Heroic Fantasy Handbook - Eldritch Spells to Arcane

General ACKS Forums House Rules
1

I have been building an updated spell list for Arcane casters, in particular Shaded Arcane.

As part of this, in the intermediate step I have actually came up with a list of all the HFH spells converted from Eldritch to Arcane.

Here it is: HFH Eldritch to Arcane Spell List - Google Sheets

The colour markings mean:
Blue: I allowed a 2.5 point “breakthrough” on any particular spell, so spells that end up very close to the border after getting an adjustment of point cost are reduced down by 2.5.
Red: Spells that have a lot of design space (floating around the X3-X6 where X is Spell Level - 1 in points). These are spells that would likely not actually be created by a Mage. Sling Stone in particular is bad as it costs 4 points under Arcane. I am considering adjusting these spells down a spell level for Arcane, but it would be nice to hear people’s thoughts.
Purple: Spells that already had a breakthrough in the Eldritch rules are unchanged but are marked with the hideous purple colour. For example, Dark Whisper is 25.5 but level 2. This is a 5 point breakthrough.

Does anyone have any thoughts on these?

1 Like
2

This is really useful. I’ll do a deep dive on this and offer feedback. I hadn’t tackled this project yet, and am really grateful you did!

3

I have added the 6+ spells as an additional column for proper tracking (Angelic Aura in Death and Healing Circle in Healing). I had also copied the Wall spells across wrong but they’re fixed now.

I think the main takeaways are:

  • There are no “HFH”-style Blast spells for Arcane level 5-6.
  • There are no Weave-style spells for Arcane level 5-6.

These are the two main design spaces with missing spells, I think.

4

It doesn’t look like I can edit my original post, which is bizarre.

Here is the second step to my rebuilding of the Arcane List (which is open to Comments on GDrive):

The colour coding is quite clear. I have removed massive breakthrough spells (by which I mean Magic Missile, Fireball and Sleep).

I have got a reasonably detailed analysis sheet for spell type per level. I need to go through the PC types for the ones that currently have question marks, and to go through HFH for all the sub-types.

I think I need to add Cantrips as another spell level.

None of the spell levels are massively far from 60 spells per level. The biggest ones are level 5 and level 6, which are missing 17 spells and 15 spells respectively. These spell levels have nearly no blast spells whatsoever.

Any thoughts? Is there any spells that I am missing?

The next step is identifying White / Grey / Black and building / adding spells to make up to 60 spells per level (which would make a pleasant 1d6+1d10 roll).

5

I have done it and applied some conditional formating, see link in last post.

Some findings:

  • Weave / Wall spells need to be clearly delineated. You have Weave Smoke and Wall of Smoke both at level 1, for instance.
  • Similarly with the different types of Blast (creation vs environmental).
  • Not sure whether to remove the “Call” spells that are partially replaced by “Animal Call I/II/III”. I think “Herd / Pack Call I/II/III” may also have a place.
  • The rest of the spells work reasonably well, I think.

Changes that I may or may not do:

  • HFH-style spells at odd levels, Core-style spells at even levels. This works out reasonably okay with the Blast and Wall spells with the way 1.5 division works.
  • This would mean “Environment”-style spells (draw from environmental source) are at odd levels, “Create”-style spells (create from magic) are at even levels.
  • HFH-style blast spells need making for level 5, Core-style blast spells need making for level 6.
  • Weave spells at levels 1, 3 and 5, Wall spells at levels 2, 4 and 6.
  • Perhaps Animal at odd levels (1, 3, 5) and Herd / Pack at even levels (2, 4, 6).

Any thoughts, @archon ?

6

So spell concept classification for Blast.

Blast
Assigning elemental effects to each of these spells, as well as streamlining them a little bit.

1st, 3rd, 5th and 6th level spells can be used with Elementalism to assign an elemental effect, which also gets them their appropriate effect (Ignite with Fire, Gust with Wind, Slow with Water, Knockdown with Earth).

They can be used unaligned but without the additional effect as Grey spells. This is basically a cost assigned to the spell to remove the Black magic designation.

  • 1st Level - Blast (Bolt): Create elemental effect and use it to attack, similar to Magic Missile. Requires attack throw. Maybe change name to “Dart”.
  • 2nd Level - Blast (Draw): Use the environment to create a stronger attack. No attack throw.
  • 3rd Level - Blast (Blast): Create elemental effect with AoE, similar to fireball. Saving throw versus Blast avoids?
  • 4th Level - Blast (Rile): Use an environment effect to create a large blast attack. Saving throw versus Blast avoids half.
  • 5th Level - Blast (Aura): Create aura effect around given character.
  • 6th Level - Blast (Storm): Create long-time large area effect.

Examples
Fire Bolt (1st Level Arcane): [1d6 damage per level (27), maximum 3d damage (x0.33)] (8.91), ignite flammable object (10), blast is elemental fire (x1), instantaneous (x1), no saving throw permitted (x1), 1 creature + 2 per 5 additional levels (x3), attack throw required to hit target (x0.35), 30’ range (x0.6), Arcane (x1)
Ice Bolt (1st Level Arcane): [1d6 damage per level (27), maximum 3d damage (x0.33), instantaneous (x1), no saving throw permitted (x1)] (8.91), [halve target’s movement rate for spell duration (5), 1 round per level (x4), saving throw avoids spell effect (x0.5)] (10), blast is elemental water (x1), 1 creature + 2 per 5 additional levels (x3), attack throw required to hit target (x0.35), 30’ range (x0.6), Arcane (x1)
Wizardly Bolt (1st Level Arcane):: [1d6 damage per level (27), maximum 3d damage (x0.33)] (8.91), instantaneous (x1), no saving throw permitted (x1), 1 creature + 2 per 5 additional levels (x3), attack throw required to hit target (x0.35), 30’ range (x0.6), Arcane (x1)

The cost of these is exactly the same.

7

Summoning
Thinking on Summoning as a type, there is, by my assessment, another form of spell missing.

So far we have:

  • Call: Get animal from nearby on same plane. (White)
  • Conjure: Get creature from another plane, not under your control. (Black)
  • Summon: Get creature from another plane, under your control. (Black)

There is a fourth (Grey) type that I think is implied in certain HFH spells:

  • Animate Object: Get creature from inanimate object, under your control. (Grey)

This the type used in, for example, Brazen Bull from HFH.

The only issue with this is the use of “Animate” because it is used in “Animate Dead”. I was thinking “Enliven” or “Invigorate” but they imply life more than “Animate” does.

Example spells for this would be:

  • Animate Tool (1st Level Arcane): Cause a tool to spring up and begin performing a task as commanded for the next day. The tool counts as being able to perform 3sp worth of work for the day. Using this incorrectly (for example, commanding a hammer to brush or a brush to hammer) almost always results in the overly comedic destruction of the tool.
  • Animate Statue (3rd Level Arcane): Cause a statue (as a monster equivalent to size, include some sort of table) to begin moving as if it were a construct. The statue will obey the caster’s commands to the best of it’s ability.
  • Animate Earthen Army (5th Level Arcane): Causes an platoon made of earth to spring up and follow the caster’s commands.

Details on these needs to be hammered out.

8

Good assessment. More needs to be done in this vein, I agree.

1 Like