Balagarn's iron horn should be on a cooldown for warlocks

[Aren]

@Szaren

So you'll just reapply this while the warlock changes tactics and spams gdispel on you now for free while you have the balor on you

all because balagarn's has every non-str character on their heels from the get-go

do you play a warlock?

I have played many warlocks. Currently I play a 24/6 rogue.

[Aren]

@zavander

Do you play a monk?

[Zavandar]

i pointedly don't play monks because they are busted and have been one of the most outspoken advocates for nerfs, ty

[Aren]

I mean, sure, but also no. The balor will deal damage to you, and you will slowly but surely lose the fight. Especially if the warlock gets to shoot a grease or two in there. I really want to see a 66 AC rogue ( whose AC drops to 56 by the way, because he just used a scroll ) spending his time re-reading the same scroll over and over again while there is a balor on top of him.

Why is the balor on top of you? Why are you fighting a warlock without warding the place against summoning / banishing his summon first?

[Tarkus the dog]

Okay, you waste your time trying to dispel the summon ( mords + word of faith ), that's 12 seconds of you being a sitting duck ( on top of that, there is a good chance it doesn't even remove a summon ). He summons a glabrezu, and after a while he can summon the balor again.

And let's say you caught him with his pants down and dropped a dismissal on top. He runs away, or just manages just fine because as a dex character you don't deal any serious damage to him, and then he eventually brings up the balor ( or more likely, he outright beats you). Even better, you enter the "Me shadow conjuration, you mords" loop, dismissal times out and he brings up the Balor.

Or, you know, while you are busy trying to dismissal/mords/WoF he uses Balagarn's and kills you.

[malcolm_mountainslayer]

Dude its only dc 20. Str base 12 or 14 plus bullstr potion and skleen if you are worried should put you at around 50% chance of success. If you suceed, the warlock wasted time he could have been hitting your with something else.

Furthermore, the Horn has limited range. Any dex range character would laugh at balgarns horn via called shot etc.

If we really wanted to push the meta, the des character could have quickslotted items with str on them. This is a bit over top imo though, but a dex character should not be stuck in a 1 vs 1 fight unless they want to be there. With stuff like blinding speed a d stealth. They can avoid till more favourable conditions or use the fact that summons follow you through stealth to get out of range of horn and or lure into traps.

If it was say multiple rogues agaisnt multiple warlocks. Balgarns horn can do friendly fire and crippling strike can bring down str scores. If warlocks spread out then rogues all Gank same target at once and said target better hope they live and their horn knocks all the rogues down at once.

In general dex based characters tend to be subpar in comparison to str ones and have always had to rely on being creative to have the edge.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

Disagree with the CD.

Warlocks aren't great in PvP as it is lol. They might look good on pen and paper but there are so many ways to counter them.

Agreed. Globes (even the Lessers) of invulnerability shut down a lot of their options, and while globes can be breached, that's a resource war (a pretty even one at that). Lesser globes can even be wanded, so if they want to trade a mord for a wand charge every round I'm okay with that.

Edit: According to the NWN wiki minor globe can't be wanded, but I think Arelith worked around that?

[Aren]

Okay, you waste your time trying to dispel the summon ( mords + word of faith ), that's 12 seconds of you being a sitting duck ( on top of that, there is a good chance it doesn't even remove a summon ). He summons a glabrezu, and after a while he can summon the balor again.

And let's say you caught him with his pants down and dropped a dismissal on top. He runs away, or just manages just fine because as a dex character you don't deal any serious damage to him, and then he eventually brings up the balor ( or more likely, he outright beats you). Even better, you enter the "Me shadow conjuration, you mords" loop, dismissal times out and he brings up the Balor.

Or, you know, while you are busy trying to dismissal/mords/WoF he uses Balagarn's and kills you.

Banishment and dismissal makes it impossible to summon creatures for a set amount of time.

[Kalopsia]

Dude its only dc 20. Str base 12 or 14 plus bullstr potion and skleen if you are worried should put you at around 50% chance of success. If you suceed, the warlock wasted time he could have been hitting your with something else.

Just adding this for the sake of clarity. :)
It's not DC20. It's an opposed strength check.

The strength check of this spell is (creature's strength + d20) vs. (20 + d20). Ties go to the creature. The creature's strength is its actual strength score rather than strength modifier, e.g., a creature with 20 strength would get 20 + d20 rather than 5 + d20 to oppose the knockdown.

(Source: https://nwn.fandom.com/wiki/Balagarn's_iron_horn)

TL;DR: With 20STR, you'll get knocked down 50% of times, and only with 39 or more STR, you're entirely immune.

[Zavandar]

Disagree with the CD.

Warlocks aren't great in PvP as it is lol. They might look good on pen and paper but there are so many ways to counter them.

Agreed. Globes (even the Lessers) of invulnerability shut down a lot of their options, and while globes can be breached, that's a resource war (a pretty even one at that). Lesser globes can even be wanded, so if they want to trade a mord for a wand charge every round I'm okay with that.

Edit: According to the NWN wiki minor globe can't be wanded, but I think Arelith worked around that?

you realize there are breach wands, right?

and you have to banishment/dismissal before their summon comes out, when very often that's the first thing they do.

i think a lot of people participating in this discussion aren't very informed.

[Tarkus the dog]

Like I said, even if you catch the warlock with his pants down and drop a banishment/dissmisal ( good luck banishing him faster than he can summon the creature, though ), he can literally just run away, and come back with a summon. Or dance around you for long enough, if he wants to, since dex toons have 0 kill pressure.

I hate repeating myself, so I haven't a clue why are you ignoring my points.

Any dex range character would laugh at balgarns horn via called shot etc.

Not really. Discipline / Freedom / True Strike / Grease / Balor running at the archer to beat him to a pulp. We went over this already.

[Ork]

This is kind of how every feedback thread goes on Arelith these days.

[Tarkus the dog]

This is kind of how every feedback thread goes on Arelith these days.

It was meant to go into suggestions but the "no u" arguments got the better of me.

[Aren]

Well do excuse me for not agreeing with you and pointing out why. I guess things would be easier/better if everyone shared your opinion. In any case - I'll leave this, if all you want is for others to be echoing your own opinion. Thanks for the back and forth!

No hard feelings.

[CptJonas]

Well do excuse me for not agreeing with you and pointing out why. I guess things would be easier/better if everyone shared your opinion. In any case - I'll leave this, if all you want is for others to be echoing your own opinion. Thanks for the back and forth!

No hard feelings.

Dont be sorry for it...you were right...Good arguments...And once I read all your post I know, I dont need to write anything...you said all what I wanted to

[Ork]

Well do excuse me for not agreeing with you and pointing out why. I guess things would be easier/better if everyone shared your opinion. In any case - I'll leave this, if all you want is for others to be echoing your own opinion. Thanks for the back and forth!

No hard feelings.

The issue with your argument is that the mechanics you quote fall limp against experienced players. Banishment/dismissal require a will save, and the DC is routinely low for UMD implements. In order for these options to be effective you need to cast them before a Warlock can pop off their summon - but that isn't crippling. They can leave the area and return with their balor.

Ghostly visage, globe spells can be breached with relative ease, and UMD implements such as these are rarely prepared and warded before PvP engages. While ghostly visage is low on the breach list, I recommend reading the breach list to see if you've witnessed rogues running around with premo, spell mantle and acid sheath to buffer the removal of ghostly.

Balagran's can utterly disable certain builds allowing the Warlock's summon to clean up flat footed opponents with relative ease. Your arguments aren't sufficient to say they provide a hard counter to balagran's spam. Since it attacks strength and only strength, all characters without a high strength are vulnerable. And that's a lot of characters.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

Disagree with the CD.

Warlocks aren't great in PvP as it is lol. They might look good on pen and paper but there are so many ways to counter them.

Agreed. Globes (even the Lessers) of invulnerability shut down a lot of their options, and while globes can be breached, that's a resource war (a pretty even one at that). Lesser globes can even be wanded, so if they want to trade a mord for a wand charge every round I'm okay with that.

Edit: According to the NWN wiki minor globe can't be wanded, but I think Arelith worked around that?

you realize there are breach wands, right?

and you have to banishment/dismissal before their summon comes out, when very often that's the first thing they do.

i think a lot of people participating in this discussion aren't very informed.

Or you're overlooking context in your own argument. If you throw lesser breach vs a dedicated caster (which a level 30 lock qualifies as, edit: as does any mage with globe prepped) you can pretty much guarantee you won't get the buffs down you want. Since we're discussing pvp, it's a safe bet that the 'lock will have quite a few buffs to eat through, a large number of them item based.

Once you mord them down you can trade breach for globes, but if you're trying to get rid of globes with breach wands in the opening volley, you're losing, because globe shuts down all your offense until it's gone.

[Zavandar]

the summon would beg to differ

[Basementfellow]

What's up with the attitude? Who hurt you?

cringe

[Aniel]

What a terribly toxic forum thread. Anyways, to weigh in... I agree with a proposed cooldown. Warlocks spamming balagarns, while hilarious to watch as a 3rd party must be infuriating from how little counterplay there is to it. If you aren't fighting a strength character or a 46 SR monk then balagarns becomes a 'I win' button with very little interaction from the opponent.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

the summon would beg to differ

The summon can get wrecked by any mage that can cast their own banish, or a WoF scroll, which is still cheaper than mords. Banish followed by WoF and now the lock has no summons until the banish timer is gone.

Presume the lock starts fight with summon means possible both sides have times to cast before the fight. Wards and globes up. Warlock uses mords , other uses banish, then WoF to start the next round if resisted. No fiend, no globe, fiend on cooldown timer.

Warlock closes distance, globe back up.

[Ork]

We're not really talking about mages in this counterplay, but dex based characters. Of course a mage has more options to lock down a warlock than a rogue or dex-based fighter.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

We're not really talking about mages in this counterplay, but dex based characters. Of course a mage has more options to lock down a warlock than a rogue or dex-based fighter.

UMD is more prolific on arelith than any other server I've ever been on. The same tactics above work with scrolls.

[Zavandar]

wof scrolls are cl 13

warlock summons have 32 sr

you will have to mords it first to have more than a 10% chance of succeeding if you are using a scroll, and even then it's not guaranteed.

going to repeat my point about people in this debate not being informed. bowing out because of that.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

This thread started off claiming non str characters hag no counters to locks. When pointed out that an entire bracket of characters do, it was said casters don't count for some reason even though they're non strength.

If the lock has scrolls to burn, so does the other side, Caster or not.

Changing the debate points from OP doesn't make you more informed than anyone else, and your exit is tasteless for claiming otherwise. It's a very underhanded way to call the rest of us ignorant because you couldn't railroad a point.

I was fine with the debate until that.