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D&D Older Editions
Custom Spells for 3.5 - Are these balanced?
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6352824" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>Howdy. I don't really mind, but technically this should go in the homebrew forum. Anyway...</p><p></p><p>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? </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>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. </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>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 <em>hold back</em> 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.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>It is more potent than increasing AC, but I think this one is fine overall. </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>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.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 6352824, member: 4937"] 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? 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. 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. 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 [I]hold back[/I] 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. 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. 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. 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. It is more potent than increasing AC, but I think this one is fine overall. 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. [/QUOTE]
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