Ideas for a class (PEACH) (Moved)

[Ralcos]

This class isn't anywhere near complete, but I just want some suggestions on how to develop it in a balanced way.

The concept itself is the descendant of a bloodline that gains his power from his own lineage, for his own purposes.




Inheritor
Ability Scores:
Alignment: Any allowed by the Inheritor’s chosen bloodline.
Hit Die: d8

Class Skills:
The Inheritor’s class skills are Climb (Str), Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Decipher Script (Int), Disable Device (Int), Gather Information (Cha), Jump (Str), Knowledge (All skills, taken individually)(Int), Perform (Cha), Profession (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), Swim (Str), and Use Rope (Int).

Skill Points: (4 + Int mod; x4 at 1st level)

Base Attack Bonus: Full (as Fighter)
Saving Throws: Good Will (as Wizard)

Class Features:
All Inheritors have the following class features.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency:
Inheritors are proficient with all simple weapons and all martial weapons, and are proficient with light armor (but no shields).

Bloodline:
All inheritors are special, for they can use their own blood as a power source (whether for good or for evil). A bloodline is chosen at 1st level, giving bonus feats and spell-like abilities as the character gains levels in the Inheritor class.
The choice has only one special rule: The bloodline must be the same race or of the same lineage of the race, if the bloodline has a race in its name (e.g. A half-elf is allowed to take any elven race bloodline, while an orc can only take the orc bloodline). An Inheritor can only take one bloodline.

At levels 1, 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, and 18, you gain a special ability, spell-like ability, or similar from your chosen bloodline.

At levels 2, 6, 12, and 18, you gain bonus feats from your chosen bloodline.

Racial Bloodlines

Base Bloodlines:
Elemental Bloodline
Draconic Bloodline
Infernal Bloodline
Abyssal Bloodline
Celestial Bloodline
Aberrant Bloodline
Ethereal Bloodline

[Palanan]

I would recommend removing the spoiler tags and presenting the class as a long OP. Almost all homebrew classes follow that format; some have sections which are spoilered, but yours isn't nearly long enough to need it. Much easier to read without the spoilers.

[ArcturusV]

As far as balance concerns go:

Chances are you want your Inheritor to have all day long stamina, you want to look towards Warlock as a balance comparison. You probably wouldn't go wrong with your Bloodline Inheritor being a version of the Warlock, and even their flavoring is somewhat similar.

If you want your Bloodline Powers to be more swingy, you're talking X per Day Uses and such, it gets harder to balance. There's a few key things to keep in mind about balance.

Most adventures, at least module based ones, tend to focus on X encounters per day, that number being 3-5. Some leeway for Random Encounters or the ability bypass an encounter in some way. But generally you're talking 3-5.

This is the problem the Monk, and the Paladin have, for example. They both get powers that they can't actually use that often. A Paladin can't even smite evil once per encounter until he hits level 20. A monk can only five finger death touch some guy once per week. The idea behind this failing is that it's not really FUN when you can't be what you're supposed to be most of the time. The flip side, where mileage may vary, is that it's more memorable in ways if you Smite Evil rarely, so each strike becomes more memorable as you save it up against a truly vile foe rather than dusting random brigands with it.

But that's the concern. You don't want to have a class that can't do it's thing all that often. Spellcasters at low level often complain about that. My level 1 wizard blows his wad in a single encounter, etc. But the flip side to that is that when the level 1 wizard blows his wad, he probably just single handedly won the fight. So it's a trade.

So you want to keep that in mind. You want to look at your powers like: "I can use them all the time" but keeping them relatively minor compared to high impact stuff like spellcasting. Keep them to uses per day but being mindful of the pacing of an average adventure day. If you want to mimic something like Smite Evil, with the feel that each Smite should be memorable, you should make it more effective than the standard smite. Here's what I mean:

A second level paladin has ONE smite per day. So he needs to choose it wisely, use it against the biggest, baddest thing he can, right? But what does he get for his one smite attack per day? Probably a +2 Charisma bonus to the attack roll, and +2 damage on the strike if it hits. Not exactly awe inspiring power. You MIGHT argue this helps him power attack, but he can still only shave off 2 on to Hit, because it's capped by the Base Attack Bonus (regardless of the Smite to hit buff, so not like he can rock out +4 instead). All in all, your one a day isn't that impressive. So you want to have your one a day be more effective, more splashy than a Paladin's smite.

The other concern, if you do limited per day, is how you want it to go. Is this going to be like spell casting where they might "blow their wad" in a single encounter? If so it should be worthwhile. But you should also consider trading it off for a weaker chassis when they don't have cosmic power to rely upon. As they level, get more and better powers. Following spellcaster sort of gimmicks, not a bad way to go.

The other option is to have a more generalist feel, and this is probably "better" for low level play, if that's your concern. Have the powers limited to 1/day. Have a more 'robust' frame to the class, d6/d8 HD, 6 skills points, good skill selection, etc. Have the Powers be something that allows them to spike and do something amazing, or just be decent all day long. Example:

You have something like the Orc Blood Inheritor Power, Orcish Blood Rage. When the power hasn't been activated yet, it's just "stored" and ready, anytime that blood is spilled (Someone hits with a lethal attack) within 15' of the Inheritor, they get a +1 Divine bonus to Attack, Damage, Intimidate until the end of the round. The Orc Blood Inheritor may expend this power to fuel a strike with the rage of the orcish species. He gains a bonus to attack equal to his level, another bonus equal to his level if he is injured (Taken HP damage, nonlethal damage, ability damage), and another bonus equal to his level if his target is injured. The attack deals double damage, triple if the Inheritor is Injured, if the target is already injured they are shaken for Charisma Modifier (At least 1) rounds.

Side note: You may want to have extra class skills based on bloodline. Similar to say, Half-Dragon Paragons. So you have a core of class skills, and then something like "If Orc: Add Intimidate and Survival", "If Demon: Add Bluff and Sleight of Hand", etc.