Looking for a class

[arawra]

My next character concept involves literally trading anything and basically everything (except autonomy) for power. Please discuss suggestions for classes that rotate around this idea.

[Tyuqa]

warlock gets power by making a deal with an evil outsider?

[MisterKaws]

Expert, just plain expert. There's no class made for trading, use expert for that.

[Chester]

Something like the Disciple of X / Thrall of X classes from Book of Vile Darkness?

[frogglesmash]

The Binder makes pacts with various arcane beings in exchange for power.

[Grod_The_Giant]

The Binder makes pacts with various arcane beings in exchange for power.
Binder/Ur-Priest/Divine adaptation Anima Mage?

[ATHATH]

Expert, just plain expert. There's no class made for trading, use expert for that.
If you do want to go the skill-monkey route, use Factotum instead of Expert.

[The Viscount]

I'm going to second Binder. You allow otherworldly beings inside your head (occasionally with some effect on your behavior) in exchange for the power they lend you.

Mountebank from Dragon Compendium is a base class that is dedicated to the service of a fiend, but I would not recommend it.

If your trading is more physical than not you can look into prestige classes like Impure Prince, Fleshwarper, and Renegade Mastermaker.

[ekarney]

Mountebank from Dragon Compendium is a base class that is dedicated to the service of a fiend, but I would not recommend it.


The Mountebank is one of those classes where the concept is hella awesome, but the execution not so much. It depends on your groups level too.

Also the Death Master, (also DragCon) is a servant of Orcus, and pretty much what the Dread Necromancer sohuld have been.

[daremetoidareyo]

Malconvoker all the way. Why trade things of real value, when you can just *lie?*

[arawra]

This (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=13431) looks promising...

[Zaq]

A user of Necrocarnum (generally an Evil Incarnate, possibly with Necrocarnate to taste) callously harnesses other people's soul energy for his or her own purposes, and since Necrocarnum is heavily implied to damage that soul energy in ways that normal Incarnum does not, you're certainly offering up things that normal people would be absolutely horrified to offer. Forget carelessly spending Other People's Money—you're spending Other People's Souls.

Going in another direction, there are the Dragonpacts from Dragon Magic. They're generally not considered super optimal, but they're definitely fluffy, and pretty much any Sorcerer-type character can pick one up. Considering how much Sorcs are defined entirely by their magic, a Sorcerer using their own magic as a bargaining chip is definitely an example of someone trading away something that most people wouldn't even think of. If you want to really build your character around these pacts, the Pact-Bound Adept PrC lets you make more pacts and makes them stronger, though I seem to recall that it's not without its downsides (I think it might lose a CL? AFB at the moment).

Going in still another direction, Renegade Mastermaker from Magic of Eberron starts out by replacing your (usually perfectly good) hand with a mechanical one, and it eventually lets you swap out other parts of yourself for warforged components. Speaking as someone who actually has swapped out a body part for a mechanical replacement (no joke—I have a metal shoulder), that sort of thing HURTS LIKE HELL and really shouldn't be done lightly—yes, I know, it's a fantasy universe with magic to help things along, but that doesn't change much in my eyes. I didn't really have a choice (my biological shoulder was very much NOT "perfectly fine"), but any character who would voluntarily trade a working body part for a mechanical augmentation is making a trade that I think they're crazy to do. (This effect can be supplemented with other grafts, especially warforged grafts.) Plenty of classes let you make trades involving greater or lesser aspects of your soul, but how wild is it to trade away chunks of your body?