Rule change - any bad side effects?

Nils_Lindeberg · 12-27-2019, 06:51 AM

I am planning a face to face campaign and was thinking of changing the cost of spells. Mainly I would change spells that need a continuation ST cost.

I was thinking of a generic change that all those kind of spells lasts 12 turns, and the cost is base cost + 2 x continue cost. So a spell that cost 4 +2/turn, would cost 8 and then last for 12 turns (which for most practical purposes is about one fight).

The reason for this is that the spell system is basically balanced around one on one fights between wizards, but it is not balanced for a death test situation, unless the resting rules are changed. And that the most used spells are the ones with a set cost. With this system, more spells are all of a sudden interesting to pick up and I like many good choices.

A second change would be the cost of missile spells. The cost would be based on your base ST, so that there would be room for a strong mercenary wizard archetype. The maximum number of ST spent on a missile spell would be Base ST / 4 round-up. This would mean that you can only spend 1/4 of your base ST on a missile spell at the most. So 1d at ST 2-5, 2d at ST 6-9, 3d at ST 10-13, 4d at ST 14-17, 5d at 18-20. And then 1d more per 10 ST.
If you cast a missile spell at less than full power, it only costs 1 ST.

Can anyone come up with a reason that this would be skewing game balance or make some spells too powerful, or some other spells like Staff X, obsolete? I want wizards to have some staying power even at lower levels before they have started to invest in their staff or gotten hold of power stones. But I don't want them to be able to go nova either.

hcobb · 12-27-2019, 09:00 AM

If summon creature X doesn't run through X's hit points in half a minute then you're not using them right. Hence the Summon gems are one use magic items, except for that snake.

larsdangly · 12-27-2019, 09:01 AM

I don't think either of these would radically change the balance of the game, so they are unlikely to cause harm. You will reduce the average power of missile weapon spells, as pretty much no one will invest so many attribute points in ST to gain a 4 or 5 point lightning, but some wizards, particularly of smaller races, will be stuck at 2. You will effectively discourage the frequency of uses of spells that have a renewing cost, as they will seem overly expensive in situations where you only want to use their effects for a turn or so.

What is the motivation for these rules changes? They seem not dissimilar from RAW, in terms of complexity and overall effects.

Nils_Lindeberg · 12-27-2019, 09:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hcobb

If summon creature X doesn't run through X's hit points in half a minute then you're not using them right. Hence the Summon gems are one use magic items, except for that snake.

I don't quite get you here. Is it to powerful to have summon spells for the cost that I suggested, or?

Nils_Lindeberg · 12-27-2019, 09:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by larsdangly

I don't think either of these would radically change the balance of the game, so they are unlikely to cause harm. You will reduce the average power of missile weapon spells, as pretty much no one will invest so many attribute points in ST to gain a 4 or 5 point lightning, but some wizards, particularly of smaller races, will be stuck at 2. You will effectively discourage the frequency of uses of spells that have a renewing cost, as they will seem overly expensive in situations where you only want to use their effects for a turn or so.

What is the motivation for these rules changes? They seem not dissimilar from RAW, in terms of complexity and overall effects.

The first problem is that you almost never use spells for just one turn since you cast and then it might have an effect in the same turn, but most often not if your DX was low, and then it is time to renew it. If you intend to use it for two turns, then you are on equal footing with the new cost, but with the added perk of getting much more use out of it. So I don't think there will be fewer casts, but instead a lot more. In my experience, there are a very limited number of spells that see actual play on a regular basis, and the majority of them are continuation spells that are just too costly to have running until they can make a difference.

When it comes to missiles, weak casters won't get a boost, but that is because they are already very good, and it is not usually because of the missile spells. I want something that makes it worthwhile to actually be a military wizard or a gish. Someone with ST. As it stands now, ST is a complete dump stat and that, in my mind, completely breaks the balance of needing all three stats.

Some complained about Conan the wizard, but I never really bought into that. First, Conan was a Rouge and no one complained about a Rouge with 20 ST, but that is beside the point. There were plenty of wizards with power stones even when attribute bloat was a thing. And in our campaign the wizards always prioritized IQ, then DX, then ST. Only in extreme attribute bloat of 45p or more did ST become "warrior-ish" and I never saw a wizard with ST 18+. Now it definitely isn't a thing, so the reasons for maxing ST are slim. Now you get at least some power out of it that can be used on the battlefield that could motivate a mercenary wizard to put points into ST.

Instead of Molly characters that even get an indirect boost to DX from the staff spell and can cast spells based only on IQ, etc. ST for wizards needs a boost. And I don't want them to be more insta-kill deadly all around since 5d lightning bolts are no fun when used against a party. Now it will be 4d fireballs, 3d lightnings or 2d wraths at the most, or someone is casting with a very low DX since ST 14, DX12, IQ 14 characters will be rather rare. And on top of that, we have the possibility of casting 1 fatigue missiles and that puts wizards on par with damage from other weapons for that ST. So not unbalanced, but an option. And a GM can cast plenty of missile spells on the party and motivate why they are only 1d or 2d and not the normal max of 3d. The enemy is saving their ST or is already low on fatigue.

I was thinking about adding an option that if you cast at 1d level, it is free of cost, but I was afraid that would make the staff spell as a combat weapon useless. But maybe not. I am not sure. Missile spells don't work when engaged, and basic staffs only works in melee.

High DX casters already can get a boost from aim, missile weapon talent and then aim for the head. High IQ wizards have a long list of fantastic close to game-breaking spells, but hight ST wizards are not an option at all without some house rules.

Nils_Lindeberg · 12-27-2019, 09:52 AM

Another possible solution would be to allow repeated spell selection for "expertise" and "mastery" spells.
Each extra level would lower the casting cost by 1/2 round-up (minimum 1 reduction), if already at 1 it will last twice as long before you have to renew it or you roll for a 50/50 chance of not having to pay for it at all. And renewal cost will also be halved if there is one. And you would get +1 DX casting it.

This would make a party of only wizards, more diverse since they could specialize in different spells. And the expertise and mastery levels of spells could be a quest to find in itself.

And the third option is the separate fatigue track, which in practice doubles the available casting mana, but once the fatigue is gone you take real wounds.

But these options hit every spell, even the ones most often picked and cast. I would like to see some of the more odd spells used more often.

Skarg · 12-27-2019, 03:40 PM

I'm not sure I agree that there is a problem as (I think?) you perceive it. And I'm not sure this will actually have the kind of effect on wizard balance as you are hoping, but I think it will do some of the detailed things which you want, and seem reasonable to me, at least these parts:

* You'll get more player-designed ST 10 and ST 14 wizards.
* Maintained spells will be more useful for longer-term tasks.

The main "balance" and use-case consideration I see is about it now being much more feasible to use summoned creatures and various other spells for entire combats, and longer in non-combat situations. So for example:

* Protection spells will be much more desirable and likely to be on for an entire combat. Lots of Blur, Reverse Missiles, Stone Flesh, etc. With Turn Missiles available at IQ 9 now, this may be a pretty big balance tip against missile weapons.

* Some offensive spells that were already pretty effective will now last an entire combat, even low-IQ ones like Avert, Clumsiness, Confusion, Slow Movement, will now mean people are messed up for an entire combat (or until the Wizard gets taken out?) if they get hit with them.

* Similar for several other spells. Reveal Magic now means you basically see all spells being cast for the whole combat within 5 MH.

* Some spells become much more useful outside combat too: Silent Movement, Invisibility (!), Flight...

* And of course summons now lasting a minute. This makes Summon Dragon rather better, but also now you can have a ST 20 flying gargoyle for much longer, or a bear for having something with ST 30 to do things.

I can imagine more non-wizards learning a spell, not wearing armor, setting their metal weapons down, and casting a spell like Blur or Turn Missiles on themselves before picking up their weapons and entering combat.

As for balance: It seems to me that in campaign situations where a wizard can rest for a couple of hours after a fight, this does tend to make wizards stronger than warriors. And since Legacy has no casting penalty for non-wizard casters, I can see some new types of designs of characters that wouldn't work before, which some people might like but I don't think I would.

I'm noticing that ST 9 DX 13 IQ 10 has a good chance even with just Summon Myrmidon of summoning two 32-point warriors for 12 turns, for example. That seems just better than a fighter type. And, it can be added to a thief character or something.

Anyway, I'd just go through all the spells and imagine being a clever player of scheming NPC, and what the implications and (ab)uses might be...

Nils_Lindeberg · 12-27-2019, 05:44 PM

Skarg, all good points. Just the kind of feedback I was looking for.

Most of the spells you mentioned can be used in this way already, but I haven't seen it so much outside one on one duels. But a rogue with Summon Myrmidon will take out a real Myrmidon, since he can get two going, and then join the fight with 1 ST if possible after casting and reequipping. But he could do that with an illusion today almost as easilyt and even get one one or two more. So it is not a great imbalance, and now people might actually wonder if the summoning is real or not. So not a huge problem in my book, and it does allow for some heroes getting a spell or two. I am fine with that. The most common addition in our campaigns have been the extra illusion spell or Blur, since a fighter can keep it up for a fight and still end up less hurt.

But all of the buff spells cost turns to cast. So it is not always viable, and later on they might get hold of magic items that let them do it.

Slow spells might be a tad boring to have on you for a long time, but they would not be affected since they are not a cost per turn and have a set cost.

Turn missile would protect one guy, so it might be prudent to have a backup melee weapon for the archers. They usually end up in melee after a while anyway. We never saw many Reverse Missile spells, unless it was a magic item, but now we might.

Avert is a bigger problem, but often an enemy can retreat side ways away and find other targets along the way. But a 12 turn avert is very serious CC spell.

I do like the implications of utility spells outside combats, or the possibility of riding your summoned dragon into combat though.

But most of these problems will arise if the enemies have fully charged staffs or power stones. And I hate to give enemy spell casters a bunch of gear to make them cast cool spells. And it is also very boring to be a wizard that only casts one standard spell per fight and then do nothing more or less. Even staff fighting can be taxing in a long fight. In campaign games, you either fight on different days or you fight several encounters in rapid succession. I am not used to fight, rest for an hour or two, fight again, rince and reapeat.

And if a person wants to cast reveal magic, I am fine with them seeing things for the whole fight. They did sacrifice a turn or two and mana to get it started. I have never seen that spell outside of arena fights where you could precast a spell or two before entering.

And fighters with blur on them, it is already a thing, but not super effective. It takes time to prepare, you lose precious turns, you almost never cast it silently as a fighter and reequipping will take time. So I think it is pretty balanced. I would guess you could get it going every other fight or so.

I will try to go through all spells and check. But thanks for your input it gave me a few things to consider. And I have some other house rules that might clash with this one too. Hmm.

Anthony · 12-27-2019, 05:48 PM

A risk of significant duration beneficial spells is the rise of pre-combat buffing, where you are neutralizing the normal action cost of casting spells by casting it before the fight really starts (for example, in an ambush situation). This was a severe issue in D&D 3.x, resulting in extreme nerfs to spell maintenance in 4th and 5th editions.

Nils_Lindeberg · 12-27-2019, 06:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anthony

A risk of significant duration beneficial spells is the rise of pre-combat buffing, where you are neutralizing the normal action cost of casting spells by casting it before the fight really starts (for example, in an ambush situation). This was a severe issue in D&D 3.x, resulting in extreme nerfs to spell maintenance in 4th and 5th editions.

Hmm, a very good point. Hmm.

Often pre buffing will be hampered by circumstance, but when it is not, it will be a one-sided encounter. And players really hate it when the enemies do the same things to them.

This problem might come up more often now that we have mana staffs and power stones with RAW, but it will be after a while. And then we will also have a bunch of magic items that can be used. I wonder how much impact it will have at lower XP levels.

Maybe one can compensate by having fewer wizards in general, which was one thing I had planned on anyway. And fewer magic items, since the prices would be higher and I wanted horse and steel to rule the battlefield in this particular campaign. The problem in high-level D&D is that a lot of characters, sometimes the whole party were casters, and many buffs affected the whole party, and for different length of time.

I will definitely keep this in mind. Instead of people having always on magic items or activating magic items as a free action or an action when buffing, they now have to stand in line for a "blessing" from the wizard before a fight. It might be an even trade of sorts.

But a very good point. Buff fests before every fight are not that much fun. But a new wizard archetype will be available, the buffer/bard/support wizard, instead of the summoner, attack wizard. And I do like new archetypes. More choice is always refreshing. :-D

12-27-2019, 06:51 AM	#1
Nils_Lindeberg Join Date: Jul 2018	Rule change - any bad side effects? I am planning a face to face campaign and was thinking of changing the cost of spells. Mainly I would change spells that need a continuation ST cost. I was thinking of a generic change that all those kind of spells lasts 12 turns, and the cost is base cost + 2 x continue cost. So a spell that cost 4 +2/turn, would cost 8 and then last for 12 turns (which for most practical purposes is about one fight). The reason for this is that the spell system is basically balanced around one on one fights between wizards, but it is not balanced for a death test situation, unless the resting rules are changed. And that the most used spells are the ones with a set cost. With this system, more spells are all of a sudden interesting to pick up and I like many good choices. A second change would be the cost of missile spells. The cost would be based on your base ST, so that there would be room for a strong mercenary wizard archetype. The maximum number of ST spent on a missile spell would be Base ST / 4 round-up. This would mean that you can only spend 1/4 of your base ST on a missile spell at the most. So 1d at ST 2-5, 2d at ST 6-9, 3d at ST 10-13, 4d at ST 14-17, 5d at 18-20. And then 1d more per 10 ST. If you cast a missile spell at less than full power, it only costs 1 ST. Can anyone come up with a reason that this would be skewing game balance or make some spells too powerful, or some other spells like Staff X, obsolete? I want wizards to have some staying power even at lower levels before they have started to invest in their staff or gotten hold of power stones. But I don't want them to be able to go nova either.

12-27-2019, 09:00 AM	#2
hcobb Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Pacheco, California	Re: Rule change - any bad side effects? If summon creature X doesn't run through X's hit points in half a minute then you're not using them right. Hence the Summon gems are one use magic items, except for that snake. __________________ -HJC

12-27-2019, 09:01 AM	#3
larsdangly Join Date: Dec 2017	Re: Rule change - any bad side effects? I don't think either of these would radically change the balance of the game, so they are unlikely to cause harm. You will reduce the average power of missile weapon spells, as pretty much no one will invest so many attribute points in ST to gain a 4 or 5 point lightning, but some wizards, particularly of smaller races, will be stuck at 2. You will effectively discourage the frequency of uses of spells that have a renewing cost, as they will seem overly expensive in situations where you only want to use their effects for a turn or so. What is the motivation for these rules changes? They seem not dissimilar from RAW, in terms of complexity and overall effects.

12-27-2019, 09:52 AM	#6
Nils_Lindeberg Join Date: Jul 2018	Re: Rule change - any bad side effects? Another possible solution would be to allow repeated spell selection for "expertise" and "mastery" spells. Each extra level would lower the casting cost by 1/2 round-up (minimum 1 reduction), if already at 1 it will last twice as long before you have to renew it or you roll for a 50/50 chance of not having to pay for it at all. And renewal cost will also be halved if there is one. And you would get +1 DX casting it. This would make a party of only wizards, more diverse since they could specialize in different spells. And the expertise and mastery levels of spells could be a quest to find in itself. And the third option is the separate fatigue track, which in practice doubles the available casting mana, but once the fatigue is gone you take real wounds. But these options hit every spell, even the ones most often picked and cast. I would like to see some of the more odd spells used more often.

12-27-2019, 03:40 PM	#7
Skarg Join Date: May 2015	Re: Rule change - any bad side effects? I'm not sure I agree that there is a problem as (I think?) you perceive it. And I'm not sure this will actually have the kind of effect on wizard balance as you are hoping, but I think it will do some of the detailed things which you want, and seem reasonable to me, at least these parts: * You'll get more player-designed ST 10 and ST 14 wizards. * Maintained spells will be more useful for longer-term tasks. The main "balance" and use-case consideration I see is about it now being much more feasible to use summoned creatures and various other spells for entire combats, and longer in non-combat situations. So for example: * Protection spells will be much more desirable and likely to be on for an entire combat. Lots of Blur, Reverse Missiles, Stone Flesh, etc. With Turn Missiles available at IQ 9 now, this may be a pretty big balance tip against missile weapons. * Some offensive spells that were already pretty effective will now last an entire combat, even low-IQ ones like Avert, Clumsiness, Confusion, Slow Movement, will now mean people are messed up for an entire combat (or until the Wizard gets taken out?) if they get hit with them. * Similar for several other spells. Reveal Magic now means you basically see all spells being cast for the whole combat within 5 MH. * Some spells become much more useful outside combat too: Silent Movement, Invisibility (!), Flight... * And of course summons now lasting a minute. This makes Summon Dragon rather better, but also now you can have a ST 20 flying gargoyle for much longer, or a bear for having something with ST 30 to do things. I can imagine more non-wizards learning a spell, not wearing armor, setting their metal weapons down, and casting a spell like Blur or Turn Missiles on themselves before picking up their weapons and entering combat. As for balance: It seems to me that in campaign situations where a wizard can rest for a couple of hours after a fight, this does tend to make wizards stronger than warriors. And since Legacy has no casting penalty for non-wizard casters, I can see some new types of designs of characters that wouldn't work before, which some people might like but I don't think I would. I'm noticing that ST 9 DX 13 IQ 10 has a good chance even with just Summon Myrmidon of summoning two 32-point warriors for 12 turns, for example. That seems just better than a fighter type. And, it can be added to a thief character or something. Anyway, I'd just go through all the spells and imagine being a clever player of scheming NPC, and what the implications and (ab)uses might be...

12-27-2019, 05:44 PM	#8
Nils_Lindeberg Join Date: Jul 2018	Re: Rule change - any bad side effects? Skarg, all good points. Just the kind of feedback I was looking for. Most of the spells you mentioned can be used in this way already, but I haven't seen it so much outside one on one duels. But a rogue with Summon Myrmidon will take out a real Myrmidon, since he can get two going, and then join the fight with 1 ST if possible after casting and reequipping. But he could do that with an illusion today almost as easilyt and even get one one or two more. So it is not a great imbalance, and now people might actually wonder if the summoning is real or not. So not a huge problem in my book, and it does allow for some heroes getting a spell or two. I am fine with that. The most common addition in our campaigns have been the extra illusion spell or Blur, since a fighter can keep it up for a fight and still end up less hurt. But all of the buff spells cost turns to cast. So it is not always viable, and later on they might get hold of magic items that let them do it. Slow spells might be a tad boring to have on you for a long time, but they would not be affected since they are not a cost per turn and have a set cost. Turn missile would protect one guy, so it might be prudent to have a backup melee weapon for the archers. They usually end up in melee after a while anyway. We never saw many Reverse Missile spells, unless it was a magic item, but now we might. Avert is a bigger problem, but often an enemy can retreat side ways away and find other targets along the way. But a 12 turn avert is very serious CC spell. I do like the implications of utility spells outside combats, or the possibility of riding your summoned dragon into combat though. But most of these problems will arise if the enemies have fully charged staffs or power stones. And I hate to give enemy spell casters a bunch of gear to make them cast cool spells. And it is also very boring to be a wizard that only casts one standard spell per fight and then do nothing more or less. Even staff fighting can be taxing in a long fight. In campaign games, you either fight on different days or you fight several encounters in rapid succession. I am not used to fight, rest for an hour or two, fight again, rince and reapeat. And if a person wants to cast reveal magic, I am fine with them seeing things for the whole fight. They did sacrifice a turn or two and mana to get it started. I have never seen that spell outside of arena fights where you could precast a spell or two before entering. And fighters with blur on them, it is already a thing, but not super effective. It takes time to prepare, you lose precious turns, you almost never cast it silently as a fighter and reequipping will take time. So I think it is pretty balanced. I would guess you could get it going every other fight or so. I will try to go through all spells and check. But thanks for your input it gave me a few things to consider. And I have some other house rules that might clash with this one too. Hmm.

12-27-2019, 05:48 PM	#9
Anthony Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Berkeley, CA	Re: Rule change - any bad side effects? A risk of significant duration beneficial spells is the rise of pre-combat buffing, where you are neutralizing the normal action cost of casting spells by casting it before the fight really starts (for example, in an ambush situation). This was a severe issue in D&D 3.x, resulting in extreme nerfs to spell maintenance in 4th and 5th editions. __________________ My GURPS site and Blog.