How to counter Mordenkainen's Disjunction

[Zhure]

Not to drag this into the House Rules forum, but what are people's opinions of a variant which is identical other than "instead of being destroyed, affected magic items which fail their save lose their power completely for 1 round per caster level"?

Advantages: if the targets win the fight, the DM hasn't nerfed all of their magical items. Also, it makes the spell a little more fun to use against groups of PCs.

Disadvantages: One of the balancing factors may be that you destroy potential treasure when you use the spell against your enemies.

Thoughts?

1- I'd suggest 1d4 rounds of magic item suppression, making it mimic Dispel Magic.

2- obliterating magic items is the downside of using this spell. Other than the problem with artifacts, and nerfing all permanent items, this spell is *THE* spell to use in combat at that level. It completely obliterates PC-type opposition. If you get rid of the nerf function, this spell actually gets better. Leaving in a weakened form of nerfing (1d4 rounds, for example) only INCREASES the functionality of the spell.

Greg

 

[Anubis]

First off, don't use Forgotten Realms examples to discuss balance issues, because you're only showing how munchkin Forgotten Realms is by doing so.

The spell is balanced as is. It has a fairly easy save for powerful characters, and it is a double-edged sword that needs to be used sparingly.

 

[KarinsDad]

I think MD has a very important game use.

As PCs, it is very easy to acquire a LOT of magical items by 17th+ level. A LOT.

Having an NPC wipe out all PC buff spells and pruning out the items a party carries is very useful as a counter to the inherent Monty Haul nature of 3E.


With regard to PCs casting it on NPCs, that's ok too. It just limits the number of magic items a party will acquire if it is done.

Personally, I see nothing inherently wrong with this spell unless the DM is having every opponent arcane spell caster use it.

But, as a once in a while attempt to regain game balance (which is questionable as is at those levels), I think it is a fine spell and a core rules one at that.

For once, WotC put an element into the game that can be used by DMs to readjust balance as part and parcel of the game itself. Bravo!

 

[Cloudgatherer]

While not what you are looking for....

Don't use buffing spells. Don't carry magic items .

Not what most people would suggest, but if you are expecting to be blasted by a disjunction and taking severe losses, might as well tuck the items away.

Also, if you set up a contingency to put up a anti-magic shell around you when in the area of this spell, then there you have it.

Edit: I meant antimagic, not force.

 

[Enkhidu]

Two ideas to make the spell useful and still very powerful.

Impose an XP cost based on the amount of magic destroyed (the rule of thumb would be 20% of the XP used to create the magic items). This makes it just as effective, but extremely costly. However, it would be devastatingly difficult to impose this on the fly.

Or...

MD effects all items in the radius for 1d4 rounds per level of the caster. In addition, the caster chooses 1 item in particular to be permanantly disjoined.

Still very effective in a fight, but it also makes it much harder to permanently nerf a characters enitre cache.

 

[Thanee]

Just a helpful bump for Cloudgatherer!

Bye
Thanee

 

[Cloudgatherer]

Just a helpful bump for Cloudgatherer!

(Scream in background) I went back 10 pages looking for this before I thought, "you know, I bet it got bumped to the first page." Sure enough, here it is...

Thanks Thanee.

 

[Sollir Furryfoot]

Just my 2 cents, but as for a Mordekainen's Disjunction variant, how about if they roll a 1 on the will save for an item, the item is disjoined-giving Mordekainen's Disjunction a slight risk to destroy items as well.

 

[James McMurray]

MD effects all items in the radius for 1d4 rounds per level of the caster. In addition, the caster chooses 1 item in particular to be permanantly disjoined.

Still very effective in a fight, but it also makes it much harder to permanently nerf a characters enitre cache.

This (andother "fixes" like it are not actually fixes. The major downside to MD is that you destroy the loot. If it could be used without destroying magic items permanently, my sorcerer would take it and open every combat off with it.

 

[Kyramus]

leave the spell as is. It's a 9th level spell.
If you want to make it target only one item, then you might as well make the arguement that Wish can only make you change hair colors.

By the time people are able to cast 9th level spells, magic items will be either easy to acquire or make. It just takes some down time to make them.

Dispel magic makes things inert and it's a level 3 spell. Why can't a 9th level spell make it permanently non magical?

as for the original question posed.
The wish spell cannot make you immune as it only makes effects below 8th level, HOWEVER I personally would allow you to wish for a contigency spell be created that CAN store antimagic field since it is the same level of contingency and normally can't be used in conjunction with it.

The antimagic field will help you more when you get hit by a moden's disjuct. read page 230 for morden's disjunt against antimagic field.