But the point that most games don't go above level 7, so extended balance considerations are meaningless is an argument in bad faith.
Lol, thats not what I said. I said ignoring levels 1-7 is a super silly thing to do since those are the most played levels. I never said to ignore levels 8+.
You are twisting people's posts to fit your counter points.
a ranged martial is a shocking claim to me. I have played a 1st level fighter with a composite shortbow and having a +9 to attack and 1d6+3 damage
Also, I call bs on this. How did you get 18 dex and 22 strength at level 1?
But the point that most games don't go above level 7, so extended balance considerations are meaningless is an argument in bad faith.Lol, thats not what I said. I said ignoring levels 1-7 is a super silly thing to do since those are the most played levels. I never said to ignore levels 8+.
You are twisting people's posts to fit your counter points.
a ranged martial is a shocking claim to me. I have played a 1st level fighter with a composite shortbow and having a +9 to attack and 1d6+3 damageAlso, I call bs on this. How did you get 18 dex and 22 strength at level 1?
Its a 14 STR and point-blank shot.
Ah, gotcha. I always forget about the extra damage from point blank.
So, if I get you right, you are saying that a fighter who maybe matches the damage of a caster's cantrip by going into a stance and nets +9/+4 to hit in two shots at 1d6+3 (6.5 - one with a higher, the other with a lower chance of success) is somehow comparable to a caster doing 1d4+4 (6.5) with half damage on a miss to two targets then possibly following that up with an occaisional ranged attack of his own at +5 or 6 (for 3.5 dmg)? Not to mention, the archer is, I believe likely more subject to soft cover and everything else.
The damage still seems to favor the caster if you ask me. I dunno if thats how cantrips should compare to martials when you look at other cantrips.
Seems like a stretch man. Especially when the caster gets a focus spell every combat, a full compliment of spells and a suite of other cantrips he can draw on. Think about all the tools a caster has that the martial doesnt and how close their spammable damage is at ranged thanks to electric arc. Its silly.
If you have to keep having to come up with corner cases to justify some mechanic, the thing is probably broken man. Electric Arc is OP.
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Same. I’m the only main caster in my AoA group, the noncasters spam Electric Arc. It’s often better than their own bombs or attacks.
We now tend to call it “imagine my shock”.
As for me, I have 9 cantrips prepared so Arc is in there, but more often I lean into skill use and debuff spells as a good necromancer should. There’s enough damage around and the other cantrips don’t really compare.
I would call it "shock and awe" like the Irag war bombing campaign.
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Ah, gotcha. I always forget about the extra damage from point blank.
So, if I get you right, you are saying that a fighter who maybe matches the damage of a caster's cantrip by going into a stance and nets +9/+4 to hit in two shots is somehow comparable to a caster doing 1d4+4 with half damage on a miss to two targets then following that up with a ranged attack of his own at +7?
The damage still seems to strongly favor the caster if you ask me. I dunno if thats how cantrips should compare when you look at other cantrips.
Seems like a stretch man. Especially when the caster gets a focus spell every combat, a full compliment of spells and a suite of other cantrips he can draw on.
What caster has a +7 on a ranged attack?
If it is a weapon they are trained in it is +2 +1 from level +3 tops from a 16 Dexterity for a +6.
Additionally, after the first round, the fighter is capable of taking three shots pretty consistently because there are no penalties anymore for firing into melee, but it has been my experience that standing still and attacking a bunch is generally a bad strategy because it leaves you very open to counter attack and enemies rarely fall after getting hit one time. Being able to take two important non attack actions and still unleash a devastating ranged attack that only targets one enemy has often a more valuable use of the PF2 action economy than having to spend two actions attack and only have one action to move of do something else important. There are many great non-attack actions to take in PF2 such as demoralizing, hiding, taking cover, moving out of range, or interacting with the environment.
Also the caster is not likely using three actions to attack every round because they will have to reload their cross bow or sling unless they are investing general or ancestry feats into a weapon proficiency, which is possible, but is extra costly for the caster because attacking with a weapon will not be something they are likely to do every round, because it is a much worse situation for the caster to end up facing two enemies in melee than for the ranged fighter.
Fighters get critical hits a lot. At least that has been my experience in play so far. They are often getting critical hits on 18s and 19s. A critical hit with a short bow at level 1 does 2d6+6+D10. It is often a enemy finisher. Finishing foes is much more valuable than doing damage to two separate enemies.
Personally, I am glad that wizards and other casters have a decent range of options for being useful in and out of combat. As has been argued before, produce flame is a particularly low lying fruit as a cantrip for pure casters. Its only real value right now is for targeting weakness and for rogue/casters wanting to be able to flank and unleash a powerful sneak attack.
The range and crit rider of ray of frost is a big deal that work together very well. It is a strong cantrip worth considering unless you are primarily dungeon crawling in tight spaces.
Acid splash is a little weird in PF2, but has at-will AoE that can cause enemies to avoid ganging up on one target, especially if they have weakness to splash damage, which includes almost all swarms, which are fairly common at low levels.
Daze targets will, has good range and has a crit rider that makes it very good against most bosses.
Tanglefoot and then move away can be a shutdown tactic on melee focused enemies that will allow your ranged allies to dismantle them and it lasts for 2 rounds by the time you are level 3.
Telekinetic projectile feels a little underpowered to me at a 30ft range, but I see a lot of folks choosing it so clearly the D6 and variable damage type is enough to convince many.
I just don't see your fears playing out that this one cantrip is so much better than all other cantrips and ranged attack options that it needs to be reigned in for the sake of fun or game balance.
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Ok, I changed my house rules to rider version for Electric arc. It is mostly like what I typed before with 2 changes:
First, on a Crit Fail the arc jumps to another target within 30 feet of the first target, not 30' from the caster. So you could possibly hit someone up to 60 feet from the caster if you get lucky.
Second, it says if there are no other targets, the 1st target takes double damage instead. Note that the caster can't just choose to apply double damage, it only happens if there are no other targets within 30'.
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Typing more words doesnt make you more right.
I editted my post soon after to adjust my typo on the caster ranged weapon attack bonus but I guess you were too busy typing that essay up to notice.
Trying to ridicule someone for typing a lot is scraping the bottom of the barrel pretty hard.
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Samurai:
I think I will give them both double damage and the arc jump on crit since other cantrips give you double damage and a rider (like how produce flame sets them on fire and does double damage). Its also easier to adjudicate in play.
It feels a little strong thanks to half damage on a successful save but its not crazy with the nerf.
Trying to ridicule someone for typing a lot is scraping the bottom of the barrel pretty hard.Typing more words doesnt make you more right.
I editted my post soon after to adjust my typo on the caster ranged weapon attack bonus but I guess you were too busy typing that essay up to notice.
I literally have zero idea what you are talking about. I talked about a POST not a PERSON. I can call out a wall of text when I see it. I didnt call anyone any names.
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This aint the Youtube comment section. Long comments don’t make you right, but sometimes a lot of words are required to explain your thoughts when there are a lot of different factors at play.
This aint the Youtube comment section. Long comments don’t make you right, but sometimes a lot of words are required to explain your thoughts when there are a lot of different factors at play.
That may be true. This is especially true when they have charts and numbers that they are outlining.
But long forum comments can also be analogous to when in spoken conversation someone starts talking over others they disagree with just to wear them down. Thats not a back and forth if you feel me. Its a wall of text.
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Electric Arc is a fine cantrip that fits in with the expected power levels of cantrips over 20 levels and does not need any official Eratta change.
There are clearly some folks that feel it is over powered at lower levels and want to come up with houserules to nerf it.
That conversation probably belongs in a houserule thread.
I disagree.
I and others feel it is far too strong and that it is quickly becoming a default selection.
Also, I do not believe that opposing voices should have their threads moved when I disagree with them.
yeah if i'm being perfectly honest, i can't think of many fights where you have the joy of staying 35+ ft from the actions.That's game dependent. If every encounter is 30' or less, then every encounter is melee and any range is meaningless... 60' gets you the option to move in and out and take cover ect where 30' it's much less of an option and it more likely for you to get into situations that are unfavorable like foes flanking you staying 35'+ is far different than staying unflanked.
every single interior battle is going to almost certainly have you required to be within 30 feet to maintain los.
outside, there aren't many instances i can think of that are likely to start combat from that far away.
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Electric Arc is a fine cantrip that fits in with the expected power levels of cantrips over 20 levels and does not need any official Eratta change.
There are clearly some folks that feel it is over powered at lower levels and want to come up with houserules to nerf it.
That conversation probably belongs in a houserule thread.
You know that other than the AoA game I play in, I also run a lv10 converted campaign, right?
Guess the cantrips used in it...Also, about those 20 levels, we could use a repost.
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I don't think this belongs in Houserule thread, but Rules Discussion, as most who want "fixes" to EA would like them as Errata. If this was just Houserule discussion, I don't understand the level of vehement argument against people's perspectives.
I'm pretty tired of Unicore's posting pattern here myself, consistently putting words in people's mouth to create some strawman argument, such as Data Lore pointed out:
As another example, this other comment is also inventing a claim nobody else ever actually made:But the point that most games don't go above level 7, so extended balance considerations are meaningless is an argument in bad faith.Lol, thats not what I said. I said ignoring levels 1-7 is a super silly thing to do since those are the most played levels. I never said to ignore levels 8+.
but those people also seem pretty adamant that range is a meaningless attribute and that being a caster hanging out within 1 movement of multiple enemies is never going to be a problem
When of course nobody really said that, he can't actually quote anything like that. But hey, nice strawman to boost your self-esteem or whatever.
I think some of what Unicore has written has been in good faith engagement, but too much devolves to whatever seems convenient for his rhetoric. I mean, people routinely keep posting grossly erroneous claims, like flatly ignoring 1/2 damage of Fail, which demonstrates failure to reciprocrate engagement i.e. pay attention to others statements (or even solidly understandt the topic themselves), but I haven't seen Unicore point out or correct one of those posts, despite his profuse engagement here... Hardly giving an impression of honest, fair engagement, I think.Again, for somebody who claims to believe this is a Houserule discussion, a very strange level of hostility, IMHO. Sometimes if you're already made your point, there is no reason to keep delving back into argument to make sure you get the last word in. There really isn't such a need if you are confident and focused on constructive engagement. If the terms of your disagreement have already been made clear, what is actually accomplished by that? Really that ends up not only wasting others' time and attention, but your own. /shrug
Electric Arc is a fine cantrip that fits in with the expected power levels of cantrips over 20 levels and does not need any official Eratta change.
There are clearly some folks that feel it is over powered at lower levels and want to come up with houserules to nerf it.
That conversation probably belongs in a houserule thread.
You know that other than the AoA game I play in, I also run a lv10 converted campaign, right?
Guess the cantrips used in it...Also, about those 20 levels, we could use a repost.
In this thread we have already talked about how produce flame is an underpowered cantrip, except that it has potential to synergize very well with rogues as it allows them to make ranged or melee attacks and more easily take advantage of flatfooted targets to add sneak attack. The fact that it trails at the bottom of your chart is unsurprising although its critical effect gets pretty brutal at higher levels, almost guaranteeing that the enemy is going to waste two actions putting themselves out, which also stacks powerfully targeting flat-footed foes and the goblin's burn-it power. I.E. even the "worst case scenario" for cantrips, according to this chart, has significant ways to be boosted.
The only other cantrip on that chart is telekinetic projectile which I do find underwhelming, but I think its schtick is supposed to be that you get the versatility of inflicting different damage types with one cantrip and a lot of creatures were given resistances and weaknesses to different kinds of physical damage.
Weapons have a wide range of damage potentials, damage types and traits which make them different and interesting. It would be a shame for all cantrips to be too similar.
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Samurai:
I think I will give them both double damage and the arc jump on crit since other cantrips give you double damage and a rider (like how produce flame sets them on fire and does double damage). Its also easier to adjudicate in play.
It feels a little strong thanks to half damage on a successful save but its not crazy with the nerf.
That would end up being triple damage, 2x to the main target and 1x to the secondary target. That just seems too much IMHO. Because remember, the d4's can increase from being heightened, and you apply your casting mod as a bonus to each target too (or 2x bonus when doubled). No, I think I'll leave it as regular damage to another target OR double damage to main target, not both. If Produce Flame is better because double damage + persistent fire or Ray of Frost gives double damage and -10 speed for 1 round on a crit, that is just more reason to add them to your casting repertoires! I think the ability to hit 2 targets for damage (no save to the second target) is plenty.
I do. Ran FoP. Every caster picked up Electric Arc and used it exclusively (even on single targets - still great for that). In the AoA campaign Im playing in its also very popular with the casters.Really? Why do they do this? Ray of Frost, Produce Flame, Chill Touch, and Telekinetic Projectile all either deal more damage or deal the same amount of damage but have a secondary effect. They're all strictly better than Electric Arc when dealing with a single target, so saying that your players use it even then isn't really helping your case.
That's like saying "The Fighter's Swipe feat is so good, he even uses it when there's only one target."
I have the same problem as Data Lore, but with telekinetic projectile. Nobody seems to want to take any other attack cantrip. Many non-casters are even taking it.
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Electric arc is not the only cantrip to do half damage on a save. It does do it twice when able to target two enemies which is an excellent feature of the cantrip. And I, and others have taken that ability into account when talking about it and other cantrips as well. The main reason I have not spent much time addressing it about electric arc in particular is because I do not believe that a modest amount of reliability in a spell or cantrip that does nothing amazing on its critical results is grounds for gaining the "overpowered" tag. I think Electric Arc is a very good cantrip, I just think that it has some limiting factors that don't necessarily appear on a damage per attack chart that help bring down it down from a "must use every round" category.
The point of this thread was, according to my understanding, to discuss whether Electric Arc was overpowered.
I can sympathize with people who agree that it is overpowered wanting to pro-actively offer a house rule alternative to consider, but it can make it difficult to focus on the discussion as to whether there is a serious game balance issue resulting from the current power level of the cantrip as is, that needs to be addressed by the developers.
My suggestion that alternatives to the existing Electric Arc cantrip be moved to a different thread is to allow the base discussion of this thread focus on what it means that people think Electric Arc is over powered and what impact that is having on game play.
I believe that cantrips are already sitting in a place that borders on an underpowered use of actions for characters, and only becomes justifiable for casters because keeping up a different attack option requires an investment of both attributes and feats, for minimal long term payout.
The way cantrips make up for being generally inferior use of actions is by having situational supremacy that can be very valuable. Because electricity damage is not currently a particularly useful damage type, and creatures with low reflex saves tend to have high overall hit points, the likelihood of a casting of electric arc doing something amazing in the combat is relatively low, especially with that overall damage inflicted number has to be split between two enemies.
This makes electric arc a cantrip that is desirable for being a fairly reliable way of inflicting some damage each round. Which again is good, but it is not an unbalanced cantrip that is going to have a noticeable shift on major encounters, because it is just doing a useful thing, reliably well.
I also want to make it clear that I am discussing this in good faith and have completely ignored repeated personal digressions about me and my purposes here in order to keep the discussion focused on what I thought was the purpose of the thread.
Edit: There are also a lot of people pronouncing a death of the wizard as a character class in PF2 and arguing that the reduction in power of many regular sell slot spells has made this the Martial version of Pathfinder. It is my belief that cantrips holding weight over all levels of play was an intended design paradigm to help give casters a way, along with focus powers, to have a meaningfully way to contribute to combats and that electric arc is probably one that developed to set the bar for "damage dealing cantrip." In much the way that the Mauls, great axes and great swords set the damage bar for weapons.
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Arguing that electric arc is better than a ranged martial is a shocking claim to me. I have played a 1st level fighter with a composite shortbow and having a +9 to attack and 1d6+3 damage that I can direct at the same target within 60ft instead of...
lol. I agree. It's not the fighter's fault if the wizard wants to expose himself.
*Fighter shoots arrows at the enemy*
*Wizard goes all Emporer Palpatine on the enemy*
*Enemy smacks wizard around*
Wizard: Fighter, why aren't you protecting me!?
Fighter: Why'd you run out to them? You're supposed to stay behind ME!
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At this point I think just having 2nd target only trigger on 1st target's Fail+CritFail is my baseline, with 2nd target effect downgraded by one tier (i.e. CritFail->Fail, Fail->Success, Success->CritSuccess). So especially if you can select lower-Reflex enemy as 1st target, it still pulls off same niche well, and may very well still be most commonly chosen Cantrip.
I don't think changing that is inherently the priority, just reigning it in so it isn't QUITE as easy a choice, generally. Making 2nd target not so absolutely consistent, incentivizing prioritizing weakest/lowest Reflex enemy FIRST for greatest chance at 2nd "attack" gives more engaging dynamic IMHO: You can't just target boss and mook simultaneously with no consequences, and even 'poor Reflex' enemy can Succeed their Save.
If it was tagged as Attack spell and those had their DCs affected by MAP, the downgraded effect on 2nd target may not be needed, but that involves broader mechanic beyond just amending this Cantrip. (Just giving it the Attack tag currently could theoretically penalize combos with other attacks, but is avoided by just using using the spell after other attack)
Ah, gotcha. I always forget about the extra damage from point blank.
So, if I get you right, you are saying that a fighter who maybe matches the damage of a caster's cantrip by going into a stance and nets +9/+4 to hit in two shots at 1d6+3 (6.5 - one with a higher, the other with a lower chance of success) is somehow comparable to a caster doing 1d4+4 (6.5) with half damage on a miss to two targets then possibly following that up with an occaisional ranged attack of his own at +5 or 6 (for 3.5 dmg)? Not to mention, the archer is, I believe likely more subject to soft cover and everything else.
Why would it be +5 or +6? If he makes the ranged attack first, then follows up with electric arc, he doesn't take any multiple attack penalties at all, ever.
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At this point I think just having 2nd target only trigger on 1st target's Fail+CritFail is my baseline, with 2nd target effect downgraded by one tier (i.e. CritFail->Fail, Fail->Success, Success->CritSuccess). So especially if you can select lower-Reflex enemy as 1st target, it still pulls off same niche well, and may very well still be most commonly chosen Cantrip.
I don't think changing that is inherently the priority, just reigning it in so it isn't QUITE as easy a choice, generally. Making 2nd target not so absolutely consistent, incentivizing prioritizing weakest/lowest Reflex enemy FIRST for greatest chance at 2nd "attack" gives more engaging dynamic IMHO: You can't just target boss and mook simultaneously with no consequences, and even 'poor Reflex' enemy can Succeed their Save.
If it was tagged as Attack spell and those had their DCs affected by MAP, the downgraded effect on 2nd target may not be needed, but that involves broader mechanic beyond just amending this Cantrip. (Just giving it the Attack tag currently could theoretically penalize combos with other attacks, but is avoided by just using using the spell after other attack)
While the consistency sounds good, how does it actually work out? If you want a grit fail to do double damage and jump to another target for single damage, that is 3x the number of d4's and 3x your stat mod. And on a mere Fail it would be 1 and a half x each. I don't think that would work, no other cantrips give triple xd4+stat mod on a crit fail or 150% both on a fail, or 50% on a success.
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While the consistency sounds good, how does it actually work out?At this point I think just having 2nd target only trigger on 1st target's Fail+CritFail is my baseline, with 2nd target effect downgraded by one tier (i.e. CritFail->Fail, Fail->Success, Success->CritSuccess).
Making 2nd target not so absolutely consistent, incentivizing prioritizing weakest/lowest Reflex enemy FIRST for greatest chance at 2nd "attack" gives more engaging dynamic IMHO
I believe you misread my post. I wrote "not so absolutely consistent", i.e. somewhat INconsistent.
My proposal downgrades 2nd target damage in two distinct ways: sometimes not effecting them at all (on 1st target Success and Crit Success),and if it does effect 2nd target, the effect is downgraded, which is to say the 2nd target's Success tier is upgraded:
with no damage on normal Success in addition to Crit Success, half damage on a Fail, and only 1x damage on Crit Fail.
Which makes it work almost as well VS multiple mooks with poor Reflex Saves, just downgrading effect on 2nd target,
but 2nd target efficacy further deteriorates if 1st target has good Reflex Save (negating 2nd target) AND/OR 2nd target has good Reflex Save (atop Success tier upgrade).
I feel making 2nd target contingent on 1st CritFailing is too extreme since it removes any reliability of main schtick (2 targets),
while my approach makes 2nd target not completely reliable, but is a weaker attack if it does happen.
Nah, if people can’t even agree on raw data, the thread is fully and utterly over.
Math’s pretty clear, several solutions to bring it in line have come up, and despite attempts to deny the initial observations, nothing has come up to convincingly explain why the numbers should be so skewed. Page 2, maybe 3 was the end of it.
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this thread seems to me all the proof that is needed that electric arc is very balanced in the context of this game.
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While the consistency sounds good, how does it actually work out?At this point I think just having 2nd target only trigger on 1st target's Fail+CritFail is my baseline, with 2nd target effect downgraded by one tier (i.e. CritFail->Fail, Fail->Success, Success->CritSuccess).
Making 2nd target not so absolutely consistent, incentivizing prioritizing weakest/lowest Reflex enemy FIRST for greatest chance at 2nd "attack" gives more engaging dynamic IMHOI believe you misread my post. I wrote "not so absolutely consistent", i.e. somewhat INconsistent.
My proposal downgrades 2nd target damage in two distinct ways: sometimes not effecting them at all (on 1st target Success and Crit Success),
and if it does effect 2nd target, the effect is downgraded, which is to say the 2nd target's Success tier is upgraded:
with no damage on normal Success in addition to Crit Success, half damage on a Fail, and only 1x damage on Crit Fail.
Which makes it work almost as well VS multiple mooks with poor Reflex Saves, just downgrading effect on 2nd target,
but 2nd target efficacy further deteriorates if 1st target has good Reflex Save (negating 2nd target) AND/OR 2nd target has good Reflex Save (atop Success tier upgrade).I feel making 2nd target contingent on 1st CritFailing is too extreme since it removes any reliability of main schtick (2 targets),
while my approach makes 2nd target not completely reliable, but is a weaker attack if it does happen.
I think I understand, second target gets hit but +1 step of success on the 2nd target's save, but what is the effect on the first target on a Crit fail vs just a fail? Either way a 2nd target gets hit, but does a crit fail on target 1 mean double damage? That is what I was talking about. Double damage + 2nd target taking either full or half damage (or 0 if they succeed) means that you are potentially doing up to 3x your d4's + stat mod. I know, that is still better than the RAW, which can allow up to 4x effect if both targets crit fail their saves, but I still think that is too high.
I did some test combats and I think Ediwir is right with his fix. I basically nerfed the damage to equal Daze but it still hits two targets.
I will test it out next week when I run some new players through the beginning of Curse of the Crimson Throne.
Best of luck :) I haven’t altered it myself yet, but the math is promising. If paizo hasn’t reached a decision on how to correct it on wednesday, I’ll likely use that as a temp (probably work a little more on refining, as it’s a bit rough). No point doing extended work when there’s an update that close.
I hate when someone I'm talking to dismisses a well thought out argument without reading it because it's either doesn't agree with them or is too much work for them to read. It's rude and frustrating, but it does however make me realize their not worth talking too. It's confirmation bias at its finest really.
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I feel Electric Arc is in a decent space compared to what the other classes are contributing. While playing a level 1 sorcerer with only 3 "real" spells per day, I don't think cantrips ought to be a last resort way to spend your time. With Arc I was able to contribute decently, particularly finishing off enemies that were nearly dead but could have gotten in another hit if they got a turn. Being able to reliably do some damage at a distance is nice.
It's more that the other cantrips aren't quite pulling their weight than that electric arc is all that strong.
Produce Flame: sometimes fire weakness is a thing, and it's got "arson utility". But the melee options just feels half-baked to me, what good is it?
Ray of Frost: I like the long range, but much of the time the battlefield isn't actually 120ft clear shooting.
Acid Splash: just doesn't do all that much damage, and now that the other spells also work on swarms, it's a hard choice to spend a spell known on it.
Divine Lance: the hope is that it does major damage against fiends/outsiders. But otherwise it's doing the same damage as other cantrips, less resisted but more circumstantial.
Disrupt Undead: this is fine actually. Positive weakness exists, the base damage is okay, and it almost always hits because it's a basic save, not a to-hit.
I think the big thing is that the basic save cantrips (electric arc, disrupt undead) are just much more reliable than the to-hit cantrips, while the chance of a critical success to hit are not really bigger than the chances of an enemy critically failed save.
Given your feelings, what would you think about an ability (Feat, class ability, etc?) that said spells that require an attack roll do 1/2 damage on a miss and no damage only on a crit miss? (I believe some game did something like that once?) That is basically the same as the half damage on a success, no damage needs a crit success rules, just expanding it from saving throw spells to attack roll spells.
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Or, Ascalaphus, if damage on a miss rubs you the wrong way as it does me, we could just change the saving throw spells so that without some special ability or feat they do no damage on a successful save. That's the way 5e does it unless you have the 6th level Wizard's Evocation ability "Potent Cantrips" that allow you to still do half damage on a successful save.
I think this is the kind of change we need, at least for cantrips, but maybe even for all spells. The core effects of the spells and cantrips remain the same, but a successful save = no damage or significant effects (at most a slight penalty from some condition for 1 round). Instead of the Rogue's Evasion saying "If you get a success, it becomes a critical success" so that they take no damage when they succeed, we can instead say "when you fail, your result improves by 1 step. (crit fail becomes full damage like a normal fail, fail becomes 1/2 damage)."
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I think this is the kind of change we need, at least for cantrips, but maybe even for all spells.
Literally the whole point of 2e's spell paradigm is that spells are no longer as effective as they were in previous editions, but now are likely to do something because saves are no longer binary.
Going back on that seems like a really bad idea and entirely misunderstanding the whole point of saves in 2e.
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Confirmation bias is certainly bad and I do suffer from it more often than I like to admit, but there's more to this than that.
If you remember, we started this from raw data noting that Arc's damage is roughly double that of any other cantrip, making it a clear outlier. That part is not up for discussion, nor can be argued against in good faith. Two plus two still equals four, and I hope we all agree on this.
There's a damage calculation tool you can use to do your own projections if you like, allowing you to insert other cantrips, alter targets, or whatnot. Feel free to plot your own graphs - I did it a few times, just lazy with uploads.
The part that's being argued by some is, instead, that while some see it as a clear mistake (personally I believe it the result of a format copypaste, like many others in the book), some sustain there might be reasons for the outlying value.
The reasons vary.
From what I can see, there are three currents:
- Arc's damage is in line due to the downsides of the cantrip, such as short range and dependency on multiple target (situationality argument).
- Arc's damage is in line because cantrips as a whole should be compared to weapons, and it is other cantrips that are behind (caster/martial argument).
- Arc's damage is in line because it lacks other effects (power budget argument).
Thing is, we are not talking about a 20% damage margin, we are talking about an almost +85% increase over the next highest value (Telekinetic Projectile, a pure damage cantrip), consistently and proportionally increasing across levels.
To compare (power budget), Produce Flame and Ray of Frost are roughly equivalent damage-wise, with a -20% variation on Telekinetic Projectile. Does that -20% budget fairly for a 10-20% chance at slowing, or a 10-20% chance at persistent damage? Probably. (and yes, I am considering lower level targets. Why would you cantrip a bossfight, I have no idea)
Daze and Acid Splash also lose a rough 40% of their damage budget for the splash and stun chance. Could argue about the fairness of Acid Splash's budgeting, but that's for another thread.
Point being, the small chance of slow isn't worth more than half the spell's power, so something's off.
The range for almost all these cantrips is 30ft. You'll notice I did not mention the range of Ray of Frost in the budget - that is because while I like it (and actually used it in game a couple of times), 30ft is the threshold at which range starts being less relevant. You'll remember from playtest days when Longbows had 30ft of Volley, and it was so harsh that it got reduced to 20. You can put 20ft between characters and monsters in closed spaces. You'll have a lot of trouble with 30. There is nothing situational about this, and it was already recognised by hundreds of testers over a prolonged time. Having multiple targets, as well, isn't a rare situation, or at least not rare enough to warrant such a large boost.
The one point that I am actually more favourable towards is that cantrips as a whole could use a buff. It would change their place in the game and would alter the gameplay a lot, but if Arc is in the right place and the others aren't, then things make more sense. It's just very unlikely that everything lines up in the wrong way, and one single mistake is much more believable. That, and the idea that martials have higher long-term reliability and so shouldn't have to compete with casters' at-wills (they already compete with their bursts).
In short:
extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
Nothing brought up so far gets close to justifying an 85% damage boost (or 140% if you use Ray of Frost as your baseline), so I haven't put much effort in arguing it. Also, I work weekends and couldn't sit down to type until now, sorry guys.
Now for the serious part of this post - I was wrong. Redoing some calculations on the Daze damage scaling highlighted some failure breakpoints. If you want to use it, use it, but there are some levels at which the total damage from the two targets will only equal Telekinetic Projectile. I was working under the idea of having a 10-15% constant edge over it, and it doesn't actually keep all the time, so if Paizo hasn't gotten to a solution I might review it next week.
If you had to leave the damage die and two targets in some capacity, how would you balance the budget?
I don’t mind one cantrip being high on damage in the right conditions, do you have conditions where the damage would be on budget?
Loved the post by the way.
If you had to leave the damage die and two targets in some capacity, how would you balance the budget?
I don’t mind one cantrip being high on damage in the right conditions, do you have conditions where the damage would be on budget?
Loved the post by the way.
Maybe make it melee against two targets. That would justify the extra damage in my eyes, because then it happens much less frequently.
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extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
I don't think evidence really matters at this point. Everyone's seen the numbers and has had their own experiences with it. You think it's a significant problem and other people don't.
I don't think either of you are going to magically draw up some proof to convince the other that you're right and their wrong (or vice versa).
Long, detailed post explaining how the math lines up with the arguments
I make it a point to try to always reexamine my position based on the actual data. Prior to this entire thread, my impression was that it was probably the strongest cantrip, but my group only has one caster, he's a bard, and the player isn't available a lot so I run him about half the time, and about a quarter of the time he's out because the party already has 4. He has electric arc (via elf ancestry feat), but it had to compete with inspire courage/move/shoot bow. It hasn't seemed overpowered, but it wasn't competing with other spells so much (although it seemed strong enough that I recommended the player take the option, even if it wouldn't scale as well due to staying at "trained" since it wasn't part of his main tradition). It's also been low levels, where the absolute difference is pretty small.
I agree that obvious must-have options are an issue, so I'll look toward the errata, but may come around to adjusting myself for the next campaign. Hero Lab Online had a bug where it wasn't printing it, so the part-time player kept forgetting he had it and doing other things...and is looking to swap out some options for LOCG stuff, so I think electric arc will be a casualty and I won't really have to deal with it for this campaign.
Anyway, thanks. I totally get how it's not breaking people's games; it's not breaking mine, and it wouldn't, but it definitely seems like a must-have for any arcane/divine caster. I might be okay with that out of laziness and lack of negative impact to my game, but it does seem like it's outside of what the designers likely intended.
Now for the serious part of this post - I was wrong. Redoing some calculations on the Daze damage scaling highlighted some failure breakpoints. If you want to use it, use it, but there are some levels at which the total damage from the two targets will only equal Telekinetic Projectile. I was working under the idea of having a 10-15% constant edge over it, and it doesn't actually keep all the time, so if Paizo hasn't gotten to a solution I might review it next week.
I'm assuming by "on the Daze damage scaling" you were saying this error was in regard to your suggested fix, which apparently was tying to the way Daze scales as: Caster ability mod damage with heightened (+2) to add 1d6. It doesn't read that way without familiarity with your fix (almost like you're saying you were wrong about how Daze scaled relative to electric arc or something), so I'm mostly just clarifying.