Can anyone explain the purpose of this wonderous item?

[Tiberius]

Ah, an interpretation that makes the BBB a more expensive and less versatile replacement for the Handy Haversack or any of the various Bags of Holding. Good idea.

Basically, you have decided that the BBB is an item only a moron would acquire. I'm sure that makes you feel special.

Not necessarily. The B^3 makes a great travelling spellbook. If I've got these huge tomes full of spells, I wouldn't want to lug them around all the time and risk their destruction, especially since spells are so expensive to scribe. Because the book accepts spells without cost, I can copy my spells from my "library" spellbooks to my "traveling" B^3 with a minimal expenditure of time. It's easily worth the cost of the Book to a) get rid of that weight and b) not have to worry about losing all of my spells should something catastrophic happen.

I think the purpose of the item is to give wizards peace of mind, not wholly circumvent the scribing costs. Failure to scribe a spell onto a standard book which is left in a secure place is foolish in the extreme, and the wizard who seeks to minimize his costs that way is simply asking to be turned into a slightly more capable commoner when his book is destroyed.

-Tiberius

 

[Storm Raven]

But over the course of a month or so, you could cast every 4th level spell in the PHB, with no scribing costs.

In exchange for 120 levels worth of spell pool debt, which would have to be repaid as you go (an 8th level caster can only have a total of 24 levels of spellpool debt at any given time), meaning that, in exchange for the "versatility" of casting one different spell per day, you have to give up the qeuivalent of another 4th level spell slot on an almost daily basis.

 

[Storm Raven]

Yup. I see the Book as a prestige and style thing. Like really little cellphones. They don't actually do the job any better than a big clunky cellphone, but they look cool.

I personally feel it fits the 9000gp price tag far better than the scribe-70k-of-spells-for-free interpretation... which makes it an "Only a moron wouldn't have it" item.

Ah, so your position is that 9,000 gp items that are "highly sought after" by wizards should be useless junk that no one in their right mind would actually want.

If I put a $50,000 price tag on a Yugo, no one wants it, no matter how chic I try to make it seem to own one. I find your interpretation, since it makes the BBB the Yugo of magic items, to be both ludicrous and dumb. I'm glad that you aren't involed in any game I've been associated with, given your silly position on this.

 

[Zhure]

Since the BBB has so many interpretations (two), I figured I'd cut to the chase and just disallow them IMC. Works so far.

Greg

 

[Spatzimaus]

It's easily worth the cost of the Book to a) get rid of that weight and b) not have to worry about losing all of my spells should something catastrophic happen.

This reminded me of something. IMC, we were arguing about the BBB... we've been using the non-Monte interpretation (i.e., it still costs to scribe); it's a high-level campaign, and the ability to let Wizards get completely around the scribing costs was just too much. This was when one of my players came up with a beautiful compromise:

The BBB isn't a spellbook. It's a template. That is, it's a magical conduit connected to up to 5 spellbooks you have stored in a secure location. They're the true magical books, while the BBB just allows you to use a normal-ink duplicate to memorize the spells.

So, when you get a new spell, you scribe it into your normal books, at the full cost and normal number of pages. Then, stick the spellbook in your home.
Okay, now that spell is available for the BBB to use. Copy the spell in normal ink into the BBB, and now you only need to carry the BBB with you to use the spell.
If you want to change which spells are in there, rip up the BBB page and a new blank one magically replaces it, but you can only copy the spell into the BBB if the original is in front of you (no changing it while you're in a dungeon).

The idea is, a Wizard might only ever need to carry one or two of these books (45 spells goes a LONG way), instead of lugging around a bunch of spellbooks. And, if the BBB is destroyed or stolen, you still have the originals at home. That sort of benefit is easily worth 9k.

One downside: you can't actually scribe a new spell into the BBB; first, you need to scribe into your originals. This isn't always practical, so a lot of Wizards will bring along a half-empty normal tome of miscellaneous spells, with room to scribe new stuff.

We added a few other things: the BBB only works if the originals aren't moved and only if they belong to the caster, so if you loot a BBB off someone you can't use any of the spells contained inside (you'll just have to rip out all the pages, and start over). Likewise, if the originals are stolen you can't cast the spell from the book until you recover it. So, a lot of "mage guilds" have vaults where members keep their tomes.

I'm sure he got the idea from the W&H library in the season finale of Angel, it had been on the night before. But it was a great idea, and it solved some DM headaches (loot off enemy Wizards, why join a mage guild, etc.)

Oh, and using the same concept, we also made Boccob's Blessed Scroll. It duplicates 10 existing scrolls, and when you read a spell off of it, both the original and that section of the BBS go blank. No more fumbling through packs looking for the right scroll; it's great for classes like Rogue that can't cast themselves but use scrolls often.

 

[Storm Raven]

Not necessarily. The B^3 makes a great travelling spellbook. If I've got these huge tomes full of spells, I wouldn't want to lug them around all the time and risk their destruction, especially since spells are so expensive to scribe. Because the book accepts spells without cost, I can copy my spells from my "library" spellbooks to my "traveling" B^3 with a minimal expenditure of time.

You apparently missed the part of Hypersmurf's interpretation where he determined that for his game, the BBB doesn't reduce scribing costs. Hence, your entire argument is flawed.

It's easily worth the cost of the Book to a) get rid of that weight and b) not have to worry about losing all of my spells should something catastrophic happen.

Getting the far less expensive and much more versatile Handy Haversack will get reid of the weight of those spellbooks, as will a bag of holding. Both options allow more flexibility and cost less then the BBB. Why would anyone want a BBB in Hypersmurf's world when they could get a Haversack?

I think the purpose of the item is to give wizards peace of mind, not wholly circumvent the scribing costs. Failure to scribe a spell onto a standard book which is left in a secure place is foolish in the extreme, and the wizard who seeks to minimize his costs that way is simply asking to be turned into a slightly more capable commoner when his book is destroyed.

Sure, using the BBB as your sole spellbook is living dangerously, but shouldn't that choice be up to the player?

 

[Storm Raven]

Since the BBB has so many interpretations (two), I figured I'd cut to the chase and just disallow them IMC. Works so far.

Well, really it boils down to (a) an interpretation offered by the individual who wrote the section in the DMG on magic items and (b) a bunch of people advocating a house rule.

If you ban everything in 3e D&D that has been the subject of a house rule, you aren't going to have much of a game left.

 

[hong]

If you ban everything in 3e D&D that has been the subject of a house rule, you aren't going to have much of a game left.

Nonsense.

 

[Spatzimaus]

Originally posted by Storm Raven If you ban everything in 3e D&D that has been the subject of a house rule, you aren't going to have much of a game left.

Unless you add a house rule to fill the gap, of course. You may not have much of the original D&D left, but isn't that the whole point of the d20 system?

It's perfectly reasonable, as DM, to say that an item doesn't exist in your world. Any item you think is overpowered/undercosted should be considered for this. If they hadn't errata'd the price on Boots of Springing and Striding, wouldn't it be okay to simply disallow them?

IMO, using Monte's opinion of how the BBB should work, I think it's horribly overpowered. Of course, I also think that Monte's Ranger is horribly overpowered, so I have yet another reason not to go with his opinion.
So, I either had to raise the price, change how it worked, or remove it from the game. See above for how I changed it.

 

[hong]

It's perfectly reasonable, as DM, to say that an item doesn't exist in your world. Any item you think is overpowered/undercosted should be considered for this. If they hadn't errata'd the price on Boots of Springing and Striding, wouldn't it be okay to simply disallow them?

I'm just wondering which DM is fool enough to allow the absorbing shield in their game.