U56: Changes to Holy Smite, Order's Wrath, Chaos Hammer, and Unholy Blight

[Corinth2003]

"what's the problem we're trying to solve here?" is a question I hear quite often when discussing requests for changes.

I read the proposed changes to Holy Smite, Order's Wrath, Chaos Hammer, and Unholy Blight and was left wondering "why are these changes being made now?"

If I had to guess, it's probably something along the lines of "These spells deal outsized damage, compared to other spells of the same level, that it makes balancing adventures difficult. Those who have these spells are not challenged enough, while those without struggle."

From that perspective, it makes sense that you would want to reduce the damage to keep it around other spells of the same level.

The thing that makes these changes hard to accept is these spells have built-in restrictions to balance them.

The spell Holy Smite specifically hurts Evil creatures. I'm picking on this spell since most adventures have plenty of Evil creatures to affect.
- It deals full damage to Evil (LE, NE, CE) creatures. (they still get a save for half damage and to avoid the negative effect)
- It deals half damage (with a save for another half) to Neutral (LN, NN, CN) creatures. (along with never getting the negative effect)
- It deals NO damage to Good (LG, NG, CG) creatures.
- It deals double damage to Evil (LE, NE, CE) Outsiders.
- the spell has an alignment consideration where it has no effect if an Evil spellcaster casts it. (not much of an issue for Holy Smite, but can effect players if they try Unholy Blight)

I don't think people are complaining that Holy Smite deals too much damage to archons.
/sarcasm on
...and Holy Smite is well known for its ability to clear rooms full of iron golems in one casting.
/sarcasm off

If you are going to pursue reducing the damage to be on par with other area effect spells of the same level, please consider removing the restrictions.

What I recommend for Holy Smite if you keep to the 1d6+4 per caster level damage scaling:
- It deals full damage to all creatures. (Save for half damage)
- Evil creatures suffer the negative effect. (not applied if the save for half damage was successful.
- It deals double damage to Evil Outsiders.
- Spell has no effect if an Evil spellcaster casts it.

Damage dice remain on par with other 4th level spells. It's still unique in that it's more effective against evil creatures, but not "game breaking."

[Karthunk]

"what's the problem we're trying to solve here?" is a question I hear quite often when discussing requests for changes.

I read the proposed changes to Holy Smite, Order's Wrath, Chaos Hammer, and Unholy Blight and was left wondering "why are these changes being made now?"

If I had to guess, it's probably something along the lines of "These spells deal outsized damage, compared to other spells of the same level, that it makes balancing adventures difficult. Those who have these spells are not challenged enough, while those without struggle."

From that perspective, it makes sense that you would want to reduce the damage to keep it around other spells of the same level.

The thing that makes these changes hard to accept is these spells have built-in restrictions to balance them.

The spell Holy Smite specifically hurts Evil creatures. I'm picking on this spell since most adventures have plenty of Evil creatures to affect.
- It deals full damage to Evil (LE, NE, CE) creatures. (they still get a save for half damage and to avoid the negative effect)
- It deals half damage (with a save for another half) to Neutral (LN, NN, CN) creatures. (along with never getting the negative effect)
- It deals NO damage to Good (LG, NG, CG) creatures.
- It deals double damage to Evil (LE, NE, CE) Outsiders.
- the spell has an alignment consideration where it has no effect if an Evil spellcaster casts it. (not much of an issue for Holy Smite, but can effect players if they try Unholy Blight)

I don't think people are complaining that Holy Smite deals too much damage to archons.
/sarcasm on
...and Holy Smite is well known for its ability to clear rooms full of iron golems in one casting.
/sarcasm off

If you are going to pursue reducing the damage to be on par with other area effect spells of the same level, please consider removing the restrictions.

What I recommend for Holy Smite if you keep to the 1d6+4 per caster level damage scaling:
- It deals full damage to all creatures. (Save for half damage)
- Evil creatures suffer the negative effect. (not applied if the save for half damage was successful.
- It deals double damage to Evil Outsiders.
- Spell has no effect if an Evil spellcaster casts it.

Damage dice remain on par with other 4th level spells. It's still unique in that it's more effective against evil creatures, but not "game breaking."

We have gotten zero feedback from the devs which to my mind means we are just going to have to eat the changes and like it.

[kmoustakas]

"what's the problem we're trying to solve here?" is a question I hear quite often when discussing requests for changes.

I read the proposed changes to Holy Smite, Order's Wrath, Chaos Hammer, and Unholy Blight and was left wondering "why are these changes being made now?"

If I had to guess, it's probably something along the lines of "These spells deal outsized damage, compared to other spells of the same level, that it makes balancing adventures difficult. Those who have these spells are not challenged enough, while those without struggle."

From that perspective, it makes sense that you would want to reduce the damage to keep it around other spells of the same level.

The thing that makes these changes hard to accept is these spells have built-in restrictions to balance them.

The spell Holy Smite specifically hurts Evil creatures. I'm picking on this spell since most adventures have plenty of Evil creatures to affect.
- It deals full damage to Evil (LE, NE, CE) creatures. (they still get a save for half damage and to avoid the negative effect)
- It deals half damage (with a save for another half) to Neutral (LN, NN, CN) creatures. (along with never getting the negative effect)
- It deals NO damage to Good (LG, NG, CG) creatures.
- It deals double damage to Evil (LE, NE, CE) Outsiders.
- the spell has an alignment consideration where it has no effect if an Evil spellcaster casts it. (not much of an issue for Holy Smite, but can effect players if they try Unholy Blight)

I don't think people are complaining that Holy Smite deals too much damage to archons.
/sarcasm on
...and Holy Smite is well known for its ability to clear rooms full of iron golems in one casting.
/sarcasm off

If you are going to pursue reducing the damage to be on par with other area effect spells of the same level, please consider removing the restrictions.

What I recommend for Holy Smite if you keep to the 1d6+4 per caster level damage scaling:
- It deals full damage to all creatures. (Save for half damage)
- Evil creatures suffer the negative effect. (not applied if the save for half damage was successful.
- It deals double damage to Evil Outsiders.
- Spell has no effect if an Evil spellcaster casts it.

Damage dice remain on par with other 4th level spells. It's still unique in that it's more effective against evil creatures, but not "game breaking."

They made changes because on previous hardcore cleric and fvs had the most success leveling and were very popular. Thus they tried to find out what was their most used power and nerfed it.

[Lotoc]

They made changes because on previous hardcore cleric and fvs had the most success leveling and were very popular. Thus they tried to find out what was their most used power and nerfed it.

Except Lynnabel has said he mistakenly thought Holy Smite, Unholy Blight etc. were single target when he was doing the update to spell damage in u48.4 so gave them single targer damage values.
Definitely a bit late to correct said error sure, and it's clearly a problem to have spells be such an outlier.
Just wish we had higher level alignment spells.