Well I am rather awed by the power of the first level spell priest that is ignored by many. It is doom, a fun spell, that gives the enemy a nifty
-2 penalty on THAC0 and saving throws. What's more, it says Casting Time:1 round but it is casted at speed factor 1, like a magic missile. There is no saving throw, and best fact is that it is STACKABLE!!! YES, my cleric dualled into a mage can cast it REPEATEDLY in an Improved Alacrity frenzy, and let's see what it does:

5 DOOMS=-10 to saves. Add a good old GREATER MALISON. -4 to saves. Shoot a Finger of Death which additionaly gives -2 penalty too!

NOW the unfourtunate victim must make a save vs spell at -16 penalty or die! AND they die most of the time!!! GREAT! EVEN they save, (with a lucky 20 roll) they still have -14 to saves and -10 to THAC0s which really hinders nearly everything BADLY.

Jaheira and Minsc (yes Boo teaches him to cast spells at highest levels)can cast this quickly on the battlefield to an enemy to make it more suspectible to spells!

TRY it! It is simply marvelous to DISINTEGRATE and uber but DOOMED adamantite golem (first lowering resistance ofcourse) or FoD'ing a tough monster with ease!!!

What do you think? Is the spell a bit too powerful? What about casting time and stacking ability.

[ September 20, 2005, 17:35: Message edited by: Taluntain ]

As you said, it's a spell easily overlooked. I use it all the time, especially because it allows for no save. :evil: Throw that spell out at a dragon first thing (if you have an all-cleric party, more the better) and watch him/her fall.

I don't think it's too powerful; not any more than other spells. This is all my opinion, of course. ;)

It doesn't bypass MR.

Useless.

Let me tell you why.

If I've got time to keep casting Doom over and over in a fight where Improved Alacrity is worth my while,

1) The enemy is immune to 1st lvl spells

2) The enemy has way too much MR to bother reducing...just fry with Dragon's Breath, Sunfire etc.

3) I havent memorised gay spells like FoD...Project Image is a lot better. I'm better off casting Skull Traps.

4) Why waste so many Dooms on a character to reduce spells so much? IMO its a waste to cast spells other than Greater Malison (which is my favourite spell in the game) to reduce saves, as damage spells do SOME damage all the time.

Okay, I'll relent...Doom has moderate use. Its NOWHERE near the usefulness of Project Image, Timestop, Glitterdust, Mislead, Stoneskin etc. though.

I heard a long time ago tha it stacked then I heard it had been fixed by a fixpack. Sodo you have baldurdash and the like, if so, it will work in my game too. And are you sure its stacking? You can repeatedly doom a monster but it won't have more than a -2 penalty... or thats what i thought.

I am SURE it stacks, just cast it on a NPC in your groups MANY times and you will see his/her saving throws go high crazy(which is a bad thing) and THAC0 will increase greatly! (which is bad also) Cast 5 dooms on NPC and check in character information screen.

Faraaz, why are you so harsh on my favourite spell? I just like killing TOUGHEST enemies with a mere killer spell like Disintegrate, Flesh to Stone, Finger of Death and ...maybe Wail of the Banshee? YES it could be so cool!

I think doom is great as it is a first level priest spells.High level priests have TONS of first level spells BUT they do not use them much. (a cure light wounds is useless, sanctuary has its own uses though.) SO I think it is great for first level pick for a priest! Ofcourse GreaterMalison is better but it is a 4th level mage spell and mages do not have as many 4th spells as priests have 1st. Plus there are VERY GOOD picks for that level, Stoneskin, Fireshields, Improved Invisibility, cool beyond words IcyStorm are all great! (No sorcerers OK? :) )

One can beat a very tough enemy with this. Add 5 dooms and it will be a much better victim for any spell! AND if at least 3 persons in your party can cast DOOM (Jaheira, Minsc, Viccy, Aerİe, plus maybe your PC?), it is just great! (Minsc can not cast anything usefull afterall, so HAMSTER DOOM UPON EVIL!!! :D )

What's nice about Doom is that it's one of those spells that remains useful throughout the game, wthout being overpowered. It's just a far better use of 1st level slots than Cure Light Wounds, as it allows you to set enemies up for Finger O' Death or even Chromatic Orb (with Greater Malison), and it backs up your fighters by nerfing your enemies THAC0. It's not a Weapon of Infinite Cosmic Power (tm), just well thought-out and balanced. Thus, it deserves our respect and warm plaudits.

After all, is it neccesarily good that Mislead, PI, etc. are so horribly overpowered and broken? :heh:

Disintegrate and Flesh to Stone are both a bad idea, generally. IIRC, killing an enemy with either spell estroys any items they are carrying. They aren't really destroyed with Flesh to Stone, they're just petrified along with the enemy and you can't collect them. And since getting cool new items is the best reason to fight high-level enemies, these two spells seem completely counter-productive to me.

^If I KNOW there is cool stuff, I never use DISINTEGRATE, but if a petrified enemy is cured via Stone to Flesh, it will have 1hp, kill it and you will gain the XP TWICE and get the loot!

BTW thanks for the nice words THE Magpie! :)

Dooms plus greater malisan and natures beauty is horribly nasty!

Yeah well if it stacks, then its broken. Its not supposed to I'm sure. But since i'm such a big cheater i'll give it a go. I love the spell though. its just that I dont like using it on an enemy more than once.

Doom is the greatest first level priest spell in the game. I use that spell all the time. Doom is as needed as my all time favorite Magic Missile (i love casting Magic Missile on tough charcters hoping it'll work).

Doom is never overlooked by me, it's always the first thing I put in my priest scroll.

^Glad to know that there are others who like doom! :)

@Malovae

Why do you think it is broken? YES it is casting time is broken, (1 spped factor instead of 1 round) but is it supposed not to stack? I mean, greater malison can not be stacked because it is an area-effect spell, and gives a massive penalty. If it was stackable, it would be over-kill. But doom is weaker version of Greater Malison which affects only one target, and it seems right to me that it is stackable.

BTW what patch/mod makes it unstackable? I have latest patch and a few fixes from mods but it is still perfectly stackable.

@Silverstar: Baldurdash fix pack. It's essential for a decent gaming experience IMO.

Also...Doom isn't very useful because firstly, 5 Dooms stacked means 5 rounds wasted!

AND...please keep in mind that you don't start off with Improved Alacrity at lvl 1 :p

Moreso, if you're playing with a party, you don't get to use Improved Alacrity till about 2/3rd of the way into the game.

I remember Balthazar casting Greater Malison on me multiple times and getting a massive save penalty.

I do believe that Greater Malison stacks or at least it looked like it did. Next if you are in a party with a couple divine spell casters it dosn't take 5 rounds to doom someone 5 times just a few. Just knock their saving throws to heck and blast them with natures beauty or what not and watch the bodies pile up! Works better with Greater Malison but doom works in a pich especially on tough singular enemies that have lots of hit points and wouldn't be dead by the time this combo was set off.

Doom shouldn't stack afair, and I'm possitve Baldurdash or some such most 'ave fixed it, 'cus doom do nay stack in my games...

i knew it, you need to patch this broken spell people :p

you need to patch this broken spell peopleDo you really expect us to patch this spell....or were you hit in the head multiple times when you were typing that?

I'LL NEVER PATCH DOOM!

I'm a "bash 'em 'til they're goo" kind of guy myself and only tried the doom tricks a few times. I prefer to use the mages to buff and strip defences -- them pummel the vile creature to death. It's the only civilized way to go.

^Yet it helps tremendously on toughest enemies who resists nearly every spell.

For example, have you ever tried Improved Ilych? If you can lure him alone (which is very tough but doable with skill, farsight spell and lots of luck) and have a cleric PC, you can make him chase stoneskinned/mirrorimaged Immy whilst pempering him with multiple dooms, casted by you and Jaheira, (thus 2 dooms per round) Ilych will not be able to hurt Immy if you do it right, and after 8 or so dooms, cast a basic Hold Person spell, and he will be frozen! (or save vs spell at a ridiculous -16 penalty, which I am sure is hard even for him) Then all of the party wails upon him and he is dead in a blink, as he can not gulp extra healing potions or defend himself when held. (automatic hit) I haven't tried this though, I beat him with an evil trick of bouncing lightning bolts, special thanks to Immy. Just an idea that this spell can really turn the tides in battle against a single tough enemy.

BTW I thought I had some fixes in my mods, apparently it does not fix doom.

for Faraaz:
quote "The enemy has way too much MR to bother reducing.." endquote

If the enemies MR (magic resistance) is so high, why not kick off the fight with the spell 'Magic Resistance' (no save) from your priest.

Although designed to cast on friends, it works brilliantly on enemies. No matter what the MR of the enemy is before, after casting 'Magic Resistance' the max it can have is 40% (2% per level up to 40% at 20th), and if your caster is a lower level the max MR is lower too !

Then immediately after casting 'Magic Resistance', and in the same round, get your m/u to cast 'lower resistance'.

If your priest and M/U are both (say) 20th level, then the creatures MR is down to 10% in one round. If your NPC's are of lower level, for example 15th, the the enemies MR is down to 5% (30% minus 25%).

Maybe Aerie who has both priest and m/u spells could put both in a 'Spell Trigger' ?

Warning: The priets 'Magic Resistance' spell is Range=Touch, so your priest may need some protections of her own first.

Not possible if you're soloing a Non-divine caster! :D

Besides...the strategies I use RARELY use Doom as a crutch. Greater Malison, yes. Doom, no. I don't waste a round for just a -2 penalty when fighting Firkraag et. al. I just cast GM, Power Word : Blind if I feel like it, then anything and everything else. Works just as well.

"I don't waste a round for just a -2 penalty when fighting Firkraag"

Doom + Greater Malison+Chromatic Orb is one of the best ways to kill Firkraag

@Incaranate: I disagree.

With Doom + Greater Malison...at best you only negate the +6 bonus to the saving throw. That leaves Firkraag with his normal saving throws which are quite excellent. :p

Also...that's for wussies.

Firkraag is one of the best battles in the game, where you get to try out all sorts of creative tactics to kill him. WHY would you want to cheapen it with cheese?

I don't think that doom+Greater malisan+whatever is for "wussies" it isn't any worse than most any other tactic I have heard. Trapping and attacking while he is blue are a lot cheaper and far less plausible (and if you use these no problem the game was designed for you to do that well except for maby the attacking while blue tactic). In fact this tactic is much more intelligent than my first tactic which was a group assult from all sides. It worked by the way though not as quick and painless than this combo.

There is no shame using such tactics nor should there be. This is why such spells exist in the game.

Using two legit spells is not cheese. And yeah there are lots of ways to kill things, and thats one of them.

@Faraaz: I disagree with 98% of the things you posted on this topic.
First: Its NOWHERE near the usefulness of Project Image, Timestop, Glitterdust, Mislead, Stoneskin etc.Well, it isn't suposed to be as useful as those spells. In case you forgot... It's a first level spell! It has as much use as much a level 1 spell should have. How can you even compare this with Timestop?!

Second: You said 5 Dooms stacked means 5 rounds wasted! . Now, let's see... Anomen, Viconia, Aerie, Minsc, Jaheira (and I think Valeygar and Cernd, too). Now, these are some NPCs that have Doom and you can use them for casting with each one of them in a round. Plus, your own PC could caste it if he would be a Ranger, Paladin, or any kind of priest for that matter.

Third: You said With Doom + Greater Malison...at best you only negate the +6 bonus to the saving throw. That leaves Firkraag with his normal saving throws which are quite excellent. Later you said... Firkraag is one of the best battles in the game, where you get to try out all sorts of creative tactics to kill him. WHY would you want to cheapen it with cheese? Now, let me tell you that with his "normal saving throws which are quite excellent", Firkraag falls from the second or third Finger of Death which I cast on him so, no doubt, it will fall from a Chromatic Orb with a Doom casted first AND Greater Malison.
You said that these tactic is "cheesy". It isn't. It is as much as casting Power Word: Blind and watching how a dumb Red Dragon stays like stuned in one place... I just cast GM, Power Word : Blind if I feel like it, then anything and everything else. Oh. You mentioned one of your favorite spell being Project Image... Ahem! :rolleyes: May I ask in which ways you use it? Now... that's for wussies. Doom is not cheesy and it isn't overpowered neither. It isn't ignored neither for that matter. It's just a very good level 1 spell. Just like Magic Missile.
Just my two cents, no offense. ;)

I was thinking of doing a long rant, but Hyperion pretty much said it all. Right on! And just in case someone hasn't noticed it, blinding a dragon means he can't attack even a fighter right in front of him cutting him to shreds, because the creature is bigger than his (blinded) line of sight. Exploiting a designing flaw reeks of Major Mozzarella.

^Well, thank you for your defending of our precious doom spell! :thumb:

It is fun to weaken even the most strong enemies with continously dooming them via your PC and 2-3 more NPCs, the critter will have a massive -16 penalty to saves AND THAC0 in 2 rounds! So unless it had a save vs spell lower than 3, it iwll %100 eat everything you cast on it, be it a finger of death or chromatic orb!

Also, as it is casted like a magic misile, (casting time:1) divine casters can still attack at that round, this especailly helps Valygar, Minsc, and Jaheira. If they see a tough critter running to them, they will all cast doom instantly (maybe PC and Aerie or Viccy can join for major doomnation!) by the time the critter attacks anyone it will be weakened so greatly and fighters will be happy to meet such a weak foe who can not hit anything, not to mention spellcasters will rejoice to throw any kind of spell with a save allowed at the unfourtunate victim, guarantying a much higher percentage of success than the original!