Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Kyle_the_wizard 07-02-06, 03:28 PM	One of my players in a new game hated how much the wizard and sorcerer classes clashed so he asked all the gamers if he could change it a bit. With my approval he wrote up the changes and I'm now posting them up here for others opinions on it. Any character wishing to play an arcane caster rolls a percentile dice 1-70 Ability 71-98 Spark 98-100 Blood born The player uses the BAB, HD and base saves of the wizard Ability: The character has the ability to cast arcane magic though not as adept at it as those born with the spark or a Blood born. Spark: Those born with the spark at one point in there life magic will flare up in them and make itself known. The player gains a +1 to caster levels and Magic Points. Blood Born: Very few magic users are the blood born. The blood born are those who are born to weild magic, what degree done so is up to the person in question. They gain a +3 to caster levels and +3 Magic points * Note the caster level plus' do not affect the higher difficulty spells the player can cast Magic Magic is a living force and survives and grows through those who weild it. Magic alone cannot do anything in the weilder the weilder must first gain control of the magic and harness it. To do so the player must Make a 15 will save. Failing adds a +1 to the next try (must wait atleast 1 week) and has one of the following effects: 1 1d4 x level damage (nonlethal) 2 3d6 Raw energy damage in a 20 foot radius spread from the player (not effecting the player) 3. Blindness/deafness for 3 hoours 4. 1 point of permanently drained constitution 5. Summons a Lesser elemental to the area 6. Weather anomoly( ex.3 5 foot tall hurricanes) lasting 10 minutes, following the player After Harnessing the magic the player must now learn what he can do with it. He must spend a minimum of 2 weeks learning the basics of magic through trial and error unless he can find another Magi to assissest him. With another Magi's help it takes only 3 days Magic Basics Types of magic: Spell- A spell usually lasting no longer than a couple days at the most most often has an instant effect such as a fireball. Enchantment-An enchantment is a prolonged spell used to enhance a person or item in a way it usually lasts forever unless the enhancement placed on the person/item is unwound. Ritual- A ritual is a complex spell involving many hours of studying and always takes a longer time to cast than a spell or enchantment. The Ritual usually summons some kind of creature to aid the caster or bring someone back to life. Curse- A curse is what is called the "darker" part of magic. A curse is used by people to coerce or punish a person Not all curses are permanent (ex. You shall never sleep until you...) but some are. Curses are not very useful for combat situations as all curses are a passive thing only truely effecting the person after some time has passed. Major Magic aspects: Life- The aspect of magic that is drawn from and effects life, all harming and healing spells have atleast one strand of life. Life is a major part of Ritual magic no ritual is possible with out strands of life woven in. Earth- Spells dealing with rock or plants focus on earth strands. Fire- Fire is a destructive force many artillary spells use atleast a little fire. Water- Water magic is completely docile almost no attacking spells are possible with water, Water magic focus' more on defensive arts. Air- Air magic is the crudest form of magic and the most used as it uses the air around people to change properties (ex. A shield of air to block physical attacks) Death- Death magic is rarely used found in only the most horrid Rituals and curses. Its powers are used to kill another or bring undeath to be. Chaos- Chaos is what enables magic to grow and gives any spell weilded with it that extra realism (ex. An illusion woven without chaos would like like a painted picture yet one woven with would have the birds flying around and the grass flowing in the breeze) Using to much chaos can have dire consequences though. Light-Spells using the power of the sun and light can only be used by those of a good alignment. They are usually bright and angelic when cast. Shadow- Shadow magic is about the opposite of light magic, Only those who are evil aligned can use it and the powerful ones suck the light from whereever they are and cast shadowy illuminations everywhere. Minor magic aspects: There are hundreds of minor magic aspects such as heat and cold, or texture that smooth over the edges of spells, They do not need to be noted in any spell unless the spell focus' on that minor aspect instead of a major aspect ex. A heat spell that changes how warm an object is, heat becomes the major aspect instead of fire. Spell Casting: Casting spells require magic points. Magic points come from your spell craft ability. For each spellcraft point you have you have 1 magic point. (this cannot exceed class skill points for other classes, is cross class skill if multi classing) Spells use different mana points depending on the complexity of the spell. To determine how difficult a spell is Take the level of the spell (if making a new one get the opinion of the DM) and that is the difficulty rating. It costs 2 magic points per 1 diffuculty level and 1 for a cantrip. Learning spells: To learn or "make" a spell your magi must first have an idea of the spell effect he desires than he must than determine how to best use the 9 majore elements to create that effect. Ex. Making a blindness spell would use for major elements light or shadow and chaos. Spells can be learned this way taking 3 weeks per difficulty of the spell. (1 1/2 for cantrips) Learning spells from tomes. Spells and Rituals espically can be learned from tomes of another magi. Each magi who learns a spell from a book must always therefore after cast the spell from a book. Creating your own spell does not require casting it from a book. When casting a spell from a book of another magi it takes a spellcraft check of 10 +1/2 spell difficulty (rounded up) to cast each time. Failing the check means: Spells of 5th diffuculty or lower just sputter, 6th and higher backfire on the caster. Custom Magi spells (add intelligent modifier from PHB table 1-1 in a lump form excluding levels) Level of magi #of custom spells 1 3 2 6 3 9 4 12 5 15 6 18 7 21 8 24 9 27 10 30 11 33 12 36 13 39 14 42 15 45 16 48 17 51 18 54 19 57 20 60 *For each spell made over the limit amounted it costs 300exp x diffculty x #over allowed(if zero do not apply)
Voldar_Mecorthio 07-02-06, 07:35 PM	You seem to be trying to retune the arcane spellcasting system. You haven't. You have created an entirely new system of magic, like psionics or incarnum. Congratulations. My suggestion is to allow your system allong with the normal arcane system, and to fine tune your new one. For one, just throw out that "roll for ability/spark/bloodborn" thing. CLASS FEATURES SHOULD NEVER UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES BE RANDOM!! NO EXCEPTIONS!! Let your player figure out how he got his power, and leave the numbers alone. Other than that I like the idea. Like I said, refine the idea and create a class in the pattern used by most people who make custom classes. You should easily be able to find what I'm talking about. You should probibly make your own spell list for this new system, either with a mixture of existing spells or maybe make the entire spell list yourself. I encourage you to develop your idea, but in it's present state it's not ready for playtesting.