Eschew Materials??

[Findlefarb]

What are your thoughts on the feat Eschew Materials?

I've seen people swear by Eschew Materials, to the point that they can't ever consider a caster without this feat at first level. To me, though, this feat reads as "get out of spell component pouches free." It only works against components of 1gp or less in value, so, it covers anything that you'll get in a spell component pouch. It's one item that you purchase at chargen and ignore for the rest of the character's career. I can't see any reason to take this feat in that case.

What's your experience? Have cheap material components ever come up in your game? They haven't in mine. Are there perhaps styles of play in which the feat means more?

 

[FireLance]

Are there perhaps styles of play in which the feat means more?

Yes, it means more if you have an adversarial DM who likes to cripple the PCs by taking away the basic equipment they need to function effectively. See also: Spell Mastery.

 

[HeapThaumaturgist]

Yea. It's effective only if you have an adversarial GM, then they might be the difference between life and getting ground down to 1st level.

Which means, basically, if I need those two feats, I'll just go ahead and quit the game. I'm not really into that sort of game.

Y'know the situation: bad-guys tend to have ogres with Improved Sunder around. A dunk in a river means you lose 10,000gp in spell books unless you have role-played out getting them waterproofed. Rangers double-tap your familiar. Every time you RP in an inn, you'll be attacked by assassins that night the moment you take off your armor. A fallen PC gets CDGed by rote. Your friends are expected to loot your corpse and your new PC comes in a level below the LAST poor sucker that died, who came in a level lower than the LAST sucker, etc etc, until you're bringing in a 2nd level PC after your 7th level guy bites it.

Eeep!

--fje

 

[nimisgod]

I don't know if it's an essential feat as you say, but it's pretty handy. As a GM, I like to mix things up a little and take away things that players often take for granted... like firm footing and sleep. I play sorcs more than I do any other class and I don't find myself taking this feat at all.

If you wanted to play a spellcaster who covers most of his bases, then it's a must have. But IME, most GMs don't even care... though there is the occasional smart baddie who tries to shut a spellcaster down via attacking the component pouch.

Another way to avoid this problem: be a psion

 

[Jack Simth]

It's useful if you make use of Gaseous Form or similar (no components allowed); makes it possible for a Sorceror (who also has Silent and Still) to use lower level spells even when paralized (always fun when that 10th level Sorceror you thought was down for the combat due to the failed save vs. paralisis lets loose with a Fireball), during a grapple (full-round to retreive spell components before casting while grappling; if you don't need any, you can surprise someone), when the caster's hands are kept away from the pouch (chained to a wall, hands tied, polymorphed....) or when the spell component pouch is unavailable for some other reason (sundered in combat, captured and stripped, lifted by Slight of Hand, stolen from camp when the watchman wasn't observant enough, et cetera).

It's also useful for flavor when you want a character that doesn't need such trappings, or couldn't realistically refill a spell component pouch, but who cares about flavor on a rules forum?

 

[Infiniti2000]

...during a grapple (full-round to retreive spell components before casting while grappling; if you don't need any, you can surprise someone)...

This IMO is the reason to get Eschew Materials. Combined with Still spell, it's a must have if you're expecting to get grappled. Of course, any competent mage should have dim door prepared and any competent cleric or druid should have freedom of movement, so it's not as useful as it's first made out. The fact is that it's a common houserule to give out Eschew Materials for free (to just sorcerers if not everyone).

 

[Cabral]

The fact is that it's a common houserule to give out Eschew Materials for free (to just sorcerers if not everyone).

Heh. I actually thought I was the only one ...
As for the usefulness, it's a bit better than taking feat to save on a 25g piece of equipment. Better because, in addition to saving 25g, you can cast simple spells while streaking or getting the business end of your DM's pet tentacle beast ...

 

[F5]

I love eschew materials. This is strictly hosuerule territory, but I dislike material components, so I let all casters get cheap access to equipment that duplicates the effects of this feat:

Magic wands. Not like the kind you can craft, but the classical kinds of magic wands, that wizards use to focus their powers. In game terms, call it a Metamagic Rod of Eschew Materials, with unlimited uses per day, the large cost of this is mitigated by special materials that make this (and ONLY this) magic item very cheap to craft. Cheap enough that Master Wizards often buy or make one for their students. They don't HAVE to be wands. Clerics can have a kind of scepter with their holy symbol on it. Druids can have a Hawthorne branch twined with dried holly berries. Whatever, as long as it means I don't have to deal with a diligent player taking time out of an adventure to replenish his guano supply.

You can still use components if you like them. Expensive components and foci still need to be obtained. And you can still get the drama of having a caster cut off from his spellcasting tools and "helpless", if that kind of thing floats your boat. But it seems a lot less silly to me than having a mighty wizard rooting around in a bag for a ball of twine and a black feather (or whatever).

 

[BluWolf]

As a rule I have pretty much ingored components under 50gp my whole DMing life. The only value I see in them is in flavor and trying to keep track of a gnats-ass or even remebering to deduct the 25 gp everyonce in a while was a complete waste of record keeping time.

So I house-ruled the feat to reflect this a made it a class feature of the sorcerer in my home brew. I still make the wizard do the adminstration of the compenents if he does not take the feat at some point. But most Wizard players I have met like the admin side of the game anyway.

 

[pbd]

The fact is that it's a common houserule to give out Eschew Materials for free (to just sorcerers if not everyone).

Heh. I actually thought I was the only one ...

We get around this by just not requiring mundane, simple components; although expensive components are ceratinly needed.