NEW BASE CLASS - Invoker from Dota 2 - Peer Review Appreciated

[xCrash14x]

Someone posted a custom base class the other day which they mentioned was in part based on the hero Axe from Dota 2. I love Dota 2 and it made me think, what hero would I want to play in Pathfinder?... The answer was simple. Invoker. For those not familiar with Dota 2, Invoker is an incredibly complex and rewarding caster class hero to those who spend the many hours necessary to master him. The pathfinder version requires less mastery, but I still think the spells are fun.

Please feel free to look it over for any balance issues. Medium armor proficiency and shield proficiency to address the complete lack of AC increasing spells. Link to google doc below.

Invoker Base Class

Edit:

I have made changes based on some of the posts made here and have also added a significant early bottleneck for casting. Invoke is now an ability which has a cooldown and spells must be invoked to memory before they can be cast. This is to prevent an invoker of level 3 who has 1 level in each element (and thus access to all 10 spells) from being able to cast a spell every turn until long after any other caster has run dry. The restrictions and cooldown grow smaller as the invoker's level increases.

I also made some minor changes to the spells for balance issues.

A link to the revised google doc is located below.

Invoker Base Class (Revised)

[Flak]

Hahahaha WOW you put a lot of love into this. It's awesome. I can't comment on balance because I haven't yet had an opportunity to read the whole thing carefully, but man I want to run this :)

[incredilee]

One thing that catches my eye is alignment restriction. I don't think there should be any restriction. From what I've learned from watching Avatar TLA, a chaotic being who uses chaotic elements tends to lack order in favor of destruction, whether it be accidental or purposeful. A rigorous lawful character is just as suited, if not more, to get chaotic elements under his/her control as a naturally wild chaotic character.

What it sounded like you were trying to go for was if you have a chaotic mind you'll instinctively understand how the 3 elements work. I don't think alignment has anything to do with knowing how to make the 3 elements work together.

[incredilee]

Timeless: I think this is a neat idea but a little more complicated than it needs to be. Instead of changing the age brackets, they could remain the same, but an Invoker would not take any penalties or bonuses from the age brackets due to being "magically healthier". They can still die from old age like normal. In addition, since an Invoker has to spend nearly a lifetime to master their art, a rule should be that an Invoker has to start at middle age and no younger. They may not live any longer, but in turn, they are perfectly healthy and capable of combat into their final days.

It's like an old person who has being eating healthy and exercising their entire life. They may live a little longer, but the main bonus is that they "function" like a younger person even when they are 70.

Edit: This class is super cool though. I really want to run a game with an Invoker in it.

[xCrash14x]

@incredilee

i can see what you are saying about the chaotic alignment. It really doesn't matter very much, i just kind of envisioned this a sort of a counterpart to the monk. The monk spends his entire life honing his body to perfection though strict self governance. I felt as if the invoker would be similar in that he would spend a lifetime honing his mind to perfection, but would do so by immersing himself in the chaos of uncontrolled magic in its most potent form. But it makes sense that a Lawful character could just as easily apply his self-governing tendencies into rigorous study of the primal elements as the monk does with himself.

As for Timeless, I definitely like the idea that they receive no penalties or bonuses from aging. It would not be a balance issue at all but would add flavor to the class in that even the most inexperienced invoker would be twice the age of anyone else in the party. I might still keep the longer lifespan in there personally simply for RP purposes as Invoker in Dota 2 is immortal and thousands of years old, but this is certainly something that could be tweaked or even disregarded on a case by case basis.

[xCrash14x]

@ Flak

Thank you. I really love the Invoker character in Dota so I wanted to do it justice in this game. As for balance issues, most of the spells scale up to around 18d6 max + effects based on the level of the elements, but the damage die are almost always limited to 1d6/caster level so even if you level just one element you can't be hitting for 18d6 at level 6. 18d6 + spell effects is about comparable with existing level 8 spells which is about where I want it, but the effects may or may not be overpowered in the context of pathfinder. That's the part I'm really unsure of.

The Forge spirits spell starts out summoning 1 creature comparable to a small fire elemental (CR 1) and ends at 2 creatures roughly equivalent in stats to a huge fire elemental (Cr 7) at level 12 minimum to max both elements. So it may look like a lot of variables in that particular spell but it should scale okay.

Any further input is always appreciated. Thanks for looking.

[KCRift]

Crash - could you send me a PM? For some reason I can't PM you from your profile page. I'd like to talk with you about this class a little more.

[Petty Alchemy]

A couple of things:

Spell Resistance 3 or 6, does nothing. It's too weak to block anything by the time you get it.

I don't like how the passives and ability scores level at the same time. I'd stagger it out more.

[xCrash14x]

Petty Alchemy wrote:

A couple of things:

Spell Resistance 3 or 6, does nothing. It's too weak to block anything by the time you get it.

I don't like how the passives and ability scores level at the same time. I'd stagger it out more.

I definitely get what you are saying, I also had the thought that leveling each element for some of the intermediate levels just felt like stepping stones to continue to improve. So I have taken the upgrades to the passives from Master Invoker and applied them directly to leveling the elements and made it levels 2, 4, 6. I buffed the spell resistance slightly, but it now as a consequence no longer stacks. As it stands now it will go something like this for leveling each element:

Level 1: Damage Type to Primal Blast, and Elemental Resistance 5
Level 2: First Passive Bonus (Fast Heal 1, Move Speed 5, Spell Resist 5)
Level 3: First Ability Increase
Level 4: Second Passive Bonus (Fast Heal 2, Move Speed 10, SR 10)
Level 5: Primal Blast Special Effect, Elemental Resistance up to 10
Level 6: Final Passive (previously from Master Invoker)(Fast Heal 3, Move Speed 15, Spell Resist 15), and Second Ability Increase

So now no dead levels, but still weighted toward the higher end of each element. :)

As for SR, it was not my intention for it to be too powerful, but by allowing it to stack I wanted it to remain a viable passive throughout the game like the others, but by buffing it too much and allowing it to stack, an invoker with level 6 Exort and a Mantle of SR would be much too difficult to hit. At max 15 from Exort + 21 from Mantle of SR a level 20 caster would have to roll a 16+ to hit with a spell. But this revision will give the character some early SR of a decent level. Low enough that a Mantle of SR will still be useful, but they might be able to forgo it for another item in that slot if they want and still have some protection.

If anyone can think of a better passive for Exort that would not be too powerful but would remain viable for an entire game please let me know. The other passives were easy, but I had a hard time deciding on that one.