Automatic Metamagic (Divine Ability) Clause Confusion

[Belzbet]

Hi all heres another stupid question. What does this mean exaclty:"Any metamagic feat selected cannot have a level requirement of 21st or higher."
I dont quite understand how to determine what metamagic feats have a level requirement higher than 21 and which do not.


Heres the full text of the ability (Deities and Demigods pg. 36):

Automatic Metamagic
The deity can apply a particular metamagic feat to spells it can cast
or to spell-like abilities it knows with no spell slot adjustment.
Prerequisite: Spellcaster level 1st.
Benefit: The deity chooses one metamagic feat. As a free action,
the deity can apply the selected feat to the spells from any one
spellcasting class the deity has or to its spell-like abilities. A spell
altered by the use of this ability does not use up a higher-level slot.
Notes: The deity must obey all the limitations normally associated
with the metamagic feat. For example, a deity using Automatic
Metamagic (quicken wizard spells) could cast only one
quickened wizard spell each round.
Any metamagic feat selected cannot have a level requirement of
21st or higher. Feats that depend on making the spell’s level higher,
such as Heighten Spell, do not work with this ability.
A deity can have this ability multiple times, choosing a metamagic
feat and either a spellcasting class or spell-like abilities to
which the ability will apply each time.
Suggested Portfolio Elements: Knowledge, magic

 

[Sekhmet]

Pretty much rules out Epic Spells being able to be automatically Intensified.

 

[Belzbet]

Pretty much rules out Epic Spells being able to be automatically Intensified.

Thanks for the quick response. How do you this ability works with Enhance spell? I am thinking that Enhance spell is similar enough to Heighten spell and that it cannot be selected with this feat.

Also I am still having trouble trying to figure out why intensify spell has a level requirement of 21 (I figured that intensify spell was not eligible). Is it because you need a spellcraft of 30 (so you would need to be level 27 to use the feat)??

 

[Sekhmet]

Intensify doesn't have a hard level requirement of 21, but Epic Spells do. I only used Intensify as the example of why Epic Spells can't be used with this feat.
Enhance Spell doesn't change the level of the spell like Heighten does, it just raises the maximum number of dice you can throw. It is perfectly fine with this feat.

 

[Belzbet]

Intensify doesn't have a hard level requirement of 21, but Epic Spells do. I only used Intensify as the example of why Epic Spells can't be used with this feat.
Enhance Spell doesn't change the level of the spell like Heighten does, it just raises the maximum number of dice you can throw. It is perfectly fine with this feat.

Thanks again. Yeah actually I know that Enhance spell doesnt raise a effective spells level. But, it is similar enough TO Heighten spell that it shouldnt be allowed to be used with this (the reason why we cant use Heighten spell is, presumably, because it would let us increase the DC of spells with no increase in slot, and so we could simple heighten it to the max level with no bad consequence). Similarly, if we would allow this feat to apply to Enhance spell a spellcaster could increase the damage done to the max (usually your CL). I know they dont do the same thing but the point is they BOTH can be applied multiple times. No matter what RAW is, I wouldnt allow this ability to apply to enhance spell.

Also, and it may be a typo, but in the ability description it says that metamagic feats themselves have a level requirement: "Any metamagic feat selected cannot have a level requirement of 21st or higher." Any metamagic feat selected NOT "Any spell selected when using this ability..." The clause intends to state that you cannot apply this ability to a metamagic feat with a level requirement above 21 (so either intensify can be selected with this ability or it cant and if it can then you can apply it to ANY spell you known).

Also, you CANNOT apply metamagic to epic spell, so it was never a problem to rule out being able to automatically intensify an epic spell (and the automatic metamagic ability states that all the normal requirements still apply).

Hopefully we can figure out what it would mean to say a metamagic feat has a level requirement (a spells level requirement is not at issue).

 

[Sekhmet]

You appear to be right, I must have misread it.
I think it is safe to assume any metamagic feat with in the Epic category (Enhance, Intensify, and any in a splat book), as they would all require you to be level 21 or better before you could pick them up.

Thankfully, with my failing to read the wording correctly, I went back through and checked the wording of Enhance and Intensify, which are both labeled Epic, and so have a hard requirement of level 21 (Intensify has a soft level requirement of 27).

 

[Belzbet]

Thankfully, with my failing to read the wording correctly, I went back through and checked the wording of Enhance and Intensify, which are both labeled Epic, and so have a hard requirement of level 21 (Intensify has a soft level requirement of 27).

That must be it!! All epic feats have a level requirement of 21, so ANY epic metamagic feat will have such a requirement.
Thank you

 

[Betrayor]

That must be it!! All epic feats have a level requirement of 21, so ANY epic metamagic feat will have such a requirement.
Thank you

So that means also that you can not heighten a spell above 9 level since there is a separate epic metamagic feat(Improved Heighten Spell) to do that....