Souls for Experience based components

[hirojinbrodie]

I am running a very evil campaign and I was wondering if I should allow the use of souls in place of experience cost, specifically thinking in terms of crafting and such. I imagine that obtaining these things would require a decent level and more then likely have a high price (dealing with devils, evil wizards of significant skill, etc). I am wondering if this is a good idea, or if it could throw the whole thing out of whack.
The campaign deals with the close contact with such forces, so story wise it would make sense. How should I implement it? Should the soul be based on level. If used as a component is it only usable once then it is gone? Thoughts?

[ArcturusV]

Well... The rules for Souls as Crafting Components are in vile darkness... if I remember right it's basically something like 3 XP a pop for every soul used. So for high level items you're talking about decimating an entire village in order to create a single item.

But honestly if you're evil and concerned with Power, you probably don't want to use Souls as XP components. Not using Souls actually can make you more powerful in direct terms of XP as you get that +10% bonus over your teammates at level cusps.

[Rubik]

Yeah, using souls isn't very useful. What you do is cast Power Word: Pain or some other pain-based spell on those you would otherwise extract a soul from to create Liquid Pain (from the BoVD). If you have nipple clamps of exquisite pain (also from BoVD), you can also create ambrosia (which, ironically enough, is from BoED). If you use a non-damaging spell, it's even a renewable resource, and with the clamps, people will willingly come back for more. It'll help you keep from getting smacked down by the forces of good, since you're not forcing anyone to do anything they don't want to do. You'll just be giving them an unusual source of pleasure, right?

And if you really want to make souls worthwhile, go look at thinaun, from Complete Warrior. Weapons made from it trap souls when the creatures they touch die. Make the XP bonus worthwhile. Say, 1 xp per 5 hp the creature had while still alive (or at least animate).

[Crake]

Well... The rules for Souls as Crafting Components are in vile darkness... if I remember right it's basically something like 3 XP a pop for every soul used. So for high level items you're talking about decimating an entire village in order to create a single item.

But honestly if you're evil and concerned with Power, you probably don't want to use Souls as XP components. Not using Souls actually can make you more powerful in direct terms of XP as you get that +10% bonus over your teammates at level cusps.

Actually its 3xKnowledge(Religion) check. The check is modified based on certain criteria (such as having a hungry demon eat the sacrifice's extremities before killing them, sacrifice's willingness and level etc). Meeting as many of the criteria as possible can quite quickly ramp up the check (getting a 50 isn't out of the question at level 10ish, so that's 150 dark craft xp per sacrifice, enough to fuel 3750gp worth of market value in item crafting), so even a relatively low level character can get quite a decent number of xp. Note that items crafted in such a way are tainted with evil, and always show up on Detect Evil spells.

Also note that using a soul in this way actually consumes the soul, making it impossible to resurrect. I personally used a variant on that where the soul instead powered the magic item, and should the magic item ever have been destroyed, the soul was free to move on.

Edit: There's also the option of using sacrifices to summon creatures like efreeti, and offering them virgins in exchange for using their wish SLA's to improve magic items for you. And of course, the 1 time free wish you can get from a DC50 sacrifice check.


And if you really want to make souls worthwhile, go look at thinaun, from Complete Warrior. Weapons made from it trap souls when the creatures they touch die. Make the XP bonus worthwhile. Say, 1 xp per 5 hp the creature had while still alive (or at least animate).

Sadly the souls of deceased creatures are only worth a measly 10xp (according to the BoVD) :smallfrown: Still worth something if you can collect them en-masse, like a certain time travelling incubus did in one of my games (1000 years, and a corrupted lineage... that adds up)