Talk:Bounty Hunter (3.5e Class)

Ratings

	SecondDeath777 likes this article and rated it 3 of 4.
	Wicked complex...but wicked cool. You could honestly make a campaign around only these guys. I dig.

Thank you! The-Marksman (talk) 09:04, 24 December 2017 (MST)

Franken Kesey likes this article and rated it 3 of 4.

First, most rogue and assassin builds out there are all about high damage and sneaking around. That is their role of course, but is cliche and predictable at this point. This class on the other hand deviates greatly from this trope while still having the capacity to fill a similar role in the party. Second, the code of ethics shows how they are different from indiscriminate assassins. It is short. Most parts make sense, yet the No Hunter Shall Interfere With Another's Hunt seams out of place when payment goes to the hunter that brings the bounty first. Especially since even lawful bounty hunters are competitive. Third, the non-lethal strike is well done. Adds mechanics to the flavor. Fourth, The quarry has some really good effects. A much improved and specific form of favored enemy (which fits the flavor). However, losing XP for changing quarries is just bad. What if the party is sent to a completely different realm and the quarry is no longer in the area. Last paragraph may be better with 1/2 class level added to attack and damage rolls (instead of full). Fifth, Restraints is has some good mechanics, and could be simplified a little. Referenced to book pages is unnecessary a simple link will make it less wordy. Sidenote, whips and nets are included in their proficiency list which helps a great deal with this feature. Sixth, Silencing Strike is another well written counter to spellcasters and sentries. Then you build on this with Lock Down, keeping quarries from using magic to escape. Seventh, the Ray of Exhaustion is perfect as a non-violent way to disable an opponent. Plus most of their quarries are vulnerable to it. Thus it is a better way to put opponents out of combat than strict damage. Eight, dislike same skills stacking from multiple sources (esp. improved tracking giving a boon to the same skills as quarry). Also, links to referenced spells are nice. But over-all a well written class which creates its own niche.

Balance

While there are a few abilities that are rogue-level (or potentially higher, such as permanent Freedom of Movement at level 13), this class doesn't really function well in combat; it has no staying power, no way to deal damage, and no way to get enemies to target it or take the hits that might come at it. As it is, I think overall a better balance point for it to be at is Fighter. --Ghostwheel 13:30, January 8, 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, well, 3 things; firstly, thank you very much for your input, I appreciate anyone from the Wikia's input with my work. I know that you and all of the other people here on the wikia are far more experienced D&D players than myself, and because of that, you all have different view points on the game, its mechanics and how those mechanics work, which Im always happen to take into account with my work. Also, for the record, his freedom of movement isnt permanent, its rounds per day based off of ability score.

Secondly, Its my personal opinion, that not every class needs to have a quasi-compulsion ability that forces enemies to attack the character and only the character inorder to be a decent, or even good class or good fighter type class. Those things work especially well for tanks, yes, but unless the class is called "The Tank" than I dont think thats a 100% nessesity for a good class. The class needs to be able to fufill its purpose, usually upon which its named. A bounty hunters purpose? To find, and then apprehend criminals who are likely to want to flee and not be found. I feel that Ive done a fairly decent job at fufilling that purpose, even if I took a large chunk of the class abilities from a WoTC class that already had it right.

Also, as far as not having staying power, again, the D10 hit die is the fighting level hit die and bab, and he has medium armor capabilities and doesnt lose class features from wearing medium armor, so being moderately well armored for his level, having a decent con, and having the D10 hit die I feel give him averagely decent staying power. Not every class needs to be over powered with damage reduction, and fast healing, and spell resistance, and a buttload of uber abilities. Sometimes its merely enough to be good.

As far as not having a way to deal damage, I might agree that that part could be particularly weak, and I'd like this to be a rogue level balanced class, so I'd like to correct especially this short coming, but Im not sure what kind of ability that could be added to the class would suffice for raising the damage potential of the class, which brings me to my third point, in order to bring the class upto the listed balance, Id have to add more abilities, and the way I had been looking at it, was that I already had too many class abilities as it is (not nessesarily too many for for my taste, just for what I thought the standard of how many class abilities a class gets, as viewed by everyone else). So would it be proper or alright to add abilities on to the seemingly largish amount it already has to bring it up to Rogue balance, or would that just start being overkill? I'd greatly appreciate a reply and further input based on my statements above, thanks Ghostwheel!! The-Marksman 14:25, January 8, 2010 (UTC)

A character in D&D can do one of three things in combat; play the striker, beating enemies down and killing them quickly, play the defender, forcing enemies to attack them and having the HP or armor to be able to take the hits that would kill another character, or play an arcanist, doing everything from battlefield control to buffing to summoning to debuffing to SoDs. Obviously there are a few exceptions, but they're few and far between for combat-viable characters. Characters that can't do any of these can easily be ignored by enemies, who kill everyone else in the party until the WoS is the last one left, before killing them. (Assuming that the enemies are rogue-level and the others in the party don't manage to pick up the slack of the WoS.) The bounty hunter might be able to track people, but can't bring them in at all, so it doesn't really fulfill its purpose at all--or rather, that's a monk/fighter-level purpose, and if that's all they can do, they'd be better off at that level.

Also, "staying power" means nothing if you can't force enemies to attack you. Instead, they'll ignore you, since you have no real damage capabilities outside of feats (and then you're basically reduced to the level of a fighter without as many bonus feats or a barbarian without rage), and other party members will have to pick up the slack, or DMs will have to count you as a non-combatant and reduce enemy power comparatively.

If you want to add abilities, then do so--and if you want to keep it rogue-level, I'd suggest removing Freedom of Movement, since it's pretty wizard-level IMO. Most of the other abilities seem around fighter-level for the most part, apart from one or two though those are more dependent on the situation. But for ideas on how to give it a way to be viable in combat without just copying what's come before, I can't help you much with that. One idea I had and used for the rogue-level ranger variant is this, though I'm sure you're creative enough to think of one on your own ;-) --Ghostwheel 04:00, January 9, 2010 (UTC)