Endarire
2014-07-31, 09:43 AM
Greetings, all!
As a general whole, we D&D 3.5 players understand that magic in D&D 3.5 is powerful. I'm curious why these abilities are included in their current form in D&D 3.5, considering WotC understood things in 3.0 needed rebalancing enough to warrant a half edition.
I'm also curious why these abilities became 'standard' in previous editions. Were these just DM tools that got turned into player abilities?
(The legacy part of the title refers to things from older editions - not necessarily weapons or items of legacy.)
First off: Permanent minions. The planar binding series turns player characters into permanent masterminds and overlords. Unlike summons, which can be powerful if used correctly but rarely last more than 2 minutes, permanent pets are, well, very powerful. A similar notion applies to simulacrum - and especially to simulacrum[/i]. Due to how simulacrum (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/simulacrum.htm) is worded, I can get a spell component pouch or take Eschew Materials (or be a spell-to-power Erudite) and make 'sims' of any creature within the HD limit, like a Solar. Sure, there's a GP cost and EXP cost, but getting a sim Solar for 1100 EXP and 1100GP in materials is wondefully cheap for a pet who can cast spells as a L20 Cleric and grant a free wish once per day. If I use lesser planar binding to bind a Mirror Mephit (Expedition to the Demonweb Pits - look in the back of this book for a creature listing) I can get simulacrum 1/day as a spell-like ability. That means no EXP or GP cost.
Second: Open-ending form-changing abilities. As a PC, I tremendously like being able to be a 12-headed Pyrohydra (or a Will-o-Wisp, or a War Troll, or a Steel Dragon, or...) on demand, or being able to Wild Shape into an Eagle starting at Druid5. The limits set on 3.5 that were meant to balance such abilities didn't really do much. There exist plenty of low HD creatures with tremendous abilities (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=343.0) granted by alter self (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/alterSelf.htm). As a PC and GM, I generally support open-ended form-changing abilities more than permanent minions because people are still limited to what actions they can normally take. (I also don't allow spellcasting from form changing unless explicitly granted.) Open-ended form changing seems thematic and cool, but also feels overwhelming to an unprepared party/GM.
Third: Silent. Image (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/silentImage.htm). Even alter self and co are explicit compared to silent image. When I rewrote this spell to clarify what constituted 'interaction' and what effects this spell could explicitly produce, it wound up around 4 pages. We could simply remove silent image and its line from the game, but that also removes a significant portion of this game's Illusion spells for Wizards, and a big source of player creativity.
Fourth: "Give me immunity or give me death!" The notion of a lot of hard counters to abilities. See true seeing (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/trueSeeing.htm), mind blank (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/mindBlank.htm), death ward (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/deathWard.htm), et al. Having played earlier editions of D&D, these immunity abilities felt justified. They required you actually get these spells, cast them at the right time, and have a GM cooperate by allowing them to work, instead of saying effectively, "I have no reason to send Illusionists after my group since they can reliably use true seeing." Additionally, earlier editions were expected to have a downright tremendous attrition rate. (See Gygaxian Naturalism (http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2008/09/gygaxian-naturalism.html) and Nethack (http://www.nethack.org/v343/downloads.html).) Being able to secure your survival due to these abilities helped a lot in the right circumstances. However, in 3.x, these abilities are of debatable merid. They protect against one-shotting an unprepared person, but also require a caster to provide. Third edition's philosophy of player empowerment, with having so many abilities that are clearly detailed, may have been a factor in the inclusion of these abilities.
Fifth: Very expensive niche/novelty magic items. There's a reason why +X to stats, skills, and saves are standard. They're practical. Paying over 100K for a Helm of Brilliance (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Helm_of_Brilliance) reminds me of why I forgot about this item until recently. (Maybe people were just expected to get this sort of stuff in random drops and sell it for useful stuff.) WotC got better at making items for the Magic Item Compendium, but also reduced the number of continual effects and made them X/day (usually 1-3/day) effects. This is probably more balanced, but having to remember to use an item is a lot more (or maybe a bit more) arduous than adding the stats to my character sheet and forgetting about it.
As a general whole, we D&D 3.5 players understand that magic in D&D 3.5 is powerful. I'm curious why these abilities are included in their current form in D&D 3.5, considering WotC understood things in 3.0 needed rebalancing enough to warrant a half edition.
I'm also curious why these abilities became 'standard' in previous editions. Were these just DM tools that got turned into player abilities?
(The legacy part of the title refers to things from older editions - not necessarily weapons or items of legacy.)
First off: Permanent minions. The planar binding series turns player characters into permanent masterminds and overlords. Unlike summons, which can be powerful if used correctly but rarely last more than 2 minutes, permanent pets are, well, very powerful. A similar notion applies to simulacrum - and especially to simulacrum[/i]. Due to how simulacrum (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/simulacrum.htm) is worded, I can get a spell component pouch or take Eschew Materials (or be a spell-to-power Erudite) and make 'sims' of any creature within the HD limit, like a Solar. Sure, there's a GP cost and EXP cost, but getting a sim Solar for 1100 EXP and 1100GP in materials is wondefully cheap for a pet who can cast spells as a L20 Cleric and grant a free wish once per day. If I use lesser planar binding to bind a Mirror Mephit (Expedition to the Demonweb Pits - look in the back of this book for a creature listing) I can get simulacrum 1/day as a spell-like ability. That means no EXP or GP cost.
Second: Open-ending form-changing abilities. As a PC, I tremendously like being able to be a 12-headed Pyrohydra (or a Will-o-Wisp, or a War Troll, or a Steel Dragon, or...) on demand, or being able to Wild Shape into an Eagle starting at Druid5. The limits set on 3.5 that were meant to balance such abilities didn't really do much. There exist plenty of low HD creatures with tremendous abilities (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=343.0) granted by alter self (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/alterSelf.htm). As a PC and GM, I generally support open-ended form-changing abilities more than permanent minions because people are still limited to what actions they can normally take. (I also don't allow spellcasting from form changing unless explicitly granted.) Open-ended form changing seems thematic and cool, but also feels overwhelming to an unprepared party/GM.
Third: Silent. Image (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/silentImage.htm). Even alter self and co are explicit compared to silent image. When I rewrote this spell to clarify what constituted 'interaction' and what effects this spell could explicitly produce, it wound up around 4 pages. We could simply remove silent image and its line from the game, but that also removes a significant portion of this game's Illusion spells for Wizards, and a big source of player creativity.
Fourth: "Give me immunity or give me death!" The notion of a lot of hard counters to abilities. See true seeing (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/trueSeeing.htm), mind blank (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/mindBlank.htm), death ward (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/deathWard.htm), et al. Having played earlier editions of D&D, these immunity abilities felt justified. They required you actually get these spells, cast them at the right time, and have a GM cooperate by allowing them to work, instead of saying effectively, "I have no reason to send Illusionists after my group since they can reliably use true seeing." Additionally, earlier editions were expected to have a downright tremendous attrition rate. (See Gygaxian Naturalism (http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2008/09/gygaxian-naturalism.html) and Nethack (http://www.nethack.org/v343/downloads.html).) Being able to secure your survival due to these abilities helped a lot in the right circumstances. However, in 3.x, these abilities are of debatable merid. They protect against one-shotting an unprepared person, but also require a caster to provide. Third edition's philosophy of player empowerment, with having so many abilities that are clearly detailed, may have been a factor in the inclusion of these abilities.
Fifth: Very expensive niche/novelty magic items. There's a reason why +X to stats, skills, and saves are standard. They're practical. Paying over 100K for a Helm of Brilliance (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Helm_of_Brilliance) reminds me of why I forgot about this item until recently. (Maybe people were just expected to get this sort of stuff in random drops and sell it for useful stuff.) WotC got better at making items for the Magic Item Compendium, but also reduced the number of continual effects and made them X/day (usually 1-3/day) effects. This is probably more balanced, but having to remember to use an item is a lot more (or maybe a bit more) arduous than adding the stats to my character sheet and forgetting about it.