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I'd like to get some wider feedback on my archetype for the Alchemist. It's gone over pretty well with the group I play with, but I'd like to know what the community at large thinks. For reference, the AT is supposed to play kind of like the Psycho class from Borderlands 2.
I really like the concept of a kamikaze alchemist!
I'm no alchemist expert, so please take what I suggest with a grain of salt.
What I like:
The restrictions to alignment, though I think it should increase to only be chaotic alignment, for I don't see Neutral anything loving the thrill of explosions and are willing to blow themselves up. The balance of Blitzer’s Bomb; twice the bombs but half the damage. The concept of a charisma based alchemist and the Blitzer’s Belligerence ability. Though I think the name should be changed to Blitzer's Stubbornness. And the mixture of healing and damage of Blitzer’s Blessing.
Things I think need refinement:
I think the names are a little hard to keep track of. I know you were going for alliterations, but confusion may arise if an ability was mentioned when another was intended.
I think Blitzer's Buff is really cool, but the one thing I'd change would be when you choose what resistance it should have. Since it works in place of Mutagen I assume that it is made in preparation of the day, thus I think it should be chosen what affects it should have when making it, rather when drinking it.
Question before critique; Does Blizter's Boom do full damage to everyone in proximity. No splash damage except the Blizter? I kinda think full damage should also apply to him. If you're going to make it strong enough not to have splash, then they shouldn't get the luxury of it either.
Blitzer's Beef I think is a little unnecessary. Before constitution mods, and with the Blizter's Buff you're looking at 14 life at level one with a 5 resistance (to presumably the type of bomb they are using) that most likely replenish 2 damage back to your buff. So say you have 1d6+4 (18 Cha) max 10 dmg. If it was splash it would only do 5 dmg which would be negated and not even touch the Buff Bonus. If it full dmg it would still be negated by 7 points (energy + Buff) leaving only 3 dmg dealt to a relatively high hitpool at lvl 1. I think instead change the hit dice from a d8 to a d10 and let them take Toughness if they so choose. That way they can still have craft potion so they don't have to waste money at level 10 to use Blitzer’s Blessing more effectively (without using bomb usages) and the balance of using a feat during progression to make themselves even more powerful.
Sticking with Blitzer’s Blessing, I think it shouldn't have any penetration effects. It's plenty powerful within it's own right, and it's still a bomb like an alchemists bomb. Maybe if you stick another bomb usage amount to give it penetration (making it MORE powerful) then I'd be ok with that.
And think Chain Reaction should have a more defined explosion time. Instead of right after it hits 0 to a number of rounds after fortitude save failure or death (below Con score). I also think there should be less choice in the manner. If it's chaotic energy, the Blitzer shouldn't be able to choose anything about the exploding corps (whether it explodes or not, what effect, discoveries, safe squares). It should all be chaotic.
I hope I wasn't too long winded, and again, I'm not an alchemist expert. You put a lot of thought into this class archetype, and it shows! I hope my critiques made since and were constructive. ;)
I like it.
I'm also wondering why you chose charisma for the main stat.
I chose Charisma because it's based on the force of your will. It's left ambiguous so people can fluff it how they like, but when I designed it I meant for people to be exploding by sheer willpower. That's also why the death threshold is Cha-based. You're not using alchemy/science to do it, it's all spirit.
Mighty Eskimo:
You are absolutely right about the alignment. I thought I had changed that a while back but it looks like I didn't. Fixed~
Yeah, I was going for alliteration, but I think you may be right. Sometimes I have a hard time keeping track myself.
I was going off of how potions of Resist Energy work, you choose the energy at the time of drinking as opposed to when it's made. I'll take it under advisement, though. Most people are just gonna pick their favorite element anyways, so I guess it wouldn't be too much of a big deal.
The damage is something I'm working on, testing it and tweaking as I go along. I want to get it so it's strong enough that you don't feel like a load, but not so strong that the DM needs to drop a couple dozen HP on baddies to keep you from one-shotting everything. I also want to make it so you do have a chance of negating your own damage. I'm currently considering Reflex for splash damage (possibly half splash) for everyone.
Blitzer's Beef, from my testing, is absolutely necessary. The Blitzer has to run up, go boom, and then get whaled on as everyone focuses on them because "Holy cow, that's a lotta damage, we gotta kill that guy quick!" Even when they get Belligerence I haven't seen a Blitzer last much more than two or three rounds right up in the fray. Whether it's from getting knocked out by Color Spray, frozen by Ghoul's Touch, or just smashed by an angry Barbarian, Blitzer life means you're getting hit a lot. Sure, you can hang back and throw regular bombs, but then you're doing piddly half damage.
I'm, like, 99% sure that hit dice are linked to BAB, so d10 means you gotta be full BAB. I'm really leery of changing the class' HD.
Having them keep Brew Potion would leave them with a dead class feature, since Blitzer drops extracts completely. How are you gonna brew potions without any extracts?
You may not have noticed, but Blitzer's Blessing already costs 6 bombs to use. I had thought that would have been enough cost for the effect? It deals only one Blitzer's Boom worth of damage/healing, and you have to be knocked out to use it as well. It's an emergency thing, not something you should be using every fight.
Chain Reaction is actually a recent addition, so I haven't had any time to test it yet. One of my players gave it to me as a suggestion, so I'll see how it goes in actual play. I worry about making it too chaotic, cuz then you're the guy who blew up the wizard while he was trying to do something, you know?
Thank you very much for all of your words~
I just realized that me saying that the Blitzer's Boom does "full damage" may have made people think I meant "maximum damage". It's actually just as opposed to the half damage that the Blitzer's Bombs normally do, so saying that was redundant and confusing and I have removed the word "full".
Yeah, I missed a couple of things when I wrote my suggestion apparently. My bad ;p
I think you're right about the HD and BAB, but if your class is going down super easy maybe they'll need to be a closer to a fighter in the first place. I'm just speaking of self experiences, but when I learn my class goes down really quick, I tend to back off anyways.
Which is just me I know, but if someone told me that I'd fall very quickly in battle I'd probably stay away from that class. No matter how much damage I'd do.
Thematically I saw the Blizter grabbing 2 bombs and smashing them together when doing a Blitzer’s Boom rather than having an explosion emanate from his being. And to touch on what the other commenters are saying; even though I like the idea of using Charisma, if all it does is change where the bonus come from it might be better to keep things as less complicated as possible, and leave it Intelligence. They say that true intelligence border on insanity. Like blowing yourself up ;)
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It's actually there because the group that I play in allows undead PCs. So I specifically made a Cha-based archetype that is incompatible with undead. There's nothing besides pure spite holding a Blitzer to Charisma focus. Maybe I'll put in a thing about using Int with DM fiat.
When I use them against players, I generally have one or two Blitzers by themselves. When I have them supported by a party, it takes longer for them to go down, but they still get focused hard. I'll have to try out a higher level Blitzer, possibly high enough to get the Blessing, and see how that goes.
Good to have some free blitzer alchemy stuff out there. ;)
