I am confused as to exactly what the new Marshal Auras article is supposed to be? I assumed they were new Marshal auras, but it appears they're new Commander auras.
How exactly do these work in the case of the Marshal class? Marshal's auras improve as they level up and the reason for that is because that is their main stick for being a 20-level Class, whereas Commander auras are just an added privilege for taking part in a professional military role.
In other words, do the auras in this article improve as the Marshal levels up, assuming these are all new Major Auras (as opposed to Minor Auras, which is affected by your Charisma modifier)? For example, say a 2nd-level Marshal takes the Cavalry Commander aura. All it does is grant allies +1 morale bonus to attacks and Ride checks when mounted. Now, does this bonus increase to a +2 morale bonus at 7th-level Marshal (as stated in Miniatures Handbook) and then +3 (14th-level) and finally +4 (20th-level)? Or does it remain at +1 morale bonus?
I sure hope it doesn't remain at +1 considering a Marshal's auras increase in level because he has to remain somewhat useful at higher levels to the rest of a party. Keeping it static makes the auras unwanted.
But then, maybe I am wrong about the purpose of the article itself in that it's not new Marshal Auras, but new Commander Auras? Which is it?
Contributor
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So, this article is a bit of a hodge-podge, and for that you can thank that one guy—you know, that guy who edits Class Acts.
As such, it does several things, none of which get completely explained. The article as it became was meant partially to bring owners of Miniatures Handbook up to date with what appeared in Heroes of Battle. Hence the Class Skills section and the Commanders section. The meat of the article, though, deals with new commander auras (all-new or adapted from the marshal class). That isn't clearly spelled out, however. Now, some of these auras can also be used as marshal major auras (as you suggest), and in that case follow all the rules of normal major auras (the listed bonuses then equaling the marshal's major aura bonus).
I want to make it clear that Stefan didn't introduce that confusion into the article; I did. Yes, even editors sometimes make mistakes. ;_;
But hey, that kenku marshal picture is pretty nifty!
WARK!
I haven't received #348 yet, so as the author I can't throw my .02 into this fray, but the intent of the article was to update the marshal auras from Miniatures Handbook to be more consistent with the commander auras from Heroes of Battle.
At the bottom of p.76 of Heroes of Battle is a side bar called "Commander Auras and D&D miniatures." The intent of the article was to do the work that was suggested in that sidebar.
KENKU MARSHALS!!!! WHAT MADNESS IS THIS? Have you been hitting the fermented soy milk again, Mike? ;)
Ok, thanks for clearing that up. Reading the article over, I understand it now.
So, from what I gather with this article, a 20th-level Marshal can have simultaneously active:
---One Minor Aura
---One Major Aura
---Three Commander Auras
And he has 10 Commander Auras in total.
Ok, I get it now. Heck, that's even better. Alrighty then, moving on!
And I was wondering what that was. I had a feeling it was a kenku, but then I though "A kenku marshal...? Nahhh!"
Pretty neat though, I like it. D&D 3rd Edition is positively fun with its oddities that 1E or 2E hardcore players would get frightened by, heh heh.
Hopefully this will make high level marshals something someone would want to play as a PC, because when I first read the class I thought that it would make a great NPC class, but "would I want to play this?"
I have a player who's playing a marshal, actually. He has one level of bard that he took for story reasons, and he's taking a 5 level PrC from Heroes of Battle (slightly revised); otherwise, he plans on the other 14 levels being marshal levels.
And Mike, I wanted to clarify something... Editors make mistakes sometimes, or editors get caught making mistakes sometimes? :D
I've got a character who's a Marshal-Battledancer so that she can capitalize on the charisma she'll need in the prestige class she's shooting for. Master of Tactics allows her to deal a respectable amount of damage if she has an ally, despite having relatively low strength for a melee combatant; Motivate Charisma will give her a significant boost on her intimidation based abilities later on, and Demand Fortitude (or whatever it was called) and its sibling for Will saves can be incredibly helpful if you're worried about the wizard getting splattered by a disintegrate or the fighter being dominated.
I tend to like high charisma characters, though, so my thought processes when looking at the marshal were "Cool! A character whose charisma influences their combat effectiveness!" rather than "What? You mean I have to spend points on charisma to get anything out of this class?"
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Ok, thanks for clearing that up. Reading the article over, I understand it now.
So, from what I gather with this article, a 20th-level Marshal can have simultaneously active:
---One Minor Aura
---One Major Aura
---Three Commander AurasAnd he has 10 Commander Auras in total.
I'm a little confused myself, and I just want to make sure I have this right so could you confirm please Mr. McArtor? A 20th level Marshall with the new rules presented in the article can have up to five auras active simultaneously One Minor, One Major, and Three Commander Auras, and that same Marshall would know 8 Minor Auras, 5 Major Auras, and Ten Command Auras. Again, I just want to clarify and make sure I have this right one of my players is considering playing a Marshall.
Thanks in Advance.
I'm a little confused myself, and I just want to make sure I have this right so could you confirm please Mr. McArtor? A 20th level Marshall with the new rules presented in the article can have up to five auras active simultaneously One Minor, One Major, and Three Commander Auras, and that same Marshall would know 8 Minor Auras, 5 Major Auras, and Ten Command Auras. Again, I just want to clarify and make sure I have this right one of my players is considering playing a Marshall.Thanks in Advance.
On bottom of p.92 of the article it states the minor/major distinctions don't apply to this variant. It also states that the article's auras represent an integration of the MH auras into the HoB system, so basically ignore the MH auras and just go with the auras in HoB and this article. However, the auras are considered "major" auras only for the purpose of improving the auras base bonus at 7th, 14th and 20th level, as stated on p.13 of the MH.
At 20th level, a marshal can have a total of three auras active, project them 120 feet and may know up to ten auras. Activating each aura is a swift action.
The aura system in HoB is different from the aura system in MH and this article was designed to help a DM do what it says to do in the sidebar on the bottom of p.76 in HoB.
More clarification that I should have included in my earlier response--the aura system presented in Heroes of Battle is different from the Miniatures Handbook. If a DM wants to use that system instead of the MH system, then the variant marshal in 348 is an appropriate adaptation. If you want to stick with the MH system, then the variant in 348 isn't appropriate.
I guess that's one drawback for the new Class Act format that broadens the amount of material that the article can draw from--not everyone has all those books and may get confused when trying to use a class act article with a missing or inappropriate source book.
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More clarification that I should have included in my earlier response--the aura system presented in Heroes of Battle is different from the Miniatures Handbook. If a DM wants to use that system instead of the MH system, then the variant marshal in 348 is an appropriate adaptation. If you want to stick with the MH system, then the variant in 348 isn't appropriate.
I take it then essentially the Auras (Ex) p92 of Dragon #348 replaces the Auras (Ex) class feature on page 12 of the MH. If you use the Auras class feature in the magazine you would select from the auras on page 93 of Dragon #348 and the Auras in HoB. You would know a number of Auras equal to half your class level, and could project 3 auras up to 120 feet at 20th level. If you use the Marshall and the Auras class feature presented in the MH as is at 20th level he could project one major and one minor aura up to 60ft. He would know 8 minor and 5 major auras. He could also project one commander aura following the rules of Commanders presented in HoB and #348's sidebar. Overall, the best any marshall could do is 3 auras at 20th level. The variant presented in 348 gives you better range for projecting you Auras at 120 ft however less of a variety to choose from only 10 possible auras. The MH marshall has more variety 14 possible auras (8 minor, 5 major, 1 commander) but less range 60ft for the major and minor auras, and 30 ft for his commander auras.
Yes, but the marshal's auras are +2 at 7th, +3 at 14th and +4 at 20th level.
The article wasn't meant to replace the marshal class from MH, but to give DMs an option for using a marshal that was integrated with the (lower powered?) aura system in Heroes of Battle, which is different from the MH. The "Marshal of Battle" class act was intended as just that--a marshal variant integrated into the Heroes of Battle system of auras, which not every DM uses, obviously.
It's a variant. I would accept the argument that the variant is less powerful than a traditional marshal, but when you consider that the auras in HoB are available to anyone with commander rank, the bonuses the marshal gets in range and level bonuses to the aura's bonus itself make the marshal variant fairly attractive for players whose DM runs a Heroes of Battle campaign.
Thank you for reading it and considering it.
Not what I expected. I like the idea of integrating HoB into the Marshal class instead of replacing the Minor/Major auras. So I think I'll stick with this as an add-on to the Marshal class rather than a "variant" to his aura ability.
Not what I expected. I like the idea of integrating HoB into the Marshal class instead of replacing the Minor/Major auras. So I think I'll stick with this as an add-on to the Marshal class rather than a "variant" to his aura ability.
That's cool...I'm glad you still got something out of it.
I ran into one problem with the article. I presume that this variant marshal does not have to meet the prerequisites for the commander auras (I did not see it mentioned). If this is not the case, then the marshal would be incapable of learning most of the auras.
This is actually a problem I have with the way commander auras were presented in Heroes of Battle. The prerequisites exclude a large number of alignment/class options. I seem to remember that most neutral good characters would have a hard time gaining a commander aura (I am going from memory here). This limits the usefulness of the rules in many campaigns.
I have a player in my AoW campaign whose character is a marshal. We discussed reworking legendary leader to use the marshal auras for the reason listed above.
I ran into one problem with the article. I presume that this variant marshal does not have to meet the prerequisites for the commander auras (I did not see it mentioned). If this is not the case, then the marshal would be incapable of learning most of the auras.
Some of the auras are very specific about the prerequisites, yes.....and yes, marshals would have to meet the prerequisites of the commander auras in Heroes of Battle. As far as marshals not being capable of learning "most" of the auras depends greatly on the player's choices for their character. Some of the auras require skill ranks in skills that are not on the marshal skill list, but that doesn't mean the marshal can't take ranks in that skill...so "incapable" really only applies when the aura is a racial aura like "orc commander" or such and the character isn't an orc. However, I would agree that playing a marshal is tricky and requires careful forethought of what skills/feats are needed to meet the prerequisites of many of the auras. The auras and variant marshal in this article were presented as an attempt to integrate the MH marshal into HoB by "converting" the auras from MH into the commander aura system of HoB.
Giving a marshal free reign to choose any of the auras at will without having to meet the prerequisites makes the class too powerful, IMO....plus, it doesn't make much sense to say that a marshal who grew up among horse nomads all of a sudden gets to use the "naval commander" aura. The prerequisites should tie into thoughtful character development and background, but that's just my opinion--you can do whatever you want in your own game, of course :)
Giving a marshal free reign to choose any of the auras at will without having to meet the prerequisites makes the class too powerful, IMO....plus, it doesn't make much sense to say that a marshal who grew up among horse nomads all of a sudden gets to use the "naval commander" aura. The prerequisites should tie into thoughtful character development and background, but that's just my opinion--you can do whatever you want in your own game, of course :)
Agreed. My complaint over the auras is really aimed at the alignment prerequisites. A neutral good character is limited to the following HoB auras: Animal Commander, Deathslayer Commander, Feral Commander, Giant Killer Commander, Healing Commander, and Spellslinging Commander. Of these, a marshal would need to multiclass in order to benefit from Healing Commander or Spellslinging Commander, and Giant Killer requires a character to be small.
So, in the case of the player in my AoW game (NG human), he would be limited to Animal Commander, Deathslayer Commander, and Feral Commander. I have to admit though, the Deathslayer commander would be useful to them.
In any case, while article made a brillant attempt to bring the character in line with the rules in HoB, I found that it would still require a great deal of work on my part for use in my game.
In any case, while article made a brillant attempt to bring the character in line with the rules in HoB, I found that it would still require a great deal of work on my part for use in my game.
You make a good point. Perhaps more aura selection to widen the choices would fix the problem. Maybe I'll query Mike to see if he wants me to do that....you could as well, if you have some ideas in mind.