Are there any classes or class abilities that you wished was done differently?
Arcanist- This could have been a Wizard Archetype.
Hunter- I wish this was a full martial class.
Investigator- I like the class but don't like how studied combat and studied strike work.
Medium- Would have liked a simpler/less paper work version.
Ninja- Not bad but could have been better.
Samurai- This could have been so much cooler then a Cavalier variant.
Shaman- Really wish this was a Cha based spontaneous Druid caster class.
Shifter- I love the natural attacks, unarmored AC(though I wish they let you choose Cha instead of Wis), but the actual shifting....
Skald- Just don't like the rage song stuff.
Slayer- I wish this one when the path of being very focused to slaying a creature type, subtype, etc..(dragon slayer, vampire slayer, giant slayer, etc.)
Swashbuckler- I like this one but could have used a good fort save, Dex to damage built in, and a few other tweaks.
Vigilante- Liked the play test version were you could custom make your hero. Also the class's alternate persona could have been a NPC class or a NPC class template of some kind.
Warpriest- Would have liked a martial class, like a Paladin but any alignment.
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The Spiritualist really needs a rework.
The large majority of the Spiritualist's class features are underwhelming or literally just SLAs of spells they have on their spell list already. Here's a list of "class features" listed in the class progression table, that aren't useful and/or available to other classes:
Bonded Manifestation (3)
Detect Undead (5)
Calm Spirit 1/day (7)
Bonded Manifestation Increase (8)
See Invisibility 1/day (9)
Calm Spirit 2/day (11)
Bonded Manifestation Increase (13)
Calm Spirit 3/day (15)
Call Spirit (16)
Dual Bond (17)
Bonded Manifestation Increase (18)
Calm Spirit 4/day (19)
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Let's take a look at the SLAs first.
Detect Undead (5) and See Invisibility (9) should never have been spells. This should have been a Spiritualist-specific "spirit sense" that's always active and at level 9 allows you to deal with invisible incorporeal undead. It could have worked like scent, but the radius increases with level and if you spend a move action you would pinpoint invisible foes as if using See Invisibility.
Calm Spirit (7, 11, 15, 19) is in the same position. Don't default to spells when trying to create class features. Base it on Wild Empathy instead, and allow the Spiritualist to try as many times as they like in a day, but no more than once per target. They're supposed to be better at this than other classes, remember?
Call Spirit (16). It's a 16th level class feature, put in some effort. Maybe you use the knowledge of a spirit you call upon to add more spells known temporarily?
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This leaves us with the class features that normally won't see any use.
Bonded Manifestation (3, 8, 13, 18) and Dual Bond (17), are a real drain of class features simply because their use is at odds with your main class feature: The phantom.
You can't have your phantom out and manifested while using Bonded Manifestation, and it can only be used for a couple of rounds per day. Which is really weird considering that most of the benefits are weak enough to be permanent at the levels you get them.
Oh, and in the one specific case when you'd want to use it, when your phantom is banished, you can't.
First off, remove the duration and banishment restrictions completely. This class feature should be what defines the Spiritualist, and in that case it needs to be readily available. This is now the perfect opportunity to introduce some "Character Shaping Choices", allowing you to choose between different abilities that activate with your Bonded Manifestation. These extra abilities can have a duration limit, gradually becoming permanent as you level up.
In addition to being able to use Bonded Manifestation while your phantom is out, it should be possible to boost your phantom with these abilities.
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Thanks for coming to my TED talk.
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Vigilante - It's an interesting and flavorable class with lots of options. But for some reason they get a sneak attack that isn't sneak attack. Basically shooting the class in the foot by preventing it from synergizing with things that work with sneak attack. It feels like they did something different for the sake of it being different. Either give them normal sneak attack or give them a sneak attack that works like Knife Master's sneak attack. But make the darn thing count as sneak attack.
It also would of been nice if the abilities had been thought out better with regard to a normal campaign. The class seems like it would be amazing but only in a very specific type of game. Otherwise you're half a class when adventuring and half a different class when you're not.
Even in the perfect game to play a vigilante, the class doesn't really work unless all the players are playing vigilantes. "Why is peter parker hanging out with Thor and Captain America?"
At minimum people will assume that both halves of your character know each other personally since they're both in the same circles. I guess if your alter ego never interacts with the party it could work. But that that means that now you're playing half a class all the time or you're going off by yourself a lot in your non-combat form. Which is a bad idea on two fronts.
I like the flavor of the class and would love to play one but I just don't see it working 99% of the time.
Edit: I just had a thought that makes this work. Instead of being a class it should be a way of doing Gestalt. You pick a hero class and a NPC class and can just change between them. It also means that either everyone is playing one or no one is.
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I'm not sure why the Spiritualist isn't simply a Summoner archetype with psychic magic and a specific kind of eidolon.
Of course I've never read the class, so I'm not insisting it should be.
The whole class is honestly just baffling. In the same book we have complex and innovative classes such as the Occultist and Mesmerist, both which have a lot of customization and distinct mechanics. Then it was time to add a psychic pet class, and they completely botched it. It's like playing a class without class features. You've got your spells and your pet, but nothing else that isn't shamelessly stolen from somewhere else.
They realized that the Summoner already fulfills the theme they were after, so they decided to just copy it. Except make literally everything worse as the Summoner is considered OP. Here's the class features they copied (and renamed) from the Summoner Class, with some slight tweaks:
Life Link, Bond Senses, Shield Ally, Maker's Call, Greater Shield Ally, Life Bond.
This is (probably) also the reason why you can't use Bonded Manifestation while the phantom is out. The Summoner can't use their Summon Monster SLA while the Eidolon is out, so they copied that mechanic too. But Bonded Manifestation is never worth using as it depends on you deciding to go into melee. Which is a bad idea. +10 DC on concentration checks because psychic magic, no combat bonus feats, simple weapon proficiency, and only light armor proficiency on a class that suffers no spell failure chance.
And the Phantom is the combination of all that is bad with Eidolons and Animal Companions, somehow merging into the worst pet of them all. You share magic item slots, it can't use weapons or armor, and it's ability scores are horrendous. Then we crank the proximity limitation of Eidolons to the max, resulting in a sad mess that must stay within 50 ft of you at all times.
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Unchained Summoner. More specifically, the Eidolon that got a large chunk of flavor gutted from it by tying them to outsider types, and then tying those types to base forms so even more potential flavor was taken away. It didn't make sense for any established lore or already written Summoners.
RIP fun build your own creature, min-maxers ruined you for everyone.
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Sneak attack. It's inconsistent, the methods of making it more consistent are also inconsistent, and it doesn't really support the rogue fiction all that well anyway. There's no version of it that I find satisfying.
Bane, favored enemy, and similar abilities. These are another gamble like sneak attack that leave a character's damage output rather swingy but don't make play more interesting in exchange for the instability. These need to be tied to target's abilities rather than their themes, otherwise you either hit the right theme or waste your class abilities.
Combat feats. These also tend to be too specific. Switching to broad catagories of abilities that advance on their own would be better. Some combat feats shouldn't be any harder to learn than a wizard writing a new spell in their spellbook.
Rogue should be full BAB with d10 HP, Sneak Attack should multiply on Vital Strike and apply whenever an opponent suffers a penalty to AC.
Swashbuckler and Gunslinger need a full rework, deeds are a bad system because they do not offer player choice. Also plays into systems that are done poorly elsewhere (Dex combat, Gun rules, crossbow rules, etc).
Shifter needs a complete rework to perform as a "full melee druid" with better options for changing forms and partial form changes/chimeraization. Thats the least they could get for 9 ****ing spell levels >_<
Ranger's too specialized, Slayer does favored enemy much better than Ranger because Ranger is trapped in its 3.5 form for continuity reasons.
I'm not sure why the Spiritualist isn't simply a Summoner archetype with psychic magic and a specific kind of eidolon.
Of course I've never read the class, so I'm not insisting it should be.
The whole class is honestly just baffling. In the same book we have complex and innovative classes such as the Occultist and Mesmerist, both which have a lot of customization and distinct mechanics. Then it was time to add a psychic pet class, and they completely botched it. It's like playing a class without class features. You've got your spells and your pet, but nothing else that isn't shamelessly stolen from somewhere else.
They realized that the Summoner already fulfills the theme they were after, so they decided to just copy it. Except make literally everything worse as the Summoner is considered OP. Here's the class features they copied (and renamed) from the Summoner Class, with some slight tweaks:
Life Link, Bond Senses, Shield Ally, Maker's Call, Greater Shield Ally, Life Bond.This is (probably) also the reason why you can't use Bonded Manifestation while the phantom is out. The Summoner can't use their Summon Monster SLA while the Eidolon is out, so they copied that mechanic too. But Bonded Manifestation is never worth using as it depends on you deciding to go into melee. Which is a bad idea. +10 DC on concentration checks because psychic magic, no combat bonus feats, simple weapon proficiency, and only light armor proficiency on a class that suffers no spell failure chance.
And the Phantom is the combination of all that is bad with Eidolons and Animal Companions, somehow merging into the worst pet of them all. You share magic item slots, it can't use weapons or armor, and it's ability scores are horrendous. Then we crank the proximity limitation of Eidolons to the max, resulting in a sad mess that must stay within 50 ft of you at all times.
The archetype for spiritualist in planar adventures is really neat and unique though. If it weren't for setting neutrality itd be a solid base class version.
The archetype for spiritualist in planar adventures is really neat and unique though. If it weren't for setting neutrality itd be a solid base class version.
Soul Warden? Can't say it does anything unique, except the Warding Vessel ability.
The archetype for spiritualist in planar adventures is really neat and unique though. If it weren't for setting neutrality itd be a solid base class version.Soul Warden? Can't say it does anything unique, except the Warding Vessel ability.
that and the single greatest scout familiar in existence.
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Let's see ...
Bard: Bards should get the Marching Song (or whatever it's called) that Skalds get - giving your party bonuses on travel speed or distance per day or whatever. This is one of the few real world abilities that musicians had in armies (morale boost), but magical bards can't do it? (If they can and i missed it let me know.)
Ranger: Favoured Enemy. Never really liked it. It can work for games like Giantslayer, but it's kinda a meta-gamey mechanic. Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but if your GM or Player won't meta-game enough to make this decent then it's terrible.
Rogue: Sneak Attack. I agree it's just a janky way to get damage. It's a fun idea but shouldn't be half your class abilities. If it IS half your abilities it should be more reliable.
Gunslinger: This is less of a class thing and more of a system thing. Early firearms were slow ... REALLY slow. But they were also powerful, and the ignoring armour thing was a thing. I would have preferred firearms to be a vital-strike type weapon that's really powerful. Gunslingers have like 8 mandatory feats to get the build working, after which they kill all the things all the time. There also doesn't seem to be much reason to continue Gunslinger past level 5.
Witch: Slumber Hex. Save or die effects aren't really that fun, and having one that can be spammed at every enemy all day from level 1 is weird.
Skald: Inspired Rage is amazing for a very particular type of party, and terrible for everyone else. I don't think it's a bad mechanic per-se, but there should be more archetypes that replace it.
Swashbuckler: Should have 2 good saves. Also why make it so hard to get DEX to damage with an Estoc when you can get it with a machete. I kinda agree with Paizo that DEX to damage should be hard to get, but once it's out there why restrict it to Slashing weapons and the Rapier?
Antipaladin: Chaotic Evil isn't really the antithesis of a Paladin, Lawful Evil is. The Antipaladin "code of conduct" is rediculous and obviously tacked on. There are archetypes that change this, but the base premise is just silly.
Finally a more broad category, 9th level spontaneous casters: Why do they get spells a level later than their prepared counterparts? Bloodragers get new spell levels at the same time as Paladins. Bards get them at the same time as Magi. Why don't Sorcerers and Oracles keep up with Wizards Clerics and Druids? There are 2 problems with this that I can see, I'll spoiler them because it's a bit of a rant, and because once I saw them I couldn't un-see them, and it makes it hard for me to play them =P
(Sorry, rant over)
The Kineticist always seemed like a cool class to me, but their Burn mechanic is all kinds of wonky. I get the concept, but having a major part of your class involve basically shooting yourself in the foot just doesn't work all that well. I think they could have made it work more like the Grit or Ki Pool resources, without the non-lethal damage handicap and it would have worked just fine.
The Arcanist’s arcane pool. The fact you don’t start the day with a full pool is unnecessarily fiddly bookkeeping, especially as the ability to burn spells for more pool points is one that characters are unlikely to use for at least 4-5 levels (or whenever point become more valuable than 1st level spells).
I love the class, but that’s just bad design.
I do wish the kineticist had a pool of "burn" point equal to 1/2 level plus con mod, other then that I really love the class. As for how elemental overflow would work I think it would kick in when your burn points are at least at half full/empty.
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Finally a more broad category, 9th level spontaneous casters: Why do they get spells a level later than their prepared counterparts? Bloodragers get new spell levels at the same time as Paladins. Bards get them at the same time as Magi. Why don't Sorcerers and Oracles keep up with Wizards Clerics and Druids?
I feel like it was because the Sorcerer (and later spontaneous casters like Favored Soul just followed on this logic) were designed by people who felt like they were taking a huge crazy risk introducing a non-Vancian caster in the first place, and kind of nerfed it into the ground during the design phase. It was shiny and new and untested and utterly flew in the face of what D&D had been doing for decades, and, IMO, they flinched and 'nerfed it by committee,' in that each of the half-dozen people with doubts about it threw in their own two cents about how to keep it from 'totally replacing the wizard' or some such nonsense.
Bumping the spell acquisition levels for Sorcerers (or Oracles, etc.) up to the same as Wizards/Clerics/Druids/Witches seems like the easiest fix in the world, and I seriously doubt that doing so is going to so unbalance the classes that nobody is ever going to want to play a Wizard (or Cleric) again, just because the Sorcerer (or Oracle) gets 2nd level and higher spells at the same level now.
Finally a more broad category, 9th level spontaneous casters: Why do they get spells a level later than their prepared counterparts? Bloodragers get new spell levels at the same time as Paladins. Bards get them at the same time as Magi. Why don't Sorcerers and Oracles keep up with Wizards Clerics and Druids?I feel like it was because the Sorcerer (and later spontaneous casters like Favored Soul just followed on this logic) were designed by people who felt like they were taking a huge crazy risk introducing a non-Vancian caster in the first place, and kind of nerfed it into the ground during the design phase. It was shiny and new and untested and utterly flew in the face of what D&D had been doing for decades, and, IMO, they flinched and 'nerfed it by committee,' in that each of the half-dozen people with doubts about it threw in their own two cents about how to keep it from 'totally replacing the wizard' or some such nonsense.
Bumping the spell acquisition levels for Sorcerers (or Oracles, etc.) up to the same as Wizards/Clerics/Druids/Witches seems like the easiest fix in the world, and I seriously doubt that doing so is going to so unbalance the classes that nobody is ever going to want to play a Wizard (or Cleric) again, just because the Sorcerer (or Oracle) gets 2nd level and higher spells at the same level now.
That would certainly make for a very different feeling class. I remember playing "Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor"(which is based on 3.0 D&D) where they made the baffling decision to not include the wizard class. This meant that if you wanted an arcane caster you HAD to make a sorcerer and I absolutely hated it because you were always a level behind where you should of been in terms of spell progression.
If sorcerers (and their counterparts) had the same progression as wizards I know that I would at least be willing to play one to see how they are. I honestly don't have a sense if i would pick it over wizard or not since wizard has been the only choice, prior to witch, if you wanted to play an arcane caster that gets 9th level spells and doesn't have a delayed spell progression. Would I always play a sorcerer instead of a wizard? that would depend on what the classes offer outside of arcane spell progression.
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Sorcerers certainly ought to get their Bloodline spells as soon as they can cast spells of that level. Plausibly, they could get only that spell a level before they get that spell level, with 2 slots per day. eg a 3rd level Sorcerer learns his 2nd level bloodline spell (and no other) with 2 uses; a 5th level learns his 3rd level and so on.
And why no Bloodline cantrips?
And clerics should get domain orisons. And paladins and rangers should get orisons too, so you don't get orisons jammed into 1st level spell slots, forever to be ignored.
Cantrips and orisons are the red-headed stepchild of spellcasting. Possibly because of the rule that 1st-level wizards know all cantrips, someone decided there couldn't be any more.
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Oh, I got one. An update to sorcerers so they get a list of bloodline powers to pick from like Oracle mysteries have revelation.
On a related note: First level bloodline/school/domain powers like Rays and Claws and stuff not being restricted to a limited amount of uses a day. One reason I heard they got the limit added was because people were(apparently) worried about players burning through doors or powering batteries.
Yeah Dragonborn3, I agree with those 2 points.
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Personally I wish the natural attacks from bloodline powers worked like the Shifter claws.
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Anything involving Drakes. Paizo made cool archetypes.... and shot them in the foot by giving not very useful drake companions. Cavalier can't ride their drakes, yes, this will make the people wanting dragon options happy. Better remove a lot of class features that would make sense to have on a dragon rider too.
Oh, and when a Drake is finally big enough to ride you can't with the Mount power, which you need another drake power to take, and it restricts flight even if you would be in the drake's Light Encumberance range.
Or you could get a Draconic Companion animal companion and not have to jump through hoops and lose large amounts of class features for a dragon themed mount.
cavaliers can’t have Draconic companions via the archetype. Not that the archetype is good, more noting the insult on injury aspect.Anything involving Drakes. Paizo made cool archetypes.... and shot them in the foot by giving not very useful drake companions. Cavalier can't ride their drakes, yes, this will make the people wanting dragon options happy. Better remove a lot of class features that would make sense to have on a dragon rider too.
Oh, and when a Drake is finally big enough to ride you can't with the Mount power, which you need another drake power to take, and it restricts flight even if you would be in the drake's Light Encumberance range.
Or you could get a Draconic Companion animal companion and not have to jump through hoops and lose large amounts of class features for a dragon themed mount.
It's possible but it requires jumping through more hoops than you should have to.
The Huntmaster Archetype gives back the share spells ability allowing you to to take the Draconic Companion archetype. Then to get something that can both fly and is ridable you'll have to take the feat Beast Rider(at 7th level) to add pteranodon as an option.
edit: I suppose an alternative is to take Curious Companion instead of Beast Rider and then pick dragonfly. But since it only gets up to medium size you would either need to take the feat undersized mount or be a small race in order to ride it.
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Agreed, having claws a few rounds per day is really awful. They aren't the only type of ability out there that needs tons of feat and stat support to be worth using, but they're probably the most glaring.
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Investigator
Studied Combat- Add Int mod to damage with melee weapons.
Studied Strike- Instead of sneak attack I would have liked abilities like these...
Bypass/lower DR
Lower Energy Resistance
Lower SR
Lower AC
Lower/prevent movement
Inflict various status ailments
Lower Saving Throw
Dimensional Anchor
Dispel Magic(target)
Gain Knowledge of a single weakness(without a knowledge check)
Lower Attack Rolls
Lower Damage
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Medium: Should have options to switch spirits and choose the resulting spirit powers as the day progresses rather than having to do so in advance. This would create a much more useful 'jack of all trades' class that can respond to situations as they occur. About to get into a fight? Switch to Champion spirit and give it some influence over you. On a ship and the crew have all been killed? Switch to Trickster with ranks in Profession: Sailor (maybe even channeling one of the dead crew members). Et cetera.
Monk: Should have used existing feats (e.g. TWF & Double Slice) restricted to when performing a Flurry of Blows rather than reinventing the wheel. That would have avoided a lot of confusion on how things worked and allowed those feats to serve as pre-reqs for other options.
Witch: Should have used spellbooks exactly like a Wizard for most of their spells and limited the 'spells in the familiar' mechanic to patron spells.
It is squishy (half the HP of a d6 HD class which lacks good defensive spells), but the main thing is it's more targetable than a book and more expensive to make backups of. You need a few thousand for a stone familiar.
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It is squishy (half the HP of a d6 HD class which lacks good defensive spells), but the main thing is it's more targetable than a book and more expensive to make backups of. You need a few thousand for a stone familiar.Sounds like it should have been done the way DD4e did familiars: it's not a real animal, and when killed automatically reforms at some point in the near future.
Given that pathfinder exists as a direct result of the negative blacklash to 4e. I'm sure they wanted to avoid doing anything the way 4e did it.
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Oh, I got one. An update to sorcerers so they get a list of bloodline powers to pick from like Oracle mysteries have revelation.
On a related note: First level bloodline/school/domain powers like Rays and Claws and stuff not being restricted to a limited amount of uses a day. One reason I heard they got the limit added was because people were(apparently) worried about players burning through doors or powering batteries.
The number of bloodlines with the absolutely useless "get worthless claws" ability is the bigger problem, IMO.
Yeah, I get it- dragons and demons HAVE claws. Why does a full caster want 1d6 melee claws?
It's a complete waste 99% of the time.
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Oh, I got one. An update to sorcerers so they get a list of bloodline powers to pick from like Oracle mysteries have revelation.
On a related note: First level bloodline/school/domain powers like Rays and Claws and stuff not being restricted to a limited amount of uses a day. One reason I heard they got the limit added was because people were(apparently) worried about players burning through doors or powering batteries.
The number of bloodlines with the absolutely useless "get worthless claws" ability is the bigger problem, IMO.
Yeah, I get it- dragons and demons HAVE claws. Why does a full caster want 1d6 melee claws?
It's a complete waste 99% of the time.
yeah, they're worthless in both directions. On the one hand if you're a full caster meleeing something with your D6 claws is suicidal at best. On the other hand, if your character is built to go into melee then you'll want something that hangs around for longer than a few rounds per day.
I had a character built for melee with the serpentine bloodline bite ability. I had to use it really sparingly because I got so few uses and it was horrible when I missed.
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Clerics should get more class features other than "cast a spell," "get spells related to your deity," "get a weak first-level domain ability related to your deity."
Oracles get all sorts of goodies every few levels. Clerics get some starting goodies and a buff at level 8 (or sometimes 6). Then, nothing to look forward to other than marginally better healing and more/better spells.
In the same vein, Wizards. Pretty much the same problem.
You know, I think most Core Rulebook classes could use an overhaul. They're too tied to 3.5, and the later classes really show off how innovative Pathfinder classes can be.
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Fighters should start with the necessary Knowledge skills to identify enemies. Fighters should start with the necessary Acrobatics and Stealth skills to close the distance between themselves and their enemies. Fighters should start with the necessary Diplomacy skills to formally address their superiors that won't get them demoted or lashed with a whip.
Gunslinger/Swashbuckler Weapon Training should have the special line in their descriptions that allow them to count as Weapon Training for feats and prerequisites.
Remove all alignment restrictions. Alignments are stupid. Restrictions based on stupid alignments are even worse.
Make the Ninja and the Samurai their own classes, not alternative options to crappy classes.
Bloodline Powers and Gunslinger/Swashbuckler Deeds need to be chosen by the player from a list like Revelations and Talents.
Clerics should get cool Domain Powers at the same rate Sorcerers receive Bloodline Powers.
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It is squishy (half the HP of a d6 HD class which lacks good defensive spells), but the main thing is it's more targetable than a book and more expensive to make backups of. You need a few thousand for a stone familiar.
Right, the fact that there is only one specific magic item (which didn't even exist for a few years after the class was introduced) that allows you to 'back up' your spell list is the main thing.
Without that, the familiar dies and suddenly your 10th level Witch is scrambling to find 1st level spells to learn.
The whole process of 'copying' spells from one familiar to another is also a pain. Kill a wizard and you can copy their spellbook. Kill a witch and you have to get their familiar to cooperate in order to get any spells from it... and even then you've only got a day before it reverts to a normal animal and loses all the spells.
It is also just a fairly pointless bifurcation of rules. You need to re-create all the limits and processes around spellbooks for 'spell familiars'... and there are inevitably going to be gaps and then subsequent rules (e.g. spellbook preparation rituals) that need to be somehow shoehorned in or which have to be excluded from the class.
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Oh, I got one. An update to sorcerers so they get a list of bloodline powers to pick from like Oracle mysteries have revelation.
On a related note: First level bloodline/school/domain powers like Rays and Claws and stuff not being restricted to a limited amount of uses a day. One reason I heard they got the limit added was because people were (apparently) worried about players burning through doors or powering batteries.
Yes to both!
Back in the day, I had a series of substitution powers for the Aberrant Bloodline first, but eventually intended for all of them.
Abilities for for Elemental Sorcerers that don't necessarily have anything to do with cold, acid or electricity, but involve water & fog, earth & stone or air & wind, could also be neat. I'd love a stone sorcerer that felt more like a geokinetic or 'earthbender' and wasn't flinging acid jets around, since that doesn't feel very 'earthy' to me. Perhaps they conjure stones that hurl (or roll along the ground, or fall from the sky, or erupt from the ground). Perhaps the earth erupts beneath their feet, knocking them down and damaging them with stony shrapnel. Whatever, just not 'acid splash 2.0.' :)
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Sorcerers certainly ought to get their Bloodline spells as soon as they can cast spells of that level. Plausibly, they could get only that spell a level before they get that spell level, with 2 slots per day. eg a 3rd level Sorcerer learns his 2nd level bloodline spell (and no other) with 2 uses; a 5th level learns his 3rd level and so on.
That would be a neat option, rather than just bumping all spell progression to the same as clerics/druids/wizards, to have the spontaneous casters only get early access to their Bloodline/Mystery spells.
And why no Bloodline cantrips?
And clerics should get domain orisons. And paladins and rangers should get orisons too, so you don't get orisons jammed into 1st level spell slots, forever to be ignored.
Cantrips and orisons are the red-headed stepchild of spellcasting. Possibly because of the rule that 1st-level wizards know all cantrips, someone decided there couldn't be any more.
Yeah, I love cantrips. There was a 3rd party (ENWorld?) Prestige Class called the Master of Small Magics that specialized in cantrips, and I remember loving the idea of a base class that represented some spellcaster who had a handicap and couldn't cast any higher level spells. He'd get cantrips, and then be able to burn the higher level spell slots to enhance them (as well as getting a number of 'free' enhancements based on his level), so he could spend some upping range, damage, duration, etc. and, at the end of the day, function as a sort of 3.X Warlock (or PF Kineticist), enhancing the heck out of a Ray of Frost or Acid Splash to make it do damage/level at a greater range, or create multiple rays like Scorching Ray (burn some daily spell slots to enhance it!), or affect a cone (even more enhancements required!), etc.
But yeah, it also would be cool to have more cantrips, and just include a sentence somewhere that the cantrips introduced in books after the core book are *not* automatically known by all wizards, but must be discovered and added to their books normally. Bang. Problem solved, minimum fuss.
Witch: Should have used spellbooks exactly like a Wizard for most of their spells and limited the 'spells in the familiar' mechanic to patron spells.What's wrong with the current version? Is the familiar too squishy?
Familiar hit points are simply done wrong. For some reason, the familiar gets half its owner's hp, regardless of where those hp come from. So a raging Barbarian 7 / Wizard 1 with 24 Con has a familiar with many more hp than that of a Wizard 8 with 12 Con, even though it's in all other ways worse.
It should have been done just by wizard level (4/level?), with FCB options to increase it like you can on an animal companion.
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Not exactly a class/class ability, but i wish that enhancement bonuses to weapons/armor/magic items in general upped the save dc of their abilities by the same amount.
I also kind of wish the occultist, and some other classes had abilities that upped the save dcs of magic item effects.
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Not exactly a class/class ability, but i wish that enhancement bonuses to weapons/armor/magic items in general upped the save dc of their abilities by the same amount.
I also kind of wish the occultist, and some other classes had abilities that upped the save dcs of magic item effects.
For reals! Paying thousands of gold for a DC 14-15 save is a cruel joke.
By the time you can afford the enchantments, Cantrips have higher DC's. Lol.
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All magic item save DCs should be based on the user.