HeapThaumaturgist
First Post
I'm also creating a new feat that will up "Effective Aptitude" by 2 points or so. This is to aid in casting times, as that's what really nerfs this sort of caster. They can haul out some pretty hairy stuff at 1st Mag. The caster's player was out on Sunday so I prepped his PC. Took a few minutes and a calculator to get him set up.
I did mess with magic a little. I left the skills as-is. It really forced the caster into a tough position, because he needed Cha, Int, and Con to make a good caster. He dropped Str and Dex to 8, couldn't drop Wis because he wanted good Will. It seems a touch ODD to let Dedicated and Charismatic have the casting trees, but I wanted there to be ways to work other kinds of casters up. Because it is skill-point based, however, most casters will probably go Smart. Especially with Savant.
I've messed with some of the spells to better reflect my own game. The BCCS magic system was obviously written with Lady and the Dominator in mind, so, say, attacking somebody with a TKed sword STARTS at DC 45. That's pretty tall. It's not so much about hitting the DC (in a few levels, my caster could) but about the fact that even in a few levels, that would be a spell that he'd need 3 full rounds to cast. For a simple attack with a TKed weapon. But for that same DC he could use Force to whallop somebody at 10' with, oh, 8d6 nonlethal damage, give or take. Some of the spells are just WEIRD like that, personally.
I fixed up a few things specific to my setting. Dropped the DC on Air Magic down to 10 from 15 so my caster could take it at 1st level. Like you, we wanted a slightly higher magic level than what would be offered by the system "straight". I'll probably change some more stuff on a case-by-case basis depending on WHAT our caster wants to take.
The evil race of my campaign was actually easy to work up. I gave them +1 Spell Energy, +2 Aptitude, SR, and Dabbler or Talent. -2 Con, +2 Cha. Makes for very nice "evil spellcasters" flavor. Especially since I invariably give them Afflict. My players are SO tired of getting struck blind or deaf or dumb. They were almost frothing at the mouth on sunday because I'd whipped up a caster that could do a 3-round Blindness as a 1 Action touch spell. (Those guys are +1LA)
Giving a Fetish is good. I let my caster build some fetish rings for his spells, for instance. I'm thinking of tying the increased aptitude feat to something, perhaps a way to put it into a staff. I think that would be an interesting bit of flavor. He casts FASTER with his focus staff, etc.
Watch Spell Energy. With high Con and the Spell Energy from magnitude and a Spell Energy Resevoir feat he's got 6 points already. Even worked WAY up the biggest drain I've seen was 1d8+12, that on a blended spell -I- made up. 20' blast of wind that would knock a Medium creature prone AND do 5d6 nonlethal damage. Most of the time, though, for your average spell he totally ignores the drain. 1-2 points, 3-4 for his pre-prepped spells. It's barely worth tracking. It's TIME that's the issue for him, as I've said before. So you can probably ignore SER for a pre-prepped caster to up that aspect for the player.
--fje
I did mess with magic a little. I left the skills as-is. It really forced the caster into a tough position, because he needed Cha, Int, and Con to make a good caster. He dropped Str and Dex to 8, couldn't drop Wis because he wanted good Will. It seems a touch ODD to let Dedicated and Charismatic have the casting trees, but I wanted there to be ways to work other kinds of casters up. Because it is skill-point based, however, most casters will probably go Smart. Especially with Savant.
I've messed with some of the spells to better reflect my own game. The BCCS magic system was obviously written with Lady and the Dominator in mind, so, say, attacking somebody with a TKed sword STARTS at DC 45. That's pretty tall. It's not so much about hitting the DC (in a few levels, my caster could) but about the fact that even in a few levels, that would be a spell that he'd need 3 full rounds to cast. For a simple attack with a TKed weapon. But for that same DC he could use Force to whallop somebody at 10' with, oh, 8d6 nonlethal damage, give or take. Some of the spells are just WEIRD like that, personally.
I fixed up a few things specific to my setting. Dropped the DC on Air Magic down to 10 from 15 so my caster could take it at 1st level. Like you, we wanted a slightly higher magic level than what would be offered by the system "straight". I'll probably change some more stuff on a case-by-case basis depending on WHAT our caster wants to take.
The evil race of my campaign was actually easy to work up. I gave them +1 Spell Energy, +2 Aptitude, SR, and Dabbler or Talent. -2 Con, +2 Cha. Makes for very nice "evil spellcasters" flavor. Especially since I invariably give them Afflict. My players are SO tired of getting struck blind or deaf or dumb. They were almost frothing at the mouth on sunday because I'd whipped up a caster that could do a 3-round Blindness as a 1 Action touch spell. (Those guys are +1LA)
Giving a Fetish is good. I let my caster build some fetish rings for his spells, for instance. I'm thinking of tying the increased aptitude feat to something, perhaps a way to put it into a staff. I think that would be an interesting bit of flavor. He casts FASTER with his focus staff, etc.
Watch Spell Energy. With high Con and the Spell Energy from magnitude and a Spell Energy Resevoir feat he's got 6 points already. Even worked WAY up the biggest drain I've seen was 1d8+12, that on a blended spell -I- made up. 20' blast of wind that would knock a Medium creature prone AND do 5d6 nonlethal damage. Most of the time, though, for your average spell he totally ignores the drain. 1-2 points, 3-4 for his pre-prepped spells. It's barely worth tracking. It's TIME that's the issue for him, as I've said before. So you can probably ignore SER for a pre-prepped caster to up that aspect for the player.
--fje
, here is my "power-caster" for my Emorian special forces team:
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