Alter the Sewers Corpse Blight.

[DollarPhil]

Having been questing with a fair few bards and Sorcs recently, I've noticed this thing to be a complete pain in the rear to them, for multiple reasons, and for protection from it to be considerably difficult to acquire. Warning, there be MATHS on the horizon.

The DC on Corpse blight is 11. it hits about every few turns, both from the area and also if someone else infected is near you. Once infected you get another save at I think DC 18 to avoid it again, but then after that, the CHA damage is automatic. The incubation time is maybe 2 rounds, unlike the 20 min for the rest. Only a Cure Disease or Tonic removes it, not the more common Antidote. Unlike every other stat damage, there's not a save for each hit and it happens every couple of rounds. If you're infected, unless you immediately hit Cure Disease you have just lost your highest level bonus spells and it's going to get worse from there in the next six seconds.

A L6-8 sorc or bard has 2 base Fort Save.
14 CON's fairly average for a PC, so that adds 2.
So, that's 4 vs DC 11. A bit under a one in three chance of failing.
If you have to save just three times in a row, you've only got a bit more than a one in four chance of not failing.

Checks are forced not only every few rounds and every time you transitions, but by other people. Because this disease is only a pest to sorcs and bards, other classes can and will ignore it, and won't be buffed up with anti disease protection. If they get near you, bang, another check.

Of course, someone is bound to say "just take disease gear!" True, could do that. But, the average, decent level sorc or bard needs +6 to be immune or they will eventually fail due to the number of saves. Most Disease items have +1 or +2 vs it, and the more save items you have, the lower your slots are for spellslot gear. or defense. Importantly, both Bards and Sorcs are bugged on spellslot gear in that they will always lose an available casting if they remove it, unlike clerics etc who will lose the slot on the far right of the list. This means that swapping say, spellslot rings for Disease rings is not a clever idea. Disease saves aren't convenient to buff either. 1 or 2 off Endurance, one off Resistance if you spam that. Plus, when you're not wearing that, and some PC runs out the sewers and destroys your spellslots, you're screwed.

Or "avoid the sewers". Well, let's see. It's the area that leads to the Rafter, you have to go through it for numerous quests including one for Sorcs, and those quests down there are the best chance for getting +disease gear (Pestilent Scourge). Bit of a Catch-22. Imagine if instead of this, the Temple District spammed a Mind-Affecting Save that applied a stacking -2 AB penalty in the same way. The place would be avoided like, well, the plague.

Still, a minor change or two could keep it a pest, but one that's a general or RP annoyance, not a complete Healthpot and Spellslot Drain on two classes.
Ideas:

• Make Ironguts grant a +4 bonus to Disease saves, so you can travel about safely by using consumables or spells. Those potions are easy to acquire and would provide enough bonus that you would be fine if you thought ahead and has just a bit of gear. Disease saves are also hardly going to turn it into an uber defense spell and would even give a degree of counter to Infestation of Maggots.
• Have the Sewer Disease system apply a random normal disease along with the flies effect.
• Have the disease instead apply a Universal Saves Penalty or something equally annoying, rather than totally destructive to the two classes with the least ability to resist it.

Incidentally, if you're playing an 18 Con Gold Dwarf Sorc with Resist Disease... go away. You're not representative. :P

[SelfishMan]

I concur.

[Emprez]

When my character, who is a pure bard, travels to the sewers, which i did twice and then never again. Both times i could instantly turn around and cure and rest and risk running back in fully fort buffed, because, yes, i DID lose ALL my spells over this desease instantly. Its not fun or balanced at all to lose all skill where other classes and beings do not.

[Howlando]

There are only a few trigger points where you might catch this low DC disease.

Salutary tonics, +disease saves, potions of health are all quite common in our world.

[SkillFocuspwn]

Yes, the disease really isn't that bad! Some places are difficult, they need to be done differently! Also, stuff with like +4 saves vs disease are really common if you look around.

[Cerberus]

In my not so humble opinion, I think it's fine the way it is or should be made even nastier. Personally I find it hard to IC justify classes likes bards and paladins or hoity-toity high society snobs (you know, like the 999 PC's with titles) using the sewers to travel around. It's one thing if they're going down there for the reason of a job located there, I feel it's another thing to say, "Hey, let's wander through the sewers to get from point A to point B". Sewers are suppose to be shit, rat and disease ridden nasty places that normal people try to avoid, not use as a shortcut. Most normal people would look at a sewer entrance and say, "Eww, no... I'll take the long way around."

[Letsplayforfun]

http://www.escapefromunderdark.com/forums/showthread.php?t=39901


http://www.escapefromunderdark.com/forums/showthread.php?t=37095

[Porkolt]

I managed to drink a health potion before this disease incubated once. And I didn't have it quickslotted.

So the fact that it's too fast is rather moot.

[Barehander]

As much as you can present counter-arguments to why the disease is bad, I haven't seen a single good argument stating why it's a fun and good idea.

If you want people to use an area, it should not be an annoyance. And clearly, it's an annoyance for many. Some people say "it's fine" or "it makes sense" but I have yet to be convinced by anyone claiming "it was awesome and improved my RP and immersion notably." Now, if you don't want people wandering around the sewers (which is what adventurers do, no matter the class, mind you), then you shouldn't have them.

There's a lot of this fallacious logic and ambivalence going around: you offer something, like an area or an item or a special boon, yet you actively discourage its use. It doesn't matter whether it "makes sense" or "is fine": it's just backwards design. One would think you'd want people to use all the cool features of the game to the fullest, not drive them out of a nice area by means of an irritating quirk that rarely promotes any meaningful RP.

[Mort]

Now, if you don't want people wandering around the sewers (which is what adventurers do, no matter the class, mind you), then you shouldn't have them.

No, we dont want people to chill in the sewers willy-nilly, as we dont want them to go dance on a dragon's belly without consequences (which is what adventures do, no matter the class, mind you.)

The idea is that there are plenty of reasons to go to these places. To explore, discover, adventure, -- it's normal to have some aspects of those areas detering from exploring or forcing the people to prepare whether its really minor stuff like
 - a disease
 - monsters
 - region risks
 - environmental hazards

Why have underwater breathing? Is it because you dont want people to explore underwater areas? Well, no. There are tools (bubbleberries, spells, items) that help with that making it even more rewarding to go down there as you explore places that have probably been not seen by a great many on the server.

Why have sewer diseases? Well, there are lots of interesting things to explore, learn, etc down there and can be easily circumvented by a wide array of tools (feat, perk, items, spells).

Why have monsters garding certain areas? Well, again, lots of interesting rewards and lots of tools to circumvent this (weapons, spells, and so on).

If one of your objectives is to just hoard stuff (get ZEH supplies!111!), then of course, all these hazards are going to deter you toward that objective and be refer to as annoying.

If your objective is to be different from your typical player and live or try to live in hazardous environments, then you will see these things that deter away the softies as fun elements to incorporate into your roleplay... whether you are a badass who just go wrestle mist ogres for fun or just a creepy hermit who lives in the sewers or someone who lives in the wild.