TOPIC: FINAL Big Change to Powers Available on the Mark of Enlightenment

Due to some work done on the Path to Enlightenment adventure at Ring Con, we are yet again changing the powers available to select while making a Mark of Enlightenment. This will tie things together rather well -- as the adventure tells the tale of how your characters obtained their MoE -- by traveling to Enlightenment -- the demi-plane where the Ten Saints dwell.

You will select a Saint to follow, and they will "mark" you with a powerful divine symbol that will gain you one of these powers:

St. Bullo - +3 to hit with Melee attacks
St. Fleck - +3 to hit with Ranged attacks
St. Fokee - +5 to Ranged damage
St. Gubb - May use Eldritch Runestone effect (1/game)
St. Hopp - +5 to Melee damage
St. Lorca - Automatically make all skill checks
St. Raya - +3 to Healing Spells & +3 Sacred damage to damage Spells
St. Stern - +10 to Retribution Damage
St. Valla - +4 to Saves
St. Wilton - May equip up to 3 Ear slot items

Thank you all for your patience with these changes! It is much appreciated, and this will make the token a much coolor and more memory-filled endevour.

Really looking forward to Ring Con!!!

Regarding the St. Wilton power, I'm not a fan of it being a slot expander but if it has to, you might want to make it "May equip an extra Ear slot item" instead of specifically calling out a third Ear slot. That way down the road you don't box yourself in if there's ever newer Tokens that start allowing the Ear slot to be expanded to 3 or more.

Not gonna lie Jeff I think there’s a missed opportunity to have a St. Elmo mark here

Jeff, is this change going to have any effect on the token name?

As an alternative suggestion maybe have St. Wilton be +10hp & + 5AC, or some combination of HP/AC.

I very much like the thematic piece of the marks where you now choose a saint to follow. Much cooler!!

I do have concerns about St. Wilton being slot expander. The ear already expands slots and this is just gonna problem for balance when compared to the others. I like the other powers, I just really don't like this one.

Edit: to add on why I don't like it. Ear already expands slots, so now we have even more expanded slots, which will mean if it's not the most powerful option today (which it already is in many cases) it will be in a few years times as we get more legendaries and relics added to the game. It makes all the other saints simply feel worse now and even worse over time.

But again, I like the overall direction of this change!

The only thing about the Ear Slot Expander is that the slots it expands all have caps. So, it really doesn't do a whole lot in the way of power creep. Flexibility, definitely yes, which I think is a good thing. Maybe down the road it will lead to a bigger gain, but right now you won't get +5 melee or ranged damage from the slot expander.

Dave wrote: The only thing about the Ear Slot Expander is that the slots it expands all have caps. So, it really doesn't do a whole lot in the way of power creep. Flexibility, definitely yes, which I think is a good thing. Maybe down the road it will lead to a bigger gain, but right now you won't get +5 melee or ranged damage from the slot expander.

I'd argue you can already. If you add back in the arcane earcuff you would just need add 1 of (charm of winter, charm of summer, bifrost charm) and then any charm like "charm of targeting" to hit +5 ranged damage.

Rings you just need ring of the Yeti and Ring of Roaring. I could likely find more.

But in short, I think the expander already rivals or exceeds the other options.

Grizwald wrote: Jeff, is this change going to have any effect on the token name?

No. It might slightly effect the text on the token explaining the power. We will see what fits. We will try to fit in the Saint's name, if possible.

Impy wrote:

Dave wrote: The only thing about the Ear Slot Expander is that the slots it expands all have caps. So, it really doesn't do a whole lot in the way of power creep. Flexibility, definitely yes, which I think is a good thing. Maybe down the road it will lead to a bigger gain, but right now you won't get +5 melee or ranged damage from the slot expander.

I'd argue you can already. If you add back in the arcane earcuff you would just need add 1 of (charm of winter, charm of summer, bifrost charm) and then any charm like "charm of targeting" to hit +5 ranged damage.

Rings you just need ring of the Yeti and Ring of Roaring. I could likely find more.

But in short, I think the expander already rivals or exceeds the other options.

I'd argue you're already equipping Bifrost and probably Summer or Winter. This is going to be like your 8th thru 10th best Charms or 7th thru 9th best Ioun Stones. Honestly, this is the only option that in my mind comes close to me not picking +5 melee or +5 ranged damage. Only 85-90 people are going to have this Mark. How many of those will take this option?

I was debating between Melee and Ranged damage so St. Wilton is clearly a great choice for me. It's worth easily +4 damage and maybe more depending on what charms/iouns are already equipped.

The only potential negative is if there are more Ear slot expanders in the future.

Dave wrote:

Impy wrote:

Dave wrote: The only thing about the Ear Slot Expander is that the slots it expands all have caps. So, it really doesn't do a whole lot in the way of power creep. Flexibility, definitely yes, which I think is a good thing. Maybe down the road it will lead to a bigger gain, but right now you won't get +5 melee or ranged damage from the slot expander.

I'd argue you can already. If you add back in the arcane earcuff you would just need add 1 of (charm of winter, charm of summer, bifrost charm) and then any charm like "charm of targeting" to hit +5 ranged damage.

Rings you just need ring of the Yeti and Ring of Roaring. I could likely find more.

But in short, I think the expander already rivals or exceeds the other options.

I'd argue you're already equipping Bifrost and probably Summer or Winter. This is going to be like your 8th thru 10th best Charms or 7th thru 9th best Ioun Stones. Honestly, this is the only option that in my mind comes close to me not picking +5 melee or +5 ranged damage. Only 85-90 people are going to have this Mark. How many of those will take this option?

I'd rather flip this question back to you. If we both recognize this slot bonus currently matches, and sometimes exceeds most of the current other Mark bonuses and will get more powerful over time why not take it out? It is in a different tier of power altogether with its versatility when the point of the Mark Powers are to give the crafter the option to choose a power important to them? This one saint can do a dang good job at replicating all the other saints, which feels to me like it removes the point of actually making that choice. They're only 85-90 of these at most, wouldn't we want their choices to matter and not be able to reproduced by another Saint?