New Jobs

I think different jobs should have different specials, but we shouldn't destroy the usefulness of the Profession skills by making the others so much better, since they are worthless in game for anything other than this.

For instance, the new Teacher and Healer proposals are basically freebies for many characters. Anyone trying to max Diplomacy (Lasair, for instance) automatically make Teacher. That's one reason why the CP proposal for teachers, while paltry, is more fair than the older one with SP, although it isn't just right yet, since the teachers are paid less than unskilled Labourers with no ranks in anything.

Druids and certain Clerics are very likely to get the Healer job for free also by buying useful skills for their adventures, and thus it should also pay less than Professions.

However, all of these skills could have different specials--what if Performer paid the same/less but had (Special: With high perform results, you may attract the attention of influential patrons), for instance?

Solnath said:

I think that the point at the moment isn't necessarily making the wages exactly the same, but rather provide different jobs that suit different kind of characters. Also yes, now that you pointed it out, maybe the teachers' pay should be in copper pieces instead of silver. Though historically speaking, scribes had a pretty high wage in medieval times.

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Though historically speaking, scribes had a pretty high wage in medieval times.

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Historically speaking, a Judge has a much higher wage than a Sailor, but since both of those are based on Profession(Judge) and Profession(Sailor), and since those skills do absolutely nothing else, we would be basically encouraging everyone to pick Profession(something lucrative) if we deviated from the standard rules and tried to pay based on the Profession's relative worth in historical societies.

The other interesting idea is to give some of the jobs from the job system a really high requirement and then make them pay more. For instance, perhaps Teacher is low-paying, but then there might be

Professor--You are a visiting professor at the Academy of the Chromatic Order for a term.
Requirements: Knowledge Arcana 8 ranks, Spellcraft total bonus +15, Ability to cast 3rd-level Arcane Spells
Special Requirements: You must submit a resume and be approved by the Academy for the visiting professorship (which if you don't have the feat Academy Graduate due to attending the Academy yourself requires you to be much more impressive than the above requirements), you must dedicate an entire term to you professorship--not just one week.

Payoff: Over the course of the entire term (four months), you gain a 2000 gold stipend, 1000 gold worth of free crafted magic items and 100 craft points, and 1500 gold worth of free spell research. If you were a visiting professor with Sice, double the stipend, if with Omega, double the items, if with Daryne, double the spell research, if with Mordrue, add in 1000 gold in successful mundane research (can be published/sold and counts as a MW item for the Knowledge skill of your choice).

Hrm... I really don't like the idea of 4 month PC disappearances, after which they return with monetary gains. If a PC wants to be a professor at the Academy, I think a DM should run an "adventure".

Rae ArdGaoth said:

Hrm... I really don't like the idea of 4 month PC disappearances, after which they return with monetary gains. If a PC wants to be a professor at the Academy, I think a DM should run an "adventure".

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Well, it gets rid of them at least. And then gains are actually less than the old Performer proposal or Teacher proposal would have given at the higher end. Just a thought, of course. If it was an adventure, it would probably be extremely boring. "And then the next day, you and your Research Assistants do some more research, but you have to lecture those students for an hour. But the next day, your class doesn't meet, so you and your Research Assistants just do some more research. Then the next day, you administer a test for your class. And then you frantically try to grade it before the next class. And then the next day, you deal with angry, sobbing, or otherwise unhappy students of various sorts who did badly on the test, armed with excuses, threats, and accusations that the test was too hard. Then the next day, you and your Research Assistants do some more research. Then the next day..."

Unless you add Drama! which helps keep the action going. However that's very un-D&D.

Solnath said:

Unless you add Drama! which helps keep the action going. However that's very un-D&D.

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Actually, we did have an adventure about being a student at the Academy, but that was anything but typical circumstances--there was a Philosopher's Stone, and a mysterious forgotten area where one of the founders kept his secret experiments, and snake monsters, and a journal with a soul fragment that possessed people and a Dark Lord returning.

Actually, I guess that is fairly typical for a magic school nowadays

Yeah, I've noticed you get a lot of inspiration from Ms. Rowling, Rystil.

So, basically you were roleplaying Harry Potter?

Most people consider much talk and little action to be boring, I don't mind it though. But back on topic, I don't care what the pay is as long as Sammy can help local Orussusians as a healer. I can even take a "covers food and shelter" wage, but I want her to just not idle about when she can be saving the world one step at a time.

Yeah, I've noticed you get a lot of inspiration from Ms. Rowling, Rystil.

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Inspiration? Well, not really. But when Manzanita wrote up the Academy, it was enough of a direct lift from Hogwarts that I decided in my adventure that I was going to attempt to parody Harry Potter (which I think is fairly horrible writing and completely horrendous plot resolutions, if well characterised) while still being serious about making the Academy a cool place. And thus you get my favourite scene in the entire adventure:

ATfL said:

"It's not Rayne. I promise you it isn't Rayne. If we come out of this alive, I'll bet you 100 gold on it," Elektra says, a bit afraid, but still confident in her trust of Rayne, "Well Truman, any more deus ex machinas?"

"I can't think of any."

"This is where I make the quip about the wands cancelling out. I'm still mad at you for sending my nexus away, though it found its way to Orussus. Still, you were moronic enough to not realise that since that was my nexus, this must be my book--I'll take that now."

*The 'notebook' floats from its position on the ground (Vanitri had to drop it as a free action in order to draw his blades) to her hand.*

"Sorry Lex, nothing personal my dear--I'd honestly rather not kill you if I didn't have to, but you've left me no choice. There's increased security and my sanctum has been breached. I count three people here, and I need two more to finish my philosopher's stone--and Vanitri stays, he's a cutie. No hard feelings, right?"

"Shut up--stop trying to sound like you're being nice, you bastard!"

The Dark Lord puts a hand to the heart, "You wound me, Lex. But at least you make this easier,"

*Blood-red energy builds up in front of the Dark Lord and forms an arc with the Philosopher's Stone, as it slowly coalesces into a beam of light that begins to shoot forth towards Lex. Suddenly, there is a shout that comes from just nearby where no one seems to be standing:*

"No--you can't take Lex, you bastard!" Aldin Ferrous drops the cloak of invisibility from in front of him as he charges at the Dark Lord with a dagger.

"Oh, thanks! You're right--she can live," the Dark Lord acknowledges, swinging the ray to meet Aldin.

*Blood-red energy engulfs him, suffuses him, and he screams a terrible scream and collapses to the ground, the colour draining from his body until he is left a smoking ruined husk on the ground.*

"I wish I didn't have to do that. Well, only one more then."

...

*Truman, who is still conscious, though staggered, grins and says:*

"No, why not choose me? If that's what you want, then do it. Don't kill Vanitri or Elektra. Let it be over with."

"If that is your wish...you are on the brink anyway I will keep it small and painless" she shoots a small red beam at Truman, but instead of affecting him, it hits off his eyepatch and rebounds towards Elayna.

"Ha, psych! I said I was out of deus ex machinas, but not yet. You see, thanks to my mother's love, any spell that would kill me rebounds on the caster."

"Wow, that is a deus ex machina."

"No, it's just an unusal plot element of which you were not aware. A deus ex machina is when someone else comes out of the blue and saves the day. You should know that. Good work stalling Vanitri," Rayne heads down the hall, the other Elektra guiding the way.

"Rayne."

"Elayna."

"Stuck-up whore."

"Racist bitch."

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I like the double irony there Of note, he isn't actually immune to magic because his mother loved him, but he likes to use that as a bluff because he has an Eyepatch that can reflect a killing spell of level 0-3 1/day He tries it again in Rinaldo gets Schooled:

"And don't even think about using dark magics on me to get to Lex. My mother loves me, so I'm immune to all magic," he states, rubbing his eyepatch

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Aha, so that's what that line meant. Not having read A Teacher for Laynie, I was confused when I read it. Now it makes sense.

And you don't like the Potter books? I find them simple, yet uncannily addictive and quite good. We have very different tastes when it comes to novels, Rystil. =)