Making the Reanimated Medium work

[Knightfox]

The Reanimated Medium has a LOT of really cool flavor, but seems to have been left by the wayside somewhat. The writing of several key features (mostly Channel Self) simply do not work as written and go against the direction of the intent. Lets first break down what is currently written and then address how I propose fixing these problems.

• 1.) As written a medium may channel a spirit for 24 hours after performing a 1 hour seance and then may not do so again for 24 hours. When the 24 hours has passed the medium loses the spirit and all influence with it. In the Reanimated Mediums case this means that after 24 hours he would lose all influence and enter a coma for 24 hours.

• 2.) The description of the Reanimated Medium says "A reanimated medium becomes more powerful the more influence it has over its body," but the influence track is left the same, meaning that having more influence actually imposes a penalty on the medium, a -2 initiative and a penalty based on the spirit emulated (negatives to strength, caster level, unable to accept spells from allies).

  The text of Channel Self indicates that Reanimated Mediums should want to have more influence, but realistically they benefit more from having at least 1 influence but less than 3, to subvert the influence penalty. This means that the Reanimated Medium actually suffers a penalty until using his spirit surge at least once while the standard medium suffers no penalty until using spirit surge twice.

• 3.) Channel Self says that a Reanimated Medium can have a maximum of 6 influence, but rules as written cannot attain more than 4 (3 from channeling self and 1 from Propitiation).
  

Parts 1 and 3 I believe are errors in editing, but as no FAQ exists and no comments exist in the boards besides my own I doubt it will be addressed anytime soon. Part 2 is simply a suggested change of my own, I think it would go a long way to making the Reanimated Medium thematically work better. Lets break it down.

• 1 & 3.) I believe the Reanimated Medium is supposed to be able to channel self at most once every 24 hours, but is not required to. Unlike a normal medium the Reanimated Medium would maintain his spirit choice and influence from day to day. He would be able to channel self to add 3 influence to his current total and change his spirit choice if he wished. This would also allow the Reanimated Medium to reach 6 influence.

• 2.) I propose that the influence penalty direction be reversed, like most other aspects of the Influence system in this archetype. Instead of having a penalty for having 3 or more influence the Reanimated Medium would not suffer the influence penalty until he has less than 3 influence. This would represent the Medium having less influence over their body and the players spirit devolving into the emulated spirit. To regain full control the medium would need to channel self again and reassert control over their body. This would also allow the medium an additional use of Spirit Surge before incurring the penalty to make up for the loss of Taboos.
  

[1of1]

Sorry to reanimate an old thread, but it's kind of fitting for the subject.

So, Reanimated Medium reverses all influence gains and losses, right?
And a normal Medium drops to minimum influence after 24 hours, right?
What's the reverse of dropping to minimum?
Is there anything in the Reanimated Medium's rules that would exclude that from the reversed polarities like the influence penalties are?

[Alphavoltario]

Sorry, yet again, for a 2 year time gap Necro

1) Actually they would be forced into a state of waking up, then comatoseing again, as they only gain 1 influence and then pass out the next day as their influence drops to 0.

2)I'm sure it was intended to keep the balance of the class, but even on a normal medium, these penalties stack up too fast for a 'jack-of-all' type character (which a bard does without swimming in concrete slippers); and I agree, why are you taking penalties when you have more control over yourself?

3) It is now highly speculated that RAI the Reanimated should carry over the previous days influence (a kineticist [also needs some mechanical help] can keep Internal Buffer points, why can't you keep control over your body).

1of1 wrote:

So, Reanimated Medium reverses all influence gains and losses, right?

And a normal Medium drops to minimum influence after 24 hours, right?
What's the reverse of dropping to minimum?
Is there anything in the Reanimated Medium's rules that would exclude that from the reversed polarities like the influence penalties are?

The reason they wouldn't default to max is that channeling gives you no extra points then. Why use an ability to give you points (one of two options to in this archetype) when you are already at max.

Removing the 'channel the spirit for 24 hours' clause that a normal medium has needs to go on this one as well.

TBH the channel self ability needed more than 1 1/2 paragraphs to detail this ability, and it should have replaced, not altered the spirit feature (as it is almost an entirely separate ability, functioning in complete contrast to its source material.)