Author Topic: On Illithid Savant  (Read 14985 times)

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Bastian

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On Illithid Savant
« Reply #40 on: June 25, 2011, 04:44:04 PM »
"Aquire Class Feature" is most similar to class features like "Bonus Feat", "High Arcana" and "Special Ability" (much like the Fighter, Archmage and Rogue class features of the same name).  The difference is that each time you get it, you aren't limited to a particular list, but you don't automatically get the ability.

Yet does someone with ten levels in Rogue and a Major Bloodline get more than one Special Ability?  No, they do not.  Likewise, an Illithid Savant who eats the brain of a high-level IS still only gets one use of Aquire Class Feature.  That's just the way it goes.
Do you have any proof at all for those assertions? Because that completely goes against the wording of Acquire Class Feature which says it gives benefits at 4th, 7th, and 10th levels rather than you getting the class feature multiple times (hint text trumps table).
Quote
Acquire Class Feature (Ex): At third level, an illithid savant permanently gains one class feature of a consumed brain's owner...[details on how to treat these acquire abilities]...At 7th level and again at 10th level, the illithid savant can gain another class feature from a consumed brain.
Quote from: Rogue
Special Abilities
On attaining 10th level, and at every three levels thereafter (13th, 16th, and 19th), a rogue gains a special ability of her choice from among the following options.
Quote from: Fighter
Bonus Feats
At 1st level, a fighter gets a bonus combat-oriented feat in addition to the feat that any 1st-level character gets and the bonus feat granted to a human character. The fighter gains an additional bonus feat at 2nd level and every two fighter levels thereafter (4th, 6th, 8th, 10th, 12th, 14th, 16th, 18th, and 20th).
Quote from: Geomancer
Ley Lines
At 2nd level, a Geomancer learns to create magical connections with a specific type of terrain
-snip terrain choices-
In that terrain, a Geomancer's effective caster level for all spells increases by 1.  At 6th level and again at 10th level, the character may either choose a new terrain in which to recieve the benefit (at +1) or increase his effective caster level in a previously chosen terrain by an additional +1.

Note that the last is the closest parallell.  Not only does it use the same language in the text for gaining new levels, but in the table it's listed as "Ley Lines +1", "Ley Lines +2," and "Ley Lines +3", which, like Aquire Class Feature, is not what the Text says.  Instead, it's a class feature you gain three times with a choice on exactly how it applies each time.

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So what your saying is that for each of those class features the text indicates that it is all one class feature which provides different benefits at different levels and the table indicates that it is multiple class features and since it supports your position the table must be right even though text explicitly trumps table.

Note that before you protest and say that the text doesn't indicate that it is all one class feature, there is nothing in the text that says you gain the class feature multiple times, all it is saying is that you gain different benefits at different levels.

Eldritch_Lord

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On Illithid Savant
« Reply #41 on: June 25, 2011, 05:27:10 PM »
Um...correct me if I'm completely off-base here, but I'm not seeing why Acquire Class Feature only gives you a single ability at the time you gain Acquire Class Feature.  To me, the wording suggests that, starting at 3rd level, wheneverTM, you just need to go out and eat people, which is kinda broken, but hey, this is WotC.

What am I missing?

Prime32

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On Illithid Savant
« Reply #42 on: June 25, 2011, 06:09:45 PM »
By request, I split this stuff off from the Fun Finds thread.
« Last Edit: June 25, 2011, 06:20:38 PM by Prime32 »
My work
The tier system in a nutshell:
[spoiler]Tier 6: A cartographer.
Tier 5: An expert cartographer or a decent marksman.
Tier 4: An expert marksman.
Tier 3: An expert marksman, cartographer and chef who can tie strong knots and is trained in hostage negotiation or a marksman so good he can shoot down every bullet fired by a minigun while armed with a rusted single-shot pistol that veers to the left.
Tier 2: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything, or the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.
Tier 1: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything and the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.[/spoiler]

Lo77o

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #43 on: June 25, 2011, 07:10:00 PM »
Um...correct me if I'm completely off-base here, but I'm not seeing why Acquire Class Feature only gives you a single ability at the time you gain Acquire Class Feature.  To me, the wording suggests that, starting at 3rd level, wheneverTM, you just need to go out and eat people, which is kinda broken, but hey, this is WotC.

What am I missing?

Ill be buggered and buttered.... Seems like you might be right. Iv never actually read it all that carefull, iv just listened to people on the forum. Nice spotted.
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jojolagger

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #44 on: June 26, 2011, 12:14:09 AM »
What am I missing?
That people still respect WotC enough to assume that they wouldn't give such a powerful ability to anything, in such an easy way. They found an unusual way of reading it that seemed a far more fair power level, and everyone seemed to agree.

oh god, just realized a factotum can emulate the ability to gain abilities at level 19, giving 6 class abilities, 8 feats, 8 skills, and 4 specials per brain.
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In other words, he thinks there's a "correct" way to play D&D.  *sigh*
There is: Kill shit and loot the corpse!
When you use a tool the way it was designed for -- its intended function -- then it will work very well for you.

But it's not the tool's fault if you use it for something else and you fail utterly, such as trying to eat cereal with a butterknife, pounding nails with a screwdriver, blogging to voice your political opinions, and brushing your teeth with a hammer.
[/spoiler]

SorO_Lost

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #45 on: June 26, 2011, 12:22:22 AM »
What am I missing?
Nothing. I used to think that, and still do but need to fact check. Honestly bringing that up is over kill given IS steals Acquire Class Feature as an IS at X level and rules of Acquire Class Feature does in fact give 3 abilities for being 10th level. Further even a Author agrees in a published article.

By request, I split this stuff off from the Fun Finds thread.
Good move.

Also no the Factotum cannot obtain this ability. "Standard Class" is a "Base Class", not a "Prestigious Class".
A Hellbreaker can. Steal it and then kill/eat the IS's brain before it times out.
Tiers explained in 8 sentences. With examples!
[spoiler]Tiers break down into who has spellcasting more than anything else due to spells being better than anything else in the game.
6: Skill based. Commoner, Expert, Samurai.
5: Mundane warrior. Barbarian, Fighter, Monk.
4: Partial casters. Adapt, Hexblade, Paladin, Ranger, Spelltheif.
3: Focused casters. Bard, Beguiler, Dread Necromancer, Martial Adapts, Warmage.
2: Full casters. Favored Soul, Psion, Sorcerer, Wu Jen.
1: Elitists. Artificer, Cleric, Druid, Wizard.
0: Gods. StP Erudite, Illthid Savant, Pun-Pun, Rocks fall & you die.
[/spoiler]

jojolagger

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #46 on: June 26, 2011, 12:29:41 AM »
Also no the Factotum cannot obtain this ability. "Standard Class" is a "Base Class", not a "Prestigious Class".
A Hellbreaker can. Steal it and then kill/eat the IS's brain before it times out.

Source on Standard = Base please.
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Quotes [spoiler]
In other words, he thinks there's a "correct" way to play D&D.  *sigh*
There is: Kill shit and loot the corpse!
When you use a tool the way it was designed for -- its intended function -- then it will work very well for you.

But it's not the tool's fault if you use it for something else and you fail utterly, such as trying to eat cereal with a butterknife, pounding nails with a screwdriver, blogging to voice your political opinions, and brushing your teeth with a hammer.
[/spoiler]

SorO_Lost

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #47 on: June 26, 2011, 02:25:10 AM »
Also no the Factotum cannot obtain this ability. "Standard Class" is a "Base Class", not a "Prestigious Class".
A Hellbreaker can. Steal it and then kill/eat the IS's brain before it times out.

Source on Standard = Base please.

Quote from:

Tiers explained in 8 sentences. With examples!
[spoiler]Tiers break down into who has spellcasting more than anything else due to spells being better than anything else in the game.
6: Skill based. Commoner, Expert, Samurai.
5: Mundane warrior. Barbarian, Fighter, Monk.
4: Partial casters. Adapt, Hexblade, Paladin, Ranger, Spelltheif.
3: Focused casters. Bard, Beguiler, Dread Necromancer, Martial Adapts, Warmage.
2: Full casters. Favored Soul, Psion, Sorcerer, Wu Jen.
1: Elitists. Artificer, Cleric, Druid, Wizard.
0: Gods. StP Erudite, Illthid Savant, Pun-Pun, Rocks fall & you die.
[/spoiler]

JaronK

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #48 on: June 26, 2011, 04:15:45 AM »
Source on Standard = Base please.

PHBII, Dungeonscape, and DMG all refer to "standard classes" and mean the sorts of classes that aren't PrCs, giving a number of examples.   It's unclear what Paragon Classes and Variant Classes count as though, though this page seems to indicate that Variant Classes do not count as Standard Classes:  http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20070209a

Note that a few places refer to "base class" as meaning a class in the PHB, which is a bit different... it's possible that a Hexblade (to pick a random example) is a standard class but not a base class.

JaronK

jojolagger

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #49 on: June 26, 2011, 04:34:05 AM »
Source on Standard = Base please.

PHBII, Dungeonscape, and DMG all refer to "standard classes" and mean the sorts of classes that aren't PrCs, giving a number of examples.   It's unclear what Paragon Classes and Variant Classes count as though, though this page seems to indicate that Variant Classes do not count as Standard Classes:  http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20070209a

Note that a few places refer to "base class" as meaning a class in the PHB, which is a bit different... it's possible that a Hexblade (to pick a random example) is a standard class but not a base class.

JaronK

Okay, yeah, Factotum can't.

Damn WotC naming things in a confusing way.
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Quotes [spoiler]
In other words, he thinks there's a "correct" way to play D&D.  *sigh*
There is: Kill shit and loot the corpse!
When you use a tool the way it was designed for -- its intended function -- then it will work very well for you.

But it's not the tool's fault if you use it for something else and you fail utterly, such as trying to eat cereal with a butterknife, pounding nails with a screwdriver, blogging to voice your political opinions, and brushing your teeth with a hammer.
[/spoiler]

PlzBreakMyCampaign

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #50 on: June 27, 2011, 01:33:58 AM »
Not at all.  You gain the "Aquire Class Feature" ability three times over the course of the Illithid Savant PrC.  Each time you get to aquire ONE class feature.  If you use it to gain Aquire Class Feature, you just gained back exactly what you used.  No different than casting an 8th level spell that lets you regain an 8th level spell slot.
...

Try reading the rules and not the table before closing the book.

B. The way Acquire Class Feature is written, Bloodline 3 / Illithid Savant 7 gains three Class Features though Acquire Class Feature.
I understand what snakeman is saying. I believe I understand what soro is saying. Since soro's is the more powered up version, his to me atleast has the burden of proof. Unfair, yes but c'est la vie.

**pulls out copy of SS**

What I see is "at 7th and again at 10th level, the IS can gain another class feature from a consumed brain."

Keep in mind bloodlines only advance formulaic things. Since the wording mentions no formula it is a no-go for BL, though granted it is on the cusp like SA progressions.

That aside I assume you are saying that it is only one ability. When eating a brain and trying to use the ability it simply checks for a) availability (an IS10 can't permanently gain more than 3 class features assuming they are all non-IS brains) and then checks for b) the IS level. Part b) is interesting and appears to be RAW. However if an IS3 eat an IS10, the IS3 still doesn't have to prerequisite levels for the 2nd and 3rd uses.

One may argue that he needn't have them. The only way I can see this is if the ability 'changes' to whatever is absorbed. Is this unreasonable and does anyone think they can prove this part?

Since no rule states that Acquire Class Feature stacks with itself, it doesn't.  I guess if you ate someone who had the more advanced Acquire Class Feature you'd get that, but that would just save you levels in the class... you couldn't keep going up from there.
Makes sense. NGDBSS the example there is consistent with jaronk's interpretation because the example hasn't eaten any brains for more Acquire Class Features.

tldr; show why IS3 eating IS7 gets its two unused ACF chances

edit: ignore the BL part, soro realized the mistake.
        Eldritch Lord that would be what is known as an 'abusive' interpretation. It is possible, but abuses the 'one class feature' 'additional class feature' and 'a brain' clear RAI there :)
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An interesting read, nice to see a civil discussion
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NeverGetDrunkButStaySober

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #51 on: June 27, 2011, 04:17:20 PM »
Since no rule states that Acquire Class Feature stacks with itself, it doesn't.  I guess if you ate someone who had the more advanced Acquire Class Feature you'd get that, but that would just save you levels in the class... you couldn't keep going up from there.
Makes sense. NGDBSS the example there is consistent with jaronk's interpretation because the example hasn't eaten any brains for more Acquire Class Features.
JaronK's argument was that multiple instances of the same class feature don't stack; Acquire Class Feature itself was just the one in question. And my example was showing a case where they did, in fact, stack (wizard spellcasting at multiple caster levels), so that argument is not always valid.

JaronK

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #52 on: June 27, 2011, 04:30:36 PM »
From looking it over, it doesn't seem that there's a general rule on the topic of whether multiples of the same class feature stack.  Monks Wis to AC evidently doesn't (as CustServ at least said the Wis bonus from Swordsages is the same thing and thus doesn't stack) yet others that are actually identical seemingly do.  Maybe I've missed it.

Which means this whole thing comes down to a DM ruling of whether "Acquire Class Feature" can stack with itself.  If it can't, the best you can do is use the first ability to eat the Acquire Class Features ability from a more advanced Savant, then use the two more uses you now have to eat other stuff.  If it does stack, then going around eating more Savants gives you a basically endless loop.

JaronK

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #53 on: June 27, 2011, 05:42:36 PM »
(minor tangent ... but close enough)



It's my understanding that the Breaking The Core thread got almost everything in core, down to (su).

The sarrukh ability makes them (ex) along with non-core.
LoP's Omni conjectured that Epic Spells can do the same.
I suppose the quick and dirty Illithid Savant reading all this time, has been along the same lines.

The other LoP Omni approach is: legit Infinity Knowledge check = you know how to do this,
even if you don't know how exactly, to do this.


And  :) game on !!
« Last Edit: June 28, 2011, 05:59:42 PM by awaken DM golem »

zook1shoe

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #54 on: June 28, 2011, 02:45:27 AM »
What about eating a cleric's and a wizard's brain? Their main class feature is "Spellcasting"

How is that different that a Sorcerer's and a wizard's brain? Or two wizards' brains?

The reason most instances of having the same ability, is because they overlap, like Divine Body or Trapfinding.

But there are many other things that either stack outright, or advance independently, like Bonus Feats or Wild Shape.

EDIT: couldn't a two-headed Illithid Savant eat one of its own brain to gain its own class features again? That would basically only work for ones like Bonus Feats or a rogue's Special Ability
« Last Edit: June 28, 2011, 05:28:16 AM by zook1shoe »

Lycanthromancer

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #55 on: June 28, 2011, 01:40:49 PM »
1. Cast Regeneration.
2. Eat Own Brain
3. ...?
4. Profit!

Better with half-flayer Dvati.
[spoiler]Masculine men like masculine things. Masculine men are masculine. Therefore, liking masculine men is masculine.

I dare anyone to find a hole in that logic.
______________________________________
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jojolagger

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #56 on: June 28, 2011, 02:27:58 PM »
1. Cast Regeneration.
2. Eat Own Brain
3. ...?
4. Profit!

Better with half-flayer Dvati.
:lmao
That is awesome.
Countdown to Zombie Apocalypse 97
When you see this, copy it into your sig and -1
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Quotes [spoiler]
In other words, he thinks there's a "correct" way to play D&D.  *sigh*
There is: Kill shit and loot the corpse!
When you use a tool the way it was designed for -- its intended function -- then it will work very well for you.

But it's not the tool's fault if you use it for something else and you fail utterly, such as trying to eat cereal with a butterknife, pounding nails with a screwdriver, blogging to voice your political opinions, and brushing your teeth with a hammer.
[/spoiler]

JaronK

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #57 on: June 28, 2011, 03:53:02 PM »
Learnean creatures can't be killed by brain eating, I believe.  So a Learnean creature doing this should be able to just eat its own brains back and forth.

JaronK

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #58 on: June 28, 2011, 06:02:48 PM »
1a) ... fest Fission
2a) ... eat own brain of extra self
3) ..... ?
3y) ... Fission expires
3z) ... cast regeneration
4) ..... profit !


maybe 3y and 3z should be 2y and 2z
idk

Lycanthromancer

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Re: On Illithid Savant
« Reply #59 on: June 28, 2011, 06:05:58 PM »
So what happens if you're wearing a ring of regeneration and get vorpal'd? Or illithid'd?
[spoiler]Masculine men like masculine things. Masculine men are masculine. Therefore, liking masculine men is masculine.

I dare anyone to find a hole in that logic.
______________________________________
[/spoiler]I'm a writer. These are my stories. Some are even SFW! (Warning: Mostly Gay.)
My awesome poster collection. (Warning, some are NSFW.)
Agita's awesome poster collection.
[spoiler]
+1 Lycanthromancer
Which book is Lycanthromancer in?
Lyca ... is in the book. Yes he is.
 :D
shit.. concerning psionics optimization, lycan IS the book
[/spoiler]