Epic Arcane Archer: Overpowered?

[Zad]

Overpowered compared to what? Balance is only meaningful if you balance against other things. Did you compare to other level 30 characters? If not, then I doubt you can say it's overpowered.

 

[Andion Isurand]

In additon to what Pax said...

A "smoking" weapon or armor also provides its own seperate 20% miss chance due to the concealment it provides the character, and True Seeing can't overcome it.

 

[CRGreathouse]

Actually, an Epic Spell would indeed shut him down, in a jiffy.

Say, "Invulnerability" (Seed: Ward). You coudl always give youself DR(50) against everything.

DC 14, +4 for all three physical types is 18, +90 for DR(50) is 108.
Change the target to Personal is -2, for 106

For mitigating factors, burn 2,000XP when you cast it, -20 is a DC of 86.
Increase the casting time from 1 minute to 10, is -18 DC, for 68.
Increase teh casting time by 30 days, is -60 DC, for an 8

Make it permanent, x5 DC is a 40; the cost is 360,000gp and 14,400XP. 8 days are needed to develop this spell.

If you leave it a Touch-range spell, the Spellcraft DC ends up at 50. Cost rises to 450,000gp and 18,000XP. 9 days are needed or this spell to be researched.

Sure, it's utter cheese. But hey ... so is a limitless supply of +10 arrows!!

By the rules, this epic spell would be DC 430, a little too high for comparison with the 30th level character.

 

[Pax]

How do you figure?

The Permanent factor specifically says to apply it after everything else.

 

[ruleslawyer]

More to the point: The arcane archer is a one-trick pony. The magical arrows are a really, really useful ability; no one else at these levels is going to be as good at overcoming DR as the arcane archer. It's the main reason why I advocate this class when doing epic archer builds; sub-epic, it's the worst archer PrC out there, losing out to a straight cleric archer by a good measure and being utterly blown away by the deepwood sniper, peerless archer, or OotBI.

Let's clarify here: This arcane archer is at best 20th level. That means +10 arrows. OK, this is pretty useful; +10 bonus damage to an arrow, with up to four arrows per round fired. Woo hoo. You, as a sorcerer, will be unleashing at least one 9th-level and two 6th-level spells in the same round with Auto-Quicken. That means that you get two Quickened disintegrate spells (save vs. an insanely high DC or die, successful save still means 5d6 damage) plus a wail of the banshee, power word kill, gate (60 HD nets you two solars if you want 'em) or any other uber-cheese spell. And you're worried about 40 extra points of damage per round?

Honestly, the arcane archer player is probably going to feel like a complete second-stringer compared to you, Cloudgatherer. He'll most likely end up mopping up foes with magic immunity or those who pass their SR checks. You'll be doing the main mauling.

Incidentally, you really should take AQS x3 right off the bat, since you're building your sorc from the ground up. Skip one of your Automatic Still and Silent feats; they're sorta useful, but not nearly so much as Quicken. Having the luxury of unleashing three 9th-level spells per round is pretty insane.

 

[The Souljourner]

How do you figure?

The Permanent factor specifically says to apply it after everything else.

No, I believe it says after all other factors (which means before mitigating factors... that means you multiply it by 5, THEN start subtracting stuff). Permanent epic spells are REALLY difficult to cast (unless you cheese out the casting time and damage).

I agree with ruleslawyer, don't take so much still or silent spells... quicken is much more effective for the "kill with a thought" thing. I mean, it's not like you need to say a lot in that free action, it's like a wave of your hand and uttering the word "die" or something similar.

If you really want to have automatic still and silent spell, that's up to you, but you're losing a *lot* of power by doing that.

-The Souljourner

 

[karateka]

An epic monk could easily counter that combo with infinite deflection, maybe even reflection. His +10 arrows will allow the monk to take DC30 reflex saves, nothing he can't pull off.

 

[Cloudgatherer]

Honestly, the arcane archer player is probably going to feel like a complete second-stringer compared to you, Cloudgatherer. He'll most likely end up mopping up foes with magic immunity or those who pass their SR checks. You'll be doing the main mauling.

Speaking of magic immunity... what did our DM throw at us in our first session together? Half-golems. Immunity to magic and piercing weapons. Nice guy eh?

Actually, my character will be the second stringer. Due to how the game is being run (I'll talk more about it on request), my character has significantly reduced powers. First session, the highest spell slot I could use was 5th level. Second session, I was temporarily able to use higher level magic, and it appears I will regain all of my abilities, but regaining spells is tricky. I regain my lowest spell level of spells per night of rest (if any first levels have been used, I regain those, then 2nd, then 3rd and so on). Heh.

Originally posted by ruleslawyer
Incidentally, you really should take AQS x3 right off the bat, since you're building your sorc from the ground up. Skip one of your Automatic Still and Silent feats; they're sorta useful, but not nearly so much as Quicken. Having the luxury of unleashing three 9th-level spells per round is pretty insane.

Wasn't going for uber power, but I'll probably pick that up next. I like the feats as they are for now. I'm not complaining about my relative power level with respects to the arcane archer, I *know* I could twink out my character even further, I chose for more style than power.

 

[Pax]

No, I believe it says after all other factors (which means before mitigating factors... that means you multiply it by 5, THEN start subtracting stuff). Permanent epic spells are REALLY difficult to cast (unless you cheese out the casting time and damage).

But, is not a "mitigating factor" by definition a "factor" ... ?

 

[orbitalfreak]

But, is not a "mitigating factor" by definition a "factor" ... ?

From the FAQ::

It seems very easy to develop permanent epic spells and avoid any real cost for developing them just by piling up mitigating factors. It’s true that there’s a big multiplier for a permanent effect, but since you apply the multiplier last, you can mitigate the spell’s DC down to nothing and then still wind up with nothing after applying the multiplier. Is that correct? Also, is there a minimum DC for an epic spell? Or can you really mitigate the DC down to nothing and so avoid any time or expense for
developing the spell?

When you see a multiplier on Table 2–2: Epic Spell Factors, you apply the multiplier last after adding up all the factors. You have to apply the multiplier before moving on to Table 2–3: Epic Spell Mitigating Factors. This makes it very difficult to reduce an epic spell’s DC to nothing unless the spell is fairly weak as epic spells go.

There is no minimum DC for an epic spell; if you want to pile on the mitigating factors, you can go ahead. Keep in mind, however, that epic spells work on a pay-me-now-or pay-me-later basis. You might avoid the development time and cost, but you’ll pay for the mitigating factors every time you cast the spell. A smart spellcaster stops applying mitigating factors when she gets the DCs down to 10 + her Spellcraft score. Any more than that is a waste unless the spell in question is something you won’t cast very often.

If this bothers you, feel free to impose a minimum DC on an epic spell. A DC 10 would a good limit.
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So: Add, Multiply, Subtract.
(edit: formatting)