Death Domain Death Touch

Azul · May 25, 2003

I recently used a cleric with the death domain against my players for the first time (well, technically it had a huecuva template on it

) and lo and behold, it popped off the party's cleric (who had suffered prior injuries from the huecuva's skeleton minions) using its death touch domain power. Several of my players flipped when I rolled the "damage dice" (beating the cleric's measly 4 remaining hit points) and announced that the cleric dropped lifelessly to the ground. A few of the more agitated players went on and on about how the power was overpowered because it lacked a save and whatnot and how it was disproportiately powerful compared to other domain powers. I was rather taken aback by the reaction of the players since it's one of the PHB domains and no one had mentioned that power as unfair before.

Now, I'd never really given death touch that much thought since frankly, I'd always considered it kind of wussy. 1d6 per level is pretty unlikely to take out a creature that is of similar hit dice to you unless you've already weakened it considerably... it's once/day and it's an all or nothing attack. Destruction's smite ability seems far more reliable and War's free feats seem more practical to me.

Also, death has a pretty crumby array of domain spells IMHO (most are already on the cleric lists and many aren't all that useful unless you are really into making undead). It always seemed to me that the weaker domain spell lists often have a good ability to compensate for the spells, or vice versa.

My question to you fine folks is "Is the death domain balanced, weak or overpowered?" and more specifically, "Is the death touch ability balanced, weak or overpowered? Does it need a save to make it fair or to present the impression of fairness to players (who often prefer to die by failing a save than just having the DM announce 'you're dead'?"

Is there a real issue here or am I just dealing with a case of player sour grapes?

darkbard · May 25, 2003

i think you're dead-on [pun intended] with regards to the spell power vs granted power balance of the various domains. i'd also say that your players are suffering from sour grapes. how is the death touch attack any different than if you had rolled an attack with a mace and did enough damage to kill the character that way? sure, a touch attack is more likely to succeed, but that's just playing the npc smart by exploiting a pc weakness [heavily armored combatants [like the aforementioned cleric likely was] aren't known for their high dexterity or other means of improving touch ac]. the baddie is a servant of the death god[dess], after all, so such an ability does seem fitting. and it's only useable once per day as you pointed out.

shilsen · May 25, 2003

Sour grapes. As you noted, the death domain granted power makes up somewhat for the weak domain spell list. It's also balanced due to its variability, since the cleric usually has to roll really well or find a substantially weakened opponent for it to work.

Malin Genie · May 25, 2003

Yep - sour grapes. I use a cleric with Death Touch, and it's difficult to use successfully - often you are better off just inflicting wounds. And as you noted, the spell list pretty much bites (Wail of the Banshee is the only spell not already on the Cleric list that it provides IIRC)

Glyfair · May 25, 2003

The Death domain is one of those domains that is very good a putting a scare into players, but not one overpowered in a way that makes player characters want to take it.

From a PC POV, it's good at taking out opponents that are weak or already weakened. Also, it's all or nothing. The spell list is somewhat average.

However, if an NPC has the domain, the PCs could be running scared. If one gets weakened and hit, or the opponent gets a lucky roll at the time, not only is the PC dead, he is DEAD. No wimpy "Raise Dead" is going to bring them back from the dead, you need to bring out the big guns. For most low-level and medium-level campaigns, this means the character is gone from the game.

IMO, this does exactly what it should, it makes death an important part of the game. It also means that clerics of death gods will put the proper fear into PCs that they should. Indeed, a powerful one should probably be the first target for any competent PC group in a large battle.

Glyfair of Glamis

Lord Pendragon · May 25, 2003

The Death Touch cleric ability is a bit like Power Word: Kill in that your current hit points are effectively your saving throw. With a measly d6 per level, the Death Touch has almost no chance of working on a healthy fighting type, or a cleric, and only an average chance of affecting a rogue. Wizards are in trouble, but they also often have the best defenses vs. touch attacks, and are well-away from the evil cleric to begin with.

Another drawback for the Death Touch is that if it fails to affect the target, it does nothing. So as someone else said, it's really all-or-nothing. It's also only good for straight clerics, as multiclassing doesn't gain you any extra d6's for that check.

I ran a Death cleric once against my party, and the cleric used the ability on a low-level bard. It killed her, and surprised the heck out of my players. But that was only because the bard had been wounded, and I rolled really well on those d6's.

I also play a CN death cleric with the ability. I've managed to successfully use it once. But I'm not holding my breath until I can use it again!

nimisgod · May 25, 2003

I agree. Its not really so powerful. IMO, it can be compared to a magic missile except its not as reliable. If the enemy has low enough hp, then he's toast.

It is far from overpowered, you just used it at a good time.

Azul · May 25, 2003

Thanks for the feedback, folks. My co-DM and I have discussed it and decided not to nerf the death touch. It seems fairly balanced to us after reading your comments and giving it more thought.

Fip · May 26, 2003

You made the right call. Man, players can really go to far with their arguments some times...

Gort · May 26, 2003

Actually, I used this ability on one of my players as well...

It's pretty powerful. But I wouldn't say it's out of this world. And anyway, if the guy you killed had 4 hitpoints left, hell, he could've just breathed on him and he'd have died. Would your players have preferred him to be inflict wounds-ed to -10 or have the domain power used? It's all the same in the end.