Paladin, revisited - My first homebrew, feedback is welcome

[Kaleph]

Some weeks ago I started a thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?527091-Possible-paladin-fixes) about some ideas I had to revamp the Paladin, a class which I find nice flavor-wise but underwhelming crunch-wise. The main driver is, that some of my fellow players have been interested in the class, but decided not to play it due to its luckluster mechanics; since in the future we could play in a Warcraft/ WoW setting, a buffed-up paladin would be a nice addition (I never played the videogame, but I'm very interested in the setting).

So, thanks also to some suggestions I collected in the previous thread, I came out with this version (https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByKQoekUX3zXNUtqTXluNHlyTWM/view?usp=sharing), which I already distributed to my friends. The target was:

Bumping up the class a couple of tiers
Making it more tanky
Introducing more special abilities
Making more appealing to take many levels in the class, rather than a dip
Giving more (and more various) role-play hooks


You're welcome to give feedback - what you like, what you don't like, what you would add.
The image on the first page is courtesy of a friend of mine, he makes some nice artwork, you may have a look if you like.

[aimlessPolymath]

Unable to access document.

[Kaleph]

Unable to access document.

My bad, try now.

[rferries]

1) This is a very professional-looking document, kudos!

2) Steely Resolve and Furious Smite are complicated but flavourful.

3) Positive Energy Channeling is great, steamlining lay on hands plus remove disease plus turn undead all into one class feature.

4) Minor edit needed - "The Paladin does not have access to any domain spells or granted powers, as a cleric does. A Paladin prepares and casts spells the way a cleric does, though he cannot lose a prepared spell to spontaneously cast a cure spell in its place. A Paladin may prepare and cast any spell on the Paladin spell list, provided that he can cast spells of that level, but he must choose which spells to prepare during his daily meditation. A Paladin also gets one domain spell of each spell level he can cast, starting at 2nd level."

5) I'll miss Divine Grace (Resilient Troops notwithstanding).

6) I feel like your deity or cause should be explicity Good, rather than just non-Evil

7) The table refers to Major Auras, yet the writeup says just Auras (and seems to imply that you learn different auras at different levels). May need an edit.

Very well done! I particularly like all the immunities you acquire as you level up.

[JBPuffin]

6) I feel like your deity or cause should be explicity Good, rather than just non-Evil

No Paladins of Pharasma?

[Baby Gary]

I love this soooo much, but there is one little problem that I found (besides that everything look amazing!)

He can select a new opponent on any action.
so could he use am immediate action to change the AC bonus to whoever enemy is currently attacking.

[Morphic tide]

Okay, so, let's look at the stuff changed:

You lazily stapled on the Crusader's delayed damage mechanics, literally just took them right as they were on Crusader. This is a very lazy improvement to Paladin. If I wanted the delayed damage mechanic, I'd just go for Crusader, because it keeps the big advantage of Martials by not having any significant limited use abilities, not this Paladin, which looks like a sloppy stapling together of the official Paladin, Crusader and Marshal.

Upped to 5/9 casting, with a progression I've never seen before and a spell list that looks to be heavy on the self-buffs and gish support looted from Cleric. Great idea, unfortunately you made the mistake of using a spellbook. On a Divine caster. Why not just keep the Cleric/Druid full-list casting, or go for Spells Known like a Bard? Paladins are much less equipment dependant than other Martials, why bring this down by tying their casting to a destructible item? They already loose their powers if they do even a single Evil act willingly, why penalize them further?

Lay on Hands was replaces with a significantly-improved version that still manages to be basically useless. 10 points from the pool for a Turn Undead attempt is good, but even with 18 Charisma you need to be level three for the first use, so it's not nearly able to keep up with demands of Divine feats. Removing conditions is nice, but being a full-round action is kinda crippling. Taking 10 points for removing Exhaustion, Nauseated, Poisoned or Stunned is kinda bad for the aforementioned reason of not enough points in the pool to make it work, as well as not giving a workaround for the all-important Daze effect that is so hot because there's so few ways around it. Unlike Stunned. Fixing Diseased, Blindness, Deafness or a negative level for 20 points from the pool is good, because those are frequently long-term conditions and making the blind see is a nice bonus.

The Auras are not nearly good enough for their scaling and restrictions. The restriction of needing three Intelligence and sharing a spoken language with the Paladin doesn't make sense for a Divine presence. +2 to all saves, AC or attack rolls at level 8 is good, but not nearly good enough to be worth passing up 10 ft. move speed bonus. Especially because you arbitrarily split melee and ranged attack rolls. Circumstance bonuses are one of the less common, but are a problem because there's other ways of getting them. Moral bonuses are overdone, but Sacred bonuses are fairly rare and thematically-fitting. Also, Saves > AC > DR, by a lot, especially with the piddly numbers on show here.

Challenging Strike is bad for tanking, for several reasons. One, it requires the target to have five or more intelligence, so it won't work on any beastly targets or the majority of Undead, two, it only affects things with CR two or more lower than the Paladin's level, thus only working on mooks, and three, the save adds only half of level to it, which is rather bad because boosting saves by one per level isn't all that hard.

The Dodge bonus not qualifying as the Dodge feat is rather bad, and Paladins are heavy-armored melee monsters, not dexterous combatants. Also, only working on one target at a time makes the above issues with Challenging Strike more severe because you will have a single-target AC increase and an ability that won't let you force attacks from single large targets. It would work far better as a Sacred bonus to Armor or Natural Armor in general.

Immunity to Fear and Diseases is good, but also situational. Immunity to Charm, from the Paladin of Freedom, is much better as it's more likely. Fear-effect immunity has other sources, Charm-effect immunity is one of the hardest subsets of mind-affecting immunity to get and also more likely to screw over the party on failure of save.

Mettle is always good, and having it be Fort and Will Partial immunity makes certain spells much less useful. Like Disintegrate suddenly dealing no damage on a successful save. Evasion, or similar effects, can be gained by a 2-level Rogue dip for covering Ref Partial immunity.

Armor Mastery to ignore armor move speed penalties makes the above complaint of the move speed bonus being too good all the more serious, as the Paladin can now keep up with some mounts while on foot. And the above complaint of the Auras only affecting Int 3+ creatures makes it so that you end up with no reason to use lower-quality mounts ever, because you can just use an Aura to boost your speed to match them. One that can't affect the Int 1-2 mounts.

Sturdy Mind is an automatic reroll on failed saves vs. Mind Affecting. This is good. Getting Charm and Compulsion immunity at level 15? Not so good. At that level, Mind Blank is too easy to get to not have it be blank mind-affecting immunity.

Minor Fortification is much too weak for level 17. 25% chance of not being Precision Damaged, when you can easily afford full immunity to such on your armor, is kinda pitiful. You are getting effects late.

Devoted Sacrifice is just an AoE Shield Other, without the AC bonus. The AoE is also goddamn tiny, being only 20 ft. at 18 Charisma. There's easy ways to have a threatened area larger than that. Hell, there's ways for your character to occupy a space larger than that.

Smite Evil uses the Crusader-looted feature as a prerequisite, thereby further reducing the desire to use this version of Paladin. At least change the name, dude, it's insulting. Also, it doesn't even pass DR/Good.

[rferries]

Okay, so, let's look at the stuff changed:

You lazily stapled on the Crusader's delayed damage mechanics, literally just took them right as they were on Crusader. This is a very lazy improvement to Paladin. If I wanted the delayed damage mechanic, I'd just go for Crusader, because it keeps the big advantage of Martials by not having any significant limited use abilities, not this Paladin, which looks like a sloppy stapling together of the official Paladin, Crusader and Marshal.

Upped to 5/9 casting, with a progression I've never seen before and a spell list that looks to be heavy on the self-buffs and gish support looted from Cleric. Great idea, unfortunately you made the mistake of using a spellbook. On a Divine caster. Why not just keep the Cleric/Druid full-list casting, or go for Spells Known like a Bard? Paladins are much less equipment dependant than other Martials, why bring this down by tying their casting to a destructible item? They already loose their powers if they do even a single Evil act willingly, why penalize them further?

Lay on Hands was replaces with a significantly-improved version that still manages to be basically useless. 10 points from the pool for a Turn Undead attempt is good, but even with 18 Charisma you need to be level three for the first use, so it's not nearly able to keep up with demands of Divine feats. Removing conditions is nice, but being a full-round action is kinda crippling. Taking 10 points for removing Exhaustion, Nauseated, Poisoned or Stunned is kinda bad for the aforementioned reason of not enough points in the pool to make it work, as well as not giving a workaround for the all-important Daze effect that is so hot because there's so few ways around it. Unlike Stunned. Fixing Diseased, Blindness, Deafness or a negative level for 20 points from the pool is good, because those are frequently long-term conditions and making the blind see is a nice bonus.

The Auras are not nearly good enough for their scaling and restrictions. The restriction of needing three Intelligence and sharing a spoken language with the Paladin doesn't make sense for a Divine presence. +2 to all saves, AC or attack rolls at level 8 is good, but not nearly good enough to be worth passing up 10 ft. move speed bonus. Especially because you arbitrarily split melee and ranged attack rolls. Circumstance bonuses are one of the less common, but are a problem because there's other ways of getting them. Moral bonuses are overdone, but Sacred bonuses are fairly rare and thematically-fitting. Also, Saves > AC > DR, by a lot, especially with the piddly numbers on show here.

Challenging Strike is bad for tanking, for several reasons. One, it requires the target to have five or more intelligence, so it won't work on any beastly targets or the majority of Undead, two, it only affects things with CR two or more lower than the Paladin's level, thus only working on mooks, and three, the save adds only half of level to it, which is rather bad because boosting saves by one per level isn't all that hard.

The Dodge bonus not qualifying as the Dodge feat is rather bad, and Paladins are heavy-armored melee monsters, not dexterous combatants. Also, only working on one target at a time makes the above issues with Challenging Strike more severe because you will have a single-target AC increase and an ability that won't let you force attacks from single large targets. It would work far better as a Sacred bonus to Armor or Natural Armor in general.

Immunity to Fear and Diseases is good, but also situational. Immunity to Charm, from the Paladin of Freedom, is much better as it's more likely. Fear-effect immunity has other sources, Charm-effect immunity is one of the hardest subsets of mind-affecting immunity to get and also more likely to screw over the party on failure of save.

Mettle is always good, and having it be Fort and Will Partial immunity makes certain spells much less useful. Like Disintegrate suddenly dealing no damage on a successful save. Evasion, or similar effects, can be gained by a 2-level Rogue dip for covering Ref Partial immunity.

Armor Mastery to ignore armor move speed penalties makes the above complaint of the move speed bonus being too good all the more serious, as the Paladin can now keep up with some mounts while on foot. And the above complaint of the Auras only affecting Int 3+ creatures makes it so that you end up with no reason to use lower-quality mounts ever, because you can just use an Aura to boost your speed to match them. One that can't affect the Int 1-2 mounts.

Sturdy Mind is an automatic reroll on failed saves vs. Mind Affecting. This is good. Getting Charm and Compulsion immunity at level 15? Not so good. At that level, Mind Blank is too easy to get to not have it be blank mind-affecting immunity.

Minor Fortification is much too weak for level 17. 25% chance of not being Precision Damaged, when you can easily afford full immunity to such on your armor, is kinda pitiful. You are getting effects late.

Devoted Sacrifice is just an AoE Shield Other, without the AC bonus. The AoE is also goddamn tiny, being only 20 ft. at 18 Charisma. There's easy ways to have a threatened area larger than that. Hell, there's ways for your character to occupy a space larger than that.

Smite Evil uses the Crusader-looted feature as a prerequisite, thereby further reducing the desire to use this version of Paladin. At least change the name, dude, it's insulting. Also, it doesn't even pass DR/Good.

Yikes! You make many valid points but it almost seems like you view this homebrew as a personal affront :D

I think the prayerbooks were cribbed from Archivists, maybe (not sure, I've never actually read the writeup for the class)?

I feel like the Lay On Hands effects should all be cumulative -rather than splitting points between restoring hp and removing conditions, it would be better to have "whenever you restore at least X hp to a character, you also remove all of the following conditions from that character", cumulative up to essentially duplicating a heal spell.

I agree the Int requirements for the abilities are a bit unwieldy; they make sense thematically but are probably too complex.

[Kaleph]

So, first of all thank you for this first round of comments.


1) This is a very professional-looking document, kudos!Thanx; I did it mainly because I wanted to practice a bit with MS-Word.


2) Steely Resolve and Furious Smite are complicated but flavourful.They're almost identical to the crusader abilities; they should be manageable, taken individually, although they're not the only complicated feature, so I cannot be sure, how easy is the class to be used. But the only way to find it out is to test it.


3) Positive Energy Channeling is great, steamlining lay on hands plus remove disease plus turn undead all into one class feature.I used the dragon shaman healing ability to build it.


4) Minor edit needed - "The Paladin does not have access to any domain spells or granted powers, as a cleric does. A Paladin prepares and casts spells the way a cleric does, though he cannot lose a prepared spell to spontaneously cast a cure spell in its place. A Paladin may prepare and cast any spell on the Paladin spell list, provided that he can cast spells of that level, but he must choose which spells to prepare during his daily meditation. A Paladin also gets one domain spell of each spell level he can cast, starting at 2nd level." I'll review the wording and correct it as necessary.


5) I'll miss Divine Grace (Resilient Troops notwithstanding).This was a hard decision; as you may imagine, I tried to avoid frontloading and splashing the bonuses through the 20 levels instead.


6) I feel like your deity or cause should be explicity Good, rather than just non-EvilMmmm and Saint Cuthbert?
Or
No Paladins of Pharasma?


7) The table refers to Major Auras, yet the writeup says just Auras (and seems to imply that you learn different auras at different levels). May need an edit.Dunno, there's no Minor Auras, so I don't feel like adding any flag. Anyhow I can better clarify how auras are gained, in case the table and the actual text are not clear enough.


Very well done! I particularly like all the immunities you acquire as you level up.Thanx, yes the main effort was to scale the class feature in a way that made sense.


I love this soooo much, but there is one little problem that I found (besides that everything look amazing!)
so could he use am immediate action to change the AC bonus to whoever enemy is currently attacking.
Thank you, I'll change it to "He can select a new opponent at the beginning of his turn", or the like.


I feel like the Lay On Hands effects should all be cumulative -rather than splitting points between restoring hp and removing conditions, it would be better to have "whenever you restore at least X hp to a character, you also remove all of the following conditions from that character", cumulative up to essentially duplicating a heal spell. I agree the Int requirements for the abilities are a bit unwieldy; they make sense thematically but are probably too complex.Both comments are likely to be embodied, thank you.

[Kaleph]

I answer in a separate post, to increase readability.


You lazily stapled on the Crusader's delayed damage mechanics, literally just took them right as they were on Crusader. This is a very lazy improvement to Paladin. If I wanted the delayed damage mechanic, I'd just go for Crusader, because it keeps the big advantage of Martials by not having any significant limited use abilities, not this Paladin, which looks like a sloppy stapling together of the official Paladin, Crusader and Marshal.Don't forget dragon shaman, Knight, swashbuckler, and a Paladin homebrew (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?221312-A-hero-is-a-man-too-stubborn-to-die-a-3-5-Paladin-fix-(PEACH)&p=12150015#post12150015) by Grod_the_Giant. My point is that, whenever possible, I prefer to use existing features, that probably already work, rather than creating new ones. The crusader mechanics have the advantage of not being use-limited, and fit with the tanky feel.


Upped to 5/9 casting, with a progression I've never seen before and a spell list that looks to be heavy on the self-buffs and gish support looted from Cleric. Great idea, unfortunately you made the mistake of using a spellbook. On a Divine caster. Why not just keep the Cleric/Druid full-list casting, or go for Spells Known like a Bard? Paladins are much less equipment dependant than other Martials, why bring this down by tying their casting to a destructible item? They already loose their powers if they do even a single Evil act willingly, why penalize them further?I admit this was a late change, and I did it for two reasons: to enhance the reasons to stay in the affiliation, and to give the DM control over the available spells. The latter point is mechanically important for me, so I won't change it. Other than that, in the campaigns that I've seen, having a spellbook is not a noticeable limitation, i.e. normally it's never scrapped.


Lay on Hands was replaces with a significantly-improved version that still manages to be basically useless. 10 points from the pool for a Turn Undead attempt is good, but even with 18 Charisma you need to be level three for the first use, so it's not nearly able to keep up with demands of Divine feats. Removing conditions is nice, but being a full-round action is kinda crippling. Taking 10 points for removing Exhaustion, Nauseated, Poisoned or Stunned is kinda bad for the aforementioned reason of not enough points in the pool to make it work, as well as not giving a workaround for the all-important Daze effect that is so hot because there's so few ways around it. Unlike Stunned. Fixing Diseased, Blindness, Deafness or a negative level for 20 points from the pool is good, because those are frequently long-term conditions and making the blind see is a nice bonus.Damn, I was sure I included Daze, I'll add it of course. Dude, you can also read sometimes before speaking, dazed is already listed. Regarding the turn undead's cost, I only partially agree with you - you actually need level 2 to start using it (2xLevelxCharisma=2x2x4=16 at level 2). An alternative would be to have it cost 5 points only, which would basically mean that, at high level, you may have at-will divine feats (2x20x7=280, which would mean up to 56 turn undead uses, but still I cannot use DMM: persist). I have to think about it.
Regarding the full-round action, there's a feat that provides a workaround - take it as a feat tax, like natural spell for a druid. I wanted to create something iconic, in addition to combat blessing.


The Auras are not nearly good enough for their scaling and restrictions. The restriction of needing three Intelligence and sharing a spoken language with the Paladin doesn't make sense for a Divine presence. +2 to all saves, AC or attack rolls at level 8 is good, but not nearly good enough to be worth passing up 10 ft. move speed bonus. Especially because you arbitrarily split melee and ranged attack rolls. Circumstance bonuses are one of the less common, but are a problem because there's other ways of getting them. Moral bonuses are overdone, but Sacred bonuses are fairly rare and thematically-fitting. Also, Saves > AC > DR, by a lot, especially with the piddly numbers on show here.Consider that this is the marhsal ability, and that it's Ex, not Su. Yes, there are good and bad options, but I don't see how it would be a problem, the players like to have things they can choose amongst; consider also that the save boost is intended to replace divine grace. I'll probably also add some of the draconic auras, too.
EDIT I though again about it, if I make it Su, sacred and int-independent it would probably be an improvement overall (Ex vs Su is not such a big benefit).


Challenging Strike is bad for tanking, for several reasons. One, it requires the target to have five or more intelligence, so it won't work on any beastly targets or the majority of Undead, two, it only affects things with CR two or more lower than the Paladin's level, thus only working on mooks, and three, the save adds only half of level to it, which is rather bad because boosting saves by one per level isn't all that hard.Basically you're reading it completely wrong, so some of the comments make no sense. The save scaling is definitely standard and, at Level 20, equates epic spells. Also, against evil characters you use the damage as a basis for the DC. I already considered to remove the Int-based limitation, though (it comes from the Knight class, which has a different flavor after all), so I'll follow your suggestion.


The Dodge bonus not qualifying as the Dodge feat is rather bad, and Paladins are heavy-armored melee monsters, not dexterous combatants. Also, only working on one target at a time makes the above issues with Challenging Strike more severe because you will have a single-target AC increase and an ability that won't let you force attacks from single large targets. It would work far better as a Sacred bonus to Armor or Natural Armor in general.This is also partially obsolete, due to your wrong reading of the challenging strike feature. The combination d10 + challenging strike + dodge bonus (instead of a general Bonus) requires also a little bit of strategy.


Immunity to Fear and Diseases is good, but also situational. Immunity to Charm, from the Paladin of Freedom, is much better as it's more likely. Fear-effect immunity has other sources, Charm-effect immunity is one of the hardest subsets of mind-affecting immunity to get and also more likely to screw over the party on failure of save.Immunity-fear is iconic, so I'd leave it. Sturdy mind and resilient troops should severely reduce the chance of being charmed, while leaving a certain risk, which I find nice. I consider your point, anyhow, I have to test it in-game.


Mettle is always good, and having it be Fort and Will Partial immunity makes certain spells much less useful. Like Disintegrate suddenly dealing no damage on a successful save. Evasion, or similar effects, can be gained by a 2-level Rogue dip for covering Ref Partial immunity.OK


Armor Mastery to ignore armor move speed penalties makes the above complaint of the move speed bonus being too good all the more serious, as the Paladin can now keep up with some mounts while on foot. And the above complaint of the Auras only affecting Int 3+ creatures makes it so that you end up with no reason to use lower-quality mounts ever, because you can just use an Aura to boost your speed to match them. One that can't affect the Int 1-2 mounts.Mounts are still good because of encumbrance/heavy load. And at level 10 overland movement is not a problem anymore.


Sturdy Mind is an automatic reroll on failed saves vs. Mind Affecting. This is good. Getting Charm and Compulsion immunity at level 15? Not so good. At that level, Mind Blank is too easy to get to not have it be blank mind-affecting immunity.The problem is that I have too many features scattered through the levels, otherwise I'd have given it earlier. Possibly to be re-arranged.


Minor Fortification is much too weak for level 17. 25% chance of not being Precision Damaged, when you can easily afford full immunity to such on your armor, is kinda pitiful. You are getting effects late.This was mainly a filler, if I remove it does it look better?


Devoted Sacrifice is just an AoE Shield Other, without the AC bonus. The AoE is also goddamn tiny, being only 20 ft. at 18 Charisma. There's easy ways to have a threatened area larger than that. Hell, there's ways for your character to occupy a space larger than that.Agreed in principle. Probably the best fix is to use the "close" range here.


Smite Evil uses the Crusader-looted feature as a prerequisite, thereby further reducing the desire to use this version of Paladin. At least change the name, dude, it's insulting. Also, it doesn't even pass DR/Good.You're insulting me with this comment. Smite evil is iconic, I want to leave the name as it is. A crusader cannot take this feat, the ability has a different name. The DR story makes also no sense, it's the same with the original smite, but a paladin can cast holy weapon, so what's the point?

[Jane_Smith]

I would also like to add the prayerbook is completely out of place. Paladins do not receive their power from the gods: only in the dedication of good/their own souls/will/etc. You could even be an atheist paladin - their codes are not connected to the gods in any way, and in many times, a paladins code and a gods dogma butt heads for paladins who do worship gods (Even good ones); as "Doing the Right Thing" as a way of life does not necessarily tie in with having to worship any god. They have not had to have gods sense I believe 2nd edition D&D if im not mistaken. Unless your changing this mechanic on a personal/homebrew basis and making them get power directly from the gods.

Refrences;

http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2oon6?Do-Paladins-Need-a-Goddess

James Jacob Himself;
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2l6h8?On-Pathfinder-and-Paladins-and-Development#46
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2l6h8&page=2?On-Pathfinder-and-Paladins-and-Development#59

These are for the Pathfinder version of paladin; but a quick google trip can also find refrences to the same rulings for 3.5 and 5e. Not to sure about 4e - skipped that whole edition myself. > _ >

[Kaleph]

I would also like to add the prayerbook is completely out of place. Paladins do not receive their power from the gods: only in the dedication of good/their own souls/will/etc. You could even be an atheist paladin - their codes are not connected to the gods in any way, and in many times, a paladins code and a gods dogma butt heads for paladins who do worship gods (Even good ones); as "Doing the Right Thing" as a way of life does not necessarily tie in with having to worship any god. They have not had to have gods sense I believe 2nd edition D&D if im not mistaken. Unless your changing this mechanic on a personal/homebrew basis and making them get power directly from the gods.

Refrences;

http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2oon6?Do-Paladins-Need-a-Goddess

James Jacob Himself;
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2l6h8?On-Pathfinder-and-Paladins-and-Development#46
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2l6h8&page=2?On-Pathfinder-and-Paladins-and-Development#59

These are for the Pathfinder version of paladin; but a quick google trip can also find refrences to the same rulings for 3.5 and 5e. Not to sure about 4e - skipped that whole edition myself. > _ >

This is the second comment against the prayerbook, which is a sign that something should be reviewed from my side. Regarding the crunch, I already explained why I wanted this requirement for the spells; it's definitely arbitrary, and the class wouldn't undergo any significant change with or without the prayerbook.

Now, the flavor. I analyzed your comment, and arrived to the same conclusion as you and Morphic tide, but for a completely different reason.
Actually, I don't fully understand your point: what is the relationship between a prayerbook and a deity? Probably the word "prayer" is confusing; it doesn't mean that you have to pray a god, but simply that divine spells in a book are somehow accumunated to "prayers" (similarly to lev. 0 divine spells being called "orisons") for fluff reasons.

Please consider a second argument. The SRD Paladin receives spells exactly in the same way as a cleric does: "through prayers and meditation"; this methodology works also for atheist clerics, and doesn't require worshipping a specific deity. Though, the word "praying" is also here used in the description: because divine powers (including spells) are, well, "divine" in nature, and so they require a blessing from an otherwordly entity (although not necessarily a god in the classical sense).

Finally, and this is the part which confuses me, this homebrew paladin doesn't actually need to pray, only to study his spellbook (refer also to the archivist preparation routine). The archivist (and consequently my homebrew) are consequently more "atheist" flavor-wise than the cleric and the standard Paladin.

Nevertheless...
The prayerbook lets the divine spells of the paladin originate from academical studies and researches, which is definitely out of place. Also, allowing 2 free spells/level doesn't work, since I am forgetting about the domain spells. An ex-Paladin would still keep access to his spells, since there's no reasonable relationship between code of conduct and being able to read magical scripts. Also charisma as primary casting ability makes no sense, because intelligence would be required to study the prayerbook.
Too many flaws, I'll keep the prayerbook out of the equation...

[Morphic tide]

I answer in a separate post, to increase readability.

Don't forget dragon shaman, Knight, swashbuckler, and a Paladin homebrew (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?221312-A-hero-is-a-man-too-stubborn-to-die-a-3-5-Paladin-fix-(PEACH)&p=12150015#post12150015) by Grod_the_Giant. My point is that, whenever possible, I prefer to use existing features, that probably already work, rather than creating new ones. The crusader mechanics have the advantage of not being use-limited, and fit with the tanky feel.
Crusader is Crusader, a class built to go literally forever without truly needing a healer or to stop for rests outside of the general sleep deprivation rules. Paladin is heavy on the limited use stuff, the key is to balance how limited the use is. And you don't need to make truly new mechanics, adjusting existing ones to better fit works wonders.


Damn, I was sure I included Daze, I'll add it of course. Dude, you can also read sometimes before speaking, dazed is already listed. Regarding the turn undead's cost, I only partially agree with you - you actually need level 2 to start using it (2xLevelxCharisma=2x2x4=16 at level 2). An alternative would be to have it cost 5 points only, which would basically mean that, at high level, you may have at-will divine feats (2x20x7=280, which would mean up to 56 turn undead uses, but still I cannot use DMM: persist). I have to think about it.
Regarding the full-round action, there's a feat that provides a workaround - take it as a feat tax, like natural spell for a druid. I wanted to create something iconic, in addition to combat blessing.
I missed the "twice your class level" part, as I was expecting just Lay on Hands with tacked-on extras. I also missed the 5-point condition removal, which is where Dazed and Sickened were.


Consider that this is the marhsal ability, and that it's Ex, not Su. Yes, there are good and bad options, but I don't see how it would be a problem, the players like to have things they can choose amongst; consider also that the save boost is intended to replace divine grace. I'll probably also add some of the draconic auras, too.
EDIT I though again about it, if I make it Su, sacred and int-independent it would probably be an improvement overall (Ex vs Su is not such a big benefit).
(Su) actually is a significant downside in a few cases. Largely revolving around Anti-Magic Field. Sacred is a hard enough bonus type to find that it's non-stacking nature is rarely an issue, though it does mitigate some of the hardest abuses of the DMG item creation guidelines.


Basically you're reading it completely wrong, so some of the comments make no sense. The save scaling is definitely standard and, at Level 20, equates epic spells. Also, against evil characters you use the damage as a basis for the DC. I already considered to remove the Int-based limitation, though (it comes from the Knight class, which has a different flavor after all), so I'll follow your suggestion.
I could have sworn the damage-to-DC was for Undead, which wouldn't have made any sense, due to the Int-limit not applying to most Undead. Seriously failing at reading correctly, here. Or you've edited several of my complaints away before replying, but that seems less reasonable than me just making a bunch of mistakes due to rushed reading.


This is also partially obsolete, due to your wrong reading of the challenging strike feature. The combination d10 + challenging strike + dodge bonus (instead of a general Bonus) requires also a little bit of strategy.
...Far too used to maximums, rather than minimums. Although there's a minor balance issue with Challenging Strike anyways, as it makes switch-hitting very, very strong by letting you pull out a crossbow and force the biggest enemy to charge straight through the party and waste one or two rounds getting to a plate-armored meatwall. Who will spend said rounds getting off hits on the second and/or third biggest enemies.


Immunity-fear is iconic, so I'd leave it. Sturdy mind and resilient troops should severely reduce the chance of being charmed, while leaving a certain risk, which I find nice. I consider your point, anyhow, I have to test it in-game.
Resilient Troops is a good argument, forgot the fact that most scaling is one per two levels, but Sturdy Mind is all the way at level 11. Dominate Person comes online for full casters at level 9. Charm person comes online at level one, though has difficulty forcing people to fight eachother.


Mounts are still good because of encumbrance/heavy load. And at level 10 overland movement is not a problem anymore.
Seeing this statement reminds me that this Paladin doesn't have their special mount. The rather useful one that would make my issue with mounts being of very little use go away by automatically having more than 3 Intelligence. Adjusting the scaling on that and tossing in flight at level 7 or 11 would make the charge builds that Paladin is commonly used for work at higher levels, especially with the move speed bonus Aura. Or one can roll it into a list of situationally-good abilities to pick from with bonus feats as an option...


The problem is that I have too many features scattered through the levels, otherwise I'd have given it earlier. Possibly to be re-arranged.
Well, you don't need a feature every level. And reducing multiple entries, like Steely Resolve, by replacing them with mechanically similar abilities which don't need multiple entries can save table space. As well as various frills of significant power being placed into a list of choices that lets you trade them for Bonus Feats. Hmm... Mettle, Armor Mastery, Sturdy Mind, Divine Courage, Divine Petition, Holy Determination and Lesser Fortification are all situationally good and compare to varyingly high-quality feats like Divine Metamagic and Natural Spell. Armor Mastery is great for an on-foot charger or kiting tank, for example. The value of being able to run away is hard to understate.


This was mainly a filler, if I remove it does it look better?
Honestly, if you are sticking a pure filler ability into a class, you should always make it be able to be used as a bonus feat. Rogues do this by having a list of Rogue Tricks which includes a no-questions-asked bonus feat option. Having a limit to Divine feats and Fighter Bonus Feats for the bonus feats given by the semi-blank-check would work well by offering the exact feats this class could use most. Mostly-filler things like Fortification and Divine Petition can be moved to this.

Divine Petition, which is marked on the class table yet not on the features list due to being rolled into the Channel pool, in particular, is half-useless due to mechanics, and will usually be activated due to active mistakes by the player. Because having 30 points in the Channel pool yet hitting 0 HP takes refusing to heal thyself when you are getting low on health. Or eating a crit that takes you from feeling safe on HP to below zero in one go. It's a safety net ability, which is nice for newbies or against DMs who tend to send too-dangerous enemies at the party, but it's not going to be used very often, so leaving it an option amongst a selection of situationally-powerful abilities or ever-precious bonus feats is a decent design choice for working around the desire to fill table space. Heck, the mount can be one of the options, if you make it Familiar based, rather than Animal Companion based. Share Spell and having half the Paladin's HP? Sounds good.


You're insulting me with this comment. Smite evil is iconic, I want to leave the name as it is. A crusader cannot take this feat, the ability has a different name. The DR story makes also no sense, it's the same with the original smite, but a paladin can cast holy weapon, so what's the point?
Well, sorry if I have trouble distinguishing a nearly word-for-word copy of an ability from the original ability. Let's put the two abilities side by side:


Furious Smite (Ex): You can channel the pain of your injuries into a boiling rage that lets you lash out at your enemies with renewed vigor and power. Each attack that strikes you only pushes you onward to greater glory. During your turn, you gain a bonus on attack rolls and damage rolls equal to the current value of your delayed damage pool (see steely resolve, above) divided by 5, and rounding down (minimum +1). You can only gain a maximum bonus on attack rolls and damage rolls of +6 from furious smite. Use the table below to quickly determine the attack bonus and damage bonus from furious smite, based on the amount of damage in your delayed damage pool. This ability’s benefits last until the end of your turn.

Furious Counterstrike (Ex): You can channel the pain of your injuries into a boiling rage that lets you lash out at your enemies with renewed vigor and power. Each attack that strikes you only pushes you onward to greater glory. During your turn, you gain a bonus on attack rolls and damage rolls equal to the current value of your delayed damage pool (see steely resolve, above) divided by 5, and rounding down (minimum +1). You can only gain a maximum bonus on attack rolls and damage rolls of +6 from furious counterstrike. Use the table below to quickly determine the attack bonus and damage bonus from furious counterstrike, based on the amount of damage in your delayed damage pool. This ability's benefits last until the end of your turn.

Literally word-for-word copy with the sole exception of the name. Steely Resolve is just copied wholesale. I understand that reusing existing mechanics makes things easier, but doing variations helps prevent mistakes like this. Instead of just delaying damage, you can have it be replaced with a pseudo-DR that drains the Channel pool, thereby better justifying it's existence and further differentiating this Paladin fix from Crusader. Furious Smite can then scale off of how much of the pool was used last round, which can be helpful for ranged characters because they can be acting as regular healers, then turn the bonus on ranged attacks, enabling a less frontline version of the class. I mean, the majority mechanics supporting it makes it happen most of the time, but the option to go for a less-tanky playstyle on the Paladin is nice.

As for Smite Evil, you can root that into the Channel pool, or have it be a baseline function of Furious Smite because that number is far from worth a full feat. 1d4 per 5 points of damage taken last round? With Alignment restriction? If it's so iconic that you must have it to the point of making it a feat, then it needs to be good enough to be worth a feat. Which it isn't. Even 6d4 damage isn't all that big. There's poisons that easily do worse than that through Con damage on typical things of that level, though getting through the Fort saves involved is hard.

Also, how is DMM: Persist not on the table? It eats three feats, yes, but DMM for it would cost 35 Channel pool points, which is doable off of a +1 total Cha bonus, let alone the +4 that's all too easy to get at higher levels. It's wasteful as hell, yes, but doable. Unless this version of Paladin doesn't count as having Turn Undead for prerequisites, in which case it can't get any of the feats that are powered by Turn Undead.

---

So, to summarize the sort of changes I suggest, have Divine Courage, Mettle, Sturdy Mind, Divine Petition, Lesser Fortification and Holy Determination removed as class features and replace, not slot-by-slot, with a list of options. Said list including Mettle, an option for each "type" of mind-affecting effect, as in fear, charm and illusion effects, Sturdy Mind and a Fortitude save equivalent, Divine Petition as-is, a mount pick that covers for Flight at some point between level 7 and level 11 and bonus feats from Fighter or Divine feats.

Place the picks every four levels, giving enough picks to grab all the existing stuff on the list, obviously missing Lesser Fortification because it's too situational to keep up with bonus feats from two highly-useful categories, an emergency attack-negation button, what are functionally rerolls and immunity to categories of mind-affecting. I do admit that having Charm or Illusion immunity at level four is kinda nasty, as is rolling twice on any one save, but they aren't that out of line with what's enabled by having a mount or an extra bonus feat from two of the more optimization-friendly lists. Although it may actually be better for the other options to be able to outclass extra feats, as it makes it so that the fact those options exist really matters.

Additionally, replace Steely Resolve with an ability that restores the Channel pool for taking damage, limited to a cap by round. Either one point per level or copying the Steely Resolve scaling, as well as possibly negating damage per-attack by basically auto-healing when hit to serve as pseudo-DR tied to the Channel pool. It's a fairly high tier function by giving extra Turn Undead uses, but doesn't give infinite healing like Crusader can have thanks to Manoeuvre functionality. Then, Furious Smite can be made to scale with Channel pool spent last round and Smite Evil can be rolled into the Channel pool under mechanics closer to the official Paladin. Namely, Charisma to attack rolls and level to damage as the functionality. 1d4 damage per two levels, maybe? Maybe have the scaling be a spending cap, to better tie into Furious Smite becoming based on Channel spending.

And... That's really it. The feats don't really need any particular changes, they're just oddly-scaling in a way that makes them sub-par, for the most part. The entire point of the changes I'm suggesting here is that they make the Channel pool into the class's central mechanic in a way that actually makes it work out as a long-term, but not indefinite, tank. Similar role to Crusader, but limited in how long they can go. It can be a crazy long time, yes, but not literally indefinite unless fighting massively outclassed mooks.

[Kaleph]

(Su) actually is a significant downside in a few cases. Largely revolving around Anti-Magic Field. Sacred is a hard enough bonus type to find that it's non-stacking nature is rarely an issue, though it does mitigate some of the hardest abuses of the DMG item creation guidelines.The homebrew is mainly to be used in our campaigns, where there are normally not so many AMF running around. Switching to holy type and removing the int-based limitation is instead not only useful, but also nicer flavor-wise.


Or you've edited several of my complaints away before replying, but that seems less reasonable than me just making a bunch of mistakes due to rushed reading.Naaaa, c'mon, I didn't edit the file :smallsmile: I'm not such a munchkin.


...Far too used to maximums, rather than minimums. Although there's a minor balance issue with Challenging Strike anyways, as it makes switch-hitting very, very strong by letting you pull out a crossbow and force the biggest enemy to charge straight through the party and waste one or two rounds getting to a plate-armored meatwall. Who will spend said rounds getting off hits on the second and/or third biggest enemies.That's a side-effect which I was taking into account but maybe underestimating. Think also about AoO. It can be fixed in many ways, though (e.g. enemy within 9 m, or melee-only), or simply left as it is (it would add some edge to the class).


Seeing this statement reminds me that this Paladin doesn't have their special mount.This was also done on purpose, and again based on the preferences of my fellow Players/typical campaign style. The problem disappear if I follow your next piece of advice, i.e. removing some fixed features and provide an array of options (including mount) to choose from.


Well, you don't need a feature every level. (...) As well as various frills of significant power being placed into a list of choices that lets you trade them for Bonus Feats. (...) Rogues do this by having a list of Rogue Tricks which includes a no-questions-asked bonus feat option. Having a limit to Divine feats and Fighter Bonus Feats for the bonus feats given by the semi-blank-check would work well by offering the exact feats this class could use most. (...) Heck, the mount can be one of the options, if you make it Familiar based, rather than Animal Companion based. Share Spell and having half the Paladin's HP? Sounds good.Thank you - this is the best piece of advice so far. Actually I tried to achieve a similar result by turning some class features I had in mind into feats, but incorporating them back into the class within a list of options rogue-style is definitely the best idea.


Divine Petition, which is marked on the class table yet not on the features list due to being rolled into the Channel pool, in particular, is half-useless due to mechanics, and will usually be activated due to active mistakes by the player. (...)Some players will love it. I mean, I've seen people watching at the knight's capstone as the most powerful and broken ability of the entire 3.x. Remember that, although I posted it here, the class is mainly developed to satisfy my friends. In addition, I agree that it won't see play too often, but...I would find it nice even if it would be used once in an entire campaign.


Well, sorry if I have trouble distinguishing a nearly word-for-word copy of an ability from the original ability. Let's put the two abilities side by side (...) Instead of just delaying damage, you can have it be replaced (...)At the moment I'm not able to find a better mechanic then the original ability, but it would be indeed nice to come up with a completely new idea. Maybe in a couple of weeks...


As for Smite Evil, you can root that into the Channel pool, or have it be a baseline function of Furious Smite (...)I'll make up my mind on it, maybe I can bring it back in furious smite (as it was at the beginning).


Also, how is DMM: Persist not on the table? It eats three feats, yes, but DMM for it would cost 35 Channel pool points, which is doable off of a +1 total Cha bonus, let alone the +4 that's all too easy to get at higher levels. It's wasteful as hell, yes, but doable. Unless this version of Paladin doesn't count as having Turn Undead for prerequisites, in which case it can't get any of the feats that are powered by Turn Undead.I purposedly wrote the ability so as to have maximum 30 healing points (= 3 turn attempts) per single usage of a divine/devotion feat.


So, to summarize the sort of changes I suggest (...) Place the picks every four levels, giving enough picks to grab all the existing stuff on the listUnderstood.


I do admit that having Charm or Illusion immunity at level four is kinda nasty, as is rolling twice on any one save(...)Easily fixed by adding requirements.

All in all, this round of comments from you was very precise and comprehensive, really some good points and advice. Thank you.

[Kaleph]

Thanks to all the support, I've edited (and saved) a new version here (https://drive.google.com/open?id=0ByKQoekUX3zXRjVQUzFxR0c4SWc). This class is being at the moment beta tested, looks cool!