Are spell DC's too low?

[WizarDru]

In my campaign, I let Spell focus give +2 and don't allow Greater spell focus. That seems more balanced.

Wait till you get to high levels.

 

[Staffan]

Wait till you get to high levels.

Well, the way I see it, +1 to a small number of spells (though they'll probably be about a third of the spells you use, since you went to the trouble of getting spell focus for them) is too little for a feat. However, allowing the +4 bonus for greater spell focus pushes save DCs into the stratosphere (I allowed it in my old 3.0 Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil campaign, and my baddies had almost no chance of succeeding against the twinked-out gnome transmuter's incapacitating spells). So, this way you can still take a useful feat (Spell focus giving +2) without the unbalancing +4 effect also available.

I also recall reading Andy Collins saying something like "Well, we'd have liked to just remove Greater Spell Focus and keep Spell Focus the way it was. But with GSF being around in so many books already, we thought it was best to nerf it rather than just not reprint it, and that required nerfing Spell Focus too."

 

[ptolemy18]

If in your game the spell DC is too low, use the old versions of SF/GSF and see if it helps.

This is what I do in my campaign. I don't know why they felt the need to nerf it in 3.5... another lame minor point I have to house-rule, sigh... :/

Jason

 

[ptolemy18]

Honestly, if spells worked as often as we "expect" them to, there'd be no point in playing anything besides a caster of some sort, and even then, it'd be a dangerous and gritty game.

All the players in my group dislike playing casters (too many rules to memorize, they think). The end result has been sort of like a CONAN game or something, where the heroes don't use magic, only the villains. But I like casters, so I'm going to keep hitting them with fiendishly buff magic-using NPCs until finally a player bothers to learn the spellcasting rules so they too can bask in the power.

Jason

 

[ptolemy18]

If DCs were higher, spellcasters employing good tactics would quickly become overpowered, much like certain builds were in 3.0.

Out of curiosity, what types of spellcasters do you think were most overpowered in 3.0?

I was enjoying playing a super-Transmuter in 3.0 for awhile (Polymorph Other at 7th level, plus Spell Focus, plus Greater Spell Focus ) but he did eventually get his butt kicked by a horde of rogues flanking him to death. Every character has *some* weakness...

Jason

 

[beaver1024]

It depends on whether the DM molly coddles the players or not. If the DM doesn't and consistently challenge the PCs with appropriate CR monsters then the wiz/sorcs players might as well retire their characters and start another character. However if your DM goes out of his way to ensure that his campaign ideas are tailored to wiz/sorc weaknesses then you'll get the encounters with monsters that are half the wiz/sorcs' level so that the wiz/sorc can feel useful with their almost certain probability (50%) that their spells will have minor effects on the monsters before they're killed.

 

[Pants]

Out of curiosity, what types of spellcasters do you think were most overpowered in 3.0?

I'm not sure, but maybe it involved SF, GSF, Practiced Spellcaster (that feat from FRCS that allowed casters to treat their spellcasting ability score as two points higher for the purposes of extra spells and save DC's), Archmage PrC, and maybe Haste? Granted it is High-Level, but it's a horrible combination of Save DC stacking effects and two-spells a round.

As for the question, no, Save DC's are fine now. They're made to save against not to always be successful.

 

[Numion]

I'm not sure, but maybe it involved SF, GSF, Practiced Spellcaster (that feat from FRCS that allowed casters to treat their spellcasting ability score as two points higher for the purposes of extra spells and save DC's), Archmage PrC, and maybe Haste? Granted it is High-Level, but it's a horrible combination of Save DC stacking effects and two-spells a round.

Well, in my game a player had a sun elf 19th level Spellcasting Prodigy (you meant that, not Practiced Spellcaster) Wizard with 4 levels of Archmage - yup the olde spell power +6. Wail of the Banshee was 'some good'. (of course with the Archmage shaping ability).

I was the DM, and after that I had to tone it down - I mean, over half of my group, hell, all but one to be honest, are straight up powergamers. It was the first character that was retired because of too much damn power. He liked to bragg that he killed a god with a single Finger of Death spell (in reality is was a banished god, with the statistics of a normal MM Titan).

 

[Li Shenron]

I also recall reading Andy Collins saying something like "Well, we'd have liked to just remove Greater Spell Focus and keep Spell Focus the way it was. But with GSF being around in so many books already, we thought it was best to nerf it rather than just not reprint it, and that required nerfing Spell Focus too."

Well they could have thought of a little more daring solution. I don't think that very many people considered SF to be the problem but rather GSF.

They could have kept SF as it was, and add a very high requisite to GSF, like "arcane caster level 15+" (or even more). That way at least you would have seen GSF only in the highest level characters, and not many GSF per each PC.

Or they could have made GSF work on a single spell, such as:
- take SF in Transmutation
- take GSF in Polymorph Other

In my experience the 3.5 version hurts Sorcerers too much, while it's fine for the other casters.

 

[frankthedm]

I am not a whining player, I am a DM watching frustrated mages.

With a DC of only 10+lvl+modifier the DC's for spells are really low. We play fairly low scores, so most of the Mages have +2 in their casting stat, so a first level spell is just DC 13. Thus the monsters keep making their saves. Now, there are no-save alternatives, but they have pretty much stopped casting 'save' spells because of how infrequent they work.

Am I missing something?

They might be forgeting to take spell focus. Or thumbing their noses at it because 2 feats feels pricey. I made spell focus +2 to start and dropped greater from my game, but most of my NPCs go for mages first so it balances out. In a low score game, making it +2 and only one feat[ever] should be very attractive

3.0 CRs were designed assuming 15 was the high stat on a PC. 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8 / 25 point buy.

don't forget to age your spellcasters.