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My gm has agreed to allow me to play a wizard again finally (after the last scary bastard my group banned me from playing them as a player and using them as a gm)
I want to do something like an old school I.e. 2nd ed shadow mage but we have up graded to pf but all the shadow spells are crap illusions which can be fun but not what I want nor is there a shadow school for wizards can anyone help me come up with one?? And if lilith would bring in some over delightfull cookies to help me bribe ppl into helping
slightly off topic: I think you should help educate your fellow players since you are a lot better than they are.
Back on topic: What books are you allowed to use?
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Several non-shadow spells can be 're-flavored' as shadow magic.
Ray of enfeeblement (shadow's grasp), color spray (shadow spray), mage armor (armor of darkness), shield (shadow barrier), obscuring mist (sepia smoke), sleep (call of the night), magic missile (shadow forces), etc.
Chill touch (which nicely emulates the touch of an undead shadow), charm person (darken the mind), cause fear (noctophobia), etc. also could go along with a darkness / shadows theme.
Plus you could attempt to have a custom shadow themed spell, that you character researched during their apprenticeship.
Example;
1) A version of magic missile that only inflicts nonlethal damage, and has a Will save for no damage sounds much weaker, using Illusion (Shadow) energy instead of Evocation (Force), but would be able to create 1 missile / level, up to 5 missiles at 5th level. Such a 'Shadow Missiles' spell would be progress twice as fast as magic missile, despite it's flaws, because it wasn't designed as an uber-spell, but to *fool other spellcasters* into thinking that the 4th level journeyman illusionist casting 'magic missile' ('cause stuff like fireball is out of his reach) was actually a 7th level wizard to be feared, who is only holding off on the black tentacles by choice! The spell would be very hard to tell from a standard magic missile spell, since it's designed to be mistaken for magic missiles, giving a +5 or +10 to the DC difficulty to tell it isn't a magic missile spell. As a result, those attempting to counterspell it will be using the wrong spell, and those hoping that their shield spell or brooch of shielding will block the 'force damage' will be in for a surprise, since it's shadow damage instead!
2) A 'gloom' spell that gives everyone in the area 20% concealment, but doesn't affect you, making it weaker than obscuring mist, in one respect, but better in another.
3) A blinding 20 ft. cone of darkness that leaves it's targets blind for one round, and then dazzled for the next minute. It's got a bigger area of effect than color spray, and a longer term 'debuff,' but it won't be knocking anyone unconscious!
4) A shadow lantern spell that creates a torch-equivalent heatless 'darkfire' that sheds light that only you can see. While you've got your shadow lantern out on guard duty, the area around you is pitch black, but you can see just fine. Perhaps the spell conjures an actual physical lantern (or uses one as a focus) and your companions can also touch the lantern during the casting, and see by your 'dark light.'
5) You create a single 'mirror image,' but it is wreathed in shadows. It never leaves your square, and there is a 50% chance that an attack on you hits it instead, destroying it. Unlike a standard mirror image, as long as it isn't destroyed, it mimics your physical actions. If you are casting spells or using magic items or even throwing alchemical fire, the shadow's copycat effects are meaningless, but if you physically attack someone, in melee, with an unarmed attack or with a ranged weapon, a nonmagical shadow-duplicate of that attack comes from the shadow, inflicting nonlethal damage equal to the unmodified damage of your base attack (Will save to take no damage at all from this shadow copy of your attack). So if you smack someone with your staff, or fire a crossbow at them, an identical shadow copy of that attack also lashes out, and the target must save or take nonlethal damage equal to the base weapon damage (1d6 or 1d8, in these examples, ignoring Str bonuses, item bonuses, etc.).
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slightly off topic: I think you should help educate your fellow players since you are a lot better than they are.
Back on topic: What books are you allowed to use?
I do try I'm a mil brat who spent way to much time studying military history and tactics and I'm rather creative in use of spells and things hence the ban I do try to point out things and give suggestions on tatics but no one listens cause I'm like 5 years younger than my current group and they "know" more about the game. Hey I just learned to play with buddies on fort bragg they taught me everything I know
currently any pf books he said if I could come up with a reasonable abilty set for a shadow wizard I could take that as my school instead of one of the current schools I half way had an idea to use the old shadow adept from 3.5 as a base but there's not really enought to it I mean the shadow shield is nice but that's it and Set nice ideas on spells I have been working something simaliar to that and I'll probly try to convert the old FR shadow spells too given time but my primary need is for a shadow wizard school progression to hand my dm in a week or so my main problem is that I'm not used to how the system is blanced yet so I'm afriad I'll ethier gimp it or op it not that high lvl wizards aren't over powered anyways if you know how to use your spells to control the area.
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Oh yeah one other thing that lights me off bout my group they are min-maxers to hell and back again but I'm not I like rounded characters so they get mad at me cause my dpr and dcs and other such crap isn't as high as theirs but when my characters out perform then because of tactics and build choices that let me do things they didn't think of or are able to do more than one thing well they don't understand. *cries* I think I need a new group. But I want my wizard rant done let's get to work
So we need school abilities I think maybe a buff to cl if in shadow and a penalty when I light is a good start also I think that in addition to any "dark" based spells being school spells light spells of any school should be considered as opposed on top of like evo and whatever else I pick
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Could somebody please tell me about 2nd Edition "Shadow Wizards"?
I can't start helping if I don't know the foundation.
They started in the forgotten realm cs with the intro of the shadow weave basically they are wizards who instead of fling fireballs and making completely unreal illusions instead make things of shadow so they a partially real the current shadow evoc and shadow conjure spells are left overs of that they deal in necromany illusions enhanced with shadow and enchantments to ensnare the mind of their foes they have hard time using real forces so you don't see them casting evoc spells or transmutaions or conjure spells very often and anything that creats light never at all
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Could somebody please tell me about 2nd Edition "Shadow Wizards"?
I believe they were introduced in Spells & Powers along with other variant 'specialist' wizards, like alchemical specialists or dimensional magic specialists, but they mostly consisted of a list of kinda/sorta appropriate spells, and not anything exciting and new.
The Shadowcraft Mage of 3rd edition, Shadow Weave Adepts of FR and Shadowcaster of the Tome of Magic are probably about a thousand times more useful for coming up with something for a 3.5/Pathfinder shadow wizard.
Ideas along this vein might also be fun to pillage later for Golarion use, since there's mention of shadow-themed wizards of an 'Umbral Court' in Nidal that could be fun to play with, although Paizo hasn't put out much for mechanical content on that contingent yet.
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Could somebody please tell me about 2nd Edition "Shadow Wizards"?I believe they were introduced in Spells & Powers along with other variant 'specialist' wizards, like alchemical specialists or dimensional magic specialists, but they mostly consisted of a list of kinda/sorta appropriate spells, and not anything exciting and new.
The Shadowcraft Mage of 3rd edition, Shadow Weave Adepts of FR and Shadowcaster of the Tome of Magic are probably about a thousand times more useful for coming up with something for a 3.5/Pathfinder shadow wizard.
Ideas along this vein might also be fun to pillage later for Golarion use, since there's mention of shadow-themed wizards of an 'Umbral Court' in Nidal that could be fun to play with, although Paizo hasn't put out much for mechanical content on that contingent yet.
I never saw the shadowcraft mage or the tome of magic for 3.x I didn't want to tease myself with stuff I wasn't allowed to play. So Set do you think we can come up with any thing? I mean let's see we need abilities not sure how powerful to make them or at which lvls they should be but
Shadow infusion x/day makes spells a little more real +x to dc or maybe you take %dmg even if you save??
Shadow jump xfeet/day as shadow walker
Conjure shadows all illusion and conjuration shadow spells you cast are infused with shadow increasing their dcs by +x/x/wiz lvl
Um any other ideas ppl come on please help I know some one out there has some good ideas
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This for the nerco side maybe
Falling under shadow
X/day you may cause a creature to be shadowed for 1rd/lvl as a swift action where in the targets shadow becomes a gate to death and the shadows of the nether realms reach forth to grasp at his soul if a shadowed target reaches the dying or dead status they ferry his soul to the realm of the dead and pay you a tribute (you heal 1hp per lvl of the victim)
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You are trying to create a new shadow school for the wizard class, right? You aren't trying to build an entirely new class if I got that right.
If that is right you only need to come up with three things.
* A first level power that enhances your specialty or grants some minor defense from it and is always active. This will probably scale up once or twice and at 20th level it will increase dramatically in power- possibly adding a new twist.
* A first level power that grants you a minor attack or maybe buff usable (3+ Int mod) times per day. If it does damage it will be something in the neighborhood of 1d6 + Int mod. It might force a minor condition on your target like shaken or dazed.
* At 8th level you get a new power with the shadow theme. It might work on a formula related to your wizard levels (e.g. x rounds / lvl) or if it depends on a spell effect it might improve at 12th (as a transmuters shapechanging).
Everything else will be down to fluff in how you describe your spells and so on.
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Example set:
Enduring Shadow (Su): Whenever you cast an illusion spell, increase the duration by a number of rounds equal to 1/2 your wizard level (minimum 1). At 20th level, you can change the duration of all shadow conjuration spells to permanent. You can have no more than one shadow conjuration spell made permanent in this way at one time. If you designate another shadow conjuration spell as permanent, the previous spell immediately ends.
Touch of Shadow (Sp): As a melee touch attack, you can cause a creature's vision to be fraught with shadows and darkness. The creature touched treats all other creatures as if they had concealment, suffering a 20% miss chance on all attack rolls. This effect lasts for a number of rounds equal to 1/2 your wizard level (minimum 1). You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Intelligence modifier.
Shadow Infusion (Su): At 8th level, your shadow spells are 20% more real. At 12th level they become 40% more real.
I can't speak to the balance of what I'm proposing here as I am no game designer and may have missed potential for breakability. Others can step in there to offer commentary on whatever you settle on. I like it though. It will give you shadow minion creatures which last longer and are more solid eventually allowing you to keep one (or several lesser powered ones) always active as a capstone. You will increase the DC by taking Spell Focus (Illusion) and Greater Spell Focus (Illusion). None of the current school powers increase DC. If you are playing within the Pathfinder world of Golarion there is a feat in the Rise of the Runelords Player's Guide (Varisian Tattoo) which will also allow you to add +1 to your DC. your character would need to be Varisian of course. That book was 3.5 though so you may not be able to include it.
Oh yeah one other thing that lights me off bout my group they are min-maxers to hell and back again but I'm not I like rounded characters so they get mad at me cause my dpr and dcs and other such crap isn't as high as theirs but when my characters out perform then because of tactics and build choices that let me do things they didn't think of or are able to do more than one thing well they don't understand. *cries* I think I need a new group. But I want my wizard rant done let's get to work
So we need school abilities I think maybe a buff to cl if in shadow and a penalty when I light is a good start also I think that in addition to any "dark" based spells being school spells light spells of any school should be considered as opposed on top of like evo and whatever else I pick
I beleive there is a similar class in the 3.5 Tome of Magic Book. I dont care much for the book, but I think the class is decent. It might be a prestige class. I don't remember. You could check to see if anyone will let you borrow it, or try to browse through it at a bookstore.
PS: Next time they whine I would tell them you can't argue with results. ;)
edit:Ninja'd Kyrt
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Hmm- With some investigation this turns out to be a mess.
The wording on the first one would need some work to prevent you from being able to cast offensive spells with a permanent duration like acid arrow, black tentacles, or cloudkill. Maybe best to restrict it to the shadow conjuration versions of summon monster as that is what the original ability was focused on.
Also the duration bonus was meant to be only for a subschool of your specialty: Conjuration (summoning). The illusion school has the same duration increase, but only for spells with a duration of concentration. So applying it to all spells of one school is too broad, but restricting it to only shadow spells means you wouldn't even be able to use it until 7th level.
And increasing the reality of your shadow spells becomes a problem with simulacrum which I didn't even know was shadow. Allowing you to create 90% real simulacrums instead of 50% is not going to work. Also shades starts as 80% real so I've effectively written it to do 120% damage. Haha! That's what I get for messing around.
Okay so-
*Restrict Enduring Shadow's extended duration to illusions with duration of concentration. The 20th level effect only applies to shadow versions of summon monster.
-and-
*Shadow Infusion should be 10% increase at 8th level and 20% at 12th level.
I'm sure there are still problems with that, but it's a start.
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120% dmg on shades is the sexiest thing along with 90% simulacurms but I think my dm would hit me with a stick and I'm going for the old school shadow mages so necro and encahtments too those are probly my favs so I think I would like to focus on those some also like I said maybe a dc increase xtimes/day for shadow spells I'll probly convert the shadow spells from the forgotten realms also given time just to fill out my list and blinding some one is something one of those spells cover at 1st lvl with a lil dmg but thank and keep the ideas coming
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If you are set on the DC increase you could use this from the Universalist Wizard as a base:
Metamagic Mastery (Su): At 8th level, you can apply any one metamagic feat that you know to a spell you are about to cast. This does not alter the level of the spell or the casting time. You can use this ability once per day at 8th level and one additional time per day for every two wizard levels you possess beyond 8th. Any time you use this ability to apply a metamagic feat that increases the spell level by more than 1, you must use an additional daily usage for each level above 1 that the feat adds to the spell. Even though this ability does not modify the spell's actual level, you cannot use this ability to cast a spell whose modified spell level would be above the level of the highest-level spell that you are capable of casting.
So if you restrict it to heighten and only shadow spells that would give you a framework for what you want. Maybe you could trade the restrictions in to negate the metamagic feat prereq. Increasing the DC of your spells is not really what the schools powers do though. That is for your feats.
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What kind of necromancy effects are you looking for? I looked at the necromancy school and the cleric death domain, but they didn't really have anything that seemed to work for a shadow theme. Is it supposed to be draining? How does necromancy tie in exactly?
It was drain as the cold darkness of shadow was draining like ray of enfeeblement or envenration or there was one in 3.5 which was evard's that also did a 1pt lvl drain every round with a save and no I'm not really set on the dc increase it just seemed less breakable than increased shadow dmg %s
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Yeah, the % increase thing may cause unforeseen problems. You'd have to make simulacrum an exception for sure.
Look at the Conjuration school's ability for 8th level. That would fill in for the shadow jump idea you pitched above.
Dimensional Steps (Sp): At 8th level, you can use this ability to teleport up to 30 feet per wizard level per day as a standard action. This teleportation must be used in 5-foot increments and such movement does not provoke an attack of opportunity. You can bring other willing creatures with you, but you must expend an equal amount of distance for each additional creature brought with you.
As far as the necromancy effects only one of the 8th level school powers affect enemies directly and it is enchantment. You could mess with the fluff and consider it a soul draining necromantic effect. Note that there is no save.
Aura of Despair (Su): At 8th level, you can emit a 30-foot aura of despair for a number of rounds per day equal to your wizard level. Enemies within this aura take a –2 penalty on ability checks, attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and skill checks. These rounds do not need to be consecutive.
There are some necromantic metamagic feats in Libris Mortis, but there we are leaving PF Core again. Then again, it sounds like you are building this character outside the core anyways as you are importing spells, building class features and such. So Fell Weaken costs one slot higher, but if the spell it is applied to does damage the target(s) take a -4 Str penalty for 1 minute. Maybe you could build that into an 8th level ability. Something like "At 8th level, you can create illusions infused with necromantic energy for a number of rounds per day equal to your wizard level. Enemies who fail to disbelieve such an illusion while physically interacting with it take a –4 penalty to strength. These rounds do not need to be consecutive."
Though this is a bit weaker as it is tied to a save and doesn't quite affect as many things as the enchantment version. I said physically interacting because otherwise you could float an illusion over a battlefield and affect every soldier who was close enough to look up and see it. Maybe you can tinker and work that into something close to what you are looking for. Maybe they take the penalty whether they save vs the illusion or not. The illusion may be a trick, but the necromantic energy infusing it is real enough.
I skimmed and didn't see that it was included anywhere... so I'll mention KQ (Kobold Quarterly) issue 13. It was both a shadow bloodline for sorcerers and a shadow school for wizards. And I'm pretty sure that issue is still available right here at paizo.com (or its PDF). (Or the magazine might be at a FLGS too).
Hope that helps.
Dean
KQ 13 has a shadow bloodline and contains rules for the school of shadow.
The school of shadow also contains rules for shadow infusions that start at level 1. All pathfinder articles in KQ are checked out by Paizo before they are published, so it is almost 'official'.
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I skimmed and didn't see that it was included anywhere... so I'll mention KQ (Kobold Quarterly) issue 13. It was both a shadow bloodline for sorcerers and a shadow school for wizards. And I'm pretty sure that issue is still available right here at paizo.com (or its PDF). (Or the magazine might be at a FLGS too).
Hope that helps.
Dean
Thanks that helps a lot now I just need to do shadow spell conversions and make sure they are balanced I wish there was a tome for shadow like there is for necromancy
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A fun shadow-themed power for a replacement power for the level 8 Illusion School power or a level 9 or 15 Umbral Sorcerer Bloodline power would be the ability to transform into a shadowy duplicate of yourself, gaining the advantages of the Incorporeal trait, but being unable to cast any spell that require verbal or material components, as you cannot speak in this form, and your gear transforms with you into a shadowy duplicate of itself. You can assume this state as a swift action, and for a total of 1 round / sorcerer level (or wizard level, depending on what class you got this power from), but these rounds do not have to be consecutive.
A weaker version of it would use the effects of Gaseous Form, instead of the Incorporeal trait, and would not prevent spellcasting.
The 'starter power' that gives a bonus to illusion spell durations could be replaced with the ability to reduce the effects of concealment from darkness effects (or mundane darkness) by one step. Someone within deeper darkness would only have partial concealment (20% miss chance) against you, while someone in shadowy conditions would be as clear as day to you. someone standing within an obscuring mist would be just as difficult for you to see as anyone else, as your advantage is only against foes concealed within shadow or darkness, mundane or magical.
Alternately, perhaps any illusion spell you cast can optionally blind / dazzle it's target(s) for 1 round per level of the spell being used as a 'rider' effect. Spells that already can blind, such as color spray, would add an additional round, while a shadow evocation of a fireball could blind a foe for up to three rounds (being treated as a 3rd level fireball, not a 5th level shadow evocation). A weaker version of this effect would only 'darken the eyes' of an affected for, and give them a 20% miss chance against all targets during the duration of effect, as shadows cling to them and make it difficult for them to see clearly.
Bump
Are you looking for something particular? Because KQ 13's school of shadow should do everything that your first post requested, I do believe that an earlier KQ had a bunch of shadow spells (3.5) that might help you.
