Does it not fit the theme you're thinking Im going with or it doesn't fit with the power level and balance?
I don't know, honestly. It doesn't look to be overpowering, at a glance... but it doesn't quite seem to fit the class' archetype.
On theme: Often in books and movies dark things have multiple forms. Think the Queen of Darkness from Dragon Lance or Dante from Devil May Cry.
On balance: The object is to have only a few things each form can do to encourage frequent shifts and usage of strategy.
I see what you're saying, but don't you think it might be too many choices? I mean, reading over what you posted below... that's a lot of stuff to remember. It'd be great for a min-maxer or someone who enjoys exploring every tactical option possible, but a casual gamer would get overwhelmed by all that and never realize the class to its full potential. Me, I like using tactics and playing intelligently, but I don't get enjoyment from wringing every single drop of potential from my character - I prefer to have fun and play the game. So, take my comments for what they're worth.
That may be the case. But the druid can do everything this class can do but better. Including having a different shapeshift form for nearly every occasion.
Don't try to balance this against the druid. That thing is the most powerful class in the game and needs to be beaten with a nerf stick.
True. They do suck, but IMO for this class to be balanced, finding something super optimized to pair with it will just make it worse. At the same time, it would make form advancement really difficult.
Well yeah. But then, given the sheer amount of stuff out there, any player could find a combo to break anything, given enough time. If you think that Joe Gamer can easily find something that would make this class into an overpowered monster, then chances are it needs to be toned down a bit.
This, right here, is focused enough for a 15-tier PrC instead of a 20-level base class.
What?
What I meant was, the class is very focused - it's all about drawing power (from darkness, Shadow, the cosmos, whatever). As opposed to base classes, which are fairly open - the fighter fights (but the actual choice of HOW he fights is left up to the player to customize); the cleric is a representative of a god (again, which god is the player's choice); the rogue can be stealthy, thuggish, thieving, diplomatic, or any combination thereof. The Warshade, OTOH, is very un-customizable - every one of them gets the same abilities. (I must admit, though, that customization is one of my pet peeves; when I revised the classes for Project Phoenix, I gave most of them paths of some sort to increase flexibility and customization.) You could easily make this into a 15-tier PrC geared toward warlocks or sorcerers.
The idea I was shooting for was something extremely complicated that made you think a few steps ahead.
Like I said, complicated is good for min-maxers, but not for casual gamers.
Combined with the sacrificing a pack of Sunless Mire charges, it can get up to 30d6. At 20 ft. across, you can deal up to 6528 damage with that ability. Sunless Mire maxed out is +16d4. Each 5' increment of the burst allows you to affect 8 targets. Using Quasar and sacrificing 10 sunless mire charges increases quasar damage to 30d6. 30d6 damage maximized is 180+6d4 damage. Since Each 5' increment of a burst allows you to target 8 enemies, and a 20' burst has 4 increments of 5', you get a total of 32 people. 180 damage x 32 people=5760 damage. In addition to that, they all take 6d4 damage from the remaining sunless mire charges. Maximized to 24 damage each, that's a total of 768 damage. 5760+768=6528 damage total. (the equation is 180 x 32 + (24 x 32)= 6528. That's extremely powerful, and should have repercussions. At least I think it should. Anything that doesn't die is going to look right at you. Which is where the team work factor of play comes in. And actually now that Im looking at the actual in game numbers, whether it's maximized and assuming everyone fails their save or not, that looks way over powered.
Quick shifting and combining moves is what makes this class good. Picture this: In behemoth form, Evard's Black Grip everything to your adjacent squares with a move action, shift into human form with a swift action, use sunless mire with a standard action. Now everything adjacent to you makes a save, and if they all fail you get +8d4 damage. Later on, Evard's Black Grip can affect more targets, and sunless mire expands to 10 ft. allowing you to affect 16 targets with it instead of 8. Remember a 5' burst is you in the center and each square around you. Allowing for a total of 8 targets.
The 5-ft. burst thing doesn't sound right, but I'll take your word for it.
Think you may have misread. Nether bolt is one target.
Yeah, I think I meant something else.
See above quote, it's a total of 8d6 healing for yourself when maximized. Not too shabby if I do say so myself.
Now that you've explained it, it makes a bit more sense. That is a decent ability.
I didn't think having pets that deal 1d6 damage a round was too powerful. Check again, they're casting nether bolt at level 1, so they're helping very minorly if they hit. I clarified the portion about the soul. It was never intended to destroy the soul, rather just to make it untargetable by the spell a second time. Requiring a new fresh corpse.
Yeah, the 1d6/round isn't bad (I did read that the first time, but I was tired and just focused on the "specter" part). Instead of calling them specters, though (since it makes me think of the undead specters), why not just call them spirits to avoid confusion?
Eclipse was never meant to do damage, but added a 1d4 damge component for arguments sake.
Well, if you're going to be drawing off energy from others to heal yourself, it makes sense to deal some kind of damage to them, a la vampiric touch.
Nightfall: As a matter of fact that's exactly what it is, and was intended to be so. I didn't want to add a cap to it's damage but figured it would be too powerful if I didn't, so type and cap added.
All spells in 3.5 have a cap, so it simply makes sense - especially when you're using negative energy. Resist energy and its ilk don't protect against it.
It's not an actual shadow as per illusion spells. I believe what your thinking of are phantasms, though. Think more along the lines of unseen servant. It's essentially just a hand made of negative energy. If it's wording is a hard issue, I will rewrite the text.
It's not the wording so much as the fact that a hand of energy shouldn't be able to manipulate anything. Force, sure - we've got mage hand, the Bigby's spells, etc., but pure energy isn't material.
From dictionary.com: "Gravimetric: Of or relating to measurement of variations in a gravitational field." I direct you to my above statement where I said power origin may have come from the cosmos.
What if it comes from Shadow?
I agree that it is slightly underpowered, but the object of the power was to allow some minor crowd control in Behemoth form, while adding the 1d8 damage component on to it allowed it to be affected by sunless mire. Think about a sunless mire at that level, even if SM only hits half of the total targets it can will be 8d4 damage. 8d4+1d8 damage max= 40 damage to a possible of 8 people and they're knocked prone. It's not perfect, but it does add a little bit more strategy to the class. For example, you could use Gravimetric Emanation, shift into mephit form and fly up without worrying about AoO's. It's about making each form work with it's specific abilities while maintaining versatility.
Tripping up to 8 people without a check is certainly useful, and when used in the context of tactics, it's probably better than I'm envisioning.
Thank you though for your post. You brought up good points of interest.
Sure thing.