Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Girallon Hunter 09-18-06, 02:57 PM	A player in my campaign is about to take the 5th level of Argent savant for his sorcerer and gain access to the Unbind Force ability. Unbind Force: At 5th level, an argent learns to unweave a force spell or effect and liberate its magical energy. As a standard action, an argent savant can attempt to dispel a single force spell or effect within 60 feet (even those normally immune to dispel magic, such as wall of force). If he succeeds on a caster level check (DC 11 + opposing caster's level), the force effect is unbound. This immediately dispels the effect and deals 1d6 points of force damage per level of the dispelled spell to all creatures and objects within 10 feet of the unbound spell. For example, if an argent savant unbound a wall of force, it would deal 5d6 points of force damage to anyone within 10 feet of the wall's former location. The question is: can he automaticaly succeed in unbinding his own force spells, like in Dispel magic? Possible implications: caster casts walls of force near enemies and then unbind them (and causing force damage) with automatic success. Personally, I think that to unbind a spell, you kinda have to fight against it, that is why the energy is released violently, and not "unharmfully", like when you dispel your own sepll. Therefore, you can not automaticaly succeed on this particular check. Do you agree or disagree?
Mort_Q 09-18-06, 03:09 PM	I'm tempted to agree, but I prefer the is it fun rule... if it doesn't unbalance things, don't worry about it. There are easier ways to do more damage at high levels (if I recall the PrC entrance requirements correctly) than what is being suggested.
Fruscht 09-18-06, 04:50 PM	I think it should be like Dispel: you automatically succeed on caster level checks againt any spell you have cast. So I'd allow him to automatically unbind any force spell he has cast. Besides, it's not anything really important (broken) that will give him a big advantage.
Shatteredtower 09-18-06, 09:46 PM	I'll agree with the first two posters here. Allowing it would make a class ability more useful, but not come close to breaking it. I admit that 1st Ed's wand of force (in the original Unearthed Arcana) leaves me more favourably biased toward the argent savant in this regard. You see, you could expend a charge from the wand to produce a wall of force, but it could also absorb that spell effect to put a charge into it. Now that was abusable.
Mort_Q 09-20-06, 10:23 AM	On more thought... If you're worried about the PC throwing up a Wall of Force, which of course has it's own rewards, and then dispelling it on the last round of it's duration for a double whammy, just base the damage on the number of rounds of duration left... so if the wall only has one round left, it does only 1d6.
Thiez 09-20-06, 11:06 AM	That'd be stupid :P What if someone casts permanency on the wall?
Mort_Q 09-21-06, 10:25 AM	That'd be stupid :P What would? What if someone casts permanency on the wall? Increase the DC of the dispel? I need to read up on the spell...
Girallon Hunter 09-21-06, 01:55 PM	On more thought... If you're worried about the PC throwing up a Wall of Force, which of course has it's own rewards, and then dispelling it on the last round of it's duration for a double whammy, just base the damage on the number of rounds of duration left... so if the wall only has one round left, it does only 1d6. But the damage is 1d6 per spell level, not caster level... I get your idea, though.
Thiez 09-21-06, 03:00 PM	What would? Well, it's not that hard. If you want to base the damage done on the number of rounds left, and one has a permanent force effect, your ruleset crashes.
Mort_Q 09-22-06, 09:49 AM	What would? Well, it's not that hard. If you want to base the damage done on the number of rounds left, and one has a permanent force effect, your ruleset crashes. Rulesets only crash if the person using them is an idiot. ... either make it impossible to dispel, or treat it as a freshly cast wall and then have the wall reform later (whatever the rule is for dispelling a permanent effect).
Thiez 09-23-06, 07:35 AM	The rule for dispelling a permanent effect is the same as any normal spell: if you make the dispel check, the permanent spell ends. Impossible to dispel a force effect because you want to base the unbind force damage done on duration is making things quite complicated and may lead to unexpected results. Oh, btw, Mage Armor (1 hour/level) would be a killer if you base damage on the number of rounds left. Same for Blade Barrier (1 min/level), Explosive Runes (Permanent), Floating Disk (1 hour/level), Forcecage (2 hours/level), Resilient Sphere (1 min/level), Sepia Snake Sigil (Permanent), Shield (1 min/level), Telekinetic Sphere (1 min/level), Tiny Hut (2 hours/level). Thing is, MOST force effects have a duration measured in minutes per level or longer. Why can't we just use the normal rules, using the spell level for damage?
Mort_Q 09-24-06, 11:18 AM	Why can't we just use the normal rules, using the spell level for damage? No reason. I was just thinking out loud. Some people might take it as unfair that a player could take advantage of their own spells' powers and then dispel them at the last moment and get all the energy back out as damage. I don't think it's unbalanced or broken as written.