Guest (Unregistered) at [unixtime wrote:1091835161[/unixtime]]
A. Level 1 casters of Bless spells can cancel the effects of pimp buffs like Tenser's Transformation or Polymorph.
Well obviously stuff with the [buff] tag would only be for willing targets.
B. Some spells buff your equipment(like Greater Magic weapon), so you stack there.
GMW really shouldn't exist at all. It's a broken concept. It's free equipment just for being a cleric, and that doesn't work at all under the current gold system.
C. Some spells will last a long time and give enemies stackable penalties(like Symbols), which is the same as giving all your guys stackable buffs.
Eh, symbols are a rare thing and putting them on your clothes and shit is basically munchkin rules abuse. Just limit them to static objects and you'll be fine. Sure if you want to set a bunch of em up then go ahead, but you can't take them with you.
D. Some spells effect everyone in an area (like Bless). Are your clerics going to not cast Bless because it interferes with the mage's Shield spell?
Well, not all spells need have the buff tag, mage armor and some of the lesser stuff like shield that doesn't stack with normal armor or shields doesn't need that tag. But stuff like divine favor, divine power, and righteous might should have them, and that alone is going to stop the majority of the cleric problem. Just applying the [buff] tag to those three spells and 95% of the problem is gone.
Getting rid of persistant spells only means that the mage in the party casts a Mass Invisibility or Fog Cloud when ambushed and the party waits three or four turns and eats popcorn so that the cleric cast all his prep spells and then can outfight the fighter. For offenses where the cleric knows that he's going to attack, he'll have the time to cast his spells in order to rock the encounter.
Eh... that has tons of complications, because gaining 4 rounds just isn't that easy if teleportation takes a while. Yeah, cast a fog cloud and they'll still be tracking you by sound (which you know, you'll be making unless you want all silent spells), not to mention clerics tend to have crappy hide and move silent skills, some things have blindsight and so on. Also, that's 4 rounds they can just run the fuck away and make you sit there looking like jackass for burning all your spells.
As for stuff where the cleric is able to get the guy in an ambush, let him. If he takes someone by surprise he deserves some advantage and that's ok, but that rarely happens. More often than not the party is invading the NPCs lair, and they've got all the prep time and the party has to kinda guess when to precast their spells, and when the spells last only 1 round/level, you've got to be pretty accurate or have a ton of them.
If the different bonuses were priced the same and were allowed to stack, there would have to be a balancing effect like level. Maybe at level 1 you can have up to a +5 to AC from stacking bonuses, and it goes up by 1 per level.
Well you could do that placing an arbitrary cap, but why? I mean that's just going to ensure that every character spends the max he can on bonuses, and really doesn't give them much choice. A diminishing returns system is the best because it grants choice without excessive restriction. If you want to have a really good magic sword, you can, you'll just pay out the ass, but because each bonus is progressively harder to obtain it won't be that unbalanced.
Otherwise, there is no reason to not overspecialize, since feats like Power Attack reward a really big attack bonus.
With diminishing returns there's a reason not to overspecialize, because it's cheaper to improve other areas as opposed to your main area. In other words, you are choosing between a sword +4, or a sword +2, a ring pro. +2, a cloak of resistance +3 and an amulet of health, or something similar. Basically you have the option to overspecialize, but it's not particularly efficient because you're burning a lot of money that could be possibly better spent elsewhere. That's what diminishing returns costs do.
