Bladesinger Variant, with build - What do you think?

[Shayleigh]

Hi all, just wanted to see what you thought of a character I plan on making, it has a few variant rules and some house rules, so far all blessed by my DM.

I'm starting off as a grey elf evoker, dropping illusion and necromancy, my intelligence is high enough so that I have all the skill requirements needed for the bladesinger PRC. Also my wizard is using the variant from UA, getting rid of the wizard bonus feats, and scribe scroll feat for fighter bonus feats at the appropriate level.
2nd level I will take fighter, I convinced my DM into letting my fighter levels have the skills of the bladesinger not the fighter, in return I do not gain heavy or medium armor profiency as well as no shield profiency. Is that a fair trade?

My levels go as follow with feat selection.
1: wizard, Combat Expertise, Improved Disarm
2: fighter Weapon Finesse
3: wizard Weapon Focus: Rapier
4: fighter Dodge
5: fighter
6: fighter Combat Casting, Weapon Specialization: Rapier

As for the variant Bladesinger, my DM and I agreed to have it so that spell level was increased every level instead of every other level, in return the bladesinger loses her D8 hp and gets a D6 or D4. (Not sure which yet, what does everyone recommend?)
The reason for this is my character is going to be the only arcane spellcaster in the group.

So, what does everyone think, about the build and all the variants?
Thanks for the input.

 

[monboesen]

Shayleigh thats not balanced at all for several reasons.

The fighter stuff you are dropping is stuff you dont want anyway. You are not going to wear heavy armor anyway, so essentially you are giving up nothing in order to gain access to skills you really want.

A more fair way of doing this is taking levels in the Swashbuckler class from Complete warrior. You gain the right skills, no proficiency in heavy and medium armor, weapon finesse and even intelligence bonus to damage at third level.

But allowing full spellcaster acces to the bladesinger in addition to its other abilities (mainly full BAB) is way over the top. No decrease in Hd is going to make that balanced. Compare to the Eldritch knight, another fighter/mage hybrid. He gains 9 spellcaster levels, full BAB, one bonus feat, 2 skillpoints and lousy skills, d6 Hd and nothing else. No spellcasting in armor, no int bonus to ac or any other ability.

If your variant were allowed there would be no reason to play an eldritch knight, your bladesinger is better in every single way (except possibly for hd). There wouldnt even be much reason to play a fighter. In most fights your variant would be much better off due to skills and spells.

The bladesinger is not meant to be a full caster, if thats what you want play the eldritch knight. The bladesinger is a fighter/mage, competent at both things but not as good at them as a single classed fighter or wizard.

So in short, no, it would not be balanced. What i would suggest though, is using the magic rating rules from UA, so that your fighter/swashbuckler levels contribute slightly to your effective caster level.

 

[D20 Addict]

So far so good!