Saving the Samurai?

[genshou]

Could you explain to me what the flavor for the OA Samurai had to do with those crappy mechanics? That was just about the lamest thing I have ever seen. It is nothing more than a fighter with new flavor and one feat pre-chosen from the Book of Exalted Deeds.

P.S. - Not trying to pick on anyone, I just can't understand why people like that class. Maybe it is just because I can't stand Rokugan.

The Samurai has more skill points and access to a lot of useful skills (Diplomacy, Iaijutsu Focus, Perform, Sense Motive). That counts for a lot when you compare a Fighter to a Samurai.

 

[Hawken]

The Rokugan D20 book updates the OA samurai. I can't remember if it is 3.5 or not, but the mechanics of the class are a step up from the OA samurai, and I think they do have good Will saves and 4 skill points per level. They don't have Heavy armor proficiency but they do have their Ancestral Daisho which lets them sacrifice GP or XP (I forgot which) to enchant their swords.

If you can get a hold of that book, it might be worth it mixing that Samurai class with some levels from the Inkyo class (a monk class that gets ki abilities in place of martial arts) or with the PHB monk class. Most of the time, samurai didn't wear armor. Their armor usually only came out when armies went out on the battlefields.

 

[genshou]

The Rokugan D20 book updates the OA samurai. I can't remember if it is 3.5 or not, but the mechanics of the class are a step up from the OA samurai, and I think they do have good Will saves and 4 skill points per level. They don't have Heavy armor proficiency but they do have their Ancestral Daisho which lets them sacrifice GP or XP (I forgot which) to enchant their swords.

If you can get a hold of that book, it might be worth it mixing that Samurai class with some levels from the Inkyo class (a monk class that gets ki abilities in place of martial arts) or with the PHB monk class. Most of the time, samurai didn't wear armor. Their armor usually only came out when armies went out on the battlefields.

I forgot about the good Will save progression.

In Oriental Adventures, the Samurai spends gp equal to the market price of the item (stupid and senseless, it's no different from buying a magic item except you have to waste a hundred consecutive days yourself in order to do so). In Rokugan, the Samurai spends XP as if using the Craft Magic Arms and Armour feat, but does not have to sacrifice the raw materials (gp) cost. This way works much better as it actually gives an advantage to the process. Either way the maximum effective enhancement bonus follows a level-based chart to keep the character from getting too powerful a weapon too early.

 

[Li Shenron]

The CWar Samurai isn't terrible itself, it is just terribly narrow. It could barely represent a Samurai of a single faction or dojo. It was bad design for a book like CWar, which is supposed to be pretty generic in setting...

The OA or the Rokugan versions were brilliant because the base version is very generic (think Fighter with less bonus feats, more skills, and the ancestral weapon features), but then each Clan had its own technique feats, so two Samurais for different clans end up with quite different tactical abilities.

But of course, in your setting you might not have clans, and just get the base version. The only problem could be that it would be too similar to Fighter.

Changing the feats to generic bonus feats should work well. More difficult to replace the shouting abilities, but it can be done. Make a bonus feats list anyway, don't just allow "any" feat, so that the list has a flavor on its own!

 

[Arkhandus]

OA Samurai have strong Will saves as well as strong Fortitude saves, plus better skill points and class skills than a Fighter. And they get Ancestral Daisho, though it's not a great ability, but it's something at least. In exchange, they give up a few bonus feats and some of the Fighter's larger selection of bonus feats to choose from, and Samurai have to remain of Lawful alignment and follow their code. All in all slightly stronger than the Fighter, but only until you consider the feats available to Fighters in the 3.5 Player's Handbook, Complete Warrior, and Player's Handbook II. Then they're probably about on-par, give or take just a bit of overall power, though Fighters are definitely a tad better in damage-dealing due to Weapon Specialization et al. OA Samurai choose one of the Rokugani Clans to learn their bonus feats from (i.e. Crab Clan gives access to bonus feats for hitting hard and toughing it out, Dragon Clan gives access to bonus feats for two-weapon fighting and ki shouts IIRC, Scorpion Clan gives access to bonus feats for deceptive and clever fighting, etc.), but these can just be redefined as different dojos or martial arts styles in any other setting.

In Oriental Adventures, the Ancestral Daisho ability gives Samurai a free masterwork bastard sword (katana) and masterwork short sword (wakizashi), representing the Samurai's honor and duty respectively. It allows them to enhance these weapons through meditation and sacrifices to the spirits of their ancestors and the Fortunes/Kami/whatever, with certain values in GP for different degrees of enhancement. The minimum and maximum enhancement possible depends on their Samurai class level. The Samurai chooses what enhancement bonuses or equivalent special abilities to imbue their daisho with; so the Samurai can have a +1 honorable returning katana of throwing and a +3 defending wakizashi of ghost touch at the middle levels, for instance, without needing to find these particular items in a magic item shop, or without needing to find a friendly spellcaster who possesses the proper feats and spells to create these specific items.

The Rokugan book (which is also 3.0 like OA, not 3.5) adds some Minor Clan bonus feat lists for Samurai, as well as a variant to have Samurai pay some paltry XP for Ancestral Daisho enhancements instead of the much more significant GP expenditures noted in Oriental Adventures. Rokugan also adds several overpowered feats that Samurai can take to be equal or better Fighters than Fighters themselves. One of my major beefs with the Rokugan book's shoddy balancing. The Rokugan book also adds Void feats and allows a human to take the Void Use feat in place of an ancestor feat for their human bonus feat (OA normally restricts Rokugani humans to taking an ancestor feat as their human bonus feat). Void Use and its related feats are generally overpowered as well, though a few of them are reasonable. On the plus side, the Rokugan book has some neat Style feats available for warriors of the different Clans, and a feat that allows someone to learn Style feats from another Clan (allowing a gaijin non-Rokugani to learn Style feats from a single Clan, for instance). Some of these feats are also overpowered, but a decent number of them are reasonable. The Rokugan book also has a 20-level Courtier class, a 20-level Inkyo class (enlightened monk, less martial arts focused, more elements and void and miscellaneous-skills focused), and a 20-level Ninja class (pretty much a slightly weaker version of the rogue, with a few different class features, better proficiencies, and d8 hit dice IIRC). That book has a lot of different stuff though, this is pretty much just mentioning some material from the 2nd and/or 3rd chapters, IIRC.

 

[comrade raoul]

You know, a slightly tweaked and renamed CW "kensai" makes a fine samurai. He gets a close equivalent to an ancestral katana, a restrictive implementation of an oath of service, great social skills, an old-school, AD&D-style Strength boost, and even the chance to be a daimyo at 10th level.

 

[GreatLemur]

To be honest, I'm not really sure there's any need for the Samurai class. Core classes that strongly suggest a specific setting or cultural background are a dumb idea to start with, and the Samurai class doesn't bring with it any abilities so unique that they wouldn't make more sense as feats.

I don't really mind the idea of a variant fighter class to represent some kind of noble, educated warrior, though. Give it good Fortitute and Will saves, and more skill points, and then take away some bonus feats--yep, just like OA, minus the free daisho--and call it a day. I kind of like the idea of taking away automatic proficiency with heavy armor, too.

 

[Li Shenron]

Yep, you should use the OA version normally, and the Rokugan version only in Rokugan.

In OA the acestral daisho has a gp cost, so it's similar to a free craft weapons & armor feat which is usable only on your katana, but doesn't cost xp.

In Rokugan it's the other way around (xp cost but not gp) because of the setting, where money and equipment don't have the same prevalence as in normal D&D. Gp-free enhancements and the strong feat as well compensate for the general lack of magic equipment.

 

[Hawken]

you should use the OA version normally, and the Rokugan version only in Rokugan.

Just because you feel some of the Rokugan feats are overpowered doesn't mean they have to be used. The samurai class in Rokugan D20 can be put in any setting without the Rokugan feats if they are going to be that disruptive and still be a balanced, fitting class. They end up with fewer feats and no heavy armor proficiency compared to a fighter, so they're far from superior.

I think they would be a good, feasible addition to any setting that could accomodate a samurai.

 

[Arkhandus]

Well, really, its' the Rokugan samurai's payment of just XP and no GP for magic katana and wakizashi that's kind of overpowered, regardless of whether or not you use the Rokugan book's various feats. The samurai would, at the very worst IIRC, be 1 character level behind the rest of the party sometimes (but not behind any resident magic-item-crafter in the party) but have even more GP worth of gear since their two magic weapons are basically free. Magic weapons are almost the most expensive magic items around (I'm pretty sure I recall the tomes of +5 inherant ability increase being more expensive, or maybe there was something else more expensive, but magic weapons are definitely the most prominent of expensive items). Oriental Adventures samurai have no monetary/magic-item advantage over other classes, just the convenience of choosing whatever magic item enhancements they want to pay for on their katana/wakizashi, without need for a resident high-level spellcasting magic-item-crafter.

If the OA samurai's Ancestral Daisho benefits were removed, along with possibly his or her code of conduct, it'd make a good, martial 'noble' class, though.