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The touch spells that currently (may) suck are chill touch (unclear if its save negates, but appears to be), vampiric touch (also, unclear)
touch of idiocy (save negates).
All the other touch spells seem decent (no play experience yet), and seem up to 2E par with other class abilities, etc. There are some good ones.
But vampiric touch is 3rd level, and does nothing if enemies save?
Touch of idiocy is 2nd and save negates?
We know that 2E monsters will more often than not make that save (they have strong bonuses, making these two spells (and perhaps chill touch) the worst choices for any spellcaster.
Please prove this thesis wrong.
Take into account that spells are RARE resources.
Shouldn't there be some degrees of success/failure for those spells?
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For the record:
Sometimes you will be called on to attempt a basic saving
throw. This type of saving throw works just like any
other saving throw—the “basic” part refers to the effects.
For a basic save, you’ll attempt the check and determine
whether you critically succeed, succeed, fail, or critically
fail like you would any other saving throw. Then one of
the following outcomes applies based on your degree of
success—no matter what caused the saving throw.
Critical Success You take no damage from the spell, hazard, or
effect that caused you to attempt the save.
Success You take half the listed damage from the effect.
Failure You take the full damage listed from the effect.
Critical Failure You take double the listed damage from the effect.
Touch of Idiocy would probably be too good if it inflicted Stupefied 1 on a successful save. "Beat my DC by 10 or more or else take a 25% chance to fail every spell you cast this combat" amounts to a PF1 style Save-And-Suck.
Touch of Idiocy is designed the way it is becuase it can deliver a -2 penalty on a fail and a -4 on a crit fail.
A -2 is rare at that level, and is generally only available on a crit fail for something imposes Frightened. Frightened quickly reduces, so it's less useful even though it's more generally applied.
A -4 penalty is the max possible and is otherwise unprecedented at that level, I think. So you burn a low level Touch of Idiocy hoping to get a decent (and long lasting) debuff on the target, and if you do that's when you're willing to commit with your high level expensive spell slots.
And of course beyond the higher penalty vs. sick/frightened when applied to will saves, stupefied is particularly good against spell casters, reducing their offensive DCs and potentially disrupting their spell casting.
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The good thing is that as far as I can tell, you don't need to make a melee touch attack any longer. (unless the spell description tells you to)
For most touch spells, you auto hit and your target only need to make a Saving Throw.
Oh wow I had to double check that when I saw this, but you're right. Unless it says to make a spell attack, touch spells auto hit.
There are spells that don't tell you to roll an attack but still have the attack trait, like spider sting. I assume you still have to roll for those.
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There are spells that don't tell you to roll an attack but still have the attack trait, like spider sting. I assume you still have to roll for those.
No, if they don't tell you to roll an attack roll (spell, melee, or ranged attack) you don't.
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All the attack trait means is that the ability counts toward the multiple attack penalty, as far as I can tell.
There probably will be more ways to interact with actions that have the Attack trait in different ways, so it's also leaving that design space open.