AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic

Xenos wrote:

I'm not talking about buffing the familiars, though some of the less useful ones could be made more useful. Alas that Mosh never got around to doing his changes to Familiars that would have seen them get the love Animal Companions got.

Familiars are not and never have been intended to ever even be combat-worthy. Animal companions are part of class balance for classes that otherwise just flat out suck compared to their counterparts. The skeleton already makes me cringe that it even exists.

But yeah, no need to do anything insanely dumb like retool all summons. Just do what Arelith does and have a conjurer give stuff like +2 ac/ab/str/dex/con and +50 hp per focus if anything. It's what a conjurer does.

You can't really sit there fluffing spells already benefiting from spell foci (coughsEvocationcoughs) while being like "but these guys over here who's spells do nothing with foci... get nothing."

Dark Immolation wrote:

What I always thought Mord's Sword could be was like an animate equipment spell. It'd make more sense given that it's Transmutation(in nwn at least).

You'd cast the spell on a weapon or piece of armor in your inventory, and a sort invisible force construct a la Shelgarns Blade would be summoned wielding or wearing it. The base summon would be relatively weak besides its construct properties, but you could easily make up for it by animating a powerful weapon or armor that you'd otherwise junk or sell. You would basically decide what role you want the summon in by what you animate it with. Weapon = glass cannon. Armor = tank.

And really. What alchemist transmuter doesn't want to be followed around by an animated suit of armor?

That's a pretty awesome idea and would provide a lot of flavor to not just transmuters, but mages in general. As it stands, there is no proper animate spell.

You could go the opposite direction and apply debuffs to all summons UNLESS you have SF/GSF Conjuration. (Maybe large debuffs with no feats, small debuffs with SF, and vanilla with GSF). ESF Conjuration doesn't add anything further because it already gives you the turns/lvl EDK.

The current summon monster spells are already incredibly powerful on Amia. I agree that they don't need to be buffed from where they're at now. Getting my mages to lvl 30 has always been FAR easier than getting anything else to lvl 30 due to summoning and buffing.

Maybe at least make mages earn that power? This would also make Conjurers distinct from non Conjurers without making already very powerful summon spells even stronger.

Snape75 wrote:

You could go the opposite direction and apply debuffs to all summons UNLESS you have SF/GSF Conjuration. (Maybe large debuffs with no feats, small debuffs with SF, and vanilla with GSF). ESF Conjuration doesn't add anything further because it already gives you the turns/lvl EDK.

With my idea of "DC" for summons, it'd be easy just to make it so non-conjurers are getting better summons slower. Not the same as(or as difficult as) having them buffed/debuffed, but it is the same thing empirically. That was in fact something I kept in mind. Currently, it's sort of a no-brainer to use summons as a caster. Everyone uses a summon. It's free damage and a meat shield, you're crazy not to.

I personally disagree with the notion that there should be no-brainer spells, especially ones that don't get any better even if you focus in the supposed school that would make you better at it. Making summons less of a no-risk-large-reward scenario for non-conjurers is probably more warranted than ever, with all these other spell changes giving mages more viable options to stand in battle and do damage.

In my mind, we would do this: if you're a Conjuration based mage with normal casting ability per your level, the DC's for creatures would be in such a way you wouldn't notice a difference. You might get a higher level summon one level earlier than you would before once or twice. If you were not, your line of summons lag a little bit behind what you used to have. You're not horribly gimped, it's still free damage if you still want to try soloing things with a meatshield. But it should and would become more and more apparent to you that sticking behind a summon might not be your best(or only) option any more. That being said, Conjuration as a school is in a pretty good place right now. While the summon risk and reward thing still deserves to be fixed, I will fully admit now might not be the best time to do it. Not before we make sure those "other options" are fully there for mages.

I do agree with about everything here. As it stands, conjurers are still viable for the end game, at least, for the turn based EDK.

And I like the idea of simply lagging the summons that non-conjurors get.

Also, and this should probably be posted under the Bugs thread, but has anyone else noticed mind fog not giving the -6 wis penalty? I haven't tried it on other player characters yet, just monsters. But I haven't noticed any penalty to Wisdom when casted on myself or on monsters, even with ESF enchantment.

Are these spell changes being summarized in an updated list we can see? I can't being to keep track of it all, and it doesn't look like the spells modifications sidebar is current, is it?

Or is there another thread that has a list of all these changes in one updated post?

Thanks.

Most of these have been posted in announcements. We need to translate them into the sidebar though.

Vortex wrote:

Are these spell changes being summarized in an updated list we can see? I can't being to keep track of it all, and it doesn't look like the spells modifications sidebar is current, is it?

Or is there another thread that has a list of all these changes in one updated post?

Thanks.

Because I was looking for them too...

Plus these.

And these.

And part of the Mestil's Sheathe change was left out of the description, apparently.

Because I love you all very much, all the spell changes in one post, alphabetized and sorted by Arcane and Divine. If a spell is found in both the Arcane and Divine spell list, I included it under Arcane, since that is the convention of our current spells tab. Note: this is what is listed, if a spell isn't behaving as stated it's probably a good idea to mention it in the IA Bugs forum.

Arcane

Acid Fog: Each spell focus in conjuration added +1d6 to the secondary damage. Epic spell focus adds +1d6 to the initial damage.
Acid splash: Damage increased to 1d3 + 1. An additional 1d3+1 acid per spell focus.
Balagarn's Iron Horn: fixed to true strength check
Ball Lightning: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Focus applies a -3 penalty to saves vs electricity for 5 rounds.
Bigby's Clenched Fist: Duration is reduced to 5 rounds. Spell Focus Evocation grants +2 to damage per round. Greater Spell Focus Evocation grants +4 damage per round. Epic Spell Focus Evocation grants +1 round duration.
Bigby's Crushing Hand: Duration is reduced to 5 rounds. Spell Focus Evocation grants +2 to damage per round. Greater Spell Focus Evocation grants +4 damage per round. Epic Spell Focus Evocation grants +1 round duration.
Bigby's Grasping Hand: Duration is reduced to 5 rounds. Epic Spell Focus Evocation grants +1 round duration.
Blindness/Deafness: Reduce duration to 2 rounds +1 round for Epic Focus. Greater Focus adds small (Mass Heal sized) AoE.
Chain Lightning: This now has 3 arcs of lightening + 1 arc per spell focus, all arc do full damage, save for half. Targets may get hit by more than one arc.
Cloudkill: +2 to HD for instant death per spell focus in conjurations and for save vs. death. Epic spell focus gives and additional +1d10 acid damage.
Combust: Each Spell Focus adds +1d6 damage to the initial damage and the DoT secondary damage.
Cone of cold: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Spell Focus applies slow on a failed save, and -3 saves vs Cold for 5 rounds. For the BoT variations - fire does a 3 round dot like Wall of Fire, acid does a Acid Breath style one round dot and electricity does the one round stun on a secondary will save like Gedlee's Electric Loop.
Confusion: Reduced to 3 rounds Confusion, with a lasting -2 to mental stats for the remaining duration of 1 round/Caster level. Epic Enchantment raises the penalty to -4 mental stats, and adds an extra round to the Confusion.
Color Spray: Spell Focus adds +1d6 fire damage, Greater Spell Focus adds +1d6 Acid damage, Epic Spell Focus ads +1d6 electric damage and +1 round to the CC effects.
Daze: +1 HD per spell focus.
Delayed Blast Fireball: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Focus makes the trap version do d8 damage dice instead of d6.
Dismissal: Removed the stray +6 to DC that Bioware included for some unknown reason.
Dispel Magic: Each Spell Focus adds +2 to the CL cap of the dispel check.
Displacement: Spell Focus makes 3 rounds per level, Greater Focus makes 5 rounds per level and Epic Focus makes turns turns per level.
Dominate Monster: Duration is reduced to 5 rounds only when cast on PC/Summon/Familiar. Epic Spell Focus Enchantment grants +1 round/turn of duration Added secondary effect -2 Will Save reduction with a duration of 3 turns + 1 turn / 2 levels.
Dominate Person: Duration is reduced to 5 rounds only when cast on a PC/Summon/Familiar. Epic Spell Focus. Enchantment grants +1 round of duration. Added secondary effect -2 Will Save reduction with a duration of 2 rounds + 1 rounds / 3 levels
Electric jolt: Damage increased to 1d3 + 1. An additional 1d3+1 electrical per spell focus.
Ethereal Visage: Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus add 5% concealment and 5/+3 DR, ending at 35% concealment and 30/+3 DR. Epic Focus allows the spell to last Turns/level.
Fear: Reduced to 4 rounds duration, with a lasting Doom effect (-2 AB, -2 damage, -2 skills, -2 saves) for the remaining duration. Epic Necromancy adds an extra round to the Fear.
Feeblemind: Greater Spell Focus also applies the ability damage to Charisma, Epic Spell Focus allows Feeblemind to damage all 3 mental ability scores.
Fireball: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Focus gives 10% fire vulnerability to targets that fail their save for 5 rounds. Nonstacking.
Firebrand: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Focus applies a -3 penalty to fire for 5 rounds.
Flare = +1 round per spell focus.
Gedlee's Electric Loop: Each Spell focus is +1d6 to the damage of the spell. Epic Focus doubles the AoE and adds +1 round to the stun's duration.
Ghostly Visage: Each Spell Focus adds +5% Concealment and 5 DR/+1, ending at 25% concealment and 20/+1 DR at epic.
Great Thunderclap: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic focus adds +1 round to the various control effects
Greater Dispelling: +2 CL to dispel check cap per Spell Focus
Greater Shadow Conjuration Minor Globe of Invulnerability: As normal - adds temporary +5 saves vs Cold and Negative energy. Greater Illusion focus allows spell to last turns/level.
Greater Shadow Conjuration Web: Targets affected by the web take 2d6 cold and negative damage per round while entangled. Greater and Epic spell focus add +1d6 to each damage type.
Hold Monster: Paralyze effect lasts 4 rounds, with a lasting -4 Dex penalty and a 20% slow for the rest of the duration. Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus each att -1 more and 5% more to the Dex/Slow penalty, and Epic Enchantment adds 1 round to the duration.
Hold Person: Hold animal is included in this... Hold/Paralyze reduced to 2 rounds, with a lasting 20% Slow for the rest of the duration. Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus each add 5% to the Slow, and epic Enchantment adds 1 round to the duration.
Horizikaul's Boom: Spell Focus makes the damage die d6, Greater d8, Epic makes it a small (Mass Heal sized) AoE.
Ice Dagger: Each Spell focus adds +1d4 damage to the damage cap (so +3d4 total), Epic makes it a small (Mass Heal sized) AoE.
Identify: +5 Lore per Spell focus
Incendiary Cloud: Each Spell Focus adds +1d6 to the damage of the spell.
Legend Lore: Greater Spell Focus allows the ability to add to Craft Armor and Weapons skills. Epic Skill Focus allows the spell to add to Spellcraft skill.
Lesser Dispel: Each Spell Focus adds +2 to the CL cap of the dispel check.
Lightning Bolt: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Focus adds a secondary Will save to stun for 1 round, similar to Gedlee's Loop.
Magic Missile: Each Spell Focus adds +1 damage per missile, Epic Spell focus makes each missile bounce once to a new target.
Mestil's Acid Breath: 1d6 to damage cap per spell focus. Epic Spell Focus adds 1/2 damage on second round.
Mestil's Acid Sheath: Damage reduced to 1d6+1/caster level. Also grants 10/- immunity to the element that is used (fire/cold/acid from BoT). Spell Focus and Greater spell focus each grant +1d6 to total damage. Epic spell focus raises resistance to 15/-.
Meteor Swarm: epic spell focus reduces the safe zone around the caster to 0.1 feet.
Mind Fog: Each Spell Focus adds -2 Wisdom penalty (so -6 total) to the target on a successful save as long as the target stays in the cloud.
Phantasmal Killer: Each Spell Focus adds +1d6 to the damage on a successful fort save. Even on a successful Fort save, with Epic Spell Focus, the Target is still afflicted with the Doom effect for 5 rounds (-2 attack, damage, saves, skills)
Prismatic Spray: Spell Focus turns the Fire damage portion into 40 (up from 20). Greater Focus turns the Fire and Acid into 60 damage (up from 40 each.) Epic Focus turns all three damage types into 80 damage.
Remove Blindness/Deafness: Epic spell focus conjuration adds 1round/lvl immunity to Blindness and Deafness.
Remove Curse: Epic spell focus conjuration adds 1round/lvl immunity to Curses.
Ray of Frost: An additional1d4 + 1 cold damage per spell focus.
Scintillating Sphere: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Focus gives 10% Electric vulnerability to targets that fail their save for 5 rounds. Nonstacking.
Shadow Mage Armor: Replace old effect entirely with - Applies 5/- cold and negative energy resistance for duration. Epic Focus each add 5/- resist to each of cold and negative.
Shadow Magic Missile: Each missile (max of 5 missiles) does 1d4+1 cold and 1d4+1 negative energy damage, with no save.
Shadow Melf's Acid Arrow: Deals 3d6 cold + 3d6 negative energy damage, and 1d6 cold, 1d6 negative energy every round after for (CL/3) + 1 rounds. Each spell focus adds 1d6 cold/1d6 negative to the secondary damage.
Sound Burst: Each Spell focus adds +1d8 to the damage of the spell. Epic Focus adds +1 round to the Stun's duration.
Sun Burst: Reduced blindness on failed save from permanent to 3 rounds
Tasha's Hideous Laughter: Could remove the DC modifier due to "language barriers".
Wall of Fire: Each Spell Focus adds +1d6 to the damage of the spell. Epic Focus applies a Combust effect, burning the target for 2d6 damage a round for 3 rounds after the target leaves the wall. Does not stack.
Wounding Whispers: There were some bugs left in by Bioware that have been fixed. The damage is now rolled for each attack as opposed to once at spell cast. It calculates damage for Empowered and Maximized versions of the spell.

Divine

Aid: +1d8 temp HP per Spell Focus.
Aura versus alignment: Both good and evil versions become a Divine damage shield and that the damage shield is 1d6 + 1/2 CL. SR is equal to 13 + CL, with each Spell Focus adding +2 more to the SR vs alignment.
Bane: Epic Spell Focus makes this save less.
Call Lightning: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Focus allows the spell's dice to be d8 when in outdoors and wilderness areas.
Cure Light/Moderate/Serious/Critical Wounds: + 1d8 per spell focus in conjuration. Epic Spell focus makes it an AoE effect.
Cure minor wounds: 2+ hp per focus.
Doom: Epic Spell Focus makes this a small (Mass Heal sized) AoE.
Earthquake: nerfed to 20d8, spell focus makes it 21d8, greater spell focus makes it 23d8 and epic spell focus makes it 25d8.
Fire storm: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell.
Flame Lash: Each spell Focus is +1d6 damage. Epic Focus Entangles the target on a failed Reflex save.
Flame Strike: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell.
Hammer of the gods: Each Spell Focus adds +2d8 to the dice cap of the spell. Epic Focus Evocation makes the damage dice of the spell d10 against the caster's opposing alignment (Good <-> Evil, Law <-> Chaos. TN gets nothing, sorry.)
Healing Circle + Circle of Doom: increased to 5d8 base healing or Damage, each SF adds 1d8, ESF adds a small regen or damage over time effect.
Inflict minor wounds: +1 damage per spell focus.
Monstrous Regeneration: Greater spell focus conjuration increases duration to 1 round/caster level. Epic spell focus increases the duration to 2 rounds/caster level.
Neutralize Poison: Epic spell focus conjuration adds 1round/lvl immunity to Poison.
Remove Fear: Epic Spell Focus grants Immunity to Fear for the duration
Remove Blindness/Deafness: ESF adds rounds/level Immunity to Blinded and Deafened.
Searing Light: Each Spell Foci adds +2d6 to the dice cap for damage, Epic Focus adds a fort save vs a 3 round Blind
Sunbeam: Each Spell Focus adds +2d6 to the dice cap of the spell, and +1d6 to the damage vs living targets.
Vine Mine: Entangle has 3d6 piercing damage added, Hamper Movement adds -4 Dex and -2 Reflex saves, Camouflage also adds +4 Move Silently
Virtue: 10 HP to max per spell focus. Max 30. No stacking.

Updated: Jan 8

I think that post is worthy of making a new topic so it isn't buried.

"Spell Changes Compilation."

also you are missing some spells.

chain lighting, monstrous regen, etc.

I was still in the process of editing. It's been updated.

Thanks DI! Awesome.
Wow, that's whole lotta changes. :shock:

I think the new changes along with the nerfing of the Evasion items on the server really made mages arsenal more versatile and fun. Plus the ridiculously long duration of all mages restraining spells was finally balanced so I'm personally really happy about the last balancing wave.

Just two things:

1. Time stop seem to interrupt spellcasting and I don't think it should since it basically speeds up the caster. Why any other spell being cast around the caster be affected by it?

2. Back in the days I remember they said that since there are new ways to resist magical damage, the components needed for IGMS were removed. Are we expecting the components to be back again? To me the same argument that used to be valid for the old Forceful Hand still applies here: if the only way to resist a spell is to become immune to all spells, it is overpowered.

Daniel wrote:

1. Time stop seem to interrupt spellcasting and I don't think it should since it basically speeds up the caster. Why any other spell being cast around the caster be affected by it?

That's actually how it works in its original P&P version. From a pure lore standpoint there might be a reason, but from a game balance standpoint, even in P&P, a couple rounds of spell casting with no save or way to fight back would be a bit over the top. You don't have to be a balance guru to understand that 9 seconds = 3 spells casted hasted, which is more than enough to dispatch most things if they aren't fighting back or healing during the time.

The original NWN version was eventually changed to any spells that are cast during the duration simply take effect at the end of it, which is basically just as bad once you start chaining max IGMS. But if you're looking for a lore reason, I guess you could say that even though you're moving fast, the Weave still has to react in its own time. You can cast a Fireball in frozen time, but it's still going to take a while for it to get to wherever its supposed to be, no matter how fast you cast it.

Quote:

2. Back in the days I remember they said that since there are new ways to resist magical damage, the components needed for IGMS were removed. Are we expecting the components to be back again? To me the same argument that used to be valid for the old Forceful Hand still applies here: if the only way to resist a spell is to become immune to all spells, it is overpowered.

I seriously doubt we're bringing back spell components for IGMS. The idea was flawed in the first place, since we had Bags of Holding. A mage only actually runs out of their components once. Then they wise up and just carry around 5 full bags of them and it never becomes an issue again.

The currently held suggestion for combating IGMS is healing potions. Take that as you might. I still would love to see it made some sort of touch attack, with crits on 20's, but I'm biased in not having a regular noodle-armed mage. That and it leads to things like imp invisibility giving 50% resistance to IGMS/ILMS/Magic Missile and that's no good. Maybe if it could be made to ignore magical concealment... I'm rambling. The components aren't coming back, whether or not IGMS and similar spells will be getting additional means to "resist" them is yet to be determined.

Dark Immolation wrote:

I seriously doubt we're bringing back spell components for IGMS.

That applies to Sand of Time as a component for Time Stop as well?

The idea behind buying components was nice, I think, the execution unfortunately not as much. But at least mages had some expenses - right now, they have almost none. While other classes have to spend thousands on pots, scrolls, ammunition or other miscelaneous items, mages got it all in the head.

And cheers for the list, DI. It's sticky worthy... or something :mrgreen:

Both spells are nerfed compared to their component days.

Dark Immolation wrote:

That's actually how it works in its original P&P version. From a pure lore standpoint there might be a reason, but from a game balance standpoint, even in P&P, a couple rounds of spell casting with no save or way to fight back would be a bit over the top. You don't have to be a balance guru to understand that 9 seconds = 3 spells casted hasted, which is more than enough to dispatch most things if they aren't fighting back or healing during the time.

The original NWN version was eventually changed to any spells that are cast during the duration simply take effect at the end of it, which is basically just as bad once you start chaining max IGMS. But if you're looking for a lore reason, I guess you could say that even though you're moving fast, the Weave still has to react in its own time. You can cast a Fireball in frozen time, but it's still going to take a while for it to get to wherever its supposed to be, no matter how fast you cast it.

So lore-wise none of the versions apply to Amia since all effects occur at the casters time. If I cast, say, Premonition, just when a wizard nearby finished casting Time Stop, according to both versions of TS (nwn and PnP), the Premonition should apply after the TS ends and not be interrupted by it. This is not the case right now and it seems like a bug.

Dark Immolation wrote:

The currently held suggestion for combating IGMS is healing potions. Take that as you might. I still would love to see it made some sort of touch attack, with crits on 20's, but I'm biased in not having a regular noodle-armed mage. That and it leads to things like imp invisibility giving 50% resistance to IGMS/ILMS/Magic Missile and that's no good. Maybe if it could be made to ignore magical concealment... I'm rambling. The components aren't coming back, whether or not IGMS and similar spells will be getting additional means to "resist" them is yet to be determined.

So there's still no consensus about this spell being overpowered? As for suggestions, how about some sort of a concentration check vs target's dexterity + tumble ranks or something, for deciding the percentage of missiles that actually hit the target. I saw something like that on another server and I think it make sense that the mage is supposed to guide the missiles to hit the target.

Maverick00053 wrote:

Both spells are nerfed compared to their component days.

If I remember correctly, before the Arcane Defiance stuff was added the component IGMS version was exactly as the none-component IGMS we have today.

Quote:

So lore-wise none of the versions apply to Amia since all effects occur at the casters time. If I cast, say, Premonition, just when a wizard nearby finished casting Time Stop, according to both versions of TS (nwn and PnP), the Premonition should apply after the TS ends and not be interrupted by it. This is not the case right now and it seems like a bug.

This isn't a bug, it's a fixture of the engine and how Time Stop functions. I guess if you class that as a bug, go for it, but it can't be fixed.

Quote:

If I remember correctly, before the Arcane Defiance stuff was added the component IGMS version was exactly as the none-component IGMS we have today.

No, components were around when more than 10 missiles could hit a single target.

Quote:

No, components were around when more than 10 missiles could hit a single target.

Are you sure? I don't remember playing on Amia at the time IGMS was per default bioware and I play mages from day one. The components were removed at

PaladinOfSune on Mon, Feb 11 2013 wrote:

Removed spell component requirements for Isaac's Greater Missile Storm and Time Stop.

So 3 years ago you could IGMS per default nwn? That's like 300+ magical damage on a single target with metamagic, I don't think I remember something like that.

Default IGMS has a max missile count of 20. I want to say it used to be 20 missiles with up to 15 on a target or something, then was changed to 10 per target but the cap was removed (Thus 30 max). I'm pretty sure it was not always 30 max, but it's been awhile.

One target could be hit by all 20 if done properly. Which wasn't too hard.

Also yes Tormak and I are pretty sure. I remember the times well. Mages were god then.

Alright, this was really bugging me because I was certain at the time they removed the components the spell still had that limitation of 10 missiles per target, yet you seem pretty convinced that it didn't. So I did a lil research to make sure I wasn't hallucinating and I've found numerous posts of players referring to igms from 2009 to 2013, until 4 days before the announcement of the removal of the components by PaladinOfSune.

Galenson on Aug 2009 wrote:

Even A maximised missile storm will do 120 total damage that is divided evenly over a group of targets, an empowered delayed fireball or horrid wilting has the potential to be even nastier to all targets.

Link: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=40422&p=653095&hilit=missile#p653095

Dark Immolation on Aug 2009 wrote:

Anyway, if you set an IGMS, you're better off knowing you're getting a full 120 magical, every time hit the button than playing around with a rank 9 spell that may roll lower damage. Maximize is your friend.

Link: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=40422&p=653047&hilit=igms#p653047

Draco on Jan 2012 wrote:

But compared to spells like Maximized Isaacs Missile Storm, dealing a solid 120 magic damage whether the target is far away or directly in front of you.

Link: viewtopic.php?f=8&t=63571&p=1052383&hilit=missile#p1052383

Herr Delta Houdini on Feb 2013 wrote:

Take note its been nerfed so any one target can only be hit by a maximum of 10 missiles from individual castings, but the amount of missiles fired is uncapped to 30.

Link: viewtopic.php?f=143&t=59938&p=1154107&hilit=IGMS#p1154107

I think you guys talking about waaay way back, before the 1.69 update. Somewhere even before 2006. I am toying with mages the day I was introduced to Amia somewhere along 2006-7 and I don't remember dealing more than 120 magical damage with igms.

Also, I don't know who and when wrote that but I think it also suggests that indeed there was a time when igms was as it is today plus the components.

Ooo, that is a whole lot of changes! Luckily not much seems relevant for Lyraesel except for Wounding Whispers which she likes.

A change I'd like to see is additional difference and flavor added between the Planar Summoning line and the regular I-IX summon line. As is, Planar summons are (generally) a bit tougher in turn for a shorter duration; this more true in Gate vs Summon IX than anywhere else. And while that is fine, I feel like it's a missed opportunity, given that there are no real DC spells for conjuration past level 6(for Arcane at least). Conjuration is fine overall, but there is a bit of a slow down in the mid levels where gaining focus on your spells doesn't really mean anything. You're just waiting for EMD and EDK. Meanwhile with the planar vs summoning line, while planar summons are marketed as being "emergency" buttons, they really don't feel like that at all. They're just stronger summons that you get a shorter time. Even if you tried to use them in an emergency, they don't show up until 1 round after cast, enemy AI doesn't recognize them fast enough to attack them, and any relatively smart player knows to ignore them completely.

Long story short, I think it would be awesome to make them feel like what they ICly are: divine intervention. A Final Fantasy summon. It's not your buddy that tags along with you from spawn to spawn, but something you call because you're either in over your head or need help now. My suggestions are as follows.

1. Normalize all planar summons to 2 rounds/CL/

2. Planar summons when summoned roll an Entreat effect, similar to Knight Commander's against all nearby enemies when they appear. This roll is vs Will and is determined as per regular spell DC.

3. Each spell focus adds a 2d6 Divine damage burst upon summoning/entreatment. With ESF Conjuration the Entreat effect becomes 1 round of Daze.

Dark Immolation wrote:

Long story short, I think it would be awesome to make them feel like what they ICly are: divine intervention. A Final Fantasy summon. It's not your buddy that tags along with you from spawn to spawn, but something you call because you're either in over your head or need help now.

While i like your idea, Planar Binding is not divine intervention, it's kidnapping and extortion. You force a creature of your choosing into a binding circle where it stays indefinitely while you attempt to strike a deal with it. Now i've always been of the mind that if you call something goodly and you are not evil and the need is appropriate, it won't kill you for the assault. IG we can kind of assume that we've made deals with the creatures ahead of time, our first born for 100 callings? Good deal!

Planar Ally, which i like a lot more personally, is the one where you make a request to your deity who then sends you an elemental or outsider of THEIR choosing. Though it can also function as a general plea across the planes. This creature still requires a payment though, so it's not really that different from Binding, save that they answer your call, instead of being forced into a situation where they have to make a deal. Though apparently it can waive the payment.

So even Planar Ally is not really Divine Intervention, but rather Divine Matchmaker. And given that the Planar Ally, and even the Binding can linger indefinitely, or the same creature could be called again and again, could result in a buddy! Though it is important to keep in mind these are NPCs and when played outside of their default setting of "KILL MAIM BURN!" should have DM oversight or at least a nod.

Other fun facts, both of these are Calling spells, as such, when your Planar friend/minion dies, it really dies! Further, these spells have no duration, and thus once called the creatures can stay, as stated above, indefinitely!

Xenos wrote:

While i like your idea, Planar Binding is not divine intervention, it's kidnapping and extortion. You force a creature of your choosing into a binding circle where it stays indefinitely while you attempt to strike a deal with it.

I'm well aware of how they work in P&P, but the NWN versions don't really reflect that at all. The closest you get is that the Planar Binding series can be used to paralyze an Outsider, and a lot of people aren't even aware of that. Either way, I meant the spells are "divine intervention" in the purest sense that they're calling some holy/unholy entity or creature to your aid. And in that context, they should feel more urgent and more of a gamechanger than they currently do. There's a reason you're calling demon or divine agent to your side, rather than a relatively mindless animal, elemental, or beast(the Summon Series).

What you say does however remind me of another option to make the planar summons feel different. In P&P the Bindings and Gate aren't just for getting something to fight with you, they're about getting some help with a task in general. We could give them the henchmen AI from HotU, that would allow them to do(upon command) things like searching for traps, identifying items in an inventory, or healing the target. Alternatively, it would be just as easy to implement a dialogue for them, which of course you'd only be able to access outside of battle. You can ask them to perform one task for you(like the henchmen stuff mentioned before) after which they disappear.

Not that its entirely feasible here, but I played on a server that had a gate variant where if you didn't have magic circle versus evil up the resulting Balor that came out would immediately attack the summoner XD Not saying we should do it at all it was just a rather neat RP gimmick thing.

isn't that how it works vanilla

Not as far as I remember? I dunno its been forever since I played the campaign with a caster and I don't recall it doing that on any other server I've played on. May be wrong though.

Yeah that is vanilla gate. Fun spell but kind of a mess with the fact it can run wild. I rather not deal with that drama.

Maverick00053 wrote:

Yeah that is vanilla gate. Fun spell but kind of a mess with the fact it can run wild. I rather not deal with that drama.

Old school pvp tip. Cast vanilla Gate unwarded, three times, greater sanc out and watch the Balor implosion shit storm.

"If they didn't want us to do it, it wouldn't be in the game!"

DolphinRacer wrote:

Not as far as I remember? I dunno its been forever since I played the campaign with a caster and I don't recall it doing that on any other server I've played on. May be wrong though.

My favourite part of the original game was the bit were you use a summoning circle to call forth a demon and the idea was to talk with it and workout the fate of the dead souls trapped in the place... its funny when you play the game for the first time without a clue and the resulting things that come forth keep attacking and chasing you round.

... for days o would wonder what that item which granted protection against alignment was for! lol

thunderbrush wrote:

Maverick00053 wrote:

Yeah that is vanilla gate. Fun spell but kind of a mess with the fact it can run wild. I rather not deal with that drama.

Old school pvp tip. Cast vanilla Gate unwarded, three times, greater sanc out and watch the Balor implosion shit storm.

Don't forget to summon one while warded thereafter, and dominate one

Are there any plans for tweaking the Shadow Variants yet? As is, the spells still draw from the base script of the original spells they copy. This means not only does Illusion Foci have no affect on them, but anyone with the regular Evocation/Abjuration/Conjuration foci gets full benefits from casting them like you were casting the normal versions. Somewhat mitigated by the fact you can't metamagic most Shadow Variants, but with the new ESF bonuses, the higher DC from casting a spell as a Variant may be worth it. I.E. Casting Fireball from Shades with a +3 to the DC and thus likelier chance of getting that nice fire vulnerability combo going.

An idea for what to do with the Shadow Variants that is more intuitive than the Darkness mechanic combo I suggested earlier.

Shadow Variant Redux:

1. All subspells are changed to use Illusion Foci for their DCs and benefits.

2. Shadow Variants now roll an initial Will save against their targets. On a failed save, the spell is treated as Empowered(or Extended in the case of Darkness and Web) and gains the appropriate Foci benefits. On a successful save, the spells work as their unmodified versions with no additional damage/duration or Foci benefits.

3. Naturally, Mind Immunity nullifies both the empowering effects and the would-be offensive bonuses by default.

This would make them feel like their own things, work around the meta-magic weirdness, and not breach our current lore of how the Variants work. The variants in Amia aren't partially-real like they are in P&P; they are partially made/reconstructed out of shadowstuff. While they don't need to be believed to have an effect on a target, it's easy to reason that additional belief in them could lead to additional effect, as they are still part of the school of Illusion.

We already have stuff in mind for the Shadow spells.

Quote:

1. All subspells are changed to use Illusion Foci for their DCs and benefits.

This is on there.

TormakSaber wrote:

We already have stuff in mind for the Shadow spells.

Quote:

1. All subspells are changed to use Illusion Foci for their DCs and benefits.

This is on there.

Michael Harcourte claps.

TormakSaber wrote:

We already have stuff in mind for the Shadow spells.

Quote:

1. All subspells are changed to use Illusion Foci for their DCs and benefits.

This is on there.

I know it's a "it'll be posted when we finish" deal, but can we get some insight on what else you had in mind? What issues are you guys setting out in general to fix with them and Illusion?

The reason I came up with the empower bit is because the only real offensive options Illusionists get come via the Variants. Weird is sometimes alright in its BoT form, but down the line Illusion is either utility, not-worth-it Fort save(Mass Blindness/Deafness and Phantasmal), or... Color Spray. It would be alright for them to have a few options that do damage so long as they were fulfilling the maxim of the Illusion school: Deceive. That is to say beating something's Will Save. Even with the new Focus benefits the vanilla spells of the Variants aren't very appetizing without some sort of added effects. I suppose it wouldn't have to be damage, though. It could be some sort of CC added to them. Illusion is just lacking in general for offensive features.

Anyway, that's the issue I find with them, even if they were currently using Illusion Foci. The utility of having multiple spells doesn't really outweigh the fact that the spells themselves aren't worth what you could slot there in comparison, even if it's a non-Illusion spell and you're an Illusionist.

So i was thinking about the Charm spells in the car and i wondered if we could not do something like, upon casting charm, the caster gets a bonus to the various social skills. Or, to avoid some strange Barbarian/Bard with 9000 intimidate, we could set it up to give the caster an auto 20 on next social skill roll. I like the second option more, personally.

Do the Charm spells even do ANYTHING on Amia? I believe I have tested them on both friendly and hostile creatures.

thunderbrush wrote:

Do the Charm spells even do ANYTHING on Amia? I believe I have tested them on both friendly and hostile creatures.

They do, it's just that they sent NPCs to Neutral, which is immediately broken by anything in your party performing a hostile action to them, so most time you don't even notice.

At first glance, it does not seem these changes have gone through.

Tested with a PC with Spell Focus: Illusion, at least. It looks like the VFX for the fire damage is triggering, just not the damage. Ghostly Visage shows no change.

I'm happy with the idea of those changes, though.

Try it tomorrow. Server needs to reset, etc first and they just went in.

No luck, still.

And Im fairly certain you guys would have done it, but I feel better asking: is this damage on Color Spray queued to go off before the CC effects? Otherwise it might be problematic when you put something to sleep, then immediately deal damage to it right after.

K. Looking into it.

Spell fixes were plugged into both servers, try again after the reset of either server from the timing of this post:

Amia A = ~20 minutes
Amia B = ~6 hours

Ghostly Visage seems to be working now. But Color Spray is still the same, with the addition of apparently making the casting PC roll against it as well. Sorry, I saw that, thought I grabbed a screenshot, but didn't. When I logged in to repeat it, it wasn't doing it any more. Maybe someone else can see if they can recreate the bug.

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