Time in ALFA - Spells

[FoamBats4All]

We have pretty overwhelming community desire to change time at the Time in ALFA poll. However, a few people have requested that we have two discussions/polls -- one for spell durations, one for narrative time. That seems like the next logical step, so here you go.

[kid]

The way this pole is phrased is pretty one sided.

How about a few more options? like.. should we incease hourly only if we decrease 10min/level ones?

Assuming we dont move to 1:1 time comp (which in itself might disrupt balance if spells match time)

Any changes to hour/lv spells without similar change to 10min/spell would change game balance.

[FoamBats4All]

The way this pole is phrased is pretty one sided.

How about a few more options? like.. should we incease hourly only if we decrease 10min/level ones?

Assuming we dont move to 1:1 time comp (which in itself might disrupt balance if spells match time)

Any changes to hour/lv spells without similar change to 10min/spell would change game balance.

Any change would change game balance. And I got talked to last time by a few people who thought the poll had too many options. You're the first one to comment that there are too few options. A simple yes/no is better.

I'll keep my opinion on the other stuff out of the thread for now. Not interested in forum catfights, just numbers.

[Zelknolf]

I'm not sure that we can answer this one with just "yes" or "no" as it's currently phrased. Resting restrictions might be a conditional to answer yes, or the handling of spells which are currently hour/level but are rather powerful even at 7 RL minutes and/or are shorter-duration in PnP (death ward and protection from alignment come to mind). People who believe as much may vote on either side, depending on what the question is understood to be (that is, whether or not we extend hr/lvl spells in isolation of other changes, and if not, what the order of operations will be).

Indeed, I voted yes here, but if the question is meant to be "Should we change hr/lvl spells to last longer and change nothing else?" my answer would be an emphatic no.

[FoamBats4All]

I'm not sure that we can answer this one with just "yes" or "no" as it's currently phrased. Resting restrictions might be a conditional to answer yes, or the handling of spells which are currently hour/level but are rather powerful even at 7 RL minutes and/or are shorter-duration in PnP (death ward and protection from alignment come to mind). People who believe as much may vote on either side, depending on what the question is understood to be (that is, whether or not we extend hr/lvl spells in isolation of other changes, and if not, what the order of operations will be).

Indeed, I voted yes here, but if the question is meant to be "Should we change hr/lvl spells to last longer and change nothing else?" my answer would be an emphatic no.

Well, yeah. Hour/level spells are related to, well, hours. It's hard to discuss one change in time-related functions without talking about everything. However, a few people asked to split the issues -- yourself being one of them.

Death Ward and Protection from Alignment will eventually get nerfed down to their PnP durations, whenever someone with the know-how gets around to doing it. Has happened to plenty of other spells, and has nothing really to do with this poll, it'll happen at some point either way.

[vergin_sacrifice]

It seems to me, that what really needs to be discussed is the basis of time dilation. Why was it sped up for spells in the first place? If the reasons are still valid, they need to be taken into consideration for the final decision of what change or not change at all.

Personally, I believe that the spell and rest cycles need to remain paired somehow. If the spells are cycled through 3x as fast, then should have to wait 1/3rd of the time to rest.

I know of the argument that if in a DM run event, the dm can choose to allow rest or force at any time. But they can just as easily not, and no one gets to play with a DM all the time in any case.

[Regas]

The argument that dms can fix spell issues is really a bit more complex than it seems. Current hr per level spells are a nightmare in my weekly campaign as they force our mid level casters to forgo basic protection spells until the last possible moment and once used contribute to a silly amount of rushing and anxiety on the part of the players, especially casters. The problem with force rest is it re-sets all the spells for a caster, not just the ones with the problematic duration. It seems to me that just boosting the hr per level spells to maybe twice as long (14 mins per hour) and addressing the obvious non-canon duration might be a quick fix. Lengthening the ig hours to 13 mins (or whatever makes sense close to that) is better still as it does not change the relationship between resting and duration.

[FoamBats4All]

Six members so far are against the idea. I know there seems to be a strong majority asking for this to be reviewed but I'd like to hear from those not in support of making the change...

I'm betting that some of you have good reasons why you don't want to see time compression change and I really want to have a detailed look at the pros and cons.

Thanks

Reg

Only 3 members opposed in this one, but still, would be beneficial to hear those concerns.

[t-ice]

It seems to me that just boosting the hr per level spells to maybe twice as long (14 mins per hour) and addressing the obvious non-canon duration might be a quick fix. Lengthening the ig hours to 13 mins (or whatever makes sense close to that) is better still as it does not change the relationship between resting and duration.

This.

Changing 10mins/level spells for half their duration (5mins per level) might also improve the balance (which pretty much seems to mean stoneskin). Though could be tech messy, I gather?

Another thing to consider might be to remove all spells with duration in minutes on ATs that are flagged to constitute some IC time travel that is not IG represented. Which needs work on modules, I suppose.

[boombrakh]

[Swift]

[Zelknolf]

Another thing to consider might be to remove all spells with duration in minutes on ATs that are flagged to constitute some IC time travel that is not IG represented. Which needs work on modules, I suppose.

One of the major limitations that we have right now with spells with duration is that we are unable to access the duration after it's applied, except in the crudest sense (we can identify permanent v. not permanent ... and that's as detailed as it gets). Doing something like this would be of equal complexity to coding time dilation on account-- it would be "possible" in that we could rewrite every spell to assume a different scheme of calculating spell duration, but the cost of doing so would be rewriting every spell.



Also, heroism and conviction are 10 min/lvl spells. People don't notice them so much, because they're bonuses and not DR, but they're pretty big deals all the same-- easily gamechangers in fights.

[t-ice]

One of the major limitations that we have right now with spells with duration is that we are unable to access the duration after it's applied, except in the crudest sense (we can identify permanent v. not permanent ... and that's as detailed as it gets).

Huh? So once we have a spell effect on the PC we can't trace back what spell it is? Or once we know "it's the effect of the haste spell", the code can't tell "haste is a round per level spell"?

[FoamBats4All]

One of the major limitations that we have right now with spells with duration is that we are unable to access the duration after it's applied, except in the crudest sense (we can identify permanent v. not permanent ... and that's as detailed as it gets).

Huh? So once we have a spell effect on the PC we can't trace back what spell it is? Or once we know "it's the effect of the haste spell", the code can't tell "haste is a round per level spell"?

Alas, yes*. We also can't access the duration to see how much time a spell has left, or modify that value.

(* Well, okay, we -can-, it'd just be expensive and cumbersome to write. We could make a list of every round/minute duration spell, and compare them to GetEffectSpellId for each effect on the player.)

[Ithildur]

All things considered, 10 min/lvl spells generally come out alright if cast once the group hits an adventuring area/dungeon (the delays of skill checks, dialog, descriptions, etc balanced out by travel times sometimes being faster in real time than IC time); the problem occurs when someone casts them before say going on a trip (say TSM's overland map) that would take a day ICly but only take 30 minutes real time.

The current solution is to simply not cast these spells before starting out on overland/long distance travel; use some self restraint if you're a player. If a DM is present and players are observed casting them before starting out on long distance travel, "You've traveled now for a full day, your 10 min/lvl spells are long gone" and removing the spells should drive home the point.

Overall, 10 minute/lvl spells seem fine as they are if the above rule of thumb is observed; I don't think I've ever heard either players or DMs complain about them. Nor do folks complain about min/lvl spells generally (even though they consistently run out before they should ICly); the main ones that are problematic are the hour/lvl spells.