I can't be the only one that's thought of this, and I'm sure that there's errata about it somewhere. For the sake of my sanity there has to be.
HERO POINT RECURSION
I'm a 9th level cleric. I've got a Level 2 Pearl of Power.
I've prepared Heroic Fortune and Mass Heroic Fortune today, and I've already cast both. In fact, I've cast all my spells today.
I activate the pearl of power to recall Heroic Fortune. I cast it to get a hero point. I use my hero point to recall and cast Mass Heroic Fortune. Everyone in the party, including me, gets a hero point. My teammates all use their new found hero point to recall a spell/daily ability. I'll use my hero point to recall Mass Heroic Fortune. I'll keep this up until my buddies are fully restored.
Now if there's an alchemist, bard, paladin, or another cleric in the party, and if he's also taken Heroic Fortune, he can use the last hero point from my Mass Heroic Fortune to cast Heroic Fortune on me. I've now got two temporary hero points. I'll use the first to regain a spell, and the second to cast and recall Mass Heroic fortune.
We've gone from zero spells to fully restored for the cost of 2,000 GP. Now please, PLEASE tell me this is illegal.
So, you waste one of your pearls of power to restore everyone's hero points to max. Which is 3. Honestly, it's a waste of effort and would probably inspire your GM to give you less hero points anyway. Or throw harder challenges since you are swimming in hero points.
Strictly speaking? I don't believe there is anything that says you can't do that... Though I always assumed any spell or ability recalled that way had to be used asap.
Personally? Hero points are suppose to be used to do heroic, spur of the moment stuff, not game the system so you can give yourself infinite spells per day. If you GM thinks that counts as heroic, have fun I guess.
I agree that it shouldn't be done, but it points to a larger issue: a cleric can use a 2nd level pearl of power as an Xth level pearl of power via Heroic Fortune. Even if you don't go for recursion, that seems like a pretty nasty exploit.
The rules say "The GM is the final arbiter on the award and use of hero points.", so I'd have no problem as GM enforcing that.
Then again, I'd have no problem as GM telling someone they can't do the things in the example above even if that rule wasn't there. It's just too obvious an attempt to use a loophole, in a similar vein to using your third wish to wish for more wishes.
Most likely I'd go with a ruling of "You can't use a hero point to recall any variation on the heroic fortune spell".
Yeah, but really, 2k gp every time to fully restore hero points for. .. what, exactly? They're temporary, Fading away after few rounds. If I where the DM, I'd just let you do that, and let my npc do the same thing. I'm not so sure my players will be grateful.
Now, I've never played PFS before, but I'm pretty sure that pearls of power are still a 1/day item, not a once-and-it's-gone deal. That 2k you spend gives you the pearl for as long as you hold onto it. Rules-wise, there's nothing saying you can't, but I don't know any DMs who'd be okay with their group doing it.
I can't be the only one that's thought of this, and I'm sure that there's errata about it somewhere. For the sake of my sanity there has to be.
[...]
I'll use my hero point to recall Mass Heroic Fortune. I'll keep this up until my buddies are fully restored.
[...]
We've gone from zero spells to fully restored for the cost of 2,000 GP. Now please, PLEASE tell me this is illegal.
There isn't errata, but there is the 1,000 gp material component of Mass Heroic Fortune to consider (as well as the less expensive but still extant 100 gp cost of Heroic Fortune).
If a high level character has expended his entire spell complement and wants to restore them this way... well, at 1000 gp per spell, it's a very, very, very expensive substitute for a night's sleep that you can get for free.
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There isn't errata, but there is the 1,000 gp material component of Mass Heroic Fortune to consider (as well as the less expensive but still extant 100 gp cost of Heroic Fortune).
If a high level character has expended his entire spell complement and wants to restore them this way... well, at 1000 gp per spell, it's a very, very, very expensive substitute for a night's sleep that you can get for free.
Unless you can get Blood Money onto your spell list (Via Improved Eldritch Heritage: Arcane with a Half-Elf Oracle or a Mystic Past Life Bard), this won't really work. You can False Focus the lower version of the spell, but I can't think of a way to bypass the higher version of the spell's cost sadly.
It's not heroic...ish, but it is possible. I'd say congratulate him for a cool combo, and ask for him to hold off on using it to keep the challenge where it should be. It's more of a high op combo than it seems your group intends to play at (since they could just bring back Restoration to heal all the ability damage from the spell.)
I've never like the board's tendency to deny legitimate (if questionable) combinations. Give the devil his due, thank him for being clever, and don't worry so much about the small stuff. Doesn't seem like it can help you out yourself, so it's just a party buff unless you have two players doing this trick.
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I would quote the genie's three rules about wishes to the player...with special emphasis on the first one:
"No wishing for more wishes
No bringing back the dead
No making anyone fall in love with you"
The same principle applies...
Yeah, but really, 2k gp every time to fully restore hero points for. .. what, exactly? They're temporary, Fading away after few rounds. If I where the DM, I'd just let you do that, and let my npc do the same thing. I'm not so sure my players will be grateful.
Generally speaking, this response is the ultimate proof that the thing in question is broken.
"Nuclear weapons aren't that powerful, because the enemy can use them too" isn't a valid point to argue that nuclear weapons aren't overpowered weapons.Coriat argument about the gold cost is a much better one.
Yeah, but really, 2k gp every time to fully restore hero points for. .. what, exactly? They're temporary, Fading away after few rounds. If I where the DM, I'd just let you do that, and let my npc do the same thing. I'm not so sure my players will be grateful.Generally speaking, this response is the ultimate proof that the thing in question is broken.
"Nuclear weapons aren't that powerful, because the enemy can use them too" isn't a valid point to argue that nuclear weapons aren't overpowered weapons.Coriat argument about the gold cost is a much better one.
I'm not arguing about nuclear weapons. To me it seems it's not a nuclear weapon. Yes, you can loop hero points gain. you can try it. But the 2nd or 3rd time you try, your opponent can ready an action. Can you pass concentration check? And then you're without spell at all. If a player really press me to use this combo, I'll say him that it's cheesy for sure, and I prefer he don't use it. But if he really want, I still can use it a lot. The point here is not "the nuclear weapon is overpowered", but "as player, I'd be happy if the DM use that against me every time?"
I'm not arguing about nuclear weapons. To me it seems it's not a nuclear weapon. Yes, you can loop hero points gain. you can try it. But the 2nd or 3rd time you try, your opponent can ready an action. Can you pass concentration check? And then you're without spell at all. If a player really press me to use this combo, I'll say him that it's cheesy for sure, and I prefer he don't use it. But if he really want, I still can use it a lot. The point here is not "the nuclear weapon is overpowered", but "as player, I'd be happy if the DM use that against me every time?"Yeah, but really, 2k gp every time to fully restore hero points for. .. what, exactly? They're temporary, Fading away after few rounds. If I where the DM, I'd just let you do that, and let my npc do the same thing. I'm not so sure my players will be grateful.Generally speaking, this response is the ultimate proof that the thing in question is broken.
"Nuclear weapons aren't that powerful, because the enemy can use them too" isn't a valid point to argue that nuclear weapons aren't overpowered weapons.Coriat argument about the gold cost is a much better one.
I think you are missing the point. This is not a combo to be used in combat, it takes way too much actions. It's a combo to be used *after* combat, to replenish the resources and being 100% full spells every fight, so you can "go nova" and use your best spells in every single encounter, and then recover all your spells 1 minute after the combat ends.
Yup. I missed the point, sorry for that. Didn't get that. So, it's really op from this point of view. As DM, if I use hero points I'll for sure rule that temporary hero points fade away with the non instants advantage you gain. So if you use it to recall spell, at the end of the duration of the spell, if you didn't use it, those spells fade away, as well as uses of rage, smite, channel, and so on. Maybe it's not raw, but really that's the way I read the hero points mechanic. It's mean to give you resources to make heroic acts, not to go nova anytime you wish.
Ps: sorry again, I really didn't realize the point of hero points :)
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There isn't errata, but there is the 1,000 gp material component of Mass Heroic Fortune to consider (as well as the less expensive but still extant 100 gp cost of Heroic Fortune).
Oh thank God. Yes, this makes it non-broken. Well done that man!
Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to tell a paladin about the 100 GP he doesn't have.
This is why I don't like point systems in my tabletop rpgs.
Yup. I missed the point, sorry for that. Didn't get that. So, it's really op from this point of view.
You don't need to apologize :)
Anyways, as already mentioned in the thread, the spell has gold cost. 100gp and 1000gp. You'll need to spend *several thousands gold* everytime you want to pull the trick. It *might* be useful in certain encounters in certain campaigns, such as "race against the clock" type of encounters at high level, which is somewhat cool (and probably better than the party teleporting to a created demiplane where time stands still and sleeping there). But it's not going to break the bread and butter campaign anywhere soon
Yup. I missed the point, sorry for that. Didn't get that. So, it's really op from this point of view.You don't need to apologize :)
Anyways, as already mentioned in the thread, the spell has gold cost. 100gp and 1000gp. You'll need to spend *several thousands gold* everytime you want to pull the trick. It *might* be useful in certain encounters in certain campaigns, such as "race against the clock" type of encounters at high level, which is somewhat cool (and probably better than the party teleporting to a created demiplane where time stands still and sleeping there). But it's not going to break the bread and butter campaign anywhere soon
Hmmm. Good point. The price is effectively high. But I think you don't necessarily need to have all the spells. Normally you don't go nova with all your spells, just the few really effective. I think with 5k gp you can recall almost every thing you need to face an encounter. I don't know now, I need to think out of it a bit more.
@Blackstorm 5k gp also give you 4x 5th level scrolls, for example.