Spell Charger (Magus Archetype)


Homebrew and House Rules


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There are a lot of mobility boosting Magus archetypes, but most Magi can not make use of them because of how spell combat works. Mounted Magus, two handed weapon Magus, and unarmed Magus are also an often requested builds; with the right combination of feats this archetype also helps those out a bit.

Spellcharge wrote:


At 1st level, the Spell Charger learns how to cast spells while charging at his enemies. As a full-round action, he can charge an opponent (using the usual rules for charge) and can also cast any spell from the magus spell list with a casting time of 1 standard action (any attack roll made as part of this spell also gains the benefits of the charge, but any concentration check made also gain the AC penalty of charge). He finishes casting the spell at the end of his charge (any damage taken during the charge necessitates a concentration check), but can cast the spell before or after he attacks.

Spell Charge replaces Spell Combat.


I think this looks very reasonable. I can't come up with any direct criticisms. Mobility is great, but so is full-attacking, so on the surface it seems like a very balanced trade. If anything jumps out at me later I'll let you know. For now though I think it looks excellent. Maybe it could be cool to create an arcana that let you spend an arcane pool point to like ignore difficult terrain while spellcharging or take a single 90-degree turn during your spellcharge or something like that. Just an idea.


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I'm not sure how this would help a TWF Magus? Or an Unarmed one really. The only real reason to go Unarmed with a Magus (Hex Strike) really makes you less dependent on full attacking already. It would help if you were capable of actually building for the endgame, and can take Pummeling Charge, but since a Magus doesn't qualify for that until level sixteen... yeah.

Honestly this probably works better as a feat (chain) than an archetype. I want to say that there's a 3pp feat that already lets a Magus cast while charging, which would be a starting point.


I do suppose this could work well as an arcana or a feat instead of an archetype, yeah. I thought maybe it was a little too powerful for an arcana or a feat, and thus the creation of an archetype that exchanged spell combat for it seemed reasonable. I'd probably prefer an arcana more too, if that'd not be too powerful.


kestral287 wrote:

I'm not sure how this would help a TWF Magus? Or an Unarmed one really. The only real reason to go Unarmed with a Magus (Hex Strike) really makes you less dependent on full attacking already. It would help if you were capable of actually building for the endgame, and can take Pummeling Charge, but since a Magus doesn't qualify for that until level sixteen... yeah.

Honestly this probably works better as a feat (chain) than an archetype. I want to say that there's a 3pp feat that already lets a Magus cast while charging, which would be a starting point.

Not two weapon, two handed. It doesn't have spell combat's "must leave 1 hand free" stipulation. It helps unarmed Magus by allowing him to cast a spell along with Pummeling charge (needs 2 MoMS dips admittedly).

It feels very strong for an arcana. Keep in mind that with spellstrike you are attacking twice on a single charge.


Yeah, that was my thinking too. If you wanted to make it an arcana or a feat you'd probably have to split it in two and make some kinda chain out of it, which seems stilted and cumbersome. I think it's fine as it is, especially if you tack on some mobility-themed arcana to boost a spellcharge. Not that it would NEED those to work, but I think it would be a nice flavorful addition.


Well, those should probably exist as general feat-like things. For example, if you can charge in a curve with wheeling charge, I don't see why there isn't an option to do that on foot.

Charging over difficult terrain also solves itself once you can fly, or you could take some feats that help with it (dragon style comes to mind). Maybe some way to get feather step as a magus could also help. Spell dancer is a very good mobility magus archetype and this makes it all the better.


This is fair enough. I have this habit of wanting to reinvent the wheel a little too often. The things I mentioned you are right in saying there already exist options for. I suppose it's a question of design philosophy, and I can certainly appreciate wanting to avoid feat/arcana bloat. To me it would just seem more elegant that a magus could snatch an arcana that let them spend a pool point to gain the benefits of dragon style for one round, rather than having to go through all the prerequisites and such. I can totally see why that might seem superfluous though. And it has little enough to do with your archetype which totally already works beautifully as things stand now.


Yeah, that's my reasoning as well. Keep things compact. Adding more arcana is outside the scope of the archetype, but it's quite reasonable.

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Does the magus get an attack in addition to the spell this grants?


You get to make the attack at the end of the charge, yes. That's why it's replacing Spell Combat. Otherwise it would be just a pretty limited boost in movement.

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I'd make that a little more clear.


It says "cast the spell before or after he attacks" so I thought it would be pretty clear.

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Ah, there we go. You don't need to use so many parenthesis. You have an entire sentence all in parenthesis.

This is actually a pretty cool idea. I've been brainstorming various replacements for spell combat and spellstrike that have the same general theme (combat-related action economy benefits with spells) but do something different.


You are right, I could probably drop some of those... in my defense, I'm pretty sure the Spell Combat description is mostly the same.

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