Talk:Spell Leech (3.5e Maneuver)

Balance Point

I'm a little confused about the mandatoriness of the purely mental standard action, especially given that everyone (except maybe the caster, it's psychological) should be able to easily realize that this caster isn't doing any important things with its standard actions. If the mental standard action isn't mandatory, then this doesn't actually stunlock a caster or ruin them in moments, so it could probably be put at High balance. --Foxwarrior (talk) 03:25, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

The standard action is necessary to attempt the Will save. If the caster being targeted does something else with their standard action, then the initiator of this maneuver is free to wipe a spell slot. --Luigifan18 (talk) 03:38, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Oh, so the reason it's Very High is because it's a no-save scry-and-sabotage. That makes sense. --Foxwarrior (talk) 04:01, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

There is a save, it just has to be made round-by-round and you need to spend a standard action to take it. By the way, what's a "scry and die"? --Luigifan18 (talk) 04:16, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

There are essentially no situations in which a Very High-balance caster would spend a standard action to get a chance at holding onto a spell rather than spending a standard action to cast a spell to deal with you. "Scry and die" is when you scry on someone, and then teleport up and kill them. Scry-and-sabotage isn't that, but it seems like a reasonably good description of an effect that lets you know things and sabotage later battles. --Foxwarrior (talk) 04:32, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

May I just point out that the mechanics behind this maneuver are really confusing? So basically, you must concentrate on your target to maintain the connection, effectively expending a standard action and hope to God your target also expends their standard action to retain their spell? Or am I missing something? And, is this equivalent exchange (at best) of standard actions not absolutely unworthy of 9th level? --Sulacu (talk) 14:16, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

The whole maneuver is based on spell worm, so it had to keep the stealth aspect. I only made this a concentration maneuver because spell worm's an epic spell and spell leech is supposed to be a 9th-level maneuver - it had to be weaker in some respect. Anyways, like spell worm, spell leech is unobtrusive. Until your target tries to cast a spell and succeeds on a Spellcraft check, he is completely unaware that you're in his head killing his spells. He therefore ends up taking a standard action to attempt a Will save every round by default without consciously realizing that he's doing so. This stops him from taking double move or full-round actions, and he doesn't have a bloody clue that such actions are being denied to him. If he tries to take a double move or full-round action, he instead takes a move action and spends a standard action to resist, and he's completely oblivious to his mind being tampered with. Only when your target tries to spend his standard action on something else can he even begin to suspect that something's wrong, but that's nothing more than a faint feeling of unease until he casts a spell (or tries to, anyways) and finds out that some of his spells are missing (e.g. he succeeds on the Spellcraft check). If he's spending standard actions to concentrate on a spell, you're completely free to wipe out the rest of his spells (unless he has another standard action to spend resisting you) and he won't find out until he stops concentrating on his current spell and tries to cast another one. Once that's happened, he can spend his actions however he wants, including taking double moves or full-round actions, but he understands that if he does not spend a standard action to try to fight you off, you'll delete a spell from his mind. And if you use this maneuver before your target is aware of your presence, you just might wipe all of his spells out before even having to confront him! --Luigifan18 (talk) 17:27, 17 November 2012 (UTC)