Words of Power: Sense Hidden and Ball Lightning


Rules Questions


Hey all,

Hoping someone can help me make sense of these two words...

Sense Hidden seems pretty useless. By default, it allows the caster to see invisible critters only up to 10' away in a cone. So now, facing matters. Since it's a second level word effect, the cone target can be boosted, improving the caster's ability to detect invisible in a 20 cone only! Oh, and boosting the effect to a level 6 word simulates True Seeing, but again, only in a 10' cone.

Whoop. Am I missing something, or is it kinda useless? Now a "personal" target word I can understand, then it would work just like See Invisible. But ... "cone"??

for the other word that has me completely baffled - Ball Lightning. It has a target restriction of "selected", which reduces this spell to either a ray with saving throw and SR, or a melee touch with saving throw and SR. Also, the word's description implies that more than one target can be selected ("...maximum 15d8 to one target + 1/2 that damage to any other targets included in the effect.") But the "selected" target restriction actually restricts this word to a SINGLE target! Sure, you can boost the target word by adding three levels to the wordspell, so now it's an 8th level wordspell that can affect only targets no more than 30' apart. Quite inferior to the actual 8th level electricity effect word Thunder Strike.

So, in summary, I can't figure out these two words. Any other ideas, opinions, or direction to a previous forum discussion would help. (And yes, I did do a lot of searching before posting!)

Nathan


The cone can be boosted up to 40 ft. The range isn't that bad considering the iconic adventure takes place in cramped quarters.
Selected states that with a spell that deals energy damage there is only a touch attack or ranged touch attack (decided when the spell is cast). Also it can be boosted to chain to multiple targets (like chain lightning).


Kierato wrote:

The cone can be boosted up to 40 ft. The range isn't that bad considering the iconic adventure takes place in cramped quarters.

Selected states that with a spell that deals energy damage there is only a touch attack or ranged touch attack (decided when the spell is cast). Also it can be boosted to chain to multiple targets (like chain lightning).

Hey Kierato, thanks for your reply.

Compare the level of boost required for a 4th level cone (level 4) and the actual see invisible spell. Sure a 40' cone 4th level wordspell is fine in cramped quarters, but not fine outdoors. It's a severe limitation. Conversely, the Unseen words work very similarly to the actual invisibility spells. 2nd level word effect, and boosted for a 4th level word effect that doesn't expire upon attack, a la greater invisibility.

I already pointed out how the selected target word works in my original post. Thank you for summing it up. But my original question is still unanswered - what point is there in a word effect description that implies multiple targets, when the selected target word is specific to only one target? A boosted selected increases the entire wordspell by three levels, making it a level 8 wordspell, and then that boosted targeting overrides the effect's descriptions regarding multiple targets.

I believe that Sense Hidden should be limited to target personal, boost to selected for +1 level. That would mean see invisibility at 2nd level wordspell, and a third level wordspell to be able to cast in on someone else.

I also believe that the ball lightning effect word's description should explain how it is supposed to work. It is completely incompatible with it's target word restriction.

It feels like a lot of things with words of power slipped through the playtesting cracks. The more I am playing it, the more I am wishing I had made a standard spellcasting sorcerer, and that feeling sucks.

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