Subject: MYSTARA-L Digest - 24 Mar 2006 to 29 Mar 2006 (#2006-59) From: MYSTARA-L automatic digest system Date: 30/03/2006, 19:00 To: MYSTARA-L@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM Reply-to: Mystara RPG Discussion There are 7 messages totalling 287 lines in this issue. Topics of the day: 1. Glantri's Secret Crafts as Prestige Classes (4) 2. A couple of questions (3) ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 09:50:34 +0200 From: Luca Daverio Subject: Glantri's Secret Crafts as Prestige Classes Hi! I'm a new subscriber to this mailing list and I'm very happy to have joined. Mystara is the setting with which I started playing DnD: it will always have a place in my heart :p I have recently started a campaign in Glantri as dungeon master (hard work :p) and now I'm facing the problem of the Seven Secret Crafts. My players wanted to use the new 3.5 edition of the rules. The information about geography, history, locations is still useful as it is, but characters, spells and so on need tuning. I was wondering if anyone of you has already tackled the conversion issues. At the present moment I'm trying to put the Wokani Craft into a Prestige Class, but I'm already stuck in a fundamental point: should it be a five levels prestige class or should it be a ten level prestige class? If it's five level, it should have very restricting requirements and so it should be accessible only at high levels (I was thinking 14 or so). On the other hand there are NPC that have levels as Wokani and they are low - mid level (Carmina de Belcadiz is the example, she is 7th level as reported in Glantri Kingdom of Magic). The ten level prestige class, then, seems the solution, but I don't know how to distribute the abilities. Can anyone help me? Thank you all, even if you only read this long post :p ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 13:30:23 +0200 From: Giampaolo Agosta Subject: Re: Glantri's Secret Crafts as Prestige Classes Luca Daverio ha scritto: > Hi! I'm a new subscriber to this mailing list and I'm very happy to have > joined. Mystara is the setting with which I started playing DnD: it will > always have a place in my heart :p Welcome! I can't help you -- I'm an (O|A)D&D gamer -- but the Vaults has a few articles that may be of interest: http://pandius.com/pc_drac.html http://pandius.com/pc_alch.html Bye, GP ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 08:58:48 -0800 From: Andrew Theisen Subject: Re: Glantri's Secret Crafts as Prestige Classes Luca Daverio wrote: At the present moment I'm trying to put the Wokani Craft into a Prestige Class, but I'm already stuck in a fundamental point: should it be a five levels prestige class or should it be a ten level prestige class? If it's five level, it should have very restricting requirements and so it should be accessible only at high levels (I was thinking 14 or so). On the other hand there are NPC that have levels as Wokani and they are low - mid level (Carmina de Belcadiz is the example, she is 7th level as reported in Glantri Kingdom of Magic). The ten level prestige class, then, seems the solution, but I don't know how to distribute the abilities. I've wondered about this one myself, and haven't yet come to a conclusion that I really like. The way I see the PrC's, a 5 level class should represent either a) a dabbler, or b) the pinnacle of one's career. There are many examples of the former (where a character gains some abilities and things before returning to a more "standard" career), and examples of the latter would be the Heirophant and Archmage- people who have directed their adventuring careers (through skill and feat choices, spell choices, etc.) to an ultimate goal that is represented by the (in some cases, IMO) larger powers of the "end" Prestige Class. That being the case, I view the 10 level PrCs as something akin to an adventurer's "major" career choice. The prerequisite levels are just the "undergraduate" or "general" studies, leading to their ultimate choice, represented by the 10 level class. The Secret Crafts seem to me to be (in their presentation in Gaz3 and G:KoM) career choices, rather than dabblings and hobbies. The various members of the Crafts seem to have chosen their Crafts as representative of the style and manner of magic that they choose, over any other, to practice (with a few possible exceptions). Prince Morphail, for instance, seems to be more a Necromancer than a wizard; Herr von Graustein is an Alchemist, not just a wizard. Thus, my preference is to make them 10 level PrC's, with additional levels for expanding into Epic levels. (Alternatively, they could be made 15 level PrCs along the lines of the Paladin and Ranger from Unearthed Arcana.) Of course, this is complicated by a lot of things- 1) Some of the Crafts have more abilities than others. A Dracologist has 9 abilities (IIRC), while some other crafts have very few. 2) Game balance is more of an issue in 3E than in earlier versions, and that needs to be taken into account when designing the abilities. 2a) Some abilities should be broken up, and given scaling power levels, rather than just making a wholesale conversion from their Circle to a level, IMO. (Example: the Necromancer's turning undead ability should be level dependent, the Dracologist's draconic transformation should probably be split up and expanded into more than just a one-time transformation, in order to remain comparable to similar shapeshifting powers, etc.) 3) The introduction of "specialist" wizards in 2E (and, thus, 3E). This affects certain classes, in particular the Illusionist and Necromancer. Aside from cosmetic differences (name changes- Necromancer/Death Master; Illusionist/True Illusionist?), there are other considerations- How does a Necromancer differ from a Death Master (both descriptively and statistically)? What is the difference between an Illusionist and a True Illusionist (especially tricky, as the Illusionist's powers are essentially just spells that were available to illusionists in 1E/2E but not in OD&D)? Someone else suggested recently that you might consider using Substitution Levels in place of a Prestige Class, though I don't know that that would quite fit the concept as well. I've got a lot of preliminary notes on converting Secret Crafts that I would be happy to share if you would like. ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 09:37:45 -0800 From: "Richard B." Subject: A couple of questions 1. Do the inhabitants of the Hollow World have their own name for it? They certainly don't call the place "Hollow World", do they? 2. Same for the Broken Lands. Is that really what the orcs call it? 3. I'd just read somewhere that "Emirikol the Chaotic", the character from that full page illo in the 1st ed DMG (I think), had been transplanted from Greyhawk to Mystara. Anyone know if this is true and in what module does he appear? Thanks, R. --------------------------------- Blab-away for as little as 1ยข/min. Make PC-to-Phone Calls using Yahoo! Messenger with Voice. ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 21:00:49 +0200 From: Luca Daverio Subject: Re: Glantri's Secret Crafts as Prestige Classes First I'd like to thank you for the welcome and the advices :) Then let's get to the core of the mail... Andrew Theisen wrote: > The Secret Crafts seem to me to be (in their presentation in Gaz3 and > G:KoM) career choices, rather than dabblings and hobbies. [...] > Thus, my preference is to make them 10 level PrC's, with additional > levels for expanding into Epic levels. (Alternatively, they could be made > 15 level PrCs along the lines of the Paladin and Ranger from Unearthed > Arcana.) I agree. It's not possible to dabble in a Secret Craft. You have to find a sponsor and you even have to "discover" the Craft, because of its secrecy. A ten level PrC, IMO, is the best solution. I think that 15 levels are too many, because the Seven Crafts don't cover a core class role as Ranger and Paladin do. > 1) Some of the Crafts have more abilities than others. A Dracologist has > 9 abilities (IIRC), while some other crafts have very few. True. This the first problem I faced in my preparing study. Dracologists have enough abilities to make a ten level PrC, but other ones - Criptomancers come to mind - need hard work. My idea is to add abilities where the need arise. This new powers should be added according to the Craft qualities, so Wokani could have Enchantments and Mind Affecting abilities or other ones that can belong to a witch > 2) Game balance is more of an issue in 3E than in earlier versions, and that needs to be taken into account when designing the abilities. Game balance is hard to achieve. The PrCs, in whatever form, need serious testing and tuning. I agree with you. > 2a) Some abilities should be broken up, and given scaling power levels, > rather than just making a wholesale conversion from their Circle to a > level, IMO. You're right. It's unbalancing to take the abilities of the Seven Crafts, as they're written in GaZ3 and/or in G:KoM, and take them into a 3E PrC. The number of times that a given ability can be used per day should be calculated according to its power level (and similar powers in existing PrCs) and not only to the fixed numbers written in GaZ3 or in G:KoM. > 3) The introduction of "specialist" wizards in 2E (and, thus, 3E). I think that "specialist" wizards are like students that start studying at university. One can choose to become an electronic engineer, but he can later choose to become an expert in analogic or digital electronics. The electronic engineer is the "specialist" wizards, the "analogic electronics expert" is the PrCs... I don't know if I've explained myself :p > Someone else suggested recently that you might consider using Substitution > Levels in place of a Prestige Class, though I don't know that that would quite fit the concept as well. Do you mean Substitution Levels like those presented in Unearthed Arcana for characters that have extraplanar, for example, ancestors? I don't think that they can cover the issues that a Secret Craft implies. > I've got a lot of preliminary notes on converting Secret Crafts that I would be happy to share if you would like. Thank you!!! That would be greatly appreciated! :) We can share our studies and, maybe, create the whole PrCs (I know, I sometimes run too fast :p) ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 12:52:24 -0800 From: Andrew Theisen Subject: Re: A couple of questions "Richard B." wrote: >1. Do the inhabitants of the Hollow World have their own name for it? They certainly >don't call the place "Hollow World", do they? Hmm. That's a good one. I don't think I've ever seen the question come up before. My guess is that it would vary from culture to culture, but that most of them would use either whatever word in their language/culture they used to describe the world when they were in the Outer World, or else they would use a term that describes something akin to "heaven" or "other place" or something, for those that believe they were transported (IIRC, the Azcans believe they were in another place before they arrived in the Hollow World. Maybe they call it "ilhuicatl", or "chiltic ilhuicatl" or something.) Alternatively, the place is sometimes referred to as "Land of the Red Sun", so maybe that is the phrase/term by which it is known in the Hollow World. (Ex, to the Azcans, something like chilitic tonatiuhan or something... I don't really speak nahuatl, so I'm probably butchering the language). Alternatively to that, they might simply call it something based on the Brute-Men's word for it- something that the Neathar first "translated" and (since Neathar is the "common" tongue of the HW) was later adopted by the other cultures. I don't know if this would be allowed by the cultural bias or not, but in any case, I'd suggest maybe that the Brutish word for Mystara might be "Urt" (going back to the Gold Box Megalith name for the planet). >2. Same for the Broken Lands. Is that really what the orcs call it? The orcs and other humanoids probably just call the land according to the various tribal regions from Gaz10- ie, Red Orcland, Hobgobland, High Gobliny, etc. I doubt they have a name for the entire region like human nations. > 3. I'd just read somewhere that "Emirikol the Chaotic", the character from that full >page illo in the 1st ed DMG (I think), had been transplanted from Greyhawk to >Mystara. Anyone know if this is true and in what module does he appear? Hmm. This one I do not know anything about. Emirikol the Chaotic doesn't ring any bells. Perhaps he was one of the NPCs from AC1: Shady Dragon Inn? I don't have my copy nearby to check. ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 16:03:46 -0600 From: Daniel Subject: Re: A couple of questions For some reason I remember the Hollow World being called Terrat or something similar. I could be mixing worlds though. Been awhile since I've boned up on HW. ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ End of MYSTARA-L Digest - 24 Mar 2006 to 29 Mar 2006 (#2006-59) ***************************************************************