Aurasynth Knight [prc] (Magipunk)

[sirpercival]

Mostly designed by littha, edited and posted by sirp, fixed by Garryl.  Some love for mechanosynths!

Aurasynth Knight

   
"If you would like to meet your end, I would be happy to introduce you."

-Reynolds Skrath, aurasynth knight

An aurasynth knight is a glowing warrior, encased in supple metal and blasting foes with his prismatic armbolt.

BECOMING AN AURASYNTH KNIGHT
An aurasynth knight begins as a mechanosynth/holomancer.

 ENTRY REQUIREMENTS
   Coherent Light: 2d6
   Evolve: Armbolt

Class Skills
 The Aurasynth Knight's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Arcana (Int), Athletics (Str), Concentration (Wis), Engineering (Int), Negotiation (Cha), Perception (Wis), Persuasion (Cha), and Profession (Wis).
Skills Points at Each  Level : 2 + int

Table: Aurasynth Knight				HD: d8
Level 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10	Base Attack Bonus +1 +2 +3 +4 +5 +6 +7 +8 +9 +10	Fort Save +2 +3 +3 +4 +4 +5 +5 +6 +6 +7	Ref Save +0 +0 +1 +1 +1 +2 +2 +2 +3 +3	Will Save +2 +3 +3 +4 +4 +5 +5 +6 +6 +7	Special Martial holomancy, armblast Aurashield, backflash Laser projection, luminescent evolution +1d8 Next stage (type), power of light Bonus feat, luminescent evolution +2d8 Power of shape Barrage, luminescent evolution +3d8 Next stage (immunity) Bonus feat, luminescent evolution +4d8 Aura bombardment	Sculpts and Essences    0 1 1 2 2 3 3 4 4 5	Evolution +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver +1 level of Synthevolver

Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: An aurasynth knight gains proficiency with heavy armor, as well as one exotic armor of his choice.

Invocations: An aurasynth knight learns new light sculpting and prismatic essence invocations as shown in the table above.  His aurasynth knight and holomancer levels stack for the purposes of determining which grade of light sculpting and prismatic essence invocations he can select, as well as for the caster level of his existing invocations.

Martial holomancy: An aurasynth knight uses his Constitution modifier in place of his Charisma modifier for his holomancer abilities, where applicable.  He also ignores arcane spell failure for invocations while wearing armor with which he is proficient.

Evolution: At every level, an aurasynth knight increases his evolution progression as if he had gained a level in synthevolver.  This does not include evolution 0 enhancements.

Armblast (Su): The first stage of an aurasynth knight's training teaches him how to combine the luminous power of coherent light with the pure mechanical power of his armbolt. An aurasynth knight adds his armbolt damage to damage dealt by his coherent light attacks.  Whenever he makes a full attack with coherent light, he may instead make one attack with his armbolt for each attack he makes with coherent light, at the same attack bonus.  He may make these attacks in any order.

Aurashield (Su): Beginning at 2nd level, an aurasynth knight may channel his power over light into a shield that can stop incoming attacks in their tracks. As long as the aurasynth knight has a free hand, he may channel coherent light into a protective barrier which grants a shield bonus to AC and a resistance bonus to saves equal to the number of dice his coherent light attack would deal (including the extra damage from his armbolt).  The aurashield may be activated and deactivated with the same action it would take to draw or sheath a weapon, and may not be dropped.

Backflash (Su): Whenever an aurasynth knight of 2nd level or higher damages a target with coherent light, his next armbolt attack against that target before his next turn is resolved as a touch attack, and benefits as well from any prismatic essences he applied to that coherent light attack. Each coherent light attack affects a different armbolt attack, but this effect cannot be applied more than once to any given armbolt attack.

Laser projection (Su): At 3rd level, an aurasynth knight can use his coherent light attack against any target he has attacked this round with his armbolt, even if that target is out of range of his coherent light (as long as it is still within range of his armbolt). If he does so, treat his coherent light as a projectile attack with a range increment equal to that of his armbolt for the purpose of determining penalties for attacking targets at distant range increments.

Luminescent evolution (Su): Beginning at 3rd level, the damage of an aurasynth's armbolt increases by +1d8.  This bonus damage is untyped, as per coherent light, modified by any prismatic essences or light sculpts applied to your armbolt (see Power of Light).  This damage increases by +1d8 at 5th, 7th, and 9th level.

Next Stage (Ex): Upon reaching 4th level, an aurasynth knight learns to combine holomancy with mechanical synthetic evolution, allowing him to undergo a unique transformation.  The aurasynth knight's type changes to elemental, with the bound elemental subtype (see below).  His eyes take on a powerful white glow and glowing bands of runes appear around his joints.  This visual manifestation of his power may be hidden as a standard action, and stays hidden until released as a free action.   While the manifestation is hidden, the aurasynth knight loses access to his coherent light damage and his sculpts and essences (but he still meets prerequisites that he met before).  At 8th level, the transformation intensifies as the aurasynth knight gains immunity to mind-affecting effects.

Power of Light (Su): The second stage of training teaches how to control the focused energies of an aurasynth knight's armbolt by changing the essence of light.  An aurasynth of level 4 or higher may apply prismatic essence invocations to his armbolt (including the extra damage granted by luminescent evolution). This follows the normal restrictions of the chosen essence, including the type of action required to make an attack with the armbolt. In addition, essences that apply to the first attack in an iterative attack may be applied to the Armlaser and Armgrenade evolves.

Bonus feat: An aurasynth knight gains a bonus feat at 5th and 9th level.  The chosen feat may be any exotic armor proficiency or fighter bonus feat for which he meets the prerequisites.

Power of Shape (Su):  The third stage of training teaches an aurasynth knightof 6th level or higher how to control the power of the armblaster with the art of shaping light.  Any armbolt attacks gained from his backflash ability benefit from light sculpts in addition to prismatic essences that apply to the associated coherent light attacks.

Barrage (Su):  At 7th level, the penalty to an aurasynth knight's attack rolls for making secondary natural attacks with his armbolt and making iterative attacks with his coherent light are reduced by 1 for every previous successful attack he makes with either during his turn. This cannot reduce the penalty he suffers on a given attack roll to less than -0.

Aura Bombardment (Su): Upon reaching 10th level, an aurasynth knight reaches the pinnacle of his power.  Once per day as a full-round action, he can make a single coherent light attack and a single armbolt attack against every target within range of both of them.  This ability is generally used to shock and awe a large group of enemies, or provide covering fire for advancing allies.
 
PLAYING AN AURASYNTH KNIGHT
 Brief description on how to play the class you are designing.
 Combat: Here's a section where you will describe common combat methods for your class. Remember to include information on how your class will use his powers in combat.
 Advancement: This is a section on different options and paths that the class can go down when they advance in power.
Resources: What resources might a member of this PrC be able to draw on.

AURASYNTH KNIGHT IN THE WORLD
"A quote of somebody else talking about your class!"

-name of quote originator

Aurasynth Knights serve as shock troopers for close quarters fighting where the toughness of a mechanosynth can be combined with the destructive power of a Holomancer, their name derives from a defunct mercenary company who pioneered this style of fighting. Despite the name, Aurasynth Knights are no more inclined to be bound by any sort of honor than anyone else, indeed they are often popular bouncers and strong arms in the casinos and night clubs of Evernight where their lumionus justice is hard to miss.
 Daily Life: Most Aurasynth Knights are mercenaries and generally live fairly typically for that, they spend their time cleaning their equipment and training when not on duty
 Notables: Make up some cool information about notable figures in the history of your class. It's best to give a little information from one of the good alignment and evil alignment (unless it's a good or evil only class).
 Organizations: Some information about organizations dedicated to the practice of your class and other organizations which members of your class will be attracted towards.

NPC Reaction
 Most NPCs avoid a confrontation with an Aurasynth Knight, their common presence as security detail generally makes people wary of starting a fight with one.



Bound Elemental Subtype:

• A Bound Elemental possesses the following traits (unless otherwise noted in a creature's entry).
• Immunity to Poison, Sleep Effects, Parlysis and Stunning.
• Unlike other Elementals, a bound elemental is subject to critical hits and flanking.
• Unlike other Elementals, a bound elemental can be raised or resurrected.
• Does not need to eat, sleep, or breathe, but can still benefit from the effects of consumable spells and magic items such as heroes' feast and potions.
• Does not need to sleep, but must rest for 8 hours before preparing spells.

[Nanshork]

Since Armblast is a simple weapon can it be enchanted?

[Garryl]

It would still need to be masterwork for that. And since it's not a natural weapon, you can't use a Necklace of Natural Attacks and friends to boost it any more.

I see a disturbing lack of synergy in this class. At 1st level, you gain no progression of any abilities and actually lose a good chunk of both existing abilities (Holomancer invocations) and future ones (Holomancer invocations and Synthevolver evolution choices). Your Coherent Light misses out on 2 dice of damage (one from two levels on Synthevolver, another from the slowed class progression) meaning that even with an Armblast you're barely doing more damage once the evolution 0s kick in, at the cost of making regular attacks instead of touch attacks,  losing your free secondary natural ranged attack, and preventing you from using your sculpts and essences (the little Holomancer bling you still get) until near the end of this class.

As a Synthevolver, you're 5 levels behind. As Holomancer, you're only out 2 levels, except that you lose everything but your blasting.

Semi-related, but the Holomancer's Coherent Light isn't affected by ASF, and the invocations have a typo saying they aren't affected by ASF of armor heavier than medium, rather than medium or heavier.

[sirpercival]

Hmm... yes, all that is true.  Do you have any suggestions on how to fix it?

[littha]

Higher Coherent Light scaling and making the armblast count as masterwork so that it can be enchanted would up the damage output significantly if that is what is needed.... otherwise, unique sculpts and essences would help. Possibly also dropping the 2 dead synthevolver levels too...

[Garryl]

Not a complete list:
- Progress Holomancer caster level, even if you don't get more invocations.
- Make 1st level not be a negative level (I'd play Holomancer 3/Synthevolver 2/Commoner 1 over /Aurasynth Knight 1 in E6).
   - Dump Martial Holomancy and Restricted Evolution.
   - Give something actually useful at 1st level.
- Let an Armblast actually be better than Coherent Light normally is, instead of a bit more damage for a lot less accuracy. Boost the good stuff, don't trap it with mediocrity. If you're taking away the touch attack, you need to give something pretty nice to compensate. Losing the prismatic essences and light sculpts is just cruel.
   - The simplest solution is to just add armbolt damage to your Coherent Light (no limitations, just tack it on on top of your regular awesomeness).
- Change Armblast to not nerf one of the cool things about the armbolt, that it was a ranged natural attack. Natural attacks are hard to come by, and ranged ones are... well there's the Manticore and the Totemist's Manticore Belt. That's about it.
- Power of Light and Power of Shape are just giving you things you should have had already. Aura Bombardment costs one of your few Stage 2 Evolves in order to give you something you could have had a few levels ago anyways with your light sculpts.
- Knightly Training is just about useless without the proficiencies. Go ahead and give them at level 1. You know you want to.
- Armbolt and Coherent Light probably aren't the best things to mix. Mechanically, they're redundant, and Coherent Light is better in almost every way. Armbolt doesn't even have anything special that it brings to the party (except being a natural attack, but even that is limited).

I'll try to whip up a quick fix for some of these issues.

Also, I have to wonder if this niche isn't already filled by the Energy Warrior. PoC may not be finished, but it's still in a very playable state and is explicitly included in your campaign setting.

[sirpercival]

You know, maybe I should just take the ideas and rebuild it from the ground up, with different abilities and stuff.

[Garryl]

Quick fix ideas.

Sculpts/Essences: Learn a new one at every even level.
Invocations: Class level stacks to determine caster level.
Evolution: +1 Synth at ALL levels. No evolution 0s, but see Armblast.

Coherent Light: No increases, but see Armblast.
Martial Holomancy: At 1st, use Con instead of Cha for invocations, and ignore ASF of armor with which you are proficient for the purpose of invocations.
Armblast: Add your armbolt damage to your Coherent Light damage. When you make a full attack with Coherent Light, you can make one secondary armbolt attack for each Coherent Light attack you can make, instead of only one. You can make these attack in any order.

Aurashield: As normal. Counts your armbolt damage (as applied with Armblast).
Backflash: At 2nd level, if you damage a target with Coherent Light, your next Armbolt attack against that target before your next turn is resolved a touch attack and benefits from any prismatic essences you applied to that Coherent Light attack. Multiple Coherent Light attacks will affect multiple armbolt attacks, but this effect cannot be applied more than once to any given armbolt attack.

Luminescent Evolution: At 3rd, 5th, 7th, and 9th level, the damage of your armbolt increases by +1d8. Treat this bonus damage as untyped damage, as per Coherent Light. It is affected fully by any prismatic essences or light scultping invocations applied to your armbolt.
Laser Projection: At 3rd level, you can use your Coherent Light attacks against any target you have attacked this round with your armbolt, even if that target is out of range of your Coherent Light (as long as it is still within range of your armbolt). If you do, treat your Coherent Light as a projectile attack with a range increment equal to that of your armbolt for the purpose of determining penalties for attacking targets at distant range increments.

Next Stage (Elemental): At 4th level.

Bonus Feat: At 5th level and 9th level. Any Fighter feat or Exotic Armor Proficiency feat.

Power of Shape: At 6th level, you can apply light sculpting invocations that you used with your Coherent Light attacks to your armbolt attacks that benefit from Backflash.

Barrage: At 7th level, the penalty to your attack rolls for making secondary natural attacks with your arbolt and making iterative attacks with your Coherent Light are reduced by 1 for every previous attack you've already made with either of them this turn. This cannot reduce the penalty you suffer on a given attack roll to less than -0.

Next Stage (mind-affecting immunity): At 8th level.

Aura Bombardment: Once per day, you can make a single Coherent Light and secondary natural armbolt attack against every target within range of both of them.

[sirpercival]

Also, I have to wonder if this niche isn't already filled by the Energy Warrior. PoC may not be finished, but it's still in a very playable state and is explicitly included in your campaign setting.

Well... mechanosynth is getting very little love, and I like this idea to mesh.  But Energy Warrior is actually a very nice option to ALSO mesh with mechanosynth, so I will be writing another PrC to do so. 

Plus, you can never have too many gish prcs, IMO.

[sirpercival]

OK, updated using Garryl's quick fixes.  Fixed now?

[littha]

Armblast (Su): The first stage of an aurasynth knight's training teaches him how to combine the luminous power of coherent light with the pure mechanical power of his armbolt. An aurasynth knight adds his armbolt damage to damage dealt by his coherent light attacks.  Whenever he makes a full attack with coherent light, he may instead make one attack with his armbolt for each attack he makes with coherent light, at the same attack bonus.  He may make these attacks in any order.

The wording on the Armblast needs some work, It is confusing as to what it actually does with these possiblities:
1. may swap coherant light attacks out for armbolt attacks when making a full attack
2. may follow a full coherant light attack with one armbolt attack for each you used
2.1. possibly followed up by your normal armbolt natural attacks, because you could do that anyway and nothing says that you cant.

[littha]

Another point That I need to make is that as the bonus damage from progressing Evolution 0 and coherent light is missing the expected damage of the class may be a lot lower than intended.

Synthevolver 2/Holomancer 3/Aurasynth Knight 10
Armblast: 5d8
Coherant Light: 5d8+2d6

(assuming point 1 of the above post)
Attack Routine of
Light/Blast/Light/Blast
5d8+2d6/5d8/5d8+2d6/5d8
29.5/22.5/29.5/22.5
104 damage a round.

Assuming point 2 (Light/Blast/Light/Blast/Light/Blast/Light/Blast) its 208 damage a round and assuming point 3(Light/Blast/Light/Blast/Light/Blast/Light/Blast/Blast) its 230.5

This seems a little low for a level 15 character

[Garryl]

I haven't looked closely at how SirP worded it, but my suggested version was as per #2 (4+4 attacks). Your math is off slightly for a 15th level character. though (BaB is only 13, so no 4th attack yet) for 156 damage. Of course, you can boost that (the +1 damage/die essence would give +72 damage to that, and you have all your feats and items and whatnot). And blowing things to kingdom come is only part of your class features since you have full evolution progression and stuff.