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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Victim" data-source="post: 4623160" data-attributes="member: 78">Comparing the amount of damage over the whole fight to a one shot attack seems pretty weak.  Think about the present value of money - X amount of money of delivered in chunks of X/10 over the next ten years is worth a lot less than just getting the right away.  Damage is the same way, since all the damage up front lets you kill enemies right away so they take fewer actions, instead of slowly bleeding them while they attack you.  If Fireball did the same damage as Stinking Cloud in less time, it'd be much better than the later power (which is already really good).Plus there's the action cost.  Fireball costs the standard action to use.  Stinking Cloud or Icy Grasp costs not just the initial action to use, but also actions to sustain and possibly move or attack with the effect.  Sure, you can use Bigby's the whole encounter and it will do a lot of damage.  But the mage who used fireball will have extra actions he can use to do other things.  When the Bigby's has to attack again (using a standard action), the mage who used Fireball can make other attacks (probably just with an at will, but still) - it's not those extra attacks from Bigby's come out of nowhere; they're just replacing other attacks that could be made.</blockquote>