Talk:Words of the Witch (3.5e Spell)

The Poor Poor RNG
+2 and -8 adds up to a spell that is essentially an automatic kill against people who are normally fairly resistant to Fortitude-based attacks. Generally speaking, making spells harder to save against than average is the worst way to make a spell stronger against some targets. --Foxwarrior (talk) 05:22, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * It's a death effect. How else am I supposed to make it stronger? --Luigifan18 (talk) 15:40, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I originally had the penalty at &minus;4, and then decided that the list of potential victims was so narrow that &minus;4 wasn't good enough. (Lolwut?) Anyways, the penalty's back at &minus;4. --Luigifan18 (talk) 16:12, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Give it damage or lesser status effects that apply whether or not the target saves? A difference of 6 is still really serious. --Foxwarrior (talk) 16:40, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * The thing is, I really want this to be devastating to creatures that make a habit of attacking arcane spellcasters. It's supposed to be the arcane spellcaster's revenge. When it comes time to strike down the wizard-hating tyrant who killed the party wizard's entire family (and, to add insult to injury, for no other reason than sheer paranoia), this is supposed to be the spell to use for the job. --Luigifan18 (talk) 19:39, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * "Your turn: what do you do?"
 * "I walk 30 feet, then I get revenge"
 * "Okay, you've gotten your revenge. What now?"
 * This sounds somehow anticlimactic to me. Maybe that was your objective? --Foxwarrior (talk) 00:01, 9 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Obviously, most of the challenge is supposed to be in getting up to a high enough level to cast this spell, then getting to the target and getting the spell off. Nobody said the DM had to make that easy - your target could have a lot of guards to body-block you with. Or perhaps the target is a high level and thus actually has a decent chance of making the Fortitude save even with a penalty. --Luigifan18 (talk) 00:24, 9 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Also, the spell was originally meant to do something along the lines of 10d6 per turn. Which wouldn't stop until the target died or got a remove curse cast on them. In other words, a curse burning the soul. (You have clicked the hyperlink, yes?) --Luigifan18 (talk) 00:29, 9 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Also, as it is now, this spell is a lite version of wail of the banshee. Is wail of the banshee anticlimactic? --Luigifan18 (talk) 15:46, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes. --Undead_Knave (talk) 04:58, 19 September 2014 (UTC)

Yahwhut
This feels nit-picky to say when I feel like the whole article needs a drastic overhaul, but I'm not happy with your mention of Yahweh. It's an odd call-out to make, since we (appropriately) don't have an entry for Yahweh on the wiki. It's in poor taste to bring real religion into game articles, especially when casting them in a negative light. You should remove the reference.

Secondary question out of idle curiosity: does anyone know of D&D deities that hate arcane spellcasters on general principle, and not just because of opposing alignments? I can't think of any. Spanambula (talk) 06:10, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Ratings
It's really mostly about who drew first blood. If the wizard was going around smiting innocents, then taking him down is totally justified. If he was just minding his own business? Not so much. --Luigifan18 (talk) 23:27, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Maybe it is, but this spell is anti-divine - as the description states, arcane and divine spellcasters sometimes fail to get along. Also, it's only more difficult to save against for its intended targets, which is basically the whole point. --Luigifan18 (talk) 16:08, 8 October 2014 (UTC)
 * There are other spells that have "intended targets", and they represent this by giving unintended targets immunity, or sometimes just a bonus to their saves. Generally speaking, the default DC for a spell is high enough. --Foxwarrior (talk) 02:49, 9 October 2014 (UTC)
 * SRD:Feeblemind would seem a clear counter example on intended target screwing Fox. It isn't asking you to track multiple categories of tiny modifiers like this is though. - Tarkisflux Talk 06:01, 9 October 2014 (UTC)