Alternates to Turn Undead (3.5, Skyrim-themed)

[Kesnit]

My wife is putting together a Skyrim-themed 3.5 D&D game. She is thinking about letting classes that get Turn Undead swap out TU for something that thematically fits their deity. (She's using the Nine Divines, the Daedric Princes and the Night Mother.) No one has to trade off TU. This is just an option for those who want to.

This is what we have come up with so far:


NINE DIVINES

Akatosh
Breath weapon usable turn-attempts times per day. Damage=(Cleric level/2)d6

Arkay
Favored Enemy (Undead) as a Ranger of your Cleric level

Dibella
Charm Person/Monster as an SLA, turn-attempts/day. Saving throw is CHA based. (Both use the same turn pool.)

Julianos
All Knowledges are class skills. Gain 4 additions skill points per level that must be used for Knowledge skills

Kynareth
Turn Plants as undead

Mara
Sanctuary turn-attempts/day. Save is CHA based.

Stendarr
All attacks against demons and devils are considered "Good" for the purposes of overcoming DR.

Talos
All exotic melee weapons are class weapons. +(Cleric level/5) to hit with exotic melee weapons. (Barbarian, Fighter, and Paladin levels are all considered "Cleric" levels for purposes of this calculation)

Zenithar
Automatically gain magical crafting feats at the minimum required level (i.e. Forge Ring requires Caster level 12. Once you have 12 caster levels, you get the feat for free).



DAEDRIC PRINCES
Azura
Low-light vision, dark vision, or IR vision. (Whichever is one-step past what you get from your race)

Boethiah
May use Sneak Attack a number of times equal to your turn attempts. Damage is equal to the SA of a Rogue of your Cleric level. Rogue levels count as Cleric levels for determining SA damage.

Clavicus Vile
Gain a fae dog as an animal companion (as a Druid, but you cannot swap out your AC as you gain levels)

Hermaeus Mora
All Knowledges are class skills. Gain 4 additions skill points per level that must be used for Knowledge skills

Hircine
Can choose to become a werewolf. (Werewolf level-2) count as cleric levels.

Malacath
All exotic melee weapons are class weapons. +(Cleric level/5) to hit with exotic melee weapons. (Barbarian, Fighter, and Paladin levels are all considered "Cleric" levels for purposes of this calculation)

Mehrunes Dagon
Bluff, Gather Information, Intimidate, Sense Motive and Spot become class skills. Gain 3 skill points per level which must be used in those skills

Mephala
Gain Unholy Knowledge, which works like Bardic Knowledge, but is based on Wisdom rather than Intelligence

Merida
Turning replaced by Greater Turning, as per the Sun Domain (except all TU attempts are Greater Turn Attempts)

Molag Bal
Dominate as an 4th level SLA, usable turn-attempts/day. Save is CHA based.

Namira
Can choose to become a vampire. (Vampire levels-3) count as cleric levels.

Nocturnal
Gain Disable Device, Escape Artist, Move Silently, Open Lock and Sleight of Hand as class skills. Gain 3 skill points per level that must be used in those skills

Peryite
If infected by a disease and damage is taken from it, you become immune to that disease. Contagion may be prepared in a Domain slot.

Sanguine
1/2 turn-attempts/day: Randomized Summon Monster. Spell level cast is up to the highest you can cast. Creature summoned is randomly rolled. (i.e. If you can cast up to 5th level spells, when you use this ability, roll to determine which SM list - 1 through 5 - is used, then roll again on the appropriate list to see which monster appears.)

Sheogorath
1/2 turn-attempts/day: Randomized Baleful Polymorph. Rolls are done like Randomized Summon Monster for Sanguine. (So you may polymorph the enemy into Small Monstrous Spider or a Bearded Devil.)

Vaermina
Fear as an SLA, turn-attempts/day. Save is CHA based.


Night Mother
We aren't really sure, and are looking for ideas.


For Hircine and Namira, we're planning to use a progression that turns the templates into classes. (PCs can get the templates other ways as well.) I'm not sure losing 2 or 3 levels is sufficient to make up for the power of the template, but I figured they would be a decent starting guess. I'm open to suggestions on more appropriate adjustments.

Overall, what do people think of these ideas? Are some of them too good? Too bad?

[GhengisConrad]

For balancing, its always easier to take a different class and it's abilities, and change the names and flavors; rather than take a class and change its abilities.

Aren't turn attempts already Skyrim themed, as there is a ton of undead in that game?

[PurpleSocks]

Devotion feats & Divine Metamagic is way too huge, if your group has any optimisers none of them are going to give up Turn Undead unless you make it compatible with those feats.

[OldTrees1]

Devotion feats & Divine Metamagic is way too huge, if your group has any optimisers none of them are going to give up Turn Undead unless you make it compatible with those feats.

To avoid/fix this issue:
Have the alternate class features to Turn Undead also be able to power [Divine] feats and Devotion feats.

[Kesnit]

For balancing, its always easier to take a different class and it's abilities, and change the names and flavors; rather than take a class and change its abilities.

I don't understand what you are saying here. Do you mean rather than chance TU, we just refluff something from some other class? Or do you mean take abilities from other classes and give them in place of RU?


Aren't turn attempts already Skyrim themed, as there is a ton of undead in that game?

Yes, there are. She was just thinking of giving some kind of deity-appropriate ability, rather than the stock.


Devotion feats & Divine Metamagic is way too huge, if your group has any optimisers none of them are going to give up Turn Undead unless you make it compatible with those feats.


To avoid/fix this issue:
Have the alternate class features to Turn Undead also be able to power [Divine] feats and Devotion feats.

That was my wife's thought on the issue. I brought it up last night in the context of PrCs. In that case, she said "if the class just adds to Turn Undead, the alternate can be used. If the class changes Turn Undead into something else, then they can't use the alternate." (In other words, if the PrC says "X class stacks with Cleric to determine turn attempts per day," then they can consider the alternate to be TU for purposes of meeting pre-reqs. On the other hand, if the PrC changes how default TU works, then the PC has to have kept TU.)