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Icewalker
2008-01-19, 02:01 AM
This class is for my partially finished sea-based campaign world.

It has some holes in it, primarily the capstones, because I haven't yet finished the ship-to-ship combat system yet.

Some notes on ship size: sixth rate is a frigate. Anything smaller is a quite small ship. Fifth rate is also a frigate, although somewhat bigger. Fourth, Third, and Second rates are all increasingly large ships of the line. First rates are big to the point where it isn't efficient any more, and are rare and used as flagships to large fleets.

Also, some notes on my cannon damage:
9 lb. cannon: 4d3
12 lb. cannon: 4d4
18 lb. cannon: 4d6
24 lb. cannon: 4d8
32 lb. cannon: 4d10
42 lb. cannon: 4d12

[hr]
Sea Mage
Ship Mages have the following game statistics:
Abilities: Sea Mages need primarily intelligence, as it is the score they use to cast spells.
Alignment: Any
Starting gold: 4d6 x 5 (75 gp)
Hit dice: d4

Skills
4 + int skills/level (x4 at first level)
Class skills: Balance, Bluff, Concentration, Craft, Knowledge (Arcana), Profession, Spellcraft, Use Rope

Spells (in terms of known, per day, and method of casting) as Sorcerer, although key ability score is Int, not Cha, and with a unique new spell list.

{table=head]Level|Base Attack Bonus|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Special

1st|
+0|
+0|
+0|
+2|Sea Legs

2nd|
+1|
+0|
+0|
+3|Wind Bolt//Cannonfire 12

3rd|
+1|
+1|
+1|
+3|Quick-spell

4th|
+2|
+1|
+1|
+4|Greater Wind Bolt//Sea’s Cleansing

5th|
+2|
+1|
+1|
+4|Sailor’s Step +1

6th|
+3|
+2|
+2|
+5|Wind Wall//Cannonfire 24

7th|
+3|
+2|
+2|
+5|

8th|
+4|
+2|
+2|
+6|

9th|
+4|
+3|
+3|
+6|Channel Wind//Cannonfire 42

10th|
+5|
+3|
+3|
+7|Sailor’s Step +2

11th|
+5|
+3|
+3|
+7|Hurricane Bolt//Emperor’s Volley

12th|
+6/+1|
+4|
+4|
+8|Tempest Bolt//Sea’s Blessing

13th|
+6/+1|
+4|
+4|
+8|

14th|
+7/+2|
+4|
+4|
+9|

15th|
+7/+2|
+5|
+5|
+9|Sailor’s Step +3

16th|
+8/+3|
+5|
+5|
+10|Hurricane Bolt//Emperor’s Volley

17th|
+8/+3|
+5|
+5|
+10|

18th|
+9/+4|
+6|
+6|
+11|

19th|
+9/+4|
+6|
+6|
+11|

20th|
+10/+5|
+6|
+6|
+12|Sailor’s Step +4, God’s Typhoon//Ravenous Ocean[/table]

Class Features
Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: The Sea Mage is proficient with the cutlass (as scimitar), quarterstaff, and pike, but not with any armor or shield. Armor of any type interferes with a Sea Mage’s movements, which can cause her spells with somatic components to fail.
Sea Legs: At 1st level Sea Mage’s get Sea Legs as a bonus feat.
Wind Bolt//Cannonfire 12:
Upon reaching 2nd level, a Sea Mage decides which of two paths it wishes to take. The first path is that of the Wind Seer. This path allows the Sea Mage to knock arrows out of the air, eventually improving to the point where the Seer can send massive storms after his foes. The second path is that of the Ship Mage. Ship Mages can summon and shoot cannonballs, and send magic from the sea to hinder foes.
Wind Seer: Wind Bolt: At 2nd level, the Wind Seer gains the ability to shoot a small gust of powerful air at a target at will as an immediate action. This can be used for many different purposes, such as knocking over a small object, or knocking an arrow or bolt into the ground or sea.
Ship Mage: Cannonfire 12: At 2nd level, the Ship Mage gains the ability to summon a cannonball and shoot it at his foes at will as a standard action. At 2nd level, Ship Mages gain the ability to summon cannonballs in the first size category: 9 lb. or 12 lb. This ability can also be used to summon and fire grapeshot of the appropriate size. When these cannonballs fall to the ocean or the ground they vanish.
Quick-Spell: Similar to the meta-magic feat Quicken Spell, Quick-Spell functions as a metamagic feat in terms of application to spells. A spell being modified by the Quick-Spell feat changes from a full round or a standard action to a move action, but must be cast from a spell slot one level higher than the original spell. Any spell with longer than a full-round casting time cannot be modified by Quick-Spell.
Wind Seer: Greater Wind Bolt: At 4th level, a Wind Seer’s Wind Bolt ability functions on a stronger level. It can be used at will as an immediate action to send a still small but extremely powerful burst of wind at a target. This is powerful enough to knock a cannonball off course into the ground or sea.
Ship Mage: Sea’s Cleansing: A Ship Mage can summon the cleansing powers of the sea into somebody to remove disease from their body. A number of times per day equal to the caster’s Sea Mage level, a Ship Mage can cast Remove Disease or Neutralize Poison (Either use counts as a daily use).
Sailor’s Step: When on a ship in water, the rocking action of the boat allows sailors to dodge enemies’ attacks more easily. Starting at 5th level, Sea Mages get a +1 dodge bonus to AC when on a ship in water, increasing to +2 at 10th level, and an additional +1 every five levels, reaching +4 at 20th level.
Wind Seer: Wind Wall: At 6th level, a Wind Seer gains the ability to use the spell Wind Wall as a standard action. This ability can be used a number of times per day equal to the caster’s Sea Mage level.
Ship Mage: Cannonfire 24: At 6th level, the Ship Mage can summon and shoot cannonballs of the second size category: 18 lb. or 24 lb. The 18 lb. Cannonfire can also be cast as grapeshot. This ability functions the same as Cannonfire 12.
Wind Seer: Channel Wind: At 9th level, a Wind Seer gains the ability to channel the wind around them into a specific direction. In a block encompassing their entire ship, a Wind Seer may set the direction of the wind. This ability takes up the Wind Seer’s entire attention. It can be used for a number of rounds equal to 2x the Wind Seer’s Sea Mage level per day, although this does not have to be used all at once.
{table = head]Sea Mage level|Ship Size that can be encompassed
9th|Sixth Rate or Smaller
11th|Fifth Rate
13th|Fourth Rate
15th|Third Rate
17th|Second Rate
19th|First Rate[/table]

Ship Mage: Cannonfire 42: At 9th level, a Ship Mage’s Cannonfire ability upgrades once again, allowing them to summon and shoot cannonballs in the largest size category: 32 lb. and 42 lb. cannonballs.
Wind Seer: Tempest Bolt: At 12th level the Wind Seer gets the ability to create a large burst of wind as an immediate action at will. This burst of wind is rather weak, but spread out in a somewhat large area. In a half-sphere in front of the caster with a radius of 5 ft. per Sea Mage level, this burst of wind knocks all arrows or bolts out of the area and away.
Ship Mage: Sea’s Blessing: At 12th level, a Ship Mage gains the ability to bless a ship with the luck of the sea. The crew finds that the rigging and sails of the ship seem to fall into place perfectly, the wind always shifts to their favor, and enemy attacks seem to fail to pierce their hull. Sea’s Blessing can be used 1/day, and lasts for 24 hours. It gives a ship +1 MP, and +2 to Pierce AC. Other advantages should be added through luck at the DM’s discretion.
Sea’s Blessing may also be reversed, and cast as Sea’s Wrath, taking up its use for the day. This brings horrific luck to the cursed ship. Rigging breaks or slides away at the inopportune moment, food is found rotting, and enemy shots smash their way through the hull with ease. This gives a ship -1 MP, and -2 to Pierce AC (This cannot bring the Pierce AC below the hit AC).
Wind Seer: Hurricane Bolt: At 16th level, a Wind Seer gains the ability to summon a massive blast of air, powerful enough to displace volleys and capsize small ships. 3/day as an immediate action, A Wind Seer may use Hurricane Bolt. The burst of wind is in a 120 foot cone directed out from the caster. It will immediately capsize anything smaller than a 6th rate ship in the area. Any other ship will be hindered severely, reducing its MP by 3 on it’s next 2 rounds. The blast also displaces any ranged weapon in the air, sending it flying off randomly.
Ship Mage: Emperor’s Volley: At 16th level, the Ship Mage gains the ability to imbue his ship’s volley with massive power. 3/day as a full-round action, the Ship Mage may enchant the entire ship with Emperor’s Volley. Any cannons fired within the round this ability is used deal an extra die of damage, and increase one step in size (42 lb. cannons, instead of increasing another step in size, just gain a second additional die of damage, increasing their damage to 6d12). If a volley is fired from the ship, it appears to thicken in the air. The volley is increased in size by 20% (add 1 cannonball for each 5 in the volley, of the same sizes).
Wind Seer: God’s Typhoon: This spell creates a storm of tremendous power. The storm…beats the crap out of ships.
Ship Mage: Ravenous Ocean: This spell creates a massive vortex beneath the targeted ship. This vortex opens wider than the ship itself, and for a moment, appears to have massive teeth of water. The ship is sucked deep into the ocean, and, in general, never seen again.

Spell List
0th: Know Direction, Mending, Create Water, Purify Food and Drink, Message, Dancing Lights, Ghost Sound, Light, Share Talents
1st: Animate Rope, Obscuring Mist, Unseen Servant, Deathwatch, Mage Armor, Magic Missile, Tenser’s Floating Disk, Kelgore’s Fire Bolt, Reform Anchor*
2nd: Eagle’s Splendor, Fox’s Cunning, Protection from Arrows, Continual Flame, Scorching Ray, Lesser Burst of Swiftness*, Master’s Touch
2 (SM): Make Whole, Warp Wood, Wood Shape, Shipshredder shot*, Razor Spray*
2 (WS): Fog Cloud, Whispering Wind, Gust of Wind
3rd: True Strike Cannon*, Clairvoyance, Haste, Create Food and Water, Remove Disease, Fireball, Flame Arrow
3 (SM): Water Breathing, Water Walk, Summon Monster III (Water Elemental only)
3 (WS): Wind Wall, Call Lightning, Stinking Cloud, Lightning Bolt, Sleet Storm, Summon Monster III (Air Elemental only)
4th: Evard’s Black Tentacles, Lesser Globe of Invulnerability, Dimension Door, Spell Immunit, Channeled Pyroburst
4 (SM): Freedom of Movement, Control Water, Minor Creation
4 (WS): Air Walk, Solid Fog, Ice Storm
5th: Teleport, Prying Eyes, Sending, Waves of Fatigue, Overland Flight, Permanency
5 (SM): Major Creation, Fabricate, Summon Monster V (Water Elemental only), Reform Mast*
5 (WS): Call Lightning Storm, Control Winds, Cloudkill, Summon Monster V (Air Elemental only)
6th: Heroes’ Feast, Bear’s Endurance Mass, Otiluke’s Freezing Sphere
6 (SM): Repel Wood^, Summon Monster VI (Water Elemental only)
6 (WS): Wind Walk, Chain Lightning, Acid Fog, Summon Monster VI (Air Elemental only)
7th: Spell Turning, Drawmij’s Instant Summons, Plane Shift, Greater Teleport, Bigby’s Interposing Hand, Simulacrum, Waves of Exhaustion, Limited Wish
7 (SM): Phase Door, Summon Monster VII (Water Elemental only)
7 (WS): Control Weather, Summon Monster VII (Air Elemental only)
8th: Fire Storm, Greater Spell Immunity, Otto’s Irresistible Dance
8 (SM): Iron Body, Summon Monster VIII (Water Elemental only)
8 (WS): Whirlwind, Incendiary Cloud, Summon Monster VIII (Air Elemental only)
9th: Teleportation Circle, Foresight, Bigby’s Crushing Hand, Meteor Swarm
9 (SM): Summon Monster IX (Water Elemental only), Elemental Swarm (Water Elementals only), Shipsoul Pact*
9 (WS): Summon Monster IX (Air Elemental only), Storm of Vengeance, Elemental Swarm (Air Elementals only)


*New spells
^Spells modified or with additional notes

[hr]
As a footnote, I am worried that this class is ridiculously overpowered.

Icewalker
2008-01-19, 02:04 AM
True Strike, Cannon
Divination
Level: Sor/wiz 4, Sea Mage 3
Components: S, F
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Touch
Target: One cannon or cannonball touched.
Duration: See text

You enchant a cannon with the power to give a temporary intuitive insight to the next gunner using it. The next single attack roll made with that cannon, as long as it is within the same round, gains a +20 insight bonus to hit. Additionally, it is not affected by the miss chance that applies to attackers trying to strike a concealed target.
Focus: A small ivory model of a cannon (10 gp)


Shipshredder Shot
Transmutation
Level: Sor/wiz 3, Sea Mage 2
Components: S, M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Touch
Target: One cannon or cannonball touched.
Duration: See text

You enchant a loaded cannon with power. If the cannon is fired within that round, the cannonball grows a ring of jagged spikes as it exits the barrel. This ring of spikes makes the shot into a Shipshredder shot. Shipshredder shots automatically pierce if they make a hit on the ship. They deal an extra die of damage (5d6 instead of 4d6, etc), roll for second target (person/cannon) twice, and then deal half of the damage they did to the side hit by the shot to the other side as well.

Example: Shipshredder shot attack beats a ship’s hit AC but not its pierce AC. The shot pierces anyways, because it is Shipshredder. It rolls to deal 16 damage to the port hull which it hit. Roll 1d10 to check for killing crew or damaging a cannon. Roll a second time because the shot is Shipshredder. Then, the starboard hull takes 8 damage (half of what the port side took) as the shot exits the other side.

Shipshredder shots against people instead of ships: When a Shipshredder shot is fired at a person, it must only make a touch attack instead of a normal attack. If the shot hits, it deals damage to the target’s armor equal to the damage dealt to the target (this is also increased by 1 die of damage, as against ships).

Material Component: A bent nail.


Razor Shot
Transmutation
Level: Sor/wiz 3, Sea Mage 2
Components: S, F
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Touch
Target: One cannon, swivel gun, or bag of grapeshot touched.
Duration: See text

You enchant a cannon or swivel gun loaded with grapeshot. If the cannon or swivel gun is fired within that round, the grapeshot transforms from bullets into razor blades as they leave the barrel. This causes the size of the cone to increase by 10 ft, and the damage dice to increase from d6 to d8, as well as changing the type to slashing damage instead of bludgeoning.

Focus: A razor.


Reform Anchor
Conjuration (creation)
Level: Sor/wiz 2, Sea Mage 1
Components: V, M
Casting Time: 1 minute
Range: Touch
Target: See text

You take a broken anchor chain or anchor mount and summon a new and intact anchor into place. If an anchor is broken from the ship, it will have broken in one of three places: it will either have popped out of the anchor mount, broken off the chain at the very bottom, or have been severed in the middle. This spell requires the caster to be touching the point where the anchor has been broken. After one minute of casting, a full and intact anchor will be reformed and attached where the broken one was.

This ability does not work if an anchor was simply detached intentionally, not broken, and is still within a mile of the remains of the anchor system.

Material Component: A small and well-carved iron model of an anchor (1 gp)


Reform Mast
Conjuration (creation)
Level: Sea Mage (Ship Mage) 5
Components: S, V, M
Casting Time: 3 full rounds
Range: Touch
Target: One broken mast, touched

You touch the inner wood of a broken mast, and over the course of three rounds, a new intact mast, complete with sails, is reformed and attached to the stump of the old.

Material Component: Ten-foot Pole, scrap of sailcloth
((Check it out! I found a use for the 10-ft pole!))

Shipsoul Pact
Conjuration (creation)
Level: Sea Mage (Ship Mage) 9
Components: V, S, M, Xp
Casting Time: 1 day
Range: Rouch
Target: One ship touched

You pour your very soul into this powerful spell, sacrificing portions your own body and soul to form a fully intact ship from any amount of remains. To cast this spell, the caster goes into the ocean, and enters a trance for 1 day, during which he must be holding some measure of remains of a ship (see material component). After the one day is complete, the fully intact ship forms around the caster, who remains in a coma for (4d4 – caster’s con modifier) weeks. The caster must have been on the ship for at least 1 week while it was still intact and functioning to cast this spell.

Material Component: The material component for this spell is a piece of a ship that was once intact. The piece can be of any size, but must be recognizable as some sort of material from the ship (no eroded bits of sand that could once have been wood, or materials reclaimed and re-used for other uses). This material component can be anything from a nail to a broken mast, it doesn’t matter.

Xp Component: 2500 xp

DracoDei
2008-01-19, 06:02 AM
Personally I would have them "Throwing" pre-existing canon-balls rather than creating them out of thin air, just seems better flavor-wise... then again that means that on land they have to use Tenser's Floating Disk (or something like that) to carry around enough to do much at higher levels even if you assume they recover the cannonballs after each fight...

Obrysii
2008-01-19, 09:57 AM
What is the range increment and maximum range that the Ship Mage can throw/fire his or her cannon balls?

Icewalker
2008-01-19, 02:21 PM
I had them shooting them originally, instead of summoning, and it was also a spell, but then it felt underpowered compared to arcane casters because of the lower damage compared to stuff like fireball and lightning bolt. Maybe I should change it back. Shooting them is definitely cooler (and that is indeed why I put Tenser's Floating Disc on their spell list).

Cannon range...Here's the thing: cannon's have a ridiculously massive range. ie thousands of feet. It seems to me that at that point they wouldn't be very usable, to the point of less than a -10 range increment modifier. One idea I have is to split it up to 10 range increments instead of 5, reaching -20 to hit when they are shooting at targets 4000+ miles away.

Except I have a problem with cannons having the same +0 range modifier at 50 ft or 400 ft. Which makes me want to have some over-complicated exponential range increment system.

Obrysii
2008-01-20, 08:57 AM
Cannon range...Here's the thing: cannon's have a ridiculously massive range. ie thousands of feet.

What cannons are you talking about? Modern naval guns, sure. Medieval cannons? Absolutely not. At least not with any accuracy.

I'd say a 200' range increment, max of 5 range increments. That allows for a 1,000' range which is quite acceptable for a medieval cannon.

By the time of the American Civil War, the best cannons had a range of ~1 mile.

That'd be representative of a 500' range increment and a max of 10 range increments.

Nebo_
2008-01-20, 09:22 AM
The only problem I see is that the spell list looks a little small.

Icewalker
2008-01-20, 01:14 PM
Yeah, I picked out the spell list down to the point of anything I think they would use in some situation or another, which shrank it down quite a bit. I'm just worried that if the spell list was bigger, it would be like a sorcerer with a massive load of class features as well as spellcasting.

Ok, I don't even remember where my cannon distance source was from, so I'll trust you on it. (It was some random website).

Of course, cannon distance (I think) increases slightly as the size goes up. Are you able to confirm this? Then there are long nines.

By the way, I think there will be some more homebrew spells coming to Sea Mage, but mostly for higher levels. Stuff like Shipshredder Volley.