As the title suggests, this thread is about the Mythic Archmage's Eldritch Reciprocation, a path ability you can pick up from T6 onwards. Firstly, this is the ability:
Eldritch Reciprocation (Su) wrote:
You can choose to take extra damage from an arcane spell to replenish mythic power. When you are hit by or fail a saving throw against an arcane spell that deals hit point damage, as an immediate action you can choose to take damage as if that spell were affected by the Maximize Spell feat. If the spell’s damage can’t be increased by the Maximize Spell feat or is already under the effect of the Maximize Spell feat, you instead take double damage from it. The spell’s damage ignores your spell resistance, energy resistance, energy immunities, and other protections against damage.
If you take at least 25 points of damage from the spell, you regain one use of mythic power.
Most of the guides I've read, rate this ability poorly:
From CTP's Guide to Mythic Adventures
CockroachTeaParty wrote:
Eldritch Reciprocation (passive): If this didn’t require an immediate action and replenished more than 1 use of Mythic Power at a time, it would still be terrible. You don’t want to be hurt; no amount of MP is worth that, especially when you can just be a badass and go fishing for Boons.
From Mythic Archmage Path (Alternate Link)
Quote:
Eldritch Reciprocation: Ugg, yuck, regain mythic power in exchange for taking maximized damage from spells, and you have to take at least 25 damage for it to work? Ok, forget this one folks, it’s not worth it, generally I’d rather avoid damage then take damage even for extra mythic power.
Am I missing something? This ability seems pretty powerful to me. Nothing about the ability states it must be used in Combat. And if used outside combat, gaining Mythic Power from damage can be beneficial, if you also use Mythic Power to heal yourself for more than the damage taken.
If my reading is correct (and it may not be), Eldritch Reciprocation can be turned into a strong ability, using a series of steps detailed below. And there is even a final trick which pushes its power to absurd levels.
Incendiary Cloud + Eldritch Reciprocation (ICER)
Lets say you are a Wizard or Sorcerer Mythic Archmage with Wild Arcana.
Using either your own spell slots or Wild Arcana, cast Greater Aggressive Thundercloud, Greater Flaming Sphere or Incendiary Cloud. (The rest of this post assumes you use Incendiary Cloud for the final trick, but Thundercloud and Flaming Sphere both work as well outside the final trick).
Hit yourself with your own Arcane spell, and intentionally fail your save. This qualifies you to use Eldritch Reciprocation. You take 6d6 maximized = 36 damage, and regain 1 Mythic Power. But, you can't do this indefinitely, you need to heal up in between.
Staff of Heal+ Enhance Magic Items (SHEMI)
If you have Enhance Magic Items, some ranks in UMD, and a Staff with the Heal spell, you can UMD the staff and spend Mythic Power instead of Staff Charges. Spending 1 Mythic Power, you can heal yourself far more than the 36 damage, netting a profit (remember that Enhance Magic Items lets you add half tier to Staff CL). So long as you can hit the UMD DC20 even on a natural 1, you can keep using the staff without risk of failure.
So at Tier 6, when you can first pick up Eldritch Reciprocation, you can take 108 HP damage for 3 Mythic Power, and then spend 1 Mythic Power to UMD a Staff of Heal to restore 110 HP (8 minimum stave CL + 3 Enhance Magic Items). In practice, the actual numbers are a bit less favorable than this, because a Sorc/Wiz total HP at CL12/MT6 won't be that high. But even a regain-2-spend-1 Mythic Power ratio works well enough for most purposes.
ICER-SHEMI effectively gives you limitless Mythic Power outside of combat. You can start fights with nearly full Mythic Power (minus the 1 used to Heal yourself back to full HP). And the investment to achieve this isn't that costly. To recap, you need:
*Wild Arcana (Which is the best Archmage Arcana anyway)
*Eldritch Reciprocation
*Enhance Magic Item and enough ranks in UMD (Both of which are useful anyway, outside this combo)
*A Staff of Heal (Technically available as a Staff of Life, but that is probably way too expensive. And you are unlikely to be able to buy a custom Staff with just Heal. You probably have to take Crafting Mastery, and make this yourself with the help of any Divine Caster who can cast Heal. But as with EMI+UMD, Crafting Mastery is a solid ability to have on its own anyway).
Comparison against Channel Power and True Archmage
Arguably, ICER-SHEMI is strong, but not absurdly strong. Mythic Tiers already include Recuperation, letting you recover full spell slots between fights. Provided your spells known/spell prepared choices are good, starting combat with full Mythic Power and full Spell Slots is great, but comparatively, not vastly superior to starting combat with less Mythic Power and full Spell Slots.
Hence, a case could be made that the Nova-bility of Channel Power makes it a better pick at Tier 6 than Eldritch Reciprocation. Of course, you could (eventually) squeeze both Path Abilities into your build.
Additionally, at Tier 10, you automatically gain True Archmage. This lets you recharge Mythic Power anyway and makes Eldritch Reciprocation sort-of redundant. (Specifically, a True Archmage can Summon a bunch of Lillends and ask them to cast their Bard spells at the Archmage to recharge Mythic Power).
Things get a little more complicated if you feed your ample Mythic Power to your party members via Restore Mythic Power. How strong (or weak) this is, will depend on your party member's exact builds, and is beyond the scope of this post. But I'm sure you can think of a few ideas.
The Final Trick: Augmented Mythic Time Stop
At Tier 10, another ability becomes available, which changes the ICER-SHEMI combo from strong to absurd.
Time Stop has the wording: "Normal and magical fire, cold, gas, and the like can still harm you." Which means you can use ICER-SHEMI to damage yourself and recharge Mythic Power inside Time Stop as well. True Archmage cannot do this, or at least not as easily. Monsters summoned within Time Stop, can only act only during "normal time" and hence remain frozen relative to you.
So you can stop time for hrs/CL, use the combo above for rechargeable Mythic Power, and then spend that Mythic Power to flood the battlefield with Delayed Fireball Blasts (or whatever else you fancy). You should grab Elemental Spell or Mythic Energy Conversion in case you are up against Fire Immune enemies, and probably Channel Power to punch through SR.
Am I reading this correctly? I realize no sane GM would allow the final trick, but does it work in theory?
