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Well let's see here. 10' is a pretty small range, expends half of the paladin's smite evils for the day at level, and lasts a minute.
It's powerful but not game breaking by any means. You are aware of the errata for smite evil that limits the 2x damage against certain things to only the first attack, correct?
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This ability is an encounter breaker. There is a difference. It is subject to all the same counters as a regular smite evil.
If the party uses it to blast one encounter to pieces, throw another tough one at them. Have the bad guy send in a party of brutes to get them to use up the paladins smite before he goes in after the fodder falls.
Now, if your game only has maybe one fight a day, yes this power is a game breaker and you should rebalance it. Personally I think the game should be balanced for one encounter, so that you can have as many in a day as the story requires. But that would require more changes than anyone is willing to do.
There are some smite evil discussions you can search for on the forums that have ideas for handling it. That should be helpful to you.
Just remember that it applies once to any given action. A wizard benefiting from aura of justice only gets smite damage on one magic missile or one scorching ray, whereas the meleeists get smite on all of their attacks.
That's how I broke it up to avoid magic missile/quickened magic missile shenanigans at the table.
Besides that, it's pretty okay. Remember that the benefits last for one minute and that they have to declare their smite by the end of the paladin's next turn. They don't benefit from Detect Evil like a paladin does, so they might misfire the smite.
Even so, it's a very good ability that can easily destroy most solo encounters. Solution: Don't do solo encounters if you can help it.
This ability is a game breaker. Is anyone else experiencing a similar problem?
I certainly have noticed this problem. I DMed Second Darkness and was horrified how the PC's were slaughtering the encounters. Admittedly, many of the higher level encounters were demons, but even so, the results were simply brutal.
I've house ruled it that only Good aligned PC's gain benefits (I couldnt accept how the CN dwarf barbarian could logically benefit from a Lawful Good paladin ability.) and use their own charisma modifier instead of the paladin's (minimum +1).But I'm curious how others are dealing with this problem.
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Well let's see here. 10' is a pretty small range, expends half of the paladin's smite evils for the day at level, and lasts a minute.
It depends on your interpretation of the rules. The ability description indicates that the paladin can only give it to allies within 10', it says nothing about them having to stay within ten feet afterwards. At the start of combat, the party is often pretty closely packed. By the second interpretation, the entire party now benefits from the Smite, no matter how far apart they end up by the end of combat.
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It depends on your interpretation of the rules. The ability description indicates that the paladin can only give it to allies within 10', it says nothing about them having to stay within ten feet afterwards. At the start of combat, the party is often pretty closely packed. By the second interpretation, the entire party now benefits from the Smite, no matter how far apart they end up by the end of combat.Well let's see here. 10' is a pretty small range, expends half of the paladin's smite evils for the day at level, and lasts a minute.
I agree. The range effect applies only to when the Aura of Justice is invoked. Those in range must immediately declare the target of their individual smite evil. The party can then break up at that point and engage at will without regard to the 10' rad.
I really cannot see how this is a "game breaker". It's an 11th level power and it benefits the whole party potentially. So no character is shining more than any other.
If it's making the fights too easy -- up the hits on the bad guys. Big deal.
It is a silly power really, smite evil makes the paladin shine in a battle, aura of justice makes sure everyone else outshines him.
I think the paladin is the least well done of any of the classes really, bad enough not to allow it as written.
Just remember that it applies once to any given action. A wizard benefiting from aura of justice only gets smite damage on one magic missile or one scorching ray, whereas the meleeists get smite on all of their attacks.
Well it should apply to all scorching rays (unless the "each ray needs an attack roll" changed), but wouldn't to anything else that has multiple hits.
Just remember that it applies once to any given action. A wizard benefiting from aura of justice only gets smite damage on one magic missile or one scorching ray, whereas the meleeists get smite on all of their attacks.Well it should apply to all scorching rays (unless the "each ray needs an attack roll" changed), but wouldn't to anything else that has multiple hits.
I let the wizard drop smites on his AoE effects like fireball instead of dropping 4d6+32 six times on a series of touch attacks.
Now that smite was errata'd, I would feel much more comfortable with the 4d6+32 and then 4d6+16 five times-- it's more "in line" and it reduces the damage potential by roughly half. I just thought it was absolutely ridiculous that the sorceror had the potential to drop 216 -minimum- in one round at level 16 with no effort but a metamagic rod, whereas the paladin in the party had dedicated all of his feats, gear choices etc. to be able to dual-wield his shield and rapier with bless weapon and holy sword on his shield-- and he still only got 5 attacks, some of which were at minimum bonus, and likely to miss, and he was often the target of attacks since he was the only melee party member, etc. etc.
Now it's more balanced after the errata, so I'd allow it.
Dragon, antimagic field. Done. :)
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Its not as broken as you think. I've dealt with it in multiple ways now but the easiest by far is get the build up to that last bad guy making the party nervous and then have him use an illusion of himself. Smite wasted and party can then yell their obscenities as the fight continues. A single tactic that the party uses to often should become known and countered, especially since it must be used the round it is granted.
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Its not as broken as you think. I've dealt with it in multiple ways now but the easiest by far is get the build up to that last bad guy making the party nervous and then have him use an illusion of himself. Smite wasted and party can then yell their obscenities as the fight continues. A single tactic that the party uses to often should become known and countered, especially since it must be used the round it is granted.
Personally, I would rather see a more balanced ability than resorting to tactics like illusions, non-evil enemies, multiple enemies, or just having the bad guy run away. Since parties often save this for the big boss fight it just seems anti-climatic to do stuff like that.
Sometimes I'd like to be able to pit my group against a single epic enemy, but at high levels making that challenging without being overwhelming is really difficult. If a single ability on a single PC is dominating how a GM needs to plan encounters that is a good sign it could use some tweaking.
It is a silly power really, smite evil makes the paladin shine in a battle, aura of justice makes sure everyone else outshines him.
I think the paladin is the least well done of any of the classes really, bad enough not to allow it as written.
Paladins are a light that makes their allies shine brighter. Bards do almost the same thing, but no one mentions them getting out shined.
Paladins are a light that makes their allies shine brighter. Bards do almost the same thing, but no one mentions them getting out shined.It is a silly power really, smite evil makes the paladin shine in a battle, aura of justice makes sure everyone else outshines him.
I think the paladin is the least well done of any of the classes really, bad enough not to allow it as written.
Not at your table maybe, but you can accept that as a bard since you play that character from level 1 and you choose to play a pure support character.
A paladin on the other hand is supposed to be the shining knight against evil, having allies shine more brightly is fine and all but the int 7 wis 7 cha 7 fighter/barbarian will shine brighter than the paladin ever will, it is overdone.