(no subject)
Oct. 6th, 2020 05:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethWhile trying to decide what spells I would like to learn in Pathfinder
I am once again realising
how much I'm really just trying to duplicate
what tech does in the here now already.
A smart phone with just the torch and camera working would be a priceless Artifact in context, and its ability to be a portable library could only be duplicated with Portable Hole and a whooooole lot of books. Message functions could be marginally improved with magic since the receiver wouldnt need a phone, but the idea of a worldwide network of messages sent and received is so incredibly expensive and complex to do with magic it's not even a dream. And as for all the functions I dont use or know what to do with... phones are just Artifact level fancy.
And we almost all have one in our pockets.
Plus all the Preserve and Fastidiousness spells in the world kind of add up to our modern food storage and hygiene standards?
Magic has tech beat on food production out of thin air, but it's difficult to scale up, you need a lot of people casting a lot of spells.
It's making me appreciate here now, I guess.
... also want to wander back to the urban fantasy rules and still have dragons etc but not have to doubt the clean water.
Nice clean and purify spells are good to have anywhere though.
Pathfinder magic item creation makes it really easy to create some very super fancy items, even when you dont have the spells to create them with, which is difficult to make sense of Watsonian. But the rules exist so you can spend a feat to get exactly the magic items you need, with a chance of curses. The limit isn't caster level, it's wealth by level, same as when you're shopping. Only it's so much cheaper the rules also tell the GM how they can squish that wealth back a bit. Which suggests the balance isnt quite what it could be.
... if I was in Pathfinder world I would make magic items and just have lovely shiny things like spoons that make food and cups that make water and a necklace for air and some boots with endure elements. Get the basic needs covered, then go have fun with the really fancy items.
... I can see how just pouring all the money into the best headband looks optimised, but it also looks boring. So.
The RPGbot recommendations are not impressed with my choices. Like, next to Merciful Spell it just says 'you are not a pacifist'. And why not? I want my spells to capture people and then we can give them a good talking to. And it says Linguistics is rubbish, but obviously they did not play the same adventure paths, full of demon contracts to figure out. Plus there's feats that make some Charisma based skills be Linguistics dependent instead, which is an Int skill so a wizard or other low charisma high smarts person could switch stat and get some bonuses going.
The game rules channel players into being very specific shapes, I reckon. And optimising for very specific challenges. Mostly fighty.
Trying to imagine what everyone else in the world does, with a random grab bag of stats they didnt optimise and no chance to train like a PC, or with training but no way of looking on their character sheet to know in advance what they'd be good at... it's a weird set of angles.
The more I read these rules the more they feel like rules and not a world.
Oh well.
... very shiny things in there anyway...
Things magic does better: Teleport and anything to do with planes. Instant improvement of stats. Anything telepathic, though a lot of that is rude. Impossibilities.
I just try and get the practicalities to make sense first and it turns out to take a lot of spell slots...
I am once again realising
how much I'm really just trying to duplicate
what tech does in the here now already.
A smart phone with just the torch and camera working would be a priceless Artifact in context, and its ability to be a portable library could only be duplicated with Portable Hole and a whooooole lot of books. Message functions could be marginally improved with magic since the receiver wouldnt need a phone, but the idea of a worldwide network of messages sent and received is so incredibly expensive and complex to do with magic it's not even a dream. And as for all the functions I dont use or know what to do with... phones are just Artifact level fancy.
And we almost all have one in our pockets.
Plus all the Preserve and Fastidiousness spells in the world kind of add up to our modern food storage and hygiene standards?
Magic has tech beat on food production out of thin air, but it's difficult to scale up, you need a lot of people casting a lot of spells.
It's making me appreciate here now, I guess.
... also want to wander back to the urban fantasy rules and still have dragons etc but not have to doubt the clean water.
Nice clean and purify spells are good to have anywhere though.
Pathfinder magic item creation makes it really easy to create some very super fancy items, even when you dont have the spells to create them with, which is difficult to make sense of Watsonian. But the rules exist so you can spend a feat to get exactly the magic items you need, with a chance of curses. The limit isn't caster level, it's wealth by level, same as when you're shopping. Only it's so much cheaper the rules also tell the GM how they can squish that wealth back a bit. Which suggests the balance isnt quite what it could be.
... if I was in Pathfinder world I would make magic items and just have lovely shiny things like spoons that make food and cups that make water and a necklace for air and some boots with endure elements. Get the basic needs covered, then go have fun with the really fancy items.
... I can see how just pouring all the money into the best headband looks optimised, but it also looks boring. So.
The RPGbot recommendations are not impressed with my choices. Like, next to Merciful Spell it just says 'you are not a pacifist'. And why not? I want my spells to capture people and then we can give them a good talking to. And it says Linguistics is rubbish, but obviously they did not play the same adventure paths, full of demon contracts to figure out. Plus there's feats that make some Charisma based skills be Linguistics dependent instead, which is an Int skill so a wizard or other low charisma high smarts person could switch stat and get some bonuses going.
The game rules channel players into being very specific shapes, I reckon. And optimising for very specific challenges. Mostly fighty.
Trying to imagine what everyone else in the world does, with a random grab bag of stats they didnt optimise and no chance to train like a PC, or with training but no way of looking on their character sheet to know in advance what they'd be good at... it's a weird set of angles.
The more I read these rules the more they feel like rules and not a world.
Oh well.
... very shiny things in there anyway...
Things magic does better: Teleport and anything to do with planes. Instant improvement of stats. Anything telepathic, though a lot of that is rude. Impossibilities.
I just try and get the practicalities to make sense first and it turns out to take a lot of spell slots...