Why is SR necessary to the game?

[WizarDru]

My question is rather general. Why couldn't have D&D be designed with Saving Throws only and without SR?
The specific Saving Throws rules of 3.x might require SR for some case, but actually those rules are not that far from a form which would allow to get rid of SR.

A couple of reasons, IMHO.

First, it's a holdover from previous editions, where you had monsters that had a similar stat....usually things like Demons, Devils and the like. 3.0 conversion rules said take the 1e/2e magic resistance and divide by 5. Add the result to 11 to get their SR.

Second, it creates a simpler solution than extra saving throws or more complicated systems, and allows more granularity in the magic system. Creatures with SR generally are meant to be immune to direct magical attack or at least being slain by first level spells. The majority are outsiders, and meant to be opponents who are selectively immune to spells, except by powerful casters.

In system, there are three primary ways to ignore magic for a monster: resistance, immunity and saving throws. A saving throw doesn't JUST apply to spells, so giving a creature an ungodly high saving throw has external effects. Throwing everything into resistance is too simplistic, but giving selective bonuses is too complex, especially at high levels (where most resistance monsters live), when you have enough modifiers to worry about without adding those into the mix. Immunity is fine, but it's an all-or-nothing affair.

A combination of them allows you to create a demon who laughs off a fifth-level wizard's attempts to slay him, while cowering in fear from an archmage casting the same spell. It allows you to create spells that have the advantage of not being saved against, but that don't affect creatures with a high magical immunity (and vice-versa). For example, you can have a creature that can ignore a fireball, but not the results of a flaming arrow.

 

[smootrk]

SR does not bother me too much, but I wish there was SR versus specific effects or magical schools instead of blanket SR that shoots down everything.

 

[Victim]

Saving throws can get high enough that spells that bypass it are almost required. SR creates a defense for those spells, and generally reduces the effect of spells overall.

The comparison of SR to an AC for spells is rather apt. However, I have one major issue with it. Most fighters at the levels in which SR becomes prevalent will have more than one attack, and if the attack misses, the fighter only loses time. What makes SR so frustrating is that the wizard is generally only getting one shot in a round and that each shot is costing him resources. Losing one entire round to a poor SR roll sucks.

 

[airwalkrr]

SR is by no means "necessary" to the game. But it fills the role of the monster that is especially resistant to magic. Saving throws represent luck and ability to lessen or occassionally avoid negative magical effects. SR represents a resistance to all magic, good or bad, and does not necessarily incorporate a creature's ability to avoid magical effects so much as shirk them off completely. The key difference is that many spells allow saving throws for half or partial effect. Spell resistance negates the effect of the spell completely, regardless of whether the creature can save.

If you wish to take SR out of the game, you wouldn't ruin the game, but you would need to account for how it changes the game by lowering the CR of creatures with SR, particularly those with very high SR, like mind flayer's, whose resistance to magic is a hallmark of that creature.

 

[Dracomeander]

Since it appears that everyone is overlooking my previous post, I'll state it again in a more easily read format.

What you seem to be confusing is the difference between

1) being able to throw off the effect or part of the effect of magic (saving throw),

2) the ability to ignore the effect of the magics of a being with a lesser ability at controlling magic (spell resistance),

3) and the ability to totally ignore certain magical effects due to an innate nature of the creature being targetted regardless of the skill of the magic wielder (immunity to certain effects).

They are three very different things that sometimes appear to give the same effect. However, the mechanics need to be separate because a single mechanic can't cover all three situations.

 

[Stalker0]

The answer to teh question: "Why is SR necessary to the game" is simple. The answer is its not.

But then again, neither are feats, 9 levels of spells, 8 or more base classes, three types of saving throws, etc. All of these add complexity to the game, wouldn't it be better if they were all removed?

The answer to this is, its a tradeoff. Adding features to the game gives you more variables to work with as others have stated, more tools for your creation process. Adding special abilities makes monsters more interesting, and allows a greater variety. It also adds more complexity, we have to look up special abilities, remember them, and so forth.

So the tradeoff is variety for simplicity. And of course there's a point where there's too much variety, and the game becomes too complex.

You could retweak the game so that you wouldnt' need SR. The game would be simpler as a result. But you would lose some of the variety that SR allows for and basic saving throws do not. So, the ultimate question is, is that tradeoff worth it to you?

 

[Bad Paper]

What do you think are the fundamental reasons (mechanically or otherwise) for Spell Resistance to exist in the game?

For the same reason there is this absurd mechanic called "Armor Class." SR is the same thing.

 

[frankthedm]

If you wish to take SR out of the game, you wouldn't ruin the game, but you would need to account for how it changes the game by lowering the CR of creatures with SR, particularly those with very high SR, like mind flayer's, whose resistance to magic is a hallmark of that creature.

Flayer is a hard creature to adjust CR on by taking away. So much All or Nothing to the flayer. The SR makes sure all involved are about equaly screwed. Low will saves get boned by the blast, high will saves can't cut the SR. And that will save DC is not that easy.


Maybe halve the SR, change the now more or less instant-kill plane shift* to willing targets only, change the stun of the mind blast to confusion, add 4 HD and have the previously fatal extract be 10d6 acid per round and playtest a few fights.

 

[Aus_Snow]

What do you think are the fundamental reasons (mechanically or otherwise) for Spell Resistance to exist in the game?

To model that permanent psychic fortress / holy or unholy shielding / otherworldly mazelike soul-pattern type effect. And stuff.

But I think it's also important to remember that saves don't only apply to magic. SR does, pretty much. That's a significant difference, and a useful one for when you're creating creatures that operate differently across various levels of reality.

 

[Li Shenron]

No. SR is ignoring magic. Saving throws are avoiding/getting out of the way/shrugging off magic. There's a significant difference. A dragon with high SR may be so confident in his SR as to just walk through a wall of fire. Isn't that a situation that you find interesting? That's not a mechanic you can model with saving throws.

It's almost the same difference between AC bonus from Dex and AC bonus from armor: the first is avoiding the blow, the second is absorbing it. Yet they work well as two bonuses on the same thing.

What I'm saying here is that SR is just another way to avoiding the effect of a spell, like a shield is just another way to avoid the effect of an attack. But we don't NEED a separate mechanic for shields!

The Wall of Fire situation: if there wasn't a SR rule, a dragon could simply have a high enough ST so that it could just walk through it unscathed. If you want this possibility that the dragon could avoid ALL effects of the spell, you need a tweak either to the ST rules (e.g. saying that beating a ST by 10 or more ignores all the results) or to the specific spell.

I'm not saying these "tweaks" would be a breeze to apply TO THE CURRENT BOOKS. I'm just saying that if SR wasn't a sacred cow from previous editions, and if the designers removed it when designing 3.0, in my opinion the 3ed game would have worked just as well (of course in that case the ST rules would have been slighlty different). I'm NOT trying to change the game NOW.

Wait a minute, think about what you're saying here. You want to remove SR and replace it with an exact duplicate? How does that change anything?

It wasn't a suggestion! I was trying to point out that you cannot say that a certain mechanic is necessary to the game because it cannot be modelled by another mechanic, and making an example by absurd.

You have to think about what you have in the current rules in order to determine the fundamental mechanical reasons for a mechanic. I don't see any other way. More importantly, you have to think about them to tweak anything. You can't create/tweak rules with your head in the sand.

As I said, I want to make this clear, I'm trying to think in general terms... How can you for example think that SR is what it is because certain spells are what they are, and not VICEVERSA? Obviously when they wrote the rules, different things were designed together at the same time, possibly to work with each other.

I am definitely trying to understand also what would need to be changed, in order to keep the game similar enough to what it is now, I will NOT pretend that it can be EXACTLY the same, but it could be FUNDAMENTALLY the same.