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View Full Version : Common Magical Effects and You: Averting the Christmas Tree Effect [3.5]



Golden Ladybug
2013-03-28, 09:30 PM
I'm sure you've all experienced this phenomenon while building mid-to-high level characters before; you've put together your class levels, chosen your feats and you look at the gold you have available? A pretty hefty sum, and you could definitely get some really cool stuff with it.

But, you probably should buy a Stat Boosting Item before you do anything else. You don't want your Spell DCs to be too low, and you really need your To-Hit score as high as you can get it. And you should definitely buy a Cloak of Resistance too. Saving throws are important, and they're not something you can really afford to neglect.

...but your AC is pretty low. Suppose you should Enchant your Armor, and maybe buy a Ring of Protection as well. Since you're dealing with AC, you should probably game your To-Hit mod as well; time to enchant your Weapon of choice as well.

Suddenly, you're out of gold and you've bought the same things you buy every time you build a character. I've had about enough of that.


Removing Common Magical Effects


Ability Scores and Saving Throws
{table=head]ECL|Saving Throws|Abilities

1st|
-|
-

2nd|
-|
-

3rd|
Resistance +1|
-

4th|
-|
Ability Scores +2

5th|
-|
-

6th|
Resistance +2|
Ability Scores +2/+2

7th|
-|
-

8th|
-|
Ability Scores +4/+2

9th|
Resistance +3|
-

10th|
-|
Ability Scores +4/+2/+2

11th|
-|
-

12th|
Resistance +4|
Ability Scores +6/+4/+2

13th|
-|
-

14th|
-|
Ability Scores +6/+4/+2/+2

15th|
Resistance +5|
-

16th|
-|
Ability Scores +8/+6/+4/+2

17th|
-|
-

18th|
Resistance +6|
Ability Scores +8/+6/+4/+2/+2

19th|
-|
-

20th|
-|
Ability Scores +10/+8/+6/+4/+2[/table]

Resistance: At Equivalent Character Level 3, characters gain a +1 Resistance Bonus to all Saving Throws. This bonus increases by +1 every 3 levels thereafter.

Ability Scores: At Equivalent Character Level 4, characters gain a +2 Bonus to an Ability Score of their choice. At every even level thereafter, characters gain an additional +2 Bonus to an ability score or increase all bonuses to Ability Scores by +2, except for the most recent bonus. Characters cannot apply multiple bonuses to the same Ability Score through this feature.

The Progression of Saving Throws and Ability Scores is important to every character, and I aimed to provide a logical, effective increase to both as a function of levelling up. I tried to stagger the progression so that, at any point, you would actually be able to buy the bonuses this system is giving you within the constraints of your Wealth by Level. This obviously changes when we get to the top end, when the bonuses start going into Epic Magic Items. I don't think there's any problem with that, though.


Magical Equipment and Armor Class
{table=head]Base Attack Bonus|Magic Weapons|Magic Armor|Deflection|Natural Armor


+1|
+0|
+0|
+0|
+0

+2|
+0|
+0|
+0|
+0

+3|
+0|
+1|
+0|
+0

+4|
+1|
+1|
+0|
+0

+5|
+1|
+1|
+0|
+1

+6|
+1|
+2|
+0|
+1

+7|
+1|
+2|
+1|
+1

+8|
+2|
+2|
+1|
+2

+9|
+2|
+3|
+1|
+2

+10|
+2|
+3|
+2|
+2

+11|
+2|
+3|
+2|
+3

+12|
+3|
+4|
+2|
+3

+13|
+3|
+4|
+3|
+3

+14|
+3|
+4|
+3|
+4

+15|
+3|
+5|
+3|
+4

+16|
+4|
+5|
+4|
+4

+17|
+4|
+5|
+4|
+5

+18|
+4|
+6|
+4|
+5

+19|
+4|
+6|
+5|
+5

+20|
+5|
+6|
+5|
+6[/table]

Magic Weapons: When a Character's Base Attack Bonus reaches 4, that character's skill and prowess makes any weapon they wield noticeably more effective. Any Weapon they wield is treated as a +1 Weapon, granting them a +1 bonus to both attack and damage rolls, overcoming DR/Magic and allowing a character to strike Incorporeal Creatures 50% of the time. Every 4 points of Base Attack Bonus thereafter, Weapons wielded by a character are treated as if they were of a higher enhancement bonus.

Magic Armor: When a Character's Base Attack Bonus reaches 3, their skill in combat allows them to better avoid harm. Any Armor or shield they use is treated as a +1 Armor or Shield, granting them a +1 Bonus to AC (bonuses from Armor and Shields stack). Every 3 points of Base Attack Bonus thereafter, Armor and Shields used by a character are treated as if they were of a higher enhancement bonus.

Natural Armor: When a Character's Base Attack Bonus reaches 5, their experience in combat has caused their skin to harden, to better protect them from harm. Character's gain a +1 Bonus to their Natural Armor. Every 3 points of Base Attack Bonus thereafter, their Natural Armor Bonus to AC increases.

Deflection: When a Character's Base Attack Bonus reaches 7, blows are deflected away from them before they even have the chance to connect, as if a thin layer of energy protected them from harm. Character's gain a +1 Deflection Bonus to their AC. Every 3 Points of Base Attack Bonus thereafter, this Deflection Bonus increases.

Rather than following the same progression by ECL for Ability Scores and Saving Throws, I decided to tie the increase in Weapon and Armor Potency, and Deflection and Armor Bonuses, to a Character's Base Attack Bonus. The scaling is once again quite linear, and can easily be projected for Epic Level play if you so wish. Deflection is a better bonus than NA, so it comes later. Likewise, since it is cheaper to enchant Armor than it is to Enchant Weapons, Armor begins scaling earlier and quicker.

Full BAB types gain the most from this, obviously, and since they are the ones in the front lines, they are definitely in need of decent AC. Medium BAB characters don't get the same protection and accuracy, but they don't need it quite as much. Poor BAB characters are rarely in direct combat, so the lower bonuses to AC and their Weapons are less important. In any case, since most Poor BAB characters are Spellcasters, I don't think its unreasonable to think they can handle themselves.


Using These Rules

This is by no means a revolutionary, never before seen idea that will shake the very foundations of the world, but nonetheless there are going to be a certain number of changes that you would need to implement to use this fix.


The purpose of this Homebrew is to seperate the Paradigm of Personal Power equating to Wealth. This fix provides character's increased power and ability from their own merits. As such, this system does not take into account the "increase" in wealth provided by these bonuses. It may be appropriate to reduce Wealth by Level, or require that not all of a character's wealth is invested in physical assets
Due to the seperation of Numeric Enhancement Bonuses and Magic Weapons, it may be appropriate to change the way Magic Items are made; Rather than requiring a numeric +1 before any enchantments can be added to a weapon, I would suggest allowing Masterwork Weapons to be immediately enchanted with special properties. So, there would be no +1 Flaming Swords, simply Flaming Swords
As a caveat to the above, consider making Magic Armor and Weapons rarer and more potent. Since any weapon, from a simple Club to a convuluted Double Spiked Chain, acts as a Magic Weapon in the hands of a powerful character, weapons that are independent of a character would do well to be a bit more special and important
This system provides inherent, non-magical bonuses to a character's vital statistics, and as such would be well-suited to low magic or low wealth games; it allows you and your players to keep within those boundaries, while also remaining able to effectively combat higher level threats
Hopefully this would be obvious, but when using this fix, I would caution against using magic items that emulate Common Magical Effects. This system is designed to replace them, not supplement them


Advice on refining this fix, clarifying the rules text or comments on how I could improve it are all very appreciated.

bobthe6th
2013-03-28, 10:03 PM
Seems solid, might be fun to figure home much gold this is effectively granting.

Though I worry for the 3/4 BAB charicter... they won't be on the same level as the proper martial charicter. And the multi classer is a bit stuck...

Silva Stormrage
2013-03-28, 11:20 PM
Love this idea completely keying the abilities to BAB is interesting certainly. One thing you might want to add is that temporary BAB increases (Divine power) won't increase the natural armor, deflection etc of the character. It would make divine power a lot stronger and it really doesn't need that.

Do these bonuses effect monsters? Because monster ECL can be a LOT higher than normal characters. Same with their BAB. Also what should the reduced WBL rate be? 1/2, 1/4? It might be better to see how much this actually grants in WBL though.

Golden Ladybug
2013-03-29, 12:02 AM
I didn't intend to grant this to all monsters (as Silva pointed out; they come out pretty far ahead in the ECL department), but it would be there to boost up Humanoid/Mostly Humanoid foes if necessary. The ethos of this fix was to replace WBL granting power with a PC's personal skill granting power.

Although, perhaps having the first table apply to Monsters/NPCs while the second one only applies to PCs may be a solution. It would make the world more threatening and challenging, while still putting the PCs in a position that makes them uniquely qualified to be the heroes.

That is a good point about the temporary BAB increasing spells. I did ponder about them briefly, but clearly not enough to have the foresight to add a clause preventing them from benefiting from massive increases in potency by casting a spell.

And lets figure it out, shall we?

At Level 5, this grants you bonuses equal to 10,000gp (assuming full BAB), more than doubling WBL :smalleek:

At Level 10, we've gotten a total of 68,000gp worth of bonuses, not only doubling WBL but throwing a bit more than the WBL of a 6th level character on top of that.

At Level 15, we are up to 174,400gp, so we're no longer doubling WBL (but are still in excess of 150%)

At level 20, its gone into Epic Bonuses for the Ability Scores, but ignoring Epic Pricing for now, it gives out 464,000gp, which is still over the 150% line.

With that in mind, a conservation suggestion of 1/3 of WBL (perhaps only post ECL 3? Although that would invite some weirdness with losing money by levelling up...) would be where I'd aim for. This will still leave PCs with a decent amount of gold to spend on their characters, but doesn't make things quite so Monty Haul.

DracoDei
2013-03-29, 01:36 PM
On phone right now so will read later. For now have a different approach to the way you phrased the problem.
Wikipedia-like cross indexing: Special Snowflake Christmas Trees (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=241299)

EDIT: I have now added a reciprocal link.

Here are my comments:
Do the ability score increases just show the most common way of doing things or are you sure that that is the ONLY progression that is possible when ranking from highest bonus to lowest? I will also point out that opportunities to change your mind about what you value most highly are rare, and only seem to apply to the lowest bonuses, making the first two or three choices you make very important, because that will determine where your two biggest bonuses will always be.

You also MIGHT consider having this REPLACE the every 4 level ability score increase, especially if you fix the preceding problem. Then again, that further exacerbates the problem of an odd score being about the same as the even score one less than it for most ability scores. Maybe reduce the granularity to 1 instead of 2? My own solution was to give a 1 point ability score increase every level, but say that no more than half of the increases (rounded up) can go to any one stat. I ganked your idea (with credit), and created this hybrid

EDIT^3: Alternatively, inspired by THIS (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=278041) (which I also cross-indexed at the start of this post) keep the items, but make the every level increases default to enhancement bonuses, but every 4 levels you may select any single point of such enhancement bonus and change it to untyped. This CAN be the point you just added at that level, but it doesn't have to be.



You don't do anything about flight, which I found something to handle (NOT my original work). Of course, it isn't QUITE as good as flight, and that is intentional because I was trying to introduce variety, not eliminate TOO many magic items.

alanek2002
2013-04-20, 04:15 PM
... :D You just made many animes possible.

DracoDei
2013-04-20, 08:28 PM
... :D You just made many animes possible.
How so? Was it the flight rules Warriors and Wuxia (which I had nothing to do with)?