Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Faithless the Wonder Boy 05-05-06, 09:34 PM	I was thinking of implementing the following house rule into my next campaign, and I was wondering what people thought of it. Basically, spontaneous casters with the appropriate metamagic feat may take, as one of their known spells, a spell modified by said metamagic feat. This is then no longer subject to the full round casting time normally required by spontaneous metamagic. For an example, a sorcerer could take, as one of their "known" fifth level spells, quickened true strike. They have to permanently use up the slot, but it allows them to actually benefit in some way from quickened spells (or move and use other metamagics). Of course, if they then spontaneously apply a metamagic feat to a spell permanently modified by one, the casting time is still extended to a full round, even if they, say, apply Empower Spell to a permanently quickened scorching ray. How does this sound? I don't think it would cause any balance issues, and it provides a way for sorcerers and other spontaneous casters to benefit from metamagic. I could just import the Accelerate Metamagic feat into my campaign, but I think this house rule makes a lot more sense, and I've been pretty selective about what feats I'm importing.
gkp79 05-06-06, 03:50 AM	Wait a few more days for PHB2 info to get widespread when the book is released. There is a class option for sorcerers in there that lets them trade the familiar out for normal-speed metamagic casting instead. This sounds even better than what you are suggesting here.
Kessalin Talira 05-06-06, 12:51 PM	It sounds like the Metamagic Specialist ability you're referring to works like Accelerate Metamagic, from Races of the Dragon. One of the PHB 2 threads has a recent post saying that's how it works, presumably coming from someone overseas that has it already. EDIT: It appears that what I read was incorrect, and most likely an assumption on someone else's part. The actual text of the Metamagic Specialist ability seems to be: You can apply metamagic feats that you know to sorcerer spells without increasing the casting time. This benefit even lets you quicken your sorcerer spells with the Quicken Spell feat. You can use this class feature a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Int modifier (minimum 1). This is an extraordinary ability. For those that don't have Races of the Dragon, Accelerate Metamagic works like Divine Metamagic: Choose one metamagic feat that you have when you take the feat, and casting spells with that metamagic feat applied doesn't raise the casting time. To take this in a completely different direction, I just had a thought about spontaneous casters and metamagic, that I might use as a houserule: A spontaneous caster can apply metamagic feats with no spell level adjustment to their spells without increasing the casting time. At fifth caster level, they can apply metamagic feats with a +1 spell level adjustment without increasing casting time. For every five caster levels above 5, the spell level adjustment increases by 1. A 20th caster level spontaneous caster can use +4 spell level adjustment metamagic feats, such as quicken spell or twin spell, at the spell's normal casting time, (or as a swift action in the case of the quicken spell feat). What do you think? Back to the OP's idea, I do like the idea of permanently metamagiced spells. I've thought something like that would be alright for wizards, too. Create a 7th level "twin fireball" spell, a quickened true strike, etc.
scienceman47 05-14-06, 02:18 AM	Variant in PHII does all the work.