Rage mage rebalance

[Prime32]

Work in progress.

Rage mage

Prerequisites
Feats: Combat Casting
Skills: Concentration 8 ranks
Special: Rage or frenzy ability, Ability to cast arcane spells or use spell-like abilities

Hit Die: d8

BAB: Good
Saves: Fort good, Ref poor, Will good

Lv	Special	Spellcasting
1	Spell rage	-
2	Ki strike (magic)	+1 level of existing spellcasting class
3	Quicken Spell	+1 level of existing spellcasting class
4	Furious casting (+2)	-
5	Ki strike (cold iron)	+1 level of existing spellcasting class
6	Furious casting (+3)	+1 level of existing spellcasting class
7	Mystic rage	-
8	Ki strike (adamantine)	+1 level of existing spellcasting class
9	Furious casting (+4)	+1 level of existing spellcasting class
10	Rapid casting	-

Spell rage (Ex): A rage mage can freely cast spells while raging. In addition, while in a rage or frenzy, a rage mage's primary spellcasting ability score increases. If his rage normally increases a single physical ability score, the increase is equal to half that bonus. If his rage would increase multiple ability scores, the increase is equal to the bonus. Eg., a wizard/barbarian with a rage which increases their Str and Con by +4 would gain +4 to Int, while a sorcerer with a frenzy which increases their Str by +6 would gain +3 to Cha.
A character's rage mage levels stack with his levels in one class that provides rage or frenzy for determining the number of times per day he can rage and the bonuses granted.

Ki Strike (Su): At 2nd level, a rage mage's attacks are treated as magic weapons. At 5th level they are also treated as cold iron weapons. At 8th level they are treated as adamantine weapons.

Quicken Spell: At 3rd level, a rage mage receives Quicken Spell as a bonus feat. If he already possesses this feat, he may choose another for which he meets the prerequisites.

Furious casting (Su): At 4th level, a rage mage's caster level increases by +2 while in a rage. This bonus becomes +3 at 6th level and +4 at 9th level.

Mystic rage (Su): At 7th level, choose one spell of 3rd level or lower with a non-instantaneous duration which can affect you. Whenever you enter a rage, that spell affects you as a supernatual ability until the rage ends.

Rapid casting: At 10th level, a rage mage may apply the effects of the Quicken Spell metamagic feat to one spell per round, with no increase in casting time or spell level. He cannot cast another spell in the same round he uses this ability.

[Akalsaris]

Why the Ki Strike abilities for a barbarian/wiz PrC?  It seems like advancing DR X/- or advancing uses of rage/day would both make more sense.

[Risada]

Why the Ki Strike abilities for a barbarian/wiz PrC?  It seems like advancing DR X/- or advancing uses of rage/day would both make more sense.

A character's rage mage levels stack with his levels in one class that provides rage or frenzy for determining the number of times per day he can rage and the bonuses granted.

He already advances rage per day... but yeah, I also wonder why the Ki Strike...

[Prime32]

Why the Ki Strike abilities for a barbarian/wiz PrC?

Is magic rage treating weapons as magic that odd? Granted, adamantine might be pushing it...

[VennDygrem]

You might want to keep the magic weapons thing, though by the level a character gains entry into the class, their primary weapon should actually have at least a +1 enhancement and thus be magic, anyway. Still, nice to know you can pick up a table leg or a big rock and know it can get through the bad guy's DR.

Maybe instead of the other DR-overcoming abilities, other abilities which feed into combining melee combat and spellcasting. Maybe something that allows you to ignore an amount of spell resistance when casting a spell up to one round after a successful melee attack? A bonus to-hit or to damage on melee attacks after successfull casting a spell? Usually these abilities, granted by feats or other sources, end up being pretty lame or underpowered, but I'm sure we can come up with something interesting.

That, or maybe the ability to add its strength bonus to damaging spells? Power Casting (like Power Attack- recklessly sacrifice something to gain increased effectiveness)? Bonus spell-like abilities? There are all sorts of things that can fill in the blanks and be considered useful. Even something as simple as a bonus Metamagic or combat feat at one of the levels could be useful, though this depends. Whatever it is, it should add to the core concept of casting spells in a rage/frenzy.

[woodenbandman]

Giving quicken spell to a class that loses 5 spells known levels at minimum is not such a great idea. Perhaps grant Sudden Quicken instead?

[Risada]

Giving quicken spell to a class that loses 5 spells known levels at minimum is not such a great idea. Perhaps grant Sudden Quicken instead?

I also thought that, until I read the capstone... Quicken for free as long as you cast only one spell per round... so it's a spell+full attack every round...

[woodenbandman]

Hmm... That capstone could be pushing it, but maybe not. The caster levels lost might make this balanced. You are limited to 8th level spells if you grab that capstone, but then again a quickened Summon Monster 8 never hurt anyone.

[EjoThims]

I've been working on something similar here, but for any caster type.

I also don't really understand giving ki strike instead of channel spell or just magical boosts to physical damage, and why limit it to Quicken Spell?