Celtavian said:
They really have to work on the epic magic system. Sure a caster can create a spell that might affect epic level enemies, but the cost is enormous and out of line with that it costs a melee to be equally as effective.
Take, for example, the Epic Spell:
Ruin
Last session our group (four 20th to 22nd lvl PCs) ran into a pair of
Hunefers, which can cast this Epic spell once per day. It would be our first encounter with Epic Magic in the campaign. We were ....."concerned", to say the least.
The hunefers started casting...and then we got our first shock: the spell has a 1 round casting time. "Alright!", we said, "That means we can beat on the hunefers for an entire round, and maybe either disrupt the spell or kill the hunefer. Excellent!" The rogue's player piped up, "Sure, but a one round casting time means the spell is super-nasty. If we
don't kill or disrupt it, we're toast."
We spent the round wailing away at the hunefers, but they are tough beasts, and so next round the Epic Spell went off.
Then we got the second shock: The Epic spell only does
20d6 damage.
"That's it?" we gasped, our mouths hanging open in disbelief. "And you say there's a Fort save for half....
and our SR might stop it too? You've got to be kidding...."
In the end, our SR on the Ftr did stop the Epic Spell cold. No damage...and even if there was damage, the Ftr could have
easily taken 20d6 (which works out to 70 hp average).
Pathetic.