Cranston777's page

Hello,

Straight to the point, I might home rule that caster level is tied to your hit dice and not your class. I am bothered by the fact that non-casters can multi-class and prestige all over the place, but casters are afraid to most of the time because their caster level will suffer. My thought is simple, your caster level is based on your hit dice instead of your class level, because it is “caster” not “class” and as you advance as a character no matter what your class, you are a spell caster if you cast spells. This will not affect spells per day, spells know or anything else tied to the class.

My example:
Sorcerer level 4
Spells Known 6/3/1
Spells Per Day 6/3
• The sorcerer wants to rage, just because, so he takes:
Barbarian level 4
• Yay he can rage now, he wants to continue casting spells as a sorcerer so he jumps back

At this point normally he would be caster level 4 which puts him at a major loss in power.
My rule would mean his caster level is 8, he still casts 6/3 with 6/3/1 known.
Any familiar or bloodline powers do not advance or progress as they are tied to the Sorcerer class level.

The only reason I won’t do this is if someone here can point out to me any major game mechanics that would be broken or if there are any major loop holes that would rip the fabric of a game apart by creating a crazy over powered player. Personally I can’t think of anything like that.

Please note from a point of politeness:

Long time player, long time GM, I know the system and am asking for a different point of view, not a crash course on Pathfinder mechanics.

My example is just an example please don’t tell me to play a Bloodrager.

This is not for a specific player, myself, or NPC, I simply thought about the rules today and said “hmmm that seems kinda lame” and thought to potentially change it.

Short:
All character classes with less than 6+INT, gain 6+INT for initial skill points.
Each player selects one skill that is tied to their character story, this skill must be raised every level. If a non class skill is selected it becomes a class skill.

Long:
I thought I would throw this out there just to see what kinda feed back I would get. In my own personal games I think that the skill point distribution is quite unfair for some of the classes and makes little sense. To say a fighter is unskilled is an insult. I served in the United States Marine Corps and I can assure you that "fighters" "warriors" and anyone else that wants to survive in the battle field has just as many "skills" as lawyers or doctors, they are just different types of skills. To that end I added a home brew rule to character creation in MY games. All character classes raise their initial skill point count to 6+INT if it is below 6. In addition to that each player may select one skill that becomes a class skill (if it isn't already), this skill must be tied into their character story and must be raised every level. The idea is that each player brings to the table a different set of skills, not that one player is more skilled than another. I was told right off the bat that "Wizards would gain a huge advantage over everyone else as their primary stat is INT." I have found no proof in that statement what so ever, in most cases it allows wizards to fill in more knowledge skills as every knowledge in the game is a class skill.

I have had no problems with balance. In fact balancing the skill values for all the classes allows many characters that would sit in the background for part of an adventure to step up and get involved.

I would not suggest changing a currently running game but I would be pleased if anyone out there would take this idea and try it for yourselves on a new game you might be planing.