Withering [Effect]

A result of a (not so) recent gaming session with the IH rules in use is the discovery that the Withering [Effect] Divine Ability is really powerful. So powerful that it renders most other forms of attack obsolete. They're given for free as Uncanny Withering Mastery abilities by a number of portfolios at Intermediate Deity level, meaning one doesn't need to sacrifice Divine Abilities to take them, and taking a double portfolio doubles the damage. Using something like Intelligence Withering Beam with a 60HD Lesser Deity gives an Int Draining ranged touch attack that drains 45 Int with no save. (if Surtur's Cosmic Mastery sets a precedent) If this hits, it will one-shot any other deity that doesn't have Int as a primary ability score (Average Int for lesser deities is 10(Base)+16(Divine)+5(Inherent)=31), and mission-kill a deity that has been improving nothing but Int since 1st level (Max Int for a 60HD Lesser Deity without the Knowledge portfolio is something like 18(Base)+2(Racial)+16(Divine)+5(Inherent)+15(Ability Score Increases)+30(Headband of Epic Intellect)=86), since someone who relies on Int that is drained down to 31 Int suddenly loses a whole crapload of spell slots, has their Spellcraft DC taken down a lot, and takes a huge hit to AC, Saves, DCs and Attack Rolls (no more Cunning/Intellectual abilities). Their ability to fight back is so drastically reduced that they're sure to die next round.

I had a player in my group who managed to score most of the kills without causing a single point of damage. Damage spells do very little, mêlée attacks need to get critical hits, which are hard to do because everyone's AC is so high, and spamming Save-or-Die effects is hit-or-miss due to the number of ways one can get around spells at that level. Meanwhile a canny Wizard simply Quickened a number of buff spells, and then used his Intellectual Mind-boosted Superior Withering Intelligence Ray (Mi- Mi- Mi-Mikuru Biimu!) to reduce all opponents bar one to the intellectual capacity of vegetables over the space of 3 rounds.

Was it really your intent for the gods with ability-score related portfolios to basically be able to kill anyone who hasn't put a considerable proportion of their power into raising that ability score, and render impotent anyone else with a touch attack?

It's possibly worse than that, since if your Int is damaged to zero you fall unconscious regardless of whether you have an Int-enhancing item or not. Your maxed out god, then, only has 56 points for the purpose of being damaged/drained. (Of course the +30 still gives the normal bonus to save DCs and the like.)

CRGreathouse said:

It's possibly worse than that, since if your Int is damaged to zero you fall unconscious regardless of whether you have an Int-enhancing item or not. Your maxed out god, then, only has 56 points for the purpose of being damaged/drained. (Of course the +30 still gives the normal bonus to save DCs and the like.)

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Actually, I remember a discussion on the wording of bonuses and the way stat damage/drain works is, since it never goes below zero, if you have an item to increase a stat, only the "Base" can be drained; the Enhancement will allways sit on top if it.
IE 20 Int with Headband +6. Even If drained -50, that brings the 20 to 0, but the +6 then applies.

I don't recall what the outcome of the discussion was but there wasn't much opposition.

Hiya mate!

Buugipopuu said:

A result of a (not so) recent gaming session with the IH rules in use is the discovery that the Withering [Effect] Divine Ability is really powerful. So powerful that it renders most other forms of attack obsolete. They're given for free as Uncanny Withering Mastery abilities by a number of portfolios at Intermediate Deity level, meaning one doesn't need to sacrifice Divine Abilities to take them, and taking a double portfolio doubles the damage. Using something like Intelligence Withering Beam with a 60HD Lesser Deity gives an Int Draining ranged touch attack that drains 45 Int with no save. (if Surtur's Cosmic Mastery sets a precedent) If this hits, it will one-shot any other deity that doesn't have Int as a primary ability score (Average Int for lesser deities is 10(Base)+16(Divine)+5(Inherent)=31), and mission-kill a deity that has been improving nothing but Int since 1st level (Max Int for a 60HD Lesser Deity without the Knowledge portfolio is something like 18(Base)+2(Racial)+16(Divine)+5(Inherent)+15(Ability Score Increases)+30(Headband of Epic Intellect)=86), since someone who relies on Int that is drained down to 31 Int suddenly loses a whole crapload of spell slots, has their Spellcraft DC taken down a lot, and takes a huge hit to AC, Saves, DCs and Attack Rolls (no more Cunning/Intellectual abilities). Their ability to fight back is so drastically reduced that they're sure to die next round.

I had a player in my group who managed to score most of the kills without causing a single point of damage. Damage spells do very little, mêlée attacks need to get critical hits, which are hard to do because everyone's AC is so high, and spamming Save-or-Die effects is hit-or-miss due to the number of ways one can get around spells at that level. Meanwhile a canny Wizard simply Quickened a number of buff spells, and then used his Intellectual Mind-boosted Superior Withering Intelligence Ray (Mi- Mi- Mi-Mikuru Biimu!) to reduce all opponents bar one to the intellectual capacity of vegetables over the space of 3 rounds.

Was it really your intent for the gods with ability-score related portfolios to basically be able to kill anyone who hasn't put a considerable proportion of their power into raising that ability score, and render impotent anyone else with a touch attack?

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I have noticed this imbalance myself. I'm sure I'll have recalculated it for the final version.

One of the problems is that characters start with lower levels than ability scores. Meaning at non-epic levels, my balancing of Energy Drain and Ability Drain is correct.

However, at epic levels the difference is probably even, and at immortal levels ability drain becomes more powerful, than energy drain.

So its a really tricky to balance at every level.

One thing I would say is that characters with really powerful attacks will quickly get a reputation that will alert their (immortal) foes. So in that respect it pays to diversify.

I'm also wondering if perhaps a single portfolio should allow beings to trump immunities 25%, while double portfolios trump at 50% (which is effectively 100% considering the double HD factor) instead of 50%/100% respectively.

Ltheb Silverfrond said:

Actually, I remember a discussion on the wording of bonuses and the way stat damage/drain works is, since it never goes below zero, if you have an item to increase a stat, only the "Base" can be drained; the Enhancement will allways sit on top if it.
IE 20 Int with Headband +6. Even If drained -50, that brings the 20 to 0, but the +6 then applies.

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The enhancement bonus always applies, quite true, and the stat can't be drained below 0. Are you arguing that a stat item of at least +1 prevents a character from going unconscious as a result of stat damage?

CRGreathouse said:

The enhancement bonus always applies, quite true, and the stat can't be drained below 0. Are you arguing that a stat item of at least +1 prevents a character from going unconscious as a result of stat damage?

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I am not "argueing" I was just mentioning that that could be the case. I am not sure whether that using it as such is balanced. But it does make sense in a strange sort of way.

Hmmm... Withering Beam does 1/8 HD ability drain, Greater Withering Beam does 1/6 HD ability drain, Superior Withering Beam does 1/4 HD ability drain, and Perfect Withering Beam does 1/2 HD ability drain. I got those values from the Challenge Rating PDF and the Epic Bestiary's section on dragon breath weapons, which seems to be partly based on Ascension's [Effect] abilities. Are those the correct formulas, or have they been toned down?

If those are indeed the right values, then I can definitely say that Withering [Effect] is objectively better than every other divine [Effect] and most cosmic [Effects], most especially Withering (Constitution) [Effect].

Consider two 80 HD Greater Deities fighting each other, one with Perfect Sonic Beam which deals 80d6 sonic damage and the other with a regular Withering (Constitution) Beam which deals 10 Constitution drain. The Perfect Sonic Beam deals 280 damage on average, which is most likely already pathetic since most Greater Deities have ~4000 hp or ~8000 hp in their home plane. The Withering (Constitution) beam reduces the target's Constitution by 10, thus reducing his Constitution modifier by 5, thus reducing his maximum hp by [5 × 80] or 400 hit points. An attack that costs but 1 divine ability slot already does more damage than an attack that costs 4 ability slots!

You'll see that Withering [Effect] is even more powerful than a Perfect Cosmic [Effect]. Let's take two 240 HD Old Ones, one with Perfect Cosmic Beam which deals 240d20 divine damage and the other with Withering (Constitution) Beam which deals 30 Constitution drain. The Perfect Cosmic Beam does 2520 divine damage on average. The Withering (Constitution Beam) reduces the target's Constitution by 30, thus reducing his Constitution modifier by 15, thus reducing his maximum hp by [15 × 240] or 3600 hit points. But wait, Old Ones multiply their total hit points by ×2, so that's effectively 7200 hit points lost! An attack that costs 1 divine ability slot does much more damage than an attack that costs 4 cosmic ability slots (24 divine ability slots)! That's not right.

The big problem is that Withering (Constitution) [Effect] scales in power as your enemy has more HD, whereas other [Effects] do the same damage no matter how much HD your enemy has (Certain exceptions like Gravitic [Effect] exist, of course). So in effect you're scaling the damage by two factors: your own HD and the target's HD.

What makes it even more weird is that if your enemy has no Constitution score, all of a sudden your super-powerful Withering (Constitution) [Effect] is totally worthless.

Hey there!

I have been thinking that the way to solve this is by taking the square root of your own Hit Die (modified for effect type) as the effect.

So a 50 HD Lesser God would deal 7 points of Withering Damage (or alternately 2d6) from a Ray. Double that from a touch attack, half it for a cone effect and quarter it from a Strike or Aura power.

What do you all think?

The same thing would apply to Energy Drain.

The math would likely be fine (diminishing returns and all that at higher levels) but man, it seems a bit complicated.

Some people just don't like to do math. I know my group wouldn't, though I don't have a problem with it.

I don't see it as being that much of a problem since most creatures by epic level are immune to ability damage/drain and there are ways to become immune. In terms of numerical balance, however, it is a bit powerful. Perhaps you should simply do away with portfolio trumping immunities in general? Or perhaps you should just reduce the power of the effect. Try to keep the math simple though. Most people will get confused if you don't.