My hand at home-brew.

[TharpinUp]

This is campaign specific at the moment, however I plan on revising the class, and making the whole pantheon based around it.

I have made a class called The True Druid, more closely tied to the Celtic Pantheon than anything else. Some of the Lore is from The Iron Druid Chronicles by Kevin Hearne, so I do not claim the concept or details. I only claim the execution.

I tried to make a relatively overpowered early game class, that stagnates as the levels progress. It was my hand at a Dynamic Spellcaster based in divine magic.

Looking for constructive criticism on how to change the system. I didn't want it favoring the Spheres of Power, True Sorcery, or Chaos Magic, but I wanted to make it free-form, and dynamic.

This .doc file is my try. :)

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1NLjMgTGVDy8s-gtgYAz6wJo2f5MCSDhf

[TharpinUp]

When I have the right amount of total posts, I'll make that a proper link.

[aimlessPolymath]

I'm having trouble reading this class, so I'm going to try and summarize it as I go. Let me know if I misunderstand something.
Level 1: Get Bound to the Earth. Effects:
-Gain 2 extra languages.
-Special note: Hard to multiclass into this class (6 month wait time for existing Druids... impossible for other classes?)
-Can use Spellcraft instead of Concentration... for what?
-Rules of Gaia:
--Cannot cast spells if heel not touching ground
--Cannot use harmful spells directly on living creatures
--Can communicate with Elementals while directly touching them?
--Earth elementals can naturally sense your location, with unknown range.
- A number of cantrips at-will... and also True Sight, negating all illusions. That's pretty good, and anomalously good compared to the other options.
You get spellcasting. You can use Spellcraft for it, but given the large Headspaces bonus you get, I'm not sure why you would.

Level 2:
Headspaces: Appear to grant bonuses to Concentration checks, and also some other stuff I don't understand.

Level 3: Nothing.

Level 4: Something about bindings? Apparently they let you multi-cast? At this level I think you have two, and you use one to cast with.

Level 5: Nothing.

Level 6: Still not sure what headspaces do for you.

Level 7: Nothing.

Level 8: Nothing

Level 9: Nothing.

Level 10: Still not sure what headspaces do for you.

Level 11: Nothing

Level 12: Take 10 on bindings not requiring concentration checks, whatever that means. And you can freely create macros.

Level 13: Nothing

Level 14: Another headspace.

Level 15: Nothing.

Cutting it off here.


Anyway, the actual spellcasting.

Apparently, with one action, you can make a single change. The DC is... 10 + number of bindings, as given by the table? It looks like you make a Concentration check, and the result is you do anything? The limitation is that the size of what you do requires multiple bindings. However, for objects of up to Tiny size, the attempt is a free action, letting you try as many times as you like in a single round. Notably, no size scale requires a standard action. Notably missing are damage calculations, though you can only attack people indirectly with binding so it matters less.
Powerful utility with essentially unlimited variety, but this looks heavily limited in scale of effect.
I would like to see a bit more explanation here- can you do anything? Anything scientifically possible?
There's a table of buffs/DCs but I'm not sure how to use it. If I buff a Medium creature with a +2 Str buff, what DC do I use? Is this a Dimunitive buff or a Medium binding? What DC do I use to Target Other?
What is the "addition of DC in macro"? It seems like anything over Tiny sized macros are practically impossible?
I'm not fully clear on what defines a single binding- the size table seems to indicate that a single-step effect that affects a Medium-sized object involves 17 bindings, but the Macro section would imply that only one is involved.

You can shapechange, but it's not clear what class of binding it is to do this. In addition, since your shapes are determined at level 1 and cannot be changed, the 2x HD limit means all your forms are 2HD or less, unless you multiclassed into it.

Then at the end there's a section on "common bindings", which seems to ignore the binding DC table entirely, so I'm not sure what to make of that.
Diagnose Poison binding seems irrelevant since it's covered under Bindings of Gaia.

Verdict:
8/10 utility options, primarily because you can do anything physical you can imagine. Solves most problems relating to interacting with physical objects almost automatically, but other than that is pretty limited. If you want to cross a raging river, this can do it, but not quickly or safely due to size limitations.
5/10 healing; limited to nonmagical wounds primarily, not useful at combat speed. If someone gets cursed, this guy's not going to help.
4/10 Buffs? I'm not clear on the action cost, but it's a minor buff all day.
3/10 Offense; This can't cast offensive spells directly on people, so it's mostly limited to hitting them.

[TharpinUp]

There is an entire other chapter of lore that I have to include.
(Skill changes; Resivoirs; Items; Feats; A Pantheon; Creatures; Detail)
The current campaign setting is an old convoluted one, that had another DM plus myself. Long story short the universe goes from D&D to d20 Modern.
A flood of 4 Elder Evils being the dividing line that caused the changes.

I can however, clear some things up.
Bound to Earth is the majority of the class. (I stated it's to be a late game weakling but an early game hero.[Reason being that they were indeed wiped out])There is a heirarchy of elementals that interact with the class. Refrain from thinking of them as specific elementals. They are on a larger scale than what D&D had to offer. Even Tempests are less massive.
They are more a metaphysical embodiment of the life force from any given ecosystem. Each new Terrain is a new elemental. So instead of an elemental of a specific element who is born of the corresponding plane; you get a hyper aware spirit of a region. One that can only communicate with True Druids, and is mostly unknown by the rest of the world.
Gaia is at the top, it is the soul of the entire planet.
Below her are the plate techtonics, each of which are massive quasi-elementals(native), and they are damn near unresponsive. Gaia can communicate with them, at a pace. Species come and go in the midst of their conversations.
Below them are the Elementals. Capital E.
Each region that had a different climate and biodiversity would be the home of a different elemental. Say you go from the Colorado highlands to the Grand Canyon, and the entity you contacted in each place would be new and separate.
They can effect their own mass (region of their spirit) in a multitude of ways, and manifest through the elements of nature.
Example: They can move gold somewhere it shouldn't be and carve a road or tunnel into their mountains, but if they want to physically act on the beings of the world, they either have to manifest or call a druid. They are bound by even more strict tenants. You can get one to manifest in the base elements, but it's more than likely they manifest into their favorite plant or vermin. You're more likely to get killer cacti, colossal redwood treants, Huge(size) Wheelbugs or Swarms of buff rats, than you are to have one made of the base elements. The energy expenditure isn't just magical for them, it's literally pulling from the life energy of their ecosystem. Like an animal, they take the path of least resistance. Living things have their own energy, so they only have to change or boost what is already there.
(They speak in images and emotion, and it is recommended you speak to them in a different language than your common tongue, or spell casting tongue. If you don't, they will start listening when you are using the same language and think you are speaking to them. ) The bottom of the heirarchy is every wild elemental, they are technically just left-overs of wild and unsettled energy.
D&D ones still exist within it, they just draw their power from their home planes.
All of that was to explain that through the Elementals you are connected to the Tectonic Plates, and through them you are connected to Gaia, the source of your energy. (Everything has a 1.5x higher dc when not in the material plane, because though there is a connection, it is weak)
With the Bond to Gaia, you gain the ability to interact with the True Elementals; cast your bindings; you gain 4 forms of Gaias choosing (DM or Die Roll) They are supposed to be reflective of the druid and its strengths. The forms are unchangeable once decided, though templates carry over, and the Racial HD is equal to your class HD. (Predator/Hooved/Flying/Aquatic)
Their bonus HD doesn't matter as long as they are natural creatures without templates.
Last but not least is the healing triskele on the back of the hand. It governs any magical healing, to you or otherwise.
(Unwritten, but it gives you a slow regeneration[sans limb recovery] that you can activate, and it works by the round, so long as you have an available headspace)
The two languages are the prerequisite for the normal druid to be bound to the earth.
At first level. You get Speak with the Earth as with plants or animals, your bindings can boost everything from your immune system to your sex drive(abi scores, saves, near invisibility, alchemy on a level of chemistry),you get 4 shape shifting forms that have unlimited uses. (Too much will give you nasuea and fatigue eventually) and finally you get the ability to heal grevious wounds without assistance, remove toxins and diseases, and very carefully, do the same to others.
Multiclassing into it is more rare than out.
Each headspace requires you learn a language, and then remember a complete body of work, line for line, before it can be used. Children are more susceptible to new languages than adults, so archdruids (title & maybe a prestige later) tend not to look for older apprentices, and adults typically choose quicker roads to power. Even if the adult is intelligent, and knows many languages, the cross class would still take at least 6 years, because it's not easy memorizing like that. (Special feats like Pefect Memory would shorten the time)
The druid's choice of spellcrafting or concentration governs which skill he will us to make his bindings.
Similar to True Sorcery that way, though that is spellcraft only.
I need to reword the heel thing. As long as any of your tattoo is touching the earth, you get the
benefits, but if your heel tatoo is damaged, it cuts off the whole binding until it's repaired. Same goes for the rest of the tattoo, the closer to the heel it gets damaged, the more that gets cut off. Say a spot on your ribs is damaged. You will be able to speak to the elementals, and do bindings, but you wont be able to shift or heal.
You can craft bindings that cause indirect harm to others, like boulders that fall on them, holes that break their legs. Hell you could bind their coat to a train track just before the train arrives and it wouldn't matter. However, as soon as you target anything living aside from plant matter, and try to negatively effect it, Gaia kills you. Instantly.
(Thats also why you can unbind all the atoms in an Undead's body. Regardless of their HD. A level one True Druid can unbind a level 30 vampire with 20 levels in Reveler as easy as a 1 HD zombie. As if they were just unanimated material. This is the only time that the size of the creature counts. Upon a kill of this type, the experience reward is only 1-100. The Dm can choose 50 as a default, or roll a percentile)
It is still survival of the fittest to her, and you can't use the life of her, against her. You must compete, and either overpower or outsmart your opponent. The True Druid was made only to protect Elementals from dark arcane magics, and to heed when they call upon him.
Once again, the elementals are a spirit of sorts, and in that context, "Earth," meant the planet. All the Elementals are either physically connected to one another, or they are connected by The Plates. Which means they can always ping your exact location throufh each other. However to stop this, you could just put on some socks, lay on your left side, or hell, walk on a sidewalk. Though with the connection, your magic would falter too, without a resivoir.
(The Earth loves True Druids, at request they can ask for the elemental to not let anyone know where they are. You can also over power most anything in a battle of nature. I.e; Obad Hai (nature domain) is effecting a certain area with an overgrowth of thorns, blocking off the area. If you speak to the elemental, not only can it reverse the effect, but it can also keep it from returning, or happening to begin with.)

The true sight ability is the only way you can see the bonds to do your bindings. Those bonds are everything from the molecules, to the energy they produce. It is on the magical spectrum as much as the physical. Hence why seeing this would allow you to see through glamours.
The love between a family/couple, bonds that make an enchantments or spells, and the bonds that bind the molecular structure of things, are all visible and able to be effected.
(The bindings can also effect magical bonds, and in this system, all spells that have a duration of 1 round or more can be unbound. That needs its own table because it expands what you can do)

The spellcasting works like this. Based on the weight of the material you wish to move, you determine the size of that much weight, of that much of the item. (2lbs of brick takes a lot less space than 2 lbs of ashes; The density of the object actually helps the bindings, or else that would be vice versa. ) So at lv1 - 3 you could only bind everything the slow way, one at a time. At level 4 you gain macros. Like computer macros, they are a whole lot of function in one press. So the Spellcraft/Concentration dc of the macros are 10 + x2 number of bindings depending on how many bind . The little print tells you how long they take to bind, and by increasing the time by a step, you get bonuses on your roll.

So to move enough material in a MACRO to count as Large, it takes a 52 to succeed for each time you need the effect. Doing the same thing without the macro would be 21 separate rolls with a DC 31. The word Macro is literal here.

Headspaces can actually be broken, they count as distraction free zones or buffers. Say you got 10 things happening in your forethough distracting you , and it would end up being like a -20 concentration, you would instead leave those mental feelings there, and move to a separate headspace to do your binding. A calm river beside a raging inferno.

They also double as place to hide from mental magics. Each level you acquire one doesn't give you the language, or the memorized works. Those are still manual. Say you have 6 languages, starting off, you only have your main 2 headspaces. The one of your common speaking language, and the one of your binding language. (Gaelic in d20 modern; Druidic in D&D.), at second level you gain the mental ability to acquire another headspace thouth it isn't automatic. It takes 8d6 weeks of memorization in the morning[ the time when spellcasters prepare spells], 4d6 weeks of full study. You remove 1d6 from the roll for every positive point in your Int Modifier, and add 1d6 for each negative. Photographic memory type feats also drop the die size to d4; Min time is 1d4 weeks; A single week being the absolute minimum)

The more headspaces, the more retreats. (Could be in combat in one/while healing in another simultaneously)
You can also planeshift via trees you tether (a separate binding) to the earth, from level 1. To bring someone with you though, it requires a headspace for each person. You literally have to keep their molecular and magical structure firmly in your mind.

Macroing requires you to do the base binding at least once, Macro Mastery allows you to craft them to begin with.
(1-3 you have to roll for every binding; at 4 you can make Macros that are 10 + x2 the number of bindings, from binding types you have previously done; At 12 you no longer have to have a base binding for the Macro, you can start with the Macro.)
I worded the last bit wrong, you can take a 10 on concentration so long as you aren't interrupted. (Damaged, Etc.)

The 20th level ability allows you to cast Large and Smaller bindings without rolling for them.
And you can take a 10 even while being interupted.

I could see how you would be confused if you thought the tables were referring to creature size. Those are the amount of material you bind. I'm also going to agree with you on the dc's, I may make the headspaces give you bonus mods to your governing skill.

That actually helped a lot. You helped me see where I need more detailed explanation, more lore, and more tables.

[TharpinUp]

This class is only meant to heal itself, really. It was more about making a dynamic divine spellcaster than another healer.
A huge part that I forgot was, True Druids are immune to curses (Gaia doesn't allow it), and that the Elemental can heal you as well as long as you sleep with your tattoos in contact with the earth.

The elementals can cure magic poisons and diseases as well.

It needs work. Thank you ^^

Did the .doc file look okay?

[aimlessPolymath]

There's a lot to unpack in that wall of text, but I'll pull out the stuff relevant for class design:


With the Bond to Gaia, you gain the ability to interact with the True Elementals; cast your bindings; you gain 4 forms of Gaias choosing (DM or Die Roll) They are supposed to be reflective of the druid and its strengths. The forms are unchangeable once decided, though templates carry over, and the Racial HD is equal to your class HD. (Predator/Hooved/Flying/Aquatic)
So the thing I wanted to address was this line from the class doc:

If the DM doesn’t care, the Player may choose, so long as the creatures base HD isn’t anymore than x2 the druid’s.
At level 1, 2x the druid's HD is 2. So you can only choose 2 HD forms. For example, black bears are inaccessible.


At first level.
Let's see...

You get Speak with the Earth as with plants or animals
Not listed in class doc.

your bindings can boost everything from your immune system to your sex drive(abi scores, saves, near invisibility, alchemy on a level of chemistry),
It's not actually clear to me that they can do anything beyond ability scores or saving throws, actually. I would expect that you'd need Craft(alchemy) in order to be able to do anything with alchemy, though instant crafting is reasonably powerful on its own.

you get 4 shape shifting forms that have unlimited uses. (Too much will give you nasuea and fatigue eventually)
This is the most significant thing you get, really. The nausea and fatigue don't seem described in the rules, and I don't see how you actually use your shapeshifting. This falls off really quickly with level.

ability to heal grevious wounds without assistance, remove toxins and diseases, and very carefully, do the same to others.
Yeah, but... Yes, unlimited out-of-combat healing is useful, but the healing this class provides isn't very fast, and I think you're overestimating the value of poison/disease healing. The value of this is presumably higher in Modern than 3.5.

The druid's choice of spellcrafting or concentration governs which skill he will us to make his bindings.
If you get +4 to Concentration for each headspace you have I don't think it's really a contest.

You can craft bindings that cause indirect harm to others, like boulders that fall on them, holes that break their legs. Hell you could bind their coat to a train track just before the train arrives and it wouldn't matter.
I don't think this is particularly check- or time-efficient in terms of dealing damage.
Okay. I want to use a 2 step macro. Step 1: Float this sack of flour into a cloud around that person. Step 2. Light it on fire. (look up flour explosions- they're a thing)


FINALLY. Spellcasting rules.

So at lv1 - 3 you could only bind everything the slow way, one at a time.
I don't understand what "the slow way" actually involves. What is one bind? What can I do with one bind?


by increasing the time by a step, you get bonuses on your roll.
Sorry, I don't see what you're referring to here. What bonus?



So to move enough material in a MACRO to count as Large, it takes a 52 to succeed for each time you need the effect. Doing the same thing without the macro would be 21 separate rolls with a DC 31. The word Macro is literal here.
I... don't think I like where this is going in terms of scaling. d20 oaperates on a scale of 1-20 rolls. However, the DC gaps involved here are much larger than this; a character is going to almost always be able to hit DC's below a certain level, and completely unable to hit them above a certain level. However, with DCs scaled the way they seem to be, that range represents approximately two size categories. If you're going to do something with that level of difference between DCs, why even bother with the rolls? You can just say "At level X, the character unlocks Y-sized bindings and Z-sized macros" and just let them do them automatically, or with a simpler check that's harder to game by dumpster-diving for bonuses (a magic item of +10 to a skill costs about 10k gp), like caster level checks- roll your level + your stat, no Skill Focus feat taxes involved. Remember, a player may rock a +7 to a skill at level 1, but that doesn't actually scale very fast naturally- they're going to maybe hit a bit over +20 by level 10 unless the DM is being permissible with magic items.


Say you got 10 things happening in your forethough distracting you , and it would end up being like a -20 concentration, you would instead leave those mental feelings there, and move to a separate headspace to do your binding. A calm river beside a raging inferno.
"One headspace can be used to do either of the following:
-Take one purely mental action.
-Negate one source of Concentration checks or circumstance penalties to Concentration checks. "



You can also planeshift via trees you tether (a separate binding) to the earth, from level 1. To bring someone with you though, it requires a headspace for each person. You literally have to keep their molecular and magical structure firmly in your mind.
NONE OF THIS IS IN THE CLASS DOCUMENT