Ordinary Magician base class and Love-Coloured Magic school DA ZE!

[oslecamo]

Weee, been a long week.

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The change makes it a lot easier to swallow, though personally I would have just matched Ordinary Magician's restriction with one of a similar scale, since the Ordinary Magician's penalty isn't likely to come up in the span of normal play unless the GM really likes long time spans (Also templates aren't that great on a caster unless you're playing gestalt. Caster levels/progession are king yo.). I have a few ideas, but I have to admit I'm not familiar with Touhou at all so I wouldn't have any idea if I'm really on base. So I guess I'll just suck it up as is.

In regular conditions yes, templates aren't that tempting for casters.
But my monster classes do include several caster-friendly templates, and some of them are considered among my strongest homebrew from what I hear (monster of legend and paragon in particular), thus the ordinary magician's penalty isn't that irrelevant for actual play.

Plus hey, bragging rights. If Riverside View taught me something, is that a lot of players take their character's lifespans quite seriously.

Considering that a lot of those spells will likely have to be damage spells as you level up to replace lower level spells a lot of those choices aren't really that desirable. A spellbook doesn't get to replace its old and busted stuff with new exciting stuff like maneuvers, so you're likely cycling through stuff that you don't actually want to use anymore most of the time. Add this to the fact that you have to rely on bigger and better spells at higher levels for your damage maneuvers rather than metamagic-ing lower level spells to get the most bang for your buck and you're going to have a lot of spells in your book that will eventually be straight up obsolete.

The reduction of the penalty to scribing new stuff helps a lot with this, but that feature kind of becomes necessary to use frequently to actually get the most out of your Sealed Spells as uses go up. The fact that the Sealed Spells more rapidly outpace the rest of your spells at higher levels works out alright though, since you're more likely to have gotten time to scribe a few more decent niche spells into your book. It just seems a shame that you're not likely to actually be able to make full use of this feature unless your GM is relatively generous with downtime. I still look forward to using it in play though to see if my observations hold up.

Play report would be nice, yes. And also remember, that with Sealed Spell, each extra writing in your spellbook becomes that much more valuable since it's always at the tip of your fingers.

As I mentioned up there, I'm unfortunately not very familiar with Touhou at all. I just take an interest in these because they're mechanically interesting and fun looking.

Thanks, great to hear that!

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D'oh! I could have sworn I wrote this up. I probably got sidetracked answering everything else. Oh well, here's something I guess:

"Your victim cannot use that spell/maneuver again for 24 hours, and you cannot carry more than one "charged" precious thing at a time, you must previously spend them or store them in a safe location. A safe location for the purposes of this feat would be a structure that is not temporary (such as a Mage's Magnificent Mansion), does not move (such as a vehicle), and cannot be carried with you (such as a Bag of Holding). If the structure is destroyed, then the items stored their lose their charge."

A lot bulkier, but more clearly states intent at least. Do with it what you will.

I believe you had a minor typo there, should be "there lose" instead of "their lose", but otherwise great, edited in!

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So like just treat the spell as if it had the [Light] tag or something? It would make it somewhat vulnerable to [Darkness] spells, but that mostly just means the light isn't shed in magical darkness so I'm not sure if that's problematic. Searing Light isn't a [Light] spell, though Sunburst is. Go figure on that one. How would doing something like that match your intent? I might have to examine a few [Light] and [Darkness] effects to check for interesting interactions, but if it's just generating light then I suppose that would also be relatively simple, though how it interacts with magical darkness is probably a good question to answer.

Oh, sunburst looks just like I wanted. Replaced it in the maneuvers details at start, plus clause about 50% damage against creatures that are specifically vulnerable to light.

Seems like a weird penalty considering that most of the melee spells are superior when allowed to apply like this. There are a lot of really nasty melee touch spells that work very well with these maneuvers with no investment added, but ranged spells require two extra feats just to make work? Anyway, might want to clarify the relevant penalties right up front in a separate bit to be sure about what's relevant.

Also you added my bit on multiple projectiles, but forgot to take down the old bit.

Melee spells will use (probaly inferior) Str to hit instead of Dex unless you burn a feat for Weapon Finesse.
And you won't get penalties for firing in melee if your allies are just smart enough to stay out of your line of fire.

Fixed bits, added more clauses, added spoiler to the general stuff.

Then you try and break through that ceiling. Especially if you packed something that does nasty damage to objects. 

That's the spirit!

Even if it not may be the wisest course of action if you're, say, under a volcano/lake.

Hmm, could you release a spell stored in the weapon on an Attack of Opportunity?

Yes.

Also if you're trying to use your book and have the broom on hand, then now you still wouldn't be able to use the broom/quarterstaff as a weapon since it's a 2-hander (unless a nice club broom will do). Personally I think it'd be a neat thing if you could have up to one book floating with you hands free, but I'm still kind of whatever on attacking at all with this class as is anyway so I wouldn't say it's necessary per se.

Added clauses for combining a Magical Furnace/Grimoire with it.

Eesh. Lemme give that a tweak:
"If you hit and the spell required an attack roll, then the spell is treated as if any required attack rolls were hits and the DC (if any) is increased by 4. Creatures within a burst of up to 5 feet per IL are affected as well, but at this maneuver's normal DC."

Thanks again!

Maybe replace the first sentence with:

"You may initiate this maneuver after the result of an attack against you is determined to be successful, but before you suffer its effects."

Done

A bit inspired by Iron Man, but this one of Marisa that I picked off of google image search might fit the bill.

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Indeed it does. Marisa steals everything!

(where did I put that Double Mega Beam Rifle Marisa pic?)

As a side note, if you ever need any opinions on wording you can feel free to shoot me a PM. I can't promise that I will necessarily be prompt in answering, but I could always use a bit of editing practice when I have the time.

Edit: Addendum
First fight tonight. I had one problem come up, and afterwards we leveled up to 5 so I started skimming level 3 spells and came up with a couple interesting cases that could use clarification.

-For Meteoric Shower, it's stated that if they fail the save then they're pushed. But what if the spell you cast doesn't have a save? It doesn't specify any particular save, so my GM had to ad hoc rule it in as fort (it should probably default to something if the spell doesn't have a specified save).

Good idea.

-Explosive Runes. This one is weird, but it fits the criteria of dealing damage and standard action to cast so it works with most of the maneuvers, even if not especially well with stances. Considering all the items the average adventurer probably carries on their person, you can probably make them explode just by touching every single object on their person via the AoE and watching the fireworks, and that's just what they have on them. Pebbles, marbles, volleys of arrows or other ammunition meant to simply litter a field with lightweight objects could convert simple debris into a minefield of epic proportions. Now this is kind of rife with abuse held at bay by sane GM interpretation I think, but it strikes me as one of the more interesting spells you can turn into an AoE. Additional point, since you're exploding objects and they take damage too, you'll probably be destroying your own loot by using this tactic so it's a bit of a scorched earth tactic. Still kind of a funny broken trick, though I'd be interested to hear your interpretation of it.

Well I would say that's more of a problem with Explosive Runes itself. You don't need this school to abuse the heck out of it.
Anyway in my view Explosive Runes wouldn't qualify since it doesn't actually deals the damage directly, it creates runes that must be read to deal damage. Like you can't make a Master Spark out of Summon Monster despite the summons being able to deal damage. Added clause to clarify that you can't combined the maneuvers with spells that demand extra conditions/discharges to actually deal the damage.

-Manyjaws. I don't even know where to begin with this one. I'm inclined to say something like the jaws being able to fly around within the AoE, and any individual jaw being treated as a projectile per hit when it connects with a target. It's got so many fiddly bits going on that I'm not sure you can even make it work with this school, without just having to make a special rule just for it. Any thoughts on unraveling this potential headache?

Counting each jaw as a projectile seems simple and sensible enough. They'll only last 1 round anyway.

-Vampiric Touch. Its usefulness mainly hinges on whether an AoE Vampiric touch is just one application across multiple targets or multiple applications of the same effect (the latter doesn't stack). Also how's that cap on temp HP work out when you're hitting multiple targets? If the limit only applies on a per target basis then you can get a whole heap of Temp HP.

They're not supposed to stack. My head isn't exactly very fresh right now to discuss fine details.

Anyway thanks again! Also your big post at the Oni thread gave me a lot to think about. Alas my weekend seems like it'll be quite busy and I'll probably only be able to reply to it next week if not next weekend.

[Geigan]

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Weee, been a long week.

The change makes it a lot easier to swallow, though personally I would have just matched Ordinary Magician's restriction with one of a similar scale, since the Ordinary Magician's penalty isn't likely to come up in the span of normal play unless the GM really likes long time spans (Also templates aren't that great on a caster unless you're playing gestalt. Caster levels/progession are king yo.). I have a few ideas, but I have to admit I'm not familiar with Touhou at all so I wouldn't have any idea if I'm really on base. So I guess I'll just suck it up as is.

In regular conditions yes, templates aren't that tempting for casters.
But my monster classes do include several caster-friendly templates, and some of them are considered among my strongest homebrew from what I hear (monster of legend and paragon in particular), thus the ordinary magician's penalty isn't that irrelevant for actual play.

Plus hey, bragging rights. If Riverside View taught me something, is that a lot of players take their character's lifespans quite seriously.

I can't argue very well with that since my group plays largely gestalt, consistently involving your monster class homebrew. But damn, you got me on Riverside View. I concede.

Considering that a lot of those spells will likely have to be damage spells as you level up to replace lower level spells a lot of those choices aren't really that desirable. A spellbook doesn't get to replace its old and busted stuff with new exciting stuff like maneuvers, so you're likely cycling through stuff that you don't actually want to use anymore most of the time. Add this to the fact that you have to rely on bigger and better spells at higher levels for your damage maneuvers rather than metamagic-ing lower level spells to get the most bang for your buck and you're going to have a lot of spells in your book that will eventually be straight up obsolete.

The reduction of the penalty to scribing new stuff helps a lot with this, but that feature kind of becomes necessary to use frequently to actually get the most out of your Sealed Spells as uses go up. The fact that the Sealed Spells more rapidly outpace the rest of your spells at higher levels works out alright though, since you're more likely to have gotten time to scribe a few more decent niche spells into your book. It just seems a shame that you're not likely to actually be able to make full use of this feature unless your GM is relatively generous with downtime. I still look forward to using it in play though to see if my observations hold up.

Play report would be nice, yes. And also remember, that with Sealed Spell, each extra writing in your spellbook becomes that much more valuable since it's always at the tip of your fingers.

I get Sealed Spell next level, so we shall see. 

I believe you had a minor typo there, should be "there lose" instead of "their lose", but otherwise great, edited in!

You are correct on the typo.

So like just treat the spell as if it had the [Light] tag or something? It would make it somewhat vulnerable to [Darkness] spells, but that mostly just means the light isn't shed in magical darkness so I'm not sure if that's problematic. Searing Light isn't a [Light] spell, though Sunburst is. Go figure on that one. How would doing something like that match your intent? I might have to examine a few [Light] and [Darkness] effects to check for interesting interactions, but if it's just generating light then I suppose that would also be relatively simple, though how it interacts with magical darkness is probably a good question to answer.

Oh, sunburst looks just like I wanted. Replaced it in the maneuvers details at start, plus clause about 50% damage against creatures that are specifically vulnerable to light.

Might want to combine "-You can choose for any elemental damage dealt by the spell to become untyped "light" damage, much like a Sunburst spell." and "-A creature to which sunlight is harmful or unnatural takes +50% damage from this "light" damage." into one point, because my first thought was that +50% damage was on top of any similarities to sunburst as opposed to the only major similarity... or at least I assume that the extra damage thing there is the only relevant similarity or else I have further questions. 

Seems like a weird penalty considering that most of the melee spells are superior when allowed to apply like this. There are a lot of really nasty melee touch spells that work very well with these maneuvers with no investment added, but ranged spells require two extra feats just to make work? Anyway, might want to clarify the relevant penalties right up front in a separate bit to be sure about what's relevant.

Also you added my bit on multiple projectiles, but forgot to take down the old bit.

Melee spells will use (probaly inferior) Str to hit instead of Dex unless you burn a feat for Weapon Finesse.
And you won't get penalties for firing in melee if your allies are just smart enough to stay out of your line of fire.

Fixed bits, added more clauses, added spoiler to the general stuff.

One feat vs two. But fair enough, you specialize in one or the other mostly and I didn't even mention the limitations of having a melee spell in your stance as opposed to a ranged one most of the time.

-Explosive Runes. This one is weird, but it fits the criteria of dealing damage and standard action to cast so it works with most of the maneuvers, even if not especially well with stances. Considering all the items the average adventurer probably carries on their person, you can probably make them explode just by touching every single object on their person via the AoE and watching the fireworks, and that's just what they have on them. Pebbles, marbles, volleys of arrows or other ammunition meant to simply litter a field with lightweight objects could convert simple debris into a minefield of epic proportions. Now this is kind of rife with abuse held at bay by sane GM interpretation I think, but it strikes me as one of the more interesting spells you can turn into an AoE. Additional point, since you're exploding objects and they take damage too, you'll probably be destroying your own loot by using this tactic so it's a bit of a scorched earth tactic. Still kind of a funny broken trick, though I'd be interested to hear your interpretation of it.

Well I would say that's more of a problem with Explosive Runes itself. You don't need this school to abuse the heck out of it.
Anyway in my view Explosive Runes wouldn't qualify since it doesn't actually deals the damage directly, it creates runes that must be read to deal damage. Like you can't make a Master Spark out of Summon Monster despite the summons being able to deal damage. Added clause to clarify that you can't combined the maneuvers with spells that demand extra conditions/discharges to actually deal the damage.

That's fair. I would have said the school still broke explosive runes over its knee though, because you could potentially produce a ridiculous number of runes in no time and in a way that would stack up ridiculously. Additional clarification is good though.

-Manyjaws. I don't even know where to begin with this one. I'm inclined to say something like the jaws being able to fly around within the AoE, and any individual jaw being treated as a projectile per hit when it connects with a target. It's got so many fiddly bits going on that I'm not sure you can even make it work with this school, without just having to make a special rule just for it. Any thoughts on unraveling this potential headache?

Counting each jaw as a projectile seems simple and sensible enough. They'll only last 1 round anyway.

I mean I guess what I said makes sense, it's just that it was giving me a headache with all its fiddly bits and I never really liked Manyjaws all that much anyway.

-Vampiric Touch. Its usefulness mainly hinges on whether an AoE Vampiric touch is just one application across multiple targets or multiple applications of the same effect (the latter doesn't stack). Also how's that cap on temp HP work out when you're hitting multiple targets? If the limit only applies on a per target basis then you can get a whole heap of Temp HP.

They're not supposed to stack. My head isn't exactly very fresh right now to discuss fine details.

If my GM makes a ruling on it I'll mention it, but yeah get back to me when you can on this one since I feel like it has implications for other spells relevant to the school.

Anyway thanks again! Also your big post at the Oni thread gave me a lot to think about. Alas my weekend seems like it'll be quite busy and I'll probably only be able to reply to it next week if not next weekend.

Yeah, take that one in parts if you have to. I did that over a couple days when I was bored, but still wanted to think about the campaign I'm in, and I just kind of touched on everything that I could think of since I was considering it for a character.

[oslecamo]

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So like just treat the spell as if it had the [Light] tag or something? It would make it somewhat vulnerable to [Darkness] spells, but that mostly just means the light isn't shed in magical darkness so I'm not sure if that's problematic. Searing Light isn't a [Light] spell, though Sunburst is. Go figure on that one. How would doing something like that match your intent? I might have to examine a few [Light] and [Darkness] effects to check for interesting interactions, but if it's just generating light then I suppose that would also be relatively simple, though how it interacts with magical darkness is probably a good question to answer.

Oh, sunburst looks just like I wanted. Replaced it in the maneuvers details at start, plus clause about 50% damage against creatures that are specifically vulnerable to light.

Might want to combine "-You can choose for any elemental damage dealt by the spell to become untyped "light" damage, much like a Sunburst spell." and "-A creature to which sunlight is harmful or unnatural takes +50% damage from this "light" damage." into one point, because my first thought was that +50% damage was on top of any similarities to sunburst as opposed to the only major similarity... or at least I assume that the extra damage thing there is the only relevant similarity or else I have further questions. 

Only relevant similarity, combined points.

-Manyjaws. I don't even know where to begin with this one. I'm inclined to say something like the jaws being able to fly around within the AoE, and any individual jaw being treated as a projectile per hit when it connects with a target. It's got so many fiddly bits going on that I'm not sure you can even make it work with this school, without just having to make a special rule just for it. Any thoughts on unraveling this potential headache?

Counting each jaw as a projectile seems simple and sensible enough. They'll only last 1 round anyway.

I mean I guess what I said makes sense, it's just that it was giving me a headache with all its fiddly bits and I never really liked Manyjaws all that much anyway.

Seems like that one's solved too then.

-Vampiric Touch. Its usefulness mainly hinges on whether an AoE Vampiric touch is just one application across multiple targets or multiple applications of the same effect (the latter doesn't stack). Also how's that cap on temp HP work out when you're hitting multiple targets? If the limit only applies on a per target basis then you can get a whole heap of Temp HP.

They're not supposed to stack. My head isn't exactly very fresh right now to discuss fine details.

If my GM makes a ruling on it I'll mention it, but yeah get back to me when you can on this one since I feel like it has implications for other spells relevant to the school.

Ok, added another clause to clear up that it's “multiple applications of the same effect” and don't stack.

Gah, that's a lot of clauses, but I guess that's what I deserve for making a school based on channeling spells.

[Geigan]

Ok, added another clause to clear up that it's “multiple applications of the same effect” and don't stack.

Gah, that's a lot of clauses, but I guess that's what I deserve for making a school based on channeling spells.

Dang, I'll have to find a replacement for Vampiric Touch now. Probably for the best though.

I know the pain of dealing with mechanics meant to handle general/open ended systems from experience, which is why I expect I will only find more potential problem spells and loopholes in the future. Thankfully there are only so many spells that are really useful when channeled through LCM.

Btw, how do you classify weapon-like spells such as Blade of Pain and Fear, Whirling Blade, or Threesteel? (note that each of those three are somewhat different spells)

[oslecamo]

Ok, added another clause to clear up that it's “multiple applications of the same effect” and don't stack.

Gah, that's a lot of clauses, but I guess that's what I deserve for making a school based on channeling spells.

Dang, I'll have to find a replacement for Vampiric Touch now. Probably for the best though.

I'll point out that vampiric touch gives you temp HP equal to the damage you deal, and that several LCM maneuvers increase the damage the spell deals, so there should still be good synergy.

I know the pain of dealing with mechanics meant to handle general/open ended systems from experience, which is why I expect I will only find more potential problem spells and loopholes in the future. Thankfully there are only so many spells that are really useful when channeled through LCM.

Btw, how do you classify weapon-like spells such as Blade of Pain and Fear, Whirling Blade, or Threesteel? (note that each of those three are somewhat different spells)

I don't remember the exact wording of those spells, but I believe they all need separate attack rolls before starting to deal damage, so I would classify them as non-valid, like summon monster, or wall of iron that can technically deal damage if you drop it over someone.

EDIT: Whirling blade should work. Can't find where threesteel is from.

[Geigan]

I don't remember the exact wording of those spells, but I believe they all need separate attack rolls before starting to deal damage, so I would classify them as non-valid, like summon monster, or wall of iron that can technically deal damage if you drop it over someone.

EDIT: Whirling blade should work. Can't find where threesteel is from.

Threesteel is from Dragons of Faerun. Sorry, it was pretty obscure so it's probably a bad example, and it's not that different from Whirling Blade anyway. I just brought it up since it's a weird spell around the same level that I've always wanted to make work well somehow.

Something like Black Blade of Disaster might make for a more interesting question, since it's not really something you wield so much as you concentrate on. I think the definition of "separate attack rolls" as a distinguishing feature could probably use more specificity.

[oslecamo]

Black Blade of Disaster would work fine, since it attacks right away, and it won't last more than 1 round so concentration duration is not very relevant. The key aspect is if the spell deals damage right as it is being cast, or needs something else after being cast for the damage to occur. Seeked to clarify.

[Raineh Daze]

Does the double from Illusion Star get destroyed on taking any damage? I'd assume yes, but there's no specifying. Same for the 'what if my orbs get hit?'

For Orreries Sun, does using maneuvers through the orbs use the same action as normal? I'd expect yes, given that it's implicit in the 'as normal' bit. More importantly, what if you use the orbs for say, Dragon Meteor? That would make them move, not you, but they're normally beside you.

[oslecamo]

The clone has the same defensive statistics as the initiator, that includes HP. But that may be a bit too good, halved it.
The orbs also all have listed amounts of HP, they're destroyed when reduced to zero, that's specified in the stances and everything.

Yes, Orreries Sun doesn't change the initiation times of maneuvers.

Good point about movement, added clauses that you move with the orbs if the maneuvers would make them move.

[Raineh Daze]

The clone has the same defensive statistics as the initiator, that includes HP. But that may be a bit too good, halved it.

Even half HP seems too good for a swift action that doubles your firepower. You're going to burn through maneuvers, but counting as two casters for a single boost is just insanity.

[oslecamo]

Ok, made it "wink out of existence as soon as takes damage" as per your suggestion.

[CrazyYanmega]

A balance issue occurs once you hit epic levels. Magic Recycled Bomb+Deep Ecological Bomb+10th level casting= Everyone within a 20 ft radius getting a free Wish.

[Raineh Daze]

"Balance issue". "Epic levels". Isn't epic nothing BUT balance issues?

[Geigan]

Simple fix anyway. Just make sure you have to pay the XP component cost (and maybe gp component cost) for spells you use on Magic Recycled Bomb. Possibly make sure that you have to pay for each target affected by Ecological Bomb as well if AoE XP cost spells are any more problematic than regular AoE spells. Abuse via AoE versions of non-AoE spells is kind of this class/discipline in a nutshell anyway though.

[oslecamo]

Applied above fixes.

[CrazyYanmega]

Marisa has been retired. She became a minor noble of the kingdom, and is now a quest-giving NPC for the campaign continuation, as are all of the other PCs.

I can't even begin to imagine the crazy quests Marisa would hand out.

[ketaro]

Lots of fetch quests into other kingdoms to 'borrow' stuff and lying about having permission to do so 

[CrazyYanmega]

Lots of fetch quests into other kingdoms to 'borrow' stuff and lying about having permission to do so 

Seeing as Marisa's bluff is usually 51 BEFORE rolling...

[Shadlith]

I hope this doesn't count as thread necromancy, but I had a couple minor questions about how this class works, if you're willing to answer them?

1) In the Youkai Magician thread, you noted that "Magical furnace boosts spell damage, Magical grimoire does not." Cool. But, um...

I can't see that trait in the magical furnace? Is that something from before an edit? Because as it stands, the only reference to damage is if it's enchanted with the Frost enchantment or whatever, and both of them add that to damage.

2) What does Light Sign "Luminous Strike" actually do?

I mean... it turns your spell into a gun. Okay. But the gun lasts for 1 round, and takes the same action to fire as it'd take to cast the spell. So what's the benefit of turning the spell into a gun, instead of just casting the spell directly?

I mean, take a Fireball bound into a stance. You use your swift action to channel it into Light Sign, then fire the magicannon as a standard action, thus getting a fireball at the target location.

Why not skip the swift action and just cast fireball? Are magicannon described elsewhere to do something, and I just missed them?

[oslecamo]

1) Hmm, seems like you're right. Both magical furnage and magical grimoire equally boost damage. Maybe I changed it after making that comment.

2)Luminous strike allows you to cast the spell as an attack action. Not the same action as it's take to cast the spell. So if you have Haste up and take a full attack, you can throw two fireballs plus iteratives.