Avatar d20 fixes

[dman11235]

Ehhh. That borders a little bit too much on going against the show's feel, for my tastes. I see where you're going with it, but yeah.

But don't you want to be better than canon?   Suggestion retracted.  But I don't like the seeds as we have them now.  They seem....weird to me.

Right, you can quicken to move action, getting you 180 average damage. This damage ignores miss chances. That seems pretty big to me, given that they are a primary form of defense at high levels. As a bonus, you get to move people around. This altogether felt too difficult to model well with Move Earth.

I just feel that it's a bit plain right now.  Damage is fine though.  Ah benders, single-handedly bringing AC back as a viable defense measure!  And putting balance as an important skill!

I kinda assumed falling damage went without saying.

You can do straight up. Catapult lists ranges of "up to" and "can be", so you can negate most components.

"Affected subjects take falling damage as normal. If the subject strikes a wall or ceiling, they take damage as though they had fallen the distance they traveled."

Note that now the flung creature will take no damage (at base augment).  Yet the SS maneuvers do damage based on the distance of the toss.  Hence my proposed re-wording.  You can fling them up to a certain horizontal distance, they take damage based on that, and can land in any square within range.

Sandswallow is a softer form of Solid Fog, and allows an Earthbender a method of movement control against flying creatures. I'd say it very much needs to stay.

Ah, but it does stay...in combining Dust Cloud with Dirt Spray.  You get all the effects of both.  As a combined seed bending, you know, with the DC+DC-4 thing?  Though I see your point.  Maybe, I'll have to think it over more.

Changed.

I considered Deflect Attack taking the place of the immediate action, but Deflect Attack specifically blocks things with attack rolls. Earth Wall can protect against things like Meteor Swarm, making it the more useful choice, unless the opponent has an ability that passes through walls.

Right, but my points still stand.  This blocks LoE, but is almost always strictly sub-par compared to Deflect Attack.  It needs a small beef-up.

Dropped the permanent duration. Not sure what's so bad about this seed, though - it's basically Feel the Flow, only more useful since Earth is more common than Water.

It wasn't bad...it just needed to not have a permanent duration augment.  For the record, I think Feel the Flow should get a small beef up though.

As long as you're fighting on the ground, you've got a swift Dimension Hop at-will that ignores barriers. That seems rather worth a seed to me, and it's not bad for overland travel once you can use it as a swift.

I never said it wasn't powerful, I said it needed more.  It's really short.  And can't be combined with any other seed that I can think of.  Maybe a forced move so you can move others as well?  that doesn't seem too out of the question.

Plants do, but in the show, Earthbenders can't do a thing to 'em for flavor reasons. Toph specifically complains about it in The Runaway.

Well that shows me.  Maybe a canon/non-canon little clause?

It's a Fortitude save to switch up the nature of most of their abilities, and visually I imagine soft stone quickly shifting around you, then solidifying. It's a Fort Save to resist the imprisonment and break your bonds before they can form fully.

Change: "While imprisoned, a subject has five rounds worth of air before he begins to suffocate (as rules for drowning.)"

The reason I said "no reflex save?" was precisely what you just outlined.  There are a couple uses for fort...maybe...and fort gets a lot of love otherwise.  Benders: single-handedly making the reflex save matter again.  I don't think a fort save here works.  What you described was a strength check or grapple check.

Headcracker mentions that itself. It seems pretty clear to me.

What's the one truth about people?  They're stupid.  Clauses like these help them not be as stupid.  Also remember: you wrote it, it's going to make sense to you....usually.

Combined.

You know...I intended for Rubble Wave to still exist on its own....I was just considering the AoE Dirt Spray to be that combined with this, as the combining seeds function goes.

Swapped in the earlier hardness table. You can make walls with Tectonic - much thicker walls than Earthwall. Earthwall creates thin stuff, these are 60-inch thick things. All you have to do is raise a line of squares.

I'd say Tectonic is actually pretty useful at lower levels. You create squares that are completely impassable to ground-bound movement. At higher levels, it's a great function for doing things like destroying a building by unsettling the ground its on or creating a completely impregnable, virtually indestructible wall around something. (It's three times as thick as Earth Wall, assuming you make a space only 5 ft. wide.)

I wouldn't call that "making walls".  I call that "making reverse craters".  This I see making holes and pillars.  Up/down BC, where as walls are side/side BC.  They both affect side/side, it's just the method of affecting them.  Also, you shouldn't be having trouble with your walls being destroyed at high levels, since they have a thickness based on BL.  This one I see more of trapping single creatures down a long pit, or up high on a pedestal, where they'd take massive damage from falling and waste actions.  If used for walls....you won't be making very many walls....and you just made Earthwall obsolete.  I guess we'll have to discuss it.

I'm almost done with water btw.

[dman11235]

Water time!  Let's do this thing!  Do it good!

Bend Plants:
[spoiler]Seems fine, but the amounts will have to be tested.[/spoiler]

Bloodbending:
[spoiler]See Earth: Puppet, and the beginning of that post.[/spoiler]

Capture:
[spoiler]Needs augments.  I thought it had them once?  Like, to increase the size and whatnot?  And DC?  I'd up the maintainance action to full-round, since it's a SoD pretty much.  Though, maybe not, since you can just fight your way out pretty easily.  Just a couple rounds on melees, high dex and spellcasters will either be able to get out fine or not get trapped.  Out on a limb: leave maintainance as-is.  But add some augments.  Increase DC by exceed somehow (+1/3?) and increase size by increase (5'diameter increase for +5 DC?), maybe something else.  Also, note the size of creature that can be trapped.  Currently I think it's medium, but it's a 10'sphere, and that's large.[/spoiler]

Feel the Flow:
[spoiler]Very standard.[/spoiler]

Healing Waters:
[spoiler]Two parts:
Healing: needs to be at will.  Trust me, it's nothing.  Decrease the amount healed to 1d6+1/BL.  Add in an exceed augment for bonus damage healed, on the order of +1d6/3 or 4.

Ability:  Either lower the initial DC and the augments, or lower the augments by a bit more.  Quick numbers, you can't do any healing reliably until level 11, and can't do negative energy until level 15 or 16, and that's only one.  Can't do two until level 20ish.  I'd say DC 25 to start, and +6 DC for each of those things.  +10 DC to start negative levels.  By level 20 you've got so many ways to get rid of all of those things it doesn't really matter anymore.[/spoiler]

Golem:
[spoiler]See golem for Earth.  Yes, I realize that this is a loop.  Okay, fine.  I feel there should be an exceed augment here.  Something small.  Bonus HP or something.  Bonus HP on a 2/1 basis.  Maybe even 4/1 basis.  Just something.  Otherwise Golem for both needs to be settled at a different time, discussing the golem itself.[/spoiler]

Ice Shards:
[spoiler]For the rain one, it should be a separate exceed augment for the DC increase.  Maybe.  Convince me.

I think my previous statements on Orca's Maw stand.  The augment for additional squares should probably cost less, same with the other augment.[/spoiler]

Illusionary Mist:
[spoiler]Still needs more.  It's...plain now.  Can't do much.[/spoiler]

Move Water:
[spoiler]I think we settled this one.[/spoiler]

Phase Change:
[spoiler]Needs to be able to affect more, otherwise it's fine.[/spoiler]

Precipitate:
[spoiler]Needs more movement hampering effects, but is otherwise fine.  I believe looking at the Sleet Storm spell can give some inspiration.[/spoiler]

Puppet:
[spoiler]See earth's puppet equivalent.  Also, should be opened to all creatures with water (I know, bloodbending).  Might need to be combined into Golem?[/spoiler]

Riptide:
[spoiler]This looks fine.[/spoiler]

Shape Water:
[spoiler]Why shaping such a small amount of water?  Should be +1/1.  Also, I don't like that extra little bit about the weapons breaking on a nat 20.  It's just more stuff that doesn't need to be there.[/spoiler]

Spout:
[spoiler]I think we've covered it enough.  Though, the damage augment should be exceed, not increase.[/spoiler]

Steady Stance:
[spoiler]there should probably be an amount of HP needed to destroy the shackles, rather than just a full-round action solving it.  I mean, it's a really mean seed if you catch them, but all that augmenting means nothing if they can just spend a full-round and auto-break free.  Something like hardness for ice, HP of 2/BL?  And then an exceed augment increasing that further, on a 2/1 basis.  It just doesn't seem fair to leave it as a single full-round does it.[/spoiler]

Tentacle:
[spoiler]Might want to change the size increase augment to +5 increases all of the tentacles.  I mean, you'll be blowing a whole lot of DC on getting more than large tentacles anyways, much less two of them.  That's +28 DC under the current system, two attacks at huge slams.  Under the +5 affects all, it's +18.  This way you can "flood the field"...you actually can, rather than just having a bunch of really weak ones.

For the octopus augments, I think the size increase shouldn't increase size, but just grant additional reach, str, and maybe damage.  Maybe.  Because it really doesn't make sense to have a bunch of large sized tentacles all occupying a medium square.[/spoiler]

Water Blast:
[spoiler]water....to the face...

though....what's with that first augment?  It seems kind of random....and not very useful...[/spoiler]

Water Shield:
[spoiler]For the dome, the increase in miss-chance should be exceed.  for the shield, the extra shield bonus should be exceed.[/spoiler]

Water Whip:
[spoiler]I'd lower the amount on the exceed augment, if only to stagger it a bit.  Every 4 should be fine.[/spoiler]

Wave:
[spoiler]You got your basic math wrong....but otherwise it's fine.  +4 str is +2 bonus on bullrush, not +1.[/spoiler]

[AstralFire]

I just feel that it's a bit plain right now.  Damage is fine though.  Ah benders, single-handedly bringing AC back as a viable defense measure!  And putting balance as an important skill!

I'm open to suggestions. Anyone?

Note that now the flung creature will take no damage (at base augment).  Yet the SS maneuvers do damage based on the distance of the toss.  Hence my proposed re-wording.  You can fling them up to a certain horizontal distance, they take damage based on that, and can land in any square within range.

Reworded. Still does no damage at base augment, like the weakest Setting Sun ability, Mighty Throw.

Ah, but it does stay...in combining Dust Cloud with Dirt Spray.  You get all the effects of both.  As a combined seed bending, you know, with the DC+DC-4 thing?  Though I see your point.  Maybe, I'll have to think it over more.

I think major, non-obvious essentials should be filled in with base seeds. The seed system's flexibility helps to cover holes that don't occur to us or for someone to be able to take advantage of creativity in a very specific situation. This is a pretty general use thing, and I personally wouldn't think of "AoE Slow" as a result from any of the other current seeds mixed.

Right, but my points still stand.  This blocks LoE, but is almost always strictly sub-par compared to Deflect Attack.  It needs a small beef-up.

Funny, I figured Deflect Attack would be the inferior one in most cases, barring stuff like porting arrows. How much requires an attack roll but no LoE? I can think of a few, but nothing big... and this blocks natural 20s.

I never said it wasn't powerful, I said it needed more.  It's really short.  And can't be combined with any other seed that I can think of.  Maybe a forced move so you can move others as well?  that doesn't seem too out of the question.

Maybe not strictly combined, but you could, say, Metalbend Earth Glide (well, there's an Advanced Form right there) into an Iron Golem and puppet it from the inside. I allowed bringing adjacent creatures along, which is nice for moving a battlefield where you want.

Plants do, but in the show, Earthbenders can't do a thing to 'em for flavor reasons. Toph specifically complains about it in The Runaway.

Well that shows me.  Maybe a canon/non-canon little clause?

"If you are playing a non-canon setting, plants and oozes actually have a lot of minerals in them, so consider broadening the targets."

How's that?

The reason I said "no reflex save?" was precisely what you just outlined.  There are a couple uses for fort...maybe...and fort gets a lot of love otherwise.  Benders: single-handedly making the reflex save matter again.  I don't think a fort save here works.  What you described was a strength check or grapple check.

Alright, switched it to Reflex negates from Fort partial, since partial doesn't make much sense in this case. And heh, yes, we do have a lot of Reflex save or sucks/dies, it's a new one.

What's the one truth about people?  They're stupid.  Clauses like these help them not be as stupid.  Also remember: you wrote it, it's going to make sense to you....usually.

"You can apply this template to any seed which requires or targets earth, such as Headcracker, Earthwalker, and Move Earth. "

How's that?

You know...I intended for Rubble Wave to still exist on its own....I was just considering the AoE Dirt Spray to be that combined with this, as the combining seeds function goes.

Whoops. Uncombined.

I wouldn't call that "making walls".  I call that "making reverse craters".  This I see making holes and pillars.  Up/down BC, where as walls are side/side BC.  They both affect side/side, it's just the method of affecting them.  Also, you shouldn't be having trouble with your walls being destroyed at high levels, since they have a thickness based on BL.  This one I see more of trapping single creatures down a long pit, or up high on a pedestal, where they'd take massive damage from falling and waste actions.  If used for walls....you won't be making very many walls....and you just made Earthwall obsolete.  I guess we'll have to discuss it.

I've rephrased them as 'mounds' to prevent confusion.

And yeah, I did. Tectonic was originally meant to be much hardier and drastic at the expense of less diverse control (I had forgotten that), so I changed it back to +3 DC/1 square.

[AstralFire]

Bloodbending: See Earth: Puppet, and the beginning of that post.

Uh, you never actually commented on puppet. >.>

Capture:
[spoiler]Needs augments.  I thought it had them once?  Like, to increase the size and whatnot?  And DC?  I'd up the maintainance action to full-round, since it's a SoD pretty much.  Though, maybe not, since you can just fight your way out pretty easily.  Just a couple rounds on melees, high dex and spellcasters will either be able to get out fine or not get trapped.  Out on a limb: leave maintainance as-is.  But add some augments.  Increase DC by exceed somehow (+1/3?) and increase size by increase (5'diameter increase for +5 DC?), maybe something else.  Also, note the size of creature that can be trapped.  Currently I think it's medium, but it's a 10'sphere, and that's large.[/spoiler]

I made it +5 Skill DC for +1 Save DC, so that's a +4 to 6-ish at 20 in non-canon. 300 HP is a lot to chew through (especially with regen) and I'd say Imprison is actually the weaker of the two presently, so I'm wary of accelerating the save DC too fast.

Healing Waters:
[spoiler]Two parts:
Healing: needs to be at will.  Trust me, it's nothing.  Decrease the amount healed to 1d6+1/BL.  Add in an exceed augment for bonus damage healed, on the order of +1d6/3 or 4.

Ability:  Either lower the initial DC and the augments, or lower the augments by a bit more.  Quick numbers, you can't do any healing reliably until level 11, and can't do negative energy until level 15 or 16, and that's only one.  Can't do two until level 20ish.  I'd say DC 25 to start, and +6 DC for each of those things.  +10 DC to start negative levels.  By level 20 you've got so many ways to get rid of all of those things it doesn't really matter anymore.[/spoiler]

Done.

Golem:
[spoiler]See golem for Earth.  Yes, I realize that this is a loop.  Okay, fine.  I feel there should be an exceed augment here.  Something small.  Bonus HP or something.  Bonus HP on a 2/1 basis.  Maybe even 4/1 basis.  Just something.  Otherwise Golem for both needs to be settled at a different time, discussing the golem itself.[/spoiler]

I dunno. Summons are quite powerful, the golems already autoscale with your HP, and by the mid-teens in a non-canon you can control them as swifts, allowing for three a round. Change made, though.

Ice Shards:
[spoiler]For the rain one, it should be a separate exceed augment for the DC increase.  Maybe.  Convince me.

I think my previous statements on Orca's Maw stand.  The augment for additional squares should probably cost less, same with the other augment.[/spoiler]

Separate from... what? The grapple check? Doesn't seem logical for it to grapple you more strongly and then be just as easy to break out of.

Orca's Maw updated to be like Quake (affects four) and both of them drop down to +3 per for their augments.

Illusionary Mist:
[spoiler]Still needs more.  It's...plain now.  Can't do much.[/spoiler]

I definitely agree, I just don't know what to do with it at the moment.

Phase Change:
[spoiler]Needs to be able to affect more, otherwise it's fine.[/spoiler]

I avoided that on purpose. While Move Earth + Density can't flashtrap an entire battlefield since Move Earth works on weight (and thus is much more restricted than Move Water), Move Water hurling water everywhere + insta-freeze = AoE save or die.

Precipitate:
[spoiler]Needs more movement hampering effects, but is otherwise fine.  I believe looking at the Sleet Storm spell can give some inspiration.[/spoiler]

Ice Storm leaves the snow on the ground, unlike its spell version - so I spelled out what that means exactly. How's that?

"The snow remains on the ground until it melts normally, requiring a DC 15 Balance check to move through."

Puppet:
[spoiler]See earth's puppet equivalent.  Also, should be opened to all creatures with water (I know, bloodbending).  Might need to be combined into Golem?[/spoiler]

o.O I originally combined 'em and you suggested splitting. Why the change of heart?

Shape Water:
[spoiler]Why shaping such a small amount of water?  Should be +1/1.  Also, I don't like that extra little bit about the weapons breaking on a nat 20.  It's just more stuff that doesn't need to be there.[/spoiler]

Changed.

Spout: I think we've covered it enough.  Though, the damage augment should be exceed, not increase.

Steady Stance:
[spoiler]there should probably be an amount of HP needed to destroy the shackles, rather than just a full-round action solving it.  I mean, it's a really mean seed if you catch them, but all that augmenting means nothing if they can just spend a full-round and auto-break free.  Something like hardness for ice, HP of 2/BL?  And then an exceed augment increasing that further, on a 2/1 basis.  It just doesn't seem fair to leave it as a single full-round does it.[/spoiler]

Done.

Tentacle:
[spoiler]Might want to change the size increase augment to +5 increases all of the tentacles.  I mean, you'll be blowing a whole lot of DC on getting more than large tentacles anyways, much less two of them.  That's +28 DC under the current system, two attacks at huge slams.  Under the +5 affects all, it's +18.  This way you can "flood the field"...you actually can, rather than just having a bunch of really weak ones.

For the octopus augments, I think the size increase shouldn't increase size, but just grant additional reach, str, and maybe damage.  Maybe.  Because it really doesn't make sense to have a bunch of large sized tentacles all occupying a medium square.[/spoiler]

...o.- Didn't I suggest doing that for octopus before?

They're both now +6 to increase all tentacles for simplicity's sake. Octopus only grants the reach and strength.

Water Blast:
[spoiler]water....to the face...

though....what's with that first augment?  It seems kind of random....and not very useful...[/spoiler]

eh. Pretty early on, it allows you to effectively ignore Line of Effect. That seems useful to me. (Avoids sudden walls, like from Earth Wall and Wall of Flames, for example!)

Water Shield:
[spoiler]For the dome, the increase in miss-chance should be exceed.  for the shield, the extra shield bonus should be exceed.[/spoiler]

Water Whip:
[spoiler]I'd lower the amount on the exceed augment, if only to stagger it a bit.  Every 4 should be fine.[/spoiler]

Wave:
[spoiler]You got your basic math wrong....but otherwise it's fine.  +4 str is +2 bonus on bullrush, not +1.[/spoiler]

Done, done, and done.

[dman11235]

Well, I planned on doing more tonight...but I got roped into pulling another double.

But two things:

On Octopus...I suggested that earlier.....

And on Puppet, the change of heart was because earlier Puppet was Bloodbending.  And now Puppet is controlling a glob of living water.  Differences in statements lead to different bases.  So really it's because the old Puppet had nothing to do with Golem...and this one is almost a replica of it...If I had it my way, Puppet would be very different.  And Bloodbending would be a seed, not a template (because what can you use with it.....wait.....see out of parentheses) wait....Bloodbending allows you to control all flesh, so you can use things like Move Water, Phase Change, Shape Water, Water Blast, etc. with flesh, DoA.  Waterbenders can make waves of zombies.  Wow.  Thorough discussion needed on the advancement of these seeds.  Personally I like my any bender PrC to allow "bloodbending".  By bloodbending I mean puppets.  This would eliminate the Puppet seed for Earth and Water (and Fire and Air?), and have it be the first level ability of a Prc.  Bloodbending would be a template for water, allowing for them to manipulate flesh of various sorts, much like Plant bending (make it the same template maybe?) does for plants.

[AstralFire]

Bloodbending's always been a template in my version, and puppet always targeted [Water] creatures. >.> (Seriously, you can check the old post.) Anyway.

And yeah, I intended bloodbending to have those far reaching applications. It is theoretically possible to make a Spout of living humans.

I see what you're saying, and I like it. I think we can just include a note that canon-wise, the PrC should really only be taken by Waterbenders and that lets us be done with it.

[dman11235]

Really?  Maybe I was responding to the GitP version?  I remember Bloodbending being a seed at one time, at least I thought so...

Well, we can just have waterbenders have the easiest access.  I mean, they do have the easiest method of using puppets.  But I feel certain that if Toph or Bumi worked at it enough, they could bend people.  Heck, Bumi bends his bones in the episode where he meets Aang again.  Not much, but he straightens out his hump.  Zuko might be powerful enough eventually to be able to bend life as well, but it's out of the firebender mind set, so he might not even try.  Same with Aang.  Really, water and possibly earth will even try it.  I don't know.  We should discuss this a bit more I feel.  Who else is still with us?  You know you all are free to chime in....  I just don't know what we should do with it.  I feel as if every element should have access to it, but water clearly has an advantage.  I'm kind of....split.  Maybe sleep will help?

I need to go to sleep.  I work again tomorrow, and today was exhausting.

[Zuki]

I interpreted Bumi's suddenly standing tall and straight as just that--deciding to stand up straight and exercise proper posture. My brother looks a good bit shorter when he slouches, and when he's about the house, that's pretty often. He sure doesn't slouch in a fencing match, however, and he likes to stand up tall and loom a bit when he wants to make a point. Bumi's exactly the sort of crazy old man that would pretend to be frail and be underestimated.

While it's a bit hypocritical conceptually, considering Headcracker, I'm going to have to say I don't really like the idea of 'bonebending'. From a science perspective, blood plasma is about 90% water, the proportion of bone that is officially mineral matter is noticeably less. We may already have an example in the show of a failed 'bonebending' attempt. Recall when Aang found the exposed bit of Lion Turtle shell in the middle of the forest on its back, and, thinking it was an unusual sort of earth, attempted to bend it without result. Turtle shells are bone, with a keratin covering. From what we know of how Toph discovered metalbending, it seems that the ability to perceive and classify a substance as of a particular element (within reason), is what's necessary to bend it.

There's also the thematic dimensions to consider. Earth is the element of substance and matter, but with its healing ability, Water is the element of life. Body manipulation is appropriate for waterbenders because it is the other side of the coin to their healing ability, the darker and more sinister variation. Sort of like the idea that healing magic and necromancy should be part of the same school, I seem to recall they were in 2nd edition. Body control is too esoteric for earthbender philosophy, which has metalbending as its alternate material niche.

I understand where you're coming from, Dman, but I'd rather leave bonebenders out of our mostly-canonically based document. If someone reads the flavor text in Headcracker and wonders why their manipulative would-be Dai Li agent hasn't made with the bonebending, then they can talk about adapting Bloodbending and any related PrC with their DM, or concoct a truly memorable and unexpected villain that with a trick up his sleeve the PCs will never expect. Perhaps a sidebar on expanding the scope of what the bending disciplines can control, or advice on creating new seeds and templates, would be appropriate, but I'd rather not have bonebending explicitly spelled out as kosher, for some reason.

Edit: I just wanted to add: The mental image of a Bloodbender creating a massive Wave or Spout of human bodies is somewhat creepy and very very awesome.

[dman11235]

From what we know of how Toph discovered metalbending, it seems that the ability to perceive and classify a substance as of a particular element (within reason), is what's necessary to bend it.

Right....so they need the ability to perceive and classify bone as an element.  This is one of those things that I find is possible in canon, it's just that we haven't seen it.  Just because they didn't do it, doesn't mean it can't be done.  I mean, it's not like they did everything possible, is it?

Also, it's not just bone, but all of the minerals (30% of the body by weight) that you would be bending for puppetteering with earth.  And with fire it's the life force that you're bending.  Passing it off as controlling the reactions in a person's cells.  For air, it's all the dissolved air.  Though, what is it about air that gets bended?  Gasses in general?  Or oxygen?  I think it's gasses in general, which makes airbending a body easier (you have some gas pockets in your body, namely the joints, which is what you get cracking your joints from).

I interpreted Bumi's suddenly standing tall and straight as just that--deciding to stand up straight and exercise proper posture.

It's kind of debatable, but it looks to me as if his bone structure changes a little bit.  Not much, but his hump is reduced.  And unless he's got a supernaturally flexible spine that can shrink and enlarge, he shouldn't be able to do that.  However, it might have been an error in animation.  Or I might be seeing too much into it.

NOTE: I'm not being hard-headed here, I just want to try and explore all possible reasons for not-allowing Puppet for the other elements.  It's called debate.  Just making it clear.

[AstralFire]

Neither of us think you're being hard-headed. =p An undefended point is one that is unvalued. I for one am glad that there is actual discussion here rather than people glaring because they want me to shut up. =p

Will respond after church. On time crunch now.

[AstralFire]

Now, as far as Bumi's concerned, I'm with Kalen - Avatar was just making use of the fact that it's a cartoon, so it can more easily show great differences and mutations in stature and size. I think an easy solution would be to leave Puppet as it currently stands as a seed listed in every discipline - it's not particularly strong. Make aforementioned PrC boost Puppet, etc and outline everything so it can more or less be taken by every class, design it with that in mind, but title it Bloodbender anyway... and then, in the adaptation section, give precise information for turning it into a class for all four benders. Pre-thought adaptations get the same consideration as the basic class, and it lets each individual take it or leave it, while reducing knee-jerk shock from those who skim over the document.

I'll work on a Lifebender seed for Fire and some sort of seed for Airbenders manipulating the air in someone's body later today, after my job interview to facilitate and match Bloodbend and Headcracker as prerequisites. Currently Fire's got way too much of its life philosophy running off of Inner Flames. I don't like having to speculate so much about such a radical part of the show, but that element of firebender philosophy got introduced so late...

[dman11235]

I just feel that it's a bit plain right now.  Damage is fine though.  Ah benders, single-handedly bringing AC back as a viable defense measure!  And putting balance as an important skill!

I'm open to suggestions. Anyone?

Currently.....no ideas (wait!  Got a couple!).  For the record, I was just making sure that you knew the amount of damage you could do.  Lesee.  Maybe an augment to affect multiple adjacent opponents?  Seems to fit.  Maybe some more later.

Note that now the flung creature will take no damage (at base augment).  Yet the SS maneuvers do damage based on the distance of the toss.  Hence my proposed re-wording.  You can fling them up to a certain horizontal distance, they take damage based on that, and can land in any square within range.

Reworded. Still does no damage at base augment, like the weakest Setting Sun ability, Mighty Throw.

Try: "Up to 10 feet in any direction, including up".  That eliminates without a shadow of a doubt any confusion related to where they may end up.  Otherwise, I like it.

Ah, but it does stay...in combining Dust Cloud with Dirt Spray.  You get all the effects of both.  As a combined seed bending, you know, with the DC+DC-4 thing?  Though I see your point.  Maybe, I'll have to think it over more.

I think major, non-obvious essentials should be filled in with base seeds. The seed system's flexibility helps to cover holes that don't occur to us or for someone to be able to take advantage of creativity in a very specific situation. This is a pretty general use thing, and I personally wouldn't think of "AoE Slow" as a result from any of the other current seeds mixed.

After thinking it over more, I agree.  It stays.  And looks fine.

Right, but my points still stand.  This blocks LoE, but is almost always strictly sub-par compared to Deflect Attack.  It needs a small beef-up.

Funny, I figured Deflect Attack would be the inferior one in most cases, barring stuff like porting arrows. How much requires an attack roll but no LoE? I can think of a few, but nothing big... and this blocks natural 20s.

I actually can't think of anything besides things which specifically exist to counter lack of LoE.  The thing is, with DA, you're going to make them almost always miss due to AC.  And you can use it more.  This does block nat 20's, but you can't use this after the roll, btw.  This is restricted to one attack block.  I guess this is better if you can avoid being hit on all but the first, but DA is better otherwise.  And then you have other enemies to worry about....Maybe that PrC for benders+swift actions will help.

I never said it wasn't powerful, I said it needed more.  It's really short.  And can't be combined with any other seed that I can think of.  Maybe a forced move so you can move others as well?  that doesn't seem too out of the question.

Maybe not strictly combined, but you could, say, Metalbend Earth Glide (well, there's an Advanced Form right there) into an Iron Golem and puppet it from the inside. I allowed bringing adjacent creatures along, which is nice for moving a battlefield where you want.

Psst.  Iron golems aren't usually hollow.  Seems better.  Well, is better.  I think we can improve on it more.

Plants do, but in the show, Earthbenders can't do a thing to 'em for flavor reasons. Toph specifically complains about it in The Runaway.

Well that shows me.  Maybe a canon/non-canon little clause?

"If you are playing a non-canon setting, plants and oozes actually have a lot of minerals in them, so consider broadening the targets."

How's that?

Ooh!  How about a new template for earth: Plant bending.  Does for earth what it does for water.  Toph just doesn't have the seed.  Otherwise that note does work.

I'm a bit tired tonight (three shifts in a row!  Yay!) so I'll leave it at that.  Tomorrow I've got a 9:00 shift, but then I'm off for two days in a row.  expect a lot tomorrow and the next few days.  We should be able to get beta up in that time.  By beta I mean every bender has been gone through thoroughly and the first set of adjustments made for everything.  Alpha for my MoO project maybe.

[AstralFire]

[dman11235]

Sure.  But....this opens up new augments....thus accomplishing what needed to be done!  Yay!  So augments: DC set by BL (10+1/2 BL+wis), bonus to DC on an increase augment, bonus damage on an exceed augment, bonus area on an increase.  What about that?  Am I missing any?

[AstralFire]

I am always iffy about increasing DCs... and bonus damage on an exceed could get the damage up pretty high for a discipline that doesn't have it as its focus; I mean, I know what optimized full attack Fighters -can- pull off, but I've been trying to design around what gets most often pulled off in what I've seen, using single-classed ToB and sometimes Psionics as a rough guide.

[dman11235]

That why we lowered it I thought.....And with the exceed, you can either not increase the area and have it do more damage, or increase the area and it will do less damage.  But the DC increase allows you to actually challenge those who would normally look the other way: everyone.  Saves are easy to get high, especially fort and ref.  This wouldn't be a 1/1 basis though, that would be insane (DC 40 ref save or take massive damage?!?  At level 10?!?), but a more reasonable amount that would yield a single target DC 40 or so at level 20.  Maybe DC 35 or 30.  I'm not all too sure on what would be 75% for a good but not focused reflex character.  To get more targets affected you'd need to lower the DC.  And with that insane DC you'd be doing lower damage.  We have no numbers yet, I'll crunch some tomorrow.  I need sleep.  Big day tomorrow.  Early one too.

Btw, I'm shooting for a tier 3 class with each of these.  Sounds like you're trying to do the same.  Read up on JaronK's Tier System for Classes for more info.  Just search for it here, should find it.

[AstralFire]

*nods* I understand what you mean about the DC. I am not totally against it, I just want to be careful with the implementation. And yeah, after the first time you mentioned Tiers I looked up the thread. Was useful.

But an exceed +damage is basically free extra damage, since exceeds don't use up any of your increase pool. That concerns me most.

[dman11235]

Yeah they do....you increase the DC, and whatever you roll over that is the exceed.  So in order to even get a boost to damage at level 20 you need to set the DC using increases lower than what you can get with a check.  As in, say I have a +20 bonus.  I have a seed that's DC 15.  I have 15 to work with, it has a +1 exceed augment, and a +5 and +2 increase augment.  I increase the DC to 27 via +2 increase and +5/+5 increase.  I get +3 worth of exceed, not +15.  If I don't increase the DC, then I'd get +15 worth of exceed.

So with this, you can either do more damage, or affect a bigger area, or increase the DC.  Or a combination of lower values of the above.

[AstralFire]

Currently the exceed mechanic is built around auto-scaling like Bender Level, just like the similar (less well-spelled out) 'overall' augments in Psionics. An exceed mechanic that only works off of what's leftover after all augmenting only benefits those seeds with multiple exceeds, and most don't have one.

That confusion is my fault, it's defined in the bending overview, but I took out the "base difficulty class" section in all the exceed statements. I think I'd started to make your earlier change to the exceed mechanic and then went back to mine. Trying to figure out how to word these once and for all for maximum clarity.

[AstralFire]

Okay, this is how things now read for clarity; this has probably been the source of some of our other power disagreements, since exceed was much stronger to me than you.

Augmentation
[spoiler]   Augmentation: Most forms have variable effects based on your bending skill. Specific augments are listed in the description of each form; at the DM's option, others may become available based on the situation. There are four types of Augments:

- Increase augments are fairly common. Subtract the base difficulty class of the form from your bending check result. This is the size of your augment pool. You must use or spend points from your augment pool on Increase augments in order to gain their benefits.  You must decide how to increase augment a form prior to rolling your bending check for it.

- Exceed augments are rare; to determine the strength of an Exceed augment, simply subtract the base difficulty class of the form from your bending check result.

- Quickening augments are the most common, and are described below. Quickening augments actually increase the base difficulty class of a form for purposes of determining the augment pool and the strength of any exceed augments. You must decide whether to attempt to quicken a form before rolling your bending check for it.

- Templates are a special kind of augmentation. Template Forms are forms that exist purely to alter the effects of other forms, and must be learned as any Seed Form would. Template Forms are therefore specific to each type of bending. Applying a Template Form creates an Advanced Form, and can change many characteristics of the Seed Form, such as its duration or Bending Time. Template augments actually increase the base difficulty class of a form for purposes of determining the augment pool and the strength of any exceed augments. You must decide whether to attempt to apply a template to a form before rolling your bending check for it.

   Augments can be added or removed while you  maintain a form; however, you must add +4 to the difficulty class that round in order to sustain your mental and physical balance while adjusting to a change. Certain forms may specify restrictions on when that form can be augmented.

   Quickening: Most forms with a Bending Time of Full-Round or shorter can be quickened. For every ten points you increase the difficulty class of a form, you can reduce the bending time and maintenance time of any such form to the next smaller action, to a minimum of Swift. A full-round action becomes a standard action becomes a move action becomes a swift action. However, some forms have their own rules on quickening, either allowing you to quicken them at less of a cost, or sometimes not at all. These special rules will be contained in their description.
   Forms with a Maintenance Action require you to spend at least that much effort a round focusing on the form to keep it from ending. Maintenance Actions can be quickened unless the form's description states otherwise, as you must make another bending check each time a form calls for a Maintenance Action.[/spoiler]

Example:
Augment:
- For every five points you use from your augment pool, you can increase the duration of Blind by one round.
- For every five points that you exceed the difficulty class, you deal 1d6 slashing damage with a successful attack. Reflex negates.