Idea for Arcane Caster need brainstorming

[HereBeMonsters]

Ok so I was looking at the Spirit Shaman and I really like the base of it, the caster system and the spirit guide getting you listed number of spells each day.

So here is what I want to take from Spirit Shaman:
Access to its full spell list.
Massive amount of Spells per Day
Limited number of spells known per day.
To a degree the spirit guide

What I want to add:
Change Guide to familiar
Change spell list from Druid to Wizard/Sorcerer (Maybe the DMG witch with a a few more spells added)
Add a number of class features to make it not just a dip then rush into a PrC

Perhaps Invocations in addition to their spells?
Perhaps Domains (Similar to the PF Witch patron spells)

Any other ideas while we are brainstorming?

EDIT:
This spoiler is what I have so far.

http://i40.tinypic.com/2ed85fn.jpg
Familiar- Has basic mechanics of a familiar such as Share spell and so forth.
Two Patron Domains- Domain spells are always treated as spells known per day.
Patron Lore- Add half your character level rounded down to your knowledge checks both trained and untrained.

[bobthe6th]

So like a sorcerer that can change their spells on a daily basis, but with even fewer spells known?
Reasonable I guess.

[HereBeMonsters]

The only issue I might have is that it would have access to ALL spells on their list and just pick which spells it wants to choose each day. So at level twenty it could cast 6 spells per day of all spells save the 9th spell slow it only gets 5 of those.

[Xaotiq1]

Have you looked at the Sha'ir???

http://dndtools.eu/classes/shair/

[HereBeMonsters]

Its a good idea, but they lawyered that class into a cannot be played by anyone without a legal degree thing. I mean the rules on how long spells take the gather that you have both a spells known which takes several rounds per spell level of spells KNOWN to gather which makes no sense.. how are they known if the Gen needs to fetch them.

To the domain spells that could take days to collect and all his spells expire after 1 hour/Sha'ir class level. So at level 1 you have spells for 1 hour before ALL of the spells expire.

Nice idea horrible execution.

[Grod_The_Giant]

So like a sorcerer that can change their spells on a daily basis, but with even fewer spells known?
Reasonable I guess.
More like a wizard with a spellbook that contains every spell in the game and can never be taken away. And class features. Does wizard+ sound reasonable to anyone?

[PairO'Dice Lost]

More like a wizard with a spellbook that contains every spell in the game and can never be taken away. And class features. Does wizard+ sound reasonable to anyone?

Exactly. The spirit shaman is "merely" high Tier 2 because (A) the druid spell list is a few killer spells short of being a Tier 1 list on its own, (B) the spirit shaman's class features, while reasonably powerful in their niche, are still niche and nowhere near as versatile and powerful as wild shape, (C) the spirit shaman doesn't get any companion creatures, and (D) the spirit shaman is MAD in its casting stat.

Even just giving the base sorcerer with no class features at all beyond its familiar the spirit shaman casting method with no other changes would make it a very high T1 class because being able to access the entire wizard list on a daily basis is incredibly powerful. The only other class that gets something similar is the Mage of the Arcane Order, which makes you pay several feats and extended casting times for the privilege of doing so a limited number of times per day.

And then to suggest adding invocations, domains, and/or other real class features on top of that? No. Just no. You'd need to start with a much more limited spell list like, say, the wu jen's, before that would be at all reasonable.

[Grod_The_Giant]

The spirit shaman is "merely" high Tier 2 because (A) the druid spell list is a few killer spells short of being a Tier 1 list on its own, (B) the spirit shaman's class features, while reasonably powerful in their niche, are still niche and nowhere near as versatile and powerful as wild shape, (C) the spirit shaman doesn't get any companion creatures, and (D) the spirit shaman is MAD in its casting stat.
And even that is debatable.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

And even that is debatable.

This is true. I should probably have said that it's arguable as to whether it's T1 or T2, and the consensus seems to be that it's "merely" high T2 because of those four mitigating factors. Using the wizard list over the druid list obviously negates point A and most likely overshadows the other three points as well.

[HereBeMonsters]

And yet the Sha'ir is a class that is not considered OMG broken

[Eternis]

That's sort of because it's an incredibly complicated class that takes around a minute (OOC) to get even one spell that's in the supposed "known" category, and it'll delay the playing time by a truckload. No-one WANTS to play it, and even if they did, they'd get shanked by the morally ambiguous party member/evil PC-killing OP NPC on or before session 10. That, and the fact that there's a chance at not knowing the spell you want for the entire day, along with the time it takes in-game, you're likely to die very easily.
....#RulesLawyeringMakesYouThePunchingBag #NeverAgain

[HereBeMonsters]

Not sure where you got the idea that they have to deal with that kind of moral stuff from.

Their known spells are in rounds which are not very long at all. The minutes for unknown spell would hurt granted, which is why you prepare spells that will take minutes early before combat and if you need a pinch hit spell you use the spell known list to pull the quicker to call spells.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

And yet the Sha'ir is a class that is not considered OMG broken

The sha'ir is tier 1, though (or very near it, since as with the spirit shaman people do still debate its placement), and has superior downtime utility compared to the wizard. Its power is mostly reined in by its inability to reliably prepare spells at low levels, its susceptibility to ambushes, and its need to expand its spell list through familiarization rather than automatically knowing all of them...and of course the fact that few groups use the Dragon Compendium, so the sha'ir and its potential aren't as well known in the optimization community as the erudite or the archivist.

A class that can pick any spells it wants each day from the entire wizard list without jumping through the hoops of familiarizing itself with spells, rolling Diplomacy all the time, waiting minutes or hours between preparing each new spell, and so forth is better than a sha'ir and a wizard in all ways.


In case that didn't convince you, let's try a logical argument: Take a standard, by-the-book wizard, B. Let him cast any of his prepared spells in any combination instead of the exact combination he memorized and call this new version of the wizard T. You'd agree that T is more tactically versatile and powerful than B because he can apply his spells in more ways on the fly and can diversify his prepared spells a bit more, right? Now let's take a standard, by-the-book wizard and hand him a spellbook containing all the spells in the game instead of making him research them himself and call this new version of the wizard S. You'd agree that S is more strategically versatile and powerful than B because he has many more spells to choose from and can spend his wealth on magic items instead of expanding his spellbook, right?

Now let's apply both of those modifications to the standard, by-the-book wizard. If T is better than B in some situations and S is better than B in some situations, then T+S is either going to be better than B in more situations or is going to be a lot better than B in the same number of situations (likely both, depending on the amount of overlap of T and S). Is making a class that is much better than the wizard--the class most commonly held up as the most powerful and game-breaking class in the game--in some areas and merely somewhat better than the wizard is others, with no noticeable drawbacks relative to the wizard at all, really a good idea?

[Grod_The_Giant]

And yet the Sha'ir is a class that is not considered OMG broken
It's got an awkward preparatory mechanic, but yeah, assuming a favorable reading of the expired spells thing I'd put it pretty near the top of tier 1, with a lack of support as the most limiting factor.