Njall's Happy Fun Time Role Playing Train of Pain (RPGs)

[Boyfriend]

What's the base spell from BoVD? That seems excessively overpowered for a 9th level spell.

Well most many 9th level spells are excessively overpowered already, every noncaster gets totally screwed over by force cage (well rules might have changed but used to be like that) and that's not even 9th level.

The spell as written does not affect blindsight, which any 9th level caster should be able to easily gain access to, then there's various ways to mindlink yourself to still see within it, since it has permanent duration it can be cancelled with dispel magic or anything similar. Mordekainens disjunction will get rid of it automatically.
It's been a while since I've played DnD, but something that gets completely countered by Blindsight/Magical Dispel does not really seem very overpowered to me at 9th level.

The radius seems excessive to me, when would you actually want a giant ball of darkness that big; you're bound to get the attention of just about anyone.

[Snake-Aes]

My friends and I have been playing in a D&D 3.5 (fairly well houseruled and splatted*) campaign setting for about 7 years now, across 2 distinct campaigns.


* What I mean by this should be explained by this complete rewrite of a spell whose concept originated in the Book of Vile Darkness

Ah, I think I see the problem... Never was a fan of the book. Loook weeee're EEEVIL... WE HAVE NIPPLE CLAMPS! EeeeeeEEevil!. Sigh. Kids. Evil, as such, never appealed to me as a game concept. Sort of bland and boring, really. But I am a cranky old fellow. Or perhaps I am entirely missing the point you are making here - which seems likely.

I don't see the evil in nipple clamps.

But I do tell you, Evil can be very interesting in the game. We have a particularly good background of evil people who are loved by their (not evil, you damn psychotic inquisitor) people. Good luck killing the dragon whose crimes in the last 50 years consisted of demanding reverence and one sacrifice every 10 years in exchange of protecting the city from any sort of crime. And said sacrifice happens to live a life of luxury and comfort at the side of the dragon. Yeah, go ahead and kill their only protector.

[Talderas]

Well, a normal fireball has like dc 30 on the epic spell rules, but that won't quite bring 9 level spells to spellcraft 500. That orb of frozen undeath thingies that piss people off is like 300 and does both a lot of damage and raises undead, fun stuff.

Utterdark might be a level 9 spell if you make it last an hour per caster level, allow 9th level light spells to pierce it, make it a hour-long cast time and put a couple extra casters to complete the ritual.

Sort of, on the Fireball. The energy seed to mimic fireball would be a Spellcraft 19 spell, that does 10d6 damage in a 20ft radius blast. Fireball is a 3 Sor/Wiz spell that deals 1d6 per caster level up to 10d6. So essentially a lv10 Wizard or Sorcerer would normally have a base Spellcraft skill of 13, plus Int modifier, and possible even a few other boosts to spellcraft to make it easy enough to learn. However, since all seeds start with a base cast time of 1 minute, you need to add 20 to the Spellcraft DC to make it a standard action cast time. That's where it becomes stupid.

I agree, knock up the cast time, make it a ritual, limit the duration from permanent and it wouldn't be so bad.

For the record.... that 525DC Epic Spell would cost 4,725,000gp and 189,000xp to develop.

[Boyfriend]

Honestly, in most cases I'd prefer Acid Fog over this Utterdark spell, it grants total concealment past 5 foot, which is for battlefield control about the same, acid fog is also not countered by any light spells, has a 1 action cast time does 2d6 damage to anyone, but also slows movement speed down to 5 feet per round. And it's a 7th level spell.

I can hardly see how the uselessly huge radius and duration make this worthy of a 1 minute cast time. (You can also make Solid Fog permanent, which due to the movement speed restriction is probably superior anyway?)

[Njall]

But I do tell you, Evil can be very interesting in the game. We have a particularly good background of evil people who are loved by their (not evil, you damn psychotic inquisitor) people. Good luck killing the dragon whose crimes in the last 50 years consisted of demanding reverence and one sacrifice every 10 years in exchange of protecting the city from any sort of crime. And said sacrifice happens to live a life of luxury and comfort at the side of the dragon. Yeah, go ahead and kill their only protector.

As I said, I found Book of Vile Darkness rather banal. And that WAS one of the items in it. Nipple Clamps of Exquisite Pain, as I recall.

Meh. I haven't every been terribly impressed with evil player characters. A good evil villain is stock-in-trade for most games. On the player side, however, most of them seem more interested in screwing over the other players or indulging in petty hate fantasies - it usually just ends up being sad. That said, since there must always be an exception to my absolutist statements, a Dark Side Star Wars game was actually hellaciously fun.

Nb: Evil dragon protector one done by Mr. Pratchett and by Mr. Tom Holt and by Mr. Zelazny in ways we cannot hope to equal.

[ceela]

For some reason I am stricken with an urge to run a swords & sorcery version of Paranoia. Has anyone written such a thing, or should I start inventing Top Secret Experimental Magic Items and 6-charge resurrection spells?

[Njall]

For some reason I am stricken with an urge to run a swords & sorcery version of Paranoia. Has anyone written such a thing, or should I start inventing Top Secret Experimental Magic Items and 6-charge resurrection spells?

I've seen it done... but for the life of me, I can't recall where. It might have been a TOON game at a convention though Tales from the Floating Vagabond helps too.

[Snake-Aes]

the concept isn't hard to convert...
mutants into sorcerers, tech into magi.

[Njall]

the concept isn't hard to convert...
mutants into sorcerers, tech into magi.

Ah, but to get the tone right... that's tougher. Paranoia haz a flavur.

[ceela]

the concept isn't hard to convert...
mutants into sorcerers, tech into magi.

I think my thought processes went "Magical incident investigation team in WoD -> Same thing in D&D or something -> Hang on that sounds like Paranoia." I then started pondering a small, secluded village entirely in the thrall of a completely insane sorceror and his clueless but well-meaning minions. Troubleshooters are naturally needed to hunt down rogue mages, mutants and other traitors. To aid them, they have a limited-resurrection spell cast on them. Unfortunately the side effect of the resurrections is a random mutation each time...

It sort of went downhill from there, really. I should make notes.

[Njall]

the concept isn't hard to convert...
mutants into sorcerers, tech into magi.

I think my thought processes went "Magical incident investigation team in WoD -> Same thing in D&D or something -> Hang on that sounds like Paranoia." I then started pondering a small, secluded village entirely in the thrall of a completely insane sorceror and his clueless but well-meaning minions. Troubleshooters are naturally needed to hunt down rogue mages, mutants and other traitors. To aid them, they have a limited-resurrection spell cast on them. Unfortunately the side effect of the resurrections is a random mutation each time...

It sort of went downhill from there, really. I should make notes.

True. True. Heck, I seem to recall running a version of GURPS: The Prisoner set in the Albedo universe way back when. Ravenloft would work as well, especially as the original adventure was a pocket universe or bubble kingdom (yay, Erfworld!)

[Snake-Aes]

the concept isn't hard to convert...
mutants into sorcerers, tech into magi.

I think my thought processes went "Magical incident investigation team in WoD -> Same thing in D&D or something -> Hang on that sounds like Paranoia." I then started pondering a small, secluded village entirely in the thrall of a completely insane sorceror and his clueless but well-meaning minions. Troubleshooters are naturally needed to hunt down rogue mages, mutants and other traitors. To aid them, they have a limited-resurrection spell cast on them. Unfortunately the side effect of the resurrections is a random mutation each time...

It sort of went downhill from there, really. I should make notes.

True. True. Heck, I seem to recall running a version of GURPS: The Prisoner set in the Albedo universe way back when. Ravenloft would work as well, especially as the original adventure was a pocket universe or bubble kingdom (yay, Erfworld!)

...boop.

[Njall]

Ah, now do you think I'm hardcore?

I should dig out my notes for "The Station." It was a place where those who knew too much about what was really going on or had seen things they ought not to or, were thought to have. And their keepers. All on an 'abandoned' space station of outre design.

[Snake-Aes]

Compared to what? The fact I recognize it and am almost thirty years younger is just as alarming. At least I am not one of the 2d6 players of Aeon in my country.

[Njall]

Compared to what? The fact I recognize it and am almost thirty years younger is just as alarming. At least I am not one of the 2d6 players of Aeon in my country.

Yes, the fact you recognized Albedo would be somewhat surprising, at least in some circles. But given your taste in characters however, less so. Albedo was an interesting universe. Sadly, the second edition of the game was one of the few cases where the game was actually less playable. The Sanguine version is actually fairly decent - Piet van Hiel did a good job. However, I'd still give a tooth to run a good game of Lace and Steel once again. 7th Sea will have to suffice, I fear.

Actually, I shouldn't bitch about 7th Sea. The Frieburg boxed set is one of the better city supplements I've seen though it is overly ambitious. It, along with Pavis/Big Rubble, were great sources of inspiration for Blood over Gold.