Tome of Clear Thought Stacking with itself and other items

[Christopk-K]

I made my questions into two different threads. They both concern boosting INT but based on different mechanics. Hope that's ok.

1) Could you use a Tome of Clear Thought +2 at one time and a Tome +3 at another time for a total bonus of +5? From me point of view it could work. Unlike other items the bonus and cost have a linear relationship, so the tome +2 and +3 ´together would cot the same as a tome +5. You'd only need to save longer to buy the +5 tome directly.

2) I'd expect the total bonus from tomes to max out at +5 as tome +5 is the highest bonus available?

3) Would inherent bonus from the tome stack with enhancement boni from Headband of Vast INT?

Tome of Clear Thought:

This heavy book contains instruction on improving memory and logic, but entwined within the words is a powerful magical effect. If anyone reads this book, which takes a total of 48 hours over a minimum of 6 days, she gains an inherent bonus from +1 to +5 (depending on the type of tome) to her Intelligence score. Once the book is read, the magic disappears from the pages and it becomes a normal book.

Headband of Vast INT:

This intricate gold headband is decorated with several small blue and deep purple gemstones. The headband grants the wearer an enhancement bonus to Intelligence of +2, +4, or +6. Treat this as a temporary ability bonus for the first 24 hours the headband is worn. A headband of vast intelligence has one skill associated with it per +2 bonus it grants. After being worn for 24 hours, the headband grants a number of skill ranks in those skills equal to the wearer's total Hit Dice.

[Jericho Graves]

1.) I could be wrong on this, but for tomes at my table, if you buy a +2 and then a +3 you only have a +3 bonus because same type bonuses (inherent) don't stack.

2.) As per Rules As Written, yes. +5 Tomes are the highest available.

3.) The tome is an Inherent Bonus, and the Headband is an Enhancement Bonus, different bonuses do stack.

[fretgod99]

Minor note: Bonuses, not Boni. Boni isn't a word. Common mistake, though. Bonus isn't actually a Latin word, which is where the mistake comes in.

On to the point, Tome of Clear Thought stacks with the Headband because they provide different types of bonuses (Inherent and Enhancement, respectively).

Note that the bonuses from Tomes of Clear Thought and Wish would not stack, because they are both Inherent bonuses.

Further note that multiple bonuses from successive Wishes do stack because the rules specifically state that they do (so long as the proper protocol is followed).

And yes, +5 is the highest bonus available on a Tome. Conceivably, a GM could allow you to create items with higher bonuses, but those things start to get prohibitively expensive.

EDIT: Jericho is correct that technically a +2 Tome and a +3 Tome do not stack. Some GMs will house rule this, but by RAW they do not work together.

[Lifat]

Rules As Written is very clear that bonuses of the same type do not stack.
Tome of clear thought +2 and tome of clear thought +3 both grant inherent bonuses so they do not stack with each other.
They do stack with enhancement bonuses from headbands and with untyped bonuses from the ability score increases that happens every 4th level, and if you could find other types of bonuses they would also stack (not sure if any exist for intelligence).

Personally speaking I do houserule that inherent bonuses do stack with each other so that when you read a book +3 and a book +2 you end up with +5. And yes, +5 is the cap.

[_Ozy_]

I've always found it surprising that the books don't follow the standard bonus^2 scaling of other enhancement types of magic.

In this sense, stacking the lower level bonuses really isn't a price discount so it's not quite as cheesy as trying to stack 5x +1 deflection bonus items.

[fretgod99]

_Ozy_ wrote:

I've always found it surprising that the books don't follow the standard bonus^2 scaling of other enhancement types of magic.

In this sense, stacking the lower level bonuses really isn't a price discount so it's not quite as cheesy as trying to stack 5x +1 deflection bonus items.

I typically allow the same stacking largely for that reason. However, the only difference is that it will be easier to buy five +1 books, particularly over time, than it will be to buy one +5 book. So, instead of waiting to buy a +5 book, you can gradually buy +1 books over time and benefit from all the bonuses along the way.

Whether you think that's a bad thing really is up to you. Like I said, I still allow the stacking of +1 books. They're rare and exciting and I don't want players getting disappointed because the +1 book they just found won't really do anything them.