Talk:Bookcaster (3.5e Class)

Don't Understand Some Design Choices

Some of the design choices I don't quite understand here.

• Why does it take you longer to find the spell in your spellbook as the spell level goes up? If it's level appropriate at level 9 and you're level 9, it takes you 3 rounds to reach the spell, whereas if it's level appropriate at level 1, and you're level 1 it takes you 1 round. The level-appropriateness of the action hasn't changed but it got significantly more expensive.
• What's up with the spell DC changes? Looks like it's designed to basically force the magic focus class feature onto the class. You likely come out ahead of things with a +1 DC overall, but it seems like it's supposed to just drain some amount of wealth from the character.
• Improved Scribe: This is a silly amount of bookkeeping for a feature that basically says "your spellbook doesn't run out of space". Why not just make every spell cost a single page from the get-go and cut this.

Anyway, that's what I ran into reading it over. Surgo (talk) 15:35, 11 June 2022 (UTC)

Those are some great critiques of a work I haven't looked at in a long time. Looking at it with a new eye 4 years later, here are the things I would, and may, change. These are not in the order you mentioned them, but rather in the order of explanation/fix length.

• Improved Scribe: That's a good idea, honestly. This was me playing with mechanics a little bit.

• Spell DC Changes: This was another instance of me playing with a few things; I had a lot of gripes in 3.5e that martials usually need to spend a lot of wealth on magical equipment, but casters don't. With the Bookcaster, this was a balance thing, and testing out how a caster would feel if they had to have equipment too.

• Spell Search: This was to balance your ability to cast any of your spells at any time. In a combat situation, it's easier to swap between your lower-power spells than it is to get to your big spells, leading to more planning (Hopefully). If I had to changes this, I would alter the entire mechanic - When you cast a spell from your Grimoire, if it isn't the one open on the page and isn't Bookmarked, you must roll a d6 - On a result of 6, you find the spell in your book and can cast it; If not, you find a random spell. Using a move action before casting a spell negates the need to roll, and at 10th or 11th level, I'd say that you get to your desired spell correctly on a roll of 5 or 6, effectively a 30% chance.

Anyway, those are my passing thoughts in response. I haven't done much for 3.5e in aq long time, having moved over to 5e and my own system, which I've yet to finish fleshing out. If you go looking around, you'll notice my Thaumaturge class - The replacement for Wizard - Looks a lot like an updated version of Bookcaster. --Zhenra-Khal (talk) 06:03, 12 June 2022 (UTC)