I feel like 'wildly inaccurate' has to take into account the nature of the good and past experience with it.
With an expensive item the peasant has never seen before, then you have crazy appraise guesses. A fur cloak worth 1,000 gp might get priced anywhere from 50 to 10,000 gp.
With the cut of ham worth 2 sp, no peasant will see the cut of ham and think it's worth a thousand gold because that'd be insane. But they could see the cut of ham and think it isn't very good and only worth like 5 cp. Or they think they're getting a good deal and the cut is worth 3 or 4 sp. Those are estimates that are far outside the 20% margin but not crazy.
But I think the real solution is
1) A circumstance bonus for extremely common items that have been bought before.
2) Allowing people to make Appraise checks using their Profession ranks for items relating to that Profession. Bookbinders can appraise paper, farmers bags of turnips, and sailors lengths of rope without having any idea about the items of other professions.
3) You just don't even try to make the check and trust the merchant. Or you buy the item and grumble about how they're probably cheating you even though you have no idea of the value of the item (Definitely a real world behavior).
I think Mass Daze actually does remove the HD limit as the low level version says "Target one humanoid creature of 4 HD or less" and the Mass version target line does not have the HD restriction.
But while I'm comparing it to Mass Daze because they are AoE action limitation spells, it's just as easy to compare it to other 4th level spells like Black Tentacles.
I think Option 1 is making the spell way too strong for its level.
Compare it to Mass Daze a spell of the exact same level doing a very similar thing.
Mass Daze is an AoE spell that if they fail their will saving throw they can't act for one round.
Now we compare to confusion. We up the duration to round per level but give them a 25% chance of acting normally and a 75% chance of doing nothing. Honestly that's pretty balanced. But hey let's tack on a 25% chance that instead of doing nothing they hurt themselves. Everything is still okay.
Then we add the 25% chance to attack the nearest creature. And then we add that if a confused creature is attacked it will attack what attacked it, meaning that there's a 25% chance per person you hit to get people stuck in a confusion attacking loop.
Now if you limit that to a single swing of your weapon or shot from your bow, this spell is still very deadly, it is still much, much better then Mass Daze. But if you go with Option 1 this spell becomes an AoE save or die spell at level 4.
I feel like Option 3 because Options 1 and 2 are just way too strong given the nature of the spell.
First it's an AoE spell, those have weaker effects then single target spells.
Because of the round per level duration and the clause that confused things attack anything that attacks them, without limiting the offensive capacity of the spell it's almost a guaranteed kill for anything that fails it's will save in the 15 foot radius.
It also makes the spell really, really random to make PCs or Monsters go all out. The jump between "Hurt yourself: Deal 1d8+STR" and "Hurt someone else: Deal 50+ damage" is a huge leap.
I think the best spell to compare it to is Mass Daze which is a same level spell. Both have roughly equivalent areas. Mass Daze is a guaranteed single round of actions lost if they fail their will saves. Confusion with Option 3 is a balanced alternative where you run the risk of them rolling low and still getting to act but in return get round per level duration and the opportunity for confused creatures to get stuck in an attack loop. Confusion with Option 1 has a lot more in common with a mass Save or Die spell unless your casters are already tapped out and martials can never get a full attack off.
CASTING
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S, M/DF (three nutshells)
EFFECT
Range medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
Targets all creatures in a 15-ft.-radius burst
Duration 1 round/level
Saving Throw Will negates; Spell Resistance yes
DESCRIPTION
This spell causes confusion in the targets, making them unable to determine their actions. Roll on the following table at the start of each subject's turn each round to see what it does in that round.
Table: Confusion Effects
d% Behavior
01-25 Acts normally
26-50 Does nothing but babble incoherently
51-75 Deals 1d8 points of damage + Str modifier to self with item in hand
76-100 Attacks nearest creature (for this purpose, a familiar counts as part of the subject's self)
A confused character who can't carry out the indicated action does nothing but babble incoherently. Attackers are not at any special advantage when attacking a confused character. Any confused character who is attacked automatically attacks its attackers on its next turn, as long as it is still confused when its turn comes. Note that a confused character will not make attacks of opportunity against any creature that it is not already devoted to attacking (either because of its most recent action or because it has just been attacked).
This spell has a very glaring ambiguity. It does not in anyway define what attack means. There's been a fair amount of discussion on the spell but near as I can tell no official FAQ answer, and people seem to be interpreting the spell in many different ways.
There seems to be four possible ways to interpret the spell.
1. You must go full out in attacking the creature. Casters use spells, melee characters full attack. Do your best to kill it even if it's an ally.
2. You must do your best to attack but don't have to use daily resources. Full attacks from the fighters, but casters don't have to use spells.
3. You don't go all out in attacking, just make a single attack roll with whatever weapon you have in hand.
4. Anything that counts as an attack qualifies so you can drop your weapons and make unarmed melee attacks against allies and it still counts.
Most of the opinions fall into the Option 2 or Option 3 camp, but the difference is fairly big. In our session today it meant the difference between character death and not when confusion hit the party and a fighter was standing next to the sorcerer. After a ten minute break while we googled trying to find an answer. Eventually we went with Option 3 because the DM felt he couldn't kill a character with that much ambiguity in how the spell should be handled.
Personally I think the Option 3 ruling is the correct one, but even in the party we were split about down the middle and it'd be really great to have some sort of official ruling on it.
The character would have to be aware of the spell being cast to try and counter it.
Immediate Actions are once per round which means the quickened spells should still be going off.
It's an ability that requires a point of mythic power each time it's used, if you're up in the higher mythic tiers where this isn't that painful, you're just butting into the known balance difficulties of that level of play.
You're not missing anything, buildings that produce magic items just didn't have their prices changed even though the utility of magic items changed. This makes some buildings like Magic Shop very not worth it by RAW.
I'm not sure how much design space there is for social skills.
Social skills are only going to come into play when interacting with NPCs obviously. So they work for handling things like lower prices, increases in reputation, extra dialogue choices. All that stuff is easy. Going beyond that to the extent of allowing you to solve situations diplomatically instead of militarily might be too difficult to program well and too easy to game.
Now it'd be absolutely amazing if they designed a system where you could choose to negotiate with the centaurs who want the land in your hex instead of fighting them off and design it in such a way that it felt balanced, meaningful and fun, but I'm not holding my breath for it.
I don't see any textual support for the idea that the character can simply walk up the waterfall. I do see textual support for the idea that when stepping into the waterfall the magic carries them to the top.
While there is no text saying what counts as in the water, I'd define it as enough water to mostly or fully immerse the person if there was no magic involved.
The Mistborn book series has a magic system that involves people being able to push and pull metal. People in the books shoot coins by propelling them quickly with their magic.
Quests:
400 gp for stopping at least six bandits
800 gp for killing or making peace with the kobolds
600 gp for a tatzlwyrm head
250 gp for moon radishes
1000gp in store credit for getting svetlana's ring
5000gp for killing the Stag Lord
There's a number of magic items hidden in hexes, not going to spoil which ones, but it's quite possible to not make the rolls and miss them.
Tartuk has a wand of magic missle and bracers of armor +1
Dovan has a +1 rapier
Stag Lord has +1 leather armor, +1 composite longbow, Amulet of Natural Armor +1 and Stag's helm
~500gp of coin and stuff at Thorn River Camp
~600gp of coin and stuff aboveground at Stag Lord Fort
Inside the cellar of the Stag Lord, there was about 7,000gp worth of trade goods, 3,000 gp worth of jewelry and 1,000 gp worth of coins.
Now admittedly I'm not really sure how you managed to burn down a damp cellar with earthen walls, but as you can see you guys lost a lot of loot by doing that. Still even losing out on the 11,000 gp, you seem more impoverished then you should be.
Did you guys not go into the basement of the stag lords fort or something?
You've got about 10,000 gold plus whatever the holy symbol and sorc bow are worth. In comparison, my players took out Kressle's camp, stag lord's fort, dealt with the kobolds and mites and finished the radish and returning the wedding ring quest. Selling everything that wasn't nailed down netted them about 22,000 gold. Which should be even higher for your group since you've explored more hexes by the sound of it.
In addition, you sunk a good chunk of your resources into the amulet of mighty fists which is a really overpriced item.
Your levels are correct for where you are now.
If you know you're going to be fighting trolls, you should consider stocking up on items to help fight trolls.
The fundamental problem with wizard is their rarity and the inability to replace them.
Wizard training takes awhile, and you can't send everybody off to wizard school, much less simply give them the extra levels to makes them more effective.
So yes, wizards can do a lot of damage to masses of men, but when they do so they open themselves up to attack from units dedicated to killing them. And once lost they are not easy to replace.
The role wizards would probably take is similar to air superiority. They hold off on launching attacks on the ground troops until their able to kill or throw off the enemy air support. Once they do that they can tear into the enemy army and inflict a lot of damage.
If I were building a mage killer
We'll start with a Wizard 6. Reasonably within the level range you could expect I think. He's have to make caster checks to use a lot of items
1st level: Damaging spells
Self-cast: Protection from Arrows
Self-cast: Fox's Cunning
Self-cast: Resist Energy (Fire)
Self-cast: Resist Energy (Lightning)
3rd level slot - Dispel Magic x2, Summon Monster IIIx1
Scroll of Overland Flight (1,125gp) Lasts 9 hours
Scroll of Improved Invisibilityx3 (2,100gp) Lasts 7 rounds
Ring of Invisibility (20,000gp)
Scroll of Feeblemind (1,125gp)
Scroll of Black Tentacles (700gp)
Scroll of Cloudkillx2 (2,500gp)
Scroll of See Invisibility x5 (750gp)
Scroll of Scorching Ray x5 (750gp)
Scroll of Lightning Bolt x2 (750gp)
Scroll of Enervation x2 (1,400gp)
Total: 31,200gp or 15,600 crafted
Our mage uses the scroll of overland flight and ring of invisibility to cruise high above the battlefield ready to strike against any casters who reveal themselves.
Once one does by unleashing rocks, fireballs or the like, the wizard activates See Invisibility and casts any short term buffs and swoops down.
He tries to use detect magic to detect the wizard and see if the wizard has any buffs worth dispelling.
When he's ready to start, he activates the scroll of improved invisibility.
Open with Dispel Magic if necessary, otherwise, open with scroll of feeblemind.
Follow with scroll of black tentacles.
Follow with scroll of cloud kill.
Use some combination of Scorching Ray, Lightning Bolt, Summon Monster III, extra cloud kill, enervation and first level damage spells to make the caster deadified. Then run back to your own lines.
Obviously, the enemy will then begin to adapt and you'll end up having caster air battles.
On how my party almost beat the Stag Lord's Fort without fighting anything.
Spoiler:
So, my party, who are only level one, took out the river camp right away and interrogated the bandits to find out about the alcohol shipment. They took water hemlock that was in the area (my kingmaker geography is based on Manitoba, Canada so since it grows there it grows here). They poisoned six of the eight bottles. They come in and present the booze to the Stag Lord. He immediately pops a bottle open to take a swig. The party gets super lucky and I roll he takes one of the unpoisoned bottles, so he doesn't notice anything wrong. Had he tasted the poison, he would have tasted it and attacked.
So he goes back to drink. The next bottle is a poisoned one. He makes his first saving throw. The initial symptoms of water hemlock poisoning are nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, tremors, confusion, weakness, dizziness, and drowsiness. So there was a fair amount of overlap with getting drunk. I figure, he's not going to notice the first successful save with already having drunk the first bottle. But he'll notice the next save.
So I roll the next save and get... a one. Okay, well that was probably a pretty bad seizure (the further onset of the poisoning), rolling a 1 was pretty incapacitating, but as soon as he makes a save he'll go out and shoot the party. I roll again. One. Roll again. One. Roll again. One. And at this point, he's taken sufficient dex damage that he's hit 0 and he suffocates to death right there.
I sit there flabbergasted. Akiros notices the commotion, sees they've killed the Stag Lord but is of course, not torn up about it. He calls the party in to tell them he wants to take out the other bandits. My party all become convinced this means Akiros is really the stag lord in disguise (ah players...). The party takes out a poisoned bottle to share with the bandits, two of them drink. Dovan gets suspicious, and tries to see the Stag Lord, Akiros draws his sword and then... proceeds to crit and one shot him. *sigh* Nothing in this fort is going to do damage to the players...
They get the bandits to surrender, and then help to save the lives of the ones who were poisoned. Because one bandit was the mentally slow one who didn't understand what was going on and Fat Norry started to cry about how he didn't want to die. The party was touched.
Fortunately, when the party called Auchs in, and told him to surrender because the Stag Lord was dead, Auchs asked where Dovan was, the PC standing adjacent to Auchs informed him that he had killed Dovan hoping to intimidate him. Auchs promptly swung his greatclub at knocked the player into negative hitpoints. The rest of the party rushed forward, the bandits standing watch heard the commotion and ran to help. One of the surrendered bandits (Falgrim Sneed) drew a dagger and tried to stab the archer who was standing right next to him. It wasn't an easy thing but the party managed to kill everyone. I wanted someone to let the owlbear loose, but no enemy managed to get near it.
Overall it was a great set of sessions. And the level one party got enough XP from just those three encounter areas (Olegs, River Camp, Stag Lord Fort) that they were already level 2 by like the fourth session of the game.
That poisoning thing is probably going to come back to haunt them when Grigori shows up to denounce them as cowards and poisoning scum after he gets the story from the bandits the party released.
I find players of archers tend to go absolutely crazy about carrying as many arrows as possible, but in actual gameplay, not needing remotely as many as they carry.
So I wouldn't worry about the game balance. Eric's solution seems like a good one. Just try and go with what seems realistic and things work out alright most of the time.
I know it says that you can sell individual magic items that cost 4,000 gp for 1 BP. But when it comes to most minor items that are created from certain buildings in the city, they don't cost anywhere near that much. What do you do with those minor items? Do you let them sit there until the players buy them for themselves? or can you pool them together to reach 4,000 gp? the rules aren't clear on this. i'm not quite sure how to handle them.
Generally GMs either let the roll to sell and give the players one BP when they sell a combined total of 4,000 gold, or make the check to just clear out the slot for no BP
