Still not Quite Dead Yet (OOC)

Okay, no problem.

Keeping the peace? Yeah right. :twisted:

correct. I would appreciate if whoever is here would post, I want to keep the game going to prevent it from stalling.

Yeah, but I meant in the IC thread

Waiting on Dunamin.

15d6 damage triggered only by opening (by force) a sealed door as a 6th level spell is not nearly so sick, however (though it is permanent).

It's a terrifying spell if you're the attacker, but it's 10 minute casting time, 500 gp material component, and fairly limited scope (that is, it can only target, doors, windows, etc.) makes it utterly worthless as an offensive spell. It can also be dispelled with some dificulty (considerable dificulty, in this case, actually) or disarmed with a DC 31 disable device check.

Nodody would have answered, and one of you, and one of you would have had to break it down somehow, catching both of you in the blast eventually. Bear in mind that the conditions you specified (If Bruce hasn't opened the door by then) were fulfilled, which is why the door was disintigrated.

Destroying the door in any way triggers the spell regardless of whether a victim is in range or not. (This is not IC knowledge, though.)

On a more positive note, this is on the list of better outcomes (though not the very best, there were a few ways to get in unhurt). If a wall was disintigrated, for example, I planned on giving you 1d4+1 rounds before all three stories of the (teleport warded) house collapsed on your heads, traping both of you inside the ruble for a very long time and then putting you up against angry guards when you finally blew your way out. Positive thoughts! Muhahaha! :twisted:

Poking BERK and Dunamin

Okay, I'll NPC Bruce until then.

Posting a few new houseruled uses of skills to get some use out of them at higher levels.

Also, in the same vein, not everyone has listed their Knowledge (The Planes) specialties in their character sheets. (See the Skills section in the PSCS section for rules on this)

Bluff:

Feinting is a is a move action (instead of a standard action) for anyone with 14 or more ranks in bluff. This is because improved feint isn't a very powerful feat at high levels, because most bonuses to AC come from sources other than DEX. This makes feinting more useful at high levels.

The penalty to feinting against nonhumanoid creatures is changed to -4 vs. creatures with adifferent body shape (regardless of creature type).

New use:

Force a readied action. This use of bluff is a specialized use of feint and is resolved in the exact same way. This action can be used to convince a foe that you are taking a certain action, which may be a trigger for a prepared action. You must know (or guess) the trigger of the readied action that the oppont has prepared. You may take a -20 penalty to this roll to cause the opponent to take their prepared action without knowing or guessing it. To immitate spellcasting to trigger a prepared action or counterspell, see spellcraft.

Intimidate:

Demoralize:

It is now possible to demoralize an enemy when not in melee combat at a -10 penalty. For each 10 points a target fails it's save vs fear, it is shaken for an aditional round fer -10 increment. If a character has 19 ranks or more in intimidate, they may demoralize as a move action instead of a standard action.

It is also possible to demoralize all opponents within 5 feet per 2 ranks in intimidate (they must be able to see you) by rolling an intimidate check at -10. Each enemy receive a +1 morale bonus on this save for each ally within the radius of the intimidate affect

Sleight of hand:

Conceal somatic components of a spell:

In order to make use of this skill, the user must have a cloak, heavy sleeves, or some other way to obscure their hands. Make a sleight of hand check of DC 15+2xspell level. If you fail this check, the spell fails because the sleeve or cloak interferes with the spellcasting. Anyone wishing to identify the spell must make a spot check with a DC equal to the sleight of hand check. Failure means that they cannot use somatic components to identify the spell (see spellcraft).

Spellcraft:

Identify a spell-like ability:

DC 20+mimiced spel level

Provoking a counterspell or wasting a readied action with a spell as a trigger:

Make a spellcraft check. Your opponent makes an opposed by a spellcraft check adding a bonus of 2xthe highest level spell they can cast to the roll. Alternitively, they may roll a sense motive check at -10 with no bonus if this is more favorable (Spellcraft may not be used untrained). If you succed on this check, the readied action or counterspell is wasted (see changes to counterspelling later in this post)

Modifiers to identifying a cast spell:

-10: spell is not in the language of your magical tradition and you do not speak this language. (Infernal is the tradition language of every party caster except Yebena). Other common tradition languages include: draconic, giant, one of the 4 elemental languages, or celestial.

-5: spell is not in the language of your magical tradition but you speak at least some of the language in question (If Canzon tried to identify one of Yebena's spells, he would do so at a -5 penalty. Likewise, Yebana, would still take a -5 to her spellcraft check to identify when identifying a spell with annother tradition language even though she is fluent in infernal. (Note that Sidharta's ring does not translate quickly enough to offsset the -10 penalty to spellcraft when identifying spells in languages he does not otherwise understand.

-5: Sorceror identfiying a wizard spell

-5: Wizard identifying a sorceror spell

-5: Arcane caster identifying a divine spell

-5: Divine caster identifying an arcane spell

+5: Three major components (verbal, somatic, focus/material component)

+0: Any two major components (verbal, somatic, focus/material component)

-5: Any one major component (verbal, somatic, focus/material component)

-20: no visible components (verbal, somatic, focus/material component)

Counterspelling changes:

It is possible to counterspell as an immediate action whenever a spell is cast. If this action is taken, the caster loses a standard action on their next turn. You may not counterspell in this way if you cast a spell on your turn or if you otherwise could not cast a spell. You also may not counterspell in this way if you are flat-footed. You may also ready a standard action to counterspell as normal.

It should be easier to identify a spell with all three components. A spell with two is the norm in D&D, making it the base DC. A spell with only one component should harder to identify since you're missing a point of reference. A spell without any components should be impossible to identify, but I've put the -20 there to allow a very slim chance.

Remember, with spell points, It is possible to use dispell infinitely (for the purposes of a combat encounter). Because of this, picking and choosing which spells to counter and which to ignore needs to be more dificult in order to avoid making dispell magic the best spell in the game (Figure of speech. Shapechange is still the best spell in the game. )

To BERK's question. I don't have Complete Psionic, so I can't rule on that propperly (informally, the answer is yes, you take a -5 unless the mantle says otherwise) what the the mantle's description says, specifically may change this.

I am the DM, I can do whatever I feel like with the PHB rules. If I were to declare that everyone in my game must start with 1 point buy and play pink elves, everyone in my game must start with one point buy and play pink elves (and nobody would join the game). You are not under any mystical compulsion to stay in this game. If you don't like my style of DMing or my housrules, ninjas aren't going to come to your house and stab you for having your own opinions. You are entitled to them.

Also, recall your character creation. You will remember that I disregarded the published LA values in the Monster Manual and allowed you to take a class that ordinarily would have its own spell progression as a sorceror PRC. Why didn't you complain about inconsitency with RAW then?

In any case, to adress the topic being discussed, there is a very clear distinction between an argument that deals entirely in specific points and attacks the logic of the other party specifically, directly, and impersonally, and an argument that is based on value judgements and attacks on the person of other party. You have strayed into the latter category with the previous post. If you want a debate, you will have a debate, but I expect that you argue in a civil way and adress only the points being argued. It would not make me happy to have my OOC thread locked by Clueless.

My argument is the following:

1. Counterspelling is very rarely a feasable option as it is barring presteige class abilities like the Archmage's Mastery of Counterspelling ability. How many times has one of your characters (in any game) made use of the counterspell action?

2. A reasonably well prepared spellcaster of similar can kill annother spellcaster of similar level fairly easily with only 1 high level spell that exploits a weak save (See the character optimization boards on WoTC for discussions on spellcaster combat. Even without a highly optomized character, their arguments apply, albeit to a slightly lesser degree).

3. This short combat encounter is not desirable in D&D if the goal of the game is to create a drawn-out and dramatic fight and to prevent the PCs from dying early and often from a high level spell.

4. Making counterspelling more useful will serve to decrease the incentive to cast offensively.

5. Counterspelling combined with rules that allow a near unlimited casting of dispell magic make this option more desireable than it should be in a party with multiple high level casters, only one of which needs to use dispell magic each turn.

6. In order to make this less of a problem while still ensuring counterspelling is a feasable option, changes have to be made.

7. Changing Spellcraft is an effective way of doing this because it is mechanically simple and does not require any modifications to the spell itself. Spellcraft also does not scale well. A 16th level wizard with an int of 18 can identify a 9th level spell 100% of the time. This excludes item enhancemets, synergy bonuses, and the like.

8. This new approach is less reliable, and allows a caster facing the prospect of being countered the possibility to cast low level spells that are more dificult to identify in order to waste their oppnent's spell points.