Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Keenath 11-13-07, 12:58 PM	Am I the only person who thinks Confused is the most overrated condition in D&D? Consider the effect: 10% chance -- target attacks me 10% chance -- acts normally 30% chance -- "babble", which is code for "lose a turn" 20% chance -- run away 30% chance -- attack nearest creature Now, in most cases the nearest creature is going to be an ally tank or similar, and in the case of effects that cause Confusion and are delivered with a melee attack, it's guaranteed to be ME. And that's assuming the enemy has allies around and isn't a lone monster. So, in total, there's a 50% chance that my target will attack me or an ally (except in the rare case that the target was close to one of his allies and far from the party), and a 50% chance that he'll lose his turn, possibly running away in the process (which is an irritation rather than an advantage, more often than not). Now, I suppose I'm not really complaining about the Confusion spell, which drops an area effect and lasts for most or all of a battle. But then there's effects like Lesser Confusion, the Headshot feat (trade in 5 dice of sneak attack damage, and the target has to save or be confused for 1 turn), and so on. Really? I spend resources for a 50% chance that you won't attack, and you still get to save against it? And this is considered BETTER than Daze, which is save or lose a turn with 100% certainty? (Daze is level 0, Lesser Confusion is level 1!) Confusion (the spell) is worth talking about because it can sow chaos into the enemy ranks when used at the right time (as an opening gambit against a large number of foes, and probably going to last the duration of the battle). But these 1 round confuse effects are for the birds! (Of course, that doesn't even touch on the mechanical awkwardness of Confusion, where a group of affected enemies means a percentile roll and table lookup for EACH enemy, every turn, to see what he does. A half-dozen confused monsters is fun to watch and think about, but a pain in the rear to actually run.)
Nephlite 11-13-07, 02:41 PM	Am I the only person who thinks Confused is the most overrated condition in D&D? Consider the effect: 10% chance -- target attacks me 10% chance -- acts normally 30% chance -- "babble", which is code for "lose a turn" 20% chance -- run away 30% chance -- attack nearest creature Now, in most cases the nearest creature is going to be an ally tank or similar, and in the case of effects that cause Confusion and are delivered with a melee attack, it's guaranteed to be ME. And that's assuming the enemy has allies around and isn't a lone monster. So, in total, there's a 50% chance that my target will attack me or an ally (except in the rare case that the target was close to one of his allies and far from the party), and a 50% chance that he'll lose his turn, possibly running away in the process (which is an irritation rather than an advantage, more often than not). Now, I suppose I'm not really complaining about the Confusion spell, which drops an area effect and lasts for most or all of a battle. But then there's effects like Lesser Confusion, the Headshot feat (trade in 5 dice of sneak attack damage, and the target has to save or be confused for 1 turn), and so on. Really? I spend resources for a 50% chance that you won't attack, and you still get to save against it? And this is considered BETTER than Daze, which is save or lose a turn with 100% certainty? (Daze is level 0, Lesser Confusion is level 1!) Confusion (the spell) is worth talking about because it can sow chaos into the enemy ranks when used at the right time (as an opening gambit against a large number of foes, and probably going to last the duration of the battle). But these 1 round confuse effects are for the birds! (Of course, that doesn't even touch on the mechanical awkwardness of Confusion, where a group of affected enemies means a percentile roll and table lookup for EACH enemy, every turn, to see what he does. A half-dozen confused monsters is fun to watch and think about, but a pain in the rear to actually run.) The fun part is if one hits another while both confused they will stop rolling since they auto attack those that attacked them.
Keenath 11-13-07, 05:15 PM	I forgot to even mention that! If any of your party attacks them, they'll immediately go back to fighting you, and that cancels out any benefit long-term confusion might give. Confusion is a decent idea, but really, it's gotta be less crippled and less randomly useless.
Keenath 11-14-07, 01:13 PM	Huh. So does that mean I *AM* the only one who thinks confusion is overrated?
goawayugh 11-14-07, 01:45 PM	Huh. So does that mean I *AM* the only one who thinks confusion is overrated?No.The fun part is if one hits another while both confused they will stop rolling since they auto attack those that attacked them.Yes, this is HILARIOUS!!!
jaelis 11-14-07, 02:14 PM	Confusion the spell is pretty decent to cast on a group of enemies, as you note. Getting them to attack each other is better than having them sit around dazed. And it's loads of fun to cast on the party! Lesser confusion is pretty bad, especially since you could have cast hideous laughter. But it is certainly better than daze, since it doesn't have the creature limitation or HD cap. But it's not horrible... it does give you a chance to have one of your enemies attack another one and that can be pretty good sometimes. If your comparing to a hypothetical spell that dazed all creatures in a 30 ft circle for one round per level... well, I think that would probably be higher than third level.
Keenath 11-14-07, 02:27 PM	Well, as I noted, the spell "confusion" isn't terrible. What I think is overrated is confusion as a status condition. Lesser confusion, Headshot, Bewitching Blast, and so on and so forth... those are the ones I think are overrated. It's the 1-round durations, I guess, that really makes is suck.
dman11235 11-14-07, 07:20 PM	Well, look at the levels of the spells/invo/amount of SA gotten rid of. It's not much (except that in the SA case, it's a lot harder to call because you're giving up damage, but not all that much).
Keenath 11-15-07, 10:54 AM	I'm sorry, but even a 1st level spell that says "save negates, and he has a 50% chance to ignore it even if he fails" is just a garbage spell. An ability that asks me to trade in ten levels' worth of sneak attack for the same thing is just as bad. It's garbage, especially compared to some of the other ambush feats -- like dealing 1d4 CON damage, dropping SR by 5, and so on -- all of which require giving up LESS sneak attack damage than Headshot, and none of which have a save. If Headshot were saveless, I'd go for it.
1 ton ghost 11-15-07, 12:56 PM	simply change the condition FX. i've seen many DMs do this because, truth be told, Confusion is the ulitmate wildcard. it basically turns the EL into "anything can happen day." simply sticking to the listed "options" can lead to stagnation. look around the environ, consider PC abilities and dispositions, etc.
dman11235 11-15-07, 05:41 PM	Really? 1d4 con is no where near as good as having your opponent attack his ally. And dropping SR by 5? Not useful a lot of the time. The reason it's got a DC based on how much SA you give up is that it's a much better result than a mere 5d6 extra damage, there's the potential of him losing out on attacking you for a full round, and a potential on him losing out on a full attack the next one too. And what about the phantasmal spells? Are they worthless too? It takes two saves to do what they can. Save for nothing, and then a fort save for a much lesser effect. You say 50% chance of working, I say 80%. The babble is also worth it. It is slightly overrated, but it is still worth it.
Keenath 11-16-07, 10:12 AM	Really? 1d4 con is no where near as good as having your opponent attack his ally. And dropping SR by 5? Not useful a lot of the time.I would say that a guranteed 1d4 con damage is worth more than a will-negates effect that MIGHT make him attack a friend. But in point of fact, there's very little chance he WILL attack a friend. Unless you use a sling (and who does that?), you'll need to be adjacent to deliver that sneak attack, so in most cases you or an ally (or both) will be next to the enemy when his confused turn comes up (you, if you had to move-and-hit while he's flatfooted; an ally and maybe you, if you were flanking). Since Confusion doesn't specify how to determine targets among equally-close creatures and monsters don't always stand side-by-side, there's a good chance the poor rogue (or ally) would eat the attack anyway in that case. And because the confusion only lasts one turn, even if he DID attack one of his allies, the ally wouldn't necessarily attack back, and there's no mechanical reason they'd get into a fight of their own. With ongoing confusion, yes, the "attack last creature who attacked you" comes into it. One turn duration? Doesn't work. The reason it's got a DC based on how much SA you give up is that it's a much better result than a mere 5d6 extra damage, there's the potential of him losing out on attacking you for a full round, and a potential on him losing out on a full attack the next one too.The DC isn't based on how many SA you gave up; it's based on how many SA dice you get overall. In other words, it's 1/2 your rogue/ninja/sneak-attacking-class level. If you were a wizard or cleric or whatnot, that number would be the spell level of your best spells. Yes, there's a chance of him losing a turn and a chance of losing out on the next full attack too -- but there's also a 20-50% chance (depending on positioning) of him just fighting instead -- of the ability doing NOTHING USEFUL. And what about the phantasmal spells? Are they worthless too? It takes two saves to do what they can. Save for nothing, and then a fort save for a much lesser effect.They're not worthless because the EFFECT IS MUCH GREATER. Two saves versus DEATH is a totally different thing from (effectively) two saves versus lose-a-turn. You say 50% chance of working, I say 80%. The babble is also worth it.It's not the babble that I think isn't worth it; it's the attack-nearest, which has a good chance of being ME. I'd rather put the enemy ~18 HP closer to being dead -- or better yet, down 2 points of CON, to weaken his Fort save and drop his HP by his hit dice.
dman11235 11-16-07, 05:15 PM	Well, I personally would never take an ambush feat (none of them are worth it in my opinion). The point is that confusion can be really good, that's why there is a good chance of it not working. And we'll say 65% then. There's a 50% chance that the attack nearest will be a good thing. How's that?