Pathfinder Rebuild: Fighter

[Aergoth]

(I miss the old tables!)

So I went and tried to fix the fighter (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Cw0AXY2p6iqa0g19DBGOLMZFDpibvypbgzvGLXiP21E/edit?usp=sharing). Not sure if I got it right or not.

This is part of a larger set of classes and rules edits I'm doing to pathfinder for fun, rebuilding classes to make them a little more viable and interesting to play. I'm also hoping this will reduce the need for minimal archetypes so that they can be the sort of thing that changes a class top-to-bottom rather than swapping out class features like they're spare parts.

In this case that's meant increasing the skill points available to martial characters so they're not starved for them, and for the fighter, implementing a system similar to rogue talents or magus arcana to give a fighter some more options, especially non-combat ones.
Some of the entries under martial prowess are taken measure for measure from rogue talents, but I've sort of run dry on ideas so any help there would be appreciated.

I've borrowed a couple cues and alterations from this (http://theworldissquare.com/feat-taxes-in-pathfinder/)post over at The World is Square.

Among other things Combat Expertise, Deadly Aim and Power Attack are all simply combat options available at +1 BAB and any feats that require them as pre-reqs now require +1 BAB. I haven't implemented any of the other changes from TWiS yet.

I've also revamped the Cleave and Great Cleave chain to make them a little more ammenable to fighters. A caster is capable of dropping spells that manage more than one enemy at first level, I think improving great cleave to drop the penalty to AC is also worth it. Dropping the strength requirement also means that these feats are now more available to builds that don't rely on strength, and to races that take a strength penalty.



Cleave
Prerequisite: BAB +1
On your turn as a standard action you may attempt to strike an enemy at your highest attack bonus, forgoing any other attacks you may have. If this attack lands, you may attempt to strike another enemy adjacent to you at your highest attack bonus -2 (min 0). When using cleave, you take a -2 penalty to AC for the rest of the turn.


Great Cleave:
Prerequisite: Cleave, BAB +5
On your turn as a standard action you may attempt to strike an enemy at your highest attack bonus, forgoing any other attacks you may have. If your attack hits, you deal damage normally and may attempt to strike another enemy adjacent to you, at your highest attack bonus, you may attempt to strike other adjacent enemies at your highest attack bonus for each successful hit. You may not strike the same enemy more than once during this attack action.


For the sake of legibility the Deft Maneuvers and Powerful Maneuvers are feats republished here.


Deft Maneuvers
You do not provoke an attack of opportunity when performing a trip, disarm, dirty trick, feint, reposition, or steal combat maneuver. In addition, you receive a +2 bonus on checks with these combat maneuvers. Now a prerequisite for the relevant greater combat maneuver feats.
This feat replaces the following: Improved Trip, Improved Disarm, Improved Dirty Trick, Improved Feint, Improved Reposition, Improved Steal




Powerful Maneuvers
You do not provoke an attack of opportunity when performing a bull rush, drag, overrun, or sunder combat maneuver. In addition, you receive a +2 bonus on checks with these combat maneuvers. Now a prerequisite for the relevant greater combat maneuver feats.
This feat replaces the following: Improved Bull Rush, Improved Drag, Improved Overrun, Improved Sunder



Changelog:
Sept 18. 2015
Changed 1/day martial prowess options to 1/encounter or 1/round.
Added an increase to at will at 10th level for combat cantrip and warrior's prayer
Added an increase to 3/day at 10th level for battlefield piety and acquired arcana
Added: Use the Whole Weapon
Added: With Both Hands
Added: Back to Back
Added: Blade Catch
Added: Shield Pin
Added: Picket
Added: Flourish
Added: Interposing Shield

Sept 20 2015

Added rewritten Cleave and Great Cleave feats
Added Opportunistic Cleave
Added Reaching Threat
Added Dungeon Dweller
Added Reaction Strike
Added Impede
Added Rob Momentum
Editted Marksman's Zen to actually do something

Oct 5 2015

Added to the list of Martial Prowess:
Bravery
Make your own luck
Penetrating Strike
Push Through
Skirmish
Spellbreaker
Editted: Cat Steps, now called Light Steps

[nikkoli]

I would love to see how you wrote up your ideas, but it won't let me open the link to the fix.

[Aergoth]

I am uncertain why that's the case. It should be available. I'll try from another computer in the morning.

[Ethereal Gears]

Link works now. I'll give this a thorough read-through in a few hours when I have more time, but scanning through it looks very interesting! Nice layout.

EDIT: Right, so I had a look-through. I think this looks good. I've read a lot of fighter fixes, done a few myself, and I think this adds a sufficient level of boost and versatility to make the class more playable. I have a few thoughts:

It seems a bit much to me to get a martial prowess every odd-numbered level after 3rd. I would hand them out like magus arcanas, at 3rd, 6th, 9th, 12th, 15th and 18th. This might not be a balance issue, though. Just strikes me as inelegant for some reason.

It seems strange that there's a martial prowess to give you 0th- and 2nd-level spells, but not 1st-level ones. Is this merely an oversight? Otherwise I would definitely add that. I would honestly create a single talent, one for cleric spells and one for wizard, and allow them to gain one 0th-level, one 1st-level, one 2nd-level, one 3rd-level and one 4th-level spell from both lists, ramping up the uses per day from 1 to 2 per SLA at 10th level or so. 1st-level spells available at 4th level, 2nd-level at 8th level, 3rd-level at 12th level and 4th-level at 16th level. Make each previous spell level a prerequisite for the one after (except possibly 0th-level), so you can't just jump straight to 2nd- or 3rd-level spells without gaining a 1st-level one first. This is just an idea, though. But at least granting access to 1st-level spells makes sense to me.

Marksman's Zen doesn't seem to actually say what it does; the description reads like a synopsis rather than laying out the entire ability.

I think in general, some of the "once per day" abilities, such as Choose Your Ground, should get more uses per day as you level up.

I love Stalking Horse. Awesome flavor and seems useful enough to take.

If I find anything else, I'll post again, but those are my notes for now. Great job, though, overall. I really like the feel of the martial prowess abilities.

Cheers,
- Gears

[upho]

Great initiative! A few things already feel right on spot both in terms flavor and mechanics - like the Cleave-saver and that awesome Stalking Horse trick (that one had me laugh). Though I think the Martial Prowess options generally need a major buff. For example, I don't think any of the 1/day tricks are nearly strong enough to motivate such a harsh use limit. Many of them can be replicated - or closely replicated - several times per round simply by getting a feat or two or some relatively cheap equipment.

More importantly, as far as I can tell, this version doesn't do very much to remove the fighter's greatest weaknesses; lacking effective combat options and versatility in general and lacking options other than the old "stand still and full attack for maximum damage" in particular. I'd change the Martial Prowess options to allow a fighter to specialize and be strong and actually effective either as a damage-dealer or in a combat role other than the old weaksauce "durable fake defender/immobile single-target damage-dealer", like controller, party buffer, debuffer, or especially combined variants like defender ("true" tanking) or leader.

To get there, I'd recommend creating several Martial Prowess options that improve (and/or remove limitations from/expand applicability of) the already existing options for combat maneuvers and similar combat versatility stuff (like Greater Trip, Stand Still, Cornugon Smash, TWF, several Combat Style and Teamwork feats, non-magic weapon properties like performance, reach, trip etc), probably combined with the trick allowing for bypassing related feat prereqs and similar. For example, a Martial Prowess trick that simply allowed the fighter to use the trip combat maneuver and related options (Wolf Trip, Vicious Stomp, Riptide Attack etc) against flying creatures would do a lot to save a tripping fighter from its current mediocrity in higher levels. Or perhaps a trick that allowed for performing more than one Dirty Trick against one target per round? Or allowed for two attacks per single-attack action or triggered AoO when TWF-ing? Or one which gave pounce? Or allowed for bypassing DR, or perhaps immunity to fear/mind-affecting when demoralizing? Or maybe for blocking attacks targeting nearby allies? All these very martial things that go above and beyond what most other Paizo classes can do in combat, regardless of their feats.

For some inspiration, unless you haven't already, take a look at the class features of the warlord (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warlord) and especially the warder (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder) from Path of War (keeping in mind these classes also get several very versatile and effective maneuvers and stances on top of their class features). I think the fighter desperately needs options along the lines of the warder's Defensive Focus, Aegis and Armiger's Mark class features. And maybe also take a look at the feats Deadly Agility, Defensive Expertise, Double Weapon Finesse and Lightning Swap already published (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/feats), and Improved Quick Draw, Pikeman’s Training, Pinning Arrow, Polearm Dancer, Prodigious Two-Weapon Fighting, and Seize the Opportunity play tested for the upcoming next book (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EPARqt5jpie03MIXStgFrNK_si6g218bjT4TFbcizPY/edit) in the series. Many of these were designed with the specific intent of improving combat versatility and making more various types of "weapon-expert" builds mechanically viable, which I believe the fighter class should excel in.

(Nitpicks: A few of the more basic weapons are missing from the weapon groups, like shields. And I suggest you change skill points/level to 4 instead of the highly non-standard 3, it would help making the poor fighter less imbalanced, without removing any flavor IMO.)

[Aergoth]

@upho I debated moving to 4 points per level, but I wasn't sure if I'd be treading on skillmonkey toes with it.
As far as the martial prowess the other point there was to give the fighter more options out of combat, hence you've got the Quartermaster and War Stories options. The party fighter in my game did complain that most of his character's interaction was "I hit it with my sword" so this was supposed to broaden things a little. I did genuinely run out of ideas with the options for this class so I figured posting it wasn't a bad idea.

As far as bypassing DR, I hadn't considered it. I know I've seen at least one homebrew that allows the fighter to switch up weapon damage type in order to bypass DR (those pesky skeletons and the like) without switching their weapon.

I'm a fan of the ToB style classes but I've had some players that don't neccessarily want to have the bookkeeping associated with a caster that tends to carry off with it. I'm also trying to shift the use of archetypes so that you're not swapping out class features like pieces of an outfit. The archetypes for classes I'm working on are going to be focused specialists, rather than the generalist that a fighter represents.

@ Gears: I chose to focus on 0 level and second level spells because the 0 level cantrips provide utility more often than not My picks would probably be things like light, purify food and drink, bleed over something like ray of frost. A fighter (or at least this version of it) has options that should outstrip a first level spell most of the time particularly if we're just looking at the core PF book. The first level list for cleric has some better options than wizard, but looking at the second level list, I kind of want to be able to cast Aid, Align Weapon or one of the second level buff spells (Bear's Strength et al) or cure/inflict moderate wounds over cure/inflict light, sun metal, or shield of faith.

This rebuild is also removing quarter-casting by default from some classes (the paladin, the ranger) in favor of trying to buff martial classes and broaden their horizons from "I stand there and full attack", so creating a mock-quarter-caster with SLAs seems to go against the grain of that idea. Increasing uses per day might not be a bad idea, and I might expand the options to first or second level spells. Really trying to stay away from the idea that you need to have your own magic to function.

As far as the gear, there's actually a major revamp of the equipment options that goes along with this (mostly serving to cut down on exotic weapons and make small martial characters a little more viable, but there's some other neat stuff there.) which is why there's a couple groups missing. I also didn't want to fall into the trap of trying to make every possible group of weapons, the list isn't supposed to be exhaustive. I'm about halfway through. A lot of weapons that were previously mechanically subpar (based on damage and crit calculations) get a boost to a specific area of interest if they're masterwork (or enchanted, by extension). I'll probably need to put this up alongside things eventually.

Re: Marksman's Zen the idea is that you wouldn't trigger attacks of opportunity from enemies that threaten you when firing a ranged weapon, but I realize that I wrote that when I was debating removing point-blank shot. That might need to be changed then.

General consensus seems to be that the X/day limit on some abilities is a little harsh. And I'm rather proud of stalking horse myself! I know mounted combat is kind of terrible but so's having to put points in stealth when you're not going to use it often.

[Ethereal Gears]

I do see your point about wanting to buff the "mundane" side of fighters rather than papering their flaws over by pouring SLAs over them. Still, even if there was a general Martial Prowess ability that could be selected multiple times to get you 2 uses per day of a spell of each level from 1st-4th, plus unlimited cantrips, I don't see how that stops you from also creating awesome non-magical options that outstrip those.

Still, I can see the logic of wanting to restrict magic in the class, and that's fine. I've just always rather liked the idea of playing a warrior who's picked up a few odd spells here and there without being a proper caster. It's a sort of character that's kind of hard to recreate properly using existing PF material. You either have to pick a silly race or go with something like magus or eldritch knight, which is way too mage-y for the feel I'm trying to evoke.

But that's not your class! I do agree with my fellow Stockholmian upho about creating more Martial Prowess stuff to support combat maneuvers, teamwork feats, et cetera. I think also a few more cool and flavor skill-based ones like Just Passing Through and Stalking Horse would be nice. Maybe something to let you use Profession (soldier) in place of other types of skill checks, or to do things like setting up camp somewhere it's not easily spotted, et cetera.

Just some thoughts.

Cheers,
- Gears

[Aergoth]

The only problem I've ever run into with the teamwork feats are that they seem a little lackluster and require both parties to spend the feat to gain the benefit. So I've got prowess options like "Make an Opening" and "Assault Leader" instead, where the fighter chooses options that provide benefits to allies, rather than requiring allies to spend resources to assist the fighter.

The sort of warrior you're describing is one I'd love to make an archetype for, because the magus/eldritch knight are both a little tricky and quarter-casters don't quite have the right spell list. If it's not the fighter it's going to be the magically enhanced version of the ranger for sure.

I've updated the original as per the changelog.

[Aergoth]

I've added a few more interesting martial prowess options, this time we're mostly looking at battlefield control stuff and expanding on some of the existing ones.

I've also added the rewritten versions of cleave and great cleave that this system is working with. They're also up in the original post.

Cleave
Prerequisite: BAB +1
On your turn as a standard action you may attempt to strike an enemy at your highest attack bonus, forgoing any other attacks you may have. If this attack lands, you may attempt to strike another enemy adjacent to you at your highest attack bonus -2 (min 0). When using cleave, you take a -2 penalty to AC for the rest of the turn.

Great Cleave:
Prerequisite: Cleave, BAB +5
On your turn as a standard action you may attempt to strike an enemy at your highest attack bonus, forgoing any other attacks you may have. If your attack hits, you deal damage normally and may attempt to strike another enemy adjacent to you, at your highest attack bonus, you may attempt to strike other adjacent enemies at your highest attack bonus for each successful hit. You may not strike the same enemy more than once during this attack action.

[Ethereal Gears]

Ooohhh! I like! Underhanded is going to be really nasty with dirty tricks. War Stories is very broad, but still concrete enough that GMs would hardly ever have any problem with adjudicating when it applies. Perfect! And my love of magic-dabbling martials of course makes me adore Wand Combat.

I think your Cleave and Greater Cleave rewrites look good too, although I'm wondering, would it be too powerful to have them be able to target enemies within reach rather than just adjacent enemies? I feel like cleaving with polearms can make a lot of sense, sometimes. Great big sweeping glave slashes, et al. Just a thought!

Cheers,
- Gears

[Aergoth]

I'm uncertain about the cleave mechanics as they'd apply to reach weapons. The rules I have right now are an attempt to mesh of the rules we had for cleave circa 3.5 and the pathfinder cleave.

3.5 cleave had an emphasis on using the defeat of one enemy to trigger attacks on more enemies, meaning that it makes sense for a fighter to try and clean up weaker enemies or enemies that have already been softened, so that attacking an opponent doesn't feel wasted. The downside is it's relying on being able to drop a lot of enemies when you get to the point of great cleave, where enemies are going to start being tougher, it feels like it's really easy to get to a point of diminishing returns with this feat.

PF cleave emphasizes spreading damage around between multiple enemies, so the intent seems to be little more skewed towards actually hitting them and having a solid average damage rather than worrying about maximizing damage to trigger cleave. The downside is the obnoxious -2 ac penalty that they leverage on using it in the first place and the fact that it needs to be declared.

Adding reach weapons I think skews the feat in favor of them, reach weapons are granting a pretty solid benefit as it is. I can definetly do some work to grant them some extra tricks of their own but until I see it in play my gut says reach weapons and cleave is tricky.

[Aergoth]

So, quick update!
I'm working on some overall system modifications to teamwork feats and style feats that should help with this area and I probably won't be doing much to support that with Martial Prowess.

Added to the list of Martial Prowess

Bravery
Make your own luck
Penetrating Strike
Push Through
Skirmish
Spellbreaker
Editted Cat Steps, now called Light Steps