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Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 1958173" data-attributes="member: 1210">Um, actually, there are tons of improved/modified versions of spells that people have researched, you included.  Fire daggers, fire grenade, Malford's group invisibility, Orbius' mobile scrying, I could go on at length.  To clarify, what I won't go for is a spell that is exactly the same as another spell except for the energy type.  I'm probabaly more likely to go for a variant with the same energy type (like the aforementioned fire grenade).  Improved versions of spells are trickier- often, a small change makes a huge difference in a spell's power level.  Pass through earth and stone, for instance, is much more powerful (as an effect) in 3e than it was in 2e, and a version that lasts an hour per level seems excessively powerful.  Mobility is crazy important now compared to the old days.  That said, you're right about elemental aura allowing the hour/level PtEaS- I hadn't realized that.  Given that, I'll go for your greater pass through earth and stone as a 7th level spell.Of course he doesn't have to give the spell back, but if I'd realized you were going to view it as a precedent I would have been much more explicit that it isn't.  Truly, I'm not just being a bastard.  As I stated above, I really don't like unnecessary redundancy.  You think the spells remain balanced when you just shift the energy type, but I don't think that's necessarily true.  To go into more detail as to why, it's because it breaks limits.  To clarify with an example, if I build a spellcasting monster who is optimized for fire- with feats and abilities that give bonus damage to fire effects, that bump up the DC of saves against my fire effects, etc.- and there are fiery abilities at every spell level, I have just created an optimal monster without any drawbacks whatsoever.  So my flaming mage of doom who gets +2d6 fire damage, +4 to fire DCs, +4 to penetrate SR with fire spells and so forth actually always gets +2d6 damage, +4 to DCs and +4 to penetrate.  Now, as a dm, sure I can make that monster anyway if I want to- but without a very good reason, I won't because I have to make up lots of random crap to justify it.  I'd frankly rather justify my bad guys with existing rules than add a bunch of random crap to my game in order to make my npcs 'rules-legal.'I guess what I'm getting at is: Keeping different effects distinct preserves drawbacks.  Believe me, if I would allow straight variant energy spells like you're proposing, you wouldn't be the first to get 'em.  Many a bad guy would have had spells they were immune to that they would have used at ground zero while fighting you.  I've thought about this before.  I didn't think it was fair when I debated iceberg swarm (or whatever the heck I would have called it) for Felenga instead of meteor swarm, and you'll notice that he stuck to the flaming explosive meteors.  I think this customizability of energy effects is one of the things in 3.5 psionics that might be broken.  It's a huge advantage, and I think you're greatly underrating it.Again, I'm really not just trying to be frustrating, but I'm much more interested in preserving the flavor and balance of my campaign than in saving time.  Hope you make it this weekend. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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