Genius Guide Magister, balanced or over-powered


Advice


Hi,

I was looking at the Magister and wanted to know if anyone tried it and found it to be good, or over-powered? I was particularly interested in the Metamagic Magister.


I haven't tried it, but sorcerer is already a good class and it appears to blow sorcerer completely out of the water. I know it's easy to overreact to novelty, but I can't imagine ever choosing to play a sorcerer with the Magister available. You do lose some spells known - one per spell level - but get a crazy amount in return. Is it overpowered? You do have a very limited number of spells known, so maybe not, but it looks pretty stacked. (If it's the case that because there's no "magister spell list" then Magisters need to use UMD to use any wand/scroll, that pulls them back in line pretty far. If it's the case that EVERY spell is considered to be on their spell list, the reverse is true.)


the bloodline option is the only thing that really breaks this class as noted above. why use your good pal the sorcerer when you are a swiss army knife of all casters? but since your doing the meta-pool option you are good and balance. on the issue on UMD it in choosing spells section of the magister.


I would say that the metamagic pool variant is on the whole more powerful than the bloodline variant, which is itself more powerful than the sorcerer. Free metamagic is very powerful and the metamagic magister gets tons of it on top of being a superior caster to begin with. It still may be less powerful than a theorycraft/Schroedinger wizard, but that's sort of faint praise balancewise.


Don't they have multiple casting attributes? That and less spells known are huge drawbacks.


I don't think it is overpowered. I do think it is a good replacement for a mystic theurge if a player does not want to split classes.

How good the class is really depends on what you want to do.

As for the Metagmagic Magistar that depends on the specific feats chosen, and how high you boost you saves, and so on. I would not say the ability on its own is an issue. I probably would have had the pool be 1/2 the character's level, and not force player to counter every metamagic feat, but only to make sure they countered a feat entire.
As an example the option to counter the empower feat of an empowered maximized spell would have been nice with my idea.

With the way I see it now you can cancel feats using core options and use your pool on the rest so it is not as restrictive as it seems at first.


Cheapy wrote:
Don't they have multiple casting attributes? That and less spells known are huge drawbacks.

I missed the multiple casting attributes, although honestly the way it's done here I don't think it's a massive issue. As far as fewer spells known, that does hurt, although most bloodlines tend to have at least a few mediocre spells that wouldn't be too badly missed.


Balin wrote:

Hi,

I was looking at the Magister and wanted to know if anyone tried it and found it to be good, or over-powered? I was particularly interested in the Metamagic Magister.

I have a quick (but probably stupid) question:

On the spells known table, what does the (+2) and (+3) represent?

I thought it was domain spells but I was wrong.


scary harpy wrote:
Balin wrote:

Hi,

I was looking at the Magister and wanted to know if anyone tried it and found it to be good, or over-powered? I was particularly interested in the Metamagic Magister.

I have a quick (but probably stupid) question:

On the spells known table, what does the (+2) and (+3) represent?

I thought it was domain spells but I was wrong.

No one knows?!?

Crud.


You could try asking the author.


scary harpy wrote:
scary harpy wrote:
Balin wrote:

Hi,

I was looking at the Magister and wanted to know if anyone tried it and found it to be good, or over-powered? I was particularly interested in the Metamagic Magister.

I have a quick (but probably stupid) question:

On the spells known table, what does the (+2) and (+3) represent?

I thought it was domain spells but I was wrong.

No one knows?!?

Crud.

Essentially it is laying out the spell selection method. When you see 4+3 in the 2nd level column of the spell's known table it means you know 4 2nd level spells from your primary list, and 3 spells that can be from a different list OR from your primary list (because half of your spells known must be from your primary list).

Overall I dont find the class overpowered I think it fits well against prepared casters, and probably has a leg up on other spontaneous casters, but not a huge one. I really like the class and hope to get the chance to play one at some point in the future.

Scarab Sages

scary harpy wrote:

I have a quick (but probably stupid) question:

On the spells known table, what does the (+2) and (+3) represent?

I thought it was domain spells but I was wrong.

Kolokotroni wrote:
Essentially it is laying out the spell selection method. When you see 4+3 in the 2nd level column of the spell's known table it means you know 4 2nd level spells from your primary list, and 3 spells that can be from a different list OR from your primary list (because half of your spells known must be from your primary list).

First, an apology to scary harpy. I'm not used to seeing rules questions here, rather than in the product or 3rd Party compatible threads, so I didn't see your question in a timely manner.

Kolokotroni is correct on what the numbers mean and how they work -- it's nice that such questions often get answered even if I don't see them

In general I don't reply on threads that ask opinions about whether something I wrote is balanced, because I'm obviously biased. That said, I am always happy to answer rules questions, so do feel free to ping me with a pm on a rules question if you don't want to hunt down the product thread. (I would ask people give me permission to them copy the question into the right thread, in case anyone else has the same question.)


If I understand you correctly:

I know 7 spells: 4 from my primary list and 3 from whatever I choose (following all rules). Cool!

Kolokotroni wrote:


Essentially it is laying out the spell selection method. When you see 4+3 in the 2nd level column of the spell's known table it means you know 4 2nd level spells from your primary list, and 3 spells that can be from a different list OR from your primary list (because half of your spells known must be from your primary list).

Many thanks to everyone who replied!


2 people marked this as a favorite.

If the Magister is anything like the other Genius Classes they are going to be pretty well balanced. None of the Genius Classes I've allowed have been overpowered. Godlings (Adept, Clever, Eldritch and Mighty), Time Thief, Time Warden, Vangard, Shadow Assassian, Deathmage, Dragon Rider, Death Knight, Templar, and Mosaic Mage. All of these seemed to fit in fairly well with no issues of being grossley overpowered compared to the Core Classes and the Base Classes from the APG, Ultimate Combat and Ultimate Magic books.


I agree, Realmwalker.

I adore the Mosiac Mage and the Magister. I also bought the Shaman and am reading it now. (I like all the variations of Sharman!)

Thanks for the recommendations!


Realmwalker wrote:
If the Magister is anything like the other Genius Classes they are going to be pretty well balanced. None of the Genius Classes I've allowed have been overpowered. Godlings (Adept, Clever, Eldritch and Mighty), Time Thief, Time Warden, Vangard, Shadow Assassian, Deathmage, Dragon Rider, Death Knight, Templar, and Mosaic Mage. All of these seemed to fit in fairly well with no issues of being grossley overpowered compared to the Core Classes and the Base Classes from the APG, Ultimate Combat and Ultimate Magic books.

Indeed, though I have not yet gotten a chance to use the magus, I have had godlings, time thieves, vangard, shadow assasins, dragon riders, witch hunters, and templars in my game with no ill effects. Super Genius Game's base classes are top notch, and they really scratch my itch for new, and interesting ideas in game.

Liberty's Edge

I agree with SSG having great products. I currently have an Armiger in my Jade Regent campaign and while great as a tank, it has some weaknesses that balance things out perfectly. I always get excited with each new SGG class releases.

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