Talk:Edgemaster (3.5e Prestige Class)

Look what I did...

And here it is, the improved concept of the Archblade, the "ultimate fighter", and specifically made for fighters. Fighters, as you know, are a rather low tier class. They have a lot of trouble with a lot of everything. This PrC is balanced to compare to what a wizard can do. A breakdown level by level, starting at level 11.

11th: The wizard has had flight for some time, and has been at range out of the fighter's reach. The counter is Blade Beam to strike at range. It is based on a 2nd-level spell, Whirling Blade.
The wizard polymorphs into something uncrittable. Crit the Uncrittable solves that, based on a series of 1st-level spells for the same thing. If one assumes a +3 adjustment for "crit anything" (such as from Charm Person 1st to Charm Monster 4th), this is effectively a 4th-level spell.
The wizard has disintegrate, enervation, and a whole bunch of real nasty rays. Parry Ray will remove them, based on Ray Deflection, a 4th-level spell. The swiftness is countered by the now instant-duration instead of round/level.

13th: The wizard has motherfluffin' Forcecage. Break out the Force Buster and crash through.
The wizard, and many monsters, have crazy grapple scores (via the wizard summoning grapplemonsters). Not to mention all sorts of Solid Fogs and other battlefield controls. And he can teleport and shadow walk and... well shadow walk back with Shadow Rift. 6th level spell, but utility mostly.
The wizard has a bunch of damage in the form of a great pile of dice, just look at the spells. Suppress Damage is based on the Comp Psi power Dampen Power, which is 2nd, but expanded to cover physical attacks too. However, most physical attacks look like this-> 1d12+7378921 damage, so it's kind of less effective anyhow.

15th: The wizard has Finger of Death. You have a Deathblow. You are now better.
The wizard is casting everything! The party is dying! Counterspelling is useless, unless it's suddenly not. Runica has no direct spell to compare it to, but the loss of standard actions means the fighter is out of the fight while helping allies, and it can still only handle 1 spell per round, making it trouble vs multiple casters.
The wizard has hit you with negative levels, ability damage, and a save or die, and your will save or other save was not enough. You can't stop it, but you can hurt him. Vaguely based off a crusader maneuver, but due to the differences, there's not a direct comparison.

17th: The wizard has his 9th level spells. He is packing a thousand immunities. However, becoming immune to force is hard. You now have force damage to fight his ethereal ass. Closest effect is a 1st-level Desert Wind maneuver, but with Force instead of Fire. Might call it a 5th or 6th level.
The wizard is invisible, and packing tons of temp hp. Sixth Sense either gives you the blindsense to see past the myriad of concealers, or serves as a utilitarian hp checking device against friend or foe.
The wizard has enchantments, particularly dominate person. You have mind blank; suck on it, wiz.

19th: The wizard has all sorts of AoEs. You don't. Or didn't, now you do. Slash All is Whirlwind Attack Plus.
The wizard is buffed. Now you can dispel it with Destroy Strike.
The wizard, by spell or summon, is dealing thousands of damage. You don't care, you can survive everything short of a vorpal or disintegrate, and you have parry ray for the latter.

Downside... this is about as "no power early, lots of power later" unbalanced as you get, but this is Fighter after all...

Don't forget the warblade. Could probably do something like Warblade 10 / Edgemaster 10 if you find a way to nab a feat at level 10 for Greater Weapon Focus. Or Warblade 9 / Fighter 1 / Edgemaster 10. --Ghostwheel 07:01, September 11, 2009 (UTC)

Quite. Fortunately the warblade is already pretty strong and the combat edges here are very maneuver-esque (in fact check the Adaption), so it's more of a lateral shift in power for warblade entering warriors. -- Eiji Hyrule 15:01, September 11, 2009 (UTC)

Wait, isn't the wizard itself the ultimate example of "no power early, lots of power later"? --Luigifan18 (talk) 21:10, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Wizards do well at low levels (Color Spray, Silent Image, Grease, lookin' at you). They're just squishy. I suppose it's best said that everyone starts out weak, but the wizard grows quick while the fighter does not. The whole "Linear Fighters Quadratic Wizards" rule. -- Eiji-kun (talk) 03:29, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

The problem isn't just the squishiness, it's the lack of spell slots. I mean, come on, they get only 1 1st-level spell at 1st level (maybe a few more, depending on Intelligence), and 0-level spells are nearly useless. --Luigifan18 (talk) 02:13, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Testing

Edgemaster

Column 1	Column 2	Column 3	Column 4	Column 5
Row 1	Stuff	More Stuff	Still More Stuff	...
Row 2	Stuff	More Stuff	Still More Stuff	...

Let's see how that looks... -- Jota 01:49, September 15, 2009 (UTC)

Domo arigato Mr. Jotato (Domo domo.... domo domo...) -- Eiji Hyrule 02:31, September 15, 2009 (UTC)

Bonus Points

... for adapting a SotN quote with that pic. - TarkisFlux 03:22, September 15, 2009 (UTC)

Ratings

	Aeturo favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	One of my players played this in a recent campaign and now it's going to be a staple of high level fighters in my future campaigns. Great job of bringing the fighter to the wizard level.

	Luigifan18 favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	Bah. The rating macro refused to let me type any text in, so I had to do it the long way. Anyways, this is a very fun and powerful-looking melee class with just enough special powers (and just enough limitations on those powers) to expand its tactical utility sky-high.

	Leziad favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	Look very fun to play, nice to see some sweet VH content.

	Ghostwheel favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	Despite the late prereqs, this class is solidly built and looks like a ton of fun. With the sandboxed maneuver-like abilities, this class truly stands out as what a master swordsman of the wizard-level should look like.