Drow and Blindness

[LinuxPup]

Can be changed so that Drow are not blinded by light/fire spells if they resist the spell with their SR?

[Amoenotep]

as stated before, you can resist the spell..you cannot resist the flash of light that comes with it.

[MasterYoda]

Topics been discussed. The answer was no because its not the spell that is blinding u ... its the bright light being shined from it.

[Binkyuk]

But I could just as easily say 'I resist the fireball, but not the blistering heat and subsequent fire damage'. What exactly is SR supposed to resist?

[LinuxPup]

...the bright light....which came from the spell.

Seems odd that you can resist one form of radiation and not the other. Perhaps just give the the attack and save penalties, but no blindness then? This could simulate an adverse effect to the Drow not being able to see as well, but without the Bioware problem of blindness.

I guess the main point is...if blindness/blind fight worked correctly, I'd have no problem the way it works now, but Bioware seems to have messed it up. Getting blinded should be a bit more rare I think because its too powerful.

This is the same reason myself and others have said WoF needs to be nerfed.... it completely owns dex builds (and even strength ones too).

[cely]

Yeah that was what Joran mentioned as well in this thread: http://www.nsrealm.com/public/ns4/viewtopic.php?t=4140

I think the point of contention is, what exactly does it mean to resist a spell? Does it mean you just feel no effects of it, or does it mean that anything the spell creates is invisible to you?

If the bright flash of light is part of the spell, and you resist the spell, why should the bright flash of light affect you any more than the other parts of the spell? What's so special about the visual elements that makes them non-resistable, whereas the damage elements are?

That said....If you resist a grease spell, for example, for all intents and purposes the magical grease doesn't exist for you. However, you would still SEE it sitting there on the ground, wouldn't you? So maybe the visual elements aren't resistable.

However, if you resist a spell like Darkness - obviously you don't still see the Darkness or else you'd be affected by it. So maybe resisting a spell does mean no visible components are seen by you...

It's a philosophical debate about the nature of spell resistance that nobody can really answer, it's up to the DMs of a PnP game or the Devs of a mod to decide what it means. In our case, we want it to mean what would be best for all players, create the most fun and enjoyment, while still taking balance into account.

Discussing the different sides of the issue is always good

[disastro]

sorry for the thread-cromancy here but i'm playing a drow for the first time and ran into the issue where the blindness hits even if you spell resist a light spell.

ironically, if you FAIL to spell resist the spell, but then make your save and avoid it with evasion, you do NOT get blinded.

so you're in the awkward position of not really wanting the SR, and low level casters are more effective against you (due to the broken bioware blind fight/uncanny dodge system) than high level casters. as far as i can tell uncanny and blind fight don't do much of what they're supposed to.

was gonna report it as a possible bug but i guess it's a subject of some debate.

edit to add after reading the whole thread: reflex save to prevent blindness from bright light sources has precedent in Sunburst spell. so avoiding blindess by avoiding the bright spell is a concept that already exists.

[disastro]

in the spirit of presenting solutions instead of just problems, i think linuxpups suggestion to change drow blindness to steep ab/ac penalties makes for a more logical and consistent system. so how about this:

-all light spells can affect drow by reducing ab/ac by like 10 for 2 rounds. the ac reduction should be dodge if possible. these spells are like "flashbang" grenades vs drow.
-successful spell resist avoids this effect entirely.
-reflex save at -10 reduces duration to 1 round.
-uncanny dodge cuts the ac reduction by half.
-blind fight feat cuts the ab reduction by half.

the ideas here are to preserve the restriction on drow as a real limiting effect, and yet work around the busted bioware blind fight/uncanny dodge mechanic. this also makes for an effect consistent with how other spells work and makes higher level casters more dangerous than low level casters.

moving wof to ac/ab penalties (modified by the right feats) over straight blindness might be a good idea too.

i've been crawling the bioware boards but theres no news on whether 1.69 will fix uncanny/blindfight (which would make this entire discussion moot).

[Amoenotep]

maybe drow can be blind when they are outside in the daytime? or penalized anyway...same concept as light spells.

[disastro]

maybe drow can be blind when they are outside in the daytime? or penalized anyway...same concept as light spells.

as far as i know drow already have a : "-2 to all attack rolls, saves, and checks in brightly lit areas" according to the wiki. i will have to test this to see if it's actually the case. i can definitely see magical brightness simply magnifying the existing daylight effects, mitigated but not negated by the right build options.

edit: on that note i guess having your darkness aura up should probably help in some way.

[Kirg]

Having darkness and invisibility spells active, prevents your drow being affected by the disatvantage.
I think it is fair that the spells blind the drow even if they don't do any damage. The light is still there after all, if a fireball is hurled at your feet e.g.. Although it shouldn't slow the drow down. They are used to move in utter darkness.

[Sparky]

Don't forget Duergar in your arguments. Drow aren't the only race affected by said Fire/Light spells.

[Lorkar1]

Just remember Disastro that with proper training even the effects of a flash bang grenade can be minimized. So the same should be true of light effects on drow with training. Maybe lessening the penalties as the Drow gain in levels.

[Amoenotep]

maybe we should take into account that darkness cast as a spell, whether by mage or race, is magical darkness and not just "in the dark". therefore coming into line of the magical darkness description that it is so dark so that no one can see through it without real true seeing or ultravision.

think of it as running through an extremely dense semi solid fog....not just a cloud covering the sun around you.

[disastro]

sparky and lork: good points (i didnt know duergar had the same limitations).

i guess you could say that by level 40 a drow at war on the surface should have gained a little skill at dealing with light, something like level/10 reduction in the penalties? so if you start at -10, by level 40 its -6, cut in half for the right feats, reduced duration if you save.

kirg: I understand your direction but the game mechanics just don't work that way in similar situations: sunbeam/sunburst (which can blind anybody through bright light) offer 2 ways to avoid blindness: spell resistance and reflex save. so if you resist the spell it simply doesnt affect you in any way. Otherwise these spells would blind regardless of SR if the game worked as you describe.

Personally, I prefer consistently implemented game mechanics.