Alternative/variant of cleric: the PROPHET

[candidus_cogitens]

Prophet

The prophet class includes a variety of characters: priests, priestesses, cultists, diviners, oracles, mystics, ovates, shamans, witches, seers, or others who perform works of power through their connection to the divine. They need not be affiliated with a church or cult, although those who do profess allegiance to a particular deity often take on leadership roles among those who share their faith. This class overlaps significantly with the cleric class, and is intended as an alternative to that class. Note that the word prophet does not always necessarily mean one who predicts the future, but simply one whose speaks with divine authority, or otherwise makes the power of the divine manifest.

Abilities: Wisdom is the most important ability for prophets, because it influences their ability to cast spells.

Alignment: Any.

Hit Die: d8.

Class Skills:
The prophet’s class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Decipher Script (Int), Innuendo (Wis), Intuit Direction (Wis), Heal (Wis), Knowledge (religion) (Int), Knowledge (History) (Int), Listen (Wis), Perform (Cha), Scry (Int), Search (Int), Sense Motive (Wis), Speak Language, Spellcraft (Int), Spot (Wis). See Chapter 4: Skills for skill descriptions.

Skill Points at 1st Level: (4 + Int Modifier) x 4.

Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 4 + Int modifier.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency:
Prophets are proficient with dagger, club, mace, sickle, halfspear, shortspear, longspear, quarterstaff, dart, sling, javelin, scythe and handaxe. Prophets are proficient with light armor and shields.

BAB: As cleric.

Saves: High Will.

Spells: Spells per day, as cleric (see PHB, table 3-6).

Deity, Domains, and Domain Spells: As cleric.

Spontaneous Casting: During daily spell preparation, a prophet selects one conversion domain, which can be any of her deity’s domains (not necessarily the prophet’s normal domains), Knowledge, or Divination. This ability works according to the rules for the cleric’s ability to convert spells into healing spells and replaces that ability.

Level
1: Turn or rebuke undead. Augury, or Channel/Inhibit healing energy.
2:
3:
4:
5:
6:
7:
8:
9:
10:

Augury
A neutral-aligned prophet (lawful neutral, true neutral, or chaotic neutral) may chose one of the following abilities: Interpret Bird Flight, Interpret Entrails, Interpret Stars, or Interpret Dreams. These abilities represent the prophet’s ability to find significance in phenomena that would appear meaningless to others. Only prophet’s who are attuned to the balance or coexistence of good and evil have this ability. The results of these interpretations are often cryptic, and the dungeonmaster should use careful judgment as to what information may be gained by a player in this manner. Players should be aware that this ability will not yeild useful results in every case. An augury check, d20 + level, determines the relative clarity or usefulness of the interpretation, but even the highest rolls do not guarantee great clarity. A prudent DM may wish to make useful

Channel healing energy
A good-aligned prophet can use her power to channel positive energy not only to turn or rebuke undead, but also to heal. A turning attempt may be expended in order to release healing energy (for cleric’s who channel positive energy). Each channeling heals 1d4 hit points, plus 1d4 for every three caster levels. Thus, a third level prophet can heal 2d4 hit points per chanelling, and at sixth level, 3d4.

Hinder healing energy
An evil-aligned prophet can use her power to channel negative energy not only to bolster or command undead, but also to hinder the magical and/or natural healing of foes. A turning attempt may be expended in order to place this curse upon a single foe (who must be within 60 ft. and visible when the curse is cast). This curse prevents healing from taking place for a single day. The curse can be removed only by a Remove Curse spell. The only type of healing that cannot be affected by this curse is that which is bestowed by a paladin’s Lay on Hands ability.

 

[MarauderX]

I think I would change the Prophet into a sorcerer version of the cleric, where charisma matters the most to attract followers to the faith as well as get them to do the god's will for you. I like the idea a lot, and I will try to work something up for it that would analigous to the sorcerer/wizard setup.

The only thing I don't like presently is the HD - I would keep it at d6. Also, I might change the armor and weapons knowledge to reflect a wizard, so that a prophet would have to spend skill points/feats to learn to use armor and weapons. I would also add in the leadership abilities mentioned in the DMG, but would augment them to allow for more at lower levels. IMO, the charisma would work to let followers of the prophet worship and let the god work 'through' them willingly with just a fair amount of direction from the prophet to inspire the follower to carry out whatever act for the god.

I like the augury and energy additions too.

 

[candidus_cogitens]

I appreciate your suggestions, Marauder. Some of them I had thought about in a previous draft of this class.

At one point I had two classes, a prophet and a priest. The priest's spellcasting was charisma based, and the prophet's were wisdom based. Eventually, I gave up on the priest as a class, because it seems like more of an NPC role. But, I would still consider using charisma as the chief ability. Both have a distinct flavor. My inclination is to try to keep it fairly similar to the cleric class, based on the idea that it is often better to tinker less.

The "priest" that I created was much less combat oriented. Only a d6, or d4. No armor. Fewer weapons. But the feedback I got on this was that in comparison to the cleric class, I had taken away a significant amount, and not given much back. And in comparison to the wizard class, divine spells simply are not as powerful. One thing I considered was to have the priest's spell knowledge be as though he were one level higher. But that might cause other problems.

The whole motivation for tinkering with the cleric is that it has archetype problems. It's based on the medieval Christian crusader. And that is such a particular historical phenomenon that I find it rather awkward when transfered to a different context. A priestly type who wears heavy armor is just ... strange.

So, I tried to go for something more flexible, loosely based on Old Testament prophets, like Moses, Joshua, and Elijah, who are somewhat war-like, but cheifly distinguished by their connection to the divine. They are much more adventure-ready than a simple priest, but not exactly soldier-like.

In my own campaign, I use this class as a substitute for the cleric. If you wanted to use it IN ADDITION to the cleric, rather than IN PLACE OF it, then you might reasobably feel that this class is too similar to the cleric, and you might want to distinguish it more by emphasizing Charisma more, for example.

 

[MarauderX]

Ahhh... I see, you are using the prophet IN PLACE OF the cleric... I was thinking IN CONJUNCTION WITH. Yeah, I was looking for more of a distinction between them to have in a campaign as a PrC or something similiar.

 

[candidus_cogitens]

Well, even though I use it in place of the cleric, I would think it COULD be used in conjunction with the cleric.

Basically, it is a cleric with less armor, lower fortitude saves, more skill points, and a bit more flexibility with the turn undead ability. And I changed how spontaneous casting ability works, so that a character would not necessarily be pigeon-holed into the healer.

 

[handforged]

I like the idea of breaking up the divine caster ability a little bit more. The way I see it the cleric is just to good at everything. Combat? yep. Offensive Spells? yep. Buff Spells? yep. Defense Spells? yep. Turning Ability? yep. Social Presence? yep. He can even use spells to detect traps and the like, if he gets poisoned, he can fix it.

I think that the next campaign I run the divine classes will be broken up a little differently.

Holy Warrior- similar to the paladin with no alignment restrictions
Priest- similar to the cleric with less combat ability, Wis based
Prophet- similar to the sorceror, but with divine spells, better list and spell like abilities, Cha based

Ranger- no spellcasting abilities, but some spell like abilities, holy warrior for nature worshipping people
Shaman- holy man for animist/spirit worshipping cultures
Druid- pretty much unchanged, maybe some type of spontaneous casting or spell conversion

Any thoughts on this? Sorry to hijack the thread, I really like your priest(from my list, since we reversed the names) idea.

~hf

 

[candidus_cogitens]

Cool ideas, Handforged!

Ranger: I like the idea of a non-spellcasting Ranger.

Paladin: I don't see why we shouldn't eliminate the alignment restrictions as you suggest.

Druid: I agree--fine as is.

Shaman: Isn't that an awful lot like a druid?

Priest: More of a pure spellcaster seems appropriate.

As for the prophet, you seem to have gotten on board with MarauderX. I am wondering how you view this archetype. What makes the sorcerer an appropriate model? If you are going to add a shaman and a priest, then presumably you have a distinct archetype in mind for the prophet.

 

[handforged]

I'll elaborate on the ideas a bit more...

Druid- I see this individual as a worshipper of nature, just nature, every leaf is a holy object. Not to be protected at all costs, but to be respected and weighed as a valuable entity. Druid's don't seem like spiritual leaders except among groups that are especially nature oriented such as fey races and maybe some barbarians. They are the power of nature with a voice.

Shaman- A shaman is a leader of a group that is animist, that is sees spirits in all objects. They might think that their ancestors come back to guide them through life by communicating through the spirits of rocks, trees, or rivers. I envision using the Shaman class directly from OA, with few changes.

Prophet- directly connected with the divine these people seek to do their god's will. They seek to convert others to the worship of their god because it effects their power. They are the showy voice of God. They are leaders and persuaders. Or they are the distant miracle-givers that communicate through their actions but are unable to actually lead a group of followers. They lead cults, or inspire them

The way I envisioned the system originally, I saw each group (divine and nature) having a warrior(Holy Warrior/Ranger), a combo fighter/caster(Priest/Shaman), and a pure spellcaster(Prophet/Druid). I realize that the druid has decent combat abilities, especially once wildshape comes into play, but I also play a fairly low-level world where 5th level is considered noteworthy and 10th is legendary. I thought about dropping the Druid's HD to make up for the gain of spontaneous/conversion casting.

~hf

 

[candidus_cogitens]

Historically, the druids were absolutely the spiritual leaders of their communities, and had political power as well. You might want to read an excellent book called "Druids", by Morgan Llywelyn. It is fiction, with fantasy elements, but based on what we know from history.

A question for you, on another point, Why do you want to treat the priest as a fighter/caster combination? Priests in most cultures are less inclined to pick up a weapon than the commoner would be. That's the problem I have with the cleric class as it stands--it's only loosely based on a very specific and very limited historical phenomenon, the militant priests of the crusades.

 

[MarauderX]

Back to the Prophet thing...

I was thinking of the prophet as a cross between wizard/sorcerer/cleric. Perhaps it's a PrC, but I am starting to like it as a whole new class.

Charisma as prime requisite, Wisdom as secondary.
Cleric spells and spell table, only spell numbers are shifted up one level.
Cleric Saves. Can turn same as cleric, only +1 times per day.
Wizard's restriction as far as weapons and armor. Divine spells cast have percentage of failure if wearing armor per equipment tables.
Sorcerer's BAB, HP, & skills. Also, knowledge(religion) becomes a wisdom based skill, as the prophet could interpret things in a new way.