Well written post, OP. I do RP resting, so I understand your discomfort. Typically, I just carry restoration scrolls around and suffer through the penalty, as I believe it is part of the atmosphere of fighting vampires.
Honestly, since so much of the game is based around fighting vampires, I enjoy that fighting them is somewhat unique. The frustration is part of the appeal, as strange as that may sound.
Level drain is much softer in BGII than in the PnP game. And it is easy to counter. In addition to the spell already mentioned, Undead Hunters and Blackcheeseguards are immune, as are raging Barbarians and Beserkers (a certain NPC for example), and the Cleric of Lathander kit power. Using a "tank" should be a familier tactic for most players these days. You only need one party member to be protected.
It was the Wrights that used to be a pain in PnP days, since these cropped up at quite low level. By the time you where fighting vampires you should be equipped to deal with level drain.
I agree with a lot of other posters that level drain should stay the same, but NPP should have a longer duration and you shouldn't have to go through and re-pick all your memorized spells each time (though you still shouldn't be able to cast them while level-drained). Even if they just bumped the duration of NPP to 1 turn, that would make it long enough that you could buff a couple frontliners with it and expect to finish the fight before it ran out.
I cannot stress enough how important this remember spell choices feature is. I basically reload immediately if my casters get level drained because its so damn tedious to reselect everything.
Keep it the way it is, but its just so irritating to reset spellbooks when anyone that casts spells is hit.
I want a way to implement a sort of "spellbook memory" so that when you cast Restoration on a drained caster, all of their spell slots come back and they are filled with unmemorized versions of what were in those drained spell slots.
Looks like some have already posted before me. There are solutions to the drain. There are even items that permanently protect against the effect. And removing the effect is as simple as your cleric casting lesser restoration (and there are a bunch of potions/scrolls of same in game).
It is annoying. It is supposed to be annoying. It gives Vampires a power that most other monsters in the game don't have. And it isn't anywhere near as difficult to remove/prevent as the OP indicates. Keep it as it is.
Removing or altering level drain would remove some danger and fear from encountering vampires. They're supposed to be pretty damn scary and powerful. There are some defenses against such as negative energy protection, which make level drain slightly manageable.
Level drain is very annoying though.. especially when spellcasters are drained. Constantly re-memorizing the entire spellbook is the worst!
Just imagine how tedious it must be to actually be that mage, spending an hour every morning deciding which spells to inject temporarily into your brain.
Remove fatigue from Restoration Also try to somehow remember what spells where picked in the spellbook, this is imo the most annoying thing with level drain. The spells should ofc be marked as used, but just the fact that I don't have to redo my spellbook each time a caster is restored from level drain would improve A LOT.
Level drain is very annoying though.. especially when spellcasters are drained. Constantly re-memorizing the entire spellbook is the worst!
Agreed. But then that is why I keep my spell casters well back and away from combat. They are capable of some defensive abilities against same, but there nothing for avoiding damage and negative effects like not being hit.
@subtledoctor. It is a legacy from D&D rules. In PnP, it works like that. And it isn't intended to represent "Being bitten/getting blood sucked". It is intended to represent the vampire being of the negative material plane and channeling it through them. It is also not "Making you younger", but it is intended to drain your power/life energy which in this case is represented by your level. You don't get younger, but you do get weaker. In that, I think the rules work appropriately for the context.
But to your point, what game mechanic would you add if it were removed/altered? How would you represent vampires such that they aren't merely another monster that has hitpoints and does damage to the players? Removing that ability really neuters vampires and leaves them nothing but regeneration. Thus Vampires become trolls, but with better hair cuts. So what would you add to offset that?
I've also always thought of it as draining "life energy" or something like that, not making you younger or even less experienced as such. And no, CON drain isn't the same as draining the very life energy of a being, IMO.
@FinneousPJ, Neither STR drain because that would mean that Wizards would be all but immune to the effects. Even straight Hit point drain would simply be a bigger attack and would make Wizards more susceptible to it than tanks. And INT or WIS drain would render casting useless pretty quickly and would have very little impact on other classes. In fact, I can't think of any one STAT drain that would have equal impact on all classes. So what else could be 'Drained' to replicate this effect? It is a conundrum.
Plus, removing Vampire's abilities like that would make level Drain the spell kind of not make sense. or is that 3rd edition??? I get confused sometimes.
I like level drain, to be honest... Makes you actually fear those fights, and makes you use different tactics as opposed to other fights.
What I do agree on is to make Negative Plane Protection last longer. 5 rounds is ridiculous, doesn't worth having memorised, even if you know you will be fighting vampires... Make it last for 5-10 TURNS instead, so it would hold for at least one fight...
It's fine. It's challenging and tactical. I am literally scared of vampires when I play, retreating my mages and clerics as far as possible while advancing my meatshie - I mean pure fighters like Minsc or summoned monsters to melee the crap out of them.
They become less of a problem however once my clerics gain levels and are able to turn them.
It's fine. It's challenging and tactical. I am literally scared of vampires when I play, retreating my mages and clerics as far as possible while advancing my meatshie - I mean pure fighters like Minsc or summoned monsters to melee the crap out of them.
They become less of a problem however once my clerics gain levels and are able to turn them.
Exactly, most of the fights with the vamps have chokepoints for your meatshields to stand in if I remember rightly. You don't need a saving throw against attacks like this. Vampires just require some tactics and prepwork. Armor class == saving throws in this case.
Prep prot from evil -2, summon a couple kobolds or skeletons round 1 malison, recitation -4 AC round 2 slow, chant -9AC Round 3 Holy Smite (blinds) or Doom -11 to -15 AC
@subtledoctor, your view of "Life Energy" is pretty narrow, but that is understandable as it is one of the ineffable things that is very hard to define. And even harder in a game like D&D. But FinneousPJ is pretty much encapsulating the essence of what the D&D manuals indicate. he isn't pulling out of thin air.
And as I indicated, reduction of constitution would only have any significant impact on High Con Fighter types or really low con everyone. And with the really low con everyone, there is an extremely narrow window to play with. One hit or two would kill any character with a con less than 6 (0 con = death). but again, even at a con of 4, a wizard is still going to be at full strength. Where a Fighter who's normal con is 18 would start feeling effects as soon as 17. There is a HUGE disparity in the impacts.
Thus, I "Think" Frank and Gary and the rest tried to tie "Life Essence" to POWER as represented by level, rather than any inconsistent Ability score hit. Just a guess on my part, but again I ask, What different would you suggest to replace this ability to make Vampires the terror that they are today if you could remove level drain?
Yes it's annoying, but that's part of the game. Vampires can drain you vital force til you die (by loosing levels, you loose THAC0, HP and so on).
I guess you're also the kind of people who prefer that dead people auto-rez at the end of a fight instead of having to bring their corpse to a temple or casting a spell ?
That's why I hated Dragon age, amongst other things...
You missed the point of my post.
This is not about making the game easier. I think the basic ideas behind level drain are awesome: Make characters weaker by MAKING them weaker? Sweet! What I don't like is how every aspect of the ability makes it downright annoying to deal with, as if they were trying to frustrate the player: -No real counterplay besides getting a select item/playing select class (Thanks for bringing that up someone). -Spells dememorise. -Being hit means you have to go through a routine of re-memorising spells or keeping extremely situational spells available.
I like that you bring up death, though. After the first couple of levels in BG1, death is mostly a mechanic designed to punish you. However, there are a few reasons why I don't have a problem with raise dead or running down to a temple if needed: -It's a possibility common to ALL enemy encounters, and not just a select few. -It's a punishment for the player who fail to micromanage their party properly, and not a punishment for simply being hit. -Death can be prevented by a number of means. Restoring hit points and moving out of the way are both of these.
"I think Level Drain should stay in the game, but the implementation should be modified in some way."
It seems people are choosing this option and then saying spells/abilities that counter/heal Level Drain should be modified - this obviously isn't the same as (and I paraphrase) "the implementation of Level Drain should be modified".
"The implementation of Level Drain should be modified" was written to not only refer to the ability itself, but the mechanics surrounding the ability including counterplay and curing mechanics. They were correct to select that option per your description.
You're right. I chose the wrong vote. I do not wish for the implementation of the spell to change, only maybe, the implementation of some of the spells to counter/cure it.
"You just want the game to be easier" Reply - "If you read the post you'll actually note that I barely discuss the difficulty of fights and battles and focus on why Level Drain is frustrating to have used on your characters. My intention is to remove the annoying nature of the current implementation whilst keeping its main effects on the combat scenario to a minimum and adding counter-play options similar to what other spells have."
I don't have difficulty dealing with vampires and such. However, dealing with them is the biggest pain since the two main counter-items are retrieved within half an hour of each other.
Level Drain invokes a certain "fear" with it. If the "fear" of being level drained is part of the game, then that's fine. However, what I dislike about the mechanic is that it brings this "fear" on through the annoyance of having to deal with it afterwards, rather than being scared of the effects IN THE COMBAT. If a combat ability doesn't make you scared of what will happen DURING COMBAT that's supposed to make you feel "fear", then it's just a poor implementation in my opinion. If the counterplay abilities suck to drive in that fear, then so be it. The problem is that the spell appears to be designed to suck post-combat.
To be honest I wouldn't mind the effects of level drain to be buffed if there was counterplay besides "get a certain item" or "rest twice afterwards".
Comments
I do RP resting, so I understand your discomfort. Typically, I just carry restoration scrolls around and suffer through the penalty, as I believe it is part of the atmosphere of fighting vampires.
Honestly, since so much of the game is based around fighting vampires, I enjoy that fighting them is somewhat unique. The frustration is part of the appeal, as strange as that may sound.
It was the Wrights that used to be a pain in PnP days, since these cropped up at quite low level. By the time you where fighting vampires you should be equipped to deal with level drain.
However, a longer negative plane protection is more likely, and would also be nice
I want a way to implement a sort of "spellbook memory" so that when you cast Restoration on a drained caster, all of their spell slots come back and they are filled with unmemorized versions of what were in those drained spell slots.
It is annoying. It is supposed to be annoying. It gives Vampires a power that most other monsters in the game don't have. And it isn't anywhere near as difficult to remove/prevent as the OP indicates. Keep it as it is.
Level drain is very annoying though.. especially when spellcasters are drained. Constantly re-memorizing the entire spellbook is the worst!
I'd choose sorcerer any day of the week.
Also try to somehow remember what spells where picked in the spellbook, this is imo the most annoying thing with level drain. The spells should ofc be marked as used, but just the fact that I don't have to redo my spellbook each time a caster is restored from level drain would improve A LOT.
But to your point, what game mechanic would you add if it were removed/altered? How would you represent vampires such that they aren't merely another monster that has hitpoints and does damage to the players? Removing that ability really neuters vampires and leaves them nothing but regeneration. Thus Vampires become trolls, but with better hair cuts. So what would you add to offset that?
Plus, removing Vampire's abilities like that would make level Drain the spell kind of not make sense. or is that 3rd edition??? I get confused sometimes.
What I do agree on is to make Negative Plane Protection last longer. 5 rounds is ridiculous, doesn't worth having memorised, even if you know you will be fighting vampires... Make it last for 5-10 TURNS instead, so it would hold for at least one fight...
They become less of a problem however once my clerics gain levels and are able to turn them.
Prep prot from evil -2, summon a couple kobolds or skeletons
round 1 malison, recitation -4 AC
round 2 slow, chant -9AC
Round 3 Holy Smite (blinds) or Doom -11 to -15 AC
this is an epic game that should have epic challenges to go with it
And as I indicated, reduction of constitution would only have any significant impact on High Con Fighter types or really low con everyone. And with the really low con everyone, there is an extremely narrow window to play with. One hit or two would kill any character with a con less than 6 (0 con = death). but again, even at a con of 4, a wizard is still going to be at full strength. Where a Fighter who's normal con is 18 would start feeling effects as soon as 17. There is a HUGE disparity in the impacts.
Thus, I "Think" Frank and Gary and the rest tried to tie "Life Essence" to POWER as represented by level, rather than any inconsistent Ability score hit. Just a guess on my part, but again I ask, What different would you suggest to replace this ability to make Vampires the terror that they are today if you could remove level drain?
Responding to one's that provoke me most: You missed the point of my post.
This is not about making the game easier. I think the basic ideas behind level drain are awesome: Make characters weaker by MAKING them weaker? Sweet! What I don't like is how every aspect of the ability makes it downright annoying to deal with, as if they were trying to frustrate the player:
-No real counterplay besides getting a select item/playing select class (Thanks for bringing that up someone).
-Spells dememorise.
-Being hit means you have to go through a routine of re-memorising spells or keeping extremely situational spells available.
I like that you bring up death, though. After the first couple of levels in BG1, death is mostly a mechanic designed to punish you. However, there are a few reasons why I don't have a problem with raise dead or running down to a temple if needed:
-It's a possibility common to ALL enemy encounters, and not just a select few.
-It's a punishment for the player who fail to micromanage their party properly, and not a punishment for simply being hit.
-Death can be prevented by a number of means. Restoring hit points and moving out of the way are both of these.
"The implementation of Level Drain should be modified" was written to not only refer to the ability itself, but the mechanics surrounding the ability including counterplay and curing mechanics. They were correct to select that option per your description.
See above. If you want a real response make a real post.
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I don't have difficulty dealing with vampires and such. However, dealing with them is the biggest pain since the two main counter-items are retrieved within half an hour of each other.
Level Drain invokes a certain "fear" with it. If the "fear" of being level drained is part of the game, then that's fine. However, what I dislike about the mechanic is that it brings this "fear" on through the annoyance of having to deal with it afterwards, rather than being scared of the effects IN THE COMBAT. If a combat ability doesn't make you scared of what will happen DURING COMBAT that's supposed to make you feel "fear", then it's just a poor implementation in my opinion.
If the counterplay abilities suck to drive in that fear, then so be it. The problem is that the spell appears to be designed to suck post-combat.
To be honest I wouldn't mind the effects of level drain to be buffed if there was counterplay besides "get a certain item" or "rest twice afterwards".