It's important to note that critting on your attack roll reduces the enemies save by one step, meaning if you crit, no matter what the pit fiend does, even if they roll a natural 20, they take full damage from the spell at the very least, if not double damage from failing the save + you critting the hit since there is no such thing as critically succeeding a disintegrate save. I'm not sure if Balor's or Pit Fiend's take half damage from all spells or something but otherwise I don't see how Disintegrate's expected damage could ever be less than 50% barring absorption and the like.
We're both wrong.
Without enhancements you have a 50% chance to miss (zero damage) and a 50% chance (or much higher for the Pit Fiend) chance for them to successfully save and take half damage. That's an expected value of 37.5% or less of the average damage dice when you decide to cast the spell - 50% chance of zero on a miss plus 25% chance of a hit and failed save (full damage) plus 25% chance of a hit and successful save (half damage) equals 37.5% of expected damage (not accounting for your small 5% crit chances at each stage, which boosts this but still leaves you well under 50%).
Again, my point is that you really need those hit enhancers, and save debuffs don't hurt.
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Floating Disk went from 1 hour per level down to 1 hour. It went from 100 pounds per level to a flat 5 bulk, and you can't put a person on it or it fails. Not that you could find a 5 bulk person anyway. 5 bulk is about 25-50 pounds. No, it isn't a cantrip.
What is this spell even for now?
I certainly wasn't disagreeing with your point though, considering a 9th level disintegrate's average damage is just 1/3rd of a pit fiends HP, missing would be a disastrous waste. I don't really think the spell is designed for Pit Fiends and Balors though, more for mid-power creatures than the late game ones.
It's weak against all equal power enemies by design, I think. Nothing will ever get one shot unless it is several levels below you. We've done the high end, lets look at the low end.
11th level Wizard with 18 dex, 20 int and a +1 wand has (11 + 4 + 1) +16 to hit and (10 + 11 + 5) 26 DC and his Disintegrate does 66 avg damage on a hit and failed save.
1. An 11th level Toad Demon has TAC 26 (hit 55% of the time), +20 Fort (saves 75% of the time) and 265 HP (four times the avg damage of the Disintegration. You'd need at least two double damage disintegrates to kill it, and some luck on the damage rolls. The odds of that are terrible without significant help.
2. An 11th level Elder Air Elemental has TAC 31 (hit 30% of the time), +15 fort save (saves 50% of the time), and 145 HP. One double damage plus one single damage will kill it if both hit. Still very hard to do.
3. An 11th level Elder Earth Elemental has TAC 26, +20 Fort, 185 HP. Same defense stats as the Toad Demon but fewer HP, basically the same overall vulnerability as the Air Elemental.
I'll skip the Water and Fire Elementals, they're similar, higher TAC gets lower Fort and vice versa, HP within the same ballpark.
4. An 11th level Stone Golem is immune.
5. An 11th level Adult Black Dragon is TAC 27, Fort +20, HP 195. Slightly ougher than the Earth Elemental.
6. An 11th level Goliath Spider is TAC 25, Fort +20, 228 HP. Probably tied with the dragon for second toughest behind the Toad Demon.
I expect this holds all the way up the level growth. A max level disintegrate that is optimized via party help, True Strike, and some mild debuffing has a good (but far from guaranteed) chance to do double damage to a target, but will only take off between 50-90% of the targets HP, with 2/3 being normal. That's very nice, but it requires a boost to not have a very high chance of being a damp squib and will still require some luck and some other (usually very significant) damage to finish it off.
Grease got a small buff alongside the nerfs. You can't target most 2-handed weapons anymore (1 bulk limit, most 2h weapons are 2B) but when you target the floor it no longer has to be a 10-foot square, which makes it slightly easier to use without affecting the party and significantly better in narrow corridors.
Depending on how Dangerous Sorcery gets applied to damage rolls 9th lvl Magic Missile does 187 avg damage with no attack roll.
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Just got through reading the spell list myself.
Overall, I'm okay with spells getting rebalanced as weaker per spell level in this edition considering that martials seem like they need more time to get all their tricks. If martials took longer while casters stayed the same, then the gap would have only gotten bigger.
Like how there are a good number of uncommon spells to help the GM keep a bit of control on certain things (especially setting breaking ones). Notably both scrying and teleport are uncommon spells, and scrying explicitly does not allow scry n' fry anymore.
Especially happy with nerfs to Endure Elements. Now it's a 2nd level spell with a 10 minute casting time that has to be heightened to 5th level before it can deal with extreme temperatures. Not to mention the temperature bands of what qualifies for severe or extreme cold/heat seem to have been adjusted. And with Create Water being a 1st level spell now, harsh environments seem like they can actually be a thing in the setting. (Though strangely, Create Food seems to be only a 2nd level spell now instead of 3rd level.)
Comprehend Language and Tongues getting pushed back in level means mundane language knowledge can be more useful without getting replaced as quickly.
It looks like Detect Magic + Read Aura will now be 2 default cantrips for casters? At least until Detect Magic gets its heighten effect.
The Shield cantrip looks rather good, especially once it gets its heightened effects. Sure it gets dismissed for 10 mins after a shield block, but a normal shield looks like it can only take 1-2 hits before being broken anyway. If you have a longer adventuring day, the cantrip might actually be better (& far cheaper) than an actual shield, especially considering a legendary steel shield is only hardness 11, while the cantrip heighted to 3rd level nearly matches that at hardness 10 (and later increases to 15 and 20). And unlike an actual shield, you never have to repair it or worry about an unlucky hit destroying it beyond salvage and wasting the money you spent on it. Plus being verbal only casting means you can freely two-hand a weapon with it for more martial casters. Overall, I have to wonder if it might be too good considering every caster gets it for free while martials are paying for shields (& replacements) and using up a hand in combat.
And as others have already said, True Strike looks very strong. I imagine that any gish would happily fill all their first level slots with it, and it'll be near essential for any high level spells requiring an attack roll to make sure you don't waste the effect.
Animate Dead and Astral Projection were removed :(
Animate Dead and Astral Projection were removed :(
I suspect both will return in the final. Quite likely as rituals. Animate Dead, I'm almost certain will be there and a ritual. A lot of the missing options will likely return, similar to magic items. This is just a test after all. And they only put a few rituals in, probably just to see if the system works before they go all in with creating more. My playtest starts tomorrow, and I doubt we'll see rituals until later. But I am rather liking the way they're done. Although maybe there could be some option for rituals that don't take multiple days. Some kind of fast ritual that's quicker than a standard one, but longer than normal spell casting. And doesn't take a slot.
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I'll be a little sad if Animate Dead returns only in ritual form. Having a spell to create a few undead mid-fight means a fight against a necromancer feels more dangerous, not only do you worry about their magic killing you and your companions, but that if it does, your companion will get right back up and fight again. This going away would be a shame.
I'll be a little sad if Animate Dead returns only in ritual form. Having a spell to create a few undead mid-fight means a fight against a necromancer feels more dangerous, not only do you worry about their magic killing you and your companions, but that if it does, your companion will get right back up and fight again. This going away would be a shame.
That's a good point. So there is a design space for both spell and rituals to animate dead. Maybe Animate Dead as a spell and Create Undead as a ritual.
Posted this in another thread too, but Comprehend Languages looks flat-out better than tongues 90% of the time.
2nd level version works how it always had but for only one language, and is a nerf (except for duration, which is buffed at levels 3-5).
3rd level version gives speaking a language, meaning it worked for a lot of what you needed tongues for by granting one language. It doesn't grant multiple languages like tongues, and you need exposure to the language to use it, but it is also 2 levels lower, common, and lasts 6 times longer.
4th level version is as above, but also affects the whole party as opposed to the above's one creature, or tongues' 1 creature. And it is still one level lower and one step more common than tongues. And you can throw a few NPCs or familiars in on the speaking-stuff action.
Another potential game-changer, I think holding a touch spell charge is gone from the game. Any find it anywhere, or did it get left in PF1?
It can't be RAI for disrupting spells to be this difficult for enemies, even if it is RAW (at least for now).There four monsters in the bestiary who have Disruptive on their AoO, which allows them to trigger on a Concentrate action. Levels 13, 20, 20, and 22, though.Not sure why some of you seem to think concentration on a spell is easily broken. It's no longer "take damage on an enemies turn and lose the spell".
Concentration takes a single action on your turn each round. Only being damaged on this action will make you lose concentration. The action has only the concentrate trait, so it doesn't even trigger attacks of opportunity.
Not counting exotic reactions some monsters might have (haven't read the bestiary yet), the only reliable way to hit a caster when he does his concentration action is to ready an action with that trigger.
Are you kidding? Spell disruption is ridiculous easy, it only takes damage equals to caster level, and anyone can use the Ready Action to Ready a Strike when the caster cast a spell.
It can't be RAI for disrupting spells to be this difficult for enemies, even if it is RAW (at least for now).There four monsters in the bestiary who have Disruptive on their AoO, which allows them to trigger on a Concentrate action. Levels 13, 20, 20, and 22, though.Not sure why some of you seem to think concentration on a spell is easily broken. It's no longer "take damage on an enemies turn and lose the spell".
Concentration takes a single action on your turn each round. Only being damaged on this action will make you lose concentration. The action has only the concentrate trait, so it doesn't even trigger attacks of opportunity.
Not counting exotic reactions some monsters might have (haven't read the bestiary yet), the only reliable way to hit a caster when he does his concentration action is to ready an action with that trigger.
Normal AoO is more common and triggers on any somatic or material components. Disruptive just adds verbal components and nonspellcasting concentrate actions.
As a lover of playing wizards, this really does break my heart. Support caster/conjurer has always been a reliable build for me in 1e because my party usually has one or two heavy hitters. So I can throw down debuffs on the enemies and summon a monster or two to eat a crit from the giant enemy with a huge damage rider or send over a flanking partner.
Honestly I feel one of the best way to reign in spells would be to go back through the 1e spell list and just remove the scaling. Like summon monster. If you tightened up the list of possible summons and made all levels of the spell last for 1 min, it would be much more balanced. From experience, our combats rarely went over 10 rounds and if I was using Summon Monster IV to summon 1d4+1 from the Summon Monster II list, those guys weren't hitting anything.
As was mentioned earlier, blasting spells got the buffs pretty much all around, but are generally poor uses of spell slots. Every wizard needs a fireball or a two once the battle is in hand, but Glitterdust, Summon Monster, Walls, Haste/Slow, Rope Trick, et al, those are our bread and butter.
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Another Scrying nerf: you can no longer cast spells through the scrying sensor, so no Detect spells, Read Magic, Tongues or Message . The latter is especially painful as that eliminates long-distance, two-way communication.
Removing scry&fry is a positive development, but the way the nerf is worded means you also can't scry on one of your allies in order to teleport to them. So don't split the party, folks.
Detect Scrying lasts 10 minutes at 4th level. Why would anyone prepare this as a 4th level spell? If you know you're going to be scried on in a 10-minute window then you don't need the spell. If you don't know within a 10-minute window, then it's not going to help.
So many nerfs to simple things. Mending, Prestidigitation, transportation... Apparently spells are powerful enough to kill people in a spetacular manner, but not fix a tear in your clothes in under an hour. Magic can do everything except remove the tedium from your daily life. Ugh. It feels like Paizo only wants blaster wizards in this edition.
Many of these nerfs have a distinct "addressing combat issues we don't like" odor to them, but there's no consideration of magic's place and function in the wider world. For example, how does a government protect itself from magical attack if Antimagic Field is a rare spell that can't suppress higher level magic?
As far as my group has been able to determine, spells with attack rolls (and no saving throw, e.g. Ray of Frost) can no longer crit.
The rules for crits on 178 says, "If you critically succeed at a Strike" and the rules for crits on 308 says, "When you double the damage on a critical success with a Strike, or with any other action or activity that multiplies damage."
However, spells do not use the Strike keyword, defined thus on page 10:
You use the Strike action to make an attack.
Following the "spells only do what they say they do" no spell qualifies as "any other action or activity that multiplies damage" except the ones with saving throws.
As far as my group has been able to determine, spells with attack rolls (and no saving throw, e.g. Ray of Frost) can no longer crit.
The rules for crits on 178 says, "If you critically succeed at a Strike" and the rules for crits on 308 says, "When you double the damage on a critical success with a Strike, or with any other action or activity that multiplies damage."
However, spells do not use the Strike keyword, defined thus on page 10:
You use the Strike action to make an attack.Following the "spells only do what they say they do" no spell qualifies as "any other action or activity that multiplies damage" except the ones with saving throws.
That’s the general rule. The specific rule for each spell overrules it. If it says it crits, it crits in the way it says it does.
That’s the general rule. The specific rule for each spell overrules it. If it says it crits, it crits in the way it says it does.
That's my point. There are no "make a [ranged] touch attack" spell that lists a crit effect. PF1, all spells with an attack roll could crit for double damage. Now none of them can.
This is the "notable spell changes" thread and that's a pretty notable change.
Have...you...read any of the ranged touch spell descriptions? They all have crit effects!
It’s in the text of Polar Ray, not the heightening numbers.
Another notable change on Scrying: the sensor doesn't follow the target unless they critically fail on their saving throw.
Critical Failure The spell succeeds, and the eye follows the target if it moves, traveling up to 60 feet per round.
Detect scrying is really only going to be useful if you want to discuss something super sensitive (ala cone of silence). It was a struggle to get it cast regularly in PF1e, with this change it will almost never be cast.
Summon Monster has been noted as taking a hit via concentration, reduced actions, and reduced power level of the summons, but the elementals actually work quite nicely as crowd control even if they can't hit anything very reliably. Starting at 5th spell level they are large, at 6th they are huge, making them decent HP walls that have to be killed before an enemy can advance. But wait, there's more!
Air Elemental: All have the high winds aura, imposing difficult terrain for flyers trying to outmaneuver you. Starting at 6th spell level they have a breath weapon attack that imposes some knockback even on a successful save.
Earth Elemental: Earth glide lets it go suicide attack through dungeon/cave walls if you want. At 6th spell level they have an aura that makes difficult terrain and imposes minor damage for walking through it.
Fire Elemental: They all inflict fire damage explosions when they die, so that's something. At spell level 6 they also have a damaging fire aura. Great for blocking/areal denial of monsters with fire weakness.
Water: Like air, they have a big difficult terrain aura to slow down swimmers. Alas, their active control ability is a reaction, so summons don't get it. But their (woefully inaccurate) melee strike has some pushback.
Other interesting summons at 6th spell level include the Nightmare, which has a sick 2 aura (albeit with a really easy save when they take the actions to get rid of it), and a Lust Demon (which has a 50-60% chance to succeed at its grapple against a vulnerable level 11 foe, immediately followed a free enervation and a small chance that they fail their will save and allow a double enervation next turn).
I wouldn't personally prepare a 9th level spell for this, but I note the Valkyrie can deliver 3x11d8 Heal spells and 3xDeath Wards if you happen to need them. The Treachery Demon at this level is at least a Huge bag of hit points that cannot, alas, use his Reverse Gravity due to insufficient actions.
At higher levels summons appear to have about a 30% chance to hit same level (as the caster) enemies with their first attack. Don't plan on melee being a reasonable contributor.
Have...you...read any of the ranged touch spell descriptions? They all have crit effects!
Lets see...
No crit: (8)
Fire Ray
Polar Ray
Chill Touch
Heal/Harm
Lay on Hands
Spectral Hand
Tangling Creepers
Touch of Idiocy
Crit (crit effect is in the paragraph text, violating the layout rules): (6)
Acid Arrow
Acid Splash
Moonbeam
Produce Flame
Ray of Frost
Searing Light
Crit in bold: (7)
Call of the Grave
Disintigrate
Force Bolt
Tanglefoot
Touch of Obedience
Touch of Shadows
Touch of Undeath
Fake out (crit modifies a saving throw, not bolded): (2)
Enervation
Ray of Enfeeblement
So it's about 2:1 "has" to "doesn't", with the critical effect listed in two different ways. Note that "crit: deal double damage" isn't even restricted to the "listed non-bold in the paragraph" as Force Bolt is in the "bolded" category:
You fire a dart of force from your fingertips. Make
a ranged touch attack against the target to deal force damage
equal to 1d4 plus your spellcasting ability modifier.
Success The target takes full damage.
Critical Success The target takes double damage.
Failure The target is unaffected.
Heightened (+1) The damage increases by 1d4.
It’s in the text of Polar Ray, not the heightening numbers.
Hmm...Really?
POLAR RAY
You fire a blue-white ray of freezing air and swirling sleet from
your finger that can chill its target to the bones. You must
succeed at a ranged touch attack to affect the target, which then
takes 8d8 cold damage and is drained 2.
Heightened (+1) The damage increases by 2d8.
I do not see the word "critical" in that at all. That makes Polar Ray one of the "does damage" spells that doesn't critical at all!
On top of that all of the "Touch of..." spells have a critical effect except Touch of Idiocy of some inane reason. Is there any reason the crit can't be "Stupified 3" or "Stupified 2 and..."?
I read Polar Ray as Ray of Frost.
Yeah, it doesn’t get a crit because of that Drain 2 effect.
Yeah, it doesn’t get a crit because of that Drain 2 effect.
Touch of Obedience just after it does Drain 1 (effectively the same as Drain 2 most of the time) and "a –2 conditional penalty to Will saves against mental effects" on a crit.
Yeah, it doesn’t get a crit because of that Drain 2 effect.Touch of Obedience just after it does Drain 1 (effectively the same as Drain 2 most of the time) and "a –2 conditional penalty to Will saves against mental effects" on a crit.
Touch of obedience does Stupefied for one round. That’s a penalty to a caster’s DCs and ability to cast. Drain is a days long condition that lowers HP and maximum HP and Fort saves. Damage that can’t be healed or regenerated and softened up against the nastiest category of spells.
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Well was thumbing through the spells myself, and I noticed a couple.
Touch of obedience does Stupefied for one round. That’s a penalty to a caster’s DCs and ability to cast. Drain is a days long condition that lowers HP and maximum HP and Fort saves. Damage that can’t be healed or regenerated and softened up against the nastiest category of spells.
It took me the longest time to figure out what you were going on about. And I still think you're wrong.
1) Both spells say "Stupefied X." Neither spell uses the word Drain.
2) I am not sure how either of these spells cause an effect that results in lowered max/HP.
I think what you were trying to get at is that Touch of Idiocy is 1 minute while Touch of Obedience is 1 round.
But I still don't see any reason why Touch of Idiocy should not crit ever.
And that's just one of the 8 spells that no longer crit. Five of the others deal damage and can't crit.
I've never been talking about Touch of Obedience, I've been talking about and comparing Polar Ray (Drain) and Touch of Idiocy (Stupefied). With some confusion earlier between Polar Ray and Ray of Frost.
There are too many spells with conceptual and name similarities.
Ok, let's look at your list upthread of spells that don't crit.
Touch of Idiocy shouldn't crit because it's a big debuff, a low level spell, and a big duration. Compare to level 6 Feeblemind, it's straight up better in most circumstances if you use Reach Spell. As long as you hit, they've got a big penalty to spell casting and a -2 to Will saves for a full minute, spam Will save spell as required after that to win.
Similarly, Polar Ray shouldn't crit because it gives a huge debuff (Drain 2) on a hit, it doesn't need more.
Fire Ray doesn't crit because it heightens at every level and is off brand for the Cleric, so they don't get full goodies. It's better than Produce Flame in range and base scaling, loses in crit capability and potential persistent damage, and gives Clerics an option they don't normally have.
Chill Touch does have a crit effect, double damage (living) and a debuff (living and undead).
Heal/Harm don't crit because they have a single action casting option and auto scale with their damage from a resource pool separate from spell slots. Your nova spamming capability is already pretty strong for a damaging spell, especially for a Cleric casting a damaging spell.
Lay on Hands doesn't crit because it heightens really fast if you have the d6 version, it does double duty as a healing spell, only takes one action, and can be spammed from pool points rather than limited by spell slots.
Spectral Hand doesn't crit because it has no direct effect itself. If you crit on the role you crit (if applicable) with the delivered spell, not Spectral Hand itself.
Tangling Creepers doesn't crit because it already repositions, entangles, and makes a creature immobile for a round on a hit, they didn't feel it needed more than that.
The general rule is that spell powers pay for their heightening by having capabilities between Cantrips and Spells. Cantrips are weaker but infinitely spammable (and sometimes worse action economy) and sometimes make up for their weakness (partially) with a crit effect. Paizo has also chosen to downgrade other spells on some fronts when they get upgraded on most. Compare Weird (9th level) to Phantasmal Killer (4th). Weird can affect huge number of opponents vs single target PK, but actually does less damage than a 9th level PK, doesn't have any effect on a save, and has less effect on a crit fail.
I don't really understand your original post or what you were trying to say about spells based on (irrelevant) Strike crit rules. You included this puzzler in your post:
As far as my group has been able to determine, spells with attack rolls (and no saving throw, e.g. Ray of Frost) can no longer crit.
Ray of Frost, of course, does in fact crit (as does Chill Touch), which is what made me think you were just completely missing all of the spells that explicitly say they crit and didn't know how to read them. Or maybe this was your turn to confuse it with Polar Ray...
Touch of Idiocy shouldn't crit because it's a big debuff, a low level spell, and a big duration. Compare to level 6 Feeblemind, it's straight up better in most circumstances if you use Reach Spell. As long as you hit, they've got a big penalty to spell casting and a -2 to Will saves for a full minute, spam Will save spell as required after that to win.
Can still do something like "on a crit: double the duration."
Similarly, Polar Ray shouldn't crit because it gives a huge debuff (Drain 2) on a hit, it doesn't need more.
No good counter on this one.
Fire Ray doesn't crit because it heightens at every level and is off brand for the Cleric, so they don't get full goodies. It's better than Produce Flame in range and base scaling, loses in crit capability and potential persistent damage, and gives Clerics an option they don't normally have.
Its heightening is half as good as other spells. Literally all non-cantrips get 2 dice per +1 heightening as a baseline. Still not a reason this couldn't crit.
Chill Touch does have a crit effect, double damage (living) and a debuff (living and undead).
Probably overlooked it.
Heal/Harm don't crit because they have a single action casting option and auto scale with their damage from a resource pool separate from spell slots. Your nova spamming capability is already pretty strong for a damaging spell, especially for a Cleric casting a damaging spell.
If you're referring to Channel, that's because they merged Channel with Cure. As Channel is already heads and shoulders above other access to Heal, I can see this as a reason not to crit....as well as a reason to make Channel not the Heal spell.
Lay on Hands doesn't crit because it heightens really fast if you have the d6 version, it does double duty as a healing spell, only takes one action, and can be spammed from pool points rather than limited by spell slots.
I think I can be ok with this, but *shrug*
Spectral Hand doesn't crit because it has no direct effect itself. If you crit on the role you crit (if applicable) with the delivered spell, not Spectral Hand itself.
Probably my being too hasty in trying to locate all of the "make a touch attack" spells.
Tangling Creepers doesn't crit because it already repositions, entangles, and makes a creature immobile for a round on a hit, they didn't feel it needed more than that.
"makes it immobile for 1 round or until the creature Escapes"
So. 1 round. Because "until it escapes" is basically meaningless on a 1 round spell. I mean, sure, they could spend their actions trying to escape, but at best this steals 2 actions from an enemy (and at worst, 4).Weird can affect huge number of opponents vs single target PK, but actually does less damage than a 9th level PK, doesn't have any effect on a save, and has less effect on a crit fail.
Soo...it became an AOE and lost damage. That's normal.
Ray of Frost, of course, does in fact crit (as does Chill Touch), which is what made me think you were just completely missing all of the spells that explicitly say they crit and didn't know how to read them. Or maybe this was your turn to confuse it with Polar Ray...
Probably overlooking it buried in the rule text instead of being bold, like the other two thirds of attack based spells.
Shrink Item last a day base line and forever it you put the item in a small chest.
Well was thumbing through the spells myself, and I noticed a couple.
Pretigitation has been beaten to death Went from the most flavourful cantrip to worse than useless for bards.
Air bubble, lasts a minute. Now just a life saver.
Animal Messenger, lasts a week but a range of 120 feet? "Ok Mr. Snail, deliver this letter to that guy over there. Take your time..."
Darkvision lasts an hour. Even the Half-Orcs go 'what?'
Blindness/Deafness now separate spells.
Amusingly False Life got an upgrade on duration, downgrade on power.
Floating disk. Duration change *and* no putting your unconscious buddy on it.
Flesh to Stone got Flesh to maybe Stone, eventually.
If you only have 5 bulk worth of your friend left, he's probably worse than unconscious and could be scooped onto the floating disc without trouble. However, you're better off dragging him along with telekinetic projectile at that point.