Are these rewards balanced?

[OzymandiasX]

I'm running a 3.5 game in a custom world setting (Very low magic, characters are level 12). My players are about to wrap up a pretty significant story arc and I'm looking to give them nifty rewards. Without going into detail, they are going to be thanked personally by a deity (in disguise, of course) and each given a reward.

I just wanted to get some feedback to make sure that none of the rewards are overwhelming/underwhelming in comparison to the others... (Since I have some very experienced players, I tend to customize all monsters, loot, etc to keep them on their toes, so almost nothing is directly out of a book)

These are the characters and what I'm giving them:


* Ranger/Scout - Getting boots that allow him to ignore difficult terrain and +4 vs fear saves. (Movement and tumbling are important to his build)

* Barbarian/Tempest - Getting his primary weapon blessed so that it is now Holy and gains an additional +1 bonus. (The Holy bit is significant, as they'll be fighting a good bit of evil outsiders)

* Radiant Servant - Gaining the Luck domain, as well as +1 Luck bonus to Saves and AC. (Has a habit of failing easy saves, so the free reroll from the Luck domain will definitely be used. lol)

* Mystic Theurge - Spellbook with all Div and Trans spells in it. Getting essentially a +4 bonus to all knowledge skill checks (his char concept is a scholar and he uses these a lot. His spellbook is a bit low on spells currently, especially in Trans)

* Druid (Shapeshifter) - Essentially +5 natural armor amulet. (He usually does combat in animal form, but has relatively crappy AC and usually takes a pounding)



Keep in mind that it is a low-magic campaign setting, and magic items are rare. Each character only has 2-3 magic items and there is little to no access to ever just go shopping for DMG items.

So what do you guys think? I want these to be awesome and useful personalized gifts (from a deity) for each character. But I also want to avoid any player feeling like he's been gypped.

If you were playing any of these characters, would you think what you're getting is cool? Do you have any suggestions for changes/substitutions?

[Kelb_Panthera]

You need to tone down the MT's gift or bring the others up to match.

Seriously, all of the spells from the second best school added to his book? I remember a spell-book type magic item, it might've been a relic of Boccob, that gives a spellcaster a 50% chance per day of getting any spell of his choice to prepare that day. That'd probably be much more in line with where you're aiming. If it is a relic, just remove the relic bits, i.e. it doesn't require a 5th level slot each day or the true devotion feat.

[Darius Kane]

You need to tone down the MT's gift or bring the others up to match.
Don't forget he's a Mystic Theurge.

[tyckspoon]

Agree that the Theurge's gift is out of line. The others aren't *bad* gifts, mind, it's just that a spellbook that, used well, will have the Theurge set for the rest of his career (and potentially make him incredibly wealthy if he thinks to make scrolls/sell access to it to other wizards, who presumably also are having trouble finding spells..) is even better. (Although that does depend some on how broad the spell sources you use are- if it's just PHB stuff, it's probably ok. If you use the Spell Compendium, it's probably too much.)

Personally, I'd make the Ranger's boots allow him to 10-foot step; that way he has a ready means of activating Skirmish and Full Attacking. Assuming he isn't using a free/swift movement/Pouncing method already.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Don't forget he's a Mystic Theurge.

He's a caster in a low-magic campaign. He's already got the potential to utterly dominate with just the two level-up freebies.

The entire transmutation school will make him a god amongst children.

Unless you're pretty good at adjudicating them, I'd be wary of giving him -all- of divination too.

The item I was thinking of is the Tome of Ancient Lore, MIC pg 189. If you remove the requirements for activating the relic power it should be in line with where you're aiming.

[TuggyNE]

The Swift Hunter's boots are pretty underpowered, as mentioned; shifting fear immunity to some sort of mobility enhancer, perhaps even the fabled 10' step, would probably work well.

[OzymandiasX]

This is just the type of feedback I'm looking for. Thanks!


I don't have my books with me, but I'll definitely look at the Tome of Ancient Lore for the Mystic Theurge this evening.

What if, as tyckspoon suggested, the MT's reward is restricted to only all Div and Trans spells that are in the PHB? He has hard a hard time getting spells to add to his current spellbook, so some of it will be catch-up...

Another thing I didn't mention is that the whole campaign probably won't go past level 15 or so. (I find that higher than that the D&D system doesn't work well for the low-magic settings I perfer) And considering that the Mystic Theurge was completely underpowered through much of the campaign (we started at level 3), I'm fine with him being the biggest threat in the party at this point.


And I do like the 10' step idea for the Ranger/Scout... (I'll have to crunch some numbers to make sure it won't 4x his damage output or something with the feats he has)

[OzymandiasX]

The others aren't *bad* gifts, mind, it's just that a spellbook that, used well, will have the Theurge set for the rest of his career (and potentially make him incredibly wealthy if he thinks to make scrolls/sell access to it to other wizards, who presumably also are having trouble finding spells..)

True, though making too much money won't be an issue, as the party already has more money than they can really spend. When you can't use $$$ to stockpile magic items, you get to use it on stuff like "gifting" to officials, buying keeps, funding causes, and other creative roleplay stuff that I love running much more than running combat :)

[only1doug]

I agree that the scouts boots need a bit more oomph.

How about the boots giving the step of the wind stance (L1 setting sun stance from ToB) which ignores terrain penalties to movement and grants a combat bonus if the enemy is affected by the terrain as well as the 10' step.

[molten_dragon]

My thoughts on these.


Ranger/Scout - Getting boots that allow him to ignore difficult terrain and +4 vs fear saves. (Movement and tumbling are important to his build)

Very underpowered compared to the average of the rest of the items. Definitely add something to these to make them more balanced, or nerf the rest by quite a bit. Maybe a small permanent movement speed bonus (10 ft) and haste once or twice a day would about even them out.


Barbarian/Tempest - Getting his primary weapon blessed so that it is now Holy and gains an additional +1 bonus. (The Holy bit is significant, as they'll be fighting a good bit of evil outsiders)

I would say this is a pretty good average powere level compared to the others. It should be fine.


Radiant Servant - Gaining the Luck domain, as well as +1 Luck bonus to Saves and AC. (Has a habit of failing easy saves, so the free reroll from the Luck domain will definitely be used. lol)

This is maybe slightly underpowered, but only slightly. Not enough that I'd worry about changing it really.


Mystic Theurge - Spellbook with all Div and Trans spells in it. Getting essentially a +4 bonus to all knowledge skill checks (his char concept is a scholar and he uses these a lot. His spellbook is a bit low on spells currently, especially in Trans)

This is very overpowered compared to the average. Every single divination and transmutation spell is ridiculous, even without the +4 to all knowledge skills. If you want to give him spells, just give him some, either that he can pick, or that you pick for him, but giving him all spells from a school as versatile as transmutation is extremely powerful.


Druid (Shapeshifter) - Essentially +5 natural armor amulet. (He usually does combat in animal form, but has relatively crappy AC and usually takes a pounding)

This one is also sitting at a pretty decent average power level along with the barbarian's weapon and the radiant servant's luck

[Kelb_Panthera]

This is just the type of feedback I'm looking for. Thanks!


I don't have my books with me, but I'll definitely look at the Tome of Ancient Lore for the Mystic Theurge this evening.

What if, as tyckspoon suggested, the MT's reward is restricted to only all Div and Trans spells that are in the PHB? He has hard a hard time getting spells to add to his current spellbook, so some of it will be catch-up...

Another thing I didn't mention is that the whole campaign probably won't go past level 15 or so. (I find that higher than that the D&D system doesn't work well for the low-magic settings I perfer) And considering that the Mystic Theurge was completely underpowered through much of the campaign (we started at level 3), I'm fine with him being the biggest threat in the party at this point.


And I do like the 10' step idea for the Ranger/Scout... (I'll have to crunch some numbers to make sure it won't 4x his damage output or something with the feats he has)

The PHB transmutations and divinations have the worst offenders for game breaking. I really think the ToAL is more what you're looking for.

Are you prepared to answer the questions of Contact other Plane? How about dealing with polymorph, or polymorph any object?

The ToAL can act as access to spells for adding to the spellbook too. He preps the spell, then scribes a scroll of the spell using the one he prep'ed then he copies it from the scroll to his spellbook. This unambigously works for up to 4th level spells, and will work regardless of spell level unless you rule that he can't look up the same spell multiple times on consecutive or non-consecutive days.

In time, quite a lot of time, this can make it possible to learn every spell ever. It takes a minimum of 3 days per spell though. 1 day to craft a scroll of up to 4th level (5-6th level take 2 days and 7-9th take 3) 1 day to research the scroll, and 1 day to scribe it into his spellbook. It also costs the usual 50gp per page in the spell-book and half the market price of a scroll of the spell he's learning.

You can reduce costs and time by simply letting him scribe a new spell directly from the tome to his spellbook. In that case it still takes 2 days and 50gp per page.

Edit: wow I'm a mook. A wizard can scribe any spell he has prep'ed into his book for 50gp per spell level in a single day. PHB pg 178-179.

[OzymandiasX]

Thanks, molten_dragon, the boots were the item I was thinking might be a bit underpowered. I'm definitely going to give them a boost.



Are you prepared to answer the questions of Contact other Plane? How about dealing with polymorph, or polymorph any object?Hehe. Yes, I'm a fairly experienced DM and players get access to these spells anyways.


So I looked up the Tome of Ancient Lore (in the Complete Divine) and it gives a 90% chance of finding ANY spell. This seems a lot more powerful than all of just two schools.

I do agree that the Mystic Theurge's reward could be toned down some. What if I drop Trans and make it just have all Divination spells in it? (And keep the +4 to knowledge checks)

And since he is still limited by spells/day, having extra spells in his book that he'd have to wait till the next day to cast... It doesn't give him that large of an advantage, because when stuff is going down, the party usually can't afford to wait a day to change out prepared spells.

[BowStreetRunner]

The Radiant Servant's reward is not under-powered at all. If in fact you are granting a bonus domain and not just an item that provides access to the domain, that easily puts it right up there with the others.

If you want to bring up the boots you can do the same thing. Just grant his character the ability without needing the item makes it significantly more valuable. (Just curious though, what is his scout level if he doesn't already have Flawless Stride?)

[Kelb_Panthera]

Thanks, molten_dragon, the boots were the item I was thinking might be a bit underpowered. I'm definitely going to give them a boost.


Hehe. Yes, I'm a fairly experienced DM and players get access to these spells anyways.


So I looked up the Tome of Ancient Lore (in the Complete Divine) and it gives a 90% chance of finding ANY spell. This seems a lot more powerful than all of just two schools.

I do agree that the Mystic Theurge's reward could be toned down some. What if I drop Trans and make it just have all Divination spells in it? (And keep the +4 to knowledge checks)

And since he is still limited by spells/day, having extra spells in his book that he'd have to wait till the next day to cast... It doesn't give him that large of an advantage, because when stuff is going down, the party usually can't afford to wait a day to change out prepared spells.

That was changed to 50% for your highest level spell or 100% for lower level spells.

If it doesn't quite work for you, the all divinations book could be okay. It's still quite powerful, but only if it's carefully wielded.