Fighting the Undead

[Dice4Hire]

I would have to agree. Clerics can do great healing and undead killing almost incidentally, with the second or third at-will choice and half of their dailies and utilities. The rest should be offense. If the party is trying to make up for an attack every round that hurts.

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

One of the parties I adventure in has a pacifist cleric, and yeah, once stuff gets bloodied, missing that one extra damaging attack per round is noticeable.

I've never been a huge cleric fan in any edition, and though they're better now than any other edition (IMO), I still don't find them thrilling to play, especially super-healing pacifists. Yawn.

As much fun as it can be slaughtering undead with Radiant mojo, I'd rather do that as a paladin. Although, I've noticed quite a few that are surprisingly not vulnerable to Radiant.

 

[Destil]

As much fun as it can be slaughtering undead with Radiant mojo, I'd rather do that as a paladin. Although, I've noticed quite a few that are surprisingly not vulnerable to Radiant.

Feature not a bug, IMHO. Making an entire popular category of monsters have the same vulnerability encourages people to say stupid things like 'radiant is the best damage type, and necrotic is the worst.'

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

Feature not a bug, IMHO. Making an entire popular category of monsters have the same vulnerability encourages people to say stupid things like 'radiant is the best damage type, and necrotic is the worst.'

I'm well aware that it's not by accident. It just doesn't match the flavour presented. I don't think that it's Wrong or even Bad. In fact, I agree, it's good that they aren't all radiant resistant.

I thought the arguments about which damage keywords were best and worst had more to do with the sheer number of creatures that were resistant or immune to those keywords? A quick compendium search backs that theory up (without giving any credence whatsoever to the relative rarity of the creatures in question).

It's all very well and good to say, "poison damage sux becuz three times more creatures resist or are immune to it than any other damage type! OMG! Frostcheez FTW!"

Except if (and I'm just using this as an example) most of them are monsters that most DMs never use, then it doesn't matter. I don't actually know if this is the case in any of the 'damage type x sux' arguments or not, it's just possible that this is the case.

Anecdotally (I am well aware that anecdote =/= fact), I have been playing a necromancer-flavoured wizard for quite some time (now level 9) and I haven't felt particularly "gimped" by my choice to (with DM's permission, of course), re-keyword many of my powers. I guess YMMV*.

* the Y here refers to You in the general, Player's Handbook sense; anyone reading, not necessarily you, Destil.

 

[Ryujin]

I'm well aware that it's not by accident. It just doesn't match the flavour presented. I don't think that it's Wrong or even Bad. In fact, I agree, it's good that they aren't all radiant resistant.

I thought the arguments about which damage keywords were best and worst had more to do with the sheer number of creatures that were resistant or immune to those keywords? A quick compendium search backs that theory up (without giving any credence whatsoever to the relative rarity of the creatures in question).

It's all very well and good to say, "poison damage sux becuz three times more creatures resist or are immune to it than any other damage type! OMG! Frostcheez FTW!"

Except if (and I'm just using this as an example) most of them are monsters that most DMs never use, then it doesn't matter. I don't actually know if this is the case in any of the 'damage type x sux' arguments or not, it's just possible that this is the case.

Anecdotally (I am well aware that anecdote =/= fact), I have been playing a necromancer-flavoured wizard for quite some time (now level 9) and I haven't felt particularly "gimped" by my choice to (with DM's permission, of course), re-keyword many of my powers. I guess YMMV*.

* the Y here refers to You in the general, Player's Handbook sense; anyone reading, not necessarily you, Destil.

I would have to agree. For example I would never want to play a Darklock, without the ability to alter damage keywords. There's a feat that lets you do Necrotic AND Poison damage, rather than Necrotic OR Poison damage, but both damage types seem to be fairly equally resisted. Many undead, for example, have resistance to both.

 

[Destil]

It's all very well and good to say, "poison damage sux becuz three times more creatures resist or are immune to it than any other damage type! OMG! Frostcheez FTW!"

Pretty much my point. When I run my game I go out of my way to make sure the same tactics don't always work, and a bit part of that is making sure resistance/immunity/defenses are varied across encounters. My group's run into a lot of radiant vulnerable undead, but they've also seen more resist radiant than most other forms of resistance.

Much the same way I dislike the idea of 'Will is the best defense to hit' and make sure it isn't so in my game.