Manor Lord: 3.5 Class

I was talking to someone in discord and the concept of “what can you really do with a bunch of guys with thumbs” came up. Essentially, the old RPG concept of clever tools, logistics, physics questions and the like. Things like the classic use a 10ft pole to check for traps, or I recall one game I played where we got a Rosetta Stone, carved into a wheel. Well we rolled that thing down any hallway we found letting it just soak up traps. Finally getting back to the old standby of paying 4-5 peasants to stand by you with slings to pepper folks with arrows, and how good it is at level 1. I got thinking, what could we do with that as a class. Could we make it viable? Then I challenged myself to start writing, and well… here it is.

Is it perfect? Nope. Is it playable? Probably. Is it somehow both wildly OP and wildly under powered? Yup. Do I think it could be fun? I do. You’ll always have your loyal friend around, and you can have effectively unlimited level 1 dudes hanging around. Very quickly, you’ll have them make a camp somewhere and just spend your actions calling them to you so you’re not rolling gigantic piles of dice. But it also opens the door, if you really feel a need to wage 1000-man battles.

The Manor Lord

You’ve always got friends in the area, and can get them to do pretty much anything for you.

• HD: D6
• BAB: Poor
• Fort: Bad
• Ref: Good
• Will: Good
• Skills: 8+Int, all
• Prof: Simple weapons, shields, light armor.

Level 1: Friend: You gain the services of a familiar much like a wizard. You’re familiar is called a Friend, and must be a 1HD humanoid with no class levels. You can allocate its feats, skills, abilities, and race when you make this friend. Your Friends Int Score is set to a minimum of the value from the familiar table, it never decreases. Your Friend cannot have a template.

Level 1: Recruit: If you spend an hour recruiting in a city or similar environment with 1HD humanoids, you can gather Recruits. These Recruits are 1HD followers who believe in your cause, whatever it may be. They have no special abilities, just 1HD in the humanoid racial class. You can allocate feats, and skills as you wish. Race is limited by local populations. If the city is not big enough to support that many unclassed 1HD humanoids, that is OK. Your recruits heard your call and came from out of town. Your Recruits have free will, and will broadly follow you, but will not behave suicidally. They will not willingly charge down a hallway to clear out traps for example. On purpose anyway. Recruits act on their own turns with their own actions, but always right after you in initiative order, unless they were given Orders that turn, in which case they skip their turn. If you bring all of them into a fight at higher levels, average rolls are strongly recommended.

Level	# of Recruits	Camp Size
1	1
2	5
3	10
4	25
5	80	Thorpe
6	200
7	400	Hamlet
8	600
9	900	Village
10	1,400
11	2,000	Small Town
12	3,500
13	5,000	Large Town
14	8,000
15	12,000	Small City
16	17,000
17	25,000	Large City
18	50,000
19	100,000	Metropolis
20	200,000	Planar Metropolis

Level 1: Supportive: When you, or one of your Recruits use aid another, they provide a +4 bonus instead of the normal +2.

Level 2: Supportive II: You, and your Recruits provide a +4 bonus for flanking.

Level 3: Logistics – Teleport: Cha mod/Day, as a standard action, you can summon one of your Recruits (or Promoted Units) to an open space next to you as though you had used the teleport spell. At level 9, this increases to greater teleport, and at level 15 this is as per plane shift. There is never a margin of error for these abilities, and they only work for Recruits.

Level 4: Orders: You can issue the following orders to any recruits within earshot. They are compelled to obey, even if dangerous (but not obviously suicidal), and don’t hold grudges for orders issues. A Recruit always needs to hear an Order to follow it. This is a mind affecting compulsion.

• Take the Hit: When a creature within 60ft of you would be targeted by an attack roll, as an immediate action, you Order one of your Recruits to move up to 2x its speed and become the new target of the attack, assuming they are still eligible.
• Human Shield: As an immediate action, when an ally within 60ft would take damage, you can move any number any number of Recruits move up to 2x their speed adjacent to the target. That ally can spread the damage out at their discretion among the Recruits and themselves.
• Dog Pile: As a standard action, you Order any number of recruits to Dog Pile. You point at a target within 100ft of you, and any number of recruits can move towards it, provided they end their turn adjacent to the target. One of your Recruits can then make a Grapple attempt, while the remainder use the Aid Another action.
• Volley: You can Order a squad of recruits to make a volley attack. Select all Recruits in a 30ft radius that you can see who can make a ranged attack. One Recruit rolls an attack roll against a single square, AC 5, and the remainder use Aid Another. The attack deals damage equal to the attacker’s normal damage multiplied by the number of Recruits using Aid Another. So 1d8 from a longbow, multiplied by 4 Aid Another is 1d8*4. Any creatures in the targeted square can make a reflex save DC 10+Cha Mod+# of Recruits making the attack for half damage.
• Defensive Formation: As a standard action, you can Order a visible selection of Recruits that you can see, wielding shields, to take a defensive formation. When in a Defensive Formation, they cannot move or be moved, and cannot be overrun. In addition, they cannot make attacks, but do gain a +4 bonus to AC. You can tell your Recruits to exit a defensive formation as a swift action.

Level 5: Human Chain: Your Recruits can combine their carrying capacity only for the purposes of carrying you and your allies. This allows them to build human pyramids to climb over walls, or across bridges.

Level 6: Camp: You can tell your Recruits to make camp. They can spend 8 hours digging latrines, pitching tents and making a camp. Given a week’s time, this camp can function as a thorpe with thatch houses. This is usually relevant for availability of NPCs, item shops, and purchase levels. At level 8, with another week’s time, this can upgrade to a hamlet with log cabins. At level 10, with another week’s time, it becomes a village with a low-slung wooden wall and town center. At 12, with another week’s time, it becomes a small town, and many buildings are built from stone. At level14, with another week, it becomes a large town. 16, and a week turns it into a small city. 18 and a week, a large city. 19 and a week a metropolis, and 20 and a week, a planar metropolis. You can only have one camp at a given time.

Level 6: Promotion: With a 10-minute ritual, you can promote 1 Recruit. You can sustain Cha mod promotions at any one time. A promoted unit is no longer a Recruit. Instead, they gain levels in an NPC class equal to half yours. You can also give them racial hit die instead. You can allocate their class levels, or abilities at your discretion. Special* If you’d like, you can instead promote an undefined “Recruit” from your Camp into a more powerful creature. They can be promoted to a creature with an Int score of at least 6, and a CR of no more than 1/2 your HD. This Recruit isn’t technically promoted, and doesn’t suddenly become a dragon. Instead, you’ve always had a dragon in your Camp and just decided to call him over. Once Promoted, a Recruit is always Promoted, and cannot be downgraded back to a regular recruit. A slain Promoted unit no longer counts against your limit.

Level 7: Supportive III: When a spell is cast on one of your Recruits, you can count them of a creature 2 sizes smaller than it is, or as 1/2 of a creature, at your discretion.

Level 12: Supportive IV: Your Recruits provide a flanking bonus against any adjacent creature.

Level 17: Supportive V: Your Recruits don’t need to eat, breathe, or sleep and are immune to fatigue.

Level 20: Gate: You can use Gate as an SLA with a CL equal to your HD. You can only use gate as a portal, not to summon creatures, and you can only maintain one gate at a time.