Prestige Class: Brotherhood of the Staff

Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, here it is! Tell me what you think

Brother of the Staff
Hit Die: d8.
Requirements
To qualify to become a brother of the staff, a character must fulfill all the following criteria.

Base Attack Bonus: +5
Skills: Balance, Jump and Tumble 10 ranks
Feats: Weapon Focus (any staff or polearm), Expertise
Special: Must be trained by a master.

Class Skills
The brother’sskills (and the key ability for each skill) are Balance (Dex), Climb (Str), Concentration (Con), Escape Artist (Dex), Hide (Dex), Jump (Str), Listen (Wis), Move Silently (Dex) and Tumble (Dex)
Skill Points at Each Level: 4 + Int modifier.

Table: The Brother of the Staff
Level Base
Attack
Bonus Fort
Save Ref
Save Will
Save Special
1st +0 +2 +2 +2 Brother’s Rate of Strikes
2nd +1 +3 +3 +3 Brother’s Reach, Brother’s Defense +1
3rd +2 +3 +3 +3 Staff Acrobatics +2
4th +3 +4 +4 +4 Solid Strike +1d6
5th +3 +4 +4 +4 Flurry of Strikes, Brother’s Defense +2
6th +4 +5 +5 +5 Staff Acrobatics +4
7th +5 +5 +5 +5 Strike of Vengeance
8th +6 +6 +6 +6 Brother’s Defense +3, Solid Strike +2d6
9th +6 +6 +6 +6 Staff Acrobatics +6
10th +7 +7 +7 +7 Strike of death


Class Features
All of the following are Class Features of the arcane archer prestige class.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Brothers are proficient with the quarterstaff, shortspear, ranseur, guisarme, glaive, and longspear, and no armor or shields. Note that the brother cannot use any of his abilities while armor.

Brother’s Rate of Strikes: The brother is highly skilled in using the staff, so his rate of strikes follow the monk’s unarmed strike rate of attacks.

Solid Strike: Three times per day, the brother can get additional damage to his strike. He must declare before the attack that he is using solid strike, and if he misses the opportunity is wasted.

Brother’s Reach: The brother can use his staff in such a way that he gets to add 5 feet to his reach. So the brother would have a 10 foot reach with a quarterstaff, or a 15 foot reach with a longspear.

Brother’s Defense: The brother is so good at defending with his staff that he gets a dodge bonus to his AC as a result.

Staff Acrobatics: The brother is able to use his staff when he uses the Balance, Jump and Tumble skills.

Strike of Vengeance: The brother can use the Whirlwind Attack feat as a standard action, even if he does not have the feat.

Strike of Death: Once per day, the brother can declare a strike of death. If he misses he wastes the opportunity. If he hits, the target must make a Fortitude save at DC 10 + damage dealt or die immediately.

Overall I like this class. Now, a little of fluff description would be a good thing.

All of the following are Class Features of the arcane archer prestige class.

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Typo here. Is this class meant to be a PrCl for 3.0 or 3.5? (I say this because of said "rate of monk attacks)

Staff Acrobatics: The brother is able to use his staff when he uses the Balance, Jump and Tumble skills.

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I don't understand this, as this ability provides a bonus (+2, +4, +6).

Solid Strike: Three times per day, the brother can get additional damage to his strike. He must declare before the attack that he is using solid strike, and if he misses the opportunity is wasted.

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A monk 7th / Staff-brother 4th makes 1d6 of damage with each staff attack. At 12th level, a monk would do 1d12 of damage with each attack. So maybe Solid Strike could be with ALL staff attacks. It makes for slightly more damage statistically than a pure monk, but the class loses all special abilities of a monk in the meantime. Now, this comments is valid only if the Brother doesn't find an overpowered magic staff +4...

This leads me to the following idea: since a true monk is still more interesting in terms of specials gained, I suggest that the staff brother gets 1d10 hit die and Fighter BAB.

isnt there already an Order of the Stick