Let us take a closer look at the spell-casting Fighter.
Level 1: 4 skill points per level, 4 Int-based class skills added. Lose Tower Shield, Two-handed martial weapons AND the bonus feat. This is officially the worst first level any PC class has to offer. Note that the archetype never gains any ability, at all, that would make one-handed weapons a good idea.
Level 2: Cantrips! You get to memorize one. Also, small, narrow and fiddly Knowledge bonus. Lose your bonus feat, again. Bravery +1.
Level 3: Eldritch Armor Training 1/15%. It is a straight upgrade to armor training, but at this point you don't have any combat spells worth the action, so you don't care.
Level 4: First bonus feat!
Level 5: Spellcasting, using Ranger spells/day and the Bloodrager list. Note how actual Rangers get their first spell at level 4, not 5.
Level 6: Second bonus feat, Bravery +2
level 7: Eldritch Armor Training 2/20%. 2. level spell(s).
Level 10: Third bonus feat, Bravery +3, 3rd level spell
Level 11: Eldritch Armor Training 3/25%
Level 13: 4th level spell.
Level 14: Fourth bonus feat, Bravery +4
Level 15: Eldritch Armor Training 4/30%
Level 18: fifth bonus feat, Bravery +5
Level 19: Armor Mastery
Level 20: Weapon Mastery
To sum it up, you have a martial class with:
4 skill points
No proficiency with two-handed martial weapons.
Int-based prepared Bloodrager casting with wizard cantrips.
Armor Training with percentage ASF reduction
Bravery, with no ability to trade it for anything you care about
Bonus feats at levels 4,6,10,14 and 18.
All in all, very unimpressive. Losing your early bonus feats AND Weapon Training is just too painful. The loss of two-handed weapons is just adding a weird insult to injury.
Eldritch Armor Training is darn sweet and having the Arcane Armor feats stack with it mean even Eldritch Armor Training 1 can net you a 35% reduction in ASF.
3 levels is a bit much for a dip but if someone REALLY wants a heavy armored arcane caster it could be worth it. Using it as a gestalt with Child of Acavna and Amazen/Wizard would be pretty awesome.
However, I'll agree as a straight class character it's mighty unimpressive.
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Look, you needed someway to recognize that it was still a Fighter. If they gave it a decent list of features how would you know what class you are playing?
Eldritch Armor Training is darn sweet and having the Arcane Armor feats stack with it mean even Eldritch Armor Training 1 can net you a 35% reduction in ASF.
3 levels is a bit much for a dip but if someone REALLY wants a heavy armored arcane caster it could be worth it. Using it as a gestalt with Child of Acavna and Amazen/Wizard would be pretty awesome.
However, I'll agree as a straight class character it's mighty unimpressive.
You could take Heavy Armor class 1/full caster X, take Still Spell on everything the hard way, and still be better off.
Yeah, it really needed full 6-level casting or to keep weapon training. It's just giving up way too much to get too little. I didn't want to dismiss it too quickly, but I've been struggling to think of any situation where it isn't completely outclassed by an existing option. Really, the only thing it has over the Magus is full BAB, and without weapon training I don't think that's anywhere near enough.
And no, a 3-level dip for Eldritch Armor Training is never worth it. Seriously, we're talking Mystic Theurge level sacrifice for a caster build here, you'd better be getting something godly out of it. You could just slap still spell on all your spell slots and be ahead at that cost (edit - ninja'd on the comparison)
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Look, you needed someway to recognize that it was still a Fighter. If they gave it a decent list of features how would you know what class you are playing?On the other hand, not having any good features is not Fighter-unique. Namely, the NPC classes as well as Core Rogue and Core Monk.
And here I thought Core Rogue & Monk were NPC classes all along, namely, Non-Playable-Characters...
Instead of Child of Acavna and Amazen, better to use Enlightened Bloodrager (works better with Primalist) if you want spontaneous casting, or Steelblood Bloodrager if you don't care about the Cantrips but want Heavy Armor, or Myrmidarch Magus if you want prepared spellcasting (which even with its Diminished Spellcasting comes out better in the spellcasting department, and gets both Weapon Training and Armor Training, for only 2 fewer Bonus Feats and only slightly worse effective BAB when using a Weapon Training weapon). For the latter, if you really want to stack it up, go Myrmidarch Magus VMC Fighter (if you would have spent some of your feats for a Fighter on Advanced Armor Training(*) and Advanced Weapon Training anyway).
(*)This assumes that the upcoming Armor Master's Handbook will have Advanced Armor Training options that approximately parallel Advanced Weapon Training.
Eldritch Armor Training is darn sweet and having the Arcane Armor feats stack with it mean even Eldritch Armor Training 1 can net you a 35% reduction in ASF.
3 levels is a bit much for a dip but if someone REALLY wants a heavy armored arcane caster it could be worth it. Using it as a gestalt with Child of Acavna and Amazen/Wizard would be pretty awesome.
However, I'll agree as a straight class character it's mighty unimpressive.
You could just play a Steelblood Bloodrager and not have to worry about ASF at all.
This archetype would have been a lot better if they had given it the Sorc/Wiz list; greater access to utility spells is what I would want out of it compared to the Bloodrager, but with the exact same list available I see very little reason to play this archetype.
A redeeming quality that I can found is that it's a decent single-class entry for Arcane Archer as Bloodrager abilities aren't that synergic while fighter features are generic enought to fit well
It's already discussed in the other thread, but the archetype on its own doesn't function very well.
If you combine it with the VMC (magus) progression, you get an actually viable class that plays like a full BAB version of the magus that rides the paladin/ranger chassis, and gets heavy armor.
Granted, it needs the Stamina System to function properly, then feats like Arcane Armor Training and Arcane Strike can actually function for the class without eating up your choices.
It doesn't play like a fighter, but it probably shouldn't. You get more skills, spellcasting, and through the Spell Blending Magus Arcana, you can get more utility or buff spells from the wizard list that the Bloodrager doesn't have access to.
You also can pick up the various Arcana for the metamagic options and such.
Arcane Pool helps with weapon damage.
Arcane Strike and Arcane Accuracy combined replace Weapon Training for to hit/damage.
You just have to get over the fact that it's a fighter archetype and treat it like a different class. It has a lot of potential to be an actual fun class, granted a niche that can probably be served better by a magus, and is more likely to be considered mechanically inferior to an Arcane Bloodrager, but by no means is it not functional.
Well since it doesn't have weapon training anymore it loses out on a lot from that book.
A redeeming quality that I can found is that it's a decent single-class entry for Arcane Archer as Bloodrager abilities aren't that synergic while fighter features are generic enought to fit well
That was what I was hoping to use it for. Unfortunately it uses the Bloodrager spell list which doesn't have a lot of good area spells for use with Imbue Arrow. Eldritch Archer gets entry to Arcane Archer two levels later, but has much better spellcasting and more synergistic class abilities.
WOW this looks terrible on paper so far. Why would ANYONE play this over Bloodrager/Magus? I mean, I've been aching for a heavy armor, prepared, Paladin-style class, but this falls SO short in every regard! XD
Reason to play over a bloodrager: Heavy Armor, not limited to rage, access to more combat feats
Reason to play over a magus: heavy armor sooner, full BAB and martial potential without running out of gas at earlier levels.
The VMC options really round it out.
A redeeming quality that I can found is that it's a decent single-class entry for Arcane Archer as Bloodrager abilities aren't that synergic while fighter features are generic enought to fit well
That was one of my first thoughts as well, but when I actually looked at it in greater detail it just seems horrifically feat starved and the loss of weapon training is really painful. I'd rather do the naive entry and just multi-class wizard. In the long-run, the wizard spell progression will overtake the Child of Acavna and Amaznen anyways. Less directly it gets competition from the Eldritch Archer Magus archetype, which fulfills a very similar conceptual niche.
If you combine it with the VMC (magus) progression, you get an actually viable class that plays like a full BAB version of the magus that rides the paladin/ranger chassis, and gets heavy armor.
I just don't see this as nearly enough to redeem the archetype. While there's nothing exactly like it, there are so many excellent options in the same design space that it's edged out in almost every way.
For instance, the only things it has over Myrmidarch Magus is full BAB, more skill points, and getting access to casting in heavy armor at a lower level. Even if we're comparing against a VMC Magus variant, the Myrmidarch is still getting spellstrike at a lower level, a faster arcane pool progression, more magus arcana, spell combat, far superior spellcasting progression, weapon training, and significantly more feats since it's not VMC'ing. Sure, the Child of Acavna and Amaznen does have some points over the Myrmidarch Magus, but it's clearly the inferior option in general. This would be fine if it was only the one thing outclassing it, but it's not. There are tons of competing Magus and Bloodrager archetypes, and CoAaA struggles to find relevance in an increasingly-crowded field.
It's not something horrifically non-viable, but it's somewhere around the Mystic Theurge. Yeah, it works, and technically there's nothing that's exactly like it... but for everything it can do there's something that does it way better. As I said originally, I feel it really needed either 6-level casting or to keep weapon training. If it had either of those things, it would have a much more competitive position when placed side-by-side with its various alternatives.
My issue with The Child of Acavna and Amazen is that it is about as good as a bloodrager who never enters a rage. Seriously.
I may houserule that the archetype gets to keep Weapon Training to keep it up to par.
I feel like this archetype was made by someone who didn't do the proper research for precedent; I don't understand why the Child of Acavna needs to be limited by Arcane Armor Training to use Heavy Armor. We already have the Steelblood Bloodrager, the Magus, and the Chelish Diva Bard as examples of classes that give heavy armor in spellcasting with zero caveats.
WOW this looks terrible on paper so far. Why would ANYONE play this over Bloodrager/Magus? I mean, I've been aching for a heavy armor, prepared, Paladin-style class, but this falls SO short in every regard! XDReason to play over a bloodrager: Heavy Armor, not limited to rage, access to more combat feats
Reason to play over a magus: heavy armor sooner, full BAB and martial potential without running out of gas at earlier levels.
The VMC options really round it out.
Hampered by the fact that it is extra terrible at low levels.
Worth mentioning that the Bloodrager list is pretty underwhelming; lots of blasty stuff that isn't useful at all to a 4th level caster and for utility it mainly just gets combat buffs. The Bloodrager is good for his bloodline powers much more than his spell list.
I definitely think this archetype would be worth looking at if it got 4 levels of sorc/wiz instead. Then at least there's a choice between raw power or versatility if you want the Bloodrager or Child of Acavna.
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I think it's best comparison is against the bloodrager.
If you look at it that way, you are trading off bloodrage, bloodline powers, fast movement, uncanny dodge, DR, and bloodline feats (6,9,12,15,18)
for heavy armor, arcane spell failure, int spell casting instead of cha, bravery, armor training, and some feats (4,6,10,14,18). Pretty terrible trade off.
You don't get any more feats than the bloodrager and lose rage and a bunch of great powers for heavy armor, bravery and armor training. Yuck.
A better comparison would be to compare to Steelblood Bloodrager, which (compared to standard Bloodrager) already trades off Fast Movement (but gets Indomitable Stance (which seems more situational but not too shabby for what it does), Uncanny Dodge (but gets a sort of pseudo-Armor-Training), Improved Uncanny Dodge (but gets real Armor Training), and Damage Reduction (but gets Blood Deflection, which is probably less generally useful but situationally better).
So, going from Steelblood Bloodrager above to Child of Acavna and Amaznen it looks like you:
- Get more ranks of Armor Training, but worse ability to cast spells in armor (eats your Swift Action to reduce arcane spell failure, and might not be enough to get this to 0)
- Get more effective skill ranks due to being an Intelligence-based spellcaster instead of a Charisma-based spellcaster, while having the same base skill ranks per level
- Trade out Bloodrage and Bloodline Powers for Bravery
- Trade one set of bonus feats for another of the same size but with more flexibility
- Trade out spontaneous spellcasting for prepared spellcasting with slightly delayed progression and the addition of Cantrips (which Steelblood Bloodrager doesn't get; Enlightened Bloodrager gets Cantrips, but is not compatible with Steelblood, because they both replace Damage Reduction)
It still would be worse if kept weapon training, but at least it would be viable. Or it should have kept all of fighters bonus feats. Losing 6 feats and weapon training is worse than gaining L4 spell casting - in my opinion it's worse than the base fighter.
I agree -- losing 6 feats and Weapon Training puts it both below the base Fighter and Myrmidarch Magus. As noted above, Myrmidarch Magus has better spellcasting even with its Diminished Spellcasting, has only 2 ranks of Armor Training but doesn't give you arcane spell failure with types of armor that it gives you proficiency with (although you have to wait until 13th level to get Heavy Armor), gives you 3 Bonus Feats (2 fewer than Child of Acavna and Amaznen), and gives you 3 ranks of Weapon Training, which effectively eats up much of the BAB advantage of Fighter without Weapon Training, and gives you the opportunity to go VMC Fighter to really stack up the Armor Training and Weapon Training (and while this eats feats, if you were going to spend 2 feats each on Advanced Armor Training and Advanced Weapon Training, the only loss is a feat to get Bravery, which isn't the greatest, but isn't totally terrible.
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Trade out Bloodrage and Bloodline Powers for Bravery
And right about here is the point where I start to jump ship...
Can I just point out really quick the Paladin that looses spellcasting gets a feat every four levels in exchange? The ranger from the same book trades out casting for... a single class feature that's kinda like weapon training only tied to favored enemy and pretty funky because of it.
Not saying these are good archetypes. Just saying that the rough measurement we are being given here is 5 feats ≈ 4th level spellcasting. So... cantrips are worth their weight in gold then?
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Another, small, thing to consider is that the Child has Fighter levels = Caster Level. No -3 CL like with the Paladin or Ranger.
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You know, at this point, I'm just about ready to throw out the caster level -3 on paladins and rangers. I don't see why bloodragers and mediums, fighters in this case, can have CL=level, while the paladin and ranger get dinged. Heck, Medium even gets knacks at level 1, and both the medium and bloodrager actually start with 1 spell slot, instead of relying on bonus slots.
