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::::::@Ghostwheel - I don't actually want it to continue scaling into usefulness at higher levels. Sleep, color spray, and others at level 1 drop off; even glitterdust drops off as people acquire blindsight and other things that mitigate it. I would honestly drop the scaling entirely or make it even more trivial, but the idea that spells have to scale and remain relevant (despite what that does to your number of combat relevant spells per day as you increase in level) is so ingrained into this edition that I suspect people would just dislike it for other reasons. Still, I'm glad you think the base damage is on the right track. - [[User:Tarkisflux|Tarkisflux]] <sup>[[User talk:Tarkisflux|Talk]]</sup> 05:33, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
:::::::Tarkusflux, apologies if I didn't really explain my point very well, I was rushed. Lets look at this spell both from the player's perspective, and the DM's perspective. A player can take this at level 1, and it's big damage, a sorcerer could spam it several times a day, potentially killing multiple foes in one shot each time, goblins, orcs, skeletons even zombies aren't going to pose a challenge, if it's CR 1 or less, it's dead in one shot if it fails it's save and with smart use of the battlefield the PC can hit multiple foes at once. That's at level 1, as the average damage (and with 4 dice average is fairly likely) is 9-11 damage. From the perspective of the DM, if any foe of the party has this spell, and uses it against those level one players with their maximum hitpoints, well if it hits the party cleric, he's probably in the negatives in one shot, same with the rogue, sorcerer, wizard, anyone who isn't a pure melee bruiser. Unless the melee fighters have some form of fast movement or the battlefield is really constricted, any spellcaster, be it a PC or NPC can hit people with this spell twice before they can close. So ranged attacks or spells like this one become the only effective counter. yes as you've written it, the spell loses it's ability to be a real player killer as levels rise, it's not much of a threat to a level 5 party, but a CR 5 caster will likely have moved on to something more effective with access to level 3 spells anyway, saving Lightning Spear as a nice cleanup spell. After all, it hits an area so that unconscious wizard, or cleric, if he gets hit again is just straight up dead, no save. I know it's not a Tier 1 class, but the Warmage is built for this spell! At level 3 a Warmage can take this spell, as it's on the Wiz/Sorc spell list and cast it at least 6 times a day. Each time he does, he also adds his INT mod to the damage, lets say 2 as a reasonable example ignoring racial mods to INT as a factor. It's 5d4+2, an average of 14 to 15 damage, to everyone in the area who doesn't save. Assume the Warmage is the challenge for a party of equivalent level. Most melee classes have less than a 50% chance to save for half, so likely they've just lost half or more of their hitpoints. The Rogue has by level 3, a better than 50% chance to make his save, all things being equal and if he does, he saves for none, lucky him. The Cleric, like the melee classes probably won't save so he's on his last legs after one hit. The Sorcerer or Wizard, probably wont save and if he doesn't, he's probably bleeding out. Oh, and an intelligently played Warmage, is going to get to cast it against someone on the party at least once more before a close range spell, or melee character can get close enough to do something to that Warmage. So back to my original point, this spell poses a serious danger of wiping out most or all of the players in just a couple castings at the levels it's most likely to be used. It also risks many sorcerers and wizards becoming one-trick-pony encounter enders at the lower levels. Hence my suggestion to restrict it to just the voltage domain spell. Then it will still be used, but only once a day by a Cleric of the relevant deity. Why I wouldn't let it into my game, is two fold, the spell would get used by the PCs all the time to tackle mobs of low CR enemies early on for farming or to short circuit encounters, and if I used it on them with any regularity, it would just PK them. Which I personally do not like to do. Those are my thoughts on the spell as it's currently written. [[User:Tunganation|Tunganation]] ([[User talk:Tunganation|talk]]) 08:43, 1 April 2014 (UTC)
