Athasian Grey Soul

Post/Author/DateTimePost
#1

jaanos

Mar 22, 2006 22:43:13		Ok, after much thought i've decided to take the plunge and develop an prestige class for Undead Advanced Beings using some of Athas.Orgs material. What i'm looking for is feedback on the powers, feats etc - if you don't believe they should exist, meh!

I've got a concept that some Grey Souls (as i've dubbed them) simply move into the grey as incoporeal entitites, others remain fixed on athas. Read and let me know what you think.

Jaanos

Athasian Grey Souls
"Undeath is only the beginning. I have no fear of your King… nor any other Dragons… they will not test their might against mine… there is too much to loose"
- A grey soul to a templar victim

Grey Souls are incredibly powerful individuals who have mastered both arcane magic and psionics after undeath. In their quests for power, these individuals have chosen to undergo a metamorphosis, changing them into one of two undead forms. Grey Souls command terrible magic capable of draining the life-force of both man and beast, as well as drawing strength from the grey, leaving only undead servents in the place of the living creatures that it used to power it’s spells.

They are masters of the Way and the arcane arts, and can combine these supernatural powers into psionic enchantments, allowing them to exploit even further might. Many of the rulers of the Dead-Lands are, walking one of the paths to become a grey soul. Other Grey Souls exist, but they are few and remain hidden, as the sorcerer-kings are quick to strike down any contenders to their power. In addition, they are hunted by spirits of the land and elemental clerics who seem them as a corruption of the true order of things

How Grey souls learnt their transformation is lost in time. Some suggest it was developed in the dead lands, others by a Necromancer long ago. The known Grey Souls of the Tyr Region and the North are of many different origins, but most are human or from races long extinct, hinting that the path can be followed after obtaining undeath.

NPC Grey Souls are powerful beings with little concern for the common man. The personality of each Grey Sould is unique, but common to almost all Grey Souls is the desire to complete the next step of their metamorphosis. The hatred against all that lives burns coldly in them, and the power they can achieve beckons to them.

NPC Grey Souls will sometimes use adventurers in their great schemes, to retrieve items of importance, dispose of enemies, or other tasks they see fit. Sometimes a Grey Soul will seek amusement through sending mortals on dangerous quests with dire consequences if they fail, but usually it is part of a carefully wrought plan to further it’s own power and transformation.

Hit Die: d12
Requirements
To qualify to become an athasian Grey Soul, a character must fulfill all the following criteria.
Skills: Knowledge (arcana) 24 ranks, Knowledge (psionics) 24 ranks and one of the following: Knowledge (Planes) 20 ranks or Knowledge (undead) 20 ranks
Feats: Grey Casting 2 metamagic feats and 2 metapsionic feats
Spells: Must be able to cast 9th-level arcane spells and manifest 6th-level psionic powers.
Special: Must be undead. Must be able to cast arcane spells and cast Grey Soul Transformation 1 OR Must be undead and be able to cast divine (paraelemental spells)
Class Skills
The athasian Grey Soul’s class skills (and key ability for each skill) are Bluff (Cha), Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Decipher Script (Int), Disguise (Cha), Jump (Str), Knowledge (all skills, taken individually) (Int), Listen (Wis), Literacy (none), Profession (Wis), Profession (Wis), Psicraft (Wis), Spot (Wis), and Spellcraft (Int).
Skill Points at Each Level: 2 + Int modifier.

Class Features
Weapon and Armor proficiencies: proficient in simple weapons and the whip.

Spells and Powers per Day: Starting at 2nd level, and at each level thereafter, an Athasian Grey Soul gains an effective caster level and manifester level increase in an existing arcane spellcasting class and an existing manifester class, for purposes of determining level-dependant spell and power effects (including augmentation), overcoming SR/PR and dispel effects.
He does not receive additional spells per day, power points, known powers or learn new spells, nor does he gain any other benefit a character of those classes would have gained.

Grey Soul Magic (Su): Athasian Grey Souls can choose to power their spells with energy from the grey when using the grey for casting, the terrain is considerd "fertile"
Casting using grey force this way is considered defiling and subject to all the rules thereof. Not sure about that bit

In addition, the massive amount of negative energy drawn from the grey affects Living creatures caught in the defiling radius of the athasian Grey Soul, when they are using Grey Soul magic must make fortitude save (DC 10 + 2 per spell level) or take 1 point of damage per level of the spell being cast and lose 1 level temporarily as a result of the negative energy drain. (0 level spells inflict1 point of damage but donot inflict level loss) Grey Soul magic requires a piece of masterwork obsidian of a value of least 250cp as a focus.

[HTML]Class level Special Spells and powers per day
1st Grey Soul magic, Pathway choice 1, Fear Immunity, Negative Energy Healing
2nd Psionic enchantment, Gravespeaker, +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
3rd Pathway choice 2, Advanced Control Undead +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
4th Psionic enchantment, Dead Bishop 1 +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
5th Pathway choice 3, Zone of Animation 1 +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
6th Psionic enchantment, Enhanced Control Undead +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
7th Pathway choice 4, Dead Bishop 2 +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
8th Psionic enchantment, Zone of Animation 2 +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
9th Pathway choice 5, Dead Bishop 3 +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
10th Psionic enchantment, Dominate Undead +1 effective caster level of existing arcane spellcasting class and +1 effective manifester level of existing manifester class
[/HTML]
Pathway (SU): Starting at first level, the Grey Soul must choose a transformation pathway. Once chosen, it can never be reversed. The two pathways are the Material Grey Incarnate or it’s alternative, the Grey Ascendancy. Both are detailed below:

Material Grey Incarnate:
This pathway sees the Grey Soul remain firmly rooted on the material plane, drawing increasing strength from the grey to bolster it’s physical, mental, psionic and magical powers. Each level of transformation provides unique bonuses to the Grey Soul as detailed:

[HTML]Pathway Choice Special Spells and powers per day
1
2
3
4
5
[/HTML]
Grey Ascendancy:
This pathway sees the Grey Soul gradually move it’s existance to the Grey. In effect, it’s coporeal existance fades as it become more and more intwined with the very fabric of the Grey it’s self. Eventually, the Grey Soul moves to the Grey and become and incoproeal entity that only occasionally manifests it’s self on the material plane.
Each level of transformation provides unique bonuses to the Grey Soul as detailed:

[HTML]Pathway Choice Special Spells and powers per day
1
2
3
4
5

[/HTML]Fear Immunity: Grey Souls develop immunity to fear as they understand what will happen when they move to the grey

Gravespeaker (Su): At 2nd level, the Grey Soul gains the ability to speak with dead at will, and receives a +2 bonus to Bluff, Diplomacy and Sense Motive checks when conversing with intelligent undead. If the Grey Soul already has this ability, the bonuses to Bluff, Diplomacy and Sense Motive stack.

Zone of Animation (Sp): At 5th level the Grey Soul automatically exudes a 10-ft sphere that acts like a perpetual area-effect animate dead spell centered on the Grey Soul. At 8th level, the sphere expands to 20ft. The Grey Soul can suppress this at any time. Undead created by the Zone of animation count normally towards the total HD controlled by the Grey Soul

Dead Bishop: Starting at 4th level, the Grey Soul can have twice as many HD of animated undead than normally allowed. This then expands to three times as many undead at 7th level and four times as many undead at 9th level.

Control Undead (Sp): At 3rd level, the Grey Soul can exert control of undead created and controlled by others, including intelligent undead. The Grey Soul can use command undead as per the spell once per day. If the Grey Soul already has this ability, it stacks with the previous version.

Dominate Undead (Sp): At 3rd level, the Grey Soul can exert a greater control of intelligent undead. The Grey Soul can use this ability to replicate the dominate spell once per day.

Negative Energy Healing (Su): At 10th level, the Grey Soul becomes immune to the adverse effects of negative energy. He is not affected by energy drain and ability damage, and inflict spells have no effect on him. Instead they heal the Grey Soul the rolled damage (in the case of inflict spells) and give a temporary (1 hour boost) to it’s attribute scores (in the case of energy drain)

Psionic Enchantment (Su): Athasian Grey Souls can combine psionics and arcane magic in unique ways to augment their casting and manifesting. At 2nd level and every even level thereafter, athasian Grey Souls learn a psionic enchantment chosen from the following list:

Metamixture: The athasian Grey Soul chooses a metapsionic feat. It can now apply this metapsionic feat to spells in order to boost them as if using a metamagic feat of the same type. For example, it could use Maximize Power to maximize the variable numeric effects of a spell, or use Extend Power to double the duration of a spell. Using metamixture is a free action that does not provoke an attack of opportunity. The athasian Grey Soul must spend power points as normal when using a metapsionic feat to boost a spell. Treat the spell as a psionic power of equivalent level for the purpose of determining the power point cost. The athasian Grey Soul cannot spend more power points in this fashion than its manifester level. If a metapsionic feat has the same effect as a metamagic feat already applied to the spell, there is no additional effect. Metamixture can be selected more than once. Each time, it applies to a different metapsionic feat. More than one metapsionic feat may be applied to a spell using metamixture. The athasian Grey Soul still cannot spend more power points than its manifester level when boosting the effects of a spell with multiple metapsionic feats affected by metamixture.

Metapotency: The athasian Grey Soul chooses a metamagic feat and a metapsionic feat that it possesses that grant the same effect on numeric values (for example, Extend Spell and Extend Power) and gains synergistic bonuses. When applying either feat, multiply its effects by 1.5. For example, if applied to Extend Spell or Extend Power, metapotency allows these feats to increase the spell or power’s duration by 150% instead of doubling it. If applied to Empower Spell and Empower Power, metapotency allows these feats to increase the spell or power’s damage by 75% instead of 50%. Metapotency has no effect on Maximize Spell and Maximize Power. The increased cost in spell levels or power points is unaffected by metapotency. For example, an empowered spell affected by metapotency still uses up a spell slot two levels higher than the spell’s actual level. Metapotency may be selected multiple times. Each time, it applies to a different pair of matching metamagic and metapsionic feats.

Arcane augmentation: The athasian Grey Soul can spend a prepared spell slot to increase its limit for augmenting psionic powers during manifestation. Using arcane augmentation is a free action that does not provoke an attack of opportunity. Add the level of the spell slot to the athasian Grey Soul’s manifester level for purposes of determining the maximum amount of power points it can spend while manifesting a single power. For example, Nordak, an athasian Grey Soul with 20 manifester levels, spends an 8th-level spell slot to increase the maximum power points it can spend to augment a power by 8. These additional points cannot be used to apply additional metapsionic feats.

Path of least resistance: The athasian Grey Soul uses the lower of a targets’ spell resistance and power resistance if it knows both the psionic and arcane equivalent of a power or spell (e.g. charm person and charm person, psionic). Whether the athasian Grey Soul uses the power or spell, it uses the lower of targets’ SR and PR when making a spellcaster checks to overcome resistance. Path of least resistance applies to all spells and powers for which the athasian Grey Soul knows both a psionic and arcane variant.

Psionc raze: The athasian Grey Soul can amplify the effects of its defiling radius to drain the psionic strength of creatures. When casting a spell, the athasian Grey Soul can opt to have its defiling radius drain 1 power point per level of the spell slot expended from all creatures caught in the defiling radius. Using psionic raze costs 1 power point per two spell slot levels, rounded up. For example, an 8th-level spell requires the athasian Grey Soul to spend 4 power points and causes all victims to lose 8 power points.

I was thinking of re-doing this along the lines of "grey raze" - thoughts?

Far reach: The athasian Grey Soul can use touch spells and powers on targets up to 30 feet away. Far reach can be selected more than once. Each time it is selected, it increases the touch range by an additional 30 feet, to a maximum of 90 feet.

Ex-Athasian Grey Souls

An athasian Grey Soul who becomes a preserver cannot progress in levels as an athasian Grey Soul, though he retains all his athasian Grey Soul abilities.