The Shadowcaster -weak?

Cadfan said:

Except please, if you do try to change the shadowcaster, don't listen to people who want to turn it into a clone of already existing classes. I LOVE the flavor of having mysteries that, the longer you know them, the better you get at using them. The mystery mechanic is very cool. Its just the reality of so many mysteries that I basically cannot use because 6 levels later they'll be obsolete dead weight, that drags the class down.

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No worries. Any tweaks that I may or may not eventually recommend for the shadowcaster will be just that: Tweaks. I have no interest in redesigning the class from the ground-up; potential problems with power level notwithstanding, it's still pretty much the class I wanted to design.

Cadfan said:

My vote is to make mystery DCs scale at 1/2 caster level + cha.

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That's a nice simple tweak. Maybe even one that can be delivered in an errata.

Hey Ari!

As promised, my comments on this class :

There are some advantages to it, compared to a wizard (or sorcerer):

- d6 die (while I fail to see why the class got d6, since he is more or less a scholar like a Wizard)
- At higher levels, roughly two-thirds of his mysteries are cast as spell-like abilities or supernatural ability, i.e. one of the advantages being silent casting.
- The mysteries are well designed, and probably as powerful as wizard spells, contrary to what many said. Many of these spells are battle spells.

There are some important disadvantages to it, compared to a wizard (or sorcerer):

- the number of known mysteries is low, compared to a wizard and even to a sorcerer’s limited number of known spells, so they can be one-trick-ponies for a long time, before getting to higher levels.
- or: The number of times they can use these mysteries is low too, IMHO.

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I compared 13th levels Wiz, Sor and Shc (using the one on p 116)

Number of spell known:
Shc: 13 + 6 lesser fundamentals
Wiz: choose daily up to 25 different spells from a potentially long list of spells
Sor: 32

Max number of cast spells per day:
Shc: 31 + 18 lesser fundamentals
Wiz: 25 (int 16) + 4 level 0
Sor: 34 + 6 level 0

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My suggestion, if I may: Give them a much better variety of mysteries: increase the number of known mysteries, by perhaps giving a bonus of one every three level (plus perhaps more for low levels)

That would make approx. these new numbers:

Number of spell known:
Shc: 17 + 6 lesser fundamentals
Wiz: choose daily up to 25 different spells from a potentially long list of spells
Sor: 32

(Variety is still low, but the number of spell compensates: )

Max number of cast spells per day:
Shc: ± 39-40 + 18 lesser fundamentals
Wiz: 25 (int 16) + 4 level 0
Sor: 34 + 6 level 0

Rationale: I think the mysteries themselves are well designed and compare well to sorcerer’s or wizard’s spells. So the proposed changes would increase the number of mysteries known: with a more limited number of spells than a Wiz, but a higher number of spells, the class would compare better with wizards, IMHO.

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And yes, the flavour text is quite cool. I plan to add levels of Shadowcaster to a Fraternity of Shadows Ravenloft wizard.

Regards,

Joël

(edited for clarity)

Quick comment to the poll designer: as a marketing guy, I have to say the poll is flawed You should have put "don't know" at the end, as a separate choice.

Because it's not possible to interpret the "In the middle/don't know" result %, since we can't know if people voted for "this is well balanced" or "I don't know"

Just my 2c

Joël

Joël of the FoS said:

the poll is flawed ... since we do not know if people voted for "this is well balanced" or "I don't know"

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Yeah. And since it's in a rather obscure book, the "I don't know" is expected to be high.

-- N

Okay, I've been giving this a lot of thought, taking into account what people here have been saying, as well as comments from other folks, and a few other RPG writers. The following alterations are what I'm currently considering. This is not official errata. This is not even unofficial errata. I may well change my mind on one or all of these, before I give my "final" stamp of approval on any tweaks to the class. (And of course, even once I do, it'll have no official weight.)

Now, this doesn't go as far as some of you have requested, but it's where I'd like to start. If some of you would like to volunteer to run a few playtest adventures with these changes in place, I'd very much love to know how it goes.

1) Grant bonus mysteries per day based on Int. These would work just like bonus spells. For instance, if your Int is 14, you can cast one extra mystery of 1st-level equivalent and one of 2nd-level equivalent per day. (Note that each mystery does give an equivalent level, even though you don't learn them by level.)

2) Eliminate the rule that says you have to take mysteries in a given Path in order. If you want to jump around, so as to broaden your versatility, you can. You must still have at least one mystery of any given level equivalent (1st, 2nd, etc.) before you can get a mystery of the next higher level within a type (Apprentice, Initiate, Master), but they need not come from the same Path.

3) Eliminate the rule that says you get a bonus feat equal to half the number of paths you have access to. Instead, you get a bonus feat equal to the total number of Paths you complete. Thus, while you are no longer required to take the entirety of a given Path, there's still encouragement to do so.

4) Allow the shadowcaster to swap out mysteries, like a sorcerer does spells, with the caveat that if you suddenly "un-complete" a Path, you lose a feat as well.

5) Once your Apprentice Mysteries become supernatural abilities, change the save DC from 10 + equivalent spell level + Cha to 10 + 1/2 caster level + Cha. This makes them useful even against high-HD opponents, and follows the pattern for other supernatural abilities.

(And BTW, the warp spell mystery shouldn't say that it allows a Will save. The caster level check determines success or failure.)

Now, be aware that I have not playtested the changes myself. I'm not running a game at present--my last campaign wrapped up a few weeks ago--nor am I currently playing a shadowcaster. I also haven't been able to devote too much time to considering them, as I've just wrapped up a huge gig for WotC, and am about to dive into a short one for Vampire, before (tentatively) starting another for WotC. So I'll be the first to admit, there might be repurcussions to these ideas that I haven't yet seen. I'm quite eager to hear any thoughts you folks have, and any results that might come up in play. As I've said before, the shadowcaster was my first attempt to design anything so fundamentally different from the standard classes, and I won't pretend it's perfect.

So let's make it perfect.

Mouseferatu said:

1) Grant bonus mysteries per day based on Int. These would work just like bonus spells. For instance, if your Int is 14, you can cast one extra mystery of 1st-level equivalent and one of 2nd-level equivalent per day. (Note that each mystery does give an equivalent level, even though you don't learn them by level.)

2) Eliminate the rule that says you have to take mysteries in a given Path in order. If you want to jump around, so as to broaden your versatility, you can. You must still have at least one mystery of any given level equivalent (1st, 2nd, etc.) before you can get a mystery of the next higher level within a type (Apprentice, Initiate, Master), but they need not come from the same Path.

3) Eliminate the rule that says you get a bonus feat equal to half the number of paths you have access to. Instead, you get a bonus feat equal to the total number of Paths you complete. Thus, while you are no longer required to take the entirety of a given Path, there's still encouragement to do so.

4) Allow the shadowcaster to swap out mysteries, like a sorcerer does spells, with the caveat that if you suddenly "un-complete" a Path, you lose a feat as well.

5) Once your Apprentice Mysteries become supernatural abilities, change the save DC from 10 + equivalent spell level + Cha to 10 + 1/2 caster level + Cha. This makes them useful even against high-HD opponents, and follows the pattern for other supernatural abilities.

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Looks like some sound suggestions, thanks Ari

Mouseferatu said:

3) Eliminate the rule that says you get a bonus feat equal to half the number of paths you have access to. Instead, you get a bonus feat equal to the total number of Paths you complete. Thus, while you are no longer required to take the entirety of a given Path, there's still encouragement to do so.

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Just my spontaneous thought here.

This change does actually just the opposite from what it was originally there to achieve. I find this quite strange and rather jarring.

Originally, the budding Shadowcaster got the bonus feat for knowing lots of different paths. Due to the Mystery Path mechanic, this meant that there was some kind of method in place to try and balance between getting better mysteries in a path or knowing lots of minor spells in the paths.

With the above suggestion, the focus isn't on general knowledge of weaker spells, but instead prioritises completing the Path. Also the rate of acquiring the feats is now slower. Also, gaining feats when a path is complete, means that the feats will not be acquired until 5th and 6th level, then 11th and 12th level, and then 17th and 18th level. Which is sort of clumping things together yet again into a kind of ketchup effect. Nothing, nothing and then 3rd level mysteries and feats. Nothing, nothing, and then 6th level mysteries and feats.

First, thanks for taking the time to discuss this with us! I think it's great that the designer of the class is open to hearing all of our bit$%ing and moaning.

I have a couple of comments on your proposed changes, below:

Mouseferatu said:

1) Grant bonus mysteries per day based on Int. These would work just like bonus spells. For instance, if your Int is 14, you can cast one extra mystery of 1st-level equivalent and one of 2nd-level equivalent per day. (Note that each mystery does give an equivalent level, even though you don't learn them by level.)

...

4) Allow the shadowcaster to swap out mysteries, like a sorcerer does spells, with the caveat that if you suddenly "un-complete" a Path, you lose a feat as well.

5) Once your Apprentice Mysteries become supernatural abilities, change the save DC from 10 + equivalent spell level + Cha to 10 + 1/2 caster level + Cha. This makes them useful even against high-HD opponents, and follows the pattern for other supernatural abilities.

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I really like these ideas, as I think they help to address some of the fundamental concerns I had with the class. Namely, they provide a little more flexibility (especially if your bonus mysteries can be chosen on-the-fly from any you know of the appropriate level) and a small boost in power. None of the changes are dramatic, so they keep the core concept intact. I would even go so far as making the save DC change apply to spell-like abilities, but at that point it feels more like fine-tuning rather than making a significant change.

Mouseferatu said:

2) Eliminate the rule that says you have to take mysteries in a given Path in order. If you want to jump around, so as to broaden your versatility, you can. You must still have at least one mystery of any given level equivalent (1st, 2nd, etc.) before you can get a mystery of the next higher level within a type (Apprentice, Initiate, Master), but they need not come from the same Path.

3) Eliminate the rule that says you get a bonus feat equal to half the number of paths you have access to. Instead, you get a bonus feat equal to the total number of Paths you complete. Thus, while you are no longer required to take the entirety of a given Path, there's still encouragement to do so.

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I'm not convinced that I agree with these. One of the cool and interesting things about the class was the interplay between the desire to complete a path and the desire to spread your knowledge for the extra feats. The combination of these two does address the limited flexibility of the Shadowcaster, but it eliminates the interesting tradeoff between breadth and depth of knowledge.

I think you might be able to increase flexibility while still retaining the tradeoff if the path structure was changed. If each path had two (or more) mystery choices at each level, players would have more flexibility in progressing through a path, but you could retain the incentive for players to spread their knowledge across multiple paths. Doing this would have the added benefit of forcing you to design some new, cool mysteries!

green slime said:

Just my spontaneous thought here.

This change does actually just the opposite from what it was originally there to achieve. I find this quite strange and rather jarring.

Originally, the budding Shadowcaster got the bonus feat for knowing lots of different paths. Due to the Mystery Path mechanic, this meant that there was some kind of method in place to try and balance between getting better mysteries in a path or knowing lots of minor spells in the paths.

With the above suggestion, the focus isn't on general knowledge of weaker spells, but instead prioritises completing the Path. Also the rate of acquiring the feats is now slower. Also, gaining feats when a path is complete, means that the feats will not be acquired until 5th and 6th level, then 11th and 12th level, and then 17th and 18th level. Which is sort of clumping things together yet again into a kind of ketchup effect. Nothing, nothing and then 3rd level mysteries and feats. Nothing, nothing, and then 6th level mysteries and feats.

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I think I understand the logic of this change. Under the original rules, you had to complete Paths to get greater powers, and so there was a strong incentive to do so. The Bonus Feats were a counterweight that gives you an incentive to spread your choices around and widen rather than deepen your knowledge.

Now look at Ari's suggestions. Since you no longer need to follow a Path to get greater powers known, there's little incentive to do so. So now the Bonus Feats serve as a counterweight encouraging you to complete Paths.

I agree there are bunching effects, but this way the Bonus Feats do at least serve their original purpose.