Drillmaster, used on the party, is too complicated (virtual class levels?), lasts too long (several days?), paradoxically too short (all that gold for only a couple days? If the bad guy doesn't attack soon the gold will have been wasted) and is not very effective if used on other PCs (The BAB will be smaller then what they already have unless they are low BAB and have less levels than the fighter, the extra feats will be useless to casters and will make martials outshine the fighter).
Let me show you an example.
NOTE: I'd like to point out that I miscalculated the XP trained per day... That should be x10 (or divide the XP needed by 10).
Take a level 6 party of 5 characters. One party member is a Fighter we'll nickname Deathzone (he has a thing for Combat Patrol). He has the following feats: Power Attack, Dodge, Mobility, Combat Reflexes, Spring Attack, Cleave, Combat Patrol, plus the equivalent of all the Armor Proficiencies, simple Weapon Proficiencies and martial Weapon Proficiency feats.
He decides to create a Drill.
As a level 6 fighter, he can make a drill that matches up to a level 3 character (2 feats) who qualifies as Fighter 3rd. He goes with this profile:
+3 BAB, W.P. Glaive (1), Combat Reflexes (3)
The formation is simply a cohesive infantry unit; everyone's adjacent to each other and not mounted.
We're using medium progression, so 5k XP are needed to learn the drill.
So, the Drill being crafted would have an entry like...
Shelter of Blades
Benefits: Provides a minimum of 3 Base Attack, Proficiency in Glaives, and the Combat Reflexes feat.
Formation: Cohesive infantry unit.
Requirements: Trainer must be a 6th level martial character with the Combat Reflexes feat and proficiency in Glaives.
Experience Cost: 5000
When training, he borrows the Bard's cloak of charisma +2, giving a CHA bonus of +1 (his base is 10). Every day he trains up (((1d20+1)x6)-4)x10 XP per person, which averages 590 XP. It take around 9 days for everyone to master the drill.
If Deathzone were a higher level, the drill can be taught faster (averages below):
07th : 7 days
08th : 6 days
10th : 5 days
12th : 4 days
15th : 3 days
This of course changes with the number of people in the drill, and the charisma bonus he has while running the drill.
And, of course, the duration of the drill lasts longer.
To use this in a game, it would allow a Fighter to run a drill with his party members before the campaign, allowing any 2+ of them to go adjacent with Glaives and get Combat Reflexes for free, so long as they remain adjacent. It will likely be available until the end of the adventure, or at least the first part.
@Ashiel:
I'm gonna be honest. I already use Stances and Techniques for my Martial Artist class (built mostly by Kuma, but I helped and I use it). That is why I want something different for the Fighter.
Ok. Then what sort of alternative would you suggest that gives the Fighter their own niche ability that makes them something besides NPC-Warrior + Feats/damage, while not sharing the mechanics of Barbarians, Paladins, Rangers, Monks, Rogues, or your own homebrew class?
My younger brother suggests giving them a Rage mechanic like World of Warcraft, where you generate rage or focus during combat and spend it to do exceptional effects. I'm hesitant about this option though because it might seem to be too similar to "grit" that Gunslingers use, and the naming convention is reminiscent of barbarians, and people just seem to blow up when people mention WoW and Tabletop RPGs (mainly because I think people are narrow minded, but there you have it).
So we return to the design goals...
So, who else has ideas that handle the above?
Side Note: I didn't intend for this to end up being a martial arts discussion, but since it actually IS relevant to martial characters, I think it's worth noting that martial arts by no means translates to "unarmed combat". Quite the contrary, it is the art of war. It is combat technique that has been honed to the point of being an art form. You are an artisan of battle.
Martial arts include unarmed fighting, melee combat, ranged weapons, grappling, and so forth. Even in eastern traditions such as Shaolin Kung-Fu and early Jiu-Jitsu, weapons were par for the course. Jiu-Jitsu was developed by samurai sharing combat experience and advice for fighting other guys in heavy armor; which is why it has few strikes and many throws. Once you downed the guy, you used your weapon to kill him while he was stunned.
I believe there's a Germanic fighting style for using longswords or large blades, which emphasizes holding your weapon high, with the intent of making large crescent-like swings, to parry blows, or chop your opponent to pieces after you dodge their attack (sidestep->chop=profit).
"Martial Art" does not mean "unarmed combat art". It's just that unarmed combat is generally something included in all martial arts, whether it was 7 centuries BC, or today with modern firearms.
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After going back and really thinking about my ideas, I realize that alot of them are too complicated for alot of new gamers to pick up. This then led to the conclusion that I did what I always do - overanalyze, overcomplicate, and sometimes overcompensate.
So, that said, here is what my new houserule is for a fighter fix.
Note that none of the bonus feats are combat feats. They are, in fact, boosters of skills, movement, and saving throws.
As for such things like the Master of the Craft feats, I still like the idea of crafting things besides magic items or equipment. But that's a whole other subject.
Fighter
The Fighter is an expert in martial fighting techniques.
Alignment: any
Hit die: d10
Class Skills
The Fighter’s classes skills are acrobatics, climb, craft, heal, knowledge engineering, perception, profession, survival, and swim. A fighter may pick one more skill to be a Class Skill. Skill ranks per level: 4+ intelligence modifier
Weapon and armor proficiencies: The Fighter is proficient with simple and martial weapons and with light armor, medium armor, heavy armor, and shields but not tower shields.
Recovery: The Fighter can be treated for deadly wounds a number of times a day equal to his Con Modifier + half his fighter level (minimum 2), and it only takes 1 minute to use Treat Deadly Wounds on a fighter.
Techniques
Shake It off: The fighter can choose to remove one condition from himself at the start of each turn, any turn that they use this ability they loss their standard action that turn.
Pierce the Shell: The Fighter can make a single melee attack as a Full round action that targets the touch AC of the target. Because more of the fighter attention is on placing the strike in just the right place they suffer a -2 to their AC until the start of their next turn.
Back flip: When hit by a melee attack you can do a back flip as an Immediate action, make a jump check as part of this action, and your AC for the triggering is equal to your jump check.
Spin Attack: As a Full round action make an attack against each enemy in reach. You only do half damage.
Never Give Up: As a swift action a fighter can gain 1d8+Con modifier Temporary Hit points which last for up to ten rounds. The fighter has to wait 1d4 rounds before he can use this technique again.
Sudden Shift: You can move half your speed as a swift action
Uncanny Dodge
Evasion
Cunning Reflexes: You can also add Int mod to you reflex saves.
Table Fighter Class
Level...BAB....Fort...Reflex....Will....Special
1.......+1......+2......+0......+0......Combat Feat
2.......+2......+3......+0......+0......Combat Feat, Recovery
3.......+3......+3......+1......+1......Armor Training 1
4.......+4......+4......+1......+1......Combat Feat
5.......+5......+4......+1......+1......Weapon Training
6.......+6......+5......+2......+2......Combat Feat, Technique
7.......+7......+5......+2......+2......Armor Training 2
8.......+8......+6......+2......+2......Combat Feat
9.......+9......+6......+3......+3......Weapon Training
10......+10.....+7......+3......+3......Combat Feat, Technique
11......+11.....+7......+3......+3......Armor Training 3
12......+12.....+8......+4......+4......Combat Feat
13......+13.....+8......+4......+4......Weapon Training
14......+14.....+9......+4......+4......Combat Feat, Technique
15......+15.....+9......+5......+5......Armor Training 4
16......+16.....+10.....+5......+5......Combat Feat
17......+17.....+10.....+5......+5......Weapon Training, Technique
18......+18.....+11.....+6......+6......Combat Feat
19......+19.....+11.....+6......+6......Armor Mastery
20......+20 +12.....+6......+6......Combat Feat, Weapon Mastery
Weapon and armor proficiencies: The Fighter is proficient with simple and martial weapons and with light armor, medium armor, heavy armor, and shields but not tower shields.
Is there a reason you took tower shield proficiency away from Fighters?
Recovery: The Fighter can be treated for deadly wounds a number of times a day equal to his Con Modifier + half his fighter level (minimum 2), and it only takes 1 minute to use Treat Deadly Wounds on a fighter.
What is a Deadly Wound?
Shake It off: The fighter can choose to remove one condition from himself at the start of each turn, any turn that they use this ability they loss their standard action that turn.
This is poorly defined. It definitely needs to make a little more sense. As is, it can be used to end everything from being held to being petrified, dead, or entangled in a net, etc. It requires no action, and apparently occurs at the start of each turn, which means that it would occur when it's not the Fighter's turn as well.
I like the concept, but the execution needs work.
Pierce the Shell: The Fighter can make a single melee attack as a Full round action that targets the touch AC of the target. Because more of the fighter attention is on placing the strike in just the right place they suffer a -2 to their AC until the start of their next turn.
Making this a full-round action doesn't help the Fighter in terms of mobility at all. In fact, it just goes back to favoring Archers, and yet you can't Vital Strike with this, so it is definitely lackluster. Additionally, you're trading all your attacks for 1 touch attack, but Fighters usually don't have issues landing hits on high AC foes except at very low levels, where this would be gnarly, but fairly useless at higher levels.
Back flip: When hit by a melee attack you can do a back flip as an Immediate action, make a jump check as part of this action, and your AC for the triggering is equal to your jump check.
Should be acrobatics check. Likewise, perhaps it should be something less specific than "back flip" and instead something like "quick reaction" or something. We already have people complaining that we're getting too much kung-fu in their non-existent western history abomination.
Spin Attack: As a Full round action make an attack against each enemy in reach. You only do half damage.
Another ability that is flashy but nigh useless. You make a single attack, at half damage even, versus a bunch of enemies, and you can't be moving while you do it. The only way this is useful is if you are fighting hordes of low-level mooks who are 1 HD with no HP bonuses at-all.
A 20th level Fighter can sport a +15 strength bonus, +5 enhancement, +4 weapon training, +2 dueling gloves, and +18 power attack, and +4 from specialization. Plus a paltry weapon damage of about 7 average damage. So at 20th, you're looking at maybe 25 damage to everything surrounding you. That's not going to be meaningful unless the creatures are like CR 3.
Not a lot of complaints otherwise. Doesn't leave much to building unique Fighters though.
A way to change fighter easy is to give stances as feats. Maybe you can have just one every 4 levels or similar. Then an archetype that drop something like armor training to have more or use 2 togheter.
I wonder what the Fighter's role is in the game's future.
If a person, completely new to Pathfinder, were to look at the Fighter and every other class, how would they see it? And if someone had a character in mind, what might make them choose to use the Fighter to represent it over other classes?
Ranger: Archer, tracker, expert monster-hunter.
Cavalier: Honorable (or not) knight, expert in mounted combat and duels/challenges. Aristocrats?
Barbarian: Savage, angry, strong warrior, probably very brutal. Big weapons.
Rogue: Skilled and finesse-based combatant.
Monk: Martial artist with a mystic bent. Unarmed, unarmored, fairly skilled.
Ninja: Ninja.
Paladin: Stalwart religious warrior, generally defensive with a strong zealous bent. Natural leaders.
Magus: Soldier- mage.
Bard: Charismatic, inspirational, knowledgeable leader.
Gunslinger: Modern warrior, semi-pirate.
Alchemist: Bomber or pseudoscience mutant warrior.
Inquisitor: Monster-hunter or man-hunter extraordinaire with a religious bent.
You can try to point to the Fighter's mechanical abilities for guidance, but there isn't a whole lot there to point to an archetypical theme. There are (or at least were) very few fighter-only feats, none of which stood out as compellingly interesting to have compared to a proper class ability.
"Fighter," as a word, really doesn't describe what kind of a character it is supposed to fit- except perhaps in the same way "adult" might describe a type of human. The name seems to have descended from "Fighting Man" back in the days when there were only three classes, and "Fighting Man" really did adequately describe and represent your character (which may or may not have had a last name).
In 3.0, the main draw of the fighter was that it could be shaped into whatever type of fighting character you could imagine- two-handed swordsman, archery master, charismatic captain of men. Now, though, most of these are acknowledged as being more evocative with other classes: two-handed weapons for a Barbarian, archery on a Ranger, charismatic captain as a Bard or Paladin. Mechanically there might be advantages as a Fighter, but if you consider versatility and thematics, another class probably suits it better.
I think there is a lot of sentimental attachment to the Fighter in its mostly tabula-rasa form. As a class, it seems very versatile. In practice, it is mostly just a copycat class- it gets bigger numbers doing what you want it to, but the theme of what you were wanting to portray likely could be done by a different class, along with a wider diversity of abilities to help the character look more like a growing, adapting being.
As I said, I wonder what the future of the Fighter really is. Perhaps it might get a better name.
Fighter
The Fighter is an expert in martial fighting techniques.
Alignment: any
Hit die: d10
Class Skills
The Fighter’s classes skills are acrobatics, climb, craft, heal, knowledge engineering, perception, profession, survival, and swim. A fighter may pick one more skill to be a Class Skill. Skill ranks per level: 4+ intelligence modifier
Weapon and armor proficiencies: The Fighter is proficient with simple and martial weapons and with light armor, medium armor, heavy armor, shields, and tower shields.
Recovery: The Fighter can be treated for deadly wounds a number of times a day equal to his Con Modifier + half his fighter level (minimum 2), and it only takes 1 minute to use Treat Deadly Wounds on a fighter.
Techniques
Shake It off: The fighter can choose to remove one of the following conditions from himself as standard action, if the Fighter cannot use standard action or have because of the condition they can remove the condition but loss their standard action this turn as if they had used it. Conditions that can be removed: Blinded, Confused, Cowering, Dazed, Dazzled, Deafened, Entangled, Exhausted, Fascinated, Fatigued, Frightened, Nauseated, Paralyzed, Shaken, Sickened, Staggered, and Stunned.
Pierce the Shell: The Fighter can make a single melee attack as a Standard action that targets the touch AC of the target. Because more of the fighter attention is on placing the strike in just the right place they suffer a -2 to their AC until the start of their next turn.
Back flip: When hit by a melee attack you can do a back flip as an Immediate action, make a acrobatics check as part of this action, and your AC for the triggering is equal to your Acrobatics check.
Spin Attack: As a Standard action make an attack against each enemy in reach.
Never Give Up: As a swift action a fighter can gain 1d8+Con modifier Temporary Hit points which last for up to ten rounds. The fighter has to wait 1d4 rounds before he can use this technique again.
Sudden Shift: You can move half your speed as a swift action
Uncanny Dodge
Evasion
Cunning Reflexes: You can also add Int mod to you reflex saves.
Table Fighter Class
Level...BAB....Fort...Reflex....Will....Special
1.......+1......+2......+0......+0......Combat Feat
2.......+2......+3......+0......+0......Combat Feat, Recovery
3.......+3......+3......+1......+1......Armor Training 1
4.......+4......+4......+1......+1......Combat Feat
5.......+5......+4......+1......+1......Weapon Training
6.......+6......+5......+2......+2......Combat Feat, Technique
7.......+7......+5......+2......+2......Armor Training 2
8.......+8......+6......+2......+2......Combat Feat
9.......+9......+6......+3......+3......Weapon Training
10......+10.....+7......+3......+3......Combat Feat, Technique
11......+11.....+7......+3......+3......Armor Training 3
12......+12.....+8......+4......+4......Combat Feat
13......+13.....+8......+4......+4......Weapon Training
14......+14.....+9......+4......+4......Combat Feat, Technique
15......+15.....+9......+5......+5......Armor Training 4
16......+16.....+10.....+5......+5......Combat Feat
17......+17.....+10.....+5......+5......Weapon Training, Technique
18......+18.....+11.....+6......+6......Combat Feat
19......+19.....+11.....+6......+6......Armor Mastery
20......+20 +12.....+6......+6......Combat Feat, Weapon Mastery
I made some changes based off of what you said.
As for the number of techniques the listed ones are just the start and more can and should be added to the list.
I got the I ideal for back flip from playing Zelda.
This is more what I came up with in the first plase, but I did not want to over correct and make the fighter to good.
Treat Deadly wounds is a use of the heal skill that lets you recover hp without the use of magic. See page 99 in the core rule book.
So...I decided to take this to heart, and I'm currently working on a re-write of the fighter. In a nutshell, it utilizes maneuvers, stances and a system I'm calling 'focus', which acts a bit like grit.
Keep in mind that everything below is essentially in the "drawing board" stage, and I don't yet have anything testable.
The Basics
Focus: Every fighter has a "focus" pool, which they can spend to activate maneuvers and stances. At the beginning of combat, he starts with 1 point in his focus pool, and can have a total number of points equal to his intelligence modifier. Every time, during combat, he makes a successful attack roll against an opponent or is hit by an opponent's attack roll, he gains 1 focus point. He retains all focus points until 1 minute after combat ends.
Maneuvers: The fighter has a "combat manual" in which he keeps his recorded maneuvers and stances. He can then "prepare" his maneuvers and stances at the beginning of the day. He begins with one prepared maneuver, and can prepare one more every 3 levels thereafter.
Maneuvers do not have levels, but instead have a "cost," between 1 and 4 focus points. They also have minimum level requirements before they can be prepared. Prepared maneuvers aren't spent like spells when used, and remain prepared all day
Stances: At 5th level, the fighter can prepare 1 stance, plus 1 more for every 4 levels thereafter. Like maneuvers, stances are recorded in the combat manual, prepared, and cost focus points to activate. Once activated, a fighter can remain in a stance until he activates a new stance, ends the stance voluntarily, or combat ends, whichever comes first. He can only have 1 stance active at a time. Activating a stance is a move action.
Stances are otherwise like maneuvers. They do not have levels, but do have level requirements to prepare.
Renewed Vigor: At 2nd level, a fighter can call upon inner strength to ignore wounds in combat. He can spend 1 focus point to heal 1d6 HP for every 2 levels he possesses as a standard action that does not provoke an attack of opportunity.
Ex.: Valeros, a 5th level fighter with a total focus pool of 4 (2 int, 1 "extra focus" feat), can prepare 2 maneuvers for the day, and 1 stance. He prepares the "Tiger Strike" maneuver (attack with two weapons as a standard action, cost 1 point), the Parry maneuver (immediate action, attack roll negates enemy's attack, cost 2 points), and the Sword as Shield stance (if wielding no shield, gain 1/2 strength bonus as a shield bonus to AC, cost 2 points).
He enters combat with 3 enemies, earning 1 focus point. During his turn, he uses Tiger Strike to attack one of the enemies. Both attacks hit and he earns 2 focus points. During the enemies' turns, he is hit once, earning 1 more focus point (total 3/4). On his turn, he activates Sword as Shield and uses Tiger Strike again, defeating an enemy and earning 2 more points (total 2/4). On his opponents' turns, he parries one attack, and gets hit by another (total 1/4). Running low on health, he uses renewed vigor to heal himself.
Combat continues, blah blah. You get the picture of how the system is supposed to function.
~~~
Beyond the abilities listed, I've got Combat Arts replacing bonus feats at every even level (fun stuff like "Juggernaut", which turns your HD from d10 to d12), a "Dual Stance" ability (self-explanatory) at 19th level, and a capstone that allows you to string together standard-action maneuvers during a full-attack.
Basically, I'm wondering if 1) my idea can even work in theory, and 2) if it can, is it a good idea?
Questions, comments, and criticisms are more than welcome. I should have a prototype up and running within the next couple days.
...Catch Phrase,
-Chris