Yet Another Attempt at a Decent Shifter Hack (PEACH)

[BladeofObliviom]

So this started with a Skype conversation. It was funny but I don't remember exactly how it went and new skype's search function is useless so it would be far too much effort to go back and find it. The point is, the Shifter is bad and should feel bad and fails to deliver on the promises of a cool martial shapeshifter class. It occurred to me that just giving them actual Druid wildshape would be an improvement on the gimped mess that they get and it all kind of spiraled out until it occurred to me that I could probably do better on my own.

So I did! Or attempted to, anyway.

I stuck this in a google doc because there are bits I'm probably going to want to adjust anyway. (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1gBruRrcZdCeaGQ22BOJUpnHrJyFgtjyinYxYYaZZLVk/edit?usp=sharing)

It's complete from levels 1-19, potential adjustments aside, and I'm curious what people think outside of my usual circles.

[pi4t]

Hmm. The progression on the wild shape seems to have gone wrong somewhere; you can shift into forms from tiny to huge at 4th level, but then huge becomes an option again at 6th? Consistency with capitalisation (or non-capitalisation) of size categories would also be good.

I'm also a bit confused about why you chose the progression you did. As far as I can see, it follows the standard druid progression except that it starts with the 6th level version (and then sits there until the druid catches up). Unless there's some reasoning I'm missing, wouldn't it be better to either follow the druid wildshape progression all the time, or stay 2 levels ahead for the whole progression? (And if so, consider the possibility of giving the base ability at level 2; it gives early access to things like flight, but the class doesn't get much else at low levels so it could be argued to be a fair tradeoff. Especially when using flight means having to either fight in a flying - and thus probably not terribly powerful, at this level - form, or having to spend uses of wild shape to shift in and out of combat forms. And having to wait until 4th level for your key class feature hurts, a lot.)

The limited uses per day are also a problem; consider using the duration that the "real" shifter was switched to, of 1 hour per level-plus-wisdom-modifier, used in 1 hour increments.

The Deinonychus minor aspect seems weak; even at level 15 it gives less than improved initiative. Consider buffing it.

[BladeofObliviom]

That's all quite sensible. The tiny to huge bit is definitely an error; I'd blame copypasta but it's more likely that I misremembered the size range allowed on Beast Shape II. As for the progression as a whole, I wanted to include an actual progression (Base shifter gets no such thing, of course) but didn't really want to 'downgrade' to Beast Shape I at level 4, so I left it in and let it play a bit of early access.

In retrospect, it is central enough to the class (even moreso than it is for a druid) that it really should be present from level 1. I'm thinking maybe just go with the Druid progression, but add an initial step mimicking Alter Self (or Animal Aspect) at level 1. That way, they can actually take advantage of their first major form right out of the gate.

Deinonychus is a victim of being clearly one of the best options in the first place, and maybe being whittled down a little too much when the Minor forms were made always-on. I'll give that a second look.