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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ruleslawyer" data-source="post: 380502" data-attributes="member: 1757">Some responses to your concerns, wolff:First, arcane spellcasters shouldn't be throwing around damage-dealing spells at epic levels unless they really mean it. Save-or-die spells are a much better way to go. Of course, with Improved Metamagic available to casters at epic levels, you'll start seeing lots of multiply-Empowered blasting spells, which do quite substantial damage.Second, it is by no means certain that saves and SR increase faster than spell DCs and caster level, depending on what set of rules you use. If you use the core books only, then expect spellcasters to get their hands on the best stat-boosting items they can find, thereby boosting average spell DCs by 3-5. If you use the splatbooks, expect castings of empowered fox's cunning or similar spells, raising DCs by a similar amount. I expect that a spellcaster's DCs should average 23 + spell level by the time s/he reaches epic levels, using only the core rules. Your average CR 21 monster (the thorciasid, for example), will have at least one save that makes it susceptible to the higher-level spells thrown by that caster.If you use FR save-DC-boosting classes or Greater/Epic Spell Focus feats, the numbers change dramatically in favor of the wizard. It's pretty easy to get DCs of 28 + spell level for the caster's preferred spells, and that will beat most saves for monsters of the appropriate CR. The same for SR, which incidentally follows a pretty strict pattern of 10-12 + CR for epic monsters (the pseudonatural template is a unique exception, and after all the fighters have to have SOMETHING to do). That means that a spellcaster has a 50/50 chance of getting any individual spell through. Couple with the Spell Penetration feat, and you get a 60/40 chance. Use GSP, and that goes up to 70/30. All this, of course, assumes that the wizard doesn't just cast buffing spells, maze, time stop, and other dweomers that require neither saves nor SR. They have a HUGE selection of these at epic levels.As for AQS and Multispell causing casters to burn resources faster: At these levels, that's pretty irrelevant. A wizard just needs to last one combat; after that, he can teleport back to his stronghold (or better still, to a plane with fast-flowing time) and prepare spells again.I speak from some experience; the wizard in the epic party I DM is constantly in danger of overshadowing his fellow party members, even though they are one and three levels higher than he, respectively.</blockquote>

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