Fixing The Paladin

[jsaving]

Definitely, the most important thing to know is whether you think the 3.5 paladin is too weak.

The paladin was balanced under the assumption that extra uses of "remove disease" are almost, but not quite, worthless. If you think the paladin is too weak and want to make him substantially better, then by all means, scale back his disease-curing abilities and give him something else instead. But if you only think the paladin is "boring", not underpowered, then you are breaking the class if you let him take fighter feats or divine feats instead of "remove disease".

 

[CrazyDrake]

the 3.5 paladin is fine, in my opinion. like everyone's said, they aren't as good fighters but they aren't supposed to be.

maybe you should check out the 'warrior paladin' option offered in the complete warrior.

are you taking into account the pally's mount? is your highest or second highest ability in charisma? do you use smite evil whenever you can?
if you said 'no' to any of these things, then you're not getting the most out of the class, which is probably your problem.

 

[Nightfall]

Uhm if you mean 3.0 paladin, yeah it's kind of weak. 3.5, just fine. (Extra smites, plenty of abilities, plus with Complete Divine and SL paladins, the paladin class shines like few others.)

 

[Hardhead]

Uhm if you mean 3.0 paladin, yeah it's kind of weak. 3.5, just fine. (Extra smites, plenty of abilities, plus with Complete Divine and SL paladins, the paladin class shines like few others.)

I don't know what a SL Paladin is, and we don't have Complete Divine.

Maybe it's just our group, but we don't run into fear effects that often. As someone else said, the remove disease is almost worthless, as is Divine Health. Aura of Good is just a RP effect, that isn't meant to be worth anything.

Divine Grace is very nice, but doesn't improve with levels. Lay on hands is OK, but it's mainly just "emergency heal." You don't rely on it.

Turn Undead can be nice, depending on the campaign. But we don't fight all that many undead. Maybe that's just us, but hey.

That leaves Smite Evil, which while nice, doesn't nearly equal a Fighter's feat progression, and isn't always effective (when the "bad guys" are CN or whatever, for instance).

So, I guess what I'm saying is that the Pally is very situational, and some of those situations (undead, diseases, fear) aren't real common in our campaign. Considering that our next campaign will be Eberron (which has more "shades of grey") the Smite Evil may be worth even less than normal. I suppose I could see how he's powerful in a campaign with lots of undead and fear effects, but not for us.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

I think you're laboring under some misconceptions here. My own experience playing a paladin and playing paladins is that my paladin really felt weak from about first to fourth level and may now start to come into his own.

My observation from looking at other peoples' paladins is that paladins start to shine brightest at high levels and when mounted. The mount ability is probably one of the most significant class features of the character.

Maybe it's just our group, but we don't run into fear effects that often. As someone else said, the remove disease is almost worthless, as is Divine Health.

Right on there. Fear effects don't seem that common (though a lot of the powerful evil outsiders and dragons have fear auras so there may be something there--we just haven't run into any of them). Certainly, in my experience, immunity to fear isn't even remotely close to as useful as the Holy Liberator's immunity to charms and compulsions.

Aura of Good is just a RP effect, that isn't meant to be worth anything.

Divine Grace is very nice, but doesn't improve with levels.

Nonsense. Divine Grace is one of the most scalable paladin abilities because attributes are scalable. If it starts at +2 (14 charisma), it will almost certainly finish at +8-+10 between stat bumps, inherent bonusses from tomes, and +6 cloaks. If you manage to finagle some other kind of charisma increase (like the competence bonus from DotF Armor of Command) it scales even faster.

Lay on hands is OK, but it's mainly just "emergency heal." You don't rely on it.

In my observation, by mid levels, Lay on Hands is one of the best combat healing abilities out there. An 8th level paladin with an 18 modified charisma will cure 32 points of damage with Lay on Hands. The 8th level cleric only averages 27 points with a cure critical wounds. Past that, the only thing that competes with it is a Heal spell and at 20th level, even a Heal spell is unlikely to be able to match the Lay on Hands ability for curing damage.

Turn Undead can be nice, depending on the campaign. But we don't fight all that many undead. Maybe that's just us, but hey.

3.5 really nerfed the paladin's Turn Undead ability. It's semi-useful against hordes of weak undead--provided they're not accompanied by an evil cleric and therefore bolstered. If the weak undead are accompanied by an evil cleric, the paladin shouldn't bother. At -3 levels, it's not going to be very useful against tough undead. It was marginal at -2 levels in 3.0. About all it's good for is powering Divine feats.

That leaves Smite Evil, which while nice, doesn't nearly equal a Fighter's feat progression, and isn't always effective (when the "bad guys" are CN or whatever, for instance).

It all depends on how you leverage smite evil. A high level paladin using Smite Evil and Divine Might on a Spirited charge might easily break 150 points of damage in a single hit. (1d8+8 (str), +20 smite, +5 lance, +10 Divine Might, +10 power attack (more if you let him wield the lance two-handed) x3 for spirited charge with a lance= 3d8+159 And he can do that five times.

So, I guess what I'm saying is that the Pally is very situational, and some of those situations (undead, diseases, fear) aren't real common in our campaign. Considering that our next campaign will be Eberron (which has more "shades of grey") the Smite Evil may be worth even less than normal. I suppose I could see how he's powerful in a campaign with lots of undead and fear effects, but not for us.

Definitely true. Paladins are most effective in a campaign that focusses around paladin-like themes of good vs. evil. They can be effective in other situations though.

My own chief difficulty with the paladin class is that it seems far too geared towards mounted combat and defensive (sword and shield, etc) fighting--and that, like the sorceror, the early levels are often painful.

 

[Dark Jezter]

The paladin is one of those classes that looks weak on paper, but can be surprisingly powerful in actual play. I've seen Paladins do some pretty amazing stuff in gameplay.

If you want to make them more powerful, though, consider giving them access to the Divine Feats from Complete Warrior. Divine Shield and Divine Might can really increase a paladin's combat powers.

 

[Sejs]

The only two changes I would make to the Paladin class would be:

1) change Remove Disease into a scaling Get Rid of Bad Thing ability that accrues when the paladin gets another weekly use. Call it Hand of Mercy or something. Starts off with Remove Disease(6). Then it's Remove Disease and Poison(9). Then Remove Disease, Poison and Paralysis (12). Then Remove Disease, Poison, Paralysis, and Curse (15). And finishing off at 18th with uh.. one other thing. Whatever that may be. The fact that the ability is on a week-long recycle makes it more of an ace-in-the-hole rather than just getting out of every bad thing all the time.

2) list alternatives to the mount for a paladin that has no desire to be a rider. Personally I like the idea of a celestial companion like a lantern archon as an alternate.

 

[Ruvion]

Well then a hand of mercy it is...I like that idea!
...now rearranging this idea, you get:

Hand of Mercy (Sp): Instead of remove disease 1/week at level 6, the paladin gains the hand of mercy 1/week ability and thereafter this ability replaces the remove disease x/week. When the paladin first gains the hand of mercy ability at level 6, he can use it to remove fear. At level 9, the paladin may use the hand of mercy to grant remove paralysis. Starting at level 12, the hand of mercy can remove disease. At level 15, the hand of mercy can remove blindness/deafness. Finally at level 18, the hand of mercy can remove curse. The frequency with which you can use the hand of mercy does not increase (stays at 1/week), but the selection of things you can do with it does as you level.

Consider this idea borrowed!

The only two changes I would make to the Paladin class would be:

1) change Remove Disease into a scaling Get Rid of Bad Thing ability that accrues when the paladin gets another weekly use. Call it Hand of Mercy or something. Starts off with Remove Disease(6). Then it's Remove Disease and Poison(9). Then Remove Disease, Poison and Paralysis (12). Then Remove Disease, Poison, Paralysis, and Curse (15). And finishing off at 18th with uh.. one other thing. Whatever that may be. The fact that the ability is on a week-long recycle makes it more of an ace-in-the-hole rather than just getting out of every bad thing all the time.

 

[S'mon]

I give Paladins (optionally) SR 6+Level from 4th level ('cos God protects them!), instead of their spells. If they have a Holy Avenger they get +2 SR. Seems to work, & keeps them viable.

 

[Terry Edwards]

I have to jump in with the "Paladin works fine as is" crowd here. If you find it underpowered you may just need to work on strategy. Power up with divine favor (gets better with progression) and bull's strength for damage potential or endure elements (as needed) and eagle's splendor (to pump saving throws) for protection. At higher levels you have dispel magic (a lot of options here) and heal mount (very useful when your mount soaks up damage). 4th-level, not that you need the spells so much by this time but...holy sword. Use your mount man! Read up on mounted combat and take the feats to make the most of it. I will conceed that in a low evil campaign the paladin plays second string fighter until getting the mount at 5th level but once you're riding around pumping up with spells it's all good. Plus with the aura of good you know when something is evil and therefore whether it is succeptible to smite, no waste here. If I were to bump the paladins power the only thing I would consider is giving them a good Will save to match Fortitude.