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John Longarrow
2017-01-06, 10:18 AM
This thread is for changes to the base fighter to make it more relevant in light of the new books that have come out since the original PHB.

Inego Montoya, Robin Hood, Conan, William tell, and a host of others have one commonality that cannot be overlooked; they are all at hear Fighters. The youth who is taken from home in chains and forced to learn to fight, the brigand with a heart of gold, the sword master without equal; all fighters.

This rework is intended to give relevance to the class as master of arms. It is geared as a modification that enhances what a fighter can do without changing its core mechanics.

The following are what changes from the base class of fighter:

1) Fighter bonus feat at ever level. This is an increase of 9 feats.

2) Fighters do not need to meet stat pre-reqs for bonus feats. This means a low dex fighter can learn the entire two weapon fighting tree or a lwo int fighter can learn Combat Expertise.

3) Fighters come from all backgrounds and have more 'roles' in society than any other class. As such the player chooses 10 skills to be class skills at 1st level. The fighter also gets 4+int bonus skills per level. This allows for the mounted warrior to be as viable a build as one of the three musketters

4) Additional Class features that scale with level:
- A fighter gets a competence bonus equal to half their fighter level (round down) on saves VS fear and fear effects. This IS the kind of person who will stand, holding the line, while being charged by a horde intent on killing them. By 6th level a fighter should be as resistant to fear as a Cleric or Wizard. At higher levels the fighter should hold their ground even when casters turn and run.

- A fighter can use their fighter level in place of their ranks in appraise when appraising weapons and armor they are proficient in.

- A fighter can use their fighter level in place of ranks in Sense Motive when using the Assess an opponent option (Page 68 in Rules Compendium)

- A fighter reduces Armor Check penalties by one half their fighter level (round down) for both armor and shields worn/used. Starting at 4th level fighters treat armor as one category lighter for its impact on movement speed. At 8th level fighters ignore armors impact on movement.

- A fighter increases the max dex for a suit of armor by 1 for every three levels of fighter (round down).

As a fighter is feat dependent, the following two posts will include changes to both the list of fighter bonus feats as well as changes to feats when taken by a fighter.

John Longarrow
2017-01-06, 10:19 AM
List of bonus feats:


Feat
Source
Note


Acrobatics
SRD
Fits well with some fighter concepts


Agile
SRD
Fits well with some fighter concepts


Alertness
SRD
Too useful to not be included


Animal Affinity
SRD
Fits any mounted combatant concept


Athletic
SRD
Fits wefighter concepts


Blind Fighting
SRD



Combat Expertise
SRD



-Improved Disarm
SRD



-Improved Feint
SRD



-Improved Trip
SRD



-Whirlwind Attack
SRD



Combat Reflexes
SRD



Dodge
SRD



-Whirlwind Attack
SRD



-Mobility
SRD



-Spring Attack
SRD



Endurance
SRD
Should have been a bonus feat IMO


-Diehard
SRD



Exotic Weapon Proficiency
SRD



Improved Critical
SRD



Improved Initiative
SRD



Improved Shield Bash
SRD



Improved Unarmed Strike
SRD



-Deflect Arrows
SRD



-Improved Grapple
SRD



-Snatch Arrows
SRD



-Stunning Fist
SRD



-Superior Unarmed Strike
ToB



Great Fortitude
SRD
All bonuses to save should be available to fighters


Improved Initiative
SRD



Investigator
SRD



Iron Will
SRD
All boosts to saves should be available



Leadership
SRD
Added to reflect "warlord" type characters


Lightning Reflexes
SRD
All boosts to saves should be available


Mounted Combat
SRD



-Mounted Archery
SRD



-Ride-By attack
SRD



-Spirited Charge
SRD



-Trample
SRD



Negotiator
SRD



Persuasive
SRD




Point Blank Shot
SRD



-Far Shot
SRD



-Precise Shot
SRD



-Rapid Shot
SRD



-Manyshot
SRD



-Shot on the Run
SRD



-Improved Precise Shot
SRD



Power Attack
SRD



-Cleave
SRD



--Great Cleave
SRD



-Improved Bull Rush
SRD



-Improved Overrun
SRD



-Improved Sunder
SRD



Quick Draw
SRD



Rapid Reload
SRD



Run
SRD



Self-Sufficient
SRD
Added to reflect non-ranger 'hunters'


Skill Focus
SRD
Fighters need to be good at many things other than just "Hitting"


Stealthy
SRD
Added to reflect non-ranger 'hunters'


Toughness
SRD
Added to reflect non-ranger 'hunters'



Track
SRD
Added to reflect non-ranger 'hunters'


Two Weapon Fighting
SRD



-Improved Two Weapon Fighting
SRD



--Greater Two Weapon Fighting
SRD



-Two Weapon Defense
SRD



Weapon Finesse
SRD



Weapon Focus
SRD



-Weapon Specialization
SRD



--Greater Weapon Focus
SRD



---Greater weapon Specialization
SRD

John Longarrow
2017-01-06, 10:20 AM
List of changed feats



Feat
Source
Change


Combat Expertise
SRD
Fighters may choose to take a penalty up to their fighter level on attacks and gain a dodge bonus to AC equal to the penalty taken


Combat Reflexes
SRD
May take a number of Attacks of Opportunity equal to either their Dex bonus OR their fighter level divided by 4 (round down), which ever is greater.


Dodge
SRD
A fighter gets a dodge bonus to AC equal to their fighter level divided by 4 (round up) against all enemies.

John Longarrow
2017-01-06, 10:57 AM
Reserved for future expansion, maybe list of AFCs?

tsj
2017-01-07, 04:03 AM
Very nice and should be able to raise the fighter one tier I think.

The Real Deal
2017-01-07, 05:12 AM
Let the fighter use his massive **** as a warclub

Ivogel
2017-01-07, 05:15 AM
Very nice changes indeed! I would love to play this fighter in 3.5. Altough maybe a feat every level is a bit much, especially if you don't have access to all the splatbooks.
Also you could break the combat portion of the game pretty easily by takibg for example only feats that increase your damage every time.

Maybe at every odd-numbered level starting at lv 3, a fighter can increase one of his ability scores by one, but he cannot put it in his highest stat. This would encourage builds that would not be possible otherwise.

nonsi
2017-01-07, 09:48 AM
Any decent Fighter fix needs at the very least the ability to make full attacks as a standard action no later than level 13.

Also, a bunch of floating feats (such as demonstrated here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?499711-Variations-on-a-Theme-Fixin-Fighter&p=21183500#post21183500)) seem more useful to me than a feat at every level.

Wouldn't hurt if the class also offered some swift action and immediate action alternatives, and some real options (such as presented here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?267315-A-Quick-amp-Simple-Fighter-Fix-%96-I-believe-this-one-actually-does-something)).


And here's an enlightening analysis of the Fighter's problem (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?276366-The-Fighter-Problem-amp-How-to-Fix-It).


For a Fighter fix that really rocks, my preferred fix is this one (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=18777407&postcount=11).

Grod_The_Giant
2017-01-07, 10:41 AM
Okay. You'll do very well early-game, getting your schtick off the ground sooner, but you'll still fade after around 6th, methinks. You get marginally better at noncombat stuff thanks to the skill boost, I guess, but not enough to make much difference. Like the Pathfinder Fighter, you wind up solidly in T4 terrain. I think overall the biggest thing you've done is make Fighter an even better dip.

John Longarrow
2017-01-08, 11:31 AM
Still going through feats to see which ones are not listed as bonus but should be. Maybe I should change the post on feats to just list ones I'm including?

NOTE: Making the class of fighter relevant means not only that you could play one to 20th+ level in low optimization or low magic games but to give the base class a reason to be used for 5 to 10 levels before going into a prestige class. Biggest issue that fighters have in core is their main class feature (feats) does not scale.

tsj
2017-01-08, 01:20 PM
Maybe it needs some stuff that depends on the levels of fighter you have in order to decrease the dip advantage

Grod_The_Giant
2017-01-08, 01:33 PM
Still going through feats to see which ones are not listed as bonus but should be. Maybe I should change the post on feats to just list ones I'm including?

NOTE: Making the class of fighter relevant means not only that you could play one to 20th+ level in low optimization or low magic games but to give the base class a reason to be used for 5 to 10 levels before going into a prestige class. Biggest issue that fighters have in core is their main class feature (feats) does not scale.
Probably not a bad idea.

If you want to keep the basic (nonexistant) structure of the Fighter class, you're going to need to make Fighter feats better-- a lot better. Jiriku's fix was a great example of the kind of thing you need to do; it included lots of Fighter-only feats that were basically class features.

nonsi
2017-01-10, 03:36 PM
Still going through feats to see which ones are not listed as bonus but should be. Maybe I should change the post on feats to just list ones I'm including?

NOTE: Making the class of fighter relevant means not only that you could play one to 20th+ level in low optimization or low magic games but to give the base class a reason to be used for 5 to 10 levels before going into a prestige class. Biggest issue that fighters have in core is their main class feature (feats) does not scale.



1. If it is feats that you're after, then you'd probably want to take a look over here (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=2394.0).
2. With everything presented to you so far, you have all that you need to make a decent Fighter fix.