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ZiggZagg
2011-05-19, 10:26 AM
I created a thread the was meant to ask a question, and instead turned into a discussion of the magic system I invented for my campaign setting. SO, I'm creating a thread to be used for discussion about the system as a whole. Here it is: https://docs.google.com/View?id=ddsrbggv_4559pc7bcw

Can also get to it from the link in my signature.

Let me know what everyone thinks :-D

Eldest
2011-05-19, 12:17 PM
Its meant for 3.5, correct?

Tvtyrant
2011-05-19, 12:31 PM
Okay, here are the issues I see:

1.CON: It makes utility spells really, really powerful. By level 16 you auto-succeed on any third level spell or lower using 6 dice. This means you can auto-any utility spell you want and then just stand there and wait for your dice pool to regen. This is an issue at even lower levels, since you can keep trying till you succeed. Its like a mini-15 minute workday.

2.CON: Combat casting doesn't take a hit at all. Most combat only lasts four rounds; you have enough dice to use your maximum dice-per-spell on three rounds in a row. If you use your swift action to regain dice this goes up to four. In a fight lasting longer then that your screwed, but you would be anyways.

3.PRO: You have made metamagic much less usable, which is good since that is the focus of most cheese. Persist takes more dice then you ever have, etc. You might want to houserule mitigation, but as is it doesn't apply anyways, so its a start.

4.PRO: The counterspell system is interesting, in that it insures that both sides will be using as many dice as possible. Casters will likely drain themselves trying to block each other, so it halves the number of spells used in combat.

5. How does this work with SLAs?

I would also like to point out that I really like this idea. I know it probably doesn't sound like it, but just because it isn't perfect doesn't make it good :D

erictheredd
2011-05-19, 12:43 PM
A couple of comments

1-- I love the mechanic, it feels good.

2) why is everything attached to constitution? under this system constitution is the main prerequisite.

3) 1+ ability modifier is a bad number, particularly if it is a permanent rate. Also, the rate is fairly constant and so does not scale well with levels. a second level wizard with a con of 12 and an int of 11 can cast a first level spell every other round. That's --- nasty. sure, about time 18 it will blow up in his face, but by then the problem's over.

4) 0 level spells? DC 2?

5) spells blowing up on all ones is a good touch, but it hurts low level casters a LOT more than high level. when you roll 3 dice you have a 1/216 chance of a critical failure. That means opponents will score critical hits vs. your fighter more than 3 die spells blow up in your face. When you roll 2 dice you have a 1/36 chance of a critical failure, and first level wizards must cringe everytime they cast a spell, which either leaves panting on the ground or has a 1/6 chance of blowing up, and about a 1/12 chance of leaving them dieing(lame pun) on the floor. Also, this mechanic applies to clerics, which doesn't make to much sense.

so, suggestions:

perhaps regain dice at a rate more like level+ability mod per minute, and make these rates tied to a mental ability rather than the one ability no one ever uses as a dump stat. or regain at a rate like
(3+ablity mod)/2 every two rounds. It needs to be smaller, more dependent on levels, and less dependant on stats.

add 0 level spells.

make a fail mechanic that is more even and has more to do with a level of failure than the absolute bottom.

EDIT: We always play at lower levels, and combat usually lasts more than four rounds. of course, it takes a long time to kill 20 kobolds. So my concerns come from a different view.

Tvtyrant
2011-05-19, 12:47 PM
I actually think the failure rate makes sense; your going to get better at not blowing yourself up over time. Also, the dice pool with stats mod is HUGE. I would remove the stat mod altogether, otherwise this is just a massive boost.

erictheredd
2011-05-19, 12:50 PM
it does, but it goes away for high level spells. the risk a 1st level caster has casting a 1st level spell should not be three orders of magnitude greater than a 7th level caster casting a 4th level spell

Tvtyrant
2011-05-19, 12:54 PM
Why not? A First level caster is casting a first level spell. A seventh level caster is casting a fourth level spell. The difference between spell level and caster level increases at each juncture. At level 20 your casting a 9th level spell, which is 11 spell levels behind your caster level. Thus the difference between CL and SL makes the system make sense to me.

erictheredd
2011-05-19, 01:04 PM
Mostly this is about balance. People complain about wizards being able to one-shot other classes, but at 1st level, it works the other way around as well. Our first level wizards are not power houses, they are a resource that my other players use to get to their enemies and negate advantages.

I think that higher level spells should be more dangerous than low level spells. perhaps attach a failure DC to each spell level. The spell level itself might be a good idea. That still keeps the decreasing as you get higher level, but its not as dramatic.

Tvtyrant
2011-05-19, 01:18 PM
Well if he cut the number of dice in the pool to the number of levels the caster has then you could justify allowing the caster armor, which would offset the issue a little. Or break up the spell levels and have 18 instead of 9.

erictheredd
2011-05-19, 02:07 PM
That's a good point with breaking up the spell levels. I have never liked the strict "This is level 2, this is level 1, and there is nothing in-between" I realize that its neccessary for the way the game is currently built, but if you make 18 (or perhaps 19 or 20, don't forget 0 level spells), you get a much more continuous feel. Of course, this would likely lead to referring to the spells by their DC rather than their level.

There is also a great gap between 1st level and 0 level spells. (once again, this is the low level DM speaking here), and such a system would allow for things in between (a "greater ray of frost that actually does d6 dammage and becomes useful)

Tvtyrant
2011-05-19, 03:31 PM
Hmmm, I will have to think about how you would break it up fairly. Like the ability to combine slots to make metamagic so lower level slots are worth something.

erikun
2011-05-19, 03:43 PM
I think the DM would become rather annoyed if every encounter involved the Wizard becoming invisible and spamming Silent Summon Monster all the time. (You need to target an opponent to counterspell, which is basically impossible if the target in invisible.)

Tvtyrant
2011-05-19, 05:07 PM
On the other hand, if you make it take slots from the same level as the original spell its hardly broken. Summon Monster IV would be very expensive to spam no matter what level you are, and low level summons=crud.

ZiggZagg
2011-05-19, 10:24 PM
Alright, first, thank you everyone for your responses. I was away from the computer at a session (running Ravenloft for a group...FUN!!!) So, to catch up and address the concerns of those that posted.

@ Eldest-Yes, 3.5 D&D. Sorry, basics, probably should have mentioned that LoL

@Tvtyrant-Glad to hear you like it. Let me see if I can answer your points.

1. By utility spells, do you mean like Mage Armor and the like, or are you thinking of something else?
2. Yes, you do have enough dice to spam your highest stuff a lot. However, if you are using that swift action to regain dice, you aren't counterspelling, which means the enemy is doing the same thing back. So, slight balancing factor there, I think...though, admittedly, not much of one.
3. That was one of major targets. I am the powergamer of both my groups that I play in. I was able to see firsthand the ridiculous tricks possible, so I wanted to make it still possible, but much more difficult. A caster going Nova is much more manageable in this system, I'm hoping.
4. This wasn't my intention, but I did notice that is what happens. When I first implemented it, I proved this to some of my skeptic players that a caster can really gimp himself if not careful. I had an NPC caster that was winning pretty well against the group, but in one round the battle swung around because the caster drained his dice, and couldn't regain enough fast enough to compete the PC spellcasters then. The intention was simply to create a counterspell system that didn't rob the caster of his entire action in combat.
5. In order to keep the Warlock from being COMPLETELY obsolete, SLA's work the same. They are just auto cast, no dice required.
Thank you for your feedback. Much appreciated.

@ erictheredd-Thank you for all your feedback as well. I will get to analyzing your suggestions sometime tonight or tomorrow. As for your list of comments:
1. Thank you. It's good to get positive feedback from outside the two groups playtesting it for me right now. It took about a month to fully develop the system, but it is undergoing constant minor tweaks. Every little bit helps :-D
2. Everything is attached to Constitution as a slight balancing factor against spellcasters as a whole. It gives them 2 ability scores to focus on rather than 1. I wanted to give it the idea that it is physically draining and demanding to wield magic. It worked well for the campaign flavor I was looking for, but I also decided to make it part of the system rather than the campaign house rule (because I have a few house rules to the system just for my campaign to keep the ruleset itself as generic as possible). The major downside I have noticed is now all the wizards in my campaign are big burly athletes due to their massive Constitution scores LoL
3. I prefer to keep it static, as I don't want the number regained to be enormous. I have already found that recovering dice is too easy, but I don't know of a way to mitigate it anymore without being too harsh.
4. Correct. Didn't put it on the table, I know. I should probably remedy that LoL
5. As was mentioned in other posts, I wanted the idea of lower level casters being inexperienced, and thus prone to mistakes. I would prefer a system that was able to punish drawing too much power, therefore having to balance whether to max your dice per spell, but I think I have found good grounds for now. Can work on that later...and that might be more of a thing to make for my campaign rather than putting it directly into the system

Sorry for the TL;DR

Anyway, thank you everyone for commenting. Please, continue the feedback. It is much appreciated.

Tvtyrant
2011-05-20, 01:41 AM
Those are more buffs then utility. Let me grab some from the SRD to see if what I'm talking about can be made clear.

Alarm: Wards an area for 2 hours/level.
Unseen Servant: Invisible force obeys your commands.
Comprehend Languages: You understand all spoken and written languages.
Detect Secret Doors: Reveals hidden doors within 60 ft.
Identify M: Determines properties of magic item.
Floating Disk: Creates 3-ft.-diameter horizontal disk that holds 100 lb./level.
Disguise Self: Changes your appearance.
Magic Aura: Alters object’s magic aura.
Erase: Mundane or magical writing vanishes.
Animate Rope: Makes a rope move at your command.
Jump: Subject gets bonus on Jump checks.

Those are just the level 1 spells; they each allow you to do something outside of combat that you normally couldn't: Identify makes several skills irrelevant, Erase can be used to get rid of messages, Disguise Self for spy work, Comprehend Languages for talking to anyone, Floating Disk for hovering, Magic Aura for Mount shenananigans, Animate Rope to get up cliff faces, etc. These have no combat value, but are amazing out of combat. Several of them allow you an endless number of tries because your never in any hurry.

ZiggZagg
2011-05-20, 10:25 AM
Alright, I see more of your concern. To be honest, I don't have an answer for how to deal with those spells always being available. I know some of them require costly material components, so that is a small balance factor. Outside of that, I don't have much to refute that casters will always have access to them

Quellian-dyrae
2011-05-20, 02:55 PM
Alright, I see more of your concern. To be honest, I don't have an answer for how to deal with those spells always being available. I know some of them require costly material components, so that is a small balance factor. Outside of that, I don't have much to refute that casters will always have access to them

What if you changed it so characters recover dice more slowly - say every hour - but their dice get refreshed fully on a per-encounter basis. I'd probably phrase it as, they refresh fully upon the successful completion of a challenging or dangerous encounter, from adrenaline or getting a second wind. That gives them the go all day capability in terms of adventuring, without letting them spam non-combat spells. Having it happen at the end of an encounter also helps curtail excessive pre-combat buffing.

Tvtyrant
2011-05-20, 03:14 PM
What if you changed it so characters recover dice more slowly - say every hour - but their dice get refreshed fully on a per-encounter basis. I'd probably phrase it as, they refresh fully upon the successful completion of a challenging or dangerous encounter, from adrenaline or getting a second wind. That gives them the go all day capability in terms of adventuring, without letting them spam non-combat spells. Having it happen at the end of an encounter also helps curtail excessive pre-combat buffing.
This is a really good idea; it basically alters the caster dynamics so that they are willing to use their spells in battle but hesitant to do it out of battle.

ZiggZagg
2011-05-20, 04:57 PM
That doesn't sound like a bad idea...but how would you justify it flavor wise? I'm not able to see adrenaline being a good explanation, and the groups I play with can get pretty big on the flavor aspect of things, and how/why they work. Not saying it's not a good idea, because it is actually, and I really like...just trying to think of a way to put it in without sounding like a **** :-p

Quellian-dyrae
2011-05-20, 07:47 PM
Hmm...what about something like this?

Spellcasters have deep reserves of energy, but drawing too much can be exhausting or even dangerous. A spellcaster can fully refresh its power dice as a full-round action. However, doing so is taxing. The caster must make a Constitution check, DC 10, when doing so. Magical and special bonuses to ability checks cannot apply to this check, but increases to Constitution apply normally. A spellcaster without a Constitution score substitutes a Charisma check.

If this check fails, the caster suffers spell fatigue. This condition imposes the normal penalties of fatigue, plus a -2 penalty on spell save DCs, and increases the DC to cast spells by 2.

If the caster fails such a check while already suffering spell fatigue, the condition worsens to spell exhaustion. This entails the penalties for normal exhaustion, and increases the penalty on save DCs and the increase to casting DCs to 6.

If the caster fails such a check while already suffering from spell exhaustion, it becomes spell drained. In addition to the effects of spell exhaustion, the character is treated as staggered, and loses consciousness the next time it fails to cast a spell or runs out of power dice. A caster in this condition must use its powers with extreme care; failing a Constitution check to recover power dice while in this state is fatal.

In all cases, these conditions cannot be prevented or removed by normal immunities to, protections against, or treatments for the fatigued, exhausted, and staggered conditions. A Limited Wish, or other restorative effects with an XP cost of 300 or more, can reduce the effect of spell fatigue by one step, while restorative effects with an XP cost of 1,000 or more can completely eliminate a caster's spell fatigue. A Wish or similarly powerful magic could even eliminate an entire party's spell fatigue.

Each time the caster succeeds a Constitution check to refresh its power dice, the DC of future checks increases by 3. The DC cannot go below 10.

Recovering one's power is an act of significant will, and situations that bolster the character's morale can make this feat easier. In such situations, the caster may choose to either treat a failed check as a success (with the corresponding +3 to the DC of future checks), or negate the DC increase for a successful check. Mechanically, the caster should always receive this benefit upon completing a challenging or dangerous encounter (EL no less than character's level - 2). The DM may award it in other situations of high positive emotion, but the benefit cannot be achieved through magical influence of any sort.

Spellcasters can marshal their powers more safely with time. Each hour, the caster recovers power dice equal to 1 + its Constitution modifier, and lowers the DC to refresh its power dice by 1, if it is currently higher than 10. A full night's rest fully refreshes the character's power dice, sets the DC of checks to refresh it back to 10, and eliminates all spell fatigue.

ZiggZagg
2011-05-20, 11:03 PM
That...is very interesting. I will definitely have to take that under advisement. It's huge change to implement, but it might not be a bad idea. Thank you for that feedback

ZiggZagg
2011-05-20, 11:04 PM
One thing I forgot to mention is that I did create potions to restore spell dice, but they seem a bit superfluous at the moment, since they gain 1+con modifier back every round. With that change, the potions would actually have a role, and it would keep from possibly failing a check...hmmmm...perhaps it's time to go back to the drawing board

Absol197
2011-05-21, 12:36 AM
I'd just like to put in my 2 copper pieces, and say that I'm in love with this system. I'm very tempted to make this standard in any game I run from now on, so much kudos :smallsmile:

Definitely having spell dice restored on a longer period is a good idea, as others have suggested. Please continue to update as you get stuff hammered out!

ZiggZagg
2011-05-21, 08:35 AM
Thank you, Absol. It's nice to hear that something I have worked so hard on actually has that kind of support. :smallbiggrin:

I will test drive the new idea of spell dice regenerating slower this week, and let everyone know how it goes.

Quellian-dyrae
2011-05-21, 03:18 PM
I just read back through the system, have a couple questions/thoughts for you:

It looks like the formula for DCs is basically 2 + 2/SL. This in mind, would it make sense for metamagic to increase the DC by 2 per additional SL? Or is spending the extra dice meant to make up the difference?

On a similar note, with psionic augments, you could probably simplify the thing by just saying that augmenting increases the DC to cast by 1 per PP, to a max DC of 3+ML.

Also, do metapsionic feats still count against a psionic character's augment limit?

I was also thinking that the dice bonus for a high ability score was too much, but actually it isn't as major as I thought for reasonable ability scores. I might lower it to just bonus dice equal to the ability modifier all the same.

Spontaneous casters get a pretty bad deal here. They lost the thing that made them unique, but kept all their disadvantages relative to prepared casters. The bonus dice are pretty paltry (not even enough for a single max-die spell). Before they were theoretically less optimal than a prepared caster, but they had a purpose. Here, I don't see any reason to play one, aside from deliberately self-nerfing.

Finally, just a typo spot: under Caster Level, it says "If the increase is only applied to certain spells or a certain school of magic, then you do gain a bonus die", instead of do not.

chrisrawr
2011-05-21, 03:41 PM
An idea for out-of-combat spells that could retain flavor - it steals a bit from the True Namer - Casting, or attempting to cast the same spell repeatedly causes a resistance to form as the spell builds up against itself. This takes the form of an increase in failure chance - from all 1's, to* all 2's or under, to all 3's or under - as the caster tries to force out the same spell over and over.

ZiggZagg
2011-05-21, 10:54 PM
@Quellian-dyrae: That isn't exactly the formula I used, but that may be what it added up to. I can't remember exactly what I was thinking when I wrote it, but I know it had something to do with the percentage based on the max dice. I think I had it figured out that rolling max dice, you had a 50% chance to cast the spell when you first get access to that spell level, and then a level or two later you get one more die and it becomes easier. And yes, burning the dice for Metamagic is meant to make up the difference

the Psionic part I'm still trying to work on, because I am not the best with the system. My Psionics guru came up with the warning, but I think the main thing is we wanted to remove the words "Power Points" from the description because they have been removed completely.

Yes, the Meta-Psionic Feats that spend points to use still count towards the limit for augmenting. Psionic Focus has also been kept, since I'm told that was a HUGE balancing factor for that system.

Spontaneous Casters are one thing I'm still trying to figure out. I was hoping the bonus dice would help, but you don't think it's enough? Any ideas on a way to help them out a little bit more. Right now, the only reason to play one would be for the spells that are exclusive to their class, which for certain classes isn't that wonderful.

And thank you for spotting that typo. I will fix it when I get the chance.

ZiggZagg
2011-05-22, 12:03 AM
Alright, the document has been modified temporarily with the suggested change. The only change I made to the suggestion is I removed the penalties to spell DC's for failed checks, but retained the increase the casting DC's. Also, since I use the condition track from Star Wars SAGA edition, I wrote up rules for that part as well. The more I think about it, the more I like the proposed change. The next thing I want to do is create rules for the potions that restore spell dice. The idea behind them is that they replenish your dice, but you have to make fortitude saves to avoid becoming addicted to them, similar to Lyrium from Dragon Age. There will be multiple versions of them with increasing power, and increasing addiction DC's. They would actually be useful under the proposed change, since regaining dice in combat can get tricky and dangerous. I will let you know how all these changes go and which ones I think should be kept based on player feedback. By all means, if anyone else wants to try the system out, go for it and let me know how players react to it. I have been using it as written for a few months now, and the players seem to like it. Wonder if it will still be the case when they don't recover their dice as fast...LoL

Quellian-dyrae
2011-05-22, 04:07 PM
Spontaneous Casters are one thing I'm still trying to figure out. I was hoping the bonus dice would help, but you don't think it's enough? Any ideas on a way to help them out a little bit more. Right now, the only reason to play one would be for the spells that are exclusive to their class, which for certain classes isn't that wonderful.

Yeah, not really enough. I think what I'd do is let spontaneous casters use their spells/day table for their spells known if beneficial, let them add bonus spells from a high ability score to their spells known, give spontaneous full casters access to higher level spells one level earlier at one fewer spell known, and give them a bonus power die every odd level rather than at 1st and every 4th. As a result, prepared casters have the advantage of being able to swap out their spells, while spontaneous casters have more unique spells available at once and more power dice.

That's if you want to beef up spontaneous casters of course. Even comparing unfavorably to prepared casters, they're still considered the second strongest group of classes in the game. If you wanted to instead tone down prepared casters, you could achieve roughly the same comparison by removing prepared casters' bonus spells prepared for high ability scores, delaying their access to higher level spells by one level, lowering whatever their maximum number of spells prepared is for a given spell level by 1, and say halve the bonus power dice for high ability scores.

Tvtyrant
2011-05-22, 04:10 PM
Or you could simply remove them; in this system it makes very little difference, so just treat them as the same thing.

ZiggZagg
2011-06-02, 10:56 PM
Alright, I know it was longer than a week, but I tried out some of the previously mentioned changes, mainly the change to the regeneration time of the dice, and I have to say that it worked out much better with them regenerating by the hour instead of the round. The players never even had to make the Constitution checks to regain their dice, but their wasn't much fighting this session, and what there was happened quick. But it kept their dice in check better, and they had to conserve them outside of battle. SO! Thank you for the help and the suggestions. Any additional comments and ideas are welcome, but I think that change was a big shove towards an actual final product :smallbiggrin: