[short rant] My only beef with EPIC...

[MerakSpielman]

Is that Rod in the ELH? There really shouldn't be a way around the xp cost. It's the only real limiting factor there is on epic spells.

 

[Mulkhoran]

When I get home this evening, I'll post the math. I may have gotten it wrong, which would certainly be nice .

Just a quick comment on this, since I don't have my ELH in front of me: +37 permanent AC isn't that outrageous. I know that sounds insane, but if you look at some of the challenges in the ELH, the attack bonuses climb extremely high, even before any enhancements or spell-like abilities start getting used. The spellcasters *need* that level of power, just to be able to survive.

That, at least, has been my impression of the Epic material so far. Yours may differ.

 

[Mortaneus]

Let's try this:

Seed: Armor

Base DC 14 for +4 AC

+18 more = +36 DC = 50 DC

Permanent = 46 DC x 5 = 250 DC

Change to personal = 250 - 2 = 248 DC

Increase casting time by 10 minutes = 228 DC - 20 = 228 DC

Increase casting time by 100 days = 228 DC - 200 = 28 DC

Caster takes 18d6 damage (easily taken) = 28 DC - 18 = 10 DC

Totals: 10 DC, 90,000 gp, 2 days, and 3600 xp

So, basically, for a 1/3 of a year of work, the cost of a ring of regen, and less than a wish worth of xp, you have +22 AC for the rest of your life by making a laughable DC10 spellcraft roll.

 

[MerakSpielman]

Better hope nothing else comes up during those 3 months you need to cast it.

And, as has been said, at epic levels, +20 just ain't that much.

 

[Dark Eternal]

The magic system is okay, although it is too easily broken, IMO. One of the first things I did was see what it would cost to make a spell that had a small XP cost, and how high I could pump AC with it if the spell duration was permanent... +37 or so, right off the bat, more if you have a really insane spellcraft.

The GM will have to check every single epic spell and be very firm with the "no" word to make it work - and if you say "no" too much, even to obviously broken stuff, the players stop feeling like their epic, and more like they're in 1st grade.

Hard to fix, that.

The best way to 'fix' this has nothing to do with the system, and everything to do with your players.

What you don't want is for them to be bringing you things that you're going to have to say "No" to in the first place. In my experience, most players can be brought around to the idea of developing ideas in collaberation with the DM, for the purpose of enchancing the game, rather than enhancing their character. Once they are building things and asking themselves "Is this the kind of thing that my DM will want to have in his game?" rather than, "Is there anything else I can do with this idea to make it give my character even more power?", then you should be able to start using that "No" word a lot less frequently.

That'll be 2 copper pieces, please.

Edit: Truncated sig.

 

[Bendris Noulg]

They should have just said "Hey, find Soldarin's site on the web, use that."

ROFLMAO!!!

 

[Mortaneus]

Same math as before, but replace that 50 DC of armor with something else, like....

+17 Enhancement to a stat (DC 49)
+17 Natural Armor (DC 49)
SR 30 (DC 47)
DR 16/+8 (DC 50)
+5 Deflection AC (DC 54)
+5 Insight AC (DC 54)
+5 Luck AC (DC 54)
+5 Divine AC (DC 54)

Keep in mind you can start throwing these when you hit 21st level. With the modified DCs being so low, it's no problem. All you need is the xp.

 

[seasong]

The best way to 'fix' this has nothing to do with the system, and everything to do with your players.

Actually, it's got nothing to do with my players. MY players are awesome, thank you very much. And after running a superhero soap opera where they were allowed to just PICK their powers, I don't think they'll have any issues with Epic Spell Casting.

But in very general terms, if the system requires awesome players in order to work at all, it's broken.

What you don't want is for them to be bringing you things that you're going to have to say "No" to in the first place. In my experience, most players can be brought around to the idea of developing ideas in collaberation with the DM, for the purpose of enchancing the game, rather than enhancing their character.

My experience also. However, this is more along the lines of "advice on how to train players to be awesome so that you can deal with a system that is broken".

I may be wrong about the system being broken. But having awesome players has little to do with whether or not the system is broken - it just has to do with whether the break bothers you personally.

Edit: Actually, to hit on your original point - you don't consider the time invested to train your players to be "hard to fix"? You're a better man than I - I take a year or so to really get any given player up to 'great'.

 

[Dark Eternal]

Glad to hear it, and I'll give you the point.

However, all I really meant was that there's no such thing as a system that can't be abused. No amount of tweaking, changing, reconstructing, altering, rewriting, and complicating the Epic rules will prevent a DM from having to tell their players "No." But that's not the system's job in the first place.

I don't think the system as they presented it is broken. Far from it. I don't believe it's perfect, either; but nothing is or ever will be.

I do believe the system that they've presented requires a lot of adjucation on the dungeon master's part. But then, that's exactly what I would want a system that puts this much power into the hands of the characters to do, so I'm fine with that.

In essence, what the system can do, and what any particular DM should let it do are not the same thing. But since no two DM's run the same kind of game, the system should be capable of accomodating them all. It's this system's ability to do that which seems to me to be provoking the idea that it's 'broken'. From where I sit, it's not broken - it's doing it's job.

Reply Edit: Point well made, and well taken. It took my DM well over a year to train me, and I dare say that if I had had to train the players I game with now, it would have taken me still longer. I guess I just don't really look at that as it's own task, since it's part and parcel of everything else the DM does.

 

[seasong]

The GM will have to check every single epic spell and be very firm with the "no" word to make it work - and if you say "no" too much, even to obviously broken stuff, the players stop feeling like their epic, and more like they're in 1st grade.

I think you'll find this agrees with your post above . Especially as regards "I do believe the system that they've presented requires a lot of adjucation on the dungeon master's part. "

It's certainly not impossible to use.