Base Class: Scholarly Warrior

[Lord Wyrm]

Lord Wyrm,
Did either of the players take the class?

Anyone else have any comments (good, bad or whatever...)

One did, he's pretty open to new classes. He's not liking the hit die, course when he made the heal check to negate an poison that caused death as secondary damage he was quite pleased. The fact he made his Disable Device to use Aid Another and help the rogue stop and instant kill trap was pretty cool too.

 

[Thia Halmades]

Hey y'all.

I like this. I don't know about the skill points, because I haven't seen the math broken down, but I think you're saying that at the extreme, it's a +4/+3/+2 circumstance bonus, so while powerful, it isn't 'absurd.' That was one of the major bits that caught my eye.

I agree that this should be a lawful class, and that's probably a change I would make.

I disagree that they should be barred from taking STR based feats; I see it for flavor, but that seems to unfairly limit their build options.

Reminds me a bit of Swashbuckler with some different flavor; I think the lower HD is a good balance, that's nice. Also, Reactive is very good (and saves you from blowing it on a natch 1).

Looks solid to me.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

I really like it. Don't see the need to make it Lawful only, since wizards are just as dedicated to studying and don't face that restriction. If you insist on keeping "physical" feats off-limits, maybe at least allow for dex-based feats. The int and dex based combat feats often form inter-locking feat chains.

 

[szilard]

I generally like the flavor, but some of the mechanics could be streamlined.

Some comments/suggestions:

Skills: I find the the ever-increasing "extra skill points" thing to be awkward. I'd simply give them 6 skill points/level. You might want to add Sense Motive and Bluff to their skill list (to aid in feinting).

Insightful Action: The way this increases is awkward. I'd make the bonus equal to Intelligence Bonus +1/5 class levels or something along those lines.

Breadth of Knowledge: The way you have set this up - in particular the synergy between this and the huge number of skill points and the skill focus feats - the scholarly warrior will be far better than any other class with respect to knowledge skills. This might be intentional, but... I don't know. It rubs me the wrong way that they'd be so superior to, say, wizards or bards.

Bonus Skill Focus: Is this necessary? I don't know that I'd see a scholarly warrior type as particularly specialized in specific skills.

Bonus Feats: The limitations here are awkward. Remember, these are supposed to be warriors. They should have some combat relevant feats - many of which require minimum physical ability scores. Honestly, I'd probably just include some bonus feats that they'd specifically get... say Combat Expertise at 2, Improved Feint at 5, Improved Disarm at 10, Improved Trip at 15, and any Fighter bonus feat at 20. (if they take any of those earlier, they can sub in fighter bonus feats).

I think that if I were to recreate this class, what I might do is include something like:

Application of Precise Thought: The scholarly warrior has learned to apply reason to solve his problems where others might rely upon luck or brute force. Once per day, a scholarly warrior may replace any ability modifier with his Intelligence bonus (if any) for the purposes of a single roll. This may include attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and skill rolls. A scholarly warrior may use this ability twice a day at third level, and an additional time per day for every three additional levels.

and/or

Adaptive Mastery: A scholarly warrior learns to apply his patience and insight to a wide variety of tasks. He may take 10 on any d20 roll up to a number of times per day equal to the lesser of his Intelligence bonus and 1/4 his character level.

-Stuart

 

[Flame_Excess]

There are 9 skills availlable when an exceptionnal starting character with 18 int, race: human could get 4(initial)+4(int)+1(race) skill points to spend. This is aside from the additional skill points from further levels.
So I'd add about every acceptable skills to the list.

I think that the abilities are all to be reviewed; that's my personal opinion. Rogues are masters of skills and wizards masters of knowledge yet none get so good bonuses to their skill rolls. I like the idea that the class must spend points to knowledge skills though. Maybe making those additional points available to spend on skills that don't need practice would be interesting.

The scholar warrior is, in my opinion, a good strategist. Maybe that you could have him learn how to fight against creatures bigger/smaler than him gain no bonuses against you.
I can also think of an ability that on a successful blow, you could roll a "X" die to determine if you succeed to take your opponent's area square, forcing him to move. That would cause any attacks of opportunity on your target but not on you in addition to take a strategic position in the fight.

I see the scholar warrior a bit as an army man. You could make up some more abilities based on that idea.

In general, I like the idea because that's a class I'd truly enjoy to play.

 

[CRGreathouse]

I think the class will have trouble keeping up in combat. An 8th-level fighter has 5 bonus feats; your class would have 1 (and not Power Attack, Cleave, Dodge, Mobility, Spring Attack, Whirlwind Attack, Two-Weapon Fighting, or a host of other martial feats). The skill boosts are nice, but not powerful; I don't see this class seriously contending on the battlefield. If you added more skills it might vie with the bard, but it can't fight -- d8 aside, even.

Personally I'd drop the bonus skill points and skill focuses and give it a few more feats so it is somewhat viable on the battlefield. It need not match the fighter for sheer power and flexibility, but it should be able to do something useful.

 

[Dei]

I think the class will have trouble keeping up in combat. An 8th-level fighter has 5 bonus feats; your class would have 1 (and not Power Attack, Cleave, Dodge, Mobility, Spring Attack, Whirlwind Attack, Two-Weapon Fighting, or a host of other martial feats). The skill boosts are nice, but not powerful; I don't see this class seriously contending on the battlefield. If you added more skills it might vie with the bard, but it can't fight -- d8 aside, even.

Personally I'd drop the bonus skill points and skill focuses and give it a few more feats so it is somewhat viable on the battlefield. It need not match the fighter for sheer power and flexibility, but it should be able to do something useful.

I agree, I like the flavour of it but if you put this class in the ring with a regular fighter it would get turned into paste. It might be a brainy paste, but it's still paste. I like the extra skills so I would keep them but I would change the bonus skill focus feats into regular bonus int/dex based feats to give it combat viability otherwise it's more like a martial expert or something than a scholarly fighter.

 

[Nellisir]

I generally like it; I'd steal it if it were OGC. Would you consider putting it under the OGL?

 

[BRP2]

I like the class, but flavor-wise it confuses me a bit, but it's probably just me. Doesn't seem to be the tactician I expected, but that's fine really. I would probably make things less... "awkward" as someone put it, and maybe give them a Lore master's Lore ability(which could probably stack with Bard and, of course, Loremaster). One way to look at it would be a more "lawful" knowledge keeper when compared to the Bard.

Flavor-wise, I don't really understand full BAB or the name "Warrior" when combined with knowledge-based class. Then again, maybe in a campaign, there is a culture(or cultures) that has Eastern Monk-like warriors that train in combat all their life, but also do the bookkeeping for the region(s), sort of like Western Monks. Kind of screams prestige class, but that is a personal DM choice, rather a flavor choice.

EDIT:

Thinking it further: If you were going to turn this into a prestige class, I would add incentive/ease for a Fighter(or other, probably lawful, class) to pick it. Examples would be, adding a lot of methods on how Knowledge skills would help in combat and preparation for combat and/or maybe a feat that gives skill ranks in Knowledge skills(which might be sort of controversial, but is very similar to the class ability itself).

 

[Quartz]

Surely a similar effect can be achieved by multiclassing Fighter (or Ranger) and Rogue?