Spellbinder (3.5e Prestige Class)

The spellbinder is a magician who seeks to gain mastery over the finer details of his spellwork.  Able to craft a personal focus that allows him greater control over his magic, he shapes, contorts, and manipulates the forces of magic with the greatest of ease.

An elven spellbinder unleashing fiery doom through his crystal ball, a personal focus of his own making.

Becoming a Spellbinder

Entry Requirements

Skills:	Knowledge (arcana) 8 ranks, Spellcraft 8 ranks.
Feats:	Craft Wondrous Item, and any two metamagic feats.
Spellcasting:	Able to cast 3rd level arcane spells.
Special:	You may not be True Neutral.

Table: The Spellbinder

Hit Die: d4

Level	Base Attack Bonus	Saving Throws			Special	Spellcasting
		Fort	Ref	Will
1st	+0	+2	+0	+2	Forsaken Words, Personal Focus	+1 in an existing arcane spellcasting class
2nd	+1	+3	+0	+3	Aligned Magic	+1 in an existing arcane spellcasting class
3rd	+1	+3	+1	+3	Spellbinding	+1 in an existing arcane spellcasting class
4th	+2	+4	+1	+4	Metaphysical Sacrifice	+1 in an existing arcane spellcasting class
5th	+2	+4	+1	+4	Metamagical Finesse	+1 in an existing arcane spellcasting class
Class Skills (6 + Int modifier per level) Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Knowledge (any, taken individually) (Int), Profession (Wis), Perform (Cha), Spellcraft (Int), and Use Magic Device (Cha)

Class Features

All of the following are class features of the spellbinder.

Weapons & Armor Proficiency:  The spellbinder gains no additional proficiencies beyond those they already possess.

Spellcasting:  At the indicated levels, you gain new spells per day and an increase in caster level (and spells known, if applicable) as if you had also gained a level in an arcane spellcasting class to which you belonged before adding the prestige class level.  You do not, however, gain any other benefit a character of that class would have gained.  If you had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a spellbinder, you must decide to which class to add each level for the purpose of determining spells per day, caster level, and spells known.

Forsaken Words:  You have mastered the art of spellcasting.  You gain the Silent Spell metamagic feat as a bonus feat.  When applied to your spells, it has a +0 adjustment to that spell's level, and you may apply it spontaneously to any spell you cast even if you are a prepared spellcaster.

Personal Focus:  You can use your Craft Wondrous Item feat to craft a personal focus upon reaching 3rd level.  A personal focus replaces any need for a focus, material component, or expensive material component equal to its market value or less, and you can determine the market value of the focus at the time of its creation.  For example, if you craft a personal focus worth 5,000gp (costing 2,500gp and 200xp to craft, plus the cost of whatever form the focus takes), it can be used in the place of any focus or material components your spells require up to 5,000gp.  If using your personal focus in place of a material component, the personal focus is not consumed upon completion of the spell.

You may use your spellbinding ability (see below) to lower the cost of creating a personal focus, and you may only posses one such focus at any given time.  The personal focus is an active magic item and behaves appropriately in any situation where that nature may come into play, such as entering an antimagic field or being targeted by dispel magic, in which case you must then supply the normal components or foci to cast your spells as appropriate to the situation (assuming you can cast at all).  If you already possess a personal focus and wish to craft a new one, you must first destroy your original, regaining 50% of its gold value in raw materials.

Your personal focus is protected by your saving throws, spell resistance, and other similar traits even when not in your direct possession, and you always know its general direction and condition regardless of distance or what plane it is currently on. Only divine intervention can interrupt this extraordinary sense.  Others can use your personal focus to track you down, gaining a +5 circumstance bonus (or -5 to your saving throws to resist divination spells) on any attempts to do so as long as they have your personal focus in their possession.

Your personal focus can also be a magic item, such as a magic ring, staff, or rod. In such a case, simply add the market price of both the magic item and your personal focus together and use that total to determine the cost to craft the item.

Aligned Magic (Su):  Your personal focus channels the power of magic through your very soul, and in turn the spells you cast with it gain a reflection of your spirit.  Choose a non-neutral portion of your alignemnt.  From that point onward, any spells you cast through your personal focus may have that alignment descriptor applied to them unless they are already of the opposite alignment.  For example, a lawful good spellbinder can choose to make their spells [Lawful] or [Good] whenever they cast them through their personal focus.

If such a spell is cast upon a creature of the opposite alignment, you gain a +1 bonus to your caster level.  If they are of the opposite subtype, you instead gain a +2 bonus to your caster level.

Spellbinding (Su):  By weaving strands of ambient mana into your spells, you can power those spells with the very essence of magic rather than your raw essence.  Whenever one of your spells or spell-like abilities has an experience point cost associated with it, you can lower that xp cost by 10% per class level, to a maximum of 50% at 5th level.  Note that this is a supernatural ability, and it can be suppressed in an antimagic field, dead magic zone, or other similar phenomena.  You may also use your spellbinding ability when crafting magic items, lowering the experience cost for their creation in the same way.

Only spells cast through your personal focus can be affected by spellbinding, and you must have a personal focus nearby in order to make use of it when forging magic items.

Metaphysical Sacrifice (Su):  You gain the ability to cast metamagic spells spontaneously (even if you normally must prepare your spells) by taking ability damage instead of increasing the level of the spell.  To do so, you suffer one point of ability damage for each spell level by which you are increasing the spell through metamagic.  You choose which of his ability scores to damage at this time, but all damage from casting of a single spell must go to the same ability.  In this manner, you can increase a spell’s level beyond your normal capabilities.  You must still have a sufficient ability score to cast a spell of the level to which metamagic enhanced it.  Heighten Spell is unaffected by this class feature.

Ability damage taken from metamagic manipulation is also resistant to magical restoratives.  Should any character attempt to cast a spell that restores ability damage (such as lesser restoration'') lost by this ability, they must succeed on a DC (15 + amount of ability damage suffered) caster level check or the spell has no effect on the injured spellbinder, but additional attempts to restore the damage can still be made.  Ability damage returns at the normal rate with rest and time.

Only spells cast through your personal focus can be affected by metaphysical sacrifice.

In addition, if you are a spontaneous spellcaster, you may apply metamagic feats on the fly without increasing the casting time of the spell.  This affects your forsaken words class feature as well.

Metamagical Finesse:  You have an easier time using metamagic than other spellcasters.  The spell level increase for applying a metamagic feat to any spell drops by 1 (minimum +1 level, or +0 level if the feat already has a +0 level adjustment).  A spell affected by the Heighten Spell feat is unaffected by this ability.

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