@Kyoni: You are missing the point. We aren't trying to say that there aren't overpowered choices out there. We aren't saying that the Gentle Rest cannot be stopped in any way. We are saying that it is too good for the price you pay (essentially nothing since the rest of the Repose Domain is quite good aswell).
We aren't saying ZOMG TO POWERFUL MUST BE BANNED! We are saying that it could definitely do with a save, at least on the second part of the ability to make it more on par with what you should be comparing it against... Other 1st lvl domain powers.
If you absolutely want to have it be a save I request that it doesn't require a touch attack any more... usable at 30ft range... sounds fair?
Having it require TWO touches for the sleep and a save and stoppable by spellresistance, puts into worthless category. Because that's way too many chances to fail, and I'm not waisting my standard action to maybe-with-lots-of-luck take away his move action.
And for *** sake give those BBEG some sidekicks... this game is about action economy, so of course a 4vs1 fight is not even remotely fair... just giving that big dragon a bunch of measly kobold slaves will change the entire fight!
Other cool cleric domain powers have been pointed out by others already (I love travel and liberation), but why only compare to other clerics? it's not about what a cleric can do, but what characters can do, would you accept this power if it were a witch or a sorcerer doing this?
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One cleric, with quicken spell-like ability, could put down** spoiler omitted ** on the first round with a single touch. By that point, PCs are likely 17th-18th level, so beating an ** spoiler omitted ** isn't all that difficult. Granted, still need to get to him to touch... but if you can, game over man, game over! lol.Why on earth is that CR ~17 BBEG standing all by himself, with no contingency plans nor access to "Freedom of Movement", a lowly level 4 spell?
This spell enables you or a creature you touch to move and attack normally for the duration of the spellDaze, stagger, stun, paralyze, ...? not doing anything!
Maybe you should cite the whole paragraph:
This spell enables you or a creature you touch to move and attack normally for the duration of the spell, even under the influence of magic that usually impedes movement, such as paralysis, solid fog, slow, and web. All combat maneuver checks made to grapple the target automatically fail.
Daze, stagger, stun,don't impede movement, they take away actions.
If we follow your line of thinking freedom of movement would allow to act to people asleep or dead.
Maybe you should cite the whole paragraph:
This spell enables you or a creature you touch to move and attack normally for the duration of the spell, even under the influence of magic that usually impedes movement, such as paralysis, solid fog, slow, and web. All combat maneuver checks made to grapple the target automatically fail.Daze, stagger, stun,don't impede movement, they take away actions.
If we follow your line of thinking freedom of movement would allow to act to people asleep or dead.
If stagger is not canceled by Freedom of Movement... why does Freedom of Movement cancel Slow?
An affected creature moves and attacks at a drastically slowed rate. Creatures affected by this spell are staggered and can take only a single move action or standard action each turn, but not both (nor may it take full-round actions).
It says staggered right there in the description.
Freedom of Movement specifically calls out Slow as one example of spell it counters, so I'd say anything that applies "staggered" and is a spell or spell-like is countered. However Freedom of Movement does not cancel sleep and I see no reason why it should... but you have to stagger a creature before the second touch will sleep it, anyways.
This spell enables you or a creature you touch to move and attack normally for the duration of the spell, even under the influence of magic that usually impedes movement, such as paralysis, solid fog, slow, and web. All combat maneuver checks made to grapple the target automatically fail.
Imho this means any magic taking away your standard and/or movement action is canceled by Freedom of Movement. The word "even" makes the difference for me, though I'm not a lawyer and not that good at grammatical finesse.
Being dead is not a magical effect that prevents you from acting, it's you not being alive any more.
Sleep is a good question... at my tables we handle it like this:
"mental impediment" -> requires protection from mind-magic
"physical impediment" -> requires protection through freedom of action
but that's probably a houserule, unless it's RAI? it's justified for me because it cancels paralysis and similar effect that stop the body from moving like it should without that magical impediment...
That actually makes me think that if you really want to put a save on Gentle Rest it should probably be fortitude... how is that a mental ability (aside from the sleep spell being will save?). Most fatigue/exhaustion magic use fortitude? so do most effect that stagger and allow a save or have anything to do with death: fortitude.
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Staggered: A staggered creature may take a single move action or standard action each round (but not both, nor can he take full-round actions). A staggered creature can still take free, swift and immediate actions. A creature with nonlethal damage exactly equal to its current hit points gains the staggered condition.
Staggered Impede movement?
Freedom of movement allow you to move normally under the effect of a slow spell because the spell say that if work against slow. The use of the conditions has some weird effects sometime.
Slow was a spell that reduced your movement, now it impose a condition.
And note that Freedom of movement don't counter slow. the spell say:
This spell enables you or a creature you touch to move and attack normally for the duration of the spell,
You are still under the effect of the spell, it simply don't suffer its drawbacks. Even with your interpretation the touch will still stagger you. You would simply not be hindered by being staggered. a fourther touch will still put you to sleep.
[i]Countering something[/i[] is a very specific effect.
[quote?PRD]Some spells can counter other specific spells, often those with diametrically opposed effects.
Only the spells that specifically say that they counter something counter that something and only that something.
freedom of movement don't counter anything.
Freedom of movement allow you to move normally under the effect of a slow spell because the spell say that if work against slow. The use of the conditions has some weird effects sometime.
Slow was a spell that reduced your movement, now it impose a condition.
However the text clearly says move AND ATTACK... if you drop that "and attack" from the spell's first sentence, you'd be right, but why specify the "and attack" then? breaking out of combat maneuvers is not an attack but an opposed check...
Also if all this spell does is negating the reduced movement or being entangled, this spell should not be a 4th level spell... would be more in line with slow and haste (3rd level) in that case.Hold Person is level 2
Hold Monster is level 4
Do you think it should suppress Flesh to Stone? why yes, why not?
You are still under the effect of the spell, it simply don't suffer its drawbacks.
Ok, my bad, I missed that suppressed instead of canceled part. Since FoM lasts 10min./lvl we never had this issue.
Favoring monsters which are immune to sleep or making sure everything has high SR could really limit the DM’s choices in encounter design and might make it tougher to run published adventures. Sure, the DM can take some steps to counter the auto-sleep combos, but why should he or she have to?
Adding a saving throw to just the sleep effect would help curtail combinations which some of us consider abusive. Even if you don't feel that the auto-sleep combos are abusive perhaps you can empathize with the people who do instead of putting all your efforts into "proving" there isn't a problem. If you can show us that Gentle Rest is not a worthwhile power without the no-save sleep effect perhaps you'll influence us to change our minds. On the other hand, if you can admit that it would be a pretty good power even with a saving throw on the sleep effect maybe we could change your minds instead.
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Well, 137ben, your response is pretty much the opposite of what I was hoping for. I'm not too offended by you telling me what to do, but I think the term "auto-sleep" makes it pretty clear what I'm talking about. If you'd prefer to call it "no-save sleep effect" I guess that's fine. Your claim that Gentle Rest is "almost NEVER" useful contradicts what I've seen in play, but rather than just relying on my own anecdotal evidence I'll go ahead and try to refute some of your statements with facts and logic.
First off, while stagger is somewhat less useful at lower levels it isn’t “absolutely no effect” as you’ve repeatedly claimed. Consider the example of a CR2 leopard which attacks with a claw/claw/bite routine. Gentle Rest could be used to reduce the monster to just a bite attack. That’s useful. Staggering a CR1 ghoul to prevent two potentially deadly attacks and make the monster unable to coup de grace seems useful too, and as an added bonus the staggering effect lasts multiple rounds on undead. In fact, about a third of the monsters at CR1 are capable of making multiple attacks per round, and I’m pretty sure that percentage tends to go up with CR1. By CR5 Gentle Rest can prevent a troll from using Rend. That’s useful and might help save a PC’s life.
Your claim that “EVERYTHING” at higher levels has SR is clearly hyperbole and could probably be dismissed as such without further investigation. I’ll take the time to establish some facts regarding SR by consulting the Monster DB from d20pfsrd though. Sorting the 2,473 monsters in the Monster DB shows me that only 689 of them have SR, about 27%. Of the 533 monsters at CRs 8-12 only 189 of them have SR. That’s certainly not everything. In fact, it’s barely over a third (about 35%). Even in the lofty heights of CR 13-17 only about 67% of the monsters have SR (184 of 274). It should be noted that the percentage of foes with meaningful SR in an actual campaign might reasonably be significantly lower since NPCs with class levels are sometimes common foes and often have no or low SR. Even if SR is present it can often be beaten. Sure, it is a defense, but it is a defense which also affects most spells the Cleric might cast. If you have a 60% chance to get through you might as well get through with a no-save sleep effect.
I also don't see why you're putting so little value on sleep effects. A typical party is likely to have at least one PC or pet near an enemy. If the enemy goes to sleep the PC or pet can perform a coup de grace, and considering the Fort save that's almost certain death. Sure, some monsters are immune, but that does nothing at all to help those which aren't. This encourages the sort of limitation on the DM's monster choices which I mentioned earlier.
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Devilkiller, while I don't agree at all with 137ben that this is in any way underpowered (I think it's one of the stronger 1st level powers), but there's a couple of things:
Against the leopard:
A leopard has a touch AC of 14, which means even a decently combat-oriented 1st level cleric will have at most a 50/50 of hitting it. And also note that either you wear light armor, or you have a dangerous situation where you need to stand so that a leopard is within 20ft of you during it's turn, where it can quite effectively pounce you. And if you wear light armor and the attack fails, you are in a very high-risk situation.
And compare to other options: Against the leopard, the cleric could simply cast Command - even the combat cleric will enforce a save of 14 or so with it, which means it has roughly the same chance of working, only it removes _all_ actions for a round, and can be done at 25 ft.
Against the ghoul:
A ghoul has 12, which means a 1st level cleric will have perhaps 60/40 of it. It's a good option to use against a ghoul, however note that a ghoul is a CR1 monster so a single ghoul should be kind of easy even for a newbie 1st level party - for an optimized group with good teamwork it should be a cakewalk. And if we compare to other characters, a 1st level fighter or barbarian has a decent chance of simply one-shotting it with it's +5 (2d6+8) and +6 (2d6+11) attacks respectively.
Against the troll:
The troll is easier to hit; for a say 3rd level combat cleric it's perhaps a 75% chance of working, but if it doesn't, that's very very bad. However, the troll has a 10ft reach that you have to get within, and with it's +10 CMB vs your perhaps 16 CMD it has a quite large (75%) chance to trip you on your way, leaving you prone within it's reach. So unless you've stripped it of it's AoO, you effectively has about a 20% chance of it working. Against the troll you have Hold Person, which has a bit lesser chance of working (55% instead of 75%) but has a 130ft range and cripples the troll far worse (paralyzed instead of staggered).
Also, when it comes to higher-leveled creatures, while it's true that classed NPC's are less likely to have SR, it is also much more likely that they'll have magic items or spells which neuter the effectiveness, and classed NPC's more often than not have non-trivial touch AC's. Also, I don't know how you performed the search, but in addition to direct SR it could be worth looking at how many have immunity to sleep (at least all dragons, don't know what more) and how many have immunity to spells (most golems) and how many have inherent Freedom of Movement (a bunch) and how many are flying and ranged enemies (many outsiders).
While the defenses are circumstantial, there are a LOT of them, and if you pick a completely random monster from the database there's quite a large chance that it will have one or more of them.
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Also, I'm not sure I agree that a "typical" party will usually have be in range of a given enemy, especially not during the first round of combat which is what you have been talking about IIRC. Quite a lot of enemies avoid the party getting into melee with them, or use good tactics to only fight them one at a time, or the party simply can't reach them etc.
I think it's quite hard assuming what a "typical" party will do but IME, it's not at all an obvious thing to have.
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So, dip 1 level of cleric, then go monk. Take:
Gentle Rest
Domain Strike
Medusa's WrathFull Attack.
Then you can apply Gentle Rest as a swift action if you hit with an unarmed strike, and you get two extra swings with Medusa's wrath.
Holy smokes; that's hideous.
I'd forgotten all about that feat (Domain Strike).
Devilkiller:
coup de grace provokes an attack of opportunity: lonely BBEG problem again
also if you really want to put a saving throw on gentle rest, I'd be fine with that under the condition that you make it ranged and remove the touch attack. That way you get your precious save and I have a decent chance to have this ability actually work.
Because as long as killing the monster outright is more efficient then trying to sleep it with little chance of success, I'll just go ahead and rage-pounce it.
I've seen one DM once, who fudged dice of saving throws because he didn't like how his monsters were debuffed/cc'ed...
- at first everybody stopped using those spell and it mostly ended in buffing the party then magic-missile & rage-pounce it to death
- then when he wondered why we didn't use tactics, and we explained how this was pointless
- finally, we enforced that ALL combat dice would be rolled in the middle of the table
- since then the chances of his monsters making the saves has drastically decreased
This little anecdote is to underline how players will always try to find the strategy that's most likely to work. Put too many chances to fail on gentle rest and nobody will take it any more...
so back to my question...
Are you fine with this change: Make it a saving throw ability, but make it ranged and remove the touch attack requirement?
Hey Kyoni, that's uncalled for and a fair bit off-topic. Let's leave the assumptions of foul play and the off-topic fudging rants at the door and discuss the actual ability, shall we?
Hey Kyoni, that's uncalled for and a fair bit off-topic. Let's leave the assumptions of foul play and the off-topic fudging rants at the door and discuss the actual ability, shall we?
I did discuss the actual ability... and I keep asking again and again why the "touch attack" part is dismissed so easily by Devilkiller and others and they keep insisting how important that saving throw is.
I put the "rant" in a spoiler... better?
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Against the leopard:
A leopard has a touch AC of 14, which means even a decently combat-oriented 1st level cleric will have at most a 50/50 of hitting it. And also note that either you wear light armor, or you have a dangerous situation where you need to stand so that a leopard is within 20ft of you during it's turn, where it can quite effectively pounce you. And if you wear light armor and the attack fails, you are in a very high-risk situation.
And compare to other options: Against the leopard, the cleric could simply cast Command - even the combat cleric will enforce a save of 14 or so with it, which means it has roughly the same chance of working, only it removes _all_ actions for a round, and can be done at 25 ft.
Considering that you need to have Speak with Animals for that to work, it is a bit costly in term of spells.
Command
School enchantment (compulsion) [language-dependent, mind-affecting];
@Kyoni: So you are basically saying that a 2nd level spell is better than a first lvl domain power? Shouldn't it be? And I'd even argue that Hold Person works on far fewer targets than the 1st lvl domain power.
Why should it be better? Many domains have special abilities that are or become better than most second level spells.
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@Kyoni: So you are basically saying that a 2nd level spell is better than a first lvl domain power? Shouldn't it be? And I'd even argue that Hold Person works on far fewer targets than the 1st lvl domain power.
A domain power should be usable throughout an entire PCs career... if it becomes worthless (ie: never used) at level 3 then I'd rather pick a different domain that stays useful even at levels 7, 12, 18...
@Kyoni: I agree with you that putting a save on the entire thing is going to far!
Would you really say that a save on the secondary effect would hamper the domain power so much that you would never choose it?
It would be the same thing as just houseruling the entire sleeping part away.
To sleep a target you need to:- touch it to make it staggered
- touch it AGAIN to make it sleep
and you want to put a save on top of that?
some people already pointed out that this touching has roughly a 50%-70% to land... let's make it simply a 60%, ok?
first hit chance 60% to stagger
second hit chance 60% * 60% -> 36% to sleep
which is already rather low
now if we assume the save has a 70% chance (most probably less due to MAD cleric) to still affect the target we are down to 25% chance (most probably less then 20%) of actually having everything go as smoothly as you'd like...
As I said: a lot of other classes can do this with a single standard action (spells, hexes, whatever)... so it's already unlikely the cleric will do this because others will be quicker, as they don't need two melee-rounds to set it up. Spellcasters can do this before the monster even reaches melee.
So this ability is already weaker then spells, make it even more weak, and it's not even worth considering.
I'd really like to see some numbers from the "needs a save" crowd, because some numbers are off if you feel that the chance of success is more like 70%+ and not 40%- for the sleeping going as smoothly.
So what are the str/con/wis/cha stat of your clerics, what level are they and against what CR of monsters do they succeed so easily?
Gentle Rest (Sp): Your touch can fill a creature with lethargy, causing a living creature to become staggered for 1 round as a melee touch attack. If you touch a staggered living creature, that creature falls asleep for 1 round instead. Undead creatures touched are staggered for a number of rounds equal to your Wisdom modifier. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Wisdom modifier.
Hitting with this 2 rounds in a row will not cause a creature to go to sleep as it only lasts for one round, the target will no longer be staggered when it comes around to your turn again.
Robert A Matthews: That has been recognized. The case is where the cleric either:
1. works together with another cleric or a wizard using frigid touch or some other method for staggering and
2. gets quicken spell-like ability to use it as both swift and standard.
@Kyoni - I think your change is too much of a departure from the original ability. Mine would apply mostly in corner cases. I happen to think that they’re abusive corner cases. Opinions on game balance and the value of sleep effects is sure to vary widely though. That’s why I thought it might be reasonable to propose that Gentle Rest is “good enough” even without the sleep effect and therefore it shouldn’t be a problem to add a save to just the sleep effect (not the stagger)
I’m not sure why you suspect me of “fudging” saving throws for monsters. I never said that I’d like the sleep effect to have a save so that I could fudge it. Maybe some DMs would like that. I just want the monsters. and PCs for that matter, to have a fair chance against a sleep effect which will likely result in their death.
Regarding our "lonely BBEG" comment, many encounters published by Paizo and other companies only feature one monster. Most DMs I know run mostly published adventures and want them to be as "ready to run" as possible right out of the box. What happens to single foes is important. I’d also like to point out that they’re not always BBEGs. Not every monster should need a supporting cast of mooks. Anyhow, even if a fight has 2-4 foes it would often be pretty efficient to take out 1 per round with a coup de grace combo.
@Lifat - I too suspect that the chance of Gentle Rest being changed after all these years might be small. On the other hand, there have been plenty of new answers in the FAQ for the Core Rulebook this year, some of them less than a month ago. I guess the rulebooks have become living documents to some extent. I know that I for one almost always check the PRD rather than printed materials when questions arise.
I’ll also point out that there’s no reason why monsters can’t use these combos. If the PCs are “foolish” enough to get within melee range of a monster some low level NPCs could open a nearby door, rush in, and start touching people. Soon it would be coup de grace time, and I suspect that at least some players would feel that it was a little unfair since their massive AC and saving throws were bypassed by some street level mooks. If a touch attack does damage the damage usually scales with level. Saving throw DCs generally increase for higher level creatures and powers as well. None of that matters here. If you’re not an elf you’re probably in trouble.
Regarding ghouls and such - I wasn’t trying to prove or even imply that Gentle Rest is overpowered against the leopard and ghoul. I was mostly just trying to counter the argument that is is useless. That said, I think that Gentle Rest could be reasonably useful against those monsters. If you’re not convinced I can go into further detail, offer other examples, etc. My goal isn’t to prove that the no-save stagger effect is overpowered, just that it makes for a decent 1st level domain power all by itself and having the sleep effect be no-save too is probably overkill.
Regarding positioning - Obviously the PCs won’t always be in range for a coup de grace combo on the 1st round. Many battles involve melee though, and once a PC or pet is in melee with the foe there’s a chance to set up a coup de grace combo. In pretty typical published dungeon adventures around levels 6-11 I’ve often seen the sleep combo play out like:
Round1 - Encounter starts at some distance, PC-Sorcerer casts Spectral Hand while PC-Cleric, PC-Magus, and PC-Fighter move towards melee range. The Witch does...something...
Round2 - Either the Sorcerer or Magus hits the victim with Frigid Touch. Cleric hits monster with Gentle Rest, Fighter performs coup de grace. Fight Over.
If the monster doesn’t have any ranged attacks the melee PCs might hang back and wait for it to close (perhaps getting some AoOs as it comes in). The Sorcerer could save a spell by having the Aberrant bloodline. There could be two Clerics or a Cleric and an Inquisitor. Against a foe without significant SR a familiar could apply Frigid Touch from a wand, or it could come out of a Spell Storing Weapon. A Bard could use Terrible Remorse instead. A sado-masochist Cleric or Inquisitor could wear Spell Storing armor to deliver the initial staggering effect when he or she gets hit and then apply Gentle Rest on the next attack. With the right feats that attack could be an AoO so that you could perform the coup de grace yourself on your next turn.
Sure, it requires a little teamwork, but a lot of that teamwork could probably happen in between combats rather than during them.
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This really isn't a thread about a rules question, it's a "I don't think it should work the way it does" thread. Flagged so it can be moved someplace more appropriate.
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I just want the monsters. and PCs for that matter, to have a fair chance against a sleep effect which will likely result in their death.
Why is the touch attack part not chance enough? why do you need to double the chances of failure? if you double it nobody will bother with it any more.
It seems like their cleric's chance to hit with his touch attack is unusually high in your games?Regarding our "lonely BBEG" comment, many encounters published by Paizo and other companies only feature one monster. Most DMs I know run mostly published adventures and want them to be as "ready to run" as possible right out of the box.
Unfortunately this is often close to impossible... whether it's Gentle Rest or another combo, some players will come up with something that works really well and make part of the published encounters a push-over when they shouldn't be. That is not a problem with Gentle Rest, it's a problem about the general balance that does not and will probably never exist... it's up to the DM to balance encounters. And yes that takes quite a bit of work and time.
What happens to single foes is important. I’d also like to point out that they’re not always BBEGs. Not every monster should need a supporting cast of mooks. Anyhow, even if a fight has 2-4 foes it would often be pretty efficient to take out 1 per round with a coup de grace combo.
The last one... because while an enemy is standing nearby, coup de grace provokes AoO from all of them... taking 3 solid hits from 3 enemies while performing the coup de grace, could seriously hurt the fighter, especially at lower levels. Or one of the enemies could, instead of hitting for damage do a maneuver to trip the fighter: no coup de grace until the fighter gets back up.
Round1 - Encounter starts at some distance, PC-Sorcerer casts Spectral Hand while PC-Cleric, PC-Magus, and PC-Fighter move towards melee range. The Witch does...something...
Round2 - Either the Sorcerer or Magus hits the victim with Frigid Touch. Cleric hits monster with Gentle Rest, Fighter performs coup de grace. Fight Over.
the witch uses her slumber hex on the first round: sleeping foe, the fighter coup de grace's, while the cleric, magus and sorcerer are watching
but then I'm not sure why the sleep + coup de grace would be any better then everybody just whacking the lone monster good? between the magus and sorcerer and fighter they should have enough damage to kill your monster on the first round anyways?
Magus with shocking grasp (no save)
Sorcerer with one of the many damage spells (burning hands / magic missile / ??? )
Fighter with power attack
your lone monster would survive three solid hits?
Make the cleric an evangelist archetype and he can add +1 atk and dmg to the magus and figther with bardic performance.
If a fight that starts at "some distance" means the whole party starts within 20ft, we play pretty different games. Here it's usually more like 50-80ft, rarely going below 30ft (mostly if it's a social situation gone bad) and sometimes going up towards several hundred feet.
I'll go ahead and address some points which were raised.
@Skylancer4 - I agree with you and feel kind of bad clogging up the Rules Questions forum. Is there a "Game Balance" forum?
@Kyoni - Touch attacks are a trivial barrier at higher levels. At lower levels they do provide some control, but the standard stagger effect would still have no save. I've tried to provide some evidence that this is a decent power. Some have proposed that it is flat out overpowered. Obviously opinions vary. The fact that they vary from "useless" to "overpowered" is odd but perhaps not unusual for the message boards. Regarding the Witch's Slumber hex, I think that's a pretty high powered option itself, but at least the enemy gets a saving throw, and if that save succeeds the enemy is immune for 24 hours. The fact that the Gentle Rest combo can act as a no-save "clean up" to failed Slumber attempts doesn't make it any better.
@Ilja - In dungeon encounters I'd expect that the PCs usually start out within a move or double move of the monsters. Even your 50-80ft average distance is something many PCs can cover in a single round. Even if the CdG guy is running a little behind it would be pretty trivial to execute the combo again once the enemy is prone.
Touch attacks are a trivial barrier at higher levels. At lower levels they do provide some control, but the standard stagger effect would still have no save. I've tried to provide some evidence that this is a decent power. Some have proposed that it is flat out overpowered. Obviously opinions vary. The fact that they vary from "useless" to "overpowered" is odd but perhaps not unusual for the message boards. Regarding the Witch's Slumber hex, I think that's a pretty high powered option itself, but at least the enemy gets a saving throw, and if that save succeeds the enemy is immune for 24 hours. The fact that the Gentle Rest combo can act as a no-save "clean up" to failed Slumber attempts doesn't make it any better.
I ask again: if the touching is trivial for you (it is not for me)... would you agree to make the entire ability a ranged ability that has a saving throw, but WITHOUT the touch attack part?
yes? no? why?
@Ilja - In dungeon encounters I'd expect that the PCs usually start out within a move or double move of the monsters. Even your 50-80ft average distance is something many PCs can cover in a single round.
A double move is too far to use Gentle Rest. And if the cleric is using light armor, it's in big risk if the attack fails.
If we're talking about spreading the combo over several rounds, where the enemy also gets loads of chances to act, then sure... But then we can't really assume the enemy is just going to stand there, right?
I mean, say you're level 4, and you encounter a half-fiend minotaur in a dungeon, 50 ft away. You roll initiative Sorcerer, Fighter, Minotaur, Cleric. Your cleric is in light armor, so has AC 17 (+2 shield, +5 chain shirt) and has 30 hp. The fighter is in medium armor and AC 19 (+7 breastplate +2 dex) and 34 hp. What's the plan? I'm trying to follow your stated tactic here.
Round 1:
- Sorcerer casts spectral hand
- Fighter double moves up, takes the AoO for average of 15.5 damage.
- Minotaur full attacks the fighter for average 23.8 damage. Fighter is now on average unconscious.
- Cleric double moves up
Round 2:
- Sorcerer tries to stagger with frigid touch, has about 60% chance to hit and then about 40% chance to beat SR.
- Fighter rolls to stabilize.
- Minotaur (76% chance) charges sorcerer with it's +11 (2d6+15; x3). The cleric gets an AoO whack with it's mace. Otherwise if staggered, minotaur readies action to 5ft step away whack the cleric if she casts.
- Cleric double moves up to the minotaur which is now at the sorcerer, eats an AoO for 18.2 damage, or if the minotaur is staggered she tries to cast, takes an AoO for average of 18 damage, must make a concentration check and then has about a 50% chance to hit and a 40% chance to beat SR.
I mean honestly, that doesn't sound like too efficient a tactic. At least not compared to the cleric casting Shield of Faith on the fighter, the sorcerer casting Create Pit on the Minotaur (much better chance of succeeding), both casters moving out of the minotaur's charge lane, and the fighter charging the minotaur (if it isn't pitted), potentially bull-rushing it if the fighter has nice enough strength.
I know the combo works because I’ve seen it used in play many times. I guess maybe we had a “perfect storm” since the party included both a Sorcerer and a Magus who knew Frigid Touch. When something would get staggered the Cleric would apply Gentle Rest, and the monster would sleep. Using lots of monsters with SR is a reasonably effective counter, but that leaves the DM with the choice of only picking monsters with SR or applying templates to give everything SR. One seems boring. The other seems like it might be unfair and shouldn't be necessary to control a 1st level domain power.
I'm certainly not saying that Gentle Rest sleep combos are good in all encounters, but that when they’re good they seem too good. I guess I'm not convincing anybody here though. Obviously there were some other folks early in the thread who felt Gentle Rest is too powerful, but they've likely become bored with the discussion by now. I'll go ahead and reply to a few points anyhow though if we're going to keep talking I'd rather discuss why adding a save to the sleep effect would be bad. Is the staggered effect which the OP felt is problematic not powerful enough?
@Kyoni - Regarding your suggestion, I think turning the whole thing into a ranged ability with a saving throw is a much bigger change than just adding a saving throw to the sleep effect. I'm not sure if there's any real chance of the ability changing, but I think it is more likely that a small change would be made than a big one. Having "double jeopardy" for a powerful effect like sleep also doesn't seem like a bad thing to me, especially since unlike many sleep effects this one doesn't have hit dice limits and isn't limited to 1 attempt per day.
@Ilja - I’ll grant that a CR6 half-fiend minotaur with SR against a 3 member 4th level party is not particularly susceptible to Gentle Rest. That said, your example party is a PC short and uses pretty bad tactics. Throw in a Magus or something and perhaps they’ll do better. If the Fighter is going to double move and take an AoO why wouldn’t he charge? He could also hang back and ready an action to hit the minotaur with a polearm. Alternately the Fighter could wear full plate +1, carry a heavy or tower shield +1, have an AC of about 28-30 when on full defense. Then he could pretty safely wait for the minotaur to come to him and get in range of the touch attacks. That would become an even better idea at 6th level when the Fighter gains a 2nd attack.
The combo really makes more sense later on when 2nd level spells are no longer a precious resource. A clever party also might add the spell storing property to their weapons and armor and put Frigid Touch in them. The armor could obviously reduce problems with missing the touch attack as well as helping to suppress enemy full attacks. Perhaps that says more about the power of Frigid Touch than it does about Gentle Rest, but the two together can be a little depressing. I’d expect that if DMs used this tactic against PCs there might be some objections.
I used the tactics you describe. For an optimized party of three 4th level characters against a single target, I'd say a CR6 is about right. I looked at different monsters but there simply didn't seem to be many CR6 monsters that fit in a close-walls dungeon. Lots of dragons, dinosaurs, giant owls. Also teleporting fiends, a wood golem that's immune to spells, etc.
I mean, when the strategy is mostly useful in tight areas and most monsters that tend to be in tight areas have defenses against it, it seems to be quite rarely useful, at least in our campaigns.
The fighter didn't charge because the lower AC would increase the risk of dying substantially. The fighter didn't use a pole weapon because then the cleric would eat the AoO instead, and might actually die if the AoO critted. Readying against the minotaur is a pretty bad idea since the minotaur would likely not charge the fighter but rather the cleric or sorcerer.
It could use tower shield + full plate, but not only would it have far less movement, it also can't really maneuver anywhere with a little rubble or a stairs - eating that -13 to acrobatics checks is kinda harsh.
And why would the minotaur charge the full-defense fighter? It's an int 9 creature, probably smarter than the fighter. If the fighter is full defending, it'll very simply just charge the sorcerer which has a quite large risk of simply dropping when hit (and far worse defenses too).
And at 6th level you're not fighting one minotaur, that'd be a walkover for _any_ optimized party. It's more likely two minotaurs at that point.
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@Kyoni: So you are basically saying that a 2nd level spell is better than a first lvl domain power? Shouldn't it be? And I'd even argue that Hold Person works on far fewer targets than the 1st lvl domain power.A domain power should be usable throughout an entire PCs career... if it becomes worthless (ie: never used) at level 3 then I'd rather pick a different domain that stays useful even at levels 7, 12, 18...
@Kyoni: I agree with you that putting a save on the entire thing is going to far!
Would you really say that a save on the secondary effect would hamper the domain power so much that you would never choose it?It would be the same thing as just houseruling the entire sleeping part away.
To sleep a target you need to:
- touch it to make it staggered
- touch it AGAIN to make it sleep
and you want to put a save on top of that?some people already pointed out that this touching has roughly a 50%-70% to land... let's make it simply a 60%, ok?
first hit chance 60% to stagger
second hit chance 60% * 60% -> 36% to sleep
which is already rather lownow if we assume the save has a 70% chance (most probably less due to MAD cleric) to still affect the target we are down to 25% chance (most probably less then 20%) of actually having everything go as smoothly as you'd like...
As I said: a lot of other classes can do this with a single standard action (spells, hexes, whatever)... so it's already unlikely the cleric will do this because others will be quicker, as they don't need two melee-rounds to set it up. Spellcasters can do this before the monster even reaches melee.
So this ability is already weaker then spells, make it even more weak, and it's not even worth considering.I'd really like to see some numbers from the "needs a save" crowd, because some numbers are off if you feel that the chance of success is more like 70%+ and not 40%- for the sleeping going as smoothly.
So what are the str/con/wis/cha stat of your clerics, what level are...
A Nethyr has pointed out in another thread where he has analyzed the 4 bestiary monsters AC against the suggested values, the average touch AC don't go up until you get to CR above 20.
So it is an ability whose efficiency go up as you go up in level.A lot of the creatures with SR are immune to sleep, SR isn't so influent and most spellcaster would search for ways to overcome SR, regardless of what domain ability they have.
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Since this hasn't been debunked yet
you cannot take Gentle Rest as a Quickened SLA
This creature can use one of its spell-like abilities with next to no effort.
Prerequisite: Spell-like ability at CL 10th or higher.
Benefit: Choose one of the creature's spell-like abilities, subject to the restrictions described in this feat. The creature can use the chosen spell-like ability as a quickened spell-like ability three times per day (or less, if the ability is normally usable only once or twice per day).
Using a quickened spell-like ability is a swift action that does not provoke an attack of opportunity. The creature can perform another action—including the use of another spell-like ability (but not another swift action)—in the same round that it uses a quickened spell-like ability. The creature may use only one quickened spell-like ability per round.
The creature can only select a spell-like ability duplicating a spell with a level less than or equal to 1/2 its caster level (round down) – 4. For a summary, see Table: Quickened Spell-Like Abilities.
A spell-like ability that duplicates a spell with a casting time greater than 1 full round cannot be quickened.
[Chart omitted]
Normal: The use of a spell-like ability normally requires a standard action (at the very least) and provokes an attack of opportunity.
Special: This feat can be taken multiple times. Each time it is taken, the creature can apply it to a different one of its spell-like abilities.
Cleric domains, sorcerer bloodlines, wizard schools, and certain other class features give spell-like abilities that aren't based on spells. What's the effective spell level for these abilities?
The effective spell level for these spell-like abilities is equal to the highest-level spell that a character of that class could normally cast at the level the ability is gained.
For example, a 1st-level elemental bloodline sorcerer has elemental ray as a spell-like ability. Because a sorcerer 1's highest-level spell available is 1st, that spell-like ability counts as a 1st-level spell. A 9th-level elemental bloodline sorcerer has elemental blast as a spell-like ability. Because a sorcerer 9's highest-level spell available is 4th, that spell-like ability counts as a 4th-level spell.
—Sean K Reynolds, 07/08/11
I think you are reading "duplicating a spell" in a too restrictive way. It not need to be a spell, it need to have a spell level, and domain powers have it.
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I'll go ahead and address some points which were raised.
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@Kyoni - Touch attacks are a trivial barrier at higher levels. At lower levels they do provide some control, but the standard stagger effect would still have no save. I've tried to provide some evidence that this is a decent power. Some have proposed that it is flat out overpowered. Obviously opinions vary. The fact that they vary from "useless" to "overpowered" is odd but perhaps not unusual for the message boards. Regarding the Witch's Slumber hex, I think that's a pretty high powered option itself, but at least the enemy gets a saving throw, and if that save succeeds the enemy is immune for 24 hours. The fact that the Gentle Rest combo can act as a no-save "clean up" to failed Slumber attempts doesn't make it any better.
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To use a definition from another thread, the difference is that some people play Rocket tag Pathfinder, where if you enemy isn't dead before he get to acting the first round you are playing wrong.
Note that the Rocket tag definition isn't mine, is the definition used by the people that play that way.
To use a definition from another thread, the difference is that some people play Rocket tag Pathfinder, where if you enemy isn't dead before he get to acting the first round you are playing wrong.
Note that the Rocket tag definition isn't mine, is the definition used by the people that play that way.
At high levels, Pathfinder generally ends up this way unless both players and GM deliberately set out to avoid that phenomenon.
At high levels, Pathfinder generally ends up this way unless both players and GM deliberately set out to avoid that phenomenon.To use a definition from another thread, the difference is that some people play Rocket tag Pathfinder, where if you enemy isn't dead before he get to acting the first round you are playing wrong.
Note that the Rocket tag definition isn't mine, is the definition used by the people that play that way.
Not really. The DM doing it is enough.
If the DM just drops the CR construct (which is quite useless when designing high-optimization games anyway) and chooses to optimize the monsters for defense, then they are likely to survive first barrage of attacks and thus characters playing glass cannons will be in a dangerous situation.
If as a DM one just slaps on higher-CR monsters to compensate for optimized players it tends to get to rocket launcher tag, but if you just customize a bit (or even better, use hero points) you can get away from that.
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At high levels, Pathfinder generally ends up this way unless both players and GM deliberately set out to avoid that phenomenon.To use a definition from another thread, the difference is that some people play Rocket tag Pathfinder, where if you enemy isn't dead before he get to acting the first round you are playing wrong.
Note that the Rocket tag definition isn't mine, is the definition used by the people that play that way.Not really. The DM doing it is enough.
If the DM just drops the CR construct (which is quite useless when designing high-optimization games anyway) and chooses to optimize the monsters for defense, then they are likely to survive first barrage of attacks and thus characters playing glass cannons will be in a dangerous situation.
If as a DM one just slaps on higher-CR monsters to compensate for optimized players it tends to get to rocket launcher tag, but if you just customize a bit (or even better, use hero points) you can get away from that.
In most homebrews I've run I quickly teach glass cannons to diversify their skills by pitting them against exact copies of themselves with opposite alignments. That cursed mirror really comes in handy... :)
If they don't get the message strange NPC partys with skills strangely similar to theirs tend to appear once in a while. It also saves me some time as a DM as I no longer have to stat out NPCs (the players do it for me by creating their characters)l