Spellcasting Mooks

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Fri Mar 28, 2008 8:20 am

I was thinking about this. Mooks are generally just warriors, who chop with a sword or shoot with a bow and go down like two-cent hookers. Just look at F&K's Warrior variant for a more appropriate method of statting them up.

Is there a need, or even a use, for an Adept NPC class, the equivalent of a magic mook? Or am I better off just changing the flavour text of the warrior; where instead of mighty longbows, they have wands that shoot fire using Charisma instead of Strength for damage?

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Fri Mar 28, 2008 5:18 pm

What I can say's that there's definitely a "magical mook" fighting style, as spellcasters often have battlefield control arbitrary enough that it still works against more powerful opposition, and those guys make touch attacks often enough that crap attack ratings aren't much of a problem. So yeah, might be interesting ... you might also use the sorcerer if you play Tome (which I'm not sure about).

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Sun Mar 30, 2008 3:34 pm

As Bigode mentions, casting spells like grease and web is very applicable in combats of any level, so a follower who happens to be a Wizard can be extremely effective and helpful even if you are personally high level.

That being said, having enemies dumping large amounts of battlefield control gets annoying fast, and when you trot out a bunch of enemy mages you probably don't want to draw special magic terrain all over the table, so yeah there's room for an Adept NPC. The goal would be to make something that feels like a Magic User (fragile and dangerous relative to its power level), while still having a minimum effect on the actual battle mat and being weak enough that it can come in groups.

Adept
"The acolytes of the college of sorceries will not allow an outsider to see the Necromancer."

The worlds of D&D have a multitude of world altering magicians who slay dragons with their mighty magics and transform the very fabric of history and reality with their minds. But while these characters are often the primary focus of the D&D game, the fact remains that magic is an extremely palpable and utilitarian force in the D&D world, and the vast majority of those who use it are not actually capable of performing such awesome displays of magical prowess. These are the Adepts – the people who wield sorceries in a manner that is entirely unlikely to get their names told in lasting song and story.

Adepts in the Game: Adepts aren't playable as PCs. They lack the depth and tactical versatility to be an interesting character and they are not powerful enough to pull their weight in any real adventuring setup. They have a CR equal to half their Adept level and don't get multiclassed with real classes at all. In order to keep this from being potentially unbalanced, we strongly suggest that Adepts show up in groups. So while a 4th level Adept is nominally a CR 2 opponent, he's not really a good challenge for a 2nd level party. But 2 of them are an appropriate challenge for a 4th level party. And that's really what the Adept is for – showing up in groups and getting smacked around anyway.

Hit Die: d4
Class Skills: The Adept's class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Balance (Dex), Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Handle Animal (Cha), Intimidate (Cha), Knowledge (Any, Int), Profession.
Skills/Level: 2 + Intelligence Bonus
BAB: Poor (1/2), Saves: Fort: Poor; Reflex: Poor; Will: Good

Level, Benefit
1 Replaceable, Elemental Attack
2 Dangerous Magic
3 Versatile Magic
4 Defensive Magic
5 Specific Magic

All of the following are Class Features of the Adept class:
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: An Adept is proficient with all simple weapons, as well as Light Armor.

Replaceable: Adepts represent the faceless hordes of assistant spellcasters, acolytes, and cultists. They are intended to be easy to use, and relatively easy to replace. Instead of worrying about the feats that an Adept has, simply give Warriors +1 to the damage of their magic powers for each feat they would be eligible for.

Elemental Attack (Sp): Depending upon what school of magic or cult they belong to, the Adept may use one of a number of different energy types. Necromancers and Death cultists use Negative Energy, Fire Adepts and Pyromancers use Fire, and so on. Each Adept has an elemental attack which does one kind of energy damage chosen when the Adept is created. It does a d8 of damage to a single target within Medium range and allows a Saving Throw of the target's choice to halve the damage. The Save DC is either Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma based depending upon what the precepts of the group happen to be. This is a spell-like ability, but it has Somatic and Verbal Components anyway (no Arcane Spell Failure though). Energy types are chosen from the following list (though nothing prevents unique cults from having Adepts which use more obscure energy types):

Negative Energy
Fire
Electricity
Acid
Cold
Force

Dangerous Magic: 2nd level Adepts have magic that causes a dangerous side effects on those who fail their save against the effect and take at least one point of damage. The effects are based on what kind of magic is being used:

Negative Energy - targets who fail their save are frightened for one round.
Fire - Targets who fail their save are on fire until they are put out.
Electricity - Targets who fail their save are stunned for one round.
Acid - Targets who fail their save will take damage again next turn (save for half), and will continue to take damage every round until they make a save or they are washed off with alcohol.
Cold - Targets who fail their save are slowed for 10 rounds.
Force - Targets who fail their save are pushed back a number of 5' squares equal to the number bonus damage the Adept has from lost feats minus one square for every size category the target is larger than Medium.

Versatile Magic: 3rd level Adepts can use their choice of two different energy types, which are still both selected when the Adept is created (the original and the extra energy type).

Defensive Magic: 4th level Adepts use magic defensively somehow. All allies within 10' of a 4th level Adept have a +2 Resistance Bonus to Saving Throws and a +2 Deflection bonus to AC.

Specific Magic: 5th level Adepts no longer allow their target to select the Saving Throw type they make against their Magic. The Adept selects one save type (Fort, Reflex, or Will), and all targets must make that saving throw type against their Elemental Attacks regardless of whether that's a good thing for them or not.

Trading Out Adept Levels: Adept levels aren't capable of doing anything good. If for some reason an Adept became a named character, he becomes a member of a real character class. That is, simply trade levels of Adept for levels in a real class that has a casting or spell-like abililty progression.

-Username17

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 1:22 am

I'd swap the order of Defensive and Versatile.

-Crissa

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 5:36 pm

Crissa wrote:I'd swap the order of Defensive and Versatile.

-Crissa

Nah. The thing is that you can expect there to be more 1sts than 2nds, more 2nds than 3rds, and so on. The guys who can lay on two different kinds of energy damage don't have an effect on the others particularly. The guys who create a little defensive bubble do. You want the guys putting out the defensive bubble to be rare enough that players can go out of their way to take them down.

-Username17

Jacob_Orlove · Post by **Jacob_Orlove** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 6:21 pm

So these guys only ever do 1d8 points of damage? I guess you really could have a lot of them running around.

SunTzuWarmaster · Post by **SunTzuWarmaster** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 6:47 pm

Not really...

An optimized adept (Strongheart halfling ftw!), will do 1d8+2 at level 1, and 1d8+3 at level 3, due to the Replaceable ability!

Yes, I was also underwhelmed with damage output, but the key thing is reliability. They ALWAYS do (1d8+feats)/2, which is more than a guy with a crossbow can say, although I do feel that they should get a (RelevantAbilityScore)->damage style ability, but I don't address Frank when it comes to balance

.

Also, the point is that the melee guy just cleaves through them, or that a single fireball takes them all down.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 7:07 pm

Yeah, I figured by 3rd you'd expect to encounter groups of them instead of singles; but varied defenses wouldn't be common yet.

-Crissa

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 10:13 pm

The important bit is that they're always throwing around debuffs. Since they're supposed to be in groups, there's a fair chance of people actually failing and suffering from such. Two of the blasts actually keep the recipient from actually doing anything, another two actually do more damage, and another can be used to deadly effect if fought near a cliff.

SunTzuWarmaster · Post by **SunTzuWarmaster** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 10:42 pm

Coupled with the fact that oftentimes they get to set the terrain.

JonSetanta · Post by **JonSetanta** » Tue Apr 01, 2008 1:45 am

I'd make it a 3 level class.
Regardless, fits the job of 'caster mook' nicely.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Tue Apr 01, 2008 7:06 am

Crissa wrote:Yeah, I figured by 3rd you'd expect to encounter groups of them instead of singles; but varied defenses wouldn't be common yet.

-Crissa

Remember that even the "4th level" Adept is only CR 2, which means that 3rd level characters are encountering them in groups. A modestly challenging encounter could seriously be a 4th level Adept, two 2nd level adepts, and two 1st level Adepts. That's rain a lot of Lightning on a 3rd level party and probably scare the crap out of them. But they'll be going down fast enough that the 3rd level party should win.

-Username17

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Tue Apr 01, 2008 8:38 am

Heh, I can imagine a 'magic brigade', where you have a mix of adepts & warriors while changing the skin/flavour text of the warriors to look like they rage with arcane niftiness.

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Tue Apr 01, 2008 3:49 pm

At this point, I ask: is there what to do for other NPC classes? Not that I'm planning to use the possible result; mostly curiosity.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Tue Apr 01, 2008 8:49 pm

Bigode wrote:At this point, I ask: is there what to do for other NPC classes? Not that I'm planning to use the possible result; mostly curiosity.

Wasn't really planning on it. Aristocrats and Experts don't usually even need rules.

-Username17

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Tue Apr 01, 2008 11:45 pm

I did mean mostly "unidimensional enemies to show up in groups", like the current ones. For example, whether there's anything to do for "thugs" or [something involving mainly support].

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Wed Apr 02, 2008 12:01 am

I would hope warriors would fill the thug role.

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Wed Apr 02, 2008 12:08 am

Sorry, it's the old meaning divergence of the word. I meant something like the NPC version of rogue-like classes, which is related to even the original thugee to some extent.

JonSetanta · Post by **JonSetanta** » Wed Apr 02, 2008 12:42 am

virgileso wrote:I would hope warriors would fill the thug role.

I'd rather see some sort of catch-all mook class with a series of feat/ability slots for the special attacks.
But then again I'm leaning that way for a whole game.

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Wed Apr 02, 2008 1:40 am

A support-mook class might be nice, for a sort of "the boss's acolyte each heal him 5 points per round, so you run around killing them first" effect.

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Sat Jun 21, 2008 6:35 am

Tiny question, would there be a balance concern at any point if you had something like an 'combat wand'.

It would be a ranged simple weapon that you wield with one hand, but only spellcasters can use it. It would function in essentially all ways like a composite shortbow, shooting blasts of force that count as piercing damage (subject to DR as normal). You would even have to buy components/ammo at the same cost rate, something like cheap crystals either ground into a powder and stored in a component pouch, or as a gemstone popped into the tip of the wand that loses value as it's used.

The main difference would be that it's subject to SR and a 'mighty' wand uses the wielder's casting stat mod instead of strength for the bonus damage. Upgrade it to an equivalent to the longbow by making it two-handed and having it be a staff.

Voss · Post by **Voss** » Sat Jun 21, 2008 4:10 pm

You'd get a lot of gun jokes (and... other jokes) but I don't think it would be unbalancing as long as range/damage/crit is comparable to a bow. You're essentially just reskinning it. Drop a feat somewhere on the monster and its more or less mechanically equivalent to just having a bow.

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Sat Jun 21, 2008 4:44 pm

I wasn't thinking of its use with monsters, but with players. As compared to other weapons, would it be out of line?

Voss · Post by **Voss** » Sat Jun 21, 2008 5:08 pm

Not really. Restrict it in some way (ranks in Arcana, or just 'ability to cast spells' or whatever) and call it a day. As long as it isn't out of line with normal weapons, it should be fine. They still have to deal with their crappy BAB. As a simple weapon, I'd give it the standard x2 crit modifier. Use the same costs and restrictions for 'mighty' versions and it shouldn't be much of an issue.

NoDot · Post by **NoDot** » Sat Jun 21, 2008 5:21 pm

Use-Activated "Hand Crossbow" of CL 1 Ray of Frost
Cost: 1,000gp
Treat as a Hand Crossbow.