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View Full Version : It's not too late, it's never too late... (3.5 PrC and domain, PEACH)



Noctis Vigil
2012-01-19, 01:52 AM
The quote in the title is from the song "Never Too Late" by Three Days Grace, and is the inspiration for this class. The domain doesn't really have an inspiration, other than I thought it needed to exist. I'll put the domain first. Please note, the entry requirements for Life Bringer are pretty steep, but the class is powerful enough to warrant it, I feel.



Life Domain
Granted Power: Once per day, you may restore someone to life. Restoring someone requires one minute. The person revived is unconscious and at -9 HP, but stable, and suffers no experience or stat loss. The person being revived must have died within the last hour for this power to work. This ability does not regrow body parts; the body must be in such condition that living is still possible once this ability is used. If an ability score is at 0 when this is used, this ability recovers 1 point to that stat. Someone revived in this manner always loses all spells they had prepared.

Level 1: Close Wounds (SpC)
Level 2: Stabilize (SpC)
Level 3: Spark of Life (SpC)
Level 4: Revenance (SpC)
Level 5: Revivify (SpC)
Level 6: Revive Outsider (SpC)
Level 7: Resurrection
Level 8: Death Ward, Mass (SpC)
Level 9: True Resurrection



Life Bringer
Some Clerics devote themselves to more than healing or prayer, they devote themselves to the study of life itself. They have given up much in their study, but the results let them thwart death itself.

Prerequisites:
Alignment: Must be Good
Skills: Must have and maintain max ranks for your level for Heal, Knowledge (Religion), and Knowledge (The Planes)
Spells: Must be able to cast Resurrection, and have access to the Life domain.
Special: Must have spent all of his previous level casting only Resurrection out of your 7th level spell slots.

Class Skills list as Cloistered Cleric.
Skills per level: 4+Int Mod
Hit Die: D6



Level
BAB
Fort Save
Ref Save
Will Save
Special
Spellcasting


1st

+0

+2

+0

+2
Life Power
+1 level of divine casting


2nd

+1

+3

+0

+3
Life Seer
+1 level of divine casting


3rd

+1

+3

+1

+3
Life Saver
+1 level of divine casting


4th

+2

+4

+1

+4
Life Wielder
+1 level of divine casting


5th

+2

+4

+1

+4
Life Bringer

-



Class Features: The following are all class features of a Life Bringer.

Proficiencies: A Life Bringer gains no additional proficiencies.

Spellcasting: At every level except 5th, a Life Bringer gains spells per day and an increase in caster level as if he had just gained a level in a divine caster class he possesses. This class must be the class he spent a whole level casting Resurrection out of his 7th level spell slots with. If, for some strange reason, he has more than one of those, he picks which one is increased.

Life Power: A Life Bringer is incredibly skilled at bringing creatures back to life. At 1st level, the time required to cast a spell bringing someone back to life is reduced to 1/10th the normal casting time (full round for Raise Dead or Revive Outsider, swift action to Revivify, 1 minute for Resurrection or True Resurrection). This power also applies to the Life domain power, reducing the time on it to one round to use.

Life Seer (Su): A Life Bringer has developed the ability to see life around him. At 2nd level, whenever he looks at a creature, he can tell if it is living, dead or undead. This ability allows him to see life itself, thus he can see invisible creatures, and see through illusions of creatures.

Live Saver: A Life Bringer has the power to save those who have just died in combat. Starting at 3rd level, once per day as an immediate action, he may cast Raise Dead, Revive Outsider, Revivify, Resurrection or True Resurrection on a creature who just died within 30 feet of him. The spell functions as normal, save changing the casting time to immediate action. Using this power is exhausting, and the Life Bringer immediately becomes exhausted until he rests for 8 hours to recover spells.

Life Wielder: A Life Bringer is granted extra power in his resurrection spells by his deity. At 4th level, he may choose to drop a prepared spell of the appropriate level to spontaneously cast Raise Dead, Revivify, Revive Outsider, Resurrection or True Resurrection. In addition, the recipient of his resurrection spells no longer suffers level loss or stat drain upon revival.

Furthermore, by expending some of his own life in the process, he can bring back those who died a long time ago. By expending 500EXP in the casting process of a resurrection spell, the time limit on how long someone may have been dead is multiplied by 10 (so 10 days per caster level for Raise Dead, 10 rounds for Revivify, and 100 years per caster level for Resurrection and True Resurrection).

Life Bringer: A Life Bringer has finally mastered bringing people back from the dead. He gains one additional spell slot for every level he can cast, but he must prepare the spell from the Life domain in it, and he cannot drop these slots to cast spontaneously. Furthermore, he no longer requires material components to cast a resurrection spell.

NeoSeraphi
2012-01-19, 01:59 AM
Just letting you know, as I'm sure you didn't already, the deathwatch spell has the [Evil] descriptor, and a cleric who was of Good alignment would not be able to cast it. (Source: The Book of Vile Darkness page 77)

Also the close wounds spell from the Spell Compendium seems like another good option for the Domain.

It's Knowledge (The Planes), not Knowledge (The Plains) for your prereqs.

Dumbledore lives
2012-01-19, 02:04 AM
The prerequisites seem ... oddly specific. I see no reason to require cloistered cleric or even the life domain. By just requiring resurrection you allow classes like the healer and the favored soul to get in, and I don't really see a reason they shouldn't. And for skills, just say 18 ranks, they'll max them out anyway, so it really won't make any difference. Otherwise it's looking good, though I might move the lost caster level to 1st instead of 5th, otherwise people can simply avoid the last level.

Noctis Vigil
2012-01-19, 02:05 AM
Oh bugger, you're right it does. I think I shall take your suggestion and make that Close Wounds, thank you.

Any other words of wisdom, NeoSeraphi?

Noctis Vigil
2012-01-19, 02:10 AM
@Dumbledore lives: I removed Cloistered Cleric from the prerequisites, although I think I'll leave max skill rank in those unless you can give me a good reason not to require them. As for the 4/5 spellcasting, I left the caster level off the last level, where I give him 9 extra spell slots instead. I could change it, though. Do you think it makes the class too dipable?

absolmorph
2012-01-19, 05:22 AM
@Dumbledore lives: I removed Cloistered Cleric from the prerequisites, although I think I'll leave max skill rank in those unless you can give me a good reason not to require them. As for the 4/5 spellcasting, I left the caster level off the last level, where I give him 9 extra spell slots instead. I could change it, though. Do you think it makes the class too dipable?
Unless you're building a character beyond level 14, I don't think this is worth dipping just because of the "spent all 7th level slots on Resurrection" prereq.
Gotta say, though, the thought of bringing back someone who died 2 millenia ago is pretty awesome. Were I to make a character who meets the prereqs, I would definitely take this just for that.

The Winter King
2012-01-19, 07:09 AM
The first level ability is awkward. I can see what it is supposed to do but it sound s like it reduces your window to cast your life restoring spells. Replace time limit with the words casting time.

This class is great but perhaps it could gain more uses of its domain ability for uses of Turning, reduce XP cost of those spells, and alleviate level/con loss

legomaster00156
2012-01-19, 09:08 AM
So, starting at level 3, your party never dies. Ever. Sounds balanced. :smallbiggrin:

Zaydos
2012-01-19, 10:33 AM
The class is so-so. You get 5000 GP true resurrections if the body is intact and wasn't killed by a death effect (Raise Dead), 10,000 GP if the body is mostly destroyed or was killed by a death effect, making it cheap to revive the dead. Starting at Lv 16 you could bring someone back the moment it's your turn and at Lv 17 they don't suffer a penalty for it. Let's the DM crank up the power a bit.

The domain power is actually the strongest feature for when you get it. 1/day bring someone back who died within the last hour is a lot better than Revivify, and doesn't list limits on how mangled the body is making it even better, and doesn't cost 1000 GP. Honestly I'd really reduce the domain granted power, especially if you want the class to be useful (in high level games I've played people didn't die every adventure and the domain power is just as useful as the entire PrC), as is starting at Lv 1 the party doesn't suffer from battles unless they're a TPK (which is bad). At these levels if the DM cranks up the power from "might kill a PC" you now have "might wipe party".

Yitzi
2012-01-19, 10:42 AM
The main downside of this class is that most of his abilities require a not-so-insignificant amount of cash to use. Perhaps he should also get a reduction in (or even complete removal of for the lower-level ones) the material component cost for resurrection spells?

NeoSeraphi
2012-01-19, 10:45 AM
The main downside of this class is that most of his abilities require a not-so-insignificant amount of cash to use. Perhaps he should also get a reduction in (or even complete removal of for the lower-level ones) the material component cost for resurrection spells?

I got this one, Noctis.


Life Bringer: A Life Bringer has finally mastered bringing people back from the dead. He gains one additional spell slot for every level he can cast, but he must prepare the spell from the Life domain in it, and he cannot drop these slots to cast spontaneously. Furthermore, he no longer requires material components to cast a resurrection spell.

Emphasis mine. It does come at the last level of the class, but it's there. Absolutely no material costs.

Noctis Vigil
2012-01-19, 01:08 PM
All in all, I'm surprised. I expected someone to cry foul over the amount of power granted here. OK, let's dig through these in order...

@absolmorph: Glad you like it. :smallbiggrin:

@The Winter King: I reworded the first level ability, does that help? Also, resurrection spells don't cost EXP to cast, and I already removed the stat and level loss for them (4th level ability).

@Zaydos: Actually, you get them for free. 5th level ability removes all the material components from the spells. Also, I added several limiters on the Life domain granted power. I'm contemplating making it once a week, as well. What do you think?

Yitzi
2012-01-19, 01:27 PM
Emphasis mine. It does come at the last level of the class, but it's there. Absolutely no material costs.

Now why didn't I catch that?:smallredface: