From publisher blurb:
The Divine Champion Class is a new class designed for use with the Shadowdark RPG.
The divine champion class has an 8-sided hit die and includes the following abilities:
Cosmic Alignment: A divine champion is tied, body and soul, to Law, Chaos, or Balance.
Divine Grace: The divine champion is granted strong defenses against the powers of their enemy alignment.
Divine Health: The divine champion is immune to diseases, mundane and magical.
Divine Might: The divine champion has a pool of divine power, earned through pious acts, that is used to empower their divine powers.
Lay on Hands: The divine champion can heal allies and innocents alike.
Divine Powers: Each divine champion chooses a selection of divine powers as they advance in service to their cosmic cause, making each champion unique by definitely tied to their cosmic alignment.
Designer's Notes
I designed the divine champion to more closely emulate the classic paladins and anti-paladins of old school games. The priests of Shadowdark contain elements of the classic clerics and paladins, but are really more on the clerical side of development and utility.
The divine champion more closely fits the classic paladin at its core, and takes advantage of system elements from Shadowdark to create a full spectrum of champions of Law, Chaos, and Balance.
The divine champion is first and foremost a warrior – even able to choose some fighter abilities at times – and dedicated to the war for their god(s) and/or demons(s) and their Cosmic Alignment. Service in other ways is vastly secondary.
The magical powers of the divine champion are more limited than those of the cleric, save for their three core abilities, which are martially oriented. Their divine powers are also more strongly themed by their alignment, ensuring that classic flavor of the paladin and anti-paladin.
The champion of Balance is not some sort of nature-oriented defender; they use the very essence of magic to seek to maintain the balance between Law and Chaos, lest one or the other gain enough of an advantage and bring about an apocalypse while seeking to conquer the mortal plane…