Source? Though I see it postulated regularly, I have never seen any evidence of that anywhere in all my years of following Paizo.I'll look for other examples, but here is Mark Seifter suggesting the decoupling I mentioned and excluding true strike from spell attacks if doing so, and here is another comment where he talks about its impact on spell attacks. The general gist appears to be that true strike is such an impactful spell when combined with spell attacks that so long as it (or sure strike now) exists, spell attacks can't be allowed to be made more accurate, because it's already a huge power boost to attack spells like disintegrate.
I find that line of reasoning to be garbage in that it assumes that every caster using spell attack is loading up on surestrike. It means every spell attack spell's actual cost is 1 extra action and 1 extra spell slot.
This is really just not an issue any more.
The remaster has dramatically reduced the number of spell attack roll spells available to casters, so they serve only as occasional spells to use in situations where targeting AC is a particularly good idea, like against oozes who have really low AC, or against solo creatures with really, really high saves and +1 or +2 bonuses to save against magic. These are maybe once an adventuring day situation and not every encounter situations. Hero points and the occasional sure strike handles the vast majority of these situations just fine.
If you have a focus spell that uses spell attack rolls that you want you want to use all the time, that is when you consider doing something like picking up a staff of the unblinking eye.
Martials typically do not have ways to target all saves as easily as casters, especially not with effective, high damage attacks that also do heavy debuffing without having to switch weapons/waste actions as well. Their runed out weapons are what the character is going to use at least once, and often more like 2 or 3 times every single round. The shadow signet ring is specifically not just a flat bonus to spell attack rolls because the game is heavily pushing casters into playing the rock/paper/scissors game of saving throw targeting.
Spending your wealth as a caster on having more scrolls to have higher rank spells to throw at your enemies that target different saves will greatly increase your effectiveness as a caster over spending money on something like an item that gave you a low bonus to your spell attack roll spells.
The issue isn't really just "sure strike exists" as that works for martials very easily as well, it is that spell attack roll spells are meant to be one niche spell type in a casters arsenal of options and spending a lot of gold on specializing in them leads players down a path of frustration with spell casting. That is also very likely why we lost the eldritch trickster racket and the feat for adding sneak attack to spell attack roll spells.
|
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Standardised and inflexible caster progression is one of the Original Sins of 2e.
It’s hindered design space and created a persistent friction within the system.
It’s too baked in now however.
Standardised and inflexible Martial progression does not elicit much criticism though AFAIK.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I find that line of reasoning to be garbage in that it assumes that every caster using spell attack is loading up on surestrike.
Surestrike is why we can't have nice things... ;P
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I do not see the need for attack roll bonuses to spells. It's a complete non-factor. Paizo could add it or not add it and it will have no impact on the game.
I implemented attack roll bonuses to attack roll spells on wands and staves up to a +3 item bonus to attack rolls. It did absolutely nothing noticeable in the game.
There aren't enough good attack roll spells for it to be noticeable. The few attack roll spells players might use can be used with sure strike on occasion.
Even the addition of the Shadow Signet came and went. I tried it on one character just to see what happened. I rarely used it. Past the the early levels, you don't use attack roll spells. The most used attack roll spells I've seen are cantrips at early level and something like hydraulic torrent or whatever it is called. But past the low levels, no one bothered to use it.
There are not enough good attack roll spells in the game for players to even worry about item bonuses to attack roll spells. It's one of those things that keeps coming up and it is clear from my experiments it would have zero impact positive or negative on the game.
I could care less if Paizo puts it in or not. My players didn't use the item bonuses to attack rolls past the low levels. The don't buy shadow signet rings. They use attack spells so rarely that they don't even care enough about them to remember to work very hard to land them. Attack roll cantrips are something they fire off at higher levels to do a bit of damage without using a spell slot. None of them would waste an 8th level slot on something like polar ray without sure strike if they even bothered to slot that spell.
Item bonuses to spell attack rolls just doesn't matter enough to waste much time on it.
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Standardised and inflexible Martial progression does not elicit much criticism though AFAIK.Standardised and inflexible caster progression is one of the Original Sins of 2e.
It’s hindered design space and created a persistent friction within the system.
It’s too baked in now however.
That's because it's only trying to do the one thing, which is treated the same at all times. Caster Progression is trying to do two things at once, which aren't treated equally.
The games AC scaling assumes a normative progression on par with an optimised, master-tier, martial. Because caster progression is tied closely to save scaling instead of AC, spell attacks can't fit into this assumed progression.
This makes Spell Attacks mechanically predisposed to fail against on-level and higher enemies.
This issue could have been somewhat sidestepped if Paizo had opted to design Spell Attack with failure riders like most save spells, but with the exception of Live Wire, they did not.
Making Spell Attacks the least reliable type of spell in a spellcasters potential arsenal.
The true bugbear here is the inability to gain an item bonus' to spell attacks, creating a barrier to operate on the normative progression which can't be overcome.
None of this information is fronted or discussed with the player or GM, it needs to be discovered.
/whole problem in a nutshell.
---
Also, for what it is worth, we do not have wholly standardised martial scaling. Fighters and Gunslingers doing their thing.
Fighter and gunslinger's thing is following normative scale, but a +2, so it's still following normative scaling. The only one that doesn't is alchemist which si expert at 7 and master at 15.
I find that line of reasoning to be garbage in that it assumes that every caster using spell attack is loading up on surestrike. It means every spell attack spell's actual cost is 1 extra action and 1 extra spell slot.
The general line of reasoning with 2e's design, especially regarding casters, is that if you can optimize, you're assumed that you are optimizing for balance purposes, so that the ceiling of optimization doesn't dramatically overtake the rest of play. I definitely agree with you that not every caster has equal access to sure strike, especially divine or primal casters, but that's just part of the problem with the spell's implementation.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Sometimes I wonder if a +1 is really going to make any difference for casters, or if it will just end up being one of those endless shifting goalposts situations. Where like, we start with +1 to hit, then it becomes wanting +1 to DCs, then the demand for a striking equivalent, and then a greater potency version, etc etc, while casters still feel as if they were behind their non-caster brethren.
I don't know if its just fatigue for this topic or what, but I feel like at this point, the only thing that will make people feel satisfied is something massively game-changing for casters. Something crazy like removing incap from like, 1/2 the spells in the game or something like that. I don't know anyone who complains about casters are is like "a small boost to attack spell accuracy solves my complaints", it's always about just feel and vibes of not being stronger, so it feels like this only stops being a recurring issue when casters get broken again by removing their save or suck limiters.
For what it's worth, I've made caster DCs and attacks scale 2 levels earlier to Expert and Master, and added a small +1 item bonus to them, and it has improved the enjoyment of my caster players quite a bit. Not everyone wants casters to be broken again, for some people it just really does feel frustrating to have your spells miss or enemies succeed at saves so often, with the way Paizo decided to do the math.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
This topic should have stayed dead, there is nothing to be gained here
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I do think the discourse has evolved since the time this thread was created. The caster supremacists appear to have given up or mellowed out, and the community as a whole has also come to genuinely appreciate casters' strengths a bit better. Thanks to community members like the Rules Layer and the person behind behind the newly-formed Mathfinder channel, I think more members of the community have gotten to see just how fun and powerful spells can be. Even in the current environment, though, some lingering criticisms remain, and I think they're generally much more reasonable:
In my games, I've sometimes experimented with some changes that I think have significantly improved the enjoyment of my caster players without making them more powerful:
In practice, my casters were exactly as accurate as martials on their spell attacks, with no dips and fewer means of dramatically increasing their accuracy, and that parity felt a lot better, with players no longer drawing unfavorable comparisons to the martials on accuracy. The other stuff I think just generally gave casters a few more flexible options to play with, though not stronger options relative to what they already had, and had them use spells with the incap replacement trait very much just like normal spells, with the occasional spectacular moment when a low-level enemy crit failed and got saddled with some horrific curse. It wasn't about buffing casters at all, so much as easing some pain points and giving them more fun toys to play with, in the same manner one would do for martial classes.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Standardised and inflexible Martial progression does not elicit much criticism though AFAIK.Standardised and inflexible caster progression is one of the Original Sins of 2e.
It’s hindered design space and created a persistent friction within the system.
It’s too baked in now however.
That's because it's only trying to do the one thing, which is treated the same at all times. Caster Progression is trying to do two things at once, which aren't treated equally.
The games AC scaling assumes a normative progression on par with an optimised, master-tier, martial. Because caster progression is tied closely to save scaling instead of AC, spell attacks can't fit into this assumed progression.
This makes Spell Attacks mechanically predisposed to fail against on-level and higher enemies.
This issue could have been somewhat sidestepped if Paizo had opted to design Spell Attack with failure riders like most save spells, but with the exception of Live Wire, they did not.
Making Spell Attacks the least reliable type of spell in a spellcasters potential arsenal.
The true bugbear here is the inability to gain an item bonus' to spell attacks, creating a barrier to operate on the normative progression which can't be overcome.
None of this information is fronted or discussed with the player or GM, it needs to be discovered.
/whole problem in a nutshell.
---
Also, for what it is worth, we do not have wholly standardised martial scaling. Fighters and Gunslingers doing their thing.
Yeah, this. The whole remaster seems to have accepted Spell Attack delayed scaling is a problem, decided its too baked in to fix directly, and thus instead did things like "have fewer Spell Attack spells" and then also Live Wire's being a Spell Attack that still does damage on a miss. (And also scales way faster than any other cantrip, though that might be an error.)
The biggest problem I really have with Spell Attack is how it scales so unevenly. Some levels it's pretty on-par, some levels its behind a bit, and some levels it's just absolutely awful in comparison to a weapon attack. Like, at level 13 an Agile Grace Fighter's third attack has the same accuracy as a Wizard's first spell attack, and that just feels awful if you're the Wizard.
Shadow Signet helps though it's clunky to use, and Sure Strike turns any attack into effectively a full turn since it'll take 3 actions, though it also helps.
The other problem is that the tools used to try and mitigate it at level 13 when it feels horrific also still work at level 19 when the gap isn't nearly so wide.
It's just a design issue, and the conversation about it has largely died down mostly because people have figured out that a lot of the time you just don't want to use Spell Attack rolls if you can avoid it.
I took up Mark Seifter's suggestion and decoupled spell attack proficiency from spell DC proficiency, and made spell attacks on casters go to expert at 5th level and master at 13th level (not legendary), while letting spell attacks benefit from potency runes, which I allowed to be etched onto staves. I reduced the cost of scrolls, staves, and wands a little to make the purchase of those runes a bit easier.
Oh that sounds like a great idea! The worst levels are definitely the ones where caster proficiency lags martial proficiency, and this would eliminate those.
What adjustments did you make to costs for scrolls/wands? I find that new players favor wands and veterans favor scrolls because they're so much more cost efficient right now.
Beyond this, there's often requests, rather than demands or big arguments, for stuff like more variable-action spells like heal, equalizations to certain spells that are really below the curve (and some requests to equalize spells that are above the curve too, like slow and synesthesia), and criticisms of the incapacitation trait. The latter in particular I think was Paizo trying to do casters a solid by still giving them "I win" buttons under specific circumstances in a game designed for balanced and tactical combat, but it backfired due to how the trait shifts down the entire accuracy of a spell against high-level enemies, so a lot of players still fixate on the worst-case scenario.
Yeah, agreed. I don't see a lot of players criticizing Synthesia, even though they'll often admit it's out of line. Even the martial players don't seem to mind that in my experience because it's not taking them out of the encounter: they still get to hit the enemy to bring it down.
Incapacitate has a perception problem for sure. You're right that it backfired in the sense that players often just see that trait and decide not to take those at all. It's understandable, though they can really swing some encounters even though they don't work on bigger enemies. I don't think as a GM they're as bad as a lot of players seem to think, but I find players tend do what you said: "this won't work on the BBEG so its worthless."
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Players never think about how the incapacitation trait protects them far more than it hinders them. Going up against a cult of low level casters would be a nightmare if spells like paralysis and calm didn’t have a level limit of efficacy, especially as they’d be spammable out of lower level slots.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I think it is fair to say the topic has evolved a bit.
If we look at both player cores, we can see that Paizo have made changes to soften the problem.
Wizard's got Knowledge is Power, Oracles got Whispers of Weakness and Sorcerers got Ancestral Memories.
Not all of those are equal (not by a long shot...) but it does show that there has been a recognition that Spell Attack math is generally quite bad.
But even before that, with the advent of the Kineticist and Gate Attenuator's giving a permanent item bonus to caster scaling, we see movement. That said, Paizo was pulling different levers with Kineticist in general.
So yes, there is - general - and always has been a sore spot in regard to Spell Attacks. We have recently seen moves to soften that in some places. So the topic has progressed.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Players never think about how the incapacitation trait protects them far more than it hinders them. Going up against a cult of low level casters would be a nightmare if spells like paralysis and calm didn’t have a level limit of efficacy, especially as they’d be spammable out of lower level slots.
Maybe that's true at super high levels (my highest is a 12), but most of the time, the mechanics of incap are very much stacked against the PCs.
The foes players fight tend to be higher level more often than lower, especially when the foes are so often outnumbered by the PCs. Additionally, the "mook" or "grunt" type foes that are below PC level are super rarely the spellcasters. So while the spellcasting boss may be levels above the lieutenant or mooks (and the PCs), the party will always contain X creatures of equal level.
Even further; incap spells go by spell rank. PCs fight more than once a day, while I've literally never seen an encounter where the foes had some of their resources drained to simulate attrition. This means that foe spellcasters will have their top rank slots always ready, while an even-level PC may not have the ability to hit the foe with an incap due to lacking their top slot.
This also makes using incap spells on mooks super aggravating. Unlike most non-damage spells, you need to heighten the incap spell, and always have to guess how far below your L you're willing to gamble that a mook squad will be. Even just putting it in a slot that's 2nd highest will trigger the trait to protect all foes of Lvl - 1 or 2.
.
All this together leaves foes much more often protected by incap when compared to the PCs.
This danger multiplies when you factor in saves. The time you most need a mechanic to make spells less dangerous is when there is a significant level gap, and that's exactly when incap does literally nothing for your PC.
Consequently, PCs have to constantly fear a single Feeblemind / Never Mind spell ending their career, while such spells are nearly worthless for a PC to use.
.
The b%#!+@!& of spells like Never Mind is *why* it's considered essential to save a hero point.The developer-justified reason for a 2A spell to be an instant ender is because of the incap trait, yet the mechanic does nothing to help mitigate the actual danger.
I still cannot believe that someone actually thought that a trait which literally does nothing to reduce the danger of a spell when the PCs will most often be encountering it was a good idea. Incap being such an all or nothing binary, especially when that's typically against PCs, makes the mechanic a horrible failure of design (which stands out due to how generally good most of pf2 is).
Aside from those flanking feats, incap is one of the only mechanics where knowing the combat level of foes suddenly makes a huge difference. That extra mechanical consideration alone makes the spells a huge pain in the ass for players to use, especially when pf2 makes foe level adjustments so easy for the GM that you'll genuinely not know without an RK question.
Every single angle I try to analyze the incap mechanic from, it's a total dud/bad idea that IMO should never be used in future spells.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Don't AC-targeting spells offer more opportunities to take advantage of buffs and debuffs?
I've had such spells land more frequently than save spells in many of my games because my party can generally swing the AC gap further than they can the save gap.
I think that's something often overlooked in discussions such as this.
Don't AC-targeting spells offer more opportunities to take advantage of buffs and debuffs?
I've had such spells land more frequently than save spells in many of my games because my party can generally swing the AC gap further than they can the save gap.
I think that's something often overlooked in discussions such as this.
You also have to remember roller's advantage when considering AC vs Save spells, where "if it meets it beats".
I don't remember the math, but I think off-guard got the gap "close," and might have gotten it to be +0 or even +1 in some circumstance. Saves in general vary a *lot* which makes it annoying to analyze.
But yeah, that's a pretty yikes conclusion if off-guard is not enough.
And besides off-guard, just about all other debuffs like Sicken will also lower saves alongside AC.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Don't AC-targeting spells offer more opportunities to take advantage of buffs and debuffs?
I've had such spells land more frequently than save spells in many of my games because my party can generally swing the AC gap further than they can the save gap.
I think that's something often overlooked in discussions such as this.
I think, ultimately, for the variation and nuance that can happen in and between any given encounter, the issue remains that there is the assumption of Item Bonus access baked into AC scaling. Meaning that spell attack will return worse results overall because they are favoured to do so.
In any given individual encounter, your results will very on a number of factors, but the disadvantage gets you in the long run!
That said, there are other ways to solve it without actually adding flat numbers.
An item that allows you to treat your proficiency bonus for spell attacks as tier higher, placed at the right level, would have a similar effect without pushing the post 19 ceiling higher, for example.
I find that line of reasoning to be garbage in that it assumes that every caster using spell attack is loading up on surestrike.Surestrike is why we can't have nice things... ;P
Errata Sure Strike to only work with weapon and unarmed attacks. Problem solved. Now we can't use it as a crutch to cripple spellcasters.
Don't AC-targeting spells offer more opportunities to take advantage of buffs and debuffs?
I've had such spells land more frequently than save spells in many of my games because my party can generally swing the AC gap further than they can the save gap.
I think that's something often overlooked in discussions such as this.
Not really. The only damage cantrips that offer AC attacks are TKP, GC, and Ignition. The former doesn't do much other than D6 at a range, GC adds a bleed even on a success, and Ignition adds burning on a critical. These aren't really debuffs more than they are damage riders. Frostbite, Acidic Burst, Daze et. al. are far more likely to include actual debuffs.
As for save spells not landing as much, monsters have super-tuned saves to counteract the factor that save spells still have an effect on a success (most of them, anyway; still want errata for Command, Grease, and Floating Flame to do something on a success). Spell attacks don't have that safety net, and the monster AC assumes you get item bonuses to attack rolls, meaning by default Spell Attacks have less going for it than save based spells.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Don't AC-targeting spells offer more opportunities to take advantage of buffs and debuffs?
I've had such spells land more frequently than save spells in many of my games because my party can generally swing the AC gap further than they can the save gap.
I think that's something often overlooked in discussions such as this.
Only if you're using one in melee or have help. Most debuffs casters are putting out also apply to saves (Frightened/Sickened/etc).
Melee Spell Attack rolls can get flank (but there aren't that many melee spell attack spells). Ranged ones can get off guard, but you need someone else providing that via something like Trip so unless your party is built around it, it's not reliable for the vast majority of spell attack spells.
And of course, if you do have that, the martials are also getting it so you're still at the same deficit in terms of actually hitting something, even though your odds went up: theirs did too, and their crit odds probably went up by more than yours since they are starting farther ahead. So it still feels lousy.
Spell Attacks are mathematically the worst attack roll in the game, and nothing's really changed on that front except Live Wire's damage on a miss.
A couple of things:
Floating flame is just a basic reflex save in player core 1.
Command gets to do powerful stuff (like waste 1 to 2 actions, sometimes also provoking an attack) as a rank 1 spell with no incapacitate, exactly because it doesn't also have success rider. If you really look through the spells, you will see that the spells that do really effective things on success actually don't do that much more on a failure. They kind of front load the ability into the success and critical failure results. Spells that really bite hard on just a regular failure often do nothing, or very minor effects on success. It was an intentional design decision. There obviously is room for some indiviudal spells to bounce around between the two with errata (see floating flame) but I don't think you will win over the developers from keeping both as distinct categories.
The intersection of incapacitation and spell attack roll spells is in players looking to spam the same spells over and over again, which is why the developers have been resistant to making changes to either. Calm, paralysis, sleep, dominate, never mind are just not meant to be spells that players should be expecting to use in every single encounter, against every enemy, which is why I (and many others) see the "these are spells competing for top rank slots" as a positive for the game. The same thing happens with spell attack roll spells if the damage output from them consistently becomes more reliable in most situations over saving throw targeting spells. Without item bonuses, it is already the case against powerful solo creatures that spell attack roll spells will often exceed saving throw spells in damage and effect on an encounter in all but a very small handful of spells that are generally over praised on the forums (like fear, slow, synesthesia, etc), precisely for the reasons Raving Dork mentioned. The thing is that you have to be casting high rank spell attack roll spells to really see it and the remaster has nearly removed such spells, especially ones designed for targeting one solo creature, so almost always this conversation about spell attack roll item bonuses is coming back to players that are trying to use cantrips as their primary combat/damage contribution. At the levels where item bonuses would enter this picture, cantrips should not be caster's combat/damage contribution to most encounters.
Shadow signet is a great item to exist in this game for casters who want to use the tricky few spell attack roll spell slot spells left in the remaster, but only in specialized/niche situations. Disintegrate, for example, is brutal with the shadow signet against any creature with a weak fort save, especially since you can still sure strike or hero point the initial attack roll. It is also effective on a spell like blazing bolt, when you are fighting creatures like fiends with bonuses to save vs spell, and very high ACs. Once you have identified a weak save, it becomes a way to flex your ability to hit that save, even if you don't have a lot of spells that already target it. All without trivializing the usefulness of other spells in most other situations. It is not an item that every caster needs to have, but it is an item that casters can use effectively if they want to. In my opinion, that is a much better design target than some kind of item bonus to spell attack roll spells generally or removing sure strike from the game, which doesn't, by itself make for a "must use" spell, but again as another trick to keep in your tool kit, but not over use, or you are probably undermining your character's combat contribution to encounters.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
A couple of things:
Floating flame is just a basic reflex save in player core 1.
Command gets to do powerful stuff (like waste 1 to 2 actions, sometimes also provoking an attack) as a rank 1 spell with no incapacitate, exactly because it doesn't also have success rider. If you really look through the spells, you will see that the spells that do really effective things on success actually don't do that much more on a failure. They kind of front load the ability into the success and critical failure results. Spells that really bite hard on just a regular failure often do nothing, or very minor effects on success. It was an intentional design decision. There obviously is room for some indiviudal spells to bounce around between the two with errata (see floating flame) but I don't think you will win over the developers from keeping both as distinct categories.
The intersection of incapacitation and spell attack roll spells is in players looking to spam the same spells over and over again, which is why the developers have been resistant to making changes to either. Calm, paralysis, sleep, dominate, never mind are just not meant to be spells that players should be expecting to use in every single encounter, against every enemy, which is why I (and many others) see the "these are spells competing for top rank slots" as a positive for the game. The same thing happens with spell attack roll spells if the damage output from them consistently becomes more reliable in most situations over saving throw targeting spells. Without item bonuses, it is already the case against powerful solo creatures that spell attack roll spells will often exceed saving throw spells in damage and effect on an encounter in all but a very small handful of spells that are generally over praised on the forums (like fear, slow, synesthesia, etc), precisely for the reasons Raving Dork mentioned. The thing is that you have to be casting high rank spell attack roll spells to really see it and the remaster has nearly removed such spells,...
Not only that but Floating Flame now only moves 10 feet per sustain; okay, I have a bit more respect for this spell now. But still not much.
My problem with Incapacitate spells is that they are mostly used by bosses and against encounters with multiple mooks; they are otherwise not useful at all due to the scaling they are usually given. When a boss uses it, it's powerful. When a PC uses it, it's only somewhat strong against equal or weaker enemies, and unless they multi-target, there are better uses for those actions.
Please stop using Shadow Signet as a defense for Paizo's poor design. The game can very easily allow spell attacks to go against save DCs instead of AC, without breaking the math, and if they really intended for spells to not be able to affect AC, they can do so easily within this very system. The whole "pick up this specific item to properly use your spells" defense is like saying you need a CLW wand in PF1.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Players never think about how the incapacitation trait protects them far more than it hinders them. Going up against a cult of low level casters would be a nightmare if spells like paralysis and calm didn’t have a level limit of efficacy, especially as they’d be spammable out of lower level slots.
Yep. I tried to change this one and it was more problematic for the party than helpful. Just made enemy casters brutal. The incap tag is baked in hard and removing it will lead a massively increase lethality.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm still wondering why so many are wasting writing on spell attack rolls when I'd love to see a list and how long that list is of spell attack roll spells that are worth using over save spells.
Paizo put the shadow signet ring in and it still doesn't get used. Some poster a long time ago claimed it would make spell attack rolls overpowered and break the game, here we are reviving a four year old thread so some people can complain about not getting a spell attack item bonus for spells that aren't worth using.
It's unbelievable.
You can even test this yourself by adding spell attack item bonuses into your game like I did and see for yourself that they will still rarely be used because you have so many other better options.
Paizo should toss the item bonus to spell attack rolls in the game just so these threads don't come up and watch it do nothing to game balance unless Paizo suddenly adds a huge number of quality spell attack roll spells to the game with the item.
I even see this problem with the Kineticist. I bought the gate attenuator, but I so rarely use attack roll abilities that it sites there mostly doing nothing.
The time I use attack roll spells the most is in the very early levels when I'm stuck using cantrips. Same with the kineticist. I only use elemental blast at those early levels before I get the good stuff.
It's mind boggling to listen to people push this issue again when it is one of those issues where Paizo tossed in a fix and that fix barely gets used or remember because no one much uses attack roll spells regularly.
Super low priority for something like this at best.
I have only ever seen the shadow signet used by clerics and Wizards. The cleric used it almost exclusively with Searing Light (now Holy Light), as a lot of undead have bad fort saves, and the wizard used it most frequently with disintegrate, scorching ray (now blazing bolt) and cantrips, most of which now are saving throw spells instead of spell attack roll spells.
For the most part I agree that the issue is incredibly overblown because there are just not enough spell attack roll spells to make item bonuses to spell attack roll spells a thing in the first place, and the ones that are there now are just enough of them to be useful for going against solo boss monsters who don't have a great AC and your party is focused on debuffing AC and boosting attack rolls (like with inspire courage). People looking to sink a bunch of money into items to boost spell attack roll spells are looking for the wrong thing out of casters in PF 2 and are going to end up disappointed in the end anyway. Sure strike and hero points are much better and more reliable ways to land those rare spell attack roll spells that you will want to use.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
What adjustments did you make to costs for scrolls/wands? I find that new players favor wands and veterans favor scrolls because they're so much more cost efficient right now.
Because I was adjusting on the fly after my players had agreed to the changes to spell attacks, I basically told them: "if you want to buy weapon potency runes for your staves, go ahead and I'll just discount the cost from the caster items you buy". If I were to put down some more formal rules for this, I'd focus exclusively on staves and do the following:
So in a nutshell, give current staves a free weapon potency rune, adjust Price only in the rare cases where the staff would become cheaper than the rune, and tie the property rune to the staff's spells to prevent transferring and reselling the free rune. This ought to be minimally disruptive to balance, particularly given how casters in ABP get the full gamut of fundamental runes on their staves for free without real issue, but also not too disruptive to a caster's purchases, given how staves tend to be pretty important on any caster.
It's mind boggling to listen to people push this issue again when it is one of those issues where Paizo tossed in a fix and that fix barely gets used or remember because no one much uses attack roll spells regularly.
If your mind is this boggled, you could always just visit other threads instead, rather than give oxygen to the one you despise with ostentatious declarations of how little you care about the topic. Let other people care if they want, if the topic is truly of no consequence then it will never affect you anyway.
I have only ever seen the shadow signet used by clerics and Wizards. The cleric used it almost exclusively with Searing Light (now Holy Light), as a lot of undead have bad fort saves, and the wizard used it most frequently with disintegrate, scorching ray (now blazing bolt) and cantrips, most of which now are saving throw spells instead of spell attack roll spells.
For the most part I agree that the issue is incredibly overblown because there are just not enough spell attack roll spells to make item bonuses to spell attack roll spells a thing in the first place, and the ones that are there now are just enough of them to be useful for going against solo boss monsters who don't have a great AC and your party is focused on debuffing AC and boosting attack rolls (like with inspire courage). People looking to sink a bunch of money into items to boost spell attack roll spells are looking for the wrong thing out of casters in PF 2 and are going to end up disappointed in the end anyway. Sure strike and hero points are much better and more reliable ways to land those rare spell attack roll spells that you will want to use.
My players asked for item bonuses to attack roll spells for ages. I finally put them in.
Wands: 1st to 3rd: +1 item bonus. 4 to 6th: +2 item bonus. 7th to 10th wands: +3 item bonus.
Staff: Normal: +1 Greater: +2 Major: +3
I put these in. Players like the +1 at the early levels when they were using attack cantrips.
After about 5th to 7th level, my players forgot these item bonuses even existed. They rarely used cantrips, much less attack roll cantrips given electric arc is an amazing cantrip doing the same damage for a save.
Eventually they were so little used and so often forgotten about, I just removed the house rule from the game. No use keeping a house rule no one uses or cares about past a few low levels.
When a house rule isn't worth my time because the players don't use it or care about it even when it supposedly providing them an amazing, highly desired advantage, then it is not as necessary or even worthwhile to add or worry about as some would make it seem.
Spells that make spell attack rolls basically exist for the Magus (and the Eldritch Archer) rather than for normal spellcasters, who have the option of picking different spells.
Spells that make spell attack rolls basically exist for the Magus (and the Eldritch Archer) rather than for normal spellcasters, who have the option of picking different spells.
That's not an excuse, since they can fix Spellstrike/Eldritch Shot to not require attack roll spells, in the same way they fixed Channel Smite in the Remaster, and in the same way they expected Shadow Signet to "fix" the problem with spell attacks not being able to target saves (which is actually worse in most cases, because saves are usually harder to affect than AC, compensated by the factor they still do something on a success 95% of the time). Granted, Magus and Eldritch Archer don't have the item bonus problems that other spellcasters do, but I don't see the reason why they have to be restricted to attack roll spells, nor do I see the reason why other spellcasters can't benefit from spell attack roll bonuses.
And it's super easy to do it, since they already have the groundwork in place. All they have to do is implement it.
I'm still wondering why so many are wasting writing on spell attack rolls when I'd love to see a list and how long that list is of spell attack roll spells that are worth using over save spells.
Paizo put the shadow signet ring in and it still doesn't get used. Some poster a long time ago claimed it would make spell attack rolls overpowered and break the game, here we are reviving a four year old thread so some people can complain about not getting a spell attack item bonus for spells that aren't worth using.
It does get used in my games, but in general it's not a good solution to the problem. This problem appears at level 2 and becomes pretty significant by level 5. New players get impacted by it and figure out "oh, Spell Attack sucks", and stop using it. They're not waiting until level 10 to then find something that only sometimes actually fixes it.
It's a lot like the original Aid DC of 20: it taught people the wrong thing at low level and by time that was no longer true, people had learned to not use it. (Of course the GM can and should always change the Aid DC since a flat number for that just doesn't work well.)
It's unbelievable.
You can even test this yourself by adding spell attack item bonuses into your game like I did and see for yourself that they will still rarely be used because you have so many other better options.
Paizo should toss the item bonus to spell attack rolls in the game just so these threads don't come up and watch it do nothing to game balance unless Paizo suddenly adds a huge number of quality spell attack roll spells to the game with the item.
Paizo should toss it in because the lack of it is something they seem to recognize as a problem already given both the Shadow Signet and the remaster's movement away from Spell Attack rolls (and Live Wire just going "screw it, missing is fine").
I'm still wondering why so many are wasting writing on spell attack rolls when I'd love to see a list and how long that list is of spell attack roll spells that are worth using over save spells.
Paizo put the shadow signet ring in and it still doesn't get used. Some poster a long time ago claimed it would make spell attack rolls overpowered and break the game, here we are reviving a four year old thread so some people can complain about not getting a spell attack item bonus for spells that aren't worth using.
It does get used in my games, but in general it's not a good solution to the problem. This problem appears at level 2 and becomes pretty significant by level 5. New players get impacted by it and figure out "oh, Spell Attack sucks", and stop using it. They're not waiting until level 10 to then find something that only sometimes actually fixes it.
It's a lot like the original Aid DC of 20: it taught people the wrong thing at low level and by time that was no longer true, people had learned to not use it. (Of course the GM can and should always change the Aid DC since a flat number for that just doesn't work well.)
Paizo should toss it in because the lack of it is something they seem to recognize as a problem already given both the Shadow Signet and the remaster's movement away from Spell Attack rolls (and Live Wire just going "screw it, missing is fine").It's unbelievable.
You can even test this yourself by adding spell attack item bonuses into your game like I did and see for yourself that they will still rarely be used because you have so many other better options.
Paizo should toss the item bonus to spell attack rolls in the game just so these threads don't come up and watch it do nothing to game balance unless Paizo suddenly adds a huge number of quality spell attack roll spells to the game with the item.
I'd love to see Paizo add them to the game and then take data on if they even get used past the low level.
I can see clerics using them with holy light and spiritual weapon. Certain classes with some quality attack roll focus spell like the spiritual weapon type of cantrip by the psychic may get used more. The wizard might get more out of an attack roll item bonus as they don't have good focus spells to use and might use attack roll cantrips more.
Even the Remaster changed some attack roll cantrips into save cantrips like frostbite, which further cuts back attack roll spells.
I do think that in a world where spell attacks could benefit from item bonuses, that creates a bit more flexibility for what you could achieve for casters: for instance, in a world where casters had trained-to-martial spell attacks, item bonuses, and no access to Shadow Signet or sure strike on spell attacks, you could conceivably implement some kind of spell-slinger class that'd have expert-to-legendary spell attacks plus item bonuses, with perhaps a reduced spell DC to compensate (Zoken44 came up with a brew to this effect). The main problem at this stage would be the limited number of attack spells, though one way to go around that could be to make such a class extremely good with cantrips, in a manner that'd be structurally similar in some ways to the Psychic but markedly different in how they'd play.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I do think that in a world where spell attacks could benefit from item bonuses, that creates a bit more flexibility for what you could achieve for casters: for instance, in a world where casters had trained-to-martial spell attacks, item bonuses, and no access to Shadow Signet or sure strike on spell attacks, you could conceivably implement some kind of spell-slinger class that'd have expert-to-legendary spell attacks plus item bonuses, with perhaps a reduced spell DC to compensate (Zoken44 came up with a brew to this effect). The main problem at this stage would be the limited number of attack spells, though one way to go around that could be to make such a class extremely good with cantrips, in a manner that'd be structurally similar in some ways to the Psychic but markedly different in how they'd play.
You forget they nerfed several cantrips to make the Psychic class more appealing.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I do think that in a world where spell attacks could benefit from item bonuses, that creates a bit more flexibility for what you could achieve for casters: for instance, in a world where casters had trained-to-martial spell attacks, item bonuses, and no access to Shadow Signet or sure strike on spell attacks, you could conceivably implement some kind of spell-slinger class that'd have expert-to-legendary spell attacks plus item bonuses, with perhaps a reduced spell DC to compensate (Zoken44 came up with a brew to this effect). The main problem at this stage would be the limited number of attack spells, though one way to go around that could be to make such a class extremely good with cantrips, in a manner that'd be structurally similar in some ways to the Psychic but markedly different in how they'd play.You forget they nerfed several cantrips to make the Psychic class more appealing.
Nobody ever believes me whenever I say that Paizo has a history of nerfing existing content to make new content look better, even when they do it again. So I wouldn't get your hopes up.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Me neither. The remaster changes to cantrip damage hurt the psychic a little bit, because for the most part trading ability modifier for an extra damage die is not a good trade.
And with spells-from-slots often getting a little boost from the remaster, I think the psychic actually looks a bit short-ended because they don't have all that many slots.
I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.
If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
is that causality?
| 8 people marked this as a favorite. |
If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
This doesn't make any sense. The Psychic power crept cantrips by getting better ones (Imaginary Weapon) or upgrading old ones (Shield, Telekinetic Projectile) and then adding Amp on top. They did not in any way change old cantrips for everyone else.
To say cantrips were nerfed to make Psychic look better implies the developers willfully designed the cantrips in the original core rulebook and all books until Dark Archive weaker than they otherwise would have because they already planned Psychic getting better ones, which is such a deranged idea I'm frankly astounded anyone would think so.
And even then, I've seen very few people take Psychic Multiclass except Magus in order to get Imaginary Weapon. Sometimes I see someone picking up Amped Daze, but by and large it's Magus and IW due to how well they synergise and the fact that Magus feats at 2nd and 6th level are so underwhelming picking up MDC and Psi Development is well worth it.
is that causality?If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
Yes, since causality is "B happens because A happens, but C happens if A doesn't happen."
If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
This doesn't make any sense. The Psychic power crept cantrips by getting better ones (Imaginary Weapon) or upgrading old ones (Shield, Telekinetic Projectile) and then adding Amp on top. They did not in any way change old cantrips for everyone else.
To say cantrips were nerfed to make Psychic look better implies the developers willfully designed the cantrips in the original core rulebook and all books until Dark Archive weaker than they otherwise would have because they already planned Psychic getting better ones, which is such a deranged idea I'm frankly astounded anyone would think so.
And even then, I've seen very few people take Psychic Multiclass except Magus in order to get Imaginary Weapon. Sometimes I see someone picking up Amped Daze, but by and large it's Magus and IW due to how well they synergise and the fact that Magus feats at 2nd and 6th level are so underwhelming picking up MDC and Psi Development is well worth it.
Exactly my point, though; some cantrips were reduced to make room for Psychic's versions of them. It probably wasn't done since Core Rulebook (otherwise I suspect Warpriest would have been the first published Wave Caster, not Magus and Summoner), but as evidenced by the Remaster, certain ones were changed to accommodate the power boost that Psychic versions granted, while some were not.
Psychic having some better cantrips is worth even taking a basic dedication for; it is a great Multitalented feat choice, for example. On top of that, it is flexible in what can or can't apply for it, as it is just as good for Intelligence-based casters as it is for Charisma-based ones.
Yes, since causality is "B happens because A happens, but C happens if A doesn't happen."is that causality?If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
I mean they asserted it. but is it supported?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
What do you mean? The cantrips were made long before the psychic came out. They did not change in the Remaster.
The only psychic cantrip that is an outlier is Imaginary Weapon. Not everyone is picking it up, just the magus who relies on cantrips more than others.
Psychic cantrips honestly aren't that great. When not amped, are not better than the regular cantrips.
In the Remaster, gouging claw was made even better. Needle Darts was also added which is another cantrip upgrade.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The "nerf to cantrips" was less "an intentional nerf" and more "to fix an asymmetry between cantrips and other spells."
Since pre-remaster you always added your casting stat to cantrips but never to other spells. But as a result, you had people forgetting to add their casting stat to cantrips (making them weaker) and people mistakenly adding their casting stat to other spells (making cantrips comparatively weaker.)
To fix both these problems Paizo removed the static damage from your KAS to cantrips but added another die making the A/B comparison as close as possible. In some contexts, cantrips got buffed (like you're a martial who goes into eldritch archer).
If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
What do you mean? The cantrips were made long before the psychic came out. They did not change in the Remaster.
The only psychic cantrip that is an outlier is Imaginary Weapon. Not everyone is picking it up, just the magus who relies on cantrips more than others.
Psychic cantrips honestly aren't that great. When not amped, are not better than the regular cantrips.
In the Remaster, gouging claw was made even better. Needle Darts was also added which is another cantrip upgrade.
Frostbite and Ignition both say hi.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Frostbite and Ignition both say hi.If Psychic had the quality of cantrips that were available to everyone, nobody would be picking it up as a MCD. Ergo, the cantrips were nerfed to make the Psychic ones more appealing.I am playing a psychic right now and have seen another psychic played to level 14. Not sure what cantrips they nerfed to make the psychic look better.
What do you mean? The cantrips were made long before the psychic came out. They did not change in the Remaster.
The only psychic cantrip that is an outlier is Imaginary Weapon. Not everyone is picking it up, just the magus who relies on cantrips more than others.
Psychic cantrips honestly aren't that great. When not amped, are not better than the regular cantrips.
In the Remaster, gouging claw was made even better. Needle Darts was also added which is another cantrip upgrade.
Frostbite changed to a save. I see it used more now as prior the main save based cantrip was electric arc. So if Frostbite was nerfed, why is it getting used more than prior?
Ignition was made more variable. It is still 1d4 at range with the same range and now has added melee option that increases it to d6. This improved ignition to make it more useful to the magus.
If anything, cantrips were improved so the magus didn't have to dip into psychic to obtain a quality cantrip. Right now gouging claw and the melee version of ignition make magus attack roll cantrips better.
So how were these nerfed again? I'm not seeing it in play. In fact, in place cantrips seem better.