D&D 4E Planar touchstones in 4e

[ryryguy]

I'm trying to bring a 3.5 campaign into 4e. In that campaign, all the PC's had the planar touchstone feat from 3e Manual of the Planes. Travel to touchstones was a central theme of the campaign.

First, is there any 4e version of the planar touchstone feat published anywhere? I don't believe there is, but I don't have most of the 4e books and sources (including the 4e Manual of the Planes).

Assuming there isn't, does anyone have any thoughts about how this might best be handled in 4e? Basically the 3e feat gave you a feat-ish thing like a situational bonus, plus a spell-like ability that could be used a limited number of times when you tagged a touchstone. So I suppose a 4e version could include a regular feat sort of bonus, plus grant a daily power that could be used a limited number of times?

Obviously this would be far too good of a feat for general consumption - basically a feat plus a power for the cost of feat. But for my campaign, where every PC gets it automatically, it's no so much of a balance concern.

But how much should I worry about effectively granting an extra daily power to each PC? How much impact would this have on their effectiveness?

One specific thing I do worry about is that though they'd all be getting that touchstone power, they'd be getting different powers at different points in time and at different levels. This could lead to some slight intra-party balance issues if PC A gets a level 3 touchstone power (when the group is level 3) and later PC B gets a level 9 touchstone power (when the group is level 9).

Would it make sense to try to scale the touchstone powers along with the player's level automatically? In fact the spell-like abilities granted by the old feat worked this way... you could get a fireball that you could use 5 times doing 1d6/character level... use a charge at 5th level, you did 5d6. Use the next charge at 7th level, you'd do 7d6. But 4e powers aren't designed to scale dynamically that way (except at the tiers), and I'm not sure how practical/desirable it would be to try to keep that.

The 3e version also tried to balance the effectiveness of the spell-like ability against the number of charges; weaker, less useful SLA's got more charges. I'm not sure if that makes sense to try to carry over. I wonder if it might be best not to make them charged at all, considering how now every PC will have a plethora of uncharged, reusable powers.

Finally, I'm not completely set on trying to keep that feat + charged power form for the 4e conversion, if anyone has any other ideas. Maybe the most important thing I'd like to keep if at all possible is the way the benefit granted by the feat could be thematically linked to the touchstone site itself, i.e. something fire related for a plane of fire touchstone, etc.

 

[themilkman]

But how much should I worry about effectively granting an extra daily power to each PC? How much impact would this have on their effectiveness?

That depends on the power you give them. If you give the players an extra daily-use power that does the damage (or has other special benefits) on par with other daily powers, then it may be a bit overpowering at the beginning of the game. If you give them daily-use powers that are more on the level of encounter powers, in terms of damage and effects, then it shouldn't matter so much.

One specific thing I do worry about is that though they'd all be getting that touchstone power, they'd be getting different powers at different points in time and at different levels. This could lead to some slight intra-party balance issues if PC A gets a level 3 touchstone power (when the group is level 3) and later PC B gets a level 9 touchstone power (when the group is level 9).

4e allows for players to retrain just for the reasons you mention. Some feats become more powerful later on, other feats lose their effectiveness over time. Allowing players to retrain their planar touchstone feat to gain a more powerful power should balance things out.

Finally, I'm not completely set on trying to keep that feat + charged power form for the 4e conversion, if anyone has any other ideas. Maybe the most important thing I'd like to keep if at all possible is the way the benefit granted by the feat could be thematically linked to the touchstone site itself, i.e. something fire related for a plane of fire touchstone, etc.

Multiclass feats already provide a bit of a template that you could use for designing your powers. They provide some small bonus (a trained skill) and give a limited use power. Using those as a starting off point, you should be able to balance your new touchstone powers nicely. Other things that might give you a hint on how to flavor your powers: genasi powers, swordmage powers, wizard powers, and all of their paragon class whatnots. Also, spellplague powers have some semi-funky effects that might be fun to play around with.

 

[ryryguy]

Thanks for the suggestions, milkman.

Retraining is a good idea, but it might seem a bit weird that the power stemming from the same touchstone source keeps "spontaneously" changing. But maybe not a problem as long as they are in sort of the same family. I can always change special effects and damage types and so forth to keep them thematically linked.

 

[Dr_Ruminahui]

If they are a central part of your campaign, why make feets for them? Why not just generate an in-game mechanic for them?

For example, visiting keystone X will give the characters power Y until Z occurs.

Sure, you can make it part of the character choice process by making them feets, but that isn't the only option. Indeed, such an option makes for wasted feets if due to setting reasons they aren't able to access the keystones.


Inquisitor Psychologis Ruminahui

 

[Fluxx]

Why not make the touchstones a set of Wonderous Items?
They can give a general property which can be identical to all Touchstones.
But each touchstone has a different daily item power.
Give out a Lvl 3 touchstone instead of a Lvl 3 item and a Lvl 9 touchstone instead of a Lvl 9 item - so you have less problems with balancing.

(If for some reason they should get all items the same time give them some special effect like 'you can use the property of this Item but to use the power the touchstone must first be activated/stimulated/enhanced by bathing it in the blood of a black dragon' or some other event you as GM have control over so that it will be activated at the Lvl you want. Just don't forget to withhold a Lvl 9 Item from the treasure parcel as soon as the Lvl 9 Item is activated.)

I think that would give the fewest problems with balancing...


Greetings

Fluxx

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I would also just treat them as magic items. There are a number of guidelines in AV regarding stepped access to higher level magic item powers, etc. which can be used to allow scaled access. A touchstone can be a Wonderous Item (doesn't use a magic item slot) which has one or even several powers. Daily magic item power use limits will pretty much take care of regulating the amount of utility people can get out of them.

Remember, 4e magic items are individually a lot less powerful than those in earlier editions. The whole concept of 'charges' also does not exist in 4e. It was always a book keeping nightmare and I say good riddance to it.

As for what the actual powers of the touchstones would be, that is pretty much wide open. There could be elemental attack powers, recharge abilities (use the touchstone to regain use of an encounter power for example), healing, buffs, etc. Pick them based on your ideas about the plane they relate to. I would use existing magic item powers and character powers as a model for that type of effect. Not having played 3e I don't really know thematically what would best match the 3e touchstones.