But Why Does it Have to Be So HARD?!

Designing classes is not easy!

I can almost hear the chorus of "Oh really? No shit, Sherlock!" going on as people read that opening line, but the difficulty is in the small things. Some things I was able to 'hand wave' away, like, why can an Alchemist only create so many concoctions in a single day. (Because they're extremely volatile chemicals, and you don't have the skill to manage too many at once.)

The hard part is getting the balance between fire power and staying power. First, I decided to have a d6 for the hit die, just like a mage. This makes the Alchemist a bit flimsy in terms of taking a hit, but when I put it up to a d8, they became a bit too tough at lower levels. (Huff!)

Then there was the problem with just how powerful an Alchemist's damaging extracts should be. I tried following the spell damage table in the DMG, but as there are no spell levels to 'level up' the hit effect (without simply making a bottle mage), the fire power gets a bit low. No problem, just up the level a little, or give on-going damage, right? Oh, Hell no. That makes them just too powerful.

I'm toying with the idea of on-going damage again, limited by the level of the Alchemist, and I'll let you know how that goes, but for now, WHY DOES IT HAVE TO BE SO HARD?!