I love the smell of poisonuos spells in the morning... [PrC, PEACH]

[insecure]

Eldritch Poisonmaster

Ever tried being poisoned by something defying the laws of nature?
- Edrox, member of the "Snake's Bite" guild.

You are a master of both poisons and spells, knowing how to hit your enemies where it hurts with both. Combining these two things, you reach new highs within the two arts, knowing how to debilitate your enemies either by subtle methods like poisoning their food and drink, or by blasting at them with your spells. Enhancing your poisons with spells and your spells with poisons, you train yourself in both things, your abilities reflecting how you gain experience in combining these forces. Your prowess in the way of the venoms and the use of your spells are rivaled by none.

Requirements
Feats: Great fortitude, Skill focus (Craft: poisonbrewing)
Skills: Craft (Poisonbrewing) 8 ranks, Spellcraft 5 ranks
Spellcasting: Caster level 5+

Class skills (2 + int modifier): Concentration, Craft, Knowledge (Arcana), Heal, Profession, Spellcraft

Hit Dice: d4

The Eldritch Poisonmaster
{table=head]Level|Base Attack Bonus|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Special|Spell

1st|

+0

|

+0

|

+0

|

+2

|Poison use|+1 level of arcane spellcasting class

2nd|

+1

|

+0

|

+0

|

+3

|Master brewer|+1 level of arcane spellcasting class

3rd|

+1

|

+1

|

+1

|

+3

|Resistant body|+1 level of arcane spellcasting class

4th|

+2

|

+1

|

+1

|

+4

|Spellfused toxin|+1 level of arcane spellcasting class

5th|

+2

|

+1

|

+1

|

+4

|Virulent spell|+1 level of arcane spellcasting class[/table]

Class features:

Weapon Proficiencies: You gain no proficiencies with any weapons or armor.

Poison use (Ex): Upon entering the class, you learn how to handle poisons properly. From now on, you never risk poisoning yourself when handling poison.

Master brewer (Ex): You are a trained poison-brewer, knowing how to enhance your poisons with additional power. Starting at second level, you may increase the DC of the poisons you brew with +1/class level. In addition, you can now take 15 on Craft (Poisonbrewing) checks.

Resistant body (Ex): Your body has become used to the almost constant contact with poison. Beginning at third level, you gain a +1/class level competence bonus on saves against poison.

Spellfused toxin (Su): When you acquire fourth level, you learn how to enhance your poisons with the power of your spells. You can now, as a full-round action, infuse one dose of poison with a spell. The spell used must be a touch range spell. If the creature exposed to the poison fails its save against the poison, it also suffers from the effects of the spell. If the spell allows spell resistance, both the poison and the spell effects can be negated with a successful spell resistance check. Any poison infused with a spell in this way loses its potency after five rounds, and both the spell and poison are ruined.

Virulent spell (Su): When you reach fifth level of the class, you learn how to deliver your poisons through your spells. Whenever you cast a spell which deals damage, targets only a single creature, and allows a save or spell resistance, you may also add the effects of one of your poisons to the spell. The poison used is consumed by the spell as though it were a material component. If your opponent doesn't succeed on his save against the spell, he also suffers from the effects of the poison.

[Kesnit]

I know this is only a 5 LVL PrC, but IMO, the ability to mix poison and spells comes too late. Poison Use and Resiliant Body should be LVL 1. If you want to keep Spellfused Toxin and Virulent Spell seperate, put them at 2 and 3. Master Brewer can move to 4 or 5. Not sure what to put on the remaining level...

Spellfused Toxin seems a little "meh" since the use is rather limited. It would work for an NPC class, but not a PC. Perhaps allowing the spell/poison combo to keep its potency until used (or dispelled, brought into an anti-magic field, etc).

Also, should Evil (or at least Non-Good) be a requirement?

[Abd al-Azrad]

I rather like the class concept as well, but it does need a little something extra. The full caster progression basically makes up for practically any lack of nifty abilities, but we all know how competitive PrCs have to be to draw any takers.

I also have problems with the Spellfused Toxin, specifically the duration (or lack thereof) which means that in order to make an attack with one, you need to take (a) a full-round action to infuse a poison, then (b) a standard to apply that poison to a weapon, then (c) yet ANOTHER standard to deliver an attack roll with that poison. Or, just (a) and (c) with a contact poison. And you need to do this all within five rounds, before both poison and spell denature- so that's two to three rounds of prepwork, in which you COULD have been just blasting an enemy with spells.

Consider either changing that ability to a free action (to charge the poison with a spell) or allowing the poison to remain potent until discharged. The former would be more combat-oriented, but I think the latter would better reflect the spirit of a poisoner: taking hours, even days, to prepare for a flawless and untraceable murder.

As for Virulent Spell, it's a neat ability, and makes you a lot more dangerous in combat- in fact, it fully replaces the combat usefulness of Spellfused Toxin, further convincing me that that latter ability should work more as a long-term assassination tool than a fightin' tool. Perhaps (if you want to strengthen the class later on) give Virulent Spell at 3rd or 4th, and Virulent Spell (area) at 5th. I imagine all could appreciate a Fireball that also doses its victims in some Dex-damaging poison, so they'd be more likely to fail their saves against further Fireballs.

EDIT: The idea of infusing a toxin with the Poison spell amuses me far more than it should.

[Project Icarus]

I agree that Spellfused Toxin becomes obsolete at fifth level unless it is changed to a long-term ability, much like a potion.

As for the bonuses from Master Brewer and Resistant Body, are they +1/poisonmaster level or +1/HD?

The idea of infusing a toxin with the Poison spell amuses me far more than it should.

No, I believe that's completely justified

[Abd al-Azrad]

A potion, yes! The spellfused toxin should allow the caster to effectively Brew Potions out of their known spells, using toxins as the base liquid! Use standard potionmaking rules, the spells will (more likely than not) be limited to harmful ones, and... I don't know if XP and gold cost reductions are necessary, as this is kind of a neat idea already.

Wait, this is going to make the ability suck. Potions use the lowest possible CL and DCs, unless brewed specially... and will never be terrifying in DCs. I guess spell out explicitly in the ability that spells infused this way keep your CL and DC, without any increase in XP or cost?

...Yeah, on further inspection, there's no bloody reason at all to use the standard potionmaking rules, as they suck at making weapons. Hm.

As far as the doubled effects go, how does making saves against them work? Do you save against both simultaneously, or one after the other? This is significant if, say, you hit someone with a toxic Enervation- do they suffer the save penalties against the poison?

[Debihuman]

Master brewer (Ex): You are a trained poison-brewer, knowing how to enhance your poisons with additional power. Starting at second level, you may increase the DC of the poisons you brew with +1/level. In addition, you can now take 15 on Craft (Poisonbrewing) checks.

.

Normally you either take 10 or take 20. Taking 15 is weird.

From the SRD:

Taking 10
When your character is not being threatened or distracted, you may choose to take 10. Instead of rolling 1d20 for the skill check, calculate your result as if you had rolled a 10. For many routine tasks, taking 10 makes them automatically successful. Distractions or threats (such as combat) make it impossible for a character to take 10. In most cases, taking 10 is purely a safety measure —you know (or expect) that an average roll will succeed but fear that a poor roll might fail, so you elect to settle for the average roll (a 10). Taking 10 is especially useful in situations where a particularly high roll wouldn’t help.

Taking 20
When you have plenty of time (generally 2 minutes for a skill that can normally be checked in 1 round, one full-round action, or one standard action), you are faced with no threats or distractions, and the skill being attempted carries no penalties for failure, you can take 20. In other words, eventually you will get a 20 on 1d20 if you roll enough times. Instead of rolling 1d20 for the skill check, just calculate your result as if you had rolled a 20.

Taking 20 means you are trying until you get it right, and it assumes that you fail many times before succeeding. Taking 20 takes twenty times as long as making a single check would take.

Since taking 20 assumes that the character will fail many times before succeeding, if you did attempt to take 20 on a skill that carries penalties for failure, your character would automatically incur those penalties before he or she could complete the task. Common “take 20” skills include Escape Artist, Open Lock, and Search.

[insecure]

Hokay. Belated reply, but whatever. Gonna use a different system instead of quotes this time.

@ Abilities comming too late: This was what I was afraid of would happen, but I don't think adding more abilities would help unless they're very minor. Giving you acces to Spellfused toxin earlier might help this, though, but when?

@ Spellfused toxin: I don't think letting it keep it's potency indefinitely would help that much, since then you could just prepare an extreme amount of poisons and use them as extra spells. Still, I prefer the longer duration over the short, so instead I'm thinking about letting you "spellfuse" one poison a day, but they last for a week. Thoughts?

@ Taking 15: I don't know where, but it was explained in some supplement, and as you already can take 10 on craft checks, I'd let you take 15 too.

@ Doubled effects: The doubled effects are already explained in the abilities, although the wording could use a serious overhaul.

@ Class or character level: It's class level. Gonna add that to the abilities.

[Debihuman]

Since "Taking 15" is supplemental material and not standard, you should explain it or at least cite to the supplement. I've never heard of "Taking 15" so I'm not sure whether the mechanics follow Taking 10 or Taking 20.

Debby