Skinning Feats - Arcane Reserves - Vancianesque

[Garthanos]

I recently looked at Arcane Reserves an interesting skin for it popped to mind.
Encounter Attack Powers become sentient spells swirling around in the mind desiring to be cast distracting the mage from giving proper focus on other magics... till after he has expressed the aggressive ones this encounter.

Feats are really presented mechanistically I am wondering how people visualize them.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Heh, yeah, that's not bad. Wondering about the title of this thread though. I don't recall a classic Vance work using that concept (definitely not in the DE cycle anyway, its been a while since I read some of the other stuff).

Actually after rereading the whole of the DE cycle fairly recently I don't even really see why people would say 4e is NOT a 'Vancian' magic system. Old D&D certainly was one pretty straightforward interpretation and maybe closer to the original in some respects, but multiple use spells definitely fit as well, though they were mentioned less frequently. It certainly seems to me that 4e's power system, as applied to spells, is still quite 'Vancian'.

 

[Garthanos]

Heh, yeah, that's not bad. Wondering about the title of this thread though. I don't recall a classic Vance work using that concept (definitely not in the DE cycle anyway, its been a while since I read some of the other stuff).

It might not be specifically I sometimes absorb flavor then generalize... Its been a long time since I read Vance.

A spell that is a coherent distinct thing impressed in your mind... not really learned in a normal sense nor really integrated with general lore, knowledge and understanding... might just be D&D version of Vancian to me.

Actually after rereading the whole of the DE cycle fairly recently I don't even really see why people would say 4e is NOT a 'Vancian' magic system.

Describe every spell a different way every time and use appropriate naming conventions.
Give your players a bonus off a random table if they do ;-). <-joking mostlly.

 

[Piratecat]

Encounter Attack Powers become sentient spells swirling around in the mind desiring to be cast distracting the mage from giving proper focus on other magics... till after he has expressed the aggressive ones this encounter.

That's how I flavor my malediction invoker, with his words of power being sentient spells that talk to him. It's a lot of fun!

 

[Garthanos]

That's how I flavor my malediction invoker, with his words of power being sentient spells that talk to him. It's a lot of fun!

My Malediction Invoker is a witch / Sehanine goddess learned spell caster with a serpent familiar and baleful malediction wears scale armor herself...

Grasping Shards = Hurls a potion which shattering and gives off vapors that look like serpents of mist and cling to the target slowing them.
Visions of Blood are exactly as written.
Her hand of radiance are gleaming moonlight - goes red as blood when she is really pissed.

Feats are treated as pretty raw effects by the system..

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

My Malediction Invoker is a witch / Sehanine goddess learned spell caster with a serpent familiar and baleful malediction wears scale armor herself...

Grasping Shards = Hurls a potion which shattering and gives off vapors that look like serpents of mist and cling to the target slowing them.
Visions of Blood are exactly as written.
Her hand of radiance are gleaming moonlight - goes red as blood when she is really pissed.

Feats are treated as pretty raw effects by the system..

Yeah, that's for sure. When you get right down to it pretty much everything can be skinned any way one sees fit. Honestly it was pretty close to true in any of the older editions aside from those annoying alignment things (which really wasn't much and best ignored anyway).

 

[Garthanos]

Yeah, that's for sure. When you get right down to it pretty much everything can be skinned any way one sees fit. Honestly it was pretty close to true in any of the older editions aside from those annoying alignment things (which really wasn't much and best ignored anyway).

There was in AD&D some flavor like the Cleric class that I couldnt get my DMs to ignore... when I wanted to play a Sword Mage or an Odin priest (using a spear), I am aware that this become a sanctioned thing later... but clerics used blunt weapons to avoid sheading blood....errrr huh.