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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Knight Otu" data-source="post: 2547617" data-attributes="member: 192">Copying my answers over:[sblock]1.a) The cleric and druid share this honor. These two classes, when played properly, can cause a lot of damage with their spells, and can hold their own in a fight very well thanks to their "buff" spells, the cleric better than the druid. The druid, on the other hand, has less to fear that his spells go to waste due to an unfitting environment, as his Spontaneous Casting ability is more flexible than the cleric's.1.b) The half-orc bears this mark. While he may be the only race that offers a Strength bonus, it suffers from penalties to two mental statistics. While that may seem like a good trade with the addition of Darkvision - how many good mental stats does a warrior need, anyway? - it falls short once you compare it to the other races.Half-elves, the next step on the "power ladder", have a little more flexibility going for them, though their higher power is not fully apparent.Dwarves, the most powerful race presented in the Player's Handbook, are very easy to compare. Sharing Darkvision and the -2 penalty to Charisma, the half-orc effectively loses 2 points of Constitution, 2 points of Intelligence and several abilities (some situational, but still good). He gains, on the other hand, two points of Strength.2. Longstrider is somewhat weaker than most 1st level spell, but still can be an useful utility spell. It is not a spell a character wants to prepare, but ocassionally may want to have as a scroll. It is quickly eclipsed when the character has a mount that is not an animal companion, due to the personal only range, and as soon as better, and easier to share, travel spells become available, it is obsolete. A wizard, especially, has easy access to the mount spell.3. The idea of swift actions, but not the name, has been part of the game from the start, in the guise of Quicken Spell and Barbarian Rage. Naming that concept allows for easy reference both in the rules and in the discussions. It creates an easily identifiable group of spells sharing the concept. Also, it allows for the creation of more swift spells within a given product, as the rules behind them need to be printed only once. Otherwise, these spells would take too much space.Swift spells do become problematic when they are used too much, however. As the pre-revision Haste spell showed, the ability to cast many spells in a round is troublesome in many games. The Quicken Spell feat has the cost of increasing the spell's effective level by 4. With too many swift spells, a player may quickly reach a point where he gets the Quicken Spell feat for free, with no or little increase in spell level.Another problem is that the rules may be confusing or partially incomplete. A commonly seen question is "Can you perform a swift action as a standard action?"4.* Arcane Defiance defies one design decision by requiring an Int of 12. To make uneven scores relevant, it should be 13.* The Benefit line superfluously repeats all the prerequisites. With the current prerequisites, it should read: "You get a +1 bonus to all saving throws against spells from the school of magic you select." The feat should state "Choose a school of magic" before the prerequisites line.* The prerequisite "Ability to cast one spell from the selected school" is potentially superfluous. While getting rid of it allows a non-spellcaster to get the bonus, it seems unlikely that such a character would waste a feat slot for Spell Focus, gaining no benefit, to qualify for this one, which provides little benefit.* I feel this feat to be underpowered compared to the Great Fortitude line of feats. Even with getting rid of the above prerequisite, I feel increasing the bonus to +2 would be in line.* This feat literally begs for the Special line that allows it to be chosen multiple times.* Burning Barrier of Breath may benefit from a shorter and/or more relevant name. Suggestions: Breath Wall, Wall of Breath, Defensive Breath.* The feat allows a silver dragon to create a wall of fire - that should not be. I would suggest to make it a metabreath feat that shapes the breath weapon into a wall, with the usual restricing factors. While it may be easier to restrict it to creatures with a fire breath, the feat would seem to be more interesting, and easier to balance (considering mephits have little problem qualifying, for example), if it were a metabreath feat as above. As written, it is too powerful.* The benefit line leaves too many uncertainties. Is it a spell, or a spell-like ability? What is the caster level? Why can that black dragon breathe a ring of fire? Is using the feat a standard action? Can it be used every time it could use its breath weapon?5.* The Ruby Golem poses a number of memory issues, sonic weakness and the warband building. Having to remember what amounts of sonic damage were dealt can be troublesome. I'd suggest Vulnerability to Sonic (double damage from Sonic). Losing fearless is not intuitive for a golem, and may be easily forgotten.* In addition, constructs are by definition Fearless, so there is little need to print it on the stat card.* The ability named Magic Immunity has been represented by the Spell Resistance All ability, and I feel that should be the case here as well.<My knowledge of the Miniatures game is rather limited, but I answered as well as I could>6."As long as the effect lasts, you get a +2 bonus on Reflex saves if you have the Evasion ability. The bonus increases to +4 if you have the Improved Evasion ability. If you have neither ability, you receive no bonus.Any condition that makes you lose your Dexterity bonus to Armor Class (if any) also makes you lose this bonus."7.I really like the commander effects of the Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures game. They are a good way to give a warband, creature and/or faction their own identity. I feel an effect like this, not restricted to any class, would work as a good alternative to the current Leadership feat.----An added analysis of the Ruby Golem using the source material available to me (Monsters of Faerûn, pgs 53 + 54).While the stat block does capture some of the elements of the original creature, it is a faulty conversion unless it was deliberately created as a lesser ruby golem. It should be large, it's level 10, speed 6 with burrow 2 (though the latter ability may be too minor), AC 25, Hit Points 85, and melee attack +12/+12 (15). It is missing Damage Reduction as well.It is an intelligent construct with fast healing (printed as regeneration, but in D&D, constructs and regeneration are a bad mix), as such its regeneration, and its "independence" are well within reason.While I am not familiar enough with the pricing guidelines for DDM, I suspect its point cost is too low after those changes, and maybe currently, as well.[/sblock]</blockquote>

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