Spell Compendium as a book?

[torrasque666]

My group and I are rerolling our characters and still trying to work out the kinks for our creation rules. We have so far agreed to not allow Spell Compendium as a book, due to how broad its sources are, but would still use its writings as errata due to the fact that we mostly use dndtools as our source. Another player(who left for unrelated reasons) made the claim that if we weren't allowing SC as a book, to not use its writings. So I kinda want to get a feel for how "fair" it is to use it in this way.

For reference, we have a small pool of communal books(PHB 1&2, DMG[Magic items yo], ToB, all the Ebberon books) as well as two non-setting books and one non-setting material(homebrew/dragon allowed for this one)

So Playground, Yay or Nay for using the Spell Compendium as an errata without allowing it as a source?

[Umbranar]

Using the Spell Compendium as an errata sounds good to me and I can fully understand why you would ban it...for druids, wizards/sorcerers and clerics/favored souls.
However, I think the lower tier classes like rangers, bards and paladins are much more useful with the spells from the spell compendium (some spells are still rediculous though but the spell lists of these classes are small so you can discuss the spells).

[AnonymousPepper]

SC makes a ton of major and imo important balance changes. Personally I'd be in favor of allowing it period, but in lieu of that, definitely use it for the errata at least.

[Khedrac]

This is pretty close to what we do. We use SC as the primary source for all the spells in it, but we only allow spells from whichever other books are "open" for the campaign (which depends on the campaign).

[Wacky89]

I've never seen the point in limiting the players to a few books, what is it you gain from it? Annoying the players? Making them jump through hoops to make the character they want? If it's for balance then the players should know better, not making high op characters for a low-mid op campaign

[Curmudgeon]

If the DM doesn't have access to a book, that's a valid reason for disallowing its use in a game. That's not the case here. Setting a limit on non-core sources, other than availability, strikes me as an arbitrary restriction with the result of maintaining power superiority for Cleric, Druid, and Wizard.

Any time you create a house rule, ask yourself: (1) Who benefits? and (2) Who suffers? Most of the powerful spells in Spell Compendium were available beforehand in sources like Complete Arcane and Complete Divine. The new spells in the book frequently are on the lists of the partial casting classes, like Ranger and Assassin. So you wouldn't change things much for Tier 1 spellcasters, but you'd hurt the weaker partial casting classes.

Seems like a bad house rule to me.

[nedz]

Most of the broken spells available to T1 and T2 characters are in the PH, or at least the SC adds very little in this regard. The SC does help the T3 and T4 half casters especially. It also includes the vigor line which help improve out of combat healing — which is generally regarded as weak in core.

[Darrin]

Given the available sources you listed, I don't see how using the Spell Compendium for updates/errata helps much. Spells from PHBII and Eberron aren't generally going to be in the Spell Compendium. Mostly the SC consolidates CDiv, CArc, and 3.0 Forgotten Realms books. As far as balance goes, Curmudgeon hit the nail on the head: SC increases the utility of half-casters. Disallow it, and you're mostly screwing over assassins, bards, rangers, etc., and they really could use the help.

[DeAnno]

If you are worried about broken spells, core and PHBII are both way less balanced than the SC on that front.

[torrasque666]

I've never seen the point in limiting the players to a few books, what is it you gain from it? Annoying the players? Making them jump through hoops to make the character they want? If it's for balance then the players should know better, not making high op characters for a low-mid op campaign

This was actually something discussed and decided upon by the players. We recognized how easily it was to create a build that overwhelmed our DM who's still kind of new. So we decided to limit ourselves in a way that is less fluff and more crunch. No one is playing a T1 class, or even T2, and we also got rid of the more broken spells outright.

Mostly the reason for not allowing the SC was that by picking it as a caster you essentially got access to several books for the price of one, thus defeating the purpose. We're aware of how broken full casters are.

[Curmudgeon]

Mostly the reason for not allowing the SC was that by picking it as a caster you essentially got access to several books for the price of one, thus defeating the purpose. We're aware of how broken full casters are.
Why is "picking" any particular book an issue? And what's wrong with going for the best value when you're buying D&D sources? What purpose is being defeated here? If you're not playing a full spellcaster, Spell Compendium shouldn't be a problem. It's not that book but rather Player's Handbook and the full casting classes in it that's the culprit.

I like playing Rogues in large part because of the many options the class affords. Those options are mostly scattered, one or two per book, all across the D&D publishing range. I might use two dozen books by the time the game gets to level 20. I've spent more in both money and time than is perhaps reasonable on D&D books, but the whole point of playing a game is to have fun, right?

If a character isn't out of line (in terms of power) for the party, why would you care how many books the player "picks"? Please explain, because I clearly don't get what you're trying to communicate.

[torrasque666]

We established the limit because we are well aware that wanton access to every damn thing made by WoTC could easily overwhelm our DM and kill his fun. Like I said, these rules were decided upon by us, the players because our DM frankly doesn't have the time to read 100+ books and understand them intimately. We have maybe 6 players. So outside of what we, as a group, selected for the communal pool, he only has to read and understand an additional 12.

This isn't about value when buying books as we don't play in person. We play over roll20. Half the time I'm not even sure we actually "own" half the books we do. I don't think you really understand us Curmudgeon. Our DM isn't an optimized DM. He's still learning the ropes. Half the players aren't optimizers. We imposed this limit to drop the power because we don't want rocket tag.

Its not about picking when buying. Its about picking for source selection.When using limited sources like we are, picking a book like Spell Compendium violates the spirit of the limited sources.

I'm all for using as many sources as we can. I realized how hard it was to build my character without access to my entire library. But that's a challenge. And we're ok with that.

[Anlashok]

He doesn't need to "intimately" learn a hundred books. He needs to learn what the feats and spells you take do.. And those numbers are pretty static.

The game doesn't get any less rocket tag by makin it core only either

[deuxhero]

Setting a limit on non-core sources, other than availability, strikes me as an arbitrary restriction with the result of maintaining power superiority for Cleric, Druid, and Wizard.

Even "no books for other campaign settings"?

But yeah, Core is far and away the most broken thing out there. Candle of Evocation gate loop is 100% core.

[Curmudgeon]

Even "no books for other campaign settings"?
Yes, because these books will almost invariably include material that's not setting-specific. The Education feat in Eberron Campaign Setting isn't restricted to Eberron, so you can use that in your Greyhawk game without issues. Clearly you don't want Faerûn regional feats in your Eberron game, but that's not adequate reason to ban all the generic content from FR books. It's perfectly reasonable to restrict content by setting; it's not so reasonable to restrict books solely by the setting name on the cover.

[nedz]

Yes, because these books will almost invariably include material that's not setting-specific. The Education feat in Eberron Campaign Setting isn't restricted to Eberron, so you can use that in your Greyhawk game without issues. Clearly you don't want Faerûn regional feats in your Eberron game, but that's not adequate reason to ban all the generic content from FR books. It's perfectly reasonable to restrict content by setting; it's not so reasonable to restrict books solely by the setting name on the cover.

Education actually appears in four books so it happens to be a poor example.

Eberron Campaign Setting
Player's Guide to Faerûn
Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting
Ghostwalk

[Curmudgeon]

Education actually appears in four books so it happens to be a poor example.

Eberron Campaign Setting
Player's Guide to Faerûn
Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting
Ghostwalk

Actually looking up those feats tells the real story. The Ghostwalk and Faerûn feats are region-specific. Only the Eberron feat (the most recent update) is a setting-independent general feat.