The half orc sorcerer fcb gives additional damage to fire damage spells.
If I use scorching ray, does this additional damage apply to each ray I fire or just one of them?
Such rules usually only apply to one
|
According to the rules, the bonus damage would only apply to one ray.
But the official rule is dumb, inconsistent, and not in any way that I've seen unbalanced, so I say screw it and add it to each ray of scorching ray. Is it really going to break the game if you do? It's a cool synergy that makes a typically unused spell have a specific, interesting effect? Then it's fine.
Davor, with arcane trickster builds, you can very quickly get unbalanced games using the rules as you suggest.
I just wrote up a quick build to make sure (very bare bones build). They can use Battering Blast (level 3 spell) to deal an average of 121 points of damage at level 10. At level 14, they're using the same spell to do an average of almost 250 points of damage (using a level 3 spell slot). If they used a level 5 spell slot, and a metamagic rod of empower spell, they could kill a CR 19 Great Wyrm Black Dragon by themselves in one turn (without the metamagic rod, they'd leave it with 10 hp). They can use a spell in that fashion over 10 times a day (well, with multiple rods). That's probably something level 14 characters shouldn't be able to do.
Since you can make an arcane trickster fun and powerful enough without adding addition damage to each attack, there's no reason to break the game.
EDIT: Also note, you could use the same level 5 spell slot to do 100+ damage to three different targets instead.
Seconded.
If you give that extra damage to every ray, half-orcs racial favored class bonus would be much stronger than any other bonus.
Boiling Blood rocks with that extra damage :D
|
|
Davor, with arcane trickster builds, you can very quickly get unbalanced games using the rules as you suggest.
I just wrote up a quick build to make sure (very bare bones build). They can use Battering Blast (level 3 spell) to deal an average of 121 points of damage at level 10. At level 14, they're using the same spell to do an average of almost 250 points of damage (using a level 3 spell slot). If they used a level 5 spell slot, and a metamagic rod of empower spell, they could kill a CR 19 Great Wyrm Black Dragon by themselves in one turn (without the metamagic rod, they'd leave it with 10 hp). They can use a spell in that fashion over 10 times a day (well, with multiple rods). That's probably something level 14 characters shouldn't be able to do.
Since you can make an arcane trickster fun and powerful enough without adding addition damage to each attack, there's no reason to break the game.
EDIT: Also note, you could use the same level 5 spell slot to do 100+ damage to three different targets instead.
You're going to have to be way more specific, because the only reason I fought so hard against that ruling was BECAUSE of the Arcane Trickster.
Regardless, it'd be impressive to see how you get 250 points of damage off of 3 battering blasts doing 5d6 each plus... what, 5d6 sneak attack damage each, give or take a couple? It sounds like some pretty hefty spell augmentation for blasters that could be problematic regardless of specific rule.
|
|
Yeah! Stupid rule, not being unbalanced! Screw it!
Allow me to clarify: The thing it seeks to fix is in no way that I've seen unbalanced, and it flies in the face of consistency. You would never think that Power Attack applied to only a single attack that a Fighter makes, or that Sneak Attack applies to only a single attack a rogue makes, or that Favored Enemy only applies to the first attack in a full attack, but all of a sudden you use a spell that creates multiple attack effects, and it only applies once?
Consistency is more my beef than anything else.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
You really don't see a problem with .5×level becoming .5xlevelxlevel?
5 bonus damage per spell at level 10 is a nice use of your favored class bonus, 50 bonus damage per spell is whacky and clearly not intended. 10 skill points for +50 damage a round is not in the ball park of balanced.
I don't quite follow. How are you getting 50 bonus damage (.5 * level * level) exactly?
I don't quite follow. How are you getting 50 bonus damage (.5 * level * level) exactly?You really don't see a problem with .5×level becoming .5xlevelxlevel?
5 bonus damage per spell at level 10 is a nice use of your favored class bonus, 50 bonus damage per spell is whacky and clearly not intended. 10 skill points for +50 damage a round is not in the ball park of balanced.
This is what I'd like to know: I'm keenly interested in what fire spell you can cast that allows 10 attack rolls from a 10th level character.
|
|
None that I know of. If you say there are not, I have no reason to doubt. I don't know my evocations.
More like 1 per 2 caster levels? Per 3? Less broken then, but still too good for a FCB I think.
Just the half-orc bonus becomes 10 damage on top of a scorching ray. 18 damage at around 12th level. It's hardly game-breaking, and encourages using a little-used spell.
That's the point. Is it useful? Sure, but it's unique, and not overly strong. What if scorching ray was the spell of choice for Half-Orc Sorcerers precisely because of this, but is rarely used by anyone else? What does that say about the nature of scorching ray in the setting itself? It provides narrative opportunity because it's so unique.
The only way this could actually be a thing is if you could somehow get Telekinesis to fling a boat-load of torches, causing it to deal fire damage, but even that use of Telekinesis got clarified in a way that makes sense for the spell, so... yeah, if there was some way to fire off 10+ rays per round, I'd pull back what I'm saying in a heartbeat. There is not, to my knowledge, though, so I'll continue saying it isn't a big deal, and encourages a unique type of synergy.
|
|
Closest I can think of is eight attacks with a CL 15 fiery shuriken.
At that level, you're looking at 8d8+56. That's not a bad use of a turn at 14th/15th level.
|
|
So in 3 rounds, youve exceeded the benifit a halforc alchemist could get from their FCB over the whole day.
Yep, sounds balanced.
You make it sound like it matters. Options between classes don't need to be perfectly balanced between each other: They just need to be balanced within the system.
To put it another way: If I ruled it this way and you were playing in my campaign, would you feel compelled to play a half-orc sorcerer over every other option? Is it powerful enough that it makes other options useless in comparison?
The same alchemist can burst WAY more damage than that in a single round. It's all about perspective.
Exactly. This isn't a class feature, or even a feat chain. It's a favored class bonus being way stronger than intended.
Huge damage from low level spells with no real investment.
FCB is equivalent to a feat [Toughness/Cunning]. For a single feat [Additional Traits], you can reduce your metamagic level by 2 for a spell, so you could take that fiery shuriken and add empowered it for FREE as an equivalent ability/power. So I'm not really seeing 'way stronger than intended'.
We can look at regular FCB if you wish: catfolk monk FCB adds 1/2 level to claw/clawblade damage rolls. At 15th level, a monk can make those same 8 attacks [flurry, haste, ki] adding the same bonus to each attack. As such, it really doesn't seem stronger than intended.
EDIT: and don't forget that by 15th, what doesn't have fire resistance anymore. A simple resist 5 chops off 40 fire from 8 hits...
You're going to have to be way more specific, because the only reason I fought so hard against that ruling was BECAUSE of the Arcane Trickster.
Regardless, it'd be impressive to see how you get 250 points of damage off of 3 battering blasts doing 5d6 each plus... what, 5d6 sneak attack damage each, give or take a couple? It sounds like some pretty hefty spell augmentation for blasters that could be problematic regardless of specific rule.
Uh, build is gone. But could probably easily recreate.
2 Ninja
4 Sorcerer
8 Arcane Trickster
Relevant nonsense: +1 CL from Ioun Stone. +2 CL from trait (total is now Caster Level 15). +1 Sneak Attack die from Accomplished Sneak Attacker feat (for a total of +6d6). With Intensify Spell, and a trait that eliminates the +1 spell level, you're popping three orbs that do 7d6+6d6 sneak attack (a ninja could swift action invis against those who can't see it). Orc Bloodline and Blood Havoc means you tack on +2 per die (from my understanding, this counts towards Sneak Attack, as well. Though I believe it would be more balanced if this wasn't the case). That means 3(7d6+6d6+26). Averaging it out, we're now at 214.5 damage. There are tons of improves to this.
I don't remember exactly what I did. If the toon could afford Greater Sniper Goggles, that gives us +12 damage per orb. Now I'm trying to remember. Get a drawback for another trait, and you can make Empower only cost one additional Spell Level. That's not what I did previously, but that would add an additional average of 22.75 damage per orb.
With Maximize Spell rod, that level 4 spell slot is doing 416.25 damage. (Because I didn't show many math last time: Each orb does 7d6(5d6 base, intensified adds 2d6 more) +14 base damage (+2 per die, one from Blood Havoc, one from Orc Bloodline) + 6d6 (Sneak Attack) +24 (+2 per die from Blood Havoc and Orc Bloodline, +2 per die from Greater Sniper Goggles). All of this is maxed and empowered. There are three orbs.)
I mean, when you have many, many different factors that determine total damage, and all of them grow exponentially, you can start doing stupid amounts of damage.
Is this a very specific build? Yeah, it's optimized. That's what most people do with a build. They do the most that the rules will allow.
This entire post is incoherent, but hopefully you get my point.
I mean, I've made a build for an Arcane Trickster that uses the actual rules (you can't stack Sneak Attack per orb) that's very similar to the above build, and it's still fun, flavorful, and can hold it's own. So sure, I'm for the current ruling.