PDA

View Full Version : 3.5 Shivering Touch



Gnosko
2010-06-03, 01:31 PM
I have seen a lot of talk of the Awesomesauce concerning Shivering Touch. Please explain all the wonderful broken ways this spell can be (ab)used. For instance how do you one shot a dragon with this?

Boci
2010-06-03, 01:32 PM
Cast it? It does 3d6 dex damage no save, and the dragon cannot move it it has 0 dex.

Machiavellian
2010-06-03, 01:33 PM
Cast it? It does 3d6 dex damage no save, and the dragon cannot move it it has 0 dex.

When your stat reaches 0, don't you up and die?

The Glyphstone
2010-06-03, 01:34 PM
No, 0 dex paralyzes you. 0 Con kills you.

Fax Celestis
2010-06-03, 01:34 PM
When your stat reaches 0, don't you up and die?

Just for Con. Str/Dex paralyze you, Int/Wis/Cha turn you into a vegetable.

Greenish
2010-06-03, 01:35 PM
It deals 3d6 Dex damage as a touch attack. Great Wyrm Gold Dragon has 10 Dex and touch AC of 2. Creatures with 0 Dex are helpless.

Machiavellian
2010-06-03, 01:36 PM
Just for Con. Str/Dex paralyze you, Int/Wis/Cha turn you into a vegetable.

My DM told me that Str and Con do (you aren't strong enough to pump blood, and thus die, and whatever Con's is)

Fax Celestis
2010-06-03, 01:39 PM
My DM told me that Str and Con do (you aren't strong enough to pump blood, and thus die, and whatever Con's is)

Nope. See also:


Ability Score Loss

Some attacks reduce the opponent’s score in one or more abilities. This loss can be temporary (ability damage) or permanent (ability drain).

While any loss is debilitating, losing all points in an ability score can be devastating.

* Strength 0 means that the character cannot move at all. He lies helpless on the ground.
* Dexterity 0 means that the character cannot move at all. He stands motionless, rigid, and helpless.
* Constitution 0 means that the character is dead.
* Intelligence 0 means that the character cannot think and is unconscious in a coma-like stupor, helpless.
* Wisdom 0 means that the character is withdrawn into a deep sleep filled with nightmares, helpless.
* Charisma 0 means that the character is withdrawn into a catatonic, coma-like stupor, helpless.

Keeping track of negative ability score points is never necessary. A character’s ability score can’t drop below 0.

Having a score of 0 in an ability is different from having no ability score whatsoever.

Some spells or abilities impose an effective ability score reduction, which is different from ability score loss. Any such reduction disappears at the end of the spell’s or ability’s duration, and the ability score immediately returns to its former value.

If a character’s Constitution score drops, then he loses 1 hit point per Hit Die for every point by which his Constitution modifier drops. A hit point score can’t be reduced by Constitution damage or drain to less than 1 hit point per Hit Die.

Greenish
2010-06-03, 01:40 PM
My DM told me that Str and Con do (you aren't strong enough to pump blood, and thus die, and whatever Con's is)Your DM is houseruling (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#abilityScoreLoss).

Draz74
2010-06-03, 01:40 PM
My DM told me that Str and Con do (you aren't strong enough to pump blood, and thus die, and whatever Con's is)

Then your DM is making up rules that contradict the rulebooks. (Which he is, of course, allowed to do.)

Machiavellian
2010-06-03, 01:41 PM
Then your DM is making up rules that contradict the rulebooks. (Which he is, of course, allowed to do.)

ah... Jerko told me that's what it said...

Darklord Xavez
2010-06-03, 01:43 PM
I have seen a lot of talk of the Awesomesauce concerning Shivering Touch. Please explain all the wonderful broken ways this spell can be (ab)used. For instance how do you one shot a dragon with this?

A) Spectral Hand.
B) Widened Spectral Hand.
C) Be a Warmage.
D) Be a Warmage and use either A or B.
-Xavez

jiriku
2010-06-03, 01:47 PM
My DM told me that Str and Con do (you aren't strong enough to pump blood, and thus die, and whatever Con's is)

Your DM was creatively houseruling. 0 Str is not fatal.

Shivering touch is a great spell, although not quite as great as advertised. Its chief claim to fame is that because it doesn't allow a save, and because the Dexterity scores of your opponents don't increase very much as CR increases, it's nearly as useful at level 15 as it was at level 5. However, the restriction to touch range and a single target limits it greatly, and large classes of opponents (undead, constructs, creatures with the cold subtype) are entirely immune to its effects.

That said, it would probably be more appropriately balanced as a 4th level spell. I would houserule it to 4th level IMC, but OMG I love giving it to my low-level casters as a "secret weapon" in case some PC melee machine gets all up in their grille.

If you're interested, there are other (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=134096&highlight=shivering+touch) threads (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=126631&highlight=shivering+touch) on the subject.

Greenish
2010-06-03, 01:47 PM
A) Spectral Hand.
B) Widened Spectral Hand.
C) Be a Factotum.
D) Be a Factotum and automatically breach target's SR.
-XavezFixed that for you. Warmage doesn't even have either of those spells.

Lin Bayaseda
2010-06-03, 01:49 PM
It's not awesome, it's poorly designed. Someone didn't quite think through the wide range of otherwise-exceptionally-powerful creatures that can be brought down by this low-level spell.

Congratulations, you can now kill Red Dragons because, a few years ago, someone had an editorial deadline to meet.

Boci
2010-06-03, 01:55 PM
It's not awesome, it's poorly designed. Someone didn't quite think through the wide range of otherwise-exceptionally-powerful creatures that can be brought down by this low-level spell.

Congratulations, you can now kill Red Dragons because, a few years ago, someone had an editorial deadline to meet.

Making it a penalty pretty much fixes it. Powerful debiff, but it won't end the battle.

Draz74
2010-06-03, 02:09 PM
Making it a penalty pretty much fixes it. Powerful debuff, but it won't end the battle.

Quoted for truth. And spelling fix. :smallwink:

Yuki Akuma
2010-06-03, 02:22 PM
There's nothing saying a penalty to an ability score can't bring you below 1 - specific spells that give a penalty say that, but there's no blanket rule.

So it'd need a bit more changing than just making the damage a penalty. :smallwink:

It was probably intended as a penalty, given the flavour text and the fact that it has a duration. But it is famously badly worded.

Defiant
2010-06-03, 02:23 PM
This spell is the dumbest spell I've ever seen, balance-wise.

Whoever thought that 3d6 dex damage is a good idea at spell level 3??? That person was a moron.

Yuki Akuma
2010-06-03, 02:24 PM
This spell is the dumbest spell I've ever seen, balance-wise.

Whoever thought that 3d6 dex damage is a good idea at spell level 3??? That person was a moron.

Charitably, that person was not entirely up to speed on the difference between ability damage and ability penalties.

Fax Celestis
2010-06-03, 02:25 PM
Charitably, that person was not entirely up to speed on the difference between ability damage and ability penalties.

Because that is exactly the kind of person that should be writing sourcebooks. -_- Not someone like, you know, me, who actually knows this crap.

jiriku
2010-06-03, 02:46 PM
Shrug. I actually use shivering touch liberally among my NPC spellcasters, and have known my players to use it from time to time. I am unimpressed. Players defeat it easily by mowing down the casters at range or with pouncing charges, group encounters defeat it easily by not relying on any one monster to carry the encounter, and solo monsters defeat it easily by using Stand Still and the like to prevent casters from approaching. It is over-strong for a 3rd-level spell, but by CR 8 or so my monsters have better attack options to choose from.

Myou
2010-06-03, 02:46 PM
How does one protect one's monsters from mages with cold hands who like touching them inappropriately?

NotJesus
2010-06-03, 02:47 PM
How does one protect one's monsters from mages with cold hands who like touching them inappropriately?

Thermal underwear.

Greenish
2010-06-03, 02:49 PM
How does one protect one's monsters from mages with cold hands who like touching them inappropriately?There's Scintillating Scales, level 2 (?) spell that causes your Natural Armor to apply to touch AC. Obviously, a spell that fails to breach the target's Spell Resistance is quite useless, too.

Mystic Muse
2010-06-03, 02:52 PM
Thermal underwear.

:smallbiggrin:

Myou
2010-06-03, 02:53 PM
There's Scintillating Scales, level 2 (?) spell that causes your Natural Armor to apply to touch AC. Obviously, a spell that fails to breach the target's Spell Resistance is quite useless, too.

Yeah, but that depend on you having a high con mod and lots of natural armour. And being a caster. Great for dragons, but I was hoping for something more general.

jiriku
2010-06-03, 02:55 PM
How does one protect one's monsters from mages with cold hands who like touching them inappropriately?

For dragons,
Scintillating scales. It's second level, and turns the dragon's natural armor bonus into a deflection bonus, dramatically increasing touch AC. This protects from shivering touch and from tactics revolving around summoning large numbers of ability-draining incorporeal undead.

Wingbind or dispel magic against enemy flyers is good, although the dragon would need to take Practiced Spellcaster once or twice in order to have a chance at dispelling the spells of a CR-appropriate PC spellcaster.

For dragons with bolt-type breath weapons, you'd be surprised how well flyby attack+wingover+breath weapon works as a defense. If the dragon ends its turn airborne and at least 100 feet from any enemy, most melee characters can't get close enough to attack it, and spellcasters can't hit it with any spell with a range less than Medium. If it also ends its turn in a source of concealment, like a cloud bank or copse of trees, it's well-protected from most archery and long-range targeted spells. Plus, if one idiot (I'm looking at you flying monk) with a high movement rate pursues while the rest of the party can't keep up, the dragon is free to mutilate that fool on its next action while everyone else is double-moving trying to get into range.

Anticipate teleportation is a useful spell, as dragons generally don't rely on teleportation and players may try to use tactical teleportation to overcome the dragon's maneuverability advantage.

There's an ability in the xorvintaal dragon template in MMV that allows a dragon to waive its AoO in order to flap its wings and bull rush a foe away. The Stand Still feat can accomplish something similar. This prevents characters from closing to within touch range.

Against shivering touch delivered via spectral hand, destroy the hand. Catching it in the area of your breath weapon while you fry a couple of PCs should be sufficient.

Additionally, any dragon with the Cold subtype is immune to shivering touch, and there are something like thirty templates that you can apply to a dragon that will either give it the cold subtype or render it immune to ability damage.

Edit: some of this is dragon-specific, but much of it can apply to any large solo monster.

Edit Edit: For other types of monsters, probably the easiest method of managing shivering touch is to use a group of 6 to 8 monsters. If the PC uses one spell to eliminate one monster in one round, that's an effective use of a spell, but it's hardly going to break the encounter. Players can do worse to your plans with web or evard's black tentacles.

Solo monsters can benefit from being immune to ability damage (undead, constructs, plants), being immune to shivering touch (cold subtype, spell immunity), having a high touch AC and considerable miss chance (most types of fey and most solo arcane casters), having considerable reach, power and the Stand Still feat (an easy trick for giants), or shrugging it off with spell resistance (many outsiders and abberations).

JaronK
2010-06-03, 02:57 PM
It's especially nasty on Factotums who can use Darkstalker to just sneak close to a dragon (that dragon will NOT be beating the Factotum's Hide or Move Silently checks). Then he does the usual Spectral Hand/Shivering Touch attack in the surprise round (thanks Cunning Surge) and adds Int to damage to make it really stick. Scintillating Scales is worthless because the dragon doesn't even know he's there (if the dragon randomly casts it, the Factotum can always just wait till it goes down before attacking). So by level 8, the Factotum can drop most dragons without much chance.

By Factotum 11 he can also ignore SR, just in case the dragon had that.

Wizards can pull a similar stunt by teleporting in and using Celerity + Spectral Hand + Shivering Touch, maximizing the Shivering Touch with a Lesser Wand of Maximization.

JaronK

Defiant
2010-06-03, 03:03 PM
Wizards can pull a similar stunt by teleporting in and using Celerity + Spectral Hand + Shivering Touch, maximizing the Shivering Touch with a Lesser Wand of Maximization.

JaronK

Rod :smallamused:

Still, I dislike the idea of a level 3 spell being able to drop just about anyone in one or two shots... it can do up to 18 dex damage.

The game focuses less on the proper balance of spells and more on the defensive options to obvious spell choices.

Devils_Advocate
2010-06-03, 05:17 PM
My DM told me that Str and Con do (you aren't strong enough to pump blood, and thus die, and whatever Con's is)
Losing Strength normally isn't lethal, even if it falls all the way to 0, but there's a bizarre special exception for Shadows (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/shadow.htm). Possibly your DM saw this, assumed that it was the general case, pulled a fluff justification out of his ass, and then misremembered that explanation as appearing in a rulebook (which it does not).

Constitution is kinda like health, except that there are also hit points and for that matter Fort saves, so it's weird. Lots of things work like that in d20; the notion that Dex measures coordination and ability to dodge kinda falls apart when you consider that your attack bonus and Reflex save are determined as much by your level. If there were just a unified set of core stats instead of separate ability scores, saves, attack bonuses, AC, HP, etc., that seems like it would be a lot simpler. And if damage were then normally done to "active" scores instead of just to Con/HP, getting injured would actually, y'know, injure you. But now I've gone off on a game design tangent.

Superglucose
2010-06-03, 05:31 PM
Cast it? It does 3d6 dex damage no save, and the dragon cannot move it it has 0 dex.
It specifically does not affect anything with the Cold subtype which is trivially easy to get. It also requires a touch attack, and if you can't figure out how to get your dragon to avoid touch attacks... well yeah. Or alternatively make it immune to ability damage, like, say, make it undead? Or a caster who gives himself the undead type?

JerichoPenumbra
2010-06-03, 08:36 PM
There's also the fact that it has a duration of 1 round/lvl.

Yuki Akuma
2010-06-03, 08:40 PM
There's also the fact that it has a duration of 1 round/lvl.

Which means nothing because it deals damage, and does not impose a penalty.

This argument has been repeated dozens of times. Ability damage does not work that way. It's a badly-edited spell - at one point in production it apparently allowed a saving throw, judging from a particular monster entry.

Runestar
2010-06-03, 08:45 PM
There's also the fact that it has a duration of 1 round/lvl.

Even if we assume the designers intended for the dex damage to go away at the end of the duration, the dragon would be dead long before then, what with the entire party CdG'ing and all. :smallbiggrin:

PId6
2010-06-03, 08:46 PM
There's also the fact that it has a duration of 1 round/lvl.
Yep, meaning it deals 3d6 Dex damage every round for CL rounds. Fun. :smallcool: Well, it's one interpretation.

Superglucose
2010-06-04, 12:00 AM
Even if we assume the designers intended for the dex damage to go away at the end of the duration, the dragon would be dead long before then, what with the entire party CdG'ing and all. :smallbiggrin:
Really? Here's how I see the fight going.

Wizard casts "Reach" Shivvering Touch. Dragon takes 0 dex damage by gaining immunity to either ability damage or the Cold subtype.

Or at low levels, Wizard casts Spectral Hand. Dragon laughs and breathes fire. Spectral hand dies thanks to low reflex, party takes damage. Wizard shrugs and tries to move in, Dragon elects to not take its attack of opportunity. Smiling the Wizard concentrates to cast Spectral Hand, and eats a "Mage Killer" AoO to the face.

Wizard is now down. Red Dragon successfully overcomes crippling weakness to Shivvering Touch without relying on buffs.

Alternatively, you try to touch the Red Dragon who has used scinillating scales and various other buffs to increase his touch AC to absurd levels. Low-level wizard misses due to -1 STR, BAB of +2/+3, and +2 extra bonus coming out to +4. At CR +4 (difficult fight) (in this case for a level 5 party, when you get access to Shivvering Touch iirc) Scinillating Scales alone raises the touch AC of our dragon friend to 24. Wizard needs... a +20. Ok, you say, I'll just use True Strike first!

Fine. My Dragon walks up to you and omnoms you.

Play smart. In SSB: Brawl you have to know a) when the other character can kill, b) what moves he uses to kill, and c) how he gets into position to use his kill moves.

In D&D it's the same thing. By playing smart and careful, a Dragon should be able to counter even shivvering cheese. That's not to say Shivvering Cheese isn't a stupidly broken spell: it is. It's just not some kind of unstoppable behemoth nuke.

Binks
2010-06-04, 12:25 AM
Wizard shrugs and tries to move in, Dragon elects to not take its attack of opportunity. Smiling the Wizard concentrates to cast Spectral Hand, and eats a "Mage Killer" AoO to the face.

Wizard then points to the part of the concentration rules that allows him to cast without provoking attacks of opportunity and his insanely high concentration skill. Dragon is forced to concede that, yes, indeed the wizard can cast without provoking an AoO with an easily made check. Wizard finishes concentrating, launches the spectral hand, and hits the dragon for 3d6 dex damage. Dragon falls over paralyzed from taking a ridiculous amount of ability damage.

2 years later

Wizard and Dragon have a good laugh about the time the dragon completely forgot about one of the wizard's core skill uses and got paralyzed as they have a cup of tea together.

Superglucose
2010-06-04, 12:28 AM
Wizard then points to the part of the concentration rules that allows him to cast without provoking attacks of opportunity and his insanely high concentration skill. Dragon is forced to concede that, yes, indeed the wizard can cast without provoking an AoO with an easily made check.
No, actually. I realize that your levels may all be in barbarian and you may have given up literacy, but "Mage Slayer" is a nice feat on page 81 of CA. Wizard doesn't even get to concentrate.



Wizard finishes concentrating, launches the spectral hand, and hits the dragon for 3d6 dex damage. Dragon falls over paralyzed from taking a ridiculous amount of ability damage.
Good luck hitting the dragon.



Wizard and Dragon have a good laugh about the time the dragon completely forgot about one of the wizard's core skill uses and got paralyzed as they have a cup of tea together.
If you're going to try making me look like an idiot, you should probably quadrouple-check your premises first. Because frankly,
Spellcasters you threaten may not cast defensively (they
automatically fail their Concentration checks to do so), is a direct quote and makes you look kind of foolish.

But give me ANY ECL where you're casting Shivvering Touch and I'll show you how to make a dragon exceedingly resistant to the spell.

Binks
2010-06-04, 12:36 AM
No, actually. I realize that your levels may all be in barbarian and you may have given up literacy, but "Mage Slayer" is a nice feat on page 81 of CA. Wizard doesn't even get to concentrate.

"Mage Slayer" is a feat. "Mage Killer" (what you said in your post) sounds like a title made up for a dragon's super special awesome AoO attack. And let's not reduce this to insults please. If you thought I was trying to make you look stupid or something I apologize, I just thought the imagery was amusing, no insult intended.


But give me ANY ECL where you're casting Shivvering Touch and I'll show you how to make a dragon exceedingly resistant to the spell.

Making a dragon resistant to a spell isn't impressive. Heck, give it the Cube or whatever that thing was called and you can make it immune to all* spells. That doesn't mean that the spell isn't ridiculously overpowered though. Saying you can make a monster resistant to something means nothing, it's like saying you can design an encounter that will challenge Pun-Pun. Yay? It's still completely broken, the fact that you can make something that challenges it doesn't disprove that at all.

Standard Dragon (as stated out) vs. shivering touch is pretty much game over for the dragon. That's OP for a spell like that, and the entire point I was trying to make.

*Obviously there might be exceptions, but they don't matter for the point of this analogy.

Tar Palantir
2010-06-04, 12:41 AM
While Spectral Hand is rather easy to kill, both the Reach metamagic feat and the Arcane Reach ability of Archmage allow a caster to launch the Shivering Touch from well outside its threatened area. Shivering Touch can have Reach applied to it at level 9 without mm reducers. The highest touch AC of any of the core dragons is 12, and it only decreases with age. A 9th level wizard with 14 Dex has +6 to hit, and thus stands little chance of missing. If the dragon does buff himself with Scintillating Scales, a Quickened True Strike does much to mitigate any difficulties. Dragons have relatively poor SR for their CR, and any caster purposefully dragon hunting will prepare more than one casting of the necessary spells. Not guaranteed (there are always nat ones, after all), but odds of success with minimal risk are high.

Philistine
2010-06-04, 12:42 AM
No, actually. I realize that your levels may all be in barbarian and you may have given up literacy, but "Mage Slayer" is a nice feat on page 81 of CA. Wizard doesn't even get to concentrate.
Except for the part where you never mentioned taking that feat in your earlier post.


If you're going to try making me look like an idiot, you are engaging in a wasteful duplication of effort, because I've already got that covered.
Fixed that for you.

EDIT: The Shadow Sun! The Shadow Sun!

Superglucose
2010-06-04, 01:16 AM
Making a dragon resistant to a spell isn't impressive. Heck, give it the Cube or whatever that thing was called and you can make it immune to all* spells. That doesn't mean that the spell isn't ridiculously overpowered though.
I never said it wasn't. The question is "how do you defend against it?" and the answer is "Quite easily, actually. It's a very obvious tactic with a very large number of good ways to prevent it, and many of those methods are frequently good for other things as well."



Standard Dragon (as stated out) vs. shivering touch is pretty much game over for the dragon. That's OP for a spell like that, and the entire point I was trying to make.
Wrong. Standard Dragon vs Shivering Touch is pretty much "Ok, the Dragon now has restricted movement because he can't get close to the wizard." Dragon still has 150ft fly speed.

I object to this silly idea that Shivering Touch is this OHKO that a dragon can do nothing against because ONOES TOUCH ATTACK! Here's the trick with touch attacks: you have to touch someone to hit them with it. Yes, yes, spectral hand exists. What if the dragon flies away from it and stays high for several minutes waiting for your spell to end? What if the dragon learns Magic Missile just to kill it? What if the Dragon wins initiative and kills you before you have a chance to do anything?

Shivering Touch is overpowered, but not because it represents a OHKO on most dragons pretty much of the time, because it doesn't. It is overpowered because if it connects it is an absurd amount of dex damage[i] which is very good for a third level spell. Someone said, and I agree, that this spell is actually only "pretty good" as a 4th level spell. Why's that? Because compared with the Core-only options of Enervation, Black Tentacles, and even Greater Invisibility (just to pick some good offensive spells from the 4th level wizard list) it's not significantly better. In fact, the "broken" 4th level spell (polymorph) is oobs and gobs better than Shivering Touch, even in the Dragon fight.

Yes, [i]if you hit the dragon with the spell at low levels you are likely to remove the dragon's dex and reduce it to 0. But how are you going to hit the dragon? Worst case scenario, the dragon flies away. At higher levels there are many ways to gain immunity to Shivering Touch, and pretty much all of them are good ideas to have up anyways.

Shivering Touch is a broken spell at its level. It is not "ohko" for dragons any more than "Quickened forcecage + cloudkill" is a "great" combo for wizards. At the very least, we're casting two spells (1 2nd and 1 3rd) and then we have to manage to maneuver our wizard to well within charge range of the dragon, who with some really simple RAI can be used to start a grapple (it's pretty clear to me that grappling is an option you have when attacking, and it's pretty obvious to see what a charging grapple would look like... just watch a game of Football).

Oh also? No dragons are statted up in the SRD. They aren't given feats, and they are specifically designed to be built from the ground up by the GM. So don't give me the "as they are statted up" argument. You're supposed to build it yourself, with a few suggestions by the makers of the game as for what feats to look at. And besides, why is a core-only dragon facing off against a non-core caster?

@Tar, by the time you have access to Archmage, Shivering Touch ceases to be a factor at all because any dragon worth its salt will be immune to ability damage five ways to sunday, and be rocking a rather sizeable touch AC. And by that point we're not talking about "one 3rd level spell killing a dragon" we're talking about "two fifth-level spells and a 2nd level spell kills a dragon." That's significantly less scary to me.

The Cat Goddess
2010-06-04, 02:10 AM
1) When within range of someone(thing) with the Mage Slayer Feat, a Spellcaster automatically knows it... which, IMHO, takes the Mage Slayer feat from "Cool" to "Eh".

2) Reach Spell is a nifty +1 spell level Metamagic Feat that allows the caster in question to use Shivering Touch from 30ft away.

3) A Quickened True Strike is a 5th level spell... and honestly, pretty worth it if you know you're going to be fighting a caster-type Dragon.

4) Of course, you could also just cast regular True Strike on the round before... then step up a bit closer... then cast your Reach'ed Shivering Touch.

5) Even better, get the "Cast on the Run" feat and you can move double your move while you cast your spell to get close.

mostlyharmful
2010-06-04, 04:23 AM
1) When within range of someone(thing) with the Mage Slayer Feat, a Spellcaster automatically knows it... which, IMHO, takes the Mage Slayer feat from "Cool" to "Eh".

It's also a massive nerf for a dragon to take, their CL is already in the toilet and half their awesome is tied into their Gishiness, kiss that goodbye with Mage Slayer.


2) Reach Spell is a nifty +1 spell level Metamagic Feat that allows the caster in question to use Shivering Touch from 30ft away.

Or use your familiar.


3) A Quickened True Strike is a 5th level spell... and honestly, pretty worth it if you know you're going to be fighting a caster-type Dragon.

Over investment when it's an expanded buff you can prep with a 1st level slot before the fight and with pearls of power it doesn't matter what you're fighting, its almost always useful, no shreodegoer for you.


4) Of course, you could also just cast regular True Strike on the round before... then step up a bit closer... then cast your Reach'ed Shivering Touch.

Or get your familiar to do it, what with it's ability to fly, better attack bonus and extra actions...


5) Even better, get the "Cast on the Run" feat and you can move double your move while you cast your spell to get close.

Or.... give it to your familiar that moves faster than you, gets extra actions and generally rocks?

Runestar
2010-06-04, 04:35 AM
Yes, if you hit the dragon with the spell at low levels you are likely to remove the dragon's dex and reduce it to 0. But how are you going to hit the dragon? Worst case scenario, the dragon flies away.

The dragon is now paralysed at dex0, how is it still able to fly? It can still cast stilled+silent spells and use SLAs, plus its breath weapon, but that's pretty much it.


Oh also? No dragons are statted up in the SRD. They aren't given feats, and they are specifically designed to be built from the ground up by the GM. So don't give me the "as they are statted up" argument. You're supposed to build it yourself, with a few suggestions by the makers of the game as for what feats to look at. And besides, why is a core-only dragon facing off against a non-core caster?

There are stats for all the dragons in draconomicon. Since some of them do match the few statted dragons in the MM, we can assume they serve to fill in the missing links. Not that it matters to me, since I always take the liberty of heavily modifying the existing stats of monsters.

However, I can't think of many feats which can effectively counter shivering touch (maybe martial study: wall of blades or melee evasion). Spells can plug the gap more easily (we already have scintillating scales, spell immunity) but I still think it requires a disproportionate amount of effort on the dragon's part to counter it.

Aotrs Commander
2010-06-04, 05:49 AM
Shivering Touch is just insane. 3D6 Dex damage will screw up or outright paralyse nearly anything in the game, except stuff like Air Elementals. (And even they will suffer if the wizard does something like use Sudden Maximise + Sudden Empower (or a rod), since 18+ 1/2 3D6 (average of 28-29 Dex damage) will flatten almost anything. And, as mentioned, it has a duration. Unless, as Yuki_Akuma suggests, we charitably assume they meant penalty not damage, it means that you get that damage on each melee touch attack1.

Yes, a specific build (or at least part of a build) made to counter it can counter it. However, I work on the basis that any one thing that requires you to include specific counters against it is too powerful. I mean, really, with what you can do with Scorching Ray, say, you could do to Shivering Touch (Arcane Thesis, Reach Spell blah blah blah). It is a dragon-killer, technically, but more importantly, it's an every-other-sod-killer as well. It will murderise most NPCs (unless they are specifically geared up to resist it) and most other monsters. And if you read it as getting 3D6 Dex damage on every melee touch attack2...I mean, wow.

To be fair, 3D6 ability damage will tend to screw up nearly any ability score, taken across the breadth of a game's regular opposition, with the possible exception of Str and Con (which tend to be much higher for large creatures). You could make a similar argument about, say Ego Whip, except the damage is much lower for the same level AND it allows a save for half.

Shivering Touch was the only spell I unilaterally banned before I even got Frostburn. When I did, I found it was even more broken that I thought (and had a 1st level lesser version very nearly as bad). It's jsut poorly worded, far too powerful for a 3rd level spell and open to too much easy abuse.



1As it says "on a succesful melee touch attack." It might be supposed to mean "you make a melee touch attack and if you hit, you" which would better imply you make one attack (and presumably the duration would apply to "holidng the charge" as it were), but as it stands "on a succesful melee touch attack" can equally imply you would get it on any melee touch attack. I doubt that's what was intended, but that was my first interpretation on reading it. It's just not well worded (or "well-" anything, except maybe "-hard"...)

2Horrid, horrid thought... If you Maximise a spell like that, do you maximise the damage for the first attack only or the damage for everything? E.g., if you cast a Maximised Spiritual Weapon (no, I don't know why you would, just bear with me!), would you deal maximum damage every attack? Because 10+1/2 3D6 Dex damage PER melee attack would be just...stupidly broken.

hewhosaysfish
2010-06-04, 07:19 AM
I like the idea of using undeadifying templates on dragons, to make them immune to ability damage:

I imagine a setting where dragons once ruled the world; massively strong, naturally magical behemoths enslaving or devouring the humanoid races at their whim.
But then one mage came up with a new secret weapon and suddenly, dragons died by their hundreds. Seeing their empires broken and their species being pushed to the brink of extinction, the desperate survivors turned to the darkest arts of necromancy... becoming vile dracoliches and retreating to deepest reaches of the Plane of Shadow, where they plot their revenge against humanoids who have supplanted them as rulers of the Material world.
Now, after four thousand years, the Age of Dragons has long-since fallen into myth and superstition... but our enemies have not forgotten us!


It sound like a great idea for a campaign setting to me*. Or at least the major plot-arc for an existing one (assuming a bit of retrofitting with the established prehistory). It's got everything: ancient empires, dragons, hideous ancient nemesis, dragons, triumph of the human(oid) spirit, dragons...
Everything that grabs me about a DnD setting.

But as a fix for a level 2 spell it may be going a bit to far.

Seriously guys? An entire race of beings (never mind one as inherently powerful as dragons) becoming undead (after first having sex with a frost giant in the hope of producing some kids with the Cold subtype before rendering themselves clinically dead) in response to one spell?



*Wait? Doesn't Eberron have some craziness going on with dragons in its history?

Tokiko Mima
2010-06-04, 09:00 AM
How does one protect one's monsters from mages with cold hands who like touching them inappropriately?

All of your monsters have one class level of binder and LOVE Naberius. :smallamused:

Saintheart
2010-06-04, 09:05 AM
Quoted for truth. And spelling fix. :smallwink:

It doesn't need fixing if the creature is using Weapon Finesse. Depriving a Dex-based fighter of Dex rather nicely de-biffs him, too. :smallbiggrin:

lesser_minion
2010-06-04, 09:07 AM
There's also the fact that it has a duration of 1 round/lvl.

Which either has a cosmetic effect only ("the target shivers"), renders the damage incurable for that long (i.e. dragons can't protect themselves with CCS abuse and more contingent restoration spells than you can shake a stick at), or causes the damage to repeat every round the target is shivering.

Damage is always a consequence - if the spell's nice enough to clean up the real estate it just destroyed, it has to say so. This extends to all four major classes of damage (ability loss, energy drain, lethal damage, nonlethal damage).

Presumably, the intent was for the target's Dex to be reduced while it was shivering, and I imagine there was supposed to be a save as well. But that's not what the text says, it's just what the text appears to mean.

The Cat Goddess
2010-06-04, 11:04 AM
All of your monsters have one class level of binder and LOVE Naberius. :smallamused:

I'd imagine, Key, that having that many people "loving" Naberius would return him to being a deity at that point. :smallbiggrin:

Fax Celestis
2010-06-04, 11:46 AM
Batman dragonry

Thank you for turning D&D into an arms race rather than merely saying "this spell is too good for its level." I am sure your playstyle works for your group, but I cannot imagine playing under a DM whose first reaction upon seeing an obviously overpowered spell, item, etc. is not to remove the item but to instead ramp up the difficulty level of everything else to compensate. Yes, dragons are ancient, genius beasts. Yes, they are supposed to be difficult. But what you are describing is a Nintendo Hard (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NintendoHard) D&D experience, and that is not something I would ever enjoy. It becomes a thought puzzle rather than a game at that point, so why not just go do some sudoku or picross? It's more expedient.

jiriku
2010-06-04, 12:12 PM
I really don't get the drama that occurs around this spell. I mean, have any of you guys actually used this spell as a player, or allowed it in campaigns you DM, or are you all just having a good time armchair quarterbacking?

I've run it as both a player and a DM. Extensively. Really, it's not that exciting. Yes, as a player, I did in fact one-shot a dragon with it. Worked pretty well on beholders too, and a couple varieties of demon and devil too, once I threw in Sudden Maximize. But quite frankly, I one-shotted monsters using any of a dozen other spells just as easily.

From the DM side, I crippled a PC with it, once. After they realized that my casters would actually learn and prepare melee-touch-delivery spells, they started to stand off and shoot instead. And I can put the hurt on my players just as effectively with a fireball or a shower of poisoned spell-storing arrows loaded with blindness or bestow curse. The DM's toolbox is bottomless.

Shivering touch is a little OP. Take a couple Xanax, houserule it to 4th level if you like, and call it a day.

Greenish
2010-06-04, 12:15 PM
I really don't get the drama that occurs around this spell.What drama?

Irreverent Fool
2010-06-04, 12:49 PM
use your familiar.

Many characters give up their ability to summon a familiar in order to gain other mechanical benefits. At best a familiar is a liability. Even if a character has one, that familiar is going to have to get in touch range of a dragon. With half of your less-than-impressive wizard HP and a reach of 0 feet, the familiar will likely be eaten before he gets close.

Optimystik
2010-06-04, 12:51 PM
No optimized wizard is going to have a familiar.

Wait, what?

I assume you mean trading it away for an ACF at first level, but you can get it back easily via the Obtain Familiar feat. This is actually a superior option because doing so causes its abilities to stack with your CL rather than your wizard levels, allowing you to PrC freely.

As for the benefits of having one, I refer you to the Familiar Handbook. (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19870010/The_Familiars_Handbook_--_2007)

Irreverent Fool
2010-06-04, 12:54 PM
Wait, what?

I assume you mean trading it away for an ACF at first level, but you can get it back easily via the Obtain Familiar feat. This is actually a superior option because doing so causes its abilities to stack with your CL rather than your wizard levels, allowing you to PrC freely.

As for the benefits of having one, I refer you to the Familiar Handbook. (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19870010/The_Familiars_Handbook_--_2007)

Looks like you posted while I was correcting myself. I'm aware of the advantages, but it still seems foolhardy to send you living liability into chewing range of a dragon.

Mongoose87
2010-06-04, 12:56 PM
Many characters give up their ability to summon a familiar in order to gain other mechanical benefits. At best a familiar is a liability. Even if a character has one, that familiar is going to have to get in touch range of a dragon. With half of your less-than-impressive wizard HP and a reach of 0 feet, the familiar will likely be eaten before he gets close.

This is why you have it loaded into a ballista, in advance, and get your cohort to fire it, after you cast your touch spell.

Sliver
2010-06-04, 12:59 PM
This is why you have it loaded into a ballista, in advance, and get your cohort to fire it, after you cast your touch spell.

Won't it still trigger every possible AoO on it's way? :smallamused:

lesser_minion
2010-06-04, 01:00 PM
Of course, one way is to let the fighter participate - give him a spell storing sword or ring and cast Shivering Touch into it.

Irreverent Fool
2010-06-04, 01:04 PM
Of course, one way is to let the fighter participate - give him a spell storing sword or ring and cast Shivering Touch into it.

I'd rather let the warblade with his d12 hps do it. :smallbiggrin:

lesser_minion
2010-06-04, 01:10 PM
I'd rather let the warblade with his d12 hps do it. :smallbiggrin:

Yes, but that makes no-one happy, since the warblade would be :elan: participating! anyway.

PId6
2010-06-04, 01:33 PM
I'd rather let the warblade with his d12 hps do it. :smallbiggrin:
Well, presumably if you have a warblade on your team, he would have Surge'd away the dragon a long time ago, along with the BBEG, the sun, and the strong nuclear force.

Lord Vukodlak
2010-06-04, 02:55 PM
The spell has no saving throw and to most foes it deals a crippling attack.
Doesn't matter that the spell's range is touch, as by default you can hold the charge on a spell. Cast the spell out of range of the enemy then close in. A real handy trick would be this, cast shivering touch then hold the charge. The next round ready an action to touch the dragon when it attacks you. Then take a move action forward provoking an AoO from said dragon. The dragon bites and and you discharge shivering touch on his head.

The spell its self is doesn't even make any sense. It deals ability damage but has a duration, and with no mention of performing multiple touches, or continual damage which means the only conclusion is the damage is temporary. The spell simply isn't balanced at all. Make it a penalty and the spell is fine, potent but workable.

As to the familiar delivery, get an eyeball familiar they deliver touchspells with eye rays!.