Author Topic: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]  (Read 14160 times)

Offline Garryl

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #40 on: December 02, 2012, 04:47:30 PM »
You're letting a skill be roughly equivalent to full casting under certain specific circumstances. However, it's quite possible to generate those circumstances yourself (invade someone's dream yourself, and then pull them into the Dreamheart to make it "real"... you even have a skill usage for that). You can easily generate spell effects beyond what a full caster can do at an equivalent level (from skill ranks alone, you're at Wizard +2 class levels, and if you pump your Wis score, the sky is the limit).

If you must keep Alter Reality, I'd suggest treating it as an illusion (Will disbelief, as it is only a dream after all).

Oh, btw and unrelated, maybe the Dreamcatcher should also stop dream stability from dropping when others fail their checks by 10 or less?

Offline phaedrusxy

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #41 on: December 02, 2012, 06:05:32 PM »
You're letting a skill be roughly equivalent to full casting under certain specific circumstances. However, it's quite possible to generate those circumstances yourself (invade someone's dream yourself, and then pull them into the Dreamheart to make it "real"... you even have a skill usage for that). You can easily generate spell effects beyond what a full caster can do at an equivalent level (from skill ranks alone, you're at Wizard +2 class levels, and if you pump your Wis score, the sky is the limit).

If you must keep Alter Reality, I'd suggest treating it as an illusion (Will disbelief, as it is only a dream after all).

Oh, btw and unrelated, maybe the Dreamcatcher should also stop dream stability from dropping when others fail their checks by 10 or less?
Wiz+2=artificer. So there is precedent for that, but of course that's a whole class, not just a single skill... The Dreamcatcher offers a cheap way to avoid the perils of Dream Assassins, though (which is exactly why I made it so cheap). Still, I think your suggestion of offering a Will save on all effects is a good one. So I'll at least add that.

Why would you want it to remove the stability drops? Because they're supposed to protect from nightmares? I guess that makes sense.
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Offline Garryl

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #42 on: December 02, 2012, 06:59:33 PM »
Yeah. Just because a Dream Assassin has a harder time murderating you, doesn't mean he can't make your life miserable and prevent you from ever getting a restful night's sleep again (unless you get security to throw him out).

Offline phaedrusxy

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #43 on: December 02, 2012, 07:26:36 PM »
Yeah. Just because a Dream Assassin has a harder time murderating you, doesn't mean he can't make your life miserable and prevent you from ever getting a restful night's sleep again (unless you get security to throw him out).
I think that's OK. I actually worried a bit that the Dreamcatcher was a bit too big (and too easy) of a nerf to the system, especially since there will be at least a few classes based around using it.

Funny clip. :P

Also, even without adding a Will save, the people the "Dream Assassin" pulls into the Dream Heart won't be entirely helpless. They'll still have full use of all the faculties they would have had in the waking world (spells, items, etc). Should I make that explicit somewhere? I probably should...

So... now we need to make a Dream Assassin class...  :D


Edit: I changed how Instill Doubt works (made it a Will save with the DC set by the agressor's Lucid Dreaming check, rather than an opposed check; and also increased the cost to the target's Will save modifier). I also added a Will save to all uses of Alter Reality.

I can't wait to use this in a game now.  :cool
« Last Edit: December 02, 2012, 07:42:26 PM by phaedrusxy »
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Offline phaedrusxy

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #44 on: December 02, 2012, 07:52:21 PM »
Separate issue, so I decided to reply rather than just edit it into the last post:

Should I add a feat to boost your maximum Dream Points? On the one hand, it will let you access crazy things like higher level spells via the Alter Reality of Lucid Dreaming, but on the other hand it is only going to benefit you while Dreamwalking, which will likely not take up a large portion of most games.

I'm tempted to do this, and then make this a prereq for some classes related to this skill, but would like feedback...
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Offline sirpercival

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #45 on: December 02, 2012, 07:59:43 PM »
So... now we need to make a Dream Assassin class...  :D

I think you mean "Factotum".  Particularly Factotums of noble birth....... ;)
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Offline phaedrusxy

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #46 on: December 02, 2012, 08:08:06 PM »
So... now we need to make a Dream Assassin class...  :D

I think you mean "Factotum".  Particularly Factotums of noble birth....... ;)
lol, yeah, I know, there are classes which could perform this role admirably already. Maybe we should just make up an organization for them, instead. :P
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Offline Garryl

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #47 on: December 02, 2012, 10:20:37 PM »
I present, for your perusal, The Extractor.

a) You've got too much going on there. It's like the complexity of a Factotum plus the complexity of an Incarnate (the Factotum-level complexity itself being Bard + Rogue).
b) Too much essentia at low levels. You'll have more than you can use at several levels, and you're almost at full capacity for most of the other levels. That makes the essentia mechanics meaningless (especially the class feature that lets you get even more). Normal meldshaping classes only get about 1/2 to 2/3 of the essentia they can stuff into their class-granted soulmelds at any given level.
c) The fluff of the class meldshaping (er, dreamshaping) is that everyone else is wrong? Don' be doing dat! Just say something like they can shape the raw dreamstuff much like souls, or better yet, they shape the energy in the dreams of souls, rather than the energy of the souls themselves.

Offline phaedrusxy

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #48 on: December 02, 2012, 10:32:56 PM »
I present, for your perusal, The Extractor.

a) You've got too much going on there. It's like the complexity of a Factotum plus the complexity of an Incarnate (the Factotum-level complexity itself being Bard + Rogue).
b) Too much essentia at low levels. You'll have more than you can use at several levels, and you're almost at full capacity for most of the other levels. That makes the essentia mechanics meaningless (especially the class feature that lets you get even more). Normal meldshaping classes only get about 1/2 to 2/3 of the essentia they can stuff into their class-granted soulmelds at any given level.
c) The fluff of the class meldshaping (er, dreamshaping) is that everyone else is wrong? Don' be doing dat! Just say something like they can shape the raw dreamstuff much like souls, or better yet, they shape the energy in the dreams of souls, rather than the energy of the souls themselves.
I don't know enough about Incarnum to comment on the rest, but the bolded part is the best part of the class. :D I know this is probably implied, but you should state it explicity: while the Extractor thinks that everything is a Dream, and that he's just manipulating Dreamstuff, those knowledgeable in arcana and the planes dismiss this as preposterous, and think that Extractors are just another version of spellcaster, albeit one whose manipulation of magic is based upon their own delusion. Leave it to the reader to determine who is correct. :P

I should probably put the exact same thing in my Awakened Dreamer PrC, since the fluff on it is pretty much exactly the same...
« Last Edit: December 02, 2012, 10:35:01 PM by phaedrusxy »
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Offline sirpercival

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #49 on: December 03, 2012, 12:13:02 AM »
I present, for your perusal, The Extractor.

a) You've got too much going on there. It's like the complexity of a Factotum plus the complexity of an Incarnate (the Factotum-level complexity itself being Bard + Rogue).
Yes, that's exactly what it is.  Since my original concept was "incarnum + factotum w/ infinite shore instead of arcane dilettante", I don't think that's likely to change... sorry!  lol.
 
Quote
b) Too much essentia at low levels. You'll have more than you can use at several levels, and you're almost at full capacity for most of the other levels. That makes the essentia mechanics meaningless (especially the class feature that lets you get even more). Normal meldshaping classes only get about 1/2 to 2/3 of the essentia they can stuff into their class-granted soulmelds at any given level.
Good call.  I reduced the number of soulmelds, but then forgot to reduce the essentia too.
Quote
c) The fluff of the class meldshaping (er, dreamshaping) is that everyone else is wrong? Don' be doing dat! Just say something like they can shape the raw dreamstuff much like souls, or better yet, they shape the energy in the dreams of souls, rather than the energy of the souls themselves.
I'm going to use phaedrus's suggestion here.


In other news, I've changed the maneuvers to per-encounter instead of per-day, and at the suggestion of someone on gitp I'm going to overhaul the extraction mechanics entirely.  The new idea is to make it more organic: rather than "roll a bunch of skill checks, here's your information", the various pieces are going to be tactical options that you can use against your opponent.  Things like "design a maze to prevent your target from benefitting from his dreamscape", "use gather info to locate specific informatics that you want", "use bluff to avoid notice", etc.  Also I'm going to build in the Lucid Dreaming "Nightmare" setting, since it's so clearly based on Inception.
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Offline sirpercival

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Re: Discussions [Insert Inception Musical Sting Here]
« Reply #50 on: July 31, 2013, 07:56:58 PM »
For your perusal, and also to be linked here.
I am the assassin of productivity

(member in good standing of the troll-feeders guild)

It's begun — my things have overgrown the previous sig.