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View Full Version : Binder [Epic Progression and Vestiges]



Xeran
2007-03-29, 08:14 PM
EPIC BINDER

The Binder is such an interesting and fun class to play I wanted a way to keep that edge of power in Epic levels without having to resort to a PrC.

First , your EBL (Effective Binder Level) would continue to increase as normal, as would your Binder Check Modifier.

After that, things could go as follows.

Lvl
21: Prime Vestige
22: Greater Pact Augmentation
23: Bonus Feat
24:
25: Bonus Feat, Greater Pact Augmentation
26: Bonus Feat
27:
28: Greater Pact Augmentation
29: Bonus Feat
30:

The Prime Vestige is effectively a Vestige with a Maximum Vestige Level of 9, and only one of these powerful Vestiges can be hosted at a time. Making a Pact with such a powerful entity is an hour long ceremony of binding, and the pact lasts for one week. Prime Vestiges cannot be expelled. A few Prime Vestiges will be explained later.

Greater Pact Augmentation is like the normal ability excepot it has better abilities applicable and it's effects do not stack. One ability would be Spell Resistance, perhaps 10+level. Another might be Fast Healing. Perhaps others including alternate forms like the ability to become incorporeal etc.

Bonus feats are fairly standard in Epic classes. They are on a tree level progression save for the one at level 25, which is a continuation of the established pattern set by the base class, and so takes precedent. I have yet to think of applicable Bonus Feats for the Binder Epic Feat list.

Well, that is about it. Now on to Prime Vestiges.

Arioch, Lord of the Seven Darks [DC=45]
(Yes, this is from the Elric Books)
Arioch, the manifestation of Chaos, is a being of seven forms, seven powers, seven signs. Seven is his number and to be influenced by him is to be turned into an agent for chaos.
Legend: Arioch is one of the most primal entities in the multiverse. He exists beyond reality, and no mortal convention can truely capture what he is. However, many scholars rely on the description of famed Binder Syfal. He said he was the physical representation of Chaos, one of four such creatures. He represents chaos even as Gods represent the faith of their worshipers. Though he seems to be an intelligent, free willed creature, he instead functions only to serve chaos, and all of his actions are the result of such.
Special Requirement: Arioch must be summoned forth in an area of magical or supernatural darkness.
Manifestation: Arioch always appear as one of seven forms. To begin with, your shadow, usually invisible in magical darkness, becomes visible to you. It is then ripped away and drawn into Arioch's seal, where it slowly forms his present manifestation. His forms are as follows: A young boy with wise eyes and a crown of fire, a Pit Fiend composed of shadows, a Balur composed of shadows, an immense fly, A noble blackguard bearing a black sword, a robed and cowled figure bathed in shadow, and an exact representation of you formed of your own shadow. Some have theorized that how he appears before you relates to your standing with him.
Sign: Seven are the signs of Arioch. First, seven umbral gems appear to be floating about your head like Ioun Stones. Next, your skin is black as night. Third, your eyes are black pupil-less pits. Fourth, your voice is sweet sounding, like birdsong. Next, You tend to whisper with gravelly tones. Sixth, all shadows seem darker and larger around you. And finally, you have no personal shadow.
Influence: What happens to those who fall under Arioch's influence is simple. For the duration of your pact with him, your are Chaotic. No magic can disguise that fact and you are zealous in all things chaotic. Openly law-oreinted things that cross your path you have hostile reaction to, if not battle with. Your alignment reverts to normal at the end of your pact.
Granted Abilities: Arioch gives you seven abilities, mostly doing with darkness and chaos.
The First Dark: You gain Blindsight out to 120 feet.

The Second Dark: All weapons and unarmed attacks have the Anarchic quality.

The Third Dark: At will as a standard action you can summon a steed to ferry you about made of shadow vapors. It behaves like a horse save that upon it your are treated as having the ride skill as trained and having +20 insight to ride. The Steed is incorporeal, bearing your weight through some unknonw power. It can only transport you. It flys at a speed of 150 feet with perfect manueverability.

The Fourth Dark: All spells with the light descriptor are automatically succesfully dispelled when their source coems within ten feet of you. Magic Items are merely supressed.

The Fifth Dark: At will as a Standard action the Binder can project an aura about him that works like the Cloak of Chaos spell, granting it's abilities to him and to all allies within 10 feet. This lasts for one minute and after it is used one must wait five rounds to use it again.

The Sixth Dark: As a melee touch attack or a Ranged touch attack with a range of 30 feet (weilders choice), the weilder can offer forth a blast of pure chaos that scrambles the target, breaking apart it's very atoms. The victim must suceed at a Fortitude save or be blown apart, dying instantly. A succesful save means the target merely takes 20d6 damage.

The Final Dark: By spending a full round action you can render a fallen opponents soul nearly impossible to ressurect. Shadows coem forth, chain the soul, and consume the body. Thereafter one must spend a wish each to both reform the body and release the soul before any ressurection magic will work.

Well, that is it for now, though I am going to work on more Prime Vestiges, I am thinking of doing one with Syfal that powers up other Vestiges.

Xeran
2007-03-29, 08:34 PM
[Epic Vestige]
Syfal, First of all Pact-Sworn [DC=50]
Syfal, the most famous of all Binder's (he is mentioned severla times in Tome of Magic), disapeared suddenly eon's ago. Since then, many speculate that he acheived the power of a God. In fact, Syfal became that which he was so bound to, a Vestige, perhaps the most powerful one.
Legend: Syfal was a scholar and visionary who not only discovered Vestige's, but discovered how to summon forth and make pact's with them. He traveled the land for over a hundred years, gaining students and passing on his teachings before disapearing suddenly and mysteriously.
Special Requirement: None.
Manifestation: After drawing Syfal's seal and summoning him forth you feel an intense pain in your entire body. Slowly each Vestige is draqwn from you, trailing tatters of your ripped soul along with it. These form into an adrogenous form of a man, with eye of pure, glowing gold.
Sign: There is but one sign of Syfal, and that is skin of gold. Anyone who has even remotely heard of Binder's knows you for one as soon as they see you and your golden skin.
Influence: You must do all you can to leave a legacy for Binder's everywhere. This could involve taking on apprentices, writing books of your knowledge, etc. If anyone asks you about Pact Magic or Binding you must tell them the answers truthfully and in length if they allow it.
Granted Abilities: While Syfal offers no really new abilities of his own, his power allows you to empower, expand, or otherwise better the powers you already have. The only unique ability he offers is that to be able to live a little longer to practice your Pact-Magic more.
Might of the Pact: All DC's for your Supernatural abilities granted by Vestiges increase +5.

Quick Revival: The wait time after the use of an ability is reduced by two, to a minimum of one round wait.

Repetitive Power: Any Granted Power that may only be used a certain amount of times per day can now be used one more time per day. This does not apply to Syfal's Granted Power's.

Vestige Vengeance: Once a day as a free action you can treat one of the supernatural abilities you have from a Vestige as Maximized, maximizing all numeric effects in it to maximum.

Eternal Pact: While hosting Syfal you do not suffer mundane aging. All negative aging impacts are nullified for as long as you host him.

Syfal's Blessing: You gain Fast Healing 10 for the duration of you hosting the Pact.

Xeran
2007-03-31, 09:03 PM
Here is the possible epic Binder Feat List.

Additional Magic Item Space, Augmented Alchemy, Damage Reduction, Energy Resistance, Epic Enduracen, Epic Fortitude, Epic Prowess, Epic Reflexes, Epic Skill Focus, Epic Toughness, Epic Will, Extended Life Span, Fast Healing, Great Charisma, Great Consitution, Great Dexterity, Great Strength, Perfect Health, and Spellcasting Harrier.

The_Snark
2007-03-31, 09:18 PM
Looks okay so far. Although Arioch's signs are a bit too much; some of them overlap. Your eyes and skin both turn black? And it's hard to whisper in gravelly tones when your voice sounds like birdsong... just seems like a bit too much to me. But that's more a flavor objection.

It also seems like binding Syfal should require a large amount of ranks in Knowledge (arcana or the planes).

Me, I'd be more inclined to have a feat called Bind Epic Vestige, which would give access to one epic vestige each time the binder took it, but that might not work out so well. I'm interested to see what you come up with for Greater Pact Augmentation.

Xeran
2007-04-01, 09:58 PM
Sure the eyes and skin both turn black. What's wrong with that?

I can see what you mean about the voice...Hmmm....how about you get rid of the one about the birdsong and add in that all colors around you seem darker, more subdued. More...shadowed.

Binding Syfal already requires a Binding DC of 50. That is almost twice the amount of some other 8th level vestiges, and this is only one level higher.

I thought about turning it into a feat thing, but I am worried about people able to get a whole bunch of Epic Vestiges, they are made to be very powerful and very singular, completely obsessing you on their influence.

Maybe for Augmentation you have all the same abilities as normal augmentation, and they stack with normal augmentation. After all +6 or +7 to all saving throws is still pretty good. You also have two new options that stack with only themselves. One is SR of 15, and each time you take it your SR goes up by 15 (this would only give a max of SR 45 at level 28, not too powerful I think), or Fast Healing 10, which improves by 10 every time you take it. These new options are only for Greater Pact Augmentation.

The_Snark
2007-04-02, 12:48 AM
Having pitch black eyes and pitch black skin just seems redundant, is all. It seems like it's the exact same sign. I like the darkening, though it does seem like it's similar to the larger shadows already around you.

I meant you'd have to take a feat to learn how to bind an epic vestige, not that each feat would enable you to bind the vestige whenever you chose. The system of only allowing one epic vestige at a time is good, though you might consider a feat something like...

Improved Epic Binding
Prerequisites: Bind Epic Vestige x2, Knowledge (arcana) 30 ranks, Knowledge (the planes) 30 ranks
Benefit: You may have one additional epic vestige bound. It occupies a slot that would normally go to one of your non-epic vestiges.

And my suggestion about giving Syfal a Knowledge requirement was largely a flavor suggestion, but since he requires you to explain binding to anyone who asks, at length, it seems like you ought to know enough about it to explain. Maybe he could grant bonuses to those Knowledge checks, the way other vestiges grant skill bonuses.

alchemy.freak
2007-04-02, 11:13 AM
if you need to actually draw the seal of the a vestige, it turns out that the seals for the vestiges are actually the seals of real daemons from Christian myth, and Wotc didn't use all of them, so there are some that you could use for these new vestiges. look up demon on wikipedia and you should be ably to find them

Xeran
2007-04-02, 05:02 PM
There are plenty of seals within the Book of Fifty names section of the Necronomicon for that.

Maybe your right about the knowledge (perhaps knowledge history?) but I disagree about the feat. Epic Vestiges are so powerful you should not be able to bind more then one at a time. I only plan on creating five of them: Syfal, Arioch, one for Law, one for Good, and one for Evil.

katarl
2007-04-30, 02:29 PM
I believe allowing a greater number of vestiges to be held at one time might be a better epic binder than more powerful versions, but I do like improving pact augmentations in epic level.

And thats not to say your vestiges aren't nice either. Utilising the higher binding check you'll have is an argument for having higher level vestiges, otherwise it becomes mostly redundant.

In any case, allowing a greater number of vestiges is something you left out.

Xeran
2007-05-01, 08:10 PM
True, true. I decided that a more powerful version more balancing for the class. As someone who is playing a twentieth level Binder, I can tell you that they are slightly underpowered at higher levels when compared to others. Adding more vestiges of normal levels being able to be bound I thought was not only a weaker option, but one less fun for new character. Players always like something new. :)

Catch
2007-05-01, 10:54 PM
For Arioc's Sixth Dark (<3 Elric) I'd suggest a wait time. Die or take massive damage every round is a wee bit much.

Nice work, though.

Xeran
2007-05-05, 12:51 AM
Your absolutely right. There should be a five round wait time.