Visions of Avarice trivializes melee encounters?

[Goumindong]

In open terrain the spell is not as useful, definately better with dungeon rooms and the like.

Of course, the team could try to knock a monster back in the area so he gets hit again.

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Remember its often harder to pull when things get in the way of the "each square must be one closer"

 

[Bast1ano]

Looking for viable nerfs

I've seen this used in my campaign three times now. It completely locked out all melée in those encounters. It's clearly overpowered. I don't see any of the dailies in the group (while very effective) contending with this one. I want my wizard to have fun locking down dangerous foes but this is too much of an easy button. It simply overshadows all other spell options.

I'd like some more ideas on viable nerfs. If I cant come up with a good option that keeps the spell useful as a daily but doesn't ruin my encounters I'm going to have to remove it from my game and just refund the power to my player. Help!

 

[DracoSuave]

Don't stick all your enemies in one spot. Mix up the attack groups so there's some ranged supporting some melee.

Use minions to clog up squares.

 

[Trevelyan]

I've seen this used in my campaign three times now. It completely locked out all melée in those encounters. It's clearly overpowered. I don't see any of the dailies in the group (while very effective) contending with this one. I want my wizard to have fun locking down dangerous foes but this is too much of an easy button. It simply overshadows all other spell options.

I'd like some more ideas on viable nerfs. If I cant come up with a good option that keeps the spell useful as a daily but doesn't ruin my encounters I'm going to have to remove it from my game and just refund the power to my player. Help!

What's so overpowered about requiring a wizad to use two minor actions per turn just to stand a reasonable chance of keeping a bunch of melee enemies stationary? It's effective if used well, but it is a daily power which does no damage and eats actions to keep in play. And the final outcome is only that the party defeats an encounter which they were presumably expected to defeat anyway, only they do it by expending a daily power resource rather than a couple of daily healing surge resources.

Perhaps the problem isn't that the power is too strong, but that your expectations of a level 5 controller daily pwoer are too low. And I guarantee you that if you nerf or remove this power then your wizard player will just pick up Stinking Cloud or Grasp of the Grave and be equally effective.

If you want to limit the power then do so by using appropriate tactics. Don't send in a bunch of melee only enemies against the aprty, and if you absolutely have to do this then split them up so the wizzard can't target them all. Look out for opportunities to daze the wizard - being dazed will force him to chose between sustaining the power or doing something else, and even when sustained he can't repeat the attack so any monster which makes its save that round can escape from the radius.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

I have not seen this power in play yet, but from what I have read in this thread, we are talking about a Daily power that:

A> Requires action investment by the wizard
B> Alters the landscape of the battle field
C> Works very well when the rest of the team takes tactical advantage
D> Can be worked around through a number of tools in the DM's toolkit
E> Makes the Wizard a hige target of the bad guys...


?

Seems like a win to me!

I would not nerf this power, altho I might have some words with Stalker0 about that staff/orb combination

 

[Turtlejay]

My Illusionist (RIP) had this power, and it was always a game changer. Well, the two times he used it before he died. Things to remember:

It does no damage.
It can't be moved.

It does no real harm to the enemy other than forcibly move them to the spot of your choosing. I can see how in some situations it could be seen as overpowered, but most powers have those kinds of situations, right?

Jay

 

[Bast1ano]

I have reviewed both Stinking Cloud and Grasp of The Grave. Both of these spells are exactly the level of power I would expect from a 5th level daily. Both of them have a burst radius consistent with other daily powers across multiple classes. What I also like about these two powers is that keeping enemies (even dazed ones) in the zone requires more strategy, coordination, and effort from the party. While both of these powers may initially catch any number of foes within their zones, determined creatures can escape within a round or two. If the party wants to get them back into the zone they will have to find another way to do so.

Thank you for your suggestions. Clogging up lines of movement with minions and other creatures is a good idea. Stacking conditions on the wizard that reduce his number of actions also seems key to limiting his options. Still, I'd rather not have to keep this in mind for every encounter.

My solution will probably be to reduce the range of the burst. It's really the only aspect of the power that is clearly out of line with the other daily powers of this level. The fact that it makes other wizard powers more attractive in some situations probably means it's the right move.

 

[kerbarian]

There are a couple things you can do with monster tactics, within the rules, that help mitigate it:

1) Heal checks. If there are two adjacent enemies within the effect, one can make a heal check on the other to grant a save vs. immobilized, and then the other guy (if he makes his save) can immediately move out. I've even had a ranged enemy voluntarily walk into the central square so that he's always available for heal checks, and if no one needs to be released, he can just sit there and shoot.

2) Readied actions. This one seems like a bit of an abuse of the rules, and in our campaign readied actions are house ruled to disallow it. By RAW, though, you get to save in between readying an action and taking that readied action. So, while immobilized, a creature can ready an action to, for example, charge the nearest enemy as soon as the ranger makes an attack. The monster readies an action, finishes its turn, makes a save, and then has a chance to charge before the wizard can re-immobilize it (delay past the wizard if necessary, to make sure he can't re-immobilize before the readied action goes off).

 

[OchreJelly]

2) Readied actions. This one seems like a bit of an abuse of the rules, and in our campaign readied actions are house ruled to disallow it. By RAW, though, you get to save in between readying an action and taking that readied action. So, while immobilized, a creature can ready an action to, for example, charge the nearest enemy as soon as the ranger makes an attack. The monster readies an action, finishes its turn, makes a save, and then has a chance to charge before the wizard can re-immobilize it (delay past the wizard if necessary, to make sure he can't re-immobilize before the readied action goes off).

I'm not even sure you need to house rule this one. The rules for delay specifically state that harmful effects are saved after you act:

End Harmful Effects after You Act: After you return to the initiative order and take your actions, end effects that last until the end of your turn and that are harmful to you. For example, if an enemy weakened you until the end of your next turn, the weakened

I could be wrong but I thought a sidebar stated this applied to both ready and delay actions.

 

[Squire James]

My experience with the spell (from a huge sample of one) is that it does put a very large class of monsters at a huge disadvantage. My judgement of the situation is that the spell is not an unreasonable effect, but that its effect covers too wide a range of enemies.

So several solutions present themselves. The DM can reduce the number of encounters with melee-only foes, but this is a pretty major alteration in the fabric of some campaigns. The DM can house-rule in the Charm keyword to allow certain monsters to ignore their greed. This might not be enough.

If I felt I had to tamper with the spell, I would remove the "repeat this attack" mechanic and add "Aftereffect: target is slowed (save ends)" to the immobilize effect. Anything more than this and I might as well ban the spell (which of course is another option).