Counterspelling needs fixing but have not seen anything....

[Steven Hume]

Hey am wondering if counterspelling is going to be looked at by PF? 3.5 counterspells is USELESS, i been testing a system found off one of the boards which seems to work great, so far it saved the figher from a MM that would have finished him off and stopped a cleric from bull str the raging barbarian to hack the party up. Its an easy system using opp rolls of spellcraft, any comments are welcome

Counterspelling (same for psionics)
I use a house rule for Counterspelling, i never liked
how 3rd dealt with it. Now i know this rule makes
improved counterspelling and reactive counterspelling
useless but i never see anyone takes these anyways but
thereare new rules for them below.

Counterspelling is a Move action that can be used outside your turn but only if you still have a Move left in round. You must have a move action to use this, and can only use 1 move action to dispel per round(either on your turn or foes turn).

When counterspelling, each side makes a Spellcraft check, if you dont have any ranks in Spellcraft you make a Int Check. If you have spellcraft you can use it to ID what level and school the spell is (DC 15+spell lvl), next you can then release a spell slot to try to decrease the power of the spell. The released spell can be any level you can cast and have prepared. You gain bonus to your check based on these factors:

For each level that your spell is higher than caster +1
For each level that your spell is Lower than caster -1

If using spell of same school +1

If using spell of opposing element(if an elemental spell) +2
If using dispel magic spell +4

All bonuses stack.

Metamagic Note: because Metamagic increases the power of a spell for purposes of counterspelling the spell counts as the increased level when checking the difference in the dispelling spell level Eg. If a max fireball is being dispelled you can use a 3rd to try to dispel but if you use only a 3rd level you would get a –3 because the max fireball is 6th lvl.

Spell-like abilities Note: A wizard can try to dispel a spell-like ability but will not know the level or school before hand and takes –2 to roll.

Divine and Arcane Note: A caster can try to dispel magic that he does not use(wizard dispels divine or cleric dispels arcane) but the opposing rolls is based on religion or spellcraft, which the caster must have at least one rank in to even try and they get a –2 to roll.

You subtract the dispeller's roll from the caster's roll. If you get a negative value, you reduce the caster level by that negative amount. If CL is reduced to 0 spell is totally countered. The spell uses the new CL for all level based values(so a 2nd lvl fireball does 2d6 and uses CL of 2 for range of spell) the caster knows his new CL for this spell.

For example, Wizard A, a 10th level evoker with a +18 Spellcraft, decides to cast Lightning Bolt (Spell DC 18). Wizard B, an 8th level wizard with a +15 Spellcraft, decides to counter it. Both make Spellcraft checks (in this example). Wizard A rolls a grand total of 23 (5 on the die), while wizard B gets a whopping 31. The difference is -8, so Wizard A CL is reduced by 8 making his Lightning bolt a 2d6 bolt.

This rule makes party spell casters more useful against enemy spell casters and does not force them to load up on combat spells to feel useful in a party. I still need to play test this and get some feedback but I think this rule works well. This also gives an edge to sorcerers as they got the extra slots to burn to counter over wizard. If you got any comments good or For each level that your spell is higher than caster bad about this rule please feel free to comment

[die_kluge]

I don't think the game would suffer without counterspelling.

I've seen counterspelling done a total of once, maybe twice since 2000 when 3rd edition came out - and I was the one who did it.

So, it's definitely not a very common rule.

[JoelF847]

die_kluge wrote:

I don't think the game would suffer without counterspelling.

I've seen counterspelling done a total of once, maybe twice since 2000 when 3rd edition came out - and I was the one who did it.

So, it's definitely not a very common rule.

It's true that counterspelling is a little used option, but I think the point of this post is that it should be fixed so that it is worth using and becomes a cool option.

I've only used it once or twice, but I have to admit, that when I did, it was 10 times cooler than simply casting a spell, especially when it was against the main villian of the adventure.

A few options off the top of my head that might make counterspelling more attractive are:

1) make it an immediate action, so that as long as you didn't cast a quickened or swift action spell, you can always have a shot at counterspelling without potentially wasting your turn readying. Yes, there's a feat that does this, but why not just make this the normal way it works? It would definately change how spell duels worked.

2) Provide some bonus when you counterspell. For example, if you succeed in counterspelling, you absorb some of the energy of the spell you counter, and can a) gain a bonus on your caster level for the next spell you cast in the next round, or b) restore a spell slot or prepared spell that you have used of 1 level less than the spell you countered.

[Steven Hume]

die_kluge wrote:

I don't think the game would suffer without counterspelling.

I've seen counterspelling done a total of once, maybe twice since 2000 when 3rd edition came out - and I was the one who did it.

So, it's definitely not a very common rule.

right but since i intro these rules i had counterspelling used twice in 4 games, it should be used more, the classic wizard spellbattle trying to get your spells through as each counters, i really think it should be more like this, and these rules dont add to the power level of casters, but gives them something else to do than just be blasters or healers or whatever.