New Class:Good?

[Macrovore]

Here's a new class that i'm thinking of introducing into my campaign. Kinda like a reverse warlock, with many of the same abilities. It needs a new name though.

Spoiler:

Celestial Mage (or the Peacekey)

Game Rule Information
Abilities: A high Charisma score makes a celestial mage’s invocations harder to resist. High dexterity is very valuable to a celestial mage, allowing him to better aim his holy blasts, and a good Constitution score is also useful.
Alignment: Any good
Hit Die: d6

Class Skills
The celestial mage’s class skills are: Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Gather Information (Cha), Heal (Wis), Knowledge (arcana, the planes, religion) (Int), Profession (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int) and Use Magic Device (Cha).
Skill points: 2+Int modifier

Class Features
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: celestial mages are proficient with simple weapons and with light armor, but not with shields.
Because the somatic components required for the celestial mage invocations while wearing light armor without incurring the normal arcane spell failure chance. However, like arcane spellcasters, a celestial mage wearing medium or heavy armor or using a shield incurs a chance of arcane spell failure (all invocations, including holy blast, have a somatic component). A multiclass celestial mage still incurs the normal arcane spell failure chance for arcane spells received from levels in other classes.

Invocations: A celestial mage does not prepare or cast spells as other wielders of arcane magic do. Instead, he possesses a repertoire of attacks, defenses, and abilities known as invocations that require him to focus the holy energy that suffuses his soul. A celestial mage can use any invocation he knows at will.
To use an invocation, the celestial mage must have a Charisma score of at least 10+the spell level equivalent. The save DC for an invocation (if it allows one) is 10+the celestial mage’s Cha bonus+spell level equivalent.
There are four levels of celestial mage invocations: least, lesser, greater, and divine. At first level the celestial mage knows one least invocation, and at certain levels, he learns more. At 6th lvl, he can learn lesser invocations. At 10th lvl, he can learn greater invocations, and at 16th lvl, he can learn divine invocations. Also, at every level the celestial mage learns a new invocation, in addition he can choose to switch an invocation he already knows with a different invocation of the same level or lesser. The old one is simply erased from his memory and he can no longer use it.

Holy blast: At first level, the celestial mage can concentrate the arcane might inside him and create a holy blast. The holy blast is a ray requiring a ranged touch attack with a range of 60 ft. It allows no save, bypasses all damage reduction and energy resistance, but is subject to spell resistance and deals only half damage to objects. The damage it deals at 1st level is 1d6, but it increases by one die every odd level (except 19th), as well as 20th lvl, when it deals 9d6. This is a weaponlike spell, and as such, certain feats that apply to weapons apply to this also. The holy blast is an Evocation [good] effect.

Healing Blast: At third level, the celestial mage can convert his holy blast into a healing blast. It works the same way (although the celestial mage’s allies would probably wish to allow it to affect them, so he probably wouldn’t need to make an attack roll) that the regular holy blast does, including damage and range, but it is positive energy (and thus heals living creatures and deals damage to undead). Unfortunately, since positive energy is more powerful and harder to control than arcane power, using a healing blast requires the celestial mage to recharge for 1d8 rounds. During this time, he cannot use either his healing blast or his holy blast (although he can use other invocations freely, except blast shape or blast essence invocations). At 7th lvl, the recharge time decreases to 1d6 rounds. At 11th lvl, it decreases to 1d4 rounds. At 15th lvl, it takes 1d2 rounds to recharge, and at 19th lvl, he can use the healing blast without limit, and doesn’t need to recharge to use either the holy or healing blast (thus making it completely at will). The healing blast is a Conjuration (healing) [good] effect.

Detect magic, Detect Evil: At 2nd level, the celestial mage can invoke detect magic and detect evil at will.

Trick Item: At 4nd lvl, the celestial mage can always take 10 on Use Magic Device checks, even when distracted or threatened.

Protection from Evil: At 4th lvl, the celestial mage can invoke protection from evil at will. He can only cast it on himself.

Magic Circle against Evil: At 8th lvl, the celestial mage can invoke magic circle against evil at will. He can only cast it on himself. This replaces the ability to use protection from evil.

Dispel Evil: At 10th lvl, the celestial mage can invoke dispel evil at will. He can only cast it on himself.

Imbue Item: At 12th lvl, the celestial mage can create magic items without knowing the spells required to create it (he must have the requisite feats though). This ability works exactly like the warlock (Complete Arcane) ability of the same name.

Table: The Celestial mage
BAB Fort. Save Ref. Save Will Save Class
Features Invocations
Known
1 +0 +0 +0 +2 Holy blast 1d6,
New invocation (least) 1
2 +1 +0 +0 +3 Detect magic, Detect evil 2
3 +2 +1 +1 +3 Holy blast 2d6
Healing blast recharge 1d8, 2
4 +3 +1 +1 +4 Trick item, Protection from evil 3
5 +3 +1 +1 +4 Holy blast 3d6 3
6 +4 +2 +2 +5 New invocation (lesser) 4
7 +5 +2 +2 +5 Holy blast 4d6,
Healing blast recharge 1d6 5
8 +6/+1 +2 +2 +6 Magic circle against evil 5
9 +6/+1 +3 +3 +6 Holy blast 5d6 6
10 +7/+2 +3 +3 +7 Dispel evil 6
11 +8/+3 +3 +3 +7 Holy blast 6d6,
Healing blast recharge 1d4,
New invocation (greater) 7
12 +9/+4 +4 +4 +8 Imbue item 8
13 +9/+4 +4 +4 +8 - 8
14 +10/+5 +4 +4 +9 Holy blast 7d6 9
15 +11/+6/+1 +5 +5 +9 Healing blast recharge 1d2 9
16 +2/+7/+2 +5 +5 +10 New invocation type (divine) 10
17 +12/+7/+2 +5 +5 +10 Holy blast 8d6 11
18 +13/+8/+3 +6 +6 +11 - 11
19 +14/+9/+4 +6 +6 +11 Unlimited Healing blast 12
20 15/+10/+5 +6 +6 +12 Holy blast 9d6 12







Celestial Mage Invocations:
The celestial mage can cast three basic types of invocations: blast essence invocations, which alter the damage and effects of the celestial mage’s holy blast; blast shape invocations, which alter the shape and targets affected of the holy blast—these invocations can also be applied to the healing blasts; and other invocations. A celestial mage can only apply one blast essence and one blast shape (one of each) invocation to his holy or healing blast at any one time.

Blast Essence Invocations
Least
Mighty Blast—same as warlock invocation Frightful Blast.
Sickening Blast—same as warlock invocation of the same name.
Lesser
Brilliant Blast—same as warlock invocation Beshadowed Blast.
Fiery Blast—same as warlock invocation Brimstone Blast.
Wintry Blast—same as warlock invocation Hellrime Blast.
Forceful Blast—deals force damage and target must make reflex save or be knocked prone.
Greater
Enchanting Blast—same as warlock invocation Bewitching Blast.
Noxious Blast—same as warlock invocation of the same name.
Corrosive Blast—same as warlock invocation Vitrolic Blast.
Divine
Radiant Blast—blast is positive energy, and deals double damage to undead. This requires a recharge time of 1d4+1 rounds before you can use a holy or healing blast.

Blast Shape Invocations
Least
Holy Spear—your holy blast has a range of 250ft.
Holy Strike—your holy blast is channeled through a melee attack.
Lesser
Holy Chain—same as warlock invocation Eldritch Chain.
Holy Sword—your holy blast becomes a dancing weapon. While in this form, you cannot use your holy or healing blast.
Greater
Holy Cone—your holy blast is a 30ft. cone, so the targets must make a reflex save for half damage.
Holy Bolt—your holy blast is a 60ft. line, so the targets must make a reflex save for half damage.
Divine
Holy Burst—your holy blast becomes a 20ft. diameter burst, so the target must make a reflex save for half damage

Other Invocations
Least
Divine Utterance—same as warlock invocation Baleful Utterance, but word spoken is one of the Creation Words.
Divine Influence—you gain +6 to bluff, diplomacy, and gather information checks for 24 hrs.
Holy Luck—same as warlock invocation Dark One’s Own Luck.
Angel’s Sight—you see normally in normal and magical darkness for 24 hrs.
Entropic Warding—same as warlock invocation of the same name.
Leaps and Bounds—same as warlock invocation of the same name.
See Unseen—same as warlock invocation of the same name.
Water Walk—you can walk on water and similar substances (as the spell) for 24 hrs.
Lesser
Charm—as spell, but range 60ft.
Curse—as spell.
Turn Undead—turn or destroy undead as a cleric of ½ caster lvl.
Retreat—same as warlock invocation Flee the Scene, but invisible for 1 round also.
Blindsense—you gain blindsense 30ft. for 24hrs.
Daylight—as spell
Walk Unseen—same as warlock invocation of the same name
Voracious Dispel—same as warlock invocation of the same name.
Divine Might—you gain a +4 enhancement bonus to any one ability score for 24hrs.
Greater
Consume Magic—same as warlock invocation Devour Magic.
Celestial Call—same as warlock invocation Warlock’s Call
Greater Blink—as spell, but self only
Divine Hand—as telekinesis
Holy Will—as suggestion
Divine
Holy Discorporation—same as warlock invocation Dark Discorporation, but turns into swarm of glowing globes of light.
Holy Vision—same as warlock invocation Dark Foresight
Holy Storm—as firestorm, but half of the damage dealt is normal damage.
Change—as polymorph(self only) or baleful polymorph.
Retributive Invisibility—same as warlock invocation of the same name.

[Macrovore]

Sorry. Here's the class features chart in a nutshell. Average BAB, good Will saves.

1 holy blast 1d6, least invocations (1 invocation known)
2 detect magic, detect evil (2 invocations known)
3 healing blast recharge 1d8, holy blast 2d6
4 trick item, protection from evil (3 invocations known)
5 holy blast 3d6
6 lesser invocations (4 invocations known)
7 healing blast recharge 1d6, holy blast 4d6 (5 invocations known)
8 magic circle against evil
9 holy blast 5d6 (6 invocations known)
10 dispel evil
11 healing blast recharge 1d4, holy blast 6d6, greater invocations (7 invocations known)
12 imbue item (8 invocations known)
13 -
14 holy blast 7d6 (9 invocations known)
15 healing blast recharge 1d2
16 divine invocations (10 invocations known)
17 holy blast 8d6 (11 invocations known)
18 -
19 unlimited healing blast (12 invocations known)
20 holy blast 9d6

[Nyaricus]

dude, i would re-post in house rules - waaaay more traffic there. I am not much for arcanist-types, but he looks awesome!!! But, like i said, go to house rules. here's a link, in case you don't know where to go: http://www.enworld.org/forumdisplay.php?f=45

[Macrovore]

i think i will, but the reason I posted it here is because of the fact that although our membership is few, the GMF, especially NC and CE, have an immense knowledge about the game and it's fragile balance.
*drops to knees and screams "NIGHTCLOAK!!!! Why have you forsaken me!!!"*

[Nightcloak]

* Sigh *

Sorry, real life is very busy right now. The holiday is keeping me going 24/7 plus the online class I'm taking. It will quite down after turkey day, then I'll take on your class

[Macrovore]

thx, man
i think it's pretty balanced. i got rid of the DR, the energy resistance and the fast healing for healing magic and some protective invocations.

[Blade of Desecration]

Looks pretty balanced, but did you remove any offensive invocations to balance out the gained protective ones?

EDIT: Come to think of it, I still say the Healing Blast is broken. While a cleric can heal more all at once, this practically removes the need to rest to regain health. Once a battle is over, just take as long as you want to zap everyone back to full health. That's unlimited healing right there.

[Macrovore]

i took out the stuff like wall of fire and black tentacles, but since he primarily channels positive energy, i think that he still needs to be able to heal at least somewhat.
and i need another idea for a holy blast essence invocation

[Macrovore]

*bump*

[Kisanji Arael]

Hate to ssay it, but they're right. hmmm, how to balance....

First off, the healing definitely needs to be lowered as far as power goes. If I were playing one of these, I would use a healing blast in any round that I couldn't use anything else. Set healing blast to 2/3 progression, maxing out at 6d6.

But it still needs to be reduced inasfar as rest time is concerned. hmmm.... what if you say that it can only affect a creature every so often. Say... 2/hour. Even with my reduction, they will still will throw out damage like a Warlock, but they are limited to healing each of their allies for only 12d6 during any given battle. Throw in a feat that increase this number by 2/hour, and can be gained 3 times. If they want to heal a person a lot, they will be able to, but they will have to do devote most of their feats to it. Oh, and can they revive as a major invocation (1/day might be reasonable, or "after being revived by you, that creature is overloaded by your healing blast and cannot be affected again for 24 hours)

[Cheiromancer]

Another way of dealing with healing blast is to have it give some kind of adverse affect to the recipient. Fatigue, say (caused by the body going into an overstimulated overdrive of healing). Two fatigues is exhaustion- after that is paralysis for some duration. Since these effects are caused by excessive positive energy, curative magic doesn't help- it only adds fuel to the fire, so to speak.

Don't know how to tinker with it so that it doesn't become unbalanced as a weapon- give it a save to negate, maybe with a +4 bonus. Undead don't get the bonus, but since they are not subject to fatigue, they just take damage from the positive energy.

Something like that, anyway.

[Macrovore]

so, it heals them, but the target must make a fort save or become fatigued/exhausted/paralyzed for 2 rounds?

[Cheiromancer]

Originally Posted by Macrovore

so, it heals them, but the target must make a fort save or become fatigued/exhausted/paralyzed for 2 rounds?

It depends on what you are trying to limit. If you are trying to limit healing in combat, a short bout of fatigue would work. Probably more like a minute of fatigue, though. (10 rounds). If you are wanting to limit healing out of combat, you might have to make the effects more drastic. Standard fatigue lasts 8 hours, for example.

One thing that would limit combat healing is if the healing rays merely convert lethal damage to nonlethal damage. It won't keep them on their feet any longer, but it will make them heal up in hours rather than in days.

Fatigue might set in after combat, rather than during it, and last until the nonlethal damage has all been healed. (It heals at the rate of 1 hp/level/hour IIRC).

Just throwing out some ideas. But there should be a way of making unlimited healing work without messing up the standard balance of things.

[Xereq]

i like the idea of converting lethal damage into nonleathal damage, it can still be the difference life and death at negative hit points but it just means that the character is unconsious and not dieing.

you might consider giving it a "casting time" of 1 minute and several quickened uses per day, also an invocation that gives target ally fast healing 3 for subdual damage,at around the level clerics get access to heal would be balancing, as clerics could convert any spell at that level into heal instantly, making subdual conversion underwhelming

or perhaps just make it so that the class starts out with subdual conversion at 3rd moves up to half healing/half convesion at around 7th and full healing at 14th.

again, look at comprable healing classes and assume that if the Infused Channeler (perfect name) is going to have a healing ability the party will want it to be the primary healer, freeing up the cleric to be all rightous and smighty (whats with good clerics and avoiding the smightyness and death spells? SAVE OR PROFANE INFIDEL!!! FROM PELOR WITH LOVE!!!FEEL THE BURNING PURITY OF PELOR'S LOVE!!!).

[Macrovore]

xereq, change your avatar. there's someone with it, already. I almost yelled at plotnik. Whether he was behind that post or not, he needs to control his anger. even poor Matt didn't deserve that, man.

[Blade of Desecration]

Originally Posted by Macrovore

xereq, change your avatar. there's someone with it, already. I almost yelled at plotnik. Whether he was behind that post or not, he needs to control his anger. even poor Matt didn't deserve that, man.

He had it comin'.

Maybe you can have it that after being healed a certain number of times, someone has to start making fortitude saves from the buildup if you try to heal them. If they fail, they take damage equal to the amount normally healed.

But anyways, another idea is that you heal, but it does nonlethal damage to you equal to the damage healed.

EDIT: Wow, I feel stupid. That does the exact same thing as just converting it to non-lethal. :\

[Macrovore]

or maybe using it too many times on one person in too short an amount a time can open a small rift to the positive energy plane, and they get massive healing extremely fast, but it's so uncontrollable that they get temp hp too, and they can explode (just like in the positive energy plane).

In other words, they can blow people up by attacking them, or healing them

[Nightcloak]

Alrighty.

*Rolls up sleeves*

First of all, good job. Making a good counterpoint to the warlock is nice, and giving a good divine caster concept for charisma is great. I like the feel of it and I think the game needs more use of the traditional "dump" stats.

The big issue which has been well covered is the unlimited healing potential. I'm going to offer a different solution to the problem.

First. I'm not big on the side affects as a balance cocept, unless it fits the world concept. The player is going to have to plan ahead and make choices in combat anyway to run this character, just like any other spell caster, so no need to tone down the actual effect after he has decided to heal someone versus casting an invocation or attacking in combat or any other action he forgoes to use the ability. In other words, let the player have their powers and have fun. You want them to play your new class you worked on.

What I would do is limit the healing as a spell like ability (which means concentration checks to avoid AoO in combat) that can be cast a number of times per day equal to his wisdom modifier (or once/week with a negative modifier). You could use Charisma, I'm just throwing Wisdom out their do to 1) Thematic: Your reference to divine power being harder to control, and 2) I like the idea of special character classes having more stat requirements - that makes them special (like a paladin needing a number of good stats to run well). I just think specially classes should be a little harder and, well... special. Plus it puts the breaks on the healing a little more. That is just my 2 coppers.

Now the rest looks good. You followed the format of the Warlock which is good as far as rules goes; it uses existing rules making it easier for characters to know. It is tied to the Warlock which makes it an easy concept for players to “wrap themselves around”. And it follows a Wizards created class which means it was created by some of the best rule minds in the industry who should have play tested the class (although some prestige classes from Wizards has made me question this). I’ve noticed that Bruce Cordell’s name pops up on a lot of Wizard products dealing with magic, and if he did this class then it should be fine. The man does some great work (beware his dungeons – they are fabulous but also quite dangerous). I would play test it if possible, or come to an understanding with the first player to play it that “If it seems weak, I’ll boost it and if it is to strong, I may need to roll something back” kind of agreement. A good player will work with you.

The scratch and sniff test:

How does it compare to a base class, which it should not be better than. If you compare it to a cleric, which it is similar to because of the healing IMO (plus the healing is the balance issue), then you get the following:

Similar BAB, the Celestial Mage has reduced saves, lower hit points, and reduced combat proficiencies when compared to the cleric. On the plus you get a lot of special abilities. The cleric has limited special abilities (based on domain powers) plus every GMs bane, turn undead. The Celestial mage looks strong so far, but…

The mage has access to a limited number of invocations while the cleric has a vast spell selection but is limited by the number of times per day it can cast them. On the surface, it looks even.

High level comparison: A 15th level cleric with a 22 for Wisdom can cast 35 different spells per day (not including 0 level spells) plus 8 domain spells. A Celestial Mage with a 22 Charisma and 22 Wisdom can cast 9 different invocations, but can repeatedly cast those invocations all day. The Celestial Mage launches a Heal Blast 6 times per day for 7d6 healing – or an average 21 points of healing) as a ranged touch attack. The cleric can cast heal 4 times per day for 150 points of healing when he touches someone and still have 31 spells + 8 domain spells available.

Now unlimited invocations per day may sound pretty good to a cleric having 43 spells available, but there are some considerations. The invocations are not as powerful as the cleric spells and some invocation are used to affect the Celestial Mages main class feature – the Holy Blast. Also, it is doubtful that the cleric will find itself in a situation where he would actually burn through all of those spells in a day. It’s possible, but odds are it will be rare. Most groups go down when the spell casters get low on spells. That makes the number of spells/invocations available less important. When you combine that with the Celestial Mage having 9 different invocations and the cleric having a possible 43 different actual spells the scales tip heavily in favor of our friend the cleric.

In fact, I’d say the spell and healing capabilities out ways all of the special abilities of the Celestial Mage accept the holy blast. That is the factor that will either make the class equal to the cleric or a little weak. That probably needs to be seen in action to be judged, but looks pretty good.

In retrospect, my recommendation on the healing blast needs to be tweaked. At 3rd level, the Celestial Mage with a wisdom of 18 can heal someone for an average 6 points - 4 times per day while the cleric can cast a cure light wounds for an average 7 points – 4 times per day. Not bad. The 15th level casters from the example above show the gap in healing growing considerably. You may wish to consider either:

1) Allowing the Celestial Mage to add his level to the healing, like the cleric, or

2) Casting it more often then what I recommended to start. Perhaps the Celestial Mage starts out with 1 + Wisdom modifier at 3rd level then gets more castings as he raises in level, say an additional use every 3rd level.

Hope all of that helps out!

[Macrovore]

how about the celestial mage can use the healing blast a number of times per day equal to his class level (with the same recharge rate listed in the chart)

[arelian]

Some ideas to consider...

1) Limit the number of hit points any one target may regain from that class ability each day to the maximum possible result from any particular Celestial Mage (18 HP if they have a 3d6 Healing Blast). If the first use on one particular target gets a result of 10 HP, that target can gain no more than 8 HP on the next use. HP gains in excess of the target's unwounded total become temporary hit points that fade at a rate of one per round (or so...).

2) Base side effects off the Planar Handbook's description of the perils of being on a Positive Energy plane without protection from positive energy overload.

3) There's a web-book I found called Gryphon's Book of Feats that has in it a feat called Divine Channeling, which allows one to expend a Turn attempt in order to heal HP equal to the caster's CHA modifier. This might give another starting point.