Spells at the Wrong Spell Levels

[Kaelik]

No, because it's an AoE save or die on everything, but if they make the save it's still super powerful, more powerful than Wail of the Banshee.

And that's only level 17, 20 per level is fucking retarderdly bad at level 1-10.

So bottom line evocations should start at level 1 with Fireball, and then move up to level 9 with 15 per CL damage or more. Amount per CL should scale with.

[Username17]

So 20 hit points per level is just right?

Not necessarily, although in the case of a spell to cast at 17th level, I think a simple 20 points/level over a 100' radius of electricity, acid, or cold damage would be fairly reasonable. Unfortunately, 9th level spells are kind of in a bind because they are supposed to stay relevant from 17th to 20th level, but I genuinely don't care that much what happens when Cornugons show up in groups. It is also useful to compare and contrast to 1st level, where enemies seriously have like five hit points when they come in groups and a d4/level is a fucking joke while 12 points/level (or even just 12 points total, since it is the same thing) would be completely overpowered.

Tracking the gain of hit points per level of enemies and extracting the levels of beat down that evocations have to provide to stay relevant is certainly possible. However, the current reality is that at virtually all levels of play, the "zappy pow" spells have damage values that are woefully inadequate. Burning Hands is underpowered, Fireball is underpowered, Mass Harm is underpowered. And everything in between is underpowered.

For most levels though, the problems can be solved by simply recruiting spells of higher level down to lower levels. Fireball would be a decent thing to cast sometimes as a 1st level spell, Mass Harm would be something you'd seriously reach for as a 5th level spell. And so on.

The technique works well enough except at the edges. There is nothing to lower Burning Hands down to where it wouldn't be a waste of a combat action. There is nothing to recruit down to 9th level. Even the damaging shit out of the D&D Joke Book doesn't really hurt a Battlebriar very much, and you're supposed to be treating pairs of those fuckers as a speed bump.

-Username17

[Princess]

So yes, 10 points a level to multiple opponents is too weak

Yeah, sure, if your DM banned all these free metamagic tricks. Otherwise we can multiply it.

with 15 per CL damage or more.

Easy mode, huh?
15 damage per CL kills almost anything with one round. Why within one round even if mobs have 300+hp? Answer is simple, there will be multiple spellcasters in the party (or, guys with swords with comparable damage per round).
And what about opposing spellcasters or mobs with inherent spellcasting? I remind you that raging dwarf barbarian with tome of bodily health +5 have 16.5 hp per level. Or anyone supposed to have five energy immunity + persisted forceward precasted pack?

I'd say that all these damages are good if we are playing "we win heroically and within 6 seconds" genre, no more.

[Kaelik]

Point of Note: Mass Harms power is tripled if you are all undead fighting living foes though.

Hard to account for that without making it too weak if you are living facing living, or too strong for undead fighting living.

EDIT: Oh yeah, damage spells tend to benefit more from metamagic, and so the Alpha nerd metamagic rules seriously fucking buff evocation a good amount, especially combined with lower level evocations.

[Kaelik]

Easy mode, huh?
15 damage per CL kills almost anything with one round. Why within one round even if mobs have 300+hp? Answer is simple, there will be multiple spellcasters in the party (or, guys with swords with comparable damage per round).
And what about opposing spellcasters or mobs with inherent spellcasting? I remind you that raging dwarf barbarian with tome of bodily health +5 have 16.5 hp per level. Or anyone supposed to have five energy immunity + persisted forceward precasted pack?

I'd say that all these damages are good if we are playing "we win heroically and within 6 seconds" genre, no more.

15 per CL is assuming something like Fire/Acid. I'm hard pressed to think of a single CR 17 monster without immunities.

The only things core CR 17 or higher are Dragons, Angels, Demons, Devils, and Titan/Tarrasque (And also shitty CR 7s with class levels that are therefore shitty and don't count.)

300 Hp is low, and almost all these monsters have the ability to disguise themselves, or just cast Energy Immunity.

I mean, bottom line, you do have to compare these spells against Wail of the Banshee.

[Princess]

First, no one fails saves against wail of banshee.

Second, packing opponents with precasted energy immunity or such will result in one thing — one more guy with the sword get kicked out of party and replaced by Cleric with dispels (and any other useful things), so he will make something like 37 dispel check.

Third, we were talking about mass-effect spells, which means that one-target spells will inflict more pain and might result in autodefeat to most opponents (who have such low touch AC that it makes anyone laugh).

I think that high-level evocations better to follow (approximately, not strictly) damage cap rules in DMG unless we want to receive another one "you win gloriously but first mistake kills you" Exalted-like games. Then what to add to them so the "mighty" Meteor Swarm or like would have some chances against lowly combust-with-lots-of-cheap-meta?
1. "Smart" area spells, which don't harm your sword guy rushed to chop mobs, or any targets you tell them not to touch.
2. Big area spells. Big is like to cover at least city. Their damage might suck but still they are epic. Nowadays we have only control winds (who destroy cities only because "dmg says so, and we ignore object hp/hardness rules", it's 5d6 actually bad at destroying even humble peasants huts) and apocalypse from the sky (corrupt spell).
3. Piercing. 9th level spells suck 5th level energy immunity? Screw that. Make them ignore less than level 8 protection, allow them to make part of damage disregarding anything, make them ignore this evasion or treat impevasion like evasion, ignore spell resistance or such, and maybe inflict untyped damage.
4. Side effects. Raw damage is boring. Damage with side-effect (especially wuth side-effect even on succeeded save) is good if side-effect is good.

That what comes in to my had when I try to remember why I never play evoker.

[Kaelik]

You know what, nevermind, you are clearly and idiot who doesn't know how to play D&D or apparently, Exalted, so I'm just going to ignore you.

[Leress]

First, no one fails saves against wail of banshee.

Hahahaha, oh that's rich.

Second, packing opponents with precasted energy immunity or such will result in one thing — one more guy with the sword get kicked out of party and replaced by Cleric with dispels (and any other useful things), so he will make something like 37 dispel check.

You know that monsters have natural immunities, right?

Third, we were talking about mass-effect spells, which means that one-target spells will inflict more pain and might result in autodefeat to most opponents (who have such low touch AC that it makes anyone laugh).

High level stuff doesn't target AC that's low level shit and even that only applies half the time then.

I think that high-level evocations better to follow (approximately, not strictly) damage cap rules in DMG unless we want to receive another one "you win gloriously but first mistake kills you" Exalted-like games. Then what to add to them so the "mighty" Meteor Swarm or like would have some chances against lowly combust-with-lots-of-cheap-meta?

The ones now do that and they suck.

1. "Smart" area spells, which don't harm your sword guy rushed to chop mobs, or any targets you tell them not to touch.

Meta magic: Sculpt Spell

2. Big area spells. Big is like to cover at least city. Their damage might suck but still they are epic. Nowadays we have only control winds (who destroy cities only because "dmg says so, and we ignore object hp/hardness rules", it's 5d6 actually bad at destroying even humble peasants huts) and apocalypse from the sky (corrupt spell).

There are many more big area spells then those.

3. Piercing. 9th level spells suck 5th level energy immunity? Screw that. Make them ignore less than level 8 protection, allow them to make part of damage disregarding anything, make them ignore this evasion or treat impevasion like evasion, ignore spell resistance or such, and maybe inflict untyped damage.

That contradicts something you just said about not wanting rocket launcher tag.

4. Side effects. Raw damage is boring. Damage with side-effect (especially wuth side-effect even on succeeded save) is good if side-effect is good.

While riders are good having a lot of them will slow the game down.

[JonSetanta]

Normally, Refuge is a mediocre spell because of it's level/GP cost (it shouldn't be a 9th level spell for Sor/Wiz, for example; it's not nearly as bad for Clerics, who get it at 7), but having it at will (or otherwise being able to disregard said cost) actually makes it a awesome spell. Said commoner should immediately invest in an inn, and hand out Business Cards of Refuge with each stay. He'd easily have more business then he could handle, from powerful adventurer-types across the lands. Yes, even if his inn is in the middle of nowhere, overlooking a swamp full of wights or something.

"Staying here lets me safely teleport out of harm's way into town later? I'm all over that!"

Done right, it's basically a spell that makes scrolls of town portal, except that the town is picked in advance. 1500 Gp is, admittedly, kinda pricy for a scroll of teleport, but it's a spell component cost, and there are ways of getting around that.

That's a fucking awesome low-level campaign idea. It would revolutionize a populous and economics as a whole.
Still not teleport, but the limitation of "Take my card" is great.

[Princess]

Hahahaha, oh that's rich.

Have you forgot about Death ward or Energy Immunity:Sonic?

You know that monsters have natural immunities, right?

You know, unless they're Saint they usually have one immunity. You know it's not hard to have any of four basic energies for any spell at your disposal?

Meta magic: Sculpt Spell

Have you ever read past the name of this feat?

The ones now do that and they suck.

First of all they suck because metacost reducing system is broken. Second, they do not have any of the effects I described.

High level stuff doesn't target AC that's low level shit and even that only applies half the time then.

You mean they target saves or you suppose playing easy mode with "I have 9th level, I autosucceed"?

There are many more big area spells then those.

How many? "War" spells from DrMagazine?

[Leress]

Have you forgot about Death ward or Energy Immunity:Sonic? You know, unless they're Saint they usually have one immunity. You know it's not hard to have any of four basic energies for any spell at your disposal?

Death Wards duration is very shitty for what it does. Also very few creatures have Energy Immunity: Sonic. Also of course it's not hard to have all four basic energy type just use Energy Substitution Meta-Magic.

Have you ever read past the name of this feat?

Yes, it doesn't do exactly like you want but you can aim it so it doesn't hit your allies.

First of all they suck because metacost reducing system is broken. Second, they do not have any of the effects I described.

No, they suck because the damage is shitty for the level and/or action cost. Meta-magic cost/cost reduction is an entirely different problem.

You mean they target saves or you suppose playing easy mode with "I have 9th level, I autosucceed"?

Of course they target saves.

How many? "War" spells from DrMagazine?

I don't have any of the magazines except for couple of articles. I don't have my books with me right now so I will have to get back to this later.

[Princess]

Death Wards duration is very shitty for what it does. Also very few creatures have Energy Immunity: Sonic. Also of course it's not hard to have all four basic energy type just use Energy Substitution Meta-Magic.

Some death wards are triggered and some are persistent. Also energy immunity:Sonic is what you suppose to see on any opposing spellcaster if your company bothers optimizing.

Yes, it doesn't do exactly like you want but you can aim it so it doesn't hit your allies.

Can it hit opponent grappling my ally without harming ally? Can it burn anything on battlefield except for four scattered party members? The answers are no, and simply modifying cone to line isn't an answer.

No, they suck because the damage is shitty for the level and/or action cost. Meta-magic cost/cost reduction is an entirely different problem.

Sure they do, that's why I told that guidelines in DMG must be followed approximately. The exact amount of damage considered adequate depends on gaming company of course. But as I thought about it, possible solution is increase in dice size. For example to make 5th and 6th-level spells use d8, 7th and 8th level spells use d10 and 9th level spells use d12. Spells of 4th level and lower are quite balanced as for me. I haven't tested this option before (however my testing actually proves nothing because we have entirely different hp management system), but have to admit that it relies on that you have at least ten of each dice type.

Of course they target saves.

As far as I know, if DM don't spam ray deflection spell, touch attacks are more preferable. They can be augmented via divine power or true strike.

[Username17]

First, no one fails saves against wail of banshee.

Lolwut?

There are lots of ways to be immune to Wail. Silence, antimagic field, Immunity to Death effects, Magic Immunity, and Immunity to Sonic. Of those, the only one that I would call common is Immunity to Death effects. You get that for being a Construct or Undead and from death ward. Death ward is an understandably highly sought after effect for player characters, because while the effects it protects you against are not especially common, they are things that can result in fucking level loss, which is a condition so bad that in many games you would seriously be better retiring your whole damn character and bringing in a new one. But monsters are going to die anyway and only show up once; so death ward is frankly a waste of time for them unless the DM knows ahead of time that the players want to use one or more Death effects and is metagaming accordingly.

At 17th level, the optimal situation to use Wail of the Banshee is when facing something badass that is also surrounded by a bunch of mediocre to piddly shit. Which is coincidentally every CR 17 monster in the book. Which isn't hard, since that's just Formian Queens (who come with a bunch of Formians by definition) and Mariliths (who come with a bunch of Tanar'ri by definition). If you expand the search to the MM3, you can find some encounters that aren't like that (such as the Plaguebrush), but even then the majority of such monsters actually do specifically come with retinues (as you might expect from their names of Verminlord or Nycoloth Commander). It's a Save-or-Die on the big thing and coincidentally may murderate like 16 other things just for hilarity. Of the CR 17 monsters in either the Monster Manual or the Monster Manual 3, the only one that has Immunity to Death effects is the fucking Greater Cadaver Collector and the Horrific Vasuthant. And the Cadaver Collector is:

• Solitary, so you wouldn't use Wail of the Banshee on it regardless.
• A fucking puzzle monster golem with Magic Immunity who would be completely immune to most damaging evocations anyway, and has a bizarre special rule where if they are in the area of a wail of the banshee they have a special effect triggered, which is probably a no-save slow effect that lasts 3 rounds but is written poorly and doesn't exactly say that.

And the Vasuthant is:

• Undead
• So annoying and obscure, your DM will probably never use it.

So... that's it. The standard encounter in 3.5 at the level you get Wail of the Banshee is an encounter where Wail of the Banshee is optimal and is against enemies who are not immune to it. So the real question is whether enemies can actually fail a save. You're 17th level, so your Int is about 22 before a headband and 28 afterwards. Your save DC is therefore 28 before you do anything to increase it. You are however 17th level, so you could have Spell Focus, Spell Power, Fate Mastery, Prayer, Heighten Rods, or anything else to modify that situation in your favor. Most CR 17 enemies have a Fort Save between +17 and +20, and their minions have a Fort Save between +5 and +12.

So, yes. When you cast Wail of the fucking Banshee, things fail theirs saves and die. Like, all the fucking time. In pretty much any circumstance you cast it, you'd at least clear the room of the vast majority of mooks, and you'd have between a 30% and 60% chance of ending the boss monster at the same time.

-Username17

[Princess]

the DM knows ahead of time that the players want to use one or more Death effects and is metagaming accordingly.

After MIC it costs 4k to have contingent deathward. And if your company do some optimization to buy this immunity is perfectly logical unless dm especially want opponents being vulnerable.

Fate Mastery

WTF is it? Fate spinner?

Heighten Rods

Heighten cannot increase level past 9, wail is already level 9. Or you mean Epic Heighten?

Most CR 17 enemies have a Fort Save between +17 and +20,

I have to remind that CR = ECL are weaksauce enemies with almost no threat (or at least it is said so) to grind them 13.3(3) times to gain level. So the real challenge is CR 19-20, Ancient Black and Very old Blue Dragons both have CR 19 and +23 Fort save, so they need roll of 5 to succeed.

clear the room of the vast majority of mooks

Mooks are often too easy to dispose of.

[Username17]

After MIC it costs 4k to have contingent deathward. And if your company do some optimization to buy this immunity is perfectly logical unless dm especially want opponents being vulnerable.

Being vulnerable to what? Death effects are rare. Even out of 17th level NPC gear values, which are in turn substantially more than Monster gear values, 4k is kind of a lot. Their total gear value is 100k. But seriously, how many special immunity items are you routinely slapping on critters? Are you going to tell me that mass charm is worthless because every single enemy could be equipped with a cheap-ass protection from evil effect that lasts for one combat? Are you going to tell me that dimensional rift is a weak spell because all the enemies could be equipped with those cut rate Dimensional Shackles before every combat?

What the fuck? Death ward is a single target protection, and level appropriate enemies at the level wail of the banshee comes online do not normally have it by default. Even slightly meaningful encounters at that level have a bunch of enemies in them, so even if your DM is jerking you around by filling the gear allotments of enemies who will only show up in one encounter with equipment that is super cheap because it has the "disadvantage" that it only works in one encounter per day, and he's metagaming like mad to load enemies up with obscure immunity items to exactly the spells you happen to have, he's still basically just raining fucking money on you. Five enemies with those bracers is 20,000 gp, and that shit did absolutely nothing to make them actually win.

Your claim is basically ridiculous. The fact that a counter to a spell exists anywhere in the rules does not mean the spell is useless. To assert otherwise is completely insane. If enemies are loaded up with Death Ward Bracers, hit them with Mass Charm. If they are loaded down with Evil Protection Rings, hit them with wail of the banshee. If your enemies have both, then have the Druid's animal companion fucking kill them because they don't have any fucking weapons.

I have to remind that CR = ECL are weaksauce enemies with almost no threat (or at least it is said so) to grind them 13.3(3) times to gain level. So the real challenge is CR 19-20, Ancient Black and Very old Blue Dragons both have CR 19 and +23 Fort save, so they need roll of 5 to succeed.

Wait... what?

No seriously, what the fuck are you babbling about now? That completely unoptimized wizards only one-shot hard encounters with skull dragons using a multi-target kill spell 20% of the time... so it's worthless? No seriously, what the fucking hell are you talking about?

If you're spending a single spell to attempt to win an encounter on the first turn all by yourself, why are you assuming it's a hard encounter and not a standard one? And why are you assuming that the Wizard has the lowest possible Save DC? And why are you using a multitarget Fort save killer on a solitary Dragon? Care to invoke a scenario which is even slightly plausible?

And lest we forget: even in that scenario, one-shotting the Dragon on a roll of 1-4 on a d20 is actually pretty damn good. If four players all did that, they'd win the fight before the Dragon acted 59% of the time.

-Username17

[mean_liar]

No one cares about monsters at level 17. The only opposition worth measuring have class levels and appropriate gear, and (at least partial) immunity to crits, death effects, negative energy, and similar things are de riguer at that level... to say nothing of the fact that yes, even monsters are going to have some of those going for them at that point too.

[shirak]

Would it be reasonable to have high-level evocations work as percentages? As in, if you get hit by Rocks Fall you lose half your HP on a successful save. And fucking die on a failed one because the actual damage of an atomic explosion or the core of the sun or whatever is Infinity.

Admittedly, then we are straight back on SoD territory but, hey, balance.[/i]

[Username17]

No one cares about monsters at level 17. The only opposition worth measuring have class levels and appropriate gear, and (at least partial) immunity to crits, death effects, negative energy, and similar things are de riguer at that level... to say nothing of the fact that yes, even monsters are going to have some of those going for them at that point too.

Wow. Now we are so far into No True Scotsman that I genuinely don't even know what to say. We don't care about Mariliths anymore? Seriously? So you're saying that the only enemies that concern us are enemies who are themselves spellcasters who have turned up immunity effects to all the players' spells and effects, and thus no spells actually matter.

Well, that sorts everything out. Apparently at 17th level you could hand out a spell that did over nine thousand fire damage, because the only enemies we care about are ones who have cast energy immunity and thus can't be hurt. /sarcasm

OK, can people shut the fuck up about their weird Killer DM fantasies? At 17th level you face groups of enemies and player characters kill or disable several of them every round of combat and fucking wail of the banshee is the fucking default go-to attack spell. That is the D&D as described in the actual books. Any of this other crap is stuff you guys made up in idle speculation land.

-Username17

[JonSetanta]

Would it be reasonable to have high-level evocations work as percentages? As in, if you get hit by Rocks Fall you lose half your HP on a successful save. And fucking die on a failed one because the actual damage of an atomic explosion or the core of the sun or whatever is Infinity.

What is this... a "Gravija" spell from the Final Fantasy series?
http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Gravija

That works for bringing the expected number of rounds for combat down to a reasonable level, but I'm still convinced that SoDs are a Bad Thing.

3 rounds, expecting success for the attacker on each of their turns, is much more rational for a push/pull battle that is fair to both sides.
Of course you won't get success each round, but just in case they do... it's not going to end up a Bastard manga encounter in which Dark Schneider simply casts VENOM and the enemy melts instantly.

[mean_liar]

We don't care about Mariliths anymore? Seriously? So you're saying that the only enemies that concern us are enemies who are themselves spellcasters who have turned up immunity effects to all the players' spells and effects, and thus no spells actually matter.

We do not care about Mariliths. They have blade barrier, unholy aura and a nasty constrict ability done only from a full-on grapple that basically does no damage, which is to say they only have blade barrier. And without anticipate teleport or any other ancillary abilities relevant to 17th level, they're basically just cannons.

They're just another example why CR-as-XP is a joke, since an optimized party of 17th level characters would breeze through a marilith without coming anywhere near spending 25% of their daily resources. The blade barrier is the roughest thing they have going and unless they can kill someone outright with it, they're averaging 4 casts of Lesser Vigor off a wand in damage.

What sort of precautions DOES an INT 18 demon high on the hierarchy take while operating on a budget? You call outfitting like they intend to stay alive at the highest tiers of non-epic DnD power a No True Scotsman, and at the same time assume that the PCs are all tuned up with a great selection of DC- and CL-boosters and intend to play Rocket Launcher Tag.

Why are optimized enemies No True Scotsman while optimized PCs totally okay?

OK, can people shut the fuck up about their weird Killer DM fantasies? At 17th level you face groups of enemies and player characters kill or disable several of them every round of combat and fucking wail of the banshee is the fucking default go-to attack spell. That is the D&D as described in the actual books. Any of this other crap is stuff you guys made up in idle speculation land.

That's an odd conclusion to reach from a guy known for playing Logistics and Dragons. The "actual books"? What a bizarre and uncharacteristic measure to use. Wail of the Banshee is great for annihilating minions, sure. Why not?

Princess' "add rider effects" remains the best option for high-level evocation.

[JonSetanta]

Here's my fix for SoDs that's been banging around in my head for a while;

• Casting #1: "SoD" spell slaps a specific debuff such as, say, Entangle on a target for X amount of time.

• Casting #2: SoD spell checks for specific debuff on target. If present, target is then reduced to 0 HP and Staggered but stable and not losing HP.

• Casting #3: SoD spell checks for debuff on target, and Staggered condition (and/or just 0 HP), and if both conditions are met.. the target is killed, petrified, imprisoned, soul-stolen, or whatever else the spell usually does as a straight-out combat ender.

[Dominicius]

When it comes to encounter ending spells I like the Holy Word/Blasphemy/Dictum mechanic the best.

Now if only D&D had a workable CL system...

[ubernoob]

Here's my fix for SoDs that's been banging around in my head for a while;

• Casting #1: "SoD" spell slaps a specific debuff such as, say, Entangle on a target for X amount of time.

• Casting #2: SoD spell checks for specific debuff on target. If present, target is then reduced to 0 HP and Staggered but stable and not losing HP.

• Casting #3: SoD spell checks for debuff on target, and Staggered condition (and/or just 0 HP), and if both conditions are met.. the target is killed, petrified, imprisoned, soul-stolen, or whatever else the spell usually does as a straight-out combat ender.

Making casters synergize with each other is not the solution to fixing caster/melee disparity.

[JonSetanta]

Making casters synergize with each other is not the solution to fixing caster/melee disparity.

"Each other" being the key part there, since I'm not concerned with multiple spellcasters but rather the capabilities of a single one.

Obviously doubling or tripling Wizards in a party will make any encounter easier, but the change I propose at least takes longer than "LOL I cast Finger of Death. You lose. What? You made the save? Finger of Death, again"

If you want to synergize between casters and non-casters, give each class debuffs that reward the player for using the other's abilities after.
For instance, a physical attack that reduces saves, lowers SR, or makes a target lose actions. Spells would then reduce a target's aim, AC, or movement speed.

[ubernoob]

Making casters synergize with each other is not the solution to fixing caster/melee disparity.

"Each other" being the key part there, since I'm not concerned with multiple spellcasters but rather the capabilities of a single one.

Obviously doubling or tripling Wizards in a party will make any encounter easier, but the change I propose at least takes longer than "LOL I cast Finger of Death. You lose. What? You made the save? Finger of Death, again"

Your solution makes smart players do the 4E party composition because casters can't do anything on their own. You're hurting the Druid/Fighter/Wizard/Barbarian party and not fixing the Wizard*4 party. That's stupid.

If you want to synergize between casters and non-casters, give each class debuffs that reward the player for using the other's abilities after.
For instance, a physical attack that reduces saves, lowers SR, or makes a target lose actions. Spells would then reduce a target's aim, AC, or movement speed.

Since you know what the non-retarded solution is, you should just do that instead of doing something retarded.