Today, I introduce a custom class, made entirely by me. I give you, the Magi-tek engineer. Artheria is a world with trains and firearms, magi-tek has changed the face of the globe, and has been a major impact on life in Artheria. There are airships, properly functioning firearms, gunblades, mechanical carts, clockwork robots, and all other manner of modern-like fantasy inventions. (A 6 shooter, while awesome and in real life much better than a sword, in a world where mages can cast lightning bolts and spells to protect from such weapons, they aren't the end all be all. Would you want a shot gun if you could throw a fireball the length of 2 football fields with a thought? Maybe, maybe not, but the world would be a far different place if that were the case. Moving on from that weird thought...)
This is from in large part the Magi-tek engineer. The roots of this class are from 1000 years ago, in a little town called Gnomenholm, at a dwarf's black powder shop called Bob's Boomsticks. After a sizable research budget into various types of black powder weapons, (From the players I had at the time) Bob eventually hired a gnome alchemist to help, and from that, Gnomish magi-tek and Dwarven rune-tek were born. During the reckoning, the surviving gnomes were spread around the globe and into the sky on floating continents, spreading magi-tek all over. The dwarven rune-tek is found mostly underground.
Halflings have spent the bulk of the last 1000 years with a few gnomes in practically every village, and they share a large floating continent as well, (which was originally ripped from Mangderithon.) this has spread the secrets of magi-tek engineering to the brave ones over the last 1000 years. Almost every halfling trading company has either a halfling or gnome engineer in their membership.
The final race to have magi-tek is the Goblins. Goblins, over 1000 years ago, conquered a gnome village, with a series of extensive ruins underneath, full of ancient gnome technology. (This was a large scale battle event with my players army facing off against the Goblin army, and not only did the players fail, but they failed horribly.) From there, the goblins were able to learn their own ways with ancient gnome tech, and over the last 1000 years, the goblin race now has its own engineers.
Now that we've established the origins of the class, we can get into the nitty gritty.
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| (Your stereotypical Gnomish magi-tek engineer) |
This brings me to the first cool factor of the magi-tek engineer. They are the only class that gains access to and can upkeep an airship. (Other than a higher level properly set up wizard or bard) I'm introducing several skills that the magi-tek engineer gets access too, and no one else, that are required for airship building, repairing, and usage.
*First off, Knowledge (Aeronautical Engineering) Wizards, Experts, Bards, and Engineers only. This skill is used to know how to make anything associated with airship, planes, or any other type of flying device. The next logical step is then Craft (Aeronautical Engineering) Wizards, Experts, and Engineers only. This skill makes the required parts.
*Knowledge (Magi-tek Engineering), Wizards, Experts, Bards, and Engineers only. This skill is used to identify properties and functions of magi-tek items. It also allows for minor to potentially major repairs on existing magi-tek devices, though it does not allow the enhancing or making of new items in any way.
*Knowledge (Magi-tek Engineering), Wizards, Experts, Bards, and Engineers only. This skill is used to identify properties and functions of magi-tek items. It also allows for minor to potentially major repairs on existing magi-tek devices, though it does not allow the enhancing or making of new items in any way.
Profession, (Aeronautical Navigator) Anything with Profession, This skill is the ability to pilot and plot courses in an airship. This skill is the first without the wizard, bard, expert, or engineer restriction. Navigators that work as a taxi service make a lot of money. This skill can also be used to make simple repairs to an airship. (instead of base 1 gp like in profession, base is 100 gp)
Craft, (Magi-tek Engineering) Magi-tek engineer only, this skill is the making of all things Magi-tek. Magi-tek items are quite unique, first off, magi-tek items only count as masterwork, despite the many enhancements a magi-tek item may have, it will only be masterwork. That means you can also enchant them further. Have a magi-tek sword that does lightning damage? Get a wizard to put lightning burst on it, and now you got a crazy lightning sword that may almost look like a lightsaber.
That covers the new skills. Realistically, wizards, bards, and magi-tek engineers are the overwhelming majority of airship owners/operators. (Wizards enchanting ships with fly spells and such, engineers making it work with magi-tek engineering.) The major difference between these two airship types is magi-tek items aren't guaranteed to fail in an anti-magic zone, where as a flying wizards airship would, and fall out of the sky.
Moving on from airships, let us discuss the class itself. First off, they use cleric base attack bonus, (BAB) and have a d8 for hit dice. They then get 6 + int mod skill points per level. As far as proficiency goes, they gain all simple weapons, and exotic weapons (firearms) and exotic weapons (explosives). They cast spells as a wizard, using spellbooks (mixed in with their engineering diagrams) gaining a caster level every even numbered level. (Use wizard chart) Unlike wizards, magi-tek engineers can cast in light armor. (Gestalt engineer/wizards can cast in light armor only, engineers can not benefit from the armored caster feat from the complete arcane.)
At level 20, a magi-tek engineer will cast spells as a level 10 wizard, gaining access to 5th level spells. (Though most engineers will most likely be gnomes or goblins,*yes goblins* which at level 20 would have caster level 14 with the racial bonuses, and would have access to level 7 spells)
The only races that can be magi-tek engineers are Halflings, Gnomes, Dwarves, and Goblins. There is currently no major school that has opened to allow other races to learn the craft. Magi-tek engineers may be of any alignment.
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| (Goblin Magi-tek engineer, with crossbred woolly rhino companion.) |
Level BAB Fort: Ref: Will: Abilities:
1. +0 +0 +2 +0 Engineers Companion, magi-tek starting gear
2. +1 +0 +3 +0 Caster level +1
3. +2 +1 +3 +1 Impromptu Engineering 1
4. +3 +1 +4 +1 Caster level +1
5. +3 +1 +4 +1 Companion upgrade 1
6. +4 +2 +5 +2 Caster level +1
7. +5 +2 +5 +2 Engineer's Focus 1
8. +6/1 +2 +6 +2 Caster level +1
9. +6/1 +3 +6 +3 Impromptu Engineering 2
10. +7/2 +3 +7 +3 Caster level +1, Companion upgrade 2
11. +8/3 +3 +7 +3 Bonus Feat
12. +9/4 +4 +8 +4 Caster level +1
13. +9/4 +4 +8 +4 Engineer's Focus 2
14. +10/5 +4 +9 +4 Caster level +1
15. +11/6/1 +5 +9 +5 Companion upgrade 3
16. +12/7/2 +5 +10 +5 Caster level +1
17. +12/7/2 +5 +10 +5 Impromptu Engineering 3
18. +13/8/3 +6 +11 +6 Caster level +1
19. +14/9/4 +6 +11 +6 Engineer's Focus 3
20. +15/10/5 +6 +12 +6 Caster level +1, Companion upgrade 4
HD: d8, 6 + int mod skill points. Alignment allowed: any, races: halfling, gnome, dwarf, and goblin.
Proficiency: Simple weapons, Firearms and Explosives, and light armor.
Class skills: Appraise, Concentration, Craft (Any, including the new skills listed above), Decipher Script, Disable Device, Knowledge (Any), Listen, Spellcraft, Spot, Use Magic Device, Use Rope
Abilities:
Engineer's companion: This is a companion, often made by the engineer in some way or another. It will be significantly more powerful than your standard animal companion. There are an enormous amount of variations, so individual engineers will be creative, the following chart is a good guideline though. An engineer can choose what the character wants, in discussion with the DM, or you can roll 1d6.
1. Oozeling. A small, friendly ooze creature, maybe it flys, maybe it swims, maybe it does all of it. Type of damage will be mostly elemental, toughness will be medium compared to the other companions. The oozeling is the only companion that can 'live' in a gnomes pocket plane.
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| (Don't you just just wanna squeeze it? Don't, you'll take acid damage.) |
2. Clockwork robot: This will be a mechanical robot, humanoid, which will fight with fists and some ranged elemental abilities.
3. Clockwork animal: A mechanical animal of practically any form, can be medium sized (if small engineer) or large sized, (if dwarf) stats and attacks will be determined by the DM depending on what is decided, but whatever it is will be tough. Tougher than the mechanical humanoid, though not as offensively minded.
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| (Poking out eyes and shooting lightning, this clockwork bird is stylish and deadly.) |
4. Mini-Magi-tek Golem: A small sized magi-tek golem, made of stone, wood, metal and wire. This will not have ranged attacks, but will be a capable melee combatant.
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| (4 feet of durable punching fury. Also keeps time.) |
5. Crossbred hybrid animal: A creature that doesn't exactly seem possible, (like the many horned woolly rhino in the goblin picture) maybe a wolf with a porcupine, or a boar with an eagle. Some fluke magical experiment brought your companion to be, and it is fiercely loyal for some reason.
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| (Nananana na na na na Bat Dog!) |
6. Elemental Magi-tek Mephit: (Type will be determined randomly) A tough, intelligent, enhanced mephit. It will start out only slightly stronger than the mephit in the monster manual, but will gain more abilities than any of the other companion types.
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| (Just your friendly neighborhood ice mephit.) |
Summarize: Jell is sneaky and tough, with elemental damage. Clockwork humanoid is a mix of elemental archer and monk, clockwork animal is a tougher more melee oriented clockwork creature, (it will always have a weak ranged attack) the golem is melee tank, crossbred animal is the wildcard, and the mephit is the friendly sorcerer type companion.
Magi-tek starting gear: This is a very very useful bonus. You start the game with 1d3+1 magi-tek items. This is like starting with several +3 to +6 enchanted items. An extremely beneficial start. Common choices are weapons and armor, but the player can choose anything, like a wand or a rope, to enhance.
Casting is identical to a wizard of the engineers caster level, but can be done in light armor.
Impromptu Engineering: This incredibly versatile ability is to essentially create anything that is meant to be temporary and useful, from ammunition to grenades, patches for your airship, 1 use spring loaded super jump boots. This ability allows the player to attempt, as many times per day as point of intelligence mod, to make a craft (magi-tek engineering) check, and try to make something improvised and useful.
For example, the players are about to be ambushed by some gnolls, the engineer uses an Impromptu Engineering ability to improvise a claymore mine out of a flat rock, some black powder from her gun, and some metal shavings from the fighters busted up armor. The higher the rank, (1, 2, 3, etc.) the higher the damage capability (Or other numeric effects) of the items. (4d6 at rank 1, 8d6 rank 2, 12d6 rank 3, etc.) This skill can temporarily fix armor, a sinking ship, almost anything the engineer can convince me is possible. (Or just near-possible)
Engineering Focus: This confers the listed bonus to any item that the magi-tek engineer makes herself, be it a gun, grenade, healing kit, or magic wand. This will add to the attack bonus, or perhaps the save DC or other effectiveness of whatever is being made. The engineers focus stacks with things like weapon focus. (An engineer that has weapon focus, rifle and has made their own rifle benefits from both bonuses)
Companion Upgrade: This upgrade will be different depending on the companion, but the following will always occur: increased HD, and everything that goes along with that. (BAB, HP, Saves, etc.) Increased stats and increased natural armor. Also, depending on the type, (most types other than golem or clockwork animal) will gain more attack options as they power up. If a companion dies, it can be replaced in game at a cost of roughly 100 gp per HD, with some modifiers according to type and upgrade level. (Stronger will be more expensive, essentially.)
Bonus Feat: Can only be chosen from the wizard list, or the list of 'skill bonus' feats, (alertness and skill focus, for example.) Magitek-engineers gain bonus feats at 11, 21, 31, etc.
Epic level Engineers: Companions continue to upgrade every 5 levels, Impromtu Engineering continues to improve at a rate of every 6 levels after 17, (23, 29, 35, etc.) and Engineers Focus continues at a rate of 6 levels after level 19. (25, 31, 37, etc.) Caster level continues to increase every even numbered level.
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| (Airships have been vital since the Reckoning tossed continents into the sky 1000 years ago.) |
On Airships:
As a large draw of this class is the airship, let me elaborate on it. There is a chance when making a character to start with an airship, but even if you don't, you can always make one over time in game.
The required skills at minimum are Knowledge (Aeronautical Engineering), Craft (Aeronautical Engineering), and Profession (Aeronautical Navigation), If you don't take Craft (Magi-tek Engineering), you will have to enchant your airship will spells like fly or levitate. Of course, you couldn't use your Impromptu Engineering ability without the skill, so why would you not take it?
Skill selection is very important for the Magi-tek engineer, intelligence is your primary casting stat, so you will most likely have a lot of skill points, but 4 slots are practically guaranteed to be taken, which makes that impressive 6 base not seem that great. (That doesn't even count the other required skills of Concentration, Knowledge (Arcana), and Spellcraft.)
Overall, this is a funky class that will be a lot of fun and highly customizable. I hope it works out.
"Today you are You, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than you."
Dr. Seuss, Happy Birthday to You!
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