Hybrid Class- The Lockheart


Homebrew and House Rules


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Hello Paizo Community!

I've been working on my own Hybrid Class, the Lockheart.

It's a mix between a Barbarian and a Paladin. (With a dash of Inquisitor) and I'm pretty satisfied with it. I'd love to get some input to improve it, and to round it out a bit. I haven't personally playtested it, so there's that too.

The point of the Lockheart is that they kind've have a split personality, with a Lawful Mind and a Chaotic Mind. The Lawful controls the Chaotic one, and channels it for strength. (I should probably mention now it dumps the Good aspect)

It's designed to be a support tank, with high survivability, and strong offensive capabilities that grab attention.

Know any Lockhearts? I can't think of anything that directly matches, but Mace Windu reminds me of it. He has a stylized lightsaber form Vaapad, and despite being Good actually channels the dark side in his combat. It's really cool and worth a read! So the Lockheart is like that with Law and Chaos.

I tried to blend some class features and come up with some new stuff, so please let me know what does and doesn't work.

Thanks!


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The only Lockheart I know is Tifa.


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Scythia wrote:
The only Lockheart I know is Tifa.

WAY better than this guy.

Liberty's Edge

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Hello Mage Hunter!

I read through your Lockheart class and I think its a pretty good concept. I got that its a kind of like a paladin, except that its all about extinguishing chaos instead of evil. And that he uses incredible control of his emotions as his weapon.

So some thoughts. I think that the class could use a bit more customization. It sounds like there will be unchained powers, which will be one way to customize the class. I have a couple of suggestions for that.

First, I noticed that the Lockheart gets a few bonus feats. I think it would be better if these feats were options that you could choose to take as a Lockheart. For example, maybe they would get bonus feats at certain levels; which could include things like Endurance, Diehard, Greater Fortitude, and Furious Focus.

Second, I noticed that they get hold monster as a SLA. I wasn't sure exactly why they would get this spell and this spell alone. I can think of several other spells off hand that would also fit the theme of the class. For example, remove fear, rage, calm emotions, and protection from law. One thing to consider is giving them spells as a class feature. My other suggestion would be make a new category of abilities (maybe called perseverances or resiliencies?, which could include getting spell like abilities among other select-able options.

Third, I didn't really understand the release ability. It sounds kind of like spell sunder; but I wasn't sure. I think this would be better as some kind of select-able option; maybe another option you could select as a resiliency.

A final note is that I feel like Aura of Mind Resistance is somewhat unbalanced. It functions like the Paladin's aura of courage...which only affects fear. Aura of Mind Resistance affects everything mind affecting; which includes all fear effects and basically 75% of all Will saves. I would limit it to something more specific; perhaps with an option to expand what it effects through feats or special abilities.


Hey Badblood,

Thanks for your input, it's much appreciated. I knew I was missing something, and customization was it. I like your ideas and I'll see later about implementing them.

Oh, and 'release' was inspired by focusing blow, a Hobgoblin racial feat. I love the idea of perseverances.


This has the core of a base class for Hellknights. I was actually toying with the idea of a Hellknight Stormtrooper archetype of Barbarian, but hadn't actually put together anything for this, other than the concept of an Order's Wrath version of Rage that works even though they are Lawful, and the idea that they need to combine elements of the Armored Hulk and Urban Barbarian archetypes, which normally cannot be combined, as well as the idea that they should transition well into the Hellknight prestige class. In the lore, this would be named after one of the spells most commonly used in the excruciating training used to convert captured Barbarians of other types into Hellknight Stormtroopers -- they are repeatedly forced to fight Devils in secret arenas, while being stormed with Order's Wrath, and brought back from the brink of death only to have to go through the whole process again until they can hone their Rage into a brutal and merciless expression of Law, or die in their failure to learn self-control. Of course, these Devils are not considered to be tough enough to be worthy of qualifying the Hellknight Stormtroopers for their Hellknight test, which requires a separate battle against a more powerful Devil. However, Hellknight Stormtroopers would have less in the way of Paladin-like abilities than your Lockheart concept, instead being almost purely living machines of terror and death for all who oppose the Hellknights' ideas of Law. Due to the heinous nature of the training, the great majority of Hellknight Stormtroopers would be from the more evil Hellknight Orders, and be Lawful Evil or at best Lawful Neutral, with rare non-Evil Hellknight Stormtroopers (and extremely rare Good ones) coming from the tiny population of individuals who would willingly undergo such excruciating training and even more rarely manage to come out with their lives and sanity intact, to act as warriors for the less Evil Hellknight orders to counter the more Evil Hellknight orders.


Good to have some free Lockheart playtesting stuff out there. ;)


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Hey I had some thoughts if you are still looking for feedback. These are just my opinions.

At 17th they get immunity to compulsion, but at 15th they are immune to mind affecting. Is there non-mind affecting compulsion? Personally I would give them Tireless Unchain(ing?) at 17 instead.

Also the wording on release is unclear.
Does he have to attack them?
If not what is the range?
What kind of action is it?
If its an attack does it take a standard or can he use one of his attacks during a full attack to hit his ally?
Is there a limit to the damage he can deal?

I like the concept of slapping some sense into them but needs clarification.

I'm a little worried about how crazy their will save is going to get. You have high base on a class that wants wisdom, an untyped +2 at lvl 2 and additional +2 for unchaining. Then at 3 they get +4 vs mind affecting. So at say lvl 6 we have: 5 base +2 class +2 unchain +2 wisdom (at least) +4 aura = +15, with no resistance item and 14 wisdom. This means that a caster with 3rd level spells and 18 in their stat needs him to roll a 1 to affect him. If it was me, I would say remove the +2 during unchain, or give him low progression.

The fort save is also going to be huge, but that is more expected from a front line brawler.

Capstone could be stronger as well. In my opinion they should get mighty rage benefits with all unchainings, with the option for super damage vs chaos if they want, and maybe exhausted instead of unconscious? I feel like it would be super lame to finally get your capstone, charge the mighty chaos lord and then roll a 1 on your will save and fall unconscious in the second round. Very few capstones are "maybe this is great, maybe not."

Also you want to specify that the save DC's for all his SLA's are Wisdom based (I assume that was your intent).

Overall cool concept, good job.

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