Epic Spell: Planar Conduit

[-XXX-]

when you start to deliberately forego tools at your disposal that would help you be a better combatant, you have no excuse to be surprised that you're.. not as good at combat.

I was actually advocating gearing for Lore/UMD and Discipline.

But let's face it - complaining about powerful summons is easier than slapping +2 lore runes on one's gear.
Heck, some builds don't even have to do that - they just need to find 30 skill points to allocate into UMD and they'll be able to use breach wands and the Celestial Grimoire - 0 gear requirements there.

[Zavandar]

and there are mords gems which don't require any skill investment at all and can be thrown on the floor to aoe breach SR, followed up by wof (which can also be found in rod form and not require a skill investment either).

it's certainly a tempo advantage for div summoners over arcane summoners, but still doable. this difference definitely doesn't merit nerfing the SR spell.

at this point, i think a top-end of 43 ab, 22 innate sr, and 30%+ reduced damage would be a good move for conduit. i haven't decided how i feel about health/ac, but the word archon, ghaele, and shiradi need their AC tweaked since they can be hit with vestments.

[garrbear758]

We seriously suggesting the SR spell is the problem here and not the summon? LOL

[Griefmaker]

Why not just cut out the second summon?

It is a 1/day epic spell and definitely should be a significant improvement over Summon Creature 9 and even more definitely should be worthwhile to take, unlike the current EDK. The second summon admittedly makes it overpowered (though in my biased opinion it is nice when you are roaming PvE since they can work together and make exploring fun instead of stressful or irritating).

Or for a better alternate idea:

Planar Conduit summons the weaker of the two summons (should still be a significant improvement over Summon Creature 9 considering it is a 1/day epic spell and requires an epic feat). Then change EDK into an Improved Planar Conduit feat which requires Planar Conduit and summons the stronger of the two summons which should be significantly stronger than the weaker one, especially since it requires /TWO/ epic feats to take.

But if someone is willing to burn two precious epic feats for a pretty darn strong summon...good for them! They are likely significantly weaker in other critical areas, PvP-centric or otherwise.

Mummy Dust uses the idea of an undead swarm and has three weaker summons with more bodies, more APR, various immunities, etc. The planar creatures are solo summons, but make up for it by being stronger individually...and distinct upgrades to the Summon Creature line of spells. And requiring two precious epic feats to get full power.

I suppose if Mummy Dust is considered too weak, maybe the EDK feat could be changed into an Improved MD/PC feat and if an animator is willing to spend two epic feats, then they can also have stronger summons.

One thing that should be removed though is being able to cast magic vestment, GMW, whatever on planar summons. Buffing the creature is good. Buffing their equipment, not so good.

[-XXX-]

and even more definitely should be worthwhile to take, unlike the current EDK.

I'd argue that the EDK should be a worthwhile feat to take as well, but that's an entirely different topic altogether.

[MissEvelyn]

Why not just cut out the second summon?

I believe it's because of how easy it is to make them go away. All it takes is to cast Dismissal (which you can put on a wand), and while the chance of both creatures failing their Will saves is low, it is still there. You can essentially make them instantly go away with the cast of one spell.

I wonder why we aren't discussing removing the +6 to DC bonus Dismissal gets, making it more powerful than the higher-leveled spell Banishment.

But, I digress. In PvP, it's very easy to deal with the conduits. In PvE, maybe give more monster casters the ability to cast Dismissal? That would seem fair to me.

[Hazard]

Why not just cut out the second summon?

I believe it's because of how easy it is to make them go away. All it takes is to cast Dismissal (which you can put on a wand), and while the chance of both creatures failing their Will saves is low, it is still there. You can essentially make them instantly go away with the cast of one spell.

I wonder why we aren't discussing removing the +6 to DC bonus Dismissal gets, making it more powerful than the higher-leveled spell Banishment.

But, I digress. In PvP, it's very easy to deal with the conduits. In PvE, maybe give more monster casters the ability to cast Dismissal? That would seem fair to me.

I don't know about that, because in my experience nearly every place I go seems to have copious amounts of dismissal, and outsider turning. It could just be a surface thing (the only place I've tried out PC, because in the UD I use Mummy Dust), and it could come down to the areas I like to go to .. but at least in my experience it seems to be very common already, especially in low-mid level areas (Lost Desert, for example).

I didn't know about this +6 DC to dismissal though. What's the deal with that?

[-XXX-]

Dismissal is strange

[MissEvelyn]

Why not just cut out the second summon?

I believe it's because of how easy it is to make them go away. All it takes is to cast Dismissal (which you can put on a wand), and while the chance of both creatures failing their Will saves is low, it is still there. You can essentially make them instantly go away with the cast of one spell.

I wonder why we aren't discussing removing the +6 to DC bonus Dismissal gets, making it more powerful than the higher-leveled spell Banishment.

But, I digress. In PvP, it's very easy to deal with the conduits. In PvE, maybe give more monster casters the ability to cast Dismissal? That would seem fair to me.

I don't know about that, because in my experience nearly every place I go seems to have copious amounts of dismissal, and outsider turning. It could just be a surface thing (the only place I've tried out PC, because in the UD I use Mummy Dust), and it could come down to the areas I like to go to .. but at least in my experience it seems to be very common already, especially in low-mid level areas (Lost Desert, for example).

I didn't know about this +6 DC to dismissal though. What's the deal with that?

It's a vanilla NWN thing that Arelith either never did away it or somehow missed it. I think it might be one of those things where it was deemed to 'work as intended', as you can't put Banishment on wands, but you can with Dismissal.

I'm glad Arelith found other uses for Banishment, but I do wish that it was either more powerful than Dismissal, or at the very least got a +4 bonus to its DC to have the DC be on par with Dismissal.

[Hazard]

I believe it's because of how easy it is to make them go away. All it takes is to cast Dismissal (which you can put on a wand), and while the chance of both creatures failing their Will saves is low, it is still there. You can essentially make them instantly go away with the cast of one spell.

I wonder why we aren't discussing removing the +6 to DC bonus Dismissal gets, making it more powerful than the higher-leveled spell Banishment.

But, I digress. In PvP, it's very easy to deal with the conduits. In PvE, maybe give more monster casters the ability to cast Dismissal? That would seem fair to me.

I don't know about that, because in my experience nearly every place I go seems to have copious amounts of dismissal, and outsider turning. It could just be a surface thing (the only place I've tried out PC, because in the UD I use Mummy Dust), and it could come down to the areas I like to go to .. but at least in my experience it seems to be very common already, especially in low-mid level areas (Lost Desert, for example).

I didn't know about this +6 DC to dismissal though. What's the deal with that?

It's a vanilla NWN thing that Arelith either never did away it or somehow missed it. I think it might be one of those things where it was deemed to 'work as intended', as you can't put Banishment on wands, but you can with Dismissal.

I'm glad Arelith found other uses for Banishment, but I do wish that it was either more powerful than Dismissal, or at the very least got a +4 bonus to its DC to have the DC be on par with Dismissal.

Oh, thanks for explaining that. I remember implosion had a similar thing, by like +2 or something.

[Ork]

I believe it's because of how easy it is to make them go away. All it takes is to cast Dismissal (which you can put on a wand), and while the chance of both creatures failing their Will saves is low, it is still there. You can essentially make them instantly go away with the cast of one spell.

I wonder why we aren't discussing removing the +6 to DC bonus Dismissal gets, making it more powerful than the higher-leveled spell Banishment.

But, I digress. In PvP, it's very easy to deal with the conduits. In PvE, maybe give more monster casters the ability to cast Dismissal? That would seem fair to me.

I don't know about that, because in my experience nearly every place I go seems to have copious amounts of dismissal, and outsider turning. It could just be a surface thing (the only place I've tried out PC, because in the UD I use Mummy Dust), and it could come down to the areas I like to go to .. but at least in my experience it seems to be very common already, especially in low-mid level areas (Lost Desert, for example).

I didn't know about this +6 DC to dismissal though. What's the deal with that?

It's a vanilla NWN thing that Arelith either never did away it or somehow missed it. I think it might be one of those things where it was deemed to 'work as intended', as you can't put Banishment on wands, but you can with Dismissal.

I'm glad Arelith found other uses for Banishment, but I do wish that it was either more powerful than Dismissal, or at the very least got a +4 bonus to its DC to have the DC be on par with Dismissal.

Don’t need to worry about these spells mostly because the % chance is low. Big slaad has 16 will and you can add another 16 with owls, protection from spells, and protection from alignment. 32 will verse both the scroll and wand succeed with a 95% chance. Obviously casters that use their own CL is a lot more likely. Divine is best for conduit as you can use spell resistance spell to cover them too.

[AstralUniverse]

look guys we are not going to reach an agreement on this one when the core of the disagreement is playstyle and opinion on how things should work from a very fundamental standpoint. Some say summons should be a side-kick and some say they should be comparable to actual melee builds. I dont see how the latter can ever make sense in a pc game that has both mundane characters and summoners playable individually, but either way, this debate should end here. I fully trust that the dev team has all the data they need to make decisions in the matter at this point.

[RedGiant]

I didn't want to weigh in again on this same topic we've had before, but I also don't want there to seem to be a false consensus.

Some very smart people here argue that we should balance around "best case" scenarios. I argue again that broken builds, improbable wind-ups, and unsustainable buffs are not points of balance.

All of these acrobatics prove that you can get the best summons in the game to a place where a decent warrior build starts. Is it good? Hells yeah! Am I alarmed? No. If you want to be alarmed, have your favored soul / cleric / shaman put those same buffs on my 53 AB, 800hp, critting for 200-300 hp Barbarian, who was that mean before you cast anything.

Another argument I would dispute is that a caster can do this and then you still have to deal with them and their spell book.

Here again I would argue to reach these numbers, casters dont have much of a spellbook left. An incomplete list follows to make your summons really scary: mage armor, protection from alignment, bulls, cats, bears, owls, negative energy protection, death ward, freedom, haste, spell resistance, regeneration, aura of vitality, protection from spells, oh, and bless, aid, prayer, battletide. Now consider many of these you need to do twice, or three times if you want to ward yourself.

But what about wands/scrolls? Well, you can use them at peril of their lower casting level making your 1/day summons trick even more vulnerable to dispelling and dismissing. But in many cases, including some of the combat buffs, you won't even finish warding till they expire.

All of this to say to do this reliably and for required duration, your spellbook is key and you must use most of it to pull this stuff off.

Tl:dr
Dont balance off of the improbable. (Or 60 round wind-ups)
Your properly built mundane is better.
Your casting ability is severely invested, if not hobbled, to pull off zuper PC scenarios.
Proceed knowing you are one Mords from destitution.

[godhand-]

snip

[ Sarcasm ]

In the wise words of Greta Thunberg, "HOW DARE YOU"

How dare you mention that to achieve the high numbers required when people lobby about these discussions that you must sacrifice elsewhere in the build.

How dare you acknowledge the ridiculous spell-tax of achieving these nubmers and their impacts on spellbooks

How dare you use common sense and imply that PvP balance exists outside of a bubble of perfectly warded scenarios with precise positioning and professional-level players.

How dare you imply Mords works as intended.

To use the words once told to me.

"The immediately above post is wrong in about every aspect, as are most of your other posts."

[/ Sarcasm ]

[Xerah]

I really don't understand the need to make all these bad faith assumptions. No one is looking at ultra buffed option A and saying in need to drop by the difference between base level and ultra buffed. It's purely an example and pushing these ideas that people saying the summons are too strong because they are only looking at the edge cases is simply not what anyone is looking at.

This is a new feat that hasn't been around as long as mummy dust. Expect there to be adjustments. This was 100% supposed to be a good version of mummy dust; it's not supposed to be a number of steps better (which, clearly, it is). I can assure you that no amount of mental gymnastics that's going on here is going to "trick" the people who look at what's balanced and what needs adjustments. And also don't take that these things don't get instantly adjusted as validation either way; someone actually has to spend the time to do this (personally, I find editing creatures really tedious).

Everyone has said enough here and AstralUniverse summed it up best.