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View Full Version : D&D 3.x Other Specialist Wizard Feats (streamlined)



rferries
2017-07-10, 10:28 PM
These feats are very simplified (and boring) versions of the feats I made for my revised wizard class. They should be more suitable for standard play however.

The idea for these feats is that all wizards are generalist wizards, who use these feats to become specialist wizards without having to sacrifice schools of magic. They can be taken as wizard bonus feats and you may take them for more than one school of magic (thereby specialising in multiple schools).

Ideally the word "specialist" would be replaced with the proper school of magic e.g. Arch-Specialist would become Arch-Necromancer.

Apprentice Specialist [Wizard]
You have started specialist training in a particular school of magic.

Prerequisites
Wizard level 1st, Spell Focus (chosen school), Int 14.

Benefits
Choose a school of magic you have selected for Spell Focus. You gain a +1 bonus to your caster level when casting spells from that school.

Special
You may select Apprentice Specialist more than once, each time choosing a different school of magic.

A wizard may select Apprentice Specialist as one of his bonus wizard feats.


Master Specialist [Wizard]
You have completed specialist training in a particular school of magic.

Prerequisites
Wizard level 6th, Apprentice Specialist (chosen school), Greater Spell Focus (chosen school), Spell Focus (chosen school), Int 16.

Benefits
Choose a school of magic you have selected for Apprentice Specialist. Whenever you apply a metamagic feat to that spell, the metamagic adjustment of that feat is reduced by one (to a minimum of +0).

Special
You may select Master Specialist more than once, each time choosing a different school of magic.

A wizard may select Master Specialist as one of his bonus wizard feats.


Arch-Specialist [Wizard]
You have not only mastered a particular school of magic, you have expanded it.

Prerequisites
Wizard level 12th, Apprentice Specialist (chosen school), Greater Spell Focus (chosen school), Master Specialist (chosen school), Spell Focus (chosen school), Int 18, must have created a new spell of the chosen school.

Benefits
Choose a school of magic you have selected for Master Specialist. You gain a +1 bonus to your caster level when casting spells from that school. Whenever you apply a metamagic feat to that spell, the metamagic adjustment of that feat is reduced by one (to a minimum of +0).

The benefits of this feat stack with the benefits of Apprentice Specialist and Master Specialist.

Special
You may select Arch-Specialist more than once, each time choosing a different school of magic.

A wizard may select Arch-Specialist as one of his bonus wizard feats.

AOKost
2017-07-12, 06:58 AM
I feel this is the perfect progression for this kind of feat and works perfectly with Pathfinder. This is the way that D&D (in my opinion) should have run 'specialization' instead of forcing the characters to have certain schools unavailable all together.

Though you might add in the under the Arch that the benefits stack with those of the previous feats...

rferries
2017-07-12, 08:20 AM
I feel this is the perfect progression for this kind of feat and works perfectly with Pathfinder. This is the way that D&D (in my opinion) should have run 'specialization' instead of forcing the characters to have certain schools unavailable all together.

Though you might add in the under the Arch that the benefits stack with those of the previous feats...

Thanks, and edited to add your suggestion.

Darth Ultron
2017-07-13, 07:36 AM
Apprentice Specialist does not really do anything, and is really close to just being a feat tax. Sure, if you roll play by the numbers a +1 to caster level at low level is slightly useful...sometimes....but it's not really worth a whole feat slot.

So you might want to add some more to it to make it feat worthy.....like ''Pick a spell of the chosen school and add it to your spell book'' or Even Better ''Pick a spell of the chosen school from any spell list and add it to your spellbook.

Master Specialist well, does nothing new. Sigh..too much does the metamagic reduction....and makes metamagic so broken. It's bad enough if a wizard can do several metamagic feats at no cost...but beyond broken when some games let the ''negative count'' for all sorts of broken things.

But mostly it iust a very ''ok, boring'' ability. You want something a bit more fresh/unique/new.

The same goes for Arch-Specialist.

AOKost
2017-07-13, 04:29 PM
Apprentice Specialist does not really do anything, and is really close to just being a feat tax. Sure, if you roll play by the numbers a +1 to caster level at low level is slightly useful...sometimes....but it's not really worth a whole feat slot.

So you might want to add some more to it to make it feat worthy.....like ''Pick a spell of the chosen school and add it to your spell book'' or Even Better ''Pick a spell of the chosen school from any spell list and add it to your spellbook.

Master Specialist well, does nothing new. Sigh..too much does the metamagic reduction....and makes metamagic so broken. It's bad enough if a wizard can do several metamagic feats at no cost...but beyond broken when some games let the ''negative count'' for all sorts of broken things.

But mostly it iust a very ''ok, boring'' ability. You want something a bit more fresh/unique/new.

The same goes for Arch-Specialist.

I really like the idea about adding a spell, or maybe it should be a couple of spells totaling up to the maximum level of spell you can cast or some such...

The topic of reducing metamagic level reduction to negative is something to be seriously considered, but I think that most DM's wouldn't allow anything to go lower than a +0 level adjustment. Though I do like the restriction of it being limited to a specific school. Maybe the feat should add a little something extra... like a competance bonus to Knowledge (Arcana) and/or Spellcraft when concerning the associated school of magic... or when crafting items that use spells from the chosen school they have a free +1 CL to any affects/effects when finished being made...

The Arch is a little boring overall, but I feel it makes a nice fit... You could give another bonus to Knowledge (Arcana) and/or Spellcraft when concerning spells of the chosen school that stacks with the previous bonus, but I feel that's as far as this should go...

As is, these are really sub-optimal feats for a character that wants to specialize in a particular school or maybe 2... but not penlaize them for doing it. This could make for some very powerful characters in some respects though. Maybe there should be clauses for Summoning and Necromantic affects that alter your HD by a certain amount for the purpose of calculating the HD of beings you can control...

I'd Other than the possible skill bonuses though, I'd leave them alone as they are, even seeming a little boring to some. I feel they are great thematically without imposing any penalties for those wanting to still generalize in the other schools while specializing in a particular school.

rferries
2017-07-13, 08:30 PM
Thank you both for your comments. I agree with all of your suggestions but I'm not going to bump up the power level much more as these feats were intended as "balanced" counterparts to the various "unbalanced" revised wizard feats I posted a while back.

Kaskus
2017-07-13, 10:55 PM
You could also take a look at the existing school powers and build them into the feats. It would add more flavor and allow existing builds that use those powers to work on your alternative system. You could also add a bonus spell slot that can only be filled with a spell from a specialized school (multiple specializations don't grant multiple slots).

So for example, Apprentice Necromancer would give Grave Touch and allow you to qualify for Command/Turn Undead (also add it to your bonus feat list but not give it for free)

Master Necromancer: perhaps this is where the spell slot comes in?

Arch-Necromancer: Add Life Sight and what do you think of picking a level 1 necromancy spell and making it a spell like ability?

You wait a little longer for the bonus slot and for life sight than the book version but you don't give up any schools so is the delay and feat investment worth it as a trade off?

rferries
2017-07-14, 02:51 AM
You could also take a look at the existing school powers and build them into the feats. It would add more flavor and allow existing builds that use those powers to work on your alternative system. You could also add a bonus spell slot that can only be filled with a spell from a specialized school (multiple specializations don't grant multiple slots).

So for example, Apprentice Necromancer would give Grave Touch and allow you to qualify for Command/Turn Undead (also add it to your bonus feat list but not give it for free)

Master Necromancer: perhaps this is where the spell slot comes in?

Arch-Necromancer: Add Life Sight and what do you think of picking a level 1 necromancy spell and making it a spell like ability?

You wait a little longer for the bonus slot and for life sight than the book version but you don't give up any schools so is the delay and feat investment worth it as a trade off?


Ha yep, I've already done an extensive writeup for the specialties (Abjuration through Enchantment here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?528741-Revamped-Wizard-Take-2-(Arcane-Feats-Abjuration-to-Enchantment)); Evocation through Transmutation here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?528867-Revamped-Wizard-Take-2-(Arcane-Feats-Evocation-to-Transmutation))). The feats in this thread are deliberately lower-power and more generic.

jqavins
2017-07-17, 03:31 PM
So often when I read new classes and new feats here in Homebrew, I get a bad taste in my mouth from the power inflation. This is really good in that it does not contribute to power inflation.

Even so, if I use these in my game (as a complete replacement for RAW specialization) I think I would use AOKost's skill bonuses. The plus to CL on crafted items is, in my reading, already present in the feats as rferries wrote them; it's true that using a spell in the crafting of an item is not, strictly speaking, casting the spell per se, but I would consider it included.

And speaking of negative level adjustments for metamagic feats, how about this as a separate feat:
Lowered Spell [Wizard, Specialist]
You can slot a spell at a lower level.

Prerequisites
Apprentice Specialist.

Benefits
Choose a spell in one of your specialized schools that you have already learned. You can prepare this spell in a slot one level lower. You can learn first level spells in cantrip slots. This feat can not be applied to cantrips.

Special
You may select Lower Spell more than once, each time choosing a different spell.

So yes, specialization does allow for negative level adjustment to spells, but only by using an additional feat per spell so reduced. The reduction from the specialization feats still can't go negative, but this lets a spell without any other metamagic feats go to -1, and reduces the level increase with metamagic feats by one. If the specialist feats reduce the cost to zero then the Lowered Spell benefit goes on afterward.

rferries
2017-07-18, 05:21 AM
An ingenious solution, but it seems a little too restrictive. I can't think of any spell that is so good and multi-purpose that it's worth spending a feat on in this way...maybe apply the benefits to one spell of the chosen school for each spell level you can cast?

AOKost
2017-07-18, 06:09 AM
So often when I read new classes and new feats here in Homebrew, I get a bad taste in my mouth from the power inflation. This is really good in that it does not contribute to power inflation.

Even so, if I use these in my game (as a complete replacement for RAW specialization) I think I would use AOKost's skill bonuses. The plus to CL on crafted items is, in my reading, already present in the feats as rferries wrote them; it's true that using a spell in the crafting of an item is not, strictly speaking, casting the spell per se, but I would consider it included.

And speaking of negative level adjustments for metamagic feats, how about this as a separate feat:
Lowered Spell [Wizard, Specialist]
You can slot a spell at a lower level.

Prerequisites
Apprentice Specialist.

Benefits
Choose a spell in one of your specialized schools that you have already learned. You can prepare this spell in a slot one level lower. You can learn first level spells in cantrip slots. This feat can not be applied to cantrips.

Special
You may select Lower Spell more than once, each time choosing a different spell.

So yes, specialization does allow for negative level adjustment to spells, but only by using an additional feat per spell so reduced. The reduction from the specialization feats still can't go negative, but this lets a spell without any other metamagic feats go to -1, and reduces the level increase with metamagic feats by one. If the specialist feats reduce the cost to zero then the Lowered Spell benefit goes on afterward.

I actually really like this idea to reduce the level of a spell, but maybe it should have Spell Thesis as a prerequisite. This would work in conjunction like this Take Apprentice, then Spell Thesis in the spell of the selected school, then Lower Spell. This would say reduce Magic Missile to a cantrip (0-level) and reduce the cost of metamagic feats by 2 levels (to a maximum of +0), and if they go to Arch, this will increase caster level by 2 and reduce Metamagic costs for that spell by 3 levels (to a minimum of +0).

Some might say that this is too breaking, but I don't think it is... Especially if you use Magic Missile as an example of thematic use to be used in conjunction with classes like Sorcerer/Wizard Magic Missile Mage, and Abjurant Champion, though to be fair, I'd house-rule some spells to work in conjunction with Magic Missile Mage, and allow more iterations of Magic Missile as higher level spells too such as Improved Magic Missile, Greater Magic Missile, Superior Magic Missile, and Perfected Magic Missile. That gives a higher level Magic Missile at every odd spell level. But those spells wouldn't be affected by the above combinations unless they were all taken separately. But this brings me to the point of my rambling: Magic Missile Mages should be able to cast their primary spell as many times as they want throughout the day, so lowering the level of it to Cantrip makes perfect sense (if you're using 3.P rules).

The bonuses to skills would be very minor in the long run, but still... every little bonus helps!

I've been wondering... Should there be a clause in the Special section stating that a particular spell can't have it's level lowered by the feat more than once, so each time the feat is taken it must be applied to another school? Or would you allow a particular spell to be reduced even further? I don't feel this would hurt too much as it eats up the feat economy while you're focusing on lowering the level of one spell you know, but if you could take it 3 times, you could have a Fireball as a Cantrip too... Though by this point, you've spent something like 5 feats! Six if you require Spell Thesis (and I would). I don't know very many that would be willing to do that, even if it meant they could stack more metamagic feats on a given spell... at some point it just becomes too hard and too much. For lower level spells to become Cantrips can be a bit OP... but not really. Even at low-mid level having a 1st level spell as a cantrip by spending a Feat isn't that OP.

I've heard that this shouldn't be allowed because it messes with the spell level/power economy but I feel that it's a trade-off with the Feat economy, so it's more than fare.

jqavins
2017-07-18, 11:00 AM
I actually really like this idea to reduce the level of a spell, but maybe it should have Spell Thesis as a prerequisite. This would work in conjunction like this Take Apprentice, then Spell Thesis in the spell of the selected school, then Lower Spell.
The way I wrote this the cost in feats for lowering spells is one per school plus one per spell, which I thought was enough to keep people from using this over and over. If you want to increase the cost to one per school plus two per spell I won't argue.


Should there be a clause in the Special section stating that a particular spell can't have it's level lowered by the feat more than once, so each time the feat is taken it must be applied to another school?(My underlines)

I don't understand. It seems like you're jumping between spell and school. The feat as I proposed it does state "each time choosing a different spell." So it already is limited to once per spell. Are you suggesting that the feat should be limited so you can only take it for one spell per school? That would require the Apprentice feat and the Lower feat for each spell, as well as messing with the fluff. I don't think that's a good idea, and if you go that way then I really don't think the Spell Thesis is needed, as that would make it three feats per spell lowered.

AOKost
2017-07-18, 10:11 PM
(My underlines)

I don't understand. It seems like you're jumping between spell and school. The feat as I proposed it does state "each time choosing a different spell." So it already is limited to once per spell. Are you suggesting that the feat should be limited so you can only take it for one spell per school? That would require the Apprentice feat and the Lower feat for each spell, as well as messing with the fluff. I don't think that's a good idea, and if you go that way then I really don't think the Spell Thesis is needed, as that would make it three feats per spell lowered.

I'm sorry I confused you, and you are right. I didn't mean to put "school" in the latter underline. I meant "spell" but it was late, and I was a bit tired, so please forgive me. I must have misread or even overlooked the part where it states that the spell can only be lowered once.