The set up: the party just leveled up to sixth (so I started my Magus at 6th). An airship filled with criminals we had already defeated at earlier levels had crashed just outside of town. We were dispatched to apprehend them.
The party:
LN Medium humanoid (human)
Init +0; Senses Perception +6
DEFENSE
AC 16, touch 10, flat-footed 16 (+6 armor (chain shirt +2)) 20
hp 60/ (6d8+12 (con bonus)+6 (favored class)+6 (racial starting hit points)+6 toughness)
Fort +8, Ref +3, Will +6
OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft.
Melee +3 Flail +11 (1d8+7 20 x2) +15 to trip, +15 to disarm
Spell Combat +3 Flail +7 (1d8+7 20 x2) +11 to trip, +11 to disarm and Spell (concentration check at -2, DC 15+twice spells level)
Spells Known (Magus 6th) – concentration +9 (+13 defensively, grappling or spell combat)
Vs Spell Resistance +6
2nd —acid arrow, bull strength, invisibility, mirror image
1st —color spray, grease, magic missile, shield, shocking grasp
0 —detect magic, ghost sound, light, mage hand, spark
STATISTICS
Str 18, Dex 10, Con 14, Int 16, Wis 10, Cha 10
Base Atk +4; CMB +8 (+12 with trip, +10 with disarm); CMD 18 (22 vs trip, 20 vs disarm)
Feats Combat Casting, Combat Expertise, Improved Disarm, Improved Trip, Toughness
Magus Arcanas concentrate, maneuver mastery (trip)
Skills Climb +13, Knowledge Arcana +12, Knowledge Dungeoneering +9, Knowledge Planes +9, Perception +6, Spellcraft +12
Languages Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Orc, Undercommon
SQ
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Arcane Weapon (Su)
The +2 Flail is now +3 because of this ability.
Concentrate (Ex)
A magus with this magus arcana can reroll any concentration check he has just made with a +4 bonus. He must use this ability after the roll is made, but before it is determined if the roll is a success. The magus must take the second roll, even if it is worse. The magus can use this ability once per day.
Maneuver Mastery (Ex)
This is applied to the trip combat maneuver. Whenever the magus uses trip he uses his magus level in place of his base attack.
Equipment: +2 Flail (8324gp), +2 chainshirt (4250), cloak of resistance +1 (1000), amulet of teamwork (2000)
NOTE: we don't use traits, instead we use the racial bonus' hp option from the original PF playtest.
The villains!
We rode a carriage to the crash site. I already had Shocking Grasp cast and held for my first attack. An explosive trap goes off tipping our carriage over. We all make and ALL pass reflex saves to keep from falling all over each other. We exit the carriage and the ambush begins!
Round 1 – I get a 16 on my initiative and go after most of the party, which is good actually. The paladin soaks an attack of opportunity from a large fire elemental outside the carriage. On my turn I move up to that large fire elemental and unleash a precast shocking grasp through my flail (rolled 18 to hit, 6 for flail damage and 14 on shocking grasp) for 27 damage total.
Attacked for 3 by fire elemental, failed reflex save and now on fire.
Rest of party split up to engage all the enemies. The monks globes harry the casters and keep them from moving more than a 5' step each turn. Our shield fighter and the sunderer square off and taunt each other, each makes a ready action against the other which puts both of them out of the fight for the round.
Round 2 – took 2 from being on fire, delayed until the cleric dropped create water on me. Stopped being on fire, declared spell combat, rolled 20 to hit dealing 12 to the fire elemental, rolled 18 on my concentration check to cast magic missile for 8 on the elemental. I am going toe to toe with a large fire elemental. The rest of the enemies are focused on the other party members, mostly harassing the casters.
Attacked for 8 by fire elemental and lit on fire, again. I tell her not to worry about me and go heal the paladin who's engaged the orc brothers and are kicking her tail! The shield fighter and sunderer also engage and the shield takes some damage, which scares the crap out of our shield fighter. The shadowdancer realizes that fire elementals are immune to crits and refocus' on the elemental summoner.
Round 3 – Took 6 from being on fire. Activated Spell Combat again. Rolled 12 to hit (for 19 total) dealt 13 more damage to the fire elemental and dropped it. Rolled 9 on my concentration check (for a total of 20) and dropped a shield on myself (this would prove to be a bad tactical choice on my part).
Round 4 – Took 3 fire damage (and the fire went out on its own). Charged the monk who's miniature portals were still wrecking our caters, rolled 11 on my charging trip for a total of 28. Down he went. This made it impossible for him to access his portals freeing up our casters for a round (this proved clutch).
Monk stands up, provoking. An 18 total hit him for 10 damage. He took his standard to hit my reduced AC of 18 and missed.
Our shield fighters shield is still taking damage. The druid gets a call lightning off and things start to turn around. Our twohander drops a second fire elemental and the shadowdancer drops their summoner. One down, four to go. The kobold harasses our cleric keeping her locked down, she flees the carriage so he can't shadow jump near her. Now she can start helping the paladin who's almost out of channels.
Round 5 – Activated Spell Combat! Got a 17 total on my trip attempt against the monk, he did not fall down, but I did roll 18 on my concentration check to cast mirror image (rolled a 3 for 5 images). So far, spell combat has been very kind to me. This is where I tactically failed. Mirror Image by itself would've been better than shield. Shield would've been better as a Grease or similar battlefield control spell, because it would've helped the party more.
Attacked by the monk and missed, he rolled a 3. His other attacks were on other allies, but the portals don't move far or fast. He puts two on just me.
The druid drops a Flaming Sphere and directs it towards the sunderer. The twohander engages the sunderer as well. The shield fighters shield is reduced to 3, but he won't disengage.
Round 6 – Activated spell combat, to lesser effect. Got a 20 total on trip and failed, rolled a 5 on concentration and used once per day reroll, got an 18 (33 total) and threw an acid arrow at the monk (hit him on a 22 touch attack for 5 damage). This provoked, but he missed me. Not sure if I can 5' in the middle of spell combat. I was going to throw the acid arrow at the sunderer, but the druid dropped him with Flaming Sphere, she also put a Call Lightning bolt on the monk, but he made his save and had evasion.
Round 7 – Spell combat is rockin'! Rolled a 1 on my trip attempt for the monk (we have no fumble penalties, thank Gawd!) and a 9 on my concentration (20 total for a DC 17 grease). Grease was placed under an orc who made his reflex save, but the placement blocked retreat for the enemy.
The shadowdancer gave the kobold a taste of his own medicine and he quickly fled. The cleric cast Sound Burst on an orc, stunning him and taking flank away for one of the brothers, which helped the paladin who's soaked over 100 damage this fight.
The monk is missing horribly, but his near hits are draining my images. If I didn't have Shield up then he would've been rolling to see if he was hitting an image instead of me. I realize that both these spells do not work well together.
Round 8 – the cleric moves up into flank, but I rolled a 3 and failed to trip him. Then the druid pulled a kill steal (her second for the night) and call lighteninged the monk to death.
Remaining orcs are killed and battle ends.
Assessment: In three rounds I took on a 60hp monster and killed it with minimum resources spent. Had my Magic Missile been another Shocking Grasp then I would've dropped it in two. The monk was a problem because I rolled low and even if I hadn't his CMD is a monks CMD, so there's that. If I didn't use Spell Combat in round six then my trip attempt would've been a successful 24, which would've helped the rest of the party. The ability to engage one enemy while either adding more damage through spells or battlefield control through Grease and other spells is clutch. It is a very busy class though and the penalties to hit kept me from dominating the field. No one really thought my actions (other than the initial successful trip attempt) had that much of an effect on the field.
The class was a lot of fun to play. I never failed a concentration check, but I was geared to not do so. The constant failure to attack/trip was annoying, but if could keep one foe down while casting on other foes then I might have overpowered the field.
Likes: Diversity of actions. Being able to attack and cast in one round, even with the high threat of failure, is fun and cool. The Maneuvers Mastery arcana allowed the character to mimic a fighter of equal level in some situations. Since this is a high Int class I see trip and disarm being very common. The opening move of Shocking Grasp on my flail for that first attack drew some attention to what I was doing. It was big and flashy and cool.
Dislikes: after 8 rounds of combat (which could be viewed as two separate fights) I am tapped. I have enough spells for one more fight and then I'm a liability. My AC is low, but my trip/disarm is good, just not as good as the twohanded trip fighter already in the party. Granted, that's after three combats in a day, at 6th level, so I might be exaggerating the penalty here. For a front line melee guy my attacks are low and my AC is lower. If I went the Weapon Finesse route then my attacks would've been laughable, but I'd have a much better AC. At this point I'd prefer to play a straight up Wizard instead.
Facts: My attacks missed often, but my concentrations were at 100%. I did make poor spell choices for my list, but I also didn't know what I'd be facing at the start of the game day. Acid Arrow is great against casters and Magic Missile is good at distance. If I had the ability to convert spells into say, Shocking Grasp I would've done so almost every time. If I had medium armor then the shield spell would've been more than enough. With a low AC I felt encouraged to buff up, and it was unnecessary.
Suggestions: An arcana or class ability that can convert spells into a melee touch spell. Doing so would allow me to keep up with the fighters and rogue damage-wise, but only for a limited number of times per day. Another good idea would be feat retraining similar to the fighters ability. At higher levels Combat Casting is pointless, and a melee class that can't take Power Attack or Combat Expertise at first level needs someway to gain those feats without missing out on important maneuver options at mid levels. Many people have suggested putting the armor proficiencies into the arcana's. I support this. I also support putting fighter only feats into the arcana's as well. Have a base class that counts as half of another class seems silly and pointless. It should be more elegantly done and I think the arcana's really solve this without having to add more stuff to the class.
Thoughts on the Arcane Pool: I've expressed a dislike for such a mechanic. I realize a few people who are very loud on these forums support it, but after seeing this class in play I don't believe that it's needed. The class is very close to being perfect as is. Streamlining the arcana's and making them come up at every other level would go a long ways towards making an enjoyable class that isn't overpowered, which this almost is. I was successful quite often and had I been successful with every attack I would've dominated the field. The monk would've fallen far earlier and I could have engaged another foe before combat expired. An Arcane Pool would give too many more options and might put the class over the top.
But, , , the lead Dev himself as expressed a like for the concept. [sigh] If it is too be done, and I am STILL against it, then I ask that Arcane Pool be unusable during the turns that Spell Combat are activated. This is a very good ability and the only balancing factor at low levels is the penalty to hit. Yes, it is annoying, but it is needed. When the penalty starts to drop away at higher levels is when the other classes are also shining brightly. So please, just tread carefully if you're going to do this.
Final, final, FINAL assessment: This is a great NPC class. One Magus, properly played, can solo a party. Melee attacks which will more than likely trip/disarm/dirty trick (yay dirty tricks!) one guy while battlefield control harries the rest of the party is an exciting foe for any group. I've been putting together monsters with Magus levels and I got to tell you, I'm impressed. Especially at higher levels! I run two different groups of 10th level characters (all the same players, but on different ends of the world) and I see the Magus being common sight for them in the adventures to come.
Thank you to any who read this whole thing. You're one of the good ones.
Thank you to any who read this whole thing. You're one of the good ones.
You're welcome ;D
Seriously, though: Very good read. Seems like Spell Combat can indeed become quite powerful at medium-high levels, as I thought.
I still believe the Magus needs something to do that doesn't burn his spell slots, so I'm a big fan of giving him some sort of other recource to work with like an arcane pool or maybe even something totally dfferent. Even a few once/day arncanas that don't expend or alter spells would go a long way. But I also agree with you that this needs to be done VERY carefully lest it won't add too much power to an already quite powerful class - and full attack + casting in the same round IS powerful, no matter how you look at it.
I'm mostly concerned with the first few levels. A low-level Magus has very little spell slots to work with, and risking to lose these few spells by using Spell Combat doesn't seem appealing to me. I think a few new combat-oriented cantrips would go a long way. A touch cantrip dealing 1d3 damage (even 1d2 would be enough!), as some have suggested, or even one-round-buff cantrips (like +1 to armor or attack (or even concentration!) for 1 rd or something) would actually make me want to use Spell Combat as early as level 2.
Wow, a post that contains a play-test and feedback, instead of just criticism!
A good read, and very interesting analysis, thanks.
Facts: My attacks missed often, but my concentrations were at 100%. I did make poor spell choices for my list, but I also didn't know what I'd be facing at the start of the game day. Acid Arrow is great against casters and Magic Missile is good at distance. If I had the ability to convert spells into say, Shocking Grasp I would've done so almost every time. If I had medium armor then the shield spell would've been more than enough. With a low AC I felt encouraged to buff up, and it was unnecessary.
This is exactly what I've been seeing with the magus I'm GMing for as well. Smart play can completely mitigate the concentration problem. There is nothing that can be done about the -4 to attacks with spell combat, as modifying opponent AC is rather difficult as a magus.
My suggestions from the GM side are twofold:
First, reduce the melee attack penalty of spell combat to -2 as if the spell were a light off hand weapon during two-weapon fighting. Perhaps only for touch range spells.
Second, I've temporarily houseruled spellstrike and it's done absolute wonders for the flow of play for the magus. When spellstriking, I allow any hit that breaks touch ac to resolve the touch portion of the attack. This seems to normalize damage output to just under what I typically expect from a fighter on most rounds. Generally, the magus either succeeds on his concentration check but grazes touch ac with his sword, or fails concentration and lands his melee attack. Sometimes both will land, sometimes both will fail, but these are rare. Additionally, every once in a while the sword will crit while delivering a shocking grasp and everyone at the table will all gather round with baited breath to see how horribly the target is going to get liquified.
All in all, I think the class is spot on concept, and the math just needs tweaking along with some small changes.
I don't think the arcana system needs to change. Right now it is simple and functions much like the beautiful rogue talent system. Magus does not need a more complex bookkeeping system in addition to being a prepared spellcaster.
The top end ability is mathematically irrelevant though, which should be addressed before release.
Very nice run down, I wish I could have played in my live game saturday with a 1st level magus, oh well. Not to be critical but if you were on fire that should have been an extra concentration check for the continual damage, very unlikely to mess you up, but still a small chance it could have messed up your shield spell.
A question on continued encounters in the day. Would you have considered falling back on scrolls and wands for self buff spells?
Very nice run down, I wish I could have played in my live game saturday with a 1st level magus, oh well. Not to be critical but if you were on fire that should have been an extra concentration check for the continual damage, very unlikely to mess you up, but still a small chance it could have messed up your shield spell.
A question on continued encounters in the day. Would you have considered falling back on scrolls and wands for self buff spells?
Looking over the math I still made my concentration checks, so no cheating on my part. Both the GM and I got a laugh out of this.
The problem with scrolls and wands is that, the good stuff, cost a little much. Being frontline focused means I don't want to spend feats on item creation, nor money on non-armaments.
In pinch though, a wand of grease would help out sometimes.
This seems to be one of the better playtests I have read. Good read and I hope I have the same experience. The more I've read, the more I've come around to accepting spellstrike as written. Cheating the action economy at levels 1 and 2 is huge, even if only a couple times a day.
This seems to be one of the better playtests I have read. Good read and I hope I have the same experience. The more I've read, the more I've come around to accepting spellstrike as written. Cheating the action economy at levels 1 and 2 is huge, even if only a couple times a day.
That's why I think this class is excellent for villainous NPC's. I've statted a few up, like a rakshasa, a green hag, a lich version and a xill. Man, my players are going to hate me over the coming weeks ;)