For your perusal and commentary, then:
Here are the major elements that I have thus far come up with for the Witch Circle Craft, along with other design notes for your feedback. (PS- Forgive the formatting- I haven't figured out how to make a table on this board- I suspect I only have to use the HTML formatting tags, but I don't have the time atm; the disadvantage of doing this at work. )
Witch
Description/Flavor Text goes here
Hit Die: d4
Requirements: To qualify as a wiccan, a character must fulfill all the following criteria:
Feats: Brew Potion, Scribe Scroll
Skills: Knowledge (arcana) 6 ranks, spellcraft 10 ranks, disguise 4 ranks
Spellcasting: Ability to cast arcane spells of 3rd level or higher.
TABLE X-X: THE WITCH
Level BAB Fort. Ref. Will Special Spellcasting
1 +0 +0 +0 +2 Brews and Philtres +2 +1 level of existing class
2 +1 +0 +0 +3 Silver Tongue +2 +1 level of existing class
3 +1 +1 +1 +3 Doll Curse —
4 +2 +1 +1 +4 Brews and philtres +4, witches' charm +1 level of existing class
5 +2 +1 +1 +4 Silver Tongue +4 +1 level of existing class
6 +3 +2 +2 +5 —
7 +3 +2 +2 +5 Brews and philtres +6 +1 level of existing class
8 +4 +2 +2 +6 Silver Tongue +6, Shape Change +1 level of existing class
9 +4 +3 +3 +6 —
10 +5 +3 +3 +7 Ultimate Possession, brews and philtres +8 —
CLASS SKILLS
The witch’s class skills (and the key ability for each) are Bluff (Cha), Concentration (Con), Craft (alchemy) (Int), Disguise (Cha), Handle Animal (Cha), Heal (Wis), Knowledge (all skills, taken individulally) (Int), Sense Motive (Wis), Speak Language (Int), Spellcraft (Int), and Use Magic Device (Cha).
Skill Points at Each Level: 2 + Int modifier.
CLASS FEATURES
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Witches gain no new proficiencies in either armor or weapons.
Brews and Philtres (Ex): A witch gains the listed number as a bonus to her Craft (alchemy) checks.
Silver Tongue (Ex): A witch learns to speak in a very persuasive manner, as long as her arguments remain plausible. The wiccan gains the listed number as a bonus to Bluff checks used to influence others. Additionally, use of the Bluff skill is a standard action rather than a full-round action when attempting to influence others. She must be able to speak the language of those whose attitudes she is attempting to affect.
Doll Curse (Ex): The witch is able to make a replica of a living creature he or she knows, and use it to cast spells upon the target even if separated by distance. She must have a piece of the creature (lock of hair, skin, etc.) or a personal item belonging to the creature in order to establish a connection. Using the doll, the witch can cast any spell that has a target of living creature upon the target, regardless of distance separating the witch and her victim; normal chances of avoiding the spell’s effects (spell resistance, saving throws) still apply. Construction of the doll takes x amount of time and money.
Witches' Charm (Sp): Witch is affected as if casting a disguise self spell at will.
Spellbinding: Improved Familiar feat for free? Or second familiar, perhaps?
Witches' Curse (Sp): Bestow Curse spell-like ability, usable x times/day.
Shape Change: The wiccan gains the ability to cast shapechange x times/day.
Ultimate Possession (Sp): Gains ability to possess others as per possession in the Book of Vile Darkness. It only works on living creatures, and it only works like the Controller aspect.
Notes:
1) Doll Curse needs some work, though I'm not exactly sure how I'm going to tweak it. It definitely needs clarification, though.
2) Witches' Charm: I don't recall offhand how this works; I'll have to check it when I get home. In any case, it seems to me that it essentially enables the Witch to use the disguise self spell at will (though in the case of OD&D, this power only worked a certain number of times/day). Needs some clarification, perhaps spread its use over a period (such as 1/day at this level, increasing at later levels?)
3) Spellbinding, obviously, I'm not sure which way to go with it. I kind of like both ideas. Have to check the specifics of the ability when I get home though- it seems to me that it might be a bit different than my notes here imply.
4) This is a good example of an ability that should probably scale with level. The initial thought was that it would be just using the bestow curse spell as a spell-like ability, but it could either increase in potency and/or number of uses per day. I should check the Hexer base class in Complete Warrior for an idea of a similar concept.
5) Shapechange. Another idea of an ability that should scale. I think it should start at a lower level, similar to the druid, with increasing numbers of usage and abilities as the Witch gains levels. In particular, I was thinking that allowing the Witch the use of Wildshape (swarm) at this level of the Craft (to reflect the higher Circle) would be good- allow the witch to assume a cat or bat swarm form as one of her options.
6) Ultimate Possession- my notes above pretty much explain what I was thinking about going for here, but this ability definitely needs some clarification/change since the magic jar spell functions somewhat differently in 3E than it did in OD&D.
Anyway, I'll try and post some of the other Crafts that I've worked on for your perusal and input.
[EDIT] Just thought of something- 2 things, really.
1) IIRC, the Witch Craft mentioned something to the effect of the witch being able to cast spells directly out of a spellbook. I think I would like to reflect this with the Craft abilities (perhaps some of the "middle" levels) by allowing such a thing, though it would still use one of the witches spell slots for the day (IE, they would be swapping out a prepared spell in order to cast a spell out of their spellbook, the casting taking bump up to the next casting time as a result; ie, a swift spell would be a standard action; a standard action spell would be a full-round action; etc.)
2) Not entirely sold on the Caster level progression as yet. I think I would have to see the overall abilities before I signed off, but I think this class is not so powerful as to limit it to a 5 level (or lower) progression, but that it should be on the higher end.
Anyway, I went over the Craft info in Gaz3 last night, and came up with and clarified some ideas:
1) The Spellbinding feat- the option I presented (to either gain Improved Familiar or an extra Familiar) is a bit different from the concept as described. I thought they seemed similar in concept (essentially giving a familiar to the witch), so went with the more easily digestible and describable options I put forth, but a third idea- more in keeping with the letter of the ability- would be to have any summoned creatures (and/or those brought forth with planar binding spells) to function as if under clairaudience/clairvoyance and magic mouth spells. In such a case, I would add the requirement that the Witch/Wokan be able to cast some form of summoning spell (perhaps it could be a Circle requirement for advancement, if we use the model of the Ardent Dilettante from the Planar Handbook, as suggested by Ripvanwormer and Traianus.
2) I had modified the Doll Curse ability from its original format for this proposed class- it originally only took 3 forms (Doll of Pain, Insanity, and umm... something else). I did that mainly because I thought it would be interesting to be able to have the Witch/Wokan do more voodoo/sympathetic magic than just those three types, and because it could work well with the new item crafting rules (ie, it becomes a new type of Witch-only item crafting feat).
If it seems more in keeping with the tone of the class than the idea I proposed, we could always just stick with the 3 original abilities, and parse them out over the course of the class.
Another option would be to make a new feat- Craft Doll (or something), that could potentially be purchased by anyone- and just give it to Witches/Wokans as a Bonus Feat.
1) Your idea for the Spellbinding ability is good. I wonder though if it should only apply only to summoned creatures of the Animal type, otherwise I think it starts to get away from "witch" and more towards "demonologist" with the more advanced summoning spells.
2) I would keep Doll Curse more in line with the Gaz, with the three types. Your current version seems over powerful to me. Adding an item creation aspect (along with an small XP req per doll) seems reasonable. I'd like to see more about this ability (I realize this is an early draft).
3) Witch's Curse: I don't see it in your level progression. Depending on when it's first gained, maybe have it 3/day, by 10th level maybe have it at 5/day.
4) Shapechange: 3/day as per spell, limit shapes to animal forms and bat or rat swarm.
5) Your skill based abilities (Brews and Philtres, Witch's Charm) look good.
6) Ultimate Possession: I have the BoVD, but I imagine most here do not. You might want to further elaborate how this works so it is usable for people only with the SRD.
I'll have to pull out GAZ3 sometime soon and look more closely at the crafts. I'll be able to give better feedback then.
It is a great start, though!
I'll weigh in here with a few comments relating directly to this class (and keep the more general connversion ideas to the other thread).
Cool- I was actually just sitting down to post some more ideas about this.
1) Your idea for the Spellbinding ability is good. I wonder though if it should only apply only to summoned creatures of the Animal type, otherwise I think it starts to get away from "witch" and more towards "demonologist" with the more advanced summoning spells.
Good point, and something to bear in mind. The Gaz specifically mentions gremlins and imps, so my first suggestion was to keep with that, but I can definitely see altering it a bit and limiting it to animals. In fact, if we go with that, we might put the Summon Animals spells on an exclusive spell list for the Witch. The Witch spell list from the DMG (in the Modifying Character Classes section, p 174-175) doesn't mention either summon monster or summon animal in the spell list (in fact it says they don't summon monsters), although I think that the archetype they present there would actually be well rounded out by summon animal spells.
2) I would keep Doll Curse more in line with the Gaz, with the three types. Your current version seems over powerful to me. Adding an item creation aspect (along with an small XP req per doll) seems reasonable. I'd like to see more about this ability (I realize this is an early draft).
It is too powerful as written. I have some ideas for making it a bit of an Item Creation ability like you suggest to tone it down. I'll work on that, and then present two different versions- one with the Doll Curse abilities from the Gaz, and one with the Item Creation bonus feat (and an exploration of the feat itself).
3) Witch's Curse: I don't see it in your level progression. Depending on when it's first gained, maybe have it 3/day, by 10th level maybe have it at 5/day.
Whoops! I think I forgot to include it because I wasn't yet sure of how to do it. I think something like the Hexblade is good (essentially a bestow curse effect, a limited number of times/day, with increasing penalties), although the Gaz one is somewhat more powerful. The bestow curse spell itself changed in power level quite a bit from 2nd and 1st Edition AD&D (and the OD&D version was a bit more powerful- or at least more open to interpretation- than either of those). I was trying to decide whether the spirit of the ability was more important than the mechanics.
Also, I'm not sure if including the ability to curse generations of the victim is too powerful or not. Offhand, I'd say it is, but then again, how many campaigns really last long enough to have a second generation of PCs descended from the first? (And, frankly, I think it might be kind of a cool roleplaying hook to start a new generation PC with a curse holdover from his father's run-in with a witch.) Offhand, I'm inclined to keep it as flavor.
I'm going to read the Book of Vile Darkness' entry on curses and see if that gives me any ideas.
4) Shapechange: 3/day as per spell, limit shapes to animal forms and bat or rat swarm.
Think this should be similar to a Shapechange spell-like ability, or more of a druidic Wildshape? I'm sort of torn on the issue.
5) Your skill based abilities (Brews and Philtres, Witch's Charm) look good.
Cool. I was thinking the bonuses might be too high (at least on the Silver Tongue ability), but not sure.
6) Ultimate Possession: I have the BoVD, but I imagine most here do not. You might want to further elaborate how this works so it is usable for people only with the SRD.
Definitely- the entry here was mostly a placeholder, as I hadn't quite decided on specifics. I was hoping the Possession information might be in Unearthed Arcana (which is now on the SRD pages), but I just perused the Hypertext d20 site and they're not there.
Looking over the ability in BoVD now, though, I'm wondering if I should limit it to just Controller, though. Should I open it up to all forms of possession, do you think?
I should probably also limit its usage, which I haven't done I see. The original ability was only usable once/month, which I will reduce substantially, but I also don't think they should be able to do it at will.
I think I should also emphasize the vulnerability of the normal form while possessing another body, because that could be a big concern.
I'll have to pull out GAZ3 sometime soon and look more closely at the crafts. I'll be able to give better feedback then.
It is a great start, though!
A quick note about Doll Curse - even with an unlimited range you may want to limit it so that it only works if the doll and the target are on the same plane.
Regards
Gary