Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Asmodeur 01-04-07, 11:03 AM	Hey all In the campaign where I am currently a player, I play a paladin. Next time he will most likely hit lvl 5, meaning a warhorse. Frankly I find the warhorse annoying, and it is ill suited for the campaign we are in, ie mostly dungeons and urban encounters. I talked with my DM about that, and luckily he agreed. He told me to come up with another "granted power" that my character could get instead. Anyway, I thought about it, but my mind seems a little blank atm. Most ideas I got was feat related, ie a free feat of some sort, either combat or a divine one. I figured maybe someone on these boards had more experience with the paladin, because despite playing since 2e came out or so, I have never played a paladin before, and my players (when I DM) have not played it much either. Any ideas would be much appreciated.
Tarkwin 01-04-07, 11:10 AM	PHB 2 has the charging smite ability as an option to replace the paladin mount. T
pres_man 01-04-07, 11:21 AM	Or maybe see if you can get another type of "companion", perhaps a trusty hound (riding dog), that will guard your back or stand guard over you while you rest.
Asmodeur 01-04-07, 11:58 AM	PHB 2 has the charging smite ability as an option to replace the paladin mount. T PHB2 is one of the few books i dont have access to, any chance you can tell me more, or is that against the rules of the board?
BlinkDOGwrangler 01-04-07, 01:13 PM	When you charge and smite, you add 2 times your level in damage to evil critters
Asmodeur 01-04-07, 01:52 PM	Much obliged, sounds interesting.
Leo 01-04-07, 02:28 PM	Persuade your DM to get another beast. It even says in the PHB that a paladin could begotiate a mount based on the camapign seting(a shark for an aquatic campaign, for example).
BoringInfoGuy 01-08-07, 02:30 PM	:bump: I wanted to post some ideas, but didn't have time at work. By the time I actually had the time to reply, I couldn't find this darn post.:mad: It's probably too late, but I'll put up a couple of alternate ideas tonight.
Elrinade 01-08-07, 03:47 PM	Replacing the warhorse with a sentient magic sword might work pretty well. Not sure how you'd balance it, though...
ZypherX 01-08-07, 03:58 PM	Maybe steal some material from the Kensai PrC?
Knight9910 01-09-07, 12:28 AM	Since when does a sentient magic sword have to be balanced? Item Familiar is unbalanced as hell...
BoringInfoGuy 01-09-07, 12:02 PM	Sorry, further delay. My post was written, but the site when down for maintanance last night. (For all this trouble, it better be a good post on my part. . .)
BoringInfoGuy 01-09-07, 07:16 PM	The first thing that came to mind when I read this post is to conisder why the paladin has the powers that he does. Paladins seek out and confront evil. They have abilities that are a mix of offence, defense, and support/other. Offense: detect evil, smite evil, lay on hands (vs undead), special mount, and turn undead. Defense: detect evil, Divine grace, lay on hands, aura of courage, divine health. Support / other: Aura of good, lay on hands, aura of courage, special mount, remove disease. All of these abilities are at there best when the paladin is facing evil. Smite evil, naturally, is only useful against evil. Note that many of the paladin's abilities can be used in multiple ways. If you're playing a paladin, then this is all recap. Why bother to write it out? Because if you are going to change around a class, it's important to remember what you are changing it from. Now, if we are removing one of the unique abilities of the paladin, then why not try to create a new unique ability that fits the paladin's flavor? What does the mount do for the paladin? When fighting while mounted, the player gets an extra attack each round on a standard action, and three extra attacks on a full round action. The mount can be summoned once a day, and lasts 2 hours per paladin level, starting at 10 hours when the paladin is first able to summon his mount. This is potentialy a huge amount of extra damage per day of battle. The mount is dismissable when unneeded, and will always return with full health the next time it is summoned. The mount will also improve slightly as the paladin levels, gaining new abilities. When the mount is useful, it is very useful. It also really fits the flavor of the heroic figure riding into battle. But that doesn't mean it is always useful. Such as in an urban / dungeon based game like Asmodeur is in. Let's try something to fit in with the seeking out evil aspect of a paladin. (BTW, I am terrible at coming up with names for abilities, so I'll just describe them). Balance is untested, so use at own riske. 5th level. The paladin gains darkvision 30ft. If the paladin already has darkvision, it improves by 30ft. 8th level. The paladin can see normaly in the area of effect of the darkness spell, and spell like effects that mimic darkness. 11th level. The paladin can see normaly in the area of effect of the deeper darkness spell, and spell like effects that mimic deeper darkness. 15th level. The paladin's Detect evil ability can no longer be fooled by any spells or abilities such as undetectable alignment. You could call these the "Evil can run, but it can't hide" abilities. Here's something that fits with the paladins abilities to resist evil. At fifth level, the paladin gains the ability to resist damage from evil creatures. This ability works just like damage reduction, except that instead of being bypassed by evil, it only reduces the damage from evil attacks. In effect, this would only reduce the damage from attacks considered evil for the puropses of bypassing damage reduction. Clear? 5th Resist Damage 1/vs Evil 8th Resist Damage 2/vs Evil 11th Resist Damage 3/vs Evil 14th Resist Damage 4/vs Evil 17th Resist Damage 5/vs Evil Just the thing when you are going toe to toe with a Demon. In effect, this is trading the extra damage you can inflict with a special mount, and trades it for extra staying power against evil creatures. Final, and least developed, idea is to improve the paladins support abilities. The paladin's Aura of courage gives all allies within 10ft a +4 moral bonus on saves vs fear effects. How about when the paladin hits level 5, the range of the bonus improves. As the Paladin continues to level, the range continues to increase, and different bonuses are added closer to the paladin. So, at higher levels, every ally within [50]ft get's the bonus vs fear. Every ally withing [40]ft also gets 1/2 the paladin's divine grace bonus (miniumun +1, assuming the paladin has at least a +1 bonus himself), Every ally within [30]ft also gets an additional +4 divine bonus vs magical diseases. Every ally within [20]ft can also be the target of the paladin's lay on hands ability without the paladin actually having to lay his hand on the target. Every all within [10]ft is also immune to fear, just like that paladin. The last set is probably overpowered, and definitly overcomplicated. But there is probably a support based ability the paladin could have that would work better. These are just some ideas I'm throwing out. Very rough, and completly untested. They may be more helpful to you if you think of them as inspiration.