Discussion and Suggestion Thread

[DonQuixote]

Truly, you are a genius.  The change has been applied.


Oh, and just so everyone knows, the savant revisions are still in the pipes.  It's just been a wacky week of not being on my medication.


8/30/12: So, I finally figured out the new savant alternative class feature.  Once I figure out the masked one substitution levels, it'll all go up.

[The-Mage-King]

...Don, I just had a terrible idea. Want me to work it out and post it somewhere? It's a small, non-standard circle, that focuses mostly on defensive buffs.


I'm thinking Champion ACF to get access, or maybe a feat or two...


EDIT: Ooh, I thought about how to do it better. Argent Bulwark will break new ground with this stuff, I think...

[DonQuixote]

Savant and Masked One changes!

• Savant
  
  • Changed bonus feat progression--there are now only three bonus feats, at 2nd, 9th, and 16th levels.
  • Expanded bonus feat list as necessary.
  • Reintroduced a slightly changed version of the Lore Mastery class feature.
  • Added the Gnosis class feature at 13th level.
• Savant Alternative Class Features
  
  • Added the Chronarch - Time-based savant that reacts quickly to his surroundings and eventually doesn't die.
• Masked One Savant
  
  • Complete revision.  Now replaces abilities at 3rd, 4th, and 13th levels.

...Don, I just had a terrible idea. Want me to work it out and post it somewhere? It's a small, non-standard circle, that focuses mostly on defensive buffs.


I'm thinking Champion ACF to get access, or maybe a feat or two...

I'd go with a feat with a BAB requirement.  That way, a defensive-minded anchorite can pick it up and be DEFENDER MONK.  And, since it won't count as one of the chosen circles, you don't even have to write an aspect for it!

Also, at this rate, you're going to force me to add a "Lesser Circles" section at the end of the Arcane Circles chapter.

[The-Mage-King]

I'd go with a feat with a BAB requirement.  That way, a defensive-minded anchorite can pick it up and be DEFENDER MONK.  And, since it won't count as one of the chosen circles, you don't even have to write an aspect for it!

Also, at this rate, you're going to force me to add a "Lesser Circles" section at the end of the Arcane Circles chapter.

Eh. My idea has changed. Simply put: Formulae and Maneuvers are very similar.

I'll get a handful of proof-of-concept abilities set up.  Just need a term for it...



EDIT: Thinking about it... That variant of the idea is stupid, and I should probably just go with the lesser Circle. I'll call it a Semi-Circle, I suppose. 

[DonQuixote]

Bladeshaping?

Also, this sounds like something that may end up in Appendix I: Martial Adepts and Spellshapers.

[The-Mage-King]

Nah. After thinking about it, I'll just go with a lesser Circle for it, calling it a Semi-Circle. 

[pppp]

All changes are great but the Chronarch bothers me a lot. The idea is undoubtedly very interesting, but abilities are quite disappointing. He exchanges two circles for bunch of perks, which are useful, but not original or flashy. The Chronarch needs desperately some cool active ability (as curse of Dark Impulses Impulse Mage) to make up for lost circles.

Moreover, he cannot learn new formula at second level, because he learns all possible first level formulae at first level.

[DonQuixote]

All changes are great but the Chronarch bothers me a lot. The idea is undoubtedly very interesting, but abilities are quite disappointing. He exchanges two circles for bunch of perks, which are useful, but not original or flashy. The Chronarch needs desperately some cool active ability (as curse of Dark Impulses Impulse Mage) to make up for lost circles.

Well, I would say that the regeneration capstone is pretty darn flashy.  You are right, though.  I've been struggling with trying to figure out a cool ability, but it's pretty difficult to do that with TIME without being broken.

Moreover, he cannot learn new formula at second level, because he learns all possible first level formulae at first level.

Once again, my idiocy shows through!

The plan for today is to work at these ideas, then start the feat revision.  May Vecna have mercy on my soul.

12:11 PM: Replaced the silly initiative bonus with a "jumps through time" deal.  Also noted that the chronarch doesn't learn a new formula at 2nd level.

[pppp]

12:11 PM: Replaced the silly initiative bonus with a "jumps through time" deal.  Also noted that the chronarch doesn't learn a new formula at 2nd level.

Yay, limited to self time hop! Maybe cut duration and change the activation to immediate action, it would become better defensive ability.

Actually, stealing from psionics is a very good idea. How about Elemental Adept ACF called primal adept or something with access to eternal time, astral essence and unseen hand circles with Astral Construct instead of elemental companion and few other psi-like goodies?

[DonQuixote]

Yay, limited to self time hop! Maybe cut duration and change the activation to immediate action, it would become better defensive ability.

Thing is, savants are an intelligence-based class very strongly themed around knowledge.  The time travel ability is more of an anticipation defense than an "oh shit" button.  An "Agh oh God get me out" ability makes sense for a more spontaneous character type, but a class that is based around tactical knowledge and planning should have defenses that play that way, as well.

Actually, stealing from psionics is a very good idea. How about Elemental Adept ACF called primal adept or something with access to eternal time, astral essence and unseen hand circles with Astral Construct instead of elemental companion and few other psi-like goodies?

So, anyone who knows me personally knows that I have a very complicated relationship with psionics.  To whit: I'll pillage it for mechanics when appropriate, but I very strongly dislike the flavor.  Very strongly.  No campaign that I have ever run has included psionics in the setting--not because I think that it's more broken than spellcasting, but because I simply do not want it as an aspect of the world.  I will allow players to use psionic materials if they wish, but they must reflavor it as arcane magic that simply uses a different mechanic.  Astral constructs must always be described as if they were summoned creatures, psycrystals must be reflavored as some sort of item familiar (while not being an actual item familiar), and the whole "everything is crystals" muck gets tossed out the window.

There will never be any psionic-themed spellshaping material.  While I may, on occasion, get wording or ideas from psionic powers or class features, spellshaping will always be arcane.

[The-Mage-King]

....Why, upon reading the Chronarch ACF, do I have the desire to say "Hellloooooo STONEHENGE!", and spec for Intimidate?

 

[DonQuixote]

I can't tell you.  Have you tried looking at it with 3D glasses?

[The-Mage-King]

I can't tell you.  Have you tried looking at it with 3D glasses?

Hm. Might work.

The old, two colored kind, or the newer sort?

[DonQuixote]

Two-colored kind, obviously.

[pppp]

Thing is, savants are an intelligence-based class very strongly themed around knowledge.  The time travel ability is more of an anticipation defense than an "oh shit" button.  An "Agh oh God get me out" ability makes sense for a more spontaneous character type, but a class that is based around tactical knowledge and planning should have defenses that play that way, as well.

I think that event tactical-based character have access to immediate actions (warblades and their counters, wizards and immediate action spells). Moreover, usefulness of standard action self-only time hop is quite vague. First one is to disappear when things go tough and cease fighting totally. Okay, no problem with that, but at later levels everyone would have access to much better escape buttons. Second one is to tactically disappear to gain some advantage and this use is not so great even at low levels. You spend your very valuable standard action (this means no attacking) and disappear. In the meantime enemies can easily focus on rest of your team. If this ability was immediate action, as conjurer's Abrupt Jaunt, at least one of the enemies would lost his attack or special ability.

If you want to keep standard action activation time, at least give this ability better scaling and at higher level usable on objects and eventually enemies.

So, anyone who knows me personally knows that I have a very complicated relationship with psionics.  To whit: I'll pillage it for mechanics when appropriate, but I very strongly dislike the flavor.  Very strongly.

Sounds like very complicated relationship. Thanks for clarification.

[Sohala]

Just curious, but why did you make it so Spellshape Incanter only scaled to level 13, instead of taking it to 19 (following the six level spacing)?

[DonQuixote]

I think that event tactical-based character have access to immediate actions (warblades and their counters, wizards and immediate action spells). Moreover, usefulness of standard action self-only time hop is quite vague. First one is to disappear when things go tough and cease fighting totally. Okay, no problem with that, but at later levels everyone would have access to much better escape buttons. Second one is to tactically disappear to gain some advantage and this use is not so great even at low levels. You spend your very valuable standard action (this means no attacking) and disappear. In the meantime enemies can easily focus on rest of your team. If this ability was immediate action, as conjurer's Abrupt Jaunt, at least one of the enemies would lost his attack or special ability.

If you want to keep standard action activation time, at least give this ability better scaling and at higher level usable on objects and eventually enemies.

I think I'm actually going to go with what Bauglir suggested over chat last night.  As a part of the standard action to jump forward through time, you'll be able to ready an action (up to a standard action), which will go off when you reenter the time stream.  I'm still trying to figure out wording for this one.

Just curious, but why did you make it so Spellshape Incanter only scaled to level 13, instead of taking it to 19 (following the six level spacing)?

There are two reasons here.  The first is that Hanako's Akashic Magic system--from which I stole the scaling--has only three levels.  The second is that I really wanted to feel like I could give out interesting and powerful utility abilities.  Getting the lesser incantations at-will and the greater incantations 3/day would be a bit much, I feel, especially since you'd also be getting a new tier of master incantations.

Since the incantations themselves aren't the main focus of a spellshaping character, I don't really see a problem with this.  When I write the epic rules for spellshapers--which I apparently should do, according to some sources--I'll scale things such that you get lesser incantations at will and greater incantations 3/day at 21st level, and greater incantations at will at 30th level.


9/4/12, 8:20 PM: Well, I changed the chronarch's time hop ability.  It now lets you ready an action that goes off as soon as you return to the time stream, without changing your initiative count or affecting your other actions in that round.

I'm also bouncing around feat ideas for the anchorite, the savant, cambians, caymir, and living spellshapes.  The anchorite feats are mostly settled, but the savant is giving me some difficulty.  Similarly, I think that cambians are going to get feats based off of the four humors--after all, that's where they got their names--but I'm struggling with caymir and living spellshapes.  We'll have to see.

Today is also a fairly significant day for me, in general.  Two years ago, I played in my first D&D session ever.  I was a 1st-level human bard, and I had absolutely no idea what I was doing.  At all.  In my confusion, I somehow ended up getting a kiss from the girl of my dreams.  That night indirectly led to the writing of the spellshaping system, and rather more directly led to my current state of bemused happiness.

Happy anniversary, darling.  I swear, I'll fix the ashbound oracle for you by the end of the week.

8:39 PM: Secrets of the Ash added to the ashbound oracle.  It now grants additional formulae known from any circle to which you have access, rather than just Searing Flame.

[DonQuixote]

So, I'm going to need a few weeks to get re-adjusted to college scheduling.  I only have classes three days a week, but I have massive amounts of reading to do.  I didn't exactly show myself to advantage last year, so I really need to put my back into it before graduation.  Fortunately, I think the current stage of revisions is such that, as long as you remember to swap "numen" for "spellshape aura," nothing's actually broken.  I think everything's still playable.

Once I finish writing and compiling feats, I'm going to wrap up the core rule rewrite, which will involve detailing the formula and incantation descriptions.  As a part of this, "Shaping Action" will become "Shaping Time".  I'll also be introducing core rules for epic spellshapers--God help me.

After that, I'm going to take a brief fluff break, revising the fluff for the six races and the six base classes.  Spellshape champion is the biggest offender, since it talks about half-elves for no good reason, but I also want to clean up the Masked One fluff.

Once that's done, I'll be on to circle revisions.  I'm not expecting to rewrite every formula--not by any means.  There are a few that need attention, though.  Such as that Devouring Shadow one that leaves your target helpless.  Coup de grace is bad.

After revising the circles, I'll move on to prestige classes.  During this time, I'll be cleaning up what exists and possibly detonating a few of the currently extant options.  I'll also, presumably, be writing a few new ones.  Moreover, I'm going to be working fairly closely with those of you who have written spellshaping material in order to make sure that what goes in the BIG DAMN PDF accurately reflects your desires.  I primarily expect to be changing around wording and expanding fluff entries, but I'm going to be running the changes past you, anyway.

Prestige classes will lead to items.  I don't anticipate making many changes here, though I will be altering the wondrous items such that they can be created with the Craft Spellshape Items feat.  I might also mess with how Spellshaping Scrolls work.  Man, I wish I had a better name for those.

Finally, monsters.  There won't be any actual changes to the elementals--I'm comfortable with those--but I have a list of monsters that I was thinking of including, so we'll see if I actually have the willpower to write them out.  I honestly have no idea how much energy I'll have at this point, so I might end up going with the path of least resistance here.

Then come the appendices!  Appendix One: Martial Adepts and Spellshapers will contain the Dragonheart Adept and the Sublime Shaper.  In addition, there will be a variant feat that allows martial adepts to learn incantations, with specific disciplines being tied to specific circles.  There may be other things here, but I don't yet know.

Appendix Two: Variant Spellshaper Classes will be the home of the Flamespeaker and the Spellshot Marksman.  The Flamespeaker is going to have to undergo some fairly significant revisions, since a lot has happened since the last time that I touched it, but I think the Marksman is good to go as-is.  I don't think there will be anything else in this appendix.

[sirpercival]

Awesome!

So, hypothetically... if I was planning on writing a spellshaping Vestige and a PrC or two to mix pact magic & spellshaping, when would you need that finished by, to fit with your timeline?

[DonQuixote]

I'm not even going to pretend to give dates for things, since I have no idea how long anything is going to take me.  Here's the rough breakdown:

• Any feats that should be included in the Character Options chapter should be in by next Saturday.
• Any circles should be in by the time I finish revising the race and base class fluff.
• Any prestige classes that should be in the Prestige Classes chapter should be in by the time I finish revising the circles.
• Any items that should be in the Spellshaping Items chapter should be in by the time I finish revising the prestige classes.
• Any spellshaping monsters should be in by the time I finish revising the items.
• Any new spellshaping base classes for the appendix should be in by the time I finish revising the monsters.
• Any material combining spellshapers and martial adepts should be in by the time I finish revising the variant spellshaper base classes.
• Any material combining spellshapers with any other non-Core subsystem should be in by the time I finish revising the Martial Adepts and Spellshaping materials.

There are a few things that mention "Any X that should be in the X chapter".  This is to differentiate between things that should more properly belong in one of the appendices.  It now looks like there will be three appendices, incidentally:

• Appendix One: Variant Spellshaper Classes
• Appendix Two: Martial Adepts and Spellshaping
• Appendix Three: Other Traditions and Spellshaping

Basically, I'm going to make most of the stuff in the main body of the book as Core-friendly as possible.  I'm thinking that the spellshaper/initiator prestige classes will actually be moved to Appendix Two, while things like the Azure Ascetic will go in Appendix Three.  Martial Adepts get their own appendix primarily because of the mechanical similarities.  Binding/Incarnum/Shadowcasting/Whatever Else will go in Appendix Three.

Incidentally, the reason that I'm trying to establish the PDF organization while revising the online material is to prevent myself from falling into the trap of having very well-organized posts, but a very difficult-to-navigate PDF.  Right now, the only thing that's giving me trouble is The-Mage-King's proposed "semi-circle."  No idea where I'll put that.