Examples of Divine Crusader Scrolls breaking the game?

[gogogome]

Just out of curiosity. Just so I don't get caught flat-footed since I am allowing artificers to craft Divine Crusader Scrolls.

CL1 Animate Dead - I don't see a problem with that.
CL4 Planar Binding - Way too expensive, unreliable, and short duration to use.
CL7 Shapechange - As long as it's not for free wishes I don't see a problem.
CL7 Wish - If I remove xp is a river for that character (DMG by RAW says I can) it's balanced, but if I don't it gets out of hand after a short while.

[TiaC]

So, given that this is an artificer, at level 7 they'll be able to craft 9th level scrolls for probably around 400gp?

At that level, Summon Monster IX will trivialize a lot of fights.

Shambler gives long-term minions that are good enough to matter.

Fire Seeds and Resist Fire together beat most things that don't have resistance (8d8+8*CL).

If the party fighter has UMD, Antimagic field would be annoying.

Astral Projection lets them copy all their other scrolls for free, but it's much more expensive.

Polymorph any Object can be a permanent buff.

Power Words have no save and things will have much lover HP at that level.

That's what I saw from looking through core domains.

[noob]

Imagine a wand of time stop together with artificer infusion sheanighans and a few other wands it allows an artificer to do tons of stuff and possibly have an infinite loop.

[TiaC]

Imagine a wand of time stop together with artificer infusion sheanighans and a few other wands it allows an artificer to do tons of stuff and possibly have an infinite loop.

Wand? A wand would still be limited to 4th level spells. However, a schema of a 9th level spell at low levels could be really absurd.

[noob]

Wand? A wand would still be limited to 4th level spells. However, a schema of a 9th level spell at low levels could be really absurd.

There is ways to make wands of higher level with a prc is not it?

[OgresAreCute]

There is ways to make wands of higher level with a prc is not it?

Dorjes can hold 9th level powers, but I don't think that works with divine crusader.

[RoboEmperor]

So, given that this is an artificer, at level 7 they'll be able to craft 9th level scrolls for probably around 400gp?

1012.5gp


At that level, Summon Monster IX will trivialize a lot of fights.

At the cost of 1012.5gp per fight.


Shambler gives long-term minions that are good enough to matter.

7 days of 1d4+2 Shambling Mounds would break the game at that level, but it drops off really quickly.


Fire Seeds and Resist Fire together beat most things that don't have resistance (8d8+8*CL).

Psh, scorching ray with metamagic is better and doesn't cost money.


Astral Projection lets them copy all their other scrolls for free, but it's much more expensive.

As you pointed out this is not economical.


Polymorph any Object can be a permanent buff.

To be fair, if PaO is a permanent buff then other plays would just buy it so the only thing the artificer is doing is making it cheaper to acquire the scrolls.


Power Words have no save and things will have much lover HP at that level.

I'd say aforementioned summon monster IX is better since they can affect multiple creatures than just one.


Wand? A wand would still be limited to 4th level spells. However, a schema of a 9th level spell at low levels could be really absurd.

Schemas are limited to 6th level spells. If you want permanent 9th level spells you need permanent runes from the runecaster PrC, which is expensive (IIRC identical to the costs for custom magic items), has some severe limitations, and you need to create them via Wish since Inscribe Rune doesn't let you make 1/day or permanent runes.

[gogogome]

Wand? A wand would still be limited to 4th level spells. However, a schema of a 9th level spell at low levels could be really absurd.

Etch Schemas also have a CL10 requirement so you need to be at least level 12 to craft a Schema.

Thanks for taking the effort to look at the domains. Some of them are troubling like Shambler, but they all become useless eventually so I'm not worried.

[OgresAreCute]

In a similar vein, prestige classes with their own casting tracks allow Artificer to access many spicy things, taking from lists like Sublime Chord, Ur-Priest and Nar Demonbinder. An artificer can craft a scroll of Summon Giants, taking it from the Disciple of Thrym spell list as a 4th level spell at level 5. Summon Giants is a lot more economical than Summon Monster IX (4 * 7 * 25 = 700 gp vs 9 * 9 * 25 = 2025 gp). Of course, after halving the price from crafting it yourself and applying all your cost reducers it'll be much lower than that, but Summon Giants costs less than half of what Summon Monster IX does (and a lot less XP too). Not sure if you've already considered this or not since you only asked about Divine Crusader.

Edit: Now that I think about it, you could potentially make a wand of Summon Giants since it's a 4th level spell? Probably too expensive to do at level 5, but it's a thought.

[RoboEmperor]

In a similar vein, prestige classes with their own casting tracks allow Artificer to access many spicy things, taking from lists like Sublime Chord, Ur-Priest and Nar Demonbinder. An artificer can craft a scroll of Summon Giants, taking it from the Disciple of Thrym spell list as a 4th level spell at level 5. Summon Giants is a lot more economical than Summon Monster IX (4 * 7 * 25 = 700 gp vs 9 * 9 * 25 = 2025 gp). Of course, after halving the price from crafting it yourself and applying all your cost reducers it'll be much lower than that, but Summon Giants costs less than half of what Summon Monster IX does (and a lot less XP too). Not sure if you've already considered this or not since you only asked about Divine Crusader.

Edit: Now that I think about it, you could potentially make a wand of Summon Giants since it's a 4th level spell? Probably too expensive to do at level 5, but it's a thought.

The wand will cost 10,500gp to make. Just checked, Disciple of Thrym gets it at CL7.

[OgresAreCute]

The wand will cost 10,500gp to make. Just checked, Disciple of Thrym gets it at CL7.

I'm aware, and a savvy artificer will have more cost reductions to boot. I don't quite recall how much WBL is at level 5 though.

[Cosi]

animate dead at 1st level is actually pretty powerful. Combined with desecrate you can make a pair of Wolf Skeletons which are fast, tough, and between the two of them stronger than pretty much any 1st level PC. Whether that's broken or not depends on the campaign, but it's not something you can discount. Particularly because animate dead scales well even into mid levels.


1012.5gp

Which is less than the average treasure per encounter at that level. Meaning you can just go beat up Hill Giants or whatever until the cows come how and get whatever wealth you are supposed to have.


7 days of 1d4+2 Shambling Mounds would break the game at that level, but it drops off really quickly.

So what? Game's still broken.


As you pointed out this is not economical.

I would think that you would understand that there is no way for an item that doubles your items to not be economical.


To be fair, if PaO is a permanent buff then other plays would just buy it so the only thing the artificer is doing is making it cheaper to acquire the scrolls.

It is entirely possible for something to be balanced at one price, and unbalanced at another.

[RoboEmperor]

animate dead at 1st level is actually pretty powerful. Combined with desecrate you can make a pair of Wolf Skeletons which are fast, tough, and between the two of them stronger than pretty much any 1st level PC. Whether that's broken or not depends on the campaign, but it's not something you can discount. Particularly because animate dead scales well even into mid levels.

You can't afford it at first level. In fact you can't even afford the Animate Dead let alone Desecrate. And you can't heal it unless you have a cleric in the party, and even if you do he's not gonna heal him! He's got his own thing to do, not prepare inflict wounds for my schtick, or play a spontaneous inflict caster instead of a cure caster because of this. How do I know so much? Because I tried to do this in 2 separate tables. Didn't happen...


Which is less than the average treasure per encounter at that level. Meaning you can just go beat up Hill Giants or whatever until the cows come how and get whatever wealth you are supposed to have.

You assume a formulaic DM who doles out cash like it's a video game. And didn't you tell me if you're crafting your own gear there is no difference in WBL? So while it takes 1012.5gp to create a scroll you need to sell 2025gp of loot to pay for it.


So what? Game's still broken.

Everything can be abused like Planar Binding, but just because one or two tricks are capable of breaking the game at a certain level doesn't mean it shouldn't be included right? Like Planar Binding.


I would think that you would understand that there is no way for an item that doubles your items to not be economical.

If you can sell it. But selling Astral Projection is like selling Minor Creation Poison. And Astral Projection is not exclusive to this trick. Lesser Planar Binding Nightmares. So you ban the spell from the game not whatever gives you access to it because Astral Projection is borked even at level 17.


It is entirely possible for something to be balanced at one price, and unbalanced at another.

Personally, I'd pay for the higher CL PaO for Greater Dispel Magic protection rather than one that can be dispelled by 3rd level Dispel Magic.

[Cosi]

You assume a formulaic DM who doles out cash like it's a video game. And didn't you tell me if you're crafting your own gear there is no difference in WBL? So while it takes 1012.5gp to create a scroll you need to sell 2025gp of loot to pay for it.

A formulaic DM is what makes it not work. If your DM gives you a linear adventure path with a fixed set of encounters that total to a finite sum of wealth, the ability to get less profit in exchange for no risk isn't enticing, because you'd be cutting into your resources. In an open world, you can simply spend more time fighting Giants for no-risk wins.

And, yes, it's not necessarily crafting that breaks this. You can also break it by buying scrolls. But that doesn't make crafting scrolls not break it. That's the problem with all the analysis you do. You seem to think that if you just don't use all the broken tricks something gives you access to, having access to those tricks isn't broken. But that's nonsense. Binding an Efreet and wishing for level-appropriate WBL is still breaking the game, even if you refuse to wish for a Belt of Magnificence +10000000000 that grants infinite wishes.


Everything can be abused like Planar Binding, but just because one or two tricks are capable of breaking the game at a certain level doesn't mean it shouldn't be included right? Like Planar Binding.

Yes, planar binding should be excluded from the game, or modified into something not broken. Usually what happens is that there's a gentleman's agreement (implicit or explicit) and people kind of eyeball it so that planar binding doesn't do anything stupid.

Have you ever played a game where you were allowed to say "I spend a week using all my 6th level spell slots to bind Glabzerus then restart the adventure with 20 pets that are individually stronger than any party member"? Because I certainly haven't. That's what planar binding does. And if you're not doing that, your game doesn't include planar binding, even if you never explicitly changed the rules text of the spell.


If you can sell it. But selling Astral Projection is like selling Minor Creation Poison. And Astral Projection is not exclusive to this trick. Lesser Planar Binding Nightmares. So you ban the spell from the game not whatever gives you access to it because Astral Projection is borked even at level 17.

And you don't think getting access to it 10 levels early is even a tiny bit of a problem? Even if this particular use is broken at both ends, it's laughable to suggest that there's nothing that's fine at 17th level but busted at 7th.

[RoboEmperor]

And, yes, it's not necessarily crafting that breaks this. You can also break it by buying scrolls. But that doesn't make crafting scrolls not break it. That's the problem with all the analysis you do. You seem to think that if you just don't use all the broken tricks something gives you access to, having access to those tricks isn't broken. But that's nonsense. Binding an Efreet and wishing for level-appropriate WBL is still breaking the game, even if you refuse to wish for a Belt of Magnificence +10000000000 that grants infinite wishes.

Well, to be fair, if you don't use anything that can break the game, the game becomes.. what? E6 with no spellcasting? D&d requires a gentleman's agreement that allows abusable things into the game for d&d to be fun. At least for me. You give me E6 with no spellcasting and I'll throw my book in your face. In my opinion, Planar Binding is this line. Anything more abusable than planar binding is too much even for the Gentleman's Agreement, while anything similar or less is fair game, which is why in my analyses I compare everything to Planar Binding.

If you disagree with my opinion, well, ok. Everyone has their own criteria and opinion.


Yes, planar binding should be excluded from the game, or modified into something not broken. Usually what happens is that there's a gentleman's agreement (implicit or explicit) and people kind of eyeball it so that planar binding doesn't do anything stupid.

Have you ever played a game where you were allowed to say "I spend a week using all my 6th level spell slots to bind Glabzerus then restart the adventure with 20 pets that are individually stronger than any party member"? Because I certainly haven't. That's what planar binding does. And if you're not doing that, your game doesn't include planar binding, even if you never explicitly changed the rules text of the spell.

That is an interesting interpretation. Never heard that before. Very interesting.


And you don't think getting access to it 10 levels early is even a tiny bit of a problem? Even if this particular use is broken at both ends, it's laughable to suggest that there's nothing that's fine at 17th level but busted at 7th.

Which is the purpose of this thread I gather, to find out exactly which spells are busted at 7th and how many of them there are to see if this is worth allowing into the game or not. Shambler is one such example.

[Nifft]

Just out of curiosity. Just so I don't get caught flat-footed since I am allowing artificers to craft Divine Crusader Scrolls.

If you give Divine Crusader a caster level equal to what a Chameleon would have -- i.e. CL = (2 x class level) -- then you solve two problems: the Divine Crusader can actually cast spells that work, and scroll prices aren't disrupted.