Custom character - psychic


Homebrew and House Rules


My daughter would only consent to play a game with the wife and me if she could play a character of her choosing. Looking through the blogs with me, she saw Rivani and said that she wanted to play "that gypsy chick" and wanted her to have lots of spells. So after reading the lore for Rivani and for psychics, I created an initial version for a game. Afterwards, I went back and made some tweaks (though I feel that there is still room for improvement).

Note that this doesn't have to be "Rivani." As far as I'm concerned, it could be any psychic. I used Seoni as a baseline, but made some adjustments to the skills.

SKILLS

Strength d4 □ +1
Dexterity d6 □ +1 □ +2
Constitution d6 □ +1 □ +2
Intelligence d10 □ +1 □ +2 □ +3 □ +4
Arcane: Intelligence +2
Knowledge: Intelligence +1
Wisdom d8 □ +1 □ +2 □ +3
Perception: Wisdom +2
Charisma d8 □ +1 □ +2 □ +3
Divine: Charisma +1

POWERS

Hand Size 5 □ 6 □ 7

For your combat check, you may discard a weapon or an item to use your Arcane skill and add 1d6 (□ +1) and add the Attack and Ranged traits. This counts as playing a spell. After completing the combat, you may succeed at an Arcane 8 check to recharge the weapon or item instead of discarding it.

You may automatically succeed at your check to recharge a spell or an item that has the Mental trait.

You may discard (□ or recharge) a spell to add 1d4+1 to your attempt to acquire a weapon or item. This counts as playing a spell.

CARDS LIST FAVORED CARD TYPE: SPELL
Weapon 1 □ 2
Spell 4 □ 5 □ 6 □ 7
Armor -
Item 4 □ 5 □ 6
Ally 2 □ 3 □ 4
Blessing 4 □ 5 □ 6

(PSYCHIC DUELLIST ROLE)

POWERS

Hand Size 5 □ 6 □ 7 □ 8

For your combat check, you may discard a weapon or an item to use your Arcane skill and add 1d6 (□ +1)(□ +2)(□ +3) and add the Attack and Ranged traits. This counts as playing a spell. After completing the combat, you may succeed at an Arcane 8 check to recharge the weapon or item instead of discarding it.

You may automatically succeed at your check to recharge a spell or an item that has the Mental trait.

You may discard (□ or recharge) a spell to add 1d4+1 to your attempt to acquire a weapon or item. This counts as playing a spell.

□ You may discard (□ or recharge) a weapon or item to reduce combat (□ any) damage by 2 (□ 4). This counts as playing a spell that you may play even if you already played a spell in the same encounter.

□ You may discard a spell to add 1d6 to a combat check by another character at your location.

(AMNESIAC ROLE)

POWERS

Hand Size 5 □ 6 □ 7 □ 8 □ 9

For your combat check, you may discard a weapon or an item to use your Arcane skill and add 1d6 (□ +1)(□ +2) and add the Attack and Ranged traits. This counts as playing a spell. After completing the combat, you may succeed at an Arcane 8 check to recharge the weapon or item instead of discarding it.

You may automatically succeed at your check to recharge a spell or an item that has the Mental trait.

You may discard (□ or recharge) a spell to add 1d4+1 to your (□ or any other character at your location's) attempt to acquire a weapon or item. This counts as playing a spell.

□ Before exploring your location you may recall spells. Discard all spells in your hand and shuffle them with all of the spells in your discard pile, drawing 1d4 (□ +1)(□ +2) spells from the shuffled spells.

□ You may discard a card to examine the top card of your deck; if it is a spell, you may add it to your hand.

DESIGN NOTES

You can probably see where I took most of the powers from other characters.

For the combat check power, the concept is that the psychic is using her psychic power to fling a weapon/item at a bane (much like the picture of Rivani appears to be doing). For the psychic duellist, this was extended to using psychic power to move a weapon/item into the path of incoming danger in order to reduce the damage.

I also gave both the Arcane and Divine skills in order to give the character access to a broader range of spells (via recharging them). Only a handful of spells have the Mental trait, so I'm hoping that part isn't too powerful.

The psychic duellist role is focused on combat power, mostly for the psychic, but with the added ability to aid another character at the same location. This role will be much more focused on gathering weapons and items in order to use them in combat. There is some risk that the character will get fewer spells back than were forgotten (though canny players won't let that happen if they can help it) and that you won't necessarily get the spells that you want, but that all seems to be accurate to the description of the archetype.

The amnesiac role was a bit more interesting, and I see that role being much more focused on using spells instead of flinging weapons/items (though the role doesn't lose that basic ability).

As I said, I'm sure that there's room for improvement, so I'm looking to those that are more experienced in this kind of thing than me to point out the things that I'm not seeing.

Cheers!


D'oh!

Perception should have been Wisdom +1.

Also, I'm thinking that should be changed to Survival (assuming it's Rivani, she travels a lot so is bound to have picked up some survival skills along the way).

I also goofed in the design notes - the sentence about forgotten spells should have closed the following paragraph about the amnesiac role (not the psychic duellist role).


your base power uses weapons (and items) as fodder for her power. however, you only have 1 weapon. so most of the time you'll be trashing items, meaning most of those items won't ever do the things they are meant to do. as someone who has used RotR Seoni, its depressing when i have to sacrifice a Sage even though i know a wisdom check is coming up. and this base character (especially the duelist role), is discarding and sacrificing too many cards that you won't get to use them for their actual ability most of the time, creating a rather boring and flat character. as a side note, the only reason to get a weapon on seoni is for the stability and consistency of not having to lose a card every combat. it also seems redundant to sacrifice a weapon for a combat ability. if you're doing that consistently, you should just swap it for an attack spell slot. i know that's a bit of min/max'ing rather than keeping in-theme, but realistically people tend to min/max anyway, even if they are doing it subconsciously.

the duelist really does discard a lot of cards. this should be looked at and tested before you try her for real and it turns out she kills herself by turn 3. a hand size of 9 is pretty huge. 8 is, on average, the max.

there are a couple of other custom char's on here that try and merge weapons and spells, like kilazar the strength wizard a few threads down and a duskblade character in an older thread. you may want to check them out for ideas.


My gut says the recall spells ability is too powerful. If you've got no spells in your hand, it's free healing. Maybe make it [that number of spells]? Or something along those lines. I like the idea of leaving it up to chance, but if she's maxed out her spells at 7 and she's getting back 1d4+2 of them, that's not much chance to be had. Even less when you consider she's probably not going to have all 7 spells in her hand/discard at once.


Thanks for the feedback. I combined your suggestions with some other ideas I had throughout the day and made the following revisions:

SKILLS

Strength d4 □ +1 □ +2
Dexterity d6 □ +1 □ +2
Constitution d6 □ +1 □ +2
Intelligence d10 □ +1 □ +2 □ +3 □ +4
Arcane: Intelligence +2
Knowledge: Intelligence +1
Wisdom d8 □ +1 □ +2 □ +3
Perception: Wisdom +1
Survival: Wisdom +1
Charisma d8 □ +1 □ +2

POWERS

Hand Size 5 □ 6

For your combat check, you may discard a weapon or an item to use your Arcane skill and add 1d6 (□ +1) and add the Attack and Ranged traits. This counts as playing a spell. You may succeed at an Arcane 6 check to recharge the weapon or item instead of discarding it.

You may discard a weapon or item to reduce combat (□ any) damage by 2. This counts as playing a spell that you may play even if you already played a spell in the same encounter.

You may recharge a spell to add 1d6 (□ 2d6) to your attempt to acquire a weapon or item.

CARDS LIST FAVORED CARD TYPE: SPELL
Weapon 1 □ 2
Spell 4 □ 5 □ 6 □ 7
Armor -
Item 4 □ 5 □ 6
Ally 2 □ 3 □ 4
Blessing 4 □ 5 □ 6

(MINDBLADE)

POWERS

Hand Size 5 □ 6 □ 7

For your combat check, you may discard a weapon or an item to use your Arcane skill and add 1d6 (□ +1)(□ +2)(□ +3) and add the Attack and Ranged traits. This counts as playing a spell. You may succeed at an Arcane 6 check to recharge the weapon or item (□ or return it to your hand) instead of discarding it.

You may discard a weapon or item to reduce combat (□ any) damage by 2 (□ 4). This counts as playing a spell that you may play even if you already played a spell in the same encounter.

You may recharge a spell to add 1d6 (□ 2d6) to your attempt to acquire a weapon or item.

□ You automatically succeed at your check to recharge a card with the Mental trait.

□ For your combat check, you may recharge a spell to use your Arcane skill +1d4 and add the Attack, Ranged, and Mental traits. This counts as playing a spell. You may not play a weapon on the check.

□ You may discard a spell to add 1d4 to a combat check by another character at your location.

(AMNESIAC)

POWERS

Hand Size 5 □ 6 □ 7

For your combat check, you may discard a weapon or an item to use your Arcane skill and add 1d6 (□ +1)(□ +2) and add the Attack and Ranged traits. This counts as playing a spell. You may succeed at an Arcane 6 check to recharge the weapon or item instead of discarding it.

You may discard a weapon or item to reduce combat (□ any) damage by 2. This counts as playing a spell that you may play even if you already played a spell in the same encounter.

You may recharge a spell to add 1d6 (□ 2d6) to your (□ or any other character at your location's) attempt to acquire a weapon or item.

□ You automatically succeed at your check to recharge a card with the Mental trait.

□ Before (□ or after) exploring your location you may recall spells. Discard all spells in your hand and shuffle them with all of the spells in your discard pile, drawing the same number of spells from the shuffled spells.

□ If you acquire a spell (□ boon) with the Mental trait, you may immediately explore your location again.

NOTES

I didn't mention this before, but I've created this character for general use similar to the characters in the class decks (so maybe I'll move on to other psychics once I get this one done ;) ).

I made some tweaks to the skills, removing one of the Charisma feats and shifting it up to Strength. I also removed the Divine: Charisma +1 skill and replaced it with Survival: Wisdom +1. This better represents "Rivani" and her travels, at the expense of being able to recharge Divine spells.

I reduced the hand size feat to 6 (vice 7).

I also removed the automatic success at recharging Mental spells and applied a diminished version of the armor power (the character can have no armor cards in the deck).

The main changes dealt with the ability to acquire/recharge weapons/items. When used in combat, the recharge roll was reduced from 8 to 6. With a minimum roll of 3 (1d10+2), the character will be recharging weapons/items most of the time when using them in psychic combat; and if the character reaches the Intelligence +3 feat, she will be recharging weapons/items *every* time. This may be too good, in which case increasing the recharge to 7 might be appropriate. Similarly, the chance to acquire weapons/items was improved, first by changing the chance from 1d4+1 to 1d6 (which gives a broader range both for success and failure) as well as changing the feat increase to a 2d6 chance. Also, the spell use was changed from a default discard with a feat increase to recharge to a default of recharging the spell.

Overall, the character has a much better chance of both getting and keeping weapons/items for use in psychic combat, and overall character survivability has increased by both decreasing the maximum hand size and giving the ability to use weapons/items to reduce damage.

The cards list didn't change any (yes, the character still has a limited number of weapons). My initial instinct is that having a high number of items should work. If that turns out to be incorrect, I'll probably remove the blessing 6 feat and increase the weapon feats to 3.

The power to automatically recharge cards with the Mental trait has become a feat for both roles.

I also reduced the max hand size feats for both roles (maxing both out at 7). This increased overall survivability, but forced me to look hard at the other powers for feats so that I didn't create too many new powers (simply allowing for incremental improvements to a few powers).

I've re-named the Psychic Duellist as a "Mindblade" (I don't know if that sounds stupid or not, but I figured I'd throw it out there).

The Mindblade/Psychic Duelist has a new power, which is the ability to recharge a spell to make a mental attack. This is slightly weaker than using a weapon/item, and lacks the feat improvements while also having the Mental trait (and there are some banes that are immune to this trait, again making it slightly weaker). This is basically representing the psychic using the power of her will to strike out at an opponent without having to throw a weapon/item.

The ability to enhance another character's combat check was reduced from 1d6 to 1d4. I don't know if that was necessary or not, but my gut instinct was that 1d6 made the character too powerful.

I also gave the Mindblade a feat to return weapons/items used in psychic combat directly to the hand instead of recharging them.

Overall, the Mindblade has a definite focus on psychic combat.

For the Amnesiac, I changed the recall of spells power so that the character draws the same number of spells as were discarded (so no free healing). If the wording on this isn't clear, I'll fix it.

I also removed the power to examine the top card of your deck and add it to your hand if it's a spell. That power was replaced with the ability to immediately explore again if a spell (or boon) with the Mental trait is acquired. The overall focus of the Amnesiac role is acquiring and using spells (while retaining the basic psychic powers).

I have to admit that I didn't look at the other custom characters as was suggested. It might seem quirky, but using ideas from official characters doesn't bother me, but using them from other players' homegrown characters seems like stealing. I admit that it sounds foolish, so I probably need to re-think that policy. :)

My intent is to playtest this character this weekend, using her in place of Seoni in Wrath of the Righteous scenarios. I'll probably round the party out with Alain and Kyra. We're still playing the base set level 0 AP, and I don't want to ruin surprises in higher APs until we get through them with our regular party, so my playtesting will be limited to lower levels for now. I'm still refining the character through Friday evening, though, so feedback is welcome.


After more consideration, I figured that there was a disconnect between the roles. One was supposed to be combat-based while the other was supposed to be spell-based. So it didn't seem likely that a character would start with a common path and then choose one of the roles as a specialization later on. The two roles really required different starting paths.

So I looked at the pregenerated versions of Rivani for PFRPG and decided that a "Rivani" character should really be spell-based. I also saw that the distribution of her skills didn't quite match up to the RPG equivalents. So I have revamped the character (and now it *is* supposed to be Rivani - until we get an official version). I've taken the psychic duelist role and developed it for another character (which I'll discuss in a separate topic).

SKILLS

Strength d4 □ +1 □ +2
Dexterity d6 □ +1 □ +2
Constitution d6 □ +1 □ +2
Intelligence d12 □ +1 □ +2 □ +3 □ +4
Arcane: Intelligence +2
Knowledge: Intelligence +1
Wisdom d8 □ +1 □ +2 □ +3
Perception: Wisdom +1
Survival: Wisdom +1
Charisma d6 □ +1 □ +2

POWERS

Hand Size 5 □ 6

Proficient with □ Weapons

For your combat check, you may use your Arcane skill instead of the normal dice.

You may discard a weapon or item to reduce combat (□ any) damage by 2 (□ 4). This counts as playing a spell that you may play even if you already played a spell in the same encounter.

You automatically succeed at your check to recharge a card with the Mental trait.

CARDS LIST FAVORED CARD TYPE: SPELL
Weapon 2 □ 3
Spell 4 □ 5 □ 6 □ 7
Armor -
Item 3 □ 4 □ 5 □ 6
Ally 2 □ 3 □ 4
Blessing 4 □ 5

RIVANI (AUGUR)

POWERS

Proficient with □ Weapons

Hand Size 5 □ 6 □ 7

For your combat check, you may use your Arcane skill instead of the normal dice.

You may discard a spell (□ or weapon or item) to reduce combat (□ any) damage (□ for you or another character at your location) by 2 (□ 4). This counts as playing a spell that you may play even if you already played a spell in the same encounter.

You automatically succeed at your check to recharge a card with the Mental trait.

□ Before exploring a location you may recharge a spell to examine the top card of your current (□ any) location. Return the card to the top of the location deck (□ or shuffle it into the location deck). If before your first exploration, you may then move to a different location if you choose.

□ If you acquire a spell (□ boon) with the Mental trait, you may immediately explore your location again.

RIVANI (AMNESIAC)

POWERS

Hand Size 5 □ 6 □ 7

Proficient with □ Weapons

For your combat check, you may use your Arcane skill instead of the normal dice.

You may discard (□ recharge) a spell to reduce combat (□ any) damage by 2 (□ 4). This counts as playing a spell that you may play even if you already played a spell in the same encounter.

You automatically succeed at your check to recharge a card with the Mental trait.

□ You gain the skill Divine: Wisdom +1 (□ +2).

□ Before (□ or after) exploring your location you may recall spells. Discard all spells in your hand and shuffle them with all of the spells in your discard pile, drawing the same number of spells from the shuffled spells.

□ You may display a spell, draw a random spell (□ spell of your choosing) from your deck, then recharge the displayed spell.

NOTES

The skill adjustments were the reduction of Charisma from d8 to d6 and a corresponding increase for constitution, driven by the RPG character's scores.

I also gave her some weapons (based once again on the RPG version).

The basic powers were then adjusted. First, the combat check power was changed because the picture looks like she's simply wielding weapons with her mind (instead of throwing them at the enemy). I also gave the damage reduction power as basic to make up for the lack of armor cards.

The Augur role more closely resembles the higher level version of Rivani, focusing on her ability to sense her surroundings as well as protect others via her spells.

The Amnesiac role was adjusted by giving her the Divine skill (to give her access to more spells) as well as to perform a variant of the previous "recall" power by recharging a spell to draw another spell from the character's deck.

This is the version I'll be playtesting in place of Seoni.

I then went on to develop two other psychics (a la the new class decks), making one character a sort of psychic rogue (with one role as a psychic thief/spy and the other as a psychic assassin) and the other a sort of psychic warrior (with one role being sort of, but not quite, a psychic magus and the other being a sort of psychic paladin). I'll discuss both of those characters in separate topics, though (my posts are long enough with just one character).


i love the simplicity of the first power but it may be too strong at d12 +2. the only character in Runelords close is Seoni who has to discard a card for it and the barbarian who doesnt have much else besides combat. even the weapons hoar-i mean, master, valeros, is d10+3. maybe make it like valeros at d10+3, especially since rivani has potentially 6 combat cards? she can basically hoard all the best with a constant d12+2. otherwise the base powers are great.
@augur, i love the scrying power. maybe change the bonus to an occupied location or unoccupied location instead of just any location. that may be too awesome. the second power may not be that useful, it depends on which Campaign you play. Runelords isn't all that flush with Mental.
@amnesiac, i dont like the last ability. it's good and fits thematically, but consider how much shuffling that will be. physical tedium needs to be considered for custom powers. and i see myself tiring of all that shuffling pretty quickly.


Gwyns Firstborn wrote:
i love the simplicity of the first power but it may be too strong at d12 +2. the only character in Runelords close is Seoni who has to discard a card for it and the barbarian who doesnt have much else besides combat. even the weapons hoar-i mean, master, valeros, is d10+3. maybe make it like valeros at d10+3, especially since rivani has potentially 6 combat cards? she can basically hoard all the best with a constant d12+2. otherwise the base powers are great.

I totally get what you're saying, but I'm trying to model the skills after the RPG version, and her Intelligence is pretty high there. Interestingly enough, I drew a similar conclusion in my first playtest with the character (Demon Politics). Perhaps one or two alternatives would fulfill a similar outcome to what you're suggesting (either one alone or both in combination).

First, the skills could be adjusted to Arcane: Intelligence +1 and Knowledge: Intelligence +2 (according to her background, she's very much a book-smart person).

Second, adjust the power to:

"For your combat check, you may use a d10 instead of the normal dice."

Note that my playtest notes were to adjust it to d12, but I've gone down further to d10 based on your input.

What do you think would provide the most balanced outcome?

Quote:
@augur, i love the scrying power. maybe change the bonus to an occupied location or unoccupied location instead of just any location. that may be too awesome. the second power may not be that useful, it depends on which Campaign you play. Runelords isn't all that flush with Mental.

I simplified the power even further:

"Instead of exploring a location you may examine the top card of your current location. Return the card to the top of the location deck (□ or shuffle it into the location deck)."

The representation there is that she is searching psychically instead of physically, so it takes up a full exploration. However, the character could easily play a card that allows an exploration afterward if she wants to encounter the card.

Of course, this leaves me with an extra feat, so I'm working on a new (and simple addition). One idea I'm considering is making the feat an add-on to the power, allowing her to recharge a card to either place the top card at the bottom of the location deck or shuffle it back into the deck (representing her ability to avoid the card as a result of sensing it psychically).

Quote:
@amnesiac, i dont like the last ability. it's good and fits thematically, but consider how much shuffling that will be. physical tedium needs to be considered for custom powers. and i see myself tiring of all that shuffling pretty quickly.

I totally get what you're saying here, but I'm keeping it for now. As you said, it fits thematically (and I think it's relatively balanced). There are several other characters that are able use similar powers (Jirelle in the Duelist role, Amaryllis in the Primalist role, etc.). To me, all of the searching and shuffling is something a player would accept when they choose Rivani and the Amnesiac role. Now if playtesting shows that Rivani's searching and shuffling is a real pain, I'll try to find an alternative.

Thanks for all of the feedback.


Okay, I thought about it a bit more.

The base role combat check power needs to be at a d8. This gives her some degree of flexibility while maintaining proper role focus (other characters are the physical fighters, she's a spellcaster - she can use Attack spells when she needs to be potent in combat).

So it's:

"For your combat check, you may use a d8 instead of the normal dice."

This represents her ability to wield weapons with her mind while not being as skilled with them as warriors (and it's far better than the d4/d6 that her strength/dexterity would allow).

For the Augur explore location power, it needs a bit more to make it worthwhile.

So it's:

"Instead of exploring a location you may examine the top card of your current location. Return the card to the top of the location deck or place it on the bottom of the location deck)."

This represents her knowing what's ahead and either choosing to face it or avoiding it entirely.

This leaves an extra feat, which would go to a hand size increase to 8.

Thoughts?

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