Agreed: a much better example would have been a flanking or invisible Improved TWF rogue using Rapid Shot and touch-attacking with flasks of Alchemist's Fire... that combination beats the Duskblade hollow. And if they're size Small with the Giant Killing Style stance, well, ouch.
Not to cavail too much, StreamOfTheSky - as I agree with you in general about the inappropriateness of some of the comparisons - but saying that the Duskblade can pull that trick all day long is a bit of an exaggeration. At 13th level he can do it six times, assuming that a) he actually GETS six full-attack actions in an adventuring day, b) that none of the six opponents he gets his full attacks against are immune or resistant to the spell, c) that he actually manages to
hit with all of those attacks (an unreasonable assumption, and something that people weren't figuring into that thread), d) that his opponents don't inconveniently die before he finishes getting all his attacks against each one, leaving him unable to complete his full-attack action and e) that he does nothing else whatsoever with his 3rd-level spell slots.
Lets make a couple more assumptions so we can work out what the results are... I'm going to have the Duskblade use a +3 two-handed sword with a +6 Strength bonus, for 2d6+12 base damage. He gets 6d6 per attack on top from
Vampiric Touch. What the hell, let us have him
hasted from somewhere as well. As such, he's getting 24 attacks in a day that do 8d6+12 points of damage.
Meeting all of our listed criteria, our Duskblade has done an average of 960 points of damage. Wow, pretty good eh?
By contrast, and making a similar set of assumptions to those we allow the Duskblade, a 13th-level Wizard who wants to waste everyone's time can throw down a maximised 10d6-energy-damage-in-an-area spell, catching everyone in the room for 60 points of damage or 30 if they save. Per opponent, that's not a lot, but if
he catches six opponents and half of them make their save (a not unreasonable proportion on average) then he has just dished out 270 points of damage. If he used a Lesser Rod of Maximize Spell (which he did, because he's a Wizard and therefore not stupid) then he did that with a 3rd-level spell slot. With a couple of Maximize rods and no other kind of fiddling around at all, he can pull that trick 5 times per day, for an average of 1350 points of damage.
Thing is, the Wizard hasn't had to make an attack roll for any of that: he has just "hit" whatever he was aiming at. And we haven't counted his 4th, 5th, 6th, or 7th-level slots yet, which hopefully he'll be doing something a bit more useful with.
Despite standing by my assertion that the rules as written don't suggest (to me at least) that the Duskblade would get multiple uses of a single spell per target, I actually find it pretty hard to care. By the time he gets the ability,
real casters are several levels into their "I Win" territory: I'm all in favour of letting melee types have access to stuff that lets them really matter from time to time, when circumstances are right.
And yup, I fully accept that everyone else's mileage can and probably will vary significantly from mine. I've played in enough different groups to know that - for various reasons - some campaigns make melee work right up to high levels, and in these cases the "liberal" interpretation of the Duskblade's ability would have far more in-game impact. But then, those campaigns can just restrict the Duskblade to the one-use-of-touch-spell-per-target, so it's all good
None of that addresses the Rogue though
