Arcane Weapon is fine, but any ideas for an alternative feature for those who don't want to suck DC 20+ concentration checks to cast spells without their weapon in hand, or those who want to make a monk/magus?
Arcane Weapon is fine, but any ideas for an alternative feature for those who don't want to suck DC 20+ concentration checks to cast spells without their weapon in hand, or those who want to make a monk/magus?
If you are disarmed you can bring it back to your hand as a free action. If the weapon is destroyed you can bind a new weapon the next day. Compared to the Wizard arcane bond, this is hardly a disadvantage at all.
Hum... but is it "in-hand" thought? (don't hurt me for splitting that hair)
If you are disarmed you can bring it back to your hand as a free action. If the weapon is destroyed you can bind a new weapon the next day. Compared to the Wizard arcane bond, this is hardly a disadvantage at all.
Returning it to hand is at 19th level, that's a lot of adventuring where your weapon can get disarmed/sundered etc etc.
Also seems that Quick Draw is going to be a useful feat for a magus with an arcane weapon.
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Crossposted from ENWorld (where I initially posted the below analysis of Arcane Weapon). It is related to the topic, though not necessarily the specific concerns of the OP :)
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Near as I can tell, there is not a meaningful difference between the two. To the extent that one is more powerful than the other, it is the Paladin's Divine Bond Weapon which remains the superior class ability, overall. Let's look at the Paladin's Divine Bond and compare it with the Magus' Arcane Weapon ability:
Paladin
Divine Bond: Upon reaching 5th level, a paladin forms a divine bond with her god. This bond can take one of two forms. Once the form is chosen, it cannot be changed. The first type of bond allows the paladin to enhance her weapon as a standard action by calling upon the aid of a celestial spirit for 1 minute per paladin level. When called, the spirit causes the weapon to shed light as a torch. At 5th level, this spirit grants the weapon a +1 enhancement bonus. For every three levels beyond 5th, the weapon gains another +1 enhancement bonus, to a maximum of +6 at 20th level.
Paladin Bonded Weapon Progression:
5th = +1 defending, flaming, keen, merciful
8th = +2 axiomatic, disruption, flaming burst, holy
11th = +3 speed
14th = +4 brilliant energy
17th = +5
20th = +6
The Paladin can add the following abilities, using the + for the ability as reflected in Table 15-9 of the Core Rules: axiomatic, brilliant energy, defending, disruption, flaming, flaming burst, holy, keen, merciful, and speed.
Meanwhile, the Magus Bonded Weapon ability works as follows:
Magus
Arcane Weapon (Su): At 4th level, a magus gains the ability to imbue a melee weapon with powerful abilities. When he prepares his spells, he can also spend a portion of this time bonding with a single melee weapon. At 4th level, this grants the weapon a +1 enhancement bonus. For every four levels beyond 4th, the weapon gains another +1 enhancement bonus, to a maximum of +5 at 20th level. These bonuses can be added to the weapon, stacking with existing weapon enhancement to a maximum of +5, or they can be used be used to add any of the following weapon properties: dancing, flaming, flaming burst, frost, icy burst, keen, shock, shocking burst, speed, or vorpal.
Magus Arcane Weapon Progression:
4th = +1 flaming, frost, shock, keen
8th = +2 flaming burst, icy burst, shocking burst
12th = +3 speed
16th = +4 dancing
20th = +5 vorpal
Each of the Paladin and the Magus can add these same bonded weapon abilities: flaming, flaming burst, keen and speed.
Uniquely, the Paladin can add: axiomatic, brilliant energy, defending, disruption, holy and merciful.
Uniquely, the Magus can add: : dancing, frost, icy burst, shock, shocking burst, and vorpal.
In all honesty, I cannot see anything game breaking about the Magus bonded weapon ability. Yes, it can add vorpal – but only at 20th level. Put bluntly, level 20 abilities in Pathfinder RPG amount to little more than flavour text. They have essentially ZERO impact during actual gameplay. Moreover, if you were to take “vorpal” off that list, would anybody seriously complain if the GM just armed his 20th level Magus NPC with a vorpal blade instead anyway? I don’t think so.
In terms of abilities that have significant and REAL effects during actual gameplay at the levels that the overwhelming majority of games are actually played, the Paladin’s abilities of disruption and holy are the real eye-openers which can have a significant effect in game. The Magus has nothing to compete with these extraordinary weapon abilities. Disruption is a save or disintegrate effect vs a raft of typical foes the party will fight - and it's available at 8TH LEVEL!! The game seems to have survived this all the same. I'm not too worried about a 20th level vorpal effect compared to disruption at 8th, frankly. And I suggest you should not be too concerned about it either.
Yes, speed is very powerful, but not at the level that the power is granted (11th and 12th, respectively). The game seems to have survived nicely up until now. If a Paladin can have a weapon of speed at 11th level and the game has not broken, I don’t perceive a significant impact on game balance if the Magus has that ability at 12th level – especially seeing as he already has a resort to haste FAR earlier than 12th level already in the game (as does everybody else, in practice).
Remember, the Arcane Weapon is always active, while the Paladin Divine Bond has a short duration.
Also seems that Quick Draw is going to be a useful feat for a magus with an arcane weapon.
As a thematically appropriate alternative, a glove of storing would work wonders too.
It would also allow having a rod, wand or staff on hand without dealing with the messiness of drawing or storing such items.
How about this: using a cestus, brass knuckles or some other "weapon that lets you still hold things" in your hand with a glove of storing. Then, have a rod of quicken magic in that glove of storing. Storing and retrieving the rod would be a free action... retrieve, cast your spell, store, full attack?
I disagree. The paladin is a sacred warrior, channeling the power of his faith (well, "a celestial spirit") into his weapon; something like that should only be possible for a short time. Moreover, the paladin has substantial offensive (higher BaB/STR) and defensive (better armor, better HD) advantages over the magus.
The magus, on the other hand, is telling the universe to sit down, shut up, and focus some appropriate power into his blade, chop chop. His armor is lighter, his BaB is lower, his HD is lower, and his spells per day are no better than a wizard's (and, in fact, advances more slowly). I think the arcane bond is excellent just as it is.
However, I do think that ghost touch should be one of the powers that can be bonded onto a weapon. Given the magus already has magic missile, shield, and wall of force amongst his potential spells, giving him the opportunity to be the guy who absolutely guaranteed can chop down those incorporeal shadows (assuming he planned ahead properly) seems like a top-notch idea to me, and not one that's overly powerful in the longer run compared to some of the other imbue-abilities mentioned.
The Paladin has some of the worst spellcasting abilities of all the spellcasters, and an even more limited list than the Magus.
While the paladin is limited to only 4 spell levels, his spell list is rather nice, and even nicer once you include the APG spells. Including the APG I'm not so such his spell list is actually more limited than the Magus's.
The Magus makes up for the Lower BAB with possible Speed ability in it's weapon.
As the Speed ability isn't available for imbuing until 12th level, no, it doesn't really make up for it. Particularly since the magus has had haste available to him since level 7.
The Paladin also uses STR as it's Substat, just like the Magus would use it's STR as a Substat.
*buzz!* Sorry, no. The magus, as any spellcaster, has INT (or applicable casting stat) first, then DEX -- both for the defense that armor won't provide at low levels, and for the ranged attacks that spells require. The paladin, being a holy warrior and front-liner, has STR, CON, and then WIS, with DEX as a disant backup. The two classes are both capable in melee combat, but fulfill different roles and require totally different approaches.
The Paladin has to get "Channel Smite" in order to use the same ability that a Magus gets automatically. The only difference being that the Paladin, once it gets it's feat, can do it probably maximum 6-8 times a day. With Magus' quickened ability, and the Spell Combat ability, it makes up for it, but even then, it can do a much bigger array of effects, and some of them get extremely nasty.
I'm fuzzy on what ability you're referring to here for the magus. The magus doesn't get anything remotely like a channel-positive-energy offensive ability, unless you're in some roundabout way referring to the arcane weapon's possible added energy damage? Given that it's far more limited in overall damage than that possible with a Channel Smite (only 1d6 elemental damage, which might be resisted, as opposed to positive energy damage, which never is), I disagree that it's anywhere close to the paladin. Additionally, Spell Combat is so gimped early on by penalties as to make it substantially less effective than the paladin's smite-it-til-its-dead ability.
The Paladin has some of the worst spellcasting abilities of all the spellcasters, and an even more limited list than the Magus.
Possibly because the paladin primary role isn't to serve as offensive spellcaster, it's to self-buff the better to beat down opponents. Moreover, not being able to use medium armor until level 7 on the magus's part is a huge relative disadvantage.
The two classes fulfill utterly different roles in the party, and the paladin is definitely the bigger brother in straight-out combat. The magus has to be a bit more disciplined and tactical, from what I'm reading.