Castastic feats (3.5 feats, PEACH)

[Noctis Vigil]

Just a few more random feats for casters. I found a big fistful of other random feats for Monks that will most likely make it up here later, but for now, just these.

Feat: Life Component
Prerequisites: Caster Ability Score 17, Eschew Materials
Benefit: You need no material components for your spells. Instead, you may spend 1/25th the cost of the expensive component in EXP to cast the spell. No matter what fraction this equals out to when you cast the spell, always round up to the nearest whole point of EXP.

Feat: Emergency Spell
Prerequisites: Caster Ability Score 17, Endurance, ability to cast spells of 3rd level or higher
Benefits: You may cast spells when you have none left in an emergency. Pick one class you may cast spells with. You may now willingly take ability burn to your caster stat for that class to spontaneously cast one spell you know, with one stat point equaling one spell level. For example, a Wizard could willingly take 4 Int burn to cast a 4th level spell. You may not cast cantrips with this feat. You may not apply metamagic to spells cast with this feat. Any damage dealt by this feat may not be magically healed; you must recover through time and rest.
Special: This feat may be taken multiple times. Each time, select a different class you have that casts spells to gain this benefit for.

Feat: Lost Tradition
Prerequisites: see feat text
Benefits: You cast your spells differently than anybody else, be it through a lost art or just some quirk. Pick one stat of your choice. This is now your caster stat for one spellcasting class. This feat must be taken immediately upon entry into the spellcasting class to which you are applying it.
Special: This feat can be taken multiple times. Each time, you may pick the caster stat for an additional caster class that you have just entered.
Note: This is actually an update to the feat of the same name from the book Bastards & Bloodlines, and I actually nerfed the feat. The original reading of it could be interpreted as letting you pick one stat and make it your caster stat for every caster class you had, so I cleaned the wording up.

[NeoSeraphi]

The official 3.5 term is "ability score", not "stat". Also, everyone in existence will take Lost Tradition and choose Constitution. I seriously suggest you at least confine it to mental ability scores.

Life Component looks fine.

Emergency Spell should say "May voluntarily take ability damage" instead of "burn points".

[Noctis Vigil]

Life Component is actually ungodly useful in emergencies, too. Don't have 5000G in diamonds to resurrect someone? Just burn 200EXP.

Corrected the wording in Emergency Spell.

And Lost Tradition, as it is in Bastards & Bloodline, did indeed let you choose non-mental ability scores to cast out of, and I was trying to stay somewhat true to it. I simply fixed it when one of my players pointed out he could triclass gestalt three casters on one stat with it, so I made this version instead. It's gotten some playtest time in my groups, and is really quite nice for the more combat oriented caster classes. I actually had a Paladin that switched to Cha casting at one point, letting him have turning, Divine Grace, Lay On Hands and casting all come out of one stat. Was quite nice.

[Tenno Seremel]

You may now willingly take damage to your caster stat for that class to spontaneously cast a spell from, with one stat point equaling one spell level. [...] Any damage dealt by this feat may not be magically healed; you must recover through time and rest.

Ability Burn: This is a special form of ability damage that cannot be magically or psionically healed. It is caused by the use of certain psionic feats and powers. It returns only through natural healing. [SRD]

[Noctis Vigil]

Burn was indeed the word I used originally, but NeoSeraphi said it was the wrong one, so I changed it. I assumed he knew what he was talking about, since his experience with the game is superior to mine. Should I change it back?

[bobthe6th]

it should have been ability burn I think, rather than burn points.

[Dragon Star]

Depends on what you want. You probably don't need to, the circumstances under which you would use it in the first place preclude a cleric just healing the damage to give you more spells, and even if that did happen it wouldn't matter, as the divine caster would be losing spells to replenish the arcane. Leaving it as damage is fine, but of you want it to be a REALLY serious feat that you almost never use, then burn is good.

[Zaydos]

It needs to be burn. Otherwise it's a feat which turns Wis 23 (after items and spells) into pay 100 GP for a 9th level spell slot (Restoration is Lv 4, costs 100 GP and fully heals ability damage to all stats).

Also what about Favored Souls which use different stats for different aspects of casting?

[Noctis Vigil]

A Favored Soul would cast out of his primary caster stat, or Charisma.

Actually, that brings up an interesting question: are there any other casters that use two caster stats like that? I'm not familiar with them off the top of my head.

And incidentally, Lost Tradition would switch both stats for a Favored Soul.

[Dragon Star]

Oh, wow. I missed the fact that it lets you cast spells above your normal max level. that should be changed. if it isn't, burn might be not be a big enough penalty.

[Noctis Vigil]

Oh, wow. I missed the fact that it lets you cast spells above your normal max level. that should be changed. if it isn't, burn might be not be a big enough penalty.

Yeah no. Fixed that, and changed the wording to burn.

[Kazyan]

Gishes would love Lost Tradition. Cast from strength = you are now SAD. I can also see Arcane Tricksters taking it to cast from dexterity.