[3.5, Base] How do I kill thee with barriers? Let me count the ways. (PEACH!!)

[GuyFawkes]

Healing and restoration work by using temporary barriers like splints.

AMEN!

No time for a full critique at the moment, I just saw this and it is really well written and formatted, which is nice. Also liked your fluff a lot.


There was just one thing I saw in a recent post I wanted to comment on quickly and will likely come back later for an in dept review:



The problem I have with this is:



So your at will 1 cubic foot barriers do 0 damage, because you don't have 10 cubic feet. In fact, by this you can only do 1d6 at level 2 with 2 full round actions. At level 4 this goes up to 4d6 with 2 full round actions, or 2d6 with 2 standard actions.

Even at level 20, you can pull off 40d6 with 2 full round actions. So you are spending 2 full round actions to get the effect of Disintigrate, something a Wizard gets from a 6th level spell slot, as a standard action.

What's worse is you can only do this a very limited number of times per day. You really need more barriers, especially at low levels. I'd even suggest going so far as taking your level 20 barriers per day and making them your baseline, and gaining like 1 per 2 levels for 1/4, 1 per 3 levels for 1/2, and 1 per 4 levels for max.

Thanks for the compliment!

Okay, hmm. Yeah it must be how I wrote it, but what I intended for it to mean is that the damage die would increase by 1d6 for every 10 cubic feet, such that barrier sizes less than or equal to 10 cubic feet would do 1d6 damage, barrier sizes greater than 10 but less than or equal to 20 would do 2d6 in damage, and so on. And this is multiplied by a factor of 1 for every 4 class levels rounded up. Gah, now I am finding lots of mistakes in my wordings. Thanks for that.

Anyway it should work like this: for a level 1 Barrier Master, a 1 cubic foot barrier would do 1d6 in damage, a level 5 Barrier Master would do 2d6 in damage, and so on.

Adding barrier size into the equation, a level 1 Barrier Master can make a maximum size of 5 cubic feet, would do 1d6 damage, at level 5, making a 10 cubic feet barrier would do 1d6 multiplied by 2 (5/4 rounded up) for a total of 2d6. Also at level 5, the maximum size that can be created is 25 feet for 2d6 damage, multiplied by 2 (5/4 rounded up) for a total of 4d6 damage.

So, at level 20, one swift action at will barrier is of 10 cubic feet in size, doing 1d6 in damage multiplied by 5 (20/4) for a total of 5d6 damage, while the maximum sized barrier of 100 cubic feet would do 10d6 damage multiplied by 5 for 50d6 damage.

And yeah, another issue here would be the action required for imploding created barriers. As I have written it, at will barriers take a swift action to create, or a full attack action to create as many barriers as the number of attacks granted by BAB in one go, 1/4 barriers or smaller take a move action to create, 1/2 barriers or smaller take a standard action to create, and greater than 1/2 takes a full round action, with the action required to implode taking the same kind of action as creating the barrier.

I have realized when Travel commented about it that in this way, I could pull off one implosion for every 2 rounds, maybe a maximum of 3 implosion for at will sized barriers at higher levels, which is very very low damage-wise. What I decided was take the action required for imploding one step down, such that at will barriers take a free action to implode, 1/4 or smaller a swift action, and so on. Thoughts?

OK, I want to say a few things before I start. 1.) I have actually read some of that manga, so I know exactly where you got the idea and what the goal is. 2.) I love the idea itself.

Which is why this hurts: I'd put this at tier 4 or low 3. It isn't exceptionally flexible, it's low power (if I was judging off power alone, I'd slap it in low T4 or high T5), and I really can't see a ton of places I would use it personally; he's basically a Warlock of another color. Barriers are nice, but he needs to be pulling more of them out than 20 big ones a day. Heck, in the manga he threw tons of these things all over the place, even slept in one! I'd make the barriers 5-foot cubes (one square), just for simplicity's sake, and make that your at will freebie, then work your way up. The low low number and sad, tiny size is just the start, though. Next is the damage formula: 1d6 per 10 cubic foot per four levels? That's only 5d6 at 20th level, if I even read the strange formula right. So bigger fields do more damage when they collapse? That means you can do up to 50d6 at 20th level (once again, if I actually understood the formula). But he can only do that 5 times a day tops. I'd make the damage more, especially if you look at the manga, where the barrier kills ghosts and spirits in one hit. Following that as a guideline, this thing should have equivalent power at some point.

You have an interesting start to barrier abilities, but only 10? You master all of them by the end? This guy needs way more abilities to choose from, and I'd say more abilities gained as well (one per level if you're aiming for the Sorcerer in power).

Sadly, I have to agree that this guy is mostly useless at 1st level, and indeed, until he can capture whole creatures inside barriers, really, at least from an offensive perspective. From a defensive perspective...OK, he's less useless at low levels, but I'd still turn to a Cleric or Wizard for a buff spell over this guy, unless he's making a a bunch of one-foot cubes attuned to my vital bits before battle (I could probably convince a GM to grant me partial cover and RP EXP for creativity at least once for it, anyways).

My biggest suggestion is to give him minor spellcasting; go through some of the books and pull anything that looks like a barrier spell out and give him a divine spell list.

Also, Blank State needs more uses. Badly. This is the best ability on his list, he should get at least as many uses per day as a Barbarian gets uses of Rage.

He has a lot of potential, and is a very flavorful class, but I don't see him as very useful outside of gestalt gaming. Sorry my review is so negative. Hope it helps anyways.

Thanks for your comments. And no, I don't take any review as negative, so don't worry bout it. You have indeed interesting points that you raised up.

Okay, I just realized I made a HUGE mistake on my volume calculations. Dammit, I should have my license revoked! I shall comment on the size thing as soon as I make my corrections.

I do admit the damage formula is a bit screwed up at the moment, as well as the actions required to pull off a create-and-explode tactic. I am currently working on those, so yeah. But I wouldn't write the class off as useless at level one. If I made a one cubic foot barrier inside the torso of a creature and it is of the coordinate type, meaning it is immovable, then I would have rendered that target unable to move for at least an hour. And all I need to pull it off is a swift action and a range touch attack.

For the barrier abilities, yeah, I do admit there's more to be had from this. And as I said, I would very much welcome any suggestions for an ability to add to the list.

For the spellcasting, I'm not too keen on the idea. Maybe the closest thing I'd do on that front would be to give him UMD.

For Blank State, I think this will have to depend on the adjusted damage and number of barriers cast per level.

This class could use some other spell casting, with barriers and the like, and maybe a few other select spells for use.

It needs something like 15-20 abilities.

Yeah, as I said above, not too keen on spellcasting.

For the abilities though, yeah I'm planning to add more to the barrier techniques, so if you've any suggestions, it's very much welcome.