Evil eye: Overrated


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Witch guides and witch discussion threads often wax rhapsodic about Evil Eye. I can't help but wonder if I'm looking at the same hex.

Evil Eye wrote:

The target takes a –2 penalty on one of the following (witch’s choice): AC, ability checks, attack rolls, saving throws, or skill checks. This hex lasts for a number of rounds equal to 3 + the witch’s Intelligence modifier. A Will save reduces this to just 1 round.

This is a mind-affecting effect. At 8th level the penalty increases to –4.

Let's compare:

Demoralize Target wrote:

You can use this skill to cause an opponent to become shaken for a number of rounds.

Shaken: A shaken character takes a –2 penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks.

Here's the thing: as the Intimimancy guide notes, using a standard action to inflict shaken on one opponent makes you 10% of a contributor for that round. There is a 10% chance that your target will waste their standard action because of your efforts. This is a terrible return on a standard action. Intimidation becomes valuable when you can do it as a swift or free action.

And yet isn't intimidation four times as efficient as Evil Eye? A knowledgeable player can mitigate the inefficiency by picking out the key stat to evil eye, but I'd hardly say it's better than shaken. You can hit AC if you want, I guess.

Duration is arguably different. If the witch is willing to stagger himself he can keep the evil eye going forever. On the other hand, taking the Memorable trait makes it easy to get shaken stuck for three rounds. That covers a huge chunk of the average fight.

Am I missing something here? What makes Evil Eye a worthwhile use of a standard action?

Grand Lodge

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Evil Eye works even on a failed save. You can Evil Eye multiple stats. And as long as you have a move action, you can keep all penalties in effect thanks to Cackle.

Even worse, Intimidate before you cackle and have double the penalties. Just a question of where you want to spend your resources. A hex, skill points, or both?


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Let me put it this way for you. Let's say you've gotten four hexes: Evil Eye, Misfortune, Cackle, and Slumber. Here's how a typical combat for you can go now.

Round 1: Evil Eye someone's saving throws. If they fail, it's a long duration debuff. If they pass, they still have the debuff, meaning it doesn't actually matter how high their saves are. This is an excellent debuff that enables both your spells and everyone else's in the party to work better.

Round 2: If they passed the save against Evil Eye, Cackle to maintain it for another round with a move action. Either way, use Misfortune on them, which they are less likely to pass due to Evil Eye's influence.

Round 3: Cackle if necessary. Hit the incredibly debuffed opponent with Slumber if they're still standing.

Yes, this does take 3 turns to set up. But after personally dealing with more than a few witches in my games, I can tell you that few things survive this cocktail of debuffs.


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Actually evil eye and demoralize together are even better.

Evil eye is also a soften up or test run....

If a target makes the will save I might select a spell with a fort or reflex save instead.

Sovereign Court

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chuffster wrote:
Here's the thing: as the Intimimancy guide notes, using a standard action to inflict shaken on one opponent makes you 10% of a contributor for that round. There is a 10% chance that your target will waste their standard action because of your efforts. This is a terrible return on a standard action. Intimidation becomes valuable when you can do it as a swift or free action.

I'll point out real quick - that % is wrong. It's way more than a 10% drop in their accuracy.

If a foe hits 50% of the time, giving them a -2 drops it to 40%, giving them a 20% accuracy penalty, plus the penalty to saves.

(If you want to look at it the other way, you have a chance of missing your attack anyway while max rank Intimidation nearly always works for at least a round against humanoids.)

But yes, generally it's not worth using without some ability to make it more efficient. Though there are exceptions, such as against a flying foe when you have crappy ranged attacks (and others in your party at good at it).

It's also worthwhile against boss style foes if your intimidation is high enough to work consistently.

But yes, as TriOmegaZero points out, it's the cackle which makes Evil Eye a solid option, making it basically work 100% of the time for the rest of the fight.


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Charon's Little Helper wrote:
chuffster wrote:
Here's the thing: as the Intimimancy guide notes, using a standard action to inflict shaken on one opponent makes you 10% of a contributor for that round. There is a 10% chance that your target will waste their standard action because of your efforts. This is a terrible return on a standard action. Intimidation becomes valuable when you can do it as a swift or free action.

I'll point out real quick - that % is wrong. It's way more than a 10% drop in their accuracy.

If a foe hits 50% of the time, giving them a -2 drops it to 40%, giving them a 20% accuracy penalty, plus the penalty to saves.

(If you want to look at it the other way, you have a chance of missing your attack anyway while max rank Intimidation nearly always works for at least a round against humanoids.)

But yes, generally it's not worth using without some ability to make it more efficient. Though there are exceptions, such as against a flying foe when you have crappy ranged attacks (and others in your party at good at it).

It's also worthwhile against boss style foes if your intimidation is high enough to work consistently.

But yes, as TriOmegaZero points out, it's the cackle which makes Evil Eye a solid option, making it basically work 100% of the time for the rest of the fight.

The 10% value is correct. When they roll, there is a 10% chance that your contribution was relavent.

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QuidEst wrote:
The 10% value is correct. When they roll, there is a 10% chance that your contribution was relavent.

Okay - then when you swing your sword you're only about a 50% contributor. (depending upon your accuracy, their AC, and their DR) From the context, it seemed to mean as a comparison to other uses of your time.

It also goes up over 10% if roll more than 1 die the next turn on attack rolls and/or saves.


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Charon's Little Helper wrote:

I'll point out real quick - that % is wrong. It's way more than a 10% drop in their accuracy.

If a foe hits 50% of the time, giving them a -2 drops it to 40%, giving them a 20% accuracy penalty, plus the penalty to saves.

Quid Est is correct. It would take away 20% of their hits, yes, but you're ignoring all of the times when they would miss anyway and you wasted your action for nothing.

In other words, after using evil eye, there are three possibilities:
40% chance: they roll high enough to hit you, evil eye or no
10% chance: they miss because of the evil eye
50% chance: they roll low enough to miss you, evil eye or no

mourge40k wrote:

Round 2: If they passed the save against Evil Eye, Cackle to maintain it for another round with a move action. Either way, use Misfortune on them, which they are less likely to pass due to Evil Eye's influence.

Round 3: Cackle if necessary. Hit the incredibly debuffed opponent with Slumber if they're still standing.

Honestly, I have never understood this sort of strategy. Using misfortune for the sole purpose of weakening an opponent for a later slumber hex makes no sense, because the misfortune has exactly the same chance of success as a slumber would. It would be much more effective to just slumber them immediately: if your misfortune succeeds, yeah, they're weakened, but if your slumber succeeds then they're out of the fight. On a success you're choosing between the effects misfortune and slumber, and on a failure it doesn't matter which you used. Assuming no immunities or the like, why on earth wouldn't you just use the hex that is clearly more powerful?

Charon's Little Helper wrote:
It also goes up over 10% if roll more than 1 die the next turn on attack rolls and/or saves.

For saves I agree with you, but the enemy full-attacking won't change the probabilities in a meaningful way. Yes, each attack has a chance to miss because of the evil eye, but each miss then negates a proportionally smaller amount of their damage potential.


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Avoron - it makes it so they need to save 2 out of 3 in order to avoid slumber instead of 1 out of 1. Those odds will be worse in most cases. Of course, the advantage is mitigated by allowing them another round of actions before you put them down, but from a gameplay perspective (rather than tactical optimization) I'd call that a win since it gives the GM more time to enjoy running their monster.

Edit: misspelled the other poster's name. Sorry! :-(


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At levels 1~7, Evil Eye is an aid another that lasts multiple rounds and can hit more stats.
At levels 8+, the debuff value of Evil Eye is comparable with Misfortune, except that Evil Eye doesn't care whether your opponent saves.


Berinor wrote:
Avaron - it makes it so they need to save 2 out of 3 in order to avoid slumber instead of 1 out of 1. Those odds will be worse in most cases. Of course, the advantage is mitigated by allowing them another round of actions before you put them down, but from a gameplay perspective (rather than tactical optimization) I'd call that a win since it gives the GM more time to enjoy running their monster.

Yes, it improves your chances of eventually succeeding on a slumber hex by a small amount. Specifically, it increases the target's chance of eventually failing their save by p(fail)[p(succeed) - p(succeed)2]. In the best possible circumstance, that changes a 50% chance of your hex working to a 67.5% chance. And as your hexes become more effective, the influence of misfortune becomes smaller and smaller. It really, really isn't worth taking a hex and wasting an entire turn just for the sake of pulling off that "1-2-3 combo" that seems to be held in inexplicably high regard.

And now you're just getting silly. If a combat ends quickly, that just means you can move on to other fun and interesting things. And if you seriously don't want to take away the GM's fun by killing their monster too soon, then I would suggest doing something other than targeting them with hexes for three rounds straight. Something like casting a spell. Witches still have spells, right?


Avoron wrote:
And if you seriously don't want to take away the GM's fun by killing their monster too soon, then I would suggest doing something other than targeting them with hexes for three rounds straight. Something like casting a spell. Witches still have spells, right?

Slumber and Misfortune might whiff, and when it does, the creature is immune to those hexes for 24 hours. Non-cantrip spells are obviously a limited resource. In mid-late game (levels 8+), when the resource pool of spells becomes a lot bigger for a Witch is also when Evil Eye gets better, so Evil Eye is still a valid option during some battles.

Evil eye is not a limited resource. No matter how often an opponent saves, a Witch can always keep spamming Evil Eye. The comparison point of Evil Eye should not be limited-use non-hex resources like spells. There are two comparison points of Evil Eye:
1) Hexes: Comparing different options during Level up.
2) Non-limited resources such as Cantrips and the Intimidate skill: Comparing different infinite-use actions during Combat.

Edit for clarification: I'm in no way saying that Evil Eye is the best action possible during Combat. There are so many Combat situations where Evil Eye is simply not good enough. Those situations are when a Witch should start using limited-resources such as spells. Evil Eye lets a Witch choose a 'good enough' option during combat without using limited-resources.


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Avoron wrote:

Yes, it improves your chances of eventually succeeding on a slumber hex by a small amount. Specifically, it increases the target's chance of eventually failing their save by p(fail)[p(succeed) - p(succeed)2]. In the best possible circumstance, that changes a 50% chance of your hex working to a 67.5% chance. And as your hexes become more effective, the influence of misfortune becomes smaller and smaller. It really, really isn't worth taking a hex and wasting an entire turn just for the sake of pulling off that "1-2-3 combo" that seems to be held in inexplicably high regard.

And now you're just getting silly. If a combat ends quickly, that just means you can move on to other fun and interesting things. And if you seriously don't want to take away the GM's fun by killing their monster too soon, then I would suggest doing something other than targeting them with hexes for three rounds straight. Something like casting a spell. Witches still have spells, right?

I was offering an explanation that it's not exactly the same because your earlier post didn't seem to take that nuance into consideration. Whether going from 1/2 to 2/3 is worth the extra rounds and using up another hex selection is a judgment call.

And trimming a 10 round combat to a 5 round one is probably a case of moving on to other fun and interesting things. Going from 1 round to 3 rounds is letting this fun and interesting thing develop rather than being ended just as it begins. If the player enjoys throwing out hexes and saving spells, more power to him/her. If the GM spends a long time putting the NPC together in case of a successful slumber hex, it can feel like a waste if they get knocked unconscious before their turn comes up in initiative.

Edit: and if the combat is consistently ended in round 1, other players might be disappointed not to get to use their abilities. SoS/SoD spells can be extremely potent but they're not automatically fun (or unfun for that matter).

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Evil Eye to AC lets your party barbarian or fighter Power Attack and not really lose any accuracy.

Evil Eye to saves helps other characters land their effects.

Remember that Pathfinder is generally a team game, and teamwork is a force multiplier.

Personally, my favorite witch "fight ender" is quickened ill omen followed by a SoS, but Evil Eye has its place as a solid debuff that doesn't use up resources.

Scarab Sages

So, we need to stop looking at evil eye as a 10%/20% chance of failure, and instead look at total % contribution.

Against an enemy whose primary combat ability revolves around attacking, Evil Eye is, effectively, a ~10% reduction in total damage, for free (up to 20% at 8th). That is like giving your entire group a +2 to AC against the target, which is solid support for no cost. The AC penalty, in a combat heavy party, increases group damage against the target by 10-20% PER ATTACKER. In a large group at 8th level, in one standard action, you can basically deal 60-100% damage in party contribution with a single, irresistible action. That effective damage keeps rolling over as well if the fail their save, or you cackle.

It's the same with support characters. A +1 bonus to attack rolls to all attack-oriented allies means you have roughly contributed 5% of your share of the damage per relevant ally, and if you can keep it going and apply it to yourself (as a bard,etc.), your contribution is rather easily met.


or familiar with a wand ill omen.


I have to ask what is the evil eye's current rating?

If you are saying on the debuff scale it is a 7, and here is why.....

Overrated? Who knows it is a fine tool in the witches arsenal....


QuidEst wrote:
Charon's Little Helper wrote:


I'll point out real quick - that % is wrong. It's way more than a 10% drop in their accuracy.

If a foe hits 50% of the time, giving them a -2 drops it to 40%, giving them a 20% accuracy penalty, plus the penalty to saves.

The 10% value is correct. When they roll, there is a 10% chance that your contribution was relavent.

Not that I don't agree that it was a terrible way to put it, but 20% is right... in a way.

10% is 20% of 50%. Yes, it is very confusing.

lets say you need 11 or above to hit. That means there are 10 numbers (11-20) that can hit. Evil eye takes out 2 of those numbers. Thus, 20% of the hitting numbers don't work anymore. It is only 10% of the overall dice, but 20% of the former winning numbers.

I completely agree that charon's little helper chose a poor way to phrase it.

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lemeres wrote:
I completely agree that charon's little helper chose a poor way to phrase it.

I'll agree with that. I'm good with #s, but I'm bad at explaining them.


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Charon's Little Helper wrote:
lemeres wrote:
I completely agree that charon's little helper chose a poor way to phrase it.
I'll agree with that. I'm good with #s, but I'm bad at explaining them.

Raises glass.


the op is right that it is a weak effect. Its better than a cantrip though and always sticks.

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The OP is right that it is a weak effect.

And the reason is action economy. Yes, EE always does something. But you're a full caster with other at-will hexes, so you'll always have something better to do with your standard actions. It's the same as why wizards shouldn't cast Acid Splash each turn even though they can.

Don't use EE in turn one, and the hex you actually wanted to land in turn two. It's better to use that hex in turn one, and if it fails, use it again in turn two via Accursed Hex. Or even better, use an area effect spell in turn one; if your spells aren't better than hexes (other than slumber), find some better spells.


Evil eye is also useful among many opponents... Even without cackle.

The effects stack and last long enough as is.

If I know a cleric has cause fear I can hit the saves first....

Evil eye is taken at low levels. Can you build a 10th+ level witch without EE? Of course you can but it will be obvious it was built at level, not organically.


Kurald Galain wrote:

The OP is right that it is a weak effect.

And the reason is action economy. Yes, EE always does something. But you're a full caster with other at-will hexes, so you'll always have something better to do with your standard actions. It's the same as why wizards shouldn't cast Acid Splash each turn even though they can.

Don't use EE in turn one, and the hex you actually wanted to land in turn two. It's better to use that hex in turn one, and if it fails, use it again in turn two via Accursed Hex. Or even better, use an area effect spell in turn one; if your spells aren't better than hexes (other than slumber), find some better spells.

Yeah, the action economy is the part that I think gets missed. Of course you would rather have the opponent Evil Eye'd than not, but it doesn't really seem to be worth a standard action.

I've tooled around with the witch a little bit and having evil eye always kept me busy but when I walked back through what had happened it didn't feel like it ever had much effect on the outcome. I feel like it's better to rock out with your killer hex + Accursed Hex, as you say. If you're worried about running out of targets... Bruising Intellect only costs a trait and lets you standard action demoralize folks pretty well as a witch.

I do think it's worth keeping Misfortune in your back pocket so you have a non-mind-affecting debuff.


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I've seen the witches have lots of utility spells and fall back to hexing for combat use. I agree it's not the strongest thing, but it's for sure and will last the entire fight, which can be hard to do for intimidate. And it's tons better than cantrips or a crossbow.

Silver Crusade

I've played a Winter Witch in PFS, from level 1, and I have to say that Evil Eye saw A LOT of play time. There was actually a combat, supposed to be a fairly tough one, that my witch made into a cakewalk for the party with a combo of Evil Eye, Misfortune, and Cackle. And that was one highlight, she was a favorite at a lot of tables because 1. she was always contributing, making things easier for the others, and 2. because I was actually playing a cooperative character.

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CWheezy wrote:
the op is right that it is a weak effect. Its better than a cantrip though
Chess Pwn wrote:
And it's tons better than cantrips or a crossbow.

People, people, saying that something is better than a cantrip is not a compliment. It's hilariously wrong to think that the witch list contains only (or even mostly) utility spells. If you've got 8-15 spells per day plus pearls of power, start casting them.


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Kurald Galain wrote:
CWheezy wrote:
the op is right that it is a weak effect. Its better than a cantrip though
Chess Pwn wrote:
And it's tons better than cantrips or a crossbow.
People, people, saying that something is better than a cantrip is not a compliment. It's hilariously wrong to think that the witch list contains only (or even mostly) utility spells. If you've got 8-15 spells per day plus pearls of power, start casting them.

But what if there are mundanes in the party? We have to let them pretend to be useful, and hexes do just that while still letting us contribute.

Shadow Lodge

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Kurald Galain wrote:
If you've got 8-15 spells per day plus pearls of power, start casting them.

Only on opponents that matter. For pathetic fools not worth my time, I package them up for the mere mortals (read: martials) to dispatch.


I remember a scenario with 3 witches as enemies. I had one player stupidly rush way ahead smoke a bad guy. Gte hit with 2 evil eyes and a hold person. Then I had a grunt walk up with x4 weapon looking for the softest spot on the pc.

He ended up living, but evil is a stacking debuff.


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8 spells. half utility. that's 4 combat spells. 1 spell per fight. fight lasts 3-4 rounds. evil eye is a good AC debuff.

15 spells. half utility. that's 8 combat spells. 2 spells per fight. fight lasts 3-4 rounds. evil eye is a good AC debuff.


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In actual gameplay misfortune makes a Abig difference, especially in boss fights. People complain about the sleeo hex, but it's not that difficult to deal with. -4 to your AC and saves are not small things. Even a -2 isn't small.


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Why should I be wasting my spells in combat, just to make the martials look inferior? I need those spells for use out of combat, to make the skill-monkeys look inferior!

Scarab Sages

I'm a fan of Evil Eye because of its auto-success. It's good fallback when you don't want to cast a spell or to help set other things up. Once you hit 8th level, a -4 is a fairly significant penalty.

It's also often misplayed in combination with Cackle. If the target makes its save, then Evil Eye lasts for 1 round. That means that it ends just before your next turn in combat. Which means if you cackle on your next turn, it's too late. Evil Eye has already ended, so you can't extend it. You need to cackle on the same round that you Evil Eye (assuming they make their save) in order to extend it indefinitely. The same goes for Misfortune, Fortune, etc. Combine that with the 30 foot range on most of the hexes, and it's a lot less automatic of a round 1 action. If you have to move up to get into range, then you don't have an action to cackle (or you have to activate a Cackling Hag's Blouse to cackle as a swift).

Cackle also only has a 30 foot range, so an effective counter to it is for the enemy to move away from the Witch. Especially if it's an enemy caster that doesn't care about making a full attack. That forces the Witch to use a move action to keep them in range. Combined with a cackle, that means the Witch is spending their entire round to maintain their debuff instead of inflicting a new one (again, excepting items that allow a limited number of swift action cackles per day).

Misplaying cackle is one of the things that leads to the Witch sometimes feeling overpowered. Playing it correctly brings the class back down to earth, and it necessitates a lot more strategic thought. Of course if they fail their save against Evil Eye, you don't really need to cackle at all, because they'll probably be dead before the duration runs out.


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Wall of text & Maths incoming. I've made the important parts bold for anyone who wants to just skip to the important parts.
If I have made any mistakes feel free to correct me, but anyone correcting/disagreeing with me better have read the entire thing or I'll just link them back to this post.

Charon's Little Helper wrote:
It also goes up over 10% if roll more than 1 die the next turn on attack rolls and/or saves.

I wrote a huge reply to this the other day and my computer crashed just before i posted it... so here's round 2.

The "10% combat effective" crowd are saying that there's a 10% chance that your Evil eye will have any effect on combat. They are correct, but not completely correct.

There's a 10% chance Per roll affected you'll have a meaningful effect on combat.

LEVEL 1 WITCH
What that means is that a level 1 witch who targets an enemy's AC for her 3 martial buddies isn't "10% effective for the round", she's "27.1% effective for the round".

The equation looks like this:
combat effectiveness = 1 - (0.9^x) where "x" is the number of rolls affected by the hex. (0.9^x means 0.9 to the power of x)

So if 3 allies are attacking an enemy, that's:
1 - (0.9^3)
= 1 - (0.9 X 0.9 X 0.9)
= 1 - 0.729
= 0.271
(or 27.1% effective)

Level 1 Witch is 27.1% effective even if the enemy passes their save.

Now that doesn't look good, but that's the number if the enemy MADE their save. Compare that to a slumber hex where the enemy made their save (0% efficiency) and it looks a lot better.

If the enemy fails their save, even a 14 INT witch (the lowest INT I can imagine) will have 5 rounds of Evil Eye. This means that "x" in the equation becomes 15 (3 attacks per round for 5 round is 15 attacks).

1 - (0.9^15)
= 1 - 0.20589...
(let's leave it to 5 decimal places)
= 0.79411 (or 79.411% effective)

Level 1 Witch is 79.411% effective if their enemy fails their save.

Now let's unpack what that means.
That's a 79% chance that somewhere in the next 5 rounds the witch's Evil eye hex will affect AT LEAST ONE ROLL made by your allies (turn a miss into a hit). That means there's still a 20% chance you've wasted your action, but that 79% includes the chance that you turned 2 misses into hits, or 3, or anywhere up to 15 (and it also affects critical confirmation rolls).

Those were the stats for a level 1 witch with 14 INT.

LEVEL 8 WITCH
This is where it gets good. Let's assume at least a 16 in INT (our 14 INT witch would at least have a headband by now if nothing else)

First off, our equation changes to 1 - (0.8^x) (because you're now giving a -4 instead of a -2)
Second, even 3/4 BAB characters should have a 2nd iterative attack by this level.

Let's assume your allies get 5 attacks per round between them (not hard to do at this level)

If the enemy PASSES THEIR SAVE the equation is:
1 - (0.8^5)
= 1 - 0.32765
= 0.67323
(that's 67.232% effective)

Level 8 Witch is 67.232% effective even if the enemy passes their save.

That's looking pretty good considered your enemy passed their save (and with 16 INT you better get used to them passing their saves).

What about on a failed save? We now have 16 INT (that's 6 rounds of effect) and 5 attacks per round, that means our "x" becomes a 30 (5 attacks per round for 6 rounds)

If the enemy FAILS THEIR SAVE the equation is:
1 - (0.8^30)
= 1 - 0.00124 (to the nearest 5 decimal places)
= 0.99876
(or 99.876% effective)

Level 8 Witch is over 99% effective if the enemy fails their save.

Now to be completely honest, if you haven't dropped your enemy the 29th attack, you're probably in a lot more trouble than any hex can help you with, but the point here is that the hex is more effective than even it's advocates have been saying.

Also once again, this is the % chance that AT LEAST ONE ROLL is affected by your hex, not that every roll is affected (although that last equation still had over a 99% chance that at least 2 rolls were affected).

Evil Eye is also fairly versatile, allowing you to target AC, ability checks, attack rolls, saving throws, or skill checks.
Your witch should have high INT, role-play that INT and choose your targets appropriately for your party.

Evil eye's effects are possibly the weakest of any debuff hex, but it still works if your enemy saves, and has no restrictions on who you can use it on or how often you can use it (aside from action economy).

Is evil eye the best hex? I don't think anyone would argue that.
Is it useless? I find that hard to believe.

P.S. This entire post assumes a single standard action Evil Eye hex, no stacking with Misfortune etc, no cackle, no other buffs/debuffs included.

P.P.S. I forgot to include the reason for the equation being what it is, so here it is:
The chance of your hex not affecting anything in combat is 0.9 per roll. This is multiplicative (eg, 2 rolls = 0.9 X 0.9). Therefore the chance of affecting SOMETHING is the opposite of that. If there's a 0.81 chance that you'll have NO effect on the combat, it stands to reason that the remaining 0.19 is the chance that you'll have SOME effect on the combat.
Therefore the equation is: 1 - (0.9^x) from levels 1 to 7, and 1 - (0.8^x) (where "x" is the number of rolls affected by the hex)

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Ferious Thune wrote:


It's also often misplayed in combination with Cackle. If the target makes its save, then Evil Eye lasts for 1 round. That means that it ends just before your next turn in combat. Which means if you cackle on your next turn, it's too late. Evil Eye has already ended, so you can't extend it. You need to cackle on the same round that you Evil Eye (assuming they make their save) in order to extend it indefinitely. The same goes for Misfortune, Fortune, etc.

That's actually the big reason to grab the Soothsayer hex. Have them delayed until their turn and it'll still be active when you cackle the next turn.

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MrCharisma wrote:

Is evil eye the best hex? I don't think anyone would argue that.

Is it useless? I find that hard to believe.

Right. But your math misses the point: you shouldn't look at EE in a vacuum, but compare it to what else you could be doing with your standard action. So it's not useless in the sense that "it does nothing" (which is trivially false), but useless in the sense that "you have something better to do, pretty much ALWAYS".

Many or most novice witch players have the default strategy to either (1) use evil eye and cackle every single turn no matter what, or (2) use evil eye to "set up" for the effect they actually want in turn 2 (or worse, use evil eye to set up misfortune, then both to set up the effect they want on turn 3). Both of these are common traps: they look like good tactics but analysis reveals they're really not.

And that's why we get threads like these every couple weeks, every time a novice witch player comes to that realization on how to improve his game, and wants to share it. This is the forum for advice, after all.


Kurald Galain wrote:
MrCharisma wrote:

Is evil eye the best hex? I don't think anyone would argue that.

Is it useless? I find that hard to believe.

Right. But your math misses the point: you shouldn't look at EE in a vacuum, but compare it to what else you could be doing with your standard action. So it's not useless in the sense that "it does nothing" (which is trivially false), but useless in the sense that "you have something better to do, pretty much ALWAYS".

Many or most novice witch players have the default strategy to either (1) use evil eye and cackle every single turn no matter what, or (2) use evil eye to "set up" for the effect they actually want in turn 2 (or worse, use evil eye to set up misfortune, then both to set up the effect they want on turn 3). Both of these are common traps: they look like good tactics but analysis reveals they're really not.

It seems you're the one that's looking at Evil Eye in a vacuum. What makes it a good hex in my mind is the fact that it's a very versatile force multiplier that is certain to work regardless of what the enemies saves are like. If you're just considering the witch, yeah, it kind of is a "wasted" action when you could use a spell instead. However, you don't always need to use your spells to solve a situation, especially if you know you have to conserve them for something important later on. In cases like those, hexes like Evil Eye are a perfect way to contribute in a positive manner everyone can take advantage of.

For example, one of my Kingmaker groups consists of a Court Bard, a Fiendish Vessel Cleric, a Mesmerist, and a Witch. Highest strength score among them is 10, and most don't have access to a good ranged weapon (mostly by their choice). However, between the Court Bard and the Witch, they can generally ensure that the party is relatively safe from, as they put it, "those silly people who think swords are a good idea." Even at their current level of 7, they basically can hand out an essentially irresistible -4 to hit and -2 to damage. This gives the Mesmerist and Cleric time to do their thing (as the destruction domain and painful strike make them the highest damage dealers in the party.) If the opponents seem like they'll be hard to hit (this being very relative thanks to the comparatively low to hit they have), the witch can just hit them with the AC debuff instead.

However, where it really shines is the save debuff. Between the witch and the mesmerist hitting saves with yet another virtually irresistible -4 and the wide variety of fight-ending spells/abilities available to most of the characters, this pretty much ensures that the next effect they hit something with is going down.

The only problem with this is that this is not yet high-level play yet, so I still don't have a ton of evil eye experience at high levels, though this is more due to the fact that the last campaign I had a high-level witch in was Carrion Crown, AKA "Mind-affecting is useless the campaign!"

In short, Evil Eye isn't just about your witch alone. It's about everyone on your team.

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mourge40k wrote:
It seems you're the one that's looking at Evil Eye in a vacuum.

That's very funny considering the rest of your post consists of only pointing out that EE does something instead of wondering if other hexes or spells might do more.

Quote:
What makes it a good hex in my mind

Right. But what makes it a poor hex in gameplay is that in most situations, a witch is more effective doing something else. Don't look at EE in a vacuum, but compare it to other hexes and spells. At least MrCharisma made the effort of doing math on it.


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What some of the detractors seem to be missing is this is an ability you get at level 2.

No, it doesn't hold up great at mid-high levels...but it's not supposed to. And it's a great fall back for when you want to do something, but you don't want to waste a resource. Yes, yes, we're level 10 fighting a bunch of Gobin Fighter 4's, but I don't want to just say "I delay".

At levels 2-6 or so, however, it's a solid option. You have relatively few spells per day at that point and you're probably using some on buffs and some on utility, leaving the big save or suck spells for the big, tough fights. Being able to Evil Eye, or Misfortune, or Peacebond everyone else is quite nice.

Sure, you could just Intimidate someone instead...but spending ranks equal to your level and having to invest in Charisma is a bigger hit than taking one of your crappy low level fiddly Talent abilities as Evil Eye, and more effective in at least one sense: A LOT of things are resistant to or immune to Fear (an easy one is things larger than you, eating a -4 for every category they have over you hurts).


Kurald Galain wrote:
mourge40k wrote:
It seems you're the one that's looking at Evil Eye in a vacuum.

That's very funny considering the rest of your post consists of only pointing out that EE does something instead of wondering if other hexes or spells might do more.

Quote:
What makes it a good hex in my mind
Right. But what makes it a poor hex in gameplay is that in most situations, a witch is more effective doing something else. Don't look at EE in a vacuum, but compare it to other hexes and spells. At least MrCharisma made the effort of doing math on it.

Pick a level. Say how many fights in a day, and how many rounds a fight lasts.

ex: lv5, 3 fights a day, 4 rounds per fight.
You do this and I'll compare evil eye to other options. I'd be willing to do 3 comparisons if you'd like.

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Sundakan wrote:
What some of the detractors seem to be missing is this is an ability you get at level 2.

What most of the proponents seem to be missing is that you also get other abilities at level 2. Notably, spells (which are supposed to be better than hexes because they're limited in use), and other hexes.

Quote:
And it's a great fall back for when you want to do something, but you don't want to waste a resource. Yes, yes, we're level 10 fighting a bunch of Gobin Fighter 4's, but I don't want to just say "I delay".

See, that goes for every single hex; that's not an argument for ee.

I understand that witches may want to avoid Slumber on account of cheesiness, but even aside from that, hexes like Fortune, Misfortune, Healing, Peacebond, and Fly are all better choices at level two than ee, and better actions if you don't want to spend a spell slot.

EE at level two? Not such a good choice.


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There's also the matter that most of those are "one and dones".

You use Fortune, you can't use it on that guy again all day. Worth it for a minor combat? Probably not. Healing gets a pass because of that one spell, otherwise same deal.

Misfortune I'll grant you, though if they pass you're done.

Flight is pretty garbage at levels 2 and 4, so you probably aren't taking it until 6 when you can actually Fly.

Peacebond only works on archers or if for some reason your enemies haven't drawn yet.

Evil Eye is reusable and RELIABLE. It's not reliably stellar, but it will always, always, always work like it's supposed to. You use it, they eat a -2. Done. 3+Int mod rounds isn't too shabby if they fail either (compare Intimidate's one round).

I'm not seeing any argument for it being worthless. It's not great, the argument could be made that it's not even GOOD, but it's worth taking at low levels even if you only plan to retrain it later.


Kurald Galain wrote:

I understand that witches may want to avoid Slumber on account of cheesiness, but even aside from that, hexes like Fortune, Misfortune, Healing, Peacebond, and Fly are all better choices at level two than ee, and better actions if you don't want to spend a spell slot.

EE at level two? Not such a good choice.

... In what universe is the Healing hex ever a good option? I mean, it's pretty much a 1/day per creature cure light wounds at that point that eventually becomes cure moderate wounds. It's useful for maybe the first couple of levels, but is quickly replaced by wands. Now there's a hex that makes me feel like I'm wasting my time and my options. Flight is also just a permanent feather fall and bonus to swim checks at second level, which is... underwhelming. I'd rather take it at later levels, when it actually becomes useful. Fortune is a nice "save my bacon!" effect, but it's once per round limits its usefullness to pretty much just being for saves. Misfortune is a solid choice, I admit. But I'd still rather give them the Evil Eye debuff first, and then hit them with Misfortune. That leaves Peacebond, which requires that you go first, period.

Yeah. You know, it almost looks like that except for Misfortune, Evil Eye is the most versatile and powerful option out of the hexes you listed for second level. Imagine that.


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To quickly address the folks who say it's better the misfortune twice with accursed hex.

In general forcing two rolls gives you an average decrease on the roll of about 4.8. So that is 2 actions with a slightly better chance of success than an evil eye for -4 then a misfortune (after level 8).

To really decide which is better you have to consider the opportunity cost. If you hit with the first misfortune that's awesome you miss you get nothing for a round. Then you attack with misfortune again all or nothing.

In the evil eye first situation -4 to all saves 100% of the time. This helps every other caster in your group land a save or suck of their own. That's a -4*number of save or suck spells. Next turn, misfortune or if the other caster did things that also lowered their saves tactically switch from misfortune to slumber or your favourite save or suck.

I don't recommend evil before level 8. But after that is is only slightly statistically worse than 2 misfortunes but their are enough positives I think that balance it out. I think both options are valid and should be used by a smart witch. If you are trying the 2 misforunes against a cleric you are praying for 1s. That is the only way this will work. If it is a animal of some sort misfortune first they will likely fail on the first.


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Even if you go first, Peacebond requires you to catch your enemy ENTIRELY by surprise. As in, they're asleep or something because enemies that are on guard will have weapons drawn already.


Ferious Thune wrote:

I'm a fan of Evil Eye because of its auto-success. It's good fallback when you don't want to cast a spell or to help set other things up. Once you hit 8th level, a -4 is a fairly significant penalty.

It's also often misplayed in combination with Cackle. If the target makes its save, then Evil Eye lasts for 1 round. That means that it ends just before your next turn in combat. Which means if you cackle on your next turn, it's too late. Evil Eye has already ended, so you can't extend it. You need to cackle on the same round that you Evil Eye (assuming they make their save) in order to extend it indefinitely. The same goes for Misfortune, Fortune, etc. Combine that with the 30 foot range on most of the hexes, and it's a lot less automatic of a round 1 action. If you have to move up to get into range, then you don't have an action to cackle (or you have to activate a Cackling Hag's Blouse to cackle as a swift).

Cackle also only has a 30 foot range, so an effective counter to it is for the enemy to move away from the Witch. Especially if it's an enemy caster that doesn't care about making a full attack. That forces the Witch to use a move action to keep them in range. Combined with a cackle, that means the Witch is spending their entire round to maintain their debuff instead of inflicting a new one (again, excepting items that allow a limited number of swift action cackles per day).

Misplaying cackle is one of the things that leads to the Witch sometimes feeling overpowered. Playing it correctly brings the class back down to earth, and it necessitates a lot more strategic thought. Of course if they fail their save against Evil Eye, you don't really need to cackle at all, because they'll probably be dead before the duration runs out.

If you are fighting inside a fight is likely to already be withing 30 feet. If you are fighting outside then even one round is good because when polls come up here asking about average, non-boss fights, the fight time is around 3 rounds. Even if evil eye one expires you still have 2 more to hit them with before the round is over.

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Malkin the Magician wrote:
In general forcing two rolls gives you an average decrease on the roll of about 4.8. So that is 2 actions with a slightly better chance of success than an evil eye for -4 then a misfortune (after level 8).

I will say - while that's a decent ballpark - that varies a lot.

If they would normally succeed 90% of the time (roll of 3+) a reroll would only lower it to 81% (though also reduce crit chance on attack rolls).

Against the same foe a -4 would lower the success rate to 70%, being more than twice as valuable. Even the -2 EE would be superior in that case.

However, if they would normally succeed only 25% of the time (roll of 16+) then the reroll would lower it to 6.25%. In this case the -4 EE would still be marginally better as it would lower the success rate to 5%.

So - if they would normally succeed somewhere between a roll of 7+ or 15+ then misfortune is slightly better, but on the more extreme pass/fail % (before the debuff) a -4 EE is actually the superior option.

Note: That isn't even counting the 100% success rate or the longer duration on a failed save for EE. Misfortune though affects both attack rolls and saving throws, while EE affects only a single thing.


Kurald Galain wrote:
MrCharisma wrote:

Is evil eye the best hex? I don't think anyone would argue that.

Is it useless? I find that hard to believe.

Right. But your math misses the point: you shouldn't look at EE in a vacuum, but compare it to what else you could be doing with your standard action. So it's not useless in the sense that "it does nothing" (which is trivially false), but useless in the sense that "you have something better to do, pretty much ALWAYS".

Many or most novice witch players have the default strategy to either (1) use evil eye and cackle every single turn no matter what, or (2) use evil eye to "set up" for the effect they actually want in turn 2 (or worse, use evil eye to set up misfortune, then both to set up the effect they want on turn 3). Both of these are common traps: they look like good tactics but analysis reveals they're really not.

And that's why we get threads like these every couple weeks, every time a novice witch player comes to that realization on how to improve his game, and wants to share it. This is the forum for advice, after all.

There is a gap between novice(no real combo tactics) and a high level player. Even those who are novices can put together simple combos.


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Kurald Galain wrote:
mourge40k wrote:
It seems you're the one that's looking at Evil Eye in a vacuum.

That's very funny considering the rest of your post consists of only pointing out that EE does something instead of wondering if other hexes or spells might do more.

Quote:
What makes it a good hex in my mind
Right. But what makes it a poor hex in gameplay is that in most situations, a witch is more effective doing something else. Don't look at EE in a vacuum, but compare it to other hexes and spells. At least MrCharisma made the effort of doing math on it.

The witch having something else they could do, does not make EE poor.

That is like saying the barbarian could have hit for 900 points of damage so this 450 points of damage is garbage.

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