The World of Avlis

Anyone notice this?

Case: I'm using say, a swordsman's belt and have a DR spell like Premonition up.

In the past (pre 1.61 maybe??) : I get hit by a slashing weapon. Premonition absorbs the damage, I lose that many points of DR. If it goes over the 30 points, my belt takes the next five, and if it goes over 35 I take HP damage over that.

Now : I get hit by a slashing weapon. The belt reduces the damage by 5 points, then Premonition takes away the next 30. If the hit is over over 35 damage, I take HP damage.

The overall effect is that my DR wears off more slowly this way, if the gear absorbs before the spells do.

It may not sound like a big deal at first, but when you're trying to whack through the 200/400 points of stoneskins and premonition that a mage has up it can be hard enough. NOW when your hits are reduced before even effecting that stoneskin? In the case of a mage with a greater belt especially....Yikes.

Has worked like that for me since 1.32 at least I believe..

kombinat wrote:Has worked like that for me since 1.32 at least I believe..

yup, been that way for months at least...you getting hit so little that you only noticed now,Emp?

Ha! This is how I always hoped it would work when I played a mage! Now I play a fighter, I want it back to how it was You just can't win sometimes can you?

Suppose I could check the PnP rules to see how that should work.

Yup, now it's as you've said. Damage resistance works first and damage reduction goes later if there's still some damage left.

The whole damage reduction thing has suffered a lot of changes with 1.61, though. Try stacking different kinds of DR coming from spells/items and you'll see weird things.

Dirk Cutlass wrote:Ha! This is how I always hoped it would work when I played a mage! Now I play a fighter, I want it back to how it was You just can't win sometimes can you?

Suppose I could check the PnP rules to see how that should work.

Hehe, precisely.

My mage isn't retired, not even close, but I can see the hell that it would be to try to beat a buffed mage like this. Having to do 20 damage (greater belt example) to even start to scratch away at that 200 point premonition...

The other option is to either own a +5 weapon, or have yours enchanted by a cleric/mage when going in. Then it becomes pretty moot...dead mage .

And as every mage worth his salt has permanent +5 weapons at the disposal of him/her and friends because of one stupid lowlevel spell making all meticulously gathered +2/+3 weapons moot also...*sigh*

Teaming up means shit now, unless you have a cleric or mage in your party.

Sicko-

Khaelindra wrote:And as every mage worth his salt has permanent +5 weapons at the disposal of him/her and friends because of one stupid lowlevel spell making all meticulously gathered +2/+3 weapons moot also...*sigh*

Doesnt help much when your BAB is 8 and you cant hit the broad side of a barn when it comes to high level monsters. Really all its good for is saving your spells for harder monsters and being able to mop up easy ones without wasting those spells. This is ESSENTIAL for mages in no rest dungeons such as the Underdark, LRC or the spider caves. And it also does wear off, so its not like we are talking perminant here.

I can see the potential, however, for creating a really powerful sorcerer/fighter now with these spells. He would definatly own at lower levels.

4x4_Ender wrote:I can see the potential, however, for creating a really powerful sorcerer/fighter now with these spells. He would definatly own at lower levels.

You only get +1 per 3 lvls, so until lvl 6 as a caster they will not have any better weapon then any other noob can buy from the AAAA for a few fire potions in trade. The buffs last for about 2 minutes. They have less hit points, bab, and feats then other figthers the same lvl. They cannot use spells in combat until lvl 3 as a wizard or 4 as a sorcerour because they need to use still spell and cast all spells as one spell lvl higher to use armor. Greater magic weapon and keen that are needed for that is a 3rd lvl spell, so that will require 5-6 mage lvls. Thus at low lvls the mage fighter sucks almost as bad as normal mages. It is about lvl 10-15 that melee mages start to shine.

Anyway you look at it, power-wise cleric is a much better choice for a melee caster than fighter/mage.

WrathOG777 wrote:

4x4_Ender wrote:I can see the potential, however, for creating a really powerful sorcerer/fighter now with these spells. He would definatly own at lower levels.

You only get +1 per 3 lvls, so until lvl 6 as a caster they will not have any better weapon then any other noob can buy from the AAAA for a few fire potions in trade. The buffs last for about 2 minutes. They have less hit points, bab, and feats then other figthers the same lvl. They cannot use spells in combat until lvl 3 as a wizard or 4 as a sorcerour because they need to use still spell and cast all spells as one spell lvl higher to use armor. Greater magic weapon and keen that are needed for that is a 3rd lvl spell, so that will require 5-6 mage lvls. Thus at low lvls the mage fighter sucks almost as bad as normal mages. It is about lvl 10-15 that melee mages start to shine.


Anyway you look at it, power-wise cleric is a much better choice for a melee caster than fighter/mage.

Well said Wrath. I have a mage/ranger and I was pretty weak at lower levels in comparison to a straight ranger/fighter. Spells duration is too short and you have to few hp's and too poor a BAB to be a front line fighter. I am lvl 17 now and would still probably be more dangerous if I'd stayed pure in either of my classes.

I have an even balance between classes so don't have killer spells or a really nasty BAB. I am thinking I should start to really kick ass round about lvl 30 ...if I'm not in a wheelchair first. Now, with PrC's and epic levels you will eventually lose out on many of the bonuses of epic levels if you multiclass unless you take a PrC. But I don't care too much really as I like the combination, its a little unusual and fits my character well.

Emprod wrote:The other option is to either own a +5 weapon, or have yours enchanted by a cleric/mage when going in. Then it becomes pretty moot...dead mage .

Another options would be to dispell her/his damage reduction spell first and then give her/him a nice bashing.

Or if you have a +3 weapon, pop a bless and an aid potion.

Tada.

Aid doesn't add anything to damage, you're +4 with that combo

Doesn't add damage, but it pops your enchantment level up by +1, so your +3 weapon would act like a +5, and thus Premonition doesn't do anything to it. I didn't think it worked either until Emprod proved me wrong a few weeks back.

Fuzz wrote:Or if you have a +3 weapon, pop a bless and an aid potion.

Tada.

That doesn't work since 1.61 (or 1.59, not too sure), now you need actual enhancement to bypass damage reduction. With a weapon +3, bless and aid you'd have +5 to hit but your enhancement is still +3, so you'll cut through ethereal visage and shadow shield but not through stoneskin and premonition. Not even bardsong or warcry add enhancement now, the only way to get more is... greater magic weapon.

^--- BOOYAH!

See that Emprod? Yeah, suck it, punk. Telling me to drink a Bless potion to fight that Balor because my monk's fists were only +2.

Eat it.

Hey, but it used to work!

* makes a note to whack on Emprod more often *

4x4_Ender wrote:And it also does wear off, so its not like we are talking perminant here.

Just for your information: unless we're talking a really deep no-rest area, i consider every spell of 1 turn/level or longer as essentially permanent unless dispelled for casters that can cast GMW for a +5 bonus. Sure you have to cast it, so it takes a spellslot, but it will last until your next rest easily.

Just out of curiosity: does anyone know whether the exclusion of ranged weapons from the bonus-giving spells was intentional? And whether the inability of a druid to enchant his own natural weapons with the GMF-spell (or any other animal's natural weapons beside his own companion) was intentional?

M.

I am fairly sure Greater Magic Weapon does not affect natural weapons (I am not even sure it will affect a monks HTH combat). The spell you are looking for in this case is Magic Fang and Greater Magic Fang (I think that is the name) they affect animal attacks. Magic Weapon in the PHB is clearly intended to be only cast on weapons.

I also know that bless does not stack with all weapon bonuses. Chosen has a bonus vrs evil and when I use bless my attack bonus with Chosen does not change but I can see my BAB has increased by 1.

Also for any creature with damage reduction anyway you should be getting the free effectiveness vrs other things equal to your own damage reduction. So in elemental form you should have the ability to negate +3/x damage reduction.

The other thing is that if you whack someone with a weapon and see the hit but no damage then you change weapon types. What is annoying is that the halberd is still bugged in that you can block it with a belt of any kind.

It is also worth noting that the amount of damage some characters can do makes it likely your premonition spell will not last many blows. I've been told of a character that has +32 damage bonus using a sword fully buffed up (able to do 40 pts with a regular hit and 80 with a critical) with attack bonuses such that they miss only when rolling a 1. 1 attack round and you have taken around 80 pts of damage to your premonition spell even through a greater belt and the lesser belt well nice is not realy very effective when you are fighting the more powerful monsters or characters with that sort of damage bonus. Those half-fiend warriors for example are brutal if you do not have a greater belt.

I would have a heck of a time against a greater belt and premonition until I sorted out what sort of belt it was and changed weapons. Assuming I lived that long. Fixing Time Stop so that it worked like it was suposed to would go a long way toward helping that (instanteous spells do not affect people under a time stop and that means no attack spells nor can the mage mellee them as they are invulurable to the mages spells and attacks while under the effect...excepting area attacks with a duration longer than the timestop itself...the person can not even be targeted by a spell) since it is not supposed to allow the mage to fight large groups with impunity it is supposed to allow the mage to summon aid, buff himself or withdraw. And that last one is underrated in my mind. Most other characters in combat have no other choice once they engage they win or they die. A high level mage can timestop and run.

Spell Singer wrote:Fixing Time Stop so that it worked like it was suposed to would go a long way toward helping that (instanteous spells do not affect people under a time stop and that means no attack spells nor can the mage mellee them as they are invulurable to the mages spells and attacks while under the effect...excepting area attacks with a duration longer than the timestop itself...the person can not even be targeted by a spell) since it is not supposed to allow the mage to fight large groups with impunity it is supposed to allow the mage to summon aid, buff himself or withdraw. And that last one is underrated in my mind. Most other characters in combat have no other choice once they engage they win or they die. A high level mage can timestop and run.

I think you are wrong see. How it should work is that all those damage spells are cast. They donot kick in until time starts though. So what happens is the mage casts several fireballs, wiltings, whatever, then instead of getting hurt too, they walk off before time stop end and the targets take all the damage at once when time starts again. That is how it is supposed to work. The only difference that has from how it works now, is that a mage cannot tell if the target is going to die or not. Right now they know their spells worked before time stop is done.

Spell Singer wrote:I am fairly sure Greater Magic Weapon does not affect natural weapons (I am not even sure it will affect a monks HTH combat). The spell you are looking for in this case is Magic Fang and Greater Magic Fang (I think that is the name) they affect animal attacks. Magic Weapon in the PHB is clearly intended to be only cast on weapons.

Correct.

I also know that bless does not stack with all weapon bonuses. Chosen has a bonus vrs evil and when I use bless my attack bonus with Chosen does not change but I can see my BAB has increased by 1.

Interesting. What is "Chosen"?

Also for any creature with damage reduction anyway you should be getting the free effectiveness vrs other things equal to your own damage reduction. So in elemental form you should have the ability to negate +3/x damage reduction.

Yup. But don't forget, monsters should have this as well. I'd rather like to see that actually, but I don't think its going to happen as they'd have to change all the standard monsters with DR into custom ones.

The other thing is that if you whack someone with a weapon and see the hit but no damage then you change weapon types. What is annoying is that the halberd is still bugged in that you can block it with a belt of any kind.

Thing is, greater belts are a bit more common than they should be anyway, and you shouldn't be able to change them mid-combat really.

It is also worth noting that the amount of damage some characters can do makes it likely your premonition spell will not last many blows. I've been told of a character that has +32 damage bonus using a sword fully buffed up (able to do 40 pts with a regular hit and 80 with a critical) with attack bonuses such that they miss only when rolling a 1. 1 attack round and you have taken around 80 pts of damage to your premonition spell even through a greater belt and the lesser belt well nice is not realy very effective when you are fighting the more powerful monsters or characters with that sort of damage bonus. Those half-fiend warriors for example are brutal if you do not have a greater belt.

Vence with a greatsword, fully buffed up and high on bloodfury, can do:

10 + d4 fire damage
2d6 + 5 + (16)

So on average he does 12.5 fire damage and 28 normal damage. That still takes forever to get through a premonition, though it is possible to just spam knockdown.

I would have a heck of a time against a greater belt and premonition until I sorted out what sort of belt it was and changed weapons. Assuming I lived that long. Fixing Time Stop so that it worked like it was suposed to would go a long way toward helping that (instanteous spells do not affect people under a time stop and that means no attack spells nor can the mage mellee them as they are invulurable to the mages spells and attacks while under the effect...excepting area attacks with a duration longer than the timestop itself...the person can not even be targeted by a spell) since it is not supposed to allow the mage to fight large groups with impunity it is supposed to allow the mage to summon aid, buff himself or withdraw. And that last one is underrated in my mind. Most other characters in combat have no other choice once they engage they win or they die. A high level mage can timestop and run.

Timestop does work correctly... mostly. You shouldn't be able to melee people, but Wrath is correct in that fireballs just sit there... then go boom.

And Khalendra is right... most buffs are pretty much permanent for mages over 14th level or so unless you go into the underdark.

Titanium Dragon wrote:

Also for any creature with damage reduction anyway you should be getting the free effectiveness vrs other things equal to your own damage reduction. So in elemental form you should have the ability to negate +3/x damage reduction.

Yup. But don't forget, monsters should have this as well. I'd rather like to see that actually, but I don't think its going to happen as they'd have to change all the standard monsters with DR into custom ones.

This does already work for NPCs. Use shadowshield and let an elder elemental pound on you. Their attacks go right through the DR.

We're swaying the point here.

Before, if I had a greater slashing belt, and premonition, it'd take a greatsword wielding hardass who did 30HP a hit, 7 hits to start doing real damage to me.

Now, if I have a greater slashing belt, and premonition, it'd take a greatsword wielding hardass who does 30HP a hit, 21 hits to start doing real damage to me.

That's that.