Here are two new spells I've been tinkering with as alternate options to compete with Scorching Ray and/or Acid Arrow at Sorc/Wiz 2. Please let me know what you think. My goals were to make these spells power balanced, while also giving them some nuance and flavor of their own. Note that I labeled them as "Sorc/Wiz 2" but would have no problem offering them to other arcane spell-casting classes not in the main rulebook, as appropriate.
First up:
"Snow Ball
School Conjuration (creation) [cold]; Level Sorc/Wiz 2
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S, M (pinch of salt, or handful of snow), F (a sling stone)
Range close (25ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Effect one ball of snow
Duration instantaneous
Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance no
Description: A ball of snow appears in your hand and you hurl it through the air at its target. You must succeed on a ranged touch attack to hit your target. The ball deals 1d4 points of cold damage for every 5 feet of distance it travels between you and the target, with no splash damage."
Some of my thoughts going into this spell:
It would be nice if conjurers had something other than Acid Arrow. Acid Arrow's main claim to fame is its long range and somewhat low damage (at least initially). But Acid Arrow has that annoying DOT component, which is really cool because it's evocative of the acid slowly continuing to eat away at the target. I looked at the two damage types that are not represented at level 2, and decided that some kind of cold-based, short ranged attack would be good, since lightning damage sounds a lot more like evocation anyway. That established, I thought of different things one could do with cold damage at spell level 2, and played around with chilling cone attacks, all of which seemed like watered down Cone of Cold, so I gave up on that and then started to think bout the good old "chuck a snowball at the guy" idea. Since Acid Arrow has that great DOT component which really makes it feel like an acid spell, I thought it would be cool of the damage this snowball spell could have it's damage accumulate (i.e. "snow ball") somehow. At first I thought of making it a thing where you cast it and wait, concentrating on it all the while, and the longer you wait, the more damage it does. I decided that was too hard to implement and really not attractive during a fight, so then I tried to make it do damage based on how far it flies, which I think works well. You have to position yourself perfectly to get full damage out of it, which makes it tricky, but potentially better than Scorching Ray, but then it does cold damage, which is, I feel, more commonly resisted by monsters. I really agonized over whether it should be 1d4 per 5ft or 1d6, or changing the distance metric somehow. This is one big place where I'd welcome opinions, specifically, would the funkyness of the distance rule cause you not to take this spell, and if so, would making it 1d6/5ft make it TOO good, and if so, is there a middle ground to be found?
Spell number 2:
"Shocking Arc
School Evocation [electricity]; Level Sorc/Wiz 2
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S
Range close (25ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Effect one or more rays
Duration instantaneous
Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance yes
Description:You emit a blue-white arc of lightning that jumps from your hand to the target, dealing 2d12 points of electricity damage. This ray is a ranged touch attack and has a critical hit threat range of 18-20. If a critical hit is scored, the damage is not doubled, but you get to roll again and shoot a second ray if a suitable target is in range. If that shot scores a critical hit, you may roll another shot, etc, until you fail to score a critical hit. The maximum number of total ranged attack rolls you can get per casting of this spell is limited to two arcs at caster levels 3-5, three arcs at levels 6-9, four at levels 10-13, and five at levels 14+."
Thoughts:
Just as a point of clarity, the spell only ever gives you one ray up front. After that, any additional rays you might get have to come from crits, and even then there's a limit on how many of those you can get. There are feats one can take to increase the critical threat range of this spell, as well as giving one a bonus to confirm crits, so if you leverage it enough, it can get a lot better. I had thought about making some sort of limitation on how many times you can hit the first target, or maybe forcing you to have to hit different targets, but since many fights are "party versus solo badguy" I decided against those ideas. My goal was to make a spell that can sporadically get you more damage than Scorching Ray at the same caster levels, but often doesn't, thus causing it to be about the same on average, better if you take the feats to improve it. And again, I think electricity damage is maybe a little lower quality than fire or acid, but not by much.
I welcome any constructive suggestions.
I don't think Shocking Arc would be unbalanced if you could choose, each time you roll a critical threat, to EITHER roll to confirm the crit and do crit damage OR arc to an additional target.
|
The only suggestion I have is to also limit the damage on the snow ball to a certain number based on caster level. IE at third it does a max of 3d4 maxes out at 10d4 or something similar. Other wise its damage out-scales most other spells depending on range. I like the idea of it accelerating constantly to do more damage or getting bigger as it flies since it does cold damage, maybe adding that to the description would help as well?
The only suggestion I have is to also limit the damage on the snow ball to a certain number based on caster level. IE at third it does a max of 3d4 maxes out at 10d4 or something similar. Other wise its damage out-scales most other spells depending on range. I like the idea of it accelerating constantly to do more damage or getting bigger as it flies since it does cold damage, maybe adding that to the description would help as well?
The maximum range of the spell is 25ft + 5ft/2 levels, thus limiting the damage as well, since the damage increases depending on the actual distance that the snow ball flies. It's true that in this way, your damage as a level 20 caster would be 15d4, but only if the snow ball actually traveled all 75 ft of the maximum distance, which I feel would be hard to accomplish in close quarters. Plus you still only get one target ever, unlike Scorching Ray, and here the damage is cold, not fire, which is also a bit of a downgrade. As a level 3 caster, you'd get a maximum of 6d4 with it, if you could position yourself optimally, which is an average of 15 cold damage, compared to Scorching Ray's 14 fire. At level 8, the Scorching Ray get's two rays, which gives you two chances to hit, and when they both hit you get 8d6 with the rays for an average of 28 damage (in two shots, so they get resisted individually), and with the snow ball, you'd max out at 45ft range, giving 9d4 which averages out to 22.5 damage to a single target in a single shot, if you hit with that shot. So it's less damage even when maxxed, and only one chance to hit, and cold damage, but it only get's resistance applied to it once. At level 16, the Scorching ray caster get's 3 rays, average of 42 damage over three separate hits, the snow ball does a maximum of 13d4 for an average of 32.5 cold damage in one shot, but only when you hit the target from exactly 65 feet away (that's 13 linear squares). Considering that a lot of cold/fire damage is resisted at those levels to the tune of 10 points per ray, the scorching ray that hits all three times might only get 12 damage across in reality after resistances are applied to each ray, whereas the snow ball get's 22.5 of it's 32.5 after resistances. I need to play test it to see how much of a constraint the range-dependence is on the snow ball's damage at high levels.
I don't think Shocking Arc would be unbalanced if you could choose, each time you roll a critical threat, to EITHER roll to confirm the crit and do crit damage OR arc to an additional target.
Having just reread the Feats section, a wizard or sorcerer would have to be level 16 to take Improved Critical and level 18 to take Critical Focus (those are the feats that give you doubled threat range and +4 to confirm criticals, respectively). That being the case, I wonder if this type of spell is ever that desirable by then. The Magus could qualify for the necessary feats at levels 11 and 12 respectively, which isn't as bad I guess. One idea I had was that instead of rolling to confirm the critical, your "to confirm" roll get's replaced by the "to hit" roll for the second arc, which only seems fair, since you're not getting critical hit multiplier damage on the crit anyway. Anyway, I think this spell needs improvement to make it more competitive with Scorching Ray overall. I want to stick with the theme of making it about the same on average, but more random and thus sometimes better sometimes worse.
|
I'd change the snowball/iceball (or earthball/rockball, doing bludgeoning damage) to roll along the ground, growing as it rolls. The first person it strikes in the straight line eats the damage, so it's most effective if you have a clear line towards a target at near your maximum range. I'd let it hit automatically anyone in it's path, but allow a Reflex save to negate damage, as the target leaps clear.
Or maybe that would just be a totally different spell. :) I like the idea of it rumbling along the ground, getting larger as it does, and inflicting more damage if it hits a target further away, creating the unusual case where the spellcaster would step backwards and to the side before rolling the attack spell at the target, hoping to both get some distance between them (to increase his damage) and get a clear line of effect, so that an ally or another foe doesn't end up intercepting the bowling ball of doom.
.
Having the shocking arc dependent upon Improved Critical, which as you've noted, a mage may hardly ever qualify for, seems like a waste. Perhaps it's saving throw dependent, and if a target fails, a full strength bolt moves on to the next target, and if the target succeeds, the bolt ends with him.
The only suggestion I have is to also limit the damage on the snow ball to a certain number based on caster level. IE at third it does a max of 3d4 maxes out at 10d4 or something similar. Other wise its damage out-scales most other spells depending on range. I like the idea of it accelerating constantly to do more damage or getting bigger as it flies since it does cold damage, maybe adding that to the description would help as well?The maximum range of the spell is 25ft + 5ft/2 levels, thus limiting the damage as well, since the damage increases depending on the actual distance that the snow ball flies. It's true that in this way, your damage as a level 20 caster would be 15d4, but only if the snow ball actually traveled all 75 ft of the maximum distance, which I feel would be hard to accomplish in close quarters. Plus you still only get one target ever, unlike Scorching Ray, and here the damage is cold, not fire, which is also a bit of a downgrade. As a level 3 caster, you'd get a maximum of 6d4 with it, if you could position yourself optimally, which is an average of 15 cold damage, compared to Scorching Ray's 14 fire. At level 8, the Scorching Ray get's two rays, which gives you two chances to hit, and when they both hit you get 8d6 with the rays for an average of 28 damage (in two shots, so they get resisted individually), and with the snow ball, you'd max out at 45ft range, giving 9d4 which averages out to 22.5 damage to a single target in a single shot, if you hit with that shot. So it's less damage even when maxxed, and only one chance to hit, and cold damage, but it only get's resistance applied to it once. At level 16, the Scorching ray caster get's 3 rays, average of 42 damage over three separate hits, the snow ball does a maximum of 13d4 for an average of 32.5 cold damage in one shot, but only when you hit the target from exactly 65 feet away (that's 13 linear squares). Considering that a lot of cold/fire damage is resisted at those levels to the tune...
Their are metamagic feats that can extend your range for the snow ball spell well beyond the intended short range making the spell do way more damage then you would ever have intended. Using the enlarge feat can extend range to 50 + 5 ft per level or go even higher with the reach feat bumping it all the way to 400 + 40 ft per level. While it is unlikely for characters to get the chance to use this spell often with the range we are talking about it can happen and when it does it will be ludicrously high damage. So the cap on damage would be advisable
Point taken on the Extend Spell feat. As such I feel I would add the text "The snow ball’s damage cannot exceed 20d4 under any circumstances, regardless of range." to the end of the spell's description. As for rolling the snow ball along the ground, that leads to a lot of misery when you consider all of the various types of "bad" terrain it might encounter. I mean, can you roll it over molten lava? What if the terrain is very difficult, does that effect it at all? How high does an obstacle have to be to stop it entirely? I didn't want to get into that sort of stuff, so I decided to make it airborn and be done with it. But yes, the visual of the wizard "bowling" the snowball at the target was really attractive to me at first as well.
As for Shocking Arc, although it seems far less "flavoriffic", I'm considering the following total rewrite:
"Shocking Arc
School Evocation [electricity]; Level Sorc/Wiz 2
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S
Range close (25ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Effect one or more rays
Duration instantaneous
Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance yes
You emit a blue-white arc of lightning that jumps from your hand to the target. This arc is a ray which has a critical hit threat range of 18-20/x3. You may emit one arc, plus one additional arc for every four caster levels beyond 3rd (to a maximum of three arcs at 11th level). Each arc requires a ranged touch attack and deals 2d12 points of electricity damage. The arcs may be fired at the same or different targets, but all arcs must be fired at targets within 30ft of each other and fired simultaneously."
While it's really unoriginal, it still kind of does what I wanted, in that it relies on critical hits to be good, and when it get's them it's better than Scorching Ray. After accounting for critical hits, Scorching Ray averages about 14.5 points of fire damage per ray. This spell averages about 15.8 per arc. That said, when you don't get a crit, it's more random, because you're rolling 2 bigger dice instead of 4 smaller ones. The non-crit Scorching Ray averages 14 points per ray. the non-crit Shocking Arc averages 13 points per arc. The older version of Shocking Arc was problematic in that it was very hard to do apples-to-apples comparisons to Scorching Ray with it, due to its almost complete dependence on scoring and confirming criticals with it. I have to admit now that I didn't originally realize the BAB requirements for the Improved Critical and Critical Focus feats were so high.
I like the concept around the "Snow Ball" spell, specifically with the update Set mentioned. I too see it rumbling along the ground, gaining momentum and size. Doesnt have to be that way, of course, and the "how" the snowball gets to the target isnt overly important anyway.
However, being 2nd level, I would definitely cap the damage at 10d4, not 20d4. 20d4 is too much for a spell of that level to devlier in a single round, even on a single target, imo.
If you wish to keep the critical hit spawn aspect of your arc spell why not simply expand the critical hit range per X level of the spell with the caveat that the spells critical hit range can't be expended by feats or can't be expanded beyond a certain range such as the 15-20 max crit range.