Thanks all. The Wizard threads are long and confusing when you don't have any characters with a vested interest in the topic.
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I'm not sure it'd be that bad tbh.
If you look at them, most spells that rely on attack rolls have fairly similar effects on a successful hit compared to spells that rely on saves on a failed save, but end up falling behind in general because they do nothing on a miss.
Giving those spells a miss effect would basically remove that problem outright and make them more comparable to the spells people actually cast.
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I think there's a lot more ways to get bonuses to hit (and penalties to enemy AC), though. Getting those lowered saves are a lot less easy.
I'm not sure it'd be that bad tbh.
If you look at them, most spells that rely on attack rolls have fairly similar effects on a successful hit compared to spells that rely on saves on a failed save, but end up falling behind in general because they do nothing on a miss.
Giving those spells a miss effect would basically remove that problem outright and make them more comparable to the spells people actually cast.
I agree that it wouldn't be that bad, but I'd rather see an item bonus to spell attacks, plus a general addition to whatever designer handbook paizo uses that an increase in effectiveness is an acceptable exchange for a no effect on a miss.
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I agree that it wouldn't be that bad, but I'd rather see an item bonus to spell attacks
Me too, generally speaking. I just want to push back on this notion that making attack-based spells less terrible would somehow break the game.
Math has already shown that spells like Polar Ray do comparable damage to similarly leveled save granting spells (in that case Horrid Wilting) on a successful hit. Letting them also do comparable damage on a miss would just be evening the odds at least until you remember that polar ray is a single target spell and horrid wilting can hit over a thousand targets.
The one downside to item bonuses to spell attacks that I can see is that right now there are very few spell attacks in the game and a lot of overlap between them.
We risk creating a scenario where a player is forced to choose between spending a significant chunk of gold to keep the math relevant on a small number of spells, or to save that money by picking another spell that's just as good as the first spell is after investment.
I suspect that might be part of why there are no such items in PF2 right now, there are just too few relevant spells (as of right now) and a sort of why bother factor if the cost is comparable to similar options.
I agree that it wouldn't be that bad, but I'd rather see an item bonus to spell attacksMe too, generally speaking. I just want to push back on this notion that making attack-based spells less terrible would somehow break the game.
Math has already shown that spells like Polar Ray do comparable damage to similarly leveled save granting spells (in that case Horrid Wilting) on a successful hit. Letting them also do comparable damage on a miss would just be evening the odds
at least until you remember that polar ray is a single target spell and horrid wilting can hit over a thousand targets.The one downside to item bonuses to spell attacks that I can see is that right now there are very few spell attacks in the game and a lot of overlap between them.
We risk creating a scenario where a player is forced to choose between spending a significant chunk of gold to keep the math relevant on a small number of spells, or to save that money by picking another spell that's just as good as the first spell is after investment.I suspect that might be part of why there are no such items in PF2 right now, there are just too few relevant spells (as of right now) and a sort of why bother factor if the cost is comparable to similar options.
...Polar Ray averages out damage-wise to 1.5x the damage and -2 to Fort, though.
I agree that it wouldn't be that bad, but I'd rather see an item bonus to spell attacksMe too, generally speaking. I just want to push back on this notion that making attack-based spells less terrible would somehow break the game.
Math has already shown that spells like Polar Ray do comparable damage to similarly leveled save granting spells (in that case Horrid Wilting) on a successful hit. Letting them also do comparable damage on a miss would just be evening the odds
at least until you remember that polar ray is a single target spell and horrid wilting can hit over a thousand targets.The one downside to item bonuses to spell attacks that I can see is that right now there are very few spell attacks in the game and a lot of overlap between them.
We risk creating a scenario where a player is forced to choose between spending a significant chunk of gold to keep the math relevant on a small number of spells, or to save that money by picking another spell that's just as good as the first spell is after investment.I suspect that might be part of why there are no such items in PF2 right now, there are just too few relevant spells (as of right now) and a sort of why bother factor if the cost is comparable to similar options.
At the very least such an item would help out attack roll cantrips, which are a lot less attractive than electric arc for a number of reasons.
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At the very least such an item would help out attack roll cantrips, which are a lot less attractive than electric arc for a number of reasons.I agree that it wouldn't be that bad, but I'd rather see an item bonus to spell attacksMe too, generally speaking. I just want to push back on this notion that making attack-based spells less terrible would somehow break the game.
Math has already shown that spells like Polar Ray do comparable damage to similarly leveled save granting spells (in that case Horrid Wilting) on a successful hit. Letting them also do comparable damage on a miss would just be evening the odds
at least until you remember that polar ray is a single target spell and horrid wilting can hit over a thousand targets.The one downside to item bonuses to spell attacks that I can see is that right now there are very few spell attacks in the game and a lot of overlap between them.
We risk creating a scenario where a player is forced to choose between spending a significant chunk of gold to keep the math relevant on a small number of spells, or to save that money by picking another spell that's just as good as the first spell is after investment.I suspect that might be part of why there are no such items in PF2 right now, there are just too few relevant spells (as of right now) and a sort of why bother factor if the cost is comparable to similar options.
My sense is that cantrips are the only attack roll spells that are making people feel like an item bonus is necessary. The higher level ones are almost always going to be cast with true strike, and disintegrate and polar ray don't need an item bonus to stack with that. The first level spell attack roll spells are a little underwhelming as well, but there are so many better spells anyway, and no one would be getting an item bonus to casting at a point where you would still be using your first level spell slots to effectively be making attacks with. At that point, if you are a blaster, you are much more efficient using your first level slots for true strike.
Attack roll cantrips are effectively limited to ray of frost, produce flame and telekinetic projectile.
Acid splash is a mess of a spell because splash damage is undefined and the spell doesn't have the splash trait. Produce flame is the better spell in every possible way unless you explicitly need acid damage instead of fire, which is almost never, and acid splash's heightening underperforms making it worse over time.
Tanglefoot is a really interesting spell, but doing nothing on a miss, no damage, and taking 2 actions makes it hard to believe that getting an item bonus is going to make it a much more attractive spell.
With so few spells really needing it, I think specific items that interact with those spells would be more interesting than a generic wand of item bonus to spell attack rolls.
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The higher level ones are almost always going to be cast with true strike...
If you're an Arcane caster, sure. That's not as true for the Primal blasters.
I would much prefer spell attacks be supported in the form of more spells like true strike, rather than as an item. I don't think a spell attack+ item would be very interesting, and I really enjoy that casters don't have a lot of "mandatory spending" and can instead focus on buying items that fit their playstyle and give additional tactical options.
The higher level ones are almost always going to be cast with true strike...If you're an Arcane caster, sure. That's not as true for the Primal blasters.
And Divine blasters!
Divine spell list has excellent blast spells, both with attack rolls (Searing Light) and without (Divine Blast, Harm).
Well this is a thread about wizards so I was mostly commenting on them, but the primal list has even fewer high level spell attack spells than the arcane.
I am not disagreeing that spell attack roll spells are unsatisfying to a lot of people. Honestly I think they (above cantrip level) are mostly in the game for npc casters to have high risk high reward spells to scare the PCs with.
It is a wizard thread, and not all wizards should rely in True Strike as a crotch.
Also if what you are saying is true and spell attack spells are "for NPCs" that seems incredibly bad. Specially when you take into account many such spells are just as iconic as Fireball.
* P.S. there was a recent thread saying the GMC monster creation guide has monsters generally having +2 spell attack over PCs. Aka NPC spell attacks are a lot more accurate.
Whoever making the monsters be like "hell nah, my monsters are not gonna be as incompetent as PCs! Fighter weapon proficiency on spell attacks it is".
True strike used on every single attack roll spell is a crutch. It's supposed to be a cool bonus, not just a way to approach like 60% chance to hit on a mediocre spell.
Silly to compare Polar Ray to multi-target/AOE spells. It should be doing like twice as much as Horrid Wilting given that it's single target and has a huge chance to do nothing.
Polar Ray in particular just feels like a mistake for how terrible it is. I don't think it's entirely fair to use that spell in particular as a benchmark - it's awful, it feels bad to cast, it's the worst spell attack in the game for its level. Not saying spell attacks are in an amazing place atm, but they're not all Polar Ray.
Polar Ray in particular just feels like a mistake for how terrible it is. I don't think it's entirely fair to use that spell in particular as a benchmark - it's awful, it feels bad to cast, it's the worst spell attack in the game for its level. Not saying spell attacks are in an amazing place atm, but they're not all Polar Ray.
Well, which one is good? And don't say Disintegrate, both spell attack + save makes it a lot worse in practice than it seems.
And I'm talking "better than equivalent saving throw spell" good.
At first glance, the rule is followed with NPC's from Gamemastery Guide: spell attacks are universally +2 higher than DCs.
Necromancer (lvl5) is DC 21, attack +13.
Cult Leader and Demonologist, both lvl7, are even worse: they are DC26, attack +18, which is actually 1 higher DC and 3 higher to hit than lvl7 PC would have.
All are Int+4.
Well, which one is good?
I don't contend that spell attacks are in a good place at the moment, only that Polar Ray is the worst one by a fairly large margin and that using it as an example makes the situation seem a lot more dire than it is.
I'm not 100% sure what you mean by "better than equivalent saving throw", but I assume "worth taking over/alongside saving throw spells of the same level"? In that case, disintegration is one of them but I'll name another one since you didn't like that one. Spiritual weapon would probably be my pick. It's not an autopick spell but still a solid pick-up for Divine and Occult casters to diversify their repertoire.
Acid Arrow is good if you use True Strike to hit or it's being used while buffed against a flat-footed opponent. It has an effective damage, if it hits, of 3d8+3d6 at it's base level 2 and a progression of 1d8 + 1.5d6 per spell level heightened.
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Polar Ray in particular just feels like a mistake for how terrible it is. I don't think it's entirely fair to use that spell in particular as a benchmark - it's awful, it feels bad to cast, it's the worst spell attack in the game for its level. Not saying spell attacks are in an amazing place atm, but they're not all Polar Ray.
So you keep tossing this around and I'd like an answer.
Horrid Wilting does 10d10, average 55 damage.
Polar Ray does 10d8 (average 45 damage) and drained 2, which against a level 15 enemy is 30 damage and -2 Fort; totalling 75 damage, Fort -2.
Level 8 Disintegrate does 16d10, averaging 88 damage.
Level 8 Spirit Blast does 20d6, averaging 70 damage.
Level 8 Finger of Death does 80 damage.
What makes Polar Ray so bad?
So you keep tossing this around and I'd like an answer.Horrid Wilting does 10d10, average 55 damage.
Polar Ray does 10d8 (average 45 damage) and drained 2, which against a level 15 enemy is 30 damage and -2 Fort; totalling 75 damage, Fort -2.
Level 8 Disintegrate does 16d10, averaging 88 damage.
Level 8 Spirit Blast does 20d6, averaging 70 damage.
Level 8 Finger of Death does 80 damage.What makes Polar Ray so bad?
I guess the downside is you can't crit with the extra 30 damage.
But given that it also lowers the maximum HP by that amount as well (30 permanent damage until the following day) I'd say that's a pretty even trade IMO.
Also would like to know what makes it "bad".
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I guess the downside is you can't crit with the extra 30 damage.
Polar Ray can't crit at all, it has no critical success effect.
It also does nothing on a miss, which cuts its expected damage essentially in half against most CR relevant foes (it's more accurate against lower level enemies, but also does less damage against them given drained's mechanics).
But given that it also lowers the maximum HP by that amount as well (30 permanent damage until the following day) I'd say that's a pretty even trade IMO.
Is it really? I don't feel like the scenario where you fight the same enemy on back to back days is really relevant enough for that to matter.
Also would like to know what makes it "bad".
I feel like Cyouni spells it out pretty well. The spell looks okay if you look at how much damage it does on a successful hit, but the spells it's being compared to also have failure and critical effects, Polar Ray doesn't (barring Disintegrate, which also has a lot of problems).
I may have given the impression I was making a more general statement than I was. I have a personal grudge against polar ray, so calling it "bad" may have been a little hasty on my part. (I do still think it's "bad", but that's not my main issue with the spell)
For a 8th level spell, "underwhelming" may be closer to what I intended. I don't like how it doesn't interact with the crit system at all, I don't like how vanilla it is for a high-level spell, I think it's a weird spell that reminds me of save-or-suck spells from 2E.
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THe fact polar ray doesn't have a crit effect is what makes it look like a spell that slipped through some kind of editorial process where the reader thought all spell attack rolls had a default critical success mechanic when they do not. It is a very bad spell for players to prepare, in part because true strike feels like a waste on it because it can't do anything with a critical hit.
Against an opponent with armor, an 8th level shocking grasp can do 9d12+(1d4+8 persistent damage), with a critical hit doubling the base damage. It has a range of touch, but can benefit from flanking, which means, against a metal armored foe, with spectral hand, you can easily be rocking an effective +3, and still use true strike without needing reach.
Polar Ray does 10d8 (average 45 damage) and drained 2, which against a level 15 enemy is 30 damage and -2 Fort; totalling 75 damage, Fort -2.
Level 8 Disintegrate does 16d10, averaging 88 damage.
Just for comparison's sake, I did a calculation of a 15th level wizard (DC36, +26 to hit with spells) attacking a creature with these two spells. The creature was based on gamemastery guide for Moderate stats for 15th level: AC36 and Fort +26.
Polar Ray has a 55% chance to hit and deal 75 effective damage. So the average damage on cast is 41.25.
Disintegrate has two stages of calculation. There's the initial 50% chance to hit and 5% chance to crit. On a successful hit, the creature has a 50% chance to save for half, 5% for 0, 40% for full dmg, and 5% for double damage. On a successful crit, the creature has a 50% for full, 5% for half, and 45% for double.
Using those chances, the average damage for 8th level disintegrate is 39.27.
So the two spells are pretty comparable. Polar Ray gives you the fort debuff, but lacks the small chance of a crit that annihilates the target. Also, disintegrate gets a lot better if you can debuff the target's AC than polar ray does.
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Note that True Strike significantly increases expected damage from spells with attack rolls, and they benefit from the plethora of status bonuses to hit etc.
So spells that use attack rolls do less damage on average in a void but are capable of receiving more buffs.
Seems reasonable to me.
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Seems reasonable to me.
I don't agree. You shouldn't be reliant on having true strike prepared in order to make your other spells functional. As pointed out, some casters don't even have true strike on their list.
Frankly, if True Strike is so overbearingly good that attack-based spells end up needing to be noticeably worse just to compensate, that indicates to me that True Strike was badly designed more than it indicates that spell attacks are fine.
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Not just true strike who's action and spell slot are both not free but other benefits like bless, inspire courage, heroism.
There are also a fair amount of ways to get access to low level spells of other disciplines if something is important to you.
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What if the existence of true strike, and placing it on the arcane list, was a balancing factor between the wizard and the Druid?
Getting overly concerned about spell attack roll spells being underpowered from a theoretical stand point is a mistake. If you closely examine the spell list, they are not very common and, with the exception of polar Ray, often capable of having extremely powerful effects on critical hits.
The problem is that a few cantrips fall into this otherwise less common spell group, and that makes it feel like a greater issue than in it is.
Flat footed is one of the most common conditions to be inflicted, that is a +2 bonus to spell attack rolls. Spending a round or two debuffing the boss (as a party not just your own character) before hitting them with your highest level damage/ battle ender makes a lot of sense. These are all tactics that any caster can do. It is also a very bad strategy to have the arcane list, memorize 8th level or your highest level attack roll spells and not memorize truestrike spells to help those spells land powerfully. The game really should not be balanced around the assumption that characters are deliberately acting sub-optimally.
Something to boost spell attack roll cantrips would be interesting, not over powered and a welcome eventual addition to the game. But if that something gives an additional possible +5 to 6 to hit with a heightened shocking grasp over what a saving throw spell can get, (+1 circumstance bonus against metal armored foes, -2 enemy AC from flanking, +a potential 3 from giving spell attack rolls an intense bonus), you have probably made an over powered option. Especially since all of these bonuses stack with debuff a like fear which work for saving throw spells.
There just aren’t enough higher level spell attack roll spells to pretend like true strike is not an intentional balancing factor in this equation. It is only on the arcane list to give arcane casters an edge with a couple of select higher level spells.
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THe fact polar ray doesn't have a crit effect is what makes it look like a spell that slipped through some kind of editorial process where the reader thought all spell attack rolls had a default critical success mechanic when they do not. It is a very bad spell for players to prepare, in part because true strike feels like a waste on it because it can't do anything with a critical hit.
Polar Ray is also missing the Attack keyword, which makes me think the absence of 'double damage on critical hit' is an editorial oversight.
I checked the spells which do have Attack as a keyword. They all do something on a critical hit, and generally they do double damage if they do damage at all.
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Yeah, I'm confident it was an oversight and will be ruling double damage on a crit in my games.
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But the limited number of spell attack roll spells is also a limiting factor on the value of true strike for wizards.
There are very good wizard builds that steer clear of spell attack roll spells altogether. The spell only becomes useful if a wizard decides to pursue an otherwise underpowered build option.
Edit: it is not a full consensus, but there are a lot of people saying that something is wrong with polar Ray and it isn’t a great spell to look at to discuss spell attack roll spells. That’s why I shifted to looking at shocking grasp heightened to level 8 instead. 58.5 average damage + persistent damage against metal wearing enemies is brutal at 15th level, especially if you give yourself a decent chance of critting. It is a spell with an attack roll with considering, but it is also an action you’d probably want to truestrike if it was an option.
True strike is not actually good early on. You don't have enough resources to use it at that point. However, it becomes a lot better as you level and is probably the most useful 1st level spell at the highest levels.
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Spell attacks are a little under. The presence of True Strike does a little to bring them up, but the disparity with martials starting at level 5 until casters get legendary spell proficiency is too large. For that reason, I'd like to see a +1 to hit bonus item at level 5 for spell attacks, which would cause casters to hit as well as most martials without true strike eventually.
I think any other buff would put attacking with true strike way over the top.
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Did you consider that the disparity with martials is... intentional? Just to remind you: Doing damage is the purview of the *martial* classes.
Worse, it is the *only thing* they have going for them. And seeing that casters ALREADY get to alter reality at their whim, they simply DON'T GET to be as good at damage dealing as the martials.
So that, you know, there still is a reason to even *have* martial classes in the game.
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Did you consider that the disparity with martials is... intentional? Just to remind you: Doing damage is the purview of the *martial* classes.
Worse, it is the *only thing* they have going for them. And seeing that casters ALREADY get to alter reality at their whim, they simply DON'T GET to be as good at damage dealing as the martials.
So that, you know, there still is a reason to even *have* martial classes in the game.
But what if I want to build a spellcaster that only focuses on damage? This is most people new to the hobby. Shouldn't be discouraging a playstyle that's advertised for them. Nobody wants to fight better than a martial, but maybe equal for 3-4 turns when you unload your highest spell slots.
Plus, the utility gap has been narrowed a lot. It's still there, though, mainly because of Fly/Teleport/Water Breathing.
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Did you consider that the disparity with martials is... intentional?
The last few pages have been comparing spells to... other spells. So, even given your point, that doesn't excuse the balance issues brought up here.
Just to remind you: Doing damage is the purview of the *martial* classes.
But this is just flat dumb. Putting damage spells in the game and then intentionally designing them to be terrible just so Fighters can feel better about themselves would be some pretty damn sketchy game design.
Saying iconic character archetypes shouldn't exist (i.e. blasters, probably the single most iconic flavor of spellcaster in modern fiction) in order to preserve some bizarre notion of niche protection is also just plain awful.
Luckily that doesn't actually seem to have been the goal.
Hehe at someone thinking martials only have damage going for them in pf2e. If anything martials have more going on than before.
Martials have in all editions had better baseline survivability. But now with skills being a more important part they can hold their own with casters to a greater degree especially with most utility spells being nerfed. The 3 action system benefits casters way more than martials to the point caster feel they are mostly stuck in 1st gear with martials zooming around in 5th.
Martials have a lot more easy to access debuff options in pf2e than ever before (athletics skill and intimidation are both great). Not to mention AoO seem to belong to martials now.
Damage disparity is no longer a thing and I seriously doubt buffing attack spells to hit bonus will impact how good martials feel to play at all.
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But this is just flat dumb. Putting damage spells in the game and then intentionally designing them to be terrible just so Fighters can feel better about themselves would be some pretty damn sketchy game design.
Saying iconic character archetypes shouldn't exist (i.e. blasters, probably the single most iconic flavor of spellcaster in modern fiction) in order to preserve some bizarre notion of niche protection is also just plain awful.
... Are you serious or just trolling?! Because, honestly, I just can't tell anymore at this point.
*Niche protection*? For Fighters? And by extension EVERY NON-SPELLCASTING CLASS? Are we even talking about the same thing here anymore?
Let be brutally clear here: The martial classes can do one thing. One. Thing. And that is inflict HP damage to enemies. Now there are some class features/feats that allow certain classes a *very limited* kind of debuffing or battlefield control, but that's it.
Now let us remind ourselves what casters can do again, shall we?
Everything.
In D&D 3.x and PF 1 there have printed a 4-digit number of spells. Each and every one of them represents something a muggle can't do, something that a martial class has no hope to ever achieving, or even getting close to mimicking.
And if you chose a class with that vast, overarching kind of power, narrativ AND otherwise, there is a price to pay, period!
You do not get to beat the martials. At. Their. Own. Damn. Game!
Fighting is not a niche, it is the largest part of the whole game! Martial classes get to excel there, but the price they pay is that they simply lack much narrative and utility power, with the possible exception of the Rogue. Maybe.
Casters of all stripes on the other hand HAVE all that narrative and utility power. So obviously they CAN NOT also have martial power ON TOP of that!
So unless there are a lot more Master and Legendary tier skill feats that allow muggles to break reality over their knees too, casters do not get to complain about niche protection, because *their* nice is still locked in an underground bunker.
As for the iconic blaster: Even a caster who specialises in blasting will still have ALL THE OTHER reality breaking powers at his disposal (sorcerors with intentionally limited spell selection excluded maybe), so UNLESS there is a way for them to pay the price of admission, they DO NOT GET to be as good at single-target damage as the martials. Pure and simple.
They still excel at area damage and can handily out-damage martials on THAT front. However, this is balanced by the fact that they will do best against scores of lower-level enemies. Something the martial classes could probably hack their way through eventually. But a fireball can hasten the process somewhat, so that gets a pass.
But if a blaster was regularly capable of out-damaging the martials, there simply would be no reason for martial classes to exist. Because saying that casters run out of spells is a dirty, rotten, lie. Yes, cantrips are spells too.
So then, when martial classes are at a point where they are fun to play out of the box, a *BIG PART* of why they are at that happy place is because casters can no longer steal their thunder and their lunch money too. So unless you want to ruin martial classes *again*, do not clamour for 'moar damage'. Ask instead how we can make the things caters are *supposed* to be good at better.
There has been a lot of talk about how unsatisfying it is that 'failure' is the new success in the 'grades of success' system. While the incapacitation trait pretty much made rocket-tag a thing of the past (good riddance), it is still frustrating to see the full effect of a spell only coming up about 1 in 20 cases. And even the 2nd best result has a less-then-even chance of happening to at-level adversaries.
This is where casters need help. Not at inflicting HP damage.
Now the problem is, an item bonus to casting would boost both: Debuffing and battlefield control, where casters DO need help, AND blasting, where they have no business getting help.
Did they overnerf casters? Arguably so. But it is easy to print some extra power creep to prop them up again. Whereas it is impossible to reign in material that is OP. So they erred on the side of caution, and a good thing they did.
Item bonuses alone are not going to work since they are indiscriminate. But there should be class feats that work a bit like a reverse Juggernaut: Instead of a success, the target is considered to have rolled a failure instead. If the target has an ability that would make a success a critical success, that gets cancelled. That would go a long way to make debuffs and battlefield control more viable.
But maybe we have to wait until Ultimate Magic for something like that.
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... Are you serious or just trolling?! Because, honestly, I just can't tell anymore at this point.
Yep, you caught me. I'm trolling when I say I think blasters should be good at the thing they're 'supposed' to do (i.e. blasting).
Definitely trolling when I say that I think spell attacks shouldn't have mechanics that make them both unfun to cast and categorically worse than other kinds of spells.
Clearly.