Binders: Better Paladins than Paladins?

[Xuldarinar]

Looking through the tome of magic, a thought occurred to me. Could a single class binder make a better paladin than, well, a paladin. Hear me out on this one.

1. Andras: Weapon Proficiencies, a mount, Smite Good or Evil 1 per 5 rounds, Improved Critical with any weapon.

2. Tenebrous: Deeper darkness, see in darkness, touch of void 1 per 5 rounds, Turn/rebuke undead 1 per 5 rounds, Flicker 3/day

3. Kas (Dragon 341): On critical, permanently blind target. Can critical against and blind undead. +4 Bluff. 25% crit/sneak attack resistance, Ignore DR on Undead. More weapon proficiencies.

4.?

[Silva Stormrage]

Well aren't the better class features for paladin the mount, spell casting, and divine grace? Can the binder duplicate any of those well?

I don't particularly play binders or paladins much though so I am not sure.

[soveliss24]

Also, the amount of fluff change to justify this in my head hurts my brain. That may not be an issue for everyone though.

[The Viscount]

An imitation of divine grace can be replicated with setting all the pact bonuses to a bonus on saves, which can go as high as 4, about as high as an average paladin could expect.

Karsus allows use of spell trigger items as if a wizard, which doesn't get you the paladin list, but gets you spells.

Andras' mount as mentioned above is good enough to be a paladins, and his smite is just better.

If you really want to go all Zinc Saucier, Buer gives immunity to disease and poison, and Knight of the Sacred Seal has very paladin-esque fluff.

[Xuldarinar]

Well aren't the better class features for paladin the mount, spell casting, and divine grace? Can the binder duplicate any of those well?

I don't particularly play binders or paladins much though so I am not sure.


Andras provides the mount.

Karsus can allow a binder to use spell trigger items as a wizard of their binder level. Its not paladin spellcasting, but.. it is spellcasting in a sense.

Divine grace. I know of no vestiges that offer a similar bonus, and a Paladin/Binder loses access to divine grace.

[BladeofObliviom]

The short answer, really, is no. Paladins admittedly don't have too many great things going for them, since their spellcasting is just about useless and all of their class features after the first two or three levels aren't worth much.

Really, the only paladin abilities of value are Detect Evil (it's spammable, at least, and can let you spot ambushes coming), Smite Evil (which at least gives a decent boost to damage and accuracy, even if you can't use it as often as it would actually be helpful), Divine Grace (Which is actually really amazing if you focus on Charisma, as you should), and maybe Aura of Courage (since Paladins get low Will Saves, and a lot of monsters have fear effects).

The Binder proposed here does get a lot of nice plusses, like a great improvement on the Smite Evil ability due to increased uses and a whole lot of powers that the Paladin just doesn't get, but it doesn't get Divine Grace or the other goodies in those first few levels.


Although now that I think about it, dipping Paladin could power up a Binder, since they rely on Charisma anyway. Divine Grace with high charisma, combined with the Binder's naturally high saves (aside from reflex, which almost never matters on Save-or-Dies) means that a Binder/Paladin would be pretty much unstoppable against effects that allow saves.


EDIT: Why would a Paladin/Binder lose access to Divine Grace? Binder doesn't have any alignment requirements, and Vestiges aren't (technically) Evil creatures, so I don't see why consorting with them would cause a Paladin to fall.

[Xuldarinar]

From the tome of magic itself:

Paladin: A paladin who goes against the will of her deity with regard to pact magic -again, by taking levels as a binder- cannot use the divine grace ability.-

[Metahuman1]

Change "Make a deal with dead and semi forgotten X" to "Pray to my god/cause/powers of good for ability's."

There are Vestiges that provide Pounce, Ghost touch on all weapons and attacks, Stat boosts, the ability to hit everything in your movement speed, healing capability's and immunity's inline with paladin flavor and there's even one that gives you a mount and a lance and another that gives the mounted feats you always wanna take anyway.


I don't know of them getting the straight spell casting or divine grace straight class, but you know what, Dip which hunter and archivist and go Anima mage and it's the same thing for all practical intents and purposes, just more potent.

[Fax Celestis]

Tangent: A binder/paladin/tenebrous apostate might be interesting.

[BladeofObliviom]

From the tome of magic itself:

Paladin: A paladin who goes against the will of her deity with regard to pact magic -again, by taking levels as a binder- cannot use the divine grace ability.-

If you look at the same Sidebar, you'll likely notice that it also states that a Paladin or Cleric need not turn their back on their deity or their ideals to turn to Pact Magic.

Also, that only applies if the Paladin happens to worship a deity that frowns on Pact Magic, which is not even necessarily true.


Tangent: A binder/paladin/tenebrous apostate might be interesting.

Unfortunately, Tenebrous Apostate requires nongood. There's probably a way around it, but it's probably kind of silly. Like maybe dropping to neutral to take levels and then atoning.

Like I said, silly.

[mattie_p]

We had two binder entries into the Paladin Zinc Saucier Competition.

The Kindhearted Heretic (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=13826931&postcount=46) and Karania (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=13826931&postcount=46), who took 2nd place.

[Kuulvheysoon]

The short answer, really, is no. Paladins admittedly don't have too many great things going for them, since their spellcasting is just about useless and all of their class features after the first two or three levels aren't worth much.

Really, the only paladin abilities of value are Detect Evil (it's spammable, at least, and can let you spot ambushes coming), Smite Evil (which at least gives a decent boost to damage and accuracy, even if you can't use it as often as it would actually be helpful), Divine Grace (Which is actually really amazing if you focus on Charisma, as you should), and maybe Aura of Courage (since Paladins get low Will Saves, and a lot of monsters have fear effects).

The Binder proposed here does get a lot of nice plusses, like a great improvement on the Smite Evil ability due to increased uses and a whole lot of powers that the Paladin just doesn't get, but it doesn't get Divine Grace or the other goodies in those first few levels.


Although now that I think about it, dipping Paladin could power up a Binder, since they rely on Charisma anyway. Divine Grace with high charisma, combined with the Binder's naturally high saves (aside from reflex, which almost never matters on Save-or-Dies) means that a Binder/Paladin would be pretty much unstoppable against effects that allow saves.


EDIT: Why would a Paladin/Binder lose access to Divine Grace? Binder doesn't have any alignment requirements, and Vestiges aren't (technically) Evil creatures, so I don't see why consorting with them would cause a Paladin to fall.

It's actually a variant rule covered on page 14 of the Tome of Magic under the Heterodoxy and Heresy sidebar.

[BladeofObliviom]

Actually, taking a good look at it, Knight of the Sacred Seal advances pretty naturally from Paladin/Binder, and covers up most of the holes in the defense, too!

One of the "once per 5 rounds" abilities boosts Reflex Saves and AC based on Charisma, which is quite useful, and with an upgrade, becomes a full-party buff.

And then you get to be an Outsider (Native), which is a massive improvement over Humanoid in a lot of cases, with DR 10/Magic tossed on (presumably) for giggles.


It's actually a variant rule covered on page 14 of the Tome of Magic under the Heterodoxy and Heresy sidebar.

Yeah, I noticed that little detail. The same sidebar offers a way out of it, though, and it still would only apply to gods that actually care about it.

[Fax Celestis]

Actually, taking a good look at it, Knight of the Sacred Seal advances pretty naturally from Paladin/Binder, and covers up most of the holes in the defense, too!

There's also the (imo) underloved Witch Hunter PrC in that same book.

[Kuulvheysoon]

There's also the (imo) underloved Witch Hunter PrC in that same book.

I wouldn't say that it's under-loved, just more used as a dip for Mettle than as a serious Prestige Class.