I mean I can tell you number 1 absolutely has been an issue. I have seen it happen at the table.None of it has ever been an issue.Possible reasons.
1. It causes confusion for some folks who don't know what their casting modifier is. It's not a big barrier to entry but I've seen it trip up players. Just telling them to roll X many dice is easier and more self contained.
I have also seen it happen. In PBP, which means that I can link to it.
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It seems that casters are getting pushed towards abusing the new focus point system, replacing their cantrips with multiple rounds of focus spells instead. Classes that get bad focus spells get f~*%ed, I guess.
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I get why Paizo would want to avoid having cantrips set the damage curve for classes with spells. Cantrips are supposed to be more on the order of "backup weapons" rather than "your main combat tool."
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I get why Paizo would want to avoid having cantrips set the damage curve for classes with spells. Cantrips are supposed to be more on the order of "backup weapons" rather than "your main combat tool."
Seeing as they were already filling that role, since you don't ever use cantrips in a serious encounter, making them worse at being your filler action when you have nothing better to do is just insulting. Cantrips were already worse than just having a maxed bow and the main value was in being free while not being completely worthless.
The only upside is that any combat you were casting cantrips in is one where your actions probably didn't matter anymore anyway.
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There are also classes, like the Summoner, that are extremely dependent on cantrips.
And low level casters don't have the spell list to last and need cantrips for that.
A nerf of cantrips would be a very bad idea.
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This looks to me like a solution in search of a problem. I've never seen anyone complain that low level caster damage is too reliable and needs to be more swingy.
This also seems like a change at odds with my understanding of what the Remaster was about. It doesn't seem calculated to move away from OGL issues, and I don't think it's addressing an issue that has caused major problems for players.
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There are also classes, like the Summoner, that are extremely dependent on cantrips.
And low level casters don't have the spell list to last and need cantrips for that.
A nerf of cantrips would be a very bad idea.
Magus also depend on cantrips.
You heavily depend on cantrips for the first 3 to 5 levels or so where it is very easy tor run of spells.
I know with my druid at early levels it was extremely common for me to use a bow in combination with a save cantrip which improved my damage since the MAP penalty was not great.
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I have also seen it happen. In PBP, which means that I can link to it.Are you trying to argue this is a common issue? Or merely trying to point out that you have players who don't sufficiently read the rules and Paizo should modify the game for their lack of attentiveness?
I'm pointing out that saying, "this never happens, so we don't need to consider it" is an invalid assumption.
And I agree with NielsenE that this is caused by having spell slot and focus spells generally not include the ability modifier, but cantrips generally do.
That player that got it wrong that I linked to has been playing in my gaming group for a couple of years now and is no slouch when it comes to knowing the rules.
There are also classes, like the Summoner, that are extremely dependent on cantrips.
And low level casters don't have the spell list to last and need cantrips for that.
A nerf of cantrips would be a very bad idea.Magus also depend on cantrips.
You heavily depend on cantrips for the first 3 to 5 levels or so where it is very easy tor run of spells.
I know with my druid at early levels it was extremely common for me to use a bow in combination with a save cantrip which improved my damage since the MAP penalty was not great.
Magi better get used to picking up amp telekinetic projectile early and retraining it after imaginary weapon becomes available. Between their base focus spell, ancient elf-ing the archetype and an early force fang we can get triple focus spellstrikes before we transition to IW at 6 and retrain force fang for a familiar for the extra focus point when you need a quick recharge when you can't refocus. Once they strip away the int-to-damage from it it might actually be weaker than the Cleric route, but the damage typing is still better than fire or negative and the extra true/sure strikes are always appreciated until those get nerfed too.
Druid should be fine though. Just tempest surge more and get used to casters being """balanced""" around having full focus points.
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Magus also depend on cantrips.
This is arguably a positive change for a Magus player, though, because a Magus player can now completely dump INT, focus entirely on attack spells, and replace a 1dX + 0 damage with 2dX damage, all powered by STR or DEX.
You heavily depend on cantrips for the first 3 to 5 levels or so where it is very easy tor run of spells.
This is where a negative impact will be felt, as cantrip damage becomes less reliable and more swingy.
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I get why Paizo would want to avoid having cantrips set the damage curve for classes with spells. Cantrips are supposed to be more on the order of "backup weapons" rather than "your main combat tool."
Thinking of spell slots as being the main combat tool has a problem though. That main combat tool is only usable 5 or 6 times per day. And that many times only starting at level 3.
At levels earlier than that, or if we are going to have more than two combats per day, what that means is that these spellcasting characters are completely without a main combat tool.
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I wonder how many folks lamenting this change will be alright with it if most casters have a low level feat that lets them add an attribute to their spell damage rolls, not limited just to cantrips? That seems like the kind of thing people will get really excited about because it will apply to focus spells and spell slot spells too, and be seen as a boost for the ability of casters to take on blasting. It would limit the utility of people grabbing damaging cantrips with ancestry feats but I could see that being an intentional shift as well.
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I wonder how many folks lamenting this change will be alright with it if most casters have a low level feat that lets them add an attribute to their spell damage rolls, not limited just to cantrips? That seems like the kind of thing people will get really excited about because it will apply to focus spells and spell slot spells too, and be seen as a boost for the ability of casters to take on blasting. It would limit the utility of people grabbing damaging cantrips with ancestry feats but I could see that being an intentional shift as well.
Honestly, this kinda seems like it'd be a feat tax, and casters already don't get class feats at level 1. It'd be pretty hard to justify getting anything else at it's level.
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If you aren't planning on casting a lot of damaging spells, the difference between adding your attribute modifier and not would be pretty small.
Since the spells are getting an extra die instead of the attribute in the first place, I wouldn't be surprised if the add on was more gradual anyway, starting with just a +1 would get cantrips up to where players expect them to be.
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I am also fine with removing the attribute damage and changing that to an extra damage die or two if it comes with additional effects from the spell.
I don't think that a spellcaster's main combat tool needs to be pure damage. Let the martials contribute with more damage. Spellcasters can contribute with more effects.
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I have also seen it happen. In PBP, which means that I can link to it.Are you trying to argue this is a common issue? Or merely trying to point out that you have players who don't sufficiently read the rules and Paizo should modify the game for their lack of attentiveness?I'm pointing out that saying, "this never happens, so we don't need to consider it" is an invalid assumption.
And I agree with NielsenE that this is caused by having spell slot and focus spells generally not include the ability modifier, but cantrips generally do.
That player that got it wrong that I linked to has been playing in my gaming group for a couple of years now and is no slouch when it comes to knowing the rules.
No one ever complained about it on these forums or anywhere I've seen these games discussed. It was not brought up in the playtest to my knowledge or in any other instance.
I don't know precisely what is driving this change and I don't want to get too worked up about it at this point, but it's an unpopular change. I don't think they should do it myself. I think it will be a very bad idea given the number of caster players already severely unhappy about the randomness of dice rolls when it comes to saves and damage as it is with caster damage.
The ability score to damage provides a controllable floor for damage that players like to have that makes them feel some control over their power. It's why martials enjoy that strength to damage which gives them a better range and doesn't feel terrible when you do something like roll double 1s on a burning hands or a produce flame.
It's why you don't see me using much in terms of DPR calculations for overall damage long-term because damage occurs in short battles and not across a thousand rounds of combat. So those double 1s and low damage rolls mix in with higher damage roles in different combats to make damage very spiky from fight to fight.
Ability score bonuses to damage help a little bit to lower the spikiness of damage and give the feeling of control to a player that wants a more consistent damage curve.
I think it is a bad idea to remove ability damage from spell damage, especially cantrips which are more useful at lower level where the ability score provides the same floor and feeling of control that strength or ability score to damage does for martials.
I hope they rethink this change.
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I wonder how many folks lamenting this change will be alright with it if most casters have a low level feat that lets them add an attribute to their spell damage rolls, not limited just to cantrips? That seems like the kind of thing people will get really excited about because it will apply to focus spells and spell slot spells too, and be seen as a boost for the ability of casters to take on blasting. It would limit the utility of people grabbing damaging cantrips with ancestry feats but I could see that being an intentional shift as well.
I will not be ok with a feat. I do not like feat taxes.
I will house rule ability modifier to damage for all spells if this change is made. Casters already do low enough damage with too much spikiness as it is.
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I feel I may be one of the only people who was happy looking at the new cantrip descriptions. I mostly play casually at home with my wife, and there have been times we just forget to add attribute modifiers to cantrips as it feels unintuitive to us.
So we're just happy for the simplicity of it, and admittedly we also like the thought of being to roll more dice as we think dice are fun.
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I'll see your snake eyes on Burning Hands and raise you a double pair of 1's on Treat Wounds.
I'll see your snake eyes on Burning Hands and raise you a double pair of 1's on Treat Wounds.
I could add attribute to that as well and make players feel better with no balance issues. I think I might do that too. That does feel terrible as well.
If the play by Paizo is to move in this direction, I think I will move to attribute bonuses on a lot of stuff from spells to skills to the swashbuckler's damage. Players would be a lot happier if I did. Given the upward limit on attribute bonuses is already set at a maximum of +7 for players, it won't cause any balance issues.
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I'll see your snake eyes on Burning Hands and raise you a double pair of 1's on Treat Wounds.I could add attribute to that as well and make players feel better with no balance issues. I think I might do that too. That does feel terrible as well.
The houserule we went with was that hero points could be used to reroll healing value amounts.
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Congrats the Int based martial can now dump Int... how positive that is.
Let's get rid of Int giving trained skills while we are at it. That stat is clearly meant to be a dump stat at this point. Intelligent characters? Nope only charismatic or wise characters allowed.
This is hyperbole, yes?
You are aware that for intelligence based spellcasting the intelligence modifier would still apply to spell attack rolls and save DC.
And I would personally be fine with trading a couple points of average damage for additional effects on cantrips. I suspect that even some Magus characters would be willing to make that trade.
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I wonder how many folks lamenting this change will be alright with it if most casters have a low level feat that lets them add an attribute to their spell damage rolls, not limited just to cantrips? That seems like the kind of thing people will get really excited about because it will apply to focus spells and spell slot spells too, and be seen as a boost for the ability of casters to take on blasting. It would limit the utility of people grabbing damaging cantrips with ancestry feats but I could see that being an intentional shift as well.
I'd personally love it, but depending on your disposition some might consider a caster feat for a scaling 4-6 damage on all of your stuff as early but mandatory feat tax
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I think the main reason people are reacting negatively to it is because some of the cantrips are 2d4, which is lower average damage. But others are 3d4, which is higher. (Although eventually it may get out scaled as your casting stat grows, hopefully by then you aren't relying on cantrips for damage too often.)The main reason I react negatively is the minimum damage. In the old scheme it was 5. In the new one it's 2. You rather easily can get results less than minimum damage at the 1st level in the old scheme in the new scheme at 3rd level, or even sometimes at the 5th level! That is very noticeable at low levels.
They got very sound thinking before with making normal guaranteed damage for cantrips with the modifier. I just can't see any sensible reason to remake that now.
No, finding out what your spellcasting modifier is is not a problem.
My problem with the removal of spellcasting modifier is that now the spellcasters does better damage Striking with a longbow (and probably with shortbows too due deadly) than can do with an attack spell that uses 2-actions. My feeling is that I backing to D&D 3/3.5 where casters carries crossbows in initial levels to do some damage.
We you notice that the full casters are better with weapons than with their magic is good point that you are going to the wrong way.
This probably makes Nethys mad.
IMO this nerf only could do some sense if they change the attack spell damage formula to add your spellcasting bonus as general rule like kineticist does to 2-action blasts.
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I think the main reason people are reacting negatively to it is because some of the cantrips are 2d4, which is lower average damage. But others are 3d4, which is higher. (Although eventually it may get out scaled as your casting stat grows, hopefully by then you aren't relying on cantrips for damage too often.)The main reason I react negatively is the minimum damage. In the old scheme it was 5. In the new one it's 2. You rather easily can get results less than minimum damage at the 1st level in the old scheme in the new scheme at 3rd level, or even sometimes at the 5th level! That is very noticeable at low levels.
They got very sound thinking before with making normal guaranteed damage for cantrips with the modifier. I just can't see any sensible reason to remake that now.
No, finding out what your spellcasting modifier is is not a problem.My problem with the removal of spellcasting modifier is that now the spellcasters does better damage Striking with a longbow (and probably with shortbows too due deadly) than can do with an attack spell that uses 2-actions. My feeling is that I backing to D&D 3/3.5 where casters carries crossbows in initial levels to do some damage.
We you notice that the full casters are better with weapons than with their magic is good point that you are going to the wrong way.
This probably makes Nethys mad.
IMO this nerf only could do some sense if they change the attack spell damage formula to add your spellcasting bonus as general rule like kineticist does to 2-action blasts.
All my casters invest money into normal weapons.
Because it's only one action and I have a decent chance to hit with no map penalty
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I welcome a nerf to damage cantrips. Damage cantrips crowded out other options and I believe contributed to misunderstandings on the purpose of casters. Cantrips did enough damage and such that new players leaned on them hard instead of exploring the various things you can do like skill actions, recall knowledges if it's fixed, contributing with their high mental stats to things like demoralize or working as a battle medicine user in worst case.
There are other cantrips and the new figment and tangle vine look like solid options.
As it was new players got a feel that cantrips have a similar feel to their counterpart in 5e and from such it's easy to see how that can influence perceptions of the class due to blasting being a more sparing action. Furthermore the dominance of damage cantrips means other cantrips got ignored.
Damage Cantrips still hold a niche but you have to consider your actions more.
I think another good aspect of this is with cantrips being less of a great low level options is to encourage less spell hoarding. Usually with focus spells you start with 4 or 5 usable spells and given time to refocus that can be a lot higher. Having to consider using your resources more often to me is just a benefit. I at least have seen new players be hesitant with using their spells and just cantrip spam.
2d4 is not terrible damage early on. By the time you get to 3rd level most casters will have a nice pool of spells and with focus points now expanding based on the number of focus spells you know means for most combats you will have a spell and focus spell to cast and sometimes two spells and a focus spell. With your average combat length that to me feels fine. You can use level spell-> focus spell-> cantrip to finish off and a lot of combats will be cleaning up by then
This makes absolutely zero sense.
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Yes, you are mixing unrelated different things.
That's good to a spellcaster having a bad DPR at low-levels because its forces them to do other things is just you trying to force a play style to others.
Many spellcasters already have a pretty fragile chassis. Giving them a terrible damage output, fewer daily limited resources or forcing them to have to get a collection of focus spell with their feats just to compensate this isn't the right way to do a fun class.
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This makes absolutely zero sense.
How so? I've witnessed cantrip spam before and it's come from watching newer players. This is primarily impacting low levels as it doesn't take long for a cantrip to fall off. Granted this is with newer players.
Most spellcasters are not primary damage dealers and should not be consistant damage dealers.
And like I've said they have shown two reworked cantrips that do things other than damage that to me look really useful and I hope that is expanded
Do you also get upset over strike spam?
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I think the main reason people are reacting negatively to it is because some of the cantrips are 2d4, which is lower average damage. But others are 3d4, which is higher. (Although eventually it may get out scaled as your casting stat grows, hopefully by then you aren't relying on cantrips for damage too often.)The main reason I react negatively is the minimum damage. In the old scheme it was 5. In the new one it's 2. You rather easily can get results less than minimum damage at the 1st level in the old scheme in the new scheme at 3rd level, or even sometimes at the 5th level! That is very noticeable at low levels.
They got very sound thinking before with making normal guaranteed damage for cantrips with the modifier. I just can't see any sensible reason to remake that now.
No, finding out what your spellcasting modifier is is not a problem.My problem with the removal of spellcasting modifier is that now the spellcasters does better damage Striking with a longbow (and probably with shortbows too due deadly) than can do with an attack spell that uses 2-actions. My feeling is that I backing to D&D 3/3.5 where casters carries crossbows in initial levels to do some damage.
We you notice that the full casters are better with weapons than with their magic is good point that you are going to the wrong way.
This probably makes Nethys mad.
IMO this nerf only could do some sense if they change the attack spell damage formula to add your spellcasting bonus as general rule like kineticist does to 2-action blasts.
This is why I'm trying to hold off getting too wound up. We don't know the full changes yet and they may have a plan for this.
I'm hoping it's not decision making like D and D 4E of pushing through highly unpopular changes and forcing the player base to swallow it then telling them their wrong for not liking it. That's when the real problems start when the design team thinks they are right about a major divisive issue in their game.
This is a problem because the people that accept the issue would accept anything Paizo does whereas the group who won't accept it will start looking elsewhere for their gaming fun like what happened with 4E when the designers were told it wasn't good and shoved it down the player's throats. Ripped their player base into two groups and opened the door for other games.
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I welcome a nerf to damage cantrips. Damage cantrips crowded out other options and I believe contributed to misunderstandings on the purpose of casters. Cantrips did enough damage and such that new players leaned on them hard instead of exploring the various things you can do like skill actions, recall knowledges if it's fixed, contributing with their high mental stats to things like demoralize or working as a battle medicine user in worst case.
There are other cantrips and the new figment and tangle vine look like solid options.
As it was new players got a feel that cantrips have a similar feel to their counterpart in 5e and from such it's easy to see how that can influence perceptions of the class due to blasting being a more sparing action. Furthermore the dominance of damage cantrips means other cantrips got ignored.
Damage Cantrips still hold a niche but you have to consider your actions more.
I think another good aspect of this is with cantrips being less of a great low level options is to encourage less spell hoarding. Usually with focus spells you start with 4 or 5 usable spells and given time to refocus that can be a lot higher. Having to consider using your resources more often to me is just a benefit. I at least have seen new players be hesitant with using their spells and just cantrip spam.
2d4 is not terrible damage early on. By the time you get to 3rd level most casters will have a nice pool of spells and with focus points now expanding based on the number of focus spells you know means for most combats you will have a spell and focus spell to cast and sometimes two spells and a focus spell. With your average combat length that to me feels fine. You can use level spell-> focus spell-> cantrip to finish off and a lot of combats will be cleaning up by then
They aren't really changing the number of focus points you have. They're just clarifying that rule which was sometimes printed, sometimes not saying "if you already have a focus pool, increase the number of focus points by one". There's still a cap of 3 focus points. You can refocus a bit better, sure. But personally it really doesn't feel like that's sufficient compensation for the loss of ability score to damage on cantrips.
It just punishes you even harder if you take a non-damaging focus spell.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Luis loza has said across places that the cap is staying, for from this specific forums you can find it here