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View Full Version : Two Specialized Sorcerer Classes-PEACH, bitte!



GreyMantle
2009-11-15, 10:52 PM
[obligatory introduction is obligatory]

So, in my home games I've totally eliminated pretty much any spellcaster that gets 9th level spells (Wizard, Druid, etc). I've replaced them with sorcerers that have specialized in a certain theme or school (or, in the case of the Beguiler, just used the class outright). The only two I actually had to make myself were a Divination-based one and a Transmutation-based one. I have posted them here, just to see if they all seem relatively appropriate. (for reference, I use homebrewed versions of literally every PHB-class; of these classes, the martial ones are far more competent than their standard versions and the spellcasters, if not "weaker," per se, are hopefully not the "OMG!! RAEPED!!111!" level that they tend to currently be)

Basic Notes:
-All of my sorcerer classes get Advanced Learning every level that can be from any spell list, but that first directs to the spell level of the wizard, then cleric, then druid to prevent Archivist-esque shenanigans.
-"School Focus" is an ability every Sorcerer has that pretty much lets them apply Spell Focus and similar feats to spells that are thematically appropriate but, because of the quirks of the school system, wouldn't normally get to benefit. (the best example is fear as an illusion spell. Seeing as phantasmal killer already is supposed to cause super amounts of fear, I'm totally at a loss why a caster couldn't just summon some random illusion that causes fear.
-I've reduced the skill list. I doubt it will really matter.
-They only go up to level 11 because that's where all my games stop.

Fleshwarper
“I can make you bigger, faster, stronger, better…”
Some people like certainty. They think that being able to wake up and know that their day is going to be roughly similar to any other day is a Good Thing. Others prefer a more…varied approach. For them, waking up one day with another tentacle sprouting from their forehead is its own kind of blessing. Some of these devotees of change become Fleshwarpers, sorcerers whose powers alter their own bodies and those of the people around them, often in useful ways.

Alignment: Most Fleshwarpers are too busy experimenting on everything to really care about moral codes; they tend to be Evil more often than Good, though, for obvious reasons.

Races: Goblins, with their highly morphic bodies, often become Fleshwarpers. After goblins, humans are probably the most common Fleshwarpers.

Starting Gold: 6d4x10 gp (150 gold)
Starting Age: Moderate.
Hit Die: d10

Class Skills: The Fleshwarper’s skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Arcana (Int), Bluff (Int/Cha), Cartography (Int), Ciphers (Int), Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Disable Device (Int), Dungeoneering (Int), Geomancy (Wis), Perception (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), Stealth (Dex), Thaumaturgy (Cha), and Use Magic Device (Cha).
Skills/Level: 4 + Intelligence Bonus
BAB: Medium (3/4), Saves: Fort: Good; Reflex: Poor; Will: Good

Level, Benefit
1 Armored Spellcasting, School Focus
2 Critical Hit/Sneak Attack Resistance
3
4 Extended Transmutations
5 Gaseous Form
6 Graft Flesh
7 Immunity to Polymorphing
8 See the True Flesh
9
10 Hero’s Graft
11 Aura of Dissolution
The following are the Class Features of the Fleshwarper

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Fleshwarpers are proficient with all simple weapons, as well as the whip and the net. They are proficient with light armor but not with shields of any kind.

Spellcasting: Fleshwarpers cast spells from the Fleshwarper Spell List with the Good Progression. Intelligence determines their Spell DC’s, and Constitution their bonus spells.

Armored Spellcasting: When wearing armor and or shields in which the Fleshwarper is proficient, he suffers no chance of spellcasting failure.
School Focus: Transmutation

Critical Hit/Sneak Attack Resistance (Ex): The vitals of a Fleshwarper slosh about in ways that make any sort of precision strike extraordinarily difficult. Whenever he would normally be hit by a Sneak Attack, Critical Hit, Death Attack, or similar ability, the attacker must make a Dungeoneering check, opposed by the Fleshwarper’s Arcana check. The attack only deals extra damage if the attacker wins the check.

Extended Transmutations (Su): Any Transmutation spell the Fleshwarper casts is automatically Extended, as the feat. He may instead choose for any Transmutation spell he casts with a duration of 1 hour/level to last until he next regains his spell slots.

Gaseous Form (Su): A Fleshwarper may switch to and from gaseous form (as the spell) as a standard action. However, if he spends more than 1 hour/level consecutive hours in this form, his body is unwilling to return to normal flesh, and he takes a -2 penalty on all attack rolls, skill checks, and saving throws for 12+(number of hours he stayed in his gaseous form over 1 hour/level) hours or until he receives a heal spell or similar magic.

Graft Flesh (Ex): A Fleshwarper gains the feat Graft Flesh, even if he doesn’t meet the requirements (he probably doesn’t). He is not limited by his type in which grafts he is able to apply. Also, make sure that the costs aren’t totally retarded.

Immunity to Polymorphing (Ex): All the experimentation a Fleshwarper has done upon his body has given him a supreme command over his own form. He becomes entirely immune to effects of the [Polymorph] subschool or any other ability that would alter his form in some unpleasant way (the touch of a chaos beast, for example). He may still choose for such effects to affect him.

See the True Flesh (Su): Any creature within Medium Range of the Fleshwarper that is under some [polymorph] or polymorph-like effect that relies on actual alteration of the flesh as opposed to, say illusion, is automatically identified as such the instant the Fleshwarper notices it by some sense (sight, an arcane eye, etc). By concentrating (a Move Action) on it for 1 round, a Fleshwarper may see the creature’s true and original form.

Hero’s Graft (Ex/Su): As proof of his mastery of the flesh, a Fleshwarper creates some totally hardcore graft and applies it to himself. He chooses from one of the following:

Aura of Dissolution (Sp): Once per day, for 1 round/level, the Fleshwarper may exude an aura that affects all hostile creature within Short Range. Those affected must make a Fortitude Saving Throw (DC 10+1/2 level+Int Modifier) or lose control over their forms, as the Corporeal Instability ability of a chaos beast, save that those affected are in no danger of becoming a chaos beast (if their Wisdom is reduced to zero, they merely fall to the ground unconscious in a writing, twisting form until the Aura ends, at which point they return to their own form but still have the Wisdom damage).

Fleshwarper Spell List
0-detect magic, detect poison, mending, purify food and drink, read magic, resistance
1-endure elements, grease, enlarge person, horrible taste, jump, magic weapon, ray of clumsiness, reduce person, remove scent, sleep, slide, vigor
2- babau slime, blindness/deafness, darkvison, delay poison, false life, gentle repose, human form, lesser restoration, resist energy, scale weakening, spider climb, swim, the various +4 to ability score spells
3- amorphous form, arms of plenty, fly, gaseous form, haste, lycanthropy, nauseating breath, protection from energy, ray of exhaustion, remove blindness/deafness, slow, stinking cloud, undulant innards, water breathing
4- corporeal instability, death ward, dimensional anchor, evard’s black tentacles, giant vermin, mass enlarge person, mass reduce person, mass resist energy, monstrous form, neutralize poison, poison, stoneskin
5-baleful polymorph, blight, divine power (I advise a fluff change), fiend form, graymantle, indomitability, lesser ironguard, miasma of entropy, righteous might, slay living, symbol of pain, symbol of sleep, waves of fatigue, wrack
6-disintegrate, dragon form, flesh to stone, fleshshiver, harm, heal, heroes’ feast, pox, ray of entropy, repulsion, stone to flesh, the mass versions of the +4 to ability spells



The Seer
[I]“I see many…things. They are all…brown.”
An old and favorite adage is “knowledge is power.” While this is true to some extent for nearly everyone, for some people it’s like, extra-true. Seers make up an extreme proportion of this group of people. They have dedicated their lives to mastering the sorcery necessary for learning and storing as much information as humanly (or gnoll-ly, etc) possible. That means, if you want to go find out what the thirteenth illegitimate son of Lord Flanders d’Montague said to his secret maid lover at dinner two hundred years ago this day, or when the geo-political conditions for invading that neighboring barony are most likely to be most fortuitous, you should probably talk to a Seer.
Although nearly everyone knows that Seers are masters of finding things out, fewer know that with the knowledge of information-gathering comes also the knowledge of information hiding.

Alignment: Many Seers are of the opinion that the Truth does not conform to any moral standards, so why should they? There are exceptions, of course.

Races: Races like Elves and Dwarves that like to consider things in the long run tend to appreciate the art of the Seer more so than others do. Still, information is valuable anywhere.

Starting Gold: 6d4x10 gp (150 gold)
Starting Age: Moderate.
Hit Die: d6

Class Skills: The Class Skills for the Seer are Arcana (Int), Bluff (Int/Cha), Cartography (Int), Ciphers (Int), Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Dungeoneering (Int), Geomancy (Wis), Perception (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), and Thaumaturgy (Cha).
Skills/Level: 4 + Intelligence Bonus
BAB: Poor (1/2), Saves: Fort: Poor; Reflex: Poor; Will: Good

Level, Benefit
1 Spellcasting, School Focus, Armored Casting, Ever Watchful
2 Lesser Telepathic Bond
3 Knowledge Mastery (Theory)
4 Destiny’s Touch
5
6 Control Scrying
7 Knowledge Mastery (Application)
8 Greater Telepathic Bond
9
10 Detect Thoughts
11 True Seeing
The following are Class Features for the Seer.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Seers are proficient with all simple weapons and light armor, but nothing else.

Spellcasting: A Seer casts spells drawn from the Seer spell list. Wisdom determines her saving throw DCs.

Ever Watchful (Ex): A Seer has trained herself to be constantly attentive at all times. She is always treated as if she had maximum ranks in Perception and Sense Motive. If this would normally have maximum ranks already, she instead gets a competence bonus on Perception and Sense Motive checks equal to half her class level.

School Focus: Divination

Lesser Telepathic Bond (Su): A Seer may extend a bond of telepathic communication between a number of allies within Short Range equal to 1/level, or her Wisdom modifier, whichever is lower. Communicating is generally Not an Action; reasonable restrictions apply. Anything said must be “routed” through the Seer; that is, one ally cannot directly communicate with another unless the Seer is also in on the conversation. At 8th level, the restriction becomes 1/level or her Wisdom modifier, whichever is higher, Long Range is the maximum range, and the restriction about “routing” no longer applies.

Knowledge Mastery (Ex): A Seer’s great breadth of knowledge is not based so much on rote memorization as an intuitive grasp of why things happen as they do. When drawing on merely “factual” uses of Arcana and Thaumaturgy (example: knowing the features of the 797th layer of the Abyss) and any use of Cartography and Dungeoneering, a Seer may use her Wisdom modifier for the skill check instead of her Intelligence or Charisma modifier. At 7th level, a Seer’s knowledge is so great that she may even apply her Wisdom modifier to Arcana and Thaumaturgy checks that go beyond mere fact-knowing (ex: forcing a dormant portal to the 797th layer of the Abyss to open and let her and her party pass through it).

Destiny’s Touch (Su): A number of times per day equal to half her Wisdom modifier (minimum 1), a Seer may reroll any die roll she has made. The decision must be made before the result is known.

Control Scrying (Su): If a Seer becomes aware that she is currently being scryed upon, she may make an opposed caster level+Wisdom modifier vs. caster level vs. other caster’s DC stat check. If she succeeds, she may alter whatever the scryer sees. Note that such changes will generally have to be subtle; it does not take a genius to notice that the party of adventurers in a dank cellar is unlikely to suddenly go from planning to raid a castle to suddenly dancing through a green meadow with seventeen unicorns.

Detects Thoughts (Su): A Seer may radiate a constant aura of detect thoughts, except that the range is changed from 60 ft to Medium range. The strain of sorting out all of the various thoughts is one of the reasons many of the most powerful Seers act like they’re insane.

True Seeing (Su): A Seer constantly sees her surrounding through the power of true seeing, as the spell

Seer Spell List
0-amaneusis, detect magic, detect poison, know direction, light, obscuring mist, read magic
1-command, conceal thoughts*, deathwatch, destiny dissonance*, detect hostile intent*, detect secret doors, detect undead, distract, distract assailant, identify (only requires 10 gp material component), precognition, true strike, undetectable alignment
2-augury, calm emotions, darkvision, detect thoughts, fog cloud, invisibility, locate object, misdirection, object reading*, see invisibility, status, zone of truth
3-arcane sight, clairaudience/clairvoyance, comprehend languages, fate link*, greater dispel magic, invisibility purge, nondetection, scrying, secret page, speak with dead, suggestion, unluck
4-arcane eye, confusion, correspond*, detect scrying, divination, hallucinatory terrain, illusory wall, know vulnerabilities, locate creature, mindwipe*, sensory deprivation, solid fog
5-commune, contact other plane, prying eyes
6-analyze dweomer, decerebrate*, find the path, hide the path, legend lore, mass suggestion, probe thoughts, wall of dispel magic, zone of revelation
* XPH

Milskidasith
2009-11-15, 11:00 PM
Please use table formatting, and bold the ability titles. Even if these are good, they are too much of an eyesore to read in the painful wall of text state they are in now.

GreyMantle
2009-11-15, 11:42 PM
Hopefully that will help. And I apologize, but I am of the opinion that the normal tables are a huge waste of time and space. (this opinion could change if I became more skilled at table-fu, but this is how things are right now). This format gives the important information (when abilities are gained, and the progressions used for BAB and saves) but is pretty easy and quick to type out.

DragoonWraith
2009-11-16, 12:08 AM
Well, I'm going to disagree with you - I'm personally very visual, and I can't get any kind of idea of how the class works without a table. So I can't help you unless you do one. And I've seen others make much the same statement, so you're greatly limiting your audience if you don't make one (whether or not that's important is up to you).

They're also really easy to make. You start with [ table=head] without that space, and you end with [/table]. In between, separate cells going across with the vertical bar ( | ), which is Shift+backslash ( \ ) on your keyboard. Each line is a row.

So, you could quote my post to get the first level's worth:
The Seer
{table=head]Level | BAB | Fort | Ref | Will | Special | 0th | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th
1st | +0 | +0 | +0 | +2 | Spellcasting, School Focus, Armored Casting, Ever Watchful | 5 | 3[/table]