Mearls talks about how he hates resistances

[Irda Ranger]

Just some more thoughts ...

I've decided I don't dislike Resistances nearly as much as I dislike Vulnerabilities. I like the idea of the Ice Wizard of the North fighting the Frost Giant with icicles and frozen shackles, and I don't want his allies saying "You know, you'd get an extra 5 damage if you used a Flameburst ..."

Another idea I have is where the environment plays a larger role. Say you are in the arctic. Because everyone's cold resistance is working full-tilt on negating the cold, it is reduced by 5 or 10 points. In an elemental region of flame, fire resistance is reduced by 20.

Shazam! That's awesome. Monsters would be "balanced" with their natural habitats, so that if you encounter a Frost Giant in its polar lair, no particular Resistance (though you better have your own).

Another way to put it might be "Resistance 10 when not in a XX terrain."

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On a related topic, I see lots of feats proposed. I think that's the wrong way to go about it because you've already expended a resource (power selection). Elemental "specialization" should be built into the selection of Powers, because the price you pay is the loss of flexibility. The wizard who doesn't load up on one damage type gets an inherent benefit (flexibility), so there should be an inherent benefit to specialization.

My suggestion is that Elemental Specialization should be an Arcane Power Source class feature. Each class that uses the Arcane Power source just gets benefits automatically (at the cost of lost flexibility) when the load up on one damage type. The Flexible wizard bypasses Resistance by switching to a different power. So we have to give the Elementalist a way to bypass it too, to keep encounters (and PC class builds) balanced.

Here's the thought:

Elemental Mastery (Arcane Power Source Feature)
For each power with an Elemental keyword of a particular type beyond the first power with that keyword, the Arcanist gains Terrainborn 5, Pierce Resistance 5. If you have five or more powers of the same type you gain Terrainwalk (Acid, Fire, Cold, Thunder, Lightning) or ???? (Psychic, Necrotic).

Terrainborn X: You are immune to the first X damage dealt by an environment of the given type.

Pierce Resistance X: You bypass the first X points of damage type resistance.

Terrainwalk: You can walk on terrain of a given type as normal terrain. Cold wizards can walk on snow and ice; Acid wizards on liquids of all sorts; Thunder & Lightning wizards (aka, Storm Wizards) on clouds and mist; Fire wizards on flame and lava.

????: I haven't thought of a good benefit here. Anyone?

Limitation: You can only have one Elemental Mastery at a time and it is always in the Element you have the most Powers keyworded to. If you have 3 Powers with the Fire keyword and 4 with the Acid keyword you are an Acid Master and have no special Fire related abilities.

Exception to the Limitation: If you take a Dual-Mastery Heroic Tier Feats (e.g., Burning Blizzard) you may then have Mastery in both of those damage types if you otherwise qualify for it by power selection.

 

[Phaezen]

So resist 10 is almost the same as immune then, and resist 15 effectively is, since there are very few builds that reliably hit on a 5, and even if they could, they now need a 20.

How about trying a 5 for 1 conversion, in otherwords 5 points of vulnerability/resistance is equal to a 1 point penalty/bonus in defences?

Phaezen

 

[Irda Ranger]

Or a even better idea, you do nothing and let the player deal with this situation. After all the character did voluntarily put all "eggs in one basket".

Some people like to reward players for building on a theme, rather than punish them for daring to deviate from mix-maxed super-builds.

And I agree that it makes much, much more sense to have fire mages in the artic than frost mages. But I guess this cliché will never die.

A cliché? In D&D? Sacre bleu!!

 

[billd91]

Some people like to reward players for building on a theme, rather than punish them for daring to deviate from mix-maxed super-builds.

Building on a theme is fine, but there is also such a thing as over-building on a theme. In other words, min-maxing too much along a narrow or over-specialized theme. If the only tool you have is a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail...

 

[NMcCoy]

Of course, the new multi-element rules give you a handy way to circumvent resistances. You could easily expect a feat like the following in Arcane Power, I think:

Blazing Light
Paragon Tier
Prerequisite: Dex 13, Cha 13
Benefit: When you use a power that has the fire or the radiant keyword, you can choose to make all damage that power deals fire and radiant damage.

 

[apoptosis]

i always thought it was weird that creatures that produce/are fire are not more resistant to cold damage than normal critters.....

 

[Spatula]

Ideally, each element should have about as many monsters with vulnerability as there are monsters with resistance, and every element should have about as many as any other.

That would be good for giving DMs some choice in types of monsters to throw at players, but it doesn't help the players much. You don't face a statistical spread of the available monsters in the course of a campaign, you face whatever the DM decides the throw at you.

 

[Irda Ranger]

Building on a theme is fine, but there is also such a thing as over-building on a theme.

Now if you could just find two DMs who agree on exactly where that line is ...

Personally I'd think it was pretty neat if a PC managed to make every spell he had Fire keyworded in some respect. Fire Shield, Wings of Flame, Fiery Portal (allows a campfire to act as a Teleportation Circle), etc.

 

[billd91]

Now if you could just find two DMs who agree on exactly where that line is ...

Personally I'd think it was pretty neat if a PC managed to make every spell he had Fire keyworded in some respect. Fire Shield, Wings of Flame, Fiery Portal (allows a campfire to act as a Teleportation Circle), etc.

Neat or not, I'm not going to have sympathy for the player if he finds that all of his spells aren't of much help against a red dragon, salamander noble, or barbed devil. And if the monster is appropriately placed, I'm not going to change the monster just so he can feel useful. He's going to have to creatively dig his way out of the hole he dug for himself.

 

[ravenheart]

You could also even look at translating resistances into a defense bonus. I like that avenue better because you can still use combat advantage or other accuracy boosts to negate that disadvantage. Even in that case, I'd still reserve such traits for elemental creatures.

Emphasis mine.

1) Change resistances to situational bonuses to defenses and saving throws

ie. resist fire 5 would translate into a +2 bonus to defense against attacks with the fire keyword AND a +2 bonus to saving throws against ongoing fire damage. This in addition to "terrain walk" abilities and such would be a sufficient fix, don't you think? Vulnerabilites would get a similar treatment - with penalties, of course.

This is what happens when two (at least one, and I'm not talking about mine) great minds think alike. Also when I'm so giddy with excitement I can't bother to read through the entire thread.

But why would this only be reserved for elemental creatures? Is it too hard to imagine, for example, an undead creature resistant to necrotic damage simply being more difficult to harm or bestow a condition upon with necrotic powers? I mean, as long as it's not completely immune to the damage type/keyword, it can still be damaged by it. Ex. a wight with resist 10 necrotic is hit by a ray of enfeeblement for 16 damage. The resistance, as is, reduces the damage taken by 10. The necrotic keyword, is per definition (PHB p. 55), "Purple-black energy that deadens flesh and wounds the soul." The wight still take, and this is important, necrotic damage, although it is undead and has resisted it partially.

But I digress. I still think feats could prove to be an alternate solution.