Post/Author/DateTime	Post
ClementWillowbreaker 04-10-07, 04:57 PM	So I was considering cleric cheese, and Divine Metamagic Persistent Spell. Persistent Spell is the only feat where it is pointless you actually pay the spell adjustment cost, and it also benefits cleric since they have all these nice short-term buffs and an alternate way to pay for them. So here is a question for people that normally ban those feats and Nightsticks (which are the real abuse since they are horribly written). With the following changes, would you be cool with that two-feat and one-item combo... 1) Night Sticks are replaced with a phylactery with the same price and effect, that has to be worn for 24 hours to function. This way, you can't keep on trading in fresh rods. No way to get more than 4 additional turns a day from items, and it costs a slot. 2) Persistent Spell just multiplies the duration of the spell by eight, instead of making it a flat 24 hours. Same restrictions on spells, and now they scale somewhat. It's five levels higher than Extend, which doubles, so its is essentially 7x by DnD math. So as an example...a lvl7 cleric can spend 7,500gp for a head item he has to wear all the time, to cover 4/7 of the cost to benefit from two of his feats (Persist and Divine Meta Persist). He expends a lvl4 spell slot, and gets Divine Power for 5 minutes and 6 rounds. Enough to prebuff for one entire battle, or perhaps two in rapid succession. A lvl20 cleric expends the same spell and turns and gets Divine Power for 16 minutes- enough to be a fighter for two fights if he presses hard, but very rarely more than that. In either case, to Divine Meta a second casting, he has to rely on his own Cha modifier (and needs 24 to even afford a second Persist) or actually take Extra Turning. Do you suppose that is more balanced to an investment of two feats for a one- or two-shot effect, and a minor magic item? Night Sticks replicate a feat, and would be properly priced by comparison...if you actually had to keep the stick with you. So this a work-around.
tarkin 04-10-07, 05:05 PM	Persistent Spell has more problems. Part of the problem is that without metamagic level reducers, it is not worth it. So it is always either A. not worth it or B. Abusive. I see no way to fix that, including yours. The NightStick thing is a good idea, as they are already bad. But there are other ways to reduce Persistent so it does not solve the problem. Are you going to go around and 'fix' all the ways to reduce the cost of Persistence? Duration x 8 is worthless for the huge cost to get. ----------------------- If I were going to fix Persistent, I would make it a +0 metamagic feat that cost XP. That gets rid of all the abusive things to 'cheat' it's costs, and also reduces the cost to something you can pay without looking silly. Now, the only problem is figuring out what the proper xp cost should be. Probably base it on magic item rules, including the duration adjustments.
ClementWillowbreaker 04-10-07, 05:27 PM	But there are other ways to reduce Persistent so it does not solve the problem. Are you going to go around and 'fix' all the ways to reduce the cost of Persistence? Duration x 8 is worthless for the huge cost to get. I do agree that +6 is unwieldy unless you find another way to pay for it. Perhaps I should scale it down to a lower adjustment (like +3) and have it quadruple durations. And aside from Nightsticks and Divine, there aren't too many ways to cheap feats. Rods are stackable, but their cost is very high. When I followed the exponential progression, Persistent (as written) Rods would be over 200,000gp. Personally, I wouldn't mind a Cleric dropping that much for my +6/x8 version. Thems a lot of command-word items for the Fighter, by comparison.