Before I had stumbled across these forums, I and my friends had agreed that the soulknife and fighter were severely underpowered classes. There are, of course, other classes, but these two were the ones that we wanted to play the most, and so I took it upon myself to modify them, while keeping the flavour of the classes intact. And so, the soulknife isn't getting ToB manoeuvres or manifester levels. And because the changes will make the 2 PrCs for soulknives underpowered, I incorporated them right into the class options, rendering both the soulbow and illumine soul obsolete.
Soulknife Changes
Full Base Attack Bonus progression, as Fighter
Get a +1 bonus to saves vs mind-affecting effects at 1st level, and increases by 1 at 6, 11, and 16. At 20th, gain immunity to mind-affecting.
Gain specific bonus feats pertaining to the Mind Blade
Level 4: Weapon Specialization
Level 8: Weapon Mastery (specific to mind blades, whether melee or thrown)
Level 12: Greater Weapon Focus (instead of level 9)
Level 16: Greater Weapon Specialization
Level 20: Weapon Supremacy
Change the special ability enhancements list to anything allowed to a melee weapon, except Sizing, Morphing, Throwing or Changeling properties. If the enhancement has its cost listed in GP instead of a + bonus, then 6,000gp or less is a +1, 6,001 to 16,000 is +2, 16,001 to 30,000 is +3, 30,001 to 50,000 is +4, and 50,001 to 75,000 is +5. Anything over 75,000gp would be equivalent to a +6 or greater, and is relegated solely to epic levels. (calculated using values listed in the Magic Item Compendium).
Remove Multiple Throw, Bladewind, and Knife to the Soul from the standard progression. Instead, starting at level 7, the Soulknife gains an ability option at every odd level, until 19th level. Ability options are:
- Multiple Throw
- Bladewind
- Knife to the Soul
- Extended Throw Range, can be taken multiple times
- Penetrating Throw
- Positive Energy Conduit
- Positive Energy Ray, prerequisite: Positive Energy Conduit
- Positive Energy Healing, prerequisite: Positive Energy Conduit
- Positive Energy Burst, prerequisite: Positive Energy Conduit, Positive Energy Ray
- Camouflage (as Ranger ability)
- Hide in Plain Sight (as Ranger ability), prerequisite: Camouflage
- Evasion (as Monk ability)
- Improved Evasion (as Monk ability), prerequisite: Evasion
- Expanded Shape Mind Blade, can be taken multiple times
- any Psionic Feat, 2-Weapon Fighting, or any feat with 2-Weapon Fighting as a prerequisite, so long as all prerequisites of the feat are met.
Extended Throw Range: Each time this ability is taken, the range the mind blade can be thrown increases by +50'. Once this ability has been taken once, ranged weapon enhancements can be taken for the mind blade, except for the Quick Loading, Returning, or Morphing properties. Any property that is melee only does not apply to thrown attacks, while ranged only will not apply to melee attacks.
Penetrating Throw: Make a single attack that affects all targets in a line, out to 30' plus 50' for each Extended Throw Range. All bonus damage, such as Psychic Strike or a critical hit, only affect the first target in the line.
Positive Energy Conduit: Psychic Strike deals damage to undead, regardless of its intelligence score.
Positive Energy Ray: Standard action, ranged touch attack 60', deals 1d6 damage per class level to undead. Usable once per day per 3 class levels.
Positive Energy Healing: Once per day per 5 class levels, as an immediate action, the soulknife heals 3d8+class level HP. This ability automatically activates if the soulknife is reduced to 0 or less HP, and can prevent death if it heals a sufficient amount of damage to keep the soulknife at -9 HP or higher.
Positive Energy Burst: As a standard action, the soulknife can expend his psionic focus to unleash a burst of positive energy, dealing 1d6 damage per class level to all undead within 60', will save DC 10 + 1/2 class level + con mod for half damage. This uses one of his Positive Energy Rays for the day.
Expanded Shape Mind Blade: The soulknife can choose 3 simple or martial melee weapons to add to his list of shapes available to change his mind blade into, and is proficient with these shapes. If he has 2 mind blades, each may be shaped separately.
At epic levels, a soulknife can choose to take another ability option instead of an epic feat.