Yet Another Fighter Fix [PEACH] [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

View Full Version : Yet Another Fighter Fix [PEACH]

Rogue Shadows

2013-02-19, 01:16 PM

http://www.art.eonworks.com/gallery/fantasy/fantasy_warrior-200310-SM.jpg

What do I know of cultured ways, the gilt, the craft and the lie?
I, who was born in a naked land and bred in the open sky.
The subtle tongue, the sophist guile, they fail when the broadswords sing;
Rush in and die, dogs--I was a man before I was a king.

The Fighter

{table=header]Level|Base Attack Bonus|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Special
1st|+1|+2|+1|+0|Armor training 1, bonus feat
2nd|+2|+3|+2|+0|Bravery, physical prowess
3rd|+3|+3|+2|+1|
4th|+4|+4|+2|+1|Armor training 2, physical prowess
5th|+5|+4|+3|+1|Grit
6th|+6/+1|+5|+3|+2|Physical prowess
7th|+7/+2|+5|+4|+2|Tough defense 1/day (reflex)
8th|+8/+3|+6|+4|+2|Physical prowess
9th|+9/+4|+6|+4|+3|Armor training 3
10th|+10/+5|+7|+5|+3|Physical prowess, tough defense 2/day
11th|+11/+6/+1|+7|+5|+3|Awesome actions
12th|+12/+7/+2|+8|+6|+4|Physical prowess, tough defense (will)
13th|+13/+8/+3|+8|+6|+4|Greater grit, tough defense 3/day
14th|+14/+9/+4|+9|+6|+4|Armor training 4, physical prowess
15th|+15/+10/+5|+9|+7|+5|Swift actions
16th|+16/+11/+6/+1|+10|+7|+5|Physical prowess, tough defense 4/day
17th|+17/+12/+7/+2|+10|+8|+5|Supreme training, True Grit
18th|+18/+13/+8/+3|+11|+8|+6|Physical prowess
19th|+19/+14/+9/+4|+11|+8|+6|Armor training 5, tough defense 5/day
20th|+20/+15/+10/+5|+12|+9|+6|Physical prowess, Weapon mastery[/table]

Skill Points At Each Level: 4 + Int modifier, x4 at 1st level
Class Skills: Balance, Climb, Craft, Handle Animal, Intimidate, Jump, Knowledge (dungeoneering), Knowledge (engineering), Knowledge (history), Knowledge (local), Listen, Ride, Spot, Survival, Swim, Tumble

Class Features
All of the following are class features of the fighter.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: A fighter is proficient with all simple and martial weapons and with all armor (heavy, medium, and light) and shields (including tower shields).

Armor Training (Ex): Fighters are more maneuverable when wearing armor than members of other classes. Whenever wearing armor, the fighter reduces the armor check penalty by 1 (to a minimum of 0) and increases the maximum Dexterity bonus allowed by the armor by 1. These bonuses improved by 1 at 4th level and every five levels thereafter.

Additionally, beginning at 4th level, the fighter can move at his normal base land speed while wearing medium armor. At 9th level, the fighter can move at his normal base land speed while wearing heavy armor.

Bonus Feat: At 1st level, the fighter gains a bonus feat. This may be any feat marked as a fighter bonus feat for which the fighter otherwise meets the prerequisites.

Bravery (Ex): Starting at 2nd level, a fighter gains a bonus on Will saves against fear effects equal to ½ his fighter level.

Physical Prowess: As part of lifelong training and experience in the ways of combat, the fighter becomes an exceptional combatant. At 2nd level and every other level thereafter (4th, 6th, 8th, etc.), the fighter may select a special ability from amongst the following. Unless otherwise specified, the fighter can select a prowess only once.

Amazing Wrestling (Ex): Large opponents grappling with a fighter with this prowess do not receive their normal size bonus to grapple checks. This prowess can be taken up to four times. If it is taken twice, then up to Huge opponents have their size bonus negated. At three times, up to Gargantuan opponents have their size bonus negated, and at four times, Colossal opponents have their size bonus negated.

Applied Force (Ex): The fighter gains +1 Strength, and a +2 bonus on all Strength checks and Strength-based skill checks. This prowess may be selected any number of times. Its effects stack.

Armor Mastery (Ex): While wearing armor, the fighter gains Damage Reduction equal to the armor’s base AC bonus (that is, ignoring any enhancement or other bonus the armor might have to its AC). So, for example, a fighter wearing plate mail receives DR 8/-. The fighter must be at least 6th level to select this prowess.

Bash (Ex): The fighter can knock foes away from him with a single powerful attack. As a standard action, he makes a single melee attack at his highest base attack bonus. If the attack succeeds, the target must succeed on a Reflex save (DC 10 + ½ the fighter’s level + the fighter’s Strength modifier) or be knocked back 5 feet, plus an additional 5 feet for every 5 points by which they failed their save. Further, they are knocked prone.

Bonus Feat: In the place of a prowess, a fighter may gain a bonus feat. This feat may be any feat marked as a fighter bonus feat. The fighter must still meet any of the feat's prerequisites.

Combat Bearing (Ex): The fighter gains +1 Dexterity, and a +2 bonus on Dexterity checks and Dexterity-based skill checks. This prowess may be selected any number of times. Its effects stack.

Concentrate Attack (Ex): The fighter focuses all of his power on a single target. As a move action, he chooses a single target that he is aware of. He does not need to see the target. Against that target, the fighter gains a bonus to attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and AC equal to ½ his fighter level. However, the fighter takes an equal penalty to attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and AC against all other targets. He loses these benefits and penalties if he makes attacks against any other target. The target need not be a creature; for example, if the fighter knows the location of a trap, he may designate the trap as the target he is concentrating on. The fighter must be at least 10th level to select this prowess.

Deflect (Ex): The fighter is skilled at deflecting incoming fire. As a reaction, he may negate a ranged attack against him (from a weapon or a spell) by making an opposed melee attack roll at his highest base attack bonus. If his opposed attack roll equals or exceeds the incoming attack roll, that attack is negated. The fighter may perform a deflection any number of times per round, but he takes a cumulative -5 penalty to each attempt made in the same round after the first. The fighter must be of at least 6th level to select this prowess.

Dungeon Crasher (Ex): When making a bull rush, if the fighter forces an opponent to move into a wall or other solid object, the fighter’s momentum crushes his foe against it, dealing 1d6 bludgeoning damage plus twice the fighter’s strength modifier, plus an additional d6 per two fighter levels. The fighter must be at least 6th level before selecting this prowess.

Elusive Attack (Ex): The fighter has mastered a technique of combining offense and defense. As a full-round action, he can make one attack at his highest base attack bonus. Until the start of his next turn, attacks against the fighter gain a 20% miss chance. This prowess may be selected up to three times. Each time it is selected, the miss chance improves by 20%, to a maximum of 60%. The fighter must be at least 8th level to take this prowess a second time, and at least 16th level to take it a third time.

Frightful Presence (Ex): The fighter is a terror to behold in combat. Whenever a creature sees him make an attack the first time in a round, it must make a Will save (DC 10 + 1/2 the fighter's level + the fighter's Strength score) or else become panicked for 1d4+1 rounds. Regardless of whether it succeeds or fails on the check, the same creature cannot be affected by the same fighter's Frightful Presence a second time for 24 hours. The fighter must possess the Intimidating Presence prowess and be of at least 12th level to select this prowess.

Greater Healing Surge (Ex): As a standard action, the fighter can heal any ability damage he has suffered to a single ability score. The fighter can perform a greater healing surge a number of times per day equal to his Constitution bonus (if any). The fighter must be of at least 12th level and possess the healing surge prowess to select this prowess.

Healing Surge (Ex): The fighter finds an inner reserve of strength and ability. As a standard action, he heals a number of hit point equal to his (10 + his Constitution bonus ) x ½ his fighter level. The fighter may use the healing surge any number of times per day, but each time he does he divides the total result of the surge in half for each additional use in a day beyond the first, rounded down (minimum 0). Thus, a 7th-level fighter with a 16 Constitution can heal 39 hit points on his first attempt, 19 on his second attempt, 9 on his third, 4 on his forth, 2 on his fifth, 1 on his sixth, and none on his seventh or on any subsequent attempts for the remainder of the day. The fighter does not have to be conscious to use a healing surge. Thus, a dying fighter can use a healing surge to stabilize, or even recover entirely. The fighter must be of at least 6th level to select this prowess.

[i] Intimidating Presence (Ex): The fighter may use his Strength modifier on Intimidate checks rather than his Charisma modifier.

Jab (Ex): If the fighter is wielding a piercing weapon, he can take a full-round action to make an attack at his highest base attack bonus. This attack ignores the target’s armor bonus and natural armor bonus. Further, if it hits, it automatically threatens a critical (and the roll to confirm the critical also ignores the target's armor bonuses). The fighter must be of at least 8th level to select this prowess.

Leap (Ex): The fighter can perform a bull rush attack against several foes by jumping into the midst of them. The fighter must precede the attack with a jump. Each foe adjacent to the fighter’s landing point must make a Reflex save (DC 10 + ½ the fighter’s level + the fighter’s Strength modifier) or be knocked backwards 5 feet. Further, each target that failed its Reflex save takes 1d6 damage per two fighter levels. The fighter must already have the bash prowess to select this prowess.

Overpowering Attack (Ex): The fighter can focus his attention in combat to deliver a single deadly attack. As a standard action, he makes one attack at his highest base attack bonus. That attack deals double damage, as do any other attacks he makes before the start of his next turn. The damage from overpowering attack is multiplied before any multipliers from a confirmed critical hit are calculated. The fighter must be of at least 16th level to select this prowess.

Parry (Ex): The fighter is an expert at turning blows aside. As a reaction, he may negate a melee attack against him by making an opposed melee attack roll of his own at his highest base attack bonus. If his opposed attack roll equals or exceeds the incoming attack roll, that attack is negated. The fighter may perform a parry any number of times per round, but takes a cumulative -5 penalty on each attempt made in the same round after the first. The fighter must be at least 6th level to select this prowess.

Recovery (Ex): The fighter becomes adept at shrugging off conditions that would hamper him. As a standard action, a fighter can remove a number of the following conditions from himself equal to his Constitution bonus (if any): blinded, dazed, deafened, exhausted, fatigued, nauseated, panicked, paralyzed, shaken, or stunned. The fighter must be of at least 8th level to select this prowess, and he can use it a number of times per day equal to his Constitution modifier (minimum once).

Riposte (Ex): The fighter can respond to attacks made against him with an attack of his own. Whenever he successfully parries an attack, he may use the result of his opposed attack roll to make an immediate melee attack on the enemy that attacked him. The fighter must possess the parry prowess to select this prowess, and be at least 10th level.

Safe Shot (Ex): The fighter does not provoke attacks of opportunity when making ranged attacks. Further, if he has the Point Blank Shot feat, he is treated as having the Close Combat Shot feat as well for any and all purposes.

Stamina Reserve (Ex): The fighter gains +1 Constitution, and a +2 bonus on Constitution checks and Constitution-based skill checks. This prowess may be selected any number of times. Its effects stack.

Stunning Blow (Ex): The fighter’s blows render his opponents senseless. As a standard action, he makes a single melee attack at his highest base attack bonus. If his attack is successful, he deals damage as normal and the target must succeed on a Fortitude saving throw (DC 10 + ½ the fighter’s level + the fighter’s Strength modifier) or be stunned for 1 round. The fighter must be of at least 8th level before selecting this prowess.

Trick Shot (Ex): The fighter chooses one of the following combat maneuvers or actions: bull rush, disarm, feint, sunder, or trip. The fighter can perform this action with a ranged attack against any target within 30 feet, albeit at a -5 penalty. This prowess may be selected up to five times, each time selecting an additional combat maneuver; in addition, the penalty to perform the maneuver at a range decrease by 2 each time he selects this prowess, to a minimum of 0. Further, if the fighter has taken this prowess four times, then he receives a bonus on trick shots equal to his Strength modifier. The fighter must be at least 4th level to select this prowess.

Grit (Ex): Beginning at 5th level, a fighter can resist magical and unusual attacks with great fortitude. If he makes a successful Fortitude save against an attack that normally would have a lesser effect on a successful save (such as any spell with a saving throw entry of Fortitude partial), he instead completely negates the effect. An unconscious or sleeping fighter does not gain the benefit of grit.

Tough Defense (Ex): Beginning at 7th level, the fighter is able to use sheer physical toughness and pigheadedness to overcome many challenges. Once per day, the fighter can choose to make a Fortitude save in the place of a Reflex save. He gains additional uses per day at 10th level and every three levels thereafter.

Beginning at 12th level, the fighter gains the additional ability to make Fortitude saves in the place of Will saves. Either usage of Tough Defense is still drawn from the same limit of uses per day.

Tough Defense may be used in conjunction with the fighter abilities Grit, Greater Grit, and True Grit, as applicable (when used in conjunction with Supreme Grit, the fighter simply negates the incoming effect entirely).

Awesome Actions (Ex): Beginning at 11th level, the fighter becomes adept at making the most of actions and opportunities in combat. Instead of receiving a standard action, move action, and swift action each turn, the fighter receives two standard actions and a swift action. This allows the fighter to move his full base speed twice at no penalty, make two attacks at his highest base attack bonus, make use of two fighter special abilities, and so on.

A fighter taking a full-round action still receives only that action and free actions in a turn.

Greater Grit (Ex): At 13th level, you gain Greater Grit. This functions like Grit, except that even on a failed saving throw the character takes only half the effect of the attack or spells (such as half damage)

Swift Actions (Ex): A 15th-level fighter is supremely gifted at combat. A number of times per day equal to 1/4 his fighter level, the fighter may take any action normally requiring a standard action or a move action as a swift action instead, including moving, attacking, casting a spell, using a prowess, and so on.

True Grit (Ex): At 17th level, the fighter gains Supreme Grit. He becomes immune to hit point damage that would be caused by any effect requiring a Fortitude save. Additionally, he becomes immune to death effects, poison, disease, energy drain, and ability drain.

Weapon Mastery (Ex): At 20th level, a fighter chooses one weapon, such as the longsword, greataxe, or longbow. Any attacks made with that weapon automatically confirm all critical threats and have their damage multiplier increased by 1 (×2 becomes ×3, for example). In addition, he cannot be disarmed while wielding a weapon of this type.

HC Rainbow

2013-02-19, 06:30 PM

I'm not sure if its just me or if half of the things you've given a fighter make them ridiculous.

Its a great concept to try to improve the fighter, but looking at this makes it look twice as ferocious as a frenzied berserker 10/barbarian10.

That being said, some of the numbers need to be tweaked down just a tad bit. Just a tad.

Kane0

2013-02-19, 06:56 PM

*Cracks knuckles* Alright, lets have a look.

Armor Training
Cool, pretty much as PF

Bonus Feats
Given all the other things you are giving, I'd say just get rid of bonus feats and make them an option under Physical Prowess.

Bravery
Just make it straight up immunity to match the paladin.

Physical Prowess
Most of these are good, I'd consider making bonus feat a Physical Prowess option and moving the Physical Prowess ability to take the bonus feat space (once per 2 levels starting at 2), then shuffle around other abilities to unclutter levels a little.

Retraining:
Maybe just make this a 'floating' feat that he can switch around at the beginning of the day or with a bit of time to change over?

Grit
Cool

Make it Count
Good way of making weapon focus, weapon spec and other 'useless' feats more relevant. May want to be more specific or limiting to avoid abuse of feats like power attack though.

Tough Defense
Cool

Awesome Actions
Nice idea, and I don't dislike it, but there would be ways to abuse it.

Greater Grit
Cool

Swift Actions
Probably make this ability usable a bit less often, or make only move actions usable as swift actions. Otherwise looks a bit too powerful

Supreme Grit
This one looks a little too good. Fair enough giving a fortitude equivalent of evasion, but evasion and abilities like it never make you immune to 1/3 of all things requiring a save. On top of this, you can switch out your other two saves for fort and thus be immune. This one tips the power too far.

Weapon Mastery
No problems here.

Note: Adding in an ability at one of the lower levels that mimics the Warblades Weapon Aptitude ability would be a good idea.

Edit: Just saw the medium reflex save. I approve. Maybe let the fighter choose whether to give that medium save progression to ref or will? Also, having the medium save progression there at all may become a little redundant since you have Tough Defense to cover those weak points. Maybe it's best left out of this particular fix.

P.S. Mind if I add this one to the Commonly Corrected Classes Compendium? Feel free to browse over the other fighter fixes there for things you may like to include.

Powerdork

2013-02-19, 07:00 PM

First off, I'm noticing that this class has Good Fortitude, Poor Will and... Reflex. What's up with Reflex?

Second, at level 16, you get 8 swift-standard actions per day, and one every two levels thereafter. That's a bit much, don't you think? Refer to the latter half of HC Rainbow's post.

Djinn_in_Tonic

2013-02-19, 07:52 PM

Glad to see a beefed Reflex save as well as Bravery only taking up one spot on the table. No time for a real review (on a bus right now) but I did notice that Bash doesn't have an action associated with it. Might want to fix that.

Rogue Shadows

2013-02-19, 10:57 PM

First off, I'm noticing that this class has Good Fortitude, Poor Will and... Reflex. What's up with Reflex?

Most of the classes in Star Wars Revised d20 have a "medium" save. I've always liked the concept, and whenever I make a homebrew class I tend to port it in. I think it's something that should be applied across the board for d20.

P.S. Mind if I add this one to the Commonly Corrected Classes Compendium? Feel free to browse over the other fighter fixes there for things you may like to include.

Go right ahead! :smallbiggrin:

Bonus Feats

Not a bad idea RE: feats; I'll do it.

Retraining

I prefer to liken it to how sorcerers can trade out spells known. People who know me on this board also know that I'm not a fan of fighters suddenly forgetting how to Power Attack one day. Now, per-day uses of various things, I can get behind, as I can just conceptualize it as the fighter growing weary and simply not being able to give it his all after a hard day of constant fighting. And of course, the DMG says that the process of levelling up requires downtime and training, so I can get behind the idea of a fighter letting his knowledge of how to Power Attack slip in favor of learning how to Shield Bash. But, at the start of each day? It's too much of a disconnect for me.

Retraining is by and large superfluous anyway; most people tend to plan out their class progressions meticulously and so will probably never use it, and even if they make a mistake, the fighter gets enough feats - especially in Pathfinder - that it probably doesn't kill the build. Retraining basically allows you to try something new without being stuck with it forever.

Bravery

Eh...precisely because it would match the paladin, I don't want to do this; to me, it feels like stepping on the paladin's toes. Besides which, with Supreme Grit/Tough Defense in combination, eventually he can outright become immune anyway. A limited number of times per day, anyway.

May want to be more specific or limiting to avoid abuse of feats like power attack though.

Hmm.

"Starting at 7th level, the fighter may add 1/2 his fighter level to any static numerical bonuses provided by feats the fighter possesses (such as Alertness or Weapon Focus, but not feats which can grant a variable numerical bonus, such as Expertise or Power Attack)."

Look good?

Awesome Actions

Yes, it is abuse-able, but at the same time by the time you get it, you're a 10th-level fighter. You should be rewarded for your dedication to the class with something that might make you able to meaningfully stand up to spellslingers and horrible, horrible monsters (who are often spellslingers themselves).

Swift Actions

By the time you take this ability, you're 16 levels deep into the class. Does it really do anything that unbalancing by that point? Bear in mind that at the same level, wizards are getting 8th-level spells like irresistible dance, polymorph any object, and other shennaniganry. They already have reverse gravity, limited wish, and so on.

I will make it usable less often, though.

Supreme Grit

By the time you acquire Supreme Grit, you are an 18th level fighter (unheard of in this day and age) with a Fortitude save of 11 + Con modifier + ridiculous magic bonuses. In all likelihood, you don't fail Fortitude saves except on a natural 1 anyway. Is it really that much of a gamebreaker to reduce a 5% chance to a 0% chance?

As for using it in combination with Tough Defense: That's sort of the point. It allows the fighter to not be one-shotted by a dominate spell or the like, to not allow spellslingers to bypass their hit points entirely. If the spellslinger wants to defeat the fighter, he now has to whittle his way past the fighter's defenses (in this instance, burning his way through the fighter's Tough Defense uses), the same way the fighter has to whittle his way past the spellslinger's.

Either that, or the spellslinger can cast a spell that doesn't allow for a save at all, which makes Supreme Grit superfluous in any event

(For the record, I think that the Rogue should get Supreme Evasion, for the same reasons listed above).

I'm not sure if its just me or if half of the things you've given a fighter make them ridiculous.

To this, I have only one question before I proceed: how does this fighter compare against a wizard or sorcerer of equal level?

Djinn_in_Tonic

2013-02-20, 02:35 AM

Alright. Serious review time. Let's buckle on our critiquing hats and get down to business. *buckles*

Skill Points At Each Level: 4 + Int modifier, x4 at 1st level
Class Skills: Balance, Climb, Craft, Handle Animal, Intimidate, Jump, Knowledge (dungeoneering), Knowledge (engineering), Knowledge (history), Knowledge (local), Listen, Ride, Spot, Survival, Swim, Tumble

Knowledge (engineering) and Knowledge (history) stand out as unusual choices, but I can't really complain about giving Fighters a chance to branch out skill-wise. Good start.

Armor Training (Ex): Fighters are more maneuverable when wearing armor than members of other classes. Whenever wearing armor, the fighter reduces the armor check penalty by 1 (to a minimum of 0) and increases the maximum Dexterity bonus allowed by the armor by 1. These bonuses improved by 1 at 4th level and every five levels thereafter.

Additionally, beginning at 4th level, the fighter can move at his normal base land speed while wearing medium armor. At 9th level, the fighter can move at his normal base land speed while wearing heavy armor.

Relatively minor, but eh. I'd almost rather see this as a straight AC buff though, as this discourages Fighters from using anything but Heavy armor, and I feel Fighters should be given a choice as to their armor use. Making this a flat scaling bonus would mean that you'd get the same benefit from any armor, which I think wouldn't force the choice as much.

Bravery (Ex): Starting at 2nd level, a fighter gains a bonus on Will saves against fear effects equal to ½ his fighter level.

While I do appreciate seeing this compressed into a single ability and not cluttering up the class table, I'd rather see Fear immunity, or maybe something that allows them to make Fortitude saves instead of Will saves against Fear effects. This is a really large bonus to hand out in a relatively edge case (saves against fear and only fear), and I think you'd benefit from simplifying it a bit.

Amazing Wrestling (Ex): The fighter gains a +4 bonus on grapple checks. This prowess may be selected any number of times, and its effects stack, but the fighter must be of at least 6th level to select it.

Problematic when it stacks infinitely. Being good at grappling is fine, but being able to perma-lock anything even close to your size isn't: if this were, say, added to his effective size category up to a maximum of the opponent he's grappling, it'd be much more balanced. As is, taking this 3+ times renders your grapples effectively inescapable. Not that that's an issue, as the other abilities are often insanely overpowered, so I expect this to be relatively overlooked...

Applied Force (Ex): The fighter gains +1 Strength, and a +2 bonus on all Strength checks and Strength-based skill checks. This prowess may be selected any number of times. Its effects stack.

Cool. No issues here.

Armor Mastery (Ex): While wearing armor, the fighter gains Damage Reduction equal to the armor’s AC bonus. The fighter must be at least 6th level to select this prowess.

No real issue here, although you might want to specify how this stacks with magic armor. Does the enhancement bonus add to AC?

Bash (Ex): The fighter can knock foes away from him with a single powerful attack. As a standard action, he makes a single melee attack at his highest base attack bonus. If the attack succeeds, the target must succeed on a Reflex save (DC 10 + ½ the fighter’s level + the fighter’s Strength modifier) or be knocked back 5 feet, plus an additional 5 feet for every 5 points by which they failed their save.

Probably not worth the action spent, as it not only distances a foe from you (when you want to be in melee with an opponent), but also is very unlikely to ever knock foes more than 5-10 feet. Might want to consider allowing this as part of a normal attack routine, or making it knock the target prone in addition.

Bonus Feat: In the place of a prowess, a fighter may gain a bonus feat. This feat may be any feat marked as a fighter bonus feat. The fighter must still meet any of the feat's prerequisites.

Interesting way to reconcile the old feat-fighter. Seems alright.

Combat Bearing (Ex): The fighter gains +1 Dexterity, and a +2 bonus on Dexterity checks and Dexterity-based skill checks. This prowess may be selected any number of times. Its effects stack.

Same as the earlier one, but for Dexterity. Again, no issues with this ability.

Concentrate Attack (Ex): The fighter focuses all of his power on a single target. As a move action, he chooses a single target that he is aware of. He does not need to see the target. Against that target, the fighter gains a bonus to attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and AC equal to ½ his fighter level. He loses these benefits if he makes attacks against any other target, however. The target need not be a creature; for example, if the fighter knows the location of a trap, he may designate the trap as the target he is concentrating on. The fighter must be at least 10th level to select this prowess.

This I have a huge issue with. We're talking at least a +5 bonus to all attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and AC against a foe, reaching as high as +10. I really don't think the Fighter needs a huge numerical boost to bring him up to par: he needs options. This is pushing him over the top: a +5 to +10 bonus to saves alone against a target is rather insane.

Deflect (Ex): The fighter is skilled at deflecting incoming fire. As a reaction, he may negate a ranged attack against him (from a weapon or a spell) by making an opposed melee attack roll at his highest base attack bonus. If his opposed attack roll equals or exceeds the incoming attack roll, that attack is negated. The fighter may perform a deflection any number of times per round, but he takes a cumulative -5 penalty to each attempt made in the same round after the first. The fighter must be of at least 6th level to select this prowess.

Parry (Ex): The fighter is an expert at turning blows aside. As a reaction, he may negate a melee attack against him by making an opposed melee attack roll of his own at his highest base attack bonus. If his opposed attack roll equals or exceeds the incoming attack roll, that attack is negated. The fighter may perform a parry any number of times per round, but takes a cumulative -5 penalty on each attempt made in the same round after the first. The fighter must be at least 6th level to select this prowess.

Hm. I'm not sure I like this being effectively unlimited, but I'd have to see it in play. That being said, this combined with Coordinated Attack is way to good, as your +10 bonus against your foe means you can block all their ranged (and/or melee) attacks. Those extra bonuses are throwing off the balance here: a well-built Fighter will be untouchable in many fights.

Dungeon Crasher (Ex): When making a bull rush, if the fighter forces an opponent to move into a wall or other solid object, the fighter’s momentum crushes his foe against it, dealing 1d6 bludgeoning damage plus twice the fighter’s strength modifier, plus an additional d6 per two fighter levels. The fighter must be at least 6th level before selecting this prowess.

Relatively standard. Lots of fun. Approved. :smallbiggrin:

Elusive Attack (Ex): The fighter has mastered a technique of combining offense and defense. As a full-round action, he can make one attack at his highest base attack bonus. Until the start of his next turn, attacks against the fighter gain a 20% miss chance. This prowess may be selected up to five times. Each time it is selected, the miss chance improves by 20%, to a maximum of 100%.

...What? Up to 100% miss chance? This is an AMAZING trade if you can lock people down (or move to position for full attacks without sacrificing your ability to full attack, which this class can do). By allowing this to stack you've really allowed huge one-trick ponies, which I can't call good design. I feel this ability should be limited to one iteration, or two at the most: perhaps up the level required to take the ability, make it a standard action, and give a 25-30% miss chance. That makes for a tempting ability, but one that occupies only a single slot so you don't have a huge reward for ability stacking and having no other tricks.

Frightful Presence (Ex): The fighter is a terror to behold in combat. Whenever a creature sees him make an attack the first time in a round, it must make a Will save (DC 10 + 1/2 the fighter's level + the fighter's Strength score) or else become panicked for 5d6 rounds. Regardless of whether it succeeds or fails on the check, the same creature cannot be affected by the same fighter's Frightful Presence a second time for 24 hours. The fighter must possess the Intimidating Presence prowess and be of at least 12th level to select this prowess.

...are you sure you want such a huge duration on an AoE save-or-suck for the entire opposing force? It's Strength based and this class has innate Strength boosting potential in Prowess choices, meaning it's entirely possible for most encounters to begin with a large portion of the opposition simply dropping their weapons and running away to be slain.

I'd be much happier with a lower duration, and/or change the effect to be Frightened. Then fighting is still an option: they'll just be much weaker.

Another option is to make the duration MUCH lower (1-2 rounds) and have it trigger whenever the Fighter slays a creature.

Greater Healing Surge (Ex): As a standard action, the fighter can heal any ability damage he has suffered to a single ability score. The fighter can perform a greater healing surge a number of times per day equal to his Constitution bonus (if any). The fighter must be of at least 12th level and possess the healing surge prowess to select this prowess.

Healing Surge (Ex): The fighter finds an inner reserve of strength and ability. As a standard action, he heals a number of hit point equal to his (10 + his Constitution bonus ) x ½ his fighter level. The fighter may use the healing surge any number of times per day, but each time he does he divides the total result of the surge in half for each additional use in a day beyond the first, rounded down (minimum 0). Thus, a 7th-level fighter with a 16 Constitution can heal 39 hit points on his first attempt, 19 on his second attempt, 9 on his third, 4 on his forth, 2 on his fifth, 1 on his sixth, and none on his seventh or on any subsequent attempts for the remainder of the day. The fighter does not have to be conscious to use a healing surge. Thus, a dying fighter can use a healing surge to stabilize, or even recover entirely. The fighter must be of at least 6th level to select this prowess.

Cool. Like these, like the implementation. Well done.

[i]Intimidating Presence (Ex): The fighter may use his Strength modifier on Intimidate checks rather than his Charisma modifier.

Standard issue. Effective, if relatively boring. Fine option to have.

Jab (Ex): If the fighter is wielding a piercing weapon, he can take a full-round action to make an attack at his highest base attack bonus. This attack ignores the target’s armor bonus and natural armor bonus. Further, if it hits, it automatically threatens a critical. The fighter must be of at least 8th level to select this prowess.

Careful with this: with weapons that have a x3 or greater crit multiplier, this is almost always better than a regular full attack (especially when you have less than four attacks). I'm not sure I approve of invalidating the full attack in this fashion, especially this early. I'd rather see this as automatically threatening a critical as a Swift action, X per day (or X per encounter).

Also, as written, does the confirmation roll also bypass the armor bonuses? You might want to specify: I think it's supposed to, but I'm not positive.

Leap (Ex): The fighter can perform a bull rush attack against several foes by jumping into the midst of them. The fighter must precede the attack with a jump. Each foe adjacent to the fighter’s landing point must make a Reflex save (DC 10 + ½ the fighter’s level + the fighter’s Strength modifier) or be knocked backwards 5 feet. The fighter must already have the bash prowess to select this prowess.

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! I like this. Although I'm not sure of it's utility, because unless I don't remember my Bull Rush rules correctly this does nothing but knock a group of people back 5ft. I could be attacking them. I'd consider putting some damage on this: perhaps the Fighter comes crashing down for 1d6/2 levels or something like that.

Overpowering Attack (Ex): The fighter can focus his attention in combat to deliver a single deadly attack. As a standard action, he makes one attack at his highest base attack bonus. That attack deals double damage, as do any other attacks he makes before the start of his next turn. The damage from overpowering attack is multiplied before any multipliers from a confirmed critical hit are calculated. The fighter must be of at least 16th level to select this prowess.

Again, standard stuff. Still good.

Recovery (Ex): The fighter becomes adept at shrugging off conditions that would hamper him. As a standard action, a fighter can remove a number of the following conditions from himself equal to his Constitution bonus (if any): blinded, dazed, deafened, exhausted, fatigued, nauseated, panicked, paralyzed, shaken, or stunned. The fighter must be of at least 8th level to select this prowess.

Combine this with Parry/Deflect and/or Elusive Attack and we can now ignore/negate most forms of attack that don't outright kill us. You might want to consider some form of limitation on this, although I don't see this one as being as big a deal.

Riposte (Ex): The fighter can respond to attacks made against him with an attack of his own. Whenever he successfully parries an attack, he may use the result of his opposed attack roll to make an immediate melee attack on the enemy that attacked him. The fighter must possess the parry prowess to select this prowess, and be at least 10th level.

This plus Parry plus Overpowering Attack plus the huge attack bonuses this fix can generate is a bit much. With any of those issues resolved, it's much less of an issue.

Safe Shot (Ex): The fighter does not provoke attacks of opportunity when making ranged attacks. The fighter must be at least 4th level to select this prowess.

Nice. I'd allow this at level 1 though: it opens up a huge number of options for archer builds. I might also say the Fighter is treated as having Close Combat Shot if they also possess Point Blank Shot, just because I feel archers deserve a bone tossed their way every now and then.

Stamina Reserve (Ex): The fighter gains +1 Constitution, and a +2 bonus on Constitution checks and Constitution-based skill checks. This prowess may be selected any number of times. Its effects stack.

Yep. Like the others, I approve. Although Constitution-based skill checks are basically nonexistent and largely unimportant for the Fighter, so this of undoubtedly of slightly less utility than the others. No huge deal though: it's still good.

Stunning Blow (Ex): The fighter’s blows render his opponents senseless. As a standard action, he makes a single melee attack at his highest base attack bonus. If his attack is successful, he deals damage as normal and the target must succeed on a Fortitude saving throw (DC 10 + ½ the fighter’s level + the fighter’s Strength modifier) or be stunned for 1 round. The fighter must be of at least 8th level before selecting this prowess.

Trick Shot (Ex): The fighter chooses one of the following combat maneuvers or actions: bull rush, disarm, feint, sunder, or trip. The fighter can perform this action with a ranged attack against any target within 30 feet, albeit at a -5 penalty. This prowess may be selected up to five times, each time selecting an additional combat maneuver; in addition, the penalty to perform the maneuver at a range decrease by 1 each time he selects this prowess. The fighter must be at least 4th level to select this prowess.

Once per maneuver? Seems quite the tax on the ranged character...I might consider upping it to at least 2 per iteration, if not all outright. Maybe once to allow all of them, and once to negate the penalty: compared with many of the other options, I'm not sure that would be to strong, especially since the range is limited to 30 feet.

Retraining: Beginning at 3rd level, whenever a fighter gains a bonus feat, they may choose to swap out one of their previous bonus feats and take a new one as well as get their new bonus feat. So, for example, at 4th level, a fighter that took Weapon Focus (longswords) at 2nd level can ‘retrain’ and take Dodge instead. He must still meet any prerequisites for the feat he is retraining in.

Nice, although this is strange now that you've removed most of the Fighter's mandatory bonus feats...

Grit (Ex): Beginning at 5th level, a fighter can resist magical and unusual attacks with great fortitude. If he makes a successful Fortitude save against an attack that normally would have a lesser effect on a successful save (such as any spell with a saving throw entry of Fortitude partial), he instead completely negates the effect. An unconscious or sleeping fighter does not gain the benefit of grit.

Greater Grit (Ex): At 13th level, you gain Greater Grit. This functions like Grit, except that even on a failed saving throw the character takes only half the effect of the attack or spells (such as half damage)

Yep. Sounds good.

Supreme Grit (Ex): At 17th level, the fighter gains Supreme Grit. He becomes immune to any effect requiring a Fortitude save.

I consider this one much less good, because I'm strongly opposed to outright immunities: they're actually not much fun, and they also really discourage the DM from using things that showcase your character's strengths, because the DM is positive those things will fail to harm you at all. I might use the Construct style immunity here, but your mileage may vary. I just have a strong dislike of blanket immunities.

Make it Count (Ex): Beginning at 7th level, the fighter adds ½ his fighter level to any static numerical bonuses provided by feats that the fighter possesses (such as Alertness or Weapon Focus, but not feats which apply a variable numerical bonus, such as Power Attack). For example, a 7th-level fighter with Weapon Focus adds a +4 bonus to his attack rolls, not a +1 bonus.

Sorry. This is the first ability I'm going to straight-up say absolutely NOT to. I debated this as a possibility on a Fighter thread that popped up, but I realized the +20 attack bonus from Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Focus, the +12 save bonuses from Iron Will and Lightning Reflexes, the +10 AC bonus from Dodge and so forth encourages nothing more than numerical min-maxing to being a class that never misses, never gets hit, and makes all its saves. It means you suddenly want most of your feats to grant numerical bonuses, and, further, makes many of the Prowess abilities no longer appealing: why get +4 to grapple when, for a single feat, I get +14?

Finally, imagine things like Parry when you have +10 to attack rolls from Coordinated Strike and +20 from Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Focus. Your Fighter is basically impossible to hit: he can Parry SIX attacks before he's working at his normal, still incredibly high, attack roll.

I can suggest nothing but cutting this ability. Feat numbers aren't good to mess with: to many feats are to across the board in terms of what level of power they give, and adding a blanket +10 to that is crazy, even at 20th level. The Fighter has only had a minor issue with his numbers, and that issue is in AC being useless and damage not competing well with save-or-dies (largely due to iterative attacks usually missing). This is going way to far in the other direction, and takes almost all the chance out of the dice.

Tough Defense (Ex): Beginning at 8th level, the fighter is able to use sheer physical toughness and pigheadedness to overcome many challenges. A number of times per day equal to half his fighter level, the fighter can choose to make a Fortitude save in the place of a Reflex save.

Beginning at 12th level, the fighter gains the additional ability to make Fortitude saves in the place of Will saves. Either usage of Tough Defense is still drawn from the same limit of one-half the fighter’s total level.

Tough Defense may be used in conjunction with the fighter abilities Grit, Greater Grit, and Supreme Grit, as applicable (when used in conjunction with Supreme Grit, the fighter simply negates the incoming effect entirely).

Until this added Grit and the improved versions, this was looking to be powerful, but acceptable. 6+ uses of "Excuse me, I'll completely ignore this spell and/or effect" is coming perilously close to making an invincible Fighter: remember, he's already able to dodge or parry most attacks, heal himself, and remove status conditions. Again, blanket immunities aren't fun: this Fighter so far has VERY little risk involved at higher levels.

Aesome Actions (Ex): Beginning at 11th level, the fighter becomes adept at making the most of actions and opportunities in combat. Instead of receiving a standard action, move action, and swift action each turn, the fighter receives two standard actions and a swift action. This allows the fighter to move his full base speed twice at no penalty, make two attacks at his highest base attack bonus, make use of two fighter special abilities, and so on.

A fighter taking a full-round action still receives only that action and free actions in a turn.

This I rather like. It's not insanely powerful but IS still good, and it really lets you use your Prowess abilities. I just wish there were more standard action Prowess abilities that combo'd well into each other... (hint, hint, hint :smalltongue:)

Swift Actions (Ex): A 15th-level fighter is supremely gifted at combat. A number of times per day equal to 1/4 his fighter level, the fighter may take any action normally requiring a standard action or a move action as a swift action instead, including moving, attacking, casting a spell, using a prowess, and so on.

NICE. This is a great kicker, and lets the Fighter really shine in some key combat moments. Endorsed.

Weapon Mastery (Ex): At 20th level, a fighter chooses one weapon, such as the longsword, greataxe, or longbow. Any attacks made with that weapon automatically confirm all critical threats and have their damage multiplier increased by 1 (×2 becomes ×3, for example). In addition, he cannot be disarmed while wielding a weapon of this type.

...this would be nice, if it didn't come completely out of the blue. This Fighter has shown no inclination to be focused in a single weapon, and I don't think throwing that in at level 20 is a good idea. Additionally, it's a rather passive and, at this point, somewhat minor ability compared to some of the stuff you have. Doesn't really feel like it fits this class well.

*****

OVERALL OPINION

You have some cool stuff here. Some of it (the action-advantage abilities and some of the Prowess abilities) is really great. But it's bogged down by a chassis that is really...well...bland and uninteresting while being overpowered at the same time.

In short, much of this class suffers from a case of blanket immunities, effective immunities, and arbitrary number-increasing which, while they undoubtedly make the class more powerful, also remove the elements of chance, risk, and, ultimately, fun from the class. The Fighter needed cool tricks and options: you've given him some with Prowess and his own special action advantage shenanigans. That's awesome. But then you hugely buffed all his numbers, gave out tons of "get out of jail or just ignore jail for free" cards, and generally made him a number junkie who can largely ignore the d20 and just hit things for free all day.

Having seen many of your other homebrew and other Fighter fixes, this one disappoints me a bit. There are some real gems in here, but you really need to bring those out and polish them: they're currently trapped in a morass of increasing numbers of hard-counter abilities.

Edit: I understand you want the Fighter to be able to stand against a Wizard or Sorcerer but, as I've said before (and will undoubtedly say again), an overpowered Tier 4 class (which this still is, if only just) is NOT a Tier 1 class. It's just gamebreakingly powerful in a single aspect, and, unlike a Tier 1 class, it's gamebreakingly powerful even in the hands of a barely skilled player. Playing a Batman Wizard requires knowledge and planning: playing this class effectively requires taking feats that grant numerical bonuses and abusing that interaction with other class features. That's it.

If you want to compete with the Wizards, you need to have options that allow you to compete, and tricks that can circumvent their tricks. Having abilities that just go "Nope. Not today" is fine, but all that does is make those Tier 1 classes feel useless against you, while you're still effectively useless against them if they're played right. No one wins. The trick is to find a way that let's both have an equal set of tricks, none of which truly hard-counters the other, so there's more give-and-take in gameplay. This Fighter is definitely overpowered in combat...and still can't do much of anything BUT combat. :smallfrown:

Rogue Shadows

2013-02-20, 03:38 AM

an overpowered Tier 4 class (which this still is, if only just) is NOT a Tier 1 class

Well, no, and I don't think it is. I simply also don't think that, at least in the case of Tough Defense/Grit, this leads to an overpowered class. Again, reducing a 5% to a 0% is hardly game-breaking or overpowering, and forcing a Tier-1 to whittle away at daily uses of Tough Defense rather than simply going "BAM MIND CONTROL I have a pet now" is, in fact, game balancing.

I think of them as basically Brain Points to contrast with Hit Points.

Armor Training

This was lifted straight from Pathfinder, though I changed its progression slightly.

I guess it depends on what you see the class as doing, and what you want the class to do. The idea of a lighter-armored fighter maneuvering around the battlefield is fine enough, but it's also sort-of the Swashbuckler's niche. I'm actually putting the finishing touches on a fix for that right now; I'll probably post it tomorrow.

Point being that when I think "fighter," I think the classic examples of a dungeon-crawler in full plate or scale mail, the guy who, on seeing a dragon, gets ready to go toe-to-toe with it, hackin' and slashin' away.

Bravery

The confusing thing is that you mention not liking blanket immunities below...

Amazing Grappling

Should I change it so that, instead, it gradually negates larger and larger size bonuses to grappling? I want the fighter to be able to eventually wrestle the Tarrasque.

Armor Mastery

I was thinking just the armor's base AC bonus. So plate mail and +5 plate mail both just give a flat DR 8/-. I'll make that clearer.

Bash

I'll make it knock the target prone.

Concentrate Attack

This was adapted from the Barbarian ability of the same name from Diablo II: Diablerie. In that, though, the barbarian took a penalty to AC from the target of his concentration, but received a bonus to AC against all other targets. Didn't make much sense to me.

Initially I wanted to impose a like penalty to attacks, saves, etc., from all other targets besides the concentrated one, but I had a feeling I'd get yelled at for that. Should I re-implement it?

Deflect/Parry

These are adapted from the Star Wars Saga Edition. In that, they required Used the Force checks rather than attack rolls. In practice they were a little unbalancing, but that was largely due to the fact that skills scaled way faster than attack bonus in that game; here, making opposed attack rolls should even things out.

Mostly, this is a way to solve the problem that is the fact that at high levels, AC just isn't very good, as it's easy to hit. The solution is to, of course, make it only the first line of defense, rather than the last, before reaching the squishy HP. Of course, the cumulative 05 penalty will really start to kick in if you're fighting lots of enemies, which hopefully, you are, because that's more fun.

Now that I see the problem with Concentrated Attack, though, I think I'll definitely re-implement the like penalty to it that I originally wanted.

Elusive Attack

The ability that this is based on, from PHB II, allowed up to a 60% miss chance. I wanted fighters, again, to have other options for defense besides AC that scales poorly, though obviously I went too far. I'll limit it to up to 3 times (I want it to cap at just over 50%), but I'll make sure to up the levels at which you can take it.

Frightful Presence

The duration is actually pulled directly from the Monster Manual, which gives 5d6 rounds as standard for the ability, and has comperable triggers (for example, a dragon flying overhead or attacking). I'll shorten it, though, to 1d4+1 rounds.

Jab

The confirmation roll is supposed to also bypass the armor bonuses, yes.

Leap

I'll add some damage.

Recovery

I'll give it a per-day limitation; 1/2 fighter level seems to be my standard.

Riposte

Again, I'll make it so that Concentrated Attack gives a like penalty to attacks from/saves and AC against all other targets.

Safe Shot

Adapted from Pathfinder's Archer archetype, where it's gained at level 3. I'll drop it down to 1, though, and throw it the feat considerations you mentioned.

Trick Shot

Adapted from the Pathfinder Archer Archetype, as above. In that, though, Trick Shot only imposed a -4 penalty, but also only applied to Disarm, Feint, and Sunder attempts. I'll make it decrease by 2 per iteration...maybe even give a slight bonus if you take four or five.

Supreme Grit

Again, weird that you don't like this, but are okay with a blanket fear immunity...in any event, like I said, by the time you acquire this you are a very high-level fighter who probably can't fail on the Fortitude saving throw except on a Natural 1 anyway. For all intents and purposes you're immune anyway, and no DM is going to throw something at you that relies on Fortitude saves.

Make it Count

Understandable, but at the same time I want to keep something like this in order to make otherwise useless feats worthwhile investments. Maybe a +1 bonus at 7th, plus an additional +1 at 11th and every 4 levels thereafter? So it caps out at +4.

Tough Defense

It's my solution to the classic problem. Without Tough Defense this fighter is very good at the physical side of things; then again, he was very good at the physical side of things anyway. The fighter's problem has never been in hitting things or dealing damage or making Fortitude saves, it does all that just fine already. However, its fundamental problem comes from the other side, namely, "BAM DOMINATE now I have a new pet," and like abilities. The point being that a wizard should not be able to utterly, trivially bypass the fighter's armor, hit points, and basically saves in order to one-shot him.

This applies to the other side of the DM screen as well. It's not very fun to try and design a balanced high-level encounter when all your fighters HAVE to blow their limited NPC wealth by level into mind blank effects and such to not simply become fodder for the party enchanter. When was the last time you saw a 20th-level fighter as the campaign's end boss?

Weapon Mastery

Pulled from Pathfinder. I'm actually not too happy with it, and am open to suggestions for a replacement.

Djinn_in_Tonic

2013-02-20, 12:17 PM

Note: Other than what I discuss here, the changes look great to me! So if this post seems like nitpicking in several places, well...that's because it is. :smalltongue:

:smallbiggrin:

Well, no, and I don't think it is. I simply also don't think that, at least in the case of Tough Defense/Grit, this leads to an overpowered class. Again, reducing a 5% to a 0% is hardly game-breaking or overpowering, and forcing a Tier-1 to whittle away at daily uses of Tough Defense rather than simply going "BAM MIND CONTROL I have a pet now" is, in fact, game balancing.

While this is somewhat true, it's a very strange form of balance. Rather that completely ignore spell effects, I'd much rather see an ability that lets a Fighter temporarily ignore their effects, or lets him re-make a Will save with a bonus equal to his Attack Bonus if forced to attack a creature while under mental control: whatever it is, something that isn't just "Nope. Try again." until you finally run out of uses and succumb immediately anyway.

That gets us a Fighter who can fight through penalties without pause, but who might succumb to a crippling spell effect once his combat furor dies down: to me, that makes a lot more sense than the Fighter who simply ignores everything like some sort of spell-absorbing monster.

Finally, note that the ability doesn't do anything but prolong combat and burn resources: the Wizard is still invisible, ethereal, and flying around out of your reach. All you're making him do is burn ten extra spells to eventually kill you.

Soft counters are a lot better: even the best protected Wizard can fall prey to a dispel magic or an anti-magic field, so no spells (short of a few insane combos) are uncounterable hard negation. Maybe try mixing in slightly less hard-counter defenses with a bit of anti-magic offense?

The confusing thing is that you mention not liking blanket immunities below...

Well, yes. But I do accept some: blanket immunities to fear (a relatively small subset of Will save effects) isn't anywhere NEAR as potent an end-all defense as blanket immunity to Fortitude saves that can be applied (many times a day) to Will and Reflex saves as well.

Would I rather see this ability allow Fortitude saves to be used in place of Will saves against fear? Definitely. But that's just me.

Should I change it so that, instead, it gradually negates larger and larger size bonuses to grappling? I want the fighter to be able to eventually wrestle the Tarrasque.

I like this much better, as you avoid the unbeatable grapple issue while still providing an obvious bonus. You might want to escalate the rate to +8 though, as this ability would now only have a benefit against larger foes.

This was adapted from the Barbarian ability of the same name from Diablo II: Diablerie. In that, though, the barbarian took a penalty to AC from the target of his concentration, but received a bonus to AC against all other targets. Didn't make much sense to me.

Initially I wanted to impose a like penalty to attacks, saves, etc., from all other targets besides the concentrated one, but I had a feeling I'd get yelled at for that. Should I re-implement it?

I would re-implement it, and then maybe make it take a Swift action, since there is now an obvious downside. Either that or make this ability a core ability, remove Supreme Grit and Tough Defense (or make Tough Defense merely apply Constitution or Strength to Reflex and Will saves instead of the usual modifier), and let the Fighter use Concentrated Attack to prioritize important targets and have huge bonuses to even his bad saves against those targets, which should let him shrug off most spell effects (as it brings even his bad Will save up to a +16 base).

That might be a nice fix, honestly. You have a Fighter who can barrel through to the spellcaster relatively unaffected, but at the expense of not being able to hard-counter other spell effects from other sources. Either way, just a suggestion.

Mostly, this is a way to solve the problem that is the fact that at high levels, AC just isn't very good, as it's easy to hit. The solution is to, of course, make it only the first line of defense, rather than the last, before reaching the squishy HP. Of course, the cumulative 05 penalty will really start to kick in if you're fighting lots of enemies, which hopefully, you are, because that's more fun.

Now that I see the problem with Concentrated Attack, though, I think I'll definitely re-implement the like penalty to it that I originally wanted.

I would also still be careful...do you want this Fighter to be basically guaranteed to win any 1-v-1 fights ever?

Again, weird that you don't like this, but are okay with a blanket fear immunity...in any event, like I said, by the time you acquire this you are a very high-level fighter who probably can't fail on the Fortitude saving throw except on a Natural 1 anyway. For all intents and purposes you're immune anyway, and no DM is going to throw something at you that relies on Fortitude saves.

The thing is that that 5% chance keeps PCs on their toes, and makes it so you don't just waltz your Fighter into a room filled to the brim with poisonous gas, or launch him into space without a helmet. It also means the DM will occasionally hit you with things because there's a chance you'll fail your save, so your beefy save feels good more often than not, since you still get to use it occasionally.[/i]

Understandable, but at the same time I want to keep something like this in order to make otherwise useless feats worthwhile investments. Maybe a +1 bonus at 7th, plus an additional +1 at 11th and every 4 levels thereafter? So it caps out at +4.

That's still very good in some situations (Weapon Focus results in a +10 to attack rolls from that and Greater Weapon Focus). Probably a bit to much for 2 feats.

I'd really suggest just letting it slide. Your Fighter already gets some nice bonuses: keep the feat fix attempts for...well...a feat fix. Taking a feat fix onto a class subsystem is almost assured to not work well, or have outliers that you missed and end up incredibly powerful.

It's my solution to the classic problem. Without Tough Defense this fighter is very good at the physical side of things; then again, he was very good at the physical side of things anyway. The fighter's problem has never been in hitting things or dealing damage or making Fortitude saves, it does all that just fine already.

Right. So why do many of your abilities make him significantly better and hitting things and/or dealing damage? You toss out some huge attack bonuses with this class. :smallconfused:

However, its fundamental problem comes from the other side, namely, "BAM DOMINATE now I have a new pet," and like abilities. The point being that a wizard should not be able to utterly, trivially bypass the fighter's armor, hit points, and basically saves in order to one-shot him.

Correct. But neither should the Fighter be put on a 10-point pool of hard counters: that means the outcome is exactly the same, just delayed. This means the DM has to have enough spells to burn through that pool before an encounter puts a Fighter at risk or, worse, than PC spellcasters have to chew through enough potent spells to make a Fighter opponent actually expend Tough Defense uses. This war of attrition neuters casters to the point of boredom (look...my first ten powerful spells will do nothing, and he'll just ignore the weaker ones...yay), but doesn't actually fix the problem of the Fighter being out-classed completely by spells that negate him entirely (incorporeal casters, invisible casters, flying casters, and so forth). There's just a timer on his inevitable death.

He has a hard defense, but it's not the pool of soft counters and soft offensive counters that he needed to be able to compete well. My opinion, at least: take it with a grain of salt if you wish.

This applies to the other side of the DM screen as well. It's not very fun to try and design a balanced high-level encounter when all your fighters HAVE to blow their limited NPC wealth by level into mind blank effects and such to not simply become fodder for the party enchanter. When was the last time you saw a 20th-level fighter as the campaign's end boss?

True. But, again, when was the last time your PC caster enjoyed sitting back and having his first 5-10 rounds of combat be completely negated by something that had no chance at all of being affected by spells? All this will likely to is propagate the "No-Save-Just-Suck" sort of spells when a Fighter is involved.

Pulled from Pathfinder. I'm actually not too happy with it, and am open to suggestions for a replacement.

I'll think it over and get back to you.

HC Rainbow

2013-02-21, 10:54 AM

In my honest opinion, I feel that this class will do MUCH better against batman than his previous form, which really isnt saying much, but I feel with all the numbers that will add up to your attack roll you could become some super crazy trip crit locker with a scythe doing x5 damage on every successful trip and taking swift actions to make sure even if they DO get away you can just hunt them down and full attack and trip them.

If played just right this fighter would, again, just my opinion, but near never miss, crit the hell out of everything, which, crit may be underlooked in some aspects but in others can really rack up a lot of damage.

I always viewed a fighter as one who could have an arsenal of weapons for every occasion and use each one to its fullest potential, maybe a level 20 ability where they gain proficiency with all weapons, including exotic, improved critical and focus on all weapons, something around those lines.

Again, I'm not the best at optimizing fighters but looking at this build makes me feel like the barbarian PC I have with me is just a child.

Edit: Tough Defence + Supreme Grit = What on EARTH will Batman do. First round they'll flail around aimlessly or be forced to use a couple of no saves allowed spells, and you'll sit on their face and proceed to cut off their limbs coup de grace-ing them endlessly due to weapon mastery.

Rogue Shadows

2013-02-21, 03:49 PM

Summery: I ditched Retraining and Make it Count, lowered the fighter's pool of Tough Defense (but made it available one level earlier to combat dead levels), and limited and renamed Supreme Grit. And...now I have a dead level at 3rd Level.

I hate dead levels. Hmm...think Level 3 is too early for all of a fighter's attacks to be considered magical for the purposes of overcoming DR? Probably. Hmm...

Well, I was actually considering giving the fighter an ability called First Strike that gives him scaling d4s of damage on his first attack each round, if it hits. It'd scale at the same rate as Sneak Attack. Too much?

While this is somewhat true, it's a very strange form of balance. Rather that completely ignore spell effects, I'd much rather see an ability that lets a Fighter temporarily ignore their effects, or lets him re-make a Will save with a bonus equal to his Attack Bonus if forced to attack a creature while under mental control: whatever it is, something that isn't just "Nope. Try again." until you finally run out of uses and succumb immediately anyway.

Actually I have a barbarian rebuild that does that, sort of. Rather, whenever they would become the subject of any effect (an attack, a spell, whatever), a number of times per day equal to 1/2 their barbarian level they may make an immediate melee attack against the thing that's affecting them, or an immediate charge against the thing affecting them if it's not in melee range (if it's not in charge range, then they're SOL). Once that immediate action is resolved, it takes effect.

It seems like a more barbarian-y thing. Barbarians ignore effects for a time, but they'll still eventually take effect; while a fighter outright negates them through sheer

Finally, note that the ability doesn't do anything but prolong combat and burn resources: the Wizard is still invisible, ethereal, and flying around out of your reach. All you're making him do is burn ten extra spells to eventually kill you.

To be absolutely fair...

1) the same thing can be said about HP in the first place - that is, all HP does, due to its essentially binary nature, is prolong a fight, since as long as you have more than zero, you're operating at full power. By giving the fighter a limited pool of negate-effects, he essentially gains HP that he can burn against powerful effects;
2) the fighter can himself be invisible, ethereal, or flying around, too. While I acknowledge that access to magical items should not be taken into account when Tiering classes, that doesn't change the fact that at given level X a character of a given class can be assumed to have item-access to numerous effects, such as flying and the like.

I would also still be careful...do you want this Fighter to be basically guaranteed to win any 1-v-1 fights ever?

Well...to an extent, sort of, certainly in straight-up weapon to weapon combat.

What I'm trying to create here is basically the most Tier-4 that was ever a Tier-4. When you put levels into a class called "fighter," you're not looking to be broadly applicable in numerous situations; you're looking to fight. In a straight-up melee slugging match, no other class should compare to a fighter, except in specific situations (a paladin, for example, can be better against evil creatures; and a ranger can be better against his chosen favored enemies or at a range; while, say, the swashbuckler and the barbarian give up sheer combat capability in return for more versatility in social (swashbuckler, and paladin to an extent as well) or wilderness (barbarian, and ranger as well) settings).

As for the other archetypes facing a fighter in melee combat (rogue, priest, mage)...not even close, not unless the rogue can get in a positively lethal backstab, preferably while the fighter is asleep; the priest can get the direct intervention of God; or the mage summons up a horde from the blackest pits of Hell or literally re-writes reality with a wish. But in exchange they get ludicrous skills, or neat spells.

Rush in and die, dogs--I was a man before I was a king.

or launch him into space without a helmet.

Oh, right, that will make him immune to a vacuum, wouldn't it...hmm.

"True Grit (Ex): The fighter never takes hit point damage from any effect requiring a Fortitude save. Additionally, he is immune to poison, disease, death effects, energy drain, and ability drain."

keep the feat fix attempts for...well...a feat fix.

Yeah, good point. This fighter isn't as much as a...what's the feat version of a skillmonkey?...a featsquirrel the core fighter.

True. But, again, when was the last time your PC caster enjoyed sitting back and having his first 5-10 rounds of combat be completely negated by something that had no chance at all of being affected by spells?

Again, due to the essentially binary nature of hit points, that's exactly what a melee or ranged attack, or a spell that deals damage, is. The spell isn't completely negated, it simply burns away some uses of tough defense, much as dealing damage burns away hit points.

I'll decrease uses-per-day (ten is, perhaps, a bit much), but overall I don't see a meaningful reason to eliminate it entirely.

Yakk

2013-02-21, 10:23 PM

Needs more super-linear.

Instead of "take this ability multiple times", simply have the ability auto-scale.

Ie:
Awesome Wrestling: You gain a +2 class bonus to grapple checks, and do not need to make a melee touch attack to initiate a grapple, and moving into your opponents space when initiating a grapple does not provoke opportunity attacks. Creatures larger than you are treated as 1 size category closer for the purpose of grapple checks, increasing to 2 size categories at level 5, 3 at level 10, 4 at level 15, and you can ignore the larger size category of enemies at level 20. While grappling you do not lose your dex bonus to AC and you threaten squares normally. You do not take a penalty to attack rolls while grappling.

... a bit verbose, but basically you get non-sucky grappling, with a scaling reduction in enemy size category bonuses.

Swift Actions: You start at level 15. Why divide fighter level by 4? That's 3 at level 15, 4 at level 16, and 5 at level 20.

Give X, then +Y/level.

Also needs more swift action abilities.

...

Level 18 is a horrible dead level. You need some way for the abilities you gain at higher levels to scale. Wizards are gaining a 9th level spell/day at this point -- what are you getting to compete? +1/2 BaB, 4 HP, and what?

This is why abilities need to auto-scale. Every ability you can take "more than once" should auto-scale. Every ability you can pick at level 18 should be compared to "how does this compare to a 9th level spell once per day? Is it in the same neighborhood?"

If the ability doesn't compare, cut it up and recycle the parts.

...

This character is still mostly aimed at fighting similar armed and equipped enemies. Most melee enemies at level 20 will be pit-fiend scale, or dragon-scale. How does this character (with core abilities) deal with flying opponents? Enemies with 20' of reach?

...

And I agree, defensive vetos suck. Near vetos are more fun.

If you have some resource pool, you can imagine being able to burn them in exchange for boosts to rolls. Ie, suppose you have Healing Surge dice, and you can burn them to get a bonus on your Fort save.

Now vs Fort effects are not "immune", but rather "I can soak them" -- until you run out of dice!

Throw in some mechanic where the character is encouraged to "take damage" to save resources, but avoid the effects of a failed save?

Ie, suppose the Fighter gains healing surge dice at level 2 and each level afterwards.

As a standard action they can roll (level/2) dice +con bonus to gain that many temporary HP and gain the effects of taking a full defence action. When healed by an effect, these temporary HP can be converted into increased healing.

Now, you start getting ways to spend these dice rather than on temporary HP. Maybe real healing? Maybe roll them as a bonus to your fort save? But you only get to keep the highest healing surge die (you can roll as many as you want, you just keep the highest).

etc.

Rogue Shadows

2013-02-22, 12:18 AM

Yakk

2013-02-22, 03:26 PM

The primary reason why most of the abilities don't scale, is because larger numbers don't necessarily help. If a 15th-level fighter got a +100 bonus to all grapple attempts, it would not make him meaningfully better at grappling the enemies he's likely to face at that level compared to a regular fighter grappling the same opponents.
Sure. But making the fighter spend 4/20 levels worth of class abilities to be able to grapple at level 20 is pointless. Why not just make that one pick scale with fighter level?

At level 18, the fighter gets one of these abilities. Is that non-scaling "improved grapple" an ability you'd be excited to get at level 18?

On top of that, it only makes grappling larger foes better -- it doesn't make you a better grappler of same-size (or smaller) foes. I'm all for mitigating "grappling larger opponents", but having a "invest repeatedly in this and all you get is the ability to grapple larger opponents" mechanic seems questionable.

Further, of the various prowesses, the only ones that don't actually scale are the three ability score boosts (for the obvious reasons), greater healing surge (because there is no need), and trick shot.

All the rest are reliant on something like an attack roll, which means that they do, in fact, scale.By that standard, a spell that grants a save scales, because the wizard's intelligence goes up as they gain levels.

Instead, spell effect scales (damage dice go up), spell DCs scale (int goes up, feats boost spell DCs, etc), and the wizards pick of new abilities scales (new abilities are higher level spells, with higher level built-in DCs, and nastier effects if they land).

An ability that only gets more accurate (against enemies that get harder to hit in nearly equal amounts) is lackluster.

As for flying monsters, as I said, while equipment should not be considered when Tiering a class, the simple fact of the matter is that there is no such thing as an 18th-level character who does not have access to equipment that will allow him to fly, or become ethereal, or what have you. So if the fighter is facing a flying enemy? He has his carpet of flying or his winged boots or somesuch.
Except there are reasonable, in-genre ways that a fighter can fight flying opponents. Being able to "ride" hostile creatures, being able to jump a reasonable distance (unreasonable for a non-hero, perhaps), being able to attack limbs that attack the fighter, having decent bow and other ranged weapon skills (that do more than just damage), being able to inflict wounds that shut down enemy mobility, etc.

By this logic, hit points suck, and it'd be more fun if, every time you lost hit points, you had a chance of dropping unconscious, even if you're at full HP and you only took 1 damage.
HP are a great example of partial mitigation of an effect.

A game without HP would have death being the result of a successful sword blow. Instead, you have HP -- sword blows are non-fatal if the defender can burn HP to soak their effect.

They aren't an immunity to sword blows -- they are an ability to mitigate their effect to a limited extent, in such a way that the attack isn't completely wasted.

Immunity to fortitude targetting effects isn't like HP -- it is like immunity to all damage. Sure, the critter can still be defeated (there are lots of ways to defeat something without using damage).

Having a lot of HP is like being able to mitigate fortitude targetting effects at a cost. Having some pool of points or dice you can use to shrug off the fortitude-targetting effect.

Having lots of HP is fun (to some extent). Being immune to damage is a boring veto, only fun if it is a puzzle challenge you run into once.

Having a way to mitigate vs Fort effects is fun. Being immune to all vs Fort effects is boring, only fun if it is a puzzle challenge you run into once.

This is a problem on the spellcaster side of the fence, not the fighter side.
That is a matter of perspective.

Slowing down caster progression by a factor of 1.5x -- how is that different than speeding up fighter progression by a factor of 1.5x?

If you want to make your fighter a match for a level 15 core wizard, just make a 15 level fighter class with all of the same abilities. Leave the last 5 levels blank -- or better yet, but in abilities that actually match the kind of things that the wizard can do.

Now, unless you go off and let the fighter completely change their build every day, the fighter isn't going to become tier 1, so won't match the wizard. But there is little reason why a fighter shouldn't get abilities that make the wizard feel jealousy at level 18. Much like the wizard should get abilities that the fighter feels jealousy about.

Keeping that in mind, the prowess Frightful Presence, if gained at 18th level, is comparable to a symbol of fear that has been Heightened to 7th level. It has a shorter duration, but no range, no spell resistance, and a higher base save DC (19 + stat as opposed to the symbol's 17 + stat).
Except, of course, in 3.5 the wizard is instead getting Symbol of Death, which has a DC of 18+stat (in a class that has lots of DC-based abilities, and lots of incentive to boost DCs), and kills. Or trap the soul (DC 20+attribute assuming you know the target's name, or no-save if you trick the target).

And those are "lower tier" wizard spells -- just save-or-die spells, and ignores save-or-suck and just-suck spells the Wizard has to choose from.

My point is, the abilities you gain should scale in accuracy (DC, to-hit) and effect (consequences if it connects). The level 16-20 abilities should invoke jealousy.

Now, I'm not just saying "more power" -- as noted, I agree that "Immune to fort-targetting effects" is relatively boring (even if reasonably jealousy provoking).

You could throw in mechanics to ignore (Su) effects -- or even spell and spell like effects -- completely (burn some die pool, make a fighter level + dice check against the effective caster level of the (Su) effect, and if you win you can disrupt the effect -- the old "hit something hard enough, it breaks" rule -- except no hitting!) This would allow your fighter to smash their way through a wall of force, see through glitterdust, etc.