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Just a couple short archetypes that I've had brewing in my head for awhile. Finally decided to get them down in words and see how well balanced they are.
As always, any help is greatly appreciated.
Some paladins put more stock in their combat abilty than in their ability to manipulate positive energy and heal harmful conditions. The maxim that a dead enemy cannot hurt you is bread and butter for holy templars.
Bonus Feat
At 3rd level, and every 3 levels thereafter, a holy templar gains a bonus feat in addition to those gained from normal advancement. These bonus feats must be selected from those listed as Combat Feats, or any feat that has smite evil or lay on hands as a prerequisite.
This ability replaces mercy.
Fighter Training (Ex)
At 4th level, a holy templar counts his paladin level as his fighter level -3 for the purpose of qualifying for feats (if he has levels in fighter, these levels stack).
This ability replaces channel positive energy.
Sometimes a paladin is not blessed with the capability to weave divine magic, but instead is granted the ability to be an inspiration to those around her. These devout agents spend their time traveling from place to place, spreading the words and wisdom of their deity.
Class Skills
Add Perform (oratory) to the devout agent's list of class skills.
Holy Scripture
At 1st level, a devout agent gains the ability to deliver a select number of supernatural and spell-like performances through the force and power of her divinely inspired preaching and exhortation. This ability is similar in all respects to bardic performance as used by a bard of the same level (including interactions with feats, spells, and prestige classes), using Perform (oratory) as the devout agent’s performance skill. However, a devout agent gains only the following types of bardic performance: inspire courage at 1st level; inspire competence at 3rd level; inspire greatness at 9th level; and inspire heroics at 15th level.
Holy scripture replaces the paladin’s spells class feature. A devout agent does not gain any spells or spellcasting abilities, does not have a caster level, and cannot use spell trigger or spell completion magic items.
First is too good.
6 combat feats from the class. 10 feats from leveling.
Gets access to the highest level Fighter only feats.
Why would you ever play a Fighter if there was this paladin? The only thing stopping you would be that Code.
My recommendations: Give the feats at 4th level and ever 4 levels thereafter. Possibly even 4th and every 5 levels thereafter.
Second is a bit on the weak side, IMO. But awesome flavor.
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First is too good.
6 combat feats from the class. 10 feats from leveling.
Gets access to the highest level Fighter only feats.
Why would you ever play a Fighter if there was this paladin? The only thing stopping you would be that Code.
My recommendations: Give the feats at 4th level and ever 4 levels thereafter. Possibly even 4th and every 5 levels thereafter.
Largely because a Fighter nets five more feats than this version of Paladin, and gets Weapon Training and Weapon Mastery. Next to the what the Empyrial Knight gets in place of Mercy, I felt this was pretty decent.
I can see your point, though. It IS a 60% increase to the feats that paladin gets. I mainly put it at 3rd and every 3 for symmetry with Mercy, but I'm not opposed to 4th and every 4.
Second is a bit on the weak side, IMO. But awesome flavor.
Any suggestions for improving Devout Agent? There are a handful of other Bardic Performances that sort of fit thematically (Fascinate, Soothing Performance, and, if you squint, Deadly Performance), but I didn't feel they fit well enough.
I was considering putting in Versatile Performance, since Perform (oratory)'s associated skills are Diplomacy and Sense Motive, which are very appropriate Paladin skills.
I am a fan of move action ranged aid another. Maybe add charisma bonus to the bonus.
Theologian cleric can do something like it. I did the ability for a cavalier archetype I wrote for Rite Publishing. It's good enough, IMO, to not full attack all the time. My character that has it can give something like +7. Keeps the squishies alive and ensures our plans work :-)
It's a neat idea. What kind of range are we talking? Did you give it a range increment making it harder to do from farther away? At what level do you feel it would be appropriate?
I kept it to 30', much like the Theologians.
It requires a DC 10 oratory check instead of the attack roll.
I gave the ability to move action Aid Another at level 1.
At level 4 or 5, they got the ability to use it at range. I don't remember at what level they got to add their Int to the bonus. Possibly 1.
The concept for that guy was a cavalier who got...wait for it...the bardic performances you listed! And other stuff related to Int.
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It's a neat idea. What kind of range are we talking? Did you give it a range increment making it harder to do from farther away? At what level do you feel it would be appropriate?I kept it to 30', much like the Theologians.
It requires a DC 10 oratory check instead of the attack roll.
I gave the ability to move action Aid Another at level 1.
At level 4 or 5, they got the ability to use it at range. I don't remember at what level they got to add their Int to the bonus. Possibly 1.
The concept for that guy was a cavalier who got...wait for it...the bardic performances you listed! And other stuff related to Int.
XD It just feels natural for Paladins/Cavaliers/etc. to have the Inspire X abilities.
I'll start work on a newer version of Devout Agent.
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I would second this...a 60 percent boost to the number of combat feats is a bit much.
I don't know...to get those six feats you're giving up your Mercies (admittedly situational at best) and 10d6 Channel Energy (admittedly used less often than Mercy). Extra Mercy is a narrow feat, so let's treat mercies as half a feat. That makes 3 bonus feats viable there. If we treat each potential die of Channel Energy as a third of a feat, that gives us another three, with one left over for Fighter Training.
Even if we changed it to 4th and every 4, they'd get five bonus feats (a 50% increase). Is that 10% really such a big problem?
At 5th and every 5, they'd get four extra feats (a 40% increase) and it begins to feel like they're giving up too much when they could just devote a few levels to Fighter and come out about the same.
That's just the way I see it.
Any thoughts on Devout Agent?
Well, you could make it 4 + 1 for every 5 after. But really, mercies are extremely situational, and nowhere near as good as say, greater weapon focus. or weapon specialization. Or Penetrating Strike.
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Well, you could make it 4 + 1 for every 5 after. But really, mercies are extremely situational, and nowhere near as good as say, greater weapon focus. or weapon specialization. Or Penetrating Strike.
4th and every 5 falls into the same category as 5th and every 5. You net 4 feats and give up a lot.
You could take 2 levels of Fighter to get 2 extra feats and keep the Mercies and Channel energy and come up roughly even.
I don't like that the Devout Agent has performances before the vanilla Paladin has feats. I'd make the Agent have bard level -3 and start off with Inspire Courage at 4th and so on.
Better yet, I'd make them replace Aura of Justice (which overlaps with the performances in terms of party buffing and might be too much of a double-down) with something cooler, like:
Preach the Word (Ex)
Once per round, whenever the Paladin lands a critical hit on an evil enemy, brings an evil enemy to 0 or less hit points, or stabilizes a dying ally (magically or otherwise), the Paladin may begin a bardic performance as a free action.
How COOL is that? Dude commences reciting passages off his bible as he fells down enemies.
