This is sort of for my own DMing knowledge, but I am curious about single spells that completely nerf encounters. In this regard, I am looking for the spell that nullifies the biggest threat of the monster, taking almost all of the threat out of it. Here's some I thought of, but I'd love to see other examples.
Harpy- Silence
Rogues- Obscuring Mist
Will-O-Wisp- Resist Energy
Demi-Lich- Anti-Magic Field
Chuul- Freedom of Movement (this spell will come up a lot)
Shadows- Death Ward
Everything - Time Stop
Time Stop is really good, but by itself doesn't just guarantee a win against the monster. (Its the spells you cast during it that are helpful, and most often, I see it used to get buffs off when there isn't time to otherwise) Another one:
Lurker in Light: Invisibility Purge
I'm not sure what you are getting at with this thread?
There are many spells that allow basically "auto-success" against many types of encounters. To expand on your shadows example, Death Ward shuts down any encounter where the monsters prime ability is level drain or death magic - specters or banshees for example. The fly spell (or levitate, etc.) will defeat creatures without flight or a good ranged attack. Protection from alignment will shut down many encounters that rely on enchantment or summoned creatures. Protection from energy will make many encounters a easy. Hide from undead, delay or neutralize poison, etc. etc.
You could even say that the parties ability to heal (and or teleport away) will allow them to defeat creatures that can't heal themselves.
There are just so many spells that neutralize encounters that it seems like it would be easier to list the spells that DON'T trivialize encounters.
Detect Evil- Court cases
Detect Thoughts- Many social encounters
Many of my players think they can do this but any time someone has no ranks in spellcraft their first assumption is that you are obviously planning to kill them with a spell and so start attacking.
If the spell has somatic and verbal components I assume NPCs will just see you casting a spell in the middle of the conversation. That spell could be anything from shooting acid into your face to launching you into outer space, if they don't know better they'll attack.
I'm not sure what you are getting at with this thread?
There are many spells that allow basically "auto-success" against many types of encounters. To expand on your shadows example, Death Ward shuts down any encounter where the monsters prime ability is level drain or death magic - specters or banshees for example. The fly spell (or levitate, etc.) will defeat creatures without flight or a good ranged attack. Protection from alignment will shut down many encounters that rely on enchantment or summoned creatures. Protection from energy will make many encounters a easy. Hide from undead, delay or neutralize poison, etc. etc.
You could even say that the parties ability to heal (and or teleport away) will allow them to defeat creatures that can't heal themselves.
There are just so many spells that neutralize encounters that it seems like it would be easier to list the spells that DON'T trivialize encounters.
I guess I'm getting at specifics of single spell that simply allows an entire group to defeat a monster. Some monsters can't reasonably harm a group that uses just one of these spells. To nitpick, I wouldn't consider Color Spray, Sleep, or Charm etc applicable because they involve saves that are not guaranteed to always succeed. Death Ward wouldn't stop a Banshee, just give you a bonus against her bad effects (Wail). Protection from Energy can be worn down with enough damage, Hide from Undead only allows you to bypass the undead since its broken once you attack (which may or may not succeed at that point).
Fly, Wind Wall, and Fickle Winds are good examples, as is Protection from Alignment.
I was kind of joking about Time Stop though at a minimum it would give you time to cast the other listed spells. Anyhow, Freedom of Movement is even less of an auto-win against a Chuul. That said, I'd rather see FoM grant a bonus to CMD and CMB against grapples rather than complete immunity. Since the Chuul can do just as much damage with 2 Claws as with a grapple and Constrict I guess that Remove Paralysis to thwart the tentacle attack might be almost as good at a lower spell level.
Death Ward also only protects one PC. If you're going to cast the spell 4-5 times I suppose that Magic Missile would get rid of Shadows too. There's a Repose domain power which makes everybody immune to energy drain though, and that really can gut certain encounters. One spell which can certainly cause problems with certain encounters is Command Undead. It is a no save win against any unintelligent undead with a 2nd level spell, plus you potentially gain the undead as an ally. I guess killing a single skeleton or zombie doesn't seem like that big of a deal, but it seems like a shame to neuter those creatures at such a low level when they might still present a reasonable threat to some parties.
I agree that Fly can be very powerful. Luckily there are a lot of places with ceilings where it is tough or impossible to get up out of the reach of ground based melee monsters, especially if they can jump a little.
True about FoM, though it does give you a big advanatge against the thing in its own environment. I guess a better example of FoM would be against a Mohrg, which definitely nerfs it.
I guess I'm looking specifically for 'I-Win' button spells, like FoM against a Mohrg. Death Ward might be a bad example, but Command Undead is a good one; zombies can scale up to CR 8 pretty easily, and gaining that as an ally is pretty frightening.
Oh Command Undead is glorious. No HD cap, lasts for days and unintelligent get no save, and it can still effect intelligent undead! Really, in conjunction with Animate Dead, it basically gives you a massively extended pool of undead to work with to the point that the HD cap on Animate Dead quickly becomes irrelevant.
Once again the Mohrg has some options and is only prevented from grabbing or paralyzing that one PC. Of course there's also the matter of getting FoM cast before the very stealthy Mohrg gets hold of you in the first place. The Ring of FoM is much more problematic than the spell in this regards.
Yeah, shadows are easy prey for Command Undead and can create more shadows which it can control or even order to fail the save vs your Command Undead. I guess similar tactics could work with vampires, and the master vampire would be a lot more durable. Vampires could also Dominate living beings, potentially extending the empire formed by your 2nd level spell even further. Allowed to run rampant I suppose that Command Undead could trivialize an entire campaign, but I suspect most GMs would counter it in various ways, most commonly, "Hey, that's Evil, cut it out!" (Honestly I don't blame them)
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
On the subject of weakest saves, the Dazing Spell metamagic can let you target weak saves, especially Reflex, with a very powerful effect.
Rogues- Obscuring Mist
Beware the Shadow Strike feat, otherwise that nerf just became a TPK...
Globe of Invulnerability, Lesser- Rakshasa. All it can do then is claw at you then.. which isn't going to work against a 10th level party.
|
Detect Evil- Court cases
There's plenty of ways around that. Misdirection can make an innocent suspect look evil, undetectable alignment or a handful of other effects can prevent an evil person from detecting, and beingevil doesn't necessarily mean you committed a specific offense, nor does not being evil necessarily mean you're innocent.
Pit Spells- Roper. While its got SR 27, its only sporting a reflex of +5 and 10 ft of movement and large size, coupled with the inability to deal with difficult terrain. It's not supposed to have to move, meaning just one of these spells neutralizes it, if not killing it in the case of Hungry pit. A proper placement means that even if it makes its save, it either has to spend the turn double moving away (possibly subjecting it to another one, pinning it between the two) or fall in anyways.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
In the case of poor Mr Roper, he doesn't even have the climb speed that most oozes possess, limiting him to at best 10' a turn of moving upwards, more than enough time for a Hungry Pit to just annihilate him.
Pit v golems
Dazing anything v incorporeals....and in fact everything
Dazing Spell is really strong in a lot of encounters. I wonder if it shouldn't offer a new save each round.
I used an Acid Pit to get rid of a Roper a few sessions ago. If somebody doesn't want to "get in the Pit" a Huge or Greater Air Elemental in Whirlwind form can probably encourage them. Of course this is even better outdoors.
|
Black tentacles and slow are two spells that pretty much put the screws to (almost) everything. Alternatively, you could trap something up against a wall with a force wall, ice wall, resilient sphere or what have you and drop an acid pit under them. Good luck with that; you still fall in even if you pass the save because no adjacent squares are open.
Freedom of movement turns a lot of dangerous monsters into trivial encounters due to its grapple protection.
Cacophonous Call and its Mass version make encounters trivial. One missed save and your nauseated for the duration. It's better than hold spells now.
Prediction of Failure on a single big creature encounters can turn an encounter trivial. Even on a failed save, it lasts 1 round per level and gives a -4 penalty on every roll.
energy drain and enervate make single creatures trivial. If you can cast more than once and/or empower or maximize them, they can turn a dangerous creature into a trivial creature quickly.
I'd like to see a lot more spells provide a save every round or save period.
Oozes without climb speeds: Pit Spells
Stinking Cloud (+Grease if you're a real jerk): Anything with a bad fort save
Fog Cloud: Rogues
Grease: Things that like to charge
Greater Teleport: Because "losing" doesn't matter when you can just leave
Mage's Disjunction: If it works? Everything at high levels.
Waves of Exhaustion: All melee
Icy prison
Good call on the enervate. Got hit by 2 in the same round recently in a game and made me sad for a while!!
A lot of these aren't quite "win button" spells. Icy Prison is definitely a nasty spell, but at least creatures with allies can be freed pretty easily with damage. I don't think Prediction of Failure is that bad as an 8th level spell since Bards can make everybody within 30' shaken as a swift action with Dirge of Doom (and then hit them with Cruel weapons to get sickened too). Meanwhile the Witch could use Evil Eye for another -4 which stacks with those.
In any event, the enemies can at least still try to fight, unlike with Cacophonous Call, which I agree should offer a save every round. Along the same lines, Greater Forbid Action lasts for a round per level, and if you command them not to move even stuff with Greater Teleport has to sit still and get blown away. I'd prefer if any spell which effectively eliminates multiple foes from combat with a failed save offered a new save each round.
Well, the Spellbane spell can potentially negate any problems you may have with spells that nerf encounters. Provided the monsters are capable of casting it they can just specify the spells that hurt them most and become immune to it. Unless of course the spell the players are using gives them the advantage without being in the range of spellbane (like flight).
And unlike the players, you're tailoring the encounter to them and have the benefit of know what your monsters are going to be facing. I'm not saying you should make your monsters seem to be metagaming and somehow know the PC's bests spells, but they could be aware of their own weaknesses and use spellbane to cover them to the best of their ability.
Reverse gravity can create ALOT of fun
Blade barrier comboed with reverse gravity being used twice. Set up a trap so that enemies get reverse gravitied right through the blade barrier, hit the ceiling, and then it reverses again.
The group that invented it called it the Gnomish Negotiator.
I've used pit spells as a high int wizard to devastating effect in rise of the runelords on a regular basis.