My gut reaction was unbalancing, but I think that was too quick. I really like it from a player perspective. I think the economy of actions is enough of a balance, and the +2 levels is appropriate.
Only thing I can really think off the bat is that requiring the spell to be Dismissable for the feat to be applied. This avoids things like Suspending a Summoned Swarm before it starts attacking your allies, which I like to hold to flavor of the game.
I'd probably like to see a limit on number that can be sustained, but one doesn't seem much fun, and any other arbitrary number doesn't seem right.
Imagining a Halfling Barbarian using a sling staff to throw angry bullets and then clubbing away in melee, and it's even kind of effective. But that's entertaining, so not a bad thing. Everyone using composite bows can get a bit dull. As far as Crossbow I'm not to big on the flat +3 damage, just feels flat and too fighterish. Would personally prefer a fighter exclusive feat that adds Dex mod to Crossbow damage, which is normally unmodified, as opposed to allowing anyone to add dex mod to sling damage which can already benefit from strength.
Momentum strike: At fifth level when attacking with a weapon that he did not attack with on his previous attack or a creature he did not attack with his previous attack a warcrafter gains an additional d8 damage on a succesful attack. He can get this bonus multiple times in one turn as long as he attacks with a different weapon or a different creature. This bonus increases to 2d8 at tenth level.
I'm envisioning the golf bags of vengeance and justice two party members of mine had. We've tried to get away from carrying around 20 different weapons since, I don't think your intention is to be pulling out a new weapon for every hit, not an effective fighting style, but this is a fantasy game. Personally would probably opt for all attacks in a round on a an opponent that has not been attacked before due to unpredictable fighting style.
Another alternative might just be Powerful Cleave + 1d8 damage when performing Cleave Attacks, +2d8 at 10.
Nice class conceptually, looking forward to your work.
A walljump ability's not that hard to get going mechanically. We already have one for wall-running(a feat for Monk or the climb skill technically could do it). Since you're bouncing between 2 points, I'd have to say the DC should be 2x intended jump distance. That's higher than the 1x for the fairly easy horizontal jump & lower than the more physics-hindered 4x for vertical jump. From a mechanics standpoint, it's essentially a...
Ok, the simplicity is nice, makes a lot of crazy things possible, but this is High Fantasy. I'd still prefer more difficulty for the rebound jump, so personally might use something like this, (Total DC of Vert Jump / 1+Rebound Points) + 10 and each rebound consumes 5 ft of movement for shifting momentum. So to jump up the 30 ft chute in 2 Jumps would be DC 70 and 35ft, 3 Jumps DC 50 for 40ft, 4 DC 40 for 45ft, 5 DC 34 for 50ft, 6 DC 30 for 55ft.
That is probably overly complicated, Multiplication and Division in DC determination, so 2x really may be the better way to go for a Fantasy game, thanks.
I don't see a harder metal increasing the craftsmanship of the gun to reduce misfiring, it doesn't misfire because the iron is breaking, it's just a harder more durable gun. The overloading gunpowder is an interesting idea, but in the end I think i'd expect a magic enhancement to reduce misfire, magic can do anything.
On the other hand, pistol whipping golems, that's a good use of an adamantine gun.
+1 on the The_Normal_Anomaly's Long Post
1d8 Two Handed Martial Weapon w/ 18-20 Threat Range
The Katana is as much a finesse weapon as a Longsword. As a long time L5R player, I like the idea of maybe a single Samurai school that wields the daisho set, but this ability should be rarer than just a feat.
Now a 1d12 2H Exotic Nodachi would peak my interest, or better yet a Tetsubo, because Greatclub does not do it justice. Earthbreaker Hammer mechanics would do it well enough though.
That is per rules, and isn't very useful to someone adept with the lock picks in the first place. Knock at a caster level of 3 would only be a +13 to disable device, but would bypass two locks.
So I would suggest using the Chime of Opening as a reference for the base item.
PRD wrote:
Chime of Opening
Aura moderate transmutation; CL 11th
Slot —; Price 3,000 gp; Weight 1 lb.
Description
A chime of opening is a hollow mithral tube about 1 foot long. When struck, it sends forth magical vibrations that cause locks, lids, doors, valves, and portals to open. The device functions against normal bars, shackles, chains, bolts, and so on. a chime of opening also automatically dispels a hold portal spell or even an arcane lock cast by a wizard of lower than 15th level.
The chime must be pointed at the item or gate to be loosed or opened (which must be visible and known to the user). The chime is then struck and a clear tone rings forth. The wielder can make a caster level check Against the lock or binding, using the chime's caster level of 11th. The DC of this check is equal to the Disable Device DC to open the lock or binding. Each sounding only opens one form of locking, so if a chest is chained, padlocked, locked, and arcane locked, it takes four successful uses of a chime of opening to get it open. a silence spell negates the power of the device. a brand-new chime can be used a total of 10 times before it cracks and becomes useless.
That effect in mind, do math to change price to 3 charges per day, 3000 * 5 * 2 / (5/3)
Resulting in a price of 18100 with 100 for being Mwk Thievestools.
Functions like Knock, but only one lock bypassed per use, but with a +21 to bypass the DC.
Keeping in mind that the previous item at CL 11 would have cost 23860, but would bypass two locks.
Overall it's a nice item, but Knock isn't really useful for rogue types, and thieve's tools aren't really useful for those that need Knock, flavor of item is nice though, so I wouldn't bother including the 100gp in the price. The hefty price tag is off putting, so I'd probably only give it to a party if I think they'd actually be keeping it and not trying to pawn it off on vendors.
To really get the price down, I might suggest only 1 use per day for the chime like version, and then it'd be 6100 gp. A nice tool for a rogue still training his lock pick skills, the +21 once per day can get past some things that normally can't even be picked.
1d3 damage cantrips aren't really a viable option in any situation I've ever been in other than finishing off trolls. I generally don't see many wands at early levels, but these are a good option for a GM to introduce to a campaign with slow levels and arcane casters too often on the sidelines. I know as a player I generally have difficulty using wands heavily when if they're a possibility of selling them later.
I wish I remembered where I saw the numbers, but low level characters are not balanced for more than X number of encounters per day. Martial classes will always be ready, healers ability usage is completely based on difficulty of encounters, and spell casters are in the unique position to be able to conserve their abilities. Conservation is a fun aspect of the game for some involving strategy and the like, but others don't get quite the same kick out of knowing they're capabilities and choosing to sit back from the front line.
There is also the possibility that the GM is running way too many encounters per adventuring day, if this is the case, balance is already out the window, and you can broaden your options by quite a bit, to go as far as refreshing spells mid day, or one or two spells after every encounter.
What's balanced for one campaign is not for all. RAW makes it pretty hard to keep casters relevant over the course of too many encounters, and playing an irrelevant character is not fun.
Arcane Shield - Personally don't like immediate actions, so I'm slightly biased, and level 10 sounds like a long enough time to delay more of them in the game. Unbalancing, not really, irritating to me as GM, probably.
Arcane Blast - Could be balanced with lower damage, but this defeats the point in my mind. Shocking Grasp or Magic Missile should be better than sacrificing Comprehend Languages for the day in battle, so quite unbalancing as written. Sacrificing a prepared spell for a 1d4 ranged touch attack(Only damage die worse than Shocking Grasp or Magic Missile) does not seem a better option that a level 0 for 1d3 or a crossbow.
If you really want Sorcerer/Wizards to have low level stamina, I'd just switch the 3+Mod /day abilities back to at will as in the beta. But personally I prefer better rounded stat builds that can still participate in combat at low levels just a few points to hit and damage behind.
I think Wizards had a feat for spontaneous domain casting that I liked on similar mechanics. Overall I like the idea, and especially with the Channel uses being a decent ability in my play, it's a reasonable cost. Flavor wise it seems to make sense as the removes are more positive energy like, hold person is the only one in my mind that doesn't seem to fit for negative energy. Unfortunately the only real spells that stand out as negative energy are undead related.
If anything I'd prefer a little more customization in the feat, maybe something as simple as choose two spells you know that are at least one level less than your highest level of available spells, not domain spells. But that is really getting away from the core idea of the feat and more tangent although kind of alternative.
In my opinion with how the movement and system is setup. 60 feet would the be most a ninja would be able to move, but with a possible Super-Ki action enhanced movement.
In other words i think Ki should be involved in what you are suggestion to augment the movements and only with the use of a Ki power.
But that's my opinion because looking at something from our reality like "Parkour". They need a great moment to scale surfaces that are near each other, and even then they are only able to scale up to a certain height within a certain time limit.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkour
I'd prefer wall jumping to be not a ninja exclusive idea, but more an advanced use of the acrobatics skill. The ninja ki use already grants a +20 to the check enabling more difficult feats, I'm just trying to establish rules for more difficult feats. Although the idea of possibly adding movement speed for the round exclusive to jumping is interesting to make more difficult feats possible.
My original thoughts were based less in reality and more on video games, but I like the contrast to Parkour. The mechanics already stipulate a maximum in air time of 6 seconds as the beginning and end of a round, and you can not end movement on a not solid surface.
The big difference in what is possible in reality and Pathfinder can be seen in the jump distances. In reality, the record holding vertical leap is 61", let alone the average NBA player at 28". While in Pathfinder, the ninja using Ki Power can clear 60" rolling a 1, and 120" rolling a 20. Combine with actual ranks in the skill from levels and the possibilites are far out of this world.
However movement speeds which are just as important are a bit more in line with reality, a human double move being around 7 mph, or full x4 run at ~14mph. So to outperform the world record you need haste, and even then you're not too far ahead, or be a monk. Which I sadly kind of forgot about, but is the best jumper in the game.
Anyhow, that was a lot of reality that helped me conceptualize wall jumping being possible, and not nearly as difficult for Acrobats as in reality. Although in watching Parkour videos and old Ninja Gaiden clips, I realized what I was imagining was more akin to the parkour jumping, where Ninja Gaiden is more a jumping and clinging to a wall. This however lead me to wonder about DCs concerned with this maneuver, staple to Assassin's Creed.
How hard is it to catch yourself on a wall?
Climb check with Climb DC of Wall +10 for instability, would be my first thought.
Since Monk Flurry is now akin to TWF progression, I don't see much issue balance wise with any one-handed weapons. As far as thrown they should be light in my mind, seem to remember something about one-handed being more difficult to throw.
I'd be against making Splash Weapons or Improvised Weapons a selectable option for the feat, but something like Shot-puts would make sense, then just need quick draw and bunch of crafted orbs.
Just to be clear I'm think of a monk alchemist, not a monk/alchemist, I have no memory of how alchemist abilities work with additional attacks.
Was thinking about this the other day, and with Ninja on the way it seems timely, ideas for rules governing wall jumping Ninja Gaiden style.
Basic idea I had was to treat the second surface as Severely Unsteady, +10 to DC, and the second jump is without running start regardless. Although, in the case where the second surface is actually Severely Unsteady, the two factors would compound, so probably best to give call it something else.
So to jump up the 5ft wide chimney chute to a ledge 30ft up would require 6 DC 30 Jump checks, each one representing a 5ft vertical jump, and 60 ft of movement for each jump being 5ft up and 5 ft back towards opposing wall. Of course this could also be done by just a series of rolled jumps without a set DC and take the check divided by four as vertical progression, using 10ft of movement each jump.
As in any movement or jump, you can't end turn in air or on wall, so movement speed should keep this in check well enough. Other than that, a lot of common sense, needing semi opposing face for angles and the like.
This all seems possible for a level 2 acrobatic ninja with a double move action, or for my case a Flame Oracle in Agile Breastplate.
Anyhow, I'm open to ideas or impressions, +10 to DC may be too much, additional movement for the 180 degree momentum shift might make sense. Its nothing game breaking other than the ability to possibly scale a sheer surface without magic. If some one already posted something similar, my apologizes, and I'd be curious to read it.
Dominated the summoner who was already invisible and hiding, commanded his eidolon to attack
Just want to point out that this isn't as cut-and-dry as you state.
Eidolons are not forced to obey their summoner's commands, unless I'm missing something, nor does dominate person transfer to the Eidolon. A good-aligned Eidolon isn't going to just turn on his long-time travel companions for no reason.
You're right to point it out, this was an issue that came up at the table. We made determination that eidolon follows order without question to avoid other issues, but other play groups may play this differently.
So yes a summoner is going to be without his pet for a day if he lets it die. It doesnt seem worse off then anyone else dieing though. Does the cleric normally carry around 5000 diamonds and prepare raise dead in this game? Usually a near party wipe like that puts the adventure on hold for a day anyway.
They had in total, three scrolls of raise dead and 2 breaths of life prepared. I know it's a bit much, but play group is used to more high risk, high reward ventures.
As far as responses of don't let it die, the eidolon had best AC in the party, it not dying just means someone else dies faster. Same could be said to any other class, most classes are fairly ineffective dead, so they should avoid death.
I said in original post that I personally thought he was quite effective without his eidolon. Being the only one who could cast haste honestly made him the biggest damage dealer in the party. However, the player wanted his pet. Sure he could do other things, but that's not what he made his character to do.
Thanks to all for feed back, everyone ahs different play style, and that's why there are house rules.
Alright, so maybe a courteous player won't nova, but a hateful GM might, as I did in playtest. Dominated the summoner who was already invisible and hiding, commanded his eidolon to attack, and started summoning 1d3 lions each round. They focused fire on the succubus first after failing to dispel the dominate. She died midway through 2nd round. Eidolon was pinning the sorcerer at this point, fighter was confused, druid tried summoning but was grappled while casting, and cleric tried to heal. So, it continued, fighter, druid, and cleric had enough AC that they were surviving. But sorcerer died that round, and eidolon moved on to cleric. So at that point, fighter and druid kill the summoner, takes 3 rounds. At this point the the 8 lions kept on fighting, finishing off weakened cleric that round, druid in next, and fighter two rounds later, with 4 lions to spare.
So the lesson we all learned was if the summoner starts to act funny, pin his face to the ground. And he was to never be out of sight from the party at any time. We also house ruled at the table that they were to be standard action extended, instead of how presented for a quick fix.
So in a playtest I killed his eidolon, not to mention his fighter and druid friends. Well, the fighter and druid got raised. The eidolon couldn't be, so the summoner whined and moaned for the next 5 encounters in the day.
Summoner as a class is growing on me, we had some issues but the things that really were problematic we fixed at table and are already being discussed to very long length in other threads.
The issue I'd like to report with a possible solution is the dead eidolon. While I think it should be a set back when the eidolon dies, I'm not sure it should be more of a set back than when the fighter dies. I can see why one could want it to be more a set back to counter balance the free raise he'll get if he waits a day, but for fun gaming it doesn't feel right leaving him so out of the game for rest of session. And while he was arguably just as good as the rest of his party without his eidolon due to spending his time casting party spell buffs, he wanted his pet back.
Talking with my player, we came to idea of using the Planar Binding spells as a sort of raise dead for the day. Ignoring what the spell actually does as far as bargaining and trapping, just using it to call back the eidolon, 10 minute cast time, a material component comparable to raise dead/resurrection, gives it similar use. If more mechanic needed, different bindings could work better for recalling the eidolon to this plane, with a gate spell working more like true resurrection.
A summoner may cast spells on his eidolon even if the spells
normally do not affect creatures of the eidolon’s type
(outsider).
Notice that it isn't dependent on the previous sentence at all and is in of itself a whole and complete sentence.
Agreed that Enlarge Person can be shared, which makes me question why Summoner even has share spell. What can a summoner cast with share spell that they couldn't cast normally?
Shareable spells:
Shield, they have enough AC
Expetious Retreat, good spell, haste will come later, but good spell
Reduce/Enlarge Person, asks to be abused
Alter Self, *sigh*
Fire Shield, good spell, wouldn't mind seeing this as an evolution ability
Dimension Door, Teleport, Greater Teleport, send away eidolon and stay where you are, not really necessary
Ethereal Jaunt, annoying
Spell Turning, good spell
Just think it'd be nice to get Eidolon away from the typical familiar stereo-typed abilities. He's not a familiar, he's not a part of you, and a class that's spell list is a large majority buffs for others, the ability to cast a few self only buff spells on the eidolon is unnecessary.
Yeah, hex is an action that provokes because it says it is. I'm kinda in between on the issue. Easy fix would be to make them spell like and then they could be just cast defensively but would then be subject to spell resistance and the like. I like them bypassing spell resistance, but the AoO for every melee hex is a problem, so I would like less melee hexes personally, most of them seem like they would work just as well as ranged powers. And a ranged hex that negates ability to make AoOs like the rogue can might not be all bad.
So if you can find a 15th level Gnomish Armor Expert you can have your +5 Huge Full Plate it just about 35 weeks. As long as your BBEG doesn't mind waiting 3 weeks for the summoner to take his time enchanting the armor afterwards.
Need to remember that next time anyone asks for something made out of special materials or high level magic items, those don't exist, too much work. But seriously, it's a fantasy world, and if you really wanted a huge suit of armor you could commission 100 peasant armor crafters to make it piece by piece in about a week taking 10 for a 14. Although if you want to stick by the rules, they'll have trouble making the masterwork component.
Point is that most of the time armor crafting is not a one man job, and when it is, you're right, it takes forever. But it's not really that much longer than anything your average party of adventurers normally has.
In regards to boosting their AC further, share spell and summoner spell list gives it a nice extra boost.
Barkskin for further natural armor 10min/lvl
Reduce Person for a little AC and fitting where huge things can't go, keep most of the strength and all the natural armor 1min/lvl
Mage Armor if your GM won't allow you to have any huge armor 1hr/lvl
Shield spell for extra AC without sacrificing an arm. 1min/lvl
Few other spells that make them harder to hit but for sake of completeness
One last note for people scared of Dismissal/Banishment, Dimensional Anchor your pet, as A GM I would still allow those two spells to work since they're not listed in dimensional anchor, but rules might be otherwise.
Like I said, one example, if you prefer the summoner and healer to be a mile away it works just as well, just suggesting line of effect would be a good requirement for common sense. And Die Hard works very well for both pets and summoners, no problem with that.
. Actually if the creature is an excessive distance from the summoner, it dies. I don't have the book, but I know it's max hp drop to75% after 100 ft and get worse the farther away you are.
It goes out to 10,000 ft, well within a mile, at 75% max health, max health isn't much a factor in this scenario since it's the summoner's max that matters, and he has an average hit die.
My only question is how often are you going to come across +5 Huge Full Plate and + 5 Huge Steel Shield? It is up to the DM to keep balance through out the game and if he/she is handing out this kind of loot I would be scarred for the life of my character because there could be another Summoner out there with a very similar Eidolon.
Summoner can craft items, maybe they do have a use other than being friends with a monster. It may be the GM's place to keep balance, but a huge suit of armor isn't that hard to find. At the point where a player can afford +5 anything, the cost of commissioning a bunch of blacksmiths to make it bigger isn't that much.
Bigger and smaller creatures shift the weapon sizes down and up. So a Small creature would shift all weapon sizes up one (a small weapon becomes medium)and a Large creature would shift all weapon sizes down one (a large weapon becomes medium). See, much easier, simple, and more logical. Actually, how difficult would it be to house rule weapon to work more like I described above?
Very easily done, it's how the weapon sizes worked in 3E before 3.5 changed it. I always liked it and it made finding weapons for different size characters randomly a bit easier.
Well since the life link ability can only be done when an eidolon takes enough damge to send him back to his plane, the summoner would be able to use this ability once the eidolon takes that much damage however an eidolon can still be brought to negs within 1 of its con, if the summoner can stay alive while taking the eidolons damage the answer is yes but the eidolon would be rendered useless once it goes into the negatives unless it has a fierocity ability associated with it. The downside is that one the healer must keep up with all damage taken and the summoner has a poor hit die and healers cant heal all day. also the sphere wont last forever
Like I said, one example, if you prefer the summoner and healer to be a mile away it works just as well, just suggesting line of effect would be a good requirement for common sense. And Die Hard works very well for both pets and summoners, no problem with that.
Waiting on an answer to this one. When I first read class I assumed they were creatures with all the possible slots for magic items just like a person, with a few logical exceptions.
However for my playtest, I'm only allowing the armor and weapon slots, no other magic items, even non slotted, work, the magical nature of eidolons interferes with the way they work. It's a necessary for class balance at this point.
Zurai's interpretation is correct, it's a free action that can be taken "Whenever an Eidolon takes enough damage to send it back to its home plane".
I still have questions on this ability, mainly if it requires any line of effect, or can a summoner sit fortified in a resilient sphere with a healer while the eidolon is nearly unkillable?
And that's just one simple example, and I'm aware that it has to be a completely killing blow, so if you can just deal a blow that send it to being unconscious you're good to go.
A humanoid beast, plated with armor wielding a huge greatsword, Soul Calibur inspired, he's just a huge warrior that hits pretty damn hard while power attacking with a free bite/trip on full attacks and a very nice vital strike when he can't.
Nightmare pic here if you're not familiar
Nightmare:
Biped Eidolon of 15Smn
CE huge outsider
Init +2; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +15
Defense
AC 34, touch 10, flat-footed 33 (+16 natural, –2 size, +9 armor, +1 dex)
hp 149 (13d10+78)
Fort +13, Ref +6, Will +8
Offense
Speed 30 ft. (20 ft. in fullplate)
Melee Huge Greatsword +27/22/17 (4d8?+26/19–20) or 2 Claws +24 (1d8 +9), bite +26 (2d6+18 plus trip)
Space 15 ft.; Reach 15 ft.
Statistics
Str 47, Dex 14, Con 21, Int 7, Wis 10, Cha 11
Base Atk +13; CMB +33; CMD 45
I have to admit that I don't really like the lower level versions of spells. For instance, now I suppose that a wand of Teleport is possible, and wands/potions/scrolls of Haste just got significantly cheaper. Not to mention Summon Monster IX as a 6th level spell... :-/
Would hate to not mention those wonderful potions of stoneskin.
I wouldn't nix the minute-per-level duration, I actually like that, I would just restrict the number of summoned monsters that a summoner can call at any one time to maybe one, then possibly up to three or so at a time at higher levels.
Personally kind of torn, but agree that there are other fixes I wouldn't have much problems with.
As a gm I'd definitely prefer to keep players to a one pet limit, summoner already has an eidolon, but that's more because my play groups complete ineptness in the math department and every pet literally exponentially increases the time it takes to complete a turn.
As a player, I use summon monster and the durations are too short for the out of combat situations they really excel at. I really liked the standard action cast times for the summoners, I think my happy medium would be free as bonus spells, auto extend, and standard action to cast. But it really just depends on play group for this kind of ability.
You want wishes you'll just have to bind and bargain with genies the old fashioned way, highly supporting the no costly material component spell likes.
For most part agree with OP, I too run/play in games where consecutive fights with no downtime are common. Multiplying a spells duration by ten fold in this case makes it the equivalent of being able to cast the spell ten times. And the ability to cast your highest level spell over 30+cha mod *10 times per day is kinda crazy. Given, it's all situational, and if you run those kinda of games I'd just recommend house ruling the duration down.
I was amazed when I read they could cast it as a standard actions, hehe.
As far as offense, they have an Eidolon, enough said.
it would seem even less likely that the character would have spent time learning to cast spells in armor when he has spells that protect him far better.
Right, right, agreed, forgot the whole common sense thing, why would he learn to cast in armor? If he wants to there are feats to learn, bards have that whole excuse with spells being more verbal and the somatics are supposed to be simpler in nature.
As far as familiar breaking, it's off topic, but it was old 3.5 so thankfully most of it doesn't carry over. You can still easily polymorph your familiar into something and share spell pretty much everything in the book including transformation last. Thankfully, pathfinder got rid of the whole stat changing so a polymorphed familiar is still a semi weak critter...unless you're a small character with a tiny familiar, that could open up some options.
Quijenoth wrote:
Share spells doesnt work the same way in pathfinder as they did in 3.5 - 3.5 you could cast shield on yourself and it would also affect your familiar within the same casting - under pathfinder you must cast it twice.
And that is wonderful news, another one of those rules I assumed didn't change and never had a reason to look up, thank you paizo
Bugger you reminded me they get share spell...and then they get large size, and then the mounted summoner, with...dammit...I was already banned from playing familiars.
I'd like to see a bit more of the commanding eidolon nature, as it is now it's ill defined, probably intentionally to allow for more character options, but more to the point I want to feeblemind the summoner and have his eidolon go on a berserk uncontrolled killing rampage.
Sorry, have trouble getting past the feeling of Cleric being OP since...well always, but in seriousness, looking at it more, I'm inclined to agree as they are a half speed BA, they just have such a split spell list between arcane and divine, I can see it being a tough call to make. Just need to think of it as the normal healing progression, cleric's are the jerks with the accelerated version.
Way I see the class is he's a combat caster who could use a bit of armor. Spell list is mostly buff spells, he's proficient with weapons, decent attack bonus, and he can even mutate his body later on to grant himself unique attacks.
They can use wands of cure light wounds, and cast heal much later on, not really much more I can ask for from a healing class, except maybe being a cleric, but I think that's asking for a bit too much.
I personally like Charisma for the summoner, but it's more a flavor thing really. I didn't imagine the eidolon as my friend as much a planar spawned creature bent by my will forced to do my bidding. Only problem I have with it is that most of their spells are buffs or conjurations without DCs, so you're better off making a well rounded fighter to give you more to do while your pet fights. And then there's the level 20 ability that changes your stats, was happy when pathfinder did away with that for druid, would prefer not to see it come back, but again, it's a level 20 ability.
Witch I though was going to be wisdom when I saw it, was surprised by int, but it's prepared arcane spell casting, so I think either fits just fine, and would be easy to house rule either way. I know I've been playing a charisma based sorcerer and calling it a witch for a couple years now.
It reminds of my astral construct based build from 3.5. I like it. I will be messing with it in the days too come. At first glance it looks OP, but I liked to see in action first.
Yeah, enjoyed that spell a lot as well.
Having a lot of fun with the multitude of eidolon options, with barely any tweaking it's a fully playable player class as well as a really easy way to make monsters while keeping CR in some form of check. It's just a bunch of templates rolled into one, loving it.
By full caster I only mean at level 16 they have caster level 16 and can cast level 9 equivalent spells, you don't need 9 levels of spells to be a full caster. But really trying to get other people's ideas on Eidolons, haven't looked at the man behind the monster nearly as much.
Life Bond and Life link, one won't die as long as other is up, and then there's the ease of healing what can almost be like two life totals merged into one. They get a good selection of defensive buff spells on their list.
And I have a feeling Simulacrum causes any damage you take to transfer to pet.
Ok quick mock up at level 15 since that's level of current campaign.
Biped Eidolon Lvl 15
20 EV points
2 Armor
2 Weapon
6 Str
3 Large
4 Huge
1 Bite
2 Grab(Bite)
Would make him a quadruped with arms and pounce to be a bit more efective, but I'm trying to make a pet barbarian, sadly one point short of DR.
47 str = 16 base + 6lvl + 6ev + 8l + 8h +3in
21 Higher than player's raging Barbarian at 26
21 con = 13 base + 4l +4h
Only 1 higher
And 2 less base attack than his Barbarian
One less feat and about 10% or so fewer hit points.
Not computing AC, Barbar cries
No DR, and admittingly, no player of mine is walking through town with a huge beast, let alone most dungeons...sadly he's still got better damage without the size increases but their to hit perfectly evens out, and his hp takes a big hit without it.
Making assumption that summoner invest most of money on attack gear for pet and ac for self, so he should end up with just as weaponry as barbar.
So things I'd like to see in changes from more reading.
Types to bonuses to discourage equipment stacking on top is one thing. Things like the size changes being activated abilities with durations, on top of making them actually be able to follow anywhere, it would give a bit more balance to the crazy power increase if it only lasted 20 minutes a few times a day.
Point buy stats for eidolons, as they are now they don't scale with different ability score generation rules, but not really necessary for core rules.
Personally, I'd like to see less evolution points and multiple different pets. One pet at a time, people can't stack quite so many abilities to make hideous monsters, and encourages people to make versatile diverse monsters.
Oh, and I have been kind of intentionally ignoring the fact that while comparing an Eidolon to a PC, this is just supposed to be a pet of a full caster with a 3/4 speed base attack.
And that's why I love pathfinder, think I have a player that would love to try this class. In the mean time I'm playing with building a level 15 Eidolon, and I'm already seeing what you mean with the points. Still feeling bad for my friend's barbarian though.
I know it's a play test, but they're out so initial discussion has to be gut reactions.
And first thing I see it seems that a summoners pet is looking like the largest source of melee damage I've seen based on insane strength and assuming the summoner equips his pet as easily as any barbarian or fighter can equip themselves.
As I said, gut reaction is all it is, but I think I'd rather play an Eidolon than a barbarian, and that scares me a bit.
Otherwise, I like the idea, and hopefully with some testing I'll see where he fits in the party.
I really like the flavor and mechanic of making skills more relevant to making magic items. The skills necessary are a bit rough if you're attempting to make a character specialized in item crafting, but that's quite reasonable.
Idea I'd like to suggest is a character capable of creating magic items can enlist aid from other people who have the necessary skills. Much like can be done with spells from other casters, a wizard could imbue magic into a sword as a blacksmith was doing the actual crafting. For many items NPCs could be hired, but for higher powered items finding a master jewel crafter may be an adventure of its own if no player actually has the craft skill.
