ECL pros and cons... a discussion

[Nemesis Revised]

It's tough luck being an ecl character. It's fun but it also takes longer to level. I personally have an ecl shifter; I swear it is so hard to level. I think I'm the only character using an ecl shifter, everyone else being human. The benefits of being an ecl character aren't readily realizable.

For example, a fire genasi is resistant against fire (1/2 damage). However, his flame lash is sad. It only works well around the first few levels. Suggestion: perhaps the damage of the flame lash can be based on a character's level. How about allowing the character to use flame lash 3x instead of just one time? Or... how about giving the character a chance to cast flame shield on himself? Or maybe flameweapon? This would be a neat idea for the fire genasi theme.

Another example, the earth genasi is good against acid (1/2 damage). The barskin on the other hand is pretty handy for low levels. Once you attain medium-higher levels however, you'll realize that you can just use potions for barskin (or have a caster do it for you). Suggestion: how about giving the item stoneskin as well? That will come handy especially if the character is a fighter.

Svirfneblin (deep gnome). This fella is beautiful. His attributes are good and realizable even at high levels (spell resistance of 30 once you hit level 20). Cons? The ECL 3. Makes it tough to play.

Drow. Beautiful as well. Especially with a darkness ability, the character becomes an abomination of stealth. The SR is beautiful as well. But perhaps it would be nice to give a tad bit more of bonuses for this character. For example, I noticed that a drow city guard can cast up to three dispel magics. Perhaps it would be nice if the a drow player can do the same, allowing him to cast 3 dispel magics on his enemies.

Half-ogre. Pretty well balanced I'd say. Since he has a -intelligence and -wisdom, most players would opt to play a melee class for this. Pretty balanced so far.

Further suggestions, it's tough leveling an ecl. Especially if the character is ECL +3 and has 3 classes (I have a githzerai fighter/sorc/RDD). We all know leveling isn't the only thing in this mod, but having fun. Perhaps more abilities and bonuses can be installed to ecl characters to make them more useable.

Another suggestion would be to change the entire concept of ECL. (this sounds too radical though) But my suggestion is this, the higher the ecl, put more xp reduction in gaining xp instead of counting character levels. For example:
ECL 1 --> gets -10% of experience gained.
ECL 2 --> gets -20% of experience gained.
ECL 3 --> gets -30% of experience gained.

That way, characters can still level and have fun without worrying too much of xp. To what's it worth, ecl characters should be given more bonuses that they can even use especially when they are of epic proportions.

Other Suggestions
1) Do characters with growing SR (drow, githzerai, svirfneblin) get to blow up their SR past 30? I hope they do!

2) Perhaps give ECL characters 'epic bonuses' once they hit epic levels. For example; give an earth genasi a greater stoneskin ability. Give the drow a greater dispelling ability, etc, etc.

--> These are just suggestions however. Feel free to criticize them or post further suggestions. Thanks!

[JesterOI]

The SR on Drows and Svirfneblins is +4/4levels.
I was going through the toolset and saw that with the way subrace SR works currently it could be set to increase in increments of 2/2levels. That might help out a bit with making levelling them easier.

[Donan]

My input is about the Drow. They are a pain to level but to me they have huge perks. I created a drow rogue under the belief he can do several things, with terrible fort saves the SR is a true lifesaver (I really hope it’s fixed to go above 32SR) especially against a wizard spamming wail all over the place or the druids with stonehold. The rogue gives you an edge over fighters, with SD you can hide from them since for most it’s next to impossible to get your spot check high enough to see a nearly pure rogue. The way I see it it’s an extremely versatile char capable of handling most situations or at least being able to sneak away if overwhelmed to survive and fight another day.

My biggest gripe is the ultravision. You get the darkness item at the start, which is great, and the drow live underground so I would think ultravision would be innate. I know darkvision is for low light places but when the whole race depends on darkness natural or magical I think that ability should be a part of them. It may sound demanding but if anyone played the SL and not take cleric, their favored class, that ECL hurts bad.

Oh and the last part, everyone likes to raid menzo so I have discovered how fun it is defending against invaders.

That’s my input.

Long live the Shadow Legion

[imom411]

Unfortunately, I think giving every drow character an automatic ability to use darkness tactics (both long-lasting darkness and ultravision) would be pointing them in a very specific direction. It seems like it would almost require that you use these tactics in order to get those tough levels. This, however, is part of another discussion, which is essentially giving more monsters ultravision or dispel.

[JesterOI]

Does the subrace SR actually go up to 32 at level 24 or does it stay at 30 from level 20?

[DrakhanValane]

I think it currently caps at 30, jester.

As for Darkness/Darkvision/Ultravision... in PnP Darkvision allows you to see in complete darkness up to a certain range (usually 60' or 120'). It does NOT allow you to see through magical darkness. Drow have Darkvision. They do not get blindsight (which would allow them to "see" through magical darkness since it doesn't rely on vision). Low-light vision just lets you see twice the distance in sub-optimal lighting (torchlight, starlight, etc). The benefits of Darkvision are hard to see in NWN. And yes, you can have both low-light vision and darkvision.

[JesterOI]

ECL worth this?
It was definitely fun that's for sure!

The SR thing would be nice if it was 2sr/2levels...

[Nemesis Revised]

drow is beautiful. dark beauty; on the other hand, has anyone tried the other ecl characters?

questions:
1) does sleet storm really work?
2) anyone tried casting banish on a githzerai?

[AggieDan]

Actually, playing last night I had my drow cleric out and joined a nice little party. Turns out we ended up with 3 drow total in the party. Two of them were archers (and one of those had assasin levels, ouch).

With enough ultravision to go around, we had a really fun time.

As far as the other ECL races... I've primarily played one other, which is Earth Genasi. The barkskin did help in the lower levels. But, most useful to me has been the inability of certain mind spells just not working on him as well as the acid resist. As a fighter with miserable will saves, the ability to go places like the Hive without getting dazed was awesome.

[TheBestDeception]

2) anyone tried casting banish on a githzerai?

Tried this the other day on a Tiefling (one of the plane-touched) ... no effect. Did not try Planar Binding, however.

[imom411]

As far as the other ECL races... I've primarily played one other, which is Earth Genasi. The barkskin did help in the lower levels. But, most useful to me has been the inability of certain mind spells just not working on him as well as the acid resist. As a fighter with miserable will saves, the ability to go places like the Hive without getting dazed was awesome.

From nsrealm race page, for Earth Genasi:

Favored Class: Fighter
Must be Neutral-aligned
+2 Strength, +2 Constitution, -2 Dexterity, -2 Charisma
+2 to all Fortitude saving throws
Half damage from all acid-based attacks
Barkskin 1/day as cast by a 5th-level Druid
Earth Genasi Clerics must take Earth as one of their clerical domains

I don't see anything about will saves. Who's right?

[Flailer]

[Grrrr...typed out all this once and lost it all before I could post it]

I think the darkness spell effect on the Drow and Tiefling races is great and very useful. However, some of the other spell effects on the other planar touched races don't seem to be on the same level. Here's some suggestions on some alterations to level out the spell abilities a bit (taken roughly from some DnD docs):

Aasimar:
Light 1/day - is there something I'm missing here? Is it a magical light that blinds drow or pierces magical darkness or something? Other spell effects that might make sense for Aasimar: Charm Person/Monster, Mass Charm (if it was enabled again), Color Spray, Darkfire, Searing Light, or Sunbeam. I'm not sure how difficult it would be, but perhaps you could even make the spell effect dependant on the char level? So, early on, Color Spray. After 17th level, Pris Spray? I'd probably be more in favor of a ing affect like the Drow darkness than a one shot attack however. That seems a bit more balanced.

Air Gensai:
Gust of Wind is cool - if it were to scale so the DC would rise with the character level. Other logical options: Wind Rider (Haste spell), Thunder Cloak (Wounding Whispers spell), Acid Fog, or damage spells that scale with level: Lightning, Chain Lightning, Call Lightning. Or, if the character is hit, the attacker receives 1d6 electrical damage.

Earth Gensai:
Barkskin is good for early levels, but perhaps on later levels it could change to Stoneskin and then Greater Stoneskin? Other options: Flesh to Stone (Stonehold later?), Quicksand (Grease spell), Poison Thorns (Quillfire), or Earthquake. Or, use the boulder hurl effect that the Elder Earth Elemental uses!

Fire Gensai:
Flame Lash 1/day - maybe okay if the DC scaled in level with the char. More of a permanent affect would be better I think: Darkfire, Flameweapon, Elemental Shield (would be an appropriate visual effect for the Fire Gensai), or a series of improved attacks (maybe more uses per day for attacks would make them on par with a long lasting darkness): Burning Hands, Fireball, Combust, Firebrand, Incendiary Cloud, or Inferno.

Water Gensai:
Sleet (Slow) is okay I guess, but again, make the DC scale with the char level. Other options: Icicle Field (Blade Barrier), Cone of Cold, Drown (maybe the attack like the Water Elemental where you lose half your HP to be able to make the attack), Freeze (Flesh to Stone spell), Summon a Water Elemental (which unfortunately are the suckiest of the elementals), or Chill (Infestation of Maggots spell).

But, I'm not a dev (although I am a software developer), so I can't comment on how hard any of these are to code into the mod. But, in this case, it's my job as a beta tester to just make suggestions, not implement them.

[DrakhanValane]

2) anyone tried casting banish on a githzerai?

Tried this the other day on a Tiefling (one of the plane-touched) ... no effect. Did not try Planar Binding, however.

Githzerai are from the plane of Limbo, so it should affect them. Aasimar and Tieflings are Native Outsiders--that is, native to the prime material--so it shouldn't. I don't know about the other plane-touched but I suspect they should be the same.

[DrakhanValane]

As far as the other ECL races... I've primarily played one other, which is Earth Genasi. The barkskin did help in the lower levels. But, most useful to me has been the inability of certain mind spells just not working on him as well as the acid resist. As a fighter with miserable will saves, the ability to go places like the Hive without getting dazed was awesome.

From nsrealm race page, for Earth Genasi:

Favored Class: Fighter
Must be Neutral-aligned
+2 Strength, +2 Constitution, -2 Dexterity, -2 Charisma
+2 to all Fortitude saving throws
Half damage from all acid-based attacks
Barkskin 1/day as cast by a 5th-level Druid
Earth Genasi Clerics must take Earth as one of their clerical domains

I don't see anything about will saves. Who's right?

Uh, Fighters have Will as a weak save and their build probably didn't have much WIS in it. Hence the low will saves. It isn't an inherent property of Earth Genasi.

[imom411]

DV, I believe you misunderstood my question. I do understand that fighters have low will saves. I confused the issue by asking about will saves. What I meant was the "inability of certain mind spells just not working on [the Earth Genasi]." This was what made me go, "huh?"

As far as I can tell, there is nothing including but not limited to improved will saves that the Earth Genasi has to make certain mind spells "not work on him."

Am I missing something?