One of my players has always loved the idea of playing a Magic Missile Mage, so his first character, naturally, was a Draconic bloodline Sorcerer.
As he's been digging into the book, and discussing build ideas with me, one thing stuck out; the 1st level Sorcerer class feat, Dangerous Sorcery.
DANGEROUS SORCERY FEAT 1
When you cast a non-cantrip spell that deals damage and that doesn’t have a duration, you gain a conditional bonus to that spell’s damage equal to the spell’s level.
How does this feat interact with Magic Missile? Obviously, if only one action is spent, on a first level Magic Missile, it would simply add +1 damage to that missile.
But adding additional actions, or heightening the spell adds additional missiles. And, to quote the spell, "You choose the target for each missile individually."
Does this bonus apply to every missile? To one specific one? Is it/can it be distributed among the targets? How does this actually play out... it's remarkably vague.
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As I read it, and I believe was mentioned on the prerelease forum as well somewhere, the damage bonus applies once per target. If you send 9 missiles at the same target, you get the bonus damage only once. If you send 9 missiles at 9 separate targets, then just like if you instead caught 9 people in a fireball, it would do the bonus damage to each of those 9 targets.
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That makes a lot of sense to me, and, relayed to the Sorcerer, makes him very happy as well, as a compromise between worthless and ridiculous. Thanks!
As I read it, and I believe was mentioned on the prerelease forum as well somewhere, the damage bonus applies once per target. If you send 9 missiles at the same target, you get the bonus damage only once. If you send 9 missiles at 9 separate targets, then just like if you instead caught 9 people in a fireball, it would do the bonus damage to each of those 9 targets.
Might have been Mark replying to me.
From the sorcerer blog:That's essentially what I have mocked up in a file of possible clarifications.Is there any precedent for ruling it at "treat all simultaneous hits against the same creature as single damage source if from one spell, hits not against the same creature are multiple iterations of the damage"?
Thematically it's a bit wibbly but it seems like it should play closer to intended, and against resistances and weaknesses more like Double Slice.
If it's applied once but you have multiple missiles it does raise the question:
Can a sorcerer apply the bonus damage only to one single missile out of their volley, or divide it up amongst various targets?
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As I read it, and I believe was mentioned on the prerelease forum...
I believe you are referring to the exchange below, found in the Sorcerer Class Preview blog.
I hope blasting damage is looking all right. I've been optimistic, but those feats leave me a little underwhelmed at first glance. (Though, if Dangerous Sorcery works off each seperate "hit" for a spell, Heightened Magic Missile is gonna be awesome.)
That's definitely one we're planning to keep a close eye on!
AAAAW HEEELL YEAAAH. If Dangerous Sorcery gives damage to each missile, that spell is gonna be a popular Spontaneous Heighten Choice.
1st level: 3d4+3+3 =13.5
3rd level: 6d4+6+18 = 39
5th level: 9d4+9+45 = 76.5
7th level: 12d4+12+84 = 126
9th level 15d4+15+135 = 187.5
Those numbers are significantly better than what we were seeing for the AoE damage, as I predicted. Especially when you consider it is there's no save
That means a 5th level Dangerous Sorcerer probably won't be one shotting a Red Cap, but if that thing has taken even a single greatsword hit, it is dead. And those higher level numbers.... Mmmf.
Yeah, the wording right now is technically ambiguous on multi-"particle" effects in general, since the entire spell gets the bonus damage. It certainly should not apply to every particle, and I think the best close reading doesn't cause it to do so (though still leaves you questioning exactly where it goes), but I imagine some people are going to be running it the problematic way, which will provide a useful test of both unless we want to just errata it to avoid that variation. This is not just something for the sorcerer feat, it's an issue with any +damage or -damage source (since -3 to all damage is definitely something that can happen and would pretty much render magic missile useless if you applied per missile), as well as resistances and weaknesses. I think it will be clear to most that if a spell 52.5 damage and a feat seems to increase that by 135 damage, something is not working properly.
Hi, guys on the question here how I read it. When you cast a non-cantrip spell, so there are 3 casting actions at most in this spell so that being said the first MM from each casting should get the bonus the resulting bonus missiles are not cast just splintered from the original 3 and as such do not receive the bonus. Tell me what you think.
It's the same casting of a spell. The casting is from the first action to the last action, everything in that being the spell. You just get to choose how long the casting of MM is.
Also that seems like a very silly and likely broken idea for a fixed turret of magic missile - it not following the all in one turn clause, and having an upper number of actions according the number of resources you spend on it.
It was in the blog or the friday chat somewhere. Jason (IIRC) said something along the lines of "if a 31 damage spell is doing 76 damage with a feat, then something's wrong." And what's wrong is the application of the +5 damage: its supposed to be "per spell," not "per particle."
He also said that they'd fix that language up at some point.