NeoSeraphi
2012-06-20, 04:19 PM
Author's Note
The cleric is actually pretty badly underpowered in Pathfinder. Sure, the cleric still has gamebreaking 9th level spells, but whatever. In Pathfinder, spellcasters are relevant at all levels, not just higher levels. PF casters get cool abilities that they get to choose from. Sorcerers get Bloodlines, Wizards get Arcane Schools, and Oracles get Mysteries and Revelations and Curses. What do clerics get? Domains. Domains are supposed to function similarly to Arcane School...in theory. In practice, a Domain often gives very little reason to stay in the class. It's not that the structure of the cleric is bad, it's the Domains themselves.
Meanwhile, an oracle gets the same spell list as a cleric but also gets his Domain spells as free spells known. So rather than being restricted to casting a spell once per day per spell level, an oracle of Flame can shoot fire all day, and an oracle of Battle can wade into melee whenever he wants. In Pathfinder, 24 hour buffs are effectively gone (As they should be) which means the cleric with his fewer spells per day, limited actions, and medium armor proficiency can't just walk around pretending to be a fighter like he can in 3.5.
You might say that a cleric makes a better healer because of the Channel Positive Energy class feature, which would be true, but an Oracle of Life gets that ability anyway, as well as Charisma-based casting, meaning the Oracle of Life will have many more Channels per day, even with 2 fewer base.
So with that in mind, I present a cleric prestige class meant to make clerics more interesting and active in Pathfinder. Yes, they might still be as powerful as they were in 3.5, but they require much more system mastery to be that way, and that's no fun for a casual player.
The Profanist
The Profanist is a powerful cleric of negative energy who is able to inflict devastating wounds upon his enemies and drown them in their own pain. Most Profanists are sadists, but that is not necessarily true of all of them. Sadistic or not, Profanists must be used to seeing creatures in pain and bleeding, or they won't last very long.
Prerequisites:
Alignment: Any non-good
Feats: Improved Channel, Selective Channel, Extra Channel
Special: Channel Negative Energy 3d6
Spellcasting: Must be able to cast inflict serious wounds as a divine spell
Hit Dice: d8
Class Skills: The Profanist's class skills are Craft, Intimidate, Knowledge (Religion), Profession, and Spellcraft.
Skill Points Per Level: 2+Int mod
{table=head]Level|Base Attack Bonus|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Special|Spellcasting
1st|
+0|
+2|
+0|
+2|Channel Negative Energy +1d6|
2nd|
+1|
+3|
+0|
+3|Bloody Channel|+1 level divine spellcasting
3rd|
+2|
+3|
+1|
+3|Channel Negative Energy +2d6|
4th|
+3|
+4|
+1|
+4|Blinding Channel|+1 level divine spellcasting
5th|
+3|
+4|
+1|
+4|Channel Negative Energy +3d6|
6th|
+4|
+5|
+2|
+5|Frightening Channel|+1 level divine spellcasting
7th|
+5|
+5|
+2|
+5|Channel Negative Energy +4d6|+1 level divine spellcasting
8th|
+6|
+6|
+2|
+6|Poisoning Channel|+1 level divine spellcasting
9th|
+6|
+6|
+3|
+6|Channel Negative Energy +5d6|+1 level divine spellcasting
10th|
+7|
+7|
+3|
+7|Master Channeller|+1 level divine spellcasting
[/table]
Class Features: The following are the class features of the Profanist prestige class.
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Profanists gain proficiency with the whip. A Profanist receives a +2 circumstance bonus on all Intimidate checks he makes while wielding a whip.
Channel Negative Energy (Su): At 1st level, the Profanist selects a single class that he is able to channel at least 3d6 dice of Negative Energy from. His Profanist levels stack with that class's levels to determine the DC to resist his Channel Negative Energy feature, and at each odd level, he increases the dice per channel by +1d6.
Spellcasting: At each level except 1st, 3rd, and 5th, the Profanist gains new spells per day, spells known, access to higher level spells, and an increased caster level as if he had gained a level in a divine spellcasting class he had previously belonged to. The Profanist may not increase his spellcasting for a divine class he belongs to that does not have inflict serious wounds on its spell list. If the Profanist belonged to more than one divine spellcasting class, he chooses one to advance at each even level.
Bloody Channel (Su): Starting at 2nd level, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he may choose to decrease the amount of dice he channels by 1d6. If he does so, each creature who fails its saving throw against the negative energy also gains the bleed condition, and bleeds for an additional 1d6 points of damage per round until the bleed condition is removed.
Blinding Channel (Su): Starting at 4th level, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he may choose to decrease the amount of dice he channels by 1d6. If he does so, each creature who fails its saving throw against the negative energy is also blinded for 1 minute.
Frightening Channel (Su): Starting at 6th level, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he may choose to decrease the amount of dice he channels by 1d6. If he does so, each creature who fails its saving throw against the negative energy is also shaken for 1 minute.
Poisoning Channel (Su): Starting at 8th level, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he may choose to decrease the amount of dice he channels by 1d6. If he does so, each creature who fails its saving throw against the negative energy also gains the following poison:
Injury; save Fort DC equal to the DC of the Profanist's Channel Negative Energy; frequency 1/round for 6 rounds; effect 1d4 Str damage; cure 1 save
If the Profanist decreases the amount of dice he channels by 2d6, the poison instead deals 1d4 Con damage and the cure is 2 saves.
Master Channeller (Su): At 10th level, the Profanist is a powerful disperser of negative energy. He gains 3 additional daily uses of his Channel Negative Energy feature. The DC for the save against his Channel Negative Energy feature increases by +2. When he uses the Selective Channeling feat, his Charisma score is treated as if it were 4 higher for the purposes of that feat only. Finally, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he channels an additional dice of negative energy. This dice does not actually deal damage to any creatures, but it may be sacrificed as if it was a dice of damage for the purposes of any of the Profanist's class features.
The cleric is actually pretty badly underpowered in Pathfinder. Sure, the cleric still has gamebreaking 9th level spells, but whatever. In Pathfinder, spellcasters are relevant at all levels, not just higher levels. PF casters get cool abilities that they get to choose from. Sorcerers get Bloodlines, Wizards get Arcane Schools, and Oracles get Mysteries and Revelations and Curses. What do clerics get? Domains. Domains are supposed to function similarly to Arcane School...in theory. In practice, a Domain often gives very little reason to stay in the class. It's not that the structure of the cleric is bad, it's the Domains themselves.
Meanwhile, an oracle gets the same spell list as a cleric but also gets his Domain spells as free spells known. So rather than being restricted to casting a spell once per day per spell level, an oracle of Flame can shoot fire all day, and an oracle of Battle can wade into melee whenever he wants. In Pathfinder, 24 hour buffs are effectively gone (As they should be) which means the cleric with his fewer spells per day, limited actions, and medium armor proficiency can't just walk around pretending to be a fighter like he can in 3.5.
You might say that a cleric makes a better healer because of the Channel Positive Energy class feature, which would be true, but an Oracle of Life gets that ability anyway, as well as Charisma-based casting, meaning the Oracle of Life will have many more Channels per day, even with 2 fewer base.
So with that in mind, I present a cleric prestige class meant to make clerics more interesting and active in Pathfinder. Yes, they might still be as powerful as they were in 3.5, but they require much more system mastery to be that way, and that's no fun for a casual player.
The Profanist
The Profanist is a powerful cleric of negative energy who is able to inflict devastating wounds upon his enemies and drown them in their own pain. Most Profanists are sadists, but that is not necessarily true of all of them. Sadistic or not, Profanists must be used to seeing creatures in pain and bleeding, or they won't last very long.
Prerequisites:
Alignment: Any non-good
Feats: Improved Channel, Selective Channel, Extra Channel
Special: Channel Negative Energy 3d6
Spellcasting: Must be able to cast inflict serious wounds as a divine spell
Hit Dice: d8
Class Skills: The Profanist's class skills are Craft, Intimidate, Knowledge (Religion), Profession, and Spellcraft.
Skill Points Per Level: 2+Int mod
{table=head]Level|Base Attack Bonus|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Special|Spellcasting
1st|
+0|
+2|
+0|
+2|Channel Negative Energy +1d6|
2nd|
+1|
+3|
+0|
+3|Bloody Channel|+1 level divine spellcasting
3rd|
+2|
+3|
+1|
+3|Channel Negative Energy +2d6|
4th|
+3|
+4|
+1|
+4|Blinding Channel|+1 level divine spellcasting
5th|
+3|
+4|
+1|
+4|Channel Negative Energy +3d6|
6th|
+4|
+5|
+2|
+5|Frightening Channel|+1 level divine spellcasting
7th|
+5|
+5|
+2|
+5|Channel Negative Energy +4d6|+1 level divine spellcasting
8th|
+6|
+6|
+2|
+6|Poisoning Channel|+1 level divine spellcasting
9th|
+6|
+6|
+3|
+6|Channel Negative Energy +5d6|+1 level divine spellcasting
10th|
+7|
+7|
+3|
+7|Master Channeller|+1 level divine spellcasting
[/table]
Class Features: The following are the class features of the Profanist prestige class.
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Profanists gain proficiency with the whip. A Profanist receives a +2 circumstance bonus on all Intimidate checks he makes while wielding a whip.
Channel Negative Energy (Su): At 1st level, the Profanist selects a single class that he is able to channel at least 3d6 dice of Negative Energy from. His Profanist levels stack with that class's levels to determine the DC to resist his Channel Negative Energy feature, and at each odd level, he increases the dice per channel by +1d6.
Spellcasting: At each level except 1st, 3rd, and 5th, the Profanist gains new spells per day, spells known, access to higher level spells, and an increased caster level as if he had gained a level in a divine spellcasting class he had previously belonged to. The Profanist may not increase his spellcasting for a divine class he belongs to that does not have inflict serious wounds on its spell list. If the Profanist belonged to more than one divine spellcasting class, he chooses one to advance at each even level.
Bloody Channel (Su): Starting at 2nd level, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he may choose to decrease the amount of dice he channels by 1d6. If he does so, each creature who fails its saving throw against the negative energy also gains the bleed condition, and bleeds for an additional 1d6 points of damage per round until the bleed condition is removed.
Blinding Channel (Su): Starting at 4th level, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he may choose to decrease the amount of dice he channels by 1d6. If he does so, each creature who fails its saving throw against the negative energy is also blinded for 1 minute.
Frightening Channel (Su): Starting at 6th level, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he may choose to decrease the amount of dice he channels by 1d6. If he does so, each creature who fails its saving throw against the negative energy is also shaken for 1 minute.
Poisoning Channel (Su): Starting at 8th level, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he may choose to decrease the amount of dice he channels by 1d6. If he does so, each creature who fails its saving throw against the negative energy also gains the following poison:
Injury; save Fort DC equal to the DC of the Profanist's Channel Negative Energy; frequency 1/round for 6 rounds; effect 1d4 Str damage; cure 1 save
If the Profanist decreases the amount of dice he channels by 2d6, the poison instead deals 1d4 Con damage and the cure is 2 saves.
Master Channeller (Su): At 10th level, the Profanist is a powerful disperser of negative energy. He gains 3 additional daily uses of his Channel Negative Energy feature. The DC for the save against his Channel Negative Energy feature increases by +2. When he uses the Selective Channeling feat, his Charisma score is treated as if it were 4 higher for the purposes of that feat only. Finally, whenever the Profanist channels negative energy to harm living creatures, he channels an additional dice of negative energy. This dice does not actually deal damage to any creatures, but it may be sacrificed as if it was a dice of damage for the purposes of any of the Profanist's class features.