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[On the Qualities of Fate]

On the Qualities of Fate

Fate, Destiny, Predetermination.
All words for the same fundamental concept - this idea and often faith that our lives, our actions are predetermined and ultimately have meaning.

Like a road in the desert, it streches out ahead of us, not simply the footsteps we leave behind. The road weaves on from the moment we draw our first breath to the moment we release our last. Or at least, this is the commonly held belief, that fate must be straight. It must be linear, it must be A to B.

I propose that this is not, in fact, accurate and proffer my own theory: While Fate is fundamentally unbreakable, it is malleable - but not without risk nor consequence for those that dare attempt to meddle with it

Imagine for a moment: fate not as a line, but as a series of dots like the glittering lights upon a star chart. Each of these is a point of certainty, a place, a time, or a situation - something that must, by fundamental law of the universe, occur.  Man, like many the aspiring student of astrology will seek to connect these dots, forming shapes within the dark void of the sky, but man is also amateur, his lines are not straight, his path not simple and narrow.

These imperfections, the unclear lines and faulty directions are because man is unguided. He walks, but does not know his destination and worse yet, he may chose not to follow the path fate has laid out for him. He may choose otherwise, but this will cause him to encounter processes and trials which block him, obstruct him and cause both he, and those around him, great harm.   

Man realises this.  He understands subconsciously that the path that fate has laid out for him is the easiest. He understands that while it may itself not be without its own perils - its pains and its suffering - that to stray from it too far is to invoke the fall.

And what is the fall? Like raising a stone from the ground and letting it tumble back to the earth under the effects of gravity, fate has its own pull, its own draw. This is such that while man's choices are imperfect to the mechanisms of fate, very few ever truely deviate far from their intended path as the hereto named fatidical force simply draws them back. 

So while fate is malleable and open to manipulation (to a degree), where fate begins, ends and each of these points of certainty along the way must eventually be adhered to. As such, the further man is from his point of certainty when the allotted time comes, the harsher the ripples and waves of fate tug to bring him back - and the harsher the penalty for the one who caused him to be so off-track.




OOC Easyread
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On the Qualities of Fate

Fate, Destiny, Predetermination.
All words for the same fundamental concept - this idea and often faith that our lives, our actions are predetermined and ultimately have meaning.

Like a road in the desert, it streches out ahead of us, not simply the footsteps we leave behind. The road weaves on from the moment we draw our first breath to the moment we release our last. Or at least, this is the commonly held belief, that fate must be straight. It must be linear, it must be A to B.

I propose that this is not, in fact, accurate and proffer my own theory: While Fate is fundamentally unbreakable, it is malleable - but not without risk nor consequence for those that dare attempt to meddle with it

Imagine for a moment: fate not as a line, but as a series of dots like the glittering lights upon a star chart. Each of these is a point of certainty, a place, a time, or a situation - something that must, by fundamental law of the universe, occur.  Man, like many the aspiring student of astrology will seek to connect these dots, forming shapes within the dark void of the sky, but man is also amateur, his lines are not straight, his path not simple and narrow.

These imperfections, the unclear lines and faulty directions are because man is unguided. He walks, but does not know his destination and worse yet, he may chose not to follow the path fate has laid out for him. He may choose otherwise, but this will cause him to encounter processes and trials which block him, obstruct him and cause both he, and those around him, great harm.   

Man realises this.  He understands subconsciously that the path that fate has laid out for him is the easiest. He understands that while it may itself not be without its own perils - its pains and its suffering - that to stray from it too far is to invoke the fall.

And what is the fall? Like raising a stone from the ground and letting it tumble back to the earth under the effects of gravity, fate has its own pull, its own draw. This is such that while man's choices are imperfect to the mechanisms of fate, very few ever truely deviate far from their intended path as the hereto named fatidical force simply draws them back. 

So while fate is malleable and open to manipulation (to a degree), where fate begins, ends and each of these points of certainty along the way must eventually be adhered to. As such, the further man is from his point of certainty when the allotted time comes, the harsher the ripples and waves of fate tug to bring him back - and the harsher the penalty for the one who caused him to be so off-track.



[/hide]

The moth fixtures are also destructable, which may not bhe intentional.-

[A b e l l e E n o r r e]

Dear "Estellise"

I do not know exactly how you got yourself a copy of my incomplete manuscript, nor why you think it is appropriate to approach me with your purported illiteracy.

Your comments are noted. I would suggest you seek someone capable of reading the common tongue in order to elaborate for you the on the contents of your misbegotten copy of my works, however if you cannot master reading, I cannot expect you will comprehend it.

(Here, Spelled out in intentionally large, scratchy letters which just oozes unspoken condescending tone)

A b e l l e  E n o r r e

[Preamble]

Preamble

Fate is ephemeral, but eternal, impossible to grasp and yet we encounter it each second of each minute of every day of our lives. I am sure there are many who would balk at the idea of fate, this inconceivable uncontrollable and unknowable thing.

How can it possibly exist?

Better yet, how can one put faith in it?

A reading of fate is often intentionally arcane, a trick of mystics and seers well guarded and often mimiced by charlatans and crooks then compounded by the many purported ways by which to do so.

Is a drawing of cards more accurate a measure of fate than a reading of tea leaves? - it is difficult to say and scientifically suspect. While I am presently just an Acolyte, it is my hope that through the reading of the stars and manipulation of celestial gravitation that a scientific means by which to dictate the future be found - and if possible, fate also changed. 

OOC Easyread:
[hide]

Preamble

Fate is ephemeral, but eternal, impossible to grasp and yet we encounter it each second of each minute of every day of our lives. I am sure there are many who would balk at the idea of fate, this inconceivable uncontrollable and unknowable thing.

How can it possibly exist?

Better yet, how can one put faith in it?

A reading of fate is often intentionally arcane, a trick of mystics and seers well guarded and often mimiced by charlatans and crooks then compounded by the many purported ways by which to do so.

Is a drawing of cards more accurate a measure of fate than a reading of tea leaves? - it is difficult to say and scientifically suspect. While I am presently just an Acolyte, it is my hope that through the reading of the stars and manipulation of celestial gravitation that a scientific means by which to dictate the future be found - and if possible, fate also changed. 

[/hide]

A Theory on Fate and Fatidical Manipulation

By Abelle Enorre

Penned IY 7787

OOC Easyread:
[hide]

A Theory on Fate and Fatidical Manipulation

By Abelle Enorre

Penned IY 7787

[/hide]

I tried this alot as well - my suggestion would be replace the Unique power on herbs and similar items (All variety of herbs, Antivenomes, Sal tonics, Healing kits etc)  with "Unique power (Touch)" and remove the artificial range check from the script itself, so if the target moves out of range in the interrim it doesnt break it and waste a round - which can mean life or death sometimes.

This will let it function much more in line with how Cure wounds spell function in that you need to initially get close, but it is then forgiving if they move out of range mid animation.

If I had to guess I'm assuming that PFA the submenu "Spell" has been added but doesnt work on Familiars.

Probably needs replacing with just flat Prot from good or evil.

Could limit them to dispelling level 3 spells and below. I imagine that could work -- but yes. They are vastly underwhelming.

If situations like that are arising, it should probably be brought to the DM's attention asap.

From the wiki:
Will also give the Ironguts buff to target on DC 20 and Lesser Restoration for DC 30

When you meet the DC it will give you the message to say you have treated the targets symptoms and fortified them against more, but they dont actually get the benefits.

It would probably be less of an issue if there were simply more quests that dropped one. At the moment there is a scant few that do. They're..really kinda hard to find

So the control issue was always a thing with rotbringer unfortunately, killing a lot of things at once, the system is unable to place one before the other, sees them all as being added to the summoning pool at the same time, the summoning pool being pushed over max, then none of them actually get summoned.

My guess at a fix might be to alter the way it works so it adds a delay to the zombies being summoned and then sort of queuing them up when they are summoned in this specific manner, like there is a 1 round delay, the script summons one at the end of each round and every time one dies it checks to see if the script is already running and if so, increase the duration by one round.

Any sort of delay with the initial summoning should do it - this should also deal with the rotbringer zombie issue of them not getting their unique little rotbringer zombie buff (glowing green etc) which happens when more than 1 is summoned at the exact same moment.

On the same thread: in the previous chapter the Rotbringers corpse-less animating also produced (2 of the) rotbringer zombies where, in this chapter, they are just bog standard shamblers

From what I understand, while it does appear this way, It does actually work.

Its weird, I know but since the spell cant preempt what sort of damage the player is going to cause at any given moment this is the way it was implimented by the devs.

I'm pretty sure if you actually check the damage numbers, it does function.

[Pros:]

So I leveled an AM up to 5 earlier to get an idea of how the Arcane mimic functions and works as well as a few of the problems facing it.

To address a few things first, this is the rundown for the mimic ability as listed, in red are my comments on how things CURRENTLY work, which I suspect are mostly bugs

Mimic Spells ability:
Mimics get the Player Tool: Mimic Spells. By targeting another creature with the player tool the mimic copies the spells of the creature by the following conditions:
* If the target doesn't have a spellcasting class, this fails.
* If the distance between the mimic and the target is more than 10 meters, this fails. No current range limit
* The mimic only copies from spell circles they can currently cast as a sorcerer.
* The amount of spells copied from each level are the amount of spells the PC should be able to cast as a sorcerer in their current level.
* The copied spells are only part of the Wizard/Sorc spellbook. (this is a tech constraint I have no way around for now)
- If there's still cooldown, or the target is too far, nothing happens No current Cooldown, No current range limit. If you use it on something non suitable it wipes your current spellbook clean.
- If the creature is a subdued PC, this will always work It will always work regardless there is no DC save or request to check currently.
- If the creature is a hostile NPC or PC, they roll a Will save against their spells being mimicked. DC: 15 + SORCERER_LEVEL
- If the creature is a neutral PC, they get a dialog whether to submit or resist to having their spells mimicked
- If the creature is a neutral NPC, nothing happens It can be used on Neutral NPC's without issue at present. - Which is frankly one of the few reasons you can actually do low level quests, since it means you always have access to some low level spells.
The cooldown for the ability only triggers if they succeed in mimicking the spells

In addition to this a few things to note or clear up.
You can only mimic a maximum number of spells per spell level that sorcerors would have access to. I.E if you would normally have 3 level 2 spells at level 5 and  you mimic a wizard with 4 different level 2 spells in his slots, you will get the first 3 and skip the fourth.
When you level up with this perk, you lose access to all your current spells.
If you try to mimic yourself, a target with no spells, the ground or another invalid object such as a placable, you do not get any spells and you lose access to all your current spells.
Mimicing spells from another target does not refresh any/all of your spell slots, you're limited to the same number of spells per day that a sorceror of your level would normally get regardless of mimicing.
When you try to mimic a targets spells it displays a very obvious and distinct visual effect on both you and the target letting everyone know what you've just done.


So my opinion of this is that there isnt a clear enough vision of what this perk should be at present.
All of the perk bonuses are around  swapping spell kits quickly and at level 8, up to every 3 minutes - but there's no clear benefit to doing so, unless you're surrounded by sorcerors specifically and want to take advantage of having a very small portion of their kit available to you, but the reason this doesn't work at present is often many of these benefits and the utility and usefulness of the skills are tied to having Feat investments into spell focuses (and the heal skill, in positivists case). This is further a problem because it heavily impacts your ability to be a solo mage when you're stuck with whatever the last person you managed to get stuff off of had, or whatever the mobs have in any given quest, which could leave you unable to cast any spells at all of certain levels.

The idea and concept of quickly swapping around entire spellkits as well is problematic from a quality of life perspective as it means reorganising your entire hotbar every time you do this and thats a time consuming issue.

So Pro's and Cons as I see them with the perks current incarnation:
Pros:
Swap about spells on the fly allowing a significant amount of potential spell flexibility.

Cons:
Severe lack of specialisation leading to a more mediocre and much less consistant performance (You have to hope the spells you get line up with the Spell focuses you have)
QOL issues with swapping spells and having to work with the hotbar.
No other perk bonuses. The entire level 8 perk bonus does nothing if you dont have a sorceror nearby who's spells have modifications and the perk does not give the character anything other than +3 to 2 skills otherwise.
May not be able to swap about spells in combat anyway as Neutral PC's cannot submit to the request of having their spells stolen while in combat and a hostile character may make their save.[/li][/list]
Horrendous early game. If you dont know people who are willing to give you their spells, you need to go hostile to try and forcefully take them just to complete the early level quests.


The Path Forward.
First we need to establish if we want this to be slower, only swapping spells every so often or if we want it to be quicker, constantly trying to swap spells about and then we need to figure out a way to reward the player for actually doing that.

My suggestions would be as follows:
Shunt the bonuses from level 5 mimic to level 1 and level 8 mimic to level 5. These arent a big deal. They arent super impactful, let the players have them early.

Either remove, or improve on the "If Hostile/Neutral, then this happens" system. If we're intent on keeping it 'd suggest if hostile it gets a save, if neutral it doesnt. Or, if we're determined to keep the current system of resisting and allowing on a neutral, then allow the "Setally" command, if used on the mimic, to allow this to succeed automatically. Additionally, if used a neutral PC still force a saving throw if resisted or if the target is unable to open a conversation window at that time.

Then add a true level 8 bonus to effect depending on your vision for the perk.
If you want it to be slow and methodical, something like what Sankarul said about being able to move around a spell focus or you gain a spell focus/G Spell focus based on what perk it is probably fine if a bit underwhelming, something that rewards forward thinking about what you're likely to face.
If you instead want to go for this vision of quick switching spells and using multiple PC and NPC spellbooks over the course of a fight or quest, then instead give them some manner of benefit to actually doing that, like it refreshing some of your spell slots, empowering your next spell(s) with random metamagic, giving defencive buffs or maybe giving substantial buffs depending on who and what you just stole spells from.  Stole from a wizard with spell school necromancy? Gain SF NEcromancy and 25% immunity to Negative energy until you swap. Target a Cultist sorc? Gain GSF Conjuration and the +2 rounds/level duration on summons.

There are definately some very, very specific circumstances wherre the current interation might be more useful than a regular perked sorceror, but even then it comes with a whole host of downsides and restrictions, quality of life issues which, in addition to having basically no benefits from your perk while actively in any given spellbook I dont think this hot-swapping sorceror is going to be a particularly viable choice.

I know dispel and breach traps are in the world.

Do you refer specifically to player placable ones?