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View Full Version : Is there a "Lesser Quicken" feat?



Flame of Anor
2010-08-02, 04:44 PM
It would make casting the spell a move action, not a swift action.

Jack_Simth
2010-08-02, 05:05 PM
It would make casting the spell a move action, not a swift action.
I'm guessing 3.5?

There very well *shouldn't* be. It'd hurt the action economy too much, and make casters even stronger compared to the rest. Currently, you can get off a single good spell in a round. With Quicken Spell, you can get off a second (you can also get off minor spells that are designed to be... minor, swift actions), but then you're either using a spell four spell levels lower, making a rather hefty investment into the 3/day Rod of Quicken Spell, or picking up some of a set of fairly specific feats and PrC's.

A 'lesser quicken' would be broken, as you'd get even more actions in a round.

WarKitty
2010-08-02, 05:07 PM
There is sudden quicken which lets you quicken a spell once per day for free.

aeauseth
2010-08-02, 05:09 PM
I think your out of luck for the feat. There is a sudden quicken, but the prereqs are horrible.

Check out the Circlet of Rapid Casting from the MIC. It's about 15k and allows a low level quickened spell a few times a day (don't recall the exact details).

FMArthur
2010-08-02, 05:50 PM
There is sudden quicken which lets you quicken a spell once per day for free after taking every feat in the book it was printed.

Fixed that for you. :smallwink:

Sudden Quicken may as well not exist, it's such an enormous waste - you probably couldn't even trick a new player into getting it. Metamagic rods are also wasteful of resources, but much less so. Metamagic spell level reducers from classes and feats are generally the way to go if you want to quicken a lot. Psions generally have a much easier time casting multiple spells in one round than any other casters, requiring little to no book-diving to pull it off. Paladins have a feat that lets them do all of their spells Swift. Clerics can reduce metamagic the easiest, with Divine Metamagic running off of Turn attempts (which are easy to get). Anyone who can Polymorph can be a Choker to get an extra action a round.

Actually, I should stop. There are tons and tons of ways to break the action economy with spells, but there are very, very few things that let you cast as a move action.

Prime32
2010-08-02, 07:16 PM
Some spells have "swift" versions (eg. swift haste) which are a swift action to cast but only last 1 round. Most of them are the same level as their base.

The Shadowmind
2010-08-02, 07:23 PM
There is the rapid spell metamagic that turns a full round spell to a standard, a multi-round spell to a full round, a multiple minute spell to one minute, or a mutiple hour spell to one hours for +1 spell-slot. From Complete Divine.

Popertop
2010-08-02, 09:12 PM
I'm guessing 3.5?

There very well *shouldn't* be. It'd hurt the action economy too much, and make casters even stronger compared to the rest. Currently, you can get off a single good spell in a round. With Quicken Spell, you can get off a second (you can also get off minor spells that are designed to be... minor, swift actions), but then you're either using a spell four spell levels lower, making a rather hefty investment into the 3/day Rod of Quicken Spell, or picking up some of a set of fairly specific feats and PrC's.

A 'lesser quicken' would be broken, as you'd get even more actions in a round.

I would place restrictions on it, like, you can't cast a lesser quickened spell the same round you cast a quickened spell, and some other business.
A lesser quickened spell uses up a spell slot two levels higher than normal.

Tequila Sunrise
2010-08-02, 09:21 PM
I would place restrictions on it, like, you can't cast a lesser quickened spell the same round you cast a quickened spell, and some other business.
A lesser quickened spell uses up a spell slot two levels higher than normal.
+1. Lesser quickened = quickened, for the purpose of spells/round, so ya can't cram a third spell into your nova. +2 spell level makes it a fun and feasible feat until you can retrain it into regular Quicken.

Honestly, I'd be ecstatic if a player wanted a feat like this. It's much more balanced than PrCing for metamagic reducers or stocking up on metamagic rods.

Jack_Simth
2010-08-02, 09:24 PM
I would place restrictions on it, like, you can't cast a lesser quickened spell the same round you cast a quickened spell, and some other business.
A lesser quickened spell uses up a spell slot two levels higher than normal.Still heavily abusable. With Quickened Spells at a +4 adjustment, when you cast your 'secondary spell', your opponent can... pretty much ignore it, really. At 11th level, you can blast someone with Flesh to Stone, and then Dimension Door away if it doesn't take him down. And that's... Core+This. Without Lesser Quicken, you have to wait another 4 levels (15th) to pull this off.

Oh, and I'm assuming using Lesser Quicken also prevents you from using "regular" swift-action spells, right?

Marnath
2010-08-02, 09:24 PM
There is the rapid spell metamagic that turns a full round spell to a standard, a multi-round spell to a full round, a multiple minute spell to one minute, or a mutiple hour spell to one hours for +1 spell-slot. From Complete Divine.

No it doesn't :smallconfused: Rapid metamagic gets rid of the increased casting time from spontaneous casting of metamagic.

*edit reading comprehension fail. I'm thinking of a different feat.

lsfreak
2010-08-02, 09:29 PM
I would place restrictions on it, like, you can't cast a lesser quickened spell the same round you cast a quickened spell, and some other business.
A lesser quickened spell uses up a spell slot two levels higher than normal.

It'd need to be at least +3. Casters barely use their move actions as it is, so the difference between swift and move actions is generally negligible.

In fact... move actions might even be better, since swift actions are usable for other things (item activates are often swift). I'd probably pin a spell as a move action at +5 with a restriction of 2 spells/round.

arguskos
2010-08-02, 09:32 PM
Actually, yes, there is, but not in official WotC sources. In the Warcraft d20, there is the Hasten Spell feat. It's a +2 increase and can only be used on spells of 1 standard action.

Frankly, I think it's probably pretty breakable, and so don't recommend it personally, but there you have it. Something does exist, just not in WotC sources.

Emmerask
2010-08-02, 09:36 PM
If you want to cast more then two spells / round use the spellmatrix line of spells (I think in magic of faerun book), though they have some restrictions :smallsmile:

lsfreak
2010-08-02, 09:38 PM
If you want to cast more then two spells / round use the spellmatrix line of spells, though they have some restrictions :smallsmile:

Arcane Fusion and Greater Arcane Fusion work too - 5th level slot to cast a 4th and 1st level, or 8th level slot for a 7th and 4th. Arcane Spellsurge + Metamagic works as well. They're sorcerer-only, though.

jiriku
2010-08-02, 09:54 PM
There is no lesser quicken, but Repeat Spell, Split Ray, Chain Spell, Widen Spell, and Sculpt Spell can all fulfill that function by allowing your one spell to affect more targets for between a +1 to +3 spell level adjustment. If your spell would normally affect X targets, and applying one of these feats can allow you to affect X * 2 targets, that's as good as casting the spell twice, and you've only spent one spell slot too. Applying Empower Spell to a spell that's been Split or Twinned is also a lot like casting it twice.

ericgrau
2010-08-02, 09:57 PM
It still gives 2 spells per round so it'd be almost as good as a full quicken. It should add at least 3 levels to the spell, assuming it's not so close in power to a full quicken that the feat is disallowed. I mean moving is kind of nice, but how often do casters really need to?

PId6
2010-08-02, 11:14 PM
I'd say either +5 or (better yet) nonexistent. In core, quicken is better, since there's nothing else you can use swift actions for besides Feather Fall, but once you get out of core swift actions become far more important than move actions. Spellcasters have a very hard time making move actions useful for something besides moving (archivist's Dark Knowledge is the only one that comes to mind immediately), so this is pretty much more actions for little cost. Not something that should exist.

Now, if it costed both a move action and a swift action, I can see it as a +3 or a (very strong) +2.

Tequila Sunrise
2010-08-02, 11:40 PM
It still gives 2 spells per round so it'd be almost as good as a full quicken. It should add at least 3 levels to the spell, assuming it's not so close in power to a full quicken that the feat is disallowed. I mean moving is kind of nice, but how often do casters really need to?
I guess that depends on how aggressive your DM is.

Andion Isurand
2010-08-02, 11:59 PM
I'd say either +5 or (better yet) nonexistent. In core, quicken is better, since there's nothing else you can use swift actions for besides Feather Fall, but once you get out of core swift actions become far more important than move actions. Spellcasters have a very hard time making move actions useful for something besides moving (archivist's Dark Knowledge is the only one that comes to mind immediately), so this is pretty much more actions for little cost. Not something that should exist.

Now, if it costed both a move action and a swift action, I can see it as a +3 or a (very strong) +2.

...like trying to use Cloak Dance with my move action while mounted?

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=162758

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Arcane Fusion and Greater Arcane Fusion work too - 5th level slot to cast a 4th and 1st level, or 8th level slot for a 7th and 4th. Arcane Spellsurge + Metamagic works as well. They're sorcerer-only, though.

Arcane Spellsurge is Sor/Wiz

Milskidasith
2010-08-03, 12:09 AM
The suggested feat (move action spellcasting) is quite possibly better than quicken, and probably shouldn't exist; casters don't need a power boost.

Psyx
2010-08-03, 05:51 AM
Casters are clearly rubbish, so need something else to make them better.



Try Impromptu Metamagic from Dragon. Coupled with quicken, you'd get one free quicken a day. With easy metamagic, you'd get two.

Runestar
2010-08-03, 07:20 AM
Still seems a little too strong, as casters don't really have any need for their move action, and this allows them to cast 2 spells each round much more cheaply. :smallannoyed: