3.0/ 3.5 Haste

[Biggus]

Starting a new thread to avoid hijacking an existing one.

In this thread (http://http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?583807-What-did-3-0-do-better) Quertus mentioned that by giving an extra partial action per round 3.0 Haste allowed melee types to effectively have the pounce ability which was very useful to them. But by allowing casters an extra spell it increased their power even further, so heavyfuel suggested making Haste give an extra move action instead.

This seems like a good idea, I'm thinking of using this in my game instead of the "extra 30ft move speed" in 3.5.

Is there anything I'm missing? Any reason not to do this? Any way it could be abused? The only thing I can think of is that it would allow casters to move, cast, and move in a single round, would that be a major problem?

(Edited as I slightly misrepresented the original thread)

[Mike Miller]

It sounds fine to me. I would say, look up a list of things you can do with a move action (psionic focus, reload xbow, etc). That will give you an idea of the potential usage of haste as an extra move action.

[Troacctid]

That's basically what it does in 5e too.

[Khedrac]

It also allows casters to cast channelled X spells as a move action instead of a swift action and then still have a full round action to do whatever.

You will have to rule what happens with full round casting (as in summoning spells) when hasted.

The 3.0 haste was single target, are you making that change to your modified 3.5 version?

[Troacctid]

It also allows casters to cast channelled X spells as a move action instead of a swift action and then still have a full round action to do whatever.
There isn't a move action option for them. It goes from swift to standard.

[Selion]

Haste is already one of the best party buff in 3.5/pathfinder, no need to improve it further. Having a good spell specifically martial oriented is good in order to lure the wizards playing teamwork, but it's pointless trying to improve martial classes making them buff-dependants.

[Quertus]

Starting a new thread to avoid hijacking an existing one.

In this thread (http://http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?583807-What-did-3-0-do-better) Quertus mentioned that by giving an extra partial action per round 3.0 Haste allowed melee types to effectively have the pounce ability which was very useful to them. But by allowing casters an extra spell it increased their power even further, so heavyfuel suggested making Haste give an extra move action instead.

This seems like a good idea, I'm thinking of using this in my game instead of the "extra 30ft move speed" in 3.5.

Is there anything I'm missing? Any reason not to do this? Any way it could be abused? The only thing I can think of is that it would allow casters to move, cast, and move in a single round, would that be a major problem?

(Edited as I slightly misrepresented the original thread)


Haste is already one of the best party buff in 3.5/pathfinder, no need to improve it further. Having a good spell specifically martial oriented is good in order to lure the wizards playing teamwork, but it's pointless trying to improve martial classes making them buff-dependants.

While I like the idea of having Haste give either a move action or an extra attack on a full attack or a free "partial charge", whichever the user decides is most beneficial that round, I have to point out two things.

First, thanks for acknowledging me! I feel obliged to point out my minority opinion that 3.0 Haste is a stealth nerf to casters, as it makes them run out of spells twice as fast! In play, casters don't really notice it - they feel like they're more powerful, but, actually, they're just much less efficient, and much less powerful in the long run.

Two. Personally, I think it's nice to have more than one way to skin the "melee needs nice things like full attacks" cat. Lion Totem Barbarian 1 / whatever else is still a valid build under this suggestion; but, now, so is something else. Win / win?

[heavyfuel]

Starting a new thread to avoid hijacking an existing one.

In this thread (http://http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?583807-What-did-3-0-do-better) Quertus mentioned that by giving an extra partial action per round 3.0 Haste allowed melee types to effectively have the pounce ability which was very useful to them. But by allowing casters an extra spell it increased their power even further, so heavyfuel suggested making Haste give an extra move action instead.

This seems like a good idea, I'm thinking of using this in my game instead of the "extra 30ft move speed" in 3.5.

Is there anything I'm missing? Any reason not to do this? Any way it could be abused? The only thing I can think of is that it would allow casters to move, cast, and move in a single round, would that be a major problem?

(Edited as I slightly misrepresented the original thread)

Also, thanks for the aknowledgement. :smallsmile:

Now I feel like I should elaborate on what I intended to say on the thread you linked. 3.0's Haste made casters very powerful. Running out of spells twice as fast doesn't matter when you just have kill the BBEG and then rest to regain spells.

However, like Selion said, I do think that Haste is already an extremely powerful spell and shouldn't be made stronger.

So my suggestion isn't "swap the 30ft speed bonus for an extra move action". My suggestion is "swap the extra partial action for an extra move action".

This makes the Haste much more in-line with other spells of the same level, such as the Fly spell. Fly is a very strong buff that affects only one person. Reworked Haste is also a very strong buff that only affects one person.

Allowing for "extra move action OR extra attack on a full attack" would help mundanes more, but it further solidifies 2 handed weapons as the supperior choice of melee. Allowing for this buff to target multiple creatures would make it way stronger than any other 3rd level spell (except for maybe cheesed Shivering Touch).

I'm all for helping mundanes, but I don't think the way to help them is by giving casters super powerful mundane helping spells.

[Biggus]

Thanks all for input.


look up a list of things you can do with a move action (psionic focus, reload xbow, etc). That will give you an idea of the potential usage of haste as an extra move action.

Good idea. The only ones which seem like they could be game-changing are "Direct or Redirect a Spell" and "Retrieve a stored item". I don't think they'd be hugely problematic, but if anyone wants to enlighten me otherwise...


Haste is already one of the best party buff in 3.5/pathfinder, no need to improve it further.

Can you expand a bit on why you think this? Haste doesn't see that much use in my 3.5 games (unlike in 3.0 where it was a must-have).


I feel obliged to point out my minority opinion that 3.0 Haste is a stealth nerf to casters, as it makes them run out of spells twice as fast!

I think that's a valid concern when Haste is first available, but less so as you go up levels, especially as at high levels you have enough wealth to have scrolls and so on as backups for those times when you do run out of spells.


Personally, I think it's nice to have more than one way to skin the "melee needs nice things like full attacks" cat. Lion Totem Barbarian 1 / whatever else is still a valid build under this suggestion; but, now, so is something else. Win / win?

Yeah, this was part of my reason for wanting to adopt the change, Lion Totem Barbarian 1 seems to be almost a requirement in a lot of melee builds, I liked the idea of removing the necessity for it.


However, like Selion said, I do think that Haste is already an extremely powerful spell and shouldn't be made stronger.

So my suggestion isn't "swap the 30ft speed bonus for an extra move action". My suggestion is "swap the extra partial action for an extra move action".

This makes the Haste much more in-line with other spells of the same level, such as the Fly spell. Fly is a very strong buff that affects only one person. Reworked Haste is also a very strong buff that only affects one person.

My concern is that since reworked Haste would be much more useful to noncasters than casters, if it's a single-target spell a lot of casters might be reluctant to take it.

Also, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on why Haste is already an extremely powerful spell. My impression is that 3.5 Haste is pretty useless to anyone who's not a melee combatant.


Allowing for "extra move action OR extra attack on a full attack" would help mundanes more, but it further solidifies 2 handed weapons as the supperior choice of melee.

This is a good point, I hadn't thought about that. I've often thought I'd like to even up the melee styles a bit, have you seen any good ways of doing this?

-----------------------------------------

On the whole, I am liking the idea of the change, because I'm trying to even out casters against noncasters to some extent. My current camapign has a 9th-level Wizard who's already getting hard to challenge with anything level-appropriate, and it's only going to get worse (I recently saw a thread about how a well-played 13th-level Wizard can reliably beat a 20th-level Fighter, unless the Fighter resorts to tricks like using Leadership to have a caster cohort, or optimising UMD to cast spells themselves).

[Eldariel]

Yeah, this was part of my reason for wanting to adopt the change, Lion Totem Barbarian 1 seems to be almost a requirement in a lot of melee builds, I liked the idea of removing the necessity for it.

Have you considered just cutting the middleman and removing full attack mechanics entirely (optional: from melee only, if you want archers to be easier to catch - as a bonus, why not make spells take on average a round to cast too so casters need to worry about their positioning a bit more and suddenly the most mobile character on the battlefield is also the most position dependent, the melee warrior)? Just allow characters to attack just as effectively after movement as without movement. This brings fluidity to combat, allows martial types to reposition and still do their stuff, removes the need for pounce (but thanks to many creatures with pounce having Rake and similar, it's still useful), makes all kinds of martial types (and martial enemies) more viable and overall, just makes the game flow better. It does make monsters more lethal as they get to full attack after movement but to be honest, it's both easy to account for and martial enemies already needed help; it's the spellcasters you need to worry about TPKing the party. It also makes level advancement make more sense: on level 1 there's already no difference between full attack and single attack (unless you TWF for some godawful reason) but on level 6 a difference is suddenly introduced. Whuh? Where'd that come from?

[heavyfuel]

My concern is that since reworked Haste would be much more useful to noncasters than casters, if it's a single-target spell a lot of casters might be reluctant to take it.

Enlarge Person and Bull's Strength are good single target buffs that suck for casters but they still prepare them. These were the two that came to mind just now, but I'm sure you can find many others such buffs. Making it single target and party friendly doesn't mean casters won't prepare.


Also, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on why Haste is already an extremely powerful spell. My impression is that 3.5 Haste is pretty useless to anyone who's not a melee combatant.

It really depends on party composition.

If your party is a Warblade, a Cloistered Cleric, a Wizard, a Swordsage, and a Bard, then Haste is a pretty crappy option.

However, if the party is a Lion Totem Barbarian, a Druid, a Wizard, a Rogue, and a Ranger, then Haste is absolutely amazing.

For every round after the first, each character is making one extra attack at full bonus+1. That's one extra for the Barbarian, the Druid's Animal Companion, the 1d3 summoned creatures the druid just brought it, the Rogue, the Ranger, and the Ranger's Animal Companion. That's ~6 extra attacks every round.

If each extra attack deals an average of 20 damage and has a 70% average chance of hitting (both rather low averages), that's approximately 85 damage per round. If the combat lasts for 4 rounds after haste is cast, this single spells will have allowed for and extra 340 damage. If you think that's a bad 3rd level spell, then you and I are playing on very different optimization levels.

This math also doesn't take into account the extra damage the +1 to attack the spell grants, nor does it take into account the damage that it prevented because of +1 AC and Reflex.

Oh, and on top of it all, it also grants everyone extra movement speed.

The spell is absolutely bonkers depending on your party composition.


This is a good point, I hadn't thought about that. I've often thought I'd like to even up the melee styles a bit, have you seen any good ways of doing this?

Yes, many.

- Using Pathfinder's Power Attack instead of 3.5 is great since now you can never Power Attack for a bajillion damage.
- Make TWF a feat that allows one off hand attack for every main hand attack. Improved TWF and greater TWF are removed from the game or given other function such as reducing the TWF penalty.
- Allow for two weapons to be enchanted as one, but the enchantments only apply as long as a single person is wielding them both at once.
- The Shield Ward feat (PHB 2) no longer exists and is now part of how shields work (as long as you are proficient)
- Halve the price for shield enchantments (but remove the Animated Shield enchantment from the game, otherwise expect literally every character have one).

[Elkad]

My impression is that 3.5 Haste is pretty useless to anyone who's not a melee combatant.

Speed is rarely useless.
As a caster, moving 80' instead of 50' (or whatever, but that's a good benchmark speed when Haste comes online) means I can likely avoid melee completely. Which means less spell slots used on defenses.

[Hish]

Speed is rarely useless.
As a caster, moving 80' instead of 50' (or whatever, but that's a good benchmark speed when Haste comes online) means I can likely avoid melee completely. Which means less spell slots used on defenses.

Honest question: how is your base move speed 50'? I play in what I think is a pretty mid-op group, and I can't think of anything worthwhile that will boost your speed like that.

[Eldariel]

Halve the price for shield enchantments (but remove the Animated Shield enchantment from the game, otherwise expect literally every character have one).

PF version of Animated Shield neatly sidesteps this issue. Activating it costs an action (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/animated/) (albeit just a Move one), and it lasts only for a couple of rounds at a time. Still definitely usable but no longer an automatic option.

[martixy]

If you want to bring a bit of 3.0 haste to 3.5 I'd rather not touch the normal 3.5 haste. It's kind of an iconic spell and fine as is.

But I'm not opposed to having a Level 4-5 spell "Greater Haste" that simply gave you an extra move action each round.

[Quertus]

I think that's a valid concern when Haste is first available, but less so as you go up levels, especially as at high levels you have enough wealth to have scrolls and so on as backups for those times when you do run out of spells.

Two three some number of things:

One, none of my tables like consumables. I finally have a player who gravitates to that style, so we'll see how it turns out. But, IME, from my tables, there is little to no "endurance through consumables".

Two, consumables lack a good Save DC.

Three, high-level consumables are bloody expensive!

Four, if you only have one Dimensional Anchor memorized, it only takes one encounter to remove what may be a necessary resource in the next encounter. Contrary to popular opinion, the problem gets *worse* the higher level (and therefore the more "you must be this tall to ride" requirements the adventure assumes) you become.

Five, my tables tend to run published modules, and otherwise build "there's 100 encounters today" scenarios. The "15-minute adventuring day" is mostly foreign to us.

So, yeah, from my experience, Haste is a trap.

[heavyfuel]

One, none of my tables like consumables [...]

Five, my tables tend to run published modules, and otherwise build "there's 100 encounters today" scenarios. The "15-minute adventuring day" is mostly foreign to us.

So, yeah, from my experience, Haste is a trap.

If you do have 100 encounters per day, how do any of your PCs stay alive? Even those with at-will resources such as Maneuvers and Invocations will eventually run out of HP for example. And they do all that consumables?! Or are the 100 encounters so incredibly weak encounters where no one loses HP?

Cuz yeah, in either of those scenarios I'm sure being able to cast two spells per round isn't that much of an advantage.

But almost no one plays like that, and I think you'll be hard pressed to find someone who agrees that "better than free Quicken Spell" is a horrible deal for a level 3 spell.

[Quertus]

If you do have 100 encounters per day, how do any of your PCs stay alive? Even those with at-will resources such as Maneuvers and Invocations will eventually run out of HP for example. And they do all that consumables?! Or are the 100 encounters so incredibly weak encounters where no one loses HP?

Cuz yeah, in either of those scenarios I'm sure being able to cast two spells per round isn't that much of an advantage.

But almost no one plays like that, and I think you'll be hard pressed to find someone who agrees that "better than free Quicken Spell" is a horrible deal for a level 3 spell.

Most importantly, 3.0 Haste is not "better than free Quicken Spell". It's "absolutely nothing*, at the cost of a 3rd level spell slot" on round 1. To get any value out of it, you have to go to round 2 - at which point, you've used 4 spells (to get the effectiveness of 3).

Really, if your Wizard needs 3 spells to contribute meaningfully to the encounter, they are highly suboptimal for my tables.

And, fine, Wand of Lesser Vigor is a consumable. But 3k for 200 charges, plus 5k(ish) for Scroll of True Resurrection covers the vast majority of our standard "party funds", even at epic level.

Also, Crusader maneuvers for free healing comes online at level 1. And there's several other (generally less effective) techniques.

* OK, a 4-point AC bonus...

[ericgrau]

Starting a new thread to avoid hijacking an existing one.

In this thread (http://http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?583807-What-did-3-0-do-better) Quertus mentioned that by giving an extra partial action per round 3.0 Haste allowed melee types to effectively have the pounce ability which was very useful to them. But by allowing casters an extra spell it increased their power even further, so heavyfuel suggested making Haste give an extra move action instead.

This seems like a good idea, I'm thinking of using this in my game instead of the "extra 30ft move speed" in 3.5.

Is there anything I'm missing? Any reason not to do this? Any way it could be abused? The only thing I can think of is that it would allow casters to move, cast, and move in a single round, would that be a major problem?

(Edited as I slightly misrepresented the original thread)

Casters get spring attack for spells, yes. Melee also gets spring attack and/or pounce. It's too much power for a 3rd level spell. As-is haste is high up for level 3 spells. You shouldn't fix anything with spell tax nor feat tax. It forces players to get the ability and blow an action on it if they want to keep up and so limits other choices. A standard action tax is especially bad. Just 2-3 such abilities and you've decided all the player's actions for the important part of the fight, completely draining all the fun out of D&D combat for that player. If you think melee should have spring attack and/or pounce, then just give it to them for free.


If you want to bring a bit of 3.0 haste to 3.5 I'd rather not touch the normal 3.5 haste. It's kind of an iconic spell and fine as is.

But I'm not opposed to having a Level 4-5 spell "Greater Haste" that simply gave you an extra move action each round.
Also works. But with the power of action economy I'd peg it at a much higher level. Less if your party already has easy was to get the effects. Pounce maybe, but "spring spell" takes a little work via feats or magic items. In high optimization with a lot of movement items (even better than anklets of translocation) and feats (even beyond travel devotion) in use I'd peg it at 5th level. It temporarily provides well over ten thousand gp worth of high power items to the party for a single action. Worth several tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of gp of lower power items. If not some feats too. Less would be fair for a temporary 3rd level effect, WBL be darned since it's temporary. But not this much. In low optimization where anklets of translocation and so forth might be banned, I think 8th level is fair. For everything in between, some level in between 5th and 8th.

[Segev]

It's not a stealth nerf. The 15-minute adventuring day is an issue even in 3.5, and casters are the primary culprits (aside from enabling DMs; I can't even blame the parties, really, because from an in-game perspective, refusing to wait when there is time to do so and it means a huge increase in win rate and survivability would just be silly levels of impatient. The kind of impatient that gets shounen protagonists Very Important Lessons based around almost losing their own lives or that of their friends when they won't wait for everyone else to be ready).

Action economy is far more important than expendable resources under most circumstances. Nova-ing faster only makes you all the more powerful.

And while 3.0 haste on oneself on the first round of combat means you don't catch up in action economy until round 2, you don't use it when you're surprised. You use it when you have those pre-combat rounds to buff, and can open up with two spells per round. (IIRC, 3.0 haste was single-target only, or I'd say it is not a waste even in round one, since you can still haste the fighter at the same time.)

Action deficit kills. Having two actions instead of one is a huge advantage, no matter how much faster it burns through your resources.

[ericgrau]

It's not a stealth nerf. The 15-minute adventuring day is an issue even in 3.5, and casters are the primary culprits (aside from enabling DMs; I can't even blame the parties, really, because from an in-game perspective, refusing to wait when there is time to do so and it means a huge increase in win rate and survivability would just be silly levels of impatient. The kind of impatient that gets shounen protagonists Very Important Lessons based around almost losing their own lives or that of their friends when they won't wait for everyone else to be ready).

Action economy is far more important than expendable resources under most circumstances. Nova-ing faster only makes you all the more powerful.

And while 3.0 haste on oneself on the first round of combat means you don't catch up in action economy until round 2, you don't use it when you're surprised. You use it when you have those pre-combat rounds to buff, and can open up with two spells per round. (IIRC, 3.0 haste was single-target only, or I'd say it is not a waste even in round one, since you can still haste the fighter at the same time.)

Action deficit kills. Having two actions instead of one is a huge advantage, no matter how much faster it burns through your resources.

Oh if the O.P. means single target then I'd drop my spell level estimates by 2-3.

Also when picking targets low op would use it for pseudo pounce (assuming they're not allowed pounce in other ways) while high op would most often use it for "spring spell"/kiting and totally defeat the O.P.'s goal. If it was even cast at all. Since making it single target and only grant bonus move actions might make it a little worse than 3.5 haste in high op.

[Quertus]

It's not a stealth nerf. The 15-minute adventuring day is an issue even in 3.5, and casters are the primary culprits (aside from enabling DMs; I can't even blame the parties, really, because from an in-game perspective, refusing to wait when there is time to do so and it means a huge increase in win rate and survivability would just be silly levels of impatient. The kind of impatient that gets shounen protagonists Very Important Lessons based around almost losing their own lives or that of their friends when they won't wait for everyone else to be ready).

Action economy is far more important than expendable resources under most circumstances. Nova-ing faster only makes you all the more powerful.

And while 3.0 haste on oneself on the first round of combat means you don't catch up in action economy until round 2, you don't use it when you're surprised. You use it when you have those pre-combat rounds to buff, and can open up with two spells per round. (IIRC, 3.0 haste was single-target only, or I'd say it is not a waste even in round one, since you can still haste the fighter at the same time.)

Action deficit kills. Having two actions instead of one is a huge advantage, no matter how much faster it burns through your resources.

Never play an ace when a duce will do. Spamming lots of spells for diminishing returns is inefficient.

In a Vancian, "Wizard is your panic button", Combat as War "not everything is a balanced encounter on the razors edge of a TPK" setting, Haste is a stealth nerf. In a "all spells can be cast at will", Combat as Sport "be optimal or be dead" setting, then, yes, Haste is a boon to action economy.

How your table plays will determine whether 3.0 Haste is a boon or bane. IME, at my tables, it's a stealth bane, a willingly-imposed nerf by Wizards who didn't think things through. And who bring the TPK by ensuring that they're not ready at the end - the flip side of your impatient shounen protagonists.


But with the power of action economy I'd peg it at a much higher level. I think 8th level is fair. For everything in between, some level in between 5th and 8th.

I mean, if I were caring about balance, I'd make it a Cantrip, castable on muggles only, available in item form, comes with a free cohort. :smalltongue:

[Segev]

Never play an ace when a duce will do. Spamming lots of spells for diminishing returns is inefficient.

In a Vancian, "Wizard is your panic button", Combat as War "not everything is a balanced encounter on the razors edge of a TPK" setting, Haste is a stealth nerf. In a "all spells can be cast at will", Combat as Sport "be optimal or be dead" setting, then, yes, Haste is a boon to action economy.

How your table plays will determine whether 3.0 Haste is a boon or bane. IME, at my tables, it's a stealth bane, a willingly-imposed nerf by Wizards who didn't think things through. And who bring the TPK by ensuring that they're not ready at the end - the flip side of your impatient shounen protagonists.

In "combat as war," it's not a stealth nerf unless you use it foolishly. In such a case, nearly anything that lets you have more flexibility is a stealth nerf, because the foolish will use the flexibility to squander more resources more uselessly.

There will always be situations where having superior action economy is valuable; you cast 3.0 haste when they arise. "Play two 5s at once" may be far more efficient than playing a deuce or an ace (to mangle the metaphor; sorry, but I don't play those kinds of card games, so I may strain this unduly). It's all about when and how you use it.

In "combat as war," the ability to get off two specific spells at once in the opening round may be crucial, in which case a pre-battle 3.0 haste would not be a nerf at all.

Calling 3.0 haste a "stealth nerf" is saying Quicken Spell is always a massive stealth nerf, since it costs a spell slot 4 levels higher and also burns out your spells twice as fast for less effect! And yet, it's one of the more powerful feats available, especially before we get into spells like celerity.

[Ramza00]

Most importantly, 3.0 Haste is not "better than free Quicken Spell". It's "absolutely nothing*, at the cost of a 3rd level spell slot" on round 1. To get any value out of it, you have to go to round 2 - at which point, you've used 4 spells (to get the effectiveness of 3).

Really, if your Wizard needs 3 spells to contribute meaningfully to the encounter, they are highly suboptimal for my tables.

And, fine, Wand of Lesser Vigor is a consumable. But 3k for 200 charges, plus 5k(ish) for Scroll of True Resurrection covers the vast majority of our standard "party funds", even at epic level.

Also, Crusader maneuvers for free healing comes online at level 1. And there's several other (generally less effective) techniques.

* OK, a 4-point AC bonus...

To my understanding the metamagic rods in 3.0 cost the same as 3.5 for I do not see the pricing changed in the core rulebook 3.5 updates (free on wizards.com's website.)

So that makes a lesser metamagic rod of quicken (up to 3rd level spells) 35,000 gp for 3x a day quicken up to a 3rd level spell. 2x 3rd level Pearls of Power (so you only have to prepare 1 haste a day but you get the benefit of 3 hastes a day) will allow you to cast your 3 hastes a day for 53,000 gp and 1 3rd level spell slot.

This is a bargain at lvl 15 and 15+ play, but affording to metamagic rod is not possible at lvl 13 with wealth by level (unless you craft it yourself), and the metamagic rod but no pearls of power is avaliabile at lvl 14.

----

TLDR: My point here is Quertus you very much have a point, 3.0 haste has marginal value by itself, but use it as part of a chain of normal not exploitative tools and suddenly the downsides of 3.0 haste pretty much go away.

-----

Back to the OP


Starting a new thread to avoid hijacking an existing one.

In this thread (http://http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?583807-What-did-3-0-do-better) Quertus mentioned that by giving an extra partial action per round 3.0 Haste allowed melee types to effectively have the pounce ability which was very useful to them. But by allowing casters an extra spell it increased their power even further, so heavyfuel suggested making Haste give an extra move action instead.

This seems like a good idea, I'm thinking of using this in my game instead of the "extra 30ft move speed" in 3.5.

Is there anything I'm missing? Any reason not to do this? Any way it could be abused? The only thing I can think of is that it would allow casters to move, cast, and move in a single round, would that be a major problem?

(Edited as I slightly misrepresented the original thread)


If you allow melee to use an extra move action instead of 30ft movement, or instead of the extra attack of haste, you might want to look into the magic item Hammersphere from the MIC p161 (or the 3.0 Arms and Equipment Guide but it is a little more expensive here but not by much.) For 1,500 GP if you buy a Hammersphere, or 750 GP+60 XP if you craft it you get a 1 a day Spiritual Weapon (like the spell, lasts for 7 rounds) that does damage for 3d6 and you need not be a spellcaster to use this Spiritual Weapon type effect.

So it is a standard action to activate a Hammersphere but then you get a hammer that follows you around for 7 rounds and it does 3d6 damage and gets additional attacks based off your BAB (so it is better for melee, medium for clerics and 3/4 BAB classes, and poor for wizards and 1/2 BAB classes.) The thing is the hammersphere stops attacking once it kills the first enemy, but you can have a new enemy targeted for a move action (and thus the Haste effect we are talking about) but when a hammersphere moves in this way it only gets 1 attack during the movement round. (So if the hammersphere does not kill the enemy you get 2 attacks at BAB 6, 3 attacks at BAB 11, 4 attacks at BAB 16.)

The damage is spell damage / force damage for this 3d6, and it affects incorporeal enemies as if it was an incorporeal weapon with no miss chance. The attack bonus for this weapon is your BAB + Your Wisdom Modifier. This weapon does not get benefits from your feats or your class abilities so no things like power attack.

Effectively you are Alucard from 1:10 to 2:00


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_EOHqTwl5s

MIC says the shape of the Hammersphere should be a Hammer for it is flavorly tied to Moradin (dwarf god of hammers) but this type of flavor is also encouraged to be changed in other parts of 3.5 D&D. Unless you going for a Thor Ragnarok God of Hammers / Mjölnir Feel. Spiritual Weapon the spell Hammersphere is based off of your diety favored weapon but the damage is still the same, and if the weapon is a bow and arrow it acts like a melee weapon but flavor wise you are shooting arrows with Spiritual Weapon.

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Whatever you do Quertus have fun.

[heavyfuel]

Never play an ace when a duce will do. Spamming lots of spells for diminishing returns is inefficient.

You're arguing under the assumption that a player will always cast haste and nova.

That's not true. Smart players will continue to use their resources sparringly, but having the option to nova when necessary is absolutelly not a bad thing.

When you're met with a bigger than expected threat and push comes to shove, doubling your spellcasting output can be absolutely encounter/game breaking. If a couple of spells is all it takes for your wizards to contribute, imagine what they can do with a half-dozen when they need to, which is the key part.

Better to have the ace and not need it, then not have it and need it. Sometimes playing the ace is absolutely the best option.

[Quertus]

Well, what y'all are saying makes sense. I guess I've just never seen the combination "uses Haste" and "conserves spells" before. IME, "conserves spells" has always been paired with a "one and done" attitude; whereas "uses Haste" has always been paired with a "can we rest yet? It's been two whole encounters!" mindset. (Or, at least, that's all I can remember. Darn senility.)

So, sure, played conservatively, I can see how Haste can be yet another emergency button for the fallback plan Wizard to hit. I'd say I'm struggling to remember a time when it would have been worth the pricetag to Quicken it*, but, then, what else is a Wizard going to do with their money?

Lastly, I'm having a hard time imagining it being a useful tactic without violating the "balance to the table" principle. Maybe on a tactically inept academia mage?

* and, on a related note, worth the opportunity cost to carry it around, "just in case"

[Segev]

Well, what y'all are saying makes sense. I guess I've just never seen the combination "uses Haste" and "conserves spells" before. IME, "conserves spells" has always been paired with a "one and done" attitude; whereas "uses Haste" has always been paired with a "can we rest yet? It's been two whole encounters!" mindset. (Or, at least, that's all I can remember. Darn senility.)

So, sure, played conservatively, I can see how Haste can be yet another emergency button for the fallback plan Wizard to hit. I'd say I'm struggling to remember a time when it would have been worth the pricetag to Quicken it*, but, then, what else is a Wizard going to do with their money?

Lastly, I'm having a hard time imagining it being a useful tactic without violating the "balance to the table" principle. Maybe on a tactically inept academia mage?

* and, on a related note, worth the opportunity cost to carry it around, "just in case"

I played an epic-level sorcerer who had tricks that expanded his repertoir considerably who nevertheless played as conservatively as possible, trying to use as few spells as he could and be a precise chisel that brought down the pyramid by hitting the right spot. He was quite content to throw a little BFC out, a buff or two, and let his less-casty allies sweep up the mess. But if things got out of hand and the need was there, he kept on reserve the means to cut loose with a half-dozen high-level spells at once. On the medium-scale of Adam saying "Let's get dangerous," he took down a massive pile of hit points and immunities that was damaging the party and not taking anything by Quickening a Twinned Sphere of Ultimate Destruction and then Twinning another, for a total of 4 40d6 spheres of effective disintegrate damage. Up until then, he'd barely dipped into his spells for the day, using mid to low level magics to aid and support while his party was awesome.

There's no point, to him, in nova-ing when there are others who can handle it. His job is to demonstrate why the bad guys don't want him to come over there, and would vastly prefer to deal with his allies.

[Biggus]

Hi all, sorry it's taken me so long to get back to you, I haven't had the time and energy to give this my full attention until now.



If each extra attack deals an average of 20 damage and has a 70% average chance of hitting (both rather low averages), that's approximately 85 damage per round. If the combat lasts for 4 rounds after haste is cast, this single spells will have allowed for and extra 340 damage. If you think that's a bad 3rd level spell, then you and I are playing on very different optimization levels.

I take it you're talking about fairly high-level characters there?

But yeah, fair point, even if you use lower numbers it's still a lot of extra damage for a 3rd-level spell.




- Using Pathfinder's Power Attack instead of 3.5 is great since now you can never Power Attack for a bajillion damage.
- Make TWF a feat that allows one off hand attack for every main hand attack. Improved TWF and greater TWF are removed from the game or given other function such as reducing the TWF penalty.
- Allow for two weapons to be enchanted as one, but the enchantments only apply as long as a single person is wielding them both at once.
- The Shield Ward feat (PHB 2) no longer exists and is now part of how shields work (as long as you are proficient)
- Halve the price for shield enchantments (but remove the Animated Shield enchantment from the game, otherwise expect literally every character have one).

Thanks for the tip about PF Power Attack, that makes 100% more sense than the 3.5 version.

I'd already done that with TWF.

Interesting ideas about shields, I'll give them some thought.

And yeah, Animated Shields are another thing that practically everybody (apart from arcane casters) past a certain level seems to have as standard...


PF version of Animated Shield neatly sidesteps this issue. Activating it costs an action (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/animated/) (albeit just a Move one), and it lasts only for a couple of rounds at a time. Still definitely usable but no longer an automatic option.

Thanks for reminding me about this, I'd considered using the PF version but then I forgot about it.


You shouldn't fix anything with spell tax nor feat tax. It forces players to get the ability and blow an action on it if they want to keep up and so limits other choices. A standard action tax is especially bad. Just 2-3 such abilities and you've decided all the player's actions for the important part of the fight, completely draining all the fun out of D&D combat for that player. If you think melee should have spring attack and/or pounce, then just give it to them for free.


In this case, I disagree, I don't think pounce should be something everyone should have, but I want there to be several options of how to get it, rather than everyone having a level of Lion Totem Barbarian. If Haste gives it, then Haste items like Boots of Speed also give it, and I've also considered making Dire Charge into a nonepic feat (it's generally considered underpowered as epic feats go), so there's a class level, spell, item and feat route.

[Elkad]

Honest question: how is your base move speed 50'? I play in what I think is a pretty mid-op group, and I can't think of anything worthwhile that will boost your speed like that.

Xeph, Catfolk, Celerity Domain, Speed of Thought, Freedom Mantle, Quick trait, Alacrity Crystal, Barbarian dip, a couple Stances, and of course Alter Self forms (Varag for 60' base, Run and Spring Attack, and some other useful bonuses, like +8 Move Silent and +3 NA) or Wildshape.
None of which are enhancement, so they stack with Haste.

So it depends on your interpretation of "worthwhile"

Personally, I value movement speed highly. On a melee toon, it means I can get to the fight, including repositioning. On a ranged toon (archer or caster), it means I can stay out of melee range.
If I'm fast on a wizard, I'm less likely to need hitpoints, grapple defenses, armor class, etc.

And when it all goes wrong, I can run away successfully.