Proposal: Bring Spells in line with PnP

[Brokenbone]

Deafened status, per the NWN2 wiki, may give a 20% spell fail chance for verbal spells... as well as somehow cut someone off from the ability to enjoy bardic support (can't hear song = can't get all the tasty buffs?).

http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Deafened

I take that wikia thing with a grain of salt though. Maybe it's accurate, maybe it's not.

If it does do some nasty things and DOESN'T impact AI, a blended "temp blind, perma deaf" may at least be better than the current state of affairs. *shrugs*

[Blindhamsterman]

Lesser and Greater Missile Storm Spells.

The only spell like these in PNP is a bit different it's level 4 I believe. It can be countered by Shield Spell and does lower dice of damage.


My suggestion - to keep versatility and coolness would be this:

We add the Spell IDs for Lesser and Greater missile storm spells to the shield spell as spells it negates.

We then drop their damage types down to 1d4+1s instead of 1d6s.

Means such an uber spell is decreased in max damage, has a slightly higher average damage and is completely negated by a level 1 spell

Seems totally fair. And should be a simple thing to update.

Anyone have issue with the above?

[Ithildur]

What spell is it you're referring to from PnP? Just wondering.

[Zelknolf]

I know the one that BHM refers to, but also can't recall the precise name. It lives in the Spell Compendium, and functions by firing one missile per caster level (max 10) at a primary target, and each one ricochets to hostile targets near the primary target, and the spell is stopped by Shield. It's largely meant to fill the force magic gap between Magic Missile / Mage Armor and (ssh, not really Bigby because he's a Greyhawk wizard)'s [x]ing Hand spells.

I'm not keen on rolling this out at the same time as the new resting restrictions, because we already have wizards living and dying by the missile storms. Give it another release, so people can get used to not having all of the spell refreshes they want and then some first-- it'll be worth hitting then.

[t-ice]

If it does do some nasty things and DOESN'T impact AI, a blended "temp blind, perma deaf" may at least be better than the current state of affairs. *shrugs*

That might be good, though not really high priority. It's only against PCs that this would be used, as I see it. And the main problem is that, at least far as I know, at least a server reset will fix all ailments. So it'd be technically challenging to use getting deafened as a plot feature.

Color me math staggered, but doesn't 1d6 have exactly the same average damage as 1d4+1 (average is 3.5)? So really, just as well. You fire so many missiles that it's the average that counts anyway. Modifying Shield to block Missile Storm, just as well, but mostly irrelevant. Odds are mobs won't be doing much with it, and how often do PCs get hit by missile storms? Still, suppose it's a nifty addition.

[Zelknolf]

Greater missile storm is significantly more powerful, and trumps even level 9 spells in its capacity to do raw damage in a single dose. The details of how the missile storms are implemented also leads to some technical (technically, exploitable-- but not really something to rage about; it's very difficult for a player to notice that they're doing it on account of the spam that the missile storms put out) problems-- and those would get solved by the Spell Compendium implementation.

[t-ice]

I do recall the Missile Storm being great in what little I played of the MotB campaign. If it's considered overpowered and toned down, no arguments here. It's particularly silly in the sense that the "storm" is actually only powerful as a single-target killer. Spells that don't split the damage, rather damaging all in area, are far more powerful against groups. Like Firebrand for prime example. If the implementation Zelk speaks of brings in a area-of-effect element (akin to Chain Lightning perhaps?) it would sound particularly welcome to me.

[hollyfant]

Greater missile storm is significantly more powerful, and trumps even level 9 spells in its capacity to do raw damage in a single dose.

Except... it doesn't. It's a lot of little doses. Get ye some DR, and let them spam their puny missiles.

ALFA's low-levelness - in gear and enemies as well as in actual levels - can cause a spell like this to reap havoc. But it's not necessarily the spell's fault.

Also: does a "miss chance" counter these?

[Brokenbone]

We do not have DR for magic/force damage that I can think of. Elemental/Sonic, or Negative, yes those are priced! Same with a little bit of Physical via things like Adamantine or spells like Stoneskin. Divine and Magic damage are more or less irresistible. Spell Resistance may screen out on a % chance, or spells like Globe of Invulnerability, or an immunity item that names off a spell like Magic Missile, or a spell that is a specific counter (like Shield)... but note we also don't have counterspelling.

Missile storms are kind of in a "class of their own."

[t-ice]

Yeah, no DR against nwn2 magic damage. (Really should be force damage, but that doesn't exist in nwn2, and force is pretty much supposed to be unresistable.)

And yeah, if you cast Missile Storm to a group it's not great since the damage spreads out and doesn't add up to much compared to the likes of Firebrand, Chain Lightning or even good ol' Fireball. The thing is nwn2 Missile Storms are lone-target killers, since all the irresistable missiles gang up on one target if there's only one in the area. This will outright murder a lone wiz, sorc or even rogue - no save nor gear to help (thought there is Spell Resistance). Whether that's unbalanced, well, I wouldn't be in clear opposition if someone claims so, but high level spells are powerful, and target being alone is a big if. But anyone got a canon reference?

[Ithildur]

Hm... I personally rarely used Missile Storms when I played the OC/expansions or my high lvl caster on another NWN2 server. I felt there were better ways to kill single targets with.

The lvl 4 version does 24-35 dmg average based on caster lvl (caps at 1d6*10), no save, hits unerringly. The orb spells do 24-52 based on caster lvl (caps at 1d6*15) no save, ignores SR, and has a secondary disabling effect if fort save is failed, requires an easy to land ranged touch attack (which also means sneak attack and/or critical hits apply when they're brought in line with pnp). Range favors Missile storm, but imo isn't a huge factor if you know what you're doing and not soloing. Ice Storm does 7d6 or more to an entire group, two types of dmg, no save, etc. Also, Empowered Magic Missile can do 30 dmg or so on a good roll, using up only a lvl 3 slot (plus pay for a fairly common feat for wizards/sorcey's) though it can be blocked much more easily than missile storms.

The lvl 6 version does 70 dmg average (2d6*10; max per single target is locked at 10 missiles iirc) to one target and then you're done. Meanwhile, lvl 6 spells offer stuff like Bigby Forceful Hand (no save), Disintegrate (save or up to 2d6*20 dmg; 5d6 if save made), or Flesh to Stone (save or die). Against most dangerous single targets I'm going with the Bigby or Disintegrate 9 times out of 10 FTW, unless I want to exploit the Missile Storm bug (which I prevented anyway by installing a spell fix mod that removed the bug). Or I Mass Bulls Str my entire party; why settle for 7*10 for one round when I can make, say 2 lvl 11 fighters and rogue (8 attacks/rnd) extra nasty for 11+ minutes and launch them at the target?

I think Missile Storms are a concession to the more solo oriented gameplay of vanilla NWN2, where a solo pure wiz/sorc needed to be able to do some dmg by himself vs high save mobs. I'd probably support changing the lvl 4 version to the pnp Spell Compendium version because, well, it fits our pillar better. I'm pretty sure I'd never bother using either lvl 4 version in ALFA regardless (unless a plot/DM featured incorporeal foes?). Donno about the lvl 6 version; drop it altogether maybe or use 2d4+1/missile? Although if we're pulling stuff from outside NWN2 there are better things than Missile Storms to fill up that lvl 6 slot even just from Core books...

[t-ice]

Good rundown of the numbers, Ith. Have to point out that Orbs (as well as some of the others mentioned) are elemental damage, against which easy defenses like Protection from Energy exist. And the ranged touch attack might hit 75% of the time, but it's zero damage if it's a miss. Disintegrate also needs the touch. For mages, mirror image wins against touch attacks.

Anyways, I believe your numbers in that the storm isn't that OMfG-deadly. It still does murder lone low-hp targets, particularly ones who might have defenses against an array of other things, but that's a specific purpose it's good at, and fair enough.

So anyone care to write down the canon version referred, please?

[Blindhamsterman]

For mages, mirror image wins against touch attacks.

sadly not.

Touch attacks ignore Mirror Image - trust me, I've had extensive testing done at the hands of Viigas' many enemies with inflict wound spells.

[t-ice]

Touch attacks ignore Mirror Image - trust me, I've had extensive testing done at the hands of Viigas' many enemies with inflict wound spells.

=(

[Blindhamsterman]

its that reason alone that i'd love to see Mirror Image work more like pnp heh (miss chance for non blinded foes to attack you, hitting an image making the % chance to miss gradually decrease).

Currently MI is better than it should be vs mooks (uber AC = win) but worse against more scary stuff with any kind of touch attack as it ignores MI.