Hercules in Deities and Demigods

[Akunin]

Misread the "at will" bit - no, they use Item Creation Rules, with a few additions for Epic play.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Re: no, no, UK

Hi jasamcarl!

Yes, Avatar is listed as a salient ability, but we don't yet know what the ability is. Yes, obviously the creation of an avatar is involved, but any restrictions in terms of time, number of Avatars, actions that can be taken concurently, etc are not known.

Does that mean we can't speculate, hypothesise, discuss!?

Last time I looked this was the General Discussion Forum!

You said it yourself, wotc seems to be going the gods as npc route

It appears this is the route they are concentrating on, but not exclusively.

(i.e. as an alternative to dm fudging);

If you get the rules right why would the DM need to fudge!?

my point here is that is not 'broken' unless wotc clearly intended for these gods to be played.

WotC have disclosed that Deities & Demigods will have rules for running Deity characters, so obviously that is their intention.

And as to Hermes making something more powerful than himself...well, see above; we don't know what the ABILITY 'Avatar' is as of yet. Do we know what the Avatar is in and of itself. Yes.

But given the facts so far, my previous hypothesis is more than plausible you have to admit!

I would suggest you wait until the book actually makes an appearance, until then your musings aren't striking me a relevant.

I'm not passing judgement, merely proffering an opinion based on the current evidence.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi Akunin!

I can think of one way, yeah. Got 49M gold pieces handy?

Don't you mean 4.9 million gp?

For a +70 Belt of Strength!?

Yes, it can be done by throwing money into item creation,

I anticipated that.

but a more realistic value for a level 80 fighter (not including items) is a little less than half that. And that's with your 5 points from wishes, attribute points gained through levels,

...and devoting as much of your Epic benefits to enhancing strength as possible.

Its the Epic benefits I was most interested in. Are these treated as bonuses or multipliers I wonder!? In fact, not sure if you should tell us that!?

Ability scores for Epic characters are more flexible, yes (there are more ways to improve attributes). Bear in mind that in order to get a strength as high as I described requires focusing your character in one direction to the point that he'll be lacking in the others. STR of 60+ is nice, but the rest of your stats will still be well within mortal range, and you're sacrificing much of the flexibility that comes with Epic level benefits...

I agree.

Hercules' stats look about right, but Hermes should be a bit higher, I think.

Thats what I thought.

250k? Wow. That's super cheap! Actually, that's at the low price end for Epic items.

True but imagine if you can make them at will, with no cost to yourself!

The 49 million gp item referance, above is an item that could (if you had the money and the time, not to mention the xp) be made at a much level lower than 80. Much lower.

Really! Now thats very interesting!

 

[Upper_Krust]

Re: ok......

Hello again.

No, i meant that a pc could not be a God in a normal adventuring party and maintain balance.

Extravagant, but I don't see why not.

As of these rules, the avatar is what one would expect, a less powerful version of the current diety.

I don't think the distinction is great enough to make it worthwhile.

To add a large number of akward new rules to simulate this would be overkill.

I agree too many rules will 'spoil the broth'. But I think Avatars could easily be set much weaker and kept simple.

 

[jasamcarl]

k

Uh, no, i don't think your previous speculation is 'more than plausible'. If, having had no experience with dnd the month before it came out, you heard about the Fireball spell and posted something along the lines of "What!? A spell which can be thrown around that does much continuous damage and whos dc probably scales because the damage does as well and AT THRIRD LEVEL! Now that is unbalanced, or dare i say broken? This is sound preposterous, or at the very least, stupid in many instances!" I would not consider that more than plausible.

 

[jasamcarl]

My First Flame?

Again, you do not know exactly what an Avatar can and cannot do. If i had to SPECULATE i would say he is not precluded from certain high level abjurations, etc. His stats are there for CR purposes. Under certain conditions an Avatar could be of much greater value than the core diety; what was offered was a simple, elegant method of determining. But what do i know, because of course I HAVEN'T READ THE BOOK.

 

[Glyfair]

OK, my contribution today will be:

Hera's Avatar

Avatar of Hera:

As Hera except divine rank 8; AC 65 (touch 44, flat-footed 65); Atk +65/+60/+55/+50 melee (1d8+23, +5 thundering heavy mace); or spell +59 melee touch or +58 ranged touch; SQ DR 43/+4; fire resistance 28; no fast healing, SR 40, divine aura (800 ft., DC 34); SV Fort +49, Ref +51, Will +50; all skill modifiers reduced by 8.

Salient Divine Abilities: Alter Form, Alter Size, Arcane Mastery, Automatic Metamagic (extend wizard seplls), Divine Blast, Divine Shield, Extra Domain (Protection), Extra Sense Enhancement (sight), Shapechange.
Spell-Like Abilities: Caster level 18th; saving throw DC 34 + Spell level

Of course, we don't have her stats to compare them with.

Glyfair of Glamis

 

[Upper_Krust]

Re: k

Yet again!

Uh, no, i don't think your previous speculation is 'more than plausible'.

You seem to be blatantly dismissive of the facts laid before you so far.

If, having had no experience with dnd the month before it came out, you heard about the Fireball spell and posted something along the lines of "What!? A spell which can be thrown around that does much continuous damage and whos dc probably scales because the damage does as well and AT THRIRD LEVEL! Now that is unbalanced, or dare i say broken? This is sound preposterous, or at the very least, stupid in many instances!" I would not consider that more than plausible.

Hardly an accurate parable of events.

Again, you do not know exactly what an Avatar can and cannot do.

We know that Avatars are based on the deities stats, with differences (perhaps all, perhaps not) via Divine Ranks.

So at a base level Hermes Avatar is 60th-level with a Divine Rank of 7.

Therefore I stand by my opinion that Avatars do not promote interaction with mortals, which if you remember was my point of philosophical contention.

Mechanically the full difference of 8 Divine Ranks is not yet known to us but have already ascertained a number of relevant factors affected by Divine Rank:

- Automatic Actions (DC 10 + Divine Rank)
- Innate Spell Levels (Level 10 + Divine Rank)
- Domain Powers (Uses per day = Divine Rank)
- Divine Aura (DC = Divine Rank + 10 + Cha bonus)
- Salient Divine Abilities (Divine Rank, or Divine Rank +1, gaining one for Divine Rank +0)
- Divine bonus to AC
- Spell Resistance (32 +Divine Rank)
- Damage Reduction (35 + Divine Rank)

But what do i know, because of course I HAVEN'T READ THE BOOK .

Hey, feel free to speculate though!

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi Glyfair mate!

Thanks again for stopping by again!

OK, my contribution today will be:

Hera's Avatar

Avatar of Hera:

As Hera except divine rank 8; AC 65 (touch 44, flat-footed 65); Atk +65/+60/+55/+50 melee (1d8+23, +5 thundering heavy mace); or spell +59 melee touch or +58 ranged touch; SQ DR 43/+4; fire resistance 28; no fast healing, SR 40, divine aura (800 ft., DC 34); SV Fort +49, Ref +51, Will +50; all skill modifiers reduced by 8.

Salient Divine Abilities: Alter Form, Alter Size, Arcane Mastery, Automatic Metamagic (extend wizard seplls), Divine Blast, Divine Shield, Extra Domain (Protection), Extra Sense Enhancement (sight), Shapechange.
Spell-Like Abilities: Caster level 18th; saving throw DC 34 + Spell level

Of course, we don't have her stats to compare them with.

Thats confirmed a number of other ideas I thought.

I wonder what Heras Levels are:

Probably Outsider 20HD/Wizard 20/Cleric 20 (with perhaps Fighter 10 as well?) if the other two are any indication!?

 

[GravyFingerz]

Hi Glyfair mate!

Thanks again for stopping by again!



Thats confirmed a number of other ideas I thought.

I wonder what Heras Levels are:

Probably Outsider 20HD/Wizard 20/Cleric 20 (with perhaps Fighter 10 as well?) if the other two are any indication!?

Be careful Krust, if you speculate too much, you might get in trouble