Design & Development - Necromancy & Nethermancy

[renau1g]

Hehe, you could dominate Vecna that way. I think that's a bit far, but yeah, don't forget the cantrip also requires a minor, so for a class that already struggles a bit with its action economy (using Minor actions fairly regularly to sustain Daily powers) this is a tough pill to swallow.

 

[WalterKovacs]

I actually liked all the Dailies they showed off - cool, old school flavour, neat mechanics. I liked those.

Disrupt undead is awful. It should at least scale, or, add Int modifier to the amount, or, you know, not suck.

And yeah, they do have another answer, but it doesn't come in until level 10, meanwhile the Pyromancers have been burning things that are made of fire since 1st level.

Pyromancers trigger off the fire keyword, so all their powers tied to their school deal fire damage. Necromancer powers do not deal exclusively necrotic damage, and many have an extra/seperate effect against undead which at least offsets necrotic damage.

If they're going to make you wait until 10th to not suck everytime there are undead about, they should at least have made it worthwhile. Ignore necrotic resist, and _______________.

Well, they are giving you something different at level 1 instead of "just" ignoring necrotic resist. And again, unlike fire powers (which don't ussually impose conditions other than ongoing damage) necromacy powers aren't as much about damage as they are about rider effects, while fire, being basically a "do lots of damage in big areas" type of build prioritizes damage over other control effects.

 

[Aegeri]

Hehe, you could dominate Vecna that way. I think that's a bit far, but yeah, don't forget the cantrip also requires a minor, so for a class that already struggles a bit with its action economy (using Minor actions fairly regularly to sustain Daily powers) this is a tough pill to swallow.

Vecna is one of those solos with some love from the new design rules could be really awesome. He already has one of the best powers in the game that a solo could have, so I would love to see him officially updated fully and given some more MM3 like mechanics.

 

[twilsemail]

Hehe, you could dominate Vecna that way. I think that's a bit far, but yeah, don't forget the cantrip also requires a minor, so for a class that already struggles a bit with its action economy (using Minor actions fairly regularly to sustain Daily powers) this is a tough pill to swallow.

With the new solo rules this would just eliminate his extra action, wouldn't it?

Maybe Slow>Immobilize>Daze?

 

[Aegeri]

With the new solo rules this would just eliminate his extra action, wouldn't it?

No. There are no inherent rules that really govern what solos do specifically. The majority of newer solos have built in powers that ignore conditions or affect them differently. This means they aren't totally blanket immune, but you're rarely going to stun/daze/dominate lock them into submission nowadays. The mechanics are widespread enough now in the rules that applying them to previous solos retroactively is perfectly sensible and something you should do anyway. I mean adding a power like action recovery doesn't really do a lot to their stat block and makes them much better.

 

[WalterKovacs]

But necromancers gain the same feature... just much later. Is this better?

It's not just a matter of taking it later. You get two schools (the second at level 4), but you can only master one, so you have to choose to master necromacy (and therefore lock in your paragon path as well) to get the benefit, while a pyromancer could just set it and forget it. Also, the necromancer gets something else at level 1. For a pyromancer, if you go up against something without fire resist, you basically have no benefit [other than the small damage boost]. The other schools don't rely on the type of enemy you are facing to benefit from your apprentice mage class feature. So, getting it later means you get something else sooner. Depending on what that is, it may be better. [Also, you can pick a different mastery option, so you may have a choice to pick a better option if the necrotic resistance hasn't been a problem and you don't forsee it being one in the future].

And yeah, I like pyromancers.
What is bad about able to do damage with thematic spells?

Pyromancers are tied to fire spells. All fire spells deal fire damage, but not all necromancer spells deal necrotic damage. Also, most fire spells don't do much other than damage (or conditional damage, or save ends damage, etc). No stunning, dazing, weakening, knocking prone, penalties to defenses/attacks, etc, etc, etc. So, if the only thing fire spells do is damage, making sure they do their damage is a good thing. Necromancers as a school is likely not as focused on damage as the primary focus. We don't even know what they do get as their apprentice mage feature yet, probably something that makes their spell effects better instead of just improving damage. Pyromancers are secondary strikers, necromancers aren't.

Is it fun for the group when the controller nearly sucks?
For the controller?
For the DM who laughs at the character and his own wisdom to use fire-resistant monsters?

It makes the fire theme able to compare to a radiant theme.
BTW, Assassins are able to ignore poison resistance and immunity for just 1 feat!

Pyromancers definitely needed their ignore resistance (although the flat resist vs. a scaling remove x ammount would have maybe been better, but just flat ignoring it is probably the better option just for the purposes of simplicity).

As for poison resistance ... it's rarer than fire/necrotic, and I'm not sure, but it seemed like poison immunity was more common than poison resistance (as lots of undead and constructs were just flat out immune to poison).

 

[Aegeri]

Yeah, poison immunity is the most common kind of immunity in the game. The number of times in one of my games a PCs one poison power was hilariously useless was actually really surprising. Then again it was a bit undead/outsiderish heavy, so that didn't work in his favor. But half the time we just ignored anything the poison part of that power did.

I still don't see the point in just not blanket removing necrotic resistance. Given that many creatures interact with damage types without needing resistance - like volcanic dragons - since MM3 it's not a huge deal. It keeps the player feeling useful in an encounter with undead and it's not as ridiculously convoluted as designing billions of undead specific riders.

 

[Nichwee]

The Fighter ignores "weapon resist" from level 1. Why not let a pyromancer ignore "fire resist" or a necromancer ignore "necrotic resist."

But then a Fighter almost never finds a monster with Vulnerability Weapon either, while casters can find, or impart, vulnerabilities - so they get resisted a bit more but have better odds of getting bonus damage.

Also fighters don't ignore 'Resist Weapon' from level 1 - Swarms have resistance to Melee and Ranged, and the Fighter just has to take it on the chin - unless he took a Close power, but then a Necro isn't forced to have zero non-necrotic powers.
Luckily, Resist Weapon (or in truth an equivalent) is not that common, while some energy resistance might be more so (tho Resist Necrotic on a non undead is pretty uncommon too - and they have a way to deal with it if it is on an undead as a cantrip).

 

[WalterKovacs]

Yeah, poison immunity is the most common kind of immunity in the game. The number of times in one of my games a PCs one poison power was hilariously useless was actually really surprising. Then again it was a bit undead/outsiderish heavy, so that didn't work in his favor. But half the time we just ignored anything the poison part of that power did.

I still don't see the point in just not blanket removing necrotic resistance. Given that many creatures interact with damage types without needing resistance - like volcanic dragons - since MM3 it's not a huge deal. It keeps the player feeling useful in an encounter with undead and it's not as ridiculously convoluted as designing billions of undead specific riders.

The thing is:

(A) not all necromacy powers deal necrotic damage [or only necrotic damage in terms of dual damage type powers] these don't require convoluted undead specific riders
(B) necromacy powers aren't evocations. Some wizard powers do lots of damage (often spread around), some do no damage at all, but have effects, others do both. Even if they do necrotic damage, there are likely other effects. As a controller, those secondary effects are probably more useful than damage

It's comparing apples and oranges. Pyromancers can't pick fire powers that don't deal fire damage AND most fire powers do nothing but damage. They would be useless if they weren't doing much damage. The Mage is a controller, not a striker. There are things more important than damage which controllers need to keep in mind, and they have put things in place if damage is a grave (pardon the pun) concern.

If nothing else ... you have a spellbook. You have access to a second school. While fire resistance can pop up sort of randomly ... undead have haunts (sorry again) that can tip you off, and you can prepare spells accordingly. Some of the necromancer undead effects might be worth picking, and some other spells you may decide to go with your alternates instead to get around the resistance. Wizards have versatility, mages more so with the encounter powers added to the spellbook, so on top of all the other ways to dealing with the issue they have that to fall back on. And, the options we haven't even seen yet, like the level 1 ability we get for picking the school, any of the feats or powers or paragon path options, etc ... And, if it is really make or break, at level 10 and on, it's no longer a problem at all, and until then, there are a ton of ways to mitigate the problem.

 

[renau1g]

It's comparing apples and oranges. Pyromancers can't pick fire powers that don't deal fire damage AND most fire powers do nothing but damage.

Yes they can, AIP (dagger) and grab a Flaming Dagger. Done.