Fizban
2021-07-28, 07:15 AM
So I've been comparing summons and not summons and moving to the planar exchange spells and now on to the PHB2+ X-shape spells to see what I should put where making new spells, but as I expected there's a problem.
The planar exchange are easy to evaluate and basically kings of balance: they're Summon Monster/Nature's Ally picks from one level higher, very easily evaluated and controlled and actually just give you the monster as written, but not very exciting- they're more likely to grab players' attention for sounding cool before they realize it's still only a shade better than normal summons, minus optimization options (I have them on my Healer list as sort of trap/rule of cool options). So naturally I might want to adjust them/make new spells a bit more powerful, and why not compare to the X-shape spells?
But the X-shape spells, in addition to being swift actions and failing to prevent carryover of all your active buffs, also obviously use a complete different scaling. The higher level spells have monsters at listed CR of roughly CL +1 (at 9th), -1 or 2 at 8th, CR "7" at 5th and 6th but with wildly different monster strengths, 5 at 4th, and 3 at 3rd (this is for combat monsters obviously, not the pseudodragon or CSc fish/bird ones).
I can and will compare some combat numbers myself, but what I'm wondering is: has anyone actually used any of these spells, and if so, how did they go? Preferably without the easy-cheese buff stacking, but even that would be something. And party details for comparison would also be best.
The planar exchange are easy to evaluate and basically kings of balance: they're Summon Monster/Nature's Ally picks from one level higher, very easily evaluated and controlled and actually just give you the monster as written, but not very exciting- they're more likely to grab players' attention for sounding cool before they realize it's still only a shade better than normal summons, minus optimization options (I have them on my Healer list as sort of trap/rule of cool options). So naturally I might want to adjust them/make new spells a bit more powerful, and why not compare to the X-shape spells?
But the X-shape spells, in addition to being swift actions and failing to prevent carryover of all your active buffs, also obviously use a complete different scaling. The higher level spells have monsters at listed CR of roughly CL +1 (at 9th), -1 or 2 at 8th, CR "7" at 5th and 6th but with wildly different monster strengths, 5 at 4th, and 3 at 3rd (this is for combat monsters obviously, not the pseudodragon or CSc fish/bird ones).
I can and will compare some combat numbers myself, but what I'm wondering is: has anyone actually used any of these spells, and if so, how did they go? Preferably without the easy-cheese buff stacking, but even that would be something. And party details for comparison would also be best.