|
Alright, i'm playing a dual cursed oracle, and i'm taking the misfortune mystery at level five. it reads..
Misfortune (Ex): At 1st level, as an immediate action, you can force a creature within 30 feet to reroll any one d20 roll that it has just made before the results of the roll are revealed. The creature must take the result of the reroll, even if it’s worse than the original roll. Once a creature has suffered from your misfortune, it cannot be the target of this revelation again for 1 day.
now, the obvious intention is for this to be used offensively, though it can be used defensively as well, say used on your own party when they roll poorly. However, it stipulates you have to decide before the results are revealed. You don't normally watch the DM roll his dice, so how can you even USE this ability? Same with your friends. If they roll a '1', you know the results. If the GM says "critical threat" or "ac 25" and you know your fighter has AC 24, than you know the results. It appears great, but at closer inspection, it appears almost unusable.
this brings me to the second ability they get, which is..
Fortune (Ex): At 5th level, as an immediate action, you can reroll any one d20 roll that you have just made before the results of the roll are revealed. You must take the result of the reroll, even if it’s worse than the original roll. You can use this ability once per day at 5th level, and one additional time per day for every six oracle levels beyond 5th.
this is usable only on yourself, but you cannot use it if you know the Enemy's AC, the DC of their spells/abilities, or if you roll a '1', am i correct? if you happen to run your own game, and you know the DC of a troglodyte's stench aura, is the re-roll not allowed? It again, seems significantly worse than advertised, simply because of the "before the results of the roll are revealed" stipulation. Am i off base here? does anyone have a proposed fix? I'm at a bit of a loss.
In my campaigns, I allow the use of both misfortune and fortune even if you know the results of the roll. It's not really unbalancing, since the abilities are still primarily used on opposing critical threats, opposing high rolls on saving throws, and party's failed saves.
Anyway, back to the way they're actually written: The "before the results of the roll are revealed" simply means you have to decide based solely on the D20 roll, without modifiers (it doesn't matter if you know what the modifiers will be, the enemy's AC, etc.). In a group with a dual-cursed oracle, the DM should reveal his D20 rolls.
Im pretty sure they are supposed to be based on the Witches Hexes Fortune and misfortune, which makes you take the better and worse rolls.
So fortune for a witch You roll twice get a 15 and and 8 as the 2nd roll you take the better roll. The inverse for misfortune, roll twice and take the worse. Because as those are written they don't make any sense at all.
What? They make perfect sense. They just require you to have all die rolls be public knowledge... which is not unreasonable.
would it be unreasonable for the DM to just call out what AC he hit, or what save he made, instead of the actual die roll?
That would be revealing the results of the roll, which is specifically what those abilities say not to do.
If it's really unfeasible to have the actual d20 in sight, the player could also set a threshold, and say "If you roll a 19 or 20, I may want to use my ability" and just have the DM note when one comes up.
The knowledge in question here is the final knowledge of how things play out, not knowledge of whether a certain number is high enough. For instance, if I know I need at least a 15 to hit (because a 15 hit previously), and I roll a 2, I can use the reroll even though I know that my 2 is a miss. Likewise if I roll a 1.
That Misfortune one is close to being overpowered, IMO, because of the theoretically unlimited rerolls per day and the ability to use it to both help your allies and hinder your enemies.
You just need to train your fellow players to wait a moment after the DM announces the result of his attack roll so that you can request a reroll before the player tells the DM that he hit or missed. The revealing of the result is the player's statement confirming the hit or miss, not your figuring out that the DM hit or missed by combining his announcement of the die result combined with your prior knowledge of your ally's AC.
The revealing of the result is the player's statement confirming the hit or miss
Why do you think so?
Players can metagame the results either way, but I think the intent was only for the die result to be revealed, not the rest.
If he tells you what his total attack roll was, you already know the result. If you just see the die roll, you have to manually cheese it by applying what you've calculated his attack bonuses to be to figure out if he is going to hit.
I'm not sure I understand this. My understanding is that if you roll an 18 on a fortitude save you don't know the results until the dm says you passed or not.
Say you have a +7 to fort saves, you get a total roll of 25. Most of the time you can gather whether it will be a success before he announces things.
If you roll a 2 or something, there is a good chance a reroll might be in your best interests.
If your dm rolls npc attacks and saves behind a screen (I'd say most of them don't) you might well have no idea whether you should make a reroll.
I've been kind of wondering whether it wasn't overpowered myself. I kind of interpret as meaning you can give yourself and any other person you happen to meet a reroll once a day. I could be happy with it never using it on an opponent.
You've described things perfectly.
And what people worried about it being OP are forgetting is the cost associated with this Revelation; it requires you to take a second Curse which never improves. Thats huge. In a vacuum, I'd agree with the sentiment that this Revelation MAY be OP... but in play? Dual Cursed hurts bad.
|
|
agreed. i've dropped ten feet from my movement speed to take this. i took haunted and lame. two of the non-crappy ones that actually impact the character. so it's not OP at all. thanks guys, i agree, my GM is just gonna be relaxed about it and say "i hit AC 25" and i'll decide if it's a reroll or not. if he says "thread to crit" i can ask for a re-roll. no problem, no need to split hairs and make a big deal out of it.
I play a Dual-cursed Oracle. When I use it to allow my allies reroll (which I do. All the time), I wait until it's clear that said ally is obviously distressed with their result and ask them, "[Player Name], do you want your daily reroll?" Then they tell me yes or no, and the game goes on.
I think that Mistfortune is fine in this manner. It's very fun, and to be completely honest it makes my character feel useful; especially since I designed his entire build to be based around luck and rerolls (well, that and healing with the Mystery of Life). If I was a normal Mystery of Life oracle without that little piece of awesome tactical advantage, I'm positive that my players would feel that I didn't contribute enough to the party, but considering that I alleviate their bad luck once per game day (and believe me, I keep a very detailed list of who I use my Mistfortune revelation on), they tolerate my presence :).
As for the flavor, I usually flavor it that my revelation isn't aiding my allies as much as it is again hindering my enemies. Something like "a lucky slip on so and so's part surprises the foe, causing it to lower its guard." or whatever. Its like the old saying; someone's fortune is another's misfortune.
Finally, you're limited to one reroll a turn, even between both abilities. After all, you can only take an immediate action once per round :-P. It's a fun, awesome perk for taking on a second curse that never gets any better and I don't think it's unbalancing at all. I've played far more unbalancing characters than a free reroll.
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
|
Sometimes it's obvious what the result of the roll is and that can't be helped. Sometimes it's not obvious, it's on those rolls where it becomes relevant. The GM asks you to make a will save, you roll an 11 and announce your total modified score, 15, The GM tells you you've failed... now you cannot re-roll. Similarly when the GM is rolling you often don't know what the modifiers are on his rolls.
It's a solid ability but not something people are going to be clamoring for.
The other possible interpretation is that "before the results" can refer to before you know what the repercussions are. "You failed your save. Before I tell you what the spell does to you, do you want to Errol?"