The Sevenfold Hierophant

[GrayDeath]

Setting Info: This Class is mainly meant to be played in a Setting I ahve built where there are exactly 7 Gods in "TheFaith".
These Gods are bound by some very specific Rules and usually do not allow single God Clerics to go above a certain level (if they exist at all, depending on the time played in there are only Lay Devotees and Adepts).

Hence this class is meant to venerate The Faith, not The Gods themselves, and gains Powers granted by all 7 Gods. Its members usually coming out of either mundane Believers or NPC Adepts. It is specifically NOT meant as a "Power Up Tool" for Clerics and /or Druids, see restrictions.

I would be very pleased to receive any feedback, but mainly I am looking for any problems I might have overlooked.

Mechanically its intent is to provide the otherwise pretty weak local Divine Casters with a thematic Power boost, that is not "over the top" and allow "Mundanes" some very thematic Divine casting.


The Sevenfold Hierophant


Level
Base Attack Bonus
Fort Save
Ref Save
Will Save
Special


1st

+0

+2

+0

+2
Doamin, Skill Focus


2nd

+1

+3

+0

+3
Domain, Additional Domain Slot


3rd

+1

+3

+1

+3
Domain, Skill Focus


4th

+2

+4

+1

+4
Domain, Additional Domain Slot



5th

+2

+4

+1

+4
Domain, Skill Focus


6th

+3

+5

+2

+5
Domain, Additional Domain Slot



7th

+3

+5

+2

+5
Domain, Domain Flexibility



The 7fold Hierophant


7fold Hierophants are the Glue that keeps The Faith together. Not bound to any particular God, but very much to the Faith, they wield Divine Power greater than that of anybody else. More importantly though, they avoid being drawn into the never ending internal feuds between the Priesthoods of the gods, the Nobles, and the Arcane chools by simply being ONLY beholden to the Tenets of The Faith.



Requirements: Sevenfold Hierophants msut be of Lawful Alignment (almost always Lawful neutral (85+%)) and be standfast Members of The Faith.

Knowledge Religion 10 ranks, Knowledge Planes 5 ranks, not a Cleric or a Druid.
If the Sevenfold Hierophant ever becomes a Cleric or a Druid, he loses access to all his Domains permanently (and should retrain his levels, and flee the Faith at that....).
In theory Favoured Souls can become Sevenfold Hierophants, although it would require both a very specifc agreement between the 7 and a permissive DM.


Basics:

HitDie: D8. Hierophants are resilient, as their travels and mission requires.

BAB: Low. Hierophants are NOT Fighting Men.

Saves: High Will, high Fortitude

Class Skills: Diplomacy, Gather Information, Knowledge Religion, Knowledge Planes, Listen, Profession, Sense Motive.
Skillpts: 4+Int Mod/Level

Sevenfold Hierophants gain no additional Weapon or Armor proficiencies whatsoever.

Casting progression: Arcane Spellcasters gain new Spells (but not other class abilities) at every Level of this Class but the first, third and 6th. Initiators are treated the same.
Noncaster Classes (this also includes Incarnum Classes, the Warlock and the Binder) gain their special Class Features/Binds/Invocations and so on, on all Levels but the first and the 6th. (This also includes the Rogues Sneak Attack, the Fighters Bonus Feats, and so forth).


Domains: Each time the Sevenfold Hierophant can choose a domain, he has to choose one of the Domains the 7 possess. At First Level this MUST be the Law Domain. After that the choices are only limited as stated above.
At Level 1 he has one Domain Slot, which increases by one at Levels 2, 4 and 6.
Domain Spellcasting: The Sevenfold Hierophant can cast Level 1 Domain Spells at 7fH-Level 1, Level 2 Domain Spells at 7fH-Level 2 and so on. This means he cannot reach beyond the 7th Level Spells of his Domains!


Skill Focus At first, Third and 5th Level, the Sevenfold Hierophant may select Skill Focus as a Bonus Feat. he can only select Skill Focus for one of the Class Skills of this Class.


Domain Fleixibility Once per day per 3 Levels the Sevenfold Hierophant can channel his immense Divine Power to transform one of his granted Spells. For sacrificing two Domain Slots, he can cast one Spell of the same Level that he does not know. This Spell must be from the Cleric or Druid Spell list and cannot have the [Evil], [Good] or [Chaos] descriptor.


Domains of The Seven:
Air, Animal, Community, Domination, Earth, Inquisition, Knowledge, Law, Life, Luck, Nobility, Protection, Retribution, War.

[aimlessPolymath]

I'm not entirely clear on what you mean when you call divine casters the most "mechanically weak", given that spellcasting is, well, extremely powerful. This class trades all that out... for seven domains?

I'm especially not sure why extra domains and repeated access to the Skill Focus feat are supposed to shore up this supposed weakness.


Mechanically its intent is to provide the otherwise pretty weak local Divine Casters with a thematic Power boost, that is not "over the top".

That said, the actual class looks okay:

Domains: Each time the Sevenfold Hierophant can choose a domain, he has to choose one of the Domains the 7 possess. At First Level this MUST be the Law Domain. After that the choices are only limited as stated above.
At Level 1 he has one Domain Slot, which increases by one at Levels 2, 4 and 6.
This needs explicit explanation for how non-clerics interact with this feature, I think. I believe there are rules somewhere, but you should be explicit about this. I mean... fighters can take this class. How do they get domains? How do they cast spells?


Casting progression: Arcane Spellcasters gain new Spells (but not other class abilities) at every Level of this Class but the first, third and 6th. Initiators are treated the same.
Noncaster Classes (this also includes Incarnum Classes, the Warlock and the Binder) gain their special Class Features/Binds/Invocations and so on, on all Levels but the first and the 6th. (This also includes the Rogues Sneak Attack, the Fighters BOnus Feats, and so forth).
This is probably the strangest-looking part of this class to me. It makes the class very, very good for some characters, who give up relatively little (i.e. Binder), but much worse for others. It's also what makes me think that this concept doesn't necessarily need to be for a PrC; if you're getting almost all of your class's benefits out of being in a different class, in what sense are you not just in the class? There's also some weird optimization tricks you can do with this to double-advance two classes simultaneously, though that part isn't particularly busted (maybe?).


Its members usually coming out of either mundane Believers or NPC Adepts. This doesn't match the requirements- you need to be level 7 to hit the Knowledge(religion) requirements. That's not a "mundane believer" in any sense of the word.

Generally, I do very much like the idea of opening religion up to noncasters. In addition, domains make sense as a clearly "religous" way to do it. I'm just not very happy with the specifics of your implementation; structuring it as a PrC doesn't make much sense to me.

The priest, in my sig, was an attempt to build a religious character not dependent on spells- though it had spell access, it didn't rely on it for power.


Anyway.
Given my interpretation of your stated goals (making local religious figures a little thematically better, not buffing up clerics/divine casters, being able to enter it from a NPC class), the way I would do this is via a feat chain. Apologies, but I may hijack your thread a little to do this.
This has the following benefits:
-Available to literally anyone who I want to.
-Doesn't interrupt normal progression.
-At the same time, can't be taken at the same time as any sort of focused build, limiting charop ability, while leaving it open to NPCs.

So, here's an example system for NPCs to pick up minor spellcasting.
Disciple of the [Domain] [Worshipper]:
You have the ability to channel the power of your deity to a particular task.
Requirements: Must worship a deity which grants the particular domain.
Benefit: Choose a domain. You now add this domain's to your Worshipper spell list.
Special: You can take this feat multiple times, choosing a different domain each time.

Expanded Power [Worshipper]:
You can channel even more of your deity's power.
Requirements: One Worshipper feat.
Benefit: Each day, you can prepare an additional Worshipper spell. It must be at least one level below the maximum Worshipper spell level you have access to. It cannot be the same level as an extra spell you prepared through a different copy of this feat.
Special: You can take this feat multiple times.

Anyone with at least one Worshipper feat becomes a divine spellcaster, with caster level equal to their level. They have one spell slot per spell level, and can cast spells with level up to the number of worshipper feats they possess. They prepare spells in a process requiring ten minutes, once per day.

A Worshipper feat cannot be selected as a bonus feat, only as part of the normal feats gained as a character progresses in level; Worship requires dedication.

[GrayDeath]

The only local divine casters are adepts and Sevenfold Hierophants, unless you count one or three favored souls of "not official gods", and with mundane, see the class examples given, I mean non caster classes.

Will clear the wording up once I am home, as well as the (simply forgotten) paragraph about how complete noncasters gain domain usage. Stupid me :/

And no, a feat chain sadly will not achieve what I have in mind, especially since gaining seven domains from The Seven is very thematically important.

[Satinavian]

- This class is for some reason allowed for clerics of pantheons or of concepts. I am not sure if you wanted that.

- That this class does advance arcane casting but doesn't advance divibne casting is strange.

- Seems most beneficial for scorcerers.

[JeenLeen]

This was already addressed a bit earlier, but how do Domain Slots work?
Since a non-spellcaster taking this class has no spell levels, is it
1) each slot defaults to level 1
2) the first slot is level 1, the second level 2, and so on
3) the slots are not tied to any spell level, but you can either
3a) cast any spell from the domain list (i.e., if level 1, you can cast any spell from the Law Domain, but just once)
3b) cast any spell from the domain list equal to your level in Sevenfold Hierophant (e.g., no high-level spells for a 1-level dip)

---

If they could make the skill pre-reqs, this seems like a good 2-level dip for a fighter or rogue (since they keep their progression.) Sacrificing 1 BAB for the fighter (and almost nothing for the rogue) seems worth some bonuses to Will/Fort and gaining a touch of spellcasting.
I'm not sure if this is a pro or a con, for your intended purposes, but I wanted to mention it.

[GrayDeath]

- This class is for some reason allowed for clerics of pantheons or of concepts. I am not sure if you wanted that.

- That this class does advance arcane casting but doesn't advance divibne casting is strange.

- Seems most beneficial for scorcerers.

Its actually meant to be most beneficial for either Sorcerers or Mundanes, yes.
And good thing, I removed the "SPecific God mention, this class is NOT meant as an Upgrade for Divine Casters, unless you are an Adept, period.


This was already addressed a bit earlier, but how do Domain Slots work?
Since a non-spellcaster taking this class has no spell levels, is it
1) each slot defaults to level 1
2) the first slot is level 1, the second level 2, and so on
3) the slots are not tied to any spell level, but you can either
3a) cast any spell from the domain list (i.e., if level 1, you can cast any spell from the Law Domain, but just once)
3b) cast any spell from the domain list equal to your level in Sevenfold Hierophant (e.g., no high-level spells for a 1-level dip)

---

If they could make the skill pre-reqs, this seems like a good 2-level dip for a fighter or rogue (since they keep their progression.) Sacrificing 1 BAB for the fighter (and almost nothing for the rogue) seems worth some bonuses to Will/Fort and gaining a touch of spellcasting.
I'm not sure if this is a pro or a con, for your intended purposes, but I wanted to mention it.


Yes, it is supposed to be a good Upgrade for "Mundanes", since the Setting has no real Clerics they and Adepts are almost the only ones truly benefitting from it.

And Sorcerers willing to forgo 9th level Spells for 7 Domains with 4 SLots up to Level 7 of course. :)

Thank you all for your feedback.