[Prestige Class] Blackguard/Paladin Spell Duration

[Dardonas]

One of the most thematic classes in PotM is Blackguard.  However, it lacks a lot of the power Paladins had, despite it supposed to be the great temptation of power a Paladin could fall to receive.  Recently, Blackguard received some buffs to its spells and some new spells in general.  However, when looking at a caster class with only ten levels maximum possible, they will struggle to be a useful part of any group, always behind the curve of their level.

I don't think it's an ability they get in PnP, but if I could suggest that the unique combination of Blackguard and Paladin could have an interaction where paladin levels count towards a Blackguard's spell progression.

The effects this would have:
- Increased spell duration for spells
- No extra blackguard spell slots as blackguard spells don't progress beyond level 10 (unless I'm mistaken)
- Demonflesh would grant 7 extra natural armor class at 18 combined levels, in comparison to being unable to be more than 4 (though I believe in PnP this is supposed to cap at 4)

This would make the IC motivation/act of becoming a blackguard a more suitable upgrade and more in line with what a fallen paladin could be motivated to fall for.

[Purist]

It is stated that former Paladins are supposed to make stronger Blackguards than any other base class, so what has been suggested on caster levels makes sense.

[Wargtimmen]

I agree with this idea. Blackguard seems like weaker than Paladins, and Blackguard's way should have to be a path for those who seek power. So some additions on the class for making this less weaker would be good.

[Revenant]

It would be nice for Unholy Sword to be able to reach a duration comparable to Holy Sword.

[Bouquet of Lotuses]

+1 Blackguards need a buff

[King Pickle]

Blackguards inability to stack damage types like Paladin can makes it considerably weaker. In addition that, because of caster level Blackguard is easier to dispel and most spells won't last full rest period.

[Bad_Bud]

easier to dispel and most spells won't last full rest period.

You could say that about any prestige class spellbook, really, and I feel like Blackguard's best buffs have a fairly forgiving duration (if you're even willing to cast them in front of people to expose yourself as a Blackguard).

[Dardonas]

easier to dispel and most spells won't last full rest period.

You could say that about any prestige class spellbook, really, and I feel like Blackguard's best buffs have a fairly forgiving duration (if you're even willing to cast them in front of people to expose yourself as a Blackguard).

Demonflesh and Corrupt Weapon lasts for hour + 1 turn / level, so at maximum it'll last 16 minutes.  Most Paladin/Blackguards won't have 10 blackguard levels for a while so they'd be looking at half of that realistically (assuming 10 paladin, 5 blackguard), their spells would last 11 minutes while having a rest timer of 24 minutes. 

Their buffs, should they have their paladin level count towards their class spell progression, would only last as long as a paladin's would and still be easy to dispel as it'll be the same sort of system as the Pale Master / Wizard. 

You bring up a good point about the risk of a Blackguard revealing their nature as well - Paladins without any sort of self buffs are pretty shortchanged and have a harder time in general.  They aren't comparable to fighters and have to have some sort of buffing to manage well on their own.  A fighter blackguard would be in a better place from having the extra feats.  Now, I'm not arguing that PrCs should be extremely powerful or more powerful than base classes.  Even if this change were to go through, a full Paladin is probably more preferable and stronger as are most full classes in comparison to PrC hybrids.  All this change would do would make it so that you aren't too large of a detriment to any group you're in (provided you're buffing yourself) in that a handful of your self buffs last as long as a paladin's would.

[Bad_Bud]

Corrupt weapon isn't hour + 1 turn / level

[Dardonas]

Corrupt weapon isn't hour + 1 turn / level

My mistake on that.  It'll last for a good bit.  Your other buffs though?  Eagles Splendor, Bull's Strength - these will burn up pretty quickly.  They don't have a very comprehensive spell list so the number of spells this affects is quite low. 

Demonflesh
Corrupt Weapon
Eagles's Splendor
Bull's Strength
Freedom of Movement
Unholy Sword

It would also augment the healing output of Cure Wounds spell line and damage with Inflict Wounds spell line.

Even so, having these last for your rest timer would be a quality of life change more than anything else, and it'd only specifically work with Paladin.  Possibly there could be some interaction with Cleric if that was desired too?  I won't get into that can of worms and just stick with paladin/blackguard since it's the topic of the thread.

[EO]

Blackguards have other advantages, and ultimately, no one is forced to pick that PrC. If someone feels the class is so weak they do not want to pursue that path, they don't have to pick it. A fallen paladin can multiclass into another class if they want to.

Fallen paladin blackguards are already substantially more powerful than other blackguards, and if they fail a Powers Check on top of that, they don't even need to meet most of the requirements. Since they are implemented as per PnP and aren't particularly weak, there's no reason to review that class.

edit: Actually, as Bad_Bud reminded me, if we go by the 3.5 rules, the paladin's (and ranger's) caster level is half their class level. This is something we could consider to rebalance paladins and blackguards since a level 20 paladin would thus cast as a level 10 character.

[Bpretty]

edit: Actually, as Bad_Bud reminded me, if we go by the 3.5 rules, the paladin's (and ranger's) caster level is half their class level. This is something we could consider to rebalance paladins and blackguards since a level 20 paladin would thus cast as a level 10 character.

That's not fixing blackguard, that's breaking paladin and ranger, you would make the classes virtually unplayable with such short term spells.

[EO]

Balance is an equilibrium. It can be reached different ways. Rather than looking to permanently keep buffing classes we can consider debuffing others to reach the same effect.

Having shorter duration spells doesn’t break a class it merely weakens them.

[Dardonas]

The topic wasn't exactly an argument about balance, it's quality of life... if a ranger and paladin (and blackguard as well) have low duration spells they're going to have a painful leveling and dungeoning experience.

[Hallvor Hadiya]

[Bpretty]

I'm not sure you've played on the server in recent times, but I guarantee you that if you reduce ranger/paladin to half their level as caster level, the classes will see an even further decline in their use on the server. Unless you also reduce the amount of time between rest cycles, these classes will spend half their time standing around waiting to rest. You may as well just remove their spells completely if you go through with this idea.

[tom]

With how the server's resting and dungeons are balanced, bringing other half casters down to Blackguard's level will just make them far less fun to play when it comes to PvE which is what most people do on the server.

[Famous Seamus]

Balance is an equilibrium. It can be reached different ways. Rather than looking to permanently keep buffing classes we can consider debuffing others to reach the same effect.

Having shorter duration spells doesn’t break a class it merely weakens them.

I respect where this is coming from. Balance is a tough thing to achieve, especially with caster classes.

That said, as a player who has played a paladin consistently (near-daily) for almost the past year and a half, paladins feel like they're already in a balanced spot with their current setup. At the moderate levels where they spend most of their gameplay, the majority of their wards last until shortly before their rest period (except for a few wonky levels where their rest timer is slightly longer). Having spent quite a bit of time in those few wonky levels, I can say that there can be some OOC frustration both for the paladin's player and their fellow players when the rest of the party has to stop every 12-15 minutes and wait 6-12 minutes to rest and re-ward because the paladin's buffs expired, turning their beefy warrior into a subpar fighter. Changing the system such that that would become a near-guarantee all the time risks greater frustration (to the point of adventuring as a paladin or adventuring with a paladin not being fun).

I know paladins are supposed to have a harder time than most classes, but they already have a pretty challenging time. Many that I've seen follow the "no lying" rule, which leads to dangerous and difficult situations where there's no easy way out, whereas other classes can just tell a white lie and waltz away no problem. The stringent requirements for the LG code also restrict certain RP opportunities, railroad the character into a very limited set of possible actions at times (often, few of them actually wholly good or beneficial), and lead to performing intricate moral gymnastics to reconcile lawfulness with goodness in the morally corrupt Demiplane of Dread. They also have an entire RP guide outlining the "thou shalts" and "thou shalt nots" that are expected when playing the class.

Add to that the fact that the paladin, while a good and versatile martial class, is very niche and--often--subpar when compared to its colleagues. Paladins are strong, but they will always be a worse fighter than a fighter and a worse cleric than a cleric.

Simply put, playing a paladin is fun, but it's already hard work. I have never in my life been so stressed while still having fun as I've been while playing Vandryn.

I get the feeling that halving paladins' caster level for purposes of spells and various abilities would make the class substantially less viable and substantially more underwhelming (when paladins are supposed to be shining exemplars of virtue and piety paired with notable martial prowess). That might discourage people from playing as them, sure--and I know there aren't supposed to be a ton of them in the demiplane, but there already aren't a ton of active ones at any given time. Rangers would similarly suffer from this change, and unlike paladins, there's no rationale for why there shouldn't be gobs of them bopping around the Core.

I acknowledge the logic behind the proposition, but for the sake of the players, I earnestly hope that it isn't implemented. There are other places where the server deviates from the sourcebooks. It seems fairly innocuous to let this already long-standing deviation stand too.

Speaking of deviations and as for the blackguard situation (assuming a buff to blackguard is still on the table), rather than counting paladin levels for caster level, would it be possible to slightly adjust the duration of blackguard spells in a way that doesn't depend on caster level? For instance, changing a blackguard buff from 1 hour + 1 turn/level to 1 hour + 2 turns/level? I'm very unfamiliar with the coding behind NWN, so I'm not sure whether that's viable or how much work it would require.

Either way, thanks for taking the time to hear me out, and thanks for all the work on the server.

[King Pickle]

easier to dispel and most spells won't last full rest period.

You could say that about any prestige class spellbook, really, and I feel like Blackguard's best buffs have a fairly forgiving duration (if you're even willing to cast them in front of people to expose yourself as a Blackguard).

True, and you can build a BG in many different ways. But I was comparing a full Paladin vs Paladin/BG.
Few people want to go through the trouble of applying for a prestige class that will make their character weaker.

Compared to a Paladin, BG has one good spell, which is Abyssal Might. Its better than Righteous Fury.
Corrupt Weapon is decent.
Demon Flesh is decent.

But no basic spells like Protection from Alignment, Owl's Wisdom or Dispel Magic.
No Divine Favor, Aura of Glory or Sacred Heaven.

You get Sneak Attacks that are effective and you can Smite Good, but it doesn't help you in dungeons much.
Then there are offensive spells like Poison:
"The DC of the poison is 10 + 1/2 caster level + your primary spellcasting ability modifier"
So about DC 17 spell at level 20. You can boost the DC a nudge with Owl's Wisdom (potion, because you can't cast the spell).

Maybe I'm off topic here but I think the spells could use some work.

[Revenant]

Fallen paladin blackguards are already substantially more powerful than other blackguards, and if they fail a Powers Check on top of that, they don't even need to meet most of the requirements. Since they are implemented as per PnP and aren't particularly weak, there's no reason to review that class.

I'm not going to get into the weeds of why, despite individual BG abilities being amplified, most other BG builds are stronger than a pal/BG. You do it for story, so balance doesn't matter there. A straight Pal is also better than a Pal/BG, and a significant part of that is the casting loss. The following change would only exacerbate the issue, ironically, because the spell duration from higher level paladin would be even more important.

edit: Actually, as Bad_Bud reminded me, if we go by the 3.5 rules, the paladin's (and ranger's) caster level is half their class level. This is something we could consider to rebalance paladins and blackguards since a level 20 paladin would thus cast as a level 10 character.

This is an awful idea and comes off as a threat. If you don't want any suggestions that make classes (except fighter) at all stronger, make an announcement and pin it. I think that's a reasonable approach that prevents people resenting someone every time a dev comes in and says "Buffs are bad, and frankly you should be grateful that we're not going to nerf instead." Even a simple "No, this is not in line with the dev vision. [Refuses to elaborate further, leaves]" would be better.

If you ever do something like this, I want you to play a ranger from 1 to 15 and actually experience what the modern situation is first-hand. Even if it requires stepping back from dev work for a bit, it's important for people to engage with the products they build anyway.  Balancing in PnP is different from balancing in NWN for the simple sake of the medium. The myriad rules differences, implemented both by BioWare and PotM, attest to and reinforce that simple fact. One cannot neatly apply a personal understanding of or old community statements about PnP 3e to NWN.

easier to dispel and most spells won't last full rest period.

You could say that about any prestige class spellbook, really, and I feel like Blackguard's best buffs have a fairly forgiving duration (if you're even willing to cast them in front of people to expose yourself as a Blackguard).

True, and you can build a BG in many different ways. But I was comparing a full Paladin vs Paladin/BG.
Few people want to go through the trouble of applying for a prestige class that will make their character weaker.

Compared to a Paladin, BG has one good spell, which is Abyssal Might. Its better than Righteous Fury.
Corrupt Weapon is decent.
Demon Flesh is decent.

But no basic spells like Protection from Alignment, Owl's Wisdom or Dispel Magic.
No Divine Favor, Aura of Glory or Sacred Heaven.

You get Sneak Attacks that are effective and you can Smite Good, but it doesn't help you in dungeons much.
Then there are offensive spells like Poison:
"The DC of the poison is 10 + 1/2 caster level + your primary spellcasting ability modifier"
So about DC 17 spell at level 20. You can boost the DC a nudge with Owl's Wisdom (potion, because you can't cast the spell).

Maybe I'm off topic here but I think the spells could use some work.

[Enters weeds.]

The best Blackguard builds have 8 wis and skip their casting, which is also why Pal/BG is not actually stronger than other BGs - 6 points matter a lot on a server where stats are precious. Abyssal Might is the loss you feel, and it can be sourced from scrolls when you need it in a pinch (since as mentioned, using it dungeoning will put you in hot water with a lot of people). Demonflesh and Corrupt Weapon are entirely overshadowed by products of crafting available at reasonable cost. Unholy Sword is an ok consolation for people forced to go deep, but it will only ever last half as long as Holy Sword.

Blackguard is taken for the RP, and it is taken for DM/DS and Dark Blessing. That's it.

[Yesper]

Fallen paladin blackguards are already substantially more powerful than other blackguards, and if they fail a Powers Check on top of that, they don't even need to meet most of the requirements. Since they are implemented as per PnP and aren't particularly weak, there's no reason to review that class.

I'm not going to get into the weeds of why, despite individual BG abilities being amplified, most other BG builds are stronger than a pal/BG. You do it for story, so balance doesn't matter there. A straight Pal is also better than a Pal/BG, and a significant part of that is the casting loss. The following change would only exacerbate the issue, ironically, because the spell duration from higher level paladin would be even more important.

edit: Actually, as Bad_Bud reminded me, if we go by the 3.5 rules, the paladin's (and ranger's) caster level is half their class level. This is something we could consider to rebalance paladins and blackguards since a level 20 paladin would thus cast as a level 10 character.

This is an awful idea and comes off as a threat. If you don't want any suggestions that make classes (except fighter) at all stronger, make an announcement and pin it. I think that's a reasonable approach that prevents people resenting someone every time a dev comes in and says "Buffs are bad, and frankly you should be grateful that we're not going to nerf instead." Even a simple "No, this is not in line with the dev vision. [Refuses to elaborate further, leaves]" would be better.

If you ever do something like this, I want you to play a ranger from 1 to 15 and actually experience what the modern situation is first-hand. Even if it requires stepping back from dev work for a bit, it's important for people to engage with the products they build anyway.  Balancing in PnP is different from balancing in NWN for the simple sake of the medium. The myriad rules differences, implemented both by BioWare and PotM, attest to and reinforce that simple fact. One cannot neatly apply a personal understanding of or old community statements about PnP 3e to NWN.

easier to dispel and most spells won't last full rest period.

You could say that about any prestige class spellbook, really, and I feel like Blackguard's best buffs have a fairly forgiving duration (if you're even willing to cast them in front of people to expose yourself as a Blackguard).

True, and you can build a BG in many different ways. But I was comparing a full Paladin vs Paladin/BG.
Few people want to go through the trouble of applying for a prestige class that will make their character weaker.

Compared to a Paladin, BG has one good spell, which is Abyssal Might. Its better than Righteous Fury.
Corrupt Weapon is decent.
Demon Flesh is decent.

But no basic spells like Protection from Alignment, Owl's Wisdom or Dispel Magic.
No Divine Favor, Aura of Glory or Sacred Heaven.

You get Sneak Attacks that are effective and you can Smite Good, but it doesn't help you in dungeons much.
Then there are offensive spells like Poison:
"The DC of the poison is 10 + 1/2 caster level + your primary spellcasting ability modifier"
So about DC 17 spell at level 20. You can boost the DC a nudge with Owl's Wisdom (potion, because you can't cast the spell).

Maybe I'm off topic here but I think the spells could use some work.

[Enters weeds.]

The best Blackguard builds have 8 wis and skip their casting, which is also why Pal/BG is not actually stronger than other BGs - 6 points matter a lot on a server where stats are precious. Abyssal Might is the loss you feel, and it can be sourced from scrolls when you need it in a pinch (since as mentioned, using it dungeoning will put you in hot water with a lot of people). Demonflesh and Corrupt Weapon are entirely overshadowed by products of crafting available at reasonable cost. Unholy Sword is an ok consolation for people forced to go deep, but it will only ever last half as long as Holy Sword.

Blackguard is taken for the RP, and it is taken for DM/DS and Dark Blessing. That's it.

Well said. People shouldn't be taking PrCs simply for the sake of power alone. Any PrC is a manifestation of the character's journey. It may be "feels bad" if one is only looking at the PrC as a stat block, but it is (in my opinion) moreso an accolade to represent the player's dedication to the story and character. Stats should be secondary on a roleplaying server, but I'm getting the impression that this is being lost in the background noise here. It's for that reason that I also vehemently disagree with the decision to remove the application gate for PrCs in general, but I will leave it at that for the sake of remaining mostly on topic.

[BraveSirRobin]

Don't Paladin caster levels already combine with Blackguard caster levels? I could've sworn this was already a thing, which affected duration and the power of the spell. So GMW from a 10 Paladin, 10 Blackguard should be the same as a level 20 Paladin's.

[Bad_Bud]

Don't Paladin caster levels already combine with Blackguard caster levels? I could've sworn this was already a thing, which affected duration and the power of the spell. So GMW from a 10 Paladin, 10 Blackguard should be the same as a level 20 Paladin's.

A Paladin/Blackguard still counts as a fallen Paladin (and thus loses access to all their Paladin abilities), but gains bonus abilities as a Blackguard (some of which are some of the same abilities they lost as a fallen Paladin), so they are not able to cast their Paladin spells anymore.

[Anarcoplayba]

Fallen paladin blackguards are already substantially more powerful than other blackguards, and if they fail a Powers Check on top of that, they don't even need to meet most of the requirements. Since they are implemented as per PnP and aren't particularly weak, there's no reason to review that class.

I'm not going to get into the weeds of why, despite individual BG abilities being amplified, most other BG builds are stronger than a pal/BG. You do it for story, so balance doesn't matter there. A straight Pal is also better than a Pal/BG, and a significant part of that is the casting loss. The following change would only exacerbate the issue, ironically, because the spell duration from higher level paladin would be even more important.

edit: Actually, as Bad_Bud reminded me, if we go by the 3.5 rules, the paladin's (and ranger's) caster level is half their class level. This is something we could consider to rebalance paladins and blackguards since a level 20 paladin would thus cast as a level 10 character.

This is an awful idea and comes off as a threat. If you don't want any suggestions that make classes (except fighter) at all stronger, make an announcement and pin it. I think that's a reasonable approach that prevents people resenting someone every time a dev comes in and says "Buffs are bad, and frankly you should be grateful that we're not going to nerf instead." Even a simple "No, this is not in line with the dev vision. [Refuses to elaborate further, leaves]" would be better.

If you ever do something like this, I want you to play a ranger from 1 to 15 and actually experience what the modern situation is first-hand. Even if it requires stepping back from dev work for a bit, it's important for people to engage with the products they build anyway.  Balancing in PnP is different from balancing in NWN for the simple sake of the medium. The myriad rules differences, implemented both by BioWare and PotM, attest to and reinforce that simple fact. One cannot neatly apply a personal understanding of or old community statements about PnP 3e to NWN.

easier to dispel and most spells won't last full rest period.

You could say that about any prestige class spellbook, really, and I feel like Blackguard's best buffs have a fairly forgiving duration (if you're even willing to cast them in front of people to expose yourself as a Blackguard).

True, and you can build a BG in many different ways. But I was comparing a full Paladin vs Paladin/BG.
Few people want to go through the trouble of applying for a prestige class that will make their character weaker.

Compared to a Paladin, BG has one good spell, which is Abyssal Might. Its better than Righteous Fury.
Corrupt Weapon is decent.
Demon Flesh is decent.

But no basic spells like Protection from Alignment, Owl's Wisdom or Dispel Magic.
No Divine Favor, Aura of Glory or Sacred Heaven.

You get Sneak Attacks that are effective and you can Smite Good, but it doesn't help you in dungeons much.
Then there are offensive spells like Poison:
"The DC of the poison is 10 + 1/2 caster level + your primary spellcasting ability modifier"
So about DC 17 spell at level 20. You can boost the DC a nudge with Owl's Wisdom (potion, because you can't cast the spell).

Maybe I'm off topic here but I think the spells could use some work.

[Enters weeds.]

The best Blackguard builds have 8 wis and skip their casting, which is also why Pal/BG is not actually stronger than other BGs - 6 points matter a lot on a server where stats are precious. Abyssal Might is the loss you feel, and it can be sourced from scrolls when you need it in a pinch (since as mentioned, using it dungeoning will put you in hot water with a lot of people). Demonflesh and Corrupt Weapon are entirely overshadowed by products of crafting available at reasonable cost. Unholy Sword is an ok consolation for people forced to go deep, but it will only ever last half as long as Holy Sword.

Blackguard is taken for the RP, and it is taken for DM/DS and Dark Blessing. That's it.

Well said. People shouldn't be taking PrCs simply for the sake of power alone. Any PrC is a manifestation of the character's journey. It may be "feels bad" if one is only looking at the PrC as a stat block, but it is (in my opinion) moreso an accolade to represent the player's dedication to the story and character. Stats should be secondary on a roleplaying server, but I'm getting the impression that this is being lost in the background noise here. It's for that reason that I also vehemently disagree with the decision to remove the application gate for PrCs in general, but I will leave it at that for the sake of remaining mostly on topic.

People should not chose a PrC for sake of power alone. I agree wholehaertedly with that. Perfect.

However, the Blackguard is described as an Epithome of evil, whoe consorts with evil in exchange for power.

Come on: a champion of evil who is frankly weaker than the other classes? Why woild he consort with devils and the forces of evil?

[Iolantir]

This is an awful idea and comes off as a threat. If you don't want any suggestions that make classes (except fighter) at all stronger, make an announcement and pin it. I think that's a reasonable approach that prevents people resenting someone every time a dev comes in and says "Buffs are bad, and frankly you should be grateful that we're not going to nerf instead." Even a simple "No, this is not in line with the dev vision. [Refuses to elaborate further, leaves]" would be better.

If you ever do something like this, I want you to play a ranger from 1 to 15 and actually experience what the modern situation is first-hand. Even if it requires stepping back from dev work for a bit, it's important for people to engage with the products they build anyway.  Balancing in PnP is different from balancing in NWN for the simple sake of the medium. The myriad rules differences, implemented both by BioWare and PotM, attest to and reinforce that simple fact. One cannot neatly apply a personal understanding of or old community statements about PnP 3e to NWN.

I was going to stay out of this thread, but please, for the love of God, listen to this man. If Rangers and Paladins essentially get their caster levels halved over this thread (or for any reason at all), it would be nothing but a negative impact to players. No one would benefit from this. The experience of the game would be worse. And for what?

I understand the drive to create an experience that's close to 3.0/3.5 as possible, but DMs very often manipulate rules for the enjoyment of their players. Because the enjoyment of the players and the DM is the ultimate reason to play DnD. If this change would be only a negative impact, why make it?