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I've seen plenty of resources and contests expanding the horizons of "Pact Magic" as listed in the Tome of Magic.
I was wondering if anyone has seen Trunename Magic and Namers similarly expanded, and in either case, am announcing my intention to do so.
I will be adding a connection to the "Dark Speech" and "Words of Creation" feats, as in my India Game, speaking the words in the oldest tongue is how Brahma the Creator manifested all matter.
Hence, I need to up the powers of "Naming" or at least the applications, while keeping it "in balance" with other factors in normal play.
Any suggestions?
I know I will be combining resources from sigils and related feats from Illumians and adding such resources as the elements of the Dracolexi prestige class.
I've seen plenty of resources and contests expanding the horizons of "Pact Magic" as listed in the Tome of Magic.
I was wondering if anyone has seen Trunename Magic and Namers similarly expanded, and in either case, am announcing my intention to do so.
I will be adding a connection to the "Dark Speech" and "Words of Creation" feats, as in my India Game, speaking the words in the oldest tongue is how Brahma the Creator manifested all matter.
Sounds great.
Hence, I need to up the powers of "Naming" or at least the applications, while keeping it "in balance" with other factors in normal play.
What do you mean by the 'powers' of naming?
Any suggestions?
I suggest that you decide on a fix for the truenaming DC problem before delving into all the good stuff.
TS
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What do you mean by the 'powers' of naming?
...
I suggest that you decide on a fix for the truenaming DC problem before delving into all the good stuff.
TS
What Truenaming DC problem? I am familiar with the mechanics but I haven't had a chance to implement in actual play myself. The aesthetics and potential appeal to me, but a I am having to rewrite many of the resources more-or-less from scratch anyways, this isn't really surprising. Could you specify? I have the book and I -HAVE- read it several times, but any issues have yet to jump out at me. But then, I haven't had time to tear it apart mechanically like say, Incarnum.
Truenamer would be a really cool class ...
... if his basic mechanic wasn't such a hopeless failure. I wonder if anybody playtested it :)
So what would you suggest? How would you fix it?
Is it that it has too steep a ramp from failure to broken?Or do you find it generally too weak?
How would you alter it to interact comprehensively in a world with Psionics, Divine Magic, Incarnum, Pact Magic and no Arcane, specifically?
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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IIRC, the problem with Truenaming is it's extremes. Either the Truenamer doesn't have his +x of truenaming at mid to high levels and nothing works, or he blows all his gold on a +5 or better X of truenaming and everything's a cakewalk.
If you're using pact magic, make sure to get Secrets of Pact Magic and Villians of Pact Magic.
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If you're using pact magic, make sure to get Secrets of Pact Magic and Villians of Pact Magic.
Agreed and linked. This is the definitive source for all things awesome in the realm of Pact Magic.
IRC, the problem with Truenaming is it's extremes. Either the Truenamer doesn't have his +x of truenaming at mid to high levels and nothing works, or he blows all his gold on a +5 or better X of truenaming and everything's a cakewalk.
Truename magic is a great idea that doesn't work. Maybe Dario can look into it.
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IIRC, the problem with Truenaming is it's extremes. Either the Truenamer doesn't have his +x of truenaming at mid to high levels and nothing works, or he blows all his gold on a +5 or better X of truenaming and everything's a cakewalk.
So if I can raise the DC's on an exponentially increasing bell-curve in one direction, and lower them in another direction, that would make this work across a twenty-level spread, mathematically speaking, right?
This would even out the spread of the powers DC's, and give benchmarks to reach and "make or break" those checks. Do you think I should prevent overcompensation by subtly tweaking/decreasing the namer's skill DC's?Secondly, comprehensive rules for interaction between Truenaming and other (in the case of my particular campaign, related) powers such as Psionics, Divine Magic and Incarnum, as Naming as I see it operates kind of like a D&D equivalent of how White Wolf's World of Darkness described Mage - The Ascension's "Magick", an altering and reworking of pattern's in the tapestry of (the universe/destiny/fate) from the natural order of things.
I remember reading a treatise on 'lifting' Mage - The Ascension's magic system into D&D 2nd edition... Would Truenaming work if a Paradox-like mechanic was applied to it?
If you're using pact magic, make sure to get Secrets of Pact Magic and Villians of Pact Magic.
Already done. Bought them as birthday and X-Mas presents for my various fellow-players and even have the Print & Soft Copy bundle for myself.
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IIRC, the problem with Truenaming is it's extremes. Either the Truenamer doesn't have his +x of truenaming at mid to high levels and nothing works, or he blows all his gold on a +5 or better X of truenaming and everything's a cakewalk.
If you're using pact magic, make sure to get Secrets of Pact Magic and Villians of Pact Magic.
What Matthew says. Let's take a lvl 10 truenamer:
13 ranks in the skill + 4 INT bonus (assuming Int of 20) + 3 Skill Focus: Truenaming = 20 total, against a CR 10 creature the difficulty of the check is 35, so 25% chance of success. Assuming you have that INT of 20 (not always the case) and you dumped one feat for Skill Focus, which other party members didn't have to.
(PFRPG would use the same numbers)
So you have circa 25% chance of success, and even if you succeed, the things you can do using truenames have nothing on the good old Fireball, Save-or-suck spell or a full attack of lvl 10 melee. Simply put, people will start advising you to stick to crossbow.
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IIRC, the problem with Truenaming is it's extremes. Either the Truenamer doesn't have his +x of truenaming at mid to high levels and nothing works, or he blows all his gold on a +5 or better X of truenaming and everything's a cakewalk.
If you're using pact magic, make sure to get Secrets of Pact Magic and Villians of Pact Magic.
What Matthew says. Let's take a lvl 10 truenamer:
13 ranks in the skill + 4 INT bonus (assuming Int of 20) + 3 Skill Focus: Truenaming = 20 total, against a CR 10 creature the difficulty of the check is 35, so 25% chance of success. Assuming you have that INT of 20 (not always the case) and you dumped one feat for Skill Focus, which other party members didn't have to.
(PFRPG would use the same numbers)
So you have circa 25% chance of success, and even if you succeed, the things you can do using truenames have nothing on the good old Fireball, Save-or-suck spell or a full attack of lvl 10 melee. Simply put, people will start advising you to stick to crossbow.
So would you say if the DC's were simply lowered by a formulae, that this would solve the problem? Or is it the effects of Naming are too weak, in your opinion, even if they do "land"?
It seems we have some disparity of opinion on this issue, as some are weighing in as Naming being too "broken" when they do land.
Further thoughts?
I appreciate all the discussion on this, and am eager to hear more input.
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1.) The mechanic is too hard without major optimization
2.) The effects are in rare cases overpowered and in most cases underpowered.
3.) Overall contribution of a Truenamer in a group is subpar, leading to frustration on all fronts.
However, Binders are great - one player has a Binder in my RotRL campaign, and he saved the party many times in tight spots thanks to creative use of vestiges. The versatility of Binder is second to none, and the class offers great opportunities for role-play. Good stuff.
Do you think Truenamers would work better with the Pathfinder version of Skill Focus? (+3 to the chosen skill; +6 if you have 10 ranks [3.5 version of 13 ranks])
Or what if the mechanic was 10 + double the CR?
Or what if the Truenamer received an occasional boost to their Truespeaking Skill, say +1 every 2nd/3rd/4th/5th level?
Aside from the DC problem*, one of the bigger disappointments for me with truenaming was the lack of options. There really needs to be twice as many utterances in order to offer some real choices. I tried mapping utterances to comparable spells to see if there was some standard factor, but it looked pretty random.
Furthermore, I think I would ditch the skill check entirely and go with a warlock-like spell-like abilities mechanic. Many of the constraints on the truenaming checks (they get harder the more you use them, as well as they get harder the higher level the target is, even for allies) feel very artificial, and there's a sidebar even fessing up to that.
You could make them usable only 3/day rather than at will like a warlock since they get 29 utterances to a warlock's 12 invocations, but really the difference is in flexibility and how deep their pockets are. You can still only (typically) use 1 a round, each round - so the power difference isn't much.
But definitely dig through other books for more spells to add, because the selection in Tome of Magic is really sparse and generally rather sucky compared to a wizard or sorcerer of comparable level.
* Which also relates to the fact that it's HD based, whereas challenges are typically balanced based on CR - so a comparable CR might have a very high or low HD based on many other factors.
So would you say if the DC's were simply lowered by a formulae, that this would solve the problem? Or is it the effects of Naming are too weak, in your opinion, even if they do "land"?
The really simple and effective fix for truenaming DCs is this:
1. Drop the truenaming skill, and make it a class level check instead (still modified by Int). It's effectively a class ability already, as any retarded gamer monkey will take full ranks anyway. Doing this also helps prevent munchkin players from min/maxing their truename skill bonus into the stratosphere, enabling them to Utter all the live long day. (Level checks are harder to min/max than skill checks.)
2. Drop the amulet of the silver tongue. A PC shouldn't have to have a specific magical item just do his class' shtick semi-consistently.
3. Change the truename DC to 10 + target's CR/level, and lower all static DCs by 5. At first level, a truenamer will be able to hit a target two or three times and then have to switch. At higher levels, the truenamer will be able to make the DCs a bit more consistently, allowing him to use meta-utterances and/or hit the same target more often. I think this situation balances the truenamer much better against other full casters, though still not to their power level.
4. Halve all the DC modifiers for meta-utterances, so that they are in keeping with the new DC scale.
Using those house rules, truenaming actually works the way it was supposed to work.
TS
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So would you say if the DC's were simply lowered by a formulae, that this would solve the problem? Or is it the effects of Naming are too weak, in your opinion, even if they do "land"?The really simple and effective fix for truenaming DCs is this:
1. Drop the truenaming skill, and make it a class level check instead (still modified by Int). It's effectively a class ability already, as any retarded gamer monkey will take full ranks anyway. Doing this also helps prevent munchkin players from min/maxing their truename skill bonus into the stratosphere, enabling them to Utter all the live long day. (Level checks are harder to min/max than skill checks.)
2. Drop the amulet of the silver tongue. A PC shouldn't have to have a specific magical item just do his class' shtick semi-consistently.
3. Change the truename DC to 10 + target's CR/level, and lower all static DCs by 5. At first level, a truenamer will be able to hit a target two or three times and then have to switch. At higher levels, the truenamer will be able to make the DCs a bit more consistently, allowing him to use meta-utterances and/or hit the same target more often. I think this situation balances the truenamer much better against other full casters, though still not to their power level.
4. Halve all the DC modifiers for meta-utterances, so that they are in keeping with the new DC scale.
Using those house rules, truenaming actually works the way it was supposed to work.
TS
That's exactly what I was looking for, thank you Tequila.
By the By, many thanks to all who responded and provided their own insights, I appreciate it.
Finally, as an addendum: I am thinking of having all Truespeak users gain this additional benefit:
Immediate racial abilities and modifiers of an Illumian, and gain a bonus glyph-feat on a fighter progression. Treat each glyph feat as an additional +1 to Truespeak checks in addition to their usual benefits.
Thus the Illumians, which never really made sense as a Race, become a Class or Caste of Truespeak magic-users, and as such any race can apply (never really made sense to me that only humans went through that ritual, always thought of it as kinda stupid). Their Cabals become a societal distinction kind of like a "Conclave of Truespeak Mages" which makes infinitely more sense, IMHO.
Adding a Truespeak component to the Dracolexi prestige class and perhaps extracting its abilities into Truespeak lexicon.
Words of Creation/Dark Speech will add a +4 modifier to Truespeak checks in addition to their other abilities.
What do you think, does this work? I think it would eliminate the need to lower Truespeak DC's by the additional five...
Your thoughts TS, et al?
I can't remember where I saw it (it was somewhere on these boards, though) but I found a potential fix for the truenamer that someone had come up with. I copied and pasted it and made a note of it in yahoo so I could use it later:
Truenamer Fix
The Truenamer
Truespeak: Instead of a skill, truespeak is a unique ability. A truenamer's truespeak bonus is equal to (truenamer level X 2) + Intelligence modifier. The DC to speak a creature's truename aloud is 10 + (2 X CR). The DC to speak a magical item's truename aloud is 10 + (2 X caster level). All other truespeak DCs, and truespeak DC modifiers, remain the same.
I BELIEVE it went on to eliminate the magic items that increase truenaming, and also got rid of the rule that raises the DC the more you use it. Seems fair to me, because there will ALWAYS be a significant chance of failure, and truenamer powers are nowhere NEAR as useful or powerful as a wizard or other full caster.
Don't know if that helps or not, but thank you from me to the person who came up with it!
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Just want to comment on some of the ideas/add ons.
Wow, an idea that makes Illuminans something more than Elan knockoffs.
if you're using Darkspeech/Words of Creation, I'd limit them to destroying things for Dark and creating/healing mending for WoC.
Dracolexi makes sense. Might be interesting to replace a Dragon's spell casting with truenaming for a new challenge.
*Paladin stands by the ancient rune covered blue wyrm, ready to drive holy sword through its skull.* "Any last words, foul beast?"
*The blue dragon's mouth quirks in a reptillian smile, even as it coughs up blood.* "Yes, morality unmade"
*The paladin's face wrinkes in confusion, then in horror as he's erased from reality*
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RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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Finally, as an addendum: I am thinking of having all Truespeak users gain this additional benefit:
Immediate racial abilities and modifiers of an Illumian, and gain a bonus glyph-feat on a fighter progression. Treat each glyph feat as an additional +1 to Truespeak checks in addition to their usual benefits.
I like the Illumian race, and I like Truenaming, but they aren't quite as closely tied as you suggest. Truespeech is a spoken thing. Illumians are tied to written words and glyphs. It doesn't make as much sense to me that they would be tied too closely togehter.
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I like the Illumian race, and I like Truenaming, but they aren't quite as closely tied as you suggest. Truespeech is a spoken thing. Illumians are tied to written words and glyphs. It doesn't make as much sense to me that they would be tied too closely togehter.
Finally, as an addendum: I am thinking of having all Truespeak users gain this additional benefit:
Immediate racial abilities and modifiers of an Illumian, and gain a bonus glyph-feat on a fighter progression. Treat each glyph feat as an additional +1 to Truespeak checks in addition to their usual benefits.
... as in my India Game, speaking the words in the oldest tongue is how Brahma the Creator manifested all matter.
As I stated earlier, this is with a specific campaign in mind, with a specific setting's conceits. Words have power, and the very knowledge of those words and the speaking of them "bringing forth" that power by invoking it in spoken inflection being the theme.
It all boils down to the 'Magic of Words, Glyphs, and Names".
And while not initially tied together as written, as stated elsewhere I am rewriting most of the "External resources" for this campaign like Incarnum, psionics and yes, Truenaming.
As is alluded in Races of Destiny, the language that the Illumian Progenitor Tarmuid found or "created" lends itself to the hidden structure of the universe. These words and language is manifested, in glyphs.
Sounds similar to the D&D baggage of Truenames to me ...
You don't have to agree with me, but IMHO the entirety of the focus is the manifestation of power through spoken or written word, hidden syllables in lost tongues that get down to the older or "truer" nature of things.
The illumians, like many RPG concepts, I find, make a weak bid as a race but a fantastic one as a culture or societal role or niche(ie. Wizards/Loremasters of a lost language).
I simply propose re-working them to be race unspecific and require initial indoctrination of "two levels" (as they like to multiclass) in the Namer base class. Naturally they don't get any other benefits excel for the Power Glyphs for multiclassing, the point is to reward riding the Namer base class and acquiring Glyph feats as one does so...
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RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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As I stated earlier, this is with a specific campaign in mind, with a specific setting's conceits. Words have power, and the very knowledge of those words and the speaking of them "bringing forth" that power by invoking it in spoken inflection being the theme.
It all boils down to the 'Magic of Words, Glyphs, and Names".
You don't have to agree with me, but IMHO the entirety of the focus is the manifestation of power through spoken or written word, hidden syllables in lost tongues that get down to the older or "truer" nature of things.
Excellent. I can get 100% aboard that concept.
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Tequila, Matthew, Chris ... heck, anybody!
Any further ideas on what to extract and turn into Lexicons for Truespeak?
On another note, what would Truespeak's interaction with Psionics be?
And have there been any other threads/ messageboards postings/ 3rd party projects similar to Secrets of Pact Magic or our current endeavor here to expand on this?
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As an Addendum, I wanted to Note that we decided for my campaign, a custom class needed to be created.
We expanded this further as most of the tributary classes were R#RY&(*E#@&$ing weak compared to standard core classes.
Here is the final notes that we are currently using in Playtest:
Start with the Truenamer Class as written.
Make all Truename Checks as Class-level Checks instead of Skill Checks.
Treat all Buff/Sympathetic Lexicons as Half the DC listed.
All Offensive Control-based checks made AGAINST an opponent or enemy are at the listed DC. For Unresearched foes "On the Fly", no Success should be possible but we have decided to leave this within the Realm of a Natural 20 or at DOUBLE the listed DC.
No Buffs to Naming can be gained save via level-gain or the following:
Words of Creation - For all Buff/Creation based Lexicons manifesting an item or substance, +4
Dark Speech - For all Unravelling/Destruction based Checks +4
(Sans the alignment components for each but making them heavily obscured lore)
Grant the Illumian Racial Adjustments at the 1st level of the Class. Modify the character in all ways to match the Illumian race listed. The Sociology and Background is cultural for the -society- where Illumians or "Wielders of Truename Magic" are inducted into.
Grant a Bonus Feat as per a Fighter's feat progression. These MUST be Glyph feats as per Races of Destiny. Each on of these grants a +1 to Naming checks.
We are currently working on Extrapolating and expanding upon the current available Illumian Power Glyphs by cannibalizing the Dracolexi, Geometer, Initiate of the Seven Veils, Warweaver and Seeker of the Song Prestige Classes.
Despite this we still found the class by and large ineffective except for specific encounter-based interactions. AS such we decided to "gestalt in" the Class abilities and Spell Progression of Monte Cook's "Runethane" from Arcana Evolved.
As such the final Build is something that will be fully explored for an entire 20 level progression but thus far is proving to be EXTREMELY well-built while having definitive gaps for balance and power
Final streamlining will consist of either reverse-engineering the Runethane spell list and/or the Power Glyphs into The Truename Lexicons.
Thus making all more "interconnected" as the Final Class is meant to be "A path to mastery of the Deeper Magic behind Spoken and Written Word"
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Cool stuff here, guys! I've always been disappointed with the lack of support for the mythos of true names in RPGs, D&D specifically.
Monte's Arcana Evolved stuff had the first cool tempt to incorporate it that I encountered. In fact some of my very first (semi-professional) writing was on truenames: 2 articles they accepted over at Diamondthrone.com.
EDIT: GAH! I went looking for the articles. They've changed the site over at Diamondthrone and my articles are gone -- or at least I can't find them.
Balls.
I wrote a blog entry and reposted them. Feel free to plunder for your game if you like. Maybe this stuff will be useful to you.
Or maybe its just poo.
Either way, looking forward to seeing the final version of this.
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I made a pathfinderized version of the truenamer, and some epic utterances. I'll see if I can find those threads.
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Extremely gratified by all the responses, guys.
I will be carefully compiling and going over the work I've done plus "con su permiso" your proposals. I may publish a web PDF with altered terminology as I believe sadly none of this stuff is SRD.
I also am thinking of including/using or being inspired by aspects of RuneChild from Arcana Evolved and the various breakdowns of Runes and Runemasters from WoW d20's "More Magic and Mayhem". They had a way of clarifying buffs glyphs etc that was truly quite innovative whilst still being straighforward and very clear on application/implementation.
Again, the issues of intellectual property and etc yield their ugly head.
However, unless i miss my guess if I supplement with the Sanskrit words thereof and alter drastically enough (over 30% as per US Copywrite law) I should be ok to make it a free offering on the inter-web.
At least, that's precedent from P-Diddy logic.
:-P
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For those interested, please click on the following link and identify yourselves with a FB chat to me. I am the group's only Admin listed.
As this is a development ground for future blogging and gaming products, certain common courtesy and common sense rules apply. Please identify yourself in a chat message or PM to me with your forum handle.