Protoss zealot

[keeper2161]

I am going to be playing a gestalt campaign soon and thought of trying to make a protoss zealot from starcraft. I was thinking soulknife and a psychic warrior. Maybe even soulknife and psion for a high templar. For those that don't play starcraft the protoss are a highly advance psychic race. Their foot soldiers use dual punching blades. Some of the stronger protoss can even blink or shadow step (these are called dark templar). Would a soulknife/psychic warrior be viable and what race would I use?

http://www.andrea-orioli.com/immagini/protoss/wip_11.jpg
Zealot

[Sayt]

Psychic Warrior/Soulknife/Dark Tempest (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/psionic-prestige-classes/dark-tempest/) would seem the tighest fit based on what I know.

[zergling.exe]

I love the protoss and Starcraft itself, and have often wondered about making some of the units in D&D format. I'm unfamiliar with Pathfinder so unfortunately I cannot assist. Though this: "Some of the stronger protoss can even blink or shadow step (these are called dark templar)." isn't entirely accurate. Dark templar are a different culture, not any stronger than a typical protoss warrior. That's just game mechanics. Though shadow stepping would be more aligned with void energy than regular protoss energy (Tassadar gets it in HotS, but he can also channel both psionic and void energy).

edit: For a race, the 3.5 Elan would probably work quite well. For 1 pp a day they don't need to eat, and are aberrations so thus fairly alien to humans like the protoss.

[keeper2161]

Any race suggestion? I was thinking Ophiduans. Also as a soulknife could I make the mind blade two shortswords and put them on my wrists?

[legomaster00156]

Any race suggestion? I was thinking Ophiduans. Also as a soulknife could I make the mind blade two shortswords and put them on my wrists?
The fluff of what your mind blades look like is entirely up to you, just remember that the mechanics will still treat them as being held in your hands.

[zergling.exe]

Any race suggestion? I was thinking Ophiduans. Also as a soulknife could I make the mind blade two shortswords and put them on my wrists?

I think Elans would be a better fit. Repletion allows them to not need to eat or drink at the cost of 1pp a day to emulate the protoss diet of light. Plus naturally psionic.

Relevant soulknife info:
A soulknife must choose the form of her mind blade at 1st level. She can either form it into a light weapon, a one-handed weapon, or a two-handed weapon. If the soulknife’s chosen form is a light weapon, she may choose to form two light weapons when forming her mind blade if she so chooses, but she suffers the standard penalties for two-weapon fighting.
How exactly you wield them is a fluffy bit you would have to ask the DM about. I personally wouldn't have a problem with a soulknife saying they are projected from their wrists, but I would probably also say that you still can't use your hands for other things.

[Keltest]

Some other abilities the standard zealot possesses are a very limited form of battle precognition which enables them to avoid attacks better and make their own, and the ability to charge an opponent at high speeds to close with them for an attack. Theyre also inherently telepathic, as are all protoss (you may notice that handsome fellow doesn't have a mouth).

[Grand Arbiter]

Posting from mobile, so keeping this short.
Seconding Elan for the race. Spending 1pp for food/water, to boost a save, or more pp to negate damage seems in line with the Protoss.

For pairing with soulknife, Psychic Warrior could work well with the right abilities chosen. Also maybe look into the Aegis, though.

[Buufreak]

Psychic Warrior/Soulknife/Dark Tempest (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/psionic-prestige-classes/dark-tempest/) would seem the tighest fit based on what I know.

This actually looks pretty solid for a dark templar, minus the perm'd invisibility. And honestly, they are much closer to the standard zealot than a high templar, in terms of mechanics.

Speaking of templars, if you go that route, do you plan on using their potentially controversial ability to form an archon? If so, I would love to see some mechanics on that! For those outside the know, it is when two high templar (primarily psionic casters) fuse their bodies and souls into a single being that is essentially a psionic star with a corporeal anchor. Its most common form of combat is using some of this star power as a bolt of energy that explodes on contact (a range touch AoE, more or less).

The flip side is when two dark templars fuse into a dark archon. As dark templars as more combat based than their "enlightened" brethren, these somehow do the opposite and fuse into a completely combat inept being, although it gains many abilities including psionic feedback which drains mana and damages based on the amount drained, and full fledged mind control with no limit. We are talking a permanent dominate monster.

Obviously the fusion power is there, but I don't feel like it fully captures what templars do, mostly because once fused into an archon, there is no going back.


For a race, the 3.5 Elan would probably work quite well. For 1 pp a day they don't need to eat, and are aberrations so thus fairly alien to humans like the protoss.

Elans work well here, I think. They are humanoid in shape, but a stretch from human. They seem enlightened as a culture, and have that social distance that others can't seem to understand. Their psionic tendencies is a bonus!

[Segev]

In StarCraft II, Dark Archons are no longer a thing. Any two Templar, Dark or High, can merge into a regular Archon.

In the RTS game itself, the typical strategy is to use High Templar for their psi storms and then, when out of energy, merge them right there on the battlefield while the Zealots and Stalkers and the rest of the army are defending them, before sending the merged Archons in as short-ranged powerhouses.

I think the only reason to merge Dark Templar into Archons is when the opponent has so much detection that the Dark Templar is useless.

Regardless, because it is both a permanent change that alters power suite (i.e. build) entirely and requires a second character, I think Archon-merge is something best left off of one of these builds.

Out of curiosity, has anybody considered a Large race for this? Protoss are something like 3 meters tall on average.

[khadgar567]

In StarCraft II, Dark Archons are no longer a thing. Any two Templar, Dark or High, can merge into a regular Archon.

In the RTS game itself, the typical strategy is to use High Templar for their psi storms and then, when out of energy, merge them right there on the battlefield while the Zealots and Stalkers and the rest of the army are defending them, before sending the merged Archons in as short-ranged powerhouses.

I think the only reason to merge Dark Templar into Archons is when the opponent has so much detection that the Dark Templar is useless.

Regardless, because it is both a permanent change that alters power suite (i.e. build) entirely and requires a second character, I think Archon-merge is something best left off of one of these builds.

Out of curiosity, has anybody considered a Large race for this? Protoss are something like 3 meters tall on average.
lot of people tried to create them but without dsp content its to hard to create the bastards as they dont have paizo style arcane casters in their race and nearly all of them including enginiers or entertainers can manifest mind blade so we need entire supplement to simply adress core diffrences

[zergling.exe]

This actually looks pretty solid for a dark templar, minus the perm'd invisibility. And honestly, they are much closer to the standard zealot than a high templar, in terms of mechanics.

Speaking of templars, if you go that route, do you plan on using their potentially controversial ability to form an archon? If so, I would love to see some mechanics on that! For those outside the know, it is when two high templar (primarily psionic casters) fuse their bodies and souls into a single being that is essentially a psionic star with a corporeal anchor. Its most common form of combat is using some of this star power as a bolt of energy that explodes on contact (a range touch AoE, more or less).

The flip side is when two dark templars fuse into a dark archon. As dark templars as more combat based than their "enlightened" brethren, these somehow do the opposite and fuse into a completely combat inept being, although it gains many abilities including psionic feedback which drains mana and damages based on the amount drained, and full fledged mind control with no limit. We are talking a permanent dominate monster.

Obviously the fusion power is there, but I don't feel like it fully captures what templars do, mostly because once fused into an archon, there is no going back.
Archons are a fun subject. Before SC2 launched, Blizzard was planning on replacing both the archon and the dark archon with a twilight archon. It was never revealed exactly what it was capable of, but this got scrapped and instead all fusing just became a regular archon. LotV 5 years later reintroduced dark archons as a special dark templar only fuse, losing feedback and maelstrom for confusion and gained the ability to defend themselves.

Most humorously, the SC1 archon hero was a fusion of Tassadar and Zeratul, making it the first twilight archon, though non-canon.

For abilities, archons definitely should have all the abilities available to high templars but cranked up to 11. Their description even states that psionic storm is their default attack! For the actual fusion process... I'd probably make it a racial ability that requires 2 manifesters of at least 5th level each or perhaps a combined of at least 10. Maybe make it so that you add the class levels together then multiply by 1.5 for the final abilities.



Elans work well here, I think. They are humanoid in shape, but a stretch from human. They seem enlightened as a culture, and have that social distance that others can't seem to understand. Their psionic tendencies is a bonus!

Also that protoss live for ~1000 years and elans are immortal. Hilariously, the oldest protoss were around back before the Templar/Dark Templar split. Yeah, only around 800 years since the time of Adun and the founding of modern protoss ways.

edit:

In StarCraft II, Dark Archons are no longer a thing. Any two Templar, Dark or High, can merge into a regular Archon.

In the RTS game itself, the typical strategy is to use High Templar for their psi storms and then, when out of energy, merge them right there on the battlefield while the Zealots and Stalkers and the rest of the army are defending them, before sending the merged Archons in as short-ranged powerhouses.

I think the only reason to merge Dark Templar into Archons is when the opponent has so much detection that the Dark Templar is useless.

Regardless, because it is both a permanent change that alters power suite (i.e. build) entirely and requires a second character, I think Archon-merge is something best left off of one of these builds.

Out of curiosity, has anybody considered a Large race for this? Protoss are something like 3 meters tall on average.

Covered the archon bit in last post, but I could easily see calling them medium size with powerful build and be done with it.


lot of people tried to create them but without dsp content its to hard to create the bastards as they dont have paizo style arcane casters in their race and nearly all of them including enginiers or entertainers can manifest mind blade so we need entire supplement to simply adress core diffrences

The energy blades are generated by a device on their wrist. While they conceivably could make it without one, that would probably be better modeled by a psionic power than a racial ability.

[Dienekes]

In StarCraft II, Dark Archons are no longer a thing. Any two Templar, Dark or High, can merge into a regular Archon.

In the RTS game itself, the typical strategy is to use High Templar for their psi storms and then, when out of energy, merge them right there on the battlefield while the Zealots and Stalkers and the rest of the army are defending them, before sending the merged Archons in as short-ranged powerhouses.

I think the only reason to merge Dark Templar into Archons is when the opponent has so much detection that the Dark Templar is useless.

Regardless, because it is both a permanent change that alters power suite (i.e. build) entirely and requires a second character, I think Archon-merge is something best left off of one of these builds.

Out of curiosity, has anybody considered a Large race for this? Protoss are something like 3 meters tall on average.

Eh, in lore Dark Archons are still kicking around, in the same way there are still Dragoons and Reavers. They're just not in the primary units available for the player, though you can get them in the campaign.

[Buufreak]

Eh, in lore Dark Archons are still kicking around, in the same way there are still Dragoons and Reavers. They're just not in the primary units available for the player, though you can get them in the campaign.

The biggest thing is their power is so great, they are forbidden unless in times of great strife, like intergalactic war. I did a bit more reading, though they are godly, they burn out in a short time, with only 1 ever existing for a decent length of time. They also corrode the world around them.

[zergling.exe]

Eh, in lore Dark Archons are still kicking around, in the same way there are still Dragoons and Reavers. They're just not in the primary units available for the player, though you can get them in the campaign.

Unlike dragoons and reavers though, dark archons can still be made. Honestly I think they just didn't want to deal with mind control in multiplayer again. The machinery to create dragoons (technically immortals as well, being modified dragoon exoskeletons) and reavers was lost with Aiur. Since Aiur is being/has been reclaimed, dragoons and reavers may make more of an appearance in future Starcraft media.

[Starbuck_II]

Here is feats to implement the shields:
Shield Prowess

You’ve learned how to generate a shield of psionic energy without technology

Prerequisite: Able to cast 1st level arcane spells, or be able to use 1st level psionic powers

Benefit: You can generate a shield of psionic energy for a number of minutes equal to your level, these do not have to be consecutive. This shield functions like the spell of the same name, but it blocks rays in addition to this (the shield AC bonus applies to ray attacks). At anytime you take a hit, you can have the shield shatter in your place, reducing the damage by 1d4 plus one per level; but it reduces one minute off of your duration for this.

Strengthened Shield

The shield you use to protect yourself has a bit more density

Prerequisite: Shield Prowess

Benefit: The shield that you have that surrounds you now has 10+1/2 levels hit points of its own; which function like temporary hit points. At a time you are attacked, you can choose to have your shield take the damage instead of your hit points. If the shield’s hit points deplete to 0, the shield is destroyed. Any leftover damage is transferred to you after you roll the 1d4+1 per level. The shield’s hit points regenerate at a rate of 1 per 1 round, but always takes double damage from electricity. The shield itself is immune to critical hits or precision damage.
Special: This feat can be taken multiple times. Each time you do, the shield gains an additional 5 hit points.

Improved Strengthened Shield

The shield you use to protect yourself is denser

Prerequisite: Constitution 15, Wisdom 15, Strengthened Shield,

Benefit: The shield only takes 50% additional damage from electricity. The shield also gains an additional 10 hit points.

[Florian]

I´m actually so-so on gestalting squlknife and psywar, not enough synergy for my taste. The Mindblade Magus archetype also offers twin psychic blades, should be the better basis.

[keeper2161]

I like those feats. I think I will use the Elan race. The campaign is using the 20 point buy system.

Str10, Dex16, Con14, Int12, Wis16, Cha 8. The extra 2 points I put into Dex.

[JW86]

When I DM'd, I had an underground sect of Githzerai who flavour-wise WERE Protoss. I even statted up robots for the Sentries, Observers, Dragoons etc.

I created Zealots as Githzerai with 2 levels in Monk, any further levels in Psywar. I gave them a custom 1d6 energy-blade fist weapon, and let their manifestation of Claws of the Beast enhance it. I created Adepts as Githzerai Monk/Ardent. High Templar were Monk/Psion. Tashalatora was a common feat.

I also gave them a custom temp HP-based Shield (10 HP, Fire/Cold/Acid/Elemental Resist 2, Fast Healing 1)

[keeper2161]

A Soulknife/Mindblade Magus isn't terrible. The problem is that it makes the character MAD. Anyone know of a way for either a soulknife or psychic warrior to cast through there weapon?

[Keltest]

In StarCraft II, Dark Archons are no longer a thing. Any two Templar, Dark or High, can merge into a regular Archon.

In the RTS game itself, the typical strategy is to use High Templar for their psi storms and then, when out of energy, merge them right there on the battlefield while the Zealots and Stalkers and the rest of the army are defending them, before sending the merged Archons in as short-ranged powerhouses.

I think the only reason to merge Dark Templar into Archons is when the opponent has so much detection that the Dark Templar is useless.

Regardless, because it is both a permanent change that alters power suite (i.e. build) entirely and requires a second character, I think Archon-merge is something best left off of one of these builds.

Out of curiosity, has anybody considered a Large race for this? Protoss are something like 3 meters tall on average.

7 feet tall. closer to 2 meters than 3. And I agree that archon merge is not worth modeling. They have a lifespan measuring in days or less, and is basically considered to be a suicidal sacrifice.

[Segev]

Mind Control was hard to use well, but when it worked, the fun you could have with a Protoss that controlled Zerg and Terran units was immense. (Mind control an SCV and a Drone.)

I think they found a solution for that problem with the Infestor in SCII: the mind-controlled builder-unit either can't build, or builds stuff that his original boss owns.

Replace the Dark Archon's "lose all shields and energy" with "dies" when it mind controls something, too, and that would probably be better. (Now it's the mind of the Dark Archon finding a new host.)

[Keltest]

Mind Control was hard to use well, but when it worked, the fun you could have with a Protoss that controlled Zerg and Terran units was immense. (Mind control an SCV and a Drone.)

I think they found a solution for that problem with the Infestor in SCII: the mind-controlled builder-unit either can't build, or builds stuff that his original boss owns.

Replace the Dark Archon's "lose all shields and energy" with "dies" when it mind controls something, too, and that would probably be better. (Now it's the mind of the Dark Archon finding a new host.)

Actually, you can in fact control a probe and have it start warping in stuff. Theres an achievement in game for making a zealot on the ladder when you queued as zerg.

Its technically possible with terran too, but hard because Neural Parasite will wear off before the building is completed, so you need a conga line of infestors to keep the SCV under your control and working on the building.

[Segev]

Huh, neat. I may have to try that some day.