Overcoming spell resistance.

[Pigkappa]

I'm playing a cloistered cleric in a level 10+ campaign. The party is formed by a Beguiler, a Wizard, a Rogue/Assassin, a Fighter (maybe with some PrC) and a Barbarian (same here). I'm the only one who can heal, the only devoted buffer, and I don't want to be a melee fighter, so I just cast spells (from scrolls if necessary) most of the time.

The campaign is full of Drows and we (=me, wizard, beguiler) are having a few problems with that annoying spell resistance. The DM is already pissed off at me and (mainly) at the beguiler because we ask him about a lot of things that aren't in the core book, and are usually better than the average spell or magic item from the PHB or DMG. He's not happy with the cleric Identifying everything with no material cost, the Beguiler casting crazy spells ("All opponents roll a Will save with DC 24. Those who fail, start attacking their companions."), both of us asking him about magic items from the MIC and so on. We're not really overpowered; the Fighter and Barbarian (he's actually a frenzied berseker I think) are doing good, the Wizard is doing good since he never comes to the game and I'm currently playing his character, and the Rogue is often useless but that's his fault.


How can we overcome that nasty spell resistance, or which good spells can we use which don't allow a SR check? We can ask the DM about non-core spells or items, but they should be balanced (=weak). For example, Assay Spell Resistance is banned because it breaks action economy, and Spell Vulnerability has been nerfed to -1 per 2 caster levels.

Anything in core is allowed unless it sounds really munchkinish (e.g. "Just before we go into that room, I use Summon Monster V to summon this monster who can cast Aid on the whole team" is definitely not allowed).

(I'm not saying the DM is unfair. I'd be as cruel as he is if I were in his place, but still, having a 50% miss chance on all my offensive spells is annoying.)

[hivedragon]

Wait, you are a cleric and you are worried about spell resistance? :smallconfused:
Just buff your allies and your summons and you should be fine.

[Pigkappa]

"Buff your allies" how? The low-duration buffs I'm currently casting are just Aid and Recitation. What else is worth wasting a turn on?

And what should I exactly summon? The monsters from SM5 I checked aren't so great (Slam +8? Our melee characters have like +20 to hit!).

[Morbis Meh]

So, you're only allowed to use PHB spells? If not use the spell compendium, the orb line of spells negate spell resistance and you as a cleric can cast spell resistance. There also weapon enhancements that lower spell resistance (found in the MIC though it sounds like you DM frowns upon using them even though the are CORE). We would be able to help you better if we knew exactly what sources you're allowed to work with.

[Big Fau]

Don't use offensive spells, and use DMM: Quicken/Persist (the former being a bit more balanced) on your buffs so you can get up front and do some damage.


And look into spells with a duration expressed in 10 minute increments. A single casting of those spells can last you for a good while (extending them is very useful, since you can get a good two or three hours out of a single spell).

[Pigkappa]

I'm allowed to work with anything provided it's balanced and nice and whatever. This isn't a theoretical build; I'm playing this character in a campaign and therefore there's nothing like "You can use this book even if that means you are invincible, but you can't use this one even if it's balanced."

I provided you several examples of what's allowed and what isn't. If you want some more, Eternal Wands are banned, an item from the MIC which grants reach 3 times/day to the fighter is allowed, Revivify is banned, Energy Vortex is allowed, writing low-level scrolls in less than 1 day is allowed even if it shouldn't be by RAW.

Of course the DM could say no to some of your hints, but I'll still thank you for the tip.



Is the Spell Resistance spell so good? If there's a caster, he's likely to succeed in his check to understand what magic I cast and he's going to attack someone else. I'm likely to waste an action by using that...

I'll look for that weapon enchantment, thanks for that.

The cleric and the beguiler can't cast Orb spells.




Edit: ok, I'm going to say it once more. This character is really played in a campaign. We have non-casters. I don't want to break the game.
So there's no Divine Metamagic, there's no level-10-cleric-becoming-better-than-a-level-15-fighter-at-fighting and things like those. :(

[hangedman1984]

there are quite a few conjuration spells (the orb line being the most famous) that aren't affected by spell resistance

[Pigkappa]

Cleric and beguiler :smallfrown:

[Morbis Meh]

You won't be casting offensive spells with either they are not built for that, so give up on it because you will not find anything that will work spell wise because those two classes don't have that spell list; however if you can convince your DM to allow you to take the Spell Domain either through the contemplative PrC, you get access to anyspell and and anyspell greater which will allow you to cast the orb spells using your domain slot. Conjuration spells are your only way to bypass SR completely and the cleric and beguiler don't have a wide selection of damage based spells from that school.

[Pigkappa]

if you can convince your DM to allow you to take the Spell Domain either through the contemplative PrC

I won't even try since this is really munchkinish. The beguiler tried doing something like this to cast Fireball and the spells from the Travel domain, but he wasn't allowed to (luckily).

Well then, any idea for some new buffs I should cast in combat? Or anything else to do when I don't have to dispel some nasty effects on my teammates?

[tyckspoon]

It sounds like your DM's balance-point is set low enough that most of the better suggestions will get ruled out as 'too munchkiny', but here's some other spells you could look into:

Righteous Wrath of the Faithful: Cleric 5, basically a Haste variant. You get the extra attack as per Haste, but instead of the extra move speed and minor hit/AC bonus you get a +3 Morale bonus to hit/damage. Might not be worth it if you already have somebody doing Haste regularly, but without a Bard around that Morale is a reasonably significant and easy to stack bonus type.

Conviction (,Mass): 10-min-per-level Morale bonus to saves. Level 1/3 for the Mass version; good candidate for Extending. I suspect your DM will whack this one as 'too strong', because if you have level appropriate Resistance items already this will probably let your party pass most saves pretty comfortably.

Unfortunately a lot of the really high-impact buffs are Self-only.. and as far as blasting goes, Flame Strike is about as good as clerical spells get.

Edit: Well, there's Dragon Breath, which will give you a breath weapon for round/level (with the usual 1d4 round recharge time, so you'll probably only breath once or twice with each casting of the spell.) Breath Weapons are Supernatural abilities, which ignore Spell Resistance, but expect your DM to nerf that/declare that since it's a spell it has to check SR anyway.

And Ebon Eyes, which is a level 1 spell that lets you see normally in darkness and, importantly and specifically, magical darkness. This is something you will probably deal with rather a lot, considering every single Drow can cast Darkness.

[Morbis Meh]

Since you are fighting a lot of drow why not spam daylight they are quite weak to it?

[Thespianus]

I won't even try since this is really munchkinish. The beguiler tried doing something like this to cast Fireball and the spells from the Travel domain, but he wasn't allowed to (luckily).

Well then, any idea for some new buffs I should cast in combat? Or anything else to do when I don't have to dispel some nasty effects on my teammates?

Since Assay Spell Resistance is out, might want to look for the True Casting spell? It's a level 1 divination spell that works like True Strike, giving +10 on one SR-check.

hard to get to, since it's a Wizard/sorcerer spell, but doable if the Beguiler goes 2 levels into Unseen Seer (which in fairness, ought to be non-Munchkiny ;) )

But yeah, it's hard to get non-SR spells for Clerics. No UMD either? Using Wands of Orbs or Lesser Orbs might work in that case...

[Pigkappa]

We don't have the level appropriate Resistance items (except for me). I never noticed the Conviction (mass) and it's really nice, I hope it will be approved.

Casting Daylight is a good idea too. I'm going to have a few problems with my level 3 spells since I'm already casting two magic vestments/day...

[Cespenar]

If you have a Cha monster among your party, a single level dip in Marshal could give the group the Cha modifier as a bonus on overcoming spell resistance.

[Optimator]

It sounds like your DM's balance-point is set low enough that most of the better suggestions will get ruled out as 'too munchkiny'

This. You may need to forget about casting offensive spells.

[Funkyodor]

You could always try Imbue with Spell Like Ability on the fighter and give him the spells Shield Other and Divine Favor. It's a way to give melee types personal range / spells that only affect the caster.

[Zaq]

Anything in core is allowed unless it sounds really munchkinish (e.g. "Just before we go into that room, I use Summon Monster V to summon this monster who can cast Aid on the whole team" is definitely not allowed).

Wait, really? Using a level 5 spell to get the equivalent of a handful of level 2 spells is "definitely not allowed"? What is Summon Monster for, then? No, really, I'm being serious.

[Pigkappa]

Wait, really? Using a level 5 spell to get the equivalent of a handful of level 2 spells is "definitely not allowed"? What is Summon Monster for, then? No, really, I'm being serious.

Come on, that's really not how it was intended to work. Most of the creatures you can summon that way have similar attack bonuses, deal similar damage, and have some stupid more abilities. If one of them is *definitely better than the other ones*, it's a mistake that shouldn't be exploited.

A level 5 spell to have multiple uses of a level 2 spell would certainly be balanced, but doing this by Summon Monster which already has great versatility (earth elemental to move through earth, griffon to fly) is quite lame. That's just my opinion anyway...


(I was thinking about the Archon and he's got much more than the Aid spell. Tongues, Magic Circle against Evil...)

[prufock]

The Wizard shouldn't have much problem with SR. Acid Arrow, Acid Splash, Acid Fog, Black Tentacles, Cloudkill, Grease, Flame Arrow, Fire Shield, Solid Fog.

You might have to rely on Insect Plague.

Orange Ioun Stone raises CL by 1.
Death Knell raises CL by 1, but is not a safe bet.

A Drow's SR (11+class levels) shouldn't be insurmountable. At level 10 you can have an orange Ioun Stone, so your CL check can be +11, which means you have to roll whatever their class level is for the spell to work. Assuming they have no more levels than you, you should be succeeding around 50% of the time.


You could always try Imbue with Spell Like Ability on the fighter and give him the spells Shield Other and Divine Favor.
Divine favour won't work. "Only cleric spells from the schools of abjuration, divination, and conjuration (healing) can be transferred."

[noparlpf]

What constitutes "core" in your group? Because last I heard MIC counted as core.
Go for the Orb spells. They're Conjuration, no SR, Fort save only applies to the secondary effects. They're in both the Spell Compendium and either Complete Mage or Complete Arcane, I forget which. (Why are there two books on arcane casters? And why are there divine spells in those books?)

[Cog]

What constitutes "core" in your group? Because last I heard MIC counted as core.
"Core" isn't defined by group; it just means the basics needed to play the game - DMG, PHB, and MM1, and no more.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

I dunno about Righteous Wrath of the Faithful. The Beguiler's best bet against Drow is probably Haste.

[noparlpf]

"Core" isn't defined by group; it just means the basics needed to play the game - DMG, PHB, and MM1, and no more.

That's what I used to think, but I keep hearing of other books being called "core" so I get confused.

[Gabe the Bard]

If you're looking for ways to lower SR, you might be able to use Bestow Curse to reduce SR by a couple of points. It's not that great, since it's a touch spell and you need to beat the target's SR in the first place.

You could also make a custom magic item or weapon that has a chance to lower SR, like a sword that bestows a curse every time it crits. That would be more for flavor, but it could be fun for the fighter or barbarian.

You'll have to talk to your DM about either of these options. But if he's mostly throwing enemies with SR at you, he really shouldn't nerf all your options for overcoming SR, core or non-core.

[Pigkappa]

What constitutes "core" in your group? Because last I heard MIC counted as core.

PHB1, DMG1, MM1.



The Wizard shouldn't have much problem with SR. Acid Arrow, Acid Splash, Acid Fog, Black Tentacles, Cloudkill, Grease, Flame Arrow, Fire Shield, Solid Fog.

The Wizard is a new player to D&D and we don't want to tell him what he should do all the time. He's not going to do much more than blast. We convinced him to take a few utility spells (Dimension Door, Greater Magic Weapon, Dispel Magic and the like) and that's enough.



If you're looking for ways to lower SR, you might be able to use Bestow Curse to reduce SR by a couple of points. It's not that great, since it's a touch spell and you need to beat the target's SR in the first place.

So I should use a level 3 spell with about 25% chance of success (touch attack + SR + Will save) to lower his SR by a couple of points? :(

[Ernir]

The DM has banned the #1 go-to tool for overcoming SR (Assay Spell Resistance). He probably wants SR to stay relevant.


So I agree with Optimator. Find other spells to cast in combat.

Recitation? Great buff, Spell Compendium.
Righteous Wrath of the Faithful? Already been mentioned, more useful if you know of something other than Haste for the Beguiler to do.
Giant Vermin? On the spiders that always seem to be around whenever you encounter drow.
Wall of Stone? Lock the drow away from the encounter.
Daylight! Drow-be-blind, no save.
Dispel Magic? If there isn't anything around worth dispelling, it probably isn't worth your spell slots anyway.


So I should use a level 3 spell with about 25% chance of success (touch attack + SR + Will save) to lower his SR by a couple of points? :(
I think I'd rather just cast the spell I want to get through the SR. xD

[hangedman1984]

reserve feats, they are supernatural abilities so spell resistance isn't a factor. True you'll have to wait until next time you get a feat (unless your dm will allow retraining), but it should work.