If you want some background, I'll write some details, if you just want to look at the mechanics that need balancing, scroll down to the "Help Me Please" below.
Background
So I'm running a west marches campaign, I have 20 players (18 active, 2 passive) and they're all members of this organization called the Magistery, which as a source of inspiration I drew upon The White Tower (Wheel of Time), Hogwarts (Harry Potter), The Citadel (asoiaf / Game of Thrones), and just a bit of The Chromeria (Lightbringer), in order of significance in terms of influence. So this organization inducts initiates, and at level 3 you are eligible to take the Apprentice's Examination, at which point you become an Apprentice, and get a Magistery Ring. This ring is the magic item I need help balancing. So as an apprentice, this ring is something you cannot take off, and really it's not even the ring, the ring is just the permanent arcane focus, the enchantments are on the person and cannot be removed (except by some crazy DM magic or other wildness)
Apprentices have an effect on the ring, they basically get a Zone of Truth that can be activated at will, but the radius is only 1 foot around the person. When activated, the ring glows, and this organization has a very strong reputation, it's generally known that someone with this ring cannot lie (technically I made the DC 30, but there's other DM effects to lying while wearing it, I figure those out on an ad hoc basis when it happens, but it hasn't yet). Edit: Forgot to mention, that once you become an apprentice of any house you are no longer able to deactivate the zone of truth. You are forever forced to tell the truth whenever you speak, which is why world-wide people trust those with Magistery rings (and also why forgers are hunted down with serious consequences)
When the apprentices complete their next test, the Disciple's Proving, they join a house within the Magistery, a sub-faction. There are 7, each is named for a color, typified by an "element," and governs a specific facet of the Magistery's influence, all encompassed around the idea of preserving "truth from knowledge" (the founding tenet), but includes Knowledge (Brown, Light and Dark), Justice (Blue, Water), War (Green, Earth), Healing (Yellow, Lightning), Castigation (Red, Fire), Diplomacy (Gray, Wind), and Philosophy (White, Sonic). Anyone who's read the wheel of time knows exactly where I got all of this from. When they join a house, they get a house boon that is somewhat fitting for the house's domain. Here's my campaign's wikipage on The Magistery if you want additional background: http://solace5e.com/index.php/Magistery
Next they would complete the Adept's Ascension and become Adepts, which allows them voting seats within the Magistery, and their rings become a ring of spell storing (and comes pre-loaded with Raise Dead or a Diamond worth 500gp), on top of their house boon and permanent self-zone-of-truth. Master is the final rank, although it doesn't grant any additional privileges in terms of this magic item, so I'll leave that out for now.
Help Me Please
So I need help making the enchantments sort of equal in terms of usefulness and attractiveness, obviously certain PC types will gravitate towards one or another, but I want to make them close to balanced. This is what I've come up with so far, I have seven and the player would get to choose one sometime between level 7-11 depending on how the story goes:
Brown’s Referential Treatment
+3 History, +3 Arcana
Chair’s Knowledge: Immediately know whether a topic is documented within the Magistery Library, and advantage on any check to recall information about it
Blue’s Grace
+3 Perception, +3 Investigation
Selective Foresight: Advantage on all Dexterity saving throws, and 1d4 bonus on Perception and Investigation checks for each Blue assist
Green’s Tactical Advantage
+2 Survival, +2 Nature, +2 Animal Handling
Captain General’s Understanding: You can analyze a creature (or multiple creatures with reduced efficacy) using Survival, note its armor, weapons, and tactics, and gain advantage on all attacks against it for 1 min
Yellow’s Healing Touch
+2 Medicine, +2 Religion, Expertise with an herbalism kit
Weaver’s Restoration: Spare the Dying as a reaction or bonus action, brings target to 1 HP (can be used at 30ft range once per short rest)
Red's Dispensation
+3 Intimidation, +3 Performance
Highest Order: You can sense the presence of magic within 60 feet of you, and with an action you can sense any “perversions” of magic within 1 mile
Gray’s Prerogative
+3 Persuasion, +3 Deception
Clerk’s Verbosity: every 10 minutes spent discussing something gains an advantage on Persuasion checks (this effect stacks with itself)
White’s Judgment
+6 Insight
Reason's Embrace: Advantage on all Wisdom checks, and there is a permanent Zone of Truth 30 feet around the wearer (DC 30)
And for my own purposes, I've created a fancy flow chart version, which may be easier to read (also welcome critiques to this format): https://i.imgur.com/rH8rImJ.png (also shown below)
soooooo thoughts? I could use some outside eyes to help me make this a difficult choice for the players because they're all so good and not a difficult choice because they don't know which one might help them one day in the future.
I think Clerk's Verbosity is the only one that's not as good as the others, but I don't know your campaign. Maybe you're playing a social-interaction-oriented campaign and that sort of thing comes up all the time.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
I think Clerk's Verbosity is the only one that's not as good as the others, but I don't know your campaign. Maybe you're playing a social-interaction-oriented campaign and that sort of thing comes up all the time.
I had the same thought, there is a fair bit of social interaction, and I allow for some downtime stuff where they can use Persuasion for some politics, I have to figure out a way to limit this, either I'd allow them to take a critical success on those checks, or they'd only be able to gain one advantage on it.
but it feels like it just doesn't have the same flare as all the others, which is the reason I added the "stacking with itself" feature for double, triple, or quadruple advantage, but it feels like I'm just putting all of the bonuses in one single area.
Since all of my players are physically unable to lie, I was thinking of something along the lines of Thieves Cant where someone with the Gray's boon could do something like take 10x longer to say something but you are able to lie using clever evasive speech, without outright actually lying, giving them essentially the only color that can "sort of" lie to anyone.
Since all of my players are physically unable to lie, I was thinking of something along the lines of Thieves Cant where someone with the Gray's boon could do something like take 10x longer to say something but you are able to lie using clever evasive speech, without outright actually lying, giving them essentially the only color that can "sort of" lie to anyone.
I like that idea a lot better than what you've got. The power level still isn't anywhere near par, I think, though.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Since all of my players are physically unable to lie, I was thinking of something along the lines of Thieves Cant where someone with the Gray's boon could do something like take 10x longer to say something but you are able to lie using clever evasive speech, without outright actually lying, giving them essentially the only color that can "sort of" lie to anyone.
I like that idea a lot better than what you've got. The power level still isn't anywhere near par, I think, though.
What about both? That actually might make sense because it's really the only way to make use of deception if you're truly unable to lie to someone.
Gray’s Prerogative
+3 Persuasion, +3 Deception
Clerk’s Verbosity: every 10 minutes spent discussing something gains an advantage on Persuasion checks (this effect stacks with itself)
Clerk's Prevarication: you can lie by speaking cleverly and evasively, but it takes you 10 times longer than normal to convey what you want to
I think with those two in place, it makes it really feel like this is clearly the politics / diplomacy house (which it is supposed to be)
okay, I think I've "finalized" it, the party is around 3-5 right now, so I have a little bit before they're mostly above 7. I may make some corrections or tweaks before they become real for the PCs. I did change the white's from wisdom checks to wisdom saving throws, the wisdom checks was waaaaay too much after I gave it some playtest thoughts.
If you want some background, I'll write some details, if you just want to look at the mechanics that need balancing, scroll down to the "Help Me Please" below.
Background
So I'm running a west marches campaign, I have 20 players (18 active, 2 passive) and they're all members of this organization called the Magistery, which as a source of inspiration I drew upon The White Tower (Wheel of Time), Hogwarts (Harry Potter), The Citadel (asoiaf / Game of Thrones), and just a bit of The Chromeria (Lightbringer), in order of significance in terms of influence. So this organization inducts initiates, and at level 3 you are eligible to take the Apprentice's Examination, at which point you become an Apprentice, and get a Magistery Ring. This ring is the magic item I need help balancing. So as an apprentice, this ring is something you cannot take off, and really it's not even the ring, the ring is just the permanent arcane focus, the enchantments are on the person and cannot be removed (except by some crazy DM magic or other wildness)
Apprentices have an effect on the ring, they basically get a Zone of Truth that can be activated at will, but the radius is only 1 foot around the person. When activated, the ring glows, and this organization has a very strong reputation, it's generally known that someone with this ring cannot lie (technically I made the DC 30, but there's other DM effects to lying while wearing it, I figure those out on an ad hoc basis when it happens, but it hasn't yet). Edit: Forgot to mention, that once you become an apprentice of any house you are no longer able to deactivate the zone of truth. You are forever forced to tell the truth whenever you speak, which is why world-wide people trust those with Magistery rings (and also why forgers are hunted down with serious consequences)
When the apprentices complete their next test, the Disciple's Proving, they join a house within the Magistery, a sub-faction. There are 7, each is named for a color, typified by an "element," and governs a specific facet of the Magistery's influence, all encompassed around the idea of preserving "truth from knowledge" (the founding tenet), but includes Knowledge (Brown, Light and Dark), Justice (Blue, Water), War (Green, Earth), Healing (Yellow, Lightning), Castigation (Red, Fire), Diplomacy (Gray, Wind), and Philosophy (White, Sonic). Anyone who's read the wheel of time knows exactly where I got all of this from. When they join a house, they get a house boon that is somewhat fitting for the house's domain. Here's my campaign's wikipage on The Magistery if you want additional background: http://solace5e.com/index.php/Magistery
Next they would complete the Adept's Ascension and become Adepts, which allows them voting seats within the Magistery, and their rings become a ring of spell storing (and comes pre-loaded with Raise Dead or a Diamond worth 500gp), on top of their house boon and permanent self-zone-of-truth. Master is the final rank, although it doesn't grant any additional privileges in terms of this magic item, so I'll leave that out for now.
Help Me Please
So I need help making the enchantments sort of equal in terms of usefulness and attractiveness, obviously certain PC types will gravitate towards one or another, but I want to make them close to balanced. This is what I've come up with so far, I have seven and the player would get to choose one sometime between level 7-11 depending on how the story goes:
Brown’s Referential Treatment
Blue’s Grace
Green’s Tactical Advantage
Yellow’s Healing Touch
Red's Dispensation
Gray’s Prerogative
White’s Judgment
And for my own purposes, I've created a fancy flow chart version, which may be easier to read (also welcome critiques to this format): https://i.imgur.com/rH8rImJ.png (also shown below)
soooooo thoughts? I could use some outside eyes to help me make this a difficult choice for the players because they're all so good and not a difficult choice because they don't know which one might help them one day in the future.
my west marches campaign wiki: http://solace5e.com/
I think Clerk's Verbosity is the only one that's not as good as the others, but I don't know your campaign. Maybe you're playing a social-interaction-oriented campaign and that sort of thing comes up all the time.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
How does Clerk's Verbosity "stack with itself"?
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
my west marches campaign wiki: http://solace5e.com/
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
What about both? That actually might make sense because it's really the only way to make use of deception if you're truly unable to lie to someone.
Gray’s Prerogative
I think with those two in place, it makes it really feel like this is clearly the politics / diplomacy house (which it is supposed to be)
my west marches campaign wiki: http://solace5e.com/
okay, I think I've "finalized" it, the party is around 3-5 right now, so I have a little bit before they're mostly above 7. I may make some corrections or tweaks before they become real for the PCs. I did change the white's from wisdom checks to wisdom saving throws, the wisdom checks was waaaaay too much after I gave it some playtest thoughts.
my west marches campaign wiki: http://solace5e.com/