Please Critique - Instant Portrait (Spell)

[Angel Tarragon]

Instant Portrait
Conjuration (Creation)
Level: Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 minute
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None

This spell creates a painting from a blank canvas that caster provides. The canvas can be of any size. The caster must have a gem worth 10gp per levl of the caster. The caster then must grind the gems while envisioning what will appear on the canvas. Then the caster must spread the ground gem onto the canvas and speak aloud: Planto meus portrait fio!

The spell at this point calls for a Craft (Painting) check. The spell has a +1 to this check per level of the caster and per point of the casters Intelligence bonus. The result of the check is the value of the painting times ten in gold pieces (a natural 1 does not count as a failure in this case, and a natural twenty provides no bonus, in either case just add the modifiers and find the value).

The image in the casters mind at the time the gem was ground then quickly fades into existence on the canvas.

The material components of this spell are a paintbrush and a blank canvas. The paintbrush is consumed in the casting.

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What are your thoughts on this spell?

 

[Zhnov]

Show me the $$

This has the appearances of being a gold making machine. Is that the intent?

Assuming an average roll of '10', no Int bonus, and max ranks of Craft(painting):

Caster  Input    Output
Level    gp        gp 
1        10gp      150gp
2        20gp      170gp
5        50gp      230gp
10       100gp     330gp
20       200gp     530gp

[joke]
I guess eventually, there would be a glut on the market of 'instant paintings', and the value of such would drop through the floor.

Like many "startups", the first dude to make a show of using the spell would be sitting on a pile of gold, while nobody else would have a good use for the spell anymore because it had been overused, and poor people would be burning paintings to stay warm at night.
[/joke]

Seriously, I recommend some type of limiter, or perhaps a modified mechanic to determine the value of the resultant art.

Also, I recommend the canvas be limited somehow in size. Otherwise, you might have mischevious young wizards painting entire castle walls.

~Orlic

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Good points, Orlic Pazafar!
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Instant Portrait - Revised
Conjuration (Creation)
Level: Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 minute
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None

This spell creates a painting from a blank canvas that caster provides. The canvas can only be a maximum size of 1 square foot per two caster levels. The caster must have a gem worth 25gp per levl of the caster. The caster then must grind the gems while envisioning what will appear on the canvas. Then the caster must spread the ground gem onto the canvas and speak aloud: Planto meus portrait fio!

The spell at this point calls for a Craft (Painting) check (any ranks the caster has in the skill does not provide any bonuses to this roll). The spell has a +1 to this check per two levels of the caster and per point of the casters Intelligence bonus. The result of the check is the value of the painting times ten in gold pieces (a natural 1 does not count as a failure in this case, and a natural twenty provides no bonus, in either case just add the modifiers and find the value).

The image in the casters mind at the time the gem was ground then quickly fades into existence on the canvas.

The material components of this spell are a paintbrush and a blank canvas. The paintbrush is consumed in the casting.

[NOTE: This spell is commonly useed so that casters with the Teleport spell can use the painting to teleport to a place as if he/she had seen it casually.]

 

[Morgenstern]

Since the point is to create a tool (for later teleporting) rather than a valuable art object, you might drop the caster level from the gp in/out calculation altogether. The material component should indicate the gems and brush - the canvas should be indicated as a target, and get a line in the spell's stats:

Target: 1 canvas, not to exceed 1 sq. ft/caster level.

...or something similar.

You could have the brush be expensive enough to count as a cost, the spell count as a +1/caster level (max +10) bonus to the caster's Craft (painting) (so artistic casters are better able to visualize what they want the final rendition to look like), and fix the value at something like the cost of the materials (gems and brush) plus the check in sp or some other modest gain of that sort. That makes it a terrible money engine (produces only a handful of coins per casting, plus you've got to go tot he trouble of selling it if you're after money).

In any event, this should definitely also be a Bard 1 spell . If you play OA, I'd also make this a Shugenja 1 spell.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Thanks for the response Morgenstern!
Why should it be a Bard spell?
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Instant Portrait - Version 3.0
Conjuration (Creation)
Level: Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 minute
Target: 1 canvas, not to exceed 1 sq. ft/2 caster levels
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None

This spell creates a painting from a blank canvas that caster provides. The canvas can only be a maximum size of 1 square foot per two caster levels. The caster must have a gem worth 25gp per level of the caster. The caster then must grind the gems while envisioning what will appear on the canvas. Then the caster must spread the ground gem onto the canvas and speak aloud: Planto meus portrait fio!

The image in the casters mind at the time the gem was ground then quickly fades into existence on the canvas.

The material components of this spell are a masterwork paintbrush and a blank canvas. The paintbrush is consumed in the casting.

[NOTE: This spell is commonly useed so that casters with the Teleport spell can use the painting to teleport to a place as if he/she had seen it casually.]

 

[Angel Tarragon]

bump.

 

[Vlos]

I like the concept.

First, I believe there is a spell that copies a non-magical page of written text onto a new page. I believe this is a first level spell, which is easier than making a nice painting, so you may consider it a higher level, though back in the old days, writting was an art form, so maybe its fine. - just some thoughts.


Second, it is also a nice spell for other things besides teleport. For example in my campaign this week we ran across a mural(sp) that we wanted to make a scrapping of, but it was very large. This spell would have been a perfect thing to make a copy of it.

Since it appears you don't want it as a money maker, and it is a low level spell, maybe it creates an illusion instead of an actual painting, thus it's not permament and cannot be sold, yet will still fullfill your teleport requirements. So it creates an illusion from memory, which is visible to all. Anyone viewing the illusion can teleport to the location as if seen. The illusion lasts 1 round per level.