Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 evilhamster Jun 22, 2009 13:02:41	Picture this, a player wants to do a lightning based swordmage and asks his DM if he can take altered versions of powers with other energy types to change them all to lightning. I can of course see this character taking the feat that increases lightning and thunder damage because it will apply to all his powers but doesn't seem so bad or rules breaking as still he wont be so confident against enemies which resist lightning and looses versatility in exchange. But are there any reasons why this would break the game? I know it would certainly fall within house ruling, but how much does this affect the game in favor of character flavor? Changing divine types damage from radiant to necrotic if they follow evil deities is even suggested in the core books, is this so different?
#2 drnick Jun 22, 2009 13:04:48	As a DM, I've allowed one of my players to do this and it hasn't presented any trouble whatsoever. YMMV of course. If it's any help, modifying damage types is rule supported.
#3 jenius Jun 22, 2009 13:08:01	Well, it's unbalancing in that he can take lightning/thunder related feats, or perhaps roll up the lightning version of Gensai (sp?). You're right that he loses out against lightning resist dudes though. I think it would make more sense for him to just rp it as lightning damage, really if he wants it to change mechanically then he probably wants to use (abuse) it in a specific way, whereas if he just wants to coolness of it he could just pretend it's lightning but play it by the book. When I dm, I generally don't give house rules that players specifically ask for because usually there's a reason beyond rp that they'd be asking for a mechanical change.
#4 bone_naga Jun 22, 2009 13:34:50	I don't see any issues with it. I wouldn't allow him to change EVERY power for the class. Just look over the power list, and for each level make sure there is at least one power that will have the thunder or lightning keywords. If he chooses all of those powers, he will get bonuses from feats and such, but will also suffer against enemies resistant to those damage types. If you designate which of these powers will have altered keywords instead of just letting him change whichever ones he sees fit, you may also be forcing him to give up a degree of flexibility if he adheres too rigidly to that concept. But either way you do it, I don't see much of a balance concern.
#5 Seeker95 Jun 22, 2009 13:58:47	As long as the change is permanent, I'm cool with it. Sometimes I will require some explanatory justification. And every now and then a power requires so much fluff change to fit that I require the player to re-write it for me.
#6 satori Jun 22, 2009 14:09:26	As long as the new damage type isn't Radiant.
#7 ChrisTheS Jun 22, 2009 14:11:55	The only known balance issues are in converting everything to fire (since fire is the most common resistance type) or necrotic (which diminishes effectiveness against the majority of undead, one of the more common monster types). Those are the only known overarching concerns - there are always situational ones, but rarely do they result in an increase in power rather than a decrease. Viz. Jenius' concern about 'mechanical advantage' - for some classes, there are enough powers that normally have a given keyword that characters could specialize without having to reflavor. Changing existing powers isn't any more unbalancing than that, and disallowing it for fear that the player is pursuing a mechanical advantage is actually unfairly disadvantaging them in comparison to other characters who can achieve that advantage by the book (for instance, I'm eventually going to be playing a storm sorcerer who has nothing but lightning/thunder powers. This produces massive amounts of synergy from my Lyrandar dragonmark alone, and it's done entirely by the book. For a Lyrandar swordmage or druid, who doesn't have the luxury of picking every power as a lightning or thunder one straight from the book, not allowing them to select powers to provide best synergy with their build would be greatly underpowered in comparison).
#8 nyteloki Jun 22, 2009 14:32:55	Personally, I would allow them to make their case to me about their powers. I would allow some of their powers to be changed. But I most definitely would not allow them all to be changed. Certain power types would likely be off the table (radiant). That said, I might allow them to change one at-will power if the flavor of the power makes sense; assuming another at-will does not already provide access to that type of damage. I would then allow maybe one, maybe two encounter/dailies to be changed too. This way, if they attempt to abuse this change, it is limited. It encourages them to use what is already designed. It provides for DM over sight on the power changes. And, most importantly, they get to have their fun designing a character with the flavor they want. If it become a problem in the future, I would disallow the change on future power choices, such as when they need to replace daily and encounter powers.
#9 ChrisTheS Jun 22, 2009 14:45:59	I don't see why radiant should be off the table, given that it only makes the character incredibly dangerous to about 60-80% of representatives of one creature type and only average effectiveness against any other type. Sure, if you've got a campaign focused on undead-slaying and nobody is playing a divine class, it might be an issue, but otherwise it's scarcely mechanically superior to any other damage type.
#10 evilhamster Jun 22, 2009 14:51:25	Thanks for all your great responses guys, if I may go slightly off subject, what about allowing weapon type feats for other weapons? Continuing with the lightning swordmage example, using a quarterstaff (in this case metallic ;) ) instead of a great sword or the double blade from AV? AFAIK the quarterstaff does not have lots of feats for a defender to consider the weapon seriously, but adapting things like heavy blade of opportunity to a staff could make it work, and the damage and proficiency bonus are lower either way so it might remain a non-optimal option but remain with the character concept, or the line should be drawn there?
#11 xtian Jun 22, 2009 14:52:28	Radiant might be unbalancing if the character nabs something like Radiant Servant or Divine Oracle in a class that normally doesn't have access to much Radiant damage. However, I would let the player use whatever element they wanted and only tone it down if it seemed very powerful in play.
#12 mellored Jun 22, 2009 15:05:51	AFAIK the quarterstaff does not have lots of feats for a defender to consider the weapon seriously, but adapting things like heavy blade of opportunity to a staff could make it work, and the damage and proficiency bonus are lower either way so it might remain a non-optimal option but remain with the character concept, or the line should be drawn there? That's something i would just reflavor, take a double sword and call it a staff.
#13 bone_naga Jun 22, 2009 15:31:02	That's something i would just reflavor, take a double sword and call it a staff. This. Just make sure that if you do this, he must take feats as if it were a double sword, not as if it were a staff. Its only when you allow him to take feats/abilities for both that it becomes unbalanced.
#14 AbdulAlhazred Jun 22, 2009 16:02:06	Thanks for all your great responses guys, if I may go slightly off subject, what about allowing weapon type feats for other weapons? Continuing with the lightning swordmage example, using a quarterstaff (in this case metallic ;) ) instead of a great sword or the double blade from AV? AFAIK the quarterstaff does not have lots of feats for a defender to consider the weapon seriously, but adapting things like heavy blade of opportunity to a staff could make it work, and the damage and proficiency bonus are lower either way so it might remain a non-optimal option but remain with the character concept, or the line should be drawn there? I think in the specific case of the quarterstaff you're fairly safe. It is as you say a pretty non-optimal weapon and aside from staff wizards there is really no great use for it. Tinkering with the feat chains that work with superior weapon (and some martial ones) OTOH is fraught with peril. Specifically the following weapon groups are pretty safe to tinker with: staff Mace Sling Unarmed/improvised These all belong to weapon groups that have either only one weapon or only a few basic weapons in them. It probably should be OK to do things with other specific weapons that are generally inferior options, but you may end up changing the balance of choices between certain weapons. Short Sword for instance is basically a useless weapon currently. It isn't actually BAD, it just doesn't make any sense for any build AFAIK to actually use it. Some kind of feat specific to that weapon or giving it access to one specific feat from another weapon type's feat chain is unlikely to break things, but you may have to have very specific wording. Certain oddball weapon choices might also be nice to have a feat for like the spiked shield or maybe even the parrying dagger.
#15 Nibelung_ajr Jun 23, 2009 7:41:50	Short Sword for instance is basically a useless weapon currently. It isn't actually BAD, it just doesn't make any sense for any build AFAIK to actually use it. Melee halfling one-handed with +3 prof bonus. Except rogues, who get +1 to hit with daggers.
#16 slobo777a Jun 23, 2009 8:16:56	One additional thing - if a player makes *all* (or nearly all) of a character's powers have the same energy type, they have become one-dimensional to the point that it is difficult to pick encounters without meta-gaming - if the enemy happen to have good resistance to that energy type, then the character is useless, and may suffer the ultimate price. If you end up avoiding that kind of encounter because of this, then the character never pays any "price" for specialising, whilst keeping all the benefits. Basically you as DM can never collect on the trade-off that the player has apparently made, the over-specialisation has made the stakes too high. It's like he/she has managed to sign an IOU ("I'll lose one in 20 fights badly") to get some extra damage points ("But these three feats apply to all my attacks") - calling in the IOU could well end the game! It's something to keep in the back of your mind whilst allowing a change like this. A couple of changes to match a cool character concept are very unlikely to make an unbalancing difference. Changing everything in the same direction could well do. This doesn't just apply to energy changes, but any build modification that spends normal or weak abilities to improve strong ones.
#17 ekio Jun 23, 2009 9:26:49	As long as the change is permanent, I'm cool with it. Sometimes I will require some explanatory justification. And every now and then a power requires so much fluff change to fit that I require the player to re-write it for me. Agreed, cept the second part. My group tends to play fast and loose.
#18 AbdulAlhazred Jun 24, 2009 7:05:49	Melee halfling one-handed with +3 prof bonus. Except rogues, who get +1 to hit with daggers. Meh. Rapier and Katar are all better choices. The rapier considerably so. If you don't like the thought of your halfling fencing then call it an arming sword. It doesn't get any better than that for halflings. So like I say, shortsword is pretty basically a useless weapon. About all I can see doing with it is maybe taking it at 1st level with the intention to upgrade. That and of course off-hand usage, but that is really not a rewarding path to go down unless you're a ranger, and then you would just use 2 rapiers. Like I say, short sword is useless. Not a bad weapon, just always second choice. So modding it is unlikely to hurt anything. The worst you end up with is something as good as a rapier.
#19 Nibelung_ajr Jun 24, 2009 23:38:43	Meh. Rapier and Katar are all better choices. Obviously they are. Rapier and katar are superior weapons, they should be better than a military weapon. Short sword is still the only one-handed +3 military weapon that a small character can wield.
#20 Saric Jun 25, 2009 3:25:03	Personally the only time I allowed a mainstream re-haul of all damage types of a certain type was when clerics wished to be evil clerics and cast "necrotic" instead of "radiant". This is supported by the rules in the dmg, and it wouldn't even be that big of a deal if a cleric who worshiped kord wanted lightning or thunder instead of "radiant". But just for the record, if you do allow a cleric to make "necrotic" clerics, they will suck against undead.... Ironic isn't it? However, for everyone else I made this heroic tier feat. Its basically like Arcane Admixture, but more open to every class but doesn't have the benefit of two keywords. Energy Substitution Benefit: Choose any power that you know that has a specific damage type, and choose one of the following keywords: Acid, Cold, Fire, Force, Lightning, Necrotic, Poison, Psychic, Radiant or Thunder. The power now deals your chosen damage type instead of its normal damage type and replaces its keyword with your chosen one. Each time you gain a level, you can choose to reassign either the power to which this feat's effect applies or the damage type (or both). Special: You can choose this feat multiple times. Each time you take this feat, choose a different power. You can't apply this feat to the same power more than once.
#21 amthyst_fire Jun 25, 2009 3:39:34	Personally the only time I allowed a mainstream re-haul of all damage types of a certain type was when clerics wished to be evil clerics and cast "necrotic" instead of "radiant". This is supported by the rules in the dmg, and it wouldn't even be that big of a deal if a cleric who worshiped kord wanted lightning or thunder instead of "radiant". But just for the record, if you do allow a cleric to make "necrotic" clerics, they will suck against undead.... Ironic isn't it? However, for everyone else I made this heroic tier feat. Its basically like Arcane Admixture, but more open to every class but doesn't have the benefit of two keywords. Energy Substitution Benefit: Choose any power that you know that has a specific damage type, and choose one of the following keywords: Acid, Cold, Fire, Force, Lightning, Necrotic, Poison, Psychic, Radiant or Thunder. The power now deals your chosen damage type instead of its normal damage type and replaces its keyword with your chosen one. Each time you gain a level, you can choose to reassign either the power to which this feat's effect applies or the damage type (or both). Special: You can choose this feat multiple times. Each time you take this feat, choose a different power. You can't apply this feat to the same power more than once. Charging a feat is a little steep for something that, RAW, is free, don't you think? I could see making them research it (depending on how I feel and how much spare gold my PCs have, I do so) and charging them. My typical rate for something like this would be 100 gp per week, and 1 week per level of spell (New spell), or 1 week to research how to substitute one damage type for another. Did the same thing for 3.X, and no one ever had a problem with it.
#22 slobo777a Jun 25, 2009 4:13:10	Charging a feat is a little steep for something that, RAW, is free, don't you think? The feat works for me, the benefit of changing your mind every level is pretty good. As a DM, it looks good to me too, it will prevent a player gaining a stack of "everything the same", but still allow the player to theme their best energy attack to the character.
#23 AbdulAlhazred Jun 25, 2009 8:55:33	Obviously they are. Rapier and katar are superior weapons, they should be better than a military weapon. Short sword is still the only one-handed +3 military weapon that a small character can wield. Sure, but very few characters stick to military weapons since the superior weapons are well, superior. Inevitably your halfling fighter is going to upgrade fairly soon unless you're simply dead set on playing with a poor weapon choice. The same might be said about most any of the military weapons, but most of them do have their niche uses. Short sword just happens to be the one that conspicuously doesn't, very low level play being a limited exception. Personally the only time I allowed a mainstream re-haul of all damage types of a certain type was when clerics wished to be evil clerics and cast "necrotic" instead of "radiant". This is supported by the rules in the dmg, and it wouldn't even be that big of a deal if a cleric who worshiped kord wanted lightning or thunder instead of "radiant". But just for the record, if you do allow a cleric to make "necrotic" clerics, they will suck against undead.... Ironic isn't it? However, for everyone else I made this heroic tier feat. Its basically like Arcane Admixture, but more open to every class but doesn't have the benefit of two keywords. Energy Substitution Benefit: Choose any power that you know that has a specific damage type, and choose one of the following keywords: Acid, Cold, Fire, Force, Lightning, Necrotic, Poison, Psychic, Radiant or Thunder. The power now deals your chosen damage type instead of its normal damage type and replaces its keyword with your chosen one. Each time you gain a level, you can choose to reassign either the power to which this feat's effect applies or the damage type (or both). Special: You can choose this feat multiple times. Each time you take this feat, choose a different power. You can't apply this feat to the same power more than once. Yeah, it certainly doesn't seem like an imbalanced feat. The question is, is it really enough to give you a themed character? It may depend on the class and which keywords you're talking about. I might go further and extend the concept of Weapon Multi-classing here. Multi-class into "Necromancy" and provide a feat chain that allows deeper customization. That way you can not only sacrifice a feat to just switch a single keyword of one power, but you could get other benefits as well which are more worth the cost of some feats.
#24 Nibelung_ajr Jun 25, 2009 20:31:12	Sure, but very few characters stick to military weapons since the superior weapons are well, superior. Inevitably your halfling fighter is going to upgrade fairly soon unless you're simply dead set on playing with a poor weapon choice. The same might be said about most any of the military weapons, but most of them do have their niche uses. Short sword just happens to be the one that conspicuously doesn't, very low level play being a limited exception. So, using your own words, Long sword (bastard sword), battleaxe (waraxe), greataxe (execution axe), greatsword (fullblade), longspear (greatspear), maul (mordenkrad), battle hammer (craghammer)... they are all "poor weapon choices" just because there is a better superior weapon?
#25 AbdulAlhazred Jun 26, 2009 9:16:48	So, using your own words, Long sword (bastard sword), battleaxe (waraxe), greataxe (execution axe), greatsword (fullblade), longspear (greatspear), maul (mordenkrad), battle hammer (craghammer)... they are all "poor weapon choices" just because there is a better superior weapon? Well, your list includes superior weapons on it, but I understand the gist of the question, and the answer is that it will ALWAYS benefit a character to go up the chain to the top weapon in whatever category they are using. So yes, it is more effective to use a Fullblade than it is to use a Greatsword. The short sword is the single most significant case, that's all. There are still characters in my game using some military weapons at 5th level, but they are certainly well advised to switch. I suspect none of them has bothered to read AV is all. So it isn't that people never use them, it is simply that they are lesser options and my original point was that if a feat happens to improve one of those options it isn't a big deal. The character could choose that feat or they could choose the corresponding superior weapon proficiency feat. It aught to be roughly balanced. For example, a feat that let you do 1d8 damage with a short sword would work fine. It is pretty much a wash vs taking rapier proficiency. It just puts the characters taking those 2 choices on a par. That was where this whole line of discussion originated from. Which weapons can you afford to provide enhancing feats for and the obvious choices are simple and military weapons, as long as the feat is specific to that one weapon.
#26 Shamanstarr Jun 26, 2009 16:34:45	Older editions of D&D specifically recommended customizing your characters by focusing on specific energy types, or modifying spells to make them your own. The DMG and MM recommend doing this with Monsters to make them more unexpected. I personally see no problem with being able to change 1 power per level's energy type, as long as the energy types your changing is in the "Dragon Breath" tree of energy, or Radient/Necrotic. I would not let someone change things to or from Weapon Damage, Force Damage, Fear, or Psychic. Once per level, you can change a power's Key Powersource from Fire, Cold, Poison, Lightning, Acid, Radient, or Necrotic to a different one on the list. The power would get a new name reflective of the new powersource/energy type, shopuld be explained in the character concept, and not just be a change for change sake. Also note that some powers have an effect that is reflective of the power source that the power uses. Examples of this includes primarily Cold damage. Generally most cold powers also Slow characters. Similarly, Acid and Poison tends to have an Ongoing Damage component. I can see keeping Ongoing damage components in some cases, and not in others. You could work with the PC to modify the extra effects of a power to be more in line with the new powersource. Example, changing Icy Rays to Ray of Acid. Instead of the target being slowed on a hit, have the target take ongoing Acid damage, save ends. In this case, your trading one effect for another, so the balance should be maintained. If they either trade effects or drop an effect, it's allowed, but they don't get to gain effects when none are available. Changing Fireball to Frostball would not Slow the target, it would just be the damage is Cold based. Seuss
#27 vebrandsson Jun 26, 2009 18:01:13	I allowed a divine character devoted to the raven queen change their powers that deal fire damage (as well as a small number of radiant damaging powers but not many) to deal cold damage instead, found no problem with it at all. See no effect on balance what so ever.
#28 cormroc Jun 27, 2009 15:38:32	... it will ALWAYS benefit a character to go up the chain to the top weapon in whatever category they are using. One counter example I can think of right off the top of my head is a Goliath using a Greataxe. One feat gives you d12+2/3/4, where the execution axe would take 2 feats to get to 1d10+3/4/5 (statistically anyway). When you get a vorpal weapon the balance may shift back towards the execution axe (too lazy to figure out if it actually has a significant effect), but until then Greataxe is the way to go.
#29 Nibelung_ajr Jun 28, 2009 13:56:56	the answer is that it will ALWAYS benefit a character to go up the chain to the top weapon in whatever category they are using. Benefit, yes. "Must have", no. Well, i agree that we disagree, and that's all. My halfling bard is happy with his shortsword, and will still wield it while i cant find feat space to put rapier/katar prof on it.
#30 jaron95 Jun 30, 2009 15:08:00	Swordmage wants to deal lightning damage with every attack? Two words: Lightning Weapon. Power (At-Will • Lightning): Free Action. All damage dealt by this weapon is lightning damage. Another free action returns the damage to normal. No powers need to be changed. No house rules need to be enacted. Your Swordmage gets the desired effect by exercising (or, depending on your perspective, sacrificing) his choice of weapon enchantment.
#31 Saric Jun 30, 2009 23:48:42	Swordmage wants to deal lightning damage with every attack? Two words: Lightning Weapon. No powers need to be changed. No house rules need to be enacted. Your Swordmage gets the desired effect by exercising (or, depending on your perspective, sacrificing) his choice of weapon enchantment. That wouldn't work with powers with the implement keyword. Which means his weapon powers could all be converted to lightning damage, but implement powers could not benefit and be altered to lightning damage. Quoted from the phb faq 17. When you are using a magic weapon as an implement, like a Holy Avenger or a Pact Dagger, what benefits do you get from the weapon? You gain any bonuses listed under Enhancement, Critical and Property.