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Kyrel
Learned Scribe
151 Posts |
 Posted - 27 Jun 2012 : 23:45:13
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Guys. Branching out from another thread about what's wrong with the Realms, I have a question (sorry if it's been debated to death before).
As someone pointed out, one of the problems in D&D3.5 was the Saves at high levels, as some characters basically couldn't fail their good saves, and had no chance in hell to successfully make their bad saves.
In a game like D&D, where we have character levels and continous improvement of the characters. Have anyone come up with a good way to solve this problem?
Simplest solution is of course to simply change the rate the saves improve at, or screw around with the save DC's. But have anyone come up with anything more interesting or elegant that that?
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Hawkins
Great Reader
USA
2131 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2012 : 00:15:45
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| I don't have time to get into the thick of it right now, but Trailblazer breaks down a lot of the math in 3.5. I am actually trying to adapt it for some low-magical item Pathfinder rules. |
Errant d20 Designer - My Blog (last updated January 06, 2016)
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Diffan
Great Reader
USA
4429 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2012 : 01:57:13
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| I don't think the math was ever fixed for Save progression in D&D. The DC doesn't scale the same as the Saving Throws do, hence the disparity between them. The question is, should it vary greatly and by how much? Is a range of 40% to 55% acceptable overall? |
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Dalor Darden
Great Reader
USA
4211 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2012 : 03:11:55
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I truly think that magic items were supposed to counter the defect in saving throws at high level.
I played an 18th level Wizard in a short game (started at 18th level) and all my saves were 50+ easily. |
The Old Grey Box and AD&D for me! |
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Diffan
Great Reader
USA
4429 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2012 : 04:17:45
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quote:
Originally posted by Dalor Darden
I truly think that magic items were supposed to counter the defect in saving throws at high level.
I played an 18th level Wizard in a short game (started at 18th level) and all my saves were 50+ easily.
Unless you had some un-godly high Ability score, how is this possible? Also, what edition? In 3E, DC is calculated as 10 + spell level + Ability Modifier + Feats + spell-modification (like Spell Enhancer, Spell Compendium). So lets say you had an Intelligence modifier of 40 and you had Spell Focus (necromancy), and Greater Spell Focus (necromancy) followed by Shadow Weave Magic (+1 to DC for Necro spells) and spell enchancer casted just prior to a 9th level spell.....that'd be a DC 38, which is pretty ridiculous. DCs in the 50's is pretty hard to accomplish Rules-As-Written. |
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Dalor Darden
Great Reader
USA
4211 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2012 : 05:37:17
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quote:
Originally posted by Diffan
quote:
Originally posted by Dalor Darden
I truly think that magic items were supposed to counter the defect in saving throws at high level.
I played an 18th level Wizard in a short game (started at 18th level) and all my saves were 50+ easily.
Unless you had some un-godly high Ability score, how is this possible? Also, what edition? In 3E, DC is calculated as 10 + spell level + Ability Modifier + Feats + spell-modification (like Spell Enhancer, Spell Compendium). So lets say you had an Intelligence modifier of 40 and you had Spell Focus (necromancy), and Greater Spell Focus (necromancy) followed by Shadow Weave Magic (+1 to DC for Necro spells) and spell enchancer casted just prior to a 9th level spell.....that'd be a DC 38, which is pretty ridiculous. DCs in the 50's is pretty hard to accomplish Rules-As-Written.
I am talking 3.5...and I said my saves (fort, ref, will) were 50+...not my spell DCs. 
There were so many items that could give stackable bonuses to saving throws: Infernal Bonus, Luck Bonus, blah, blah, blah...it wasn't hard at all to have Fort, Ref & Will at 50+ each at level 18.
HOWEVER, having said that...it wasn't impossible with the Magic Factory mechanics of 3.5 to generate godlike spell DCs also...as you so ably pointed out.
EDIT:
As an example, you could have an item that added a +5 Infernal modifier to spells you cast...stacked with another item that adds a +5 modifier from another source. The problem with 3.5 was that once a character reached a certain level...and was capable of creating magic items (such as a Wizard); there wasn't much that could stop him except the gods...and even they weren't truly safe unless the DM was on top of making sure munchkins PLAYED the game Munchkin instead of his game! |
The Old Grey Box and AD&D for me! |
Edited by - Dalor Darden on 28 Jun 2012 05:41:38 |
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Gary Dallison
Great Reader
United Kingdom
6351 Posts |
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Kilvan
Senior Scribe
Canada
894 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2012 : 15:53:03
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My party is currently level 17/18, and I do not have that problem. Then again, no character is truly optimized (though all of them are multiclassed), all of them have at least a +3 resistance bonus and theres a cleric spell that grant a +4 morale bonus for a long period of time. With all that, the average low save will be around 18-ish and the average high save will be 28-ish. The average spell DC is 30, so yes, 1 of the save (or 2) will be hard to miss, but the other will have a good 50% chance to succeed, which is more than what I had during my 2nd edition days.
Multiclassing with 2 different* base classes + 1 prestige class with 2 good saves usually solve that problem I think, and it is common enough to be fun without being weird or min-maxed. I am not familiar with Infernal bonuses and luck bonuses are extremely rare in my campaigns (and never above +2).
Other option; everyone plays a monk!
*different like fighter/wizard, and not fighter/barbarian |
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Ayrik
Great Reader
Canada
7969 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2012 : 20:15:51
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| This seems like an easy area to tweak for those who are concerned with balancing disparity between classes. The quadratic wizard could lose a lot of his advantage if his linear fighter opponent becomes effectively immune to anything magical thrown at him. |
[/Ayrik] |
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Dalor Darden
Great Reader
USA
4211 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2012 : 22:10:42
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quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
This seems like an easy area to tweak for those who are concerned with balancing disparity between classes. The quadratic wizard could lose a lot of his advantage if his linear fighter opponent becomes effectively immune to anything magical thrown at him.
Yes...many fighters can arrange to nearly always make their saving throws. There are still spells that give no save or deal damage without save...but they aren't enough to outright destroy. |
The Old Grey Box and AD&D for me! |
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Gametechnical question...
