Dragonborn/Draconic Feats, and a PRC

[Glade Riven]

I think the sorcerer thing is stupid, especially when there is already a draconic bloodline where you gain draconic traits. It looks like it is an excuse to get more feats, and therefore not balanced.

 

[DevistonX]

Hmmm... Truedat.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

DRACONIC ARMOR [DRACONIC]
Change: You gain DR X/magic where X is equal to the level of the spell you just cast + Cha mod. The bonus received from Cha mod can not be higher than the number of Draconic feats you have). For example, after casting fireball having this and Draconic Heritage feats with a +5 Cha mod, you would gain DR 5/magic for 1 round.

Too much. In general, any of the feats that are based on spell level should only be based on spell level.

DRACONIC HERITAGE [DRACONIC]
Change: You also gain a bonus to the skill associated with your Draconic Heritage equal to the number of Draconic feats you have.

This is a good change. I may steal it.

DRACONIC KNOWLEDGE [DRACONIC]
Change: You gain a bonus to Knowledge skills equal to the number of Draconic feats +2. If you have 10 or more ranks in a Knowledge skill, the bonus is increased to +4.

Too much. Compare this to Bardic Knowledge. As written originally, this feat makes each draconic feat you take equivalent to two levels of Bardic Knowledge. This is a phenomenal feat on its own.

DRACONIC SENSES [DRACONIC]
Change: If you have five or more Draconic feats your darkvision increases to 90 feet and works in magical darkness.
If you have seven or more Draconic feats your blind sense increases to 40 feet.

The ability to see in magical darkness is unique to devils; draconic feats should not give characters abilities that dragons don't possess.

If you want to increase the vision range, I'd set it based on the number of draconic feats you have. If you have 3 or more, you gain darkvision 10' per feat (maximum 120'), and if you have 4 or more, blindsense out to 5' per feat (maximum 60'). That matches the original benefits and scales accordingly.

DRAGONFIRE ASSAULT [DRACONIC]
Change: You gain bonus damage equal to 1/2 the number of Draconic feats you have. If you have the Draconic Heritage feat or if you are a half-dragon, the extra damage is of the energy type (acid, cold, electricity, fi re, or sonic) that corresponds to your heritage or your draconic parent instead. If your feat or your parent is not associated with one of these energy types, this
feat has no effect for you.

It's a good enough feat on its own, but this isn't going to break it.

DRAGONTOUCHED
Change: You also gain an additional +1 to the skill associated with the Draconic Heritage feat. If you do not have the Draconic Heritage feat you may opt this bonus to apply to the Perception skill. If you take the Draconic Heritage feat, you may change this bonus to apply to you skill associated with the feat.

Draconic Heritage already covers this and a non-Sorcerer is always going to take Dragontouched before Draconic Heritage. Leave it alone.

DRACONIC CLAW [DRACONIC]
Change: You additionally gain a bonus to your damage on your claw attack equal to 1/3 the number of Draconic feats you have.

Make it an enhancement bonus so that it doesn't stack with greater magic fang or an amulet of mighty fists. If it doesn't stack, you could even make it +1 per two draconic feats. It's a nice benefit at low levels, but unless you're dropping all of your feats on draconic feats your claws aren't going to be better than the others' weapons.

DRACONIC FLIGHT [DRACONIC]
Change: ...fly speed equal to 15...

This doesn't need a boost.

DRACONIC LEGACY [DRACONIC]
Change: Your caster level for these spells are always calculated one higher than normal.

This feat gives free spells known for a Sorcerer. It doesn't need to be improved.

DRACONIC PERSUASION [DRACONIC]
Change: ...bonus equal to two times...

Makes the math easier. I'd allow it.

DRACONIC POWER [DRACONIC]
Change: Increase the benefits of this feat by one for every six Draconic feats you have.

It already stacks with Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus. This is too much.

DRACONIC PRESENCE [DRACONIC]
Change: If you have four or more Draconic feats, you can effect creatures with HD equal to your own.
If you have eight or more Draconic feats, you can effect creatures with up to 1 more HD than your own.

Dragons can only affect creatures with HD less than or equal to their own. I'd allow four feats to give them the full ability, but no more than that.

DRACONIC RESISTANCE [DRACONIC]
Change: If you completely negate damage dealt by the energy descriptor associated with your Draconic Heritage feat, the bonus received from this increases to five time the number of Draconic feats you have for a number of rounds equal to one third the number of Draconic feats you have (minimun one round).

Why would this happen? This doesn't make any sense. Besides, this feat is good enough on its own.

DRACONIC SKIN [DRACONIC]
Change: ... natural armor increases by one for every two Draconic feats you have (minimum plus one) not counting this feat or Draconic Heritage.

Keep it simple. Effects that are based on the number of draconic feats you have should be based on all of your draconic feats. This would bring Draconic Skin in line with Bestial Hide, but there's an important difference between the two; aberrant feats come with penalties that grow more severe the more you have.

I'd be willing to allow it to scale like Bestial Hide, but only if it didn't stack with the Sorcerer's Draconic Bloodline or the natural armor bonuses from either the Dragonfire Adept or the Dragon Shaman.

DRACONIC TOUGHNESS [DRACONIC]
Change: Additionally, upon taking this feat you gain 3 bonus hit points.

This isn't necessary, and it would make Draconic Toughness strictly better than Toughness from 1st-5th level. This feat is good enough already.

ENHANCED ASPECT [DRACONIC]
Prerequisites: Dragonborn, Draconic Heritage, Sorcerer level 1
Benefit: Your effective Hit Die for the purposes of determining the benefit of your racial Aspect is increased by one for every 3 Draconic feats you have.

These things are level-based for a reason and allowing you to boost them would be problematic.

ADDITIONAL ASPECT [RACIAL]
Prerequisites: Dragonborn, 12 HD or more
Benefit: You may select an additional Draconic Aspect associated with your race. The scaling of this aspect is you HD as normal, minus five. If you have the Enhanced Aspect feat, it can be used to mitigate this penalty.

This is way more powerful than a feat should be. Make up a racial PrC that grants this at 5th and 10th levels and doesn't grant spellcasting on those levels. As a bonus, you wouldn't need the penalty.

HEART OF THE DRAGON ENGORGED [RACIAL]
Prerequitisites: Dragonborn, 6 HD or more, HEART draconic aspect
Benefit: The damage your breath weapon deals is increased to 1d10 per 1d8 you previously had. Additionally you gain one damage per five HD you have. This feat only effects the damage dealt by the breath weapon gained from the dragonborn race.

Increasing the die type is good. It doesn't need to grant additional damage dice.

MIND OF THE DRAGON REALIZED [RACIAL]
Prerequitisites: Dragonborn, 6 HD or more, MIND draconic aspect
Benefit: At 3 HD, your granted senses increase by 10 feet. At 6 HD the Perception bonus increases to +3. At 9 HD your granted senses are increased by an additional 10 feet. At 12 HD the Perception bonus increases to +4. At 15 HD your granted sense increase by an additional 10 feet and the bonus to your Perception check increases to +5.

The Mind Aspect already gives you senses almost equivalent to a True Dragon and this feat would make them superior. Plus, there's nothing stopping the Perception bonus from stacking with the one from Draconic Senses.

WINGS OF THE DRAGON UNFURLED [RACIAL]
Prerequitisites: Dragonborn, 6 HD or more, WINGS draconic aspect
Benefit: Flying speed is increased by 20 feet and maneuverability increases one grade.

No. This is the equivalent of Improved Speed and Skill Focus (Fly) combined. This needs to be split up into two different feats, and the bonus to flight speed needs to be reduced.

SKIN OF THE DRAGON ENCASED [RACIAL]
Prerequisite: Dragonborn, 6 HD or more, RUNIC HIDE draconic aspect
Benefit: You gain an additional +1 to natural armor and your damage reduction gained from the RUNIC HIDE aspect is increased by 2. If you do not have the damage reduction yet, you gain damage reduction 2/Magic until you reach 9 HD, then your 5/Magic is increased to 7/Magic.

RUNED DRACONIC ARMOR [DRACONIC]
Prerequisite: Dragonborn, Skin of the Dragon Encased, Draconic Armor, 9 HD or more
Benefit: The damage reduction from these sources stack.

Runic Armor gives Dragonborn abilities that True Dragons do not have and is way overpowered for a LA +0 race. That list of immunities is comparable to a Warforged's, and Warforged have drawbacks to compensate for it.

ARCANE BREATH RECHARGE [DRCONIC]
Prerequisite: Dragonborn, Draconic Heritage, HEART dragon aspect
Benefit: Whenever you cast an arcane spell, the recharge time for your breath weapon associated with your race is reduced by one round.

This is fine.

RETRIBUTIVE BLOOD [RACIAL]
Prerequisite: Dragonborn, HEART dragon aspect
Benefit: Enemies that attack you with a natural or melee weapon (not reach weapons) take 1 damage per base damage die (as if you have NO modifiers) of your breath weapon. If you have the Draconic Heritage feat this dakage correspond to your draconic heritage dragon race. If you do not have the Draconic Heritage feat or you heritage does not deal one of the true dragon damage types, your default damage type is fire.

This is fine.

SUNSCALE DRAGONBORN [RACIAL] (Sorry, had to.)
Prerequisite: Dragonborn, RUNIC HIDE dragon aspect
Benefit: Whenever you are outside during the day, you gain a +2 enhancement bonus to natural armor (characters without natural armor have an effective score of +0).

This is fine.

ELDRITCH BREATH [RACIAL, ELDRITCH]
Prerequisite: Dragonborn, HEART dragon aspect, Eldritch Blast 1d6
Benefit: You may combine your eldritch blast with your breath weapon to add 1d6 damage to eldritch blast for every 2 dice damage you have for your breath weapon. This takes a toll on the eldritch energies being tied to your draconis fundamentum, giving your eldritch blast the same recharge time as your breath weapon. After which the eldritch blast functions as normal.

This isn't overpowered, but it's a waste of a feat. The only reason to ever do this would be to apply it to a noxious blast against an enemy with SR and acid resistance greater than your average eldritch blast damage.

EXTENDED DRACONIC ARMOR [DRACONIC]
Prerequisites: Draconic Heritage, Draconic Armor, any other 5 [DRACONIC] feats
Benefit: The bonus you receive from Draconic Armor lasts for an additional round. If you cast another arcane spell that would give you damage reduction, the two bonuses do not stack, use the higher of the two or in the case of casting the same level of spell, refresh the 2 round duration.

This is fine. It seems like a waste of a feat to me, but I also feel that way about Draconic Armor. It's good for improving your other draconic feats, though.

SECOND DRACONIC HERITAGE [DRACONIC]
You have another type of draconic blood coursing in your veins that has finally gained enough power to emerge.
Prerequisites: Draconic Heritage, Draconic Legacy, Sorcerer level 10
Benefit: You may choose a second dragon to be a part of your heritage and gain all the benefits thereof.
Special: You bonus to saves versus sleep and paralysis increase by 2. Should you choose a dragon with the same draconic skill or element, you gain a +4 to the skill and +2 to saves versus that elemental descriptor instead of gaining the benefits of the Draconic Heritage feat twice.

This is way too good. Just by being a Draconic feat it grants a +1 bonus to the associated skill and saving throws and it doubles the effect of Draconic Resistance.

Simply allowing it to function as a second Draconic Heritage and allowing you to take draconic feats with a second dragon type is more than good enough. If your DM allows this, you should also change the wording of any draconic feat that specifies an energy type so that it only applies to a single energy type unless you take it more than once.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Dragonfire Theurge done by another changed for my purposes.

Thank you for this. I've been working on something similar myself.

The Draconic Arcanamach gives the Sorcerer considerable benefits-- extra spells, bonus feats, dragonpacts-- without costing him anything. Compare it to the Wyrm Wizard in Dragon Magic. You need to give up at least three caster levels for this to be balanced. The original Dragonfire Theurge gets away with it because it requires levels in two different caster classes, and even then I think it's overpowered.

Furthermore, the draconic archanamach is eligible to choose metabreath feats, as if her breath weapon had an effective recharge rate of 1 round.

Unless the metabreath feats are rewritten, this is a serious problem. They're not even remotely balanced for PC use, and the Dragonfire Adept already gets breath effects that mimic some of them.

If you're going to allow this at all, limit the total number of rounds you can delay your breath weapon to your Constitution modifier.

ALTERNATE SORCERER CLASS FEATURE

With as good as draconic feats are? No way, especially with Dragon Disciple and Draconic Arcanamach granting bloodline levels. You're basically trading in your temporary claws, minor natural armor, and daily breath weapon for vastly improved versions and pumping up the value of all your other draconic feats.

 

[DevistonX]

Fair fair and fair. I like all your suggestions. I noticed earlier that the Alternate Class Feature was jus dumb, and obviously me trying to get something for nothing.

So that's gone.

EDIT: The "Furthermore, the draconic archanamach is eligible to choose metabreath feats, as if her breath weapon had an effective recharge rate of 1 round." simply means like if you didnt have a recharge time, you have at least 1. I think you saw it as "only 1 round penalty" am i right?

And for the PRC, 3-6-9? Giving up casting I mean.

 

[DevistonX]

Viktyr Korimir, I replied to your second post, your first one... wow. So much feedback. Also shows me how long i've been out of the game. Forgetting some of these basic things. That being said, I'll get back at you in regards to them.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

EDIT: The "Furthermore, the draconic archanamach is eligible to choose metabreath feats, as if her breath weapon had an effective recharge rate of 1 round." simply means like if you didnt have a recharge time, you have at least 1. I think you saw it as "only 1 round penalty" am i right?

No, I saw what you meant. Base 1 round of delay to be modified by the feats. It's the feats that I think are broken. I don't think they should be allowed. And if they are allowed, you can't use the feats to delay your breath for more rounds than your Constitution bonus.

And for the PRC, 3-6-9? Giving up casting I mean.

Yeah, that would work just fine. It doesn't even have to lose invocation at those levels.

 

[DevistonX]

Lose invocation? I'm not sure what you mean, the original class yes, had invocation business. I modified it to JUST be sorcerer. Like.... the full caster version of the Dragon Disciple.

Ok, I apologize, I thought you had misunderstood. That was done... 4 years ago? Bout that by my DM. Con mod number of delays rounds. I think it happened after a character forwent his breath weapon for virtually the rest of his life and took out a continent. Yeah. Con mod.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Lose invocation? I'm not sure what you mean, the original class yes, had invocation business. I modified it to JUST be sorcerer. Like.... the full caster version of the Dragon Disciple.

Ah, right. It had slipped my mind. Really, if you want a full caster version of Dragon Disciple, your best bet is to just stick to Sorcerer. There's the Dragonheart Mage in Races of the Dragon and the Pact-Bound Adept in Dragon Magic that focus on draconic feats and dragonpacts, respectively.

Ok, I apologize, I thought you had misunderstood. That was done... 4 years ago? Bout that by my DM. Con mod number of delays rounds. I think it happened after a character forwent his breath weapon for virtually the rest of his life and took out a continent. Yeah. Con mod.

Re-reading the feats, it's not quite as broken as I remember, though I would definitely still insist on the Constitution limitation.

 

[DevistonX]

Of course I know of those Prestige Classes, they just seem a little too... bland. The one that I made is a little bit of both which is what I was looking for but in one "tree" if you will. As for your suggestions earlier...

D. Armor: Fair, I thought it needed a little more, but when combined with Draconic Vigor... Core Feat.

D. Knowledge: Copy that, I hadn't looked at the Bardic Knowledge for PF so that was my mistake. Core feat.

D. Senses: Didn't know that ability was devil sensitive, for this one I will simply take your suggestion.

Dragontouched: Fair enough. Not sure why I edited this one, I guess just to add one more to the list. Core Feat.

D. Claw: I will take your suggestion. Enhancement bonus that does not stack with bonuses of the same type and is +1 per two feats.

D. Flight: Core Feat.

D. Legacy: Core Feat

D. Power: ACH! Good point, Core Feat.

D. Prescence: I like your suggestion, but I will amend it to five feats and you effect full.

D Resistance: I saw this one as a nifty feat IMO. What my aim for the enhancement thing was, if he negates all the damage, he then absorbs the energy into himself, giving him the temporary immunity. Kind of like a short antivirus to immunize himself. Feedback on that thought?

D. Skin: Wow! Good call! The reason that It was suggested to me to dumb it down so much from my original idea, was the fact that Dodge is essentially the same as this feat, but this one is better. So why would someone ever take Dodge when this is available. I think I will however return the scaling to it but at a +1 per 3 feats with the requirement of Draconic Toughness as a prerequisite. To mediate the penalties gained with Bestial Hide. I will however allow it to stack.

D. Toughness: Fine, done. Core Feat.

Enhanced Aspect: Removed because you made a good point.

Additional Aspect: Yeah this was just a shot in the dark. I kind of knew that this would be the outcome, but I had to try! Removed.

Heart of the Dragon Engorged: It doesn't grant bonus damage DICE, it grants a bonus +1 point of damage for every 5HD you have. At level 20 you simply gain a +4 to damage.

Mind of the Dragon Realized: You are right, but I'm going to need to spend some time working on this one. Pending Amendments.

Wings of the Dragon Unfurled: Good call, how about, "speed increased based on maneuverability. +5 clumsy, +10.... etc"?

RUNIC HIDE: You are right now that I look at it. I really need some advice on this one. I think that +1 NA and a immunity or two is valid. Even if it's not something a True gets, I'm not a True, I am a dragonborn, with a base race so something a little different. But all of the immunities, your right, a little too much.

Second Draconic Heritage: Yeah I liked the idea of this feat, but never intended to take it. It will need some rewording/reworking/aborting.