No more GM sucker punches, and the gameplay challenges thereof

[Volourn]

"Concession accepted. Have a nice day.  :biggrin:"

 

Oh, you gave up? AS In haven't. You do realize that the PHB is not the only resource right?  It's a book that's what? 300 or so pages long? It can't go into every detail but if you read it as well other soruces I am right you are wrong. DnD is not a broken system and it sure isn't a 'horribly broken' system. And, claiming other books be it DMG or other - are 'optional' is irrelvant since, officially, per DnD rules written in the PHB ALL rules are optional PHB included. So, nice try.

 

But, hey, tell me if raise dead is 'overpowered' when your priest dies and nobody else can cast the spell or your 8con wizard dies and fails the RS roll or even worse your 18con dwarf with 99% RS ends up getting a bad roll. HAHAHA! Or tell me how raise dead is broken when your low level party asks the only cleric capable of casting the spell in the area to do so and he a) refuses and laughs, b) tries to but god makes spell fizzle, or c) he tells you  that in return you have to do something for him and it's something your 'goodly' heroes find distasteful.

 

Do you even know how to play DND and know the rules? You'd think since you have the manual you would but you don't. perhaps, you've spent too muich time playing DND CRPGs like BG that treat raise dead as just another random spell which it isn't or heck doesn't even enforce alignment/godly wishes on its priests as it should.

 

 IIRC, You can read in the DMG about 'purchasing spells' and see what it says about various spells.

 

 

"How does the video game industry still exist, then?"

 

It give potential customers what they want. That's why. It exists because there is a market for video games.

 

"Or [government of your choice]?"

 

One dislking a gov't doesn't mean it's broken. Also, one's 'broken' gov't is another one's 'awesome gov't. I dislike Russia's gov't but it seems to be 'working'. *shrug*

 

 

Plus, being an 'evil' gov't doesn't mean you are 'broken'.

[Gromnir]

 

I re-read the descriptions in the PHB and DMG (AD&D 2e). Here are the limitations:

 

• Body must no older than 1 day / caster level, i.e., 9 days old, tops, for a 9th level caster.
• Recipient of the spell has CON permanently lowered by 1 point.
• Recipient must make Resurrection Survival check or be permanently dead.
• Recipient must be human or demi-human, unless DM rules otherwise.
• Any missing body parts won't be restored. (Of course there is other magic that can do that.)

There is no mention of the soul having to want to return, cost to the caster, or required divine approval. (Some of that was added in 3e though, precisely because resurrection-on-order is so obviously absurd.)

 

However the core rules as written do not impose any limits beyond that. So a L9 priest could cast Raise Dead 365 times a year. If one person out of 10,000 was a L9+ priest, that'd be enough to keep a fair-sized town's aristocracy in Raise Deads at will. Which is silly, wherefore all the houseruling to make it less so.

 

D&D is badly broken, and AD&D is ludicrously broken. This is just one of the ways.

well, to be fair, a 9th level cleric in 2e were not an every-town kinda personage. rogue's gallery stats for rigby list him as level 9 and serten gets all the way to 15. rogue's gallery were, admittedly, 1st edition, but leveling didn't become faster in second, so am thinking it is fair to use such well-known iconic characters as a guide. also, rez fail were based 'pon constitution and average con o' 9 is gonna result in a fail rate of 30%.  if you died originally 'cause o' age or general poor health (constitution) those fail chances is gonna be even less forgiving. furthermore, any dm is gonna have the cleric beholden to tenants of faith such that random or your example spam resurrections of the aristocracy would be seeming unlikely.  

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

 

 

ack. needs correct this. serten, the famous cleric for whom numerous spells is named, were a 10th level cleric, not 15. our rogue's gallery got a printing error so we we realized something were up when we took another peek and it appeared as if serten had 10 hps at level 15.  that struck us improbable. actual scores were charisma 15, level 10 and 53 hps. better.

 

...

 

not that any here were genuine curious, but these were the most iconic player characters in the d&d world at the time, and they barely had eclipsed the level 9 threshold.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Lephys]

I hope they implement some sort of reaction system (One thing 4E got right) with a complimentary "Spell Craft" checks were one can attempt to recognize a spell as it is being cast, and seek to counter it.

Ooh!

 

What if... instead of simply having to prepare the appropriate counter-spell spell, you simply had to "spend" one of your spell slots to counter a spell?

 

As in, you have 3 high-level spells prepared, buy you get hit with some horrible equivalent-level spell from an enemy (something that's just an effect, and not damage). And you get your Spell Craft check, as per your example (I've always loved that whole spell identification aspect in combat). And, if you succeed in identifying the spell, you have the option of spending a spell to counter-act that spell (not always to 100% counter-effect.).

 

The result would be the same (having to use a spell slot to counterspell something), but it would be a lot less rock-paper scissors. Plus, if you'd already cast all your spells of the appropriate level, you wouldn't be able to do it. I know a lot of times when you first get Level X spells, you only have like 1 per day. So, if you get to a combat with something like Petrify, do you wait it out in case you need that spell to counter the Petrify? Or do you just cast that spell in the hopes that you won't need to counter Petrify?

 

Opportunity cost.

 

*shrug*. Just a thought.

[Mr. Magniloquent]

 

I hope they implement some sort of reaction system (One thing 4E got right) with a complimentary "Spell Craft" checks were one can attempt to recognize a spell as it is being cast, and seek to counter it.

Ooh!

 

What if... instead of simply having to prepare the appropriate counter-spell spell, you simply had to "spend" one of your spell slots to counter a spell?

 

As in, you have 3 high-level spells prepared, buy you get hit with some horrible equivalent-level spell from an enemy (something that's just an effect, and not damage). And you get your Spell Craft check, as per your example (I've always loved that whole spell identification aspect in combat). And, if you succeed in identifying the spell, you have the option of spending a spell to counter-act that spell (not always to 100% counter-effect.).

 

The result would be the same (having to use a spell slot to counterspell something), but it would be a lot less rock-paper scissors. Plus, if you'd already cast all your spells of the appropriate level, you wouldn't be able to do it. I know a lot of times when you first get Level X spells, you only have like 1 per day. So, if you get to a combat with something like Petrify, do you wait it out in case you need that spell to counter the Petrify? Or do you just cast that spell in the hopes that you won't need to counter Petrify?

 

Opportunity cost.

 

*shrug*. Just a thought.

 

 

To clarify, I meant "counter" in all senses of the term. Either to nullify their spell directly, or simply cast a spell in response to it. That being said, I always wished in 3rd Edition D&D that someone could expend and equivalent or greater level spell to counter another. Needing to have a just the exact spell to use as a counter, or having Dispel Magic hog up a major portion of your spell slots just was not practical.

 

I'm in general agreement with your suggestion for those reasons an more. I feel counter-spelling would be a nice function to have in PoE, since pre-buffing will not exist and the prevalence of hard-counters is...questionable/tenuous/unknown. It would make a great Wizard class ability.

 

*Edited for grammar.

Edited April 22, 2014 by Mr. Magniloquent

[Karkarov]

"Recipient must make Resurrection Survival check or be permanently dead."

 

Again, this is the big one that people miss. The spell doesn't always works. On top of that your con is lowered so if you die more times you have EVEN less of a chance to survive another casting. Your typical human has a 9 or 10 con.  A priest is not going to bother trying on some random punk. Raise Dead also doesn't work on elves (in old times maybe 3E changed that) so another limiting factor as you then have to use ressurection. A good priest is not going to use it on evil characters or likely vice versa. You are basing this on lame ass CRPGs.

You realize your conn also has to be absolutely in the gutter for you to not have a very high chance of success.  Specifically a guy with 10 conn, (absolute human average according to D&D) had a 75% chance of success on the roll.  If you cast it on the rate 18 conn character who was the peak of human conditioning guess what.... no roll they auto pass it.  So 3/4 butt average guys could make the roll.  Until your conn hits an abysmally low 4 you always have at least a 50% chance, even then you still have a 45%.

 

So it wasn't as hard to make that roll as you imply, especially for fighter type characters.

 

Regardless we aren't talking about Eternity versus pen and paper RPG's as Eternity isn't a pen and paper game.  We are talking about it versus the Infinity Engine games where I don't ever recall having to make a resurrection survival roll or losing conn for being raised.

 

Oh also, not all cleric spells were gifts from gods.  Clerics could draw power from their own beliefs and literally supply their own spells, likewise a good DM who felt the clerics god wouldn't want the cleric raising people from the dead could simply not let his clerics learn the spell from the get go.  Very few DM's treated clerics correctly, as in, you can't cast these spells cause you worship Waukeen and what does wealth and commerce have to do with summoning a huge insect swarm?

Edited April 22, 2014 by Karkarov

[constantine]

There is NO resurrection magic in PoE (right? not 100% sure)

 

 

Good call from devs, and you guys don't need to argue over it so much. Pen-and-paper D&D can be & more likely is 'house rules'. You may create a Campaign world where nobody dies since almost everyone is brought back to life (i think it'd make an interesting notion btw  )

[constantine]

There is NO resurrection magic in PoE (right? not 100% sure)

 

 

 

 

Confirmed there will be no resurrections.

[Karkarov]

Confirmed there will be no resurrections.

Yes if a character dies in Eternity, they dead.

 

Bear in mind "death" and "just getting knocked out" are very different though.  If you run out of stamina you are "knocked out".  You have to run out of HP, which is much harder to damage than Stamina is, to actually die.  Example.... a guy hitting you with an attack that hits for 4 Stamina damage might only do 1 HP damage, or even none at all.  When you see Sawyer talk about the chance that a guy might take you out in one hit.... he means knock you out, not take you from Full HP to dead.

Edited April 22, 2014 by Karkarov

[Volourn]

Exactly. They're using the very lame NWN2-JE-KOTOR-ME nonsense.Good thing theya re giving the option of death = death. As that's the way it should be.

 

 

"75% chance of success on the roll."

 

Which means 1 in 4 would fail.  That should you that the roll isn't to be taken lightly. And, then you lose 1 con so if you die again your chances of failure increases. Like I said, it's a useful powerful spell but you don't want to spam it and if your party is constantly dying that you need a raise dead spell so much perhaps you should take a closer look to the party's play style or the DM. L0L

 

I remember having entire quests based around the raise dead spell. Good times.

[Chippy]

Are percentages in? I asked about them in "CRPG Pitfall to avoid thread".  Maybe someone more tech savvy than I could explain how game engines manage a percentage or a die roll, because in most games, I'm less than impressed. 

[Hassat Hunter]

I don't know about all games, but the few I know it's just a random number 1-100, and then the chance decides whenever true or not (so 15% being 1-15)

[Karkarov]

Are percentages in? I asked about them in "CRPG Pitfall to avoid thread".  Maybe someone more tech savvy than I could explain how game engines manage a percentage or a die roll, because in most games, I'm less than impressed. 

I am pretty sure there is no percentage roll in this game.  Per the other thread if you have "death" on and you die then well... you dead.  There is no raising in game per the devs themselves so if you play with death on and a character dies you either reload or find a new party member.

[Volourn]

Except main character obvious. Main character dead = game over ala BG since the story is PC centric.

[Karkarov]

Except main character obvious. Main character dead = game over ala BG since the story is PC centric.

Yeah pretty much.  I don't think you game over if the MC just goes unconscious though.  At least I sure hope not.

[IndiraLightfoot]

 

Except main character obvious. Main character dead = game over ala BG since the story is PC centric.

Yeah pretty much.  I don't think you game over if the MC just goes unconscious though.  At least I sure hope not.

 

I hope so too. That was a nice feature in NWN2. Your MC could be all but dead while the rest of your companions tried to save the day.