A Pound of Flesh / Elemental Bolt (Advanced Spell)

Teonas my Undir Shaman (who has both spells by the way) totally approves this message….er spell!

Considering I use Pound of Flesh as my major “healing spell” I’d say yes… Came in handy during the a certain fight in Once Upon a Time in Metra (to the frustration of the GM Eric Hughes.

Josh

you should be writing a “guide to advanced spells” seriously

Pedro, thanks man! When you get those clarifications up it will make a significant impact on the way advanced spells are put together.

yep…

but as I was saying… write up a guide.

that’s one of things this community is missing… player written guides!!

A Pound of Flesh / Elemental Bolt
Category: Advanced
CTN: 21 (18+18-15)
Speed (Strain): 7 (+4) ( 5 (+3) + ½ 4 (+2))
Range: 30’ (1 Target)
Duration: Instant
Defense: Avoidance

Effect: Choose an element (Earth, Air, Fire, or Water). Elemental Bolt deals d6 (Primary) damage of the chosen elemental type.

Effect: Your Target takes (Primary) damage and you instantly heal an ally of your choice by the same amount. The damage dealt by this spell bypasses the Target’s AR.

As combined spells also have their effects combined, wouldn’t you heal d6 + 2x(Primary)?

When it was discussed on the old boards the concensus was no. I think the concern was it becoming too good by dealing damage and healing better than dedicated spells could.
I would content that that is the whole point of a combined spell – to be better than the original. One is already taking a substantial risk in attempting to cast combined spells (much higher than average CTN, having to bypass all indicated defenses, etc), thus the benefits should match the risks.

(never mind the really high CTN, and casting numbers)

That’s the thing, though. You *can’t* overlook the high difficulty of casting the spell just because you want to do so. Having a large CTN, having only one primary die be explodable, requiring both spells be of the same source and duration, and other explicit restrictions placed on advanced spell is the ‘cost’ of trying to be a magical bad ass. Creating and actually casting an advanced spell is already very restrictive. It’s been mathematically shown that casting an advanced spell (already made up of adapted spells so they fit together), then adapting it to be “epic” is no easy task.

Mind you, none of my characters have any casting ability — my characters speak pretty or kill with arrows — so I have no reason to argue for some one else being more awesome than I other than I think nerfing advanced spells to the point of ‘why bother’ is just a waste. Between the discussions from the old boards and what I’ve seen here – overruling what’s in the book, I see no real benefit to creating advanced spells.

I honestly don’t see why it’s an issue that *some* combinations of spells are awesome. There are plenty of combos that are just ‘meh’. So a powerful mage with said combos are pretty awe inspiring, so what? How is it different than a behemoth melee fighter that combines two weapon fighting with runes on each exceptional weapon, die bumps to might, and martial techniques? Even without exploding dice, the target likely just took 30+ damage. When it comes right down to it, not all builds are created equal. I think it’s a mistake to try to nerf things because they seem to be too powerful (to some). Sure, that mage and fighter probably own the combat…oh well…put more critical skill checks in the mods to make the “less effective combatants” shine. One of my characters is *awful* in combat, but he can talk the rain out of falling on him. I don’t feel slighted when that character almost a full tier below him makes my guy look like he’s fighting with a feather duster – cause combat ain’t what he does. On the other hand, my Ss’ressen is so skilled with a bow and in stealth that he could almost sneak up on the Gods and shoot’em in the face – but he couldn’t talk his way out of a paper bag without starting a jihad scale war…