Upon completing an incredibly difficult foray into the Abyss and squaring off against a host of NASTY opponents, one of the options for a reward is ... drum roll ... 40,000 GP worth of a magic item(s).
What?! How will 40k make a REAL difference for an 18th level/9th tier character? Potions and wands?! I mean ... what kind of a difference is that going to make at that point in the Adventure Path? I almost think one of the characters should steal a line from Caddyshack and yell at Iomedae "Thanks for nothing Danny Noonan!!"
I'm sure I'm missing something, but what?!
Interesting.
That would be the reward that you DON'T take. Take one of the other ones that are infinitely more useful.
That reward is a Stupid Test. Unless there is a glaring/gaping hole in your equipment load out that you can *only fill via this reward*.
It was a unanimus vote by my players for Queen Galfrey!
Absolutely none of them wanted that job.
...and b one of the players has a chance to become a herald.Why you'd want to, I'm not quite sure. Setting aside that it's not much of a boost either (the sacred bonus is nice but the PCs probably already have Arueshalae's +2, and one 3rd level and one 6th level SLA per day isn't all that crash hot especially when the actual Mortal Herald rules from Mythic Origins are noticeably better in terms of what they make available to the characters), given her track record with Heralds and generally unlikable personality (see: 8-page thread about the problems people have), who'd want to be suckered into that job?
Take the Miracle. It's the best of a bad selection, but a free Miracle will always come in useful.
I'm considering giving the Mortal Herald abilities as a bonus, in addition to the bonuses presented, should the one Iomedean in my party accept the appointment(I cannot see them refusing).
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...and b one of the players has a chance to become a herald.Why you'd want to, I'm not quite sure. Setting aside that it's not much of a boost either (the sacred bonus is nice but the PCs probably already have Arueshalae's +2, and one 3rd level and one 6th level SLA per day isn't all that crash hot especially when the actual Mortal Herald rules from Mythic Origins are noticeably better in terms of what they make available to the characters), given her track record with Heralds and generally unlikable personality (see: 8-page thread about the problems people have), who'd want to be suckered into that job?
Take the Miracle. It's the best of a bad selection, but a free Miracle will always come in useful.
Well, once you ignore or change the encounter with Iomedae, one of your players - most likely a follower of Iomedae - gets pushed pretty much to the top of the church structure. Thats a pretty nice PR reward, and let’s face it. a group does not attempt this kind of quest for material rewards.
The players get a to keep the artefacts and are even greater heroes.
Giving the temporary job to an NPC is actually quite reasonable, after all the PCs might very well be kinda busy.
Oh and I would suggest the the divine intervention reward.
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I'm considering giving the Mortal Herald abilities as a bonus, in addition to the bonuses presented, should the one Iomedean in my party accept the appointment(I cannot see them refusing)....and b one of the players has a chance to become a herald.Why you'd want to, I'm not quite sure. Setting aside that it's not much of a boost either (the sacred bonus is nice but the PCs probably already have Arueshalae's +2, and one 3rd level and one 6th level SLA per day isn't all that crash hot especially when the actual Mortal Herald rules from Mythic Origins are noticeably better in terms of what they make available to the characters), given her track record with Heralds and generally unlikable personality (see: 8-page thread about the problems people have), who'd want to be suckered into that job?
Take the Miracle. It's the best of a bad selection, but a free Miracle will always come in useful.
Mortal herald is a very good ability, if you want to give it the player who actually becomes the her herald, consider offering it to everybody in the group as a temporary mythic ability.
Well, I was planning on offering it to the fighter(for gorum) and the cleric(for pharasma); killing Baphomet(I don't imagine they'll run and from what I understand, the fight is less than difficult) is exactly what you need to do to get Pharasma's attention and killing a demon lord or forcing it to flee is more than equivalent to killing two armies(if we are to take "army" as equivalent to what's presented to us with mass combat rules).
The trick is going to be the monk, who's an out an out atheist. Need to find something to offfer him that he won't latly refuse.
Everyone.
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Well, once you ignore or change the encounter with Iomedae, one of your players - most likely a follower of Iomedae - gets pushed pretty much to the top of the church structure.First in line to get their heart ripped out/mysteriously die/horribly murdered/lose their divine boss like the rest of the Aroden/Arazni/Iomedae/Hand of the Inheritor line, too.
Mortal herald is a very good ability, if you want to give it the player who actually becomes the her herald, consider offering it to everybody in the group as a temporary mythic ability.If you're worried about the power of the ability then just allow a player to take it as one of their regular path abilities upon reaching 9th tier, rather than as a bonus path ability. Rescuing her Herald should qualify as an act of valour great enough to meet the requirements for becoming her new Herald... and, well, the AP says that she offers it.
I wouldn't say the ability is all that powerful in a comparative sense at this late stage, especially since at 9th tier anybody with Touched By Divinity is already obscene - it's easily twice as versatile as Mortal Herald, and Mortal Herald is itself a big step up from Divine Source in ranking that vein of ability.
While I agree, that divine source (that is what you meant by Touched By Divinity, right?) is a very good ability, that gives quite a bit of bang for your buck. Buuuuut at Tier 9 the characters will have 21 points of mythic power, and while this resource is quite valuable using them to cast ninth level spells (especially as a non-caster) is extremely good.
And divine source does restrict you in the choice of domains, so most of the time at least one of your domains will be an alignment domain. So yeah I consider it a very good choice for characters unable to cast high level spells, or no spells at all.|
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Well, I was planning on offering it to the fighter(for gorum) and the cleric(for pharasma); killing Baphomet(I don't imagine they'll run and from what I understand, the fight is less than difficult) is exactly what you need to do to get Pharasma's attention and killing a demon lord or forcing it to flee is more than equivalent to killing two armies(if we are to take "army" as equivalent to what's presented to us with mass combat rules).
The trick is going to be the monk, who's an out an out atheist. Need to find something to offfer him that he won't latly refuse.
Do not feel forced to follow the requirements of the mortal herald feats as written, the heroes are a pretty big deal and any god would love to have them on his side.
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While I agree, that divine source (that is what you meant by Touched By Divinity, right?) is a very good ability, that gives quite a bit of bang for your buck. Buuuuut at Tier 9 the characters will have 21 points of mythic power, and while this resource is quite valuable using them to cast ninth level spells (especially as a non-caster) is extremely good.
And divine source does restrict you in the choice of domains, so most of the time at least one of your domains will be an alignment domain. So yeah I consider it a very good choice for characters unable to cast high level spells, or no spells at all.
No, Touched By Divinity the campaign trait.
Which is any two domains as offered by the god you have the trait for, allowing you to spend MP to cast from them.
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While I agree, that divine source (that is what you meant by Touched By Divinity, right?) is a very good ability, that gives quite a bit of bang for your buck. Buuuuut at Tier 9 the characters will have 21 points of mythic power, and while this resource is quite valuable using them to cast ninth level spells (especially as a non-caster) is extremely good.
And divine source does restrict you in the choice of domains, so most of the time at least one of your domains will be an alignment domain. So yeah I consider it a very good choice for characters unable to cast high level spells, or no spells at all.
No, Touched By Divinity the campaign trait.
Which is any two domains as offered by the god you have the trait for, allowing you to spend MP to cast from them.
Oh sorry, I had not considered those traits.
Then yes, the trait is far better than the mythic ability, but since you have to choose hierophant as you mythic path, chances are pretty high that you are already a cleric/druid/oracle. If that is the case, the ability to cast a spell for a point of mythic powers isn’t that good.
I consider the riftwarden orphan trait far better, and frankly too good.
It's fairly hard to be an atheist in a world where the gods are manifestly present. Do you mean agnostic?
If you actually mean atheist, have the gods offer to ignore him as well, providing him fairly high SR against divine spells.
I mean atheist as defined in Faiths & Philosphies; he believes the gods physically exist, but sees no reason to worship them. Rather, he feels that the path of good and enlightenment comes from personal betterment of the individual. I did give him a trait(the name of which I am blanking on at the moment) that gives him a +1 bonus to saves against divine spells to help reflect that.
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I mean atheist as defined in Faiths & Philosphies; he believes the gods physically exist, but sees no reason to worship them. Rather, he feels that the path of good and enlightenment comes from personal betterment of the individual. I did give him a trait(the name of which I am blanking on at the moment) that gives him a +1 bonus to saves against divine spells to help reflect that.It's fairly hard to be an atheist in a world where the gods are manifestly present. Do you mean agnostic?
If you actually mean atheist, have the gods offer to ignore him as well, providing him fairly high SR against divine spells.
Well you could just give him an inherent bonus to one or more of his stats, monks kinda like that ^^
Might do something like that. We'll see how it goes.
In truth I'm a long ways off from this point, but I like to plan ahead.
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Oh sorry, I had not considered those traits.
Then yes, the trait is far better than the mythic ability, but since you have to choose hierophant as you mythic path, chances are pretty high that you are already a cleric/druid/oracle. If that is the case, the ability to cast a spell for a point of mythic powers isn’t that good.
Yes, you're probably a divine caster (mind you, you don't have to be with Dual Path - pick Beast's Fury and Dual Path into Archmage if you're an arcane caster, for example, since Beast's Fury will apply to your familiar or a cohort; and you get the 4 HP/tier rather than 3 HP/tier, and still get to have your Archmage path abilities minus the capstone), but that isn't much of a limit.
The issue with Touched By Divinity, much as with Mortal Herald, is that you're casting the spells as spell-like abilities, costing only a point of mythic power (it's functionally identical to Mortal Herald in this application, actually, with the exception that it gives you all the spells from two domains rather than one).
That's the obscene part about it, because with the right domains (the right patron, too), it's tremendously powerful in what spells it allows you access to. For example, Iomedae and Sarenrae offer the Glory domain. At 9th tier, you'd be able to cast Gate as a SLA for 1 MP, allowing an individual to gate-spam for as long as their MP holds out. They also both grant Sun, which can give you Prismatic Sphere at 9th level for an ultimate defense. Continuing the AP-featured deities theme, Desna? Luck domain, Miracle-spam.
Now, you'd need to pick the right deity, but those three right there are linked to the AP (Iomedae is obvious, Sarenrae has heavy redemption themes like what's in WotR, and Desna is linked to Arueshalae).
I'd be perfectly happy to give up quick recharges of magic items for the ability to eventually throw miracles like candy bars (and the Luck domain is solid even without Miracle). Divine Source is weaker because you...
I think you will agree, that the ability to use mythic power to “cast” spells as spell like abilities is much more valuable to a character that lacks significant spellcasting from his class levels. Those characters already have ways to convert mythic power into spells.
So those characters will have to take a “wrong” mythic path, take the dual path feat (not just spending a mythic feat, but also preventing any other combinations) and get a suboptimal power (I consider Beast's Fury to be only really useful for summoners).
Of course they could just be taking another trait and gain other amazing abilities (3hp per level, ignoring the damage reduction of demons and higher crit multiplier…) keep their ability to dual path and save a mythic feat.
Seems pretty fair to me, there might be some cases, that benefit more or less, but from my perspective mortal herald seems pretty well balanced.
Some domains are clearly better than others though, as you mentioned luck, sun and glory are pretty great, but the war domain has divine power and some other nice spells.
While it would be nice, I think that mortal herald and touched by divinity should not allow you to select subdomains. Limited wish as a spell like ability could be too good, and while there seems to be no domain and subdomain that grants access to wish, you can get resurrection and true resurrection (without material cost). That might be too good.
While a witch or magus at these levels could have access to the hex that lets you resurrect people once per day, doing it 21 times could be a little bit much.
Now all I want is a cast limited wish as a magus, crafting a custom staff seems a bit cheesy.
I suggest checking out Age of Worms for examples of high level encounters and abilities/items. From what I read, it is expected for the characters to be able to use powers like Wish/Miracle since it goes right past rocket-tag and into nuke-tag at the end.
It's not a question of greed/"give me more gold" ... but winning isn't cheap. Characters need to invest in expensive [Robes of the Arch-Magi, 200k +10 total enhancement weapons & armor, etc.] to compete at the very highest of levels.
It is what it is. Nobody goes up to a major league baseball player and says ... it's the World Series and you're facing a Cy Young Award winner ... here's a t-ball bat.
It's not greed or power gaming ... it's an investment in survival & victory.