Shocking Grasp and Spellstrike


Pathfinder Second Edition General Discussion

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So almost everyone knows that Shocking Grasp was the bread and butter spell of most Magus players in the earlier edition. The +3 bonus to hit vs metal helped it quite a lot. My question is about this feature but for 2nd edition.

Shocking Grasp specifically says "If the target is wearing metal armor or is made of metal, you gain a +1 circumstance bonus to your attack roll with shocking grasp, and the target also takes 1d4 persistent electricity damage on a hit."

Most of the arguements I have seen online were divided between two options. Some considered the "attack roll with shocking grasp" to only be a spell attack roll while others claimed that "Your spell is coupled with your attack, using your attack roll result to determine the effects of both the Strike and the spell." clause in the spellstrike itself makes it possible for this interaction to work. What are the communities opinions about this ?


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Well, I went looking back at the text for Spellstrike, and...

"The effects of the spell don’t occur immediately but are imbued into your attack instead. Make a melee Strike with a weapon or unarmed attack. Your spell is coupled with your attack, using your attack roll result to determine the effects of both the Strike and the spell."

So, it's not entirely clear, but by my read, the "are imbued into your attack instead" means something. The conditional +1 to hit is one of the effects of the spell, after all.

I'd lean towards having the +1 to hit apply to spellstrike where appropriate


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I don't see it specifying an attack roll type. So the best RAW that I can read into it is that it would work with the attack roll made with Spellstrike.

What that means for balance is a different question entirely. A +1 bonus is fairly significant. And it feels, to me at least, that the attack roll bonus and the persistent damage are incentives to actually use the spell even though it is a touch range spell that a Wizard couldn't cast without being in melee range and provoking AO (or using a familiar to deliver). A Starlit Span Magus using it doesn't have those drawbacks.

That said, I would probably allow the bonus to the Magus attack roll. Because I don't hate my players.


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I would be fine with it. I agree with Sanityfaerie, that the language of Spellstrike seems to imply that the +1 should apply.

Also, I am ok giving a Magus a +1 to hit with one of their 4 spells for the day. Shocking Grasp at level 4 does 4d12, or an average of 24 damage. Acid Arrow averages 29.5 assuming only one round of persistent damage. Chromatic ray does an average of 36. Telekinetic projectile does 18.

At on a level 6 slot, SG does an average of 36. Disintegrate averages 33 on a successful save, or 66 on a fail. AA averages 42. TP averages 25.

Shocking Grasp isn't so great that a +1 is going to make it overpowered when you are using a spellslot while leaving plenty of damage on the table if you used a better spell.


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I disagree with sanityfaerie, the ability gives you a strike and then you cast a spell and since you never actually make the spell attack with shocking grasp so the +1 never applies.

But it's a cool feature of the spell so I let it work in my home games.


Kelseus wrote:

Also, I am ok giving a Magus a +1 to hit with one of their 4 spells for the day. Shocking Grasp at level 4 does 4d12, or an average of 24 damage. Acid Arrow averages 29.5 assuming only one round of persistent damage. Chromatic ray does an average of 36. Telekinetic projectile does 18.

At on a level 6 slot, SG does an average of 36. Disintegrate averages 33 on a successful save, or 66 on a fail. AA averages 42. TP averages 25.

Shocking Grasp isn't so great that a +1 is going to make it overpowered when you are using a spellslot while leaving plenty of damage on the table if you used a better spell.

Shocking grasp does 5d12 (33) and an extra 1d4+3 persistent vs metal at 4 and 7d12 (46) and +1d4+6 persistent vs metal at 6. It starts at 2d12 not 1d12.


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Squiggit wrote:
I disagree with sanityfaerie, the ability gives you a strike and then you cast a spell

That's not the order though: it's cast a spell then Strike. "You Cast a Spell that takes 1 or 2 actions to cast and requires a spell attack roll. The effects of the spell don't occur immediately but are imbued into your attack instead. Make a melee Strike with a weapon or unarmed attack. Your spell is coupled with your attack, using your attack roll result to determine the effects of both the Strike and the spell."

I can see "imbued into your attack instead" including the +1 circumstance bonus as the Strike roll is the roll for your spell too. There is also the fact that it is a "bonus to your attack roll" and not on your Spell attack roll, which is more inclusive. IMO, I'd say it's a grey area, as you could make a RAW argument either way and I don't see a 'too good to be true' argument holding water. If I ran it, I'd have no issue allowing it even if it was a RAW only game.


Whether the +1 applies is going to vary with the GM for sure. That said, even if it does, there are arguments to use and prepare other spells.

For instance, Horizon Thunder Sphere has very similar damage to Shocking Grasp (on non-metal targets) but has added versatility with its 3- and 6- action versions. Acid Arrow for the persistent damage. Expansive Spellstrike lets you lay in with AoE spells with the economy bonus. Etc.

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Kelseus wrote:

I would be fine with it. I agree with Sanityfaerie, that the language of Spellstrike seems to imply that the +1 should apply.

Also, I am ok giving a Magus a +1 to hit with one of their 4 spells for the day. Shocking Grasp at level 4 does 4d12, or an average of 24 damage. Acid Arrow averages 29.5 assuming only one round of persistent damage. Chromatic ray does an average of 36. Telekinetic projectile does 18.

At on a level 6 slot, SG does an average of 36. Disintegrate averages 33 on a successful save, or 66 on a fail. AA averages 42. TP averages 25.

Shocking Grasp isn't so great that a +1 is going to make it overpowered when you are using a spellslot while leaving plenty of damage on the table if you used a better spell.

On a 6th level slot, Shocking Grasp deals 5d12 upfront and 1d4+5 as persistent, while Acid Arrow deals 7d8 upfront and 3d6 as persistent. If we only consider the persistent damage hitting for one round, SG deals 40 average and AA deals 42 average. The way I look at it, that +1 makes it much more worth to use than just 2 increase in average damage because it contributes to higher crit chance. (assuming used with True Strike it is a quite high chance to crit)

The way I look at it, Shocking Grasp has the highest possible maximum damage, and unless you want something dead really fast, it is not worth to use a spell slot for it since even the cantrips provide a really good amount of damage. But if I was going to use one of my spell slots for increased burst damage, or two slots to add in True Strike for extra accuracy, I would probably prefer Shokcing Grasp.

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Dubious Scholar wrote:

Whether the +1 applies is going to vary with the GM for sure. That said, even if it does, there are arguments to use and prepare other spells.

For instance, Horizon Thunder Sphere has very similar damage to Shocking Grasp (on non-metal targets) but has added versatility with its 3- and 6- action versions. Acid Arrow for the persistent damage. Expansive Spellstrike lets you lay in with AoE spells with the economy bonus. Etc.

Yeah it has versatality but as a Magus you already have really tight action economy that you probably wont event use the 3 and 6 action versions, and in terms of damage, average damage only catches up at spell level 6 and passes it by 0.5 on levels 7-8-9 each, to a total of 1.5 at maximum, and that is completely ignoring the persistent damage, which is 10.5 average at that level.

I agree that Expansive Spellstrike adds in extra utility and possibly cone and line spells to deal extra aoe, however you have really bad DCs as a Magus. At level 11, you will most likely have +4 Int and be Expert in spell DCs. So a DC 29 vs a level 11 monster would be quite low since the creature numbers table indicates that the save bonuses of level 11 monsters vary between +24 to +18 with a mean of +21. So even if you target the weakest save of the enemy, thats a 50% chance at highest. Against a strong save, it will be only 20% chance of them failing their save. So unless you are including 5+ enemies in that aoe, it will not be that worth mathematically.


at lvl 11 a full spellcaster is going to have 11+4+5 = 30

Having 29 is one less, so the difference wouldn't be that much.

The difference will start kicking in by lvl 15, moving from -1 to -2 ( or -3, if the magus didn't, or couldn't, "properly" invest into int since the beginning ), and last until lvl 16 ( total 2 levels ).

Then will return lvl 19 an 20 ( or maybe sooner, depends on the intellect apex item aviability ).

Anyway, it's a major issue only for the last 1/4 / 1/5 of the game.


Lunaris G. Velskud wrote:


On a 6th level slot, Shocking Grasp deals 5d12 upfront and 1d4+5 as persistent, while Acid Arrow deals 7d8 upfront and 3d6 as persistent. If we only consider the persistent damage hitting for one round, SG deals 40 average and AA deals 42 average. The way I look at it, that +1 makes it much more worth to use than just 2 increase in average damage because it contributes to higher crit chance. (assuming used with True Strike it is a quite high chance to crit)

The way I look at it, Shocking Grasp has the highest possible maximum damage, and unless you want something dead really fast, it is not worth to use a spell slot for it since even the cantrips provide a really good amount of damage. But if I was going to use one of my spell slots for increased burst damage, or two slots to add in True Strike for extra accuracy, I would probably prefer Shokcing Grasp.

Yeah, I dropped a d12 there, but I think the point still stands. It's only as good or worse than other spell options at the same level, it is only 1 of your 4 spells per day, and that +1 isn't going to hit against most enemies. At level 11+ you are fighting a lot more demons and dragons and a lot less guys in full plate. So you are risking losing 7.5 average damage in exchange for a +1 to hit against some enemies.

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