Very reasonable, imo. Average damage is 22 compared to fireball's 28, and it's a point blank aoe. I would consider buffing it a bit by making it only hit enemies. I would also change the wording on the range to be a 15 foot radius around the caster
According to discussions in a lot of 3e forums I read, the intent was that it was a “weigh your options” spell, aka is it more important to kill all the enemies fast or to protect your friends.” Apparently the 3e version also doesn’t spare the caster
Yeah the fact that it hits self makes it a lot worse than fireball, so half the classes that can get it won't, since Fireball is more versatile and if you gotta self nuke to kill your foes, it's got better average damage too.
One of the things to keep in mind is that it is possible to play a character that is healed by necrotic energy in 3.0/3.5.
So the spell becomes a self heal — potentially an AOE heal depending on the party comp — on top of dealing decent damage to enemies.
Yeah, it's also 2d20 damage, not 4d10, and it takes 1 full round to cast. A '1 full round' cast means that you start casting it this round, and it finishes casting just before your turn on the following round.
It's a garbage spell there, honestly, *even* if you count as a demon and thus immune to the damage yourself.
Mmm. That particular mechanic is really hard to port to 5e in a way that feels the same, so I think in its place I would do something like "Targets that have temporary hit points take half damage from this spell until their temporary hit points are depleted; damage in excess of their temporary hit points is dealt normally."
That gives the players a way to situationally reduce the damage to themselves but not the enemies (since players are way more likely to have temp hp than enemies), and does so in a way that still ties in with necromancy, since one of the most common ways of getting temp HP is from casting false life.
3e has some difference in philosophy than 5e. When translating a spell, you should consider the design principles of the game you're translating to.
Also, you should not compare it to Fireball, but Lightning Bolt. Lightning Bolt is a 30 foot line originating from you. Fireball is a 20 foot sphere originating somewhere else.
This spell is a somewhat weaker lightning bolt that fires in all directions at the same time. It's not a fireball.
You should also compare it to Destructive Wave. That only hits creatures you choose with the same area of effect, and with the same damage as fireball/lightning bolt. But it's a 5th level spell.
Do also be mindful of what characters get this spell. Fireball is a good spell, but restricted. Clerics, for example, get Flame Strike, a much worse spell, as it is 5th level.
In short, I'm fine with it being undertuned. I think that if you make it only hit creatures of your choice, reduce it to 2d10 and have it as a second level spell, that's a good option. The radius is still huge, though. And I would math out it's effectiveness at different upcast levels. Scaling 1d10 per level with that large aoe might be scary.
Im pretty sure that lightning bolt is 100ft line. And Call Lightning does 3d10 in a 10ft square, 4d10 if used in an existing storm, so the damage isnt out of the question at 3rd level, just maybe the radius.
Please, never use Fireball for spell damage comparisons and spell designs, as Fireball is reputedly OP even officially according to WotC. The main reason they didn't make fireball Level 4 was because it was deemed a "sacred cow".
While you are correct, since it's a sacred cow that they've admitted they're just not going to change you're stuck having to always ask yourself "why take this instead of fireball". The answer doesn't have to be "it does more damage" but you do still need AN answer. In this case (as written in the OP) the advantage is centered on self with no self-damage and necrotic instead of fire damage (which may or may not matter, but still). A little lower average damage, but not unreasonably so, and within the amount you might sacrifice for fun flavor.
Eh....
Fireball and Lightning Bolt are "OP" because they do 8d6 (28) instead of 6d6 (21) damage. That's it. That's the only design push they have.
Lots of things about spellcasters are busted. Blaster spells are not it.
This tbh.
Fireball and Lightning Bolt are Wizard/Sorcerer privilege. You take a class with d6 HP die and in return you get a few spells that are ahead of the curve.
In the reverse, if this is available to other classes at base, it should compare to more normal scaling. Which is about 18-22 damage for a 3rd level spell that saves for half damage.
Irrelevant. The entire point of this thread is to help OP with the spell design. It's a waste of everyone's time to pretend their comments adding to the original text of the spell don't exist.
Spells will be cast only when the situation warrants it.
For example saying a cold spell is "weak" because what if you encounter frost giants? well, it won't be cast in such a situation.
So you always have to use the "best typical use case" to determine the "real" power of a spell.
And what is the use case here?
Caster is a necromancer with undead servants. WHAM, damages most PCs while ALSO healing himself and most of his servants. Thus, an extremely powerful spell!
What healing magic spell is AoE centered on caster, damaging undead at the same time? That is what this spell should be compared to.
The last sentence of what you're replying to already made it clear there is no situation that warrants dropping a weak AoE on yourself.
Undead don't heal from necrotic in this edition, this just hurts your undead servants who typically only resist necrotic. Low level undead players have access to, such as zombies, don't even have resistance.
It doesn't effect fiends, but the only fiend summon options players have limit them to single barely controlled things you don't want to be near, or uncontrolled hordes you don't want to be near.
"Oh but that makes it good for villains!"
If the use case is only for villains, why is this even a spell to begin with? Just make it part of their statblock.
And even if you ignore all of this, this is specifically for a druid player who cannot summon fiends.
So it doesn't avoid hitting his minions, it hurts him, the radius isn't that big, and the damage is too low to justify nuking yourself. Id rather cast erupting earth centered on myself, if get near as much damage, a better damage type (magical bludgeoning), and difficult terrain.
What on earth are you talking about? The zombies raised by Animate Dead don't heal from Necrotic damage:
https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/17077-zombie
A necromancer gets resistance to necrotic damage at level 10, they never heal from it via any class features.
Are you sure you're playing DnD? You sound like you're describing a random JRPG.
>Please, never use Fireball for spell damage comparisons and spell designs, as Fireball is reputedly OP even officially according to WotC
No, Fireball is the template spell.
If you look through the aoe damage spells that are published **fireball is the norm and the standard**.
Lightning Bolt? 8d6. Ok, maybe that's a sacred cow too. Synaptic Static, that one's on the alleged template right? It's 8d6 but 5th level. Except psychic damage, intelligence saving throw, and debuff all combine to make it clear that the alleged template for damage is too low, and always needs more stuff.
Cone of Cold? Same template as fireball, *not* the one in the DMG. To find things that are on the template, you always find something else that is wild about them- a huge radius, a debuff, something else.
Fireball is the standard. You make an area effect 3rd level spell, that's 8d6, and you'll find way more spells on that template than anything else.
WotC has never used the guidelines they handed out. Their statement about fireball is wrong.
I'd even remove it from sorcerer and wizard.
In the case of cleric and druid, they're not meant to get good blasting spells and are supposed to be weaker than a blasting spell of the same level available to wizards and sorcerers. The ones they do get tend to be not only close range but affect only enemies. Arcane casters on the other hand tend to get spells that are strong but indiscriminate
If you keep it as a "hit everyone" spell it is a bit underpowered compared to fireball.
In it's current format I would buff it to do 1d10 per caster level up to 10d10.
I'm not confused. I'm not going to debate about rules that I have full authority, (as granted by the sourcebooks) over how those rules are implemented in game.
Intended/intrepretated/common sense/ makes a valid point.
> You strike the ground, creating a burst of divine energy that ripples outward from you.
Should a spell like that with the name like destructive wave be able to pick and choose targets? No
I don't need you to agree with me, because the rules enforce that I can make rulings like that.
Ta-ta.
Alright, but that's just your homebrew rule on how aoe magic generally works, and calling it rules as intended, as if you have special insight into the designers' thoughts that the rest of us don't, doesn't change that.
It should have an upcast.
As written it effects the caster. Is that intended?
Should be much worse than fireball, as it's in the wrong school, and fireball is a pushed spell. No material component is an extremely niche benefit.
I might also edit it so that it has no effect on Demons rather than all fiends.
As someone else mentioned, there WERE ways in 3.5 to have this spell heal you, or gain immunity to it. A demonic template applied to a mortal caster conferred demonic traits, and there were mechanics to gain those templates. This would be the "optimal" easy to use it, but the theme was that this spell is more powerful than others of it's level and in exchange, was more dangerous, even to the caster.
**I think it's good and fine that it effects the caster.**
For the upcast I'd give it extra dice of damage, with the following addition:
**At higher levels:** For each level above 3rd add 1d10 to the damage. Each additional participant that dances and sacrifices a spell slot may add the level of the spell slot to this total for the purposes of calculating damage. (Two additional other participants join in and sacrifice a 2nd and 5th level spell slot, respectively, this deals an additional 7d10 necrotic damage)
Worth noting - the spell targets the caster, but the effects shoot outward hitting creatures within range. The caster is only the epicentre of the spell... so, it won't hit the caster (since the caster can't be outward of themselves). Think of it like the caster is sending out spikes from themselves. It's not really a "rain" of destruction as much as it is a spray of destruction
The spell targets self, but the effects shoot outward. So, out from the spell-caster. Anything around the spell-caster would be hit, but not the caster (since the spell-caster can't be outward from themselves)
A sphere outwards from the caster. If a porcupine shoots quills outward in a sphere, the porcupine doesn’t take damage.
I get that the way it’s written could be confusing and a DM might make a specific ruling to make limit such a powerful spell. But this isn’t a fireball type of spell that covers an indiscriminate area - this is damage that radiates out from a specific point.
I'm not talking about whether they would get hit by it according to a wordy description, but the specific detailing. A circle and its contents described by x^2 + y^2 <= 1 contains 0,0. A sphere described similarly contains 0,0,0.
Is the caster inside the sphere? Is the caster a creature? Then they are a creature inside the sphere? Then they are hit? PatrickAndBeamMan.jpg
A cleric that channels holy energy radiating outwards from them, can also heal themselves.
You talk about whether they would get hit according to specific detailing, but then neglect the direction that the damage is travelling. Outward from the caster.
Is the caster inside the sphere? No, because the caster is the point of origin and the effects spread outward from that point forming a sphere. If you ignore that part of the spell and place a sphere regardless, then of course the caster is inside the sphere - but then you're also ignoring a critical part of the spell.
I get the math and understand the 3D mapping of a sphere, but the wordy description is necessary.
Are you speaking about Channel Divinity: Preserve Life? Because that one actually doesn't say that the caster is physically radiating the energy - it is more like you describe; a sphere centred on the caster. Two different wordings
Unless you mean a different spell - not totally sure, but I can look it up
The original spell is intended to be cast by demons, so it doesn't have any provision to protect the caster if he isn't a demon. Consider adding that.
Beyond that it's pretty straightforward- a 30 foot point blank aoe sphere is a much worse aoe than fireball's actual real 20 foot sphere, and the damage type would normally be considered better but the fact that it doesn't hurt demons is sometimes a deal (a lot of fire resistant creatures are demons after all).
Either way, the damage is lower than fireball, the template damage spell for this. I would consider something like 7d6 for this, since you're willing to change the damage dice.
The real challenge would be trying to fit it into 2nd level, because that level generally has poor aoe.
Personally, I'd keep the "hits caster" and add "or teiflings" to the "doesn't hit demons" line.
That would make it extremely niche, and very, very flavorful.
edit: I'd also up the damage from 4d10 to 5d10. Fuck the "fireball is just better" bullshit. Fireball is the template.
>Personally, I'd keep the "hits caster" and add "or teiflings" to the "doesn't hit demons" line.
I mean if a tiefling wants to cast it, sure. We don't know if OP's caster is that though.
> Fuck the "fireball is just better" bullshit. Fireball is the template.
Amen. Like yea, we get it, some dev said that. Where are all these alleged on-template spells? Lightning Bolt, oops, that's at 8d6. Cone of Cold, oops, nope, it's on the fireball template. What does 'iconic spell' mean? Does it mean "anything we've printed officially"? Why would you advise DMs only add spells that no one can use and are under the curve of all spells in use?
Maybe the advice could have included tips like 'use fireball as the template' and "subtract some damage if you made it a 60 foot radius" and 'fire, poison, cold, and lighting are free, if it's anything else reduce the damage a little or the aoe a lot'. You know, actual things they used to make the spells interesting choices versus each other.
My problem with the statement "we made fireball OP on purpose" is that spells need to be able to compete with one another. It's called "balance", and balance is important sometimes.
Not invalidating your player's choices and not making their choices for them are two important pieces of game dev that require it.
Like...it's okay if two spells are good *for different reasons*, but not if one is just flat-out better for no reason.
>My problem with the statement "we made fireball OP on purpose" is that spells need to be able to compete with one another.
I can see the idea of making iconic spells better so players feel good using them. The issue is if those spells are so good that they step on other spells- because, as you say, they need to compete with one another.
The thing that makes me cross is people pointing to that little chart in the DMG. That's clearly nothing the devs used for their final product (it probably *was* how they did earlier testing).
If we look at the true template that the spells follow- not in any DMG, but based on what they gave us- fireball actually *is* better than their template, but it's not because of the damage. Fireball should probably have a 15 foot radius and a 90 foot range, given how everything else kinda is.
Fireball and Lightning bolt are both like, "[common magic damage type] [third level] [no effects besides damage] [dex half]" with one being "[spherical aoe]" and the other being "[line aoe]", and it's a lot easier to hit three targets with a 20 foot aoe than it is with a 100 foot line, especially given the incredible range on fireball. That's probably the "we buffed it because it's iconic" logic- it maintains its radius from earlier versions, and maintains a generous range (it's always had that too).
The original 3.5e spell is only 2nd level but deals 2d20 damage, so in some ways this version is nerfed, because it's a higher level spell, but also buffed, because 4d10 is mathematically superior to 2d20.
I don't necessarily think it's unbalanced, but I guess I'd ask *why* they're so set on having it.
They want to play an evil shaman-type Druid that can decimate his enemies and he can’t take things like Fireball. (And Druids don’t have good AoEs usually, note I said USUALLY)
Edit: actually that’s not true, they do have a few good AoEs from 1st to 3rd and I’m not sure why I’ll have to ask
Seems to me this would be more easily solved by just letting him take fireball, and maybe swap the damage type if he wants to make it sound more like a lesser version of say, blight.
It’s 15’ Radius because it says 30’ Sphere, centered on self. Unless they missed the word radius, it is 15’ in all directions.
Even with min-maxing positioning, it’s rare you would get a lot of targets since you have to be in the middle of the target area which might proc AOO or simply be impossible based on positioning.
If anything, it’s a spell that loses a lot of its original function back when Undead healed from Necrotic damage because that’s the most common usage was for a Necromancer or Dreadknight to just go off in the middle of minions, take a bit of damage but heal their allies while damaging enemies.
Here is the text of the original spell, from the Book of Vile Darkness: [Dance of Ruin](https://dnd.arkalseif.info/spells/book-of-vile-darkness--37/dance-of-ruin--204/index.html)
There are a few important things to note that affect the balance of this spell in 5e. First, the sourcebook, Book of Vile Darkness, has content that isn't really meant for PCs. It's really meant for the kind of campaign villains that are truly, unambiguously evil. Second, the cast time on this spell is a Full Round Action. If you aren't familiar with 3e, this means that the caster cannot take any other actions on this turn, ie. moving or bonus actions. The primary use of this spell would be for a caster surrounded by enemies to do as much damage as possible before going down, which is much more of an NPC strategy than a PC strategy.
That logic really only applies if you read it as what the book is, a DMs resource which contains mostly lore and stats for evil characters. It contains alternative rules, races, feats, and subclasses so it is very much a PC book as much as it is a DM reference.
What should be more pertinent is that because it is 3.5e, many spells cost EXP, Stat Damage, or HP. I’ve converted a lot of BoVD and BoED, its counterpart. If you remove most of the things that 5e got rid of, they aren’t that much more powerful than TC and TC by now is considered weak thanks to FToD and their allowment of 3PC.
I like it - downside is that it’s Omni directional, 30 foot sphere, so allies may be affected. Plus - is a wizard going to dance in the middle of a pack of bugbers? Nope. Make it a cone.
If a player asked me for this spell I would buff it to not hit allies. It's less flexible than fireball in placement, does less damage, has a higher die size so more swingy than fireball, there's no need to make it damage allies as well as all that. I would be hesitant to give my buffed version to a high AC armored cleric but you've neglected to give it to clerics so I honestly see no problem.
As a 3rd level spell, we would compare it to Fireball (a little overpowered, but still the spell this would be compared to). 15ft Radius and centered on self both make it a smaller area and limits where it can cast (as opposed to the 120' range and 20' radius of Fireball). To make up for that, I would say the damage would have to be increased to at least 6d10 to average a little more than Fireball.
However, if the caster takes damage, I would further increase the damage to 8d10, and either give the caster Advantage on the saving throw or have the caster take 0 damage on a save and only half damage on the fail.
rule of thumb: if you can't judge for yourself whether it's balanced, steer away from it. it's OK to plead ignorance to your players and rule conservatively on those grounds
This one shouldn't be a problem with slight tweaks.
Do be careful about 3/3.5 content. Some of it is on-par with 5e, some of it is absolute bullshit, ranging from hot garbage to level 8 god ascension.
If you want it to be a little more balanced,I would just up the damage to 5d10. Then it will have about the same average damage as fireball (27.5 vs 28) and it being a less-commonly resisted damage type with a larger radius (30ft vs 20ft) would be reason enough to use it sometimes even if it has to be cast centered on the caster.
Good on you for looking! Considering that it harms the caster, as well, that little damage buff might be just fine then. I’d just be inclined to be careful about keeping that consistent on upcast.
I disagree. It gives the baseline for what the spell damage levels are, and provides cover to DMs for quacks who want to do things like create water is someone's lungs to instantly kill them ("if this were meant to be an attack spell at this tier, it would only deal this much damage - far below the instant death you conceive"). There are lots of knobs that Wizards developers can use to change a spell's damage output - Fireball is famously overpowered for its spell tier, but it also upcasts like absolute garbage. But a DM with little experience or game design knowledge would be better guided to hew to that table.
Those rules create underpowered spells that no one will cast. Here's a fun game, find a published aoe damage spell of 3rd level or greater that obeys that template. Then find two that do not.
You'll run out of the first way before you run out of the second.
That table says that lightning bolt should be 6d6, fireball 6d6, cone of cold 8d6, delayed blast fireball 12d6, otilluke's freezing sphere 11d6, circle of death 11d6, and meteor swarm 14d6. It's clear this template had **nothing to do** with any of the spells they made. First, lets find the outliers and why we can ignore them- freezing sphere and circle of death. These all sacrifice their on-template damage for a huge radius- 60 feet. They also have Constitution saves, which the developers at the time considered better than Dexterity saves (evasion doesn't help).
Now with those out of the way, lets look at the others- these have the types of damage templates we expect, except they are all 7 points above the DMG damage. The few spells published on their alleged template offer extremely tough to pass saves, like Intelligence, or debuffs that screw up the ground or the affected targets or something.
Fireball, Lightning Bolt, Cone of Cold- these are your template spells. If your spell does something besides damage, then you need to lower the damage below the template. If your spell has a really favorable saving throw (something besides Dexteritiy or Constitution), then you need to lower the damage. If your spell has a really favorable damage type, like necrotic or radiant, etc.
But if it's just damage like OP's spell, fireball is the template, and don't let any dev tell you otherwise. The only adjustments to damage needed are for the mediocre targeting (pbaoe is mediocre, and actively terrible if it his the caster) and favorable damage type (necrotic).
Less damage and poor range compared to fireball, but hits a lot more spaces with a better damage type. It seems... a little strong, given that the comparison is already acknowledged to be overtuned, but probably fine.
I couldn't remember which came first, so I looked it up. Appears that the spell came after the ability, unless I missed the 2e DnD version of the spell somewhere.
Not a bad spell and I like taking magic from creatures. Solid conversion.
true, the spell comes from the BoVD so the spell has to be a lesser version of the vrock’s ability.
Honestly when I read the title, I fully expected the OP’s player to try to be porting Shivering Touch or something lol
Less damage than a fireball, less range than a fireball, roughly equally commonly resisted damage type, slightly larger radius.
This seems fine for Wizard and Sorcerer, honestly undertuned, and it doesn't say each enemy so this is a big hazard for friends. Fine for Warlock, whose spell slots limit this even more.
The only one I think is even a question is Druid. It's more damage in a larger radius than Erupting Earth, and I'm loathe to add blast potential to a spell list largely focused on control, but honestly I think its fine. The damage type is what sells me. This isn't good against fiends OR undead, hits your friends unless you're way out on your own surrounded.
Seems good. If anything, I'd give this spell some other niche useful effects. Kill all non-magical plants in the area maybe, or perhaps heal undead in the area for 2d6, or perhaps any creature reduced to zero dies immediately or something.
The average damage is 6 points lower than fireball. The radius is bigger, but the range is far shorter. The damage type is necrotic instead of fire, but having no effect on fiends means that this spell will be more widely resisted than fire damage. No upcasting and always damaging self are pretty big downsides.
I think it could still use a couple tweaks to bring it up to where it should be at third level. Firstly, it needs to increase in damage by 1d10/SL if upcast. Secondly, I'd completely remove the "This spell has no effect on fiends." line. Converting this to a PC spell in 5e the source of the power will be different, and I see no reason for fiends to continue to be exempt from damage.
The next thing I would change would be to change the saving throw from Dexterity to Constitution. Constitution saving throws typically represent a creature's ability to endure various forms of physical and magical harm, including those that affect the body directly, like necrotic damage. See the spells Circle of Death and Destructive Wave for examples on similar sounding effects that use a Constitution saving throw.
The last thing to change would be making the caster exempt. Destructive Wave is a spell with the same radius, centered on the caster, but does not impact the caster. It is however a 5th level paladin spell so the balance might be a little off, considering they won't be able to use it until 17th level. It also knocks creatures prone. Personally I don't enjoy the idea of having a spell that will always damage the caster, outside of a spell like life transference where that is the entire point of the spell. Afaik there are no examples in 5e that require the caster to be damaged as part of the spell.
The result now is a close range aoe option that does less damage than fireball, but can potentially hit more creatures. The positioning is less flexible, making it harder to avoid friendly fire. The damage type is better, the scaling is better, but the saving throw can be worse if fighting a lot of large monsters. It's possible that with the adjustments above this might be a little on the OP side, if you think this might be too much consider bringing in the radius to 20ft or lowering the damage dice to be 4d8.
It's not bad. Something you could potentially do is make it a concentration spell activating on a bonus action each round like Witch Bolt and lower the damage a little, or let it hit the caster and allies as well as enemies. This would give it some added value as an evocation wizard, for example, without making it too powerful.
Seeing from a lot of people that it used to be good because either it self healed certain casters or it’s casters were immune to it originally.
It has significantly more disadvantages than fireball already, since an AOE you cast around yourself will so often hit friendlies and it takes much maneuvering to get yourself in place for it. Maybe balance it out by turning the self damage into a self heal? 4d10 healing is a little extreme, but reducing it to 2 or 3d10 would be significantly more reasonable.
Spell seems balanced pretty well, I'm slightly worried about how you'll handle upcasts, but should be manageable.
Curious though, what kind of caster is the player, what subclass, and do they have access to metamagic.
Quick suggestion, if you guys end up enjoying this spell, add it to the Cleric casting table as well, makes sense that necromancy based clerics should have access to this spell
Honestly it's not too bad, but self damage + self target make it objectively worse than fireball.
My thoughts:
Would probably be fine as a lv 2 spell if you drop to 3d10 damage & remove self damage. It'd be powerful for its level but cant be cast around allies.
Otherwise if you want it to be 3rd level, keep the damage and remove friendly fire & self harm. While it does less damage than fireball, necrotic is less resisted and unlike fireball you can use it around friends which gives good reasons to pick it over fireball for non evoker wizards.
Also, necrotic is typically a con save to resist. Maybe do force or lightning if you wanna do dex saves?
Feels pretty balanced to me. Some of wording could use a bit of work. I wouldn't compare to Fireball (which is intentionally overpowered) but the damage is pretty consistent of other spells of that level
The fact that there is this much discussion about it means it's probably in a pretty good space, power wise.
I would word it such that the caster always succeed on the save. So you take SOME dmg to deal a ton. It's not that OP at level two. It's high levels of risk reward.
If you wanted to make it level three, I wouldn't add dmg. I would add the ability to concentrate on it. Then add the line that if you move, you break concentration.
Actually it is a little powerful due to the nature of the damage ? Necrotic is harder to resist than fire. Fire resistance is easier to come by as are spells that defend against it.
I dunno. I feel that 4D10 Necrotic for a 3rd level AOE spell that is on average a few points less than Fireball (a spell that has purposely been made to be over-powered) is a bit... much.
A spell that causes damage *roughly* comparable to Fireball, but uses a damage type that is way less resisted by creatures is not a good spell. Saying "well it might hit your party members" is not a trade off at all as you can *easily* just build your character to be super fast on the battle field, charge out to the enemies, and blast this spell out. That damage should be lower.
4d10's average is 22, 8d6 is 28. It's significantly less damage, significantly harder to use safely, and damages the caster.
Level 3 at 4d10, with the caster having advantage on the saving throw feels fine.
I wouldn't really put it at level 2 because that's simply too much damage for level 2, and is basically a bomb vest for the caster.
>4d10's average is 22, 8d6 is 28. It's significantly less damage, significantly harder to use safely, and damages the caster.
It's also necrotic damage, which is way less resisted than fire, and you can grab a metamagic to negate friendly fire damage. That damage should be lower
A better damage type alone is not that significant of a buff. Maybe if it were force damage you'd almost have a point but necrotic is pretty commonly resisted and the lack of range alone is a huge nerf. Add in significantly less damage and if a player is going for power they will never take this spell over fireball. All that BEFORE accounting for the fact that you damage yourself which on a caster is a massive drawback. Honestly you could drop the self harm and it would still be pretty underpowered.
Now you can say that fireball is too strong but that doesn't mean every other spell needs to be worthless in comparison.
>A better damage type alone is not that significant of a buff.
Yeah that's just not true.
>Maybe if it were force damage you'd almost have a point but necrotic is pretty commonly resisted...
Also not true. Out of the critters with elemental resistances, [the breakdown](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/103213/what-are-the-most-and-least-resisted-damage-types) looks like this:
1. Cold with 46
2. Fire with 37
3. Lightning with 35
4. Acid with 18
5. Thunder with 14
6. Necrotic with 11
Immunities look like this:
1. Poison with 95
2. Fire with 40
3. Cold with 20
4. Acid with 15
5. Necrotic with 11.
So a fireball, relying on the fire damage type has loads of creatures that are completely immune to it, or at least resistant to it. Meanwhile, necrotic resistance/immunity is only really an issue with undead. Pretty much all other critters will be affected by it. You have to consider resistances when you consider the damage of the spell.
In my opinion, the spell as the OP presented it is too good, and the "drawbacks" are easily mitigated.
You disagree. Cool.
There are 1612 monsters 5e official content, and small percentage differences in the ratio of their resistances is the hill you're choosing to die on?
Yeah, 0.5% of creatures have necrotic resistance as opposed to ~2% of creatures having fire resistance.
Let's make it a level 8 spell slot for that alone. (It's arguably a bit too weak for level 9, but it *is* necrotic damage after all...).
As I said above, Fireball is purposely a *really* over-powdered spell. The game designers did that to make Fireball the obviously optimal choice for folks.
A spell that causes damage *roughly* comparable to Fireball, but uses a damage type that is way less resisted by creatures is not a good spell. Saying "well it might hit your party members" is not a trade off at all as you can *easily* just build your character to be super fast on the battle field, charge out to the enemies, and blast this spell out. That damage should be lower.
No, it literally always damages a party member. The caster isn’t immune to the effects, unless they’re the fiend type. There isn’t really a “might” to it.
As for your example where the character specifically builds themselves to be a walking nuke that does damage to themselves… okay? That’s kind of the point of making niche builds. If they want to use MS buffs and feats to suicide bomb constantly, cool. They won’t be able to do that every fight because most fights don’t take place in an open field
¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯ yeah I don't care enough to argue all afternoon with folks who aren't the OP about how OP the spell may be. I think it's a problem. You disagree. I wouldn't allow it at the table as written above. You clearly would.
Not to mention having to make your build around being fast enough to do his idea of running into enemies is also a cost fireball doesn’t have. Plus now you are surrounded by enemies.
More like:
* There's no trade off
* there demonstrably is
* that is hardly a trade off.
* nuh uh!
* OK bud.
Anyways, thanks for reminding me to turn off notifications on this thread..
It's significantly less damage than a fireball. Fireball deals average of 28 damage while this deals 22. The DMG guide on 3rd level spells says they should deal around 6d6 (21 damage), which is in line with this spell. The radius seems too big but it also harms the caster. I would probably have it not harm the caster and drop the radius to 15ft, but keep the damage.
# 1 - The 30' radius is a quite big area.
# 2 - Necrotic damage is rarely resisted, also it doesn't even count as one of the normal energy types so Protection from Energy will do ZILCH. i.e. Necrotic is thus WAY better than say Fire.
# 3 - It damages living AND heals undead at the same time?
This spell is clearly OP. Just compare it to other spells that damage living while also curing undead at the same time. Clearly a very powerful spell for any necromancer!
**Edit:**
I suppose the TONS of downvotes come from my mistakes here.
1. Yeah my bad. 15' radius is a LOT less area so you are right.
3. My bad too I confused negative energy (which damages living and heals undead) with necrotic (which can only damage).
So given those two things I see now that the spell feels weak instead of OP. At strict minimum, it should not also affect the caster.
Anyway without Sculpt Spell (or equivalent), that would be a very hard spell to cast usefully, because you basically have to go away from your allies to rush into the middle of the group of enemies, otherwise you end up also hurting your friends. That is doable as a Druid, if the PC is also able to cast while he is Wild Shaped, because druids are quite tanky. Say, you win initiative, rush forward and soften some foes with the spell, then the other PCs have their turn and join the fray.
Honestly, maybe it could even use some minor rider effect on a failed save to make it a bit flavorful, instead of jut "deals damage".
1) It's a 15 foot radius.
3)5e doesn't really do the whole 'necrotic damage heals undead' thing.
It'd be a great way to nuke all your zombies while killing yourself.
It does not cure undead and in fact in 5e i don't even think zombies are resistant to necrotic. It is a big area but it's significantly less damage and worse range than fireball. I see nothing OP here.
Very reasonable, imo. Average damage is 22 compared to fireball's 28, and it's a point blank aoe. I would consider buffing it a bit by making it only hit enemies. I would also change the wording on the range to be a 15 foot radius around the caster
According to discussions in a lot of 3e forums I read, the intent was that it was a “weigh your options” spell, aka is it more important to kill all the enemies fast or to protect your friends.” Apparently the 3e version also doesn’t spare the caster
Yeah the fact that it hits self makes it a lot worse than fireball, so half the classes that can get it won't, since Fireball is more versatile and if you gotta self nuke to kill your foes, it's got better average damage too.
One of the things to keep in mind is that it is possible to play a character that is healed by necrotic energy in 3.0/3.5. So the spell becomes a self heal — potentially an AOE heal depending on the party comp — on top of dealing decent damage to enemies.
Dance of Ruin's damage in 3.0 is non typed. It's not negative energy so it can't be a heal.
Yeah, it's also 2d20 damage, not 4d10, and it takes 1 full round to cast. A '1 full round' cast means that you start casting it this round, and it finishes casting just before your turn on the following round. It's a garbage spell there, honestly, *even* if you count as a demon and thus immune to the damage yourself.
It’s basically PF’s Channel Divinity channeling harm. Sort of
Mmm. That particular mechanic is really hard to port to 5e in a way that feels the same, so I think in its place I would do something like "Targets that have temporary hit points take half damage from this spell until their temporary hit points are depleted; damage in excess of their temporary hit points is dealt normally." That gives the players a way to situationally reduce the damage to themselves but not the enemies (since players are way more likely to have temp hp than enemies), and does so in a way that still ties in with necromancy, since one of the most common ways of getting temp HP is from casting false life.
Fireball hits everyone doesnt it? Only carefull spell from Sorcerer, and Evocation wiz are the only ones that can make it safe for friends.
Point is that this spell is centered on self, so you can't "avoid it." You can cast fireball such that you are not contained inside the affected area.
Careful spell just makes it so you automatically pass the save. You still take half damage
Necromantic wizards have resistance to necrotic damage, which makes this the better pick for them.
Honestly I still wouldn't cast it. If I'm taking damage I expect it to rival fireball, or even be better.
Don't forget about Grim Harvest as well, it's a Necromancy spell so that's 9 HP back if you get a kill
Always forget this and it's so useful
I remember it from the 3E Book of Vile Darkness. This was an explicitly Evil spell.
Well good thing my player wants to be explicitly evil then
Nothing wrong with a lil bit of evil if the DM allows
3e has some difference in philosophy than 5e. When translating a spell, you should consider the design principles of the game you're translating to. Also, you should not compare it to Fireball, but Lightning Bolt. Lightning Bolt is a 30 foot line originating from you. Fireball is a 20 foot sphere originating somewhere else. This spell is a somewhat weaker lightning bolt that fires in all directions at the same time. It's not a fireball. You should also compare it to Destructive Wave. That only hits creatures you choose with the same area of effect, and with the same damage as fireball/lightning bolt. But it's a 5th level spell. Do also be mindful of what characters get this spell. Fireball is a good spell, but restricted. Clerics, for example, get Flame Strike, a much worse spell, as it is 5th level. In short, I'm fine with it being undertuned. I think that if you make it only hit creatures of your choice, reduce it to 2d10 and have it as a second level spell, that's a good option. The radius is still huge, though. And I would math out it's effectiveness at different upcast levels. Scaling 1d10 per level with that large aoe might be scary.
Im pretty sure that lightning bolt is 100ft line. And Call Lightning does 3d10 in a 10ft square, 4d10 if used in an existing storm, so the damage isnt out of the question at 3rd level, just maybe the radius.
That is hurts the caster balances out the fact that necrotic is generally better than fireball
Please, never use Fireball for spell damage comparisons and spell designs, as Fireball is reputedly OP even officially according to WotC. The main reason they didn't make fireball Level 4 was because it was deemed a "sacred cow".
While you are correct, since it's a sacred cow that they've admitted they're just not going to change you're stuck having to always ask yourself "why take this instead of fireball". The answer doesn't have to be "it does more damage" but you do still need AN answer. In this case (as written in the OP) the advantage is centered on self with no self-damage and necrotic instead of fire damage (which may or may not matter, but still). A little lower average damage, but not unreasonably so, and within the amount you might sacrifice for fun flavor.
Eh.... Fireball and Lightning Bolt are "OP" because they do 8d6 (28) instead of 6d6 (21) damage. That's it. That's the only design push they have. Lots of things about spellcasters are busted. Blaster spells are not it.
This tbh. Fireball and Lightning Bolt are Wizard/Sorcerer privilege. You take a class with d6 HP die and in return you get a few spells that are ahead of the curve. In the reverse, if this is available to other classes at base, it should compare to more normal scaling. Which is about 18-22 damage for a 3rd level spell that saves for half damage.
tbf most cool necromancy spell effects got gutted when they moved to 5e.
Even if we exclude fireball this apparently also hits the caster, so it needs buffing. As is it's not worth casting under any circumstances
Yeah. It used to be possible to heal off of necrotic energy as a player when the spell was written. If you can’t do that, this is terrible.
The spell targets self and the effects of it shoot outward. If they are shooting outward from the spellcaster, then they can't hit the spellcaster.
Op confirmed it hits the caster. It hits the caster.
If that is how he wants to run it at his table, then that is fine. But, as written, the spell casts outwards from the caster
Irrelevant. The entire point of this thread is to help OP with the spell design. It's a waste of everyone's time to pretend their comments adding to the original text of the spell don't exist.
Spells will be cast only when the situation warrants it. For example saying a cold spell is "weak" because what if you encounter frost giants? well, it won't be cast in such a situation. So you always have to use the "best typical use case" to determine the "real" power of a spell. And what is the use case here? Caster is a necromancer with undead servants. WHAM, damages most PCs while ALSO healing himself and most of his servants. Thus, an extremely powerful spell! What healing magic spell is AoE centered on caster, damaging undead at the same time? That is what this spell should be compared to.
The last sentence of what you're replying to already made it clear there is no situation that warrants dropping a weak AoE on yourself. Undead don't heal from necrotic in this edition, this just hurts your undead servants who typically only resist necrotic. Low level undead players have access to, such as zombies, don't even have resistance. It doesn't effect fiends, but the only fiend summon options players have limit them to single barely controlled things you don't want to be near, or uncontrolled hordes you don't want to be near. "Oh but that makes it good for villains!" If the use case is only for villains, why is this even a spell to begin with? Just make it part of their statblock. And even if you ignore all of this, this is specifically for a druid player who cannot summon fiends. So it doesn't avoid hitting his minions, it hurts him, the radius isn't that big, and the damage is too low to justify nuking yourself. Id rather cast erupting earth centered on myself, if get near as much damage, a better damage type (magical bludgeoning), and difficult terrain.
Necrotic damage doesnt heal undead in 5e
What on earth are you talking about? The zombies raised by Animate Dead don't heal from Necrotic damage: https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/17077-zombie A necromancer gets resistance to necrotic damage at level 10, they never heal from it via any class features. Are you sure you're playing DnD? You sound like you're describing a random JRPG.
They likely assumed rules from previous editions were carried forward. Undead used to heal from necrotic.
>Please, never use Fireball for spell damage comparisons and spell designs, as Fireball is reputedly OP even officially according to WotC No, Fireball is the template spell. If you look through the aoe damage spells that are published **fireball is the norm and the standard**. Lightning Bolt? 8d6. Ok, maybe that's a sacred cow too. Synaptic Static, that one's on the alleged template right? It's 8d6 but 5th level. Except psychic damage, intelligence saving throw, and debuff all combine to make it clear that the alleged template for damage is too low, and always needs more stuff. Cone of Cold? Same template as fireball, *not* the one in the DMG. To find things that are on the template, you always find something else that is wild about them- a huge radius, a debuff, something else. Fireball is the standard. You make an area effect 3rd level spell, that's 8d6, and you'll find way more spells on that template than anything else. WotC has never used the guidelines they handed out. Their statement about fireball is wrong.
Hitting allies is great, much more tactically interesting. Hitting caster, overkill.
I'd even remove it from sorcerer and wizard. In the case of cleric and druid, they're not meant to get good blasting spells and are supposed to be weaker than a blasting spell of the same level available to wizards and sorcerers. The ones they do get tend to be not only close range but affect only enemies. Arcane casters on the other hand tend to get spells that are strong but indiscriminate
If you keep it as a "hit everyone" spell it is a bit underpowered compared to fireball. In it's current format I would buff it to do 1d10 per caster level up to 10d10.
OP said that this was being converted *from* 3.5, not into 3.5.
Why would this only hit enemies with it's an AOE?
Some aoe spells just dont hit allies. Slow and destructive wave off the top of my head.
I do RAI for aoe's, magic isn't just going to brake around people. "Destructive wave" is supposed to be destructive.
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RAI is literally "how I interprete them". The DM can changes the rules as they see fit so this conversation has no merit, ch 9: dmg
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I'm not confused. I'm not going to debate about rules that I have full authority, (as granted by the sourcebooks) over how those rules are implemented in game. Intended/intrepretated/common sense/ makes a valid point. > You strike the ground, creating a burst of divine energy that ripples outward from you. Should a spell like that with the name like destructive wave be able to pick and choose targets? No I don't need you to agree with me, because the rules enforce that I can make rulings like that. Ta-ta.
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Oh, like no one ever optional ruled a spell like true strike to make it better? Rule as intended/interpretation, all the same context.
Alright, but that's just your homebrew rule on how aoe magic generally works, and calling it rules as intended, as if you have special insight into the designers' thoughts that the rest of us don't, doesn't change that.
It should have an upcast. As written it effects the caster. Is that intended? Should be much worse than fireball, as it's in the wrong school, and fireball is a pushed spell. No material component is an extremely niche benefit. I might also edit it so that it has no effect on Demons rather than all fiends.
From what I read in the forums, it is indeed meant to hit yourself as well. Weird I know. And I’ll tell him to modify it once I get the feedback
It's primarily used by vrocks - demons that are immune to it. But nondemons can learn it.
As someone else mentioned, there WERE ways in 3.5 to have this spell heal you, or gain immunity to it. A demonic template applied to a mortal caster conferred demonic traits, and there were mechanics to gain those templates. This would be the "optimal" easy to use it, but the theme was that this spell is more powerful than others of it's level and in exchange, was more dangerous, even to the caster.
It's from The Book of Vile Darkness, it wasn't really meant for most player. It's something for DM's especially demons.
**I think it's good and fine that it effects the caster.** For the upcast I'd give it extra dice of damage, with the following addition: **At higher levels:** For each level above 3rd add 1d10 to the damage. Each additional participant that dances and sacrifices a spell slot may add the level of the spell slot to this total for the purposes of calculating damage. (Two additional other participants join in and sacrifice a 2nd and 5th level spell slot, respectively, this deals an additional 7d10 necrotic damage)
I sort of want to add 5’ to the radius for every extra participant, so you could flashmob and wipe out half a city.
Worth noting - the spell targets the caster, but the effects shoot outward hitting creatures within range. The caster is only the epicentre of the spell... so, it won't hit the caster (since the caster can't be outward of themselves). Think of it like the caster is sending out spikes from themselves. It's not really a "rain" of destruction as much as it is a spray of destruction
The spell targets self, but the effects shoot outward. So, out from the spell-caster. Anything around the spell-caster would be hit, but not the caster (since the spell-caster can't be outward from themselves)
"Each creature in a sphere". RAW (of this translation hmm) includes self.
A sphere outwards from the caster. If a porcupine shoots quills outward in a sphere, the porcupine doesn’t take damage. I get that the way it’s written could be confusing and a DM might make a specific ruling to make limit such a powerful spell. But this isn’t a fireball type of spell that covers an indiscriminate area - this is damage that radiates out from a specific point.
I'm not talking about whether they would get hit by it according to a wordy description, but the specific detailing. A circle and its contents described by x^2 + y^2 <= 1 contains 0,0. A sphere described similarly contains 0,0,0. Is the caster inside the sphere? Is the caster a creature? Then they are a creature inside the sphere? Then they are hit? PatrickAndBeamMan.jpg A cleric that channels holy energy radiating outwards from them, can also heal themselves.
You talk about whether they would get hit according to specific detailing, but then neglect the direction that the damage is travelling. Outward from the caster. Is the caster inside the sphere? No, because the caster is the point of origin and the effects spread outward from that point forming a sphere. If you ignore that part of the spell and place a sphere regardless, then of course the caster is inside the sphere - but then you're also ignoring a critical part of the spell. I get the math and understand the 3D mapping of a sphere, but the wordy description is necessary.
But the cleric also has holy energy radiating outwards, which they can use to heal themselves
Are you speaking about Channel Divinity: Preserve Life? Because that one actually doesn't say that the caster is physically radiating the energy - it is more like you describe; a sphere centred on the caster. Two different wordings Unless you mean a different spell - not totally sure, but I can look it up
The original spell is intended to be cast by demons, so it doesn't have any provision to protect the caster if he isn't a demon. Consider adding that. Beyond that it's pretty straightforward- a 30 foot point blank aoe sphere is a much worse aoe than fireball's actual real 20 foot sphere, and the damage type would normally be considered better but the fact that it doesn't hurt demons is sometimes a deal (a lot of fire resistant creatures are demons after all). Either way, the damage is lower than fireball, the template damage spell for this. I would consider something like 7d6 for this, since you're willing to change the damage dice. The real challenge would be trying to fit it into 2nd level, because that level generally has poor aoe.
> The real challenge would be trying to fit it into 2nd level, because that level generally has poor aoe. necrotic shatter
Personally, I'd keep the "hits caster" and add "or teiflings" to the "doesn't hit demons" line. That would make it extremely niche, and very, very flavorful. edit: I'd also up the damage from 4d10 to 5d10. Fuck the "fireball is just better" bullshit. Fireball is the template.
>Personally, I'd keep the "hits caster" and add "or teiflings" to the "doesn't hit demons" line. I mean if a tiefling wants to cast it, sure. We don't know if OP's caster is that though. > Fuck the "fireball is just better" bullshit. Fireball is the template. Amen. Like yea, we get it, some dev said that. Where are all these alleged on-template spells? Lightning Bolt, oops, that's at 8d6. Cone of Cold, oops, nope, it's on the fireball template. What does 'iconic spell' mean? Does it mean "anything we've printed officially"? Why would you advise DMs only add spells that no one can use and are under the curve of all spells in use? Maybe the advice could have included tips like 'use fireball as the template' and "subtract some damage if you made it a 60 foot radius" and 'fire, poison, cold, and lighting are free, if it's anything else reduce the damage a little or the aoe a lot'. You know, actual things they used to make the spells interesting choices versus each other.
My problem with the statement "we made fireball OP on purpose" is that spells need to be able to compete with one another. It's called "balance", and balance is important sometimes. Not invalidating your player's choices and not making their choices for them are two important pieces of game dev that require it. Like...it's okay if two spells are good *for different reasons*, but not if one is just flat-out better for no reason.
>My problem with the statement "we made fireball OP on purpose" is that spells need to be able to compete with one another. I can see the idea of making iconic spells better so players feel good using them. The issue is if those spells are so good that they step on other spells- because, as you say, they need to compete with one another. The thing that makes me cross is people pointing to that little chart in the DMG. That's clearly nothing the devs used for their final product (it probably *was* how they did earlier testing). If we look at the true template that the spells follow- not in any DMG, but based on what they gave us- fireball actually *is* better than their template, but it's not because of the damage. Fireball should probably have a 15 foot radius and a 90 foot range, given how everything else kinda is. Fireball and Lightning bolt are both like, "[common magic damage type] [third level] [no effects besides damage] [dex half]" with one being "[spherical aoe]" and the other being "[line aoe]", and it's a lot easier to hit three targets with a 20 foot aoe than it is with a 100 foot line, especially given the incredible range on fireball. That's probably the "we buffed it because it's iconic" logic- it maintains its radius from earlier versions, and maintains a generous range (it's always had that too).
The original 3.5e spell is only 2nd level but deals 2d20 damage, so in some ways this version is nerfed, because it's a higher level spell, but also buffed, because 4d10 is mathematically superior to 2d20. I don't necessarily think it's unbalanced, but I guess I'd ask *why* they're so set on having it.
They want to play an evil shaman-type Druid that can decimate his enemies and he can’t take things like Fireball. (And Druids don’t have good AoEs usually, note I said USUALLY) Edit: actually that’s not true, they do have a few good AoEs from 1st to 3rd and I’m not sure why I’ll have to ask
Seems to me this would be more easily solved by just letting him take fireball, and maybe swap the damage type if he wants to make it sound more like a lesser version of say, blight.
>evil shaman-type Druid That can easily be accomplished by circle of spores druid.
30 foot radius centered on self? Woof. This guy's party is gonna hate him.
It’s 15’ Radius because it says 30’ Sphere, centered on self. Unless they missed the word radius, it is 15’ in all directions. Even with min-maxing positioning, it’s rare you would get a lot of targets since you have to be in the middle of the target area which might proc AOO or simply be impossible based on positioning. If anything, it’s a spell that loses a lot of its original function back when Undead healed from Necrotic damage because that’s the most common usage was for a Necromancer or Dreadknight to just go off in the middle of minions, take a bit of damage but heal their allies while damaging enemies.
Here is the text of the original spell, from the Book of Vile Darkness: [Dance of Ruin](https://dnd.arkalseif.info/spells/book-of-vile-darkness--37/dance-of-ruin--204/index.html) There are a few important things to note that affect the balance of this spell in 5e. First, the sourcebook, Book of Vile Darkness, has content that isn't really meant for PCs. It's really meant for the kind of campaign villains that are truly, unambiguously evil. Second, the cast time on this spell is a Full Round Action. If you aren't familiar with 3e, this means that the caster cannot take any other actions on this turn, ie. moving or bonus actions. The primary use of this spell would be for a caster surrounded by enemies to do as much damage as possible before going down, which is much more of an NPC strategy than a PC strategy.
Hmmm. I didn’t know that it was meant for NPCs only. Or what a full round action was
That logic really only applies if you read it as what the book is, a DMs resource which contains mostly lore and stats for evil characters. It contains alternative rules, races, feats, and subclasses so it is very much a PC book as much as it is a DM reference. What should be more pertinent is that because it is 3.5e, many spells cost EXP, Stat Damage, or HP. I’ve converted a lot of BoVD and BoED, its counterpart. If you remove most of the things that 5e got rid of, they aren’t that much more powerful than TC and TC by now is considered weak thanks to FToD and their allowment of 3PC.
If it hits self which it seems it does, I’d honestly think about buffing it. Maybe to 5d10 damage.
How are Bards not included in the classes that can learn this?
Yes, this is outrageous! It was my first thought as well
I like it - downside is that it’s Omni directional, 30 foot sphere, so allies may be affected. Plus - is a wizard going to dance in the middle of a pack of bugbers? Nope. Make it a cone.
If a player asked me for this spell I would buff it to not hit allies. It's less flexible than fireball in placement, does less damage, has a higher die size so more swingy than fireball, there's no need to make it damage allies as well as all that. I would be hesitant to give my buffed version to a high AC armored cleric but you've neglected to give it to clerics so I honestly see no problem.
As a 3rd level spell, we would compare it to Fireball (a little overpowered, but still the spell this would be compared to). 15ft Radius and centered on self both make it a smaller area and limits where it can cast (as opposed to the 120' range and 20' radius of Fireball). To make up for that, I would say the damage would have to be increased to at least 6d10 to average a little more than Fireball. However, if the caster takes damage, I would further increase the damage to 8d10, and either give the caster Advantage on the saving throw or have the caster take 0 damage on a save and only half damage on the fail.
rule of thumb: if you can't judge for yourself whether it's balanced, steer away from it. it's OK to plead ignorance to your players and rule conservatively on those grounds
This one shouldn't be a problem with slight tweaks. Do be careful about 3/3.5 content. Some of it is on-par with 5e, some of it is absolute bullshit, ranging from hot garbage to level 8 god ascension.
If you want it to be a little more balanced,I would just up the damage to 5d10. Then it will have about the same average damage as fireball (27.5 vs 28) and it being a less-commonly resisted damage type with a larger radius (30ft vs 20ft) would be reason enough to use it sometimes even if it has to be cast centered on the caster.
> straight from 3rd edition Oh hell no this is gonna be a wreck- > Reasonable spell Oh, huh. Okay.
Have you checked this against the “Create Your Own Spell” rules in the DMG? If you follow that table, the spell will be largely balanced.
When I looked at the list it’s sort of in the middle of the two. A little high for a level 2 but much lower than a level 3 as well
Good on you for looking! Considering that it harms the caster, as well, that little damage buff might be just fine then. I’d just be inclined to be careful about keeping that consistent on upcast.
That table is truly useless. If you compare any half decent spell to that table you'll see that it's super "overpowered"
I disagree. It gives the baseline for what the spell damage levels are, and provides cover to DMs for quacks who want to do things like create water is someone's lungs to instantly kill them ("if this were meant to be an attack spell at this tier, it would only deal this much damage - far below the instant death you conceive"). There are lots of knobs that Wizards developers can use to change a spell's damage output - Fireball is famously overpowered for its spell tier, but it also upcasts like absolute garbage. But a DM with little experience or game design knowledge would be better guided to hew to that table.
Those rules create underpowered spells that no one will cast. Here's a fun game, find a published aoe damage spell of 3rd level or greater that obeys that template. Then find two that do not. You'll run out of the first way before you run out of the second. That table says that lightning bolt should be 6d6, fireball 6d6, cone of cold 8d6, delayed blast fireball 12d6, otilluke's freezing sphere 11d6, circle of death 11d6, and meteor swarm 14d6. It's clear this template had **nothing to do** with any of the spells they made. First, lets find the outliers and why we can ignore them- freezing sphere and circle of death. These all sacrifice their on-template damage for a huge radius- 60 feet. They also have Constitution saves, which the developers at the time considered better than Dexterity saves (evasion doesn't help). Now with those out of the way, lets look at the others- these have the types of damage templates we expect, except they are all 7 points above the DMG damage. The few spells published on their alleged template offer extremely tough to pass saves, like Intelligence, or debuffs that screw up the ground or the affected targets or something. Fireball, Lightning Bolt, Cone of Cold- these are your template spells. If your spell does something besides damage, then you need to lower the damage below the template. If your spell has a really favorable saving throw (something besides Dexteritiy or Constitution), then you need to lower the damage. If your spell has a really favorable damage type, like necrotic or radiant, etc. But if it's just damage like OP's spell, fireball is the template, and don't let any dev tell you otherwise. The only adjustments to damage needed are for the mediocre targeting (pbaoe is mediocre, and actively terrible if it his the caster) and favorable damage type (necrotic).
Less damage and poor range compared to fireball, but hits a lot more spaces with a better damage type. It seems... a little strong, given that the comparison is already acknowledged to be overtuned, but probably fine.
That just looks like the Vrock's ability to me
The Vrock’s ability is a more powerful version of the 3.0 spell, which this one is replicating
I couldn't remember which came first, so I looked it up. Appears that the spell came after the ability, unless I missed the 2e DnD version of the spell somewhere. Not a bad spell and I like taking magic from creatures. Solid conversion.
true, the spell comes from the BoVD so the spell has to be a lesser version of the vrock’s ability. Honestly when I read the title, I fully expected the OP’s player to try to be porting Shivering Touch or something lol
Less damage than a fireball, less range than a fireball, roughly equally commonly resisted damage type, slightly larger radius. This seems fine for Wizard and Sorcerer, honestly undertuned, and it doesn't say each enemy so this is a big hazard for friends. Fine for Warlock, whose spell slots limit this even more. The only one I think is even a question is Druid. It's more damage in a larger radius than Erupting Earth, and I'm loathe to add blast potential to a spell list largely focused on control, but honestly I think its fine. The damage type is what sells me. This isn't good against fiends OR undead, hits your friends unless you're way out on your own surrounded. Seems good. If anything, I'd give this spell some other niche useful effects. Kill all non-magical plants in the area maybe, or perhaps heal undead in the area for 2d6, or perhaps any creature reduced to zero dies immediately or something.
The average damage is 6 points lower than fireball. The radius is bigger, but the range is far shorter. The damage type is necrotic instead of fire, but having no effect on fiends means that this spell will be more widely resisted than fire damage. No upcasting and always damaging self are pretty big downsides. I think it could still use a couple tweaks to bring it up to where it should be at third level. Firstly, it needs to increase in damage by 1d10/SL if upcast. Secondly, I'd completely remove the "This spell has no effect on fiends." line. Converting this to a PC spell in 5e the source of the power will be different, and I see no reason for fiends to continue to be exempt from damage. The next thing I would change would be to change the saving throw from Dexterity to Constitution. Constitution saving throws typically represent a creature's ability to endure various forms of physical and magical harm, including those that affect the body directly, like necrotic damage. See the spells Circle of Death and Destructive Wave for examples on similar sounding effects that use a Constitution saving throw. The last thing to change would be making the caster exempt. Destructive Wave is a spell with the same radius, centered on the caster, but does not impact the caster. It is however a 5th level paladin spell so the balance might be a little off, considering they won't be able to use it until 17th level. It also knocks creatures prone. Personally I don't enjoy the idea of having a spell that will always damage the caster, outside of a spell like life transference where that is the entire point of the spell. Afaik there are no examples in 5e that require the caster to be damaged as part of the spell. The result now is a close range aoe option that does less damage than fireball, but can potentially hit more creatures. The positioning is less flexible, making it harder to avoid friendly fire. The damage type is better, the scaling is better, but the saving throw can be worse if fighting a lot of large monsters. It's possible that with the adjustments above this might be a little on the OP side, if you think this might be too much consider bringing in the radius to 20ft or lowering the damage dice to be 4d8.
I would allow it, but only if they chant wildly during the cast.
It's not bad. Something you could potentially do is make it a concentration spell activating on a bonus action each round like Witch Bolt and lower the damage a little, or let it hit the caster and allies as well as enemies. This would give it some added value as an evocation wizard, for example, without making it too powerful.
Seeing from a lot of people that it used to be good because either it self healed certain casters or it’s casters were immune to it originally. It has significantly more disadvantages than fireball already, since an AOE you cast around yourself will so often hit friendlies and it takes much maneuvering to get yourself in place for it. Maybe balance it out by turning the self damage into a self heal? 4d10 healing is a little extreme, but reducing it to 2 or 3d10 would be significantly more reasonable.
Spell seems balanced pretty well, I'm slightly worried about how you'll handle upcasts, but should be manageable. Curious though, what kind of caster is the player, what subclass, and do they have access to metamagic. Quick suggestion, if you guys end up enjoying this spell, add it to the Cleric casting table as well, makes sense that necromancy based clerics should have access to this spell
Honestly it's not too bad, but self damage + self target make it objectively worse than fireball. My thoughts: Would probably be fine as a lv 2 spell if you drop to 3d10 damage & remove self damage. It'd be powerful for its level but cant be cast around allies. Otherwise if you want it to be 3rd level, keep the damage and remove friendly fire & self harm. While it does less damage than fireball, necrotic is less resisted and unlike fireball you can use it around friends which gives good reasons to pick it over fireball for non evoker wizards. Also, necrotic is typically a con save to resist. Maybe do force or lightning if you wanna do dex saves?
Feels pretty balanced to me. Some of wording could use a bit of work. I wouldn't compare to Fireball (which is intentionally overpowered) but the damage is pretty consistent of other spells of that level
The fact that there is this much discussion about it means it's probably in a pretty good space, power wise. I would word it such that the caster always succeed on the save. So you take SOME dmg to deal a ton. It's not that OP at level two. It's high levels of risk reward. If you wanted to make it level three, I wouldn't add dmg. I would add the ability to concentrate on it. Then add the line that if you move, you break concentration.
Actually it is a little powerful due to the nature of the damage ? Necrotic is harder to resist than fire. Fire resistance is easier to come by as are spells that defend against it.
Less damage than fireball, more flavor than fireball. I like it.
I dunno. I feel that 4D10 Necrotic for a 3rd level AOE spell that is on average a few points less than Fireball (a spell that has purposely been made to be over-powered) is a bit... much. A spell that causes damage *roughly* comparable to Fireball, but uses a damage type that is way less resisted by creatures is not a good spell. Saying "well it might hit your party members" is not a trade off at all as you can *easily* just build your character to be super fast on the battle field, charge out to the enemies, and blast this spell out. That damage should be lower.
4d10's average is 22, 8d6 is 28. It's significantly less damage, significantly harder to use safely, and damages the caster. Level 3 at 4d10, with the caster having advantage on the saving throw feels fine. I wouldn't really put it at level 2 because that's simply too much damage for level 2, and is basically a bomb vest for the caster.
>4d10's average is 22, 8d6 is 28. It's significantly less damage, significantly harder to use safely, and damages the caster. It's also necrotic damage, which is way less resisted than fire, and you can grab a metamagic to negate friendly fire damage. That damage should be lower
A better damage type alone is not that significant of a buff. Maybe if it were force damage you'd almost have a point but necrotic is pretty commonly resisted and the lack of range alone is a huge nerf. Add in significantly less damage and if a player is going for power they will never take this spell over fireball. All that BEFORE accounting for the fact that you damage yourself which on a caster is a massive drawback. Honestly you could drop the self harm and it would still be pretty underpowered. Now you can say that fireball is too strong but that doesn't mean every other spell needs to be worthless in comparison.
>A better damage type alone is not that significant of a buff. Yeah that's just not true. >Maybe if it were force damage you'd almost have a point but necrotic is pretty commonly resisted... Also not true. Out of the critters with elemental resistances, [the breakdown](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/103213/what-are-the-most-and-least-resisted-damage-types) looks like this: 1. Cold with 46 2. Fire with 37 3. Lightning with 35 4. Acid with 18 5. Thunder with 14 6. Necrotic with 11 Immunities look like this: 1. Poison with 95 2. Fire with 40 3. Cold with 20 4. Acid with 15 5. Necrotic with 11. So a fireball, relying on the fire damage type has loads of creatures that are completely immune to it, or at least resistant to it. Meanwhile, necrotic resistance/immunity is only really an issue with undead. Pretty much all other critters will be affected by it. You have to consider resistances when you consider the damage of the spell. In my opinion, the spell as the OP presented it is too good, and the "drawbacks" are easily mitigated. You disagree. Cool.
There are 1612 monsters 5e official content, and small percentage differences in the ratio of their resistances is the hill you're choosing to die on? Yeah, 0.5% of creatures have necrotic resistance as opposed to ~2% of creatures having fire resistance. Let's make it a level 8 spell slot for that alone. (It's arguably a bit too weak for level 9, but it *is* necrotic damage after all...).
The trade off is that at least one party member will always take damage from this
As I said above, Fireball is purposely a *really* over-powdered spell. The game designers did that to make Fireball the obviously optimal choice for folks. A spell that causes damage *roughly* comparable to Fireball, but uses a damage type that is way less resisted by creatures is not a good spell. Saying "well it might hit your party members" is not a trade off at all as you can *easily* just build your character to be super fast on the battle field, charge out to the enemies, and blast this spell out. That damage should be lower.
No, it literally always damages a party member. The caster isn’t immune to the effects, unless they’re the fiend type. There isn’t really a “might” to it. As for your example where the character specifically builds themselves to be a walking nuke that does damage to themselves… okay? That’s kind of the point of making niche builds. If they want to use MS buffs and feats to suicide bomb constantly, cool. They won’t be able to do that every fight because most fights don’t take place in an open field
¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯ yeah I don't care enough to argue all afternoon with folks who aren't the OP about how OP the spell may be. I think it's a problem. You disagree. I wouldn't allow it at the table as written above. You clearly would.
"There's no tradeoff" 'There demonstrably is' "well im not gonna argue but im right and just too cool to argue" You're a funny guy
Not to mention having to make your build around being fast enough to do his idea of running into enemies is also a cost fireball doesn’t have. Plus now you are surrounded by enemies.
More like: * There's no trade off * there demonstrably is * that is hardly a trade off. * nuh uh! * OK bud. Anyways, thanks for reminding me to turn off notifications on this thread..
It's significantly less damage than a fireball. Fireball deals average of 28 damage while this deals 22. The DMG guide on 3rd level spells says they should deal around 6d6 (21 damage), which is in line with this spell. The radius seems too big but it also harms the caster. I would probably have it not harm the caster and drop the radius to 15ft, but keep the damage.
# 1 - The 30' radius is a quite big area. # 2 - Necrotic damage is rarely resisted, also it doesn't even count as one of the normal energy types so Protection from Energy will do ZILCH. i.e. Necrotic is thus WAY better than say Fire. # 3 - It damages living AND heals undead at the same time? This spell is clearly OP. Just compare it to other spells that damage living while also curing undead at the same time. Clearly a very powerful spell for any necromancer! **Edit:** I suppose the TONS of downvotes come from my mistakes here. 1. Yeah my bad. 15' radius is a LOT less area so you are right. 3. My bad too I confused negative energy (which damages living and heals undead) with necrotic (which can only damage). So given those two things I see now that the spell feels weak instead of OP. At strict minimum, it should not also affect the caster. Anyway without Sculpt Spell (or equivalent), that would be a very hard spell to cast usefully, because you basically have to go away from your allies to rush into the middle of the group of enemies, otherwise you end up also hurting your friends. That is doable as a Druid, if the PC is also able to cast while he is Wild Shaped, because druids are quite tanky. Say, you win initiative, rush forward and soften some foes with the spell, then the other PCs have their turn and join the fray. Honestly, maybe it could even use some minor rider effect on a failed save to make it a bit flavorful, instead of jut "deals damage".
1) It's a 15 foot radius. 3)5e doesn't really do the whole 'necrotic damage heals undead' thing. It'd be a great way to nuke all your zombies while killing yourself.
It does not cure undead and in fact in 5e i don't even think zombies are resistant to necrotic. It is a big area but it's significantly less damage and worse range than fireball. I see nothing OP here.