Help needed with extend metamagic

[Zander]

How does the extend metamagic feat affect spells that depend on their duration for their effect?

For example, Lesser Vigour from the Spell Compendium page 229 grants fast healing 1 for 10 rounds plus 1 round per caster level (max 15 rounds). If this were extended, would it be fast healing 1 for 20 rounds plus 2 rounds per caster level?

Another example: Cloud of Knives from the PHB II page 107 has a duration of 1 round per level granting one knife per round. If extended, would this be 2 rounds per level granting one knife per round? NB the spell doesn't say one knife per level but one knife per round.

What's your personal take on this?

Is there an official ruling?

 

[Goolpsy]

im not sure i would put things that way; say your caster lvl 4 casting lesser vigor.. you would calculate it like: (10 + 4*1)*2
in this case its essentially the same, but doubling effects might lead to confusing and miss metamgiced spell...

Anyway, the Feat doesn't say anything about not working on damage spell, hence it should work normally here

Edit: Extend doubles time, not effect

 

[MarkB]

Your interpretation appears to be correct in each of these cases.

 

[Question]

I believe there is an errata or FAQ for vigor spells that explictly lists the max duration "As is", meaning extend wont extend past the max.

I dont think its fair really, you can maximsie or empower cure spells.

 

[Infiniti2000]

How does the extend metamagic feat affect spells that depend on their duration for their effect?

For example, Lesser Vigour from the Spell Compendium page 229 grants fast healing 1 for 10 rounds plus 1 round per caster level (max 15 rounds). If this were extended, would it be fast healing 1 for 20 rounds plus 2 rounds per caster level?

That would be my interpretation as well.

Is there an official ruling?

The FAQ, however, says:

The vigor series of spells (found in Complete Divine) raise an interesting question. Does the built-in maximum duration of each spell limitation override the effect of the Extend Spell feat?

Yes. Extend Spell still increases the spell’s duration, but only up to the spell’s listed maximum duration. Use either the normal maximum duration or the doubled duration, whichever is less. If a 7th-level druid used Extend Spell on her vigor spell, the duration could not increase beyond 25 rounds.

 

[Zander]

Thanks, Infiniti2000 and everyone else who has posted a reply.

That clarifies things for Vigour but what about Cloud of Knives and other duration dependent spells?

 

[Pyrex]

Extend Spell doubles the duration of a spell. Effects that depend directly on duration will be improved. Effects that *don't* depend directly on duration are unaffected.

Example 1, Cloud of Knives:
The effect of Cloud of Knives is that you get to fire 1 knife per round for 1rd/level.
Adding Extend makes the spell last for 2rd/level, and you still get to fire a knife each round. See Also: Acid Arrow, Spiritual Weapon.

Example 2, Call Lightning:
Call Lightning lets you call 1 bolt/level (max 10 bolts) over a duration of 1min/level.
In this case, Extend still doubles the duration to 2min/level, but as it's listed as a seperate variable not tied to duration, Extend does nothing for the total number of bolts you can call, it just gives you more time to use them. See Also: Protection from Energy, Sunbeam.

 

[Hypersmurf]

One of my favourites is Extended Heat Metal.

For the first seven rounds, you take damage. For the next seven rounds... well, you radiate a neat transmutation aura...

-Hyp.

 

[Pyrex]

Or, for a not-entirely-dissimilar argument, Extended Creeping Cold.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Or, for a not-entirely-dissimilar argument, Extended Creeping Cold.

Interestingly, I'd use Creeping Cold as an example of something that's completely dissimilar to Heat Metal.

Heat Metal effectively says "On round 1, the spell has effect 1. On round 2, the spell has effect 2. ... on round 7, the spell has effect 7." There is no definition in the spell text for what happens on round 8 of an ExHM.

(Arguably, we could say that on round 13, the round 6 effect occurs, since 13 is the 'next to last round' of the spell; similarly, round 14's effect is 'None', rather than undefined.)

Creeping Cold, on the other hand, defines the effect for all durations - 1d6 cumulative cold damage per round. So we know, from the spell text, what happens on rounds 4, 5, and 6 of an ExCC: 4d6, 5d6, and 6d6 cold damage respectively.

-Hyp.