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Kioran
2008-04-01, 06:31 AM
There is one question I have been asking myself, both in regards to my own d20-rewrite and the Pathfinder system, as well as "4th Ed" - obviously, some spells can be very problematic if they can be cast at will (Heal, Fabricate etc.), at least at some levels, while others (burning hands, Mage hand etc.) are obviously a lot less problematic. If one strives to reduce Item dependency, it is actually quite logical to make some magic effects available to normal characters, either as SLAs or at will. That has also already been done, in a limited fashion, via Reserve Feats or the warlock.


But what are the hallmarks of a spell effect that is either harmless, or critical as an at-will ability? Power, of course, t-will abilities need to be qeaker than the limited ressources, but there are some spells which have primary or secondary qualities which make them more or less suited.

This is, to me, the absolute no-go quality which disqualify any spell for something like a reserve feat or at-will SLA:
- permanent duration or effect. This includes healing, but most notably spells like shape stone or fabricate.

These are effects that make for a definite worse candidate:
- long duration non-personal buffs. These can be spammed to the point of being perma-active, even in large groups. Problematic.
- special obstacle-circumvention spells like fly, invisibility, knock - or Glibness (a ridiculous spell for other reasons as well). These remove an entire dimension of hazards and obstacles for the party and alter the dynamics of encounters significantly. Such things, if attainable should be more than just a minor investment for the character in question. In the same vein, itīs okay for the Warlock to have these effects, since he is forced to take many levels in a moderately weak class to gain only a handful of invocations - that is, if he is burning Feats as well. Overland flight, on the other hand, is an abomination and should be at least a higher spell lvl.
- huge area effects. Too much impact on the surroundings. not necessesarily unbalancing in a fight, but harmful for both campaign cohesion and verisimilitude. Large-scale slaughter/turning the tide via mass-blessing should cost at least a spell slot.

These kinds of spells are, to me, good candidates for being spammable:
- Weaponlike spells. Be it Eldritch blast, shocking grasp or maybe even burning hands - itīs just another way of doing damages. Should odviously be balanced against normal weapons and their damage output, but is, as such, not problematic.
- Personal buffs. Like the warlock Invocations "The dark oneīs own luck" or "spiderwalk" etc. - or like Incarnum for that matter. These become perma-buffs which replace magic items and are, unless hideously overpowered, no problem. A very good option to reduce item dependency, by the way.
- anything that can, with some effort or investment(Skill ranks, class Features or Feats), easily be copied by mundane means.

Thatīs my opinion at least. But did I miss anything? Overlook anything critical?

Chronicled
2008-04-01, 06:37 AM
I'm pretty sure that Clerics are going to be getting at-will healing in 4e. Which I think is a better way to keep them from being solely healbots than what 3.5 tried. I think the new idea is that they don't have to spend their spells on healing, so they can contribute other ways in fights.

Nebo_
2008-04-01, 06:40 AM
I'm pretty sure that Clerics are going to be getting at-will healing in 4e. Which I think is a better way to keep them from being solely healbots than what 3.5 tried. I think the new idea is that they don't have to spend their spells on healing, so they can contribute other ways in fights.

Healing spells are per encounter. The use healing surges of the target, but heal extra damage.

Chronicled
2008-04-01, 06:46 AM
Healing spells are per encounter. The use healing surges of the target, but heal extra damage.

Is that new, or was it just clarified? I was remembering p. 56 of Races and Classes:


A cleric grants all allies near him an increase to their self healing, and he can also cure their wounds by using healing words. A cleric doesn't spend any of his other spells to use them, nor will he need to spend the lion's share of his actions healing others.

Kioran
2008-04-01, 06:46 AM
I'm pretty sure that Clerics are going to be getting at-will healing in 4e. Which I think is a better way to keep them from being solely healbots than what 3.5 tried. I think the new idea is that they don't have to spend their spells on healing, so they can contribute other ways in fights.

Regardless of the actual mechanics in 4th Edition, I doubt that this would be a good idea - It would mean that a party with just one cleric could forge on indefinitely with their available non-daily ressources as long as their cleric is alive, which makes the cleric even more valuable and indispensable to the average party.
Free healing is, frankly, a massive alteration of playstyle, since it removes one very important source of attrition.


I do suspect, however, that WotC just made some HP-recovery or healing effectss available to all classes, meaning healing surges for the most part, but also some feats or class Features which improve upon them......

kamikasei
2008-04-01, 06:54 AM
Characters in 4e have "healing surges" according to their class, a resource limited per day. You can use a "second wind" action to spend a surge to heal yourself for some number of hit points. A cleric's healing uses one of the target's surges but to greater effect. A paladin's Lay on Hands uses one of his surges to heal someone else.

So a cleric can heal an unlimited number of people in a day, but not one person an unlimited number of times.

Nebo_
2008-04-01, 07:12 AM
A cleric grants all allies near him an increase to their self healing, and he can also cure their wounds by using healing words. A cleric doesn't spend any of his other spells to use them, nor will he need to spend the lion's share of his actions healing others.

All of the healing spells that I used were minor actions that were usable 2/encounter.

Kurald Galain
2008-04-01, 07:26 AM
Free healing is, frankly, a massive alteration of playstyle, since it removes one very important source of attrition.
I'm reasonably sure 4E doesn't do much with attrition anyway.


Anyway, Kioran, things like flight-at-will or invis-at-will don't seem to be particularly overpowered at moderate levels (warlock can get one of those at level 6, the other at level 8, and that's not an uber-class). I think an important distinction here is whether the effect stacks. For instance, if you can grant flight at will, to how many people can you grant it at the same time? If the answer is "1" that's not much of a problem. If you can create stone walls at will, how many of those can be in existence at any one time? Again, as long as the answer is some small, finite integer, it's fair game.

Even healing-at-will isn't such a big deal; 3E already has healing-at-will, it only costs a certain amount of time (in particular, you have a limited amount of heals per day). So if a class has an at-will healing power that costs ten minutes to activate, or something, it's not much of a problem depending on your power level.

Kioran
2008-04-01, 07:54 AM
I'm reasonably sure 4E doesn't do much with attrition anyway.

Anyway, Kioran, things like flight-at-will or invis-at-will don't seem to be particularly overpowered at moderate levels (warlock can get one of those at level 6, the other at level 8, and that's not an uber-class). I think an important distinction here is whether the effect stacks. For instance, if you can grant flight at will, to how many people can you grant it at the same time? If the answer is "1" that's not much of a problem. If you can create stone walls at will, how many of those can be in existence at any one time? Again, as long as the answer is some small, finite integer, it's fair game.

Even healing-at-will isn't such a big deal; 3E already has healing-at-will, it only costs a certain amount of time (in particular, you have a limited amount of heals per day). So if a class has an at-will healing power that costs ten minutes to activate, or something, it's not much of a problem depending on your power level.

Yes - but most of the warlocks tricks are personal only or weaponlike - which is the important qualifier. Thatīs no free long duration buff for everyone and his dog. However, the most important balancing factor is that each of theses, to me, quite powerful tricks represents a large chunk of the warlockīs overall class features or overall ressources.
I want to make a somewhat larger selection of spells available at will in my homebrew, and not only to a specific class but to almost any class. Therefore, I need to consider things a lot more carefully. You are right though - the effect affecting more than a very limited handful of persons/places is another important criterion.

And maybe they do away with attrition in 4th - I certainly wonīt. It would play hell with verisimilitude.