Schylerwalker
2012-06-19, 03:27 PM
Hey there Playground, I need some help balancing some of my Homebrew classes while still keeping them flavorful and fun to play.
For a while now, I've been making quite a few homebrew classes, and encouraging people to ignore most of the base classes playtest these classes. Many of them are meant to be more interesting, balanced fixes of classes like cleric and wizard. For example, I have a priest class that doesn't armor, but has full clerical spellcasting. They don't get spontaneous cure or inflict, but instead can spontaneously cast spells from the two Domains they pick, and they get a few other nifty tools.
All of the classes are aimed at being about as balanced and good to play as Pathfinder classes. I.E., no dead levels. And almost all of the melee fighters have some kind of healing ability (At least for themselves) and some kind of battlefield control ability. They're all aimed at being T3. One goal of these classes was to give them an awesome ability at twentieth level.
Not all of them are completely done, but quite a few of them are, and I'd be willing to post them, or some of their abilities, if the Playground is finished. I really just want some advice on how you guys would balance base classes while keeping them fun and exciting.
Here's a list of my classes and a little summary about them.
Agent: A rogue fix, but meant to be more stealthy and skill oriented than sneaky combat based, at least around low levels. They get a ton of skill points, adding their Wisdom in addition to their Intelligence after first level, get all class skills, all good saves, a d8 hit die, and average BAB. Their class features focus around improving and utilizing their skills and confusing and misdirecting their enemies.
Berserker: A barbarian fix, the berserker wears no armor but gets to add his berserker class level as a dodge bonus to his armor class (His "Whirling Defense"). Berserkers can go into a berserker fury, where they get bonuses to Strength, a penalty to AC, immunity to fear, and become immune to damage. However, when they drop out of the fury, they take all the damage they were supposed to take. They also get warcries every three levels, either hindering enemies or boosting allies.
Dark Mage: A spontaneous Charisma-based spellcaster, that can only cast spells from the schools of Conjuration and Necromancy (Save for 0 lvl spells). Still need to customize their spell list to avoid weird spells for the kind of spellcaster they are. As they gain power, they can take damage to Constitution, Intelligence, and Wisdom to apply Metamagic Feats to spells for free. Cannot avoid this with Undeaditute, and if Undead, Constitution becomes Charisma. They slowly transform into a weird undead/demon fusion as they level up.
Engineer: Specializes in bombs, guns, traps, and the like. Still on the drawing board, mostly ideas and a few notes.
Guardian: The ultimate tank. All armor and shields, d12 hitdie, all good saves, average BAB, average skills. They get auras, which buff themselves and the party, strikes which improve their combat abilities, and a ward that can heal and buff allies. One of the classes that needs balancing.
High Mage: Spellbook oriented Intelligence-based primary arcane spellcaster. Can only cast spells from the schools of Abjuration, Divination, Enchantment, and Illusion (Save for 0 lvl spells). Gets study and identification-based class features as they level up, at a combat class feature (Called Wizard's Fire).
Magician: Basically my bard fix. A spellcasting rogue type sort that confuses the hell out of his enemies and alters the flow of the battle with his control over luck and chance. I think it's very balanced, and it's a very flavorful, fleshed out class. One of my favorites.
Mystic: Still on the drawing board, for the most part. A kind of bard/monk/sorcerer, they get spellcasting and unarmed combat. A few bonus feats to help their unarmed combat, and a pool of harmony points to heal themselves, their allies, and fuel their special abilities (And maybe spells).
Priest: As I said, a primary divine spellcaster, with the cleric's spell list. Doesn't get armor, and infact suffers an arcane spell failure chance. However, they get to add their Charisma modifier to their armor class, and they get Domains and some minor class features.
Reaper: A melee fighter, with heavy armor, specializing in two-handed weapons. They heal when they kill people, can coup-de-grace faster, and get better chances of critting and do more dmaage when they crit. Scare and debuff their enemies.
Samurai: A skill- and Charisma-oriented fighter, the samurai takes oaths as he levels up, separating himself from the physical world and gaining metaphysical power. He gains access to several strikes (Based off of sword forms from the Wheel of Time series) and Bushido powers (These really need to be balanced).
Scoundrel: Another rogue fixed, but more focused on killin' people with his dirty fighting techniques (His main class feature is called dirty fighting. It gives him proficiency with all improvised weapons, and instead of sneak attack, he just deals twice his Scoundrel level in bonus damage in any sneak attack situation).
Shaman: A druidic primary spellcaster with turn undead. Not as naturey as a druid, focusing more on dead ancestors and spirits and the like, but still plenty naturey. Their high level class features are kinda meh.
Soldier: The ultimate melee warrior, my fighter fix. Only d10 hitdie, but they get average skills, a bonus feat at 1st, 2nd, 4th level, and every four levels thereafter, a soldier's prowess every three levels, and some other random goodies (Like layered armor). The prowesses give him a sick utility belt, and help him specialize one way or another.
Warden: My ranger fix, they get an animal companion, which advances like a druid, and some archery and wilderness-focused class features. Not done yet, but I'm happy with what I have so far.
Wild Mage: A Wisdom-oriented primary spellcaster, with access to the schools of Evocation and Transmutation (Save for 0 lvl spells). Gains access to animalistic features as they level up, which they can turn on and off, and I might give them some alternative summoning abilities if I think they need a boost.
Witchknight: This class is a light melee class, with some stealth abilities, mostly focusing on getting into the thick of melee to debuff and scare enemies away. A Charisma and Dexterity oriented melee class, a little fragile, but able to scatter enemies and control the battlefield.
Zealot: My "paladin" fix? Has to be of any non-neutral alignment, and be within one alignment step of their god. Lots of healing, buffing, self-buffing, and enemy-debuffing. A medium melee class. Gets to add their Charisma modifier to damage to any enemy that doesn't share their alignment and has an Intelligence score of 3 or higher.
Soooo....yeah. Tl;dr, I need help with my custom base classes! Give me advice on how to balance them. I'd be happy to post up the full information of any of these classes (Save for the Engineer and the Mystic; not even close to being done with those) to go more in depth on them.
For a while now, I've been making quite a few homebrew classes, and encouraging people to ignore most of the base classes playtest these classes. Many of them are meant to be more interesting, balanced fixes of classes like cleric and wizard. For example, I have a priest class that doesn't armor, but has full clerical spellcasting. They don't get spontaneous cure or inflict, but instead can spontaneously cast spells from the two Domains they pick, and they get a few other nifty tools.
All of the classes are aimed at being about as balanced and good to play as Pathfinder classes. I.E., no dead levels. And almost all of the melee fighters have some kind of healing ability (At least for themselves) and some kind of battlefield control ability. They're all aimed at being T3. One goal of these classes was to give them an awesome ability at twentieth level.
Not all of them are completely done, but quite a few of them are, and I'd be willing to post them, or some of their abilities, if the Playground is finished. I really just want some advice on how you guys would balance base classes while keeping them fun and exciting.
Here's a list of my classes and a little summary about them.
Agent: A rogue fix, but meant to be more stealthy and skill oriented than sneaky combat based, at least around low levels. They get a ton of skill points, adding their Wisdom in addition to their Intelligence after first level, get all class skills, all good saves, a d8 hit die, and average BAB. Their class features focus around improving and utilizing their skills and confusing and misdirecting their enemies.
Berserker: A barbarian fix, the berserker wears no armor but gets to add his berserker class level as a dodge bonus to his armor class (His "Whirling Defense"). Berserkers can go into a berserker fury, where they get bonuses to Strength, a penalty to AC, immunity to fear, and become immune to damage. However, when they drop out of the fury, they take all the damage they were supposed to take. They also get warcries every three levels, either hindering enemies or boosting allies.
Dark Mage: A spontaneous Charisma-based spellcaster, that can only cast spells from the schools of Conjuration and Necromancy (Save for 0 lvl spells). Still need to customize their spell list to avoid weird spells for the kind of spellcaster they are. As they gain power, they can take damage to Constitution, Intelligence, and Wisdom to apply Metamagic Feats to spells for free. Cannot avoid this with Undeaditute, and if Undead, Constitution becomes Charisma. They slowly transform into a weird undead/demon fusion as they level up.
Engineer: Specializes in bombs, guns, traps, and the like. Still on the drawing board, mostly ideas and a few notes.
Guardian: The ultimate tank. All armor and shields, d12 hitdie, all good saves, average BAB, average skills. They get auras, which buff themselves and the party, strikes which improve their combat abilities, and a ward that can heal and buff allies. One of the classes that needs balancing.
High Mage: Spellbook oriented Intelligence-based primary arcane spellcaster. Can only cast spells from the schools of Abjuration, Divination, Enchantment, and Illusion (Save for 0 lvl spells). Gets study and identification-based class features as they level up, at a combat class feature (Called Wizard's Fire).
Magician: Basically my bard fix. A spellcasting rogue type sort that confuses the hell out of his enemies and alters the flow of the battle with his control over luck and chance. I think it's very balanced, and it's a very flavorful, fleshed out class. One of my favorites.
Mystic: Still on the drawing board, for the most part. A kind of bard/monk/sorcerer, they get spellcasting and unarmed combat. A few bonus feats to help their unarmed combat, and a pool of harmony points to heal themselves, their allies, and fuel their special abilities (And maybe spells).
Priest: As I said, a primary divine spellcaster, with the cleric's spell list. Doesn't get armor, and infact suffers an arcane spell failure chance. However, they get to add their Charisma modifier to their armor class, and they get Domains and some minor class features.
Reaper: A melee fighter, with heavy armor, specializing in two-handed weapons. They heal when they kill people, can coup-de-grace faster, and get better chances of critting and do more dmaage when they crit. Scare and debuff their enemies.
Samurai: A skill- and Charisma-oriented fighter, the samurai takes oaths as he levels up, separating himself from the physical world and gaining metaphysical power. He gains access to several strikes (Based off of sword forms from the Wheel of Time series) and Bushido powers (These really need to be balanced).
Scoundrel: Another rogue fixed, but more focused on killin' people with his dirty fighting techniques (His main class feature is called dirty fighting. It gives him proficiency with all improvised weapons, and instead of sneak attack, he just deals twice his Scoundrel level in bonus damage in any sneak attack situation).
Shaman: A druidic primary spellcaster with turn undead. Not as naturey as a druid, focusing more on dead ancestors and spirits and the like, but still plenty naturey. Their high level class features are kinda meh.
Soldier: The ultimate melee warrior, my fighter fix. Only d10 hitdie, but they get average skills, a bonus feat at 1st, 2nd, 4th level, and every four levels thereafter, a soldier's prowess every three levels, and some other random goodies (Like layered armor). The prowesses give him a sick utility belt, and help him specialize one way or another.
Warden: My ranger fix, they get an animal companion, which advances like a druid, and some archery and wilderness-focused class features. Not done yet, but I'm happy with what I have so far.
Wild Mage: A Wisdom-oriented primary spellcaster, with access to the schools of Evocation and Transmutation (Save for 0 lvl spells). Gains access to animalistic features as they level up, which they can turn on and off, and I might give them some alternative summoning abilities if I think they need a boost.
Witchknight: This class is a light melee class, with some stealth abilities, mostly focusing on getting into the thick of melee to debuff and scare enemies away. A Charisma and Dexterity oriented melee class, a little fragile, but able to scatter enemies and control the battlefield.
Zealot: My "paladin" fix? Has to be of any non-neutral alignment, and be within one alignment step of their god. Lots of healing, buffing, self-buffing, and enemy-debuffing. A medium melee class. Gets to add their Charisma modifier to damage to any enemy that doesn't share their alignment and has an Intelligence score of 3 or higher.
Soooo....yeah. Tl;dr, I need help with my custom base classes! Give me advice on how to balance them. I'd be happy to post up the full information of any of these classes (Save for the Engineer and the Mystic; not even close to being done with those) to go more in depth on them.