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[Nerjin]

I'm in the camp that says you should have to prepare the level 0 spells. I don't really see why the Tier 1 classes need the bonus...

[Rolepgeek]

Nerjin.

It's so they can be relevant-ish at low levels. A Daze per round really isn't going to accomplish much. At high levels, it doesn't make a difference anyway. Limited number of infinite whatevers to choose from? Sure. Or at least large numbers of them; 20 Dazes a day is plenty.

[Nerjin]

Well I guess. But I dunno. I figure you exchange early game usefulness for being the end all be all of the party at later levels. Granted, I've never played a high level campaign [am hoping this will become one eventually] so I'm not exactly sure. Still... I suppose as long as martial classes get some sort of boost at higher levels too it should be okay.

[Flying Dice]

I'm in the camp that says you should have to prepare the level 0 spells. I don't really see why the Tier 1 classes need the bonus...

You do, for caster classes that have to prepare spells. That aside, the purpose is pretty clear: pure casters are weaker early and stronger late than martial classes; a 1st level wizard or sorcerer already has a pretty small 'load', so to speak, in a fairly normal 1st level party, never mind one like this. The intent of the balance changes was to make non-tier 1-2 classes more effective at higher levels, and a counterbalance to make casters have slightly more depth at low levels, aka not having to say "welp, that's my (counts on fingers) spells for the day, I'm useless until we rest."

The only arcane cantrips which retain effectiveness after the first few levels are ones which don't really have direct combat/debuffing/CC applications; prestidigitation, arcane mark, detect magic, &c. Being able to deal 1d3 damage per turn or grant +1 on saves to a party member per turn is hardly overpowering in light of what any of the melee classes (or even the warlock) can do. That's the primary point of the cantrips, basically as a substitute for what low-level wizards and sorcs normally do with their hand-crossbow or sling; they're sitting around in the back plinking things with Ray of Frost or Acid Splash instead of those while waiting for opportunities to use their real spells. The same applies to other cantrips that aren't really combat spells; they're basic utility spells and if you didn't have a source for them you'd probably just end up with a pile of wands that do the same thing for the same character to UMD on.

To put it in perspective, Ruvitsuvi does 1d3 damage with Ray of Frost. Cernan cures 1HP or does 1d8 with his crossbow. Osoero does 1d6 with Eldritch Blast. Ulric does 1d8 with his longbow. Tradok and Slork do 1d12+STR with their axes. Krag does 2d8+13 with his greatclub. Each of those is potential damage per turn. I really don't see how being able to cast a 1d3 cantrip each turn is a problem. There are three orisons which pose problems, which are easily solved with a houserule, and only one of them was more than situational (if you knew that an encounter was coming and had a set start point like a door breach you could spend a minute buffing someone with temporary HP; and I can imagine a scant handful of situations where continuously producing water could be exploitable).

Personally I'd just rule that you can't use CMW out of combat unless it's during a full period of 8-hour rest. That solves that problem, and as above, healing 1 HP per turn in combat isn't exactly worldshattering so much as being slightly more useful than standing around doing nothing much. I suppose the same should apply to Virtue and Create Water, but those are really the only ones I can see with potential for abuse, at least within SRD.

Basically, in summary, cantrips are not major factors even in RAW level 1 campaigns. They're ways for casters to not be totally nonfunctional baggage at early levels after using their spells/while hoarding their spells for the perfect moment, and it's boring as fuck to play a caster (especially an arcane caster) at low levels for exactly that reason. All unlimited cantrips do is make it so that they have something mildly productive to do with their turns at low levels, while they'll always have better uses for their actions at high levels.

--

On an unrelated note, that last elemental needs about a gentle breeze to keel over. Just waiting on a stray wind to blow by...

[Nerjin]

I vote that Krag attacks the nearest enemy with his greatclub. Just in hte interest of getting this going again.

[My Name is Immaterial]

I vote that Krag attacks the nearest enemy with his greatclub. Just in hte interest of getting this going again.

+1

[Rolepgeek]

Also, when the warlock has infinite Shatters at will, infinite Virtue doesn't really compare.
Though that's about all I have...*cries* *glass breaks in a 50 foot radius*

I love warlocks, but at the same time...so little to do with them, until magic devices come into play. Wonderful, wonderful UMD checks. 12th level Warlocks/2nd level Chameleons are, in a way, more broken than 20th level wizards, if one chooses to abuse it. Being able to craft literally any magic item with a mere expenditure of time and EXP has it's perks.

I doubt I'll be going for Chameleon, though. With the changes to Warlocks giving me access to lovely additional least and lesser invocations, I don't think I want to lose the invocation levels.

In all honesty, there's a lot of issues most arcane classes and whatnot bring up with versatility and/or utility things that render so many cool fantasy scenarios redundant. "oh no, we're on a crumbling bridge! Oh wait, I'll just cast Fly." "oh no, a cliff! Feather fall." "Oh no, we're in the desert, we need to find an oasis! Oh wait, Create Water."

Which is why, I think, PCs get reduced to murderhobos; unless there is a physically present force trying to kill you, it's hard to find good challenges for mid-level 'optimized' PCs. Quotation marks are because the warlock choosing Fell Flight isn't optimization, it's common sense.

Sidenote: Does Rapid Shot apply to Eldritch Blast? And can I present new invocations for perusal and possibly approval? Nothing gamebreaking(i think), just maybe stuff like Bewildering Blast(Confusion effect for one round if they fail the save), and maybe some thematic late-game stuff like Ride of The Wild Hunt or something. Though that could be part of the fey-themed prestige class, if PN allows/makes/approves it.

[Flying Dice]

I'm going to say yes, because that's in keeping with PBS and Precise Shot being applied to it, which is standard as far as I'm aware. That said, it'll become redundant if you take Eldritch Chain, so I personally wouldn't bother.

I vote that Krag attacks the nearest enemy with his greatclub. Just in hte interest of getting this going again.

+1

I was going to give him until a bit later today, but it doesn't really matter much. Update in a while.

[Rolepgeek]

Au contraire. Eldritch Chain will be all the more useful precisely due to rapid shot. From the wording of it, and common sense, given that Eldritch Blast is an attack action now, you cannot hit the same target with the eldritch chain more than once for each given eldritch chain. The other possible interpretation is thatyou wouldn't be able to hit them even in subsequent rounds, which makes Eldritch Chain effectively useless.

Or, if nothing else, it could jump to multiple different targets, and I think one can even attack different people in the same full-attack action and whatnot. Can wait to see the result of each attack before choosing the next target, even, if I'm reading right. Which would allow a nice apread of debuffs.

Hmmm...since Eldritch Blast is an attack action now...does that mean thatone can apply different essences and blast shapes to each one in the attack? There might not really be a point to it, beyond applying more debuffs, faster, but it aould make for interesting scenarios. Utterdark Doom followed by Repulsive Cone and finishing off with a Noxious Chain or two.

[Flying Dice]

Actually, it appears that my initial assumption was wrong. As far as I can tell, the reasoning is thus: Eldritch Blast is a SLA invoked as a standard action and cannot be made into or part of a full attack; Rapid Shot requires you to make a full attack. PBS and Precise Shot work because you can treat the EB as a ranged attack and neither feat requires it to be anything it can't be.

So the long and short is: Wait until you get Quicken SLA.

Working on Krag's poke &c. Looks like Remuthra hasn't been active for nearly a week, so I can probably safely NPC him if it becomes necessary until he returns.

[PrivateNomad]

If I'm ever not on, Tradok's auto-attack is to hack at the enemy and to be stupid.

[Rolepgeek]

38. Warlocks can Eldritch Blast as an attack action as long as it is your turn. Happy birthday.

Flying Dice.

Houserules.

Anyway. So, does anyone else find it odd that being more muscular means you can swing at the speed of light? I mean, a Troll with 30 strength isn't uncommon. But it's not typically thought of them as being extraordinarily accurate with clubs and shit. Yet...I mean, I can understand when it's going through shield and armor bonuses to AC; he's simply smashing through. To an extent, I can even understand that being stronger allows you to have finer control over a weapon, since you don't need to expend as much relative proportions of your energy just to swing it. But for a Troll to be able to hit someone with 30 Dexterity as easily as they might someone in full plate and shield? That doesn't seem a little off to you?

[Flying Dice]

I... honestly don't remember where that came from. Which is sort of silly, as it's a restatement of how RAW work, except made more clear as to why PBS and Precise shot apply (since technically speaking EB isn't a 'ranged weapon' in the same sense as a bow). It says nothing about full attacking, though it probably should be more explicit.

[Tawa]

So, I found the ultimate of RAW idiocy.

Mithral Shirt: This extremely light chain shirt is made of very fine mithral links. Speed while wearing a mithral shirt is 30 feet for Medium creatures, or 20 feet for Small. The armor has an arcane spell failure chance of 10%, a maximum Dexterity bonus of +6, and no armor check penalty. It is considered light armor and weighs 10 pounds.

It seems innocent until you realize that dwarves become faster while wearing it.

[Flying Dice]

Hehe, I love that one.

Incidentally, I might have been drunk while writing some of the houserules. I don't remember. :x