Word Wizard (3.5e Class)

Author: Foxwarrior (talk) Date Created: 2009-09-18 Status: Playable Editing: Clarity edits only please

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Word Wizard

“	Long Spyn Pentapyr Quadrolek. Fighting fire elementals is so much harder when all I've got are spells that deal at least half fire damage.	”
—Oliuh Monkoth, Half-Elf Word Wizard

The Word Wizard is a dangerous foe, striking fear into the hearts of many and confusing all who oppose them. However, where the Wordmaster spams a particularly well-suited spell, the Word Wizard is forced to wield whatever odd spells he's prepared for the day.

Making a Word Wizard

The Word Wizard benefits from their unusual ability to create new spells each day. However, the rules for how their spells are created is fairly restrictive, meaning that there are many strange things that Wizards and Clerics can do that Word Wizards cannot.

Abilities: Word Wizards use Intelligence to boost the power of their spells and to learn more words.

Races: Any mentally focused race is sure to have members that would enjoy being Word Wizards, especially those that enjoy linguistics.

Alignment: Any.

Starting Gold: 9d8.

Starting Age: Complex.

Table: The Word Wizard

Hit Die: d4

Level	Base Attack Bonus	Saving Throws			Special	Words per Day
		Fort	Ref	Will
1st	+0	+0	+0	+2		7 words
2nd	+1	+0	+0	+3	Edit	15 words
3rd	+1	+1	+1	+3		25 words
4th	+2	+1	+1	+4		36 words
5th	+2	+1	+1	+4	Nonrepetitive Prefixes	49 words
6th	+3	+2	+2	+5		63 words
7th	+3	+2	+2	+5		79 words
8th	+4	+2	+2	+6		96 words
9th	+4	+3	+3	+6		115 words
10th	+5	+3	+3	+7	Action Verbs	135 words
11th	+5	+3	+3	+7		157 words
12th	+6/+1	+4	+4	+8		180 words
13th	+6/+1	+4	+4	+8		205 words
14th	+7/+2	+4	+4	+9		231 words
15th	+7/+2	+5	+5	+9	Accelerating Pronouns	259 words
16th	+8/+3	+5	+5	+10		286 words
17th	+8/+3	+5	+5	+10		317 words
18th	+9/+4	+6	+6	+11		349 words
19th	+9/+4	+6	+6	+11		374 words
20th	+10/+5	+6	+6	+12	Adverbs of Power	410 words
Class Skills (4 + Int modifier per level, ×4 at 1st level) Concentration (Con), Craft (Any word-related) (Int), Decipher Script (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Forgery (Int), Knowledge (Int), Listen (Wis) Speak Language (None), Spellcraft (Int),

Class Features

All of the following are class features of the Word Wizard.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Word Wizards are not proficient with any weapons. They are also not proficient with any armor and suffer from arcane spell failure penalties while wearing it.

Spells: The Word Wizard uses wordcasting to cast spells.

When the Word Wizard levels up, they learn two new words at random. If their intelligence is at least 11, they roll for three random words and pick two. If it is at least 15, they can choose whether the word will be a Modifier Word, a Spell Shape Word, or an Effect Word. If it is at least 19, they can choose the word. If it is at least 23, they learn an additional word.

A first-level Word Wizard knows one Modifier Word of their choice, two Spell Shape Words of their choice, and two Effect words of their choice, plus a number of Effect words equal to their Intelligence modifier. These bonus words are randomized as though they had acquired them on a level up.

All words the Word Wizard knows are drawn from the wordcasting page, and cannot be words that are specifically restricted to other classes.

The save DC of a Word Wizard spell is equal to 10 + one third the spell's word count + the Word Wizard's Intelligence modifier.

When the Word Wizard wakes up from an extended rest, he must prepare his spells. No two spells he prepares may be identical and he spends all Word costs at the time of preparation (Although not component or XP costs). When he casts a spell, he uses up that preparation of that spell.

A Word Wizard who somehow gains words during the day (by failing a wordcasting check, for example) may spend 15 minutes preparing them into a spell. He may not prepare it into a duplicate of a spell he has already prepared that day.

Edit: The Word Wizard may spend fifteen minutes altering one preparation of one spell. When he does so, he may swap out one word in that spell for another word. He may not make any changes that would result in him having more than one instance of each spell prepared at the same time.

Nonrepetitive Prefixes: The Word Wizard may reduce the casting time of his spells by condensing long chains of the same spell word into a prefix and a spell word. The time it takes to cast the spell is reduced by one fewer than the number of words removed in this way, but all other attributes of the spell are left unchanged. For example, without using Nonrepetitive Prefixes, the spell "Bang Pyr Pyr Pyr Pyr Pyr" would normally take a standard action to cast. With Nonrepetitive Prefixes, it could be spoken as "Bang Pentapyr", meaning it would take a swift action to cast.

Action Verbs: The die sizes for damage-dealing effect words increase by one step. 1d6 improves to 1d8, 1d4+1 improves to 1d6+1, 1d4 improves to 1d6, and so on.

Accelerating Pronouns: The Word Wizard's spells are cast twice as quickly. As such, they take twice as many words to cross each time interval threshold.

Adverbs of Power: For every third instance of any given spell word (nonrepetitive prefixes do not change the number of instances of that spell word for this ability), the DC of the spell is reduced by 1.

Epic Word Wizard

Table: The Epic Word Wizard

Hit Die: d4

Level	Special
21st
22nd	Action Verbs
23rd
24th	Cheaper Spells
25th
26th	Bonus Feat
27th
28th	Cheaper Spells
29th
30th	Bonus Feat
4 + Int modifier skill points per level.

Action Verbs: At level 22 and every 10 levels after 22, the Word Wizard gains an additional instance of Action Verbs, further increasing die sizes. It goes 1d6/1d8/1d10/1d12/2d8/2d10/2d12/3d8/3d10/3d12/4d10/4d12...

Cheaper Spells: At level 24 and every 4 levels after 24, the number of Words the Word Wizard must spend to prepare a spell is reduced by 1. Therefore, a level 28 Word Wizard could prepare an infinite number of 2-word spells, although no two of them could be identical.

Bonus Feat: At level 26 and every 4 levels after 26, the Word Wizard gains a bonus feat. The feat must have spell word-based casting as a prerequisite.

Spellcasting: The Word Wizard continues learning words as normal (If there are any left)

Playing a Word Wizard

Combat: Word Wizards generally fill the same roles as Wordmasters, although they do it less reliably and in a more amazingly powerful fashion.

Advancement: Word Wizards would do well to consider gaining levels in Inanomancer, Scriptwriter, Literate Mage, Word of Life, Word of Undeath, or Wordsman, since all of these are prestige classes designed for Word Wizards.

Word Wizards in the World

“	People speak words every day, never realizing that they could be speaking in some sort of quasilatin while focusing their willpower in order to illustrate their points more descriptively.	”
—Oliuh Monkoth, Half-Elf Wordmaster

Daily Life: Oliuh Monkoth, on a good day, wakes up, goes to the library and reads a large book, and then wanders over to some harmless dungeon filled with monsters and slaughters all living, construct, and undead beings within it in a blast of incredible death.

Notables: Oliuh Monkoth is the most notable Word Wizard, but Palibus Wavennet, renowned historian, scholar, and slayer of small armies is another one.

Organizations: Bookish Word Wizards often run into each other in libraries and bookstores. The more violent kind, however, is generally more likely to be found wandering between public speeches.

NPC Reactions: NPCs tend not to approve of Word Wizards. Sure, they are mere students of grammar and proper sentence structure. On the other hand, they have a tendency to annihilate small cities.

Word Wizard Lore

Characters with ranks in Knowledge(Arcana) can research Word Wizards to learn more about them. When a character makes a skill check, read or paraphrase the following, including information from lower DCs.

Knowledge(Arcana)

DC	Result
5	Word Wizards can create their own blend of magic. You can be certain that they will cast a slightly different spell every time.
10	Word Wizards prepare their spells much like ordinary Wizards.
15	Word Wizards, for all of the obvious comparison to Wizards, are often more like Sorcerers than Wordmasters are.
20	Incredibly powerful Word Wizards can cast spells that are about twice as powerful as the spells that incredibly powerful Wordmasters cast.

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