Homebrewed PRC for a melee warlock

[Nezkrul]

Special: must single handedly defeat a strong opponent with only melee attacks and hideous blow (leaves "strong" up to the GM)

Improved Dodge feat, and the increasing Dodge to a +2 bonus both appeared in Immortal's Handbook: Ascension. The class is about DPR, so it doesn't need a special ability to give it AC

The player of the warlock doesn't want to resort to splat books for his character, so I created this PRC for him (half-orc warlock, 6 charisma, high physicals, wields a fullblade for big hideous blow damage)

 

[Dandu]

Special: must single handedly defeat a strong opponent with only melee attacks and hideous blow (leaves "strong" up to the GM)

Then why not just drop it entirely?

 

[Jackinthegreen]

Just how many splats might be acceptable for him?

And what other things do you think we might need to know about with regards to this class and your campaign?

I suppose the good news for him is Battle Caster is in CArc, so he can get a hold of mithril full plate for AC.

Edit: I wonder if allowing Eldritch Blast damage to crit if the weapon crits might be worthwhile for a class ability.

 

[Empirate]

On the Dodge thing: the problem with the feat is not so much that it only grants a +1 bonus. It also only applies against a single opponent that you have to designate. Pathfinder's version of the feat simply gives you a +1 dodge bonus to AC vs. all comers, which isn't nearly as horrible. In fact, it's a decent feat - there are better, of course, but there's also stuff that's much, much worse. 3.5 Dodge, on the other hand, just plain sucks, and can be considered a feat tax in the worst sense if you include it in a PrC's prerequisites.

EDIT: the crit thing is already there. Just as with channeled spells, critting with the weapon means you crit with the blast (although you don't get the weapon's crit multiplier).

 

[Dandu]

Edit: I wonder if allowing Eldritch Blast damage to crit if the weapon crits might be worthwhile for a class ability.

I think it already does. Weaponlike spell and all.

 

[Nezkrul]

hideous blow is a weapon attack that adds eldritch blast damage, so jack's suggestion would be a special ability that would allow the eldritch blast damage on hideous blow (read as extra damage dice) to get multiplied by the crit

I'm leaving dodge in the class prerequisites because it helps the class, is gettable by even 1 level dip in fighter, and the class needs a tax of some sort.

I'm considering including Skip Williams' suggested application of Practiced Spellcaster feat for warlock in my game as well, to help with multiclassing; +4 to effective caster level for invocations, up to hitdice, and increased eldritch blast damage as if the character's warlock level were 4 higher up to hitdice; prereq- 2d6 eldritch blast.

Instead of dropping the special requirement, how about you help me find something you can agree with? The class is strong enough to warrant one.

 

[Jackinthegreen]

Practiced Invoker is a feat I'd certainly allow in any games I'd run. Admittedly though, I'd change some things about the warlock class since it trails behind the Dragonfire Adept a bit.

Dodge, assuming it's +1 against everything, is something that's moderately useful enough that making it a feat tax would work.

Its power is a bit hard to quantify since it's really only damage stuff. At the moment I'm not of the opinion that straight-up damage is a big deal. That may or may not change as I play more, but if in your experience it is a big thing then the class will work for you guys.

Something you might want to think about though: Allowing the essences to have their DC based on the character's Strength mod instead of Charisma if it's a Hideous Blow. That way a character with a mediocre or bad Charisma score can at least get somewhere with the essences instead of having to be multi-attribute dependent. It's actually one of the more commonly proposed racial substitutions for half-orc warlocks, although in that case most don't limit it to Hideous Blow and just make all invocation save DCs based off Str mod.

As for the special requirement, one published class that might go along the lines you want is the Invisible Blade from CW. To quote:
"Special: The candidate must defeat a worthy opponent in single combat using one or more daggers, kukris, or punching daggers in any combination as his only weapons."
Another one would be the Reaping Mauler: "Special: The candidate must have defeated at least three opponents one size larger than himself with his bare hands."

So there's some room for saying something like "Special: The candidate must have defeated at least three worthy opponents using only Hideous Blow to damage the opponents."

That in itself might be worthwhile since Hideous Blow doesn't exactly start off well.

You might want to add Power Attack to the prereqs perhaps? And then Hideous Swipe would count as Cleave for prerequisites or something because they're pretty much exactly the same thing.

 

[Dandu]

and the class needs a tax of some sort.

You know, that's exactly how we got Archmage, Red Wizard, and Incantatrix.

If you give the class legitimately powerful abilities, then a feat tax of one feat isn't enough. Far better to simply tone down the class.

Look, let's use, as a comparison, a Glaivelock; a warlock who focuses on Eldritch Glaive. If the Glaivelock is superior to a warlock using your prestige class, I would give serious thoughts as to changing your prestige class so that it is, at least, on par with a Glaivelock.

Instead of dropping the special requirement, how about you help me find something you can agree with? The class is strong enough to warrant one.

Spellsword's special requirement goes along the lines of "Must have defeated a foe in armed combat without resorting to spells" or words of that effect, iirc.

 

[Jackinthegreen]

You know, that's exactly how we got Archmage, Red Wizard, and Incantatrix.

Don't forget Frenzied Berserker.

While we're speaking of Hideous Blow versus Eldritch Glaive, let's compare them:

Eldritch Glaive and Hideous Blow both trigger AoOs. The difference is EG likely won't trigger it from the target you're actually attacking because you get reach from it. EG wins on that front both in terms of granting reach and not usually triggering an AoO from the target.

EG and HB are both melee attacks. EG, however, is still a touch attack and thus is usually more likely to hit. HB can get ahead though because the weapon's enhancements can add things that can't be done to EG. Could swing either way, but it'll take more resources to make HB good than EG.

EG is a full round action (note that it wasn't listed as full attack action, so technically doesn't benefit from Haste et al) while HB is a standard. So HB can be used much more easily on the move, but it won't grant as many attacks or do as much damage as EG does when it's at its best. Unless of course the weapon used with HB really kicks butt. Both can be Quickened though. Depending on circumstances, it can go either way, and both require large investments to get the most from.

EG persists until the next turn, thus allowing AoOs with it. HB can't do that at all except via this class.

EG is sadly vague. Does it require hands to use? Can the character use Power Attack with it? At least HB is more clear on how it works.

EG is in a more obscure book: Dragon Magic. HB is right there in Complete Arcane. HB wins on being easier to access and being more likely to be allowed.

 

[Nezkrul]

how can a glaivelock (not allowed in game cuz no dragon magic) better than this class worked into a build focusing on warlock, this class, and no more than 2 fighter levels over time? This class gets 4 (5 with speed on a weapon) hideous blow attacks at the end, and each one can get a +5 unnamed bonus to hit from Eldritch Power; sure glaive is touch but you get less attacks and you need weapon finesse to hit with your dex instead of strength; whereas this class can just focus on strength.

about using strength instead of charisma, would that be just something built into say a Racial Sub level for Half-Orc Warlock, or is it feat worthy?