New Core Class - The Expert (your only choice for skill monkey)

[bobspldbckwrds]

here is The Expert. He is a dilettante, a scholar, and someone who is useful outside of combat!

Hit die: d6

Class Skills: All (yeppers, all of 'em)

Skill Ranks per level: 10+ int modifier

Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: All Simple and martial weapons, Light Armor and buckler proficency

1st level: BAB: +0 F: +0 R: +2 W: +2 - Skill Focus
2nd level: BAB: +1 F: +0 R: +3 W: +3 -
3rd level: BAB: +2 F: +1 R: +3 W: +3 - Skill Focus, Bonus Feat
4th level: BAB: +3 F: +1 R: +4 W: +4 -
5th level: BAB: +3 F: +1 R: +4 W: +4 - Skill Focus, Ability Substitution 1/day
6th level: BAB: +4 F: +2 R: +5 W: +5 - Bonus Feat
7th level: BAB: +5 F: +2 R: +5 W: +5 - Skill Focus
8th level: BAB: +6/+1 F: +2 R: +6 W: +6 -
9th level: BAB: +6/+1 F: +3 R: +6 W: +6 - Skill Focus, Bonus Feat
10th level: BAB: +7/+2 F: +3 R: +7 W: +7 - Ability Substitution 3/day
11th level: BAB: +8/+3 F: +3 R: +7 W: +7 - Skill Focus, Permanent Ability Substitution
12th level: BAB: +9/+4 F: +4 R: +8 W: +8 - Bonus Feat
13th level: BAB: +9/+4 F: +4 R: +8 W: +8 -Skill Focus
14th level: BAB: +10/+5 F: +4 R: +9 W: +9 -
15th level: BAB: +11/+6/+1 F: +5 R: +9 W: +9 -Skill Focus, Bonus Feat, Ability Substitution 4/day, Permanent Ability Substitution
16th level: BAB: +12/+7/+2 F: +5 R: +10 W: +10 -
17th level: BAB: +12/+7/+2 F: +5 R: +10 W: +10 -Skill Focus
18th level: BAB: +13/+8/+3 F: +6 R: +11 W: +11 - Bonus Feat
19th level: BAB: +14/+9/+4 F: +6 R: +11 W: +11 - Skill Focus
20th level: BAB: +15/+10/+5 F: +6 R: +12 W: +12 -Ability Substitution 5/day, Permanent Ability Substitution

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Skill Focus: as feat
Bonus Feat: self explanatory
Ability Substitution: you may substitute the pertinent ability for a skill check with another of the same type, I.E. physical score for physical score, mental score for mental score
Permanent Ability Substitution: as above, except you choose ONE Skill to permanently substitute the ability. you may later use the standard ability substitution on the ability.

[Another_Poet]

Interesting but a couple of suggestions.

The idea of giving 1 free exotic weapon proficiency is awesome but becomes almost worthless to someone without a full BAB progression. At +0 at 1st level you are useless at the beginning and without 4 attacks at 20th level you're worthless at the end. Even fighters with full BAB are weak, giving someone a push toward melee specialist and then depriving them of BAB doesn't balance anything.

Also you didn't state which armour/shields they're proficient with - is that by accident, or do they not get any?

You can probably just scrap the "Wizardry" ability altogether - at Caster Level -10 it's useless. Consider giving a slight spell progression from the early levels onward, something like what a Duskblade gets but with a different (more utility-focused) spell list.

Ability substitution scares me. It seems very, very powerful. And hard to suspend disbelief over - your Climb skill comes off of Constitution? Knowledge comes off of Charisma? What? With all the skill points and skill focus feats you can probably ditch this ability and they'll do just fine.

ap

[MeklorIlavator]

This seems both really, really good, and really, really bad at the same time. It's good because for a 1 or three level dip you get all class skills, a ton of skill points, exotic weapon proficiency, martial weapon proficiency,and a couple of feats. Sure, 2 of those feats are skill focus, but that can take out some annoying Prerequisites. On the other hand, it can't really do anything besides skills until 11th level, and by that point the spell casting is too little, to late.

[Zeta Kai]

Hoo-boy, this is gonna be tough.

First, You need a table to made this more legible. Here's a blank table to work with:
{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort Save|Reflex Save|Will Save|Special
1st|||||
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4th|||||
5th|||||
6th|||||
7th|||||
8th|||||
9th|||||
10th|||||
11th|||||
12th|||||
13th|||||
14th|||||
15th|||||
16th|||||
17th|||||
18th|||||
19th|||||
20th|||||[/table]

Second, you might be asking yourself "Zeta, why didn't you go the extra mile & fill in that table?" Well, I didn't bother because this class, as it is right now, has major flaws, & it needs to be fixed before I dare cast it in stone.

Third, there's a typo in the BAB at 20th level. It's supposed to be "+15/+10/+5". This is probably the smallest error in the whole entry.

Fourth, the Reflex & Will save progressions are insane. A poor save is ⅓HD+0 & a good save is ½HD+2. Some people add an average save, which would be 2/5ths HD+1, but this is not used by WotC. The save progressions that you use for Reflex & Will follow no formula, & ultimately are way, WAY, WAY too powerful. No base save should be higher than +12 by 20th level without a much better reason than you have.

Fifth, this class shares it's name with an NPC, which is not an error per se, but many will consider it bad form.

Sixth, having all skills as class skills is pretty crazy. The Factotum gets away with it, but it's a much better-designed class than this one. If I were you, I'd just pick several favorites. A good rule of thumb for this is to take the number of skill points the character get at each level & add 20-30%. Which brings me to my next point...

Seventh, you have too many skill points. This is not my opinion, it is a fact. It's rare for classes to have 8+INT skill points, & more is unheard of. It's just broken & unnecessary. Stick to the norm.

Eighth, why does this class get so many weapon proficiencies. Alright, I get the concept. I understand the class's schtick, but seriously. Why would my ace-of-all-trades uber-skills grant me automatic proficiency with nunchucks or an urgrosh? I could see this as a later class feature (something to plug up one of those many dead levels), but not for free at 1st level. Which brings me to...

Ninth, there are too many dead levels. There are 5 dead levels, which is quite a few for a class with no spellcasting ability.

Tenth, this class relies heavily on extra Skill Focuses & bonus feats, which I find to be more than a little weak. Now, I haven't played with this class obviously, but I think that a 20th level Expert would play like an unoptimized Fighter (IE a Fighter that chose Skill Focus as often as possible). Or like an NPC Expert, which is just as bad, really.

Now, to be fair, I think that there is a germ of good ideas in this class. And I'm not tearing down your class attempt to be cruel. But you need to understand the concepts of good class design before you go off & make something new; otherwise you're like an architect that doesn't understand what holds a building up. I recommend that you go check out Fax Celestis's Guide to Homebrewing (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10313). Read it, know it, love it. Then go forth & do better.

Welcome to the forums, BTW.

[Adumbration]

Seventh, you have too many skill points. This is not my opinion, it is a fact. It's rare for classes to have 8+INT skill points, & more is unheard of. It's just broken & unnecessary. Stick to the norm.

Actually, it's not quite unheard of. The Changeling Rogue substitution class has the same, 10+int in Races of Eberron. Just a sidenote.

[Ashtagon]

Actually, it's not quite unheard of. The Changeling Rogue substitution class has the same, 10+int in Races of Eberron. Just a sidenote.

That's a racial substitution class - just 3 levels total. I don't know of any 20-level class that goes over 8.

[Baron Corm]

Getting an extra 2 skill points per level is not broken. Now they can decipher scripts AND play the lute, in addition to all of the social and rogueish skills they already had! Not that game-breaking. There's only so many useful skills.

"This is not my opinion, it is a fact."? Welcome to the homebrew forum. Please open your mind a little.

[bobspldbckwrds]

Thank you for pointing out the glaring errors and providing me with the formulas and table. I did mean for it to share the name with the NPC class. The spellcasting is not meant to be the center of the class, and therefore has been put on the sideline. the reason that i gave it wizard casting instead of a spell list of it's own is that while it shouldn't have to use the spells for combat it still may. this class is all about something that everything i have seen on this board is diametrically opposed to. flexibility.

The Expert is not supposed to be a combat powerhouse, and therefore isn't. he can defend himself, but dont expect him to wrestle a bear. as for the ability substitution, you can believe that an ELF can shoot LIGHTNING from their hands, but not that someone can pull themselves up a wall just on sheer toughness alone or that they can negotiate through intelligence rather through force of personality... really? about him getting all skills as class skills, and 10 ranks a level: i did say scholar and dilettante.

[Athaniar]

Actually, all skills and 10+INT skill points are very appropriate for this class. And that is your opinion, not a fact, Zeta. Adn the weapon proficiencies I can understand: the Expert isn't good at weapons, but he can use them. As for Ability Substitution, I like it, but spellcasting just doesn't feel right, and it is impeded by armor. I'd rather see more abilities revolving around skills.

[BRC]

Personally, the biggest problem with this class is that it needs another name. "Expert" is already an NPC class, why don't you do something like "Prodigy" or somthing else.

Secondly, I would drop the Exotic Weapon Proficiency bit, it dosn't really fit in with the rest of the class. The way I see it, this class is taken by somebody really smart and talented, such a person probably trains in the various simple and martial weapons (Hence the proficiencies), but isn't very good with them. However, they probably wouldn't bother learning an Exotic weapon. As it stands now, This class knows more weapons at level one than the Fighter, a class basically built around using weapons. Also, I'd drop the the spellcasting, if an Expert wants to cast spells, he can UMD.


Also, I like the idea of Ability Substitution, in fact, for a class feature to replace Wizardry, I may suggest "Ability Substitution, Permanent". Where you can permanently link a specific skill to a different ability. It makes sense that somebody could learn how to, say convince people VIA logical argument rather than force of personality (INT instead of Cha for diplomacy).


Though some skills don't work with that. I can imagine using Dex or Con for climbing, or using Int or Cha for Sense Motive, but I can't figure out how one would, say, use CHA for Knowledge.

[Another_Poet]

BRC's suggestiosn are made of win.

Bobspldbckwrds, please understand I'm not trying to insult your creation. If I thiought it was a dumb idea I wouldn't have posted at all, let alone twice. But I'm sure you can see that there is a difference between something that's simply fantastic/supernatural (such as shooting lightning bolts) and something that's illogicial and inconsistent with D&D rules (such as using your Constitution score, i.e. your health, to see how good you are at tying a knot, i.e. Use Rope skill). Can you see how that would be a little hard for people to roleplay? And why it might leave a funny taste in a DMs mouth?

I'd go with BRC's suggestion that it is a one-skill, permanent ability. You choose a skill and change what ability that one skill comes off of and that choice is made for life. Maybe you could offer this ability multiple times, once at 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th level or something. Using Int instead of Charisma on Use Magic Device seems fine. There are some valid uses for it.

I see what you're saying about wanting a flexible class. I think it's a good idea. The problem with the spellcasting isn't that it should be all-or-nothing, that's not what I'm saying. If I were you I would look at other classes that get partial spellcasting from Level 1 onwards. There are some lesser spell progressions that would be perfect. You can give them the full Wizard spell list if you want, though I would probably trim it down somewhat to be mostly utility spells with a few good attack spells. My point was that having no spells at all for levels 1-10, and spells that are too weak to be any good from levels 11-20 doesn't actually make the class flexible.

ap

[BRC]

More thoughts on Ability Substitution. In some cases they make so much sense they could be allowed without taking this PRC. Like using Int for diplomacy as I mentioned above. It adds a nice flavor to the class by letting it play to it's strengths with skills.

However, other subs make no sense whatsoever, like using Con for tumble. So either you risk overloading this class with paperwork by providing a big list of skills and which attributes you can sub with them, or risk a mean DM blasting the class down by explicitly saying these subs are up to DM's judgment. A player might say "Hey, I want to use my Int for survival instead of Wis" (Somthing reasonable in my opinion) and the DM, feeling mean, says No, thus essentially rendering this class feature useless.

But, on the other hand, a DM can easily make class features useless (no evil enemies against a paladin, undead against a rogue) so it may not be a big deal.

[bobspldbckwrds]

EWP and Wizardry dropped, they really were redundant with so many bonus feats and UMD and even UPD as class skills. thanks poet and BRC for the suggestions, and for being graceful to my defensivenes

[Another_Poet]

Hey no problem. I hope it helps. You have a good idea - a skill monkey whose skills actually mean something? Sign me up.

[Severedevil]

This class could definitely use some Skill Mastery.

I'm not sold on ability substitutions, though. There's a reason each skill has a specific ability tied to it. Across the board bonuses, or the ability to make certain skill checks as a swift action, or something like that would seem to fit better than using your dexterity to make appraise checks.

[BRC]

This class could definitely use some Skill Mastery.

I'm not sold on ability substitutions, though. There's a reason each skill has a specific ability tied to it. Across the board bonuses, or the ability to make certain skill checks as a swift action, or something like that would seem to fit better than using your dexterity to make appraise checks.
Except that, as written above, you couldn't use dexterity for Appraise checks. You could use Int, Wis, or Cha (Though Cha dosn't make much sense in this case, hence my questioning above).

[Haven]

You could use Int, Wis, or Cha (Though Cha dosn't make much sense in this case, hence my questioning above).

You interrogate the item until it tells you its value?

[Morphamagus]

You interrogate the item until it tells you its value?

I'm thinking more you figure out what you can convince someone it's worth?

[Lappy9000]

I'm thinking more you figure out what you can convince someone it's worth?Convince the item that it's worth a lot?

[Thurbane]

Maybe instead of Exotic Weapon Proficiency, the class's natural learning abilities allow him to take only a -2 instead of -4 penalty to any non-proficient weapons?