No spell resistance vs. Orb spells? Why?

[James McMurray]

I'd suggest he play a specialized conjurer focusing on orbs if you're looking to compare the two. As a warmage he'll be able to cast all the area spells too, making it harder to figure out which encounters he sucked at because of orbs and which encounters he sucked at because of AoEs.

 

[hong]

As opposed to always using the most favorable conditions to a spell to 'prove' it's broken?

It's funny how tactics often works that way.

That's another reason why I didn't like the example. The claim was so outragious that even if I proved it false the response would be 'big deal'.

It's also funny how those who decline to propose scenarios of their own give up the right to criticise when others do their work for them.

The truth is that in a reasonable encounter the CR 15 Red Dragon also destroys the mages.

Ah. A "reasonable encounter" involves a CR 15 monster always killing an EL 15 party. Clearly this is a new meaning of reasonable that I wasn't aware of before.

 

[James McMurray]

He didn't say party, he said mage.

 

[hong]

Doesn't change anything. Does a reasonable encounter with a matching-EL monster, even a dragon, always involve the mages dying in the first round? I don't think so.

 

[IanB]

I'd suggest he play a specialized conjurer focusing on orbs if you're looking to compare the two. As a warmage he'll be able to cast all the area spells too, making it harder to figure out which encounters he sucked at because of orbs and which encounters he sucked at because of AoEs.

Actually my personal suspicion is that a lot of the orb-hate is ultimately rooted in and caused by the nature of the warmage class, which is what I'd like to really get a look at in a long campaign. I've seen the orbs used, but never by a character totally focused in them, and they were definitely in the "solid but not broken" category. So, now I'd like to look at the most extreme possible case.

 

[IanB]

Doesn't change anything. Does a reasonable encounter with a matching-EL monster, even a dragon, always involve the mages dying in the first round? I don't think so.

I have to say I've noticed a strong correlation between "getting into a fight" and "the mage gets killed" in our current high level game... but yeah, I don't think assuming that you're going to kill 1/4 of the party in a *same level* encounter is at all reasonable.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

I think I will specifically encourage one of my players to try out the warmage in my upcoming AoW game, as I'm now quite curious about how it will stand up against a 'standard' environment.

My warmage has died 3 times. He has been adventuring from 6th to 13th levels during this time. Keep in mind we are playing with the "Max Possible Hit Points for Heros" rules or it would be more than this.

1. Grappled by some sort of invisible devil that attacked through my circle wall of flames and fireshield.
2. Negative Energy Fireballed 4 times though I was hiding behind columns.
3. Turned into a monkey.
4. I went to -9HP being enveloped by a giant ooze once, but the Favored Soul saved my bacon.

During this time I have only one-shot-one-killed 1 major NPC and 1 higher powered but not highest powered NPC. Both were on critical hits with empowered acid orbs. The party minotaur/fighter has one-round-of-attacks-one-killed quite a number of NPCs, and that is after he has sundered their weapon making them useless in the fight.

DS

 

[James McMurray]

Doesn't change anything. Does a reasonable encounter with a matching-EL monster, even a dragon, always involve the mages dying in the first round? I don't think so.

None of the examples given have mentioned anything about a party at all. I fail to see why this one should also include them. Perhaps he meant for it to, but it goes aginst the trend of the thread.

 

[hong]

None of the examples given have mentioned anything about a party at all. I fail to see why this one should also include them. Perhaps he meant for it to, but it goes aginst the trend of the thread.

Here is what was said.

The truth is that in a reasonable encounter the CR 15 Red Dragon also destroys the mages.​

Now of course, it's within the bounds of possibility that your games generally feature lone mages traipsing into monster lairs. However, for most people I'd hazard to guess (terrible, I know) that a "reasonable encounter" will involve other party members besides the mages as well.

 

[Rystil Arden]

Here is what was said.

The truth is that in a reasonable encounter the CR 15 Red Dragon also destroys the mages.​

Now of course, it's within the bounds of possibility that your games generally feature lone mages traipsing into monster lairs. However, for most people I'd hazard to guess (terrible, I know) that a "reasonable encounter" will involve other party members besides the mages as well.

I think that he expects a "reasonable CR 15 encounter" to one-shot the Mages, in which case, having a group or not doesn't matter. In a game like that, I can see how the Orb level of making combat less fun is not actually making combat less fun because combat is already horribly unfun.