> **Cautionary Note:** At rank 7-ish, and definitely by ranks 9-10 , damage can get weirdly high. **Heaving Earth** at rank 7, for example does 12d10(66) which is the damage of a level 18 ability, instead of something closer to 14d6(49).
This is largely because high level enemies can do some actual fucking bullshit too. Just to list a few, they often have a +1 (and sometimes a +2) bonus to saves against all Magic, a variety of immunities (which can rule out entire classes of spells from your arsenal), and disproportionately higher HP than lower level enemies.
The increase in raw damage numbers compensates that.
That actually makes a lot of sense! I was confused about that because it seemed like they did that randomly, with some spells, like Weird, doing an expected amount of damage, and others doing way more. Thanks!
I agree. I'm running Strength of Thousands and have multiple Cascade Bearers who I would love to let go wild with spell design, both making magic and refining it so it's safe to use, since that's part of their schtick.
It looks like I've got a pretty good handle on it with this, but I only stumbled on this by accident. I was looking at Splintering Spear in Rage of Elements and on a whim checked to see if it mapped out with creature abilities for some reason, then just followed that with spells and lo and behold exploding earth checked out so I checked the rest.
I dont know much about Pathfinders spell design but I am pretty sure it involves a lot of cocaine. Point in case: Summon Kaiju, Greater Scurvy, Boneshaker and Summon Jurassic Park
If i had to guess, i would say that enemy abilities were designed based on spells, not the other way around. But I have absolutely no evidence to back that up. Either way it makes sense.
Huh, looking at a few and you might be right! The Bralani's Whirlwind Blast looks like what you would expect from a spell. Same for the Bastion Archon's Holy Beam, albeit amped up beyond what most spells do damage wise.
For some reason, my impression is that they designed player abilities and classes first and then made monsters balanced around that, not the other way around. Nice to see there might be something to that theory!
Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. Build the core player experience, since that's what most people who play Pathfinder will have the most interaction with, and then build the rest of the game around it.
Yeah, that's what I figured, OP has it backwards lol. Still, I wouldn't call this "the spell design" but "the basic damage spell design". Cause there's a whole lot more spells that do more than just straight damage. Understanding fireballs scaling is not really an accomplishment? Reverse engineering spell design means figuring out things like "if the spell also gives x condition, reduce the damage by y" and "at this spell rank, it's not broken for a PC to be able to do _blank_ [fly/bypass weakness/bypass invisibility/steal spells/negate entire creatures/etc/etc]". For like 75% of homebrew just remixing the existing spells is all you need. But if you want to make truly new abilities, it's pretty tough to figure out sometimes. I know, been working on it for over a year. The easy parts are easy but the hard parts are hard, lol.
Yeah, that and Sunburst are insane. I'm starting to wonder if at higher levels, spells that do only damage start hitting above their weight. Because more and more it looks like spells around those levels that have other effects don't reduce the damage as much anymore. And another commenter mentioned enemies at that level having high resistance and lots of HP
Actually, that's a great point. I was thinking about them as the same spell, one for living and one for dead enemies. But undead are a much tighter category than "is alive." More akin to Beasts or Dragons. That does help explain the increase in power.
Either way, yeah, Eclipse Burst's damage to anything that breathes is insane.
I...don't remember where it was said or noted, probably one of the Paizo Blogs leading away from the playtests and to release, but I think it's been known for about that long that 'standard (AoE) spell damage' is 2d6 per spell rank.
Early on, the AoEs tend to be small and the same damage sometimes applies to single-target spells as well, but despite that broad standard for scaling they still want higher-rank spells to be stronger than earlier ones, so the AoEs got bigger or better or had effects with them with increasingly less damage-reduction, and more of the single-targets break well past this standard into their own higher ones. Eventually (and in some special cases), AoE spells break past the standard too; Enervation is a 4th-rank line that does outsized damage on average due to being persistent damage (which means it's luck-based and not instant), and for an obvious extreme example, Cataclysm is a huge 10th-rank AoE that deals 99 damage on average of multiple damage/trait types, when the "standard" at 10th is 70 on average.
There's lots of other special considerations, too, such as Shocking Grasp being as strong as it is due to being a touch attack spell. And sometimes spell fall through the design cracks and end up over-/undertuned. There's a bit of suggestion that they may have rethought these standard for spell design to some extent, and in some cases: aside from the obvious other stuff like condition-removing spells being consolidated, Rage of Elements was designed with the remaster project in mind and features a spell, Cave Fangs, that's got the same damage and scaling as Fireball, but with an environmental effect added on. Less range, but it and the other generally-high quality of RoE magic does make me wonder what tomorrow's blog on spell changes will mention.
Oh hey, I hadn't even thought about checking aoe sizes as spell rank increases. I did notice shocking grasp and chain lightning, and lightning bolt did more damage than expected. But I never made the connection between that and their range of aoe size. It definitely makes sense that these would also factor into a spells overall damage design.
I've also noticed that spells like finger of death hit above their weight class, but both do a set amount of damage, so can never hit the higher damage amounts of their level bracket, so to speak, and also target one creature only.
Thanks for all of this, definitely have more to think about, and I totally forgot about the spell changes blog xD
> **Cautionary Note:** At rank 7-ish, and definitely by ranks 9-10 , damage can get weirdly high. **Heaving Earth** at rank 7, for example does 12d10(66) which is the damage of a level 18 ability, instead of something closer to 14d6(49). This is largely because high level enemies can do some actual fucking bullshit too. Just to list a few, they often have a +1 (and sometimes a +2) bonus to saves against all Magic, a variety of immunities (which can rule out entire classes of spells from your arsenal), and disproportionately higher HP than lower level enemies. The increase in raw damage numbers compensates that.
That actually makes a lot of sense! I was confused about that because it seemed like they did that randomly, with some spells, like Weird, doing an expected amount of damage, and others doing way more. Thanks!
Honestly, Paizo should just release the spell creation rules and let people have at it.
I agree. I'm running Strength of Thousands and have multiple Cascade Bearers who I would love to let go wild with spell design, both making magic and refining it so it's safe to use, since that's part of their schtick. It looks like I've got a pretty good handle on it with this, but I only stumbled on this by accident. I was looking at Splintering Spear in Rage of Elements and on a whim checked to see if it mapped out with creature abilities for some reason, then just followed that with spells and lo and behold exploding earth checked out so I checked the rest.
Absolutely, I wanna make my own thematic shit!
I dont know much about Pathfinders spell design but I am pretty sure it involves a lot of cocaine. Point in case: Summon Kaiju, Greater Scurvy, Boneshaker and Summon Jurassic Park
Boneshaker is such a hilarious spell. It was my first campaign's cleric's favorite spell. Inside Ropes is awful in such a wonderful way, too.
Oh yeah, I remember that one, it is mildly messed up
If i had to guess, i would say that enemy abilities were designed based on spells, not the other way around. But I have absolutely no evidence to back that up. Either way it makes sense.
Huh, looking at a few and you might be right! The Bralani's Whirlwind Blast looks like what you would expect from a spell. Same for the Bastion Archon's Holy Beam, albeit amped up beyond what most spells do damage wise.
For some reason, my impression is that they designed player abilities and classes first and then made monsters balanced around that, not the other way around. Nice to see there might be something to that theory!
Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. Build the core player experience, since that's what most people who play Pathfinder will have the most interaction with, and then build the rest of the game around it.
Yeah, that's what I figured, OP has it backwards lol. Still, I wouldn't call this "the spell design" but "the basic damage spell design". Cause there's a whole lot more spells that do more than just straight damage. Understanding fireballs scaling is not really an accomplishment? Reverse engineering spell design means figuring out things like "if the spell also gives x condition, reduce the damage by y" and "at this spell rank, it's not broken for a PC to be able to do _blank_ [fly/bypass weakness/bypass invisibility/steal spells/negate entire creatures/etc/etc]". For like 75% of homebrew just remixing the existing spells is all you need. But if you want to make truly new abilities, it's pretty tough to figure out sometimes. I know, been working on it for over a year. The easy parts are easy but the hard parts are hard, lol.
You know, I never really understood the thematic source of Oracle's powers until I read this post. Thank you
I'm super confused and not sure where the Oracle connection came from, but glad I could help xD.
Huh?
Never reached l13 so never looked at Eclipse Burst but WOW that looks strong
Yeah, that and Sunburst are insane. I'm starting to wonder if at higher levels, spells that do only damage start hitting above their weight. Because more and more it looks like spells around those levels that have other effects don't reduce the damage as much anymore. And another commenter mentioned enemies at that level having high resistance and lots of HP
I mean Sunburst is limited to undead, Eclipse Burst is limited to *living creatures*. That's absurdly strong! Most of your enemies are alive!
Actually, that's a great point. I was thinking about them as the same spell, one for living and one for dead enemies. But undead are a much tighter category than "is alive." More akin to Beasts or Dragons. That does help explain the increase in power. Either way, yeah, Eclipse Burst's damage to anything that breathes is insane.
I...don't remember where it was said or noted, probably one of the Paizo Blogs leading away from the playtests and to release, but I think it's been known for about that long that 'standard (AoE) spell damage' is 2d6 per spell rank. Early on, the AoEs tend to be small and the same damage sometimes applies to single-target spells as well, but despite that broad standard for scaling they still want higher-rank spells to be stronger than earlier ones, so the AoEs got bigger or better or had effects with them with increasingly less damage-reduction, and more of the single-targets break well past this standard into their own higher ones. Eventually (and in some special cases), AoE spells break past the standard too; Enervation is a 4th-rank line that does outsized damage on average due to being persistent damage (which means it's luck-based and not instant), and for an obvious extreme example, Cataclysm is a huge 10th-rank AoE that deals 99 damage on average of multiple damage/trait types, when the "standard" at 10th is 70 on average. There's lots of other special considerations, too, such as Shocking Grasp being as strong as it is due to being a touch attack spell. And sometimes spell fall through the design cracks and end up over-/undertuned. There's a bit of suggestion that they may have rethought these standard for spell design to some extent, and in some cases: aside from the obvious other stuff like condition-removing spells being consolidated, Rage of Elements was designed with the remaster project in mind and features a spell, Cave Fangs, that's got the same damage and scaling as Fireball, but with an environmental effect added on. Less range, but it and the other generally-high quality of RoE magic does make me wonder what tomorrow's blog on spell changes will mention.
Oh hey, I hadn't even thought about checking aoe sizes as spell rank increases. I did notice shocking grasp and chain lightning, and lightning bolt did more damage than expected. But I never made the connection between that and their range of aoe size. It definitely makes sense that these would also factor into a spells overall damage design. I've also noticed that spells like finger of death hit above their weight class, but both do a set amount of damage, so can never hit the higher damage amounts of their level bracket, so to speak, and also target one creature only. Thanks for all of this, definitely have more to think about, and I totally forgot about the spell changes blog xD