Underpowered Spells

[Voadam]

foresight is the only 9th level spell I have used in a game as a PC. It definitely rocks for super dangerous situations. despite having access to about a dozen 9th level spells. the only other one I prepared was from the 2e forgotten realms hardcover that blasted any other spell of any level automatically.

from the srd:

Once the spell is cast, the character receives instantaneous warnings of impending danger or harm to the subject of the spell. The character is never surprised or flat-footed. In addition, the spell gives the character a general idea of what action the character might take to best protect him or herself - duck, jump right, close the eyes, and so on.

I remember when the warning I got was teleport out immediately, and another time it was to drop all active spells. Both times it saved my life.

 

[jmucchiello]

1: Mount, arguably Ventriliquism
2: Tasha's, Leomunds Trap
3: Gust of Winds, Illusory Script,
4: Fire Trap, Rary's Mnemonic Enhancer
5: Dismissal, Nightmare
6: Guards and Wards, Control Water
7: Reverse Gravity, Statue
8: Sunburst
9: None - DM needs to be very helpfull with Foresight is all.

Is this a new cleric domain? What's the domain power?

Tasha's Hideous Laughter: They broke this spell between editions. In 2nd ed, my group of 7th level characters wiped out 3 frost giants with three castings of this spell. The big combat for the night was very short. It's victims are prone and not defending themselves. Fighters can just sweep on in and make mincemeat of their opponents like this. Rogues get their sneak attack damage. It's just ugly all around.

Guards and Wards is a great spell but it should be Universal, not Abjuration. There are NO saving throws to any of the effects. You have to have spell resistance to avoid any of the simpler effects.

Statue: I have never figured out why it is 7th level. Shugenja in 2nd OA had it at 3rd level, is that still true?

Mount: This only looks useless because Expeditious Retreat was created. The older edition versions allowed for better mounts as the caster went up in level. Perhaps this is why you included it on your list?

Joe

 

[incognito]

Hey Joe,

Re: Tasha's, It's the **1** to 3 rounds that irks me. 1 round of anything is not such a big deal. 1d4+1? Now that's a spell. Otherwise I'll cast sleep or color spray, or hold person and take them down for much longer.

<u>Gurad and Wards</u> is a great 4th - maybe 5th. OK, so no saves - but oops it only lasts 2 hours/ level so you ahve to recast it EVERY DAY. The point of the spell is to protect your castle while you are gone/busy, I thought...By the way, it afects you and your minions too.

RE: Statue - don't know, don't own oriental adventures.

RE: Mount. Takes 10 minutes to cast (not a fast getaway), and at low level, who needs a horse for only 4 or 6 hours...once you reach L3 take Alter Self, or level 5 take Phantom Steed which does progress.

 

[Al]

incognito:

1: Mount, arguably Ventriliquism
2: Tasha's, Leomunds Trap
3: Gust of Winds, Illusory Script,
4: Fire Trap, Rary's Mnemonic Enhancer
5: Dismissal, Nightmare
6: Guards and Wards, Control Water
7: Reverse Gravity, Statue
8: Sunburst
9: None - DM needs to be very helpfull with Foresight is all.

Mount is useful if you need to get somewhere fast and don't have teleport. Expeditious Retreat, with 1min/level duration, isn't going to cut it for long-haul journeys: four to six hours may be no good, but if you're doing a trek, why not memorise two or three? And it's a 1 full round casting time, not 10 minutes, so you were a factor of 100 off.

Ventriloquism is useful for espionage type adventures. Have the guards investigate one area whilst you slip into another.

Gust of Wind: if the enemy is keen on the fog spells, this is a lifesaver. One acid savant I once made had a favourite tactic of casting as many Acid Fogs are he could, then making a Wall of Force around himself and watching people dissolve.

Dismissal: very useful against outsiders indeed. As for coming back, why should they? They've been summoned by an irritating wizard/cleric/sorceror, and want to go home. You let them do so. Why do they want revenge?

Nightmare: that's what my players would've thought. But since they pissed off that illusionist, and he send them Nightmares *every night* to all of the arcane spellcasters in the party, they changed tune pretty quickly.

Reverse Gravity: are you joking? No save, no SR, and you can neatly remove all those annoying melee types. Probably one of the *better* spells of its level.

Sunburst: if I'm ever your DM, remind me to throw vampires at you. Not to mention the tac-nuke effect: with up to 200' radius area of effect, this is the preferred spell for high-level war wizards.

On the Foresight issue, the main problem is that unless your DM can himself tell the future, it's limited in its utility somewhat. Of course it's useful, but it pales compared to, say, Shapechange. And, shurai, saying that some spells are meant to be weaker than others doesn't really sound like an argument, but an excuse.

 

[the Jester]

Regarding Mount: first off, it takes only one round to cast. Secondly, what a multipurpose spell! It's like expeditious retreat, shield, summon monster (i.e. bait or a hit point battery) all rolled into one! In fact, it was the sorcerer's first spell in my campaign.

Useless spells? They tried hard to make 'em all useful in 3e, but there's a few stinkers... what do you ever do with Erase, for example? And what about Leomund's Trap? Does any rogue ever not try to figure a way past a trap they can't disable? What about Illusory Wall? "We search for secret doors." "Okay, you try to tap the south wall and your finger goes through it." Wow, that didn't last long, did it? And it's a 4th level spell! Leomund's Secret Chest? Well, it's okay as long as nothing steals your stuff- you can prolly protect it better with other spells of fifth level and lower.

Other than those, most of the spells in 3e are pretty good, imho.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I can't believe that nobody has mentioned the 4th level "Illusory Wall" spell yet.

It creates a permanent, 10ft x 10ft x 1ft illusory wall/floor/ceiling which doesn't disappear when people walk/fall through it.

4th level !!?!?!

Perhaps the permanent nature of this tiny illusion ranks it up there with polymorph other, improved invisibility, phantasmal killer and the rest of them...

 

[Xarlen]

I have to agree with Reverse Gravity being good.

Transmute Rock to Mud, Reverse Gravity, Transmute Mud to Rock.

 

[Lucius Foxhound]

They tried hard to make 'em all useful in 3e, but there's a few stinkers... what do you ever do with Erase, for example?

I used to agree ... until I found a spellbook with Explosive Runes all over it. Erase takes care of it much more easily than dispel magic and has a better chance of success.

I have to agree with Reverse Gravity being good.
Transmute Rock to Mud, Reverse Gravity, Transmute Mud to Rock.

This, I love.

 

[shurai]

On the Foresight issue, the main problem is that unless your DM can himself tell the future, it's limited in its utility somewhat. Of course it's useful, but it pales compared to, say, Shapechange. [/B]

I find that the DM can tell the future, pretty frequently in fact. After all, he can fiat every single event in the game world . . . except the PCs of course. This is solved easily enough, especially if you consider the caster's motivation for answering the following question: "So, what are you guys planning to do?" You're right, sometimes there are unintended consequences, but even considering them I'd sure want the spell. Also, saying it is more or less useful than another spell is very hard when they have such radically different effects. I myself, thinking about it, would have a hard time deciding between Shapechange and Foresight. I guess it would be influenced by the character, the game's play style, and the game world.

Originally posted by Al And, shurai, saying that some spells are meant to be weaker than others doesn't really sound like an argument, but an excuse. [/B]

I didn't actually say that. I said, "the designers felt that . . . not all spells are equal to begin with." The difference between 'meant to be' and 'are' is subtle but important. 'Meant' implies that the designers intended to make spells unequal for some reason, where as 'felt that' and 'are' presumes that the designers made a value judgement on an existing condition. This 'outside condition' is the game world that we play in. Though they chose to change many things for balance's sake, one of the things they left mostly alone was the inherent inequality of the corpus of spells, because I think they'd agree that not every spell of a given level in the game world is precisely equally useful.

Now that that's out of the way, most forensics experts agree that a valid way to counter an arguement is to deny the validity of making such an arguement, regardless of how apropos the arguement itself may be. So if I seem to be excusing the game designers from drafting a bunch of unequal spells, it is because I think having a bunch of unequal spells is okay. If that's true, then panning a particular spell serves little purpose. The excuse, as you called it, is the justification for the arguement, not the arguement itself.

Also, I wanted to make everyone feel better by adding a sense of purpose to some of the perceivedly weak spells. If the designers felt that the game was more interesting that way, maybe it's okay if it is so.

-S

 

[Cheiromancer]

How about Sending and it's big brother, Demand?

They look like they could be a level or two lower and not break anything.