Abandoned by Luck (PrC)

[Jallorn]

The Overlooked

Whether abandoned by, or hidden from, fate as a punishment, blessing, or simply chance, the result is the same, a being who can never rely on luck to get through life. Luck, good or bad, is something that happens to other people. These are the Overlooked. Their course in the future isn't simply hard to chart, it's impossible. They have no fate, and somehow, even the wisest of gods tends to overlook them at some stage in their schemes. Overlooked can find this state of being to be either a blessing or a curse, but almost never will they be unchanged by this. Their position as a spanner in the works makes them a target for anyone, mortal or divine, who schemes; they simply can't help but mess things up, they do it just by existing.

Requirements:
Skills: 8 ranks in any three skills.
Feats: Must not have any Luck feats.
Saves: +4 Ref or +4 Will or +4 Fort

Hit Dice: d8

Skill Points: 6+Int Modifier
Skills: Overlooked select 6+Int modifer skills to count as class skills or 10 skills, whichever is higher.



Level
Base Attack Bonus
Fort Save
Ref Save
Will Save
Special


1
+*
+0
+0
+0
Luckless, Path of Mastery, Just that Good


2
+*
+0
+0
+0



3
+*
+1
+1
+1
Anathema to Fate +1


4
+*
+1
+1
+1
Hidden from the Gods


5
+*
+1
+1
+1



6
+*
+2
+2
+2
Anathema to Fate +2


7
+*
+2
+2
+2



8
+*
+2
+2
+2



9
+*
+3
+3
+3
Anathema to Fate +3


10
+*
+3
+3
+3
True Mastery



The Overlooked does not gain any new weapon or armor proficiencies.

Luckless: Overlooked cannot rely on luck, it simply doesn't visit them. This also includes bad luck, however. As a result, Overlooked always know exactly what they are capable of; there is a certainty to their lives, whether certain failure or certain success. Overlooked no longer roll dice. Any time they would roll a die, they instead simply count the result as half the die size. A d20 therefore counts as a 10, while a d4 is a 2 and a d12 is a 6. The sole exception to this is when determining hit points at level up. Furthermore, he may never gain a luck feat.

Path of Mastery: Overlooked come from all walks of life, but all of them can find common ground in the level of devotion they pour into what they do. At first level, an Overlooked picks one of three paths to master, that of the Warrior, the Thief, or the Mage.

*An Overlooked who chooses the Path of the Warrior gains a good Base Attack Bonus and a bonus feat at every level of Overlooked that cannot be a luck feat.
*An Overlooked who chooses the Path of the Thief gains an average Base Attack Bonus and gains a Sneak Attack progression at every odd level. If the Overlooked already has another form of precision damage, such as the Scout's Skirmish ability, he may choose to improve that ability instead of gaining a Sneak Attack progression. He may only improve one such kind of precision damage this way. He also gains a bonus feat at levels 2, 5, and 8, that may not be a luck feat.
*An Overlooked who chooses the Path of the Mage gains a poor Base Attack Bonus and improves one spellcasting or psionic class's casting as if he had gained a level in that class at every level except first.

Just that Good: An Overlooked, stripped of the blinder of luck, has a deep insight into what really works well. As a result, they gain a bonus to all checks that would normally be a d20 roll equal to one half their class level, rounded up.

Anathema to Fate: At level 3, an Overlooked develops an understanding of the ways fate and luck aid others, and how to sever these ties. They gain a +1 bonus per damage die to all damage results. This bonus increases by 1 at level 6 and again at level 9.

Hidden from the Gods: At level 4, an Overlooked has sufficiently adjusted to existing outside fate that others, Divine or mortal, find it difficult to remember to plan for him, or to find him in divinations. Any divination attempting to predict the actions the Overlooked will take in the future automatically fails, in fact, as far as the prediction is concerned, the Overlooked doesn't exist. The Overlooked gains a bonus equal to their class level against divination attempts made to detect the Overlooked in the present, such as scry. In addition, any being with a divine rank has a 20% chance of not being able to detect the Overlooked through the divination per divine rank (10% chance for DR0), even if the attempt is otherwise successful. They still see or otherwise detect the location the Overlooked is in, they just can't detect the Overlooked himself. This applies even if the Overlooked is not the target of the divination, but merely in its area.

True Mastery: At level 10, an Overlooked is truly the master of his own fate. With true skill unprotected by luck, the Overlooked can achieve that which would normally be achievable only with luck's aid. A number of times per day equal to the Overlooked's highest ability modifier, the Overlooked may count a single d20 check as a critical success or critical hit. The Overlooked also increases the bonus gained from Just that Good by +1.

[Jallorn]

Right off the bat, I had thought that choosing a Path would give me a better relevant Save. Fortitude for Warrior, Reflex for Thief, Will for Mage, especially considering your requirements to get into the class.

Except due to Just that Good, I decided to keep saves poor.


Luck Feats aren't all that superb, and just because you can't choose one doesn't really necessitate the need to get a bonus feat at every level in the Warrior Path. The Fighter only gets one at 1st and every even level, but he doesn't get anything else: He doesn't get 6+Int skills of any ten he wants, or any other class features. Feats are his only thing.

I have 0 problem with the class being strictly better than vanilla Fighter. Vanilla Fighter is a boring, underpowered class. That said, part of the reason the Path of the Warrior gets feats at every level was to avoid dead levels. And the restriction on Luck Feats isn't a mitigator, it's just a case of crunch obeying fluff.


Anathema to Fate is nifty.

There's many more spells of Divination other than just Scry. What about divination spells that don't require a save to resist?

Yeah, that's something I need to look into. Ideas would be appreciated.


Just That Good, especially with the cap, seems... wonk. +6 to any d20 roll? Nevermind skill checks or attack rolls, that is including Initiative (Which is the equivalent of +12 Dexterity), ability checks (+12 in any individual score), Saves (+12 in relevant score), Caster Level Checks vs Anything (+6 CL, which is actually pricy as hell to achieve). It seems innocent enough, but that kinda thing can snowball once you realize what you really have.

And in regards to Luckless, I'd say make it an option when rolling. Otherwise you get such things as a Wizard using Empowered spells, and never dealing as much damage as a Maximized. Each d6 of a spell will only get a 4.5 result, as opposed to 6 if maximized, when actually rolling a 4, 5 or 6 would get a better result when Empowered.

Luckless was the starting concept of the class, so no, it's not going to be optional. Also, Just that Good goes along with it. What's really happening is the class is getting an 11 on every d20 roll at first level, 12 at 3rd, etc. up to 16 at 10th. Anathema to Fate fixes the damage dice downside. Admittedly, the first level is a drop for mages, but by level 9 anyone rolling d6s for damage is dealing full damage, and even higher dice, while not maximum damage, is above average. Always. This class trades range of potential for a narrow certainty.


One of the things I don't really like about the Handbooks and a lot of power gaming is that it shoehorns people into certain classes and combinations. With this class... I feel like if it was official material, people would flock to it for the same reason people flock towards Uberchargers, Clericzillas and the like. You're very much behind everyone else if you don't take it, so you avoid taking much anything else.

I was trying to avoid that, but I was afraid I may have loaded the class with a little too much. I ran out of ideas for class features, and knowing that I needed some form of casting progression if I expected casters to take the class, I tried to say, "Fighters get just as much from the class as casters."

[Cardea]

I have 0 problem with the class being strictly better than vanilla Fighter. Vanilla Fighter is a boring, underpowered class. That said, part of the reason the Path of the Warrior gets feats at every level was to avoid dead levels. And the restriction on Luck Feats isn't a mitigator, it's just a case of crunch obeying fluff.
If you wanted to avoid dead levels, I'd recommend looking at what WotC did with their dead level articles. They didn't give the Fighter more feats, they let him choose to get bonuses to one of three physical checks at each previously-dead level. And even if you were trying to avoid dead levels, only four levels are technically 'empty' with Path of the Warrior, not including feats.

Luckless was the starting concept of the class, so no, it's not going to be optional. Also, Just that Good goes along with it. What's really happening is the class is getting an 11 on every d20 roll at first level, 12 at 3rd, etc. up to 16 at 10th. Anathema to Fate fixes the damage dice downside. Admittedly, the first level is a drop for mages, but by level 9 anyone rolling d6s for damage is dealing full damage, and even higher dice, while not maximum damage, is above average. Always. This class trades range of potential for a narrow certainty.
Except that's not how its actually functioning. d20s are stuck at 10, and you're adding a bonus to it. If it was treated as a 16 at 10th level, getting a critical range of 15-20 would result in always critting. The die result might be the same, but its still a matter of the die roll being 10.

I was trying to avoid that, but I was afraid I may have loaded the class with a little too much. I ran out of ideas for class features, and knowing that I needed some form of casting progression if I expected casters to take the class, I tried to say, "Fighters get just as much from the class as casters."
Saying that, however, just creates more of a problem, rather than trying to fix something. Casters are going to get infinitely more from a class that progresses Spellcasting just by virtue of having spells, compared to Fighters who aren't. Throwing more feats at them isn't going to make them get as much. There was a PSA some guy posted up in the Homebrew Design section a ways back saying that just because a Wizard can do worse is by no means a reason to bloat up non-casters with too much, which is what you've effectively done, but moreso because a Caster can take the same class and reap more benefits, because Spells > Feats.

Don't get me wrong, I like the idea behind the class. But it'd create a vacuum of power in any game it was in.

[Jallorn]

If you wanted to avoid dead levels, I'd recommend looking at what WotC did with their dead level articles. They didn't give the Fighter more feats, they let him choose to get bonuses to one of three physical checks at each previously-dead level. And even if you were trying to avoid dead levels, only four levels are technically 'empty' with Path of the Warrior, not including feats.

Except that's not how its actually functioning. d20s are stuck at 10, and you're adding a bonus to it. If it was treated as a 16 at 10th level, getting a critical range of 15-20 would result in always critting. The die result might be the same, but its still a matter of the die roll being 10.

Saying that, however, just creates more of a problem, rather than trying to fix something. Casters are going to get infinitely more from a class that progresses Spellcasting just by virtue of having spells, compared to Fighters who aren't. Throwing more feats at them isn't going to make them get as much. There was a PSA some guy posted up in the Homebrew Design section a ways back saying that just because a Wizard can do worse is by no means a reason to bloat up non-casters with too much, which is what you've effectively done, but moreso because a Caster can take the same class and reap more benefits, because Spells > Feats.

Don't get me wrong, I like the idea behind the class. But it'd create a vacuum of power in any game it was in.

Fair. Suggestions for fixing the bloat?

As for Luckless and Just that Good, it seems to me that the ability is therefore weaker than, "The die result is 10+X," so what are you arguing here? I wanted to avoid always getting crits, since they're usually feats of luck moreso than skill.

[Realms of Chaos]

So this class takes up a full half of your career, gets only a small handful of features with dead levels galore before adding your "path", and you're worried about this thing being too bloated? Have you considered, say, reducing this to a plain old 5-level class?

You could give Luckless at level 1, some ability to specifically control d%s at level 3, a weakened true mastery at level 5, and just give "just that good" at even levels (giving +1 at level 2 and +2 at level 4, allowing you to take 12 on d20 rolls, which a certain martial stance already allows in most ways). If everything is shrunk down enough, it might seem a lot more splashable.

Also, I am disappointed that the HD is listed as "d8" instead of "4". For shame!

[Jallorn]

So this class takes up a full half of your career, gets only a small handful of features with dead levels galore before adding your "path", and you're worried about this thing being too bloated? Have you considered, say, reducing this to a plain old 5-level class?

You could give Luckless at level 1, some ability to specifically control d%s at level 3, a weakened true mastery at level 5, and just give "just that good" at even levels (giving +1 at level 2 and +2 at level 4, allowing you to take 12 on d20 rolls, which a certain martial stance already allows in most ways). If everything is shrunk down enough, it might seem a lot more splashable.

Also, I am disappointed that the HD is listed as "d8" instead of "4". For shame!

Thanks RoC, always good to hear from an expert.

You raise an excellent point about condensing the class. I will have to give it thought. Also, HD are exempt from Luckless. Although that does make it somewhat more humorous.