The Singer of Soldiers
Music, poetry, acting and other arts make life worth living, and this week’s new archetype lives by those means, just as his enemies die by them. That’s right, it’s time for a new skald archetype, the singer of soldiers, whose unique powers are geared towards bolstering the martially-inclined while crushing enemy spellcasters. But that’s enough of my song and dance: let’s get to the performance of this deadly skald.
New Skald Archetype
Singer of Soldiers
While all skalds celebrate military traditions through the arts and use their aesthetic prowess to whip their allies into a frenzy, the singer of soldiers goes a step further, not only using his arts to enhance the his martial allies, but to sing the virtues of sword over spell. More than just gifted in the ability to combat enemy spellcasters, the singer of soldiers is philosophically devoted to the accomplishments of men and women who rely on themselves rather on than arcane energies to accomplish heroic deeds. He uses his abilities both to champion the world’s warriors in their mighty quests, and to defeat those who would resort to magic to accomplish their ends.
Counter Magic (Su): A singer of soldier is an expert at fighting against mages of all stripes, and though he lacks the ability to cast spells of his own, he can use secret lore and ancient verse to counter spells and dispel magical effects. Beginning at 1st level, a singer of soldiers gains the ability to use his powers to defeat the magic of other characters. As a standard action, he can either ready an action to counter a spell or attempt to dispel a spell already in place. In order to accomplish either of these tasks, he must succeed on a special dispel check. He rolls 1d20 and adds his class level and Charisma modifier as a bonus on this check. The DC of this check is equal to 10 + the caster level of the spell + the spell level of the spell. If the check is successful, the spell is countered or dispelled. At 7th level, he can ready an action to counter a spell as a move action. At 13th level, he can ready an action to counter a spell as a swift action, and at 19th level, he can ready an action to counter a spell as a free action once per turn.
As his power increases over time, he gains a greater ability to counter and dispel spells of certain varieties. At every even-numbered level, he may select a single subschool or descriptor; he gains a +2 bonus on dispel checks made against a spell of that subschool or with that descriptor. Additionally, at 4th level, and every 3 levels thereafter, he chooses a single school of magic and gains a further +1 bonus on dispel checks against all spells of that school. These effects are cumulative, so a 4th-level singer of soldiers who selected the illusion school, the shadow subschool, and the shadow descriptor would gain a +5 bonus on dispelling a shadow conjuration spell. A singer of soldiers cannot select the mind-affecting or death descriptors.
A singer of soldiers can use this ability 3 times per day, plus an additional time per day at each level beyond 1st.
This ability replaces the spellcasting and lore master class features.
Raging Song: A singer of soldiers’ special songs imbue his listeners with potent defenses against spellcasters. At 1st level, a singer of soldiers gains the raging song class feature as normal, except that creatures who accept the raging song may always use Spellcraft and Knowledge (arcana) to identify spells that are being cast or which are already in place, though they cannot use other aspects of those skills which would ordinarily be prohibited by the raging song’s effects.
This ability modifies the raging song class feature.
Inspired Rage (Su):A singer of soldiers knows a special song, which drives his allies into an intense battle rage. This functions as the inspired rage song, except that the song grants a bonus on saving throws against spells, rather than a bonus on Will saves.
This ability modifies the inspired rage raging song.
Ballad of the Warrior (Su):At 10th level, the singer of soldiers learns to create a special performance which hinders arcane energies. This raging song only affects enemies within 100 feet who can clearly see and hear the singer of soldiers. All affected enemies must succeed on a Will save (DC 10 + ½ the singer of soldiers’ level + the singer of soldiers’ Charisma modifier) or suffer 50% spell failure for all spells. This effect lasts for as long as the singer of soldiers uses this performance.
This ability replaces the dirge of doom raging song.
Route Spells (Sp): At 5th level, a singer of soldiers can use his abilities to defeat spells in order to turn them on his foes. Once per day, whenever he successfully counters a spell with the counter magic class feature, he may choose to have that spell be affected as though turned back by a spell turning spell, except that the singer of soldiers need not have been the target of the spell cast in this way. Area spells, effect spells, and touch range spells cannot be turned affected by this ability, as with the spell turning spell. At 11th level, and again at 17th level, the singer of soldiers gains an additional daily use of this ability
This ability replaces the spell kenning class feature.