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View Full Version : E.M.P.A. - Effect Essences [Alternate Spell System] Needs testing!



Capoeira
2007-10-15, 03:13 PM
So Ive been spending some time thinking about houserules for a new campaign Ill be starting next year, and It has lead me to develope a new spellcasting system, loosely based on truenaming (mechanically) and elemental manipulation (thematically).

First let me explain my use of skills: I do this to expedite gameplay and simply the char.creation process. skills are based on class and INT, as per 3.5 rules, but instead of points/level you just get trained in your class skills, plus 1/INT bonus.
Untrained skills get a roll of d20 + attribute mod - modifiers/penalties
Trained skills get d20 + 5 + applicable class level + attribute mod - m/p
Specialized skills get d20 + 10 + level + attribute mod - m/p and in many cases can take 10 on a check.

Its not perfectly balanced, but in all cases common sense supercedes the ruleset anyway.
Anyway, on to the beginning of my new spell system:


Taking a look at poopular fiction, I was listings the most useful, powerful, and interesting powers (teleportation, regeneration, elemental, etc.) and comparing them to D20 equivalents when there were. I started to see them as being grouped into a few related categories. Adding and removing ill-fitting selections I worked up a list of basic powers divided into 4 essences, with 4 spheres or schools of training in each:

((if anyone wants to tell me how to do a table that would be nice...))

Listed in general order of difficulty in each group:

Elemental magic (earth/air/fire/water), light and darkness spells, storms/nature effects, electrical/magnetic/gravitational effects, up through the force (ala Lucas) are grouped into the energy essence

Regeneration, augmentation, transmutation, cloaking (camouflage,invis), enchanting, transforming and enchanting are grouped into the Coproreal/Material essence

Extra sensory perception, mind reading, mind tricks, charms, domination, direct psionic attacks and defences, curses, psionic immunology, foresight, and permanent control are grouped in the mental/psionic essence

Telekinesis, levitation/flight, advanced mechanical effects, astral/ethereal sight, a/e travel, voluntary etherialness, teleportation, summoning, planeswalking, and chronolocical effects such as slowing, stopping, or travelling through time are grouped as spiritual/superplanar essence.

each has a slight school tree, which must be climbed to allow access to more complex functions, such as megnetic effects or time stop.
the skill trees look like this:

Energetic
start with elemental sphere, can move into natural -or- electromagnetic, but to learn direct primal force you must have training in all 3 other spheres.

Material
Starts with regeneration sphere, transmutation and cloaking branch from that, but only regeneration and transmutation are needed for the transformation sphere.

Psionic
Starts with perception sphere, grows into psionics sphere of attacks and effects, both of those are required for either domination or superawareness spheres, which are two separete branches and require no overlap.

Aetherial
Starts with telekinesis sphere, expands into etherial/astral planar effects, which is then needed for teleportation, finally temporal effects comes directly from all 3, making it and direct unmanifest force powers the hardesst to get.

Each has a different but similar tree and they look *sort of* arcane drawn out from the middle of a circle. :smallbiggrin:

As far as use, its all skill-based, spontaneous, and very open-ended.
Each of those 16 spheres can be trained to lesser, greater, or mastered levels (just like my skill ruleset, greater gives a +5 to all lesser checks of that sphere, mastery gives +10 to lesser, +5 to all greater) and players will be encouraged to come up with their own spell/effect combinations, with the DC and required skill check being decided upon each spells creation/casting. For example, a level 5 mage who will have greater understanding of the elemental sphere will be able to cast a fireball unlimited times per day, but each casting (as well as circumstancial penalties) subtracts -1 from his success rate and every casting starts with a d20 to see if it even has an effect.

This makes magic far less reliable, occasionally more powerful, and far more adaptable and spontaneous.

other rules Ive come up with so far are:

Must be level 5+ to learn greater level understanding of spheres, level 10 for mastery of a sphere.

skill levels are awarded on a similar path as spell level in 3.5, wizards for example getting 1+ 1/2 levels, scorcerers getting 1/2 levels, palys and rangers get 1/4 levels, etc...
Except that all caster classes get 1 point at every 5 levels in addition for balance reasons.

Here is a list of spells from 3.5 and their aproximate place in this system

fireball
3.5=level 3
mastered elemental effect (requires 3 skills in elemental sphere)
roll d20 to get maximum damage (for example, a roll of 7 minus 3 {for a 13+(attribute bonus) DC} gets 4, a 4d6 fireball with an easy DC)
time stop
3.5=level 9
mastered temporal effect
roll d20 to get duration in rounds
mirror image
3.5=level 2
greater psionic effect, (makes illusions)
roll to get number of images
cure serious wounds
3.5=level 4
greater regeneration
roll for hit dice healed
implosion
3.5=level 9
greater transformation
roll d20 to get DC/damage dealt on save
hellball
3.5 level 10/epic
mastered elemental + greater transmutation + lesser telekinesis effects
probably need a hell of a d20 roll to pull this off without incinerating oneself
shapechange
3.5=level 9
greater transformation
roll d20 to see duration
lightning storm
3.5=level 3
greater nature effect
roll to see DC/damage/number of strikes



Okay, now you guys be nice this is my first time posting such an... experimental... system.



To close, heres an example characer:

Joey
level 7 scorcerer (elemental focus)
spell points 3(1 each at level 1,4,6)+1(bonus at lvl 5)=4
Spellskills:
greater, lesser elemental (2)
lesser telekinesis (1)
lesser electromagnetic/gravitational(1)
so he can fireball(g. elem), levitate(l.tele), throw boulders(l. elec/grav/l.tele), electrocute(l. elec/grav), et cetera depending on the players imagination and dice rolls...
He CANNOT detect thoughts, heal, teleport, summon, transmute/enchant, etc. so this is a very attack-oriented example character.

Capoeira
2007-10-15, 04:18 PM
a shiney imaginary copper peice to the first poster with comments, suggestions, or and interest in seeing this alternate spell mechanic in action...

Prophaniti
2007-10-15, 04:46 PM
This is actually quite a fascinating system. I would love to hear more about it. Now give me my shiny copper piece!

Seriously though, very nice work so far. Seems original and creative, sounds mechanically sound and justifies immediate playtesting. I'd like to see more in depth explanations of how the die roll mechanic works and the skill point system you seem to use. How many points does a Wizard get per level? a sorcerer? a warlock? Are any classes barred from specific spheres? etc...

EDIT: I see that you said how many points your sorcerer example got at each level, but you didnt say why. Also, what's the difference between 'lesser' and 'greater' effects? Is that something the DM determines, or do all effects in a given sphere become 'greater' after you reach so many skill points?

Capoeira
2007-10-15, 06:12 PM
thanks for the response! and the good review!

As far as lesser/greater/master level effects, that should be decided by the DM, under some guidelines. super basic guildlines would be
lesser= things that can happen as freak accidents in the normal world(big nonmagical fires, everything prettymuch obeying physics, healing touch, basic ESP and telekinetic stuff from widely spread cultural mythology)
greater=standard non-epic stuff from the average fantasy setting (flying, fireballs, charms, jedi tricks. healing spells that regrow limbs, high-adventure stuff, but non-epic, non-world-affecting)
master= anything epic that can easily sway an event with one roll (kill in a blast, change time, transform the npc into a chicken, hellballs... using the force to sense the true motives of your long lost auntie, etc)


As far as points/level, Ill break it down like this: pretty much whenever your existing 3.5 class should give you a new spell LEVEL you get instead a skill point to invest along one of the 4 skill essence trees.

I havent gotten to test it out yet though, so this might be the biggest thing to change accoring to balance.


One more thing
I did include character stats in this too... and it works like this. You need to have minimum stats to add points to an essence tree and learn new effects.

Energy essence draws from INT and CHA
so to deal with raw elements you must have intellect and personal power
Material essence draws from WIS and CON
for this you must be centered and tough enough to handle the transmorphing
Psionic essence draws from CHA and CON
For this its all about charisma, baby. being tough enough for the headaches is good, though.
Aether(just thought to call it that)essence draws from WIS and INT
which means that if you want to mess with the basic order of the planes you better have a good plan about it!

Your total skill points in any essence cant be more than the combined attribute bonae from that essence governing attributes. For example that level 7 mage from before would have to have at least a +2 in int, and +1s in con, cha, and wis, but more would be good for learning various essences.


I did it like this so there arent these *heavily uneven* stated character, like the epic clerics with 30 wisdom and 13 int. how in hell do you have the sense and insight of an elder dragon but the intelligence of a grad student????

However, as each essensce only needs two stats, your standard fireballing mage would still have craptacular constitution, since he will be needing some int wis and cha each for flying through the air laughing and burning things.

Also, since the archetypical healing cleric would only be using healing and psionic essences, he could be a wise, tough, charismatic idiot if you really wanted the other stats higher.

The nice thing about this limit is it makes it harder for a character to master several essences... which you dont want cause that character could take the nearest enemy, force-propel him into the army behind him, transforming him into a hail of little poisoned bullets at the mean time, then make every bullet into a little black hole that sucks up the survivors when they land...

Course he d have to roll pretty darn well to make it happen the first try...

Prophaniti
2007-10-15, 06:54 PM
1)So, how does this work with existing classes? Are they limited on what essences they can train in or is it only stat-based? Can your wise, tough, charismatic idiot still throw a fireball provided his int isnt a total dump-stat?
EDIT:Or do you have just a generic 'Spellcaster/Mage' class that picks up distinguishing names based on theyre spec in the various essences?

2)How do you decide what effects you know how to produce? In your original post you said it was limited only by player imagination and DM leniency, but then you hint at 'learning' new effects. How do you plan to structure this?

3)So, it seems the vast majority of known spell effects when translated in to your system would be classified as 'greater'. Is that correct or did I miss something? Nothing wrong with that, mind you. Just want to make sure I understand you correctly.

4)
did it like this so there arent these *heavily uneven* stated character, like the epic clerics with 30 wisdom and 13 int. how in hell do you have the sense and insight of an elder dragon but the intelligence of a grad student????
Just like you said. Though more commonly seen in high Int, low Wis variety, ridiculously unbalanced mental stats are entirely possible, even likely in a world of magical aid and change. I completely see your point as far as balance goes, trying to reach a balance rather than have every stat normal and one uber high.

5)I realize you may not have answers to all these questions, I also realize that the last one isnt even a question. I'm just giving some advice and pointing out things to consider. This will probably need some playtesting before it's balanced and all the kinks worked out, but its a phenomenal start!

Capoeira
2007-10-15, 07:14 PM
okay, thanks again for all the great input!
to answer a bit:

1. I iriginally intended to leave which schools are available completel up to role play/character design. The standard classes themselves tend to lead character roles enough for me already.

2. Though I havent decided yet... I think experience should be enough to grow within each essence, since they thematically build from each other... maybe you need to be taught/gifted each new essence though?
I think I like that... like you either get it or you dont, but certain events or people can open up a new world of understanding for you, if the dm wants...

Lets say for now that the base classes each start with one they archetypically always use, then the player has to quest to open up the other 3 if they want.

Yea I think for the most part, since this is such a potentially power-heavy system, that most lesser effects wouldnt even register on the radar of the average 3.5 fireball and stoneskin mage. Lesser effects are subtle...
telekineticly moving a key to a door,
using spidey-sense to see an imminent danger,
strengthening a party member or his equipment,
creating water or light,
astral visions,
that is all lesser effect type stuff. you should be able to pull it off no problem at higher levels, but until you get greater or masterful skill, you still have a solid chance of failure.


1)So, how does this work with existing classes? Are they limited on what essences they can train in or is it only stat-based? Can your wise, tough, charismatic idiot still throw a fireball provided his int isnt a total dump-stat?
EDIT:Or do you have just a generic 'Spellcaster/Mage' class that picks up distinguishing names based on theyre spec in the various essences?

2)How do you decide what effects you know how to produce?

3)So, it seems the vast majority of known spell effects when translated in to your system would be classified as 'greater'.

Capoeira
2007-10-16, 08:53 AM
Anyone feel like giving this system a try? I am about 300 miles away from my regular group (my gf, my dad and his gf) right now, but I really want to see this system used but some imaginative players.