Shifter versus Ley Line Walker

[Malleable]

So I know that the Shifter description says that "the Shifter's spell knowledge leans towards spells that summon. control and influence others, deal with channeling and controlling energy, and dimensional travel."
The spells they gain per level are only at their level or below.
BUT they can still learn whatever they want, right? There is no real limitation to what they can learn. They just have to find it or someone willing to teach them, right?

Personally I find the Shifter's abilities to be MUCH more interesting and powerful.

Am I missing something here? Who out there would play a Ley Line Walker over a Shifter?

Thanks,
Mal

[Nekira Sudacne]

Correct. Shifters are full general casters with no special restrictions.

As for why anyone would pick LLW over shifter, other people's ideas of cool are different than yours.

[Shark_Force]

to be clear (assuming you're using RUE)

the shifter learns 3 new spells per level. two of them are from a shorter list, but are not level-restricted; your level 2 shifter can decide to learn dimensional teleport from those spells if they want.

it is only the spell that they can learn from the full list that is limited by level.
as a result, they will in fact tend to know a lot more spells from that limited type of spell than they will from the overall standard invocations list.

as to why anyone would be a ley line walker, I find there are some definite interesting abilities. ley line phasing is one of only a very few reliable long-range teleports in the game, for example.

in order to make the best use of their abilities, you will of course need to find ways to force enemies to fight you on a ley line, for example, but if you do then you can get some fairly significant advantages. they also get a lot more PPE than shifters (both in terms of base amount and PPE recovery which can be important if you have to spend a lot on a regular basis), unless the shifter makes a pact... a pact which, I hasten to add, can saddle you with some pretty awful creatures that you now owe some degree of servitude to. now, maybe the shifter will get super lucky and pull off a pact with a god of magic, but more likely you're going to get some horrible alien monstrosity that is going to expect you to do terrible things on a regular basis.

[Malleable]

but more likely you're going to get some horrible alien monstrosity that is going to expect you to do terrible things on a regular basis.

Ahhh, I thought the choice of who you make a pact with was up to the Shifter - I didn't realize it was random or rolled or something else. I would normally choose a God of Magic...

Thanks guys,
Mal

[Nekira Sudacne]

but more likely you're going to get some horrible alien monstrosity that is going to expect you to do terrible things on a regular basis.

Ahhh, I thought the choice of who you make a pact with was up to the Shifter - I didn't realize it was random or rolled or something else. I would normally choose a God of Magic...

Thanks guys,
Mal

Not quite

Who you make a pact with is, 100%, up to the shifter.

Who your communication rift contacts to make a pact is a skill roll, but you don't know if you failed or not.

if you fail, you can try to close the link and try again. but Alien Intelligences can force communication rifts wider and send minions through, so your risking your life every time you try. They don't take refusal from Mortals very well.

or worse, Demon Lords and Alien Intelligences are good at pretending to be beings they are not. You can think you got a god of magic and it was actually just an AI lying to you.

And the problem with selling your soul is there are no takesies-backsies. If you sell your soul to a being who says he's *insert god of magic here*, you have no way of disproving it through the rift. and once you make the deal, your stuck with whoever it is.

So you are free to make a pact with whomever you want, you simply cannot be certain the being you made the pact with is actually the being you thought it was. and many such beings are very good at corrupting mortals slowly with incrimentally questionable tasks so that by the time they figure out they've been deceived, they've either already embraced evil or else are so crushed by guilt for what they've already done they no longer have the will to resist their new master.

And check that skill %. 20%+5% per level. you are much more likely to get something nasty than actually get who you wanted. and if you wait until the odds are good, well, you're waiting to level 7 just to have coin-flip odds of not contacting an Alien intelligence or something, and closer to level 10 to have decent though still by no means certain odds. and it caps out at 90% at level 15, so even if you wait until you have maximial odds to sell your soul, you still have a 10% chance of accidentally contancting a splurgorth who just rips the communication rift open and sends a half dozen Conservators to take you as a slave if you don't sell yourself willingly.

Shifters are described as a dangerous and mistrusted class for a reason. That's why the pact with the supernatural is an optional feature: many Shifters just will never make one because they don't want that risk.

[Shark_Force]

I mean, it isn't quite 100% the shifter's choice.

the other entity has to decide they want to make a pact with the shifter as well after all; you can't just call up Thoth and expect him to instantly agree to a pact just because *you* feel like making a pact. frankly, given that even if you're a terrible person many of the creatures you could wind up making a pact with are untrustworthy in addition to being evil (and being terrible doesn't make you any more fond of being stabbed in the back), I have to suspect that the relatively few beings that won't actually consistently screw you over are in high demand, and can pretty much pick and choose the shifters they want to have serving them.

so not only is it a case where most of the beings you could make a pact with are evil and are completely willing to lie to you in order to get you to sign a pact with them so that they can slowly bend you to their service, but the few that aren't like that can freely choose the servants they feel are most valuable...

[Mack]

Had a concept a while back for an AI that I nicknamed "the Redeemer." He'd look for really selfish or evil characters who want to make a pact (either a Shifter's or Witch's), but he'd slowly drive them to become good (and possibly all the way to Principled if they made it long enough). And any familiar involved would function like Jiminy Cricket.

[Nekira Sudacne]

I mean, it isn't quite 100% the shifter's choice.

the other entity has to decide they want to make a pact with the shifter as well after all; you can't just call up Thoth and expect him to instantly agree to a pact just because *you* feel like making a pact. frankly, given that even if you're a terrible person many of the creatures you could wind up making a pact with are untrustworthy in addition to being evil (and being terrible doesn't make you any more fond of being stabbed in the back), I have to suspect that the relatively few beings that won't actually consistently screw you over are in high demand, and can pretty much pick and choose the shifters they want to have serving them.

so not only is it a case where most of the beings you could make a pact with are evil and are completely willing to lie to you in order to get you to sign a pact with them so that they can slowly bend you to their service, but the few that aren't like that can freely choose the servants they feel are most valuable...

Okay, yes, the other being has to be willing, but that I assumed was already understood: it's 100% up to the shifter to accept an offer of a pact, it's not up to them weather or not a pact is offered in the first place.

[The Dark Elf]

Shifter and LLW are very different and clear character concepts.