Truenamer's and Their Place in D&D

[Phylion]

I have been doing some research on Truenamers and would like to know whether they are a decent class or not. If so, explain why, if not, explain why not. Thank you.

[Waker]

Here is Zaq's thread on the topic of Truenamer's.
Though I haven't personally played a Truenamer, my understanding of the class is that is requires a fair degree of optimization in order to use their main class ability, which is still rather underwhelming.

[Grod_The_Giant]

They have an awesome concept, but they simply don't function mechanically. This thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=214115)does a good job explaining everything, but the main issues are:

Many of their utterances are kind of crap-- Suppress Item! Morale boost!
Poor editing that leaves some abilities unusable. (Perfected Map utterances have no DC)
They require high amounts of optimization to be useable, since the DCs they need to hit grow twice as fast as their modifier does organically.

[Pluto!]

I have been doing some research on Truenamers and would like to know whether they are a decent class or not. If so, explain why, if not, explain why not. Thank you.
If you've been doing some research on Truenamers, I'm astounded that you haven't run headlong into the consensus that they're one of the worst-designed classes in the game.

An individual truenamer has access to few effects, the effects generally aren't very strong, and the DC formulas and "Laws of X" give the Truenamer a hard time even doing its mediocre tricks reliably.

It's a class you can bust your ass or use some abusable variant rules to make work, if you want to play one. But that's something that you can do with pretty much any class.

[eggynack]

If you've been doing some research on Truenamers, I'm astounded that you haven't run headlong into the consensus that they're one of the worst-designed classes in the game.
I don't know if that's fair. Truenamers look a lot like wizards, or at least warlocks, and it's hard to tell if something's effective spells are underleveled or underpowered at first glance, or if a DC is easily reachable or not. Truenamers aren't actually all that bad, as long as you hit the DC's. Tier four is the general consensus. Anyways, I second reading Zaq's stuff. He knows more about truenamers than just about anyone, and the handbook is a pretty good read.

[Pluto!]

I don't know if that's fair. Truenamers look a lot like wizards, or at least warlocks, and it's hard to tell if something's effective spells are underleveled or underpowered at first glance, or if a DC is easily reachable or not.
Fair. I assumed "research" meant something like a Google search, where just about every mention of a Truenamer comes packed with a cheap shot at it.

Reading the book, the effects aren't the weakest if you assume they're usable and especially the headaches of the Laws aren't clear at all.

[Morithias]

I find truenamers are best used as plot devices. After all it's stated in tome of magic that. "Truenames encompass reality in it's entirety, everything in the world, everything that ever was, and presumably everything that ever will be has a truename."

And due to the fact that there is no official epic truenamer...a clever DM could argue that an Epic Truenamer could literally have Haruhi Suzamiya level reality warping powers....a truely dangerous threat, and a great exposition NPC.

[Bonzai]

I played a True Namer from lvl 3-15, and a complete diary of my experience can be found HERE (https://community.wizards.com/forum/previous-editions-character-optimization/threads/1193391).

My short consensus? If a player has a DM that is willing to work with him on some common sense home brew, then a True Namer can be an interesting experience and will contribute just fine to the party. Here are the main issues;

1. The DC raises. Gear, custom items, feats, etc... all can help. However I would never consider playing one again without the Item Familiar feat, or a homebrew variant like we used in our campaign. It makes a huge difference as time goes on.

2. The most aggravating thing for me was not being able to effect more than one target until 17th level is ridiculous. This is another area that the True Namer really falls flat on. Again, we home brewed a feat for this, and I highly recommend getting with your DM and allowing it. Even if the feat only allows you to target your party, it would b a huge benefit. It actually makes you feel useful giving the entire party haste, flight, fast healing, etc...

With those two things, a true namer can be a productive member of a party. Not wizard or cleric good, but nearly bard good... at least until latter levels where you start getting game breaking stuff.

As I see it, there are three real ways to build a Truenamer. They can be the party buffer/down time healer. They can be a debuffer. Or they can be a tank/gish type of character. My build was as a buffer/healer for the most part. I avoided most utterances with a saving throw, and enabling and supporting the rest of my party. I could also debuff some and deal damage, so I had some flexibility. A debuffer is going to want to max out his save DC's and pretty much design his build around min maxing them. Lastly, a True namer can be a decent tank, with decent armor, recitations, fast healing, and utterances.

At the end of the day, a True Namer will make you work hard for every little scrap you get. Often times you get utterances that mimic spells that other's get four plus levels earlier, however many of them are slightly better than the original. Like a no save slow, or a Dispel that can remove buffs cast by gods. Not all of them are worth the wait, but some are definitely interesting.

Would I play a True Namer again? No. I've done my time with the class and gotten the experience I wanted with it. Did I feel like I was dead weight? No. At worst I was a near zero drag on party resources, and on more than one occasion I saved the day with my unique skill set. I almost always was able to do something productive and contribute in some way. Contribute as much as an optimized caster? Not even close.

[Psyren]

If you're going to repair it through homebrew, you may as well just use a fixed version from the start. Check out Kyeudo's Truenamer fix, Book of Words, in my sig - it keeps the feel of the original but fixes the math and adds brand new utterances.

[Red Fel]

The problem - the biggest problem - with the class is the mechanics of it. Ignoring for a moment the fact that some of their Utterances are useless (I seem to recall the existence of more than a few useless spells, that fact doesn't seem to hurt a Wizard's reputation) the mechanics actively work against the class.
The DC of your typical Truespeak check is 15+(2xCR) of the target. That means, as you face tougher enemies, your difficulty increases substantially, faster than you can increase your ranks in Truespeech. DC goes up 2, to your 1 point invested.
This DC also applies to buffs on your friends and yourself. That's right; as you become stronger, it becomes harder to buff yourself. That's just silly, that is.
The Law of Resistance says that every time you use an Utterance in a day, its DC increases for the remainder of the day. This is, in theory, an attempt to limit Utterances the way they limit spells/day.
The Law of Sequence says that only one copy of an Utterance can be in effect at a time. This means that you can't give the same buff to multiple allies, or the same penalty to an enemy, etc.
The way these features work together, you basically have to optimize your entire build around this single skill check, and you don't even get any particularly good Utterances until much later in the game (if at all), and your uses thereof remain obscenely limited. And unlike the Wizard, who can at least be pewpewing with wands or somesuch when his spells run out, all of your skills are invested in Truespeech; you are completely useless when your skill checks fail.

[Czin]

I have been doing some research on Truenamers and would like to know whether they are a decent class or not. If so, explain why, if not, explain why not. Thank you.

Due to the way that their DCs against monsters works and how skill progression works, the Truenamer is a rare example of a class that actually gets worse as it gets higher up in level until you reach a point where everything appropriately CR'd to your level is out of your ability to affect at all. Which is compounded by a lot of the laws in place for the class. Like the one concerning repetition which will *rapidly* lead you to literally talking yourself out of usefulness for a fight, which is especially terrible as you don't have many utterances to begin with due to only having the resources of one third of one splatbook. The law of sequence then hurts your ability to affect things in large numbers immensely, further punishing you in large scale encounters.

Had this not been a problem, they could have been a pretty potent class.

[Juntao112]

I have been doing some research on Truenamers and would like to know whether they are a decent class or not. If so, explain why, if not, explain why not. Thank you.

Don't listen to the naysayers. Truenamer is a perfectly viable class (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=8270).

I can't believe I typed that with a straight face.

[Bonzai]

Due to the way that their DCs against monsters works and how skill progression works, the Truenamer is a rare example of a class that actually gets worse as it gets higher up in level until you reach a point where everything appropriately CR'd to your level is out of your ability to affect at all. Which is compounded by a lot of the laws in place for the class. Like the one concerning repetition which will *rapidly* lead you to literally talking yourself out of usefulness for a fight.

Had this not been a problem, they could have been a pretty potent class.

Item Familiar solves that issue thankfully. It allows you to actually improve as time goes on, instead of making temporary gains. And yeah, you actually become decent. However even being able to quicken every turn didn't keep me from being out classed by pure caster's. I played a Focused Specialist Conjurer/Master Specialist in a different campaign at the same time, and even 4 levels behind my Conjurer was far more potent.

[Czin]

Item Familiar solves that issue thankfully. It allows you to actually improve as time goes on, instead of making temporary gains. And yeah, you actually become decent. However even being able to quicken every turn didn't keep me from being out classed by pure caster's. I played a Focused Specialist Conjurer/Master Specialist in a different campaign at the same time, and even 4 levels behind my Conjurer was far more potent.

Which really is a shame as truenaming by all rights should be the most powerful of abilities while being immensely difficult. It's reality warping bound only by your vocabulary. Now short of having the actual power cosmic this should be the skill to end all skills. Not something that even when optimized to hell and back, still rates as a "bleh" to Erudites, Clerics, Druids, and Wizards. Nevermind the unholy terror that is the beholder mage or illithid savant.

[Pickford]

Poor editing that leaves some abilities unusable. (Perfected Map utterances have no DC)
[/LIST]

The errata would like a word with you:


• To speak an area’s truename (using the Lexicon of the
Perfected Map), you must succeed on a Truespeak check
with a DC equal to 25 + 5 per level of the utterance. If
the area is a magical location, increase the DC by an
additional 5.

Shockingly these are the only utterances that are more difficult by utterance level. The rest only get harder by target. (Which means, you can utterly :smallamused: ruin targets below your party CR)

[nedz]

Don't listen to the naysayers. Truenamer is a perfectly viable class (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=8270).

But that's almost as bad as the UMD Monk handbook, at least UMD is a Truenamer class skill I suppose.

Hint: Next time use Blue instead of White.

[Bonzai]

Which really is a shame as truenaming by all rights should be the most powerful of abilities while being immensely difficult. It's reality warping bound only by your vocabulary. Now short of having the actual power cosmic this should be the skill to end all skills. Not something that even when optimized to hell and back, still rates as a "bleh" to Erudites, Clerics, Druids, and Wizards. Nevermind the unholy terror that is the beholder mage or illithid savant.

To be fair though, the campaign ended before I got to the latter levels. So no gate on tap, asking the world for spoilers, or giving people permanent ghost touch for kicks.

[Big Fau]

Hint: Next time use Blue instead of White.

They don't have that convention at BG/MMB.

@OP: Imagine a Warlock that was constantly 4 levels behind everyone in terms of class features, and couldn't affect more than one opponent with his most common class features.

That's the Truenamer, when the class actually works.

[Czin]

To be fair though, the campaign ended before I got to the latter levels. So no gate on tap, asking the world for spoilers, or giving people permanent ghost touch for kicks.

It's really a darn shame since the idea has so much potential.

[Draz74]

@OP: Imagine a Warlock that was constantly 4 levels behind everyone in terms of class features, and couldn't affect more than one opponent with his most common class features.

That's the Truenamer, when the class actually works.

That's a pretty good comparison, although a little bit of an exaggeration. Once you optimize your skill check enough (which is tedious, but not hard with one kind of cheese or another), Truenamer is really pretty similar to Warlock.

Utterances are a little worse than Invocations overall, but definitely include a few more unique effects that Invocations can't hope to duplicate (including mediocre healing).

The Truenamer gets more skill points, but that's not a big deal, between the need to throw maximum skill points into Truespeech and the lack of most of the Warlock's good social skills. (Similar need for UMD in both cases, although the Truenamer certainly never becomes an expert item crafter like a Warlock 12.)

[Psyren]

To be fair though, the campaign ended before I got to the latter levels. So no gate on tap, asking the world for spoilers, or giving people permanent ghost touch for kicks.

A campaign that ends before level 20? Who does that? :smalltongue:

[KillianHawkeye]

I thought Truenamer was an NPC class? :smallconfused::smallwink:

[Phylion]

Thanks for the advice. From what I can tell, I probably won't be playing a Truenamer soon, as my DM is pretty stingy on the cheese. But for the sake of furthering Truenamers everywhere, what if you accepted some new feats to a Truenamer's potential repertoire(effectively turning this thread into Truenaming Homebrew, which I should probably turn into a new thread but eh):

Apologetic Truespeech
Prerequisite: Ability to cast 2nd Level Utterances

If you beat the DC of a Truenaming Check to cast an utterance by 10 or more, you may choose for the Law of Resistance to not apply to that utterance.

Truespeech Multiplicity
Prerequisite: Ability to cast 2nd Level Utterances

If you beat the DC of a Truenaming Check to cast an utterance by 10 or more, you may choose for the Law of Sequence to not apply to that utterance.

Truespeech Arcana: Lexicon of the Evolving Mind

Select one arcane spell of any spell level from one to six that targets a single creature. Select one utterance from the Lexicon of the Evolving Mind. You lose the ability to cast the chosen utterance, but you gain the ability to cast the arcane spell as an utterance of the Lexicon of the Evolving Mind.




And then you can make the Truespeech Arcana Feat for the other two lexicons.
Would enjoy some input.