Hung Over Review: Magic of Incarnum

[Kaelik]

It's game designer hubris and its an almost universal trait among game designers and would-be game designers. Just look at almost any thread here, and the one thing you'll never see is anyone actually admitting they were wrong and their idea was terrible to start. One of the worst things you can ever do is to bash the proposed idea. The majority of the time, it just triggers an intellectual street fight mentality where both sides refuse to back down. At that point, you can be sure they'll defend the idea with their dying breath and nothing that is said will ever convince them.

You are wrong.

Also, you are a poopy head.

[JonSetanta]

Body slots suck so much that I went the complete opposite with the RPG I wrote called Domain.
I limited characters to 1 item per 5 levels, they must invest "essence" points into an item to get them to work.

Granted I got the idea from Incarnum, but it was mostly just to avoid christmas tree effect.

[BearsAreBrown]

Because you bothered with the Psicarnum stuff you might be interested in these:

Dragon Magic

The Dragon Magazine is neato because AFAIK its one of the very few ways to get the swarm sub-type without Polymorph shit.

[OgreBattle]

Were they consciously going for a lower power level than wizard/cleric/druid? Like they acknowledged "wow we really overpowered them in 3e, let's tone it down with the spellcasters", or were the incarnum classes just weaker by accident?

Say if you had a campaign where the only magic allowed was incarnum based would they be able to overcome shadows, wyverns, beholders and so on?

chakra and essentia would be easier to explain if they called it "mana", "tapping", and it came in more than 1 color (maybe 5 colors, and a colorless one)

[Ancient History]

I think - between the Warlock, Incarnum-classes, some of the Complete Psion classes, and whatnot - that late 3.5 D&D was definitely going for a different power dynamic, but equally obviously not everyone was in on the loop.

So you get classes like Soulknife and Incarnate which are pretty clearly designed to incorporate magic items as part of their schtick to abide by or maybe nerf some of the madness that wealth-by-level guidelines had brought, but then you'd have somebody else come along later with a magic item or feat or prestige class or spell to do something "cool" or increase the power so it didn't quite suck as much, both of which attempts mostly failed and just added to the endless convoluted mess that was the late 3.5 ruleset. So they went to fix monty haul and...well, failed.

And equally obvious from classes like Warlock, Totemist, and to a lesser extant Divine Mind is that you're getting a transition away from Vancian spellcasting - where wizards are explicitly quadratic glass ninjas - and into a character concept where you have more-or-less fixed, recurring abilities.

You can clearly see what they were going for - it was headed toward D&D4, yes, but what they thought they were "fixing" was wizards running out of points. I honestly think that was the basic noise behind psychic focus when they first introduced it; they wanted Psions to have something to do that didn't cost power points, because an empty psion is fucking useless and just sits at the back of the party for the rest of the session until they can have a fucking lie-down. At the same time they wanted to severely reduce options - which is why sorcerers and psions have fixed # of spells/powers, and warlocks even fewer invocations - but then you get somebody writing up the Erudite and why the fuck wouldn't you want that?

I think you can definitely make something of the whole mess, but it would require more effort than I'm willing to put into it.

[Jefepato]

No one fucking cares about the Incarnate, because it's a medium BAB class that supposedly specializes in hitting people with a sword.

You are greatly misrepresenting the Incarnate, Frank.

It's a low BAB class that supposedly specializes in hitting people with a sword.

[Username17]

Were they consciously going for a lower power level than wizard/cleric/druid? Like they acknowledged "wow we really overpowered them in 3e, let's tone it down with the spellcasters", or were the incarnum classes just weaker by accident?

You can see the wheels of nerfage spinning in this book. What starts as a pretty sweet Gorgon Mask turns completely worthless as it gets no less than five restrictions added to it that turn it into basically a 1st level spell you get at character level 14. I don't think there was ever even a rough idea of what powers were level appropriate - just a paralytic fear of writing something overpowered.

You saw the same design strategy with Savage Species - the idea was that players would figure out how to break things so anything that you could figure out something even passably decent to do with during design needed to be nerfed. That might seem crazy to you, but Rich Redman confirmed that was literally exactly the design guidelines given down from above for Savage Species. And it doesn't help that when I talked to him in 2003, he was convinced that your benchmark for power had to be magic missile because "it's the best 1st level spell and nothing should be better than it."

So basically, WotC corporate culture was convinced that it was 1994 and that wizards not only could contribute meaningfully to encounters by casting magic missile but that they would be advised to do so. In addition, they were basically afraid of min/maxxers and decided that the way to "play it safe" was to make things superficially weak in proportion to how weird they were. This results in Incarnum and other "alternate" systems coming out the gate with heavy handed nerfs applied right and left.

In short: the design target was "garbage tier" under the understanding that it was new territory and they would probably miss the mark and hit higher than that.

Say if you had a campaign where the only magic allowed was incarnum based would they be able to overcome shadows, wyverns, beholders and so on?

If everyone was a Totemist, maybe. Although it would be hard and all the characters would end up looking the same. Incarnates and Soulborn have no fucking chance. Soulborn don't even have any soulmelds until 4th fucking level.

chakra and essentia would be easier to explain if they called it "mana", "tapping", and it came in more than 1 color (maybe 5 colors, and a colorless one)

Essentia and Chakras just needed to be way simpler than they were. I think that what we're looking at is like four or more draft proposals being run in parallel with the attempt of somehow figuring out which one was best from forum feedback. There are ten body slots which each have three distinct levels of slotedness and there are two different other kinds of slots and a power point pool that you can use to buy things into two of the levels of those body slots, and one of the levels of body slots only comes online at higher levels and does so at a different rate for different characters. It's a hot mess.

First of all, the "body slot" thing just has to fucking go. It increases all of the complexities of everything by ten fucking times. Secondly, you need to fucking rank these things. Don't try to sneak in chakra types to level associations, because that doesn't make any fucking sense. That's what ends up with you giving out true seeing as a 24th level ability (I wish that was a joke). Nut up and write "low," "medium," and "high" level shit. Fucking call it that so you know what you're writing and your reader can fucking find shit.

But of course, as long as Andy Collins was lead developer on the project, tracking body slots was always going to happen. It's stupid and unworkable, but Andy Collins wouldn't let that dog lie for seven actual years.

-Username17

[CCarter]

I honestly think that was the basic noise behind psychic focus when they first introduced it; they wanted Psions to have something to do that didn't cost power points, because an empty psion is fucking useless and just sits at the back of the party for the rest of the session until they can have a fucking lie-down. At the same time they wanted to severely reduce options - which is why sorcerers and psions have fixed # of spells/powers, and warlocks even fewer invocations - but then you get somebody writing up the Erudite and why the fuck wouldn't you want that?

I think you can definitely make something of the whole mess, but it would require more effort than I'm willing to put into it.

There's some discussion by Cordell in Dragon #316 on psionic feats/focus. The short summary would be that they wanted psionic feats to be better than non-psionic, but didn't like the 3.0 mechanic (minimum PP reserve) as it largely prevented psychic warriors from using their powers.

[nockermensch]

I honestly think that was the basic noise behind psychic focus when they first introduced it; they wanted Psions to have something to do that didn't cost power points, because an empty psion is fucking useless and just sits at the back of the party for the rest of the session until they can have a fucking lie-down. At the same time they wanted to severely reduce options - which is why sorcerers and psions have fixed # of spells/powers, and warlocks even fewer invocations - but then you get somebody writing up the Erudite and why the fuck wouldn't you want that?

I think you can definitely make something of the whole mess, but it would require more effort than I'm willing to put into it.

There's some discussion by Cordell in Dragon #316 on psionic feats/focus. The short summary would be that they wanted psionic feats to be better than non-psionic, but didn't like the 3.0 mechanic (minimum PP reserve) as it largely prevented psychic warriors from using their powers.

I liked the idea of psionic focus. It introduced a different rhythm for casting that was interesting during playtime. Of course, the practical result was that the 5th level bonus feat for all psions ended up being Psionic Meditation, after which they they simply became a fixed piece of artillery.

[OgreBattle]

I'm not familiar with D&D psychics, but the Psi Focus line of abilities has a nice rhythm to it. So you get your focus, maintaining focus gives you some benefits while expending focus can let you do a bigger thing.

That sounds like a good mechanic for action hero types in general. Has anyone on the Den revisited psychics for a Tome style class?

[fbmf]

You mean line how the Tome Fighter has Combat Focus?

Game On,
fbmf

[Lago PARANOIA]

That sounds like a good mechanic for action hero types in general.

It's not. At least as implemented by the XPH. The psionic focus mechanic encourages you to avoid picking up expansion options that depend on using it lest you trip on your dick. For example, the whole Chain Power and Empower Power (ugh) was weaker than the sum of its parts. Which would be okay if the psionic focus feats were the only game in town but they weren't. You could just pick other feats or pick up Psionic focus feats that weren't meant to be used in combat like Extend Spell.

If you're looking for inspiration for a Tome class, the maneuver refresh mechanic for the Bo9S's Warblade was much better. To wit: they put both your defense and offensive maneuvers in the same refresh pool. However, refreshing the pool prevented you from using the maneuvers in the same turn. It created a choice as to whether you refreshed and was able to keep up the offense or whether you accepted a lower offense rate at the benefit of not being caught with your pants down. You could further seed your pool by loading up on round-by-round strikes with the rest being defensive maneuvers which limited your ability to do spike damage but left you open less frequently. Or you could go for a high-flying style which had nothing but strikes + boosts. Or you could just load up on defensive maneuvers and rely on typical sword-based character tricks like Shock Trooper and Elusive Target. It's a simple, but extremely effective resource management mechanic. Definitely the best one I've ever seen in a property with 'D&D' in the title.

[Prak]

Is it remotely common for people to choose Race before choosing Class? Like, even if you have a very low level of system mastery and aren't thinking of a particular schtick that you'll want to multiclass your way toward, who picks the race first and then tries to figure out what class would work?

(Admittedly, I actually have done this once, because I really wanted to play a crowperson. But still!)

I guess I do this with Pathfinder, but that's probably because I like playing non-standard races, and so have to find something that sounds interesting but doesn't fuck with my level, and with classes in pathfinder I simultaneously figure "eh, it's a class, it should work roughly the same as 3.X" and "Fuck that, I'll have to figure out what the fuck it does... that can wait"

[Ancient History]

Part of the problem was just the layered, interlocking systems that really weren't designed to go together - and anything that even looked like it would be effective was nerfed for fear of being a gateway to ultimate power, so everything ended up being lukewarm crap.

The basic concept of Incarnum and reassigning essentia isn't terrible - but the execution was terribad and it was already competing with an existing system which it wasn't really compatible with. If you've already got a pair of magical boots, why much about with the incarnum feet chakra/slot nonsense? Similarly, why muck about with spell levels as sorcerer when Psion power points are much more flexible?

[Avoraciopoctules]

Is it remotely common for people to choose Race before choosing Class? Like, even if you have a very low level of system mastery and aren't thinking of a particular schtick that you'll want to multiclass your way toward, who picks the race first and then tries to figure out what class would work?

(Admittedly, I actually have done this once, because I really wanted to play a crowperson. But still!)

I guess I do this with Pathfinder, but that's probably because I like playing non-standard races, and so have to find something that sounds interesting but doesn't fuck with my level, and with classes in pathfinder I simultaneously figure "eh, it's a class, it should work roughly the same as 3.X" and "Fuck that, I'll have to figure out what the fuck it does... that can wait"

Pathfinder has races that strongly encourage certain class choices, I could see someone grabbing drow and then going summoner or kitsune then enchantment-sorcerer. Or Suli then monk, haha. If some likes a racial bonus a lot, they might look for a class that fits it.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Pathfinder has races that strongly encourage certain class choices, I could see someone grabbing drow and then going summoner or kitsune then enchantment-sorcerer. Or Suli then monk, haha. If some likes a racial bonus a lot, they might look for a class that fits it.

Why doesn't the fired 4E and Pathfinder design teams just fucking merge and get it over with? They're on largely the same fucking page, they just work on different products.

[OgreBattle]

You mean line how the Tome Fighter has Combat Focus?

Game On,
fbmf

Yeah, that's exactly what came to mind, it's a fairly simple class feature that just feels right. When a class feature is used it should be something worthy of its own panel in an action manga, and Combat Focus gives me the feels.

Vader expends his combat focus

If you're looking for inspiration for a Tome class, the maneuver refresh mechanic for the Bo9S's Warblade was much better. To wit: they put both your defense and offensive maneuvers in the same refresh pool. However, refreshing the pool prevented you from using the maneuvers in the same turn. It created a choice as to whether you refreshed and was able to keep up the offense or whether you accepted a lower offense rate at the benefit of not being caught with your pants down. You could further seed your pool by loading up on round-by-round strikes with the rest being defensive maneuvers which limited your ability to do spike damage but left you open less frequently. Or you could go for a high-flying style which had nothing but strikes + boosts. Or you could just load up on defensive maneuvers and rely on typical sword-based character tricks like Shock Trooper and Elusive Target. It's a simple, but extremely effective resource management mechanic. Definitely the best one I've ever seen in a property with 'D&D' in the title.

Yep. When I read about Orcus I again, makes me wonder how 4e would've turned out of stuff like the Warblade was the core fighter.

[Prak]

I know this is an incredibly meaningless gripe, but what the fuck is she even wearing? It's like she rolled out of bed still half asleep, put her breastplate and ...armoured thigh boots on, and then woke up enough to realize she was still wearing her lace panties and couldn't run out to battle in just panties and armour, but didn't have enough time to take off her armour so she just threw a dress on over it. Backwards. What the fuck?

[shadzar]

its those dumb one legged pants. you can see the other leg is covered with them too.

[Username17]

Zenya is wearing a side slit, W neck dress. She wears this over jointed banded mail armor that covers her legs, the lower part of her thighs, her chest, her shoulders, and her forearms. Her abdomen, underarms, pelvis, head, and upper thighs have no armor. It appears to be the kind of armor devised for something like "picking blackberries" rather than "being in combat." Also, her morningstar is comically oversized. Also, she has a halo attached to her head "for no reason." And of course, she is a bizarre mix of traits attached to Incarnates and Soulborn, such that it is clear that the vision of what the people in this book were actually supposed to do was never even the slightest bit clear.

But aside from all the terrible design decisions of the character (which is essentially "all of them"), I think the biggest failure is the Azurin/Soulborn interaction of the eyes. Why would anyone think that you should introduce a new race in the same book as you introduce a new class that makes it literally impossible to distinguish that race from a normal human? That doesn't make any sense.

-Username17

[Koumei]

Her abdomen, underarms, pelvis, head, and upper thighs have no armor.

Pretty sure there's nothing vital in any of those places. What, couple of kidneys, couple of livers, some bones, the eyes are clearly made of magical light so they're stab-proof, it's all good.

I think the biggest failure is the Azurin/Soulborn interaction of the eyes. Why would anyone think that you should introduce a new race in the same book as you introduce a new class that makes it literally impossible to distinguish that race from a normal human? That doesn't make any sense.

They should probably flash in alternate colours like police lights. Then they can run about shouting "NEE-NAW, NEE-NAW" before they fight crime.

[codeGlaze]

I think the biggest failure is the Azurin/Soulborn interaction of the eyes. Why would anyone think that you should introduce a new race in the same book as you introduce a new class that makes it literally impossible to distinguish that race from a normal human? That doesn't make any sense.

They should probably flash in alternate colours like police lights. Then they can run about shouting "NEE-NAW, NEE-NAW" before they fight crime.

xD I could see shit like that happening in something like Discworld.

[shadzar]

couple of livers

she has some BBQ chicken livers and didn't share?

[Aryxbez]

That sounds like a good mechanic for action hero types in general. Has anyone on the Den revisited psychics for a Tome style class?

You mean line how the Tome Fighter has Combat Focus?

Far as I recall, it actually came from PHBII's "Combat Form" feats, with the state being called "Combat Focus". It even had a picture of Regdar in said state, so I kinda assumed Tome was taking from that brief idea.

I guess I do this with Pathfinder, but that's probably because I like playing non-standard races

I too actually like the flavor of playing monster races, but then I'm also one to want to customize the race so that it fits, or doesn't mess with whatever class I want to play. Such as a Gnoll Jester (iconic jester image to me), Lumi Soldier, or a Nezumi iaijutsu-styled swordsage.

That said, Frank's Soulborn is very solid (bordering on RNG-breaking when paired with Tome feats) at later levels, and still gets a lot of the fun powers like X-Ray Vision, Flight and Summoning.

I was curious if anyone was going to comment on his version of those classes. Which, as a DM, I had felt the RNG-breaking powers firsthand. Resulting in the Soulborn Player being the most powerful character in the party, with little/noone able to contribute to his level (save the Wizard, but was still in close second to Soulborn). It sorta got disruptive after awhile, finding it a little powerful from a DM's perspective Auto-piloting on Wizard-level. It's probably fine in a game where everyone is mentally on the same page of "Wizard-level"/system-mastery. From a Player standpoint though, I absolutely adore the idea of a warrior type class who gets superpowers.

Another thought on Totemist, Frank implies In Chapter 2 the image is dumb? yet it's the same one he used for [Tome] Totemist. It seems it makes an interesting impression for a class that wears monsters, curious what was wrong with it (if anything)?

[ubernoob]

That said, Frank's Soulborn is very solid (bordering on RNG-breaking when paired with Tome feats) at later levels, and still gets a lot of the fun powers like X-Ray Vision, Flight and Summoning.

I was curious if anyone was going to comment on his version of those classes. Which, as a DM, I had felt the RNG-breaking powers firsthand. Resulting in the Soulborn Player being the most powerful character in the party, with little/noone able to contribute to his level (save the Wizard, but was still in close second to Soulborn). It sorta got disruptive after awhile, finding it a little powerful from a DM's perspective Auto-piloting on Wizard-level. It's probably fine in a game where everyone is mentally on the same page of "Wizard-level"/system-mastery. From a Player standpoint though, I absolutely adore the idea of a warrior type class who gets superpowers.

I played a level six Soulborn (Frank's version, not the crappy MoI class) briefly in a Tome game. I was definitely the MVP by a significant margin. If I remember correctly I was using a build something like this:

Feats:
1) Combat School (My super duper soul blade)
Human) Horde Breaker (goes well with the "No 5' steps for you" ability)
3) Blitz
6) Danger Sense

Something like that. Soulmelds looked something like this:
Minor bonuses- I get 9 basic +2 enhancement bonuses while everyone else gets only 6. My stats are pretty good because of it.
Major stuff: Reach with my soulblade, Enlarge person effect (always on), and this:

Startling Power: Once per turn, the Soulborn can force a target they have just struck for damage with a melee weapon to make a Fortitude Save (DC 9 + 1/2 level + Charisma Modifier) or become dazed for one turn.

Basically what that means is that I have 20' reach and if I hit someone with my soulblade I deal a bunch of damage (blitz and smite every round as well as power attack) and force 2 different save vs daze effects.

Damage isn't quite in the one shot everything range, but you walk around with 20' reach, two on hit vs daze effects every round, and have +CHA to saves on top of the resistance item you have.

So, you beat basically everything that is melee (you wear heavy armor and go sword and board the whole time this is happening), everything that is a spellcaster (+cha to saves), most grapple monsters (being large), and generally go around being Kore.

Did I mention that we still know 4 more soulmelds that we could trade out the above soulmelds for? Two of which get to pick off the Better Soulmelds list which includes a Fly speed, invisibility, X-Ray Vision, and Blindsight? The other two can select from immediate action unlimited counterspelling, Animal summoning (limited times/day, but useful for clearing a hall of traps), Silence, and a ranged touch attack save vs daze (for that one time the DM throws a monster that can kite you).

TLDR: Level six soulborns go to crazy town. Only real weakness is reflex save SoL spells. Those are pretty rare though.