3.5e War Chef Class Homebrew - Thoughts Appreciated

[NobleGalahad]

Hello! Longtime visitor, but I decided to finally make an account to share a homebrew class that I've been working on. It's called the War Chef, and is designed to be a funky caster / warrior mix. Please let me know your thoughts on balancing, because I would love to run this in some upcoming groups!

D&D 3.5
Class
War Chef

War Chef
There is one weakness that all adventurers share; they all need to eat. The War Chef, master of all culinary arts as well as battle, is able to easily fulfill this need, while bestowing their allies with magical reinforcement through their arcane cuisine. Hardy, strong-willed, and deliberate, the War Chef travels the land, constantly looking for new ways to improve their craft.
War Chefs depend heavily on their cooking, but can also hold their own in a fight. Through a unique fighting style that combines sharp kitchen implements with food-based attacks, the War Chef is able to take down even the most tasteless of foes – that is, if they aren't too busy eating to fight.

Adventures: War Chefs are constantly on adventures, always searching for new and interesting ways to prepare food. By expanding their repertoire, the War Chef is able to surpass their peers on the road to becoming a master. Often traveling in groups, or in a band of adventurers, the War Chef enjoys company. This means that the War Chef makes fast friends with all types of adventurers. Their free-spirited and cheerful nature makes them quite personable, and for that reason War Chefs make good leaders in groups.
Good War Chefs might be found traveling with a party of weathered adventurers, supporting them in their long and arduous quests for good. Evil War Chefs might be found traveling with dark cults, luring away victims with the smell of their irresistible craft.

Characteristics: War Chefs cook through either an innate relationship with food or through careful study. These two types of War Chefs, while equally common, tend to dislike one another. Either way, the magic in their cooking is directed towards effects that assist allies, rather than harm enemies. Through the use of special oils and other cooking ingredients, high level War Chefs can harness several forms of fire and acid based magic, but that is, for the most part, the extent of their offensive magical capabilities. To counterbalance this, the War Chef constantly trains with their cooking implements, and keeps them honed to a razor's edge. This unique fighting style, different for each War Chef, forms the center of their offensive capabilities. While the Chefs do develop some abilities in this regard, theirs are not as advanced as those of classes fully devoted to the fighting arts.

Alignment: The War Chef can be any alignment, but tends slightly towards chaotic over lawful. Most lawful War Chefs use careful study to prepare and create their cooking. Chaotic War Chefs, by comparison, are much more likely to “wing it” while cooking, and tend to look down on those who use recipe books.

Religion: War Chefs can worship any number of deities, but many tend towards Fharlanghn, the God of Roads, to protect them on their frequent and dangerous journeys for new methods of cooking. Some War Chefs also pay tribute to Obad-Hai, God of Nature, for providing ingredients for them to cook with. However, most War Chefs are too devoted to their work to spend any large amount of time in the service of a deity.

Background: War Chefs usually become enchanted with cooking early in childhood, whether due to the influence of another War Chef or some other particularly great chef in their lives. Inspired to learn the culinary arts, the War Chef finds over time that their craft is not as good as they desire. It is this drive, this wish to improve, that begins the War Chef on their journey of discovery. Once a hopeful encounters a War Chef, and learns the rudimentary arts of combining the arcane and culinary, they too can become a War Chef.
War Chefs have strong bonds with one another, especially if they have a history together. Equally likely to travel alone as in groups, War Chefs are divided by only one thing; their style of cooking. Those who are spontaneous cooks rarely interact with those who study and prepare, and the opposite is true. They often form large coalitions within their styles of cooking, in order to share gained knowledge and affect what goes on in the world around them, if they so desire.

Races: Any race can be a War Chef, though Half-Orcs and other less intelligent races are less likely to appreciate the culinary arts.

Other Classes: War Chefs find plenty in common with other adventurers, and have been known to delve into other disciplines at times. However, War Chefs driven by improvisation find it harder to get along with the more serious classes, as War Chefs who use meticulous cooking methods find it more difficult to relate to the more spontaneous classes.

Role: A War Chef often plays the role of support for a team of adventurers, preparing foodstuffs for them ahead of time, then assisting in combat later. In social settings, War Chefs make good, charismatic leaders, as long as the people they are interacting with don't have anything against their profession. Good at negotiations and diplomacy, a War Chef is handy to have whether surrounded by allies or enemies.

Game Rule Information

Abilities: The most important ability for the War Chef is either Intelligence or Wisdom, based on their cooking style. After that, dexterity is important for their unique fighting style. Charisma is important to several of the War Chefs key spell foods, making it just as important as Dexterity for the successful War Chef.

Alignment: Any

Hit Die: d6

Class Skills
The War Chef's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Concentration (Con), Craft (Food) (Int), Decipher Script (Int), Gather Information (Cha), Knowledge (Cooking) (Int), Perform (Cooking) (Cha), Profession (Chef) (Wis), Search (Int), Sense Motive (Wis), and Tumble (Dex). See Chapter 4: Skills for skill descriptions.

Skill Points at 1st Level: (3 + Int Modifier) x 4

Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 3 + Int Modifier

Class Features

All of the following are class features of the War Chef.

Base Attack Bonus: A War Chef’s Base Attack Bonus is equal to that of a Bard at equal level.

Saves: A War Chef’s saves are equal to that of a Bard of equal level.

Spells Per Day: A War Chef’s spells per day are equal to a Wizard of equal level.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: War Chefs are proficient with weapons similar to those they use in cooking. These include the dagger, quarterstaff, sap, short sword, handaxe, and light mace. In addition, War Chefs are Proficient with any kitchen implement suitable for use as a weapon. War Chefs are not proficient with any armor or shields; in the kitchen and on the battlefield, they require completely unrestricted movement in order to properly perform their craft.

Cooking Style: At 1st level, a War Chef must declare their cooking style as either Spontaneous or Planned. A Spontaneous chef uses Wisdom in any rolls involving their cooking abilities. A Planned chef uses Intelligence in any rolls involving their cooking abilities. Once determined, a War Chef's cooking style may not change.

Kiln Mastery (Ex): A War Chef becomes highly resistant to physical blows due to constant injuries in the kitchen, and they have a sixth sense for avoiding additional harm. When unarmored or unencumbered, the War Chef adds their Cooking style Ability Modifier (either Wisdom or Intelligence) to their AC. In addition, The presence of their Arcane Kiln gives a War Chef gains a +1 bonus to AC. at 10th level, this bonus is increased to +2, and increases to +3 at 20th level. These AC bonuses apply even against touch attacks or when the War Chef is flat-footed. They lose these bonuses when they are immobilized or helpless, when they wear any armor, when they carry a shield, or when they carry a heavy load.

Culinary Kung-Fu: A War Chef is proficient with all kitchen implements as weapons. They are treated as improvised weapons, however the War Chef suffers no -4 penalty when wielding them. A War Chef may dual-wield kitchen implements as though they had the Dual-Wielding feat. Additionally, when dual-wielding kitchen implements, the War Chef may perform a Flurry of Blows as a Monk half their level, rounded up. As they gain levels, the War Chef's skill with kitchenware grows beyond any normal capacity. At 4th level, and every 4 levels thereafter, they may treat an improvised kitchen implement as a weapon of one size greater than it is for purposes of damage. (For Example, a frying pan deals 1d3 damage at 1st level, 1d4 damage at 4th level, 1d6 damage at 8th level, and so on.)

Arcane Foodstuffs: A War Chef may infuse the food they cook each day with spells. In order to do this, they need an Arcane Kiln and proper cooking ingredients. They may use any number of spell slots at the beginning of each day as they prepare food, infusing the chosen spell of their choice into whatever they make. At the beginning of each day, the War Chef may take time to cook any number of Arcane Foodstuffs, as long as they are able to commit the required amount of spell-slots for the day. The War Chef uses the Wizard's spell list, but may only use non-damaging spells from it in their cooking. Any remaining slots may be used to prepare Arcane Flame spells.

Revitalizing Snack: A War Chef keeps a certain number of healthy ingredients on hand at all times – enough to whip together a dish known as a Revitalizing Snack at a moment's notice. They may craft a number of these equal to one half their level (rounded up) per day, and may, as long as they are within range, toss them to their allies without rolling. Consuming a snack is a standard action, and heals 1d6 hit points. At 6th level, this increases to 1d8 hit points. At 11th level, this increases to 1d10, and at 16th level, this increases to 1d12. A Revitalizing snack must be consumed fresh to receive any benefit; it loses it's potency one minute after creation.

Arcane Flame: As a War Chef gains experience, they learn over time to use their arcane kilns for more than just cooking. War Chefs gain access to one fire based spell of each level as they advance, and may prepare daily spell slots with these attacks instead of Arcane Foodstuffs. A War Chef may prepare an Arcane Flame spell only as long as they have access to spells of that level. A War Chef may only cast these spells if they have access to their Arcane Kiln.

Arcane Flame Spell List

Lv. 0 - Light
Lv. 1 - Orb of Fire, Lesser
Lv. 2 - Fireburst
Lv. 3 - Fireball
Lv. 4 - Blast of Flame
Lv. 5 - Fireburst, Greater
Lv. 6 - Fire Seeds
Lv. 7 - Fire Storm
Lv. 8 - Incendiary Cloud
Lv. 9 - Meteor Swarm

[Hish]

First, I don't claim to be an expert critic. I don't have as much experience with actual gameplay as other might.

It does seem to be underpowered in combat, unarmored, with a d6 hit die, 3/4 BAB, and a less-than-stellar weapons list (especially at lower levels). I think a ranged option would help (either a weapon added to their list or a cooking implement that explicitly works as a ammo-like thrown weapon or something).

Can you be a bit more specific about how the Arcane Foodstuffs work? I assume they grant the spell's effect to the consumer, but that doesn't really make sense with multi-target or area spells. What if the spell doesn't act on creatures? (eg. mud to rock is "non-damaging," but can only be cast on mud.)
Spellcasting based on the Artificer's infusions might work better.

Finally, the Craft mechanics don't work very well with food, so Profession (Chef) is usually used. Maybe you could offer both, because one is keyed off of Wisdom and the other Intelligence.

Again, not an expert, could be totally wrong about the balance.

I like idea, and it seems well developed. The biggest thing is fleshing out the casting system.

[OGDojo]

Okay so heres a few things i would suggest

Skills:
Give him the skill "Survival" since part of his job will be to gather ingredients on the road and cook them properly, he would need a way to forage and understand what he is picking and why, you may also wanna give him "Knowledge (nature)" to help with that as well

Proficiencies:
i actually agree with the "No armor or shields" since (as a cook myself) having armor on would make me unnecessarily hot, some chefs prefer to work shirtless or in a t-shirt. however i would say that they gain proficiency "Frying pan" and make the frying pan sort of like this

Frying pan:
Bludgeoning, 1d6 damage, crit x2, Range -,

On top of being a blunt instrument of destruction for any unfortunate enough to be hit by it, the Frying pan conveys a +1 deflection bonus to AC when it was used for attack. if it was used to cook with on the previous round it was used you also gain a 1d4 fire damage enhancement. and if it isnt used to attack then the wielder gains a deflection bonus that matches the wielders Dex (max of 3)

Arcane Kiln:
you may also wanna add what an Arcane Kiln is so that people don't go looking for it in the Source books.

Revitalizing Snack:
as far as revitalizing snack, if they are suppose to be for support then healing 1d6 at levels 1-5 is decent because even someone with 70 hp would be thankful for that paltry amount. but after that it should go up by d6s so that they can keep up with the health of the party, cuz after that even a wizard (d4+con (usually a +2 or less) min:6 due to low con and rolling 1s Max: 48 if you max rolls and put an 18 in con) would't be healed enough for it to be worth stopping for a full standard action to eat a snack unless it was life or death and they would more than likely just run away with their full round than stop and eat. so i just suggest that the snacks be 1d6/4 chef level. that way they arent by any means a healer but they have the ability to keep someone from dying if needed or help the healer as a backup, just in case.

Eat time:
i think that eat time should be a free action. that way if a chef tosses a snack to their party members it wont disrupt the flow of combat, it will just take up their free action (my group uses their free actions ALOT, not having that 5ft step can hurt alot). however if they are removing it from their bag then it would take up a move AND free action,
i also suggest another thing Revitalizing Snack can be used for later on in this post.

Arcane Foodstuffs:
Arcane foodstuffs should have their effects vary based on the quality of which the food is cooked. if you require each food to be made based on a crafting DC check like the Cleric's turn undead ability, you can add things like Metamagic and health boosts based on how well your roll. i think it would add another layer of depth to the class making it more joyful to use. and perhaps make a small list of dishes that the war chef can choose from with different Health effects for each spell level, that way they can pick a dish, roll the dice, add their health or metamagic stuff to it along with their spell, then when someone eats it they gain all of the effects based on the dish itself. that would make the culinary aspect of the chef much more pronounced and useful to a group. and have each effect last a number of hours (1 hr/ CL) so that by level 4 the Chef can keep certain boosts going all day without having to mix something up on the spot.

A Few More Abilities!:
i would also suggest a few more abilities
Aromatic Therapy:
A War Chef's inspiration is guided by battle! once a chef has started a fire with one of his spells he can then place a pot on top of it and begin to cook, adding various spices and ingredients to make a beautiful smell. increasing the Base attack bonus, and saves by +1/4CL and all skill checks by +2/4 CL for the duration of time that the cook is cooking. maximum of +5/+10 respectively.
this will give the Cook more use in combat than just a knife wielding crazy man with no armor. makes him more support based like a Bard.

Pepper Spray:
A cook Shakes some pepper in his hand and casts it at his opponent, who then becomes either blind for 1d4 rounds as they try to remove the stinging pepper from their eyes or they loose any Scent ability for 1d4 rounds and are stunned until the rounds are up as they begin sneezing up a fit.

Enticing Aroma:
with a successful perform cooking check, a cook draws creatures and beings toward with the allure of well cooked food. a Profession Chef check or a concentration check OR a Sense motive check can be used to overcome this as well as a will save to resist the luring scent presented to them, failure draws their quarry in to eat making it perfect for traps/ambushes or even sleeping or poisonings

Poisonous Mixture:
The Chef knows how to make good food... he also know how to cover up uninviting smells or how to mix in unhealthy ingredients into their food without making it taste off or smell weird. any opponent trying to discern if the chefs cooking is poisoned or not takes a -1/cl penalty.

Head of the Kitchen:
While in combat the head chef runs the battle like he would his own kitchen staff giving the party a +4 BAB bonus and a +2 on saves vs fear or mind influencing effects.

Spells:
i would also suggest that the "Spells" that it prepares can only be non damaging spells besides Fire based spells. and fire based spells can be pulled from any spell list. and the spells that aren't fire based spells can only be used for cooking.
Also cooking in combat takes a number of rounds based on the level of spell being infused into it, but while its cooking the Aromatic therapy effect begins and when finished its a move action to dip the Revitalizing Snack into it, a free action to toss it to a party member and a free action for the party member to eat it.

if you want more ideas please give me a hollar, i have been wanting to make a class like this for a while now and yours is a great starting point, giving it a few tweaks and a few more abilities will have it up and running in no time.:smallcool:

[El'the Ellie]

Let me start off by saying I love the flavor (pun intended).

Overall: I think a prestige class might fit better than a base class. A war chef seems like a practiced combination of magic and cuisine: as such, this hyper-specific fighting style seems like a representation of certain prior choices, rather than a core style of adventuring. A base class would open you up to a lot of design space because you can make certain assumptions about the choices of the character that took the prestige class (IE, the prerequisites)

For instance, You could have perquisites that looked something like:

Base attack bonus +4
Craft(Culinary)* 9 ranks
Able to cast 3rd level arcane spells.

* I could be wrong, but I've usually seen Craft(Culinary), Craft(Cooking) or Profession(Chef) to represent a Chef, not usually Craft(Food) or Perform(Cooking)

This would ensure that someone taking the class had these things already. That could be a 9th level Sorcerer or Wizard, an 8th level Bard, or some combination of Sorcerer/Wizard and something with full BAB

At each level, the prestige class could advance casting of the Arcane caster, just like Archmage does. Alternatively, if you want to spread power out between melee combat and arcane casting, you can only advance arcane casting at some levels, the way Eldritch Knight does.

Skills: I've never seen a class (especially a base class) grant a specific Craft or Perform (or Profession) skill. Usually, they generally grant the Craft/Perform skill, and allow the player the freedom to choose the sub category. In cases where the class wants you to have a specific type of Craft/Perform, the class usually makes it's abilities depend on your ranks in the skill. For example, most bardic music abilities start with "A bard with X or more ranks in Perform". You could do something similar like "A war chef with X or more ranks in Craft(Culinary)...". X is usually equal to the max number of ranks you could have in a skill at the level the ability is granted (6 for an ability gained at 3rd level, 9 for one gained at 6th level, etc.)

Just like Base Attack Bonuses and Saving Throw progressions, Skill Points per level generally fall into one category of: 2/level, 4/level, 6/level or 8/level. The War Chef, with 3/level is a very strange outlier. While not wrong per se, most people are used to it being one of those 4 groups. Also, I would consider increasing the skill points to something like 6/level: Any chef worth their salt (pun intended) is probably going to max ranks in some craft skill (especially so if you decide to require to have some abilities require certain ranks), which is a bit like a 1-point tax they must pay to play the class. This hurts a lot more if they have fewer skills per level (3) and doesn't hurt nearly as much if they have a lot (6+). Keep in mind a Wisdom-based War Chef might have a +0 Int, and so could have only 3 skills per level. If they have to max Craft and another crucial skill (like concentration, for casters), they have essentially 1 point to spend where they want.

Spells: I think this section could use a bit of clarification, and possibly is too strong. First some clarification:

A War Chef uses the Wizard spell list, but there's no reference to spells known. Do they know all spells? Do they have a 'Recipe Book' that is functionally similar to a Wizard's Spellbook?
A War Chef mostly 'casts' their spells in the beginning of the day by cooking. How long do these spell-foods stay good? All day? Does the food, once prepared, take up space? How do I consume the food to activate the spell? (IE, is it a standard action, same action as casting the spell? Does it require a free hand? Does it provoke an Attack of Opportunity?) Can I give the food to other people to consume? If so, be careful because that allows the caster to (in a roundabout way) 'cast' a personal range spell on other people. For instance, True Strike becomes very very good when the barbarian/paladin can use it to power attack for all they have.
How do I use an Arcane Foodstuff if the spell has multiple targets, or no targets? (For instance, how do I select targets for the Haste spell? How do I select the area for the Obscuring Mist spell?)
What, exactly, is a 'non-damaging' spell? It is just hit points, or does ability damage and drain count as well? Does nonlethal damage count as damage? Do penalties, death-effects, and other negative effects count as 'damage'?
How do I influence an opponent into eating an Arcane Foodstuff with negative effects (like Hold Monster)? Can I shove it in their mouth, or do I have to trick them into eating it?

Next, some balance notes:
Wizards are often understood to be one of the strongest classes in the game, and that's almost entirely due to their wide spell list, versatile spells known, and the speed at which they access new spell levels. Some things that keep them in check are: Bad saves, BAB, HP, and skill points; no class abilities to speak of; requirement to prepare spells and write new spells in a spellbook; and a lower amount of spells per day.

A War Chef has a decent BAB, (slightly) better HP, better saves and skill points, has some cool class abilities, and, most importantly, seems to have access to all spells known. They do have some relevant limiting factors: they still have to 'prepare' in the form of casting their spells in the beginning of the day, they can't cast damaging spells, and (possibly) they must expend resources without knowing if they will actually need the spell for the day (for instance, if a War Chef and a Wizard both want to cast Limited Wish one day, it seems like the War Chef must expend the 300 xp early in the morning, even if the Limited Wish is not used. By contrast, it costs the Wizard nothing to have the spell prepared, and he only needs to spend the xp once he actually casts the spell.)
However, this alternative style also has some potential buffs as well: the war chef can (possibly) use personal range spells on allies, can use spells with long casting times in combat effectively (considering the time to consume an Arcane Foodstuff probably takes the same amount of time regardless of spell casting time?), And can give spells to other people to use. (Buffing the party is a lot more effective if each person can 'cast' a buff on their first round, rather than if the Wizard has to do it once per round.)

All said and done, the tradeoffs seem to make it equal to wizard casting in my eyes. However, players will always reduce the impact of things that hinder them, and maximize their benefits, so even a trade-off that is neutral is still a buff for anyone that wants to play a War Chef. Thus, even before we count the bigger HD, saves, BAB, Skill Points, and Class Abilities, we're looking at something that is a little stronger than the strongest class in the game.

Proposed Fix
War Chef is a combination fighter and Arcane Caster so giving them full wizard casting, even with possible nerfs, is going to make them very, very strong. I suggest modeling their casting after bards, as you did with their BAB, saves, and HP. If their casting progression is slower, it gives you the ability to put more power into their combat side. If you did this, I would suggest again increasing their skill points as well as their HD to a d8 (or possibly a d10): if they're going to be an unarmored character in melee combat, they need hitpoints. All my other suggestions are based on making this switch to casting progression.

Cooking Style: The choice between using wisdom or intelligence as a casting stat is interesting, but the wording of 'spontaneous' or 'prepared' is misleading: those words are almost always used to refer to how a caster picks out their spells. However, wisdom or int War Chef still has to 'prepare' their spells in the sense that they have to cook all of them (minus Arcane Flame spells) at the beginning of the day.

Kiln Mastery: This is great, and is a good way to keep a casting type unarmored, but still in the fight. I would suggest actually increasing the level-based bonus. I realize it's essentially the same as half a Monk's AC bonus, but... well, a monk's AC bonus is not sufficient for being a melee fighter. As it stands, a War Chef might have a +5 AC at first level (very good!), a +6 AC at 10th level (Meh), and a +7 AC at 20th level (useless). I might consider changing it to +1 at first level, with a +1 increase at every 4 levels thereafter (+2 at 5th level, +3 at 9th level, +4 at 13th level, +5 at 17th level). As an additional class feature (since this class could use more of those if the casting changes to a bard's casting), you can also give them some DR, like the barbarian gets. This is more reminiscent of shrugging off damage (from frequent cuts and burns) then only AC bonus.

Culinary Kung-Fu: Dual-wielding isn't a feat. Perhaps you meant Two-Weapon Fighting? If so, you might want to also give them Improved Two Weapon Fighting and Greater Two Weapon Fighting as class features when they would normally qualify for them. Also, you may want to consider giving them the Weapon Finesse feat if you want them to be Dex based fighters, and have Culinary Kung-Fu treat improvised weapons as light for the purposes of Weapon Finesse. (I don't believe they do by default, but I could be wrong)

Also, if you decide to switch to Bard spell progression, there's a lot of room in here to add some strength, which is good because as is they are a bit lack luster melee fighters. A chef is skill with using their knives to chop and carve meat already. Perhaps you could allow them to add their (INT or WIS) bonus to damage with daggers. Perhaps in later levels you can add some bleed damage, the ability to pin people by their clothes, or debilitating injuries similar to the rogue's line of feats that trade sneak attack bonus for inflicting status conditions.