Rebalancing the Scales

[violence in the media]

Except that you're ignoring the fact that most spellcasters have to engage in spell selection long before they know what "the situation" is going to be. The DM may design a situation where erase is the perfect solution to the situation at hand but, without sufficient advance warning, nobody will ever have it prepared. You will always have people gravitate towards the most efficient option when they have to be prepared for literally anything.

The likelihood of erase winning a combat scenario is rather unlikely. The likelihood of glitterdust winning a combat scenario is likely. (While non-combat solutions to problems are possible, they are improbable in a game like D&D that focuses on combat.)

If the only consideration for spells is their combat application, then why does erase exist in the first place? That tangent aside, you still haven't addressed the point that people generally have to pick spells while ignorant of what situations they'll find themselves in. In that case, you're going to pick the best, most generally applicable spell you can. It doesn't matter if that's glitterdust or something else.

[MGuy]

Mguy, if a fighter could only swing his sword 17 times in a given day (for whatever reason), how many opponents should he expect to be able to kill or neutralize?

Also, WTF is "think deeper" supposed to mean? Do you want someone to spend more time on their turn dithering about what to do? Who are you looking to challenge here? Your smart players will just find the next most optimal solution and do that; so the only people that will be challenged are the ones who can't pierce the opacity of your new rules.

Once your wizards are reduced to blasting, are you still going to be upset when they're able to take a foe out in one spell?

1) How many foes he is expected to neutralize will be dependent on the system. What is the purpose of that question?

2) No. I don't want someone dithering. I want spellcasting to be more dynamic. I want someone to have to worry about things after they cast the spell. will it be disrupted? How long do I have to hold it for? Where should I be when I cast it. If having to make more decisions about how you cast your spells makes things more complicated for people then I accept it.

3) I am looking to challenge everyone not just the people who don't know how to build their characters.

4) I always expect there to be people who study the rules in order to get the most out of there character. Its going to happen. If someone is that dedicated to the meta game so be it. What I want are rules that are harder to exploit. So that even the optimizers have to work harder even with the best characters they can make.

5) Firstly I don't want any one spell taking anything of equal or higher level than the PC out in one hit. I don't care how its done. No I don't favor blasting over other things if that's what you're getting at. Truth be told when I play, my favorite type of caster to play a summoner and I'm even nerfing that.

Except that you're ignoring the fact that most spellcasters have to engage in spell selection long before they know what "the situation" is going to be. The DM may design a situation where erase is the perfect solution to the situation at hand but, without sufficient advance warning, nobody will ever have it prepared. You will always have people gravitate towards the most efficient option when they have to be prepared for literally anything.

1) You hit one of the issues on the nose. Preparing spells BEFORE an encounter is SUPPOSED to be a cost. A risk. Its what's suppose to give the Sorcerer the edge of the wizard, because a sorcerer doesn't need to prepare.

2) Now the erase issue being the perfect solution to something and no one having it prepared is solved simply by the "I want to be prepared to do anything" wizard leaving a spell slot open so he can fill it with what he needs. Moreover if they don't have the "perfect" solution that shouldn't stop the game from going on. They'll just have to use the "other" solution.

[violence in the media]

1) How many foes he is expected to neutralize will be dependent on the system. What is the purpose of that question?

The purpose of this question is to illustrate that, if you're going to limit the quantity of attacks that a character is capable of using, then they all pretty much either have to have a greater individual effect than the attack of someone who can spam something all day long or so domething otherwise inachieveable.

2) No. I don't want someone dithering. I want spellcasting to be more dynamic. I want someone to have to worry about things after they cast the spell. will it be disrupted? How long do I have to hold it for? Where should I be when I cast it. If having to make more decisions about how you cast your spells makes things more complicated for people then I accept it.

If you want spellcasting to be dynamic, how about putting some actual action choices in there for the wizards other than just leaving them to a turn of "I maintain my spell and hope for the best" inaction? Put in a choice where each turn spent casting the SoD hiked the DC by 2, or added 2 rounds to the effect duration, or something. Concentrating on EBT allows you to make a single attack up to 20' outside its AoE to grab someone and drag them in. Things like that where players get to make a choice and do something rather than passively standing around paying the action-tax.

3) I am looking to challenge everyone not just the people who don't know how to build their characters.

You cannot challenge everyone.

4) I always expect there to be people who study the rules in order to get the most out of there character. Its going to happen. If someone is that dedicated to the meta game so be it. What I want are rules that are harder to exploit. So that even the optimizers have to work harder even with the best characters they can make.

Working harder =/= working hard.

5) Firstly I don't want any one spell taking anything of equal or higher level than the PC out in one hit. I don't care how its done. No I don't favor blasting over other things if that's what you're getting at. Truth be told when I play, my favorite type of caster to play a summoner and I'm even nerfing that.

Then what the hell do you want spellcasters to do? If the wizard gets 10 attacks in a day, and it takes 2 of them to down an opponent, while the fighter takes 3 attacks to down same said opponent but gets unlimited attacks in a day, then why am I playing the wizard again?

What if some canny player figures out a way to drop level appropriate enemies in one spell? Do you toss in an insta-ban there? Why not save yourself the trouble and just outlaw outcomes you don't want? Just make a rule that no spell can OHKO an enemy of your level or above and, if it somehow happens, the enemy automatically survives with 1 hp or gets an immediate last round action or something?

2) Now the erase issue being the perfect solution to something and no one having it prepared is solved simply by the "I want to be prepared to do anything" wizard leaving a spell slot open so he can fill it with what he needs. Moreover if they don't have the "perfect" solution that shouldn't stop the game from going on. They'll just have to use the "other" solution.

How many spell slots do you want the wizard keeping open? Also, they already use the other solution. They cast glitterdust on the dude with the scroll that they needed to erase and then burn it.

edit: sorry guys, didn't mean to jack the thread.

[TavishArtair]

Except if everyone takes an action that neutralizes the spellcaster's own, for free (for instance, everyone moving to the other side of a wall of stone coming up) then you've done nothing, and only spellcasters are uniquely disadvantaged in that their threat-neutralizing spells take a long time to get off, making them less than spectacular in terms of tactical maneuvering.

The ability to be unpredictable is really something you almost cannot price.


On a tangent, I think what you really want is to run different spells on different resource systems, so that the "endthefightnow" resource, let's say, has some particular limitations preventing it from being used easily, and a generation rate that is slow-ish, interrupting the tempo of "one complete destruction of the battlefield per round" (which admittedl wizards do too much of sometimes) and the "dosomethingusefulandhelpfultoallies" resource, let's say, has another limiter that is not shared, and instead can be used at a more free rate.

If you think setting up a system like that is a lot of work, then I will point out to you that modifying each individual spell to account for its balance/imbalance is also one, and you already seem to want to do that, so.

[Psychic Robot]

If the only consideration for spells is their combat application, then why does erase exist in the first place? That tangent aside, you still haven't addressed the point that people generally have to pick spells while ignorant of what situations they'll find themselves in. In that case, you're going to pick the best, most generally applicable spell you can. It doesn't matter if that's glitterdust or something else.

Erase exists because it's something cool that wizards can do. The smart wizard will prepare glitterdust so that his spell slots will be 97% applicable to the challenges he will face, and he will scribe a scroll of erase for 1% of the additional 3% of the time when that spell will come in handy.

The entire point of rebalancing spells is to make it so that the majority of combat spells are "generally applicable" to the combat. If scorching ray is equally useful as web is equally useful as glitterdust, then the wizard is free to choose to prepare what best fits his concept (rather than being laughed at by the other wizards for picking acid arrow).

[Mask_De_H]

VitM, fix your tags please. Thread's gone pear-shaped.

That, and before it dropped off, the 4uccess! thread had a workaround to what Tavish is saying: your abilities worked off of three tiers. You had your basic attacks, which led up to your specials, which led to your supers. Make the "lolimhelping" spells basics, and the "loliwin" spells require an action tax of some sort (like using one basic and one special beforehand).

[RandomCasualty2]

The entire point of rebalancing spells is to make it so that the majority of combat spells are "generally applicable" to the combat. If scorching ray is equally useful as web is equally useful as glitterdust, then the wizard is free to choose to prepare what best fits his concept (rather than being laughed at by the other wizards for picking acid arrow).

Yeah, 3.5 is rather remarkable in that it's a game with so many options, yet really so few options. The majority of your options are newbie traps or so situational as to not even be viable. And of course you have the "made of win" spells like glitterdust that everyone would be a fool not to take.

[MGuy]

Violence:

The purpose of this question is to illustrate that, if you're going to limit the quantity of attacks that a character is capable of using, then they all pretty much either have to have a greater individual effect than the attack of someone who can spam something all day long or so domething otherwise inachieveable.

Spells, so far, are still better than mundane attacks. Direct and unsaveable ability damage damage from save or dies, terrain manipulation, etc are still options you can't do by attacking.

If you want spellcasting to be dynamic, how about putting some actual action choices in there for the wizards other than just leaving them to a turn of "I maintain my spell and hope for the best" inaction? Put in a choice where each turn spent casting the SoD hiked the DC by 2, or added 2 rounds to the effect duration, or something. Concentrating on EBT allows you to make a single attack up to 20' outside its AoE to grab someone and drag them in. Things like that where players get to make a choice and do something rather than passively standing around paying the action-tax.

Again... You still have as many spell actions on a given turn. Will someone please tell me why you are saying that you lose actions? You don't. The effect of a number of spells just come a round later, at the start of your turn. You still GET your action, you still cast a given spell on a given round unless you use feats or abilities to in/decrease it, and you can do the same the next round. The only time when holding a spell prevents you from doing anything else is when you have 3 (or more) spells running. Considering that would take 3 separate rounds of casting and deliberate use of spells that require an action to hold (going from swift up to standard), you'd pretty much CHOOSE to get yourself into a situation where you couldn't do anything else. And if you CHOOSE to not be able to do anything else you're welcome to the choice.

That being said. I had considered spell augmentation but I think metamagic and spell related feats already cover it.

You cannot challenge everyone.

That doesn't mean I shouldn't strive to.

Working harder =/= working hard.

Working Harder > Working as you are now.

Then what the hell do you want spellcasters to do? If the wizard gets 10 attacks in a day, and it takes 2 of them to down an opponent, while the fighter takes 3 attacks to down same said opponent but gets unlimited attacks in a day, then why am I playing the wizard again?

What if some canny player figures out a way to drop level appropriate enemies in one spell? Do you toss in an insta-ban there? Why not save yourself the trouble and just outlaw outcomes you don't want? Just make a rule that no spell can OHKO an enemy of your level or above and, if it somehow happens, the enemy automatically survives with 1 hp or gets an immediate last round action or something?

1) Another point hit on the nail. Having limited spells SHOULD be a detriment. It should FORCE you to carefully think about spell usage. Spells do more than mundane attacks and can do it to multiple foes at once. Even though this is the idea there are a myriad of ways to get around that little limit. Scrolls, wands, etc exist and can easily be created by those who use spells to break whatever spell limit/day you slap on them. All they take to make is a little down time and gold you don't care about, which is hardly a real cost at all.

2) Why are you playing a wizard when you get to the finish line by meeting the same goals as what you'd expect out of any other class (IE Killing or otherwise bypassing/incapacitating a given opponent)? Because you like the way the wizard does it I'd have to guess. I play a wizard because I like summoning. I don't know why you do it.

3) No. I would not instaban anything because you can still incapacitate an enemy with only one spell. It just takes longer to do.

4)No, arbitrary "you can't kill this in one round," rules don't suit me. I'd maybe do it as a zero ruling on a BEG, but no I'm not instituting that kind of shit. If a player finds a way to exploit the system in such a way s/he can cast his way to a kill on the first turn (which you can do even under this system it just costs an assload of resources to perform) then kudos he found an exploit in a game. There are always exploits. If it becomes a major problem I will rework the rules.

How many spell slots do you want the wizard keeping open? Also, they already use the other solution. They cast glitterdust on the dude with the scroll that they needed to erase and then burn it.

I don't care how many they keep open. I was pointing out that there is already a solution to the problem you pointed out.

Tavish:

Except if everyone takes an action that neutralizes the spellcaster's own, for free (for instance, everyone moving to the other side of a wall of stone coming up) then you've done nothing, and only spellcasters are uniquely disadvantaged in that their threat-neutralizing spells take a long time to get off, making them less than spectacular in terms of tactical maneuvering.

Except there are several things you're missing.

1) Most monsters and classes won't know what your action is. It takes a spellcraft check to recognize a spell. And reasonably in game it'd take some knowledge of how magic works to know that is what you have to do to fuck up the spell. I haven't given any indication that there is evidence of a spell before it takes effect beyond what a spellcraft check would pick up.

2) You can cancel the spell or redirect it at any time. They hide behind a wall? You redirect the dimensions of the stone wall spell to box them behind that wall.

3) You've forced them to act in a certain way. You've forced the enemy into cover. A minor but notable thing.

And yes they are less spectacular than they were. But making them so was the intention when I mentioned nerfing them.

The ability to be unpredictable is really something you almost cannot price.

On a tangent, I think what you really want is to run different spells on different resource systems, so that the "endthefightnow" resource, let's say, has some particular limitations preventing it from being used easily, and a generation rate that is slow-ish, interrupting the tempo of "one complete destruction of the battlefield per round" (which admittedl wizards do too much of sometimes) and the "dosomethingusefulandhelpfultoallies" resource, let's say, has another limiter that is not shared, and instead can be used at a more free rate.

If you think setting up a system like that is a lot of work, then I will point out to you that modifying each individual spell to account for its balance/imbalance is also one, and you already seem to want to do that, so.

I'm not really sure if I'll be adjusting spell resources. I'm thinking of different things for different classes maybe changing up some numbers, but I don't have any major problems with the magic resource system as is. At least not enough to turn everything into abilities.

Mask: I read up on it. That's exactly why I decided to have Die effects have a secondary effect(s) that build up to the actual kill. I don't want to copy it exactly because I don't want tension gauge style mechanic for magic. Not for any particular reason other than just differing taste.

[Vnonymous]

MGuy, if you can cancel or redirect the spell at any time then you have completely destroyed any chance of making spells go off one round later provide any meaningful difference to use of tactics.

[MGuy]

Wrong. If you cancel the spell you've wasted a turn. If you redirect it (as an immediate action). You've used up your swift action for the following turn and have to use at least a move action to keep that spell going. Yes you can save a spell by canceling it but you just wasted a turn for doing so. Yes you can redirect it at any time but now you can do less on the coming turn.

[Kaelik]

Additionally, because of the "longer effect time" shit, If an unbuffed Wizard meets an archer in the woods, even if the Wizard wins init, he still dies instantly and never gets to cast a spell.

[MGuy]

If the unbuffed wizard is too stupid to buff (unchanged casting times) himself first, instead of going for the 1 round casting time spells.

[tzor]

Additionally, because of the "longer effect time" shit, If an unbuffed Wizard meets an archer in the woods, even if the Wizard wins init, he still dies instantly and never gets to cast a spell.

Why is an unbuffed wizard walking in the woods in the first place?

[NativeJovian]

Probably because the woods are pretty big and buffs don't last forever.

[MGuy]

And apparently he doesn't know how to teleport where he needs to be.

[Kaelik]

Additionally, because of the "longer effect time" shit, If an unbuffed Wizard meets an archer in the woods, even if the Wizard wins init, he still dies instantly and never gets to cast a spell.

Why is an unbuffed wizard walking in the woods in the first place?

Very few buffs last all day. Even if he does have all the non persisted 24 hours buffs active at once, he still dies in a single full attack from an equal level archer.

Elemental Body, Energy Immunity, Protection From Arrows, Mage Armor?

Anything else? That's not a lot of protection against even a mediocre level appropriate archer.

Once you get into Shapechange, maybe, but before that, screwed.

[MGuy]

Ok now you're just arguing different things. The posted accusation had a wizard and ranger meeting. The wizard unbuffed vs a ranger, also presumably unbuffed but that wasn't stated. However the assumption was over 1 encounter. If the Ranger goes first and can kill the unlucky wizard in one spell then with or without the changes I posted he's dead. With the changes I posted he has buffs (blur, displacement, going ethereal, gaseous form, haste, etc), illusion spells, can cast a hold person or similar (non save or die) spell, summon something, etc if he goes first.

Now this second thing over what he can do to protect himself all day. That has nothing to do with any of the changes I've made.

[Kaelik]

Ok now you're just arguing different things. The posted accusation had a wizard and ranger meeting. The wizard unbuffed vs a ranger, also presumably unbuffed but that wasn't stated. However the assumption was over 1 encounter. If the Ranger goes first and can kill the unlucky wizard in one spell then with or without the changes I posted he's dead. With the changes I posted he has buffs (blur, displacement, going ethereal, gaseous form, haste, etc), illusion spells, can cast a hold person or similar (non save or die) spell, summon something, etc if he goes first.

Now this second thing over what he can do to protect himself all day. That has nothing to do with any of the changes I've made.

You missed the entire point on like three levels:

1) I made up the original occurrence. I know what it was.

2) The point is that no matter how well he buffs himself for all day, if he rounds a corner and sees a Ranger, he dies either way.

3) With your changes he doesn't have any of those buffs, and that's the point. He can't even have 2 buffs going at once.

It takes him a standard action to start casting, but it doesn't finish until after he's dead.

That's the whole point. You make it so that he can only have two 24 hour buffs going, because he has to keep using his swift and move action to maintain them, and he can't finish casting any buffs until after the Archer full attacks him to death.

[MGuy]

Kaelik...

1) I know you made it up. But YOU seem to miss the point of what I said. You're arguing 2 different unrelated points.

2) That IF you meet a ranger that kills you in ONE turn it doesn't matter HOW your spells work if, with or without my changes, if you do not go first, you die.

3) READ what I posted god damn you! Under my rules buffs, direct damage spells, etc WORK AS THEY REGULARLY DO! God damnit if you're not going to fucking READ what I post stop talking about it at all.

That being said Buff spells will work as normal. So things like Haste, Magic Weapon, Blur etc still function as normal. Summons, Direct damage, damage over time, healing and similar spells also function as normal. I've never seen them as worthy of nerfing (This is outlined in the Spell Lengthening Variant rule).

[Kaelik]

2) That IF you meet a ranger that kills you in ONE turn it doesn't matter HOW your spells work if, with or without my changes, if you do not go first, you die.

The point is that the Wizard dies even if he wins init. That's the whole fucking problem.

Instead of: two level 15 characters meet, each has a 50% chance of winning.

We have, two level 15 characters meet. Archer has 100% chance of winning, Wizard has 0% chance.

If he can't cast Wall of Force or Wall of Stone to break the attack line, he can't fucking survive a single round.

[MGuy]

He can STILL go invisible, use illussion's, use summons/created creatures, dominated creatures/etc (and that's without using his own action), can still use hold person/tasha's hideous laughter/irresistible dance, shape change into something better, fear effects, gaseous form, any number of tricks that don't have shit to do with a wall. You are just being fucking stupid if you don't think that a wizard is out of tricks because they can't form a god damn wall. Beyond that a 15th level wizard isn't walking in a forest he's in his doom fortress.

[Kaelik]

He can STILL go invisible, use illussion's, use summons/created creatures, dominated creatures/etc (and that's without using his own action), can still use hold person/tasha's hideous laughter/irresistible dance, shape change into something better, fear effects, gaseous form, any number of tricks that don't have shit to do with a wall. You are just being fucking stupid if you don't think that a wizard is out of tricks because they can't form a god damn wall. Beyond that a 15th level wizard isn't walking in a forest he's in his doom fortress.

Except that invisibility isn't going to do shit to a level 10+ character, summons are total shit and don't stop him from dieing next round, hold person ect, besides being level fucking two spells with saving throws that level 15 characters are immune to, are also spells that no self respecting character would fail a save against. Same for fear affects. Not to mention, by all rights should be affected by your bullshit lengthening rules, thus being fucking useless.

And nothing about polymorph or gaseous form is going to prevent him from dieing the next round.

[MGuy]

Kaelik. Let me ruin most of your argument by stating I'm not making rules for Tome games. Further let me note that the ultra competent Ranger vs the incompetent Wizard dynamic you're dreaming up isn't suitable for a reasonable debate over what they "could" be doing.

A ranger has whatever items the DM decided to let him have. And he is stuck with a shitty will save that at 15th level is +10ish while a 15th level caster is going to have DCs for that second level spell at around 21ish and that's thinking VERY conservatively on the wizard's part. And that wizard has to make the conscious decision not to use anything higher level like irresistible dance (noted that you skipped over that spell though I mentioned it). Further that wizard can quicken those lower level spells and be casting something like 3 of them in a given round because of it.

Having said all that you are ALSO ignoring the fact that at that level a wizard who doesn't need bad ass armor or weapons and saved gold by making his own MOST LIKELY has shit like contingency, bad ass defensive items, etc for just in case shit happens events like the one you're pointing out. Wizards still rock, Rangers still suck.

And no by all the rights of what I outlined for my rules that's how it goes. As you are so quick to point out THOSE spells don't end the fight just by casting them.

[Kaelik]

Kaelik. Let me ruin most of your argument by stating I'm not making rules for Tome games. Further let me note that the ultra competent Ranger vs the incompetent Wizard dynamic you're dreaming up isn't suitable for a reasonable debate over what they "could" be doing.

Fuck you. I'm talking about competent Wizard versus Competent fighter. And I'm not talking about Tome games. A level 15 Wizard with only all day buffs has AC of maybe 23-25 and 115 HP, And that's assuming ridiculously generous PB. A Level 15 Archer has AB of 30+, and average damage of over 150 per round against AC 40.

A ranger has whatever items the DM decided to let him have. And he is stuck with a shitty will save that at 15th level is +10ish while a 15th level caster is going to have DCs for that second level spell at around 21ish and that's thinking VERY conservatively on the wizard's part. And that wizard has to make the conscious decision not to use anything higher level like irresistible dance (noted that you skipped over that spell though I mentioned it). Further that wizard can quicken those lower level spells and be casting something like 3 of them in a given round because of it.

A level 15 Ranger has WBL, and that includes a +5 resistance item, and probably more bonuses to saves. Not that I was specifically talking about a Ranger, I was talking about a Competent archer. But even your average shitty level 15 Ranger has a will save of +5 base +5 will +3-5 Wisdom +1-4 luck/moral.

And once again, level 15 character = Mindblank. Is immune, but yeah, if he weren't immune (because he sucked) and was within touch range, you could totally use Irresistible dance.

In the mean time, no, he can't throw out 3+ a round with quickening. He can throw out one per round, because his standard action one doesn't occur until after the archer pin cushions him and quickened spells cost swift actions.

Having said all that you are ALSO ignoring the fact that at that level a wizard who doesn't need bad ass armor or weapons and saved gold by making his own MOST LIKELY has shit like contingency, bad ass defensive items, etc for just in case shit happens events like the one you're pointing out. Wizards still rock, Rangers still suck.

And no by all the rights of what I outlined for my rules that's how it goes. As you are so quick to point out THOSE spells don't end the fight just by casting them.

Actually, all those spells would end the fight if the Archer failed his save and wasn't immune. Because not taking actions means you lost the fight. I never pointed out that those spells don't end the fight if they affect him. They do. But finger of death also doesn't end the fight if he casts it as a standard action either, because the Archer has a +17-25 Fort save.

And no, a Wizard does not have badass defensive items. He might have a contingency, but since the contingency might be for something like Repulsion as likely as anything else, he still dies. And if the Contingency is Teleport but worded so loosely that everything sets it off, then the Wizard is useless and never gets anything done.

[Psychic Robot]

A Level 15 Archer has AB of 30+, and average damage of over 150 per round.

How are you getting this, exactly?

BAB: +15.
Dex (with gloves), starting score of 16: +7.
Bow: +3 to +4.
Bracers of archery (greater): +2.

I'm getting +28 attack bonus, and the damage is like 1d8 + 8 per arrow, though it's likely I'm forgetting something--it's been awhile since I've been through the MIC.