schrodingers fighter tier?

[zlefin]

I think it's tier 3 (though maybe tier 4 in core?), but I wanted to ask people here.

Schrodinger's fighter works as follows for this discussion:

Schrodinger's fighter is like a regular fighter EXCEPT all the bonus fighter feats are instead bonus schrodinger fighter feats. they must be chosen from those feats designed as bonus fighter feats.

On your turn, once per turn, as a free action, you can change what feats your schrodinger fighter feats are; your new feat configuration must be legal. If you lose a feat that granted bonuses, you lose the bonuses it granted, even if they might otherwise stay. (e.g. if you change your schrodinger feats so you no longer have the martial stance feat, you automatically leave the stance)

[DeltaEmil]

It will still remain tier 5. Now it's just more flexible at how to kill things, but it's still just only doing killing things, which the fighter never has really been that bad at.

It still lacks skill points to contribute outside of combat, and still can't do really much except kill things really good.

[Studoku]

Tier 4- it's now about as good as Barbarian or Dungeoncrasher.

Capable of doing one thing quite well, but often useless when encounters require other areas of expertise, or capable of doing many things to a reasonable degree of competance without truly shining. Rarely has any abilities that can outright handle an encounter unless that encounter plays directly to the class's main strength.

Fighter is a high tier 5 normally and this is enough to push it over the boundry. With this, it's a little better at fighting but it's still unable to contribute against any problem where it can't enter melee and make attack rolls.

This doesn't come remotely close to tier 3.

[Gavinfoxx]

Are all the fighter feats any feat whatsoever?

Can you switch out ALL your feats, each round?

That would pump it to tier 3 or so, I think.

[Gnaeus]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say high tier 3.

This fighter can do ranged attacks by picking up ranged feats. He can pick up charge feats when they are advantageous, then swap them out when he can't charge. He can do all combat maneuvers with the appropriate feats if he needs them (Monster grapples him, he suddenly has improved grapple).

More importantly, martial study and martial stance are fighter bonus feats. This fighter can pick ANY maneuver he wants that is within his initiator level, along with the prereqs, at will. Teleports? Check. Save or suck effects? Check. Buffs for allies? Check. Pounce type abilities? Check. Lots of these have non-combat applications as well.

[prufock]

Schrodinger's fighter is like a regular fighter EXCEPT all the bonus fighter feats are instead bonus schrodinger fighter feats. they must be chosen from those feats designed as bonus fighter feats.

On your turn, once per turn, as a free action, you can change what feats your schrodinger fighter feats are; your new feat configuration must be legal.

This is pretty much how my fighter (http://dndfulcrum.wikispaces.com/Fighter) rebuild works, but it also borrows some other things from various sources. However, mine requires 5 minutes to "retrain" feats, though you can do it instantaneously for one round, sacrificing that feat slot for the day.

I also made Dungeoncrasher and some other variants new fighter feats, and expanded the list of fighter feats.

Haven't had a chance to playtest yet, so I'm also interested in what people think of this idea.

[Barsoom]

Certainly not tier 5, since it fits the definition of T4 without even trying too hard. Only question is, 3 or 4? I'd say 3, it's the Martial Study and Martial Stance that get it there.

[JoshuaZ]

I agree with Gnaeus and Barsoom that the access to ToB feats pushed this up to T3 since there are a lot of low level utility maneuvers and stances. This gives them far more out of combat options than a normal fighter. And in weird combat situations they will have a lot more.

[Killer Angel]

It will still remain tier 5. Now it's just more flexible at how to kill things, but it's still just only doing killing things, which the fighter never has really been that bad at.

It still lacks skill points to contribute outside of combat, and still can't do really much except kill things really good.

If we don't limit it to fighter bonus feats, it would be a solid improvement.

[Big Fau]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say high tier 3.

This fighter can do ranged attacks by picking up ranged feats. He can pick up charge feats when they are advantageous, then swap them out when he can't charge. He can do all combat maneuvers with the appropriate feats if he needs them (Monster grapples him, he suddenly has improved grapple).

More importantly, martial study and martial stance are fighter bonus feats. This fighter can pick ANY maneuver he wants that is within his initiator level, along with the prereqs, at will. Teleports? Check. Save or suck effects? Check. Buffs for allies? Check. Pounce type abilities? Check. Lots of these have non-combat applications as well.

Feats change, but equipment does not. The fact that the Fighter would have to invest in both a bow and a melee weapon (unless he is allows to use Elvencraft Bows, Swordbows, or Serpent Bows) and spend an insane amount of cash on various enhancements+stat boosters means changing back and forth is a bad idea.

Contrast with the Binder, Incarnate, or Totemist, each of which can change roles daily (potentially instantly in the Binder's and Incarnate's cases) by having a class feature that allows them to bypass the normal need for such items. If I could play a Binder that can change his feats the way a Swordsage with Adaptive Style changes readied maneuvers, I'd be one damn-good Binder. The Fighter, however, is still incredibly limited by his reliance on equipment.

[DeltaEmil]

I totally forgot about some of the stances and maneuvers of shadow hand and desert wind school, which did make you become invisible, lest you fly, teleport as an extraordinary ability and such, as well as mountain hammer from the stone dragon school, which allows you to break stuff by ignoring that pesky hardness. I revise my opinion and will say that this schroedinger fighter might be mid tier 4. Still lacks enough skill points, but the utility gained might actually help. However, the maneuvers are gained at half the speed of normal martial adepts, since the fighter's initiator level is only half of that what crusaders, swordsages and warblades have, and unless the fighter is epic, will never get access to level 6 maneuvers and stances. Still, there's good stuff to be gained.

[Hecuba]

Tier 3

"Capable of doing one thing quite well"

Individual fighter builds occasionally get into this range and are considered tier 4. With all fighter feats, this is trivial

"while still being useful when that one thing is inappropriate"

If restrained to combat-based encounters (the same qualification necessary for ToB to reach Tier 3), having ALL Stances and Maneuver up to level 6 should probably qualify.

[Person_Man]

There is an important reason why most class abilities are permanently locked in or chosen once per day. If players can select their class abilities at will, it dramatically slows down real life game play.

So regardless of what Tier Schrodingers Fighter might be, being able to change your Feats every round is a terrible design choice.

Having said that, if you were to have a sizable enough pool of Feats, AND those Feats basically gave you access to other more meaningful class abilities (Martial Study, Martial Stance, Shape Soulmeld, Open Chakra, Extra Essentia, Expanded Knowledge, Wild Talent, Bind Vestige, etc) then you could probably cobble together a Tier 3. But that's not really a Fighter. It's just a generic homebrew class.

[Gnaeus]

Feats change, but equipment does not. The fact that the Fighter would have to invest in both a bow and a melee weapon (unless he is allows to use Elvencraft Bows, Swordbows, or Serpent Bows) and spend an insane amount of cash on various enhancements+stat boosters means changing back and forth is a bad idea.

Contrast with the Binder, Incarnate, or Totemist, each of which can change roles daily (potentially instantly in the Binder's and Incarnate's cases) by having a class feature that allows them to bypass the normal need for such items. If I could play a Binder that can change his feats the way a Swordsage with Adaptive Style changes readied maneuvers, I'd be one damn-good Binder. The Fighter, however, is still incredibly limited by his reliance on equipment.

Well, first off, he could switch to "unarmed combat mode" with unarmed strike + maneuvers + grapple/trip and do O.K. Certainly better than a Warblade or Crusader that was without a weapon (their strikes might be better, but they would provoke AOOs, not threaten, etc...) And given ANY ranged weapon, he would be much better as a ranged combatant than his ToB counterparts, who aren't much for ranged combat at all.

Second, I think this fighter is not massively equipment dependent in the way the tier system looks at things. The tier system does not assume no gear. When I see a class that needs very specific things that may or may not be available in game X, That is a tier hit. The Schroedingers fighter only needs ANY melee weapon (preferably 2h) and ANY ranged weapon. I think it at least compares favorably to Duskblade, which is pretty much just a big bag of damage, and which needs weapons to really be effective as well. A Psychic Warrior who is not built for unarmed fighting will also need weapons at least as much as Schroedingers fighter.

[Big Fau]

Yeah, but you have to worry about prerequisites (ability scores and skill points, for example), then you need to have the stats for whatever style you are currently using. Unless you've found a way to make Grapples, Trips, and Bull Rushes key to your Dex score, you are going to need magic items to be competent in your feat specializations.

A Totemist, on the other hand, has class features (soulmelds) that compensate for a low ability score. A Totemist can switch between ranged combat and melee combat at the drop of a hat (Rebind Totem Chakra) without really being hurt by a bad Dex or Str score (it certainly helps to have them as high as possible).

In your example of using Unarmed combat Gnaeus, switching from ranged combat mode to melee means the Fighter loses his weapon's magical abilities. He now needs Strength/Weapon Finesse, and his damage output is going to be crap. He has to make use of Tripping and Bull Rushing (possibly Grappling) to cover this dramatic drop in output, and those are keyed to Str (which means MAD is going to kick in). Even with Martial Study/Stance he's still very limited by virtue of the other flaws the class has.

While allowing the Fighter to switch combat styles on the fly is a good thing, it does not solve the rest of the problems that are keeping the class in T5. I seem to have deleted that link I always used when it came to discussing the Fighter's flaws, but the gist of it is that the feats are only a small part of a big problem.

[Grod_The_Giant]

With Martial Study, it's probably T3. However, that's not really because of feat switching; that's because he effectively knows all maneuvers and stances (albeit later than a full initiator). And that option is a mess in terms of recovery mechanisms, and feels like it's entirely defeating the purpose of feat-switching.

Without, I'd say T4. It can do one thing (combat) moderately well and with a decent degree of variety, but there's so much that it can't do*, both in and out of combat, that I couldn't rightly say that it's T3. Also, you wind up having to drop a small fortune on backup weapons to really take advantage of the feat switching.

*Anything not related to combat, most mobility elements, foes with exotic defenses...

[DeltaEmil]

With Martial Study, it's probably T3. However, that's not really because of feat switching; that's because he effectively knows all maneuvers and stances (albeit later than a full initiator). And that option is a mess in terms of recovery mechanisms, and feels like it's entirely defeating the purpose of feat-switching.But he knows them so late that the higher-level ones are not that useful anymore. It's the monk and his class features all over again. The monk's ability to talk to any being, run like crazy, slow falling a lot, having deadly punches and kicks, and self-healing and stuff is nice. But it's stuff that magic items and spells can replicate much earlier. Every eligible maneuver can also only be used once per encounter (switching them out doesn't matter, since the fighter lacks a recovery method), and you can only have a maximum of three maneuver at any time around. And some of those maneuvers have a number of maneuvers as prerequisites, forcing you to take a maneuver or stance as a tax-schroedinger-fighter-feat that you wouldn't want to use anyway.

[Aegis013]

With Martial Study, it's probably T3. However, that's not really because of feat switching; that's because he effectively knows all maneuvers and stances (albeit later than a full initiator). And that option is a mess in terms of recovery mechanisms, and feels like it's entirely defeating the purpose of feat-switching.



... having ALL Stances and Maneuver up to level 6 should probably qualify.

Martial Study can only be taken three times, IL limit and maneuver pre-requisite limitations means that the Fighter will not have access to all maneuvers. Some of the good ones such as IHS and WRT, sure, but certainly not all of them.

[eggynack]

I'd say high tier 4 at best. Sure, he can kind of emulate tome of battle classes, and that's nice. A regular fighter who pushes optimization is getting into tier 4 already, so this is pushing him to the top of the list. The problem with emulating the tome of battle classes is that tome of battle classes do it much better. They're getting access to maneuvers about twice as powerful as the fighters. Initiators level up in a manner similar to wizards, though perhaps a bit less explosively, and a few high level powers is significantly better than a pile of low level ones. Just ask any mystic theurge. Therefore, tome of battle classes are tier 3, and the Schrodinger's fighter is quite a bit worse than them, so it stands to reason that this fighter isn't tier 3. A good comparison class might actually be the adept, who gets a similarly limited progression of abilities but has enough to get to tier 4.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Every eligible maneuver can also only be used once per encounter (switching them out doesn't matter, since the fighter lacks a recovery method
"But I do have mountain hammer readied, since I just learned the feat!"
<next turn>
"No no, I can use emerald razor. I just learned the feat!"
<next turn>
"No no, I can use mountain hammer. I just learned the feat!"

Repeat ad nauseum.

[Gnaeus]

Yeah, but you have to worry about prerequisites (ability scores and skill points, for example), then you need to have the stats for whatever style you are currently using. Unless you've found a way to make Grapples, Trips, and Bull Rushes key to your Dex score, you are going to need magic items to be competent in your feat specializations.

A Totemist, on the other hand, has class features (soulmelds) that compensate for a low ability score. A Totemist can switch between ranged combat and melee combat at the drop of a hat (Rebind Totem Chakra) without really being hurt by a bad Dex or Str score (it certainly helps to have them as high as possible).
.

Yes, but a warblade or crusader can't. He has ways around the attribute dependency (like Brutal Throw) but really he doesn't need very many super high scores.

This fighter can: Shoot foes underwater (Aquatic shot) or ignore cover
Grant himself DR (Armor spec)
Cleave when it is useful
Assess CR of opponent as a free action (Combat intuition)
Give himself Fast healing (combat vigor) or extra HP (improved toughness)
Improve his initiative (and improve it more in shadowy conditions)
Blind Fight, or give himself blindsight 5
Deflect Arrows
Taunt (goad)
Sunder, Grapple, Overrun, Trip,
Stop enemy grapplers with close quarters fighting
Unarmed strike (with half a dozen options available, like doing slashing or piercing, strength penalties, paralysis, etc)
Pierce magical concealment/protection
Fight while prone
Quickdraw weapons
Spring Attack
Intimidate foes he is attacking
Knockback
Overcome alignment based DR
Fight in tight spaces without penalty
Daze targets with a boomerang
Shoot a Balista
Reload hand crossbows as a free action
Get bonuses on knowledge checks to gain strategic advantage


That is without Dragon content, or any martial study or stances. Sure, lots of those things are situational, but you have them in any situation where they help you. You are going to tell me that that is less versatile than a crusader or a duskblade? Yes, a martial adept may have stances that do SOME of those things, but far from all.

By second level, he can use any level 1 stance. That means
Fire Resistance,
Self healing with attacks
Concealment while moving
Improved flanking
Ignore difficult terrain
Give allies bonuses on will saves
(so at level 2, he is massively better than any ToB class, which can only do one or two of those things)

At level 6 he can Teleport 50 feet as a standard. Make touch attacks. Overcome DR. (At this level, the mighty duskblade knows 5 level 1 and 2 level 2 spells. The wildshape Ranger has 2 forms a day limited to animals and humanoids.)

Level 10 gives White Raven Tactics and Iron Heart Surge. Say what you like about getting abilities late, both of those abilities were still seeing common use in my last campaign through the upper teens. Also stances that give spider climb and absurd bonuses to Jump, and assassins stance and thicket of blades.

And that is just a single classed fighter. It would be VERY reasonable to take only a few levels of Initiator classes to satisfy prereqs and pick up a couple of low level abilities and advance initiator level, then fill the rest of the build with straight fighter.

So how would this fighter operate? He would probably pick an area of specialization (like melee, or ranged, or ToB) and use his general feats there to cover pre-reqs and any feats that aren't fighter bonus feats. Then he would have several default builds that he uses:
A defense build for walking around, with stuff like Combat Reflexes, Improved Init, Bolstering Voice Stance.
A charge build for when charge attacks are appropriate.
A range attack build for his favorite range option.
A full attack build for starting next to the enemy.
A battlefield control build for tanking.
And maybe a couple of utility builds, like an intimidate build or a grapple build, filling up empty slots with defensive options.

With luck, he can even "twist" his builds. Like start the round in Charge build. Charge the enemy, then shift to defense build as a free action at the end of his round for extra AC during bad guy turns, then shift back to Charge or Full Attack mode at the beginning of next turn.

[Snails]

There is an important reason why most class abilities are permanently locked in or chosen once per day. If players can select their class abilities at will, it dramatically slows down real life game play.

So regardless of what Tier Schrodingers Fighter might be, being able to change your Feats every round is a terrible design choice.

This. Just give the Fighter more Fighter feats. Or make a replacement class.

[Grod_The_Giant]

This. Just give the Fighter more Fighter feats. Or make a replacement class.

That sort of thing can be done well-- Ziegander (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=275538)proposed making feats work like a wizard's spellbook, where you choose your feats each round from an enormous set of feats known.

[Big Fau]

This. Just give the Fighter more Fighter feats. Or make a replacement class.

More feats is not the answer either. It just means people playing a Fighter PrC out faster because they run out of bonus feats they want.

[TuggyNE]

One of the practical problems with this whole idea is that you basically reintroduce the shapechange cooldown/uses problem, but with a whole new set of issues. For example, does Stunning Fist actually have a number of uses per day, or does this just mean you can use it at will by resetting the count every time you free-action-switch? How about Travel Devotion? Since there are quite a lot of feats with daily limits, not to mention the ToB stuff, this is a pretty substantial problem.

[eggynack]

More feats is not the answer either. It just means people playing a Fighter PrC out faster because they run out of bonus feats they want.
This doesn't seem entirely true. It's not like anyone's staying in fighter now for feat reasons. If any optimal character is in fighter past level two, they're doing so for dungeon crasher or zhentarim soldier. Feats don't really have that much to do with it. Really, if you want a Schrodinger's fighter, you shouldn't let them change feats every round. That's not even what the term means. What you should do is let the fighter change their feats once per encounter. That way they can fix their feats to face a particular enemy, without just relying on the quick changing for cheese purposes. It fits much better for the term because the fighter doesn't have specific feats until he's observed by the enemy.

[zlefin]

One of the practical problems with this whole idea is that you basically reintroduce the shapechange cooldown/uses problem, but with a whole new set of issues. For example, does Stunning Fist actually have a number of uses per day, or does this just mean you can use it at will by resetting the count every time you free-action-switch? How about Travel Devotion? Since there are quite a lot of feats with daily limits, not to mention the ToB stuff, this is a pretty substantial problem.


no it's not, it's extremely trivial; all uses/day and otherwise limited stuff carries over limits as if you'd kept the feat the whole time.
You word the rule roughly like that, and say that the rule is to be interpreted according to its intent (no bonus resets! no advantage from shuffling!).

and it's not a practical solution, it's a theoretical solution for assessment and analysis purposes.

[Chronos]

You word the rule roughly like that, and say that the rule is to be interpreted according to its intent (no bonus resets! no advantage from shuffling!).
"Interpret according to its intent" is easy to say, but hard to do. Just what is the intent? How did you intend for this to interact with maneuver readying/recovering, for example? I don't know, and can think of several plausible possibilities for the intention.

[eggynack]

no it's not, it's extremely trivial; all uses/day and otherwise limited stuff carries over limits as if you'd kept the feat the whole time.
You word the rule roughly like that, and say that the rule is to be interpreted according to its intent (no bonus resets! no advantage from shuffling!).

and it's not a practical solution, it's a theoretical solution for assessment and analysis purposes.
It's not really trivial at all. You can't just interpret the creator of a thing's intent without talking to the creator about it. You could easily have intended for the ability to be able to refill limited use feats. Granted, you apparently didn't. Now, we have moved from rules as interpreted, which is stupid, to rules as written, which has actual legitimacy. It seems reasonable to assume, without any evidence to the contrary, that a newly selected feat is a new in game object and thus acts exactly like the first one did, new uses per day and all. I believe that you can still switch around from maneuver to maneuver until the end of combat, so unless you really need to access the same maneuver twice in the same combat, you should be fine.

[georgie_leech]

It's not really trivial at all. You can't just interpret the creator of a thing's intent without talking to the creator about it. You could easily have intended for the ability to be able to refill limited use feats. Granted, you apparently didn't. Now, we have moved from rules as interpreted, which is stupid, to rules as written, which has actual legitimacy. It seems reasonable to assume, without any evidence to the contrary, that a newly selected feat is a new in game object and thus acts exactly like the first one did, new uses per day and all. I believe that you can still switch around from maneuver to maneuver until the end of combat, so unless you really need to access the same maneuver twice in the same combat, you should be fine.

I don't think he meant "trivial" that it's simple to figure out what was intended, but that rather than being a serious problem that requires a complex solution, it has a simple one. And honestly, "all limits carry over" is a pretty simple solution.

[eggynack]

I don't think he meant "trivial" that it's simple to figure out what was intended, but that rather than being a serious problem that requires a complex solution, it has a simple one. And honestly, "all limits carry over" is a pretty simple solution.
I suppose that's a more accurate reading of his claims. However, it seems likely that with an ability this open ended, there's going to be a few uses of the ability that weren't intended. I'm not an expert at breaking D&D things apart on that kind of level, but when you're changing your entire feat makeup every round as a free action, weird things of some kind are probably going to happen, especially when you bring things like Tome of Battle into the equation. All I'm saying is that we can't just use rules as interpreted as some kind of all purpose salve for all of the worlds woes. Sentences like, "You word the rule roughly like that, and say that the rule is to be interpreted according to its intent," seem highly problematic to me on this basis.

[Logic]

Tier 4- it's now about as good as Barbarian or Dungeoncrasher.


Capable of doing one thing quite well, but often useless when encounters require other areas of expertise, or capable of doing many things to a reasonable degree of competance without truly shining. Rarely has any abilities that can outright handle an encounter unless that encounter plays directly to the class's main strength.

Fighter is a high tier 5 normally and this is enough to push it over the boundry. With this, it's a little better at fighting but it's still unable to contribute against any problem where it can't enter melee and make attack rolls.

This doesn't come remotely close to tier 3.
The tiers system doesn't always work.
Case in point: In my Pathfinder game, I play a Tactician archetype fighter, and I am usually the most versatile party member in or out of combat. But it probably has something to do with the fact that I am the most adept in the group at maximizing builds.

[DeltaEmil]

"But I do have mountain hammer readied, since I just learned the feat!"
<next turn>
"No no, I can use emerald razor. I just learned the feat!"
<next turn>
"No no, I can use mountain hammer. I just learned the feat!"

Repeat ad nauseum.Doesn't matter. Martial Study doesn't make your maneuver readied or anything if you have no martial adept level. You use it once per encounter, you can't use it anymore for the rest of the encounter.

[Gnaeus]

Fighter is a high tier 5 normally and this is enough to push it over the boundry. With this, it's a little better at fighting but it's still unable to contribute against any problem where it can't enter melee and make attack rolls.


He can contribute as much as or more than the typical Duskblade. He is only 2 skill points behind Crusader and Warblade.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Doesn't matter. Martial Study doesn't make your maneuver readied or anything if you have no martial adept level. You use it once per encounter, you can't use it anymore for the rest of the encounter.
But it's a new feat. I'm not saying that your interpretation isn't reasonable, just that the RAW is open to argument here.

[Gnaeus]

Either way, there are enough strikes at roughly similar power levels that he should be able to cycle between the better ones. The only maneuvers he should really wish he could reuse would be special things like IHS, WRT, or the shadow travel line.

[zlefin]

don't get hung up on RAW on an ability which hasn't been vetted and thoroughly analyzed for rules loopholes. Obviously if it were ever used the wording would be improved.
When laws are made, rules of construction are sometimes used; which say how the law should be interpreted if there's confusion/question; like whether it should be construed narrowly or broadly; or in favor of defendants.

The ability was meant to be used flexibly; kinda like you had the feat all along; it wasn't meant to allow resets or shenanigans of any sort beyond the awesomeness of free feat resets.

Interpret with moderation; and against anything shenaniganical.

note: rules of construction are only used if there's a question in the first place; if you're confident already you don't need the rule of construction.

[Logic]

He can contribute as much as or more than the typical Duskblade. He is only 2 skill points behind Crusader and Warblade.

My Tactician has 8 skill points per level. (4 from class, 2 from intelligence bonus, 1 from Human, and 1 from favored class without giving up the HP every level*)

I ended up as the tank, the face, and the skill monkey in a group with one of everything (except a tank.)

So in my personal experience, Fighters are not just tier 5 or 4, they are what you make them. Though I admit they are never tier 1 or 2.


*Fast Learner feat from Advance races.

[eggynack]

He can contribute as much as or more than the typical Duskblade. He is only 2 skill points behind Crusader and Warblade.
He's not really just 2 skill points behind crusaders and warblades. That's practically a side note to the issues of this guy emulating ToB. He only progresses at half speed, which is significantly worse even if he has access to all of the maneuvers he has the initiator level for. Additionally, he doesn't have access to all of those maneuvers, because maneuver prerequisites become more and more harsh as you level. The crazy Schrodinger's fighter just doesn't emulate Tome of Battle very well.

The real question is if their mediocre Tome of Battle abilities are enough to get them to tier 3 when you add them to the fighter's variety of other approximately simultaneous feat abilities. I don't think they do. After maneuvers, fighter feats don't get you that far in terms of versatility. The distance between just tripping, and tripping, charging, grappling, riding, sundering, and whatever else you can think of, just doesn't make enough up in terms of distance. Most fighter feat chains are pretty mediocre, and having all of them doesn't do much. It does some work towards making previously situational feat chains more useful, but those situational feat chains tend to be bad too. It seems tier 4 to me. High tier 4, maybe, but not tier 3.

[Amnestic]

But it's a new feat. I'm not saying that your interpretation isn't reasonable, just that the RAW is open to argument here.

Special: "You can take this maneuver up to three times."

Which means, RAW, Schrodinger's fighter could only use it for three maneuvers. There's no exception for the feat retraining rules - it's a feat which can only ever be taken three times, regardless of switching feats around.

In fact it could even be argued that if you dropped it, you couldn't then take it up again with the same maneuver - because that would be taking the feat again, and it can only be taken up to three times. After all, "it's a new feat", as you argued.

You might argue the intention is that you can only spend a maximum of three feats on Martial Study at any one time but the text of the feat is clear: You can take it up to three times. And that's all.

[Gnaeus]

He's not really just 2 skill points behind crusaders and warblades. That's practically a side note to the issues of this guy emulating ToB. He only progresses at half speed, which is significantly worse even if he has access to all of the maneuvers he has the initiator level for. Additionally, he doesn't have access to all of those maneuvers, because maneuver prerequisites become more and more harsh as you level. The crazy Schrodinger's fighter just doesn't emulate Tome of Battle very well.
.

Actually, through most levels, he is much better at using ToB than the real initiators are.

Level 1 warblade gets one stance. 3 maneuvers. Level 1 fighter gets all level 1 maneuvers. Level 2 fighter gets all level 1 stances.

Level 4 warblade gets a second stance, but oops, no level 2 stances, so he just gets another one that the fighter already knows.

Level 9 warblade finally gets a non level-1 stance. And he does have some options available to him that the fighter doesn't get. However, if he chooses to be (for example) a battlefield controller, he wants to take Thicket of Blades, a third level stance. Oh, but wait. Devoted spirit isn't a Warblade school. At level 10, the fighter gets Thicket of Blades, Assassins Stance, Leaping Dragon Stance, Absolute Steel Stance, Giant Killing Style, Dance of the Spider, Crushing Weight of the Mountain, Roots of the mountain. Which 1 option is Mr. Warblade going to take that is more flexible than all of those?

More importantly, we know the fighter is already very comparable in damage output to a warblade, and at some levels better. The real difference is in versatility. That same level 10 warblade knows 8 maneuvers, including only 2 level 5s and 2 level 4s, and the other 4 are probably going to all be level 1 or 2 prereqs. Can he teleport? No. The fighter can. Can he cure himself or allies with a strike? No. Can he make ranged touch attacks if the enemy is across a ravine and he has no weapon? No. The fighter can. He has exactly 5 powers the fighter can't get (4 strikes, 1 stance.) The fighter has ALL the level 3 powers at his disposal, and is actually a ton more versatile than the WB. But wait, there's more! That level 10 warblade only has 5 readied maneuvers. So if he wants to have WRT and IHS readied (because they are probably the 2 most versatile maneuvers in the game) then he can only have 3 level 4 and 5 maneuvers readied and he needs to spend 5 minutes to change his strikes. And if he takes IHS and WRT, that means he has no prereqs to take high level Stone Dragon, Diamond Mind or Tiger Claw powers, all of which the fighter has up to level 3 at will. And that is JUST with ToB, it doesn't even include the fact that the fighter can master any fighting style or fight unarmed at any point.

Warblade must spend a standard action on a melee attack or doing nothing every few rounds to recover maneuvers. Assuming that the fighter cant recover maneuvers just by switching them out, he can still use every strike once in an encounter without having to spend a round not using ToB powers.

Yes, the very high level warblade has access to a lot of tricks the fighter can't match. But the tier system looks at mid levels first (roughly even, maybe advantage fighter) then low levels (massive advantage to fighter) and only then at high levels, and it is clear that even at high levels the fighter has a lot of tricks that the warblade can't match either.

[Amnestic]

Actually, through most levels, he is much better at using ToB than the real initiators are.

Level 1 warblade gets one stance. 3 maneuvers. Level 1 fighter gets all level 1 maneuvers. Level 2 fighter gets all level 1 stances.

While a schrodinger fighter can indeed get access to all the stances (assuming he meets IL, discipline* and maneuver number pre-reqs), but he only gets three maneuvers though - and he can only ever have those three specific maneuvers. As I noted above, you can only "take" the feat three times. Once you take it three times, you can't take it again. RAW is clear on this. And if he trades those feats away, he can't ever get them back.

*That discipline restriction becomes all the more important once you factor in he can only have three specific maneuvers ever, because it then limits his stance selection further to three disciplines max - possibly fewer depending on maneuver choices.

[Gnaeus]

That is an intentional misreading of the rules. It is an exception to the general rule that you can only take a feat once unless noted otherwise (so I can't take Dodge x3, for example). Compare with:
"You can gain Exotic Weapon Proficiency multiple times. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new type of exotic weapon."

The schroedingers fighter can still swap out his feats, as long as he doesn't have it more than 3 times at once.

If your incorrect reading of the rules were true, Schroedingers fighter would be high tier 4.

[DeltaEmil]

While a schrodinger fighter can indeed get access to all the stances (assuming he meets IL, discipline* and maneuver number pre-reqs), but he only gets three maneuvers though - and he can only ever have those three specific maneuvers. As I noted above, you can only "take" the feat three times. Once you take it three times, you can't take it again. RAW is clear on this. And if he trades those feats away, he can't ever get them back.I don't think that if you trade the Martial Study feats away that you can't ever have them again. But I concur on your readings that you're forever stuck on three maneuvers, and that's it. That would also mean that the schroedinger fighter can only have up to three low-level stances.

[Gnaeus]

Same answer. If you are misreading martial study, Schroedinger's fighter becomes tier 4. Reading it correctly (it doesn't say anything about retraining, and is just explaining how it works when you take the same feat multiple times) tier 3.

This is very much a RAI issue. Only a DM can answer it. I know it isn't how my local game works. (We didn't have Schroedingers fighter of course, but we had a Chameleon with Initiator levels and the floating feat) and I am still convinced we were using it correctly.

(Specifically "once you choose a maneuver with this feat, you can't change it" In this case, you aren't changing the maneuver you chose with the feat. you are taking the feat a different time, and anything you did before was not the same use of the feat. The false interpretation is akin to saying that if Schroedingers fighter takes "weapon focus: longsword" that his weapon focus is longsword any time he takes the feat, and that only by taking weapon focus multiple times can he take weapon focus in anything that isn't longsword.)

[nobodez]

What if, instead of a full spread of floating bonus feats, at each level the fighter can select an additional "suite" of fighter bonus feats, with the ability to, every two levels or so, replace a previous "suite" with another.

So, at first level, the "Suite Fighter" has only one "suite", and it contains his single fighter bonus feat. At second level the fighter not only gains a second bonus feat for his first "suite", but also gains a second "suite" of feats, which can be a different set of fighter bonus feats than the first. At third level the fighter can "retrain" one of his "suites", replacing the two bonus feats with a different choice. At fourth level the fighter adds a third fighter bonus feat to each of his first two "suites" (one of which may have been retrained at third level", and adds a third, three fighter bonus feat "suite". This process continues, with the odd levels allowing the fighter to retrain any "suite" of feats, while at the even levels, he adds a new fighter bonus feat to all of his existing "suites" and gains a new "suite" of fighter bonus feats.

The "Suite Fighter" can then, as a swift action that doesn't provoke AoOs, switch between any of his fighter bonus feat "suites". Each "suite" is self contained, so a fighter can have power attack in two separate "suites", or other feats that can only be taken a limited number of times (such as Martial Study). With each retraining he can choice these feats anew, as if he'd never chosen the feats that he had retrained (so there's no "three times for your entire career" limit on Martial Study either).

A fighter can also do a ritual, costing 100 gp per fighter level and 100 xp per fighter level (and these are "suite fighter" levels, not normal fighter levels, as expected for an ACF), and taking 8 hours, to retrain a single "suite" of fighter bonus feats. For completeness sake, say that the "suite fighter" gets a free version of this ritual at every odd level after first for the retraining class feature.

[TuggyNE]

What if, instead of a full spread of floating bonus feats, at each level the fighter can select an additional "suite" of fighter bonus feats, with the ability to, every two levels or so, replace a previous "suite" with another.

So, at first level, the "Suite Fighter" has only one "suite", and it contains his single fighter bonus feat. At second level the fighter not only gains a second bonus feat for his first "suite", but also gains a second "suite" of feats, which can be a different set of fighter bonus feats than the first. At third level the fighter can "retrain" one of his "suites", replacing the two bonus feats with a different choice. At fourth level the fighter adds a third fighter bonus feat to each of his first two "suites" (one of which may have been retrained at third level", and adds a third, three fighter bonus feat "suite". This process continues, with the odd levels allowing the fighter to retrain any "suite" of feats, while at the even levels, he adds a new fighter bonus feat to all of his existing "suites" and gains a new "suite" of fighter bonus feats.

The "Suite Fighter" can then, as a swift action that doesn't provoke AoOs, switch between any of his fighter bonus feat "suites". Each "suite" is self contained, so a fighter can have power attack in two separate "suites", or other feats that can only be taken a limited number of times (such as Martial Study). With each retraining he can choice these feats anew, as if he'd never chosen the feats that he had retrained (so there's no "three times for your entire career" limit on Martial Study either).

A fighter can also do a ritual, costing 100 gp per fighter level and 100 xp per fighter level (and these are "suite fighter" levels, not normal fighter levels, as expected for an ACF), and taking 8 hours, to retrain a single "suite" of fighter bonus feats. For completeness sake, say that the "suite fighter" gets a free version of this ritual at every odd level after first for the retraining class feature.

Hmm. That seems a lot more manageable, and honestly a lot more plausible than being able to literally switch to any configuration of feats at all as a free action. Only problem is that Martial Study/Stance is likely to want your free actions some of the time, but I guess them's the breaks.

[nobodez]

Hmm. That seems a lot more manageable, and honestly a lot more plausible than being able to literally switch to any configuration of feats at all as a free action. Only problem is that Martial Study/Stance is likely to want your free actions some of the time, but I guess them's the breaks.

That was the idea. It was a way to get the "variable feats" idea of the OP's Schrödinger Fighter, but without the infinite time sync that happens from being able to choose your feats anew every round. It likely doesn't reach as high into Tier 3 as the Schrödinger Fighter does, but it should cross the 4/3 barrier.

[Chronos]

Quoth zleflin:

The ability was meant to be used flexibly; kinda like you had the feat all along; it wasn't meant to allow resets or shenanigans of any sort beyond the awesomeness of free feat resets.
(emphasis mine)

Do you see how this might make it a little difficult to figure out what the intention is? You say that it isn't meant to allow resets; instead, it's meant to allow resets.

[Zerter]

Resets is broad, feat resets is specific. I would draw a circle within a circle to illustrate how this works, but it makes perfect sense what he is saying.

[Grod_The_Giant]

What if, instead of a full spread of floating bonus feats, at each level the fighter can select an additional "suite" of fighter bonus feats, with the ability to, every two levels or so, replace a previous "suite" with another.
I've seen people object strongly to this on the grounds that it "doesn't make sense. Why could I do X last round, but not anymore?" I would argue that's garbage and "no nice things for fighters" mentality, but then, I would (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=276280).

And I would still argue for T4-- he can do a decent number of things in combat, but still misses some important points and lacks out-of-combat utility.

[Lans]

What fighter feats give out of combat utility? I can only think of martial stance and study.

[Amnestic]

What fighter feats give out of combat utility? I can only think of martial stance and study.

There are apparently 216 possible Fighter Bonus Feats (http://dndtools.eu/feats/categories/fighter-bonus-feat/). While it's possible they missed some and possible I missed some reading that list, I saw no out of combat utility feats besides Martial Study/Stance. I may be wrong however.

[Gnaeus]

There are a few that are decent. Nothing great.
Some, like Vault and Pole Balance and Mountain Warrior, give small bonuses on skill checks.
The combat focus things let him get things like fast healing or blindsight 5. Combat focus requires a successful attack during an encounter, but does not necessarily have to be a combat encounter.
Combat Intuition gives you bonuses on analyzing an opponent.
Things like Improved Toughness, Block Arrow, or Armor specialization could be useful in trap encounters as well,

But then, Duskblades don't have a huge range of utility spells either, and their very small spells known list limits how many they can use. Warblades and Crusaders have less utility than the fighter, assuming that he can take different stances/maneuvers with bonus feats. If ToB is not on the table, I agree that either form of schroedingers fighter is T4.

[Slipperychicken]

My Tactician has 8 skill points per level. (4 from class, 2 from intelligence bonus, 1 from Human, and 1 from favored class without giving up the HP every level*)

I ended up as the tank, the face, and the skill monkey in a group with one of everything (except a tank.)

So in my personal experience, Fighters are not just tier 5 or 4, they are what you make them. Though I admit they are never tier 1 or 2.


*Fast Learner feat from Advance races.

Read the tier list again. It says optimization can bump classes up a tier, and that it's relative to other classes given similar optimization levels.

[Logic]

Read the tier list again. It says optimization can bump classes up a tier, and that it's relative to other classes given similar optimization levels.

I disagree with the idea that I have "optimized" my character. I took an alternate class feature and a feat that better suit my character concept. (Which is why I also have a high-for-a-fighter-intelligence.)

And yes, fighters are in great need of things to do besides fight. Address that and the fighter will move up a tier in capabilities.

[Shining Wrath]

I think this is Tier 3. Consider all the fighter builds: charger and ranged attacker and two weapon fighter and even sword & board. Whatever the situation calls for, schrodinger's fighter can take that role.

[Talderas]

Special: "You can take this maneuver up to three times."

Which means, RAW, Schrodinger's fighter could only use it for three maneuvers. There's no exception for the feat retraining rules - it's a feat which can only ever be taken three times, regardless of switching feats around.

Two things of note

1. You still must meet all prerequisites for the maneuver which means knowning a number of maneuvers to learn it. If you permit stances to count as maneuvers this can be alleviated by martial stance. Without that it's probably pretty safe to say that he won't be able to learn much more than 1 level 4 maneuver which he wouldn't even have access to take until level 14 compared to level 7 for the martial adept.

Assume you want any give stance and we have a pure fighter and only fighter bonus feats are retrainable. The 1st level feat is useless since he doesn't have an initiator level to take a 1st level maneuver. The first level a pure fighter can get a stance of any given level. Advance it by two levels for each maneuver from the discipline you need to know beyond the first.
1 - Lv 4
2 - Lv 6
3 - Lv 10
4 - Lv 14
5 - Lv 18

2. This actually causes some issues. There's more to martial study than just gaining a maneuver. You also gain the discipline's skill as a class skill. This means that the fighter could end up with skills with more ranks than would be permitted.

I think the change puts fighter at high tier 4. Ignoring martial study/stance the change I feel would bump fighter into tier 4 by increasing their combat versatility.