Urbannen said:
Practical experience has shown that no matter how high the save DC, they will still make their first save, and that includes critters with "bad" saves. Or maybe my DMs have always fudged in their favor.
That's statistically impossible. The creature has an equal chance of making every save unless he has access to the Protection domain or Moment of Prescience.
Nerfing SF and GSF means that spellcasters that would like to focus on using offensive spells from the Enchantment, Illusion, or (new) Transmutation schools will need to think twice about doing so. Every spell slot or learned spell represents a valuable non-renewable resource to the caster. Why prepare Suggestion when a Lightning Bolt is sure to deal damage?
It takes only one successful
suggestion to remove an opponent from the fight ... provided you use the proper
suggestion.
Suggestion isn't the best example, since the PHB is
not clear on it's effects, just like the illusion effects. You would be better off discussing a more useful spell.
In some ways the nerf makes sense, because a spellcaster has to carry more than one version of a "save-or-die" spell in order to be effective, one for when it fails the first time and another to try again.
Almost ... this assumes your DM isn't cheating, however.
[/b](When it fails for the second time, hope you're a sorcerer. Well, heck, at that point, just go to Magic Missile.)[/b]
Sounds like your DM is cheating.
This means that a spellcaster has to use more of his resources to take out a foe. This was the idea, I guess.
Yes. You're supposed to use the same amount of resources
most of the time whether you use save-or-consequences or direct damage.
The question remains: Are you going to devote resources to spells that may or may not be very effective, or to spells that will always have some effect, namely Evocations and Conjurations?
It's a gamble. If the battle ends on round one, that means less risk to yourself. Of course, you can't count on the spell working, either. Even Evocations have limits, however - there are lots of creatures that are resistant or immune to an element. In 3.5 these elemental resistances have, for the most part, been reduced. However, a 2nd-level spell can nearly trump
meteor swarm.
A fighter doesn't lose access to his weapon after using it a certain number of times - a spellcaster does.
He loses hit points instead - these come back more slowly than wizard spell slots (more likely, they take away the cleric's spell slots instead).
With the advent of creatures with spell resistance at higher levels, it is just pointless to prepare or learn some of these spells. DM: "You got through spell resistance." Player of Enchanter: "Great" DM: "But it made it save" Player: "But it made its save the last time I got through spell resistance, three rounds ago! I don't have anymore offensive spells left - I wish I had just prepared all Cones of Cold"
You can try that, but those high-CR/high-SR monsters often have more hit points now - even some of the celestials - so you're still going to be sitting there tossing spells at them for several rounds. While you're tossing those AoE evocations, the other party members (fighters and rogues, maybe clerics) can't engage the creature in melee. AoE becomes a lot better when your opponent is capable of flying.
The school of Illusion was especially hard hit by this change. If even one member of a group sees through an illusion, that means everyone in the group will likely see through it. Low level image are just incredibly easy to save against - and they don't even deal damage.
If you ask me the
image spells were weak to begin with. I have found
displacement and
mirror image, along with the
invisiblity spells to be far more useful than
major-"hey Mr. DM what does this spell do again?"-
image.
Kamikaze Midget
Also somthing to consier: Hieghten Spell.
It's pretty much only benefit in upping the spell level was upping the DC. It's still a potent tool to prep with, because the spell's higher level also hits SR pretty nicely.
The spell level has no effect on SR.
Balgus
I understand this, but who ever has the perfect spell prepared at any given moment. A clr10 only has 6/3/2/1 spells per day.
True ... but a 10th-level cleric doesn't have that many save-or-consequences spells in any event. S-o-C spells don't become "the king" until 13th-level or so.
The lower ones are almost useless at that level. And so he really only 3 spells +D a day to cast effectively. How is he able to gauge which enemy he will encounter that day, and if it is not an NPC, what is the beasts' good saves.
How does he know the NPC saves? Sometimes it's hard to tell their character class. In any event, it's often (but not always) easy to tell a creature's saves. If it's an unintelligent beast, like a dire tiger, use a Will-save-or-consequences spell. If it's a giant, do the same thing. If it's a spellweaver, try
slay living.
Note that cleric save-or-consequences spells are usually only Fortitude-save-or-die spells.
Mass command has a language and complexity restriction that reduces the range of creatures it will work on. (I wonder - can you
command a trained dog to "sit"?
)
This is why wizards have better spellcasting ability than clerics - I have found
Otiluke's resilient sphere,
hold monster and
flesh to stone to be very useful, for instance.
Taking both feats gives you +2, or 10% advantage. For a player with only 4 feats (lvl 10 human cleric) spending two of them for a measly 10% is not worth it. That is an 11 instead of 10 on a d20. Is it really worth it?
I think they were focusing on wizards for this feat ... however, the cleric should only take Spell Focus (Necromancy), whereas a wizard might take two or three Spell Focus feats.
And then you come to a char with good saves. Does that make your caster a gimp now? Before, you can rely on your fireballs and Lbolts to do some damage from far away. Now, it's a 55% hit? I'm sorry, but for 2 feats...
If it's a monk, even your
lightning bolt probably won't work... Actually, every class has a bad save,
even the monk! A monk's "bad" save is Fortitude. It's just usually higher than a wizard's Fortitude save.
Wizards have access to a lot of spells that don't even allow saves, especially at higher levels. Or just use
web, which is plain amazing. Or
summon monster if that's your style. A cleric who runs into a brute monster probably can't use
slay living effectively on it, but he can still "buff-n-bash" which is something a wizard can't do until at least 11th-level (and then pay through the nose for that option).
Elder Basilisk posted a nice rebuttal to the "Feats/class features" discussion, but what about the "poor saving throw" discussion? I believe that was the main point of Ryan Dancey's statement.