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I like it. Sure it's suboptimal, but for a Sorcerer build I have in mind, it's an awesome, flavorful, and it's a perfect fit. But I need to update it.
Updates, in my opinion, should be close to the following:
Prerequisites:
Skills: 6 ranks in Spellcraft, 6 ranks in Knowledge[Arcana]
Spells: must be able to cast Magic Missile
Feats: Spell Focus (Evocation) [I feel, from the fluff of the class, Combat Casting didn't really make sense. They're researchers into how Magic Missile can be improved upon, so I feel Spell Focus should be a better fit]
Class Skills:
Spellcraft, Craft, Knowledge(Arcana), Profession, Spellcraft.
Ranks: 2+Intelligence Modifier.
Abilities: Change Bonus Missile to add a missile every odd-numbered level. Split Overpowering Missile into regular and Improved at 5th.
Take out the line for penetrating shield spells and Brooch of Shielding in the third level ability.
Improved Overpowering Missile: Your Magic Missile spells ignore any effect that can block Magic Missiles, such as but not limited to the spell Shield and Brooches of Shielding.
1st Bonus Missile, Still Missile
2nd Energy Missile, Swift Shield
3rd Bonus Missile, Overpowering Missile
4th Reflective Shield
5th Bonus Missile, Improved Overpowering Missile.
Saves the same, BAB progression the same.
Also, I'm thinking as a side thought into spreading out the abilities and making this a 10 level class and adding a neat capstone. What do you guys think?
[Moved because I realized I was probably in the wrong forum anyway]
Buffing force magic is a dodgy thing because there's practically no defenses against it.
Yea...but it's awesome.
5 levels is fine. I'd even say that's pushing it. 10 is far too many though, unless you branch out into spells like Telekinesis.
Honestly? I'd just make it a Wizard archetype, then you can spam MM from level 1 on.
Buffing force magic is a dodgy thing because there's practically no defenses against it.
True. Think of it this way, though: Sorcerer casts maximized MM at it's highest possible caster level. 8 missiles with this PrC. 8d4+8 (probably more like 16 depending on the bloodline) 4*8+8=40 avg, 48 for a bloodline increasing damage per die. At 12th level (what you'd need for this), that's not a whole lot of damage, even on an auto hit. Now, if it was 10 Missiles at d6 each, that's much better, but that's a bit much. I Wanted to bring this in line for PF, not break it.
A good capstone if you keep it 5 levels might be Spell Perfection (Magic Missile). The PC would benefit from an early feat, and spell perfecting magic missile is certainly not the most overpowered spell one could choose.
Maybe, but that might be too much You could enter this class at 7, end at 12. Spell Perfection you can't normally get until 15th level.
Actually, now that I think about it, I'm liking it because of that. I think the capstone of being able to bypass force effects that block MM is good enough for a 5 level PRC though.
Honestly? I'd just make it a Wizard archetype, then you can spam MM from level 1 on.
That I don't like. First it doesn't match the fluff of the class, being a mage that has a particular affinity for MM, even though he knows other spells. He specifically researches MM and neglects other aspects of spellcasting (ie class features) in favor for MM improvements. I think it fits better as a PrC. Plus, Wizards aren't the only ones who spam MM :P
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Were you planning on keeping the lost caster level? I don't think it's really necessary.
Also, I think you may still be disappointed with damage. MM is only going to be 8d4 + 8 (8d6 + 12 while empowered) So a maximized empowered MM is going to do 52 damage as a 6th level spell, barring spell perfection which would bring it down to third level and allow for a quickened maximized empowered etc. That's still only 100 or so damage at level 15, and barring sorcerer bloodlines, it doesn't get much better.
Honestly? I'd just make it a Wizard archetype, then you can spam MM from level 1 on.
While I agree that it shouldn't be just for wizards, I thought it would be cool to build one that takes Spell Specialization and Greater SS and things like that that basically max out MM to its limits.
Were you planning on keeping the lost caster level? I don't think it's really necessary.
Also, I think you may still be disappointed with damage. MM is only going to be 8d4 + 8 (8d6 + 12 while empowered) So a maximized empowered MM is going to do 52 damage as a 6th level spell, barring spell perfection which would bring it down to third level and allow for a quickened maximized empowered etc. That's still only 100 or so damage at level 15, and barring sorcerer bloodlines, it doesn't get much better.
I think I'll make it full 5/5 caster levels.
Read the first line in my post, "I like it. Sure it's suboptimal, but for a Sorcerer build I have in mind, it's an awesome, flavorful, and it's a perfect fit. But I need to update it." I know it's low damage, I'm rolling d4's after all, but I don't care. I like it.
While I agree that it shouldn't be just for wizards, I thought it would be cool to build one that takes Spell Specialization and Greater SS and things like that that basically max out MM to its limits.
You can still do that as a wizard, but with this PrC. You're not losing any caster levels, so you can still take all the feat necessary to max out MM.
If anybody was wondering, I did flesh out a 10-level version.
Prerequisites:
Skills: 6 ranks in Spellcraft, 6 ranks in Knowledge[Arcana]
Spells: must be able to cast Magic Missile
Feats: Spell Focus (Evocation)
Class Skills:
Spellcraft, Craft, Knowledge(Arcana), Profession, Spellcraft.
Ranks: 2+Intelligence Modifier.
BAB poor
Saves:
Fortitude poor, Reflex poor, Will good
1st Bonus Missile
2nd Still Missile
3rd Energy Missile
4th Bonus Missile
5th Swift Shield
6th Overpowering Missile
7th Bonus Missile
8th Greater Overpowering Missile
9th Reflective Shield
10th Bonus Missile, Ultimate Magic Missile
+1 level in base casting class every level.
Bonus Missile: At 1st level, every time a Force Missile Mage casts Magic Missile, an additional missile is also created. This missile is added even if the maximum number of Magic Missiles has been reached. At 4th, 7th, and 10th, the Force Missile Mage creates another additional missile, to a maximum of 9 Missiles at 10th.
Still Missile: All Magic Missile spells cast by a Force Missile Mage is cast as if affected by the Still Spell feat, with no increase in casting time.
Energy Missile: Whenever a Force Missile Mage casts Magic Missile, he may change the descriptor to either Fire, Acid, Electricity, or Cold. The missiles deal the appropriate kind of energy damage. Only one descriptor may apply to the spell when cast.
Swift Shield: A Force Missile Mage knows he must also protect himself from other Missile Mages. At 5th level, a Force Missile Mage gains the spell Shield as a spell-like ability usable once per day as an immediate action. If used against a melee attack, the spell resolves before the attack is resolved.
Overpowering Missile: At 6th level, a Force Missile Mage begins to apply his research to his missiles. His Magic Missile spells deal one additional point of damage per missile, and he gains a +1 on caster level checks to overcome spell resistance.
Greater Overpowering Missile: At 8th level, the bonuses from Overpowering Missile double. In addition, a Force Mage's Magic Missile spells ingore effects that normally stop force effects, like Shield spells and Brooches of Shielding. Spells such as Globe of Invulnerability still stop a Force Missile Mage's Magic Missile spells.
Reflective Shield: At 9th level, whenever a Force Missile Mage is targeted by Magic Missile, he is treated as under the effect of Spell Turning, thus reflecting offensive magic missiles back at their caster.
Ultimate Magic Missile: ...Honestly I have no ideas for this that don't seem stupidly op. It must be a MM effect, or a change to the base spell you cast, like bonus missile or energy missile, but I can't think of a good capstone.
I'd love to see an official update on the Force Missile mage. I take my online persona from that class after all. Personally I think you could do more for the class in Pathfinder other than dropping the dead spell level but I can't say what right now.
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To increase the power, I suggest removing still missile, and putting Overpowering Missile there instead, making it increase by +1 at levels 5 and 8. At 6, give them Spell Perfection (Magic Missile), and for Ultimate Missile increase the damage dice of your missiles one stage (d4s to d6s). Maybe overpowered to make it stack with Empower Spell, but that's for someone else to figure out!
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To increase the power, I suggest removing still missile, and putting Overpowering Missile there instead, making it increase by +1 at levels 5 and 8. At 6, give them Spell Perfection (Magic Missile), and for Ultimate Missile increase the damage dice of your missiles one stage (d4s to d6s). Maybe overpowered to make it stack with Empower Spell, but that's for someone else to figure out!
So you'd think something along these lines:
If anybody was wondering, I did flesh out a 10-level version.
Prerequisites:
Skills: 6 ranks in Spellcraft, 6 ranks in Knowledge[Arcana]
Spells: must be able to cast Magic Missile
Feats: Spell Focus (Evocation)
Class Skills:
Spellcraft, Craft, Knowledge(Arcana), Profession, Spellcraft.
Ranks: 2+Intelligence Modifier.
BAB poor
Saves:
Fortitude poor, Reflex poor, Will good
1st Bonus Missile
2nd Overpowering Missile
3rd Energy Missile
4th Bonus Missile
5th Improved Overpowering Missile
6th Sell Perfection
7th Bonus Missile
8th Greater Overpowering Missile
9th Reflective Shield
10th Bonus Missile, Ultimate Magic Missile
+1 level in base casting class every level.
Bonus Missile: At 1st level, every time a Force Missile Mage casts Magic Missile, an additional missile is also created. This missile is added even if the maximum number of Magic Missiles has been reached. At 4th, 7th, and 10th, the Force Missile Mage creates another additional missile, to a maximum of 9 Missiles at 10th.
Overpowering Missile: At 2th level, a Force Missile Mage begins to apply his research to his missiles. His Magic Missile spells deal one additional point of damage per missile, and he gains a +1 on caster level checks to overcome spell resistance.
Energy Missile: Whenever a Force Missile Mage casts Magic Missile, he may change the descriptor to either Fire, Acid, Electricity, or Cold. The missiles deal the appropriate kind of energy damage. Only one descriptor may apply to the spell when cast.
Improved Overpowering Missile: At 5th level, the bonuses from Overpowering Missile increase by 1.
Spell Perfection: At 6th level, a Force Missile Mage gains Spell Perfection as a bonus feat but he must choose Magic Missile for the feat.
Greater Overpowering Missile: At 8th level, the bonuses from Overpowering Missile increase by 1. In addition, a Force Mage's Magic Missile spells ingore effects that normally stop force effects, like Shield spells and Brooches of Shielding. Spells such as Globe of Invulnerability still stop a Force Missile Mage's Magic Missile spells.
Reflective Shield: At 9th level, whenever a Force Missile Mage is targeted by Magic Missile, he is treated as under the effect of Spell Turning, thus reflecting offensive magic missiles back at their caster.
Ultimate Magic Missile: At 10th level, the Force Missile Mage's understanding of Magic Missile is complete. The damage die increases one step, from a d4 to a d6. When casting Magic Missile, the final effective level after applying all metamagic feats affecting the spell decreases by 1, with a minimum of 1. For instance, If you Quickened and Maximised Magic Missile, with Spell Perfection, the final level before the adjust will be 3. After applying the negative from Ultimate Magic Missile, it becomes 2.
Alright, it looks powerful and flavorful. Leave it to a playtest to find some balance. One definite weakness is being counterspelled by any enemy who's done his homework. I think that's fine though.
Or any 8th level caster that has Globe of Invulnerability spells. There's plenty of ways to stop this guy, but then again, while the enemy mage is like, "Nope, you, sir, can suck my magic wang," the rest of the party beats upon him while you stick to killing off minions turn after turn.
Maybe I should have Improved Overpowering Missile able to affect objects?
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If I were to suggest anything to add, I'd maybe give him an upgraded shield spell, because his offence is pretty nice now. An orc bloodline sorcerer 6/misslemage 10 could do an empowered maximized magic missile at 9d6+18+45, and follow that up with a quickened version of the same, using only a 2nd and 5th level spell slot.
My take: there isn't really enough "meat" there to warrant an entire prestige class. In 3.5, that was the only way to do things, so you were stuck with it, but in Pathfinder you've got archetypes and bloodlines, which really work a lot better for this sort of thing.
A variant Evoker archetype (as Meatrace suggested) would work nicely, and to me this screams to be made into a sorcerer bloodline.
My take: there isn't really enough "meat" there to warrant an entire prestige class. In 3.5, that was the only way to do things, so you were stuck with it, but in Pathfinder you've got archetypes and bloodlines, which really work a lot better for this sort of thing.
A variant Evoker archetype (as Meatrace suggested) would work nicely, and to me this screams to be made into a sorcerer bloodline.
I thought about making a force-based bloodline but I have no idea how to go about it. I guess mixing aspects of this and that one PrC from 3.5 (I can't remember the name of and can't be bothered to look it up atm) could work.
@kevin_Video oops, I guess I never noticed that.
I have various ideas to improve it.
1. Energy Missile doesn't seem like a level ability for me, more like a bonus or extra thing, so it should be given in lvl 1 with bonus missile, and at lvl 3 put the stil (or silent) spell for the missiles.
2. Ultimate missiles don't seem to be a capstone, more like a half way ability, at level 5 with improved overpowering missile.
3. The capstone will be better if it is like a barrage ability. one that can be done an ammount of times per day and does burst. or one big magic missile. like a kamehameha or something like that.
So 1 round. quickened maximized magic missiles (lvl 4), maximized, empowered (lvl 3) does average(hehehe): (7d4+21)49+73= 122 Damage.
not bad, not bad. and if i got dazing spell, rime spell, magic lineage. could do a lot of stuff :P
Being such a thematic spell, MM can be a worthy specialty. However, I think this class would be done a great service if greater emphasis was also given to other force spells.
Everyone seems to like the PrC, but has there been a PF version done yet?
I like the idea of a "Force" bloodline. Magic Missile, Telekenesis, "Hand" spells... could be interesting.
Going with a Bloodline as a rough draft: "Your character has been touched by the force behind all energy, wether it be a primordial source or something older. Because of this, you have a natural aptitude to spells that affect force."
Class Skill: Knowlage (arcana) or Fly?
Bonus Spell: ? (wanna put mythic magic missile in here...) Hand Spells, Wall of Force?
Bonus Feats:Combat Casting, Improv Initative, Still Spell, Silent Spell, Spell Perfection (Magic Missile Only), ?
Bloodline Arcana: When you cast a spell with the Force descriptor, increase damage by +1/level, split equally between all legal targets. OR, if the spell deals no damage, increase DC by 2.
Bloodline Powers:
1st: Force Field. You may cast a Force Shield which grants total cover until the start of your next turn. This is an instantaneous effect and can be used in responce to an attack. You may use this (3+Charisma bonus) times a day.
3rd: Bonus Missile. Your Magic Missile spell adds an additional missile. This superceeds the missiles per level or the maximum missiles per spell. Add another bonus missile at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 20th sorcerer levels.
9th: Overwhelming Missile. Your magic missiles deal double damage. When you reach level 18, triple it instead.
15th: Energy Missile. Your Magic Missile spell may exchange its energy type with Fire, Acid, Electricity, or Cold. If they remain as Force effects, they now ignore Shield spells and any other "Magic Missile" specific defenses.
20th: Power of the Force. Your Force spells no longer are blocked by magic resistance or damage resistance.
Granted, this is a (very) rough draft, but I liked the idea of a Bloodline route for this, so here's one! Shred to your hearts content, Interwebs!
Class ability: You may cast your Magic Missiles as a Ranged Touch attack. You gain an extra Missile if you cast the spell this way, and it can affect objects.
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Class Ability: Metamagic effects that would normally only occur on one missile of the spell instead affect every target hit by the spell (so, treating it like a fireball instead of a ray).
Example: Banespell gives you +2d6 damage against the Bane target..say, orcs.
If you Banespell a normal magic missile spell, one missile gets the Banespell, the rest are normal. A fireball, however, would get Banespell on every orc in the AoE.
With this simple change, multiple targets can get hit by multiple effects at once, so it becomes more useful as an AoE. Toppling spell, anyone?
==Aelryinth
I've recently had a similar vision of a 'Force' sorcerer bloodline, for a sorcerer who specializes in using force missile attacks, possibly even could add 'force' descriptor to other spells. Registered just to discuss it actually, since Snively has already started hashing it out.
I wanted to convert Missile Storm (greater and lesser) from Neverwinter Nights to be bonus spells for such a bloodline. It looked, to me, like they would be of fair power just straight cut and paste from the game, but I have no experience with conversions, or creating a bloodline for that matter, so thought I could work here with some vets to get this thing from blueprint to protottype.
References:
http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Isaac%27s_Lesser_Missile_Storm
http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Isaac%27s_Greater_Missile_Storm
Just wanted to share, having reread this thread and saw a couple people were interested in a force bloodline, I hashed out, and rehashed out such a thing. Some feedback would be cool, thanks in advance:
Being such a thematic spell, MM can be a worthy specialty. However, I think this class would be done a great service if greater emphasis was also given to other force spells.That's the Argent Savant class, I do believe. The Force Missile Mage prestige class is purely built around Magic Missile and nothing else. Well, Shield too, but that's one half of the Magic Missile portfolio. The Argent Savant (I might have the name wrong) was the pure force caster.
Right you are. I didn't realize that bit of information! Anyhow, my opinion still stands that its a big stretch to turn this into ten levels. Perhaps infusing some Ardant Savant into the class would help it feel less forced.
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Right you are. I didn't realize that bit of information! Anyhow, my opinion still stands that its a big stretch to turn this into ten levels. Perhaps infusing some Ardant Savant into the class would help it feel less forced.Being such a thematic spell, MM can be a worthy specialty. However, I think this class would be done a great service if greater emphasis was also given to other force spells.That's the Argent Savant class, I do believe. The Force Missile Mage prestige class is purely built around Magic Missile and nothing else. Well, Shield too, but that's one half of the Magic Missile portfolio. The Argent Savant (I might have the name wrong) was the pure force caster.
I've wanted to create a character with both prestige classes for a long time; Pathfinder prestige class design could probably accommodate a fusion of both.