Options for "Gem" and "Jewel" themes.

[tadkins]

I'm curious as to what is out there. I know of a few but you guys are far more knowledgeable. Here's what I got; feel free to contribute to the list.

Skills:
Craft (Gemcutting)
Profession (Mining)

Feats:
Attune Gem

Spells: (I didn't list all of the spells that involve gems, as there are just too many.)
Gembomb
Gemjump
Gem Tracer
Warding Gems

This is about the extent of what I know, but there has to be more out there. Any more you guys are familiar with?

[Phelix-Mu]

There are a series of gem golems that I think originally appeared in their 3e incarnation in the Monster of Faerun book for 3.0. It was updated, so they should be easy to use if you have the update file/link.

Gem dragons are an obvious option. I believe that one dragon goddess is actually a ruby dragon (and thus unique, to the best of my knowledge); hmm, I thought it was Aasternian, but it's possible that I am totally misremembering two unrelated facts here.

Psionics, especially metacreative/shaper stuff, is full of crystal themes, which are similar to gems and jewels and could easily be refluffed slightly. Of note is the Crystal Master PrC from the Mind's Eye article, which was updated to 3.5 if memory serves.

Some of the figurines of wondrous power are made from precious or semi-precious stones. There were additional ones printed in several books, including a handful in Dragon Magazine. Can't recall which books though.

[Jeff the Green]

Psionics is very crystal-centric, to the point that it's a predictable objection to the system.

[Phelix-Mu]

Psionics is very crystal-centric, to the point that it's a predictable objection to the system.

Hmm. I never thought of it as something people might object to, any more than people object to the "magical words and hand-waving" of the more bog-standard magic. But I guess people looking for something to object to will likely find it somewhere.

If someone didn't like it, though, I'd fluff it right out of there; go for Ghost Busters ectoplasmic ooze-ish themes, or glowing motes of light or something, lol. Or just get rid of it and treat psicrystals as hard-light manifestations of the master's subconscious (of any appearance appropriate, but all having the same stats).

[Jeff the Green]

Hmm. I never thought of it as something people might object to, any more than people object to the "magical words and hand-waving" of the more bog-standard magic. But I guess people looking for something to object to will likely find it somewhere.

If someone didn't like it, though, I'd fluff it right out of there; go for Ghost Busters ectoplasmic ooze-ish themes, or glowing motes of light or something, lol. Or just get rid of it and treat psicrystals as hard-light manifestations of the master's subconscious (of any appearance appropriate, but all having the same stats).

I never said it was a rational objection. If I actually had to roleplay my wizards as flinging feces and making horrible visual puns to cast their spells I'd only be playing psions.

[Venger]

Psionics is very crystal-centric, to the point that it's a predictable objection to the system.

I love psionics, but this is one of the things that really pisses me off about the system.

not the fluff, mind you (who cares? it's a roleplaying game. if you don't like it, describe it as something else)

what's really difficult is the nomenclature, because something like 20% of powers are "crystal/crystalline" something or other, making it rather tricky to pick up which one exactly is crystalstorm, crystal shard, crystal breath, etc. but in order to all stay on the same page when talking with one another on the internet or talking to your DM, you must use the official names so it's clear which one you're all discussing. it's a problem that could've been very easily avoided with the use of a thesaurus. amethyst burst may be functionally similar to these other ones, but due to the name, I don't usually mix them with it.

[Phelix-Mu]

I never said it was a rational objection. If I actually had to roleplay my wizards as flinging feces and making horrible visual puns to cast their spells I'd only be playing psions.

Fair enough. A lot of the finer points of how this stuff works is vague enough that a DM can judiciously gloss over it, or a player could reasonably change stuff to fit an appropriate theme. My year-long experience with Exalted has taught me to be even more flexible with my fluff than I was before.

Back to the topic, crysmals, while psionically-related, are a pretty cool type of elemental from the Expanded Psionics Handbook. They are worth a mention here because they reproduce after consuming a certain gp-amount of gems and jewels (a pretty unique mechanic for reproduction in 3e, as far as I know).

[Venger]

Back to the topic, crysmals, while psionically-related, are a pretty cool type of elemental from the Expanded Psionics Handbook. They are worth a mention here because they reproduce after consuming a certain gp-amount of gems and jewels (a pretty unique mechanic for reproduction in 3e, as far as I know).

also has a number of strange in-universe implications.

in sharn, you'll have your buddy eat 2 pounds of valuable truffles, while in stormreach, he might only need to eat 1.5.

so in the interest of preserving non-renewable resources (assuming your game has the necessary houserules in place for D&D to not be a post-scarcity based economy) you'd actually get customers haggling with vendors to sell them as little a quantity of saffron or whatever as possible in exchange for x amount of money.

this also means things like casting spells with costly material components (such as true seeing, which requires some amount of saffron) could be used to test the purity of a product, like with cocaine.

so you might have a criminal guild making sure the mushroom powder a character offered to sell them was pure by giving a set amount of it to a crystal golem and seeing if it reproduces, since by RAW, market price of everything is the same everywhere (unless you like playing Accounting: the game) if it does, you make some money, if you cut it with baby powder or something, then roll initiative!

fascinating stuff.

[avr]

I always assumed that the gold piece value of diamond dust required (or whatever) was just listed as such for simplicity. It should still work if your friendly party rogue/bard conned the vendor out of it in exchange for 50% of nominal value, or for a song.

On-topic again, there are some gem-like golems, or familiars with the right look (earth elementals or a faerie dragon) and/or you could even go into the Renegade Mastermaker PrC & say all the bits you're replacing are made of crystal or something. Which reminds me, along with the other crystal-related psionics stuff, there's a variant warforged called the psiforged which gets crystals embedded.

[ShurikVch]

Spells: Gem Tracer, Gembomb, Gemjump, Warding Gems;
also:
Mineralize Warrior,
Emerald Burst,
Refuge,
Appraising Touch,
Soulbind,
Trap the Soul,
Imprison Soul,
Sanctify the Wicked,
Tomb of Light (material component),
Summon Elemental Monolith (material component),
Spiritwall (material component),
Animate Dead/Create Undead line, Seed of Undeath line, Undeath after Death, Bodak's Glare (onyx),
Cone of Euphoria (material component - gem dust),
Abyssal Rift (material component - gem-studded pickaxe),
Extract Gift (sapphires),
Elminster's Evasion (focus - statuette of you, carved from ivory and decorated with gems),
Entomb (material component),
Nar Fiendbond (material component),
Khelben's Suspended Silence (material component - gem dust),
Favorable Sacrifice,
Detect Curse (material component),
Astral Hospice (material component),
Protection from Spells (focus, material component),
Drawmij's Instant Summons
Analyze Dweomer (focus),
Binding (Minimus Containment mode)
Contingency (focus - statuette of you, carved from elephant ivory and decorated with gems)
Wall of Force (material component),
Magic Jar,
Fool's gold (material component - gem dust),
Hoard Life (focus),
Aura of Evasion (material component - powdered emerald),
Icaelance (focus),
Treasure Scent,
Rainbow Beam (focus),
Ebon Eyes (material component - gem dust),
Nature's Rampart (focus)

Enigma Helm soulmeld

Crystalline troll

[Jeff the Green]

in sharn, you'll have your buddy eat 2 pounds of valuable truffles, while in stormreach, he might only need to eat 1.5.

:smallconfused: Truffles are gems now? Or is this for an equivalent, like a homebrew FFIX Blue Mage?