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View Full Version : A Book of Words: An Expanded Truenamer Fix [PEACH]



Kyeudo
2011-10-05, 12:13 AM
As everyone who has ever tried to use the Truenamer from the Tome of Magic knows, Truename Magic as written does not work. Unless you optimize your Truespeak check to the absolute maximum, including using such things as custom magic items and item familiars, you cannot have a reasonable chance of affect yourself or your allies with Truename magic, let alone a boss encounter several CRs above your level.

Further, the Truenamer lacks options. You are nearly straightjacketed into a single build to be effective, with only minor variations possible without shooting yourself in the foot. Few of the utterances that a Truenamer has access to are significantly different from what an equivalently leveled wizard or cleric could perform and are often much weaker.

To compound the problem, the presented prestige classes suck, with the possible exception of the Fiendbinder. They don't offer any interesting abilities and they more often than not lag behind their base class equivalents. None of them advance the Truenamer base class in any meaningful way, so only straight classed Truenamers get access to higher level utterances.

So, I decided to overhaul the entire Truename Magic system. Now, the presented fix is not too radically different from the existing system. Every utterance that previously existed still exists, the truenamer's utterance progression only had small tweaks made to it, and most of the feats are largely unchanged. The most severe changes are changes made to the levels and durations of many of the existing utterances, the addition of over a dozen utterances to the Lexicon of the Crafted Tool and the Lexicon of the Perfected Map, and the addition or redesign of eight prestige classes.

This latest edition adds only a single new utterance and only a single magic item, but now includes a preface, improved formating, a soulmeld, and a revision of the truename spells.

If you have any suggestions, comments, insults, etc. please feel free to share, especially the insults. I can't make it better if no one tells me anything. If anyone is interested in helping me put together an online playtest for this, just PM me and I'll see about putting together something once I get enough people.

Special thanks to those who have helped with this fix
Zaq
Draz74
Quirken
Ankh
Psyren
Yue Ryong

Without further ado, I present the Book of Words (http://www.mediafire.com/view/?zc9fk9tczzlcty6), in pdf format for your reading enjoyment.

Amechra
2011-10-05, 12:30 AM
You are one of my favorite people for this.

I have to say, the stroke of genius had to be basing your truenaming level off your skill ranks; essentially, it gave it an awesome ability to multiclass around.

In other words, you have a fan.

Kyeudo
2011-10-05, 01:08 AM
I have to say, the stroke of genius had to be basing your truenaming level off your skill ranks; essentially, it gave it an awesome ability to multiclass around.


Wait, what?? :smallconfused: Isn't that how the truenamer has always been? Truespeak ranks set up how often you can use your utterance, Truenamer level gets you better utterances.

Amechra
2011-10-05, 01:23 AM
The way you phrased it was nice and distinct, if I remember correctly.

Or it could be the lack of sleep talking.

Anyway, I am left wondering why the community seems to agree on Kellus' fix while yours is, well, cooler (not that I have anything against Kellus; his Fury system is/was awesome, but I really do prefer the neat Truename effects.)

Kyeudo
2011-10-05, 01:37 AM
The way you phrased it was nice and distinct, if I remember correctly.


If you can point me to which page that's on, that would be awesome. I think I may be thinking of something other than what you are thinking of and it's been a while since I reviewed the entirity of my own rules.



Anyway, I am left wondering why the community seems to agree on Kellus' fix while yours is, well, cooler (not that I have anything against Kellus; his Fury system is/was awesome, but I really do prefer the neat Truename effects.)

Kellus got to it first.

Amechra
2011-10-05, 02:18 AM
True, but I'm tired of homebrew systems where the majority of the effects are, well, "deal xd6 energy damage" or "you get a claw attack."

Which is why I always have failed to make my own, original systems; I just can't bring myself to do such bread and butter 'brewing, which is a BAD thing, on my part.

silver spectre
2011-10-12, 05:37 AM
Overall, I like what you've done with the system, but why keep the law of resistance?
I've never got the logic in that (other than an attempt at PC control). By the logic presented why would the universe (a semi-sentient thing that remembers everything) suddenly decide to forget that you did the same thing yesterday, but still remember what you did two hours ago?
I played one of the TOM truenamers a few years back and we removed that "law". It made for less tracking and it didn't overpower it at all.


I do have a suggestion for the range of utterances. I haven't played it out, but it seems like it would be effective, without restricting truenamers to being in charging range with every utterance.
Range: Unless otherwise specified, utterances have no maximum range, but have a range increment of 60 feet, with each 60 foot increment after the first imposing a cumulative -2 penalty to the truespeak check.


I seriously like the runeblade and the connection between runes and truespeech. Any chance you can work the runeblade into a base class?


The words of creation utterance states that the truenamer creates a functionally infinite plane, but the area listed is up to four 5-ft cubes

Zeta Kai
2011-10-12, 07:15 AM
Anyway, I am left wondering why the community seems to agree on Kellus' fix while yours is, well, cooler (not that I have anything against Kellus; his Fury system is/was awesome, but I really do prefer the neat Truename effects.)

I don't one as being more popular than the other; anytime I see a TN thread, both fixes are usually mentioned (& often linked) in the same breath. Kellus' approach was a complete ground-up overhaul of the concept, whereas Kyeudo's tack was to take the existing system & beat it into a functional shape, essentially performing the editing & playtesting duties that WotC apparently failed to do.

I could see how some might view WotC's "system" as so broken that it could not be fixed, & therefore prefer Kellus' fix, but I can also see how others would prefer to take the mechanics that they know & make them work, & thus choose Kyeudo's fix. It's the difference between renovating a building so that it's better than it ever was & leveling the building to replace it with something completely new.

Amechra
2011-10-12, 10:03 AM
I'm just saying that I've seen more brews that use Kellus' version than Kyeudo's.

RedWarrior0
2011-10-12, 01:35 PM
I like this fix in particular, and I'm working on an idea for a related artifact or three (two minor, in the sense that multiple exist; the latter of the two may be major in power level) and a plane. Do you mind if I post them here?

Kyeudo
2011-10-12, 02:23 PM
Sure, throw them up. If I like them, I may ask to include them in the PDF.

RedWarrior0
2011-10-12, 02:48 PM
Well, I think they mostly turned out alright, though the Library doesn't have the detail a full plane should, and I'm kinda torn as to where one entry stops and another starts. Regardless, The Indices, the Library, the Librarian's Quill, and the Books.The Indices:

The Indices are a nigh-infinite group of tomes which together include every personal truename in all time and all realities written in them. Any given index is a book in pristine condition, a foot wide by a foot long, with exactly 2,000 pages. Each page has a thousand truenames written upon it on each side, but many of these are irrelevent, and no noticeable order can be determined; for example, the personal truename of a particular blade of grass from seventeen thousand years ago might be next to the personal truename of a particular grain of sand on a beach twenty five million years into the future and the personal truename of the Acererak, who you seek to defeat before he achieves apotheosis. Regardless, the truenames are still only names; reading them, one with Truespeak ranks can glean the gist of what is named, but nothing more.

The number of "useful" truenames is dependent on what the GM considers "useful". If every magic item, spell, and person is "useful", then a given index will have 50d% useful truenames within its pages. If only artifacts and characters the party is likely to encounter are "useful", then it might be only five to ten in a given index.

Determining the relevance of a written truename can be done fairly easily by one who knows truespeech, as the general characteristics of a written name correspond to aspects of the thing described. Thus, scanning through a tome for useful truenames takes only an hour and a DC 20 Truespeak check per hundred pages; any useful truenames gleaned thusly require a DC 35 Truespeak check to determine the gist of what it describes and (optionally) a minute to memorize it.

While several extraplanar libraries, and a few rare Material Plane libraries, have an Index or two, the two largest are the library of Boccob in the Outlands and a plane that is simply known as The Library.

The Library:

The Library is one of the few planes that cannot be reached via the Astral Plane; instead, the only method of reaching it is through the Infinite Staircase. The closest landing to the Library connects to a door in Sigil in a dark alleyway, next to an identical door that serves as the entry to an empty five foot by five foot shack. From this door, if one ascends the Staircase (a trip taking 4d12 hours), he or she will reach a landing which is the only one of its sort; it has a stairway down, but there is no further ascending the stairs. Adorning this landing is a very simple door; upon going through it, one enters a lobby.

To one side is a hallway with a number of doors, each with a number of truenames written on it. The first has the truename of each of the party members. In it are a table and chairs for each person, to taste. Across from the entry door is a desk; behind it sits the Librarian. Each person, even if under the affects of a True Seeing spell, sees the Librarian as perfectly identical to himself or herself; if the Librarian speaks, each person hears his or her own voice. Finally, no magic of any kind works in The Library; not even a god, if one entered The Library, could have any power.

Giving the Librarian one of the Indices, if it was brought from outside, may allow it to lend its Quill in exchange. This is a powerful gift indeed, for the Librarian's Quill is the only thing able to write in the Books (next paragraph).

Speaking a word or truename to the Librarian results in it taking from under the desk a tome similar to an Index with that word or truename written on the front cover. A tome has written on its cover the word or truename described therein. First among the pages is listed the progression of truenames, which begins with the phrase written upon the front cover, then its truename, then its truename's truename, etc. The tome will not run out of pages; after it reaches about halfway through the text, no change can be noticed, even if multiple pages are turned at a time, unless it is closed. If the reader does not wish to read the progressions of truenames and meta-truenames, then he or she will find that the next time a page is turned, one of two lists comes up, depending on preference: a list of every personal truename that is a member of that word or personal truename's subset, a list of every truename that has interacted with the personal truename or a member of the word or personal truename's subset and the manner of the interaction, and a list of the word or personal truename's supersets.

For example, if the word "Sword" were spoken to the Librarian, every sword's personal truename would be included in the former list, and every shield which has blocked a sword, person killed by, wounded by, or wielding a sword, etc. would be listed in the second. The third would include "weapons", "things you can stick on a pole", etc. in addition to their supersets and several categories meaningless to those without Truespeak knowledge.
Development:
I thought of the Indices first; since there are so many, I felt it would be natural for Boccob to have a huge store of them, but barely any compared to the rest of the collection. That, of course, led me to wonder where they came from or where the rest of the collection is, which brought me to the Library. The top of the Infinite Staircase seemed appropriate for the location of something so marvelous. So of course, if there are Indices, there need to be something they refer to, no? And instead of letting you roam around and possibly harm the Books, the Librarian just happens to have the Book you seek under its desk.

And yes, Amechra, the Librarian has five hundred levels of your homebrew class of the same name.

Grod_The_Giant
2011-10-12, 03:45 PM
Yes. So many yeses.

<applause>

Mulletmanalive
2011-10-12, 07:13 PM
It took me a while to find, being in skills, but it would be worth including the DCs for Utterances in the "how this works" section. That's where i'd expected it to live, that's where i look to see how a casting system works...

Kyeudo
2011-10-13, 03:24 AM
It took me a while to find, being in skills, but it would be worth including the DCs for Utterances in the "how this works" section. That's where i'd expected it to live, that's where i look to see how a casting system works...

Good point. I'll put that in the next edition's Utterances section, under Speaking an Utterance.


Well, I think they mostly turned out alright, though the Library doesn't have the detail a full plane should, and I'm kinda torn as to where one entry stops and another starts. Regardless, The Indices, the Library, the Librarian's Quill, and the Books.The Indices:

The Indices are a nigh-infinite group of tomes which together include every personal truename in all time and all realities written in them. Any given index is a book in pristine condition, a foot wide by a foot long, with exactly 2,000 pages. Each page has a thousand truenames written upon it on each side, but many of these are irrelevent, and no noticeable order can be determined; for example, the personal truename of a particular blade of grass from seventeen thousand years ago might be next to the personal truename of a particular grain of sand on a beach twenty five million years into the future and the personal truename of the Acererak, who you seek to defeat before he achieves apotheosis. Regardless, the truenames are still only names; reading them, one with Truespeak ranks can glean the gist of what is named, but nothing more.

The number of "useful" truenames is dependent on what the GM considers "useful". If every magic item, spell, and person is "useful", then a given index will have 50d% useful truenames within its pages. If only artifacts and characters the party is likely to encounter are "useful", then it might be only five to ten in a given index.

Determining the relevance of a written truename can be done fairly easily by one who knows truespeech, as the general characteristics of a written name correspond to aspects of the thing described. Thus, scanning through a tome for useful truenames takes only an hour and a DC 20 Truespeak check per hundred pages; any useful truenames gleaned thusly require a DC 35 Truespeak check to determine the gist of what it describes and (optionally) a minute to memorize it.

While several extraplanar libraries, and a few rare Material Plane libraries, have an Index or two, the two largest are the library of Boccob in the Outlands and a plane that is simply known as The Library.

The Library:

The Library is one of the few planes that cannot be reached via the Astral Plane; instead, the only method of reaching it is through the Infinite Staircase. The closest landing to the Library connects to a door in Sigil in a dark alleyway, next to an identical door that serves as the entry to an empty five foot by five foot shack. From this door, if one ascends the Staircase (a trip taking 4d12 hours), he or she will reach a landing which is the only one of its sort; it has a stairway down, but there is no further ascending the stairs. Adorning this landing is a very simple door; upon going through it, one enters a lobby.

To one side is a hallway with a number of doors, each with a number of truenames written on it. The first has the truename of each of the party members. In it are a table and chairs for each person, to taste. Across from the entry door is a desk; behind it sits the Librarian. Each person, even if under the affects of a True Seeing spell, sees the Librarian as perfectly identical to himself or herself; if the Librarian speaks, each person hears his or her own voice. Finally, no magic of any kind works in The Library; not even a god, if one entered The Library, could have any power.

Giving the Librarian one of the Indices, if it was brought from outside, may allow it to lend its Quill in exchange. This is a powerful gift indeed, for the Librarian's Quill is the only thing able to write in the Books (next paragraph).

Speaking a word or truename to the Librarian results in it taking from under the desk a tome similar to an Index with that word or truename written on the front cover. A tome has written on its cover the word or truename described therein. First among the pages is listed the progression of truenames, which begins with the phrase written upon the front cover, then its truename, then its truename's truename, etc. The tome will not run out of pages; after it reaches about halfway through the text, no change can be noticed, even if multiple pages are turned at a time, unless it is closed. If the reader does not wish to read the progressions of truenames and meta-truenames, then he or she will find that the next time a page is turned, one of two lists comes up, depending on preference: a list of every personal truename that is a member of that word or personal truename's subset, a list of every truename that has interacted with the personal truename or a member of the word or personal truename's subset and the manner of the interaction, and a list of the word or personal truename's supersets.

For example, if the word "Sword" were spoken to the Librarian, every sword's personal truename would be included in the former list, and every shield which has blocked a sword, person killed by, wounded by, or wielding a sword, etc. would be listed in the second. The third would include "weapons", "things you can stick on a pole", etc. in addition to their supersets and several categories meaningless to those without Truespeak knowledge.
Development:
I thought of the Indices first; since there are so many, I felt it would be natural for Boccob to have a huge store of them, but barely any compared to the rest of the collection. That, of course, led me to wonder where they came from or where the rest of the collection is, which brought me to the Library. The top of the Infinite Staircase seemed appropriate for the location of something so marvelous. So of course, if there are Indices, there need to be something they refer to, no? And instead of letting you roam around and possibly harm the Books, the Librarian just happens to have the Book you seek under its desk.

And yes, Amechra, the Librarian has five hundred levels of your homebrew class of the same name.

Hmm, you've got some ideas there, but there are a few things I don't like.

First, I don't like the idea that one can figure out who and what a personal truename belongs to without an explicit label or further research. Personal truenames are so specific that they don't apply to anyone else in the entire universe and harder to say than others. Making them easy to figure out from context makes it hard to understand why truename research is so hard and so expensive.

Second, the Indices are either giant "I win" buttons for major encounters or else useless. I've made personal truenames fairly potent offensively, from the undestanding that to use one, you either had to perform expensive truename research or go on a quest of some sort to track down the personal truename of your archrival. If one of these Indices contains a major truename, that can be fine, provided it was reasonably hard to track down. However, if one of these doesn't contain a useful truename, then why the heck is it in the campaign? You need some sort of guarantee that you'll get something useful if one of these is floating around.

Third, you forgot to mention what the Quill does.

Fourth, the Library is a little too potent a place to be. Any personal truename you want just by speaking the right word and spending some time perusing a list? That's a little extreme.

Fifth, I don't like the idea of truenames having their own truename. It doesn't lend itself to a working model of the universe.

Yue Ryong
2011-10-14, 11:52 AM
*Pops by to be more of a bother.*
Was having a skim over some old magic items I made, and I found this little treasure, thought I'd give it a bit of a polish up for the newer rules and see what you thought.

Unnaming Daggers
Lore: The first Unnaming Daggers were developed for an assassin who specialised in hunting shapeshifters, particularly doppelgangers. Seeking a way to be certain that he was attacking his intended target, he approached a powerful artificer of the time (who was also known to be proficient in the use of Truenaming) with his problem. Seeing both the challenge and the possibility of saving many innocent lives, the artificer agreed to make four daggers that would harm only the intended target in exchange for the agreement that the assassin would be bound by a geas to never slay any that he was not to be paid for. Surprisingly, the Assassin agreed, laughing that it was good business practice to do so anyway. And so the first Unnaming Daggers were born. The Assassin was enourmously successful with his chosen weapons, rapidly earning the admiration and fear of many in the shady underworld he lived in. Before long, knowledge of the daggers had spread, and replicas were made for every assassin with the cash to buy them. Still, the difficulties of using them make them extremely rarely used. - (Knowledge [History] DC 30)

Unnaming Daggers are used to erase their intended targets from reality in flares of Necromatic force, wiping away the creature's truename from the very essence of reality. They may only be used upon a single creature at a time, and it takes a long, complicated ritual to reset them to a new target. Still, the raw power these blades carry make them a favoured weapon of the most dangerous assassins. - (Knowledge [Arcana] DC 20)

Description: Unnaming Daggers appear as slender, bone-white stilettos with an inscription of the Personal Truename of whomever is the current target spiralling up the blade from the ebony hilt, which is often adorned with a Black Opal at the far end.
Activation: Once chosen, the effects are constantly in place until reset against another opponent. Resetting the opponent requires an hour-long ritual that requires the wielder to speak the personal truename of the intended target (thereby requiring a truespeech check of DC 29 + the Target's CR).
Effect: Whenever the intended target is struck by this +1 Paralyzing Dagger, they must make a Fortitude save (DC 10 + 1/2 wielder's level + Intelligence modifier) or be subject to the effects of an Unname utterance empowered by the use of the target's personal true-name. Whenever anyone other than the intended target is struck by the Unnaming Dagger, they take no damage from the attack (although they still suffer the Paralyzation effects). In the hands of a character with the 'Death Attack' ability, the character may make death attacks against the intended target with the dagger without studying their victim first.
Aura/Caster Level: Strong Necromancy, Moderate Enchantment; CL 17th
Construction:Craft Magic Arms & Armour, Craft Inscription, Hold Monster, Unname, Creater must have 20 ranks in Truespeech; 110,000gp, 8,800xp & 220 days;
Weight: 1lbs;
Price: 220,302gp;

Notes: Paralyzing is a +2 Ability that prompts a DC 17 Will save or be paralyzed for 10 rounds from the Book of Exalted Deeds (p113).

Kyeudo
2011-10-14, 06:20 PM
You've got a good idea there, but I would like to see it less bound up in the dagger and more universalized.

How about turning it into a weapon property, maybe call it Focused? If you write the personal truename of a creature upon a focused weapon, the weapon becomes unable to cause harm to any other creature (no check required, getting the personal truename is the hard part), but when striking the named creature, the victim gains a negative level in addition to any damage suffered.

Yue Ryong
2011-10-14, 06:35 PM
Hm... Negative levels are pretty chunky... a +3? Maybe a +4?

*Checks SRD.* On the other hand, the Life-Drinker Axe is relatively cheap - if an effective 1 negative level in cross-balanced costs (i.e., 1NL to them = 1NL to you, which may well be a decidedly inaccurate comparison) clocks in at a mere +38kgp over and above the cost of a regular +1 Greataxe...

Certainly the object in it's original form would be well above the ratings for a +5 (hence why it's a +3 weapon that costs more than a +10 one, requires use of what is likely to be a cross-class skill for the primary users, and a fresh personal truename each use).

Hm... It would also depend a lot on the speed of the switch... for a 1 hour inscription speed, we're probably talking a... +3 ability? Hm... a little weak for a +3. Maybe drop it to a +2.

Kyeudo
2011-10-14, 06:39 PM
The major drawback is the need for personal truenames. Those things don't grow on trees. It takes several weeks of research to get anything important and that truename only works for a single entity. Also, they are expensive.

Yue Ryong
2011-10-14, 07:12 PM
*Thinks some more.* Here's the thing... for the effort being put in, I'm not sure I'd buy it even as a +1. There's not a lot of ramp-up from Negative Levels, but even they're offset pretty seriously by the Personal Truename requirement.

If I've put the effort of getting a Personal Truename for each target, this needs to be a really heavy-duty advantage to make it worth it. That was why the original item is an Unname effect - it's for the people who you want to make extra certain won't get resurrected, and are willing to pay almost any price to do so. But having that serious an effect forcibly drags it up into the 'rare & unique item' category.

On the other hand... how does this sound?

Wordbound
Backed by the knowledge of a skilled master of the word, the blade of even the humblest farmer may become capable of slaying foes mightier than it's owner could have ever dreamed. Weapons forged with this ability frequently bear tracings in what appear at a glance to be some sort of script native to the reader, but closer examination reveals it to be little more than gibberish.
Wordbound Weapons are created by Truespeakers, both for themselves and for their allies, in order to render weapons capable of binding the destiny of mighty foes to defeat with the words of the universal tongue.
By spending a full-round action describing the target to the weapon (requiring a Truespeech check of a DC23 + the Target's CR), the traced lines and shapes formed by the ornamentation flow and shift in the eyes of the Target, until they suddenly realise that the weapon bears their name and that it is destined to end them.
Once so activated, the weapon cannot deal lethal damage to any creature other than the target (although non-lethally damaging abilities such as Merciful or Paralysing still apply), but against the target, it's full force is unleashed. With each strike, the weapon deals an additional negative level, draining their life-force and forcing them to make a save the following day (DC 16) or lose a level.
If the target's Personal Truename is used in the activation of the Wordbound weapon (raising the difficulty of the roll as usual), the target instead gains 2 negative levels with each strike.
Moderate Necromancy; CL 12th; Engrave Inscription, Essence of Lifespark; Price +4 bonus.

...I may have gotten a touch overwrought & dramatic with that. Sorry.

Also, can I just say, 10,000gp for a non-switchable, single-target Bane effect for someone who you already know the Personal Truename of? Not worth it. I'd stop at about 1,500gp there.

Kyeudo
2011-10-14, 10:36 PM
On the other hand... how does this sound?

Wordbound
Backed by the knowledge of a skilled master of the word, the blade of even the humblest farmer may become capable of slaying foes mightier than it's owner could have ever dreamed. Weapons forged with this ability frequently bear tracings in what appear at a glance to be some sort of script native to the reader, but closer examination reveals it to be little more than gibberish.
Wordbound Weapons are created by Truespeakers, both for themselves and for their allies, in order to render weapons capable of binding the destiny of mighty foes to defeat with the words of the universal tongue.
By spending a full-round action describing the target to the weapon (requiring a Truespeech check of a DC23 + the Target's CR), the traced lines and shapes formed by the ornamentation flow and shift in the eyes of the Target, until they suddenly realise that the weapon bears their name and that it is destined to end them.
Once so activated, the weapon cannot deal lethal damage to any creature other than the target (although non-lethally damaging abilities such as Merciful or Paralysing still apply), but against the target, it's full force is unleashed. With each strike, the weapon deals an additional negative level, draining their life-force and forcing them to make a save the following day (DC 16) or lose a level.
If the target's Personal Truename is used in the activation of the Wordbound weapon (raising the difficulty of the roll as usual), the target instead gains 2 negative levels with each strike.
Moderate Necromancy; CL 12th; Engrave Inscription, Essence of Lifespark; Price +4 bonus.

...I may have gotten a touch overwrought & dramatic with that. Sorry.


That seems better. Let me take a crack at fitting the information into the format I'm already using when I can find the time.



Also, can I just say, 10,000gp for a non-switchable, single-target Bane effect for someone who you already know the Personal Truename of? Not worth it. I'd stop at about 1,500gp there.

It's a hard to price effect. Bane is a +1 equivalent, which varies in price based on how much other magic is on it.

Shadow Lord
2011-10-14, 10:58 PM
What would you say is better about your fix than Kellus' fix? What would you say is worse? Any specific things you think are better than his? Anything you think is specifically better than yours that is his?

Kyeudo
2011-10-15, 12:14 AM
It's been a long time since I looked at Kellus's fix and I never studied it in depth, so I can't really answer the question without taking another look at it.

I do remember looking at it and basically ruling out copying any material from it. Something about a lot of hit point limits and common names being good enough to use in utterances and Truespeak having a synergy bonus with Speak Language is all I can remember off the top of my head.

Yue Ryong
2011-10-15, 11:39 AM
It's a hard to price effect. Bane is a +1 equivalent, which varies in price based on how much other magic is on it.It's also a lot broader than the Inscription of Namebane. The Inscription works against one person and one person only. Regular bane works against countless millions of beings across all the planes. Single-target bane should be comparable to a Scroll of Foebane (Spell Compendium: Rgr4, 700gp), rather than more expensive than simply buying a second Bane weapon.

Kyeudo
2011-10-23, 12:51 AM
Here's a little something that I've been working on for the next update to the Book of Words. Let me know what you think:

CHATTERLING
Small Magical Beast
Hit Dice: 3d10 (16 hp)
Initiative: +7
Speed: 30 ft. (8 squares), Climb 20 ft.
Armor Class: 16 (+ 3 Dex, +2 natural, +1 size), touch 14, flat-footed 13
Base Attack/Grapple: +3/+0
Attack: Claw +5 melee (1d3+1)
Full Attack: 2 claws +5 melee (1d3+1)
Space/Reach: 5ft/5ft
Special Attacks: Utterances
Special Qualities: Chatter, Instinctive Utterances
Saves: Fort +4, Ref+6, Will+4
Abilities: Str 13, Dex 16, Con 13, Int 2, Wis 16, Cha 10
Skills: Climb +11, Hide +7, Listen +3, Move Silently +7, Spot +3, Truespeak +9
Feats: Improved Initiative, Dodge
Enviroment: Temperate mountains
Organization: Solitary or pack (2-4)
Challenge Rating: 2
Treasure: 1/10 coins, 50% goods, 50% items

This creature looks like an ant the size of a dog except for the forelimbs ending in mantis-like scythe claws. Once it spots you, its mandibles clack together in excitement, producing an incessant chattering.
Chatterlings are pack-hunting insectoid predetors, usually mottled green or brown in color. Though they are capable of using truespeak, they do so on instinct rather than from any particular study. They are incapable of communicating language and communicate with each other through the chattering noises they make.

Combat
A lone chatterling attacks from ambush, using reversed inertia surge only to hold fleeing prey in place while it closes in to attack. It uses its Dodge feat against the most threatening physical attacker. Packs of chatterlings hunt together, surrounding any targets crippled by reversed inertia surges to gain flanking bonuses.
Utterances (Sp): Lexicon of the Evolving Mind: 1st - inertia surge
Chatter (Ex): A chatterling speaks utterances more quickly than most creatures find possible. A chatterling can speak an utterance as a move action instead of a standard action if it wishes.
Instinctive Utterances (Ex): A chatterling's instinctive understanding of truespeak allows it to use its Wisdom modifier instead of its Intelligence modifier on Truespeak checks. Saving throws against a chatterling's utterances are 10 + 1/2 the chatterling's hit dice + its Cha modifier.
Skills: A chatterling has a +4 racial bonus on Hide and Move Silently checks and a +8 racial bonus on Climb Checks. A chatterling can always choose to take 10 on Climb checks, even when rushed or threatened. Chatterlings use either their Strength or Dexterity modifier for Climb checks, whichever is higher.

Yue Ryong
2011-10-24, 02:23 PM
Hm... the only especially worrying thing is the possibility of abusing polymorph to get hold of the Chatter ability; I assume most DMs might be wise enough to intervene to prevent that, but just in case, I'd recommend making it a (Su) ability instead, preventing access with anything less than Shapechange. Seeing as how it's an ability that effects (Sp) abilities, the inability to use it in an Antimagic field makes no difference, and this locks it away from the lower-level spell shenanigans that could be used to access it.

Grod_The_Giant
2011-10-24, 02:28 PM
Hey, quick question about the Academic- his phrasebook seems to work a lot like a wizard's... can he pay to scribe extra utterances in it, beyond the 2/level he normally gets? For most of his career, he's only slightly ahead of the Truenamer in number of utterances known (21 vs 17 at level 10, and 41 vs 37 at level 20)

Kyeudo
2011-10-24, 02:33 PM
Hey, quick question about the Academic- his phrasebook seems to work a lot like a wizard's... can he pay to scribe extra utterances in it, beyond the 2/level he normally gets? For most of his career, he's only slightly ahead of the Truenamer in number of utterances known (21 vs 17 at level 10, and 41 vs 37 at level 20)

Yes. To quote from the rules:


You can add any utterance you are capable of speaking (see the table below) to your phrasebook, provided you have the time and a willing instructor or another academic's phrasebook to copy from. Because each utterance represents hundreds of truenames and each requires exacting pronunciation notes when recorded, writing a new utterance into a phrasebook takes one page of space and one day of work per level of the utterance.

Grod_The_Giant
2011-10-24, 02:55 PM
Stupid illiteracy :smalltongue:

I assume that it costs the usual 100gp/page?

Kyeudo
2011-10-24, 03:22 PM
I assume that it costs the usual 100gp/page?

Why would ink cost that much?

Grod_The_Giant
2011-10-24, 07:34 PM
No clue, but that's what the SRD claims:


Writing a New Spell into a Spellbook

<yadda yadda yadda>

Materials and Costs

Materials for writing the spell cost 100 gp per page.

Note that a wizard does not have to pay these costs in time or gold for the spells she gains for free at each new level. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm#writingaNewSpellintoaSpellbook)

I'm pretty sure it was mocked in OOtS.

Kyeudo
2011-10-25, 12:28 AM
That's for wizard spellbooks. I am intentionally not following those rules here because those rules never really restricted a wizard in play. A ninth level spell is only 900 gold when you are playing with thousands in wealth.

Kyeudo
2011-10-25, 03:27 AM
Finally finished putting that idea of Yue Ryong's into the same item format that the pdf uses. What do you think?

Inscription of Focused Intent
An inscription of focused intent can turn an ordinary weapon into a deadly tool against a single foe at the cost of making it useless against others.
Description: A focused weapon is engraved with a circle of runes dedicating the weapon to the destruction of a single being. When the weapon has a target, the being's name appears within the circle.
Prerequisite: An inscription of focused intent can be added to any weapon.
Activation: A focused weapon is activated by speaking a short phrase of truespeak to describe a creature to the weapon. Doing so is a full-round action that requires a successful Truespeak check (DC 23 + the target's CR). If the check fails, the weapon instead targets a random creature within fifty miles of the wielder. A focused weapon can be given a target no more than once a day.
Effect: A focused weapon functions as normal until it has been given a target. Once given a target, the weapon becomes unable to deal lethal damage to any creature other than its target for one day (including damage from properties such as flaming or frost). The weapon's target, however, suffers damage from the weapon normally and gains a negative level each time it is damaged by the weapon. If a personal truename was used to give the weapon its target, the target instead suffers two negative levels each time it is damaged. The following day, the victim must make a successful Fortitude save (DC 16) for each negative level gained this way or permanently lose a level.
Aura/Truespeak Ranks: Strong universal, TR 15.
Construction: Engrave Inscription, essence of lifespark.
Price: +4 bonus

GenghisDon
2012-07-25, 03:18 PM
I'll read up on the book of words & comment tommorow; thanks!

linkrulesx10
2012-07-27, 07:45 AM
Hi

Ok read it over, found some internal conflictions.

When it comes to the law of sequence, the words and description conflict, it is also an impossible description given the words of nurturing require concentration

Otherwise it seems quite good, I would like to know what your intent there was?

Kyeudo
2012-07-27, 01:14 PM
The example is a little out of date. Originally, the Words of Nurturing did not require concentration to use in their normal mode. This was changed later, though I'm currently a little hazy about why I did it. I think it was because they comboed too well with the Chant Utterance feat I added.

linkrulesx10
2012-07-28, 03:47 AM
Ok a few more issues that I noted.

The dismissil seems very strong, its pretty much an encounter ender unless I read something wrong.

Also yeah the concentration thing for healing seemed to be an issue for me, fast healing isnt that impressive whilst it is good but I dont see it somethign to worth concentrating for during combat, I have better things to do then spend a standard action to heal 3 damage at level 3 XD

Also might be really odd, but making an object impossible to destroy has an interesting almost abusable interaction with magically enchanted arrows that have a chance to be destroyed with use, Arrow of slaying maybe? Not sure about that exact arrow but it seems possibly problematic

Overall I like what you did for the truenamer.

Also if yoi don't mind, what is your opinion on making things like speaking defensively based of concentration like it would be for a spell instead of what it currently is, make it congruent with typical arcane casting.

Kyeudo
2012-07-28, 12:03 PM
Normal dissmissal has a Will Save, reversed anchor of reality has a truespeak check. Basically works out to the same thing.

Making the words of nurturing concentration was the only way we could resolve potential abuses with the Chant Utterance feat without shutting down some really cool tricks. Personally, I think I need to look at it again and see if there is a way to both allow those tricks and switch the words of nurturing back to their original duration.

Synergy between a truenamer and another class is awesome, not abusive.

Allowing people to utter defensively using Truespeak is to keep the number of rolls during a given turn to a normal number. There is no good reason to force a Truenamer to roll a Concentration check before he rolls his Truespeak check and then his utterance's effect.

linkrulesx10
2012-07-28, 10:42 PM
hmm ok, fair point and I agree with most of it.

Although on the matter of casting defensively, if they were on a horse, or on a rocking boat or any other situation they would have to make a concentration check, I am just confused why the core truenamer would get this 1 aspect of using a SLA or whatever different from what a Wizard, Psion, Shadowcaster and basically every other magic user does.

ALso me and my friend are doing our own fix for our own game *nothing to be put online as well as this* and this has been quite helpful so thanks :3

Also bringing up a suggestion that you may want to consider, if you are still working on this that is.

In our game we found giving a scaling speak unto the masses works well, like at level 3 or 4 you can effect 2 targets and it goes up from there. Maybe consider it if you still were working on this?

Kyeudo
2012-07-29, 12:06 AM
In a normal game, how often does that really come up? Riding and sailing are far from common places to have a fight. When they do, the extra rolling is warrented by the special circumstances.

Thank you for your suggestion, but I think I'll leave Speak Unto the Masses as it is.

lunar2
2012-07-31, 12:10 PM
allowing a DC increase to utter defensively is great. for those that don't want to deal with the DC increase, you could still use concentration instead (concentration works with all SLAs unless stated otherwise), it's just an extra roll.

@utterances with XP costs. i understand that you can't use material components for true speaking, so having an XP component on things like reversed unname is fine. the problem is that a cleric can raise dead as a 5th level spell for 5,000 GP, while a truenamer can raise the dead as a 6th level utternace for 2,000 XP. generally, when converting a GP cost to an XP cost, you divide the GP cost by 5, and round down. this would give a cost of 1,000 XP for the utterance. so as it stands, you have the truenamer paying more for the same effect, that they can't use until later. additionally, the personal truename version should have the same XP cost as the regular version, since the costs of researching the personal truename and the higher difficulty of using a personal truename are the extra cost for the greater effect.

Kyeudo
2012-07-31, 09:20 PM
You are pricing the effect wrong. Reversed Unname is about as strong as Ressurection. In some ways, it's even better than Ressurection.

Kyeudo
2013-01-13, 10:52 AM
In case anyone is still following this, I decided to do some formatting work on the pdf and I decided that Chant Utterance causes too much trouble with Words of Nurturing and removed it.

Scholar23
2013-01-13, 09:19 PM
tried to download but it said it wasn't there:smallfrown:
Please tell me what to do to get it so maybe i can help

Kyeudo
2013-01-13, 10:23 PM
Looks like the URL changed when I updated the file. Should be fixed now.

Scholar23
2013-01-16, 09:04 PM
ust uploaded it will reply sometime this weekend. can you post any goals or mechanics you what to work on? then i can see what i can do

Scholar23
2013-01-16, 09:10 PM
A index would be a nice addtion or a table of contents
Like the classes so far, can you tell me what this is ment to be played with or were you want it to go.

Kyeudo
2013-01-17, 02:06 AM
A index would be a nice addtion or a table of contents


Check the bookmarks. You've got links to every major heading.



Like the classes so far, can you tell me what this is ment to be played with or were you want it to go.

The Truenamer is a support spellcaster. He can replace a cleric or druid for healing (for raw hit point healing, he can be much better given time to work) and can provide short-duration buffing magic. His direct attack abilities suck and he has poor access to save-or-dies, but his ability to keep pushing on without running out of his best utterances and to (with Quicken Utterance) spam effects out two at a time should keep him relevant to the fight.

Scholar23
2013-01-17, 10:23 AM
didn't check book marks, opps
One thing we might want to do is create a reverse from of each utterance, giving him access to two instead of one when he learns. The way to say it backward can have a higher dc to speak and then we can add a feat to counter balance that if they want to spend the time on the feat.

Scholar23
2013-01-17, 10:24 AM
I'll post some of my home brew on true magic later (probale saturday, but i will to get some on here tonight)

Kyeudo
2013-01-17, 10:51 PM
One thing we might want to do is create a reverse from of each utterance, giving him access to two instead of one when he learns.

You mean like the entire Lexicon of the Evolving Mind already allows?


The way to say it backward can have a higher dc to speak and then we can add a feat to counter balance that if they want to spend the time on the feat.

Why would I want to punish people for using their abilities unless they pay a feat tax?

Stannum (IV)
2013-02-07, 11:08 PM
I love this guide! So much fun with unique, yet seemingly, from a basic examination, balanced abilities.
The one thing I found was Pinnacle of Triumph (Normal version, on self, or on ally), with the Echoing Inflection applied, before making an attack (via quickening the Pinnacle of Triumph, quickened Temporal Twist, two standard actions from Temporal Hurricane with a truename, waiting a round and hoping nothing prompts a d20 roll, a few abilities from other classes), while wielding a +1 vorpal weapon. Now anything with a head is dead (Auto-hit then auto-crit), no save, no chance to apply AC, no resistance whatsoever. For an 18th level truenamer trying to affect himself (which is to say, perform the attack himself), the DC is 45(15+18+2*6)+6(inflection)+5(one echo)+2(personal truename)=58
And the Truespeak modifier is likely to +21(ranks)+10(competence)+3(skill focus)+4(your own truename)+5(Universal Aptitude)=+42, before counting any semi-optional enhancements or the above average INT score a truenamer likely possesses (+8 INT or so would not even be unreasonable, another +5 from Preternatural Clarity or half a dozen other effects being even simpler). At the very least, a roll of 11 or higher and another standard action allows one to use the pinnacle on the next check and guarantee it, with a roll of 16 or higher allowing it immediately (At least, on the next standard action).
Perhaps not the most broken thing ever, though all the component parts are useful enough that only the vorpal weapon (72300g) would be unlikely to be already to be owned by the truenamer. It just seems a little easy to abuse (even without the echo, one need only give the weapon to the party fighter who only misses on a natural 1, make the first attack a natural 20, and have a 95% success rate).
So, in what was likely an overly long post for a relatively simple issue, I suggest a clause along the lines of "item, class, and racial abilities normally triggered by a natural 20 are not triggered, although automatic success and failure on certain checks may still apply". Inclusive wording as there are almost certainly other similar effects. I also would recommend some sort of ability to choose what roll to apply the effect on, just to prevent the possibility of wasting the ability on a minor effect.

Yue Ryong
2013-03-23, 06:12 AM
In case anyone is still following this, I decided to do some formatting work on the pdf and I decided that Chant Utterance causes too much trouble with Words of Nurturing and removed it....Didn't we have this discussion already? It doesn't interact with them at all, after the changes made.

Kyeudo
2013-03-23, 10:56 AM
...Didn't we have this discussion already? It doesn't interact with them at all, after the changes made.

Yeah, but I decided that it needed to be changed back. Otherwise, they can't do any real combat healing. I know that's not ever been a really strong option, but it just seemed like we were bending the system to create a must-have feat for any truenamer.

cameronpants
2013-03-23, 11:32 AM
If you can point me to which page that's on, that would be awesome. I think I may be thinking of something other than what you are thinking of and it's been a while since I reviewed the entirity of my own rules.

Chapter 4, page 11. Second paragraph under "Speaking an Utterance" Header:

"An utterances is a spell-like ability with a verbal
component (unlike other spell-like abilities, which have no
components) that requires a successful Truespeak check to
complete. Your effective caster level for your utterances is
your ranks in Truespeak - 3."

Emphasis mine. This allows a multiclass Truenamer to continue to increase CL without getting new or higher level utterances. I really enjoy this.

Yue Ryong
2013-03-28, 11:03 AM
Yeah, but I decided that it needed to be changed back. Otherwise, they can't do any real combat healing. I know that's not ever been a really strong option, but it just seemed like we were bending the system to create a must-have feat for any truenamer.The flipside is that removing the must-have feat (which, to be fair, it kind of is - it possibly should be folded in as abilities for the classes), you're massively nerfing their non-combat functions. To a large extent, there isn't much point to having scrying, warding or language magic if it's going to fizzle out in the space of a minute.

As a point of comparison, it's worth looking at the Warlock, which is practically singing with long-duration, middling-potency effects (charm, baleful polymorph, spiderclimb, flight... the list goes on and on) for far less action-investment than the Truenamer (and these are the pair I consider closest to 'balanced' casters).

Kyeudo
2013-03-30, 03:26 PM
Perhaps we need to revisit the utterances then, maybe create some different types of utterances. Then we could reintroduce the feat with more elegant restrictions and get the best of both worlds.

chaos_redefined
2013-08-23, 11:52 PM
Words of Nurturing, Critical is missing a reverse.

Echoing Truenamed Temporal Spiral looks like it could be quite abusive, and is available at level 9. Quickened Temporal Spiral can be used to move the law of resistance around, if you haven't used temporal spiral as often as another utterance (to the point that Quickened Temporal Spiral is easier to use than another utterance).

Yue Ryong
2013-08-28, 07:12 AM
Perhaps we need to revisit the utterances then, maybe create some different types of utterances. Then we could reintroduce the feat with more elegant restrictions and get the best of both worlds.*Spends a LONG time thinking about this.* ...Perhaps if we built it into the relevant Utterances by creating a new duration category of 'Sustained'? It'd work functionally the same, and be pre-linked to those Utterances that you want to actually use over long durations.

Kyeudo
2013-09-30, 01:40 PM
Sorry to take so long to reply, but what would be the functional difference between this "sustained" category and a duration of "Concentration + 10 rounds" or whatever?

Yue Ryong
2013-10-01, 05:57 AM
Apart from the requirement to keep chanting? Nothing. So, basically, might as well just make that the duration. *Feels stupid for not thinking of this.* >_<

It takes my plot of 'learn city's truename, bring eternal night' off the table, but the balancing act between basic functionality for out-of-combat durations & healing stability takes precedence.

Red_Death01
2013-10-09, 08:36 AM
I have recently taken an interest in this homebrew and my DM seems to like it as well. My one question though is- since utterances have the option of using a personal truename or not. Do you take a negative if you choose to use an utterance on a person that you dont know their truename (even if you dont want to use the truename effect) or is it the standard given DC for it? That and can I choose to use the truename effect with the penalties if I dont know their truename?

Kyeudo
2013-10-09, 10:21 AM
Do you take a negative if you choose to use an utterance on a person that you dont know their truename (even if you dont want to use the truename effect) or is it the standard given DC for it?

The rules are written with the assumption that you do not know the personal truename of most targets which you want to affect. You use the standard DCs in those cases.



That and can I choose to use the truename effect with the penalties if I dont know their truename?

Not without the Perfect Description class feature.

Knowing someone's personal truename gives you a lot of power over them, especially if you want to pull Scry and Die tactics on them.

Red_Death01
2013-10-15, 12:47 PM
Additional Questions:

Echo Utterances- When using this do you effectively need to increase the DC by 11 for get the echo? or am I reading this a bit weird [to be honest this feat is awesome just a little confusing].(6 with the standard dc increase and you need the check to be at a -5 to actually echo). Also- Does the echo'd utterance count as the truenamer's utterance in regards to the Law of Sequence?- I know that it doesn't count against the Law of Resistance.

That and when an utterance is echo'd take for example a reversed Vision Sharpened on someone they are invisible... does the echo apply soon enough so that the subject doesn't seem to "blink" in and out of sight?

Thanks for the answers :D!

Kyeudo
2013-10-15, 01:00 PM
Echo Utterances- When using this do you effectively need to increase the DC by 11 for get the echo? or am I reading this a bit weird [to be honest this feat is awesome just a little confusing].(6 with the standard dc increase and you need the check to be at a -5 to actually echo).


Not quite. You only increase the DC by 6 to get the first instance to affect the target. You would need to beat the base DC by 11 to get an Echo, though.



Also- Does the echo'd utterance count as the truenamer's utterance in regards to the Law of Sequence?


Yes.



That and when an utterance is echo'd take for example a reversed Vision Sharpened on someone they are invisible... does the echo apply soon enough so that the subject doesn't seem to "blink" in and out of sight?


I'd rule that it applies immediately, but if your DM wants to do things differently, that would be fine as well. Just make sure you are both on the same page.

Kyeudo
2013-11-19, 07:07 PM
So, for those who may still be following this project, I've recently gotten a bit more active in D&D, so I've had a few ideas about this fix. Before I go and do a lot of work on stuff, though, I figure I'd post some ideas and see what people thought.

First, I'm planning to update a few Utterances durations to Concentration or Concentration + Rounds. I already plan to update Wind Carried Words and Skyward Eye, but is there anything else that really should have a longer duration?

Second, I'm considering some Tome of Battle tie-ins, such as an Utterance for recovering an expended manuver or for removing a target's stance. Truenamers already play well with spell casters, so would anyone like to see some love for the ToB?

Third, I'm likewise considering a few utterances for Magic of Incarnum, such as messing with Chakra binds or Essentia pools temporarily. Anyone wanting something like this?

Fourth, I'm ruminating about maybe adding some more prestige classes, mostly of the "hybrid of two base classes" variety, such as a bard/truenamer prestige class. Anyone have suggestions for something that is currently missing?

Finally, I'm probably going to take a second look at the Truename monsters and see if they still have (or ever had) appropriate CRs. Would anyone be interested in participating in a pure combat playtest of the various monsters?

Last question: Is there a system that needs a better interface with Truenaming that I should do some work on? Psionics maybe?

Yue Ryong
2013-11-19, 07:51 PM
1) Yay! I'd recommend... Anchor of Reality, Seek the Sky (Probably Greater only)... maybe Singular Mind (powerful, but extremely key to certain stories)... Create Object, Thwart the Traveller, Deny Passage... maybe Fog from the Void. And the ones you said, of course.

2) You've pre-empted me. I was planning on working on something similar (from the other direction) in the form of a Discipline that has Truespeech as it's key skill.

3) I... would like Incarnum to be worth the effort. But I don't really think it is. That said, it might be relatively easy to do, so maybe.

4) I... would love something that plays with the various 'power words' mechanics that existed before (the Words of Creation & Dark Speech feats in particular) and made them blend really effectively. Bard/Truespeaker is an area with a lot of interesting crossover concepts. I'd also be rather keen to see a Warlock/Truespeaker combo.

5) Sign me up.

6) I'd say Psionics is not an amazing fit for Truespeech to work with, due to how self-contained it is as a power source (also, Magic-Psionics transparency makes it pretty vulnerable already). That said, I'm all for doing more integration into other systems. You can have my prototype d20 modern (https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/8257021/Modern%20Truespeech.xlsx) advanced class, if you think it would work.

Kyeudo
2013-11-20, 11:06 AM
2) You've pre-empted me. I was planning on working on something similar (from the other direction) in the form of a Discipline that has Truespeech as it's key skill.


Good luck with that project. I'm not going to try something that ambitious.



3) I... would like Incarnum to be worth the effort. But I don't really think it is. That said, it might be relatively easy to do, so maybe.


Incarnum is always worth the effort. It's such a flexible system, it just is so different from the other systems of magic that it's hard to figure out what to do with it.

I'll always remember my Arena Totemist who blasted through his opponents by adapting to their particular build and countering it.



4) I... would love something that plays with the various 'power words' mechanics that existed before (the Words of Creation & Dark Speech feats in particular) and made them blend really effectively. Bard/Truespeaker is an area with a lot of interesting crossover concepts. I'd also be rather keen to see a Warlock/Truespeaker combo.


What exactly would the fluff on a Warlock/Truespeaker combo be? Using Truespeak to manipulate the wording on the contract for your soul?

Dark Speech was from Book of Vile Darkness, right? That's one I don't have. Where was Words of Creation from?



6) I'd say Psionics is not an amazing fit for Truespeech to work with, due to how self-contained it is as a power source (also, Magic-Psionics transparency makes it pretty vulnerable already). That said, I'm all for doing more integration into other systems. You can have my prototype d20 modern (https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/8257021/Modern%20Truespeech.xlsx) advanced class, if you think it would work.

When I said other systems, I meant other subsystems in D&D. Like, do we need support for something in Forgotten Realms or for Ninjas or some such.

Yue Ryong
2013-11-20, 11:39 AM
Good luck with that project. I'm not going to try something that ambitious.It's been sitting on my hard drive half-finished since 4e dropped. >_>
Incarnum is always worth the effort. It's such a flexible system, it just is so different from the other systems of magic that it's hard to figure out what to do with it.

I'll always remember my Arena Totemist who blasted through his opponents by adapting to their particular build and countering it.You've had more success than me, then. I found the lack of teeth simply too extreme to make really playable for any sort of feasible character, cool as I find the fluff.
What exactly would the fluff on a Warlock/Truespeaker combo be? Using Truespeak to manipulate the wording on the contract for your soul?That works one way. Another way is to use the contract on your soul as a bargaining chip for the secret facets of the True Tongue known only to those beings who pre-date the world itself and heard it being woven into place.
Or, for an extra touch of finesse, use Truenaming as a kind of Metamagic for their Invocations. Hybrid power sources are always fun.
Dark Speech was from Book of Vile Darkness, right? That's one I don't have. Where was Words of Creation from?Book of Exalted Deeds (and there is an extremely brief name-check of Dark Speech in one of the Warlock's Invocations). I like my language magic, so this is a recurring thing I keep going back to.

Dark Speech basically functioned by taking ability damage to empower & bond together evil characters, drive away good & break down objects. Words of Creation basically function by taking nonlethal damage to boost Bardic Music, doubling the duration on Conjuration (Creation) spells (that's costless), boosting the caster level of good spells/items & learning Personal True Names. All great fun.
When I said other systems, I meant other subsystems in D&D. Like, do we need support for something in Forgotten Realms or for Ninjas or some such.Well, fluff-wise, the official book & FR section of the WotC website has some decent stuff on where truenamers fit into the setting (not knowing Eberron, I don't know how well-covered it is there). I do think that Truenaming could have a place in d20 Modern, though. It's a better match for the power scale than Vancian casting, anyhow.

Kyeudo
2013-11-21, 01:46 AM
Here's a ToB tie-in utterance I came up with:
Warrior's Hesitation
Level: 4
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None

Normal: Upon speaking this utterance, the target finds himself making a crucial mistake with his fighting form, ruining his attempts to execute an advanced combat technique. If the speaker readies an action, he can speak this utterance in response to someone initiating a maneuver (see Tome of Battle pg. 38). If he does so, the maneuver fails to function. The maneuver is still expended (and can be recovered as normal), but it has no effect.
This utterance can also be spoken without need to ready an action. When spoken in this manner, any martial stance the target may be using immediately ends. The target may resume his stance as normal.
Personal Truename: If a personal truename is used to speak this utterance, the wasted maneuver or broken stance can not be used again for one minute, even if the target recovers the maneuver.

Reverse: Upon speaking this utterance, the target finds himself in a sublime state of mind, his every action flowing in perfect harmony with his fighting style. The target of this utterance can immediately recover and ready a single expended martial maneuver (see Tome of Battle pg. 38-39).
Personal Truename: If a personal truename is used to speak this utterance, the target can recover and ready a second expended martial maneuver.


maybe Singular Mind (powerful, but extremely key to certain stories)...

Which side were you thinking of? Normal or reversed?

EDIT: Looking over the utterances, I'm trying to think if the "5 rounds" duration on most of them is really justified. Wouldn't "1 minute" be simpler for most combats?

Yue Ryong
2013-11-21, 06:55 AM
Here's a ToB tie-in utterance I came up with:
Warrior's Hesitation
Level: 4
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None

Normal: Upon speaking this utterance, the target finds himself making a crucial mistake with his fighting form, ruining his attempts to execute an advanced combat technique. If the speaker readies an action, he can speak this utterance in response to someone initiating a maneuver (see Tome of Battle pg. 38). If he does so, the maneuver fails to function. The maneuver is still expended (and can be recovered as normal), but it has no effect.
This utterance can also be spoken without need to ready an action. When spoken in this manner, any martial stance the target may be using immediately ends. The target may resume his stance as normal.
Personal Truename: If a personal truename is used to speak this utterance, the wasted maneuver or broken stance can not be used again for one minute, even if the target recovers the maneuver.

Reverse: Upon speaking this utterance, the target finds himself in a sublime state of mind, his every action flowing in perfect harmony with his fighting style. The target of this utterance can immediately recover and ready a single expended martial maneuver (see Tome of Battle pg. 38-39).
Personal Truename: If a personal truename is used to speak this utterance, the target can recover and ready a second expended martial maneuver.Looks pretty good - although I might be inclined to pop a save on the Normal effect.
Which side were you thinking of? Normal or reversed?Reversed. Mind control being a big magic trope, and all.
EDIT: Looking over the utterances, I'm trying to think if the "5 rounds" duration on most of them is really justified. Wouldn't "1 minute" be simpler for most combats?I'd not object. It's still short enough to create a distinct feeling about the nature of the magic, but without quite the risk that a fairly standard fight will last long enough to end the effect and get you crushed.

Kyeudo
2013-11-21, 11:19 AM
Looks pretty good - although I might be inclined to pop a save on the Normal effect.


If I were to put a save on the utterance, I'd want to make it a Reflex save. I'd also want to drop it an utterance level, so it would be available 4 levels sooner.



Reversed. Mind control being a big magic trope, and all.


I'll have to think about it.

Kyeudo
2013-11-21, 04:54 PM
Went and set up that monster playtest. If anyone is interested, here it be (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=315799).

chaos_redefined
2013-11-22, 01:29 AM
Here's a ToB tie-in utterance I came up with:
Warrior's Hesitation
Level: 4
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None

Normal: Upon speaking this utterance, the target finds himself making a crucial mistake with his fighting form, ruining his attempts to execute an advanced combat technique. If the speaker readies an action, he can speak this utterance in response to someone initiating a maneuver (see Tome of Battle pg. 38). If he does so, the maneuver fails to function. The maneuver is still expended (and can be recovered as normal), but it has no effect.
This utterance can also be spoken without need to ready an action. When spoken in this manner, any martial stance the target may be using immediately ends. The target may resume his stance as normal.
Personal Truename: If a personal truename is used to speak this utterance, the wasted maneuver or broken stance can not be used again for one minute, even if the target recovers the maneuver.

Reverse: Upon speaking this utterance, the target finds himself in a sublime state of mind, his every action flowing in perfect harmony with his fighting style. The target of this utterance can immediately recover and ready a single expended martial maneuver (see Tome of Battle pg. 38-39).
Personal Truename: If a personal truename is used to speak this utterance, the target can recover and ready a second expended martial maneuver.

To be honest, I'm wondering how often I would use this. The normal version requires a very specific kind of enemy, one that I don't typically see that often (although one of my DMs did use them as an enemy recently, and has now found he loves swordsages). The reverse version is better, but am I willing to spend a daily resource and my standard action to get someone else an encounter ability back? I will admit that quicken and echo make it a lot better, and obviously knowing their truename doubles the effect, but there are two situations available:
1 - There are multiple opponents, and I can give allies bonuses to attack/damage, haste, flight, etc...
2 - There is only one enemy, and I can spam save-or-suck effects at him (dazing him for 2 rounds minimum, thanks to extend).

The easiest way to fix this would be:
Normal version - As is, and the target receives a small penalty to attack for a short period of time.
Reverse version - As is, and the target receives a small bonus to attack the next time he uses that maneuver (within some period of time).

A roll twice, take the worst/best for 1 round would also work.

Kyeudo
2013-11-22, 08:26 PM
So, I've been looking to put up a new version. I'm currently looking back over the utterances and classes with the help of Zaq's Truenamer Guide (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=214115) and I'm contemplating a list of changes:

Moving Speak Unto The Masses down to 11th level for Truenamers and 12th (character) level for Wordspeakers.
Removing the Truespeak rank requirements from the Enlarge Utterance, Heighten Utterance, and Inaudible Utterance feats.
The afforementioned duration changes to various utterances.
Defensive Edge providing a +2 insight bonus to AC instead of a +1 untyped bonus. (reversed utterance unaffected)
Adding a Greater Defensive Edge, which provides a +5 insight bonus to AC. Having trouble with the reverse, since it shares a level with Mystic Rampart and Mystic Rampart already does a -5 penalty to AC.
Greater Knight's Pussiance goes up to a 5th level Utterance. It's the equivalent of a maxed-out Greater Magic Weapon, something that only tops out at 20th level.
Increasing the power of Silent Caster. The duration of the normal utterance now allows for a little more room between speaking the utterance and the Silent spell and the reverse's personal truename effect now increases the duration of the silence effect by a lot.
Clarifying Archer's Eye to have a lesser effect on total concealment.
I'm considering increasing the fast healing granted by Potent Word of Nurturing, Critical Word of Nurturing, and Greater Word of Nurturing. At the levels they come into play, they are competing with Heal and 75 hit points doesn't stack up against 110 very well.
Incarnation of Angels is down to a second level utterance and I'm adding a clarification that it does not add the Extraplanar subtype (no dismissal tricks).
I'm considering bumping the damage reduction granted by Mystic Rampart up to 10/- instead of only 5/-.
Should Breath of Recovery go down another level? I hear that Pancea is only a 4th level spell and does much the same thing.
I'm thinking of doubling the damage on Energy Vortex. Apparently I forgot that you are level 12 when you get it. Dealing 2d6 per round is pathetic at level 12, even for a Commoner.
I'm thinking of adding an utterance to give or take away a target's psionic focus. Low level, probably 2 or 3.
Tatoos of Sure Defense move from an untyped bonus to an insight bonus to correspond to the changes in Defensive Edge.



To be honest, I'm wondering how often I would use this. The normal version requires a very specific kind of enemy, one that I don't typically see that often (although one of my DMs did use them as an enemy recently, and has now found he loves swordsages). The reverse version is better, but am I willing to spend a daily resource and my standard action to get someone else an encounter ability back? I will admit that quicken and echo make it a lot better, and obviously knowing their truename doubles the effect, but there are two situations available:
1 - There are multiple opponents, and I can give allies bonuses to attack/damage, haste, flight, etc...
2 - There is only one enemy, and I can spam save-or-suck effects at him (dazing him for 2 rounds minimum, thanks to extend).


This is a variation on some of the Truenamer's "cheerleading" utterances. They already have several that let them spend their actions letting a teammate do something better - Reversed Magic Contraction is probably something a Warmage or Uttercold Assault Necromancer would love to have on demand. You could be right, but I'm going to argue for this version:

One of the big limits on martial adepts is that they can't reuse the manuevers they just used. Usually, they'll have one or two manuevers that are especially appropriate, then some that aren't as helpful (but still awesome - it's hard for a martial adept to be useless). With a Truenamer backing them up, they can unload their most appropriate stuff over and over again.

Yes, the normal version is situational. However, it's a no-save-just-suck for martial adepts. You burn your action, he can't use his major class abilities. Zero sum game for you, but net win for the party, especially in a boss encounter.

Yue Ryong
2013-11-22, 09:03 PM
So, I've been looking to put up a new version. I'm currently looking back over the utterances and classes with the help of Zaq's Truenamer Guide (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=214115) and I'm contemplating a list of changes:

Moving Speak Unto The Masses down to 11th level for Truenamers and 12th (character) level for Wordspeakers.
Removing the Truespeak rank requirements from the Enlarge Utterance, Heighten Utterance, and Inaudible Utterance feats.
The afforementioned duration changes to various utterances.All reasonable.
Defensive Edge providing a +2 insight bonus to AC instead of a +1 untyped bonus. (reversed utterance unaffected)Thank you! I would NEVER get it before. Now it's... still not great, but it's at least worth considering.

Adding a Greater Defensive Edge, which provides a +5 insight bonus to AC. Having trouble with the reverse, since it shares a level with Mystic Rampart and Mystic Rampart already does a -5 penalty to AC.Hm... up the damage taken?
Greater Knight's Pussiance goes up to a 5th level Utterance. It's the equivalent of a maxed-out Greater Magic Weapon, something that only tops out at 20th level.Well... mostly. It doesn't last even remotely as long, and it doesn't bypass DR/Magic.
Increasing the power of Silent Caster. The duration of the normal utterance now allows for a little more room between speaking the utterance and the Silent spell and the reverse's personal truename effect now increases the duration of the silence effect by a lot.
Clarifying Archer's Eye to have a lesser effect on total concealment.Feasible.
I'm considering increasing the fast healing granted by Potent Word of Nurturing, Critical Word of Nurturing, and Greater Word of Nurturing. At the levels they come into play, they are competing with Heal and 75 hit points doesn't stack up against 110 very well.But by that point, Extend & Echoing utterance can be considered fairly reliable drops. 100-200hp is VERY competitive, and there is no direct metamagic equivalent for Heal.
Incarnation of Angels is down to a second level utterance and I'm adding a clarification that it does not add the Extraplanar subtype (no dismissal tricks).Tasty.
I'm considering bumping the damage reduction granted by Mystic Rampart up to 10/- instead of only 5/-.Mm... could be. DR10 is about reasonable, I'm just not sure DR10/- is. Adamantine, perhaps?
Should Breath of Recovery go down another level? I hear that Pancea is only a 4th level spell and does much the same thing.Hm... maybe. I'd probably still take it where it is, but this is seriously worth considering given the comparison.
I'm thinking of doubling the damage on Energy Vortex. Apparently I forgot that you are level 12 when you get it. Dealing 2d6 per round is pathetic at level 12, even for a Commoner.I mostly think of it as an interlock trick. It's something you layer on four or five times over with quicken over several rounds. It's not great like that, but it's not terrible. Although I'd still be on Transposition of Location.
I'm thinking of adding an utterance to give or take away a target's psionic focus. Low level, probably 2 or 3.Could work, although definitely not as high as 3. I'd consider it at 2, and be very tempted at 1. Psionics is niche enough that I'd not sink that much into making one of their bigger problems a slightly bigger one.
Tatoos of Sure Defense move from an untyped bonus to an insight bonus to correspond to the changes in Defensive Edge.
Good-good. Untyped AC boosts always make me twitchy.
This is a variation on some of the Truenamer's "cheerleading" utterances. They already have several that let them spend their actions letting a teammate do something better - Reversed Magic Contraction is probably something a Warmage or Uttercold Assault Necromancer would love to have on demand. You could be right, but I'm going to argue for this version:

One of the big limits on martial adepts is that they can't reuse the manuevers they just used. Usually, they'll have one or two manuevers that are especially appropriate, then some that aren't as helpful (but still awesome - it's hard for a martial adept to be useless). With a Truenamer backing them up, they can unload their most appropriate stuff over and over again.

Yes, the normal version is situational. However, it's a no-save-just-suck for martial adepts. You burn your action, he can't use his major class abilities. Zero sum game for you, but net win for the party, especially in a boss encounter.I'd say it's a workable concept.

Kyeudo
2013-11-22, 09:50 PM
Hm... up the damage taken?


Could work. With or without the AC penalty?



Well... mostly. It doesn't last even remotely as long, and it doesn't bypass DR/Magic.


DR/magic is a joke at the levels we're talking about.



Feasible.But by that point, Extend & Echoing utterance can be considered fairly reliable drops. 100-200hp is VERY competitive, and there is no direct metamagic equivalent for Heal.


Very true, and there's probably Speak Unto The Masses in the mix too.



Mm... could be. DR10 is about reasonable, I'm just not sure DR10/- is. Adamantine, perhaps?


How often will a PC's opponents be bringing adamantine to a fight?



I mostly think of it as an interlock trick. It's something you layer on four or five times over with quicken over several rounds. It's not great like that, but it's not terrible. Although I'd still be on Transposition of Location.


Can't. Law of Sequence won't let you hit the same target twice.

Yue Ryong
2013-11-23, 02:27 PM
Could work. With or without the AC penalty?I'd go with, but I am aware that leaves a certain amount of distinctiveness behind.
DR/magic is a joke at the levels we're talking about.But the duration isn't. In fact, I'd say if it weren't for the duration, I'd not even consider it.
Very true, and there's probably Speak Unto The Masses in the mix too.Yeah. As has been demonstrated before, total healing isn't something that Truenamers are short on. That said, there could be a case for increasing the Fast Healing vs shortening the duration. Same total, bit heavier short-term capacity.
How often will a PC's opponents be bringing adamantine to a fight?Well, I tend to use recurring villains a certain amount, so that may skew my figures. That said, DR10 is a fairly large amount to have as non-negotiable blockade. Magic, as you say, is a joke, but there's not much alignment-netural that's an upgrade. Adamantine was the first to spring to mind.
Can't. Law of Sequence won't let you hit the same target twice.*Smacks self.* Well, I'm an idiot. Thanks for reminding me. Yeah, OK. Needs a buff, then.

Kyeudo
2013-11-25, 06:35 PM
But the duration isn't. In fact, I'd say if it weren't for the duration, I'd not even consider it.


We're comparing a 3rd level spell and a 5th level Utterance. I wouldn't be considering the utterance if it wasn't for the lack of free scaling for most Utterances.



Yeah. As has been demonstrated before, total healing isn't something that Truenamers are short on. That said, there could be a case for increasing the Fast Healing vs shortening the duration. Same total, bit heavier short-term capacity.


Some sort of burst healing would be useful, something to keep the BDF alive until the fight is over. However, I'd like it to not be a cheap knock off of heal.



Well, I tend to use recurring villains a certain amount, so that may skew my figures. That said, DR10 is a fairly large amount to have as non-negotiable blockade. Magic, as you say, is a joke, but there's not much alignment-netural that's an upgrade. Adamantine was the first to spring to mind.


It's just that Stoneskin's been floating around since level 7, which is DR 10/adamantine. We're dealing with 5th level utterances, so level 14 at the earliest.



*Smacks self.* Well, I'm an idiot. Thanks for reminding me. Yeah, OK. Needs a buff, then.

It's an often overlooked implication of the Law of Sequence. I almost missed it myself.

Yue Ryong
2013-11-25, 10:12 PM
We're comparing a 3rd level spell and a 5th level Utterance. I wouldn't be considering the utterance if it wasn't for the lack of free scaling for most Utterances.*Shrugs.* I'd say a big part of the value of GMW is that you use it once and that's all you need for the day. Utterance durations just don't make the actual number comparisons that tempting. You're burning a lot of actions to make this doable.
Some sort of burst healing would be useful, something to keep the BDF alive until the fight is over. However, I'd like it to not be a cheap knock off of heal.Well, the way I'd peg it is to do stuff over 2-3 rounds (probably two, to maintain symmetry with the reverse) and adjust the Fast healing accordingly. That's fairly distinct as a method, and still fairly flavourful. Also, doesn't do the entire laundry list of status effects that Heal does.
It's just that Stoneskin's been floating around since level 7, which is DR 10/adamantine. We're dealing with 5th level utterances, so level 14 at the earliest.Stoneskin is... kind of DR10/Admantine. I prefer to think of it as 150hp that you can only use in 10 point bursts. Not that utterance-scale durations make that a big difference in functional prevention, admittedly. Well... It's hardly a big quibble. 10/- is hardly game-shattering, just something I felt was a little over the line.

Kyeudo
2013-12-07, 08:46 PM
Alright, just uploaded the new version. It has all the new changes except for that Bard/Truenamer class I proposed. That one, I'm finding it hard to come up with a good capstone.

Currently, I've some good ideas for the middle levels:

Spend a use of Bardic Music to add Charisma bonus to an Utterance's saving throw
Extend the duration of an Utterance by up to your effective Bard level by spending a Bardic Music use and concentrating on the effect (Chant Utterance returns!)
Spend Bardic Music uses to do a Speak Unto The Masses effect without needing targets to share creature type or alignment
Affect a target with a Bardic Music effect by using their personal truename, regardless of distance or line of effect.
Use Utterances without disrupting a Bardic Music effect.
Generate a Bardic Music effect that grants a circumstance bonus to Truespeak checks for others.
Skill switching - Use Truespeak instead of Perform, Perform instead of Truespeak.


Obviously, not all of these will probably make it onto the class, but none of them seem to have enough oomph to be a good reason to put as a 10th level ability. Maybe combine two into the same class feature?

Kyeudo
2014-02-17, 04:46 AM
Hey, look! A zombie!

I finally got the bard/truenamer class written - barring char-op tricks, it's either a Bard 9 entry or a Bard 3/Truenamer 3 - and I've reorganized the layout of the Prestige Class chapter. Here's a link to the latest version. (https://www.mediafire.com/?zc9fk9tczzlcty6)

Draz74
2014-02-17, 02:35 PM
Hey, look! A zombie!

I finally got the bard/truenamer class written - barring char-op tricks, it's either a Bard 9 entry or a Bard 3/Truenamer 3 - and I've reorganized the layout of the Prestige Class chapter. Here's a link to the latest version. (https://www.mediafire.com/?zc9fk9tczzlcty6)

I totally missed the updates in December. Giving Bards truenaming flavor is something I've been in favor of for a long time, so I'll definitely be checking out this latest update ...

Zandorgard
2014-08-21, 11:31 AM
Hello!

Just wanted to thank you for the awesome job you did!

I have been using this Book of Words on Campaign for about 2 years. Granted i use on one of my plot NPCs, but everyone seems to like it a lot.

Thatīs all, thank you a lot! Keep up the good work! =D

artimus261
2017-09-29, 04:06 PM
WOW just... WOW.... I just posted a fix of myself that was much more simple minded, trying to put band-aid over a freaking sword wound. This is simply exquisite. I will be using this from now on for the truenamer! You've done the world a great service <3 <3 <3