[Dusk] 10 Black Spells.

[Happiest_Sadist]

I don;t like terror. Penalties to saving throws don't sit well with me. It already is harder to resist because it is higher level, and it just isn't interesting.
How about this?

Terror: (enchantment/illusion)
Save: will negates
Duration: permanent
The target sees you transform in nightmarish ways. This is so frightening that they cannot stand your presence and are terrified and flee for as long as they can see you. If this is impossible they cower Even when they cannot see you they are shaken. This spell requires a remove curse from a higher caster, wish, limited wish, or miracle to remove.

 

[Michael Morris]

I don;t like terror. Penalties to saving throws don't sit well with me. It already is harder to resist because it is higher level, and it just isn't interesting.
How about this?

Terror: (enchantment/illusion)
Save: will negates
Duration: permanent
The target sees you transform in nightmarish ways. This is so frightening that they cannot stand your presence and are terrified and flee for as long as they can see you. If this is impossible they cower Even when they cannot see you they are shaken. This spell requires a remove curse from a higher caster, wish, limited wish, or miracle to remove.

Won't work. The original terror was (is) one of black's signature kill spells. For those not into MtG it reads

Terror
1B
Instant

Destroy target non-black, non-artifact creature.


The translated spell needs to have a similar affect. Phantasmal Killer occupies the "scared them to death" slot, so I figure terror is just a nastier PK - with a higher level of course.

 

[Michael Morris]

Bump

 

[Al]

You just emasculated Feeblemind.

If you compare it with Finger of Death, you see that both allow a save, but whilst Feeblemind reduces its opponents to a minimum 3 Int (hence making it only of limited use against e.g. barbarians, beasts and in fact most things will low Will saves), Finger of Death simpy kills them outright.

Just to add insult to injury, Feeblemind takes one full round to cast, rather than one action, and can now be reversed with a simple Restoration.

The problem with the whole new series of spells is that you start bumping the existing spells all over the place- personally, I think that Feeblemind is a powerful 5th level spell. Yet at 7th, especially as presented here, it is woefully weak.

However, rather than simply accept that Persecute is fine at 6th level, let us re-examine it. It is clearly weaker than Dominate at 5th, vastly inferior to Disintegrate at 6th and even weaker than Polymorph at 4th.

The 'mind ripper' spells are by no means that powerful. The epic spell in the ELH most derisable was Spell Worm, when a simple Feeblemind was far more effective. Balancing existing spells against house spells is the wrong way round; rather, house spells are to be balanced against the established spells. Persecute is probably legitimate at 4th, at best, for example.

The ideas, creativity and flavour text are all very good, and, did I live in your area, I would certainly contemplate playing in the Dusk campaign. Unfortunately, by assigning an arbitrary level to your spells then balancing the PHB ones against them, your balancing methodology leaves something to be desired.

 

[Michael Morris]

Maybe I did go too far in curtailing feeblemind - but the current 5th level version is way too strong. The save penalty is bad, but the spell is almost as hard to be rid of than slay living. I know the spell is going to have some official change done to it in revised 3e, but exactly what I don't know.

Anyway, if Feeblemind is 4th, then Lobotomy and Persecute is 4th.

Any spell that allows you to look into the enemy caster's mind, select and select one spell there (but not all of them) for them to lose is 3rd. Any spell that causes the loss of many multiple spells at random is 3rd.

Anyspell that allow you to cause some spells to be lost at random is 2nd

A spell that causes the loss of a single spell is 1st.

The question becomes, do you want those types of effects pushed down that far?