UMD Rogue and Bard scrolls

Discussion in 'The Temple of Elemental Evil' started by pblack476, Oct 14, 2014.

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  1. pblack476

    pblack476 Established Member

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    I want a rogue that does not fail to use any scroll up to 6th level ones (Mainly for the spell mislead) and I plan on having my bard scribe them. With high enough CHA I do not have to emulate the ability score right? Or in ToEE all arcane scrolls fall into the Wizard category and have to emulate INT?

    Also, does armor spell failure apply to scroll usage?
     
  2. XVicious

    XVicious Established Member

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    taken from 3.5 edition players hand book page.85

    According to USE MAGIC DEVIVCE SKILL

    here is the list of DC (difficulty class)
    pertaining to your question
    -----------------------------------------

    USE SCROLL 20 + spell level
    USE WAND 20 + caster level


    -----------------------------------------

    example
    in order to use a 6th level scroll you need to score
    higher then DC 26 with a d20 + your UMD skill + mod

    the only abilty needed to emulate this would be charisma, which applies to the
    Use magic device skill.


    Its is only the skill check + your charisma bonus
     
  3. short

    short Member

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    I know that the character who scribes the scroll "stores" 2 things in the scroll: the type of ability (CHA/WIS/INT) used when casting from the scroll and his own caster level rounded down to the nearest odd number. For example, a level 8 druid makes scrolls with caster level 7 that depend on wisdom for casting and saving throws. A level 5 bard makes scrolls with caster level 5 that depend on charisma, and so on. Be careful when stacking similar scrolls since they all copy the type and caster level of the bottom scroll.

    It doesn't matter if the scroll is a level 0 spell or level 9 spell, the DC is always 20 in this game. If your attribute score is too low the DC becomes 27.

    Armor spell failure does not apply to scrolls and they don't cause attacks of opportunity either. Scrolls are very strong in this game.
     
  4. pblack476

    pblack476 Established Member

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    Thx.

    I know that with high enough attribute you can cast without the ability score UMD roll. But you always have the 20+spell level roll. I just didn't know if the info on CHA/WIS/INT was stored in the scroll or not in ToEE.
     
  5. short

    short Member

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    No, really. It's always 20, not 20+spell level. At least it's true for scrolls, but I never use wands so I don't know much about them.
     
  6. pblack476

    pblack476 Established Member

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    I tested it out and got different results.

    My char is a fighter8/rogue3 with 13 points (14 -1 from CHA) in UMD and 13 INT

    Haste (lvl 3) scroll:


    1 roll with DC 20.

    Dimension Door scroll (Lvl 4):

    2 rolls. One with DC 20 and another with DC 29.

    Then a Teleport (lvl 5) scroll:

    2 rolls. One with DC 20 and another with DC 30.

    I lowered my INT in the console to 10 and tried a Haste scroll again.

    2 rolls. DC 20 and DC 29.

    Went don one spell level and tried a mirror Image scroll (lvl 2):

    2 rolls. DC 20 and DC 29.

    Dimension door with 10 INT

    2 rolls. DC 20 and 29.

    Teleport with 10 INT

    2 rolls. DC 20 and DC 30


    I did not have a lvl 6 scroll to test. But it seems that if you do not have the appropriate ability score you
    make at least a 29 DC roll. Not DC 27. And if the spell level is higher than 4, it increases to 30. I do not know what happens for lvl 6,7,8 and 9 scrolls.



    But this makes it a lot easier than I thought it would be.

    With the apropriate ability score any char can cast any spell as long as his UMD is 20. That's a piece of cake. And here I was, thinking of picking up skill focus and magical affinity to boost UMD...
     
  7. short

    short Member

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    Yeah, 27 to emulate ability score is apparently not correct. I tried a couple of times more and got 26, and you got 29 and 30. I'm not entirely sure what's going on, but meeting the ability requirement has never really been an issue so I'm not entirely sure if it matters. It also seems that bards use charisma for ability score to meet the requirements of a scroll scribed by a wizard, but he uses his intelligence to determine the saving throw.

    I'll try a little bit more and maybe we can finally figure out how this really works. I did testing in the past on the caster level, saving throws and DC needed to cast scrolls when you had the necessary ability score, but I don't know much beyond that.
     
  8. pblack476

    pblack476 Established Member

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    It is really weird. And nothing like the PHB too.

    But in the past I do remember getting 26 DC rolls when using UMD in some cases.

    I CALL UPON THE NERD ELDERS TO ERADICATE OUR DOUBTS!



    Cmon... I'm sure there's someone out there that knows this and just doesn't want to leave his cave.... =P
     
  9. short

    short Member

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    I've noticed a few more things:
    - When casting an arcane scroll (crafted by either a wizard, sorc or bard) any character can use the highest of their intelligence and charisma to meet the required ability score. Wisdom doesn't work in general, but it works for spells like Bear's Endurance that also belong to divine casters.
    - Even a single level in a class is enough to avoid the DC 20 for all spells that class has access to. Even a single level of ranger or paladin is enough to let you cast scrolls of all the ranger or paladin spells provided your ability score is high enough, even though they don't even have spells at that point.

    I couldn't find a pattern for emulating ability scores. For scrolls from lvl 1 to 7 I got the following: 26/27/25/25/25/25/25. So yes, the level 2 spell was actually the most difficult to emulate, followed by the level 1 spell at DC 26. Level 3 to 7 all had DC 25. I'm not going to bother any more with this since you just need an ability score of 13 and a +6 item to cast everything up to level 9 spells.
     
  10. pblack476

    pblack476 Established Member

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    Wow. It seems to be obviously broken then. But yes... unless you are planning on doing very non-effective casting, it can just be ignored.
     
  11. XVicious

    XVicious Established Member

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    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]


    here is the UMD skill check DC examples from the Players Hand Book

    reference for you. also a clip there for what happens when you emulate an ability .

    Hope this helps your ponder about the rules in the game.
     

    Attached Files:

  12. pblack476

    pblack476 Established Member

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    OK... but as you could see from short's testing and my own, that's not how it is implemented in ToEE.
     
  13. pblack476

    pblack476 Established Member

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    From the Game Guide:


    But it does not seem to be behaving like this every time.
     
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