True Evoker [evocation caster, PEACH]

[Belial_the_Leveler]

True Evoker

Because our favorite WotC sorceress got it right;
If fire doesn't work, you aren't using enough.

Class Skills: The True Evoker's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Decipher Script (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Knowledge (All) (Int), Profession (Wis), Speak Language (N/A), Spellcraft (Int), Use Magic Device (Cha).
Skill Points at 1st Level: (2 + Int modifier) x 4.
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 2 + Int modifier.
Proficiencies: Simple Weapons, Light Armor. No spell failure from light armor.
Hit Die: d6

{table=head]Level|
BAB|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|
Special Abilities|Spellcasting

1st|
+0|
+0|
+0|
+2|
cantrips, mastered spell (1st)|
1st, evocation master

2nd|
+1|
+0|
+0|
+3|
mastered spell (1st)|

3rd|
+1|
+1|
+1|
+3|
mastered spell (1st)|
2nd

4th|
+2|
+1|
+1|
+4|
inner fire|
energy master

5th|
+2|
+1|
+1|
+4|
mastered spell (2nd)|
3rd

6th|
+3|
+2|
+2|
+5|
mastered spell (2nd)|

7th|
+3|
+2|
+2|
+5|
mastered spell (2nd)|
4th

8th|
+4|
+2|
+2|
+6|
arcane fuel|
light/force master

9th|
+4|
+3|
+3|
+6|
mastered spell (3rd)|
5th

10th|
+5|
+3|
+3|
+7|
mastered spell (3rd)|
metamagic power 1

11th|
+5|
+3|
+3|
+7|
mastered spell (3rd)|
6th

12th|
+6/+1|
+4|
+4|
+8|
incinerate|

13th|
+6/+1|
+4|
+4|
+8|
mastered spell (4th)|
7th

14th|
+7/+2|
+4|
+4|
+9|
mastered spell (4th)|
metamagic power 2

15th|
+7/+2|
+5|
+5|
+9|
mastered spell (4th)|
8th

16th|
+8/+3|
+5|
+5|
+10|
banefire|

17th|
+8/+3|
+5|
+5|
+10|
mastered spell (5th)|
9th

18th|
+9/+4|
+6|
+6|
+11|
mastered spell (5th)|

19th|
+9/+4|
+6|
+6|
+11|
mastered spell (5th)|
metamagic power 3

20th|
+10/+5|
+6|
+6|
+12|
Destroyer|
metamagic power 4
[/table]

Cantrips
A True Evoker begins play knowing a number of cantrips equal to her charisma modifier. Those can be from any spell list and are castable at will. Whenever her charisma modifier permanently increases, she gets a new cantrip known.

Spell list and spells known.
A True Evoker has access to all evocation spells of a level equal to half her class level or less (round up), regardless of class, except for spells that require the direct intervention of a deity; if a spell appears on different levels in multiple lists, the True Evoker chooses which version to use. At the end of an 8-hour rest she can spend 10 minutes to memorize a number of them equal to her charisma modifier plus 1/3 her class level (round down). Those are her spells known for the day.
At 4th level, she adds to her list all fire, cold, electricity, acid and sonic spells that deal damage.
At 8th level, she adds to her list all Force and Light spells, even if they aren't evocation spells - they count as evocation spells for her.
Limitations: A True Evoker never benefits from items, feats, abilities, spells and class features that add spells known to her list that her base abilities could not add anyway.

Spellcasting.
True Evokers don't have spell slots. Once per 3 rounds, they can cast one of their known spells they prepared for the day of any level up to the level indicated in the column "spellcasting". While they need to prepare the spells, they can add metamagic on the fly, during the casting; maximum spell level is still limited as shown on the table - but True Evokers of sufficient power can increase the spell level beyond their normal maximum as shown in the table in "metamagic power". That does not increase the casting time.
In addition, True Evokers master a number of evocation spells as shown in the table special abilities. They can cast those spells at will instead of once per 3 rounds. The mastered spells can be metamagicked versions of low-level spells but if they are, the metamagic is a permanent part of the spell mastered and can't be changed.
Limitations: A True Evoker never benefits from metamagic cost reduction of any sort or automatic application of metamagic to her major spells. Metamagic rods may still be applied to her mastered spells only.
At the end of an encounter or scene or 5 minutes (whichever is longer), any lasting magic effects cast by the True Evoker that are either non-stationary or cast on creatures automatically end.

Inner Fire
A True Evoker has a pool of raw power with a number of points equal to her charisma modifier. At the beginning of her turn she can distribute those points as follows on a 1 for 1 basis;
add a resistance bonus to her saving throws
add an enhancement bonus to a worn armor or shield or weapon
grant such a bonus to someone else.
A True Evoker of at least 8th level may expend her greater magic (with the normal recovery period following) to burn away 1 point of ability damage, ability drain or negative level per level of the greater magic expended to the creature touched (which can be herself).
Limitations: A True Evoker that is affected by a beneficial magic that isn't instantaneous or permanent gets the bonus normally for 1 round. At the end of that round, the True Evoker's Inner Fire burns away the effect. Negative magical effects still apply normally and permanent magic items can still be used.

Arcane Fuel
For the True Evoker, all magic is fuel. She can see any such fuel within her line of sight as if by an Arcane Sight spell. Whenever one of her evocation spells strikes a creature, object or area affected by ongoing magic, there is a chance that magic will burn away. She makes an uncapped dispel check against such ongoing spells, ending a total of spell levels up to the level of the magic she used. I.e. a fireball could end up to 3 levels of spells while a meteor swarm would end 9. If a protection spell is ended, it offers no protection to the creature against the spell. At 13th level and higher, this ability may end even spells that cannot normally be dispelled such as curses, permanent transformations, walls of force and antimagic fields. At 17th level and higher, the removal happens automatically without a dispel check, as if the effects were disjoined instead.
Limitation: Neither the True Evoker herself nor her allies get any special protection from the effect; a True Evoker should always be careful where she puts that fireball.

Incinerate
At 12th level and higher, creatures hit by the True Evoker's spells cannot regenerate or fast heal that round. Healing magic must make successful opposed CL checks to function on them that round. This only applies to damage dealt by the True Evoker via her spells, not other sources.

Banefire
At 16th level and higher, damage-dealing spells cast by the True Evoker cannot be countered. As an immediate action, a True Evoker can cast an evocation spell (mastered or greater) to counter any spell or magical ability of the spell's level or lower by burning it away.

Destroyer
At 20th level, the True Evoker's magic has become truly lethal. It ignores hardness and deals half damage to creatures immune to its damage type or with magic immunity. The saving throw DC for any massive damage checks due to damage dealt rises to 10 + 1/2 the True Evoker's class level + the True Evoker's charisma modifier.

[Alias]

A True Evoker has access to all evocation spells of a level equal to half her class level or less (round up), regardless of class

Uhm, no. I was getting ready to post a thread on a new school, Evocation (Invocation) and am still going to do so, but that entire sub-school would be off limits to this class (or any other arcane caster).

I'll look at the rest later, but be careful with blanket declarations.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Uhm, no. I was getting ready to post a thread on a new school, Evocation (Invocation) and am still going to do so, but that entire sub-school would be off limits to this class (or any other arcane caster).

So because you're making homebrew X, homebrew Y has to accommodate that? That seems unreasonable.

I see no issue with his wording: it's much easier to give access to all evocation spells than it is to do something like "all evocation spells from the bard, duskblade, wizard, and cleric lists." He doesn't have to change his wording just because it would raise compatibility issues with homebrew he didn't make. If a blanket "all 3.5 evocation spells" is what he wanted then his text is fine.

[Belial_the_Leveler]

The True Evoker isn't an arcane spellcaster. She's an evocation spellcaster. You could have a True Evoker that only casted divine evocation or one that casted only arcane evocation or one that mixed it up as a personal preference and those spells would still be arcane or divine individually, with no bearing on the rules of the class.
Think of it like this; would a Mystic Theurge be able to learn your homebrewed divine-only spells while still learning arcane spells? And would their saving throw DC still depend on charisma if she was a Sorceress/Sujenja/Mystic Theurge?
The answer being yes, the True Evoker would work exactly like that. Except, you know, for the whole spell slots thing.

[Alias]

So because you're making homebrew X, homebrew Y has to accommodate that? That seems unreasonable.

It's not unreasonable to expect that others might be doing other things with such core components as a school. Maybe its just my programming background, and needing to understand that mucking with what is equivalent to the 'global namespace' is very bad. In any event, the wording is ambiguous at best, and imprecise.


I see no issue with his wording: it's much easier to give access to all evocation spells than it is to do something like "all evocation spells from the bard, duskblade, wizard, and cleric lists." He doesn't have to change his wording just because it would raise compatibility issues with homebrew he didn't make. If a blanket "all 3.5 evocation spells" is what he wanted then his text is fine.


The True Evoker isn't an arcane spellcaster. She's an evocation spellcaster. You could have a True Evoker that only casted divine evocation or one that casted only arcane evocation or one that mixed it up as a personal preference and those spells would still be arcane or divine individually, with no bearing on the rules of the class.
Think of it like this; would a Mystic Theurge be able to learn your homebrewed divine-only spells while still learning arcane spells? And would their saving throw DC still depend on charisma if she was a Sorceress/Sujenja/Mystic Theurge?
The answer being yes, the True Evoker would work exactly like that. Except, you know, for the whole spell slots thing.

Invocations come from gods. It doesn't matter what kind of magic you have access to, you aren't using invocation spells without a god's patronage. If you play a cleric of the philosophy of the flying spaghetti monster you can use all the cleric spells you want except the invocations. Their power is directly sourced.

The only reason the school is a subset of evocation is that they still involve channeling power. But where most of the evocation spells channel power there for the taking by anyone with the will to harness it, invocations "invoke" the power of a specific entity. This goes down to the very etymology of the words "invoke" and "evoke" themselves.

Now, heading into my lunch break I've read over this, and my first impression is broken. You are seeking to make a sorcerer limited to one school, but with free reign over that school. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. While evocation as a school has about the same number of spells as a sorcerer eventually gets in Core, in Pathfinder extended (Core, Ultimate Magic, Ultimate Combat, Advanced Player's Guide, Advanced Race Guide) the school balloons out to about 200 spells. My own setting adds another 100 through new spells and reassignments to the invocation subschool. This is a far higher number of spells than any individual spontaneous caster in the game normally learns by an order of magnitude.

And then on top of that, you add in any spell that "deals damage"???

Finger of Death deals damage in order to balance the thing, and it sure as heck isn't an evocation - it's a necromancy through and through. As are the inflict spells. And I could go on for pages rattling off spells in the *core* that shouldn't be folded into evocation but that deal damage (like pretty much all the conjuration (creation) effects).

That you associate "damage dealing" with evocation shows a fundamental lack of understanding of what the school is. The picture of Chandra from the MtG setting should be another clue of this. I happen to know a bit about Magic since my setting is strongly inspired by it, and I can tell you this - evocation might be red magic's strongest suit, but it isn't red's exclusive province. Sending is an evocation, but it's blue. As is wind wall. Most of the invocations are white or black.

Point being, reading over your class description it became clear quickly that you was leaving behind the concept of the school of Evocation in favor of a burn mage. I happen to have a burn wizard as well, but your's is hella overpowered compared to mine - and I consider mine to be pushing the limits about as far as is safe. One major taboo you made - you let your class get access to 6th and higher level magics faster than any existing class, and at 20th your class is gunning 13th level spells (which normally require 27th level in the Epic Level Handbook since epic casters only get 1 feat / 2 levels and must spend feat slots to gain spell slots past 9th level)

No one is going to take your class seriously unless you tone the power down seriously. Right now it's utterly broken.

[Amechra]

He's actually not getting his max level spells at a higher rate; he just has the table, which has the metamagic increase to levels already factored in, designed in such a way that it is a confusing mess.

Please, Belial, have a separate class feature that gives you extra levels for the purposes of metamagic. Please.

[Belial_the_Leveler]

Your campaign world - up to you. Though I don't see why the cleric who channels the power of the Abyss - the primordial Chaos and Evil in the heart of Creation - would need to worship anything as ephemeral and insignificant as a god in order to cast Blasphemy and Word of Chaos, or to corrupt reality itself through a chaotic evil Miracle.


You are seeking to make a sorcerer limited to one school, but with free reign over that school. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. While evocation as a school has about the same number of spells as a sorcerer eventually gets in Core, in Pathfinder extended (Core, Ultimate Magic, Ultimate Combat, Advanced Player's Guide, Advanced Race Guide) the school balloons out to about 200 spells. My own setting adds another 100 through new spells and reassignments to the invocation subschool. This is a far higher number of spells than any individual spontaneous caster in the game normally learns by an order of magnitude.
Ah, here I see where you're coming from. And I'm happy to say it doesn't work as you believe;
1) A True Evoker of 20th level with a Charisma Modifier of +10 will be able to memorize 16 major spells in a day. Those are her spells known for that day, period. Sort of how the Spirit Shaman can recover a number of different spells each time he rests from the entire druid list.

2) A True Evoker casts 1 major spell per 3 rounds. Assuming a fight lasts long enough to cast 2 of them (i.e. up to 6 rounds), over a day with 4-5 encounters, she will have cast 8 major spells. Those spells will be 9th level plus metamagic for a high-level true evoker. In the other rounds during those same combats, she'll cast a total of 16-20 evocations of 5th level or less.
For comparison, a Sorceror 20 has seven-eight 9th level spell slots (counting bonus slots) and can either add metamagic to them in several ways or cast lesser spells that boost spells or spell combos that effectively boost spells. So in "nova" power they are matched.
The sorceror also has a grand total of 74 spell slots of 8th level or less, nearly triple the spells known, access to different schools of magic and so on and so forth. In short, the True Evoker needs her special abilities just to come close.



A Finger of Death (or inflict spell) normally channels negative energy to snuff out someone's life. The True Evoker doesn't copy that. She copies the method of the spell - but instead channels fire to boil the target's blood and blow him out from the inside out. Or channels force to reach out and crush his heart. Or acid to melt his bones. In short, she copies methods of damage-dealing but makes Evocation versions of those spells.


Evocation is the school that channels/projects force and energy - either elemental/cosmic energy (for arcane) or alignment/divine energy (for divine). And yes, a Red mage from M:tG does not exactly translate to an Evoker. The channelers from the Wheel of Time series are significantly closer.
But that doesn't preclude the True Evoker from focusing on the "burn" aspect of Evocation. It was the simplest approach for a focused class.

I'll do the "force-manipulation" and the "alignment-channeling" aspects as alternate class features or sets of class options in the future.

[Belial_the_Leveler]

OK, the selling points of the class kinda got lost on the whole discussion on how it shouldn't have all evocation or it shouldn't have alignment-based spells and how it is or isn't a sorcerer/blast mage and the like. So, here is why I made this class in the first place;


Easy-to-play spellcaster; No need to decide on dozens of spells to memorize and a half-dozen additional features to be chosen from a list of too many stuff.

Tier 3 spellcaster; Primary ability is blasting people with magical energy. While it has some nice tricks (some evocation spells are quite good), it can't even come close to "doing everything"; it lacks the usual tricks of spellcasters such as teleportation, summoning, shapeshifting, illusions, most protective magic and so on.

Plays nice with noncasters; Its attacks are mostly damage that stacks with the attacks of noncasters instead of overlapping or invalidating them and its special abilities make it stronger vs magic, not vs melee.

Optimization ceiling; Because its attacks mostly deal damage and have time limits rather than slot lmits, it ends up doing at most 200-230 damage once per 3 rounds (subject to both saves and spell resistance), and up to ~80 damage (subject to spell resistance and either saves or touch AC) for a normal round.
While this doesn't mean it can't be broken if someone really tries, it has a) much lower optimization potential than most other spellcasters and b) its combat effectiveness fluctiates much less with player skill. (a maxed meteor swarm is a maxed meteor swarm)

No world-breaking; With the limitation that any effect it creates with a duration is limited to 5 minutes, any effects that might have been problematic if unchecked are now self-correcting.

No 15-min workday; Since it doesn't use spells per day, there is nothing that would lead to the usual problem of DnD spellcasters of wanting to fight once then leave the party out to hang while they're resting.

[Amechra]

You do realize that Miracle is Evocation, right?

Essentially giving them any spell of up to 7th level every 3 rounds.

[Belial_the_Leveler]

Huh. I missed that one. Guess there are still loopholes that have to be patched up. While I'm at it, I think I'll eschew the spell conversion from other schools, or make it an optional feature.