Spell resistance: bad idea?

[Kurald Galain]

I've found a few ways to give a character of mine Spell Resistance, and I'm wondering if that ability is actually worth it.

If I end up with low SR, say 5+level, then I run into the problem that most enemies are a bit higher level than me, so they'd pass the check on a roll of 4+ or thereabouts. That doesn't strike me as too useful.

If I end up with higher SR, say 12+level, then it strikes me that I need to make a resistance check against buff spells as well as emergency healing, which strikes me as extremely dangerous. If you're down and bleeding out, you really don't want a 30% failure rate on a Cure spell.

So what are people's experience with SR? Is it useful or should I avoid it? Would it help if I somehow find a way to get SR-to-arcane only, so I can still be healed?

[Ssalarn]

It depends on the character. If you're capable of casting your own buff and health spells, or if you're a strong and/or team oriented enough character that you can reliably buff out of combat and minimize the need for emergency healing, it's probably fine if you can get it high enough to actually block enemy spells.

In my experience, it hurts more than it helps. Enemy spellcasters are generally higher level and more likely to easily bypass your SR, while your party casters (especially healers and buffers) probably don't have any advantages to help them punch through it. Lowering SR murders your action economy, taking a standard action every round you want it lowered, so that's a factor as well.

To answer your question I'd need more information on your character, but that's my general view on the matter.

[stack]

If you find a way to get it against a category of enemies that you frequently face it is much better. Hard to do though. There are ways to get it against aligned spells, but you really want it against aligned sources.

[jedipotter]

I

So what are people's experience with SR? Is it useful or should I avoid it? Would it help if I somehow find a way to get SR-to-arcane only, so I can still be healed?

It's great. Sure, it does not always work, but it's better then nothing.


And don't ''fall for the numbers''. Too often people just say ''oh that is useless, they only need a 10 to beat it''. And they assume that every roll is a 20. But then roll a d20 five times....I got 6,5,5, 12 and 1. So if you needed a 10 or higher, note that four times it failed. My second set: 3, 7, 2, 19 and 16. Humm...the dice sure are random.

[(Un)Inspired]

I think spell resistance is bad as a meta concept. It doesn't, in any way, stop casters from being the best at everything, ever, always.

What it does do is narrow down the types of tactics a caster will use to win. Variety is the spice of life. Things that limit it tend to be less fun.

[Snowbluff]

It's a good idea. Your team sucks. How can they help you? You're strong enough to take down the enemy!

You should kill them in their sleep.

Until then, you can raise and lower your spell resistance with a standard action, and Su healing will still work on you.

[stack]

Now if you are playing with DSP classes like the vitalist that can heal and buff ignoring the SR, it's value increases considerably.

[Ssalarn]

It's great. Sure, it does not always work, but it's better then nothing.


And don't ''fall for the numbers''. Too often people just say ''oh that is useless, they only need a 10 to beat it''. And they assume that every roll is a 20. But then roll a d20 five times....I got 6,5,5, 12 and 1. So if you needed a 10 or higher, note that four times it failed. My second set: 3, 7, 2, 19 and 16. Humm...the dice sure are random.

Except it's rarely a 10 they need to beat it unless it's really high AC. For example, it's a 10 for a same level caster to overcome a monk's SR; if the enemy is a higher level caster, say 3 levels (an appropriate difficult challenge), he needs to roll a 7. If he actually was built to punch through and took the spell penetration feats, he needs a 3. So it works against the party a solid 50% of the time, but against spellcasting BBEG about 15%, assuming he isn't loaded up on spells that bypass SR entirely.