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DMM-Persisting Divine Power - what am I missing
- Thread starter nonsi256
- Start date
Duke Arioch
First Post
Uhm... YES!!!
That combo makes fighters and the like cry. And babies. And kittens.
That combo makes fighters and the like cry. And babies. And kittens.
Empirate
First Post
To elucidate: DMM is one of the very few ways in which the Persist Spell feat, which all of us would like to use on an awesome self buff like Divine Power, can be made to work. At all. 6 spell levels increase? What were they smoking? Who's going to use a 7th level slot to persist a 1st level spell? Nobody, that's who. But with a little bit of investment - a feat, which a Cleric has to spare usually, and Turn Undead uses, which are best invested into something other than turning actual undead, anyway -, persisting becomes viable. Great.
I don't have to tell you how fantastic a buff Divine Power is. I hope. I mean, it makes you a full front-line fighter for all intents and purposes, and you remain a full caster, as well! Dual threat, thy name be Divine Power. Not to mention that DP combined with your other buffs will let you be a better fighter than the Fighter much of the time...
Now what's great about persisting DP instead of casting it regularly is the following: a) you don't lose a round when battle is joined, or can use that round for another buff, or battlefield control; b) you're already buffed up when surprised, which can be invaluable; c) no matter how many fights you're going to have in a day, or how long they take to resolve, or how cleverly your opponents use hit-and-run to let your buffs run out... your most important buff is up and stays up.
I don't see how you invest a spell slot. I'd say that in a regular adventuring day, persisting DP saves you three 4th level slots instead of costing one. Coz you use only one 4th level slot for your regular four encounters.
Look at it this way: Imagine you're able to cast 9th level spells. Wouldn't you like to cast one of them out of a 3rd level slot instead? Miracle, as a 3rd level spell? Sound good? What if I were to tell you that all you need to make that happen is spending a feat and 6 of your daily Turn Undead uses? I bet you'd do it.
Turn uses, btw, are cheap. Cha boosters or the Extra Turning feat (or classes that grant it) sound like too much of an investment to you? OK, just use a bunch of Nightsticks instead, or take a domain that offers a different kind of turning (the elemental domains, Scalykind, etc.), or both. I recently had the PCs encounter an evil Cleric with DMM: Quicken (not Persist, but still costly). He could easily quicken 4 spells for free each day. Nice trick, and it had my players gaping. That Cleric was only level 8!
I don't have to tell you how fantastic a buff Divine Power is. I hope. I mean, it makes you a full front-line fighter for all intents and purposes, and you remain a full caster, as well! Dual threat, thy name be Divine Power. Not to mention that DP combined with your other buffs will let you be a better fighter than the Fighter much of the time...
Now what's great about persisting DP instead of casting it regularly is the following: a) you don't lose a round when battle is joined, or can use that round for another buff, or battlefield control; b) you're already buffed up when surprised, which can be invaluable; c) no matter how many fights you're going to have in a day, or how long they take to resolve, or how cleverly your opponents use hit-and-run to let your buffs run out... your most important buff is up and stays up.
I don't see how you invest a spell slot. I'd say that in a regular adventuring day, persisting DP saves you three 4th level slots instead of costing one. Coz you use only one 4th level slot for your regular four encounters.
Look at it this way: Imagine you're able to cast 9th level spells. Wouldn't you like to cast one of them out of a 3rd level slot instead? Miracle, as a 3rd level spell? Sound good? What if I were to tell you that all you need to make that happen is spending a feat and 6 of your daily Turn Undead uses? I bet you'd do it.
Turn uses, btw, are cheap. Cha boosters or the Extra Turning feat (or classes that grant it) sound like too much of an investment to you? OK, just use a bunch of Nightsticks instead, or take a domain that offers a different kind of turning (the elemental domains, Scalykind, etc.), or both. I recently had the PCs encounter an evil Cleric with DMM: Quicken (not Persist, but still costly). He could easily quicken 4 spells for free each day. Nice trick, and it had my players gaping. That Cleric was only level 8!
StreamOfTheSky
Adventurer
It costs 7 turn undeads. And if your DM allows Night Sticks, it's not that hard to afford that.
Persist Spell (and Night Sticks) is broken. Spells were balanced based on their duration. Extend Spell magnifies the duration, but proportional to the original duration, so it's ok. Persist says "Oh, the only reason it's level 2 is because it only lasts one round? CHA-CHING, BABY!"
I don't ask "What were they smoking?" in regards to the spell level cost (which coincidentally GUARANTEES the feat will only be looked at by people with cheap tricks in mind), I ask it based on the dumbfounding effect the feat gives you.
Persist Spell (and Night Sticks) is broken. Spells were balanced based on their duration. Extend Spell magnifies the duration, but proportional to the original duration, so it's ok. Persist says "Oh, the only reason it's level 2 is because it only lasts one round? CHA-CHING, BABY!"
I don't ask "What were they smoking?" in regards to the spell level cost (which coincidentally GUARANTEES the feat will only be looked at by people with cheap tricks in mind), I ask it based on the dumbfounding effect the feat gives you.
Empirate
First Post
Sure enough, more-or-less cost-free Divine Power or Wraithstrike can make every good old Fighter pull out their beard in frustration.
I've been toying with two different approaches to lengthening spell durations even more than a simple Extend Spell:
1) Extend Spell can be applied multiple times, and is self-stacking. Apply it three times, and your spell will last four times its normal duration, raising the spell level by three.
However, who would apply the feat more than once or twice? Not worth it, most of the time. So from that follows 1a) Applying Extend Spell multiple times is possible, and each application doubles the modified duration of the spell. This means applying Extend Spell three times wouldn't multiply duration by 4 but 8. Applying it four times would multiply duration not by 5 but by 16 etc.
Solution 1a) actually seems balanced to me, but I haven't thought too deeply on specific spells one could abuse this with. It might get funny with Enchantment spells, for example...
2) New metamagic feat: Prolong Spell. This metamagic feat increases a spell's level by 2. It increases a spell's duration so it lasts longer: a 1 round spell lasts 10 rounds. A rounds/level spell lasts minutes/level. A mins/lvl spell lasts 10 mins/lvl. A 10 mins/lvl spell lasts 1 hr/lvl. A 1 hr/lvl spell lasts 1 day/lvl. Spells whose duration is already measured in days cannot be Prolonged.
If a spell is both Prolonged and Extended, it lasts double the increased duration: a 1 min/lvl spell would last 20 mins/lvl, for example.
What do you think?
I've been toying with two different approaches to lengthening spell durations even more than a simple Extend Spell:
1) Extend Spell can be applied multiple times, and is self-stacking. Apply it three times, and your spell will last four times its normal duration, raising the spell level by three.
However, who would apply the feat more than once or twice? Not worth it, most of the time. So from that follows 1a) Applying Extend Spell multiple times is possible, and each application doubles the modified duration of the spell. This means applying Extend Spell three times wouldn't multiply duration by 4 but 8. Applying it four times would multiply duration not by 5 but by 16 etc.
Solution 1a) actually seems balanced to me, but I haven't thought too deeply on specific spells one could abuse this with. It might get funny with Enchantment spells, for example...
2) New metamagic feat: Prolong Spell. This metamagic feat increases a spell's level by 2. It increases a spell's duration so it lasts longer: a 1 round spell lasts 10 rounds. A rounds/level spell lasts minutes/level. A mins/lvl spell lasts 10 mins/lvl. A 10 mins/lvl spell lasts 1 hr/lvl. A 1 hr/lvl spell lasts 1 day/lvl. Spells whose duration is already measured in days cannot be Prolonged.
If a spell is both Prolonged and Extended, it lasts double the increased duration: a 1 min/lvl spell would last 20 mins/lvl, for example.
What do you think?
Sekhmet
First Post
To be perfectly honest, a melee Cleric could feasibly give up four spell slots from 7 to 9 (and quite a few at 10th, if you wanted to get into Epic) without really feeling a terrible hit to his casting or versatility to persist Bless, Prayer, Divine Favor, and Aid (just from core books).
Naturally, venturing outside of the core makes those spell slots much more important and harder for a Cleric to lose, but the benefit is generally worth it as an all day buff for yourself and others.
Naturally, venturing outside of the core makes those spell slots much more important and harder for a Cleric to lose, but the benefit is generally worth it as an all day buff for yourself and others.
Empirate
First Post
Except those bonuses (except for Divine Favor, which increases with caster level) are hardly, if at all, felt at the levels you're talking about. Besides, combining Bless and Aid is a terrible idea, since the bonuses don't stack. I don't think any of those spells are worth their level increase.
Greenfield
Adventurer
Stacking Extend Spell? I was under the impression (correct me if I'm wrong) that you can't apply a Metamagic feat to a spell more than once.
