Idea for a Fighter Fix: The Erza Scarlet style

[Vhaidara]

So, I started watching Fairy Tail recently. And the character Erza gave me an idea for a fighter fix, Her magic is equipment based, specializing in Requipping: Changing her weapon and armor instantly on the spot to match what she needs.

So, here's the fix: Fighter get additional WBL equal to normal WBL x Class level that must be spent on Weapons and Armor. No one item may pass the normal limit of spending half you WBL (standard) on a single item, and you can change weapons and armor as a free action Fighter level times/encounter, even if it isn't your turn.

For example of how the WBL thing works
Level 2: You have 2 levels of Fighter, so you get normal WBL (1000) and 2x WBL (2000) in Weapons and Armor.
Level 3: You have 3 Fighter levels so now you have normal (3000) and 3x (9000) in Weapons and Armor
Level 4: You dip a level of Barbarin. Now you get normal (6000) and 3x (18000) in weapons and Armor.


Yes, this means a Fighter dip gears you up for life (an extra WBL for weapons and armor), but it also gives Fighters an obscene variety of weapons and armor.

[Elricaltovilla]

Interesting idea. I like it regardless of the critiques I'm about to post, because I like Fairy Tail, and Erza Scarlet, but I want to point out some issues:

Mechanical Issues:

1. How much does this really help the fighter be better outside of combat? All it does is give the fighter more ways to hit stuff. It won't necessarily help him fly, talk to the dead, teleport, find the path, breathe under water or any of a number of other things the fighter needs to be able to do at higher levels.

2. Only spending money on weapons and armor is going to get really dull really fast. You don't need extra weapons or armor beyond maybe having a set of ghost touch stuff, some duds for stealthing around (isn't that why you have a rogue?) or something to overcome each type of DR (which becomes a moot point as soon as +5 weapons become available) you have run out of things to spend money on, but you have to spend the money otherwise you've wasted your major class feature, and you can't really use it on anything else. There just aren't enough useful weapon and armor enchantments to spend that kind of cash on, and you can't spend it on things like winged boots or something else that lets your character do things they wouldn't normally be able to do.

3. Just because you can have the equipment sets to be a melee guy, an archer, a sneaky guy and an impenetrable wall of steel and flesh doesn't mean you have the feats or class abilities to actually fulfill those roles.

4. This would be a pain in the butt to keep track of.

Roleplay Issues:

1. Where would the fighter buy all of this equipment? Magic Mart isn't in every game, even if it is an assumption of the system.

2. Where is this extra equipment stored? I'm guessing (Su) nondimensional space? What happens if you enter an anti-magic field?

3. Never gonna fly in a low magic/low wealth game world. Just not gonna happen.

[Vhaidara]

Maybe include a clause that once you reach certain milestones you can spend the money on more things? Like 5 gets you Rings, 10 gets you Wondrous Items?

Meh, I figured there would be a lot of problems, it just seemed like an interesting thought experiment. I was picturing a Hammerspace storage for your extra gear, but one that worked in AMF. Because honestly AMF was not good game design.

[Elricaltovilla]

Maybe include a clause that once you reach certain milestones you can spend the money on more things? Like 5 gets you Rings, 10 gets you Wondrous Items?

Meh, I figured there would be a lot of problems, it just seemed like an interesting thought experiment. I was picturing a Hammerspace storage for your extra gear, but one that worked in AMF. Because honestly AMF was not good game design.

Maybe break the progression down by slot? There are 14 slots in Pathfinder, so seven instances of 2 slots opening up, starting with weapon and armor at level 1. It'd be kind of like a poor man's Akashic Mysteries. Or rather a rich man's Akashic Mysteries :smalltongue:.

Of course, if you really wanted to be Erza Scarlet, I think you could do pretty well as an Aegis.

[Almarck]

It's an interesting fix as it does nothing to the key core of the class itself. It gets a big plus in my book because it doesn't change the fighter really, just make them better equiped.

As a suggestion, why not just make "gear points" and allow fighters to by trading tokens and putting it into a coversion chart listing buying limits? Also this allows you to say let fighters get +11 weapons or something at level 18 if you don't give it a price listing just how many points it'll cost you.

Also why is AMF bad design?

[Elricaltovilla]

.

Also why is AMF bad design?

The short answer is because it doesn't actually do anything its intended to do.

The long answer is that it's meant to negate spells within a given area, but there are so many spells that can get around that it becomes pretty much useless. It also hurts any character that would benefit from being able to negate spells like that by shutting down all their magic items that the game assumes they have so that they can even hit their designated target.

[Karl Aegis]

So, basically, you mimic 1st level psionic powers from 3.5's Psychic Warrior power list but get to add on 2nd level powers when you manifest them like you would if you had Link Power.

[Seerow]

Also this allows you to say let fighters get +11 weapons or something at level 18 if you don't give it a price listing just how many points it'll cost you.


How so? Does Pathfinder even have rules for weapons/armor past +10? I know in 3.5 once you go past +10 you get a huge cost multiplier (like x10), so a +11 weapon would cost 2.4million gp or something silly like that. But with Pathfinder pretty much ignoring Epic in favor of their Mythic progression rules, I'm not sure if anything beyond +10 even exists.




Anyway, I am not familiar with the character at all, but reading this I imagined a character whose weapons and armor transform to fill different functions. Something akin to a Morphing Metaline weapon, but on crack because in addition to changing forms it is changing magic properties, and it's not just your weapon, it's also your armor.

Honestly, I like it. But it's not a Fighter fix. It is a solid class idea (and I have seen similar things in the past), especially if you go beyond weapons and armor and into all gear. Because there are very few effects out there that cannot be recreated with a magic item in some way, and having the ability to swap loadouts between various extremely specialized pieces of equipment that most characters would never even look at is cool.

Personally though if I were to design a class along these lines, I'd agree with Almarck and design using some abstracted gear points system. Something like you gain a pool of gear points known, and gear points usable at one time. Where the points usable scales more or less linearly, while the points known grow exponentially (similar to the initial pitch where by level 20 the character has 20x more gear than he can use at one time).

You might have basic things like "1 point-Gain a +1 weapon/armor property. Spend more points to get a higher cost property", "1 point-Gain Enhancement bonus to weapon/armor = to 1/4th level". This lets the player mix and match various properties at will, rather than having to have a bunch of specifically statted up weapons, they can pull out the properties that they want at any given time. To fill in the blanks, I'd probably also add something like spend X points to gain the benefits of an item up to Y value. Introduce that at 3-5 different levels (starting with something like 1 point for an item up to 5k, ending with 5 points for an item up to 200k). I'd probably go with something like 1 (at level 1) to 30 or 40 (at level 20) points of available points for active effects, and from 5 to 600 or so points for 'known' effects.


From there I'd probably tie in a resource to the class that acts as the recharge mechanic for any and all limited use items the character adds to their repertoire. So if the character wants to pick up an item with limited charges per day? Rather than tracking that item's uses individually, it uses this resource pool. Potentially even allow usage of Wands/Staves/Runestaves added to the repertoire using that same resource pool. You can even give the option to invest extra points from your active equipment pool to get extra uses of this resource.

From there you just need your mechanic for changing things out. I'd probably go with daily swap out everything, and then using the above mentioned resource can swap out X points as a swift action, similar to the Aegis' suit functionality.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Problem 1: This makes no sense in-game. Literally no sense. Why on earth does one class find thousands more gold worth of treasure than his comrades? Why does he get away with taking more than his fair share of the loot everyone earned? Regardless of whether or not this works mechanically, it's more-or less complete gibberish fluff-wise.

Solution 1: Fighterficer. It's not a new idea, but turning the fighter into the legendary smith who's just So Good that he can make magic items is at least functional. You could maybe have him get additional discounts for crafting items that only he can use, and/or an Artificer-style crafting reserve (using gold instead of xp, obviously). The downside is that it arguably cuts the "badass normal" factor down considerably.

Problem 2: Weapons and armor aren't that useful. I mean, it's nice, and I'm sure there are a few useful properties if you look through enough splatbooks/spend enough time with the PFSRD, but even with the WBL boost, you're probably not going to be able to afford very many. And they're still almost entirely combat-only, AKA the

Solution 2a: Emulate the Soulknife's ability to switch enchantment properties, rather than entire weapons. Allow him to access any weapon/armor under a certain level-based cost. That way you actually have flexibility, although, as Elricaltovilla pointed out, you still don't have the feats and (possibly) ability scores you need to switch from being a greataxe-wielding brute to a whip-wielding controller to an archer. (Something like the Brawler's Martial Flexibility or my fighter fix (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?276280-GitP-Fighter-Fix-18343-3-Ziegander-Grod-Tag-Team-Action!)'s Combat Versatility is probably needed for that to work)


Combat Versatility (Ex): A fighter masters weapons and combat techniques like most men read books. At first level, he creates three fighting styles. At 4th level, and every subsequent 4th level, he may create one additional fighting style.

For each fighting style, he may select a number of fighter bonus feats equal to one-half his fighter level, rounded up. He may switch between fighting styles as a free action, gaining the benefits of the bonus feats of whatever style he's currently using.

He counts as knowing all bonus feats selected for this ability at the same time when it comes to qualifying for feats, prestige classes, and so on.


Solution 2b: Throw rings and wondrous items into the pot. Wondrous items in particular will actually give you non-combat options. Something like my Seer (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?314601-The-Seer-an-Alex-Verus-wannabe-%28Fixed-list-Caster-Project%29-3-5-PEACH&p=16426183#post16426183)'s ability to retroactively buy items might pair well with that.



Always Prepared (Ex): Knowing what the future will hold makes planning a whole lot easier. Beginning at 5th level, a Seer almost always has the right tool for the job somewhere on their person.

At any point, a Seer may spend any amount of gold, adding it to a sort of trust fund. As a move action, he may expend one Foresight Point to spend up to 500 gold per Seer level to purchase a single item, such as a scroll or vial of acid, at its full market price. Items produced in this fashion may be deposited back into the fund— they are lost, but two-thirds of their market price is added to the fund.

This ability only functions if the Seer has access to his own storage space— pockets, backpacks, saddlebags, and so on. The DM may veto rare or otherwise unavailable items, in which case this ability is not considered used— neither action nor Foresight point nor gold is expended.



Honestly, in Pathfinder it seems like the best easy Fighter fix would be to play a Brawler with and use a (new) archetype to trade Unarmed Strike and AC Bonus for better proficiencies and Armor Training. You also might be interested in checking out 3.5's Magic of Incarnum classes, which have a similar on-the-fly resource-redistribution system.

[ILM]

Yes, this means a Fighter dip gears you up for life (an extra WBL for weapons and armor),
Easy fix: you gain the extra WBL of twice that of a character whose ECL is equal to your levels in the Fighter class. Alternatively, just make that extra WBL a class ability and explicitly print out the numbers.

Maybe include a clause that once you reach certain milestones you can spend the money on more things? Like 5 gets you Rings, 10 gets you Wondrous Items?
Well, by the custom item creation guidelines and MIC, you can add on abilities from rings and other slots to anything, including armor and presumably weapons (are weapons a body slot?) , for a +50% increase in cost over the regular item. Since your fix gives fighters money to burn, it actually works out pretty well I think.

[Doc_Maynot]

Also, just my two cents but it seems this style is better off being a refluffed Aegis/Soulknife.

[Mithril Leaf]

I mean, this would probably sort of work, but isn't Erza just the basis of the Armorist class in Spheres of Power? She is a mage after all.

[Feint's End]

I mean, this would probably sort of work, but isn't Erza just the basis of the Armorist class in Spheres of Power? She is a mage after all.

Yes. The Armorist does pretty much exactly what she does. spend her magical talents on telekinesis and you are as close to the concept as you'll get.

Soulknife/Aegis does kind of work but is lacking the flexibility with the weapon.

[Doomeye56]

Maybe break the progression down by slot? There are 14 slots in Pathfinder, so seven instances of 2 slots opening up, starting with weapon and armor at level 1. It'd be kind of like a poor man's Akashic Mysteries. Or rather a rich man's Akashic Mysteries :smalltongue:.

Of course, if you really wanted to be Erza Scarlet, I think you could do pretty well as an Aegis.

Aegis with an opposite Archetype to the Soulknife's Armored Archetype.

[HunterOfJello]

now I want to go play a melee artificer