So I know that damage isn't the only important thing. But daze lagging behind in damage by so much and with the stunned effect only applying on a crit fail. With that in mind it really doesn't seem to be that good of a cantrip.
Does anyone else agree or have a reason to use it?
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It's only for mooks, but it's ok and it's free, spammable. At low levels, it might be the knock-over punch. At higher levels it's not so bad to put on a big brute of a mook in the way of your Barbarian. Losing an action in a round is losing the combat, throwing a cantrip at an animal or Ogre to make them lose the round isn't a waste.
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So I know that damage isn't the only important thing. But daze lagging behind in damage by so much and with the stunned effect only applying on a crit fail. With that in mind it really doesn't seem to be that good of a cantrip.
Does anyone else agree or have a reason to use it?
I think the big thing to keep in mind is that Daze targets Will. Some creatures are gonna have bad Will saves but good AC or Reflex saves. I reckon this pretty nice to have on those creatures.
The critical failure effect is also REALLY good for something you can essentially spam.
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It's only for mooks, but it's ok and it's free, spammable. At low levels, it might be the knock-over punch. At higher levels it's not so bad to put on a big brute of a mook in the way of your Barbarian. Losing an action in a round is losing the combat, throwing a cantrip at an animal or Ogre to make them lose the round isn't a waste.
Stunned 1 is also even more useful than it seems if you have any allies who act before the foe, since they can't act until they clear the stun and that might prevent a nasty reaction from some enemies. Not just for daze in particular but any effect that includes stunned 1. It's one reason stunned 1 on a success spells are really nice.
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How often will a crit success come up though? I know its more than 5% of the time in this version but I dunno. Tickling an enemy's brain for 4 damage for the first 4 levels of play just hoping to take an action or two away from a foe maybe once every few combats is just not super dramatic (or super tactically sound, imo).
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The basic setup of ranged spell that forces a save makes it more desirable than TK Projectile or Chill Touch for my Bard. And looking at the divine list, I would consider it for a cloistered cleric if my deity wasn't opp-alignment from the expected enemy alignment and the game didn't revolve around undeath. Doing nonlethal is also a plus for me, even if only mildly.I
I do wish it got an extra die to play with at some point early on though, doing 4 damage at level 4 feels like a waste of a turn.
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How often will a crit success come up though? I know its more than 5% of the time in this version but I dunno. Tickling an enemy's brain for 4 damage for the first 4 levels of play just hoping to take an action or two away from a foe maybe once every few combats is just not super dramatic (or super tactically sound, imo).
1e Daze had to be trained out or torn from the spellbook after level 4 or so. This 2e Daze might be useful. The damage is nothing, the spell is only useful on enemies we can crit success on. It's not for bossses, it's for the pet of a boss, it's for a dumb henchman. Played right, as Seifter says, they are vulnerable for a round as they don't get to use their violent and dangerous Reaction. The casting range is 60' - cutting away one of the three encounter actions can stop a charge or a second attack and a reaction.
It's a battlefield control spell - and you won't find many of that type in the cantrip list.
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Im not super knowledgable about PF1e or how it does cantrips. I am looking at PF2 Daze on its own terms and I'm just not super sold on it.
On its own, 4 damage to hope to maybe stun a mook that you think might have a weak will save once every few combats just isnt satisfying.
I am willing to check it out in play though. If need be, I'm the DM and I can always buff it up somehow if I feel the need.
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VS low Will enemies (which is obvious with at least some enemies) and/or "mooks"
the damage doesn't seem THAT bad (and reliable with 1/2 on Save), and decent chance for Stun.
Daze does lose more damage on every Level it doesn't Heighten, but where it does (+2) it isn't so bad at least VS less damaging cantrips.
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Occult only has these competing against it:
Chill Touch VS Living isn't much better damage, weaker crit effect, good Fort is probably more common than Will, and is Touch Range.
Chill Touch VS Undead does no damage but inflicts Flatfooted debuff, is swingier with nothing on Successful Save but stronger Crit Effect, and is Touch Range.
TK Projectile is better damage, if swingier re: Miss, but physical Resistance more common than Mental, and half the range.
Divine only has Chill Touch and these:
Disrupt Undead is better damage but only VS one enemy type, and also half the range.
Divine Lance isn't much better damage w/ nothing on a Miss, Alignment damage is more particular than Mental, and also half the range.
Arcane has Chill Touch and these:
Ray of Frost isn't much better damage w/ nothing on a Miss, Cold Resist is more common than Mental, Crit effect weaker, although longer range.
Acid Splash base damage isn't much better w/ nothing on a Miss although persistent damage significant if it sticks, but no other special effect, and half range.
Produce Flame base damage isn't much better w/ nothing on a Miss although crit damage significant if it sticks, no other special effect, Fire more often Resisted, also half range.
Electric Arc isn't much better single target damage although more total damage VS 2 targets, also half range.
Even if power of Stun on Crit is significant, I don't even think it's base effect is SO bad considering all factors.
(although Touch is example of something with Pros and Cons, positioning requirement can be bad, but Flanking bonus can be good)
Arcane has alot of good options but Daze is best (=2x) range of Occult and Divine options,
with range especially important for characters who lack many other ranged options, spell or weapons (using proficiency + DEX stat).
and especially Divine doesn't have anything else that works VS non-Undead or foes of opposed alignment.
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Also, at low levels, 4 damage isn't "tickling their brain". Against a goblin warrior (6 hp), that's 2 thirds of their health, and for something tougher like an orc brute (15 HP), its third of their health.
So against weak enemies, its less "tickling their brain" and more "severe, potentially lethal brain aneurysm" which is pretty okay for a cantrip. It does a bit less damage than other cantrips, but 4 damage and a reasonable chance to inflict stunned is pretty okay for dealing with mooks. (Which tend to have crappy will saves and not much HP).
With the starfinder version of this spell, my groups spellcaster was spending most of her turns spamming daze (the only other spell she used with any regularity was summon monster) as the opponents I was throwing at them tended to fail their saves against it about 70% of the time, so I think it was probably a bit too good in starfinder.
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It doesn't seem to have any visual effects associated with it and it's nonlethal.
I'm hoping to use it with bard characters ,along with their ability replace verbal, material and somatic spell components by playing an instrument.
Lulling targets to sleep with a a violin seems super cool.
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VS low Will enemies (which is obvious with at least some enemies) and/or "mooks"
the damage doesn't seem THAT bad (and reliable with 1/2 on Save), and decent chance for Stun.
Daze does lose more damage on every Level it doesn't Heighten, but where it does (+2) it isn't so bad at least VS less damaging cantrips....
Occult only has these competing against it:
Chill Touch VS Living isn't much better damage, weaker crit effect, good Fort is probably more common than Will, and is Touch Range.
Chill Touch VS Undead does no damage but inflicts Flatfooted debuff, is swingier with nothing on Successful Save but stronger Crit Effect, and is Touch Range.
TK Projectile is better damage, if swingier re: Miss, but physical Resistance more common than Mental, and half the range.Divine only has Chill Touch and these:
Disrupt Undead is better damage but only VS one enemy type, and also half the range.
Divine Lance isn't much better damage w/ nothing on a Miss, Alignment damage is more particular than Mental, and also half the range.Arcane has Chill Touch and these:
Ray of Frost isn't much better damage w/ nothing on a Miss, Cold Resist is more common than Mental, Crit effect weaker, although longer range.
Acid Splash base damage isn't much better w/ nothing on a Miss although persistent damage significant if it sticks, but no other special effect, and half range.
Produce Flame base damage isn't much better w/ nothing on a Miss although crit damage significant if it sticks, no other special effect, Fire more often Resisted, also half range.
Electric Arc isn't much better single target damage although more total damage VS 2 targets, also half range.Even if power of Stun on Crit is significant, I don't even think it's base effect is SO bad considering all factors.
(although Touch is example of something with Pros and Cons, positioning requirement can be bad, but Flanking bonus can be good)
Arcane has alot of good options but Daze is best (=2x) range of Occult and Divine options,
with range...
My party was saved a horrible death in a well known module from a combination of a druid casting tanglefoot and a sorcerer casting daze repeatedly on a level +2 creature who had a low will save. as long as one of them did something to slow the creature down once every other turn we were able to kite the beast very easily. plus a consistent 4 is better than most casters are going to get out of a crossbow for the same amount of actions and some damage on a success.
the cleric in my campaign used it when they couldn't hit people with divine lance due to them being neutral.
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Also worth noting is that as far as I can tell, 2E is the first time that paizo has allowed daze to be repeatedly used on the same creature (pf1 and SF both give creatures immunity to the spell for 1 minute after they have been successfully dazed) so that is interesting.
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It doesn't seem to have any visual effects associated with it and it's nonlethal.
I'm hoping to use it with bard characters ,along with their ability replace verbal, material and somatic spell components by playing an instrument.
Lulling targets to sleep with a a violin seems super cool.
Remember that every spell has visual manifestations around its casting whether or not the spell's effects are inherently visual. Your bards will need the Melodious Spell feat to get around that.
When you Cast a Spell, your spellcasting creates obvious visual manifestations of the gathering magic, although feats such as Conceal Spell (page 210) and Melodious Spell (page 101) can help hide such manifestations or otherwise prevent observers from noticing that you are casting.
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So the Stunned thing is cooler than I thought but still only on a crit fail which at least at my table doesn't happen very often even against mooks
The half damage on save would be cooler if Electric Arc didn't have the same and hit 2 enemies and have the same damage track as all the other damaging cantrips
I would be ok with it doing less damage if it had the same heighten as all other cantrips but did like a D4 or something
The fact that it does nonlethal damage may come in useful occasionally.
One other thing besides attack rolls' swingyness with miss, is additional vulnerability to concealment mirror image etc.
Anyways the ONLY problem I see with Daze that makes it below par is the lack of effect on Heighten(+1).
The damage track is correct for it IMHO, but it just loses out on those even spell levels where it lacks Heighten effect.
Obviously, reason being Paizo wanted simple formula, and nobody is choosing it for high damage anyways, so who cares?
OK, but if you do care, it should fulfill it's damage track, which would be 1d3/level, or (1d6/2).
You could either convert it to 1d6/2 (with no division on CritFail, /4 on Save), or just add "1d3" on even spell levels.
Other than that, Divine Lance is probably more underpowered, since it hardly does more damage than Daze...
and doesn't have any special effect even on a crit, although not sure what that could be? 1 round penalty to hostile actions/DC?
I have supported rebalancing Electric Arc so 2nd target requires Fail/CritFail on 1st, and lowering 2nd target result 1 step (CritFail->Fail).
It doesn't seem to have any visual effects associated with it and it's nonlethal.
I'm hoping to use it with bard characters ,along with their ability replace verbal, material and somatic spell components by playing an instrument.
Lulling targets to sleep with a a violin seems super cool.Remember that every spell has visual manifestations around its casting whether or not the spell's effects are inherently visual. Your bards will need the Melodious Spell feat to get around that.
When you Cast a Spell, your spellcasting creates obvious visual manifestations of the gathering magic, although feats such as Conceal Spell (page 210) and Melodious Spell (page 101) can help hide such manifestations or otherwise prevent observers from noticing that you are casting.
Thanks for showing me this,even though it's another obstacle to doing cool stuff.
I'm a little frustrated,as Casting a Spell is an action that prevents you from staying Hidden as well, with no exception I that I could find in the descriptions of either Conceal or Melodious spell.If you are Undetected, you can Strike before become observed, but if you do anything else, like Cast a Spell, you become Observed before the action.
All of this kind of stinks.
Is there a way a Player Character can do anything significant while remaining hidden or undetected?