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View Full Version : D&D 3.x Other A Gem System (Alternate Enchanting) (PEACH)



RegalKain
2017-01-07, 08:37 PM
First off, I apologize if the format is all horrible, this is the first time I've submitted any Homebrew to the forums, so I'm a bit nervous, and I am also a total newb. With that in mind, I present the Gem system.

The goal of this system, was to make it so Mundanes aren't so doomed and damned by their big brother casters, as well as give them more utility, stop them from being a cash sink etc. It aims to replace the base enchanting system with this one, it's also recommended to change Craft Magic Arms and Armor so to start the feats.


Craft Magic Arms and Armor: Prereq- Character Level 5th (You no longer need to be a caster) This skill allows you to work on, and enchant weapons and armor. At 5th level you can work on and craft gear up to +2, at 7th level you can work and craft on gear up to +3 and at 12th level you can work on and craft gear up to +4, and finally at 15th level you may work on and craft gear of any enchantment level (You must still pay for materials per the usual, and crafting rules apply however you may use your Character Level in place of any caster levels required, and you need not know the required spells to craft.)

Gem Crafting- Prereqs- Craft Magic Arms and Armor, Character Level 7th- This Skill allows you to cut and polish gems, and imbue them with mystical properties. Doing so is very time consuming, for every slot a gem would take up (So for instance a +2 gem takes up 2 slots) it takes one week of work. At 5th level you can work on gems up to +2 bonuses, at 7th up to +3 and at 12th up to +4 at 15th level you may craft gems of any enchantment level and quality (You must still pay for materials per the usual, and crafting rules apply however you may use your Character Level in place of any caster levels required, and you need not know the required spells to craft.)


The Actual System: All Weapons and Armor (now referred to as gear) of Masterwork Quality have a single Gem slot in them, you gain addition gem slots based on the enchantment level of the gear. At a 3:1 Ratio, for instance a +1 Weapon would have 3 Gem slots, a +4 Weapon would have 12. Weapons and Armor now also have the same enchantment costs, as follows:
+1= 2.5K (3Slots)
+2= 5K (6Slots)
+3= 9K (9Slots)
+4= 15K (12Slots)
+5= 21K (15Slots)

The way gems, and their slots work is as follows, any currently existing Enchantment (Let's use Flaming as our example) can be made instead, into a Gem. So we now have a Flaming Gem (Deals 1d6 Fire damage in a weapon) it's previous cost was a +1 Enchantment, which means it takes up a single Gem Slot instead. Furthermore all gems stack (Except Critical Gems, though this is all subject to DM Discretion) So for instance if you have a +1 Weapon, you can have 3 Flaming Gems equipped into it, for a total of 3d6 Fire Damage added to your attacks.
The tl;dr of this is Enchantment Cost=Gem Slot Cost.

In addition, your gems can be taken out and swapped to any enchanted weapon or armor, the time needed to do this is 1 minute per enchantment level, per gem. A feat will make this faster.

Swift Jeweler- Prereqs BAB 3- This changes the time required to swap gems from 1 minute per enchantment level, to one round per enchantment level.

The actual gold cost of gems is their Gear equivalent. In otherwords our Flaming Gem would cost us 2,500GP per gem. An enchantment that's normally higher let's say Spell Resistance (Which is a +3 Bonus in Pathfinder) would cost 9K per gem, and take up 3 Gem slots.
In addition to all of the old enchantments, there are a few new Gems I am adding in, (See Utility and Other options in the opening statement. :) )

Synergy Gems (+2 or +4)= The +2 Variation allows basic synergy in Gems. Certain gems only work when synergized with another gem, these are considered "Synergy" types. For instance, if you have a Water Gem, and a Flaming Gem on your weapon, you can spend a Swift Action to synergize the Gems within the equipment, allowing you to utilize your standard action to create a cloud of hot steam in an area of a 5ft square, if you also have an Burst Gem and a Ranged Gem, you can then fill that area with hot steam, from the indicated range. These effects can be wide and varying, and as such are ultimately up to GM discretion, discuss possibilities with your DM ahead of time, to ensure no gold or feats are wasted. It takes a swift action to synergize any Gems available if applicable, and the synergy is discharged on the first use. As such a Fighter with several attacks, cannot make iteratives with the Synergy bonuses. Only their first attack would counter, the others would be made as normal.

The +4 version auto-synergizes all Gems in your weapon (Allowing you to use any potential synergies at-will) as well as on all iterative attacks. Synergized abilities still require an action to use, dependent on the action.

Water Gem (+1 or +3)= The +1 variant creates one pint of water a round, it is also used as a synergy crystal, this is it's primary purpose. The +3 Gem operates in all ways, like a Decanter of Endless Water, in addition to being able to be used as a Synergy Crystal. In armor, the +1 Gives you a +4 Gem bonus on Swim checks, the +3 Version allows you to breath underwater, and gives you a swim speed equal to your base land speed.

Life Gem (+1 or +2)= The +1 variation gives you 1d4 points of Siphon damage, (This steals the life essence, or animating essence from an enemy hit, and returns it to you, it works on anything with a life force, or an animated essence, it works on anything you could designate as a Creature or a Target but not inanimate objects.) The +2 Variation changes this to 1d8. In Armor the +1 Auto stabilizes you, the +2 gives you Fast Healing 1.

Blood Gem (+2)= The +2 Variation deals 1d4 points of extra damage, this damage cannot be healed by Fast Healing, Regeneration or other forms of natural healing, it can only be healed with a Heal Check, or a form of Magical Healing (Such as a Cure Light Wounds spell, or the Life sphere) In armor, it drains 1d4 points of Hit points from any attack that originates adjacent to you, that targets you, that has an attack roll. (So a Fireball that is an area target spell, would not. A ray spell if cast next to you, targetting you, would. Any melee attacks do regardless of where they originate from.)

Profane Gem (+2)= The +2 Variation deals 1d4 points of extra damage, this damage can only be healed with a successful Heal Check (DC 10+Profane damage dealt) it will not heal naturally, magical healing does not work, nor does Regeneration, or fast healing.

Range Gem(+1)= The +1 variant has a base range of 15Ft, this is used in Synergies (Will describe that with other gems in an example beneath) it also adds 15ft to the range of any ranged weapon, or one third that, to the range of thrown weapons when added to an enchanted quiver.

Burst Gem (+2, +3)= The +2 variant has a radius of 10Ft, this is primarily used in synergies, for instance if you have a weapon that has a Flaming Gem, a Range Gem, and a Burst Gem, you may synergize the crystals and make an attack out to 15Ft with a 10 ft Burst that deals 1d6 Flaming damage. The +3 Variant works as the +2 Variant does, except even on normal attacks (Ranged, Thrown or Melee) any elemental gems (Such as flaming, shocking etc) do their damage in a burst.

Counter Gem (+1, +3)= The +1 Variant allows you to make an immediate attack against an adjacent foe when that foe attacks you or an ally, instead of using your Swift Action, this instead uses your Attacks of Opportunities, you may do this once per round. The +3 Variant Allows you to utilize synergized gems, special attacks (Such as bull rushes, disarms etc) and you may Counter as many times in a round as you have AoO (This is primarily used for people who have Combat Reflexes for example.)

Elemental Gems (Flaming, Shocking, Frost etc) (+1)= This works exactly like the old enchantments did 1d6 extra damage of that type, however you can also add them to your armor, to give you 3 Points of resistance per Gem (So if you had +1 Armor, with 3 gem slots, you could add 3 Flaming Gems for 9 Fire Resistance) this stacks in addition to any natural resistance, or resistance gained from other items.


This is just a general guideline of what the system is trying to achieve, I am still working on fine-tuning, as well as more options available, the goal of the system as previously stated, is to give Mundanes more options (As well as ranged options) of handling situations, it also helps to alleviate (In my mind at least) the issue of Fighters and having a host of specialized equipment, let's setup a small example.

A Fighter with a +2 Weapon and a +2 Suit of armor is going to fight a red dragon, having just been fighting Trolls. Instead of the Flaming Gems he has being wasted (Or the Flaming Enchantment in the old system) he can instead take a few minutes, take the Gems out of his weapon, and put them into his armor, giving him some extra Fire Resistance, and not wasting the damage the Dragon is immune to anyway.

In any case, that's the idea, I've play tested it with my players a bit, they seem to like it, it's much more simple and forgiving for Martials, it also makes finding that loot pile full of gems a bit more exciting because they aren't just an alternate form of currency now.

Edit: Tweaked Values

RegalKain
2017-01-07, 08:38 PM
Reserved Just In Case. Should only need one, feel free to criticize!

ArcanaGuy
2017-01-08, 11:28 PM
Being able to do 15d6 damage with a single hit at level 12 seems a little bit excessive... For a fighter, being able to do 45d6 damage at level 12 with a full round attack seems a lot excessive. Especially when you consider that damage can go way, way up with the right feats. I can easily come up with a build that would let the fighter do 120d6 damage per round or more. Cleave just became a heck of a lot more valuable... and rogue sneak attack damage is no longer quite so useful.

That being said, I like the idea... it's a bit video-gamey, but that's all right. I just think you need to consider carefully how this will make melee combat *really* ridiculously destructive - each strike on par with the wizard's most powerful spells, and with no spell-slot limit on throwing that mass devastation.

RegalKain
2017-01-09, 09:16 AM
Being able to do 15d6 damage with a single hit at level 12 seems a little bit excessive... For a fighter, being able to do 45d6 damage at level 12 with a full round attack seems a lot excessive. Especially when you consider that damage can go way, way up with the right feats. I can easily come up with a build that would let the fighter do 120d6 damage per round or more. Cleave just became a heck of a lot more valuable... and rogue sneak attack damage is no longer quite so useful.

That being said, I like the idea... it's a bit video-gamey, but that's all right. I just think you need to consider carefully how this will make melee combat *really* ridiculously destructive - each strike on par with the wizard's most powerful spells, and with no spell-slot limit on throwing that mass devastation.

Thank you for the criticism first off, I appreciate the feed back. I felt the damage was high myself, it's mostly due to how my players and I run, as well as my other DMs that throwing out that much damage by level 12-15 is a non-issue. However I want the system to be able to be utilized by people at any level of play. I've tweaked the cost of things, and made it so you cannot craft your own equipment of +5 or higher until 15th level.

How else would you suggest to manage it at high levels? I don't mind at low levels there being a bit more oomph, this helps both Martials, as well as Casters in my opinion (A caster with an enchanted crossbow can still put on respectable damage this way, or have utility when their spells run dry) I was kind of debating limiting the stacking to.

" You may stack a number of gems of the same type in a given piece of gear, equal to the Enchantment level of that piece of gear" this diminishes rapid stacking at early levels, but at late levels it only stops stacking of one time. Because you can then just have 5 Flaming Gems, 5 Frost Gems and 5 Shocking gems and you're back where you started. I don't want to eliminate stacking completely, because that swings to hard in the other direction of making it so that a fighter who spent most of his WBL on this shiny stick, should really friggin hurt. I realize the best way to test this is to try and break it, at the same token, I don't see many players just stacking 15 damage gems, with 0 utility gems (Or things like the counter Gem, ranged etc) but some might.