[3.5 Revision Spotlight] The Gnome

[GravyFingerz]

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/rs/20030527a

Um, wow.

Favored class bard? Talk about slaughtering your sacred cows. It's kind of like, "Well we support the illusionist thing." And then when you hit the bottom, they say "We don't support the illusionist thing."

I suppose I can see Gnomes having Bard as their favored class, but it's always been Illusionist.

 

[Argent Silvermage]

I don't understand the need to cling to the past.. especialy when it is so bad. Gnomes have had a bad rap in 3e in part due to the Illusionist being thier racial "class". I think the revision is right on target. It takes into account their gregarious natures and magic. The bonuses to thier illusions is a fitting tribute to the old ways.
What's not to love? Gnome may become my favorite Race.. even elves don't match the Gnome.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

So much for Gnomes: Masters of Illusion.

Doing away with sacred cows is fine, but it should at least be consistent. Gnomes can all cast some illusion cantrips; they have racial bonuses to saves against illusion -- frankly it makes sense for their favored class to be illusionist. If all those things were enchantment-based, it would be more consistent with bard.

 

[Argent Silvermage]

But that means that they have a weakened favored class. If it were wizard or better yet Sorcerer I would have no problem. but to force a player to specialize in illusionist kind of sucks.

Bard is a great concept and we haven't seen the revised spell list for them. It may have a lot more illusion spells.

 

[dravot]

Morning, Bolo!

It would seem to me that they kept much of the flavor of the illusionist gnome (bonus to saves vs. illusion, cantrips, etc.) and that's good enough for me.

I'm interested in seeing how well they work with Bard as favored class.

 

[Argent Silvermage]

Good morning Dravot.

I think the Bard idea is great. Bards have alchemy as a skill and spells plus all sorts of skills that would be needed for the gnomish national passtime.

 

[LightPhoenix]

Bard is a great concept and we haven't seen the revised spell list for them. It may have a lot more illusion spells.

I'm going to repeat this, because it's going to be needed to be repeated. Bards have received several changes that we don't know about in 3.5e, especially in spell lists.

That said, I like the general fit, but we don't know if the bard has received more illusion type powers. Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if they have, illusion is a very bard-type thing to do IMO.

 

[Katowice]

You could always 'Rule 0' to it to say that a gnome character has to choose either bard OR illusionist as his preferred class.

 

[Al]

Well, let's just kill the sacred cow and replace it with a profane ass...

Replacing illusionist was a bad step. The whole gnomish race is *geared* towards illusion. Their penchant for practical jokes, their innate ability to cast illusionist cantrips and their bonus to illusion DCs all ties in with them having a racial disposition for the illusionist.

As for the bard, I fully understand that in 3.5e the bard will become a respectable class. However, I'm not really sure it fits in with the whole gnomish racial archetype. They do not have a necessarily arts-orientated culture- indeed, their cultural description tends to have them very much going for the practical skills and sciences, with those gnomes with a steady profession tending to be engineers, scientists, scholars and the like; not dancers, prancers and balladeers.

Indeed, a far better justification for a bardic favoured class could be given for the elf (although I'm not sure that *that* hasn't been changed as well). The gnomish bard, to my mind, goes against the fundamental gnomish archetype. Change for improvement is good; change for its own sake is bad.

 

[JPL]

It's different, but I like it.

Bards make excellent tricksters [spells + rogue-type skills], and they have Knowledge as a class skill, which is consistant with the idea that gnomes value education.

Besides, gnome = gnosis = knowledge = bardic lore.

Gnomes are the keepers of the lost knowledge. This works.