Disclaimer: This class was created by Amechra. I did not contribute at all to this, nor ask permission to copy it here, but I do like it a
lot. So I thought I'd copy it over to this board, because I frequently have problems with the one
where it was originally posted, and I want to have reliable access to it. I only modified one thing, and that was to make the table match the text, and Amechra had confirmed that it was supposed to work as the text, not the table.
THE NORD'S BLADESelect any 10 Discipline skills; they are the Class skills for this class.Skill Points per Level: 4+Int Modifier
Skill Points at First Level: (4+Int Modifier)*4
HD: d8
| Level | Base Attack Bonus | Fort Save | Ref Save | Will Save | Special | Fate Dice | Maneuvers Recognized |
| 1st | +0 | +0 | +2 | +2 | Altered Fate, Fate's Swordsman | 1 | 2 |
| 2nd | +1 | +0 | +3 | +3 | Uncanny Dodge, Replace Fate | 2 | 2 |
| 3rd | +2 | +1 | +3 | +3 | Right Place at the Right Time | 3 | 3 |
| 4th | +3 | +1 | +4 | +4 | Fate's Evasion, Fated Strike (1st) | 3 | 3 |
| 5th | +3 | +1 | +4 | +4 | Alter the Outcome (Damage) | 4 | 4 |
| 6th | +4 | +2 | +5 | +5 | Mutable Past | 5 | 4 |
| 7th | +5 | +2 | +5 | +5 | Fated Strike (2nd) | 5 | 4 |
| 8th | +6 | +2 | +6 | +6 | Improved Uncanny Dodge | 6 | 5 |
| 9th | +6 | +3 | +6 | +6 | Alter the Outcome (Attack) | 7 | 5 |
| 10th | +7 | +3 | +7 | +7 | Fated Strike (3rd) | 7 | 6 |
| 11th | +8 | +3 | +7 | +7 | Improved Fate's Evasion | 8 | 6 |
| 12th | +9 | +4 | +8 | +8 | Bonus Luck Feat | 9 | 6 |
| 13th | +9 | +4 | +8 | +8 | Fated Strike (4th) | 9 | 7 |
| 14th | +10 | +4 | +9 | +9 | Bonus Luck Feat | 10 | 7 |
| 15th | +11 | +5 | +9 | +9 | Alter the Outcome (Saves) | 11 | 8 |
| 16th | +12 | +5 | +10 | +10 | Bonus Luck Feat | 11 | 8 |
| 17th | +12 | +5 | +10 | +10 | Fated Strike (5th) | 12 | 8 |
| 18th | +13 | +6 | +11 | +11 | Bonus Luck Feat | 13 | 9 |
| 19th | +14 | +6 | +11 | +11 | Fated Strike (6th) | 13 | 9 |
| 20th | +15 | +6 | +12 | +12 | Fatima Pluropotentia | 14 | 10 |
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Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: A Nord's Blade is proficient in all simple and martial weapons, along with any associated weapon of any discipline they selected in the morning; they are also proficient in all Light and Medium armors.
Maneuvers Known: A Nord's Blade is a rather different fighter than your average Initiator; in fact, they are almost surreally differently.
Each morning, the Nord's Blade may select a number of Maneuvers Known from any Discipline equal to the Maneuvers Recognized column on the table above.
They have a number of Readied Maneuvers equal to 1plus half the number of Maneuvers Recognized they have; unlike normally, they may ready a single maneuver multiple times. They may recover a single expended use of any maneuver by removing a number of Fate Dice results equal to 1 + one-third the level of that maneuver, rounded up.
Instead of learning a number of stances, the Nord's Blade automatically enters a stance of their choice; they may only enter a stance if they have met all of the prerequisites for that stance.
For the purposes of what maneuvers they have access to, select any three disciplines. For those disciplines alone, the Nord's Blade's IL is equal to their class level plus half their levels in non-initiator classes. Finally, the Nord's Blade uses their Charisma in place of the normal key ability score for those three discipline.
Fate Dice: For those who play with fate on their side, it helps that they are able to "tug" the strings, as it were. At the start of the day, a Nord's Blade rolls the number of six-sided dice indicated above, and records the results. If Fate Dice are removed, they regain a single Fate Die at the beginning of every encounter; you do this by rolling a d6, and recording the new result.
Altered Fate (Ex): A Nord's Blade is a horrible person to fight; after all, they have been changed by the fates to work on a slightly different framework of fate. As such, at level 1, the Nord's Blade is treated as if they were using the Bell Curve Rolls variant from Unearthed Arcana.
Fate's Swordsman (Su): A Nord's Blade is, literally, the Sword of Fate, and, as such, is rather more dangerous than a swordsman should be; they may, by performing a DC 20 Concentration check, replace a "d20" roll (in reality a 3d6 roll) with a roll of 4d6 and remove any one dice result. That result is then added to their Fate Dice pool; as such, it can only be used when the Fate Dice pool isn't full. This ability is a free action that may be used only once per round.
Uncanny Dodge (Ex): As the Barbarian class feature.
Replace Fate (Su): A Nord's Blade smiles at bad luck, as for them, there is no luck; they are merely saving up success for later. At 2nd level, when they roll a "d20" (really a 3d6), they may replace a single d6 from the result with of one of the dice from their Fate Dice pool. This ability is a free action that may only be used once per round.
Right Place at the Right Time (Ex): A Nord's Blade is well attuned to the ebb and flow of Fate, and, as such, is always at the right place at the right time. At 3rd level, they may add their Charisma modifier to their initiative.
Fate's Evasion (Ex and Su): This ability functions as Evasion, but can be aided by a pull at fate's heartstrings; they may swap any number of d6s rolled for damage for the evaded effect with results from their Fate Dice pool. This swap applies to the damage rolled for everyone affected by the evaded effect. The second part of this ability is Supernatural, and as such does not function when Supernatural abilities can't be used; additionally, the second part of this ability does not affect Maximized effects, as they do not actually roll the dice.
Fated Strike (Su): A Nord's Blade is strengthened by the power of fate, and of course, since fate's strings are so close to their fingers... After all, if that blow was FATED to hit, they obviously don't have to put any effort into it.
A Nord's Blade may, once per encounter per 3 Nord Blade levels, use a single maneuver of up to the listed level without expending it; if they do so, they may add their charisma modifier to either the attack roll or the damage rolls for the maneuver. If the maneuver doesn't deal damage or require an attack roll, they may instead have the duration of any effect it causes repeat next round, without spending an action. After using this ability, remove a number of Fate Dice equal to 1 plus one-third of the maneuver's level, rounded up, from their pool; if the number of Fate Dice removed from the pool is greater than the number of Fate Dice in the pool, the Nord's Blade gains a number of Negative Levels equal to the difference. These Negative Levels never become level loss, and ignore immunity to Negative Levels; Fate can only be pushed so much.
Alter the Outcome (Su): EVERYONE follows fate, its just that some people... like giving fate a push to keep it going the direction they like.
As an immediate action, a Nord's Blade may designate a single creature within 60'; for 1 round, that creature is treated as if they had the Altered Fate ability. In addition, as a free action, once per round, the Nord's Blade may use their Fate's Swordsman or Replace Fate ability on a single roll by the designated creature.
At 5th level, they may only use this ability on skill checks made by the designated creature.
At 9th level, they may also use this ability on attack rolls made by the designated creature.
At 15th level, they may also use this ability on saves made by the designated creature.
This ability may be used on the Nord's Blade themselves; this allows them to use Fate's Swordsman or Replace Fate twice on a single roll of the indicated types, if they so choose.
Mutable Past (Su): Not everyone started off perfect; however, when you can push fate around, you can usually figure out how to deal with vagaries of the past.
While they are selecting their maneuvers known, they may lower the maximum amount of Fate Dice results they may have prepared by 3 for 24 hours to make it so that one ability score is treated as if it was originally an 18 (in other words, before any increases from levels or magical enhancements, their ability score is treated as if it was an 18.) In addition, they may alter their appearance to any their race could possible have, and may alter their name, their accent, their gender, and the appearance of their clothing while they are doing this; however, this cannot be used as a disguise because, as far as the world is concerned, they have always been that way (Wanted posters alter to match a different face, the name on official documents is changed and so on.). The "18" for a given ability score lasts for 24 hours, but the other changes they may elect bring into play are permanent until they change them again through use of this ability.
Improved Uncanny Dodge (Ex): As the Barbarian ability of the same name.
Improved Fate's Evasion (Ex and Su): As the Fate's Evasion ability, but based off of Improved Evasion rather than Evasion.
Bonus Luck Feat (Ex): Luck is just another word for the vagaries of fate; thus, this marks a refinement of the Nord's Blade's talent for fate manipulation. At the listed levels, they gain a bonus luck feat, which they must qualify for.
Fatima Pluripotentia (Su): Fate is now a pushover for the Nord's Blade to push and pull; they may, as a free action once per round, set every result in their Fate Dice pool to either 1 or 6. All Dice in the pool must be set to the same value.
Multiclassing Notes
Given the odd way they use maneuvers, Nord's Blades have a special way to qualify for PrCs that require knowledge of maneuvers of a certain level from a given discipline.
A Nord's Blade may meet any requirement that involves knowledge of maneuvers of a given level of a given discipline as long as they are capable of using maneuvers of that level and have that discipline as a discipline you chose that morning.
When a Nord's Blade gains another Maneuver Known from a PrC, they alter their number of Maneuvers Known and Readied accordingly; however, whenever they gain another Maneuver Readied from a PrC, they add it directly to the number of Maneuvers they may have Readied.
When a Nord's Blade enters a PrC that advances a Maneuver progression, they do not gain IL normally; instead, they gain full IL for any Disciplines that the PrC can normally learn (for example, Shadow Hand and Devoted Spirit maneuvers for Ruby Knight Vindicator), and only 1/2 for all other Disciplines.
Nord's Blades and Luck Feats
When a Nord's Blade gains access to a Luck Feat, they do not gain daily luck rerolls; instead, the maximum number of Fate Dice they may have in their pool is increased by the amount of luck rerolls they would have gotten from the feat. Additionally, they may expend Fate Dice to use Luck Feats, on a one-to-one exchange rate.
This note also applies for any other ability that grants the ability to reroll a 20-sided dice.
Additional Stuff:
Changer of Prior Destiny: Who wants to change their backstory?
Luck Thief: Look, all you need to know is that rolling the dice now
hurts your enemy, m'kay?
Feat
Combat Replacement
Prerequisites: Replace Fate class feature, Cha 13
Benefits: You may use Replace Fate and Fate's Swordsman a number of times per round equal to 1+your Cha modifier. This number of uses is shared by both class abilities.
Special: This feat counts as Combat Reflexes for the purpose of prerequisites; if this feat is used to qualify for a feat that has an Intelligence prerequisite, change Intelligence to Charisma.
Item
Chronocharm of the Dour Oracle
A small charm shaped to look like an hourglass. In its facets, it shows a glimpse of a thousand possibilities.
This item is use activated.
When a Chronocharm of the Dour Oracle is used, a character may roll a single Luck Reroll (if they have one) after looking at the results of the a roll, instead of before. Once this ability is used, the charm is destroyed.
Cost: 500 gp
Creation: 250 gp, 50 xp, Replace Fate class feature
Notes:
I made this as a way to just shake up the rules a bit, with a bit of a rule change that I haven't seen implemented before.
Changelog
-Alter the Outcome now functions like either Replace Fate or Fate's Swordsman, rather than being able to replace all the dice.
-Fate's Evasion no longer can replace Maximized dice. This is to prevent someone from loading up their pool with 6s.
-Mutable Past was altered so that the reduction in Fate Dice only lasted 24 hours.
-Replace Fate and Fate's Swordsman now work 1/round. Fate's Swordsman allows more choice when removing that one die.
-Fixed wording. A LOT OF WORDING!
