[3.5] The Ebon Initiate, warrior-necrolock [Base Class]

[Gorgondantess]

Pretty good. The only problem I see is unlimited out-of-combat healing. They can easily heal themselves just finding some way to heal with NE(Tomb Tainted, Necropolitan...) and if they simply take the Lesser Invocation that switches energy healing, the whole party will always start an encounter at full HP, and they, due to unlimited evocations and healing, are just as strong after 500 battles as 5.

So? The Dread Necromancer has unlimited out of combat healing. Trust me, it's not a problem.

[Pechvarry]

So? The Dread Necromancer has unlimited out of combat healing. Trust me, it's not a problem.

While it's true that unlimited-out-of-combat healing isn't really a bad thing, it really is much stronger on an invoker than a vancian caster, such as the dread necromancer. The DN may start every fight with full health, but his spells (and the spells of his minions?) will gradually wear down. Invocations, on the other hand...

@ErrantX: The one thing I think this class is missing: When I first saw it, my first thought was invocation-imbued undead. A bunch of zombies whose melee attacks are all infused with Essences would be most excellent. Perhaps an ACF? Don't worry if that doesn't resonate with you -- that could be something for a prestige class.

EDIT: On the topic of unlimited healing: I think Touch of the Dead is brilliant. In the case of Dread Necro, it's absolutely ridiculous to convince your entire party to give up their character concepts in the name of becoming undead (or even wasting a feat on Tomb-Tainted Soul) just so you can heal them. This tricky application of Touch of the Dead creates the perfect number of hoops needed to perpetually heal allies (it also doesn't start 'til level 4, at a rate of one heal touch per 2 rounds).

[Avalon®]

IIRC, there's already an Ebon Initiate PrC that imbues its undead with invocations or spells. You might want to check that out.

[unosarta]

IIRC, there's already an Ebon Initiate PrC that imbues its undead with invocations or spells. You might want to check that out.

The Deathspirit Necrolyte, a prestige class that combined the Ebon Initiate and the Spirit Shaman for the Prestige Contest, could imbue her Deathspirit with invocations, I am fairly sure.

[Gorgondantess]

While it's true that unlimited-out-of-combat healing isn't really a bad thing, it really is much stronger on an invoker than a vancian caster, such as the dread necromancer. The DN may start every fight with full health, but his spells (and the spells of his minions?) will gradually wear down. Invocations, on the other hand...

The Dread Necromancer, at level 1, has charnel touch for unlimited negative energy damage. Unlimited uses per day. It takes tomb tainted soul. Bam, unlimited out of combat healing at level 1. This has never been regarded as a problem. In fact, even with that trick, most regard the dread necromancer really not all that powerful.

[Pechvarry]

Fascinating. I would've expected the dread necro/invoker angle. Spirit shaman angle makes for a pretty awesome witch doctor feel.

[unosarta]

Fascinating. I would've expected the dread necro/invoker angle. Spirit shaman angle makes for a pretty awesome witch doctor feel.

I think I had been going through awesome homebrewer's signatures for base classes, and came upon this class.

I am fairly sure I then rolled randomly for the next class and got Spirit Shaman.

[Pechvarry]

The Dread Necromancer, at level 1, has charnel touch for unlimited negative energy damage. Unlimited uses per day. It takes tomb tainted soul. Bam, unlimited out of combat healing at level 1. This has never been regarded as a problem. In fact, even with that trick, most regard the dread necromancer really not all that powerful.

I'm aware of their unlimited healing. I'm saying they have unlimited healing, minions, and VERY FINITE spell slots.

In comparison, the Ebon Initiate has unlimited healing, minions, and UNLIMITED casting (though it's weaker than spells, of course).

DN starts every fight with full HP, but gets depleted in other resources. Ebon starts all fights at full everything.

Since the above needed clarification, I feel I should also reiterate: I don't necessarily think Ebon Initiate having infinite healing is a bad thing. I just think it IS more potent on an invoker chassis. As I said above, sans Tomb-Tainted Soul, the Ebon Initiate has to juggle a lot to heal up the rest of the party, and I feel this is a great balancing mechanic for the low levels.

[Benly]

So a friend and I were just discussing what modifications we'd want to make to use this in a slightly lower-tier game. What we ended up hammering out was:

Nether Channel becomes a (Sp) instead of (Su), requiring a standard action. It can be used as a touch attack or as a ranged touch attack with range of 30' without requiring a nether shape. An Eldritch Glaive-like nether essence that allows it to be channeled through a melee weapon with a full attack (similar to how it currently works with a melee weapon) may be implemented, as may a Vitriolic Blast-like SR-ignoring essence.
Nether Channel used to heal undead heals 1 HP per damage die instead of healing its full damage (similar to the reduced effect of the Dread Necromancer's charnel touch).
Medium armor proficiency and medium armored spellcaster are not gained.
New invocations are not gained at levels 3, 8, 13, and 18.

The goal was to trim back the class's scope somewhat from its current blaster-tank-necromancer, reducing the blaster and tank aspects to focus on the necromancer. This version can still throw hurt around if it has to and still takes a hit better than your normal squishy, but is more focused on its invocations. The biggest immediate nerf is removing the ability to full attack with Nether Channel, drastically reducing its direct-damage output at higher levels.

This isn't a suggestion to modify the main class, since for a game where you're rolling with the high tiers the Ebon Initiate seems pretty reasonable. This is just what we came up with for a "Lesser Ebon Initiate" for lower-tier games, and I thought it might be of interest.

(I know it's of interest to me - I'm considering playing one in an aforementioned lower-tier game. )

[ErrantX]

While it's true that unlimited-out-of-combat healing isn't really a bad thing, it really is much stronger on an invoker than a vancian caster, such as the dread necromancer. The DN may start every fight with full health, but his spells (and the spells of his minions?) will gradually wear down. Invocations, on the other hand...

@ErrantX: The one thing I think this class is missing: When I first saw it, my first thought was invocation-imbued undead. A bunch of zombies whose melee attacks are all infused with Essences would be most excellent. Perhaps an ACF? Don't worry if that doesn't resonate with you -- that could be something for a prestige class.

EDIT: On the topic of unlimited healing: I think Touch of the Dead is brilliant. In the case of Dread Necro, it's absolutely ridiculous to convince your entire party to give up their character concepts in the name of becoming undead (or even wasting a feat on Tomb-Tainted Soul) just so you can heal them. This tricky application of Touch of the Dead creates the perfect number of hoops needed to perpetually heal allies (it also doesn't start 'til level 4, at a rate of one heal touch per 2 rounds).

The Ebon Initiate is a more powerful class than the Dread Necromancer; this was intentional for two reasons. One, there was need of a high tier invoker class because the two that there are just... aren't good. They're not tier 3 or up, and there was room for one. And two, dread necromancer (imho) is pretty much worthless. I get lich as a class feature at the end of some pretty lackluster abilities and an okay spell list. It didn't impress me. Ebon Initiate is what I felt warlock should be with a more necrotic spin. There is nothing that would stop someone from using this as a basis to bring warlock up to speed and really just make it able to compete. I aimed for Tier 2 and I think I hit it pretty well.

Agreed on the class thing. Perhaps a pet class is in order.

Unlimited out of combat healing is strong, but only as strong as the DM lets it. Make encounters come faster, for example. But it's slow, I considered making it take a round per hit point restored. As far as Touch of the Dead? Yeah, I was pleased with that invocation because necromancy gets such a bad rap, and ebon initiates don't have to be evil and puppy eating. Touch of the Dead allows the character to spend one of his valuable invocations to be a great out of combat healer. So thank you for your appreciation of Touch of the Dead, and I get why you see it's on the strong side.

The Deathspirit Necrolyte, a prestige class that combined the Ebon Initiate and the Spirit Shaman for the Prestige Contest, could imbue her Deathspirit with invocations, I am fairly sure.

Fascinating. I would've expected the dread necro/invoker angle. Spirit shaman angle makes for a pretty awesome witch doctor feel.

I think I had been going through awesome homebrewer's signatures for base classes, and came upon this class.

I am fairly sure I then rolled randomly for the next class and got Spirit Shaman.

Yeah, I was really impressed with that class. I loved that someone actually used Spirit Shaman with it too, and made something really awesome, so much so I linked it in Ebon Initiate. Anyone who wants to make things associated with Ebon Initiate I will happily link to the class, btw.

So a friend and I were just discussing what modifications we'd want to make to use this in a slightly lower-tier game. What we ended up hammering out was:

Nether Channel becomes a (Sp) instead of (Su), requiring a standard action. It can be used as a touch attack or as a ranged touch attack with range of 30' without requiring a nether shape. An Eldritch Glaive-like nether essence that allows it to be channeled through a melee weapon with a full attack (similar to how it currently works with a melee weapon) may be implemented, as may a Vitriolic Blast-like SR-ignoring essence.
Nether Channel used to heal undead heals 1 HP per damage die instead of healing its full damage (similar to the reduced effect of the Dread Necromancer's charnel touch).
Medium armor proficiency and medium armored spellcaster are not gained.
New invocations are not gained at levels 3, 8, 13, and 18.

The goal was to trim back the class's scope somewhat from its current blaster-tank-necromancer, reducing the blaster and tank aspects to focus on the necromancer. This version can still throw hurt around if it has to and still takes a hit better than your normal squishy, but is more focused on its invocations. The biggest immediate nerf is removing the ability to full attack with Nether Channel, drastically reducing its direct-damage output at higher levels.

This isn't a suggestion to modify the main class, since for a game where you're rolling with the high tiers the Ebon Initiate seems pretty reasonable. This is just what we came up with for a "Lesser Ebon Initiate" for lower-tier games, and I thought it might be of interest.

(I know it's of interest to me - I'm considering playing one in an aforementioned lower-tier game. )

As far as the down-powering? All of those are very reasonable ways to bring the class down a tier or two. Just be careful not to pull it down too much; you'd get kind of a gimped warlock then. But yeah, all of your ideas seem quite reasonable. I'd call it high tier 4, low tier 3. I'd consider not removing the ability to full attack with netherchannel, especially with ranged, but reduce its damage by half of it's dice (round down, min 1d6) when used on melee attacks (as they can benefit from power attack still). Vitriolic Blast could be called something like Annihilation Blast, inflicting half-negative and half-acid, ignores SR.

I am so absolutely stoked to see so much interest in this class, so thank you all for this interest in it.

-X

[Re'ozul]

Since its now back on the front page, i thought I'd give my thoughts on the class. Now I've only made 2 characters with them and both have only started, so while I'm going to remark on power I can't really say anything defining on balance. Still I wanted to do this for a while, because this class is my favourite homebrew on this site. Though I guess that is kinda biased as I really like invocation classes and theres not that many of them, but the Initiate comes even before the invoker so ... well I'll stop rambling for now.

Class features:

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Fluff:
Yay for a Necromancer class that is based on not being inherently evil.
Being detached from the living works splendidly for invocation based classes as they underline a sense of self-reliance. Wizards need rest and safety when they run out of spells, Clerics not only do so as well but are dependant on their Gods, Onvocation users have the full of their capabilities with them at all times. They can wander without pause, never truely needing respite from what they do.

Like usual, the Initiate is very skillpoint starved. One might think that, since its DCs are based on Int thats usually not so bad as it implies Int reliance, but just like the Warlock with his Cha, its not that absolute. Then again, just like the Warlock you get your skillboosting invocations, so its no big deal.

yay for d8s.

Just like with the warlock I have to chucle at Diplomacy and Bluff not being class skills, but having an (in this case even bigger) bonus to it through an invocation. "Talkin'? I lets mah magic do the talkin' for me."

Aura of the dead:
This makes the Initiate even better in undead heavy games, I like how the negative part only counts for those "unacustomed to death". So you still get full rapport with warriors and monsters. The ability to simply ignore unprogrammed unintelligent undead could be very interesting in dungeon delves.

Nether-channel:
Here it starts being powerful. The EI is now a better rogue. No extra conditions needing to be fulfilled and undead are (with the pure channel) the only ones where both are the same level of useless. The healing ability great with the practically mandatory Tomb-tainted-soul and makes you a great tank since it doesn't provoke in its pure form. The "on all attacks of a full attack action" however can be abused in the same ways that a rogue's sneak attack can. (Simply play Thri-Kreen) My level 6 Kobold (dragon tail, so 4 attacks) managed with some luck to kill a greater barghest in one round. (walk unseen is very powerful).

Rebuking: I'm not a fan of it, i like playing tank with profane lifeleech though.
I know its one of the best abilities. Personal prefernce simply.

Dark Grace + Shroud of Death:
These three are the biggest reason to lower your Int and power up your Cha. The combined bonus can be incredible, especially the 13th level cha-to-hp if you are playing a undead. (Maybe include a "must have a con-score to apply" line?)
Noticed wording: "He may now use his Charisma modifier in place of his Constitution score to determine his hit points and Concentration check modifier." (modifier/score in both terms I think, otherwise I can read this as treat your chamod as your con-score, making a chamod of +8 worth the same as a con-score of 8 (mod=-1). Unless thats what you are going for.)

Black Banner: A reduced version of the dread-necro's undead mastery. Considering the numerous other benefits this is absolutely enough.

Aspect of Death: More Feats are always nice.

Armored Invoker: Does this mean that spellfailure does no longer apply to medium armor now? (I never get these wordings)

Imbue Item: craftcraftcraftcraft

Deathspeak: Kill - question - animate (While this has its non-evil applications, I can see every encounter leading to an extended "we question the guys we just killed" scene)

Death's hand + Killing Power + 2 dark invocations = A very nice capstone
Death's hand boosts your abilities with only a minor negative aspect.
Killing Power gives you about 2 more damage dice on average.
More invocations, especially dark ones are never wrong.

Invocations:

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Overall, the one thing that bugs/elates me depending on wether I look at it from a DM or Player perspective, is the stacking of levels between shape and essences. I do have to admit that it makes ranged builds a lot more attractive than melee ones (at least melee ones based on many natural attacks) as it increases the chance of affecting enemies even when you have a lower Int score.

Essences:

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Least:

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Focused Channel: Does this work with healing? Furthermore this is the basic essense, its a brutal damage dealer and only of questionable usefulness if it does not work with healing and you have an undead heavy campaign. In an other case, not taking this is criminal.

Frightening, sickening: Average.

Icy: Since it only dazzles, change the will save part that says "negates dazing". Otherwise nothing special.

Osseus: Bleed is always nice, but the fact that it doesn't scale makes this one obsolete very soon. Still until level 4 this one might do more damage than focused channel. (I'd suggest a bleeding effect of 1 per channel dice)

Overall, focused channel simply steals the show in this segment.

Lesser:

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Crushing: very, very nice. due to the guaranteed 1 round dazed effect, this is a stunlock. Potentially too good. Have a multiattacking melee guy pummel a hard enemy and as long as he hits, the enemy is dazed.

Deathfreeze: straight out cold damage is something nice if you have things that aren't affected by your usual blast, though I can't find much more than zombies (i think) where that would be useful. The dex damage is very nice, but the cooldown, while necessary, negates that a bit. I have to ask though, are cooldown-invocations only usable once per round or also on all attacks, because then the cooldown is less of a problem if you can simply inflict a lot in one go.

Doomwind: 3.5 maneuvers are not so much for me, so I don't really know how good this is.

Enervating: Does this stack with itself to exhaust enemies? If yes, awesome, if not i don't see much use in it compared to the awesome cruching channel.

Felfire: Standard anti-undead essence. The higher form of osseus.

Overall, I can't help but think that crushing channel might a bit too good in this segment. Depending on how many attacks you get, you pretty much guaranteed a hit. and if you work with crazy natural attackers they can stunlock entire groups they are in the middle of.

Greater:

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Desiccating: Acid and negatable blindness. Not bad.

Ghastly: Not bad either. (your level says 6, but the DC indicates 5)

Maddening: My there are a lot of negatable conditions in this segment.

Netherlighting: Half-electric and the actual stunlock. The upgrade from crushing channel. Everybody needs this for it is awesome.

Overall, aside from the increddible upgrade from cruching channel, there is mostly flavour in this segment. It feels a bit pale compared to the lesser invocations though.

Dark:

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Calcifying: A potential ender for mook battles. Very powerful, very nice.

Ghoulish: For everything you can't petrify but paralyze. Also ... stupid elves.

Hoarfrost: Is only half the damage cold which is irrestible? Or is all of it cold, but half of it is irresistible. An upgraded Deathfreeze. Is it one save against both damages or two saves? In either case, nicely powerful, in the latter it is awesome.

Void: The EI's Utterdark Blast.

Using Deathfreeze, Hoarfrost and Void in sequence can whittle away at an enemy very fast. Very nice essences in this segment, making the Greater ones really stand out as somwhat lackluster flavour-only. But maybe I'm just not well versed enough in the different conditions and the greater ones have more power than I think.

Shapes:

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Least:

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Necrotic blast: The Blaster choice. So happy it was included.

Nether spear: I snipe you. With Horizon goggles and enlarge metamagic you can shoot people from the next village over.

void arc: Not sure about this one. Its too close for comfort with ranged types, and shapes are generally not for melle types. useful for initial attacks and crowded rooms though.

The standards. The increase in range over the warlocks spear is very nice though. you can kill anyone who tries to run away now.

Lesser:

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Death Grip: good against casters and brutish types. (two saves with most essences, very nice)

Mortisphere: shorter range fireball, but based on negative energy and upgradable with essences. The fact that most essences will make this a two-save attack makes this very usable, as long as your own people don't get in the way.

Necrotic bolt: I never get the "line" spells. Does this mean a definite hit?

Upping the ante, these froms are more powerful. Mortisphere in particular.

Greater:

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Necrotic Burst: Perfect for melee people and its a fort-save. No evasion problems for this one.

Nether cone: A cone, now? I understand its usefulness somewhat, but I'm personally not fond of them.

The shapes thin out here. As is understandable. I like the Burst far better than the cone though.

Dark:

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Death chain: touch attack on the main guy? whats the range on the secondary bolts? This is for those battles where your allies are in the thick of it all. (If only the stupid reflex save wasn't there)

Doom Lance: DOOOOOOM. Even with the cooldown this is awesome. Use it with Void channel in the void-deathfreeze-hoarfrost sequence and see your enemies suffer.

The best of the best. Only the reflex save on chain bothers me a bit, but Doom lance makes up for it with utter destruction.

Utility Invocations:

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One thing first. I don't quite get the summon restriction. Does it mean you get your first summon at level 4? Or do you get only one summon up until level 8? Or do you get one summon plus one more at 4th, 8th etc?

Least:

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Allure of the dead: An upgraded version of beguiling tongue taking into account the negatives of Aura of the dead. But this makes negotiating with unded much easier. Though of course one could ask wether a simple dip into warlock to get beguiling tongue would stack with this one.

Blood Lash: Icky, but very flavourful for evil EIs.

Bone Armor: Your own shield spell. Though I find it a bit lackluster. I find the idea of randomly floating bones appealing. Maybe a +2 bonus and a will save by anyone who wants to attack you or become dazzled for 1 round by the many bones floating before their eyes. (maybe cumulative effect on failed saves)

Breath of freezing night: Two spells for one. Very useful in lower levels and especially dungeons. Needs cartoony sounds for slipping on the ice.

Call the walking dead: There are two options on this. Either this is the spell as it is presented in Libris mortis where it wasn't specified which medium skeleton you could summon (i think) or this version, where all you can get is a human warrior. If its the former its very powerful (just take any medium monster and skeletonize it) if its the latter (like I think) the only use of this invocation is to explain the placement of the others and to make something that sets off all the traps from a save distance. Not very useful in combat, but has its uses otherwise.

Darkness of death: Average.

Death's messenger: Flavour ahoy. (with nice benefits)

Death swiftness: I have to admit I have trouble seeing people that are by fluff detached from the living tumble and jump about.

Deathsight: More flavour. Very useful in intrigue- heavy campaigns.

Desecration Aura: For when you have to get the point across that you are a necromancer.

Fearsome Glare: The least invocations have a lot of sight based spells if you want to make a mysterious character.

Grave's Grasp: Never used the warlock version of this but the image it creates is funny.

Miasmic cloud: Who farted? (Not my thing)

Mortify: Other than pure flavour and restricting ways of bringing people back I have no idea what this is useful for.

Preservation: The anti-mortify?

Speed of the dead: The duration might make it possible to have your DM allow you this as "pretty much always on". Good for ranged types that want to stay ranged.

Spiderwalk: See warlock. Spiderdeath, spiderdeath...

Spiritual sight: this is as great as for the warlock. Pretty much necessary.

Touch of the dead: Healing for allies that didn't take TtS. If the "takes half from nether channels" also works on undead it is even better.

wraithtouch: Frankly I don't really see the appeal unless you are fighting an armor-monster.

Lesser:

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Aura of decay: perfect for melee-types. Healing for you allies, death for your enemies. (unless both are undead)

Bloodmote's feast: too icky for me, but swarm spells are never really bad.

Call the restless dead: Now it gets better. One troll is good, but if you want to annoy the enemy get 4 human warriors and have them use at least an attack each to destroy them, then summon more.

Curse of the damned: If you are allowed the extra forms in BovD (i think) this is great, especially if you are evil and interrogating someone. In fact that makes it too powerful what with the curses that affect friends instead of the actual target and you being able to do this all day.

Deadly contagion: The other version of bestow curse.

Ghost step: very useful if you find yourself being boxed in.

Osseus armory: Pretty much the best spell for dungeons when you have to outfit your opal-less undead. the weapons last as long as they do. Also good if your weapons got taken away. Suddenly you are an instant armory. I like this one a lot.

Phantasmal steed: Riding in style. And very fast as well.

Poisonous touch: there sure are a lot of debilitating touch spells in these invocations.

Reach of the damned: I have to admit I have no idea how this works as it appears to work differently than the normal spell?

Stygian snow: Nice, but there are better ones.

The dead shall rise: The epitome of this class. The flat 50gp cost per creatue makes it even better. And cheapskates still get a good working out of their minions, especially in dungeons.

Unhallowed consumption: Since this is the same amount of action needed to self-heal its mostly useful on minions that are nearly destroyed anyway. Does the temporarily include non-opaled animated ones? They are temprary but they are no precisely summoned. Even if not this gives you a healing battery for 50gp. The touch part irritates me a bit. (Maybe allow for some distance in exchange for making it a full round action?)

Vampire's call: See your players trying to charm anything ... repeatedly.

Voidsense: another useful 24 hour buff.

vicious dispelling: can be very useful.

Walk unseen: THE KING of the lesser invocations. Greater invisibility at-will is awesome and potentially too strong, considering you get this at level 6. The only thing that makes it in any way justifyable is the fact that unlinke the warlocks 24 hour invisibility, this one is only the normal lenght, meaning you won't be able to get your DM to agree that you constantly renew it.

Wall of Bones: Are you using the nerfed CA version or the Oriental Adventure version. The CA makes no sense as the strenght needed to break through was limited to DC15+2 per CL maximum +10, which considering its a 4th level spell is ALWAYS +10. The original limitless modifier makes sense since it mirrors the growing thickness of the wall. Anyway, tis pell is awesome, as it allows you to encase monsters. Large at level 6, huge at level 8 and so on. And you can do this each round. If you need breathing time in a dungeon, just make the wall run up and down the sides of the corridor effectivel walling it off along the entire lenght. Enemies will need some time breaking through it.

Wraith Form: Less flight than the Warlock. Are you actually incorporeal during this? (I guess not but the wording with "grants the ebon initiate the form and flight of a wraith" makes me wonder)

Greater:

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Unholy Blight: I always consider this a viable way to figure out wether your companions are as evil as they say in evil campaigns.

Call the hungry dead: Now this is great. Together with Corpsecrafter you can get an instant strikeforce.

Cannibalize magic: destroy enemy goods and heal yourself, yes please.

Corpse explosion: Especially useful in campaigns that have actual mass combats. Have the DM leave dead guys there, then assume wraith form and walk unseen and fly above exploding the oppositions dead when medics go about their business. Or if non such scenarios exist, kill a small animal fly over an enemy encampment, drop it, explode it. (it should be invisble as you are in the air since for greater invisibility it counts as an object)

Curse of deathly despair: same problems with BovD versions as the last one. very good for evil characters.

Moilian Tantacles: Interesting, the extra damage makes this potentially devastating.

Raise the venegeful dead: I'm not going to comment further on the hour long undead creation invocations as they are all good from my point of view.

Shadow calling: A candidate for maximize SLA. 4 greater shadows are nothing to sneeze at, ever.

Vampiric Aura: the better Aura of Decay, though I am not sure how this affects trees and such. A constant lifeleech, can make you very hard to kill in melee combat.

Dark:

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Avasculate: Since I don't know all the Tier 1 shenanigans, I might be wrong, but the fact that this has no cooldown makes it entirely too powerful in my eyes. Depleting half of an enemies hp in a single standard action each round, can make encounters very quick.

Boneweird + Call of the void: More awesome minions.

Howl of the damned: There is a cooldown here, and it is appropriate. Melee types can let fly their screams of death.

Killing Touch: Destruction at-will every 4 rounds at no cost? Incredible, though on a save you most likely do more damage with your channels.

Presence of Death: Switching this with vamoiric aura in mid-fight can make you very unstoppable.

Shun the mortal coil: Very good if you are defending a position ... and you trust your companions.

Stygian Rain: Considering the other Dark invocations, this seems rather weak.

The dead shall rule: Army of wraiths, nuff said.

Wow, this took forever to write. I'm completely tired out. But I wanted to do this for weeks now, since, as I said above, this is pretty much my favourite homebrew base class.

[Benly]

As far as the down-powering? All of those are very reasonable ways to bring the class down a tier or two. Just be careful not to pull it down too much; you'd get kind of a gimped warlock then. But yeah, all of your ideas seem quite reasonable. I'd call it high tier 4, low tier 3. I'd consider not removing the ability to full attack with netherchannel, especially with ranged, but reduce its damage by half of it's dice (round down, min 1d6) when used on melee attacks (as they can benefit from power attack still). Vitriolic Blast could be called something like Annihilation Blast, inflicting half-negative and half-acid, ignores SR.

The full attack thing was the central nerf to the class. Since invocations make the Initiate a powerful controller/summoner, the goal of that particular change was to define the initiate as primarily a necromancer and secondarily a damage dealer unless the player goes out of his way to build for a damage-dealer by making a melee build. We didn't want primary-level direct damage to be something automatically available. It would've been equally possible to define the Initiate as a blaster or gish, but since the invocations are what both of us found most interesting about the class that's what we decided to work with.

I would consider the nerfed version mid T3. The dread necromancer has considerably more possibility to broaden his powers through spell-list expansion, and can rocket up to T1 with a few dirty tricks, but the revised initiate has a wider range of actual options at low levels before those spell-list tricks become available (he can take BFC that isn't another fear-inflicting spell, holy cow!) and at high levels I would say it still keeps up barring actual tier-changing shenanigans from the DN.

Edit: Oh, and agreeing with the previous poster that SpC Summon Undead I is kind of sad. (Meet Trapspringer, my zombie kobold!) I don't think LM Summon Undead I is especially broken since most of the nastier small and medium creatures don't keep their good abilities when they go skeleton or zombie, but the higher-level versions can get pretty Serious Business when you get big enough to pop out hydras and such.

[Re'ozul]

Well I'm not really talking about any abilities with Summon undead, though those are nice too. But depending on how versed your players are, your monsters can have a lot of staying power.

Animals can get you 5HD medium skeletons (Protoceratops)
No sane DM would allow dragons.
Humanoids are average.
But its magical beasts where its at:
Basilisk - 6HD
Flame Snake, Lesser - 8HD
Frost Salamander - 12HD
Tusk Horror - 13HD

Or monstrous Humanoids: Greater Doppelganager - 20 HD

All medium.
Granted I don't know wether it works with things whose normal forms are magical, but this seems quite powerful to me. Which is why i said it.

[Benly]

Well I'm not really talking about any abilities with Summon undead, though those are nice too. But depending on how versed your players are, your monsters can have a lot of staying power.

Animals can get you 5HD medium skeletons (Protoceratops)
No sane DM would allow dragons.
Humanoids are average.
But its magical beasts where its at:
Basilisk - 6HD
Flame Snake, Lesser - 8HD
Frost Salamander - 12HD
Tusk Horror - 13HD

Or monstrous Humanoids: Greater Doppelganager - 20 HD

All medium.
Granted I don't know wether it works with things whose normal forms are magical, but this seems quite powerful to me. Which is why i said it.

This is fair enough. It's a brute-force solution, but maybe restricting it to base creatures with HD equal to or less than your caster level would work?

[Re'ozul]

That idea is not bad but it makes way for similar shenanigans once you have access to the higher versions. Summoning 4 skeletons with 6HD each at 6th level via summon undead 3 used on the SU1 list is also not very balanced (though better than unrestricted access).
This is why, I mentioned that both versions are bad.
Nonrestricted or these partial solutions are too easy to abuse on all of the summon undeads.
The Restricted version is bad on Su1 but gets better. Frankly, while inelegant its a way to not have things go crazy.

You can't even say "the sum of the summoned HD has to be your CL or less" since that would make the restricted versions SU5 unworkable with summoning 4 Troll Skeletons.
Maybe limiting total HD per summoning to the level of summon undead*CL/2.
Not sure wether that would work, I'm tired and going to bed now.

[Lateral]

I'm not really sure whether I should have let you resolve natural weapon attacks as touch attacks, Re'Ozul. I made that ruling and I'm not going to change it now, but four Nether Channel touch attacks at level 6... ouch.

[ErrantX]

I'm not really sure whether I should have let you resolve natural weapon attacks as touch attacks, Re'Ozul. I made that ruling and I'm not going to change it now, but four Nether Channel touch attacks at level 6... ouch.

Natural weapons as touch attacks + nethchannel? Yowza. I'd change that ruling myself.



Otherwise this will become your problem.

-X

[Unrest]

In the table it says EI gets 2 invocations at level 1; in the text, that he gets 1. Table holds?

[drakir_nosslin]

In the table it says EI gets 2 invocations at level 1; in the text, that he gets 1. Table holds?

By RAW, text trumps table, though that might not be the case here, it being homebrew and all...

[Unrest]

By RAW, text trumps table, though that might not be the case here, it being homebrew and all...

Yup, and here it might be one of the few inevitable copy-paste errors.

[ErrantX]

Yup, and here it might be one of the few inevitable copy-paste errors.

By RAW, text trumps table, though that might not be the case here, it being homebrew and all...

In the table it says EI gets 2 invocations at level 1; in the text, that he gets 1. Table holds?

Copy/paste error. Fixed. Ebon Initiates begin play with 2 invocations of the least grade.

-X

[Re'ozul]

I had some questions in my comment post, that I would like to ask again:
(plus one or two new ones)

Shroud of Death:
Noticed wording: "He may now use his Charisma modifier in place of his Constitution score to determine his hit points and Concentration check modifier." (modifier/score in both terms I think, otherwise I can read this as treat your chamod as your con-score, making a chamod of +8 worth the same as a con-score of 8 (mod=-1). Unless thats what you are going for.)

Armored Invoker: Does this mean that spellfailure does no longer apply to medium armor now? (I never get these wordings)

Focused Channel: Does this work with healing?

Icy: Since it only dazzles, change the will save part that says "negates dazing".

crushing channel: is the on-hit guaranteed 1 round dazing a bit too strong for a lesser essence?

I have to ask though, are cooldown-invocations only usable once per round or also on all attacks? Cooldown is less of a problem if you can simply inflict a lot in one go.

Enervating channel: Does this stack with itself to exhaust enemies?

Ghastly channel: Your level says 6, but the DC indicates 5.

Hoarfrost channel: Is only half the damage cold damage which is irrestible? Or is all of it cold, but half of it is irresistible. Is it one save against both damages or two saves?

Necrotic bolt: I never get the "line" spells. Does this mean a definite hit?

Death chain: touch attack on the main guy? whats the range on the secondary bolts?

Allure of the dead: Stack with a warlock's beguiling tnogue? (yeah, cheese, but a 1 level warlock dip makes you suddenly a very good diplomat)

Bone Armor: Your own shield spell. Though I find it a bit lackluster. I find the idea of randomly floating bones appealing. Maybe a +2 bonus and a will save by anyone who wants to attack you or become dazzled for 1 round by the many bones floating before their eyes. (maybe cumulative effect on failed saves)

Death swiftness: I have to admit I have trouble seeing people that are by fluff detached from the living tumble and jump about.

Mortify: Other than pure flavour and restricting ways of bringing people back I have no idea what this is useful for.

Touch of the dead: If used on undead, do they then for the duration also take half damage from nether channels?

Fearsome Glare: Possibly breaking some people's hearts, but did you mean "cause fear" instead of "fear" for the spell effect? (A 3rd/4th level spell as a least invocation at-will would be kinda powerful). Or is it the fear spell, but only on one specific creature instead of a cone?

Reach of the damned: I have to admit I have no idea how this works as it appears to work differently than the normal spell?

Unhallowed consumption: Since this is the same amount of action needed to self-heal its mostly useful on minions that are nearly destroyed anyway. Does the temporarily include non-opaled animated ones? They are temprary but they are no precisely summoned. Even if not this gives you a healing battery for 50gp. The touch part irritates me a bit. (Maybe allow for some distance in exchange for making it a full round action?)

Wall of Bones: Are you using the nerfed CA version or the Oriental Adventure version. The CA makes no sense as the strenght needed to break through was limited to DC15+2 per CL maximum +10, which considering its a 4th level spell is ALWAYS +10. The original limitless modifier makes sense since it mirrors the growing thickness of the wall.

Wraith Form: Are you actually incorporeal during this? (I guess not but the wording with "grants the ebon initiate the form and flight of a wraith" makes me wonder)

Vampiric Aura: How is your average plant-life affected, and how is that represented in mechanic terms? (If you wander through a forest, do you gain hp, by killing object-trees?)

Avasculate: Since I don't know all the Tier 1 shenanigans, I might be wrong, but the fact that this has no cooldown makes it entirely too powerful in my eyes. Depleting half of an enemies hp in a single standard action each round, can make encounters very quick.

Stygian Rain: Considering the other Dark invocations, this seems rather weak.

[ErrantX]

I had some questions in my comment post, that I would like to ask again:
(plus one or two new ones)

Shroud of Death:
Noticed wording: "He may now use his Charisma modifier in place of his Constitution score to determine his hit points and Concentration check modifier." (modifier/score in both terms I think, otherwise I can read this as treat your chamod as your con-score, making a chamod of +8 worth the same as a con-score of 8 (mod=-1). Unless thats what you are going for.)

Semantics. Fixed.

Armored Invoker: Does this mean that spellfailure does no longer apply to medium armor now? (I never get these wordings)

Fixed the wording.

Focused Channel: Does this work with healing?

No, I'll respecify in nether channel that you cannot use essence/shapes when healing.

Icy: Since it only dazzles, change the will save part that says "negates dazing".

Typo, fixed.

crushing channel: is the on-hit guaranteed 1 round dazing a bit too strong for a lesser essence?

Perhaps, but then again, look at the competition. There are maneuvers and spells that can do this sort of thing. Perhaps it will leave them shaken for one round instead as a compromise.

I have to ask though, are cooldown-invocations only usable once per round or also on all attacks? Cooldown is less of a problem if you can simply inflict a lot in one go.

Once this invocation is invoked, it's invoked for the round. So it would be usable on all attacks.

Enervating channel: Does this stack with itself to exhaust enemies?

Yessir indeed it does.

Ghastly channel: Your level says 6, but the DC indicates 5.

Typo, fixed.

Hoarfrost channel: Is only half the damage cold damage which is irrestible? Or is all of it cold, but half of it is irresistible. Is it one save against both damages or two saves?

Half the damage is normal negative energy, the other half is irresistable cold damage. One save against the Dex damage, does nothing to the regular damage.

Necrotic bolt: I never get the "line" spells. Does this mean a definite hit?

Yes it does. It also allows for the Reflex save and potential evasion use.

Death chain: touch attack on the main guy? whats the range on the secondary bolts?

Yes, and 20ft (I'll add this now).

Allure of the dead: Stack with a warlock's beguiling tnogue? (yeah, cheese, but a 1 level warlock dip makes you suddenly a very good diplomat)

Annoyingly, yes. Warlock's Beguiling Tongue is an untyped bonus.

Bone Armor: Your own shield spell. Though I find it a bit lackluster. I find the idea of randomly floating bones appealing. Maybe a +2 bonus and a will save by anyone who wants to attack you or become dazzled for 1 round by the many bones floating before their eyes. (maybe cumulative effect on failed saves)

It's a low level effect, and they're not proficient with shields. I think it's a more than reasonable ability. While I respect your opinion on this invocation, I prefer my method.

Death swiftness: I have to admit I have trouble seeing people that are by fluff detached from the living tumble and jump about.

Vampires in lore are known for frightening swiftness, and the fluff of the ability is that by selectively making portions of your body immaterial for the scarcest moments you effectively cut drag and air resistance to your movements.

Mortify: Other than pure flavour and restricting ways of bringing people back I have no idea what this is useful for.

For making skeletons? Can't make a skeleton out of a bag of meat and guts, can ya? Also makes raising folks more difficult.

Touch of the dead: If used on undead, do they then for the duration also take half damage from nether channels?

No. They take full damage as it's positive energy. Clarified this in netherchannel.

Fearsome Glare: Possibly breaking some people's hearts, but did you mean "cause fear" instead of "fear" for the spell effect? (A 3rd/4th level spell as a least invocation at-will would be kinda powerful). Or is it the fear spell, but only on one specific creature instead of a cone?

Yes, fixed.

Reach of the damned: I have to admit I have no idea how this works as it appears to work differently than the normal spell?

Clarified the wording. Yes it works differently than the normal spell, I've clarified it. Thought it was pretty self-explainatory but evidently not. Instead of transposing two targets, it just teleports a target to you, effectively.

Unhallowed consumption: Since this is the same amount of action needed to self-heal its mostly useful on minions that are nearly destroyed anyway. Does the temporarily include non-opaled animated ones? They are temprary but they are no precisely summoned. Even if not this gives you a healing battery for 50gp. The touch part irritates me a bit. (Maybe allow for some distance in exchange for making it a full round action?)

No on 'Summon'ed creatures, yes on temporary undead for using unhallowed consumption. I like it being used as a touch, I get where you're coming from on the range thing, but then it becomes a little more than the silly it already is.

Wall of Bones: Are you using the nerfed CA version or the Oriental Adventure version. The CA makes no sense as the strenght needed to break through was limited to DC15+2 per CL maximum +10, which considering its a 4th level spell is ALWAYS +10. The original limitless modifier makes sense since it mirrors the growing thickness of the wall.

Specifically stated in both the beginning of the Necromantic Invocation section with abreviations as to spell sources, the Complete Arcane version is used in this invocation. OA's version is 3.0, and thus is overruled by the 3.5 version in Complete Arcane.

Wraith Form: Are you actually incorporeal during this? (I guess not but the wording with "grants the ebon initiate the form and flight of a wraith" makes me wonder)

Flavor text. It doesn't grant you the incorporeal subtype, it specficially doesn't say that as there is a dark invocation that actually does that. Wraith form specifically grants miss change and flight only.

Vampiric Aura: How is your average plant-life affected, and how is that represented in mechanic terms? (If you wander through a forest, do you gain hp, by killing object-trees?)

Plants are plants. They die, but their life essence is so miniscule as to not be notices. Creatures with the Plant type are a different matter, as they're creatures, not flora.

Avasculate: Since I don't know all the Tier 1 shenanigans, I might be wrong, but the fact that this has no cooldown makes it entirely too powerful in my eyes. Depleting half of an enemies hp in a single standard action each round, can make encounters very quick.

This is one that was meant to have a cool down and was overlooked. Adding that now.

Stygian Rain: Considering the other Dark invocations, this seems rather weak.

AoE damage spell, Acid Rain is actually a decent spell IMHO, and it lasts for rounds, which makes it a good invocation. So I spit one off and it lasts for dozen rounds, and sure I can't use it again for 18 seconds, but who cares? It's active for longer than that and I can use other invocations while I wait. It seemed reasonable to me for a non-spamming spell.

I hope this answers your questions and comments.

-X

[Re'ozul]

Wow, thanks. Yeah it clarifies a lot.
Only two things of those:


Touch of the dead:
(My question was about this wording)
If the target is struck by a netherchannel used for attack while this ability is in effect, he takes half damage from the attack.


Hoarfrost channel:
My question on the two saves was about the fact that the target takes strenght AND dexterity damage.

[ErrantX]

Wow, thanks. Yeah it clarifies a lot.
Only two things of those:


Touch of the dead:
(My question was about this wording)
If the target is struck by a netherchannel used for attack while this ability is in effect, he takes half damage from the attack.


Hoarfrost channel:
My question on the two saves was about the fact that the target takes strenght AND dexterity damage.

Netherchannel cannot be used to harm creatures that are unaffected by negative energy. Using it for healing purposes is limited to half and as a standard action due to the fine tuning required to use death and destruction for a more constructive purpose. Think of it as taxes.

One save, both abilities are damage. If the save is successful, then they take half damage to both abilities.

-X

[drakir_nosslin]

Any plans for an Epic progression?

[Re'ozul]

I'd like to add another question that I came up with when building a character.
If you use a high-crit weapon (scythe for example), does the crit multiplier of the weapon also work for the channel or is the channel still x2?
Also, with greater crit ranges, does the channel adapt to those or only crit on a 20?
Or do you treat it like sneak attack when used with a melee attack, i.e. no multiplication ever?

[ErrantX]

Any plans for an Epic progression?

I ought to do one of those, huh? *cracks his knuckles* Shouldn't be too hard. I've never done much with Epic homebrew before, so let's see how it goes.

I'd like to add another question that I came up with when building a character.
If you use a high-crit weapon (scythe for example), does the crit multiplier of the weapon also work for the channel or is the channel still x2?
Also, with greater crit ranges, does the channel adapt to those or only crit on a 20?
Or do you treat it like sneak attack when used with a melee attack, i.e. no multiplication ever?

Clarified it in netherchannel. When used as a touch attack or as a ranged touch attack (through nethershape invocations), it can crit on a 20 and do x2 damage. When used on a weapon, it never gets multiplied, just added to the weapon's multiplied damage. Good catch there, I totally missed that one.

-X

[mrcarter11]

Epic progression huh.. I'm excited... It's come up a few times in epic game where I take this class for a full 20 and then go into one of its PrC's.. In any case, I also have a question.. How does netherchannel interact with natural attacks in something like Wildshape.. Would each attack gain the damage?

[ErrantX]

Epic Ebon Initiate

Darius, the Grey Witness, an epic ebon initiate

"Though my life has ended, my existence endures. I have borne the birth and death of centuries, and fully intend to discover the very secrets of why we live and why we die. If knowledge is power, than a god... am I." - Darius, the Grey Witness

Imbued with the very essence of the realm of the dead, an epic ebon initiate is a maelstrom of fell energies and dark hunger, his soul teetering on the very edge of oblivion.
Hit Die: d8
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 2 + Intelligence modifier
Invocations: The epic ebon initiate's caster level is equal to his class level. He does not learn additional new invocations.
Netherchannel: The epic ebon initiate's netherchannel damage continues to increase by 1d6 additional damage at every odd-level after 20th level.
Natural Armor: At every fourth level starting at 22nd level, the epic ebon initiate's natural armor bonus from Death's Hand increases by +1.
Cold Resistance: At every fourth level starting at 23rd level, the epic ebon initiate's cold resistance from Death's Hand improves by 5.
Bonus Feats: The epic ebon initiate gains a bonus feat every three levels higher than 20th level.