Power attack for spells.

[Aquillion]

While thinking of a way to improve blasting, it occured to me that one of the reasons melee fighters are generally better at doing damage than spellcasters is because melee fighters have power attack and spellcasters don't really have any equivilent. So, here's an idea for a feat to try and replicate power attack for damage dealing spells:

Whenever you cast a damage-dealing spell that allows a Reflex save for reduced or eliminated damage, you may choose to subtract a number from all reflex save DCs associated with that spell. For victims who fail this reduced save, you may then add that number to each die of damage that the spell inflicts. The number you subtract cannot exceed your caster level, and the number of dice it boosts is capped at half your caster level. If a spell does damage multiple times or over multiple rounds, each victim only suffers the bonus damage a single time.

Of course, the thing to remember here is that save DCs are harder to increase than to-hit, generally. Sure, a level 10 caster could theoretically cast a fireball that does an extra 50 damage (more than they could add through metamagic), but -10 save DC is huge, so it wouldn't actually manage to inflict the extra damage very often, if ever. Perhaps this actually needs more of a boost...

Anyway, I was curious what thoughts other people had on the general concept.

[gotelc]

cool idea, they did give magic the weapon focus feat so this seems like a good step.

by the thread title i was thinking more of touch and ranged touch power attack so it works the same way as normal power attack, dropping a little base attack power for a little power boost, maybe give the feat both abilities, with attack roll spells its a 1 for 1 trade but with the save spells its the +1 per die thing, you could also have an improved spell power attack as a chain that make the bonus a +2 to damage for each 1 point lost.

I would definately take this as a cleric (lvl 10), "oh your an army of un-dead and have very poor ref saves, Flamestrike power attack -5" 10d6+50 OH yeah baby!

[Deesix]

The damage boost seems a little high to me, honestly...I'd personally make it 1 for 1 total, but have the damage dealt to people who make the save or not (perhaps even dealing that as minimum damage to people with evasion).

[TheGrimace]

First: it is commonly believed that wizards are teh pwnzor, and need not any help in dealing damage. but...
say, you did take the -10, and added 50 damage.
then they almost without fail succeed at the save.
number crunch
10d6=35
5d6+25=42 (good number)

so, even sacrificing any chance of them failing, maxing that out would be a good move.

[Aquillion]

The damage boost seems a little high to me, honestly...I'd personally make it 1 for 1 total, but have the damage dealt to people who make the save or not (perhaps even dealing that as minimum damage to people with evasion).That wouldn't be very good... 1 damage per CL doesn't amount to very much. 10 extra damage at level 10 or 20 extra damage at level 20 is silly.


First: it is commonly believed that wizards are teh pwnzor, and need not any help in dealing damage. but...
say, you did take the -10, and added 50 damage.
then they almost without fail succeed at the save.
number crunch
10d6=35
5d6+25=42 (good number)

so, even sacrificing any chance of them failing, maxing that out would be a good move.Blaster wizards are generally considered underpowered, though. This is to help them, mainly; since it costs a feat, it's not as though your 'average' wizards would grab it and become more powerful. It'd required a wizard who does a lot of blasting, which will still be weaker than batman.

Note that I set it up so the bonus damage is not applied when they make their save, for exactly the reason you specified.

[Triaxx]

I don't know about Wizards, but Sorcerors are going to go wild for this one. Drop a bit of Save DC, to soup up the damage? Where do I sign up?

Speaking of the damage, how is it applied? Increasing the dice? Increasing the die? D6>d8, or just adding damage?

[CasESenSITItiVE]

i've heard that blaster wizards were underpowered compared to batman wizards, but i never heard the claim tht blasters were overpowered on there own. wizards seem perfectly capable of doing damage to me.

[psychoticbarber]

I don't know about Wizards, but Sorcerors are going to go wild for this one. Drop a bit of Save DC, to soup up the damage? Where do I sign up?

This is especially poignant with Save-For-Half spells. You pump up the damage, and assume that they'll reliably take half.

[Vonriel]

Maybe I'm missing something, but isn't this already accomplished via Maximize or Empower?

[Triaxx]

Exactly, since my opening move is typically a Fireball. It's also fantastic for things such as Cloud Kill.

[Zeta Kai]

You wanna improve blasting? I think that you should look into this (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#metamagicFeats). I'm pretty sure that is what this is designed to do.