Strategist (3.5e Class)

Strategist
A master of command, the Strategist relies on the use of her Monster Control Vault to wield armies for inter(national/continental/planetary/planar/universal) conquest.

Making a Strategist
Strategists have the advantage of numbers and spreadability, but the actual Strategist often hides in her Monster Control Vault, miles or planes away from the rest of the party.

Abilities: Intelligence, Charisma, and Wisdom are all important for the Strategist. Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution are almost completely useless for the strategist, since she spends most of her time inside a vault.

Races: Any race that has some members following other members of it is far more likely to have Strategists.

Alignment: Any.

Starting Gold: 10d4&times;10 gp (250 gp).

Starting Age: Complex.

Class Skills, Tome of Prowess Variant (6 per level, ×4 at 1st level) (Cha), (Int), (Int), (Cha), (Wis), (Cha), (Cha), (Wis), (Int)

Class Features
All of the following are class features of the Strategist.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: The Strategist is not proficient with any armor or weapons.

The Monster Control Vault can deploy into a structure composed of five 10' cubes per class level with one minute of transformation, and can undeploy with one minute of transformation as well. While deployed as a structure, and only while deployed as a structure, the Strategist and his allies can enter it. Inside it are a number of handy devices. At first level, it contains a scrollable, scalable magic map which reveals any terrain features the Strategist or one of her Transponders has explored, and a speaker system for communication with her Transponders.

Monster Control Vaults weigh 3000 pounds, but their wheels make them easily pulled over terrain that isn't difficult terrain by anyone with a maximum load of 200 or more pounds.

Replacing a Monster Control Vault that has been destroyed costs 10,000 gold in materials and takes one week.

 (Su): A Strategist can create or destroy Transponders. These are small (1/2 pound) devices that permit instantaneous verbal communication with the Monster Control Vault at any distance. Creating a Transponder takes 1 gold piece worth of materials and 10 minutes of work. Destroying a Transponder is a purely mental full-round action with unlimited range. The Strategist can only have a number of Transponders equal to her class level at a time.

Even destroying and rebuilding the Monster Control Vault does not permit changing the type. You cannot use the Monster Control Vault to craft monsters that have a higher CR than your character level. Crafting a monster has a price according to this chart:

The price listed in (gp) is actually the total market value of all material components required to produce the creature. Materials used should be things appropriate for the creation of creatures of that type: onyx, corpses, brackish water, grave dirt, and clay for Undead; food and drink for living creatures who eat and drink; rare earths and fancy rocks for creatures made of stone; and so on. The exact nature of the materials need not be consistent from each identical monster to the next, but a character who knows what you are using and that you are a Strategist can identify the type of monster you will make with a DC 15 Knowledge check, and its exact identity with a DC 25 Knowledge check.

Any experience that the monster would gain is given directly to the Strategist. When experience would be split between characters, any number of monsters only counts as one character for this purpose.

All monsters created in this way start out completely loyal to the Strategist. Sufficient persuasion or magic can change this state, but they still give all their experience to the Strategist.

At 4th level, and every four levels after that, the Strategist's Monster Control Vault gains another vat for generating monsters of a new type.

At level 7, the vats can produce Huge monsters as well. At level 14, the vats can produce Gargantuan monsters.



 (Su): At 5th level, the Strategist can hear communication over her Transponder system mentally, and does not have to be in the Monster Control Vault to communicate in this way.

The Strategist can recruit characters with a CR of 1 or less of any race she has previously met (so long as CR 1 or less characters of that race are possible) for a standard fee: 3 silver pieces per day, with the first year paid in advance (usually 109.5 gold pieces). In addition, any followers or cohorts she gets from the Leadership feat or equivalent can come from this door, permitting her absolute control over their attributes (within the limitations of the feat).





A screen appears in the Monster Control Vault that allows people inside to see what one of the Transponders at a time sees, and a scrying sensor appears in the Monster Control Vault that allows people inside it to show things on tiny screens on any or all Transponders upgraded with visual capability. No corresponding visual effect is added to the "Mental Transpondence" ability.

Turning this device on or off is a standard action that requires contact with the device. Invisibility and immunity to scrying can be toggled separately.

' (Sp):''' At level 11, while the Strategist's Monster Control Vault is deployed, she can use a standard action to teleport herself and up to 1 willing ally per class level to a marked circle in the Monster Control Vault. This can transport her across planes.

The crystal ball can only be used once per day per three Strategist class levels.

Turning this device on or off is a standard action that requires contact with the device.



Anyone with one of the Strategist's Transponders can, with the Strategist's permission, teleport theirself and any number of their allies within 30' of them into the ring as a 1-round action, so long as all of them can fit in the ring together.



The Strategist has sole telepathic control over this ability.