Fly Houseruling

[WhatGravitas]

So, I like the Fly spell - in fact I love it... but as a DM, it's a royal PitA - because half of the monsters are unable to do anything sensible against it. in fact, you can fly at an altitude of about 150 ft. with your group, then pepper it with fireballs and arrows. And you monsters look sad. If they can do ranged, you'll just fly a bit higher, because the long-range spells have an enormous range (400+ ft.).

And this from level 5 on. I have no problem with a group on 10+ level doing this. Overland Flight is also fantastic and I've got no problems with it, but groups completely starting to fly, starting on 5th or 6th? Makes some encounters... boring.

I know that this problem stems from the versatility of fly in open terrain, compared to the classical dungeon, where this problem is not a problem at all. But only doing indoor encounters is... boring as well.

So, after reading the Bo9S, I've found Rising Phoenix as stance, and I'll probably adopt its solution:

The maximum altitude of the Fly spell is dependant on level:
5th level: 10 ft.
6th-10th level: 20 ft.
11th-15th level: 30 ft.
16th-20th level: 40 ft.
21th+ level: 50 ft.

If you have a higher distance from the ground/liquid surface, the spell immediately ends, protecting you until the end of turn with a Feather Fall.

This would be accompanied by a Fly, Greater-spell on 6th, that gives the full functionality of Fly, including higher duration... and Levitate would be useful for crossing pits again, instead of being completely obsoleted by Fly.

What do you think? Should I leave Fly untouched? Give it a duration of 10 min./level (3.0-style) to offset the loss of use? Up the max. Altitudes?

 

[the Jester]

Enemies on the ground can always take cover, scatter, etc. And don't forget- 400'+ is only a few range increments for many ranged weapons. They can still reach the party, they just take a penalty.

 

[WhatGravitas]

Enemies on the ground can always take cover, scatter, etc. And don't forget- 400'+ is only a few range increments for many ranged weapons. They can still reach the party, they just take a penalty.

True, but my beef with it: It works well with NPCs. In fact, if it would only NPCs, I won't even think of it - I like Fly as it is... but then, half of the monsters in the MM are... useless? I mean... the big dinosaurs, dire animals, purple worms - heck, even the Tarrasque are next to helpless against a flying group.

Most probably, I'm addressing the problem from the wrong side: it's dungeon-centric (and hence shabby) monster-design, while fly is fine.

(Side-note: I mostly post this because I'm playing a mage myself and with his flying, he wrecks my DM's plans - while I'm convinced him, that flying is fine, since it loses 90% of its use in confined spaces, it led me to thinking about the need to fly in D&D, besides for killing dragons and flying monsters.)

 

[Felix]

From level 5 on your wizard is going to cast Fly on everyone before every encounter?

Range: Touch. The caster will have to get next to everyone before they start flying.
Target: creature touched. Single target means multiple castings.
Casting Time: 1 standard action. In an average party it will take 4 rounds for the caster to get everyone airborne.
Duration: 1 minute/level. The benefit of flight completely gone in 5 minutes for one encounter.​

Your 5th level casters regularly blow all of their highest level slots on 5 minutes of flight? You mention 400ft range spells, but if the caster has used all the high-level stuff getting them in the air, then what spells have they left?

Even a 10th level wizard will only have 3 3rd level spells (disregarding bonus spells) available to him. You suggest he'd rather have 3 Fly spells than a Fly, a Fireball, and a Dispel Magic? Or some other combination of available spells?

Don't touch it. The PC who casts Fly willy-nilly won't be casting other (much) more effective and potentially troublesome spells. And his party-buff will go away in 5 minutes and he'll be completely drained of spells.

 

[WhatGravitas]

From level 5 on your wizard is going to cast Fly on everyone before every encounter?

Mine is... but we're in RHoD, and the party consists of my Wizard, an Artificer (concentrating on Blasting with metamagic spelltriggering) and a Archer... so Fly is indeed the best option by far. But then, yeah, I feel the reason why not to touch it. Without that spell, our party would've been teared to shreds five or six times...

Don't touch it. The PC who casts Fly willy-nilly won't be casting other (much) more effective and potentially troublesome spells. And his party-buff will go away in 5 minutes and he'll be completely drained of spells.

Hmm... I thought of upping it to 10 min./level, because of the severe dislike of these "one encounter"-spells.

 

[Felix]

Mine is... but we're in RHoD, and the party consists of my Wizard, an Artificer (concentrating on Blasting with metamagic spelltriggering) and a Archer... so Fly is indeed the best option by far.

That's 3 PC actions at the beginning of an encounter that could be used Fireballing the enemy just as easily. *Shrug*

Hmm... I thought of upping it to 10 min./level, because of the severe dislike of these "one encounter"-spells.

I don't get it: I thought you wanted to reduce Fly's effectiveness. Besides, you can only ascend at half-speed anyways; it's going to take you rounds worth of actions to get out of range of an enemy's ranged attacks.

 

[WhatGravitas]

That's 3 PC actions at the beginning of an encounter that could be used Fireballing the enemy just as easily. *Shrug*

Naaaah... not with my current DM. I can only fireball my group... *sigh*

I don't get it: I thought you wanted to reduce Fly's effectiveness. Besides, you can only ascend at half-speed anyways; it's going to take you rounds worth of actions to get out of range of an enemy's ranged attacks.

1) D'oh. Forgot that half-speed in my consideration.
2) I didn't want to lower the effectiveness. I wanted to keep the big melee monsters of the mid-CRs (6-11) viable, therefore my idea of giving up some evasion power, but getting some staying power.
3) But I guess I keep it as it is... because it's working right now... you know: Never touch a running system - I was just a bit too much in "gearhead mode".