Dac
2010-06-06, 01:19 PM
Greetings.
I am currently involved in an IRC D&D game. For a while, I've been wanting to play a Soulknife, but the overall badness of the class has kept me away. After reading some of the Dragon 341 feats, though, I decided to inquire to my DM about whether I could play one.
The DM said he was 'leery' about allowing a class that got a free weapon (I know - what?) but suggested that he would be open to a redesign. After I vomited some of what is below, he said he was 'mostly okay' with it. I'm currently tweaking it, and have decided to petition for help here.
Generally, I feel like the class lacks a focus, but I'm always a terrible judge of my own ****.
What I wanted to do:
- Eliminate the straightjacket effect of the original class. Even with Practiced Mind Blade, multiclassing as a Soulknife was like repeatedly punching yourself in the ****. The blade also scaled badly with weapons around its level. What I'm hoping to do is make the class palatable to a brief dip, but requires more than one or two levels to get access to the 'cool ****.'
- Make it more traditionally melee, with the benefits one would expect, like a full BAB progression, with less of a focus on sneaking around
- Open up builds through bonus feats.
Things I'm considering:
- Lowering HP die to d8 from d10. A d8 with full BAB, however, sounds a little weird to me.
- Adding Greatsword or Bastard Sword to the initial forms the blade can take.
- Adding several of the Soulknife feats from Dragon, slightly tweaked (mostly to get rid of pre-reqs that don't exist anymore). Reshape Mind Blade is a given. Tactical reassignment, however, will probably get the boot, unless Bane is explicitly listed as a weapon special ability that cannot be chosen through Improved Mind Blade.
- Adding a select list of extra non-allowable weapon enchants through Improved Mind Blade, like Vorpal.
- Changing the saves to either be Fort/Ref good, or Ref/Will good (like the original class).
Welcoming any suggestions/tips/help you can provide.
Soulknife
http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff137/catseye543/104488.jpg
A soulknife recognizes his own mind as the most beautiful—and the most deadly—thing in all creation. With this understanding and through extended practice, a soulknife learns to forge his mental strength into a shimmering blade of semisolid psychic energy.
Each soulknife’s personal blade, referred to as a mind blade, differs in color and shape according to his personality, mental strength, and even mood. Although no two mind blades look alike, all share the same lethal qualities. Because soulknives turn the power of their minds to such weaponry, they are notorious for their violence.
Abilities: As a primarily front-line fighter, strength and constitution are very important attributes for any soulknife. Dexterity can also be useful, giving a boost to the soulknife's AC, as well as enabling her to take the two-weapon line of feats.
Role: Striker, Anti-Caster (?)
Organization: None
Alignment: Any
Races: Just as the potential for psionics is inherent in many races, almost any race can become a Soulknife - so long as they have the proper training.
Hit Die: D10
Starting Gold: 5d4 x10 (125 gp)
Class Features
Class Skills: Autohypnosis* (Wis), Climb (Str), Concentration* (Con), Craft (Int), Jump (Str), Knowledge (psionics)* (Int), Listen (Wis), Profession (Wis), Spot (Wis), and Tumble (Dex).
Skill Points at First Level: 4 + intelligence modifier times four.
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 4 + Intelligence modifier.
{table=head]Level|
BAB|Fort Save |Ref Save|Will Save|Special
1st|
+1|
+2|
+0|
+2|mind blade, wild talent
2nd|
+2|
+3|
+0|
+2|bonus feat, blade focus, psychic strike +1d8
3rd|
+3|
+3|
+1|
+3|knife to the soul (2)
4th|
+4|
+4|
+1|
+4|Throw Blade
5th|
+5|
+4|
+1|
+4|bonus feat
6th|
+6/+1|
+5|
+2|
+5|swift focus (1/day), psychic strike +2d8
7th|
+7/+2|
+5|
+2|
+5|free draw
8th|
+8/+3|
+6|
+2|
+6|extra quality (dark iron)
9th|
+9/+4|
+6|
+3|
+6|bonus feat
10th|
+10/+5|
+7|
+3|
+7|improved mind blade, psychic strike +3d8
11th|
+11/+6/+1|
+7|
+3|
+7|knife to the soul (4)
12th|
+12/+7/+2|
+8|
+4|
+8|swift focus (2/day)
13th|
+13/+8/+3|
+8|
+4|
+8|bonus feat
14th|
+14/+9/+4|
+9|
+4|
+9|extra quality (adamantine), psychic strike +4d8
15th|
+15/+10/+5|
+9|
+5|
+9|-
16th|
+16/+11/+6/+1|
+10|
+5|
+10|-
17th|
+17/+12/+7/+2|
+10|
+5|
+10|bonus feat
18th|
+18/+13/+8/+3|
+11|
+6|
+11|swift focus (3/day), psychic strike +5d8
19th|
+19/+14/+9/+4|
+11|
+6|
+11|knife to the soul (6)
20th|
+20/+15/+10/+5|
+12|
+6|
+12|-[/table]
Class Features
Weapon and Armor Proficiency
Soulknives are proficient with all simple weapons, with their own mind blades, and with light armor, medium armor, and shields (except tower shields).
Class Features
Mind blade (Su): As a move action, a Soulknife can create and wield semisolid blades composed of psychic energy distilled from her own mind.
When the Soulknife creates the mind blades, she decides what shape they will take, how many to wield, and in which hands. The blades are identical in all ways (except visually) to either a longsword or a shortsword sized appropriately for the wielder. For example, a Medium size soulknife materializes a Medium mind blade that she can wield as a one-handed weapon, and the blade deals 1d8 points of damage (crit 19-20/x2). Soulknives who are smaller or larger than Medium create mind blades identical to longswords or shortswords appropriate for their size, with a corresponding change to the blade's damage (see Table 7-4 and table 7-5 in the Player's Handbook). The wielder of a mind blade gains the usual benefits to his attack roll and damage roll from a high strength bonus.
The blade can be broken (it has hardness 10 and 10 hit points); however, a soulknife can simply create another on her next move action. The moment she relinquishes her grip on her blade, it dissipates (unless she intends to throw it, see below). A mind blade is considered a magic weapon for the purposes of overcoming damage reduction.
A soulknife can use feats such as Power Attack or Combat Expertise in conjunction with the mind blade just as if it were a normal weapon. She can also choose mind blade for feats requiring a specific weapon choice, such as Weapon Specialization. Powers or spells that upgrade weapons can also be used on a mind blade.
Even in places where psionic effects do not normally function (such as within a null psionics field), a soulknife can attempt to sustain her mind blade by making a DC 20 Will save. On a successful save, the soulknife maintains her mind blade for a number of rounds equal to her class level before she needs to check again. On an unsuccessful attempt, the mind blade vanishes. As a move action on her turn, the soulknife can attempt a new Will save to rematerialize her mind blade while she remains within the psionics negating effect.
Enchanting the Knife: The Soulknife's mind blade can be enchanted just as if it were a masterwork weapon. The amount of gold necessary to enchant the mind blade is equal to the cost of a magic weapon with the same abilities and bonuses, minus the cost of the masterwork weapon itself, plus an additional 50% because of the esoteric nature of the weapon. When adding a new special ability to his mind blade, the soulknife pays the difference between the cost of his old mind blade's abilities and the new ones. Thus, upgrading from a +1 mind blade (2000 gold) to a +2 mind blade (8000 gold) costs the soulknife 9,000 gold. ( 8000 - 2000 = 6000, times 1.5 = 9000.)
When a mind blade is enchanted, the special qualities and enhancement bonuses become innate, and apply to every mind blade the Soulknife materializes thereafter. The special abilities a soulknife can enchant on her mind blade may be picked from any of those listed in the Dungeon Master's Guide (page 221), unless those abilities would conflict with the limitations listed in the 'mind blade' ability description. For example, a Soulknife could not enchant her mind blade with Dancing because a mind blade immediately dissipates once released. She could, however, enchant it with Brilliant Energy or Bane.
It is also possible that weapon enchantments from other D&D sources could be used. However, be sure to ask your DM before using special abilities from the Magical Item Compendium or other sources.
Wild Talent: A soulknife gains Wild Talent as a bonus feat at first level. (This class feature provides the character with the psionic power he needs to materialize his mind blade, if he has no power points otherwise.)
Bonus Feats: At 2nd level, the soulknife gains a bonus combat-oriented feat. The soulknife gains a second bonus combat feat at 5th level, and then one at every four soulknife levels thereafter (9th, 13th, and 17th). These bonus feats are drawn from those listed as fighter bonus feats or psionic feats. A soulknife must still meet all prerequisites for a bonus feat, including ability score and base attack bonus minimums, and any feat taken that gives a benefit to a specific weapon choice, like Weapon Focus, must apply to her mind blade.
Blade Focus: At second level, a soulknife gains the ability to charge her mind with psionic energy as a move action, granting her a blade focus. This psionic charge persists until it is expended, the soulknife is knocked unconscious, or she takes an extended rest.
Psychic Strike (Su): At 2nd level, a soulknife can expend her blade focus as a free action to perform a psychic strike. After initiating a psychic strike, the first attack the Soulknife lands before the end of her current turn will deal the extra listed damage. Creatures immune to mind-affecting effects are immune to psychic strike damage. (Unlike the rogue’s sneak attack, the psychic strike is not precision damage and can affect creatures otherwise immune to extra damage from critical hits or more than 30 feet away, provided they are living, non-mindless creatures not immune to mind-affecting effects.)
Knife to the Soul (Su): At 3rd level, a soulknife gains the ability to expend her blade focus as a free action to execute a knife to the soul. The first attack the soulknife lands before the end of her current turn deals 2 ability damage to either Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma. The Soulknife decides which ability to target when spending her blade focus.
This ability damage increases to 4 at level 11, and 6 at level 19.
Throw Mind Blade (Ex): A soul knife of 4th level or higher can throw her mind blade as a ranged weapon with a range increment of 30 feet. Whether or not the attack hits, a thrown mind blade then dissipates. A soulknife can throw a number of mind blades per round equal to the number of melee attacks she could make. Thus, a 10th-level soulknife could throw two mind blades, with a base attack bonus of +10/+5. If she had materialized a mind blade for each hand to fight with two weapons and had both Two-Weapon and Improved Two-Weapon fighting, she could throw four mind blades in a round.
Once a thrown mind blade has either missed or struck its target and done its damage, it dissipates.
Swift Focus (Ex): Once per day, a Soulknife may use her blade focus ability as a swift action. The amount of times a Soulknife can do this increases to twice per day at level 12, and three times per day at level 18.
Free Draw (Su): At 5th level, a Soulknife becomes able to materialize her mind blades as a free action instead of a move action. She can make only one attempt to materialize the mind blades per round, however.
Extra Quality (Ex): The Soulknife has learned how to hone her mental energy and fabricate psychic impressions of elements into her mind blade. At 8th level, the soulknife's mind blade acts as as if it were made of dark iron for the purposes of overcoming DR.
At 14th level this ability improves, allowing the Soulknife to treat her mind blade as if it were adamantine for the purposes of overcoming DR in addition to dark iron.
Improved Mind Blade (Su): At 10th level, a Soulknife's ability to manipulate her mind blade expands, and she can reassign any abilities she has previously added to her mind blade. To do so, she must first spend 8 hours in concentration, after which she can use the current total enhancement value of her mind blade's special abilities to select new ones. For example, a soulknife could exchange flaming burst on her mind blade (a +2 enhancement value) for the abilities shock (a +1 enhancement value) and frost (another +1).
I am currently involved in an IRC D&D game. For a while, I've been wanting to play a Soulknife, but the overall badness of the class has kept me away. After reading some of the Dragon 341 feats, though, I decided to inquire to my DM about whether I could play one.
The DM said he was 'leery' about allowing a class that got a free weapon (I know - what?) but suggested that he would be open to a redesign. After I vomited some of what is below, he said he was 'mostly okay' with it. I'm currently tweaking it, and have decided to petition for help here.
Generally, I feel like the class lacks a focus, but I'm always a terrible judge of my own ****.
What I wanted to do:
- Eliminate the straightjacket effect of the original class. Even with Practiced Mind Blade, multiclassing as a Soulknife was like repeatedly punching yourself in the ****. The blade also scaled badly with weapons around its level. What I'm hoping to do is make the class palatable to a brief dip, but requires more than one or two levels to get access to the 'cool ****.'
- Make it more traditionally melee, with the benefits one would expect, like a full BAB progression, with less of a focus on sneaking around
- Open up builds through bonus feats.
Things I'm considering:
- Lowering HP die to d8 from d10. A d8 with full BAB, however, sounds a little weird to me.
- Adding Greatsword or Bastard Sword to the initial forms the blade can take.
- Adding several of the Soulknife feats from Dragon, slightly tweaked (mostly to get rid of pre-reqs that don't exist anymore). Reshape Mind Blade is a given. Tactical reassignment, however, will probably get the boot, unless Bane is explicitly listed as a weapon special ability that cannot be chosen through Improved Mind Blade.
- Adding a select list of extra non-allowable weapon enchants through Improved Mind Blade, like Vorpal.
- Changing the saves to either be Fort/Ref good, or Ref/Will good (like the original class).
Welcoming any suggestions/tips/help you can provide.
Soulknife
http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff137/catseye543/104488.jpg
A soulknife recognizes his own mind as the most beautiful—and the most deadly—thing in all creation. With this understanding and through extended practice, a soulknife learns to forge his mental strength into a shimmering blade of semisolid psychic energy.
Each soulknife’s personal blade, referred to as a mind blade, differs in color and shape according to his personality, mental strength, and even mood. Although no two mind blades look alike, all share the same lethal qualities. Because soulknives turn the power of their minds to such weaponry, they are notorious for their violence.
Abilities: As a primarily front-line fighter, strength and constitution are very important attributes for any soulknife. Dexterity can also be useful, giving a boost to the soulknife's AC, as well as enabling her to take the two-weapon line of feats.
Role: Striker, Anti-Caster (?)
Organization: None
Alignment: Any
Races: Just as the potential for psionics is inherent in many races, almost any race can become a Soulknife - so long as they have the proper training.
Hit Die: D10
Starting Gold: 5d4 x10 (125 gp)
Class Features
Class Skills: Autohypnosis* (Wis), Climb (Str), Concentration* (Con), Craft (Int), Jump (Str), Knowledge (psionics)* (Int), Listen (Wis), Profession (Wis), Spot (Wis), and Tumble (Dex).
Skill Points at First Level: 4 + intelligence modifier times four.
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 4 + Intelligence modifier.
{table=head]Level|
BAB|Fort Save |Ref Save|Will Save|Special
1st|
+1|
+2|
+0|
+2|mind blade, wild talent
2nd|
+2|
+3|
+0|
+2|bonus feat, blade focus, psychic strike +1d8
3rd|
+3|
+3|
+1|
+3|knife to the soul (2)
4th|
+4|
+4|
+1|
+4|Throw Blade
5th|
+5|
+4|
+1|
+4|bonus feat
6th|
+6/+1|
+5|
+2|
+5|swift focus (1/day), psychic strike +2d8
7th|
+7/+2|
+5|
+2|
+5|free draw
8th|
+8/+3|
+6|
+2|
+6|extra quality (dark iron)
9th|
+9/+4|
+6|
+3|
+6|bonus feat
10th|
+10/+5|
+7|
+3|
+7|improved mind blade, psychic strike +3d8
11th|
+11/+6/+1|
+7|
+3|
+7|knife to the soul (4)
12th|
+12/+7/+2|
+8|
+4|
+8|swift focus (2/day)
13th|
+13/+8/+3|
+8|
+4|
+8|bonus feat
14th|
+14/+9/+4|
+9|
+4|
+9|extra quality (adamantine), psychic strike +4d8
15th|
+15/+10/+5|
+9|
+5|
+9|-
16th|
+16/+11/+6/+1|
+10|
+5|
+10|-
17th|
+17/+12/+7/+2|
+10|
+5|
+10|bonus feat
18th|
+18/+13/+8/+3|
+11|
+6|
+11|swift focus (3/day), psychic strike +5d8
19th|
+19/+14/+9/+4|
+11|
+6|
+11|knife to the soul (6)
20th|
+20/+15/+10/+5|
+12|
+6|
+12|-[/table]
Class Features
Weapon and Armor Proficiency
Soulknives are proficient with all simple weapons, with their own mind blades, and with light armor, medium armor, and shields (except tower shields).
Class Features
Mind blade (Su): As a move action, a Soulknife can create and wield semisolid blades composed of psychic energy distilled from her own mind.
When the Soulknife creates the mind blades, she decides what shape they will take, how many to wield, and in which hands. The blades are identical in all ways (except visually) to either a longsword or a shortsword sized appropriately for the wielder. For example, a Medium size soulknife materializes a Medium mind blade that she can wield as a one-handed weapon, and the blade deals 1d8 points of damage (crit 19-20/x2). Soulknives who are smaller or larger than Medium create mind blades identical to longswords or shortswords appropriate for their size, with a corresponding change to the blade's damage (see Table 7-4 and table 7-5 in the Player's Handbook). The wielder of a mind blade gains the usual benefits to his attack roll and damage roll from a high strength bonus.
The blade can be broken (it has hardness 10 and 10 hit points); however, a soulknife can simply create another on her next move action. The moment she relinquishes her grip on her blade, it dissipates (unless she intends to throw it, see below). A mind blade is considered a magic weapon for the purposes of overcoming damage reduction.
A soulknife can use feats such as Power Attack or Combat Expertise in conjunction with the mind blade just as if it were a normal weapon. She can also choose mind blade for feats requiring a specific weapon choice, such as Weapon Specialization. Powers or spells that upgrade weapons can also be used on a mind blade.
Even in places where psionic effects do not normally function (such as within a null psionics field), a soulknife can attempt to sustain her mind blade by making a DC 20 Will save. On a successful save, the soulknife maintains her mind blade for a number of rounds equal to her class level before she needs to check again. On an unsuccessful attempt, the mind blade vanishes. As a move action on her turn, the soulknife can attempt a new Will save to rematerialize her mind blade while she remains within the psionics negating effect.
Enchanting the Knife: The Soulknife's mind blade can be enchanted just as if it were a masterwork weapon. The amount of gold necessary to enchant the mind blade is equal to the cost of a magic weapon with the same abilities and bonuses, minus the cost of the masterwork weapon itself, plus an additional 50% because of the esoteric nature of the weapon. When adding a new special ability to his mind blade, the soulknife pays the difference between the cost of his old mind blade's abilities and the new ones. Thus, upgrading from a +1 mind blade (2000 gold) to a +2 mind blade (8000 gold) costs the soulknife 9,000 gold. ( 8000 - 2000 = 6000, times 1.5 = 9000.)
When a mind blade is enchanted, the special qualities and enhancement bonuses become innate, and apply to every mind blade the Soulknife materializes thereafter. The special abilities a soulknife can enchant on her mind blade may be picked from any of those listed in the Dungeon Master's Guide (page 221), unless those abilities would conflict with the limitations listed in the 'mind blade' ability description. For example, a Soulknife could not enchant her mind blade with Dancing because a mind blade immediately dissipates once released. She could, however, enchant it with Brilliant Energy or Bane.
It is also possible that weapon enchantments from other D&D sources could be used. However, be sure to ask your DM before using special abilities from the Magical Item Compendium or other sources.
Wild Talent: A soulknife gains Wild Talent as a bonus feat at first level. (This class feature provides the character with the psionic power he needs to materialize his mind blade, if he has no power points otherwise.)
Bonus Feats: At 2nd level, the soulknife gains a bonus combat-oriented feat. The soulknife gains a second bonus combat feat at 5th level, and then one at every four soulknife levels thereafter (9th, 13th, and 17th). These bonus feats are drawn from those listed as fighter bonus feats or psionic feats. A soulknife must still meet all prerequisites for a bonus feat, including ability score and base attack bonus minimums, and any feat taken that gives a benefit to a specific weapon choice, like Weapon Focus, must apply to her mind blade.
Blade Focus: At second level, a soulknife gains the ability to charge her mind with psionic energy as a move action, granting her a blade focus. This psionic charge persists until it is expended, the soulknife is knocked unconscious, or she takes an extended rest.
Psychic Strike (Su): At 2nd level, a soulknife can expend her blade focus as a free action to perform a psychic strike. After initiating a psychic strike, the first attack the Soulknife lands before the end of her current turn will deal the extra listed damage. Creatures immune to mind-affecting effects are immune to psychic strike damage. (Unlike the rogue’s sneak attack, the psychic strike is not precision damage and can affect creatures otherwise immune to extra damage from critical hits or more than 30 feet away, provided they are living, non-mindless creatures not immune to mind-affecting effects.)
Knife to the Soul (Su): At 3rd level, a soulknife gains the ability to expend her blade focus as a free action to execute a knife to the soul. The first attack the soulknife lands before the end of her current turn deals 2 ability damage to either Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma. The Soulknife decides which ability to target when spending her blade focus.
This ability damage increases to 4 at level 11, and 6 at level 19.
Throw Mind Blade (Ex): A soul knife of 4th level or higher can throw her mind blade as a ranged weapon with a range increment of 30 feet. Whether or not the attack hits, a thrown mind blade then dissipates. A soulknife can throw a number of mind blades per round equal to the number of melee attacks she could make. Thus, a 10th-level soulknife could throw two mind blades, with a base attack bonus of +10/+5. If she had materialized a mind blade for each hand to fight with two weapons and had both Two-Weapon and Improved Two-Weapon fighting, she could throw four mind blades in a round.
Once a thrown mind blade has either missed or struck its target and done its damage, it dissipates.
Swift Focus (Ex): Once per day, a Soulknife may use her blade focus ability as a swift action. The amount of times a Soulknife can do this increases to twice per day at level 12, and three times per day at level 18.
Free Draw (Su): At 5th level, a Soulknife becomes able to materialize her mind blades as a free action instead of a move action. She can make only one attempt to materialize the mind blades per round, however.
Extra Quality (Ex): The Soulknife has learned how to hone her mental energy and fabricate psychic impressions of elements into her mind blade. At 8th level, the soulknife's mind blade acts as as if it were made of dark iron for the purposes of overcoming DR.
At 14th level this ability improves, allowing the Soulknife to treat her mind blade as if it were adamantine for the purposes of overcoming DR in addition to dark iron.
Improved Mind Blade (Su): At 10th level, a Soulknife's ability to manipulate her mind blade expands, and she can reassign any abilities she has previously added to her mind blade. To do so, she must first spend 8 hours in concentration, after which she can use the current total enhancement value of her mind blade's special abilities to select new ones. For example, a soulknife could exchange flaming burst on her mind blade (a +2 enhancement value) for the abilities shock (a +1 enhancement value) and frost (another +1).