Tome of Battle: Book of 9 Swords - Things to watch out for?

[AllisterH]

re: Inferno Blast
If a 100 pt FIRE burst can actually take out your opponents, wouldn't they be WAY below the EL of the swordsage, thus not netting any experience points?

Seriously, this is 17th level where your wizard friend is GATEing in some high powered Celestial, the druid is shapechanging into some Elder Elemental while the cleric is busting off Miracles and a 100 pt fireball centred on you is overpowered?

Throw in the fact that there is a Reflex save which in all honesty is pretty easy to beat (its not mentioned in the actual text itself but the DC is 10+manoeuver level + wis modifier and swordsages have MAD already so their WIS modifier is not going to be anywhere as high as a druid or cleric) and the fact that it is supernatural meaning SR kicks in against it and how often are you actually going to get 100 pts?

That is not exactly a big worry IMO.

re: Skill Items
Don't be too stingy with the skill items though otherwise you potentially might end up with somewhat weaker manoeuvers. What I found to work was only allow magic items from the MIC/DMG and it seems fine.


re: Iron Heart Surge and WRT
House Rule time.
1. IHS only works against effects that DIRECTLY target you.
2. IHS only affects you personally and not those around you.
3. A person can only be affected by WRT once per encounter.

Those 3 rules seem to cover most of the problematic situations IMO.

 

[Wolfwood2]

re: Inferno Blast
If a 100 pt FIRE burst can actually take out your opponents, wouldn't they be WAY below the EL of the swordsage, thus not netting any experience points?

100 hitpoints can be a significant chunk even for an EL 17 opponent. It may not take them out by itself, but it helps. Sure a melee type can do the same with a full attack or an uber-charge build, but the burst does it to multiple opponents at once.

Seriously, this is 17th level where your wizard friend is GATEing in some high powered Celestial, the druid is shapechanging into some Elder Elemental while the cleric is busting off Miracles and a 100 pt fireball centred on you is overpowered?

Arguably those are the three most powerful spells in the game.

Throw in the fact that there is a Reflex save which in all honesty is pretty easy to beat (its not mentioned in the actual text itself but the DC is 10+manoeuver level + wis modifier and swordsages have MAD already so their WIS modifier is not going to be anywhere as high as a druid or cleric) and the fact that it is supernatural meaning SR kicks in against it and how often are you actually going to get 100 pts?

Spell Resistance does not apply to supernatural effects.

 

[WhatGravitas]

100 hitpoints can be a significant chunk even for an EL 17 opponent. It may not take them out by itself, but it helps. Sure a melee type can do the same with a full attack or an uber-charge build, but the burst does it to multiple opponents at once.

No, no, no. This refers to the fact, that at this level everybody and their dog has some protection against fire damage. Honestly, fire damage is so common, that intelligent opponents are bound to have at least chucked some protection from fire-potions.

Furthermore, take into consideration, that this is a Swordsage-only meneuver - the guy with only d8 as HD, light armor and 3/4 B.A.B. - and to use it to the best effect, he has to place himself in the midst of this opponents...

And since he needs a full-round action for Inferno Blast, he can only use one swift maneuver to move in OR get out (thus making his counters less viable). This probably means many happy flanking attacks against the Swordsage. Not good.

 

[Vorput]

Spell Resistance does not apply to supernatural effects.

Which again is a big issue in my mind (see my first post)... It seems out of balance not to allow spell resistance- and i don't think it would hurt the classes too much if it did.

 

[starwed]

It's probably best to ban the special weapon ability that's in the book: it's too easy to abuse.

There's a 4th level devoted spirit maneuver which looks out of line (it does +8d8 damage, and although the flavor text implies a drawback it has none. It's also probably more powerful than an 8th level maneuver from the same school, so I'm thinking there was a mix-up somewhere.)

Don't forget that you can give bad guys the martial study feat, or the wondrous item which grants maneuvers.

And every time a 7th level martial adept hits for 60 damage, remember that the fighter could have probably hit twice for 30.

 

[Counterspin]

Adding SR to the effects would devastate the Bo9S classes. With the exception of the problem maneuvers, initiators have paid the cost of avoiding SR by having their powers be inferior to equivalent level spells. Mix in the MAD that those classes have and you will have ruined the work done in Bo9S to bring the fighter classes in line, powerwise, with the casters.

 

[Chocobot]

defendi: part of your group's problem may be that you're not using Complete Warrior and Player's Handbook II, perhaps. I dunno if you are or not, but the core Fighter is pretty weak if you don't use any supplements.

Also: Keep in mind that Warblades only get about half as many feats as Fighters (or was it more like 3/5ths?). Also, note that the Warblade can't usually attack more than once per round with a maneuver; a Fighter can usually get off 2 or 3 attacks in the same time, either with a bow + Rapid Shot or Manyshot, or just using iterative melee attacks. It's probably more fair at 11th-level+ where the Fighter is making 3 attacks for every 1 offensive maneuver of the Warblade's. Power Attack matters some too, which a Warblade can't apply to his maneuvers.

You can't power attack on maneuvers?

 

[Rystil Arden]

Adding SR to the effects would devastate the Bo9S classes. With the exception of the problem maneuvers, initiators have paid the cost of avoiding SR by having their powers be inferior to equivalent level spells. Mix in the MAD that those classes have and you will have ruined the work done in Bo9S to bring the fighter classes in line, powerwise, with the casters.

Actually, they pay the cost of having infinite per day uses and highly superior remaining goodies by having their powers be inferior to equivalent level spells. Adding SR to a few of the supernaturalish strikes would not devastate the Bo9S classes any more than Mettle does (due to wording issues Mettle can negate the entire strike, including the base attack damage, of any strike with a Fort save for extra effect if the save is made). That said, many of the strikes that would be weakened by adding SR aren't the craziest manoeuvres anyway, so it wouldn't really change much. Desert Wind and its fire damage are often overrated, but they aren't unbalanced.

 

[Counterspin]

Rystil: I said that adding SR to all of the maneuvers would be a fiasco. As for applying it to the energy attack maneuvers, as you said, I don't see why you'ld bother, they aren't great to begin with. As for uses/day, I intentionally avoided it because it's entirely situational based on your campaign. I have never been in a game where uses/day was a huge mechanic. Given the timber of the boards, I presume I'm in the minority, but I didn't want to bring up something that's entirely arbitrary. Power per round is more universally applicable.

 

[Prophet2b]

Well... This has been a fascinating thread! I've never seen Bo9S in play, until our last session (which is unfortunate considering I've had the book since it first came out) - and while I absolutely love the mechanics and rules and flavor for all of it, I was very fearful that it might be unbalanced (i.e., overpowered) with the rest of D&D. In fact, I'd been wondering also if changing their supernatural abilities to spell-like abilities, or something along those lines, would be a good way to go.

But from what I'm hearing (and after this thread, I looked up some others, which seem to voice the same opinions), that's not an uncommon reaction, I take it? To read the books, think they look overpowered, but then find out otherwise in actual game play?

If that's true, that's awesome to hear, because I (aside from that worry) love this book.