I posted this yesterday in the GitP version of the thread, and now its here! Furthermore, I'll be going over Tier requests in this thread for a bit, and will give the Tiers at the beginning of this thread a full update to be in line with the GitP version. I see there are also quite a few big projects now here that weren't there the last time I was busy with Tiering (its been a few months), so they are candidates for getting a similar treatment to what you'll find below.
Mysterious MondaysShadow Magic has always been a bit of the odd one out amongst all magic systems. It resembles vancian casting a lot in some ways, but yet works very differently. At the same time, it shares its book with two other magic systems: Binding and Truenaming, the former of which is considered to be the most balanced magic subsystem in 3.5 and which has many fans, the latter of which is considered the worst balanced magic subsystem in 3.5 and which has many opponents. Shadow magic meanwhile has decent fluff in Tome of Magic, but neither really the strong love nor the strong hatred that the others seem to garner. Several people have built further on Shadow Magic in their homebrew however, some with a single PrC or a handful of mysteries or a feat, one or two with slightly larger projects, and then there is one man with a huge one. You might know him on the forums as Realms of Chaos.
His project, the Descent of Shadows, can be found
here and is one of the biggest homebrew projects I've ever seen, especially for something that could be considered "just" a fix. (I say just, but it certainly isn't "just" a fix, clearly!) Truly, this project is amazing, and daunting to even read through it all! Luckily, for this, I didn't need to read through everything, just the necessary bits to give a decent coverage of the base class and their full workings.
EDIT: It's later!
Cultist: Fluff is very simple and prettymuch everything can be gotten from just reading the name. On the mysteries it ties that well into the crunch, by having them start out similar to divine spells (iirc, normally they're more akin to arcane ones). They never gain access to the level 7 or higher mysteries, but they got more uses of them than a Shadowcaster for each of them. Plus, Expanded Faith grants some divine spells off the Cleric list, expanding their reportoire and versatility.
Patron's Gift can be stronger when used on yourself, but only after level 4, and healing is never bad. The True Believer feat isn't a huge thing, but if you're using Relics in your campaign, it's an amazing little extra. Later on, you gain some resistances and immunities and small ways to control undead and outsiders. Not strongly so, but they're certainly useful abilities. Overall, I'm not sure about putting it in Tier 3, it depends on the mysteries, which I assume are slightly better than the ToM ones, but the Shadowcaster is already a good Tier 4, so this one is at least Borderline.
Hollow: Being an anime fan, the name of course first reminded me of Bleach, but the name is actually quite inspired for this class. Y'know, if Realms of Chaos doesn't happen to be an anime fan who took that name and gained inspiration from it to turn it into something completely different. Mechanically, they can be compared to a Shadowy Paladin, as they gain mysteries only at level 6 and are much more combat-based than they are caster-like.
Plunged Into Darkness feels rather weird on a base class (well, any class with a similar ability *AHEMWARHULK*), so I wonder as to the fluff-wise justification for it, although I do have a hunch. Exude Darkness is likewise a weird ability, but it has its uses. Moment of Clarity looks likewise useful, but its downsides FAR outstrip the benefits of it, and you can only use it "once per level",even! I sure hope for all the downsides and limited abilities to this class, it has something good later on! We'll see, won't we?
Then there's Pull of Shadows. Reading through it, I can't help but think that either the rest of the party needs to be built around playing together with a Hollow, or you want to send it into the midst of your enemies. Otherwise, this ability seems like it'll make the Hollow more of a detriment to the party than something good.
Inured to Hardship and Freed of Flesh are finally some truly beneficial things, but all passive, non-combat things. Shadowstriding is the first really great ability the Hollow has: yay, teleportation! Sadly, this only comes at level 5, a little late for something good. Then again, I did compare it to the Paladin earlier, so maybe I'm being punished for the comparison. Touched by Darkness is another cool one, and also movement-related, so the Hollow certainly will never be in need of much aid in getting somewhere in the midst of a fight. Shadow Strike is nifty, but because the damage is nonlethal and the damage bonus variable and usually not that much (though it can easily start at +7d6), its highly limited in use, due to the high amount of monsters immune to nonlethal damage. This dampens Felling Blow as well, which otherwise could've been a great ability.
Overall, the Hollow seems very weak. Their only strong point is that they can take damage instead of expending a use of a mystery, while still using that mystery. Depending on which mystery used, this can be very strong, but they do not have access to the higher level mysteries and require taking all the previous mysteries in a path if you want to get the higher-level mysteries. The class certainly won't get out of Tier 4, in the low end, tops.
Eventide Magus: Okay, wow. You get both arcane casting with some very strong spells and full shadowcasting. There's gotta be a downside, because this is like being a full-on Noctumancer from the get-go. The Twilight stuff just piles it on some more with its special sight of all sorts combined. (Not a huge thing, but something extra nonetheless.)
The Price: Oh, so there is a downside! Whew, goo--what. That's no downside. Sure, the casting check is a hassle, but you've got so many things to cast you can go with a few failures, and with a +11 on that check you can cast everything flawlessly. Ability and skill check bonuses are one of the least hard things to get together. And this just gives it all a further power boost! Tier 2, no doubt about it.
Ephemeral Watcher: Brief glance, first impression: this is the monk amongst these classes. Well, unarmed strike at least, plus there are some debilitating oaths attached to it that are a pain to deal with, but more doable than a Paladin's oaths. Still, additional mechanical penalties...
Dust to Dust. Handy! Everyone should have this for their bigtime enemies.
Armor of Darkness. MUCH better than what a Monk gets! Dang, shattering weapons even.
Ephemeral Strike seems okay, but then you see that it allows you to threaten to a range of 30 ft. OH MY! It's still not too powerful though, because it has its limitations. It's also useable per encounter rather than per day, so bonus points for that. (Also, this plus Stunning Fist = whoop-ass.) The Greater version is also, as it says, great. Good build-up.
Resist Magic seems a little out of place, especially the use of Charisma in an otherwise Wisdom-and-Dex class.
Twilight Reserve is AWESOME and would be god-like if you acquire immunity to nonlethal damage. You see, whilst with the Hollow's abilities you need to take nonlethal damage to activate an ability, with this ability the Ephemeral Watcher first does something, and
then gets the damage afterwards (if not immune). The damage is not a condition to allow the ability to be activated. Nice.
Entropic Blow is cool. I hope a later ability builds a little further on it. (Strike and Assault, woo!)
Improved Armor of Darkness nitpick: standing in shadowy illumination already gives 20% miss chance, so that's nothing new.
Mantle of Shadow seems too much to me... but then again, spell resistance is a crappy thing, IMO, and should be gotten rid of.
Overall, this class looks well-made and pretty cool to play. It's not a high Tier one, because in many ways its like the Monk, but it has some good abilities that put it squarely in 4.
In short, it looks like my verdict on the classes would be, in order "simple, but good", "terrible mechanics, only downsides, some decent fluff", "no downsides to a lot of power", and "a very well-executed shadow monk". It seems to me Realms of Chaos' strong point is not the classes, clearly. Seeing as he is also the creator of Xenotheurgy, I'd say his strong point lies in creating something big, new and complex with good fluff, focused on the system, but not additional components utilizing that system. I'd have to check the Xenotheurge to be sure, but then again, the Xenotheurge is the only base class for that system (that I know of) and is therefore steeped in the system, and on the other hand it's a huge project that kind of scares me.
However, Shadow Magic is not entirely done with, folks! There are some more base classes, and to be honest, I want to ask you guys... what great Shadow Magic homebrew have you found? It's time to give it more love, and I'd definitely love to give it its own subsystem subsection in the beginning of the thread with some links to a lot of mysteries, feats and of course classes!
