Revised Force Shield

[Anonymous]

In order to make Force Shield more useful, I have thought up the following revision.

-Force Shield provides damage reduction vs melee and ranged attacks (but not psionics) equal to class level X half wisdom bonus.

As such, this will be much more useful than before, yet still not near as powerful as the brotherhood mages word of power (shield). A level 11 brother of the star with int of 18 will have a DR of 44, for 11 rounds, at a cost of 5 endurance only. A dessi (with this revision) will have a DR of 22, with a cost of 4 willpower every round.

Let me know what you think.

 

[SableWyvern]

DR44? Why bother with the DR? Just say "invulnerable to attack". That, IMO, is more than "more useful".

I think you missed that the Dessi's power does not provide DR (DR is subtracted from every attack. Instead, it effectively provides a bonus number of hp that replenish to maxium each round for the spell's duration.

In other words, a Dessi with a damage absorbtion of 22 would ignore the first 22 cumulative points of damage taken over the course of the round, whether from one or more sources.

Example:

Spell value of 22.

Damage taken: 5, 10, 15, 24.

Actual Rule: Damge taken = 5+10+15+24 - 22 = 34
Using the value as DR: Damage taken = 5-22 + 10-22 + 15-22 +24-22 = 2

 

[Anonymous]

Ok, but are you suggesting I should make the dessi's force shield more powerful? The above example I gave is with my revision; as per normal rules the dessi would only be able to withstand 11 pts of damage.

 

[SableWyvern]

Hmmm ...

Answering that requires much more actual thought.

I do think it is perhaps a little harsh that the Dessi's shield is destroyed if it takes more than it's limit in damge. 4 WP per round is a fair cost already; requiring a new action to cast it if it's damage threshold is exceeded seems a little excessive - especially at lower levels, where it can be expected to go down to virtually any one attack.

So, I'd be tempted to remove that limitation.

Apart from that, it's hard to make a comparison. I think it's safe to say that the Brotherhood Spell is more potent, although it does require a successful Occult check. But I don't think that every similar spell the two classes share needs to be balanced. For a start, the AC bonuses found in the Brotherhood spell are already exceeded by a Dessi's intrinsic AC bonus at higher levels. In effect, the Dessi is always gaining some of the benefits of the Brotherhood spell, just by being a Dessi.

In the end, I think that the Dessi's melee damage dealing capabilities balance interestingly with their vulnerabilty in melee. I would not want to go very far in upsetting this balance.

It's also worth considering that, at higher levels, the Dessi's Force Shield does become quite potent. While it is possible for the spell to be used at lower levels, that doesn't necessarily mean that it was intended for low level use. Whereas a Brotherhood Mage can try using more potent spells at low levels, at the risk of outright failure, a Dessi can always use any spell he knows -- but sometimes, with insufficient mastery, it just isn't worth the effort.

In short, I don't think any modification is needed. If a modification were to be made, I would not want to see more than removing the "shield is destroyed" stipulation.

 

[Anonymous]

Thats not a bad idea, since it would save the dessi a standard action, which at multiple attacks per level can mean quite a bit. However, I was comparing it to the brotherhoods word of power version of shield, which grants DR instead of AC bonuses.

But thnks for your input sable. Perhaps a little playtesting will reveal some more things. The shianti sorceror may also get some revisions to the lesser elder arts (hopefully...evocation needs some more things in it) in the forthcoming supplement.

 

[Anonymous]

If you look at the "Word: Force" power closely you will notice that nothing in the description says that it provides an effective DR. All it does is provide a non-regenerating hp buffer, whereas the Dessi power "Force Shield" provides a smaller, but regenerating hp buffer.
It's not too bad a deal especially if you consider that Power Word usage is severely limited, whereas a high level Dessi has loads of Willpower(and can even regenerate lots of points with Focus, which gives a high level Dessi tons of effective Willpower to play with to keep his defense and offense running).