The Merchant- an item master class


Homebrew and House Rules


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So my last class was an utter disaster. Thus is went back to the drawing board to try and make something that not only hasn't been touched upon thematically by paizo's classes, nor that has been touched upon mechanically. The idea? a class that specializes in using items of all sorts, be they mundane, or magical.

Thus I introduce The Merchant, a mundane (mostly) utility class. The merchant is a lover of things, and depending on what they stock their inventory with at the start of each day determines their strengths and weaknesses.

  • Every merchant gains an inventory- a collection of items they can draw at a moments notice, and they gain certain benefits with those based on their specialties.
  • Merchants are no warriors or wizards, or at least not at first. As they all start out as one of the weakest mundane classes with their lack fo combat skill, but as they grow they gain utmost utility.
  • Have fun with exotic tools! Any skill can be yours with the right item.
  • Focus your merchants trade with what wares he carries. Blacksmiths and weapontraders are different than spice merchants, and each gains unique skills and abilities.

Please check it out! if you like or think its horrible let me know!
The Merchant


Hmmm.. need permission to see the doc file.

Always happy to see another non-magical class option. Your concept brings to mind the class from Dragon Quest; definitely an underused concept in rpgs.


Gah stupid google docs. I fixed the link so anyone can view and post a comment on the file.

And yeah there aren't nearly enough mundane classes in pathfinder. Magic is cool and all, but sometimes you just want to play the guy who doesn't shoot fire everywhere.

I really did like DQ's version of the merchant, and for the life of me tried my hardest to include some sort of mechanic that converts raw money into class abilities, but I couldn't figure it out without horribly breaking WBL

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I don't understand how the main class feature of wares and inventory works. It sounds like it's some kind of substitute for spellcasting, but it's not explained at all. All of it feels nebulous and not well thought out.

The class strikes me as rather underpowered as it's a 1/2 BAB class with no good saves and no spellcasting.

I'm also not fond of some of the abilities. Some of them feel out of place, like Risky Trader. I'm not crazy about Bribery, which should be labeled as a mind-affecting effect.

I understand the premise you're going for. I think this is one of the better attempts at a merchant class on the homebrew forums, but I feel the class just doesn't have enough going for it. it needs a really strong class feature to hold it together, but I'm not seeing that here. If I wanted to play a merchant character, I'd rather play an alchemist, vigilante, or Louis Porter's machinesmith with different flavor.


Cyrad wrote:

I don't understand how the main class feature of wares and inventory works. It sounds like it's some kind of substitute for spellcasting, but it's not explained at all. All of it feels nebulous and not well thought out.

The class strikes me as rather underpowered as it's a 1/2 BAB class with no good saves and no spellcasting.

I'm also not fond of some of the abilities. Some of them feel out of place, like Risky Trader. I'm not crazy about Bribery, which should be labeled as a mind-affecting effect.

think of inventory like a number of items you have access to at anytime. as you grown in level and in charisma, you can access more items at will as a free action.your inventory is just this collection of items you deemed fit to be your "main" items for the day.

Wares are more specialized-merchant exclusive items that you add to your inventory and gain uses of. it is a sort of mundane recreation of vancian mechanics, but its a start. I'll probably reword how inventory works.

As for the 1/2BAB and all all poor saves, those are supposed to be fixed with your wares and your risky trader ability. Each ware category gives a bonus to a specific save, so for example if you decided to be a armorer and apothecary, you get the equivalent of a good fortitude save. Risky trader is also meant to focus the class less on physical prowess like other mundanes and more on their mental stat, charisma. while they'll never be as good as a rogue at attacking normally, when the need to, they can use their charisma as a bonus and give themselves a decent chance to hit.

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You don't explain how the inventory items work in the writeup. It's nebulous to call it "items" in the first place as that can mean object you can use in the game. Yet, it implies that there's more to that as a class feature. You have to be more specific when designing class feature mechanics.

Risky Trader and some of the ware category abilities do not make up for the poor BAB. Having a poor BAB communicates that the class is not a fighting type. So it makes little to no sense to give them a class feature that involves fighting when they lack the basics needed to function as a fighting class.

Worst of all, the class doesn't do their job well. The bard and investigator are better at skills and utility than your class. Even if you took away spells and extracts. Heck, a spell-less witch would probably be more useful to a party than a merchant.

Designing a non-spellcasting class with the wizard's HD and BAB is a big challenge that the class just simply doesn't overcome.


Alright I rewrote the inventory and ware sections to be more specific. Your inventory can literally hold any object in the game that you can carry, in addition to the merchanct specific wares and exotic tools.

Would just bumping the BAB to 3/4tsh and HD to d8 solve most of those issues as not be suited for combot outside of utility focuses. Damage should not be the classes strongsuite save for an armorer build. Risky trader is there for the likes of effects that require attack rolls or improving the dc of any movie you make in a pinch. You need that rope to tie somebody up when you throw it? Risky trader for the touch attack. Want that tanglefootbag to be more effective? Risky trader. its supposed to be a focrce multiplier on effects.

As for skills, I could add something in the way to add more skill focus to them. Aside from the changeable +2-6 bonus to any number of skills they chose, in addition to allowing them to make checks untrained, I'm adding the ability for risky trader to be used on skill checks.


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What might be best to do first is to figure out what kind of game role this class should be able to fill.
Did you want this class to be capable of killing or disabling opponents in combat? A problem solver? A group buffer? A mix of options, jack of all trades?

This class has a bit of a "hand-waivey" feel to it. What I mean is, you don't specifically list exact equipment on hand, so you can make it up as you go. This is actually a good thing, but it is of a certain taste that this class might not be for everyone.

An example of the concept is the Well-Prepared feat:

Well-Prepared wrote:

Somehow, you always seem to have the right tools or supplies close at hand.

Prerequisite: Halfling.
Benefit: Once per day, when confronted with a situation that calls for a particular mundane item of equipment, you may make a Sleight of Hand check with a DC of 10 plus the item's cost in gold pieces to "happen" to have such an item on your person. For example, having a crowbar would be DC 12, whereas a flask of acid would be DC 20. The item must be something you can easily carry—if you are on foot and have only a backpack, for example, you could not have a large iron cauldron. You cannot have magical items using this feat, nor can you have specific items, such as the key to a particular door. If you are stripped of your equipment or possessions, you lose the benefits of this feat until you have at least a day to resupply and "acquire" new items. You must pay for these items normally.
Special: At the GM's option, a character can substitute the Survival skill for Sleight of Hand with this feat. Such a choice is permanent.

What you could do with the Merchant is something similar:

- You have an inventory on hand, a wide selection of items that you can use, trade or sell as needed.
- The items in your inventory are nebulous: you don't have to pin down exactly what you have at a given moment. Instead, you can try and see if you have the tool or item needed with a check of some kind (since you are a merchant, maybe a Profession check?) to see if you have it (or some equivalent) on hand.
- You have a certain amount of floating "gold value" for this inventory. When you pull an item from your Schrodinger's backpack (haha) you take the value of that item from this total. This replenishes whenever you have a chance to replenish your inventory with trade.
- Start off with only non-magical items/equipment, and what can fit in your storage (so if you have a backpack, or pack mule, only items that fit in such places). Upgrades over levels adds certain levels/kinds of magic items (wondrous items?) to your inventory, and grants you automatic access to dimensional storage (handy haversack and/or bags of holding).
-Major items (such as magical weapons, armor, etc) can be gained by permanently depleting from your inventory's gold stores.

This would give you a role-benefit of utility/problem solver: you can pull something from behind your back and have a solution to a problem.. whether it's a crowbar to open a chest, a folding boat to get down that river, or a scroll of cure blindness to recover the fighter.

.

Other class ideas that push a certain role:

- Automatic languages: a merchant would probably gain at least a few major languages over the course of levels to ensure that he can communicate in the various places he'll adventure. Lower levels should grant Undercommon, Goblin, Aklo, etc... later levels grant Draconic and planar languages.

- Skill bonus: 1/2 level to Appraise, Diplomacy, Intimidate, Bluff, and Profession skills would be highly appropriate, along with your quicker use of the skill it would make them great faces to the party.

- New function for the appraise skill: learn magical functions of items using just the skill. This would be check based on a vast knowledge of items, rather than actually seeing the magical effects.
Higher level versions can give legend lore levels of knowledge of an item.

These all give more towards the problem solver/party face roles.

- Bump HD to d8, 3/4 BAB, and Medium armor plus shields. This gives them a decent combat presence that can be boosted to effective levels by choosing the right wares or items to self buff.

- Gain proficient use of whatever items he has from his inventory. So if he gives himself an exotic weapon, he can use it without penalty.
The merchant learns the function of the items he trades so he can properly sell it to a prospective buyer.

This gives him more combat ability on his own.

- More Aid Another abilities (multiple people at once if you give up your action, etc).

- Give others the benefits of teamwork feats (though you don't necessarily gain the benefit).

This gives more towards buffing the party.

.
Some or all of these can boost the jack of all trades effects of the merchant class.

Gotta go... more thoughts later.


@Kaisoku Thats pretty awesome man. Like to see you finish it for us lol

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This seems like a really neat concept. Reminds me of MacGuyver.

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