Arcania of Legend: The Four Elemental Ways

alex_greene said:
What's the latest news regarding this book anyway?
Still working on it. Unfortunately real life has a nasty habit of interfering with our plans. 3 chapters to go + a bit of revision.
 
I am very much looking forward to this.

I would like to see a (short) chapter on alternate elemental systems. Either the Chinese listed above - or the Japanese (which, oddly, does not follow the Chinese, but uses Earth-Air-Fire-Water-Void) - or how about an African elemental system (Earth-Fire-Water-Wood-Iron)?
 
Forum-ites,

Firstly, some good news. The manuscript is all but finished, just a little tidying up required, and will be in Matt's inbox by 9.00am Thursday 13/2/14 (London Time). Failing any major errors or omissions, I expect it will be available for sale in the not-too-distant future. It just has to go through editing, any revision that requires, and then to layout.

Secondly, my sincere apologies for the delays in getting this done. There were a number of factors contributing to the delays, not the least of which was a lack of planning, poor time management skills and initially underestimating the complexity of the task which all led to the project seeming a lot more daunting than it actually was. Add to that a bit, quite a lot actually, of self doubt and you have a recipe for procrastination and inaction.

However, having learnt somewhat from my 'mistakes' on this project, I think future projects (if any :oops: ) will have a much quicker turnaround.

Anyway, here is a new sorcery spell and a critter to whet your appetites:

Flame Bolt
Autonoumous, Resist (Evade, Parry–Shield)

This spell allows the caster to fire a single bolt of flame at each target. Each bolt does 1D8 damage plus one additional point of damage for each manipulation point spent on magnitude, thus the spell cast with a magnitude of two (one manipulation point) would deal 1D8+1 points of damage. The damage is fire and magical, armour protects against it normally. There must be at least one fire (natural or magical in nature) equal to or larger than a Large Flame within the spells range from which to draw the bolts.

Danbach
Danbach are small, humanoid elementals native to the elemental plane of fire. Whilst small, their bodies burn with intense heat and they are wreathed in searing flames. Danbach are short and stocky, generally between 1.0 metre and 1.2 metres tall and weigh on average 80 kilograms.

Danbach are typically the workers of the elemental plane fire, subservient to the Royal Salamanders who treat them as little more than slaves, often charged with any menial task or labour.

Combat
Danbach are not aggressive creatures and will usually run from a fight, particularly against creatures that are immune to fire. However, when backed into a corner they are quite formidable and dangerous, against foes with no protection from heat and flames they are outright deadly.


Danbach, Small Fire- Elemental

Dice Average 1D20 Hit Location AP/HP
STR 3D6+6 17 1-3 Right Leg 2/7
CON — — 4-6 Left Leg 2/7
SIZ 4D6 14 7-10 Abdomen 2/8
INT 2D6 7 11-12 Chest 2/9
POW 3D6 11 13-15 Right Arm 2/6
DEX 3D6 11 16-18 Left Arm 2/6
CHA 3D6 11 19-20 Head 2/7

Combat Actions 2 Armour: Flaming Hide, No Armour Penalty
Damage Modifier +1D4 Traits: Burn, Flaming Aura, Poison Immunity, Night Sight
Magic Points 11 Common Skills: Athletics 48%, Brawn 51%, Culture (Own) 44%, Evade 42%, Perception 48%, Persistence 43%, Unarmed 58%
Movement 6
Strike Rank 9

Weapons
Type Size Reach Damage Combat Manoeuvre AP/HP
Fists M S 1D6+1D4+1D6 Grip, Combustion As for Arm


Combat Styles:
Flaming Fist 58%
 
Nice work!

I'm looking forward to seeing your take on elemental magic works in Legend. Does it do more than just provide Sorcerers with "heavy artillery"? And do you provide any elemental spells for Divine casters?

Also, after reading this preview I want a Fireproof spell :)
 
Prime_Evil said:
Nice work!

I'm looking forward to seeing your take on elemental magic works in Legend. Does it do more than just provide Sorcerers with "heavy artillery"? And do you provide any elemental spells for Divine casters?

Also, after reading this preview I want a Fireproof spell :)
Yes and no, however I do provide 'guidelines' on using Divine elementalists.
 
Awesome news. I look forward to seeing the finished product. And hopefully you'll have another project lined up soon. 8)
 
warlock1971 said:
Very cool - looking forward to getting my hands on this and turning loose on my unsuspecting PCs. :twisted:

Yes! Players who drool over the prospect of new spells and powers often forget that these toys can also be placed in the hands of their opponents. :twisted:
 
I was looking at your spell and wondering - what advantages does it actually have over Wrack(fire)? Yes it does a higher base damage but that doesn't increase with skill, unlike most damaging spells from the core book. It also would be more expensive in magic points, requiring a fresh cast each time it is used, by the way I read the wording. So a sorcerer using it vs a single target would need 1 MP to cast, plus 1MP to give it range, total 2MP per single bolt, which can either be avoided via Evade or Shield Parry. I don't recall if armour is effective or not, but the parry option suggests it would be.

Wrack, on the other hand would need 1 to cast, plus 1 for range to last for POW minutes, forcing a Resilience check to avoid damage every CA the Sorcerer spends using the effect, as long as he can maintain concentration. All at the same cost of 2MP. Oh, yes, it also ignores all physical armour.

Magnitude is also typically used in Sorcery purely for "strength vs magical defences", all within spell features of variable power eg rate of hit point regeneration in Rejuvenate, and area covered by Protective Ward are usually, as I said above, linked to the caster's Sorcery skill.

So what does this spell offer, over Wrack, which fills the same design "hole"?
 
Harshlax said:

I see your point. From a mechanical POV there isn't any real benefit to the spell (there is, by the way, an Elementalist version of Wrack in the book), however, Elementalists tend to be show offs and this spell is something that's a bit flashy and kinda cool. Similar effects can be achieved using Elemental Mastery, a new skill that's fully described in the book. A lot of the offensive Sorcery spells don't do flashy; they're subtle and more insidious. This spell adds a bit of visual impact & flavour.
 
DamonJynx said:
Harshlax said:

I see your point. From a mechanical POV there isn't any real benefit to the spell (there is, by the way, an Elementalist version of Wrack in the book), however, Elementalists tend to be show offs and this spell is something that's a bit flashy and kinda cool. Similar effects can be achieved using Elemental Mastery, a new skill that's fully described in the book. A lot of the offensive Sorcery spells don't do flashy; they're subtle and more insidious. This spell adds a bit of visual impact & flavour.

Fair enough. Flashy's good. I was thinking Fire Bolt could be available to lower rankings, leaving the scary power of wrack to Adept or greater also. I look forward to seeing the finished book.
 
Harshlax said:
I look forward to seeing the finished book.
Apparently you won't have long to wait. I've just heard from Matt, the book is moving into layout and should be available sooner, rather than later.
 
so you sent the book to Matt on Friday and its been edited and now being laid out in just three days??? how long is the book? Is it many pages? Or does the editing happen after layout? I am curious because it seems very fast!
 
Carew said:
so you sent the book to Matt on Friday and its been edited and now being laid out in just three days??? how long is the book? Is it many pages? Or does the editing happen after layout? I am curious because it seems very fast!
Well, I did say it was going into layout, not that it had been laid out. Matt had it in his inbox Thursday morning (it's only a day I know, but...). It will probably be at least a week or more before it is available. I know Matt was really looking forward to receiving it so I assume he edited it as a priority. Part of the delay in completing the book as well, is due to the fact that I edit as I go and I wanted to do a really good job, because like a lot of you, I get disappointed when there are obvious mistakes in the text, so perhaps the finished manuscript didn't require much in the way of correction and Matt handled whatever did as part of the process.

As for page count, I'm not sure what the laid out book will be, I was given a target that I met.

Cheers,
 
Hey Damonjynx, I think its cool that you've got the book happening. It guess what I'm concerned with here is the speed from sbmission to layout. I am a hundred percent sure you did edit as you went but there's always a need for another editor on top of that and if an editor edits a book in just under 24 hours then they gotta be working through it some at speed if its now going to layout.

I'm looking forward to this book because in my campaign world that we've ported from Pathfinder we have a heavy elemantist presence and so its got my attention (and the attention of TWO of my players!!!) so I want to see the best book possible. Mongoose has gotten a lot of criticism over its editing in the past and so when I see that you sent a manuscript on day 1 and by day 4 (which, like, include a weekend - do the mongooses sleep? Guess not!) its going to a layout I wonder where the space is for editing it.

Anyway, kudos and props! Looking forward to this.
 
Carew said:
Hey Damonjynx, I think its cool that you've got the book happening. It guess what I'm concerned with here is the speed from sbmission to layout. I am a hundred percent sure you did edit as you went but there's always a need for another editor on top of that and if an editor edits a book in just under 24 hours then they gotta be working through it some at speed if its now going to layout.

I'm looking forward to this book because in my campaign world that we've ported from Pathfinder we have a heavy elemantist presence and so its got my attention (and the attention of TWO of my players!!!) so I want to see the best book possible. Mongoose has gotten a lot of criticism over its editing in the past and so when I see that you sent a manuscript on day 1 and by day 4 (which, like, include a weekend - do the mongooses sleep? Guess not!) its going to a layout I wonder where the space is for editing it.

Anyway, kudos and props! Looking forward to this.
Well, Carew, as you can see from the 1st post in this thread it has been a bloody long time in coming. I can only assume that Matt worked on it over the weekend. To be honest, I was expecting his email later in the week or possibly even next week.

By the by, perhaps the reason the editing process in this instance is so quick, is due to the fact that while I'm a bit slow in producing stuff, I'm naturally brilliant :wink:

Anyhow, enjoy the book when it is released. I sincerely hope it meets everyone's expectations. If it doesn't be sure to post constructive feedback and I'll make sure I do better on the next one!
 
I'm naturally brilliant

This might be the real reason!!!!

Hey I'm hoping its a great book and will give my guys the tools they need for their elementist characters. We got it all worked into the mythology about the way elements work and in our Pathfinder campaign its was spell schools on elemental lines that encouraged our style of play.

Cool beans.
 
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