Monster of Legend (Prestige/Template Monster Class)

[Sohala]

I'm probably just dense, but limiting the psionics to a single option, and then preventing augmentations by lack of PP, seems to make Overmind inferior to Natural Mage, by a seemingly large margin, as augmentations are part of power scaling and utility. Would it be such a terrible thing if Overmind granted enough PP to manifest each power once, without augmentations (81 PP). It would give the option of augmentations, but would cost the ability to manifest one of the other powers.

The option to select from mantles might be a nice addition.

[VennDygrem]

After taking a brief look, granting PP to augment powers would make the higher level powers too powerful for this sort of ability/class feature, as most of them either do appropriate damage for their level or have effects independent of level. However, lower level powers tend to suffer.

There are two fixes for this.

1) Just take powers that don't need to be augmented to be effective.

2) Implement a fix for the Saga feature in which for each Psionic Power you gain through the Overmind ability, you gain +1 power point for every 3 levels you surpass the minimum level required to manifest it, usable only for augmenting the respective power.

Thus, you won't have much augmentation of your higher level powers, but lower level powers should scale just enough to remain useful without getting overpowered.

[Sohala]

I assumed once a day would still be a restriction, as much as I would enjoy it not being one. Granting PP would basically be trading quantity for quality.

...Or I think I misread your concern, lets try again.

There would be no free manifesting, 81 PP covers the cost of manifesting each power once. To manifest and augment a power, you would 'lose' the ability to manifest your whole list. There are those people who would blow all the PP on maxing out four powers at level 20, but then that is all they can do with that feature. Meanwhile the people who selected arcane or divine variants still have several more daily use spells left.

[Zionpopsickle]

Just a little thing that bugs me.  Why isn't this full BAB?  Seems like a legendary monster should be pretty good at beating on things even if its a caster base.

[oslecamo]

There would be no free manifesting, 81 PP covers the cost of manifesting each power once. To manifest and augment a power, you would 'lose' the ability to manifest your whole list. There are those people who would blow all the PP on maxing out four powers at level 20, but then that is all they can do with that feature. Meanwhile the people who selected arcane or divine variants still have several more daily use spells left.

Hell if that wouldn't be free manifesting. PP from diferent sources does stack, so that would be way superior to the arcane and divine ones, which don't grant actual spell slots.

Just a little thing that bugs me.  Why isn't this full BAB?  Seems like a legendary monster should be pretty good at beating on things even if its a caster base.

No, the Paragon should be good at beating things. Monster of Legend is all about flashy abilities concentrated in a small package. Plus the class already gives more than enough stuff for two levels as it is.

[Sohala]

There would be no free manifesting, 81 PP covers the cost of manifesting each power once. To manifest and augment a power, you would 'lose' the ability to manifest your whole list. There are those people who would blow all the PP on maxing out four powers at level 20, but then that is all they can do with that feature. Meanwhile the people who selected arcane or divine variants still have several more daily use spells left.

Hell if that wouldn't be free manifesting. PP from diferent sources does stack, so that would be way superior to the arcane and divine ones, which don't grant actual spell slots.

I was using the term 'free' in place of 'costless', as the current ability allows the mainfesting of each power without a PP cost, once per day, while if PP were added the powers would have a PP cost.

PP does stack from more than once source, no denying that. The arcane and divine also provide twice as many daily uses as the psionics, under the reason that psionics has more utility, which got reduced with the lack of augmention.

I'm just trying to close the power gap between the abilities, because right now, I don't see a reason to pick the psionic option.

[oslecamo]

You're right, the last version cut the part where you got two powers per level as the others. Added that one back in.

[phaedrusxy]

So for Essence Drain, is that only for a single natural weapon? Or would you apply it to all weapons of a specific kind (like a grell's 10 tentacle attacks...)?

[VennDygrem]

Osle ruled that it's only a single, individual weapon, for a character of mine in one of his campaigns. For instance, that character is a Harssaf with dual sand-kukris (a paired weapon) which each could count for essence drain individually, but only one gets the benefit.

[oslecamo]

^What he said.

[Concerned Ninja Citizen]

On Faith Prophet: Does the domain casting ability remain and continue to advance if the character takes divine class levels? If the character takes Cleric levels, must they choose the same two domains they chose for FP?

What is the governing ability for FP domain casting?

[oslecamo]

The domain casting ability is a casting progression of its own and advances regardless of what other levels you take. You can pick other domains if you go cleric. Charisma based.

[Concerned Ninja Citizen]

Currently Natural Mage and Overmind only stack Monster of Legend levels with casting/manifesting while faith prophet stacks both monster class and MoL levels. Is this intentional?

EDIT: also, would it be reasonable to have natural mage allow the selection of subschools as well as descriptors? I ask this partly because quite a few descriptors are also subschools and the designers weren't always consistent with what was one and what was the other.

[oslecamo]

Currently Natural Mage and Overmind only stack Monster of Legend levels with casting/manifesting while faith prophet stacks both monster class and MoL levels. Is this intentional?

Yes, since faith prophet is somewhat more limited on its spell selection as domain spells come bundled.

EDIT: also, would it be reasonable to have natural mage allow the selection of subschools as well as descriptors? I ask this partly because quite a few descriptors are also subschools and the designers weren't always consistent with what was one and what was the other.

Hmm, ok, that sounds reasonable.

[Concerned Ninja Citizen]

Yes, since faith prophet is somewhat more limited on its spell selection as domain spells come bundled.

Firstly, I'd say that there's plenty of pretty awesome domains, several of which grant access to spells that lack descriptors or subschools (Dispel Magic, for example) so the difference between FP and NM/Om is more of a trade off than one being strictly better than the other.

Secondly, I'd suggest that, if there is a power imbalance, the way to deal with it is to buff FP a bit rather than to nerf NM and Om. Losing 4 effective levels of casting stacking is huge and turns those two abilities from very attractive options to ones I would probably never take.

If FP is lagging behind NM/Om, how about having it grant the powers of the chosen Domains as well as the spells? Domains are designed with that in mind anyway and it would give FP something you can't get from the other abilities.

[oslecamo]

Except that those 3 are probably already the strongest options on what's already a pretty strong Prc, so if changes are to be had, it would be nerfing something. Besides NM is still pretty atractive for monsters that already have their own arcane synergy, or if you just want 18 SLAs around a theme.

[muktidata]

Could Invocations be included in the Saga list?

[oslecamo]

They could if somebody offered a crunch basis to work on. I'm not really sure how to start that one.

[ariasderros]

Most other PrC's here specify whether the fast healing granted stacks with other sources, or not. This one does not specify.
Would a Hydra / MoL get stacked fast healing, or not?

[oslecamo]

Specified that it increases already existing Fast Healing by 2.