Billy Blork's page

Our baby was just born.

AAAACKKKRRRGG! My eyes will never regenerate!

Billy Blork wrote:

I word searched the Magic Item Creation page in the PRD. The word "waive" never appears.

The word doesn't have to be there for the concept to be there such that it can be expressed by reference.

So you're going with "Read as Inferred"?

Your overall position on how this fits together is unique and well outside the mainstream for how others are understanding it, regardless of how they disagree.

Less than half the people posting on a messageboard do not make a "mainstream". You are giving the Sorcerer/Wizard access to Cure & Resto magic, not to mention all the other spells that are not on their list. Your DM would have to have a loopy to let that slide.

If your interpretation of the Item Creation feats is how Paizo intends for them to work then I can see why so many people think wizards are over powered.

I word searched the Magic Item Creation page in the PRD. The word "waive" never appears.

Here's how I read the second paragraph.

Note that all items have prerequisites in their descriptions. These prerequisites must be met for the item to be created.

(Emphasis mine)

That's "must" not "may".

Most of the time, they take the form of spells that must be known by the item's creator (although access through another magic item or spellcaster is allowed). The DC to create a magic item increases by +5 for each prerequisite the caster does not meet.

Again, that's "must" not "may", but it allows a Crafter to use otherwise inaccessible spells in two specific circumstances:

The +5 to DC is the penalty for not knowing it yourself.

The only exception to this is the requisite item creation feat, which is mandatory. In addition, you cannot create spell-trigger and spell-completion magic items without meeting their spell prerequisites.

These tie specifically to the caster, but does not not obviate the need for meeting the prerequisites.

... And to tie this back into potions...

The act of brewing triggers the prepared spell, making it unavailable for casting until the character has rested and regained spells. (That is, that spell slot is expended from the caster's currently prepared spells, just as if it had been cast.)

You need the spell. If not in your head then at least readily available.

OK, I think I've got it. It depends on the number of people who have disposable income available. Or: Cinematic Cash Flow = Cinematic Shopping.

Wizards have a lot of options, but they must make those choices far in advance. Sorcerers, arguably, have fewer options**, but they can make their choices at the last possible moment.

Sorcerers make their choice when they level, much further in advance than Wizards.

*Despite what you might think a divination can do, what it actually -can- do is often very limited. The most commonly regarded divination is scrying which isn't even available to a Wizard or Sorcerer until level 7th level and is far from fool proof

True dat. And if you use one of the more versatile ones you are likely to surprise your DM and get poor info.

This was part of why i liked the concept in Forgotten Realms of the Adventurer's or Mercenary Charter. It was basically a license as a security contractor.

-Weylin

Now I'm reminded of a supplement I read.

A merchant convinced the ruler of a city that magic items were too dangerous to allow amateurs to buy and sell them, so it was made illegal to buy or sell magic item with a cost of greater than 1,000 gp, unless it was with him. This effectively gave him the monopoly on permanent magic item trading. Anyone could make magic items, but they could only sell or buy from him. He was backed up in this not only by the ruler who sold him the monopoly, but also by the city's other guilds who had monopolies of their own to protect, and by the thieves guild who didn't want supernatural ways of warding off their depredations to be readily available to the public.

The merchant himself dealt only in high-price items, such as silks & spices, so magic items were more of a sideline, but a very profitable one.

Magic items should be rare and noteworthy.

I just thought of my Bard buying a Mithril Shirt, Mithril Buckler and a pair of Mithril Spiked Gauntlets. In "a certain epic fantasy novel series" there was only one character that had mithril armor, and it was sized for a small character at that. Lo! how many generations of dwarven miners gave their lives so that I could go on adventures at Light Encumbrance?

Maybe I should have gone with the Mystic Theurge Crafter build and rolled my own.

Which brings up the idea of wandering into a Magic Shop and plunking down 370 gp to buy the mats to make a wand. If you really want to make magic items more precious you might, as was suggested above, require a "critical ingredient" that the adventurers would have to go out and get themselves.

I vaguely recall there being scenes cut from "The Princess Bride" where Fezik and Inigo were sent out to get the ingredients to make the "miracle pill." Fezik also got his Holocaust Cloak from that side quest. :)

Goodness, the whole idea is adventure fodder!

On the thread I spun this one off of there was a quip about making a series of adventures where the players had the job of knocking over progressively more difficult magic shops, one after the other. It was compared to Oceans 11. At the very least it would be a fantastic exercise in magical security.

(I'll advise you to not go to that thread looking for the argument. It was OT and that thread is now 11 pages long and it wanders muchly.)

I'm thinking that there would be considerable use of the Master Craftsman feat, at least at low levels. This would allow Expert NPCs to make items. (e.g. the stereotypical dwarf armorer, the little old lady who sells potions and herbs to the local village.) It won't be until you hit mid to high levels that you'd get ArchMages coming after you to get their goods back.

(Here's a challenge for a Cleric. Try to get one of the meat-shields or buzzsaw boys to take Master Craftsman & Craft Magic Arms & Armor. Good Luck ;)

This brings to mind the possibility of a sort of "collective outlet" store. Everyone who Crafts could sell through a merchant-god's church, or government designated retailer. That gives you a whole new layer of security, as in, "Ripping off the Patrician's cash cow? I don't need that kind of heat."

StabbittyDoom wrote:

A magic shop would likely have guards due to the unusual value of its goods (especially relative to the cost of hired goons). A wizard with a familiar might have their familiar watch the shop while they go in back to get something, since they can communicate telepathically to at least some extent*.

I would build/buy a Golem to guard against intruders if I were to have a magic shop :)

Golems are expensive. Maybe Iron Cobras? Of course, you could always sell them to rich nobles or merchant lords as unbribeable guards / bodyguards. Now we just need one with See Invisible.

With the right Craft skills, Profession skills, and Craft feats a Wizard can have hoards of money coming in at a steady rate on top of what he finds adventuring. Realistically money is not a problem.

Only if your DM allows you to sell retail. Otherwise you're selling at half price. But we've been over this in this thread. Lets move it to this thread.

Is the concept of Ye Olde Magicke Shoppe economically viable.

Not sure. But I’ll try to put one together.

First: what should it look like? We’re going to need a physical structure to work with.

Like a Jewelry Shop, with display cases? I havn’t seen a Glassee or Glassteel spell. You’d need something to stop “smash ‘n’ grabs”.

Should it be a Magician’s Lair? Things pickled in jars, stuffed creatures hanging from the rafters, colored candles & bubbling cauldons?

A stall in the market place... nah.

Next: What are you selling?

Will you sell fraudlent items like love potions, lucky charms and other hokum, or will you only sell The Real Deal? (I’ll bet there’s quite a few that are completely uncontaminated by magic and only sell to people who will never come into contact with a Detect Magic spell.) I think I’ll skip the Bluff checks here and deal with things made with Craft feats.

What will people buy? - Anything. :)

What can they afford? - Aha! Looking at the Cost of Living article on page 405, the Goods & Services table on 158 & the table of trade goods on 140 we see that it’s ... not very much. Seriously, it’s not until you get to luxury items that you break 1 gp.

The cheapest Magic Item you don’t need at least UMD for is... a one shot Feather Token (Anchor) for 50 gp. I can see that as an emergency supply on a big ship, but common fishermen will probably be spending their coppers on food & fuel.

Even potions are a minimum of 25 gp. That’s equal to one Ox (15 gp) and one Cow (10 gp). So a pesant could afford one if they [i]had[/] to, but a first level cleric casts first level spells for a minimum of one Cow. If you need to wake someone up from a week long coma after being kicked in the head by a mule it’s just the thing, but making Ye Olde Magick Shoppe into a couple casters doing a part time job (their primary occupation being rancher) is two scoops of no fun.

Elixier of Love is 150 gp. Probably a popular item with the more rakeish nobles as a sort of medieval Ruhypnol.

Anything reusable or constant is in the thousands.

Any ideas on how to make this work?

http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/combat.html

Casting a spell provokes attacks of opportunity.
Argument over.

As to this nonsense about whether someone can tell if you're casting a spell or not, perhaps not. But they know you're doing SOMETHING. Something weird.

We were also discussing a disrupting Readied Action.

In a world where everyone knows someone who can do magic, even if it's just the 1st level cleric at the church, most people would probably know how to go about disrupting spellcaster.

Remember the axiom: Primitive does not mean stupid.

Lets break down the clues:

• Gestures. Waving a hand around, and they only need one hand free. Pretty much self explanatory.
  
• Pulling weird junk out of a pouch. Ditto. (Sorcerers don't do this, mostly)
  
• Saying weird stuff. Depends on your game world, Clerics might invoke a prayer in the common tonuge, and in some fiction rhyming is popular. Druids might cast using Druidic.

Any of these and the caster's probably going to get the Readied Action in the face.

Less obvious clues:

• Provoking an AoO. This might look like standing still with a funny look on their face. I'd accept an Int roll / Sense Motive / a few character levels to indicate experience.
  

I'm having trouble deciding what would pick out a Still / Silent spell to trigger a Readied Action. Any ideas?

Billy Blork wrote:

I thought that's what I said.

I guess I misunderstood you. You said the Barbarian is "is waiting until the caster "does something I don't understand". I say the Barbarian is waiting for the caster to drop his guard".

The SRD actually defines attacks of opportunity as such, "Sometimes a combatant in a melee lets her guard down or takes a reckless action. In this case, combatants near her can take advantage of her lapse in defense to attack her for free. These free attacks are called attacks of opportunity."

This brings to mind Casting on the Defensive. You don't drop your guard, but defending youself while trying to focus on casting means you have to make a concentration check. If you succeed there's no AoO, and the barbarian genuinely has no clue that you were doing anything but dancing around like a clothie. I don't think I'd even allow a perception roll without a very good reason, the Disruptive feat comes to mind.

I still say the AoO has nothing to do with whether the caster is doing something the Barbarian doesn't understand and everything to do with the Barbarian sensing when the caster has his guard down.

I thought that's what I said.

I still say that the action would provoke an attack of opportunity, but is not a "detect spell casting" power. There are lots of things which provoke attacks of opportunity and only through metagaming of the most egregious sort could the player determine that the AoO was the result of a spell casting attempt.

I'm thinking it's more of the Barbarian not having "detect spell casting" power either, but instead is waiting until the caster "does something I don't understand." With no Spellcraft or K (Arcane) they have to guess from the clues they can detect. A caster dropping their guard is a BIG clue.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=

And the fact is that some lies may be too impossible, subject to the DM.

Here's another rule log for the fire.

The Legend Lore spell says, "As a rule of thumb, characters who are 11th level and higher are 'legendary,' [...]"

If I'm going to lie to some peasant I'd expect a little bang for my buck if I'm halfway to being a legend.

OTOH, choose your lies carefully. If the dupes believe you when you say, "Settle down or I'll melt your skin off," might make them say, "Aaaaahh! Kill th' witch quick afore 'e git us!" (cue pitchforks and scythes)

You might want to look into Intimidate for that. Getting someone to believe what you say and getting them to react in a particular way are two surprisingly different things.

Suggestion to Gorbacz & LilithsThrall about the wands.

750 gp means you have 50 charges on that wand. You might try buying more wands with fewer charges to increase your diversity. (Not to mention giving you character that "lived in" look. ;)

Here's a rough draft of the 5th level Sorcerer

Str 7

I remember dump stats, and not fondly. A kindly DM will avoid touching you with too many Shadows, Rays of Enfeeblement, Strength Damage Poisons...

UMD (8 + 4) 12,

I'm currently playing a Bard that has UMD at 12. I find I get more fizzles (with a Wand of MM) than I'm really comfortable with.

Nice selection of wands there. Purchased fully charged from "Ye Olde Magic Shoppe"?

The Sorcerer uses Juho - the art of using an enemy's strengths against him.

That’s more a player thing, overcoming limitations is true creativity, not a bunch of stats. The gang at my table are great at that, but they’d mostly rather hit things first and make off color comments later.

This will be a lot more significant when the Sorcerer gains more levels and is carrying a heal scroll.

<cringes remembering the 3.x "Smite"> DC: 31? You are a daredevil! That's a 40% kerfluffle at Lv 11? If it works, great! Otherwise... perhaps it's time to leave your challenge and think about the relative values of Sorcerer & Wizard when cross-classing with a Cleric. (Dare I mention Mystic Theurge? Apparently I do.)

On the whole I’d say your build is weak against undead, outsiders and others who are immune to Illusion / Enchantment, or simply have excellent Will saving throws (I know, that’s what Grease is for), but is an excellent build for dealing with mortal-types in an intrigue / espionage type campaign. I was in one of those myself before PF came out, but I’d still get bushwhacked because we still wound up dungeon crawling.

You are assuming that no "rube" will ever discover that he has been lied to. I find this even less likely.

Happens all the time. Go to randi.org. There you may find diatribes by people who are mortally insulted when they are shown evidence that the lies that con-men have told them are false.

Heck, I've known people who were angry when I showed them how to do a card trick.

Heh. The motto of bloggers everywhere: Fight for your right to be wrong!

I asked all of you to create an example 5th level Wizard to do a comparison against[...]

The challenge, though skewed in the Sorcerer's favor, was interesting enough that I saved a copy of what you said so I wouldn't have to look it up all the time.

Okay, let's make this a bit more fun

Create a Wizard at 1st, 5th, 10th, 15th, and 20th levels.

<weeps bitterly at being ignored>

I looked at Billy's stats, and it seems like he has 2 points unspent, using the 15 point buy you used.

Doh. I used the human bonus on Con instead of the high-end Int. I'm used to dice rolls rather than building stats.

If I may, I'll shuffle him more efficiently and give him an extra +2 on Wis.

I just wish we had more skill points :( You need spellcraft to learn spells... 4+ int isn't too much to ask for :(

I'm a little curious about that. I suspect it was to make the classes more distinct.

Or maybe it was all that weapons practice? Sorcerers do get all simple weapons, while Wizards can't even use a spiked gauntlet.

<"The Jets" from West Side Story starts playing> It's the SpellPunks vs. the WizWeenies!

Let me join Stéphane Le Roux. Here's a first level, fresh out the gate.

Here's Billy Blork ** spoiler omitted **

I made a profile for Billy so I wouldn't have to post him again.

I forgot to add 4 spells to my spell book.

I'll add: Protection from Evil, Mage Armor, Disguise Self & Mount.