Black classes

9 posts / 0 new
Last post
blackthornes's picture
Offline
factotums
Joined: 2005-04-21
Black classes

In this thread, i am posting a few prestige and other classes that i have either made up, or thought were good for PS, My first addition will be the Blood crow.
Blood Crow
This is based on the Chant word for a person who ventures onto the battlefield of the blood wars in search of treasure. Because of all the perils that could find them there, i devised this class with things i think could aid them in this outrageous quest.
Requirements
Skills: Hide 4 ranks, use rope 2 ranks, swim 4 ranks, jump 2 ranks, disguise 5 ranks
Feats: dodge, Skill focus (hide), improved int.
Special: must own a large cotton cloak, has to be at least one size catagory bigger than you.
The Blood Crow
Lvl...BAB...Fort...Ref...Will...Special........................
1......0.......1.......1......0.....Base land speed +5
2......1.......2.......2......0.....Lesser Crow senses
3......1.......3.......3......1.....Base land speed +10, Evation
4......2.......4.......5......2.....able bodied
5......3.......5.......7......2.....Base land speed +15, pack mule
6......4.......5.......7......3.....improved evation
7......4.......6.......8......4.....Base land speed +20
8......5.......7.......8......5.....greater crow senses
9......5.......7.......9......6.....Cloaking
10.....6.......8.......9......6.....Expert crow senses
Class Skills
Hide, jump, Appraise, Swim, Disguise, use rope, slieght of hand, bluff, escape artist, Skill points per lvl- 4+int mod
Class features
Weapon+ armor prof- lght armor, martial and simple weapons in small and medium Catagories.
Base land speed+5- apply this bonus to your base land speed, increases by 5 every 2 levels until level 7.
Crow senses- this ability allows the Blood crow to know when a fiend dies, and gives a mental picture of their possesions, at 2nd level, this works for 1 fiend per day in a 200 ft. radius from the crow, at 8th, the times increases to 3, and radius to 400, and at 10th, the times increased to 10, radius 1000 ft.
Evasion and improved evasion- as rogues special ability
Able bodied- adds a plus adds a +5 bonus to all will saves, and skills dependant on Con and Str.
Pack mule- takes away incomberence for medium loads
Cloaking- allows crow to cover themselves completely with their cloaks, and then make a disguise check (DC 20) to appaer as their physical surrondings
so what do you think guys?

Gerzel's picture
Offline
factotums
Joined: 2004-05-10
Re: Black classes

"blackthornes" wrote:
so what do you think guys?

hmm...I'd say make the class requirment for the cloak be a cloak of their size catagory, or simply remove it. Cloaks are common enough and from the way I read this it doesn't matter what cloak the character uses and the cloak ability also comes late in the class. If it was a class where the cloak became spechial and gained abilities through out the class I'd say include it.

eldersphinx's picture
Offline
Namer
Joined: 2004-12-06
Black classes

Okay, time to be brutal:
- The concept is questionable at best. Battlefield scavenger, even for something like the Blood War, isn't an occupation that requires a PrC. Straight rogues and bards can do just fine; rangers are just as able, using their Favored Enemy bonus, and even a sorcerer or barbarian could likely manage. To be a PrC, there needs to be some reason why a 5th-level character would specialize in this sort of thing, and ideally a small group of existing NPCs who already have the PrC.
- The requirements are laughable. A human with 1 level of rogue or bard and two levels of anything else can manage the PrC. Eberron may be going for easily-accessed PrCs, but for most settings a PrC should only be accessible by characters of 6th level or higher.
- BAB and saving throws are completely FUBAR. Shifting away from the Good/Poor progression of saves is generally a lousy idea; shifting away from the Good/Average/Poor BAB progression is UNIVERSALLY a lousy idea.
- Special abilities: Just about everything here is completely and utterly blah. The only potentially unique abilities are 'Crow Sense', a fairly pointless ability given that the character's supposedly seeking out battlefields where fiends are dying in the thousands, 'Pack Mule' which is only useful if your DM enforces encumbrance rules and your players don't bother with Portable Holes, and 'Cloaking' which is poorly written and utterly inferior to the Hide in Plain Sight ability gained by the Shadowdancer at Level 1.

Recommendations:
- Fix the concept. Somehow, I don't know. As it stands, the only thing less prestigious than this is a Light-Boy PrC.
- Fix the class requirements. A hint: Barbazu devils have a Spot skill of +9, and they're on the low end of the fiendish senses totem pole.
- Fix the saves and BAB. Average BAB, good Ref, poor Fort and Will saves IMHO.
- Replace the existing special abilities with a spell selection, similar to the Assassin's; the spell list gets chosen with an eye to scavenging and battlefield skulking. Improved land speed is replaced with Expeditious Retreat or Fly; cast Locate Object or Arcane Eye instead of relying on some near-useless Crow Sense. This also provides some additional tricks such as Grease, Minor Image or Glibness to deal with unexpected threats.
- Start looking at fiends and the Lower Planes, specifically, for other special abilities or spells that these guys could possess. For instance, most baatezu can see in darkness; maybe Blood Crows are actually invisible in darkness (and only in darkness). Fiends radiate fear, naturally; a Blood Crow might have a controlled panic ability to allow them to hold onto whatever they're holding and decide the direction to flee in if panicked. The alignment traits of the Lower Planes force circumstance penalties on many types of checks; an experienced Blood Crow would certainly be immune to any evilly-inclined alignment trait. And so on.

This is honestly not something I'd use in my game, or want to see available in a Planescape campaign. When you've got factols, exemplar generals, and divine proxies all available as PrC role models, who'd want to devote their life to becoming the best darn scavenger of old Blood War battlefields the planes had ever seen?

Nemui's picture
Offline
factotums
Joined: 2004-08-30
Black classes

"eldersphinx" wrote:
Okay, time to be brutal

Ugh. That was really brutal. Unfortunately, I'm afraid it was also well deserved. Sad

Still, couldn't you have added a positive note at the end, something like "I see you've put a lot of effort in this" or "keep trying, it'll get easier eventually", or something like that?

blackthornes's picture
Offline
factotums
Joined: 2005-04-21
Black classes

thanx for the posts, although i expected something a little different than "this completely and uterly sux", but thanx Simon cowel, loved the reply, really.

blackthornes's picture
Offline
factotums
Joined: 2005-04-21
Black classes

Elder Sphinx, though your recommendations are well placed, and truly, i did not think of the finds detection spells and such, that i can understand that part of your comment, but the begging is totally what i would expect a troll to say to someone, that is honestly the worst comment i have seen on this site.

eldersphinx's picture
Offline
Namer
Joined: 2004-12-06
Black classes

"blackthornes" wrote:
Elder Sphinx, though your recommendations are well placed, and truly, i did not think of the finds detection spells and such, that i can understand that part of your comment, but the begging is totally what i would expect a troll to say to someone, that is honestly the worst comment i have seen on this site.
Yes, but you'll grow out of such youth, inexperience and lack of confidence. If you have the sense to listen to others when they point out your mistakes. Laughing out loud

Anarch's picture
Offline
Namer
Joined: 2004-05-19
Black classes

"blackthornes" wrote:
...but the begging is totally what i would expect a troll to say to someone, that is honestly the worst comment i have seen on this site.

FWIW -- and it's not my ox being gored here, so I can afford to be generous -- I'd say it was one of the best, most constructive comments I've read in a while; certainly, I learned a fair amount from it. I'd second Nemui's recommendation that it should have had something positive at the end to palliate the brutality somewhat... but hey, part of being an artist -- in the small, shabby way in which all of us who post here are artists -- is taking your lumps like a man, rolling with the punches, and using the criticism to make your work better.

As always, YMMV.

blackthornes's picture
Offline
factotums
Joined: 2005-04-21
Black classes

i know, i know, you don't need to go on with it any more, jeez, i think i will wait awile before i submit the next class, it needs some modifications.

Planescape, Dungeons & Dragons, their logos, Wizards of the Coast, and the Wizards of the Coast logo are ©2008, Wizards of the Coast, a subsidiary of Hasbro Inc. and used with permission.