Re: Spell Focus
Technik4 said:
But wasn't spell focus always too powerful? I'm not saying the correct gauge for something's power is the # of people that took it, but honestly how many Specialist Wizards, Wizards, and Sorcerors out there did *not* take spell focus at least once?
As well ask how many greatsword-wielding Fighters did NOT take
Weapon Focus: Greatsword.
As well ask how many Longbow-wielding characters did NOT take
Point Blank Shot.
Commonality of selection is NOT a measure of power.
As far as looking at things independently instead of the big picture, consider if another change is to let specialist wizards increase the DCs of their spells by 1. You could not reasonably make such a change with 2 feats costing 4 points of DCs. Also, while people say that the save bonuses (Iron Will, et all) were balanced, there was no Greater Iron Will was there? Hence the inbalance.
I sincerely doubt this will be the case.
Consider another feat that wasn't as powerful, Ability Focus. Granted it is almost exclusively for monsters, but it raises *1* ability/spell 2 points. Compare this to a wiz/sorc getting a large percentage of spells they will cast every day 2 points higher and you see why ability focus was weak. Naturally monsters have different rules (they aren't around as long) but the point remains.
And for those creatures, the save DC inherently climbs for that one ability, as they gain HD -- usually, including those from their class. It's typically [10 + Con Modifier + 1/2 HD]; every other level, the Monster gets another +1 to the save DC of that same ability anyway.
In an epic arena, I play an Athach whose poison is VERY-well increasedin DC ... to a Fortitude(34), through Ability Focus (Poison) and Virulent Poison (the latter of which states explicitly that it stacks with the former), a very high constitution, and twenty HD (He's got 6 levels of Fighter).
A wizard's Fireball will always have the same save DC, barring attribute increases (etc); it doesn't go up as the wizard gains levels.
Players who only play with the core books will see that Spell Focus was split into 2 feats, not that 2 feats got nerfed.
Yep, sucking another precious feat out of the core-book-only, wouldn't-know-a-smackdown-if-it-bit me players. Nonhuman sorcerors get, what, 7 feats? Ever?
And a balanced rule system allows the lowliest min/maxer to the greatest roleplayer (who sucks at crunching numbers) to play the game. Hopefully this change makes all of 3.5 more balanced with itself (the other changes) and with the existing rules (3.0). Nevertheless, I would not judge it before you see the rest.
Ah, in otherwords, "noone is better than anyone else because we're all the same". Choices should
matter; as long as everyone has the same choices, and makes them with the same play environment in mind (which is a matter for the group as a whole to choose, collectively) ... then 3.0 does this.
I'm actually looking forward to 3.5R -- I just plan to Rule 0 the SF/GSF back to their 3.0 versions.
Against a strong save, a Wizard should see 2/3 to 3/4 of the saves get made. Against a weak save, the opposite should be true ... 2/3 to 3/4 should fail.
And most creatures have ONE strong and TWO weak saves.
So for the 2/3 rate ... any single creature, getting hit with (say) 3 spells of each save type, should succeed roughly 2 times for the strong and 1 time for each of the weak. IOW, 4 times, out of 9. About 50/50.
For the 3/4 rate, that creature should make 3 strong and 1 each of the weak, resulting in a total of 5 saves made, out of 12. Just worse than 50/50.
A hybrid rate (make 3/4 of strong saves, make 1/3 of weak saves) would produce an overall success rate of 17/36, or, just under 50/50 again.
This presumes, of course,
equal levels of min/max efforts on EACH side of the equation.
An easier way to fix save-or-die spells, btw, would be
an inherent DC reduction, and a reasonable amount of damage on a failed save.
For example, from the same spell level: Finger of Death (Save or Die) and Delayed Blast Fireball (Save for Half). Any wizard wishing to use DBF needs astounding DCs, or he can COUNT on that spell, in the critical moment of usage, being only half as effective as it was BALANCED for. Once most things start failing saves, all it means is a couple dozen more HP of damage, per creature, per casting. Not a huge deal to the DM, but, very satisfying to the Wizard's player.
OTOH, for Finger of Death, those same astounding DCs makes the same wizard "too" powerful, because BBEG's start to drop within a round or two of meeting the party.
The problem, therefor, isn't in the high DCs -- it's in the "save or die" spells themselves. Instead of fixing them, it seems WOTC has simply lowered overall spell DCs to make the "save or die" spells balanced.
In the process, they've failed to KEEP the "save for half" spells balanced, because their nerf of spell DCs is
universal.
