Re: Dumb Questions - Displace Self
Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2016 1:30 pm
What you are setting aside is my entire point for that section. It would be nether unknown nor unreasonable for an 8th circle fighter (stat'ed out as an actual PC) to have a magic weapon that gives a +1 or +2 to his attack test. He may have a blood promise that he has fulfilled giving him another +2. A rank 3 or 4 thread to a group pattern would give another +3 or +4. Now your Typical 8th circle melee fighter has a step 22 attack test instead of a step 15. Your 8th circle wizard on the other hand is likely to have an Avoid Blow talent of only around the 14 that you calculated, plus any spell enhancements they have. Without any spell enhancements a step 14 roll has less than a 9% chance of exceeding a step 22 rolls.The Undying wrote:I'm setting aside a lot of variables that could come into play here
I don't think I am over-analyzing this. I think I am correctly analyzing this. And it is not that the fighter is special. The Wizard might have something near a step 22 for his Spellcasting roll as well. But his Avoid Blow roll is likely to be considerably less than his spellcasting roll. A player will always look for ways to improve his most important rolls. For a Wizard that is Spellcasting and Willforce. For a melee fighter, it is melee attack.
Help me out here people, Look at your tables. What step numbers are your journeymen rank melee fighters rolling for their primary attacks?
What step numbers are your spellcasters rolling for avoid blow? - both inclusive and exclusive of spell buffs?
Except that the movement effect only triggers if the avoid roll is successful, In the 90% of the times a circle 8 wizard's unaugmented step 14 avoid blow roll fails to avoid the step 22 melee attack, the spell does nothing.The Undying wrote:Plus, in the old thread, we entirely went over a great reason to use Displace Self, regardless of other spells improving AB: avoiding multiple attacks thanks to the movement provided by Displace Self.
I am not saying that spellcasters should not bother with learning Avoid Blow, I am only saying that DS all by itself does no good at all unless the caster makes his AB roll, and that DS is unlikely to do any good when facing a melee adept of equal rank without a second spell that actually buffs the AB roll. Now granted few GMs spec out most of their NPCs with full PC bonus'. Most are kind of a "minimally effective circle 8". And a Master Wizard on the other hand, with 15 ranks of Avoid Blow and one or two spells boosting it with 4 extra threads each can merrily dance around a whole group of journeyman warriors without getting a single glove laid on him.
But the 3 basic points I am trying to make here is that:
(1) Unless the melee attacker has more than 1 attack per round, DS's benifits are minimal.
(2) Unless the spellcaster can make his AB rolls against his opponents attacks DS does nothing at all.
(3) Both 1 and 2 being true will usually require ether magical assistance beyond that provided by the DS spell, or a spellcaster of much higher challenge rating than the opponent.
Dodge Boost.
We seem to be coming at Dodge Boost from totally different directions. In my original post that got lost when the forum locked just before I posted it, I had a paragraph where I wondered how popular Dodge Boost actually was, since it is a spell that can buff everybody in the party except the Wizard casting it (Since Wizards and Illusionists are the only two disciplines who have no access to Avoid Blow at Novice levels), and by the time a Wizard can learn AB, he can also learn Energy Shield. Until then Mage Armor provides physical protection that everybody can use and strikes me as the better physically protective buff in a great many situations.
I agree with all that.The Undying wrote:So, is Energy Shield better than Dodge Boost when that hand loss isn't an issue? Yes, most definitely. Will this be an issue in most case? No, probably not. But does Energy Shield usurp Dodge Boost? No, most definitely not, that condition change is huge.
The Undying wrote:For example, let us take an entirely reasonable party composition where the Wizard is the only person who has AB. Might be a little unorthodox, but it could happen. After all, only the following Disciplines have AB as a Discipline Talent: Air Sailor, Archer, Beastmaster, Swordmaster, and Warrior. So, you are saying that a Wizard MUST run around with a spell that provides no meaningful bonus to his companions?
You are setting up a straw man. Rephrasing what I said into something totally different, then refuting what you wish I had said instead of what I actually said.ChrisDDickey wrote:But if you can only find a place in your matrixes for one Avoid Blow enhancer, it must be Energy Shield.
Your example is actually extremely unreasonable. First off, once again, the Wizard and the Illusionist disciples are the only two disciplines that have no access to Avoid Blow at the Novice level. So you are positing a party where nobody chose to get AB until the wizard did as his 6th circle Talent Option (having taken his 4 spell matrix as his 5th circle TO). Then you are saying that that I would insist that he use Energy Shield as his buff of choice.
Of course I never said, or even implied anything like that. Note the phrase "find a place in your matrixes". If nobody in the entire party is at all interested in AB, then of course you will not be putting any of the AB buffing spells in the matrix. However, in this weird situation, if for some perverse reason you did decide to to put an AB buffing spell into your matrix, then ES is still the clear choice (Gives you a solid bonus to two talents that you have, and if you are kind enough to cast it on your buddies who have no interest in defense, at least gives access to the talents to those who have a hand free. Maybe one of them will try it on a whim and decide they like avoiding blows).
But I never said or implied or even agree that Energy Shield is the best buff spell ever (it's not, Shield Willow is). I do think ES is the most generally useful of the three Wizard Avoid Blow buffing spells. That is all I said, and I stand by that statement. And to bring this rant back to where it started, I can think of very few cases, all involving large CR imbalances, where I would cast DS without also casting ES or at least DB.