Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Rowan_Whispercloak 08-12-06, 11:41 PM	I noticed that there has been couple of thread about the level of power of the Orb spells and that they take away from the school of Evocation so why not make them similar to the Kelgore's Fire Bolt from the PHB2 (116). Have the orbs be both Conjuration and Evocation. Have the lesser orbs do normal damage when not resisted and 1d8 of energy damage when effected by spell resistance. Have the regular orbs do the same damage when not effected by spell resistance and do half damage when spell resistance is not beaten. The extra effect happen either way and must be saved against, maybe with a -2 to DC if spell resistance halved the damage. I think I could word this a little better, but what does everyone think of this idea?
KmartKommando 08-13-06, 01:03 AM	Actually, make them do an amount of damage for a spell of their level at the minimum CL, in this case 7d6. Kelgore's Firebolt does the same thing. First level spell, at minimum CL, does 1d6 damage. Hmm, maybe all SR: yes direct damage spells should be like this. Maybe instead of all or nothing for spell resistance, take off one die of damage for each 5 or so of the target's SR. If you get through, it all goes through, if not, most of it doesn't. I still vote for the orb spells to stay as SR: no except force, that one probably should be SR: yes, but it caps at 10d6 instead of 15d6, which is huge, especially when metamagic comes into play. And none of this "magically conjures a nonmagical ball of magic energy" nonsense. Because it is quite obviously a "nonmagical orb of (acid/cold/fire/electricity/sound) assembled by magic and held together by magic until it is hurled (probably propelled by magic, at least initially, could be a magical containment field that is thrown baseball-style that dissipates on or near impact)" As to the effects themselves, they are easily explained by nonmagical substances. My take on the effects themselves: acid = acid (obviously) cold = liquid nitrogen (hasta la vista, Ogre?) :rimshot: fire = naptha/napalm electricity = ball lightning/capacitor/static charge sound = lit gunpowder? (any mechanical or chemical explosion could do a concussive blast that could be a sonic shockwave) alt. Celine Dion in a bottle? :gah: force = dunno, but I commented on our psion/wizard tossing 2 of these and missing both times "throw enough and he'll trip on the force baseballs" force could be a 'magical' shockwave
Kresalak 08-13-06, 01:08 AM	Celine Dion in a bottle? No Kmart Kommando, we're still civilized.
periscope 08-13-06, 01:10 AM	Whats wrong with the orb spells? I like them. They keep being a competitive damage spell at higher levels, they dont suffer from spell resistance (so I can finally blast the golem! dont know about you but the whole "immune to anything affected by spell resistance" thing annoys me), and they make it so that if you do specialize, you could drop evocation as a school and still remain competitive in terms of damage.
Alamanther's comeback 08-13-06, 04:14 AM	We've had this discussion before, but I don't think the orb spells really upset the balance of the game - we already have Melf's acid arrow, cloudkill, and incendiary cloud for those nasty "you got SR? Tell it to the big man upstairs!" magical attacks. I don't think SR becomes irrelevant just because Conjuration [Creation] gives us a little something - we still can't automatically banish, charm, confuse, polymorph, or slow those demons&devils without having to make a caster level cheks in advance! There's only so much you can do with direct damage... ;)