Help Balance a PrC? Knight of Tirisfal

[Suldulin]

A player in my game is interested in playing a paladin with a focus vs demons, to match with the lore of the game world I wiped this class up, now I need help going over it to try and make sure everything is in order.

Thank you in advance for any aid.

Knight of Tirisfal

Arathor had fallen apart into seven separate
nations: Lordaeron, Stormwind, Kul Tiras,
Stromgarde, Alterac, Gilneas, and Dalaran.
It was soon discovered that the use of magic
without constraint didn’t mean that magic could be
used without consequence. Relations between the
newly independent human nations were strained as
the rulers of the magocracies became increasingly
withdrawn and obsessed with amassing magical
power. This led them straight into darkness —
where they found demons waiting.
What happened in the years following is a secret
history that has only been uncovered in recent
times. To most people of Quel’Thalas, the dwarven
citadels and the seven kingdoms, these were centuries
of peace and prosperity. Yet unbeknownst to all
but a few, the powerful spells of elven and human
mages had quietly called to the Burning Legion.
The demons were happy to answer the summons
and began to slip back into Azeroth. An elven
society called the Council of Silvermoon had long
ago sworn to forestall any full return by the Legion;
this society met with the most powerful wizards of
the human nations to form the Order of Tirisfal to
hunt those demons who had already arrived.

Through it all, the Order had its agents remain
the “men and women in black cloaks,” cleaning up all
evidence of their struggles and denying the
existence of the enemy. Identifying themselves
among their fellows by their holy symbols of a
Silvermoon inscribed with elven runes over a sun
these Elven and Human Priests would gather and subtly
do battle with the demons that had managed to force
their way into the world.
HD: 1d8

Requirements:
BAB: +5
Skills: Gather Information 4 ranks, Knowledge(the Planes) 4 ranks,
Sense Motive 4 ranks, Stealth 4 ranks
Feats: Servent of the Light(Heavens), Favored Enemy: Outsider(demon)
Special: Detect Evil as a class feature or Divine Spell
Special: Ability to Turn Undead
Special: Must either have the Exalted Turning feat or take it as the
next feat.

BAB: Good
Saves: Fort Good, Ref Poor, Will Poor

Skills: Climb, Concentration, Craft, Decipher Script, Gather Information,
Heal, Jump, Knowledge(Religion), Knowledge(The Planes), Profession,
Search, Sense Motive, Stealth, Swim.
Skill Points at Each Level: 4 + Int Modifer.

Special:
1st: Sanctified Strikes, Turn Undead
2nd: Censure Demons, Nimbus of Light, +1 Caster Level
3rd: Fiend Slaying +1/+1d6, Courage of the Light I/II
4th: +1 Caster Level
5th: Courage of the Light II/III
6th: Fiend Slaying +2/+2d6, +1 Caster Level
7th: Holy Radience
8th: Courage of the Light III/IV, +1 Caster Level
9th: Fiendslaying +3/3d6
10th: Burning Light, +1 Caster Level

(total +caster levels, 5/10)

Sanctified Strikes: The character does +1 damage against evil opponents,
or +1d4 extra damage to evil outsiders and undead. Your attacks are considered
good aligned.

Turn Undead: Class levels stack with priest or paladin levels for purposes
of turning undead

Censure Demons: A knight may use one of their Turn Undead uses to
Censure Demons within 30'. Any evil outsiders within range must
make a Will Save (DC 10 + the Knight's Class level + Cha modifier) or
be Censured.
A censured demon is Stunned for 1 round and takes 3d6 Holy Damage.
If a censured demon has fewer HD than the character it must make
a 2nd Will save or be sent back to the Nether as if affected
by a dismissal spell. Only one demon can be dismissed in this way
per Censure attempt. From Lowest HD to Highest.

Nimbus of Light: You can shed a soft radiance of calming light that illuminates
a 5' radius around you, and provides shadowy illumination to 10 feet.
When this radiance is revealed you gain a +2 Circumstance bonus on Bluff,
Diplomacy, and Sense Motive
You can activate and extinguish this radiance at will as a free action.

Fiend Slaying: against fiends you gain a +1 Competence bonus to hit
and +1d6 damage. As well as +1 competence bonus to Will saves and Intimidate, Listen,
Sense Motive, and Spot checks. These bonuses increase as indicated and
stack with Favored Enemy.

Courage of the Light:
I: You gain Immunity to Fear spells and effects caused by evil outsiders, if you already
poses Aura of Courage as a class ability you instead gain Courage of the Light II.
II: You gain Immunity to Enchantment spells and effects cast or created by evil outsiders.
At 5th Level, If you posses Aura of Courage you instead gain Courage of the Light III
III: You extend your fear immunity to allys within a 20' radius
At 8th level, if you posses Aura of Courage, you instead gain Courage of the Light IV
IV: You extend your Enchantment Immunity to allys within a 20' radius

Holy Radience: At will, as a free action, you can empower your nimbus of light into
a blazing glow of holy power that sheds bright light in a 10-foot radius(and shadowy
illumination out to 20 feet).
Undead and Demons within 10 feet of you take 1d4 points of damage per round while
they remain within your halo.
If you posses or later take the Holy Radience feat it's benefits is replaced by the above
but your damage increases to 2d4.

Burning Light: Your holy Radience damage increases by 1 die type and evil
creatures that are not undead or outsiders now take half-damage (rather than none).

 

[Arkhandus]

Introducing, the Radiant Servant of Pelor, revisited and improved! *trumpets*
(joking, joking)

Um, yeah. This looks even more overloaded with goodies than the Radiant Servant of Pelor, to my eyes. It's certainly neat, but definitely far too powerful. Makes the Knight of the Chalice look like a fighter playing at being a paladin. Your Knight of Tirisfal has slightly tougher prerequisites (though attainable at a slightly lower level I think), but much greater benefits. The Knight of the Chalice has demon censuring that works similar to turning undead, but yours just has a saving throw and thus has no real limit on the power or number of demons to be affected. Your Fiendslaying is a bit weaker than their Demonslaying, but isn't restricted to chaotic evil outsiders like the Knight of the Chalice. Your PrC has lower hit dice and Will saves, but higher skill points, Sanctified Strike, and regular turning ability progression (the KotC only gets Censure Demons, no anti-undead stuff). The Knight of the Chalice has slightly superior spellcasting in some cases (against demons only, and even then only if their previous class was paladin rather than cleric), whereas your Knight of Tirisfal is better for clerics multiclassing and is only slightly inferior to the KotC in spellcasting as a paladin multiclass. Your PrC lacks the KotC's Courage of Heaven, Heavenly Devotion, Consecrated Aura, and Holy Aura, but instead has Nimbus of Light, Holy Radiance, and Burning Light, which are superior. Your PrC has at least Courage of the Light above and beyond the Knight of the Chalice's powers (and I'm pretty sure the KoT's broader benefits from other abilities also make it more powerful).

The Knight of the Chalice is already a potent prestige class, so yours could definitely use some powering down to avoid completely overshadowing clerics and paladins. I suppose I'd suggest removing the spellcasting advancement and the skill bonuses from Nimbus of Light, at the very least. Or reduce the BAB and something else. As it stands, the Knight of Tirisfal is at rather good for 1-3 levels of dipping before returning to another class, so you might consider moving Fiendslaying and/or Censure Demons up tto 4th-level or so. A cleric or paladin, as-is, gives up very little to dip into the PrC for 1-3 levels and getting some nice, broad benefits in return.

 

[dvvega]

I like the flavour text. I have similar groups in my homebrew that destroy evidence of certain historical events and current events throughout the world.

However they have many factions, because they do also edit/replace history books in libraries and if anyone uncovers a cache of old tomes, then you can be sure they will be "visited" by the group.

In your case ... I can make the following comments :

1. I note that you are using Stealth in your skill list, and thus this is not straight d20. You should make a note somewhere explaining this is C&C or what have you.

2. There should be a racial requirement of Human or Elf (perhaps even Half-Elf) since your flavour text mentions the group is made up of humans and elves. You should also either modify the entry requirements or change the bit in the flavour text that mentions Human or Elven priests (since a Paladin could qualify).

3. Due to Santified Strike I personally would require a Good Alignment.

4. The skill list is going to be difficult to achieve easily unless they dip into a level of Bard or Rogue. The cleric only has 2 of the Skills as class skills and the Paladin only has 1. Both classes only have (2 + int) points per level. Even a +2 modifier will give them 2 ranks per level in a single cross-class thus they will not achieve this PrC at 6th level (when most PrCs are achieved) by sticking to one class. Your flavour text implies that most of them are priests of some nature, so a single class. So right now you are looking at a Rogue/Cleric or a Rogue/Paladin (Bard can be there instead of Rogue). A cleric with certain domains could do it , with the added Class Skills.

5. The Exalted Turning feat should not be optional. They are demon hunters/slayers. They work hard to do their job. It should be mandatory UNLESS you grant it as a class skill (more on this later).


I really want to mess with the abilities, however I don't want to rewrite the class. As I don't know exactly where you're going with this.

I do think you should put limitations on all the Radiances - times per day and time limits. In fact I would require that the Nimbus of Light should be active while all the Radiances/Auras are being used.

As for the Auras, I don't think a Paladin should instantly jump to the next one. What I think is that it should progress like this:

Aura of Courage (as per Paladin ability, a Paladin doubles his radius)
Aura of Mental Fortitude (immunity to enchantment for character, +4 on saves for allies
Improved Aura of Courage (expend a turning attempt per ally affected - within the radius, everyone is immune for 1 round/PrC level)
Improved Aura of Mental Fortitude (as Improved Courage)

D

 

[Quickleaf]

Ok, nice start!

Are these are supposed to be covert operatives? At least that's what I'm guessing from your description, which I recommend heavily expanding on. You've obviously got some cool history which includes a false history hiding all sorts of demon summoning, and, I'm guessing goetic magic. Your current abilities seem to be a fiend slayer -- not much supports your idea of "men and woman in black cloaks." Which, by the way, I like infinitely more than a simple demon killer concept.

I would expect to see: some way to alter/erase memories of those who saw a demon, an innocuous face ability which allows them to avoid drawing attention, a demonlogy ability which allows them to assess/identify a demonic opponent, some investigate skills could be useful too, perhaps a way to bind demons? (see my deev biner feat over here... http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=134757 ).

Are these guys uncompromising knights? Your description doesn't describe them that way. In fact, they sound almost roguish. Do they operate in cities? If so, maybe some city-benefits could be a nice way to round them out, like a way to prevent a possessor demon from switching bodies, a way to track a tempter or an invisible/incorporeal demon, a way to sense if a wizard has been dabbling in goetia or demonism, and a ritual that can be performed over a corpse to prevent it from being risen as undead or inhabited by demons.

Also, you've got an organization of people working secretly. What organization benefits does a character get? Are there any drawbacks or weaknesses? For example, do they have political enemies or can demons sense them? Also, consider whether they have a special method of communicating, like hand signals, or a special language - this is always useful when giving commands to allies during battle.

And their holy symbol...it's got to get some cool power right? At least something like automatically being aided by friends of the order, though maybe a +4 hardness, or the ability to open certain secret doors of the elves might be cool.

Just another approach.

 

[Suldulin]

The setting is World of Warcraft(just after The Frozen Throne), and uses those rules (Hide&Move Silently merge into stealth, priests lose medium and heavy armor but have 4+int skills per level and various other special abilities)


Almost all the flavor text is borrowed from Land's of Conflict more to help give background than anything else. I envision this PrC being the ones that go in to take out the demon, with some subtley as far as witnesses are concerned. Rather than being the ones to cleaning up afterwards necessarily, (thus the knight part in the name). The reason why only priests are named in the flavor text is because setting wise the paladin (Knight of the Silverhand) is a very recent development in the scheme of things, while being more disposed to being the ones to engage a demon in battle.

Addressing Arkhandus:
Good points good points
The KotC Censure Demons abilities is the same only differences is the KoT has to burn through their Turn Undead uses (which is usuable less times per day) rather than getting 1 use every two knight levels. The other difference is that the KoT is based of character levels rather than 2x Knight levels, but I'm unsure about that change as it does make it tempting to dip into.


Adressing Dvvega:
Extremely helpful, thank you
Good point on the racial requirements, will change that.

Alignment was left out because alignment is a bit greyer in the setting, you have paladins who are members of the Scarlet Crusade, a lawful evil group, yet keep their goodly powers. So the setting/world lore seems to lean more towards that it is the divine magic-user's pure faith that empowers them. As long as they believe they are doing good they can fall without realizing it and still keep their abilities, until they realize it.

Setting-wise humans treat gather information as a class skill no matter their class, that does hurt elves though so suggestions are welcome.

The Special regarding Exalted Turning is because of three things.
I wanted a paladin to be able to take the prc after 5th level
The paladin doesn't gain the prerequisite of the ability to turn undead till 4th level (meaning they can't use their level 3 feat)
I did not want to grant it as a class ability but be required.

The Radiences are based off of nimbus of light and Holy Radience from BoED

Excellent fix to the auras, will definately be using that, thank you

Regarding Quickleaf:
Excellent ideas
Hrm, now how to impliment them without powering up the class further. . .

 

[Quickleaf]

Oh, of course I should of ask. What kind of game do you play in? RP-centric? Hack and slash? Investigative? City? Lots of travel?
And...even more importantly, what kind of character if your paladin PC? What kind of PrC would they be interested in. The PrC in its original form is suited to someone who likes to wade into combat and anticpates battling demons face-to-face, sword against claw. Is this what your paladin PC wants?

The Flavor
I highly suggest working out the details of the order some more before getting into the nitty gritty of the abilities. I know it always helps me, so here are some questions:
- Who is the founder of the order? What legacy have they left behind?
- Who knows about the order? Who are their enemies and allies?
- Are there any subdivisions, heresies, or factions within the order?
- How do elves view the order? How about humans? How are half-elf members viewed?
- What is the meaning of the symbolism behind their holy symbol?
- What is the structure of the order? Hierarchy? Cells?
- What sorts of resources/power bases does the order have?
- How does a member of this order react around a demon?
- What does their training involve?

The Crunch
Here are my suggestions on edits to the current class abilities in order to make a more specialized secret operative against demons. This concept fits a world in which demons aren't waging open warfare or invading all-out, but rather insinuating themselves into noble society, corrupting high-level mages, hiding in criminal organizations, possessing animals, etc.
As a side note, I'd reduce Caster advancement to +1/3 levels to bring the power down, and there's nothing about the class that says it focuses on magic.

Sanctified Strikes: The character does +1 damage against evil opponents,
or +1d4 extra damage to evil outsiders and undead. Your attacks are considered
good aligned.

I'd change this to allow the character's attacks to be considered good/holy for the purposes of overcoming damage reduction.

Turn Undead: Class levels stack with priest or paladin levels for purposes
of turning undead

Should be for purposes of censuring demons only, not undead.

Censure Demons: A knight may use one of their Turn Undead uses to
Censure Demons within 30'. Any evil outsiders within range must
make a Will Save (DC 10 + the Knight's Class level + Cha modifier) or
be Censured. (snip)

Nice ability, makes sense.

Nimbus of Light: You can shed a soft radiance of calming light that illuminates
a 5' radius around you, and provides shadowy illumination to 10 feet.
When this radiance is revealed you gain a +2 Circumstance bonus on Bluff,
Diplomacy, and Sense Motive. You can activate and extinguish this radiance at will as a free action.

I'd get rid of this ability, and replace it with demonology.

Fiend Slaying: against fiends you gain a +1 Competence bonus to hit
and +1d6 damage. As well as +1 competence bonus to Will saves and Intimidate, Listen,
Sense Motive, and Spot checks. These bonuses increase as indicated and
stack with Favored Enemy.

I would remove this ability and replace it with a power to force an incorporeal creature to assume physical form, or to hedge out a possessing force, etc.

Courage of the Light: You gain Immunity to Fear spells and effects caused by evil outsiders, if you alreadyposes Aura of Courage as a class ability you instead gain Courage of the Light II. (snip)

I like this. You might want to consider whether it makes sense for the abilities to extend to his allies.... I can see it working either way.

Holy Radience: At will, as a free action, you can empower your nimbus of light intoa blazing glow of holy power that sheds bright light in a 10-foot radius(and shadowy
illumination out to 20 feet).
Undead and Demons within 10 feet of you take 1d4 points of damage per round while
they remain within your halo.
If you posses or later take the Holy Radience feat it's benefits is replaced by the above
but your damage increases to 2d4.

Hmmm...a bit overdone, especially for someone who doesn't want their presence to be known by the masses. I'd replace it with a special organization benefit that gives the character access to demon-binding vaults, high-level protective circles which can be used to banish captive demons, etc.

Burning Light: Your holy Radience damage increases by 1 die type and evil
creatures that are not undead or outsiders now take half-damage (rather than none).

Also needs to be replaced.

 

[Suldulin]

Oh, of course I should of ask. What kind of game do you play in? RP-centric? Hack and slash? Investigative? City? Lots of travel?

I'm the DM of the game, the type depends on the players, I am for about an equal mix with a leaning towards what the players gravitate to doing.

And...even more importantly, what kind of character if your paladin PC? What kind of PrC would they be interested in.

the martial type with a focus vs demons

The PrC in its original form is suited to someone who likes to wade into combat and anticpates battling demons face-to-face, sword against claw. Is this what your paladin PC wants?

aye that seems to be what she wants from what she has told me of her character so far.

The Flavor
I highly suggest working out the details of the order some more before getting into the nitty gritty of the abilities. I know it always helps me, so here are some questions:
- Who is the founder of the order? What legacy have they left behind?
- Who knows about the order? Who are their enemies and allies?
- Are there any subdivisions, heresies, or factions within the order?
- How do elves view the order? How about humans? How are half-elf members viewed?
- What is the meaning of the symbolism behind their holy symbol?
- What is the structure of the order? Hierarchy? Cells?
- What sorts of resources/power bases does the order have?
- How does a member of this order react around a demon?
- What does their training involve?

Aye, I need to work on that

The Crunch
Here are my suggestions on edits to the current class abilities in order to make a more specialized secret operative against demons. This concept fits a world in which demons aren't waging open warfare or invading all-out, but rather insinuating themselves into noble society, corrupting high-level mages, hiding in criminal organizations, possessing animals, etc.
As a side note, I'd reduce Caster advancement to +1/3 levels to bring the power down, and there's nothing about the class that says it focuses on magic.

that was the situation at the time of the founding of the order, but the demons invaded and were repulsed within the last few years. Good suggestion on the caster advancement

I'd change this to allow the character's attacks to be considered good/holy for the purposes of overcoming damage reduction.

*nods*

Should be for purposes of censuring demons only, not undead.

*nods* good point

Nice ability, makes sense.

aye

I'd get rid of this ability, and replace it with demonology.

hrm, what would be the mechanics with the demonology ability. I kind of see the nimbus/holy radiance as projecting an aura of calm, while when facing the demon they unfurl their cloaks from robing them and blaze forth into battle.

I would remove this ability and replace it with a power to force an incorporeal creature to assume physical form, or to hedge out a possessing force, etc.

hrm.

I like this. You might want to consider whether it makes sense for the abilities to extend to his allies.... I can see it working either way.

*nods* and with Dvvega's suggestion it could possibly work to force out a possessing force.

Hmmm...a bit overdone, especially for someone who doesn't want their presence to be known by the masses. I'd replace it with a special organization benefit that gives the character access to demon-binding vaults, high-level protective circles which can be used to banish captive demons, etc.

as above this would be more when they engage the demon within its santum/in battle, while burning would be fore willing acolytes of the burning legion

 

[Quickleaf]

Demonology would essentially be an alternate use of Sense Motive vs. Bluff that can be made as long as you are dealing with something connected to the demon. For example, say demons of type X thrive on fear. When the character investigates several guards scared out of their minds, the PC could make a Sense Motive check opposed by the demon's Bluff. If the PC succeeds she successfully identifies the demon type. For every 5 points by which she succeeds she learns one special attribute of the demon (e.g. demon X's damage reduction is defeated by sweet-smelling fragrance). However if she fails by 10 or more she assumes it's the wrong type of demon; they are tricky buggers after all.

 

[Suldulin]

*nods to Quickleaf*

well seems the player has decided to go with a plain paladin *chuckles* oh well.

Thanks anyway everyone