Post/Author/DateTime	Post
LordArchaon 04-11-07, 03:26 PM	SOUL KNIGHTMartial adept monk able to shape incarnum into a Soul Armorhttp://img175.imageshack.us/img175/7192/soulknightdevotedx3it4.png "My devotion is to the art of combat. My faith is in the souls of my predecessors who protect me with the mystical gift of the Soul Armor. Behold the power of the Devoted Spirit!" - Rainwal Haspler "Warrior Angel", soul knight of the Devoted Spirit. Soul knights are warriors who have been initiated to one of the most secret knowledges: the existence of the nine soul armors, one for each martial discipline. They are not artifacts, but soulmelds. Mystical and truly magical items made by the raw material which constitutes the souls, that can be shaped by the very soul knights into the legendary soul armors. The souls that compose each armor are the ones of the many warriors who practiced that particular discipline with complete devotion, and each armor epitomizes its discipline concepts. Being nearly weightless to its wielder, these armors do not encumber the warrior and their pieces may not be detached from its body but can instead be dispelled as if they were spells. Being or not being dictated by the nature of these armors, all the soul knights are martial artists who previously fought without armor and who, after becoming soul knights, can only benefit from their mystical armors, maintaining if not improving the agile and fast combat style that characterized them before. Nobody knows how ancient soul knights are, and many stories are told about the first soul knights, but nowadays only one thing is sure: no one can become a soul knight without being initiated by another, more experienced knight. Soul knights can be among the most powerful fighters, and their allegiances may vary. Without any doubt, they always are imposing figures that after years of adventuring and glory may also become nearly immortal. True living legends. BECOMING A SOUL KNIGHT Entry Requirements: Base Attack Bonus: +5. Feats: Blade Meditation, Fiery Fist, Shape Soulmeld (soulmeld of the Blade Meditation discipline's armor/list). Skills: Knowledge (arcana) 10 ranks, Martial Lore 10 ranks. Martial Maneuvers: Must know at least three maneuvers and two stances of the discipline chosen for the Blade Mediation feat. Special: Must discover a shrine dedicated to the soul armor of the chosen discipline, and there should learn to shape one soulmeld of the armor by the means of the Shape Soulmeld feat. CLASS FEATURES Table 1: The Soul Knight Hit Die: 1d6 Save- Lv BAB Fort. Refl. Will Bonus Special 1st +0 +0 +0 +0 +1 Monk Abilities, Soul Armor Investiture 2nd +1 +0 +0 +0 0 Chakra Binds (Crown, Hands, Feet) 3rd +2 +1 +1 +1 +1 Soul Armor Stance 4th +3 +1 +1 +1 0 Soul-Infused Maneuver 5th +3 +1 +1 +1 +1 Chakra Binds (Arms, Shoulders), Soul Blast 6th +4 +2 +2 +2 0 Soul Flourish 7th +5 +2 +2 +2 +1 Improved Soul Armor Stance 8th +6 +2 +2 +2 0 9th +6 +3 +3 +3 +1 Chakra Binds (Waist, Throat) 10th +7 +3 +3 +3 0 11th +8 +3 +3 +3 +1 Superior Soul Armor Stance 12th +9 +4 +4 +4 0 Timeless Body 13th +9 +4 +4 +4 +1 Chakra Binds (Soul), Supreme Blast Table 2: Maneuvers and Meldshaping Maneuvers Maneuvers Stances Meldshaping Lv Known Readied Known Soulmelds Chakra Binds Essentia 1st 1 0 0 1 0 1 2nd 1 1 0 2 1 1 3rd 1 1 0 2 2 2 4th 2 1 1 3 2 3 5th 2 2 1 3 3 4 6th 3 2 1 3 3 5 7th 4 2 2 4 3 5 8th 4 3 2 4 4 6 9th 4 3 2 5 4 7 10th 5 3 3 5 5 8 11th 5 4 3 5 5 9 12th 6 4 3 6 5 9 13th 7 4 4 6 6 10 Class Skills (2+int modifier per level): Balance, Concentration, Craft, Intimidate, Knowledge (arcana), Listen, Martial Lore, Spot, Swim, Tumble. Weapons and Armor Proficiencies: You gain no new weapon, armor or shield proficiencies. Save Bonus: Soul knights train and develop their abilities differently from one another, being influenced both by their chosen martial discipline and their adventuring. Because of this, a soul knight periodically gains a single point every two levels which can be added to any of the three save types (fortitude, reflex or will) she chooses. Once a point is added to a save it cannot be undone, however there is no obligation for the next point to be added to the same save as the one previously chosen. [see the Samurai class by Kanachi (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=722563) for the original version of this rule] Maneuvers: At 1st, 4th, 6th, 7th, 10th, 12th, and 13th level, you gain one maneuver from the discipline you chose for the Blade Meditation feat. You must meet a maneuver's prerequisite to learn it. You add your full soul knight levels to your initiator level to determine your total initiator level and your highest-level maneuvers known. At 2nd, 5th, 8th, and 11th level you gain an additional maneuver readied per day. Stances Known: At 4th, 7th, 10th, and 13th level, you learn a new martial stance from the discipline you chose for the Blade Meditation feat. You must meet a stance's prerequisite to learn it. Meldshaping: The soul knights' signature ability is shaping incarnum soulmelds and in particular the pieces of their chosen discipline's soul armor. You know and can shape any soulmeld from the list of your soul armor. The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a soul knight's soulmeld is 10 + number of points of essentia invested in the soulmeld + your Wisdom modifier. Your meldshaper level is equal to your soul knight level. A soul knight can shape only a certain amount of soulmelds per day. Your base daily allotment is given on Table 2: Maneuvers and Meldshaping. The maximum number of soulmelds you can have shaped simultaneously is equal to your Constitution score minus 10, or the number of soulmelds allowed for your level, whichever is lower. At 1st level you can shape one soulmeld only (assuming you have a Constitution of at least 11). As you increase in level you can shape an increasing number of soulmelds, eventually becoming able to have your armor fully shaped with its seven pieces, at 12th level. At 1st level, you also gain access to your personal pool of essentia, which can be invested into your soulmelds or into certain class features to increase the power of your soul armor and your combat prowess. Your character level, as noted on Table 2-1: Essentia Capacity (in Magic of Incarnum), determines the maximum quantity of essentia that you can invest in any single soulmeld or class features. As a swift action, you can reallocate your essentia investments in your soulmelds and class features every round (see Essentia, on page 50 of Magic of Incarnum). A soul knight does not study or prepare soulmelds in advance, but must have a good night's rest and meditate for 1 hour to shape his soulmelds for the day (see Shaping Soulmelds, on page 49 of Magic of Incarnum). Chakra Binds: Beginning at 2nd level you can bind your soulmelds to your chakras, granting you new powers based on the soulmeld and the chakra chosen. Binding a soulmeld to a chakra closes the body slot associated with that chakra (see Chakras, page 50 of Magic of Incarnum). A soul knight will never gain access to certain chakras, like the brow chakra, without taking an Open Chakra feat. However, most soul armors do not have soulmelds that can be bound to those chakras. At 2nd level you can bind a soulmeld to your crown, feet, or hands chakras. At 5th level you can bind a soulmeld to your arms or shoulders chakras. At 10th level you can bind a soulmeld to your throat or waist chakras, and at 15th level you can bind a soulmeld to your soul chakra. For more information on chakra binds, see page 51 of Magic of Incarnum. Monk Abilities: You add your class level to your monk level to determine your unarmed damage, your attacks when using your flurry of blows ability, your Ki strike class ability, and the number of daily attempts of your Stunning Fist feat. You do not count your class levels for the purpose of determining when you gain any other monk class features, such as bonus feats, unarmored speed bonus or class-based AC bonus. Soul Armor Investiture: depending on what discipline you chose for your Blade Meditation feat, you will have access to different lists of soulmelds that will constitute your Soul Armor. Desert Wind: Fire Armor, which epitomizes control over fire and movement. Devoted Spirit: Celestial Armor, which may be very different depending on the knight's deity or alignment. Diamond Mind: Crystal Armor, which gives speed and concentration in combat. Iron Heart: Steel Armor, which is made and balanced for the toughest battles. Setting Sun: Sun Armor, which may confound the enemy, reflecting its power against him. Shadow Hand: Black Armor, which can obscure the wearer to let him kill from the shadows. Stone Dragon: Dragon Armor, which can make a knight solid as rock and resilient as a dragon. Tiger Claw: Feral Armor, which makes the knight a raging anthropomorphous beast. White Raven: White Armor, which inspires awe and combat prowess to the knight and his allies. Soul Armor Stance (Su): While you are in a stance from the discipline chosen for your Soul-Armor Investiture, you can forgo its normal benefit as a swift action to gain the benefit of the Soul-Armor Stance. While you use this ability you can invest essentia in it as if it were a soulmeld, and make your soulmelds more difficult to dispel. For each point of invested essentia you raise the meldshaper level of your shaped soulmelds (previously equal to your Soul Knight level) by one, but only for the purpose of resisting dispel attempts (and not, for example, for the purpose of piercing a Spell Resistance with a soulmeld ability). You can change the amount of essentia invested in this ability with a swift action. Soul-Infused Maneuver (Su): You can invest essentia in your maneuvers to make them more powerful. At any time, you can only have one single maneuver with essentia invested into it, but you can change maneuver and/or change the invested essentia with a swift action, like if they were soulmelds. To use the invested essentia, you must take a full-round action to initiate the maneuver, but doing so will increase the attack bonus and the save DC by a number equal to the number of essentia points you had invested in that maneuver, and will give you a bonus on an eventual skill check required to initiate the maneuver equal to twice the number of essentia points you had invested in that maneuver. Note that you won't be able to initiate another Soul-Infused Maneuver again until you recover all of your maneuvers, with the standard method of your base martial adept class. At 4th level you can invest only 1 point of essentia. At 8th level you can invest up to 2 points of essentia. At 12th level you can invest up to 3 points of essentia. Soul Blast (Su): Functions like Ki Blast (Player's Handbook II), but essentia can and must be invested into it. For each point of essentia the Soul Blast deals 2d6 damage (+ Wis) and has a range of 20 ft.. For example, at 12th level, with 3 points of essentia invested, it deals 6d6+Wis damage and has a range of 60 ft. You can also infuse a maneuver that requires a melee attack of maneuver level up to the essentia invested. The ranged touch attack needed for the Soul Blast counts as the melee attack needed for the maneuver to take effect. At 5th level you can invest only 1 point of essentia. At 9th level you can invest up to 2 points of essentia. At 13th level you can invest up to 3 points of essentia. Soul Flourish (Su): With a standard action, expend a readied maneuver to gain temporary essentia equal to 1+1/2 the maneuver level for a number of rounds equal to 1/2 the maneuver level (always rounded down). Improved Soul Armor Stance (Su): While you use your Soul Armor Stance you now improve your general meldshaper level and your shaped soulmelds count as if being shaped with the newly improved meldshaper level. For each point of invested essentia you raise your meldshaper level of your soulmelds (previously equal to your Soul Knight level) by one. This bonus stacks with the one against dispel attempts, effectively raising the meldshaper level of your soulmelds by two for every point of essentia invested, for the purpose of resisting dispel attempts. Superior Soul Armor Stance (Su): While using your Soul Armor Stance you undergo a beautiful magical transformation. By entering the stance with a full-round action instead of a swift action, and by having all your soulmelds shaped and all your chakra binds used, your soulmelds fuse so deeply with your body and with each other that you gain the benefits of the living-construct subtype for as long as you stay in this stance or until someone successfully dispels one of your soulmelds, since you must have all the soulmelds shaped in order to use this stance. Note that while being in this stance, apart from not having to eat or sleep, the character doesn't age and is practically immune to natural death, therefore becoming quasi-immortal. As a thumb rule, only long periods of time (months) spent in this stance are counted as not having aged the soul knight. Soul knights use this aspect of the Soul Armor Stance to seal themselves in some remote place and wait for events that will take years to come to pass. You can return to use another stance with a full-round action. Timeless Body (Ex): due to the frequent use of the transformation given by the Soul Armor Stance, after 11th level a soul knight no longer takes ability score penalties for aging. Any penalties she may have already incurred, however, remain in place. Bonus still accrue, and the soul knight may still die of old age when her time is up, although many don't let this happen using the Soul Armor Stance for long periods. Note that soul knights may still be magically aged and in that case, they would also incur in penalties to their ability scores. Supreme Blast (Su): You can "charge" your Soul Blast for up to 3 rounds, using full-round actions. At the end of the third (or second) round, as part of the full-round action, you can fire the Supreme Blast, which functions like a multiplied Soul Blast: damage and maximum range are multiplied by the number of rounds you charged, and the maximum maneuver level is also multiplied by the same amount. So charging the Supreme Blast for three rounds, with 3 essentia invested into the Soul Blast gives a Supreme Blast that deals 18d6 (+ 3x Wis modifier) damage, has a range of 180 ft and can be infused with a maneuver of up to 9th level.
LordArchaon 04-11-07, 06:32 PM	So here I will soon post a BIG 15 levels PrC (with its last one or two levels being epic already) which will be monk based, but will be especially made for monk/warblade or monk/swordsage characters. It will be the first functional "armored monk" concept: the armor pieces will be soulmelds and will only be limited by level and constitution score. The big number of soulmelds (the armor set) that the PrC will give to the character will be balanced by the fact that they will not be versatile as a normal soulmeld list: they will be decided at first level depending on the favored martial discipline chosen by the character. So if it will take sometime, that will be because I SHOULD create 72 different soulmelds! 8 for each of the 9 different armors! Maybe I'll make only few armors or maybe only few soulmelds will be unique and most of them will be nearly equal for all the armors. Any help will be welcome! :) FIRST DRAFT OF CLASS TABLE: Table 1: The Soul Knight Hit Die: 1d6 Save- lv BAB Fort. Refl. Will Bonus Special 1st +0 +0 +0 +0 +1 Monk Abilities, Soul Armor Investiture 2nd +1 +0 +0 +0 0 Chakra Binds (Crown, Hands, Feet) 3rd +2 +1 +1 +1 +1 Soul-Weapon, Soul-Armor Stance 4th +3 +1 +1 +1 0 Soul-Infused Maneuver 5th +3 +1 +1 +1 +1 Chakra Binds (Arms, Shoulders) 6th +4 +2 +2 +2 0 Soul Flourish 7th +5 +2 +2 +2 +1 8th +6 +2 +2 +2 0 Expanded Soulmeld Capacity +1 9th +6 +3 +3 +3 +1 Improved Soul-Infused Maneuver 10th +7 +3 +3 +3 0 Chakra Binds (Waist, Throat) 11th +8 +3 +3 +3 +1 Superior Soul-Armor Stance 12th +9 +4 +4 +4 0 13th +9 +4 +4 +4 +1 Superior Soul Flourish 14th +10 +4 +4 +4 0 Superior Soul-Infused Maneuver 15th +11 +5 +5 +5 +1 Chakra Binds (Soul), Final Technique Table 2: The Soul Knight: Maneuvers and Meldshaping Maneuvers Maneuvers Stances Meldshaping lv Known Readied Known Soulmelds Chakra Binds Essentia 1st 1 0 0 1 0 1 2nd 0 0 1 2 1 1 3rd 0 1 0 2 1 2 4th 1 0 0 2 1 3 5th 0 0 0 3 2 4 6th 0 1 0 3 2 5 7th 1 0 0 4 3 5 8th 0 0 1 4 3 6 9th 0 1 0 4 3 7 10th 1 0 0 5 4 8 11th 0 0 0 5 4 9 12th 0 1 0 6 5 9 13th 1 0 0 6 5 10 14th 0 0 1 6 5 11 15th 0 1 0 7 6 12
Thomar_of_Uointer 04-11-07, 07:01 PM	A teaser post? Geh. :confused: Well, at least it's Incarnum.
LordArchaon 04-12-07, 07:58 PM	So what would you think looking at the first draft of table above? One of the aims was to leave no dead levels at all. Even the two levels in which no special class features are gained, soulmelds, chakra binds and maneuvers are gained. The level in which less is gained is 11th level, but that Superior Soul-Armor Stance is able to grant the living-construct subtype for an indefinite amount of time, so that means practically immortality... The only serious doubts I have are about the big amount of Maneuvers Readied. Would it be too unbalancing?
LordArchaon 04-15-07, 10:19 AM	UPDATE: The PrC is going to use the Save-Bonus system by Kanachi (take a look at his Samurai (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?p=12102469) class) in order to be more customizable, since the different armors/disciplines could require different saves. I now also have an idea of what the entry requirements will be: Entry Requirements: Base Attack Bonus: +5. Feats: any Incarnum Feat, Blade Meditation. Martial Maneuvers: at least one 3rd level maneuver of the discipline chosen for the Blade Mediation feat. Special: Still Mind class feature. So a charcater must have at least 3 levels in the monk class, but it's not forced to have any levels in a martial adept class (Crusader, Swordsage or Warblade) although it is seriously recommended in order to be able to recover the maneuvers granted by Soul Knight also during an ongoing encounter. The best combination to enter the class is to have 4 monk levels and 3 levels in any martial adept class. Note that it is possible, for example, to create a Crusader based Soul Knight who uses Desert Wind or Shadow Hand discipline: it would just have to learn one 3rd level maneuver of that discipline by the means of the Martial Study feat and then take the Blade Meditation feat, although the character will need more levels than normal to meet the requirements for Soul Knight.
LordArchaon 04-15-07, 08:50 PM	Here is the Soul-Infused Maneuver system. I'm sure it can be perfected. In particular, it seems underpowered at first and maybe overpowered in its Improved and Superior versions. Soul-infused Maneuver (Su): You can invest essentia in your maneuvers to make them more powerful. At the same time you shape your soulmelds, you can choose to invest 1 point of essentia in a number of known maneuvers equal to half your maximum amount of maneuvers readied. At any time during the next 24 hours you can choose to use the invested essentia when you initiate that maneuver. Doing so requires no action, but the save DC for that maneuver is increased by 1. Once so used the essentia return to your essentia pool and can be invested into soulmelds or other effects. Improved Soul-infused Maneuver (Su): You can now use the essentia invested in your maneuvers one time per encounter instead of one time per day. You can choose which maneuvers to enhance this way with 5 minutes of meditation outside of combat, so that you can enhance different maneuvers before each encounter. Additionally, you can invest up to 2 points of essentia into any single maneuver. Superior Soul-infused Maneuver (Su): You can now re-invest the essentia in your maneuvers each time that you recover your maneuvers during an encounter. You still have to choose which maneuvers to enhance this way with 5 minutes of meditation outside of combat. Additionally, you can invest up to 3 points of essentia into any single maneuver. I need some feedback on this!
Kanachi 04-16-07, 08:24 AM	I have to confess I’m neither entirely keyed up on either the anime from which this draws its inspiration or very experienced playing with TOB classes. the idea however looks to be very interesting and of course I’m really flattered to see use of the point save system, thank you very much indeed. I'll keep an eye on the class and try to offer a better critique when you have written more and I’ve had a bit more experience with TOB. Nice image as well btw :)
LordArchaon 04-16-07, 12:40 PM	Thank you Kanachi! One day or another I'll make a PrC made for your Samurai class! :) The Soul-Infused Maneuver system I posted yesterday was based on the Arcane Investment class feature of the Soulcaster PrC, but I think it's a little too complex. I think I came up with something more straightforward: a single system, advancing only the number of essentia points you can invest. Soul-Infused Maneuver (Su): You can invest essentia in your maneuvers to make them more powerful. At any time, you can only have one single maneuver with essentia invested into it, but you can change maneuver and/or change the invested essentia with a swift action, like if they were soulmelds. To use the invested essentia, you must take a full-round action to initiate the maneuver, but doing so both the attack bonus and the save DC for that maneuver will be increased by a number equal to the points you had invested in that maneuver. Note that you won't be able to initiate another Soul-Infused Maneuver again until you recover all of your maneuvers, with the standard method of your base martial adept class. At 4th level you are able to invest only 1 point of essentia. At 9th level you will be able to invest up to 2 points of essentia. At 14th level you will be able to invest up to 3 points of essentia. So here are the differences to the class table: Table 1: The Soul Knight Hit Die: 1d6 Save- lv BAB Fort. Refl. Will Bonus Special 4th +3 +1 +1 +1 0 Soul-Infused Maneuver 1 9th +6 +3 +3 +3 +1 Soul-Infused Maneuver 2 14th +10 +4 +4 +4 0 Soul-Infused Maneuver 3 Now it is a little more like the Arcane Investment class feature of the Soulcaster class but at the same time it functions in a very different way, allowing more or less an infinite number of uses. Do you think that at some point of the level progression I could add something like a "Swift Soul-Infused Maneuver" to allow the character to use them without taking full-round actions? BALANCE ISSUE: The versatility of having any maneuver enhanced this way is a little too much. A possible solution that also adds some flavor to the class would be to only have this enhancement work on a very limited and fixed number of maneuvers. These maneuver could be REALLY fixed meaning that you decide which one at the time you gain the class feature (and then decide a second and a third maneuver with Improved and Superior Soul-Infused Maneuver) or they could be decided at the start of the day, always being only one, then two and then three. The system would however remain the same explained in this post, that is simpler and more enjoyable in my opinion than the first version posted some time before. Please give some feedback, good or bad it doesn't matter! :D
LordArchaon 04-16-07, 07:21 PM	Waiting for someone who likes (and owns) Magic of Incarnum to give me some help, I'll now present some other class features which are not directly connected to Incarnum. Monk abilities: You add your class level to your monk level to determine your unarmed damage, penalty on your attacks when using your flurry of blows ability, your Ki strike class ability, and the number of daily attempts of your Stunning Fist feat. You do not count your class levels for the purpose of determining when you gain any other monk class features, such as bonus feats, unarmored speed bonus or class-based AC bonus. Soul Armor Investiture: depending on what discipline you chose for your Blade Meditation feat, you will have access to different lists of soulmelds that will constitute your Soul Armor. You also have to choose the weapon-soulmeld that the armor will give you for the rest of your progression. Desert Wind: Fire Armor, which epitomizes control over fire and movement. Devoted Spirit: Gold Armor, which may be very different depending on the knight's deity or alignment. Diamond Mind: Crystal Armor, which gives speed and concentration in combat. Iron Heart: Steel Armor, which is made and balanced for the toughest battles. Setting Sun: Sun Armor, which may confound the enemy, reflecting its power against him. Shadow Hand: Black Armor, which can obscure the wearer to let him kill from the shadows. Stone Dragon: Dragon Armor, which can make a knight solid as rock and resilient as a dragon. Tiger Claw: Feral Armor, which makes the knight a raging anthropomorphous beast. White Raven: White Armor, which inspires awe and combat prowess to the knight and his allies. Soul Weapon: If you had chose a weapon-soulmeld different from the unarmed option, that weapon now counts as a special monk weapon and if bound to the hands chakra also benefits from the Ki strike class feature. Now I think the class is starting to reveal itself a little more! :) If you have suggestions for more attractive names for the various armors or, even better, if you have some advice on what peculiarities the different armors could have speaking of magical enhancements and everything, just take in count that every armor includes the following pieces: 1- A helm, crown, circlet, mask or similar item 2- Boots that may look like the leg-plates of a full plate mail and may or may not give the ability to fly, depending on the armor. 3- A weapon which can also be something different in the case of the unarmed option (like claws, gauntlets or similars) 4- Bracers or armlets that could also have an attached shield, depending on the armor. 5- Shoulder pauldrons or a mantle, both of which could transform into wings or something else, depending on the armor. 6- A medallion, necklace or periapt that may have various functions and in the armors that have a belt item will not be present. 6- A belt that may look like the corresponding part of the full plate mail and will not be present if the armor has a necklace item. 7- The breast-plate that is the most powerful piece when binded and could provide the most spectacular magical enhancements or effects. Give your two cents! And if you don't have two, at least one...
LordArchaon 04-20-07, 01:02 PM	Time to write the draft of another class feature: Soul Flourish! Soul Flourish: For this incredibly devoted knights, combat prowess comes from the soul and to the soul it can go back again, pervading it of magical energy. You can expend one readied maneuver with a standard action to gain temporary essentia equal to 1 every 3 levels of the maneuver expended. This temporary essentia lasts until the start of your next turn. Improved Soul Flourish: Expending a readied maneuver to gain essentia is now a free action. Note that temporary essentia don't stack, so expending more than one maneuver in a single round will only result in having temporary essentia equal to the highest level expended. Superior Soul Flourish: You now gain temporary essentia equal to the level of the maneuver instead of only one third of the level. Do you think it's ok? I separated the advancement in speed (from standard action to free action) from the one in essentia gained. I also updated the post about the Soul-Infused Maneuvers (http://boards1.wizards.com/showpost.php?p=12114120&postcount=8), talking about another balance issue and the possible solution.
LordArchaon 04-21-07, 11:03 PM	So now I'm going to write the last class feature before getting everything together and writing the most important part of the PrC: the list of soulmelds that will be the nine armors associated to the nine martial disciplines. Soul-Armor Stance: Their movements suddenly seem to be in perfect harmony with their armors and in the same moment you notice this change, you see that each piece of the armor started to glow of an eerie light, inspiring awe and power. While you are in a stance from the discipline chosen for your Soul-Armor Investiture, you can forgo its normal benefit as a swift action to gain the benefit of the Soul-Armor Stance. While you use this ability you can invest essentia in it as if it were a soulmeld, and make your soulmelds more powerful and difficult to dispel. For each point of invested essentia you raise the caster level of your soulmelds (previously equal to your Soul Knight level) by 2 points, for the purpose of determining caster level based effects, and by 4 points for the purpose of resisting dispel attempts. You can change the amount of essentia invested in this ability with a swift action. Superior Soul-Armor Stance: In a few seconds that seem longer due to the hallucinating nature of the happening process, the metallic sheen of the knight's armor seems to spread to his skin, while the armor pieces seem to liquefy for a moment and then solidly join together. The knight is now his armor and the armor is now the knight. A being of artistic and magical perfection. While using your Soul-Armor Stance you undergo a beautiful magical transformation. By entering the stance with a full-round action instead of a swift action, and by having all your soulmelds shaped and all your chakra binds used, your soulmelds fuse so deeply with your body and with each other that you gain the benefits of the living-construct subtype for as long as you stay in this stance or until someone successfully dispels one of your soulmelds, since you must have all the soulmelds shaped in order to use this stance. Note that while being in this stance, the character doesn't age and is practically immune to natural death, therefore becoming quasi-immortal. You can return to use another stance with a full-round action. EDIT: Added flavor here and there. Again, feedback is necessary! Come on Incarnum fans!
LordArchaon 04-22-07, 09:03 PM	After a big analysis of the class table, I've decided the final version of it. It will be a never-boring progression in which also the 2 only levels which don't give special class features will be important for other improvements such as BAB, Saves, Maneuvers and Essentia. I also splitted some class features and had them "symmetrically spaced" along the progression. I color-coded class features and made bold the numbers which are an improvement compared to the previous level. This way you can see the balanced progression. Note that the 15th level special "Chakra Bind (Soul)" is really powerful, since is the last ability of the Soul Armor. So be sure that 15th level is REALLY a level you would like to reach! Also considering that you will be a charcater of at least 21st level! :) Here you are! Table 1: The Soul Knight Hit Die: 1d6 Save- lv BAB Fort. Refl. Will Bonus Special 1st +0 +0 +0 +0 +1 Monk Abilities, Soul-Armor Investiture 2nd +1 +0 +0 +0 0 Chakra Binds (Crown, Hands, Feet) 3rd +2 +1 +1 +1 +1 Soul-Armor Stance, Soul Flourish 4th +3 +1 +1 +1 0 Soul-Infused Maneuver 1, Soul-Weapon 5th +3 +1 +1 +1 +1 Chakra Binds (Arms, Shoulders) 6th +4 +2 +2 +2 0 7th +5 +2 +2 +2 +1 Improved Soul-Armor Stance 8th +6 +2 +2 +2 0 Expanded Soulmeld Capacity +1, Improved Soul Flourish 9th +6 +3 +3 +3 +1 Soul-Infused Maneuver 2 10th +7 +3 +3 +3 0 Chakra Binds (Waist, Throat) 11th +8 +3 +3 +3 +1 Superior Soul-Armor Stance [Immortality] 12th +9 +4 +4 +4 0 13th +9 +4 +4 +4 +1 Superior Soul Flourish 14th +10 +4 +4 +4 0 Soul-Infused Maneuver 3, Final Technique 15th +11 +5 +5 +5 +1 Chakra Binds (Soul) The colors mean this: Red: A class feature that will advance each level. Lime: A unique class feature, lesser if in low levels, powerful if at high levels. Cyan: New chakra binds, make the Soul-Armor more powerful. Magenta: Soul-Armor stance: Incarnum class feature, essentia-dependent. Defense-oriented. Teal: Soul Flourish: A way to get more essentia burning maneuvers. Blue: Soul-Infused Maneuvers: Incarnum class feature, essentia-dependent. Attack-oriented. Yellow: A general improvement for all the soulmelds (the Soul-Armor). Dark Red: An indirectly gained, but very important benefit. In this case pseudo-immortality given by the Superior Soul-Armor Stance. Table 2: The Soul Knight: Maneuvers and Meldshaping Maneuvers Maneuvers Stances Meldshaping lv Known Readied Known Soulmelds Chakra Binds Essentia 1st 1 0 0 1 0 1 2nd 1 0 1 2 1 1 3rd 1 1 1 2 1 2 4th 2 1 1 2 1 3 5th 2 1 1 3 2 4 6th 3 2 1 3 2 5 7th 4 2 1 4 3 5 8th 4 2 2 4 3 6 9th 4 3 2 4 3 7 10th 5 3 2 5 4 8 11th 6 3 2 5 4 9 12th 6 4 2 6 5 9 13th 7 4 2 6 5 10 14th 7 4 3 6 5 11 15th 7 5 3 7 6 12 Some comparisons: Maneuvers known: 7 at 15th level: 1 less than a Warblade of the same character level. (Assuming 3 levels of Warblade acquired before entering th PrC, a probable situation.) Maneuvers readied: 5 at 15th level: will have 1 more readied maneuvers than a Warblade of the same character level. (Always assuming 3 levels of Warblade in the character build.) Stances Known: 3 at 15th level: same of a Warblade of the same character level. (Always assuming 3 levels of Warblade in the character build.) Soulmelds: 7 at 15th level: 2 less than a Totemist of the same character level. Chakra Binds: 6 at 15th level: 1 more than an Incarnate of the same level, highest in-game value, but doesn't gain Brow nor Heart chakra binds. Essentia: 12 at 15th level: 8 less than a Totemist of the same level, 2 more than Soulborn of the same level. These high values could make you think that this PrC more or less "gestalts" a Warblade and a Totemist, but this is not the case for the following two big reasons: Drawbacks: Martial Adept side: ONLY ONE DISCIPLINE available. The Warblade may choose from a range of 5 disciplines. And even most PrCs have access to 2 or 3 disciplines. The somewhat high number of Maneuvers Readied is also balanced by the fact that the Soul Knights burns maneuvers to get Essentia. Meldshaper/Incarnum side: only one choice of soulmeld for each chakra bind, very narrow soulmeld list. The 7 soulmelds you can shape are the 7 soulmelds on the list. The Totemist can choose his 7 soulmelds (at 15th level) from a list of more than 30 soulmelds. So all in all, the class makes a really customized character that can use its resources to boost its attack or defense depending on the situation, but in the end, you will only be a front line warrior with little or no "utilities". A very beautiful one-trick-pony whose style and destiny is decided even before the first level of the PrC, when you choose which discipline you want to specialize in.
Loth 05-05-07, 09:26 PM	I love magic of incarnum and your Idea is great!! Amazing you sinergized perfectly the idea to meld manuvers and incarnum. About the class, I without my MoI but I don't see the heart chakra why? The pogression with 15 leves is fine, the pre-requisite I don't like so why still mind?? Unarmed strike is more resonable and isn't there I know some of kinights from anime use weapons but all them kick as*** And why not finish pre-epic is more fun! When I take my book I comment the mechanics of the new class abilities... Wanna help just tell me I want see this concept gain life!
LordArchaon 05-05-07, 09:34 PM	I love magic of incarnum and your Idea is great!! Amazing you sinergized percetly the idea to meld manuvers and incarnum. About the class, I withou my MoI but I don't see the heart chakra why? The pogression with 15 leves is fine, the pre-requisite I don't like so why still mind?? Unarmed strike is more resonable and isn't there I know some of kinights from anime use weapons but all them kick as*** And why not finish pre-epic is more fun! When I take my book I comment the mechanics of the new classa abilities... Wanna help just tell me I want see this concept gain life! Thank you very much! I waited ages to see some feedback! I need to come up with at least one armor (the armor of one martial discipline) and that means creating 7 soulmelds! I must get an idea of more or less what bonuses the various pieces will give to the various disciplines... If you have ideas maybe for a specific discipline, you're more than welcome! There are no Brow or Heart soulmelds because of flavor: we don't want glasses nor lenses of sort and don't want vests, but ARMOR! :)
Loth 05-08-07, 11:05 PM	So I will try the shadowhand armor, this is the final version: ShadowHand Armor: Shadow Pauldrons Claws of darkness Obscuing Belt Arms of dread Moon boots Night Helm Pearl of midnight MidNight Armor The seven soulmelds are: Shadow Pauldrons: Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: shoulders Savingthrow: None This pauldrons protect you from physical attacks you gain the bennefits of fortification light (25% against criticals and sneak attacks) Essentia: When you invest essentia in this soulmeld you gain a insight bonus on your AC equal to 2+ essentia invested. Chakra Binds (Shoulders) You gain evasion. If you already have evasion instead you gain an insight bonus on Reflex saving throws equal the essentia invested. Claws of Darkness Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: hands Savingthrow: None You form a pair of clawed gloves or a weapon of the Shadowhand discipline. In the case of the claws you gain a +2 insight bonus to Initiative, while in the case of the weapon you gain a +1 magic enhancement to both attack and damage. Essentia: Every point of essentia you invest gives you a +1 enhacement bonus to attack and damage or to initiative. Chakra Binds (hands) You gain the benefits of Weapon finesse or shadow blade feat. In the case of the unarmed version, you gain the benefits of Versatile Unarmed Strike feat (ability to deal slashing or piercing damage also) Obscuring Belt Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: waist Savingthrow: None You gain a +1 resistance bonus on Reflex saving throws and a +2 resistance bonus on any check or saving throw to resist disarmed, triped and another +2 competence bonus on escape artist checks. Essentia: Every point of essentia increases the resistance bonus by 1 Chakra Binds (Waist) You gain the bennefits of blur spell 20% miss chance against you Chakra Binds (Soul) You gains SR equal 5 +4 per point of essentia invested Arms of dread Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Savingthrow: None You gain +1 competence bonus on attacks and damage with manuvers of the sahdowhand discipline Essentia: The attack bonus inceases by 1 for every point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (Arms) When you use a shadow hand manuver the CD of the manuver increases by 1 for every point of essentia invested Chakra Binds (Soul) Your manuvers from shadowhand discipline cause 1 extra damage for every point of essentia invested. And the target must succed on a fortitude saving throw DC 10 +1/2 meldshaper level + number of essentia invested or become blinded for 1 round plus 1 round for every point of essentia invested in this soulmeld. Moon boots Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: feet Savingthrow: None You are with a permanet effect of the skate psi-like ability. Essentia: You gains +2 insight bonus on move silently for every point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (feet) You can move in you normal speed when using moving silently or hide skills. And you gain a cumnulative enhnacement bonus of +5 feet to your speed for every point of essentia invested. Night Helm Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Crown Savingthrow: None You gain Darkvision out to 30 feet. If you already has darkvision it's range increases by +20 feet. Essentia: You gain a +1 resistance bonus to will and fortitude saves for every point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (crown) You are undetectable by magical means as for the Nondetection spell. If you invest 4 or more points of essentia in night helm this effect is instead same as mindblank spell. Pearl of midnight Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Throat and Heart Savingthrow: None As a move action you can spend one point of essentia to recouver any expended shadowhand manuver. Your attacks with natural strikes or any shadowhand weapon deal 1d4 extra negative energy damage. Essentia: Every point of essentia invested increases the negative energy damage by 1d4. Chakra Binds (Throat) One time per day you can reroll any saving throw that you make before you know the results. You gain a +1 insight bonus on the second atempt per point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (Heart) [only for those who take greater chakra feat] You become immune to poison. Instead of 1d4 extra negative energy damage your attack deal 1d4+2 plus 1d4+2 per point of essentia invested. MidNight's armor Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Throat and Soul Savingthrow: None This is one of the most fearful soulmelds of the shadow hand, it's powers are sneaky and lethal. The victims fall the ground without know what hapened. The user also merge in darkness being protected to the night's dangers. The shadows involving you form a armor that gives a +2 armor bonus to AC. This is considered a light armor without maximum dextery bonus to AC and no checks penalities or spell failure chance. This armor don´t gives any restriction to monk abilities or similars, it dosen´t stack with other armors or items that gives an armor bonus to AC. Essentia: For every point of essentia invested the armor bonus improves by 1. And you gain a enhancement bonus to hide of +2 per point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (Throat) *The armor gains an enhancement bonus to AC equal the essentia invested and has the bane blind and Ghost ward enhancements (Magic Item Compendium). Chakra Binds (Soul) *You gain immunity death effects and negative energy and negative energy effects (as the deathward spell) such as level drain, slay livng or the harm spell for example. *You can use swift ethereal jaunt 3 times per day, but to activate this ability you must have at least 3 points of essentia invested in the 'night's armor' soulmeld. *If you have sneak attack or skirmish ability you deal an extra 1d6 damage plus 1d6 for every point of essentia invested. ----------------------------------------------------------- Edited arms of dread to become more balanced, with the armor stance that rises your meldshaper level the DC may get veryhard what do you think?
LordArchaon 05-09-07, 11:08 AM	So I will try the shadowhand armor, this is the first sketch: ShadowHand Armour: Shadow Pauldrons Hands of darkness Obscuing Belt Arms of dread Moon boots Night Helm > coming Night Armor > coming You're great!! :D now let's finish this armor together and I will start reformatting the first page and make the whole thing serious! :cool: The seven soulmelds are: Shadow Pauldrons: Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: shoulders Savingthrow: None This pauldrons protect you from physical attacks you gain the bennefits of fortification light (25% against criticals and sneak attacks) Essentia: When you invest essentia in this soulmeld you gain a insight bonus on your AC equal to 2+ essentia invested. Chakra Binds (Shoulders) You gain evasion Well, this is good! I thought that AC bonus belonged to the breastplate (Soul), but we could change this from armor to armor. Hands of darkness Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Savingthrow: None You gain a +2 insight bonus on your initiative Essentia: Every point of essentia you invest gives you a +2 on hide skill Chakra Binds (hands) You gain the bennefits of Weapon finesse or shadow blade feat I like the bind part, but what about making all Hand Soulmelds of the various armors be an enhancement to the unarmed strike? I don't know, as I said, this could be different from armor to armor, but maybe if we define a bit of standard (especially for the non-binded enhancements of each soulmeld) we could think all the armors in less time, just a thought! :) However I was thinking at the hand soulmeld as a variation of Incarnum Weapon, that could be formed in the shape of one or any of the discipline favorite weapons (especially for disciplines that don't have unarmed as favored weapon, not the case of Shadowhand). Obscuring Belt Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: waist Savingthrow: None You gain a +1 resistance bonus on Reflex saving throws and a +2 resistance bonus on any check or saving throw to resist disarmed, triped and another +2 competence bonus on escape artist checks. Essentia: Every point of essentia increases the resistance bonus by 1 Chakra Binds (Waist) You gain the bennefits of blur spell 20% miss chance against you Chakra Binds (Soul) You gains SR equal 5 +4 per point of essentia invested Wow! I was thinking only one bind for each soulmeld, but this is not bad! However it would be better to have "high-level" soulmelds, like belts, bindable to lower level chakra binds, because the breastplate in this case will surely have a more powerful effect when binded and nobody would want to bind to the soul the belt instead of the breastplate! Again, just a thought. Arms of dread Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Savingthrow: None You gain +1 competence bonus on attacks and damage with manuvers of the sahdowhand discipline Essentia: The attack bonus inceases by 1 for every point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (Arms) When you use a shadow hand manuver the CD of the manuver increases by 1 for every point of essentia invested Chakra Binds (Soul) Your manuvers from shadowhand discipline cause 1 extra damage for every point of essentia invested. And the target must succed on a fortitude saving throw or become permanent blinded A little powerful when binded to arms! That is an effect that I would see as a soul bind maybe! And again, maybe it's better to make the soulmelds bindable to lower level binds more than higher level binds, but I don't know, this could add some versatility when reaching 15th level, I must think about it... Moon boots Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Savingthrow: None You gains 10 feet enhancement to your speed. Essentia: You gains +2 insight bonus on move silently for every point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (feet) You can move in you normal speed when using moving silently or hide skills. And you gain a cumnulative enhnacement bonus of +5 feet to your speed for every point of essentia invested. When I read "Moon Boots" I swear I thought about moon-walking! :D But seriously, why not adding an effect like psionic Skate?? :D Or some other mobility effect... However, this one's very good. Time to contribute! I will try the last soulmelds... I think that the helm should be the thing that adds to Hide, since as I told you, the hand soulmeld should be the weapon or unarmed enhancing thing. So here we go: Night Helm Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: crown Savingthrow: None You gain Darkvision out to 30 feet. Essentia: You gain a +2 insight bonus to hide for every point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (crown) You are undetectable by magical means as for the Nondetection spell. Midnight Armor Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: soul Savingthrow: None You are immune to ability drain or ability damage. Essentia: You gain a +1 insight bonus to all saving throws for every point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (soul) You can activate two Shadowhand stances at a time for a number of minutes per day equal to the essentia points invested. When reaching this limit, the soulmeld looses this ability until you rebind it the next day. ------------------- I didn't resist and called the armor "Midnight"..! :) I thought at it counting that the pauldrons already cover the AC bonus. I must also think about the new hand soulmeld since I also gave to the helm the hiding bonus... Here is what I thought: Claws of Darkness Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Savingthrow: None You form a pair of clawed gloves or a weapon of the Shadowhand discipline. In the case of the claws you gain a +2 insight bonus to Initiative, while in the case of the weapon you gain a +1 magic enhancement to both attack and damage. Essentia: Every point of essentia you invest gives you a +1 enhacement bonus to attack and damage. Chakra Binds (hands) You gain the benefits of Weapon finesse or shadow blade feat. In the case of the unarmed version, you gain the benefits of Versatile Unarmed Strike feat (ability to deal slashing or piercing damage also) ----------- Whoa... Not so easy to make an armor, uh? But not so difficult as I first thought, many thanks for your help, you're officially into the project! ;)
Loth 05-09-07, 01:02 PM	So backing to work.. Are some feedback about the shadow armor soulmelds ???? :confused: Night's armor Descriptors: shadow Classes: soulknight Chakras: Throat and Soul Savingthrow: None This is one of the most fearful soulmelds of the shadow hand, it's powers are sneaky and lethal. The victims fall the ground without know what hapened. The user also merge in darkness being protected to the night's dangers. You gain immunity death and negative energy and negative energy effects (as the deathward spell) such as level drain or the harm spell for example. The shadows involving you form a armor that gives a +2 armor bonus to AC. This is considered a light armor without maximum dextery bonus to AC and no checks penalities or spell failure chance. Essentia: For every point of essentia invested the armor bonus improves by 1. And you gain a enhancement bonus to hide of +2 per point of essentia invested. Chakra Binds (Throat) The armor gains an enhancement bonus to AC equal the essentia invested (maximum +5) and has the bane blind and Ghost ward enhancements (Magic Item Compendium). Chakra Binds (Soul) You can use swift ethereal jaunt 3 times per day, but to activate this ability you must have at least 3 points of essentia invested in the 'night's armor' soulmeld. If you have sneaky attack or skirmish ability you deal an extra 1d6 damage plus 1d6 every 2 points of essentia invested. :cool: What you think? too much?
Loth 05-09-07, 01:10 PM	Man I was writing and you posting =oP so I will respond your commentarys and try to meld everything ok =o) ----------------- Yeah it's just an armor and is so hard.... ------------------ First of all Thanks to be on the project About the armor bonus as you see in my armor it gives the bonus too. cause in my vision these guys are thoug and hard to hit or hard to damage. Basing on anime: the armor is a great advantage, it's make the diference. May be a class feature or a stance that gives you damage reduction when you have the armor soulmeld bound to a chakra that can only be bipassed by incarnum weapons what you think??. Because of this i give an insight bonus to Ac and an amor bonus on the armor like all soul armors. The vatious chakra binds are just there for versality, they will have no more than 10 soulmelds so some versality is necessary may be need to put on more powerful chakras.. Also exists the double chakra feat that let's you to bound two soulmelds to the same chakra.... Yeah let's create a standart like all hands or arms will give bonus on attack. So sometimes one of them gives attack and damage and the other can give a diferent bonus to damage to represent a soul armor from a more combat-focused discipline li iron heart. It's this I was thinking: *All arms or hands will give you a bonus on attack and damage with the manuvers of the soul armor discipline, that improves when you invest essentia. Yes I was thinking how to make incarnum weapons haven't done because the shadow hand has unarmed strike and this is the focus of the soul knights... but the way you make claw of darkness is awesome. *All Armors give an armor bonus on AC that improves when you invest essentia *All armulets (or similars) give an especial power, spell-like ability Wan't change or create another standart? About the comments of the soulmeds I love the midnigh name =oP the skate ability is a nice sugestion. and about the arms bind what you think about +1 per 2 points of essentia invested?
Loth 05-09-07, 03:10 PM	Please Replys.... We need feedback!! No coments, none??????????? :hoppingma
LordArchaon 05-09-07, 08:52 PM	Please Replys.... We need feedback!! No coments, none??????????? :hoppingma He he... Don't expect too much, there are few who like Incarnum and even fewer that know about the anime... However, let's define the standard for the armors. First of all, I thought about your idea of having more binds for each soulmeld and I guess it's pretty ok, and contrary to what I said, it's even better if the second bind is the Soul bind, since it will add versatility once they get that 15th level. About the standards for each soulmelds I thought this: apart from few exceptions (maybe none), the soulmelds will have fixed functions for each armor except when they're binded: this way we have half the work done! And I concord with you on many of the standard enhancements that they will give: Breastplate/Armor (Soul): AC Belt (Waist): something related to combat, like an ability enhancement (strength, dex, con...) or stance/maneuver enhancement Necklace/Amulet (Throat): maybe a save bonus as a general effect and a special ability (different for each discipline) when binded Pauldrons (Shoulders): damage reduction / fortifying and such, could give WINGS when bound to chakra, for certain disciplines such as Desert Wind! :D Armlets (Arms): something like a shield could be awesome, many of the saints from the anime had shields bound to their arms! But as a general rule, they could give skill bonuses (while the disciplines that don't give shield when bracers are bound to chakra could also have attack or damage bonuses to maneuvers, like you did!) Boots (Feet): speed enhancement or stability enhancement for everyone and then special mobility or other effects when bound to chakra (Skate for moon-walking boots anyone? :D ) Helm/Headband/Diadem (Crown): vision related or skill related bonus for everyone and something special when bound. Gloves/Claws/Weapon: like an Incarnum Weapon, with some special benefits for unarmed, but more magic enhancement for weapon (so they will end up with +6 weapons in order to overcome Epic DR!) What do you think? Next step: final version of this Shadowhand armor! I saw your last changes and think that we should correct the Armor in order to make it less powerful at the beginning... Dunno, but remeber that all soulmelds are potentially shapeable at 1st level! :) And also correct the Pearl of Midnight since it's very very powerful! Remember, we don't have to make powerful characters like those from the anime, but characters inline with D&D standards! Ok, not dumb-ass like fighters, they should be on par with high power classes, but not on par with the (extremely powerful) characters from the anime! :) But I like pretty much everything and especially the good idea of bringing in the Heart chkara too: it's a reward for the ones who get that feat later on!
Loth 05-10-07, 02:35 PM	So I´m fixing the armor giving the good abilities when you bound it to the soul chakra. The imunities I´m giving to it are from soulfire armor enhancement isn´t so terrible is? Also what you think about the helm? The resistances bonus are ok?? Where is moonwalking from? The pearl I was basing in "gloves of the poisoned soul" I´m fixing to match the gloves... Just a sugestion but I think will make feedback easy =O) Please organize the class table and class abilities in just one post, put the comments in the others . Cause is terrible to find the class abilities. And list alll of them to know what is in work (left the name of the ability and no text) That´s it... Next armor???? Desert Wind or Devoted spirit???????
vindictous 05-11-07, 01:22 AM	i had a look through and instead of having still mind as a pre-req why don't you use "the ability to bind a soulmeld to a chakra" or "essentia pool #" or even "meldshaper lvl #" as it seems that your leveling a class you had no intrest in. then you might be able to put an increase to the meldshaper level at certain levels instead of a new table. now i don't know about the anime show but the idea of combining 3 classes seems a little over the top but then the sword sage + incarnate combo seems pretty good to me, if you swap around the monk ablities as with having manuvers would detract form the flurry of blows. so swap that for the armor bonus.
LordArchaon 05-11-07, 07:34 AM	i had a look through and instead of having still mind as a pre-req why don't you use "the ability to bind a soulmeld to a chakra" or "essentia pool #" or even "meldshaper lvl #" as it seems that your leveling a class you had no intrest in. then you might be able to put an increase to the meldshaper level at certain levels instead of a new table. now i don't know about the anime show but the idea of combining 3 classes seems a little over the top but then the sword sage + incarnate combo seems pretty good to me, if you swap around the monk ablities as with having manuvers would detract form the flurry of blows. so swap that for the armor bonus. Hi! Well, I didn't want to combine too many classes either, but that's why I didn't put meldshaping requirements! After all, the meldshaping abilities this class gives are very focused. I plan to put in a "code of honor" or something that will oblige these knights to use their soulmelds only... It's not about general meldshaping, but more of a way to represent a special and unique feature that is a mystical armor. So all in all they're just combining maneuvers with monk abilities and spicing all the things up with Incarnum. However, the entry requirements are not yet thoroughly decided, so I guess I will check them again and see what can I do. Loth, I think you made a great work! Unfortuntely, I don't have much time these days, but my first priority will be to reformat the first page. You know, this thread is becoming too cluttered, but that's because I hoped that uncovering class features little by little could have been more interesting. Of course, time showed it wasn't..! I suggest the next changes we make to the Shadowhand armor and all the next armors to be made between us using private messages. This way we post them only when we have definitive versions of them! :) Do you agree? After all we can format private messages like normal posts, so it will be easy to copy them over! I hope that a little more people will at least subscribe to this thread: in a few days we'll have the PrC usable, and I guess it will be one of the most original and fun concepts around! :)
Loth 05-12-07, 12:48 AM	Yeah I know time is short =o\ I agre with vindictous still mind isn't a good pre-requisite (in my opinion, of course) as I have said before, may be meldshaping will function better.. The m Private messenges i haven't used this yet, but we ca try.. I was posting here to keep the thread on top reciving comments but you're right let's left the final version it's taek more attention... Yeah I wasn't familiar with the mechanics of the forum so I hadn't subscribed Now it's done, hope there more people subscribe too... I will initiate the desert wind armor ok? any corrections to shadow or desert send a message =o)
vindictous 05-12-07, 03:02 AM	Just thought i might add that the archivist also has access to the still mind class feature (and can cast divine spells to boot :D),and i think a number of others have it (but they might be PrC) Btw since there is no adept lvls req then how exactly does the class recover manuvers in combat, if they have taken the class at 10th lvl? i don't mean to nit pick on the reqs, i like some of the features but the post is a bit long and cuttered to get through.:eek: Next to find a adept/ divine caster Prc :w00t:
Loth 05-14-07, 12:38 PM	Bump!!!
lavitzstrife 05-15-07, 02:13 PM	itresting class.
rampant 05-16-07, 03:25 AM	Warning Harsh critique! Now I'm just working with the posted versions so if you've changed the armor via PMs then I'm sorry, but I gotta go with what I got. First of all, nix the maximums on the soulmelds, the maximum is predetermined by level so limiting them is either redundant or hurts them severely once they reach a high enough level to invest enough essentia to break that maximum. Example claws of darkness limited to +5, nix the limit. Next up is the stuff that grants limited times per day spell-like abilities, not completely unprecedented, but personally I don't find them to be a good idea with incarnum. Seriously look at arms of dread, I have to call it broken, 2 points of damage per essentia on shadow hand strikes, is tolerable, but the perma-blind on top of that is just wrong. Nights armor on the other hand is actually weak, in its soul chakra form anyway. The ghosting ability I'm not going to touch right now, but you could make the Sneak attack 1d6+1d6 per essentia without being a problem. Next up some advice on the class skeleton, consider altering the skill list based on the discipline, A Knight focused on shadow hand doesn't need white raven's diplomacy. Another good idea would be to actually post their skills. Next up is the saves, I get that they get a save bonus of some sort, but could you post the rules? The next issue is the Number of maneuvers (known and readied) and stances are pathetic. Jack it up a notch or three. Lets talk about some of the abilities, Investing essentia in a maneuver is a good idea, having it just increase a dc, especially considering how few have DCs, is boring. The immortality ability is over complex, if you want them to be long lived, give them the druid/monk ability to stop aging (timeless body), and if thats not enough then put in a better version at the 15th level. Finally ifits not too much trouble could you guys put the thing together (not asking for armors just the rest of it) somewhere? So we can look at it together. I like this class, I really do, I want this to work, thank you for your time.
LordArchaon 05-16-07, 09:33 AM	Warning Harsh critique! These are the best! :) Sorry for replying to half of it only, I have no time these days, but I plan to reformat the whole thing (adding the last details and corrections) this week. Next up some advice on the class skeleton, consider altering the skill list based on the discipline, A Knight focused on shadow hand doesn't need white raven's diplomacy. Another good idea would be to actually post their skills. Next up is the saves, I get that they get a save bonus of some sort, but could you post the rules? The next issue is the Number of maneuvers (known and readied) and stances are pathetic. Jack it up a notch or three. Lets talk about some of the abilities, Investing essentia in a maneuver is a good idea, having it just increase a dc, especially considering how few have DCs, is boring. The immortality ability is over complex, if you want them to be long lived, give them the druid/monk ability to stop aging (timeless body), and if thats not enough then put in a better version at the 15th level. Finally ifits not too much trouble could you guys put the thing together (not asking for armors just the rest of it) somewhere? So we can look at it together. I like this class, I really do, I want this to work, thank you for your time. About the skills, my idea was to make them determined by the bonuses of the soulmelds (you know "you can use the skills untrained"...), so they would have been different for each discpline without having to specify the differences directly... About the saves, I thought I had specified that I took the rules from the Samurai class by Kanachi, here's the link (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=722563)! The number of maneuvers is a little low because of the great bonuses given by the soulmelds and the advancement of their monk abilities... Are you sure it is so low? I think these knights are the types that specialize in few signature-maneuvers, you know... After all, speaking of investing essentia into maneuvers, I will try to empower it a bit. Suggestions? The immortality ability is just determined by gaining the living construct subtype and I think it's one of the most original features of the class! Also because it's based on staying in a special stance... I don't know, I think it's ok! And again, thanks for the critique and yes, I will put everything together soon. Oh, and what about the 15 level format of the prestige class? And the fact that 15th level is taken at charcater level 21? Thank you! :)
rampant 05-16-07, 11:40 AM	You did say you were using kanachi's rules, you just didn't post a llink so i couldn't find out what kanachi's rules are. So thanks for clearing that up. Skill list, ok you guys seem to have a plan so I'll back off. The problem with investing essentia into maneuvers is that unlike spells, and powers, many Maneuvers don't have DCs or scale all that much with level. One option for strikes and counters would be to let the amount of essentia invested add bonuses to the checks used to make the maneuvers function. For instance Ruby Nightmare Blade requires Both an attack roll, and a concentration check against the opponents AC let each point of essentia investment add +1 to those. Boosts are more dificult because they are less structured than the other 2 types. Your missing the point on my complaints with the immortality, thing. My issue is since they stop aging only when in the one stance it means you either A have to ignore the potencial immortality since you can't use a stance while you're sleeping, or when using other stances, Or b you have to be really **** about tracking a largely unimportant aspect of your character in order to prove he's actually gaining some benefit from the stance's ability to slow his aging. The way you have it worded the guy would have to spend all his time in that stance, even if he can get around the sleeping rule, by inoking the living construct type's immunity, he loses that the moment he steps into a new stance or gets a good whack upside the head. Granting them some of the immunities of a construct while in this stance good idea, trying to use it to make them ageless bad idea. If you want them to be potencially immortal, give them Timeless body to stop effects of aging, then give them an ability that lets them continue past their maximum age without just up and dying like a monk or druid. Yes it was an original Idea to do it that way, but original doesn't necessarily mean good, or practical. As to the number of maneuvers, yes its low known especially. These guys are supposed to master one discipline in the exclusion of all others, they should get to know most of the maneuvers in their discipline. Now admittedly you don't want them to have more than half readied at a given time. I think Posting them as actual numbers like the classes would help, with a smaller PrC it works (somewhat i wish they wouldn't), but on something this big you might want to consider using the actual numbers, makes the progession seem more satisfying even if the numbers don't actually change.
LordArchaon 05-16-07, 12:41 PM	The problem with investing essentia into maneuvers is that unlike spells, and powers, many Maneuvers don't have DCs or scale all that much with level. One option for strikes and counters would be to let the amount of essentia invested add bonuses to the checks used to make the maneuvers function. For instance Ruby Nightmare Blade requires Both an attack roll, and a concentration check against the opponents AC let each point of essentia investment add +1 to those. Boosts are more dificult because they are less structured than the other 2 types. I will consider this, but I think you could have not seen that the bonus applies to attack bonus with that maneuver also! So it's actually easier to hit with that maneuver evn if no DC is involved. Your missing the point on my complaints with the immortality, thing. My issue is since they stop aging only when in the one stance it means you either A have to ignore the potencial immortality since you can't use a stance while you're sleeping, or when using other stances, Or b you have to be really **** about tracking a largely unimportant aspect of your character in order to prove he's actually gaining some benefit from the stance's ability to slow his aging. The way you have it worded the guy would have to spend all his time in that stance, even if he can get around the sleeping rule, by inoking the living construct type's immunity, he loses that the moment he steps into a new stance or gets a good whack upside the head. Granting them some of the immunities of a construct while in this stance good idea, trying to use it to make them ageless bad idea. If you want them to be potencially immortal, give them Timeless body to stop effects of aging, then give them an ability that lets them continue past their maximum age without just up and dying like a monk or druid. Yes it was an original Idea to do it that way, but original doesn't necessarily mean good, or practical. I understand now. Look, the idea is this: you can use it (the living-construct stance) in three cases: when you fight something that needs those resistances. when you have to travel fastly, without sleeping or eating. when you want to isolate yourself for hundreds of years! :D I don't know, maybe I should put some more rules, but the idea is that all the time you pass in that stance is like time that your body doesn't "feel" or "pass" at all. As to the number of maneuvers, yes its low known especially. These guys are supposed to master one discipline in the exclusion of all others, they should get to know most of the maneuvers in their discipline. Now admittedly you don't want them to have more than half readied at a given time. I think Posting them as actual numbers like the classes would help, with a smaller PrC it works (somewhat i wish they wouldn't), but on something this big you might want to consider using the actual numbers, makes the progession seem more satisfying even if the numbers don't actually change. Yeah, I'll think about it! It's a delicate balance between other powerful aspects of the class. However, I can point you to the post where I displayed the "semi-final version" of the class table (http://boards1.wizards.com/showpost.php?p=12183039&postcount=12) (that with colors), and in particular to the analysis below the table: you will see that folllowing this PrC "canonically" makes you have the same number of stances, one maneuver known less, and one maneuver readied more, than a warblade of the same level (20th). Speaking of recovery method, they use the one of the class they had before. Yeah, I will use the right amount of numbers like in base classes! (http://boards1.wizards.com/showpost.php?p=12183039&postcount=12) :)
rampant 05-16-07, 01:54 PM	Ok what if they had used feats to qualify? instead of taking actual levels they used martial study a couple times? that doesn't have a recovery method. (Note you don't have to give them one, just make a ruling, personally I wouldn't, it'd encourage them to take levels in the classes.) Having the numbers really helps make the thing look better, I would encourage one or two more known maneuvers but its no big deal. Especially if you allow them to swap out maneuvers and stances they no longer use for new ones. YEah I saw the attack roll bonus, but my suggestion was more intended to work with the skill checks and special checks involved, the attack bonus was just so it worked for all strikes including those without a special check. You could have it apply to all d20 rolls involved in the maneuver and the DCs. Can't wait to see the next revision of soulmelds. Ok as to the skeleton of the class, I'd advise a couple of skills that are constant to all disciplines be posted as well as the number of skill points per level, suggestions are spellcraft, martial lore, Know arcana
Loth 05-16-07, 03:02 PM	Warning Harsh critique! Now I'm just working with the posted versions so if you've changed the armor via PMs then I'm sorry, but I gotta go with what I got. No we don´t change nothing yet time is short... but this makes me feel better posting all the process, it makes critique easy First of all, nix the maximums on the soulmelds, the maximum is predetermined by level so limiting them is either redundant or hurts them severely once they reach a high enough level to invest enough essentia to break that maximum. Example claws of darkness limited to +5, nix the limit. I made to don´t allow epic bonus because a 21 level character normally won´t have an weapon with an +6 enhancement bonus Next up is the stuff that grants limited times per day spell-like abilities, not completely unprecedented, but personally I don't find them to be a good idea with incarnum. Seriously look at arms of dread, I have to call it broken, 2 points of damage per essentia on shadow hand strikes, is tolerable, but the perma-blind on top of that is just wrong. As you said has precendents, so isn´t crazy And arms of dread I don´t think perma-blind so overpowered, the roblem is that don´t have limitations... May be blind for some duration is Nights armor on the other hand is actually weak, in its soul chakra form anyway. The ghosting ability I'm not going to touch right now, but you could make the Sneak attack 1d6+1d6 per essentia without being a problem. Really... Well looking the class there´s no sneak attack so in maximum the player can have 1d6 or 2d6 with the classes it has before enter in the prestige. so investing 4 essentia points it will have 5d6 plus any it has per other class abilities not so good as a rougue so I will edit... Next up some advice on the class skeleton, consider altering the skill list based on the discipline, A Knight focused on shadow hand doesn't need white raven's diplomacy. Another good idea would be to actually post their skills. Yeah I agree with you may be making an general list plus the skill from the chosen discipline what you think lord (yes I know the bonus given by chakras but this will make they very very good and it´s a boost on the low levels The next issue is the Number of maneuvers (known and readied) and stances are pathetic. Jack it up a notch or three. Agree completly (I hasn´t take much time analysing the class table and abilities) Make like prestiges i don´t think overpowered, monk abilities aren´t so overpowered Lets talk about some of the abilities, Investing essentia in a maneuver is a good idea, having it just increase a dc, especially considering how few have DCs, is boring. Ok i agree this too, it´s a nice idea but can be more explored Giving a different bennefit relationated to each discipline The immortality ability is over complex, if you want them to be long lived, give them the druid/monk ability to stop aging (timeless body), and if thats not enough then put in a better version at the 15th level. The idea is good but yeah is complex and creates the difficult to how tack thi.... may be just a class featura that expands their life time. A bennefit like the epic feat that doubles the lifetime of all age category I like this class, I really do, I want this to work, thank you for your time. As lordarchaon has said your critiques are wlecome thanks :clap:
rampant 05-16-07, 03:16 PM	Arms of dread Ok the reason you don't need to worry about the +5 cap is even if the character expands his resivior using the feat, it only gets to plus 5 before level 21 anyway, like i said the caps on a soulmeld or most other essentia reseviors are built into the incarnum system. Now theoretically with both the feat and the item you could get +6 at level 18 or so, but an incarnate or a totemist could have about +8 at the same level so no there's no real issue. The thing that bugs me about the blind ability is that it's permanent and it comes packaged with the +10 damage form, since the base meld already grants a damage boost to shadow hand, I'd cut that part out of the chakra bind and just go for, every time you strike a foe with a succesful shadow hand maneuver they are blinded, for 1 round per point of essentia invested, fortitude saving throw DC 10+1/2 meldshaper level+number of essentia invested.
Loth 05-16-07, 03:21 PM	Just 1 round per essentia ok I´ll try.... Eliminating the caps..ok you convice me...
Loth 05-16-07, 03:32 PM	I was thinking May be We can use somethik like the magic item sets so when the sou knight has 4 or more soulmelds shaped it gains extra bennefits... I don´t know may be an stance..it´s just an idea... :cool:
rampant 05-16-07, 03:46 PM	Well the class can only shape these preset melds, and they have excellent synergy to begin with. Also the class has special stances availiable that already function only when you have these meld sets shaped, so again its built right in. I think we need to focus on the base class and the shadow hand armor, once thats in place making the others shouldn't be a big deal.
LordArchaon 05-16-07, 08:13 PM	Well the class can only shape these preset melds, and they have excellent synergy to begin with. Also the class has special stances availiable that already function only when you have these meld sets shaped, so again its built right in. I think we need to focus on the base class and the shadow hand armor, once thats in place making the others shouldn't be a big deal. Great! Thanks again to everyone, I didn't think the PrC was ok, seeing so little feedback in so much time, but now we're gonna end up with something in short time. Just wait a little until I reformat the class... Oh, I still need to develop from ground up the "Final Technique" class feature, that will be different for each discipline, and being it so, we have to give precedence to Shadow Hand. I think it must be some kind of "nova" ability, a good damage dealer. It is supposed to function like a brand new maneuver (hence, we got an extra maneuver known with this) used by expending one of the readied maneuvers. And since it will function like a normal maneuver, it can be used in conjunction with Soul-Infused Maneuver, so making it with a DC should be mandatory. It's gonna be the top-notch ability (character level 20), so we must think a bit of a spectacular and very discipline-specific thing.
rampant 05-16-07, 08:20 PM	The final maneuvers are built in, You are combining two very efficient systems here, the 9th level maneuvers are plenty spectacular, and already work with the mechanics in place for this PrC. I know its your project, but seriously focus on getting the armor and basic class taken care of.
Loth 05-17-07, 08:55 AM	I agree with rampant, the nine level strikes are very good... may be you can consider making the final technique an improvement to the 9 level manuvers When each knight personalize it improving with his signature (by incresing the damage or any relevant bonus, enhancing the sinergy with incarnum. Like the possibility to invest more essentia to make an uber attack) But as rampant said they are buit in there's no need..
Loth 05-19-07, 12:06 PM	Bump!
rampant 05-19-07, 11:30 PM	I think it got pretty well covered, try posting some shanges or updates.
LordArchaon 05-30-07, 01:47 PM	Hey hey I'm not dead nor is this PrC! Sorry, but it wasn't my fault: I was unable to access the forums in the last 2 weeks or so! Tonight a big update! (maybe it's not going to be night for you, but however...)
LordArchaon 05-31-07, 06:04 PM	Sorry for being late again, but I'm thinking about a really really cool alternative to the Final Technique... you will see... :cool: EDIT: STAY TUNED! Because I will really come up with the first true complete version of the class these days.
LordArchaon 05-31-07, 11:47 PM	Here it is! Look at the start of the first page of the thread, the Soul Knight finally has a decent page! :) And what a surprise for the capstone ability... :D
Loth 06-01-07, 11:19 PM	Yess i wass off too.. my free time is short.. but I will contribute again sonner :D Very good the first page the new image fits the concept better.. Very very goood ... now I´ll take time to analyse it :cool:
LordArchaon 06-02-07, 12:10 PM	Hello guys! So what do you think about the Soul Armor Avatar? It must be said that some disciplines could take more advantage from it than others. I'll let you think about that. I'm thinking about changing the entry requirements of the PrC and in particular eliminating the monk specific requirements, replacing them with Stunning Fist as a feat: that way a 9th level Warblade or Crusader should be able to enter the class without multiclassing, but some monk levels would still be encouraged, in order to get to enter the PrC earlier (6th level minimum). This way I would also specify that the character would get the specified monk abilities like a monk of the same class level, with the exception of Ki Strike, that should be left monks-only. I was also thinking about making some synergies with Stunning Fist, maybe in place of some class feature you don't like (if the Soul Armor Avatar is too much, for example). I got some ideas, but first I want to hear from you, because if you think the class is getting well like it is now, I think the new ideas will stay there for a new Incarnum PrC... Now we need to lay down some standards for the soul armors in order to get them into "serial production"... :)
rampant 06-02-07, 03:21 PM	Personally I find the Avatar to be a bit much. This PrC should focus on the armor. The entire point of this class is the armor. Lets leave summoning to the Thaumaturgists shall we. As for Req changes, I could definetly see changing the reqs to: Base Attack Bonus: +4 Feats: Incarnum Fortified body, Blade Meditation Skills: Knowledge (arcana) 8 ranks, Martial Lore 8 ranks. Martial Maneuvers: Must know at least one 3rd level maneuver and one 3rd level stance of the discipline chosen for the Blade Mediation feat. Special: Greater Unarmed strike or monk's improved unarmed strike ability or weapon focus (weapon shaped as part of the armor) By lowering the bab and skill ranks reqs you can complete the class at level 20, this rig favors Martial adepts over martialmonks, but with a warblade or crusader /monk and a couple feats and you can still pull it off. Honestly I can see this class working better as a 10 level, and ditching some of the extraneous abilities. Stance, Chakra, soul flourish, and invest maneuver are all you need aside from the armor melds themselves. Infact I propose something like this: Code: Table 1: The Soul Knight Hit Die:1d6 lv Special 1st Soul-Armor Investiture, Chakra Binds (Crown, Hands, Feet) 2nd Soul Flourish 3rd Soul-Infused Maneuver 4th Chakra Binds (Arms, Shoulders) 5th Soul Armor Stance, 6th Soul-Infused Maneuver 2 7th Chakra Binds (Waist, Throat), 8th Improved Soul Armor Stance, 9th Soul-Infused Maneuver 3 10th Superior Soul Armor Stance, Chakra Binds (Heart, Soul) Soul Armor Investiture: depending on what discipline you chose for your Blade Meditation feat, you will have access to different lists of soulmelds that will constitute your Soul Armor. Desert Wind: Fire Armor, which epitomizes control over fire and movement. Devoted Spirit: Gold Armor, which may be very different depending on the knight's deity or alignment. Diamond Mind: Crystal Armor, which gives speed and concentration in combat. Iron Heart: Steel Armor, which is made and balanced for the toughest battles. Setting Sun: Sun Armor, which may confound the enemy, reflecting its power against him. Shadow Hand: Black Armor, which can obscure the wearer to let him kill from the shadows. Stone Dragon: Dragon Armor, which can make a knight solid as rock and resilient as a dragon. Tiger Claw: Feral Armor, which makes the knight a raging anthropomorphous beast. White Raven: White Armor, which inspires awe and combat prowess to the knight and his allies. Soul Armor Stance (Su): While you are in a stance from the discipline chosen for your Soul-Armor Investiture, you can forgo its normal benefit as a swift action to gain the benefit of the Soul-Armor Stance. While you use this ability you can invest essentia in it as if it were a soulmeld, and make your soulmelds more difficult to dispel. For each point of invested essentia you raise the meldshaper level of your shaped soulmelds (previously equal to your Soul Knight level) by one, but only for the purpose of resisting dispel attempts (and not, for example, for the purpose of piercing a Spell Resistance with a soulmeld ability). You can change the amount of essentia invested in this ability with a swift action. Soul Flourish (Su): You can expend one readied maneuver with a standard action to gain temporary essentia equal to 1 + 1/2 the level (round down) of the maneuver expended. This temporary essentia lasts until the start of your next turn. Soul-Infused Maneuver (Su): You can invest essentia in your maneuvers to make them more powerful. At any time, you can only have one single maneuver with essentia invested into it, but you can change maneuver and/or change the invested essentia with a swift action, like if they were soulmelds. To use the invested essentia, you must take a full-round action to initiate the maneuver, but doing so will increase the attack bonus and the save DC by a number equal to the number of essentia points you had invested in that maneuver, and will give you a bonus on an eventual skill check required to initiate the maneuver equal to twice the number of essentia points you had invested in that maneuver. Note that you won't be able to initiate another Soul-Infused Maneuver again until you recover all of your maneuvers, with the standard method of your base martial adept class. At 4th level you can invest only 1 point of essentia. At 9th level you can invest up to 2 points of essentia. At 14th level you can invest up to 3 points of essentia. Improved Soul Armor Stance (Su): While you use your Soul Armor Stance you now improve your general meldshaper level and your shaped soulmelds count as if being shaped with the newly improved meldshaper level. For each point of invested essentia you raise your meldshaper level of your soulmelds (previously equal to your Soul Knight level) by one. This bonus stacks with the one against dispel attempts, effectively raising the meldshaper level of your soulmelds by two for every point of essentia invested, for the purpose of resisting dispel attempts. Superior Soul Armor Stance (Su): While using your Soul Armor Stance you undergo a beautiful magical transformation. By entering the stance with a full-round action instead of a swift action, and by having all your soulmelds shaped and all your chakra binds used, your soulmelds fuse so deeply with your body and with each other that you gain the benefits of the living-construct subtype for as long as you stay in this stance or until someone successfully dispels one of your soulmelds, since you must have all the soulmelds shaped in order to use this stance. Note that while being in this stance, apart from not having to eat or sleep, the character doesn't age and is practically immune to natural death, therefore becoming quasi-immortal. As a thumb rule, only long periods of time (months) spent in this stance are counted as not having aged the soul knight. Soul knights use this aspect of the Soul Armor Stance to seal themselves in some remote place and wait for events that will take years to come to pass. You can return to use another stance with a full-round action. In this case I'd change the reqs to Base Attack Bonus: +6 Feats: Incarnum Fortified body, Blade Meditation, Skills: Knowledge (arcana) 9ranks, Martial Lore 9 ranks. Martial Maneuvers: Must know at least 2 4th level maneuvers and one 4rd level stance of the discipline chosen for the Blade Mediation feat. Special: Greater Unarmed strike or monk's improved unarmed strike ability or weapon focus (weapon shaped as part of the armor)
LordArchaon 06-02-07, 03:44 PM	Well, I might think about a way to replace the avatar with something different, or maybe leave options, but let me explain you why I don't want the class to be 10 level or to be finishable before 20th or at 20th. You surely know that both the Open Heart Chakra and Open Soul Chakra feats are Epic. One could think that this is because the feats are meant for people who uses Incarnum only through feats and so, to give them some disadvantage over regular meldshapers, they chose to let them access the most powerful chakras at epic levels only. But I would like to point you to both the Soulborn and Totemist classes. The Soulborn is a fighter type that compared to a Soul Knight build would surely result weak, since even with lower BAB, a Soul Knight benefits from big enhancements derived from soulmelds, monk abilities without really any of the monk limitations and martial maneuvers. Even being less powerful, look at what chakras, essentia, and soulmelds does it get at 20th level. Not even one of those three features reaches the power of the Soul Knight. And even looking at the Totemist, that is a "full meldshaper" class, you can notice that there is no access to the Soul chakra and that the chakra binds are not on par with the ones of the Soul Knight. What I want to tell you is that I think you underestimate the power of the meldshaping abilities of the Soul Knight: it is a powerful PrC that makes for powerful fighters, making it easy to enter it or making it easy to follow it (by making it shorter) seems to me like not giving the right "prestige" to it. It's a prestige class, and a high-level one. There had always been low, mid and high level PrCs. This one only fits in the highest level ones. Speaking about the soul armor avatar, I thought about it because the PrC takes inspiration from an anime in which the knights (or "saints") had these armors that in some way were alive. They represented the constellations and without the knight inside, they could shape themselves into the animals or mythological beasts of the constellation which they "served". I don't want to make a straight copy of the anime, but I still would like to maintain this feeling of a "living" armor. And apart from that, I want to take inspiration from both soulmelds that can give more power if willingly unshaped and from "kamikaze" abilities like the one of the Phoenix Mages, who can immolate themselves. So the idea is: give the Soul Knight an ability which costs him everything but can let him win everything. That's a knightly spirit after all!
rampant 06-02-07, 04:32 PM	Look I haven't seen the show so I can't argue on that point. But 15th level prc are tricky, and the epic rules complicate things further. How does the rather unique save system translate to epic for instance. Looking at just the mechanical aspects of the class, I figured a 10 level progression would preferable : first to trim out abilities like expanded capacity which I felt was innapropriate for what really is a martial class despite its meldshaping powers, secondly to allow for a greater degree of flexibility in characters before gaining this class a Warblade White raven knight is much more daring and flambouyant than a cunning sword sage master of shadow hand. By increasing the number of levels devoted to their base classes we allow for more developement of these differences and for superior mastery of chosen disciplines. If you want to increase the level reqs to push the class higher just increase the skill rank and bab reqs. In addition this actually brings the monk multiclass back into play as means to get Know arcane on the class list, because neither war blade or crusader have know arcane as a class skill.
LordArchaon 06-02-07, 05:18 PM	You made good points: the Save Bonus system, not being a class feature in the right sense of the word, would not be advanced in epic levels. I could think about removing Expanded Capacity too. A 10 level version of the class would simply be the class without the last 5 levels, with a few exceptions. Here you are: Table 1: The Soul Knight Hit Die: 1d6 Save- lv BAB Fort. Refl. Will Bonus Special 1st +0 +0 +0 +0 +1 Monk Abilities, Soul-Armor Investiture 2nd +1 +0 +0 +0 0 Chakra Binds (Crown, Hands, Feet), Soul Armor Stance 3rd +2 +1 +1 +1 +1 Soul-Infused Maneuver 1, Soul-Weapon 4th +3 +1 +1 +1 0 Soul Flourish 5th +3 +1 +1 +1 +1 Chakra Binds (Arms, Shoulders) 6th +4 +2 +2 +2 0 Improved Soul Armor Stance 7th +5 +2 +2 +2 +1 Improved Soul Flourish 8th +6 +2 +2 +2 0 Chakra Binds (Waist, Throat) 9th +6 +3 +3 +3 +1 Soul-Infused Maneuver 2 10th +7 +3 +3 +3 0 Superior Soul Flourish, Superior Soul Armor Stance, Timeless Body Table 2: Maneuvers and Meldshaping Maneuvers Maneuvers Stances Meldshaping lv Known Readied Known Soulmelds Chakra Binds Essentia 1st 1 0 0 1 0 1 2nd 1 0 1 2 1 1 3rd 1 1 1 2 1 2 4th 2 1 1 2 1 3 5th 2 1 1 3 2 4 6th 3 2 1 3 2 5 7th 4 2 1 4 3 5 8th 4 2 2 4 3 6 9th 4 3 2 4 3 7 10th 5 3 2 5 4 8 Very simple... The last chakra binds will be taken with feats at epic levels, and no big "nova"-capstone ability is given. No full armor either, maybe it can be done through feats. What do you think? Every PrC may have its epic progression, and in the case of this 10 level version of the Soul Knight, Soul-Infused Maneuver would continue to advance with levels. Condensing everything the 15 level PrC has into 10 levels is not possible. I think this can be an alternative, but you really can't have progression all-up till Soul chakra or all the big numbers like 12 essentia and everything. This alternative looks balanced though... I thought the PrC as something the character would really devote himself to. That's why I chose 15 levels and that's why I also thought about code of conducts or the obligation to keep leveling in the class. I also thought about making of it a base class, but didn't want to since I wanted too many monk features and it would have transformed just into a powered-up monk. I think we can have alternatives, and leave the choice to the DMs that will use this... I could even think about making a base class alternative after all, but now let's focus on the existing mechanics and on the creation of the soulmelds.
rampant 06-02-07, 09:42 PM	Nonono The idea was to condense the chakra progression. Set the skill reqs tom 10 or something so the heart soul and chakra kick in at total character level 17.
LordArchaon 06-02-07, 10:06 PM	Nonono The idea was to condense the chakra progression. Set the skill reqs tom 10 or something so the heart soul and chakra kick in at total character level 17. But I'm telling you that it's overpowered, it's like making a PrC that lets you cast 9th level spells at 13th character level. Especially if you consider that having these chakras opened, the soul knight might also take a good Shape Soulmeld feat to shape and bind powerful soulmelds like the Incarnum Avatar. This 10 level alternative is made considering the higher reqs you suggested. However, I'm not going to focus on that. I want some mechanical critiques about the soul armor avatar. And about all the mechanics in general. After that we can talk about alternatives to the 15 levels.
glacialcat 06-02-07, 10:23 PM	But I'm telling you that it's overpowered, it's like making a PrC that lets you cast 9th level spells at 13th character level. Well... Ur-Priests can do it at Lv.14, and Divine Crusaders at Lv.15... I think Apostle of Peace can get it at Lv.16, still earlier than any straight spellcaster.
rampant 06-03-07, 03:18 AM	Um I think incarnate gets Soul at about level 17, DM is borrowing my MoI. Thats what I was aiming for. Mechanically it seems sound, I think soul floursish could be done better. The 1 + 1/2 level method think allows for usefullness at all levels allowing you to just have it once instead of cluttering up your class table. Also I don't like Soul armor avatar, mostly because I don't like all or nothing gambles, and it seems especially out of place on a class that emphasizes a very tight meld list and with special abilities designed to prevent them from being unbound.
LordArchaon 06-03-07, 09:04 AM	Mechanically it seems sound, I think soul floursish could be done better. The 1 + 1/2 level method think allows for usefullness at all levels allowing you to just have it once instead of cluttering up your class table. Also I don't like Soul armor avatar, mostly because I don't like all or nothing gambles, and it seems especially out of place on a class that emphasizes a very tight meld list and with special abilities designed to prevent them from being unbound. Do you think that the classic scheme of Ability - Improved Ability - Superior Ability is cluttering? :confused: Speaking of the Avatar: there's one alternative I was thinking about. A resurrection ability, activated automatically when you die, or maybe timed. It burns the essentia points in order to let you rise up with already a lot of HP. What do you think? Make your own suggestions! EDIT: Another draft of an idea... "Sending" your armor to the ethereal plane while you stay "in stasis" on the material plane or vice-versa (maybe staying in stasis on the thereal plane letting the armor combat in the material plane). Same can be done on other planes.
rampant 06-03-07, 08:31 PM	Frankly I don't think this class needs a big capstone ability like ressurection or soul avatar at all. Yes I find ability, improved, and final ability to be cluttering. In some cases its useful when it chages theability in some way. But by using the 1 + 1/2 half method its balanced and useful at all levels so you don't need to have three entries.
LordArchaon 06-03-07, 08:49 PM	Frankly I don't think this class needs a big capstone ability like ressurection or soul avatar at all. Yes I find ability, improved, and final ability to be cluttering. In some cases its useful when it chages theability in some way. But by using the 1 + 1/2 half method its balanced and useful at all levels so you don't need to have three entries. You mean (1 + 1/2 maneuver level) of essentia gained? And leaving it standard action instead of free? About the capstone ability, maybe this class doesn't need something too powerful, but every class does need a capstone ability, it's a matter of style... Gaining something fancy is mandatory for the last level/s of every class and PrC, in my opinion. Even more than so in classes that require much commitment.
rampant 06-03-07, 10:06 PM	Precisely why you give them Heart and soul chakra at level 10. As to soul flourish make it a swift action if you use the 1+1/2, that or let it last a few rounds.
LordArchaon 06-03-07, 10:49 PM	Well, however, the Heart chakra is not necessary for the armor. If they want it, they can get it with the feat. I have an alternative (still in my 15 level concept) class table ready, with a new feature that should add fun and flavor, apart from power. The Requirements would change, leaving the "monkish" requirements to the Fiery Fist feat described in Player's Handbook II. Table 1: The Soul Knight Hit Die: 1d6 Save- lv BAB Fort. Refl. Will Bonus Special 1st +0 +0 +0 +0 +1 Monk Abilities, Soul Armor Investiture, Ki Blast 2nd +1 +0 +0 +0 0 Chakra Binds (Crown, Hands, Feet) 3rd +2 +1 +1 +1 +1 Soul Armor Stance 4th +3 +1 +1 +1 0 Soul-Infused Maneuver, Soul Blast 5th +3 +1 +1 +1 +1 Chakra Binds (Arms, Shoulders) 6th +4 +2 +2 +2 0 Soul Flourish 7th +5 +2 +2 +2 +1 Improved Soul Armor Stance 8th +6 +2 +2 +2 0 * * 9th +6 +3 +3 +3 +1 Martial Blast 10th +7 +3 +3 +3 0 Chakra Binds (Waist, Throat) 11th +8 +3 +3 +3 +1 Superior Soul Armor Stance 12th +9 +4 +4 +4 0 * * 13th +9 +4 +4 +4 +1 Timeless Body 14th +10 +4 +4 +4 0 Supreme Blast 15th +11 +5 +5 +5 +1 Chakra Binds (Soul) Soul Armor Investiture would change the element of Fiery Fist giving an appropriate element for every armor (or maybe letting choose the element...), but that's secondary. We add Ki Blast as a bonus feat at 1st level. Soul Blast: We basically make it Incarnum-enhanceable at 4th level and state (as in Soul-Infused Maneuver) that the essentia limit is equal to 1/4 the class level. (+10ft range and +1d6 damage per essentia point). The two asterisks "* *" represent the levels in which this upgrade is available (for Soul Blast and Soul-Infused Maneuver. Martial Blast: Can infuse maneuver into the blast up to a maneuver level equal to half the class level. Supreme Blast: Can charge the blast for a number of rounds (full-rounds of charging, provokes AoO) equal to invested essentia and then basically fire a multiple blast with possibly up to 3 maneuvers, but with a total maneuver level limit equal to class level (at 15th level: 3 5th level maneuvers or 1 7th, one 5th, and one 3rd, always being a maneuver level not higher than half class level per blast). It basically allows a combo (which requires good timing strategy), and which is what I wanted to see from a master of a martial discipline. Possibly strong, but justifies the 15 levels. And if you look at it, we got a full progression, without dead levels. A little overpowered? Well, it's just an idea... To unclutter the table I could say, let's just give Soul Blast at 4th, without Ki Blast at 1st and state that you can always infuse maneuvers but only up to maximum essentia invested maneuver level (only 3rd level maneuvers, and even late, at 12th level) then state that Supreme Blast is not really a multiple blast but a really super blast that also sums up the maneuver limit, allowing for 9th level maneuvers (3x3). Note that it is also 18d6 damage... But you're also wasting 3 rounds. Oh, and Soul Flourish could well be a standard action that lasts for 1 round + something. Other changes to balance the class could include a code of conduct sort of thing, stated directly into Soul Armor Investiture: no chakra binds should be used to bind other soulmelds other than those that form the armor no magic items can be used in slots were a soulmeld is shaped (normally you can't use them only were soulmelds are bound to chakras) no other martial discipline can be learned (but you can use previously learned maneuvers or stances if you want)
Eerongal 06-05-07, 05:57 PM	I gave the class a quick glance over, but i still need to do an in depth read, and i read some of the posts and discussion on it, but once again, i have yet to scrutinze anything. Seems good so far. Speaking of the Avatar: there's one alternative I was thinking about. A resurrection ability, activated automatically when you die, or maybe timed. It burns the essentia points in order to let you rise up with already a lot of HP. What do you think? Make your own suggestions! To me this sounds like it could be bordering on the edge of overpowered, just in thought of it, but since i don't have any mechanics to comment on, the way YOU'RE thinking could be fine compared to what i'm thinking. But i was thinking that, instead of auto-ressurecting, what about if you were warded from dying instead, and burning essentia to do it. For example if an attack would drop you to negative HP, you instead remain at like -9, and you lose essentia for the day equal to the amount you would have died by divided by 3 (rounded up)? And at your option, you can burn more essentia to remain at higher HP at the same rate. For example, a hit would drop you to -12, so instead you auto-burn off (no option on this part) 1 point of essentia to remain at -9. Well, the character decides that's to close to dead at this point for him, so decides to burn an extra 4 in addition to that 1, thusly leaving him with 5 burned points of essentia, but leaving him at 3 HP? Thoughts and/or comments on this idea?
Loth 06-06-07, 12:24 AM	Feedback comming...
LordArchaon 06-20-07, 09:07 AM	NEW 13 LEVELS VERSION I was busy with my prestige class that is entering the contest (Shadow Nefarite) and I really left the poor Soul Knight in the dust... Here's what I think will become the final class table. The requirements have to change this way: Entry Requirements: Base Attack Bonus: +5. Feats: Shape Soulmeld (soulmeld of the Blade Meditation discipline's armor/list), Blade Meditation, Fiery Fist. Skills: Knowledge (arcana) 10 ranks, Martial Lore 10 ranks. Martial Maneuvers: Must know at least three maneuvers and two stances of the discipline chosen for the Blade Mediation feat. Special: Must discover a sanctuary dedicated to the soul armor of the chosen discipline. Fiery Fist "needed" for the Soul Blast, which is an Incarnum version of Ki Blast (which requires Fiery Fist, which besides it's a way to force at least a monk level of 2). Now's more easy to qualify for the PrC: Monk 3/Swordsage 4, Monk 4/Swordsage 3, Monk 2/Warblade 5, Monk 5/Warblade 2... Some combination will require the feat Martial Study or Martial Stance, maybe, to gain the needed 2 stances etc. Table 1: The Soul Knight Hit Die: 1d6 Save- lv BAB Fort. Refl. Will Bonus Special 1st +0 +0 +0 +0 +1 Monk Abilities, Soul Armor Investiture 2nd +1 +0 +0 +0 0 Chakra Binds (Crown, Hands, Feet) 3rd +2 +1 +1 +1 +1 Soul Armor Stance 4th +3 +1 +1 +1 0 Soul-Infused Maneuver 5th +3 +1 +1 +1 +1 Chakra Binds (Arms, Shoulders), Soul Blast 6th +4 +2 +2 +2 0 Soul Flourish 7th +5 +2 +2 +2 +1 Improved Soul Armor Stance 8th +6 +2 +2 +2 0 * 9th +6 +3 +3 +3 +1 Chakra Binds (Waist, Throat) * 10th +7 +3 +3 +3 0 11th +8 +3 +3 +3 +1 Superior Soul Armor Stance 12th +9 +4 +4 +4 0 Timeless Body * 13th +9 +4 +4 +4 +1 Chakra Binds (Soul), Supreme Blast * Table 2: Maneuvers and Meldshaping Maneuvers Maneuvers Stances Meldshaping lv Known Readied Known Soulmelds Chakra Binds Essentia 1st 1 0 0 1 0 1 2nd 1 1 0 2 1 1 3rd 1 1 0 2 2 2 4th 2 1 1 3 2 3 5th 2 2 1 3 3 4 6th 3 2 1 3 3 5 7th 4 2 2 4 3 5 8th 4 3 2 4 4 6 9th 4 3 2 5 4 7 10th 5 3 3 5 5 8 11th 5 4 3 5 5 9 12th 6 4 3 6 5 9 13th 7 4 4 6 6 10 Soul Blast: Functions like Ki Blast (Player's Handbook II), but essentia can and must be invested into it. For each point of essentia (you can invest 1/4 your Soul Knight class levels of essentia into it, just like Soul-Infused Maneuver) the Soul Blast deals 2d6 damage (+ Wis) and has a range of 20 ft.. For example, at 12th level, with 3 points of essentia invested, it deals 6d6 damage and has a range of 120 ft. You can also infuse a maneuver that requires a melee attack of maneuver level up to the essentia invested. The ranged touch attack needed for the Soul Blast counts as the melee attack needed for the maneuver to take effect. Supreme Blast: You can "charge" your Soul Blast for up to 3 rounds, using full-round actions. At the end of the third (or second) round, as part of the full-round action, you can fire the Supreme Blast, which functions like a multiplied Soul Blast: damage and maximum range are multiplied by the number of rounds you charged, and the maximum maneuver level is also multiplied by the same amount. So charging the Supreme Blast for three rounds, with 3 essentia invested into the Soul Blast gives a Supreme Blast that deals 18d6 (+ 3x Wis modifier) damage, has a range increment of 180 ft and can be infused with a maneuver of up to 9th level. Soul Flourish: With a standard action, expend a readied maneuver to gain temporary essentia equal to 1+1/2 the maneuver level for a number of rounds equal to 1/2 the maneuver level (always rounded down). NOTE: Again, I put some efforts into the balancing of the level progression, with the objective of eliminating dead levels and making every level worthy to be reached. There are practically no dead, weak or strong levels. From level 1 to 6 you get brand new features, from 7 to 13 you improve existent features, at 14th you get the signature-stronger feature and at 15th you get the highest number of improvements.
rampant 06-20-07, 04:05 PM	Wow! I'm impressed this is very nice now. Seriously I'm so yoinking this. One thought though, instead of some generic incarnum feat which may or may not ever get used, maybe you could decrease the number of melds this class grants by one, and require that instead of an incarnum feat the prospective soulknight take the shape soulmeld feat to gain one of the armor melds, that way they still gain all of the melds but the incarnum becomes an important part of their progression before they even take their first level. Well? Aside from that I think we just need to get the armors taken care of. Is the shadow hand ready for another round of review?
MaverickWolf 06-20-07, 04:23 PM	If you're going to force at least 6 levels before a player can take this class, you need to make it a 14 level PrC. The only PrCs that should require epic play are ones designed specifically as Epic-level PrCs. If you want 15 levels, it needs to be accessible starting at 6th, not 7th.
LordArchaon 06-20-07, 05:03 PM	Wow! I'm impressed this is very nice now. Seriously I'm so yoinking this. One thought though, instead of some generic incarnum feat which may or may not ever get used, maybe you could decrease the number of melds this class grants by one, and require that instead of an incarnum feat the prospective soulknight take the shape soulmeld feat to gain one of the armor melds, that way they still gain all of the melds but the incarnum becomes an important part of their progression before they even take their first level. Well? Aside from that I think we just need to get the armors taken care of. Is the shadow hand ready for another round of review? Thank you very much! You know what? That was my original idea. And I really think I'm gonna think about it. The special requirement would be a quest to find out how/where/why to learn to shape the first soulmeld! The armors are the heavy part to develop, and I have to study these days... The Shadow Hand armor is maybe 75% done, but I think I still have to figure out a "standard" for all armors before doing them. Besides, I have to give precedence to Iron Heart, Diamond Mind, Tiger's Claw, White Raven, or Devoted Spirit, since Crusaders and Warblades, as of now, are the most fast routes to the PrC. If you're going to force at least 6 levels before a player can take this class, you need to make it a 14 level PrC. The only PrCs that should require epic play are ones designed specifically as Epic-level PrCs. If you want 15 levels, it needs to be accessible starting at 6th, not 7th. And I think you're right. This was a try on a "Normal-to-Epic transitional" PrC, but you're right: epic PrCs have specific designs. I think I will change the requirements in order to make characters access this at 6th instead of 7th. But still don't know, a 14 or 13 levels progression would not be that bad. EDIT: LOOK ABOVE! Ended up with a new 13 levels progression: relatively more condensed, but I think less powerful, due to lack of essentia. All in all, seems as good as the other one and will have better requirements, allowing swordsages more easily.
LordArchaon 06-20-07, 08:11 PM	STONE DRAGON ARMOR http://img257.imageshack.us/img257/6639/soulknightdragongv3.png "Hard as stone does not necessarily mean bulky." - Keyldra Lyverion "Opal Gem", soul knight of the Stone Dragon.
LordArchaon 06-24-07, 10:42 PM	IRON HEART ARMOR http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/8673/whitesoulknight3xz6.png "Battle-hardened souls of steel are the metal of my armor, sword and shield." - Annetyr Carliss, soul knight of the Iron Heart.
LordArchaon 06-24-07, 10:54 PM	DEVOTED SPIRIT ARMOR http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/7218/soulknightdevoted2ox1.png "One god, many devoted souls, a celestial armor: the invincible protection of my faith." - Rainwal Haspler "Warrior Angel", soul knight of the Devoted Spirit.
rampant 06-25-07, 12:16 AM	STOP TEASING ME!!! Must have crunch! Each armor has how many pieces? 7? Which chakras Ok then! You asked for it people! Devoted spirit melds Divine Force (weapon meld) - Binds to Hand, or Arm chakra Angelus (wings) - bind to Shoulder, or Soul Archon's Robe - bind to Waist, Templar Gauntlets - Bind to Shoulder, Arm Believer's Boots - Bind to Feet, Piety's Protection (armor) - binds to Soul, Heart, Shoulder Eyes of the Immortal - binds to Brow, Crown I'll get the abilities hashed out later. But based on the pictures I can get these armors set up. I've got both MoI, and ToB so I think I can handle this.
LordArchaon 06-25-07, 04:59 PM	Thank you very much for your help! :D The only thing we must take into account is that there will be no brow or heart chakras in the level progression. Heart can be acquired as epic feat and could be used as an alternative bind for one or two soulmelds to give special EPIC advantages. We should decide that while not bound, every soulmeld for each armor always gives the same bonuses, except for maybe one or two unique exceptions for each armor or maybe swapped-bonus soulmelds (some armors could give AC by the means of bracers instead of breastplate...) The pieces must always be (for each armor): Hands: it should be shapeable into any discipline's weapon, and it should always act more or less as Incarnum Weapon until bound to a chakra. Feet: the boots should nearly always increase speed, in some cases give special movement abilities, it depends if wings are given with the soulder soulmeld or what. Crown: we must decide which effect in general it should give. This may be one of the pieces which are really completely unique for each armor. Arms: bracers, in some disciplines it could form a shield when bound. I still have to figure out what kind of bonus it should give as a standard, when not bound, for every armor. Shoulders: pauldrons/wings/cloak... Waist: belt or lower cloak or similar vestment, still not clear what kind of standard (equal for each armor) bonus to give. Throat: amulet or even cloak, still to be decided Soul: the breastplate, that should give pure AC for everyone and then very very good special abilities or bonbuses when bound to the Soul chakra. It's ok to have each piece bindable to two chakras, but I would suggest to have only 3 or 4 with two binds, because it will already be a difficult task with only one for each meld...
rampant 06-25-07, 06:29 PM	Why leave out brow? I'm going to make the melds with the ability to bind brow and heart chakras anyway, I'll just make sure to have each armor bind have at least one form that binds to one chakras you designated for each piece.
rampant 06-26-07, 09:48 PM	Divine Force Descriptors: None Classes: Soulknight (Devoted Spirit) Chakra: Hands or Arms Saving Throw: None Incarnum twists and weaves itself into a glowing blue instrument of divine will. You shape incarnum into a melee weapon. Either a Longsword, Maul, Falchion, or Greatclub, sized normally for you. The choice of weapon is made each time you shappe this meld, and cannot be changed unless you unshape the meld and shape it again. The weapon cannot be sundered or otherwise destroyed (except by effects that unshape soulmelds). If the weappon leaves your grasp for any reason, it returns to your grasp at the begining of your next turn. If that is impossible, it falls at your feet (but attempts to return again on your next turn). In your hands the weapon is a special monk weapon and gains the benefit of any Ki strike class feature you may posses. Any other creature attempting to weild it doesn’t get any of the special benefits, but may use it as a normal weapon of its type. Essentia: The weapon gains an enhancement bonus to attack and damage rolls equal to the essentia invested in it. Chakra Bind (Hands) The weapon glows with blue light which trails back and forth between the striking surface, the weilder and his allies Everytime you heal yourself or an ally with an effect from a Devoted Spirit Maneuver you heal an additional amount equal to the essentia invested in the weapon. Chakra Bind (Arms) The weapon grows to massive proportions. The weapon deals damage as if it were sized for a creature one size category larger than you are. Angelus Descriptors: None Classes: Soulknight (Devoted Spirit) Chakra: Shoulder or Soul Saving Throw: None Incarnum, charged with your belief and willpower, forms two seemingly feathered wings. Upon closer inspection the wings are not feathery but made of many hard angular incarnum formations. The Angelus meld grants you a +2 insight bonus on jump checks and a glide speed (clumsy) of 10 ft. Treat as a fly speed except you cannot gain altitude, and for every 10 feet you move in any other direction, you must also move 10ft down. Essentia: The jumpbonus increases by +2, and the glide speed increases by 5ft for every point of essentia invested in the Angelus. So a Soulknight with 3 essentia invested would have a +8 insight bonus to jump checks, and have a glide speed of 25ft (clumsy). The increased glide speed also increases how far the meldshapper can travel per 10ft of altitude lost. Chakra Bind (Shoulder) The wings grow larger and more able to support and balance your weight. You gain a true fly speed (average) equal to the glide speed you would otherwise gain from tis meld. Chakra Bind (Soul) The wings fuse to your back and grow to a massive size. You gain a fly speed (good) equal to 10ft per point of essentia invested. Archon’s Robe Descriptors: Classes: Soulknight (Devoted Spirit) Chakra: Waist [B]Saving Throw:/B] Incarnum forms a cloak that floats at your hips and goes all the way to your ankles. The cloak never actually touches the ground, or your body. The archon’s robe protects its wearer from attacks both obvious and subtle. You gain extra hit points equal to your meld shaper level. These hit points are not lost first like tempporary hitpoints, and you lose their benefits when you unshape the meld. Essentia: You gain additional hit points equal to your meldshaper level per point of essentia invested. Chakra Bind (waist) The cloak binds tightly to your midsection, becoming more real. You gain a +3 on aving throws against poison, and mind inffluencing effects, per ppoint of essentia invested. Templar’s Gauntlets Descriptors: Classes: Soulknight (Devoted spirit) Chakra: Arm or Hands [B]Saving Throw:/B] These arm-length gloves follow the motions of your arms. Infusing your arms with your zeal. You gain a +2 insight bonus on bull rush checks, strength checks to disarm, and sunder damage rolls. Essentia: For every point of essentia invested the bonus increses by 2. Chakra Bind (Hands) The gauntlets draw tightly around your wrists and forearms, channeling your zeal with greater control. The critical range of any weapon of the devoted spirit school you weild is doubled. This does not stack with keen, improved critical or similar effects. Chakra Bind (Arm) The gauntlets draw tightly to your hand, chaneling your zeal into powerful strikes. The critical multiplier of any weapon of the devoted spirit school you weild is increased by one. Believer’s Boots Descriptors: Classes: Soulknight (Devoted Spirit) Chakra: Feet Saving Throw: Blue energy envelopes your legs. You gain a +4 competence bonus on saves to resist bullrush, overrun, and trample attacks. Essentia: The insight bonus increases by +2 for every point of essentia invested in this meld. Chakra Bind (Feet) The blue boots bind tighter, pushing with greater force. You gain a +1 competence bonus to reflex saves, for each point of essentia invested in this meld.
LordArchaon 06-27-07, 08:09 AM	Really good! We just have to specify that it can be treated as a special monk weapon! I don't know if already from the beginning or maybe when bound to the Arms chakra... EDIT: Oh, they (the weapons of the armors) must also get the benfits of Ki Strike. I have tu study hard for two exam these days, but I will come up with something ASAP.
rampant 06-27-07, 11:03 AM	I can see treating it as a monk special weapon. But they'll have what two levels of monk? They'd never get ki strike.
LordArchaon 06-27-07, 02:53 PM	I can see treating it as a monk special weapon. But they'll have what two levels of monk? They'd never get ki strike. They advance Ki Strike with Soul Knight levels just for that purpose, and with the new requirements they could even get Ki Strike (adamantine) if they have 3 or 4 levels of Monk.
Loth 07-01-07, 08:32 PM	Awesome images tha devoted spirit armor is amazing.. :D The thirteen level progression seems alright i would sugest it because in OA there is a prestige class like it.... :cool: Now about the class features.... Fiery fist idea is very good. That's makes the pre requisites fine. The soulblast ability became very good and balanced... I'm very busy thse days but will coment more later
LordArchaon 07-02-07, 09:50 PM	UPDATED FIRST PAGE... :) We are near to a definitive version of the class. I'll just have to check and correct wording, add something to the Soul Armor Investiture (some sort of code of counduct), and everything will be alright. Note how everything got simplified, and how I retouched the illustration (I guess I chose the best one...) in order to give a real Incarnum feeling to it.
Aage 07-02-07, 10:15 PM	Chakra Binds: Beginning at 2nd level .... at 15th level you can bind a soulmeld to your soul chakra. As level 15 doesn't exist any longer, I guess this is a typo... Feats: Blade Meditation, Fiery Fist, Shape Soulmeld (soulmeld of the Blade Meditation discipline's armor/list). I don't get this, what does it mean? :embarrass This class will probably be available to my players in my upcoming campaign, and if anyone dares play one I'll try to give a report on how it performs....
LordArchaon 07-02-07, 10:50 PM	As level 15 doesn't exist any longer, I guess this is a typo... Yeah, it was a little difficult to update everything to the new 13 level class format, I will correct it soon... I don't get this, what does it mean? :embarrass It's a little tricky, I still have to find right wording for everything. Basically, you choose a discipline in which to specialize with the Blade Meditation feat. Then, to become a soul knight of that discipline, you must undergo a quest to find a particular shrine in which you "magically" or "mystically" learn one of the seven soulmelds of the armor linked to your discipline. And this happens, mechanically, by taking the Shape Soulmeld feat applied to one of the seven soulmelds of the chosen armor. Only then you can start taking levels in the PrC, and only this way you're gonna get all the 7 pieces of the armor. The class gives you 6, but you already have 1 before entering. This class will probably be available to my players in my upcoming campaign, and if anyone dares play one I'll try to give a report on how it performs.... This is really good news! Inform me of the builds of your players so I can eventually clarify any other issue about requirements and everything. :)
Loth 07-08-07, 07:12 PM	:P Bump
forsaken1111 09-14-07, 12:32 PM	So where are all of the armor melds? Or have you only created the ones for shadow hand? I'd love to use this class.
LordArchaon 09-14-07, 09:56 PM	So where are all of the armor melds? Or have you only created the ones for shadow hand? I'd love to use this class. Hi! I'm on vacation and without computers at hand... Especially without books at hand! So the project is "paused"... I still have to "declare" some standard rules for the armor melds, because I want them to have, at least generally, the same bonuses for each armor. For example, the hand meld will always be a weapon or an unarmed strike enhancement, very much like Incarnum weapon, and only when bound it should give different bonuses depending on the armor. I know it would be more varied with different melds for each armor, but doing it that way could result into a big mess on the balance side a part from much more work to do! If you think you know which general bonuses every meld should give, post your ideas! They shouldn't be very strong, because the whole PrC is strong already... BUT they should take into account epic levels... Hope to be able to update and finish the PrC once and for all, ASAP... EDIT: Speaking of different melds for each armor, remember that each armor only has 6 (or was it 7?) melds, while the chakras are 8, so some armors will have waist meld, others won't and so on. Another variation factor will be that some melds will have two possible chakra binds... So I REALLY suggest to have the general bonuses and functions of every meld the same for every armor: many differences will be possible with binding.
forsaken1111 09-14-07, 10:50 PM	Also, why is this class geared for a monk? I'd like to use it since I like the flavor but monk doesn't seem to fit very well. It wears armor, which would encumber a monk and doesn't fit the theme. Edit: Essentially I very much like the idea of a fusion of MoI and ToB however I don't think monk was the best choice to build from. Perhaps you should shoot for an ordinary crusader/soulborn or warblade/soulborn mix?
rampant 09-14-07, 11:07 PM	Templar's gauntlet finished The armor is made of soulmelds which do not hinder a monk's abilities. The armor is made of soul energy rather than material metals.
forsaken1111 09-14-07, 11:16 PM	Okay, the armor being made of soulstuff I understand by why monk? Monk isn't even a ToB class.
rampant 09-14-07, 11:52 PM	I dunno, I just make devoted spirit melds. Slowly
forsaken1111 09-14-07, 11:56 PM	I dunno, I just make devoted spirit melds. Slowly Hehe, sorry. I just don't see the point in using monk as a base when it doesn't even fit the flavor of the class. Monk is not ToB, monk has nothing to do with Incarnum. It would make more sense to me to build this for a regular crusader or something. If I do use the class I'll be altering it to suit the campaign world and backstory anyway, so I'll probably work with my DM to change a few details so it better fits with the OP was going for. Edit: To be honest, do you think the class would suffer by just removing the monk abilities altogether? My thoughts: If you want a combat prestige class which fuses ToB and MoI make it a 14 level prestige class which you take the first level of at 7. The ideal mix should be 3 levels of a ToB class and 3 levels of a MoI class. The class would grant no melds other than one piece of armor at every even level, which ends at 7 pieces. You should have a specific progression, don't let the player choose which piece he gets next or they will take the best ones first. Have a very clear progression for the melds to avoid that. I do like your idea about giving them set bonuses. Remember, these items will be taking up magic item slots normally used for other useful items, so they have to be decent enough that someone doesn't mind replacing that item slot. Otherwise you'll run into the same problem that the soulknife has where its mindblade doesn't scale well into later levels and people end up using normal weapons. Another idea is to have each meld grant an AC bonus which stacks with any other meld in that set, that way there is a gradual progression along the class. Your AC gets higher over time instead of getting it all as soon as you get the torso meld for the main armor piece. Just some ideas. :)
rampant 09-15-07, 12:50 AM	Well Incarnum doesn't work like that. You gain access to any meld on the list for your class (in this case the armor set for your discipline), but you are limited by number chakra binds and number of melds you can have shaped at once, in addition to the number of essentia you have. Though the idea of making the torso plate scale with the number of other melds you have is interesting. Also Tobe honest: I'd make it a ten level class and remove the monk side as well. But I like making the armor, slow as I am.
forsaken1111 09-15-07, 12:53 AM	Well Incarnum doesn't work like that. You gain access to any meld on the list for your class (in this case the armor set for your discipline), but you are limited by number chakra binds and number of melds you can have shaped at once, in addition to the number of essentia you have. Though the idea of making the torso plate scale with the number of other melds you have is interesting. There you go, have the torso plate be the first meld. Make it the required one to learn via the feat, and have its armor bonus scale as the set is completed. You could do something similar with the other pieces, since they will be replacing valuable magic item slots.
LordArchaon 09-20-07, 06:19 PM	There you go, have the torso plate be the first meld. Make it the required one to learn via the feat, and have its armor bonus scale as the set is completed. You could do something similar with the other pieces, since they will be replacing valuable magic item slots. Sorry but this of yours is a completely different concept compared to Incarnum. Scalability is granted by Essentia investment... The first piece you learn, through a feat, can be any piece of the armor. About the monk, the reasons are many. First of all, the concept is being the perfect fighter, and a monk with a full set of magical armor and weapons IS a perfect fighter because of his superior defensive abilities. Plus, the initial concept was an anime called Saint Seyia (or Seiya) in which the "saints" or knights where typical monks more or less, just with armors that augmented their powers. Plus, another, now central, ability of this class is delivering maneuvers at short distances, and the concept is that of a "Ki ball" like the classical "Adouken" of Street Fighter's Ryu. And there's already a feat to be able to do that in Player's Handbook II. And it's for monks. It's not really a PrC for martial Incarnum users: it's made for martial adept monks, and Incarnum is the cherry on top. No meldshaping abilities are required because it's seen more as a "gift" than as an ability. For example, I will specify that they will not be able to use their meldshaping abilities to form any other meld and so on. I don't know if this convinces you, but the point is that Incarnum armor makes much more sense for monks than for other warriors and the whole theme of the class is being a warrior that uses its soul as a weapon. It's a very ascetic concept.
rampant 10-20-07, 02:37 AM	Got the boots up Why Am I so slow?
LordArchaon 10-20-07, 08:53 PM	Thank you very much Rampant! I'm appreciating your work: balanced and thoughtful. We have to care about balance, because this tends to be a powerful PrC with the class features alone, so armor should give only modest (but flavorful) bonuses, with the exception of the magic weapon/unarmed strike, that is meant to compensate the BAB lost in multiclassing and in the mid-BAB progression. The armor should be the thing that really makes a knight of one discipline differ from a knight of another. But at the same time, all the armors must be on the very same power level. So I suggest at least a standard "bonus-rate" for everyone, in order to keep a good balance. Thank you again Rampant.
LordArchaon 10-20-07, 09:09 PM	Oh, another thing: I'm starting to believe that the flavor I gave to the class is right, but should not be the only one available, if I want it to be adaptable. So the actual monk synergies will become "one possible path" eligible by the novice soul knights, but more will be available. In particular, the Soul Blast class feature is too much of a specialization: it will be the feature that will make place for other ones in other "paths". So now I need Ideas for not-monkish class features made for more normal characters. They can be synergies with other classes or feats, or features that just about any single-classed martial adept would like to have. But my opinion is that the big power of the PrC is made to compensate an effort in multiclassing (take a look at the Fochlucan Lyrist to understand what I mean...). Speaking of synergy with other classes, I propose "paths" for: Swashbucklers, because they would have great benefit from an Incarnum armor, just as monks. Rangers, because a Soul Knight with favored enemy and everything would be great and it would be great for Tiger Claw knights. Knights, of course... Paladins, maybe... Fighter, by the means of feat transformation, just like the actual version transforms the Ki Blast in a great Incarnum-based ability. Tell me what you think, and don't hesitate to ask for clarifications, since I often speak (and write) in a not-so-straightforward way...
rampant 10-22-07, 12:18 AM	Not a huge fan of fighters, kinda bland yaknow. Ok looking at the feats from CA, and CS, the grace and dodge abilities are the ones that should progress with the PrC.
GuyrtheadamantineOne 10-22-07, 11:49 AM	Should this PrC have, with the capstone ability, someway to use Soul Armor Stance in concert with his specialised discipline's stances?
LordArchaon 10-23-07, 08:34 AM	Should this PrC have, with the capstone ability, someway to use Soul Armor Stance in concert with his specialised discipline's stances? Not a bad idea! Superior Soul Armor Stance could include a special effect depending on the discipline. I will try to work this out soon.
GuyrtheadamantineOne 10-23-07, 12:17 PM	Glad to help, I love this project! Finally someone give love to Saint Seya, one of the cheezyest(but cool:D) animes. I made this feat, to give Ki Blast a more DBZ look to Ki Blast monks:mage: and, by a lower extent, Soul Knights!:drool: Ki Storm As you punch swiftly in the air, energy blasts fly through the battlefield, hitting your foes. Prerequesites: Ki Blast Benefits: You may use Ki Blast in a full-attack action, without taking a move action to create orbs of Ki. Your blasts now deal 2d6 damage instead of 3d6. A monk may use Ki Storm in a Flurry of Blows. You gain an extra use of stunning fist per day. Special: Soul Knights may take this feat, which they call Soul Storm ,but their Soul Blast ability instead deal 1d8 damage per essentia invested. You cannot charge a Soul Storm for higher damage. Normal: Ki Blast deals 3d6 damage. It takes a move action to create an orb an a standard action to shoot it.
LordArchaon 10-23-07, 12:31 PM	Great! :D I was just thinking that I should create a "path" (within the Soul Knight PrC) for full-attack-based knights (to take advantage of flurry) and one for more skirmish fight. I mean, it's pretty useless to advance monk's flurry when you use maneuvers. Integrating maneuvers into full-attacks would be great, but should be balnced with a good drawback. The problem is just that I spend too much time when I develop these things... Expect something more real during this week...
GuyrtheadamantineOne 10-23-07, 01:54 PM	I think it should stay as is. The martial discipline will change the characters ability, not the class. Furthermore, many boosts encourage to full-attack and use other ''normal'' ***combat moves.
GuyrtheadamantineOne 10-23-07, 04:29 PM	Another feat for fiery fist, which is pretty bland right now. I houseruled you could choose whatever element you wanted, but characters with maneuvers and Blade Meditation should choose their associated school's element. Burning Assistance As you summon the sacred knowledge of your deadly martial art, raw elemental Ki cover your weapons. Prerequesites: Blade Meditation, Fiery Fist. Benefits: When using boosts of the martial discipline you chose for your Blade Meditation feat, you may activate Fiery Fist as part of the action. Normal: Fiery Fist take a swift action to activate.
Sezarious 11-14-07, 05:48 PM	If i could help, i would. I like monks and monk manouvers and so on, but i know nothing of Incarnum. Sorry...
GuyrtheadamantineOne 11-27-07, 02:18 PM	While I will still support and help expand this project, I want to ask you, LordArchaon if I can post my own version of the Soul Knight on this forum, which will be called the Sublime Paragon. It will not be a melding prestige class, but will manipulate essentia to other ends.
DensharrRagingfire 12-02-07, 09:38 PM	I remember the anime and i like the class but it seems a mite over powered. maybe i'm just reading an old post and youve fixed the problem, but just a comment. I do however love both tome of battle and magic of Incarnmum so please, do keep working on it.
LordArchaon 12-03-07, 06:15 AM	Thanks for all the support guys! As you may have noticed, the project was dropped a good bit, but yes, I still plan to finish it. Of course, I don't pose any limits about use of my material, so GuyrtheadamantineOne, feel free to post any version you'd like of this! DensharrRagingfire, you seem the rightest person to help me, then! :D What do you think could overpower this PrC? Is it about the Soul Blast, delivering maneuvers at a distance? I think I could lower its effect and make it an option a bit like Ranger's Weapon Style, in order to create another "path", less monk-dependant, what do you think?
LordArchaon 03-01-08, 09:39 PM	Take this for a bump... http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/6118/dragoncartoon3pz8.png
Kaiosama214 03-02-08, 10:30 AM	I love it. The idea is great, ans that picture you found for the OP is amazing. Here's my complaint: it's essentially a ToB/MoI crossover, with monk abilities tacked on. Those are unneeded, and make it clunky to enter. I read this, and I say I want to play a 4 Warblade/4 incarnate/13 soul knight, which should be TOTALLY appropriate for what is being displayed, but I can't cause I need at LEAST a level or two of monk.
forsaken1111 03-02-08, 10:50 AM	I love it. The idea is great, ans that picture you found for the OP is amazing. Here's my complaint: it's essentially a ToB/MoI crossover, with monk abilities tacked on. Those are unneeded, and make it clunky to enter. I read this, and I say I want to play a 4 Warblade/4 incarnate/13 soul knight, which should be TOTALLY appropriate for what is being displayed, but I can't cause I need at LEAST a level or two of monk. I agree with this. 100%. Love the class, hate the monk splash.
LunarWolfPrime 03-02-08, 08:53 PM	Take this for a bump... http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/6118/dragoncartoon3pz8.png Is that the Tiger Claw armor.
LordArchaon 03-02-08, 10:11 PM	Is that the Tiger Claw armor. Not feral enough, I'd say Setting Sun or Desert Wind... But well, the armor is shaped by its wearer so... :) To the monk-side critics... What can I say... I think that making it Incarnate/Martial would be totally useless: you couldn't have the armor completed if using other soulmelds, so having another meldshaper class is not useful. So if we remove the monk side, we end up with a prestige class that just epitomizes one discipline by associating it with soulmelds. It seems a little too bland to me, it would just become an Eldritch Knight type, a PrC that gives you the best of two worlds without anything original. I mean, the only features that would stay in would be the ones that let you improve maneuvers with Essentia... Great deal: you could easily design a feat for those kinds of things. I think that if there would be any way to simplify the class it would be the other way: making it for monks only. Remember, there's no point in having an armor made of Incarnum if not that you could feel it weightless and so be totally unencumbered. However, I think we could just change the requisites a bit or make it customizable so that you can have at least two build options, one for monks and one for non-monks.
Kaiosama214 03-03-08, 06:12 PM	I don't really see why having a "best of both worlds" style PRC is a bad thing, but perhaps that's just me. Really, the only things I would get rid of are the Firey Fist prereq and the "Monk abilities" tacked on at first level. Everything else can stay. Also, I don't really think there's a PROBLEM with the fact that they can use other soulmelds. They will probably want the benefits of the armor all the time instead of using other soulmelds, so that bias is unfounded. Besides, Monks are certainly not the only ones who prefer to be unarmored: Both the Sword sage and the Warblade are intended to be light, fast fighters who use skill rather than plates of steel to avoid damage, and I would say the intent of the class would be to focus on THEM. EDIT: Just re-read the class...yeah, I have no idea what you're talking about. The only thing that needs to be taken out is the monk abilities at first level, replace it with something else.
LordArchaon 03-03-08, 07:18 PM	I don't really see why having a "best of both worlds" style PRC is a bad thing, but perhaps that's just me. Really, the only things I would get rid of are the Firey Fist prereq and the "Monk abilities" tacked on at first level. Everything else can stay. Also, I don't really think there's a PROBLEM with the fact that they can use other soulmelds. They will probably want the benefits of the armor all the time instead of using other soulmelds, so that bias is unfounded. Besides, Monks are certainly not the only ones who prefer to be unarmored: Both the Sword sage and the Warblade are intended to be light, fast fighters who use skill rather than plates of steel to avoid damage, and I would say the intent of the class would be to focus on THEM. EDIT: Just re-read the class...yeah, I have no idea what you're talking about. The only thing that needs to be taken out is the monk abilities at first level, replace it with something else. I don't see much argumentation sustaining your thoughts, but that's not the point. First of all, the Monk is not the only one who prefers to be unarmored (however, really, no Swordsage or Warblade would go without armor), the monk is rather the only one who NEEDS to be completely WITHOUT material armor. So there's the reason for the class. Plus, with monk's mechanics of Ki Blast (which is the reason of the Fiery Fist requirement) allow for great Incarnum synergy and allow for what has become the signature ability of the PrC: delivering maneuvers at a distance. We could obviously leave the ability in for non monks and without the right feat requirement, but then what would you use to fire it instead of burning Stunning Fist attempts? Maybe you could burn Maneuvers? To deliver another one at range? Or Essentia? To use an Essentia based ability? Did you get the point? We could also make it at will and for free, but I guess it would be A BIT overpowered. Last but not least, this is an attempt at recreating at least part of the feel of an anime in which, obviously, the combat style of these knights was totally the one of a monk. Then, I'm not saying I wouldn't make a "build option" (to speak in 4th edition terms) or "alternative path" (to speak in my terms) for non-monk characters, especially because many disciplines do not "support" unarmed combat. But... given that I really wouldn't make meldshaping a requirement (if not by the means of the Shape Soulmeld feat), because it would, among the other things like different flavor (ruined flavor IMO, because this PrC is meant to possibly exist in a world in which Incarnum is not known, even not present), it would bring in difficult balancing issues between existing melds and PrC melds... When making a non-monk option, I would strongly consider a coupling of martial adept plus another class, and not martial adept only. And that would just be to make a more interesting character, believe me: given the complete specialization and devotion into one only discipline, having only that would turn out to be frustrating, you NEED some other features. Plus, nearly all good PrCs require you to at least dab in a second class other than your main one. So, please help me in the following choice for a different non monk option: Martial Adept + Barbarian: it would enhance the rage with Incarnum and gain special abilities based on fierce-style combat and powers (it would maintain the flavor in my opinion, also because the armor does not require any intellect or knowledge, it's a gift for the bravest and most powerful fighters) Martial Adept + Swashbuckler: again good flavor and again Incarnum would be used to exploit the few good things of the poor Swashbuckler class. Grace and dodge more than anything. Martial Adept + Knight (PhB2): one big obvious choice... Martial Adept + Cleric: divinity would be good to explain the armor in a non-incarnum world, and all the special mechanics of this option would be based into channeling positive or negative energy along with Incarnum in order to unleash new martial powers... Martial Adept + Warlock: it would replace the Incarnum enhanced Ki Blast with an Incarnum enhanced Eldritch Blast, to deliver maneuvers at a distance. This would bring to a copy of what the monk option gives, with a different flavor. In all of these options, I'm considering that only 1 level of the secondary class would be necessary. Tell me what you think. I could just try to develop ALL these options, but given that I would like to please at least the few fans of the PrC, the choice for the first option to be developed is yours.
Kaiosama214 03-04-08, 12:30 AM	Really, though, it's a MELDSHAPING class, and the way you present it here is exactly what I had said: a Half meldshaper/half Martial adept with a monk ability or two tacked on. It's easy enough to make the Soul blast a "per day" ability instead of trying to base it off of the ki blast feat, and it would be MUCH better to cater it towards swordsages (which are mostly monks anyways) than make them take a level of monk just for the hell of it. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing BAD about your class....it's just something different entirely than what you intended it to be.
LordArchaon 03-04-08, 02:03 AM	Really, though, it's a MELDSHAPING class, and the way you present it here is exactly what I had said: a Half meldshaper/half Martial adept with a monk ability or two tacked on. It's easy enough to make the Soul blast a "per day" ability instead of trying to base it off of the ki blast feat, and it would be MUCH better to cater it towards swordsages (which are mostly monks anyways) than make them take a level of monk just for the hell of it. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing BAD about your class....it's just something different entirely than what you intended it to be. I don't agree: the melds, the armor, and the class itself are meant to synergyze with (or directly progress) nearly all monks abilities, and the ability or two that you mention is a nearly full progression (compared to a very limited progression in martial knowledge given that they have only one discipline). Don't agree on the half-meldshaper either: the melds this class gets are not on the list of any meldshaping class and are not used the same way, I put them in because of their possibly weightless nature and the flexibility of distributing essentia between them and the other class features. Plus, half the powers of this PrC are hidden in the not yet developed melds/armor pieces, I would like to know, if you say this PrC is not as I intended it to be, in which way or why you say it. If it's because of the "categorization", and if you really have to categorize it (something which I really don't see necessary) you could say this class is 1/6 meldshaper, 2/6 martial, 3/6 monk. If you look at the numbers it may seem different, but given that the melds are just enhancements to the monk's abilities and that the once many disciplines become 1... It's like this. Saying that this PrC is half-meldshaper/half-martial is like saying that Blackguard is half-spellcaster/half-rogue, just because it gets some spells and sneak attack. When it is a fighter after all. If you look at any monk PrC you will always see only one thing that's actually monk's: "Monk Abilities" at first level, with the description test describing which of the many abilities you progress at each level. Some also have speed bonus, but you understand that the feet meld's primary function is that of giving speed, so it would be a little too speedy with even more bonus. To speak in 4th edition multiclass terms, this PrC is made for Monks with Meldshaping feats and Martial Training. Not for Martial Adepts with Monk Training. However, again to have at least a few people using the class, the requirements are made to allow a background with more martial adept levels, for the sake of BAB... And this fact allows for the creation of a real alternative progression option built in the PrC and/or in the Requirements that would change the monk "class skeleton" into the "class skeleton" of another class, eventually one of the many I have mentioned above. If you'd like to tell me which of them seem to fit better the role, feel free to tell with related critics.
forsaken1111 03-04-08, 06:12 AM	Just so you know, I completely agree with Kaiosama214. To the point that I have already adapted a version of this class without the unneeded monk abilities tacked on. Monks should never be allowed to wear armor, regardless of its origin. It completely goes against the spirit of the class, even if you try to rationalize it as "Its part of their soul!" or "Its lightweight and unencumbering!". Heck, I was iffy about letting monks in my game wear bracers of armor. Do you know how easy it is for an armored monk to hit 50+ AC? So its not just bad fluff, its bad mechanics. Monks receive free AC and lots of bonuses because they're expected not to wear armor. This class is a great idea, but you seem stuck on a very unnecessary monk angle. As Kaiosama214 said, it would make much more sense to make a blend between two classes than somehow mix in three. You're making a martial adept/meldshaping class who also gets monk ability progression. Can you point to any other PRC which progresses three class abilities like that? The only way I know of to do that is to take a level of a 'blend class' such as the cerebremancer then take levels in the hero of legacy class which progresses a previous class's abilities while also giving its own.
LordArchaon 03-04-08, 09:14 AM	No point in arguing, seems that we speak different languages. I bet that it's true, fantasy-speaking. NOTE: None of you actually answered to anything of what I replied, so really there's no point.
teshen 03-05-08, 02:07 PM	Just so you know, I completely agree with Kaiosama214. To the point that I have already adapted a version of this class without the unneeded monk abilities tacked on. Monks should never be allowed to wear armor, regardless of its origin. It completely goes against the spirit of the class, even if you try to rationalize it as "Its part of their soul!" or "Its lightweight and unencumbering!".It's not a rationalization. If the soulmelds, in this case, are energy, or force, like mage armor, then no they don't weigh a thing. Besides, it is a externalized effect of a spiritual growth, the ability to channel your qi for defense, the same way another monk would... channel his qi for defense. Do you feel that it's against the spirit of the rules then for a monk to take advantage of things like mage armor or greater mage armor? Or the shield spell? I'd say it only makes sense in a fantasy setting for an unarmed combatant to look for ways to mitigate his weaknesses, but I could be wrong. You say that a monk can really get his ac up there... well, is there anything else can he do at that point other than be hit only infrequently? Your basic monk has MAD and has to pay twice as much to get the same effect as other characters. I may be off the bat, but it seems like the soul melds and martial techniques are subing in for what a monk would normally get with the exception of these abilities actually work together rather than at cross purposes like the monk base class. And since you're getting less soulmelds (and they seem to be designed to be slightly weaker than normal melds) and he'll have a little less to invest in the melds than a true soulmelder. This class is a great idea, but you seem stuck on a very unnecessary monk angle. As Kaiosama214 said, it would make much more sense to make a blend between two classes than somehow mix in three. You're making a martial adept/meldshaping class who also gets monk ability progression. Can you point to any other PRC which progresses three class abilities like that? The only way I know of to do that is to take a level of a 'blend class' such as the cerebremancer then take levels in the hero of legacy class which progresses a previous class's abilities while also giving its own.And this makes me think you like this idea, but you don't like monk... and that's fine. I love the idea of an unarmed martial artist, but monk fails in dnd at this on many levels. Swordsage is better. Ranger with improved unarmed strike and the ascetic hunter feat is better. Fighter/Shou Disciple is better. Would you have the similar concerns if this wasn't a prc. If LordArchaon stripped down the monk class of special abilities other than average base attack, unarmed strike, flurry, AC and speed, and tacked on slow meldshaping progression so it's weaker than meldshapers and a slower martial progression so that all martial adepts got more manuevers and stances and even more schools to pick from... It would probably be a monk that worked... would you feel the same way? I don't feel that this threeway is odd. It's a martial artist (monk class) that's studying martial arts (martial stances and manuevers) and he gains a bit of enlightenment along the way (the ability to channel personal energy). That's it. Nothing more, nothing less. Besides, if you use this for inspiration for something else, then we've got more possible options. And options are good things. I'd rather have something I think is neat and never use than something I need but that I don't have.
LordArchaon 03-05-08, 07:48 PM	Besides, if you use this for inspiration for something else, then we've got more possible options. And options are good things. I'd rather have something I think is neat and never use than something I need but that I don't have. Besides getting the point of the recent discussion (that people may simply be against monk altogether), you talked about options... looking at my post above in which I make something like a poll to decide a different option for class features advancement/improvement (other than monk), which one would you suggest?
forsaken1111 03-05-08, 09:07 PM	Not at all, I actually love the monk. I play them quite often, and have no problem making them usable and actually very good. One of my most enjoyable characters was a monk/ardent who used his mantle powers to enhance his natural attacks. I'm not against the monk at all, I just don't think it really fits what you're trying to do. Just my own opinion, and as I said I've adapted the class for use without the monk abilities.
teshen 03-06-08, 04:02 AM	Besides getting the point of the recent discussion (that people may simply be against monk altogether), you talked about options... looking at my post above in which I make something like a poll to decide a different option for class features advancement/improvement (other than monk), which one would you suggest? Well, like your shadow nefarite, I suggest multiple entry methods. Swashbuckler should add the grace and dodge bonuses and maybe a few of the prc special abilities should be powered on intelligence rather than wisdom for them. I feel they should get something else, but I don't know what. Compare monk unarmed strike, AC bonus, speed increases, and flurry improvements to a dodge increase and a save increase. I think barbarian would be really nice as well. It should increase rage and trap sense... with the possible option of subing in spell sense or any of the other somethings instead of trapsense. But that's just my desire as far as that goes. :) By the way forsaken1111, it's nice to see you again. We need to make some more racial sub levels. Maybe shifter monk this time. :D
forsaken1111 03-06-08, 05:54 AM	So perhaps a class ability at level 1 which grants different skills depending on your previous class? Some swordsage abilities if you were a swordsage, some monk if you were a monk... etc? Could be modeled after the "Mobile Combat Training" ability of the psychic acrobat in Untapped Potential. That ability will progress certain parts of either monk, rogue, or soulknife combat depending on which one you had previously. (Or which one you pick, if you had more than one class previously) This would be (to me) more appropriate and remove the "You must be like a monk" feeling I'm getting. In this way, you continue training in whatever school of combat you used to reach this point. It would just take some small work to figure out what to progress.
LordArchaon 03-06-08, 10:48 AM	So perhaps a class ability at level 1 which grants different skills depending on your previous class? Some swordsage abilities if you were a swordsage, some monk if you were a monk... etc? Could be modeled after the "Mobile Combat Training" ability of the psychic acrobat in Untapped Potential. That ability will progress certain parts of either monk, rogue, or soulknife combat depending on which one you had previously. (Or which one you pick, if you had more than one class previously) This would be (to me) more appropriate and remove the "You must be like a monk" feeling I'm getting. In this way, you continue training in whatever school of combat you used to reach this point. It would just take some small work to figure out what to progress. That's what I'm suggesting since many posts ago... Here's what I've thought again: Martial Adept + Barbarian: it would enhance the rage with Incarnum and gain special abilities based on fierce-style combat and powers (it would maintain the flavor in my opinion, also because the armor does not require any intellect or knowledge, it's a gift for the bravest and most powerful fighters) Martial Adept + Swashbuckler: again good flavor and again Incarnum would be used to exploit the few good things of the poor Swashbuckler class. Grace and dodge more than anything. Martial Adept + Knight (PhB2): one big obvious choice... Martial Adept + Cleric: divinity would be good to explain the armor in a non-incarnum world, and all the special mechanics of this option would be based into channeling positive or negative energy along with Incarnum in order to unleash new martial powers... Martial Adept + Warlock: it would replace the Incarnum enhanced Ki Blast with an Incarnum enhanced Eldritch Blast, to deliver maneuvers at a distance. This would bring to a copy of what the monk option gives, with a different flavor. I would of course see psionic classes out of this, because we don't want to mix another type of powers... Warlock is an exception as I see it appropriate to replace what is now the monk "training", by replacing Ki Blast with Eldritch Blast to deliver maneuvers from a distance... Maybe a warlock training could focus so much on Eldritch Blast and Incarnum related boosts to combat and new features as to eliminate progression of invocations (in order to keep things simple), except maybe some fixed ones, no more than 2 in the whole PrC, which could be related to the flavor and role of the class. The other classes I thought are more easy, if you find that one in particular could be the first priority, please tell me which or maybe suggest a new one!
Loth 03-19-08, 03:01 AM	So I'm coming back to much time off, but now we need to finish the armors at least! :cool: