Magic Circle against Evil?

[Guest Shin]

This spell, though advertised in the readme as "Protection from Evil 10' Radius - area of effect 10' (fix)" just seems like a strange nerf. The duration is reduced from 1 turn/level to 1 round/level, and party members have to stay close to the caster the entire duration.

 

Protection from Evil 10' Radius is normally a great way to buff your entire party with PfE, but with this change, it seems a player will have to resort to single-target casting PfE on every party member separately instead - as fights where the entire party can just stand still within 10' of your cleric aren't very likely.

 

Any particular reasoning for this change?

[Demivrgvs]

Short story, you're playing without the hotfixes, because this spell was changed again a couple of updates ago.

 

Long story, I previously made it work as an aura because that's how it works in PnP (have you ever asked yourself why it has such a small AoE even if it's just a Mass version of the 1st lvl spell? The same is true for Invisibility in 10', which is supposed to be a sort of "aura" in PnP) but more recent changes to the whole "summon fiends" behaviour (see here), and a generally negative feedback (like yours ), led me to restore its old "Mass" behaviour. While doing so I've actually made it a proper Mass Pro Evil spell with a large 30' radius AoE (if it's not an aura than a small 10' radius makes no sense), but the spell won't grant you "immunity" to summoned demons anymore.

[Guest Shin]

Ah, I see. Sorry about that, I didn't spot the hotfixes. I did view the limited range of the original ability as odd, thinking it was based on the template party formations or something - but I also don't think it was ever intended as an aura in the game, there's just too much work involved in keeping the party together.. generally this won't be monitored as rigorously in a PnP session.

 

The demon immunity.. well, I enjoy SCSII and agree with its reasoning for how PfE won't protect you from demons summoned by enemies, though I don't really see a need for a 15% failure when you summon. Simply having your own demons not attack you as long as you're protected always seemed fairly realistic.

 

Anyway, thanks a lot for clearing it up and for the quick reply.

[Dermit]

I liked the aura form

[yarpen]

Aura is great from role-playing point, but still it's difficult to make it currently worth of casting. Without immunity to demons it's "just" +2 bonus to AC and Saves (vs. evil but which enemy isn't evil). When it's not hard to sacrifice some 1st level spell slots for such a spell casted on most important party members, it's much harder to do the same with 3rd level spell which also needs caster to be in centre of party. At 4th level you've got Defensive Harmony, which does job much better. Don't even mention fact that if you've got Paladin in your party you can spam PfE as much as you want.

 

Yup, there are two solutions: make it work again as Mass spell or make it more powerfull and interesting. Enhancing bonus is as far as I know impossible (it's non-cumulative) so what about broading it's working a bit? Magic Circle could be also paralysing or slowing evil creatures which violate it or people under it. Dealing some minor damage? Repulsing evil beings? Think about it. ^^

[Demivrgvs]

Without immunity to demons it's "just" +2 bonus to AC and Saves (vs. evil but which enemy isn't evil). When it's not hard to sacrifice some 1st level spell slots for such a spell casted on most important party members, it's much harder to do the same with 3rd level spell which also needs caster to be in centre of party. At 4th level you've got Defensive Harmony, which does job much better.

Well, I'm not so sure Defensive Harmony is better (even if SR doubles its effectiveness compared to vanilla), because in many circumstances a bonus to all saves is more important than plain AC, especially for a full party, where tanks usually aren't predominant.

 

Speaking of Defensive Harmony, that is another aura-like spell in PnP. Affected creatures grant +1 AC to any ally within radius (I don't remember right now if it was 10 feet or slightly more), up to +5 AC (or +6, my memory is fuzzy right now, and I don't remember in which damn book this spell was). Long story short, it's kinda complicated but doable, though a simple aura on the caster (granting +4 AC to everyone within x feet) would probably be much easier to handle and the end result would be almost the same.

 

Don't even mention fact that if you've got Paladin in your party you can spam PfE as much as you want.

Don't expect that to happen with KR paladins. Afaik paladins never had that stupid amount of ProEvil innates in any edition, the closest thing to it is AD&D paladin's permanent 'Aura of Protection' which causes -1 to hit rolls to all evil creatures within 10 feet.

 

Yup, there are two solutions: make it work again as Mass spell or make it more powerfull and interesting. Enhancing bonus is as far as I know impossible (it's non-cumulative) so what about broading it's working a bit? Magic Circle could be also paralysing or slowing evil creatures which violate it or people under it. Dealing some minor damage? Repulsing evil beings? Think about it. ^^

I don't want to move it away from PnP unless necessary, and I do think it's already quite appealing in the current form. The only thing I may take into consideration is that PnP Pro Evil also grants immunty to charm/domination, but I wouldn't be able to limit it to evil beings, and I actually fear it could be a too cheap way to get immunity from a lot of Enchantment spells, no?

[Ardanis]

1) Make it vanilla's long-lasting mass ProEvil, without demon immunity

2) Make it 10'-15' aura, 1 turn, against all alignments, with charm immunity

[yarpen]

Speaking of Defensive Harmony, that is another aura-like spell in PnP. Affected creatures grant +1 AC to any ally within radius (I don't remember right now if it was 10 feet or slightly more), up to +5 AC (or +6, my memory is fuzzy right now, and I don't remember in which damn book this spell was). Long story short, it's kinda complicated but doable, though a simple aura on the caster (granting +4 AC to everyone within x feet) would probably be much easier to handle and the end result would be almost the sam

I know, that's the way I wanted to implement it in Faiths and Avatars mod. In SR there is no big difference in +4 AC and +1 AC for every companion close to caster... but in my little mod, where this spell is only available in Law sphere and epitomizes order and cooperation in group (well, PnP description is much better at details) - I think that this effect becomes quite important for role-playing reasons.

 

Don't expect that to happen with KR paladins. Afaik paladins never had that stupid amount of ProEvil innates in any edition, the closest thing to it is AD&D paladin's permanent 'Aura of Protection' which causes -1 to hit rolls to all evil creatures within 10 feet.

Same for Faiths and Avatars. Detect Evil at-will, lack of Protection from Evil and Aura of Power when wielding Holy Sword.

 

I don't want to move it away from PnP unless necessary, and I do think it's already quite appealing in the current form. The only thing I may take into consideration is that PnP Pro Evil also grants immunty to charm/domination, but I wouldn't be able to limit it to evil beings, and I actually fear it could be a too cheap way to get immunity from a lot of Enchantment spells, no?

Immunity to Charm in this spell is a cheap idea. It comes from fair tales about Whiteknight Heroes who fight agains tempting Evil Sorceress and usually try to not get charmed. Damn it sucks so bad. What about repulsion of any evil 1HD creature? Something similiar exists in spells like Repell Insects or Protection from Insects (PfI is 1st level spell). Also, both would be interesting buff against Summon Insects spells (especially for SCS AI), I've planned to implement Repel Insects spell which grants immunity to summon insects spells and protection from 1HD insects (in BG2 practically little spiders only).

[Demivrgvs]

1) Make it vanilla's long-lasting mass ProEvil, without demon immunity

2) Make it 10'-15' aura, 1 turn, against all alignments, with charm immunity

I obviously vote for 1) (aka, its current form). Surely I don't like the "all alignments" thing.

 

 

Don't expect that to happen with KR paladins. Afaik paladins never had that stupid amount of ProEvil innates in any edition, the closest thing to it is AD&D paladin's permanent 'Aura of Protection' which causes -1 to hit rolls to all evil creatures within 10 feet.

Same for Faiths and Avatars. Detect Evil at-will, lack of Protection from Evil and Aura of Power when wielding Holy Sword.

I hope you don't have in mind to really put AD&D Aura of Power (50% magic res to everyone within 10 feet, auto-dispel everything within range, spellcasting is prohibited within its AoE, etc.) on Carsomyr because that would be the most unbalancing thing ever! Carsomyr still is slightly OP even after having been seriously nerfed by IR, but with that aura it would be the single most broken thing in the entire game.

 

I don't want to move it away from PnP unless necessary, and I do think it's already quite appealing in the current form. The only thing I may take into consideration is that PnP Pro Evil also grants immunty to charm/domination, but I wouldn't be able to limit it to evil beings, and I actually fear it could be a too cheap way to get immunity from a lot of Enchantment spells, no?

Immunity to Charm in this spell is a cheap idea. It comes from fair tales about Whiteknight Heroes who fight agains tempting Evil Sorceress and usually try to not get charmed. Damn it sucks so bad. What about repulsion of any evil 1HD creature? Something similiar exists in spells like Repell Insects or Protection from Insects (PfI is 1st level spell). Also, both would be interesting buff against Summon Insects spells (especially for SCS AI), I've planned to implement Repel Insects spell which grants immunity to summon insects spells and protection from 1HD insects (in BG2 practically little spiders only).

Which part of "I don't want to move it away from PnP" did you miss? Jokes aside, I do prefer to not mess too much with PnP lore (and I think many players appreciate that), especially when it doesn't seem "necessary".

[yarpen]

I hope you don't have in mind to really put AD&D Aura of Power (50% magic res to everyone within 10 feet, auto-dispel everything within range, spellcasting is prohibited within its AoE, etc.) on Carsomyr because that would be the most unbalancing thing ever! Carsomyr still is slightly OP even after having been seriously nerfed by IR, but with that aura it would be the single most broken thing in the entire game.

Certainly not about such a powerfull one. I'm not sure about effects, but something far more balanced. What about Karsomir, I was thinking about possibility of implementation of Dispel Evil spell. At succsessful melee check it unsummons evil summoned creatures and automatically dispels evil spells. In PnP it dispelled spells casted by evil characters, but here it can be limited. Question is: which spells can be considered as evil and vile.