A Newbie Group’s Introduction to Reserve Feats and Martial Maneuvers

Reserve feats and martial maneuvers are unusual abilities that open up options for spellcasters and martial characters respectively. Generally they are special actions to take that are more influential than basic attacks, or modify basic actions, but less powerful than level-appropriate spells - laying somewhere in between - and what makes them especially unusual is that they can be used as many times as the player needs to in a day, being an effectively unlimited resource. The intended effect of bringing both into a game this way is to grant physical classes more variety and options without needing to change to special martial initiator classes, and to give casting classes more longevity throughout the day.

This content is intended as an introduction to these mechanics and therefore works best if the prints out the reserve feats and maneuvers or otherwise has them ready beforehand to bring to the table. Two new feats are also presented here (Endurance Spellcaster and Unorthodox Training), and new favored class options as well to both encourage and smoothly insert the features into an otherwise normal game without leaving anyone behind.

New Favored Class Level-Up Options

As an alternative to taking +1 hit point, +1 skill point or a race-and-class-specific benefit when leveling up, all characters in this ruleset can choose to gain one of the following:

 +⅕ of a new reserve feat  +⅓ of a new martial maneuver known and readied for use as with Unorthodox Training (taking this benefit without an initiator class or Unorthodox Training leaves you with no recovery method – the maneuvers become simply 1/encounter)

Reserve Feats

Reserve feats were introduced in Complete Mage, and a few others in Complete Champion. They require nearly no adaptation to Pathfinder: all of them can simply work as printed without changes. They are available to take as wizard feats by default but in general should be allowed as a substitute wherever one would be granted either their choice of a bonus wizard feat, metamagic feat, bloodline bonus feat or oracle mystery.

To use a reserve feat, simply keep a spell of the type specified available to cast (either by leaving one prepared in a slot or being a spontaneous caster with a slot open), and you gain the benefit of the reserve feat. The feat’s strength scales by numbers based on the level of the spell, causing each reserve feat to grow as you level-up and gain new spell levels.

New Feat: Endurance Spellcaster [Reserve]

Prerequisite: Caster level 5th, any reserve feat Benefit: At any time during the day, you may take a move action to expend a spell slot that is currently fueling a reserve feat of your choice. For the rest of the day, that feat continues to act as if the spell was still ready to cast, and for the next 10 minutes you treat it as if it is of a level one level higher than it actually was.

You can do this for only one reserve feat in a day, but you can take this feat multiple times and gain additional uses to expend on different reserve feats.

Martial Maneuvers Maneuvers were introduced in the Tome of Battle and updated (as well as added to) for Maximum Maneuver Level for Non-Initiator Pathfinder in Path of War and its follow-up material. Maneuvers are arranged similarly to Classes: prepared spells: they are tiered by their level (1 to 9), you have a separate amount of Base Maximum maneuvers known from the amount of maneuvers you can keep ready at one time, and Attack Maneuver there are specialized classes in place dedicated to their use. However, maneuvers very Bonus Level frequently use weapons, physical attacks, movement, and many different types of +0 - +1 1 actions, making them less similar to spells in actual play, and they can be re-readied over +2 1 and over throughout the day once expended - and even re-selected from your known +3 2 maneuvers in just 10 minutes. +4 2 +5 3 New Feat: Unorthodox Training [Combat] +6 3 Prerequisite: Base Attack Bonus +1 +7 4 Benefit: Based on the table to the right, you can choose a new martial maneuver or +8 4 stance to learn that you qualify for from any martial discipline. You also gain a maneuvers +9 5 readied slot. Despite the requirement to learn it, your initiator level when using this +10 5 maneuver is equal to your character level. You can take this feat multiple times. +11 6 +12 6 When you first take this feat, choose a mental attribute: you can recover a number of +13 7 your readied maneuvers from this feat up to that attribute’s bonus (minimum 1) when +14 7 you spend a full-round action to recover, and that attribute is also your initiation modifier +15 8 where needed. +16 8 +17 9 Martial initiators who take this feat can also select maneuvers as high a level as those +18 9 granted by their class and recover these maneuvers with their class features. +19 9 +20 9