Troll Lord Games

Hey, everybody -- I'm about to have my PCs start to confront their nemesis -- Alaric the illusionist. He went and kidnapped the party assassin's girlfriend as sureity that the party would start to give him all the magical goodies from Castle Greyhawk they came across -- as with all good PC parties, their response was "sod that -- let's hunt him down and make him pay".

I'd whipped up this spell for Alaric to aid in his survivability, but I wanted to get some feedback on it. Let me know what you think!

Thanks!

Alaric's Timeshifting

Level 6 Illusionist

CT 1

R: 40 ft.

AoE: 40 ft. diameter

D: 1 rd./level

SV: Save v. Spell negates

SR: yes

Comp: V, S, M

By means of this spell, the caster causes all living beings in the area of effect to move imperceptibly slower than they normally would, enough time to throw off their balance and speed.

When the spell is cast, the caster names a number that is lower than his initiative count -- that number becomes the initiative count for the other living creatures in the area of effect, regardless of friend or foe.

The material focus of the spell is an hourglass or egg timer turned upside down as the spell is cast. The glass is not consumed in the casting.

Lore: Alaric the Haughty was a potent yet secretive illusionist in the Free City of Greyhawk, interested in clawing his way to the pinnacle of magely power in the Flanaess -- harboring insane, unattainable notions of even toppling names like Mordenkainen and Bigby if possible. His first line of defense was never being seen -- he mastered the creation of wax golems, automatons that he could control remotely and use as doubles and cat's paws when he needed to interact with humanity.

In the remote possibility that he would come to blows personally, Alaric researched a spell that he could use to level the playing field, by insuring he would always act first in combat situations, usually affording time for escape.

One issue is apparent -- after the spell is cast, every affected creature functions simultaneously, regardless of actual initiative / speed / dexterity because all values result to the named value (which is incredibly metagamistic, by the way -- I would make it random, like 1d10, -1 / 2 caster levels). This would then likely become a penalty to subsequent initiative rolls during the spell duration so that every affected creature is not forced into cyclical redundancy. For that, I might be tempted to drop the spell level to 4 or 5.
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Serl's Corner

Am I missing something, or does there seem to be no point to this spell? What does it do?

I agree with Serl's suggestion about using the penalty per two levels...but I think the level may be fine.

Tenser...it's an initiative inhibitor spell.

I'm not sure it is going to have as big an impact on villain survival as is thought however.
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The obvious will always trip you up FAR more than the obscure.

Baron Grignak Hammerhand of the Pacifica Provinces-

High Warden of the Castles & Crusades Society

Yes, I agree. In my experience, many times I prefer going after anyone else,especially if a spellcaster and the DM does not rule "casting starts at the beginning of the round, but goes off at initiative." Without declaring actions beforehand, being able to see how the combat ensues and respond after-the-fact is far superior than rushing in and doing whatever... with two caveats:

1) you might not survive if you go last

2) if you go first, you need to destroy whatever you're going after (so if all you can inflict is 1d3 damage, you better hope the guy is a 0-level NPC with a very low Con score.)

And yes, 1 and 2 are basically the same.

The slow spell would be much more beneficial to this caster.
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Serl's Corner

Giving this a bit more thought, you may consider scrapping the initiative modification (especially as Serl said, Slow will be more helpful) and make it a true time shift style spell, in that it will freeze those in the area of effect for one round (essentially giving the caster a free round of action). This IMO would allow the caster the option of casting a second spell or getting that running headstart necessary to increase the chances of escape.

Another perspective on it if nothing else.
_________________
The obvious will always trip you up FAR more than the obscure.

Baron Grignak Hammerhand of the Pacifica Provinces-

High Warden of the Castles & Crusades Society

So I'm not missing anything - you use a 6th level spell slot purely in order to guarantee winning the initiative. I can't see anyone wanting to forego Mislead, Shades or Veil for this spell.

Technically, you don't even guarantee you'll get initiative -- save and SR are both allowed. And, it affects your allies just as equally, so if you had summoned some monster protectors, you've just screwed them over as well.

I also just saw the spell is useless against undead and many other creatures that one might want it to affect, like elementals.
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Serl's Corner

Go0gleplex wrote:
Giving this a bit more thought, you may consider scrapping the initiative modification (especially as Serl said, Slow will be more helpful) and make it a true time shift style spell, in that it will freeze those in the area of effect for one round (essentially giving the caster a free round of action). This IMO would allow the caster the option of casting a second spell or getting that running headstart necessary to increase the chances of escape.

Another perspective on it if nothing else.

That's actually not a bad idea -- and one I hadn't thought of... perhaps making it something akin to a poor man's Time Stop?

Serleran wrote:
Technically, you don't even guarantee you'll get initiative -- save and SR are both allowed.

That was more or less so that it wasn't too cheap -- I like to give players a fighting chance unless the really high-octane stuff is being thrown around

Quote:
And, it affects your allies just as equally, so if you had summoned some monster protectors, you've just screwed them over as well.

I also just saw the spell is useless against undead and many other creatures that one might want it to affect, like elementals.

The in-game reasoning for that is that he doesn't generally use living minions, instead relying on constructs to do his dirty work. Therefore, he wouldn't have to worry about living allies being screwed over by the spell. But you're right, that he might want to have an edge against foes who don't fit the definition of "living".