Talk:Spirit Meister (3.5e Class)

A few minor observations

To begin, the most minor of all: the Races entry is an opportunity to mention which races are stereotypically most likely to take levels in this class.

The bulk of the observations can be summed up as: most of the content here is a simple rehash of Barbarian, Rogue, and Fighter stuff, and the Rogue is the only High-balance one of those, a status it gets from a damage bonus this class does not share.

Inferno's Blast is a tiny damage bonus that would be rarely important if the Spirit Meister got it at level 6.

Blizzard's Bite is insanely overpowered, either Stun or Daze on every critical is extremely significant.

A talking weapon is amusing, but this one is so stupid it wouldn't have any biting witty things to say. And saying biting witty things is why talking weapons were invented. It's also not even guaranteed to be a better weapon than you could find from random drops, which has a chance of being extremely unfortunate. --Foxwarrior (talk) 06:59, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Ok, this is why I wanted to post on this site, to get feedback. My thoughts on races is that I want it to be for those races known more for agility or suppleness, so probably elf, 1/2 elf and human. The races like dwarf and 1/2 orc that rely more on strength wouldn't favor this class.

Yes, alot does come from the fighter-rogue-barbarian-monk sets. I have looked over those classes and none seemed to offer the kind of agility and speed based combatant I was looking for, and monk is just too weak. I marked the balance as high more because of defensive abilities. The class has alot of damage mitigation: DR, energy resistance, reduced falling, evasion/dodge/roll. Perhaps I missunderstood the balance categories on this site, I considered the class survivability to make it viable at that rating. Part of the idea was that the pc gain certain elemental-like traits to reflect the bonding between the pc and echo.

Inferno Blast wasn't meant to be about the damage it caused. it was focused more on the prone condition, which makes it more vulnerable to the pc's melee attacks, less likely to hit the pc and grants the pc an AOO when the target gets up. It is intended to not be an action that has to be specifically triggered, but something that happens as part of any full attack against a single target; I may not have expressed that clearly. ITBH, its also inspired by the strikes you see in many video games.

Blizzard's Bite- I see your point, crits are much more common at those levels. What do you think of the DC being for a daze on a failed check, but is stunned on a critcal failure?

Weapon intelligence- Ok, how about its INT equal to the class level, but because of its fanatical loyalty there is never a dominance check for item ego? An item with abilities higher than the pc would instead act as an advisor/mentor (or smart-ass smarter friend if you like). As for the power of the weapons themselves, at level 20 the weapon is +5 enhancement with burst, bane and keen properties. Thats a +4 worth of enhancement on top ofbeing +5 to hit and damage already, and intelligent to boot. It continues to gain in power into epic levels. It also, at level 20, will have 4 seperate weapon forms, the original melee form and 3 others which can include ranged weapons, exotic weapons, different sixe weapons. At level 20 it can also transform into a familiar form for scouting or a mount form for movement. The mount form may not sound like much, "its just like a horse!", except that this horse has DR, energy immunity, doesn't take penalties due to terrain and the benefits of the elemental type.

I appreciate the feedback, keep it coming. --Elohim (talk) 15:59, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

You should fix the BAB progression, it's very bizarrely off. Spanambula (talk) 02:57, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Doesn't seem any weirder than that for the rogue. Once you get past level four it has a static progression step.--Elohim (talk) 05:19, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

He means that it isn't the rogue progression, and it probably should be. In-between progressions aren't technically wrong, but they're also just not done. To the point that we don't even support them in the simplified templates.

And it is weirder than the rogue. The moderate progression starts at 0, increases by 1 for three levels, doesn't increase for a level, increases by 1 for 3 levels... etc. It's very consistent. This isn't - it's full BAB to start, then half-BAB for the rest of the way. Even if you get to the same point, it's inconsistent and the breaks happen at weird places. And the benefit of doing it this completely different way is really, really minor. I'd recommend changing it, and not using variant progressions outside of variant rules. They don't add anything other than confusion. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 06:40, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

More Observations

"Earth's Purity (Ex): The essence of the earth stretches forth to turn aside the blows against you. You gain + 1DR/- at 6th, 11th, 16th, 21st and 26th levels. This damage reduction does not stack with damage reduction granted by magic items or nonpermanent magical effects, but it does stack with any damage reduction granted by permanent magical effects, class features, or the damage reduction feat.:

Why? Dr/- less than 1 per level isn't impressive, dr/- less than 1/4 level is basically flavor.

"Elemental Bulwark (Ex): Bygone echos protect you from the ravages of elemental fury. You gain resistance to fire, cold, acid and electricity equal to half your class level as a spirit meister. This ability does not stack with energy resistance granted by magic items or nonpermanent magical effects, energy resistance granted by permanent magical effects, or class features; use whichever is best. At 20th level your resistance impoves to equal your class level.

It does stack with the energy resistance feat."

This is just plain sad, again.

"Blizzard's Bite (Ex): Your critical attacks can stop your enemies just as the blizzard stops the traveler. Starting at 18th level, whenever you gain a critical hit, your opponent must make a Fort save DC15 or be dazed for one round, critical failure on the save instead results in it being stunned for one round."

At level 18, everything is gonna make a DC 15 fort save. 10+1/2 HD+(ability mod) is standard. Fluffykittens (talk) 22:42, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

I'm not looking to make the pc invulnerable, DR 1 per level is out. DR 1/6 is suffecient, especially when coupled with all of the other defensive abilities; at 30th level his DR will only be 3 behind that of a barbarian. As for the energy resistance of 1/2 level 1-19, and the 1 per level 20+, that is sufficient for added defence without applying immunity. Consider a normal attack spell like fireball, it normally does a maximum of 60 damage without modification; at 19th level you are reducing that damage by about 16%, at 20th level it jumps to 33%. I don't consider that sad. Granted metamagic could incraease the damage from that fireball, and there are spells with more dmg potential, but thats neither here nor there. Remember also that this ability is granting resistance to 4 energy types. As for blizard's bite, the dc15 was left in there from a previous write up where there was a skill check, never got around to changing it to an appropriate ST check. --Elohim (talk) 01:07, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

I'm not looking to make the pc invulnerable, DR 1 per level is out. DR 1/6 is suffecient, especially when coupled with all of the other defensive abilities; at 30th level his DR will only be 3 behind that of a barbarian.

At level 16, he'll be reducing 3 damage. From the greater stone Golem's 2x(4d8+13), the unbuffed Cornugon's 3x(2d6+15 plus stun)+(2d8+5)+(2d6+5 plus infernal wound), and the unbuffed Planetar's 3x(3d6+13/19–20). In practical terms, 3 DR is doing diddly squat for him. 1/6th DR is low balance.

As for the energy resistance of 1/2 level 1-19, and the 1 per level 20+, that is sufficient for added defence without applying immunity. Consider a normal attack spell like fireball, it normally does a maximum of 60 damage without modification; at 19th level you are reducing that damage by about 16%, at 20th level it jumps to 33%.

Using fireball at level 19-20 is a low-balance point tactic. At CR 20, you have red dragons chucking out firebreath for an average 88 damage without metabreath feats and spells boosting it (with metabreath maximize and empower, that's 204 damage).

I don't consider that sad. Granted metamagic could incraease the damage from that fireball, and there are spells with more dmg potential, but thats neither here nor there.

If you're going to keep this class high-balance, yes it is. Fluffykittens (talk) 04:14, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

The concept of elemental morphing weapon guy has some traction and enough innate magic fluff to work as a High balance class, but it doesn't keep up with H balance characters. It's primary offensive features are a magic weapon (that you may not even want to use in many situations, so it may well sit in the golf bag) and low save DC effects at high levels. It has some genuinely good utility features (respite, freedom), but they often come in pretty late. The horse in particular is really weird, because there is no way I'm going to be excited about getting a horse at level 20 when I've had a carpet of flying and teleporting wizards for multiple levels. Sure, it's got some defensive features in it, but they're just not that impressive. And even if they were impressive, the lack of offensive would just make them a low priority target.

Your objections to critique so far suggests that you may have misunderstood the balance guidelines, or you prefer a different playstyle than H represents. If you're happy with the class, the easy thing to do is to just change the balance to Moderate. There are still some weird things that come in late, but it would be fine in a party with an evoker wizard and a barbarian and a single weapon flank rogue (who doesn't use much UMD) and a healer cleric, and those are all pretty Moderate. If you want it to play well with stronger builds than those, it needs a stronger offense and some reworked utility features. You could just move a bunch of higher level things down so they happen earlier (seriously, the horse thing doesn't need to be any later than the paladin gets theirs - it's really, really late IMO), boost the defensive progressions to more meaningful levels, roll most/all of the epic effects into the upper teen levels, and so on. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 06:55, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps I do missunderstand the balance designations. Until recently I had never tried my hand at any design. I have always just been a player in my group, and we have just used the classes in the PHB. Reading up some more, our campaign would probably be considered 'low-magic'. Getting our first magic weapon (+1) usually comes about 3-5th level, we play until we're 20th and the pcs retire to the nobility. We then start new pcs as family members. Its pretty fun. When I made this class I considered that it was too powerful, at least compared to what I'm used to, so I put it as 'high' balance. I've been reading some of the classes made by other members, most of them would be considered "the big bad" in power in our campaign, the end enemy for our group to face.

That being said feel free to make the changes you like to make it more viable, I'll pay attention and see what more experienced designers do.--Elohim (talk) 15:03, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

Umm, no.

I think you misunderstand me. There is nothing non-viable about the class in general, just in the specific balance category you selected. If this fits the style of you and your group and you like it, you could (and maybe even should) just change the balance on it and call it done. I missed that it's a front line fighter with 3/4 BAB earlier, so I'm not really sure if it's Low or Moderate, but you could just change it and move on. It's really okay to just put a different balance tag on it, there's a couple of users here who just write something and then let the community figure out what balance it should be tagged as.

But if you want it to be a stronger class, you need to figure out the method by which you want that to happen. If it's supposed to be a tanky defender class, you want to give it a conditional offensive feature that makes people want to attack it so that they don't get murdered later. It needs to be a threat, not just hard to hit if you want smart enemies to target it over other threats that are also easier to hit. Examples include Knight, Tome (3.5e Class) and Toxinblade (3.5e Class). If it's supposed to be a bunch of damage class, it needs a scaling damage option like the SRD:Rogue or Barbarian, Tome (3.5e Class). If it's supposed to be a controlling class of some sort (like a tripstar fighter build), you could look at something I'm not remembering. But there's lots of directions you could take it in, and no one can answer how you want it to end up but you. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 16:43, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

http://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Dungeons_and_Dragons_Wiki:Article_Balance#High_Balance First, start with a balance point. What balance point are you aiming for? Fluffykittens (talk) 16:50, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

Revised

Many changes in placement, form and function of abilities. Elohim (talk) 12:39, 30 January 2019 (MST)