s damage directly to that item, in addition to your opponent.

Why Bother: When you hit with an Illumination, you may declare that you are using this Judgment. The target must make a Fortitude save DC 15 + your Paragon of Discord level + your Charisma modifier or become both fatigued for 1d4 rounds, then they must make a Will save DC 15 + your Paragon of Discord level + your charisma modifier or become sickened for 1d4 rounds. If your Discord is Apathy, then instead of fatigued and sickened, the target is exhausted and nauseated, respectively, and the duration increases by your Paragon of Discord level.

No Time for Fun and Games: When you hit with this Illumination, you immediately learn the name and effect of every spell, power, or other supernatural ability affecting your target, as well as martial stances. You may then make an opposed Illuminator level + charisma modifier check against a number of those effects equal to your Charisma modifier. If you beat the caster level + attribute modifier of the effect, it is suppressed for 1d4 rounds. If your Discord is Fear, increase your bonus to the check by your Paragon of Discord level, and suppressed effects are instead dispelled.

Your Life is a Lie: When you hit with an illumination, you may declare the use of this Judgment. Your target must make a DC 15 + your Paragon of Discord level + your Charisma modifier Will save or lose the ability to distinguish friend and foe on the battlefield. Other characters cannot help the affected target distinguish properly, but the target may spend a full-round action attempting to clear their head; each time they do so they gain a cumulative +1 bonus to that save. This ability lasts for 1 minute, or until shaken off. If your Discord is Deceit, you may instead choose for the target to see you as an ally, and all others as enemies. If you choose this option, they instead gain a Will save as a free action at the end of each of their turns, but they take a penalty to saves equal to your Paragon of Discord level, and gain a +2 cumulative bonus to that save each round after the first.

Extra Judgment: Select one of your known Judgments. You may use that Judgment one additional time each time you use Rage of Tears. You can select this feat more than once, each time you select a different known judgment. Your Rage of Tears lasts one more round than normal.

Furious Sacrifice: At the beginning of your turn, you may expend two rounds of your Rage of Tears as a Move action in order to recover the use of one of your expended judgments. You may instead choose to recover that judgment as a free action by spending three rounds of Rage of Tears. Your Rage of Tears lasts one more round.

Feed the Furnace: You may choose to sacrifice the use of a known judgment as a swift action, if you do, your Rage of Tears lasts 1 more round. In addition, your Rage of Tears lasts an additional round normally.



Illuminations: At 2nd, 3rd, and 4th level, your Illuminations improve as if you gained another level of Dark Magical Girl. At 1st and 5th level, you gain a +1 bonus to your effective Illuminator level and 1 mote, but you do not gain access to more powerful Illuminations.

Fury and Tears: Paragon of Discord levels stack with Dark Magical Girl levels in order to determine the number of motes gained while in a Rage of Tears, and a Paragon of Discord may add her class levels to the number of rounds she can maintain a Rage of Tears.

Costume: At 3rd level, a Paragon of Discord gains an additional +1 to her Costume bonus.

Becoming Despair: At 5th level, a Paragon of Discord is constantly an Anthropomorphic Personification, as the class feature, and instead can lower the ability for a number of minutes per day equal to her class level plus her Charisma modifier, spent in 1-minute increments. In addition, the Paragon of Discord ceases to age and is functionally immortal - so long as she remains in her anthropomorphic state, if slain she rises from the grave 1 week later in a random place on the material plane up to 5d% from her last location on that plane. Each time after the first each year she rises, she loses one level, as the spell Resurrection. If brought down to her human state by her own will, she can be killed and raised normally.

Discordant Echoes (General Feat)
Prerequisites: Rage of Tears 6th level
Benefit: Select one of the following Elements of Discord. You must follow the code associated with that element. If you break your Code, you take a cumulative -1 penalty to attack rolls, saving throws, and skill checks for 24 hours. Each infraction resets the duration. If you penalty is as large as your Illuminator level, you immediately lose your Dark Magical Girl abilities and must make atonement for your actions. You also know inherently whether performing a certain action would violate your code. In return, you gain a +3 bonus to your Will saves and Intimidate checks.

{table=head]Element|Code
Deceit|You must lie at all times, constantly altering or omitting information from what you say
Cruelty|You MUST inflict lethal damage with your attacks, and must make a Will save (DC 15 + 1/2 your class level) when provoked in any way, or else attack that creature
Fear|You must intimidate in or out of combat when given the opportunity
Avarice|You cannot perform the aid another action, give anything away without appropriate compensation, and you are Hostile to any creature that attempts to take one of your possessions
Apathy|You cannot honor any agreement you make, and are loathe to make such agreements. You refuse to follow any rules.
Despair/Sorcery|You must sow the seeds of despair in everyone you meet, making them think their goals are impossible[/table]



The class is designed to be as powerful as, but functionally very different from the Exemplar of Harmony. It shares basically the same core qualities (Anthropomorphic Personification, Becoming X, requires similar skills and feats, etc) but their approach to combat is vastly different. An Exemplar of Harmony is versatile, has (probably) the highest level and most powerful Illuminations, and recovers them extremely quickly. She's a steadfast, versatile warrior with plenty of versatility (especially since she has 10 more class levels and prestige class levels to play around with and customize her approach to battle).

The Paragon of Discord is totally different. They've finished Dark Magical Girl, and they have a ton of defensive boosts from that. They don't have nearly as much staying power, so what do they do? They become shock troopers. They come in fast, ignore your attacks, and hit like a truck, and that's exactly what Judgments are supposed to help with. Extended Rage of Tears is just so they can recover some of their Judgments, or trade that for longer staying power. At very high levels, fights can sometimes get quite ridiculous, and having two or three more rounds before you're out of mojo can turn the tide of battle.

I made the judgments open to any Discord, but certain discords can use them better. It makes them different from the Exemplars of Harmony; I don't want it to be a single class with alternate class features, I want them to feel very different from each other.

What do you think?

I am continually stunned by the effort people put into making homebrews of homebrew. This could carry on until the end of time, and I would not grasp it fully.

But seriously, this is brilliant. You've even formatted it in the standard magical girl format style, which is ohmygoddessyouwouldnotbeleive how many hearts your earned. Were this thread occupied by as many green-pajama-clad fairy heroes as ponies, they would totally be calling collective shenanigains on that heart windfall. I can think of a couple minor tweaks (most notably, reducing Personification's radius to something smaller than the miles scale... and bold/italics tags), but you've done an excellent job of capturing the spirit of the class (and the PrC, in the case of Despair).


A couple of quick questions: one, was it ever agreed on what skill should Radiant Focus use in Pathfinder?
And two, trying to both convert the class to PF and format it for print, I notices one thing - Costume max bonuses are increased every 3 levels, which should make Costume+7 available on level 20. Would it be too much a boost to justify breaking the pattern? I doubt it, honestly.


On Radiant Focus in Pathfinder: Concentration actually exists in Pathfinder - it's just a glorified caster level check. Simply give the magical girl a +3 bonus when radiant focusing to compensate for not having the 'skill edge'.

On costumes... I admit, I am honestly not sure why it does not go to +7. It will go to +7. That will be a thing very shortly.

[jseah]

RE barriers and balance:
I just skimmed the illuminations list again and the barriers are nice although they ARE kinda overpowered.

As a general rule, anything that would restrict enemy actions should cost at least a standard action. Swift action action denial is pretty damned insane.

If you want an "instant barrier" sort of thing, perhaps make a variant of Fragile Shell that is immediate action use but lasts only until start of next turn and costs a bunch and has half to one-third hp of the standard action version.
And range like 10ft or something.


Swift actions stand in the grey area between almost-free (move) and reactions (immediate). Using this in ways beyond short temporary buffs/debuffs is not good. The other barriers are fine, but Fragile Shell is not.

Not unless you're gunning for Celerity levels of brokenness. As it is right now, I would still take Celerity over Fragile Shell, but not by much. In some not-that-rare situations (a ranged skirmishing battle in complex terrain), I would consider Fragile Shell BETTER than Celerity.


Example use:
Assuming the MG can afford the 1 mote / round cost of continuous casting, she just summons a Fragile Shell around enemies to trap them and doesn't maintain it. On their round, they have to break through, cutting into actions, restricting movement and serving as an unavoidable damage debuff.
Worse still, if you can afford more than 1 mote /round, you can attempt to heal the barrier as it is attacked for more damage debuff and potentially neutralizing one enemy.

For reference, if the MG's allies wish to attack trapped opponents, they just Delay (you can wait until after someone else) until after that opponent's initiative and whack away after that opponent has downed the barrier.
If the opponent has failed to drop the barrier, they delay until after the MG and on the MG's turn the barrier goes away and SHE delays until after her allies have whacked the enemy.
With this and some other initiative shenanigans, the barrier doesn't prevent allies from attacking but prevents enemies.

[Serafina]

Swift actions are however a pretty valuable resource for the Magical Girl, since she gets lots of decent options for them.
So making Barriers require a swift-action upkeep each round seems a pretty good way to restric their usage.

In addition, i am a firm supporter of the idea that you can pass trough Fragil Shell without attacking it. Options include
- requiring a free-action, part of movementstrenght-check to break trough the barrier
- likewise, a will- or fortitude saving throw to pass trough it
- allowing people to attack the barrier as part of a charge - if you charge someone behind it, you attack the barrier, if you do enough damage, you charge to your target and attack it normally.
That way it is no longer denies any actions for some enemies - but not all, thus retaining value as battlefield control.

[jseah]

I think allowing a strength check to move through (and break it) would make sense and mitigate it, but it really really needs to be standard action unless the check is easy (10 + cha mod to break could be balanced for swift action, roughly 50% chance of failing). If the check is easy, then it goes down in power alot and might not be worth the motes.

It could be buffed in terms of hp (2x) and strength check required (15 + cha), or increase in range, if you make it a standard and increase the mote cost to 2 so it can't get spammed as easily. That is roughly in line with the amount of action denial granted by BC spells (eg. Black Tentacles).
Seriously, it needs to be effective, meaning it locks down enemies and BCs very well, but needs to subtract alot from the MG's offense to keep it up. That means standard actions and mote cost.


That MGs have useful things to do with swift actions is a point. But most of those are numerical buffs/debuffs, and not large ones either (large meaning 10+). Those are fine, but trading swifts for enemy standards is always going to be a good deal compared to those unless it's a target rich environment.

...

Oh wow, I must have missed Starlight Rampart. XD
Same objection applies to that one, only that at high levels, tactical teleport gets semi-common anyway and tactical abilities start to get overshadowed so it doesn't matter so much for L4 illuminations.

[Qwertystop]

One question: Isn't it supposed to be Swallow Flyer, not Swallow Buster?

[Fawriel]

I just want to say that this class and everything associated with it is, without a doubt, the best thing ever.

But seriously, reading the OP was a real joy and made me really excited! I almost want to find a different group somewhere just so I can play it!

[Chronologist]

I made a few changes to the Exemplar of Harmony and Paragon of Discord classes. I reduced the range of their harmony/discord feat ability to 100 feet per class level, I altered the Deceit Judgment, and I changed the Apathy Discord into the Betrayal Discord, as per Owrthro's insightful comments.

I think the classes are generic enough in ability and premise to be easily adapted to any number of high-level magical girls, with Madoka Magicka being the main inspiration and example.

I agree that creating a barrier as a swift action is a pretty powerful ability, even for Tier 3. Perhaps instead of actually creating a barrier, it could be an immediate action that does one of the following:
a) grant concealment to a single target against a single attack, or
b) grants temporary hit points equal to your Magical Girl level to a single target, but only against a single attack

You could create a level 2 or 3 Illumination that increased the benefits of the barrier to total concealment and maybe double the temporary hit points.

After all, barriers in Magical Girl shows tend to either deflect incoming blasts, or protect the user from harm until it's shattered. I think this would be a better alternative to creating an actual physical barrier, which would generally be more versatile and powerful.

[LoneMage210]

Something about Stargazer's bugging me: Can the Soulbound Companion be used as a Scout of sorts, or would it have no sences to be used.

Another question: Does the Stargazer's Int replacement also applies to any PrCs related to Magical Girl, or does it isolate itself to just the Magical Girl itself?

[GFawkes]

Something that's been on my mind for a while: How would a thrown weapon Device work? My gut tells me it falls under the category of Spirit Shooter, but that only allows for one weapon, not the 4-5 needed for use.

I guess my main questions boil down to these:
-Is a thrown weapon Device legal?
-If so, does it require being a Spirit Shooter?
-What happens after you throw it? Does it return? Do you need to go yank it out of the enemy/pick it up off the ground?
-If you get multiple attacks per round, can your device only be one of them?

For my suggestions on how to make it work, if you can't think of anything/already know and I just missed it, here they are:
-Thrown weapons can be "called back" as a move action (swift if you have Quick Draw). When this happens, they simply appear in the Magical Girl's hand. Exact effect varies, but it requires a free hand to do.
-If your Device is a weapon that can only be used as a thrown weapon without penalty (For example, javelins get a penalty if used for melee, but daggers can be either, so they don't count), you can have enough copies of it existant at one time to be able to make a full attack. Example: a level 3 MG with darts as her Device could have only 1, but the same MG at level 17 could have 3.
-A Spirit Shot with a thrown Device (if it works that way) has the Device bypass up to CHA Modifier points of Damage Resistance, even DR/-. This costs 1 Mote per copy of the device being used that turn.

[Princess Tracy]

Where and wehn can we expect to see Tome of Radiance? I am excited to upgrade Umiko.

[NineThePuma]

Wrong thread, maybe? I haven't heard of "Tome of radiance" before.

[Snowfire]

Sort of right thread, just posted ahead of time and in the wrong place.

Trace,

Selinia will let them know when she lets them know. Be happy with what we've got over on the playtest thread for now, ok?

[Qwertystop]

"ahead of time"?

"Tome of <relevant word to class>"?!


*EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE*!

[Conor77]

Hey, I wanted to say something to Selinia, here, about the class. I'll preface it with saying that I've been dodging around the homebrew forum without ever looking at this class, mostly because I never liked the "Magical Girl" archetype present in a lot of anime. That aside, I think this is a wonderful class, that is nicely designed. One thing that I noticed though, and I don't know if it was on purpose, was that you never actually stated that any of the Magical Girl class features couldn't be used in Heavy armour. Which means that effectively they are 2 feats away from wearing Full-Plate with all of their other bonuses.

I'm not going to pretend I've read all the comments, so you may already be aware, and if I have pointed out an error I would caution you to think before you fix it. I see a lot of 'brewers banning heavier armours outright, because it didn't fit how they imagined the class. I think that that is a bad way to design a class, and I wish more of them would at least leave open the possibility of spending a feat to wear armour.

And speaking of possibilities, why is the magical girl not able to choose an Exotic weapon for their Device? It seems like some kind of Eagle Claw/Spiked Chain/Repeater Crossbow would be exactly the kind of thing to be wielded by a magic teenage paladin.

So again, I may not appreciate the general fictional genre, but your class does a good job of emulating it and is well designed. Kudos and a biscuit to you.

[Serafina]

You are actually wrong on all accounts :smallwink:

While the Magical Girl can indeed wear heavy armor and use most of her class features, she can ordinarily only use Light Amor for her Costume (which is pretty much her second-most important class feature).

However, there IS a feat that allows her to use Medium and even Heavy Armor for her Costume, thus directly supporting the idea.

As for Exotic Weapons, look at the Devicer-Archetype - those can use Exotic Weapons for their device, including free proficiency.

[jamieth]

Something that's been on my mind for a while: How would a thrown weapon Device work? My gut tells me it falls under the category of Spirit Shooter, but that only allows for one weapon, not the 4-5 needed for use.

I guess my main questions boil down to these:
-Is a thrown weapon Device legal?
-If so, does it require being a Spirit Shooter?
-What happens after you throw it? Does it return? Do you need to go yank it out of the enemy/pick it up off the ground?
-If you get multiple attacks per round, can your device only be one of them?

For my suggestions on how to make it work, if you can't think of anything/already know and I just missed it, here they are:
-Thrown weapons can be "called back" as a move action (swift if you have Quick Draw). When this happens, they simply appear in the Magical Girl's hand. Exact effect varies, but it requires a free hand to do.
-If your Device is a weapon that can only be used as a thrown weapon without penalty (For example, javelins get a penalty if used for melee, but daggers can be either, so they don't count), you can have enough copies of it existant at one time to be able to make a full attack. Example: a level 3 MG with darts as her Device could have only 1, but the same MG at level 17 could have 3.
-A Spirit Shot with a thrown Device (if it works that way) has the Device bypass up to CHA Modifier points of Damage Resistance, even DR/-. This costs 1 Mote per copy of the device being used that turn.

Well, I can't speak officially, but I'm currently working on a Thrown Device-based archetype, tentatively called Kaitou. The question I'm currently pondering is, how would thrown devices interact with Strikes...

Oh, by the way, I'm actually compiling my own version of "Tome of", called in my case "Tome of Luminous Might", specifically made for pathfinder.
There are all kinds of small issues coming up - for instance, Improved Mettle and Improved FlyBy Attack not existing in Pathfinder - and I made a number of small, mostly cosmetic changes, but there is one kinda large one, which I don't want to make without consulting authors - namely, I really feel Stargazer should be an alternate class, not an archetype. Your opinion?

edit:
One more thing, concerning prestige classes: At certain levels, they increase "all aspects of their illuminations", at others, only "evoker level and mote pool". So, for example, an MG10/CosCr5/AerMg5 would have 16 levels of "all aspects" and 4 of "level/motes only". So, check my math on this:

Mote pool 20
Evoker Level 20
Mote regen 4/turn (as a MG16)
Illuminations prepared
3 least / 3 lesser / 2 greater / 1 grand (again, as MG16)
Is that correct? ('Cause if it is, Nanoha, who most definitely has some AerMg levels, would never get her most iconic Illumination :-))

[Draken]

Well, I can't speak officially, but I'm currently working on a Thrown Device-based archetype, tentatively called Kaitou. The question I'm currently pondering is, how would thrown devices interact with Strikes...

Oh, by the way, I'm actually compiling my own version of "Tome of", called in my case "Tome of Luminous Might", specifically made for pathfinder.
There are all kinds of small issues coming up - for instance, Improved Mettle and Improved FlyBy Attack not existing in Pathfinder - and I made a number of small, mostly cosmetic changes, but there is one kinda large one, which I don't want to make without consulting authors - namely, I really feel Stargazer should be an alternate class, not an archetype. Your opinion?

edit:
One more thing, concerning prestige classes: At certain levels, they increase "all aspects of their illuminations", at others, only "evoker level and mote pool". So, for example, an MG10/CosCr5/AerMg5 would have 16 levels of "all aspects" and 4 of "level/motes only". So, check my math on this:

Mote pool 20
Evoker Level 20
Mote regen 4/turn (as a MG16)
Illuminations prepared
3 least / 3 lesser / 2 greater / 1 grand (again, as MG16)
Is that correct? ('Cause if it is, Nanoha, who most definitely has some AerMg levels, would never get her most iconic Illumination :-))

That is correct. And Epic Levels.

Tome of Radiance is a rewrite of the baseline setup of the MG. More like a new edition than the more tame "errata" that the last updates were.

[Princess Tracy]

My bad. Should have read forum and figured that out for myself - no patience, me. I wouldn't really describe our campaign as a playtest though....