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2018-01-28, 01:01 PM (ISO 8601)
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Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
After messing around with the Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition, one of my players expressed dissatisfaction with the rules in their current state. Since we both are familiar with D&D 3.5, and I thought an adaption might be in order.
My idea was to basically use the Wizard's chassis (with 6 skill points & any class skills, no bonus feats, and more weapon/armor proficiencies). I was thinking of keeping the magic system more or less unchanged from M20.
Other ideas included:
- The Mage starts with 1 Aretes and gains another every odd level (max 10).
- The Mage starts with 6 dots in any Spheres of their choosing, and cannot have more dots a single sphere than their Aretes.
- The Mage gains 2 dots for any Sphere(s) they wish at every new level gained.
- Pre-epic, the Mage cannot exceed 5 dots in any one Sphere.
- The Mage's magick is an SLA, and can't be altered by feats that normally work on SLAs.
- The player may pick any stat (sans Con) as their primary casting stat.
- Saving throws for the Mage's magic is equal to 10 + Aretes + primary casting stat.
- No spell per day limits.
- Caster level = character level.
- Every success the Mage gains when they roll their Aretes to use magick, either increases the spell's damage by one dice step or increases its duration.
Damage Example (d4/d6/d8/d10/d12/d20)
Duration Example (1/round-1/min-1/10 min-1/hour-1/day)
Thoughts?
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2018-01-28, 01:22 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
You mean "horribly broken"? I don't understand how you think creating a class that gets access to Mage powers in D&D is a good plan on any level at all. A Mage starting character has enough power to destroy cities if she is played by someone with a basic knowledge of physics. The Mage magic system isn't even balanced in Mage, where everyone gets to use it. Why on earth would you think it could possibly be balanced as one option among many?
Certainly, you could make a system that was "like Mage" but with rules that were less dumb. But the first part of doing that would be making the magic system less dumb.
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2018-01-28, 01:28 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
I haven't looked at PF Spheres of Power, but from what I hear they're closer to your idea. It might be easier to backport the idea than to try forcing the storyteller system and the D20 engine to gel.
Trying to make M:tA (any version) compatible with D&D sounds like a logistical nightmare. As mentioned before, there's the simple difference in rule engines. There's the fact that white wolf splats are designed to interact primarily with same splat characters, while D&D expects much broader interaction amongst different character types. You'll have to find a good rationale for paradox in a world where wizards flying around chucking fireballs at each other is very much part of the setting conceit. And ultimately, you'll have to deal with the way that most things in D&D are designed to be modular. Freeform, at-will casting is nifty when it's one of the core conceits of the whole game line, but sounds like a logistical nightmare to make that workable and balanced at a D&D table.
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2018-01-28, 01:37 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
I'm curious how they'd do that.
I harbor no illusions that it'd be balance in any way shape or form.
Any suggestions for how I might go about doing that?
EDIT:
That might be worth a look.
Logically, I don't think paradox would be a thing in a D&D world.Last edited by ColorBlindNinja; 2018-01-28 at 01:39 PM.
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2018-01-28, 01:47 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
2 dots Matter gives you the power to turn "stuff" into "other stuff" as long as you don't alter "shape, temperature, or basic state". A block of solid-state pure hydrogen the same temperature as the floor is, of course, the same "shape, temperature, and basic state" as the floor, but it is way the hell off the pressure/temperature curve for pure hydrogen and will return to that curve rather violently. I don't know if you can actually blow up an entire city as a starting character, but you can get close.
Any suggestions for how I might go about doing that?
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2018-01-28, 02:24 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Interesting, I'll have to remember that. I have two immediate questions:
1. Wouldn't that count as vulgar, and thus give the Mage that did that paradox?
2. How big of an explosion are we talking about?
I was hoping to keep the magic as close to Mage the Ascension as possible, honestly rewriting the rules into something less abusive sounds like an obscene amount of work.
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2018-01-28, 02:38 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Didn't you say that paradox wouldn't really be a factor in a D&D verse?
2. How big of an explosion are we talking about?
I was hoping to keep the magic as close to Mage the Ascension as possible, honestly rewriting the rules into something less abusive sounds like an obscene amount of work.Last edited by johnbragg; 2018-01-28 at 02:41 PM.
https://thaumasiagames.blogspot.com/
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...-Dad-is-the-DM
Homebrew quick-fixes for Cleric, Druid: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=307326
Replacing the Cleric: The Theophilite packagehttp://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=318391
Fighter feats: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=310132
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2018-01-28, 02:47 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
It wouldn't, I was thinking about doing that in Mage the Ascension.
I fear I might have to take a physics class now...
Edit: Can you create antimatter with Matter 2?
I've heard people say the spells you can make are either useless or broken.Last edited by ColorBlindNinja; 2018-01-28 at 02:50 PM.
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2018-01-28, 02:54 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Fair enough. It would give you paradox, if there is anything left of you to give paradox to. (Mundanes will have no reason to doubt the official story about a gas leak explosion for hydrogen, or nuclear terrorism for plutonium)
ME: I haven't heard anyone talk bad about Spheres of Power
CBN: I've heard people say the spells you can make are either useless or broken.https://thaumasiagames.blogspot.com/
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...-Dad-is-the-DM
Homebrew quick-fixes for Cleric, Druid: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=307326
Replacing the Cleric: The Theophilite packagehttp://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=318391
Fighter feats: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=310132
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2018-01-28, 02:56 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
https://thaumasiagames.blogspot.com/
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...-Dad-is-the-DM
Homebrew quick-fixes for Cleric, Druid: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=307326
Replacing the Cleric: The Theophilite packagehttp://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=318391
Fighter feats: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=310132
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2018-01-28, 03:16 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
The easiest away around this is to grab something like a clock, and claim it's a bomb.
I hear open ended magic systems are really really prone to abuse.
Well, I guess it depends on how much antimatter we're talking about. A few dots in the Correspondence Sphere wouldn't hurt, either.
EDIT: So that you're no where near the ensuing explosion.Last edited by ColorBlindNinja; 2018-01-28 at 03:16 PM.
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2018-01-28, 03:27 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
A'la carte magic systems are prone to abuse, because the players can min-max to either perfectly suit their current situation, or can optimize for one element for a rather spectacular effect. Still, when you compare SoP to the sheer open-ended nuttiness of Mage spheres, you're really talking night and day. Mage spheres are literally "if you can justify it within these broad guidelines we give, roll for it".
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2018-01-28, 03:36 PM (ISO 8601)
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2018-01-28, 03:49 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Maybe? Stuff does explode, sometimes quite impressively. Could you get people to believe that whatever building you blew up blew up for normal reasons? Who the hell knows!
2. How big of an explosion are we talking about?
I was hoping to keep the magic as close to Mage the Ascension as possible, honestly rewriting the rules into something less abusive sounds like an obscene amount of work.
Actually, I think you can't do that at least in M20. You can't make radioactive stuff with just Matter.
I don't know much about Spheres of Power, but I don't ever remember seeing someone talk bad about it.
Yep. Mage (particularly the physical spheres) heavily rewards knowing stuff about science, because it allows you to screw with science in ways that are specific enough to look minor to laymen, but allow you to do crazy nonsense if you know how science works.
Edit: Can you create antimatter with Matter 2?
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2018-01-28, 04:06 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
I say just pretend it's a bomb of some sort.
I'd like to research that, but I fear I'll end up on a government watch list.
True, but D&D already has a bunch ridiculous stuff that magic can do as it is.
I don't recall the details, but I believe you are correct.
Thanks for the link, I'll take a look at it.
Ah well, I went into I.T.
I'd assume that antimatter is matter. I'll Google that later.
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2018-01-28, 10:25 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
I'll just hop in quickly with some back-of-the-Wolfram-Alpha calculations. There's no scratch paper near me, so I might drop a zero in either direction.
Spoiler
First off, let's start with a cubic meter of hydrogen. There might be more or less, which will be multiplied commensurately.
Some notes:
-Standard Temperature and pressure.
A block of solid hydrogen has a density of 0.088 g/cm3.
There are 106 cubic centimeters here, so it's 88,000 g of hydrogen.
Conveniently, hydrogen has an atomic weight of about 1, so this is also 88k moles of hydrogen atoms. That's a lot.
How much energy do you get out?
Well, we're about to have 44k hydrogen molecules, each containing two hydrogen atoms.
They would like, ideally, to each occupy some amount of space; the amount is determined by the equation
PV = nRT, the ideal gas law.
P is pressure- one atmosphere.
V is volume. We're about to find how much.
n is number of molecules- 44k moles.
R is a conversion factor. Here, I'm using 0.0826 L * atm/mol * K)
T is temperature- 298 Kelvin, or therabouts.
A quick calculation later, and we obtain about one million liters of air.
How much energy does it take to fill up all that area?
The work done by gas as it expands against a constant pressure is given by P* (delta)V. Delta V is about a million liters of air, or a thousand cubic meters- the original cubic meter doesn't really register at this point. P is one atmosphere (atm), which is about 100 Joules/liter.
We end up with about one hundred million N*m, or joules.
We do subtract the heat of fusion and the heat of vaporization- the energy needed to break the bonds between the hydrogen molecules. That works out to about 1000 joules per mole, taking about 44M joules out of our final calculation.
66 megajoules, just off the expansion of the gas.
That's actually not very much! It's about 0.015 kilotons of TNT. For reference, here's half a ton of TNT.
We can do better.
Hydrogen is flammable.
We have 44k moles of hydrogen. If all of them go through the listed reaction (assuming there's enough oxygen), then we end up with
44k * 286 kJ = about 12 * 10^9 joules.
How much oxygen is actually available is left as an exercise to the reader.
That's a lot more- about 2.8 tons of TNT.
That's a lot of damage. For reference, take this -, and scale up the distances by about a factor of 13 (at least).
It's also about a magnitude 3.5 earthquake, but on the surface.
A reminder: This is per cubic meter. Also, I'm not going to bother to chart how the pressure develops over time, but it's unlikely to stay at 1 atm for long- the pressure-based energy may be a bit higher.
Um.
On topic, I'm actually not clear on how M:tA works, but I'm wary of freeform casting. How are freeform spells normally resolved there? (and more generally, how are actions resolved?)My one piece of homebrew: The Shaman. A Druid replacement with more powerlevel control.
The bargain bin- malfunctioning, missing, and broken magic items.
Spirit Barbarian: The Barbarian, with heavy elements from the Shaman. Complete up to level 17.
The Priest: A cleric reword which ran out of steam. Still a fun prestige class suitable for E6.
The Coward: Not every hero can fight.
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2018-01-28, 11:14 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
By wizard chassis, do you mean they cast from the wizard spell list but use Arete to boost spells?
Or would it all be free-form spellcrafting like in Mage? If the latter, I see a problem in knowing how many damage dice to roll with offensive spells. What would be the base for a Forces 2 amplification of damage or a Forces 3/Prime 2 fireball?
I'll also chime in that Arete 5-7 is probably closer to a level 20 D&D character than 8-10. 8-10 are really the godlike beings in Mage, with spells ranging from literally making you immortal to you can destroy the multiverse with a thought. (In Mage canon, there are a handful of mages with Spheres at or near 10, and they are basically forbidden from interacting with the rest of the world, with the non-Nephandi ones keeping the Nephandi one from destroying everything.)
However, your note that Spheres can't raise above 5 pre-epic does basically contain that, but maybe that's fine. But, as is, a level 25 guy could have 10 ranks in a Sphere, and that is way better than any craziness Epic Spellcasting can dish out.
I'd think creating Antimatter would probably be Matter 5, the same rank where you can create mythical metals. I think I've heard of DMs ruling that radioactive materials are also Matter 5, since their existence was originally supertech. For a parallel idea: in the middle ages, folk might have heard of mythril, but just because knowledge of it was common-place doesn't mean that it wasn't still Matter 5 to create it.
But, unless (as one person noted it might be) noted explicitly in the M20 rulebook, probably best to discuss with the DM.
I've also heard the idea that, if what you make is damaging, the amount you make is dependent on the damage you would deal. So a hugely successful roll on 'transmute air to acid' makes a lot of acid, while a small roll makes a little bit. Similar application could happen to a hydrogen or antimatter bomb.
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2018-01-29, 04:59 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Monte Cook already did a d20 conversion of Mage - and the rest.
It takes most of what you expect from M:TA and scale it for d20.
My experience in running it? The Mage wins.
A 5th level Mage was able to interrupt the turn order to heal an ally as they were killed - their werewolf took enough damage to kill them utterly, but the mage had enough points to interrupt and instantly heal all the damage as it was happening, while remote viewing the fight from a safe bunker.
We put some restrictions in place to manage it and keep the power level under control, which mainly worked - limits on how many points can be spent on one spell at a time, how much can be regenerated by magic, and so on.
I'd also recommend you keep a close eye on the number of schools / gnoses/ whatever they're called (it's been about 10 years since we played it) that your mage has access to - too many, and they are the ultimate power in the universe, only challenged by another mage of equal or higher power.
The mage is very much player-intelligence limited. The smarter the player, the more awesome stuff they can do. Average or duller players will struggle with the amount of choice.
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2018-01-29, 02:06 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
I think that your best bet if you ported M20 Mages into D&D would be to run an all mage party. Mages are really broken. I mean really broken. Check out this link for a couple of ideas of what they can do even at low levels. You know how a min-maxed spell-to-power erudite or a optimized artificer is tier 0? In D&D tier terms, the mage would be tier -20.
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2018-01-29, 05:56 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Thanks for crunching the numbers.
You basically roll a number of dice based on your character's skill at magic. You can cast at will.
The latter.
My main idea is that you'd start at d4 damage per caster level, and each addition success would raise the dice by one step.
Even with only 5 dots max in their Spheres?
Epic spellcasting is pretty insane, what did you have in mind that would trump that?
I'm positive that you need more than Matter 2 for radioactive materials. As for antimatter? Yeah, it's basically the GMs call.
From what I saw of the fluff, it doesn't resemble Mage the Ascension at all. Is the crunch comparable?
I'll take a look at the link, but I will say that I'm a tad skeptical that Mages would be tier -20.
Edit: That link seems to be talking about New World of Darkness, are Mages in NWoD comparable to the Mage the Accession ones?Last edited by ColorBlindNinja; 2018-01-29 at 05:58 PM.
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2018-01-29, 07:14 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Let’s not talk about the stuff that would destroy the world or get dismissed out of hand at any reasonable table. Let’s talk about at-will effects a Mage with 3 dots in a Sphere and no specialized knowledge can do at will and (in a D&D setting, Paradox-free:)
- Matter can turn all an enemy’s clothes and armor to lead and their weapons to cotton wool. Or abruptly shift all the ground under them, dropping them into a pit that seals itself above them.
- Time can have unlimited Time Stops at 3 dots by hyper-accelerating themselves, with the ability to affect the world around them. Or they can anti-Time Stop an enemy by putting a bubble of slow time around them. And freeze missiles or projectile spells in flight using the same method. Or (with life and matter dips) rewind time that has already happened, complete with undoing injury and death.
- Life can just kill you. Or if they are feeling lazy, transform the nice bacteria living in your gut into the deadliest disease they know.
- Correspondence at 3 gives all the major scry-and-die components (and their countermeasures) including divination and teleports. Oh, and minor detail: it lets you do any of your other tricks at an arbitrary distance, so you don’t actually need to do the ‘teleport in’ part of scry-and-die.
These are all book-explicit 3 dot effects that don’t require rulings about antimatter or particular cleverness to use. In Ascension, they’re restrained by Paradox, but in D&D? Yikes.
EDIT: and these are all single-Sphere effects, it gets worse when you start mixing mid-tier spheres. :-)Last edited by Lapak; 2018-01-29 at 07:24 PM. Reason: added thought
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2018-01-29, 07:24 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Just to clarify, OP is thinking of using the d20/D&D wizard chassis, but the MtA setting. So Paradox *is* a limiting factor.
It's not White Wolf Mages running around Greyhawk or Eberron or Krynn, it's Mage: The Ascension (or maybe The Awakening, or maybe The Anniversary) run with d20 resolution mechanics.
(I had the same confusion at the beginning.)https://thaumasiagames.blogspot.com/
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...-Dad-is-the-DM
Homebrew quick-fixes for Cleric, Druid: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=307326
Replacing the Cleric: The Theophilite packagehttp://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=318391
Fighter feats: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=310132
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2018-01-29, 07:24 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
OK.
These sort of effects allow saving throws in D&D. Would it be unreasonable to allow them in this case?
Forced Dream is a 3rd level power that allows you to effectively rewind time, and slowing enemies would probably allow a saving throw.
The only issue I see with stopping missiles in midair, is you'd probably need to read an action to do that.
Which D&D spells can already do, more or less.
This is probably the most broken trick you've mentioned; that would be exceedingly powerful.
That last bit involving Correspondence 3 can by done from the comfort of your sanctum, which makes all your magic coincidental. At least in M20, I'm not sure about older versions of Mage.
Edit:
I was mostly thinking of setting this in a D&D setting, with D&D monsters, classes, ect. Sorry for the confusion.Last edited by ColorBlindNinja; 2018-01-29 at 07:26 PM.
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2018-01-29, 07:30 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Ah. I have no idea how that would work, but it IS much more reasonable. Most of my examples above would be crazy Vulgar, but not all of them - the Life transmutation of bacteria could easily be coincidental. The desire to make your magic coincidental is the big limiting factor in Mage, so that would help.
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2018-01-29, 07:36 PM (ISO 8601)
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2018-01-29, 07:39 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
It would be reasonable! Now that I understand what you're doing. You'd have to figure out appropriately-scaling saves, and decide on the spot what save is targeted, but that's all possible. This is way more reasonable than what I thought you were doing, though I'll admit I don't entirely grasp the point if you're keeping the magic system.
Forced Dream is a 3rd level power that allows you to effectively rewind time, and slowing enemies would probably allow a saving throw.
The only issue I see with stopping missiles in midair, is you'd probably need to read an action to do that.
The 'stopping missiles' example is actually stopping bullets, so I'm thinking it's meant to be a very, very fast action. Effectively Immediate in 3.5 terms. Which makes sense in the Time sphere anyway. :)
As for the rest of it, if I were a player in your game I'd move as much as possible to less-direct or self-targeted effects to dodge the saving throw issue, because the flexibility is there to do it and it makes sense when you want to stay coincidental anyway. The enemy gets a save against me slowing him, but not against me speeding myself up, etc.
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2018-01-29, 07:46 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Saving throws are pretty integral to D&D, that's why I wanted to have them. Not every bit of Magick the Mage uses would require one, but in most of the examples you cited, they probably would.
EDIT: My assumption was that making saving throws was a property of D&D characters, rather than a part of the Mage's Magick.
My idea for save DC was basically 10 + the Mage's Aretes + their casting stat.
True, but Forced Dream isn't that hard to manifest just before combat.
EDIT: You can augment it to last 1/min per manifester level, too.
Ah, OK.
So, mostly buffing and battlefield control.Last edited by ColorBlindNinja; 2018-01-29 at 07:48 PM.
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2018-01-30, 03:17 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Mage Class (Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition) for D&D 3.5
Last edited by Altair_the_Vexed; 2018-01-30 at 06:52 AM.
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2018-01-30, 07:21 PM (ISO 8601)
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