Call lightning

alsih2o · Nov 21, 2004

The druid in my group just reached 5th level. In our first combat she chose to cast "Call Lightning".

3d6 every round for 5 minutes despite weather??!?!?!?!

Now I cannot find any errata on it, but WOW!

Hints, tips, reality checks?

Cabled · Nov 21, 2004

Not so many bolts

You've missed the line that says "You may call a total number of bolts equal to your caster level (maximum 10 bolts)" So due to spell duration it may hang around for 5 minutes, your player may use it all up in 5 rounds at her current level.

Knight Otu · Nov 21, 2004

But only up to five bolts. See the second paragraph:

You need not call a bolt of lightning immediately; other actions, even spellcasting, can be performed. However, each round after the first you may use a standard action (concentrating on the spell) to call a bolt. You may call a total number of bolts equal to your caster level (maximum 10 bolts).

Makes it a bit weaker, but still quite a spell...

Tonguez · Nov 21, 2004

Yeo Druids rock in outdoor skirmishes

alsih2o · Nov 21, 2004

I had missed that one.

But outdoors has nothng to do with it, says it works even underground!

kenobi65 · Nov 21, 2004

A few more things to keep in mind:

- It's a 5' wide, 30' long, vertical stroke of lightning. In other words, it comes straight down into a 5' square. So, unless you're dealing with a situation in which one character is directly above another, or you've got more than one bad guy in a 5' square (which does surely happen, but not *that* often, at least not IME), it can only affect one character at a time.

- Unlike many damage-dealing spells, the damage done doesn't increase with the caster level.

- There's still a Reflex save for half.

So, what you get is a spell that'll do, on average, 10 points of electical damage (save for an average of 5 or so), with the one *big* advantage that you can use it 5 or more times over the course of a combat.

A good spell, yup. Not a broken spell, IMO.