Picking apart epic spellcasting

[martixy]

So... I've been looking at the rules for Epic spells.

I know they are considered (almost?) irreparably broken(along with 9th level spells).

What I want to know is how or why.

I've always wanted to play in an epic level campaign, but never really had the chance to, so I want to understand the system before attempting a stunt like that.

I wanna look at this in 2 ways:
1. From a TO perspective, such as candles of invocation, chain-gating solars, liberal open-endedness with infinite mitigation.
2. From a practical campaign environment, where everyone is a sensible person and can be relied in good faith to respect the social contract / a gentleman's agreement.

So as far as 1 goes, what kind of shenanigans and exploits exist with epic and 9th level spells?
For example I vaguely remember something about Incantrix and ridiculous Spellcraft buffing, but I am not familiar with the specifics. I know of the gate shenanigans I mentioned above - what else?

What ways are there to limit exploitation and where do they break down?
For example - removing the "obedient slave" clause of Gate or introducing diminishing returns to mitigation seems a fair compromise at first glance(such as the contribution of each subsequent spellcaster being lessened by 1). But I may be missing things.
What do I need to look out for?

For 2 - No one is perfect, there is always a chance you might encounter a bad apple. (Dealing with which is outside of the scope of this discussion as it is not part of the game's mechanics.)
Even in good faith, one might accidentally break the game because of the open-endedness of the system.

So I want to be able to recognize when something might become a problem; and what it's source is as well.

[ManicOppressive]

Epic spells are broken mostly because they're supposed to be broken. The rules for what epic spells can do are so vague that you can justify just about any effect with a high enough investment. If you're going to allow your players access to Epic level spell creation, you essentially have to trust them not to try to **** the game. I usually limit epic spells to plot-centric things or things that don't affect gameplay beyond fluff.

9th level spells... Those are a different ballgame, because they're just unintentionally broken. Again, if you're going to allow them, it comes down to trusting the player. The fact is that just about every 9th level spell outside of the Evocation school is hideously broken in some way. (Except Freedom and Imprisonment, because what the hell are those doing at ninth level anyway)

Gate is obviously one of the better known examples, and removing the willing servant bits does help, but it also kind of defeats the purpose of the spell, since otherwise it's just kind of a shinier version of Plane Shift.

<Hold Monster, Mass>, Dominate Monster, Shapechange, Time Stop, and Wish are all problems as well. Shapechange can be solved somewhat with alternate polymorphing rules like Burlew's, though they're still not immune to abuse. Hold Monster, Mass and Dominate Monster are mostly just notable for wrecking encounters and forcing you to plan encounters around them or just fudge dice to keep them from ending fights in the first round. Time Stop... Well, it's Time Stop. It lets your Wizard do all of his other overpowered things more easily and more quickly.

Just ban Wish. Save yourself the pain.

But in the end, there is no easy solution for keeping 9th level spells balanced. They are fundamentally broken with regards to the rest of the game, and your options are basically "Alter them to such an extent that they are unrecognizable" or "ban them entirely." if you can't trust your players with them.

Personally, I prefer to keep talking to players behind the scenes. I'm pretty good about keeping groups that are interested in having fun, and 9th level spells can definitely be fun. Hell, who doesn't love to drop a nuke on a large encounter every now and again. It all just comes down to making sure your players are thinking about how they're impacting the game for each other.

EDIT: I forgot I've been using a houseruled version of Wail of the Banshee for the past several campaigns.

[Beheld]

For TO application of epic spells it basically boils down to this:

1) You can make a spell that Summons as a Permanent Minion, a Couatl. You can do this with zero XP, so even if thoughtbottles didn't exist and completely negate all spell research penalties, you can still research this spell in a single second for 0xp and 0gp.
2) Cast the spell to make as many Couatl minions as you want, such as, the exact specific number you need to mitigate the next spell to 0XP/0gp.
3) Mitigation allows you to cast spells in ritual format to reduce the DC and the associate research costs. Couatl's have spells, and you have a bunch of permanent ones, so you can have them all give their spell slots in your Ritual casting.
4) With enough ritual mitigation, you can do literally anything, and you have access to infinite minions, First you make a spell which permanently summons Solars, to speed up your progression, you may eventually make a spell that summons 10-12 permanent Solars, ect.
5) Once you have arbitrarily large piles of mitigation, you can now do whatever you want. So for example, you could use the Life, Creation, and Fortify seeds to create a new creature. This creature can have literally any ability anywhere in the game (or every ability everywhere in the game) and it can have extraordinary abilities that replicate every single epic spell you could ever imagine creating at will. You can make this creature so powerful that it completely trivalizes any opposition not using similar bull****. It can be magic immune and have a persistent AMF effect as an extraordinary ability, and have all of its abilities and spells and NI stats as extraordinary abilities and walk around punching things to death. It can be immune to basically every status effect that exists. And you can make it in the shape of a hollow sphere that you live inside of. Or you can make it so that each individual creature of the race looks identical to you, and then you can give it the ability to true mind switch, and then have it true mind switch with you, so that you now have all those abilities.

0) You can do all this crap in a timeless plane or demiplane, just to speed up the process relative to everyone who is merely level 20, and therefore has not ascended to power greater than the gods yet.

EDIT: Wail of the Banshee is not even remotely broken. I don't think it is even possible to do anything anyone would call broken with that spell.

[Beheld]

Hold Monster, Mass and Dominate Monster are mostly just notable for wrecking encounters and forcing you to plan encounters around them or just fudge dice to keep them from ending fights in the first round.

EDIT: I forgot I've been using a houseruled version of Wail of the Banshee for the past several campaigns.

Honestly, Hold Monster Mass is, if anything, even less possible of being OP than Wail of the Banshee. You don't even need to plan around the spell because most monsters are incidentally immune to as part of their defenses against other effects, and it's still just a save every round to escape, and most of them aren't going to fail the first save unless you are mook clearing. To say nothing of the fact that a first level spell makes you immune.

Dominate Monster is OP, but it has nothing to do with its effect on encounters where you cast it, it has to do with the fact that it has a duration measured in weeks when you can cast it, so on your off days you spend all your 9th level slots layering a bunch of dominates on level 20 bruiser monsters and then you go into every fight on your on days with 14 CR 20 monsters plus the party.

[Jack_Simth]

To say nothing of the fact that a first level spell makes you immune.The Protection From [Alignment] spells arguably make one immune to Hold Person and similar compulsions. The specific relevant clause is "exercise mental control over the creature (including enchantment (charm) effects and enchantment (compulsion) effects that grant the caster ongoing control over the subject, such as dominate person)"

Hold Person? Does not grant ongoing control (just one specific compulsion, set by the spell, not the caster). If you consider anything that's mind-affecting to fall under "exercise mental control", then yes, the Protection From Alignment spell stops it all. If you don't, then you're looking at "enchantment (charm) effects and enchantment (compulsion) effects that grant the caster ongoing control over the subject" (emphasis added), and only things that grant ongoing control - dominate person, charm person, dominate monster, charm monster, possibly Greater Command, etcetera. Hold Person gets through it just fine.

[nedz]

9th level spells are all over the place


Freedom: Meh - situational
Imprisonment: OK
Mage’s Disjunction: Broken
Prismatic Sphere: OK
Gate: Broken
Refuge: Meh
Summon Monster IX: OK-ish — just an upgrade of a lower level spell
Teleportation Circle: OK-ish — just an upgrade of a lower level spell
Foresight: Meh
Dominate Monster: OK-ish — just an upgrade of a lower level spell
Hold Monster, Mass: Meh — just an upgrade of a lower level spell
Power Word Kill: OK
Crushing Hand: Meh
Meteor Swarm: Meh
Shades: OK-ish — just an upgrade of a lower level spell
Weird: Meh
Astral Projection: Broken
Energy Drain: Meh
Soul Bind: OK
Wail of the Banshee: Meh
Etherealness: Meh
Shapechange: Broken
Time Stop: Broken
Wish: DM Dependant, can be Broken

[MisterKaws]

The Protection From [Alignment] spells arguably make one immune to Hold Person and similar compulsions. The specific relevant clause is "exercise mental control over the creature (including enchantment (charm) effects and enchantment (compulsion) effects that grant the caster ongoing control over the subject, such as dominate person)"

Hold Person? Does not grant ongoing control (just one specific compulsion, set by the spell, not the caster). If you consider anything that's mind-affecting to fall under "exercise mental control", then yes, the Protection From Alignment spell stops it all. If you don't, then you're looking at "enchantment (charm) effects and enchantment (compulsion) effects that grant the caster ongoing control over the subject" (emphasis added), and only things that grant ongoing control - dominate person, charm person, dominate monster, charm monster, possibly Greater Command, etcetera. Hold Person gets through it just fine.

Get every single monster shape soulmeld(planar ward) as an extra feat, done. No one would get anti-incarnum without good reason, just do this and then when they start spamming anti-incarnum around, just outright remove it and say those were just a specific troop that really liked planar wards.

As for how it can be broken, just about anything can get massive boosts to skills, the easiest is using nanobots: make a horde of lv1 warlock tibbits swarm around you and use aid another, you now have a +[insert high number] bonus to casting your epic spell, research something in this range, using something to mitigate the obscenely high costs you'd have to pay, then rain down destruction with your KITTY-POWERED DOOM CANNON. This wasn't even on TO, just a very cheap PO trick.

[Âmesang]

I love epic spells. I love the flavor behind the concept, the ability to manipulate the very building blocks of magic, to wield the spells of the gods, putting a caster one step closer to achieving the glory (and perhaps fall?) of the likes of the Suel Imperium or the Empire of Netheril.

With that said, I've never been a fan of "mitigating down to zero." Epic spells are supposed to be BIG!! Big areas, big targets, big effects, big names (well, that can be hard to do sometimes; how does benediction, providence, and judgment sound for divine spells?)… and big Spellcraft checks, representing (to me) one's mastery of magical theory (when combined with Knowledge [arcana], or devotion/awareness with Knowledge [religion] or [nature], I suppose). Take for example…

DISPEL MAGIC, SUPERB
Abjuration
Spellcraft DC 59
Components V, S
Casting Time 1 standard action
Range 300 ft.
Area 20-ft.-radius burst
Duration Instantaneous
Saving Throw None
Spell Resistance No
DESCRIPTIONThis spell functions like dispel magic, except that your dispel check is +30, you affect all creatures, objects, and spells in the area, and you suffer 10d6 backlash damage per casting.

Superb dispel magic can defeat all spells, even those not normally subject to dispel magic. It can dispel (but not counter) the ongoing effects of supernatural abilities as well as spells, and it affects spell-like effects just as it affects spells. Any creature, object, or spell is potentially subject to superb dispel magic, even the spells of gods and the abilities of artifacts.
SPELLCRAFTING REQUIREMENTSSeeds dispel (DC 19); Factors additional +20 to dispel check (+20 DC), change from target to area (20-ft.-radius burst, +10 DC), 1-action casting time (+20 DC); Mitigating factors 10d6 backlash (–10 DC); Cost 531,000 gp, 21,240 XP, 11 days

— Epic Level Handbook, p.96
A fairly basic version of dispel magic, right? Intended to combine the targeted-version and the area-of-effect-version with a bigger bonus and the ability to dispel more stuff, and with just the right size Spellcraft DC to be… casually reached by a "typical" 21st-level sorceress (24 ranks, +4 Int [via +2 headband of intellect], +2 synergy, +3 Skill Focus, +1 stone of good luck, +15 "ring of improved spellcrafting," and taking 10 — the headband isn't even needed at 22nd level, and by 25th with a +30 "ring of legendary [?] spellcrafting" you could update the dispel check to 1d20+50 which should last a good while).

But there's a price, right? 10d6 backlash damage per casting — this is a spell that can effect "even the spells of gods and the abilities of artifacts," utilizing a power that no mortal body was ever intended to wield, yada yada, insert glamorous doom speech here. :smalltongue: I don't know, I like how this turned out. It's a spell that feels "powerful" (to me, at least) with some backlash that makes it grand, like you're really pushing the boundaries of magic and that there's a "terrible" risk for doing so… but one that feels good, one that feels worth taking.

I don't even really mind ritual spells, though I like taking an alternate approach to it:

CURE EXTREME WOUNDS
Conjuration (Healing)
Spellcraft DC 64
Components V, S, DF, Ritual, XP
Casting Time 1 standard action
Range 300 ft.; see text
Target One creature/participant, no two of which can be more than 300 ft. apart; see text
Duration Instantaneous
Saving Throw Will negates (harmless) or Will negates; see text
Spell Resistance Yes (harmless) or Yes; see text
DESCRIPTIONThis spell functions like heal, greater restoration, and resurrection, except as noted above. Additionally, the spell cures all hit point damage, reverses level drains lost within the last 20 weeks, and returns to life a creature dead for no longer than two hundred years.

Against undead, the influx of positive energy causes the loss of all but 1d4 hit points if the undead fails a saving throw.

For each participant sacrificing a 6th-level spell slot add one additional target and increase the range by 50% (450 ft., 600 ft., etc.).

XP Cost: 2,000 XP
SPELLCRAFTING REQUIREMENTSSeeds heal (DC 25), life (DC 27); Factors restore permanently drained ability score points (+6 DC), dispel all negative levels afflicting the target (+2 DC), change from touch to target (+4 DC), increase range by 50% (+1 DC), 1-action casting time (+20 DC), each additional target (+10 DC); Mitigating factors each additional caster contributing one 6th-level spell slot (–11 DC), burn 2,000 XP (–20 DC); Cost 576,000 gp, 23,040 XP, 12 days

— Epic Level Handbook, p.98
Heck, with that ring of legendary spellcrafting a 21st-level cleric/druid with an Int 10 could still take 10 and cast this one. It normally effects just a single target (be it living, dead, or undead), but by channeling the spell power of his allies he can affect more targets over a wider area (and a rod of excellent magic would allow him to cast it for free once per day). I know it doesn't push the limits of what epic spellcasting could truly do when fully optimized, but at the same time it does do more than either of the three spells its based on do individually, no? Yeah, that's not technically how the ritual aspect is supposed to work, but I like the thought of channeling power on the fly (probably watched too much Dragon Ball Z in high school), at least assuming there's more than one spellcaster in the group (though my group would probably be wondering why you can't sacrifice more than one slot).

I d'know, maybe it's just 'cause I try not to take the mechanics too seriously… just the flavor. Like, have you ever played The Bard's Tale? The original?

ETERNAL WINTER
Evocation [Cold]
Spellcraft DC 72
Components V, S, XP
Casting Time 10 minutes
Range 3 miles
Area 3-mile radius circle, centered on you
Duration Permanent
Saving Throw None
Spell Resistance No
DESCRIPTIONYou permanently change the weather in the local area to an artic blizzard of frigid cold. It takes 10 minutes to cast the spell and an additional 10 minutes for the effects to manifest.

You control the general tendencies of the blizzard, such as the direction and intensity of the wind. You cannot control specific applications of it. When you cast the spell, the weather changes to that of a blizzard 10 minutes later (changing gradually, not abruptly). The storm continues as you left it for the spell's duration, or until dispelled or magically changed through control weather or a similar effect (reverting when that effect's duration expires).

Eternal winter can do away with atmospheric phenomena (naturally occuring or otherwise) as well as create them.

XP Cost: 5,000 XP
SPELLCRAFTING REQUIREMENTSSeeds energy (DC 25); Factors increase range by 50% (+1 DC), increase area by 50% (+2 DC), permanent duration (×5 DC); Mitigating Factors increase casting time by 9 minutes (–18 DC), burn 5,000 XP (–50 DC); Cost 648,000 gp, 25,920 XP, 13 days

— Epic Level Handbook, p.96
The terror of the evil wizard, Mangar, lives on! Well, okay, so it's just a permanent blizzard. That's it; and that's all it needs to be. A blizzard that, as far as I can tell, can be cast anywhere regardless of actual location and season. So you could cast it upon a tropical island to make the lives of the people… annoyed? Okay, less Mangar, more Black Knight from Ultima: Runes of Virtue II. Just try to have fun with it, I'd say.

Of course this is coming from a guy who'd immediately ban Mordenkainen's disjunction, having superb dispel magic as an alternative of sorts. Likewise, I'm not too keen on gate being able to call deities, even if they can't be controlled. As such, another (pointless?) example:

SUMMON LOKI
Conjuration (Summoning) [Chaotic, Evil]
Spellcraft DC 76
Components V, S, XP
Casting Time 10 minutes
Range 150 ft.
Effect One summoned deity
Duration 1 hour (D)
Saving Throw Will negates
Spell Resistance Yes
DESCRIPTIONThis spell can summon Loki, Norse God of Mischief, Strife, and Fire. Summoning him from the Outer Plane of Asgard is a long and arduous process, requiring the spellcaster to know Loki's name and some facts about his life, defeat any magical protection against discovery or other protection possessed by him, overcome Loki's spell resistance and requiring him to fail a Will saving throw.

Even if all such conditions are met, the Norse God is under no special compulsion to serve the caster.

XP Cost: 20,000 XP
SPELLCRAFTING REQUIREMENTSSeeds summon (DC 14); Factors summon unique individual (+60 DC), +30 on caster level check to overcome individual's spell resistance (+60 DC), increase saving throw DC by +50 (+100 DC), increase range by 100% (+2 DC), increase duration by 2,900% (+58 DC); Mitigating factors increase casting time by 9 minutes (–18 DC), burn 20,000 XP (–200 DC); Cost 684,000 gp, 27,360 XP, 14 days

— Deities and Demigods, p.183
— Epic Level Handbook, p.100
Originally I was going to go with Thor, but then I thought, "He's good aligned and so would probably Mjölnir my chaotic evil sorceress in the face. Loki, however, is also a chaotic evil sorcerer who wasn't always evil… so they might be able to have some fun banter together. Maybe? Okay he's probably crush her for her insolence, too." The very nature of the summon seed seems to indicate that there's a lot more to summoning an unique individual than just spell resistance and saving throws, and shouldn't it be? …and that's why I made it, honestly; to have a character say, "aww, you can summon angels? I can summon gods!"

I… I don't know what else to say. I also have a mass time stop that could allow a party to buff each other quite easily, but I've probably said too much (foolishness), already; I like epic spellcasting… and I do agree that it does need to be carefully checked. It can be really fun and flavorful if used well, but it does have the potential to be really cheesy. I will say that, as being one against "mitigating down to zero," I've often imagined epic spells as an odd sort of level adjustment — as a party reaches 22nd level the epic spellcaster decides that, instead of leveling up with the rest, she'll expend her experience developing superb dispel magic, instead — once against putting a price to awesome power, to say that if one wants to wield the magic of the gods… one has to pay for it.

[martixy]

~zip~
I knew someone would step up!
I fully share your sentiment.
I love the idea of having a system which allows you to construct, mix and match the effects found at lower levels however you damn well please.
It is, by necessity, very open ended, which is part of the problem with it, but also completely unavoidable.


~zap~
Disjunction is not broken! It's highly effective. In the times its been used against me, I've come to respect the fear and respect it instils in players!

Astral Projection is... er... I'm not sure what to think of it. I am unable to determine the intent of that spell. Usually it's rather straightforward to determine where the intent of a spell ends and abuse begins. With AP... the abuse seems to be baked into the core of the spell.

I can think of a fun little edit to that spell: No equipment, you're floating around the astral plane completely naked. :smallbiggrin:


Anyway... what are the ways one can boost his own personal Spellcraft(and Psicraft - this one's important) to truly ungodly levels?

I think the price for +skills was bonus^2*100. So that's 90K for a +30. Based off of PF: Skill Focus +6, no synergy, 21+3 ranks, +6 Int(cuz no self-respecting epic level caster would have less than that without items) +3 headband. That's a cozy +69. Not too shabby so far...

[Jack_Simth]

What I want to know is how or why.

Well, without mitigation or custom items, Epic spellcasting is basically useless (the DC to do something more useful than a non-epic spell is basically unreachable without cheddar, and you couldn't research it anyway because it costs too much).

With mitigation or custom items, however, there's no clear point at which to stop. Adam makes a buff with a little mitigation, and makes Betty feel useless in a fight. Betty, then, makes a bigger buff with more mitigation, and makes Adam feel useless in a fight. Adam, then makes a better buff with more mitigation, and makes Betty feel useless again in the next fight.

So it's pretty much either broken-weak or broken-strong.

[ExLibrisMortis]

The fortify seed can grant 1 temporary hit point for every 2 points of Spellcraft DC. In other words, a DC 61 epic spell, which costs 549.000 gp, almost 22.000 xp and 11 days to develop, can provide a whopping 23 temporary hit points, which last for 20 hours. Can I get a cheer? Anyone? Anyone at all?

On the other hand, a spell that combines life (or heal, or another harmless instantaneous seed) and fortify might well be able to instantaneously increase your ability scores by 1 each - twice a day, every day, for the rest of your career. It's completely free*, and with just twenty minutes a day, you can get high-epic ability scores for commoner-level prices.




*Let's call it DC 23 (fortify granting a non-enhancement bonus, even though this is an increase, not a bonus) + DC 27 (life) + 10 (five other +1 bonuses, one to each score). We're not applying a factor to make it permanent, because we're using an instantaneous seed. Now, we increase the casting time to 10 minutes (-18 DC), change the range to personal (-2), and get two 4th-level and two 5th-level slots from our coterie of friendly neighbourhood summoned/dominated/bound/thralled/charmed/bribed spellcasters. This spell is DC 0, free, and failing the check to cast it is a monumental achievement in itself.

[Chronos]

One fix I've pondered is to allow mitigation of the DCs as per the rules, but to calculate the price in gold, XP, and time to research a spell before any mitigating factors are applied. That way, you can still make it possible to cast the spells, but a powerful spell still costs a lot to develop, and one that's too powerful for your level simply couldn't be developed at all, because you wouldn't have enough XP to do it.

[Hecuba]

Epic spells are insanely broken in TO because they are unusually poorly suited for TO.

The fundamental core of the system is one of active DM arbitration based on the provided general guidelines.
Because TO generally presumes that the non-existent DM will permit anything that does not actively break those guidelines, the results are generally stupid powerful.

The danger for PO, however, is that it goes too far in the other direction. Many of the pre-made Epic spells fall in this trap: they are so stingy with mitigation that they are less powerful than non-Epic spells at pursuing the same goals for many levels (in some cases, even into the mid 30s). There might be something to be said for a transition period between spell slots above 9s w/ metamagic and epic casting: making it last as long as the presented epic spells would, however, probably doesn't meet anyone's expectations.

Generally, if you are a DM assessing epic spells, start with 2 questions:

Is this significantly better than the character can get with just a 9th level slot?

If not, you're probably being too stingy.

Is the scaling for this better than the character could get by pressing Improved Spell Capacity instead of Epic Spellcasting?

If so, it likely needs to have some relative drawback (significant chance of failure, risk of death, etc.).
Risky to use is different than annoying to use: if all of the drawback can be pushed outside the encounter, it ceases to be a drawback and becomes annoying bookkeeping.

Is there a chance the character would fail the check?

If not, you should probably look for some option other than a roll-based system.
There are some exceptions for this: if you are at 30 and would have allowed the spell in question at 21 with a significant chance of failure, it is probably fine to have it minimal or no chance of failure. This is, after all, like a 1st level spell when 5ths are in play. But level-appropriate epic spells should generally have some chance of failure.

[Necroticplague]

Epic spellcastin is borken in both the 'useless' and 'infinite power' senses. ironically, the gulf comes in the same areas that spells of previous areas have. Simply trying to do direct spells that you'd cast in a combat situation is dang-near useless. You pay out the nose for something even equal to some lower levels spells, and pay ridiculous amounts for anything actually useful. The Epic Fireball equivalent is not worth it. Epic Spellcasting for utility, buffs, and summons that you cast during downtime, however, is a gateway to infinite power. Transform and Heal seeds combine to let may make permanent, stackable changes to yourself, while granting you free rein to pick up the most broken monster abilities you can find. The most effective use of epic spellcasting is buffing yourself up to levels that far surpass any divinity, then outdo everyone else.

In summary, exageration of the same as pre-epic: blasters suck, buffers rule, spells are best used in your downtime.

[Florian]

I've played a lot of Mage the Ascension and Ars Magicka. Compared to that, I've found the epic spellcasting rules to be trite, boring and even more prone to breaking in regard to TO as they simply let you replicate broken stuff, just on a larger scale, like chain-gating solars or your personal army of wish granting djinns, stuff like that.

More anoyingly, the real phantastic stuff, like raising Atlantis or somesuch, still does not work well with the rules.