Spellblade (New Base Class for Pathfinder, PEACH)

[DrowVampyre]

A friend and I made this class over the last several days, and knowing that you guys are the experts, I thought I'd bring it here to see what you think. This is our first class, so if we made any serious mistakes, or minor ones, please let me know. Any suggestions about how to make it better, more balanced, etc. are welcome and appreciated. Thanks!

Spellblade

Hit Die: d8
Class Skills: (2+Int Modifier)
Acrobatics, Climb, Craft, Fly, Intimidate, Knowledge (All, taken individually), Profession, Spellcraft, Ride, Swim.

{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Special|0-lvl|1-lvl|2-lvl|3-lvl|4-lvl|5-lvl|6-lvl

1st|

+1

|

+0

|

+2

|

+2

|Armored Casting, Cantrips|3|1|-|-|-

2nd|

+2

|

+0

|

+3

|

+3

|Dance of Warding|4|2|-|-|-

3rd|

+3

|

+1

|

+3

|

+3

|Eschew Materials|4|2|-|-|-

4th|

+4

|

+1

|

+4

|

+4

|Weapon Attunement +1|4|2|1|-|-

5th|

+5

|

+1

|

+4

|

+4

|Wraith Step 1/day|4|3|2|-|-

6th|

+6

|

+2

|

+5

|

+5

|Summon Weapon|4|3|2|-|-

7th|

+7

|

+2

|

+5

|

+5

|Spell Channeling|4|3|2|1|-

8th|

+8

|

+2

|

+6

|

+6

|Weapon Attunement +2|4|4|3|2|-

9th|

+9

|

+3

|

+6

|

+6

|Wraith Step 2/day|4|4|3|2|-

10th|

+10

|

+3

|

+7

|

+7

|Physical Magical Defense|4|4|3|2|1

11th|

+11

|

+3

|

+7

|

+7

|Altered Attunement|4|4|4|3|2

12th|

+12

|

+4

|

+8

|

+8

|Weapon Attunement +3|4|4|4|3|2

13th|

+13

|

+4

|

+8

|

+8

|Wraith Step 3/day|4|4|4|3|2

14th|

+14

|

+4

|

+9

|

+9

|Mental Magical Defense|4|4|4|4|3

15th|

+15

|

+5

|

+9

|

+9

||4|4|4|4|3

16th|

+16

|

+5

|

+10

|

+10

|Weapon Attunement +4|4|4|4|4|3

17th|

+17

|

+5

|

+10

|

+10

|Wraith Step 4/day|4|4|4|4|4

18th|

+18

|

+6

|

+11

|

+11

|Evasive Magical Defense|4|4|4|4|4

19th|

+19

|

+6

|

+11

|

+11

||4|4|4|4|4

20th|

+20

|

+6

|

+12

|

+12

|Mastered Attunement|4|4|4|4|4[/table]


Proficiencies: The Spellblade is proficient with light armor (but not with shields) and with all simple weapons, as well as all light and one-handed martial weapons.

Spells: Spellblades cast arcane spells from the spellblade spell list (shown below). They must prepare spells ahead of time and keeps spellbooks, just as a wizard does. To cast any spell on their list, a spellblade must have an Intelligence score of at least 10 + the level of the spell. Their spellbooks contain 4 0-level spells and 2 1st-level spells at 1st level, and they add 2 spells of any level they can cast upon gaining each new level. TO add additional spells beyond these, they must pay to scribe the spell into their spellbook, just as a wizard does.

Armored Casting (Ex): When wearing light armor, and wielding a one-handed melee weapon in one hand, a Spellblade ignores arcane spell failure for the armor they are wearing.

Cantrips: Spellblades can prepare a number of cantrips, or 0-level spells, each day. They can cast these spells at will as a spell-like ability. The number of cantrips a Spellblade can prepare is noted under “Spells Per Day”. Cantrips are treated like any other spell cast by the Spellblade in terms of duration and other variables based on level.

Dance of Warding (Ex): Starting at 2nd level, when wielding a one-handed melee weapon in one hand and nothing in the other, and only when wearing light armor, the Spellblade adds a dodge bonus to his armor class based on his half his level, rounded down, up to a maximum of his int bonus.

Eschew Materials: At 3rd level, the Spellblade gains Eschew Materials as a bonus feat.

Weapon Attunement (Su): Starting at 4th level, a Spellblade can attune to their weapon of choice during a day-long process of meditation and training using the weapon to be bonded. Once complete, the Spellblade receives a +1 enhancement bonus to all attack and damage rolls with the bonded weapon. At every 4th level thereafter, the enhancement bonus increases by +1. Finally, at 20th level, they have become so attuned to their weapon that it gains a +5 enhancement bonus, and a simple, empathic intelligence.

Wraith Step (Su): Starting at 5th level, the Spellblade can call upon their innate magic to teleport up to 30ft in any direction as a swift action, as long as the spot is within their line of sight, 1/day. At 9th level this increases to 2/day, at 13th 3/day, and at 17th 4/day.

Summon Weapon (Su): At 6th level, the Spellblade can summon their attuned weapon to their hand as a swift action.

Spell Channeling (Su): Starting at 7th level, a spellblade can channel touch or ray spells through his bonded weapon. He may choose to substitute a normal attack with his weapon for the touch attack required of the spell. This attack is resolved as a normal attack rather than a touch attack, and does damage as a normal attack in addition to the spell's effects.

Physical Magical Defense (Ex): At 10th level and higher, a spellblade can avoid even magical and unusual attacks with great fortitude. If he makes a successful Fortitude saving throw against an attack that normally deals half damage on a successful save, he instead takes no damage. This ability can be used only if the spellblade is wearing light armor or no armor. A helpless spellblade does not gain the benefit of this ability.

Altered Attunement (Su): Beginning at 11th level, a spellblade is able to adjust the form of his weapon attunement. Rather than an enhancement bonus, he may allocate his Weapon Attunement bonus to special abilities as he sees fit. The weapon's special abilities may be adjusted at the spellblade's desire with a ritual that takes one hour. The spellblade's bonded weapon must always possess at least a +1 enhancement, however, whether from the Weapon Attunement ability or from a normal enchantment

Mental Magical Defense (Ex): At 14th level and higher, a spellblade can avoid even magical and unusual attacks with great willpower. If he makes a successful Will saving throw against an attack that normally deals half damage on a successful save, he instead takes no damage. This ability can be used only if the spellblade is wearing light armor or no armor. A helpless spellblade does not gain the benefit of this ability.

Evasive Magical Defense (Ex): At 18th level and higher, a spellblade can avoid even magical and unusual attacks with great Reflexes. If he makes a successful Reflex saving throw against an attack that normally deals half damage on a successful save, he instead takes no damage. This ability can be used only if the spellblade is wearing light armor or no armor. A helpless spellblade does not gain the benefit of this ability.


Spellblade Spells - UNDER REVISION

0-Level
Resistance
Acid Splash
Detect Magic
Read Magic
Dancing Lights
Light
Ray of Frost
Message

1st-Level
Protection from Chaos/Evil/Good/Law
Shield
Mage Armor
Obscuring Mist
True Strike
Burning Hands
Magic Missile
Shocking Grasp
Chill Touch
Ray of Enfeeblement
Expeditious Retreat
Magic Weapon

2nd-Level
Protection from Arrows
Resist Energy
Acid Arrow
Fog Cloud
See Invisibility
Scorching Ray
Shatter
Blur
Invisibility
Mirror Image
Bear's Endurance
Bull's Strength
Cat's Grace

3rd-Level
Dispel Magic
Protection from Energy
Sleet Storm
Fireball
Lightning Bolt
Wind Wall
Displacement
Vampiric Touch
Fly
Haste
Keen Edge
Magic Weapon, Greater
Slow

4th-Level
Dimensional Anchor
Stoneskin
Black Tentacles
Dimension Door
Solid Fog
Fire Shield
Ice Storm
Wall of Fire
Wall of Ice

[DrowVampyre]

We've made a few changes to the class, so if it looks different than before, it's cause...it is!

[DrowVampyre]

More changes are up, after comments from other sources. No one here has anything to say about it? >_> <_<

[Tempest Fennac]

To be honest, I hadn't seen the class until now. It's an interresting idea, but it seems too similar to the Duskblade class. (If you've not heard of Duskblades, they can be found on page 149 of http://www.crystalkeep.com/d20/rules...asses-Base.pdf ). Do Magical Defences work against non-damaging attacks with fortitude and Will saves?

[Covered In Bees]

I can't really see any reason to take this class. It's got minor, slow-progressing spellcasting from a fixed list, and while it can channel the spells through it's weapon, that also limits it to one attack per round. On top of that, they can prepare so few spells, they won't be able to regularly spell channel.

Check out the Duskblade class from the PHBII. When making a class, rather than just sprinkling abilities in, ask yourself, what is this class good at? What should it be able to do? What do I expect it to do each round of a sample combat?
Right now, it's not good at anything.

[DrowVampyre]

Well, the idea was to make it more of a light skirmisher type than the duskblade. Also, my friend (who came up with the idea) wants to stay away from splatbooks in favor of OGL or homebrew things, with the idea of publishing it at some later date.

Aside from that...I'm honestly not sure what party role it's supposed to fill. The original versions had level 6 spellcasting and medium BAB (like a bard) with more more...blasty and buffy list than bards. The changes here were suggested on another board (Paizo's, if you're curious) as a way to make it the arcane version of a ranger or paladin (that is, ranger being a combination fighter/druid, and paladin fighter/cleric), which my friend seemed to like.

And I imagine the magical defenses would work against non-damaging fort and will partial spells - that's one of the new things, and he wrote it up, so I'm not completely sure, but I'll drag him in here to answer that tomorrow if I can.

(Edit for the curious - the original version is in the first post here.)

[Faithless]

While you can't imbue your spells into your attacks, you get free weapon enhancement. That's not too bad take a look at the Kensai(I think) rules for how they enchant their weapons for free to make sure that's all balanced out.

My only real concern is that the duskblade class has spells that cap out in damage dice. The spellblade here can cast a 20d6 fireball while the duskblade could only ever do a 5d4 or something along those lines.

[Siosilvar]

Kensai weapon enchantment isn't free; it costs a (minor) amount of XP (1/25 the cost of the item).

The class looks good so far; I'll look through it a little more.

[DrowVampyre]

My only real concern is that the duskblade class has spells that cap out in damage dice. The spellblade here can cast a 20d6 fireball while the duskblade could only ever do a 5d4 or something along those lines.

Well, its spells still have to obey the spell limits (ie., fireball can only go to 10d6), which is, I believe, how Duskblades work too. Just that some of their spells have different damage progressions (1d8/2 CL or something).

And yeah, the Kensai does it with XP. However, in Pathfinder there are no longer XP costs for anything, and as the class is designed primarily for the Pathfinder rules, adding an XP cost into the mix would be kinda...odd...

Thanks for the comments! We're still new at this whole class-making thing, so it's good to hear from people who've had more experience.

[boomwolf]

You spells seem to get stuck at level 14, but otherwise its rather cool.

[Arcane_Snowman]

Aside from that...I'm honestly not sure what party role it's supposed to fill. The original versions had level 6 spellcasting and medium BAB (like a bard) with more more...blasty and buffy list than bards. The changes here were suggested on another board (Paizo's, if you're curious) as a way to make it the arcane version of a ranger or paladin (that is, ranger being a combination fighter/druid, and paladin fighter/cleric), which my friend seemed to like.

Hexblade, despite being an almost utterly powerless class, it still follows the Ranger/Paladins full bab, 4th level casting, minor spellcaster/melee benefits.

Instead of limiting it by giving a specific list, limit it by spell school, say: Transmutation, Conjuration and whatever. This way you avoid splat, but still leave an open end for anyone interested in getting something moderately interesting.

And instead of Weapon Attunement, perhaps Skirmish? It seems to encourage the "get in, get out" strategy, and with wraith step it becomes even better.