10.10.1: Votives

Summary of changes

Votives

Problem: Warlock isn't OGL

Currently, Rise has warlocks who make pacts with devils in exchange for magical power.
However, "warlock" as a name historically just means "male witch", and isn't really connected to pacts specifically.
Although D&D has warlocks by that description, that's not part of the OGL, so Rise can't use that concept.
This means that the name "warlock" should be changed.

Solution: Warlocks have been replaced by votives

The warlock class has been removed.
In its place, a new "votive" class has been added.
Votives make a pact with a devil, fae, moirai, or precursor in exchange for magical power.
They can gain maneuvers, spells, or both, giving the class a unique role.

Consumable item prices

Problem: Consumable item prices are confusing

Currently, a rank 3 consumable item costs one fifth of the price of a rank 3 permanent item.
This breaks the usual association between item rank and item cost in confusing ways.
Even if you usually track wealth with item ranks rather than gold pieces, you still have to read the gp cost for every item to figure out how many of it you can afford.
Ammunition made from special weapon materials is also cheaper than intended.

Solution: Consumable items are lower rank

There is no longer a special consumable modifier for item price.
Every rank 3 item has the same effective gold cost.
Almost all consumable items are now lower rank, giving them the same effective price in gold.
This does increase the price of ammunition made from special weapon materials, since they no longer use the special consumable price modifier.

All specific changes

General changes

• Many broken links and missing page references have been fixed
• Some references to damage types have been removed
• Resurrection now imposes a -2 fatigue tolerance penalty (from -1)
• Leveling up or waiting 30 days now reduces the resurrection penalty by 1 rather than fully removing it
• The Far Realm has been renamed to the Eternal Void

Characters

• Reducing your maximum hit points below 1 now immediately causes you to die

Combat

• Weak strikes no longer exist, and all abilities that referenced weak strikes have been redesigned
• Negative Strength no longer directly reduces damage
  • This is unnecessary now that weak strikes no longer exist
• Obstacles now have clearer rules for how they block movement, especially forced movement
• Squeezing with other creatures now has slightly clearer rules
• Throw: The baseline throwing distance has been reduced to 10 feet (from 15 feet)
• Floating creatures can no longer get stuck in midair if raised above their fly speed's height limit

Classes

• Base class rebalancing:
  • Druid: Now has medium HP progression instead of high, has +1 insight (from +0), has proficiency with standard shields
  • Monk: Now has high HP progression instead of medium
  • Ranger: Now has 6 trained skills (from 5), has proficiency with medium armor
  • Sorcerer: No longer grants +2 Mental
• Barbarian:
  • Rage now costs one fatigue
  • Savage Precision and Versatile Savagery have swapped ranks
  • Primal Warrior now grants the Brute Force combat style instead of Unbreakable Defense
• Cleric:
  • Magic domain gift is now an enhancement bonus, but scales with the domain mastery
  • Strength domain gift is now an enhancement bonus, but scales with the domain mastery
  • Trickery domain gift is now an enhancement bonus, but scales with the domain mastery
  • Water domain gift is now an enhancement bonus, and the domain mastery scaling is reduced
• Druid:
  • Form of the Hawk and Form of the Mouse now grant enhancement bonuses
  • Form of the Mouse now scales to +4 Flexibility and Stealth (from +5)
• Paladin: Divine Spell Versatility is now magical
• Ranger:
  • Know Your Enemy can now invest insight points to increase the number of creature types chosen, but does not grant an additional creature type at rank 7
  • Wilderness Warrior now grants Rip and Tear instead of Flurry of Blows
• Rogue:
  • Bardic Performance now imposes a -2 accuracy penalty if you are untrained with Perform rather than granting a +1 bonus if you are trained
  • Vigorous Verse has been removed
• A new votive class has been added
• Warlocks have been removed
• Wizard:
  • Alchemist now only allows crafting items with a rank lower than your rank in that archetype
  • Contingency now requires attunement
• Variant classes:
  • The faebonder and favored soul optional classes have been removed
  • A new anointed class has been added

Skills

• Social Insight now has a Notice Subtle Effect usage

Equipment

• Consumable items are no longer cheaper in gp than permanent items of their rank
• Almost all consumable items are now one rank cheaper
  • Ordinary ammunition, such as an arrow, no longer has a defined gp price
• All gold prices are now ten times cheaper
  • For example, a rank 2 item now costs 20 gp instead of 200 gp
• One gold piece is now worth 100 silver pieces, and one silver piece is now worth 100 copper pieces
  • Think of a gp as a $100 bill, a sp as a $1 bill, and a cp as a cent. Kind of.
• Gaseous poison clouds now linger for one minute before dispersing
• Weapons:
  • Fire and lightning arrows no longer have an accuracy penalty
  • Lances have been redesigned as an exotic weapon called a cavalry lance
  • Gnomish smallspear now has +1 accuracy (from +2) and deals 1d6 damage (from 1d4)
  • Hook sword now has +2 accuracy (from +1) and deals 1d4 damage (from 1d6)
  • Spears now have the Long tag, but only while they are held in two hands
• Weapon special materials:
  • Adamantine now deals 1d4 extra damage (from 1d4 weapon damage)
  • Pure adamantine now deals 2d6 extra damage (from 1d6 weapon damage), but is rank 8 (from rank 7)
  • Diamondsteel now grants a +2 accuracy bonus (from +3) and is rank 4 (from rank 3)
  • Pure diamondsteel now grants a +4 accuracy bonus (from +5) and is rank 7 (from rank 5)
  • Mithral and pure mithral are now +1 rank higher
  • Starmetal and pure starmetal are now +1 rank higher
• Magic apparel:
  • Bracers of Repulsion now knock back 10 feet (from 15 feet)
  • Belt of Health now has fixed rank scaling for its upgrades
• Magic armor: Crumpling Armor now requires an Armor or Reflex attack instead of physical damage
• Consumables: Poisons have been generally rebalanced to have a more consistent power level. This should generally be a slight buff.

Combat Styles

• Brute Force:
  • Desperate Smash now deals half power (from full power), but refunds the fatigue if it doesn't hit
  • Desperate Smash+ now deals full power (from 1d8 per 3 power), but refunds the fatigue if it doesn't hit
• Dirty Fighting: Knockback Shove has been redesigned as Knock Flying
• Ebb and Flow:
  • Back Into the Fray now deals double weapon damage instead of +2 accuracy
  • Guardbreaker is no longer weak, but is rank 3 (from rank 1)
  • Guardbreaker+ is now double weapon damage, but is rank 7 (from rank 5)
• Flurry of Blows:
  • Desperate Double Flurry is no longer weak, but has -2 accuracy
  • Dazzling Flurry+ has been redesigned as Blinding Flurry
  • Dazzling Flurry has been redesigned as Dazzling Speed
• Mobile Hunter: Push Through now has clearer wording
• Perfect Precision:
  • Pure Precision is no longer weak, but is rank 3 (from rank 1)
  • Pure Precision+ is now +15 accuracy (from +6), but is rank 7 (from rank 5)
  • Arrowguide is no longer weak, but only applies the accuracy buff if you hit Reflex defense
  • Groundspike has been removed
  • Pinning Shot has been added
  • Called Shot explicitly does not work with effects like Fateweaver
  • Called Shot+ has been redesigned as rank 5 (from rank 3)
• Rip and Tear: Brow Gash now triggers on HP loss (from Reflex defense), but is no longer melee only
• Unbreakable Defense: Defensive Blow has been removed

Mystic Spheres

• Aeromancy: Skyseal now has clearer wording
• Aquamancy:
  • Manipulate Water has been redesigned as a ritual
  • Aquatic Freedom has been simplified and is generally weaker
  • Desiccate now deals more damage and its accuracy bonus now makes more sense
  • Purify Water is now rank 2 (from rank 1) and affects vastly more water
• Chronomancy: Accelerated Reading is now a ritual
• Cryomancy: Chill Air is now larger at rank 1, but has weaker scaling
• Electromancy: Magnetize is now attuneable
• Fabrication: Fabricate Trinket is now Sustain (attuneable, minor) instead of lasting indefinitely
• Polymorph:
  • Alter Appearance has weaker scaling
  • Absorb Object is now Sustain (attuneable, minor) instead of lasting indefinitely
• Prayer: Blessing of Endurance no longer increases current hit points
• Pyromancy:
  • Kindle and Extinguish have been removed
  • Personal Torch now explicitly ignites flammable objects, and is Sustain (attuneable, minor) instead of lasting indefinitely
  • Heat Air is now larger at rank 1, but has weaker scaling
• Telekinesis:
  • Distant Hand now has a lower effective Strength and weaker scaling
  • Gentle Force has weaker scaling
  • Personal Ward has been redesigned as a rank 3 spell
  • Kinetic Shell now requires an Armor or Reflex attack instead of physical damage
• Terramancy: Earthquake now also knocks each target prone if it loses hit points and the attack hits Fortitude
• Vivimancy: Lifegift no longer increases current hit points

Feats

• Fateweaver: Fateseal now sets a minimum roll of 5 (from 6)
• Null:
  • Sever Magic has been renamed to Sever Attunement
  • Personal Legacy no longer increases fatigue tolerance
  • A new Purge Magic ability has been added at level 12 which removes magical conditions

Uncommon species

• Base class rebalancing:
  • Automatons now have four trained skills (from three), but no longer have +2 Fortitude
  • Dryaidi now ...

10.10.0: Hacking away at complexity

Summary of changes

Touch attacks

Problem: Requiring Reflex defense for touch is mechanically limiting

Currently, every ability that requires touching an enemy requires hitting their Reflex defense, with the exception of Shove. This requirement makes some sense, but it conflicts with another design principle of Rise: high damage single target attacks are not allowed to exclusively target Reflex defense. That constraint is necessary to keep Reflex defense focused on area attacks, and because large creatures have significant debuffs to Reflex.

As a result of these two constraints, touch range attacks are pigeonholed into generally attacking two defenses. The multipliers you theoretically get from stacking a melee range spell on top of a double defense spell are absurd, so they often end up below "standard" rate for no reason. Even if they are standard rate, low level characters don't have the power required to take advantage of such high damage scaling, giving the spells no clear niche.

Solution: Touch does not require hitting Reflex defense

All abilities that require touch attacks have been redesigned to remove the assumption that touching an enemy requires hitting their Reflex defense. This notably buffs the Trip universal ability, in addition to many specific abilities. Grappling an enemy still requires hitting both Reflex and Fortitude. This should generally increase the power and usefulness of touch range abilities, encouraging melee range casters.

Circumstantial power bonuses

Problem: Power bonuses are complicated to resolve and combine

Many abilities in Rise have fairly specific, and sometimes idiosyncratic, scaling with power. For example, a Heavy weapon user gets approximately 0.83 damage per power, with odd breakpoints. Each different spell that a character uses can have a slightly different power scaling. This makes it hard to determine quickly what will happen if a character temporarily gains a +2 power bonus. If a character can choose whether or not to apply a power bonus, such as with Wildspell or Blood Magic, they have to track the effect of that power bonus individually for all of their abilities. Even power bonuses that are static but conditional, such as a power bonus with a specific weapon or ability tag, can be complicated to calculate.

Solution: Power bonuses are always static

All abilities that previously granted conditional or optional power bonuses have been redesigned. Power bonuses are always static character effects, like attribute bonuses. Most abilities that previously granted power now grant extra damage, which doesn't have any risk of combinatorial complexity. This change should generally increase the importance of Willpower for damaging spellcasters.

Explosion targets

Problem: Variable explosion targets are a hassle

Tracking unique explosion targets can slow down the play experience, because it requires checking a value that is not normally considered. This is particularly noticeable with computer-assisted dice rolls, like in Roll20, but can also be relevant in paper. It's not necessarily a problem for that sort of mechanic to exist in some capacity. However, it should require a more explicit opt-in, rather than being part of fundamental gameplay components like the fairly common Impact weapon tag.

Solution: Mostly remove variable explosion targets

The term "explosion target" has been removed, and all effects that modified your explosion target have been redesigned. Variable explosion targets still exist with the new Fortune's Friend feat and Lucky magic weapon property. The Impact weapon tag now expands glancing blow range, encouraging low-accuracy big bonk characters.

Tripping weapons

Problem: Tripping is very niche

The Tripping weapon tag is weirdly specific. Trip is a low level universal ability, so Tripping weapons have poor scaling into high levels. There currently aren't many abilities that function like Trip, and even if more were added, it would still be an overly niche effect for such a common weapon tag.

Solution: "Maneuverable" weapon tag

The Tripping weapon tag has been replaced with the Maneuverable weapon tag. A Maneuverable weapon can be used in place of a free hand when using any Brawling ability. This allows you to apply your strike-related accuracy bonus to the Brawling ability, but does not cause you to deal damage. It's useful for the small accuracy increase, and because it means you don't have to drop or sheathe your weapon to brawl.

All specific changes

General changes

• Some broken links have been fixed
• Abilities now use "something" instead of "anything" to clarify that they only affect one target
• Abilities now grant bonuses to "magical power and mundane power" rather than simply "power" to be more clear

Characters

• All weight limits now require one more Strength
  • This means using heavy armor now requires 2 Strength instead of 1 Strength
• Pushing or dragging objects at your weight limit now just means you move half speed, rather than 5 feet

Combat

• New "brawling attack" and "brawling accuracy" terms have been added to clarify and simplify the usage of Brawling abilities
• Shove: Now uses weight limits, and is no longer Size-Based
• Throw: You can no longer throw objects matching your maximum weight category
• Trip: No longer requires beating Reflex defense, but can no longer deal damage
• The rules for fighting while in water have been clarified a bit
  • The "swimming" debuff has been renamed to "submerged" to clarify that it still happens even if you aren't trying to swim
• The rules for calculating your power with an ability, especially with a magical ability that causes you to make a mundane strike, have been clarified a bit
• Abilities that "function like" other abilities now explicitly gain accuracy bonuses that apply to the original ability
  • For example, a +2 bonus with the Grapple ability now also affects the Strangle maneuver without requiring custom text in the description of Strangle

Common Species

Classes

• Metamagic:
  • All metamagic effects that previously granted a power bonus now grant extra damage
  • All Experienced Spellcaster abilities now grant a generic accuracy bonus instead of a spell-specific accuracy bonus
• Maneuvers: All archetypes that grant maneuvers no longer grant an extra maneuver known at rank 7
• Spells: All archetypes that grant spellcasting now grant spells known at ranks 2 and 5 instead of 2, 4, 7
• Barbarian:
  • These changes are intended to reduce the play complexity of Barbarian, which should narratively be a relatively simple class
  • Battlerager:
    • Rage has been dramatically simplified, and no longer costs fatigue
    • Fearless Anger has been replaced with Amplified Anger
    • Insensible Anger has been replaced with Insensible Rage, which only functions while raging
    • Unwavering Rage has been replaced with Amplified Anger+
  • Primal Maneuvers: Widened Maneuver has been replaced with Devastating Maneuver, which increases non-strike damage
  • Totemist:
    • Bear and Lion totems have been redesigned
    • Crocodile totem's rank 7 ability has been nerfed
    • Wolf totem has been removed
    • Feral Ferocity has been replaced with Feral Frenzy
    • Feral Explosion has been replaced with Animal Ferocity
    • Animal Instincts has been redesigned and generally buffed
• Cleric:
  • Domain Influence:
    • Domain Aspects are no longer stated to be consistently active abilities
    • Domain Mastery now has its progression split between rank 6 and rank 7
    • Chaos domain has been redesigned
    • Evil domain mastery now requires a successful attack
    • Law domain aspect has been redesigned
    • Water domain mastery has been nerfed to +5 instead of +10
  • Healer: Divine Aid no longer requires touch
• Fighter:
  • Combat Discipline: Inevitable Discipline has been replaced with True Discipline
  • Equipment Training: Weapon Discipline+ is now rank 5 (from rank 6)
• Monk:
  • Airdancer: Death from Above is now weaker when first acquired, and has slightly weaker scaling
  • Ki: All ki manifestations that granted skill bonuses have weaker scaling
• Paladin:
  • Devoted Paragon: Aligned Immunity has been redesigned for Chaos and Law paladins
• Ranger:
  • Huntmaster: Coordinated Stealth has weaker scaling
  • Scout: Ambush now has an accuracy bonus against unaware targets rather than dealing double damage
• Rogue:
  • Assassin:
    • Sneak Attack is now stronger at rank 1-2 and deals double damage to unaware targets
    • Darkstalker++ is now slightly weaker
  • Combat Trickster: Finishing Maneuver can now be applied to non-strike maneuvers
• Sorcerer:
  • Arcane Magic: Mage Armor now scales at ranks 4 and 7 instead of 3 and 6
  • Arcane Spell Mastery: Dragonbreath Spell is now less effective on lines
  • Wild Magic: Wildspell now grants extra damage instead of a power bonus, and Wildspell effects are now generally weaker
• Warlock:
  • Blessings of the Abyss:
    • Abyssal Rebuke has been slightly redesigned
    • Abyssal Curse has been renamed to Curse of Abyssal Torment
  • Soulkeeper's Chosen: Possession has been redesigned
• Wizard:
  • Alchemist: Portable Workshop+ and Alchemical Precision+ have been removed
  • Arcane Magic: Mage Armor now scales at ranks 4 and 7 instead of 3 and 6
  • Arcane Scholar:
    • The Memorized Sphere and Sphere Specialization scholastic insights have been combined
    • New scholastic insights: Arcane Tattoo and Soulwoven Spell

Equipment

• The Grappling weapon tag has been renamed to Clinch to clarify that it does not cause you to enter a grapple
• The Impact weapon tag has been redesigned, and now expands glancing bow range to "miss by 5 or less"
• The Tripping weapon tag has been replaced with Maneuverable, which allows you to use th...

10.9.3: Buffs to underused stuff

General changes

• In the Roll20 sheet, passive abilities are now listed on the Abilities tab

Common Species

• Humans only know one common language instead of two
• Elves now have a new Elven Perfection ability instead of Elven Serenity
• Half-elves now have -1 Con, +1 Dex/Int/Per/Wil
• Half-orcs now only spend one point to multiclass, like half-elves, instead of having a non-exotic weapon group proficiency

Classes

• Barbarian: Rage has been slightly simplified
• Cleric: Protection Domain had its scaling and is now slightly weaker
• Druid:
  • Incendiary Spell now only applies to damaging spells
  • Natural Servant has been buffed
• Monk: Airdancer has been restructured to grant slightly more aerial abilities, but a slower land speed
• Paladin: Lay on Hands had its scaling slightly reordered to reduce awkward power breakpoints
• Ranger: Animal Companion has been buffed
• Rogue: Dazzling Discordance now correctly has the Sustain tag
• Sorcerer: Can now choose between Willpower and Perception for its base class attribute bonus

Equipment

• Verstile Grip has been slightly nerfed, but all weapons with Versatile Grip have been buffed, and some weapons have gained the Versatile Grip tag
  • This affects the battleaxe, shepherd's axe, broadsword, cavalry mace, club, morning star, flail, pick, warhammer, spear, spontoon, dwarven waraxe, falchion, totokia, and obuch
• Two-section staff is now also a monk weapon
• Heavy armor now grants +2 more damage resistance
• Vineweave armor now has the correct rank

Combat Styles

• Maneuvers that make strikes that hit multiple enemies, such as Whirlwind, no longer deal half damage on a miss
• Brute Force: Concussion now also requires beating Fortitude defense to inflict a condition
• Mobile Hunter:
  • Spring Attack is now rank 5, but is stronger with melee weapons
  • Rushdown and Fall Back have been redesigned
• Perfect Precision: Heartpiercer and Called Shot have been buffed
• Rip and Tear:
  • Rend the Hide now deals less damage
  • Brow Gash now only requires beating Fortitude rather than losing hit points to inflict its condition
  • Hamstring now also requires Reflex to inflict its condition
• Unbreakable Defense:
  • Defensive Blow now affects all defenses rather than only Armor and Reflex
  • Prepared Defense no longer causes its strike to be weak

Mystic Spheres

• Channel Divinity:
  • Endurance of the Faithful has been renamed to Endure Tribulation, and it is stronger but has less scaling
  • Mantle of Faith has been removed
• Cryomancy: Icecrafted weapons now make Cold strikes instead of using the higher of your magical and mundane power
• Fabrication:
  • Forge is now a spell instead of a cantrip and has been slightly buffed, but no longer allows using magical power for damage with weapons
  • Executioner's Axe now deals more damage
  • Personal Weapon has been redesigned
• Prayer:
  • Boon of Competence has been removed
  • Boon of Protection has been redesigned
  • Boon of Precision, Boon of Invulnerability, Boon of Deadly Fortune, Boon of Avoidance, Boon of Cleansing, and Boon of Shielding now target two creatures instead of one
  • Boon of Precision and Boon of Invulnerability are now higher rank
  • Blessing of Perseverance is no longer a deep attunement
  • Empowered Boon of Shielding now recovers more damage resistance
  • Curse of Poor Eyesight has been renamed to Curse of Blurred Vision, and is now slightly stronger
  • Curse of Sloth and Curse of Anxiety are now lower rank
  • Curse of Blindness is now higher rank, but also stronger
  • Curse of Bewilderment is now shorter range, but stronger
  • New spell: Blessing of Precision
• Summoning:
  • Summon Monster now has lower defenses, and its hit points do not depend on your base class
  • Summon Defensive Monster now grants a higher defense bonus
• Thaumaturgy: A new Imbue Weapon spell has been added
• Verdamancy:
  • Vine Tentacle now only affects you, but does not require a free hand
  • Mass Vine Tentacle is now higher rank

Feats

• Ascetic, Ghostblade, and Shieldbearer have been buffed
• Sphere Focus: Channel Divinity's level 1 and 18 abilities have been redesigned
• Sphere Focus: Prayer's level 1 ability has been redesigned
• Swiftrunner has been slightly buffed at low levels

Uncommon species

• Automaton: The armor provided by Modular Carapace now provides +1 more Armor defense, and heavy armor provides more damage resistance

10.9.2: More low level attunements

General changes

• The Roll20 sheet now autocalculates weight limits, vertical jump distance, and horizontal jump distance
• A new Omnibook.pdf has been added for people who just want EVERYTHING in one gigantic PDF

Characters

• Lifesense and and lifesight now detect all living things, not just creatures

Common Species

• Dwarves are now proficient with all metal body armor
• Orcs and half-orcs now have low-light vision instead of darkvision
• Half-orcs are now proficient with non-exotic weapons from a single weapon group
• Orcs are now proficient with all weapons from a single weapon group, including exotic weapons

Combat

• Creature now take a -4 penalty to Armor and Reflex for being in midair, rather than specifically due to flying or gliding
  • This means that knockback effects that leave you in midair now penalize your defenses
  • Long jumps don't impose this penalty
• Jumping no longer requires a running start. There is no difference between jumping with and without a running start.
• Falling damage after jumping is measured from your original height, not the apex of your jump
• Sustain (attuneable) abilities now more explicitly allow you to keep two copies of the ability active - one from attuning and one from sustaining
• Sustaining abilities is now a Swift effect, which resolves some timing ambiguity
• Visual abilities now calculate their line of effect differently, treating it as the same as line of sight

Classes

• Warlock: Soulkeepers now retain a warlock's soul for less time in the afterlife, making it more feasible for a warlock to retain their soul after death
• Wizard: Alchemist's early abilities have been redesigned to reward insight point investment, encouraging high Intelligence alchemists

Equipment

• Armor:
  • Adamantine is now slightly stronger, but pure adamantine is now slightly weaker
  • Starmetal is now slightly stronger
  • New armor special materials for leather: Shadowweave and vineweave
• Apparel: Pheonixflame Cloak has been added
• Implements: Brutish Staff, Educated Staff, and Potent Staff have been buffed
• Weapons:
  • Anchoring, Psionic, and Toxic have been renamed so the one-time version is named "X Burst", and the permanent version has no suffix
  • Brutish++ is now slightly weaker
  • Educated has been redesigned to use extra damage instead of weapon damage
  • Arcing, Flaming, Freezing, Psionic and Toxic now grant extra damage and can be toggled on and off
  • Prismatic has been redesigned
  • Surestrike has been removed
• Consumables:
  • Potions can now explicitly be used on unconscious creatures
  • Tanglefoot Bag is now higher rank

Combat Styles

• The "Damaging Hit:" terminology has been replaced with regular words
• Brute Force:
  • Concussion now deals more damage
  • Press Forward+ now deals more damage, but only moves up to half move speed
• Dirty Trick:
  • Slipstrike has been removed
  • Sweep the Leg now deals more damage
• Ebb and Flow:
  • Pure Precision now grants a higher accuracy bonus
  • Guardbreaker has been redesigned and generally buffed
• Flurry of Blows: The various flurry attacks can now be used with dual strikes again
• Rip and Tear: Hamstring and Bloodletter now deal more damage

Mystic Spheres

• Aeromancy:
  • The Airborne Leap cantrip has been removed
  • New spells: Windborne Leap, Cushion of Air, and Light Toss
  • Buffet is now rank 2 instead of rank 1
• Aquamancy:
  • Aquatic Freedom's scaling has been redesigned
  • New spells: Restorative Water, Cleansing Water, and Aquatic Agility
• Astromancy:
  • Astral Ease has been removed
  • New spells: Panic Translocation, Instant Retrieval, and Tactical Translocation
  • Transpotion can now be Swift if you spend one fatigue
• Chronomancy:
  • Rewind has been renamed to Instant Reversal - Attack
  • Expeditious Retreat has been removed
  • New spells: Accelerated Sprint, Instant Reversal - Movement, and Instant Reversal - Decision
  • Time Lock - Location is now rank 1
• Cryomancy:
  • New spells: Thick Ice and Slick Ice
• Electromancy:
  • New spells: Distant Chain, Magnetic Chain, and Extra Chain
• Enchantment:
  • New spells: Sympathetic Link and Curated Threat
• Fabrication:
  • New spells: Desperate Shieldwall, Instant Shield, Instant Copy, and Hidden Copy
• Photomancy:
  • Beautify has been clarified and slightly nerfed
  • New spells: Desperate Mirrorswarm and Beacon of Light
• Polymorph:
  • Mass Scent has been removed
  • New spells: Minor Bodymorph, Duplicate Organ, Armblade, Sudden Liquification
• Pyromancy:
  • New spells: Unstable Heat, Siphon Flame, and Desperate Fireburst
• Revelation:
  • Blindsense and Blindsight now have weaker scaling
• Summoning:
  • Summon Monster can more explicitly sprint during the action phase
  • Summon Horde - Bees is now a radius instead of a cone
  • New spell: Summon Familiar
• Telekinesis: Added Desperate Levitation
• Terramancy:
  • Stonefist has been tweaked and is now rank 1 instead of rank 2
  • New spells: Mass Stonefist, Desperate Stoneskin, Tremorsense, Tremorsight
• Thaumaturgy: Enhance Magic - Might now has slightly stronger scaling
• Toxicology: Added Regenerative Fungus
• Umbramancy:
  • Darkvision now has weaker scaling;
  • Dark Grasp has been redesigned
  • Bend Shadow has been added
• Verdamancy:
  • Entangle is now DV 8 to escape instead of DV 10
  • Vine Tentacle has been tweaked and is now rank 1 instead of rank 2
  • Braided Vine Tentacle has been tweaked and is now rank 2 instead of rank 3
  • Verdant Armor: Now has different scaling
• Vivimancy:
  • Lifetap now has stronger scaling
  • New spells: Sanguine Bond, Lifebomb, Deathtouch
  • Lifesense and Lifesight now have weaker scaling
  • Lifesight is now rank 2 instead of rank 3

Feats

• Blood Magic: Blood-Sworn Allegiance now also protects allies from miss damage
• Heavenly Warrior: Generally clarified, and level 12+ scaling has been redesigned
• Intimidate Specialization: Threatening Presence has been renamed to Cower in Fear

Uncommon species

• Automaton: Light armor from Modular Carapace now only grants +2 Armor instead of +3
• Changeling: Alter Shape has been redesigned and is generally more useful, and they now have a Skilled species ability
• Vampire: Blood Drain now explicitly ignores negative hit points when calculating its healing

Monsters

• Monsters now calculate their damage resistance without considering Constitution, reducing the effect of Constitution on monster survivability
• Monsters generally have more hit points and damage resistance

v10.9.1

General Changes

• The three books have been renamed to the Player's Primer, the Comprehensive Codex, and the Grimoire of Guidance
• The Comprehensive Codex once again has the Species, Glossary, and Reference chapters oops
• Fixed a variety of references to damage types

Combat

• A new Ready Reaction universal ability has been added
• You can no longer Sprint while moving or carrying other creatures
• You can only be moved by one effect per phase, so you can't chain movement between strong allies or mounts

Classes

• Barbarian: Rage is now Swift, and you can refresh the damage resistance while your rage is active
• Paladin: Chaos Aligned Aura has been redesigned to fix its scaling

Skills

• Balance:
  • "Creature balance" is now a Balance task
• Climb:
  • Creature climb now requires an increasingly difficult Climb attack each round to stay attached
  • Wall-jumping is now a Climb task
• Jump has been redesigned and no longer has any numeric modifier associated with it

Combat Styles

• Flurry of Blows: The multi-strike maneuvers can no longer be combined with dual strikes
• Herald of War: Several additional abilities now have the Auditory tag

Mystic Spheres

• All spells that make strikes now have a minimum rank of 2 to synchronize metamagic benefits with maneuver augments
• Chronomancy:
  • Accelerated Flurry and Accelerated Draw are now stronger, but are rank 2
  • Double Flurry and Triple Flurry no longer have an accuracy penalty, but can't be used with dual strikes
  • Weapon Haste can't be used with dual strikes
• Cryomancy:
  • Icy terrain on water is now destroyed if it takes any damage
  • Cryostrike is now stronger, but is rank 2
  • Mighty Cryostrike now deals slightly less damage
  • Chilling Blow has been replaced with Efficient Cryostrike
• Electromancy:
  • Arcing Blow is now stronger, but is rank 3
  • Mighty Arcing Blow is now stronger, but is rank 6
• Fabrication:
  • Forge can no longer create dragonscale or dragonhide
  • Instant Weapon is now stronger, but is rank 2
• Photomancy: Enduring Invisibility can now be reapplied slowly
• Polymorph:
  • The Claw spells can now be used with dual strikes
  • Distant Claw has been replaced with Extended Claw
  • Added Massive Claw
• Prayer:
  • Consecrated Blow: Now rank 2
  • Holy Blades has been removed
• Telekinesis:
  • Animated Weapon is now stronger, but is rank 2
  • Floating Armament is now rank 1
  • Heavy Floating Armament is now rank 4
• Terramancy:
  • Earthcraft can no longer create dragonscale
• Verdamancy:
  • Blight now grants +10 accuracy against plants instead of double damage

Equipment

• Echoing Staff now has clearer targeting rules
• Pellet crossbows have been redesigned and are no longer exotic

Feats

• Arbalist has been slightly buffed and clarified
• Jump Specialization has been redesigned as Heavenly Warrior
• Greatweapon Warrior: Power Attack+ has been redesigned
• Null: Disruptive Presence has been nerfed

Uncommon Species

• Dragon:
  • Are now intrinsically multipedal
  • The Dragon class rank 2 and 3 abilities have been redesigned, granting flight earlier but with a lower height limit
• Harpy:
  • Winged Agility and Winged Combat are now an intrinsic part of the Harpy species
  • The Harpy class has been redesigned and is generally stronger
• Incarnation:
  • Now has a base class
  • The Incarnation species archetype is now mandatory
• Oozeborn: Now has Disguise as a class skill
• Treant: Animate Plants is now magical

Monsters

• Monsters now add only half their attributes to all non-Armor defenses, but have slightly higher base defenses
  • This should make monster defense variance less extreme

10.9.0: Split out Tome of Creation, remove damage types

Book Reorganization

Problem

The Rise core book is almost 500 pages long. It is a vast tome, and not well designed as an introduction for new players to learn the system. As a comprehensive repository of all rules, it explains edge cases and unusual situations in detail before it can introduce core system concepts. Although it has some lighter text to weave sections together and try to summarize the system, it is still not well structured as an introduction.

In addition, many players simply don't need to know all of the rules of Rise. By far the most complicated parts of Rise relate to character creation, and many players don't create their own characters from scratch. People can play pregenerated characters, or make general choices about how they want their character to work that the GM or another experienced player can translate into Rise's specific rules. Those players still need to know how to play Rise, and how to use a character sheet, but not the full details of how to make their own sheet.

Solution

Split up the Rise player-facing book into two books: a new, smaller introduction book, and the "Tome of Creation". The core book is now only 29 pages long - still long for an introduction, but much more reasonable to understand. It has a summary of all of Rise's core concepts, and the minimum information needed to sit down at a table of Rise and participate. The Tome of Creation contains comprehensive details of Rise's character creation process, combat rules, and so on, much like the old core book. Maintaining a single comprehensive rulebook means it is still over 400 pages long. However, that is easier to use than requiring frequent cross-book references, and the intimidating size is less relevant if it is no longer the first thing a new player sees.

This will take some iteration, and this first version of the core book is incomplete. In particular, it would benefit from having a guide to how to use the character sheet, which will come in a future release.

Removing Damage Types

Problem

Currently, a creature that is immune to electricity damage has no special protection against non-damaging effects from the Electromancy mystic sphere, such as Shocking Discharge. This is narratively odd, because that spell is clearly using electricity to accomplish its effects, but there is technically no rule saying that it is an electricity-based effect.

Similarly, although a fire elemental is immune to fire damage, there is no good way to indicate that an earth elemental should be resistant to effects from the Terramancy mystic sphere, or that an air elemental should be vulnerable to those effects. Aeromancy, Aquamancy, and Terramancy have a clear narrative theme and associated elements, but mechanically they just do various types of physical damage. That means it's not easy to tie them into immunities or vulnerabilities.

The rules for resolving multiple damage types are also non-obvious. They are fairly consistent - adding an extra damage type is always good for the attacker - but not particularly intuitive for new players. It's reasonable to assume that a fire elemental would have some special defenses against a player using a Flaming sword, but in practice that is not true.

Solution

Damage types no longer exist. Instead, abilities that previously had damage types now have relevant tags, like Fire or Earth. Immunities and vulnerabilities are based on tags, not damage types. Physical damage is no longer typed.

This does require change the balance of power between offense and defense for tagged abilities. Previously, if an effect did "damage of all types", that was a strictly positive effect. Now, if an effect somehow had every individual tag, a creature with some immunities and no vulnerabilities would be immune to that effect. For that reason, there are no effects that simply add a large number of tags.

Specific changes

• New tags added: Acid, Air, Cold, Earth, Electricity, Fire, Poison, Water
• Every ability that previously did damage of a specific type now has an appropriate tag instead
• Many abilities have additional tags to emphasize a more tag-based system

General changes

• The standard damage scaling progressions have been redesigned to rely more heavily on power, and to avoid dividing power by 3 wherever possible. Non-power scaling damage values also increased.
  • This should be a buff for most characters.
  • Previously, there were three damage scaling "groups": normal scaling, high power scaling, and non-power scaling. This update removed the "high power scaling" group and increased the power scaling of the normal group.
  • Power scaling changes by rank:
    • Rank 2: Previously 1d8 + half power, now 1d6 + power
    • Rank 4: Previously 1d6 + 1d6 per 3 power, now 1d6 per 2 power
    • Rank 5: Previously 1d8 + 1d8 per 3 power, now 1d6 + 1d6 per 2 power
    • Rank 6: Previously 2d8 + 1d8 per 3 power, now 1d8 + 1d8 per 2 power
    • Rank 7: Previously 2d8 + 1d8 per 2 power, now 1d10 + 1d10 per 2 power
  • Non-power scaling changes by rank:
    *
  • Many individual abilities from classes and feats that use nonstandard damage scalings were also buffed
• All abilities which previously had "Strike" in their names and which made a strike have been renamed
  • This should avoid confusion between a strike (the standard individual weapon attack) and a maneuver (which may or may not cause you to make one or more strikes)

Characters

• You can now attune to abilities on behalf of creatures without attunement points, such as animals

Combat

• The Auditory and Visual tags now have more clear rules about how they apply to people who are trying to stop themselves from seeing or hearing
• Making dual strikes now imposes a -2 accuracy penalty instead of -1. Having 4 Dex reduces that penalty to -1 instead of removing it.
• Being vulnerable now explicitly overrides being impervious or immune. If you would be both vulnerable and immune to an attack with multiple tags, you are simply vulnerable.
• The Dirty Trick universal ability has been removed
• Objects can be thrown up to ten times the normal limit if they are particularly easy to throw, like a baseball
• Falling damage is now slightly lower, and has much slower scaling with higher weight classes

Classes

• Barbarian: Resilient Strike is now Resilient Blow, Enraged Strike is now Aggravated Violence, and Feral Strike is now Feral Ferocity
• Cleric:
  • Precise Spell now gives +2 accuracy instead of +1
  • Smiting Spell now grants a +2 power bonus instead of changing damage type
  • Miracles now have more clear powers and limitations
  • Divine Aid now scales more strongly with power
  • Bless the Worthy now restores more damage resistance
  • Destructive Strike is now Demolish, and it deals more damage.
  • Fire domain mastery has been redesigned
• Druid:
  • Elemental Strike is now Elemental Infusion. It also deals more damage and has different tag rules.
  • Elemental Strike+ has been redesigned as Elemental Tranquility
  • Airborne Spell now grants the spell the Air tag
  • Flooding Spell now grants the spell the Water tag
  • Grounded Spell now grants +2 accuracy instead of +1 and grants the spell the Earth tag
  • Incendiary Spell now has a -2 accuracy penalty on the repeated attack, can repeat on any number of creatures, and grants the spell the Fire tag
  • Form of the Hawk now has a 30 foot height limit instead of 60 foot
  • Shifting Strike is now Shifting Claw, and has stronger scaling
• Fighter:
  • Disciplined Strike is now Disciplined Blow, and has stronger scaling
  • Armored Strike is now Armored Crush, and Guarding Strike is now Sentinel's Challenge
• Monk:
  • Aerial Strike is now Death from Above, and has stronger scaling
  • Invested Strike is now Invested Blow
• Paladin:
  • Smite now has simpler damage scaling
  • Detect Anathema now has clearer wording for its rank 5 upgrade
  • Pass Judgment is now Subtle
• Ranger:
  • Tag-Team Takedown now has stronger scaling
  • Ambush has redesigned and generally stronger scaling
• Rogue:
  • Bardic Lore now does not grant class skills and is rank 2
  • Bardic Performances can now be done with one of four performance styles: dance, instrumental, manipulation, or vocal. Each style imposes a different penalty on the bard.
  • Vocal bardic performances now prevent talking and verbal components instead of gaining the Speech tag
  • Dirge of Doom now only affects creatures
• Sorcerer:
  • Dragonbreath Spell now also doubles the spell's area
  • Precise Spell now grants a +2 accuracy bonus instead of +1
  • Powerful Spell has been replaced with Energetic Spell, which grants a +2 power bonus and adds either the Cold, Fire, or Electricity tag
• Warlock:
  • Abyssal Rebuke now has stronger damage scaling
  • Banish to the Abyss now has stronger damage scaling
  • Hellfire+ now grants a +3 power bonus instead of +2
  • Secret of Bloodsharing now grants more healing at rank 7
• Wizard:
  • Portable Workshop+ now increases the number of simulataneous items to 8, instead of matching archetype rank

Skills

• Climb: Creature Climb now only imposes a -2 accuracy penalty instead of -4
• Endurance: Maintaining exertion now has clearer rules
• Perform: Now has dance, instrumental, manipulation, and vocal performances defined

Equipment

• Nets are difficulty value 8 to escape, rather than 10
• The special standard action attacks granted by magic weapons are now explicitly mundane in nature, so they use your Strength
  • Discuss: should these be magical attacks that explicitly use mundane power instead of magical power?
• Magic mplements:
  • Bloodfrenzy Staff is now stronger and higher rank
  • Staff of Energy Conversion has been redesigned
• Weapons:
  • Hook swords now have +1 accuracy instead of Sweeping (1)
• Magic weapons:
  • Bloodfrenzy is now...

10.8.0: Base class simplification

Class bonus changes

Problem

There are a large number of slightly different ways to change character statistics in small ways. This makes the process of calculating your statistics unnecessarily tedious, with a lot of flipping back and forth between different sections of the book. Class bonuses are the largest source of this phenomenon. In particular, base class bonuses often provide the effects of attributes, but broken up into their individual components.

For example, a fighter has a higher Fortitude defense, more hit points, and a higher fatigue tolerance than a wizard. Currently, each of those effects is listed individually. However, Rise already have a clearly defined concept that links all three of those statistics: Constitution. Rise's attributes are deeply interwoven throughout the system in complex ways. Duplicating each component of an attribute's effects individually is redundant, and just makes life harder.

Solution

Statistical bonuses from class abilities, especially base classes, should be simplified and reduced. Instead, classes should increase attributes. Where necessary, this means that the normal values for those statistics is increased to compensate for those bonuses not being part of the base class.

Specific changes

Characters

• Attributes can no longer go above 3 during attribute point buy
  • This ensures that the maximum level 1 attribute is still 5, as it was before this patch.
• Core statistic changes to replace base class bonuses:
  • +3 Fort/Ref/Ment
  • +2 attunement points
  • +3 fatigue tolerance
  • +1 insight point

Classes

• New base class effects:
  • Barbarian:
    • Stats: +1 Str, +1 Con or Dex, extreme HP
    • Resources: 4 trained skills
    • Items: Light and medium armor, non-exotic weapons
  • Cleric:
    • Stats: +1 Wil, +1 Int or Per, +2 Mental, medium HP
    • Resources: 3 trained skills, +1 insight, +1 attunement
    • Items: Light and medium armor, simple weapons
  • Druid:
    • Stats: +1 Per, +1 any attribute, high HP
    • Resources: 4 trained skills, +1 attunement
    • Items: Light armor, leather lamellar, simple weapons, shepherd's axe, sickle, scythe
  • Fighter:
    • Stats: +1 Con, +1 Str or Dex, +1 Armor, high HP
    • Resources: 3 trained skills
    • Items: All armor, non-exotic weapons
  • Monk:
    • Stats: +1 Dex, +1 Wil, +1 Int or Per, medium HP
    • Resources: 4 trained skills
    • Items: Light armor, simple and monk weapons
  • Paladin:
    • Stats: +1 Wil, +1 Str or Con, high HP
    • Resources: 3 trained skills, +1 attunement
    • Items: All armor, non-exotic weapons
  • Ranger:
    • Stats: +1 Dex, +1 Per, high HP
    • Resources: 5 trained skills, +1 attunement
    • Items: Light armor, leather lamellar, non-exotic weapons
  • Rogue:
    • Stats: +1 Dex, +1 Int or Per, medium HP
    • Resources: 6 trained skills, +1 attunement
    • Items: Light armor, simple weapons, Compact and Light weapons
  • Sorcerer:
    • Stats: +1 Con, +1 Wil, +2 Mental, medium HP
    • Resources: 3 trained skills, +2 attunement
    • Items: No armor, simple weapons
  • Warlock:
    • Stats: +1 Wil, +1 Int or Per, low HP
    • Resources: 3 trained skills, +2 attunement, +1 insight
    • Items: Light and medium armor, simple weapons
  • Wizard:
    • Stats: +1 Int, +1 Per or Wil, low HP
    • Resources: 4 trained skills, +2 attunement, +1 insight
    • Items: No armor, simple weapons
• Other class changes are listed with General Changes below to ensure all changes are listed together

Uncommon Species

• New base class effects:
  • Automaton:
    • Stats: +1 Con, +1 Int, +2 Fort, high HP
    • Resources: 3 trained skills, +1 attunement
    • Items: All armor, non-exotic weapons
  • Dragon:
    • Stats: +1 Str, +1 Con, +1 Int or Wil, high HP
    • Resources: 5 trained skills
    • Items: Light armor, no weapons
  • Dryaidi:
    • Stats: +1 Dex, +1 Per, +1 Int or Wil, low HP
    • Resources: 5 trained skills, +1 attunement
    • Items: Light armor, simple weapons
  • Harpy:
    • Stats: +1 Str, +1 Dex, +1 Per, medium HP
    • Resources: 4 trained skills, +1 attunement
    • Items: Light armor, simple weapons
  • Oozeborn:
    • Stats: +1 Str, +1 Dex, +1 Con, extreme HP
    • Resources: 3 trained skills
    • Items: Light armor, simple weapons
  • Treant:
    • Stats: +1 Con, +1 Str or Wil, +2 Fort, extreme HP
    • Resources: 4 trained skills
    • Items: All armor, simple and club-like weapons
  • Vampire:
    • Stats: +1 Dex, +1 Str or Int, high HP
    • Resources: 5 trained skills, +1 attunement
    • Items: Light armor, non-exotic weapons
• Other uncommon class changes are listed with General Changes below to ensure all changes are listed together

General changes

Characters

• Spending insight points to gain proficiency with exotic weapons is no longer available by default
  • It's still part of the Expanded Insight Points optional rule

Combat

• Desperate exertion now explicitly allows you to keep the original roll if it was higher

Classes

• All Spell Mastery archetypes have had their rank scaling adjusted to grant a +1 attribute bonus instead of an extra +1 accuracy
• Metamagic abilities now have less redundant wording about when you can change which spells your metamagic affects
• The Mobile Maneuver augment can no longer allow you to move as a Swift effect
• Barbarian:
  • Outland Savage: Savage Precision now gives a simpler bonus with Brawling abilities
  • Battleforged Resilience: The rank 7 ability has been redesigned
  • Totemist: Bear and Eagle totems have been redesigned, Shark totem has been mostly nerfed, and Animal Instincts has been redesigned
• Cleric:
  • Knowledge (items) is now a class skill
  • Divine Spell Mastery: Mystic Sphere metamagic has been replaced with Smiting Spell
  • Preacher: Persuasive Certainty and Inspiring Oration have been redesigned
  • Domain Mastery: War domain now grants proficiency with all non-exotic weapons, but does not grant armor proficiency
• Druid:
  • Knowledge (items) is now a class skill
  • Nature Spell Mastery: All metamagic options other than Rituals have been redesigned
  • Shifter: Bear and Mouse forms have been slightly nerfed
• Fighter:
  • Knowledge (items) is now a class skill
  • Combat Discipline: Enduring Discipline has been redesigned, and Disciplined Strike has more power-based damage scaling
  • Equipment Training: Armor Expertise no longer reduces encumbrance, scaling order was restructured, and the +1 accuracy upgrade has been replaced with a new Armored Strike standard action attack
  • Martial Mastery: You can choose any two combat styles, rather than having to pick one of the damage type-based combat styles
  • Sentinel: Stalwart Sentinel has been redesigned
• Monk:
  • Esoteric Warrior: Can now grant proficiency with exotic monk weapons
  • Ki: Ki Power has been redesigned to grant +1 Willpower
  • Perfected Form: Perfect Precision+ has been replaced with a +2 bonus with Brawling abilities
• Paladin:
  • Divine Spell Expertise: Now grants +1 Willpower instead of +1 accuracy, and Divine Conduit+ now has slightly longer range
  • Stalwart Guardian: Stalwart Defense no longer grants Mental defense, and Stalwart Defense+ has been redesigned to grant +1 Con
• Ranger:
  • Knowledge (items) is now a class skill
  • Boundary Warden: Know Your Enemy has had its scaling flipped to grant defenses before +2 accuracy, and Steadfast Warden has been redesigned to grant +1 Con
  • Scout: Perceive Weakness has been replaced with +1 Perception, and the scaling order has been slightly shuffled
• Rogue:
  • Assassin: Now grants an exotic weapon proficiency option
  • Jack of All Trades: Versatile Attacker has been replaced with attribute bonuses
• Sorcerer:
  • Arcane Spell Mastery: A new Dragonbreath Spell metamagic has been added
  • Draconic Magic: Draconic Scales and Draconic Precision+ have been replaced with attribute bonuses
  • Wild Magic: Wildspell+ has been redesigned to avoid explicit downsides
• Warlock:
  • Knowledge (items) is now a class skill
  • Blessings of the Abyss: Resist the Dark Call now grants Compulsion/Emotion immunity instead of +2 Mental, and has different scaling
  • Keeper of Forbidden Knowledge: Secret of Bloodforging rank 7 now grants +5 Armor instead of +6, and Locus of Corrupting Power+ has been slightly nerfed
  • Pact Spell Mastery: Precise Spell metamagic has been replaced with Desperate Spell
  • Soulkeeper's Chosen: Spiteful Whispers has been buffed, and all effects of Empowering Whispers+ have been redesigned
• Wizard:
  • Alchemist: Alchemical Precision+ has been nerfed, and Alchemical Tolerance+ has been buffed
  • Arcane Spell Mastery: Mystic Sphere and Precise Spell metamagic options have been replaced with Calculated Spell and Researched Spell

Equipment

• Characters with a Strength of 3 can now draw/sheathe Heavy weapons just as quickly as non-Heavy weapons
• Characters in heavy armor now still add half Dex to their Armor defense
• Small items now cost the same as Medium items
• Warhammers now deal 1d8 damage, but no longer have Versatile Grip
• Removed weapons: broadaxe, estoc, flanged mace, slapjack, ranseur
• New exotic monk weapons: hook sword and war fan
• Magic apparel:
  • Amulet of Distant Blood has been removed
  • Attribute increasing items are now rank 3 instead of rank 5, and +2 attribute items have been added at rank 7
• Magic weapons:
  • Bloodfuel has been redesigned
  • Brutish weapons are now rank 3 instead of rank 1, and Brutish+ is now rank 5 instead of rank 4, but Brutish++ now deals more damage
    • Strength is already very strong at low levels when your power is low; it only needs scaling help at higher levels
  • Educated weapons are now rank 2 instead of rank 1, but Educated++ is now rank 6 instead of rank 7
    ...

10.7.2: Fixed ability usage time

Fixed ability usage time display bug

10.7.1: Clearer ability usage times and costs

General changes

• All active abilities now explicitly list the action required to use them in the ability description box
• Abilities that increase fatigue when used now list that as a cost above the ability's effect
• Many labels that pointed to incorrect book pages have been fixed
• The Exertion ability tag has been removed
• Intangible creatures can more explicitly move through enemies

Characters

• Increasing Intelligence after character creation now more explicitly grants you trained skills and insight points

Adventuring

• Creatures can no longer sustain two instances of the same ability by any means
• Performing a ritual from a ritual book you did not write no longer has any penalty
• Performing a ritual from a mystic sphere you do not have access to now also doubles the time requirement

Combat

• Trip is now a Brawling ability
• The rules for asymmetric grappling have been redesigned as "controlling the grapple" to improve clarity

Classes

• Barbarian: Savage Precision no longer affects Dirty Trick
• Fighter:
  • Combat Discipline has been restructured and generally buffed
  • Equipment Training has been restructured and is slightly more offensive
  • Sentinel: Guarding Strike has been buffed
  • Tactician:
    • Battle tactics generally have weaker scaling
    • A new Lead from the Front battle tactic has been added
    • Shifting Stance can now grant an adjacent ally +1 accuracy instead of a +1 bonus to vital rolls
• Monk:
  • Unhindered Agility no longer increases Reflex defense
  • Perfect Precision now also allows using Dexterity instead of Strength for Brawling abilities
• Ranger:
  • Boundary Warden now also grants exotic weapon proficiency at an insight point discount
• Rogue:
  • Virtuoso now allows sustaining as a free action instead of as a minor action, but no longer allows sustaining two copies of the same performance
  • Virtuoso+ has been replaced with a new All the World's a Stage ability
  • Confound has a different rank 5 upgrade
  • Sneak Attack now deals slightly more damage at ranks 1-3
• Sorcerer: The Wildspell+ table has been redesigned to be less powerful
• Warlock: Abyssal Blast has been redesigned

Skills

Equipment

• Mundane weapons:
  • Spending insight points to gain proficiency with exotic weapons is now part of the core rules, rather than a variant
  • Compact weapons, and items stored out of convenient reach, no longer count against the number of items you can have readily available in combat
  • Compact weapons are now lightweight for their size, like other weapons
  • The ancient dragonfang breath attack now deals double weapon damage
  • Diamondsteel weapons now provide +3/+5 for crits rather than +2/+4
  • Starmetal weapons have been added
    • They provide extra damage, but have an accuracy penalty and a Strength requirement
• The damage dealt by magic items have been slightly increased
• Magic apparel:
  • Amulet of Perfect Equality is now rank 4 instead of rank 5
  • Bracers of Blessed Protection have been buffed
  • Healing Belt is now rank 1 instead of rank 2
  • Ring of Protection no longer scales its bonus to vital rolls
• Magic armaments:
  • Trimmed armor has been added
  • Fixating weapons have been redesigned
• Other magic items
  • Potion of Healing now heals more
  • Sending stones have been added

Mystic Spheres

• Various overland movement abilities now end when you attack or take damage, rather than when you take any action other than movement
• Aquamancy:
  • Aqueous Form now imposes a -1 Armor penalty
  • Added Efficient Aqueous Form
• Channel Divinity:
  • Agent of the Divine is now rank 1 instead of rank 3, but no longer scales its vital roll bonus
  • Divine Seal has a faster casting time
  • Persistent Divine Seal added
• Chronomancy:
  • Evasion is now Accelerated Evasion and is rank 2 instead of rank 3
  • Efficient Accelerated Evasion added
  • Gentle Repose is now rank 1
  • Persistent Gentle Repose added
  • Stasis Chamber now only affects objects
  • Persistent Stasis Chamber added
  • Rapid Overland Haste now has a longer casting time
• Electromancy: Chain Lightning has been simplified
• Photomancy:
  • Greater Blurred Motion has been redesigned
  • Enduring Invisibility now ends if you attack
  • Disguise Image and its variants have a faster casting time
  • Various improvements to Continuous Light have been added
• Polymorph:
  • Malleable Body now imposes a -1 Armor penalty
  • Overland Runner added
• Prayer:
  • Blessing of Perseverance is now rank 1, but no longer intrinsically scales with rank
  • Indomitable Blessing no longer scales its vital roll bonus
  • Blessing of Vitality is now rank 5
  • Permanent Bless Water replaced with Persistent Bless Water
• Pyromancy: Soul of the Phoenix now also increases fatigue level
• Revelation:
  • Armorbreak Sight is now rank 2 instead of rank 4, but is Deep
  • Greater Armorbreak Sight has been replaced with Efficient Armorbreak Sight
  • Empowered Distant Sight only reduces longshot penalty by 2 instead of 3, but is not Deep
  • Locate Object now has a longer casting time
  • Read Magic has been removed
  • Sending and its variants are now lower rank
  • Rapid Sending has been added
  • Scry Creature is now rank 3 instead of rank 4, but has a 100 mile limit
  • Distant Scry Creature has been added
  • Private Sanctum only lasts for one year
  • Scryward is now rank 2 instead of rank 3, but it only lasts for one year
• Telekinesis:
  • Floating Armament is now rank 2 instead of rank 3
  • Greater Floating Armament has been replaced with Efficient Floating Armament and Heavy Floating Armament
  • Retributive Kinetic Shield has been removed
• Thaumaturgy: Absorb Magic only grants a +1 defense bonus instead of +2
• Toxicology: Bitter Remedy and Restful Draught have a faster casting time
• Umbramancy: Deep Shadowform has been replaced with Efficient Shadowform
• Verdamancy:
  • Shape Plant added
  • Massive Flourishing Grass is no longer deep
  • Sense Plants has a faster casting time

Feats

• Barbaric Ancestry:
  • Ancestral Battlecry and Ancestral Totem can now be used as a minor action if you pay one fatigue
  • Ancestral Totem is now smaller and no longer blocks enemy movement
  • The level 18 ability has been changed
• Battle Armory:
  • Now also grants minor action attunement at level 6
  • The level 18 ability is now more interesting
• Celestial Ancestry: Redesigned the level 1 ability and some scaling details
• Draconic Ancestry: Now increases fly speed at level 18 instead of increasing height limit
• Fateweaver: Fateseal now has a more standard critical effect
• Iron Will: Now also grants the ability to detect Subtle mental effects at level 1
• Healing Specialization: Healing Touch now heals more HP
• Precognition: Now also grants +2 awareness and immunity to full unawareness at level 1
• Regenerator: Regenerative Recovery now heals more HP
• Shieldbearer: The passive Armor defense bonus is now doubled when you total defense
• Sphere Focus -- Polymorph: Now has different level 12 and 18 scaling
• Toughness:
  • Now grants better sleep reduction starting from level 1
  • Now also grants damage resistance at level 6
• Weapon Focus: Now grants +2 power instead of +2 damage at level 12

Uncommon Species

• Drow: Deep Darkness now has more standard wording
• Incarnation: Untethered incarnations have different rank scaling

Variant Rules

• Added "Complex Cover" variant

10.7.0: Intangible mists, healing buffs, and simplifications

General changes

• The Roll20 sheet now has a slot to store body armor modifiers to vital rolls
• Many typos and poorly written sentences have been fixed

Adventuring

• Somatic component failure has been removed
  • Arcane and pact spellcasters already have limited armor proficiency, which is sufficient to maintain the intended narrative
  • This could cause confusing outcomes, like forcing clerics and druids to consider somatic component failure only when performing rituals
• Dismissing an ability is now intrinsically a free action, so individual abilities do not have to specify how they are dismissed
• The rules for how spells and rituals work have been reworded for clarity
• Rituals can now be performed and transcribed from ritual books that you didn't write yourself
  • This allows ritual books to appear as treasure during an adventure, and should generally increase the accessibility of rituals
• Poisons now take longer to craft, matching alchemical items
• A new "intangible" trait has been added
  • Intangible creatures are immune to physical damage, but cannot pass fully through solid objects like incorporeal creatures
• Legless creatures cannot jump

Combat

• Critical hits with melee weapons are no longer considered a Size-Based effect
  • This rarely mattered, and was an unnecessary nerf to melee characters who put themselves in dangerous situations
• Several effects that previously changed effective size when calculating Size-Based effects no longer do so
  • This affects flight, climbing on a creature, and attacking a prone creature
  • These were mostly added to increase the accessibility of critical hits for melee characters, and are no longer relevant
• Free actions no longer have an intrinsic "one free action of the same type each round" limitation
  • This made "free actions" not actually free and required a confusing difference between "free actions" and "non-actions"
  • Instead, individual abilities explicitly specify if they have a once per round limit
• Extra damage now applies once per attack roll, rather than once per ability usage
  • Dual strikes are still a special exception to avoid doubling extra damage on single targets
  • This is mostly irrelevant, but is a slight buff to multi-strike attacks and sustained abilities which deal damage in multiple rounds
• Splitting movement between multiple movement modes is now slightly more realistic
  • This fixed an edge case where having a particularly fast or slow land speed could affect your ability to split movement between two different non-land movement modes
• Initiative is now equal to Dexterity, rather than movement speed
  • Initiative is still usually irrelevant
• The "React" special movement has been removed
• Flying creatures with a height limit can now use objects up to 5 feet away from them to support their flight
  • This allows flying creatures to fly up arbitrarily high cliffs, regardless of their height limit
• Shoving a creature two or more size categories smaller than you automatically allows you to move at full speed
• The phrase "dual wield" has been consistently replaced with making "dual strikes"

Equipment

• Massive weapons no longer deal half damage on a miss
• Carrying more than five weapons or similar items on your body now imposes an encumbrance penalty for each object beyond the fifth
• Bucklers now have more clear timing for when you choose whether you gain their defensive benefits
• The rules and timing for interacting with objects have been clarified
  • Object size no longer affects the action type required to interact with an object, which is a buff for extremely strong characters
• The Exotic Weapons table has been split up to be separate from the regular Weapons table
• Rawhide has been renamed to leather lamellar
• Magic apparel:
  • Ghost Shroud now also affects intangible creatures
  • Assassin's Cloak has been simplified and is now higher rank

Classes

• The rules for multiclassing and tracking your base class have been clarified
• Barbarian: Feral Strike's scaling has been redesigned
• Cleric: Divine Aid's healing has been increased
• Fighter: Battle tactics are now Swift
• Paladin:
  • Aligned Aura is now Swift
  • Lay on Hand's healing has been increased
  • Smite's self-damage has been reduced
• Ranger: Quarry no longer has a range limit
• Warlock: Armor Tolerance has been replaced with Survival Pact
• Wizard: Transmutation Specialization's defense effect is now Swift

Skills

• Crafting times have been increased
  • Previously, some rank 0 items could be crafted instantly, which was not intentional

Combat Styles

• Many maneuvers use a new "Damaging Hit:" prefix to save space when describing maneuvers that must hit and deal damage to have their full effect
• Penetrating precision: Arrowguide now only grants a bonus to ranged strikes, not all strikes
• Unbreakable defense: The Parry abilities now grant a shield bonus to Armor defense rather than granting a bonus if you are not using a shield

Mystic Spheres

• Almost all healing abilities have been buffed
  • Previously, healing abilities with less than medium range were not being compensated correctly for that difference
• Aeromancy:
  • Control Weather now allows you to change the weather pattern without breaking attunement
  • Mistform now makes you intangible instead of incorporeal
• Chronomancy is no longer on the pact spell list
• Telekinesis: Gentle Force more explicitly can never push creatures
• Umbramancy:
  • Sunlight Ward is now defeated by magical effects like Solar Flare and Solar Ray
  • Sunlight Ward+ has been added, which also protects from magical sunlight

Feats

• Battle Armory: Now allows you to hold 10 weapons on your body instead of the normal 5

Uncommon Species

• Untethered incarnations are now immune to critical hits from strikes
• Non-molded oozeborn, untethered incarnations, and mist form vampires are now explicitly legless, which makes them immune to being prone but prevents them from jumping
• Vampires in mist form are now intangible instead of incorporeal