Technik4 said:
Check master of the wild for a feat which grants elemental resistance 5 if you have fort 8+.
A non core feat that will only show up in stats of characters with good Fortitude saves who are
12th level or higher. That is not that big of a deal, nor is it likely to be common.
I agree, there are more types of energies which can make it difficult to have the right one for the right encounter. On the whole, in most campaigns, yes it is better off having Crit Immunity than one specific Elemental Immunity, but I maintain that the elemental ones come easier through prcs and whatnot.
You can maintain that all you want, but that doesn't make it reality. On the whole, you are likely face more opponents who are immune to critical hits than you are to face opponents who are immune or resistant to frost (for example).
I also had forgotten that multiple hits from an elemental weapon all stack for elemental damages. However in the core books 3.0 there were only 3 elements you could place on a weapon ice shock and fire. Those are quite common in the MM (esp fire), as are Rings of Fire Resistance, etc.
A ring of fire resistance is a 25,000+ gp item that has a limited usefulness, takes up a ring slot, and shows up even more rarely than armor of fortitfication. Besides, since you are talking about Masters' of the Wild feats, then perhaps you could also bother to include the Corrosive energy enhancement on weapons that showed up in Magic of Faerun. You also forgot the Thundering enhancement from the DMG.
Except, as we just talked about, the rogue whose best proficiency is actually with the rapier. Oh, but who would want to make a "precise hit" rogue? Nevermind.
But that is an attribute of
the rogue class not the rapier itself. The rapier is the "best" rogue weapon because it is the only medium sized martial weapon on the rogue list. It is not a better weapon for critical hits than the pick, the scimitar or any number of other medium martial weapons. Those weapons just don't happen to be on the rogue proficiency list.
You seem to be more interested in bandying about random statements than truly discussing things. I recognize that the weapons have been balanced so that for the most part they all gain the same benefit from keen. However if you had looked at the math in this thread you would see that high crit ranges and high crit multipliers overtake weapons like the longsword once your damage potential is high enough.
Damage potential that has to be so high that a finesse based combatant will likely
never be in a position where it makes a difference. Finesse fighters rarely have lots of damage bonuses, since, by definition, they usually aren't getting much benefit out of their strength, and in the case of the rogue, isn't benefiting from Specialization. Hence, the fact that the rapier
might overtake the longsword if you have an average expected damage per hit of 20 or more points (not including sneak attack damage, since that isn't multiplied on a critical hit) is completely irrelevant.
A core finesse fighter who is going the route of the duelist will almost always take the rapier, and in 3.0, always take keen and Imp Crit.
Unless he takes a light pick, or the handaxe, or the spiked chain. The problem isn't with Improved Critical and
keen, the problem is that the rapier is the only medium sized martial weapon that can be finessed, which makes it a better choice for medium sized finesse fighters.
But we aren't talking about finesse fighters. That has cropped up due to your silly assertion that finesse fighters are the ones who benefit the most from Improved Critical. We are talking about
fighters focused on critical hits. For them, the array of worthwhile weapons extends throughout the martial weapon list, since the weapons on that list are all functionally balanced with one another (accounting for size differences) so far as critical hits are concerned.
A rogue who is combat-focused (but not a 2wf) will almost always end up taking the rapier, and in 3.0 Keen and Imp Crit.
A rogue who is combat focused is
beter off ignoring
keen and going with
almost any other +1 cost enhancement. The fact that they might choose to pick up the
keen enhancement is vanity, not efficiency. It is a subpar choice for that character. Are you truly upset that rogues might make subpar choices?
I dont even know what is being argued anymore. I expressed most of my views at least a page ago, at this point its time to accept that the game has changed. Im not bitter, but it sounds like you better start spending some charges of your Rule 0 Wand.
The point is that the changes (based upon Andy Collin's silly "criticals weren't special" line) were not based upon any kind of
game mechanic problem, but rather based upon a personal preference that should not have cropped up in the redesign. Allowing the stacking of Improved Critical and
keen was not a balance problem, thus, it should not have been revised.
