I made this variant for two reasons.
- First of all, I like the cavalier, but I'm not too keen on a class that relies on a mount because such creatures make low-level dungeons very tedious to go through. You can't stay mounted all the time, and that takes a lot away from the class.
- Secondly, divine casters have their full caster (cleric), medium caster (inquisitor), and lesser caster (paladin). The wizard is the arcane counterpart to the cleric as the full caster (or sorcerer/oracle for spontaneous casters) The bard fills, essentially, the same role as the inquisitor, meaning he has a d8 HD, medium BAB, and medium spell progression, and a good bit of utility, giving him the ability to do casting and combat equally well, and the magus is a prepared caster that gives up some utility to be a better combatant. Arcane casters have no lesser caster equivalent, and with the magus and bard, there's not really a need to make a separate class to fill this role, but I feel that making an archetype to fill such a role is an acceptable alternative.
So here's the Arc-knight, a mount-less, arcane spellcasting cavalier.
Arc-knight
Arc-knights are infantry specialized in arcane spell casting. They are most common amongst races with a strong magic and martial tradition, such as elves, and they are quite numerous in countries where arcane magic is common amongst the aristocracy, such as Nex. They often join the Order of the Staff or the Order of the Tome
- Skills
o An arc-knight gains only 2+ his int mod in skill points, but he adds knowledge (arcane) and spell-craft to his list of class skills.
- Saves
o An arc-knight has good base will save in addition to his good fortitude save.
- Arcane pool
o Replaces mount
This functions exactly as the magus ability of the same name.
- Spell-casting
o Replaces expert trainer/cavalier’s charge
Beginning at the 4th level an arc-knight casts arcane spells drawn from the magus spell list. An arc-knight must choose and prepare his spells ahead of time.
To learn, prepare, or cast a spell, the arc-knight must have an intelligence score equal to at least 10 + the spell level. The DC for a saving throw against a magus’s spell is 10 + the spell level + the magus’s int modifier.
An arc-knight can cast only a certain number of spells of each spell level per day. His base daily spell allotment is given below.
Spells per day
Level 1st 2nd 3rd 4th
1 - - - -
2 - - - -
3 - - - -
4 0 - - -
5 1 - - -
6 1 - - -
7 1 0 - -
8 1 1 - -
9 2 1 - -
10 2 1 0 -
11 2 1 1 -
12 2 2 1 -
13 3 2 1 1
14 3 2 1 1
15 3 2 2 1
16 3 3 2 1
17 4 3 2 2
18 4 3 2 2
19 4 3 3 2
20 4 4 3 2
In addition, he receives bonus spells per day if he has a high Intelligence score.
When the above table indicates that the arc-knight gets 0 spells per day of a given spell level, he gains only the bonus spells she would be entitled to based on his int score for that spell level.
An arc-knight may know any number of spells. He must choose and prepare his spells ahead of time by getting 8 hours of sleep and spending 1 hour studying his spellbook. While studying, the arc-knight decides which spells to prepare.
Spellbooks: An arc-knight must study his spellbook each day to prepare his spells. He cannot prepare any spell not recorded in his spellbook except for read magic, which all arc-knights can prepare from memory. An arc-knight begins play with a spellbook containing three 1st-level magus spells of his choice. The arc-knight also selects a number of additional 1st-level magus spells equal to his intelligence modifier to add to his spellbook. At each new arc-knight level, he gains two new magus spells of any spell level or levels that he can cast (based on his new arc-knight level) for his spellbook. At any time, an arc-knight can also add spells found in other spellbooks to his own.
An arc-knight can learn spells from a wizard’s spellbook, just as a wizard can from a magus’s and arc-knight’s spellbook. The spells learned must be on the magus spell list, as normal. An alchemist can learn formulae from a arc-knight’s spellbook, if the spells are also on the alchemist spell list. An arc-knight cannot learn spells from an alchemist.
Through 3rd level, an arc-knight has no caster level. At 4th level and higher, his caster level is equal to his arc-knight level – 3.
- Armored Caster
o Replaces expert trainer/cavalier’s charge
At level 4, when an arc-knight gains arcane spell casting, the arc-knight also learns to minimize arcane spell failure penalties for wearing armor. The penalty for wearing armor and casting is decreased by 20%. This ability stacks with feats such as Arcane Armor Training. As an example, an arc-knight with this ability suffers only a 15% arcane spell-failure chance, and he can use Arcane Armor Training to decrease it to 5% or Arcane Armor Mastery to decrease it to 0%.
- Armored Caster, Greater
o Replaces mighty charge
At level 11, the arc-knight decreases the arcane spell failure chance by 35% rather than 20%. As with Armored caster, this ability stacks with Arcane Armor Training and Arcane Armor Mastery
- Spell critical
o Replaces supreme charge
At 20th level, an arc-knight gains the Spell-critical as per the eldritch knight class feature.
