Author Topic: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff  (Read 71660 times)

Offline Thurbane

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #20 on: June 13, 2012, 10:48:24 PM »
Do knowstones of spells with an expensive component or focus have a higher cost than those that don't?  (Don't count the focus/component cost.)
According to the Dragon in question, they do - at least, going by the pricing of the sample stones/spells given. It was something I hadn't noticed previously.

Offline Endarire

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #21 on: June 14, 2012, 05:40:26 AM »
What's the price increase?

Offline Nunkuruji

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #22 on: June 14, 2012, 03:16:35 PM »
It bums me that Knowstones were never added to the 3.5 books, and only in Dragon Mag. As a DM with spontaneous party casters instead of prepared, I will often just replace spellbooks with a random knowstone from the spell list of the book of comparable value. Caster gets an appropriate boost, or can junk it for easily calculable cash, and we move right along with things rather than the overhead of valuing out the book and selling it.

From a CO perspective, I like to think that there's a Dragon out there with Ambient Tempest levels & Knowstone crafting ability that retains the title of "Inventor of magics", who indeed taught The Art to mortal kind.

There is also some novel arrow ammunition. The particular issue evades me right now.

Offline nijineko

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #23 on: June 15, 2012, 12:42:01 AM »
It bums me that Knowstones were never added to the 3.5 books...

what are you talking about?

check out runestaves in the magic item compendium.

Offline Nunkuruji

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #24 on: June 15, 2012, 11:08:15 AM »
Doh, I forgot about those, although they have the 3/day limit, so not quite as simple, straightforward and slotless... for better or worse on cost. (babies eat brains)

Offline Garryl

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #25 on: June 15, 2012, 12:30:47 PM »
Martial Monk: If you can bypass prereqs, you can start the game with L9 maneuvers and L8 stances via Martial Stance and Martial Study.

Monk lets you bypass the prerequisites of the feats you get. Assuming that this carries over to the Martial Monk variant (having not read it myself I can't confirm, but that seems to be the general consensus here), that still wouldn't let you bypass the prerequisites of the maneuvers/stances that the benefits of those feats require you to select.

Offline nijineko

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #26 on: June 15, 2012, 11:34:18 PM »
Doh, I forgot about those, although they have the 3/day limit...

where are you getting the 3/day limit?

you use your own spell slots to cast the runestaff spells, so you don't run out until your spell slots run out.

are you thinking metamagic rods, by chance?


be sure to check out memento magica shards as well.
« Last Edit: June 15, 2012, 11:40:25 PM by nijineko »

Offline Maat Mons

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #27 on: June 16, 2012, 01:27:09 AM »
The description of every runestaff lists the daily limit on how often you can use each spell.  Three times per day is the most common.  Twice per day is also pretty common.  A few are limited to once per day. 

Runestaffs also have the annoying limitations that you must be attuned to a staff to use it, you can only be attuned to one staff at a time, and you can only attune yourself to one as part of spell preparation.  This makes utilizing runestaffs you find problematic. 

Offline nijineko

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #28 on: June 17, 2012, 07:34:15 PM »
ah, didn't reread the individual descriptions closely enough. thank you. and i think i missed the once per day attunement implication entirely.

seems like that would make modification and/or crafting them much more useful.

and the knowstones better than runestaves after all.

Offline Maat Mons

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #29 on: July 26, 2012, 05:54:59 PM »
Taking improved power (Dragon 342, p21) and selecting the magic domain allows you to activate a charged item without expending a charge a few times per day.  They did remember to disallow using the ability for things that duplicate spells that have xp costs or costly material components.  Still, it seems pretty cool. 

Offline Garryl

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #30 on: July 27, 2012, 10:51:23 AM »
If something costs multiple charges, does it just give you a single charge discount, count against multiple uses, give you the whole thing free, or something else?

I'm thinking a staff of some high level spell set to use all 50 charges per cast in order to get a high level spell on the cheap a few times per day. Bonus points if you can buy it partially charged with 1 charge remaining.

Offline nijineko

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #31 on: July 28, 2012, 02:17:48 AM »
an item that has 50 charges and a single ability using all 50 to go off is the same as an item which has one ability and one charge. unless said 50 charge item also has lower cost abilities. i think i am misunderstanding your question. i believe the item creation tables give a discount for 1-5 charges per day or some such, but the return diminishes rapidly.

Offline Garryl

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #32 on: July 31, 2012, 11:51:31 AM »
I just re-read the staff creation rules.
According to the text, using two charges makes the spell cost half as much as normal, and no mention of more than two charges used is given. Material and xp costs are reduced proportionately to the number of charges used, but still doesn't make any indications that you can use more than 2 charges. Which is odd, since there are a number of staffs with spells and abilities that cost more than 2 charges.

I was just curious if you could get a staff at 2% of the normal price to use with Improved Power (Magic domain). This being under the assumption that partially charged staffs are unavailable. If there are, I'd buy a staff with 1 charge and a spell that requires 49 charges per use for something that costs ~0.04% of the normal price (or, about 1g for a CL 17, 9th level spell). Of course, RAW disagrees with the creation of such staffs, which I hadn't realized until now.

Offline nijineko

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #33 on: July 31, 2012, 04:58:38 PM »
i seem to recall some discussion somewhere about wands being created with partial charges for less cost... but that may have been a houserule. i also seem to recall that staves cannot be made with less than full charges.

Offline Maat Mons

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #34 on: July 31, 2012, 08:21:30 PM »
Activating an ability that normally uses two charges requires expending two uses of the improved power of the magic domain (which is called power magical device).  As long as I'm elaborating, I'll also say that the number of uses per day is half your cleric level (minimum 1).  I'll also note that you can get improved domain power in four ways: as a feat, as an alternative class feature that removes turning, as an alternative class feature that removes both your normal domain granted powers, or from an item that costs 20,000 gp and occupies the throat slot. 

A ring of nine lives lets you expend a charge to treat a failed save as a success.  The Magic of Faerun version costs more but doesn't have a 1/day limit. 

Offline Jackinthegreen

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #35 on: August 01, 2012, 11:09:40 PM »
From Dragon 318, which updated Rokugan/Oriental Adventures material to 3.5.

Silver Tongue [Dragon]: You can use the Diplomacy skill (trained or untrained) to produce the following effects:

Change an NPC's attitude toward a person other than yourself.  The DC is the same as if you were changing the character's attitude toward you.

Inspire love and devotion.  If you successfully improve a character's attitude toward you (only) to helpful, you can choose to cause that character to show romantic interest in you.  The character thereafter seeks every opportunity to be near you and makes every effort to win your affection, within the bounds of relatively normal behavior.

Inspire hope or despair.  With a successful Diplomacy check against DC 25, you fill a single target with hope or despair, as if affected by the good hope or crushing despair spells.  In the case of despair, the target can negate the effect with a successful Will saving throw (DC 10 + 1/2 your Diplomacy ranks + your Charisma modifier).

Cause confusion.  Make a Diplomacy check opposed by your target's Sense Motive check.  If you beat you target's check result by 10 or more, you can cause him to become confused for 1 round.  You can use this ability as a full-round action.


Changing an NPC's attitude toward someone else is a great use that would probably be alright as-is.Inspire love and devotion though?  In short, you're such a good diplomancer that you can make anyone horny for you.  Inspire hope or despair are certainly interesting ways to use Diplomacy, but it's essentially at-will use of either spell, which are third level bard or fourth level sor/wiz.  Cause confusion is at-will Lesser Confusion, a first level bard spell.  It's an opposed skill check, which means they don't automatically save and you can automatically succeed if your check is high enough.  Fun stuff.

Offline SorO_Lost

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #36 on: August 15, 2012, 09:08:38 AM »
Beleaguered Spellcaster [Sor/Wiz/Hex AFC] (dragon #357 page 88)
Take (your_level*3) damage from a single attack and next spell you cast is either Maximized or Extended, for free, regardless of if you know the Feats or not. Usable 1+Casting_Mod times per day.

It's like it was designed for a Reserves of Strength using Undead Spellcaster wearing Blacksand clothing with one hell of a masochism streak.

Offline Jackinthegreen

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #37 on: September 04, 2012, 01:40:26 AM »
For those who might enjoy some Final Fantasy crossover, Dragon 323 has statted chocobos.
« Last Edit: September 06, 2012, 09:47:54 PM by Jackinthegreen »

Offline nijineko

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #38 on: September 09, 2012, 12:32:22 AM »
For those who might enjoy some Final Fantasy crossover, Dragon 323 has statted chocobos.

but do they have recipes?

Offline Jackinthegreen

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Re: Useful Dragon Magazine Stuff
« Reply #39 on: September 09, 2012, 02:36:16 PM »
For those who might enjoy some Final Fantasy crossover, Dragon 323 has statted chocobos.

but do they have recipes?

Recipes?  Like chocobo burger or something?  In that case, no, but it wouldn't be difficult to make them.