Solar Power
I’d go with class abilities that focused on the sun. Here are a few as food for thought.
Prestige class: Sunblessed
BAB: as fighter
Saves: good will and fort
Skills: as Paladin
Reqs: (whatever reqs will allow both Mara and Malachite to qualify)
Special abilities:
Turn Undead: Sunblessed can turn undead, and levels in Sunblessed count as cleric levels for purposes of turning undead.
Child of Light 1: Sunblessed are unaffected by bright lights, and can stare directly into the sun. They are immune to Daze, Color Spray, and similar effects. Sunblessed are also immune to the negative physical effects of the sun, including sunburn, sun stroke, and skin diseases caused by the sun. This ability has several in-game effects, including a +10 bonus to Wilderness Lore and Fortitude saving throws when trying to survive in a desert environment.
Joyful Dawn 1: During the hours of sunrise to noon, the Sunblessed gets a +1 morale bonus to BAB and saving throws.
Healing Light: When exposed to direct sunlight, the Sunblessed gains Fast Healing 1. This ability can scale with level.
Sunbake: Sunblessed can affect creatures exposed to sunlight with a Heat Metal effect (as the spell, using turning level as caster level). This requires the expenditure of a turning attempt.
Daylight: The Sunblessed can glow like the sun for 10 minutes. The glow starts at a 10’ radius, then increases by 10’ per round until it is 100’ radius. The glow counts as natural daylight for all game effects (including powering Revealing Light and Healing Light). This ability requires the expenditure of a turn attempt.
Revealing Light: Incorporeal, invisible, and similarly concealed creatures are revealed to the Sunblessed, as long as those creatures are exposed to daylight. Sunblessed are aware that such creatures are attempting to use concealing magic. Mundane hiding and concealment are still effective.
Sunforge: During the day, the Sunblessed can forge a weapon of pure sunlight. Treat the weapon as a masterwork melee weapon of the character’s choice with the Brilliant Energy enchantment, that can affect undead. The weapon sheds light in a 20’ radius. It lasts until sunset. The ability requires the expenditure of four turning attempts.
Eyes of the Sun: The Sunblessed’s eyes can emit Searing Light (as the spell). Treat the caster level as the character’s total turning levels. This ability requires the expenditure of a turning attempt. An interesting side effect of this ability is that cats tend to lay down and sleep wherever the Sunblessed's mundane gaze lingers.
Sunbeam 1: If a sunbeam is visible, the Sunblessed can summon 1d4 Lantern Archons. The Archons appear instantly but each must take a full-round action to slide down the beam. After that full round, they appear wherever the character wishes, within the limits of Summon Monster 4 (with caster level equal to the character’s turning level, for purposes of dispelling, range, and duration). This ability requires the expenditure of a turning attempt, can only be used during the day when a sunbeam is visible, and can only be used once a day.
Joyful Dawn 2: If a Sunblessed casts a spell during the instant of sunrise, he or she can spend any number of turning attempts to add to caster level (or Paladin level, for purposes of Lay On Hands). This ability must be used when the first ray of sunrise strike the caster, and therefore can only be used once per day. Special: A Sunblessed can use this ability during the creation of magic items, letting the Sunblessed create an item that would normally be beyond his power (missing even a single dawn ruins the entire creation attempt).
Child of Light 2: Light-based weapons (including Searing Light and Brilliant Energy weapons) deal no damage. The creature also gains fire resistance 20. The Sunblessed’s Type changes to Outsider.
Sunbeam 2: The character can ascend a Sunbeam into a light-filled extradimensional space on the Positive Material plane. This has two uses:
1. Treat as a Rope Trick effect (caster level equals character’s total turning level), except that the “rope” is a sunbeam that can be anywhere from ten to several hundred feet long (up into the clouds). Any character designated by the Sunblessed can move along the Sunbeam at 30’. Duration equals 24 hours.
2. Treat as a Wind Walk spell (“Sunbeam Walk”). Caster level equals character’s total turning level.
Solar Power: During the day when exposed to sunlight, the Sunblessed can gain some of the qualities of a Solar. These qualities are Protective aura (as if cast by sorcerer of level equal to character’s turning levels), Fire resistance 20, tongues, electricity, cold, acid, and petrification immunity, +4 save against poison, and Keen Vision. This ability requires the expenditure of six turning attempts, and lasts for 10 minutes or until sunset.
Flavor abilities:
Sunblessed cast no shadows caused by the sun.
Sunblessed can always determine the time of day (even when underground).
Sunblessed cause others around them to slowly tan. Flowers, especially sunflowers, brighten up when a Sunblessed is near and subtly turn to face him. These effects never result in sunburn or other damage, and have no in-game effect.
During the day the equipment, eyes, teeth, and hair of a Sunblessed seem to gleam and shine in an attractive manner, and the Sunblessed always sports a healthy, attractive tan. This has no in-game effect, other than perhaps extra attention from the opposite sex.
Mounts:
If a Sunblessed character has a special paladin mount, the mount gains the Healing Light, Child of Light 1, Child of Light 2, Revealing Light, and Joyful Dawn 1 abilities when the Sunblessed character gains those abilities. The mount also gains all flavor abilities.
-z
Edit: Doh, looks like Jeph beat me to the "Sunforge" thing.
Edit: Increased cost of the Solar Power ability to six turning attempts.
Edit: Added Sialia's cat idea to the Eyes of the Sun ability.
