I'm back team, and I am sorry. Some real life issues and our dog left us.
Should be back to regular posting now, and apologies for not giving more notice.
Aw, dude, that sucks.
Sorry about your dog, it's always bad to lose a pet.
@James: Yes, you will get additional proficiencies when you level up (and you are pretty close).
@Quiin, Andi: Sorry to hear that - both of you. Awful experience.
@GM Sappy: Okay, thanks :)
Thanks friends, and sorry to heat that Andi, definitely agree, the house does feel empty.
Question: soon you will be faced with some relatively grim themes: I can edulcorate them or have you face some ugliness. In any case I would like you to keep being hopeful and good-hearted, rather than have this game take a dark turn.
What would you prefer? Having the world be a little nicer? Or keeping positive even when things are bad and ugly?
I haven't been posting much so I'm not sure how much my opinion counts, but I am okay with a world that is mean but staying positive.
In general I agree, staying positive in the face of an ugly world seems to be kind of a theme of the characters I play. Vorin is generally optimistic in general, except when it comes to his own insecurities.
That's not to say that wouldn't be tears and anger in the moment, depending on what happens. (See the recent scene with Ameiko's father.) But I think it would take something majorly dark to rob Vorin of his optimism. (Like, all the kids at the orphanage being killed.)
Of course, I can only speak for myself. I'm also cool with a little nicer as well. :-)
I'm okay for the game to go either way, but have a preference for #2.
I'd like James to go darker over time, but I'd like it to happen as he becomes an adult. I'm therefore happy to stretch out the descent into darkness to go pretty gradual.
His model is Sam Winchester. Sam still stays positive in the face of pretty unrelenting darkness for a really, really long time. He doesn't necessarily think things are going to end well for him, but he's more interested in saving others and doing the right thing.
I think even if James starts to go darker inside, he'll remain outwardly positive with kids, especially younger kids, for a really long time.
I'm fine with whatever.
Isaac is meant to be somewhere between a classic Determinator and an Implacable Man once he gets his proper class levels. As such, the more horrible the setting the more horrible Isaac's actions will seem in response. He is not going to be a sociopath or anything but it will definitely turn up the contrast and make him seem more frightening and inhuman as he keeps walking into terrible situations.
I'm fine either way. It seems the majority vote is for bad, so I guess we are probably going to go with that.
Yup, kids trying to stay good in a bad world sounds good to me!
This scene is the best I have ever seen it handled. Great job, guys!
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Level.... Up!
You'll have to remind us what our point buy should be. I think level 0 point buy was 10 or 12?
edit: Actually, you need to give us more detail I think. I went back to the recruitment back to see what we didn't get when we first made our characters. You mention a free feat and a new trait customized to us. Also our skills were very low, and should that go back to normal?
Right, I forgot to add it: it was a 12 point-buy, but now that you are level 1 you can upgrade to 15.
Alright, Isaac will be progressing as a Conscript specializing in the Brute and Berserker spheres, I’ll throw together a rebuild when I get off from work
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Hi Sappy, this is what you wrote in recruitment. So do we get that free feat you mentioned, and the trait? And all of the apprenticeship rules go away?
Rule Override: Apprenticeship: Of course, you are just training as adventurers, you are not yet. Here are some rules for "level 0.1".
- Class Skills only give a +1 bonus.
- Starting HP are half your HD + Con score.
- Classes with high or medium BAB only have a +0 BAB. Classes with low BAB have a -1 BAB.
- Classes with medium or low BAB are proficient with two simple weapons. Classes with high BAB are proficient with simple weapons and one martial weapon. Unchained Monks are only proficient with their unarmed strikes. Magi are proficient with one martial weapon.
- Casting classes have a Caster Level of 0 for all numerical purposes. They are, however, still considered casters.
- As an integration to the above, spells with a duration of X/level last half as long (minimum 1 round).
- Non-Sphere Casting classes can cast one less Level 1 spell per day. If it would bring the total to 0, they can only cast the bonus spells for having a high casting ability score.
- Spherecasting classes have 2 spell points less than normal. This can't bring the total below zero. They also only gain one bonus magic talent instead of the two usually awarded for the first time a character gains the casting ability.
- Animal Companions, Eidolons, Ghost companions and similar buddies get the Young template.
Feats: You will get a bonus feat at level 1, chosen between Power Attack, Weapon Finesse, Deadly Aim, Point Blank Shot, Combat Casting and Combat Expertise. You do not need to meet the requirements. Plan accordingly.
Reminder: you don't have it right now.
Traits: One trait. No need to choose one from the RotRL player's guide, I think those traits are horrid. Once you get to level 1, I'll give you another trait, customized to how you played your childhood.
You are totally right, I wrote everything up and forgot to tell you. Here are the main changes:
Feats: You get your choice of Power Attack, Weapon Finesse, Deadly Aim, Point Blank Shot, Combat Casting and Combat Expertise. You don't need to meet the requirements.
You lose all of the penalties that were in the Apprenticeship section:
- Class Skills only give a +1 bonus. You get the full +3.
- Starting HP are half your HD + Con score. Full HD + Con, as appropriate for your class.
- Classes with high or medium BAB only have a +0 BAB. Classes with low BAB have a -1 BAB. You gain the appropriate BAB for a Level 1 member of your class.
- Classes with medium or low BAB are proficient with two simple weapons. Classes with high BAB are proficient with simple weapons and one martial weapon. Unchained Monks are only proficient with their unarmed strikes. Magi are proficient with one martial weapon. You get proficiencies as appropriate to your class. Spheres of Might characters can choose a Martial Tradition.
- Casting classes have a Caster Level of 0 for all numerical purposes. They are, however, still considered casters. You gain a caster level as appropriate for your class.
- As an integration to the above, spells with a duration of X/level last half as long (minimum 1 round). Spells and sphere effects last normally.
- Non-Sphere Casting classes can cast one less Level 1 spell per day. If it would bring the total to 0, they can only cast the bonus spells for having a high casting ability score. You can cast as normal for a Level 1 member of your class.
- Spherecasting classes have 2 spell points less than normal. This can't bring the total below zero. They also only gain one bonus magic talent instead of the two usually awarded for the first time a character gains the casting ability. You get the full amount of spellpoints and magic talents, as appropriate to a member of your class.
- Animal Companions, Eidolons, Ghost companions and similar buddies get the Young template. They lose the Young template.
As well, Spheres of Might character get the full practitioner level and talents known as appropriate.
And you get the following traits:
- Almos: Protection of a Forgotten God: Chakacoatl treasures every one of the few who know of him, and won't allow any to fall if he can help it. Once per day, when an ally falls unconscious, you may gain a temporary spell point. This spell point lasts until the end of your next turn and can only be spent on time and effects from the Life Sphere, and any such effect cures the maximum amount of damage or abilitty damage.
- Andi: A Pounce of Cats: Licorice's unique trick has helped you so many times that it's a second nature to both. Licorice can act normally in a surprise round.
- Empheria: Fire, Walk With Me: You have spent enough time keeping your own pyromania in check to control any sort of fires. You gain a +2 bonus to Reflex saves against fire, and once per day you may use the Affect Fire ability of the Nature Sphere as a spell-like ability.
- Isaac: I Am Your Shield: In your mind, being more resilient than usual comes with a duty to protect your friends, and you willingly rush to the frontline. Whenever an adjacent ally is the target of an attack, you can, as an immediate action, grant that adjacent ally a +2 shield bonus to AC.
- James: Hero In The Making: You never doubted that you are destined for greatness, and you rush into combat with adamant certainty. Once per day, you can take a charge action gaining a +1 morale bonus on attack and damage rolls, and ignoring the usual penalty to AC.
- Quiin: What Everyone Wants: Your affinity for reading thoughts helps you find the right words for the moment. Once per day, you can roll twice on a Bluff, Diplomacy or Intimidate check and take the best result.
- Vorin: I Am Myself: You are familiar with self-doubt, and have learned some tricks to deal with it. You gain a +1 bonus to Will against mind-affecting effects, and once per day you can reroll a failed saving throw against a mind-affecting effect. You must take the second result, even if it's lower than the first.
If you don't like them or think that they are unbalanced, tell me. They may very well be.
No, it means that when you surprise the opponents, rather than being limited by a single move or standard action, he can take a full turn (so for example you could have him move and turn to a swarm)
Any restrictions on Legendary Talents?
Not a hard restriction, but I'd like to pre-vet them: what were you thinking about?
If I have the talents for it, I was going to shoot for Giant from the Brute Sphere and later Titan
Yes, Giant and Titan are OK.
I love that trait. :-)
As for rebuild, I think I will. I love the concept of the Swashbuckler, but in practice (especially in play-by-post) I'm not a fan.
I'll need to figure out what classes and archetypes thematically fit.
Good, I’m looking forward to throwing dragons around like particularly bitey sacks of potatoes
I personally rebuilt a Swashbuckler in Spheres of Might taking a Conscript, getting Evasion, the Dedicated Duelist tradition and focusing on the Athletics and Fencing Spheres. Duelist is also very nice, centered on disarm maneuvers and bleed damage.
If you'd like to add some magic, there are several different flavors of gishes as well.
Additionally, I noticed that the Spheres wiki is adding several new classes and archetypes in a few days, so if you want to wait for them you can.
If you could roll above a 5 or so, Vorin, you probably would like the swashbuckler. Just sayin, Vorin! You are the most unlucky dice roller I've ever played with.
*laughs* Very true! Though, my biggest complaint was the panache system. Except for Derring-do, it was hard to use in play-by-post. Too much of it is reaction based.
I personally rebuilt a Swashbuckler in Spheres of Might taking a Conscript, getting Evasion, the Dedicated Duelist tradition and focusing on the Athletics and Fencing Spheres. Duelist is also very nice, centered on disarm maneuvers and bleed damage.
If you'd like to add some magic, there are several different flavors of gishes as well.Additionally, I noticed that the Spheres wiki is adding several new classes and archetypes in a few days, so if you want to wait for them you can.
That is so very tempting. The problem being that Spheres of Might's Hero Lab files haven't come out yet. And I kind of rely on Hero Lab. (Typing is very difficult for me, and it's hard to dictate many character sheet changes.)
Still, I'll consider it. :-)
I do kind of want to go 'gish' for Vorin. I've already established he has a magical talent. At the same time, I definitely want to keep the 'agile, daredevil fencer with showmanship' aspect.
Oh well, I'll give it a few more hours thought. :-)
@GM sappy: Uh, I've forgotten how we bought attributes. What did we do, please?
I like the trait (mechanics are good, flavour is awesome), but I didn't think he just charged into combat very much 'cos of the whole Move to Study Opponent thing.
@Vorin: I think you, me and Quiin need to be careful to differentiate even if we are the same class. Incidentally, have you considered a Magus (Kensai)? They can pick up some of the duelist stuff, get magic, and make decent duelists eventually. There's a version that uses Cha, I think.
@All: I was thinking a full martial. Conscript maybe? Fencing and Warleader. This'd have James shouting tactics and exploiting any enemy mistakes (sneak attack, going for flank whenever possible).
@James: yes, you had a 12 point buy and you are being upgraded to 15. If you don't plan on charging (by the way if you like Tactics the Commander is another good class) you can suggest an alternate trait either here or via PM.
@Vorin: You can definitely go Kensai Magus, and I can help you fuse it with Sphere Magus (I seem to remember there being some overlap that prevented the archetypes from stacking) and then rebuild once the HeroLab files come out.
Got the Isaac rebuild done. I settled on unarmed and unarmored, which is good because all of his equipment is small sized.
IMPORTANT NOTE: thanks to the Conscript Sphere Specialization ability, Isaac's temporary HP pool from the Berserker Sphere has jumped up to 9.
@Vorin: You can definitely go Kensai Magus, and I can help you fuse it with Sphere Magus (I seem to remember there being some overlap that prevented the archetypes from stacking) and then rebuild once the HeroLab files come out.
In looking that up, I realized Sphere Magus is in SoP (that is out, it's only SoM of the two that isn't out yet). So, I picked those Hero Lab files up.
It looks like it isn't compatible with either Kensai or Eldritch Scion (there's crossover in what features they each replace). However, it still looks fun. :-)
Of course, now comes figuring this system out and choices. :-) I don't suppose there is a feat/talent to switch to charisma for casting? ;-) It's okay, I'll be able to get to 16 intelligence at level 4 if I boost it to 15 with the new points I have now.
There is. And I see no harm in allowing you to use Charisma for all the magus abilities requiring Intelligence, especially considering how hilariously underpowered the Eldritch Scion is.
Here you can find a handbook for the system, not completely up to date but still a decent resource.
A caster is given a number of "magic talents", feat-like slots, which can be spent to permanently (with a few exceptions) acquire a sphere or a talent within that sphere.
With a few exceptions (like the Conjuration Sphere), every Sphere's basic ability can be used at will. Then there is a resource called Spell Points (usually equal to your levels in casting classes + your casting ability modifier), which can be used to augment the sphere's abilities and create more powerful effects. You can basically think of them as mana, and they recover over a full night's sleep. For example, someone with the Telekinesis Sphere can lift Diminutive objects and move them as she likes, but she can spend a spell point to keep an object lifted without needing concentration (Sustained Force).
Talents within a Sphere can either improve on the basic ability (e.g. Powerful Telekinesis allows to lift items one category larger than usually allowed) grant new ways to use them (the Destruction Sphere's Energy Blade allows to make an attack while using the basic ability) or something different (the Divination Sphere's sense talents each grant a different sense).
The last thing to mention are Casting Traditions: by default, Spheres abilities are purely mental, with no verbal, somatic, material, focus, emotion or any component. By accepting generic drawbacks (like Verbal Casting, which adds verbal components to all your sphere abilities) you can get extra Spell Points per level.
Additionally, each sphere has one or more Specific Drawback: you give up some of the sphere's abilities in exchange for an extra talent from it. For example, someone with the Divination Sphere's Limited Divination drawback can't use the divine ability from Divination, and has an additional talent from this.
Casting Traditions usually require GM approval, but I'll approve pretty much everything.
As concerns the overlap in archetypes, it doesn't come up until level 4, and at that point there should either be HeroLab files if you want to try to go martial or we can choose one of two classes overriding the other, so if you can force HeroLab to join the two archetypes you can stack those two. Otherwise, you can make a normal SoP Magus and I'll help you modify the sheet to add the Kensai abilities, or tell me your talent choices and I'll compile the sheet for you.
As for Diminished Spellcasting, I'd say you gain 1 less spell point per level, minus 1 for every 5 character levels, and 1 less martial talent, minus 1 for every 10 character levels.
The trait for Empheria is very good and thematic, but I was actually going to go into the nature sphere this level, so the 1/day power turns out to be redundant.
Changes: I added a point to charisma. I took the nature sphere (fire of course). I switched out the cantrips feat for Primal Blast, since I can do most of the cantrips with my racial spell-like abilities anyway. The feat gives me a good bonus to attack and damage, but maybe you should check it to make sure it isn't too broken for level 1 (it gives me +2 attack and +4 damage).
@Empheria: Wow, that is pretty strong. Since it only applies to fire blasts, for the moment, I'd change it so that you can apply one point of Charisma per character level to the damage.
Do you have any ideas on what would you like the trait to do? I thought about fire resistance, but you are getting it via your bloodline. Alternatively, I could be giving you the Firesight feat for 1 minute/day.
By the way, what casting tradition did you take?
I took down the damage.
Firesight looks like a good choice. What action is it to activate?
My casting tradition has somatic and verbal casting (this came up towards the beginning of the discussion thread, but apparently I still forgot to add it to my profile, so I added it now).
There is. And I see no harm in allowing you to use Charisma for all the magus abilities requiring Intelligence, especially considering how hilariously underpowered the Eldritch Scion is.
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As concerns the overlap in archetypes, it doesn't come up until level 4, and at that point there should either be HeroLab files if you want to try to go martial or we can choose one of two classes overriding the other, so if you can force HeroLab to join the two archetypes you can stack those two. Otherwise, you can make a normal SoP Magus and I'll help you modify the sheet to add the Kensai abilities, or tell me your talent choices and I'll compile the sheet for you.
As for Diminished Spellcasting, I'd say you gain 1 less spell point per level, minus 1 for every 5 character levels, and 1 less martial talent, minus 1 for every 10 character levels.
Cool, thanks! It does let me choose two overlapping archetypes, it just complains.
So yeah, I'll choose those two for now, and I'm going to swap out my orphan trait (the survival bonus no longer seems as fitting now that I realized the quality of the orphanage) for Unorthodox Casting. I also raised my Dexterity with the extra ability points.
For casting tradition, I designed my own, if that's all right. Verbal and one level of somatic — to represent the influence of learning from a regular wizard — plus Magical Signs just because it seemed so fitting for a showman like Vorin to be unable to use magic without a bit of a light show.
I also chose Destructive Touch, because it seems fitting for a Magus.
For spheres, I chose destruction (with electrical blast as my bonus talent (Energy blade would be nice, but I get a better version next level anyway.)), and Warp. I'm hoping this separates me well enough from the other casters.
I also lowered my spell points from 4 to 3, for the diminished spellcasting.
I've uploaded the sheet with these changes. Does all that sound okay? If it is, I'll update my race/class line so it shows in the thread.
@Empheria: Swift action.
@Vorin: Looks good at first sight. That Casting Tradition is basically the standard Magus, so a-ok.
Have edited my profile, decided to switch to prodigy but all the themes are there, let me know if there is anything you wanted to change! I think I still have to pick one more talent, but other than that it's pretty much done.
Looks in order. Remember that the Scoundrel Sphere gives you one link and a finisher.
I'm still torn on this. I was wondering if one of the new Archetypes would help, but I think I want to stay completely grounded for now - given the rest of the party. Even the Shouts seem a bit too magical.
An Armiger could be a solution: via Customized Weapon they can be customizable, adapt their style to the challenges and change from time to time. Also, there are some more archetypes coming in the wiki in a day or two, you can wait and check them out.
If you have a concept and don't know how to make it mechanically, you can write me a PM.
Will add the extra bits soon, thanks GM Sappy.
It is not so much the mechanical as second thoughts about the thematic elements. There's some twists there, but the concept isn't that complicated!
I was planning on Conscript with Sneak Attack (2) and Sphere Specialisation Fencing (3) and Sphere Specialisation Warleader (bonus talents 1 5 9 13 17).
The idea was that while everyone else has amazing magic powers, James just has to think things through.
The issue is that his "niche" is getting everyone in the right position and precision damage. I was building it and was starting to get worried this might be too dark. Originally it was very "martial as sports" - but now I'm a bit worried.
I do like the idea that while everyone else is doing amazing things James is using Exploits, but a bit worried about it.
@GM Sappy?
Also, my reading is that specialization's ability interacts with warleader to give ranks in diplomacy equal to MIN(5, HD+1)?
If you want a cool niche that seems to fit the campaign, you could go with the Impossible Warrior SoP archetype for fighter. If doesn't get casting but has some pretty cool anti-magic abilities and it meshes with the SoM archetype for fighter as well.
If the flavour you're going for is playing the strengths of the team, and getting sneaky attack through clever positioning, I don't see it as so dark. It would make a good variation on the classic fierce leader in plate armor.
And I think that it would work that way, yes. It doesn't seem too much of a stretch. Just tell me in advance if you ever plan on using the extra ranks for early access to a prestige class.