She Blinded Me with Science! (Magitek That Doesn't Make Me Cry Myself To Sleep)

[jojolagger]

Of course that Tank would get annihilated by any culture using Magisterial-level tech.

Not Necessarily. If I get a complete spellnode before them, I should still be able to win. Provided I can get the lock down on the spellnode concept before other do, I can use the ultimate cosmic power it comes with to maintain a monopoly. It would take Doctorate level stuff before I can scry and die anyone else, and magic and my current defenses should be sufficient, aside from 1 or 2 options.
Even then, magic should allow me to fight back well.

Seriously, once you get up there, you get stuff like orbital lasers.

That reminds me to build a Magisterial-level orbital weapon. Because you can't do it without some access to flight.

[radmelon]

Seriously, once you get up there, you get stuff like orbital lasers.

Or the ****ing Zerg horde.

Orbital zerg drop cannon. That is all.

[Omnicrat]

Can sunmetal store ebbs?

I think it it can it balances okay, because it is so dangerous to work with.

[radmelon]

No, sunmetal gives off energy, which either kills things, or, with a lead input, generates power. Attempting to charge sunmetal with ebbs will most likely result in a massive explosion.

[Kellus]

The third prestige class, the contractor, is now up. It's the specialist class in Alchemetry!

[Silva Stormrage]

Can sunmetal store ebbs?

I think it it can it balances okay, because it is so dangerous to work with.

Undead are immune to it's effects. Just saying. Its not that dangerous to work with.

[Kellus]

And for the questions that came up!

Can sunmetal store ebbs?

No, radmelon got it exactly right.

Can a spell output cast into another spell output for the purpose of creation?

Quester's right, after it's cast it's just like any other spell.

An interesting idea presented itself to me with Biolurgy. Do the creatures it creates have souls?

Fascinating, I never even thought about that. It's a great question, because in D&D beings really do have souls. I'm going to unfortunately have to go with no for most creatures, but I'm going to specify that creating sentient life brings with it a soul. So yes, you can build a race of programmed sentient cows that exist only to walk into a demonic slaughterhouse.

what have I done

I'd like to see some way to have an Exotic Intelligence mounted in a Biollurgical Chassis so that the EI can take class levels. The BC is treated as circuited for the purposes of being under the EI's control, but this allows the EI to experience the world in a meaningful way so as to develop skills and also grants it a body with which it can actually use all of its class features. I guess this would need to be a template with level adjustment.

Also a really neat idea! Cross-discipline stuff like that is really very interesting, and I like the idea so much that I'm going to make it one of the HEUR perks for the upcoming Heuristicism prestige class, the dreamason.

For those wondering about making more interesting chassises as well, like swarms and oozes as Eldan(?) mentioned earlier, that'll be a perk for the biollurgy PrC, the graughtsman. Sorry for the delay with the PrCs, I'm back on track now and they should all be up in the next few days.

As a complete side note can you eat and drink while preparing a principle? I only ask because if he could a human gramarist with the wakeful mind graph could work indefintely.

Sure! Most people still need to sleep, but if you can get around that, go nuts! The rules are pretty vague on eating and drinking anyway, so I don't really care one way or the other.

As another random question, could you put a semi-space inside another semi-space? if so infinite recursive storage, just make the opening to the interior semi-spaces as wide as the semi-space its in.

This does work, and you can make very deep semi-spaces this way, but there's two caveats to keep in mind: first, you're limited by the maximum width of 2ft by 2ft to start with, and secondly even if the portal is as wide as the space, it's still a boundary for area effects like bubbles and bursts. Otherwise, go nuts!

TANK

This is just completely awesome, and I love it.

That being said, this brings up an interesting point about modern technology. The assumption in most D&D settings, and in this material, is that moderns technology not only doesn't exist, but it's pretty much actively impossible. That is, it's actually impossible in-setting to build an integrated circuit or an aerofoil and so on. That's why I've presented magical alternatives, such as a simple orthogonal engine instead of an internal combustion engine to create horizontal movement. The example of the WWII-era tank in the spectroconstruction table was mostly there to show how much raw physical labour something like that would take to create, not necessarily the technological and scientific invention and advances that went into designing the tank in the first place. Spectroconstruction, as mentioned earlier, gives you unskilled labourers, and in a normal D&D setting, they wouldn't be able to invent and construct an actual tank I'm afraid.

That being said, if your setting actually includes real technology on par with that sort of thing, spectroconstruction is totally appropriate to build it. The thing to remember is that it's just unskilled labour, it's not people inventing and innovating things beyond the mundane technology of the setting. I realize it's a fine line to walk, but then you have craziness like using spectroconstruction to build things like actual computers and so on.

EDIT

After some insightful comments by Quester, I've decided to drop the normal method of enhancing a gold output's light radius. Instead, excess ebbs are now transformed into a bolt of light akin to a searing light effect. Thank you for bringing up how ridiculous it was!

[Qwertystop]

The third prestige class, the contractor, is now up. It's the specialist class in Alchemetry!

Why limit this to only Evil planes?

[Amechra]

Unless you are a Contractor, of course.

[Kellus]

Why limit this to only Evil planes?

Because that's just what the prestige class is; devils and demons are traditionally associated with tempting and making deals with mortals, and this class follows in that proud tradition. It's not like there's an alignment restriction, you can still be a Good person and negotiate with demons on the side, but the class itself is about dealing with fiends.

EDIT

Unless you are a Contractor, of course.

Haha, yeah. But you still need to make the Diplomacy-as-Craft check, so whatever you build needs to be within the realm of what a Craft skill could normally design. There's still no invention, because there isn't a Craft (fully automatic machine gun) skill in the game.

[Qwertystop]

Because that's just what the prestige class is; devils and demons are traditionally associated with tempting and making deals with mortals, and this class follows in that proud tradition. It's not like there's an alignment restriction, you can still be a Good person and negotiate with demons on the side, but the class itself is about dealing with fiends.

Yeah, but among other things, this means that you can't use the capstone to call the souls of skilled artisans who weren't evil. And the thing is, that might not just be fluff. What if you want to make lots of medicines?

[Silva Stormrage]

CONTRACTOR IS AWESOME.

For Continual Carmot does it give regeneration or did you mean fast healing? If regen what bypasses it, and can it affect undead or creatures without con scores?

Personally I think there should be a cap on the amount of damage that you can deal with sunmetal just because I could see a contractor sitting in a semispace making a bomb which would could deal trillions of damage with trillions of negative levels >.>

General question about sunmetal. Is it blocked by death ward? Radioativity doesn't sound like negative energy to me so I wasn't sure.

For Phlegmatic Phlogiston I really don't think this is needed... Phlogiston is already REALLY REALLY REALLY good. Can't it easily make a generator that generates 98 ebbs a round?

For solomon's key, can you craft magic items with it? Assuming you can craft the items?

[jojolagger]

This is just completely awesome, and I love it.

<reasons tank wouldn't normally work>

Honestly, I just saw the challenge and wanted to do something cool with Spectroconstruction. Oh hey, tank. I'll take a heavy German tank from late WWII, and use magic to cover the fuel and repair problems.

Another way to use Spectroconstruction would be to basically summon 1.2 carts a round, to drop on people or form barricades.

Also, with the magisterial principle KALD 207, you can seriously concentrate alcohol. Vodka is Water and ethanol, with trace amounts of other stuff. Pass it through a blue filter and you have near pure ethanol, which is a backup fuel source for the tank.
There is a more complex way to distill alcohol with only Baccalaureate principles, but needs a red filter box with the internal temperature between the boiling points of said alcohol and water.
Alternately, you just boil vodka and have some biomass filter out the water vapor.

[Kellus]

Good questions!

For Continual Carmot does it give regeneration or did you mean fast healing? If regen what bypasses it, and can it affect undead or creatures without con scores?

It just gives plain regeneration, which by the rules isn't passed by anything. Much like the tarrasque's regeneration, you would have to kill the person and then use a wish effect to keep them dead. Or more likely, since it's from something they ate, just tie them up while they're unconscious and wait 24 hours for it to pass out of their system.

Personally I think there should be a cap on the amount of damage that you can deal with sunmetal just because I could see a contractor sitting in a semispace making a bomb which would could deal trillions of damage with trillions of negative levels >.>

That sounds like a pretty awesome plot hook, I'll be honest. And remember that the range of the thing is still limited by the amount of it. Realistically, a normal sunmetal bomb is going to pretty much devastate the area anyway; 1d10 negative levels is enough to destroy nearly any society. This is mostly just added insurance.

General question about sunmetal. Is it blocked by death ward? Radioativity doesn't sound like negative energy to me so I wasn't sure.

Death ward protects against "death spells, magical death effects, energy drain, and any negative energy effects". Radiomantic bombs don't reference any of those, so no. As is, the only way to protect against it is to be inside of a lead input net, or in an antimagic field (and that last one won't help against a bomb made by a 20th level gramarist).

For Phlegmatic Phlogiston I really don't think this is needed... Phlogiston is already REALLY REALLY REALLY good. Can't it easily make a generator that generates 98 ebbs a round?

Yep. This makes one that generates more!

For solomon's key, can you craft magic items with it? Assuming you can craft the items?

Yes, if you have the Crafting feat you could make magic items with it really really fast, although you would have to supply materials and (ugh) XP as normal.

Yeah, but among other things, this means that you can't use the capstone to call the souls of skilled artisans who weren't evil. And the thing is, that might not just be fluff. What if you want to make lots of medicines?

This is interesting; the idea of summoning specific souls is mostly just fluff, the implication is that you can craft pretty much anything you want. But I realize that's a cop-out with what I just said to Amechra, so I'm going to add some expository text in there describing the limits to the Craft skills you can replicate.

[jojolagger]

There's still no invention, because there isn't a Craft (fully automatic machine gun) skill in the game.

Actually, the craft skill that lists available crafts uses such as. And gunsmithing fits quite nicely into that list. So would auto-making.

[Kellus]

Actually, the craft skill that lists available crafts uses such as. And gunsmithing fits quite nicely into that list. So would auto-making.

Okay, I give up. The contractor can build machine guns.

Seriously though, I really liked the tank, and it kind of broke my heart to have to say that it wouldn't work. I changed the table entry in spectroconstruction and added a note about the unskilled labour aspect of it so that hopefully other people won't get a mistaken impression as well.

EDIT: By the by, I ended up changing my mind about exotic intelligences and chassises. If you have a chassis connected to a circuit that has an EI, it can take control of it as if it were the brain of the creature.

[Silva Stormrage]

Good questions!



It just gives plain regeneration, which by the rules isn't passed by anything. Much like the tarrasque's regeneration, you would have to kill the person and then use a wish effect to keep them dead. Or more likely, since it's from something they ate, just tie them up while they're unconscious and wait 24 hours for it to pass out of their system.

And can it affect undead or constructs?

Death ward protects against "death spells, magical death effects, energy drain, and any negative energy effects". Radiomantic bombs don't reference any of those, so no. As is, the only way to protect against it is to be inside of a lead input net, or in an antimagic field (and that last one won't help against a bomb made by a 20th level gramarist).

The question I more of had then is do things that block negative levels block the negative levels gained through handeling radioactive material? Or the explosion from sunmetal?

[Kellus]

And can it affect undead or constructs?

Undead and constructs are both creatures, so they both gain the regeneration property for 24 hours if they consume carmot.

The question I more of had then is do things that block negative levels block the negative levels gained through handeling radioactive material? Or the explosion from sunmetal?

I'm... not clear what the question is, I'm sorry. Radiomantic negative levels are not from negative energy, so effects that block that sort of thing won't help you. It is supernatural in nature, so being in an antimagic field suppresses the radiomantic nature of sunmetal. And a lead input transformer has much the same effect.

[Silva Stormrage]

Undead and constructs are both creatures, so they both gain the regeneration property for 24 hours if they consume carmot.



I'm... not clear what the question is, I'm sorry. Radiomantic negative levels are not from negative energy, so effects that block that sort of thing won't help you. It is supernatural in nature, so being in an antimagic field suppresses the radiomantic nature of sunmetal. And a lead input transformer has much the same effect.

For the undead question I simply ask that because regeneration can't normally affect creatures without a con score. Also that makes any undead creature immune to damage while under it's affects as regeneration turns the damage into non lethal damage which undead and constructs are immune to.

For the second some things aren't like death ward were they specify negative energy. For example soulfire armor just blocks "Negative levels" you might want to specify that the negative level's aren't blocked by anything that normally blocks negative levels.

[EdroGrimshell]

Undead and constructs are both creatures, so they both gain the regeneration property for 24 hours if they consume carmot.

Technically, Regeneration is limited to living creatures, ones with a Con score, IIRC.

EDIT: Yep, I was Right. Last line says it

[Kellus]

For the undead question I simply ask that because regeneration can't normally affect creatures without a con score. Also that makes any undead creature immune to damage while under it's affects as regeneration turns the damage into non lethal damage which undead and constructs are immune to.

Oh, excellent catch. Good point, I think I'll just avoid the entire problem by making it flat fast healing. Thank you, I can't believe I'm that dumb

For the second some things aren't like death ward were they specify negative energy. For example soulfire armor just blocks "Negative levels" you might want to specify that the negative level's aren't blocked by anything that normally blocks negative levels.

Haha, no, something like that would be fine. These are negative levels that don't come from a negative energy source. So if you explicitly have an effect that blocks negative levels of all kinds, it provides immunity to radiomantic stuff. If you have something like an undead, which is explicitly immune to negative levels, it's also immune to radiomantic stuff. Death ward in particular doesn't give immunity to negative levels, it gives immunity to negative energy effects.

It's a fine line, but it's like being immune to fireballs and being immune to fire damage.

Technically, Regeneration is limited to living creatures, ones with a Con score, IIRC.

Yes, I had a flash of astounding stupidity.

[EdroGrimshell]

I'd actually like to see some extra disciplines/principles and PrCs that can have multiple specializations.

[Omnicrat]

I'd actually like to see some extra disciplines/principles and PrCs that can have multiple specializations.

2nd

Also, how do engines consume fuel? Is it matter to push or something different?

[Morcleon]

I'd actually like to see some extra disciplines/principles and PrCs that can have multiple specializations.

3rd. Also, perhaps some feats? Maybe a high (16-20) level one that allows your bubbles to penetrate semi-spaces?

Question:
If you place an engine fully in a semi-space, then attach combined wood input/output transformers, placed intersecting the portal, would the engines be able to be powered by a heuristic circuit?

[General Patton]

EDIT: By the by, I ended up changing my mind about exotic intelligences and chassises. If you have a chassis connected to a circuit that has an EI, it can take control of it as if it were the brain of the creature.

So to clarify, the EI can't learn and gain class levels while inhabiting a chassis? So much for having an EI Wizard who governs a population of chassis and is capable of ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL to lay down some magical wrath. By the way, do EIs also have a soul?

[Kellus]

So to clarify, the EI can't learn and gain class levels while inhabiting a chassis? So much for having an EI Wizard who governs a population of chassis and is capable of ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL to lay down some magical wrath.

Absolutely they can. They have mental statistics and everything, they don't even need a body to gain class levels. But I imagine it would help.

Now, the LA on something like that, I have absolutely no idea since there are far too many variables. But an EI is well within their rights to take class levels.

By the way, do EIs also have a soul?

Based on the interpretation that sentience confers a soul as established with Biollurgy, yes they do.

I'd actually like to see some extra disciplines/principles and PrCs that can have multiple specializations.

Let me finish the core eight prestige classes for specialization, and then I'll see what I can do about hybrids. I could see some really interesting ones, like the heartisan (BIOY/ALCH specialist who builds things out of abstract emotions) or the theologineer (ELDK/YGGD specialist who, quite literally, moves mountains in the name of his god). But there are any number of those hybrids you could come up with (okay, actually 28), so I'd like to get the core specialties covered first.

Incidentally, for anyone interested, the discovery lists (Alchemastery, Elder Kinetic, etc) are intended to be universal, so any specialist prestige class would have access to them.

Also, how do engines consume fuel? Is it matter to push or something different?

Whatever you like. The important thing is that the fuel starts out in the same space as the engine, and is consumed. The special FX for that are entirely up to you.

3rd. Also, perhaps some feats? Maybe a high (16-20) level one that allows your bubbles to penetrate semi-spaces?

As I mentioned before, I'm very much not a fan of feats for single classes or specific magic systems like this, because all they do is give unfair advantages or create feat taxes. There are literally thousands of feats out there, I don't really want to add to the problem.

EDIT

If you place an engine fully in a semi-space, then attach combined wood input/output transformers, placed intersecting the portal, would the engines be able to be powered by a heuristic circuit?

Clever! I'm going to say yes, since none of the rules laid out in YGGD 101 are violated.

[Amechra]

I'd actually like to see some extra disciplines/principles and PrCs that can have multiple specializations.

You know, if you want to work with me on one or two...

I mean, there isn't one for Geo-Engineering, at the very least (it's large scale Landscape Architecture; basically, it would all be climate/weather control, turning deserts into rainforests and the like.)

[General Patton]

For Submerging Engines, can we get some sort of approximate conversion rate for HP to volume of fluid blood? With the help of Black Filter anesthetic and a bunch of magical healing, you could fuel the engine without actually killing anything.

Also, when an EI uses Abnormal Behavior to produce another EI, does it use their Intelligence or that of the Gramarist at the time of preparing Abnormal Behavior? A level 12 EI that took increases to Int could make an EI that starts out smarter than they did.

[Milo v3]

I like that idea of Geo-Engineering:
Use a principle to reduce Humidity in the air to 0, making it near impossible to rain, resulting in less plants, less plants results in no stability in soil, this results in sand. Thus a desert is soon formed. It would take a year or two to do but the results can be very interesting.

Also, I made a variant version of the Contractor as I don't use the Tome of Magic's Binding. Here is a link.

[EdroGrimshell]

Heh, sorry Amechra, I'm just not good enough to make this kind of stuff yet, I'll be able to pitch ideas and the like, but that's about is. I'm already having enough trouble with a bit of homebrew I'm making that builds souls from soul fragments (which is a 3rd party thing, TBH, so it likely won't show up on here).