The Spirit Warrior - An Oriental Adventures PrC

[Michael Tree]

Thysl, you're right. Since so many of the class' abilities are dependant on the mask, balancing it is a bit weird. In any situation where the character are deprived of equipment, he won't have access to many important abilities, and he can similarly be deprived of them through Sunder, dispelling, and other means of removing an item.

At 10th level this becomes a non-issue, since the character can transform his face into a totem mask at will, but 9 levels of vulnerability is a possible balancing factor. Besides, many spirit warriors would carry a second totem mask in case of emergencies.

The spirit warrior is best at fighting spirits, but I don't think that this class is substandard in situations where there aren't spirits around. They still have fairly potent combat and spellcasting abilities, martial arts feats, and the terror mask. Their spirit sight and spirit touch abilties, while especially useful against spirits, can be useful in other situations too.

Edit: I just changed the characteristics of the Totem Mask magic item that the character must create before becoming a spirit warrior. It's now a useful magic item in its own right, not just a 1000 gp fee for entering the class, as it essentially was before.

Edit: I just added some general descriptive text below the pseudo-fiction flavor text.

 

[Michael Tree]

Ahem.

<tries to subtly *BUMP* this thread, but rolls a 1>

Now that I've made a few changes, does this class look balanced now?

 

[Magnus]

my DM doesn't like us reading stuff other than player specific stuff. so i'm deffinitely not qualified to judge whether or not this specific PrC is "balanced" or not, i certainly really like it; both in terms of flavour and abilities. it certainly has that mystic quality that's missing from a lot of PrCs. i'll certainly keep it on file in case any of my PCs die lol good job Tree

 

[Dagredhel]

Hey Michael.

Wonderful job! I think the bonus feats at 4th and 8th level should probably be dropped, and I have reservations about making the Spirit Warrior's totem mask a magic item in its own right, but otherwise I think the revised PrC is perfect, and it incorporates several inspired ideas that would never have occured to me. Congratulations on a job very well done.

On a completely different note, Mr. Tree, did you know that the suffix '-edhel' in 'Dagredhel' means tree, in Tolkien's Elvish language?

 

[Michael Tree]

On a completely different note, Mr. Tree, did you know that the suffix '-edhel' in 'Dagredhel' means tree, in Tolkien's Elvish language?

Cool. What does Dagr mean? (What are the chances that it means "who is like God", like Michael?)

I'd like to keep the feats, for the simple reason that Shamans gain a martial arts feat every 4 levels, and I can't imagibe why a spirit warrior would be less skilled in combat techniques than a semi-combatant shaman.

I made the spirit mask a magic item in its own right, because it occurred to me that the spirit warrior should gain a bonus to Intimidate checks while wearing it, but I didn't want to add yet another ability to the class. As a result, I made it a +10 Intimidate item, in the same vein as Boots and Cloaks of Elvenkind, Gloves of Swimming and Climbing, and Lenses of Detection.