The saving throw against Evil Eye is never ignored. It's a save: Will (partial) thing going on, where a successful save reduces the duration to one round. I'm sure there are spells like that, though right off the bat I can only think of spells that reduce damage or inflict a lesser version of an ailment on a save.
A cackling witch is severely limited. She is basically staggered, only she can't charge as a staggered creature would. "Ignoring" evil eye's saving throw comes at the price of a move action every single round that you want evil eye to last further than the first. If a witch has even just 16 int, an evil eye has a duration of 6 rounds. To achieve this on a failed save, you have to give up 5 move actions. That's 5 rounds where you can't double move, run, retreat, charge* or cast any spells with a full round casting time.
*Not that most witches would do this anyway, but it's still of the table.
While the ruling makes Evil Eye itself distinctly unattractive, the broader Witch class is still playable without Evil Eye.
The saving throw against Evil Eye is never ignored. It's a save: Will (partial) thing going on, where a successful save reduces the duration to one round. I'm sure there are spells like that, though right off the bat I can only think of spells that reduce damage or inflict a lesser version of an ailment on a save.
E.g. irresistible dance.
The saving throw against Evil Eye is never ignored. It's a save: Will (partial) thing going on, where a successful save reduces the duration to one round. I'm sure there are spells like that, though right off the bat I can only think of spells that reduce damage or inflict a lesser version of an ailment on a save.E.g. irresistible dance.
Thanks :D
Whether it is worth keeping is up to you. Many people use hexes more than they use spells. If you feel like you cam make up the difference with spells I would not worry about it. However if your build is based around evil eye you might want to try to build something else.
Right, so I've been playing a witch in book one of Shattered Star. I've already secured permission to rebuild my character, due to general dissatisfaction with Winter Witch and the revelation we likely won't be continuing into the second book.
As such I am faced with an important question. A few weeks ago the DM decided to nerf Evil Eye, removing the 1 round duration if they pass their Will save. Here is his rationale:it's designed with a saving throw, as it should be, but mechanically the saving throw is completely ignored.
that's why i said it can't affect them if they pass the save
so it keeps the idea, but is not opIs it worth playing a witch to fifth level without the Evil Eye+Cackle to ensure that my hexes will affect them, or should I rebuild my character into a wizard?
Also, is there a good way to refute my DM's logic?
Your DM fails to realize that evil-eye, in the grand scheme of things, is rather minute. Sure, you can ensure evil-eye never ends by cackling (move) regardless of if they succeed or fail the save, but then there is the issue that you have to be within charging or just moving and attacking range to do it unless you take some options to negate this. He should look at it like this: you are an insanely squishy character with bad AC who, around level 3 - 5, "brute" monsters should be able to hit regularly and potentially 1-shot. By being within range to cackle you are putting yourself at such a great disadvantage that it becomes a risk vs reward game where you are going to eventually lose horribly.
Of course, I've had players counter this as witches. I had a player walk around as a witch wearing full plate that he couldn't use and a tower shield. He only spammed his SLAs and cackled all the time. His spells were only used out of combat where he could take off the armor. Mostly it was to heal the fighter.
Wizards are great, but I'd recommend you play an Occultist Arcanist. You get the ability to summon monsters with a 1 min/lvl duration as a standard action as a SLA, meaning it ignores arcane spell failure. Did you ever want to play an armored mage? Now you can, just cannibalize your spells to continue doing it. More importantly this allows you to turn lower level spells into higher level summoning spells. Look it up, it is fantastic even if you can only have one summon monster spell active on the field at a time. Mix with superior summons and the new summoning feats and you're probably going to be one of the most dangerous people there not for your direct killing potential, but for the fact that you can summon for days.
Or play a shaman to use hexes and wear armor and cast spells and... you know do many of the witch stuff only while wearing armor and having a different spell list.
But beware, some of the shaman hexes will vary in strength depending on the new FAQ about abilities as sources.
I can understand your GM's concern. Especially in concert with other character builds that make use of the effects of Evil Eye, i.e. a save or suck caster alongside you. It's an especially potent ability when other player characters can take advantage of it. The fact that it effects the target even on a successful save is a huge ability. It is a Save AND Suck ability, and there is a reason you don't find many abilities like that in the game because they are so strong. With your character and another one built to take advantage of Evil Eye you have a high probability of being able to take out an enemy even if they succeed on their first save. So I can completely understand where your GM's concern is.
As to whether or not the Witch is a tenable class with this change in the functionality...that is up to you. I think the class if still very usable even without it, and you still have a chance of success with Evil Eye. Not every creatuer will make its save, and then you can really let loose with your other abilities.
But try to understand that a Witch makes single enemy fights even more impossible to run than they already were. Abilities like Evil Eye mean that no matter what you do (as a GM) your BBEG (even when used with minions) it going to be disabled or reduced so badly that he is effecticely out of the fight. Sure, that 10th level Antipaladin and his cultist minions look great on paper against the 7th level party, but the witch just CC'd him with Evil Eye and Misfortune.
And the broken sleep hex hasn't been nerfed by him? One greataxe+ sleep hex = death or scythe
The worst thing about evil eye, for me, was that often times when I wanted to put my spells to use my party went: " Just use evil eye and carry on." which was some kind of boring.
The worst thing about evil eye, for me, was that often times when I wanted to put my spells to use my party went: " Just use evil eye and carry on." which was some kind of boring.
Your party shouldn't be deciding what your character does in combat ...
Right, so I've been playing a witch in book one of Shattered Star. I've already secured permission to rebuild my character, due to general dissatisfaction with Winter Witch and the revelation we likely won't be continuing into the second book.
As such I am faced with an important question. A few weeks ago the DM decided to nerf Evil Eye, removing the 1 round duration if they pass their Will save. Here is his rationale:it's designed with a saving throw, as it should be, but mechanically the saving throw is completely ignored.
that's why i said it can't affect them if they pass the save
so it keeps the idea, but is not opIs it worth playing a witch to fifth level without the Evil Eye+Cackle to ensure that my hexes will affect them, or should I rebuild my character into a wizard?
Also, is there a good way to refute my DM's logic?
There is very good way refute your GMs logic. The Inquisitor gets a class feature call Stawart. It basicall say if the Inqisitor makes a save that has reduced effect they avoid the effect entirely. This change invalidates the Inquisitor's class feature. Basically the GM is saying if you save there should never be reduced effects.
When it comes to evil eye we don't allow cackle to apply to successful saves. It never occurred to us that you should be able to use cackle on the 1 round for successful save. Now reading it by raw you could I suppose, never noticed that. We just figured the 1 round lingering effect was not a duration so it could not be applied to that.
When it comes to evil eye we don't allow cackle to apply to successful saves. It never occurred to us that you should be able to use cackle on the 1 round for successful save. Now reading it by raw you could I suppose, never noticed that. We just figured the 1 round lingering effect was not a duration so it could not be applied to that.
Actually, that seems like the best compromise.
Allow Evil Eye as written, but if they save successfully Cackle can't be used to extend it. That's where the problem really grows. Having to make multiple saves at a penalty over several rounds is significantly worse than just 1 round. There is basically only one chance per each other character to do something with it.
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It is a Save AND Suck ability, and there is a reason you don't find many abilities like that in the game because they are so strong.
You mean like how you can just intimidate someone, and give them a -2 to saves, attacks, ability checks, and skill checks, all at once, instead of one at a time?
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It is a Save AND Suck ability, and there is a reason you don't find many abilities like that in the game because they are so strong.You mean like how you can just intimidate someone, and give them a -2 to saves, attacks, ability checks, and skill checks, all at once, instead of one at a time?
Hmmmmm..... yes, I have now realized that the right answer is to make a melee character with both Riving Strike AND Cornugon Smash.
But this is just me spewing poison and trying to cause trouble. Still, it is an interesting option, no? Riving strike is basically a failed evil eye that applies to saves as far as spells are concerned. For one of the primary GM concerns of a evil eyed witch- pairing with SoS caster, this is basically the same result. Only instead of maintaining the effect with a cackle, you do it by giving the other side a crack on the head.
And putting cornugon smash on top of that is just mean, since it makes it a -4 to those saves. So....if you are looking for revenge (DON'T LOOK FOR REVENGE KIDS) this seems like a fairly decent way to do so while keeping your debuffer role.
Maybe put it on an inquisitor (that takes an arcane SLA so they can still qualify for arcane strike) so you can also do some spell caster stuff like heals and buffs (plus that sweet 1/2 level scaling bonus to intimidate)......AND I just ended up making a 9 level reach build as I typed that....I kinda want to make an inquisitor of Nethys now just because this makes wizards awesome....
Hmmmmm..... yes, I have now realized that the right answer is to make a melee character with both Riving Strike AND Cornugon Smash.
But this is just me spewing poison and trying to cause trouble. Still, it is an interesting option, no? Riving strike is basically a failed evil eye that applies to saves as far as spells are concerned. For one of the primary GM concerns of a evil eyed witch- pairing with SoS caster, this is basically the same result. Only instead of maintaining the effect with a cackle, you do it by giving the other side a crack on the head.
And putting cornugon smash on top of that is just mean, since it makes it a -4 to those saves. So....if you are looking for revenge (DON'T LOOK FOR REVENGE KIDS) this seems like a fairly decent way to do so while keeping your debuffer role.
Maybe put it on an inquisitor (that takes an arcane SLA so they can still qualify for arcane strike) so you can also do some spell caster stuff like heals and buffs (plus that sweet 1/2 level scaling bonus to intimidate)......AND I just ended up making a 9 level reach build as I typed that....I kinda want to make an inquisitor of Nethys now just because this makes wizards awesome....
Another possibility would be a Slayer or Ranger of Sarenrae. Sarenrae's combat style lets you pick up Whirlwind Attack at 6th level, so you can do your Cornuriving Smash as an AoE.
THINGSAnother possibility would be a Slayer or Ranger of Sarenrae. Sarenrae's combat style lets you pick up Whirlwind Attack at 6th level, so you can do your Cornuriving Smash as an AoE.
...and the best way for them to get SLA is through a Sarenrae religion trait, light bringer, since that it is one of the few traits that give an SLA that scales off of level, rather than highest caster level obtained. So Sarenrae just give out cool stuff. There is a reason why she is one of the better gods for people to follow.
Anyway, point is- with all this, people are more likely to be mind controlled if you bash their heads in first. And that is a perfectly fine role for a melee character to have, and I love ACG for adding riving strike (plus mutagenic warrior- sorry..but WINGS- a lot of this is going onto a reach fighter I am thinking of anyway)
It is a Save AND Suck ability, and there is a reason you don't find many abilities like that in the game because they are so strong.You mean like how you can just intimidate someone, and give them a -2 to saves, attacks, ability checks, and skill checks, all at once, instead of one at a time?
I'm not sure I understand your point. Are you agreeing with me? Because I said not many abilities, not "no others". Demoralized focused builds can be incredibly effective, though I really don't like the mechanics used for it because 1) skills are too easy to buff compared to spell DCs, 2) save bonuses and other defenses don't help because you don't get to roll a save at all. The only thing that you can do to protect yourself is have some sort of fear immunity or have a higher wisdom. Demoralize isn't even a save or suck, because you don't get a chance to even save.
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Hmmmmm..... yes, I have now realized that the right answer is to make a melee character with both Riving Strike AND Cornugon Smash.It is a Save AND Suck ability, and there is a reason you don't find many abilities like that in the game because they are so strong.You mean like how you can just intimidate someone, and give them a -2 to saves, attacks, ability checks, and skill checks, all at once, instead of one at a time?
Don't forget to combo Cornugon Smash with Shatter Defenses so that they count as flat-footed after the first swing.
It is a Save AND Suck ability, and there is a reason you don't find many abilities like that in the game because they are so strong.
In fact there are lots of save AND suck spells. My witch had and used some of them. Frost fall (especially with rime spell), ray of exhaustion, suffocate, Terrible remorse, just off my head. A lot of spells have save partial and still have a relevant effect with a successful save.
Now for EE the effect is the save IF the witch spends a move action every turn. I don't like all or nothing effects so when playing casters I tend to look for save and suck.
There is a decent selection of save or suck spells, but relative to the number of Save or Suck spells there are far less, I guess I expressed my sentiment incorrectly. You are absolutely right though that spells without saves are favorites, or at least spells that still have an effect with save.
But I also wasn't just talking about spells, I was talking general abilities throughout the game. Personally I'd be happier if all save and sucks were removed from the game, but that would drastically alter the game and would probably be left to another edition of the game.
There is a decent selection of save or suck spells, but relative to the number of Save or Suck spells there are far less, I guess I expressed my sentiment incorrectly. You are absolutely right though that spells without saves are favorites, or at least spells that still have an effect with save.
But I also wasn't just talking about spells, I was talking general abilities throughout the game. Personally I'd be happier if all save and sucks were removed from the game, but that would drastically alter the game and would probably be left to another edition of the game.
That would be a change that could really drive me away from PF.
As is mundane characters are to weak to really play and with casters I don't like all or nothing. I lost my hope that the caster/martial disparity will some day be fixed so at the moment casters with martial abilities and save and suck spells are the only playable thing.**Other things ARE playable but not in every game and not everyone likes it.
I'm not sure I understand your point. Are you agreeing with me? Because I said not many abilities, not "no others". Demoralized focused builds can be incredibly effective, though I really don't like the mechanics used for it because 1) skills are too easy to buff compared to spell DCs, 2) save bonuses and other defenses don't help because you don't get to roll a save at all.It is a Save AND Suck ability, and there is a reason you don't find many abilities like that in the game because they are so strong.You mean like how you can just intimidate someone, and give them a -2 to saves, attacks, ability checks, and skill checks, all at once, instead of one at a time?
I was kind of disagreeing, yeah, I don't think comparable abilities are all that rare. Intimidate might be only one example, but Intimidate is hardly niche.
I was referring to commonplace use of Intimidate rather than a specialist build, though - a specialist would likely wield other advantages, such as making the check with less than a standard action, getting a free check while you damage someone, intimidating everyone within a certain area, or something similar. The commonplace Intimidate use, where you just spend a standard action to demoralize a single target, is more comparable to Evil Eye which also requires a standard action.
