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Elemental fighter
Umm, I'm going to go with a definite yes on this. I'm no design expert, but after seeing various archetypes made for RPG Superstar and comments on the site I have learned one important thing: if you're going to add abilities to a core class, you have to lose something for it. This build has given a fighter a domain, access to spells (though the progression is slow, they can cast 9th-level spells eventually), and a high amount of extra damage. All of this was added for, what? The removal of Bravery? That's a pretty minor setback with a huge amount of gain. Yeah, it's pretty broken.
As for suggestions to fix it, here is what I can think of:
1) Sacrifice Weapon Training for the bonus elemental damage, and tone it down significantly. Maybe modify Weapon Training to give +2 fire damage instead of +1 attack/damage.
2) If you want elemental spells, okay, but get rid of something else, say Armor Training. I would also cut down on the spell levels that you can cast. Simple solution would be to use the same spell progression as a ranger or paladin, but create a new spell list for the class.
3) Substitute Bravery for a low resistance to your selected element. Rather than Armor Mastery you would gain immunity to your element and perhaps vulnerability to its opposition.
Again, I am not a designer, but this might help give you some ideas to make the class a bit more balanced.
I would say trade the Armor Training (and Mastery) for the ability to 'gain' the domain, and instead of giving spellcasting, let them cast the each spell from the domain (at a suitable level equivalent to when a sorcerer gets access to the spell level) 1/day as a spell-like ability.
That is still much to powerful, i think, but it would be better.
Also, cut it down to the four basic elements (acid, cold, fire, electricity) or use sonic rather than force. If you are hell-bent on using force, it should be one die size smaller than the elemental damages. (Since there is no 'force' resistance, and force damage fulling damages incorporeals)
Going by current posted version:
Full BAB, 9th level spells, insane weapon damage with Elemental Weapon.
This reminds me of Codzilla from 3.5. Why would I not take it?
What I would suggest is to pick a current class and balance it against that class.
Do it to do ok damage most of the time, but do a more damage than most other classes in special situations(Ranger, Paladin) or do you want it to do good damage all the time(Fighter)?
The skills should be offset by potential damage, and I would drop the spells.
If you must keep the spells then you need to decide is this a caster that wants to be able to fight or a fighter type that knows how to cast spells.
In any event if you keep the spell then then the BAB should drop.
In short you need to decide what you want him to do in the game, but make sure it does not eclipse another class.
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That would be a totally different idea. At this point no mater what it is a character that only has access to 8 spells no level 0s and is restricted to the spells in that domain.
I would consider stopping spell progression with level 7 spells
One might also take note that by level 20 you would be 7 feats behind a generic fighter.
And would have had to burn other feats for weapon proficiencies since none are granted.
Cutting down on the feats would certainly help with what you're trying, but you really take away from the fighter flavour if you do that. If you don't mind, then there's no problem there, but keep in mind that you're giving the character a selection of some very powerful spells along with a full base attack bonus. That's a hard thing to balance out.
Now that I think of it, this build reminds me a bit of the Book of Nine Swords: a martial character with some pretty hefty back-up abilities at the expense of martial development. Regardless of whether those classes are balanced or not (I have heard mixed things) you may want to look there for some inspiration.
At the end of the day, like Wraithstrike said, what is it you want this class to do? If you want to be a solo adventurer, this works. If you have a party, this may alienate them a bit, and I doubt you want that. Perhaps you should talk to your group about it, or run it in a few encounters at medium and high levels to see how it handles.
hahahahahaha
Look. The Lightning Warrior has returned.
I don't think the class is overpowered. For example +2d10 (=11 on the average) energy damage at the 14th level is worse than +3 to hit & +3 to damage with normal weapon training. In fact I think you have stripped too many feats for what have been given back. But mostly I think what the class needs is streamlining = linear Spell Progression, linear Save Progression, linear Energy Damage Progression. And on what ability does spell casting depend? Cha, I assume.
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You need to use a standard base.
1D10HD Full BAB 1/4 Casting
1D8HD 3/4 BAB 3/4 Casting (Full Divine Casting)
1D6HD 1/2 BAB Full Arcane Casting
So your max spell level for a 1D10HD is 4th.
No the divine casting list is not as good as the arcane list. The Arcane list hase a verity of spells that divine caster don't get. There are some on the divine caster list. When they are there 1 to 3 levels higher or less powerfull then the arcane verson. It can be done but takes much more work on the part of the divine caster to do the same thing.
Example:
Black Tentacles 4th level arcane spell crowed control + damage
greater comand 5th level divine spell crowed control new save every round.
I would do this as Fighter Archetype:
Domain
At 1st level gain Air, Earth, Fire, Ice (Waters subdomain) or Weather domain. This replaces Bonus Feat on the first level. Elemental Fighter can't take subdomains except on the case of Water S/he has to take Ice. Elemental Fighter uses Cha instead of Wis regarding domain powers.
Domain grants a number of domain powers, depending on the level of the Elemental Fighter. An Elemental Fighter does not gain the bonus spells listed for each domain, nor does she gain bonus spell slots. The Elemental Fighter uses her level as her effective cleric level when determining the power and effect of her domain powers. If the Elemental Fighter has cleric levels (or any other that gives domains), one of her two domain selections must be the same domain selected as an Elemental Fighter. Levels of cleric and Elemental Fighter stack for the purpose of determining domain powers and abilities, but not for bonus spells.
Domain Spells
At 2nd level Elemental Fighter gets his domains first level spell as a spell like ability 1/day. DCs are 10+1/2 Elemental Fighter level+Cha modifier. At every even level thereafter he gains next Domain Spell as a spell like ability usable 1/day. So at 4th 2nd level spell, 6th 3rd level spell etc.
This ability replaces Bravery.
Elemental Damage
At 5th level Elemental Fighter can imbue his weapon with the element of his original choosing adding a additional 1d6 damage of that type. For Fire domain its fire damage, Air & Weather its electricity, Acid for Earth domain & Cold for Ice Domain. At 9th level the extra damage raises to 2d6, at 13th level 3d6, at 17th level 4d6 and finally at 20th level 5d6.
This ability replaces Weapon Training 1, 2, 3, 4 and Weapon Mastery.
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Full BAB : OK
One Good Save: OK
Spell casting: is way to high for full bab class. And is not defined any where to what kind of spells they can cast.
Weapon and Armor Proficency: Drop tower shield. It's a fighter only feet for starting. If the paladin dose not get it why should this class?
Elemental Magic: Defently not with spell casting and Full BAB.
Elemental Weapon: OK Nice ability. You will find at high level play it's not worth any thing. Way to meny thing past level 10 have high resistanc or immune to elemental damage types.
Armor Training: OK
That would be a totally different idea. At this point no mater what it is a character that only has access to 8 spells no level 0s and is restricted to the spells in that domain.
I would consider stopping spell progression with level 7 spells
One might also take note that by level 20 you would be 7 feats behind a generic fighter.
And would have had to burn other feats for weapon proficiencies since none are granted.
Cutting down on the feats would certainly help with what you're trying, but you really take away from the fighter flavour if you do that. If you don't mind, then there's no problem there, but keep in mind that you're giving the character a selection of some very powerful spells along with a full base attack bonus. That's a hard thing to balance out.
Now that I think of it, this build reminds me a bit of the Book of Nine Swords: a martial character with some pretty hefty back-up abilities at the expense of martial development. Regardless of whether those classes are balanced or not (I have heard mixed things) you may want to look there for some inspiration.
At the end of the day, like Wraithstrike said, what is it you want this class to do? If you want to be a solo adventurer, this works. If you have a party, this may alienate them a bit, and I doubt you want that. Perhaps you should talk to your group about it, or run it in a few encounters at medium and high levels to see how it handles.
He might be better off with ToB. They don't do full round attacks nearly as well as fighters or the other melee types, but they do a lot of damage on standard actions or charging attacks.
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He might be better off with ToB. They don't do full round attacks nearly as well as fighters or the other melee types, but they do a lot of damage on standard actions or charging attacks.That would be a totally different idea. At this point no mater what it is a character that only has access to 8 spells no level 0s and is restricted to the spells in that domain.
I would consider stopping spell progression with level 7 spells
One might also take note that by level 20 you would be 7 feats behind a generic fighter.
And would have had to burn other feats for weapon proficiencies since none are granted.
Cutting down on the feats would certainly help with what you're trying, but you really take away from the fighter flavour if you do that. If you don't mind, then there's no problem there, but keep in mind that you're giving the character a selection of some very powerful spells along with a full base attack bonus. That's a hard thing to balance out.
Now that I think of it, this build reminds me a bit of the Book of Nine Swords: a martial character with some pretty hefty back-up abilities at the expense of martial development. Regardless of whether those classes are balanced or not (I have heard mixed things) you may want to look there for some inspiration.
At the end of the day, like Wraithstrike said, what is it you want this class to do? If you want to be a solo adventurer, this works. If you have a party, this may alienate them a bit, and I doubt you want that. Perhaps you should talk to your group about it, or run it in a few encounters at medium and high levels to see how it handles.
That is a thought. A swordsage focusing on the Desert Wind school would really fit this style of combat, and the element could easily be changed for the powers. I would also guess that the class would work reasonably well in Pathfinder without changing it much (mainly just the skills I would think).
@Relgez - If you don't have the Tome of Battle: Book of Nine Swords or you really want to use this class, it seems like you're already on the way to get some balance into it. I don't know what to suggest without seeing an updated version of the class.
Better, you do need to clarify when the elemental warrior gets access to each spell-like ability, thou. Right now it sounds like they can get them at the level = spell level, ie 8th level spell-like ability at the 8th level of the class.
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Bab and hit die changed.
Can't think of what else to do to balance
It's definitely more balanced now. I can't tell you whether that means it's balanced or not, but it is definitely more balanced than before. I don't have any more suggestions than what have been made other than to clarify that you only get elemental damage from your domain element and that your weapon's enhancement bonuses still apply when you use Elemental Weapon (your weapon would become pretty useless otherwise). Methinks it's time to try it out.
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Full BAB Keap
Two good saves One Bad save Keap
First Level power: Elemental Magic(Ex) the one casting per day of each of the domain spells. This is a wast of a powerfull core ability. They can't be affected by meta magics. And there magic direct damage effects the weakest way to deal damage. You might want to rethink what specal power you want them to have. Given them the base domain power then haven them with ranger casting progresson. With elemental damage spells from the divine and arcane spell list. Makes them a better caster then the free domain spells even if there higher level. With intensified and empowerd you can greatly incresses the damage of low level spells to do more damage then the free domain spells. And more versatil to use.
Second level power: Elemental Weapon(Su) Needs listed what type of action it is to use. Should look somthing like.
Starting at 2nd level, a elemental fighter can imbue his weapon with the element associated with there domain. This power is a swif action to use. And is usable a number of times per day equal to 3+Cha modifier plus one time for ever two level. The duration is 1+Cha modifier. This damage stacks with other damage types but not damage of the same type. The damage incresses with level of the elemental fighter according to there level on the chart below.
Damage: needs standard for all of the energy types. Ending with 3D12 is more damage then the base monk. So get that idea out of your head.
2nd 1D4 6th 1D6 10th Adds the burts property to the weapon.(X2 1D10 X3 2D10 X4 3D10) 14th 1D8 16th 1D10 20th 2D6
New Abilitys: you need to fill in every level with geting somthing new. There are to meny open areas in the class where you don't get any thing for leveling.
Full BAB Keap
Two good saves One Bad save KeapFirst Level power: Elemental Magic(Ex) the one casting per day of each of the domain spells. This is a wast of a powerfull core ability. They can't be affected by meta magics. And there magic direct damage effects the weakest way to deal damage. You might want to rethink what specal power you want them to have. Given them the base domain power then haven them with ranger casting progresson. With elemental damage spells from the divine and arcane spell list. Makes them a better caster then the free domain spells even if there higher level. With intensified and empowerd you can greatly incresses the damage of low level spells to do more damage then the free domain spells. And more versatil to use.
Second level power: Elemental Weapon(Su) Needs listed what type of action it is to use. Should look somthing like.
Starting at 2nd level, a elemental fighter can imbue his weapon with the element associated with there domain. This power is a swif action to use. And is usable a number of times per day equal to 3+Cha modifier plus one time for ever two level. The duration is 1+Cha modifier. This damage stacks with other damage types but not damage of the same type. The damage incresses with level of the elemental fighter according to there level on the chart below.
Damage: needs standard for all of the energy types. Ending with 3D12 is more damage then the base monk. So get that idea out of your head.
2nd 1D4 6th 1D6 10th Adds the burts property to the weapon.(X2 1D10 X3 2D10 X4 3D10) 14th 1D8 16th 1D10 20th 2D6New Abilitys: you need to fill in every level with geting somthing new. There are to meny open areas in the class where you don't get any thing for leveling.
I have to agree and once again that elemental damage is too much. I also think there are too many levels where nothing is gained.
We also need to know exactly what you want the class to do and which class you want it to be competitive with as far as damage which was asked in greater detail in one of my earlier post.Air is not an elemental damage type and neither is weather. I would stick to what the game offers so things stay simple.
I think that instead of damage dice you should make the elemental damage a flat bonus. It makes it more consistent or if you really want variable damage dice then use the sneak attack progression.
OK, now your class is nerfed to almost unplayable. Referring to my earlier post where I just switched fighters weapon trainings & mastery to elemental damage d6s. That is almost your elemental damage progression in bigger steps. Take for example Falchion Fred as test subject. As written he does 59.25.
With Weapon Training replaced with elemental damage he does:
+3 Falchion +18/+13 2d4+2d6+23 15-20
DPR: 35 x (9/20+4/20) + 63 x ( 6/20 x 19/20 + 6/20 x 13/20)
= 35 x (13/20) + 63 x ( 6/20 x 32/20 ) = 59.99
OK that is more, but only slightly. But he is facing a weakness normal fighter doesn't: His ability works poorly against creatures with resistance against his elemental type. Later there are lots of cretures with resistances and resistances can be easily aquired with spells. I wouldn't do the trade for my fighter, if I was optimizing. Well, I would limit the extra damage to melee weapons though.
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Bonus Feat exchanged to Domain that doesn't really help fighter costs early on as you are feat starved, but resistance is later when all the base feats have been aquired.
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No SLA's to 9th level might be too much. But I forgot the usual limitation = you only gain the SLA, if your stat (=CHA) i high enough to cast the spell. Witch would be a MAD trap effectively, since the spells of those domains aren't especially helpful for the fighter.
I guess it wouldn't be bad to stick with Bravery as you were willing to drop spells anyway.
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Skill points, hitpoints & class skills change? 4,d8 & others won't make the class (or acrhetype) skillmonkey applicant, so I wouldn't see that as a problem.
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Monk base damage at level 20 is 2D10. This should be your guide. That should put the cap of the extra damage dice of one step below the monk base damage. So any thing that capes at or above 2D10 is out of the question.
Use standard abilitys when ever you can. Realy the wealth of 3D8X10? You can't even make starting wealth standard? And you hope to blanced this class? You can't do every thing you want to make a class and hope to keap it blanced. You have to steap back and look at all the other classes that do the same thing then look at what you want to do.
1: What do you want this class to do?
2: What base classes should you base it off of?
3: What abilitys do you want it to have?
4: Time to balance it. Dose it have any abilitys that dwarf other core class abilitys? Dose it have any abilitys that will alow it to chease it's why thow combat? Dose it make any of the other base classes usless?
5: Class done time to test it.
6: How dose it compare to other classes of it type?
7: How dose it compare to othere classes?
8: Dose it still do somthing unique to need a full class?
Elemental Fighter
Alingment: Any
Starting Wealth: 5D6X10 (Standard starting wealth for most combat classes.)
Hit Dice 1D10
Class Skills: Climb(Str) Craft(Int) Intimadate(Cha) Knowlage(Arcane) Knowlage(Planes) Profession(Wis) Ride(Dex) Spellcraft(Int)
Survival(wis) Swim(Str)
Skill Ranks: 4+Int Modifier
BAB: Full
Fort Save: Good
Reflexe Save: Bad
Will Save: Good
Weapons and Armor: Elemental fighter is proficient with all simple and martal weapons, Elemental fighter is proficient with light, and meduim armor, Elemental fighter is proficient with shields.(excluding tower shields.) A elemental fighter can cast elemental fighter spells while wearing light armor and use a shield without incurring the normal arcane spell failure chance. Like any other arcane spellcaster, a elemental fighter wearing medium or heavy armor incurs a chance of arcane spell failure if the spell in question has a somatic component.
1st level: Elemental Magic: At first level the elemental fighter picks one cleric domain from the following list. Air, Earth, Fire, and Water. They gain the domain powers not the ability to cast spells from the domain. The domain powers are based off Cha.
2nd level: Elemental Weapon(Su) Starting at 2nd level, a elemental fighter can imbue his weapon with the element associated with there domain. This power is a swift action to use. And is usable a number of times per day equal to 3+Cha modifier plus one time for ever two level. The duration is 1+Cha modifier. This damage stacks with other damage types but not damage of the same type. The damage incresses with level of the elemental fighter according to there level on the chart below. After level 8 the elemental fighter must chose what damage type she is using befor using this ability.
2nd 1D4 6th 1D6 10th Adds the burts property to the weapon.(X2 1D10 X3 2D10 X4 3D10) 14th 1D8 16th 1D10 20th 2D6
3rd level: Armor Traning +1
4th level: Spells: Beginning at 4th level, a elemental fighter gains the ability to cast a small number of arcane spells which are drawn
from the wizard/sorcerer spell list. A elemental fighter must choose and prepare her spells in advance. To prepare or cast a spell, a elemental fighter must have a Charisma score equal to at least 10 + the spell level. The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a elemental fighter spell is 10 + the spell level the elemental fighter Charisma modifier. The elemental fighter uses the paladin progression. In addition, she receives bonus spells per day if she has a high Charisma score.
5th level: Bonus Feet: May slect any combat or metamagic feat.
6th level: (Damage incresses from elemental weapon power. Domain power grants energy resistance 10.)
7th level: Armor Training +2, Elemental Armor: Elemental fighter can now ware medium armor with out suffering arcane spell fail chance.
8th level: Elemental Versatility: The elemental fighter selects a second elemental domain. They gain the granted powers from this domain only.
Reaching Domain: The domain powers Lightning Arc (Sp), Acid Dart (Sp), Fire Bolt (Sp), and Icicle (Sp). Have there range incressed to 60ft.
9th level: Bonus Feet
10th level: (Bursting effect from the elemental weapon class ability.)
11th level: Armor Training +3
12th level: Quickend Domain: A elemental fighter can use his Lightning Arc (Sp), Acid Dart (Sp), Fire Bolt (Sp), and Icicle (Sp) domain powers at an attack action. Alwoing the elemental fighter to use the exta attacks from high base attack with thes domain powers.
(Elemental resistance from domains.)
13th level: Bonus Feet
14th level: (Damage incresses from elemental weapon ability)
15th level: Armor Training +4
16th level: (Damage incresses from elemental weapon ability)
18th level: Bonus Feet
19th level: Greater Reaching domain: The domain powers Lightning Arc (Sp), Acid Dart (Sp), Fire Bolt (Sp), and Icicle (Sp). Have there range incressed to 90 ft.
20th level: Summon Elemental: A elemental fighter may summon 1D4 Elder Elementals one time per day. To summon the elementals requires 1full round action. The elementals are summoned for 1hr befor retruing home. The type of elementals summoned hase to match one of the two domains the elemental fighter hase.
(Domain elemental immunitys, Elemental weapon damage incresses.)
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A burst weapon functions as a elemental weapon that explodes with elemental damage upon striking a successful critical hit. The elemental damage not harm the wielder. In addition to the extra elemental damage from the elemental weapon ability, a elemental burst weapon deals an extra 1d10 points of elemental damage on a successful critical hit. If the weapon’s critical modifier is ×3, add an extra 2d10 points of elemental damage instead, and if the modifier is ×4, add an extra 3d10 points.