I think there's a general consensus that the way helms are originally handled in Spelljammer, whereby sitting in one even for a little while completely kills your spellcasting capabilities for the day, is a Bad Idea. One alternative is to rule that helms use x spell levels per hour; the problem here is that it favors sorcerers (or even specialist wizards) over wizards. Maybe some of you wouldn't consider that a problem, but I do.
So here's my idea: each x hours (or part thereof), the spell uses up all spells of a given level, starting with the highest level and working downwards. (Alternatively, it could start at the lowest level and work upwards -- which do you think is better?) If you've already cast all your spells at a given level, then there's no spell energy avaiable to power the helm, and that spell level gets skipped.
So for example, say you have a 7th-level wizard on the helm. As soon as he sits down and gets attuned to the helm, all his 4th-level spell slots are gone. After x hours, his 3rd-level spells get used up, and so on until he reaches 0th-level spells, after which he's completely drained of spell energy and can't operate the helm any longer.
There's a certain logic to this: although you'll have fewer high-level spells than low-level ones, this is balanced by the higher amount of energy per spell. (This breaks down at extremely high caster levels, where a 20th-level wizard has the same number of spells at every level, but you can't have everything.) As for the fact that low-level casters will have fewer spells at any given level than high-level ones, that's accounted for by the fact that the high-level caster can make the ship move faster.
Wyvern
A Spelljamming Helm just simply works. To change course or speed, a helmsman needs to make a concentration check (DR 10). This action takes 1 round (or full action or whatever it is these days). A helm can move ships ranging from Huge (at least 16' long) to Colossal (at most 120' long). Ships move at 50' per round.
That's it. Maybe different DRs for different actions, but nothing fancy. ;)
I agree, be simpler that way
Just assign DCs for various actions the helmsman must take.
Also while in contact with the helm, a helmsman may not cast spells
that is simple and makes sense, a low level drain/field or whatever preventing spellcasting of any type, and probably use of Spell-Like and Su abilities too?
Round 1: Change course
Round 2: Cast a spell
Round 3: Change course again
Round 4: Use that magic item
Etc.
I like seeing that somebody else was thinking that haveing the spell drain as a silly thing in the helm. To hard to come up with a viable way to controll it.
Not a matter that I think the magic drain was silly, but rather the context of the 3e game makes it implausable. The assumed party is much, much smaller (almost half), and there is far less use of henchmen & hirelings these days than before. Where as before you might have 6-8 characters, many of which could use spells, plus hirelings & henchmen, now the trend seems to be 3-4 characters and maybe a cohort or two at most (many of which might be animals!). Pile the headache of trying balance spell-drain into the CR system, and its more trouble than its worth. Spell-drain is no big deal for a large party (in the Jammers PBEM, we've got something like 14 PCs & 2 helm-using NPCs, with 6 PCs that can use the helm), but in a 4-man party its ugly.
I'm just tired of
with it.The "it just works" sounds to be about as good as any option to me.
I like the idea of a spell drain that's progressive, over time -- the longer you fly the ship, the more spells or spell points you lose. I don't particularly have a problem with sorcerers or specialist wizards getting extra points for this -- after all, a specialist gets extra spells, so what's the difference?
Besides, you can always give regular wizards some other sort of advantage... better maneuverability, faster maximum speeds, etc. to even things out.
Personally, one of the biggest problem I have with the original rules is that the helmsman can't run around and do things like the rest of the party -- which means that nobody ever really wants to fly the ship, you're just stuck in a chair. But a truly awesome helm that lets a character go anywhere on the ship is supposed to be extraordinarily rare. I'd like to see a helm system where the character flying the ship has some measure of freedom -- which, I know, creates another set of problems, but these are more easily addressed & solved.
Pax,
krad
I too had a problem with... sit on helm, poof! no more spellcasting for you for the day. And if you get off, whether its forced combat or, as has been said already, you need to go to the bathroom... your done. Another serious problem when you run a high level campaign... sit on the helm, and poof! you are done for the next 2 days (or more)!!! Because that is how long it takes a high level caster to re-memorize all his spells. That seems like one helluva penalty.
Draining a level's worth of spells means that once you sit down, you can get up again and do something. Sit down again and your next level spells are gone (even if you hadn't used your full 2 or 3 hrs before - a penalty for "interruption"). Also, this way a higher level spellcaster can still do a full day and have spells left, while a very low level caster will be drained (an advantage of higher level/experience). I'd rule that the last "gasp" of spell energy (the draining of your 1st level spells) is enough to keep the helm going for the remainder of a "shift" (kinda like once a flywheel gets going), but if you get off during this last stage, your done.
Denis, aka "Maldin"
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Doesnt need to affect lifejammers at all. That is an evil, almost a controled cursed, item. Just because you dont have spells drained doesnt mean doing away from other draining aspects of some helms. You can make lifejammers a cheaper form of helm, therefore more tempting for evil characters to use than actually buying a true helm. "Slaves are cheap" mentality. You can still have furnaces too. They are crude helms that drain othertypes of magic to provide motive force. True helms are minor artifacts, other helms are standard magic items that are cheaper & have a draining effect.
I don't think I agree with this... sure, "slaves are cheap," but when you've got a regular helm, spelljamming is free. Why would lifejammer-using races keep using slaves (which take up air, room, possibly even water/food, and which require expense & effort to capture) when they could simply get a regular helm and never worry about it again? Would the cost difference between a lifejammer and a regular helm really worth it?
I don't really buy into the "minor artifact" line of thinking either. Regular helms are everywhere -- every ship's got at least one, from a mosquito ship to an elven armada. In fact, on an armada, every single elven flitter has one too. When you can create one with a simple spell and some money, the word "artifact" doesn't really come into play.
I still don't like the idea of a helm draining all spells immediately and then the helmsman can't get up from the seat, but there's for certain a middle ground there. For example, draining one spell at a time as the journey progresses -- just like using up fuel. Slightly more complex than the original system, but really no more difficult than keeping track of the ship's air and food, and could be done at the same time.
Pax,
Krad
I don't really buy into the "minor artifact" line of thinking either. Regular helms are everywhere -- every ship's got at least one, from a mosquito ship to an elven armada. In fact, on an armada, every single elven flitter has one too. When you can create one with a simple spell and some money, the word "artifact" doesn't really come into play.
I still don't like the idea of a helm draining all spells immediately and then the helmsman can't get up from the seat, but there's for certain a middle ground there. For example, draining one spell at a time as the journey progresses -- just like using up fuel. Slightly more complex than the original system, but really no more difficult than keeping track of the ship's air and food, and could be done at the same time.
Pax,
Krad
The original rules referred to them as artifact level items. They were on MOST ships, not all. Alot of the smaller ships were not equipped with helms until a character put one on. That was done originally to help inforce the idea that you had to get a helm from the Arcane.
Under 3e style magic item construction, they wouldnt really have to be that powerful, and the Arcane wouldnt really have a monopoly. If you want to perserve that feel, you can have all "lesser" helms draining of some sort. Any "true" helm purchased from the Arcane can be non-draining.
So a wizard who operates a minor helm at the slowest speed for an hour might lose one first level spell. Spellcasters effectively spend their spells to power a helm, it doesn't drain away all their spells at once. The more powerful the spellcaster the longer and faster the vessel can travel.
I think there's a general consensus that the way helms are originally handled in Spelljammer, whereby sitting in one even for a little while completely kills your spellcasting capabilities for the day, is a Bad Idea.
Very Bad indeed. My own list of complaints about that includes:
- Why do helms not differentiate between wizard and clerical magic since clerics do not memorize their spells - their spells are granted?
- The higher level helmsman the more spells he has. Under 2E and earlier rules that meant that after even 1 minute on the helm a 20th level wizard who got off the helm for any reason (bathroom?) had to rememorize every spell before he could spend even 1 useful minute on the helm again. Under rules for rememorizing spells at that time it meant that at 13th level a LOWER level spellcaster could spend more time on the helm in a day because the higher level helmsman had to spend so much time OFF the helm rememorizing - regardless of the time actually spent on the helm.
- Use of a helm on a regular basis makes any spellcaster useless for anything but running the helm because he's either ON the helm (and thus will have no spells when he gets off of it) or he's OFF the helm and thus is resting or restudying spells. Since a spellcaster must have a full complement of studied spells to use a helm if the helmsman is 13th level or higher he will not be able to use the helm until the next day!
Now under 3E some of that will have changed because it changed the mechanics of regaining spells, but the suggested method still doesn't address core problems with the original notion of using spells:
One alternative is to rule that helms use x spell levels per hour; the problem here is that it favors sorcerers (or even specialist wizards) over wizards.
Well it would favor spellcasters with higher spell level totals regardless. The real problem I see is that it doesn't fix the fact that it USES spell capacity for such a stupidly mundane purpose. If your characters were on a ship on the ocean you would scream bloody murder if a DM expected your wizard to power sailing ships with his spells instead of... sails. It makes no sense to do so in Spelljammer because it just completely trashes the reason why players have SPELLcasters in the game of D&D. It isn't to be a battery for a boat. It's to be able to CAST SPELLS.
The best idea for being able to run a helm is to make it a feat. That feat should be available to ANY class. Why? Because I just cannot see Blackbeard the Pirate (a straight-classed fighter) unable to BE a pirate, to command his pirate ship unless he's got a spindly guy in robes sitting on a chair to actually make it move.
Besides, continuing to try to stick to the original method only saddles you with needless additional complexity as you play with numbers. You're rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic when you really just need greater simplicity. Like a number of other aspects of Spelljammer helms just aren't as fun and elegant as they might seem at first. Spelljammer was conceived under 2E rules. When 3E came along they tore the entire frickin' game of D&D down to its basic components and then built it back up piece by piece. I'd suggest that the same needs to be done with Spelljammer which even without the misfortune of being based on 2E rules came in with a WIDE array of it's own Bad Ideas.
Well it would favor spellcasters with higher spell level totals regardless. The real problem I see is that it doesn't fix the fact that it USES spell capacity for such a stupidly mundane purpose. If your characters were on a ship on the ocean you would scream bloody murder if a DM expected your wizard to power sailing ships with his spells instead of... sails. It makes no sense to do so in Spelljammer because it just completely trashes the reason why players have SPELLcasters in the game of D&D. It isn't to be a battery for a boat. It's to be able to CAST SPELLS.
Ships sailing on oceans still have a power source, either their sails (and the wind pushing them) or an engine. If you say that a ship's helm is its engine, then you still have to have something powering it. So either the helm is a very powerful artefact that powers itself, or you feed spells into it to make the ship move.
I use this sort of system and I don't really see the problem, it works quite well. I also don't regard flying a ship through space as a particularly mundane pursuit. Any groundling can sail across an ocean...
The best idea for being able to run a helm is to make it a feat. That feat should be available to ANY class. Why? Because I just cannot see Blackbeard the Pirate (a straight-classed fighter) unable to BE a pirate, to command his pirate ship unless he's got a spindly guy in robes sitting on a chair to actually make it move.
Spelljammer has plenty of other helm types (furnaces, lifejammers, artifurnaces, etc) that other classes can use. Besides I like the idea of spellcasters being forced to give up their spellcasting power to move a vessel, it makes a strange kind of sense.
Pirates get all the fun of leaping over onto enemy ships and hacking apard their victims with cutlasses while the spindly guy in robes is forced to sit on his throne. Why would a pirate want to give up all that fun and fly the ship himself?
Besides, continuing to try to stick to the original method only saddles you with needless additional complexity as you play with numbers. You're rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic when you really just need greater simplicity. Like a number of other aspects of Spelljammer helms just aren't as fun and elegant as they might seem at first. Spelljammer was conceived under 2E rules. When 3E came along they tore the entire frickin' game of D&D down to its basic components and then built it back up piece by piece. I'd suggest that the same needs to be done with Spelljammer which even without the misfortune of being based on 2E rules came in with a WIDE array of it's own Bad Ideas.
Sigh...
Spelljammer isn't a complex rules-heavy setting. Converting settings to 3E does not mean quantifying and balancing every single detail, that is what takes all the fun out of the game. Next you will be wanting to get rid of the Giff and those funny gnomes and their hamsters...
Next you will be wanting to get rid ...those funny gnomes and their hamsters...
Ridding the univers of those gnomes and their hamsters was actually my first thing ...back in 2ed... but on the topic of power sources for the helms. It always bothered me both for taking out a player for the day and for crippling divine casters once in the Phlow...(I still have it even in 3rd because it’s a integral part of my cosmology) If you convert helms from draining spell slots to needing a spell to activate the helm over time. It allows the caster to retain most of their spells but have some cost. Different levels of the same basic spell:
Activate Helm- powers the helm for 1 hour/level or 4 hours or 8hrs.
Spell levels determine the tactical speed and possibly duration. Hmm need to flush out the idea some more. Possibly 2 hours per casting which the caster will need to keep several spells memorized for his shift… I'm thinking each level has its varient such as the Summon Monster line.
Most helms are powered by arcane magic. Just as there are Lifejammers, forges, there are also Crystal Helms (uses psionics) and Divine Helms (powered by the prayers of the faithful).
It takes a feat to learn how to control a helm. I may allow limited control without the feat. Any other feat mentioned requires this one as a pre-req.
Helm attunement: it takes 1d4+1 rounds before you can move the vessel. Like wise, once you stand up from the helm it take 1d4+1 rounds before you can cast any spells. A feat can be spent to lower this to 1 round (for both attunement and when you leave the helm).
I think there should be a feat (maybe a feat tree?) that allows you to use spell slots to perform special maneuvers; make the turning arc tighter, give a boost to tactical movement, lessen travel time between planets/crystal spheres, increase the hardness of the ship, give a bonus to hit to the ships weapons.
Let me know what you think.
- KT
I'm getting ready to start a Spelljammer leg in the campaign I'm running for my kids. While I'm planning on having an NPC be the ship's spelljammer, here's my thoughts on helms:
Most helms are powered by arcane magic. Just as there are Lifejammers, forges, there are also Crystal Helms (uses psionics) and Divine Helms (powered by the prayers of the faithful).
It takes a feat to learn how to control a helm. I may allow limited control without the feat. Any other feat mentioned requires this one as a pre-req.
Helm attunement: it takes 1d4+1 rounds before you can move the vessel. Like wise, once you stand up from the helm it take 1d4+1 rounds before you can cast any spells. A feat can be spent to lower this to 1 round (for both attunement and when you leave the helm).
I think there should be a feat (maybe a feat tree?) that allows you to use spell slots to perform special maneuvers; make the turning arc tighter, give a boost to tactical movement, lessen travel time between planets/crystal spheres, increase the hardness of the ship, give a bonus to hit to the ships weapons.
Let me know what you think.
- KT
Sounds great. Might I suggest instead of feats perhaps use spells instead? Say as the level of the spell caster rises they get gradually better types of spells in place of their normal spells to pilot the Jammer? Might even add in another college, A Jammer College.