I was wondering if anyone with Monte Cook's Collected Book of Experimental Might could give me a brief description of the Runeblade. This class is sounds intriguing, and since I'm a sucker for gish classes anyway I think I'll like it. However, I am interested in how compatible it is with pathfinder, since it was written for 3.5. I am not looking for a full class build up, just enough to make sure it is worth the $10, since that is really the only part of that book I am interested in. Thanks for the help.
The Runeblade is a composite class, combining elements of the Mageblade and Runethane classes previously published in Arcana Evolved. I've played with those classes for years, and I've used the Runeblade itself in a couple of one-shots so far. It is a slightly complex class in terms of book-keeping, but it makes for an effective hybrid of magic and melee.
The Runeblade is essentially a melee class that can create magical runes which act as buffs for himself, his allies, and his equipment, summon creatures, and craft magical traps. A Runeblade gains a new "known" rune and/or a power to modify his existing runes (Erase rune, Sense Rune, Password, etc.) at every level. A Runeblade starts off knowing 2 lesser runes, which are roughly equivalent to 1st-2nd level spells. Advanced runes, gained at 6th level and above, are 3-4th level spells. Greater Runes are 5th-6th level spells, and the Ultimate Rune can emulate pretty much any spell effect of 6th level or lower. He can have a number of runes in existance equal to his level + Int with lesser runes counting as 1, advanced as 2, greater as 3, Power as 4, etc.
Here's the tricky bit. Any single rune can only be drawn once an hour. However, if the rune's duration is either "until activated" or hours/level and it is still around an hour later, you cann draw that same rune again and have two copies. Another hour, potentially three copies etc. So long as the total number of runes you have in existance at a time is within your limit of class level + Int mod, you can theoretically draw any rune 24 times a day, 1/hour. More practically, that's 16/day. The net effect is that if your party is willing to wait a few hours, you might be able to pull off some interesting buff and summon combos, as well as adding some formidable energy damage to his strikes. Of course, there's also some possibilities for ineffective silliness, like a 16th level runeblade spending 16 hours setting it up so that he can do 16 summon monster II's keyed off a single password so they go off simultaneously in the first round of combat.
The other thing to note is that the Runeblade is essentially married to his weapon, which is +1 in his hands at first level and gains an additional +1 to hit and damage at 5th, 9th, 13th, and 16th levels, capping at +5. This weapon eventually becomes dimly intelligent, capable of attacking thieves who try to steal it, and teleporting to the runeblade's hand when needed (eventually giving him quick draw, even if the weapon is 10 miles away in the back closet of the Inn). Some of his runes grant additional enhancement bonuses, like keen or flaming, but temporarily and only on his specific weapon. He can switch out this weapon, but doing so destroys the old one.
Overall, the Runeblade is a reasonably powerful class that gets something at every level. I would say that it is probably in the same ballpark as the Pathfinder classes, but that YMMV.
"Triggering identical runes at the exact same time negates both runes. For example, while two different doors can bear a rune of conjuring, if one door has two runes of conjuring on it, neither rune functions unless they are placed so that there is no way someone could trigger both of them at once. Likewise, a runic weapon cannot have two lesser elemental runes on it."
To my understanding a Runeblade couldn't do silly prep-time Summon Monster II's like that due to the above reason.
Thank you to you both. This sounds class sounds awesome . . . it maybe worth the $10 all by itself :)
The book is totally worth the money spent on it. My suggestion is to buy it.
