Spellfire Wielder feat - usable?

[Marius Delphus]

Oh, and yes: the biggest design flaw w.r.t. spellfire is that the best use of the ability isn't to absorb hostile magic, but to be "charged up" by friendly party spellcasters during a rest period. I haven't figured out a solution to this one; suggestions are welcome!

Suggestion: Spells used to recharge must be spells that do damage, and the the spellfire wielder must make a Fort save in order to recharge instead of taking damage. Thus, no recharging off spider climb or cure light wounds. Too heavy?

 

[Aaron L]

[my first ever double post. I feel so ashamed]

 

[Aaron L]

We've had a character in our Realms game that was a spellfire wielder since MoF came out. He's no better than any of the other characters. Our group is a human Halruuan wizard spellfire wielder (my brother), a gold elf bladesinger (me), a wood elf ranger, and a moon elf rogue. Everyone is just almost completely balanced, with me being the weakest.

Incidently, since we started we've had the Zhentarim, the Red Wizards of Thay, and the Cult of the Dragon come after us to get the spellfire wielder, and it's been more than fun.

Its a very Realmsian group of characters.

 

[hong]

Its a very Realmsian group of characters.

That could be construed as a subtle insult, you realise.

 

[Aaron L]

That could be construed as a subtle insult, you realise.

Well, when I insult myself I generally don't take too much offense

 

[Cloudgatherer]

The spellfire abilities are very cool, but not stupendously powerful at higher levels. Somewhere between 6-8th level, a wizard or sorcerer will be able to throw out more/better damage dealers than a spellfire weilder, and a cleric is simply a better healer. It's a good feat to have if short a wizard or cleric, but overall spellfire seems to be a one shot wonder in an adventure, due to problems recharging and limitations on stored spellfire levels.

 

[MythandLore]

Suggestion: Spells used to recharge must be spells that do damage, and the the spellfire wielder must make a Fort save in order to recharge instead of taking damage. Thus, no recharging off spider climb or cure light wounds. Too heavy?

The problem with this is it really really weakens a weak ability.
Spellfire has been extensively discuss before on the board, generally people who have-Not-used the feat in games think it is majorly overpowered.
The feat has 2 major flaws that weaken it severly already, the fact you must absorb spells to use it (combat absorbtion is next to useless) and the fact that the attack power at higher levels is terrible (you have to hit & they get a refelx save and the DC is lame, the save DC never gets better)
The only point that it is really able to be 'broken' is at lower levels, 15d6 etc at frist level is huge.
But at higher levels spell casters can cast spells much better (no to hit just a save with a better DC) then spellfire several times a day (A PC with 18 con doing a blast of 18d6 spellfire leaves him with no power for later, regardless of if he hits or misses something with the spellfire.)
If you think it is imbalancing at low level the best thing to do is:

A character with Spellfire wielder feat can only "discharge" levels of spellfire in a single round equal to her positive constitution modifier plus her character level.
So a 3rd (3) level character with 16 (+3) constitution can only fire a 6d6 Spellfire bolt or heal 12 hp with Spellfire in a single round even if she has 16 levels of Spellfire stored up or a 1st level character with 10 constitution can only fire a 1d6 bolt even is she had 10 levels of Spellfire stored.

This makes it not so strong at low levels as to let you outright kill bigg baddys.
4d6 at first level is not as bad as 20d6.

Well, when I insult myself I generally don't take too much offense

LOL!

 

[Humanophile]

My problems with it:

• It's a FR feat. As such, it's balanced for a higher power level, and as such is to be kept far, far away from my games. Not to get up on a soapbox, but while FR isn't inherently munchkin, munchkins flock to realms material like flies to honey. As such, I tend not to allow anything Faerunian without plenty of thought. If you're playing a high powered FR game, though, this shouldn't worry you overmuch.
• Taking it automatically makes the character a Big Cheese. A bigger cheese than the other characters. This may just be me, but anything that brings in more attention for the character should arise out of the campaign, not something they chose to pick up that someone else didn't. It's kinda like the half celestial template; even if it's balanced to howevermany levels, it still makes the PC a bigger name than his adjusted levels would indicate, which is something the party needs to be built around ahead of time.

 

[ruleslawyer]

My problems with it:

It's a FR feat. As such, it's balanced for a higher power level, and as such is to be kept far, far away from my games. Not to get up on a soapbox, but while FR isn't inherently munchkin, munchkins flock to realms material like flies to honey. As such, I tend not to allow anything Faerunian without plenty of thought. If you're playing a high powered FR game, though, this shouldn't worry you overmuch.

Ah, my pet peeve resurfaces once more...

Why does everyone keep suggesting that FR = higher power level? AFAICT, every feat, PrC, and item in FR is balanced with the core rules, and other than the badly-worded spelldancing ability of the Spelldancer PrC, the FR rules create far less potential for abuse than do the splatbook or even core rules.

This, BTW, is not aimed at your particular comments, Humanophile, but more at the specter of FR-bashing that seems to haunt every D&D3e-related board. Sigh...

 

[I'm A Banana]

I just hate FR because I hate the fact that authors like to make their own pet wizards that do all the REALLY important stuff. But let's not turn this into a Realms-discussion.

I still allow basically anything from FR in my homebrew campaign, and a PC elf of mine took the Spellfire feat. She's used it all of once, and the druid did better healing.

I even adjusted it slightly so that she could absorb area-effect spells (though they'd still hit everything else, just not the wielder).

IMHO, it's kinda worth it...with that feat, the PC basically takes something that gives the DM an excuse to make trouble for them. Since my campaign isn't FR, I've altered it so a group of elvish neo-nazi racists are trying to use her as an icon of the "true power of elvenhood." She just faught off an attempt of the bard-leader of the cabal to wed and reproduce with her.

And, of course, she was a wizard. No way she's gonna be able to take on a cabal of assassins without a bit of help from the other PC's.

She's lookin' at he Spellfire Channeller PrC, now.

I'm not having a problem with it, but I did reserve veto power when I allowed her to take it. So far, so cool.