Fire damage challenge!

[Quietus]

Kind of an odd request, but here it is - assuming I'm looking at things roughly around level 9, what's the most reliable way to deal 20-25ish fire damage to myself, or have my party do so? Dropping fireballs is one option, but that could very quickly overpower my 25 resistance, and I'd like to avoid that if I can. Reliability both of delivery and in stability of damage is important. Area of effect stuff is even better, if I can catch enemies in the blast. Assume access to most of 3.5, no dragon.

[agentnone]

Scorching Ray has the damage potential. I'm not familiar with ANY of the other source books. I'm a core kind of guy. But yeah, Scorching Ray, Fireball, maybe summon a Fire Elemental right on top of you? Maybe a cursed item, like Energy Susceptibility Fire 15 so you take extra fire damage whenever you're hit with it?

Why would you want the party to deal fire damage to you anyway?

[Chess435]

Setting yourself on fire is an extra 1d6/round. Also has some useful side benefits. :smallbiggrin:

[Elric VIII]

You could find a low level spell that deals fire damage and scales with level.You then maximize it and cast it at a CL that deals the correct amount.

For example, Combust (SpC) is a level 2 spell that deals 1d8/CL. Maximize that and lower the CL to 3 (min for this spell). You now deal exactly 24 damage per casting.

This spell isn't the best example, since there's a DC 15 Ref save or you catch on fire, but you get the idea.

EDIT: Does MM adjustment count when calculating the min CL for a spell? If so, you might need a Lesser MM Rod of Maximize.

[kpenguin]

Setting yourself on fire is an extra 1d6/round. Also has some useful side benefits. :smallbiggrin:

Like escaping ninjas? :smallbiggrin:

[Chess435]

Like escaping ninjas? :smallbiggrin:

Exactly! :smallbiggrin:

[HunterOfJello]

A swordsage could probably pull it off by punching himself a lot.

Holocaust Cloak [Stance] - 5 fire damage to attacker per attack
Searing Blade [Boost] - Deal an extra 2d6 + 9 fire damage per attack
Flashing Sun [Strike] - Make an extra attack as part of a full-round attack with a -2 penalty to all attack rolls.

Feats: Two-Weapon Fighting, Improved Two-Weapon Fighting,

That would give a Swordsage 9 five attacks on himself. Assuming everyday weapons like a dagger stabbing the swordsage that's 25 damage from Holocaust Clock and 2d6 + 9 damage from each attack of 4 two weapon fighting attacks + 1 searing blade attack (total 10d6 + 45). That makes a total of 10d6 + 70 fire damage from attacks.

Minimum damage = 76 fire damage
Average damage = 105 fire damage
Maximum damage = 130 fire damage

Go Swordsages!!!

~

There may be methods of getting higher damage by using Power Attack along with Burning Brand which is a 2nd level boost that has your melee attacks do only fire damage for that round.

[ILM]

Bear in mind you can always cast a spell at a lower caster level, provided it's still high enough to have access to that spell level. So even at level 9, you're free to cast CL5 fireballs if you fancy. Doesn't solve the issue of stability, but at least you're unlikely to hurt yourself in the process.

[Seffbasilisk]

The reserve feat Fiery Burst.

All-day at will as long as that slot is unused, d6 per spell level, so no more than 5d6 at level 9. Looking at 5-30 damage, average of 17.5.

Use fire spell tweaks like +1 per d6 and the like to raise that. You can use a lower level spell to power it...etc etc.

[Quietus]

Some very neat ideas here, thanks guys - I totally forgot about how a swordsage could factor into this, and now I've remembered that there's feats to turn power attack and sneak attack damage into fire damage. Very cool. Unfortunately, I ALSO realized that my idea won't really work the way I wanted. I was thinking about using the Flame Cincture bound to waist chakra to facilitate standing in melee while my pyromaniac friends blast away, and then directing that blast damage toward enemies for even more fire. Unfortunately, I won't be able to do this for another 5 levels, as my waist chakra doesn't open until level 14. Nuts. Ah well, would have been fun, and I did learn something from it. Two things, actually.

Continuing this line of thought, the second thing I learned was that the flame cincture's waist bind reads : "Whenever your flame cinture prevents damage, the energy remains latent within the cord for 1 round. On your next turn, you can release the stored energy as a swift action to blast any target within 60 feet. The energy blast deals fire damage equal to the amount of damage prevented by the flame cincture in the previous round." So something that deals its damage in an area over smaller bursts would be optimal. Anything like that?

Something like, say, a pyrohydra's breath weapons would be fantastic for this, since they do all their damage over a series of smaller, preventable blasts, are an area so they can be dropped on a foe as well as on me, and 3d6 is only what, 10.5 average damage - a single point of essentia would give me fire resist 15, and the belt would add up the total damage prevented in the blast the following turn. So, what spells/abilities are out there that do multiple area-affect blasts that either are fire damage or can be altered to be fire damage?

[Person_Man]

Comp Warrior has the Explosive weapon enchancement, which deals extra Fire damage to everyone within 5 ft of your target, including you if it's not a reach weapon.

[Quietus]

Comp Warrior has the Explosive weapon enchancement, which deals extra Fire damage to everyone within 5 ft of your target, including you if it's not a reach weapon.

That would be an excellent start, and definitely worth considering. I seem to remember that the blast wasn't that much (2d4 or 2d6 or something? I can look that up) but that just means the cincture could swallow that damage up easily. Also makes full attacking ... OH. Now THAT'S interesting. Using that magic item that gives properties to your natural attacks, stack natural attacks with totemist, use shape soulmeld to get the Flame Cincture? That could get nasty. I like it.

Also : When we're looking at spells, I'm willing to look at non-fire spells as well, and use Energy Substitution to make them fire-based. Something like Force Missiles would be good, except that Force Missiles is kind of a terrible spell in the first place.

::Edit:: Neat. If I can get the DM to houserule that an Amulet of Mighty Fists can get weapon properties as well, I could make a +1 explosive amulet of mighty fists for a totemist, crank out a bunch of mini-booms with every full attack, then direct any damage I take from them back to the foe I'm fighting on the following turn. Of course, that'll run me 54,000 GP... but I can't use this combo till level 14 anyway, so there's time. Still looking for other options though, the more the merrier!

[Gotterdammerung]

Not sure what book it is in but "Ball Lightning" is kinda like flaming sphere except it makes multiple balls and they do 3d6 electricity. You could energy substitution it to do fire. Then theres just plain old flaming sphere.

And there is metamagic feats like twin and repeat that could increase it's potency. At 20th you could drop 20 balls of fire on top of yourself by the beginning of your second turn. They would each do 3d6 fire dmg.

[Quietus]

Not sure what book it is in but "Ball Lightning" is kinda like flaming sphere except it makes multiple balls and they do 3d6 electricity. You could energy substitution it to do fire. Then theres just plain old flaming sphere.

And there is metamagic feats like twin and repeat that could increase it's potency. At 20th you could drop 20 balls of fire on top of yourself by the beginning of your second turn. They would each do 3d6 fire dmg.

Do those balls take up more than five feet of space? If not, then there's not much synergy here, for the same reason Scorching Ray isn't as effective - if I'm just taking damage to redirect it, then I'm wasting my swift actions and essentia allocation. 3d6*20 is wonderful, and I do love the idea, but they'd need to target more than one person. If I'm taking 3d6*20 and redirecting it, without anyone else caught in the area, then there's no reason we couldn't have just dropped the 3d6*20 on the target in the first place.

[Gotterdammerung]

Do those balls take up more than five feet of space? If not, then there's not much synergy here, for the same reason Scorching Ray isn't as effective - if I'm just taking damage to redirect it, then I'm wasting my swift actions and essentia allocation. 3d6*20 is wonderful, and I do love the idea, but they'd need to target more than one person. If I'm taking 3d6*20 and redirecting it, without anyone else caught in the area, then there's no reason we couldn't have just dropped the 3d6*20 on the target in the first place.


There is power in redirecting damage. For instance, a heightened ashtar spell from sandstorm does not create extra dmg. But it does change existing dmg to dessication dmg if the creature fails a fort save. A useful way to bypass DR for a group with a lot of flurry style melee's or archers.

The usefulness here for the ball lightning spell is that 3d6 energy dmg is very vulnerable to energy resistance. And it is limited by its mobility. Normally a wizard making that many of them would have a large headache trying to move them around to actually effect everything.

Now because of your trick he can just stick them all in one square (your square). And turn the 20 balls of 3d6 each which is vulnerable to ER into a single strike of 60d6. He has also created a pretty dangerous square on the board. Baleful teleports, grappling, slide, telekinesis can all dump an enemy into the "hot spot".

But there are other spells that work closer to what you want. Like Boiling Oil from heroes of battle. It will do 4d6 fire to a 10 foot radius no SR reflex for half. Whoever fails the reflex save also continues to burn for 2d6 a round. You could fail this save on purpose.

Vitriolic sphere, and firebrand can also work out fine.

[Elric VIII]

Here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fc/20060707a) is Necklace of Natural Attacks (bottom) if you don't already have the link.



Now because of your trick he can just stick them all in one square (your square). And turn the 20 balls of 3d6 each which is vulnerable to ER into a single strike of 60d6. He has also created a pretty dangerous square on the board. Baleful teleports, grappling, slide, telekinesis can all dump an enemy into the "hot spot".

Actually, Energy Resistance does not function exactly like DR. It prevents X energy damage for the entire round, not on a per-attack basis.

[Quietus]

The usefulness here for the ball lightning spell is that 3d6 energy dmg is very vulnerable to energy resistance. And it is limited by its mobility. Normally a wizard making that many of them would have a large headache trying to move them around to actually effect everything.

Now because of your trick he can just stick them all in one square (your square). And turn the 20 balls of 3d6 each which is vulnerable to ER into a single strike of 60d6. He has also created a pretty dangerous square on the board. Baleful teleports, grappling, slide, telekinesis can all dump an enemy into the "hot spot".

Mm, good points. Taking a spell designed to spread damage out over a number of 5-foot squares and difficult to move around and redirecting it en masse would make this very useful.


Actually, Energy Resistance does not function exactly like DR. It prevents X energy damage for the entire round, not on a per-attack basis.

True. However, most games that I've played work on an unspoken houserule that it works per-hit. I know the energy resistance spell specifically does this, which is where most people assume energy resistance comes from. Generally.

[Claudius Maximus]

Absolutely cover yourself with holly berry bombs (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/fireSeeds.htm). Even at the minimum level that's 8d8+88 twice, since you can resist and reflect all of it.

Also, energy resistance is per-hit according to the Rules Compendium.

[Zaq]

Actually, Energy Resistance does not function exactly like DR. It prevents X energy damage for the entire round, not on a per-attack basis.

The Rules Compendium disagrees. RC, pg. 48:


A creature that has resistance to energy has the ability (usually extraordinary) to ignore some damage of a certain energy type each time it takes damage of that type.

Each resistance is defined by what energy type is resists and how many points of damage are resisted. For instance, if a creature has resistance to fire 10, it can ignore the first 10 points of fire damage it takes from each attack.

Emphasis mine. Energy resistance works on every hit.

[Quietus]

Ah! I do not have the rules compendium, glad to see they cleared that little snag up.

::Edit:: Holly berry bombs are very nice, and would work wonderfully!

[faceroll]

Wow, this is an awesome idea. How wells does incarnum mix with monsters?

[Elric VIII]

The Rules Compendium disagrees. RC, pg. 48:



Emphasis mine. Energy resistance works on every hit.

Is that how it has always worked?

[Quietus]

Wow, this is an awesome idea. How wells does incarnum mix with monsters?

Quite well, actually. If a monster qualifies as an "18th level character" and has 17 con, they can take Open Greater Chakra (Waist) and gain +1 fort saves, plus the slot to bind this meld. With 13 con and no other requirement they can gain the ability to shape the flame cincture. They'd have no essentia, and be stuck at 10 fire resist, but there's a feat you can take for that, too, available at character level 6. Taking that one twice, plus the other two, gives you 4 points of essentia, bringing you up to 30 fire resist.

In general, incarnum works really well with a lot of different things.

[Gotterdammerung]

Would be neat to see a whole party designed around fueling this guys fire resisted gigaflare shoop-da-whoop.

Fire acorns from the druid

20 blazing fireballs from the wizard

Some more from the wizards fire mephit familiar

Some fire coming from the ToB guy

What other classes could jump in on the fun?

[Claudius Maximus]

Is that how it has always worked?

If memory serves there was something else in core that contradicted the per round rule, and it was debated. RC would then just be settling that debate.

[Quietus]

If memory serves there was something else in core that contradicted the per round rule, and it was debated. RC would then just be settling that debate.

The note on energy resistance in the explanation of special qualities said it was per round, originally. The Resist Energy spell specifically called out as being per attack. Rules Compendium brought everything into line with the Resist Energy spell.