Pale Master review

[Monkey_Archer]

Tested on level 20 human wizard - Pale master tier 3

Necrotic touch: About 300 damage on a failed save. Very nice

Skeletons: ~100 hp. CR:6

Arcane skeleton: casts acid arrow, scorching ray, lightning bolt, snowball swarm and some DC based spell that a rat was immune to. Likely to be quite useful for level 6 content.

Blackbones: ~150 hp. CR:12

Blackbone Arcane: casts burning hands, scorching ray, fireball, firewall and a DC based spell that a troll was immune to. Likely to be quite usefull for level 12 content, and even helpful in some high level content

Frostmarrow: ~200 hp. CR:18. All very weak for their CR rating IMO. Not one of them could kill a CR:17 ogre without constant (5+) healing with necrotic touch.

Frostmarrow Arcane: casts frostlance, snowball storm, ice storm, sleet storm and hold monster (guessing its about 25-30 DC, as it was able to hold the ogres in the vale fairly well). Moderately useful for Crowd control if the party has FOM, but does less damage then the Blackbone

Undead Traits: 100% fort, healed by negative energy, immune to positive energy. Cannot target yourself with necrotic touch, chill touch or inflict wounds spells. This makes self healing impossible (haven't tested with a friendly cleric casting mass inflict wounds though)

Wraith form: Duration 3 minutes, 5 minute cooldown. Grants undead traits. 25% incorporeal miss chance. Featherfall. +20 Move silently. Deals con damage on unarmed crits. I dont see a purpose for this yet... (maybe just stealth??) The healing immunity is a pretty large penalty for just 25% incorporeal...

Lich form: Duration 3 minutes, 5 minute cooldown. Grants undead traits. +4 con, +4 int +2 necromancy DC. Applies an inflict wound spell on unarmed attacks. Occasionally recives temporary hp when hit (appears to be 10% chance for 30 hp).


For low to mid levels i think this would be a very powerful PRE, but for endgame I'm not impressed. The summons are likely to be very useful at low-mid levels but are all much too weak to be helpful endgame. Again, in mid levels 3 minutes of healing immunity can be dealt with, but at endgame where damage is unavoidable its just a good way to get yourself killed.

Suggestions:
-Make lichform/wraithform a toggle ability, but keep the 5 minute cooldown.
-Allow inflict wounds and similar spells to target players in undead form.
-Add a self-targetable negative energy spell/ability (possibly to the currently very weak tier 3)
-Increase the effectiveness of tier 3 summons
-Vampiric touch!!!

[Sirea]

Do the traits like 25% miss chance, +4 stat, and the Necromancy DC stack?

[Visty]

dunno about the misschane, but the stats and dc stacks

[Bunker]

So Lich form alone adds a total of +4 to necromancy dc. Wow!

Question: If you activate a form, can you stop it before the timer wears off? (perhaps that was what you meant by adding a toggle?)

[Monkey_Archer]

So Lich form alone adds a total of +4 to necromancy dc. Wow!

Question: If you activate a form, can you stop it before the timer wears off? (perhaps that was what you meant by adding a toggle?)

No, it cannot be turned off.

[Bunker]

If you get a chance, I'm curious about something else.

Yugoloth Int pot has a -50% fort with the +2 int.

When in undead form, wearing a Heavy Fort Item and having drank a yugoloth potion, what is your characters current fortification? Being undead, does he still retain 100% fort?

[Maegin]

you gotta admit, the forms are spot on fow how much power they yield. the danger of no heals, or umd harm scrolls, is about right for giving someone stackable stats and dc's out the wazzou! you literally are a lich/wrath, undead traits and all

OP, does the necro touch cost any sps?

Does the wraith form's 25% miss chance stack with blur/displace? I imagin its the defensive form judging from stuff like this.

[Maegin]

what about testing this with a wf and arcane healing/reconstruct?

if wf can still be healed with recontruct, this makes wf casters that much more insane

[whysper]

Necrotic touch: About 300 damage on a failed save. Very nice

This is going to get "fixed." I have no idea what they were thinking.

[Bunker]

This is going to get "fixed." I have no idea what they were thinking.

What is wrong with it that it requires fixing?

[Kriogen]

-Make lichform/wraithform a toggle ability, but keep the 5 minute cooldown.

Not even that is enough.

Toggle with no cooldown. Stance like CE, Power Attack, monk stances. Noheal is huge penalty.

[FauxSho]

Here you go Calebro:

Lich form: Duration 3 minutes, 5 minute cooldown. Grants undead traits. +4 con, +4 int +2 necromancy DC. Applies an inflict wound spell on unarmed attacks. Occasionally recives temporary hp when hit (appears to be 10% chance for 30 hp).

It's in the OP.

[Calebro]

Here you go Calebro:


It's in the OP.

HA! LOL!
Figures. I even checked the OP, but I must have just skimmed that part.
Thanks.

[Monkey_Archer]

One more thing to add...
Undead form grants +100% fortification for a total of 200% if wearing a heavy fort item.

[Aspenor]

One more thing to add...
Undead form grants +100% fortification for a total of 200% if wearing a heavy fort item.

So add +1 to all DC's because the Pale Master can use Yugoloth INT potions in undead form without being critically hit.

[etelan]

Suggestions:
-Make lichform/wraithform a toggle ability, but keep the 5 minute cooldown.
-Allow inflict wounds and similar spells to target players in undead form.
-Add a self-targetable negative energy spell/ability (possibly to the currently very weak tier 3)
-Increase the effectiveness of tier 3 summons
-Vampiric touch!!!

Good suggestions on OP. Pale Masters could really use a little boost for as expensive as the PrE is. I was expecting pale master gear (shroud of the abbot, tower set) to be a lot more effective than they are.

[Ebondevil]

Out of interest has anyone tested to see if Vicious weapons heal a Pale Master in Lich/Wraith form?

[Ereshkigal]

Undead Traits: 100% fort, healed by negative energy, immune to positive energy. Cannot target yourself with necrotic touch, chill touch or inflict wounds spells. This makes self healing impossible (haven't tested with a friendly cleric casting mass inflict wounds though)

So a WF Pale master can still reconstruct him/herself?

[Visty]

So a WF Pale master can still reconstruct him/herself?

not unless it gets changed

atm they cant

[Rheebus]

I see that the Form of the Wraith ability requires Mental Toughness. Would the Sorcerer Past life feat also count? Any caster with a Sorc past life will take Arcane Prodigy instead of Mental Toughness because it is the same but better. My Wizard (sorcerer past life) will greatly appreciate it!

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Form of the Wraith

• Prerequisite: Wizard Pale Master II, Mental Toughness
• Cost: 2 AP
• You are able to assume many traits of a wraith.

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Mental Toughness
This feat increases the character's maximum spell points by 10 at first level, and 5 spell points for each additional level.

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Past Life: Arcane Prodigy
You recall more about your past life as a sorcerer. Your maximum spell points are increased by 10 at first level, and 5 spell points for each additional level and can produce random elemental damage spells ten times per rest. (Activate this sorcerer ability to blast a target with a ray of combined elements, doing 1d12 damage of a random elemental type plus an additional 1d12 per three caster levels on impact. A successful Reflex save reduce the damage by half.)