Stunning surge and Spell strike...Overpowered? How would you abuse?

[Cephid]

Had these hidden in an old thread, but I thought I’d try and get some comments.
Just wanted to know what people think about these to weapon abilities. They seem like they are a overpowered, but maybe not.

What do you think? Could they be easily abused?


Stunning surge:
+1 bonus
On successful attack, take swift action to emit a magic surge.
Victim makes fort save vs DC=1/2 character level + cha modifier + 10.
stunned for 1 round.
uses/day=cha modifier.

It is much more powerful than similar abilities.
(I want to use if for my melee sorcerer. 9/day, DC=25)


Spell strike
+1 bonus
as a free action, user can transfer some or all of weapons enhancement bonus to saves vs spells and spell like abilities. This effect lasts 1 round.
Unlimited use per day. i.e. permanent until you want to take a different free action.

(thought it could be abused by a non melee spell caster with greater magic weapon on it.) At level 20 for the cost of a +2 weapon, it gives a +5 save bonus all day.

So what do you think about them?

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Are these your own houseruled special abilities? I've never seen either before.

Stunning surge:
+1 bonus
On successful attack, take swift action to emit a magic surge.
Victim makes fort save vs DC=1/2 character level + cha modifier + 10.
stunned for 1 round.
uses/day=cha modifier.

It is much more powerful than similar abilities.
(I want to use if for my melee sorcerer. 9/day, DC=25)

Most magic items with a save DC have a static one, determined by the minimum abilities of the caster who created the item, so this is just awkward. Also, I don't see why the wielder should determine uses per day. MIC has alot of +1 market price effects that are a static 3/day. I'd go with that. The problem is determining the base spell level to set the save DC at. First spell that comes to my mind is Stun Ray, at level 7, that'd be a DC 20 fortitude save. Seems decent as a 3/day swift action after hitting for a DC 20 fort. save or be stunned for a round, I'd go with that.

Spell strike
+1 bonus
as a free action, user can transfer some or all of weapons enhancement bonus to saves vs spells and spell like abilities. This effect lasts 1 round.
Unlimited use per day. i.e. permanent until you want to take a different free action.

(thought it could be abused by a non melee spell caster with greater magic weapon on it.) At level 20 for the cost of a +2 weapon, it gives a +5 save bonus all day.

So what do you think about them?

First of all, you should make it a named bonus (or would it just remain as an enhancement bonus to saves?). Second of all, this could and would be absolutely abused by casters, as you wondered. How to fix it....hmm....

If you're going to leave it as unlimited uses per day w/ 1 round duration, at least make it a swift action. Swift action costs a caster generally. But I still don't really like that.

Looking at the closest parallel, the defending weapon property, I can see why you made that weapon as you did. Still doesn't sit right with me, though...

And again, I'm assuming you made those enhancements. If they're actually published, I guess this post was meaningless...

EDIT: Wow, just saw other thread. So they were legitimately printed....wow. Well then, I'd say if your DM is "by the rules," have fun! *shakes head and walks off*

 

[WarlockLord]

Where did these come from?

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

For the record, both abilities are from the magic item compendium.

Had these hidden in an old thread, but I thought I’d try and get some comments.
Just wanted to know what people think about these to weapon abilities. They seem like they are a overpowered, but maybe not.

What do you think? Could they be easily abused?


Stunning surge:
+1 bonus
On successful attack, take swift action to emit a magic surge.
Victim makes fort save vs DC=1/2 character level + cha modifier + 10.
stunned for 1 round.
uses/day=cha modifier.

It is much more powerful than similar abilities.
(I want to use if for my melee sorcerer. 9/day, DC=25)

Is it really? Other +1 abilities of note: bane, keen, flaming/frost/shocking, ghost touch, mighty smiting (MIC), Caustic surge (MIC), Brutal Surge (MIC), blessed (MIC), sacred (MIC). Of course, it shouldn't just be compared to

So, for which characters is it better than those abilities?

For a sorcerer, it may be better, but for most sorcerers, they have much better things to spend their money on than melee weapons and much better things to do with their actions than to swing the melee weapons. Unless you're some kind of wierd or multiclass melee sorcerer, most bad guys will be glad you're swing a weapon at them instead of casting empowered arcs of lightning and sudden maximized horrid wiltings.

For a fighter or barbarian, it is generally not worth it. At 6th level, a DC 12 (for the cha 8 barbarian) and at 20th level, a DC 20 (for the cha 10 fighter) stun ability is not worth it unless it's free. A paladin, or multiclass hexblade/marshal, on the other hand, may just have the charisma to make use of it. If we extrapolate the best case scenario for the enhancement, we'll put it in the hands of a 20th level paladin with a 26 charisma. 8/day DC 28 stun. That's pretty impressive for a +1 enhancement. In a core only game, it's probably not balanced, on the other hand, if you use the spell compendium and Complete Champion, etc, the 20th level paladin probably has quite a few swift spells he would like to cast or other swift action activation items that he would like to use and that goes a long way towards balancing the ability.

For reference, I've played with a similar, but more overpowered ability from the DMG II--sudden stunning--for the better part of a year on a 14th-15th level melee cleric (16 charisma at the momement so 3/day at DC 20). It's proven useful on a couple occasions but hasn't really accomplished much and is generally just another opportunity for the bad guy to roll a 1 on a save.

Spell strike
+1 bonus
as a free action, user can transfer some or all of weapons enhancement bonus to saves vs spells and spell like abilities. This effect lasts 1 round.
Unlimited use per day. i.e. permanent until you want to take a different free action.

(thought it could be abused by a non melee spell caster with greater magic weapon on it.) At level 20 for the cost of a +2 weapon, it gives a +5 save bonus all day.

So what do you think about them?

In general, I think this ability is pretty weak. The gambit that you propose--using it with a character who generally does not care about the enhancement of his weapon seems like it could wade into overpowered territory. (And that is the mark of a bad mechanic--one that only ceases being useless when it becomes overpowered). On the other hand, it's probably mostly dangerous because it's an unnamed, stacking bonus. Make it a morale bonus, for instance, and it becomes much less overpowered in most games that use non-core materials. (Since it would overlap with conviction).

 

[boolean]

Spellstrike has the same problem as Defending. It's debatable that you only get the bonus when you use the weapon to attack:
"As a free action, you choose how to allocate the weapon's enhancement bonus at the start of your turn before using the weapon, and the effect on saving throws lasts until the start of your next turn."
So, how powerful it is depends on how you define "before using the weapon".

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

I recall that Jollydoc's Age of Worms campaign had a paladin/marshall with a Sudden Stunning weapon, that played hell with any large-single-opponent combats they ran across, particularly the

Spoiler

froghemoth

in The Champion's Belt.