Handling Superpowers

[Milo v3]

While pathfinder can cover a lot of different types of characters, I feel that it often has difficultly portraying people with powers in other forms of media. In a book, a character might have the ability to turn themselves invisible whenever they want, but that's all they can do. That's... harder to do in PF, so I was wondering how people handle characters with specific powers like that.

My default method of giving someone powers like that is price it as a custom magic item, but double the cost so it doesn't take a slot, and then just taking that amount from their WBL. But someone has suggested adding superpowers as Mythic Path abilities, though I haven't looked into mythic for a long time so I'm not sure how well that would go.

[Sliver]

Wouldn't playing a different system, like M&M, be much simpler than forcing D&D to do something it wasn't really designed for?

[Milo v3]

Wouldn't playing a different system, like M&M, be much simpler than forcing D&D to do something it wasn't really designed for?

So, because one PC will have a single power. The whole group should change games, and then remake all the characters and monsters in Mutants and Masterminds so it's mechanics match what's happened previously.... no. That's much much much much much more work than even my default method of custom item creation.

Especially since mutants and masterminds has a very different feel to PF. This is just for adding powers to characters to a minor extent. Not for running a comic book game in pathfinder.

[Sliver]

Then why call it a superpower? I don't really think that D&D is a system in which the ability to turn invisible at will is a superpower...

I'm not being very helpful, am I? You can safely ignore me...

Custom magic items is probably the way to go.

[Milo v3]

Then why call it a superpower? I don't really think that D&D is a system in which the ability to turn invisible at will is a superpower...

I'm not being very helpful, am I? You can safely ignore me...

Custom magic items is probably the way to go.

Well, it'd be supernatural, so I guess it "Might" still be worth calling it a superpower... just not... a powerful one compared to creating universes.

[SkipSandwich]

I've played games where 'supernatural gifts' were tied to certain items, similar to your strategy above, I've also played games where they were given out to the whole party (mutations, chaos gifts, chosen by gods ect.) and it was treated more like applying a template (with the LA more-or-less ignored since the whole party received equivalent gifts).

If you have the situation where just part of the party is receiving special powers due to bloodline/being the chosen one/whatever, I suggest also looking at templates with benefits that scale with HD like Phrenic and the Demi-outsiders (Half-Fiend/Devil/Celestial).

Tone down/remove the stat bonuses and tweak the spell-like/psi-like ability list to better suit the theme your going for and bam! Instant superhero!

Using Phrenic as a guide;
Gaining 1/day spell like abilities (3/day for 1st level spells/powers and specifically chosen 'iconic' powers) at roughly the frequency and level a sorcerer or wilder would gain new spells, plus some minor stat/resistance buffs, is +2 LA (Caster level = HD), you may swap out gaining new powers with increasing the uses per day of old powers if you wish, and once something is a 6 or more uses per day you may as well make it an at-will ability.

If the spell-likes are instead at (Caster level = 1/2 HD) and half-caster progression (as Paladin/Ranger), then only +1 LA

Example progression
HD Power
1-2 Far Hand 3/day
3-4 Far Hand or Control Object 4/day (shared uses/day)
5-6 Concussion Blast or Control Air 1/day (shared uses)
7-8 Far Hand/Control Object 5/day; Concussion Blast/Control Air 2/day
9-10 TK Force or TK Thrust 1/day
11-12 Far Hand/Control Object At-Will, Concussion Blast/Control Air 3/day; TK Force/TK Thrust 2/day
13-14 TK Force/Thrust 3/day; Concussion Blast/Control Air 4/day; Inertial Barrier 1/day
15-16 TK Force/Thrust 4/day; Concussion Blast/Control Air 5/day; Inertial Barrier 2/day
17-18 TK Force/Thrust 5/day; Concussion Blast/Control Air At-Will;Inertial Barrier Or Control Body 3/day
19-20 TK Force/Thrust At-Will; Inertial Barrier/Control Body 4/day

LA +2

[P.F.]

Alternately, you could make it a racial ability, or a template, even. If you use the, erhm, Level Adjustment buy-off, this might be the best way to balance such a thing. On a 1st-level character, the ability to use a 2nd-level spell an unlimited number of times per day will make them noticably more powerful than other 1st level characters. By 10th level, this is a nice perk but hardly tips the scales of power anymore, and many of your enemies will be able to see invisible anyway. At higher levels, it will hardly even matter.

Or taking it out of WBL will work, too, assuming the character is of a level to afford it. It's still a bit of a workaround, because equipment can be stolen, broken, dispelled, etc, whereas a supernatural ability cannot.

[Eldaran]

Instead of making it cost LA, you could do it similar to an archetype where they give up some sort of class feature to gain the power. Like instead of a Ranger gaining Favored Terrain they gain invisibility at will instead. It might not be perfectly balanced, but as long as it's balanced against the rest of the party it should be fine.

[Ssalarn]

There's a couple systems that do a much better job of grafting more narrowly defined abilities already out there. Of particular note, both DSP's Akashic Mysteries and Drop Dead Studio's Spheres of Power have some great options for playing a character easily fluffed as a super-hero:

A Mysterial Monk who uses his first bonus feat to snag Lashing Spinnerets gets to be something that is functionally very similar to Spiderman right out the gate.

An Armorist who puts all of his talents into Alteration and takes the the Lycanthrope drawback can be fluffed as Morph from the X-Men.

Iron Man is doable through a couple akashic builds.

Green Lantern is already pretty doable with the Vizier, and there's an archetype in the next update that makes it fit that idea even better.

I'm pretty sure that an Invisible Man option it doable, probably through Spheres of Power, though part of the issue that's a little harder is that at-will invisibility is really potent, especially at lower levels.

If you want to divorce superpowers from class, Akashic Mysteries lets you dip the system through feats, or using the dragonmarks from 3.5 Eberron would be another good place to establish a balanced guidepost.

[Mehangel]

I would like to second the fact that most superpowers can be emulated through the use of Spheres of Power. Those that aren't emulated through use in that book could probably be emulated through use of Ultimate Psionics, Path of War or Akashic Mysteries.

The reason why I suggest Spheres of Power is that you can have any of the following abilities at level 1:

o At-Will Telekinesis
o At-Will Weather Control
o At-Will Greater Invisibility
o At-Will Energy Attacks
o At-Will Dimension Door-like Teleportation
o At-Will Light Manipulation
o At-Will Darkness Manipulation
o At-Will Shapechange
o At-Will Suggestion
o Time Manipulation, i.e. Rewind Time or Time Stop (While not at-will, easily usable 5 times/day @ level 1)
o Animation of Dead (Again, not at-will but easily usable 5 times per day at level 1.)

And that is just a few of the things that Spheres of Power has to offer... At Level 1

[Endarire]

This idea reminds me of Mythic Rules for Pathfinder (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/mythic).

[Psyren]

I agree with others above that, if you're absolutely married to the idea of using 3.5/PF for this, that you're best off using a more focused subsystem like Spheres of Power or Akashic Mysteries. Standard spellcasting/psionics is far too broad for what superheroes do.

[Milo v3]

Instead of making it cost LA, you could do it similar to an archetype where they give up some sort of class feature to gain the power. Like instead of a Ranger gaining Favored Terrain they gain invisibility at will instead. It might not be perfectly balanced, but as long as it's balanced against the rest of the party it should be fine.
Getting the balance right for those sounds tricky but potentially doable.


Alternately, you could make it a racial ability, or a template, even. If you use the, erhm, Level Adjustment buy-off, this might be the best way to balance such a thing. On a 1st-level character, the ability to use a 2nd-level spell an unlimited number of times per day will make them noticably more powerful than other 1st level characters. By 10th level, this is a nice perk but hardly tips the scales of power anymore, and many of your enemies will be able to see invisible anyway. At higher levels, it will hardly even matter.
LA doesn't exist in Pathfinder, and it's monsters as PC rules are.... confusing for my players so I generally steer them away from it.


Or taking it out of WBL will work, too, assuming the character is of a level to afford it. It's still a bit of a workaround, because equipment can be stolen, broken, dispelled, etc, whereas a supernatural ability cannot.
You wouldn't be able to take it away, it's just priced as a no-slot item.


There's a couple systems that do a much better job of grafting more narrowly defined abilities already out there. Of particular note, both DSP's Akashic Mysteries and Drop Dead Studio's Spheres of Power have some great options for playing a character easily fluffed as a super-hero:

A Mysterial Monk who uses his first bonus feat to snag Lashing Spinnerets gets to be something that is functionally very similar to Spiderman right out the gate.

An Armorist who puts all of his talents into Alteration and takes the the Lycanthrope drawback can be fluffed as Morph from the X-Men.

Iron Man is doable through a couple akashic builds.

Green Lantern is already pretty doable with the Vizier, and there's an archetype in the next update that makes it fit that idea even better.

I'm pretty sure that an Invisible Man option it doable, probably through Spheres of Power, though part of the issue that's a little harder is that at-will invisibility is really potent, especially at lower levels.

If you want to divorce superpowers from class, Akashic Mysteries lets you dip the system through feats, or using the dragonmarks from 3.5 Eberron would be another good place to establish a balanced guidepost.
Akashic is rather good for mimicing existing characters, though it's limited selection of veils means that it is limited in what it can portray for now. I did forget about the shape veil feat though, that'd be rather helpful, even without the bind options it means characters can have a random ability from veilweaving.

I'll have to look into dragonmarks, since I never really read Eberron.


I would like to second the fact that most superpowers can be emulated through the use of Spheres of Power. Those that aren't emulated through use in that book could probably be emulated through use of Ultimate Psionics, Path of War or Akashic Mysteries.

The reason why I suggest Spheres of Power is that you can have any of the following abilities at level 1:

o At-Will Telekinesis
o At-Will Weather Control
o At-Will Greater Invisibility
o At-Will Energy Attacks
o At-Will Dimension Door-like Teleportation
o At-Will Light Manipulation
o At-Will Darkness Manipulation
o At-Will Shapechange
o At-Will Suggestion
o Time Manipulation, i.e. Rewind Time or Time Stop (While not at-will, easily usable 5 times/day @ level 1)
o Animation of Dead (Again, not at-will but easily usable 5 times per day at level 1.)

And that is just a few of the things that Spheres of Power has to offer... At Level 1
Noted.


This idea reminds me of Mythic Rules for Pathfinder (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/mythic).
I mentioned mythic in the OP, but it doesn't really have superpowers beyond abit of teleporting, invisibility and super strength. So I'd have to add in new Path Powers.

[Kudaku]

It would help to know exactly what kind of superpowers you had in mind. Invisibility for example is easily handled within the PF system, while Flash's superspeed would probably break the system in half.

[Arbane]

It would help to know exactly what kind of superpowers you had in mind. Invisibility for example is easily handled within the PF system, while Flash's superspeed would probably break the system in half.

To be fair, the Flash's superspeed breaks EVERY system in half, even most superhero games. (the usual advice is to handwave superspeed the same way the comics do - so it's mostly 'run real fast', to 'do 100 things before the other guy can blink'.)

That Spheres of Power things seems a trifle unbalancing. O_o

[Psyren]

I would like to second the fact that most superpowers can be emulated through the use of Spheres of Power. Those that aren't emulated through use in that book could probably be emulated through use of Ultimate Psionics, Path of War or Akashic Mysteries.

The reason why I suggest Spheres of Power is that you can have any of the following abilities at level 1:

o At-Will Telekinesis
o At-Will Weather Control
o At-Will Greater Invisibility
o At-Will Energy Attacks
o At-Will Dimension Door-like Teleportation
o At-Will Light Manipulation
o At-Will Darkness Manipulation
o At-Will Shapechange
o At-Will Suggestion
o Time Manipulation, i.e. Rewind Time or Time Stop (While not at-will, easily usable 5 times/day @ level 1)
o Animation of Dead (Again, not at-will but easily usable 5 times per day at level 1.)

And that is just a few of the things that Spheres of Power has to offer... At Level 1

Admittedly I haven't read this system in detail for myself but this sounds really unbalanced.


To be fair, the Flash's superspeed breaks EVERY system in half, even most superhero games. (the usual advice is to handwave superspeed the same way the comics do - so it's mostly 'run real fast', to 'do 100 things before the other guy can blink'.)

This - a lesser speedster like Northstar or Quicksilver is probably a better benchmark for this sort of thing. Flash is basically the embodiment of Speed Itself in the DCU, or at least its chosen avatar, and games don't do well with the kind of no-limits story conventions the JLA throw around.

Supes' unlimited strength, and Bats' unlimited wealth, would be just as broken in a gaming context - they are plot devices, not game mechanics.

[Der_DWSage]

Eh...as a fan of SoP, I feel the need to rise to the defense of SoP sounding unbalanced. Lemme go through the list. Also keep in mind that most level 1 characters will have around 5 or 6 Spell Points with most of what I'm saying. (1+Casting modifier, maybe an additional point from class or casting traditions or something else.)

o At-Will Telekinesis
The 'at will' version just gives you the ability to pick up a dagger and hit people with it, using your BAB+Casting modifier to hit for 1d4 unmodified damage, though talents can improve it a bit. Probably the most powerful one of the abilities that Mehangel listed.

o At-Will Weather Control
It takes 3 rounds of charging just to get the point where you can inflict damage on people once per hour-and then there's friendly fire to take into account. And if you take the talents to make friendly fire not happen, your enemies can get into the safety field just as easily. You also can't get past the 'once per hour' damaging portion until you're at a higher level, or again, you put talents into it. I am not a fan of the Weather Sphere in general.

o At-Will Greater Invisibility
This one's actually wrong-you still need to spend spell points on it, so it's more like 5/day Greater Invisibility, but without the +20 on Stealth checks. It's actually closer to 5/day Displacement, and that's your entire allotment of spells for the day. And unless you're adding talents and spell points to make it stick around, you're spending a standard action every round to maintain it.

o At-Will Energy Attacks
Like Warlock blasts, 1d6 per 2 levels. The version that's not at will becomes 1d6/level.

o At-Will Dimension Door-like Teleportation
Still a standard action, only teleports you a Short Range, and if you move anyone but yourself or a single ally it's no longer at will. Still pretty useful for bypassing traps, I'll admit.

o At-Will Light Manipulation
...It's the Light cantrip. Moving on.

o At-Will Darkness Manipulation
You need to spend a standard action each round to maintain the darkness if you're not spending spell points. I think most agree that's a hefty price.

o At-Will Shapechange
Not Shapechange, the Spell. Shapeshifting in general, but free shapeshifting requires you spend a Standard action to maintain it every round. Shifters only need a Move action, and Druids can maintain their shapes for hours/level still, so it's effectively free for them. And even the costly version only lasts for minutes at a time.

o At-Will Suggestion
Kinda misleading again. And really open to GM interpretation. It requires it be a 'Very Simple Request,' which is pretty much 'Something they'd normally do anyway, like having a guard examine someone for a weapon, or having a Paladin heal an injured child.'

o Time Manipulation, i.e. Rewind Time or Time Stop (While not at-will, easily usable 5 times/day @ level 1)
It's not Time Stop. It's a 1-round Time-Stop that allows a will save to allow people to be unaffected. And for spending 2 spell points, you can get someone to re-do their entire turn, Will save negates. 2 SP is pretty expensive at level 1, so that's likely to be closer to 2-3 times a day, and you're down to your at-will abilities after that.

o Animation of Dead (Again, not at-will but easily usable 5 times per day at level 1.)
Undead that last for 1 minute/level, and you have a cap of about half of what Animate Dead allows.

That isn't to say that superheroes with Spheres of Power won't work-it's just difficult to have most of them come online at level 1 with anything resembling impressive abilities, or to do those impressive things more than a few times a day. I made an Elementalist-themed team of supervillains to go after my D&D party, and everyone loved how they were actually fighting against opponents with an elemental theme rather than Yet Another Sorcerer With the Elemental Bloodline.

[Vhaidara]

Yeah, the thing with Spheres is,yes, those things are at will, but they also start out very weak, and generally stay behind the curve unless you are spending spell points to make them stronger

[Psyren]

Thanks Der_DWSage, that's much more reasonable, though I'm still iffy about the at-will blinking around at level 1.

The 1-round Time-Stop sounds like an easy way to get a buffing round/ready your weapons (or even hastily don armor) in every low-level combat. Not broken necessarily but still a bit of a no-brainer for any gish it seems to me.

The Suggestion one seems tailor-made for arguments.

[Vhaidara]

Warp (the teleportation) is actually very well designed, since, while free, it is limit range (close) and very action expensive (standard). However, it is one of my favorite spheres, because, with talent investment, you can teleport other people (at range with another talent), teleport enemies (touch attack +save at bonus for dangerous locations like cliffs), throw arrows back with a readied action (ranged teleport + teleport object + readied action, an explicit callout).

And suggestion being open for argument changes it from normal suggestion/charm how? The table of examples they have is actually very well laid out. 6-7 different targets, with 5 levels of action (would do anyways, would probably do anyways, may or may not do anyways, would probably not do anyways, and wtf did you just ask me to do). The further up the scale, the bigger their save bonus.

Also, iirc, it isn't actually time stop like the spell. It is an actual time stop. As in the area/person you target just gets stasis locked (no action, no interaction). I may be misremembering that though.

[Psyren]

Suggestion: The difference is that this one isn't at-will and thus spammable. I can see a player attempting to use this at every opportunity just in case it works, simply because when you have an at-will hammer everything looks like a nail. After all, you're not out a spell slot if you fail, right?

Time Stop: If you're locked in stasis for using it, doesn't that make it useless?

Warp: Standard actions only matter in combat, and this sounds very useful even outside of that. Locked doors, traps, sentries etc are supposed to be reasonable obstacles for a 1st-level character. And in combat, this means you can nightcrawler past an opponent's threatened area, put the fighter between you and any threat that got behind the party, auto-escape grapples and other things that should be more of a danger to 1st-level characters.

Even Abrupt Jaunt's tiny range would be considered too good if it were at-will I'd say.

[Mehangel]

Eh...as a fan of SoP, I feel the need to rise to the defense of SoP sounding unbalanced. Lemme go through the list. Also keep in mind that most level 1 characters will have around 5 or 6 Spell Points with most of what I'm saying. (1+Casting modifier, maybe an additional point from class or casting traditions or something else.)

I apologize for not doing what you did to begin with, I simply was trying to show that several super-powers are available to low level characters, and that even at level one they can do atleast a fraction of what they want to become. When I said that someone can do something 5 times per day, it was because there are some general drawbacks that will be easy to grab just to give you that +1 Spell Point. This effectively making it 2 + Casting Modifier.


o At-Will Telekinesis
The 'at will' version just gives you the ability to pick up a dagger and hit people with it, using your BAB+Casting modifier to hit for 1d4 unmodified damage, though talents can improve it a bit. Probably the most powerful one of the abilities that Mehangel listed.

I just wanted to correct you there, while it is true that you can lift a dagger, using Telekinesis at level 1 to hit people with it deals only 1d2 damage as it is listed as a Diminutive object.


o At-Will Weather Control
It takes 3 rounds of charging just to get the point where you can inflict damage on people once per hour-and then there's friendly fire to take into account. And if you take the talents to make friendly fire not happen, your enemies can get into the safety field just as easily. You also can't get past the 'once per hour' damaging portion until you're at a higher level, or again, you put talents into it. I am not a fan of the Weather Sphere in general.

While I agree that Weather Control isn't really all too powerful at level 1, it is available to them. Which to me means something.


o At-Will Greater Invisibility
This one's actually wrong-you still need to spend spell points on it, so it's more like 5/day Greater Invisibility, but without the +20 on Stealth checks. It's actually closer to 5/day Displacement, and that's your entire allotment of spells for the day. And unless you're adding talents and spell points to make it stick around, you're spending a standard action every round to maintain it.

The reason why I called it at-will is that you are not required to spend spell-points on it, you can concentrate to maintain it as a Standard action, or as move action if you have the Boon.


o At-Will Light Manipulation
...It's the Light cantrip. Moving on.

If someone only takes the base sphere ability sure, but if they focus more into it, they can at-will do more than that, because most the spell point abilities only happen if you are trying to affect more than one creature at a time. Thus, at-will daze, entangle, dimensional anchor, buff, ect. Still weak, but it is more than just cantrip light unless you only choose the base sphere.


o At-Will Darkness Manipulation
You need to spend a standard action each round to maintain the darkness if you're not spending spell points. I think most agree that's a hefty price.

Again, Easy Focus Boon to Maintain Concentration as a Move action.


o At-Will Shapechange
Not Shapechange, the Spell. Shapeshifting in general, but free shapeshifting requires you spend a Standard action to maintain it every round. Shifters only need a Move action, and Druids can maintain their shapes for hours/level still, so it's effectively free for them. And even the costly version only lasts for minutes at a time.

Yeah, my bad I should've said Shapeshift, though by level 20 if someone focused entire in the Alteration Sphere, it does kind of become equivalent to Shapechange.


o At-Will Suggestion
Kinda misleading again. And really open to GM interpretation. It requires it be a 'Very Simple Request,' which is pretty much 'Something they'd normally do anyway, like having a guard examine someone for a weapon, or having a Paladin heal an injured child.'

While true, I would also like to mention that using the at-will ability only works on an individual once. So this (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0182.html) sort of thing doesn't happen (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0183.html).


o Time Manipulation, i.e. Rewind Time or Time Stop (While not at-will, easily usable 5 times/day @ level 1)
It's not Time Stop. It's a 1-round Time-Stop that allows a will save to allow people to be unaffected. And for spending 2 spell points, you can get someone to re-do their entire turn, Will save negates. 2 SP is pretty expensive at level 1, so that's likely to be closer to 2-3 times a day, and you're down to your at-will abilities after that.

True, it is not Time Stop the spell, but it was the closest representation that I could come up with at the moment. And while it is more likely that the individual will not be able to pull off more than 2 Time Retry actions in a day, Freeze Time only takes 1 spell point. Thus they can do that ability 4-5 times per day.


o Animation of Dead (Again, not at-will but easily usable 5 times per day at level 1.)
Undead that last for 1 minute/level, and you have a cap of about half of what Animate Dead allows.

Sure it isn't powerful, but it allows necromancers to temporarily raise the dead at level one.


That isn't to say that superheroes with Spheres of Power won't work-it's just difficult to have most of them come online at level 1 with anything resembling impressive abilities, or to do those impressive things more than a few times a day. I made an Elementalist-themed team of supervillains to go after my D&D party, and everyone loved how they were actually fighting against opponents with an elemental theme rather than Yet Another Sorcerer With the Elemental Bloodline.

Thankyou, The point that I was trying to get across is that with Spheres of Power, you dont have to have everyone be level 15 to pull off superpowers. With Spheres of Power you could start off at level 1 and still have Misfits (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misfits_(TV_series))strength super-powers. So while still weak at level 1, they still have their ability. Also, I would like to point out that at level 1 a character is not likely to have more than 3 talents. And since in Spheres of Power it is better to specialize rather than spread yourself thin, you are not likely to have Superman syndrome where you have every power listed. In-fact even at higher levels, characters are likely to stay within 2-4 spheres. (in Spheres of Power there are 20 Spheres, you gain 1 sphere every time you gain a caster level. Full-casters increase caster level at the rate of a High BAB attack progression. Mid-casters increase caster level at the rate of Med BAB attack progression, and Low-casters increase caster level at the rate of Low BAB attack progression.

[Vhaidara]

As noted, I forgot that suggestion was 1/target/24 hours.

Freeze time isn't meant for personal use. It's offensive: freeze the fleeing enemy, or freeze out part of a fight while you position.

Warp provokes when used, and requires a los unless you spend a talent. These are still following normal casting rules. Though all components are part of an optional set of things called drawbacks that you can take for extra spell points.

[Psyren]

As noted, I forgot that suggestion was 1/target/24 hours.

Great, that's better then. Knowing he can only influence a given target once in a day should be enough to encourage caution/reservation in the player.



Freeze time isn't meant for personal use. It's offensive: freeze the fleeing enemy, or freeze out part of a fight while you position.

"Part of a fight?" How does that work?

It sounds more like hold person than time stop based on this description unless I'm reading it wrong.



Warp provokes when used, and requires a los unless you spend a talent. These are still following normal casting rules. Though all components are part of an optional set of things called drawbacks that you can take for extra spell points.

Can you still cast defensively in Spheres, and do hits force concentration checks? Or are those drawbacks?

I still don't like it as you've only solved hopping out of melee in combat, and even then only partially. It still lets you blink through any door or past nearly any obstacle in the city at first level, and then blink back out again. Why wouldn't every thief in creation grab this? (At least in 3.5, you have to study magic for quite a while before you can teleport that often.)

[Vhaidara]

It is more like hold person, but it also stops anyone from attacking the frozen person/people.

Because that requires 2 talents from the warp sphere. I also can't remember, but I think unseen warp may require a spell point.

For talent perspective, that would require 2 feats for a non-caster, or a decent resource investment (1/5 of the low casters, aand 1/15 of the incanter (sphere wizard, basically)).

Edit: defensive casting and concentration are still there normally.

[Mehangel]

I still don't like it as you've only solved hopping out of melee in combat, and even then only partially. It still lets you blink through any door or past nearly any obstacle in the city at first level, and then blink back out again. Why wouldn't every thief in creation grab this? (At least in 3.5, you have to study magic for quite a while before you can teleport that often.)

A level 1 rogue not being a sphere caster would need to take the 'Basic Magical Training' feat to get 1 spell point and the Warp Sphere. The Rogue then would need to take the 'Extra Magic Talent' feat to take the 'Unseeing Teleport' Warp talent in order to teleport into an area she could not see. But doing so costs a spell point. With the rogue only having 1 spell point, she will be unable to teleport back.

[Psyren]

Thanks, that's the part I was iffy on - nobody said that the "at-will dimension door" had to be to a place you could see before now. Appreciate you guys clearing that up.

That still lets you blink past pressure plates in a hallway or something but at least you can't bypass a booby-trapped door.

[Mehangel]

Thanks, that's the part I was iffy on - nobody said that the "at-will dimension door" had to be to a place you could see before now. Appreciate you guys clearing that up.

That still lets you blink past pressure plates in a hallway or something but at least you can't bypass a booby-trapped door.

Well, you could, it just will be a one way bypass..

[soapdude]

Well, you could, it just will be a one way bypass..

Hopefully the door isn't locked from the other side :)

[Psyren]

Well, you could, it just will be a one way bypass..


Hopefully the door isn't locked from the other side :)

That's the point, putting in a drawback like that is a good thing. It means that the party scout won't just blink back and forth through every door the players come across, forcing the GM to either contrivedly counter that ability specifically, or give up any chance at mystery or counterplay.