That copy is now available at:
http://www.cs.hmc.edu/~byoung/T13Kv2d.doc
I've been passing it around with the caveat that it still needs a lot of review; one recipient (one with a very black-and-white sense of the rules) came back with this commentary.
Comments: Feats
Blood of Beher - i generally find this type of starting feat to be a waste of time. But its about as good as most other starting feats out there. (The whole starting feat idea is mostly pointless, imho).
Doluhre Academy - This feat is really weak. While WotC seems to think that advancing the damage die one step (and thus average damage increases by 1) is worth a feat (eg, EWP and the large number of exotic weapons that are base weapon advanced one die), its not. (+2 damage available at 1st level is probably worthwhile, +4 or more available later might be worthwhile. No, weapon spec isn't a good feat either).
Hoplite - Really, the benefit should be 'You can use your [spear/etc..] one handed', as thats how the hoplites used their spears. In fact, no army has ever trained soldiers to use a spear the size of a long spear 2-handed. (Pike's and polearms are 2-handed, pikes because theyre 25' long!, and polearms because you have to swing them. Thrusting a 13' long spear with one hand is perfectly doable with training, and it doesnt have the polearms heavy head to unbalance you). This would incidentally allow shield bashes, if something happened to be that close to you, but thats what really makes the feat worth taking - now you have a weapon at 10' and 5'. (This also corresponds to hoplite tactics - shield pushes were at least as common as actually trying to stab someone with the spear).
Improved Charge - For this to be worthwhile, it needs to give you x2 damage on the charge. Otherwise its useless.
Imp Dodge - There's a feat called Dextrous Dodge in the net book of feats which lets you consider your dex as 2 points higher for AC purposes, and counts as Dodge. You might consider replacing dodge with that instead. Adding a feat which is questionably useful, to be taken *after* theyve wasted a feat on dodge, with no good feats stemming from it, is pointless. The only reason anyone ever takes dodge is because spring attack and elusive target are so good.
Imp Ranged Sneak Attack - This should increase the range to 60'. At least. Its so hard to get ranged sneak attacks anyway.
Increased Ability - This is an epic feat. Not that its out of place pre-epic in terms of power, as its a crappy epic feat. But in case you werent aware or had forgotten, you should keep that in mind.
Jungle Child - This needs a little more oomph. Its worse than most starting feats, and you already know what i think of those already.
Steady Aim - you do realize no one ever uses the 'sit and observe' abilities, because its impossible to do and the benefits are so meagre. In this case, +2 damage for a lost round is crap. If it was x2 damage it might be worth it at low levels. To really be playable, it needs to be something like x2 damage and forces a fort save or death on that opponent (with discernible anatomy, yada yada). Otherwise its never worth doing.
Talented - the way you have it worded, i could take Talented (balance, tumble) and talented (jump, tumble). If this was not the intention, you might want to tweak the wording.
Urbanized - the regional requirement doesnt make much sense; anyone could become urbanized in game. That said, this feat is almost too powerful. (+2 I and +2 spot? holy jeez!). In general, initiative is really powerful, and providing so many ways to get more of it means you'll see characters with I +7+dex running around, which is brutal.
Worg Kinship is a neat idea. I approve.
On Raising Dead: Making it so you always lose a level sucks. Especially when characters *expect* to die *repeatedly* at high levels of play. (An epic adventure expects to kill 1-2 party members in the final encounter alone, generally. This isnt much different than the 18-20 expectation either). Penalizing True Res like this just means that characters never advance beyond about 18th level without severe DM intervention.
Spells:
Airblade - iirc, this is much more powerful than flameblade at the same spell level.
Answer the Question - this is far too powerful for 2nd level, and out of flavor for S/W divination anyway. It should be a cleric spell, probably around 4th level because its similar to divination. (The only question-based 2nd level spell, augury, is cleric and returns 'weal', 'woe', and 'weal and woe' as its only answers. This is the most powerful 2nd divination spell, and should remain so.)
Baleful Sphere - the penalties need to be toned down a little (-2?) or the spell level increased to 5 or 6.
Dig - Doesnt this spell already exist in 'Move Earth'? 2nd level is far too low for what its capable of.
Fleet Feet - Should the speed bonus be enhancement? Or do you intend it to stack with monk speed, expeditious retreat, etc...
Arcane Dagger, Shatter Sphere - Close is 25'+5'/2 levels. There are no ad hoc ranges anymore.
Strun's Wall - This should be 3rd level at least, and probably 4th.
Trigger Trap - Come now, an unseen servant pushing a log is just as effective 95% of the time.
PrCs:
Caedmonian Warmaster
-needs more skills in class with 4+int skills/lvl. (Yes, there actually is a fairly well defined relationship between class skills and skills/lvl). He should at least have climb and jump in class.
-Battle Cry should improve beyond being +1
-The abilities arent good enough to warrant an 8th level earliest entry. Reduce the requirements to make 6th level entry possible (eg, BAB to +5, kno(war) 4 ranks).
Chaos Kissed
-I'm unclear what stacking for domain spells means. They get a domain spell only spell progression?
-For a PrC thats enterable by 3rd level (Monk1/Cleric1 = +2 base saves in all 3, Madness domain), some of its features are really powerful. (babble!) Give it a skill requirement or CL requirement? It needs earliest entry to be at least 6, and maybe later.
-Strangely, im not sure what exactly a character of this PrC does. You want to be near their spellcasters, but your BAB is awful. I guess the optimal path is probably (as PrC is written) Monk1/Cl1/CK10/Rogue8 and max UMD so you can use staves of Divine Power for +20BAB. Actually, Rogue1/Cl1 is also a valid entry. Gah.
Chosen of Parushan
-DM should never be able to overrule player action choice, especially if alignment is NE. Thats the 'do whatever is best for me' alignment, thus no action is out of character if it improves the characters position. I'd strike that text from the PrC. (Now, xp penalties for good acts which aren't done for selfish reasons would be more reasonable - however, you're basically saying that redemption is impossible, which seems a little harsh). The rule as written is also like saying CN characters can't act lawfully on occasion. (Sure they can, if theyre acting randomly (for bizarre interpretation of CN) then occ they should be acting L). Its the L and G ends of the spectrum that are constrained in what they shouldnt do. Otherwise we have the disney version of evil where all bad guys have to beat puppies and mistreat their wives because theyre evil.
- "The tenets of evil". The, um, what?
- Dim Door is totally out of flavor. It really is.
- What do you have against ravens, really? =p
- needs more class skills for the number of skills/day
- HD should probably be d8
- Special ability saves should be based on class level, not character level. (DC30+cha mod at 20th level? holy
!)
Claw of Murryghn
- I really dislike this fixed alignment thing. Players should be free to develop their character, not forced into a box.
- Improved Wildshape needs the available alternate types extrapolated on.
- Strike of Undeath? Why does a druid want to create undead? This seems really out of flavor.
- Min level entrance is probably too high. Entrance requirements should be adjusted.
Dwarven Battle-Rager
- With all those pre-reqs, ditch the toughness pre-req. Its such a useless feat. (Admittedly, imp toughness counts as toughness for pre-reqs, and is marginally more useful, but still, thats a painful feat choice).
- The AC improving features are out of character. Reckless attacking should decrease your AC, not improve it. I would change the nature of these abilities to be more damage oriented.
Gnome Dreamwalker
- Enterable at 2nd level? Oh geez. I'll note you dont even need to take a caster class to take a spell focus feat, so really xxx1/Gnome Dreamwalker is a valid entrance, so long as you have 13 wisdom. (admittedly, you probably want a caster class to benefit from the class features).
- The class abilities aren't overpowering. Spell progression should probably be full. Otherwise no one will ever take this PrC because straight caster is better.
- Does Dreams Come True work with Persistent Spell? (Holy b0rk3n batman!) If so, correction, most of the abilities aren't overpowering, but this one is. My suggestion would be to nerf or remove it, because free persistent spell is too powerful.
- Dreamwalk - Whats a half action? Do you mean partial? Partial actions don't exist anymore, its a standard action or a move action.
Goblin Freedom Fighter:
-Should have fighter BAB progression, those abilities are mostly fluffy. Even with that its still a weak PrC.
Hand of Brand:
- The multiclass restriction is silly, and the game designers have said the only reason monk and paladin have restrictions is to appease playtesters. They dont think they need them (and i have to agree). I'd toss it. (You'll note there exist no PrCs with multiclassing restrictions).
- This PrC is reasonably balanced against existing WotC product PrCs. Its overpowered compared to your other PrCs.
Huntmaster
- This PrC is unplayably weak. Make it full casting progression at least, and probably reduce the entrance requirements so 5th level entry is possible. Pass without trace should be permanently active when first acquired, not useable a number of times per day. If its not full caster progression, it needs fighter BAB, and better specials.
Island Buccaneer
- remove the + from x+ ranks in the skills. Thats implicitly understood. (If you have 7 ranks, you have 6 ranks).
- Enterable at 5th level? (Rog3/F1 meets those requirements easily. If i wanted to try, i could probably do it by 4th).
- How is this PrC not totally replaced by Dread Pirate? Not to mention Swashbuckler is a base class that fulfills much of this role. (Oh yeah, Swash3 meets the min reqs, but you'd rather advance as a Swashbuckler with better features and d10 HD). This PrC is weaker than Dread Pirate, which is one of the weakest non-caster WotC PrCs to date, and probably unplayable.
Marechal Warmaster
- i dislike that territory, which should be gained IC, be gained as a class feature. Its just silly.
- This PrC is really similar to the first one, and should probably be eliminated. (Make it one PrC already). Additionally, I'm pretty sure this is a copy of an existing PrC, and therefore a copywrite violation.
Monk of the Peaceful Palm
- Unarmed attack bonus no longer exists. You should say that they maintain their flurry progression as if they were advancing as a monk.
- Otherwise, wow, a monk PrC done right!
- This is markedly more powerful than most of your other PrCs.
- As a Su, the last effect can be dispelled. It hardly requires a Wish or a Miracle.
Seledeyne Ranger
- This is a copy of Deep Wood Sniper, and a copywrite violation. I'd remove it.
Serpent Warrior
- Caster PrCs which aren't full progression need incredible abilities to justify taking them. And even then, if you lose more than 2 levels, its not worth it. Admittedly, some of the abilities are good, but its not good as a whole. Either make it a gish class (Cleric BAB), or tone down the imm crit (make it 25% res crit like fortification armor) and make it full casting.
- Fort Save DC15? At what, 15th level? Sounds like the don't roll a 1 game.
Spy of Shadoth
- This PrC is a little weak, and could use some slightly better abilities, but is otherwise fine.
Storm of the Desert
- This is a virtual copy of the Cavalier PrC, and probably a copywrite violation. Besides, better justice could be done to the concept than ripping off a subpar PrC.
Weapons:
Water Crossbow: Ow physics, ow my head, ow ow ow. Strike this monstrosity. They dont have the technology for propelling objects underwater.
Items:
The cost on Scribe's Quill seems a little low for an item with no charges.
I'm not sure how much of this we want to take into account, but if we do, I can make changes directly on that copy. I've also been considering taking it over to a TeX-based format, although my TeX-fu is not yeet strong enough to make it quite as pretty as it currently is.
