Holy open roll Batman!

A wood wight gestures at you!

The ground beneath your feet suddenly frosts and rumbles violently!

[SMR result: 33 (Open d100: 7)]

The earth cracks beneath you, releasing a column of frigid air!

You dodge out of the way!

>s

...wait 1 seconds.

>

[SMR result: 120 (Open d100: 93)]

Icy stalagmites burst from the ground beneath you!

... 25 points of damage!

Well placed shot pierces knee, that hurt!

You are knocked to the ground!

You are stunned for 5 rounds!

>s

You are still stunned.

>

[SMR result: 145 (Open d100: 49, Bonus: 71)]

The earth cracks beneath you, releasing a column of frigid air!

A swirling sonic barrier partially deflects the onslaught of the frigid attack.

... 25 points of damage!

You stagger as the icy attack shatters your right leg.

>

[SMR result: 199 (Open d100: 88, Bonus: 86)]

The earth cracks beneath you, releasing a column of frigid air!

A swirling sonic barrier partially deflects the onslaught of the frigid attack.

... 35 points of damage!

Polar blast decimates your right hand!

>

[SMR result: 133 (Open d100: 11, Bonus: 95)]

Icy stalagmites burst from the ground beneath you!

... 15 points of damage!

Shot to the hand slices a finger to the bone!

>

A wood wight chants an evil incantation.

>se

You are still stunned.

>

[SMR result: 258 (Open d100: 135, Bonus: 97)]

Icy stalagmites burst from the ground beneath you!

... 50 points of damage!

That just seems very wrong - on the 2nd to last flare the open roll killed me. That's just gross. Creature that's 5 levels under me can destroy me.

The second flare gave an endroll of of 120 and I got knocked down with a 5 round stun. Seems a bit much for such a minor endroll. I can understand the open roll on the shot that killed me, actually had the ability to kill me. But that initial roll that put me down, seems a tad aggressive.

The worst part, I could have avoided this, but apparently that 1 second I had to wait when I tried to run, right after the initial cast was longer than the 2 seconds between flare ups from the spell. I would have lived, but the second flare happened faster than my 1 second of RT I was still in when the spell was cast at me.

-Drumpel

I trust that Dev is able to monitor and make any necessary adjustments to the creature effectiveness of this spell without immediately nerfing the spell altogether. Anything more than 2 seconds per cycle would render it completely useless to me from a player offensive standpoint.

>If it gets adjusted, hopefully it will just be on the critter side. Slowing it down on the player side would be a disaster if the spell's power isn't increased to account for it, and it already hits pretty hard against most things.

I wouldn't mind seeing the creature's version having the Bonus rolls reduced by half.

Getting knocked down appears to add +50 bonus. Stunned and prone the bonus jumps a good bit again and it keeps going up from there on every flare. Even though the damage is supposed to decrease on each corresponding flare, the bonus rolls increase and it seems you can still get tagged really hard on the last one or two flares simply because the endrolls are so high.

My first clip posted, 100 health gone in 10 seconds from 1 spell.

My second clip posted 150 health gone in 10 seconds from 1 spell (and he even dodged the initial cast damage).

My bard is 1x in PF and has 139 health. So he was in fairly poor shape when the stun wore off from my first clip. Thankfully I could ring out.
The second time he got tagged with earthen fury even if the last roll didn't crit kill, there was enough HP damage that my bard would have still died.

The old boil earth could certainly hit multiple times, but it never did that much damage to my bard in wights before. Usually a stun and 30-60 health loss if he got hit from it.

Wights went from being annoying for my bard to downright deadly. Especially when just walking into the room when no one else is hunting and they immediatly cast a spell at me as I enter the room.

-Drumpel

>Maybe, like Stun & Death Cloud, the later rounds are always at a weaker crit?

I still think the bonus rolls needs to be tweaked down on the creature's version. Sure, the last couple cycles the crits should be low, but the high end rolls are making them just as lethal as the first couple of crits that hit hard with lower endrolls.

120 end roll that puts you on your back from the initial cast or second cycle, then the +50 to +100 (or more) bonus to the rolls as the cycles progress are kicking my butt. Cutting out the bonus rolls by half, should still make the spell a good weapon in a creature's arsenal, but hopefully make it less lethal towards players.

Generally from my experience, a lot of creatures (especially when you get higher in levels) have a lot more health than a player. The same spell cast at a creature may not kill it from health loss like it it may against a player.

Hopefully they look at it and decide to make some kind of adjustment down somewhere on the creature's version. I like the version my wizard casts against creatures so hopefully that doesn't get adjusted.

-Drumpel

Hunting casters has always been dangerous. There are plenty of ways to bypass this issue without calling for an immediate nerf, however. Hunting should require strategy, not cookie cutter scripting.

It sounds like the idea was that PCs could run from the spell if they have it cast at them. Maybe the time between the cast "hitting" and the first cycle should be increased, but I'm certain some players won't like that. Or, all the critters that use it could be updated to not gen with it prepped, but I'm not sure this would solve the problem. Or, copy the old Boil Earth to a 1700 list spell and update critters to use this one. It sounds like critter lores already affect the spell less than PC lores do.

As of right now I'm still watching things closely, but posting logs like this definitely helps. Thanks!

~ Konacon

>The change was very dramatic in terms of their power. Old spell = hit with half the time, usually 30-60 health loss with some minors or rank 2 wounds. New spell = when hit, once stunned/prone the high rolls still deliver outstanding levels of damage/crits and leave me with almost no health or outright dead from a crit or health loss.

This is probably becuase Boil Earth was garbage. Less garbage when critter cast, but still garbage overall.

Have you tried Song of Noise? I don't remember if that will mess with casting your own spells or not. If not, then that would probably be an easy fix for your character.

~ Methais

"Anything more than 2 seconds per cycle would render it completely useless to me from a player offensive standpoint." -- LadyFleur

"To tell them how to adjust it, requiring changes directly to the spell itself or creating a new creature version seems premature given it has been out for all of less than two days." -- also LadyFleur

Demanding that the release remain unchanged, given that it has been out for all of less than two days, seems equally premature.

.

.

Drumpel & I agree: casters are problematic for the opposition. (I, at least, am playing the Bard as a caster, not a swinger. I figure between roughly half of destroyed-gear flares hitting a potentially lethal area and roughly half of the random flare power being of sufficient power [>= rank5 crits], about a quarter of my VibChants do in the troll or giant that I target.)

But there is a HUGE difference in the efficacy of this spell, versus what it replaced, when creatures cast it.
The WEAKER results that he posted, in the first log, total -100HP just from damage. Says nothing of bleeding or other status effects. That's 2/3 of my Elf's hit points. (Looks like the crucial effects there are "stunned for 3 rounds" and "prone due to missing leg".)
The MORE damaging results that he posted, in the second log, total 150, and the initial cast even MISSED. That's either "all-but-five", or 90% of, my Elf's total. (Depending on whether he has 155 or 165 hit points, which I don't recall.) And again, that's just raw HP damage only, not wounds, not bleeders, not any other status effects (prone, stunned, death by crit). (And again, he got "stunned for 5 rounds" that time.)

BIG difference between that... and "Oh, down ~30hp, two or three small wounds and one bleeder. So, now it's MY turn..." and smoke the poor thing into next week.

.

Also, there's typically only ONE of us, and we've got a three-second limit on when we can re-cast at them or their brother. There is quite often not just the two of them but a buddy from around the corner and a cousin or three stopping by for a beer, too.
(This morning I was the only person I saw in stone trolls/giants for about 20 minutes, though I did see a disk at one point. Could have been headed into the Stronghold, or there are frequently instabilities around there.
With "just me", then, it was pretty disheartening to walk into a room and see not one, not two, but three (3) stone giants standing there.
That's an awful lot of "potential casting on the hoof, and who's to say they don't have it prepped already" going on, just for walking into a room.)

We have to kill 7-to-100+ creatures (depending on stats and whether they're >=5+ levels above us to not more than 9 levels below us) just to get a full head. Once. (Out of dozens or hundreds of headsful required.)
They have to get one lucky--well... used to be "lucky" was called for, but the new version of the spell it seems like "normal" will do it just fine--result. Once. In order to screw things up for a half hour or more.

.

But hey, I'm totally alright with taking a more pro-active stance if that's what folks want.

I can change from walking around and watching what's going on, to instead just "change room & renew Disrupt whoops sorry about that but hey, an Elf's got to stay alive against them", if it's preferred. <shrug>

.

.

And, yeah. The last thing I scripted was when Krakii still did some raises. I'm not sure that's been uncorked this millennium.

Although I suspect that were I to do so, my worries about Earthen Fury's strength would probably go down. Given that I would have my computer playing Simutronics'.
Me, I like playing the game more than I like writing scripts (or mindlessly bashing the renew button and whacking people carelessly; I've killed plenty enough of passersby when I am being careful, and they happen to walk in right as I renew).
I do enough of that at work, that I consider it, you know. Work.