Mage Armor and the Six Ability Score boosting spells all grant a +4 bonus. Yet they are all fairly generic helping spells with little style or flair. This is what I propose:
Instead of a +4, the bonus is equal to the primary ability score modifier of the spellcaster. Example 1: A sorcerer with a 17 Cha casts mage armor. Since his Cha mod is only +3, then the deflection bonus granted is +3.
Example 2: a Cleric with a 22 Wisdom casts bull strength. The bonus is a +6 due to his modifier.
This change reflects a spellcaster's individual magical potency and adds a little UMPH! to the game.
I hope Cheapy likes this :)
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it only encourages caster to invest more in their casting stat and further neglect several others.
do you really want a level 10 wizard with 26 int adding +8 to their armor class for 10 whole hours?
it's weaker at the early levels, but later on greatly advantages SAD int based pure casters by providing double the bonus by level 10 and Triple by 18-20.
i wouldn't make such a houserule as it is so biased in favor of the SAD wizard.
Mage Armor grants an armor bonus to AC. Shield of Faith is the deflection AC one.
Start with 25 stat (20 base +5 from levels) +5 insight from a tome +3 from venerable age = 33
Stat mod = 11
Cast <stat buff spell> = +11 stat
Stat = 44
Stat mod = 17
Cast <stat buff spell> = +17
Stat = 50
Stat mod = 20
Cast <stat buff spell> = +20
Stat = 53
Stat mod = 21
Cast <stat buff spell> = +21
Stat = 54
Stat mod = 22
Cast <stat buff spell> = +22
Stat = 55
Stat mod = 22
Now, I cast the physical spells on everyone and we win at life for how ever many minutes of buff we have.
I like this mechanic.
Hmm. Maybe I should focus on flavor more than mechanics lol :)
It's an extreme example, but it does encourage SAD casters.
That said, being a caster strongly encourages SAD.
At level 3 you're looking at maybe a stat of 22. Mod = +6. You don't have enough slots to spam this to get your stat really high and even if you did increasing the DC only does so much. It makes high mid/high casters very powerful since the target will fail their saves 95% of the time but it's not likely to make a huge difference in low level play. Just add in a nice bonus to support characters.
I wouldn't worry so much about the players abusing this. I would worry about the monsters with high stats abusing this. Take a look at dragons, devil, demons, and similar creatures. They have high casting stats already and can have the ability to boost them some more. Do you want a dragon adding +10 or more to its AC (stacking can make the AC go really high).
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Hah!
I like the thought of breathing a bit more life into these. They are fairly boring, and mage armor is basically just a spell tax. And the stat enhancements aren't too useful after certain levels, except to help out people who aren't focusing on stats but then suddenly need to.
A lot of the posts above have covered the major issues with this implementation, but one aspect I didn't see is that it's actually a nerf for the average game.
We're looking at about +3 until level 9, assuming a starting stat of 16. I don't believe 18 is the "average" starting stat for most. And I assume 9th level is about when people will get +4 enhancement bonuses to their primary stats. And then it won't get better until a higher level. (12-13th?)
Don't be discouraged though! Your Photographyst was pretty good.
Okay, thanks everyone for your feedback. In that case, I have a NEW idea to spice up these same spells. I'll put it into a new thread though.
We're looking at about +3 until level 9, assuming a starting stat of 16. I don't believe 18 is the "average" starting stat for most. And I assume 9th level is about when people will get +4 enhancement bonuses to their primary stats. And then it won't get better until a higher level. (12-13th?)
I don't agree at all. The "standard" starting casting stat for full casters (as in, those focused on casting, not melee druids) seems to be 18 on a 15-point buy (16 bought + 2 race). Those really going for it or on a higher PB seems to start out with 20.
With additional benefit from the stat, I can't see any reason not to boost it as high as you can. A "balanced" human wizard might start with something like Str7/Dex14/Con12/Int18/Wis12/Cha10 while a focused one will likely have Str7/Dex12/Con12/Int20/Wis10/Cha8. The second one is a bit "power-gamey" but not disgustingly so, the first one is fine in every way IMO. Neither would lose out due to this change, the second one has a LOT to gain.
Say at level 8-9 where a +4 circlet comes into play and +2 has been gained through levels, an int of 24-26 means the spells grant +7/+8 instead of +4. So while with the current rules they could boost themselves to:
Balanced: Str11/Dex18/Con16/Int24/Wis16/Cha14; AC+6 (MA+CG)
Focused: Str11/Dex16/Con16/Int26/Wis14/Cha12; AC+6
With the new rules their stats would look like:
Balanced: Str14/Dex21/Con19/Int24/Wis19/Cha17; AC+10
Focused: Str15/Dex20/Con20/Int26/Wis18/Cha16; AC+11
The difference is huge at levels ~8-9. And wizards don't really need it. Now of course those boosts aren't going to be up all the time - but for many purposes having the ability to boost it is going to be enough. And 8 minutes isn't that short of a duration (and it uses only 2nd level spells) - and for 3000 gp you could have that wonderful lesser rod of extend.
I agree that the spells are a bit bland, but there are other ways if you want to make them more interesting without making them more powerful. For example:
- Let the ability boosters grant +8 but have a duration of Concentration +1 round.
- Give ability boosters some minor extra ability (bull's strength - +4 CMD vs bull rush etc)
- Let mage armor grant a +6 AC but as soon as you take damage it falls.
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Instead of doing it this way, for spells that grant a static bonus, I allow +1 to the bonus per spell level the spell is Heightened. Thus, mage armor with the Heighten Spell feat, cast as a 5th level spell, would grant a +8 armor bonus to AC.