Unchained Alchemist


Homebrew and House Rules


I've always loved the alchemist class for all the zany weird things it can do and the cool aesthetic, but no matter how I've built it, I've never found the Alchemist to be a terribly satisfying class to play as. So I wrote a fan-Unchaining and I hope people like it.
Iorthol's Unchained Alchemist: The Google Doc
The general idea behind the alchemist is that their spellcasting list is almost entirely self-buffs, which is a cool take on a 'spellcaster' hybrid type, but action economy never really worked out.
Most of the serious casters are typically going to be buffing other characters if they're doing to be doing buffs (There are of course always exceptions) but most hybrid classes either have a hefty dose of abilities that buff themselves using swift actions, or give themselves the ability to cast spells as swift actions, or in the case of magus, casting a spell as part of a full-round action.
So the idea that the alchemist's major buffs during combat come either from their Mutagen or Extracts is great except they burn entire turns doing what other more dramatic hybrid types are doing as accessories to other actions, which is one of the main things I wanted to fix.
Rather than invent a resource pool, do something funny with bombs, or anything complicated like that, I simply decided on the Quaff ability, that lets the alchemist down an extract that is not their highest level of extract as a swift action, and being able to quaff 6th level extracts at level 19 (when they would logically get 7th level spells following their progression pattern)
Alchemists Edge was added because Poisons, without heavy house rules, are Meh at best in a lot of circumstances, and for attack-oriented alchemists I wanted there to be an incentive to using the traditional alchemical items that likely inspired the class to exist.
Likewise, much of the class feels like it should be interacting with the mundane alchemy, so Overstock was added in as a quality of life improvement, keeping an alchemists bags stocked with pseudo-real mundane trinkets.
Mutagen always felt funky to me. The standard action activation time, the overlong duration, and the fact that you can only do it once a day unless you take an hour downtime always made it feel like it was never the Right time to mutate, so I wanted to give it easier access. This iteration of the modification to mutagen is scaled as it is mostly to fill in the gaps in level 9 12 and 15, but I'm not entirely sure I like how often this allows while also robbing the class of persistent mutagen, so that is really the only part of my unchaining that I'm not totally certain on yet.


It doesn't fit what I would consider a thematic improvement. My problem with the alchemist is my character concepts rarely overlap the "physical chemistry" side (bombs, Disable Device, elemental transmutations) and the "biochemistry" side (mutagen, most extracts). In other words, I can't really use the entire class, only parts of it. I think that this is why almost every alchemist recommended is either a grenadier (physical) or vivisectionist (bio). Maybe try to make separate specializations?


It's funny that you say that because I originally was going to make thematic specializations but my initial attempt was too complicated for what I imagine falls in line with an Unchaining process.

I feel like bombs have enough Discovery support and functionality already which is why I completely left that mechanic alone.


This is a power up in all ways. There is nothing given up, so in that way I do not approve. The alchemist has certain strengths and certain shortcomings, but that does not mean that is it a weak class. Like the bard, you must play to its strengths: it cannot do everything you want it to.

I feel the same as you, that the alchemist is a great looking class with a seemingly bizarre combination of abilities, but I think a proper unchaining of a class that isn't actually weak must surrender something. For example, what if you chose one specialty at 1st level (mutagen, bombs, poison, extracts), gain some kind of benefit related to that, but still possibly have the option to do all of those things in one form or another.

I have always felt that Throw Anything should be scrapped. You're making touch attacks, wizards don't get +1 on rays for free. I also think that poison resistance has its place, but the other poison stuff is useless to 90% of alchemists. These kinds of things could be used to make room for other features.


Ciaran Barnes wrote:
I have always felt that Throw Anything should be scrapped. You're making touch attacks, wizards don't get +1 on rays for free.

Wizards get fireballs, crowd control area spells, and so on. There's no problem beefing up the Alchemists only real ranged attack capability (barring Grenadier)

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This feels like a messy and unneeded buff to the alchemist. The only thing I liked was an attempt to give the alchemist some version of cantrips. However, I think a better approach would just let the alchemist prepare polypurpose panacea at-will with the restriction that an individual can't have multiple benefits at once.


You only buffed the alchemist rather than trade anything out.

The alchemist is a fairly strong class, but I agree in that something just doesn't seem to click.

As far as self buffing goes, you are suppose to drink these buffs before initiative starts.

With what you gave the alchemist here, bombs should be dropped.

One idea for faster mundane alchemy is to bring the rate and cost up to magic item level, such as 1,000 gold per day at half cost instead of X silver at 1/3 cost. You could probably then add what you want to the alchemist by writing up some alchemical items. Furthermore, you could add a feature that lets the alchemist trade extracts for temporary alchemical items.
You could throw out bombs and mutagens entirely and just make a series of items that the alchemist could mimic and maybe use better than normal people (like mutagens have terrible a side effects that the alchemist can ignore).


Cyrad wrote:
I think a better approach would just let the alchemist prepare polypurpose panacea at-will with the restriction that an individual can't have multiple benefits at once.

My alchemist has a bit of an addiction to those. Any unused extracts get used at the end of the day.

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