| 3 people marked this as FAQ candidate. |
1. Is this 9th level ability at will?
2. Can the damage be changed to cold with the Marid's arcana?
1. As written, yes. It's an awesome Improved Eldritch Heritage option for Paladin, Summoner, and Bard.
2. It's untyped damage, so it is not energy damage and thus it can't be changed. On the plus side, that means nothing resists it. Also, it's a Su ability, not a spell.
Wow. Just wow.
The ability should probably be once per day. Most other 9th level sorcerer bloodline power are once per day, or limited rounds per day.
FAQ'd.
It's a area effect wave of liquid adamantine that can blind and be spammed. Coupled with a robe of arcane heritage that the sorcerer in my group has, and it's powerful. Wow, just wow.
Well, to be fair the entire rest of the bloodline is pretty bland or weak, I always saw Water's Fury as making up for the rest of the bloodline. Even with it as RAW, a sorc is better off with Arcane or Fey bloodline, overall.
It's also important to note that you can't use it AND cast spells, and in many cases your spells will likely be more powerful. Direct Damage is the weakest thing a caster can do and this thing gets half the normal amount a damage spell would to boot. It is an AoE, but it's a short line (well, compared to like...Lightning Bolt, at least), so you'll seldom actually get a lot of creatures in it. It's real use to a sorcerer is the blinding which is good, but there are spells right from 2nd level to blind, including Pyrotechnics which also has no SR and hits a MUCH bigger area.
IMO, it's best for as a I said, Paladin, Bard, and Summoner. And other cha-based classes without a powerful ranged offensive option (summoners do have battlefield control up the wazoo, though), as they now have one to use at will. For an actual sorcerer, I'd rather be doing other things most of the time. And compared to other at-will caster class features, is it really any stronger than Ice Tomb or Retribution hexes (available 1 level after this is) or even Slumber, with its limited viable targets but available from 1st level?
But please, don't let me stop the big freak out.
It's the at-will that gets me to wow.
I don't think at will is that wow-worthy by mid levels. Casters usually won't be running out of spells by then anyway, especially not a sorcerer with his 6 + bonus spells per level max.
I guess it must be the tables that I play. Casters are always running out of spells.
I guess it depends. At 9th level, a sorcerer who started with 18 Cha (16 and +2 racial), bumped it up at levels 4 and 8, and wears a headband of Cha +2 has a Cha of 22, and thus:
5 spells of level 4
7 spells of level 3
8 spells of level 2
8 spells of level 1
That's 28 spells, aside from the cantrips. Even using some for buffing and utility out of combat, that's a lot of rounds of combat to have spells for.
Just for comparison, a 9th level Bard with Charisma 22 has only 26 rounds of performance per day. He also has spells, but can (and IME usually does) keep the performance going on the rounds he casts in combat, so those overlap mostly.