Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Victim" data-source="post: 2998709" data-attributes="member: 78">One major reason for 4 ranks at first level is to even out the effect of other mods.  If a character has 18 Dex, then the 4 ranks make the skill equal in importance to the stat.  Otherwise skill ranks are pretty worthless in comparison to stat mods and such.  It's like high level 3.0; who cares how many ranks a character has when +skill items are so cheap.  I think making skill ranks less important in the context of other modifiers makes the problem worse.The only disconnect is the lack of context in your post.Evaluting Heal by comparing the amount it cures compared with other lower level spells is totally worthless.  Put the spells in their proper place.  How much a spell heals is irrelevant without considering how much damage enemies do and how many HP people have.  There's also opportunity costs: what else can a high level priest do with a 6th level spell and what else can he do with his turn.  Basically, healing spells have been losing ground on a character's HP since level 1: the cure progression goes up 1d8 per two levels and +1 per level.  Most characters gain way more than 1d4+1 HP per level, and by 11th level many will be gaining Con items to further increase their rate of HP gain.  Not to mention that damage has gone up quite a bit as well. In the context of the game, those smoothly scaling Cure X wounds become increasingly ineffective since damage and HP outpace them.  Heal needs to have a big jump to catch up.  Also, an 11th+ cleric can be doing a number of interesting and powerful things with his spells and time.  As the value of his other actions increase, the value of his healing options must increase in order for that choice to remain attractive.  If Heal was like 6d8+CL, it would suck unless everything else completely changed as well.The problem with Teleport is that it's context is highly variable.  We can look at how tough the monsters are, how many HP people are likely to have, and what other stuff high level clerics can do to see where Heal fits.  But Teleport offers strategic movement, and there's no universal way to value that.  In Eberron, a 9th level 'port can take a character from Sharn to Wroat instantly.  But traveling from say Qbarra to the nearest city big enough to have a train station will take several days of teleporting.  And PCs have transport options that are much faster than walking and riding anyway.  So 100 mile/level might be required in a game of internation scope.  And, in that game, a 1 mile/level would be a cruel joke, like Drawji's Instant Summons.  But if your game takes place inside a small region, then Teleport might let your cross multiple countries in single jump.  If there's no other fast transit, then it becomes even more important.  And if the game is about going into the Dungeon from the Town, then going back to sell and heal, then a Teleport that goes a mile per level might be awesome since you can escape the Dungeon instantly while a 900 mile port might be campaign blowing.  Whether or not 900 miles is too much depends heavily on the campaign and setting.Similarly, there's plenty of room of to go after raise dead.  Raise is expensive, both in money and since it costs a level.  It's slow to cast, and is subject to some restrictions.  The high level spells ease up on the restrictions and eventually the level cost.  Revivify has some harsh restrictions, but is fast and cheap.  And it's generally better not to die in the first, so there's plenty of room to work on preventing death.  Is the problem with Raise Dead that it allows the party to recover its combat losses, or that it can ressurect the dead which can have far reaching consequences.  The truth is probably some of both.  But being able to save people who are say mostly dead is much less a change in scope than being able to pull people from the afterlife.In one sense, there's very little room to go with most spells.  It's just a matter of making it easier, affecting more people/things, increasing the cap, or adding side benefits.  Broadly competent characters need teams to adventure just as much as specialized ones, IMHO.</blockquote>

Verification