Paladin Remake - Worth Doing?

[Lord_Gareth]

We've all seen them around the forums. Alignmentless paladins. Auradins. Smiters and divine champions and people following codes of honor, all under the name "Paladin". I so happen to have some vague ideas for my own remake, but I must wonder - is it worth doing again? If so, what's new that you would want to see in a remade paladin?

[unosarta]

Honestly, Paladin as a base class is far too overdone (although, I think you might be able to pull it off. But, it would still have to be pretty out there in order to be fresh). One thing that I haven't seen all that often, but would be very interesting, might be a Paladin as a Prestige Class. Now, this has been done before, but if it were to be applied to the Crusader, Swordsage, and Warblade classes, with maneuvers and all, it might be interesting. Maybe having alignment requirements based on the class (Like Crusader=Lawful, Swordsage=Chaotic, and Warblade=neutral, and then the player gets to choose where they are on the good and evil axis). With that alignment system, you could, in theory, have almost any alignment pairing (excluding true neutral, which could be its own Prestige Class). The abilities might be something similar to what the paladin currently has, but with a smite option able to smite the opposite alignment (not sure if having it be along good/evil or lawful/chaotic would be better. Hm...), and other Paladin flavored abilities, as well as maneuver progression.

Swordsage could be the sort of infiltrate and find evil/good. Crusader could be those who combat and destroy good/evil, and Warblades could protect those who might be harmed from good/evil.

It certainly could be interesting. Just a thought, take it as you will.

[Lord_Gareth]

Ermm...I don't have ToB. Or any knowledge of how manuevers work. In any event, the Paladin as a concept - that is to say, Heroic Champion - has a lot of open flexibility. Just because WotC screwed the flavor, balance, power level AND philosophy/ethics pooches doesn't mean I need to.

[ErrantX]

I'd like to see Color Wheel Paladins, ala your alignment wheel.

-X

[NamelessNPC]

I'd like to see Color Wheel Paladins, ala your alignment wheel.

-X

That would be really cool. Though the barbarian is pretty much the red paladin

[Lord_Gareth]

That would be really cool. Though the barbarian is pretty much the red paladin

Not necessarily. I'm having ideas, but this thread is still open for flavor or mechanical considerations.

[unosarta]

Ermm...I don't have ToB. Or any knowledge of how manuevers work. In any event, the Paladin as a concept - that is to say, Heroic Champion - has a lot of open flexibility. Just because WotC screwed the flavor, balance, power level AND philosophy/ethics pooches doesn't mean I need to.

Oh, that is fine. It was more just a thought process on how such a Prestige Class could work, anyway. And me longing for some prestige class for a crusader that wasn't somehow combined with a spellcasting class.

Anyway, the Color wheel paladins could be cool.

[Edit]: It would probably end up with something like this:

Table time!

{table=head]Color|Concept

White|More traditional Paladin

Green|Protector of Nature, most likely

Red|Some sort of divinely inspire rage

Blue|Protectorate of Knowledge

Black|Undead summoner, or master of death[/table]

[Lord_Gareth]

{table=head]Color|Concept

White|More traditional Paladin

Green|Protector of Nature, most likely

Red|Some sort of divinely inspire rage

Blue|Protectorate of Knowledge

Black|Undead summoner, or master of death[/table]

{table=head]Color|Concept

White|Inspiring Champion of the Law

Green|Manifestation of Nature's Wrath

Red|Defender of Freedom

Blue|Warrior-Scholar

Black|Ambitious Warrior-Priest[/table]

[unosarta]

{table=head]Color|Concept

White|Inspiring Champion of the Law

Green|Manifestation of Nature's Wrath

Red|Defender of Freedom

Blue|Warrior-Scholar

Black|Ambitious Warrior-Priest[/table]

Interesting. Maybe have the damage of the smite attempt that the "Paladin" uses be increased or decreased depending on the opposite colors, and the allied colors? Maybe even just have it be "Twice level against opposite colors, and level against allied colors, half level against your own color, as extra damage."

Also, it needs something that differentiates it more from regular smites. Maybe able to use on full attacks? Or per encounter? Just some ideas.

[Haarkla]

We've all seen them around the forums. Alignmentless paladins. Auradins. Smiters and divine champions and people following codes of honor, all under the name "Paladin". I so happen to have some vague ideas for my own remake, but I must wonder - is it worth doing again? If so, what's new that you would want to see in a remade paladin?

To be honest, probably not. The Pathfinder paladin is pretty good, and I would just use that.

I think a good Will save is pretty much a must. Lay on hands should be (2+Cha bonus) x level. Maybe the ability to cast from the entire Clerics spell list.

[Xefas]

Paladin has been done over and over again, and many of the remakes are good. The Paladin, Fighter, and Monk are probably the class least in need of a remake (because they're the most in need of a remake, so they already got hundreds of them - including an official one, via the Tome of Battle).

Honestly, if I had to pick some classes to get remakes, I'd more like to see some more Rogue remakes, or a Wizard remake (i.e. something that doesn't use vancian casting), or a Knight, Hexblade, or Soulborn remake.

Rogues you could do some kind of Skill Trick + Invocation kind of amalgamation. The worst thing about the Rogue, in my opinion, is that all of its fancy skills fall short of a few 1st-2nd level spells.

Maybe you can Open Lock well enough to produce an (Ex) Knock, or Move Silently well enough to produce an (Ex) Silence but only on yourself. Invisibility for Hide, Detect Secret Doors for Spot, Detect Snares and Pits for Search, etc (maybe Charm Person for Diplomacy?).

Knights could make Sword&Board useful again, and offer a non-religion-based Paladin alternative. Maybe have options to basically turn a mid-level Knight flavor-wise (and reflected mechanics-wise) into a Paladin/Hexblade/Divine Mind/Soulborn?

Dunno, but there are a lot of other options out there that haven't be done to death.

[Lord_Gareth]

Check siggy for a Hexblade remake :p

[Latronis]

Ofc it's worth doing, it needs doing and you get to put your own spin on it.

[SigCorps]

Personally im my campaigns I do not enforce the must be LG thing. I figure each god/goddess can have their own divine champion. You have to adjust a few of the powers, and it does take the blackguard out of the picture a bit. If the character strays from their dieties alignment, then they take the standard penalties.

But a more generic retool of the class could be nice.

[Pechvarry]

The big thing, for me, is that if you're going to remake a class, it should be as similar to the base class as possible. If you want a better holy warrior that works completely different, just give it a different name instead of calling it a remake. E.g. "Paladin of Justice" or simply "Holy Warrior" and represent it as a new base class with passing resemblances to the Paladin. But if you want a Paladin remake, make sure it's still the Paladin. That's why all I really added to mine was a better chassis, some Cleric Domains (and the ability to cast out of them), and only 1 unique ability (increasing action economy for Turning/Divine feats).

It's probably not the place to mention it, but I just realized you could take Paladin as-is, gestalt it with Marshal entirely, and have a pretty nice class.

[Ouranos]

To be honest, I just play the paladin with manuver variant listed here
http://wiki.faxcelestis.net/index.ph...e_Class_Update

Played just fine as long as you have a campaign NOT massively min/maxed.

[Pechvarry]

I like Paladin spellcasting, though. =(

[SigCorps]

After doing some research this weekend. I realized that playing a non LG pally is just really a favored soul.

Having never played a pally past of 5th level I am unsure of how they stack up against the other classes and what their deficiencies are.

Seems to me..that with all the issues with just the core classes in playablity at higher levels and usefullness, a complete revamp is needed. Just like in the MMO's, ballance is a huge issue.