D&D 3E/3.5 Why did they nerf the "sleep" spell in 3.5?

[Altamont Ravenard]

But I'm not as crazy as Altamont

Hey! :\ Oh wait, maybe that's a compliment

With all due respect, I think you are putting way too much faith in the developers. They can, and have, made mistakes

Devil's advocate and all that

There could have been better ways to handle this spell, I agree, and some great suggestions have been made in this thread so far.

AR

 

[Henry]

I'll chime in the chorus who says that they've never seen 3E Sleep abuse. In fact, in 3 years of 3E games, I've not seen one caster take sleep as a spell! Color Spray yes, but not sleep. With the restrictions on the 3.5 version I have not seen anyone take it yet, and I doubt if I ever will, unless it regains a few teeth.

 

[uzagi_akimbo]

"Sleep" having been too powerful in 3.0 ? yeah sure - for one, the caster faced some difficulties when placing it - 15' radius is quite an area (on the other hand - just how many orcs do fit into a 15' spread area anyway ?), if you do not want to affect your fighter buddies. Second - the variability made things more uncertain - was the spell going to be powerful enough to get that ogre, bugbear or the pair of gnolls - hence more fun. Third - I have mostly seen it used to take out mounts, guards (animal and humanoid) and for taking prisoners. In close comabt the effects were just too uncertain, and I haven't faced a crowd of orcs/sent them at my players at levels 1st-3rd anyway. Creatures of 5HD and more were unaffected then anyway (and it still being

IMHO the lynchpin of the whole nerf was the difficulty of adjucating what 'trigger' (and action type) is needed to awaken someone - what constituted "normal noise" in 3.0, and why was bellowing/roaring at the top of one's lungs not enough to keep someone awake ? And why was kicking someone in passing (or even stepping on him while running past etc. ) either not good enough to awaken a 'sleeper' or required a standard action ? Because WotC wanted a clean cut rule, so they 'sleep', got axed by shrinking its radius, extending its casting time and taking out the variability....

Oh my - but then it could have been so easy. Just why didn't anyone consider a random delayed onset (say 1D3 rounds with a possible renewed save for noise and tumultous surroundings - quite ok, versus guards, rather useless versus charging orcs or in mid-melee ) or even more simple, staggering the spell's effectiveness - like 1d4+1 HD affected at level 1, cap of 4HD , +1/level up to 1D4+5 maximum .... as they did with 'burnings hands' etc ?

Nawh - that would have been way too simple !

 

[ForceUser]

I suspect part of the reasoning was because of its deadliness against low-level PCs.
Quasqueton

Bingo.

 

[RuminDange]

Why not just change it to:
1 HD + 1 HD / 1 level, up to a max of 10HD
Full round casting time
Will saving throw neg
Target: 1 or more creatures no more than 10 ft apart

Given as a suggestion only. If the 3.0e version is too powerful, and the 3.5e version is too weak, make it work where it still is useful at higher levels, can't take out a whole group easily at once, but it is still a threat.
Let's face it, a standard group of 1st levels can watch their sorcerer or wizard die from a 3rd level caster using magic missile and a 3rd level caster could be a difficult but not overpowering challenge to a group of 4 1st level PC’s. So what if a spell is dangerous at low levels, so is a house cat or a great sword swung by the never ending fighter. No one ever said adventuring was easy or safe.
I have a problem with the fact a wizard or sorcerer can throw off their one maybe 2 first level spells at first level and be done for the day except for 0 level spells which amount to nothing, and then risk the one hit kill in melee combat. Whereas the fighter types can swing his weapon (no matter the choice large or small) once per round every round all day long without any penalty or problem in game until he runs out of hit points like anyone for that matter. Add to that the rogue and clerics can do the same can be protected by armor but the poor arcane spell casters better jump at the slightest thing cause they are done and can't do anything after casting 2-3 little spells of which the spells have been nerfed to "protect them at low levels" load of bull.
I don't favor the spell casters IMC, but it does seem a bit unbalanced to me. Granted a spell caster that makes it higher level can do some amazing things with the spells, but then they run out and fall back to that one good hit and their toast mode due to low hit points and no armor. Whereas the high level fighter types just keep on going swinging more and more and doing some amazing amounts of damage round after round after round.
Sorry for the rant, but the nerfing of spells and spell casting is one reason my group and I are still using 3.0e primarily with few things borrowed from the SRD for 3.5.

RD

 

[Falling Icicle]

Another thing to keep in mind is that one of the main abilities Elves get is immunity to Sleep. As weak and uncommon as the Sleep spell is, that isn't much of a bonus.

 

[MeepoTheMighty]

Don't forget that there's now Deep Slumber which puts 10 HD to sleep.

 

[SteveC]

Are you serious?

I've never seen Sleep taken in all the time playing or running 3e because it just didn't seem like a great spell now (compared to the old days - once per adventure automatically take out 4-16 orcs? Most excellent). In fact it didn't even seem like a good spell.

Now with the 3.5e multi-nerf I doubt that I'd ever see it even contemplated for a moment

(Plus I think that Andy Collins et al weren't thinking too clearly when they both stopped stacking of empower *and* reduced the number of spells that had variable effects. Either one of those could have been a solution to the problem of, say, uber-buffed bulls strength. But to do both? Did anyone *ever* report a problem with sleep as being too good? Did anyone *ever* say "damn you, that empowered sleep spell is too good. Why didn't you just cast fireball like everyone else?")

The nerf to sleep was completely barmy IMO.

I think these comments say it all. There's a problem with multiple empowers and maximize being applied to a spell: fix the feats so you can't apply them more than once to a spell. And that's exactly what they did. But then they also increased the casting time, reduced the area and lowered (on average) the effects.

Now the real problem is, they had a perfectly consistent way to nerf sleep and be consistent with other spell changes. A simple fix to having the spell be a PC killer would be to have it use the same mechanics as Hold Person: the affected targets get a new save each round. In fact, there could be a blanket rule applied that any spell which renders an opponent helpless allows for a saving throw each round the spell is in effect. That would be a new rule for 3.5E, rather than a "patch" for certain spells. In my opinion it is best to make rules for effects like this consistent across all similar spells.

But then that's just my opinion and I could be wrong...let's go have pie.

--Steve

 

[Li Shenron]

Actually, it came to my mind how Sleep could still be useful against high level BBEGs. But you have to level drain them a lot first of all

 

[Thanee]

...and wait a day, so the draining has time to take effect...

Bye
Thanee