Yet Another Eldritch Knight

[malchus]

Hi,

I was reading the thread on EK strategies in the Rules forum, and I came up with an idea for an alternate EK. I'll post the stats here and add my reason and thoughts on it below. I'd appreciate any comments, advice, or insight you guys might have on it.

Alignment: Any

Hit dice: d8

Requirements

Weapons and armour: Must be proficient in all martial weapons, light and medium armour​

Feats: Weapon Focus (any weapon), Combat Casting, [that feat which allows you to channel spell slots into attack / damage bonuses]​

Special: Must be able to cast 3rd level arcane spells​

Skills

Class skills: Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Decipher Script (Int), Jump (Str), Knowledge (arcana) (Int), Knowledge (nobility and royalty) (Int), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), and Swim (Str)​

Skill points per level: 2 + Int modifier​

Level	Attack	Fort	Refl	Will	Special			Spell casting
1	+1	+2	+0	+0	Martial Focus		+ 1 level existing arcane class
2	+2	+3	+0	+0	Casting in Armour I
3	+3	+3	+1	+1	Melee Arcana I		+ 1 level existing arcane class
4	+4	+4	+1	+1	Off-hand arcana
5	+5	+4	+1	+1	Weapon Focus		+ 1 level existing arcane class
6	+6	+5	+2	+2	Casting in Armour II
7	+7	+5	+2	+2	Martial Focus		+ 1 level existing arcane class
8	+8	+6	+2	+2	Melee arcana II
9	+9	+6	+3	+3				+ 1 level existing arcane class
10	+10	+7	+3	+3	Casting in Armour III	+ 1 level existing arcane class

Class Features

Weapons and Armour: The Eldritch Knight gains no proficiency with weapons or armour.

Martial Focus: The Eldritch Knight learns to focus his arcane powers through his weapon. Choose one type of weapon the Eldritch Knight has Weapon Focus in - a Eldritch Knight is considered to have the Eschew Materials feat while holding this type of weapon drawn. An Eldritch Knight may choose another type of weapon at 7th level (again, as long as he already has Weapon Focus for that weapon).

Casting in Armour: A Eldritch Knight can cast arcane spells with somatic components in armour without penalty, but is limited by the highest spell level he can cast while armoured. At 2nd level, he can cast spells using spell slots which are two spell levels lower than the maximum spell level he can cast. At 6th level, he can cast spells using spell slots one level lower than his maximum, and at 10th level can cast any spell he knows while in armour.

Melee arcana I: As a standard action, a Eldritch Knight can use his weapon to deliver a melee touch attack spell. He must be using a weapon he can use as a Martial Focus to do this. The attack roll can be resolved either as a melee touch attack or as a normal melee attack - if the latter is chosen, the target takes normal damage from the weapon as well as from the spell on a successful attack.

The Eldritch Knight's off hand must be free during this action if the spell has a somatic component.

Ranged touch attacks can be delivered in the same fashion if the Eldritch Knight's Martial Focus weapon can be used for ranged attacks.

When using this action, the Eldritch Knight does not draw an attack of opportunity for casting the spell (but may still draw one if making a ranged attack).

Off-hand arcana: A Eldritch Knight can use certain magical items and still make melee attacks in the same round. As long as the Eldritch Knight is wielding a weapon he can use as his Martial Focus, he may use a magic item in his off hand and make a full melee attack with his primary weapon as if he had the Two-Weapon Fighting feat. The only magic items which can be used this way are wands, rings, rods and staves which deliver a melee touch attack or ranged touch attack, and take only a single action to activate. The modifiers for Two-Weapon Fighting apply to these attack rolls as well as any melee attacks the Eldritch Knight makes with his primary weapon.

For the purposes of this ability, any item which weighs 3 pounds or less is treated as a light weapon, and anything weighing between 3 and 8 pounds is treated as a one-handed weapon. Heavier items may not be used in this fashion. Thus, in general, rings and wands would be considered light weapons, and staves considered one-handed. Rods are considered one-handed weapons unless their description treats them as light maces, in which case they are light weapons.

Only one off-hand attack per round can be made in this fashion, regardless of any Two-Weapon Fighting or related feats the character may posess.

Melee Arcana II: As Melee arcana I, however the ability can now be used as one of a Eldritch Knight's iterative attacks during a full attack action. Also, a Eldritch Knight wielding a melee weapon can make a ranged touch attack using this ability, but would not be able to apply any bonuses due to using that weapon unless the weapon can also make ranged attacks

This ability can be used once per round.

 

[Cabral]

I can't place my finger on the exact reason, but this feels wrong. You do what a spellsword does, but much better. The Melee Arcana is too powerful. I'm not sure about casting in armor. Off-hand arcana is a neat idea.

 

[malchus]

I've got to confess, this looks really cheesy on paper. But I think it might work out ok.

Firstly, why am I bothering to re-write the EK? Mainly because the current version doesn't really fit what comes into my mind when I think of what might be an "Eldritch Knight". Basically what I want is someone in armour & swinging a sword (ie, a knight), who's also pretty magical (you know, "Eldritch"). Most people seem to agree that the simple way of doing this (Fighter X / Wizard Y, or substitute in similar classes) seems to get the worst of both worlds, but the standard EK doesn't really, well, seem all that interesting either. The ability to mix it up in melee was pretty central to my idea.

Anyway, what was I thinking?

Hit Points: I'm really torn on this. My gut feeling was to go with d6, and I still could easily do that, but an EK takes such a dive on hitpoints to begin with (on average, 22 + Con mods), that I wasn't sure if d6 would cut it. For someone who might end up on the front line, I thought d8 might have to be the go.

Requirements: Weapon Focus for the Martial Focus ability, Combat Casting because of Melee Arcana. The other feat (Arcane Strike? I don't have the Complete Foo book with me) isn't really *necessary* as such, but it seemed like such a useful feat for someone taking this class that I put it in. Maybe it doesn't belong, though

Between the weapon requirements and the spell requirements, I thought I could do away with things like Spellcraft (most mages will have them at the required level anyway). Maybe Knowledge (Nobility) should be in there.

Skills: Ripped straight from the standard EK

Base attack: Full base attack? Again, this is due to the Wizard class levels letting the side down. It comes out barely ahead of a straight class average BAB after 10 levels, which seems OK.

Spell casting: This took me a while to much around with. 6 caster levels out of 10 seems to work out right for most combinations I could think of. Ftr1/Wiz9/EK10 has a caster level of 15, and as I understand the Epic rules they'll never get 9th level spells even if they continue as Wiz past 20 - is that right?

Martial Focus: Pretty standard, from what I've seen of similar efforts. I may put in some sort of ritual requirement to "bond" with specific weapons.

Casting in Armour: Yeah. I know. Completely not how it should be done. The reason I chose this way was a pet peeve of mine - I hate the way Arcane Spell Failure works, and the obvious way to link it to this class (ignore X ASF per level) bugs me as well. I wanted a character to start out wearing whatever armour they want (knights in padded armour? bah!), but still limit them in some way. If you follow this EK all the way, you have no penalties for casting in armour, but suffer somewhat for caster level. If you cherry-pick, you're short 2 spell levels while in armour.

Melee Arcana I: Using melee weapon bonuses for touch attacks seems pretty normal for this sort of build. I think allowing a single normal melee for both damage and spell is an interesting trade off here (because you give up your iterative attack, which you probably just got, to do it). It's an all or nothing gamble.

Off-hand Arcana: The idea for this came late (literally - about 4am last nigth). I hope I've limited it enough - the items have to have some sort of attack roll, and there's the TWF penalty as well. Having said that, I'm really fond of this ability - it reminds me of the Lavodes from Stephen Brust's Khaavren series. But I'm waiting for someone to point out a gaping huge hole here.

Melee Arcana II: One thing this and the previous ability allow is mixing up ranged and melee attacks. I hope it adds a fresh tactical option, but it may end up being too powerful.


One thing which goes some way to limiting this EK is that its core abilities use up the characters off hand (either empty, or with wand, etc). So it's not a build for 2-handed weapons, and shields are awkard as well.

Anyway, is it too much?

 

[malchus]

I can't place my finger on the exact reason, but this feels wrong. You do what a spellsword does, but much better. The Melee Arcana is too powerful. I'm not sure about casting in armor. Off-hand arcana is a neat idea.

Thanks for the feedback.

Anything in particular about the Melee Arcana? Or suggestions?

And in which book would I find the Spellsword?

 

[Cabral]

Actually, the Spellsword (Complete Warrior p79) sounds pretty much like what you want in an Eldritch Knight. At 10th level he can nearly ignore the spell failure on normal Full Plate armor and the Melee Arcana is very similar to the Channel Spell albility except that the Spellsword has limited daily uses and it is a spell-like ability (so it provokes an Attack of Opportunity but can be cast defensively, see Concentration)

Since this looks more like you are redesigning the Spellsword than the Eldritch Knight, I suggest you look at Complete Warrior

Last minute pun I couldn't resist: Spellsword (S-W-O-R-D)

 

[malchus]

Since this looks more like you are redesigning the Spellsword than the Eldritch Knight, I suggest you look at Complete Warrior

Last minute pun I couldn't resist: Spellsword (S-W-O-R-D)

Heh - I bet they hear that one so often they all hate that joke...

It's amazing what even 4 hours sleep will do. 6 caster levels out of 10 is clearly wrong - it should be 5.

It seems my version of the EK is very similar to the Spellsword. I'll probably continue to try and work this one out, though; mainly as I really, really hate the way ASF works, and I still like the idea of off-hand arcana.

Having said that, it looks like I have to tone down the Melee Arcana a bit if the Channel Spell ability is X times per day & potentially attracts AoOs - Melee Arcana compares too favourably, it seems. My thought for this ability then is that it cannot be combined with a normal, damage-dealing melee attack, only for melee touch and possibly ranged touch attacks. Maybe the 3rd level version should allow melee combatants to use ranged attacks on targets within melee range.

That's a significant drop in combat ablility, I'll see if I can think of something for the 9th level class features slot, which is currently vacant.

 

[Cabral]

Actually, I misread Melee Arcana. basicly you can deliver a touch attack with a melee weapon but casting the spell is not part of the standard action, right? If so then I completely misread it and it's probably fine the way it is.

The casting in armor is too strong. at level 10, a spellsword has 5% arcane spell failure in heavy plate.

The off-hand arcana is pretty snifty, but what happens if he wants to use a wand of cure serious wounds in his off-hand? It's a touch attack, but if he's using it on himself he's effectively not gaining a penalty on his "off-hand attack". It may not be that big a deal, but it should be looked into. Btw, it doesn't take a special ability to wield a touch attack as a light off-hand "weapon".

Sorry I jumped the gun earlier. It's looking better now I've had a chance to look at it.

Just a couple of notes: a level 1 spellsword reduces arcane spell failure by 10%, at level 10 he reduces it by 30%. I don't think your class should a) outdo the spellsword (casting in armor is his schtick), nor b) provide a mechanism that effectively stacks with the spellsword's. (I was going to suggest a mechanism that allowed you to cast with no ASF in Heavy armor, but normal from shields by 10th level ... but after you finish, you take 1 level in spell sword to negate the ASF from the shield and it violates both a and b.)

If you want to have the eldritch knight be able to cast melee touch attacks through his weapon, make it a spell-like ability that rpovokes an attack of opportunity (then use concentration to cast defensively)

The off-hand arcana is a neat idea, but I'm not sure it's doing anything.

What's the Weapon Focus ability on the chart?

There was something else but I forgot