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3.5E Build to be a Ruler
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Harold Groot
Apr 13, 2012, 12:30:45 AM4/13/12
to
Assume that your character (just before starting his/her adventuring
career) Gets A Vision and is Absolutely Convinced of the following:
You will survive your adventuring career. When you reach 21st level
(there is no "Epic"), you will take the Leadership feat and Retire
From Adventuring. That's when your REAL work begins. You will be
given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled). You will be
given a rank of nobility (Baron or higher). You will gather together
settlers - farmers, craftsmen and so on - and Create A New Nation.
In terms of high level characters, assume it's pretty much just you
(21st level) and your cohort (maxed out at 17th level). You'll have
followers according to the Leadership Score of "25 or higher": i.e. 2
6th, 2 5th, 4 4th, 7 3rd, 13 2nd, and 135 1st.
What classes, feats and skills would you take to be best prepared for
the job of Ruler Of A New Nation? You'll have a personal wealth of
980K gp - what items would you like to purchase?
Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
of The Old Continent.
You will still be required every now and then to handle some Big
Monster threats yourself, but more often it will be natural disasters
(floods, droughts, hurricanes, plagues, etc.) or political stuff.
If you take crafting feats - let's say you went 4k XP into 21st level,
so that's all the XP you could spend on crafting. That 4k would
likewise the source of any XP used for PERMANENT spells or anything
else that would drain XP.
Let's assume that you decide that you want access to both 9th level
Wizard spells and 9th level Cleric spells (you take one, your cohort
takes the other). What sort of uses would you find for those spells?
Would you hand them out freely, without charge, for anyone who comes
up with a good idea for them?
For example:
Public health. Do you require everyone to come into town once per
week while you (or your cohort) casts a MASS HEAL on everyone?
Infrastucture - SHAPECHANGE can do lots of things. Big/strong shapes
for moving things, building roadbeds or irrigation canals or dredging
the harbor with the DISINTEGRATE ray of a Beholder, that sort of
thing.
1000 people is small enough to make all the important decisions
yourself - but that would take up a lot of your time and for many
free-spirited adventuring sorts it would tend to drive them crazy (and
besides, your colony is expected to grow). If you don't want to do it
all yourself, what sort of government might you set up to take care of
most of the routine stuff? In Court Cases, would you decide to use
divination spells like ZONE OF TRUTH and DETECT LIE (or even DETECT
THOUGHTS and COMMUNE) to arrive at the truth of things - or would you
go with modern ideas about rights of privacy and not being forced to
self-incriminate?
====================================================================
My own LG Non-Melee-Oriented (Buffer/Healer/Crafter) Divine Caster PC
(full cleric spellcasting levels so far) is in a similar but by no
means identical position. She's already 14th level and has been
choosing levels/feats/skills to assure success on the Adventuring
side. So even if she tries to optimize the last 7 levels for
Rulership, that's a far cry from optimizing them from level 1. So far
she only has a Hint that this is her ultimate destiny - she is FAR
from being Absolutely Convinced. And even if she believed in the
Hint, she'd think that the Adventure side (which will both Save Her
Civilization and Open Up The Entire Old Continent) is the most
important thing - even if she then struggled more with ruling her own
barony. On the plus side, the In-Adventure spending of XP on crafting
and PERMANENT spells and such that she's already done will be made up
for somewhat during the upcoming levels - though she'll probably keep
spending XP and keep lagging behind the others. (Her spending
includes 2 ATTONEMENT spells that the DM didn't think she needed to
take - she holds herself to A Higher Standard and took them anyway.)
She has a long, continuous history throughout this campaign of
developing as many friendships/contacts as possible. Even though she
will lose all her current ones as soon as we travel back to DM's
homeworld, if she continues her current way of doing things she will
make lots of new friends and contacts back there before her
retirement. So recuitment of skilled settlers should be relatively
easy for her - but if someone else is a Super-Diplomat Bard, maybe
they will get all the good people anyway.
My own PC is also limited to the books in play in our campaign. But
I'm curious to what might be out there in OGL-land, so feel free to
mention 3rd-party classes/feats/etc. Just please, give some sort of
description of what the 3rd-party things do. I have most of the WotC
stuff, but almost nothing that is 3rd-party.
(I actually don't think this campaign will ever make it that far - I
expect various Real Life Events will break up the group before we get
there. There are enough House Rules in play regarding PCs that
exporting this character to another campaign might be difficult - and
the new DM might have no interest in a "Build your Barony from the
ground up" Non-Adventuring scenario. So I'm expecting this all to be
moot - but it can be a pleasant diversion to think about it.)
career) Gets A Vision and is Absolutely Convinced of the following:
You will survive your adventuring career. When you reach 21st level
(there is no "Epic"), you will take the Leadership feat and Retire
From Adventuring. That's when your REAL work begins. You will be
given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled). You will be
given a rank of nobility (Baron or higher). You will gather together
settlers - farmers, craftsmen and so on - and Create A New Nation.
In terms of high level characters, assume it's pretty much just you
(21st level) and your cohort (maxed out at 17th level). You'll have
followers according to the Leadership Score of "25 or higher": i.e. 2
6th, 2 5th, 4 4th, 7 3rd, 13 2nd, and 135 1st.
What classes, feats and skills would you take to be best prepared for
the job of Ruler Of A New Nation? You'll have a personal wealth of
980K gp - what items would you like to purchase?
Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
of The Old Continent.
You will still be required every now and then to handle some Big
Monster threats yourself, but more often it will be natural disasters
(floods, droughts, hurricanes, plagues, etc.) or political stuff.
If you take crafting feats - let's say you went 4k XP into 21st level,
so that's all the XP you could spend on crafting. That 4k would
likewise the source of any XP used for PERMANENT spells or anything
else that would drain XP.
Let's assume that you decide that you want access to both 9th level
Wizard spells and 9th level Cleric spells (you take one, your cohort
takes the other). What sort of uses would you find for those spells?
Would you hand them out freely, without charge, for anyone who comes
up with a good idea for them?
For example:
Public health. Do you require everyone to come into town once per
week while you (or your cohort) casts a MASS HEAL on everyone?
Infrastucture - SHAPECHANGE can do lots of things. Big/strong shapes
for moving things, building roadbeds or irrigation canals or dredging
the harbor with the DISINTEGRATE ray of a Beholder, that sort of
thing.
1000 people is small enough to make all the important decisions
yourself - but that would take up a lot of your time and for many
free-spirited adventuring sorts it would tend to drive them crazy (and
besides, your colony is expected to grow). If you don't want to do it
all yourself, what sort of government might you set up to take care of
most of the routine stuff? In Court Cases, would you decide to use
divination spells like ZONE OF TRUTH and DETECT LIE (or even DETECT
THOUGHTS and COMMUNE) to arrive at the truth of things - or would you
go with modern ideas about rights of privacy and not being forced to
self-incriminate?
====================================================================
My own LG Non-Melee-Oriented (Buffer/Healer/Crafter) Divine Caster PC
(full cleric spellcasting levels so far) is in a similar but by no
means identical position. She's already 14th level and has been
choosing levels/feats/skills to assure success on the Adventuring
side. So even if she tries to optimize the last 7 levels for
Rulership, that's a far cry from optimizing them from level 1. So far
she only has a Hint that this is her ultimate destiny - she is FAR
from being Absolutely Convinced. And even if she believed in the
Hint, she'd think that the Adventure side (which will both Save Her
Civilization and Open Up The Entire Old Continent) is the most
important thing - even if she then struggled more with ruling her own
barony. On the plus side, the In-Adventure spending of XP on crafting
and PERMANENT spells and such that she's already done will be made up
for somewhat during the upcoming levels - though she'll probably keep
spending XP and keep lagging behind the others. (Her spending
includes 2 ATTONEMENT spells that the DM didn't think she needed to
take - she holds herself to A Higher Standard and took them anyway.)
She has a long, continuous history throughout this campaign of
developing as many friendships/contacts as possible. Even though she
will lose all her current ones as soon as we travel back to DM's
homeworld, if she continues her current way of doing things she will
make lots of new friends and contacts back there before her
retirement. So recuitment of skilled settlers should be relatively
easy for her - but if someone else is a Super-Diplomat Bard, maybe
they will get all the good people anyway.
My own PC is also limited to the books in play in our campaign. But
I'm curious to what might be out there in OGL-land, so feel free to
mention 3rd-party classes/feats/etc. Just please, give some sort of
description of what the 3rd-party things do. I have most of the WotC
stuff, but almost nothing that is 3rd-party.
(I actually don't think this campaign will ever make it that far - I
expect various Real Life Events will break up the group before we get
there. There are enough House Rules in play regarding PCs that
exporting this character to another campaign might be difficult - and
the new DM might have no interest in a "Build your Barony from the
ground up" Non-Adventuring scenario. So I'm expecting this all to be
moot - but it can be a pleasant diversion to think about it.)
Justisaur
Apr 13, 2012, 1:04:14 PM4/13/12
to
On Apr 12, 9:30 pm, ques...@infionline.net (Harold Groot) wrote:
> Assume that your character (just before starting his/her adventuring
> career) Gets A Vision and is Absolutely Convinced of the following:
>
> You will survive your adventuring career. When you reach 21st level
> (there is no "Epic"), you will take the Leadership feat and Retire
> From Adventuring. That's when your REAL work begins. You will be
> given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
> reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
> possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled). You will be
> given a rank of nobility (Baron or higher). You will gather together
> settlers - farmers, craftsmen and so on - and Create A New Nation.
>
> In terms of high level characters, assume it's pretty much just you
> (21st level) and your cohort (maxed out at 17th level). You'll have
> followers according to the Leadership Score of "25 or higher": i.e. 2
> 6th, 2 5th, 4 4th, 7 3rd, 13 2nd, and 135 1st.
>
> What classes, feats and skills would you take to be best prepared for
> the job of Ruler Of A New Nation? You'll have a personal wealth of
> 980K gp - what items would you like to purchase?
>
> Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
> your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
> of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
> of The Old Continent.
One of my campaigns got up to this point, only about 17th. I was a
> Assume that your character (just before starting his/her adventuring
> career) Gets A Vision and is Absolutely Convinced of the following:
>
> You will survive your adventuring career. When you reach 21st level
> (there is no "Epic"), you will take the Leadership feat and Retire
> From Adventuring. That's when your REAL work begins. You will be
> given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
> reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
> possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled). You will be
> given a rank of nobility (Baron or higher). You will gather together
> settlers - farmers, craftsmen and so on - and Create A New Nation.
>
> In terms of high level characters, assume it's pretty much just you
> (21st level) and your cohort (maxed out at 17th level). You'll have
> followers according to the Leadership Score of "25 or higher": i.e. 2
> 6th, 2 5th, 4 4th, 7 3rd, 13 2nd, and 135 1st.
>
> What classes, feats and skills would you take to be best prepared for
> the job of Ruler Of A New Nation? You'll have a personal wealth of
> 980K gp - what items would you like to purchase?
>
> Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
> your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
> of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
> of The Old Continent.
cleric. We used wall of stone a lot to create large houses to house
everyone defensive structures etc. The entire town was under a
permanent consecrate(whatever it's called), evil people couldn't enter
the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
- Justisaur
Rast
Apr 14, 2012, 5:28:37 AM4/14/12
to
Justisaur wrote...
Seriously though, did anyone else do a double take at that sentence?
Joe The Peasant becomes evil and dies?
> The entire town was under a
> permanent consecrate(whatever it's called), evil people couldn't enter
> the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
In the old days this would have been great flame bait.
> permanent consecrate(whatever it's called), evil people couldn't enter
> the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
Seriously though, did anyone else do a double take at that sentence?
Joe The Peasant becomes evil and dies?
Tetsubo
Apr 14, 2012, 5:44:11 AM4/14/12
to
works. And if the population knows about it, it's a self-selection
issue. Evil folks will just stay away. Or die.
--
Tetsubo
Deviant Art: http://ironstaff.deviantart.com/
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/tetsubo57
David Lamb
Apr 14, 2012, 9:23:10 AM4/14/12
to
On 13/04/2012 12:30 AM, Harold Groot wrote:
> What classes, feats and skills would you take to be best prepared for
> the job of Ruler Of A New Nation? You'll have a personal wealth of
> 980K gp - what items would you like to purchase?
I was always fond of the castle creation splatbook from 3.0, but that's
> What classes, feats and skills would you take to be best prepared for
> the job of Ruler Of A New Nation? You'll have a personal wealth of
> 980K gp - what items would you like to purchase?
a tangent I suppose.
Isn't Diplomacy a necessary skill? One use that occurred to me is
convincing the populace that some court judgement you make is the right
one, if the case was controversial.
I suspect you're right that either you or your cohort would need to be a
cleric, for all those nice divine "help people out" spells like remove
disease, create food and water (not enough for a siege, perhaps, unless
the cleric spends a LOT of time making scrolls and adventuring enough to
replenish the XP. Or you have a constant source of income to buy them
from other people).
Following your rules about Leadership -- do you let your minions take
adventuring classes, or just NPC ones?
This will require a lot more thought; I hope to post more later today or
tomorrow.
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
Apr 14, 2012, 11:22:36 AM4/14/12
to
makes perfect sense.
--
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Website: http://www.grandcentralarena.com Blog:
http://seawasp.livejournal.com
Harold Groot
Apr 14, 2012, 5:59:52 PM4/14/12
to
On Sat, 14 Apr 2012 09:23:10 -0400, David Lamb <dal...@cs.queensu.ca>
wrote:
Since cohorts have adventuring classes, I see no reason why the
followers can't as well. So you can have 6th level clerics around to
help with accidents, disease and so on if you decide to. Or a 6th
level bard to keep spirits up, inspire competence, and access a few
spells the PC and cohort can't.
One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself. You can't have your cohort
take the Leadership feat and get his own cohort who also takes
Leadersip and have it cascade all the way down. If a cohort or
follower became a Leader, they'd go off on their own rather than stay
attached to the PC. Cohorts and followers also will not blindly spend
their money (from the NPC money table, not the PC money table) on
precisely what you want them to. They should be people who make
certain decisions on their own, not puppets who blindly follow
everything the PC says. But that said, a cooperative approach
(avoiding duplication, etc.) is quite likely.
In terms of raw spellpower, you COULD have the 21st level PC have
access to 9th level Cleric, Druid and Wizard spells - along with
access to 4th level Ranger, Paladin and Blackguard spells. Archivest
3 (Heroes of Horror - gives access to ALL divine spells, though aside
from a couple free cleric spells at each level you need to acquire the
rest of them on scrolls and copy them into a prayerbook that is
essentially a spellbook), Wizard 3, True Necromancer 14 (Libris Mortis
- much like Mystic Theurge, go up 1 level of both divine and arcane
caster at most levels) and Mystic Theurge 1 (DMG) would do it. You'd
have (mixed) divine spellcasting at 17th level and also Wizard casting
at 17th level. Now, True Necromancer requires a non-good alignment.
That could be a problem in trying to make the "best" ruler build. But
while having a good alignment makes a fine start for a "best" ruler, I
don't suppose it's an absolute requirement. A case could be made for
having a ruler who was willing to make the hard choices, to do
whatever it takes for the good of all - sacrifice some so that others
might live, that sort of thing.
wrote:
followers can't as well. So you can have 6th level clerics around to
help with accidents, disease and so on if you decide to. Or a 6th
level bard to keep spirits up, inspire competence, and access a few
spells the PC and cohort can't.
One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself. You can't have your cohort
take the Leadership feat and get his own cohort who also takes
Leadersip and have it cascade all the way down. If a cohort or
follower became a Leader, they'd go off on their own rather than stay
attached to the PC. Cohorts and followers also will not blindly spend
their money (from the NPC money table, not the PC money table) on
precisely what you want them to. They should be people who make
certain decisions on their own, not puppets who blindly follow
everything the PC says. But that said, a cooperative approach
(avoiding duplication, etc.) is quite likely.
In terms of raw spellpower, you COULD have the 21st level PC have
access to 9th level Cleric, Druid and Wizard spells - along with
access to 4th level Ranger, Paladin and Blackguard spells. Archivest
3 (Heroes of Horror - gives access to ALL divine spells, though aside
from a couple free cleric spells at each level you need to acquire the
rest of them on scrolls and copy them into a prayerbook that is
essentially a spellbook), Wizard 3, True Necromancer 14 (Libris Mortis
- much like Mystic Theurge, go up 1 level of both divine and arcane
caster at most levels) and Mystic Theurge 1 (DMG) would do it. You'd
have (mixed) divine spellcasting at 17th level and also Wizard casting
at 17th level. Now, True Necromancer requires a non-good alignment.
That could be a problem in trying to make the "best" ruler build. But
while having a good alignment makes a fine start for a "best" ruler, I
don't suppose it's an absolute requirement. A case could be made for
having a ruler who was willing to make the hard choices, to do
whatever it takes for the good of all - sacrifice some so that others
might live, that sort of thing.
Harold Groot
Apr 15, 2012, 9:08:19 PM4/15/12
to
Some thoughts on useful class abilities for a ruler:
The Church Inquisitor PrC (Complete Divine) allows one to become
completely immune to charm, compulsion and possession effects. Even
for a (mega-buffed) PC that routinely "Fails saves only on a natural
1", there is a certain appeal in actual immunity. There have been a
LOT of stories/adventures/movies/TV shows that deal with someone
influencing or taking over the person in charge. Failing a save 1 in
20 leaves this as an area of risk. Even with a domain ability or feat
or magic item that allows a retry on the save, getting a second 1 is
always possible. But rather than take all those levels in Church
Inquisitor (and limit yourself to LN or LG alignment), I think that a
Luck Feat (Dumb Luck) can get you "enough" security". Once per day
you don't merely get a reroll, you treat a natural 1 as a natural 20.
So in the 1-in-400 chance of getting two ones, you STILL save. (There
is a small amount of room for disagreement as to whether or not you
can wait to apply Dumb Luck to the second roll, but if your campaign
wouldn't allow it you can always just apply it to the first roll.)
This would also be of great use with a relic my current PC has. She
is a cleric of Wee Jas and has a set of Scrolls Of Uncertain
Provenance. This is a risky item to use - there is always a
requirement for either a Fortitude Save or a Will Save, and there are
those pesky natural 1 rolls to worry about. For the Fortitude save
she has a Headband of Conscious Effort that lets her substitute a
Concentration Check - and a natural 1 is not an automatic failure on
skill checks. For the Will Save she has an Amulet of Fortune
Prevailing (which gives her a retry on a save once per day). But if
she gets two natural 1s in a row, she turns into a ghost for a year.
So having the Guarenteed success of Dumb Luck available would really
be helpful. But our House Rules don't allow Luck Feats. They also
don't allow the spells that aren't in the PH or SC, so I can't (for
example) use ALTER FORTUNE (from PH2) to try to move the first roll
away from a "make a Will Save" result into a "make a Fortitude Save"
(which would then be changed to the Concentration Check). But the
optimized, RAW PC would not be dealing with these House Rules.
(Mind you, I'm not complaining in general about the House Rules in
this campaign. Though there are several pages of them, there are
rules that favor the PCs as well as those that work against them.
Overall it comes out pretty even. You just have different options in
some places and must therefore consider different choices and
tradeoffs - and it would be very difficult to move such a PC to
another campaign if this one ended. So far she has taken her chances
building up to The Final Showdown - but doing that for just a dozen
days is much different from doing it every day for years.)
The Dweomerkeeper PrC (from the Divine Web Enhancement on the WotC
website) is also worth a look. Mainly, it lets you cast a few spells
per day (only spells of 1 standard action or less to cast, though) as
a Supernatural ability. SU have no spell components, so you not only
save on spells that cost a lot of money but also on spells that cost
you XP! Of course, the casting time limit prevents it from being used
on RAISE DEAD, RESURRECTION and TRUE RESURRECTION - but LIMITED WISH
and WISH don't take too long to cast.
There are some questions about this SORT of thing, though. Spell-like
abilities don't require spell components - but while the earlier "cast
as Spell-like" conversions that I saw didn't say anything about it,
several of the later descriptions I saw of specific devices/abilities
started adding the standard spell XP cost back in. A case could be
made that not only should ALL "cast as Spell-like" conversions require
the standard spell XP to be spent, but that all "cast as Supernatural"
conversions should likewise require the standard XP cost. For
game-balance reasons it makes a LOT of sense - but I don't think it's
been formalized anywhere as part of RAW. (If it has been, please
point me to it.)
Dweomerkeeper also lets you designate a few spells that you can
spontaneously convert other spells to (as clerics do with CURE
spells). This has been of GREAT use to my PC as an adventurer, but
I'm not so sure it would be of as much use running a Barony. Since
the great majority of spells in the books are NOT of much use outside
an armed conflict, you'd generally be able to just memorize the ones
that WERE useful in sufficient quantities. Perhaps a "Best Ruler"
would want to designate some combat spells in this category. Then the
ruler could memorize a full slate of the
only-useful-in-non-combat-situations spells, and still be able to
switch over to combat if it came as a surprise. (Of course, a
Runestaff or three could do the same thing. That only costs money,
not your class levels. But if you're going for the Dweomerkeeper
Supernatural Casting anyway....)
The Church Inquisitor PrC (Complete Divine) allows one to become
completely immune to charm, compulsion and possession effects. Even
for a (mega-buffed) PC that routinely "Fails saves only on a natural
1", there is a certain appeal in actual immunity. There have been a
LOT of stories/adventures/movies/TV shows that deal with someone
influencing or taking over the person in charge. Failing a save 1 in
20 leaves this as an area of risk. Even with a domain ability or feat
or magic item that allows a retry on the save, getting a second 1 is
always possible. But rather than take all those levels in Church
Inquisitor (and limit yourself to LN or LG alignment), I think that a
Luck Feat (Dumb Luck) can get you "enough" security". Once per day
you don't merely get a reroll, you treat a natural 1 as a natural 20.
So in the 1-in-400 chance of getting two ones, you STILL save. (There
is a small amount of room for disagreement as to whether or not you
can wait to apply Dumb Luck to the second roll, but if your campaign
wouldn't allow it you can always just apply it to the first roll.)
This would also be of great use with a relic my current PC has. She
is a cleric of Wee Jas and has a set of Scrolls Of Uncertain
Provenance. This is a risky item to use - there is always a
requirement for either a Fortitude Save or a Will Save, and there are
those pesky natural 1 rolls to worry about. For the Fortitude save
she has a Headband of Conscious Effort that lets her substitute a
Concentration Check - and a natural 1 is not an automatic failure on
skill checks. For the Will Save she has an Amulet of Fortune
Prevailing (which gives her a retry on a save once per day). But if
she gets two natural 1s in a row, she turns into a ghost for a year.
So having the Guarenteed success of Dumb Luck available would really
be helpful. But our House Rules don't allow Luck Feats. They also
don't allow the spells that aren't in the PH or SC, so I can't (for
example) use ALTER FORTUNE (from PH2) to try to move the first roll
away from a "make a Will Save" result into a "make a Fortitude Save"
(which would then be changed to the Concentration Check). But the
optimized, RAW PC would not be dealing with these House Rules.
(Mind you, I'm not complaining in general about the House Rules in
this campaign. Though there are several pages of them, there are
rules that favor the PCs as well as those that work against them.
Overall it comes out pretty even. You just have different options in
some places and must therefore consider different choices and
tradeoffs - and it would be very difficult to move such a PC to
another campaign if this one ended. So far she has taken her chances
building up to The Final Showdown - but doing that for just a dozen
days is much different from doing it every day for years.)
The Dweomerkeeper PrC (from the Divine Web Enhancement on the WotC
website) is also worth a look. Mainly, it lets you cast a few spells
per day (only spells of 1 standard action or less to cast, though) as
a Supernatural ability. SU have no spell components, so you not only
save on spells that cost a lot of money but also on spells that cost
you XP! Of course, the casting time limit prevents it from being used
on RAISE DEAD, RESURRECTION and TRUE RESURRECTION - but LIMITED WISH
and WISH don't take too long to cast.
There are some questions about this SORT of thing, though. Spell-like
abilities don't require spell components - but while the earlier "cast
as Spell-like" conversions that I saw didn't say anything about it,
several of the later descriptions I saw of specific devices/abilities
started adding the standard spell XP cost back in. A case could be
made that not only should ALL "cast as Spell-like" conversions require
the standard spell XP to be spent, but that all "cast as Supernatural"
conversions should likewise require the standard XP cost. For
game-balance reasons it makes a LOT of sense - but I don't think it's
been formalized anywhere as part of RAW. (If it has been, please
point me to it.)
Dweomerkeeper also lets you designate a few spells that you can
spontaneously convert other spells to (as clerics do with CURE
spells). This has been of GREAT use to my PC as an adventurer, but
I'm not so sure it would be of as much use running a Barony. Since
the great majority of spells in the books are NOT of much use outside
an armed conflict, you'd generally be able to just memorize the ones
that WERE useful in sufficient quantities. Perhaps a "Best Ruler"
would want to designate some combat spells in this category. Then the
ruler could memorize a full slate of the
only-useful-in-non-combat-situations spells, and still be able to
switch over to combat if it came as a surprise. (Of course, a
Runestaff or three could do the same thing. That only costs money,
not your class levels. But if you're going for the Dweomerkeeper
Supernatural Casting anyway....)
David Lamb
Apr 17, 2012, 12:01:13 PM4/17/12
to
On 13/04/2012 12:30 AM, Harold Groot wrote:
> You will be
> given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
> reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
> possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled).
> given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
> reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
> possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled).
> Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
> your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
> of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
> of The Old Continent.
Some questions about the setup:
> your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
> of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
> of The Old Continent.
Pennsylvania is pretty big -- 280 x 160 miles according to Wikipedia,
and about 46,000 square miles. If this is classic pseudo-middle ages,
villages are typically only about 6 miles apart. That suggests
1) people are clustered near your capital and most of the territory is
unused OR
2) villages are really spread out (perhaps a mining village off in the
mountains, a few other specialized towns near major resources)
#2 means travel time is a huge deal, and you or your cohort might need
to do a lot of teleporting. Maybe you need to research a non-trap
version of Teleport Circle -- something like the psionic abilities for
teleport anchors and teleport-to-anchor. This was one feature of
Feist's novels -- major landowners had such teleport anchors for the
Great Ones to be able to visit them more easily.
There wouldn't be a heck of a lot of court intrigue or politics locally.
Do you expect to have to deal with the higher nobility in other similar
colonies (those "500 miles apart" places)?
Harold Groot
Apr 18, 2012, 1:29:41 AM4/18/12
to
On Tue, 17 Apr 2012 12:01:13 -0400, David Lamb <dal...@cs.queensu.ca>
wrote:
>On 13/04/2012 12:30 AM, Harold Groot wrote:
>> You will be
>> given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
>> reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
>> possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled).
>> Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
>> your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
>> of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
>> of The Old Continent.
>
>Some questions about the setup:
>
>Pennsylvania is pretty big -- 280 x 160 miles according to Wikipedia,
>and about 46,000 square miles. If this is classic pseudo-middle ages,
>villages are typically only about 6 miles apart. That suggests
>1) people are clustered near your capital and most of the territory is
>unused OR
>2) villages are really spread out (perhaps a mining village off in the
>mountains, a few other specialized towns near major resources)
You get to determine how many settlements, how far apart and so on.
Put your 1000 people where you want them. Assume there is enough
variety that there are enough harbors, rivers (navigable at least a
ways upstream), plains, hills, mountains and so on to give you
choices. Some will be better than others, so scouting out a good
location can help a lot. Or maybe at that point you spend the XP on a
COMMUNE spell to decide where the best location is.
>#2 means travel time is a huge deal, and you or your cohort might need
>to do a lot of teleporting. Maybe you need to research a non-trap
>version of Teleport Circle -- something like the psionic abilities for
>teleport anchors and teleport-to-anchor. This was one feature of
>Feist's novels -- major landowners had such teleport anchors for the
>Great Ones to be able to visit them more easily.
I'm not sure what you mean by "research a non-trap version of Teleport
Circle". The 9th level spell TELEPORTATION CIRCLE is NOT limited to
use in traps. It is quite reasonable to use it for goverment use, or
to open it up to commercial use, or anything else, just as you please.
Of course, it is expensive to use on a one-shot basis (1000 gp). A
possibility is to add a PERMANENCY, but that requires a 17th level
caster (which you should have) and 4500 XP (which you do not). I
believe I specified that the PC had traveled only 4k above 21st level,
so the PC couldn't do it by himself (you can't do an effect that drops
you a level). But I believe there are rules where two people can
cooperate in making a magic item and can share the cost in XP - so if
the cohort can give some of the needed XP a single PERMANENT
TELEPORTATION CIRCLE might be established. (Or maybe the Cohort is
the one casting the PERMANENCY spell and it's the PC who is providing
extra XP.) In those cases, though, there's usually a sharing of
duties as well. One person has the needed feat, one person has the
needed spell, something like that. It's not obvious how one could
split a single spell. But if one person cast PERMANENCY and another
cast MIRACLE (which has the power to duplicate PERMANENCY) to ask that
the XP cost be shared, I'd probably allow it....
If instead you're looking for something (not in the books) that would
do away with the possible error involved with a simple TELEPORT spell,
well, magical research costs money and takes time.
Naturally, there are several things you can change into with
SHAPECHANGE that have Teleport-Without-Error abilities at will. But
these are usually limited to "Self + 50 pounds of items". Still, a
few tons each day could be a big help to a new colony. And if you
want to recruit additional colonists, well, this new colony isn't
"instant death" if you land in the wrong place. Usually if you missed
on the first casting you would have plenty of time to get it right on
the 2nd TELEPORT try (or you could use GREATER TELEPORT to avoid that
whole problem when bringing in people). There is also PLANE SHIFT
(out) and GREATER PLANE SHIFT (coming back in) for a slightly "round
the bush" way of travel between continents (or colonies).
>There wouldn't be a heck of a lot of court intrigue or politics locally.
>Do you expect to have to deal with the higher nobility in other similar
>colonies (those "500 miles apart" places)?
"HAVE to deal with" them? Well, for the most part that would be up to
you. I can certainly see significant ADVANTAGES in sending out
ambassadors, signing treaties, setting up rules for trade and so on.
But if you'd prefer to be a total isolationist colony, you could make
it illegal for your own people to leave, illegal for outsiders to come
in and so on. I'd think that would lower your popular support,
though. It's generally a LOT easier to trade whatever you have in
surplus for something that someone ELSE has in surplus than it is to
make everything yourself. I won't specify what each colony might
have, just that there would be several items suitable for trade in
each colony (though it could take some time to locate them and/or
develop them so that they were available in sufficient quantity to
trade).
But the political stuff isn't something that you'd have to do
yourself. A 6th level Bard follower might be an excellent
Ambassador-at-large. 9 ranks in Diplomacy and a +3 Charisma bonus
would be within reason for a Bard follower. Probably no feats that
boost it further, though - that would require a lot of luck. (You
don't get to optimize your followers.) Putting some of your own money
into a CHA enhancement item for him/her would be reasonable, too.
He/she would probably be using it MUCH more often than you would be.
wrote:
>On 13/04/2012 12:30 AM, Harold Groot wrote:
>> You will be
>> given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
>> reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
>> possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled).
>> Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
>> your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
>> of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
>> of The Old Continent.
>
>Some questions about the setup:
>
>Pennsylvania is pretty big -- 280 x 160 miles according to Wikipedia,
>and about 46,000 square miles. If this is classic pseudo-middle ages,
>villages are typically only about 6 miles apart. That suggests
>1) people are clustered near your capital and most of the territory is
>unused OR
>2) villages are really spread out (perhaps a mining village off in the
>mountains, a few other specialized towns near major resources)
Put your 1000 people where you want them. Assume there is enough
variety that there are enough harbors, rivers (navigable at least a
ways upstream), plains, hills, mountains and so on to give you
choices. Some will be better than others, so scouting out a good
location can help a lot. Or maybe at that point you spend the XP on a
COMMUNE spell to decide where the best location is.
>#2 means travel time is a huge deal, and you or your cohort might need
>to do a lot of teleporting. Maybe you need to research a non-trap
>version of Teleport Circle -- something like the psionic abilities for
>teleport anchors and teleport-to-anchor. This was one feature of
>Feist's novels -- major landowners had such teleport anchors for the
>Great Ones to be able to visit them more easily.
Circle". The 9th level spell TELEPORTATION CIRCLE is NOT limited to
use in traps. It is quite reasonable to use it for goverment use, or
to open it up to commercial use, or anything else, just as you please.
Of course, it is expensive to use on a one-shot basis (1000 gp). A
possibility is to add a PERMANENCY, but that requires a 17th level
caster (which you should have) and 4500 XP (which you do not). I
believe I specified that the PC had traveled only 4k above 21st level,
so the PC couldn't do it by himself (you can't do an effect that drops
you a level). But I believe there are rules where two people can
cooperate in making a magic item and can share the cost in XP - so if
the cohort can give some of the needed XP a single PERMANENT
TELEPORTATION CIRCLE might be established. (Or maybe the Cohort is
the one casting the PERMANENCY spell and it's the PC who is providing
extra XP.) In those cases, though, there's usually a sharing of
duties as well. One person has the needed feat, one person has the
needed spell, something like that. It's not obvious how one could
split a single spell. But if one person cast PERMANENCY and another
cast MIRACLE (which has the power to duplicate PERMANENCY) to ask that
the XP cost be shared, I'd probably allow it....
If instead you're looking for something (not in the books) that would
do away with the possible error involved with a simple TELEPORT spell,
well, magical research costs money and takes time.
Naturally, there are several things you can change into with
SHAPECHANGE that have Teleport-Without-Error abilities at will. But
these are usually limited to "Self + 50 pounds of items". Still, a
few tons each day could be a big help to a new colony. And if you
want to recruit additional colonists, well, this new colony isn't
"instant death" if you land in the wrong place. Usually if you missed
on the first casting you would have plenty of time to get it right on
the 2nd TELEPORT try (or you could use GREATER TELEPORT to avoid that
whole problem when bringing in people). There is also PLANE SHIFT
(out) and GREATER PLANE SHIFT (coming back in) for a slightly "round
the bush" way of travel between continents (or colonies).
>There wouldn't be a heck of a lot of court intrigue or politics locally.
>Do you expect to have to deal with the higher nobility in other similar
>colonies (those "500 miles apart" places)?
you. I can certainly see significant ADVANTAGES in sending out
ambassadors, signing treaties, setting up rules for trade and so on.
But if you'd prefer to be a total isolationist colony, you could make
it illegal for your own people to leave, illegal for outsiders to come
in and so on. I'd think that would lower your popular support,
though. It's generally a LOT easier to trade whatever you have in
surplus for something that someone ELSE has in surplus than it is to
make everything yourself. I won't specify what each colony might
have, just that there would be several items suitable for trade in
each colony (though it could take some time to locate them and/or
develop them so that they were available in sufficient quantity to
trade).
But the political stuff isn't something that you'd have to do
yourself. A 6th level Bard follower might be an excellent
Ambassador-at-large. 9 ranks in Diplomacy and a +3 Charisma bonus
would be within reason for a Bard follower. Probably no feats that
boost it further, though - that would require a lot of luck. (You
don't get to optimize your followers.) Putting some of your own money
into a CHA enhancement item for him/her would be reasonable, too.
He/she would probably be using it MUCH more often than you would be.
David Lamb
Apr 20, 2012, 7:45:38 AM4/20/12
to
On 18/04/2012 1:29 AM, Harold Groot wrote:
> On Tue, 17 Apr 2012 12:01:13 -0400, David Lamb<dal...@cs.queensu.ca>
> wrote:
>
>> On 13/04/2012 12:30 AM, Harold Groot wrote:
>>> You will be
>>> given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
>>> reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
>>> possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled).
>>> Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
>>> your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
>>> of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
>>> of The Old Continent.
> On Tue, 17 Apr 2012 12:01:13 -0400, David Lamb<dal...@cs.queensu.ca>
> wrote:
>
>> On 13/04/2012 12:30 AM, Harold Groot wrote:
>>> You will be
>>> given a huge land grant in The Old Continent (abandoned with good
>>> reason a long time ago, you and your Adventuring comrades have made it
>>> possible for the entire Old Continent to be resettled).
>>> Figure you and your followers and settlers will total 1000 people,
>>> your land grant is the size of Pennsylvania and that there's a handful
>>> of other new colonies spaced out every 500 miles or so along the coast
>>> of The Old Continent.
>> #2 means travel time is a huge deal, and you or your cohort might need
>> to do a lot of teleporting. Maybe you need to research a non-trap
>> version of Teleport Circle -- something like the psionic abilities for
>> teleport anchors and teleport-to-anchor.
>
>> to do a lot of teleporting. Maybe you need to research a non-trap
>> version of Teleport Circle -- something like the psionic abilities for
>> teleport anchors and teleport-to-anchor.
>
> I'm not sure what you mean by "research a non-trap version of Teleport
> Circle". The 9th level spell TELEPORTATION CIRCLE is NOT limited to
> use in traps. It is quite reasonable to use it for goverment use, or
> to open it up to commercial use, or anything else, just as you please.
>
> Of course, it is expensive to use on a one-shot basis (1000 gp). A
> possibility is to add a PERMANENCY, but that requires a 17th level
> caster (which you should have) and 4500 XP (which you do not).
That's why I was pondering some form of "making teleport to a fixed
> Circle". The 9th level spell TELEPORTATION CIRCLE is NOT limited to
> use in traps. It is quite reasonable to use it for goverment use, or
> to open it up to commercial use, or anything else, just as you please.
>
> Of course, it is expensive to use on a one-shot basis (1000 gp). A
> possibility is to add a PERMANENCY, but that requires a 17th level
> caster (which you should have) and 4500 XP (which you do not).
location cheaper and easier". Even outside the context of this specific
exercise, I've wanted some way to teleport without error to a specific
location. Someone could create an "anchor" point and allow people to
attune themselves to it; thereafter a spell perhaps one level cheaper
than Teleport could reach it consistently.
However, even without the convenience of such a new spell, it seems to
me that rapid travel to the various towns of one's land grant (once
they're established), plus to and from various markets for one's goods,
is tremendously important. I was thinking of having either the main
character or the cohort take the 3 levels of Wayfarer Guide just for the
extra transport capacity (+1 Medium creatures per WG level; 2 levels
give a Large creature with full load). Whoever had cleric levels could
take the Travel domain, to give access to Teleport, or whoever had mage
levels could take it. It would be better for the main to do so, since
2nd level WG doesn't give spell levels and the cohort would lose a level
of spells.
That might be overkill for transporting trade goods, but the willingness
to use teleport for this purpose might be part of the colony's
"competitive advantage".
>
>> There wouldn't be a heck of a lot of court intrigue or politics locally.
>> Do you expect to have to deal with the higher nobility in other similar
>> colonies (those "500 miles apart" places)?
>
> "HAVE to deal with" them? Well, for the most part that would be up to
> you. I can certainly see significant ADVANTAGES in sending out
> ambassadors, signing treaties, setting up rules for trade and so on.
empire's court. Were you thinking of allowing some form of Contacts?
IIRC there are 2 different versions, one in UA and one in some other
splatbook (perhaps Cityscape)?
> ... It's generally a LOT easier to trade whatever you have in
> surplus for something that someone ELSE has in surplus than it is to
> make everything yourself. I won't specify what each colony might
> have, just that there would be several items suitable for trade in
> each colony (though it could take some time to locate them and/or
> develop them so that they were available in sufficient quantity to
> trade).
Yes -- this is part of why I was asking about teleport as a potential
> make everything yourself. I won't specify what each colony might
> have, just that there would be several items suitable for trade in
> each colony (though it could take some time to locate them and/or
> develop them so that they were available in sufficient quantity to
> trade).
commercial advantage. Also, before setting up any secondary villages,
the main and cohort would have to do a lot of exploring to locate those
tradeable items (find groves of spices; locate minerals or gems; find
rare animals that could be trained and sold, etc.)
> But the political stuff isn't something that you'd have to do
> yourself. A 6th level Bard follower might be an excellent
> Ambassador-at-large. 9 ranks in Diplomacy and a +3 Charisma bonus
> would be within reason for a Bard follower. Probably no feats that
> boost it further, though - that would require a lot of luck. (You
> don't get to optimize your followers.)
certainly hope you'd allow us to pick class levels. A particular array
for abilities? If we don't get to pick their feats, how would you
determine them?
> into a CHA enhancement item for him/her would be reasonable, too.
> He/she would probably be using it MUCH more often than you would be.
> don't get to optimize your followers.) Putting some of your own money
> into a CHA enhancement item for him/her would be reasonable, too.
> He/she would probably be using it MUCH more often than you would be.
for small values of N and M. N*N*M*100, I think.
Ubiquitous
Apr 25, 2012, 6:03:56 AM4/25/12
to
ra...@yahoo.com wrote:
>Justisaur wrote...
>> The entire town was under a permanent consecrate(whatever
>> it's called), evil people couldn't enter
>> the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
>
>Justisaur wrote...
>> The entire town was under a permanent consecrate(whatever
>> it's called), evil people couldn't enter
>> the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
>
>Seriously though, did anyone else do a double take at that sentence?
>Joe The Peasant becomes evil and dies?
Yes, I noticed that he's thinking of another spell. Consecrate affects
>Joe The Peasant becomes evil and dies?
undead.
--
"If I Wanted America to Fail"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZ-4gnNz0vc&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Ubiquitous
Apr 25, 2012, 6:06:06 AM4/25/12
to
que...@infionline.net wrote:
>One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
>One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
Ubiquitous
Apr 25, 2012, 6:07:31 AM4/25/12
to
que...@infionline.net wrote:
>Since cohorts have adventuring classes, I see no reason why the
>followers can't as well. So you can have 6th level clerics around to
>help with accidents, disease and so on if you decide to. Or a 6th
>level bard to keep spirits up, inspire competence, and access a few
>spells the PC and cohort can't.
If memory serves, followers are only listed by level, not class.
>Since cohorts have adventuring classes, I see no reason why the
>followers can't as well. So you can have 6th level clerics around to
>help with accidents, disease and so on if you decide to. Or a 6th
>level bard to keep spirits up, inspire competence, and access a few
>spells the PC and cohort can't.
For that I would use the 1st or 2nd edition follower rules/tables.
David Lamb
Apr 25, 2012, 7:08:59 AM4/25/12
to
On 25/04/2012 6:06 AM, Ubiquitous wrote:
> que...@infionline.net wrote:
>
>> One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>> PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>
> I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
I don't see it in the description at d20srd.org, so it might just be an
> que...@infionline.net wrote:
>
>> One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>> PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>
> I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
assumption people make, or a common house rule (since I seem to recall
being told the same thing once upon a time).
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#leadership
David Lamb
Apr 25, 2012, 7:17:20 AM4/25/12
to
>> One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>> PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>
>> PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>
Ubiquitous
Apr 25, 2012, 10:42:06 AM4/25/12
to
but never followed it through. We also wondered if taking it multiple times
would result in more cohorts or whether you could pick up as many as you
wanted.
I seem to recall seeing some Leadership feat trees too.
David Lamb
Apr 25, 2012, 11:53:43 AM4/25/12
to
On 25/04/2012 10:42 AM, Ubiquitous wrote:
> In article<jn8m1l$ncs$1...@dont-email.me>, dal...@cs.queensu.ca wrote:
>> On 25/04/2012 6:06 AM, Ubiquitous wrote:
>>> que...@infionline.net wrote:
>
>>>> One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>>>> PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>>>
>>> I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
>>
>> I don't see it in the description at d20srd.org, so it might just be an
>> assumption people make, or a common house rule (since I seem to recall
>> being told the same thing once upon a time).
>>
>> http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#leadership
>
> Yeah, we always contemplated the implications of "chaining" Leadership feats
> but never followed it through. We also wondered if taking it multiple times
> would result in more cohorts or whether you could pick up as many as you
> wanted.
ISTM it's a perfectly good interpretation for this "you're a ruler"
> In article<jn8m1l$ncs$1...@dont-email.me>, dal...@cs.queensu.ca wrote:
>> On 25/04/2012 6:06 AM, Ubiquitous wrote:
>>> que...@infionline.net wrote:
>
>>>> One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>>>> PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>>>
>>> I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
>>
>> I don't see it in the description at d20srd.org, so it might just be an
>> assumption people make, or a common house rule (since I seem to recall
>> being told the same thing once upon a time).
>>
>> http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#leadership
>
> Yeah, we always contemplated the implications of "chaining" Leadership feats
> but never followed it through. We also wondered if taking it multiple times
> would result in more cohorts or whether you could pick up as many as you
> wanted.
situation - You need a fair number of good people to be able to run a
large land grant. The secondary cohorts should have to follow the
normal rules, though, so they'd likely have lower charisma scores and
thus lower leadership scores.
El Rico D
Apr 25, 2012, 12:56:19 PM4/25/12
to
On Apr 25, 3:06 am, Ubiquitous <web...@polaris.net> wrote:
> ques...@infionline.net wrote:
> >One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
> >PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>
> I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
It's implied in the DMG description - "Cohorts are not leaders."
> >One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
> >PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>
> I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
David Lamb
Apr 25, 2012, 2:46:09 PM4/25/12
to
Ubiquitous
Apr 25, 2012, 6:48:45 PM4/25/12
to
but it seems a weak one to me.
Ubiquitous
Apr 25, 2012, 6:50:01 PM4/25/12
to
Harold Groot
Apr 25, 2012, 7:02:09 PM4/25/12
to
On Wed, 25 Apr 2012 06:06:06 -0400, Ubiquitous <web...@polaris.net>
wrote:
>que...@infionline.net wrote:
>
>>One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>>PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>
>I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
3.5E DMG p. 104 "Cohorts are not leaders."
wrote:
>que...@infionline.net wrote:
>
>>One of the few things cohorts and followers DON'T have available (that
>>PCs do) is the Leadership feat itself.
>
>I have no recollection of that rule. Is it one of your house rules?
Harold Groot
Apr 25, 2012, 7:21:53 PM4/25/12
to
On Wed, 25 Apr 2012 07:17:20 -0400, David Lamb <dal...@cs.queensu.ca>
wrote:
In the 3.5E DMG, it's not in the wording of the feat itself on page
106. Instead, it's in the more general section just before (about
various types of Frields - Allies, Cohorts, Followers) that is on page
104. (The SRD, while very useful, leaves out many things that are in
the books.) The key paragrpah is this:
"Cohorts are people who take on a subservient role. Cohorts are not
leaders. They might voice an opinion now and again, but for the most
part, they do as they are told."
wrote:
106. Instead, it's in the more general section just before (about
various types of Frields - Allies, Cohorts, Followers) that is on page
104. (The SRD, while very useful, leaves out many things that are in
the books.) The key paragrpah is this:
"Cohorts are people who take on a subservient role. Cohorts are not
leaders. They might voice an opinion now and again, but for the most
part, they do as they are told."
Harold Groot
Apr 25, 2012, 8:50:35 PM4/25/12
to
On Wed, 25 Apr 2012 06:03:56 -0400, Ubiquitous <web...@polaris.net>
wrote:
>ra...@yahoo.com wrote:
>>Justisaur wrote...
>
>>> The entire town was under a permanent consecrate(whatever
>>> it's called), evil people couldn't enter
>>> the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
>>
>>Seriously though, did anyone else do a double take at that sentence?
>>Joe The Peasant becomes evil and dies?
>
>Yes, I noticed that he's thinking of another spell. Consecrate affects
>undead.
I'd imagine FORBIDDENCE is what he had in mind. However, I've got
doubts that it would work exactly as described. It's designed to deal
damage to someone of the wrong alignment who enters the town. Assume
the caster is LG: it doesn't do damage to someone evil who is already
in the area when it is cast. And once an evil person takes damage
coming in, they don't take additional damage by staying there. So
"being evil in the area of effect" is not what triggers damage, it's
"being evil and ENTERING the area of effect." If someone "became evil
while in the area of effect", I don't think that that should trigger
it.
It's also rather expensive to try to protect a large area. 1500 base
cost for the spell, and then each 60' cube costs 1500 gp more. You
can do one cube per level, so a 20th level caster could cover an area
of 240' x 300' (x 60' high, of course). That's protection roughly the
size of a football field, costing 31,500 gp (over 50k gp if you want
to add a password).
wrote:
>ra...@yahoo.com wrote:
>>Justisaur wrote...
>
>>> The entire town was under a permanent consecrate(whatever
>>> it's called), evil people couldn't enter
>>> the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
>>
>>Seriously though, did anyone else do a double take at that sentence?
>>Joe The Peasant becomes evil and dies?
>
>Yes, I noticed that he's thinking of another spell. Consecrate affects
>undead.
doubts that it would work exactly as described. It's designed to deal
damage to someone of the wrong alignment who enters the town. Assume
the caster is LG: it doesn't do damage to someone evil who is already
in the area when it is cast. And once an evil person takes damage
coming in, they don't take additional damage by staying there. So
"being evil in the area of effect" is not what triggers damage, it's
"being evil and ENTERING the area of effect." If someone "became evil
while in the area of effect", I don't think that that should trigger
it.
It's also rather expensive to try to protect a large area. 1500 base
cost for the spell, and then each 60' cube costs 1500 gp more. You
can do one cube per level, so a 20th level caster could cover an area
of 240' x 300' (x 60' high, of course). That's protection roughly the
size of a football field, costing 31,500 gp (over 50k gp if you want
to add a password).
Harold Groot
Apr 25, 2012, 9:27:53 PM4/25/12
to
On Fri, 20 Apr 2012 07:45:38 -0400, David Lamb <dal...@cs.queensu.ca>
There are, of course, permanent magic items that can give some limited
daily TELEPORT capability. It's just a matter of how you would
allocate your money.
>>> There wouldn't be a heck of a lot of court intrigue or politics locally.
>>> Do you expect to have to deal with the higher nobility in other similar
>>> colonies (those "500 miles apart" places)?
>>
>> "HAVE to deal with" them? Well, for the most part that would be up to
>> you. I can certainly see significant ADVANTAGES in sending out
>> ambassadors, signing treaties, setting up rules for trade and so on.
>I was wondering how important it would be to have someone at the home
>empire's court. Were you thinking of allowing some form of Contacts?
>IIRC there are 2 different versions, one in UA and one in some other
>splatbook (perhaps Cityscape)?
DMG2 has rules for setting up Contacts. I'd be using that set. So
you could have someone monitoring what's going on back in the old
country, but it would still be up to you to figure out how to keep in
touch with them. (With high level magic, this shouldn't be a problem.)
Of course, Contacts generally just do small favors. Chatting about
what's happening around the capital, fine. Actually DOING something
about it is something else. And "Favors done at no charge" don't
happen that often. Of the 10 examples they give, 3 are listed as
"1/week", 3 are listed as "1/month", and 4 are just "once."
So if you want a regular chat that you set up somehow (say,
SHAPECHANGE and then TELEPORT WITHOUT ERROR), and you get the "easily
known general gossip", I wouldn't limit that. If something grabs your
attention and you want it investigated - well, "gather information
about a specific local person" was one of those "once" items.
Something in between (brought as a guest of your contact to a party
where the person in question could be pointed out to you, with the
FIRM understanding that nothing happens at the party) - maybe that's a
1/month item.
>> ... It's generally a LOT easier to trade whatever you have in
>> surplus for something that someone ELSE has in surplus than it is to
>> make everything yourself. I won't specify what each colony might
>> have, just that there would be several items suitable for trade in
>> each colony (though it could take some time to locate them and/or
>> develop them so that they were available in sufficient quantity to
>> trade).
>
>Yes -- this is part of why I was asking about teleport as a potential
>commercial advantage. Also, before setting up any secondary villages,
>the main and cohort would have to do a lot of exploring to locate those
>tradeable items (find groves of spices; locate minerals or gems; find
>rare animals that could be trained and sold, etc.)
>
>> But the political stuff isn't something that you'd have to do
>> yourself. A 6th level Bard follower might be an excellent
>> Ambassador-at-large. 9 ranks in Diplomacy and a +3 Charisma bonus
>> would be within reason for a Bard follower. Probably no feats that
>> boost it further, though - that would require a lot of luck. (You
>> don't get to optimize your followers.)
>
>Pity. What control over follower creation are you going to allow? I
>certainly hope you'd allow us to pick class levels. A particular array
>for abilities? If we don't get to pick their feats, how would you
>determine them?
That's for the DM to have fun with!
You can try to recruit certain types of people ("I'm recruiting for a
bard with good Diplomacy skills"), but who actually shows up and what
their talents actually are is where I get to have fun.
>> into a CHA enhancement item for him/her would be reasonable, too.
>> He/she would probably be using it MUCH more often than you would be.
>> You don't get to optimize your followers.) Putting some of your own money
daily TELEPORT capability. It's just a matter of how you would
allocate your money.
>>> There wouldn't be a heck of a lot of court intrigue or politics locally.
>>> Do you expect to have to deal with the higher nobility in other similar
>>> colonies (those "500 miles apart" places)?
>>
>> "HAVE to deal with" them? Well, for the most part that would be up to
>> you. I can certainly see significant ADVANTAGES in sending out
>> ambassadors, signing treaties, setting up rules for trade and so on.
>I was wondering how important it would be to have someone at the home
>empire's court. Were you thinking of allowing some form of Contacts?
>IIRC there are 2 different versions, one in UA and one in some other
>splatbook (perhaps Cityscape)?
you could have someone monitoring what's going on back in the old
country, but it would still be up to you to figure out how to keep in
touch with them. (With high level magic, this shouldn't be a problem.)
Of course, Contacts generally just do small favors. Chatting about
what's happening around the capital, fine. Actually DOING something
about it is something else. And "Favors done at no charge" don't
happen that often. Of the 10 examples they give, 3 are listed as
"1/week", 3 are listed as "1/month", and 4 are just "once."
So if you want a regular chat that you set up somehow (say,
SHAPECHANGE and then TELEPORT WITHOUT ERROR), and you get the "easily
known general gossip", I wouldn't limit that. If something grabs your
attention and you want it investigated - well, "gather information
about a specific local person" was one of those "once" items.
Something in between (brought as a guest of your contact to a party
where the person in question could be pointed out to you, with the
FIRM understanding that nothing happens at the party) - maybe that's a
1/month item.
>> ... It's generally a LOT easier to trade whatever you have in
>> surplus for something that someone ELSE has in surplus than it is to
>> make everything yourself. I won't specify what each colony might
>> have, just that there would be several items suitable for trade in
>> each colony (though it could take some time to locate them and/or
>> develop them so that they were available in sufficient quantity to
>> trade).
>
>Yes -- this is part of why I was asking about teleport as a potential
>commercial advantage. Also, before setting up any secondary villages,
>the main and cohort would have to do a lot of exploring to locate those
>tradeable items (find groves of spices; locate minerals or gems; find
>rare animals that could be trained and sold, etc.)
>
>> But the political stuff isn't something that you'd have to do
>> yourself. A 6th level Bard follower might be an excellent
>> Ambassador-at-large. 9 ranks in Diplomacy and a +3 Charisma bonus
>> would be within reason for a Bard follower. Probably no feats that
>> boost it further, though - that would require a lot of luck. (You
>> don't get to optimize your followers.)
>
>Pity. What control over follower creation are you going to allow? I
>certainly hope you'd allow us to pick class levels. A particular array
>for abilities? If we don't get to pick their feats, how would you
>determine them?
You can try to recruit certain types of people ("I'm recruiting for a
bard with good Diplomacy skills"), but who actually shows up and what
their talents actually are is where I get to have fun.
>> into a CHA enhancement item for him/her would be reasonable, too.
>> He/she would probably be using it MUCH more often than you would be.
~consul
May 3, 2012, 7:32:37 PM5/3/12
to
'tis on this 4/14/2012 2:44 AM, wrote Tetsubo thus to say:
> On 4/14/2012 5:28 AM, Rast wrote:
>> Justisaur wrote...
>>> The entire town was under a
>>> permanent consecrate(whatever it's called), evil people couldn't enter
>>> the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
>> In the old days this would have been great flame bait.
>> Seriously though, did anyone else do a double take at that sentence?
>> Joe The Peasant becomes evil and dies?
> If your design goal is to keep your settlement free from evil, this works. And if the population knows about it, it's a self-selection issue. Evil folks will just stay away. Or die.
But what about when the best farrier or blacksmith is also evil? I guess just because they are evil, doesn't mean they aren't necessary in other capacities? Or if you have to hire them for an adventure you didn't have time for? Someone's castle or plot of land I can see the use of consecrate, but a whole town?
> On 4/14/2012 5:28 AM, Rast wrote:
>> Justisaur wrote...
>>> The entire town was under a
>>> permanent consecrate(whatever it's called), evil people couldn't enter
>>> the town and if someone became evil they'd take damage.
>> In the old days this would have been great flame bait.
>> Seriously though, did anyone else do a double take at that sentence?
>> Joe The Peasant becomes evil and dies?
> If your design goal is to keep your settlement free from evil, this works. And if the population knows about it, it's a self-selection issue. Evil folks will just stay away. Or die.
--
"... respect, all good works are not done by only good folk. For here, at the end of all things, we shall do what needs to be done."
--till next time, consul -x- <<poetry.dolphins-cove.com>>
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