Mageknight (Spheres in Review)

[SangoProduction]

Link

Preamble: This class features the same huge pool of potential class features that Shifter does. Also has the same problem of being a half caster. But remains a half caster for all spheres.
Regardless, it’s basically exactly the type of class that started this whole deal. I want to do it some justice.

Post-Review Analysis:
The Mageknight’s most potent abilities tend to be very defensive. And even the majority of their not so potent abilities are defensive. And that’s a solid identity, but it’s rarely compelling. “I’m harder to affect negatively.” Eh. There’s not that much interactivity with that style. Interactions are truly the spice of … well, just about everything that humans do - gaming or otherwise.

But there’s most notably Black Dog, which does have an extremely potent potential for debuffing saves against Death and Curse effects. Potential definitely being the keyword.

[Hunter Noventa]

I was recently looking at Mageknight myself, and agreed, it's in a weird place. It's very much a 'what sphere am I supposed to use?' kind of class, because of the low CL.

[A.J.Gibson]

Minor nitpick: MageKnights get 11 talents, not 10.

The MageKnight is a weird class. It's overall idea if 'warrior who spell casts' but a lot of it's class features suggest other things. Resist Magic and Mystic Defense suggest an anti-caster class, Marked is some sort of striker ability, and Draw Power and Spell Critical both suggest a crit-fisher class (though not until level 15, I'd be pissed if I was playing a 20/x2 crit weapon and received those abilities). Stalwart is at least generic, but over all, the class feels like it's trying to do a bunch of things at once.

I'm glad someone finally read WardMage. I'm surprised Dustbringer ranks so lowly, since it seems to be one of the more popular archetypes.

[SangoProduction]

I was recently looking at Mageknight myself, and agreed, it's in a weird place. It's very much a 'what sphere am I supposed to use?' kind of class, because of the low CL.

I'll defend the Mageknight here. There are a lot of spheres where the low CL doesn't really make much of a difference, like the War sphere. Indeed, it does have a few abilities that aid in that. Not enough to really make you go "Wow. I really desire going War sphere here." Except for the wardmage archetype, although that's partially just because of action economy stacking, and is reliant on your enemies playing your way. But if they don't, then you've protected ... your 2 friends. The others are more like acquaintances.

Minor nitpick: MageKnights get 11 talents, not 10.

The MageKnight is a weird class. It's overall idea if 'warrior who spell casts' but a lot of it's class features suggest other things. Resist Magic and Mystic Defense suggest an anti-caster class, Marked is some sort of striker ability, and Draw Power and Spell Critical both suggest a crit-fisher class (though not until level 15, I'd be pissed if I was playing a 20/x2 crit weapon and received those abilities). Stalwart is at least generic, but over all, the class feels like it's trying to do a bunch of things at once.

I'm glad someone finally read WardMage. I'm surprised Dustbringer ranks so lowly, since it seems to be one of the more popular archetypes.

Right. I knew that. Just didn't originally reflect it in the writing lol.

As for Dustbringer... I'm not seeing its utility. The wrecker curse means no hand-held items, which sucks for a martial to start off with. Then gets lesser damage than monk. And what they gain in exchange is... damage to objects. And not even Destructive Blast with object-focused talents but Alter(destroy). The Dustbringer Aura is at least interesting - simply having manufactured stuff crumble around you.
And not given any implicit ability to restore anything she's destroyed, so you might not care about it, but she's destroying the party loot. Blacksmith just...does this better for most considerations.

[Rynjin]

My favorite Mageknight is the Knightknight archetype, so you can take the Magemage prestige class.

[vasilidor]

12 talents. 2 a first level and 1 every even level there after.

[SangoProduction]

12 talents. 2 a first level and 1 every even level there after.

Not necessarily, thanks to the simple fact of: Not every character's first casting class will be Mageknight, and those 2 bonus talents you're likely mentioning is not coming from the class, but from that first level.

My favorite Mageknight is the Knightknight archetype, so you can take the Magemage prestige class.

Yeah. I was wondering if and where I should put that.

[Hunter Noventa]

I'll defend the Mageknight here. There are a lot of spheres where the low CL doesn't really make much of a difference, like the War sphere. Indeed, it does have a few abilities that aid in that. Not enough to really make you go "Wow. I really desire going War sphere here." Except for the wardmage archetype, although that's partially just because of action economy stacking, and is reliant on your enemies playing your way. But if they don't, then you've protected ... your 2 friends. The others are more like acquaintances.

I didn't mean to say Mageknight is bad, it just feels a bit less obvious at a glance as to how to use it's few talents.

[SangoProduction]

I didn't mean to say Mageknight is bad, it just feels a bit less obvious at a glance as to how to use it's few talents.

Oh yeah, definitely.

[ShadowcatX]

I think you are missing a lot on marshall controller. With Circle of Symbols you can make evil creatures banned from your area, they have to make a save to enter, if they succeed and enter they provoke an AoO for being evil in your zone and every turn they provoke another AoO. You don't need to invest further into protection and you can grab quick ward to stack it onto your patrol without it costing so much as a swift action extra. Long arm also can help with any movement issues you might suffer in patrol.

[Logalmier]

Mageknight is just an extremely strong chassis on which to slap the useful spherecasting dips that don’t care about CL, like light, time, warp, bear, ect. Mystic combats are probably the strongest class specific talents in the system (swift/free action spellpoint to make all your attacks against touch, ok). Marshal Controller is an extremely free and potent power increase that lets you double dip AoOs, and gives you access to the Never Defeated Mystic Combat, a very economical self heal.

I want to speak out in defense of Swift Combatant, just because Mystic Celerity + Penetrating Blows + Swift Combatant gives you pseudo-pounce against touch AC, which seems… strong. Besides that combo, there are many situations in which free mobility can be leveraged for both offensive and defensive advantage, enabling/denying full attacks being just the tip of the iceberg.

In my experience, mageknights can be tactically interesting to play, as they do a good job giving you a bunch of meaningful options that compete for your action economy, but they’re not really that interesting to build. The good Mystic Combats basically auto pick themselves. What, are you going to pick something that ISN’T Penetrating Blows, or Mystic Celerity, or Martial Adaptation? Are you going to NOT dip the same 3-5 gish spheres every time? And then you’re out of talents, because mageknight is OG spheres and was made before everyone realized that balancing a class around talent paucity is kind of miserable.

Worth noting that the feat Extra Mystic Combat does not have a limit on how many times you can take it, unlike many similar “extra class talent” feats in the system. This in my view makes mageknight a 2 level class. Dip it to get access to Mystic Combats and Marshal Controller, then switch to something with actual class features / a talent progression that doesn’t make me want to rip my teeth out.

[Kitsuneymg]

Mageknight is just an extremely strong chassis on which to slap the useful spherecasting dips that don’t care about CL, like light, time, warp, bear, ect. Mystic combats are probably the strongest class specific talents in the system (swift/free action spellpoint to make all your attacks against touch, ok). Marshal Controller is an extremely free and potent power increase that lets you double dip AoOs, and gives you access to the Never Defeated Mystic Combat, a very economical self heal.

I want to speak out in defense of Swift Combatant, just because Mystic Celerity + Penetrating Blows + Swift Combatant gives you pseudo-pounce against touch AC, which seems… strong. Besides that combo, there are many situations in which free mobility can be leveraged for both offensive and defensive advantage, enabling/denying full attacks being just the tip of the iceberg.

In my experience, mageknights can be tactically interesting to play, as they do a good job giving you a bunch of meaningful options that compete for your action economy, but they’re not really that interesting to build. The good Mystic Combats basically auto pick themselves. What, are you going to pick something that ISN’T Penetrating Blows, or Mystic Celerity, or Martial Adaptation? Are you going to NOT dip the same 3-5 gish spheres every time? And then you’re out of talents, because mageknight is OG spheres and was made before everyone realized that balancing a class around talent paucity is kind of miserable.

Worth noting that the feat Extra Mystic Combat does not have a limit on how many times you can take it, unlike many similar “extra class talent” feats in the system. This in my view makes mageknight a 2 level class. Dip it to get access to Mystic Combats and Marshal Controller, then switch to something with actual class features / a talent progression that doesn’t make me want to rip my teeth out.

Isn’t there a feat (wiki is 502-ing at me rn) that lets you stack a second class for the purposes of meeting prerequisites that require minimum class level to access? Like “mageknight 6” or so?

[Peelee]

The Mod on the Silver Mountain: Mageknight, not Necroknight.