Artificer as an Alchemist archetype / alternate class features, thoughts?

[Michael Grancey]

Biggest goal was to make something that goes with the idea behind an Artificer, but make him unique enough to be worth playing and playable. Which is why I decided on an archetype rather than a whole new class, because really the two are very similar. Biggest thought in my head right now is whether to just slightly change Alchemy or to drastically change it.

Original thought is to remove Alchemy and create Imbue which would have a gold piece pool that can be used to create temporary Magical Items which would be good for 1 use (instantaneous durations) or good for 24 hours (other durations). They could create items up to their CL + Int Mod, the big question is how much gold do they get per day.

My other thought is to simply alter Alchemy and to Imbue and instead of making potions, extracts, and such they would enchant non-magical items that would be activated by whoever has the item or into a temporary wand. All other things being the same.

The rest of the variations are this:

• Drop mutagen -> Homunculus, which would work similar to Animal Companion OR Expert Artisan: -25% craft magic item costs
  
• Drop Swift Alchemy -> Detect Magic as a Spell-like Ability
  
• Drop Poison Resist -> 1/2 Artificer levels to Appraise and Use Magic Device
  
• Drop Poison Use -> Trapfinding
  
• Drop Poison Immunity -> Metamagic Spell Trigger 1/2 CL + Int Mod for Supplementary spell levels (i.e. has 15 spell levels when gained and uses Maximized Spell on a Wand of Cure Serious which drains 3 spell levels from his pool leaving him 12 for the rest of the day.)
  
• Drop Persistent Mutagen -> Metamagic Spell Completion
  
• Drop Instant Alchemy -> Metamagic Item use
  

Simply altering Alchemy and to Imbue would make getting Metamagic feats functional and worthwhile. Mutagenic discoveries would off course be useless, and so would some other discoveries as well.

[xorial]

Do a search on the site. Somebody did this already.

[Cheapy]

I made a list of these, here.

There are a fair number of alchemist conversions too.

[Dragonamedrake]

The popularity of this class is aparrent. I wonder why Piazo hasn't come out with a class to emulate it.

I know there is the whole copyright thing but if a 3PP can be made without copyright issue why cant Piazo do one?

[CrackedOzy]

Here's the one I use. I believe it's similar to one of the ones in Cheapy's doc.

ARTIFICER: as Alchemist archetype
Remove - Mutagen, (ability to identify potions with Craft: Alchemy), Poison Use, Poison Resistance & Immunity, (ability to apply poisons as a move/immediate action), Swift Poisoning, Persistent Mutagen
- Apprentice Crafter: At 1st level, an Artificer may use Item Creation feats to create any item, without needing access to particular spells. Spell completion items made by an Artificer may not be used by any other class, except by use of a UMD check. Treat Artificer class level as caster level for Item Creation purposes.
- Identify Items: At 1st level, an Artificer may identify any item's magical properties as if using Detect Magic.
- Artificer Knowledge: At 2nd level, an Artificer adds half his artificer level to Appraise, Spellcraft & Use Magic Device skill checks.
- Bonus Feat: At 3rd level and every 3 levels after, an Artificer gains a bonus feat that must be taken from the Item Creation list. He must meet the requirements for these feats.
- Journeyman Crafter: At 7th level, an Artificer may cut the time needed to craft magic items in half. Generally this will mean only needing 4 hours for every 1,000 gp in the item's base price. Scrolls & potions may be finished in 1 hour, if under 250 gp.
- Master Crafter: At 14th level, an Artificer may cut the time needed to craft magic items in half again (reducing it to a quarter of the normal time). Generally this will mean only needing 2 hours for every 1,000 gp in the item's base price. Scrolls & potions may be finished in a half hour, if under 250 gp.