icarr757's page

Order done! Lets make some Magic!

Anyone tried a Plano fishing tackle box? Use them for cards and cardboard pawns for Warhammer 3e. Can buy them in most any Walmart or Dicks sporting goods, Amazon too

Buff
Heal
Generally make the party better via some kind of useage of tactics. Instead of the party functioning as "warrior, thief, mage, etc" someone that makes them into a unit. If that makes sense...?

Looking to give players a option, get away from the "... so who gets stuck playing the cleric this time...?" conversation w/o going down the road of "wands of healing" and bags full of healing potions, etc...

Thanks for any advice!

You are the MAN! Even if he didnt get the last 2 done, I imagine using the first 4 will give a good feel for how to finish the last 2!

Personally, my big issue is time. Im a full time nursing student and the flaming hoops they make us jump thru take huge amounts of time, both in and out of class. Being able to follow the lead of someone who has gone before you is a huge help in learning curve!

Anyone have any current info on this? Would love to run it for some friends, but as Beatboy said, all the links are dead =/

Vancian magic simply needs to die.

The "guess which spells you MIGHT need today and if you guess wrong you are screwed" just screams at me "NOT FUN!" Add to that, if your gm has you in a "fast and furious" segment of a adventure and you dont have time to take the required study time to swap out to new spells, whats your option...? A wand, a crossbow?

Why is the concept of a ponts based mana pool and a feedback/stress penalty for mages getting to spell happy so difficult to grok when it comes to d&d/pathfinder?

Is there any word on the state of "Tales from the Rusty Dragon" and the posibility of awesome PF -> 4e conversion goodness?

I am kinda late on the 4e bandwagon (w/ 5e comming... sometime), but at a glance it looks as though 4e did a pretty good job of overall class balancing, especially the "linear warrior v the quadratic wizard" problem that has haunted 3e -> Pf, and looks like its going to rear its ugly head again in 5e (idle speculation on my part).

While I am sure nothing is perfect, is it a bad assumption to speculate if folks advance their class smartly, pick new ablilies that conencide with their primary stats, that most classes do what they are intended to do (also excluding min/max super duper optimum builds)?

Much thanks, hope everyone is playing a great game!

The 3.5 book Unearthed Arcana has a spell point system. I've seen it on all the 3.5 SRDs that I've run into and it should work for Pathfinder just as well. Granted, it improves prepared casters more than spontaneous casters but it has advantages for both.

Prepared casters have to prepare their spell slots as usual but they can use these prepared spells as more than once as long as they have the spell points for them. Spontaneous casters can cast any of their spells know as usual. Basically, this system means that prepared casters do not have to prepare the same spell more than once and all casting classes will not be penalized by needing to use up higher level spell lots for lower level spells that you ran out of slots for.

Here it is on an SRD.

This is very nice! And it works well so that a lvl 10 wiz can still use magic missle without being horribly abusive!

Thanks all for the advice!

When I say non-Vancian, I am looking for something where the player does not have to pick out his spells ahead of time and is screwed if he has picked the wrong spells. I believe this would also cover PF's words of power as I understand you still have a limited number of spell slots that you must preset each day.

Currently considering just grabbing the point/buy system from the Psi book and using that.

Comments, thoughts and advice all taken under consideration!

Thanks

Just a thought, I was looking at DC Adventures book the other day (I's a sucker for Alex Ross' art) and the thought struck me, this is a game that stats Batman vs Superman and the Penguin beside Darkside, using the same system. Now, I know jack about DCa and M&M e3, which is the system its based on, does anyone here know how they pull it off? Is it doable with Pathfinder? I do know that M&M was originally a 3.0 spin for supers but thats about all I know.

Tia

Words of magic tried to combine the free form of a "on the fly" type magic system with the structure of Vancian magic. However, what they ended up with is a system that has all the limitations of both systems and little to none of the advantages of either.

The free form magic system should allow a player to look at a situation and be able to act quickly to achieve whatever effect he needs. If the need is a 10d6 damage spell that i can throw at a range of 10hexes I should be able to find, quickly, that 10d6 of damage = x spell/magic/heka, whatever points and 10hex range = y spell points, x + y = z total points, z total points = some type of skill/magic roll to pull off a spell of that magnitude. Finally, do I have z total spell points and do i have the skill to pull off the skill roll. The down side of free form is a player bog down a game horribly by not knowing what hes trying to do, or tries to get to "cute" and do 5 different things with one spell. With Vancian magic, the spells are all premade and fire and forget.

Vancian magic allows for a character to have prearranged magic system where the player has to do nothing other than monitor a list of prechosen spells, like crossing off items on a shopping list, as they are used. The problem with Vancian magic is that once you have chosen your spells for the day, your stuck with them. Today you memorized fireball 3x and later in the game your group has to fight some firebased mob, guess what, thats 3 spell slots that are totally wasted. Memorized a sleep spell and the game your running throws undead at you... With a free form magic system your fireball is a 6d6damage spell with a descriptor so if your attacked by fire mobs you could call it lighting/ice/projectile vomiting, as long as it passes muster with your gm.

With WoP you have a Free form system that does not have consistant or logical spell point costs crammed along side the "choose your spells once a day and hope they are useful later" restrictions of a Vancian system.

Imho, what words of power should have been is a slight tweak of magic as done in Monte Cooks WoDarkness d20 or the older d20 supplement Elements of Magic. Yes, they would have required some basic changes to spell casters, ie how many spell points/lvl, etc ,etc, but it is much smoother and easier to grasp.

In a nutshell, to me it is definatly 1 step foreward, but also 2 steps back.

I was wondering, are they just terrible?

When I search for them, most I get are threads from the playtest, and from what I gathered from them, they got changed alot in print, so most of them aren't reliable really.

But I would have expected alot more threads about them, there are tons about magus and the other UM stuff, but barely anything on WoP.

So, are they just too complicated so people don't try them, or are they so bad that noone actually wants to?

The quick answer: Yes

The expenation: Words of magic tried to combine the free form of a "on the fly" type magic system with the structure of Vancian magic. However, what they ended up with is a system that has all the limitations of both systems and little to none of the advantages of either.

The free form magic system should allow a player to look at a situation and be able to act quickly to achieve whatever effect he needs. If the need is a 10d6 damage spell that i can throw at a range of 10hexes I should be able to find, quickly, that 10d6 of damage = x spell/magic/heka, whatever points and 10hex range = y spell points, x + y = z total points, z total points = some type of skill/magic roll to pull off a spell of that magnitude. Finally, do I have z total spell points and do i have the skill to pull off the skill roll. The down side of free form is a player bog down a game horribly by not knowing what hes trying to do, or tries to get to "cute" and do 5 different things with one spell. With Vancian magic, the spells are all premade and fire and forget.

Vancian magic allows for a character to have prearranged magic system where the player has to do nothing other than monitor a list of prechosen spells, like crossing off items on a shopping list, as they are used. The problem with Vancian magic is that once you have chosen your spells for the day, your stuck with them. Today you memorized fireball 3x and later in the game your group has to fight some firebased mob, guess what, thats 3 spell slots that are totally wasted. Memorized a sleep spell and the game your running throws undead at you... With a free form magic system your fireball is a 6d6damage spell with a descriptor so if your attacked by fire mobs you could call it lighting/ice/projectile vomiting, as long as it passes muster with your gm.

With WoP you have a Free form system that does not have consistant or logical spell point costs crammed along side the "choose your spells once a day and hope they are useful later" restrictions of a Vancian system.

Imho, what words of power should have been is a slight tweak of magic as done in Monte Cooks WoDarkness d20 or the older d20 supplement Elements of Magic. Yes, they would have required some basic changes to spell casters, ie how many spell points/lvl, etc ,etc, but it is much smoother and easier to grasp.

But thats just my 2 gold pieces...

If I have missed this in another post im sorry. Most posts I find about the Pathfinder Rogue tend to be: "they suck" "play a warrior/druid" etc etc. Now, I will agree, I do believe that rogue damage does suffer a tad because of backstab dependence. Any fight where a monster is backstab immune, and there are a whole lot of them out there, tends to put a serous damper on things. On the other hand, I love just about everything other than sneak attack dependency for rogues. But i am silly like that...

The UC topics all have to deal w/ only the new classes so I was curious if anyone has heard of other upcomming options that will add to the love of the rogue.

Tia

I have heard that 3.5/Pathfinder mechanics start to break down around lvl 17+ and was just curious what folks think would keep Pathfinder play both interesting in challenging in a lvl 20-30 type setting?

Would the game have to shift gears to some all new style or format? Would numbercrunching become so daunting you would need a reverise scientific notation calculator? What do ya'll think?

Just curious. I know part of the appeal of Pathfinder is that d20 is pretty darn simple to use, but to me its also pretty boring...

I like rolling dice and I enjoy how WFRP has set their system up with their (expensive) new dice system, you dont even have target numbers for rolls, gms just assign you "bad" dice to roll in your pool that can potentially counter the "good" dice. I also find it interesting that players can take a conservative or reckless stance in combat, and that this not only adds different dice to their dice pools, but also changes how some skills work. Finally, I very much like the idea of the "party card" in WFRP, that actually adds some flavor to the players party as well as gives some more combat options.

Now, dont get me wrong, I absolutly love how Pathfinder does 3.5 characters, I am just wondering if folks think it would be possible to add the WFRP options to Pathfinder characters without wrecking balance, or if anyone has tried it...?

Thanks for any constructive feedback

Has anyone tweaked with a points based magic system? I know the new ultimate magic has a hybrid points/vancian system but it seems to have alot of the limitations of both vancian and points based magic w/o giving much of the advantages of either.

Now, if you have ever looked for a AWESOME freeform magic for 3.5 based game, I would highly recomend the magic chapter from Monte Cooks WoD conversion (I think the chapter was written by Robin Laws).

I have no problem going in and making spells the long way, reading out of the book, but does anyone know, is there any rule of thumb when compairing original 3.5 spells to PF? I know pc's and monsters are more powerful in PF, was wondering if spells got that same bump across the board, or is magic still kind of at original 3.5 power levels.

Much thanks for any adivice.

Shameless bump hoping for more feeback

Has anyone tweaked with a points based magic system? I know the new ultimate magic has a hybrid points/vancian system but it seems to have alot of the limitations of both vancian and points based magic w/o giving much of the advantages of either.

Now, if you have ever looked for a AWESOME freeform magic for 3.5 based game, I would highly recomend the magic chapter from Monte Cooks WoD conversion (I think the chapter was written by Robin Laws).

I have no problem going in and making spells the long way, reading out of the book, but does anyone know, is there any rule of thumb when compairing original 3.5 spells to PF? I know pc's and monsters are more powerful in PF, was wondering if spells got that same bump across the board, or is magic still kind of at original 3.5 power levels.

Much thanks for any adivice.