Annoying Game Questions You Want Answered

[infected slut princess]

Good writers put out about 300-400 thousand published words a year, as little as 1000 words per day. I'll assume the rest of your post is just as wrong and award you a D- for creativity.

This is basically wrong. For instance, I know this 72-year-old guy who writes 40 articles a week. Many of them are short, but some of them are also very long. He spends 12 hours a day, six days a week at a computer writing. He is a fast typist and a good writer. He makes a lot of money. He also invests in real estate and does other stuff.

If you need a role model for sheer output, how about Abraham Kuyper? His fields were classics, philosophy, and literature. A collection of his writings has 961 entries, including 24 books. That does NOT include 16,800 editorials he wrote. He also learned eight languages, and he raised eight children.

You'd be amazed how much productivity you can achieve by applying yourself. But you might have to spend less time dicking around on the internet and fapping to anime or whatever you do with yourself.

[Grek]

My personal interpretation is that a wizard can decipher, copy and learn any spell that he finds a scroll of, including divine spells, spells not on the wizard list and spells that are too high level for the wizard to cast. The learning spells step is very very unrestrictive for wizards. However, a wizard is only able to prepare arcane spells that they have spell slots for and can only activate scrolls for spells on the wizard list. If a wizard finds a scroll written by a cleric, they must make a UMD check to activate the scroll. If they copy the scroll into their spellbook, they can neither cast nor prepare the spell, as it is a divine spell and wizard levels only give you the ability to cast spells prepared into wizard spell slots and only lets you prepare arcane spells into wizard spell slots.

If a wizard wants to learn a divine spell as a arcane spell, they can either A] find a arcane version of it, or B] create an arcane version using the item crafting rules. Doing so requires that the wizard learn the spell (presumably in divine form), copy it to their spellbook, create a scroll (which will be arcane because all scrolls created by a wizard are arcane) of the spell in the usual way (using either UMD checks or the aid of a divine caster to provide the spell prerequisite) and then copy the resulting scroll into their spellbook, or C] use whatever methods of spell research the DM makes available to invent a spell that does the same thing, but is arcane.

[zugschef]

I'm not even sure that this wasn't intended. The procedure of copying a divine scroll into your spellbook could involve translating as well. So you can't cast it from the scroll because you first have to translate it from divine into arcane code. What I want to say is basically that it's not like it can't make sense to allow wizards to learn divine spells from scrolls. In the case of arcane spells not on the wizard spell list it is pretty clear that you can do that.

[edit] Divine scrolls don't make sense to begin with.

[Koumei]

Sure they do: prayer sheets, ancient scriptures of litanies and ofuda. The bit where they burn up is no weirder than for arcane.

[zugschef]

Sure they do: prayer sheets, ancient scriptures of litanies and ofuda. The bit where they burn up is no weirder than for arcane.

Yeah, true. Both act as catalysts but the weird part is where they're consumed/destroyed in the process.

[Username17]

If you need a role model for sheer output, how about Abraham Kuyper? His fields were classics, philosophy, and literature. A collection of his writings has 961 entries, including 24 books. That does NOT include 16,800 editorials he wrote. He also learned eight languages, and he raised eight children.

This doesn't say what you seem to think it does. According to Wikipedia, his first listed publication was in 1862, and his last listed publication is in 1917. That's 55 years of writing. His most famous book appears to be "Conservatisme en Orthodoxie" which is 38 pages long at about 400 words a page.

Assuming every publication of his is equally long (which we know they aren't because only 24 of them are "books"), that works out to a bit over 700 words per day during his 55 year publishing career.

OWWWNNNNNN GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLLLL!

-Username17

[Hey_I_Can_Chan]

So lets say a bard finds a knowstone of plane shift. What and how many Use Magic Device checks does he have to succeed on to gain its benefits?

Knowstones (Dragon #333 93)

A knowstone is a semiprecious stone containing the formula for casting a spell within.

Physical Description: A typical knowstone is a small, smooth semiprecious stone inscribed with an ancient arcane symbol. The stone itself typically has a value no greater than 25 gp before the etching ofthe arcane symbol.

Activation: A knowstone provides its bearer with knowledge of the inscribed spell, which he can then use his spell slots to cast normally (as if the inscribed spell were among his known spells). The knowstone's bearer need not make any conscious decision to use the knowstone apart from deciding to cast the inscribed spell. (This is considered part of the spellcasting action.) Any spontaneous caster can use a knowstone, provided that the spell it includes is on his spell list and he can cast spells of its level. For example, a bard may cast crushing despair from a knowstone of crushing despair if he can cast 3rd-level spells, whereas a sorcerer must he able to cast 4th-level spells to employ a knowstone of that spell.

A knowstone always appears in a piece of jewelry but does not occupy a magic item slot. It takes 24 hours for a knowstone to attune to a new bearer, after which time the knowstone grants its inscribed spell.

Creation: You can create a knowstone for any spell you know. Crafting a knowstone takes one day for each 1,000 gp in its base price (500 gp total price for a 0-level spell). The base price of a knowstone is the spell level squared × 1,000 gp + expensive material components or focus (if any). To craft a knowstone, you must spend 1/25 ofthis hase price in XP and use up raw materials costing one-half of this base price. Creating a knowstone requires the Craft Wondrous Item feat.

[ishy]

But DeadDMWalking's tirade about how it says "arcane" a bunch of places in the book and therefore it magically must include an arcane scroll limitation on the part of the book where it says you can learn a spell off any scroll you decipher, even though it totally doesn't say that, is precisely the problem you're always going to have in trying to learn spells off of Druid scrolls. It really isn't that any such limitation exists, it's that DeadDMWalking is extremely representative of DMs, and your DM is almost certainly going to make the same argument. It says "arcane" everywhere else in the book, so presumably it meant to limit you to deciphered arcane scrolls, and now the burden of proof is on you to show that such a limitation doesn't exist in any book anywhere, which you will never be able to do because you don't even own a copy of Champions of Valor.

-Username17

While Frank is 100% correct for SRD games, such a limitation actually does exist. It is in the 3.5 Rules Compendium.

Now what about the sorcerer? He casts spells drawn "primarily" from the sorc/wiz list. Doesn't that imply that he can draw spells from other lists, too?

An obvious route to gaining more spells is bloodlines from one of the dragon wank books, think it was dragon magic.

Another good option is Runestaves from magic item compendium.
They work like regular staves but instead of having charges on the item, you have to spend a spell slot / sacrifice a prepared spell of equal level (though each spell can only be cast 3 times a day).
The part where they become awesome (and your DM is sadly likely to veto them) is when you include UMD. So you can activate the staff as if you spend the spell slot, at an emulated ability score and with an emulated caster level.

[zugschef]

So lets say a bard finds a knowstone of plane shift. What and how many Use Magic Device checks does he have to succeed on to gain its benefits?

Knowstones (Dragon #333 93)

A knowstone is a semiprecious stone containing the formula for casting a spell within.

Physical Description: A typical knowstone is a small, smooth semiprecious stone inscribed with an ancient arcane symbol. The stone itself typically has a value no greater than 25 gp before the etching ofthe arcane symbol.

Activation: A knowstone provides its bearer with knowledge of the inscribed spell, which he can then use his spell slots to cast normally (as if the inscribed spell were among his known spells). The knowstone's bearer need not make any conscious decision to use the knowstone apart from deciding to cast the inscribed spell. (This is considered part of the spellcasting action.) Any spontaneous caster can use a knowstone, provided that the spell it includes is on his spell list and he can cast spells of its level. For example, a bard may cast crushing despair from a knowstone of crushing despair if he can cast 3rd-level spells, whereas a sorcerer must he able to cast 4th-level spells to employ a knowstone of that spell.

A knowstone always appears in a piece of jewelry but does not occupy a magic item slot. It takes 24 hours for a knowstone to attune to a new bearer, after which time the knowstone grants its inscribed spell.

Creation: You can create a knowstone for any spell you know. Crafting a knowstone takes one day for each 1,000 gp in its base price (500 gp total price for a 0-level spell). The base price of a knowstone is the spell level squared × 1,000 gp + expensive material components or focus (if any). To craft a knowstone, you must spend 1/25 ofthis hase price in XP and use up raw materials costing one-half of this base price. Creating a knowstone requires the Craft Wondrous Item feat.

One. He needs to make the UMD check to emulate having the plane shift spell on his spell list (i.e. Emulate a Class Feature).

[zugschef]

But DeadDMWalking's tirade about how it says "arcane" a bunch of places in the book and therefore it magically must include an arcane scroll limitation on the part of the book where it says you can learn a spell off any scroll you decipher, even though it totally doesn't say that, is precisely the problem you're always going to have in trying to learn spells off of Druid scrolls. It really isn't that any such limitation exists, it's that DeadDMWalking is extremely representative of DMs, and your DM is almost certainly going to make the same argument. It says "arcane" everywhere else in the book, so presumably it meant to limit you to deciphered arcane scrolls, and now the burden of proof is on you to show that such a limitation doesn't exist in any book anywhere, which you will never be able to do because you don't even own a copy of Champions of Valor.

-Username17

While Frank is 100% correct for SRD games, such a limitation actually does exist. It is in the 3.5 Rules Compendium.

What's funny though, is that the Player's Handbook is the primary source and as such overrides the Rules Compendium. True story.

[ishy]

What's funny though, is that the Player's Handbook is the primary source and as such overrides the Rules Compendium. True story.

Actually no, that is sadly not the case.

Years in the making, it gathers resources from a wide variety of supplements, rules errata, and rules clarifications to provide an authoritative guide for playing the D&D game. It updates and elucidates the rules, as well as expanding on them in ways that make it more fun and easier to play. When a preexisting core book or supplement differs with the rules herein, Rules Compendium is meant to take precedence.

Bold added for emphasis.

[...You Lost Me]

And the PHB has something just like that too... so one of them is lying!

[Hey_I_Can_Chan]

So lets say a bard finds a knowstone of plane shift. What and how many Use Magic Device checks does he have to succeed on to gain its benefits?

Knowstones (Dragon #333 93)

A knowstone is a semiprecious stone containing the formula for casting a spell within.

Physical Description: A typical knowstone is a small, smooth semiprecious stone inscribed with an ancient arcane symbol. The stone itself typically has a value no greater than 25 gp before the etching ofthe arcane symbol.

Activation: A knowstone provides its bearer with knowledge of the inscribed spell, which he can then use his spell slots to cast normally (as if the inscribed spell were among his known spells). The knowstone's bearer need not make any conscious decision to use the knowstone apart from deciding to cast the inscribed spell. (This is considered part of the spellcasting action.) Any spontaneous caster can use a knowstone, provided that the spell it includes is on his spell list and he can cast spells of its level. For example, a bard may cast crushing despair from a knowstone of crushing despair if he can cast 3rd-level spells, whereas a sorcerer must he able to cast 4th-level spells to employ a knowstone of that spell.

A knowstone always appears in a piece of jewelry but does not occupy a magic item slot. It takes 24 hours for a knowstone to attune to a new bearer, after which time the knowstone grants its inscribed spell.

Creation: You can create a knowstone for any spell you know. Crafting a knowstone takes one day for each 1,000 gp in its base price (500 gp total price for a 0-level spell). The base price of a knowstone is the spell level squared × 1,000 gp + expensive material components or focus (if any). To craft a knowstone, you must spend 1/25 ofthis hase price in XP and use up raw materials costing one-half of this base price. Creating a knowstone requires the Craft Wondrous Item feat.

One. He needs to make the UMD check to emulate having the plane shift spell on his spell list (i.e. Emulate a Class Feature).

Okay, but what class feature, exactly, is he emulating?

I'm not trying to be obtuse here. The bard succeeds on his Use Magic Device check to emulate a class feature because he wants the knowstone of plane shift to add plane shift to his bard spells. He could emulate a cleric's spells class feature and that totally puts plane shift on the cleric spell list (where it already was anyway) that the bard's pretending to have, but doing that doesn't do anything to the bard's bard spell list, which is the spell list he actually wants to add plane shift to using the knowstone.

So, yeah, I'm not seeing "make the UMD check to emulate having the plane shift spell on his spell list" working. How is the bard using UMD to emulate a class feature doing that when, "Add plane shift to your bard spell list," isn't a class feature? I mean, does this get all weird, calling level-up feats class features then emulating the Extra Spell (5th-level clerical plane shift) feat of a Brd18 or something?

[Prak]

He is emulating the class feature "Have Plane Shift on his spell list"

Edit: alternatively, he emulating the class feature "have a spell list which includes Plane Shift"

[zugschef]

And the PHB has something just like that too... so one of them is lying!

He is emulating the class feature "Have Plane Shift on his spell list"

Edit: alternatively, he emulating the class feature "have a spell list which includes Plane Shift"

This. Btw..

When we release errata, it will always be free.
It logically follows that if the change of rules is not free, it is not errata. The changed text in the Rules Compendium is not free, therefore it is not official errata.

But it's true that the rules compendium adds a sentence:

Spellcasters who use spellbooks can add a spell to their book whenever they find one on a scroll or in another caster’s spellbook. The spell to be copied must be on the copier’s class spell list. [Emphasis by me.] No matter what the spell’s source, it must first be deciphered.

[Hey_I_Can_Chan]

Alternatively, he emulating the class feature "have a spell list which includes Plane Shift"

So he's emulating a nonexistent class feature. Got it. But then wouldn't that merely add plane shift to that emulated spell list and not his actual, for-reals bard spell list?

Further, if the knowstone does add to the bard's actual spells known after using this technique, the bard's best emulation is the class feature, "Have a spell list that includes plane shift as a 0th-level, 1st-level, 2nd-level, 3rd-level, 4th-level, 5th-level, and 6th-level spell," since the knowstone doesn't care at what level the knowstone itself is crafted and only cares that the potential caster has it on his list. I mean, this way he could cast it as a 0th-level spell and never need worry about heightening it to use it offensively.

[Grek]

You can't use UMD to emulate having a spell on your spell list, except to activate a spell completion or spell trigger item. A knowstone is a use-activated item and thus cannot be activated that way using UMD.

[zugschef]

You can't use UMD to emulate having a spell on your spell list, except to activate a spell completion or spell trigger item. A knowstone is a use-activated item and thus cannot be activated that way using UMD.

Why are you pulling shit out of your ass?

You can use this skill to read a spell or to activate a magic item. Use Magic Device lets you use a magic item as if you had the spell ability or class features of another class, as if you were a different race, or as if you were of a different alignment.
[...]
Emulate a Class Feature
Sometimes you need to use a class feature to activate a magic item. In this case, your effective level in the emulated class equals your Use Magic Device check result minus 20. This skill does not let you actually use the class feature of another class. It just lets you activate items as if you had that class feature. If the class whose feature you are emulating has an alignment requirement, you must meet it, either honestly or by emulating an appropriate alignment with a separate Use Magic Device check (see above).

Nowhere does it say that you can only emulate spell completion or spell trigger items, instead it explicitly says that you can use the skill to emulate "the spell ability or class features of another class" you need "to activate a magic item".

[Username17]

I don't own the Rules Compendium because I own the PHB and DMG and never saw the point. There are a number of weird things in the Rules Compendium that I am fuzzy on. Apparently it explains that resistance to non-standard damage types can't exist for example. I really don't give a single fuck either way. All of my discussions of the rules will be from the standpoint of the PHB and DMG and not of the Rules Compendium, and where they differ I shall give the Rules Compendium the middle finger.

The magic chalice example in the PHB is fairly problematic. It gives an example of using emulate class feature to not only mimic having the Turn Undead class feature but for expending one as well.

So rules as written, you have two choices with the Knowstone as a Bard. The first is that you can emulate the first level of a class that has the class feature to add spells to your Bard Class List. There are many, and the DC would be 21. Having done that, you'd then expend one of your Bard spell slots and cast Planeshift. The second one is that you can emulate the fourteenth level of Sorcerer to actually have a spell slot that could be expended to power the Knowstone and then cast Planeshift without expending any of your slots. The DC of that would be 34.

Now, obviously that second one is extremely problematic in that it is abusable as fuck. But that is straight up exactly what the magic chalice example says happens.

-Username17

[infected slut princess]

This doesn't say what you seem to think it does. According to Wikipedia, his first listed publication was in 1862, and his last listed publication is in 1917. That's 55 years of writing. His most famous book appears to be "Conservatisme en Orthodoxie" which is 38 pages long at about 400 words a page.

Assuming every publication of his is equally long (which we know they aren't because only 24 of them are "books"), that works out to a bit over 700 words per day during his 55 year publishing career.

OWWWNNNNNN GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLLLL!

-Username17

Hmm, interesting. I think the 723 words per day number you determined is probably low by my calculations, because it wouldn't include his editorials. And apparently he wrote a bunch of 700 page bricks, and a 1700 super brick. Some of the non-"books" he wrote were more than 38 pages. Of course, many of them were much less.

But this is actually encouraging. Because in any case, he was extremely productive. His biographer called him "superhuman." But if that is true, it means it's easier than I thought to have unprecedented superhuman productivity.

But say it's true that he only did around 1000 words per day. That means the 40-article-a-week guy actually has A LOT MORE daily output than Kuyper on average.

A couple years ago I read about a Jewish dude who wrote 900 books... I wonder how many words per day he churned out. I can't remember his name unfortunately. I don't suppose you know who I am talking about. He might have been a rabbi or something. Maybe writing about theology is easier because so much of it is bullshit.

Then there are dudes like George RR Margin, who appears to write 2 words per day. On a good day.

EDIT: The 900 books guy was/is Jacob Neusner. He was an academic scholar on Judaism and he was a college professor for decades. If there were no public record, his output would be unbelievable.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_bo ... ob_Neusner

The list does not include reviews and articles, which apparently he wrote a lot of as well. As of 2012, he was up to about 1000 books, written or edited. The first puiblication date listed is 1962. So that's about 20 books a year. Some of these entries are books he edited, but those are in the minority by a considerable margin.

Basically, every 2.5 weeks he completed a manuscript or edited a book. A lot of the books he wrote are huge.

That's fucking crazy.

EDIT 2: In fairness to Kuyper, a lot of his productivity wasn't writing. For example, he seems to have dicked around in politics a lot. He was Prime Minister for a few years.

1862: Ph.D., theology
1862-74: pastor
1872: Starts a daily newspaper, The Standard.
1872-1920: Edits it for most years. Writes for it until late 1919.
1873-1920: Edits a weekly weekly newspaper, De Herault
1874-77: Serves in Parliament.
1874: Resigns the pastorate (required by law -- members of Parliament)
1879: Establishes the first national Dutch political party, the Anti-Revolutionary Party.
1879-1920: Runs it.
1880: Starts the Free University of Amsterdam -- the first Dutch private university.
1880-91: Teaches theology, Hebrew, aesthetics, literature.
1881: Becomes rector.
1887: Organizes a secession denomination, 200 congregations.
1892: New church joins with older secessionist church to form Reformed Church of the Netherlands (GKN).
1894: Elected to Parliament.
1898: Chairman, Dutch Circle of Journalists.
1901-5: Serves as Prime Minister
1901-5: Writes Common Grace, a 3-volume work.
1908-12: Serves in the House of Representatives
1909: Chairman, committee to reform the orthography of the Dutch language.
1910-12: Member of the committee to re-write the national Constitution.
1912: Resigns his seat in the House for health reasons.
1913-20: Serves in the Senate.
1920: Dies.

[Foxwarrior]

I'm pretty sure a court stenographer could blow any of those guys out of the water.

[fectin]

Stenographers are rarely encouraged to create though, only transcribe.

[wotmaniac]

@ the scroll issue:
Emulate class feature has absolutely nothing to do with scrolls. There is, however, also Use a Scroll use of UMD:

Use a Scroll

If you are casting a spell from a scroll, you have to decipher it first. Normally, to cast a spell from a scroll, you must have the scroll’s spell on your class spell list. Use Magic Device allows you to use a scroll as if you had a particular spell on your class spell list. The DC is equal to 20 + the caster level of the spell you are trying to cast from the scroll. In addition, casting a spell from a scroll requires a minimum score (10 + spell level) in the appropriate ability. If you don’t have a sufficient score in that ability, you must emulate the ability score with a separate Use Magic Device check

Emulate class feature is only a DC 20 (which doesn't matter in this case, because this use has nothing to do with using scrolls). Use Scroll is a DC 20 + caster level.

[Kaelik]

UMD to emulate a class feature is talking about using a Knowstone, not scrolls.

[Hey_I_Can_Chan]

So rules as written, you have two choices with the Knowstone as a Bard. The first is that you can emulate the first level of a class that has the class feature to add spells to your Bard Class List. There are many, and the DC would be 21. Having done that, you'd then expend one of your Bard spell slots and cast Planeshift. The second one is that you can emulate the fourteenth level of Sorcerer to actually have a spell slot that could be expended to power the Knowstone and then cast Planeshift without expending any of your slots. The DC of that would be 34.

So I've thought about this more, and I can't make it go.

1. Lug around a knowstone for 24 hours.
2. The knowstone grants knowledge of the spell.
3. If dropped, the knowstone's benefit ends.

That's what the knowstone does. It's not a matter of convincing the knowstone that the bard has plane shift or whatever on his spell list. The knowstone doesn't actually care. It's work is done--it granted knowledge of the spell. It's the bard's job to have plane shift or whatever on his list--not to use the knowstone itself but to use the knowledge the knowstone's granted.

The bard's used this magic device merely by carrying it around. He just can't use what it's given him. He's been given wings but can't fly or some shit.

The bard himself isn't a magic device, right?