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Greetings and salutations to everyone - I yet live and apparently have even been writing some things. Let's see how this all turns out, shall we? Without further ado...
Introduction
Welcome to Divergent Paths: Mystic! Within these pages we will discuss the Mystic base class and many new options that are available to it. You can find the playtest document right here.
Chapter 1 will detail several new archetypes for mystic base class:
- The Force Mystic - a type of mystic who has embraced their animus and wields its elemental power more fluidly at the cost of some of their weapon training.
- The Noetic - a mystic whose animus is derived from psionic potential, rather than arcane energies.
- The Sage - a mystic who has learned how to tap into a primal, subconscious collective within his animus.
- The Shade Tamer - a mystic whose animus is tainted with the essence of death and learns to use this animus to control the dead.
- The Wandslinger - a mystic who specializes in using wands with his martial maneuvers.
Chapter 2 will detail new feats for use with your mystic (or other animus using characters!). Chapters 3 will delve into advanced tactics, which include a new prestige class and magical items for use with mystics and other animus-users.
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Please post all feedback here - I'm looking for balance of mechanics, issues or things that should be removed/added/replaced, wording issues, rules loopholes I've missed, and basic grammar of course. I feel pretty solid about most of this work, but I have some specific questioning on the abilities of the Shade Tamer archetype and the Soul Caster PrC.
-X
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besides a bunch of grammar things that will get sorted in editing anyway:
1) Would an Anima Saber wielded by a Shade Tamer deal negative energy damage?
2) Additionally, is there any chance of seeing some akashic/animus cross-over? an archtype for mystic that gives them veil-weaving and the ability to enhance it with animus (or use animus outside of combat through essence investment, maybe once per day per essence invested?)
Anima saber could do negative energy damage... hmm... I worry it could be abused as an unlimited healing item for minions though....
As far akashic/animus.... maybe? >.> I'd need to dust off my copy of Akashic Mysteries and really really learn it through again and see what I come up with. Suggestions, of course, are always welcome.
-X
Feat:
Akashic Animus [Akashic] (better name?)
You have learned to temporarily fuel your animus powered abilities out of combat using akashic energies.
Prerequisites: Animus pool or equivalent ability (such as a rubato bard’s tempo class feature or the Tap Animus feat).
Benefit: You can invest Essence into this feat. You can activate your animus out of combat a number of times a day equal to the amount of Essence invested in this feat. You produce an animus pool at a rate equal to what you normally would in combat. This effect lasts for 1 minute.
You gain 1 point of Essence.
if I have an archetype idea, I'll pitch it.
"The force mystic attacks with arcane missiles as though they were light one-handed weapons, and the"
This should probably just say that they are light weapons, otherwise the feat that you introduce to make this treated as one-handed suddenly raises odd questions.
"feats, and abilities that apply to weapon attacks (unless they're excluded from that feat, such as with Power Attack)."
Interestingly, I don't think Power Attack stops working for light weapons; evidenced by the fact that off-hand weapons are usually light weapons and all natural attacks are light 'weapons' (I could be wrong).
I've been thinking about it, and while it would be a bit of work, I think it could be worth it: creating a new category of veils for animus-users (much how Daevics have exclusive access to the blood chakra and viziers get access to the ring chakra), with the mystic leading the way on it (and maybe a note that allows the new veils to be taken with Shape Veil feat IF the character has an animus pool ability).
The veils could include a few weapon-like options (I think the only non-natural weapons in akashic mysteries is a greatclub through Crimson Totem and a spear through Loyal Paladin's Spear of Light) that can be bound to a unique Animus chakra.
Example:
Blue Dragon's Fang (better name)
Descriptors: Electricity
Class: Mystic?
Slot: Hands, Animus
Saving Throw: None
This blade crackles with tell-tale energies.
Blue Dragon's Fang functions as a longsword. Any time it strikes an opponent, it also deals 1 point of electricity damage.
Essence: For each point of essence invested, this veil deals 2 more points of electricity damage.
Chakra Bind (Hands): The wearer may choose to use their veilweaver level in place of their base attack bonus to determine their to-hit and other abilities of this veil.
Chakra Bind (Animus): You may change the energy type (and descriptor) to match your current elemental attunement. Additionally, you may spend three points of animus to treat this veil as though it had the shocking burst (or elementally equivalent) weapon special ability.
Special: This veil may be selected via the Shape Veil feat IF the character has an Animus Pool or equivalent ability.
I didn't feel like that was a good example...
...actually this is starting to sound like it's own class at this point...
Forced Attunement is useful, but seems somehow limited?
"This grants them the resistance to that type as well as the vulnerabilities of that type."
I mean fire and cold are the clear energies here, I suppose, but do other energies have vulnerabilities? I suppose positive and negative energy, but those are sort of outside of the scope of the archetype I think.
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Document updated!
Changelog 6/8/17
-Made typo fixes throughout the document - thanks for the catches on those guys.
-Fixed wording on Force Mystic arcane missiles to be light weapons
-Fixed wording on Force Mystic paraelemental animus to be more clear for how long its useful for - until next turn.
-Fixed wording on Force Mystic forced attunement - clarified what earth and air type vulnerabilities include.
-Changed initiator attribute on Noetic to Charisma.
-No changes to Sage as of yet.
-Clarified that Ways of the Undying allows undead to receive morale bonuses.
-Attemped to clarify by way of examples for Unsettling aura.
-Specified how the damage is worked in sacrificing hit points for animus for fueling dark arts.
-Moved command undead ability to initial Dark Arts suite and specified how many undead they can command.
-Clarified in Dark Arts what happens if you raise too many undead and how they initially are under your control - reminder - Black Banner doubles this.
-clarified WHY you get Craft Wondrous Item and hopefully cleared up potential pitfalls for Necrotic Transcendance and the creation of the puzzle box phylactery.
-Reduced potency on Wandslinger's Edge to +1/6 caster levels of the wand.
-Feats - fixed Animus Surge's type in the chart.
-Elemental Soul increases arcane missile damage.
-Cleaned up wording for Psi-Animus assault.
-Increase to Soul Caster HD and BAB to d8 and 3/4 BAB respectively.
-Fixed typo in Glyph Casting
-Reduced cost of Claim Spell.
-Added Improved Claim Spell - check it out.
-Reduced cost of anima saber and it now comes as just a standard item that can be enchanted like a normal weapon. Defined its weapon group and weapon type, critical range, material and hardness/hit points. Changed the gem to deep crystal. Defined what happens with shade tamers using it with negative energy.
-fixed some wordings in Spell Bullets for targeting.
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Give it another looksee please and more feedback!
-X
Good to see some free divergently mystical paths stuff out there. ;)
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Updated the main document - still haven't made any changes to Soul Caster because I'm still working out how I'm going to work with it.
Changelog
-Fixed wording in glyph casting for soul caster.
-Anima saber is a one handed martial melee weapon. If you aren't proficient with all martial, you're not proficient with it. You'd have to take Martial Weapon Proficiency (anima saber).
-bonus damage from maneuvers that does specifically list a type inflicts the same type of damage as the anima saber. Damage that specifies its type or changes the damage type of the attack supersedes the energy damage of the saber.
-anima saber enhancement bonus rules tweaked and removed craft wondrous item from needed feats to craft.
-changed elemental soul to add an additional 1d6 for that chosen element.
-fixed animus surge on the table
-X
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Been out of commission this week due to hurting my back. Able to sit at the computer again - will update the document soon with changes. Thank you for the continued interest!
EDIT: Updated.
Changelog 6/17/17
-Fixed wording in force mystic proficiencies to make them able to use their own arcane missiles.
-Fixed the order of paragraphs in force mystic's missile augments.
-Fixed wording in forced attunement so it actually works as intended.
-Fixed wording (I hope) in Shade Tamer's unnatural aura.
-Changed up Deathly Garden to be more maneuver based.
-Fixed typo in Two Wand Mojo
-Reduced cost on Spellcannon to be more reasonable and changed it to require Scribe Scroll instead of Craft Wondrous Item.
-Updating wording in soul caster's maneuver sections to jive with recent errata.
-Soul Caster gets a modified claim spell at 2nd level, and gets Font of Animus at 3rd level.
-still haven't figured out how to fix Claim Spell. Working on it.
-X
Quick update - I had to take a break from like, life for a little while due to health issues and such. I'm recovered some and I'm hitting this to get it finished ASAP.
OK - updates to soul caster and noetic are complete, and some adjustments to sage too.
Changelog
-The nerfs made to Ancient Wisdom in the sage archetype make it largely a stat swap which is equivalent to half a feat, so... kind of a throw away. Lump into the price paid for animus infusion if you will. It's free at 1st level, to signify you actually getting something for your entry free to start with as well (yes I know it makes it more attractive to mystic dips but it's not THAT big of a bonus unless I'm way off base). You can now have your punchy wiseman mystic. You're welcome. :)
-Redid pretty much everything in Noetic, so you may want to give it a thorough re-read.
-Soul Caster - Claim Spell is gone, replaced with recast spell and spell analysis. Moved font of animus to 2nd level and shifted bonus feat at 7th level to 8th level.
-X
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Changelog 7/3/17
-Fixed mystic bangle to have full enhancement progression ability from +1 to +10
-Redid the Paraelemental Elemental Animus class feature in the Force Mystic because there are 4 elements, not 5, and I apparently can't count. Changed up the progression and clarified how they change active elements and reduced costs as they level as they are more specialized in elemental energies than other mystics.
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Not sure if anyone here is still keeping up with the project, but if you do have any additional feedback, please hit me with it. Thanks!
-X