Sound of Azure said:
In advance, I apologise for any harshness in my post. 
First of all, thanks for posting this up. I'm glad you weren't too demoralised by the reaction to your Dragon Bound.
Not at all
I take it you don't like the Duskblade (Player's handbook II), Hexblade (Complete Warrior), or Battle Sorcerer (Unearthed Arcana)?
It's a shame your new class isn't laid out as nicely, but as you are in the middle of a move, that's fair enough (though if I were you, I would have waited until you moved before posting it up). I'm not going to get harsh on you about spelling and punctuation, but I'll say you really need to go over your document a bit (a lot?) more.
I do like the duskblade, hexblade is an interesting class, I do not have unearthed arcane.
Ill try….
Anyhow, on to the Battle Mage.
Tougher than a regular mage. Ok, cool.
id say. More like a warmage in complete arcane
Um, ok. I guess we'll see why when you post up the background materials. I don't see anything particularly chaotic about the class, looking at it now.
No class skills, or just not listed yet?
Please give this class base skill points of at least 2 + Int modifier. I understand that most Battle Mages will have a positive Intelligence modifier due to their spellcasting mechanic, but 0 base skill points is atrocious.
I added some for normalness, skill mastery was meant to replace it.
Some unclear writing here. You could interpret this as the class being only proficient with thrown simple weapons.
I tried to clarify this, is it readable now?
I don't understand why the battle mage receives no armour proficiency since they get an armoured casting ability (however, see below). You shoud make a note of the Battle Mage's ability to ignore spell failure from light (and later, medium) armour.
well actually they can cast spells in any armor (note: only the requirements need to be filled to cast a spell, and armor dose not get in the way at all…..), this just says they cant get armor prof. In any other way. Hopefully i clarified it in text.
Your description also notes that Battle Mages can "cast spells with light weapons, and thrown weapons without hindrance". Does this mean that a Battle Mage can cast spells with such items in their hands? Note that this description is rendered irrelevent by your description of their Spellcasting later.
yes, that’s what I meant, where is the contradiction?
Your "Spells" section notes that a Battle Mage's spells have no material, somatic, or verbal components. This renders all arcane spell failure moot, since it only applies to (arcane) spells with somatic components. So, which is it?
I know this, I added the other part to say they can’t gain Battle Mage proficiencies through feats and the like.
I'd say many Battle Mages multiclass, especially with no arcane spell failure. I find your spellcasting ability restriction nonsensical, though. I personally wouldn't leave it in.
its here to stop spell growth abuse-ment.
!!!
im sorry?
If you have Complete Divine, there's an interesting class in there called the Spirit Shaman. They "know" all druid spells and have spontaneous casting. However, they can only have a small number of spells at each spell level "retrieved" from the spirit world on any given day.
I don’t, and isn’t there their spell slots small? If it isn’t id like to know what small is.
If you want "open book" casting though, by all means go ahead. I just can't see how that would be balanced, even if the spells are restricted to being used in battle.
that’s the theme of this class. Open book, with good spells, but only in battle, is there some way you know of, to weaken this class’s spells, maybe by lowering the caster level, or something?
Interesting. Could create some multiple ability dependency. Why Con, by the way?
in my mind, my class how it is, is balanced with the War Mage, I agree that multiple stats is a cool idea.
I think it's a bad idea to omit all the components (V, S, M) from a spellcaster. Note that you also omit XP and focus components. Free Wishes and Miracles during battle? Yes, please!
oops…. Will edit that in :X, thanks
Being immune to spell failure from being in combat is extremely strong, in my opinion. It should go. If you want to make the class more resilient against being disrupted, you could give a scaling competence bonus on Concentration checks to keep a spell if struck in combat. That seems more in character for a rough and tumble battle mage to me.
I like this idea, shall we make it equal to their SR? or do you have a different idea?
So, you're changing how the class gets bonus spells too? I'd say you should stick to the normal bonus spell option, since the spell casting is otherwise identical. If it were a completely different spellcasting mechanic, I could see you changing this. Otherwise, it seems like a bad idea.
sorry house rule, fixed
It's an interesting idea. You may want to list it as a seperate class ability later.
I got it off of the 3.0 sorcerer spell description, with a few minor changes to stop power gaming.
I think it would be a good idea to explicitly state what the Battle Mage is restricted to (eg. Cleric, Druid, and Sorcerer/Wizard spells from the x, y, and z schools). This will create less confusion.
no, they have all lists, just not spells from odd classes like the bard unless a bard of the same level (as the Battle Mage level) can cast it.
As it stands, a Battle Mage couldn't heal his allies, since it doesn't directly aid him. Is this your intention?
yes they can, and I quote “note. This is only limited by the player’s imagination”, I could twist it to say it helps me, that’s the fun part of playing this class, not becoming all powerful, but to push the envelope, now of corse (sorry spell check cant help
) this is no newcomers class, it brings back 2nd editions: DM is all powerful….
This seems really arbitrary. If you want to encourage the making of "battle items", perhaps you could give Battle Mages a discount on the cost to create such "Battle items". If you want to stick with this, it would be a good idea to explicitly list what magic item types are "battle items".
that mostly stops the guys from making all the scrolls in the world and giving them to the other casters, and the battle item thing fits the fluff (sorry), and is by no means a useless restriction. And as for “battle item”, just something that aids them in battle, noted at top of class.
"To cast a Battle Mage spell, the lowest of your Constitution, Intelligence, or Wisdom score must be equal or greater than 10 + the spell's level. The difficulty class... etc"
Personally, I'd stick with a single ability score for both DCs and spellcasting ability. If you're adamant on having more than one, I'd make both instances require the average (or else just use two ability scores.
Note: I have changed it to con, but it was like this to make it hard to cast higher lvl spells, that is, con int and wis all have to be 19 or higher to cast ninth lvl spells, see the toughness?
Seems like annoying book-keeping.
Its there to make more use of battle use, and only in battle, as well as be a negitive in the start. Bookkeeping is cool, and it just takes a page of lined paper. Also added : so a 10 round spells stopped at five rounds, now lasts 10 rounds after battle stops, if battle resumes before ½ of the new timer is run out, then it reverts to the amount when battle ended). , I hope its not confusing.
Given the class's unskilled nature, this seems wholly inappropriate.
on the contrary, the skills are gone because of this ability, rather then giving 6+int….
Given that the class's spell have no Somatic components, they woudn't suffer arcane spell failure anyway.
I understand, I knew that when I made the class…..
How can a class get mastery in armour without being proficient in any?
because I put it here instead of there………
it was worth repeating
I can't see these as a good idea, given the class's other abilities. If you want the class to be resistant to spell effects, why not give them an ability like Mettle, possibly bit by bit (Say Will first, the Fortitude later). Other ideas might be a (scaling) resistance bonus against spells and spell-like abilities, or an ability like Slippery Mind.
removed it reader friendly version
As it stands, the Battle Mage will make himself immune to his own spells that would "aid" him.
commented on in my version, thanks
Do you mean the Martial Weapon Proficiency feat, or proficiency with all martial weapons? It's an important distinction.
don’t fighters have proficiency in all Martial Weapon’s?
In conclusion... this needs a fair bit of cleaning up and clarification. The main thing it needs is expanation on what you are trying to achieve, and willingness of the Author to listen to advice and suggestions as the thread goes on.
you have vary good idea’s and iv made many corrections, but the thing that will not go is the spells level gained, if we can think if a good way to dampen it conversely then cool.
If these things occur, I'm sure the Battle Mage can become a balanced and extremely cool class to play. I look forward to your response.
cool
Arkhandus said:
Sorry borble, but I figured out after trying to help with your Dragon Bound class that it was pointless to try and offer any further advice or analyses for your material. It was wasted time trying to help you grasp the imbalances and problems in your previous class, and I can only suggest that you more seriously consider the pages and pages of previous advice given to you by folks on that thread. This one looks to be another problematic class and not worth the time of trying to convince you to fix it and how.
I suppose I can make one other suggestion: Ditch this class' abilities and model it after the Ranger or Bard more closely, just changing the spell list and/or primary spellcasting stat and/or the particular class features that don't fit your concept.
Ok….
jasin said:
Wait, this is really a class that gets access to all 9th-level spells of all classes at 14th-level?
yes, but the dc’s are still that of a lvl 13
Sound of Azure said:
Crap! I didn't even look at the end of the table!
its fixable, im thinking through the caster lvl
freefall said:
I believe you misread the table. That's 9th level spells at 13th level. My first instinct was - "Go, go gadget Miracle", but I realized that since you can access all the spells from all the spell lists miracle becomes less important.
ofcorse spells become less playable because you cant use wish to get you gold, it doesn’t help the battle. Will add that……thanks
freefall said:
It seems like you are going to be getting a lot of spells. More than any other class, with the added bonus of getting those spells a lot earlier then other classes.
A comparison with a sorcerer
average sorcerer with a 28 pt buy
str 10, dex 10, con 12, wis 10, int 10, chr 18
an average battlemage
str 10 , dex 10, con 15, int 16, wis 14, chr 8
will have
SRC 1
4 first level spells 2 spells known
BM 1
4 first level spells unlimited spells known
SRC 4
7 first level spells 3 spells known
3 second level spells 1 spells known
BM 4 (higher level spells down so we have an even comparison con bumped to 14)
12 first level spells unlimited spells known
6 second level spells unlimited spells known
SRC 10 (chr = 24 (+ 4 chr item + 2 stat bumps)
8 first level spells 5 spells known
8 second level spells 4 spells known
8 third level spells 3 spells known
6 fourth level spells 2 spells known
4 fifth level spells 1 spells known
BM 10 (chr bumped to 15, three + 2 stat items chr 17, con 18 int 18)
I double cascaded spells so we have a even spell level comparison.
9 first level spells unlimited spells known
9 second level spells unlimited spells known
8 third level spells unlimited spells known
6 fourth level spells unlimited spells known
5 fifth level spells unlimited spells known
In addition to more spells the battle mage has a better or just as good everything else.
Good point, and the Bonus spells have been changed (in my world, the src would have the same amount of bonus spells, and more)
Sound of Azure said:
Ok.
To really proceed, we need to know what your design goals are. If your design goal is to have 9th-levels spells at 13th level... then there isn't really anything that can be done that's balanced. I'm assuming (possibly foolishly) that it's just an error in your table.
Nope, that’s the idea
Re: Con-based casting. That implies to me a tough character who gets power from inner reserves of energy, not an outside force. If you want split casting stats (and want to retain Con as one of them), I'd base the casting stat requirement and spell DCs on Constitution, representing the character's inner reserves and capacity of power. Bonus spells would be based on Wisdom, representing the character's self-knowledge.
Honestly, I'd base all three on Con. It's simpler, but also a bit unusual and interesting.
.
got it to con
If you do go with the Con spellcasting, I'd suggest giving the class defences and abilities based on their inherent toughness (Damage Reduction, stuff like Mettle, the Diehard and Endurance feats, and such things) as opposed to spell resistance or immunity.
no, I like it how it is, and will not make it more physical.
If you mean that you should use the normal system for bonus spells, then yes.
got that settled
The impression I got from the Battle Mage text is that they're resticted to spells that blow stuff up, and personal/touch range spells that benefit the Battle Mage (whether it can be directly or indirectly is unclear). Since this is apparently incorrect, it might be a good idea to clean up the text for clarity.
they are smart in their tactics, and can heal others, if it helps them (again quote: A Battle Mage can only cast spells
in battle, and the spell needs to aid him in battle (note. This is only limited by the player’s imagination and the compliance of the DM, for it is the DM’s job to make sure they can really cast the spell).).
Spells are the main class feature of spellcasting classes. Relying primarily on what the DM allows you to get away with... isn't the ideal way toward a balanced class, especially with such a nebulous reference as "spells that aid".
retyped for clarity, and it’s the 2nd edition balance, but its fun (in my mind) makes the game a game of cat and mouse, making you stretch your view of thinking as well as making you think
.
SR I can handle, Spell immunity just seems to be a bad idea. In any case, since the Battle Mage automatically knows the spells Spell Immunity, Spell Turning, and other spells like Globe of Invulnerability, they should have no issues with defence should they take the time to cast them.
fixed
I really hope there aren't any contradictions in the fluff. That would make me very sad.
opps, in stead of contradictions I meant clarifications
I really hope you are reading and taking note of the comments and criticisms. By taking these on board, you can become a better designer, and receive a lot more interest in your work.
I just house rule every thing in my game, that’s why it seems so odd……. Not that im not taking criticism
. Trying to fix that
.
Thanks
ben
note: i think cuting the caster lvl in 1/2 is a good idea.
ben
