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Post by polimetral on Nov 25, 2011 17:34:08 GMT
Would it be too unbalanced to make summon creature spells a Bane Knight spell, and/or even make the summon fiend/epic fiend feats count sorcerer levels for the quasi?
I believe Bane Knights might need this boost to become more popular; any possibility to add it to the to do list?
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Post by FunkySwerve on Nov 25, 2011 18:19:36 GMT
They just got boosted with new summons. Kind of a strangely timed request.
Funky
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Post by polimetral on Nov 25, 2011 18:34:31 GMT
Thanks! Are they already active or will be on the next hotpatch?
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Post by FunkySwerve on Nov 25, 2011 18:50:25 GMT
They got the standard BG summons back when the summoning update went in.
Funky
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Post by Raj on Nov 25, 2011 20:24:51 GMT
(lesser/greater) planar binding could be made BK spells.
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Post by polimetral on Nov 26, 2011 0:17:27 GMT
Did some testing at the chamber, and it seems that, at lv 40, a BK's Epic Servant equals in power the Greater Planar Binding spell, getting creatures from the same group with no changes to ab, ac, etc.
And it seems that all summoning spells and planar bindings work at full BK caster level, being or not BK spells.
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Post by Torin on Nov 26, 2011 7:11:46 GMT
The question is what they can summon at level 60:
Are these Dust Wrigts and Sungeous Drinkers for the undead feats/spells and malebranche, pitfiend, balor and mrilith? Then they get 60 casterlevel and BK rock! but if they get something less powerfull, then the spell levels of Sorc and BG for a BK don't stack...
From the spells list of BK I do not see why they CL should stack. I think Polimetrals suggestion is still valid.
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Post by polimetral on Nov 26, 2011 14:51:21 GMT
Think it has to do with the latest hotpatch, when "complementary levels stack" for summoning CL. What concerns me is Epic Servant feat getting roughly the same effects of Greater Planar Binding, making the feat kind of useless.
I believe that getting full CL for the summoning spells, or at least for some, being planar bindings more coherent with the quasi, a great thing for the Bane Knights. I always loved the idea of Mage Knight, but BKs seemed kind of underpowered when in comparison to the other semi-tanks (battle cleric, etc).
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Post by tyranlthixis on Nov 26, 2011 15:11:33 GMT
Think it has to do with the latest hotpatch, when "complementary levels stack" for summoning CL. What concerns me is Epic Servant feat getting roughly the same effects of Greater Planar Binding, making the feat kind of useless. I believe that getting full CL for the summoning spells, or at least for some, being planar bindings more coherent with the quasi, a great thing for the Bane Knights. I always loved the idea of Mage Knight, but BKs seemed kind of underpowered when in comparison to the other semi-tanks (battle cleric, etc). There are advantages and disadvantages to all buff casters. Baneknights actually have better damage output than battle clerics, but they don't get epics, gr,eater restore or battletide. They do get an assortment of aggressive spells which can make a big difference to your party and can allow a very different compilation of classes on harder runs without sacrificing any overall party stability. If you land the "area of affect" vampiric hands you can get some obscene temp hit point numbers. You should also not discount being able to fully buff with a small number of spells. I think they are different, but not underpowered by any standard. |
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Post by tyranlthixis on Nov 26, 2011 15:57:18 GMT
Having said that I don't think the scaling is working properly. My baneknight is pure blackguard/sorc and is only getting 4th tier summons (at most). I was hoping at least for Molydeus (which is what the blackguards are getting) or better.
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Post by simpetar on Nov 26, 2011 15:59:23 GMT
Think it has to do with the latest hotpatch, when "complementary levels stack" for summoning CL. What concerns me is Epic Servant feat getting roughly the same effects of Greater Planar Binding, making the feat kind of useless. Wondering the same. The case of wiz/sorc familiars and druid/ranger companions is quite clear. Are there any more classes that stack in the same way? I suppose not, but better ask, namely: 1. Greater Planar Binding / Planar Ally and Epic Fiendish Servant, aka BK fiend. All of these summon essentially the same creatures - but BGs use a special ability, while casters use spells, and both use different boosting mechanics (epic feat and conj. foci). 2. Bioware summons (mummy, dragon) for combination of wizard, sorc, druid and cleric. All of these classes are able to select these summoning feats, if they meet requirements. Special case are theurges, whose CL for normal spells stack (at -1), in addition being "complementary", by the definition of being able to learn and cast the epic summon. Even more special case are Heralds and dragon summoning: while Dragon Knight is not a Conjuration spell, it is boosted by the foci. 3. SD shadow, Shadow Conjuration line and shadow from cleric Death domain. Pre-LL these summon the same type of creature, although it changes in LLs. And again, they use different casting and boosting mechanics. simpetar |
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Post by chirality on Nov 26, 2011 19:31:18 GMT
Simpetar's comments illustrate an interesting point that I think should be addressed before finalizing any caster level effects for summoning, for the quasi-classes.
As we all know, Theurges get full CL - 1 for all wiz/cleric spells. If this has been done already, or yet to be, the assumption would be an identical scaling for summon spells (CL - 1).
However, if BKs (for example) are to be given full stacking of sorc and bg levels, this would result in a pure BK actually having +1 CL vs. pure Theurge for summons. I think it's fair to ignore any other balance considerations of BK vs. Theurge, and assume they are balanced as it is. But I don't like the idea of a "mage knight" quasi actually having more powerful summons than the quasi that is intended to be the "ultimate caster".
I would love to see BKs get more or less full CL stacking for summons; if anything, maybe being a powerful caster tank with powerful summons could really improve BK popularity (which even still is quite lacking for various reasons).
I think any or all of the quasi- or prestige classes that have default or optional access to summons should gain the benefits of stacking CLs for these summons. However, I don't think the summons of a BK or even DSM/BFM should have higher effective CLs than those of a comparable (in terms of splash vs. pure) Theurge.
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Post by polimetral on Nov 26, 2011 20:26:48 GMT
Think it has to do with the latest hotpatch, when "complementary levels stack" for summoning CL. What concerns me is Epic Servant feat getting roughly the same effects of Greater Planar Binding, making the feat kind of useless. I believe that getting full CL for the summoning spells, or at least for some, being planar bindings more coherent with the quasi, a great thing for the Bane Knights. I always loved the idea of Mage Knight, but BKs seemed kind of underpowered when in comparison to the other semi-tanks (battle cleric, etc). There are advantages and disadvantages to all buff casters. Baneknights actually have better damage output than battle clerics, but they don't get epics, gr,eater restore or battletide. They do get an assortment of aggressive spells which can make a big difference to your party and can allow a very different compilation of classes on harder runs without sacrificing any overall party stability. If you land the "area of affect" vampiric hands you can get some obscene temp hit point numbers. You should also not discount being able to fully buff with a small number of spells. I think they are different, but not underpowered by any standard. I agree, though some of those special abilities have been nerfed on some ocasions. When the Forceful Hands considered mobs STR for the DC check, BK was quite useful since kding most of the enemies was fairly easy. However, when the update modifying the bigby hands mechanics came, making it discipline DC check gaining bonuses from evo focci, I found it very hard to KD anything with Forceful hands, as even trash mobs like the Ice Mephit at Uro have a very high DC check, making it almost impossible for my lv 60 BK to kd them, as mine didnt have any evo focus at all. Since one of the premisses was BKs being excelling bigby casters, that update kind of hitted their usefulness in my opinion, what would be banlanced by granting them useful summons. |
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Post by FunkySwerve on Nov 26, 2011 21:20:18 GMT
Think it has to do with the latest hotpatch, when "complementary levels stack" for summoning CL. What concerns me is Epic Servant feat getting roughly the same effects of Greater Planar Binding, making the feat kind of useless. Wondering the same. The case of wiz/sorc familiars and druid/ranger companions is quite clear. Are there any more classes that stack in the same way? I suppose not, but better ask, namely: No. Funky |
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Post by tyranlthixis on Nov 26, 2011 22:19:55 GMT
There are advantages and disadvantages to all buff casters. Baneknights actually have better damage output than battle clerics, but they don't get epics, greater restore or battletide. They do get an assortment of aggressive spells which can make a big difference to your party and can allow a very different compilation of classes on harder runs without sacrificing any overall party stability. If you land the "area of affect" vampiric hands you can get some obscene temp hit point numbers. You should also not discount being able to fully buff with a small number of spells. I think they are different, but not underpowered by any standard. I agree, though some of those special abilities have been nerfed on some ocasions. When the Forceful Hands considered mobs STR for the DC check, BK was quite useful since kding most of the enemies was fairly easy. However, when the update modifying the bigby hands mechanics came, making it discipline DC check gaining bonuses from evo focci, I found it very hard to KD anything with Forceful hands, as even trash mobs like the Ice Mephit at Uro have a very high DC check, making it almost impossible for my lv 60 BK to kd them, as mine didnt have any evo focus at all. Since one of the premisses was BKs being excelling bigby casters, that update kind of hitted their usefulness in my opinion, what would be banlanced by granting them useful summons. Well if your BK doesn't have evo focus you need to obtain an item or rebuild. That is not really a class balance issue. Now if you can't kd at all with appropriate evo focuses because monster checks are too high that would belong in the bug forum. That is not a reason to give this quazi access to a summon spell beyond summon fiend. The real problem is why play a blackguard over a baneknight. If you give them access to summons beyond the 1x per day summon fiend, that becomes a much bigger problem all of a sudden. Theurges have nothing to do with baneknights. If you want to compare baneknights to any quazi it really should be staffmasters, as they were created around the same time and in opposition to each other. Cloth vs Plate, Conceal vs Soak etc etc. The only argument that would matter would be "would this change be thoroughly consistent within the quazi itself". It does make sense that sorcerer levels ought not impede the blackguard summon fiend ability. Sorcerer is a class that can summon fiend like beings. Usually quazi classes make use of all of their innate class abilities. The only question should be is it to be different in some way. It is a one time ability so my thought would be ...no. Making it full powered isn't going to make a big difference. |
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