Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Xeviat-DM 05-27-06, 11:02 PM	Wizards has done several things recently which have got the hamster wheels in my brain turning. Between the psionic focus system in the XPH, the incarnum system, the warlock, and now the variant Barbarian's Rage and variant Druid's Wild Shape from the PHB2, I'm wondering if it would be possible to change some more abilities to be at will rather than x/day. With Rage already taken care of, there are only a few abilities left. Let us see if it might be possible to tweek them: Bard's bardic music: Already, the bard has a lot of uses of this ability. At first level, they could choose to just use inspire courage all day long; there's nothing stoping them in the rules (though one could argue that they'd get fatigued constantly performing for 8 hours straight). Currently, the Dragon Shaman, Marshal, and Divine Mind have aura-esque abilities that are similar to bardic music, and their abilities are at will. Would it be possible to change bardic music to be unlimited, perhaps requiring perform checks? Cleric's turn/rebuke undead and/or domain abilities: If these abilities were at will, I think clerics could feel a little more magical; unlike a current first level cleric who has 3 spells a day (1 domain, two base; this is typical with a wisdom of 15). Of course, something would have to be given up: I think that turn/rebuke undead should be made into the sun/death domain abilities respectively, and then each domain's abilities be tweeked. This would take a lot of work, but it's worth thinking about. Monk's stunning fist: Now, this isn't exactly a class ability, but it might as well be. In my games, I've already made Monks into a psionic class; stunning fist and it's related feats work off of the Expend Focus mechanic, so they're already at will in my games. A more standard way of changing it would be to require a move action to charge it up, or possibly to require a full round action to deliver the stunning fist (so it could only be done once per round). Paladin's smite evil: Similarly my idea for the monk, I think the Paladin's smite could be tweeked to be similar to the Soul Knife's psychic strike; a move action to charge it. Or, it could just be a full round action for a single attack, where the paladin rears back for a mighty smite. All in all, I think this would improve the game ever so slightly. Character's abilities would vary less from encounter to encounter, and thus players would be able to consistantly count on their capabilities (and DMs could consistantly prepare for their player's abilities). Of course, there should be limitations (like how the druid can't cast spells while shape shifted, and the barbarian's rage only kicks in while they're injured), which is why I suggest things like full round actions or move equivalent actions to activate abilities. What do you think?
X-Codes 05-28-06, 12:01 AM	Hey, Bardic Music goes fast. You will obviously use bardic music at least once an encounter and quite possibly even twice or three times, and going up drastically if/when a Bard takes Ironskin Chant or that one feat from RoS... They *can* run out. When it comes to Cleric domain abilities, making them usable at will makes Clerics sickly overpowered in the early levels with one simple domain: Destruction. Combined with their mid-to-late game dominance already in-place and we have something to advoid. For stunning fist, you can already only use it once per round. If you make it require a charge-up then you would make it very much inferior to Sudden Stunning weapons. Granted, thats no problem if you don't use DMG II, but Sudden Stunning weapons are already quite powerful otherwise. The same goes for the paladin's smite. Even if you leave it as-is paladins can only use it once per round. Letting them use it at-will could be dangerous to game balance, especially if they really take-charge and go Fist of Raziel. You can never expend your psionic focus to do an actual action, you expend it to augment a power in some way. The Incarnum system also doesn't give anything very powerful at all, and the Warlock is a one-trick pony at nearly all levels. The Barbarian variant in the PHB II is exceptionally dangerous since when a Barbarian is that low in HP it's time for him to get healed, anyway. In addition, non-Barbarian levels don't increase the berserking hp limit, so you practically have to be a pure Barbarian, no PrC's. The Druid's Aspect of Nature forms are interesting, but many will argue that Shapechange is still better. Standard Wild Shape also lasts so long anyway that theres really no threat of running out of uses.
Xeviat-DM 05-28-06, 05:09 AM	You didn't seem to notice that I wasn't just saying to make them all at will, I was saying that certain things (especially domains) would need to be changed to be balanced. Paladin's smite, as I said, would take a move action to charge up; like Psychic Strike from the Soul Knife. Please, read and digest the first post before posting.
Celestial_Gold_Dragon 05-28-06, 05:24 AM	Interesting. As a player I never really liked X times per day abilities. The one thing that steps out to me as glaring in this set is to make sure there is a way a Paladin can use his smite in a charge, unless that's a specific change. I haven't tried any of those varients you listed yet but it does seem to have promise.
Thiez 05-28-06, 09:50 AM	I like this. I'm all in favor of the magic classes getting some magic at will :) And psionic focus is real cool, so yeah, more classes that use something like it :)
lostone 05-28-06, 12:05 PM	Giving clerics unlimited turns per day would make Divine Metamagic even more stupidly broken than now...if it was still allowed in the game.
Thiez 05-28-06, 12:11 PM	Then remove it. It's retarded anyway :P
Xeviat-DM 05-28-06, 05:27 PM	Giving clerics unlimited turns per day would make Divine Metamagic even more stupidly broken than now...if it was still allowed in the game. Again, if I'm even to consider implimenting any of this, then it would start with the PHB and work it's way towards the supliment books. I don't even allow Divine Metamagic (or Natural Spell for that matter), so its not even an issue for me.
X-Codes 05-28-06, 10:29 PM	I did read and digest it, and I still don't like it. The Destruction domain is a cool ability, but it's just not compatible with this alteration. Theres countless other abilities that are similar in nature (Death Touch, Defensive Roll, etc.). I don't like it. It's as simple as that.
Drachasor 05-28-06, 11:20 PM	The essential problem to overcome is making the cost of ability use comparable to the benefits it grants. With weak abilities this is easy. Bardic Singing might not be overpowered at all if it was allowed to be used without limit, for example. With some combat abilities it might work to use your idea, requiring move-equivalent or standard actions to power them up. Other abilities are still going to be too powerful if handled in this matter, but there are other possible ways to deal with them. Attack Penalty: If requiring a move-equivalent action isn't enough or doesn't feel right, then you could impose an increasing penalty on the attack. A -X to hit if you are using the ability for the Xth time in a day could do the trick. Or a -X for the Xth time in an hour. Something like that. Skill Check: Again with some sort of penalty applied for the number of uses. Uses Per Hour: Instead of limiting the uses to a certain number of times in a day, limit them based on the times per hour. Or require a recharge period of 10 minutes or so to get uses back. This places a pretty firm limit on the uses of an ability in a combat. Paying for it: Give players the option to exceed a normal limit by taking a harsh penalty. Perhaps Smite works as normal. If you want an extra one though then it is going to cost you in hitpoints for each additional one you want. Or perhaps each Smite causes an equal amount of non-lethal damage to the Paladin (so a 10th level Paladin would take 10 points of non-lethal damage doing a smite or doing a smite over his limit, for example--requires some tweaking if people are going around immune to nonlethal damage--easiest thing is making them not immune to this type of nonlethal, despite what their abilities say otherwise). Anyhow, this sort of change requires a few different strategies to work. I am sure there are some other strategies out there you could add to the toolbox. In the end you could get rid of uses/day pretty readily, I imagine. -Drachasor
Thiez 05-29-06, 05:42 AM	Or you could have unlimited per day, but wait 1d4+1 rounds before you can do it again? This could be tweaked up and down, depending on the strength of the abilities :)
Phoenix Knight 05-29-06, 10:53 AM	Or you could have unlimited per day, but wait 1d4+1 rounds before you can do it again? This could be tweaked up and down, depending on the strength of the abilities :) That certainly makes more sense than 3/day uses. It also has a precedent in breath weapons. While mechanically simple, X/day abilities don't actually make much thematic sense most of the time. A drain system (as in Shadowrun) is usually best, but somewhat hard to incorporate into d20. Afterall, if you watch X-Men, read a fantasy novel, or even play most other games besides d20, a character will never have to say, uh, sorry I've used up my super powers for the day. "Don't worry Captain Pickard, I'll be empathic again this time tomorrow."
Vaelan 05-31-06, 03:21 AM	I'm currently running a campaign that uses Recharge magic as outlined in Unearthed Arcana. Depending on how the spellcasters perform at higher levels, I will either increase the recharge time or alter spellcasting classes so that they gain fewer spell levels. I've decided to streamline the huge table of abnormal recharge times into two sentences... Conjuration (Creation): 1 hour Buff spells: 5 minutes We're at level 7 and it is working alright thus far.
Cheza 06-01-06, 05:22 PM	It a general question of your favorite game style. Do you like "Push once but hard" or do you like "Push often but not so hard at all" The easiest way is to change the X/day into x/encounter. This wouldn't solve all problems but it's better than resting after each combat. It's also a question about the difference between extraordinary and supernatural abilities. Smite evil for example uses divine magic so it's more or less a spell-like ability with casting time "free action". As a free action, it can't provoke attack of opportunities and therefore can be claled "supernatural". Additionally it ensures that any cleric can "cast" it. So if you don't like these "x/day" abilities you don't like d&d spell mechanism at all. So it should be quite sure to advise you to the UA rule of recast-time. But to admit: I don't like this as well. In my game stunning attack is a special combat action like trip or disarm. The ability gives a bonus similar to improved disarm. Smite evil has changed into an favorite enemy (evil) and "smite" is a special combat action. Many spells with casting time "on attack" have been added to the spell list. Bardic music is a skill check similar to "feint" or intimidate in combat and requires skill ranks. Bards gain the ability to cast spells "on speech" (similar to "on attack"), so any skill-check that includes speech can be used to get a "free" cast. In my game "feint" is something like a charge. You must declare it and use a full-round action to first feint (similar to the move during the charge) and get a bonus on your following attack. The speech "component" of the bluff check allows the bard to cast spells witch casting time free action. So he can add magical effects to his feint attack (p.e. a +5 bonus) Turn undead doesn't exist. It's a spell. Normally a cleric could change any spell into a healing spell. This isn't true anymore. A cleric can change any spell into a spell of his domain spell list. So if you choose healing as a domain, you still can change any spell into a healing spell, but if you choose the strength domain you'll have to choose a spell from that list. Turn undead is a domain spell, so is rebuke undead. As you can see, I dion't remove the X/day limit because most things are spell effects ans spells have ca cap. Hope you enjoy it anyway.
starfire311 06-01-06, 10:23 PM	Personally I hate x/day abilities... me and my friend both noticed a wonderful alternative awhile back when ym wife made a concentration check to use her Power surge ability from Kensai... That is when it struck us that all x/day abilities need to go. There just needs to be a balancing point to keep powerful ones from being used repeatably or so that the practical number of uses scales. Here was my 1st attempt Smite Evil As a free action make a paladin level check DC 10 if successful you add your charisma modifier to your next attack roll and 1 point of damage for each point that you succeeded by to the damage. Each time after the 1st time you use it that day increase the DC by 5. Yes it is a bit more powerful, but it also isnt as reliable.
Archangel62 06-01-06, 11:58 PM	Ah, yeah I considered stuff like this, what it does however is also alter some of the new feats. The turning rules if you can turn at will can allow for some tricks with other turning feats. The problem with the concentration thing is that skill boosting items suddenly can become far more powerful than they were meant to be.
Drachasor 06-02-06, 02:32 AM	Ah, yeah I considered stuff like this, what it does however is also alter some of the new feats. The turning rules if you can turn at will can allow for some tricks with other turning feats. The problem with the concentration thing is that skill boosting items suddenly can become far more powerful than they were meant to be. Make it something called a "Class Level Check", which is a d20 + Class Level + Charisma Mod. Where you use the levels you have in the class that grants the ability (and if you have PrCs or the like that stack then you add those stacking levels in too). This also has the benefit of increasing the value of Charisma...now if only more classes had abilities that were useable like this. The Skill System needs a major overhaul before it can handle things like this. Right now it is too easy to break anything that is skill-related. -Drachasor
Thelon Fairblade 06-02-06, 02:05 PM	Xeviat, make sure you capture this discussion for the boards' return on June 12. Would be a shame to lose the input. I think the idea has merit. My preference is for a system in which I can do what I can do, all day long, reliably. But I can definately see the other side, too -- a fledgling paladin can only call upon her god's favor so many times because of annoyance or body's ability to channel divine might or whatever. Having played a MMORPG for the last eight months, there is a lot to be said for the flavor of a powerful attack with a recharge. In World of Warcraft, for example, a paladin can make himself invulnerable for 30 seconds... once every half-hour. Or stun a target for 6 seconds, once every 2 minutes. A rogue can give herself a 50% "concealment" (dodge chance) for 30 seconds... once every half hour, or do a "sneak Attack" for extra damage once per 6 seconds. when you realize that one swing of a weapon takes 1.5-3.5 seconds, and most battles (of your level) are over in less than a minute or two, you have a comparison of sorts. Your good abilities only get to be used once or twice per fight, maybe three or four in a very long fight; your best abilities are once per 4 or 8 or 10 fights! Having said all that, I would consider each ability one at a time instead of working on a blanket statement. Because while a Bard-1 has 1 song like a Paladin-1 has one smite, a Bard-9 has a lot more songs than a Paladin-9 has smites! The dragonbreath comparison is a good place to start (went from 3/day to 1d4 delay), but also remember that this change made dragons *way* more powerful... For Paladin Smite, I would do it one of the following ways (depending on the flavor you like): 1) Always On: as Cheza said, make it Favored Enemy (Evil). +2 damage to evil targets, due to your holy aura/zeal/whatever. or 2) Less limited: as written but half-damage, X uses (according to the chart) per hour with 1d4 rds recharge time; additional uses require class level check of DC 10 + 5*# of uses today. 3) Unlimited: uses a MEA to "charge" up. Can be combined with a move action used to move or charge, with a successful CHA check DC 10. So #1 gives the paladin a lesser benefit against evil - no bonus to hit, but a consistent damage bonus that far outweighs a once/day or twice/day Smite. It does, however, remove the potential for a +40 smite critical... #2 gives you the opportunity to do smite on a charg and without any lost actions, but the difficulty rises quickly beyond the first bonus you try to get. #2 & #3 prevent the impulse slam of Full Attack with 4 Smites in a single round. #3 is unlimited use of the smite, which could get out of hand at higher levels. However, losing an action (and thus preventing a full attack action Smiting) is a price when you have multiple attacks each round. (The extra rule is there simply to retain the "smite on a charge" possibility, and mirror Drawing a weapon, something that 1st level characters can't do, but BAB +1 can.) If you're in the wilderness, journeying, you generally have 1, maybe 2 encounters each day. With a limited daily use power, you can either choose to novablast (psion term) and use it all on that single ecounter, seeming more powerful than you should; or you can hoard 1 or more uses "just in case" there is an additional encounter... An ability unused is an ability wasted. I ran a recent session where the Sun & Glory cleric only turned undead once (of three possible, and not his Sun Greater Turning) in a rough encounter with undead (on undead mounts) in the wilderness. He was afraid there'd be more encounters, and thus didn't want to "waste" the daily uses. The battle was therefore much harder than I had expected it to be for them! (The paladin didn't use her Smite, either). That's something I'd like to see change.
Xeviat-DM 06-02-06, 08:15 PM	Thanks Thelon; I will definately restart this thread at the very least when the new board is up. Hopefully I will have more than vague ideas by then. I do think that the move action charge up for smite is the best option for that particular case; it works for the Soul Knife. As for weaker paladins having less smites ... I don't find that necessary. A 1st level paladin gets less of a damage bonus with their smite. As for the other classes, I do think I have more concrete ideas: Bard: Bardic Music is entirely unlimited. Inspire Courage could be used at all times, but the bard won't be able to be silent while doing it (so there are times when tey won't be using it). Some other bard abilities might require concentration. I don't think this will overpower the Bard; it might even make them more desirable. Barbarian: Rage; as detailed in the PHB2. Cleric: This requires more work. Another project I'm working on is changing domain abilities. Eventually I will make them unlimited, but they will be weaker and possibly will require full-round actions to utilize them. Druid: Wildshape; as detailed in the PHB2. Monk: Stunning Fist; I've already changed this to a psionic feat in my games, so this is already covered. That's really it, two classes left.
Millenia 06-03-06, 01:16 AM	You can take a page from Pact Magic and give the abilities a 'recharge' time, in a way similar to both vestiges and draconic breath weapons.
FeceMan 06-03-06, 04:59 PM	Paladin's smite, as I said, would take a move action to charge up; like Psychic Strike from the Soul Knife. Now this, I really like. Not sure how to balance them, though.
Xeviat-DM 06-05-06, 03:35 PM	Now this, I really like. Not sure how to balance them, though. Well, the soulknife gets psychic strike at 3rd level? For 1d8 ... that's 4.5 damage. If the Paladin got +Cha mod to hit and +paladin level to damage, and the targets are much more limited (only evil; soulknife's limitation is creatures who can be affected by mind affecting effects), so I think the slightly lower damage output is made up by the limited targets and to hit bonus. Either that, or only allow it on a charge or a single attack taken as a full-round action.
FeceMan 06-05-06, 04:30 PM	Make it something called a "Class Level Check", which is a d20 + Class Level + Charisma Mod. -Drachasor I like that, but I'd suggest making it a class level check using a specific statistic versus charisma-only (though that would make CHA not such a dump stat).
Voldar_Mecorthio 06-07-06, 07:47 PM	I don't like it. Unlimited use per day abilities should not be very powerful, as they could be used theoretically every round. Use per day limits the user, so he has to save them for a REALLY good oppertunity. If a paladin could smite evil on every attack, that would be completely overpowered, but since he can only use it a few times, he has to save them for a hard fight. Psionic focus helps, but it doesn't completely compensate for having to save your abilities.
FlameLover 06-08-06, 08:28 PM	I dislike per day limits myself, for all things, and am trying to phase them out in my games. The two alternatives for per day abilities I really like are either per encounter limits, or a recharge time. Some abilities are even weak enough to just allow all the time. For example, I think the Bard should have no limit besides the standard action it takes to keep performing. The fact they can't attack or cast spells at the same time is limiting enough for the bonuses they give. The Paladin's Smite Evil should be a "charge up" ability, requiring a full-round action to attack for one hit (minor difference from above, just avoids problems with going into every fight "charged up"). Per encounter limits also work, but are a bit trickier to balance. The biggest problem is the Cleric though. I'm just scrapping all of the current casting classes in my games because I hate almost everything about them (from Vancian casting to lack of other class abilities). But that's not on topic, so you can ignore that little ramble ;) To summarize: I totally agree with different limits on abilities per day, whether they be at-will, per-encounter, or recharge.
Cheza 06-08-06, 10:24 PM	I do think that the move action charge up for smite is the best option for that particular case; it works for the Soul Knife. I would be careful about that. The mind blade is a special weapon quite similar to the spiritual weapon spell. It's always a short sword and can't be enchanted. So it's quite different to a greatsword with the following magical abilities: - bane outsider (evil) => + 2d6 damage - flaming or flaming burst => + 1d6 fire damage - holy => +2d6 damage vs. evil - vicious => +2d6 damage to target, 1d6 damage to you So any damage bonus from mind blade - psionic strike is more or less only an attempt to keep the weapon state of the art... or competitive. This has nothing to do with smite evil on a magical enchanted sword. As for the other classes, I do think I have more concrete ideas: [list] Bard: Bardic Music is entirely unlimited. Inspire Courage could be used at all times, but the bard won't be able to be silent while doing it (so there are times when tey won't be using it). Some other bard abilities might require concentration. I don't think this will overpower the Bard; it might even make them more desirable. Compare it with bless. It's even better than the cleric spell and the spell has uses per day too. Barbarian: Rage; as detailed in the PHB2. Hope you play with the maximum hitpoints houserule. Try a barbarian with Con10 and then test for 5 x lvl hp to activate the berserk!!! Cleric: This requires more work. Another project I'm working on is changing domain abilities. Eventually I will make them unlimited, but they will be weaker and possibly will require full-round actions to utilize them. Can you tell me, where there is a difference to normal cleric spells?
JohnSnow 06-08-06, 10:49 PM	For the record, Malhavoc's Iron Heroes chucks per day abilities in favor of a mechanic called "tokens." Basically, you do things to get tokens and then burn tokens to power your high power abilities. Poker chips, pennies, or any other thing you have a lot of make nice tokens. You do something to get them and your token "pool" goes up. Use an ability that's powered by them and the pool goes down. Each ability has its own "type" of tokens. And they even convert barbarian rage for you, so you have a model for the math. Since Mike Mearls (IH designer) now does RPG development at WotC, I expect to see more and more token-ish abilities creeping into their products.
Xeviat-DM 06-09-06, 01:21 AM	I would be careful about that. The mind blade is a special weapon quite similar to the spiritual weapon spell. It's always a short sword and can't be enchanted. So it's quite different to a greatsword with the following magical abilities: - bane outsider (evil) => + 2d6 damage - flaming or flaming burst => + 1d6 fire damage - holy => +2d6 damage vs. evil - vicious => +2d6 damage to target, 1d6 damage to you So any damage bonus from mind blade - psionic strike is more or less only an attempt to keep the weapon state of the art... or competitive. This has nothing to do with smite evil on a magical enchanted sword. Sounds to me like you don't know much about the Soul Knife; it has better enhancement than most other weapons at given levels will. You compare what you think is a simple shortsword to an enhanced greatsword ... except that the soul knife can have a bastardsword mindblade with a +5 enhancement bonus and +4 worth of enhancements. The soulknife is missing something, but I've never seen psychic strike to be their problem. Compare it with bless. It's even better than the cleric spell and the spell has uses per day too. Compare the bard's spells to the cleric's spells; the two classes are suposed to be balanced, no? And even if the bard can use their music at will, they can't sing and cast at the same time, so there will be limitations. Hope you play with the maximum hitpoints houserule. Try a barbarian with Con10 and then test for 5 x lvl hp to activate the berserk!!! And I just got done with a discussion with a player who said he thinks the new barbarian variant is too weak, and that the character will hardly ever get to rage. One saying it's weak, one saying it's overpowered, both without trying it ... sounds balanced to me. Can you tell me, where there is a difference to normal cleric spells? Um ... I was proposing that Domain special abilities be made weaker, but unlimited use. That way a cleric with the healing domain, for instance, can be a healer all the time, like they're suposed to be. In my games, for instance, I don't let clerics spontaniously cast cure or inflict spells, and they no longer have domain spell slots; but they can spontaniously convert prepared spells to their domain spells. On a side note, I just finished my MP system for the PHB Magic classes. With that done, I'm considering dropping character's max MP by 1/2, instituting the UA vitalizing spellcasting (where you're fatigued at 1/2 mp, exhausted at 1/4), and utilizing a faster MP regeneration rate. This way, effectively, casters will have 1/4th the MP as usual, but they will be brought relatively up to full strength before every battle. That way, their capabilities are the same throughout the day. Because magical healing will be easier to come by, I wrote up some quick and simple sleep requirements, where you are only able to be active for 8 hours a day and awake for another 8 before requiring rest; if you try to stay up later, you make fort saves vs. fatigue; if you fail enough times you fall unconscious.
Cheza 06-09-06, 08:15 AM	Sounds to me like you don't know much about the Soul Knife; it has better enhancement than most other weapons at given levels will. You compare what you think is a simple shortsword to an enhanced greatsword ... except that the soul knife can have a bastardsword mindblade with a +5 enhancement bonus and +4 worth of enhancements. The soulknife is missing something, but I've never seen psychic strike to be their problem. so we have oppositional views. Good for a discussion. First of all let's check the enhancement bonuses of both types: Mind blade: 4th, 8th, 12th, 16th, 20th level. So what I know for sure is that a user of a normal blade will get the enhancement bonus earlier. If you use a 1/3 of total wealth for calculating weapon enhancements: Greatsword: 5th, 8th, 11th, 13th, 14th level. So I think you can't say, the mind blade gains the higher enhancement bonus. if you calculate the weapon bonus by required caster level, it's three times the bonus. At the 5th level, the soul knife can change his mind blade into a bastardsword, but this doesn't allow him to use any oversized weapon feats a paladin could. What you shouldn't forget: It's a move action to activate the psichic strike. It's a great difference to an use activated magical weapon. Agree??? Compare the bard's spells to the cleric's spells; the two classes are suposed to be balanced, no? And even if the bard can use their music at will, they can't sing and cast at the same time, so there will be limitations. Any bard can sing for 1 standard action and the effect lasts 5 rounds thereafter. So it's quite the same to bless at low level. It's the level increment of duration, that makes bless quite good. Btw: I don't think you can compare a cleric and a bard. In my opinion, a bard is more or less a cleric/wizard multiclass character. The bard can cast divine healing magic AND arcane illusions. Cleric domains could be bardic knowledge and bardic music could be an alternative to more spells. And I just got done with a discussion with a player who said he thinks the new barbarian variant is too weak, and that the character will hardly ever get to rage. One saying it's weak, one saying it's overpowered, both without trying it ... sounds balanced to me. You misunderstood me. I don't think it's to weak. It could be unplayable. We have a normal barbarian in our group. He is a level 11 barbarian with Con 12 and has 73 hitpoints. So if he gets 18 damage, he will go into berserk rage. So if you substract 11 HPs for the +1 Con bonus, he can't take more than 7 damage to get into rage. So I don't think it's to weak, but the developer has to be a max. hp houserule player. I can't think it was planned, that lesser Con should increase the chance of berserk and that the berserk ability activates with >50% of hp.
Archtyrant Terevoth 06-09-06, 08:22 AM	Perosnally I've always hated X/day abilities. I'd prefer: X/adventure, X/encounter and unlimited use being the only categories.
Feeb 06-09-06, 11:20 AM	I think that Tome of Magic offers a couple of interesting ways that the abilties in question can be amended. Bard - Use a skill check system similar to (but not identical to) the Truename system. Once of the cheif criticisms about the truename system was the DC (both in terms of max DC and in terms of scaling.) An adjusted skill check system based off of the Perform skill would give the bard the facisimile of unlimited useage, but would work to maintain class ability balance. This system would also not unduly punish multiclass Bards. Cleric - to be perfectly honest, I see the cleric as powerful enough as is, however I do have a suggestion to offer. Using a progression similar to the Binder, have the cleric cast domain powers as (Su) or Spell-like abilities. Powers of levels 0-2 could be cast once every round, powers of greater level can be cast once every four rounds or five rounds. The cleric can access one domain at level 1, a second domain at level 8, a third domain at level 14 and a fourth domain at level 18. A cleric would also be limited in the number of unique spells he could cast per day, similar to the Erudite. Spells known progression would stay the same as the current cleric core class. Turning attempts could be used in place of unique spell useage, with the level of unique spell used having a direct effect on the strength of the turning attempt. A cleric using this variant would lose spontaneous casting. Monk - no suggestions Paladin - I like the "charging up" idea presented earlier. Could more time spent charging up the smite = greater smite damage?
mtgoracle 06-10-06, 07:48 PM	Xeviat, make sure you capture this discussion for the boards' return on June 12. Would be a shame to lose the input. I think the idea has merit. My preference is for a system in which I can do what I can do, all day long, reliably. But I can definately see the other side, too -- a fledgling paladin can only call upon her god's favor so many times because of annoyance or body's ability to channel divine might or whatever. Having played a MMORPG for the last eight months, there is a lot to be said for the flavor of a powerful attack with a recharge. In World of Warcraft, for example, a paladin can make himself invulnerable for 30 seconds... once every half-hour. Or stun a target for 6 seconds, once every 2 minutes. A rogue can give herself a 50% "concealment" (dodge chance) for 30 seconds... once every half hour, or do a "sneak Attack" for extra damage once per 6 seconds. when you realize that one swing of a weapon takes 1.5-3.5 seconds, and most battles (of your level) are over in less than a minute or two, you have a comparison of sorts. Your good abilities only get to be used once or twice per fight, maybe three or four in a very long fight; your best abilities are once per 4 or 8 or 10 fights! I'm also a WoW addict and saw a lot of merit in the cooldown of abilities rather than x/day uses. However, a system like this would make cherry picking from classes more much attractive. If we implemented a cooldown period of say, 1d6+1 rounds after each use, we would also have to add a benefit for gaining additional uses of the ability. What if, each daily use of the ability lessened the cooldown of the ability, or perhaps every use of ability has a seperate cooldown? Something like that, or a once per encounter idea sounds good.
Jerks 06-11-06, 12:33 AM	I don't know if cool down works for all abilities. I think I would design some abilities as having a cool down period. For others, I am a big fan of the escalating skill check or level check mechanic used for Truenaming and the Kensai prestige class. This way you have a fairly reliable method of using an ability a number of times. For example, for Turn Undead I might make an escalating level + Charisma check. This way you don't have to rebalance all those Divine feats.
Xeviat-DM 06-11-06, 04:40 AM	so we have oppositional views. Good for a discussion. First of all let's check the enhancement bonuses of both types: Mind blade: 4th, 8th, 12th, 16th, 20th level. So what I know for sure is that a user of a normal blade will get the enhancement bonus earlier. If you use a 1/3 of total wealth for calculating weapon enhancements: Greatsword: 5th, 8th, 11th, 13th, 14th level. So I think you can't say, the mind blade gains the higher enhancement bonus. if you calculate the weapon bonus by required caster level, it's three times the bonus. I'm not sure if you did, but did you take into account the fact that the mindblade is a +9 weapon at 20th level, not a +5 weapon. And 1/3rd your wealth for a single weapons is called one thing: "sunder bait". At the 5th level, the soul knife can change his mind blade into a bastardsword, but this doesn't allow him to use any oversized weapon feats a paladin could. Who cares. That's a feat to boost your damage costs. And yes, almost any DM would let you utilize an "exotic mind blade" feat if you really felt it necessary to waist a feat on a few extra points of damage from an oversized weapon feat. What you shouldn't forget: It's a move action to activate the psichic strike. It's a great difference to an use activated magical weapon. Agree??? So, I was comparing psychic strike to a possible variant smite evil, not any weapons. I'm not really sure what you're saying exactly. Any bard can sing for 1 standard action and the effect lasts 5 rounds thereafter. So it's quite the same to bless at low level. It's the level increment of duration, that makes bless quite good. So, such a thing would need to be changed. Perhaps the ability would need to end the round you stop. These are the sort of changes that would need to be made. Btw: I don't think you can compare a cleric and a bard. In my opinion, a bard is more or less a cleric/wizard multiclass character. The bard can cast divine healing magic AND arcane illusions. Cleric domains could be bardic knowledge and bardic music could be an alternative to more spells. A cleric is generally better than a bard in almost any level. It takes a very dedicated group who doesn't powergame for a cleric to not outshine a bard. You misunderstood me. I don't think it's to weak. It could be unplayable. We have a normal barbarian in our group. He is a level 11 barbarian with Con 12 and has 73 hitpoints. So if he gets 18 damage, he will go into berserk rage. So if you substract 11 HPs for the +1 Con bonus, he can't take more than 7 damage to get into rage. So I don't think it's to weak, but the developer has to be a max. hp houserule player. I can't think it was planned, that lesser Con should increase the chance of berserk and that the berserk ability activates with >50% of hp. And you're still going to have less hp, and get toasted by magic. You're not saying it's weak, you're saying it's too powerful; that was my point, I've heard arguements that it's too weak, and you're implying that it's too powerful. Such a barbarian would be magic missile fodder; no attack roll, no save. Sorry if I'm being a little cross, but you're not being constructive, you're just disagreeing with everything I've said rather than offering ideas which may lead to something helpful.
lostone 06-11-06, 10:56 AM	I'm also a WoW addict and saw a lot of merit in the cooldown of abilities rather than x/day uses. However, a system like this would make cherry picking from classes more much attractive. If we implemented a cooldown period of say, 1d6+1 rounds after each use, we would also have to add a benefit for gaining additional uses of the ability. What if, each daily use of the ability lessened the cooldown of the ability, or perhaps every use of ability has a seperate cooldown?Something like it starts at being usable every 1d4+4 rounds, and when the class would get another use of the ability it is 1d4+3, then 1d4+2, 1d4+1, etc. Abilities that should be used less often could use a higher die like d8, d12, etc.
Cheza 06-12-06, 11:08 AM	And 1/3rd your wealth for a single weapons is called one thing: "sunder bait". A soulknife is a character class with only one ability: Create a weapon. It has no group assistance potencial. Even a fighter gets special combat feats, that allows him to execute assistance actions. So if you compare psichic strike with smite evil, you compare soulknifes with paladins. So if you think the soulknife uses a +9 weapon, how do you think of paladin spells like Holy weapon, greater magical weapon or defensive spells like dispel chaos, ... He can use these spells to reduce the remaining cost of his weapon. So he still can use a +1 flaming, thundering, ... sword and enchant it with greater magic weapon. A duration of 10 hours should be quite sufficient. Who cares. That's a feat to boost your damage costs. And yes, almost any DM would let you utilize an "exotic mind blade" feat if you really felt it necessary to waist a feat on a few extra points of damage from an oversized weapon feat. Sure. But if you compare the soulknife with different classes, you should include feats or spells they get. A cleric is generally better than a bard in almost any level. It takes a very dedicated group who doesn't powergame for a cleric to not outshine a bard. These two classes are not comparable. As you should know, the bard uses arcane magic, so you should compare it with arcane casters like wizards or sorcerer. They use a d4 HD instead of d6, have 2+Int skills instead of 6+Int and don't use additional abilities like bardic knowledge of bardic music. So why do you think, bards are worthless?? You can compare them with Rangers too. Rangers have less spells and fewer skillpoints. For that a ranger has a higher base attack bonus and combat style feats. So a bard has bardic knowledge & music, what could replace animal companion and favored enemy. You're not saying it's weak, you're saying it's too powerful; that was my point, I've heard arguements that it's too weak, and you're implying that it's too powerful. Such a barbarian would be magic missile fodder; no attack roll, no save. I say, it could be unplayable. It's even possible for a barbarian to get into an unlimited state of berserk, if he rolls bad for his HPs on level ups. I can't believe you try to change my words!!! I wouldn't say that the developer is a max. HP player, when I think it's too powerful! My words: Hope you play with the maximum hitpoints houserule. Try a barbarian with Con10 and then test for 5 x lvl hp to activate the berserk!!! Sorry if I'm being a little cross, but you're not being constructive, you're just disagreeing with everything I've said rather than offering ideas which may lead to something helpful. I just added my thoughts. And I believe that making bardic music unlimited is really unbalanced. As I already said, making domain abilities unlimited would make them unbalanced with normal divine spells - even if you make them worse. And to your statement "you're just disagreeing with everything I've said rather than offering ideas": In my game stunning attack is a special combat action like trip or disarm. The ability gives a bonus similar to improved disarm. Smite evil has changed into an favorite enemy (evil) and "smite" is a special combat action. Many spells with casting time "on attack" have been added to the spell list. Bardic music is a skill check similar to "feint" or intimidate in combat and requires skill ranks. Bards gain the ability to cast spells "on speech" (similar to "on attack"), so any skill-check that includes speech can be used to get a "free" cast. In my game "feint" is something like a charge. You must declare it and use a full-round action to first feint (similar to the move during the charge) and get a bonus on your following attack. The speech "component" of the bluff check allows the bard to cast spells witch casting time free action. So he can add magical effects to his feint attack (p.e. a +5 bonus) Turn undead doesn't exist. It's a spell. Normally a cleric could change any spell into a healing spell. This isn't true anymore. A cleric can change any spell into a spell of his domain spell list. So if you choose healing as a domain, you still can change any spell into a healing spell, but if you choose the strength domain you'll have to choose a spell from that list. Turn undead is a domain spell, so is rebuke undead.
Feeb 06-12-06, 11:56 AM	Something like it starts at being usable every 1d4+4 rounds, and when the class would get another use of the ability it is 1d4+3, then 1d4+2, 1d4+1, etc. Abilities that should be used less often could use a higher die like d8, d12, etc. I think a better division falls along these lines: 1. How often would you like to see the ability used in combat or in a tactical encounter? 2. How often would you like to see the ability used out of combat? Most combat in D&D last anywhere from 1 to 10 rounds, in my experiece (longer combats tend to result in greater depletion of character resources, aka PKs.) Things like healing effects need to be balanced seperately as well, unlimited out of combat healing is rather powerful.
Evanta 06-13-06, 02:24 AM	You could make it as 'use once every X hours' X times/day once every X hours 1 - 12 2 - 6 3 - 4 4 - 3 5 or 6 - 2 so on and so forth. Assuming also that there is 4 encounters per day X times /day 1 - once every 4 combats 2 - once every 2 combats 3 or 4 - once every combat so on and so forth. 5 or 6
Xeviat-DM 06-14-06, 04:21 PM	And to your statement "you're just disagreeing with everything I've said rather than offering ideas": In my game stunning attack is a special combat action like trip or disarm. The ability gives a bonus similar to improved disarm. Smite evil has changed into an favorite enemy (evil) and "smite" is a special combat action. Many spells with casting time "on attack" have been added to the spell list. Bardic music is a skill check similar to "feint" or intimidate in combat and requires skill ranks. Bards gain the ability to cast spells "on speech" (similar to "on attack"), so any skill-check that includes speech can be used to get a "free" cast. In my game "feint" is something like a charge. You must declare it and use a full-round action to first feint (similar to the move during the charge) and get a bonus on your following attack. The speech "component" of the bluff check allows the bard to cast spells witch casting time free action. So he can add magical effects to his feint attack (p.e. a +5 bonus) Turn undead doesn't exist. It's a spell. Normally a cleric could change any spell into a healing spell. This isn't true anymore. A cleric can change any spell into a spell of his domain spell list. So if you choose healing as a domain, you still can change any spell into a healing spell, but if you choose the strength domain you'll have to choose a spell from that list. Turn undead is a domain spell, so is rebuke undead. Sorry that I missed this contribution, sometimes it's difficult to manage a post with large post sizes. I don't like the idea of smite and stun being combat actions, because I don't think everyone should be able to do them. I'm really unsure of what you mean by your proposed bardic music, or your feint changes: could you elaborate on them? As for changing turn/rebuke to spells, and having clerics spontaniously cast domain spells, that is an interesting idea. It would simplify the cleric so they don't have spell slots and energy channeling uses. Combined with my proposed caster alteration (I use MP, then half normal MP totals, impliment fatigue at 1/2 mp, and have MP restore at a reasonable rate) would allow casters to have the same potential in each fight, but not have too many resources to manage. I do still like the idea of rebalancing the cleric so they can afford to have unlimited use domain abilities (I'd do something similar for specialist wizards, druids, and sorcerers, though such abilities would be unique for each class). I still do think that casters should be able to be magical outside of their spells, because they can use those up.
lousywithnames 06-18-06, 01:32 AM	The other alternative is making the x/day make sense by modifying the campaign setting. Maybe every morning at dawn the high priest performs the ancient ceremony that refreshes every cleric's turn undead ability, or a crazy astrological thing happens each day, or whatever... but the rules and campaign setting should mesh.
True Cavalier 06-18-06, 08:30 AM	I skimmed through the post quickly, I like the idea, but it cannot work for everything, obviously. The abilities that are very very limited, like 1/day, should stay as is. But considering the game is "balanced" for 4 encounters per day, abilities that can be used 5 or more times per day might just go on a "At Will" basis. Specifically, for Turn Undead, you could do this. 1) Unlimited uses per day. 2) Turning lasts 1 round. You need to repeat checks on consecutive rounds to keep the undead away, which is close to the 2nd edition rule (If I remember it correctly). 3) Divine Metamagic feats do not use up Turn Undead uses for the day, but instead each can be used a number of times equal to 3+Charisma Modifier when taken. 4) Extra Turning feat is removed.
calvinNhobbes 06-19-06, 01:21 PM	I think x/day limitations for supernatural abilities makes sense. They are magical effects that the user must draw upon their inner power to use. Kind of how the number of spells that can be casted per day is limited. However, I think x/day limitations for extraordinary abilities does not make any sense at all. I think a "recharge" limit could be a good idea. Personally for stunning fist, I changed it so that the target must be vulnerable (denied dex bonus or flanked) and requires a full round action, but it can be used as many times as you can.
Phoenix Knight 06-23-06, 01:12 PM	While not for everyone, perhaps Smite Evil could be replaced with a much less powerful but always active bonus against evil. "When making a melee attack against an evil creature you add your Charisma bonus to attack rolls and receive +1 damage. This damage bonus increases to +2 at 5th level, +3 at 10th, and so on." It's actually not that different a concept from favored enemy. Heck, maybe paladins should just get favored enemy with a list limited to evil outsider, undead, evil aberrations, evil dragons, and so forth. Very few feats have daily limits, and I tend to see most extraordinary abilities as feats only available to certain classes. Other balancing factors for supernatural abilities could be damage done to the user. It seems totally arbitrary to say you can do this exactly 3/day. While I like the first option better, maybe Smite Evil is fueled by your internal energy and thus deals 1d8 damage to you every time you use it. Of course you can heal this damage, but then you have to use an action to do that, and have to use your healing power, which probably has its own limitation.
calvinNhobbes 06-23-06, 03:21 PM	Other balancing factors for supernatural abilities could be damage done to the user. It seems totally arbitrary to say you can do this exactly 3/day. No more arbitrary than spells/day limit for spellcasters.
Phoenix Knight 06-23-06, 04:01 PM	No more arbitrary than spells/day limit for spellcasters. Which is, of course, pretty arbitrary ;) . Recharge magic (as mentioned earlier in the thread, I believe) is better, but not perfect. I firmly believe that a mage should be able to use his power as long as he is willing to accept to consequences. Using such power can knock one unconscious (in Shadowrun), unleash a terrible curse (Warhammer), deprive one of one's youth (The Riddle of Steel), or earn a backlash from the universe (Mage). The current magic system is an anchronistic dinosaur created in the name of balance and preserved in the name tradition once other methods of balance where suggested. However, I think that is the subject of several other threads, including one of mine, so I'll focus this one on actual class abilities. To that end, I think any number of balance mechanics can work. The Kensai, the psionic focus, and incarnum do all grant ideas. Not every ability need necessarily use the same mechanic, either.