Base Class Challenge Chat Thread IV: All Your Base [Class] Are Belong to Us

[r2d2go]

Alright so Dungeon Engineer is playable up to 10th level! Mostly. If anyone wants to PEACH just the mechanics of it (obviously Contraptions are not finished yet), that'd be great. Of course, I'll return the favor heck I'll probably PEACH anyone who wants their class evaluated - It's good practice but yeah, I'm a little worried about the formatting of Contraptions especially.

[Jormengand]

Alright so Dungeon Engineer is playable up to 10th level! Mostly. If anyone wants to PEACH just the mechanics of it (obviously Contraptions are not finished yet), that'd be great. Of course, I'll return the favor heck I'll probably PEACH anyone who wants their class evaluated - It's good practice but yeah, I'm a little worried about the formatting of Contraptions especially.

Sure.

A couple of obvious things:

You still have CLASS NAME in several places, and no skills or proficiency.
Spell traps are already a thing. You might want to go from there.
Camouflage is the new focused lexicon. Yeah, you want to be increasing the result of the hide check, not the DC.
You should probably provide the tables for how many contraptions/traps/turrets you get, not just poke people towards other classes.
"The Dungeon Engineer has all current and future hit dice become d10s, though no other Construct Traits are gained. He also gets half his Intelligence bonus to each hit die, as ingenious design allows him to make the body even more durable. He also gains all Construct Traits other than proficiencies, and has his strength set to 24 and his dexterity set to 18, while his mental ability scores remain the same. Lastly, his contraptions become essentially part of him, allowing him to use himself as their point of origin." What gives?

I'll have a longer look a bit later, but those are the obvious bits. Also not sure where the dungeon theme comes in, except in the name which is cheating a little.

[r2d2go]

Ah, cool, thanks

Fixed a few errors - the not quite obvious fixes are that it's Construct Features that are not gained, while Construct Traits are, and that it's actually Spot/Search DCs increased by Camouflage (for hiding traps).

Honestly it's just a trap-person, though there are some traps that work best in dungeons (or at least hallways). So far there's only really two or three, but I'll be expanding. It's not the best fit for the Dungeon theme, but I like the idea

And yeah, there's a few things that I missed/left out of laziness I need to fix up

Thanks for the PEACH!

Okay, looked through the Dungeon Master. It is... hilarious

I think Turns Out He Had A Magic Item might need to have a limit, just because of the massive shenanigans you can pull. I mean, it is part of the reason the DM is going to be a decent class, but I feel that it's dangerous - there are a lot of specific spells and items you can pull out, and it might make every encounter an hour-slog through the books to find the one perfect spell or item.

It also somewhat encourages the DM to spend his WBL on consumables, since he should never actually be attacking anything and has minimal spellcasting. If I were playing this, I'd probably just buy a few defensive items (Shadow Cloak, an item of Mirror Image) and then leave the rest of my wealth as open cash for consumables. Maybe a limit/day?

I'll also note that Create Encounter has a somewhat abnormal curve. For example, from 9th to 10th level, he goes from 6 EL worth of monsters/day to 9 EL worth of monsters/day. I see you've got a pattern going (every third number stays for two levels) but it might be worth considering to adjust it for that reason, considering it seems to be his main ability.

I'll also note that at 20th level, the DM can create EL 21 worth of monsters

Anyway, interesting class nothing too bad to comment on, and certainly a cool idea

[1pwny]

Anybody want to PEACH the Corner Dweller?

And BTW, Jormangand, your Dungeon Master is awesome. I totally want to play it.

[Jormengand]

Anybody want to PEACH the Corner Dweller?

Okay, let's see:

WBL schenaniganry at level 1 is Bad, Kiddies.
Why would you get the Tome of intelligence if you could get an insight bonus to intelligence, seeing as how nothing else gives you insight to INT?
Treasure Loot is almost certainly pointless, because you'd get more for selling the book.
Practice bonuses need to be defined because they aren't a thing normally. Same with Training bonuses. Also happiness bonus (Morale, maybe?)
Spells almost all the time ignore DR anyway.
OH GOD UNLIMITED FELL DRAIN CANTRIPS WHY GOD WHY AND OH DEAR GOD YOU LATER GET TO QUICKEN THEM TOO AAARGH.
But seriously, I can see people throwing around some cantrip or other with twinned and fell drain and then quickened and fell drain to drop three negative levels on someone before they can blink. And doing that an unlimited number of times? Ow.
You can see in low light, which gives you darkvision?
The unlimited ability to be ex invisible because you're generally unnoticable, even if you're stabbing someone, needs to go.

[MrNobody]

May I ask to have my Trapcaster and its additional material PEACHed?

[Jormengand]

May I ask to have my Trapcaster and its additional material PEACHed?

Okay:

The first letter of trapcasting's description isn't capitalised.

There's nothing to stop you trapping a F2S'd rat, and it's not quite clear what happens if you cast S2F back on the statue. Presumably the rat would set off the trap by moving itself, which seems to make sense, but...

"Once set, the trap remains dormant until somone activate the trigger by moving through it (in the case of a square) o touching..."
Should be someone, activates, or.

"A trapcaster can dismiss one of his trap"
Should be traps.

"Using Trapcasting is nor arcane nor divine magic, but uses a different kind of energy that naturally flows from the Archetypical Dungeon. Because of this, a Trapcaster doesn’t need any component or focus, isnt’ required to make any concentration check and ignores the arcane spell failure imposed by armors and shields. Using Trapcasting is a standard action that doesn’t provoque attacks of oppotunity.
Trap are sensible to certain types of magic: spells that suppress magic (dispel magic, break enchantment and so forth) dispel a trap as if it were a spell. A trap works in a way similar to conjuration (summoning) spells so anything that would block a spell from that school also prevents a trap from working. A trap may be targeted with banishment, dismissal or similar spells: roll the Will save for those spells using the Trapcaster bonus. On a save the trap is dispelled."
Not/neither, isn't, armour/armor, provoke, opportunity, sensitive, a failed save.

"as the Trapcaster that casts it"
Who.

"when a creature move through the trigger square (land speed only) a thin, trasparent (not invisible) tensing wire is summoned. A creature passing through that square must make a Reflex save or be tripped, becoming prone. Starting at 4th level, when the wire successfully trips a creature it breaks in two halves that clings around the target: resolve this as a grapple check on which the trap has a bonus equal to the Trapcaster level plus his Intelligence modifier. The broken wire continues grappling for 3 rounds and if the victim manages to escape it instantly vanishes. From 8th level the wire can adjust its position and is now able to affect even flying, burrowing or swimming targets than can now trigger the trap. A flying creature that fails its save loses 20ft of altitude: should this descent cause it to touch the ground, it falls prone and take the appropriate falling damage. Burrowing or swimming creatures that fail their save lose all their remaining movement and cannot use a move action to move in their current round. At 12th level the wire becomes made of pure force making it able to affect (trip and grapple) incorporeal creatures, who suffer the same effect as swimming creatures. The wire has hardness equal to half your Trapcaster level and HPs equals to twice your level."
When, moves, transparent, into halves/into two halves, cling, trapcaster's, that/which/who, equal.

Okay, I'm going to stop correcting your grammar now (but for god's sake learn to use a comma), and just say that I can't see anyone using much other than spell traps the moment they come online. Maybe the poisonous arrows, maybe. And possibly of all things the diddy tripwire might actually be pretty dangerous. But the ability to fire off a ton of traps is pretty handy, especially since there's nothing stopping your trapcaster cohort setting a line of beneficial "Traps" for your wizard to fly through the moment he sees trouble.

Also the fact that you can fight on a field which is literally nothing but bear traps is fun, especially if you force your opponent into an AMF trap.

You may want to fix the word caliphate in the Archetypal Dungeon description.

[sengmeng]

Anybody glanced at the dungeoncrasher yet? It's been playable for a couple weeks now.

Edit: Feats added. Any feedback is welcome, but especially if there are other feats that you would like to see.

[Jormengand]

Anybody glanced at the dungeoncrasher yet? It's been playable for a couple weeks now.

- Dungeoncrasher/Barbarians are literate by the wording in the DC's version.
- I feel the "Ground at his feet" wording might be abusable by someone, somewhere.
- Fling might be a one hit KO if you can send someone up high enough, especially if you're in an area with a particularly high ceiling and can dungeoncrash them and also make them take fall damage. Other than fall damage, though, I'm not sure what the point is unless you want to launch an ally up instead of making them jump?
- The wording of Earthquake and Worldbreaker would imply that you couldn't use previous versions if it didn't specify; you could make it more intuitive.
- Not a criticism, I want to commend you for not falling into the trap of allowing to chain knocking people prone with Slam.
- Unlike Fling, I see Directed Fling actually being really useful. Chuck them through the vortex to another dimension? Yes please!
- Mobile Charge is terrible. It's like a feat (Fleet of Foot CW) only worse.
- Bounce's wording allows you to bounce people off a wall in a corner and the floor in that corner multiple times in succession dealing half crash damage each time.
- Pinball Charge might or might not be better if you are wielding two weapons or are hasted, because nowhere in the whole of Dungeons and Dragons Revised Third Edition is the term "Iterative attack" actually defined.
- Deadly Ground might work on people who fall prone while prone, including in conjunction with Slam to knock someone prone while you knock them prone.
- If you get powerful build while you have powerful build, you grow a size category but keep the powerful build for the new size category.
- I now require someone to optimise movement speed (Chuck, anyone?) just to abuse the hell out of Momentum. More seriously, it just adds to the fact that you can probably chuck several people off a cliff in one round (not that that's liable to matter at nineteenth level, but still).

- Ascetic Brawler allows you to be a monk without actually ever taking monk levels at any point in the proceedings.
- Stealthy Brawler ditto rogue ditto rogue ditto, though you have to take an assassin level or something.
- Raging Brawler almost ditto barbarian ditto barbarian ditto.
- Brawling Hunter almost ditto ranger ditto ranger ditto.

[Carl]

Just ran across a video that i so wish i'd seen way back during the last contest. Aside from being in love with the music so much inspiration. Not sure what i'm going to do with it but i thought i'd share for you lot.

[Jormengand]

Just ran across a video that i so wish i'd seen way back during the last contest. Aside from being in love with the music so much inspiration. Not sure what i'm going to do with it but i thought i'd share for you lot.

1:11-1:18: What bards SHOULD be able to do.

[r2d2go]

Hey look people with classes that want PEACHes! Jorm got you guys already but hey, why not, I'll look things over too.

Spoiler: The Corner Dweller

Show

Jorm covered most of this. For the most part, Fell Drain is the biggest problem because it adds a nasty damage type/debuff to the spell, regardless of it's level. Fell Frighten, Entangling Spell, Clawed Spell, and Forceful Spell all add something like that, but generally to a lesser degree. Lore of Black Moil and Born of Three Thunders might also be a problem, but both of those have restrictions (Black Moil costs 25 gp/1d6 damage it adds, Three Thunders Dazes the caster).

The only other thing I can say is that half DC (Ninja) tends to be a bad idea. Half damage, yes, or flat penalties to DC, but half DC might as well be auto-success, due to the scaling. A +4 or +6 bonus to the save might be more reasonable.

Otherwise, neat and flavorful

Spoiler: Trapcaster

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Unfortunately suffers something of a problem in that it's abilities do not scale well enough to be used into later levels, and also that it has very few traps to choose from. Just to use the most extreme example, why would you set a tripwire when you can crush them with a Forcecage? Of course, you might invest a feat in a good trap early, making it compete a bit longer, but in the end you're stuck with a list of only five or so good traps. I think making a traps/day list of each level, and adding many more traps, would be a good idea. Alternatively, a power-point like system might help, and would let you use less traps. Finally, better scaling could help remedy the problem.

Jorm got most of the grammar/spelling errors

Spoiler: Dungeoncrasher

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I have to disagree with Jorm on Fling. In most situations, you're dealing Dungeoncrash damage if you have only a ceiling and not nearby walls. It takes a very specific scenario to get significant value out of the falling damage and Dungeoncrash damage, though it is a nice bonus.

I will go ahead and call Bounce OP because of reasons Jorm noted - you can easily set up a situation where you're dealing hal Dungeoncrash damage for every 5 feet of knockback you're getting. I recommend making this a smaller bonus (2d6+str?), and maybe limiting the number of bounces.

With Pinball Charge, I must say the class gets frankly ridiculous. With all the abilities noted, it'll take ten minutes to resolve your turn, and a room full of enemies will become a pile of rubble and bodies because every time someone gets knocked down, you deal damage to an area around the victim, taking five rolls of damage. And because of Bounce, it means you're making a dozen of those rolls. And because of Pinball Charge, you're bouncing four of those people.

Deadly Ground only compounds this problem, and I thus recommend the same restrictions as Bounce.

Powerful build is fine at this point

Momentum is a little too much. That's easily +20 to those rolls. Making it a flat bonus (+4?) with perhaps a threshold of 30 feet would be better.

And Juggernaut charge finishes off the absurdity now you're bouncing dozens of people, instead of four. I recommend restricting this to a certain number of people, especially if you keep Momentum, which would allow you to basically hit a person every 10-15 feet of your ridiculous charge range.

Overall, very cool, but it plays like an optimized character without even trying right now

[kanachi]

Hiya guys my class (The Architect) still needs quite a bit of fleshing out, but it would be fantastic if someone could take a quick look at what I have so far to make sure that what I'm trying to get across makes some kind of sense. Thanks!

[Jormengand]

Would also be cool if there was more critiquing of the DM, rather than just squeeing.

Not that I mind squeeing.

[r2d2go]

Note that I edited in my critique, if you missed it. Just in case

[kanachi]

Would also be cool if there was more critiquing of the DM, rather than just squeeing.

Not that I mind squeeing.

Hiya, I've taken a look and I'll admit I'm a bit out of my depth trying to seriously assess the balance of the class. It is, by its very nature, built to be very free form and flexible. I think its balanced-ish is about all I can really say. I'm sure there are some encounters the DM could make that would totally tip the balance, but that all depends what the DM's DM allows him/her to get away with.

The variances in creature types for example are so vast that you could spawn in even a low level monster capable of utterly smashing a standing encounter (ethereal creatures, rust monsters and the like). Then there are spells and spell like abilities, drop something in with the objective of using its power in a certain way and you basically have access to a near endless array of utility. Sure not all of it would be 100% under your control, but with a bit of imagination you can easily form something thats quite predictable.

I love the fluff and applaud you for your endeavour and an excellent idea (so gloriously simple/obvious that I wish I had thought of it first!), but would I allow someone to play it in one of my sessions? No. Regardless its probably a strong contender to win this thing because it matches the brief so perfectly and its just so damn fun and cool! Great work!

Sorry I cant be more help.

EDIT: typos all over the place!

[r2d2go]

Hiya guys my class (The Architect) still needs quite a bit of fleshing out, but it would be fantastic if someone could take a quick look at what I have so far to make sure that what I'm trying to get across makes some kind of sense. Thanks!

Ok, looked through it

Honestly, it seems... fine? There's a slight problem in that it relies heavily on the user's creativity in using the actual building part, rather than giving statistic bonuses or abilities. I would make Architect's Armor give more and customizeable bonuses to add that missing aspect. The Labourers help, but making a class's main statistic bonus be Astral Constructs seems a bit restrictive.

Other minor things (typos?) that I think need change:

"5 cubic feet" is a lot smaller than "5 feet cubed". You should probably use the latter, instead of "5ft cubic mass".

Reconstruct probably shouldn't be able to set "against" anything unless the Architect has Weld already, and is using it. Otherwise, anyone standing against a wall is vulnerable to having a ton of clay dropped on their head

Liquids should probably be limited somehow. Remember, lava is a liquid, and dropping it on someone deals 10d6 damage a round.

Other than that, cool!

[Secret Wizard]

How's this.

[1pwny]

So, as a quick edit, I'm deciding to just ban those more unfair metamagics. I've already got Fell Drain/Frighten, and Forceful spell. So if any of you have more of those kind of encounter-breaking spells that can easily be abused, could you please tell me? I'm afraid that my knowledge of abuseable metamagic is somewhat limited.

@r2d2go: I decided after some deliberation that Entangling Spell and Clawed Spell seem legit enough to apply to Cantrips at level 9 and up.

[Temotei]

How's this.

Well, I mean, it'd be fine if it were in the thread.

[r2d2go]

So, as a quick edit, I'm deciding to just ban those more unfair metamagics. I've already got Fell Drain/Frighten, and Forceful spell. So if any of you have more of those kind of encounter-breaking spells that can easily be abused, could you please tell me? I'm afraid that my knowledge of abuseable metamagic is somewhat limited.

@r2d2go: I decided after some deliberation that Entangling Spell and Clawed Spell seem legit enough to apply to Cantrips at level 9 and up.

Flash Frost adds +2 cold damage per spell level. Mostly shenanigans, but with Heighten Spell and perhaps Snowcasting, it could do something.

Deafening Spell deafens with no save, but not too worrying.

Twin, Repeat, Split Ray and Chain each multiply things, so you might want to watch out for that. While it's not quite as scary as some other things, you could very feasibly do some nasty things with additional metamagic reducers - you might want to limit those as well. You don't specify arcane vrs divine, I think, but with Arcane Thesis, you could throw some pretty strong stuff out.

Spoiler: Optimization?

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Chained Clawed Horizikaul's Cough (+2/+0) at 10th level, dealing 1+2d6 damage to a target (no save) and half that to up to 10 targets (reflex half), at will. Or Split Ray Clawed Entangling Ray of Frost (+1/+0/+1) for 2d3+4d6 damage and entangling.

Throw in Born of Three Thunders, Snowcasting, and Repeat, and at 10th level (will take flaws) you're dealing that much damage but also forcing a save to avoid being dazed or stunned. You can also quicken or Twin it (or both) to increase the output, once you hit 17th level. At level 20 that's 48d6+12d3 damage, plus twelve saves to avoid being deafened, and twelve saves to avoid being knocked prone. And you can do that at will not too shabby, but not too impressive for an optimization. You could also Chain it for AoE at the cost of half damage.

[kanachi]

Ok, looked through it
Honestly, it seems... fine? There's a slight problem in that it relies heavily on the user's creativity in using the actual building part, rather than giving statistic bonuses or abilities.

I was inspired by a long session playing minecraft, so yeah, creativity is a big part of the class. There is a lot you can do both in and out of combat when you can rapidly alter the terrain. I am in a way a bit worried that this, being the main class feature, may in itself be to powerful in its utility.

I would make Architect's Armor give more and customizeable bonuses to add that missing aspect.

I'm thinking that at later levels Architect's Armour provides some unique bonuses dependant on the type of materials its constructed from (glass would give you bladed armour for example). The only problem is the shear endless quantity of materials, but I will try to capture most of the major ones.

The Labourers help, but making a class's main statistic bonus be Astral Constructs seems a bit restrictive.

Agreed, I want to make the Labourers a lot more unique as well at the moment they are simply juts re-skinned Astral Constructs. I'm hoping to give them some more unique applications and abilities.

Other minor things (typos?) that I think need change:

"5 cubic feet" is a lot smaller than "5 feet cubed". You should probably use the latter, instead of "5ft cubic mass".

Very true, I will do this.

Reconstruct probably shouldn't be able to set "against" anything unless the Architect has Weld already, and is using it. Otherwise, anyone standing against a wall is vulnerable to having a ton of clay dropped on their head

This actually was supposed to be the Architects main weapon, essentially dropping a mass of material on top of someone (or digging a hole out beneath the). At low levels it will however be two powerful I think. So I may make reconstructed materials "suspend in mid air until the start of the Architects next turn" which will give those underneath a chance to run (and if your still under it at that point you deserve to get squished. Also you can use it to build very temporary sky bridges.

As for weld I think it may just be easier to combine this into being part of reconstruct, which will certainly make building far easier.

Liquids should probably be limited somehow. Remember, lava is a liquid, and dropping it on someone deals 10d6 damage a round.

Yeah this was my main worry about including them maybe I will not bring Liquids in until a later level or maybe the above fix to reconstruct will mitigate the likelihood of it being used as an offensive weapon.

Other than that, cool!

Thank you! Your thoughts were really helpful. I'll try to take a look at your class ASAP!

[1pwny]

Throw in Born of Three Thunders, Snowcasting, and Repeat, and at 10th level (will take flaws) you're dealing that much damage but also forcing a save to avoid being dazed or stunned. You can also quicken or Twin it (or both) to increase the output, once you hit 17th level. At level 20 that's 48d6+12d3 damage, plus twelve saves to avoid being deafened, and twelve saves to avoid being knocked prone. And you can do that at will not too shabby, but not too impressive for an optimization. You could also Chain it for AoE at the cost of half damage.

This is kind of what I was trying to get at with the class, so thanks! When you look at it from an objective standpoint it seems pretty great, but all in all its not up to the shenanigans an actual level 20 arcane caster can accomplish.

[r2d2go]

This is kind of what I was trying to get at with the class, so thanks! When you look at it from an objective standpoint it seems pretty great, but all in all its not up to the shenanigans an actual level 20 arcane caster can accomplish.

Yeah, I figured the only thing is that instead of needing to dedicate your build to such a thing, you get six metamagic feats for free. Banning Arcane Thesis (or making the thing clearly non-arcane) would certainly cut down on this problem. But ultimately, it's up to you, especially since at this point I think the class is balanced enough that you're just adjusting it up or down half a tier.

Thank you! Your thoughts were really helpful. I'll try to take a look at your class ASAP!

No problem

[UristMcRandom]

Alright, given that there's a good chance it's not going to be complete until the last second, a PEACH on the Recluse would be nice. Obviously right now I've only got one mechanic, but I'll be finishing off the spells and starting on the other class features tonight.

[Temotei]

Alright, given that there's a good chance it's not going to be complete until the last second, a PEACH on the Recluse would be nice. Obviously right now I've only got one mechanic, but I'll be finishing off the spells and starting on the other class features tonight.

Would an extension of a day or two be enough to have a more comfortable finish?

[UristMcRandom]

Definitely.

[Temotei]

Definitely.

Cool. I'll change the due date to the end of the 7th, then.

[Secret Wizard]

Well, I mean, it'd be fine if it were in the thread.

So I need to reformat it for this forum?

[kanachi]

So I need to reformat it for this forum?

Yeah you will need to reformat it, though if you look at the title post in the contest itself you will see a full list of all the rules and all the code you need to get your format working. Its honestly pretty easy so don't let yourself be discouraged. I type up most of my work in word before hand and then just copy and paste it into the relevant slots and it only takes about 10 mins or something. Also as far as I know (and I may be wrong) you cant have submitted the class elsewhere before hand or while the the contest is running.

I've got a lot to do to make sure my own class is ready on time (RL stuff has totally bogged me down), but I also really want to do some PEACHing so if you get it submitted in good time I'll try to take a look.

Best of luck!