Introducing the SAVANT, a variant Scholar class

[thulsa]

Introducing the Savant, a variant Scholar class for the Conan RPG.

This is essentially the scholar class with a few important modifications, but a separate class name was chosen so as not to confuse the two. However, they are not intended to be used side-by-side; you should choose which variant you allow in your campaigns.

http://hyboria.xoth.net/classes/index.htm

The PDF also contains revised spells, new spells, and revised rules for sorcery.

Any feedback, good or bad, is appreciated.

- thulsa

 

[VincentDarlage]

Nice variant. I liked the Alchemy addition especially.

 

[Voltumna]

Very cool, the graphics are awsome too.

 

[Malcadon]

I have read it and I like it! You have done exceptional work.

I like the idea of not being limited to 1 Advanced Spell per level (not counting bonus spells), and it feels more like the Grim Tales rules. Not having to deal with Bonus Spells is a plus (I follow the texts to the letter, but the chart is vary misleading). The Alchemy ability is vary useful. You did some good changes to the a lot of the spells, namely how the Curses are not just numbered penalties, but are effects like what you can find in the Book of Vile Darkness. I also like how you no longer have to worship any Nordheimir god to cast Dance of Atali (now is a must have for any Scholar/Temptress combo). Your new spells looks well written and doable. And, your Revised Rules of Sorcery has a lot of stuff that makes sense.

I would also like to see how you can improve other spells from the SoS. Some of the spells have ass-backwards Prerequisites. Namely how you need a MAB +5 to cast Illusion and you need a MAB +4 & Illusion to cast Swell (how is it even possible? :shock.

I never liked how Sorcerers can drain people like a Succubus. It was overshadowing normal Sacrifice rules as well. So I changed it to sexual contact instead of a touch attack. This was a patch that worked well and added to the role-playing element of the game (but it had the unfortunate side-effect of turning all the male Scholars into rapists, but in Conan, it seems to fit in a way :wink.

 

[thulsa]

You did some good changes to the a lot of the spells, namely how the Curses are not just numbered penalties, but are effects like what you can find in the Book of Vile Darkness.

The series of ill-fortune spells were extremely underpowered as written; now the Curses style is both more attractive/powerful and has more flavor, too. Some of the new effects were inspired by Green Ronin's Testament (which has useful bits for any sword and sorcery campaign, by the way).

I would also like to see how you can improve other spells from the SoS.

I included a few spells from Scrolls of Skelos, but since that book is soon (?) coming in a revised second edition, I'll wait until then to do a complete revision.

I may revise the spells from all the other supplements as well, given time. For example, Bottle Storms from Pirate Isles is quite broken, even low-level scholars can wreak havoc with it.

- thulsa

 

[sidkfjjteidlkkf]

Simply wonderful Thulsa, it will definately be used in my campaigns.

GREAT JOB!

:wink:

 

[sgstyrsky]

Great job, Thulsa.

It was interesting that the same night I read your article I also read "A Witch Shall be Born" which mentions a savant -- a nice synchronicity.

I especially liked the descriptions of what a curse actually does to a character, rather than just assigning bland penalties to dice rolls. Much more flavorful and creepy.

 

[Malcadon]

I'm thinking about having these rules canon for my rule-set, but I'm sidetracked with other things to work on it. I was wondering if anyone else use these rules in their games, and how has such rules changed or helped their game-play.

 

[LilithsThrall]

I like it, but there are two problems with the old rules that you kept. I wish you hadn't.
1.) Absolute hit die caps on spells. These really should be relative hit die caps (for example, "cannot affect a character who has more hit die than the caster") rather than absolute hit die caps (for example, "cannot affect anyone with more than 8 hit die").
2.) Nature spells cost experience to cast - why?
I -love- the new curses style and the alchemy feat (though I'd like to see an herbalism feat as well - maybe granting the character the ability to grow his/her own lotus plants).
One concern - a tenth level caster can throw 5 kothic demonfire orbs at the same time using greater telekinesis. That's about 25d6 of damage to a target. Currently, the only thing preventing that from happening is the expense of kothic demonfire. In other words, the cheaper you make it to create kothic demonfire, the more you need to have a rule to prevent a barage of the stuff being thrown all at once.

 

[LilithsThrall]

A couple of other things -more in the area of suggestions and things I'd like to see
1.) Now that you've given the Ill-Fortune spells a much needed boost
Curse of Yentzil should be boosted as well. Remember, that's a spell that can be cast only -once- in the lifetime of a character. It should be big, but its now weaker than your rewrite of Greater Ill-Fortune.
2.) Weapon Curse, in my opinion, should work round after round (like d20 fire shield) instead of just once (perhaps the sum total of the damage from the attacks must be exceeded before the spell drops - even if that means more than one attack is deflected) . For the same reason "not this day" should, currently, be called "not this round" as the frothing Barbarian is just going to roll another to-hit now that you've blown all your PP. It should be nicer.
3.) Put some meat on the bones of the Divination style. Right now, its just cream with nothing to stick to the ribs. Spells like "Detect Lie", "Sense the Supernatural", "Combat Prescience", "Sense Danger", and maybe even "Retroactive Preparation" would be nice.

 

[VincentDarlage]

3.) Put some meat on the bones of the Divination style. Right now, its just cream with nothing to stick to the ribs. Spells like "Detect Lie", "Sense the Supernatural", "Combat Prescience", "Sense Danger", and maybe even "Retroactive Preparation" would be nice.

I disagree with that. Spells like "Detect Lie" are game-breakers when PCs have them. Further, spells like that eliminate the need for Sense Motive and similar skills. Conan should never have spells that eliminate a skill. I think that is one of the Conan game's advantages over D&D - the removal of spells that negate the need to develop a skill.

A well-played Diviner in Conan will use his Sense Motive to detect a lie, and simply claim he cast a spell to get the guy to admit to the truth.

 

[LilithsThrall]

3.) Put some meat on the bones of the Divination style. Right now, its just cream with nothing to stick to the ribs. Spells like "Detect Lie", "Sense the Supernatural", "Combat Prescience", "Sense Danger", and maybe even "Retroactive Preparation" would be nice.

I disagree with that. Spells like "Detect Lie" are game-breakers when PCs have them. Further, spells like that eliminate the need for Sense Motive and similar skills. Conan should never have spells that eliminate a skill. I think that is one of the Conan game's advantages over D&D - the removal of spells that negate the need to develop a skill.

A well-played Diviner in Conan will use his Sense Motive to detect a lie, and simply claim he cast a spell to get the guy to admit to the truth.

I disagree for two reasons.
1.) Its painfully easy to say one thing and lead people to believe you've said something else. An NPC can tell the truth and lead PCs to believe he said something else entirely - a Detect Lie spell would never pick that up (because it isn't a lie, its a misdirection). A Sense Motive skill would.
2.) Under most circumstances, the Sorcerer would still have to contrive to cast the spell without the fact that he's cast the spell being discovered.

 

[VincentDarlage]

I disagree for two reasons.
Its painfully easy to say one thing and lead people to believe you've said something else. An NPC can tell the truth and lead PCs to believe he said something else entirely - a Detect Lie spell would never pick that up (because it isn't a lie, its a misdirection). A Sense Motive skill would.

The problem with that is that the NPC has to know the Detect Lie is available - that presumes a higher level of magic saturation than the Hyborian age has.

Also, as GM, why give a PC a power just to negate its use through contrivance?

If the PC casts detect lie and doesn't detect one, it is not likely he will try a Sense Motive to see if he is being told the truth in a deceitful manner.

Back when I used to play D&D and AD&D, I always removed Detect Lie (and most of the Detect spells) because they were game-breakers. I had to work too hard as a GM to get around them - and, once again, why offer the PCs a power, if the GM doesn't want it used?

 

[Voltumna]

Regarding the Savant manner of spell acquisition, feats like Sorcerer's Boon and GSB become obsolete. Probably a good tweak to those feats for use with the Savant is to grant access to a new sorcery style. The sorcerer would need a source from where to learn the new style's basic spell, and advanced spells would be learned in the usual manner of the Savant.

 

[thulsa]

Thanks for the feedback.

1.) Absolute hit die caps on spells. These really should be relative hit die caps (for example, "cannot affect a character who has more hit die than the caster") rather than absolute hit die caps (for example, "cannot affect anyone with more than 8 hit die").

Good point. Have to think about it and look at the specific spells.

2.) Nature spells cost experience to cast - why?

The summoning spells cost XP to cast in the core rules as well; I've increased the XP cost of summoning bigger creatures because they are quite powerful and I can easily see a sorcerer summoning a lot of animals in every single encounter unless the cost is high. Plus there isn't much of a basis for this type of animal summoning in the REH stories, and it adds to the bookkeeping in combat with lots of summoned creatures.

I -love- the new curses style and the alchemy feat (though I'd like to see an herbalism feat as well - maybe granting the character the ability to grow his/her own lotus plants).

Perhaps the time required to brew up the various herbal items could be reduced, but I'm not sure I'd want sorcerers to be able to grow the plants outside their native environment. It would reduce campaign flavor.

One concern - a tenth level caster can throw 5 kothic demonfire orbs at the same time using greater telekinesis. That's about 25d6 of damage to a target. Currently, the only thing preventing that from happening is the expense of kothic demonfire. In other words, the cheaper you make it to create kothic demonfire, the more you need to have a rule to prevent a barage of the stuff being thrown all at once.

As far as I can tell, a 10th-level sorcerer can actually hurl 10 orbs at the same time (1/level), for a total of 50d6 damage. That's clearly somewhat broken (although it's still rather expensive), so this needs to be fixed.

Now that you've given the Ill-Fortune spells a much needed boost Very Happy
Curse of Yentzil should be boosted as well. Remember, that's a spell that can be cast only -once- in the lifetime of a character. It should be big, but its now weaker than your rewrite of Greater Ill-Fortune.

I agree, Curse of Yizil is a very weak spell. I like the idea of a dying curse, though. By the way, does anyone know who or what "Yizil" is?

Weapon Curse, in my opinion, should work round after round (like d20 fire shield) instead of just once (perhaps the sum total of the damage from the attacks must be exceeded before the spell drops - even if that means more than one attack is deflected) . For the same reason "not this day" should, currently, be called "not this round" as the frothing Barbarian is just going to roll another to-hit now that you've blown all your PP. It should be nicer.

I agree.

Put some meat on the bones of the Divination style. Right now, its just cream with nothing to stick to the ribs. Spells like "Detect Lie", "Sense the Supernatural", "Combat Prescience", "Sense Danger", and maybe even "Retroactive Preparation" would be nice.

I have to agree with Vincent here. I think "Detect Lie" (and the like) is bad for several reasons. I don't want magic to be used as technology; in other words, I don't want magistrates (and even "detectives") routinely casting Detect Lie as if it was a, well, lie detector. "Sense the Supernatural" sounds a lot like "Detect Magic", which is much abused in D&D. So I say good riddance to this type of divination magic.

- thulsa

 

[thulsa]

Regarding the Savant manner of spell acquisition, feats like Sorcerer's Boon and GSB become obsolete. Probably a good tweak to those feats for use with the Savant is to grant access to a new sorcery style. The sorcerer would need a source from where to learn the new style's basic spell, and advanced spells would be learned in the usual manner of the Savant.

Good idea, as long as you still need to find and learn the specific spells in the new style as usual (as you say).

- thulsa

 

[LilithsThrall]

Having taken more time to think it over, I find myself in agreement with you both regarding Detect Lie.
As for "Sense the Supernatural", I had less of a "Detect Magic" concept in mind and more of a long range non-targetting sense (that is, somewhere in this town, there is a great foul supernatural presence - but where?)

The summoning spells cost XP to cast in the core rules as well; I've increased the XP cost of summoning bigger creatures because they are quite powerful and I can easily see a sorcerer summoning a lot of animals in every single encounter unless the cost is high. Plus there isn't much of a basis for this type of animal summoning in the REH stories, and it adds to the bookkeeping in combat with lots of summoned creatures.

Well, if there isn't much of a basis for this type of animal summoning in the REH stories, why have it at all? One way to restrict the number of animals summoned is to make the casting of a summons cost a fate chip.

As for Weapon Curse, you could make it a sustained curse which affects whoever strikes the caster - depending on the level/PP of the caster, the attacker's attacking limb withers or the attacker goes blind or the like - like Greater Ill-Fortune.

As for Curse of Yizil, I could see this getting bumped up to dramatic levels. For example, after a fierce battle, you managed to kill the powerful evil sorcerer. With his last breath, he uttered his final damnation - the moon turned the color of curdled blood and a foul smelling wind swept across the land. Animals within 10 miles of the death turned feral and turned on their masters. Now, you need to quest to end the curse.
Of course, this is an example of a dieing curse by a powerful evil sorcerer, less powerful sorcerers may have less dramatic things happen - scale the effect by either the PP or the level of the caster at the moment of casting.

 

[LilithsThrall]

As I think more about it, I grow slowly more convinced that fate points are a great way to regulate the power of the Sorcerer. Have summoning require a fate point or more to work. Have permanent magical effects and magic items require so many fate points to initiate and so many fate points on a recurring basis (perhaps every campaign session) to maintain (if the Sorcerer dies, he can no longer generate any more fate points - even if he banks fate points, that bank will run dry after he's dead). You might have a binding ritual which allows characters (such as cult followers) to pay the fate point cost for magic items and permanent magic after the Sorcerer is dead.