Literally The Dumbest Class

[Amechra]

This is just a thought exercise - a really dumb thought exercise.

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Paragon

GAME RULE INFORMATION
Paragons have the following game statistics.
Abilities: All of them - don't worry, though. We've got you covered.
Alignment: Any.
Hit Die: d4
Starting Age: As Barbarian.
Starting Gold: As Sorcerer.

Class Skills
The Paragon's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Craft (Any) (Int), Perform (Any) (Cha), and Profession (Any) (Wis)

Skill Points at First Level: (Int modifier) x 4
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: Int modifier

CLASS NAME


Level
Base Attack Bonus

Fort Save
Ref Save
Will Save

Special



1st

+0



+0



+0



+0


Perfected, Open Mind



2nd

+1



+0



+0



+0


Marble Flesh



3rd

+1



+1



+1



+1


Good Enough



4th

+2



+1



+1



+1


Marble Flesh



5th

+2



+1



+1



+1


Good Enough



6th

+3



+2



+2



+2


Marble Flesh



7th

+3



+2



+2



+2


Good Enough



8th

+4



+2



+2



+2


Marble Flesh



9th

+4



+3



+3



+3


Good Enough



10th

+5



+3



+3



+3


Marble Flesh



11th

+5



+3



+3



+3


Good Enough



12th

+6/+1



+4



+4



+4


Marble Flesh



13th

+6/+1



+4



+4



+4


Good Enough



14th

+7/+2



+4



+4



+4


Marble Flesh



15th

+7/+2



+5



+5



+5


Good Enough



16th

+8/+3



+5



+5



+5


Marble Flesh



17th

+8/+3



+5



+5



+5


Good Enough



18th

+9/+4



+6



+6



+6


Marble Flesh



19th

+9/+4



+6



+6



+6


Good Enough



20th

+10/+5



+6



+6



+6


Marble Flesh




Class Features
All of the following are class features of the Paragon.

Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: A Paragon is proficient in all Simple and Martial weapons, as well as Light and Medium armor and all shields other than Tower Shields.

Perfect Anima (Ex): The Paragon is a raw, perfect example of her race. All of her ability scores improve to 18 before any other modifiers. In addition, select two skills for each Ability Score - those skills are Class Skills for the Paragon.

Open Mind (Su): The Paragon gains a Power Point reserve with a capacity equal to her Charisma modifier + 1, as well as an Essentia Pool that contains a single point of Essentia.

Marble Flesh (Ex): Each time the Paragon gains this class feature, she gains a +2 Untyped bonus to her Constitution, Dexterity, Strength, and Wisdom scores, and a +1 Untyped bonus to her Natural Armor bonus.

Good Enough (Ex): Each time the Paragon gains this class feature, she gains a +2 Untyped bonus to her Charisma, Intelligence, and Strength scores, and increases the capacity of her power point reserves and Essentia pool by 1 point each.

[Amechra]

The end results (assuming the Paragon is Human):

• Her ability scores are Str 36 / Dex 28 / Con 28 / Int 26 / Wis 28 / Cha 26
• She has a 10-point Essentia Pool.
• She has an 18-point PP Reserve.
• She has +10 NA.

This class is utterly useless at doing fun things, though. Kind of a flaw.

=---=

So my question to you - what other "it's just a bonus to numbers" can I put on there? Preferably one that does something interesting if you can combo it with something.

One idea is replacing the 1 + Cha PP pool with a 1 PP and a single Turn Undead usage. That way, the Paragon could get into Domain/Divine feats too.

[nikkoli]

It's interesting to say the least.
I feel like 1 level of this is all anyone needs. 12 class skills and 18 in all stats, a couple PP, an essentia. So that skips getting wild talent to get a couple helpful powers. It opens up lots of space to do fun essentia stuff.
But for both of those systems does the class give a manifester/meldshaper level?

[ImperatorV]

This reminds me of some of Jorm's work. I'm pretty sure he did a class that was all just massive bonuses to everything.

A 1 lvl factotum dip would be really powerful with this class. Other classes (battledancer and monk, for example) that can leverage high ability scores also really bring up it's power.

Some ideas on how to improve the paragon
- Mobility options. Whether it's just movement speed bonuses and some special use of the jump skill, or full out teleportation and planar travel, something along these lines would be helpful.
- You have power points... why not give it the ability to gain psionic focus faster, to spam psionic feats?
- Damage output is currently terrible. Might want to do something to help that.
- Bonus feats would be nice. This class has a lot of options for feats with the psionics and essentia, plus it benefits from regular feat chains a lot.
- I feel like this should have full BAB, or at least mid. Also any particular reason you have it with all weak saves?

[remetagross]

@Amechra I think the stats are actually higher than that. Str increases by 2 every level after the first, Dex, Con and Wis increase by 2 every even level and Int and Cha every odd level after level 1.

At level 5 we're looking at Str 26, Dex 22, Con 22, Int 22, Wis 22, Cha 22.
At level 10, Str 36, Dex 28, Con 28, Int 26, Wis 26, Cha 26.
At level 15, Str 46, Dex 32, Con 32, Int 32, Wis 32, Cha 32.
At level 20, Str 56, Dex 38, Con 38, Int 36, Wis 38, Cha 36


I suppose the assumption was that having enormous ability modifiers in Con, Dex, Wis and Str sort of make up for the lack of save/BAB. Let's look at that in detail. I won't account for bonuses the two characters can have, such as magic items or level stat increases.

Let's compare with a level 5 Human Fighter. Both begin with Str 18. At level 5, the Fighter has a to-hit bonus of 5 (BAB)+4=9. His damage bonus is 4. The Paragon will have Str 26 (since he gains +2 at each level) and BAB 2. That's a +10 to-hit bonus, and 8 damage bonus. The Paragon is slightly ahead. For the saves, the Fighter can reasonably have Con 16, Dex 10 and Wis 10. His saves are Fort +7/Ref +1/Wis +1. The Paragon will have Con 22, Dex 22, and Wis 22 (since he gains +2 at every even level). His saves are Fort +6/Ref +6/Will +6, enormously better.

At level 10, the Fighter has a to-hit bonus of 10/5 (BAB) +4=14/9, and he deals 4 bonus damage. The Paragon will have Str 36 and BAB 5, so the to-hit bonus is 5+13=18, and he deals 13 bonus damage. However, he only has one attack and does not have any iteratives. Which means it's about even here. When it comes to saves, the Fighter sports Fort +10/Ref +3/Will +3. The Paragon, now having Con 28, Dex 28 and Wis 28, has Fort +12/Ref +12/Will +12.

At level 15, this is +19/+14/+9 for the Fighter, and still 4 bonus damage. The Paragon has now Str 46, so this is +25/+20 for him, with 18 bonus damage. The addition of a second iterative means the Paragon utterly trounces the Fighter. As for the saves, they are +12/+5/+5 for the Fighter, and with Dex, Con and Wis of 32 each, the Paragon has +16/+16/+16. Well.

At level 20, the Fighter boasts +24/+19/+14/+9, and 4 bonus damage. The Paragon, having Str 56, has +33/+28, and 23 bonus damage. The Paragon is way on the top. For the saves, we have +15/+6/+6 for the Fighter, and with Dex, Con and Wis of 38 each, the Paragon has +20/+20+20.


Which means that a half BAB and all bad saves are not balancing enough :D

Yeah, bring in some later level abilities to make the class more worth it than just for a 1-level dip! And I'd say, instead of increasing all the stats at once like that, to give more customisation potential and to curb power a bit, at each level, give the choice of increasing by 2 only one of the possible abilities scores. Moreover, since you don't give any psionic powers nor essentia, remaining in this class for more than the first level means you'r feat taxed into taking psionic and incarnum feats to make use of this resource!

It's funny, this class sort of looks like the other Homebrew class that popped up these days, the Machinator I think.

[ImperatorV]

*snip*

Actually...

Never mind your math is right. I didn't notice the double bonus to strength.

Although you shouldn't be comparing this to a fighter because fighter is a poorly designed class.

[Amechra]

I blame the bad numbers on the fact that I was getting ready to go out for drinks with a friend. The class originally didn't get BAB or Save progressions - the idea being "how massively do you have to boost someone's ability scores for them to keep up?"

I'll debate adding stuff to make the class an actual class at some point.

[Nifft]

This kinda reminds me of the Dragon Disciple PrC.

[sengmeng]

"Dumbest class ever"? Did you even see the Chassinator?

They actually seem to take opposite routes to the same destination: boring beatstick. Oh well.

[Roderick_BR]

With this I can finally play Batman without needing (much) magic.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Y'know, I bet if you gave this a Bardic Knack style skill boost and a couple rotating bonus feats you'd have a pretty fun badass... normal probably isn't the right word, but maybe a Factotum-style "master of everything I turn my hand to?"