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View Full Version : Simple Fix to Spellcasters/ Charisma?



Legoman
2007-01-09, 11:04 PM
So, I was thinking, why not kill two birds with one stone - namely, that spell-casters are too powerful, and that Charisma doesn't have any relevance in in crunch-game.

Everyone gets SR equal to their Charisma mod + 10 + 1/2 class level.

To compensate a little, the opposed CL check to overcome resistance gets the primary casting modifier added to it.

Discuss.

Emperor Tippy
2007-01-09, 11:14 PM
The "to compensate a little" line makes the whole idea worthless. At level 20 a character would have SR of 20. They wouldn't ever stop a wizard of equal level. And Int being added for wizards just makes the difference more pronounced. A fighter with 16 CHA gets a SR of 23 at level 20. The wizard has 32 Int for a +11 to the check. He takes beats the SR every time.

TheOOB
2007-01-09, 11:31 PM
I think you need to focus more on making spellcaster weaker then making other more able to deal with casters. If you look as psionics and martial adepts they are very similar then casters, and while still more powerful then mudane characters they are not overpoweringly slow.

The two quickest and easiest fixes i can think of are make it so all spellcasters have a seperate ability score for spells per day and save DC (like the favored soul), and change or outright ban overpowered spells (polymorph, alter self, gate, ect).

As for the cha thing, I use a modified action points system and the effects of action points are heavily based on cha, a character with a stronger force of personality is capable of performing great acts of heroism beyond their abilities.

nathkry
2007-01-09, 11:48 PM
Another possible way to balance casters is to make it so that as soon as a spell caster has cast over half of their spells, they become fatigued, and after they have cast five-sixths of their spells, they become exhausted (rounding any fractions down). These conditions would last until the character recieves eight hours of uninterrupted rest and prepare over half of their spells.

Matthew
2007-01-10, 10:11 AM
Fatigue is a good check on Spell Casters.

Making Charisma more powerful has to be carefully balanced.

themightybiggun
2007-01-10, 11:45 AM
I personally play the dragonlance setting, and in that setting there is an alternate rule,

If a wizard casts a spell, he has to make a fortitude save of 10+spell level, first failure=fatigue, second failure=exhausted, third failure=unconscious.

I've found that it's a pretty reliable and dramatic way to make wizards (and other "preparing" arcane casters) more unpredictable.

Pegasos989
2007-01-10, 11:54 AM
I don't really see the charisma being underpowered. Sure, there is a lot of classes for which it is dump stat but I am not going to say that strenght is underpowered because wizards dump it. From core classes, 3/11 have cha as their primary stat (paladins, sorcerers, bards), and several more have mechanical advantages of it (cleric, "face" rogue and if I remember correctly, rangers and druids also use it for some abilities.).

If you think that I should create a thread to ask about that or want to link me to some other thread, that is fine too. :P

Matthew
2007-01-10, 12:25 PM
Exactly right. Just about the only way I would make Charisma more powerful is by making it an alternative to Wisdom for Willpower Saves.

Amiria
2007-01-10, 02:28 PM
Exactly right. Just about the only way I would make Charisma more powerful is by making it an alternative to Wisdom for Willpower Saves.

That's a good idea. Nice Will saves for Bards, Paladins and Sorcerers - and those classes wouldn't become overpowered by it.

Pepper
2007-01-10, 02:37 PM
I agree that casters should be nerfed a little rather than trying to make other classes more resiliant to magic.

Heres an off the wall idea...what if sorceror and wizard were prestige classes not base classes. And maybe a new base class of adept to spread the firepower out over a few more levels.

mikeejimbo
2007-01-10, 04:26 PM
I personally play the dragonlance setting, and in that setting there is an alternate rule,

If a wizard casts a spell, he has to make a fortitude save of 10+spell level, first failure=fatigue, second failure=exhausted, third failure=unconscious.

I've found that it's a pretty reliable and dramatic way to make wizards (and other "preparing" arcane casters) more unpredictable.

I thought it was all arcane casters that needed to make that save, not just "preparing" ones. Also, isn't there a good story reason?

Matthew
2007-01-10, 04:33 PM
Amira:
Yeah, it's quite a low powered, but useful change. One implementation method is to treat it like Dexterity and Strength in Weapon Finesse, a slightly more complicated idea is to have make negatives apply, so that:

Positive Wisdom Bonus and Positive Charisma Bonus = Use best Bonus
Positive Wisdom Bonus and Negative Charisma Bonus = Add together
Negative Wisdom Bonus and Positive Charisma Bonus = Add together
Negative Wisdom Bonus and Negative Charisma Bonus = Use worst Bonus

You might consider allowing Strength and Constitution to work for Fortitude and Dexterity and Intelligence to work for Reflex Saves.

Pepper:
That is actually a quite often suggested idea (along with Paladins). The question is what to do about Divine Spell Casters and what Classes or eligable? There was a good thread around here brainstorming Low Magic solutions with an Arcane Scholar Base Class, ah here it is: Low Magic D&D (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=28033&page=4&highlight=Arcane+Scholar). There's some good stuff in there, if you are interested in that sort of thing.

Viscount Einstrauss
2007-01-10, 04:42 PM
My fix is real simple- the personal gods of each character has to supply power to them in order to let them use any form of magic. The more magic they use regularly, the less power the god has.

This is important, because come epic levels, their personal gods start "taking notice" of their avatars more, granting them all kinds of benefits. Sure, the wizard might have unmatched arcane might- but the fighter without a lick of spellcasting is going to be decked out in full artifact gear and can call in divine favors a lot more often.

My only exception to this rule is clerics and paladins, who can charge their god to make up for using so much magic by finding new followers. Paladins with good charisma in particular can get some enormous godly bonuses like this.

Bobbis
2007-01-10, 05:18 PM
How about just charisma + character level?

JaronK
2007-01-11, 12:26 AM
Ultra simple and straightforward: Drop the whole different casters fire from different stats thing entirely.

All casters calculate spell save DCs using Charisma.
All casters need an Int of 10+Spell level to cast
All casters use Wisdom for bonus spells.

Suddenly all casters have a bit of MAD to slow them down, and charisma is important.

JaronK

Everyman
2007-01-11, 10:00 PM
Too many fixes there. The idea that all casters need Cha for saves is interesting though. It suggests that the potency of your spells depends on the strength of your personality. It also gives sorcerers a definitive advantage that few other primary casters can boast: one necessary casting stat.

Frankly, that's all I'd use.

TheOOB
2007-01-11, 10:54 PM
I acually have a varient arcanist I'm working on, it's spells per day is based on int, and depending on what school it specilizes in it either uses Wis or Cha for save DC

Viscount Einstrauss
2007-01-11, 10:59 PM
Would it be better to make sorcerers use different stats for spells per day/spell DC (perhaps change the spells per day stat to wisdom?), then do the aforementioned charisma-for-spell DC on wizards? Mostly just because it really makes sorcerers overshadow wizards otherwise. Druids and clerics could use a similiar fix...

TheOOB
2007-01-11, 11:07 PM
Thats funny, sorcerers overshadowing wizards. Even if wizards have MAD casting and sorcerers don't, the wizard would still have an advantage. A wizard can literally completely change virtually all their class abilities givin 8 hours, making them awesome at completely different circumstances. Givin time to prepare wizards have unlimited versitilitly. Sorcerers versitilitly only goes so far as their spells known, and to a lesser extend their gold with scrolls/wands.

themightybiggun
2007-01-12, 12:30 AM
I thought it was all arcane casters that needed to make that save, not just "preparing" ones. Also, isn't there a good story reason?

Well in DL they don't ignore the elephant in the room of Wizards being innately stronger than sorcerers, in fact, they make a point of it.

Wizards in Dragonlance derive their power from one of three arcane magic deities. (Manifested as three moons over the planet) Eons ago, the Arcane Siblings set out rules for magic, that as long as they were followed, would grant wizards the spells they were shooting for.

The fatigue the wizards experience and having to relearn spells every morning are explained as checks placed on the system by the deities who were basically covering their own behinds so that they didn't let loose any super-nukers on the planet.

Sorcerers on the other hand, have discovered a way to tap into the innate magic that was used to make the world itself. This backdoor (highly not cool with the deities of magic or the orders of High Sorcery as wizards are called) allows sorcerers to tap into magic with total freedom. Not answering to any god or rigidly constructed order. They experience magic fatigue too, but only as a matter of course, and it's explained by their limited spells/day.

I love Dragonlance.

Jack_Simth
2007-01-12, 12:50 AM
Thats funny, sorcerers overshadowing wizards. Even if wizards have MAD casting and sorcerers don't, the wizard would still have an advantage. A wizard can literally completely change virtually all their class abilities givin 8 hours, making them awesome at completely different circumstances. Givin time to prepare wizards have unlimited versitilitly. Sorcerers versitilitly only goes so far as their spells known, and to a lesser extend their gold with scrolls/wands.
Depending on permitted sources and campaign variant settings, there are ways around that for the dedicated Sorcerer cheese addict (with no outside help at 14th+; 13th+, for the Kobold Sorcerer who took the Greater Draconic Rite of Passage; much earlier if the Sorcerer can hire spells/psionic powers).

WARNING: Those allergic to powergaming/rules lawyering/cheese should not read further. You have been warned.

If the XPH is permitted, then the default rule is magic-psionics transparency. Under that default rule, spells interact with powers the way spells interact with spells and powers interact with spells the way powers interact with powers.

Well, Limited Wish is a 7th level spell that can duplicate 6th level Sor/Wiz spells that aren't in prohibited schools, 5th level non prohibited spells from other lists, 5th level prohibited school spells from the Sor/Wiz list, or 4th level prohibited school spells from any spell list.

Limited Wish interacts with spells by duplicating them. Well, under Transparency, the Psion/Wilder 4 power Psychic Reformation can thus be duplicated by Limited Wish.

Psychic Reformation permits the subject (no requirement that subject and caster not be one and the same, and the target is "One Creature" - by default, that means it can target the manifester) to re-choose Skill, Feat, and Powers Known selections. Under Magic-Psionics transparency, a power interacts with spells the way a power interacts with other powers. Psychic Reformation interacts with powers by letting Powers Known get re-selected. Thus, Psychic Reformation permits a Sorcerer to re-choose Spells Known.

With an XP cost for Limited Wish of 300 or more (more if the duplicated spell costs more than the 300 xp) the 50 xp/level of choices changed means 6 levels worth of decisions for the base 300 xp from Limited Wish. For a Sorcerer, from 4th through 19th (with an exception at 7th level), this is the top three levels of spells known. At 3rd and earlier, the Sorcerer only knows two levels of spells to change; at 7th, the Sorcerer can't reach his pattern-breaking 2 1st level spells at 1st anymore (and thus only gets the entirety of his 2nd and 3rd level spells known changed, and at 20th+ the Sorcerer breaks pattern and stops picking up new spell levels to change. But that's okay - a 20th level Sorcerer can change out ALL spells known for a measly (for the effect at 20th) cost of 1,000 xp.

And the reason I list the exceptions from before 14th? By default, the market price for hiring a Wiz-13 to cast the 7th level Limited Wish for 6 levels of changes when duplicating Psychic Reformation works out to 2,410 gp - which is still within the limit of spells that are generally available. If you can find a Psion-7 who knows it to manifest it for you, using the same pricing guidelines for powers as for spells, it costs 280 gp + 125 gp/level re-chosen and 25 xp/level re-chosen (manifester and target split all XP costs evenly - it costs both you and your hireling 25 xp per level of choices re-made); this is potentially within the reach of the wealth-by-level of 2nd level Sorcerer if he can find a Psion-7 who knows the power and is willing to sell it at book-listed market price, or a 3rd level Sorcerer (spending nearly all his wealth-by-level allotment as cash to hire a single spell.....) who can find a 13th level Wizard who's willing to sell a casting at book-listed market price.