Orbs vs. Evocations II- with level by level data

[FireLance]

The designers did this by shoe-horning a type of spell - the instantaneous effect energy damage spell - into the wrong school of magic. And even then they broke the general spell design principle that energy damage Conjurations are subject to SR.

Actually, I'd argue that the designers were right that Conjuration spells should not be subject to SR, but under-estimated the game effect of a relatively low-level (and hence, easily metamagiced) spell that did 1d6/level damage, maximum 15d6.

I'd recommend tinkering with either the base damage (perhaps to 1d4/level) or the damage cap (perhaps to 10 dice) before requiring Conjuration spells to be subject to SR.

My own fix for the Evocation school would run along the lines of: evocation spells that deal energy damage deal half normal energy damage and half magical energy damage. SR protects against the magical energy damage, but does not protect against normal energy damage. Energy resistance and immunity protect against normal energy damage, but not against the magical energy damage. Hence, a creature will generally need both energy resistance and SR to totally escape damage from an evocation spell. That, plus a base damage reduction for ranged touch spells (chance of full damage is generally higher than a saving throw) and Conjuration spells (to make them generally deal less damage than evocations), should balance the spells.

EDIT: Oh, we should throw in some single-target ranged touch evocations, too.

 

[Stalker0]

I think the main problem is the all or nothing aspect of conjuration SR. If WOTC wanted spells to help against SR, they could have said that you gain a +4 on SR checks when using the orbs because "part of the effect is real, not magical." That way you have a nice middle ground, SR still does its thing, but the orbs do something special. Then again, I think SR is weaker in 3.5 than it was in 3.0...mainly because Spell Focus is such a crappy feat I might as well take spell penetration

 

[Plane Sailing]

Actually, I'd argue that the designers were right that Conjuration spells should not be subject to SR, but under-estimated the game effect of a relatively low-level (and hence, easily metamagiced) spell that did 1d6/level damage, maximum 15d6.

I'd recommend tinkering with either the base damage (perhaps to 1d4/level) or the damage cap (perhaps to 10 dice) before requiring Conjuration spells to be subject to SR.

My own fix for the Evocation school would run along the lines of: evocation spells that deal energy damage deal half normal energy damage and half magical energy damage. SR protects against the magical energy damage, but does not protect against normal energy damage. Energy resistance and immunity protect against normal energy damage, but not against the magical energy damage. Hence, a creature will generally need both energy resistance and SR to totally escape damage from an evocation spell. That, plus a base damage reduction for ranged touch spells (chance of full damage is generally higher than a saving throw) and Conjuration spells (to make them generally deal less damage than evocations), should balance the spells.

EDIT: Oh, we should throw in some single-target ranged touch evocations, too.

I think that including high-damage, SR-bypassing spells changes the dynamic for certain classic monsters too much. Old fashioned golems were just plain immune to magic except for a few specific spell vulnerabilities. The 3e looked to unify mechanics, and so the (reasonable at the time) decision was made to give them infinite SR except against their vulnerabilities. It was good, because it bypassed the question of how they interact with summoned creatures, walls and so forth. However, once big damage spells appeared... who cares about specific spell vulnerabilities when you can just blast them away?

i.e. if there are high-damage, SR-bypassing spells, then golems ought to be errata'd or something, possibly other creatures that are in the same boat too.

Your suggestion for changing round the damage from evocations is an interesting one, and it would make it a more viable school again.

In the longer term, I think I'd like to see the existing spell schools pretty much vanish, and have an entirely new (and better thought through) division for specialist casters. I still think that it would best if different 'energy types' had well defined side effects that were always true for the damage type - the XPH did something along those lines, but the best that I've seen was in the original Elements of Magic by Cyberzombie. excerpt below:

 

[FireLance]

I think that including high-damage, SR-bypassing spells changes the dynamic for certain classic monsters too much. Old fashioned golems were just plain immune to magic except for a few specific spell vulnerabilities. The 3e looked to unify mechanics, and so the (reasonable at the time) decision was made to give them infinite SR except against their vulnerabilities. It was good, because it bypassed the question of how they interact with summoned creatures, walls and so forth. However, once big damage spells appeared... who cares about specific spell vulnerabilities when you can just blast them away?

i.e. if there are high-damage, SR-bypassing spells, then golems ought to be errata'd or something, possibly other creatures that are in the same boat too.

I more or less agree. I would like to move away from the old paradigm that some classes (or characters with a particular schtick) will be almost totally ineffective against certain monsters to one in which some classes (or characters with a particular schtick) are less effective but can still contribute (using their particular schtick, even if another schtick may be more effective).

For starters, giving golems hardness and ruling that energy spells affect them like objects will go some way to reducing their vulnerability to energy conjurations.

In the longer term, I think I'd like to see the existing spell schools pretty much vanish, and have an entirely new (and better thought through) division for specialist casters. I still think that it would best if different 'energy types' had well defined side effects that were always true for the damage type - the XPH did something along those lines, but the best that I've seen was in the original Elements of Magic by Cyberzombie. excerpt below:

I have some ideas along those lines, too. Once I have something substantial, I'll post it in the House Rules forum.

 

[shmoo2]

Though a BBEG with mirror image can make the orb useless.

As was commented in the other thread:
If the orbs force the DM to think up specific counter measures, while evocations do not, that suggests the orbs are too powerful in that situation.

 

[shmoo2]

Did you take into account the -4 for shooting into melee?
Did you take into account the cover bonus monsters get from your party-mates?
Between those, I really think you are overestimating the hit chance of Orbs.

Did you take into account that when your party members are in melee with the monsters, orbs are only penalized but area-effect spells may be totally unusable?

I just had to quote this (let alone the fact that those penalties can be avoided with proper tactics and/or feats).

It's amazing to see the blinders people have when doing an analysis.

Nicely said BM.


shmoo2, great job here!

We can all think up tactics to counter orbs (cover, mirror image) or evocations (simply spreading out). Then we can think up counters to the counters (move around the cover, dispel magic, create bottleneck). That's part of the fun of the game.

The point of an analysis like this is to try and show before (or after) all the tactics how much of an advantage the orbs have at each level.
Even in the majority of campaigns that leave orbs RAW, this info should be useful as a guide to when each spell type is useful.
I just think that the numbers will guide a player to want to use orbs almost all the time at high levels. That makes the game less fun.

 

[two]

Yikes

Hey thanks!



The ratios for a level 11 wizard vs. 'all' CRs:

CR	ratio
7	1.24	
8	1.24
9	1.40
10	1.58
11	1.47	
12	1.86	
13	2.30	
14	3.06	
15	2.49
16	5.01

Again, things get wacky at high levels with the orbs ability to ignore SR. And a level 11 wizard is unlikely to fight multiple CR 14 or CR 15 monsters at once. In a BBEG battle, orbs rule. Vs. mooks the party would beat easily anyway, use evocations.

In retrospect, these numbers actually backed up experience IMC also: the orbs have become 'must haves' only at later levels as we've progressed through the SCAP (were at level 16 now).

I actually expected the orbs to be better at lower levels, though. As calculated however, they seem reasonable to me until level 12 or so. A definite trade off exists as described by the 'orbs are balanced' folk- high damage get through SR vs. lower damage, SR, multiple hits. At high levels though the trade off becomes seriously skewed towards the orbs.

That's why I think a 10d6 damage cap would work well: keep the orb's no SR niche, but also keep interesting trade offs in the game.

YIKES. Thanks.

3 above 11 gives 3.0. That is pretty ridiculous. No way in the history of the world that you are gonna get 3 bad guys in every fireball at those levels.

One think I also just remembered.

It's better to do a lot of damage to one creature (likely killing it, and stopping it from attacking next round) vs. less damage spread across 2-3 creatures. This is so obvious I honestly didn't consider it as a major plus for the orbs.

DUH!

 

[James McMurray]

So, basically what we're supposed to learn from these numbers is that if you can hit two or more creatures with an area spell then the area spells are better than the Orb spells; but if you can only hit one, the Orb spells are better?

Is it just me, or is that conclusion really obvious?

Why would you waste an AoE spell on a single target anyway?

QFT

 

[ThirdWizard]

I'd rather do 90 damage to one enemy than 30 damage to three enemies.

 

[shmoo2]

So, basically what we're supposed to learn from these numbers is that if you can hit two or more creatures with an area spell then the area spells are better than the Orb spells; but if you can only hit one, the Orb spells are better?

Is it just me, or is that conclusion really obvious?

Why would you waste an AoE spell on a single target anyway?

That isn't an necessarily such an obvious balancing factor for the orbs.

Orbs have no SR, no reflex save, touch AC to hit ; Evocations have SR, reflex save, no to hit roll.

It could well be that these factors alone serve to balance the spells and that they do fairly equal damage. Indeed, that is the case at levels 7-9 or so. A caster would use orbs against high SR foes, and use evocations against those with low reflex saves or no SR or good AC.

In any case, the exact amount of extra damage done by orbs/ # of foes needed to make evocations 'worth it' is not obvious. It certainly is not trivial that the ratio starts out pretty equal but becomes worse and worse for the evocations at higher levels.

As two points out, the extreme ratios at high levels matter, because knocking out one opponent quickly is much more valuable than doing 50% damage to a few. Given that, ratios above 2.0 make the orbs more attractive even when multiple foes are present. If orbs are better either way (single or multiple foes) why use evocations?