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View Full Version : Summoning Done Right: 3.5 Base Class[PEACH](WIP)



Madara
2012-05-26, 09:59 PM
http://golgotron.com/wp-content/uploads/Pokemon_red.jpg
No. I am not a spellcaster. Nor am I a warrior.
I do not carry a sword, nor do I call upon unearthly magics.
I have no need to do such things, for my allies are willing to do that for me.


The Trainer
{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special

1st|+0|+1|+1|+1|Creature Cohort(Types I)

2nd|+1|+1|+1|+1|Creature Cohort(Elemental Affinity)

3rd|+2|+2|+2|+2|Creature Catalog, Inspiring Bond

4th|+3|+2|+2|+2| Double Cohorts

5th|+3|+3|+3|+3|Creature Cohort(Movement Modes)

6th|+4|+3|+3|+3|Cohort Melding

7th|+5|+3|+3|+3|Creature Cohort(Special Abilities I)

8th|+6/+1|+4|+4|+4|Creature Cohort(Types II)

9th|+6/+1|+4|+4|+4|Cohort Training:Weapons

10th|+7/+2|+5|+5|+5| Triple Cohorts

11th|+8/+3|+5|+5|+5|Creature Cohort(Sizing)

12th|+9/+4|+6|+6|+6|Creature Cohort(Special Abilities II)

13th|+9/+4|+6|+6|+6|

14th|+10/+5|+6|+6|+6|Quadruple Cohorts

15th|+11/+6/+1|+7|+7|+7|Creature Cohort(Types III)

16th|+12/+7/+2|+7|+7|+7|

17th|+12/+7/+2|+8|+8|+8|Maximum Cohorts

18th|+13/+8/+3|+8|+8|+8|Reversed Summoning

19th|+14/+9/+4|+8|+8|+8|

20th|+15/+10/+5|+9|+9|+9|Master Summoner

[/table]
Alignment: Any
Hit Die: 1d8

Class Skills:
Bluff (Cha), Concentration (Con), Diplomacy (Cha), Gather Information (Cha), Hide (Dex), Intimidate (Cha), Knowledge(Any) (Int), Listen (Wis), Profession (Wis), Ride (Dex), Spot (Wis).
Skill Points at 1st Level: (4 + Int modifier) × 4
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 4 + Int modifier

Creature Cohort: At first Level, the Trainer gains a Creature Cohort. This Cohort is a unique creature actually build from a combination of nature, the innate abilities of the trainer, and some advanced science. This Cohort is stored inside the trainer's focus item. The item may be any object, but it must be chosen at first level, and does not change. This Focus stores an extra-dimensional space which only the Cohort can enter and exit. In order to summon the Cohort, the Trainer must present his focus forward and activate it as a standard action.

Types: At levels 1,8, and 15, the Trainer gains access to a new grouping of types for their creature cohort to have.
Type I: Animal, Beast, Elemental, or Vermin
Type II: Ooze, Undead, Plant, Magical Beast or Abberation
Type III: Dragon, Construct, Outsider or Fey

As normal, the type decides the BAB, Saves, and Skill points for the creature, along with any other traits given by that type.

Movement Modes: All creature cohorts only have land movement until 5th level. At this level, the trainer can choose to give their cohort another mode of movement: Flight, Burrowing, or Swimming. See Building A Creature Cohort for more details.

Elemental Affinity: All Creature Cohorts can have an elemental boost in Damage at level 2. When they gain this ability, the Trainer selects one type of damage: Acid, Fire, Cold, Negative, or Electricity. The Creature Cohort's natural attacks now deal an additional 1d6 damage of that type.

Special Abilities: At levels 7 and 11, the trainer knows how to make their cohort more powerful. They have fought enough foes, and seen how a real monster fights. When they reach these levels, they gain the ability to grant their cohort a Special Ability from the list below. See Building A Creature Cohort.

Sizing: At 11th level, the Trainer can choose a different size for their creature cohort besides Large, Medium, and Small. They can also choose Tiny or Huge.

Creature Catalog: While the Trainer develops their own Monster as a cohort, they become quite knowledgeable about other monsters. Whenever the Trainer succeeds a Knowledge check made to identify a creature, they grant a +2 bonus to all their allies in attempts to track the monster, attack the monster, or reflex saves against the monster's special attacks.

Inspiring Bond: At third level, the Cohort begins to question why its master doesn't do any of the fighting. In order to keep their bond going, the Trainer begins to share damage with the monster. Whenever the Creature Cohort takes damage, the Trainer takes 1/2 the damage instead of the Cohort, and the Cohort takes the remaining 1/2.

Cohort Melding: At level 6, the Trainer takes his bond to a whole new level, being able to become one with their cohort. They gain the possession ability of an outsider, but only to their Creature Cohort

Cohort Training:Weapons At 9th level, the trainer's Creature cohort is now capable of using simple and martial weapons, if they have hands.

Double Cohorts: At 4th level, the Trainer may have two cohorts, which he stores in two separate focuses. They treat both cohorts the same in terms of building them. However, The trainer may only have one cohort out of its focus at a time. The others must remain inside their focus. Triple, Quadruple, and Maximum cohorts all work the same, except that the Trainer now has 3, 4, or 6 Cohorts respectively at those levels.

Reversed Summoning: As a full round action, the Trainer can enter one of their focuses and be inside the extra-dimensional space for up to 24 hours. They do not need to eat, breath, or sleep.

Master Summoner: At 20th level, the Trainer is now capable of having two of his Cohorts out of their Focus at once, rather than the limit of just one.

Yes this has quite a bit of work left, but it'll be interesting.

Madara
2012-05-26, 10:00 PM
Building A Creature Cohort

Size/Type:
When building a creature cohort, The Trainer is restricted to certain types depending on his level.
Type I: Animal, Beast, Elemental, or Vermin
Type II: Ooze, Undead, Plant, Magical Beast or Abberation
Type III: Dragon, Construct, Outsider or Fey

The Trainer also chooses the size of the creature. Until level 11, this must be Large, Medium, or Small.

Hit Dice:
The Creature Cohort has HD based on the Trainer's level -2 + Trainer's Cha bonus(Min 1).
Speed:

Until 5th level, the Creature Cohort can only have a land speed. Afterwards, they can have any combination of movement modes. There total movement speed(Speed of all movement modes combined) must be equal to or less than 30+ 10ft for every two Trainer levels after 5th.
Armor Class:
Calculate Creature Cohort's AC normally. They can have up to +2 Natural Armor for every three levels of Trainer.
Base Attack/Grapple:
Calculate normally. As usual, the BAB is determined based on type.
Attack:
Full Attack:
Space/Reach:
Special Attacks:
Special Qualities:
Saves:
Abilities:
Skills:
Feats:

DoomHat
2012-05-26, 10:08 PM
So, I guess it has Rogue BaB so as to better catch 'em all?

You haven't posted everything at the time of my post, but, going out on a limb here, he's basically going to have a max of 6 familiars/animal companions, one of which is extra special?

Madara
2012-05-26, 10:29 PM
Pretty much. Except I'm letting everyone go all build-a-bear on their summonable companions.

You choose their type, which comes with the BAB and saves of that type. Then later you open up more movement modes and sizes. You choose their attacks. And you build their attributes based on your level+whatever stat mod I figure on going with.

Next I'll pull out a ton of acceptable special abilities from current monsters that you can choose to add to the mix. Rogue BAB is because they are meant to fill a melee role with their monster, and if their pet dies, I want them to be able to do something.

Madara
2012-05-29, 11:52 AM
More updates. I should be done soon, within a day or so.

stack
2012-05-29, 12:06 PM
Any reason for the non-standard save progression? I suspect it will sit poorly with many.

legomaster00156
2012-05-29, 12:32 PM
Any class based on Red has already earned my approval.

Madara
2012-05-29, 02:18 PM
Any reason for the non-standard save progression? I suspect it will sit poorly with many.

It's odd that people would complain about non-standard progression. For me, I believe that the character doesn't have any "Good" or "Bad" abilities. As a character, the Trainer is perfectly average, they don't focus in learning magic, or combat. But they do know a few things from general adventuring. So, rather than give them a bad Fort save, which leads to them being frail, which they aren't, or giving them a good Fort save, so they are hardy, which they aren't, I gave them the average save. The same applies for other categories.

ArkenBrony
2012-05-29, 08:23 PM
Thank you, i have been waiting for a class like this for a while, and this one in particular is really good, i have no suggestions for mechanics, but i have spelling mistakes and the like, just to make it more neat, again great job, i love it, my players will find this class amusing if they ever get to fight it :small amused:


Sizing: At 11th level, the Trainer can choose a different size for their creature cohort besides Large, Medium, and Smalll. They can also choose Tiny or Huge.
should be spelled with 2 ll's


Until 5th level, the Creature Cohort can only have a land speed. Afterwards, they can have any combination of movement modes. There total movement speed(Speed of all movement modes combined) must be less than 30+ 10ft for every two Trainer levels after 5th.
i think i know what you mean but it should be equal to or less, or foul have to give them weird numbers not divisible by 5


and no matter how much this may be made for pokemon, because of the cohort melding, i can't help but see digimon.:smallwink:

toapat
2012-05-29, 08:43 PM
my first real comment about the class is: Awesome

my second comment is: I would prefer to see that the creation tables at least be referenced to by page in the MMs or be listed here.

i just realized, you have no Weapons or armor proficiencies with this dude.

Madara
2012-05-29, 09:03 PM
Umm. Yeah. I really can't quite justify weapons with a character who has their pet fight for them, but I could just give them simple weapons, and light armor.

I'm glad that it's being well received.



my second comment is: I would prefer to see that the creation tables at least be referenced to by page in the MMs or be listed here.

I don't quite understand this, could you reword it? :smallsmile:

toapat
2012-05-29, 09:18 PM
I don't quite understand this, could you reword it? :smallsmile:

a sticky note to the pages for the tables being referenced in which book, or the tables themselves

Madara
2012-05-29, 09:36 PM
You mean like for calculating the BAB based on HD for types? Everything I reference is in the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm)

Madara
2012-05-30, 08:14 AM
My post didn't appear on the forum page... Now it will :smallsmile:

The Zoat
2012-05-30, 09:26 AM
The part on creature cohort hit dice should say "cha bonus" right?

Madara
2012-05-30, 09:42 AM
The part on creature cohort hit dice should say "cha bonus" right?

Yeah..fixed


Any thoughts on how I should do the cohort section? Should it be in a table? Or is it fine now? I don't have experience in making a cohort section, so I'm looking for ideas on formatting.

NeoSeraphi
2012-05-30, 09:53 AM
"Beast" is not a type in 3.5. It's a type in 3.0, but in 3.5, dinosaurs are considered animals, so there are no beasts left.

Does Elemental Affinity stack with a fire elemental's Burn? Because that's quite a bit of extra damage. At 2nd level, your fire elemental will be doing 1d4, +1d4 fire, +1d6 fire with each attack, with a Reflex save to avoid catching fire and taking additional fire damage each round. Plus, that elemental will be immune to fire, critical hits, poison, sleep, stunning, paralysis and flanking. All of this together makes the Fire Elemental seem a bit unfair, perhaps you should delay elementals until 8th as well.

Creature Catalog should be changed in some way. Knowledge (Nature) will not help you figure out how to better hit an iron golem or to avoid a dragon's breath weapon. Also, a static DC? It's just as easy for me to figure out how to avoid the wolf's bite as it is to help me understand how to resist the beholder's eye rays?

The Knowledge skills have already set a pretty nice standard. Just word it like this: "Whenever the Trainer succeeds a Knowledge check made to identify a creature". There. Now you have a DC that scales with the difficulty of the monster, and the appropriate Knowledge skill applying to that check.

Not all outsiders have the possession ability (in fact, off the top of my head, I can't think of a single specific one that does). You should pick a specific creature that has the possession ability and reference it instead, if only to give us all a point of reference, since right now I don't even know which MM entry to look up in order to read the mechanics of it.

Madara
2012-05-30, 10:12 AM
"Beast" is not a type in 3.5. It's a type in 3.0, but in 3.5, dinosaurs are considered animals, so there are no beasts left.

Does Elemental Affinity stack with a fire elemental's Burn? Because that's quite a bit of extra damage. At 2nd level, your fire elemental will be doing 1d4, +1d4 fire, +1d6 fire with each attack, with a Reflex save to avoid catching fire and taking additional fire damage each round. Plus, that elemental will be immune to fire, critical hits, poison, sleep, stunning, paralysis and flanking. All of this together makes the Fire Elemental seem a bit unfair, perhaps you should delay elementals until 8th as well.

Good to know. Looks like my MM is the 3.0... oh well

As for the fire elemental. Do realize that you'll be building a creature from the ground up. They don't start with tons of special abilities and such. Special abilities don't come in until 7th level.


Creature Catalog should be changed in some way. Knowledge (Nature) will not help you figure out how to better hit an iron golem or to avoid a dragon's breath weapon. Also, a static DC? It's just as easy for me to figure out how to avoid the wolf's bite as it is to help me understand how to resist the beholder's eye rays?

The Knowledge skills have already set a pretty nice standard. Just word it like this: "Whenever the Trainer succeeds a Knowledge check made to identify a creature". There. Now you have a DC that scales with the difficulty of the monster, and the appropriate Knowledge skill applying to that check.

Will do. I kinda wanted to have a catch-all knowledge(Monsters), but we'll split it up.


Not all outsiders have the possession ability (in fact, off the top of my head, I can't think of a single specific one that does). You should pick a specific creature that has the possession ability and reference it instead, if only to give us all a point of reference, since right now I don't even know which MM entry to look up in order to read the mechanics of it.

Actually, all those with 5? or more HD do. It isn't listed in their entry, but its mentioned in a few books. One of which is the Eberron Campaign Setting, and I think one of the Demon ones... I should reference it.

jojolagger
2012-05-30, 12:56 PM
Building the creature from ground up? No! You should have to catch them.
Also, starting with a 4 HD minion at first level is somewhat ridiculous.
Also, only two special abilities? That's kinda sad, isn't it?
BEtween the somewhat weak minion scaling and the high possible starting HD, the class seems very front loaded. Why not do the abilities like astral constructs do, or have each creature get a certain number of Specials Points to be spent based on trainer level and HD, and then a big list of specials and the prices?

radmelon
2012-05-30, 01:12 PM
Also, how often can you rebuild your cohort? Because if you're stuck with the same critter from level 1, getting new sizes and types is meaningless.

Madara
2012-05-30, 01:56 PM
Building the creature from ground up? No! You should have to catch them.
Also, starting with a 4 HD minion at first level is somewhat ridiculous.
Also, only two special abilities? That's kinda sad, isn't it?
Between the somewhat weak minion scaling and the high possible starting HD, the class seems very front loaded. Why not do the abilities like astral constructs do, or have each creature get a certain number of Specials Points to be spent based on trainer level and HD, and then a big list of specials and the prices?

Indeed, It is quite frustrating. Considering the CR system is messed up, and so are any means of calculating power.

This. This is what I wanted originally. Creating a list and the values...is a huge undertaking. I suppose I could work on it.


Also, how often can you rebuild your cohort? Because if you're stuck with the same critter from level 1, getting new sizes and types is meaningless.

Any time it dies or you release it, the same way as Druids and their companions.


Edit: What if I just made Astral Construct permanent, with its level being equal to 1/ 2 levels after first?

Steward
2012-05-30, 02:55 PM
Actually, all those with 5? or more HD do. It isn't listed in their entry, but its mentioned in a few books. One of which is the Eberron Campaign Setting, and I think one of the Demon ones... I should reference it.

Fiendish Codex I says that, in order for a fiend to be able to possess someone, they must have at least 13 Cha and 4 HD, but it does not say that every fiend that meets this criteria can do so -- only some fiends can.

ArkenBrony
2012-05-30, 07:18 PM
a also dot get the allure of the possession ability, at best you can give it a +4 to a stat, which doesn't seem as major a power as the heroes fusion ability should be.

Madara
2012-05-30, 09:02 PM
I suppose, mostly I was using at a way to grant direct control on the companion in a 'safe mode' for the trainer.

ArkenBrony
2012-05-30, 10:50 PM
i understand what you wanted from it, and it works for that, but i am biased to the opinion from digimon that they could fuze, so to me its not good enough for that, but for a pokemon type class, it should be fine. And is inspired bond still in effect while you are possessing your cohort?

radmelon
2012-05-31, 09:21 AM
It's gong to be difficult to really judge the power of this class until more special abilities are posted, but I do like what I see so far.

<edit> Also, you may want to make the damage sharing from inspiring bond optional, because if your cohort has much more health than you, it's tanking ability drops noticably when you hit level 3.

ArkenBrony
2012-05-31, 05:22 PM
did you mean for them to have no weapon or armor proficiencies?
or did you just forget?

Madara
2012-05-31, 06:54 PM
It's gong to be difficult to really judge the power of this class until more special abilities are posted, but I do like what I see so far.

<edit> Also, you may want to make the damage sharing from inspiring bond optional, because if your cohort has much more health than you, it's tanking ability drops noticably when you hit level 3.

Good idea. Originally, it was built as a limit for the Trainer. But now its limiting the companion...interesting.


did you mean for them to have no weapon or armor proficiencies?
or did you just forget?

I couldn't really figure out which ones I could justify. Its...bothersome. I still need to decide. Maybe just simple weapons...

radmelon
2012-05-31, 07:06 PM
Simple weapons sounds good, because it's hard to justify being to incompetent to work a club or a dagger.

DracoDei
2012-06-01, 01:42 PM
Umm. Yeah. I really can't quite justify weapons with a character who has their pet fight for them,.
This clashes with your justification for giving them mid-bab.

Simple weapons sounds good, because it's hard to justify being to incompetent to work a club or a dagger.
Or give them a commoner's single-simple weapon proficiency*. Or a smaller selection but not one, such as the wizard gets.

*I actually have a base class in play-testing right now that gets proficiency with a single simple melee weapon... and it is actually meant to USE that weapon in combat.