Blade Mage

[Lukterran]

Has anyone seen the rifter #23 with the BladeMage in it?

I have a player in my group that is wishing to play one and I thought alright, and it was fine with me. I didn't know much about the class, thought it was like bladepriest. Which was fine, until I started reading the spells descriptions and effects that he typed out for me. (See I dont own Rifter #23) And those things are so overpowered and retarded. Does palladium books not read rifter submissions at all?!!

I mean stupidly powerful, for example: Almost ever spell can increase a weapons bonuses to strike by +1 per level of caster, another spell can triple the damage output of a weapon. Another can make a weapon do all its damage directly to hitpoints, and so one and so one. It got so retard as to have autodeath spells and autostrike spells. And the casting costs for most weren't even over 10 PPE.

I am letting him play the BladeMage, but now I have to rewrite and make correction to ever spell that he has, just to make it balanced. It would have been alot easier if Palladium books would read and edit these submissions, or reject them if they are that unbalanced. I know I don't have to allow the class in my games, but players don't always want to play the same ol boring classes and like new things so I allow it.

[J. Lionheart]

The Rifter is fan submissions, and not all are suitable for all campaigns. Little to nothing of what you'll find in a Rifter is canon material, and you are under no obligation to use it. Palladium makes no pretense of anything being balanced or appropriate for any particular power level. If they started changing things people sent in, it would no longer be a fan forum. Other than a yes/no for quality, and perhaps the most basic of proofreads for grammar and spelling, I think they avoid editing all together. Use Rifters sparingly, and never use something you don't want to.

[Nekira Sudacne]

Has anyone seen the rifter #23 with the BladeMage in it?

I have a player in my group that is wishing to play one and I thought alright, and it was fine with me. I didn't know much about the class, thought it was like bladepriest. Which was fine, until I started reading the spells descriptions and effects that he typed out for me. (See I dont own Rifter #23) And those things are so overpowered and retarded. Does palladium books not read rifter submissions at all?!!

I mean stupidly powerful, for example: Almost ever spell can increase a weapons bonuses to strike by +1 per level of caster, another spell can triple the damage output of a weapon. Another can make a weapon do all its damage directly to hitpoints, and so one and so one. It got so retard as to have autodeath spells and autostrike spells. And the casting costs for most weren't even over 10 PPE.

I am letting him play the BladeMage, but now I have to rewrite and make correction to ever spell that he has, just to make it balanced. It would have been alot easier if Palladium books would read and edit these submissions, or reject them if they are that unbalanced. I know I don't have to allow the class in my games, but players don't always want to play the same ol boring classes and like new things so I allow it.

they do read and edit. unfortuantly they recognise that different GM's have different power levels. what may be unbalanced for your game may be allright in another GM's game.

and because Palladium dosn't make any of the submissions offical, they don't HAVE to worry about power level sinse none of it really exsists in their game.

the Rifter is NOT a sourcebook from palladium, it's almost entirely a forum for fan creations it sponsors to get publicity and revenue.

[Sentinel]

I had allowed a player to begin work on a Blade Mage, with the provision that I would be heavily reviewing the spells, and making changes based on exisiting invocations for other official sources.
It's not a bad idea: just a little unbalanced in some areas.

[Belgarian]

Chalk this up to a learning experiance...if you don't have it then don't allow it. (Also usefull for receiving bribes from players)

[Entiago]

Chalk this up to a learning experiance...if you don't have it then don't allow it. (Also usefull for receiving bribes from players)

Oh so not true.......the experience ('specially regarding PF) If you don't have it then go buy it.

[Tearstone]

The Blade Mage while possibly overpowered for Palladium is almost woefully underpowered for Rifts, as was suggested for as an alternate setting.

In Rifts you have tons of Juicers, Borgs, other powerful creatures, and then you have the advent of modern EBA, Mecha, and Robot Vehicles, as well as the fact that almost everybody carries long distance weapons which can deal instant death at ranges farther than a Blade Mage can hit. If a Blade Mage plans to be successful, he has to figure out a way to get in close, and even that might not be guarenteed in Rifts Earth.

Even then, a ranger, longbowman, or man of arms using a bow has a very good chance of killing a Blade Mage before they get close, and more dedicated spell casters could eat their sack lunch if played right. Then you also have to consider Mind Mages with abilities like Bio-Manipulation and Telekinetic powers. All in all, Blade Mages can be beaten, if you think it through.

Blade Mages are designed to offeset the fact that they are MASTERS of edged weapons. Their martial art, and spells are designed to improve their fighting prowess, but do so in subtle ways. If a GM is worried about the spells and the plusses, make them non-stacking. That's the simplest way to ease up on the power some.

[gaby]

any ideas for the Blade mage,s spells?

[ZEN]

Hey guys.
When I wrote the Blade Mage, it was designed exclusively for Rifts (with a nod toward Fantasy, but it was designed as an urban character class, possibly handy for Phase world game setting also), however you have to include the fantasy setting in an article as it helps get you published.
Line Walker is the experience chart to use, or wizard I guess, sorry that got missed.

And yes, it can be a powerful class, but Tearstone pretty much summed up how to deal with it.

To those who played it and enjoyed, you are welcome, thanks for the interest.
To those who played it, or read it, and hated it, meh, you can't please everyone, thanks for the interest anyway, hope it was an interesting read.

[filo_clarke]

The problems that my PFRPG group had with the Blade Mage weren't because of power level (though, yes, they get more skills than the most skilled OCC, more starting money and gear than the richest OCC, more attribute bonuses than the most physical OCC, better Rogue skill starting percentages than the sneakiest OCC, better weapon bonuses than the best weapon-based fighter OCC, better unarmed combat maneuvres than the best unarmed fighter OCC, and potentially more starting spells than all but one of the Magic OCCs). The problem we encountered was their "instant" casting ability.

According to the OCC, with any of their spells where the Duration is "instant", the spell takes effect immediately, but any additional loss of melee attacks to the caster take place thereafter. Since their spells typically are used in melee combat, this resulted in quite a lot of "fizzled" spells that still hit their mark. If the Blade Mage cast a spell, it then hit its target, but if the target (or another opponent) retaliated in the same attack or anytime before half a melee had expired, did the spell not take place because the caster never finished casting it? Did the damage the target took simply dissapear because the spell was not completed, or did the spell caster suffer penalties from a miscast spell that still struck the target?

The wording confused us so much that we began to use rules for miscast spells (from the Nightbane system, among other sources) because it didn't make sense that the mage should be able to skip the half-a-melee-to-cast rule, or even PPE Channelling if we used those rules. Any help you could be in giving an official answer would be most helpful.

[Tor]

because Palladium dosn't make any of the submissions offical, they don't HAVE to worry about power level sinse none of it really exsists in their game.

the Rifter is NOT a sourcebook from palladium, it's almost entirely a forum for fan creations it sponsors to get publicity and revenue.

Wrong, it is a sourcebook, just not always 100% official. A decent bit of canon stuff makes it in, even if not as much as I'd like.

[ZEN]

The problems that my PFRPG group had with the Blade Mage weren't because of power level (though, yes, they get more skills than the most skilled OCC, more starting money and gear than the richest OCC, more attribute bonuses than the most physical OCC, better Rogue skill starting percentages than the sneakiest OCC, better weapon bonuses than the best weapon-based fighter OCC, better unarmed combat maneuvres than the best unarmed fighter OCC, and potentially more starting spells than all but one of the Magic OCCs). The problem we encountered was their "instant" casting ability.

According to the OCC, with any of their spells where the Duration is "instant", the spell takes effect immediately, but any additional loss of melee attacks to the caster take place thereafter. Since their spells typically are used in melee combat, this resulted in quite a lot of "fizzled" spells that still hit their mark. If the Blade Mage cast a spell, it then hit its target, but if the target (or another opponent) retaliated in the same attack or anytime before half a melee had expired, did the spell not take place because the caster never finished casting it? Did the damage the target took simply dissapear because the spell was not completed, or did the spell caster suffer penalties from a miscast spell that still struck the target?

The wording confused us so much that we began to use rules for miscast spells (from the Nightbane system, among other sources) because it didn't make sense that the mage should be able to skip the half-a-melee-to-cast rule, or even PPE Channelling if we used those rules. Any help you could be in giving an official answer would be most helpful.

Melee Actions.. not just attacks.. so the spell is cast, the effect begins immediately, like a bullet leaving a gun, the Blade Mage is then dealing with the recoil.. the casting of the spell is different in that it is a effect held and ready to go off by the mage, and a simple utterance is all it takes to complete the effect, then, after it goes off, the mage is dealing with the release of power and mental strain of channelling it.
Therefore, the spell is not fizzled if the mage is disrupted.. the way to avoid it is to stop the mage before they get close enough to use it on you.
Powerful?
Hell yes.. Blade Mages are lethal hand to hand mystic assassins.. you may note at the start of the article that the mage is best suited as a solo campaign character, also, the power, skills, money, resources and such of the mage represents that this is a character who has been at this for a while.. they are not a apprentice blacksmith who took up a long sword and went off with his drinking buddies to go poke around a troll lair.. If you have a party of those sort of first level characters, the player picking the blade mage should certainly pick something else, because why the hell would a blade mage be hanging around with those idiots in the first place?
Secrecy, surprize, striking to kill and leave no witnesses, maintaining a cover identity.. this is what the blade mage is all about.

[Lukterran]

Lol...thanks for re-opening a thread that was created like 9 years ago. I was able to completely balance out (still very power) this class for PF. If you want I can give you a list off all spell and class changes.

One of the biggest issues I found with the spells is the way that the Blade Mage P.P.E and spell cost was created. All the spells should have a cost on par with normal magic found in Palladium canon. By making the spells only cost a few PPE per casting any character with a race higher than usual PPE can just unleash Blade Mage spells all day long.

[Crucible]

Hey guys.
When I wrote the Blade Mage, it was designed exclusively for Rifts (with a nod toward Fantasy, but it was designed as an urban character class, possibly handy for Phase world game setting also), however you have to include the fantasy setting in an article as it helps get you published.
Line Walker is the experience chart to use, or wizard I guess, sorry that got missed.

And yes, it can be a powerful class, but Tearstone pretty much summed up how to deal with it.

To those who played it and enjoyed, you are welcome, thanks for the interest.
To those who played it, or read it, and hated it, meh, you can't please everyone, thanks for the interest anyway, hope it was an interesting read.

I really like it and would allow it in ANY setting. My players are so story driven it just doesn't matter.

[ZEN]

Lol...thanks for re-opening a thread that was created like 9 years ago. I was able to completely balance out (still very power) this class for PF. If you want I can give you a list off all spell and class changes.

One of the biggest issues I found with the spells is the way that the Blade Mage P.P.E and spell cost was created. All the spells should have a cost on par with normal magic found in Palladium canon. By making the spells only cost a few PPE per casting any character with a race higher than usual PPE can just unleash Blade Mage spells all day long.

Go ahead and post them!