Elysium Knight

Elysium knights stand as bastions against the darkness and evil outsiders. While anyone with the proper qualifications may join the ranks of the Elysium knights, cavaliers and paladins make up the majority of their numbers.

Requirements

To qualify to become an Elysium knight, a character must fulfill all of the following criteria.

Alignment: An Elysium knight must be lawful good, neutral good, or lawful neutral.

Base Attack Bonus: +5.

Feats: Diehard, Toughness.

Special: The Elysium knight must be able to challenge 2/day or smite evil 2/day.

Class Skills

The Elysium knight’s class skills (and the key abilities for each skill) are Acrobatics (Dex), Bluff (Cha), Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Handle Animal (Cha), Intimidate (Cha), Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (dungeoneering) (Int), Knowledge (geography) (Int), Perception (Wis), Profession (Wis), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), Survival(Wis), and Swim (Str).

Skill Ranks per Level: 4 + Int modifier.

Class Features

The Elysium knight has the following class features.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency

The Elysium knight gains no additional weapon or armor proficiency.

Spellcasting

At the indicated levels, an Elysium knight gains new spells per day as if he had also gained a level in a spellcasting class he belonged to before adding the prestige class. He does not, however, gain other benefits a character of that class would have gained, except for additional spells per day, spells known (if he is a spontaneous spellcaster), and an increased effective level of spellcasting. If a character had more than one spellcasting class before becoming an Elysium knight, he must decide to which class he adds the new level for purposes of determining spells per day.

Defensive Stance (Ex)

At 1st level, an Elysium knight can enter a defensive stance, a position of readiness and trance-like determination. An Elysium knight can maintain this stance for a number of rounds per day equal to 4 + his Constitution modifier. At each Elysium knight level after 1st, he can maintain the stance for 2 additional rounds per day. Temporary increases to Constitution, such as those gained from the defensive stance and spells like bear’s endurance, do not increase the total number of rounds that the Elysium knight can maintain a defensive stance per day. The Elysium knight can enter a defensive stance as a free action. The total number of rounds of defensive stance per day is renewed after resting for 8 hours, although these hours do not need to be consecutive. While in a defensive stance, the Elysium knight gains a +2 dodge bonus to AC, a +4 morale bonus to his Strength and Constitution, as well as a +2 morale bonus