Spell questions - Caster level et al

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If a spell has capped damage at level 10, as with fireball, for example, would it be equally easy to save against it when cast by a level 10 caster or a level 30 caster (all else being equal), or is the difficulty purely based on the spell itself, main casting stat modifier and possible spell focus?

If it is not so, then situations calling for level 20+ casters are rather rare and practically encountered only when aiming for maximum spell durations and multiclassing to get most out of your characters would be a good idea.

Another thing I thought of and am curious about is the flesh to stone spell. AFAIK it bypasses spell resistance the same way disintegrate does, but when one kills an enemy with it, does he get its stuff (for example, destroying the statue somehow)?

 

Flesh to stone turns items to stone as well.

Damage is capped at level ten, but difficulty is adjusted by the power of the mage casting, the damage is until a certain point for balance reasons.

 

Oh well, there's little use for it then. Disintegrate is simply better whenever encountering enemies with loot. I somehow didn't imagine all items were flesh too.

Is a spell cast by level 15 caster easier to save against by 15 points than a spell cast by level 30 caster (all else being still equal)?

 

My mistake, just checked back:
The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a mage’s spell is 10 + the spell level + the mage’s Cha or Int modifier.

so a lvl 30 would be harder to resist due to the improvements to Charisma he can accrue, plus has access to more spells, feats etc to improve damage output and overcoming resistance.

 

Equally easy. Regardless of caster level, or cap.

Lots of spells are uncapped. The thing is, capped damage spells become useless as the game progresses. HOF mobs are not impressed by magic missiles. Thus, a damage dealing caster needs higher levels, to cast uncapped spells, to deal damage worth the effort of clicking the cast button.

Uncapped damage spells: Shocking Grasp, Melfs arrow, Skull trap, Mordenkainen's Force Missiles, flame arrow, delayed blast fireball, horrid wilting. (Summoning spells mostly too, as some other spells, useful or less so)

 

Once you reach the damage cap of a spell (if there is one), the only thing you gain from additional levels is that it becomes easier to penetrate your target's spell resistance (if any) as you do a comparison between the caster's and target's levels during that phase. Saving throws are unaffected by caster's levels, although the extra stat points every 4th level can be used to boost your casting stat to increase the spells' DC indirectly.

 

I would almost characterize the damage cap on spells like Fireball as somewhat archaic, given that everything else in D&D 3E, including HP, scales with level linearly. Whereas, in 2E, HP progression pretty much stops at level 10.

I guess they want to prevent a level 3 spell from being useful throughout the entire game, but what it does instead is make you have to pick other level 3 spells, such as ghost armor. So its not that no level 3 spells are useful through the entire game - as I said, spells like ghost armor definitely are - its just that, for some reason, fireball isnt one of them.

 

Those are some fair points...

I would say that Skull Trap is definitely a level 3 spell that IS useful throughout all of normal mode and HOF mode.

Also, it might be considered that if the regular Fireball spell were uncapped, then it might make the level 7 Delayed Fireball spell somewhat less significant. The DFB spell could still do more damage, since it's based on d8's vs. d6's for the regular FB spell. But without any damage caps, that's not exactly a huge difference (about 1 point of damage on average per damage die per level).

 

Yeah, it would make balancing other spells such as DBFB a bit of a nightmare.

Still, its the primary reason that almost no one uses bombardment spells in HOF - they just take too long to kill enemies, even DBFB.

 

Compared to DBF a plain fireball is saved against at a +4 penalty, which is quite a lot less damage, especially considering that mobs with evasion dont get any damage at all on a successful save. Still wouldnt use it even uncapped. Same with Skull trap, which doesnt even get the elemental feat damage boost. No reason to cast it with a DBF or horrids memorized.

 

At what level are spells from scrolls cast?

For example, does a level 30 rogue throw a fifth-level fireball or a tenth+ level fireball, and would his shield last for more than 10 rounds?

The DC is probably quite low, but self-buffs would make rogue quite a competent character if spell durations are reasonable.

 

Seems like any item-activated spell is cast at the lowest possible level, ie. Book of Leaves gives you the caster level 3 variant of Barkskin and Shield ring buffs you with a caster level 1 Shield spell.

Therefore the only such items I ever bother with are Wand of the Heavens (9d6) and Wand of Cat's Grace/Bull's Strength. The latter two work fine as a short-term substitute for a full rest/rebuff cycle if you know you're going to end up traveling for several hours between areas soon.

 

Also I suspect item-activated spells have pathetically low DCs. Not sure, though.

 

Yep, I tested, and found out that spells are indeed cast from scrolls (at least via use magic device skill) at lowest possible level. Sort of makes the whole skill useless if one is not willing to hoard on emotion:hope (and possible other fixed effect buff spell) scrolls.

What a disappointment. How to make a full rogue and make one useful? Half orc backstabber monster with a double handed ax?

 

i like actually the way it works. It was never funny to run around like a christmas tree with items for everything. If a party needs a fireball cast, then it better should have a sorc, not a backpack full of necklaces of explosion.

 

What's the point of having a skill if one benefits pretty close to nothing by investing in it? The amount of scrolls found in the game is quite limited already.

Besides, can you imagine anything cooler than being backstabbed by a sneaky ol' christmas tree? "Didn't expect that, did you?"

 

I'll agree that the Use Magic Device skill probably is rather useless. A Magic Missile wand that only fires off a single MM per use seems pretty damned useless to me. As Rechet points out, there are some wands that have some use since even at its minimum level, its duration is fairly lengthy, like Emotion Hope or Bull's Strength. But wands based on those spells are rather few, and probably aren't worth spending a lot of effort and SP trying to develop the UMD skill.





As for making rogues nasty...

First of all, I've got to say that a lot of it depends on expectations. If you're expecting a pure rogue backstabber to be chunking enemies in a single attack, you'll likely be rather disappointing. However, if you have more reasonable expectations, you might find yourself enjoying a rogue.

In my last party, The Windriders, my rogue, Orran; a human Rog X/Ftr 4 with "only" a STR of 16 to start, was a devastating character as game progressed. And Orran didn't require his STR to be massively buffed with a big 2H weapon in hand to be nasty. At his nastiness, Orran was able to wreak havoc with a simple poisoned dagger. He'd hit the target with the dagger, the poison would start taking its effect, but then he'd keep hitting the target with that dagger and the poison damage would really start piling up in a hurry. BTW, note that sneak attack damage isn't affected by the type of weapon used.

Something else to consider is that a rogue with a poisoned dagger or a wounding short sword (or other wounding weapon) can actually produce a lot of damage from the poison or wounding effects, even if the weapon's standard damage seems minimal, if he piles up a number of hits on the target. (Some targets are immune to poison but not wounding, so I'd switch weapons. But I also had another backup weapon for targets, like undead, that seemed immune to both.) It's also worth noting that poisoned or wounding damage can be really nasty for spellcasters, since it can make it really difficult for a mage to complete his spell casting without it being disrupted by the poison or wounding damage. At times, you can even nail a first mage with a couple of hits with a poisoned or wounding weapon, then quickly switch to a second nearby mage. With any luck, you might be able to disable two mages with "painful" poison or wounds.

In closing, I enjoy playing rogues and believe that they can be surprisingly nasty in IWD2. I don't know if the above points will hold up in HOF, since I didn't take this party into HOF, but in normal mode, it worked out just fine.

 

The only problem with poisons, bleeding and anything that does damage over time is that direct damage just kills so much faster.

But yes, if you're willing to micromanage it, it's quite hilarious to have several enemies bleeding after you've struck each one of them - usually no more than once each - with a nice sneak attack. The dps does rack up, although the ramp-up time is considerable.

 

Well, I mean, one benefits pretty close to nothing for investing in ANY of the skills in IWD2. There aren't any skills that make you say, "Wow, if I had OrcKnowledge-30 I'd be doing 30% more damage against orcs right now!" That's why the human bonus of +1 skill points/level is so meh.

That said, I always have way more scrolls than I know what to do with. I hang on to a Resurrection scroll on purpose, just in case my main cleric dies and one of my lvl1 Dreadmasters needs to resurrect her, but other than that and the minimal set of spells that I intend to have my illusionist(s) cast, there's not much I can do with them. I tend to have the illusionists learn the other wizard spells anyway just because it's a form of stat increase, but what do you do with the extras and the cleric scrolls? I ought to sell them, but I always hang on to them just in case I ever need them, which I never do, until they start falling out of my ears and I HAVE to sell them. I guess if I were playing a solo Rogue I'd find a use for the best scrolls, especially the summoning ones.

-Max

 

Rechet, I don't mean to have this sounding like I'm coming down on you (cuz I'm not), but what's this freaking problem with "micromanagement"? If I wanted to watch a movie, I'd watch a movie!!! I ***WANT*** to control the actions of my characters! I don't want them doing stupid things! The pathfinding issues are annoying enough without letting the characters act stupidly in battle, just because some stupid AI script says so.

I guess that this "micromanagement" complaint just drives me batty. To me, there's no point in even playing the game if I'm not controlling the characters and their actions!!! ARGH!!!


As for this tactic not producing immense direct damage in a single attack, oh heaven forbid a character not be the ultimate maximized, power-gamed, dps monster!


Sorry for the tone, but I'm frustrated with powergaming being the only standard for judging the effectiveness of characters and classes and such.