Magitech in DnD 3.5e (PEACH)

[Welknair]

Edit Introduction: Wow, quite a lot has happened since I first posted this. When I originally posted this I did not know how large it would become. I've been sporadically editing it and it is in a state of near-constant flux. As such, the organization is a bit wonky and I realize that. I'm intending to actually publish a book featuring this system in addition to a deal of other material. Great fun. I'm always open to suggestions. Ask anyone here or even just read through some of the posts. I take suggestions to heart and make steps to fix apparent problems. I also just love hearing about it. If you choose to use this in your game (which you can feel free to do) I'd love to hear about how it goes. Now back to the original opening:

I have a Thuerge player who frequently tries to design new magic items and contraptions based upon existing spells, items, effects, etc. This often leads to useful new devices that I would expect someone to have created before.

In my game world, there was a large island inhabited by a group of individuals extremely gifted in the Arcane Ways, and they built many great cities. Well, my player asked "So, are there magic items everywhere or something?".

If you you don't have the Heroes of Battle book, it details an interesting prestige class called the "War Weaver". The general idea is that the War Weaver makes an "Eldritch Tapestry" to connect a group of people (number based on class level, of course) and then when a buff spell is cast by the weaver, it affects all connected. What if the city used a similar form of technology, but instead of connecting people, you connected objects. Then cast "Light" into the Tapestry. And what if you had the tapestry specifically touching orbs in various houses. "Let there be Light!"

And then I kept extrapolating what the city would look like if it were inhabited almost entirely by a population of at least level 1 wizards (Public Education?). I kept on extrapolating existing principles, until I had made something amazing. The major result was a sort of magical wiring, involving a combination of the modified tapestry (now made as a magic item), a modified principle from the Rod of Absorption, and a modified Runestaff.

I decided that the Tapestry would be allowed to carry the effects of certain spells to what it's ends touch, or it could carry general spell energy, with each end having a set direction of power flow. The Rod of Absorption proved that we could reliably store spell energy, and I created the "Battery", a device that simply holds spell energy. Alone it does nothing (except explode if you manage to bust it). Lastly the Runestaff allows us to channel whatever type of magic we please to create the effects listed in the staff (albeit at a max of 3/day). Runestaves are a bit expensive, so I devised the Runestone. A device with identical pricing, but it can only hold up to one third level spell.

Well, by default the systems attached to the tapestry want to go off, drawing energy from the network. To prevent this, triggers are often used. The Basic Trigger is a simple mechanical device that when flipped/pushed/pressed/turned slides a piece of lead in front of the tapestry line, blocking the flow of magic. For Runestaves and controlling more advanced systems, you want an Advanced Trigger system, usually attached to a Display (Really just a Silent Image Runestone.)

Anyways..

Battery ----> Tapestry ---l--> Runestone of Scorching Ray

Sorry, did I just make a Ray Gun?

It's scary, but it makes sense.

The Principles

Equivalence: Two spells of second level have the power of a single fourth level spell. Similarly, a first and a third level spell also equal a fourth level spell. We know this from the Rod of Absorption. It is somewhat contrasted with the Sorcerer's "Versatile Spellcasting" feat, which allows two slots to be used to fuel a spell one slot above them (Two second level slots would allow you to cast Fireball). This is due to the Sorcerer expending some of the combined energy to combine the spells. The amount of energy required for this is proportional to the spells being combined. The result is that the resulting spell is a single level higher than the used slots.
Ambiguity: Spell energy is spell energy. How it affects the world is dependent upon it's conduit. This allows us to channel "Ambiguous" spell energy through Runestaves and Runestones (Described later) to produce an effect that has nothing to do with the powering spell.
Multiplication: A properly formed "Tapestry" can transmit the effect of a spell capable of targeting an object to various objects attached to the Tapestry, multiplying the effect, but not the cost. We know this from the Eldritch Tapestries made by War Weavers (Heroes of War PrC)
Transmission: Tapestries are capable of transmitting spell energy across distances, without the need of a caster to direct it. Again, the Eldritch Tapestries made by the War Weavers.
Imitation: Magic items mimic life. Between "Magic Items always get saves" and the ability to spend a negligible amount to make "Sentient Magic Items", one can certainly see how Magic Items can pretend at life, at least for the purpose of being the target of spells. Most magic items get a few boons from this (See "Always get saves"), but "Tapestry Constructs", entire devices made with this system and laced with Tapestries, get one step closer. They have a circulatory system, a heart, maybe even muscles and a mind! Spells get confused, at least some of them. Later on I describe how certain spells affect Tapestry Constructs as if they were creatures.
Energy Movement: Power seeks to balance itself. Fire disperses its heat. Lightning arcs to a grounding point. The rock falls off the cliff and stops. The power flows from the battery into the Tapestry and then into a Runstone or Staff, if nothing stops it. Unless you have a trigger of some sort, your systems will fire automatically.
Too much of Anything is Bad: Too much matter in one spot? Black hole. Too much icecream? Barf. More than five spells cast in the same round within five feet of each other? Explosion.

These Principles govern this system. Learn them and the rest will be pretty intuitive.

Descriptions

Batteries are generally a sort of green crystal, with an Adamantine Coating, along with glowing green sealing sigils.

Charging Crystals look much like Batteries, but are Red.

Experience Capacitors are similarly Golden.

Tapestries are generally a silver color, that glows when powered. Ephemeral Tapestries always glow a dull blue, becoming brighter when powered.

Databanks are small (usually small) blue crystals, like a battery, minus the coating.

Runestones are grey stones carved with various runes that light up when powered.

World-Building
With the ability to physical fly very fast, one could potentially make all sorts of interesting cosmologies. One such is described below:

Basicly there are multiple Material Planes. They are grouped together in relatively small groups (2-5) orbiting a core consisting of the elemental and positive/negative energy planes. Between them is the Astral Plane, forming a bubble around the entire group. This bubble is then in the Deep Astral (pretty much pure void) which contains a possibly infinite number of Astral Planes, each with their own material and inner planes.

It would be possible to actually travel between planes of this nature without the need for Conjuration spells. If you go up (or whatever direction) long enough on any Material Plane, you'll eventually enter the Astral Plane. Go far enough from there, and you enter the Deep Astral, and you'd be able to see the Infinite Astrals.

The Deep Astral Barrier is very powerful, however, and requires Epic Magic to get through. You cannot Planeshift through it.

The Outer Planes are completely set apart from the rest of the cosmology. Conjuration spells involving them act normally, but no one is sure how they work in relation to the rest of the cosmos.

Then there would be an Epic-Spell that allows Inter-Astral travel, a sort of "Warp Drive" used for traversing the "Solar Systems". You can see how you can play with this.

Moving actual rule stuff up here now...

Feats:


Craft Tapestry [Item Creation]
Prequisite: CL 5
Benefit: This feat allows a spellcaster to create a Tapestry, a weaving of metal and magic allowing the connection of multiple objects such that a single spell may affect all of them. The size, cost, ends, weight, and effective Caster Level are based upon the level of the Tapestry. The default size is small, with the tapestry potentially covering about a medium sized creature or item. Working larger or smaller is a bit more expensive as the work requires precision and each piece must be very exact.

Max Ends	CL	Cost
2	5	500
2	5	5,000
3	6	6,000
5	7	7,000
10	8	8,000
15	9	9,000
25	10	10,000
50	11	11,000
75	12	12,000
100	13	13,000
150	14	14,000
250	15	15,000
250	16	16,000
Stays 250	+1	+1000

Max Ends: Maximum number of things that can be connected to the tapestry.
CL: The CL required to make it as well as the effective CL for effects powered by the Tapestry
Cost: Market Price. Price is equal to the CL X 1000. However, the price becomes 2000 per caster level at 21 and up. (A CL 30 Tapestry would cost 40,000)

The top tapestry cannot activate devices, has no cost adjustment for Fine to Large, and is called a "Transmission Tapestry"

If for some reason you get a Tapesty which has a CL lower than 5 (As through a couple of class abilities or Negative Level effects) the minimum number of ends is 2.

For sizes:

Size	CL	Price Mod	Weight
Fine	11	+6,000	1
Diminutive	9	+4,000	2
Tiny	7	+2,000	3
Small	5	+0	7
Medium	6	+2,000	20
Large	7	+4,000	50
Huge	8	+6,000	150
Gargantuan	9	+8,000	250
Colossal (Infinite size)	21	+20,000	500

A Tapestry covers an object one size category above it (a Tiny Tapestry could power a robotic Halfling (which are awesome at parties))

A Tapestry can be upgraded to a higher level easily (Hey look, one day's work) and the size can be changed. You can quickly change the size towards small for no cost, but re-stretching requires that you pay the cost again.

A Tapestry's level determines the CL of all spells powered by it.

DC= 10+Spell Level+Minimum Modifier (Min modifier would be 1 for a second level spell, four for an eighth, etc.)

A Tapestry may be enchanted with two metamagic feats for a cost of 2000 per spell slot adjustment. The two feats must be able to be used in conjunction with one another (You can't have Empower and Maximize, for example). Epic Level Tapestries can hold more than two, these need not be able to be used together, but each Metamagic beyond the second costs an additional 5k per feat beyond the 2nd. So getting a third feat would cost (Third Feat's Spell Adjustment)X1000+5000.

When you gain this feat you gain an odd "Kind-of-Metamagic" feat specifically for enchanting Tapestries. It isn't really a feat, but is treated as one for this purpose. It is treated as causing a two slot adjustment and brings the DC of all spells of a designated school up to 10+2XSpell Level, which can be quite useful.

Minimum CL for spells applies for tapestries casting runestone/staff spells. So you can't have a CL 5 Tapestry casting Meteor Swarm. Once a power Tap is CL 21+, it has no limit on the level of spell that it can cast.

Some clarification as to the two separate CLs: You need to have the higher of the two. The base cost of the tapestry is equal to the actual CL of the Tap X1000. You cannot make a Tapestry with a CL higher than you have. Then the size is just a price modifier on top of that base cost, and you cannot make certain sizes until your CL is high enough. The CLs of these two factors are unrelated save for you must have a CL equal to or greater than the higher of the two. You do not need to bump the CL of the Tapestry up to meet the CL required of the creator for the given size.

It is worth noting that when a tapestry is made, it is designated as an Arcane Tapestry, Divine Tapestry, or Information Tapestry. Arcane Tapestries only can activate and channel Arcane spell energy, Divine Tapestries channel Divine magic, and Information Tapestries transmit information from various devices to be explained later. This choice cannot be changed.

For the Arcane/Divine tapestries, each ending has a set direction, To or From. This can be changed, though it requires a bit of time.

Tapestries as described above are used for the purpose of transmitting raw spell energy as from batteries, to runestones/staves. They also have the capability to do something described in the first post: Deliver a spell effect to multiple attached objects. If a spell of 3rd level or lower, capable of targeting any object, is cast with the Tapestry as the target, the effect travels to up to 25 objects attached to the ends of the tapestry. This takes into consideration the direction of the ends (the effect will only travel through "Out" ends). If a runestone is hooked up with the correct kind of power tapestry with an "Out" end, as in the power is moving from the stone to the tapestry, it acts as if the stone cast the spell on said tapestry. This spell uses all the information from the tapestry that feeds it (Arcane Tapestry with CL 10--->Runestone of Light---->Arcane Tapestry with 5 ends will result in the objects on the five ends lighting up for 100 minutes). If the tapestry being affected has greater than 25 out ends, it is random which ones are affected. Info Tapestries do not have this capability. When a Tapestry is the target of a spell as to Multiply it, it does not charge attached batteries. The energy in this case is not being directed at the Batteries, which is required for them to be charged. Instead you may end up with glowing Batteries from the Multiplied Light Spell. Similarly, you cannot Multiply a spell more than once by connecting various power Tapestries; you just get glowing tapestries. The Multiplication Effect assumes a full spell targeting the Tap, not a fraction of one.

When power is sent into a Tapestry - Raw, charging power, not activating power - it is evenly dispersed among all available batteries. So if you attach a Charging Crystal, described later, to a tapestry with multiple batteries, the charge would choose one at random, assuming that both had room.

When creating a tapestry, you also have the option to set one of the ends to be an "Easy Swap" end, which allows sections that are easily interchangeable. The base price of making an end interchangeable is 1,000 gp. Components being attached, removed, or swapped onto said end require only a move action to do so, instead of the much longer process described in the Magitech Skill near the bottom.


Craft Ephemeral Tapestry [Item Creation]
Prequisite: CL 12, Craft Tapestry
Benefit: This feat allows you to craft Ephemeral Tapestries, they work exactly like normal tapestries, but cost an additional 2,000 gp per size category (+2,000 for fine, +4,000 for Diminutive, etc.). In return, the tapestry move into the ethereal plane, but remains very close to the material plane, such that the threads can be seen as a dim glowing blue. An Ephemeral Tapestry takes no space and weighs nothing.


Craft Magitech [Item Creation]
Prequisite: CL 7, Craft Tapestry, Magitech 10 Ranks
Benefit: This feat allows you to construct/enchant Runestones, Batteries, Interfaces, and Databanks. It'll get you going on the road to Magitechnological Advancement.

Batteries store spell levels. You can easily cast a spell into a battery and it'll just add to the charge. A battery can only hold one kind of magic. Once depleted, either kind can be put in, but once it has a charge of one kind, the other is incompatible. Batteries are the most costly component in Magitech and as such they are highly prized. The only way to liberate energy from a Battery is to connect it to a tapestry of the correct type and have the tapestry then connect to a runestone or runestaff.

Size	Capacity	CL	Weight
Diminutive	1-5	7	5
Tiny	6-15	8	15
Small	16-25	10	25
Medium	26-50	12	50
Large	51-150	14	150
Huge	151-250	16	250
Gargantuan	251-500	18	500
Colossal	500-750	20	750
Colossal	751-1000	21	1000

(Colossal under these circumstances is 25X25X25 and 30X30X30 for the last two batteries)

The cost of a battery is Charge X 1,000.

You can make a battery out of a rare magical catalyst for the cost of Charge X 500 in addition to the normal cost, thus reducing the amount of space the battery takes. Such a battery assumes the the size and weight of the next battery up, and is known as a Catalyst Battery.

A Battery is a bit volatile, as it holds raw spell energy. As such, it's a bit prone to... release upon breach. As in, if you can bypass it's hardness of 20 and deal 30 damage to it, it'll bust. Explosively. An exploding battery will deal 1d6 damage per spell level in a radius of 5 ft. For each additional 5 ft that the burst travels, damage is reduced by three. In this way, an epic level battery containing 1000 spell levels could decimate an area with a radius of a mile. Yes, I made a spell that allows you to detonate a battery on command to use it as a bomb. People within the blast radius may make a Reflex Save at DC 15+2 per size category of the battery (With the Too Much is Bad Principle, it effectively has the size of the smallest battery that can hold all of the charges) to take half damage. The Epic Level Batteries would count as Size 9, while a Diminutive would be Size 1. So an exploding Gargantuan Battery would call for a Reflex Save DC 26. Batteries are always completely destroyed when they detonate. The explosion travels at a relatively slow rate of 2000ft/round. This won't make much of a difference unless you're just at the edge of a monstrous explosion, but hey. It's there. (The explosion will be slowed by passing through corridors and the like if it can't break them).

At-will spells and abilities cannot charge a battery. No Warlock slaves!

If a Battery is the subject of a successful Dispel Magic aimed at it, the battery loses charge. If it was an Area Dispel, the battery only loses a single charge. Otherwise, the amount lost is based on the opposed CL check. For every one that the Dispeller beat the Battery's roll by, the Battery loses one charge.

It's also possible to make a... slightly different kind of battery. One capable of holding XP. It is made the same as a normal Battery, but is golden and always requires CL 21 (and thus the Craft Epic Magitech Feat). An XP Capacitor's stats and cost are calculated the same as if it were a normal Battery, but it holds 1000X the number of spell levels it would be able to hold. This is used in conjunction with Pass On, described in the "New Spells" section. Such a device cannot be used to level up random people, but it can provide the XP for spells and magic item creation. The caster/crafter just needs to be in contact with the Capacitor for the casting process. Yes, you can make this out of the Arcane Catalyst as well.

Runestones store a single spell of up to third level such that it can be activated when the correct amount of the correct type of magic is channeled into it. The cost is equal to Spell level X Spell Level X (400-(100 for each time usable per day below 3)). So a Runestone of Fireball usable twice per day would cost: 3X3X(400-100)=2700 gp.

You can make Runestones and Runestaves where the spells can be used more than 3/day, but it comes at an increased cost. The cost is lvl*lvl*(400+100*(Amount above 2 Factorial)). (Factorial is that number plus all the numbers preceding it, so 3 Factorial is 3+2+1). A Scorching Ray stone usable 5/day would cost 2*2*(400+100*(3+2+1)), or 4*1000, 4000 gp. A steep price for increased max uses, to the point where it may be cheaper to simpler buy more stones/staves for higher level spells, but you can get them.

A runestone needs direction. By default, even a simple spell such as Acid Splash will want to repeatedly cast as long as it is supplied with power. For this reason, a basic trigger is used, comprised of a switch, knob, button, etc. that moves a tiny piece of lead (A Basic Trigger costs 10 gold). More advanced spells that can't simply be pointed at the target require a more complex trigger system. The Advanced Trigger allows an Information Tapestry to control the magic pathway and the specifics of the spell, such that a Display or Sentient Magic Item could control said device. This allows for more exact usage and the like, but is more costly and requires power (An Advanced Trigger costs 500 gp). An Information Tapestry is not needed when using simpler spells that use only a Basic Trigger. For example, you won't find Information Tapestries in most small firearms.

Note: Silent Image, Minor Image and Major Image will all return information to their casting runestone about how they're being interacted with. This allows for "Buttons" to be made using these spells.

"I want to stuff my Battery in my Bag of Holding so it weighs nothing and takes no room!" Have fun with that - the largest BoH holds 250 cubic feet, which works out to about 6.3 feet to a side so you'd only be able to hold a single Medium battery which weighs ten pounds less than the Bag of Holding. Great plan, really.

When a Runestone or Runestaff is placed in a Magitech Device, it's Target is set. Most Evocation spells are set to cast in whatever direction it's pointed. It's also possible to set it to target a nearby Tapestry as to Multiply the effect. You can Configure this setting (Magitech Skill, much later).

If a spell requires concentration then the Tapestry provides said concentration, but while focusing so it cannot channel any other energy. For this reason, many advanced systems will have specialized Tapestries specifically for concentration.

When more than five spells powered by Tapestries are cast in the same round within five feet of one another (All within the same five-foot square), they cause Magic Feedback. Effectively the casting device is subject to an explosion as if a battery containing all of the expended spell levels had just blown. This of course can be useful under certain circumstances, but generally stops Nova builds while still allowing Skyships and Mechs to work pretty well. Note that this property does not interfere with the Multiplication Principle.

Runestaves still require Craft Staff to be made. When used with this system, a separate power line must be used for each spell contained therein.

The primary benefits for using Runestone instead of Runestaves is size, and number. A Runestaff can only use a single spell per round, whereas a group of runestones could cast them in the same round. Keep in mind the Too Much Principle.

Runestones/staves can counterspell and be counterspelled. Devices can (and often do) have a setting that is "Counterspell". While in this mode, the wielder or a Cognition Core attached can ready an action to Counterspell a target. CL check is of course based on the Tapestry. This costs an amount of energy as if the device had just cast the spell. Similarly, a caster can ready an action to counterspell a device. Diagnostics hooked up to a runestone/staff will tell whether or not the spell went off successfully.

Expensive material components must be connected to the stone via a power line, and creatures with levels may be willingly contribute their XP to power spells requiring XP.

Databanks store information of one kind or another. Hook up an Arcane Eye Runestaff with an info line leading to a Databank and it'll record everything that the eye sees. Then hook that same info tapestry up to a Display and you'll be able to retrieve that info at will. You can also use a display to modify info, write things, etc. Accessing Information requires an Access Runestone be connected (It's a new spell, I'll describe all of them later) to the info line. The varying databanks mainly differ in the amount of info they can hold. I didn't know how exactly to state that capacity, so I went with MB.

Size	Capacity	CL	Weight	Cost
Fine	1 MB	7	-	100
Diminutive	100 MB	7	3	1,000
Tiny	300 MB	9	7	2,000
Small	750 MB	11	10	3,000
Medium	2000 MB	13	30	5,000
Large	5000 MB	15	50	10,000

"How much is a Megabyte?"

Databanks double as a way to store spell specifics. Such as a load of info on how exactly to make that Greater Image look like the owlbear from three corridors back.

Well anything this advanced needs something beyond PC races to moderate systems. Introducing: THE COGNITION CORE. Sentient Items work as normal, but I'm adding a a couple that are even lower than the base. It's not really Intelligent, perse, but it can take in raw data and makes decisions based on that information. It has the sense of a basic sentient magic item. All sentient magic items can be hooked up to an information tapestry and thus control it's various functions.

Greater Cognition Core - Int 10 - 500 gp - Perfect interpretation of inputs, capable of any compatible function.

Lesser Cognition Core - Int 2 - 100 gp - Requires a Magitech Program check to enable a function. DC for each additional function increases by 5. Functions are things like "Listen" or "Open Tapestry Line".

Cognition Cores have no Ego, cannot be given Powers, have the senses of a baseline Sentient Magic Item, and the only upgrades that can be performed on them is from Lesser to Greater.

To further this, I have invented a few useful powers for Sentient Magic Items. Namely ones to be used with my Mech system. Combat Prowess is a 20,000 GP greater power that gives a Sentient Magic Item a BAB of it's level X 2, a Dex of 10+It's level, and it gives the Simple Weapons Proficiency feat. Then there are 10,000 gp minor powers for martial weapon proficiencies, exotics, and weapon focuses.

Charging Crystals are the primary source of energy used. They come in only five sizes, and are designated as Arcane or Divine upon creation. Each yields a single spell level after a given interval.

Size	Charge Interval	CL	Weight	Cost
Diminutive	1/day	7	5	400
Small	1/6 hours	10	18	1,500
Medium	1/hour	12	75	8,000
Large	1/10 minutes	16	200	45,000
Colossal	1/minute	21	800	400,000

You should find that these numbers are superior to those garnered by less specialized magic items, such as Eternal Wands. The downside is that at the given intervals the item discharges whether or not there's room for it to do so. Eternal Wands, for example, would only fire automatically if there was a less-than-full battery or a magic item it could activate, allowing it to be used as a battery/generator all on it's own. The result of adding these Generator Crystals is that they are primarily used instead of Eternal Wands, though some ships may use Eternal Wands as a source of backup energy.

Also note that a Tapestry cannot utilize power coming from a magic item (Not a battery) in the same round that that power is given. I.e. The standard action to give the power is taken separate from that to use it. This makes using Eternal Wands and other normal magic items directly as batteries somewhat less effective. This limitation is gotten around through batteries which are always ready to give their energy.

Rogues can disarm Magitech devices as they do magic traps. Use the highest level Tapestry/2 as the "Spell Level" for this check. So the DC would be 25+(Highest CL/2)

For your convenience, I have statted basic chassis for handheld and stationary devices.

Size	Cost	Weight
Diminutive	60	2
Tiny	60	2
Small	120	10
Medium	120	20
Large	240	40
Huge	480	100
Gargantuan	960	160
Colossal	1920+	240+

Note: Magitech Weapons are considered "Martial" if the setting features them prominently, Exotic otherwise.


Craft Epic Magitech [Item Creation][Epic Level Feat]
Prequisite: CL 21, Craft Magitech
Benefit: Allows the creation of Tapestries above 20th level, allows the creation of batteries holding more than 750 spell levels, and any other Magitech Devices requiring a CL of 21 and up.

Tapestries of CL 21+ that you make may be enchanted with up to two metamagic feats, and these may be epic metamagic.

This feat also allows you to create Epic Runestones. These huge devices are all Huge Size, weighing 1,000 with glowing sigils carved all over their surfaces. They contain a single Epic-Level spell. The cost of such a device is 100,000 gp per point of Spellcraft DC. Costly material components must be in contact with the stone. Backlash is dealt to the craft or device housing Stone in addition to the stone itself. These stones can handle long casting times. Multiple Casters take the form of multiple Tapestries all ending in Transit Runestones that spend the required amount of spell energy instead of the cost of Transit. These tapestries must be a high enough CL to expend this level of energy (Must be a CL 18 Tapestry to contribute the equivalent of a 9th level spell). This appears as a beam of light going from the Transit Runestones to the Epic Runestone. Using Transit in this way takes it's usual time, thus causing the actual casting of the spell to wait until Transit has been cast by all participating Tapestries. The actual cost of casting an Epic Level Spell is equal to the Spellcraft DC X 50 Spell Levels of energy.

For the purposes of cost and energy needs, mitigating factors only reduce the DC by 1 for every 2 they would normally, down to a minimum of half the original DC.

Large orbital platform, containing massive batteries, a series of powerful Tapestries feeding Transit Stones, aimed towards a central Epic Runestone containing a modified version of Vengeful Gaze of God, one with a longer casting time, no XP cost, and requiring large numbers of participating casters. Sorry, did I just make a Death Star?


Expand Spell [Metamaigc][Epic Level Feat]
Prequisites: CL 21, Enlarge Spell
Benefit: This feat can only be applied to Divination Spells with an area of a Cone-shaped emanation that does not allow any sort of save. This is almost exclusively Detect spells. Multiply the range of the spell by the number of slots you raise it with this feat. So if you used this feat to prepare Detect Magic as a 3rd level spell, it'd have an area of a 60X3=180 ft cone-shaped emanation. This feat is almost always found soley as part of Skyship Sensor Arrays.


Piercing Spell [Metamagic]
Benefits: You can now apply the Piercing Spell metamagic to your spells that deal energy damage in return for a one slot increase. The damage is not decreased when dealt to inanimate objects.


Magitech Familiar
Prequisites: Ability to gain a new familiar or Level 1 Arcane Engineer
Benefit: You create a bond with a willing Sentient Magic Item which gains the same benefits as if it were a familiar except for the speech thing. This familiar is almost always inside of a small (not always small) Tapestry Construct. In such a form, it may still Deliver Touch Spells. The item gains an Int Bonus based upon level instead of having the Int set. So a Magitech Familiar of a 4th level wizard would get +2 int. The natural armor benefits the item, not the whatever it is inside. If you are an Arcane Engineer taking this, treat your AE levels as Wizard levels for Familiar benefits.



Extra Rotes
Prequisites: Able to cast 1st level spells
Benefit: You instantly gain 10 Higher Rotes which must be either Arcane or Divine, depending upon what kind of caster you are. These are spells which you have memorized but cannot cast. Instead, they just allow you to create magic items requiring them. You cannot choose Rotes which are of a level you would be unable to cast.
Special: This feat may be taken multiple times.


Extra Temporary Craft Points
Prequisites: Temporary Craft Class Feature
Benefit: You increase your daily TCP by your CL, which increases as your CL increases. This is made for the Arcane Engineer found later.

New Spells
(Name-level-duration-description.)

Interface - 5 - 1 min/CL - Allows you to directly hook up to an information tapestry as if you were a sentient magic item
Transit - 1 - Moves power from one battery to another or one tapestry to another (Or from a battery to a Tapestry, or from a Battery to a Runestone). Transit Runestones are used to connect power tapestries. If used to connect Info Taps, the spell has a duration of 10 min/CL. Sorcerers gain additional use of this spell. Using it on a battery, they can replenish one of their spell slot. The actual process expends another remaining slot of theirs and costs the battery an equal number of spell levels. In return, the sorcerer replenishes a slot one level higher. Example: Sorcerer has a Battery with 5 charges, and has just expended a Fireball. The Sorcerer can cast Transit on the Battery and change one of his remaining 2nd level slots to a 3rd level slot. The battery loses two charges. (Someone familiar with Versatile Spellcaster will note this works just like that, but the Battery provides the second spell). This allows Sorcerers to benefit from stored energy without increasing the raw numbers of spells they get per day. Technically this spell helps any spontaneous Arcane Caster, but the spell is only added to the Wizard/Sorcerer spell list.
Diagnostics - 1 - 10 min/CL - Reveals information about magitechnological devices. Usually attached to an information line. When it is, it'll read power ratings, flow of energy, charges left per day, etc. Almost always connected to a Display. Since this connection is an info line and info ends don't have a set direction like power ends do, the diagnostics runestone could technically display the status of the display to the display. If you wanted it to. When this spell is cast, it can either target an Information Tapestry, receiving diagnostic information from everything attached or it can be cast on a single magic item, which only returns information about said item.
Arcane/Divine Transformation - 9 - Instant - This spell is used to change Arcane Energy into Divine, and it's sister spell Divine/Arcane Transformation does the opposite. When attached to two Tapestries, one of each kind, with one leading to and one leading from, these spells can transform the energy passing through them. It can transform a number of spell levels equal to CL*10 at a time.
Animate Mechanics - 4 through 9 - 10 min/CL - Vital to mechanical devices, mech suits, and sky ships, this simple spell will animate a mechanical device. This is actually a collection of spells, of level 4-9 (So they can only be stored in runestaves), each one providing a different effective strength score. In order 1,5,10,15,20,25. These will be more important and make more sense later on.
Create Thrust - 2 - 10 min/CL - Back in the dark ages, before Levitate, Fly, or even Tenser's Floating disk, we had a spell that made raw thrust. Namely it used a neat little, scalable ratio. A casting can move 120 pounds at a rate of 20ft per round. Or it could move 60 lbs 40ft per round. Or 240 10ft. Or you could cast this on two wooden slabs and attach those to a 240 lb chunk of rock and it would try to move 20 ft per round (2 spells=2XThepowah). This multiplying effect stops at and below 5 lb. Below that, this treats it as if it were still 5lb. This means you can't make a .1 lb metal sphere go rocketing at super-sonic speeds. This spell however has a tendency to be a bit unreliable. Namely, this spell cannot have the exact factors controlled. Want to levitate that table? Chances are it'll either be too heavy and stay rooted to the spot, or too light and start floating/flying upwards. This is why it was later replaced with the aforementioned spells. However, it is integral in skyship travel. Thanks to the Principle of Multiplication, we can cast Create Thrust into a Tapestry, thus affecting up to 25 disks with a single spell! YES. We call a tapestry that is at least CL 10 (as to have 25 ends) with one end attached to a Runestone of Create Thrust and the other ends to much smaller, but still pivot-able metal spheres a "Thrust Web". The Tapestry used for this is almost always Ephemeral as to prevent it from getting tangled up when the sphere twists. Anyways, this helps quite a deal for power-effective travel. Technically the Thrust Disks work, they just take up massive amounts of unneeded power. Also note that Create Thrust is now 2nd level, and as such having Extend imbued into the tapestry that feeds the Web would be a very good idea. Create Thrust stacks, up to 12 times on a single object. I've made a custom system for collisions that is very useful when using this spell. You'll find it in the Mech/Skyship area.
Energy Absorption Field - 7 - 1 round/CL - A knock off of the Energy Transformation Field from the Spell Compendium. It creates an connected area comprised of a single 10 ft cube per caster level. Instead of a spell being designated upon casting, a nearby (medium range) battery is targeted and gains the charge.
Flame Blade - 3 - 1 minute/CL - As Flame Dagger (from the Spell compendium), but 1d8+CL (Max +15) and the blade is the size of a Longsword. And if you attach this to a casting device... Sorry did I just make a Lightsaber?
Access - 2 - 1 minute/CL - To be used in conjunction with a Databank. If cast on a databank, the caster can immediately access the information, and modify it if they wish. An Access Runestone is almost always connected via an info line to both a databank and a Display. This would allow the Display to pull up the information once the connection was made by giving the signal to power the Access Stone (we have a trigger built onto the stone, connected to the same display). Given Access's cost, it usually isn't on all the time, but rather is activated when information needs to be retrieved or altered.
Restrict - 2 - Permanent - The companion to Access, this spell allows you to password either all or some of the information in a Databank. Technically, a password isn't the right word. It's more of a magical signature that is difficult to emulate unless you have been told how to do so. In the case of a person casting Access to try to get to Restricted material, they would be prompted to provide the correct signature. In the case of a Runestone, the Display prompts the user to provide said signature. This magical signature doesn't actually require anything more than being 1st level in an arcane or divine spellcasting class (the signature does differentiate). If the signature is not known, you may attempt to effectively hack the system. This is rolled as an opposed CL check against the caster of Restrict. If the Hacker wins, they access the encrypted information. Restrict can be dispelled, though this may have... unwanted side effects on the databank. Restrict can also be used to lock certain functions of a Magitech Device, such as making the super-weapon require a correct signature. You can also restrict a Battery such that it cannot be drawn from without the proper signature - this is most important for Greater Transit. When trying to bypass these features, Access is used.
Relay - 1 to 4 - 1 min/CL - This is another group of spells. Specifically it allows two information lines to be joined accross distances. The only difference between the spells is range (Close, Medium, Long, and 1 mile/cl respectively). In the case of casters, two casters would need to use this spell and be on the same "frequency". As long as this was true, they could hear what one another said. The same goes for a pair of runestones.
Detect Chemical Composition - 1 - Instant - Well... Yeah. It gives you an accurate read out of the chemical composition of a liquid, solid, or gas. Standard 60ft cone. Breathalyzer?
Create Gravity - 7 - 24 hours - A very odd spell. This is designed for those traversing Space in a Skyship such as that described later. To prevent your bones from turning to jelly and general problems due to lack of gravity, Create Gravity was made. It's an odd spell as it uses the Spell/Size scaling system described later, yet it's only usable on Tapestry Constructs. The basic effect is that the targeted Tapestry Construct now has gravity within it. This spell is based upon "Reverse Gravity". The direction of the gravity is chosen upon casting. Don't let the PCs get this. Everything will be on the ceiling.
Amanuensis, Greater - 3 - 10 min/CL - Just as Amanuensis, but this spell can duplicate the markings in spell books (Which are magical, and thus not copy-able by the normal version of the spell). Advanced societies store the spell-book information in Databanks and hook them up to Runestones of Greater Amanuensis that just continuously produce spellbooks. This spell has a costly material component - the costly materials normally needed for scribing books. These must be within Close Range of the the spell's target. This spell also has the property that it can change targets when it finishes with one. The new target must be within close range of the origin of the spell.
Gate, Skyship - 9 - Concentration (up to 1 round/CL) - Another odd one. This spell is only castable by a Tapestry and takes 100 spell levels of energy. It works exactly as Gate except that you cannot use it to call creatures, and it's diamter is between 5 and 200ft (chosen when cast)
Store Magitech Device - 3 - Permanent, until retrieved - This spell allows you to store a magitech device in a pocket dimension. The cost of this spell scales normally with the size of a Tapestry Construct. The spell fails if there is any creature or sentient magic item inside of such a device (Cognition Core are allowed). The device can be either a normal device, or a full Tapestry Construct. Either way, a miniature image of the device appears inside the large Emerald (Which is the costly Arcane Focus of this spell, costing 1,000gp). At any time the caster can call the device out of the dimension, as long as they are in contact with the storing stone. This retrieval fails if there is not enough room for the device to emerge.
Activate - 0 - Instant - This is hardly even a spell. If you hook up the correct kind of power line leading to a magic item (Let's say a Wand of Fireball), the power wants to flow. Assuming no obstruction (Triggers pressed, or there are no triggers), the item will activate at a cost of a half level of energy. In this way you can hook up Tapestries to activate other magic items. This doesn't require a runestone. Only Tapestries can use this ability. Yes, this means you could attach a random magic item (As in you don't know what it does) to a "Tester" and Activate it. Results may vary. "Where'd it go?!?" "Well it may have been Boots of Dimension Door"
Increase - 3 - 10 min/CL - When in dire need, one can Increase the maximum capacity of a Battery such that it can contain more energy. This spell targets a single battery who's maximum capacity increases by CL*3 to a max of twice it's original cap. Doubling the original Cap causes the Battery to become unstable, resulting in a complete loss of all Hardness. Tripling it reduces it's HP to 1. You cannot more than triple the Cap of a battery. This spell does not actually add levels, only room for more. If this spell expires while there are still excess levels in the battery, they start safely dissipating at the rate of 1 level a minute.
Greater Transit - 3 - Instant - As Transit, but Close range and you need not be able to see the target battery or tapestry, only know it's general location.

[Welknair]

Pass On - 9 - Instant - All things must die. Some Wizards feel that they owe something to those who continue in their footsteps and decide to give up their powers just before their deaths. They cast this spell targeting an Experience Capacitor. The result is that they lose every single of Experience Point they posess, with a corresponding drop to level 1. One fourth the experience that they possessed travels into the Capacitor for other use. This spell is fairly rarely used, as one could imagine. It takes a special kind of person to willingly sacrifice their powers for the benefit of others. The caster may sacrifice less than their full XP, with the same 1/4 traveling into the battery, with level decreases as appropriate.
Overload - 5 - instant - I said I'd give a spell for blowing batteries on command. And I don't disappoint. This spell targets a battery, and involves a 10-minute casting period involving touching said battery (No remotely detonating the batteries in an enemy's mech suit). After the designated casting time, there is a delay before it blows. If you have a display and info line hooked up to the battery, a countdown will be shown. If the Display is Minor Image, a beeping sound will accompany the countdown. If it's Major Image, there will be a voice counting. The actual duration is set by the caster and can be between 1 and 100 rounds (6 seconds to 10 minutes).
One can always cast a Targeted Dispel Magic on the Battery if they know that it is under the effect of Overload to "Diffuse" it.
Overload Protector - 5 - Permanent, until discharged - This spell is cast on an object, creature, or spot. When a battery explodes or the Too Much Principle is activated, this spell leaps into action. It protects any objects or people within 10ft of the center of this spell (object, creature, or spot) from up to Cl X Cl X 10 damage from such an explosion. If the damage is greater than this, they take the overflow. If this spell is cast on a battery, it reduces the overall strength of the blast by the given amount, possibly nullifying it. If a battery is the target of this spell, blows, but has the entirety of the blast absorbed, the battery loses all charges in it but remains intact (except for whatever busted it. A Repair spell of appropriate magnitude should be allowed to fix this). If a Protector completely nullifies the incoming damage, the spell is not discharged, rather it takes "damage" based on the strength of the blast. So a Protector that starts being able to absorb 1000 damage takes 694, now it can absorb another 206. Keep in mind that this spell only works against exploding batteries and the Too Much Principle. You may have problems involving the building or cave collapsing on you. Most large craft will have a spell such as this cast on their battery as a defense-mechanism. Overlapping Protectors do not stack.

It has been known to overload a battery attached to Thrust Web with a Mechanics Core and Sentient Magic Item. The Item is attached with an info line to the staff and disk. The Item is given the instruction to steer the device towards the target described. Given the speed of Thrust Disks and weight of a likely casing, this should be easily accomplish-able in 12 seconds. Sorry, did I just make a missile?

(Also Note: You could make an EMP bomb as following: Use a similar design, but don't detonate the battery. Instead have the Runestaff also contain Antimagic Field and tell the Sentient Magic Item to activate it when the missile came within range. It may be advantageous to try to have this device land on, attach to, or stick into the target as the Thrust Disk will stop functioning once the Field is created. But good news: If you do this by the location of their thrust disks, they're going to be having intimate relations with the ground. And don't forget you can enchant the power tapestry with Widen Spell. )


Pierce Deep Astral - Epic - DC 20 - This spell goes with the cosmology setup described at the beginning. It's an odd Epic Level spell as it doesn't use usual factors and our top Wizards can't seem to mitigate the cost. The spell itself bores a hole through the Deep Astral Barrier, allowing Inter-Astral Travel. This spell takes 10 minutes to cast and opens a hole in the Deep Astral Barrier, meaning that you must already be in the Astral Plane. The hole remains open for as long as the powering Tapestry concentrates and remains within long range, with a maximum of 24 hours.

Old Spells You Want to Remember
Resist Energy and Protection from Energy. These spells are invaluable in pretty much any craft. Since Wizards don't get Spell Resistance Spells, they use these instead. Resist Energy is usually used on larger craft as Protection will wear out pretty quickly. Smaller craft will likely use Protection from Energy as they can't afford to take much damage.

Dispel Magic. YES. The main weakness of this system is Dispel Magic. That also makes it the main weapon. You can cripple an enemy's system with a dispel magic spell, or vice versa. Normal rules still apply. If a Tapestry is dispelled, it stops all power flow through it and cannot be used for the requisite 1d4 rounds. Ooch.

Scorching Ray. Given level/damage ratios, this one takes the cake. 4d6 at 2nd level? And that number goes up for higher CL tapestries? You can see why I use Scorching Ray as a primary weapon.

Antimagic Field. Like Dispel, but no checks and it's everything within the radius. We recommend you using a device like that listed above for delivery.

Stick. This is one of the only spells from the SC that has stuck with me. It's like magic duct-tape.

Reality Maelstrom. Did somebody call for a black hole? This'll suck up those annoying fighter craft swarming your ship.

Greater Teleport. Sulu go to warp?

Repair spells. ... Need I say more?

Hardness. We're in ships and mechs. More durability is always welcome.

Fabricate. Sorry did I just make a factory?

Shrink Item. "Okay, I'm gonna Shrink the battery so it takes up less space and weighs less" If you could do that, why weren't they just made smaller? There's a reason that they're the size they are. Namely the spells to be contained within take up some measure of space. And they don't like being squeezed. You cannot Shrink Tapestries or Batteries, nor can you shrink any item or construct laced with a Tapestry.

Cure Light Wounds (From the Bard). "So I can have a Bard multiclass to Wizard and force him to make Cure Runestones that are still Arcane, right?" "No" Just no. Because no.

Mechs

The term "Mech" is used to describe both Mechsuits and simple droids. This system allows you to apply the above features into something you can use to bash your opponents. Or have shoot lasers. Or you could make something that just screams "EXTERMINATE" over and over again...

Chassis:

Size	Cost	Weight	HP	Minimum Str
Tiny	750	5	X2/5	1
Small	1500	25	X2 + 10	5
Medium	1500	50	X4 +20	10
Large	3000	100	X8 + 30	15
Huge	6000	250	X20 + 40	20

The Chassis has Hardness and HP based off of it's material. (A Mithral Huge Mech Suit would have Hardness 15 and 30X20+40=640 HP). Adamantine has a cost of 800/lb for making an Adamantine Chassis.

Almost every Mech has Plating. After much contemplation, I decided to use the tried-and-tested default armors as plating. You use the same numbers, just remember to scale for the correct size. It's also customary to.. alter the armor a bit. Instead of "Studded Leather", think of several sheets of metal (with studs in them) attached together via chain links covering the mech's chassis. Though it is not necessary, you'll be hard pressed to find a mech without at least Light Plating.

Damage: After Hardness is subtracted from damage, it is dealt to the Chasis. Keep in mind how energy damage is affected when dealing damage to objects. One third of that is then dealt to the occupant (if it's an occupied mech suit) as the suit is jostled, heated, electrocuted, etc. The first (Con) damage of this is Nonlethal, after that it is Lethal damage. Because of this, weaker occupants may fail long before their armor does. When HP is down to half it's max, many activities take a penalty (-1 AB, -1 max dex, additional -1 check penalty). At HP 0 the suit is crippled, getting only a single action a turn, but suffering no chance to harm itself by doing so. When HP=-Bonus (10 for Small, 20 for medium, etc.) the suit fails entirely and the battery blows. From -1 to there the suit is inert and powerless as the damage has crippled and blocked the power flows and mechanical systems.

Note that Cognition Cores/Sentient Magic Items are immensely useful in a mech suit. Whether they are the actual brain of the device (in which case they should get Combat Prowess if you want them to actually fight) or simply for a second opinion on the systems and situation. Sentient Magic Items inhabiting the same suit as a living occupant have several options: Automatic (It controls the attacks, using only it's stats), Dormant (Let's the occupant do the work and stay out of the way), Aid (Uses the Aid Another action to give bonuses to the occupant. This manifests as very fluid attacks, a HUD, a combat readout, or the like), or Aided (As above, but the rider is aiding the Sentience). The last two are the ones used most frequently, depending upon who has the higher AB.

The Occupant adds their Str Modifier and Score to that of the Mech for purposes of Load, Skills, and fighting.

Arcane Casters are treated as if wearing full plate when in a mech for the purposes of casting their spells (85% failure). Warmages mock the puny Wizards. Mithril Chassis reduces this by the usual 10%. You'll also need a designated mechanism that allows you to move the material components into your actual hand while you're still inside the mech. Either you spend 500gp and increase the weight by 5lb and always take a move action to get your material components, or you get Eschew Materials. Your choice.

Breaches: If a single attack not only bypasses the hardness of the material, but also deals enough damage to destroy one inch of the material (30 for iron/steel/mithral) then you have a Breach. Depending upon the environment this can be very bad. The immediate effect however is that the occupant doesn't suffer the 1/3 damage (with some (or all) being nonlethal), but instead suffers 1/2 full lethal from the attack (assuming the attack was lethal to begin with).

"Help, help! I've fallen and I can't get up!" Appendages. If you want to shake a hand, shake a sword, or shake a Halfling, they're useful. All of the cost and weight numbers that follow are for medium mechs. They scale as humanoid armor does.

Locomotion: (Note, all of this is taken from the Droids section of the Starwars RPG)

Locomotion	Up to Small	Medium	Large and up	Cost	Weight	Traits
Wheels	30ft	40ft	50ft	75	6	Double Rough Terrain Penalties, no climb or jump
Treads	20ft	30ft	40ft	100	10	No Rough Terrain Penalties, -5 climb, no jump
Legs	20ft	30ft	40ft	200	15	Normal

Appendages: (Yeah, still kinda taken from Starwars. Thanks, R2)

Appendage	Cost	Weight	Traits
Probe	100	2	Treat as two sizes smaller for unarmed damage. Almost no reach. It can push/pull things.
Claw	200	10	DC 15 Dex check to use items requiring a hand, or it drops it. 1 size larger for unarmed.
Hand	500	12	Normal

Mechanics are very important to both mechs and skyships. They come in two varieties: Light and Heavy. They're both used to convey power from either some layman turning a crank or an Animate Mechanics spell. Heavy Mechanics reduces the Str score by 1 per 10 ft the power travels while a Light Mechanics system reduces it by 2 in additional to 1 per 5 ft. Heavy Mechanics weigh 10 lb and cost 500 gp per 5 ft (Minimum of 250gp) while Light Mechanics weigh only 7lb and cost 400 gp per 5 ft (Minimum of 200).
(So Light Mechanics Str score is (Base Str -2 + (-1 per 5ft))

These numbers are assuming steel parts. You can, as usual, make these out of other materials, such as Mithral. Wooden parts can be used for 1/10 the cost, but the parts wear quickly. 20 uses calls for a craft check from the creator at DC 15, each 20 after that increases the DC by 5. A failed check means some aspect breaks such that it becomes unusable. This still happens for steel and other materials, but only every 100 uses. In either case, treat a week as a single use. A craft check can be made to repair it at DC 20 costing 1/5 the normal price of the mechanic. Or a Make Whole spell will do the trick. It's customary to have a system that checks for breaks and automatically casts Make Whole on the damaged area.

The actual construction of the chassi of a Mech would be based on Craft: Metalworking, while the Mechanics would be Craft: Mechanics.

Something most players will be interested in based on this system would be personal mech suits, so some further description may be in order. The whole "Minimum Str" for the sizes is based upon the need to convey mechanical energy throughout the mech, which is made more difficult by it being large or heavy. Plating is different from the Chassi, as it is focused on deflecting attacks, rather than absorbing them. Plating adds to the AC, while the Chassi mainly gives the raw HP and Hardness. As described below, one rank in Magitech is required to know how to pilot a Mech. This constitutes a basic "This button is go. This one fires the rockets". It allows you to recognize the basic controls. Most mechs would have a large chest piece which opened such that the occupant could crawl in or out. Once inside, you control it based upon you're physical movements being translated into Mechanical Energy further enhanced by Animate Mechanics. As previously mentioned, you use the Str score given by the Animate Mechanics spell, though you can use Aid Another to aid the machine (Or the machine could aid you if you were the stronger). You use the movement speed given by the locomotion means and may take double move actions. If for some reason Animate Mechanics ran out and you couldn't reactivate it, you'd be stuck inside a heap of extremely heavy material that most characters have difficulty lifting on their own. Your Dex score in unaffected, save for the max dictated by your Plating and the corresponding Check Penalty.

Now for a sample mech: Large Size chassis, Runestaff core containing Animate Mechanics 8 (15 Str) along with Invisibility, Shield, and Resist Energy. This behemoth would be powered by a 25 cap battery along with a Small Charging Crystal. A Medium Arcane Tapestry of CL 15 would power most of the suits functions, with a secondary CL 9 tap connecting the previously mentioned wands to the previously mentioned battery. At this point you could feel free to attach whatever auxiliary or combat systems you see fit to add. Enchanting the Tapestry which feeds to the Core Staff with Extend would likely be a wise investment as would adding an Information Tapestry with a corresponding Diagnostic Runestone along with various other sensory spell stones. Then you stick your Barbarian in this thing.

Skyships
"Skyships", "Spaceships", "Flying doohickies", or whatever you like to call them, work much the same as Mechs do. Except they are, you know, flying.

Chassis:

Size	Cost	Weight	HP	Maneuverability
Tiny	1000	4	X0.3	Perfect
Small	2000	20	X1.5 + 10	Good
Medium	2000	40	X3 +20	Average
Large	4000	80	X6 + 30	Average
Huge	8000	200	X15 + 40	Good
Gargantuan	16000	320	X24 + 60	Good
Colossal	Sq ft X 40/3	Sq ft X 4/15	XCube root of Cu ft + 80	Good

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Damage works much the same. When HP =-Bonus, the core goes nuclear. We don't suffer penalties at half HP. At -1 all systems go offline, usually causing the craft to begin a rapid descent. At -1 and below it also loses 2 HP a turn. Hull breaches are a much larger concern aboard a Colossal Skyship. A Maximized Fireball hitting your hull isn't going to be too good for personnel in the immediate vicinity.

HP is only a measure of overall structural integrity. You'll likely have numerous breaches long before the ship falls apart. Once you're dealing with truly Colossal ships, HP stops meaning much. Your engines will explode, your entire crew perish in fire, and the bridge will be destroyed long before the ship falls apart.

Having internal mechanics is just as important as before as they are used to steer the Thrust Spheres and by extension the ship. Light Mechanics are usually used here as having a high raw strength isn't that important.

You can both sneak attack and get a critical hit on a skyship or mech. Make vivid images and explanations as needed. ("You managed to pierce into the bridge and melted the captain's brain. Nice job"). The only exception is that you cannot Sneak Attack a Colossal Skyship.

Pilots of Colossal Skyships never add their Dex Bonuses to AC. How do you take evasive actions in something that large?

All attacks being launched while aboard a Skyship occur after said Skyship's movement. The Ace Pilot PrC that I have can learn the "Strafe" Ace Trick which allows them to attack at any point during that. Also note that Pilots cannot fire in any direction but ahead of them (In a sort of cone, DM decides what counts). This is because it is very difficult to steer in one direction and shoot in another. This often leads to crafts having both a pilot and a gunner.

Mechs and Skyships (Referred to as Tapestry Constructs) have a few other properties worth mentioning. First, they may be the subject of buff spells as if they were a creature. Only spells of the schools of Abjuration, Illusion, and Conjuration can affect them in this way. Albeit, at an increased cost. It takes a number of spell levels equal to Spell Level X Size (Tiny=1, diminutive =2, Colossal=8) X Size. In this way a Colossal Skyship using Greater Teleport would take 4X8X8 levels, or 256. This seems about right to me. These effects may originate either from a device within the vessel, from another device, or from a caster using a sufficiently Heightened spell (It's rare that they have a spell slot high enough, but the option's there). No spells that are Conjuration (Healing) work on Tapestry Constructs, despite most conjuration spells doing so. Conversely, all Tapestry Constructs may be targeted and affected by all Repair spells, despite them not actually being constructs and despite most transmutation spells not counting them as creatures. Second, certain offensive spells may also treat Tapestry Constructs as creatures. Spells of the schools of Evocation, Divination, or Necromancy all affect these vessels as if they were creatures. This means they can be targeted with magic missile, and if you're using Rich's Divination spells, you can hook up a Detect Creatures runestone with an info line to your display and get a neat radar! When a Tapestry Construct is the target of negative levels, the only effect is that the CL of all tapestries connected to the target decrease by the given number. This often causes some tapestries to contract at random as the maximum endings decrease and some devices are disconnected. These levels never become permanent, though if CL reaches 0, your systems fail and the vessel changes immediately to -1 HP (If it was above that before).

Despite me calling them "Tapestry Constructs" they do not have the construct type. For any spell besides the above, they are considered inanimate objects.

Saves: Tapestry Constructs are always treated as Magic Items and thus always get saves. Vessels directly piloted (I.e. Mech suits and Personal Skyships) may have the driver make the save. The save bonus for the construct itself is as given. 2+1/2 CL. In this case the Cl is that of the highest Tapestry in the construct. Colossal and Stationary constructs get no Reflex saves. A successful Disintegrate spell cast on a Huge size or greater Tapestry Construct deals 10d6 structural damage (bypasses hardness).

When I was doing some mock-ups, I ran into a problem. Namely, a scorching ray (which I've been using as a basic weapons system as it's a decent deal as far as damage and spell level go) couldn't get past mithral plating. First, a single Scorching Ray does an average of 14 damage. Mithral has a hardness of 15. "So it has about a 50% chance to deal damage, right?" Wrong. Due to how energy damage works with objects, fire damage is halved. An average of 7 damage, a max of 12. That's never going to get past the hardness. As such, I've decided that if multiple attacks deal damage to the same section of the vessel in the same round, that they stack against hardness. As such, two average scorching rays, dealing 28 damage total, would deal 13 damage to the vessel as a whole. Get four, a max power scorching ray, and you got yourself a hull breach!

As for propulsion, please see "New Spells: Create Thrust". Your basic one-man craft will probably have a full Thrust Web, while a Tarrasque-Class cruise may have upwards of 40 such Webs. It's important to note that this speed does not depend upon "Move Actions". You cannot take a Full Move to move double speed, nor do you stop moving if you spend a full round casting in the cockpit.

For the Maneuverability explanations... Really small craft don't really have a "Front" and are likely powered by a minimal number of Thrust Spheres, almost certainly not a full Web. As such, they can quickly change direction and dart about. Very large craft have massive numbers of Webs and can simply direct them downwards to hover or quickly turn on the spot. Middling sized vessels will probably have a single Web, not enough to be capable of hovering (without some nice control-handling) and it's certainly not capable of just going backwards.

To remain airborne, Skyships must have enough Thrust to propel them at least 20ft/round. Good maneuverability allows you to direct this downwards to hover, while Average makes this the minimum travel speed. See "Pilot" for rapidly rotating Spheres as to hover. You must be able to maintain the 20ft/round on a single casting of Create Thrust (I.e. not doubling the casting on a single steer-able device). If you can't, then that means too much of the strength is in not enough devices, making it difficult to steer. The result is that your Maneuverability drops by one. Not advisable, but allowed.

Increasing speed drastically also affects certain maneuverability aspects. For every 40 ft/round that the craft travels, increase relevant maneuverability distances. 80 ft/round means that an Average Maneuverability craft would turn 45 degrees in 10ft, instead of 5. Going to 120 ft/round would bump this to 45 in 15ft. This also applies to the Pilot maneuvers.

Also note that the rules for Mechs carry over to rules for standard Vehicles, such as a basic jeep powered by an Animate Mechanics Runestaff.

Mechs are subject to reductions of speed due to carrying capacity, if that wasn't apparent before.

Chassi cannot be enchanted, but Plating can be enchanted as if it were armor.

As for one last measure of defense, a Skyship or Mech can have a Reinforced Hull. This is chosen upon creation and causes the cost and weight of the Chassi to be multiplied by 1.5 and the Health Factor (The number gotten from the material for determining HP) is multiplied by 1.2. The main result however is a doubling of the damage needed to breech the hull.

Now for a sample Tarrasque-Class Skyship:

Power first. A few Colossal Charging Crystals would likely be best. Given that the chassi is costing a few million, you can pretty quickly get the charge you need. Okay, with some basic numbers, we can assume a 45 ton skyship, including cargo. With 40 webs, we would get a decent speed. Assuming a Primary Tapestry CL of 30, we already can go for 15 hours/day. Extend the Webs, and we can go non-stop. For actual power, 40*3=120 charges, for 30 hours of travel. I've been assuming most Tarrasque-Class ships would hold something on the order of 3 to 5 THOUSAND levels, refreshing that every day or two.

Let's say the dimensions are 100X100X200, which yields some basic numbers, including those for the chassi cost. For defensive systems, we would have a standard array of Shield, Resist Energy, and similar effects. Resist Energy would be our primary form of defense. Weapons would include scattered basic turrets throughout the vessel, probably around 20, each armed with a standard set of weapon spells (Scorching Ray, Fireball, Magic Missile, Dispel Magic, etc.), most of which would be in a single Runestaff, except for a few Runestones with lower-level spells for focused fire. (Four Scorching Ray Runestones all hooked to the same aiming mechanism for focused attacks!). Weapon systems would likely be powered by Maximize or Empower Tapestries, with a button in each turret area to enable the feature. The size of the ship is sufficient to hold the enormous batteries and the massive number of wands. Speaking of which, those would add up to around 2,500 wands. That's going to be 10 250 end tapestries, plus a few more to allow the wands to actually attach to our batteries. We would have Overload Protection cast on every battery, hopefully enough to prevent a catastrophic explosion... A number of contingent Repair Spells hooked up to Cognition Cores would quickly right any damage dealt to our vessel. The ship itself would likely field a crew of around 200 maximum, though you could make almost everything automated. Then throw in 10 or so Phoenix-Class fighters, and you got a decent force. If we wanted to, we could add on some Thrust Missiles that I described somewhere, in addition to various bombs and disabling devices. We have something like 5,000 lbs of cargo space mapped out in the speed. We would of course have a Runestaff containing Skyship Gate for quick movement between planes, and our Defensive Runestaff could also include Greater Teleport. The 200 crew would consist of around 20 mid-level wizards, 10 trained pilots, a few officers, a bunch of laymen, 25 or so gunners, a security crew of around 30 to 40, a bridge crew (Sulu go to warp!), a medical crew of 10 to 15, and so on. We can still fit them pretty easily. We could have a secondary battery which was somewhat smaller with it's own Charging Crystal for divine magic, allowing us to Create Food and Water pretty easily to feed the crew and power healing devices. Spell Resistance would invaluable as a defense mechanism, though it requires Divine Magic.

For Tarrasque class ships, you really don't need to describe how absolutely everything connects and how everything is hooked up. You can assume that you have a basic network of Tapestries throughout - you don't have to detail every one of them. You really just need the core information: HP, Size, Max Cap for energy, at least one Charging Crystal, Main Functions (Invisibility, Teleport, Resist Energy, etc.), your basic weapon systems, and your propulsion. Beyond those, you're really just being excessive.

Classes of Mech and Skyship
"Classes" for mechs and skyships are basic denomination to know what your dealing with. "Four Titan-Class mechs on their way", "Got a Pixie heading in now", etc.


Skyships:

Name	Usual Size	Description
Tarrasque	Colossal (Truly)	These are huge war carriers. Includes Star Destroyers and the Battlestar Galactica
Dragon	Colossal (moderate) or Gargantuan	Smaller warbirds
Gargoyle	Huge	2-man fighter. Usually one steers and controls axillary functions while the other focuses on gunning
Phoenix	Large	1-man fighter. Usually short-range, intended for coupling with a Tarrasque
Efreeti	Medium	Unmanned fighters
Couatl	Huge	Scientific vessels
Pixie	Tiny	Sensor/spy probe
Roc	Gargantuan	Transport. Rarely armed
Griffin	Huge	Smaller transport, more often privately owned
Pegasus	Large	Even smaller transport, fitting one person. Almost always privately owned.
Imp Flier	Small	General utility flier

Mechs:

Name	Size	Description
Titan	Huge	Larger mech, usually made for an occupant
Giant	Large	Standard mech for an occupant
Rogue	Large	Lighter version of the Giant, made for scouting
Warforged	Medium	Where did you think they came from?
Bullete	Huge	Tank. Made for usually two people.
Wyvern	Huge	Walker with at twinned gun set, mounted on either side. Think "Goliath" from starcraft.
Imp Walker	Small	Utility bot. Doesn't have to be humanoid
Familiar	Tiny	Companion bot.

New(ish) Skills
Craft (Mechanics): Allows you to make gears and other moving parts. Required for making the Mechanics for Skyships and Mechs. Used for making the limbs as well. And pretty much any machine you can think of.

Magitech (Int): The skill for this system. Used for analyzing, modifying, and creating Magitech systems. This skill is added to the skill list of any wizard, cleric, or other character you feel would have tutelage in these ways. Obviously only characters being raised in an environment where this technology is common would have it as a class skill.

DC	Task
15	Comprehend wiring
20	Program a Cognition Core
20	Swap Components
25	Reconfigure Components
10+1/1000 gp	Make a Schematic

Comprehend Wiring: 2 Full Round actions. Gives you a basic understanding of what you're looking at. "This goes from this to this. This wire would make things blow up".
Program: Basic instructions for a Cognition Core (The sentient magic items with only an Int of 6). Takes a Full Round.
Swap Components: 1 minute. Allows you to swap two Runestones/staves. Takes a bit of fiddling to get it to stick just right. Made as a check to remove, and a check to replace, each requiring the listed time.
Reconfigure Components: 10 minutes. Resize a tapestry, change batteries, change connections, etc.
Set Easy Swap: This has been altered and is now an enchanting option for Tapestries. See that section for more information.
Make Schematic: This allows you to make a Schematic for a device. You make this check as a craft check, with one fourth the cost of the item as the target amount (You don't need to pay 1/3) and progress being measured in Gp/week or Sp/day (10 times usual progress rate). Only one person may directly work on the schematic, though others can Aid Another. The device may not include anything besides mechanical parts, the casing, and magitech components (including runestaves, Charging Crystals, and Experience Capacitors). The Schematic must include at least two components which may not be connected on an Easy Swap. Actually, no components included in the schematic may be held together with an Easy Swap. When going off of a Schematic for a device, you make the device as a whole. The Casing, and Magitech components all come together as a single unit. You make the device as a single device (though you spend the time on enchanting v crafting as separate), and this makes things easier and more streamlined. A schematic halves the cost of enchanting the magic components. Yay, 5k for a Scorching Ray Gun! It takes a DC 30 Magitech check to modify any part out of a Schematic Device, taking one minute. Failure by 5 or more causes the part being put in or taken out to be damaged, and must be repaired before it can be used again. It is possible to upgrade a Schematic Device, but you must pay the full price for doing so and must make a check as if you were modifying it. You get a +10 on modification checks if you actually have the Schematic with you.
Use the thingymabobber: At least one rank in this skill is required to operate complex Magitechnology (Such as a Mech suit, Skyship, or advanced device, but not simple handheld devices).

For everything except the last two, you get a +5 on the attempt if all components involved were made by you.

Note that a Schematic may be stored in a Databank. It itself is not magical and can be copied or transcribed without the need for all of that work. As such, they are guarded like Artifacts.

Pilot (Dex): This skill is to be used with Skyships of Average Maneuverability (Whether you're in it or using a remote-control device). Please note that this entire skill is just the "Fly" skill from Pathfinder re-purposed. It's not my fault it works so well.

DC	Task
10	Move less than half speed
15	Hover
15	Turn more than 45 degrees with 5ft movement
20	Turn 180 degrees with 10ft movement
20	Fly up at an angle greater than 60 degrees

These are pretty self explanatory. See the "Maneuverability" rules.
I like describing how you Hover though. If you rapidly work the Spheres around in the right ways, with a decent knowledge of the craft, you can balance it pretty well. Or you can stall.

Which button is "Go"?: One rank in Pilot is needed to fly any sort of Skyship.

Also note that you cannot add more than your ranks in Pilot/2 in Dex Modifier to your AC while piloting a Skyship. So if you have Pilot 4 and a Dex of 16, you'd only get to add 2 to your AC. This section of Pilot is applicable to all Skyships not of Colossal size.

Synergy: +2 on Pilot checks if you have 5 or more in Magitech.

CRASHES
You know you're PCs are going to try it. I've been fooling around with numbers and generally got the following equation for a decent amount of damage from collisions. This was made primarily with Create Thrust in mind.

Take your ft/round. Divide that by 40. Square that. Multiply that by your weight divided by 120. Then that's the raw d6 damage.

(Speed/(40ft/round))*(Speed/(40ft/round)*(Weight/120lb))d6 damage.

Now this may seem a bit daunting. Well, it can be simplified to Speed squared X Weight= Damage. Wait... Speed, weight as in mass, and damage as in energy? E=MC2? Anyways...

This damage is dealt to both the speeding object and the target. However, neither will take more damage than the other can. As in if the ship hits a piece of paper, it can't take more damage than the paper has HP. Craft take this damage to their main HP, applying Hardness only once. However, the damage is also dealt locally to all areas hit, possibly resulting in a breach.

These numbers are still affected normally by the whole 1/3 damage to occupants stuff, with Con worth of it being nonlethal. This results in a standard fighter crashing being about enough to kill the occupant if they aren't really hearty or having special precautions.

This opens up another use of Create Thrust: Projectile objects. A tube for guiding, a large 5lb object large enough to fill said tube, with a casting device with trigger attached to the tube to cast Create Thrust on the object. Sorry did I just make a Rocket Launcher? What if you slapped a Delayed Fireball on this first? Anyways, I added the 5lb limit on the Create Thrust spell because of this application. Otherwise you end up with that .1 lb rock dealing a few hundred or thousand damage. The result is as follows:

It's most effective to use 5lb projectiles, as speed is weighed more heavily than mass is for terms of damage. This results in the speed being 120/5*20, or 480 ft/round. Now, we have 480/40 squared, times 5/120, which results in... 6. That's 6d6 damage that would be delivered upon impact, and is the optimum amount from a single casting of Create Thrust, a second level spell. "6d6 for second level? SIGN ME UP!" Not quite that easy. This would require a normal attack roll and can't have metamagic such as Empower or Maximize applied to it. On the plus side, it's normal damage, not energy damage, which means that it isn't reduced when being applied to objects. The other downside is that this thing has 5lb projectiles. Have fun lugging those around. And without a proper launching tube, you can't really aim (whether or not you're the one casting the spell). As such, without a tube you cannot apply your AB, it just kinda flies off in that direction.

On the macro scale, a colossal Skyship on just impulse power (Let's say a paltry 80ft/round), weighing 45,000 lb, would have an equation of 80/40 squared times 45,000/120, or 4 times 375, or 1500. D6. Average result of a d6 is 3.5... an average of 5250 damage. A ship this size has a volume of around 2,000,000 cubic feet, resulting in... 3860 HP. This means that chances are that it could not survive a head-on collision with something like the ground. But keep in mind that it can't take more damage than it's target, and what has that much HP besides another massive ship?


Additional Classes



Magitechnician

"I know MAGIC SCIENCE"

The Magitechnician is a caster specializing in the Magitechnological ways. It's a PrC.

Requirements: Craft Tapestry, Spellcraft 8, Magitech 8, Craft (Mechanics) 4, Craft (Metalworking) 4.

D4 hit die.
Int+4 skills per level. Class skills: Knowledge (all taken individually), Craft (all taken individually), Magitech, Spellcraft, Concentration, Decipher Script, Profession, Pilot.

Level	BAB	Fort	Ref	Will	Special
1	+0	+0	+0	+2	Crafting Reserve, Diagnostics 1/day
2	+1	+0	+0	+3	Craft Magitech
3	+1	+1	+1	+3	Quick Crafting
4	+2	+1	+1	+4	Quick Comprehension
5	+2	+1	+1	+4	Magitech Sense

Spellcasting: As if you went up in your original spellcasting class, you don't get other features, you must choose which if you have more than one, yadda yadda.
Crafting Reserve: The Magitechnician gains an amount of EXP usable only for making magic items. Each level he gains a reserve of 100XClass level experience points for this purpose.
Craft Magitech: Two levels after the requirement of a CL 5... You must qualify for the Craft Magitech feat! Here, it's free.
Quick Crafting: You make Magitech Components at twice the normal rate (2,000 per day) and make Mechanics and Metal twice as fast as well (double the result of your progress).
Quick Comprehension: Halve the time it takes you to comprehend wiring, swap components, or reconfigure components. You know this.
Magitech Sense: Treat all components as if they were made by you for purposes of skill checks. You can tell the level and type of a Tapestry, runestone, runestaff, or battery by spending a move action analyzing it.

SEE BELOW FOR ARCANE ENGINEER CLASS

Magitech and Other Magic Items
This is a bit of a thorny area. This system pretty much ignores other magic items, save for the ability to activate them with a tapestry. You could fill pretty much any magic need with this system. A Magic Sword would simply have a device attached to the hilt which was a 1 cap battery, a tiny tapestry, a button, and a runestone of Magic Weapon. Use a Schematic for this, and it's only a bit more expensive than it's normal counterpart. And it could be upgraded or transferred to another weapon. But it requires recharging. Higher level characters would probably have at least one Charging Crystal to fuel their stuff, but an Arcane Caster on the team would still be very useful.

So there are a couple of options. You could say that in your game world, magitech is long gone technology, all but forgotten, and use primarily default magic items, with a scattering of these archaic devices. You could say that this technology is the "Big Thing" and that there are almost no magic items of other sorts. Or you could say they both exist and each have their ups and downs.

Runestaves, and even normal wands are all pretty central to this system, so I would advise you to leave those as they are. The rest however- "Magic Arms and Armor" and "Wondrous Items", should be assigned a particular role in relation to Magitech.

You may make a rule derived from the "Too Much of Anything" principle that causes Magitech to act strangely upon and around other magic items. Possibly escalating to the point where mixing the two creates an explosion. You go the explosion route, if the other magic item is passive, it contributes a number of spell levels to the blast equal to the highest spell level the CL could cast.

All of the ideas in this section are only suggestions. It's up to you to decide how Magitech works in your game world. I'm just a service provider.

Basic Devices that Should be Covered
Basic array of personal firearms (Scorching Ray Gun? They aren't that hard.)

Basic array of mechs and skyships (Try to have one of each class. PCs will almost certainly requisition custom models. Models for NPC can be pretty easily inferred)

Flame Blade (My custom spell+Casting Device. There's a reason the Jedi use Lightsabers. THEY WORK. This combination generally makes sense and you can expect Flame Daggers and Blades to be used by any self-respecting melee combatant capable of obtaining them. Makes Str a little less useful)

Transporter (Dimension Door or Teleport, usually with Enlarge on the Tapestry. Players to be transported must be in contact with the device. A tad costly, but saves a wizard.)

Basic Turret (Stat a turret with whatever offensive spells you like. You can then say that it's the "Basic Model" and use it on defense platforms, skyships, and walls alike. Scorching Ray, Fireball, Dispel Magic, lightning bolt, and magic missile ought to do ya. If you don't want costly 4/day and 5/day stones, just get multiples on the same turret.)

I leave these concepts open to interpretation. It's more fun that way.

Special Thanks
Many people have helped develop this system, the following being some of those who did the most towards that end.

Jack Simth


Ralasha


3SecondCultist


Jojolagger


Endragor
-Insert Avatar Here-

Radmelon


Elfstone


Thank you!

[HunterOfJello]

This setting and city sound really cool. I'd love to see more specifics about it.

[Salbazier]

Heh, why not? I love magitech

That said, mods will knew better, but if this include things that are not RAW perhaps it will suit better in the Homebrew

[The-Mage-King]

Absolutely!

[Welknair]

Arcane Engineer

"Nerd, am I?"

The long awaited Base Class for the system! This class may emulate some of the features of the Artificer, though I still haven't actually read the Eberron book, so any similarity is due to the overlap in field of expertise. Anyways, the Arcane Scholar is a modified version of the Wizard. They forgo advanced combat training and can't specialize in a school. They get a bunch of free crafting feats, and most notably the ability to make temporary Magitech Devices. And to use nearly any spell in said making.

D4 hit die.
Int+4 skills per level. Class skills: Appraise, Concentration, Decipher Script, Craft (all taken individually), Disable Device, Knowledge (all taken individually), Magitech, Profession, Pilot, Profession, Spellcraft.

Level	BAB	Fort	Ref	Will	Special	Temporary Craft Points
1	+0	+0	+0	+2	Rote spells, Temporary Craft, Item Crafting	5
2	+1	+0	+0	+3		6
3	+1	+1	+1	+3	Rote Use	8
4	+2	+1	+1	+4		11
5	+2	+1	+1	+4	Craft Tapestry	15
6	+3	+2	+2	+5		20
7	+3	+2	+2	+5	Craft Magitech	26
8	+4	+2	+2	+6		33
9	+4	+3	+3	+6		41
10	+5	+3	+3	+7	Bonus Feat	50
11	+5	+3	+3	+7		60
12	+6/+1	+4	+4	+8	Craft Ephemeral Tapestry	71
13	+6/+1	+4	+4	+8		83
14	+7/+2	+4	+4	+9		96
15	+7/+2	+5	+5	+9	Bonus Feat	110
16	+8/+3	+5	+5	+10		125
17	+8/+3	+5	+5	+10		142
18	+9/+4	+6	+6	+11	Rote Use 2	160
19	+9/+4	+6	+6	+11		179
20	+10/+5	+6	+6	+12	Bonus Feat	199

Spells: The Arcane Engineer casts a number of spells per day drawn from an intentionally narrow list, mainly derived from the Wizard/Sorcerer list. The key Ability score is Int. The Arcane Scholar need not prepare spells, nor do they need to choose spells known when they level - their spell list is the same as their list of spells known. The number and level of spells they cast is the same as that of a normal Wizard, and I feel no need to repost the chart here. I'll post a spell list at the end of this.

Rote Spells: One of the defining features of the Arcane Engineer is their ability to learn absolutely any spell. For the purpose of making magic items, anyways. Arcane Engineers learn a number of "Rotes" each level - These are spells which they have memorized to the point that they innately know their workings - but not as to be able to cast them. When they make a magic item, they are treated as being able to cast any of their Rotes for the purpose of making such an item. Each level they learn 3 Rotes, but these must be from a class to which the Engineer has been exposed, they cannot learn a rote if it exceeds the level which they would be able to cast, or if they do not know at least one rote of each spell level below the level they wish to learn for the given class (If they wanted to get a Divine Favor Rote, they would first need a 0-level Cleric Rote). As this example would indicate, they are not limited to Arcane Rotes. Arcane Engineers can also write Spell Manuals, a lesser cousin of a spell book. Here they detail various Rotes such that others can read and learn them. Each Rote takes a single page, regardless of level and takes no magic ink to write. If an Engineer encounters a Rote which they wish to internalize, they make checks as if they were trying to copy a spell from someone else's spellbook. If they succeed, they learn the Rote. They still cannot learn Rotes of a higher level than they can cast. Also note that they can make the same check when confronted by other magical text detailing the spell (Spellbooks and Scrolls, usually) and learning from these do not suck said magic out of them. Note: These are Higher Rotes, as they allow the person who knows them to create Magic Items with them. I have stats for a few classes that learn Lesser Rotes, which only allow modification of items... If an Arcane Engineer has levels in another class which grants spells, those spells count towards the spell level requirement for learning Rotes of that class. As in, a Cleric 3, AE 7 could just start getting 3rd level Cleric Rotes without needing lower level ones first. In such a circumstance, the AE would use his AE CL for making magic items involving any Rote he knows, which may mean getting Rotes of spells he already knows from other classes may be beneficial. If an AE may learn Cleric Domain spells, but treat each domain as a separate branch off of 0-level Cleric Spells. So once you have a 0-level Cleric rote, you can learn any of the 1st level Cleric Domain Rotes, but you need the 1st spell in a Domain line before you can learn the second.

Temporary Craft: The Arcane Engineer has the unique ability to pull a MacGyver with Magitech. They can take any random bunch of materials and jury-rig it into something usable - however it doesn't last long. You can empower normal cloth, string, or the like as a Tapestry with up to your CL, turn a stone into a runestone of a spell (or rote) you know, or a similar stone into a battery with a cap up to to your CLX3. Different effects require different numbers of Temporary Craft Points. If you have Craft Staff, you can fashion Temporary Runestaves, if you have Craft Ephemeral Tapestry, you can make the cloth Ephemeral. Your TCP replenish each day along with your spells.

Runestones and Staves that you make with this ability can contain any spell that you know, have a rote of, or have prepared. The actual slot is not lost if you know or have the spell prepared.

You make all included parts at once, taking 1 minute/ 2 TCP

The cloth/string takes on the weight of a corresponding Tapestry and can be stretched or compressed one size category in either direction, though cannot pass Large. Similarly a Temporary Battery must already be of an appropriate size and gains the appropriate weight.

Item	TCP Cost
Tapestry	1/CL
Ephemeral Tap	As a Chassi of the same size
One Easy-Swap End	1
Metamagic Feat	1/Slot Adjustment
Runestone	1/spell level
Runestaff	1/spell level (add them up)
Battery	1/Cap
Cognition Core	3
5 ft of Mechanics	1
Hand	1 per
Wheels	As Chassi
Legs or Treads	As Chassi +2
Duration of the lot	1/10 Minutes

[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]

	Fine	Diminutive	Tiny	Small	Medium	Large	Huge
Chassi	1	1	2	4	7	12	20

If you use this to make Chassi and Mechanics, it is through temporary transmutation effects. Which wear out after the Duration expires, causing the chassi and mechanics to revert back to their original form. Speaking of which, you need raw material for these elements still, and the material which you use will determine the Hardness and other stats of the object.

You must always spend at least one point in Duration.

The batteries that you make start with no charge, and the charges contained in them dissipate harmlessly when the Duration ends. This means you'll need some other source of Divine energy if you want to make Divine devices.

When/if you learn Cleric rotes, choose a patron and two of that patron's domains. You can learn rotes from those domains, but do not gain the domain powers.

You may go off of a Schematic when making a Temporary Craft. If you do so, halve the cost in TCP. This reduction correspondingly reduces the creation time.

You may use a Spell Manual to access any rotes contained therein without having to memorize the desired rote. You just need to study said rote for 10 minutes right before you start making whatever magic item requires the spell.

Item Crafting: An Arcane Engineer makes magic items as if they had a CL two higher than they actually do. This however does not allow them to learn spells that are still too high of a level. This mostly helps out with Tapestries and Batteries...

Rote Use: You gain the ability to add one of your Rotes to your Spell List for the day. If it is Divine, you cannot actually cast it, but you may enjoy magic items treating you as having it known (You can use that fancy Cure Moderate Wounds wand!). You may change your choice when you first awake after a standard 8-hours rest. Treat the spell as if it were two slots higher. You may not choose a spell whose adjusted slot is beyond what you could normally cast. At level 18 you can choose 2 rotes a day to add to your list.

Note: Multiclassing to a Divine class for one level to get Alternate Source Spell is a common practice, as it allows Arcane Engineers to charge Divine devices without having to have a Divine caster on hand. Archivist is usually favored due to Key ability and Theme matching those of the Arcane Engineer.

Spell List: (Note: All of these can be found here, in the PHB, or in the Spell Compendium.)
0: Repair Minor Damage, Arcane Mark, Detect Magic, Read Magic, Stick, Light, Mage Hand, Amanuensis, Mending, Launch Bolt, Launch Item, Open/Close
1: Repair Light Damage, Diagnostics, Relay 1, Transit, Alarm, Tenser's Floating Disk, Magic Weapon, Shield, Erase, Appraising Touch, Grease, Identify, Slide, Unseen Servent, Comprehend Languages, Magic Missile
2: Repair Moderate Damage, Relay 2, Access, Restrict, Arcane Lock, Whispering Wind, Store Magitech Device, Locate Object, Resist Energy, Flame Dagger, Mechanus Mind, Shatter, Knock, Create Thrust, Make Whole
3: Repair Serious Damage, Relay 3, Tongues, Dispel Magic, Protection from Energy, Nondetection, Arcane Sight, Keen Edge, Greater Magic Weapon, Secret Page, Shrink Item, Flame Blade, Weapon of Energy, Weapon of Impact, Hold Person, Greater Amanuensis, Magic Vestment, Increase
4: Repair Critical Damage, Relay 4, Animate Mechanics (AM) 1, Scrying, Dimensional Anchor, Detect Scrying, Spell Enhancer, Remove Curse, Dimension Door, Minor Creation, Stone Shape
5: AM 2, Overload, Overload Protector, Interface, Break Enchantment, Sending, Permanency, Dismissal, Major Creation, Symbol of Spell Loss, Leomund's Secret Chest, Fabricate
6: AM 3, Repulsion, Legend Lore, Analyze Dweomer, Disintegrate, Transcribe Symbol, Hardening, True Seeing, Antimagic Field, Greater Dispel Magic, Wall of Gears, Contingency
7: AM 4, Energy Absorption Field, Energy Transformation Field, Greater Arcane Sight, Body of War, Spell Turning
8: AM 5, Dimensional Lock, Mind Blank, Temporal Stasis
9: AM 6, Disjunction, Timestop, Absorption, Magic Miasma, Reality Maelstrom, Reaving Dispel, Awaken Construct, Replicate Casting, Pass On

As you can see, the Arcane Engineer spell list is intentionally narrow and focuses on what makes magic (and the universe) tick, giving it an abjuration/divination/transmutation tilt. Be wary adding spells to this list.

Heh, why not? I love magitech

That said, mods will knew better, but if this include things that are not RAW perhaps it will suit better in the Homebrew

Woops, completely forgot that we had a section just for Homebrew... Yeah, it should go there. So should I repost, or just wait for a Moderator to move it?


This is more Homebrew than RAW, but it does build off of existing principles, just not existing systems. I'll post the full version when I have time. (I have something like eight pages of notes and stats...)

[Salbazier]

Woops, completely forgot that we had a section just for Homebrew... Yeah, it should go there. So should I repost, or just wait for a Moderator to move it?


This is more Homebrew than RAW, but it does build off of existing principles, just not existing systems. I'll post the full version when I have time. (I have something like eight pages of notes and stats...)

Just report it to mod and they'll move it. Save you the trouble of re-posting and save thsi thread from being useless.

[Welknair]

Hmm. Is there anyway to insert a table so I could better format the information?
Found it.

[Jack_Simth]

Woops, completely forgot that we had a section just for Homebrew... Yeah, it should go there. So should I repost, or just wait for a Moderator to move it?

The general method is to politely PM a mod.

As for various things?
Check out the trap rules in the DMG. Very, very flexible. Automatic reset magic traps don't have a required minimum 'recharge time' - so you can make 'traps' of beneficial spells like, say, Endure Elements, Cure Light Wounds, Cure Blindness, Cure Deafness, Neutralize Poison, Cure Disease, Create Food and Water (with Prestidigitation, so it tastes good), and others.

Energy Transformation Field (Spell Compendium, page 80) can be used the same way, and is less expensive to set up for spell effects of 3rd level or higher, although it needs to be specifically activated. It can take energy from activation of magic items, so all you need to add is a relatively inexpensive magic item that can activate some spell effect or other at will. It uses a specific example of an immovable rod in the spell description - which is just 5k. We can do better, though - a Phylactery of Faithfulness is a magic item that you activate with a moment's thought, can use at will, uses 1st level spells, and costs only 1k (if the DM decides that's a continuous effect, rather than an activated item, use the Hat of Disguise at 1,800 gp).

For lighting, just Planar Bind a Latern Archon. Seriously - they've got Continual Flame as a spell-like ability, usable at will, as a standard action, and they don't need to sleep. A day's labor from one on a bunch of prepared objects (let's go with, oh, copper coins, and just put them wherever we want light), and we can get 14,400 of them - which will get a LARGE area lit up. It's a no heat light, so to turn it 'off', you simply put a light-proof cover over it.

[Welknair]

I've actually made a modified version of Energy Transformation Field (A favorite of mine) so that it's a bit more shapable, less permanent, and instead of casting spells, recharges a battery!

Sadly, a number of citizens were opposed to enslaving angels...

[Welknair]

Comments on the info thusfar?

[Critical]

Damn, I'm bookmarking this.

[Welknair]

Damn, I'm bookmarking this.

More to come. MUCH more to come...

I'd be very interested in how campaign set in a world where the technology was prevalent would go... And yes, I have stats for operating mech suits and skyships. It's coming.

[Jack_Simth]

I've actually made a modified version of Energy Transformation Field (A favorite of mine) so that it's a bit more shapable, less permanent, and instead of casting spells, recharges a battery!

Sadly, a number of citizens were opposed to enslaving angels...

So use Lesser Planar Ally and pay them the ... 500 gp for a days/level nonhazardous task. Which may be halved or even waived completely, if lighting up a city to reduce the options for criminals qualifies as a task "strongly aligned with the creature’s ethos" for a Lawful-Good Lantern Archon. Maybe find a Lantern Archon associated with Pelor.

[Welknair]

So use Lesser Planar Ally and pay them the ... 500 gp for a days/level nonhazardous task. Which may be halved or even waived completely, if lighting up a city to reduce the options for criminals qualifies as a task "strongly aligned with the creature’s ethos" for a Lawful-Good Lantern Archon. Maybe find a Lantern Archon associated with Pelor.

Hmm. Not a bad idea. Couldn't we also use a Permanent Image of a large flame?

[Critical]

Hmm. Not a bad idea. Couldn't we also use a Permanent Image of a large flame?

That won't work, since illusions don't provide light per say.

Oh, and I'll definitely be interested in other stuff, I planned to run a campaign with "magitech" elements here and there for some time.

[Welknair]

That won't work, since illusions don't provide light per say.

Oh, and I'll definitely be interested in other stuff, I planned to run a campaign with "magitech" elements here and there for some time.

Ehh, you're right. Anyways, I'd advise you to take a look at the second post in this thread. It's getting longer.

[Jack_Simth]

That won't work, since illusions don't provide light per say.

Actually, the restriction that illusions don't provide real light was removed in the 3.0 -> 3.5 transition. At the same time they moved Continual Flame from Illusion to Evocation. Make of that what you will.

[Welknair]

Actually, the restriction that illusions don't provide real light was removed in the 3.0 -> 3.5 transition. At the same time they moved Continual Flame from Illusion to Evocation. Make of that what you will.

Continual Flame! That was the spell I was thinking of! Anyways, Permanent Image + Continual Flame would provide for most of the permanent light needs.

[Critical]

Actually, the restriction that illusions don't provide real light was removed in the 3.0 -> 3.5 transition.

Really? That's weird, one of my DM's said that my Silent Image can't produce light via RAW. Any source on this?

[Jack_Simth]

Really? That's weird, one of my DM's said that my Silent Image can't produce light via RAW. Any source on this?

If he's playing 3.0, he's unambiguously correct. 3.0 Player's Handbook, page 158:

Because figments and glamers (see below) are unreal, they cannot produce real effects th way that other types of illusions can. They cannot cause damage to objects or creates, support weight, provide nutrition, illuminate darkness, or provide protection from the elements. Consequently, ...

(Emphasis added)

So, of course, the 3.0 version of Continual Flame (page 188 of the 3.0 Player's Handbook) is an Illusion (Figment), which means the spell cannot do what it's clearly intended to do.

The 3.5 Player's Handbook, on the other hand, has the same passage, minus that troublesome phrase, on page 173:

Because figments and glamers (see below) are unreal, they cannot produce real effects the way that other types of illusions can. They cannot cause damage to objects or creatures, support weight, provide nutrition, or provide protection from the elements. Consequently, ...

At the same time, Continual Flame was changed to Evocation(Light) (page 213 of the 3.5 player's handbook).

Either change would have fixed the Continual Flame problem right up. They did both.

Now, while your DM is well within his rights to say that 'cannot produce real effects' includes true illumination (it's not a clear-cut thing), the explicit example that it couldn't was specifically removed in the 3.0 -> 3.5 transition.

As I said: Make of this what you will.



A bit back on topic:

More to come. MUCH more to come...

I'd be very interested in how campaign set in a world where the technology was prevalent would go... And yes, I have stats for operating mech suits and skyships. It's coming.

Well, once you get to the point where magic can handle all the day-to-day needs of the citizenry (Which it can, quite easily - Create Food and Water + Trap Rules = Uncapped amounts of food. Energy Transformation Field + a Paladin's Dectet Evil ability + Create Food and Water spell = uncaped amounts of food), then things look like what the powers-that-be want them to look like (if the powers that be are smart, anyway).

Suppose, for instance, that I am a Cleric-7 with Craft Wondrous Item, Leadership, and a bunch of GP and XP I want to burn. I have a Wizard-5 Cohort, and a bunch of NPC-classed followers, and a building under my control.

I (ab)use the trap rules to create automatic reset "traps" of useful spells, all running in a row. Cure Light Wounds, Endure Elements, Remove Disease, Remove Curse, Remove Blindness/Deafness, Lesser Restoration, Neutralize Poison, and Create Food and Water. When I'm making the Create Food and Water trap, I also have my Wizard Cohort help me out, putting in Prestidigitation, to make it taste like any of a few hundred dishes, picked at random. Anyone and everyone walking down the hallway with a bowl in hand gets cured of minor injuries, inured to normal weather, cured of most afflictions, and at the end his bowl is filled with some tasty food (enough to feed his entire family, usually).

I have my followers charge, say, 5 cp to walk down the hallway (untrained hirelings are paid 1 sp/day). For now, any money I collect goes into my coffers, which for the moment we'll assume are impregnable, and for the moment we'll say this 'traps' coins (I'm not spending money, yet).

What happens?

Well, there's going to be a large, but essentially fixed, number of coins in a given area. I have negligible operational expenses (just a really big setup cost), so I don't need to spend coins. So every time someone walks the hallway, five copper coins are drained from the local economy. As there's only so many coins in the local economy, sooner or later (unless something stops me), there will be a problem: Few, if any, coins in the economy. Eventually, you have a recession, depression, or even a full economic collapse - your employer can't pay you, as nobody has coins to buy his goods. You can't pay rent, as you don't have any coins to give to your landlord. Everyone (except me) goes slowly bankrupt.

Now, to stop this from happening, I change how I work with coins. I start spending money. I purchase buildings, which I then have other followers manage as landlords. I hire people at just a bit below prevailing wage for the type of work (but make sure their wages are enough that working five days gets them through my line for seven days - 7 cp/day for an untrained laborer, say). People work for me when there's no other reasonable alternatives... which will soon become the case, as my line is a very attractive thing to go through (if you do it every day, you can skip rent, and you don't need to pay extra for food - all your physical needs handled, for 5 cp /day).

If nothing interrupts me, I'm eventually employing essentially everyone, either directly or indirectly.

What do I have them do? Whatever I want. The actual essentials of maintaining this can be handled by a few dozen individuals - my Cohort and my followers. In this scenario, I'm a Cleric, I have a deity. If my deity is a patron of the arts, I'm probably employing them to gather crafting materials for other employees who make assorted art objects. If my deity is a deity of magic, I'm probably employing them to gather spell components. If my deity is a warrior-type, I'm probably building an army. And so on. The point is that with a fairly simple plan, I can make society look like pretty much anything I want, simply by paying people to take that slant.

If I want to make everyone's lives better, well, I start putting people in training. Those who will not work will not eat. I make sure to put everyone in a specialized task - craftsmen, miners, solders, artists, more clerics, whatever. But everyone needs training.

So what you'd get - in this scenario, at least - is one guy (or one small organization) calling the shots for everyone in a fairly sizable town. There will be a few constants:

1) The town is liable to end up 'specialized' - that is, most people are in the same general line of work, whether it's the specific thing the person running the place is directly hiring, or supporting industries.
2) The cost of hiring someone will be lower here than elsewhere.
3) The cost of living will be lower here than elsewhere.
4) There's one person (or a small number of people) who calls the shots (although this person isn't necessarily obvious at all).
5) There will be fewer buildings than most places (everyone has Endure Elements up constantly - most weather doesn't bother them at all)
6) Almost no clothing will not be based around practicality, unless it's directly related to a trade (everyone has Endure Elements up constantly).
7) There will be few (if any) beggars on the streets (almost all afflictions go away for 5 cp, and I'm deliberately setting it up so everyone who wants to work can - so anyone with a beggar's bowl is there by choice)
8) There is little, if any, farmland. There's no need. Just what's needed to get stuff for material goods - forests for wood, mines for coal and ore, flax fields for linen, cotton fields, sheep pasture, that kind of thing. But almost nobody is an actual farmer, and the stuff that still needs land doesn't need much of it - so you'll have a walled city that is out in the middle of nowhere, self-sufficient, and doesn't really bother to patrol the surrounding lands at all.

[Welknair]

Wow. That system does make sense, though I probably wouldn't allow that in my game as, as you said, it requires abusing the trap rules. However, the end effect is going to result from pretty much any enterprise headed by a sufficiently ambitious and competent caster. Any comments on the system illustrated so far in post 2?

[ocel]

Couldn't the dm invoke rule zero, and just state: due to the revenue, the value of the [insert currency here] is practically worthless; thus making magic items cost more than their original price? Of course you could make your society like startrek, where the money is pratically worthless, but that would make getting magic items like Paranoia.

Of-course the dm can easily ban half of those feats, I have yet to find a dm who permits "Leadership" without limiting the degree of customization per npc.

[Jack_Simth]

Wow. That system does make sense, though I probably wouldn't allow that in my game as, as you said, it requires abusing the trap rules. However, the end effect is going to result from pretty much any enterprise headed by a sufficiently ambitious and competent caster. Any comments on the system illustrated so far in post 2?

Well, you either have the capacity for a self-recharging system that makes abused traps look expensive (Battery to 3+connection tapestry. One of the connections on the tapestry is a spell effect that feeds back into the battery. The other is a spell effect that feeds into whatever you actually want to power... which now goes off every round, being constantly powered.), or you have something that's quite pointless.

If the Runestones can only go off so many times per day regardless of how much battery charge is behind them, they might impact a few individuals, but they won't much impact society at large (they're too expensive for most people).

If the tapestry size is measured the same way creature size is, you've got a problem: Creatures aren't very big, compared to cities. The 64 foot cap of Gargantuan is... maybe the size of a decent-sized house. OK, so you wire up an apartment complex... you have a 20,000 gp tapestry (25 connections, Colossal) connected to 25 orbs for lighting up the place. You cast Light into the tapestry, and all of them light up, illuminating your complex for several hours.

For that same 20,000 gp, you could hire 181 castings of Continual Flame at regular retail price, instead. Cast them on permanent wall fixtures. A simple clay jar next to them, and people can turn them off at will by covering them up.

So you're not going to be using this for lighting your apartment complex (although you might use it in the manufacture of everburning torches).

To check what effect this type of thing will have on society, first figure out something you might do with it, then figure out how you'd go about doing that same task normally.

In general: It's not really going to help much of anything.

Couldn't the dm invoke rule zero, and just state: due to the revenue, the value of the [insert currency here] is practically worthless; thus making magic items cost more than their original price? Of course you could make your society like startrek, where the money is pratically worthless, but that would make getting magic items like Paranoia.

Of-course the dm can easily ban half of those feats, I have yet to find a dm who permits "Leadership" without limiting the degree of customization per npc.

The GM can of course invoke rule 0 to do anything he wants.

The Wizard Cohort was taken for Prestidigitation: a 0-level cantrip: *every* wizard knows it, regardless of specialty (it's Universal), unless they've lost their spellbook. That's the only reason he's there, really.

The Followers don't need any specific class combination. Really, they're just there to be trusted cashiers.

As for the bit on money: Huh? Seriously? We're not making money out of thin air here (like with Wall of Iron), we're just manipulating an economy to change how cash flows in a way that benefits us, essentially arranging to convince everyone to work for us for food, health, and shelter-substitute, which we have a neigh-limitless amount of thanks to the magic trap rules and an initial investment of around 50,000 gp and around 4,000 xp. It'll take decades, if not centuries, to have that sort of an effect on the local economy anyway with that particular route. If money changes value, you just change prices & wages along with it, and it doesn't matter anymore. Meanwhile, the goods people are producing for you have their effective price based on their utility - which is reasonably fixed.

[Thomar_of_Uointer]

Seems pretty expensive for spell plumbing. Turning one light spell into two light spells shouldn't cost so much. (Of course, multiplying the effectiveness of more useful spells like cure and flaming hands ought to cost more, but you can account for that.)

I would make them more specialized (keyed to a specific spell school or spell descriptor) and cheaper. I would also give them a Caster Level rating, any spell cast at higher than a specified caster level will have a 5% chance per caster level to destroy each end of the conduit. Powerful mages should exercise restraint and voluntarily choose to lower their caster level to avoid costly repairs. (That way you can have magical lighting done however you want, but casting daylight through it is bound to break things.) Lighting a street shouldn't cost more than 200 gp to install.

Anyways, I like the idea. I hate Medieval settings where PCs can't even find toilet paper and nobody uses soap. Even without magic, cities ought to have good sanitation and standards of living (even if they have to import it from elves or other long-lived races.)

[ocel]

The GM can of course invoke rule 0 to do anything he wants.

The Wizard Cohort was taken for Prestidigitation: a 0-level cantrip: *every* wizard knows it, regardless of specialty (it's Universal), unless they've lost their spellbook. That's the only reason he's there, really.

The Followers don't need any specific class combination. Really, they're just there to be trusted cashiers.

As for the bit on money: Huh? Seriously? We're not making money out of thin air here (like with Wall of Iron), we're just manipulating an economy to change how cash flows in a way that benefits us, essentially arranging to convince everyone to work for us for food, health, and shelter-substitute, which we have a neigh-limitless amount of thanks to the magic trap rules and an initial investment of around 50,000 gp and around 4,000 xp. It'll take decades, if not centuries, to have that sort of an effect on the local economy anyway with that particular route. If money changes value, you just change prices & wages along with it, and it doesn't matter anymore. Meanwhile, the goods people are producing for you have their effective price based on their utility - which is reasonably fixed.

Hmm' well if you put it that way, it doesn't sound too broken [for a dm not a player to use], .Still doubt a dm would permit a player to pull that off, unless he had a good reason. But suppose the campaign began when your trap became more prominent, and it was called an automated tax apparatus, designed to redistribute wealth, and the entire economy followed the letter of your previous posts, it would be a sort of magitek industrial revolution.

[Jack_Simth]

Hmm' well if you put it that way, it doesn't sound too broken [for a dm not a player], infact a dm could use a trap like that to function like an pseudo automatic metro subway fare machine, taxing those whom cross the pathway, into the transportation guild's revenue.

Still doubt a dm would permit a player to pull that off, unless he had a good reason through.

Yes, you could build a subway on Dimension Door traps, quite effectively.

As for why I say it takes decades/centuries:

The DMG says the ready cash in the city is half the GP limit, times 1/10th the population. So a Small City of 10,000 people has 1,000*7,500=7,500,000 gp in cash. If *everyone* goes through the line every day, that's 50,000 cp (500 gp) drained from the economy in a day. It'll take 15,000 days (about 41 years) to drain the economy of coins completely. You'll be taking over before then, when the economy starts to collapse from lack of coinage, but this still isn't something that happens overnight, not by any stretch (figure about half the coins gone, at 20 years or so).

Oh yes, and to take over a metropolis this way? If there's 30,000 people, you're looking at 274 years for a complete coin drain, so around 137 years for a half-coinage economic takeover.

Hmm' well if you put it that way, it doesn't sound too broken [for a dm not a player to use], .Still doubt a dm would permit a player to pull that off, unless he had a good reason. But suppose the campaign began when your trap became more prominent, and it was called an automated tax apparatus, designed to redistribute wealth, and the entire economy followed the letter of your previous posts, it would be a sort of magitek industrial revolution.

You edited to something completely different...

And oh yes, this produces a 'points of light' campaign. Cities have little need to go into the surrounding countryside - so monsters take over outside them. Cities become close to impregnable (everyone's trained on something, and everyone can be trained on something skilled... and massed slingers with a mage in support for a Greater Magic Weapon spells (for DR penetration) and invisibility negation spells can take down Great Wyrms without too much trouble. However, away from the massed fire, monsters are safe from the cities, and individuals can get clobbered, easy.

And exiles from the cities form their own roving bands....

[Welknair]

Though this idea was originally begotten from spreading a light spell, it has since grown to be much more complex and expensive. Chances are that Continual Flames would be prevalent as you stated instead of using this system.

I'd say that Tapestries can be stretched a bit beyond their creature sizes. And Colossal is 64 and up. No cap put on that. I think I'll make it so Colossal requires epic level, but I'd allow it to span a city. Only the nobles and the like would actually be connected to the system and even then the spells would be worth something. We wouldn't be wasting the system on 0 level spells.

After a bit of jiggering, it became apparent that the system was better suited for small devices, mech suits, and skyships. The stats for the latter two are coming soon. The first is things along the line of the ray gun that I pointed out in my first post. Though it's quite expensive, a caster (who often has leftover spell levels) could store some energy and give this to a character with a higher AB. And technically it takes one hand to wield and as such could be dual-wielded. The skyships and mech suits are pure epic.

But yes, this system would be out of reach for the general populace.

[radmelon]

This looks to be quite an interesting idea. I'll keep my on on this.

[ocel]

yeah sorry about that, I edited it because it didn't sound coherent when I sent the first edition.