classy one
2011-11-30, 04:10 PM
Good day playgrounders! I have an idea for psionic heavy campaign involving the (rather one-sided) war between the Dreaming dark and the kalashtar. It is a gestalted game starting at level 7.
Before I get into the meat of story Id like some feedback on my houserules, see if any of them are too heavy handed or unbalancing. I'll give a brief summary as to why I have them in place so feedback can be given along that rationale. So here goes:
Race: must be kalashtar
Class: must have at least one level in the Atavist PrC from RoE on one side of the gestalt //.
The atavist movement is central in attempt to turn the tables on the Dreaming Dark, the PC are part of that movement. I made this game gestalt because 1) to keep the group smaller without losing potency, since this is a PbP game and smaller groups equal faster posting and 2) I limited the choice on one side so leave the otherside for the players.
Gestalt:
You can have one PrC on either side.
Any dual progression PrC only advances one side of the //. IE wizard7//psion5/cerebromancer2 would have 7 ML and CL, not 9CL (7 from wizard and 2 from cerebromancer).
On the other hand if you had a psion10//rogue5/slayer5 your ML would only be 10, not 13, since the ML from slayer is on the opposite side of the psion. This can get really complicated so something more streamlined and simple will be considered more favorably.
Just to keep things simple. Atavist is a duel progression PrC for SK and monk and by the book this should not even be allowed. But Atavists play a major role in the plot and hence this rule to simplify things
No templates or racial HD on either side.
You are a protype of your race, not some freakshow.
Fractional BAB and saves.
2 flaws and 2 traits. Is this overkill? Gestalt should be enough right?
Races:
Kalashtar: In addition to what is listed in the ECS, they also have +2 Cha.
Inspired: They are gestalted as well with one side the host's levels and the otherside their Quori HD and class levels. The dual mind feature also acts as a permenent schism but without the -6 ML.
The Inspired conquered an entire continent, have a web of spies all over Eberron, charmed power brokers in every nation. To have them not be a somewhat challenging foe would be a disservice to them. In many ways they are what the Atavist strive to become, a Quori spirit undiluted by generations of decendents.
Racial Sub levels:
Kalashtar seer: same as Kalashtar telepath but for clairvoyant powers instead.
Kalashtar society mind (from Untapped Potential):
1) Health Net: replace cooperative healing with Life mantle. All powers in this mantle gain the network descriptor.
3) Interlink: replaces telepathy, all Kalashtar in you worldthought network are mindlinked to eachother as long as they are in the network range. They may manifest unknown powers from powers known by another willing psionic creature in the network as if they were making physical contact.
6) Expanded network: Replaces one power known, expend focus to double the range of your worldthought network for 1min. After that time the network collapses on itself. If your network range is (any) or (planar) then you can channel powers to anyone in your network.
Class alterations:
Soulknife:
Will follow the use the Dreamscarred Press (dsp) variant (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/soulknife) with the following changes:
1) full BAB
2) You can shape your mindblade into any weapon you are proficient in.
3) Mind blade feats (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/mind-blade-feats) and their rules are in effect with the following changes: a)Any feat that requires mind blade or psychic strike has the [mind-blade] descriptor. b)A soulknife's enhancement bonus is not capped based on ECL. c) Form Mind-blade (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/form-mind-blade) is not a feat.
Just to make SK a bit stronger. I'm not sure if the uncapped enhancement bonus will result in overkill but I try to allow the PC be as strong as possible because this won't be an easy campaign. Hint: the Inspired are all gestalted too
Atavist:
1) Alignment does not have to be good
2) Unarmed strike/mind blade improvement: same as listed in RoE but now also improves flurry, psychic strike features and bonus feats.
3) At 3rd, 5th, and 9th levels gain a kalashtar or host feat (from CPsi).
So now its almost a complete duel progression fo monks and SKs. The racial feats are there to make this PrC double as a paragon class since Atavists are supposed to be the cream of the crop. Removed the alignment restriction be one of the head Atavists listed in RoE is evil. This also gives the players some freedom in PC creation as well.
Monk:
Gain monastery training (psionic class) as bonus feat. with Tashaltora, monks don't really need the help
Wilder:
Using the DSP variant (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/wilder) but with the following changes:
1) Surging euphoria at levels 4,8,12,16 and 20
2) Extra power at 6, 10 and 14
better gishing and if using the educated variant, will have only 2 powers less than a psywar
Psion:
Gain psicrystal affinity at level 1. No variants such as Erudite and Devoted Psion. Psions are fine the way they are. I never understood why their variant got psicrystal affinity at level 1 while they didn't. Erudite is a pain for PbP because of all the book keeping involved with prepared powers, and I'd rather not deal with something like StP ACF
Psychic rogue and lurk:
There is no lurk, instead psychic rogue will get lurk augments, follow lurk power gain progression and their spell lists will be combined.
Lurk augments will not have per day limits imposed on them.
Sneak attack will always count as threatened crits for the purpose of weapon abilities (like icy burst or body feeder). This does not apply to telling blows (no doubling up on sneak attack damage). psyrogue is just better in every way, but lurk does have better powers and lurk augments this is just combining the two.
Psywar:
Full BAB
Society Mind (dsp-srd) (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/society-mind):
They cannot change their powers known everyday. Instead they gain 2 powers at level 1 and 1 power per level after that. Here's their power list. (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/society-mind-powers)
They gain worldthought concert at level 9, which is an altered version of metaconcert that allows for the psychic entity to be maintained as long as all participants are in network range. Like I said before, prepared powers are a pain, I basically doubled the powers known to make up for it. Metaconcert not being on the society mind power list is kind of wierd. I wonder if increasing the range from 20 ft would be such a huge deal?
Marksman (dsp srd) (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/marksman):
Gain 1st signiture style at level 3.
Feats:
Dodge-mobility-spring attack chain:
Dodge gives +1 dodge bonus to AC for every 4 HD you have. Spring attack let's you warp a standard action around a move action and not provoke AoO when moving through a threatened square. Spring attack now let you wrap a full attack around a movement action instead of of a standard attack action.
Just in case someone wanted to go into elocater and not have to take 3 feats that suck. I also made these changes because I want to use these against my players but can't justify all the non-psywar NPCs having one level dip in barb for pounce, especially in a psionic heavy campaign
Deflect arrows: requires Dex 16 instead of unarmed strike.
Snatch arrows: requires Dex 16 and deflect arrows.
They will be facing Marksmen (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/marksman) in Reidra attack squads and they can be lockdown masters. It would be silly to think that Reidra and the Dreaming Dark would not have psionic snipers in their army. An army that dwarves all armies in Khorvaire's 5 nations.
Soulknife levels counts as fighter levels for qualifying for feats.
Other materials:
I will allow the 3rd party books Hyperconscious and untapped potential. I personally will be using them against you just to let you know. I won't allow Dragon or Dungeon magazine since I don't have all of them.
dsp srd and a detailed look at Hyperconscious are in my sig.
Before I get into the meat of story Id like some feedback on my houserules, see if any of them are too heavy handed or unbalancing. I'll give a brief summary as to why I have them in place so feedback can be given along that rationale. So here goes:
Race: must be kalashtar
Class: must have at least one level in the Atavist PrC from RoE on one side of the gestalt //.
The atavist movement is central in attempt to turn the tables on the Dreaming Dark, the PC are part of that movement. I made this game gestalt because 1) to keep the group smaller without losing potency, since this is a PbP game and smaller groups equal faster posting and 2) I limited the choice on one side so leave the otherside for the players.
Gestalt:
You can have one PrC on either side.
Any dual progression PrC only advances one side of the //. IE wizard7//psion5/cerebromancer2 would have 7 ML and CL, not 9CL (7 from wizard and 2 from cerebromancer).
On the other hand if you had a psion10//rogue5/slayer5 your ML would only be 10, not 13, since the ML from slayer is on the opposite side of the psion. This can get really complicated so something more streamlined and simple will be considered more favorably.
Just to keep things simple. Atavist is a duel progression PrC for SK and monk and by the book this should not even be allowed. But Atavists play a major role in the plot and hence this rule to simplify things
No templates or racial HD on either side.
You are a protype of your race, not some freakshow.
Fractional BAB and saves.
2 flaws and 2 traits. Is this overkill? Gestalt should be enough right?
Races:
Kalashtar: In addition to what is listed in the ECS, they also have +2 Cha.
Inspired: They are gestalted as well with one side the host's levels and the otherside their Quori HD and class levels. The dual mind feature also acts as a permenent schism but without the -6 ML.
The Inspired conquered an entire continent, have a web of spies all over Eberron, charmed power brokers in every nation. To have them not be a somewhat challenging foe would be a disservice to them. In many ways they are what the Atavist strive to become, a Quori spirit undiluted by generations of decendents.
Racial Sub levels:
Kalashtar seer: same as Kalashtar telepath but for clairvoyant powers instead.
Kalashtar society mind (from Untapped Potential):
1) Health Net: replace cooperative healing with Life mantle. All powers in this mantle gain the network descriptor.
3) Interlink: replaces telepathy, all Kalashtar in you worldthought network are mindlinked to eachother as long as they are in the network range. They may manifest unknown powers from powers known by another willing psionic creature in the network as if they were making physical contact.
6) Expanded network: Replaces one power known, expend focus to double the range of your worldthought network for 1min. After that time the network collapses on itself. If your network range is (any) or (planar) then you can channel powers to anyone in your network.
Class alterations:
Soulknife:
Will follow the use the Dreamscarred Press (dsp) variant (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/soulknife) with the following changes:
1) full BAB
2) You can shape your mindblade into any weapon you are proficient in.
3) Mind blade feats (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/mind-blade-feats) and their rules are in effect with the following changes: a)Any feat that requires mind blade or psychic strike has the [mind-blade] descriptor. b)A soulknife's enhancement bonus is not capped based on ECL. c) Form Mind-blade (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/form-mind-blade) is not a feat.
Just to make SK a bit stronger. I'm not sure if the uncapped enhancement bonus will result in overkill but I try to allow the PC be as strong as possible because this won't be an easy campaign. Hint: the Inspired are all gestalted too
Atavist:
1) Alignment does not have to be good
2) Unarmed strike/mind blade improvement: same as listed in RoE but now also improves flurry, psychic strike features and bonus feats.
3) At 3rd, 5th, and 9th levels gain a kalashtar or host feat (from CPsi).
So now its almost a complete duel progression fo monks and SKs. The racial feats are there to make this PrC double as a paragon class since Atavists are supposed to be the cream of the crop. Removed the alignment restriction be one of the head Atavists listed in RoE is evil. This also gives the players some freedom in PC creation as well.
Monk:
Gain monastery training (psionic class) as bonus feat. with Tashaltora, monks don't really need the help
Wilder:
Using the DSP variant (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/wilder) but with the following changes:
1) Surging euphoria at levels 4,8,12,16 and 20
2) Extra power at 6, 10 and 14
better gishing and if using the educated variant, will have only 2 powers less than a psywar
Psion:
Gain psicrystal affinity at level 1. No variants such as Erudite and Devoted Psion. Psions are fine the way they are. I never understood why their variant got psicrystal affinity at level 1 while they didn't. Erudite is a pain for PbP because of all the book keeping involved with prepared powers, and I'd rather not deal with something like StP ACF
Psychic rogue and lurk:
There is no lurk, instead psychic rogue will get lurk augments, follow lurk power gain progression and their spell lists will be combined.
Lurk augments will not have per day limits imposed on them.
Sneak attack will always count as threatened crits for the purpose of weapon abilities (like icy burst or body feeder). This does not apply to telling blows (no doubling up on sneak attack damage). psyrogue is just better in every way, but lurk does have better powers and lurk augments this is just combining the two.
Psywar:
Full BAB
Society Mind (dsp-srd) (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/society-mind):
They cannot change their powers known everyday. Instead they gain 2 powers at level 1 and 1 power per level after that. Here's their power list. (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/society-mind-powers)
They gain worldthought concert at level 9, which is an altered version of metaconcert that allows for the psychic entity to be maintained as long as all participants are in network range. Like I said before, prepared powers are a pain, I basically doubled the powers known to make up for it. Metaconcert not being on the society mind power list is kind of wierd. I wonder if increasing the range from 20 ft would be such a huge deal?
Marksman (dsp srd) (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/marksman):
Gain 1st signiture style at level 3.
Feats:
Dodge-mobility-spring attack chain:
Dodge gives +1 dodge bonus to AC for every 4 HD you have. Spring attack let's you warp a standard action around a move action and not provoke AoO when moving through a threatened square. Spring attack now let you wrap a full attack around a movement action instead of of a standard attack action.
Just in case someone wanted to go into elocater and not have to take 3 feats that suck. I also made these changes because I want to use these against my players but can't justify all the non-psywar NPCs having one level dip in barb for pounce, especially in a psionic heavy campaign
Deflect arrows: requires Dex 16 instead of unarmed strike.
Snatch arrows: requires Dex 16 and deflect arrows.
They will be facing Marksmen (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/marksman) in Reidra attack squads and they can be lockdown masters. It would be silly to think that Reidra and the Dreaming Dark would not have psionic snipers in their army. An army that dwarves all armies in Khorvaire's 5 nations.
Soulknife levels counts as fighter levels for qualifying for feats.
Other materials:
I will allow the 3rd party books Hyperconscious and untapped potential. I personally will be using them against you just to let you know. I won't allow Dragon or Dungeon magazine since I don't have all of them.
dsp srd and a detailed look at Hyperconscious are in my sig.