D&D 3E/3.5 3.5e Magical Offenders - Most Overpowered Spells & Fixes

[milest3hr4t]

Where do you get that from? Not from the spell description. Sounds like a literal interpretation of the spell's name to me, but that would make it a houserule.

I would have sworn the casting range was touch, but I just checked and it's not. NWN ruining my memory of how spells work. ... But isn't the point of this thread to come up with a set of house rules for low magic? I honestly think that's a pretty good one.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Take magic items in a low magic world they are uncommon sounds good right well not if you have any casters in the party. What happens is that casters use their spells to make their character better. Mundane characters without access to magic items still fall behind.

I saw this when I was playing a fighter in a low magic game that also had a paladin. Because I had no access to magic items I could not get my armor class above an 18 the paladin cast a spell on himself that raised his AC higher meaning he took less hits and lasted in combat longer.

Yes, lower than standard wealth favors spellcasters.

In a party with reasonable teamwork, one will usually see the Wiz and Cleric trying to make up some of the difference with more buffs to the meatshields.

The bigger disparity is within melee builds. For melee-centric characters having a three cleric levels or going paladin means you can be casting Bull's Strength when nobody in the party even owns Gauntlets of Str +2. Having access to wands is a big win in flexibility at little cost, too. And having emergency scrolls is a lot cheaper than emergency potions.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

3e magic is highly reliable relative to 1e/2e, because "DCs" were very flat across levels. At the levels you had access to very powerful magic everyone can make their save 75+% of the time. We laugh at 3e transmuters who try to polymorph fire giants, but life was usually like that back in the day if you liked interest spells.

As I see it, it was a design decision that every PC's "big guns" should be more likely than not to be effective. Wizards/Clerics got more reliable spells (or rather, everyone got worse saves). Melee characters got criticals, iterative attacks, and tactically interesting feats to compensate.

I would say that Skill-like spells and Mobility spells should all be boosted in level. The spellcasters can stay potent in blasting, area control, mind-bending, and illusions. Nothing wrong with relying on the athletic classes for getting up that wall and into the castle to rescue the princess.

 

[RedTonic]

And your caster can always find the path when you realize that your princess is in another castle.

I agree with Empirate; I do find perfect balance dull--but perfectly balancing casting vs. non-casting classes isn't my personal goal. I think trying to do that in the context of any of the legacy editions would probably take more time than building a very balanced system from scratch. The games I've found to be the "most balanced" typically give every class the same abilities and then reskin them for flavor. It is dull play, mechanically; it's hard to balance classes while giving them divergent roles--that's just my opinion, having tried by hand at system design previously. I can't offer any 4e opinions, as I haven't had an opportunity to play it.

I've proposed the "declare spell at top of round" houserule to my peeps; we'll see how that goes over. I really like that notion...

 

[Dandu]

If you want to test it out with a quick game, I'd be willing to play a spellcaster.

 

[RedTonic]

If you want to test it out with a quick game, I'd be willing to play a spellcaster.

I'm not sure I could put together something interesting enough to entertain you, Dandu--you're way too good for me. I'm honestly intimidated, mechanically speaking.

 

[Dandu]

A set of encounters with stock MM monsters vs a party of rather generic character should provide a better basis for calibration of houserules than hypothetical thought exercises.

 

[RedTonic]

Well, in that case, have you got free time tomorrow?

ETA
What party level do you recommend? My group is level 1, but I suspect the best test value probably won't come from that level of play.

 

[Dandu]

Level 10 is probably a good testing point for houserules. I have a level 10 monk and sorcerer, so we'd only need two characters to round out the party. I could make them, or we could get more people involved in this. Alternatively, you could make them and have control of the PCs except for mine, though that seems like a lot of work for you.

 

[RedTonic]

I would be very happy if additional people wanted to join our test--so if anyone else here is interested, pipe in. A party of four sounds a-okay.

I'll post a link to a "Playing the Game" topic here later.