Witch notes

The following will make sense only to those people who play Pathfinder and are conversant with the final playtest version of the Witch from the Advanced Player's Guide. But what the heck, it's my blog, and the best place for me to keep notes I can find later is to publish them.

So if you don't know what I'm talking about, lie back and think of England.



Class Skills
Replace Intimidate with Handle Animal
Replace Knowledge (History) with Knowledge (Local)
Skill Ranks per Level: 4 + Int modifier


Class Features
Coven Role: At 1st level, the Witch selects her Coven Role from one of the following: Charisma-based Maiden, Wisdom-based Mother, or Intelligence-based Crone.

• Maidens add Bluff, Diplomacy, and Disguise to their list of Class Skills.
• Mothers add Perception, Sense Motive, and Survival to their list of Class Skills.
• Crones add Knowledge (all) and Linguistics to their list of Class Skills.

If a group of witches contains at least 1 of each of these roles, any witch with the Coven Hex may use the best Charisma, Intelligence, or Wisdom modifier of any other Coven member as long as they are within 30 feet of each other. (Special thanks to SmiloDan over on the Paizo boards for this idea, which I modified somewhat.)

Hexes: Any time a Hex requires an Intelligence modifier to determine duration or difficulty number, use the attribute of that Witch's Coven Role instead.

Spellcasting: The requirements on learning and casting spells now depend upon which Coven Role the Witch has chosen. Everything else remains the same. A Witch must still choose and prepare her spells ahead of time, even if she is a Charisma-based caster.

Witch's Familiar: To quote the beginning of the Witch entry,

Some gain power through study, some through devotion, others through blood, but the witch gains power from her communion with the unknown. Generally feared and misunderstood, the witch draws her magic from a pact made with an otherworldly power. Communing with that source, using her familiar as a conduit, the witch gains not only a host of spells, but a number of strange abilities...

A Witch's familiar no longer acts as a spellbook. It is instead a conduit of extraplanar information with which she communes daily, much like a cleric, to regain her spells. This means the following:

• There are no more familiar bonus spells.
• However, all spells of castable level are now open to the Witch, just like Clerics and Druids.
• Loss of a familiar is now a large inconvenience instead of a disastrous, unrecoverable loss of spells.
  

Spells: Add all stat buff spells (Owl's Wisdom, Fox's Cunning, etc) and the Mass versions thereof to the Witch spell list.


I realize this version still isn't perfect but I think it goes a long way towards addressing some of the inadequacies and WTF?ness of the class as it currently exists. I look forward to your critiques of my changes (Mxyzplk especially).