D&D 3E/3.5 Custom Spells for 3.5 - Are these balanced?

[Scorponox]

Hi EN Worlders,

I was thinking of adding these spells to my game, and wanted to know if they were overpowered/underpowered, or just right. Some of them also might be redundant as I haven't looked through all the published books.


Here goes:


Deft Strike
[Transmutation]
Brd 1, Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V,S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Target: You or touched ally.


The target gains temporary, intuitive insight into the immediate future during their next attack. Their (or your) next single attack roll gains a +10 insight bonus.


---Reasoning: Why is True Strike personal only? Casters need a spell that help allies. This does half the bonus of a true strike, and costs the same (a level-1 spell). Concealed target penalty still affects this spell, unlike True Strike.






Vigilant Charge
[Transmutation]
Brd 1, Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V,S,M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Target: you or touched ally.
Duration: 1 round/level


Vigilant Charge negates the -2 AC penalty while charging, and gives the target an extra 5 ft. of movement.


Material Component
Piece of leather from a used boot.


----Reasoning: This is like Protection for Evil/Good/etc. except the +2 AC is situational, and gives a bit of a movement bonus that is hard to find at low levels. Is also much shorter duration than Protection from Evil/Good etc.






Magic Steps
[Evocation]
Brd 1, Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V,S,M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Duration: 1 round/level
Range: Close (25 ft. + 5 ft./level)


This creates a flight of stairs 20 ft high, 20 ft long, 5 ft. wide and at a 45 degree angle. (or shorter, at caster's discretion) This flight of translucent stairs is altogether mundane, having no safety rails. It looks quite literally like 25 slabs of wood floating in mid air, going up at an angle. These stairs cannot grant concealment. It can hold up to 100 lbs./level of weight. Any more than that and the Magic Steps blink out of existence.


Material Component
Wood from a used staircase or ladder.


----Reasoning: This spell helps allies climb up buildings easily. This is about the same amount of usefulness as a levitate spell but is weaker because it lasts rounds instead of minutes, and the highest an ally can get is 20 ft. vs. much higher for Levitate. The advantage over Levitate is all your allies can move up vs. only one person being able to move. It also doesn't suffer the same attack penalties as when someone is levitating. Semi-powerful for a level-1 spell. If someone argued this is a level-2 spell like Levitate, I'd not really have a problem with that.






Perdu
[Illusion]
Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V,S,M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Target: One 5 ft. square
Duration: 1 round/level
Range: Close (25 ft. + 5 ft./level)


Perdu makes an area 5 ft. by 5 ft. by 5 ft. invisible. Creatures entering the square become invisible to the naked eye, but once they step out, they become visible again. Creatures who pass through the same square can see each other within the square. The effect is stationary and cannot be moved. As with the Invisibility spell, if the person inside the effect of a Perdu spell directly attacks an enemy, they become visible immediately. If an enemy successfully attacks a creature within the square, the spell effect also ends.


Material Component
Eye of an insect or arachnid.


----Reasoning: Perdu is a ghetto Invisibility spell that lasts rounds instead of minutes and as a result, is a lower level spell. It's useful for concealing and ally quickly without resorting to a level-2 spell.




 
Sprint
[Transmutation]
Brd 1, Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V,S,M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Target: You or one ally
Duration: 1 round/level
Range: Touch


This spell increases you or an ally's base land speed by 10 feet. (This adjustment counts as an enhancement bonus.) It has no effect on other modes of movement, such as burrow, climb, fly, or swim.


Material Component
Fur of a 4 legged animal.


----Reasoning: A movement spell that can help allies. Both Longstrider and Expeditious Retreat are Personal spells. This fixes that issue and allows a caster to give an ally this benefit also. I'm tempted to also let Druids have this. Longstrider is 1 hour/level and Expeditious Retreat is 1 minute/level. This has a much shorter duration, hence the level-1 spell slot.






Hindrance
[Transmutation]
Brd 1, Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V,S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Target: You or one ally
Duration: 1 round/level
Range: Touch


Hindrance allows you or an ally to make trip and disarm attacks without provoking attacks of opportunity.


----Reasoning: Allows low INT melee allies and those who don't want to waste a feat taking Combat Expertise (and then another feat) to attempt trip and disarm attacks. People don't seem to build Combat Expertise melee guys much so this gives them a bit of variety to their attacks. This is a bit like Bigby's Tripping Hand, though that one is a medium range spell and is only for trips. This gives an ally the ability to trip without the AoO.






Safeguard
Clr 1/Hlr 1
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Close (25 ft. + 5 ft./level)
Target: One living creature
Duration: 1 round/level


Safeguard gives you or an ally within range an enhancement bonus of DR2/magic.


----Reasoning: This spell is like Barkskin, except it gives damage reduction instead of AC. It also does not increase with levels, and only lasts rounds instead of 10 minutes/level like Barkskin, hence it is a level-1 spell. I'd also like to put this on the Healer's spell list. (Along with the Vigor, Regenerate Light Wounds and Invest Light Protection spells.) This functions like Invest Light Protection, but doesn't have the healing component to it, but increases the DR by 1. It is also DR2/magic instead of DR1/evil. Still, people tell me to be careful giving out DR. Some say it is more powerful than increasing AC.






Arcane Shell
Clr 1/Hlr 1
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Close (25 ft. + 5 ft./level)
Target: One living creature
Duration: 1 round/level


Arcane Shell reduces the amount of damage taken by an energy attack. Any energy attack that does HP damage is reduced by 2 for the duration of the spell.


----Reasoning: Resist Energy essentially gives the person DR10 to one energy type, (acid, cold, electricity, fire, or sonic). Wherelse Arcane Shell only gives DR2 to any of those. Resist Energy (a lvl-2 spell) is 10 min/level, wherelse Arcane Shell is 1 round/level. In every way, except various energy types, it is inferior to Resist Energy, which is why I put it as level 1.




The reason for most of these is I'm thumbing through the books and trying to come up with spells for a buffing sorcerer to pick and there doesn't seem to be much. The other spells also give the Healer more to do as well.

 

[Celebrim]

Hi EN Worlders

Howdy. I don't really mind, but technically this should go in the homebrew forum. Anyway...

Your basic question is unanswerable because 3.5 isn't balance in the first place, so adding things to it that are unbalanced doesn't really change the overall balance. You can always justify the inclusion of anything in 3.5 on the grounds that everything is broken anyway so why not?

Reasoning: Why is True Strike personal only? Casters need a spell that help allies. This does half the bonus of a true strike, and costs the same (a level-1 spell). Concealed target penalty still affects this spell, unlike True Strike.

Why? Because True Strike is broken. The personal only limitation is the only thing that keeps it reasonably balanced because it just replaces an offensive spell use, and even then its still one of the best 1st level spells. I'm ambivalent to this one personally. I wouldn't allow it, but if you did it wouldn't bother me much.

This is like Protection for Evil/Good/etc. except the +2 AC is situational, and gives a bit of a movement bonus that is hard to find at low levels. Is also much shorter duration than Protection from Evil/Good etc.

Meh. In my game this is feat replacement by a spell, something I tend to frown on so I wouldn't allow it on that grounds. But in regular 3.5, this is so weak overall that it would barely see use. Protection from Evil's true power isn't the minor boost to AC, but the immunity it grants to mental possession and veritable immunity to conjured creatures.

Reasoning: This spell helps allies climb up buildings easily. This is about the same amount of usefulness as a levitate spell but is weaker because it lasts rounds instead of minutes, and the highest an ally can get is 20 ft. vs. much higher for Levitate. The advantage over Levitate is all your allies can move up vs. only one person being able to move. It also doesn't suffer the same attack penalties as when someone is levitating. Semi-powerful for a level-1 spell. If someone argued this is a level-2 spell like Levitate, I'd not really have a problem with that.

Depending on your game, this sort of thing is balanced as dungeon crawling utility spell. If a player designed this spell and researched it, I'd approve it. I see little pressing need for it though. Care should be taken though in these sort of cases that you don't create spells that are primarily used in manners that the spell was not designed for, and to a certain extent care should be taken that the spell does not have a large social and economic impact on your society. Overall these seem fine, but make sure such stairs are fragile and don't pose a barrier to movement. I can easily see a player arguing that such stairs hold back 100lbs per level as well as hold up, and that they then use them as a low level wall of force - which wouldn't be the intention of the spell. A general purpose shapeable force field is far more useful than your spell intends, so make sure the spell description explicitly stops any uses you don't intend.

----Reasoning: Perdu is a ghetto Invisibility spell that lasts rounds instead of minutes and as a result, is a lower level spell. It's useful for concealing and ally quickly without resorting to a level-2 spell.

Invisibility is undercosted as a spell, and as such is breakable/broken and so as such it leaves little room for less powerful lower level effects. I rate Invisibility as at least a third level spell in power and possibly a fourth level spell. It's only 2nd level in 3.X because it was historically of that level. I would not allow Perdu.

----Reasoning: A movement spell that can help allies. Both Longstrider and Expeditious Retreat are Personal spells. This fixes that issue and allows a caster to give an ally this benefit also. I'm tempted to also let Druids have this. Longstrider is 1 hour/level and Expeditious Retreat is 1 minute/level. This has a much shorter duration, hence the level-1 spell slot.

I'm ok with this spell. Once again, having spells be personal is not a problem to be solved, but an attempt at balance. If a spell isn't personal, then it ought to be increased in level by 1 and in some cases no non-personal version of the spell is balanced. This spell is however in line with what I consider acceptable skill buffing.

Reasoning: Allows low INT melee allies and those who don't want to waste a feat taking Combat Expertise (and then another feat) to attempt trip and disarm attacks. People don't seem to build Combat Expertise melee guys much so this gives them a bit of variety to their attacks. This is a bit like Bigby's Tripping Hand, though that one is a medium range spell and is only for trips. This gives an ally the ability to trip without the AoO.

I'm a bit leery of absolute effects like immunity of any sort (note that the feats in question have been altered so that they don't grant absolute immunity in my game either), and I'm not a big fan of spell as feat replacement, however in the context of standard 3.5 this is fine. And the synergy here is generally superior to granting the spellcaster the ability to perform such actions on his own.

----Reasoning: This spell is like Barkskin, except it gives damage reduction instead of AC. It also does not increase with levels, and only lasts rounds instead of 10 minutes/level like Barkskin, hence it is a level-1 spell. I'd also like to put this on the Healer's spell list. (Along with the Vigor, Regenerate Light Wounds and Invest Light Protection spells.) This functions like Invest Light Protection, but doesn't have the healing component to it, but increases the DR by 1. It is also DR2/magic instead of DR1/evil. Still, people tell me to be careful giving out DR. Some say it is more powerful than increasing AC.

It is more potent than increasing AC, but I think this one is fine overall.

----Reasoning: Resist Energy essentially gives the person DR10 to one energy type, (acid, cold, electricity, fire, or sonic). Wherelse Arcane Shell only gives DR2 to any of those. Resist Energy (a lvl-2 spell) is 10 min/level, wherelse Arcane Shell is 1 round/level. In every way, except various energy types, it is inferior to Resist Energy, which is why I put it as level 1.

I'm ok with this one as well. If anything, it's a bit weak and unlikely to make much of an impact. I wouldn't mind seeing this with multiple targets at higher caster levels - say 1 target per 3 caster levels.

 

[Scorponox]

Thanks for the reply Celebrim! I thought people just didn't like my spells. Your input is noted and appreciated!

 

[Glimbur]

Deft Strike.... at low levels compare it to Sleep, Color Spray, Grease, Silent Image (with advantageous set-up), or Ray of Enfeeblement and this seems ok. It does mean your beatstick will probably hit with one attack, but it takes a standard action and is touch range. At middle levels it costs an action in combat but is only 1st level, so it could continue to be useful unlike many of the spells I named earlier (but still touch range). At high levels you could quicken it, reach and chain it, or otherwise make it roll over but that costs a higher level spell slot. I could see some problems if a character finds a way to repeatedly have this spell cast on them (shrunken wizard hiding under their helmet with a wand, for example) but the action cost means it isn't too crazy. I'd allow it.

Vigilant Charge is a situational bonus to AC and a small move speed buff. It seems kind of weak for a 1st level spell, but you should probably make the +speed enhancement type.

Magic Steps could be used as a blockade or similar, as Celebrim points out. That's not your intended use, so you might need to get more specific in what the effect does.

Perdu is interesting in that it makes anything in an area invisible, rather than a specific creature being invisible as long as it doesn't move. I can think of enough uses for this that maybe it should be level 2, which might come with a small duration boost. It also comes with a range better than Touch, which might need to be nerfed.

Sprint is probably fine as-is, though I'm not sure how often it would get used. Too strong to be a cantrip though.

Hindrance is half of a feat (which has a pre-req) as a first level spell, and by about level 3 or 4 it lasts long enough to fill a combat. I'm not sure if it is too good or not. It does cost an action and a spell slot to enable someone to be a little better at something they still won't be great at. It's another spell I would have trouble finding a use for.

DR versus AC is kind of tricky to balance; DR 2/magic for a round or two is not that great if the party fighter is up against an orc or two, but it gets much better if the threat is a pile of kobolds. Maybe dial this one down by making it touch range.

Arcane Shell is... you are right to compare it to Resist Energy. The short duration is what makes me think it might be ok as is.