Unchained: Automatic Bonus Progression

[Susano-wo]

I was wondering what everyone thought of this alternate mechanic. I love the idea, and the numbers looks pretty good to me, but I wanted to see what the playground thought. Unfortunately, I an't seem the find the write-up online, but it gives you AC/Saves/Stats, etc as though you bought the corresponding items automatically(with optionally distributed bonuses at 19th and 20th level). To compensate for this, you half WBL.

The numbers are:

Armor attunement: can attune to an armor/shield (eventually between armor and/or shield) once a day. Gives a +1 to AC at 4th, and culminates with +5 or +4/+3(you can use the picks from 19th and 20th to add a total of +10 effective enchantment split between the armor/shield)

Deflection:+1deflection to AC at 5th, culminating in +5 at 18th.

Mental Prowess:+2 to mental at 6th, +4 to that stat at 12th, a second +2 mental stat at 13th, +2 to either at 16th, and a third +2 at 17th. These can be increased to +6/+6/+6 using the bonuses from 19th and 20th

Physical Prowess: ditto, but at 7th, 12th, 13th, 16th, 17th.

Resistance:+1 resistance to saves at 3rd, culminates at +5 at 14th.

Toughening: +1 nat armor bonus at 8th, culminating in +5 at 18th

Weapon Attunement: same as armor, and on the same levels (which is odd, considering that armor is way cheaper.) Oh, and instead of between armor and shield, you can split between one weapon or two.

Under this system, magic weapons and armor are priced by subtracting their enhancement bonus, leaving only the ability's cost.[IE +1flaming sword costs 6k+weapon cost. When wielding, subtract the special ability '+'/ equivalent ,and subtract that from attunement.

Do the bonus look like they are reasonable? the writeup says it would be more than 50% of WBL to buy these bonuses, but that that it ok, since they don't have as much flexibility as a normal character

[Extra Anchovies]

It's great for eliminating the magic item grocery list (Cloak of Resistance, Amulet of Natural Armor, etc). I have a few specific issues with it, though:

1. Monks can't make use of the armor attunement. This is easily fixed by letting them attune to (and thus stack bonuses with) Bracers of Armor, probably up to a cap of +8.
2. Weapon Attunement isn't clear on whether it can be applied to natural weapons and/or unarmed strikes. It should, at least with unarmed.
3. The weapon property rules is annoying and hurts characters who rely on magic weapons (e.g. every martial character ever). My personal fix is to halve the bonus of the properties and round down before subtracting, e.g. Keen doesn't reduce enhancements, Flaming Burst reduces by 1, and eight points' worth of properties reduces by four.
4. Mental Prowess is nearly useless for characters who aren't dependent on any mental stats (e.g. fighters, barbarians). This is more a flaw in the classes than it is in ABP, but it's worth noting.

Despite the few flaws, the system is (IMO) definitely an improvement over the standard christmas-tree magic item system. Encouraging the purchase of qualitiative +options items instead of quantitative +numbers items is always good.

[Eldaran]

3. The weapon property rules is annoying and hurts characters who rely on magic weapons (e.g. every martial character ever). My personal fix is to halve the bonus of the properties and round down before subtracting, e.g. Keen doesn't reduce enhancements, Flaming Burst reduces by 1, and eight points' worth of properties reduces by four.

This is my biggest problem, you can't exceed a +5 weapon until level 19, pretty ridiculous. Your fix is one I've already been using, and I think it works well. I applied the same to armor as well.



4. Mental Prowess is nearly useless for characters who aren't dependent on any mental stats (e.g. fighters, barbarians). This is more a flaw in the classes than it is in ABP, but it's worth noting.


Will saves and skill points are always pretty useful to have, though not exactly powerful it's a bonus they likely would not have had otherwise.

Overall I like the system, changes I made were to put the mental/physical stat bonuses at the same levels (only reason to split them up was to pad out the table), and add a +2/+2 stat bonus at 9th to help out the MAD classes a bit, then at 11th you have the choice of +4 or +2/+2.

[Milo v3]

1. Monks can't make use of the armor attunement. This is easily fixed by letting them attune to (and thus stack bonuses with) Bracers of Armor, probably up to a cap of +8.
What are you talking about? The monk can attune to clothing with it.


2. Weapon Attunement isn't clear on whether it can be applied to natural weapons and/or unarmed strikes. It should, at least with unarmed.
It can with monks and brawlers, since they're unarmed strikes count as weapons.

[grarrrg]

Unfortunately, I an't seem the find the write-up online,

Ta-da! (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/other-rules/automatic-bonus-progression)


What are you talking about? The monk can attune to clothing with it.

"The character can attune herself to one suit of armor or one shield in her possession; ...If she selects a normal set of clothing as her armor, it counts as having a starting enhancement bonus of +0."


It can with monks and brawlers, since they're unarmed strikes count as weapons.

Unarmed Strikes always count as weapons.
Monk/Brawler just allow you to treat your Unarmed Strikes as Natural Weapons (by default they are more in line with Manufactured Weapons, but 'technically' aren't either).

As for the original question, I see nothing preventing you from Attuning an Unarmed Strike or a Natural Attack.

Characters with 3 or more Natural Attacks might be hosed until they can take Legendary Twin Weapons multiple times (which ain't gonna happen til level 19+). Depends on if an Amulet of Mighty Fists is considered a "weapon".

[Extra Anchovies]

What are you talking about? The monk can attune to clothing with it.

They certainly can attune clothing, but once they give the clothing an enhancement bonus to the clothing's armor bonus, the clothing counts as armor and they can't use some of their monk powers.

It's like how they can't get Magic Vestment on their clothes without losing the monk AC bonus:

An outfit of regular clothing counts as armor that grants no AC bonus for the purpose of this spell.
The quoted passage means that if a monk's clothing becomes the target of a successfully cast Magic Vestment, their clothing counts as armor and they lose their monk AC bonus.

[Psyren]

They certainly can attune clothing, but once they give the clothing an enhancement bonus to the clothing's armor bonus, the clothing counts as armor and they can't use some of their monk powers.

It's like how they can't get Magic Vestment on their clothes without losing the monk AC bonus:

The quoted passage means that if a monk's clothing becomes the target of a successfully cast Magic Vestment, their clothing counts as armor and they lose their monk AC bonus.

No - It only counts as armor "for the purposes of this spell" - it says nothing about counting as armor for the purposes of the monk class. Magic Vestment clothing can be used by monks just fine.

Similarly, automatic bonus progression lets you choose a set of clothing "as your armor" - but it's still clothing at the end of the day.

The entire point of being able to attune clothing in this system is to let monks and other non-armor-wearing classes get armor bonuses without needing to rely magic mart to have bracers in stock, which this subsystem is designed to get away from.

[Extra Anchovies]

No - It only counts as armor "for the purposes of this spell" - it says nothing about counting as armor for the purposes of the monk class. Magic Vestment clothing can be used by monks just fine.

Similarly, automatic bonus progression lets you choose a set of clothing "as your armor" - but it's still clothing at the end of the day.

The entire point of being able to attune clothing in this system is to let monks and other non-armor-wearing classes get armor bonuses without needing to rely magic mart to have bracers in stock, which this subsystem is designed to get away from.

Hm. That's a good point. I thought I'd read somewhere that monks can't use the whole armor-as-clothing thing, but I guess I was wrong.

[Kudaku]

We're trying it out on our latest campaign and I mostly like it. The players are happily using items they'd normally never use because the item slots were hardlocked to the big 6. With that said, I think it has a few issues...

Using a single bonus track for all classes means it frequently grants enchantments you don't really want, and the priorities are weird at times. For example a fighter has to get a +2 mental bonus before a +2 physical bonus. A wizard is spending his Bonus Progression on a magical weapon he'll never use. A druid with constant and easy access to Barkskin is spending his bonus progression on an enhancement bonus to natural armor.
They should also include a solution for classes that already get WBL bonuses in the form of class features - Bladebound Magus for example.

What really concerns me is that they suggest that you can have a campaign with no magic items if you increase the bonus levels by 2 - that's nowhere near true.

[Psyren]

Actually - I just had an interesting thought. What if the PF Vow of Poverty, in addition to the "only one magic item" and "you may use consumables from others" restrictions, gave you automatic bonus progression as well? How would that stack up to 3.5 VoP?

[Susano-wo]

Yeah, I noticed that about the non-plus enchantments, but I will point out that that's only when you get to add enchantments inherently to any weapon. You can still buy an enchanted weapon at a reduced cost if you want flaming, etc. It just takes 1 or more pluses from your weapon. So you always have at least plus X, but you can use your money to turn some of that into the enchantments you want.

Now, as far as people getting boosts they don't need (though even as a fighter, I would not be unhappy to grab +INT(skills!!!) and +WIS(will save is good to have)), how much of that is compensated for by getting more bonuses than you would have using WBL? It says the bonuses are more than half WBL worth, but I haven't mathed it out to see how much(and am hoping someone else already has :smalltongue:)

[Sacrieur]

I'm glad it's an alternate rule. They did well to add it.

But I'm not going to use it. Magic items are one of the things I hand out as a reward for completing tough encounters. Getting it automatically makes me feel like you're removing the sense of tangible accomplishment with completing quests.

[Milo v3]

I'm glad it's an alternate rule. They did well to add it.

But I'm not going to use it. Magic items are one of the things I hand out as a reward for completing tough encounters. Getting it automatically makes me feel like you're removing the sense of tangible accomplishment with completing quests.

I'm not sure what you mean. You still get magic items with this rule.

[Extra Anchovies]

I'm not sure what you mean. You still get magic items with this rule.

Exactly. And instead of having to give out the relatively boring +numbers items that players need to get by, you can give them legitimately interesting items with qualitative abilities instead of quantitative ones. The PCs can get cool stuff like the Belt of Stoneskin or Cloak of Etherealness instead of needing to fill those items slots with a Belt of Physical Might and a Cloak of Resistance.

[Susano-wo]

Exactly. And instead of having to give out the relatively boring +numbers items that players need to get by, you can give them legitimately interesting items with qualitative abilities instead of quantitative ones. The PCs can get cool stuff like the Belt of Stoneskin or Cloak of Etherealness instead of needing to fill those items slots with a Belt of Physical Might and a Cloak of Resistance.

QFT. That's exactly how I feel about it Bonuses without riders are 'meh' for me. Since you need them, I'd rather just have them be granted automatically, and let me buy items that do stuff and give me more options.

[Extra Anchovies]

Does anyone know any possible reasons as to the weird scaling on everything? Of particular note is how weapons/armor are only +2/+2 or +3 for one level. Resistance does the same thing, at the same point in the table even (level 13).

[Susano-wo]

I would think its because it costs more to get a +4 weapon than two +2s, given the way everything scales, and +3 is more balanced the the WBL you are giving up for these bonuses

[Extra Anchovies]

I would think its because it costs more to get a +4 weapon than two +2s, given the way everything scales, and +3 is more balanced the the WBL you are giving up for these bonuses

No, what I meant was that it's odd that characters have a +1 resistance bonus to saves from levels 3-7, +2 from 8-9, +3 from 10-12, +4 only at 13, and +5 from 14 on. Weapons and armor have similar uneven scalings, including a point where they spend only one level at a certain enhancement bonus.

[Eldaran]

I assume they based it off WBL scaling or common levels where people buy items. It's not uncommon for people to get a +2 cloak then almost immediately replace it with a +3.

[Susano-wo]

Oh I see. Yeah I don't know, but I suspect Eldaran is correct

[Kudaku]

Actually - I just had an interesting thought. What if the PF Vow of Poverty, in addition to the "only one magic item" and "you may use consumables from others" restrictions, gave you automatic bonus progression as well? How would that stack up to 3.5 VoP?

That could work, but it runs into the same problem VoP had in that the automatic bonus progression doesn't supply you with a source for flight, haste, underwater breathing and so on. The one magic item granted by PF VoP will solve some of those problems, but it'd have a hard time covering all of them.

[Spore]

Actually - I just had an interesting thought. What if the PF Vow of Poverty, in addition to the "only one magic item" and "you may use consumables from others" restrictions, gave you automatic bonus progression as well? How would that stack up to 3.5 VoP?

Combined with Unchained Monk they could very well mean pulling the Monk up to T4. Sadly many uninformed DMs would tell you that monk is "even more OP than it was back then" and not give you the progression.

[Psyren]

That could work, but it runs into the same problem VoP had in that the automatic bonus progression doesn't supply you with a source for flight, haste, underwater breathing and so on. The one magic item granted by PF VoP will solve some of those problems, but it'd have a hard time covering all of them.

Consumables will solve that - you can drink potions all day as long as other people hand them to you. Leadership for an Alchemist cohort with Infusion can get you all the buffs you need if you're alone.

[Kudaku]

Consumables will solve that - you can drink potions all day as long as other people hand them to you. Leadership for an Alchemist cohort with Infusion can get you all the buffs you need if you're alone.

You could drink potions with the original Vow of Poverty as well*, it doesn't really negate the issues presented by VoP - especially since the rest of your party now has to use their WBL to fund your potion addiction.

Gaining a spellcaster cohort via Leadership solves everything, but then again that's part of the reason why Leadership is frequently banned - having a spellcaster cohort tends to solve everything. If you're relying on arguably the most broken feat in 3.x to gain basic utility you're in a tough spot.

Assuming the transcript I found on the feat online is correct. I could be using a faulty source though, since I have no idea where my BoED is these days.

[Extra Anchovies]

Combined with Unchained Monk they could very well mean pulling the Monk up to T4. Sadly many uninformed DMs would tell you that monk is "even more OP than it was back then" and not give you the progression.

Really? I know uMonk isn't T3, because they have basically screw-all do to outside of combat, but they're definitely good at fighting. To me, they fit the "capable of doing one thing quite well, but often useless when encounters require other areas of expertise" criteria for T4.

If we want to keep going on this, though, we should probably do so in a new thread.

[Kaidinah]

I love these rules. My current campaign is trying them out.

[Sacrieur]

Exactly. And instead of having to give out the relatively boring +numbers items that players need to get by, you can give them legitimately interesting items with qualitative abilities instead of quantitative ones. The PCs can get cool stuff like the Belt of Stoneskin or Cloak of Etherealness instead of needing to fill those items slots with a Belt of Physical Might and a Cloak of Resistance.

I don't see it as freeing up any slots. They're just going to go out and buy the belt of physical might to make their stats even higher. Or am I misunderstanding here?

[Dusk Eclipse]

The bonus to stats given by the progression are enhancement bonus and thus wouldn't stack with the belt, which I'm pretty sure it is the intention.

[Extra Anchovies]

The bonus to stats given by the progression are enhancement bonus and thus wouldn't stack with the belt, which I'm pretty sure it is the intention.

Yup. All of the bonuses are typed (resistance to saves, deflection to AC, enhancement to weapons, armor, natural armor, and ability scores) to match those provided by the items they're designed to replace.

[master4sword]

The bonus to stats given by the progression are enhancement bonus and thus wouldn't stack with the belt, which I'm pretty sure it is the intention.

Exactly. Also, the idea is that those items don't exist if you're using this system - no Belts of Giant Strength, no Cloaks of Resistance, etc. Magic weapons and armor only have special abilities, not +X. This variant exists to replace those boring-but-necessary items.

[Kaidinah]

Exactly. Also, the idea is that those items don't exist if you're using this system - no Belts of Giant Strength, no Cloaks of Resistance, etc. Magic weapons and armor only have special abilities, not +X. This variant exists to replace those boring-but-necessary items.
Which is exactly why I love them.

[Pyromancer999]

That could work, but it runs into the same problem VoP had in that the automatic bonus progression doesn't supply you with a source for flight, haste, underwater breathing and so on. The one magic item granted by PF VoP will solve some of those problems, but it'd have a hard time covering all of them.

It doesn't need to supply a source for flight, haste, and the rest. It just covers the +X bonus items people normally buy. Also, they're not banned from using magic items, they just have 1/2 WBL for a character of their level. There is nothing keeping them from using a magic item that would allow them to fly or whatever else they need a magic item to do, as long as it doesn't grant a +X bonus.

[Psyren]

It doesn't need to supply a source for flight, haste, and the rest. It just covers the +X bonus items people normally buy. Also, they're not banned from using magic items, they just have 1/2 WBL for a character of their level. There is nothing keeping them from using a magic item that would allow them to fly or whatever else they need a magic item to do, as long as it doesn't grant a +X bonus.

He was actually responding to me - I was talking about giving PF VoP Monks access to this system in addition to the regular VoP benefits as a way of keeping pace with the rest of the party.

[Pyromancer999]

He was actually responding to me - I was talking about giving PF VoP Monks access to this system in addition to the regular VoP benefits as a way of keeping pace with the rest of the party.

Ah. I misinterpreted that, then.

[Ediwir]

Am i the only one who felt the need to reword Protection Domain once those rules came out?
(to me it now reads "the Resistance bonus you receive from your level is increased by +1, and an additional +1 at levels 8 and 16, for a total maximum of +8" and then the whole transfer bonus thing)

[Psyren]

Am i the only one who felt the need to reword Protection Domain once those rules came out?
(to me it now reads "the Resistance bonus you receive from your level is increased by +1, and an additional +1 at levels 8 and 16, for a total maximum of +8" and then the whole transfer bonus thing)

The Protection Domain simply doesn't stack, just like it wouldn't under the old system if your cleric was wearing a cloak of resistance. But the good news is that you can use your "Resistant Touch" domain power to transfer away the domain's resistance bonus, and you will still have the one you got from Automatic Bonus Progression - just like a cleric, under the regular WBL system, could give away the resistance bonus from his domain and still be protected if he is wearing a cloak of resistance to replace it. The only difference now is that the ABP cleric can wear anything he wants in the cloak slot, like Wings of Flying, instead.

[Propagandalf]

How'd the Automatic Bonus Progression apply to a Soulknife (for example the Armored Blade Archetype)?
Do the Soulknives bigger weapon/armor bonuses simply replace the smaller ones provided by the ABP?

Yes, it's 3rd party stuff but I'm curious. :smalltongue:

But all in all, I'm liking it. Looks reasonable, and it really helps with reducing the cloned +X equipment that everyone in the party would otherwise have. :smallsmile:

[Psyren]

How'd the Automatic Bonus Progression apply to a Soulknife (for example the Armored Blade Archetype)?
Do the Soulknives bigger weapon/armor bonuses simply replace the smaller ones provided by the ABP?

Yes, it's 3rd party stuff but I'm curious. :smalltongue:

It's actually really simple - You can just not attune your mind blade and bam, you will have all the regular mind blade bonuses instead of the ABP ones.

Alternatively the sneakier approach is to game the attunement system a bit - place a +1 enhancement on your mind blade and then pile attributes onto it with the remaining bonus pool (up to the maximum bonus it is allowed per the table), and then attune it, getting the higher enhancement from Automatic Bonus Progression that will overwrite the +1 and keeping all the attributes you assigned to it previously. This is functionally identical to having a mind blade under regular WBL and buying a +X crystal hilt for it, so it's not even unbalanced.

If you don't do one of the above two however, the enhancement bonuses won't stack (same type.)

[Propagandalf]

It's actually really simple - You can just not attune your mind blade and bam, you will have all the regular mind blade bonuses instead of the ABP ones.

Alternatively the sneakier approach is to game the attunement system a bit - place a +1 enhancement on your mind blade and then pile attributes onto it with the remaining bonus pool (up to the maximum bonus it is allowed per the table), and then attune it, getting the higher enhancement from Automatic Bonus Progression that will overwrite the +1 and keeping all the attributes you assigned to it previously. This is functionally identical to having a mind blade under regular WBL and buying a +X crystal hilt for it, so it's not even unbalanced.

If you don't do one of the above two however, the enhancement bonuses won't stack (same type.)

Oooooooooooo! Dat's clever. Thanks!:smallsmile: