The eldritch weaver is a variant 20-level base class from Green Ronin's Advanced Player's Manual, an arcane spellcaster that chooses and focuses on several different specialties, or threads, of magic. Each thread represents a narrow series of thematically related spells, such as the thread of Fire, or the thread of Smiting. Following a thread gives mastery over the spells in that thread and also conveys some supernatural powers associated with the thread's theme. This class realizes a nifty concept introduced into second edition by Wolfgang Baur and Steve Kurtz in a great article from Dragon 216, "Paths of Power." The one downside to this class is that with so much flexibility comes a certain amount of complexity. In an attempt to offset some of that, here are a few tools to help build and run an eldritch weaver:
| Sample Eldritch Weavers | Suggested
Errata | Alphabetical List of Spells |
Warp Spells | Suggested New Spells |
The eldritch weaver offers tremendous flexibility. Just by choosing different threads, one can create a whole suite of diverse and interesting specialist characters with some cool magical powers. In order to try out this new class, I resurrected a trio of old characters—an invoker, an illusionist, and a necromancer, three specialist wizards who had been used in a rollicking second edition adventure many years ago. I recast these three spellcasters as eldritch weavers, statting each one out at 5th, 10th, 15th, and 20th level. The resulting builds seem like they would be very interesting and satisfying to play.
All page numbers refer to the Advanced Player's Manual.
p. 124, Thread of Factotums, 1st level spells: delete "Charm Monster" entry, insert "Charm Person: Makes one person your friend."
p. 124, Thread of Factotums, 6th levels spells: delete "Planar Binding, Lesser" entry, insert "Planar Binding: As lesser planar binding, but up to 12 HD."
p. 128, Thread of Knowledge, 4th level spells, Mnemonic Enhancer: delete "Wizard only."
p. 128, Thread of Knowledge, 6th level spells, Mage’s Lucubration: delete "Wizard only."
p. 129, Thread of the Mind, 4th level spells, Mnemonic Enhancer: delete "Wizard only."
p. 134, Thread of Spheres, 6th level spells: delete "Globe of Invulnerability, Lesser" entry, insert with "Globe of Invulnerability: As lesser globe of invulnerability, plus 4th-level spell effects."
p. 138, Thread of Travellers: There are no 8th level spells for this thread. (I'd recommend dimensional lock and/or discern location.)
The alphabetical list of all eldritch weaver spells includes the spell level as well as all associated threads.
In building an eldritch weaver, warp spells—spell belonging to multiple threads—are important to note, because eldritch weavers can use these crossing points to jump from one thread of spell knowledge to another. The following indices of warp spells are offered to aid in selecting spells and threads for eldritch weavers.
Several good sources for new arcane spells are available. Here are some suggested additions to the eldritch weaver thread lists: