So they have never messed up. Do you believe it's possible to have an unwavering faith in a company, so much so that others might perceive that person to be a fanboy? Not that I'm implying you are, I just want to see if you acknowledge that while the title of the designer is well respected the design itself can still be discussed.
Yeah, it's possibly, sure. Myself, I'm actually rather pissed at WotC lately, but not because of the balance of the stuff they've put out. Whatever other bad moves they've made, their classes and prestige classes are still, for the most part, incredibly well-balanced.
The player descriptions of their actions should be unique, but the scenarios should not be so different that two different groups do not recognize they are playing the same thing. (Gee, your group went up against five radiant servants of Pelor in a row? Don't remember seeing those on the Isle of Dread...)
That's why I don't run premade adventures, for one thing, but I realize some people like to. I'm not saying you absolutely have to change everything to fit your characters. But you lose every right to complain about them trampling your game if you don't.
The skeletons do not just stand there and get smashed. They are healed from behind by the dread necromancer's lich-like class features for healing undead. Have you read the class we're discussing or are you just upset that someone is questioning a WotC design and want to call out all critics as 'lazy DMs'?
Yeah, I actually have read the class. And while you can indeed use your spells to heal the undead, you'll run out soon enough. Skeletons are fragile, and not at all powerful. And your unlimited use healing class feature? 3 points per round ain't exactly a big deal. And all of these healing abilities are touch-based, so you've got to be right up next to your allies, and therefore, your enemies.
See then, in the scenario above the players might just avoid the BBEG. Or hide away in a demiplane of their own creation. Which is fine for most campaigns, but there are others where it isn't fair to the DM (or other players in some cases). Have you played games at conventions? Or an RPGA sanctioned games? There is an unwritten rule (and in the case of the RPGA, a written rule) that the players will follow the DM's module rather than the DM following whatever the players would like to do.
I actually haven't, and it doesn't seem like it would be at all fun for me, unless the DM of the game there was good enough to make it personal. But you still run in to the same deal, essentially. It takes infinitely more time to try and house-rule out what might be unbalanced than it does to make a minor in-game adjustment to account for said imbalance.
Have you read the DM of the Ring d20 comic? LotR would be very difficult to run. The story has a lot of elements that occur that do NOT center around 'the party' (which is usually split up). In fact, LotR is exactly the OPPOSITE of what you are suggesting. It's the perfect example of a living world where multiple events occur outside of a character's control that effect the plotline. If you wanted to make a player feel like he was a part of this world he should be able to move about freely and interact with these elements without having them turn into min-maxed powergame toys just so they can challenge the party.
I'm not saying you can't have events the players can't control. I'm saying that those events should still center on the characters, unless they're tossed in for background effect, or foreshadowing of future events. And who said anything about powergaming? If one player is using too much of something, or using something unbalanced, then occasionally making it unavailable is not even slightly unreasonable. Take a classic example of heroic storytelling: Superman. He's pretty much invincible, except for one thing: Kryptonite. And guess what? Somehow, Kryptonite seems to make an appearance in almost all of his adventures. The cool part is how he finds a way around the challenge. I'm not saying to put your players' Kryptonite in every adventure, but don't be afraid to use it when it's needed.
Yet every campaign that I've ever known has house rules for character creation. Some people want to find a balance that fits what they can run. Others don't, and there's nothing wrong with limitations (like nerfing the dread necromancer). Some DMs even go to message boards and ask other DMs and players for opinions of these rules (and want to clarify the RAW too) only to be shot down by someone who doesn't believe they should exist to begin with...
House rules are fine, when used sparingly. But if you're going to try and find a way to nerf everything you read on paper and say "OMG TEH BROKEN!"... that's another thing entirely.
And I gave you my opinion, and my suggested house rule. Is it my fault that my opinion is that there's no problem? And my ranting above wasn't directed solely at you, sorry if it seemed that way. It was more that this was a convenient post in which to get out what I've been wanting to say to every single person who runs around decrying everything as broken.
Hunting for elephants or dinosaurs or something. If the campaign focuses around them then they will end up finding it if they are persistent enough.
An elephant? Well, you can't get an elephantine zombie, as that would be 22 HD, so the most powerful use of it isn't that bad. And an elephant skeleton has an AC of 11. Sure, it'll do some damage, but it'll die incredibly fast, as it's nearly impossible to not hit. And then there's the fact that it's huge sized. Good luck moving a horde of elephants around the map with you...
It's a common gem, and if you look at the MIC it says that in general a player should be able to get these items. Maybe not in all campaigns, but that doesn't mean a DM should be forced to hide items and abilities. It's kind of like saying "well if you think the turn undead ability is too powerful then don't let your party fight undead".
That's fine. Even if the leaders in your world would allow widespread sale and distribution of a material known to be used to create undead (hell, we even regulate allergy medicine to make it harder to make meth), they'll still be keeping an eye on the purchase of such objects. If you're gonna purchase thousands of gold worth of onyx, you can be damn sure someone's going to notice. And alert the Cleric Squad to perform an investigation. I dunno about your group, but my players would be pissed if I
didn't do something od that sort, because, really, that's what would happen.
And for the record, Turn Undead is beyond useless... Rebuke can come in handy, sure, but Turning? Divine Feats or bust.
Now does anyone else have an opinion on the dread necromancer's class abilities? Or answers to confirm my rules clarification questions?]/quote]
If it doesn't say that it counts against your limit, they don't. And it's also not that big a deal. Besides the fact that that's still more creatures to keep track of and control, Command Undead is not instantaneous, like Animate is. Dispel Magic, anyone?
And this one might even be semi-RAW, but the spell description isn't clear on it. Under Rebuk Undead, it states that it's a move action to give commands to your undead minion. I don't think it'd be a stretch to extend this rule to animated undead, either. So, if you want all of your undead to swarm the bad guys, be prepared to do nothing but tell them to attack.
