Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Transformer" data-source="post: 6325621" data-attributes="member: 70008">I was not thinking of hit point damage, but of save-or-suck spells. If WotC has managed not to include any real save-or-suck spells in the game, then this is much less of a problem.And what it has to do with high levels is that save DCs scale with level, while &quot;weak&quot; saves do not. A first level wizard is throwing out spells with a save DC of 13. Monsters have save bonuses in their weak stats of maybe +0 or -1. So the monster has at least a chance of making its save, and the wizard might not be able to target the monster's weak save anyway due to his limited number of spells.But at level 20, things are different. The Wizard is throwing out spells with save DCs of 19, while monsters still have weak save bonuses of only +0 or -1. And now that the wizard has a ton of spells, so he can reliable target a monster's weak saves every time. The result is that monsters will almost always fail their saves, no matter how powerful they are. That could be okay, if the designers balanced damage around the fact that high level wizards never miss, and if there are no real save-or-suck spells in the game. But that's a big if.And even if we assume those things, the converse problem is still present; intelligent monsters can target PCs' weak saves at high levels, and the PCs will almost always fail those saves too. Hence the infamous ghoul slaughter.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Transformer, post: 6325621, member: 70008"] I was not thinking of hit point damage, but of save-or-suck spells. If WotC has managed not to include any real save-or-suck spells in the game, then this is much less of a problem. And what it has to do with high levels is that save DCs scale with level, while "weak" saves do not. A first level wizard is throwing out spells with a save DC of 13. Monsters have save bonuses in their weak stats of maybe +0 or -1. So the monster has at least a chance of making its save, and the wizard might not be able to target the monster's weak save anyway due to his limited number of spells. But at level 20, things are different. The Wizard is throwing out spells with save DCs of 19, while monsters still have weak save bonuses of only +0 or -1. And now that the wizard has a ton of spells, so he can reliable target a monster's weak saves every time. The result is that monsters will almost always fail their saves, no matter how powerful they are. That could be okay, if the designers balanced damage around the fact that high level wizards never miss, and if there are no real save-or-suck spells in the game. But that's a big if. And even if we assume those things, the converse problem is still present; intelligent monsters can target PCs' weak saves at high levels, and the PCs will almost always fail those saves too. Hence the infamous ghoul slaughter. [/QUOTE]

Verification