Okay, but what’s the point of playing a divine caster if you’re not going to use the spell ‘Miracle’ as an excuse to do the Full Metal Alchemist hand-clap?
Revised and expanded from the Complete Divine version.
HD d8; BAB 3/4
Choose either:
Fort Good; Ref Good; Will Good; Skills 2 + Int mod; Skill list as original Favored Soul
or
The Favored Soul chooses any two saves to progress at a good rate. The last save is poor, but they has 4 + Int mod skill points. Expand the skill list as appropriate (to about the size of the Barbarian class skill list).
Class Features
Proficient with simple weapons, their deity's favored weapon, light and medium armor and shields (but not tower shields).
Smite deific foe 1/day: The Favored Soul may smite those hated by their deity. They add their Charisma modifier to attack and their Favored Soul level to damage. Who this class feature targets is variable: undead for Pelorites, dark elves and allies for Shevarash, goblinoids, orcs and giants for Moradin, and so on. The smiting always works on those who have willfully perverted the Favored Soul's faith.
2 - Weapon Focus: The Favored Soul gains Weapon Focus in their deity's favored weapon, even if they don't meet the prerequisites.
3 - Deific Favor I: <Deific Favor is a bit of a wild-card. The initial idea was that it was a bonus feat that could be filled with any appropriate domain devotion feat (from Complete Champion). However, this is also an appropriate place to give various favored souls unique abilities (cold subtype for Aurilites, social bonuses for Sunites, sneak attack for Bhaalites, ability to choose a sorcerer/wizard spell to add to their spell-list for magic deities (or from the druid list for nature deities, a smite-focused feat for followers of various war gods, etc). The DM and player of the Favored Soul should work together to select appropriate abilites, shamelessly stealing from prestige classes where desired. I do not recommend granting turning/rebuking undead, as that should be left to the Cleric.>
4 - Resist energy 10: The Favored Soul gains resist energy 10 to a chosen element, or resist energy 5 to two elements.
5 - Smite deific foe 2/day
6 - Domain II: The Favored Soul may choose an additional domain, gaining its granted power and adding its spells to their spells known.
7 - Weapon Specialization: The Favored Soul gains Weapon Specialization in their deity's favored weapon, even if they don't meet the prerequisites.
8 - Deific Favor II
9 - Resist energy 20: The Favored Soul gains an additional 10 points of resistance that can be distributed as they see fit (in 5 point blocks). For example, they could have resist fire 10 and resist cold 10, resist acid 20, or resist electricity 15 and resist sonic 5.
10 - Smite deific foe 3/day
11 - Flight: The Favored Soul gains a a fly speed of 60ft at good maneuverability. This ability usually manifests as glowing, non-physical wings of an appropriate appearance.
12 - Greater Weapon Focus: The Favored Soul gains Greater Weapon Focus in their deity's favored weapon, even if they don't meet the prerequisites.
Domain III: The Favored Soul may choose an additional domain, gaining its granted power and adding its spells to their spells known.
13 - Deific Favor III
14 - Resist energy 30: The Favored Soul gains an additional 10 points of resistance that can be distributed as they see fit (in 5 point blocks).
15 - Smite deific foe 4/day
16 - Greater Weapon Specialization: The Favored Soul gains Greater Weapon Specialization in their deity's favored weapon, even if they don't meet the prerequisites.
17 - Greater Flight: The Favored Soul's natural flight improves to a speed of 100ft, and a maneuverability of perfect.
18 - Deific Favor IV
Domain IV: The Favored Soul may choose an additional domain, gaining its granted power and adding its spells to their spells known.
19 - Resist energy 40: The Favored Soul gains an additional 10 points of resistance that can be distributed as they see fit (in 5 point blocks).
20 - Smite deific foe 5/day
Spells: Casting is entirely based on Charisma, rather than being divided between Wisdom and Charisma. Otherwise, as original Favored Soul, but remember that spontaneous domains give substantially more spells known and thus more versatility.
Concept
As near as I can reconstruct, the Favored Soul is the result of taking the very flavorful Windwalker of Shaundakul (Faiths and Pantheons) and turning it into a generic twenty-level class, eliminating the Shaundakul-specific abilities along the way. This is mainly borne out by the frequent observation that the original Favored Soul feels like a ten-level PrC stretched over twenty levels. I really like the Windwalker, so this is my attempt to add a bit more pizzazz back into the Favored Soul, and make it a proper spontaneous divine caster, as opposed to a spontaneous cleric with energy resistance, wings and no access to all those tasty [Divine] feats.
Comments
The revised Favored Soul is basically another variant on Paladin, only as a full-casting, 3/4 BAB class (but the free weapon feats mostly compensate for that). Alternately, it is 'specialist-priest(ess)-in-a-can,' to be reflavored as desired.
It is a substantial improvement over the original Favored Soul, and care should be exercised on that front, especially given the versatility of and breadth of options of several of their class features. Their smite ability should not be as applicable as smite good/evil, and domain choice should be monitored for abuse.
If the DM has worries about the power of this revised Favored Soul, there are several options, to be combined at their discretion.
Remove the extra granted domains at 6th and 18th, or make the Favored Soul choose one domain granted power and spell list active when they recover spells. The Favored Soul already has a greatly reduced spell list compared to the cleric. This forces them to rely on their domains for their signature spells, using spells known to pick up the necessities.
Eliminate Deific Favor entirely, or make the bonuses smaller. Baseline, it's a divine-related bonus feat or special feature. One could aim to make the Deific Favor bonuses roughly half as powerful as a feat (+2 Initaitive, +2 to a skill, etc). Or, more interestingly, 'flavorful, but highly situational' (immunity to penalties from bright light, proficiency with and ability to penetrate all damage resistance with improvised weapons, ability to reflect beholder rays with a successful Reflex save vs DC 20, etc). Alternately, eliminate the Deific Favors at 8th and 18th.
Make the Favored Soul's spells dependent on Wisdom and Charisma, as per the original class. The least stylish option, but it will generally do unkind things to either their spell save DCs or their spells per day.
One last note: I generally do not allow unrestricted access to the Spell Compendium, since it increases the breadth of the Cleric, Druid and Wizard substantially, who do not, in any way, need the help. My exceptions are partial casters (Assassin, Blackguard, Paladin, Ranger) and spontaneous Casters (Bard, Favored Soul, Sorcerer), who can freely select from the Spell Compendium with DM approval. And specialist wizards, who can choose one Spell Compendium spell in their specialized school per level, again, with DM approval.
