Gnomish Inventor Quasiclass

How about having Spot reduce conceal for cannon instead of listen? There would be enough background noise that mobs fairly far off would be drowned out by nearer mobs and party members. I would also expect that cannon not be able to target anything at point-blank range.

I can see Lore having an effect on accuracy or power of equipment.

Could we have a flying ship that crashes every now and then?
And sell turnips?

Here is my idea about the Gnomish Inventor quasi:

Gnomish inventors should wear either heavy, mechanized, clockwork battle suits or laboratory aprons, depending on their control class.

An inventor that spends most of his time in a lab gains more gadgets. They wears aprons most of the time.
An inventor that spends most of his time in the field, testing, can greatly tweak and improve upon his limited selection of gadgets. Most often, this includes an improved Battle Suit.
When a new gadget is obtained, it starts out at rank 0. Improving a rank requires upgrades (costs are cumulative). Some gadgets can have higher ranks than others. CC rogue provides more upgrades, but CC wizard provides more gadgets. Each gadget has it's own skill and/or feat requirement.

Or perhaps the battle suit should be the only gadget that features ranks (in other words, it improves with rogue levels).

One major gadget is the Battle Suit.
-ranks 1, 2 and 3+ require medium, medium and heavy armor proficiency respectively, as well as a number of ranks in craft armor.
-The Inventor can 'suit up', gaining a large construct appearance. Should the gnome die while inside the armor, the armor is destroyed and the gnome will have to put on a new one. Only a limited number of suits can be carried at a single time. Resting replenished this number. (Similar to CoT divine wrath.)
-The battle suit is fully customisable, featuring a number of 'gadget slots' depending on the rank of the suit. These slots can hold ammo, bazooka-wands, bombs, claws, whatever. When a gadget is placed in a slot, this gadget may be used as a swift action (with exception of ammo and weapons; switching ammunition and weaponry does not count as a swift action, but is instantaneous nonetheless).
--Examples: put slicers in a slot to quickly change the type of bolt to slicer.
put implosives in a slot to throw an implosive at a nearby enemy without having to interrupt shooting.
-Putting on a battle suit, gives the gnome temporary hitpoints, 100% spellfailure, +12 strength, dexterity and constitution, physical immunities and immunity to sneak attacks and perhaps some more benefits.
-Some gadgets, that would otherwise occupy an inventory slot, can be placed on the suit instead, but only one of every type may be applied at a single time. These include:
--goggles
--earpieces
--gloves
--armors

It looks like a lot of the cannister's and bomb's are just copies of spells that arcane casters can cast anyway. Is the DC expected to be higher than normal? Or lower, and the benefit is the ability to use as many as you want (rather than being limited by spell slots)? I'm not seeing much reason to use ones that cast Grease, Web, Tasha's, TClap, Scint Sphere, etc.

An AoE stoning cannister would be nice.

Not sure if it's possible, but a very small AoE Death of Magic-like effect could be cool too, that affected everyone (including party members). Maybe Silence would be easier; like an emanating Silence pulse from the point of impact.

Would the Bard/Curse song bombs only work in a radius from the point of impact? I guess if that's the case, then (if possible) I'd prefer to see it as a very large aura, or possibly have both options, and change it to a helm/goggle type of item.

I still wonder if it's better to have a variety of different cannisters that modify the Curse Song independently, ala the way we split out Curse Songs for Bards. That is, one cannister lowers saves (all, or one for Fort, one for Will, one for Reflex), one lowers AC, one lowers AB, one lowers damage, etc. That would help offset or work with other Bards' Curse Song, other GI's, Shifters, and PM's. For example, if the Bard in the party gimped on lowering skills (for wahtever reason), the GI could focus on using the bomb/cannister that lowers skills more. Or a party may say "A Shifter + a GI using the AC-lowering bomb allows us to do this without a Bard". Things like that.

It's been so long, I can't recall how the armors work. Are they temporary items that augment your current armor?

Is Tenser's going to work for this quasi? Rogues are generally low on AB anyway; throw in some pre-epic Wizard levels (depending on when the 10/10 requirement must be met - that wasn't in the post), and it's even lower. I guess I'm wondering what benefits you have of taking Rogue levels over Wizard levels.

Moving whatever you like is fine by me. Nothing there that I wouldn't want others to see.

As for BAB, a 10/10 pre-epic split would result in +12/+7/+2. Requiring the levels by 22, and going 12 Rogue/10 Wizard (in that order) would result in +13/+8/+3. If you did move it to 25, that would allow someone to splash 4 of a full BAB class pre-epic, for a max of +15/+10/+5. So that's still 5 off max, but the same as a pure Rogue. Not as bad as I thought, though 4 splash levels means lower GI abilities (presumably).

Implosion != Silence. In fact I prefer Silence over Implode, for Raks and Screams. That was my main motivation for requesting it. It would let you tactically spawn Raks more easily, and be another tactical way of dealing with Screams. Maybe it's too much, I don't know. But having this pulsating Silence "thing" seems neat to me.

I understand the caster levels for a GI would be very low for the spells mentioned, but I was thinking more along the lines of the motivation to make this over a mage. Those abilities I listed are just remakes of what a mage can already do, but the "real" mage can still cast instakill spells, and do huge damage to boot. The way I see it so far:

Pros:
- Part-time Bard, with pseudo songs and KV
- Some nice Rogue bonuses like +50 Search/Find Traps
- Implode (which canister is this? I don't see it listed currently, unless it's the Vacuum - I took that to mean it physically moves mobs to the point of impact, which seemed really neat to me)
- Some resists (Energy Buffer is already pretty much the same thing, depending just how high the resists are, and work for all elements, not just one)

Cons:
- No access to Orbs, currently the biggest damage dealing spells in the mod
- No epics
- No instakilling spells
- Inability to sneak everything in the mod, like a pure Rogue can
- Lower damage in general, due to lack of great damage ammo (much like current xbow Rogues), fewer attacks/round, and the aforementioned lack of big damage spells.

And I still want Quikrete!

These 3 things from MK all sounded really good:



I would add a telescoping snorkel or some such for water-breathing. And Quikcrete.

I'm just thinking about this from the perspective "Why do I make this over a mage?" mostly. I can see people reincarnating Rogues to this, because Rogues are, generally, somewhat dull. I know a LOT of people who are looking forward to this quasi, since it was announced years ago, and I want to make sure it's as unique and fun as we can make it.

This amount of edits sounds more like a whole new class than a quasi, far more than any other quasis to date.

The Paramagic Resonator does sound nice, I kind of picture it like the CoT aura effect.

I'm a bit concerned about the portable cannon though. If you get an Elite Balor/Pit Fiend and the portable cannon locks on to them, you're kind of screwed given that it ignores sr and will be healing them for thousands of points a round.

Moved 4 posts from the DM forum thread to here - looks like they get dumped in chronologically, instead of at the end - posts are phal's and my own. I'll be formatting up a new template for the quasi after this, and posting it here. All input still welcome.

Funky

My first impression is that Rogues don't give up very much in taking 10 levels of Wizard to gain a ton of fun gadgets, whereas Wizards lose almost everything (offensively).

I tried to make a viable choice between Int and Dex, and Rogue and Wizard. Int is geared towards spells cast through bolts (and requires more than just 10 Wiz levels to unlock spells), while Dex is geared towards damage (you get your Dex mod added to bolt damage). Rogues and Wizards get different sets of abilities (was trying to make it so Rogues get better Totems and cannon ammo, while Wizards got Golems and gadgets, but it didn't really work out that way...).

Even with 10 levels of Rogue (or more), Wizards can still cast a few useful spells that ignore SR, albeit not at maximum CL:
o Mass Blind/Deaf
o Grease
o Gust (vs fumes which have no SR)
o Evard's (AB will be a bit low though)
o Great Thunderclap
And with an NB, many more mobs will be vulnerable to Weird or Wail.

The ideas listed below still don't seem to be very cohesive... ideas are all over the place and shoved into random places. There are also no bombs/grenades or armor/goggles, which would be interesting mechanics.

About the abilities, I tried not to replicate existing abilities that were already very popular (stoning, for one). I wanted to encourage the use of the lesser used abilities, such as Stun/Para/Daze (just remembered, left out Sleep), Slow, KD, Disarm, Entangle... as well as abilities that parties find it hard to live without: KD pickup, construct killer, wind killer...

Some abilities were put in specifically to duplicate possibly missing classes. Pure Rogue or Wizard Inventors get a prominent instakill ability from another class (Mortal Strike/Called Shot and Implosion respectively), but in a limited manner (you can't pick the target). Warforged golems provide a Battletide aura (barely any Clerics around these days) (woulda been Dragonfear aura, but there are so few of those so that'd stack too easily with existing Clerics and be TOO useful).


- free Brew Potion and Craft Wand
- Gate spell cast as if ESF (or LSF with specialization)
- two Wall of Fires (Stones) can be summoned at a time
- add Dex mod to damage
- use Int for xbox AB if higher than Dex
- DCs for abilities use Dex or Int mod (whichever is higher) + Craft Weapon/5

WL = Wiz lvl
RL = Rogue lvl
GIL = Gnomish Inventor lvl
CW = Craft Weapon
Levels below include LLs.

Gnomish Inventors can "imbue" their bolts with certain spells. Unless otherwise noted, this drains one use of the spell, and for GIL/15 rounds, when a bolt finds its target, it will have the indicated effect. (I find this part very interesting, it basically allows you to cast spells really, really fast. As such, DCs and effects will have to be lower than usual spells to account for at least 6 attacks (and thus casts) per round.)

They can place totems as well, which have persistent effect and do not move. Totems drain one charge per round they are out, with Dex or Int mod charges per day, whichever is greater.

The cannon has its own special ammos, but can also be imbued by certain spells. It will fire the kind of ammo it has until chnaged. The cannon targets random enemies and shoots once per round.

Golems each last one turn.


Rogue (Skill Mastery uses GIL)
---
15: Particularized Ferromagnets (ammo) - cannon covers enemies in a small AoE in fine magnetized powder, lowering their Elec immunity by 5% (stacks to 10%), and helps bolts find their target (-2 AC)
20: Poison Bolts - Fort or lowers Str, Dex, and Con by 1d4, lasts 2 rounds
25: Airblast Bombs (ammo) - as Gust of Wind, including KD effect
30: Aural Unwavifier (totem) - silence in a large aura
35: Tar Ball (ammo) - Reflex vs Slow, medium AoE
40: Superelectromagno Generatamator - strong magnetic currents attempt to rip the weapon of out nearby enemies' hands each round
45: (no L9 spells) Tazebolt - Fort vs Stun, Will vs Daze, Reflex vs Para
50: (no L6+ spells) Shelgarn's Persistent Blade spell (golem) - summons a Mechanical Sword Spider with on-hit: Fort or die vs Crit immunity


Imbuable spells (Spells with effects listed here use Int to calculate DC, and GIL as CL, including SP feats. Spells marked as "Drain" will drain one use when a bolt lands, instead of being a persistent effect as described above. with a 50 Rogue/10 Wizard split, spells up to L5 can still be cast.)
---
(L2 spell) Melf's Acid Arrow - bolts do acid damage, cannon hits a single target, lowering Acid immunity by 5% (stacks to 20%)
(3) Flame Arrow - bolts do fire damage, cannon hits a single target, lowering Fire immunity by 5% (stacks to 20%)
(4) Ice Storm - bolts do cold damage, cannon launches boulders for Blud damage (non-loot breaking)
(5) Feeblemind - as the spell, Magic damage
(6) Undeath to Death (Drain when target is undead) - Undead Will or die, Divine damage
(7) Rebuke (Drain) - Will save or die, target is immune if they have Mind, Confusion, or Fear immunity
(8) Greater Planar Binding (Drain if target is summoned) - Fort vs Paralyze, also Will vs Banishment where applicable
(9) Energy Drain - 1d4 levels drained, Negative damage
(9) PWK (Drain when a target is killed with this) - as the spell

Wizard
---
15: none (can cast L8 spells)
20: Deconstruction Wrench (item) - touch attack item, Crumble on constructs/petrified
30: Mordenkainen's Sword spell (golem) - summons a small mechanical spider, which runs around picking up anyone that is KDed, otherwise casts Grease with your GIL as CL, otherwise shoots Sticky Bolts
40: Create Undead spell (golem) - summons a Warforged construct, a powerful tank that occasionally Initimidates its target and has a permanent Battletide aura
50: BBoD spell (totem) - summons Black Gizmo of Disaster, every round casts Implosion on self (same radius, so placement very important), SP = CW/2



Both
---
20: Flashbangs (ammo) - cannon launches Flashbangs, medium AoE, Will vs Blind, Fort vs Deaf
25: Curse Bolts - single target, increased AoE at WL 15, RL 50, and GIL 40 (cumulative), with Bard level equal to highest level of WL or RL, using CW instead of Perform;
Fortificationizer (totem) - effects of Bard song, with Bard level equal to highest of WL or RL, using CW intead of Perform
30: Sticky Bolts - single target (AoE @ RL15, and can be used as ammo), Reflex vs Entanglement (on save, still slowed)
35: Gyro Bolt - Reflex vs KD for GIL/6 rounds
40: Breach Bolts - dispel check on one effect (normal DC vs d20 + GIL + (Craft Weapon/15)), lowers SR by 1 (stacks to GIL/5, same as Bestow Curse, which ignores SR anyways)
45: Collapsible Spear Bolt - massive piercing damage, lowers Pierce resist by GIL/9 and immunity by 1% (stacks up to RL/5%)
50: Gyro Bolts upgraded to Bigby's Bashing Bolts, which do Blud damage and original effect
55: Steel Golem (golem) - like 'thids golems, soaks up Elec damage until it dies or spell expires, then explodes;
Teslafier Enhancerometer (totem) - increases rolls by up to +6 for stat checks, and up to +12 for skill checks
60: Heartseeker Bolts - fort or die if not immune to Death and Disint, does some neg dmg;