Is "Spellcasting Prodigy" feat too powerful?

[Hardhead]

Well, it's clearly better than Spell Focus, wich only works for one school. I'll say this: when I began my last FR campaign, we had three spellcasters - a druid, a wizard, and a cleric. All three made their characters seperate, and all three showed up at the table with Spellcasting Prodigy.

 

[Malin Genie]

Well, it's clearly better than Spell Focus, wich only works for one school.

I don't think it's 'clearly' better. A character could quite easily have spells from multiple schools, but the 'save' spells might only come from one school (e.g. a Bard with lots of Enchantments and then spells like Cures, Mage Armour, Tongues, Greater Magic Weapon.... or a Wizard with Spell Focus: Evocation and then spells like Haste, Fly, Knock, Teleport, Displacement, etc none of which have saves.)

 

[Fenes 2]

IMHO, it depends. IMC, it is not too powerful - at least I feel so, since I gave our duelist/blade dancer who had taken a level of cleric for roleplaying reasons (at character level 11 or so) while having wisdom 10 (now 11) the feat for free as a reward from her goddess for a job well done. At level 14 having 3 instead of 2 first level spells with DCs of 11 instead of 10 is not too powerful.

I have taken spellcasting prodigy with my own sorceress, and again, it hardly matters, since she almost never runs out of spells anyway, and the DM knows (and feels free to us often) that a simple immunity to fire will counter all the spells of her that use DCs.

 

[LokiDR]

How is the difference between a 7th- and 8th-level spell slot for an all-day spell that big?

Incidentally, I don't like Persistent Spell very much either. It's either too good (improved invisibility, shield, divine power) or next to useless.

Two whole levels of a character is a significant amount time. I wouldn't use meta-magic nearly as much as I do now if it I didn't have improved metamagic. It feels like I have more spell levels to play with, so I don't mind using them up.

 

[LokiDR]

Well, it's clearly better than Spell Focus, wich only works for one school. I'll say this: when I began my last FR campaign, we had three spellcasters - a druid, a wizard, and a cleric. All three made their characters seperate, and all three showed up at the table with Spellcasting Prodigy.

At first glance it does look like a munchkin's delight. But if you really need save DCs, you use spell focus, improved spell focus, and SCP. SCP is not a large part of your monster DCs then.

The more I look at this feat, the less I think it overpowered. I think a lot of players will take it just because it is all round useful. However, it doesn't lead to any sort of broken combinations itself, only when you add other feats. Just because the combination is broken doesn't mean the parts are.

 

[Spatzimaus]

Originally posted by Pax

That's a pretty big "if", that 8-14 spread.

Yes, but it's still a decent assumption. 74 out of 1296 times (or about 6% of the time), you'll roll below an 8.
While the point-buy system makes it more painful to have those higher scores, it also guarantees you'll never have a stat below an 8. I wrote a program to run through the 1296 combinations and see what it'd give you; the final result was 28.5 points. That's why it's probably better to use 28 as the "normal" level, but the math is skewed by the fact that it's possible to roll below an 8. I just assumed that 7 was worth -1, 6 worth -2, and so on, but if you assume that a 3 or 4 is REALLY debilitating (in the same way that a 17 or 18 is exceptional) it'd lower the average a bit.

Anyway, this matches with Henry's earlier statement that 32-point-buy is a "very high number". It's well above the die-rolling method, even if you assume people don't min/max.

Frankly, IMO that's munchkinish levels of min/maxxing.

So? I'm not a munchkin (okay, back when I played Battletech I actually WAS a Friar in the Church of Munchkin), but when you're trying to balance two systems you can't assume people WON'T min/max.

Let's put it a different way. If you roll 4d6-drop-low, I can reproduce your results with around 28 points. In addition, under a point-buy system I can lower stats I don't use to raise important ones even further. I could drop three points from dump stats without substantially altering my character. So, my ORIGINAL point was that 4-drop-low is fairly balanced against a 25-point system; referring to 25 as very low-powered isn't correct IMHO.

The 10 in Strength means, he doesn't LOOK like a 90-lb weakling. The 10 in charisma means he doesn't ACT like a bookworm-without-friends. The 10 in wisdom means he isn't more oblivious than "most people".

Sure. I do the same. When I had a 25-point-buy I had a 9 WIS and 12 CHA for no particular reason. Not everyone is as enlightened as us, though, and I ended up with a character that I know would have been stronger had I used those points for other stats.

The thing is, a person with an 8 in CHA isn't automatically a bookworm, and a person with an 8 in STR isn't a weakling. They're only a little below the racial average. If 10 STR is average, an 8 might mean you're overweight. Not exactly a crippling drawback.

Typically, I would make a spellcaster with a -sixteen-, not an 18, for their primary spellcasting attribute. An 18 just isn't that neccesary IMO.

My first 3E Sorcerer started with a 15 CHA. I also had a 14 DEX, 14 CON, 10 STR, etc. The problem is, most classes can get by with at most 3 stats. Dumping the rest usually is a good move.

Y'see, I look at the attributes for the WHOLE character, and I usually odn't like playing people "below normal" in several places. I wouldn't WANT to play a Wizard with:

ST 8
DX 13
CO 10
INT 18
WIS 8
CHA 8

That costs 25 points. And IMO, it makes you little more than an idiot-savant.

As I said above, an 8 in those other stats doesn't make you an idiot-savant. You're a little weaker than average, a little less social, and a little less wise, just like most other intellectuals I know. Hardly an idiot-savant.

 

[green slime]

Spatzimaus, exactly what i was thinking...

An 8 is not a major handicap. You are slightly behind the curve. In fact, just as much slightly behind as those with a 12 are slightly above the curve.

Pax, are you really suggesting a 12 Int is Ingenoius? A 12 Con is superhumanly fit? 12 Str is extremely strong, and 12 Charisma is so charming as to be almost irresistable? I think not.

So cut the idiot-savant garbage. No player wants to suck at their chosen class. With Stat purchasing, the player has to place a value on how important certain stats are to his/her survival, and how it is going to affect their enjoyment of the game.

 

[LokiDR]

I personally feel that the tone of the game should influence the choices made. If you want unique characters, rolling would be better. If you want to powergame, you choose a point buy.

Taking a low charisma for a wizard make a person neither a powergamer nor a bad role player. A whole branch of psychology has grown up around the idea that your enviroment modifies your personality and abilities. A person who was unattractive might very well retreat to books.

What I dislike a person who tries to cover every base. A character should have some weaknesses and some strengths. Middle values for all your stats isn't very interesting.

 

[hong]

What I dislike a person who tries to cover every base. A character should have some weaknesses and some strengths. Middle values for all your stats isn't very interesting.

A player is running a berserker/shaman in my Britannia 3E game with 14 in every stat, and he's pretty darn interesting, thank you very much.

 

[LokiDR]

A player is running a berserker/shaman in my Britannia 3E game with 14 in every stat, and he's pretty darn interesting, thank you very much.

"Beserk" implies modifications to stats, with it's own set pluses and minuses. I doubt this character does everything well.