Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sepulchrave II" data-source="post: 3088600" data-attributes="member: 4303">Re: Shambler.I'm always dubious about using 9th-level spells as a baseline; that's not to say I haven't done it, because I have. But the balance of many 9th level spells (even 8th and some 7th level spells) is questionable at best; some do not scale smoothly. I think requiring that [summon] should exceed shambler  is odd.It's also a [creation] spell, not a [summoning] spell, which makes me doubly sceptical. I think if you want to up the CR and duration, you're better off doing it by fiat, rather than attempting to justify it through an anomalous spell. The closest that a nonepic spell comes to this order of power is summon elemental monolith (Lvl 9, concentration (up to 20 rounds), medium range, 1 round casting time, CR 17). On this basis [summon] might stretch to CR 17 if you rate concentration as a -2 half-factor. I had originally upped the CR to 15, but erred on the side of caution.How [summon] meshes with [call] will be a factor, as will feats which affect these seeds.  I also think a baseline which is 6 CRs below that of the summoner (assuming a 21st-level caster) is a good place to start (edit: for a pool of 12 creatures, duh!): it mirrors the difference between a 17th-level caster and most creatures on the summon monster IX list: and the difference in the real power at these CRs is smaller.Edit: choice from a pool of 12 creatures at CR 15 for 20 rounds would correspond to a specific creature of CR 16 for 20 minutes; a single CR 17 creature for 20 rounds would also correspond to a CR 16 creature for 20 minutes; shambler does the same.I think that is enough evidence. I'm convinced.Still think shambler was an odd choice, though.Re: Acid DamageGreybar and Cheiro, I think you're both right. At low-levels, it might make a difference, but at the levels we're considering, it won't matter diddly. That said, I like the optional minor factors (+1) for things like combustion, affecting objects, slippery surface etc.I can't find any iteration of the [energy] seed that I'm entirely happy with. 40d6 is too much. 20d6 leaves a bunch of spare half-factors that have to be allocated with nowhere to put them. I'm half-tempted to make typeless energy the standard, and then mitigate out to named types.</blockquote>

Verification