D&D 4E Dark Sun 4E - Defilers?

[xipetotec]

Okay, so in the world of Dark Sun, Arcana Magic can be bad. It drains life energy from its surroundings. This is *very* cool ( and reminds me of Ben's power in the show Carnivale ).

However, did I miss a paragraph or chapter somewhere on how this works in the game? What I mean is that yes, you can use the defile ability or whatever, but you can also "choose" to preserve... I kind of fail to see where to consequence really is. I mean if the user doesn't want to defile, then they are just "careful" and they don't defile? There doesn't seem to be much penalty for using Arcana magic if you don't want to defile other than how the peopleor Arthas will think of you...

Am I missing something?

( If not, I would totally houserule that all arcane magic defiles to some degree )

 

[Scribble]

Okay, so in the world of Dark Sun, Arcana Magic can be bad. It drains life energy from its surroundings. This is *very* cool ( and reminds me of Ben's power in the show Carnivale ).

However, did I miss a paragraph or chapter somewhere on how this works in the game? What I mean is that yes, you can use the defile ability or whatever, but you can also "choose" to preserve... I kind of fail to see where to consequence really is. I mean if the user doesn't want to defile, then they are just "careful" and they don't defile? There doesn't seem to be much penalty for using Arcana magic if you don't want to defile other than how the peopleor Arthas will think of you...

Am I missing something?

( If not, I would totally houserule that all arcane magic defiles to some degree )

No- you're not really missing anything.

In a podcast they talked about how they didn't want it to be a penalty for not doing it, as opposed to more of a temptation to do it... Kind of Darkside of the Force style.

It's not really forced on you to defile... The choice is yours. Do you give in to the temptation, or not...

 

[Saeviomagy]

No- you're not really missing anything.

In a podcast they talked about how they didn't want it to be a penalty for not doing it, as opposed to more of a temptation to do it... Kind of Darkside of the Force style.

It's not really forced on you to defile... The choice is yours. Do you give in to the temptation, or not...

Even in the books, defiling never really came across as much more powerful than preserving with the exception of sorceror kings, and that really could just come down to "rajaat discovered how to become a dragon before he discovered how to become an avangion, so he never went any further"

 

[buddhafrog]

Cool - not playing dark sun, but I think that I will start adapting this. I might do it for arcane powers of encounter/daily levels only when the PC rolls 1-5 for example. I'll have to think of how to incorporate it. I like the cinematic element it provides.

 

[I'm A Banana]

What I mean is that yes, you can use the defile ability or whatever, but you can also "choose" to preserve... I kind of fail to see where to consequence really is. ... There doesn't seem to be much penalty for using Arcana magic if you don't want to defile other than how the peopleor Arthas will think of you...

You're pretty much right.

However, this problem is mostly something that story can fix.

"All Arcane magic defiles to some degree, sapping vitality from people, withering plant life, killing puppies, murdering sand fleas, and generally making things unpleasant. However, this has no true mechanical effect. Descriptively, the defiler's fireball steals the life-force from nearby catcuses, or from the targets themselves, withering them and consuming them. But this doesn't do anything worth mentioning in the rules. The exception is when the Arcane caster really sucks the life out of stuff to get a true mechanical benefit, and when that happens, use the Arcane Defiling power."

I'd do preserving the same way (mostly narrative), only make an Arcane Preserving power that mimics the ability of Arcane Defiling, and causes the caster to take damage instead of the caster's allies. For learning that, you might need to burn a feat.

Sound good?

 

[xipetotec]

You're pretty much right.

However, this problem is mostly something that story can fix.

"All Arcane magic defiles to some degree, sapping vitality from people, withering plant life, killing puppies, murdering sand fleas, and generally making things unpleasant. However, this has no true mechanical effect. Descriptively, the defiler's fireball steals the life-force from nearby catcuses, or from the targets themselves, withering them and consuming them. But this doesn't do anything worth mentioning in the rules. The exception is when the Arcane caster really sucks the life out of stuff to get a true mechanical benefit, and when that happens, use the Arcane Defiling power."

I'd do preserving the same way (mostly narrative), only make an Arcane Preserving power that mimics the ability of Arcane Defiling, and causes the caster to take damage instead of the caster's allies. For learning that, you might need to burn a feat.

Sound good?

Yeah makes sense. I mean even the "reward" for defiling doesn't seem great enough to bother to me otherwise. I see the "dark side" vs "light side" argument here too I guess.

 

[Deverash]

Cool - not playing dark sun, but I think that I will start adapting this. I might do it for arcane powers of encounter/daily levels only when the PC rolls 1-5 for example. I'll have to think of how to incorporate it. I like the cinematic element it provides.

Wow. What if you used something like the weapon breakage rule for weapon users? Arcane casters, if they roll a 1 on an arcane attack spell, can choose to reroll it...by defiling. I'm going to have to talk the GM for Dark Sun about that(not that I'm playing an arcane anything).

 

[Theroc]

Arcane Defiling allows a reroll of an arcane daily attack power at the cost of 1/4th the HP of every ally within 20 squares.

Kinda similar to the breakage rules, unless I misunderstood, except Arcane Defiling can be used on ANY unfavorable roll.

 

[BASHMAN]

Part of the penalty for being a defiler is that the other PCs in the group should almost instantly try to kill your character once they find out that's what you're doing, assuming they were role-playing the setting. I suppose if it was a party of evil characters, that would be something, but even then, if I'm evil on a world that's dying of thirst, I'd still probably want to kill anyone who was destroying all nearby plant life (which contains water) and potential to grow it for centuries, because that's MY water they're destroying. How can I rob & plunder food & water if you go around destroying it (and the potential for it ever to grow back)?

As a GM, I wouldn't even allow defiling to be an option for the PCs, just as I wouldn't allow Evil characters to be an option.

 

[Spatula]

Part of the penalty for being a defiler is that the other PCs in the group should almost instantly try to kill your character once they find out that's what you're doing, assuming they were role-playing the setting.

And then you explain to them that if you had not defiled, they would have died, and which is more important - survival or this small patch of desert that they will never see again?

Going back to the 2e setting, the only PC type that was obligated to hate defilers is druids. Sure, the peasants don't like it, but the other PCs are not peasants. They are engaged in life-and-death struggles just to survive, and can decide for themselves whether traveling with a defiler is worth the risk or not.

(In 2e, I would have said not worth it, since the defiler can't turn it off and you can't really conceal it. In 4e where you can defile on a situational basis, but it hurts the rest of the group, it's an interesting tactical tool)