ToM Question

[Bob]

My friends keep talking about truenamers, I think it's in the tome of magic but I don't have that book. I think I remember hearing it was bad :smalleek:. So if anyone has any game experience with truenamers, or has read that part of the ToM, what are they, and why are they bad? :smallconfused:

[Heatwizard]

Someone analyzed one as he played it, and results were underwhelming at best. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=114269)

The gist of it is, they've got things similar to spells at will, which seems good, until you look at all the restrictions. You have to make a Truespeech check DC of (some flat number) + (the ECL of the target x2), and since you can only sink one rank into a skill every level, and DCs will, on average, go up by two every level, you will eventually be outpaced and simply not be able to stick an effect to anything, including your own allies. You can't have two instances of the same spell running at any given time, so you can only buff one ally, or debuff one enemy(and that's IF you can get it to stick). AND, if that wasn't enough, every time you do succeed at getting a spell to stick to a target, that spell gets +2 added to the DC for the rest of the day.

Now, you can brute force your way over these hurdles with a fair amount of gold invested, but beyond the difficulty inherit in actually exercising your class features is the fact that none of the spells you get are really very good. There's a couple that might make you stroke your chin and say "Hm", but nothing that really justifies grappling with the rest of the class to get.

So basically, you have to optimize as hard as you can to even use your abilities in the first place, and the payoff is mediocre at best. It's a waste of levels in a special kind of way no other class comes close to.

[Zaq]

I'm that "someone." The thread's already been linked to. If you have any specific questions, ask away.

[Rogue Shadows]

What's the quickest, cleanest way to fix the truenamer?

[Lord_Gareth]

What's the quickest, cleanest way to fix the truenamer?

Hit the "Search" button up on the forum tools and look for Kellus's truenaming fix, then implement it at your table immediately.

[BillyBobJoe]

I played a Truenamer as well *shudder*, but I can't tell you much because most of what I did was follow Zaq's suggestions.

[Zaq]

Hit the "Search" button up on the forum tools and look for Kellus's truenaming fix, then implement it at your table immediately.

I am officially neutral when it comes to comparing Kellus's fix vs. Kyeudo's fix, but I will say that Kyeudo's fix is probably "cleaner," in that it is more directly based on the ToM 'namer.


I played a Truenamer as well *shudder*, but I can't tell you much because most of what I did was follow Zaq's suggestions.

How'd that work out for you? Forgive me if I've asked you this already.

[Bob]

Someone analyzed one as he played it, and results were underwhelming at best. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=114269)


Wow, this is well done, and exactly what I was looking for, ty Zaq and ty Heatwizard for conjuring Zaq. what a bizarre mechanic, its almost like leveling in reverse, to nil. anyway, I'm off to absorb this thread.
:smallcool:

[BillyBobJoe]

How'd that work out for you? Forgive me if I've asked you this already.

I died in the second encounter. Horribly. That was not my fault though, as I GOT CRITICALED 3 TIMES IN A ROW!!! She worked fairly well in the first fight, but it ended really quick. It was mostly a plot fight to introduce our newest PC.

[Psyren]

I am officially neutral when it comes to comparing Kellus's fix vs. Kyeudo's fix, but I will say that Kyeudo's fix is probably "cleaner," in that it is more directly based on the ToM 'namer.

I'm not neutral at all, and am distinctly biased in that Kyeudo added me to the credits :smallwink: Regardless, I still prefer his fix for the reason Zaq stated.

[Big Fau]

Hit the "Search" button up on the forum tools and look for Kellus's truenaming fix, then implement it at your table immediately.

There's a search function here? On a vBulletin board?


You mean to tell me they didn't just hotlink that button to Google like everyone else does?

[Psyren]

There's a search function here? On a vBulletin board?


You mean to tell me they didn't just hotlink that button to Google like everyone else does?

1) You can do that yourself just by searching with "site:giantitp.com" from Google.

2) Google isn't so good at finding, say, posts by a particular user - if you punch their name in, you'll get both posts they made and posts that mention them.

[Divide by Zero]

What's the quickest, cleanest way to fix the truenamer?

Make utterances usable at will and cut out the LoS. Probably not the best fix, but it's fast and easy and makes them playable without breaking anything until you get gate, at which point balance is pretty much a lost cause anyway.

[Psyren]

Make utterances usable at will and cut out the LoS. Probably not the best fix, but it's fast and easy and makes them playable without breaking anything until you get gate, at which point balance is pretty much a lost cause anyway.

I think you've said this before but I still don't get it; Utterances are already usable at-will. Do you mean removing the skill check? That's the core of the class' crunch and fluff.

[Kobold-Bard]

What's the quickest, cleanest way to fix the truenamer?

Use Kyeudo's Fix (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=120488). Then smile.

I used it for a PbP game, and it worked really nicely.

[Divide by Zero]

I think you've said this before but I still don't get it; Utterances are already usable at-will. Do you mean removing the skill check? That's the core of the class' crunch and fluff.

Yes, that's what I meant. If you wanted to keep that fluff, I guess you could reduce it to "Remove both laws," because the same word becoming progressively harder to say as you use it makes no sense anyway.

[MeeposFire]

My "fix" involves making the checks for the utterance of the mind more like the other type the utterance of the perfect map (assuming you got the update that actually has the formula). Only the utterance of the mind has the check based on CR. I like making the check based on the level of the utterance as in the bigger the effect the more difficult it it to do (which is how the perfect map works). I also eliminate the roll in my system though I could add it back in if I change my formula DC from 5+(level*2) to 15+(level*2) (I do not use the law of resistance I want these to be alternate fluff invocations). This also eliminates the constant asking for the CR of the creature to get the DC (or having the DM figuring it out).

[Lans]

Make utterances usable at will and cut out the LoS. Probably not the best fix, but it's fast and easy and makes them playable without breaking anything until you get gate, at which point balance is pretty much a lost cause anyway.

I would keep the checks for the item and area ones.

[Fox Box Socks]

The problem with just axing the Law of Sequence is that the Truespeak DC is still broken. At the end of the day, the DC goes up by 2 every level and you can only sink 1 skill point into it, and it was base 15 to begin with. Once you've exhausted Skill Focuses and Amulets of the Silver Tongue, you're out of luck unless your DM is willing to play ball.

But even with that, the Utterances are still garbage. There is no Utterance equivalent to Gate or Disintegration or Contingency or any of the other mid to high level goodies traditional casters get.

[Zaq]

The problem with just axing the Law of Sequence is that the Truespeak DC is still broken. At the end of the day, the DC goes up by 2 every level and you can only sink 1 skill point into it, and it was base 15 to begin with. Once you've exhausted Skill Focuses and Amulets of the Silver Tongue, you're out of luck unless your DM is willing to play ball.

But even with that, the Utterances are still garbage. There is no Utterance equivalent to Gate or Disintegration or Contingency or any of the other mid to high level goodies traditional casters get.

And before anyone says it, no, Conjunctive Gate doesn't friggin' count. If you suck at level 19 and rule at level 20, you're still a weak class.

[TurtleKing]

@Fox Box Socks: Sounds like you didn't see Spell Rebirth and its reversed. Spell Rebirth undispels a spell while the reversed dispels regardless of CL. Yes you read that right CL doesn't matter! This is granted that no errata as come out to change that.

The fluff for the class is great, but the mechanics and lack of advancement in the PrCs sucks.

[MeeposFire]

The problem with just axing the Law of Sequence is that the Truespeak DC is still broken. At the end of the day, the DC goes up by 2 every level and you can only sink 1 skill point into it, and it was base 15 to begin with. Once you've exhausted Skill Focuses and Amulets of the Silver Tongue, you're out of luck unless your DM is willing to play ball.

But even with that, the Utterances are still garbage. There is no Utterance equivalent to Gate or Disintegration or Contingency or any of the other mid to high level goodies traditional casters get.

Why compare it to classes that many people consider too good? Shouldn't you be comparing it to things like tier 3 or 4 classes which are considered more the baseline (particularly tier 3).

[Lans]

The problem with just axing the Law of Sequence is that the Truespeak DC is still broken. At the end of the day, the DC goes up by 2 every level and you can only sink 1 skill point into it, and it was base 15 to begin with. Once you've exhausted Skill Focuses and Amulets of the Silver Tongue, you're out of luck unless your DM is willing to play ball.

But even with that, the Utterances are still garbage. There is no Utterance equivalent to Gate or Disintegration or Contingency or any of the other mid to high level goodies traditional casters get.

Solid Fog?

[Rogue Shadows]

Why compare it to classes that many people consider too good? Shouldn't you be comparing it to things like tier 3 or 4 classes which are considered more the baseline (particularly tier 3).

Agreed. Classes should be measured against the average, not the exceptional.

Mind, even with the average, Truenamer doesn't work...but that's what this forum is for.

[NecroRick]

What's the quickest, cleanest way to fix the truenamer?

Thats easy.

Simply refluff an artificer. If you get really excited, rename UMD to Truespeak. But, that'd take effort and stuff.

What, you didn't think the very words of creation that bind everyone and everything together would be quick and easy to say did you? Some of them could take *weeks*. :D

[NecroRick]

The problem with just axing the Law of Sequence is that the Truespeak DC is still broken.


Just in case you forgot:
Law of Sequence - have to wait for the duration on an utterance to expire before you can use it again
Law of Resistance - DC goes up by 2 after succeeding on a Truename check for your next attempt at that same utterance (other utterances are unaffected)

Changing the law of sequence isn't going to do much - most utterances have a duration of 5 rounds, and so you're just going to cycle through your best 5 utterances, so from level 4 onwards you're not going to have 'wasted' rounds where you can't do anything (lvl 4 is the first lvl at which you have 5 utterances unless you you a feat to get more?)

Eliminating it would simply mean the player would spam the best one, then when the die roll required actually gets above 0 they switch to their second best one etc. Maybe eliminating the law of sequence improves low-level play, but to me it sounds like it would make high level play more brainless.



At the end of the day, the DC goes up by 2 every level and you can only sink 1 skill point into it, and it was base 15 to begin with. Once you've exhausted Skill Focuses and Amulets of the Silver Tongue, you're out of luck unless your DM is willing to play ball.


Oh please. Someone trots this tired old line out every single time the Truenamer is mentioned, but 'somehow', 'magically', by some 'miraculous intervention', for any other class even the most trivial amount of effort can achieve ridiculously high skill DCs.

From a game design point of view it makes sense to have it increase by at least 1, because the character is going to put a rank in every time they go up a level.

How much more than 1 though is a matter of conjecture. An additional 1 per level doesn't seem especially hard to get from somewhere, every 8 levels you'd get an additional +1 simply from stats. Then there's feats for which you might be able to get say a +2. And you get an extra feat every 3 levels...

Lets look at the numbers.
Lets say you're level 1 and you're going to cast word of nurturing, minor on yourself.

DC = 15 + 2x your HD (1) + 2 = 19
15 : known personal truename -4
11 : You have 4 ranks in Truespeak
8 : You have an Int of 17 (+3)

With no further modifiers you need to roll an 8 or higher. You can cast Word of Nurturing Minor on yourself 6x per day. Once the DC gets to the 16+ range (and assuming it's in between fights) you can take 20...

Now lets say you hit level 3. Congrats, you just bought Craft Wondrous Item, and made yourself a lesser amulet of the silver tongue for a bargain price of 1,250gp. How do those numbers stack up now?
DC 15 + 2x3 + 2 = 23
19 : known personal truename -4
13 : You have 6 ranks in Truespeak
10 : You have an Int of 17 (+3)
5 : for item (+5)

Huh. It's actually getting easier. Who would have thought that this was possible in a system with a vast multitude of ways of increasing skill ranks???

Lets look at the other end of the scale: say you've got yourself a level 20 Truenamer. DC to do something to himself is 15 + 40 + 2 right?
57 is the target
53 : known personal truename -4
30 : we get 23 from skill ranks
20 : we get 10 from the greater amulet
10 : we get 10 from 'feats' (I dunno, be creative, make up a feat called Cunning Linguist that can be taken multiple times and stack with itself) (and then shove the rest of your feats into toughness, I don't care) (if not feats then insert other sources of bonuses here, e.g. masterwork tools (mouthwash of +2 circumstance bonus or whatever))
4: Assuming we started at 17 intelligence we get 5 increases to that, so our int will be 22 for a +6 modifier
1: Then we get another +6 to int from a headband of intellect, for +3 more

So without further shenanigans the DC is 1

Okay, what can we do with it? Well right now, we have 29 utterances that we can 'cast' with no chance of failure. Then after that, we have (the same) 29 utterances that will succeed on a 3 or more.

But wait! What happens if we spot the item creation rules for making items which grant a competence bonus to a skill? The amulet of the silver tongue grants an enhancement bonus, so they stack! Great! Let's whip up one of these bad boys, and now the target DC starts at -9, so we can use each of our 29 utterances an additional 5x per day! (An extra 145 utterances! Even if you started breaking the action economy you'd have trouble using all of those most days, let alone your regular ~290 utterances) Makes rings of wizardry look kind of weak-sauce.

For the sake of easy math, let's say you've picked up an extra utterance, so you have 30. And for your regular allotment you can do 150 total before the die roll required hits 10. And now every additional +10 gives you an extra 150 per day. Crafted a magic item? You're at 300 utterances per day. Joined a secret society? You're at 450 utterances per day.

Ding! Surely this turkey (of an argument) is well and truly [sic] done by now?

The numbers do not lie, and the numbers say the increasing DCs and Law of Resistance are really not as bad as they first look.

Oh? What's that? You want more? I'll give you more:

There's an utterance that gives you +5 to a skill check (preternatural clarity)... including Truespeak

If the (effective) DC is far enough negative you can Extend or Empower your utterance for free (if you take the corresponding feat of course). Only when it creeps back up into positives do you need to stop doing it. But if you can do it N times for one utterance, you can do it N times for *all* your utterances...



But even with that, the Utterances are still garbage. There is no Utterance equivalent to Gate or Disintegration or Contingency or any of the other mid to high level goodies traditional casters get.

That is a fair point, but (from a 'balance' point of view)they are under-powered because you can use many more of them. It's the same game design approach that ensures that the Warlock's at-will powers all pretty much suck compared to any one-off Wizard spell from equivalent level characters.

Accordingly, in effectiveness terms, the Truenamer's utterances should sit somewhere in between the tier 1 caster's spells, and the Warlock's invocations.

Taking a wild stab in the dark, I'd say they probably don't... but that is because WoTC is the game design equivalent of drunken monkeys on crack.

[Xtomjames]

Might I point out that a Truenamer's abilities can still be boosted by spell penetration and greater spell penetration. Any metamagic feat can also be used with truenamer abilities.

Also as I understand it, once a truename is learned the DC goes down.

The truenamer class has the potential to be the most powerful spell caster in game if done correctly.

[TurtleKing]

Interesting math there, interesting.

[The Dark Fiddler]

The truenamer class has the potential to be the most powerful spell caster in game if done correctly.

No it doesn't; are you missing the part where all of the utterances save one or two are completely lackluster?

[Psyren]

Any metamagic feat can also be used with truenamer abilities.

This is incorrect: SLAs cannot be used with metamagic. You need Meta-SLAs instead, or Meta-Utterances.



The truenamer class has the potential to be the most powerful spell caster in game if done correctly.

Nah, other classes can get Gate at-will without a pesky skill-check that gets harder every time they do it.

Truenamer can do some pretty unique things though. Spell Rebirth is the most common one, as well as refilling potions and such.

[Lans]

@ Necrorock- Boosting intelligence neglects charisma, which means DCs will suffer.

[Rogue Shadows]

@ Necrorock- Boosting intelligence neglects charisma, which means DCs will suffer.

Cloak of Charisma much?

[Lans]

Cloak of Charisma much?
Still 3 pts behind were he should be.

[MeeposFire]

Saving throws are not much of an issue for a truenamer. They use a binder like save progression of 10+1/2TNL+cha so secondary cha should be fine especially with items. In addition a lot of what you do will not involve saves. The best way to use a truenamer is to trouble shoot.

1. Somebody stuck in a web or ruin a melee monsters turn-inertia surge it (no save by the way).

2. You can buff or penalize creatures with various utterences.

3. Cause or eliminate status effects

4. Give you extra attacks

There are a lot of useful and interesting effects in the list. You won't be beating wizards but you can be a useful part of the party if your abilities were truly at will (on the lexicon of the mind) and are making constant use of the quicken ability. Granted doing this in RAW takes way too much effort (heck without DM help in custom items I doubt it can be done to this level of effectiveness) since using this much effort you would have a chord bard with crazy shenanigans.

[Rogue Shadows]

Still 3 pts behind were he should be.

Get an Efreeti in your debt for a wish, read a tome, and...

...um...

Roll well.

[Psyren]

Roll well.

This is generally the solution for MAD classes, which is why it doesn't work too well.

[Rogue Shadows]

This is generally the solution for MAD classes, which is why it doesn't work too well.

Well, it's all I could think up for that extra CHA-boost.

[Lans]

It makes me either want to take a marshal dip or to avoid effects that give saves

[Divide by Zero]

In addition a lot of what you do will not involve saves. The best way to use a truenamer is to trouble shoot.

1. Somebody stuck in a web or ruin a melee monsters turn-inertia surge it (no save by the way).

2. You can buff or penalize creatures with various utterences.

3. Cause or eliminate status effects

4. Give you extra attacks

Don't forget Spell Rebirth. Truenamers are best at supporting the real casters.

[sreservoir]

truenamers don't actually need to force saves for their best effects, though charisma does help with UMD, which is actually quite nice.

[MeeposFire]

Don't forget Spell Rebirth. Truenamers are best at supporting the real casters.

Very true I just wasn't trying to make my list complete as there are way to many things a truenamer could do.