Dominate Person/Monster and you

[Corona Nox]

Herro.

I'm pretty new to the server, and one of the things I've really found interesting was a lot of the changes made to spells, to either make them make sense or simply balance them.  Anyway, as my sorcerer levels and I've been considering his spell selection, I've been reminded of a strong imbalance between the Hold line and the Dominate line.  The spells work perfectly in PvE, but for some reason BioWare decided that in PvP they needed to be changed to the point of uselessness.  Keep in mind that Hold Monster/Dominate Person are the exact same spell level.

Hold Person/Monster paralyzes you, if you're hit by it and fail your save, you might as well get up from the computer and go get a drink, unless you're in a party who was prudent enough to keep a Remove Paralysis scroll or spell on hand. The only buff I can think of to stop it altogether would be freedom of movement, or being paralyze immune, or being a minotaur.  Hold spells are round/level.

Dominate Person/Monster dazes you.  If you fail your save, you can still use all the myriad of magical items you have, including a clarity potion to simply remove it altogether.  The fact that a level 9 spell can potentially be removed by a potion which is worth about 50 gold is enough of an imbalance. Dominate Person also only lasts 2 rounds + 1 round / 3 caster levels.

Many years ago I was on a server that implemented a change to the dominate line, so that if you casted it on a PC, it actually dominated them.  You basically had an unwilling henchmen, in terms of game mechanics.  Considering on such a low level server you're only able to squeeze out about a maximum of 5-6 rounds on Dominate Person, I don't see how it would be imbalancing.  That only amounts to about 30 seconds of control. Dominate Monster is a spell I don't think anyone can ever even achieve, so I don't see the turn/level thing being an issue, and if it is, make it only work on monstrous PCs.  That way a role play could be achieved where an immensely powerful wizard can bind monsters to his service, at least for 15-20 minutes, where the monster could then break free and potentially slaughter his former master.

[TheImpossibleDream]

Immunity to mind spells makes you immune to hold person here, i.e the level one spell protection from alignment!

The dominate/charm line of spells have been discussed a few times and most feel that its better the way it is. Some spells just do ~not~ translate well into nwn.

For example having an "unwilling henchman" would allow you to make a person do something life threatening or something they would not normally do. Dominate/charm are designed so that while you gain influence over a character and the ability to manipulate him, if you ask him to jump off a bridge, or go slay that goblin horde, the spell is likely to break.

There are too many rules that would have to be enforced to make these spells work effectively.

[Egon the Monkey]

Charm/Dominate is not a weapon, it's an RP device. Get a DM to oversee it, or a cooperative player, and you can mess with PCs' heads. I've used it in DM events to help get information out of PCs and NPCs alike.

[Drakill Tannan]

Thought if you asked a dominated person to throw himeslf off a bridge he would do it. I know charm does not go to such extremes, but i was in the idea dominate was abstolute control.

Back on topic:

Could it be posible to add a RP variant of the spell? IE when you cast it you can chose to cast the RP version or the other one. With a player you know and who is willing (something you could learn through a tell) you could cast the RP version that would force a saving throw or make a small visual effect appear, and at the end of the spell the same effect could appear (so a player would know when he/she is dominated and when it ends)? I would RP along with it. I could see a lot of OOC whining towards the DMs because of this though.

[Jayde Moon]

Dominate person does NOT give you the ability to give 'obviously' self-destructive orders.  New orders that are contrary to the nature of the Character ("Now, Paladin, you will kill that baby" or "Fireball your friends, wizard!") allow a new saving throw before they will be carried out.

Dominate Person

Regardless, yes, some spells simply don't translate well to the NWN environment.  Charm and dominate are among them.  Too much room for individual interpretation, which leads to hard feelings.

[Drakill Tannan]

Odd, when i dominate drow people in the OC they are pretty comftable with stabbing their buddies :P

EDIT: Wow, it actually lasts 1 day/level? Come to think of it 2 rounds +1/3 caster levels is a lot less than it should. 30 seconds of domination at level 9? pfft.

Not suggesting this to change though. Althought i would supprt 1round/caster level.

[Corona Nox]

In PnP yeah, it lasts forever and there are multiple checks that could possibly break it.  In NWN however, it only lasts about 30 seconds.  It would be ridiculous if I could dominate a Paladin and make him my permanent pet and force him to eat babies, but making him turn against his friends in a fight for 30 seconds isn't so bad.  I can do the exact same thing to an entire group with Confusion, which is only one level higher.  So it's not a balance issue.

Let me put it this way: What is the point of Dominate Person in NWN?  Hold Person is superior in every single way.  Lasts longer, is harder to protect against, and is much harder to remove.  One of my pet peeves about NWN is during spell selection, I can automatically ignore about half or more of the spells because I know they are not simply situational, but genuinely inferior or useless in comparison to other spells.  But that is for another thread, I simply wanted to point this one out since it jumps out the most to me.

[Decimate_The_Weak]

If I am to give my own opinion here:
 
I don't think that such high level spells (such as Dominate Monster, of Hold Person) should be negated by a low level spell (such as Protection from Alignment). It defeats the purpose of the spell - and it makes it utterly useless. I think the spell should be against a will save (so the higher the level the opposing PC is, the easier it will be to block it).
 
It just makes more sense to do it this way.
 
And yes, "immunity to mind spells" would work against Dominate Monster, but not Hold Person. If anything, Hold Person should be altered to go against Will, and not be negated by "immunity to mind spells".

[Egon the Monkey]

If I am to give my own opinion here:
 
I don't think that such high level spells (such as Dominate Monster, of Hold Person) should be negated by a low level spell (such as Protection from Alignment).

Just make a Neutral Enchanter :P. I really would like to know the DMs reasoning behind making "Hold X" so easy to counter vs Good or Evil casters, but I suspect it might be so they can use mobs with it on scripted quests.

[Lennon]

Dispel their wards before assailing them.

It's all about battle tactics.

[Drakill Tannan]

Lennon: it's still 2 spells rather than one. in PvP seems simple, you can unleash your whole spellbook on a single PC. on PvM or team PvP it's not as easy, because you need to divide your spellbook in between the number of PCs. Also, 1 round is not enough for a fighter to kill a wizard. 2 rounds are though, so pre-haste is a must. that's 3 spells there. I still think porotection against alignment should give +6 to saves, rather than total inmunity-

But that's not the point. Dominate person does serve a purpose: If you manage to cast and succed on a strong creature you can have a good damage-dealing tank who you can cast a fireball on once he is badly wounded to kill the entire mob. But it's impractical really, confusion is simply better. It's like tasahs hideous laughter compared with hold person, only that this time the higher level spell is the terrible one.

If the duration was something like 3 rounds + 1/caster level it could become very usefull: you dominate the big bad mosnter and you have a tank for a couple encounters. Also something should be made when casting it on players, maybe stunning them for 1 round per caster level.

[Corona Nox]

Just make a Neutral Enchanter :P. I really would like to know the DMs reasoning behind making "Hold X" so easy to counter vs Good or Evil casters, but I suspect it might be so they can use mobs with it on scripted quests.

Yeah, me and a few of my friends were actually joking about this.  It's kind of sad that if you want to play an 'enchanter' type character you have to be neutral or else you can be gimped by a level 1 spell.

Dispel their wards before assailing them.

It's all about battle tactics.

Drakill answered this perfectly.

Lennon: it's still 2 spells rather than one. in PvP seems simple, you can unleash your whole spellbook on a single PC. on PvM or team PvP it's not as easy, because you need to divide your spellbook in between the number of PCs. Also, 1 round is not enough for a fighter to kill a wizard. 2 rounds are though, so pre-haste is a must. that's 3 spells there. I still think porotection against alignment should give +6 to saves, rather than total inmunity-

But that's not the point. Dominate person does serve a purpose: If you manage to cast and succed on a strong creature you can have a good damage-dealing tank who you can cast a fireball on once he is badly wounded to kill the entire mob. But it's impractical really, confusion is simply better. It's like tasahs hideous laughter compared with hold person, only that this time the higher level spell is the terrible one.

If the duration was something like 3 rounds + 1/caster level it could become very usefull: you dominate the big bad mosnter and you have a tank for a couple encounters. Also something should be made when casting it on players, maybe stunning them for 1 round per caster level.

Even if everyone disagrees with the idea of dominating PCs, I think most people can agree that Daze is a woefully pathetic form of crowd control.  If the Dominate line caused a Stun instead of a Daze it would be a vast improvement, at the very least.

[VanillaPudding]

I could see an increased effect being worthwhile to add in.

As for the pvp whining part of this - Wizards are -extremely- potent and important in PvP already and do not need any sort of help. They are also one of the easier classes to stay alive with in the setting here. You have one of two jobs to do typically and niether one of them requires you to put yourself in any danger.

[Drakill Tannan]

I agree in the PvP thing. But EFU:A is mostly a cooperative PvM quest-based world. I think people should focus on balancing PvM and afterwards PvP, considering how more often quests take place than PvP.

As for the wizard's two jobs.. yea it might be easy to survive but it's also boring to see everyone else do -everything- while you do nothing after the party-buffing part. Wizards should have an ablity that allowed them to fight with magic most of the quest. I think unlimited catrips would do so. although at higher levels they would still be quite useless for most of the quest.

But that's totally off-topic >.>

 Back on topic: The problem i see with the "unwiling henchman" is that if players don't want to RP along with it, then it does nothing. Sure, a player becomes part of your party. But since this is a full PvP enviorment they can still hack at you with the sword or something.

[TheImpossibleDream]

I would point out that confusion causes the monster or pc to randomly walk around and attack YOU or anything it can attack, where as you have control over a dominated monster/person, I do think its duration should be rounds per level.

But please, for the sake of all of our sanity, please, please, please do not make this into an "omg wizards are underpowered and boring in pvm" thread, read it a few months ago, last year, the year before that and the year before that and it has never been entirely accurate.

If you can't use the mechanics of your class to entertain yourself, play another class, as there are people who can find some fun in the wizard class!