My Idea for Smite (Evil)

[Kerrick]

I think the damage itself is fine - what's NOT fine is how many times/day they can use it. At 5/day, it's a very weak ability. If they could use it, say, 1/round, that would be a powerful ability. Or, hell, let's say 1/minute - that's basically an encounter power, where he gets +Cha to attack and +class level to damage.

The way I did it, FWIW, is this:

1 + Cha bonus times per day, a paladin can attempt to smite good or evil (depending on her alignment), or someone of an opposing faith (no matter the alignment) as a standard action with a melee attack. She adds her Charisma bonus (if any) to her attack roll and deals 2 extra points of damage per class level, plus her Charisma bonus. Any class-based abilities that would normally apply to a melee attack (sneak attack, e.g.) can be added to this roll also, if applicable. If the paladin accidentally smites a creature that is not of an opposing alignment of faith, the smite has no effect, but the ability is still used up for that day.

Although I just now noticed that I didn't stipulate that a missed attack = equals a wasted smite; that's just stupid.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

It's mostly fine because +level damage is pretty good. I'm also accustomed to seeing Paladins use it on a mounted charge for x3 damage, of course... But I don't see how it's worse than +1 to hit and +2 damage from focus/specialization. Or how it's much worse than a completely maxed out (increased at every opportunity) favored enemy bonus. And you're far more likely to fight evil than a specific creature type. Granted it's only one attack, while those are constant, which leads to...

I agree with Kerrick. It's weakness is mainly the tiny amounts of use per day. I also don't want to give the Paladin a ton of usages and then let him unload them all in a massive nova on the BBEG either, though...

How broken would it be if the Paladin had no daily Smite limit, but instead could only smite a given enemy x times per encounter, with x being the number of times per day the Paladin progression currently allows? In other words, each encounter at level 20, a Paladin could Smite a given evil enemy up to 5 times. If there were a dozen evil enemies, he could smite each and every one of them that many times over the course of the fight theoretically.
In order to discourage the Paladin from going on a "smite frenzy" with such a rule, there should probably be a penalty associated with trying to smite an enemy that turns out to be non-evil*. Like -1 smite usage per foe per encounter for the rest of that encounter...or the rest of that day... Otherwise, the Paladin has no reason to not make his first attack on any foe a Smite Evil just in case.

*Exact legal text could be something like: "If the enemy you attempt to Smite is not evil and you had not first tried to Detect Evil on him..."

 

[Kerrick]

I'd just make it x times per encounter - that would be more than enough for most encounters, IMO. x per enemy means the paladin would be doing nothing BUT smiting if he comes up against evil enemies (which, granted, would be fairly realistic, but not very fun gameplay-wise - the rest of the party could just sit back while the paladin charges in and smites everyone to death). Besides, having it per enemy means someone (most likely the player) will have to keep track of how many times a given enemy's been smitten; if everyone's moving around, or if you're using markers for other things as well, this could quickly get very confusing.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

True. Per encounter, then.