Favoured Souls - A Bard's Path

[Opustus]

... I feel like you two slightly refuse to accept what we, people who played FS, try to explain over and over again. infi-ghostly visage IS a deal breaker, perma mass haste IS a deal breaker, not having to rest when all bard spells accessible for 16 cha investment IS a deal breaker. I could go on. Many deal breakers.

I am not refusing that, in fact I've agreed with you and suggested that the dealbreaking spells can be restricted or removed. What I fail to understand is that how the infini-cast on FS is so unfixable when everyone can only name arguably a few of spells that I could myself have fixed in the module, if someone told me how the restrictions to Warlocks have initially been made. I make a careful presumption that one doesn't have to be an idiot savant to do that.

Ghostly visage -> remove or restrict it! Perma mass haste -> remove or restrict it! Ethereal visage -> remove or restrict it! Darkness -> remove it! (Though I'd personally give every mob in Arelith Ultravision to avoid the cheese.) Ice storm -> remove or restrict it! The Raise Dead can be restricted too or completely removed, it's not Bard spell anyway and I REALLY doubt that people often go to dungeons where they know they'll just get deathed over and over again, as it's not too sound RPwise and it makes for lousy exp. Clerks can prepare plenty of slots to remedy oopsees, if braving tougher dungeons, though common sense might caution against it.

I just can't understand why the Path is so incorrigible. The offensive spells are saveable and can be cast once in a fight. Probably you would cast a round of them, trying to disable the spawn with Confusion and Warcry, then charging to battle full tilt. These spells have cooldowns unlike Warlock and Warlocks can invest in high DCs without sacrificing practically any damage output due to Eldritch blast. (I am still talking about early game, which seems to be the crux of the issue here.) The rest of the buffs have such long durations they can be set up by other classes as well, and FS are worse at taking on tough spawns than casters with access to higher level spells at an earlier character level. I just CAN'T understand it, it's not that I don't want to.

EDIT: It won't ruin my world if the Path isn't un-retired, but I think Wandering Poet has made a very good effort to justify the reinstatement, for which I'm compelled to take that side of the argument. Without having played FS, it seems very intriguing and after 10 years into NWN would love to try out something mechanically different. Also, people in general seem to have a lot of good to say about the Path and how the mechanics support new character themes.

[Astral]

I am not refusing that, in fact I've agreed with you and suggested that the dealbreaking spells can be restricted or removed. What I fail to understand is that how the infini-cast on FS is so unfixable when everyone can only name arguably a few of spells that I could myself have fixed in the module, if someone told me how the restrictions to Warlocks have initially been made. I make a careful presumption that one doesn't have to be an idiot savant to do that.

Ghostly visage -> remove or restrict it! Perma mass haste -> remove or restrict it! Ethereal visage -> remove or restrict it! Darkness -> remove it! (Though I'd personally give every mob in Arelith Ultravision to avoid the cheese.) Ice storm -> remove or restrict it! The Raise Dead can be restricted too or completely removed, it's not Bard spell anyway and I REALLY doubt that people often go to dungeons where they know they'll just get deathed over and over again, as it's not too sound RPwise and it makes for lousy exp. Clerks can prepare plenty of slots to remedy oopsees, if braving tougher dungeons, though common sense might caution against it.

I just can't understand why the Path is so incorrigible. The offensive spells are saveable and can be cast once in a fight. Probably you would cast a round of them, trying to disable the spawn with Confusion and Warcry, then charging to battle full tilt. These spells have cooldowns unlike Warlock and Warlocks can invest in high DCs without sacrificing practically any damage output due to Eldritch blast. (I am still talking about early game, which seems to be the crux of the issue here.) The rest of the buffs have such long durations they can be set up by other classes as well, and FS are worse at taking on tough spawns than casters with access to higher level spells at an earlier character level. I just CAN'T understand it, it's not that I don't want to.

You're simply wrong in most of your assumptions about how the class works in practice, rather than on paper. And as I said in another post back in the first or second page, if you have an idea for a path of any class that you think is going to be a good addition to the server? It's on you to break down the numbers and write it all and send it in the suggestion box or to one of the contributors for inspection. The favoured soul is out and if you change most of it's spells, then you might aswell just design it from 0.

[Opustus]

Astral, you might've missed the edit, sorry, but I'll repeat it here just in case. I think WanderingPoet and I have made a very good case for FS so far and the OP is good for the suggestion box as is. This is a discussion thread and instead of comments that want to see the Path obliviated, I think everyone should discuss how the Path could potentially be fixed.

Discussion threads work poorly if the one person with the constructive idea has to waste her energy trying to defend her case while others try to prove her wrong. Ideally, a discussion is a joint effort to finding workable solutions and envisioning good outcomes based on the iniative that sparks the discussion. After that the edited and commented, and thus finalized, version can be dropped in the suggestion box for the actual review.

[Astral]

Astral, you might've missed the edit, sorry, but I'll repeat it here just in case. I think WanderingPoet and I have made a very good case for FS so far and the OP is good for the suggestion box as is. This is a discussion thread and instead of comments that want to see the Path obliviated, I think everyone should discuss how the Path could potentially be fixed.

Discussion threads work poorly if the one person with the constructive idea has to waste her energy trying to defend her case while others try to prove her wrong. Ideally, a discussion is a joint effort to finding workable solutions and envisioning good outcomes based on the iniative that sparks the discussion. After that the edited and commented, and thus finalized, version can be dropped in the suggestion box for the actual review.

I think the majority of the veteran players who played this and many other paths and got a clear comparison, and the contributors of course, have already explained why it cannot be "fixed" by any means, and that if there will ever be a path called "Favoured Soul" it will take a different design and that will happen if and when a contributor decides to design one and it's approved by the admins afterwards. That's why I said you should really try to design something new (and break down the numbers, see that it's balanced and offers something unique) and send it up in the latter of development. Because yes, I could just stop replying and abandon-thread when it's starting to go in loops but I can also stay because it's the nice thing to do imo. But at this point I run out of ways to explain the situation better than this.

[Durvayas]

How is this thread still alive, and why?

[gilescorey]

Astral, you might've missed the edit, sorry, but I'll repeat it here just in case. I think WanderingPoet and I have made a very good case for FS so far and the OP is good for the suggestion box as is. This is a discussion thread and instead of comments that want to see the Path obliviated, I think everyone should discuss how the Path could potentially be fixed.

Discussion threads work poorly if the one person with the constructive idea has to waste her energy trying to defend her case while others try to prove her wrong. Ideally, a discussion is a joint effort to finding workable solutions and envisioning good outcomes based on the iniative that sparks the discussion. After that the edited and commented, and thus finalized, version can be dropped in the suggestion box for the actual review.

What about my post? I thought my post was pretty constructive. And it got ignored. What to heck?

[Opustus]

I judge thee guilty, wretch! *bangs gavel of high horseyness +5*

[Baron Saturday]

So, circle by circle, here's all the spells that would have to be looked at to prevent abuse by an infinicaster:

Circle 0-6: All cure, summon creature and dispel spells.
Circle 1: Balagarn's Iron Horn, Grease, Sleep, Expeditious Retreat
Circle 2: Clarity, Cloud of Bewilderment, Darkness, Hold Person, Ghostly Visage, Invisibility, Silence, Sound Burst
Circle 3: Confusion, Displacement, Fear, Find Traps, Greater Magic Weapon, Gust of Wind, Haste, Magic Circle Against Alignment, Slow, Wounding Whispers
Circle 4: Dismissal, Improved Invisibility, Hold Monster, War Cry
Circle 5: Literally this entire circle.
Circle 6: This one, too.

While many of these spells are not terribly powerful on their own, there are dungeons where they are situationally VERY powerful.

I will also point out that when the Admin team decided to remove Favored Souls and Weave Masters, they did it after months of observation, having gathered considerable hard data. They decided that their time would be better spent elsewhere.

[Liareth]

What I fail to understand is that how the infini-cast on FS is so unfixable.

Infini-casting on Favoured Souls isn't unfixable, which is what Peppermint said earlier in this thread. If I woke up one day with an insatiable urge to balance Favoured Souls, well - it would require a fair bit of effort but it could be done. The fact is that none of the developers on the team are interested in fixing the path. Try to remember that we work on things that inspire us, and unfortunately, what inspires you isn't always what inspires us. (And don't take that the wrong way, either! It's really great that you're excited about Favoured Souls. I'm just trying to explain why things are the way they are.)

[WanderingPoet]

I don't know how to do it without repeating what was already said many times. In practice, the FS out-classes all spellcasters and all tanks when it comes to safe grinding with minimal risk, in places that you otherwise wouldn't be in lvl range to go, which makes you lvl up to 30 (and all your party) in a ridiculous pace. I feel like you two slightly refuse to accept what we, people who played FS, try to explain over and over again. infi-ghostly visage IS a deal breaker, perma mass haste IS a deal breaker, not having to rest when all bard spells accessible for 16 cha investment IS a deal breaker. I could go on. Many deal breakers.

That is the problem with disagreements - the disagreeing part! As someone that has /also/ played a FS (for 8 months)- among many other classes (for 9 years on various servers) - its clear that none of those 'deal breakers' (outside of Ethereal visage) are even close to 'deal breakers'. Infinite ghostly visage - there are limited dispels early, and bards/warlocks/wizards get access to a Ghostly Visage, a turn/level spell. I know for a fact that it made /my/ wizard unkillable early as he whacked goblins to death with a club, and he had no problem keeping it up all the time at level 5(10 minutes extended). Perma mass haste is also easily available to wizards, with just a bit of extending and resting every 30 RL minutes. They also get Shadow Shield, Stoneskin, Premonition, etc which make them even tougher to kill that a FS can get with Ethereal Visage.

The thing is, the comparison constantly made is that infinite spells means you don't have to rest - meaning they are suddenly over powered. I'm sorry to say but the time it takes to rest and rebuff as a wizard/cleric is not any less than it takes for a favoured soul to stand around waiting 18-24 seconds per spell cast to buff allies (who lets not forget, have to rest and rebuff). Sure, they can improved invis their party, but outside of a few areas with invis purge - a wizard can improved invis their party with very little difficulty(Assuming here that the party is less than 6 people). At the cost of their level 4 and 6 spells (improved invis and extended mass haste) a wizard can give their entire party improved invis and perma haste - and then still have the rest of their spell repertoire to still be useful as a Wizard. Then look at the new spellsword path which is tougher/higher AB/higher damage than a FS could get, while still having mostly full spellcasting. Resting once every 30 minutes doesn't seem so bad when you're objectively better than the FS at everything except healing/raising.

The part of this argument that baffles me is the position that "Free, infinite X that you can summon from the ether on demand" is equivalent to "affordable, widely available X that you can put a limited amount of in your inventory."

They are not equivalent. Being able to infinitely summon free gasoline into your gas tank on a whim is OBJECTIVELY BETTER THAN buying a lot of cheap gas and storing it in your back seat. That's why the favored soul was very broken at lower levels, even if it's on-paper power at level 30 didn't seem too bad.

"Well, a PRIEST can also resurrect the entire party!" isn't actually a valid point because it doesn't address the primary problem. Priests run out of resurrection spells. Resurrection scrolls are expensive and come with a high piety cost. The priest can rest, sure, which slows the party down and forces the priest to pick which one of his/her/whatevs limited spells slots are going to be devoted to that spell. There's always a kind of accountancy involved.

FS? Just spam revives all day every day without end.

It's not the same. It's not equivalent.

What baffles me is how there can be so much argument about how FS save so much time and gold, yet people are perfectly willing to wait for 10 rounds(1 minute) for the FS to heal them all up (once they get healing circle, longer before that) - time that the entire party could have easily rest and rebuffed at 0 cost as well. The only currency for a Priest is time, and funny thing is the FS (and rest of the party) have to rebuff the dead after they raise them which means they're probably going to rest anyways to get their buff spells back. Cost for priest? 1 rest, 1 raise spell, 1 rebuff. Cost for FS? 1 raise spell, 1 minute healing them, 1 minute buffing them.

So you're right, it isn't equivalent, the math shows that the cost is actually less for the /priest/.

[Tyrantos]

Simple fix. Make every spell over 2n'd cost piety for the favoured soul. With a corresponding percentage to the circle of spell cast. Or something. I dont know.

[Ambigue]

What baffles me is how there can be so much argument about how FS save so much time and gold, yet people are perfectly willing to wait for 10 rounds(1 minute) for the FS to heal them all up (once they get healing circle, longer before that) - time that the entire party could have easily rest and rebuffed at 0 cost as well. The only currency for a Priest is time, and funny thing is the FS (and rest of the party) have to rebuff the dead after they raise them which means they're probably going to rest anyways to get their buff spells back. Cost for priest? 1 rest, 1 raise spell, 1 rebuff. Cost for FS? 1 raise spell, 1 minute healing them, 1 minute buffing them.

So you're right, it isn't equivalent, the math shows that the cost is actually less for the /priest/.

It's pretty simple, man.

When you die, your rest meter is reset.

So you sleep it off.

No one needs to wait for FS's to heal them.

[Opustus]

I know my understanding of the server balance is pretty tenuous and seeing the class in action might make me realise wherein the rub lies. It was fun to talk it over, nonetheless. I'm pretty good at balance thingmies in general and want to give my final impression (not that anyone should actually care) though incorrect it may be:

It beats me why the Path would be a no-go without major fixing, the discourse for it seems a bit exaggerated, and honestly I think that the server just had a very bad experience with FS, making it less compelling to change a decision once widely discussed and made. Having seen spellcasters and Fiendlock in action, I think that they also trivialize early content a great deal, plus they scale superbly into late game which FS doesn't. Also, in my brief experience on the server, accomplished players tend to get by the early levels and make it into high teens relatively fast, which is, if I've understood correctly, is where the FS power begins to subside. Though naturally I understand that this can be seen as a problem and FS wouldn't be helping it.

My insistence was based on a will to see WanderingPoet helped and supported, cos I think he gave a good pitch. Didn't mean to come off as overly defiant or a know-all.