darastrix83

Before anything else I would like to say that I am sorry to hear about your torn knee ligament. As I finally am getting older I have had real breaks and tears for the first time in my life and it is a real showing of my physical fragility which I would prefer not to have. Secondly I would like to sincerely apologize for the tone of my earlier comments. I did not intend to write them as angry as they sound. I was in a bad mood, at work, and I write first and then edit but my boss showed up so I just posted them and then logged out. (I was on my break but my boss would be angry any way and just assume I was slacking) My perception that the archer was an expert was from him being a "Dritz" clone. I presume that means an expert archer and it was that presumption which I now see (referencing your boss fights for level 1 players) which landed me in trouble. Additionally, I have had too many DM's, sadly almost all of them, who seem to think that the players are there as toys for their amusement and that torturing us is comical. Some of your descriptions just hit that nerve. Even though you say you stand by your earlier comments your statement that the players have 75% of the control is not what I was picturing from your remark that they were interactive filler. I have read the rest of your posts on this sight and I find your battles to be both brilliantly written and highly entertaining even for low level characters. I have no doubt that your players love you DMing style. If you are angry at me you could likely call me a Rules Layer but I am more accurately a War Gamer. This means that I use the surroundings and rules to determine my very well planned out character and to plan. When the rules of reality are inconsistent it's like physics randomly changing gravity on you and can be very frustrating. Battle plans without consistency are pointless. However, your rules (as I have seen in your stories) are both fair and creative. It also seems that if I was in your game and asked you why my expert archer can't judge distance you would be willing to listen to reason, which is really all I can ask. I am a long term player and DM and I hope that I will be able to add something to your systems. I don't have as much time as I would like to devote to coming up with them but I do enjoy reading the posts. Finally, no matter what I said I never made a fool of you, only myself. Even if everyone here who was bothering to post were responding negatively it can have no effect on if you appear foolish or not. What you are posting is helpful and useful.

Ok while I agree that I can't tell you exactly 120 feet in 1to 5 inches my supposedly master archer should be able to as easy as breathing. I can tell you if there are exactly 60 cards in my deck of cards without counting. That's because I play way to much cards. It is much less realistic that someone who practices and fights daily with a bow can't tell accurately if a target is out of range. Anyway that's what 1's are. If they roll a 1 and the monster is forever far away then they misjudged the distance. And what about range increments. If a monster is more than 120 feet away you do not automatically miss the difficulty just goes up by 2. If the adjusted difficulty is too much then yes then they would and should miss. Still they should know the distance beforehand because a skilled archer would know if stepping up 5 feet would make a shot so much easier. This is such a backwards way of looking at DMing it makes me sad for your players. role playing is interactive storytelling. That means that the characters and by extension the main plot are completely generated by your players. As the DM you are the setting and the background and the foil to the characters. If your plot was so perfect and amazing that the players were little more that filler than you should write it down and make it a book. Then you should come back and create a compelling setting with interesting plot hooks and try again at being a DM.

there is an existing prestige class in the complete arcane that is set up as a host of domination powers including a high level dominate monster. It's already balanced and will save you alot of work unless she is just really set on this other class idea. Also in D&D 3.5 there are no standard saves only poor and good so you can save your brain the work of looking.

second level spells continued Hornung's Baneful Deflector* (Evocation) Range: Touch Components: V, S, M Duration: 2 rounds/level Casting time: Standard action Target: Creature touched Saving Throw: None This spell partially surrounds the recipient in a shimmering, hemispherical field of force. The field is transparent and moves with the subject, forming a shell about one foot away from his body. The shell serves as a shield against all forms of individually targeted missile attacks (including magic missile and other spells). The caster designates the position of the shell (protecting the front, rear, side, or top of the recipient). The spell does not protect against area of effect spells or other attacks that strike several creatures at once. Whenever an individual missile attack is directed at a protected creature, the baneful deflector activates. Instead of striking the target creature, the missile's target is determined randomly among all creatures within a 15-foot hemisphere of the protected creature, including the protected creature. The missile then changes course toward its new target with normal chances to hit. If the new target is beyond the range of the missile, no target is hit. If the protected creature is struck, the spell immediately ends. If several people are protected by baneful deflector, a missile will change course several times before reaching its target. The material component is a small prism that shatters when the spell is cast. Nahal's Nonsensical Nullifier* (Evocation) Range: Touch Components: V, S, M Duration: 1d6 rounds + 1 round/level Casting time: Standard action Target: Creature touched Saving Throw: None This spell scrambles the aura of the affected creature, giving random results to know alignment, detect evil, and detect lie spells cast on that creature. When a protected creature is the focus of one of these divinations, the information gained is randomly determined. Thus is know alignment is used against a chaotic evil creature protected by the nonsensical nullifier, the response could be any alignment combination. If two characters both use the same divination on the same target two random results are generated. A new random result is generated each round; thus, continued observation of a protected creature usually results in different answers. The material component is a small amount of egg yolk smeared into the hair of the recipient.

Second-Level Spells[/size] Chaos Shield* (Abjuration) Components:V,S Duration: 1d10 rounds +2 rounds/level Casting Time: 1 Partial Action Target: Personal Saving Throw: Special Following the discovery of wild magic came the discovery of wild surges and the personal danger such surges create. After several wild mages destroyed themselves by rather spectacular means (or suffered very odd side effects), the chaos shield was created as protection from these surges. This spell imbues the wild mage with special protection against the effects of wild surges. It protects only against wild surges caused by the caster's own spells, not from the effects of another mage's wild surges. When a wild surge affects a caster protected by chaos shield, he is allowed to make a will save with the DC of an equivalent level spell cast by the caster. If the saving throw is successful, the effect of the surge on the caster is negated. If the saving throw is failed, the caster is affected normally by the surge. The spell dose not protect against wild surges that might be caused by its own casting. The chaos shield protects only the caster and does not negate the effects of a wild surge for other characters who might be in the area of effect. The caster cannot voluntarily cancel the protection once he has learned the nature of a wild surge; the chaos shield protects from both good and harmful effects. Thus, if a wild surge resulted in a heal spell for all characters within 10 feet of the caster, the protected caster might not benefit, while all others in the radius would be healed. The spell remains in effect until it negates a wild surge or the spell duration expires. Don't have time to post the rest right now work is starting. I'll finish the second level spells tonight.

Thanks Ramza for the spell list. It's pretty interesting but most of the spells are horribly unbalanced. The level 2 chaos dagger spell would be by far the best spell in the game if it weren't so broke it hurts my brain. I do intend to write new spells for the chaos mage in the future so stay tuned for that. For now just enjoy the adaptations of existing spells. First Level Spells Hornung's Guess* (Divination) Range: Sight Component: V Duration: Instantaneous Casting Time: Partial Action Area of Effect: Special Saving Throw: None Spell Resistance: No Hornung, one of the leading wizards in the field of wild magic (before his untimely disappearance while experimenting with wildwind), developed this spell to improve the accuracy of his estimates. The spell provides a wizard with an instant and highly accurate estimate of the number of persons or objects in a group. The spell's area of effect is one group of a general class of objects. All objects of the group must be visible to the caster. The wizard need not see every individual in the group, merely the general limits of the group's size and area. For example, a wizard on a hill could look down on a forest and estimate the number of trees in all or part of it. He could not get an estimate of the number of goblins within the forest, however, since the group as a whole (the goblins) is concealed from sight. The estimate generated is accurate to the largest factor of ten (rounded up). For example, if Hornung's guess were cast on a group of 439 horsemen, the estimate would be 400. If there were 2,670 horsemen, the spell would estimate 3,000. If there were 37 horseman, the answer would be 40. Clearly, using this spell on smaller groups (especially those with fewer than 10 members) is pointless. Hornung's guess can be used to quickly estimate the size of treasure hoards and army units. It is particularly popular with moneylenders and generals. Patterweave* (Divination) Range: 10 yards Component: V, S, M Duration: 1 round Casting Time: Partial Action Area of Effect: 10-foot square Saving Throw: Special Patternweave allows the caster to make sense of apparent chaos. The caster can see such things as pottery shards reformed into a whole pot, shreds of paper formed into a page, scatted parts of a working machine, or specific trails appearing out of overlapping footprints. After casting the spell, the mage studies seemingly random elements - broken bits of glass, shreds of paper, intermingled trails, etc. The items to be studied must be tangible - coded flashing lights, garbled speech, or thoughts of any kind can be studied. The wizard must study the random elements for one round, after which the DM secretly makes a will save DC 15 (I need to do some Save Vs. Spell research then I'll edit this number) for the wizard. if the saving throw is failed, the spell fails. However, if the saving throw is successful, the caster sees in his mind the patter these objects form. If the items studied are truly random, no information is gained. After the caster has visualized the pattern, he can attempt to reassemble the parts into their original form. This requires another DC 15 will save to determine whether the mage remembers sufficient details to accomplish the task. The amount of time required and the quality of the restoration vary according to the complexity of the pattern. Reassembling a shredded map may be easy; reassembling a broken clock is significantly more difficult. In any case, the wizard can make only a reasonable copy of the item. He can use this spell to restore works of art, but they will be worth only a small percentage of their original value. If the wizard has the appropriate craft skill for the object after succeeding at his will save he may make an exact copy of the object from scratch. This works identically to making the object the first time. A successful creation creates a reasonable facsimile. To make a perfect copy add the masterwork cost to the item creation. Telling the copy from the original requires an appropriate craft or appraise check at DC of the difficulty of the craft roll used to create the copy. The material component is a small hand lens through which the caster studies the objects. The lens is not consumed in the casting. Those are the only 2 level one spells for now. Next time I add level two spells and the hands down best chaos spell ever created.

I feel sorry for those friends of yours. The power mongers always blow themselves up with this class. So that should be fun for you to watch.

Sample Wild Surge Results Table D100 Roll Wall of force appears in front of caster Caster smells like a skunk for the spell duration Caster shoots forth eight nonpoisonous snakes from fingertips. Snakes do not attack. Caster's Clothes itch (-2 to initiative) Caster glows as per a light spell Spell effect has a 60' radius centered on caster Next phrase spoken by the caster becomes true, lasting for 1 turn (this one can be alot of fun provided that you wait until the caster says something that can mannifest. A questions such as where are we going does not mannifest. However, I wish I knew where we were going might grant a 1 turn glimps into a random point in the future. Also if an instantainius request is granted "were going home right now" poof they all are home then it is not ungrated at the end of the spell. However, I wish I was king of the world would since being the king of the world is an ongoing condition. As would drop dead since having a power word kill no save is clearly to much.) Caster's hair gows one foot in lengt Caster pivots 180 degrees Caster's face is blackened by small explosion Caster develops allergy to his magical items. Character cannot control sneezing until all magical items are removed. Allergy lasts 1d6 turns. Caster is affected by reduce person for 1d3 turns Caster's head enlarges for 1d3 turns Caster falls madly in love with target until remove curse is cast Spell cannot be canceled at will by caster Caster polymorphs randomly Colorful bubbles come out of caster's mouth instead of words. Words are released when bubbles pop. Spells with verbal components cannot be cast for 1 turn. Reversed tongues affects all within 60 feet of caster Wall of fire encircles caster Caster's feet enlarge, reducing movement to half normal and adding a -4 to initiative for 1d3 turns Caster suffers same spell effect as target Caster levitates 20' for 1d4 turns Cause fear with 60' radius centered on caster. All within radius except the caster must make a saving throw. Caster speaks in a squeaky voice for 1d6 days Caster gains X-ray vision for 1d6 rounds Caster ages 10 years (or the equivilant for longer lived races ie 100 years for an elf) silence, 15' radius centers on caster 10' x 10' pit appears immediately infront of caster, 5' deep per level of the caster Reverse gravity beneath caster's feet for 1 round Colored streamers pour from caster's fingertips Spell effect rebounds on caster Caster becomes invisable Color spray from caster's fingertips stream of butterflies pours from caster's mouth Caster leaves monster-shaped footprints instead of his own until dispel magic is cast 3d10 gems shoot from the caster's fingertips. Each gem is worth 1d6x10 gp. Music fills the air Create food and water All normal fires within 60' of caster are extinguished One magical item within 30' of caster (chosen randomly) is permanatly drained One normal item within 30' of caster (randomly chosen) becomes permanatly magical All magical weapons within 30' of caster anre increased by +2 for 1 turn (even if this would take their +bonus above 5) Smoke trickles from the ears of all creatures within 60' of caster for 1 turn Dancing lights All creatures within 30' of caster begin to hiccup (-1 to attack rolls +5% spell chance failure) All normal doos, secret doors, portcullises, ect. (including those locked or barred) within 60' of caster open Caster and target exchange places Spell affects random target within 60' of the caster Spell fails but is not wiped from caster's mind Monster summoning II Sudden change in wather (termperature rise, snow, rain, etc.) lasting 1d6 turns Deafening bang affects everyone within 60' of spells target. All those who can hear must make a constitution save of be stunned for 1d3 rounds. Caster and target exchange voices until a remove curse is cast Gate opens to randomly chosen outer plane; 50% chance for extra-planar creature to appear. Spell functions but shrieks like a shrieker (this does not relate to a spell or a monster - it literally shrieks like a bottle rocket) Spell effectiveness (range, duration, area of effect, damage, etc.) decreases 50% Spell reversed, if reverse is possible Spell take physical form of free-willed elemental and cannot be controlled by caster. Elemental remains for duration of spell. Touch of the elemental causes spell effect (Attack bonus equal to caster's). All weapons within 60' of caster glow for 1d4 rounds Spell funtions; any applicable saving throw it not allowed Spell appears to fail when cast, but occurs 1-4 rounds later All magical items within 60' of caster glow for 2d8 days Caster and target switch personalities for 2d10 rounds Slow spell centered on target Target deluded Lightning bolt shoots toward target Target enlarged Darkness centered on target Plant growth centered on target 1,000 lbs. of non-living matter withing 10' of target vanishes Fireball centers on target Target turns to stone Spell is cast; material componenets and memory of spell are retained Everyone within 10' of caster receives the benenfits of a heal Target becomes dizzy (-4 Attack and Armor bonus, cannot cast spells) for 2d4 rounds Wall of Fire encircles target Target levitates 20' for 1d3 turns Target suffers blindness Target is charmed as per charm monster Target forgets (busting out my ad&d books to find this spell later) Target's feet enlarge, reducing movement to half normal and adding -4 to all initiative rolls for 1-3 turns Rust monster appears in front of target Target polymorphs randomly Target falls madly in love with caster until a dispel magic is cast Target changes sex Small, black raincloud forms over target Stinking cloud centers on target Heavy object (boulder, anvil, safe, etc.) appears over target and falls for 2d20 points of damage Target begins sneezing. No spells can be cast until fit passes (1d6 rounds) Spell effect has 60' radius centered on target (all withing radius suffer effect) Target's clothes itch (-2 to initiative order for 1d10 rounds) Target's race randomly changes until canceled by dispel magic Target turns ethereal for 2d4 rounds Target hastened All cloth on target crumbles to dust Target sprouts leaves (no damage caused, can be pruned without harm) Target sprouts new useless appendage (wings, arm, ear, etc.) which remains until a dispel magic is cast Target changes color (canceled by dispel magic) Spell has a minimum duration of 1 turn (i.e., a fireball creates a ball of flame that remains for 1 turn, a lightning bolt bounces and continues, possibly rebounding, for 1 turn, etc.) Spell effectiveness (range, duration, area of effect, damage, etc.) increases 200% Unless otherwise noted, all spells created by a wild surge occur at the designated target point and function normally (appropriate saving throws are allowed). The caster's true level (as opposed to variance based level) is used when calculating range, duration, area of effect, etc. of these spells. Remember, unless the wild surge specifies otherwise it is in addition and not a replacement to the original effect which is calculated as all other chaos spells are, i.e. variance dice and so on. The above list, while long, is only a small fraction of the possible results of a wild surge. The DM is free and encouraged to create his own tables for wild surges. I do suggest however that to keep the system balance you replace options on this chart on a one for one basis with powers of similar balance. Meaning if it targets the caster the new power should target the caster if the old power was bad for the target so to should be the new one and the degree of bad or good should remain about the same even as the effect changes dramatically. I would also not recommend switching out or changing the effects that are based on the spell that was cast, rebounding, amplifying, etc. since these are the basic principles of wild magic zones and should always be a possibility. Tables like the one above cannot take into acount the situation at the instant of casting. It is not feasible to create tailored effects for every spell used in every possible way. Therefore, it is quite likely that some wild magic results will make no sence, be impossible, or have no visable effect. In these cases, the wild surge has no effect. Finally, not even the randomness of wild surges should be allowed to ruin the story of an adventure. As ultimate storyteller and arbiter of the game, the DM can overrule any wild surge he deems too destructive to the adventure. If this happens, re-roll the dice to get a new result. In a case such as this, do not treat the wild surge as having no effect. It is also not recommended that the DM ever choose the result of the wild surge this defeats the whole point of the class is point blank unfair. Reprinted in it's entirity from the book " Clearly, wild mages are a risky proposition. Not every player will want to play a wild mage; not every party will want a wild mage. The DM should not add benefits to the wild mage, hoping to make the class more "attractive" to his players. Players who like wild mages will play them without bribary. They will find the uncertainty and randomness of wild mages irresistible; these are the players for whom the wild mage was created Personal Note: Like specialist wizards wild mages must be wizard based and you can not make a "wild sorcerer." The powers presented here were never meant for such a system and I promise you would be unbalanced in such a case. Enjoy everyone spells to follow. Also I've noticed that no one else has commented though I have a huge number of views (well for my first time huge it's like 20 something.) Please if you stop by tell me what you think.

Yeah the thing about that +1 effective level is it works like 1/2 the spell penetration feat. So off the bat it's a free feat and then you have the fact that there are feats out there like fire caster that give you a bonus spellcaster level to say fire spells so mix that with a specialist and your first level evoker is doing 3d4(average 7) with his flaming hands which could easily lay waste to a whole gang of orcs for instance, or likely the entire rest of the party. I know you've been talking about changing the cleric in another thread and first I should reiterate some of the things that have been said there. One of the things that stops the cleric from being a healing b#*%& and makes them very different from the wizard or sorcerer class, or really the bard who can wield light armor and light weapons and cast spontaneous heals and has bardic knowledge and has a lot of skills, is that they can wade into battle in full plate and smash a holy maul into their enemies head. Also I know it bugs you that clerics cast spells in whatever armor they choose but divine magic is not a science the movements a cleric makes are akin to crossing yourself at a catholic church. In other words they are a devotion but even done clumsily or poorly they still trigger the spells effect because they still show the clerics devotion to their deity. As for balancing the class the cleric is deceptive in that the power of their turn undead checks are directly linked to their cleric level. If you've gone looking classes that increase your divine caster level and undead check level at each level and give you something else are extraordinarily rare. I'm not sure if there even is one, not saying there isn't but i haven't seen one. And that can be a very powerful combination given all of the divine feats especially ones that let you turn other creatures with that check. I would say as much as you itch to change the cleric class let it be. If your players are board with the cleric they will muticlass into a more diverse, but unable to turn undead, version of the cleric. Or if you absolutely feel you must change something give the cleric 1 bonus feat at 7th and another at 14th as kind of a reward for not multi classing and leave the rest of the class alone.

lol if you did it would be to someone else this is just an adaptation / derivative work of a long out of print class. Bust share your stories of crazy world shifting events and we'll call it even. It may be a day or two till I have the time to scribe a surge tale or adapt all of the spells but trust me when I say that this class is worth the wait.

I like the idea of giving the Wizard a feat every 4 instead of 5 levels because quite honestly many classes hold interest even at high levels but with only a bonus feat every 5 levels it just doesn't make sense not to have to take a prestige class. As far as the specialty wizards give them the feat every 4 levels as well. Specialists are basically a template that modifies the basic wizard class and remains balanced as long as you leave it that way. The bonus caster level is very powerful and should be avoided. I posted my class on a new topic thread. There's still some missing but it's a long project and the class discription is there for now. I look forward to your comments.

Forward: When I was a young player, still very new to constructed role playing games in general and AD&D in particular, my friends and I would gather to play our latest campaigns. The friends I made on these, floor seated, all night, role-playing sessions have lasted to this day and in some bittersweet cases a lifetime. I had always loved arcane magic and when it was my turn to play a character I often happily rolled out a wizard. So there we were rolling the dice, then 3d6 was still the standard not the high power versions we play now, and our newly appointed Dungeon Master Eric Firestone produced to my wonder and amazement a small black tome entitled simply Tome of Magic. The pages of this book would change my role-playing life forever and leave me with a permanent love of D&D. While the Tome of Magic is a veritable treasure trove of interesting mystical alternatives there was one class in particular that has always enchanted me

Thanks for your last reply it will help with this and future posts. As for this I think it looks actually quite good. I've always liked the idea of say the draconic casters but those classes are always nerfed and lack spell progression. So a heritage progression sounds fun and your trading the mass number of spells per day down to give the heritage boosts and the extra spell known per level. I like it and it sounds both balanced and fun. Humm don't feel like I helped much here but I learned alot. Maybe I can help more next time. I'm also going to post a class that I've been adapting from AD&D so look for that I'm interested in your comments. Peace

Again I think that all of your preplanning is a little bit your undoing. You apparently have a wonderful roleplaying group and for that you are very lucky. So in your example game above instead of your prison contrivance if you had brought everyone who was going to be a player together and told them "I want to make a game, the protagoist is a bumbling wizard with a good lead on finding some really powerful artifacts." then you ask them to make characters that have a reason to be going along with all this. They will write their own reasons for staying together and it will be much more satisfying then being sort of forced into it. Plus it will make better stories. This is a very, very dangerous road and I'm glad it worked out well for you. In general I would not advice using these games to work out real life issues unless you have an absurdly mature group and they are ok and aware of what you are doing. Many people would not take kindly to someone self assigning to be their therapist. In the last game I played my DM was trying to teach me a lesson that he belived I needed to learn about life through the game but I had no interest in learning his morality. We simply differ on what we think is best for me. This led to me be very uncomfortable in a game where to succed I either had to accept his morality for my character, which i didn't or work annoyingly hard against a world that was stacked against me.

The corrupting artifact is certainly classic enough and it's funny how you know they still won't realize what their doing by brining the artifact to the city. I have to disagree however that flexibility is the enemy of depth and detail. I belive that one of the gretest experiances in role playing is creating a story together. The depth provided by so many people writing their stories and you weaving them together in my experiance far outweighs anything you would have time to put together yourself. And if none of your players want to contribute to the story then your not so much role playing as playing an RPG vidio game witha pencil and your freinds are just setting you up as the computer.

I would say that you have a nice vague outline for the campaign already. That's definitely what you need to start with. I have actually had very limited success with doing a lot of pre planning for my games. In a game where you do not plan to shoe horn your characters down a very limited track (you may have restless characters for instance who have no interest in ever working at a mine, of course then you simply get them to spend the night in town and let the undead attack them and then they have an interest in undead killing, hopefully) I saw that when another gamer her asked what Prestige Class he should get that you responded, quite rightly, "What Would Your Character Do." When designing a game the answer to most questions is based on similar situations what would your players enjoy. Which of course is based on your player's characters. Usually when starting a new game I have a vague idea of what I want, in line with your plan, then I have everyone make their characters up and have them write back stories. I then weave the events in the characters back stories together to form the storyline going forward. My PC's are always the basis, weather they meant to be or not, of the structure for my metaplot. I even go so far as to have them make up their characters and write their stories a month or more before I intend to start playing so that I can do my planning work once I see where the PC's are already going. So I would say do that then post a summery of their chacters, here I mean story and a general outline of ability not stats. Then weaving a uniqe and flexible story that they will all like will be very easy. (Also once the game has begun listen to what your PC's theorize about what's going on. Sometimes what they come up with is so much better then what you had planned and you can easily take their idea and add a twist. They will both think that you are a genius and be very proud for getting so close to the answer no need to ever tell them that you changed it up)

Humm, I think I am starting to get a better understanding of what it is that you are trying to accomplish. If you don't mind me asking, how is it that you have been posting here for years but have little actual DM experience? Do you have trouble finding or keeping a group? How much player experience do you have and how often are you able to play test your modifications? I can understand banning the Psyonics and other more rules intensive additional magic systems from your game. Here is what you seem to be trying to accomplish correct me if you feel that I am wrong - You want a system that does not require you to constantly refer to or preferably even purchase any of the books - You want your players to have nearly unlimited choices without your game getting to cluttered to remember everything - You want everything to be balanced so the players have a fair chance in PvP - You want your system to conform to your ideas about each race, IE you think Dwarves are unattractive I think I pretty much hit your four big points. If one is wrong or i am missing one tell me which one. It seems to me you spend a great deal of time converting the whole system which took hundreds and thousands of man hours to properly balance and play test in the first place. I also here you constantly talking about how week the classes are and that you don't like paladins bard rangers and clerics but i know you also don't like sorcerers, or mages which I think leaves Barbarians monks and Rouges that you do like. And I'm willing to bet that when push comes to shove you don't really like them either. None of this is a bad thing. However I would like you to consider the following. Maybe you should create unique classes/races using the unmodified original versions of the classes as balance templates. Trust me when I tell you that the game is very well balanced and moving it so much is dangerous to fairness to say the least. So then when you DM if someone says "I want to be a cleric no customization for me please!" You don't feel bad for them that's what they were interested in playing. But if they say I want to make a spell caster that casts through inteligence and has a background where he ingests potions that slowly turn him into a dragon you can make a wizard that gains draconicbloodline features and some spontaneous casting per day but becomes limited in the number of spells he can know. Most DM's shy away from this kind of thing because of how time intensive the modifications are. However, this is clearly not a problem for you this would actually give you more time to spend on other parts of your game. Such as making the storyline very well thought out and interesting. Plus each character will feel unique. No one that wanted to play a sexy dwarf will have to be denied and you can customize and play with system to your hearts content. I do suggest you buy just three books though. The players handbook (you need it if for nothing else referencing all the spells) the Dungeon masters guide (has a lot of balance information that you will find indispensable with all the customization that you do) and the Monster Manual (unless you want all pvp action or have the time to make hundreds of monsters but it's still a great balance reference for power races and challenge ratings) If you buy the three books as a set it won't set you back so badly. If I still had the time to make all my classes and races from scratch I definitely would. It creates such a rich and varied world and allows your players to be truly creative and imaginative...assuming you can find players who actual want to create and imagine. But I have a real grown up job now so I trade my money for other people's creativity and go play. Good luck on all your creative endeavors. I'm sure you'll hear from me again. I'm addicted to writing about system and you're the only one who seems to be talking about it here.

I saw your post asking for help on the new spells post. My specialty is storyline and system and I am familiar with most of the basic roleplaying systems and a few more esoteric ones as well as war hammer 40K (though i don't know enough about that system to give you pen and paper advice for it) I would be happy to help you if I could but I am not sure that I have any ability to which I suspect is why you are not reciving replies to your post. You were looking at a dnd spell system so do you plan to have large table top battles in war hammer filled in between with dnd based paper and pen role playing? What story system are you thinking of using to represent individual campaigns? or are the 1990 rules of war hammer equppied to deal with single charicter story acting?

You didn't respond as if I what I said was offensive but re-reading it I think I came off a little brusque. So for that I wanted to apologize. I am actually quite impressed with your dedication to your game world and the amount of time you spend trying to improve the systems. That said, yes what you propose, especially being to choose from 90 spontaneous spells breaks the system. My favorite class is the wizard. Just the basic non-specialty wizard. With just the power that I get from that class and my ability to think a head and plan what spells I will need for the day and my ability to use old spells in new ways I am usually the strongest member of any party by 3rd level hands down. If you gave me more spells per day and then said choose any five spells and you can switch between them sanctimoniously I am now so powerful that if I am a talented player I no longer need a party at all for anything more than company. To give you a good example of how powerful spontaneously spell casting for wizards should be considered there is a feat where you must have a spell Mastered (the Feat) then you give up a spell slot 6 levels higher, then you can choose 1 spell and you can cast it spontaneously. Given that do you see how powerful allowing all spells to be cast spontaneously would be? I would suggest again using an alternate system for those people that want to have more variety in how they cast their spells. The easiest thing that I could suggest would be to adapt the Psyonic class to make a new mage class. First use the alternate rules where spell resistance works vs psyonics and vice versa. Then if there are staple spells I.E. magic Missle that you would like look at the relative powerlevel of psyonic powers and make a magic missle power. If you don't want to do that because you already have psyonics or it just grates you the wrong way. Then you might want to look into creating a class that sacrifices health to spontaneously cast spells. For instance the class you invisioned earlier with no limits on the number of spells they can cast but who takes un-healable non-lethal damage (this damage heals in time as normal but should not be able to be magicaly healed) equal to the spell level of any spell cast would be fairly close to balanced. Then an average level one mage could cast 5 spells and then pass out. That's more then they can cast now. And they could be spontaneous to any spell they have but it also leaves them very vulnerable to attack since they are so close to unconsciousness as they cast spells.

On the main topic: I understand why you would want to make the casting system more flexible. It would be more interesting and would link to having paradigms of the concept. Wizards with amazing int so on and so forth. I would normally point out here how much more powerful your system is and how unbalanced it would make this class. However, I have seen some of your other posts and am inclined to believe that you have likewise made all the other classes better than standard as well. - therefore my only point of contention is that the system you have suggested completely removes the strategy part of these classes. The inflexible way the wizard chooses his spells rewards intelligent and intuitive players for making good choices when they memorized their spells in the first place. The same is true for the sorcerer. The challenge is in choosing a small number of spells to account for all your needs. I have no idea what game balance must look like in your world any more but it seems to me in your zeal to make everything stronger you basically gave everything in the game extra powers and effectively changed nothing other then spending a huge amount of time and energy. Elegant and small changes archive better results than the baseline attacks you take against the system. If you want a truly flexible and balanced spell casting system I would suggest creating a new magic system from the ground up that has nothing to do with the preset spells that the standard magic system dictates.

On this side topic I would have to suggest that you all look at the white wolf system called simply Mage. Here I'm talking about Mage the Acension which is the old World of Darkness. I have no idea what the new system is like. But this system is flexible and works like a spontaneous casting version of the Epic magic system in DnD. You functionally have areas of magic you are good at using and then you can combine those areas to create effects.

There are so many things wrong with all of the modifications that it hurts my brain but I'll try to be calm and start from the begging. Races are balanced but over a spectrum like spells. Bottom line Magic missile is the best offensive level one spell. That doesn't mean it's the best in every situation. Still many people get other spells because they can, through clever role playing be made powerful. Races are the same all +1 races are less powerful than a certain benchmark which would make them +2 races. As far as dwarves being ugly. First Charisma is about the good looks of the race not necessarily as seen by humans. Dwarves would consider other dwarves to be much more attractive than a human. So to say that their ugly because you don't like the is facetious at best. Only truly monstrous races or ones with major personality flaws that even they find annoying should be awarded a -2 penalty to charisma. Finnaly many gamers are more interested in story that flat out power. I can kill much better opponents through plot manipulation than through beating their faces in. And what if I want to be a dwarven diplomant? now because you have "balanced" the dwarf i do not have this option. In short changing the balance eliminates options rather than creating them. If you want to make the races reflect your view of them lets be fair. Elves should be a plus race. They are supposed to be inhumanly wise beautiful intelligent and grace full +2 wis, +2 cha, +2 int, +2 dex, at the very least if not +4 to those stats. So if you want to reflect that in your world give it to them and then make them a +2 +3 or whatever it takes to make them balanced but don't arbitrarily disable them in other fields just because it's not what you like about them. As an avid modifier of the system myself I would never tell you not to modify it. That's what made dnd popular to begin with and it's still what makes in interesting. Just try and think a little more about the consequences of your actions and the results you are really looking for before you change every race in the game on it's ear.