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Reminds me of the Magus I made a couple days ago for my Emerald Spire party to face. Traded all his feats for Spheres(as per the rules) and had Beserking and Lancer. It's going to be funny to watch the looks on their faces when they get impaled on a quarterstaff.
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I'd really like to see how the Conscript turned out. I really love "build-your-class" classes (well, including the Fighter, but that's more like pity than love), and if I remember correctly, the dev team popped up somewhere before in this thread and said something in the line that this class will take the best of the incanter and some another SoP caster class' design skills combined...
Design Manager
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I'd really like to see how the Conscript turned out. I really love "build-your-class" classes (well, including the Fighter, but that's more like pity than love), and if I remember correctly, the dev team popped up somewhere before in this thread and said something in the line that this class will take the best of the incanter and some another SoP caster class' design skills combined...
Conscript is probably the most playtested, least talked about (publicly) classes we've been working on, and a big part of that is that we want to get it right. We're taking Sphere Specializations and pushing them out into much more robust and interesting options than what the Incanter gets, each with a unique capstone, abilities spread across multiple levels (and better protected against being too dippable at 1st level), and I think we've got basically every major combat class feature you might want to grab available in one form or another. It should be ready as part of the full playtest when we get that rolled out here in the very near future.
I am with Lucas and Lirya. I am excited to see the Conscript but also happy to wait until the release to see it. I love the classes that are very "build-your-own".
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I am with Lucas and Lirya. I am excited to see the Conscript but also happy to wait until the release to see it. I love the classes that are very "build-your-own".
I'm a big fan of build-your-owns as well, so I'm hoping the Conscript meets expectations when we roll it out. One of the big things we wanted was a class that didn't need each archetype and tradition requiring a massive block of text, like the hedgewitch (which is phenomenal, but it does chew through page space, even in expansion books), and we didn't want it being too attractive as a dip without much reason to stick around, like the Incanter.
So it uses the "Here's 10 bonus feats you can trade on a sliding scale), and we've got pretty much every martial class feature you can think of (with a few necessary exceptions) available for purchase. Many of them don't start at level 1 as part of our spacing things out for balance and other factors, and you generally don't always get the top-end variant of an ability (you can buy Slayer progression Sneak Attack, but not Rogue), but you can generally put together whatever combinations you want, within reason. The conscripts my players have run so far are a high Dex, lightly armored elven spearwoman with a mount and a banner, an Inigo Montoya style duelist with evasion and weapon training who uses Athletics, Duelist, and Fencing to slice and bleed his opponents to death, and a medium armored "clever combatant" with the warleader sphere specialization, studied target, and a healthy dose of Scout sphere. Plus a couple quickie conscripts I've put together for special combat encounters, some raging orc berzerkers, a fire giant dual-wielder, etc. Since it's a build-a-class, Conscript works really well for encounters where you want to add class levels to a creature and build out a thematic fighting style to remember the encounter by.
Sphere Specializations now give you the associated sphere as a bonus talent at 1st level, a class ability at 3rd and 8th level, and a special sphere-specific capstone to reward single-classing into high level play, assuming you get that far. That also means that while the Incanter unfortunately doesn't have any capstone, the conscript has over 20 to choose from, which is fairly cool in its own right.
I can't give a specific date yet, but everyone's goal is to get the next playtest up and running ASAP, so we should have an update on that in the near future.
Sweet! I'm very excited for the next preview!
By the way, the incanter technically has a capstone, a minor upgrade for its at-will specialization feature. Then again, maybe you meant that generalist incanters not getting any oomph in the end level...
Oh, and another few questions. Which sphere will have options for full speed full attacks, if any?
And, how did that "skill sphere(s)" turned out? Would it be in packaged forms like the Athletics sphere having multiple skills under its belt?
I am really looking forward to seeing the Conscript.
I am also excited to see the conscript as I would like to compare it to the Hedgewitch from Spheres of Power.
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absolutely awesome!my only concern is the split focus between riding and training an animal. While there is some overlap for certain builds, not everyone who has a bear wants to ride it, and not everyone who has a horse wants to train it to attack.
They are separate packages within a sphere. A number of talents overlap, so it made sense to make it a single sphere, but you can absolutely use one package without ever taking the other.
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Is it possible to take the mounted attack options for centaurs, too?
Well, we have stayed away from the 'Big numbers' mounted charging type abilities. The talents are more about work it with your mount, so wouldn't translate. However, a centaur would be perfectly well served with other spheres to act as a charger.
What up all, it's preview number 3, the pre-alpha playtest!
Good to see some free mighty, alpha-pre playtesting stuff out there. ;)
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So, here's a thought. I was looking at Spheres of Power again and then at the clunky "Combat Training for Non-Spheres of Might Classes" table. So, why not handle non-spheres of might classes the same way spheres of power did? A more personal approach would be more fitting. Especially for classes like the Rogue that would focus on scout and scoundrel type of spheres.
A rogue may combine combat spheres and talents to create powerful martial techniques. Strikers are considered Proficient practitioners.
This replaces the rogue talents gained at 2nd, 6th, 10th, 14th, and 18th levels.
Roguish Intuition
A rogue treats her class level as her base attack bonus with the scoundrel and scout spheres. This stacks normally with base attack bonus gained from other sources.
As an aside, I wouldn't mind that treatment for Spheres of Power characters either. Giving an update treatment to elementalist, mageknight, and maybe even combat hedgewitch would be aces.
(Forgive me if someone suggested something similar already. I haven't read through all the thread.)
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So, here's a thought. I was looking at Spheres of Power again and then at the clunky "Combat Training for Non-Spheres of Might Classes" table. So, why not handle non-spheres of might classes the same way spheres of power did? A more personal approach would be more fitting. Especially for classes like the Rogue that would focus on scout and scoundrel type of spheres. ** spoiler omitted **
As an aside, I wouldn't mind that treatment for Spheres of Power characters either. Giving an update treatment to elementalist, mageknight, and maybe even combat hedgewitch would be aces.
(Forgive me if someone suggested something similar already. I haven't read through all the thread.)
The concept of the table was to give a general method to get into the system, a generic archetype if you will. It is not intended to preclude specific archetypes with a more personal approach. We are definately doing those kinds of archetypes, though they are mostly waiting for us to get the base spheres and classes to playtest. We definately have ideas and one or two may have been written in stolen moments.
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Was playing around with a blacksmith progression, and one thing that bothers me is that you don't get Skilled Craftsman until 2nd level, which means you either start off as a 1st level blacksmith unable to actually craft anything because you have ranks in Profession (Blacksmith), or you take a rank in Craft (armor) and/or Craft (bows) and/or Craft (weapons) or something similar that becomes useless when you hit 2nd. Might I suggest either gaining the ability to substitute Profession (Blacksmith) for at least one of Craft (armor), Craft (bows), or Craft (weapons) at 1st-level, or at least allowing you to retrain any ranks in any of those upon gaining Skilled Craftsman?
It's a pretty cool class otherwise (though man, I wish you got access to Rapid Maintenance earlier), but that bothered me a little, even if it's really only a thing at 1st level...
It's current placement at level 2 was intended to kind of mirror Versatile Performance and keep the blacksmith's progression smooth, but I'll see if I can't smooth that out with a retraining option or swapping something else a bit.
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For anyone who hasn't seen, the Spheres of Might open playtest is currently up and running!
While you can comment on the doc directly, we'd prefer you to make longer comments here or on the Drop Dead Studios forum! We're looking forward to seeing what you have to say, so let us know, and let's get this open playtest rolling!
Spheres of Might Open Playtest
Sphere 1
Sphere 2
Sphere 3
Class 1
Class 2
Additional Rules
Conversion Archetypes
Where do I find Greater Barrage?
I am super excited to see Sniping back. Head Shot in particular looks nasty. :)
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Where do I find Greater Barrage?
Looking into that right now. I think that what happened was that the author pulled it right before the update due to some issue or other, but forgot to update the talents that referenced it. Soon as I have a sure answer I'll let you know, and make an necessary updates to the documents.
Thanks Ssalarn!
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Robert Jordan, accidentally replied to you in the other thread, but Greater Barrage was pulled from the playtest and inadvertently left in some prerequisites. I think I hit those but if you find anything, let me know.
Also, full list of links for anyone who needs them-
Spheres of Might Open Playtest
Sphere 1
Sphere 2
Sphere 3
Class 1
Class 2
CotS classes
Legendary Talents
Additional Rules
Archetypes
So it'd been a while since I last checked the playtest. I enjoyed seeing how this project evolved over time and I am really excited to see it when it finally comes out! I've made no effort to hide that the Sniping sphere is the one I am most excited about and I liked a lot of what's come of it, but I am slightly confused about Deadly Shot now. Why is there a damage die difference between normal AC and Touch AC? Wouldn't an attack that hits Touch AC bypassing armor be more devastating than one that has to impact armor first? If it is like Deadly Aim in that the damage adjustment only applies to touch spells and not firearm attacks that makes more sense, but to punish firearm characters seems odd.
I'm pretty certain you can't, but could you use Barrage with Shot on the Run?
Edit: is there going to be a way to tack on spheres of might to existing classes? Something in the same vein as Spheres of Power where you just replaced casting with the spheres system?
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Greater Barrage was pulled from the playtest.Wait, what? Why?!
This concerns me because if memory serves my character build used the Greater Barrage talent.
Sorry for the delay in responding, I've been splitting my time between the City of Seven Seraphs Kickstarter that both N. Jolly and I are working on with Lost Spheres and getting the Starfinder conversion rules we'll be including in Spheres of Might ready to go so we can wrap up layout and start getting .pdfs ready to distribute. I believe that Greater Barrage was pulled because we rolled its functionality into the base sphere (and another talent?) to smooth out functionality and lighten the overall talent cost for characters. Greater Barrage was more of a tax than we liked for things; we want each talent to bring something new to your character.
I'm pretty certain you can't, but could you use Barrage with Shot on the Run?
Edit: is there going to be a way to tack on spheres of might to existing classes? Something in the same vein as Spheres of Power where you just replaced casting with the spheres system?
Shot on the Run is its own full-round action, so it won't combine with Barrage, but I'm like 90% sure we added a talent to cover that functionality.
I know we have the base class archetypes, and we tried to include some really simple ones that basically just graft talents onto the class without changing its functionality too much. We worked on a simple progression that grafts directly onto a character, but it was a bit more clunky due to the differences between the two systems and I don't believe it made the final cut.
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After many delays, the prodigy is now available for your playtesting pleasure.
The prodigy is a flexible mid-BAB, Mid-caster based on making a 'sequence', using a series of moves to unlock powerful finishers. They also can gain temporary talents similar to a spiritualism hedgewitch.
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After many delays, the prodigy is now available for your playtesting pleasure.
The prodigy is a flexible mid-BAB, Mid-caster based on making a 'sequence', using a series of moves to unlock powerful finishers. They also can gain temporary talents similar to a spiritualism hedgewitch.
The Prodigy is part of the "Champions of the Spheres" add-on book from the Spheres of Might Kickstarter, initially advertised as the "gish book", just in case anyone was wondering.
Yay! I'll check it out, I guess I know what my PCs next NPC antagonist will be.
Thanks Ssalarn! I never worry about how long it'll take to get a response you guys always respond when you find time with your crazy schedule. Did you see my previous post about the Deadly Shot and Firearms in regards to the bonus damage dice?
Finally, another generic spherecaster that I adore! Which gishes around leisurely using cool combos? Lovely...
By the way, when will the book(s) be delivered? It's been a long time since the initial playtest ended...
Also good to have some free Prodigy playtestin' stuff out there. ;)
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Finally, another generic spherecaster that I adore! Which gishes around leisurely using cool combos? Lovely...
By the way, when will the book(s) be delivered? It's been a long time since the initial playtest ended...
Our estimated delivery date is December and final editing and development passes, as well as layout, do take some time. That being said, I know Adam mentioned there being a real possibility of the main book .pdf going out this month and I think that pretty much everything except the Starfinder conversion rules has been through layout, so I'd say the main book should be available in the very near future. Obviously with the prodigy still in playtest at the moment, it will be a bit longer before Champions of the Spheres gets its final editing and development and goes through layout.
So it'd been a while since I last checked the playtest. I enjoyed seeing how this project evolved over time and I am really excited to see it when it finally comes out! I've made no effort to hide that the Sniping sphere is the one I am most excited about and I liked a lot of what's come of it, but I am slightly confused about Deadly Shot now. Why is there a damage die difference between normal AC and Touch AC? Wouldn't an attack that hits Touch AC bypassing armor be more devastating than one that has to impact armor first? If it is like Deadly Aim in that the damage adjustment only applies to touch spells and not firearm attacks that makes more sense, but to punish firearm characters seems odd.
Sorry I missed this before! Essentially, it's a math fix, but there is some in-world justification as well. Targeting touch AC is already supposed to reflect the projectile punching through armor and other defenses easily, so from an in-game perspective one way to look at it is that there's only so much you can do to increase the damage potential of a bullet. Once you've taken aim and loaded your shot, the black powder does the rest of the work, while with a bow or crossbow you have more fine control over the action of the projectile with things like increasing your draw, manipulating the arrow or bolt itself in various ways, etc.
From an out of game perspective, firearms are really wonky and we noticed in our spreadsheets that when the bonus damage was applied to weapons targeting touch AC there was a marked difference in just how much those bonus dice affected damage due to the increased accuracy. There's kind of a sliding scale for the benefits of bonus dice (and damage boosts in general) based on projected accuracy when you're determining the impact of bonus damage, and using a lower die for attacks targeting touch AC helped normalize that math. Note that we do have talents that allow you to increase firearm range and negate misfires by targeting normal AC instead of touch AC, so it's not so much that firearms are getting screwed here, they're just being kept on the same basic damage progressions as other weapons instead of skewing heavily one way or the other based on build variables.| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
stuff
Sounds good! I just wanted to make sure it was intentional and wasn't like how Deadly Aim originally didn't work with firearms till they fixed it. The rationale makes sense and I can accept it even if I don't personally agree. Thanks for taking the time to keep us in the loop and respond to our questions I am super excited for this product!
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For anyone who hasn't seen it yet, Spheres of Might is now available on DriveThruRPG!
And also here on Paizo!
Print copies to follow in the next 1-3 months.
Hey Ssalarn, if we have rules questions regarding stuff in Spheres of Might, where is the best place to post? This thread? Drop Dead Studios forums? Make a new thread on Paizo? Is there an AMA like there is for Spheres of Power?
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Hey Ssalarn, if we have rules questions regarding stuff in Spheres of Might, where is the best place to post? This thread? Drop Dead Studios forums? Make a new thread on Paizo? Is there an AMA like there is for Spheres of Power?
We can field questions here in this thread, so feel free to fire away.
what happened to the skill spheres? we got the stretch goal for another book, then there was the announcement theyde be in the same book, but they arent. Is giving free ranks in the spheres considered the skill book? Or was it decided gladiator scout and the few others were enough?
The second book is the "gish book", Champions of the Spheres, which will include the Prodigy, Sage, and Troubadour classes, as well as a bunch of archetypes for classes that mix martial and magic proficiency. Skill spheres was something that never really manifested as a workable idea; we had "combat" spheres that were very skill-focused, since skills often intersect with combat, but when we looked at trying to split them into two different systems nothing really worked the way we felt it needed to, so we reworked some of the skill-centric spheres to more fully embrace and support the related skill functions and that's as far as "skill spheres" are going at this point.