I've noticed something that I REALLY don't like about divine classes...The damage type associated with the powers don't fit with the flavor of some of the gods. I mean, they are always either radiant, fire, or lightning damage.
Sure those powers will work fine if you're playing a character of any divine class that worships Pelor or some sort of storm god, but I just can't imagine an avenger of The Raven Queen attacking his foes with those damage types (cold or necrotic seems much more fitting in this case).
Would it be game breaking to allow for players to change out damage types as long as they were fitting to their god? Or maybe even a substitution feat to allow such a swap?
What do you think? And do you think Divine Power might fix this problem?
Work with your DM. I think it's absolutely no problem to change damage types to fit your character when taking the power up.
Also, I think it's good they stayed mostly with Radiant, because it simply fits for all gods.
Radiant fits MOST gods, its true. But a God of darkness and shadows probably wouldn't grant his priests lazer/light attacks.
I just can't imagine an avenger of The Raven Queen attacking his foes with those damage types (cold or necrotic seems much more fitting in this case).
Necrotic doesn't work for the RQ; she hates undead, and therefore attacking them with something that most, if not all of them, resist would be stupid, and attacking them with power that they're vulnerable to is smart.
Consider also that radiant is not the same thing as holy, nor is necrotic the same thing as unholy. Radiant energy is simply light; in this case, light from the Astral Sea, where all gods allegedly live. You might refluff it in the case of the RQ to be, say, blood-red light instead of golden, but it's still light.
Radiant fits MOST gods, its true. But a God of darkness and shadows probably wouldn't grant his priests lazer/light attacks.
Actually radiant fits all gods in the current mythos.
Remember radiant energy is the type from the Astral Sea, where ALL the gods [except Vecna and the Raven Queen] hail. It isn't so much light as it is the energy of permanence.
Also, a good substitute damage type for The Raven Queen is cold, as she is a patron of winter.
Also, I think it's good they stayed mostly with Radiant, because it simply fits for all gods.
Zehir and Vecna beg to differ. Torog probably isn't so cool with it either.
I'll be surprised if Divine Power doesn't offer something (probably some kind of feat) that lets you change one damage type to another across the board. Be very helpful for modeling different deific preferences.
Zehir and Vecna beg to differ. Torog probably isn't so cool with it either.
Those generally aren't PC-friendly gods, however.
Namely Cold + Wintertouch + Lasting Frost...
I can easily imagine a god of darkness also using radiant damage.
Yup. A black light. Instead of bathing the room in glowing white light, it makes all the white in the room glow in a purple light. The Raven Queen *and* Bane would approve.
Ok ok, so I absolutely love what they've done with divine classes and all, especially the avenger and the invoker.
I've noticed something that I REALLY don't like about divine classes...The damage type associated with the powers don't fit with the flavor of some of the gods. I mean, they are always either radiant, fire, or lightning damage.
Sure those powers will work fine if you're playing a character of any divine class that worships Pelor or some sort of storm god, but I just can't imagine an avenger of The Raven Queen attacking his foes with those damage types (cold or necrotic seems much more fitting in this case).
Would it be game breaking to allow for players to change out damage types as long as they were fitting to their god? Or maybe even a substitution feat to allow such a swap?
What do you think? And do you think Divine Power might fix this problem?
I believe the DMG offered some advice about reskinning evil cleric NPCs to use necrotic instead of radiant, or something. In general I don't think it would be game breaking. I would totally go for a feat that set your damage type for all radiant divine powers to a single element based on your diety. I'd like it to have some other side benefit as well (maybe free weapon focus in the diety's favored weapon or something?).
It seems likely to be balanced to just give it for free but just be aware of the tradeoff it involves: radiant is basically the best damage type so far in terms of vulnerability/resists and also maintains the 'divine beats undead' theme, while other elements tend to be resisted or ignored more often but some have better support feats. For example, if you made the cleric an all cold all the time cleric then expect them to take wintertouched and lasting frost at some point, but also for them to face fewer naturally vulnerable foes (and those that are usually get slowed instead of more damage) and more resistant foes.
From what I've seen making them necrotic seems like a pure and total nerf. As far as I am aware, necrotic damage is resisted by many and vulnerable by almost none and all objects are immune (including enemy-like traps). And while there are plenty of feats now to add necrotic onto other damage types (which isn't all bad; dual damage types are strictly better than either one. It's basically a way to bypass some resists/immunities), there are only 3 support feats to improve necrotic damage. Two of these give (nonstacking) +1/2/3 feat bonus to damage (only thing special here is you can chose one or the other and therefore choose between int 13/con 13 or wis 13/con 13 as prereqs), and a Shadar-kai racial feat to bypass some of the everpresent necrotic resistance. So.. IF your divine character is Shadarkai, reskinning all the radiant powers to necrotic and taking Deathly Disruption will be a non-crippling nerf to match theme.
Salla: Necrotic doesn't work for the RQ; she hates undead, and therefore attacking them with something that most, if not all of them, resist would be stupid, and attacking them with power that they're vulnerable to is smart.
Also, Im pretty sure that there are several options for worshipers of the Raven Queen and Shadar kai, be they PPs or feats or what have you, that actually grant necrotic damage effects. Necrotic is often paired with undead, but doesn't necessarily equal undead. It makes sense for a worshiper of the Goddess of Death to be able to wither someone with a prayer or attack...This is a necrotic effect.
Obviously, a divine character of the Raven Queen, if they have them in their arsenal, wouldn't use their necrotic powers against undead...
Also, I was just using that as an example... I'm not looking only for necro-divine characters. The Raven Queen was only the most obvious discrepancy.
Its hard to imagine a Sea God, or even a Love God shooting lighting and fire at people. In this case radiant would work okay as a symbol of divine power and all that.
I just am curious why fire and lighting got used to much in Divine powers. They are synonymous with divinity. Unless of course, all of the gods are Zeus, Thor and the "fire and brimstone" God of the Old Testament.
See... I too play in a variant world with gods directly hailing from the Shadowfell. Those three godlike beings, called Great Shadows, will make use of Radiant energy, too. Why? Simple. Radiant refers to the Divine Spark inside beings of divine nature, the power that created them and drives them. Radiant does not - at least for me - refer to bright and good. It refers to intensity for me.
Dark gods might have dark light radiating with burning intensity...
I guess I can live with radiant damage just being a catch all for "godly power." I mean, I can't really thing of a power to represent darkness.
Its really just the lightning and fire powers that bug me the most.
Avandra: Green radiant energy
Bahamut: Gold or Purple radiant energy
Corellon: Reddish-Yellow radiant energy
Erathis: Brown radiant energy
Ioun: Blue radiant energy
Kord: Red radiant energy
Melora: Greenish-Brown radiant energy
Moradin: Dark Brown radiant energy
Pelor: Bright Yellow radiant energy
The Raven Queen: Black radiant energy
Sehanine: Silver radiant energy
It's dark radiance. Works the same as radiant damage, but it's dark. Happy now?
Oh man, thats so clever...Why didn't I think of that! :D
The Green Lanterns use Willpower which has the spectrum of green
The Sinestro Corp use Fear, which is yellow,
Red Lanterns = Rage,
Agent Orange = Avarice
Blue Lanterns are hope
The Indigo Tribe is compassion
Starfires = love represented by a violet light.
So, no matter what the god, they can all have different colours of radiant light to strike their foes, it just should be colour coded for each god.
Also, I bet the divine classes in PHB3 are going to surprise us. Many of you may not remember, but necromancy used to control all the healing in D&D - harnessing the power of life and death. It could be that the Necromancer is going to be a divine class, rather than shadow. Especially, since most mindless undead are unaligned. Just food for thought.
Yup. A black light. Instead of bathing the room in glowing white light, it makes all the white in the room glow in a purple light. The Raven Queen *and* Bane would approve.
As would Dook Dook, god of goth teenagers, ferrets, and underground raves.
Radiant fits MOST gods, its true. But a God of darkness and shadows probably wouldn't grant his priests lazer/light attacks.
My god of darkness grants his characters radiant damage power in the form of a null light beam that draws the positive energy out of the target violently, which means that the damage isn't done by the beam, but the fleeting light.
Radiant fits MOST gods, its true. But a God of darkness and shadows probably wouldn't grant his priests lazer/light attacks.
There's always that black glow/photo negative effect you see in TV shows whenever a character is using some kind of "nega-energy". It's both dark and sort of bright at the same time.
Come to think of it, that's the first thing that's ever made me want to play an Invoker.
As would Dook Dook, god of goth teenagers, ferrets, and underground raves.
But doesn't Dook dook love Glow sticks too? Er, I mean, Sun rods?
;)
I haven't looked at it, but it occurs to me that fire and lightning (along with radiant) might lean towards the types of secondary properties that the developers felt fit best with the divine power source
Makes sense. 'Blue lightning from the heavens' to smite people is a schtick as old as First Edition, and really, in every mythology I've ever looked into, at some point, some god decides to burn a city.
1. Changing damage types - The radiant to necrotic conversion for followers of evil gods works well, and isn't too overpowered.
2. Reflavoring - Describe the powers in ways that fit the god. For instance, a cleric of Sehanine would probably use silver moonlight for radiant attacks, or a follower of Moradin would summon the energy of the forge into a beam of orange flame. Even some evil gods might have "radiant" powers, in the form of black "light" or a sickly green glow.
3. Multiclassing/Skill Training - Not all priests need be clerics or even divine. A follower of a god of thieves and trickery might have a Rogue multiclass, or might have taken things like Bluff and Thievery as skill training feats. Some of the "darker" priests might be multiclassed with Warlock or Wizard for more appropriate powers.
Ok ok, so I absolutely love what they've done with divine classes and all, especially the avenger and the invoker.
I've noticed something that I REALLY don't like about divine classes...The damage type associated with the powers don't fit with the flavor of some of the gods. I mean, they are always either radiant, fire, or lightning damage.
Sure those powers will work fine if you're playing a character of any divine class that worships Pelor or some sort of storm god, but I just can't imagine an avenger of The Raven Queen attacking his foes with those damage types (cold or necrotic seems much more fitting in this case).
Would it be game breaking to allow for players to change out damage types as long as they were fitting to their god? Or maybe even a substitution feat to allow such a swap?
What do you think? And do you think Divine Power might fix this problem?
I'd let a player do it in a heart beat.
Would it be game breaking to allow for players to change out damage types as long as they were fitting to their god?
Absolutely. Everyone knows that if you make a change on your own the whole game falls apart.
But if WoTC makes the exact same change & sells it to you? Then it's perfectly fine.