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I agree with your three points.That's a problem with *those* spells being wrongly labeled as *SR no*. Snowball should be evocation, like acid arrow. Glitterdust should be resistible, at least the blinding part.Glitterust? snowball? acid arrow?But in this case i think is more a problem with monster desing. Golems should be inmune to magic, period.They are. They aren't inmune to the laws of physics though. If I conjure a hole behind his feet, being immune to magic won't stop him to fall. If I change the gravity to work upwards, he falls too. If I conjure 100tons of rocks over him, the weight is still going to do damage.
They are all Conj. You ain't making something really magical.. but summoning acid, summoning ice, or summoning sparkles!
Have you ever had glitter thrown into your face? Like a full cup of it?
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They are all Conj. You ain't making something really magical.. but summoning acid, summoning ice, or summoning sparkles!
Have you ever had glitter thrown into your face? Like a full cup of it?
Yeah of course, the last winter my brother trow me a ball of pure snow that did 5d6 , I almost died.
Seriously, taht separation is silly let them also summon fire and electricity and erase the evocation school form all the books.
Ball of Ice and Snow.
And it didn't come from the elemental plane of ice.
They are all Conj. You ain't making something really magical.. but summoning acid, summoning ice, or summoning sparkles!
Have you ever had glitter thrown into your face? Like a full cup of it?
Yeah of course, the last winter my brother trow me a ball of pure snow that did 5d6 , I almost died.
Seriously, taht separation is silly let them also summon fire and electricity and erase the evocation school form all the books.
Ball of Ice and Snow.
And it didn't come from the elemental plane of ice.
If it is a non-magical ball of ice and snow, conjured from material plane, it SHOULD NOT, by ANY MEANS, do 5d6 damage and stagger. 1 point non-lethal at best
And same goes with acid arrow.
You aren't summoning quarter ton weighted snowballs from the top of a hill either.
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You aren't summoning quarter ton weighted snowballs from the top of a hill either.
I'm summoning a ball of snow and ice from the elemental plane of really cold stuff. And according the 5d6 points of damage, It probably is a greatly weight of cold stuff. Maybe Nitrous Oxide even.
Acid? Again, summoning from the elemental plane of Acid. Viniger, sure 1 point of non-leathal damage. Heck there is stuff in our world that is quite acidic too, like hydrochloric acid. And while its not instantly turn you into goop acid, it still burns like crazy.
Elementals, Dragon's breath, and the like can still apply elemental damage to a Ada golem.
You conjure a ball of packed ice and snow that you can throw at a single target
Unless your Wizard is packing some serious musculature, he's not throwing a half-ton ball of snow.
So either the Snowball isn't a half-ton ball of snow, and is instead just a regular snowball, or now Wizard with a Str less than 24-ish can use the spell.
Guess which is the more likely?
Conjuration is all around a poorly thought out school, both thematically and mechanically. It's ludicrously powerful and stomps all over Evocation in terms of direct damage when SR and the like is factored in.
Also, Marthkus, it's not about GMs tailoring encounters to make things easy for casters. They don't have to. A well built caster can trivialize most encounters, even some specifically designed to f%%+ them over.
As well, look at any officially released modules. There are VERY few situations that could even conceivably be called caster unfriendly.
The default assumption of the game is not that encounters be designed to screw casters. Likely because the Paizo dev team doesn't believe there's a disparity, so they see no reason to.
Which is why a reasonably optimized caster can destroy an AP as written.
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Wait.. So he's throwing the snowball? As in a thrown weapon? As in a weapon he's not proficient with.. is actually an improvised weapon at that.
So this should be xd6 (up to 5d6) + str damage. With a -4 improvised weapon penalty, and a 10 foot range increment.
So either the wizard is using an improvised thrown weapon, or as part of conjuring the spell, he used the magic to hurl it? You know.. kinda like how mage hand can pick up things?
Guess which is more likely?
Except it's not a weapon. It's a ranged touch attack.
Nice try, but not nice enough.
Also, Marthkus, it's not about GMs tailoring encounters to make things easy for casters. They don't have to. A well built caster can trivialize most encounters, even some specifically designed to f$%% them over.
If your DM throws enough varied situations at the caster, the caster will be spread too thin to cover them all. He'll be forced to either prepare just silver bullets and hope one is right or be useless, or he'll prepare well rounded spells that will work but do not one-shot encounters.
If your casters are rofl-stomping the campaign, then that is your DM's fault.
It's like complaining about rangers being OP because the DM throws the same type of creatures at the party and the ranger gets a +10/+10 to hit and damage with FE at all times.
And it's not about oneshotting encounters (though there are some builds that can do so). Simply making the encounters mop-ups for the martials with no real challenge involved is enough.
And there are many versatile spells that can do this. Even worse is the destruction of many out of combat challenges and well rounded caster can take care of, especially ones that involve travel (either short of long distance).
And it's not about oneshotting encounters (though there are some builds that can do so). Simply making the encounters mop-ups for the martials with no real challenge involved is enough.
And there are many versatile spells that can do this. Even worse is the destruction of many out of combat challenges and well rounded caster can take care of, especially ones that involve travel (either short of long distance).
Making encounters a mop-up is what casters are suppose to do. It's the martials job to be able to clean-up before the spells wear off or get removed.
If the casters tried to mop up encounters themselves, it would cut down on their spells by at-least half.
Also giving the casters enough room to wreak the enemies requires martials or REALLY good planning.
Of-course this is at higher levels. At low/majority of play levels, the martials baby sit the casters.
The problem is that encounters being reduced to "Full attack/Coup de Grace the helpless foe with no risk" makes for a boring game, an doesn't balanced in the slightest.
It doesn't matter if someone has to come back in and put the finishing touches on the encounter if most of the work was done with a single spell.
That's just what happens when you're lucky as a caster and pick the right with the right saves and the enemies rolling the right rolls.
Pathfinder combat is quick and lethal. Most fights are decided before round three is up.
You may just not like Pathfinder combat. I would really suggest giving 4e a shot. It sounds like that is more of what you want.
I don't like 4E, no. I don't hate it as much as everyone else seems to but I dislike most of the character classes and the mechanics feel "loose" for lack of a better term.
"Combat over in 3-4 rounds of fighting" and "Combat over in 3-4 rounds of mopping up after some guy that cast a spell at DC Lolno" are two entirely different things.
The former is very fun and is what makes Pathfinder's combats very satisfying sometimes.
The latter is annoying, unbalanced, and all too common with caster builds that focus on affecting enemies rather than allies.
You aren't summoning quarter ton weighted snowballs from the top of a hill either.I'm summoning a ball of snow and ice from the elemental plane of really cold stuff. And according the 5d6 points of damage, It probably is a greatly weight of cold stuff. Maybe Nitrous Oxide even.
Acid? Again, summoning from the elemental plane of Acid. Viniger, sure 1 point of non-leathal damage. Heck there is stuff in our world that is quite acidic too, like hydrochloric acid. And while its not instantly turn you into goop acid, it still burns like crazy.
Elementals, Dragon's breath, and the like can still apply elemental damage to a Ada golem.
Oh nice.
Let's see a few conjuratiom spells then:Conjure ball of fire.-> it's exactly like fireball, but ignores SR
Conjure line of lighntning->it's exactly like lightning bolt, but ignores SR
Conjure cone of cold->it's exactly like cone of cold, but ignores SR.
We could scratch evocation as a school and SR as a monster ability.
Also, Marthkus, it's not about GMs tailoring encounters to make things easy for casters. They don't have to. A well built caster can trivialize most encounters, even some specifically designed to f$%% them over.If your DM throws enough varied situations at the caster, the caster will be spread too thin to cover them all.
my DM throw at us what the AP has as encounters. And casters trivialize most of them
Pathfinder combat is quick and lethal. Most fights are decided before round three is up
the above Adamantium golem encounter, CR=APL+6, was decided as soon as the wizard took his initiative turn.
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You aren't summoning quarter ton weighted snowballs from the top of a hill either.I'm summoning a ball of snow and ice from the elemental plane of really cold stuff. And according the 5d6 points of damage, It probably is a greatly weight of cold stuff. Maybe Nitrous Oxide even.
Acid? Again, summoning from the elemental plane of Acid. Viniger, sure 1 point of non-leathal damage. Heck there is stuff in our world that is quite acidic too, like hydrochloric acid. And while its not instantly turn you into goop acid, it still burns like crazy.
Elementals, Dragon's breath, and the like can still apply elemental damage to a Ada golem.
Oh nice.
Let's see a few conjuratiom spells then:Conjure ball of fire.-> it's exactly like fireball, but ignores SR
Conjure line of lighntning->it's exactly like lightning bolt, but ignores SR
Conjure cone of cold->it's exactly like cone of cold, but ignores SR.
We could scratch evocation as a school and SR as a monster ability.
Yeah, lets go all crazy and stuff here.
Snowball, and Acid arrow have a more solid physical form. Its why they are range touch attacks.
Sajan Gadadvara
Except it's not a weapon. It's a ranged touch attack.
Nice try, but not nice enough
Exactly why its not thrown by the wizards hands. The spell doesn't have a requirement that i have an empty hand to throw the ball now does it? "But but but but spells need han.." Stop right there. No they don't. Still spell, wands, Spell strike etc.
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Snowball is NOT doing bludgeoning damage. It's cold damage. 5d6 non the less, enough to kill a horse. It's supernaturaly magic conjured cold, just like cone of cold. Creatures immunes to cone of cold should be immune to snowball too. That you roll a ranged attack is pointless, Ray of Frost, Scorching Ray, Fiery Shurikens or Polar Ray roll a ranged touch attack too.
The only reason snowall ignores SR is because it's a bad designed spell. Just like Orbs were in 3.5
Splitting up point buy by tier
Samurai, cavalier, fighter, monk, rogue all get 25.
Battle casters and 3/4 guys get 20.
Tier 1/2 classes get 15, which is spontaneous full casters, actual full casters, and summoners
I really like this idea but how do you handle characters who start out as a fighter, rogue, or monk (25 pointers at character creation) and then multiclass into caster territory? For example, we just had a 1st level rogue who decided to become a wizard at 2nd level.
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Snowball is NOT doing bludgeoning damage. It's cold damage. 5d6 non the less, enough to kill a horse. It's supernaturaly magic conjured cold, just like cone of cold. Creatures immunes to cone of cold should be immune to snowball too. That you roll a ranged attack is pointless, Ray of Frost, Scorching Ray, Fiery Shurikens or Polar Ray roll a ranged touch attack too.
The only reason snowall ignores SR is because it's a bad designed spell. Just like Orbs were in 3.5
Its a piece of the elemental plane of cold hurled at the enemy. Now, I'll admit, they shouldn't have made a cold sr ignoring spell. Sr ignoring should stay firmly in the realm of acid spells. Though, cold is one of the number 1 elements that enemies are immune to.
But you could use the same argument for any spell. Hurl a piece of the fire elemental plane. Call it "fireball".
You just need to put the Conjuration label and write a fluff sentence in the spell, and ANY evocation elemental spell could be conjuration, and non-SR. It destroys the entire point of both Evocation school and SR.
I think there should be non-SR damaging spells. But they should be limited to mundane levels of damage, and/or DR. Earthquake is a good example.
Also, Marthkus, it's not about GMs tailoring encounters to make things easy for casters. They don't have to. A well built caster can trivialize most encounters, even some specifically designed to f$%% them over.If your DM throws enough varied situations at the caster, the caster will be spread too thin to cover them all.my DM throw at us what the AP has as encounters. And casters trivialize most of them
Pathfinder combat is quick and lethal. Most fights are decided before round three is upthe above Adamantium golem encounter, CR=APL+6, was decided as soon as the wizard took his initiative turn.
That's because the golem is a stupid easy encounter. Most monsters by themselves stand little chance against a party.
Few monsters are so well rounded that they are a competent encounter by themselves.
If your caster is trivializing AP encounters that means he is skilled. You either need harder APs or a DM who can improvise. What level are your guys at?
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But you could use the same argument for any spell. Hurl a piece of the fire elemental plane. Call it "fireball".
You just need to put the Conjuration label and write a fluff sentence in the spell, and ANY evocation elemental spell could be conjuration, and non-SR. It destroys the entire point of both Evocation school and SR.
I think there should be non-SR damaging spells. But they should be limited to mundane levels of damage, and/or DR. Earthquake is a good example.
Or acid
But you could use the same argument for any spell. Hurl a piece of the fire elemental plane. Call it "fireball".
You just need to put the Conjuration label and write a fluff sentence in the spell, and ANY evocation elemental spell could be conjuration, and non-SR. It destroys the entire point of both Evocation school and SR.
I think there should be non-SR damaging spells. But they should be limited to mundane levels of damage, and/or DR. Earthquake is a good example.
No-SR damage spells have less damage than SR damage spells. So you take what already sucks (damage spells) and cast a worse less damaging spell to get past SR.
What is the problem? If the caster is casting no SR spells, then the rogue is starting to feel good about his DPR.
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Of course the whole adamantine golems.
Control Construct.
No SR. No Save.
Only a skill check vs the hd+10 of the golem. Which is a check of 40.
You'll need to be level 14 to cast this. So you've probably got at least 20 spell craft by then. 14 ranks +3 for class feature. +3 at least for 17 int.
So, controlling a golem that big looks like a pipe dream at first. So it depends on how much focus someone would give to spell craft. You could easily add +10 with skill focus/magical aptitude. +2 from elf, +1 from trait. I'm sure you'd have some int boosting items, and I'm not sure if there is skill boosting items in pathfinder
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3.0 and it's legacy products (3.5 and Pathfinder) responded to the criticism that earlier editions had that spellcasters were overpowered compared to the other classes (although only at the higher levels). It's just that the response was exactly the opposite of what any sane person would have taken. They INCREASED the power of spellcasters, while simultaneously reducing (and sometimes eliminating altogether) the balancing factors that limited their magic.
3.0 and it's legacy products (3.5 and Pathfinder) responded to the criticism that earlier editions had that spellcasters were overpowered compared to the other classes (although only at the higher levels). It's just that the response was exactly the opposite of what any sane person would have taken. They INCREASED the power of spellcasters, while simultaneously reducing (and sometimes eliminating altogether) the balancing factors that limited their magic.
I can only assume magic was garbage then in previous edition, because it is not OP in Pathfinder.
Considering how most classes have magic or access to magic, magic is par for Pathfinder not OP. Things can be UP to magic, but magic cannot be OP.
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This discussion should be about what is fun. Nerfing casters makes playing them less fun and does nothing to make the fighter more fun. Wrong approach IMO. (Individual spell fixes are acceptable, but blanket nerfs are too much.)
I have players who play martials because they find the intricacies of a caster tedious, so avoiding complex new mechanics seems a good start. Skill and ability checks really aren't used for very much, and the DCs cap out fairly low without allowing incredible things. Adding abilities requiring high DCs/skill ranks, like epic skill uses from 3.5, could be interesting. Checks should be used for any activated abilities, and skill ranks used for passive boosts. Examples:
Acrobatics
Negate a critical hit - DC 10 + confirmation roll
Balance on a hair thin wire or similar object - DC 45
Balance on a liquid - DC 55
+4 dodge when fighting defensively - 10 ranks
+5 dodge when fighting defensively - 17 ranks
Treat a fall as if it were 20 feet shorter when determining damage - DC 40
Treat a fall as if it were 40 feet shorter when determining damage - DC 50
Ignore falling damage - DC 60
Strength
Break through 1 ft. stone wall - DC 35*
Break through 3 ft. stone wall - DC 50*
Treat all rolls for falling damage as 1s. For every 50 ft. you fall, 5' of rough terrain is created, centered on impact site. Creatures in the area must make a DC 25 reflex save or be knocked prone. - DC 50
Use huge object as improvised weapon - DC 35
Use gargantuan object as improvised weapon - DC 50
Use colossal object as improvised weapon - DC 65(Primarily for colossal creatures and barbarians with Strength Surge)
*These DCs already exist in the core rules
Constitution
You may attempt to shake off (negate) one negative condition per encounter - DC 30
These DCs were designed with the following abilities allowed as feats or class features:
Colossal Strength
Req: Character level 10, 26 strength
You may add your character level to strength checks and skill checks that use strength. Abilities that allow you to use strength instead of another ability score, such as Intimidating Prowess, are not affected. This ability stacks with a barbarian's Strength Surge rage power.
Similar abilities for dexterity and constitution. Think of these as being similar to a barbarian's Strength Surge and a monk's High Jump abilities. The prerequisites require this to be a character's niche, their excelling attribute. It would be difficult to pick up more than one of these. In their niche however, that character is unmatched.
I'm working on an implementation of this for my games. If anyone is interested, I can post a public link.
(Constructive criticism and suggestions welcome, especially concerning balance.)
@Pandora's Box
Look at you trying to make the thread about what it is suppose to be about.
I had also tried so earlier with This here Mostly ignored though.
The idea is to give more weight specifically to martial classes, by having the feats search for class levels of X, class features, etc and then giving X bonus.
@Pandora's Box
Look at you trying to make the thread about what it is suppose to be about.
Oh, was I supposed to just argue? I guess I could do that too :) Props on catching the name.
I had also tried so earlier with This here Mostly ignored though.The idea is to give more weight specifically to martial classes, by having the feats search for class levels of X, class features, etc and then giving X bonus.
I gave it a look, but had a conceptual problem with it. Most of what I saw confers bonuses to existing abilities rather than adding new ones, and most of it was also offensive combat bonuses. Martials already excel at DPS so I feel that's just the wrong target. They need more help in the defensive (read: antispell), out of combat, and narrative areas. I did like the idea of a style as one feat that unlocks a variety of powers based on other similarly flavored feats though.
I think Paizo really nailed it with barbarian rage powers. Strength Surge, although just a huge numerical bonus, allows barbarian's all those fun "Hey GM, can I smash X to do Y" options. Spell Sunder puts those squishy spell types in their place, and Terrifying Howl and Groundbreaker give battlefield control options (I recommend houseruling those to scaling DCs. Y'know, like all other class features everywhere.) I wish other martial classes had more varied options like this.
I don't consider the Barbarian to be on the top of the martial. As in, they are a little too supernatural to be at the top. Barb gets a lot of abilities all together that make him all around better at fighting things..
I'm not seeing where you are getting more DPS beyond Desert Rose getting some bleed damage.
Desert Rose - dirty trick maneuvers to kick sand and dust into the faces of your enemies, blinding them. Dance and Acrobatics become class skills. Dance to avoid AoO from using dirty trick maneuvers granted by the feat. This is focused around using two light weapons too, like daggers. Two weapon fighter is a very feat intensive thing, with a bit too little reward.
Stone Splitter - Sunder armor, magic armor, and slow the enemy by pounding them with the might of your two handed weapon. Some heavy base attacks. 2h fighting. Fighters get some stuff from this that specifically calls for class features of theirs.
Twilight Sniper - Crossbows are a poor option to bows. This is intended to improve them, and increase a characters ability to stealth and be sneaky. Increases the range on sneak attacks/precision shot and the use of vital strike.
Noble Duelist - Rapier Dagger style, or similar. Light armor wielding style that has a few maneuvers and the like that cause spellcasters in their reach to be rather disturbed. Forces spell casters to basically make concentration checks within a certain distance of the Noble Duelist in addition to any other concentration check. Possibly Knowledge nobility based skills too.
Iron Curtain - focuses more on defense than the others, giving a tower shield wielding warrior some new options and tricks to use at higher levels.
Ok marthkus, apparently my dm skills are poor if I ban simulacrum.
Here is a situation: Wizard hits level 13, gets simulacrum, and decides to make an efreeti. He then uses the three wishes his simulacrum has to make 3 more efreeti, then uses those three to make three more each, etc.
After a while he starts wishing for titans and pit fiends and other combat monsters, and everyone in his party has +5 inherent bonuses to stats for free.
What is your solution?
Half hit-die efreeti can't grant wishes.
Half hit-die efreeti can't grant wishes.
Where does it say that?
Half hit-die efreeti can't grant wishes.Where does it say that?
Simulacrum creates an illusory duplicate of any creature. The duplicate creature is partially real and formed from ice or snow. It appears to be the same as the original, but it has only half of the real creature's levels or HD (and the appropriate hit points, feats, skill ranks, and special abilities for a creature of that level or HD). You can't create a simulacrum of a creature whose HD or levels exceed twice your caster level. You must make a Disguise check when you cast the spell to determine how good the likeness is. A creature familiar with the original might detect the ruse with a successful Perception check (opposed by the caster's Disguise check) or a DC 20 Sense Motive check.
Where does it not say that? No need to interpret an ambiguous rule poorly just so you feel justified to ban spells and cry foul.
