Academy of the Chromatic Order--Higher Level Advanced Studies

[covaithe]

It might be easier to catch the attention of judges if you collected all the details of the proposals in one place. I had to read the whole thread again to figure out which parts of the feats did what. And, we still have no idea what the Magus nexuses do.

A semi-related thought: I was under the impression that Ancient Medibarian was frequently used at the Academy. Perhaps not for daily conversation over meals, but certainly in many magical texts and probably in some or most of the advanced lectures. In other words, it seems odd to me to be able to get a Master's degree (Academy Master) without speaking it. Frankly, it seems a little odd to be able to graduate (Academy Graduate) without speaking it.

 

[Bront]

Might not be a bad option to add it to a req to any of these advanced degrees.

But the basic stuff you don't need it for. (Graduate is fairly basic)

 

[Rystil Arden]

It might be easier to catch the attention of judges if you collected all the details of the proposals in one place. I had to read the whole thread again to figure out which parts of the feats did what. And, we still have no idea what the Magus nexuses do.

A semi-related thought: I was under the impression that Ancient Medibarian was frequently used at the Academy. Perhaps not for daily conversation over meals, but certainly in many magical texts and probably in some or most of the advanced lectures. In other words, it seems odd to me to be able to get a Master's degree (Academy Master) without speaking it. Frankly, it seems a little odd to be able to graduate (Academy Graduate) without speaking it.

I don't need the Magus degrees approved just yet because no character qualifies for them. I agree that it is sort of odd for Ancient Medibarian not to be a requirement for Academy Graduate, but remember that we had a graduate before I went and did a big fleshing out of the Academy, and that graduate did not speak the language. I'm happy to add the language to the Master's degree though. Yes, most students would consider a graduate without the language to be a bit odd, since it is indeed used quite a bit. It would be like graduating a medieval ecclesiastical school without Latin.

 

[LogicsFate]

How many graduates are there? I for one would switch a few skill points to learning it, or at very least will in a level or two.

 

[Rystil Arden]

How many graduates are there? I for one would switch a few skill points to learning it, or at very least will in a level or two.

Three PCs and one cohort, and only half of them have the language.

 

[Bront]

Any other judges want to weigh in on this? even to say they've seen it?

 

[Rae ArdGaoth]

I've seen it. =)

But seriously, it's a big proposal! There are a bunch of things being proposed here, it's a lot to take in all at once. My first concern is that any PC who wants to be an Academian will be too constrained by all these required feats, rather than freed. I really need to look at them closer though, and now that I have ATfL fresh in my mind, I think I'll be able to view it all from a good perspective.

 

[Rae ArdGaoth]

Allow me to begin by addressing the Academy Master and Magus feats:

Okay, first things first: I second covaithe's motion to put all this stuff together. Either edit the first post or make a new post with each item that is looking for approval (the feats and the cloaks), because it's daunting, and part of the reason is because it's so spread out. A side note: Much of the cloaks' text is repeated. Might I suggest making them one base item with variant abilities, to make things clearer and less repetitive?

Secondly, this isn't really ready for votes. The exact costs of the cloaks should be laid out, with the math behind them (and some comparisons to DMG items would be nice), as should the exact cost of the graduate program. These are important parts of the feats, and I can't approve them without that information. Off the top of my head, detect magic can be made permanent with permanency and 500 XP at 9th level, and is something that many wizards would probably do as a matter of course.

Thirdly, as I said in my last post, I worry that these feats confine PC Academy wizards, rather than free them. I know Rystil is a fan of RPing it all out, but in the context of a PbP game, it's just not plausible. These actually smell more like in-character RP benefits with pretty great mechanical benefits tacked on than "feats" in the traditional sense. As such, I'm not convinced that these should be approved for general use.

More specifically, I don't like the idea that a PC wizard cannot be truly affiliated with the Academy of the Chromatic Order without extensive on-screen action. That's not really a "featish" concept to me.

That being said, I do like the idea of the special cloaks with special abilities, I like the specific tuning to an individual caster, it's clever. I don't know that feats are a necessary mechanic here.

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Switching gears now. Mechanically speaking, I don't like the Academy Prodigy feat. We're already messing with core rules enough by allowing the House feats (Daryne's Imagination and such), I'd rather not mess with the specialization rules even more by allowing banned schools (at whatever penalties, with whatever prereqs). I also don't think it adds very much flavorwise. I vote NO to that feat.

 

[Rystil Arden]

I've seen it. =)

But seriously, it's a big proposal! There are a bunch of things being proposed here, it's a lot to take in all at once. My first concern is that any PC who wants to be an Academian will be too constrained by all these required feats, rather than freed. I really need to look at them closer though, and now that I have ATfL fresh in my mind, I think I'll be able to view it all from a good perspective.

They don't have to take anything other than Academy Graduate if they don't want to, and they can still be a graduate of the Academy with the Wizard's or Journeyman's degree. Also, it can all happen offscreen if desired. The player would need to put some effort into thinking about what their thesis is called and then the time handwaved, but that's all that is strictly necessary, if not necessarily desirable (something very brief would be ideal, unless the player desired it to be more drawn out). I suppose it should also be true for Magus that there is some minor level of sanity check approval in the case of a PC who was, for instance, a renowned homocidal lunatic killer or someone else that the Academy would not want representing them as a Magus.

 

[Rae ArdGaoth]

See, the thing about the thesis. I completely missed that. Is that supposed to be a prereq for Academy Master? If so, it needs to be listed as such. And that is yet another thing that doesn't strike me as very feat-like. All these RP reqs sound more like the entry into a PrC than a feat.