A New Look at the Shadowdancer PrC

I'm gearing up for a new campaign that takes place in a sandy, desert environment. One of the players in my group mentioned that he would like to play a Shadowdancer, but I didn't think that it would fit ("shadow" is the polar opposite of "sun," ya know). So rather than tell him a flat "no," I reworked it to give it a more desert-ish feel.

Behold, the Sand Dancer! Please, critique it to death and let me konw if you see anything that might be a problem. I sort of did this one off-the-cuff, and it probably needs a lot of polish.

Prestige Class: Sand Dancer

A modified version of the Shadowdancer PrC, found in the SRD. This variety is designed to fit more smoothly into a desert campaign, while preserving much of the feel of the original. "Unchanged" refers to features, requirements, or abilities that are identical to the Shadowdancer prestige class, as written in the SRD.

Requirements: Unchanged

Class Skills: Unchanged
Skill Points per level: Unchanged

Hit Die: Unchanged

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Unchanged

Hide in Plain Sight (Su): Unchanged, except that the character must be in desert, wasteland, or similar sandy terrain.

Throw Sand (Ex): A Sand Dancer can throw or kick sand into her opponent's eyes with a successful melee attack. Whenever the Sand Dancer hits a living opponent with an unarmed strike, the target must succeed a Reflex save (DC 12) or be blinded for 1 round. To use this ability, the Sand Dancer must be standing on dust or sand at least one inch deep. The Sand Dancer may only attempt to blind one opponent per round. (This ability replaces the shadowdancer's darkvision ability.)

Evasion (Ex): Unchanged

Uncanny Dodge (Ex): Unchanged

Mirage (Sp): When a Sand Dancer reaches 3rd level, she can create visual illusions. This ability’s effect is identical to that of the arcane spell hallucinatory terrain cast by a 7th level sorcerer, except that the material component is a fistful of dry sand. This ability may be used once per day.

Summon Mephit (Su): As the shadowdancer's summon shadow ability, except that the Sand Dancer summons dust mephits instead of shadows.

Sand Jump (Su): As the shadowdancer's shadow jump ability, except that the Sand Dancer must begin and end each movement in an area with sand or dust at least one inch deep.

Defensive Roll (Ex): Unchanged

Improved Uncanny Dodge (Ex): Unchanged

Slippery Mind (Ex): Unchanged

Improved Evasion (Ex): Unchanged

TABLE: The Sand Dancer
Level..BAT....Fort...Ref....Will...Special
1......+0.....+0.....+2.....+0.....Hide in plain sight, throw sand
2......+1.....+0.....+3.....+0.....Evasion, uncanny dodge
3......+2.....+1.....+3.....+1.....Mirage, summon mephit
4......+3.....+1.....+4.....+1.....Sand jump 20 ft.
5......+3.....+1.....+4.....+1.....Defensive roll, improved uncanny dodge
6......+4.....+2.....+5.....+2.....Sand jump 40 ft., summon mephit
7......+5.....+2.....+5.....+2.....Slippery mind
8......+6.....+2.....+6.....+2.....Sand jump 80 ft.
9......+6.....+3.....+6.....+3.....Summon mephit
10.....+7.....+3.....+7.....+3.....Sand jump 160 ft., improved evasion

Cool idea. I would change the Throw Sand ability to a standard or move action, instead of one attack/round; also, the DC should be 10+class level+(probably) Dex mod; DC 12 is way too weak - you'll be around 8th level, and it's laughably easy for most monsters by that time.

The Mirage ability seems a little powerful - you can cast a 4th level spell that lasts for 2 hours/level? I'd like to suggest something I used for the Stalker of the Sands, an assassin PrC I came up with:

Mirage (Sp): Stalkers of the Sands gain the ability to create minor illusions, just like a mirage in the desert. This ability is the same as the spell silent image, and lasts as long as the Stalker of the Sands concentrates on it. This ability may be employed up to three times per day.

Click to expand...

This basically encompasses the effect you're going for, without making it too powerful.

For the sand jump, I have a flavor suggestion: when the Sand Dancer employs this ability, he dissolves into a pile of sand and then reforms at the destination point. It's nothing more than a cool visual effect, but it'd serve to make this guy really unique and interesting.

Very flavorful! Totally yoinked for my homebrew!

I like what you've done with it.

Very creative.

Kerrick said:

For the sand jump, I have a flavor suggestion: when the Sand Dancer employs this ability, he dissolves into a pile of sand and then reforms at the destination point. It's nothing more than a cool visual effect, but it'd serve to make this guy really unique and interesting.

Click to expand...

Cool, My own take would have been that they are blown away like sand in the wind and reappear at their destination point in a gust of wind and burst of swirling sand.

HeavenShallBurn said:

Cool, My own take would have been that they are blown away like sand in the wind and reappear at their destination point in a gust of wind and burst of swirling sand.

Click to expand...

That is exactly how I imagined it working. When I do the formal write-up, I'll be sure to put it in the text. Thanks for the tip!

As for the Mirage ability, I agree that silent image would be more appropriate. Using the hallucinatory terrain spell fits better with how I imagined this ability working, but I think that silent image would be much more useful to the player in the long run. I'll just change the focus to a fistfull of sand, and leave everything else as the spell.

The Throw Sand ability was written that way for a few reasons. The save DC is low b/c there is nothing magical or supernatural about the sand; the Sand Dancer just happens to kick or toss some nearby sand as part of her attacks for the round. Two, since it is something she can do with every attack option, I didn't want to make it too powerful. Three, practically anyone can kick sand into someone's eyes as a standard action...I wanted the Sand Dancer to be better at it than anyone else.

So I think I will keep the attack frequency the same (once per round as part of an unarmed attack.) I suppose that making the DC equal to (10 + 1/2 level + Dex mod) isn't too terrible of an idea, though.

Thanks, guys, for the feedback!

I really like your concept here. All very nice tweaks to change the flavor around. It makes me think of other dancer prcs that can be conceived with the same basic mechanics (rain dancer (water/wet), fire dancer/fire eater (like the Polynesian dancers with torches)).

Cheers - good work.