Are Spellcasters Overpowered?

[Tork]

So I read these boards daily & the consensus seems to be that the T1 casters (wizards especially) are overpowered in the extreme when compared to non-spellcasters.


But are they? Well, they sure are not in any game I run or most of the games I know of run by DM's that are Old Gornads like myself. It's not in the rules. So where does it come from? What makes the play style of some games make spellcasters so over powered?

First random thoughts:

1.Gentleman's Agreement This is the first thing that comes to my mind with other games. The DM and players make some sort of agreement to 'play fair' and 'not cheat' and 'not use broken or cheesey things' and to 'make sure everyone has fun'. The last one is the most odd one of all, as if spellcasters are overpowered in your game, then anyone without a spellcaster character is not having so much fun. I wonder what happens when you break the Agreement?

2.The Buddy Group This is where the group is all 'buddies' so everything is relaxed and carefree. Where the DM is not apart from the players, the DM is a player. This has the classic ''everyone is on the same side problem''. If all the players(and the DM player) all agree and think alike, then you will have problems.

3.Low Magic Worlds I think this is a big one. A great many DM's like Low Magic. But when you make the world magic weak, then any magic that exists is twice as strong. And you can do a fine Low Magic D&D game, if you alter the whole setting and rules to low magic. But if you just do the easy way of ''saying it's low magic'' you will run into problems.

4.More versatility This is the idea that a spellcaster can do anything. Though I'm not sure where it comes from, as spellcasters can't do anything. My best guess is that too many players play the character sheet. This is simple enough and easy to spot: this is the player who when anything happens in the game immediately looks down on their character sheet for the answer. So you have Player A is a fighter with a single character sheet full of equipment, feats, skills and notes; and Player B who has a character sheet, plus a couple pages of spells. So when both players characters encounter a locked door, then both look down to their character sheet for a way to open it. Player B can easily find Knock and use it to open a locked door, but player A does not have any type of ability on his sheet that says ''open door''. So by this line of thinking Player character A can't open a door as the ability is not on the sheet.

5. That a spellcaster makes other characters feel useless. This one is a bit confusing to me. How does a spellcaster do this? Sure there are some spells and magic effect that can do the work of class features, but none of them are infinite uses per day. A rouge can check for and remove traps all day and night, but a spellcaster can't.

[ThirdEmperor]

Short answer- Yes.

[eggynack]

Short answer- Yes.
Long answer- Yyyyyeeeeeesssssss.

[Raineh Daze]

A rouge can check for and remove traps all day and night, but a spellcaster can't.

How does makeup remove traps? :smalltongue:

[The Glyphstone]

To resolve #5, it's a difference between theoretical unlimited use and practical uses. The rogue could, in a vacuum, pick locks every round for an entire day. But unless you're in the Tomb of Horrors, one Wand of Knock will earn its weight many times over in terms of 'actual times you will need a lock opened per day'.

As for the rest of it...it's very easy to not play spellcasters as overpowered. But the ability to play one at less than 100% efficiency doesn't reduce their maximum power, any more than the DM's ability to houserule broken items/combos away makes said items/combos any less broken. It just means that particular group has avoided/solved the issue, while leaving it untouched for others to discover or stumble into in the future.

[White_Drake]

The first two points show how a game can still be fun with tier ones, not how tier ones are not broken. I'm not really certain what you mean by the third. The fourth is simply not true; spellcasters have hundreds (probably thousands) or spells, and can do anything. Also, it doesn't matter how resourceful the fighter's player is, I don't think he'll be able to come up with a way to teleport, fly, travel the planes, etcetera. As for the final point, he doesn't need to be able to open doors all day; how many doors will the average party need to unlock per day? Also, stepping on someone's toes half the time still sucks for the person whose toes are being stepped on.

[Killer Angel]

1.Gentleman's Agreement This is the first thing that comes to my mind with other games. The DM and players make some sort of agreement to 'play fair' and 'not cheat' and 'not use broken or cheesey things' and to 'make sure everyone has fun'.

2.The Buddy Group This is where the group is all 'buddies' so everything is relaxed and carefree.

4.More versatility This is the idea that a spellcaster can do anything. Though I'm not sure where it comes from, as spellcasters can't do anything.

5. That a spellcaster makes other characters feel useless. This one is a bit confusing to me. How does a spellcaster do this?

Answering the last one, with an example that falls also in the other questions.
We have a group that plays by gentleman's agreement, relaxed, yada yadda.
When you start to depend from the spellcasters for long distance rapid movement (also to flee from difficult fights), reliable informations, protections from nasty magic / energy drain / massive damage... in the end, you'll end thinking: what am I doing here?

[Flickerdart]

Spellcasters are theoretically more powerful than non-casters. It's not hard to build a caster that is not powerful. It's also not hard to build one that is. Anyway, to address your points.

1. A gentleman's agreement is not a spoken thing. You don't sit down and sign a paper. It is merely assumed, when you sit down at the table, that you are going to be a reasonable human being regardless of what character you brought. If someone breaks it, whether or not they're playing a caster...well, the group will handle it however they do things.

2. Elaborate. What are the problems when everyone is having fun?

3. 3.5 is possibly the worst system for low-magic, yes.

4. Fallacy. The wizard and the fighter can both use their imaginations to solve problems. But the character's capabilities are how those solutions are implemented into the game world, and when one has assets like "turn into any monster" and "summon any substance from thin air", creativity simply goes a whole lot further than if all you have is "I hit things with swords for +2 damage". Creativity doesn't let a fighter dispel a Wall of Force, or banish a demon, or fly.

5. Fallacy. Sure, a rogue can disable traps all day. But you don't need to disable traps all day, and if you replace that rogue with a wizard, the wizard can disable traps the few times you need traps disabled and do other things the rest of the time. Sure, a fighter can swing a sword all day. But when his hit points run out, he can't - and it's fairly trivial, as a spellcaster, to avoid taking any damage whatsoever, with a range of options from having summons/mind controlled minions to do the fighting for you, to making yourself impossible to harm by stacking all-day buffs.

In short, being a spellcaster doesn't simply let you be the greatest just because. It provides more ways you're able to affect the world around you. And in a game of make-believe, that's always incredibly powerful.

[Gerrtt]

I've personally never played in a game where the casters went power crazy and only used the most optimized choices and powers available to them. I recognize that they have the capacity to leave the mundanes far, far behind, but it's just not been my experience.

Are casters overpowered or are mundanes underpowered? Probably a little of both, but I think that the disparity is highlighted by the TO mentality of these (and other) message boards. I don't think in actual play you see as much, but it is still there. Otherwise nobody would ever play a monk, and in every game I've ever played someone has played one. And there's always been a fighter too, now that I think of it.

[Tork]

The first two points show how a game can still be fun with tier ones, not how tier ones are not broken. I'm not really certain what you mean by the third. The fourth is simply not true; spellcasters have hundreds (probably thousands) or spells, and can do anything. Also, it doesn't matter how resourceful the fighter's player is, I don't think he'll be able to come up with a way to teleport, fly, travel the planes, etcetera. As for the final point, he doesn't need to be able to open doors all day; how many doors will the average party need to unlock per day? Also, stepping on someone's toes half the time still sucks for the person whose toes are being stepped on.

Lots of Low Magic worlds just take all the magic and fantasy away from the world...then let the players be a by-the-book spellcaster. That makes them one of the few users of magic in the world, making them nearly all powerful. How do the guards that just have wooden clubs and fire deal with magic?

How do spellcasters get even hundreds of spells? Don't you use the spellcaster rules? Spellcasters can only memorize a set number of spells a day or cast a set number of spells per day. Spellcasters only know a set number of spells or only have a section to pick from. It is impossible for a spellcaster to do 'anything', as they have set limits as to what they can do. And my answer to the fighter teleporting would be to do it ''in game'', such a thing as bullying another to teleport them(but I know this does not count for most as the fighter ''did not do it himself'' or something).

The stepping on toes comes back to the problem of how can a spellcaster have so many 'anythings' to do all the time. Even a wand of knock will run out of charges. And does anyone note that Knock can only open stuck, barred, locked, held, or arcane locked closures of one door, box, or chest? Anyone notice that you can't effect anything with a Knock spell? Or do you just let knock work on anything? And did you know the spell can only undo two things per casting? Put three locks on a door and that is two knock spells to open...

[Flickerdart]

And does anyone note that Knock can only open stuck, barred, locked, held, or arcane locked closures of one door, box, or chest? Anyone notice that you can't effect anything with a Knock spell? Or do you just let knock work on anything? And did you know the spell can only undo two things per casting? Put three locks on a door and that is two knock spells to open...
Now who's not thinking outside the box? If you're a spellcaster, knock is far from your only means of getting past a door. You can turn to mist and slip through the cracks, delete the lock from reality, turn the door into a statue of your cat, phase through it as an ethereal or shadow being, teleport through to the other side, blow it up...

[OverdrivePrime]

Tork, I think you'll find the problem of gamebreaking casters more often in online games or game-store pickup games where not everyone knows each other from way back. With my real life group, casters aren't often a problem. We do have a gentle(wo)man's agreement, and everyone understands that they're on the same team, so when the mage hits certain power points, that's good for the ranger and the rogue as well.

However, what my group and many others who worry about T1 power have encountered is that by a certain point the primary casters make everyone else redundant.

Sure the rogue can check for traps all day. But, by level 10, there's no reason to put the rogue's neck on the line when the druid can do the job better.
The fighter can kick in doors, and hack down enemies like he's the second-coming of Guts (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qacgb2b8LVU), but by level 11, pretty much every warrior is starting to feel either redundant or completely unnecessary if there's a wizard, druid or cleric in the party. How much fun is it to be the fighter if anyone who can cast spells is better at fighting in melee than you? And if not that, they can either blow up or completely shut down anyone who you'd need to fight before you have a chance to cut down even one enemy.

And that's not even getting into what happens outside of combat. A caster's options both in and out of combat scales exponentially, while a mundane character's options are pretty much the same as when they started, with a few more bonuses.

[AmberVael]

Now who's not thinking outside the box? If you're a spellcaster, knock is far from your only means of getting past a door. You can turn to mist and slip through the cracks, delete the lock from reality, turn the door into a statue of your cat, phase through it as an ethereal or shadow being, teleport through to the other side, blow it up...

Beat it down with your fists... (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=195049)
KORG CAST KNOCK! :smalltongue:

[eggynack]

Lots of Low Magic worlds just take all the magic and fantasy away from the world...then let the players be a by-the-book spellcaster. That makes them one of the few users of magic in the world, making them nearly all powerful. How do the guards that just have wooden clubs and fire deal with magic?

How do spellcasters get even hundreds of spells? Don't you use the spellcaster rules? Spellcasters can only memorize a set number of spells a day or cast a set number of spells per day. Spellcasters only know a set number of spells or only have a section to pick from. It is impossible for a spellcaster to do 'anything', as they have set limits as to what they can do. And my answer to the fighter teleporting would be to do it ''in game'', such a thing as bullying another to teleport them(but I know this does not count for most as the fighter ''did not do it himself'' or something).

The stepping on toes comes back to the problem of how can a spellcaster have so many 'anythings' to do all the time. Even a wand of knock will run out of charges. And does anyone note that Knock can only open stuck, barred, locked, held, or arcane locked closures of one door, box, or chest? Anyone notice that you can't effect anything with a Knock spell? Or do you just let knock work on anything? And did you know the spell can only undo two things per casting? Put three locks on a door and that is two knock spells to open...
You're over-complicating things a little bit. Spell casters can't usually do everything all the time, but they can do most things all the time, and everything relevant some of the time. Sometimes, particularly at later levels, they can do everything all the time. Knock is far from the problem with spell casters. It just does one thing, and does it fairly well. The circumstances in which it's relevant are limited. Compare that to something like freezing fog. Imagine any battlefield you want, and then imagine slowing down everything in a 20 foot radius to five feet per round, having a grease effect over that whole area, and a terrible damage effect during the duration. It just ends combat, and does so without ever really interacting with the enemy.

What you need to do, in order to compare fighters and wizards, is to imagine them being played by the same player. Any level of creativity that the fighter brings to the table is also being used by the wizard, except the wizard can also reshape reality. You don't ask, "What can the fighter do?" You ask, "What can the fighter do that the wizard can't." It's a short list. Also, to make matters even worse, you have classes like the druid. Those guys tend to have more combat ability than a fighter, and that's before in combat spell casting.

[Sylthia]

To resolve #5, it's a difference between theoretical unlimited use and practical uses. The rogue could, in a vacuum, pick locks every round for an entire day. But unless you're in the Tomb of Horrors, one Wand of Knock will earn its weight many times over in terms of 'actual times you will need a lock opened per day'.

As for the rest of it...it's very easy to not play spellcasters as overpowered. But the ability to play one at less than 100% efficiency doesn't reduce their maximum power, any more than the DM's ability to houserule broken items/combos away makes said items/combos any less broken. It just means that particular group has avoided/solved the issue, while leaving it untouched for others to discover or stumble into in the future.

It also depends on the level of the party. At low levels, a wand of knock would cost a small fortune, and a wizard likely doesn't want all of his 2nd level spell slots going towards knock, but until mid-levels where wands are more easily purchased, a rogue can more easily earn his keep in the party.

[Aegis013]

How do spellcasters get even hundreds of spells? Don't you use the spellcaster rules? Spellcasters can only memorize a set number of spells a day or cast a set number of spells per day. Spellcasters only know a set number of spells or only have a section to pick from. It is impossible for a spellcaster to do 'anything', as they have set limits as to what they can do.

You can always use spells that can cast spells. Summon up creatures and command them to use their magical abilities, you now can cast 5-6 spells at least with one spell from your own personal resources.

You can get really crazy with things like the Shadowcraft Mage, who can cast Silent Image and have Silent Image cast spells for him all day long.

Spellcasters can get there. It doesn't mean they will in a given game though. Although my table's spellcasters get there frequently.

[Eldan]

4.More versatility This is the idea that a spellcaster can do anything. Though I'm not sure where it comes from, as spellcasters can't do anything. My best guess is that too many players play the character sheet. This is simple enough and easy to spot: this is the player who when anything happens in the game immediately looks down on their character sheet for the answer. So you have Player A is a fighter with a single character sheet full of equipment, feats, skills and notes; and Player B who has a character sheet, plus a couple pages of spells. So when both players characters encounter a locked door, then both look down to their character sheet for a way to open it. Player B can easily find Knock and use it to open a locked door, but player A does not have any type of ability on his sheet that says ''open door''. So by this line of thinking Player character A can't open a door as the ability is not on the sheet.
.

This line of thinking is slightly annoying to me. Given an equally smart player, both can come up with the same non-ability idea. Or in other words:
The fighter can have a smart idea to overcome an obstacle.
The wizard could have the same smart idea or use a spell, so he has more options.

[Gharkash]

My two cents.

In mid-op and up the problems start to show. Spellcasters do not need every spell to outshine or overpower, they just need a good selection.

This was evident in the last campaign i played in. Short version goes like this: wizard becomes from almost useless to valuable asset just by getting glitterdust and being the only one with force effects, able to hurt incorporeal enemies, dread necro debuffs everything, his summons stand toe to toe with the swordsage and surpass the two weapon fighting ranger (most of the times) and still has the Cha and skills to be partyface with minimal investment.

When your ranger, fully focused on combat, is being surpassed by the summons of the DN that just took two feats to compliment them, and that summon is just one spell of that DN's class features, with in and out of combat value, i think you are entitled to feel a tad disappointed.

[Sylthia]

How does makeup remove traps? :smalltongue:

It gums up the gears to the point it doesn't spring open properly.

[Flickerdart]

This line of thinking is slightly annoying to me. Given an equally smart player, both can come up with the same non-ability idea. Or in other words:
The fighter can have a smart idea to overcome an obstacle.
The wizard could have the same smart idea or use a spell, so he has more options.
Or, more importantly, the wizard can have a smart idea and use a spell. Lots of smart ideas are rubbish if you have no way of making them happen. The mundanes can only use the environment for resources. The casters can make their own environment, and their own resources.

How does makeup remove traps? :smalltongue:

It doesn't, but it can create them.

[AmberVael]

Or, more importantly, the wizard can have a smart idea and use a spell. Lots of smart ideas are rubbish if you have no way of making them happen. The mundanes can only use the environment for resources. The casters can make their own environment, and their own resources.

Yes, this. This is exactly what I was going to say.

Sometimes, you do just cast Knock on the door.

Other times you don't have Knock, but instead you convert the door into a rolling spikeball (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/fabricate.htm)* that crashes into all those pesky enemies hiding behind it.

*Results may vary depending on door material and quality. The writer of this post takes no responsibility for any horrible outcomes that occur from attempting this. The writer of this post takes all responsibility for any awesome outcomes that occur from attempting this.

[White_Drake]

Lots of Low Magic worlds just take all the magic and fantasy away from the world...then let the players be a by-the-book spellcaster. That makes them one of the few users of magic in the world, making them nearly all powerful. How do the guards that just have wooden clubs and fire deal with magic?

How do spellcasters get even hundreds of spells? Don't you use the spellcaster rules? Spellcasters can only memorize a set number of spells a day or cast a set number of spells per day. Spellcasters only know a set number of spells or only have a section to pick from. It is impossible for a spellcaster to do 'anything', as they have set limits as to what they can do. And my answer to the fighter teleporting would be to do it ''in game'', such a thing as bullying another to teleport them(but I know this does not count for most as the fighter ''did not do it himself'' or something).

The stepping on toes comes back to the problem of how can a spellcaster have so many 'anythings' to do all the time. Even a wand of knock will run out of charges. And does anyone note that Knock can only open stuck, barred, locked, held, or arcane locked closures of one door, box, or chest? Anyone notice that you can't effect anything with a Knock spell? Or do you just let knock work on anything? And did you know the spell can only undo two things per casting? Put three locks on a door and that is two knock spells to open...

I meant that there are hundreds of spells in 3.5, not that casters get all of them at once; sorry, I was unclear. Of course, they still get a lot of spells if they're tier one, and I think that they can have spontaneous access to all of them if they really want it. Of course, that's TO. Also, saying that you can get help from a wizard, and therefore you are as versatile as a wizard is a bit odd. You're right that 3.5 is horribly suited to low-magic, but 3.5 is high-magic by default, and poor DMing is poor DMing, so I don't really see how it's relevant to the discussion.

[Flickerdart]

I meant that there are hundreds of spells in 3.5
Thousands, actually.

[ericgrau]

but player A does not have any type of ability on his sheet that says ''open door''. So by this line of thinking Player character A can't open a door as the ability is not on the sheet.
This ability was actually on the character sheet in 2e and is based on strength. 3.5e still has it and it even has more well defined rules on a greater variety of ways to do it with a melee character. Heck it even tends to be easier/cheaper than knock because then you don't have to blow all your spell slots on knock, shatter, disintegrate, etc. But the problem is those rules are buried deep in the rules and not on your character sheet. Many rules are like that too. With the ability of computers to figure out a large number of modifiers and insert them onto a printable sheet, I think they should bring it back onto the character sheet via some automated tool. Or maybe I'll make that tool some day when I'm not lazy. In the mean time it is in my sig cheat sheets. But having what you can do and not what you can't do right in front of you would be even better.

[Gnaeus]

This ability was actually on the character sheet in 2e and is based on strength. 3.5e still has it and it even has more well defined rules on a greater variety of ways to do it with a melee character. Heck it even tends to be easier/cheaper than knock because then you don't have to blow all your spell slots on knock, shatter, disintegrate, etc.

1. The druid is very likely to have a higher strength than the fighter, as is the wizard, if he is in a combat form, as is the cleric, with persist Righteous Wrath.

2. I find that for the locked door to even be a factor, pretty soon all the doors are 3 foot thick steel or unobtanium. Then the walls have to ALSO be made of unobtanium, or people just break/thoqqua the wall next to the door.

But ultimately the door is a red herring. In a group with a rogue, most folks will let him have his 30 seconds of fame and open the locked door. The reason that a caster is stronger than the rogue is only partially because he can replace the rogue if he chooses to do so. It is more because the fighter has times when his class abilities are useless (anytime when he isn't fighting). The rogue has times when his class abilities are useless (like when fighting undead or oozes). The cleric or wizard can fly, poof themselves across the world, see invisible things, melee or ranged attack approximately as well as or better than the fighter, bypass obstacles (not just doors, but walls, cliffs, traps, etc) approximately as well as or better than the rogue, lock down battlefields, make minions, create magic items, and a whole lot more, all in the same day with a good spell selection, and he can make more items to cover the days when he chooses poorly. He can also completely retool his abilities between one day and the next to do completely different things if the situation calls for it.

Going back to original question, however, my answer would be no. Casters are stronger than non casters, but this does not make them overpowered. Muggles are weaker than casters, but this does not make them underpowered. It means they are at different power levels. An all caster party works fine. An all muggle party works fine. A caster/muggle party has power issues in some groups.

[Eldonauran]

But are they?
They can be overpowered, yes. I often play spellcasters because I find it enjoyable to have the energies of the cosmos at my finger tips and using only a fraction of the power available to me to resolve the situations I come across.

Should I come across a situation that demands every last ounce of my arcane might to overcome, I rise to the challenge in a blazing maelstrom of destruction and complain about it afterwards. I'm a bloody spellcaster! Leave the grunt work for the mudanes. Someone has to pull them to safety when they chose to jump from frying pan to fiery inferno.

That is my entire reason for playing a spellcaster. Not everyone likes the bookwork that comes with being one. I take the spotlight only when I am needed. Your mileage may vary.


1.Gentleman's Agreement This is the first thing that comes to my mind with other games. The DM and players make some sort of agreement to 'play fair' and 'not cheat' and 'not use broken or cheesey things' and to 'make sure everyone has fun'. The last one is the most odd one of all, as if spellcasters are overpowered in your game, then anyone without a spellcaster character is not having so much fun. I wonder what happens when you break the Agreement?
Bah, I don't like the gentleman's agreement. Then again, its not how I play the game.


2.The Buddy Group This is where the group is all 'buddies' so everything is relaxed and carefree. Where the DM is not apart from the players, the DM is a player. This has the classic ''everyone is on the same side problem''. If all the players(and the DM player) all agree and think alike, then you will have problems.
I don't know about this quote. I run pretty good, relaxed games (and participate in them as well, when not the DM). As the DM, I play along with the players, but not as a PC. I live and breathe every NPC and weave a tapestry of fantasy the reacts dynamically to the actions of the players, who had better be on the same side, otherwise why are they playing anyway? D&D is a cooperative game and isn't designed for PvP.

I run combat and encounters as though the creatures had intelligence and the players have to push themselves to keep pace. The concerned look on a players face when facing the mortality of his character is the stuff on which I thrive. The rush of triumph when they squeak through an encounter, barely intact but functional, is the dessert that comes with a game well played. I don't actively try to kill the characters, the monsters do. I am not above pointing out optimal tactics to the group when I feel as if they aren't playing to their character's strengths.

All of that is what I consider a 'relaxed and carefree' enviroment to roleplay in. Hold on to your seats! :smallamused:


3.Low Magic Worlds I think this is a big one. A great many DM's like Low Magic. But when you make the world magic weak, then any magic that exists is twice as strong. And you can do a fine Low Magic D&D game, if you alter the whole setting and rules to low magic. But if you just do the easy way of ''saying it's low magic'' you will run into problems.
Low magic worlds are fun. I've never ran one without approval of my players and when I have, it was to be expected. Gritty, difficult and rewarding. None of the players chose to play a spellcaster (or a 'pure' caster, anyway), though I could have adapted one of those in as well.


4.More versatility This is the idea that a spellcaster can do anything. Though I'm not sure where it comes from, as spellcasters can't do anything. My best guess is that too many players play the character sheet. This is simple enough and easy to spot: this is the player who when anything happens in the game immediately looks down on their character sheet for the answer. So you have Player A is a fighter with a single character sheet full of equipment, feats, skills and notes; and Player B who has a character sheet, plus a couple pages of spells. So when both players characters encounter a locked door, then both look down to their character sheet for a way to open it. Player B can easily find Knock and use it to open a locked door, but player A does not have any type of ability on his sheet that says ''open door''. So by this line of thinking Player character A can't open a door as the ability is not on the sheet.
Given enough time and fore-warning, a wizard can prepare for anything. Don't give him that much power. Someone that abuses the divination powers will quickly begin irratating the spirits, regardless if they are compensated for their service. They are not at the beck and call of some mortal fool tampering with the arcane magics.

Divorcing the fluff from the mechanics and not allowing the world to live, breath and react to the often mentioned 'abuses' or theoretical builds that frequent the board, can (and is) often game-breaking. That way lies madness. Sure, the rules say that you can do it. The rules don't say how the world reacts. That's the DM's job.


5. That a spellcaster makes other characters feel useless. This one is a bit confusing to me. How does a spellcaster do this? Sure there are some spells and magic effect that can do the work of class features, but none of them are infinite uses per day. A rouge can check for and remove traps all day and night, but a spellcaster can't.
A spellcaster making the others feel useless, in my opinion, is a poorly played character. I've described how I play one. It isn't the only way to play one. I just know that my way doesn't leave anyone with any hurt feelings, and I sincerely enjoy it.

Disclaimer: If your group/DM plays differently that what I have described, good for you! I neither hinted nor proclaimed my way to be superior or right.

[JusticeZero]

1.Gentleman's Agreement This is the first thing that comes to my mind with other games. The DM and players make some sort of agreement to 'play fair' and 'not cheat' and 'not use broken or cheesey things' and to 'make sure everyone has fun'. The last one is the most odd one of all, as if spellcasters are overpowered in your game, then anyone without a spellcaster character is not having so much fun. I wonder what happens when you break the Agreement?The issue here is that it becomes more and more pronounced as time goes on. I was playing a spellcaster in a game where everyone else was various fighty types. I wasn't even really trying to break the system, just straight up single class full caster. At a certain point, I turned into Angel Summoner, and the only way that I could let them have fun was if I overtly didn't do anything effective in cases where everybody at the table knew that I could have soloed the encounter without blinking, and each one of them knew a different combo of my abilities I could do it with. "Um... or I could cast ___.. it's no trouble really, I have loads and loads of spells left for the day... *meek*"
4.More versatility This is the idea that a spellcaster can do anything. Though I'm not sure where it comes from, as spellcasters can't do anything.The rest of the party learns what you can do. The fighter goes to the door and thinks, "Hmm, I could kick it down and maybe alert everyone or set off a trap, or, um, chop it.. or I can look over at the Wizard's Wand of Knock.

Also, at a point, the wizard actually has more resources to expend than the rest of the party. The fighters are hamburger and the wizard has half their spells left, they just haven't had time to cast them because the combats are only so long.

[Deophaun]

How do spellcasters get even hundreds of spells? Don't you use the spellcaster rules? Spellcasters can only memorize a set number of spells a day or cast a set number of spells per day. Spellcasters only know a set number of spells or only have a section to pick from. It is impossible for a spellcaster to do 'anything', as they have set limits as to what they can do. And my answer to the fighter teleporting would be to do it ''in game'', such a thing as bullying another to teleport them(but I know this does not count for most as the fighter ''did not do it himself'' or something).
A wizard who leaves spell slots open can take 15 minutes and fill one (or more) of them with any spell he has access to. That could well constitute hundreds. Throw in that one option is the ability to planeshift somewhere with slow time, where an hour passes in a year, and you've got all the spells you could ever want with all the time to memorize them.

[Grytorm]

I don't understand where this specific claim comes from. That a wizard can spend 15 minutes at any time to prepare spells, could you explain how this works?

[eggynack]

I don't understand where this specific claim comes from. That a wizard can spend 15 minutes at any time to prepare spells, could you explain how this works?
Here ya go:
"When preparing spells for the day, a wizard can leave some of these spell slots open. Later during that day, she can repeat the preparation process as often as she likes, time and circumstances permitting. During these extra sessions of preparation, the wizard can fill these unused spell slots. She cannot, however, abandon a previously prepared spell to replace it with another one or fill a slot that is empty because she has cast a spell in the meantime. That sort of preparation requires a mind fresh from rest. Like the first session of the day, this preparation takes at least 15 minutes, and it takes longer if the wizard prepares more than one-quarter of her spells."

[navar100]

No they're not. Powerful, yes, but not overpowered. Given any encounter it is possible to come up with some combination of spells and feats to overcome it allowing for everything ever published. That's a good mental exercise. For actual game play, a spellcaster does not have access to everything ever published. He does not always have the exact spell needed at the exact moment it's needed. He may not have prepared it. He may not even know it. Saving throws are made. Spell Resistance isn't overcome. He may not have a particular feat.

[PlusSixPelican]

A wizard who leaves spell slots open can take 15 minutes and fill one (or more) of them with any spell he has access to. That could well constitute hundreds. Throw in that one option is the ability to planeshift somewhere with slow time, where an hour passes in a year, and you've got all the spells you could ever want with all the time to memorize them.

Spontaneous casting Wizard is a bit much.

On the topic, there's a flipside not often brought up. Do people playing mundanes put the same effort into building their character in all of these cases? Not that this is the case every time, but I have a hard time believing it DOESN'T.

Also, at lower levels, being a Tier 1 character can be kind of painful. For example; Pathfinder Cleric, level 1. With luck, you start with maybe...6 spells a day. Likely, your first level slots are going to be gobbled up by people needing to not die, and your cantrips, while infinite, do not do very much. You probably couldn't afford much armor, so you're be uncomfortably squishier than you'd like to be to engage in combat.

I'm not defending cheesewizard. The tiers are *not* the same across all levels, and those low levels as a full caster can be painful (unless you're a Druid). Just my two cp.


It doesn't, but it can create them.

*ba dum tish*

[Emperor Tippy]

To the OP, yes spellcasters are massively overpowered when compared to melee (although in my opinion it's more that melee is massively underpowered).

Using nothing not in the SRD I can give you a level 20 caster who can not be beat by any ECL 20 non-caster you care to make (using all official 3.5 sources).

[eggynack]

No they're not. Powerful, yes, but not overpowered. Given any encounter it is possible to come up with some combination of spells and feats to overcome it allowing for everything ever published. That's a good mental exercise. For actual game play, a spellcaster does not have access to everything ever published. He does not always have the exact spell needed at the exact moment it's needed. He may not have prepared it. He may not even know it. Saving throws are made. Spell Resistance isn't overcome. He may not have a particular feat.
You keep saying this, and it's always utterly untrue. Except for the first thing, anyway. Power is relative, so the term "overpowered" doesn't mean much. Anyway, the point is that the wizard doesn't need exact spells at exact moments. He doesn't need a door opening spell to open a door, and a troll killing spell to kill a troll, and a chasm crossing spell to cross a chasm. Much of the time, a single spell can solve many situations. You can cast something like polymorph, and it'll be applicable when you're trying to open a door, or kill a troll, or cross a chasm. Additionally, polymorph lacks a saving throw, and doesn't touch spell resistance. For another example, how about stone shape? You can construct a workable bridge, or shape the stone around the door, or use one of the spell's many combat applications. People often act like every spell has one perfect situation, and every situation has one perfect spell. Were that true, casting would be as you say. However, many spells have many good situations, and many situations have many applicable spells. That's why wizards are awesome.

Compare this to fighters. Fighter tools tend to be incredibly single use. Take something high power, like tripping. That line of feats basically reads, "Seriously harm target medium sized, ground bound, two legged being." When you compare an ability like that to something more universal like solid fog, the poor fate of fighters becomes more apparent.

[eggynack]

On the topic, there's a flipside not often brought up. Do people playing mundanes put the same effort into building their character in all of these cases? Not that this is the case every time, but I have a hard time believing it DOESN'T.
Mundane characters often have effort put into their optimization. Mundane build optimization often actually takes far more work than caster build optimization, because it requires complicated feat lines and a series of short dips into front loaded melee classes. Mundane optimization tops out at around tier three, compared to wizards who are tier one.

[Augmental]

Also, at lower levels, being a Tier 1 character can be kind of painful. For example; Pathfinder Cleric, level 1. With luck, you start with maybe...6 spells a day. Likely, your first level slots are going to be gobbled up by people needing to not die, and your cantrips, while infinite, do not do very much. You probably couldn't afford much armor, so you're be uncomfortably squishier than you'd like to be to engage in combat.

A wooden holy symbol, scalemail, and a morningstar only costs 59 gp; well within the cleric's average starting wealth of 140 gp. He's not as good as the fighter in combat at first level, but he's not bad.

[The Glyphstone]

A wooden holy symbol, scalemail, and a morningstar only costs 59 gp; well within the cleric's average starting wealth of 140 gp. He's not as good as the fighter in combat at first level, but he's not bad.

Not to mention that at level 1, it's even more effective than normal to have a cleric whose spells are devoted primarily to buffs and combat rather than being a healbot, because everything is rocket tag anyways and having more people shooting rockets means the enemy gets less chances to shoot their rockets at you.

[ericgrau]

How does makeup remove traps? :smalltongue:
Rouges come with makeup remover as a bonus. So common beginner mistakes, i.e. traps, may be undone.


1. The druid is very likely to have a higher strength than the fighter, as is the wizard, if he is in a combat form, as is the cleric, with persist Righteous Wrath.
It's tempting to get into more details and all the various options, but all those are also melee anyway. Either way you benefit from having more rules on your character sheet instead of on page 94 of the DMG.

[Karnith]

I don't understand where this specific claim comes from. That a wizard can spend 15 minutes at any time to prepare spells, could you explain how this works?
Since you asked explicitly where this comes from, the rules for preparing spells as a wizard can be found on the SRD here (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm), and the rules for leaving spell slots open can be found here (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm#wizardSpellSelectionandPreparatio n).

[navar100]

You keep saying this, and it's always utterly untrue. Except for the first thing, anyway. Power is relative, so the term "overpowered" doesn't mean much. Anyway, the point is that the wizard doesn't need exact spells at exact moments. He doesn't need a door opening spell to open a door, and a troll killing spell to kill a troll, and a chasm crossing spell to cross a chasm. Much of the time, a single spell can solve many situations. You can cast something like polymorph, and it'll be applicable when you're trying to open a door, or kill a troll, or cross a chasm. Additionally, polymorph lacks a saving throw, and doesn't touch spell resistance. For another example, how about stone shape? You can construct a workable bridge, or shape the stone around the door, or use one of the spell's many combat applications. People often act like every spell has one perfect situation, and every situation has one perfect spell. Were that true, casting would be as you say. However, many spells have many good situations, and many situations have many applicable spells. That's why wizards are awesome.

Compare this to fighters. Fighter tools tend to be incredibly single use. Take something high power, like tripping. That line of feats basically reads, "Seriously harm target medium sized, ground bound, two legged being." When you compare an ability like that to something more universal like solid fog, the poor fate of fighters becomes more apparent.

I keep saying it because it is true. All you've said here is that the spellcaster is more versatile. Being more versatile is not the same thing as being overpowered. The warrior classes are not one trick ponies, though they do have less tricks than spellcasters can potentially have. That's not a universal problem among all playing groups. People have different tolerance levels of the versatility. In that sense being overpowered is subjective. See any Tome of Battle thread for other examples of this phenomenon.

[eggynack]

I keep saying it because it is true. All you've said here is that the spellcaster is more versatile. Being more versatile is not the same thing as being overpowered. The warrior classes are not one trick ponies, though they do have less tricks than spellcasters can potentially have. That's not a universal problem among all playing groups. People have different tolerance levels of the versatility. In that sense being overpowered is subjective. See any Tome of Battle thread for other examples of this phenomenon.
The problem with that claim is two fold. The first, is that versatility is actually a measure of power in D&D. Fighters just aren't able to contribute to nearly as many situations, which is what the tier system is designed to measure. When given a whole pile of problems, the wizard is likely to have an answer to most or all of them, and the fighter is likely to have an answer to very few of them. The second problem is that they also tend to be more powerful, in a direct manner. The solutions they have to problems tend to just be better than the fighter's solution.

Let's go back to tripping versus solid fog. The latter is usable in more situations, which means an increase in versatility, however it's also better in the situations in which it's usable, which means an increase in power. Tripping is likely to partially lock down a single enemy for a round. Solid fog is likely to completely lock down a twenty foot radius of enemies for a number of rounds. A fighter's grappling attempts to trade actions one for one with an enemy. A druid's giant crocodile summons tends to succeed at grappling a higher percentage of the time, faces no downside if he fails, and ultimately trades a single action on the part of the druid, for the summon's duration on the part of the enemy. The giant crocodile is also more versatile, because it can also be other animals, and it can grapple a larger variety of enemies than the fighter can, due to the higher modifier. Thus, we have a greater versatility, and a greater level of power. These things only go up as the casters level, and tend to remain static on the melee guys.

[MukkTB]

Linear Warriors and Quadratic Wizards is a thing. Depending on the skill of the players, the wizard overtakes the fighter somewhere between level 1 and level 5. The more optimization applied, the sooner the wizard overcomes. The druid doesn't really fit into that though. Its two crappy linear Warriors and a quadratic wizard all in one. The cleric has a similar thing going on.

However low tier classes can contribute fairly well at very low levels. By time you make it to 10 or 12, they are really struggling to be relevant.

[JusticeZero]

All you've said here is that the spellcaster is more versatile. Being more versatile is not the same thing as being overpowered.This is technically true. However, most of the things a spellcaster can do that are more versatile are also quite powerful in their own right.

[GilesTheCleric]

Thousands, actually.

Yup. Clerics alone have over a thousand: my old (expansive list) had ~1050 spells (I compiled them by hand, so there are no duplicates there, and I know I'm missing some sources), and dndtools says that there are 1173 cleric spells. Some of those are duplicates, and they're missing some, but it's probably a pretty accurate number. It also says that there are 3913 spells total, but I can't give any sort of estimate as to the accuracy of that number. Based on their cleric spell count, though, I would imagine it's pretty close.

Non-casters just can't keep up. Scroll through these boards to any of the huge number of threads that have asked the exact same thing, and you'll see the same answer every time. There was a pretty length lvl 16 druid vs fighter one a week or three ago that, aside from the impolite posts, did a great job at highlighting the real, practical differences.

[eggynack]

Non-casters just can't keep up. Scroll through these boards to any of the huge number of threads that have asked the exact same thing, and you'll see the same answer every time. There was a pretty length lvl 16 druid vs fighter one a week or three ago that, aside from the impolite posts, did a great job at highlighting the real, practical differences.
Yeah, that was a good thread. That wall of living stone plan was crazy fun to put together, and is still my likely go to plan for any future high level druid versus fighter matches. The biggest highlights for me were that the druid was effectively winning through nothing but melee combat, and that I got to stick one of those fancy battle tables together for the first time. Some of the failed plans were great fun too, like the summoned roc plan, and the walls of thorns plan. I also have a penchant for the many plans based around crazy blasting attacks, though those have a natural weakness to the possibility of energy immunity. I never did put together that plan involving a massive pile of simultaneous earthquakes. I should put some more thought into that sometime.

[CRtwenty]

I keep saying it because it is true. All you've said here is that the spellcaster is more versatile. Being more versatile is not the same thing as being overpowered. The warrior classes are not one trick ponies, though they do have less tricks than spellcasters can potentially have. That's not a universal problem among all playing groups. People have different tolerance levels of the versatility. In that sense being overpowered is subjective. See any Tome of Battle thread for other examples of this phenomenon.

Versitality = Power in 3.X. Pretty much every single build or strategy in the game has a counter to it. Warrior types, by their design are essentially stuck following one basic strategy while Casters are able to change theirs on the fly in response to a situation.

Look at V's second fight with Zz'dtri in the main comic for an example. Zz'dtri built himself to counter V's main strategy, however V was able to improvise on the fly and come up with a completely new method of attack to win the fight. A warrior type in that fight wouldn't have been able to adapt like that and would have gotten schooled.

[Killer Angel]

Also, at lower levels, being a Tier 1 character can be kind of painful. For example; Pathfinder Cleric, level 1. With luck, you start with maybe...6 spells a day. Likely, your first level slots are going to be gobbled up by people needing to not die, and your cantrips, while infinite, do not do very much. You probably couldn't afford much armor, so you're be uncomfortably squishier than you'd like to be to engage in combat.

At lev. 1, being a Tier 1 character can be painful.
Being a T5 character will be painful.
A first lev. cleric isn't so squishy (moderately good HP and AC, and spells on the top of it): to find yourself in CC can be dangerous, but this can be said for every melee class: at first lev. they all have to be careful in combat.

[Gwendol]

Powerful, yes, overpowered? No.

I guess the wizard can be considered overpowdered compared to the rouge though?

[Kelb_Panthera]

Here ya go:
"When preparing spells for the day, a wizard can leave some of these spell slots open. Later during that day, she can repeat the preparation process as often as she likes, time and circumstances permitting. During these extra sessions of preparation, the wizard can fill these unused spell slots. She cannot, however, abandon a previously prepared spell to replace it with another one or fill a slot that is empty because she has cast a spell in the meantime. That sort of preparation requires a mind fresh from rest. Like the first session of the day, this preparation takes at least 15 minutes, and it takes longer if the wizard prepares more than one-quarter of her spells."

^This is a direct quote from PHB pg 178.



For the "How can a wizard even afford to have -all- the spells?" question; let's do some math.

Someone above said that there're just a bit under 4000 spells, total, in the game. If we assume that 1/3 are sorc/wiz only, 1/3 are cleric/druid only, and 1/3 are overlapping then we have 2640 spells that a wizard can know. This is likely an over-estimate.

If we then assume an equal distribution between each spell level we average 5 pages in a spell book per spell for 13,200 pages to scribe every sorc/wiz spell in the game. Again, this is likely an over-estimate since there tend to be more low-level spells than high-level ones.

A Boccob's Blessed Book (DMG page 249) allows a wizard to pay 12,500gp for 1000 pages of spells. Therefore, for the cost of 14 BBB's a wizard can scribe every spell that is available to him in the game for 175,000gp.

"but kelb," you say, "a wizard has to actually find those spells somewhere before he can scribe them." PHB page 179 tells us that another wizard will typically charge a 50gp/spell-level fee for allowing you to copy a spell from his book. This adds an additional 660,000gp cost. This would put getting -all- spells available to a wizard in the budget for the WBL of a 21st level wizard. However, after a certain point, this theoretical wizard would have amassed so many and so varied a list of spells that getting new ones would likely become a straight trade for the spell he's learning. That is, he sells a spell of equal level to the caster he's buying a spell from and, thus, negates the cost. This should bring the overall cost down to within WBL for a non-epic character.

Therefore, it -is- theoretically possible for a wizard to, in fact, know every spell he possibly could, in-spite of the (likely dramatic) over-estimation of this cost.

@Tork, specifically:

I don't understand the statement "A spell-caster can't do anything." Could you clarify the meaning of this statement?

[Eldan]

Or he could go Mage of the Arcane Order, for DMs who don't hand spells out easily.

[Amphetryon]

You can solve most of the "issues" arising from a spellcaster's power level within a game. The fact that you can fix them doesn't mean these issues aren't problems. See also: Oberoni Fallacy.


There is no problem, inconsistency, loophole or mechanical issue with (whatever rule) because you can always Rule 0 the problem; inconsistency, loophole or mechanical issue.

[Togo]

So I read these boards daily & the consensus seems to be that the T1 casters (wizards especially) are overpowered in the extreme when compared to non-spellcasters.

But are they? Well, they sure are not in any game I run or most of the games I know of run by DM's that are Old Gornads like myself. It's not in the rules. So where does it come from? What makes the play style of some games make spellcasters so over powered?


It comes down to the style of the game being played.

If your ability to contribute to the game is based around the capabilities on your characters sheet, then all that really matters is how many you have and how applicable they are. So long as you get to use your feat/spell/gadget/broadsword, and using it makes a noticeable difference to the game, then your character feels useful and powerful. So in that sense, beyond low level spellcasters are 'better' because they get customisable abilities in large numbers.

But that's a big if. Plenty of games aren't based around the capabilities on your character sheet. In general, the more you're playing a fully fleshed out character in a detailed world, and the less you're playing a build combatting various abstract challenges, the more such mechanical distinctions matter. The more you're seeking to contribute to a group rather than maximise your own character's power, the less individual capability matters. And the more story, setting and gameworld elements there are in the game the less likely the game will be turning on a character sheet ability.

Even if you assume that balancing character sheet abilities between characters is important, the construction and assumptions in your game matter.

If you really want spellcasters to dominate everything, make sure you follow these simple steps.

-Allow characters to regain spells whenever they want, with nothing much happening in the world while they're out of action.
-Allow player characters access to every spell and every monster in every book, rather than restricting availabilty depending on what you want in your game.
-Make sure challenges are telegraphed a day in advance. No less, or spellcasters won't be able to learn the right spells. No more, or story and setting elements may start to creep in to displace character sheet abilities.
-Make sure that spells are interpreted as broadly as possible, with none of the pesky limitations included in the spell. In general 'high-op' play will favour generous interpretations of existing abilities, even when the end result is undesirable. The broader and more generous the interpretation, the more those will the largest range of abilities will benefit.
-Play down or ignore practical difficulties wherever possible.

The playstyles favoured on these boards, particularly the higher optimisation bands, favours spellcasters a great deal. In a more traditional environment, there are fewer problems.

That's not to say there isn't a mechanical problem here. Spellcasters have a large number of one-off abilities. A one-off ability needs to be powerful compared to alternatives, or else it's not worth using, so in general spells are more powerful than their mundane equivalents. The balance is supposed to be the specialised nature of the spells, and the limited number of uses they have. If you allow specialised spells to be broadly interpreted in a generous fashion, handwave the recovery of spells, or in other ways increase the viability of one-off powers over continual powers, then of course the spellcasters will become more powerful as a result. In general, if you allow a character to ignore or overcome limitations inherent in their abilities, then you invite a balance problem.

In many games this isn't a issue. Players and DM work together to get a play experience that feels balanced for all. But if you don't have a group that's doing this, either because you don't know the people that well, or because there is no consensus to work together to keep things balanced between the participants, then it can be a problem. An on-line community, for obvious reasons, tends to suffer from both of these problems.

The reason why it invites such strong feeling is, of course, because people feel that their own assumptions and experience are somehow the default, variations from which need special justification. In practice the reverse is true. The combined play experience of this entire community, and the play experience of everyone they know, is a drop in the ocean compared to the hobby as a whole. There's no wrong way to play this game. There's no type of game that isn't valid.



Using nothing not in the SRD I can give you a level 20 caster who can not be beat by any ECL 20 non-caster you care to make (using all official 3.5 sources).

And I can run a game in which no ECL caster of this power level was ever allowed in the first place, and in which any ECL 20 caster that was possible could be beaten. If you have a balance problem, why not do something about it? I'm sure Tippyworld is an interesting place for a game, but nothing is forcing you to stay there if you don't like it.

If you really want a game in which all mechanical choices are balanced for all games, then you need a game in which all mechanical choices work off the same mechanic. Which is the intent behind the ever-popular 4E. If you're playing 3.5, get used to the idea that different abilites work by different rules, and thus some will be better than others depending on the circumstances. If you want balance, you'll need to run the game appropriately.

[Chronos]

The problem with the Gentleman's Agreement is that gentlemen don't always agree. As an example, I'm currently playing a druid. I don't want to ruin the game, so in some ways, I've been deliberately holding back. I don't use save-or-suck spells, I don't collapse the whole room with Soften Earth and Stone, I don't assume the most broken wildshape forms. But I was taking my dire badger companion's tunneling abilities for granted. Guess what ended up having the rest of the players (DM included) going "Wait, what? That's ridiculous!"?

So, yeah, I accepted the judgment of the rest of the group that my badger can't tunnel nearly as fast as the book says he can. The agreement changed. But in the meanwhile, it caused some pretty harsh friction within the group, because we had different ideas about what exactly constituted "overpowered".

[Emperor Tippy]

And I can run a game in which no ECL caster of this power level was ever allowed in the first place, and in which any ECL 20 caster that was possible could be beaten. If you have a balance problem, why not do something about it? I'm sure Tippyworld is an interesting place for a game, but nothing is forcing you to stay there if you don't like it.
And you just banned a good third of the core Sor/Wiz spell list to do it. The fact that you can ban things also does not have any relevance to the question of whether or not spell casters are overpowered; that you ban such things is proof that you concede that argument.

[JaronK]

Some examples of overpowered casters that aren't about a player outright deciding to mess things up, from my current game:

1) We were doing an adventure where you investigate a mental institution, work your way past the guards, and eventually discover it was Mind Flayers running the place. Defeat them. I had Symbol of Sleep so I cast that on a wooden shield that the tank had. Turns out even bumped up in level a bit, all the guards were below 10 hit dice. So are Mind Flayers. That one Symbol spell ended up taking out absolutely every enemy because it just happened to be exactly the right spell for the job... we just walked around and everyone was out cold. The DM had to just pretend that the Mind Flayers made their saves because otherwise the whole thing was stupid. Note that nobody told me there were Mind Flayers... I just happened to cast a spell that ended the whole scenario.

2) We were playing a game where the DM wanted it to be lower powered so he wanted to restrict the magic items, and made it a plot point that magic items could only be found when planar caravans came through, and even then you were limited to a few things the caravan was bringing. Evidently magic items were plentiful in the City of Brass. A new player joined... and happened to pick Plane Shift as a spell known. Oops.

3) Another low magic world example: I raised a pair of Dire Bears with Animate Dead. Yeah, in a low magic world, that's really powerful.

So are these examples of players knowing everything in advance, planning in advance as a result, not having the world react to them, etc? No, they're just spells blowing away campaigns when used exactly as intended.

JaronK

[navar100]

Powerful, yes, overpowered? No.

I guess the wizard can be considered overpowdered compared to the rouge though?

Even a fighter is more powerful than make-up.

[navar100]

Some examples of overpowered casters that aren't about a player outright deciding to mess things up, from my current game:

1) We were doing an adventure where you investigate a mental institution, work your way past the guards, and eventually discover it was Mind Flayers running the place. Defeat them. I had Symbol of Sleep so I cast that on a wooden shield that the tank had. Turns out even bumped up in level a bit, all the guards were below 10 hit dice. So are Mind Flayers. That one Symbol spell ended up taking out absolutely every enemy because it just happened to be exactly the right spell for the job... we just walked around and everyone was out cold. The DM had to just pretend that the Mind Flayers made their saves because otherwise the whole thing was stupid. Note that nobody told me there were Mind Flayers... I just happened to cast a spell that ended the whole scenario.

The spell has a saving throw. The DM didn't have to pretend. Also, the spell has a limited duration and range. Mindflayers are smart enough to figure out what's going on. If they can't get rid of the symbol they could at worst just wait it out or otherwise attack beyond its range.


2) We were playing a game where the DM wanted it to be lower powered so he wanted to restrict the magic items, and made it a plot point that magic items could only be found when planar caravans came through, and even then you were limited to a few things the caravan was bringing. Evidently magic items were plentiful in the City of Brass. A new player joined... and happened to pick Plane Shift as a spell known. Oops.

That's a common DM mistake of wanting a low power game and think just getting rid magic items accomplishes that. However, even upon reaching the City of Brass that doesn't mean magic items galore. The caravans had to travel to the PCs world for a reason. Perhaps they can't sell in the City of Brass. Perhaps the efreet are the suppliers and don't take too kindly to outsiders coming in.


3) Another low magic world example: I raised a pair of Dire Bears with Animate Dead. Yeah, in a low magic world, that's really powerful.

So are these examples of players knowing everything in advance, planning in advance as a result, not having the world react to them, etc? No, they're just spells blowing away campaigns when used exactly as intended.

JaronK

Not every PC spellcaster is evil to have cast Animate Dead but even so, there were no opposing clerics to Turn them?

[Silvanoshei]

Are they overpowered? Fudge no. I can't begin to count how many wizards have fallen to my low-level campaigns/starts. Let's not beat around the bush here, wizard HP SUCK. Given enough time, those buffs start to wear off, and when they do... ohhhhhhh boy does those wizards get squishy quick. Had a false life crazy wizzy run out of spells and duration for the day, but was still in the heat of battle/quest. Needless to say, his 10 HP base was gone in one hit. He did not survive and was burned alive (@ -7 HP).

Are they overpowered? Depends on the DM. :belkar:

[Flickerdart]

Are they overpowered? Fudge no. I can't begin to count how many wizards have fallen to my low-level campaigns/starts. Let's not beat around the bush here, wizard HP SUCK. Given enough time, those buffs start to wear off, and when they do... ohhhhhhh boy does those wizards get squishy quick. Had a false life crazy wizzy run out of spells and duration for the day, but was still in the heat of battle/quest. Needless to say, his 10 HP base was gone in one hit. He did not survive and was burned alive (@ -7 HP).

Are they overpowered? Depends on the DM. :belkar:
Over three hours of straight fighting? I can't imagine the front line's HP looked any better.

[eggynack]

Are they overpowered? Fudge no. I can't begin to count how many wizards have fallen to my low-level campaigns/starts. Let's not beat around the bush here, wizard HP SUCK. Given enough time, those buffs start to wear off, and when they do... ohhhhhhh boy does those wizards get squishy quick. Had a false life crazy wizzy run out of spells and duration for the day, but was still in the heat of battle/quest. Needless to say, his 10 HP base was gone in one hit. He did not survive and was burned alive (@ -7 HP).

Are they overpowered? Depends on the DM. :belkar:
I don't really understand what you're claiming here. So, the wizard had false life, for reasons that aren't important. It's not the best he could do at that level, but whatever. The thing I take from this is that our analysis is at third level. Why does he have ten HP exactly? An average wizard has about 14 constitution, which means at least 6 HP from that alone. If the first HD is maxed out, that's 15 HP, and if it isn't, that's about 13.5 HP. It's lower than a fighter, but not by that much when you consider the fact that a fighter uses his HP as an offensive resource.

Now, just for a lark, let us consider a druid. More accurately, let us consider a druid's animal companion. At level three, a riding dog is running around with 26 HP, If the fighter's first HD is maxed out, and he has 14 con, he has 27 HP. The druid also has a druid, who can cast spells. The fighter can wear full plate, but the riding dog likely has a higher dexterity, a bump to natural armor, and can wear leather barding. Thus, the fighter has 19 AC, while the riding dog has 21 AC. Druids are no slouch defensively either. They're likely to have one less HP per level, and that's only true if the fighter is neglecting his dexterity more than the druid is. The druid has worse armor by a few points, but he has spells, which are better than any offense or defense the fighter can muster.

Thus, there are two conclusions that I can make about your analysis. The first, is that extremely low level fighters and wizards are roughly on par, if they're being played at moderate optimization. As has been noted, that level is roughly between one and five, depending on the environment. The second, is that your claims are not true for druids. They are just always better than fighters.

[Nightraiderx]

3 hrs of straight fighting is pretty bad. But the wizard proably could escape from it alot easier than many of the mundanes.
It also depends on what level the wizard was.
Out of the box wizards tend to have alot more options than the fighter
or non magic classes, let's get it simple.
lvl 20 wizard lvl 20 fighter

11 fighter feats
pros- don't run out usually
cons- don't scale well
cons- more focused to a single list.

And a base wizard with 19 int so he can cast his spells:
He has at least 5 spells per level up to 7th
4 spells 8th and 3 spells at 9th level.

5x7 = 35+4+3 around 43 spells.

That's 43 different applications that he can
use for spells that have multiple uses and/or high versatility.

Has spells that scale with level, indirectly affect combat and have
many outside of battle uses.

And since both the fighter and the wizard have 2+int but wizards have
int for most of their abilities, have a good +60~ skill points.

Yes. Go ahead and tell me the wizard isn't overpowered when
the options that are available to fighter are ALSO available to the wizard,
but why would he bother? Polymorph makes him stronger and hell he can grab
the heroics spell to get a fighter feat if he wants.

It's a matter of not just being fair/accurate. Fighters and melee mundanes
are limited to one fighting style and even then the multipliers favor one style
over the other. And a wizard may be "squishy" but let me know when a barbarian can escape a forcecage of the same wizard without using a single spell. Most mundanes (minus tome of battle) don't have alot of uses for their action economy. Not to mention ToB is a poorly written book with effects that are either poorly scaled and all over the place.

[Squirrel_Dude]

Spontaneous casting Wizard is a bit much.

On the topic, there's a flipside not often brought up. Do people playing mundanes put the same effort into building their character in all of these cases? Not that this is the case every time, but I have a hard time believing it DOESN'T.

Also, at lower levels, being a Tier 1 character can be kind of painful. For example; Pathfinder Cleric, level 1. With luck, you start with maybe...6 spells a day. Likely, your first level slots are going to be gobbled up by people needing to not die, and your cantrips, while infinite, do not do very much. You probably couldn't afford much armor, so you're be uncomfortably squishier than you'd like to be to engage in combat.

I'm not defending cheesewizard. The tiers are *not* the same across all levels, and those low levels as a full caster can be painful (unless you're a Druid). Just my two cp.

*ba dum tish*To be fair, in 3.5 the cleric got to walk around in heavy armor, and could punch about as hard as anyone else if he had the right deity. As for affording it. Clerics actually get more armor to start, on average, than Barbarians. They also had a hit dice that was comparatively much sturdier than Pathfinder (back when rogues and bards had d6s). Also, with spontaneous casting, he never has to actually prepare healing spells.

6 spells per day is not rare for clerics at level 1. It's practically the standard. 7 per day is slightly harder to gain, though. 3 0th level, 1 first level, 1 first level domain, and 1 to 2 bonus first level spells.

I would also add that DMM is another huge reason that clerics are so strong in 3.5. Lucky that didn't carry over the Pathfinder.

[JaronK]

The spell has a saving throw. The DM didn't have to pretend. Also, the spell has a limited duration and range. Mindflayers are smart enough to figure out what's going on. If they can't get rid of the symbol they could at worst just wait it out or otherwise attack beyond its range.

Turns out it's really not hard to have a very hard to hit saving throw, and the duration was enough that we could just storm the place. Also, the scenario was in an asylum... they were in range the moment they saw us. The DM straight up admitted he had to fudge the dice rolls to make the fight worth considering.

So no, they couldn't just wait it out... we just walked through the asylum and everyone was asleep the moment they saw us. The Mind Flayers had no way of stopping that.


That's a common DM mistake of wanting a low power game and think just getting rid magic items accomplishes that. However, even upon reaching the City of Brass that doesn't mean magic items galore. The caravans had to travel to the PCs world for a reason. Perhaps they can't sell in the City of Brass. Perhaps the efreet are the suppliers and don't take too kindly to outsiders coming in.

The whole thing here is that he wanted a campaign in a low magic world set in the underdark... and we could just leave and go to where there was better stuff. That's a campaign breaker.


Not every PC spellcaster is evil to have cast Animate Dead but even so, there were no opposing clerics to Turn them?

Turn Undead is generally ineffective without turn reducers... a 12 HD skeletal dire bear isn't easy for a level 6 Cleric to turn. And no, he didn't put an enemy Cleric in every fight. Btw, you don't have to be evil to cast Animate Dead, you just can't be a good Cleric (I was an Archivist, but Wizards and Sorcerers have no difficulty even if they're good).

But notice how you have to change the game world to compensate for these things? You don't have to change the game world to compensate for the Fighter hitting things with his sword, generally.

JaronK

[Gwendol]

Yeah, unless you had your save DC optimized through the roof, some enemies are likely to make their save. Also, 1000 gold in powdered gems? It's not something everyone carries around always. Finally, the range of the symbol is well inside the range of bows and many spells.
Anecdotal evidence is just that, and in this case I'm tempted to conclude that the DM forgot about his obligation to make the adventure exciting and challenging.

[cerin616]

So I read these boards daily & the consensus seems to be that the T1 casters (wizards especially) are overpowered in the extreme when compared to non-spellcasters.


But are they?


Yes



1.Gentleman's Agreement


Being less powerful and limiting your power are 2 different things. I can play down my magic user to keep the game fun, but that doesn't stop me from being game breaking strong if i wanted to.



2.The Buddy Group


Again, being reasonable and not breaking the game doesn't make the class any less able to break the game.



3.Low Magic Worlds


I have not played low magic.



4.More versatility


but thats the thing, a wizard can do anything. And anything he cant do himself, he can shapechange into something that can, or summon something that can. A level 20 wizard can shape change into a gloom and
A gloom is able to sneak attack as a 25th-level rogue, dealing 13d6 extra damage Or, in other words, he can do somethings at level 20 better than other classes of the same level.


5. That a spellcaster makes other characters feel useless. This one is a bit confusing to me. How does a spellcaster do this? Sure there are some spells and magic effect that can do the work of class features, but none of them are infinite uses per day. A rouge can check for and remove traps all day and night, but a spellcaster can't.

Again, between shape changing, gates, and other shenanigans, a wizard will indeed make any other character feel useless.


Tier 1: Capable of doing absolutely everything, often better than classes that specialize in that thing. Often capable of solving encounters with a single mechanical ability and little thought from the player. Has world changing powers at high levels. These guys, if played with skill, can easily break a campaign and can be very hard to challenge without extreme DM fiat or plenty of house rules, especially if Tier 3s and below are in the party.

Examples: Wizard, Cleric, Druid, Archivist, Artificer, Erudite (Spell to Power Variant)

[Gwendol]

I'd substitute "will" for "can" or even "has the potential".

[Carth]

^This is a direct quote from PHB pg 178.



For the "How can a wizard even afford to have -all- the spells?" question; let's do some math.

Someone above said that there're just a bit under 4000 spells, total, in the game. If we assume that 1/3 are sorc/wiz only, 1/3 are cleric/druid only, and 1/3 are overlapping then we have 2640 spells that a wizard can know. This is likely an over-estimate.

If we then assume an equal distribution between each spell level we average 5 pages in a spell book per spell for 13,200 pages to scribe every sorc/wiz spell in the game. Again, this is likely an over-estimate since there tend to be more low-level spells than high-level ones.

A Boccob's Blessed Book (DMG page 249) allows a wizard to pay 12,500gp for 1000 pages of spells. Therefore, for the cost of 14 BBB's a wizard can scribe every spell that is available to him in the game for 175,000gp.

"but kelb," you say, "a wizard has to actually find those spells somewhere before he can scribe them." PHB page 179 tells us that another wizard will typically charge a 50gp/spell-level fee for allowing you to copy a spell from his book. This adds an additional 660,000gp cost. This would put getting -all- spells available to a wizard in the budget for the WBL of a 21st level wizard. However, after a certain point, this theoretical wizard would have amassed so many and so varied a list of spells that getting new ones would likely become a straight trade for the spell he's learning. That is, he sells a spell of equal level to the caster he's buying a spell from and, thus, negates the cost. This should bring the overall cost down to within WBL for a non-epic character.

Therefore, it -is- theoretically possible for a wizard to, in fact, know every spell he possibly could, in-spite of the (likely dramatic) over-estimation of this cost.

@Tork, specifically:

I don't understand the statement "A spell-caster can't do anything." Could you clarify the meaning of this statement?

Ugh, sadly this isn't copy pasting well from Excel, but I don't have the time to format it nicely.

Just as data, here's the distribution of spell levels in the PHB, PHB2, Spell Compendium, and Complete Mage, respectively:
42 50 45 41 43 43 35 35 24
9 24 23 20 12 3 4 3 3
74 101 87 67 65 42 38 21 30
9 10 18 14 15 11 7 6 6

Totals:
134 185 173 142 135 99 84 65 63

Grand total:
1,080

Let's assume you've got an obsessive spellhoarder that wants them all, by my reckoning that's 4,535 pages, requiring 5 blessed books and 226,750 in scribing fees, for a total of 289,250. This does not factor in any free spells from leveling up. It's worth pointing out that 2 levels of geometer could save you 50,000 GP, if you're willing to cut that down to 1,000 spells, or 37,500 if you insist on getting everything and bleeding into a second blessed book.

Other people can pitch in if they'd like, and it'd probably be good to have people double check my numbers on the books that I did check. Also keep in mind that if you look in anything printed before the Spell Compendium, you need to filter out stuff that was reprinted in it. This is why I didn't do Frostburn, because while it has quite a few gems, I wasn't in the mood for crosschecking. :D I did these a while ago, and it's possible that I omitted all the various polymorph replacement spells when I did it.

Because I also had broken it down by school, here's the relevant info for you specialists out there (PHB, PHB2, Spell Compendium, and Complete Mage):

Totals:
Abj Con Div Ench Evo Ill Nec Tran Uni
44 51 28 39 41 44 39 69 3
11 18 5 10 18 8 6 24 1
63 76 27 24 83 35 58 155 4
11 16 5 5 14 8 15 21 1

129 161 65 78 156 95 118 269 9

Abjuration totals:

8 4 8 5 3 5 3 4 4
1 2 3 1 0 2 1 1 0
5 9 7 8 12 7 7 2 6
1 2 2 3 2 0 0 1 0

Totals:
15 17 20 17 17 14 11 8 10

Grand total:
129

Conjuration totals:
6 6 5 6 8 4 7 5 4
2 3 5 3 3 0 1 0 1
13 7 12 13 10 6 3 2 10
2 1 1 1 2 4 1 1 3

Totals:
23 17 23 23 23 14 12 8 18

Grand total:
161

Divination Totals:
5 3 3 4 3 3 3 3 1
0 3 2 0 0 0 0 0 0
12 4 4 3 0 2 0 0 2
2 1 2 0 0 0 0 0 0

Totals:
19 11 11 7 3 5 3 3 3

Grand total:
65

Enchantment totals:
3 3 5 4 5 4 4 8 3
2 4 3 4 3 1 0 0 1
9 17 17 15 13 3 5 2 2
2 1 1 1 3 2 0 1 3

Totals:
10 13 12 9 6 6 8 10 4

Grand total:
78

Evocation totals:
4 6 5 6 4 4 5 5 2
2 4 3 4 3 1 0 0 1
9 17 17 15 13 3 5 2 2
2 1 1 1 3 2 0 1 3

Totals:
17 28 26 26 23 10 10 8 8

Grand total:
156

Illusion totals:
5 8 4 6 7 5 4 3 2
0 2 2 3 1 0 0 0 0
3 13 6 2 4 4 1 2 0
0 0 5 1 2 0 0 0 0

Totals:
8 23 17 12 14 9 5 5 2

Grand total:
95

Necromancy totals:
3 6 4 5 4 5 4 4 4
1 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 0
2 12 10 2 6 10 8 6 2
2 1 1 4 3 0 3 1 0

Totals:
8 20 16 12 13 15 16 12 6

Grand total:
118

Transmutation totals:
8 14 11 5 8 13 4 3 3
1 6 6 4 2 1 2 1 1
24 33 25 22 20 9 10 5 7
0 3 4 4 5 1 2 2 0

Totals:
33 56 46 35 35 24 18 11 11

Grand total:
269

Universal totals:
0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 1
0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0
1 0 2 0 0 1 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0

Totals:
1 0 2 1 1 2 1 0 1

Grand total:
9

As an aside, it's hard to take this as anything but proof that no effort was made to balance the different schools.

[JaronK]

Yeah, unless you had your save DC optimized through the roof, some enemies are likely to make their save. Also, 1000 gold in powdered gems? It's not something everyone carries around always. Finally, the range of the symbol is well inside the range of bows and many spells.
Anecdotal evidence is just that, and in this case I'm tempted to conclude that the DM forgot about his obligation to make the adventure exciting and challenging.

Well, I was using Tainted Sorcerer, which instantly sets your save DC to "no, you won't" and covers the money. As for range... let's face it, anything inside a dungeon ends up pushing stuff to short range (it was a mental asylum, but the concept is the same).

What we've been doing is taking pregen adventures and just running the characters through them and seeing what happens (sometimes with level boosts to the monsters as needed). Turns out for most of them, the answer is "an Archivist runs right over them." It's two optimized characters (well, it was, we've just added one more). Yes, the DM could customize all the encounters to deal with the higher power of the caster... but that just proves the point.

JaronK

[AmberVael]

*omgtonsofdata snip*

This is some interesting information.

It's intriguing to see that Conjuration and Transmutation have a strong lead in terms of spells available. I can't imagine that's coincidence, though I wouldn't directly conclude "oh they're more powerful because they have more spells" (especially seeing as how Evocation has a pretty number of spells too).


I think the most terrifying realization I really pull away from that is how, while a Wizard would be practically bankrupting themselves to get all those spells, and a sorcerer would be crying in a corner at just how tiny he is in comparison, Cleric and Druid get everything off of a comparably sized spell list without effort.

[cerin616]

Totals:
134 185 173 142 135 99 84 65 63

Grand total:
1,080

Better yet, you take a boccobs blessed book. you have 1000 pages to scribe in. you scribe in all your 0 level, and 1st level spells, as each fo these takes up a single page.

remaining total is
661

pages in spell book used is 319, leaving us with 681 pages left.

Next is Secret Page which allows you to alter the text of one spell to hide the text of another. This tirick allows you to secret page any level spell over a level 1 spell, effectively making the page hold 2 spells, one of first level, the other of any.
So we scribe in level 9,8,7,6 spells into our book over those level 1 spells. our book now holds 638 spells and has 681 pages left.

I would continue but I think you can figure out where to go from there.

[JaronK]

Though in reality, a Wizard would just pick the best spells for his needs to learn... there's no point learning all the random ones. A single Boccob's Blessed Book plus the spells he gains from leveling should cover all his needs.

JaronK

[Flickerdart]

You don't need all the spells. You can do with the 2/level you get for free, and it's trivial to get 6 or even 8 per level for free.

[JaronK]

Indeed, Collegate Wizard alone pretty much solves things nicely even in super low wealth games.

JaronK

[AmberVael]

Though in reality, a Wizard would just pick the best spells for his needs to learn... there's no point learning all the random ones. A single Boccob's Blessed Book plus the spells he gains from leveling should cover all his needs.

JaronK
But what if you reaaaaally need all the ability to change in-game dice? You'll be sorry you don't have Cheat then! :smalltongue:


You don't need all the spells. You can do with the 2/level you get for free, and it's trivial to get 6 or even 8 per level for free.

I would strongly recommend any wizard invest at least a little bit beyond 2 per level. You can still be effective, granted, but at that point you're sporting only a handful more spells known than Sorcerer, but with an inferior casting method.

Even Collegiate Wizard will drastically change that though, as mentioned. You go from about six more spells to 46 more spells and whoops, now the sorcerer is feeling inadequate again.

[Carth]

I definitely agree that you should never waste cash on all spells. Hopefully nobody comes back and uses my data to point out how expensive being a wizard is, I didn't realize there was a possibility it might be taken that way.

[Karoht]

~omgdatasnip~A Wizard could do all that, yes.
A Pathfinder Sorcerer (or Oracle) with Paragon Surge can have any spell written in the game within a standard action. Later on it becomes any 3 spells if combo'd with the right feats. Details under spoiler cut.

Paragon Surge allows you to have access to any 1 feat you normally qualify for.
Extended Arcana gives you one extra spell known at your highest casting level, or any two at any level lower than your highest. It can be Quickened, it can be done with a wand, but one standard action later you have any spell you can cast, on your list of spells known.
If the Sorcerer takes the feat Arcane Heritage (Arcane Bloodline) and then uses Paragon Surge to get Improved Arcane Heritage, at 13th level or higher they get up to 3 spells of any level they can cast.

Combo that with False Priest Archetype. Buy Divine Scrolls.
9th Level Arcane casting, combo'd with 8th level Divine (Paladin, Cleric, Druid, Inquisitor, Ranger and Assassin even) with a minimum effort.

Bottom line, having access to every spell, or rather every spell that matters, is a trivial matter.
This is before we even touch any kind of itemization.

[cerin616]

I definitely agree that you should never waste cash on all spells. Hopefully nobody comes back and uses my data to point out how expensive being a wizard is, I didn't realize there was a possibility it might be taken that way.

except that secret page makes it less expensive, and trading spells cuts down on costs to learn them. Or heck, you can just research stuff.

[Carth]

except that secret page makes it horribly inexpensive.

Well sure, there are tons of other ways to mitigate the cost, but anyone making the argument that I mentioned will inevitably ignore such things, on the grounds that they'd never be allowed.

[Mutazoia]

How does makeup remove traps? :smalltongue:


Vanishing cream?

[Gavinfoxx]

I think this is relevant... yes, Wizards can have all the spells they want, and CAN have access to the perfect spell at the perfect moment!

Easy Bake Wizard!


Here's the recipe for one of my favorite ways of playing D&D, an Easy Bake Wizard. Put the Sorcerer to shame (well, at anything except metamagic-heavy blasting...sorcerer has a ton of ACF's for that, which you don't get...)!

Easy Bake No "Worries" Wizard

Ingredients:
1 Gray Elf (SRD, MM1)
1 Wizard Class (PHB, SRD)
1 Elf Wizard Racial Substitution Level (Races of the Wild)
1 Eidetic Spellcaster Alternative Class Feature (Dragon Magazine #357 -- the core of the build!)
1 Spontaneous Divination Alternative Class Feature (Complete Champion, be sure to check out the errata online! Use this weekly to do lots of divinations to know what spells to prepare!)
1 Collegiate Wizard Feat (Complete Arcane)
1 Aerenal Arcanist feat (Player's Guide to Eberron, optional)
1 Eschew Materials feat (PHB, SRD)
1 Domain Wizard variant, Transmutation or Conjuration domain (SRD, Unearthed Arcana, optional)
Flaws, to taste (SRD, Unearthed Arcana, optional, but necessary if you want all those feats by level 3)
Extra bits, optional, see later instructions!

Mix in bowl, and be sure to top with any one of these feats:
Acidic Splatter, Winter's Blast, or Fiery Burst (all from Complete Mage)

Notes: if it doesn't turn out right when playing it in a zero wealth game, you picked bad spells. Be sure to look at the various wizard handbooks for how to pick solid, powerful, versatile spells. And it is very thematic that you can do stuff like leave a slot open to spend 15 minutes preparing the correct spell you need in it, or take Uncanny Forethought or Alacritous Cogitation, or Nexus Method, consider taking those later. And you automatically just 'get' spells like a sorcerer... no need for scrolls or anything. This Wizard idea relies on exactly zero found scrolls and zero need for items to scribe things into his spellbook, and with Eschew Materials and the right spells chosen, doesn't even need a Spell Component Pouch (just don't take any spells with focuses or components more than 5 gp)! Also, some people might think that this trading out the ability to specialize three times, but that isn't what is going on. Due to differing language between the various options, that isn't what's happening. Some of the stuff says that 'if you don't specialize, you can do this', some of the stuff says 'by removing the ability to specialize entirely, you gain this ability.' Order in which the abilities are taken matters.

Further, some more possible ingredients to take include:

-Alacritous Cogitation feat at level 6 (Complete Mage)
-Another Great option for race is a Lesser Fey'ri (Players Guide to Faerun and Races of Faerun) with LA Bought off (the LA buyoff option is in the SRD and Unearthed Arcana; choose the powers to get the minimum LA for that race). This lets you make use of that Alter Self at will; read the handbook on the uses of Alter Self, it's fantastic.
-Get the Nexus Method feat from Dragon Magazine #319! This lets you spontaneously cast the summon monster line, and apparently adds all the spells to your spellbook! If you do this, you probably want the Transmutation Domain rather than the Conjuration Domain, to maximize spells known.
-Another good feat is Greyhawk Method from Dragon Magazine #315. This is very similar to 'Collegiate Wizard', and is arguably a different writeup of this... and it might require GM interpretation if you are in a campaign other than Greyhawk. And it might require GM interpretation if you want to stack it with Collegiate Wizard. However, you should at least consider it.
-Another option is Lesser Celadrin. You combine the rules in Player's Guide to Faerun and the rules in Dragon Magazine #350 to get Lesser Celadrin.
-Also, Fire Elf (UA/SRD) works well too.

-If you ask for houserules, consider these two:
-Permission to house rule that you can take Uncanny Forethought (Exemplars of Evil) at level 9, with the Alacritous Cogitation (Complete Mage) and the Eidetic Spellacster ACF taking place of the Spell Mastery prerequisite, without access to the 'spell mastery' capability from that feat
-Hopefully permission to house rule for the character to count Autohypnosis (XPH, SRD) as a class skill, to describe the character's eidetic memory being useful for things other than spellcasting (assuming the GM uses Autohypnosis in his game! Or get it's abilities shunted into Concentration, or whatever)

Some numbers:

Basic Wizard: Start with 3+Int mod L1 spells, +2 each level as baseline
Elf Generalist Wizard: +1 wizard spell at start, +1 each level beyond baseline
Collegiate Wizard: Instead of 3+int and +2 each level, baseline is set at 6+int and +4 each level
Aerenal Arcanist: +1 each level beyond baseline, including L1 if you take it then
Domain Wizard (Transmutation or Conjuration): One specific extra spell of each spell levels; +9 spells over career (cantrip is already known)
Nexus Method: Apparently automatically gets you the entire Summon Monster line!

So at level one, with a 20 int (cause Grey Elf or whatever, or 21 if you start at middle aged...) you know:
13 level one spells, plus mage armor or expeditious retreat automatically
At level 2, you gain six new L1 spells
At level 3, you gain 6 spells of up to spell level 2, and levitate or web, depending...

Essentially, you end up with a more versatile Sorcerer, who has access to a TON of spells, and can always get the right spell for the job... even with no gear whatsoever. And no Vow of Poverty (ewww, Exalted! And not able to gather even useful cheap equipment!) needed to be useful without wealth!

Finally, if you want to gain access to even MORE spells, the Mage of the Arcane Order prestige class can be useful. Or, if you have access to wealth by level, than Mercantile Background can get you cheaper scrolls to scribe to your brain.

[Mutazoia]

I suppose the answer to this question would rely on several factors, but primarily on whether you are sticking to core rules, or allowing splat book cheese into the mix. Also, do you mean in a PvP context or a PvE context?

In PvP

Using only the core rules, spellcasters are not majorly overpowered. A fight between a 10th lvl figher and a 10th level wizard would probably end up with the wizard broken and bleeding on the floor if all rules are in play (such as casting times). The fighter's extra feat's would most likely allow the fighter to bullrush the wizard and knock him down and carve him into ribbons, or some such.

In PvE

A fighter is a damage sponge. A spellcaster is not. Sure...at high levels a mage can set up freezing fog, with a grease effect, plus...oh..say ...cloud kill and do a lot of damage, but he's going to take time setting all that up (even with quickend spells) and not every combat situation will give him the opportunity to set up a killing field. I.E. Surprise round! 50 orcs jump out of the bushes...your all flatfooted...20 orcs charge the wizard and attack. A wizard is not going to be able to cast Knock indefinitely, or turn doors into whores all day or other such nonsense, no matter what level he get's to. He's got a limit on his spells per day..eventually he'll run out of stuff to do. You never run out of sword to hit some one with.

Now if you allow splatbook cheese, sure you can get spellcasters so overpowerd with PRC builds that you might as well not even play them...just make up what ever treasure and XP you want and write it on your character sheet.

In the end, the question is ultimately answered by your GM. Does he allow unlimited access to splat books for spellcasters with out taking in to consideration the effect on the balance altering effects they have on a game? Do they design adventures around the skill set's of the entire party instead of random generic situations?

[Flickerdart]

*snip*
You've not been around D&D boards much have you? Because you've managed to trip basically every misconception about casters that there is.

[eggynack]

I suppose the answer to this question would rely on several factors, but primarily on whether you are sticking to core rules, or allowing splat book cheese into the mix. Also, do you mean in a PvP context or a PvE context?

In PvP

Using only the core rules, spellcasters are not majorly overpowered. A fight between a 10th lvl figher and a 10th level wizard would probably end up with the wizard broken and bleeding on the floor if all rules are in play (such as casting times). The fighter's extra feat's would most likely allow the fighter to bullrush the wizard and knock him down and carve him into ribbons, or some such.

In PvE

A fighter is a damage sponge. A spellcaster is not. Sure...at high levels a mage can set up freezing fog, with a grease effect, plus...oh..say ...cloud kill and do a lot of damage, but he's going to take time setting all that up (even with quickend spells) and not every combat situation will give him the opportunity to set up a killing field. I.E. Surprise round! 50 orcs jump out of the bushes...your all flatfooted...20 orcs charge the wizard and attack. A wizard is not going to be able to cast Knock indefinitely, or turn doors into whores all day or other such nonsense, no matter what level he get's to. He's got a limit on his spells per day..eventually he'll run out of stuff to do. You never run out of sword to hit some one with.

Now if you allow splatbook cheese, sure you can get spellcasters so overpowerd with PRC builds that you might as well not even play them...just make up what ever treasure and XP you want and write it on your character sheet.

In the end, the question is ultimately answered by your GM. Does he allow unlimited access to splat books for spellcasters with out taking in to consideration the effect on the balance altering effects they have on a game? Do they design adventures around the skill set's of the entire party instead of random generic situations?
Your arguments here make absolutely no sense. What casting times are you talking about? freezing fog takes exactly one standard action to cast, as do most wizard spells. The action economy is completely on the wizard's side, because a fighter needs to use a full attack to get maximum value out of his actions. How do 50 orcs charge the wizard in the surprise round? They only get the one standard action, so they can only hit the wizard at all if he's standing right next to them. The fighter is not a damage sponge by level 10. By that point, his armor is being made obsolete by the wizard's access to miss chance. Compare the average chance of hitting a fighter to the chance of hitting a wizard with mirror image. You simply do not understand how casters break the game in any way.

[Tar Palantir]

I suppose the answer to this question would rely on several factors, but primarily on whether you are sticking to core rules, or allowing splat book cheese into the mix. Also, do you mean in a PvP context or a PvE context?

In PvP

Using only the core rules, spellcasters are not majorly overpowered. A fight between a 10th lvl figher and a 10th level wizard would probably end up with the wizard broken and bleeding on the floor if all rules are in play (such as casting times). The fighter's extra feat's would most likely allow the fighter to bullrush the wizard and knock him down and carve him into ribbons, or some such.

In PvE

A fighter is a damage sponge. A spellcaster is not. Sure...at high levels a mage can set up freezing fog, with a grease effect, plus...oh..say ...cloud kill and do a lot of damage, but he's going to take time setting all that up (even with quickend spells) and not every combat situation will give him the opportunity to set up a killing field. I.E. Surprise round! 50 orcs jump out of the bushes...your all flatfooted...20 orcs charge the wizard and attack. A wizard is not going to be able to cast Knock indefinitely, or turn doors into whores all day or other such nonsense, no matter what level he get's to. He's got a limit on his spells per day..eventually he'll run out of stuff to do. You never run out of sword to hit some one with.

Now if you allow splatbook cheese, sure you can get spellcasters so overpowerd with PRC builds that you might as well not even play them...just make up what ever treasure and XP you want and write it on your character sheet.

In the end, the question is ultimately answered by your GM. Does he allow unlimited access to splat books for spellcasters with out taking in to consideration the effect on the balance altering effects they have on a game? Do they design adventures around the skill set's of the entire party instead of random generic situations?

Freezing Fog comes with a grease effect. It's one spell, and it essentially cripples the ability of anyone to leave without teleportation, let alone in the one round needed to toss cloudkill or another finisher in.

A fighter can't keep going all day any more than the wizard. Sure, he doesn't run out of sword swings, but he runs out of hp, and does so a lot faster than the wizard if he's up in melee with the baddies. Want to keep your hp up? You need spells, whether healing to fix it or, more effectively, buffs to prevent.

And it's not like wizards run out that fast anyway. Past 2nd level, I've never seen a wizard run out of useful spells to cast, even in my last group, where we went nine encounters without rest and had no other casters in the party. You can get a fair bit of mileage if you don't just toss magic around willy nilly and wastefully.

Finally, it's the melee who need splats, not the casters. So many of the best spells are core, and melee lacks critical capabilities without noncore sources. Things like barbarian pounce, Tome of Battle, heck, enough feats for a fighter to actually have something worth taking best level 10 (if straight fighter's really your thing). In my above mentioned party, the only non-core stuff our wizard had was stuff he took for the lulz, like canoptic conversion to turn enemies into mummies (that turned out to be quite effective, actually, but he didn't really need it when he had Wish and Time Stop). Even at low levels, spells like Color Spray, Sleep, Grease, Web, Rope Trick, and dozens more give spellcasters a monumental advantages over mundanes.

[Augmental]

I suppose the answer to this question would rely on several factors, but primarily on whether you are sticking to core rules, or allowing splat book cheese into the mix.

The splatbook "cheese" you're referring to helps out mundane classes more than caster classes.


Using only the core rules, spellcasters are not majorly overpowered. A fight between a 10th lvl figher and a 10th level wizard would probably end up with the wizard broken and bleeding on the floor if all rules are in play (such as casting times). The fighter's extra feat's would most likely allow the fighter to bullrush the wizard and knock him down and carve him into ribbons, or some such.

Only if the fighter wins initiative. If the caster wins initiative, he can cast a Save or Lose spell like hold person to render the fighter helpless.


A fighter is a damage sponge. A spellcaster is not. Sure...at high levels a mage can set up freezing fog, with a grease effect, plus...oh..say ...cloud kill and do a lot of damage, but he's going to take time setting all that up (even with quickend spells)

Freezing fog + Quickened cloudkill can be set up in a single turn.


He's got a limit on his spells per day..eventually he'll run out of stuff to do. You never run out of sword to hit some one with.

But you do run out of hit points.


In the end, the question is ultimately answered by your GM. Does he allow unlimited access to splat books for spellcasters with out taking in to consideration the effect on the balance altering effects they have on a game?

They alter the balance in the favor of mundane classes.

[Carth]

The splatbook "cheese" you're referring to helps out mundane classes more than caster classes.


This, so much. Casters are broken out of the box with just core. They become more broken with splat access, but the difference between broken and more broken is basically meaningless, unless we're talking about TO. While casters definitely get nice things outside of core, for PO, mundanes unquestionably benefit more.

[Mutazoia]

This, so much. Casters are broken out of the box with just core. They become more broken with splat access, but the difference between broken and more broken is basically meaningless, unless we're talking about TO. While casters definitely get nice things outside of core, for PO, mundanes unquestionably benefit more.

Yes but in my experience I've seen more people using the splat books to boost their casters then their mundane classes. Take a look at some of the threads on this forum to see prime examples of splat book cheese mills. I see far more threads dedicated to munchikining out casters than fighters....

[Gavinfoxx]

Yes but in my experience I've seen more people using the splat books to boost their casters then their mundane classes. Take a look at some of the threads on this forum to see prime examples of splat book cheese mills. I see far more threads dedicated to munchikining out casters than fighters....

Because a 'munchkined' fighter sucks? Even 'munchkined', there isn't much interesting stuff a fighter can do, since they don't really have any powerful abilities to work with??

[eggynack]

Yes but in my experience I've seen more people using the splat books to boost their casters then their mundane classes. Take a look at some of the threads on this forum to see prime examples of splat book cheese mills. I see far more threads dedicated to munchikining out casters than fighters....
That's mostly just because wizards break in really interesting and novel ways out of core. Mundane classes tend to break in ways that are known and obvious, at least before theoretical optimization. Like, you're not going to see anyone posting, "Hey you guys, I found a secret game breaking combo! I took 19 levels in warblade, and then a 20th level in warblade!" Anyway, people post cool melee stuff all the time. I try to push the crazy whirling frenzy pouncing tripping intimidation barbarian who enters runescarred berserker every chance I get. That's just a generally cool build, that can do a cool variety of things. Mundane guys in core are around tiers four through six. Out of core, they tend more towards tiers three and four. Wizards in core are tier one. Wizards out of core are also tier one. The change to mundane guys is far greater. Casting guys are just more fun. Anyway, Tippy has a monk breaking competition running at this very moment, so you're demonstrably wrong.

[Mutazoia]

Only if the fighter wins initiative. If the caster wins initiative, he can cast a Save or Lose spell like hold person to render the fighter helpless.

True. However the fighter is more likely to have improved inish and a higher dex mod than the caster.



Freezing fog + Quickened cloudkill can be set up in a single turn.

Yes. And this has been my main beef with 3x for years. A lot of the balance that was built in to the previous editions went out the window. Still...let's just hope our intrepid caster isn't caught flatfooted and has the chance to set it up.




But you do run out of hit points.

Casters much sooner than a fighter. I'd much rather have a 10 d10 + con hp pool than an 10 d4 + con hp pool :)




They alter the balance in the favor of mundane classes.

Sadly I see more overpowering splat builds for casters than I do for mundane classes...some times this forum seems dedicated to them.

I'm not arguing that casters are not OP....but depending on how you run your game they are not God's making all other classes redundant.

[eggynack]

True. However the fighter is more likely to have improved inish and a higher dex mod than the caster.
This is untrue. Wizards need to pump intelligence, constitution, and dexterity, dexterity being the tertiary stat. Fighters need to pump strength, constitution, and dexterity, dexterity being the tertiary stat. With points being equal, the wizard and the fighter likely have the same dexterity. Wizards also have spells like nerve skitter, so they have a good chance of winning the initiative war.



Yes. And this has been my main beef with 3x for years. A lot of the balance that was built in to the previous editions went out the window. Still...let's just hope our intrepid caster isn't caught flatfooted and has the chance to set it up.
If the caster gets a single round, that's all the time he needs. Moreover, between all of their crazy evasion abilities, they're extremely likely to get that round.



Casters much sooner than a fighter. I'd much rather have a 10 d10 + con hp pool than an 10 d4 + con hp pool :)
No, fighter much sooner than a caster. I'd much rather have the 10d4+con HP pool, the ability to attack efficiently at range, and some high powered evasion abilities. Wizards protect their HP with their life. Fighters use their HP as a resource.



Sadly I see more overpowering splat builds for casters than I do for mundane classes...some times this forum seems dedicated to them.

I'm not arguing that casters are not OP....but depending on how you run your game they are not God's making all other classes redundant.
Seriously, you just need to know where to look. There are plenty of places for a swinging young mundane class lover to get his optimization on. Tippy is running his monk contest, the iron chef optimization challenges are often mundane class based, and people are constantly asking for help in putting together a good mundane build. Casters definitely are gods who make other classes redundant, but that doesn't mean we don't do mundane stuff too. The reason we keep talking about casters, is because folks with a low understanding of the game's balance keep asking if wizards are really all they're cracked up to be. If you want a good out of core fighter build, all you have to do is ask.

[angry_bear]

Yes but in my experience I've seen more people using the splat books to boost their casters then their mundane classes. Take a look at some of the threads on this forum to see prime examples of splat book cheese mills. I see far more threads dedicated to munchikining out casters than fighters....

That's mostly just site preference though. The minmax boards from what I've seen, tend to focus a fair amount on martial, or a combination of martial and caster.

That's another thing too. You know something is up when martial classes can benefit greatly by dipping into caster classes, while caster classes actually lose out when they take a level or two in a martial class. If the two styles were really balanced, a multiclass level 6 rogue level 2 wizard would be as viable as a multiclass level 2 rogue level 6 wizard. But it really isn't.

[Carth]

Yes but in my experience I've seen more people using the splat books to boost their casters then their mundane classes. Take a look at some of the threads on this forum to see prime examples of splat book cheese mills. I see far more threads dedicated to munchikining out casters than fighters....

Well, what's the net result of the boost, though? Core only casters are broken, non-core casters are more broken. The difference between broken and more broken is academic, and worthless for practical purposes. In terms of what's actually useful for practical purposes, mundanes gain a great deal more from greater book access.

[Abaddona]

If you want to be effective charger:

Lion Totem Barbarian level 1 to get Pounce ability.
Greatsword: 2d6 +1,5x str
Power attack: -1 Bab = +2 dmg
Shocktroper: when power attacking during charge you lower your AC not BAB
Leap Attack: Power attack damage during charge x2

Lion totem Barbarian: UA, Greatsword and PA: PHB, Shocktrooper: CW, Leap Attack: CA

estimated damage during charge: 12 + 40 +2d6 x2

estimated damage during charge using only PHB, DMG, MM: 12 + 20 +2d6 and you take -10 penalty to hit.
In other words splatbooks multiple potential melle damage 4 times.

At the same time, wizard:

has enough skill point to take ranks in spot and listen, also can have flying familiar = will see fighter long before he can charge.

Mirror Image: for ten minutes 1d4 +3 = minimum 80% miss chance on first attack, 75% on second, 66% on third, 50% on fourth.

Invisibility: for ten minutes mage can be invisible effectively doing to fighter whatever he wants.

Tiny hut: for 20 hours you can get total concealment as long as you are inside spell range, fighter don't even see you and you can as many time to buff yourself as you want.

Fly: 10 minutes - if fighter don't have longbow he can do nothing to you. If he has - he probably does 1d8 +8 (strong bow(5) +3). If you cast stoneskin fighter even then cannot harm him.

Also: Grease, Solid fog, Black Tentacles = all spells creating difficult terran and prohibiting charge attacks

Hell, at ten level he can just dominate the fighter or polymorph into better fighter than said fighter.

And i don't even try to be creative - after all mage can just order his flying familiar to drop twenty or so alchemists fires or feather tokens (boat) over fighters head.
Or just simply take scroll pinned to their t-shirt with clearly visible words "Eat DC 19 Reflex Save or Suck cause you're too stupid to realize that Sepia Snake Sigil can be casted on scroll pinned to the T-shirt".

[TuggyNE]

The more you're seeking to contribute to a group rather than maximise your own character's power, the less individual capability matters.

This, uh, kind of sounds like the Teamwork Invalidates Optimization (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=3112.0) fallacy.

[FleshrakerAbuse]

Uh... I only read the first page and then came to here. Um... Are we now talking wizard-fighter duels?

[eggynack]

Uh... I only read the first page and then came to here. Um... Are we now talking wizard-fighter duels?
We actually aren't, somehow. It's mostly remained on topic, without ever drifting into pointless, ill conceived, never ending duels.

[Togo]

This, uh, kind of sounds like the Teamwork Invalidates Optimization (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=3112.0) fallacy.

Nah. The link refers to the idea that an optimised character is somehow incapable of being a team player, while I was referring to the idea that if you're focused on supporting the rest of the team at a common level optimisation is less irrelvent. You could have a team of optimised characters, and that doesn't invalidate my point.

I'd also be suspicious of people posting incomplete arguements and then declaring them to be a popular fallacy. It often ends up being a straw man arguement.

[Acanous]

On Casters and Improved Initiative:
Would just like to point out that the Hummingbird Familiar (Or Greensting Scorpion/Arctic Hare if Pathfinder) grant +4 to initiative for spellcasters.

If the caster is feat-starved, they can still have +4 to init.
As an aside, the +4 from a familiar stacks with the +4 feat bonus from Improved Init. So if the Wizard and Fighter both pick up Improved Init at lv 1, the Wizard has an init mod 4 points higher, that the fighter cannot get, before we add Nerveskitter (Anticipate Peril in Pathfinder)

So yeah. The Fighter is rarely ever going before the wizard.

If that Wizard is able to polymorph into a dire tortoise (Or is Divination Specialist [Foresight] in Pathfinder) he's going to act in a surprise round with a rather obscene initiative bonus.

In Pathfinder, a Ranger is actually the closest thing a mundane can get to Wizard init bonuses, and they *Still* fall behind. (Get Snap Shot to act on surprise round with an auto-init of 20, plus 8 favored terrain, plus 2 trait, plus 10 from Dex, 4 Improved init. Ranger can start with 44 and cannot be surprised.
Div focused wizard also gets to act on surprise round, starts with a 20, gets +4 Familiar, +5 Anticipate Peril, +6 Dex, +10 from being a Div focused Wizard, and can take Improved init to get a 49. Also cannot be surprised.)
Note that the two TIE if Anticipate Peril is not up, and the wizard has spent fewer feats. Furthermore, the Wizard's init stays that high in any environment.

In both cases I assumed the characters had bought a Dex-Boosting Tome and a +6 dex item. The Ranger's starting Dex was 20 and the Wizard's was 12.
I left out other items that both could easily purchase. It is possible to get the Ranger's init to 50, but the Wizard stays 5 points ahead the entire way.

If the Wizard is not Div focused, or doesn't care about init, Mundanes can potentially beat a Wizard's init in Pathfinder.
If they're seriously focused on it, and the wizard doesn't care.

Of course, what Ranger can drop the Wizard in a single round? Even if they get the surprise round and win init, the Wizard is liable to survive, even just off of HP. If you factor in all-day buffs, he's just not going to care, and will then spend 1-3 spells shutting down the Ranger.
Possibly all on the same turn.

[Togo]

If you want a good out of core fighter build, all you have to do is ask.

...and be prepared to wade through a barrage of posters telling you to play a different class. :smalltongue:

To be fair, this is more of a problem when asking for a monk build.

[eggynack]

...and be prepared to wade through a barrage of posters telling you to play a different class. :smalltongue:

To be fair, this is more of a problem when asking for a monk build.
I suppose, but people tend to come up with some interesting stuff after the tome of battle suggestions. There's often a good thread filled with good mundane builds on the front page, and seriously, monk builds aplenty. There's often several threads filled with monk builds on the front page. I've learned tons of good monk optimization on this board, although they still suck.

[Acanous]

Fighter is in no way as bad as monk :p
In fact, a number of decent builds have a couple levels of fighter (Dungeoncrasher for example)
You just don't want to take Fighter to 20. Or 10, really.

[Togo]

On Casters and Improved Initiative:
Would just like to point out that the Hummingbird Familiar (Or Greensting Scorpion/Arctic Hare if Pathfinder) grant +4 to initiative for spellcasters.

If the caster is feat-starved, they can still have +4 to init.
As an aside, the +4 from a familiar stacks with the +4 feat bonus from Improved Init. So if the Wizard and Fighter both pick up Improved Init at lv 1, the Wizard has an init mod 4 points higher, that the fighter cannot get, before we add Nerveskitter (Anticipate Peril in Pathfinder)

So yeah. The Fighter is rarely ever going before the wizard.


I'm having problems following the logic here.

You're saying that because there exists build choices such that a particular wizard can get a higher initiative than a particular fighter, fighters don't go before wizards?

Taking a step back here, what does overpowered (as a class) really mean? Is it useful in anything other than the abstract to say that x is more powerful than Y? If you are dealing with a particular game featuring a particular setting, set of rules, setting constraints and two actual built characters, does it matter that character A is built from a class that is more powerful than the class used to build character B? I'm not seeing how it matters how powerful the classes used to build them are, rather than just comparing the power of the two characters in the game.

[Anzyr]

I'm having problems following the logic here.

You're saying that because there exists build choices such that a particular wizard can get a higher initiative than a particular fighter, fighters don't go before wizards?

Taking a step back here, what does overpowered (as a class) really mean? Is it useful in anything other than the abstract to say that x is more powerful than Y? If you are dealing with a particular game featuring a particular setting, set of rules, setting constraints and two actual built characters, does it matter that character A is built from a class that is more powerful than the class used to build character B? I'm not seeing how it matters how powerful the classes used to build them are, rather than just comparing the power of the two characters in the game.

That's not what he's saying at all. Please take this time to list out all the buffs the fighter gets to Initiative. Just Improved Initiative as a bonus feat which wizards can take to ya say... huh. See that's weird cause I mean spellcasters get (multiple) spells that add to initiative and with Hummingbird familiar available/playing PF, they get a class feature that actually gives them more initiative. I think it is fairly obvious and goes without saying that the class that has abilities that add to initiative should be realistically expected to go before the class that well.... doesn't.

[eggynack]

I'm having problems following the logic here.

You're saying that because there exists build choices such that a particular wizard can get a higher initiative than a particular fighter, fighters don't go before wizards?

Taking a step back here, what does overpowered (as a class) really mean? Is it useful in anything other than the abstract to say that x is more powerful than Y? If you are dealing with a particular game featuring a particular setting, set of rules, setting constraints and two actual built characters, does it matter that character A is built from a class that is more powerful than the class used to build character B? I'm not seeing how it matters how powerful the classes used to build them are, rather than just comparing the power of the two characters in the game.
He's saying that wizards usually have a higher initiative. The things that give a wizard high initiative are pretty low cost. Taking hummingbird familiar is a far lower cost than a feat, and nerveskitter is potentially at an even lower cost than that. These aren't obscure build choices; they are remarkably common. His claim was that initiative is hard to come by on a wizard. It is not. The fighter doesn't really have access to any resources that are exclusive to him. In core, I think that improved initiative is actually pretty common on wizards, and out of core, they get access to all of the things I mentioned. Thus, he was wrong. I don't know if this tells us that much about the nature of the game, but wizards have a much higher likelihood of going first.

[TuggyNE]

Nah. The link refers to the idea that an optimised character is somehow incapable of being a team player, while I was referring to the idea that if you're focused on supporting the rest of the team at a common level optimisation is less irrelvent. You could have a team of optimised characters, and that doesn't invalidate my point.

Hmm, I guess there is a distinction, yeah. Basically, you're saying that focus on purely non-mechanical aspects can dilute the amount of time casters spend in the mechanically-enforced spotlight. That's true as far as it goes, I suppose, but at the cost of specifically abandoning the point of playing a rules-heavy game for a large chunk of that game, in order to deal with the flaws in that particular ruleset.

Or, put another way, the less you play 3.5, the less 3.5's balance problems will trouble you. Hurray!

(Mind you, you can't simply do out-of-combat stuff, because casters dominate there too, sometimes literally, as long as they're allowed to use their mechanical solutions. You have to actually forbid any mechanical involvement, any rules, any checks in order to get this.)

[Icewraith]

It's simple. The number of fun/interesting/weird/unexpected things you can do as a t1 caster increases proportionately with the size of your spells known and/or spell slots table and somewhat with your number of feats.

The number of fun/interesting/weird/unexpected things you can do as a non-caster class increases somewhat proportionately with your number of feats. Tome of Battle classes get this somewhat more with their ability lists, but those ability lists still pale in comparison to wizard spells. You can get +100 to damage or full attack twice in a round, but a caster can gate in a Pit Fiend or shapechange into a dragon or drop a glacier on top of a non-caster (no save and be buried in debris if it's centered on the non-caster).

In a higher level campaign the casters can not only participate in combat, they can also craft magic items, perform research with divinations, fortify an entire city with walls and trenches, use spells to aid roleplay and negotiation (including charm and dominate), visit other planes, instantly travel to far-away cities, summon and bind outsiders, create undead, use skills, and all sorts of other things.

Outside of combat, non-casters have skills and roleplay - but casters also have those! The amount of powerful, useful options a caster has out of combat, either to aid in roleplay or to use as favors for negotiation, is tremendous. Once you get some powerful spellcasters in a party, it's very easy to start focusing on out-of-combat goals the fighter and rogue etc just can't contribute a whole lot to. A fighter can offer to act as a champion for the ruler's army but a bard will make the army more effective than any single fighter could, and a t1 caster can destroy entire armies on their own, or eliminate the need to send an army in the first place.

Overpowered? Well, the caster players have a lot of fun planning these sort of things. A novice player can also accidentally invalidate half of a DM's campaign by using a single core spell. An expert player knows what the most useful spells are and generally when to prepare them, and quite often forces the DM to start arbitrarily disallowing spells (um.... teleportation doesn't work here, sorry) to keep the plot and half the major encounters going.

Anyone who blames the relative power of casters on permissive or bad dms or assumes that just because they can disallow certain spells there won't be a distinctive imbalance between melee and mundane classes usually doesn't understand or hasn't seen casters being played at full (reasonable) levels of power. Not even Tippyverse RAW power (which goes to about 21 on a scale of ten), just preparing and using spells intelligently.

The difference between what a good player can acheive with a wizard is staggering compared to what the same player can acheive with a fighter.

[Phelix-Mu]

You have to actually forbid any mechanical involvement, any rules, any checks in order to get this.)

Well, or have characters that aren't interested in out-of-combat magic use. Some casters might be myopic that way, or have role play reasons for not using magic to make friends, break the economy, or optimize skill checks. But this is heavily dependent on the tenor of the group and the initiative of the player to decide to play this way, and is not a style of play that can be practically enforced by the DM.

Generally speaking, I would think that RAW pretty much leaves it entirely to the intangibles of the game (group dynamic, DM fiat/houserule, optimization level) to moderate the rather staggering advantage that magic hands casters. Even WBL is only the poorest of poor olive branches to hand the mundanes, as the full casters get it too (and it's more exploitable in concert with spells), and it's not as flexible as spells (even at the ridiculously flexible level of Magic-Mart that is common around many tables).

Spells have variety that, on it's face is a huge advantage, and to the creative player really can make a large part of the game into a trivial exercise of "how do I want to take over the world?" And as if that wasn't enough, Spell Research allows your caster to invent something to deal with that particular problem in the most efficient way possible. If the DM isn't down with that class feature, then it's back to the published spells, to pick a solution from the many combos that will likely exist to accomplish any x or y.

While the fighter shops for a new sword.

[Kaeso]

But are they? Well, they sure are not in any game I run or most of the games I know of run by DM's that are Old Gornads like myself. It's not in the rules. So where does it come from? What makes the play style of some games make spellcasters so over powered?

I'd say that there is no specific play style that makes casters overpowered. It's just that they have so many tools at their disposal to break the game. They're pretty broken out of the box.


1.Gentleman's Agreement This is the first thing that comes to my mind with other games. The DM and players make some sort of agreement to 'play fair' and 'not cheat' and 'not use broken or cheesey things' and to 'make sure everyone has fun'. The last one is the most odd one of all, as if spellcasters are overpowered in your game, then anyone without a spellcaster character is not having so much fun. I wonder what happens when you break the Agreement?

While the Gentleman's agreement is certainly an effective method of damage control, it doesn't make the casters more or less overpowered, it's simply an agreement not to use the overpowered tools spellcaters have at their disposal by design. Even then, a lot of non-broken casters like the beguiler still end up being more effective than most mundane characters, even without shenenigans.


2.The Buddy Group This is where the group is all 'buddies' so everything is relaxed and carefree. Where the DM is not apart from the players, the DM is a player. This has the classic ''everyone is on the same side problem''. If all the players(and the DM player) all agree and think alike, then you will have problems.


This is also possible, but it still has the problem that casters are often quite more effective at most things than non-casters. They will excel one way or another. The best way to mitigate this is by limiting casters to buffing, which is a form of self-sabotage but it can help. It certainly makes the game more enjoyable for the friendly neighborhood fighter.


3.Low Magic Worlds I think this is a big one. A great many DM's like Low Magic. But when you make the world magic weak, then any magic that exists is twice as strong. And you can do a fine Low Magic D&D game, if you alter the whole setting and rules to low magic. But if you just do the easy way of ''saying it's low magic'' you will run into problems.

If you go by challenge ratings, low magic actually bones the mundane characters harder than the magical ones, assuming that magical items also fall under the "low magic" rule.


4.More versatility This is the idea that a spellcaster can do anything. Though I'm not sure where it comes from, as spellcasters can't do anything. My best guess is that too many players play the character sheet. This is simple enough and easy to spot: this is the player who when anything happens in the game immediately looks down on their character sheet for the answer. So you have Player A is a fighter with a single character sheet full of equipment, feats, skills and notes; and Player B who has a character sheet, plus a couple pages of spells. So when both players characters encounter a locked door, then both look down to their character sheet for a way to open it. Player B can easily find Knock and use it to open a locked door, but player A does not have any type of ability on his sheet that says ''open door''. So by this line of thinking Player character A can't open a door as the ability is not on the sheet.

Well, the problem here is that, at least in my opinion, "looking at the character sheet" is the right thing to do. When a door is locked, you look at your character sheet to solve the situation. A wizard casts knock, a cleric casts shatter on the lock, a rogue unlocks the lock with his open lock skill and thieves' tools, the fighter has no tools at his disposal. In a social setting you look at your sheet and use bluff, sense motive, diplomacy and intimidate. Of course roleplaying is important, but the rules are the "frame" within which the roleplaying takes place, voluntarily imposed limits if you will. The problem is that some limits (fighter) are stricter than others (wizard).


5. That a spellcaster makes other characters feel useless. This one is a bit confusing to me. How does a spellcaster do this? Sure there are some spells and magic effect that can do the work of class features, but none of them are infinite uses per day. A rouge can check for and remove traps all day and night, but a spellcaster can't.

The problem here is that the party will most likely run out of hp before the caster runs out of spells if we assume mid-to-high level. Furthermore spells like find trap, knock etc. are fairly low level, so the casters can easily afford wands with those spells on them. This gives the party wizard 50 knock spells to use over the course of an adventure without even touching his spell slots. The rogue could of course use these as well with Use Magic Device, which is exactly why a lot of people around these parts consider it to be such a cool skill, to the point where you never have a reason not to max it out (unless you're of course in a campaign without magic items, in which case you're screwed anyway).

So in the end you pose viable solutions. However, you mostly treat the symptoms rather than the problem itself. I'm not saying that it's a bad thing since the problem is inherrent in the design, and solving it means overhauling the system beyond recognition.

[Acanous]

I'm having problems following the logic here.

You're saying that because there exists build choices such that a particular wizard can get a higher initiative than a particular fighter, fighters don't go before wizards?

I'm more saying that If a fighter (or ranger, or any mundane really) optimizes their build solely to do something, a wizard can still beat them consistantly at that thing with little effort and less resources.
Sometimes without even trying to be better at that thing.


Taking a step back here, what does overpowered (as a class) really mean? Is it useful in anything other than the abstract to say that x is more powerful than Y? If you are dealing with a particular game featuring a particular setting, set of rules, setting constraints and two actual built characters, does it matter that character A is built from a class that is more powerful than the class used to build character B? I'm not seeing how it matters how powerful the classes used to build them are, rather than just comparing the power of the two characters in the game.

Eh? What are you saying here? That fluff does not follow crunch? I assure you that if you try to make Shinypants McGee the King of All Fighters a Big Bad while the Grand Mubjub Dorfinkle, the World's most Powerful Wizard is imprisoned in his dungeon... There's going to be some odd looks and a shattered suspension of disbelief when the party wizard, five levels lower, can solo Shinypants with one, maybe two spells.

[Gwendol]

Well, I was using Tainted Sorcerer, which instantly sets your save DC to "no, you won't" and covers the money. As for range... let's face it, anything inside a dungeon ends up pushing stuff to short range (it was a mental asylum, but the concept is the same).

What we've been doing is taking pregen adventures and just running the characters through them and seeing what happens (sometimes with level boosts to the monsters as needed). Turns out for most of them, the answer is "an Archivist runs right over them." It's two optimized characters (well, it was, we've just added one more). Yes, the DM could customize all the encounters to deal with the higher power of the caster... but that just proves the point.

JaronK

Ah I see. Makes more sense now, and sounds like an interesting gauntlet-type way of approaching the game.

[Togo]

Hmm, I guess there is a distinction, yeah. Basically, you're saying that focus on purely non-mechanical aspects can dilute the amount of time casters spend in the mechanically-enforced spotlight.

Potentially down to zero, depending on the style of the game. Which means your spotlight isn't 'mechanically enforced' at all, it's a result of your choice of playstyle.

Combine that with a game where, rather than playing abstract embodiments of the build potential of your character class, you play actual characters that can be balanced against eachother in terms of attention, spotlight, combat ability etc. without any particular focus on their character class, and you end up with a game similar to that described by the OP.


That's true as far as it goes, I suppose, but at the cost of specifically abandoning the point of playing a rules-heavy game for a large chunk of that game, in order to deal with the flaws in that particular ruleset.

Or, put another way, the less you play 3.5, the less 3.5's balance problems will trouble you. Hurray!

There are plenty of people out there who play 3.5 because it's there and the group knows how to play it, and don't care about it being rules heavy. I've run investigative games with no combat at all. I've played a game where everyone started off as 0th level apprentices, loosely modelled on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and I've met several groups where one person makes all the characters, because the players have little or no interest in the build process. As one of my regular players put it - "creating a character in 3.5 is a game in itself, and I think it's a fun game, but it's not the same game as actually playing, and not everyone enjoys both."

The very fact that you cast demphasising the mechancis as somehow 'not playing 3.5' suggests to me that the problem is very much bound up in how you play the game. If you play the game differently, there really isn't much of a problem. Of course, it's entirely possible that there remains a problem for every playstyle that you would actually enjoy. Differing playstyle doesn't mean there isn't a problem for you that you're describing entirely accurately, merely that, just as the OP suggests, it isn't there for everyone.


(Mind you, you can't simply do out-of-combat stuff, because casters dominate there too, sometimes literally, as long as they're allowed to use their mechanical solutions. You have to actually forbid any mechanical involvement, any rules, any checks in order to get this.)

No, you don't. You have to design adventures that aren't trivially solveable by abilities the players have. Once players get access to fly, then random bandits on the road aren't going to be a suitable encounter any more. Once they get access to teleport, travel-based adventures become more problematic. But this is true of any game, and any set of abilities, whether they are class abilities (the fly spell) or somethin acquired in game (the character has made an alliance with a clan of giant eagles).


It's simple. The number of fun/interesting/weird/unexpected things you can do as a t1 caster increases proportionately with the size of your spells known and/or spell slots table and somewhat with your number of feats.

Only if you're playing your character sheet, and only counting class features as fun and interesting. A large spell list will always help of course, but the relationship won't be proportional to character sheet abilities.


A fighter can offer to act as a champion for the ruler's army but a bard will make the army more effective than any single fighter could,

Only if it's an extremely small army. Seriously, I'm trying to put a Fields of Blood Army together and I thought bardic generals would be great. But the area of effect is just too small, and the duration too brief. Not to mention the problem of issuing orders while singing or pursuading a military force to accept a chaotic travelling musician as their commander.

If you do have any practical advice for abilities that would help an army, now's the time to say!


and a t1 caster can destroy entire armies on their own, or eliminate the need to send an army in the first place.

:smallconfused: Why is your DM basing plot events in his game around something that can be eliminated by an ability of one the PCs?


An expert player knows what the most useful spells are and generally when to prepare them, and quite often forces the DM to start arbitrarily disallowing spells (um.... teleportation doesn't work here, sorry) to keep the plot and half the major encounters going.

Why? What does he gain from doing so? That doesn't sound like an expert player, that sounds like a skilled novice on a power trip. Is there some sense in which teleporting past the major encounters will help either the player or his character?


Anyone who blames the relative power of casters on permissive or bad dms or assumes that just because they can disallow certain spells there won't be a distinctive imbalance between melee and mundane classes usually doesn't understand or hasn't seen casters being played at full (reasonable) levels of power. Not even Tippyverse RAW power (which goes to about 21 on a scale of ten), just preparing and using spells intelligently.

I've seen casters played intelligently. I've played in games without a distinctive imbalance between melee and mundane classes. Different styles of play have different results.


The difference between what a good player can acheive with a wizard is staggering compared to what the same player can acheive with a fighter.

I agree, but not in the way you might expect. I find that characters that overshoot the optimisation level of the party achieve very little in practice. A good player doesn't bring a high-op character to a low-op game (or vice versa) because the game won't last, and the character will achieve nothing.


I'm more saying that If a fighter (or ranger, or any mundane really) optimizes their build solely to do something, a wizard can still beat them consistantly at that thing with little effort and less resources.
Sometimes without even trying to be better at that thing.

Ok, how about an example? The character I'm playing at the moment on these boards is a non-caster melee specialist, a 5th level character. She fights with a reach weapon, trips and disarms foes, has decent social skills(+14 bluff, +17diplomacy), and a good initiative (+8). I can see how a caster would beat her at one or maybe two things on a one-off basis, because that's how spells work, but I don't see how the wizard could be better at all of them constantly.


Eh? What are you saying here? That fluff does not follow crunch?

I'm saying that comparing the potential power of the best possible build for class A against the best possible build for class B isn't really relevent in an actual game with actual characters. What matters more is not the maximum possible potential of the class, but the characters that are actually in the game, and how powerful they are compared to the challenges that they are likely to face.

[eggynack]

Ok, how about an example? The character I'm playing at the moment on these boards is a non-caster melee specialist, a 5th level character. She fights with a reach weapon, trips and disarms foes, has decent social skills(+14 bluff, +17diplomacy), and a good initiative (+8). I can see how a caster would beat her at one or maybe two things on a one-off basis, because that's how spells work, but not all of them constantly.

You probably couldn't do it with a wizard, but you might be able to do it with a druid. Also, as you level, the wizard is likely to be able to approximate your doings to a greater and greater degree. Level five happens to be around the turning point where casters begin to really surpass fighters. In any case, a druid's fleshraker dinosaur is probably capable of performing to approximately that degree of success. They do really well at combat maneuvers. A druid can't do the bluff thing as well, but they have diplomacy on their skill list, so they aren't outclassed too badly on that count. Additionally, I'm sure there are some good spells for out of combat occasions, though not nearly as many as on the wizard list. Initiative isn't hard to match, especially when you go up a level to 6. Primal instinct and a dexterity form work wonders. They also help a lot for when you want to put on luminous armor and play the defensive game.

I think that level 5's big summon is the dire wolf, so that plus a fleshraker is really the combat bar we're going for here. Back that up with your first level battlefield control spell of choice, and you're golden. With a tripping build, you're really trying to approximate two separate things. The first is the damage, which I think the fleshraker manages, at least most of the way, and the second is the battlefield control, which a druid can certainly do. For wizards though, I don't know. I'm not nearly as versed in their optimization as some on this board, so I'll just wait and see if someone else has anything good in their defense.

[Beheld]

Ok, how about an example? The character I'm playing at the moment on these boards is a non-caster melee specialist, a 5th level character. She fights with a reach weapon, trips and disarms foes, has decent social skills(+14 bluff, +17diplomacy), and a good initiative (+8). I can see how a caster would beat her at one or maybe two things on a one-off basis, because that's how spells work, but I don't see how the wizard could be better at all of them constantly.

4 or 5 Stinking Clouds a day surpasses your action denial. Charm Person matches your Diplomacy and Bluff. 14 Dex, and a Hummingbird Familiar with elven Generalist gets you +10 to init.

I guess that leaves all the second level spells to do whatever else they want.

[eggynack]

4 or 5 Stinking Clouds a day surpasses your action denial. Charm Person matches your Diplomacy and Bluff. 14 Dex, and a Hummingbird Familiar with elven Generalist gets you +10 to init.

I guess that leaves all the second level spells to do whatever else they want.
That's a pretty nice set up, but you still need some damage dealing. You could always shoot seeking rays into the clouds. That actually sounds pretty neat.

Edit: Eh, seeking ray only bypasses normal cover. You might need a different type of spell, an AoE, or just waiting for enemies to leave the cloud.

[Oscredwin]

a Hummingbird Familiar with elven Generalist gets you +10 to init.

Humming Bird familier isn't effected by elven generalist.

[Beheld]

That's a pretty nice set up, but you still need some damage dealing. You could always shoot seeking rays into the clouds. That actually sounds pretty neat.

Edit: Eh, seeking ray only bypasses normal cover. You might need a different type of spell, an AoE, or just waiting for enemies to leave the cloud.

I mean, I would personally trade all your second level spells for glitterdust if and just add that on top of stinking cloud, and let the Druid and his AC do all the damage. I mean, we are talking about people nauseated for 1d4+1 rounds after they leave the cloud. But yes, if you wanted to be a worse character in return for doing literally everything better than that character you would want to do damage.

You could Scorching Ray or Melf's Acid Arrow people who leave the cloud. You could Kelgore's Grave Mist them in the cloud for some minor damage and debuff, you could stand next to them and use Fireburst for 5d8 AoE damage.

None of that is particularly impressive, but it probably outputs about as much damage as a tripstar, and hey, you could even have slightly fewer Stinking Clouds and have 3rd level spells that do damage too. Or slightly fewer Charm Persons and 1st level spells.

Or just second level spells you could Web people then drop Kelgore's Grave Mist. 1d6 damage per round, fatigued, and so it is even harder for them to break out of the web, and web is already basically just a wall for the duration.

[eggynack]

I mean, I would personally trade all your second level spells for glitterdust if and just add that on top of stinking cloud, and let the Druid and his AC do all the damage. I mean, we are talking about people nauseated for 1d4+1 rounds after they leave the cloud. But yes, if you wanted to be a worse character in return for doing literally everything better than that character you would want to do damage.

You could Scorching Ray or Melf's Acid Arrow people who leave the cloud. You could Kelgore's Grave Mist them in the cloud for some minor damage and debuff, you could stand next to them and use Fireburst for 5d8 AoE damage.

None of that is particularly impressive, but it probably outputs about as much damage as a tripstar, and hey, you could even have slightly fewer Stinking Clouds and have 3rd level spells that do damage too. Or slightly fewer Charm Persons and 1st level spells.
Obviously a caster can do better work with his slots than blasting, and subsequently be far more helpful than a fighter. I think the question is whether a wizard can obviate the need for a fighter entirely, in any given party. I don't think we can necessarily assume that the party just so happens to have a druidic fighter replacement, ready to shoulder the wizard's damage dealing load. Hence seeking ray. Also, seeking ray seems to be strictly better than scorching ray, at least prior to level 7. That spell is so frigging sweet. If the wizard's puny combat abilities can kill enemies post-cloud, then your argument definitely makes sense. However, I'm a bit doubtful.

Edit: Grave mist seems pretty sweet, actually. The wizard might have a shot at a built in kill condition after all. The wizard's ability to actually kill things is the thing that's coming under scrutiny here.

[JaronK]

Ah I see. Makes more sense now, and sounds like an interesting gauntlet-type way of approaching the game.

Sort of, though all the role play bits are still in place, so it's not just "run into monsters for no reason." The DM just takes existing adventures, plugs them into the world in a way that makes sense (like changing the name of a god here and there so it all feels like the same world) and throws them at us. So far it's worked pretty well but he's had a REALLY tough time actually challenging us with any of them since we pretty much always have something to decimate the opposition. We're now moving to a more diplomatic campaign because smashing stuff was too easy. Even armies can't threaten my Archivist (he's level 12).

JaronK

[Togo]

You probably couldn't do it with a wizard, but you might be able to do it with a druid.

I don't think so. I play druids a lot.


Also, as you level, the wizard is likely to be able to approximate your doings to a greater and greater degree.

That's great, but this example is level 5.


Level five happens to be around the turning point where casters begin to really surpass fighters. In any case, a druid's fleshraker dinosaur is probably capable of performing to approximately that degree of success. They do really well at combat maneuvers.

There aren't any fleshraker dinosaurs in this game, or at least none locally, so that isn't an option for a druid (or for my character as a mount, alas!). But even if there were, a trip attack of +3 that can only be used as part of a charge isn't much to write home about, and their grapple isn't much better.


A druid can't do the bluff thing as well, but they have diplomacy on their skill list, so they aren't outclassed too badly on that count.

Having it on your class list gives you +8 at 5th level, which still leaves the druid outclassed pretty badly. You could spend the rest of your skills on synergy bonuses to boost it, but why would you?



Additionally, I'm sure there are some good spells for out of combat occasions, though not nearly as many as on the wizard list.

Ok, well let me know when you find one, and we'll see if it really beats the example character on a consistent bases.


Initiative isn't hard to match, especially when you go up a level to 6.

We're still at level 5 though.


Primal instinct and a dexterity form work wonders.

Sure, but that's half your highest level spells, and if even if you happen to be already in a dex form when combat starts, it's going to be hard do that and use your spell that outclasses a high diplomacy score, all at the same time.


I think that level 5's big summon is the dire wolf, so that plus a fleshraker is really the combat bar we're going for here.

They're both worse at manuevres than the example character. And the one that's better at it isn't around for long, or in the first round.


Back that up with your first level battlefield control spell of choice, and you're golden. With a tripping build, you're really trying to approximate two separate things. The first is the damage, which I think the fleshraker manages, at least most of the way, and the second is the battlefield control, which a druid can certainly do.

Yeah, you're kinda handwaving here though. Druids can cast entangle, a spell that's useless in a wide variety of situations, such as when you have allies, or are trying to get innocents away from the bad guys, or are indoors, all of which have come up in the game. That doesn't give you either the repeatability or the reliabiltiy or the flexibilty of a good tripping build/disarm build, but it is great for taking out large numbers of melee opponents. Calling them both battlefield control ignores the fact that they work quite differently, do different things, and serve quite different purposes tactically.

Damage, sure. Damage is a game most classes can play. Since it all stacks though, the bar is higher for arguing that one damaging character makes the other outclassed. You need to be not just as good, but significantly better, and I don't think the druid gets you there unless you really specialise for it.

[Gavinfoxx]

If there are no fleshrakers locally, why is that a problem for the Druid getting one?

Their knowledge nature check is BY FAR high enough to know about them with taking 10, and the Druid isn't limited by, you know, animals being locally available in getting their animal companion.

They can swap animal companions on a moving airship, dontchyaknow.

[Togo]

4 or 5 Stinking Clouds a day surpasses your action denial. Charm Person matches your Diplomacy and Bluff.

Stinking cloud is pretty good. How are you getting 5 a day? , and what do you do against opponents with a high fort save? Or those who just flee, using your cloud as cover against retaliation, and then return a few rounds later?

Charm person doesn't really fill the same role as diplomacy. Unless all NPCs are one-shot wonders that turn up once, spill info and then are never seen or heard from again. Otherwise you're stuck with a spell that only works for a few hours and then gets you into serious trouble.

Also, is using all your highest level spell slots really outclassing someone with little effort and fewer resources?

[TuggyNE]

Potentially down to zero, depending on the style of the game. Which means your spotlight isn't 'mechanically enforced' at all, it's a result of your choice of playstyle.

I meant "spotlight in mechanically-enforced segments" more than "spotlight enforced by mechanics".


Combine that with a game where, rather than playing abstract embodiments of the build potential of your character class, you play actual characters that can be balanced against eachother in terms of attention, spotlight, combat ability etc. without any particular focus on their character class, and you end up with a game similar to that described by the OP.

In other words, the game isn't broken if your group takes some time out to fix it and avoid the problems. True, but only getting about half the point.


The very fact that you cast demphasising the mechancis as somehow 'not playing 3.5' suggests to me that the problem is very much bound up in how you play the game. If you play the game differently, there really isn't much of a problem. Of course, it's entirely possible that there remains a problem for every playstyle that you would actually enjoy. Differing playstyle doesn't mean there isn't a problem for you that you're describing entirely accurately, merely that, just as the OP suggests, it isn't there for everyone.

Two closely related things: first, the problem does exist to the extent that you play according to the rules, and second, that I mostly care (for forum discussion purposes, at least) about game design and considerations that can be expressed in words and principles, rather than vague generalizations or essentially freeform play.


No, you don't. You have to design adventures that aren't trivially solveable by abilities the players have. Once players get access to fly, then random bandits on the road aren't going to be a suitable encounter any more. Once they get access to teleport, travel-based adventures become more problematic. But this is true of any game, and any set of abilities, whether they are class abilities (the fly spell) or somethin acquired in game (the character has made an alliance with a clan of giant eagles).

The sheer number and variety of abilities a full caster can rather easily get makes this substantially more difficult; a Fighter who has somehow made an alliance with a clan of giant eagles probably hasn't also made an alliance with a phase spider, a succubus, and half a dozen other different creatures. Each such alliance or roleplaying-based ability is at once rarer, under direct DM control (as opposed to merely being subject to DM banning), and a clearer signal as to capabilities, not to mention generally more difficult to make use of. Arguably, these are all good inferiorities to have from a game design perspective (although the fact that they are all reliant on the DM to implement properly, without any particular structure built into the game, is something of a problem), but the lack of any such controls on the casters' equivalents is where the main problem lies.


Only if you're playing your character sheet, and only counting class features as fun and interesting. A large spell list will always help of course, but the relationship won't be proportional to character sheet abilities.

Yeah, the way I see it, 3.5 is philosophically best suited as a system to games where detailed rules and roleplay inform each other, rather than games where the rules are ignored because they don't work, because of the sheer number of rules to ignore. The fact that it needs to be hacked to function properly is mostly what I'm getting at, not some sort of caster-superiority agenda.

[Beheld]

Stinking cloud is pretty good. How are you getting 5 a day? , and what do you do against opponents with a high fort save? Or those who just flee, using your cloud as cover against retaliation, and then return a few rounds later?

If they have a high fort save they are also likely to beat your trips. Yes, it might be nice to also have your glitterdusts and webs.

If they try to run away, you hunt them down, because they are nauseous, and you move several times faster than them.

You can get five different ways. A 24 Int Specialist Conjurer gets 4. A Focused Specialist gets 5. You could also be a Domain Wizard Elven Generalist and get 5, provided you take the Conjuration Domain.


Charm person doesn't really fill the same role as diplomacy. Unless all NPCs are one-shot wonders that turn up once, spill info and then are never seen or heard from again. Otherwise you're stuck with a spell that only works for a few hours and then gets you into serious trouble.

Charm Person makes people Friendly, to make someone who is Friendly Helpful is a DC 20 check you can take ten on. Once you have moved someone to Friendly, you move them to helpful. When Charm Person wears off, they are still Helpful. If you are going to ground your characters strength on Diplomacy don't cry me a river when it turns out Wizards can abuse it too. There is a reason that people don't answer every question with Half-Elf Binder 1/Marshal 1, and it isn't because that character can't turn anyone in the game into his puppet in two standard actions.


Also, is using all your highest level spell slots really outclassing someone with little effort and fewer resources?

Yes. Using all your highest level slots to do more than they could do all day is in fact outclassing someone with little effort. If you cast four spells to win four encounters then you haven't spent any resources at all, as opposed to tripfighters who die in the same four encounters.

[eggynack]

There aren't any fleshraker dinosaurs in this game, or at least none locally, so that isn't an option for a druid (or for my character as a mount, alas!). But even if there were, a trip attack of +3 that can only be used as part of a charge isn't much to write home about, and their grapple isn't much better.

It's really more that he's doing all of these things at once, and doing them right next to pretty good damage. The dinosaur is also pretty far from brittle, and tossing a dinosaur into combat has a much lower cost than tossing yourself into combat. He pounces right in, deals a good amount of damage, has a chance at poisoning, and has a chance at locking the opponent down completely. This is all costless in terms of the druid's actions. The druid can easily help out with the battle with the spells I'll discuss when they come up later. My second choice at level 5 is probably the riding dog. It's not quite as offensively powerful, but he can make a serious nuisance of himself. It's more about the druid having a kill condition than about the druid actually being a dinosaur or riding dog.



Having it on your class list gives you +8 at 5th level, which still leaves the druid outclassed pretty badly. You could spend the rest of your skills on synergy bonuses to boost it, but why would you?
I suppose. They can afford a decent modifier in charisma though, and wild empathy is decent.



Ok, well let me know when you find one, and we'll see if it really beats the example character on a consistent bases.
This seems like a really complicated question. I think it needs a particular situation, because druid spells cover a pretty wide variety of situations. They get some decent divinations though, and those can be nice.




Sure, but that's half your highest level spells, and if even if you happen to be already in a dex form when combat starts, it's going to be hard do that and use your spell that outclasses a high diplomacy score, all at the same time.

It's not all that bad, especially when you get natural spell. A desmodu hunting bat is already almost equaling your initiative mod, all on its own. It's not really about outclassing a diplomacy score, so much as just being generally useful out of combat. There're workarounds, and generally a day of diplomacy is a thing you prepare for. A druid can prepare a town living list, and still be ready for combat between wild shape, his animal companion, and spontaneous summons.



They're both worse at manuevres than the example character. And the one that's better at it isn't around for long, or in the first round.
Dire wolves can last quite awhile, if you want them to. My builds tend to emphasize summoning, so ashbound and augment summoning are pretty standard. Greenbound is obviously insane, so I might break it out if we're really pushing limits here. A dire wolf is therefore going to last 10 rounds, and it has a high enough HP that it might actually make it through that whole period of time.




Yeah, you're kinda handwaving here though. Druids can cast entangle, a spell that's useless in a wide variety of situations, such as when you have allies, or are trying to get innocents away from the bad guys, or are indoors, all of which have come up in the game. That doesn't give you either the repeatability or the reliabiltiy or the flexibilty of a good tripping build/disarm build, but it is great for taking out large numbers of melee opponents. Calling them both battlefield control ignores the fact that they work quite differently, do different things, and serve quite different purposes tactically.
There's more battlefield control than just entangle. They also get impeding stones, which can work when entangle doesn't. Spore field is a nice spell to layer on top of another BFC. Obscuring mist can also help a lot with things. You can also do things that are more similar to tripping with higher level spells. I'm thinking of stuff like kelpstrand and blinding spittle here. I don't see how tripping and disarming are so much more flexible than what a druid does.



Damage, sure. Damage is a game most classes can play. Since it all stacks though, the bar is higher for arguing that one damaging character makes the other outclassed. You need to be not just as good, but significantly better, and I don't think the druid gets you there unless you really specialise for it.
You don't actually have to deal more damage in a round to outclass the fighter's damage. As long as you keep yourself out of range of enemy attacks, it doesn't matter much how quickly you're killing. Between the aforementioned summons and battlefield control spells, it's quite possible to keep your distance and have a kill condition at the same time. When you have a druid in the party, the fighter is almost another summon or animal companion. They can admittedly be better than either, but that's the role they're filling. It seems like a fast route to a fighter feeling insignificant.

[Tar Palantir]

Dire wolves can last quite awhile, if you want them to. My builds tend to emphasize summoning, so ashbound and augment summoning are pretty standard. Greenbound is obviously insane, so I might break it out if we're really pushing limits here. A dire wolf is therefore going to last 10 rounds, and it has a high enough HP that it might actually make it through that whole period of time.

Yeah, with all the summon focus stuff dire wolves are pretty sick. I'm in a level 8 campaign right now, and our druid is still using dire wolf christmas trees (greenbound+beckon the frozen=christmas tree, with augment summoning and ashbound for the lulz) to wreck pretty much any combat encounter with less than three or four opponents. She would be using brown bears, but we've had to reincarnate one NPC a day since we hit level 7, and she's saving her last slot for Last Breath in case we need raising again. Also, she has Wis 14 and straight tens for everything else save her 8 Charisma (we did 3d6 no rerolls for this campaign since it was supposed to be semi-horror; in actuality, we ended up as the masked slashers to the monsters' coed in high heels running through a dark forest), and she's head and shoulders above the rest of the party regardless.

[Silvanoshei]

I don't really understand what you're claiming here.
Wizards can die at low-levels.


Why does he have ten HP exactly?
Level 3 Wizard, 12 CON, +5 Start, rolled 1 for +2, rolled 2 for +3 = 10.


The first, is that extremely low level fighters and wizards are roughly on par, if they're being played at moderate optimization. As has been noted, that level is roughly between one and five, depending on the environment.
I wasn't really making that comparison. I was just telling everyone that Wizards at low-level can die more so than other party members. I guess Fighter could be one.


The second, is that your claims are not true for druids. They are just always better than fighters.
It depends. You're assuming I'm talking about 1 on 1's, i'm talking about PVE, not PVP. Also the DM controls the flow of the game, not the players. If you let the party spell casters get out of hand, that's your own fault.

[Silvanoshei]

Over three hours of straight fighting? I can't imagine the front line's HP looked any better.

They didn't get hit as often because of their AC. A lot of fighting, but very low level CR challenges. Like a level 8 Fighter taking on a camp of Hobgoblins or Ghouls (CR 1/2 & CR 1). There was travel time as well, due to environment.

[eggynack]

Wizards can die at low-levels.

Anyone can die at low levels. That's why they're low levels. However, a wizard rocking abrupt jaunt and some good debuffs and battlefield control is going to survive a lot.



Level 3 Wizard, 12 CON, +5 Start, rolled 1 for +2, rolled 2 for +3 = 10.

Well, there's your problem. Why did he only have 12 constitution? It's the second most important stat on a wizard. Also, wizards don't need as much health as not-wizards, because they have other defenses. Even at 3rd level, they have spells like web, invisibility, and mirror image that can keep them alive through just about anything.




I wasn't really making that comparison. I was just telling everyone that Wizards at low-level can die more so than other party members. I guess Fighter could be one.
And I'm telling you that you are wrong. You can build a really defensive wizard if you know what you're doing. Abrupt jaunt is just ridiculous, and the other spells I've mentioned are too. Fighters, by contrast, have to block punches with their face.



It depends. You're assuming I'm talking about 1 on 1's, i'm talking about PVE, not PVP. Also the DM controls the flow of the game, not the players. If you let the party spell casters get out of hand, that's your own fault.
No. Why does everyone assume that I'm talking about 1 v. 1 arena matches? When I say that druids are better than fighters, I mean in real game PvE circumstances. Do you know where fighters are at their least underwhelming? 1 v. 1 arena matches. Fighters are at their best when battle is straightforward, and everything stands on the ground, and tries to get in a full attack. Druids adapt. It's just what they do. They adapt to spelunking missions, and they adapt to city living, and they adapt to nautical adventures. They adapt to just about everything. Druids don't have many situations where they have to throw up their hands in defeat, and say that they have no resources that can help in a particular situation. Yes, they can fight in an arena. They can take on a fighter in direct combat like nobody's business. They can also do just about anything else.

[Emperor Tippy]

Well, there's your problem. Why did he only have 12 constitution? It's the second most important stat on a wizard. Also, wizards don't need as much health as not-wizards, because they have other defenses. Even at 3rd level, they have spells like web, invisibility, and mirror image that can keep them alive through just about anything.
Until you run your HP off Int like any proper wizard. :smallcool:

[Flickerdart]

They didn't get hit as often because of their AC. A lot of fighting, but very low level CR challenges. Like a level 8 Fighter taking on a camp of Hobgoblins or Ghouls (CR 1/2 & CR 1). There was travel time as well, due to environment.
Those both have attacks of +2, meaning that an AC of 22 is only hit 5% of the time. Such an AC is trivial to reach with either class. After that, the wizard also has miss chance and movement modes, and the fighter has jack all.

[Togo]

I meant "spotlight in mechanically-enforced segments" more than "spotlight enforced by mechanics".

No, even in fights, it's entirely possible for every character to have a role and every player to feel valuable and included.


In other words, the game isn't broken if your group takes some time out to fix it and avoid the problems. True, but only getting about half the point.

It's a roleplaying game. If you try and make it entirely mechancially balanced between characters you end up with 4e. It might even be the case that people complaining about mechanical imbalance on the internet is partly why we got 4e. In 3.5 we have a variety of different mechanics and mechanisms for different characters, which means that any kind of mechanical challenge is going to impact each character differently. Keeping every player involved is part of being a DM. There is no game, no theoretical balance point, where you don't have to do this.


Two closely related things: first, the problem does exist to the extent that you play according to the rules,

No. Your playstyle isn't the inevitable result of how the rules are written any more than anyone else's is.


and second, that I mostly care (for forum discussion purposes, at least) about game design and considerations that can be expressed in words and principles, rather than vague generalizations or essentially freeform play.

We're trying to answer the OP. The OP's experience, which is not uncommonly expressed on these boards, is that the game turns out pretty well balanced between players and everyone has fun. There are a number of possible reasons for this, from the simple (by pure chance the characters in his game turn out mechanically balanced in the way that they are built and played, even if the character classes allow for options that would produce an imbalanced party), to the more complicated.

But the simple fact is that if two groups of people get a different result with the same ruleset, then the problem may not be entirely located within the rules. How you play the game is a game design distinction that can be expressed in words. The rules of 3.5 include 'freeform elements' such as you're describing. As such I don't see the problem you're having here.


The sheer number and variety of abilities a full caster can rather easily get makes this substantially more difficult; a Fighter who has somehow made an alliance with a clan of giant eagles probably hasn't also made an alliance with a phase spider, a succubus, and half a dozen other different creatures. Each such alliance or roleplaying-based ability is at once rarer, under direct DM control

Just like spell research. Or access to a new rulebook.


(as opposed to merely being subject to DM banning), and a clearer signal as to capabilities, not to mention generally more difficult to make use of. Arguably, these are all good inferiorities to have from a game design perspective (although the fact that they are all reliant on the DM to implement properly, without any particular structure built into the game, is something of a problem), but the lack of any such controls on the casters' equivalents is where the main problem lies.

So exercise some control. Either the player or the DM or both can make whatever choices they want. Don't include elements in your game that will break it, or rely on the PCs being less powerful than they are. Why is this a problem?


Yeah, the way I see it, 3.5 is philosophically best suited as a system to games where detailed rules and roleplay inform each other, rather than games where the rules are ignored because they don't work, because of the sheer number of rules to ignore. The fact that it needs to be hacked to function properly is mostly what I'm getting at, not some sort of caster-superiority agenda.

Who is ignoring rules? Or changing them? 3.5 is best suited as menu of choices from which to build a game. There are more choices, monsters, setting rules and other design elements than you can ever fit into a single campaign. It was never intended that you use them all simultaneously. The DM has final say, in the rules, for a reason. Saying that the game runs into balance problems when you ignore balance is a bit like saying that the elemental plane of air sucks because not all characters have wings, or that planar travel can't be a thing because the chances are too low that all characters will be suitably protected by sheer chance. If that's the game you want to run, you make sure all the characters can participate, or you don't take the game in that direction. That's how the game works.

[zlefin]

Togo, why are you still arguing a losing point, when the effects of the tier system are well and thoroughly documented; as are the conditions when they may and may not apply to a specific game?

[TuggyNE]

Togo, why are you still arguing a losing point, when the effects of the tier system are well and thoroughly documented; as are the conditions when they may and may not apply to a specific game?

Because someone is WRONG on the Internet.

[genderlich]

They didn't get hit as often because of their AC. A lot of fighting, but very low level CR challenges. Like a level 8 Fighter taking on a camp of Hobgoblins or Ghouls (CR 1/2 & CR 1). There was travel time as well, due to environment.

...did your party have a level 8 Fighter and a level 3 Wizard? If so, why? A level 8 Wizard could take out those Hobgoblins with a single spell, e.g. a single standard action, and take 0 damage. And even if they somehow were attacked, they could easily have one or two protective spells that completely outclass the Fighter's AC at that level or really any level. And I'd like to see a level 3 Fighter take out a whole camp of Hobgoblins. Comparing the two classes five levels apart is frankly ridiculous.

[Aharon]

Until you run your HP off Int like any proper wizard. :smallcool:

Are there any ways to do that except being a very passionate elf?

[Togo]

Togo, why are you still arguing a losing point, when the effects of the tier system are well and thoroughly documented; as are the conditions when they may and may not apply to a specific game?

Well you say it's a losing point, but people do still seem to be arguing for it, and that was the issue picked up by the OP. As you say, the Tier system is well-established, the idea that there exists conditions by which it may or may not apply to a particular game are well established, yet you still get this weird idea floating around that power imbalances are somehow a universal feature that can't be altered without changing the core rules.


Because someone is WRONG on the Internet.

Hah, there's certainly an element of that.

But there's also the lingering feeling that if we can just get people to understand some of the issues they are facing from a design and play perspective, rather than just blaming it all on bad numbers from a design team that manifestly failed to duplicate an individual poster's home game, then the next edition of D&D might be a game I want to play.

[Togo]

Are there any ways to do that except being a very passionate elf?

..with a partner. What's the charisma on your wizard again? And is there anything about a (typically unattractive) elf, fumbling with his clothing while telling you that there are certain ritual needs he has to fulfil in order to ensure the survival of the party, that doesn't make you want to run away screaming?

[Tytalus]

Well, I was using Tainted Sorcerer, which instantly sets your save DC to "no, you won't" and covers the money.

I don't think using a well-known exploit is good grounds to say anything about spellcasters in general. The issue here is tainted sorcerer, not spellcasting.

[Nightraiderx]

Still saying spell casters are overpowered, just because some people don't play them overpowered does not excuse the fact that D&d 3.5 ended up creating unfair game play. Even at a base point the problem is that fighters and mundanes scale lineally and casters scale quadratically. casters gain a lot more options as they level and the mundanes get a specific thing for a specific application. Fighter's may get jump and climb and physical activities, but guess what? heavier armor means massive movement and skill penalties to their skills. While the wizard may not wear armor but has a single spell that's the equivalent of wearing a mithril chain shirt (which costs 1,100 gp to buy)

no penalty to his movement or casting capability. Even the fighter's craft skill gets dwarfed quickly as spell casters just conjure up the item and on top of that enchant the armor. Skill points are irrelevant because a caster can cast just the right spell to get a massive modifier on skill checks. There's no mechanical benefit from getting skill points. A rogue with ranks in hide and move silently is outclassed by a beguiler or a wizard casting invisibility (which gives massive modifiers to hide and move silently).

Saying that people don't always abuse the skewed rules is like saying there's a live wire in a pool of water and just because 2/1,000 people step in it and get shocked that it should be ignored. It's more than just casters being over-powered, it's that the rules FAVOR spell casting above mundanes and it makes mundanes have to rely on magic to be even "competent". The melee fighters get out-boosted, and the skill-centric characters get outclassed. And versatility is what would make the game more fun for mundanes, instead of just building a 1-trick pony. Fighters should be able to shift tactics and attack patterns a real Veteran of the field shouldn't get shafted with weak feats that do little to offer him versatility in combat and facing different opponents.

All 4E did was make a template and just copy-paste accross a bunch of classes, they didn't FEEL different because they weren't BUILT different, warriors didn't need this per day, encounter, w/e what it needs is something like a pool of experience, endurance points (similar to factotems inspiration points). Another mechanical benefit that makes skill RANKS more valuable (like having someone with 5 ranks in hide being able to hide faster (as a move action) or getting better hide bonuses than the wizard gets by just casting invisibility. It reflects the experience that character has put into training into something.

[Augmental]

Just like spell research. Or access to a new rulebook.

Or a new sword. Or armor. Or access to a new rulebook that helps mundanes more than casters.

[navar100]

Togo, why are you still arguing a losing point, when the effects of the tier system are well and thoroughly documented; as are the conditions when they may and may not apply to a specific game?

There are those of us who don't worship the Tier System. As a result we play in games where the druid and wizard travel around with the fighter and monk and everyone has a great time. Tier System disciples tend not to comprehend such a situation can happen in other people's games.

[Karoht]

Mundanes are built around reliable, sustainable damage output as a means of harming or defeating badguys.
Magic is built round control, save or suck, save or die, and huge bursts of damage.

Magic is built around an alpha strike that cripples or kills an opponent, Mundanes are built around sustained damage. Beyond all the spells that replicate class features, I think this is the biggest in-combat design difference between the two.

*NOTE*
In no way am I saying that giving Mundanes X, Y, and Z will fix the rift, I'm merely pointing out a major design difference.



There are those of us who don't worship the Tier System. As a result we play in games where the druid and wizard travel around with the fighter and monk and everyone has a great time. Tier System disciples tend not to comprehend such a situation can happen in other people's games.
Begging your pardon. I too am not a worshiper of the Tier system (if such a repugnant term actually means something), and I too am in a group where the Druid and Wizard walk next to the monk and fighter, and everyone has fun.

However, I am also not so naive as to think that at any moment, the T1's won't just turn up the awesome and outshine. No matter how well the DM designs encounters, there will eventually come the day where that Wizard or Druid goes "k, we can solve this quick and move on, [insert spell] [insert quickened spell], you guys can mop up I'ma go take a nap."

Characters are played by people. People can have a change of heart at a moment's notice. People can be real jerks at the drop of a hat. The Wizard and Druid can wake up that morning with a bee in their bonnet, prepare some different spells to their normal loadout, and proceed to kick asses and take names.

[Gavinfoxx]

There are those of us who don't worship the Tier System. As a result we play in games where the druid and wizard travel around with the fighter and monk and everyone has a great time. Tier System disciples tend not to comprehend such a situation can happen in other people's games.

The Tier System isn't, you know, meant to say such a thing is an impossibility. It just says that, 'all things being equal, the character abilities allow for...'. It doesn't say that in any particular game, a particular thing will or won't happen -- at most, it gives a list of what to watch out for, for DMs and Players.

[Terazul]

The Tier System isn't, you know, meant to say such a thing is an impossibility. It just says that, 'all things being equal, the character abilities allow for...'. It doesn't say that in any particular game, a particular thing will or won't happen -- at most, it gives a list of what to watch out for, for DMs and Players.

Correct. And can we please stop with the insinuation that people who understand the concept of "some classes are more versatile than others/provide more options than others" somehow worship this concept? It's really kind of insulting that having logic is likened to a cult, or something.

I've played a Psion/Wizard along with the monk, barbarian and ranger guys before, and we had plenty of fun and got along fine. Didn't change the fact that when a problem came up that one of their skillsets couldn't solve, I could conjure up something that could with a little preparation, or that some things would just come down to "hey, you've got a spell for this, right?".

[zlefin]

Agreed, it's simply a misinterpretation of the claims made by the tier system.
Once you get past that misinterpretation, there shouldn't be an argument left.

[Chronos]

In fact, an understanding of the tier system is necessary to have a smooth game where wizards and druids work with fighters and monks and everyone has fun. A wizard or druid player who understands the tier system knows when and how to hold back to let everyone participate. A player who doesn't understand that can actually accidentally leave everyone else in the dust.

[Karnith]

In fact, an understanding of the tier system is necessary to have a smooth game where wizards and druids work with fighters and monks and everyone has fun.
Not strictly true; Before I got into charop, I played in and DMed for plenty of low-op games where no one knew what they were doing ("Nah, I don't need a shield with my longsword. That'd just be lame!" or "Magic missile? How can I lose!"), and there weren't any significant party imbalances/where everyone had fun. While problems can certainly emerge ("Hey, you know Animate Dead, right? Wouldn't it be cool to make a zombie out of that Fire Giant?"), it is by no means inevitable.

I would still recommend that DMs be aware of what their characters are capable of doing in regards to party balance, however, and using the tier system to judge it is a pretty good manner of doing so.

[Silvanoshei]

...did your party have a level 8 Fighter and a level 3 Wizard? If so, why? A level 8 Wizard could take out those Hobgoblins with a single spell, e.g. a single standard action, and take 0 damage. And even if they somehow were attacked, they could easily have one or two protective spells that completely outclass the Fighter's AC at that level or really any level. And I'd like to see a level 3 Fighter take out a whole camp of Hobgoblins. Comparing the two classes five levels apart is frankly ridiculous.

English review. I said "Like", not "As".

Like a level 8 Fighter.

As a level 8 Fighter.

Do those two sentences mean the same thing????

[Silvanoshei]

Anyone can die at low levels. That's why they're low levels. However, a wizard rocking abrupt jaunt and some good debuffs and battlefield control is going to survive a lot.
Again, spells only last so long. Wizards are not all that powerful low-level, and can die just like any other class. Stop saying "Abrupt jaunt" and "Debuffs" can save a Wizard at low-level. They help, yes, do they prevent his death, not all the time.



Well, there's your problem. Why did he only have 12 constitution? It's the second most important stat on a wizard. Also, wizards don't need as much health as not-wizards, because they have other defenses. Even at 3rd level, they have spells like web, invisibility, and mirror image that can keep them alive through just about anything.
We roll for our stats, 3d6.




And I'm telling you that you are wrong. You can build a really defensive wizard if you know what you're doing. Abrupt jaunt is just ridiculous, and the other spells I've mentioned are too. Fighters, by contrast, have to block punches with their face.
Again, you are wrong. Spells have durations, any good DM can use that against a all mighty powerful wizard.



No. Why does everyone assume that I'm talking about 1 v. 1 arena matches? When I say that druids are better than fighters, I mean in real game PvE circumstances. Do you know where fighters are at their least underwhelming? 1 v. 1 arena matches. Fighters are at their best when battle is straightforward, and everything stands on the ground, and tries to get in a full attack. Druids adapt. It's just what they do. They adapt to spelunking missions, and they adapt to city living, and they adapt to nautical adventures. They adapt to just about everything. Druids don't have many situations where they have to throw up their hands in defeat, and say that they have no resources that can help in a particular situation. Yes, they can fight in an arena. They can take on a fighter in direct combat like nobody's business. They can also do just about anything else.
Unless said Druid has to enter a city and says "no, i'm going to puke." In that case, a truenamer is better than a Druid. Again, DM controls the power of the group. Druid is just like a Wizard, they run out of spells.

Stop putting spellcasters on a petestal, it's very bad DMing.

[Talya]

no one knew what they were doing ("Nah, I don't need a shield with my longsword. That'd just be lame!" or "Magic missile? How can I lose?"

Technically, the fighter really doesn't use a shield with his longsword, because it is lame. He's still better off using two hands on the longsword than he is with a shield in his off hand. Also, magic missile rocks. He's just using it wrong.


...did your party have a level 8 Fighter and a level 3 Wizard? If so, why? A level 8 Wizard could take out those Hobgoblins with a single spell, e.g. a single standard action, and take 0 damage. And even if they somehow were attacked, they could easily have one or two protective spells that completely outclass the Fighter's AC at that level or really any level. And I'd like to see a level 3 Fighter take out a whole camp of Hobgoblins. Comparing the two classes five levels apart is frankly ridiculous.

I will concede that most of the time, a level 8 fighter will be more useful in a party than a level 3 wizard. maybe. Sortof.

[Terazul]

Again, spells only last so long. Wizards are not all that powerful low-level, and can die just like any other class. Stop saying "Abrupt jaunt" and "Debuffs" can save a Wizard at low-level. They help, yes, do they prevent his death, not all the time.

The problem with this is the fact that the wizard actually has these things at all. The fighter doesn't get squat except HP, which everyone gets.



We roll for our stats, 3d6.
Which hurts the martial characters more, since they tend to need a better balance of good stats, where a wizard needs one, maybe two.



Again, you are wrong. Spells have durations, any good DM can use that against a all mighty powerful wizard.
Most durations of spells are longer than most combats, and the good spells can last all day. Just saying "things have durations so they can't be good" isn't an argument. Or rather it is, just poorly formulated.



Unless said Druid has to enter a city and says "no, i'm going to puke." In that case, a truenamer is better than a Druid. Again, DM controls the power of the group. Druid is just like a Wizard, they run out of spells.
There is nothing about a druid that forces it to become nauseated or any such thing for entering a city or civilized area. Revering nature does not mean giving up civilization, heck, there's reverse druids for that. Also, fighters run out of HP, but that remains the only resource they have. The druid has about twice as much, just including the animal companion. Don't even get me started on summons.



Stop putting spellcasters on a petestal, it's very bad DMing.
Stop saying arbitrary things with no factual basis or merit whatsoever.

[eggynack]

Again, spells only last so long. Wizards are not all that powerful low-level, and can die just like any other class. Stop saying "Abrupt jaunt" and "Debuffs" can save a Wizard at low-level. They help, yes, do they prevent his death, not all the time.

Abrupt jaunt can get you through quite a bit of stuff without running out. These defenses last at least as long as whatever a fighter is pulling at this level, if not longer. You can't just measure the defensive utility of web in a vacuum. You have to measure it against the defensive utility of a fighter's HP and AC, and I think the web is better. The same goes for his other high power first level spells.



We roll for our stats, 3d6.
Well, in that case I've gotta ask what the other statistics of the wizard were, as well as what the statistics of the fighter were. That stuff can be really telling about the relative defensive utility of two low level characters. If the fighter's statistics were just higher, that can account for a lot of the difference, as opposed to the effect of class, which is what you're claiming.





Again, you are wrong. Spells have durations, any good DM can use that against a all mighty powerful wizard.
A wizard gets a pretty high amount of spells at level 3. Let's say he's a focused specialist conjurer, because I already gave him abrupt jaunt. I'm also giving him a minimum of 14 intelligence, because that's the relevant amount. With all of that stuff, the wizard has five first level spells, and four second level spells. That seems like plenty to get through the average number of encounters in a day.




Unless said Druid has to enter a city and says "no, i'm going to puke." In that case, a truenamer is better than a Druid. Again, DM controls the power of the group. Druid is just like a Wizard, they run out of spells.

Stop putting spellcasters on a petestal, it's very bad DMing.
What? Wait. What? The druid has to puke in a city? What? I just, I don't understand. What? Why? That is nowhere in the druid's description. It just, it makes no sense. Also, even without spells, the druid still has an animal companion. Those guys tend to be around a fighter's power level, especially when backed up with a druid. Your logic is just not working in my head. You're going to need some kind of elaboration or something. Just... anything really.

[Karnith]

English review. I said "Like", not "As".
Like a level 8 Fighter.
As a level 8 Fighter.
Do those two sentences mean the same thing????
Actually, the words "like" and "as" can be used more or less interchangeably when used as conjunctions. Which is the manner in which you used the word "like" in your sentence.

Again, spells only last so long. Wizards are not all that powerful low-level, and can die just like any other class. Stop saying "Abrupt jaunt" and "Debuffs" can save a Wizard at low-level. They help, yes, do they prevent his death, not all the time.
Abrupt Jaunt is much, much better than AC or pretty much anything else when it comes to low-level survival. Moreover, wizards and spellcasters in general tend to win fights very quickly, even at low levels, which also contributes to them being more survivable than other classes. And, of course, hours/level and all-day spells exist, even for low-level characters.

We roll for our stats, 3d6.
You do realize that this hurts MAD characters a lot, and that MAD characters are generally not spellcasters? This hurts wizards (etc.) less than it hurts mundane-types.

Unless said Druid has to enter a city and says "no, i'm going to puke."There is no reason a druid can't enter and operate in a city. They may find it uncomfortable, but it's purely RP-related, and they aren't going to get physically sick or become useless, barring overzealous DMing.

I will concede that most of the time, a level 8 fighter will be more useful in a party than a level 3 wizard. maybe. Sortof.
You forgot to add "in combat."

[Talya]

You do realize that this hurts MAD characters a lot, and that MAD characters are generally not spellcasters? This hurts wizards (etc.) less than it hurts mundane-types.

Generally true, but fighters are much like wizards in that respect. She's really screwing over monks, paladins, and to a lesser degree, bards and rangers.

[Karnith]

Generally true, but fighters are much like wizards in that respect. She's really screwing over monks, paladins, and to a lesser degree, bards and rangers.
I know, but I felt that it bore stating that changing how stats are distributed, when not specifically targeting spellcasters (e.g. wizards get lower point-buys than everyone else), rarely hampers spellcasters in any significant way. Though it does limit some fighter builds, like trip-based characters.

[eggynack]

There is no reason a druid can't enter and operate in a city. They may find it uncomfortable, but it's purely RP-related, and they aren't going to get physically sick or become useless, barring overzealous DMing.

I just wanted to put an addendum on this thing. Druids are actually pretty good in cities. There's a whole bunch of druidic city adaptations and city specific druid spells, particularly in cityscape. You can easily put together a druid that thrives in a city, and can still be cool in nature. Druids don't just adapt to the stuff I listed; they adapt to everything. They're great when fighting a race of aerial monsters, or when trying to survive the harshness of winter, or when making their way in the big city. They're great when traversing a desert, or when attacking the BBEG's stronghold, or, obviously, when trying to navigate a dense forest. They adapt to everything, especially at high levels. It's not really a hyperbole, and it's why they're tier one.

[Der_DWSage]

Unless said Druid has to enter a city and says "no, i'm going to puke." In that case, a truenamer is better than a Druid. Again, DM controls the power of the group. Druid is just like a Wizard, they run out of spells.

Stop putting spellcasters on a petestal, it's very bad DMing.

Er. Mind explaining why Druids are going to puke the moment they enter a city? :smallconfused:

Anyway. It's hardly bad DMing if you know the limits of a spellcaster. Ignoring their potential-and by extension, the amount they can outshine other members of the party if they choose to-is bad DMing.

And keep in mind that the board does go to the extremes at times...but at the same time? This is because many of them have experienced it at one point or another. Intricate DM plans laid low because the Wizard has Fly, and the party doesn't actually have to go through the intricate mountain pass but can instead go over it. Encounters ruined, because the GM ramped things up to plan for the Wizard, and not the Fighter, who died most valiantly.

Please stop saying that it's worship, or that we're putting mages on a pedestal. It's more that we're being very wary of what they can accomplish and when they can accomplish it, and the implications thereof. They're certainly capable of a wider variety of things than any mundane class can ever accomplish, and there are ways for them to get around even the limits of spell slots so that they can keep doing them. (Rings of Wizardry, Pearls of Power, staves, wands, scrolls, use-activated magic items, metamagic rods, and that's without straying from core.)

tl;dr version:Spellcasters have the capability to be overpowered, but it's not guaranteed, especially at lower levels. A GM that's smarter than the player can mitigate it. A player that engages in Total Optimization on a regular basis can probably break the game regardless with a spellcaster.

[Karoht]

It is also relevant to point out that the options in a combat are both to fight and retreat.
The Fighter, when hit points get low, has the option of running away. That is about it.
The Wizard has whole toolsets designed to disengage (fully or temporarily) in order to come back the next week/day/hour/20 minutes with a toolset that will allow him to win combat.

Yes, spells have durations and eventually run out. At a certain point, the Wizard stops entering combats and spends those last few spell slots setting up some defenses to make camp and rest for the night, maybe leaving a few tricks in the event someone manages to ambush them ("warning, I sleep with a Disintegrate under my pillow"). And most of those tricks, the DM isn't likely to get around them without heavy amounts of DM fiat (AKA bad DM'ing). IE-The druid has to puke trying to enter a city.

The Fighter can't sleep in his armor, if he's in full plate then according to the rules it takes a crazy amount of time to put that armor on (with help), so if he's ambushed in the night he's got his weapon and shield, and thats it. If he even has that.

As for the all day Wizard? Reserve Feats are hilarious like that. Not amazing, but fun resources to take advantage of. Various attack spells, illusions, necromancy, teleporation, all useable all day long to no limit, just like that Fighter.

[White_Drake]

English review. I said "Like", not "As".

Like a level 8 Fighter.

As a level 8 Fighter.

Do those two sentences mean the same thing????

Just to pick a nit, neither of those are sentences, and then what Karnith said. Given proper context (which would be present in complete sentences involving those phrases), I could tell you whether they mean the same thing.

[soapdude]

Until you run your HP off Int like any proper wizard. :smallcool:

How exactly is this accomplished?

[iDesu]

How exactly is this accomplished?

Faerie mystery initiate. It's a feat in dragon 319 with multiple options.

[navar100]

The Tier System isn't, you know, meant to say such a thing is an impossibility. It just says that, 'all things being equal, the character abilities allow for...'. It doesn't say that in any particular game, a particular thing will or won't happen -- at most, it gives a list of what to watch out for, for DMs and Players.

I agree. That is what the Tier System was originally intended to reflect. However, then we get posts like this:


Togo, why are you still arguing a losing point, when the effects of the tier system are well and thoroughly documented; as are the conditions when they may and may not apply to a specific game?

and


Because someone is WRONG on the Internet.

Where someone who doesn't fully accept the Tier System as 3E Gaming Law is being told to "shut up", if not literally. Tier System Blasphemy is frowned upon around these parts.

[Chronos]

Yes, wizards suck at first level. Almost everyone sucks at first level. That's a feature, not a bug: You're supposed to suck at first level, the better to appreciate it once you don't suck any more. The fighter sucks at first level, too: He can't yet afford the best armor, he's still only got one hit die, and he's pretty much forced to stand in front and absorb attacks from the monsters. Yeah, if he's lucky, he'll make it through, but he can still get knocked into the negatives, or even killed outright, by a single lucky crit.

But you know what? Of the grand total of five classes in the game that don't suck at first level, only one of them is core. And guess what? It's a tier one class, the druid. He doesn't need to stand in the front line, because he's got an animal companion to do that for him, who can do that job about as well as the fighter can. And yeah, the animal companion can die to a lucky crit, too... In which case the druid is moderately annoyed, and then gets another one the next day.

[eggynack]

Various things of various kinds.
But Gavinfoxx and Zlefin were basically saying the same thing. Zlefin specifically mentioned that we have an understanding that the tier system doesn't apply to everything in exactly the same way. The fact of the matter is, the tier system is gaming law. There are parts of the tier system that account for differences in play style, so your objections aren't really objections. Just because something isn't perfectly all encompassing, doesn't make it untrue. Dungeons and Dragons isn't really some subjective thing where everyone can have their own opinions. There are actual numbers and mechanics backing things up, and some things are actually just more powerful than other things.

Spellcasters are overpowered. They have the capacity to do things that mundane classes can't even begin to match, and they start to do those kinds of things at low levels. However, the potential for insanity doesn't necessarily equate to insanity. The wizard can hurl himself off a cliff almost as well as a fighter can. Sure, he may have prepared feather fall (actually heart of air, but still), but if he didn't, he's probably going to die at the end. Just like druids, wizards adapt. They can adapt to things far better than a fighter ever can. If a wizard knows what he's doing, you have to design your campaign specifically around trying to stop him. That's a sign of being overpowered. If a monk knows what he's doing, it's possible that you have to design your campaign specifically around trying to make him useful. That's a sign of being underpowered. Different people can have different experiences, but that does absolutely nothing to change the potential of these classes. Wizards have potential. Monks do not have potential.

[Karnith]

But you know what? Of the grand total of five classes in the game that don't suck at first level, only one of them is core.
Well, I don't know about that. Barbarians can be pretty amazing at first level. Granted, they are much less amazing at first level if you're stuck in Core (Spirit Lion Totem and Whirling Frenzy being as silly as they are), but they are still formidable.

[Flickerdart]

Well, I don't know about that. Barbarians can be pretty amazing at first level. Granted, they are much less amazing at first level if you're stuck in Core (Spirit Lion Totem and Whirling Frenzy being as silly as they are), but they are still formidable.
Barbarians are amazing at first level in one encounter per day, and then they're a fighter with 2 extra HP and some survival skills.

[eggynack]

Barbarians are amazing at first level in one encounter per day, and then they're a fighter with 2 extra HP and some survival skills.
Extra rage exists, and you never really want to take enough barbarian levels to get another rage per day anyway. When your frenzies are killing everything in their path, being able to do that a couple of times a day is a pretty good idea.

[Flickerdart]

Hm, I could've sworn that had some BAB requirements, but I guess I was mistaken.

[Beheld]

Extra rage exists, and you never really want to take enough barbarian levels to get another rage per day anyway. When your frenzies are killing everything in their path, being able to do that a couple of times a day is a pretty good idea.

As compared to a fighter who took Weapon Focus, while raging you are at +1 to attack and +3 to damage. And you spent a feat to do that more than once a day, so he could take something else in addition to Weapon Focus.

Your killing Frenzies look pretty darn similar to a Fighter all the time, and you not in a killing Frenzy.

[Karnith]

Barbarians are amazing at first level in one encounter per day, and then they're a fighter with 2 extra HP and some survival skills.
In Core, that's very true, though it still makes Barbarian a pretty good choice for first-level play. Outside of Core, isn't Extra Rage the feat to take for first-level games? Particularly if you're a human and don't need to make the choice between Power Attack and Extra Rage?

EDIT: Super-swordsage'd

As compared to a fighter who took Weapon Focus, while raging you are at +1 to attack and +3 to damage. And you spent a feat to do that more than once a day, so he could take something else in addition to Weapon Focus.

Your killing Frenzies look pretty darn similar to a Fighter all the time, and you not in a killing Frenzy.
The key is that, outside of Core, you'd be a Spirit Lion Totem, Whirling Frenzy Barbarian, so that while raging you get an extra attack at no penalty (well, -1 compared to someone who took Weapon Focus), +3 to damage, +2 to AC and Reflex saves, and the ability to make a full attack on a charge. Which at first level is significantly better than whatever that Weapon Focus fighter, or pretty much anyone else, is doing.

[Flickerdart]

Particularly if you're a human and don't need to make the choice between Power Attack and Extra Rage?
Power Attack is rubbish at level 1 - whatever you hit with your greatsword eats an average of 13 damage, which is enough to end most CR~1 threats there and then. Personally, I'd take it at 3rd - high enough level so that you have the BAB to sink into it, but not high enough level that feats with tough prerequisites need the slots.

[Karnith]

Power Attack is rubbish at level 1 - whatever you hit with your greatsword eats an average of 13 damage, which is enough to end most CR~1 threats there and then. Personally, I'd take it at 3rd - high enough level so that you have the BAB to sink into it, but not high enough level that feats with tough prerequisites need the slots.
Right, I was mostly thinking in terms of meeting pre-reqs. On reflection, though, a non-human Barbarian 1/Fighter 2 (for example) gets four feats, which is enough to get Shock Trooper online at level 6 with feats to spare, so I suppose there's not so much of a rush to get it ASAP.

[Beheld]

The key is that, outside of Core, you'd be a Spirit Lion Totem, Whirling Frenzy Barbarian, so that while raging you get an extra attack at no penalty (well, -1 compared to someone who took Weapon Focus), +3 to damage, +2 to AC and Reflex saves, and the ability to make a full attack on a charge. Which at first level is significantly better than whatever that Weapon Focus fighter, or pretty much anyone else, is doing.

Not really, a fighter could have Improved Trip, Stand Still and a Glaive. The positional power along with the ability to attack and kill almost everything in one hit probably makes him at least the equal of the barbarian. Honestly, the extra attack with Whirling Frenzy isn't worth it at level 1, you kill things in one hit anyway with anyone, so you don't get the ability to stack damage from two attacks, it is just two chances at lower AB. It is great at higher levels where things survive more than a single Greatsword to the face, but at level 1 it is mediocre.

Also, you don't get +2 AC, because you still get the -2 penalty while raging, so it evens out.

[Tvtyrant]

Barbarian's shine at level 2. Extra Rage Goliath Substitution Barbarian doing an average of 30 damage on a standard action for three combats a day. Grab a huge Minotaur Greathammer and do 116 (EDIT:) average damage on a crit. Almost no optimization required.

[TuggyNE]

Also, you don't get +2 AC, because you still get the -2 penalty while raging, so it evens out.

That's a rather abusively RAW perspective; technically correct, but in practice the intention is fairly clear. (The numbers Rage gives are replaced by new numbers, including a bonus to AC instead of a penalty, rather than a bonus and a penalty.)

[Beheld]

That's a rather abusively RAW perspective; technically correct, but in practice the intention is fairly clear. (The numbers Rage gives are replaced by new numbers, including a bonus to AC instead of a penalty, rather than a bonus and a penalty.)

Uhh... I have never met anyone before you who didn't think that was the intent.

I mean, look at the two:
Regular Rage: +4 stat, +4 stat, +2 save bonus, -2 AC.
Whirling Frenzy: +4 stat, extra attack, +2 save bonus, +2 AC (-2 AC).

Are you really telling me they gave +4 AC and an extra attack instead of +4 Con?

It seems really obvious to me that the AC is a hack to cancel out normal AC penalty and the extra attack subs for +4 Con -2AC.

[eggynack]

Uhh... I have never met anyone before you who didn't think that was the intent.

I mean, look at the two:
Regular Rage: +4 stat, +4 stat, +2 save bonus, -2 AC.
Whirling Frenzy: +4 stat, extra attack, +2 save bonus, +2 AC (-2 AC).

Are you really telling me they gave +4 AC and an extra attack instead of +4 Con?

It seems really obvious to me that the AC is a hack to cancel out normal AC penalty and the extra attack subs for +4 Con -2AC.
I don't see where you're getting this interpretation. Whirling frenzy says that it gives you its bonuses and penalties instead of those in a rage. The actual loss is that you take a -2 to attack, which balances out the +2 to attack from strength. A regular rage doesn't have that to hit penalty. I can't see any RAW support for your claims.

[Karnith]

I don't see where you're getting this interpretation. Whirling frenzy says that it gives you its bonuses and penalties instead of those in a rage.Actually, no, re-reading it made me realize that he has a point. Per the SRD: (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/classFeatureVariants.htm#rageVariantWhirlingFrenzy )

A barbarian with this variant form of rage doesn't gain the normal bonuses when he enters a rage. Instead, when a barbarian with whirling frenzy enters a rage, he temporarily gains a +4 bonus to Strength and a +2 dodge bonus to Armor Class and on Reflex saves. While in a whirling frenzy, the barbarian may make one extra attack in a round at his highest base attack bonus, but this attack takes a -2 penalty, as does each other attack made that round. This penalty applies for 1 round, so it also affects attacks of opportunity the barbarian might make before his next action.

Whirling frenzy is otherwise identical to the standard barbarian rage in all other ways.
(Emphasis mine)

The description doesn't mention anything about replacing the penalties taken from raging. I'm fairly certain that leaving in the -2 AC wasn't intentional on WotC's part (otherwise I think they'd have mentioned it to avoid confusion), but as it stands it seems to be RAW.

[eggynack]

Actually, no, re-reading it made me realize that he has a point. Per the SRD: (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/classFeatureVariants.htm#rageVariantWhirlingFrenzy )

(Emphasis mine)

The description doesn't mention anything about replacing the penalties taken from raging. I'm fairly certain that leaving in the -2 AC wasn't intentional on WotC's part (otherwise I think they'd have mentioned it to avoid confusion), but as it stands it seems to be RAW.
I really don't see this argument. The frenzy does have a penalty included. It has the -2 to attack. By your logic, whirling frenzy would give you a +4 to constitution, and a +2 morale bonus to will saves. It doesn't specifically refer to these bonuses, so therefore they must exist as bonuses in the whirling frenzy. What that line actually refers to is the fatigue that comes from raging. It seems to be the only logical reading.

Edit: I see your reasoning a bit better now, but it still doesn't seem anywhere near accurate.

[Chronos]

Yeah, barbarians are close to not sucking at first level, and by second level they don't, but at first they're still a front-liner with only one hit die.

[Beheld]

I really don't see this argument. The frenzy does have a penalty included. It has the -2 to attack.

When you take the Rapid Shot feat, is there some sort of penalty attached?

When a Monk flurries, is there some sort of penalty attached?

When you TWF after taking the feat, is there a penalty attached?

WotC clearly believes that giving an extra attack but all attacks at -2 is an ability worth paying for. Not a cancel out. The -2 to attack is part of the extra attack, because that is something that comes attached to all extra attacks. (Except casters polymorph/haste, because casters are better than you.)


By your logic, whirling frenzy would give you a +4 to constitution, and a +2 morale bonus to will saves. It doesn't specifically refer to these bonuses, so therefore they must exist as bonuses in the whirling frenzy.

No, because those are bonuses, as opposed to penalties. Penalties remain, bonuses do not.

[Karnith]

Edit: I see your reasoning a bit better now, but it still doesn't seem anywhere near accurate.
I don't think that it was intended (the omission of any mention of the AC penalty is pretty glaring if it was intentional), and I have never played it that way before, but the passage only mentions the bonuses changing compared to a normal rage. It does not mention a change in penalties at all. So while fatigue is still in (obviously), it looks like it is also RAW that they keep the -2 AC penalty.

[Carth]

I agree that by RAW it looks like the -2 penalty stay, but that's right up there with monks not being proficient with unarmed strikes by RAW, or that drowning can heal anyone that's below -1 HP.

[Chronos]

No matter which way was intended, the lack of mention of the standard barbarian's AC penalty is still glaring. That's the sort of thing you really should be specific about.

[eggynack]

No matter which way was intended, the lack of mention of the standard barbarian's AC penalty is still glaring. That's the sort of thing you really should be specific about.
The only real thing missing from the text is that it should say "bonuses and penalties" where it currently says "bonuses". The list seems to cover every aspect of the ability, including penalties. I think that the ability stating the frenzies AC status is giving the final word on the topic. It tells you what happens to AC, so that doesn't fall under the header of "otherwise identical". That interpretation definitely makes sense in my head, though there may be other interpretations.

[TuggyNE]

Uhh... I have never met anyone before you who didn't think that was the intent.

Well, now you've met at least four of us, all at once.


I mean, look at the two:
Regular Rage: +4 stat, +4 stat, +2 save bonus, -2 AC.
Whirling Frenzy: +4 stat, extra attack, +2 save bonus, +2 AC (-2 AC).

Are you really telling me they gave +4 AC and an extra attack instead of +4 Con?

It seems really obvious to me that the AC is a hack to cancel out normal AC penalty and the extra attack subs for +4 Con -2AC.

As noted, you're leaving out an important penalty in your summary, which is misleading. +2 AC, -2 attack, and an extra attack in exchange for +4 Con and -2 AC seems rather more reasonable. (Or, if you like, +4 AC, -2 attack, and an extra attack for +4 Con.) There's also the fact that the save bonus goes from Will to Reflex, which is arguably a slight loss.


I agree that by RAW it looks like the -2 penalty stay, but that's right up there with monks not being proficient with unarmed strikes by RAW, or that drowning can heal anyone that's below -1 HP.

Basically, yes.

[Jerthanis]

Spellcasters are obviously more powerful than their mundane counterparts because having more options means they can more easily leverage a particular solution to a particular problem. Add to this the fact that those options granted to mundanes are often constructed with an eye towards what is actually feasible for mundane individuals. One can imagine swinging a sword and cutting a hydra's head off, one cannot imagine swinging a sword and cutting a hole into another plane of reality, or swinging a sword such that you are propelled through the air on your own power, able to change directions or hover. Meanwhile, spells are designed capable of violating every aspect of reality because that's kind of their whole point.

However, in practice, I've never seen the disparity in power between spellcasters and mundanes become nearly so big an issue as it's regularly discussed in online forums. I also frequently see people come to online discussions utterly shocked that other people have such different impressions of the state of affairs from what they have and I think there's a reason for that.

I think a big problem with the whole 3.5 power mismatch between spellcasters and mundanes in my opinion comes down mostly to a difference in mentality and perception in 4 major areas:

1.) The fact that Oberani Fallacy is a Fallacy doesn't mean it isn't good advice. Saying you can fix a problem is in fact not equivalent to saying there is no problem, this is true. It doesn't, however, mean you also SHOULD NOT make changes to fix that problem when it clearly is causing an unwelcome situation.

For me and my group, what this generally means is a lower tolerance for spellcasting cheese. For example, when we read Abrupt Jaunt, we assumed it had been written incorrectly, and said, "This isn't an appropriate power for a character to have" and rewrote it. The fact that it's never been errata'd doesn't make our judgement wrong in our opinion, and we're not interested in defending the idea that it isn't a problem in theory that Wizards have access to broken abilities like these just because those abilities can be rewritten, just that we in practice actually did rewrite it to what we consider a useful, but not-broken class feature. Meanwhile, we might not put any kind of kabosh on an Ubercharger because "Hey, he's just charging and doing a bunch of damage, that isn't going to break the game"...

In addition, my group isn't shy about bumping up saving throws or adding or increasing SR if spellcasters are being a problem.

2.) The utility of dealing lots of HP damage to debuffed enemies, or of being a vehicle toward efficient use of buffs is undervalued. My group sort of sees this as similar to the following analogy: The Party is a multistage rocket. The wizard and cleric are the engines and support crew that get it pointed in the right direction, ensure its target's position, and the Melee Damager is the Warhead inside it. The argument could absolutely be made that you could replace the warhead with more engine fuel and it'd still explode, or that sometimes you want to put a science team or diplomatic corps in the capsule rather than explosives, and warheads aren't any good there. However, most rockets that are fired in RPGs benefit from warheads being attached. In those cases, warheads that are really damaging are kind of nice to have around. A warhead without a delivery rocket might just be essentially a landmine, but, well, sometimes a landmine is useful too.

As a result, when a player wants to play a warhead, so long as the rest of the party plays the delivery system, it's all going to be fine. If they decide they're going to just play a rocket all on their own, they're going to be less efficient, and the DM is welcome to just have NPCs walk up and step on that landmine if he wants that to be the game anyway.

In my group, literally the very most common use of Dimension Door is to carry the Fighter type to a spot adjacent to an enemy, allowing him to execute a full-attack.

3.) The assumption is of a balanced sequence of events and challenges such that the versatility of a spellcaster is absolutely required, but their limited reapplication is never a detriment. It's always thought in these hypothetical objective game scenarios that, for instance, locked doors are a one or two times per dungeon phenomenon, so a Rogue's ability to spring locks without expending resources is a negligible advantage because this theoretical wizard has sufficient resources to deal with all the locks that are there in this theoretical actuality. If in your dungeons, 80% of the doors are locked or stuck or otherwise, having a big strong guy to knock them down and a rogue to pick their locks can be pretty useful, especially in the first 9 levels of the game, where a wand of Knock is more than 10% of your character's total treasure allotment. On the other hand, if you eschew locked door problems as a matter of course, the Fighter with no access to Knock is at no disadvantage compared with the Wizard who has it. This (and any similar scenario) is a specific level of utility requirement that provides an ideal environment for a spellcaster to dominate noncombat situations. Not having this specific environment does wonders for mundane problem solving such as skill use finding purchase.

4.) (the major failure of perception/mentality that the other side of the argument often falls into. I tried to split this and condense the above into two each to maintain artificial parity, but I really couldn't think of how to do it. Let me assure you I'm not trying to make the point that one side is privileged to a smaller degree of misperception, just these are the four different types of misperceptions I'm aware of and three of them are on the one side.) The people who are surprised to see caster dominance routinely discussed have not seen this property due to the circumstances of their own personal experience, and so never even considered it in the first place. Having never considered it, their own games developed without the presence of those powerful options being leveraged, and so perception slowly became reality.

I'll give a personal example: I personally think Druids suck. I have DMed for them and seen everything from Warmages to Rangers to straight Fighters outperform them utterly in every respect. I have played them and been barely able to fulfil my basic role in the group, surviving mainly on mercy of the DM, or in another instance barely contributing at all, but being safe. I do not understand why they're included on the same level as Wizards or Clerics, as every single one I've seen in a game has been utterly humiliated at every turn with abject, bedwetting, unending failure.

However, the abject devotion they get on the forums gives me pause. I have to assume there's SOMETHING I'm missing about them, some trick or option that seems obvious to everyone else, but that for whatever reason no one in my group ever identified. I have a feeling that having seen Druids suck, we created a self-fulfilling play environment where for whatever reasons, the things other people do with Druids just are never useful, or that we never think to take the right options that would make a Druid good, falling into whatever familiar patterns we have that always lead to Druids sucking. It seems incredible to me whenever I see Druid Advice threads being "Take Natural Spell -> Win", because obviously it's a far more arcane class than such posters think.

One other example of such a misperception is the idea that casters are squishy or risk running out of spell slots, or can't have buffs going all day, or don't benefit from metamagic. These all essentially come down to "I've never played a game at 10th+ level, and assume no one else does either with any regularity". This doesn't work because 10th+ is literally half the game, and people do play at such levels with a great degree of regularity.

So I feel like understanding that the environment we play in has more to do with the power of these classes than either side really realizes, and the recognition that personal experience and perception is doing a lot to shape the different sides of this debate can go a long way towards bridging this gap.

[eggynack]

I'll give a personal example: I personally think Druids suck. I have DMed for them and seen everything from Warmages to Rangers to straight Fighters outperform them utterly in every respect. I have played them and been barely able to fulfil my basic role in the group, surviving mainly on mercy of the DM, or in another instance barely contributing at all, but being safe. I do not understand why they're included on the same level as Wizards or Clerics, as every single one I've seen in a game has been utterly humiliated at every turn with abject, bedwetting, unending failure.

However, the abject devotion they get on the forums gives me pause. I have to assume there's SOMETHING I'm missing about them, some trick or option that seems obvious to everyone else, but that for whatever reason no one in my group ever identified. I have a feeling that having seen Druids suck, we created a self-fulfilling play environment where for whatever reasons, the things other people do with Druids just are never useful, or that we never think to take the right options that would make a Druid good, falling into whatever familiar patterns we have that always lead to Druids sucking. It seems incredible to me whenever I see Druid Advice threads being "Take Natural Spell -> Win", because obviously it's a far more arcane class than such posters think.

Huh. Really? It's always seemed really obvious to me that druids are incredible. Like, just looking at them on a basic level, they have a great chassis. They're practically monks, except without the punching thing, which is probably to their advantage actually. Then you have the animal companion, which is fantastic if you know what you're doing. Riding dogs are great, especially if they have some leather barding. They're defensive powerhouses, and they're no slouch offensively either. They basically take up the slot that would have been a fighter. They're not quite as good as an optimized fighter most of the time, but they fill the role perfectly. In your analogy, they're basically a free warhead for all of your plans.

Then, you have wildshape. Wildshape has several massive advantages on a druid which I can go into some detail on. First, it replaces both your strength and dexterity. This means that you can dump both of those stats, and still end up reasonably good at combat, at least at 8th. Second, it's a ridiculously versatile ability. If you need to take to the skies, or tunnel underground, or go deep under water, or grapple an enemy, or beat the crap out of an enemy, or just take some hits, there's a form for that. Moreover, you can stay in these forms all day by level 8. The versatility thing covered more advantage based ground than I thought it would, so I'll move on.

Last, but absolutely not least, you have the spells. Druids get a list that is worse than a wizard's, but it's arguably on par with that of a cleric. Mostly, they have a ton of great battlefield control and some buffs. Battlefield control is a ridiculously useful branch of magic, and they get enough flavors of it to be incredibly useful along those lines. Then, you have the unlisted type of magic they get a ton of access to, summons. Summons are basically always useful. Like wild shape, they're incredibly diverse and very useful in combat. If you optimize for it, you can do some crazy stuff with summons. Moreover, you can emulate most fighter combat styles by picking the correct animal.

Anyway, that's most of it. I can go into even more detail, if you like, but that's a good overview of their general source of power. I suspect that the druids in your game do it somewhat differently than that, but I have no idea what the specific differences are. Druids are one of the most powerful classes in the game, and they maintain that status all the way from level one through level twenty. It's just how they roll. They're great in a game with every book, or just the core books. They're great in a game with high stats and low stats. They're great in games with a lot of items, and in games with no items at all. They're great in virtually every situation ever and then some.

[Phelix-Mu]

Druids are one of the most powerful classes in the game, and they maintain that status all the way from level one through level twenty. It's just how they roll. They're great in a game with every book, or just the core books. They're great in a game with high stats and low stats. They're great in games with a lot of items, and in games with no items at all. They're great in virtually every situation ever and then some.

And that's why I'm a druid. It's awesome to be awesome. Arcane magic is a great tool, but it's kind of clunky, waaaay too many spells to select from, and my head explodes at the excessively quadratic aspect of arcane spell combos. Druid list is much more straightforward; heal it, buff it, entangle/impede it, or blow it the hell up. There's some variation and some stuff that is strictly out-of-combat (awaken), but it's generally an easy list to get down. And as prepared casters go, Spontaneous Summoning is Easy Mode. Picked the wrong spells? No problem, it's alright, just summon some huge elementals and roll with it.

Anyway, druids have always rocked for me, as it's like role playing myself in the game. The flavor and crunch have been spot on for me since 2e, and they got so silly-cool in 3e that I practically needed to pinch myself to check if I was dreaming.

Anyway, a good measure of power is that, if you can take away any one major class feature and still have a pretty powerful chassis, then that class is powerful.

[TuggyNE]

1.) The fact that Oberani Fallacy is a Fallacy doesn't mean it isn't good advice. Saying you can fix a problem is in fact not equivalent to saying there is no problem, this is true. It doesn't, however, mean you also SHOULD NOT make changes to fix that problem when it clearly is causing an unwelcome situation.

That's an excellent point, and I think I do a somewhat poor job of properly communicating it; my reason for generally arguing spellcaster superiority is mostly to ensure the nature of the problem is as clear as possible, in order to more effectively contain it. But it's hard sometimes to keep that in view.


4.) The people who are surprised to see caster dominance routinely discussed have not seen this property due to the circumstances of their own personal experience, and so never even considered it in the first place. Having never considered it, their own games developed without the presence of those powerful options being leveraged, and so perception slowly became reality.

Interesting; I hadn't really thought of that particular explanation, but it does seem to make sense. Mind over matter, and all that.

And, to be fair, it does require a certain mindset to think, "you know, I'd do so much better at the Fighter's job if I just cast these particular buffs first"; getting over the hurdle of "but Wizards are squishy/meant to only cast spells!" is not a mental leap everyone makes, or attempts to.

[eggynack]

Anyway, a good measure of power is that, if you can take away any one major class feature and still have a pretty powerful chassis, then that class is powerful.
You can actually take away a major class feature, take away another major class feature, and still have a tier one class. If you get rid of wild shape and the animal companion, you still have a prepared caster on an oddly good build. If you get rid of everything but the wild shape, you're basically running around as a wild shape ranger that can advance past medium, so tier three. If you just have the animal companion, you're still a riding dog with a crappy sling wielding friend to back you up. That sounds like mid-level tier five to me. You're still getting two sets of actions, and one of those action sets is pretty good. Druids also get a surprising number of flavor abilities. They're practically monks in that fashion. They get venom immunity, and trackless step, and wild empathy, and a whole bunch more. Druids are actually surprisingly similar to monks in a lot of ways. Then you add on the spells, wild shape, and animal companion.

[Jerthanis]

Huh. Really? It's always seemed really obvious to me that druids are incredible.

It really isn't my intention to derail with a Druid tangent, but for us, animal companions are woefully inadequate in their attack and damage to really be called anything other than expendable cannon fodder. Wildshaping has been a way to transform yourself into similarly expendable cannon fodder, but this time without an easy way to replace yourself. And its spellcasting is a perfect example of "Day late or a penny short", as many of the key spells on which the game turns often turn up as higher spell level than they appear on other spell lists, or are examples of the weaker and more reactive types of spells those other classes have. They're sort of the opposite of the Summoner of Pathfinder, who is a 3/4ths progression caster, but they get their most vital spells a level earlier than you'd expect, and so are more like a 4/5ths or 9/10ths caster... in Druid's case, really really important spells come later, or are just weak for the level they are and so in my mind, Druids are downgraded from full caster to at least 4/5ths caster.

They do have some advantages, to be sure, but many of their battlefield control is much softer than a wizard's battlefield control, or are much more subject to friendly fire issues. The only quality of their spellcasting that I find significantly better than other classes is the Summoning ability that they have, but without the same types of layered defensive buffs as wizards, they're begging to get interrupted when casting 1 round spells with Close ranges.

So we've played a number of Druids here and there, and they've just... sucked left right and forwards. Again, I'm not making this point to try to undermine public perceptions of Druid power because obviously I'm arguing against the collective wisdom and experience of apparently every other poster here with nothing but my own personal experience that they've just sucked left, right and forwards every time I've seen them fielded. I'm mostly using it as an example of a misperception that creeps in as a result of personal experience, and trying to show that I'm self-aware enough to know that occasionally, I must accept that I am in fact probably wrong about what I think is the case.

[Tvtyrant]

I'll give a personal example: I personally think Druids suck. I have DMed for them and seen everything from Warmages to Rangers to straight Fighters outperform them utterly in every respect. I have played them and been barely able to fulfil my basic role in the group, surviving mainly on mercy of the DM, or in another instance barely contributing at all, but being safe. I do not understand why they're included on the same level as Wizards or Clerics, as every single one I've seen in a game has been utterly humiliated at every turn with abject, bedwetting, unending failure.

However, the abject devotion they get on the forums gives me pause. I have to assume there's SOMETHING I'm missing about them, some trick or option that seems obvious to everyone else, but that for whatever reason no one in my group ever identified. I have a feeling that having seen Druids suck, we created a self-fulfilling play environment where for whatever reasons, the things other people do with Druids just are never useful, or that we never think to take the right options that would make a Druid good, falling into whatever familiar patterns we have that always lead to Druids sucking. It seems incredible to me whenever I see Druid Advice threads being "Take Natural Spell -> Win", because obviously it's a far more arcane class than such posters think.

The things that make a Druid win in my mind are as follows:
1. Wildshape allows them to focus on just casting and hit points. Wisdom maxed, second best or everything else into constitution. If stats are rolled this means they can afford to pick their best rolls and effectively disregard the rest. Instead of "roll four drop 1" it becomes "roll 6 sets of 4 and pick the best two sets." Point buy is much the same, as they could have 8s in everything else and come up looking good.

2. Wildshape is by itself a tier 3 class. It grants flight, burrowing, natural armor, natural weapons, stat boosts, swim speeds, size increases/decreases, spot/move silently/spot/jump boosts, and even abilities that other classes have to devote themselves to like Rage and Pounce.

There is a really good thread that shows why a Druid in Wildshape is not automatically good at melee combat. They usually have a low AC, so they take tons of damage and have a low to hit. However they can turn into a Hawk or other bird and use the AC boost and distance to cast at the enemy, or the old Badger trick of burrowing and unburrowing while casting.

3. It has access to the best buffing set for natural weapons. This synergizes perfectly with their access to Animal Companions and Wildshape. This is a bit of a controversial subject, as it falls subject to the schrodinger's caster issue. Will a Druid have the right buffs prepared? Will they have time to buff? The answer is often in my experience yes. Dropping an extended Barkskin on yourself before entering a dungeon is prudent, and will last for a long time. Greater Magic Fang lasts for an hour per caster level, so even unextended it will last for most of the day.

4. The Druid list is solid without resorting to melee combat, with spells like Splinterbolt and Entangle. At the worst they can convert spells into a solid line of summons, and taking augment summoning and getting a ring of Mighty Summons are good moves in general for them.

[Beheld]

1.) The fact that Oberani Fallacy is a Fallacy doesn't mean it isn't good advice. Saying you can fix a problem is in fact not equivalent to saying there is no problem, this is true. It doesn't, however, mean you also SHOULD NOT make changes to fix that problem when it clearly is causing an unwelcome situation.

This is not a failure, it is a different priority. I for one focus on the game design side. Whatever changes you make in your own group, they either should be copied in the design documents (if appropriate, and they usually aren't) or the are irrelevant to making the game better for everyone.

If I could make the game balanced and more fun for everyone while reducing the need for you to institute Rule Zero fixes, wouldn't that be a good thing? (I'm not saying I can, but that is the approach I begin from.)


For example, when we read Abrupt Jaunt, we assumed it had been written incorrectly, and said, "This isn't an appropriate power for a character to have" and rewrote it.

What did you think they meant to write?


2.) The utility of dealing lots of HP damage to debuffed enemies, or of being a vehicle toward efficient use of buffs is undervalued.

I'm pretty sure the main point here is that Clerics and Druids are just as if not more effective vehicles.

[Togo]

If I could make the game balanced and more fun for everyone while reducing the need for you to institute Rule Zero fixes, wouldn't that be a good thing? (I'm not saying I can, but that is the approach I begin from.)

No, I think it would be a bad thing. An extremely bad thing.

It's pointless to make characters more balanced in abstract, you have to make them more balanced to achieve their goals. Goals and context vary wildly from table to table, so unless you have a similar mechanism for resolving the abilities of different characters, you can't balance them purely on the numbers.

So the result of trying to make the system 'more balanced' is 4e. A system born of internet discussions complaining about imbalance as poor game design, in which all characters are mechanically almost identical, and gameplay is narrowly defined to ensure continuity between tables. Don't get me wrong, I think they did an excellent job. 4e is well written, runs smoothly, and has a lot of excellent features. I just don't want to play it, or any other game that heads in the same direction. I want a bumpy varied system that has a variety of mechanics. The idea that some characters are better than others in particular situations is not a bug to be fixed, it's one of the principal reasons I play the game.

And when I hear people say, hey, X is always better than Y, we need to fix X or Y, then I think, well, whatever works in your game.

What gets weird is when people tell me that X is always better than Y, that it's an immutable fact of the game, and that I must be inexperienced or changing the rules somehow if I don't agree.

It's a roleplaying game. You give each player a chance to shine. The practice of distorting the events of the game to spotlight the talents of individual PCs is discussed in the core rules, and is no less a feature of the rules than giving your druid an animal companion from monster manual III.

And it's not hard to see that spellcasters are supposed to be balanced by having a limited number of spell per day. They'll be more powerful than other characters on full spells, and less powerful as those spell run out. If they never run out, well, that's a design decision you've taken for your game.

Similarly, there are spells that duplicate features of other classes. That's really very useful if you're playing a small party that lacks certain key roles. Otherwise, don't take them. There's nothing terribly complicated about this, although you need a bit of experience to anticipate some of the problems.

[TuggyNE]

So the result of trying to make the system 'more balanced' is 4e. A system born of internet discussions complaining about imbalance as poor game design, in which all characters are mechanically almost identical, and gameplay is narrowly defined to ensure continuity between tables. Don't get me wrong, I think they did an excellent job. 4e is well written, runs smoothly, and has a lot of excellent features. I just don't want to play it, or any other game that heads in the same direction. I want a bumpy varied system that has a variety of mechanics. The idea that some characters are better than others in particular situations is not a bug to be fixed, it's one of the principal reasons I play the game.

Ah yes, the old "4e mechanical similarity is the only possible way to get balance in D&D, therefore because I dislike 4e, I dislike all attempts at balance" argument. Counterpoint: Beguiler, Dread Necromancer, Factotum, Crusader, Psychic Warrior, and a number of others; generally speaking, those are considered to be fairly well balanced at T3, but they are broadly dissimilar in playstyle. What's more, they cover a rather broad range, and other archetypes could be added or adjusted in order to suit balance. Balance is not, in fact, dependent on mechanical similarity; that's merely the cheap and easy way out.

Additional counterpoint: from all reports, Starcraft is absurdly well balanced, but each faction plays very differently.

[Togo]

Ah yes, the old "4e mechanical similarity is the only possible way to get balance in D&D, therefore because I dislike 4e, I dislike all attempts at balance" argument.

Not really. 4e isn't just mechanical similarity, because that wasn't enough. it's about mechanical similarity and narrower definition of the gameplay experience. My point is the same point I was arguing before. That balance isn't about matching mechanics, it is about matching characters to situations in the game.


Balance is not, in fact, dependent on mechanical similarity; that's merely the cheap and easy way out.

Agreed. That's why I'm arguing against people who are trying to codify balance into an immutable 'gaming law' by citing mechanical comparisons.

My point is that if you have two characters using different mechanics, then you can only balance them by the effect that they have on the game. And since games vary wildly, you can't balance for all games, only for your particular game. Balanced at your table is not balanced at mine.


Additional counterpoint: from all reports, Starcraft is absurdly well balanced, but each faction plays very differently.

Gameplay is pretty narrowly defined though. Do you see much table variation in Starcraft? Do the rules, availability of options for each faction, or the goals, vary much? Or is it very well balanced precisely because you can rely on each faction having the same options and goals every game?

[sonofzeal]

It really isn't my intention to derail with a Druid tangent, but for us, animal companions are woefully inadequate in their attack and damage to really be called anything other than expendable cannon fodder.
This is generally the case (after lvl 1-2 at least). Animal Companions aren't viable in combat unless you're investing a lot of resources in them.


Wildshaping has been a way to transform yourself into similarly expendable cannon fodder, but this time without an easy way to replace yourself.
This is generally the case, too... but is much easier to fix. There's a list of ways to boost AC to viable levels. And even if they don't, being able to turn into a bird at lvl 5 is pretty useful.


And its spellcasting is a perfect example of "Day late or a penny short", as many of the key spells on which the game turns often turn up as higher spell level than they appear on other spell lists, or are examples of the weaker and more reactive types of spells those other classes have.
Completely disagreed.

The Druid list is frankly fantastic, easily the second best in the game.Sor/Wiz wins, but they can't prep off the whole list each day; and Clerics can suppliment with Domains but their base list itself simply can't compete. The Druid list has a metric ton of utility, and a broad array of nukes, buffs, debuffs, crowd control, and pretty literally every category of spell you could hope for. Some of those aren't always as good as classes dedicated in the area (a Cleric is a better healer than a Druid, and a Warmage is a better nuker), but it's the breadth of the toolbox that makes it valuable.

Additionally, a lot of awesome spells are Druid only (Reincarnate, Awaken, Bite of the WereXYZ). Some of those (like Fire Seeds (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/fireSeeds.htm)) are accessible via certain Domains, but are still effectively limited to Druids most of the time.

Or, compare Summon Nature's Ally to the Summon Monster spells that Clerics, Sorcerers, and Wizards have. SNA often gets things at a lower level, and the unique stuff they get is often stronger and tougher. SM is a little stronger on stuff with funky SLAs and the like, but SNA still gets Unicorns for highly efficient healing, and a variety of Fey who can fulfill the utility.

A druid who isn't rushing off to bash heads with things that can hit him on a nat2 is a force to be reckoned with. As far as spellcasters go, they're possibly the most insanely flexible. I've seen poorly-played Druids too, guys who kept turning into Polar Bears and dropping to negatives in the second round of every fight. And then the campaign got up in levels and suddenly he was destroying entire armies and fortresses almost singlehandedly, as soon as someone pointed at that hey, you've got spells too y'know?

[TuggyNE]

Not really. 4e isn't just mechanical similarity, because that wasn't enough. it's about mechanical similarity and narrower definition of the gameplay experience. My point is the same point I was arguing before. That balance isn't about matching mechanics, it is about matching characters to situations in the game.

It seems like you're conflating two different things, though; one is that balance can only be defined with respect to mechanical interactions (since, by definition, freeform roleplay does not rely on character abilities or class features), and the other is that a game that does not confine itself to mechanical interactions cannot be balanced. I agree with the first, of course, but the second does not seem reasonable; if you have a game with balanced mechanical interactions, what's so hard about then allowing freeform interactions at will? As long as players make even a vague attempt to play nice in freeform, there shouldn't be any serious trouble arising there.

I suspect this comes from the idea that some characters should have mechanical support for the things they're supposed to do, and others should instead roleplay those out, which obviously means that balance would rely on equalizing incomparables. I have no trouble rejecting that idea as any kind of reasonable basis for game design; classes/characters/builds/archetypes should have roughly equal proportions of mechanical and freeform expectations. (Equal between characters in a particular game, that is; different games might have wildly different proportions.)


My point is that if you have two characters using different mechanics, then you can only balance them by the effect that they have on the game. And since games vary wildly, you can't balance for all games, only for your particular game. Balanced at your table is not balanced at mine.

As long as expectations are fair, why can't you? In one game, a particular class ability may combine well with a character's friendships or alliances; in another, a different class ability may ensure a king's assassination and a change in ruling house. If each class is vetted to make sure its mechanical effects are comparable, then any serious differences are likely to be the result of differing player skill or inconsistent DMing.

Also, what about the Factotum, or Beguiler, or Psychic Warrior, or Crusader, forces them into a narrower definition of gameplay relative to the Fighter or Wizard? If anything, they have more scope for roll-free roleplaying, not less, but it's pretty difficult to argue that they're anything but better balanced than Monks and Clerics.

Anything more will depend on specific examples of differences that could reasonably make balance impossible — and differences in rule interpretations/application, or inconsistent roleplay expectations, don't count.

Sorry for probable lack of clarity; it's late and I should have gone to bed an hour ago.But I couldn't sleep because someone was WRONG on the Internet ;)

[Chronos]

Mechanical similarity is, in fact, the absolute worst way to try to balance things. Someone already mentioned Starcraft, which is well-balanced despite the races being very different. Compare Warcraft II, though, where the races are mechanically almost identical. You couldn't pick between footmen and grunts, or between griffons and dragons... But Bloodlust was a better ability than Heal, so the orcs were better. Because they were so similar, it was almost impossible to balance them, because if there was any imbalance in any of the few things that were different, there was nothing to balance against it.

[Togo]

It seems like you're conflating two different things, though; one is that balance can only be defined with respect to mechanical interactions (since, by definition, freeform roleplay does not rely on character abilities or class features), and the other is that a game that does not confine itself to mechanical interactions cannot be balanced. I agree with the first, of course, but the second does not seem reasonable; if you have a game with balanced mechanical interactions, what's so hard about then allowing freeform interactions at will? As long as players make even a vague attempt to play nice in freeform, there shouldn't be any serious trouble arising there.

Hm..I'm not sure I agree with either of those. I think we mean different things by balanced.

Let's say we have two characters. Kerry the knight is good at fighting. Wilmina the weasel is ok at fighting, but can pick locks. Are they balanced?
You can compare as many numbers as you want for as long as you want and never come up with a definitive answer to that question. Because ultimately it's not a question about mechanics at all, its about whether the ability pick locks is useful in the game. If the game features no locks, Wilmina isn't getting a fair deal. If the game features no combat, who wants to be Kerry? If the game has lots of locks, but there's no advantage to picking the lock as opposed to just bashing down the door, then Wilmina is still out of luck.

To my way of thinking, Kerry and Wilmina are balanced if and only if they equally contribute to the game, and the goals of the group. That's nothing to do with the mechanics of either character, it's to do with what kind of party the players have, and what kind of game the DM is running.


I suspect this comes from the idea that some characters should have mechanical support for the things they're supposed to do, and others should instead roleplay those out, which obviously means that balance would rely on equalizing incomparables. I have no trouble rejecting that idea as any kind of reasonable basis for game design; classes/characters/builds/archetypes should have roughly equal proportions of mechanical and freeform expectations. (Equal between characters in a particular game, that is; different games might have wildly different proportions.)

I think you're leaning on a false dichotomy between freeform and mechanical. Giving someone an ancestral sword that's central to the plot, is both mechancal and plot related. Having a party member befriend a giant eagle is both. What exactly is the difference between a wizard trying to research a new spell to deal with a problem, and a rogue trying to use their contacts in the thief's guild to get some help?

I think the central point here is that the game is not divided into character sheet mechanics and freeform roleplaying. Interactions with the game world give you mechanical advantage.

I'm also a little unsure of what you mean by game design. Do you mean preparation of the rules of a game for publication, or running an adventure so that all characters get to participate? Because with the former I can see your point, but with the later I don't see the point at all. If you're in a sea battle, and one character needs to direct the ship's ballista, are you going to give that to the PC who can already fight effectively, or the one with little to do? Is that a fluffy freeform expectation totally distinct from character sheet capabilities, or an attempt to recognise that the game situation has led to one character being less effective, and giving them an in-game boost to compensate?



...you can only balance them by the effect that they have on the game. And since games vary wildly, you can't balance for all games, only for your particular game. Balanced at your table is not balanced at mine.

As long as expectations are fair, why can't you? In one game, a particular class ability may combine well with a character's friendships or alliances; in another, a different class ability may ensure a king's assassination and a change in ruling house. If each class is vetted to make sure its mechanical effects are comparable, then any serious differences are likely to be the result of differing player skill or inconsistent DMing.

But DMing is going to be inconsistent. So are party dynamics. In one game we may be assassinating a king, in the next fighting orcs. How do you mechanically balance Gerald McKingstabber, the specialist assasin, with Steve O'Orcblaster? Short of making both orc blasting and breaking into a palace the same mechanical test, (the point about mechanically identical abilities), or short of stipulating that every adventure should be 20% orc blasting and 5% breaking and entering, (the point about narrow definition of gameplay), you can't balance the two abilities. There is no consistent basis on which to do so. Their relative use varies wildly from session to session, adventure to adventure, from game to game, from group to group and from table to table.


Sorry for probable lack of clarity; it's late and I should have gone to bed an hour ago.But I couldn't sleep because someone was WRONG on the Internet ;)

Well quite so. But reading the above, do you see where I'm coming from?

There is a get-out clause of course. There is a way to balance different capabilities. You just assume a 'standard game' (your own game of course:smallwink:), and then balance everything according to how useful it is in the games that you personally play. That's why we get never-ending arguements about the usefulness of different characters, that's why we get people arguing balance on the basis that every barbarian has wolf totem, every wizard has 14 con, and every druid is a mute wildshaped desmondu hunting bat in luminous armour with a barded fleshraker dinosaur. Because actually, every table is different, every group runs their games in different ways. That's why we got the OP, and that's why I see the idea of balancing character classes in abstract, without reference to what choices they actually make, what the character actually does, or even what the game itself consists of, as nonsensical.

[Talya]

This is generally the case (after lvl 1-2 at least). Animal Companions aren't viable in combat unless you're investing a lot of resources in them.

At level 3, your basic core animal companion riding dog will have 4d8+8 hit points, 18 strength, 16 dex, have a base of 19 armor class (That you can easily augment further with cheap masterwork leather armor), and make a free trip attack with every successful bite attack. Feel free to take combat expertise and improved trip on him in place of alertness and his level 3 feat, to get an extra +4 to trip and a free bite attack after his free trip attack. That is, of course, still quite viable at level 4, assuming you don't want a bigger companion at that point.

Outside of core, invest a single feat in natural bond, and get yourself a fleshraker at 4, and the fun really starts. Use your handle animal skill to train him up with the warbeast template. That's not "a lot of resources." It takes a lot longer than level 2 for a druid animal companion to fall behind the PCs.

[eggynack]

At level 3, your basic core animal companion riding dog will have 4d8+8 hit points, 18 strength, 16 dex, have a base of 19 armor class (That you can easily augment further with cheap masterwork leather armor), and make a free trip attack with every successful bite attack. Feel free to take combat expertise and improved trip on him in place of alertness and his level 3 feat, to get an extra +4 to trip and a free bite attack after his free trip attack. That is, of course, still quite viable at level 4, assuming you don't want a bigger companion at that point.
I'm pretty sure that an HD advanced riding dog only has 16 strength. Your other numbers seem accurate though, and riding dogs are indeed awesome. My only real question is why people constantly feel the need to bring up wolves. They're worse in almost every way, and people are always saying, "well, compare this first level monk's power to that of a wolf." There're some examples out there, but I'm mostly just talking about a weird thing that happens.

[Talya]

I'm pretty sure that an HD advanced riding dog only has 16 strength. Your other numbers seem accurate though, and riding dogs are indeed awesome. My only real question is why people constantly feel the need to bring up wolves. They're worse in almost every way, and people are always saying, "well, compare this first level monk's power to that of a wolf." There're some examples out there, but I'm mostly just talking about a weird thing that happens.

Yeah, for some reason I remembered them as having 17 strength, not 15.

You can keep the riding dog to level 9, really, and it's still awesome, even though it's 1 hit die behind the party (assuming you didn't go the warbeast route). At 9, it takes the multiattack feat to go with it's AC provided second natural attack. Then it trips two people in a round, and hits both people twice.

[Nightraiderx]

Being ignored several times for the more "controversial and exciting" discussions I have this to say. 4e isn't the solution to the "balance" where the balance lies is that mundanes have less versatility compared to spell casters. A caster can match a bab or buff himself, but the martial SKILL should remain with the warrior, a warrior doesn't always specialize in a weapon but it damn well should give him more than a +1 or a +2 to damage, it should open options with that weapon in a way that casters should never be able to match without gishing. Not having one style (power attack 2-h) be the complete optimal choice and another (sword and board) be the opposite would do wonders. What needs to happen in order to have some satisfaction is that wizard spells are too powerful to begin with, they were nerfed in 3.75 but there was still the problem of casters being 10 x more flexible and versatile than a fighter or a ranger. Yes, we shouldn't be expecting a fighter to teleport through barriers, but he should be able to use tripping, feinting, bullrushing, disarming, or w/e to special effect. He should be able to not just be better at hitting and dealing damage, but also setting up beneficial situations, using the environment and/or the opponents strengths against them or exploiting their weaknesses. Tome of Battle was a step in the right direction, but it was still limited to people having certain builds.

This class alone narrows to how warriors should be able to play.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=69870


Maneuvers
Warrior-Poets are capable of using a diverse array of martial maneuvers from the Diamond Mind, Setting Sun, Shadow Hand, and Tiger Claw, and White Raven disciplines. Rather than learning maneuvers as they gain levels, they instead gain maneuver slots. Each maneuver slot is of the highest level of maneuver you can learn at the level you gain it. Each day, when they ready your maneuvers, you fill each slot with a maneuver of that slot’s level or lower from any of the disciplines you have access to. You ignore maneuver prerequisites when filling your maneuver slots. At first level, you have two 1st-level maneuver slots. At subsequent levels, you gain maneuver slots whose level is based off of the highest level of maneuver you can initiate, as determined by your initiator level. All of your maneuvers are extraordinary abilities, unless otherwise stated. They are not affected by spell resistance, and initiating one does not provoke attacks of opportunity.

Once you have filled a slot with a maneuver, you must ready it in order to use it. At 1st level, you may ready two maneuvers. You ready your maneuvers by exercising or meditating for 5 minutes. The maneuvers you choose to ready remain readied until you decide to ready new maneuvers. You do not need any sleep or rest to ready new maneuvers. You begin each encounter with all of your readied maneuvers unexpended. Once you use a maneuver, it is expended, and you cannot use it again until you recover. As a standard action, you may refocus yourself and take stock of the situation in order to recover a number of maneuvers equal to your Charisma modifier, minimum one.
At 6th level, and at each subsequent even level, you may trade a maneuver slot of any level for one slot of the highest level of maneuver you can learn.

If you take levels in a prestige class that allows you to learn additional maneuvers, or multiclass into another martial adept base class, you learn maneuvers from those classes normally, and do not gain maneuver slots from them. However, if you take a prestige class (but not a base class), you can fill your maneuver slots with maneuvers taken from any disciplines that prestige class has access to.

Stances
Just as with your maneuvers, you do not learn stances. Instead, you gain stance slots, which you may fill with any stance of the slot’s level when you ready maneuvers. Stances can not be used to fill maneuver slots, or vice versa. At 1st level, you gain a single 1st-level stance slot. At subsequent levels, the level of the stance slots you gain is based on your initiator level, as normal. Unlike maneuvers, stances are not readied or expended. You can use any stance you have in a slot at any time, and can switch from one stance to another as a swift action. All your martial stances are extraordinary abilities unless otherwise stated. Unlike maneuver slots, you can never trade stance slots for higher-leveled slots.

(emphasis mine)
There is the versatility that melee characters can come closer to, there are still alot of problems with the martial manuever powers and where they come in, but it would be a step towards adding the versatility martial characters SHOULD have.

[Gnaeus]

I agree with Togo. Balance is one game design goal, but one on which I place very little importance. (also, Balance is a terrible term to use, because it means so many things to different people). Predictability of outcome is much more important for me, that (for example) a "Fighter" be good at fighting. The more modular you make the system, the more options you give in character creation or play, the less "balanced" a system will be, because the assumptions you are balancing against are less and less likely to be true at any given table.

If having characters at a similar power level is a goal in your group (and I have been in groups where it is not) then I would rather address it at the table, where I can see what I am balancing AGAINST. In a party of Warblade, Factotum, Bard, Druid or Wizard or Cleric, the tier 1 may be the strongest, but he might be able to deal with it just by toning down the optimization chops a little, or focusing on something that no one else is doing. In a party of Fighter, Monk, Healer, Druid, the druid has a real problem, and probably needs to be dealt with (again, if having a party of equal power level is the goal). In a party of Wizard, Druid, Cleric, Monk, the problem isn't the casters, it is the Monk.

But even that doesn't really cover it. If I am DMing a game for my buddy and our children age 5-7, and he built the monk, and they built the casters, and for some odd reason we didn't give them lots of advice, you could wind up with a party with 3 tier 1s and a tier 5, where the tier 5 is by far the most powerful member of the team, because it is being run by a much stronger player and at a much higher optimization level, and we may need to decide that at this table, a monk with X templates and Y ACFs and Z magic items may just be too strong, even if everyone on the boards would laugh at us for saying that Monk > Druid.

TLDR. I want a system with lots of options. I would not sacrifice the strongest T1 or the weakest T5 at the altar of Balance. Balance is situational, often subjective, and far from the only or most important design goal.

[Talya]

I agree with Togo. Balance is one game design goal, but one on which I place very little importance. (also, Balance is a terrible term to use, because it means so many things to different people). Predictability of outcome is much more important for me, that (for example) a "Fighter" be good at fighting. The more modular you make the system, the more options you give in character creation or play, the less "balanced" a system will be, because the assumptions you are balancing against are less and less likely to be true at any given table.

If having characters at a similar power level is a goal in your group (and I have been in groups where it is not) then I would rather address it at the table, where I can see what I am balancing AGAINST. In a party of Warblade, Factotum, Bard, Druid or Wizard or Cleric, the tier 1 may be the strongest, but he might be able to deal with it just by toning down the optimization chops a little, or focusing on something that no one else is doing. In a party of Fighter, Monk, Healer, Druid, the druid has a real problem, and probably needs to be dealt with (again, if having a party of equal power level is the goal). In a party of Wizard, Druid, Cleric, Monk, the problem isn't the casters, it is the Monk.

But even that doesn't really cover it. If I am DMing a game for my buddy and our children age 5-7, and he built the monk, and they built the casters, and for some odd reason we didn't give them lots of advice, you could wind up with a party with 3 tier 1s and a tier 5, where the tier 5 is by far the most powerful member of the team, because it is being run by a much stronger player and at a much higher optimization level, and we may need to decide that at this table, a monk with X templates and Y ACFs and Z magic items may just be too strong, even if everyone on the boards would laugh at us for saying that Monk > Druid.

TLDR. I want a system with lots of options. I would not sacrifice the strongest T1 or the weakest T5 at the altar of Balance. Balance is situational, often subjective, and far from the only or most important design goal.


I mostly agree with everything you said here, I think. I am loathe to remove fighter, wizard, monk or druid from my games. I may give the lower tier classes some boons, or limit the most egregious RAW cheese from the higher classes, but I like the variety and modularity in the system. More options is never bad.


Being ignored several times for the more "controversial and exciting" discussions I have this to say. 4e isn't the solution to the "balance" where the balance lies is that mundanes have less versatility compared to spell casters.

Someone earlier compared 4e to Warcraft 2, and I agree. 4e didn't just limit versatility, it made just about everyone the same. There's no variety in how things are handled, at all. They "balanced" things by removing everything that makes building a character fun.

[sonofzeal]

Yeah, for some reason I remembered them as having 17 strength, not 15.

You can keep the riding dog to level 9, really, and it's still awesome, even though it's 1 hit die behind the party (assuming you didn't go the warbeast route). At 9, it takes the multiattack feat to go with it's AC provided second natural attack. Then it trips two people in a round, and hits both people twice.
I may have been exaggerating slightly. However, any Fighter that isn't spending all their feats on EWP:Sai or the like should be pretty rapidly outpacing it. I mean, at lvl 6-8 it's got 18 strength and has what, a BAB of 4?

A single +8(1d6+4) attack is not going to scare anything. To avoid accusations of biased selection, I'm going to take something in the middle of that range, a CR 7. The only melee monster I can find there with only a single attack is looking at +15(2d8+10), and has +19 on the opposed strength check to the Riding Dog's +8. Or there's a Bulette (+16(2d8+8)) with "only" a +16 on the opposed strength, but an AC that the Riding Dog only hits a third of the time. Or a Dire Bear which it can it slightly over half the time and "only" has a +14 on the check to resist trip, but has two +19(2d4+10) claws and a +13(2d8+5) bite. And Improved Grab with a +23 grapple modifier.

A Riding Dog is simply negligible compared to CR 7 threats. Its damage stinks, it can't even hit half the time, and while the trip is nice it doesn't get a racial bonus on the check and is merely medium. There are situations where it's nice, but SNA usually covers those. The 24 hours to get an Animal Companion back are simply not worth it past early levels, unless there's plenty of downtime.


(As for Natural Bond, I've always been of the opinion that you still have to meet the level requirements as given in the Alternative Animal Companions section. The wording of the feat only increases your level for the bonuses, not for the creature itself.)

[Beheld]

Let's say we have two characters. Kerry the knight is good at fighting. Wilmina the weasel is ok at fighting, but can pick locks. Are they balanced?

The solution is to not make characters like that, because that is bad game design. The "Fighter" is bad game design because everyone fights, so either the Fighter is strictly better than everyone else for a large part of the game (and that feels bad) and then he sits out and contributes nothing when the combat music isn't playing (and that feels bad), or he is just as good at fighting but does nothing outside of comment in which case he is less useful.

Better game design would be to have all character be good at fighting in different ways and all characters to have out of combat abilities that allow them to contribute there as well.

[Talya]

A Riding Dog is simply negligible compared to CR 7 threats. Its damage stinks, it can't even hit half the time,
It's hitting better than the party rogue (Same BAB, higher strength, and probably better enhancement bonuses as you level (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/magicFangGreater.htm)) - and it's tripping like a mad. Once its targets are on the ground, everyone else is going to be clobbering them.

Not that it's a good idea to stick with the basic companions, of course. it's just they take longer to become obsolete than you said...




(As for Natural Bond, I've always been of the opinion that you still have to meet the level requirements as given in the Alternative Animal Companions section. The wording of the feat only increases your level for the bonuses, not for the creature itself.)

Correct. The point is, when you take that fleshraker at level 4, you're getting your full druid level for AC bonus hit dice.

I don't like animal companions of large size (too much need for reduce animal spells in your spell slots), but let's face it, if you keep them updated, they'll stay relevant all the way to 20. At level 17, with natural bond, your Dire Tiger has 20d8+60 hit points, a base strength before gear of 29, a base armor before gear of 21, pounce, improved grab, and rake.

[Friv]

The Fighter can't sleep in his armor, if he's in full plate then according to the rules it takes a crazy amount of time to put that armor on (with help), so if he's ambushed in the night he's got his weapon and shield, and thats it. If he even has that.

This isn't entirely on-topic, but I was playing a fighter at one point, and I needed Endurance as a prereq for a prestige class.

As a result, my character would get ready for bed by stripping out of his plate mail... and then putting on a chain shirt to sleep in. Chainmail pyjamas.


For on-topic...

3E definitely intended for the number of spells per day to balance out their relative power. The argument is over whether they succeeded.

For me, they did not, for two reasons:

1) The ease of access to spells and wands meant that casters could routinely spend a very small amount of gold to have all the spells they would ever need, starting at the mid-levels.

2) The rate of HP loss for front-line characters, especially as the game goes on and attack outstrips defense, meant that fighter-types ran out of resources faster than caster-types.

The classes only work well together for the first few levels. After that, it gets increasingly difficult to have them function together safely.

And as far as the "well, my party worked fine" argument goes...

If I take a cheerful walk through a field with my friends, and we all have a good time, and then the next day I hear that the field is actually a minefield, and someone took a wrong step and blew their leg off... the correct response is not, "Well, I made it through the field just fine so there's no problem".

Nor is it "Well, just learn where the mines are so you can avoid them. It's a nice field."

[eggynack]

I may have been exaggerating slightly. However, any Fighter that isn't spending all their feats on EWP:Sai or the like should be pretty rapidly outpacing it. I mean, at lvl 6-8 it's got 18 strength and has what, a BAB of 4?

A single +8(1d6+4) attack is not going to scare anything. To avoid accusations of biased selection, I'm going to take something in the middle of that range, a CR 7. The only melee monster I can find there with only a single attack is looking at +15(2d8+10), and has +19 on the opposed strength check to the Riding Dog's +8. Or there's a Bulette (+16(2d8+8)) with "only" a +16 on the opposed strength, but an AC that the Riding Dog only hits a third of the time. Or a Dire Bear which it can it slightly over half the time and "only" has a +14 on the check to resist trip, but has two +19(2d4+10) claws and a +13(2d8+5) bite. And Improved Grab with a +23 grapple modifier.

A Riding Dog is simply negligible compared to CR 7 threats. Its damage stinks, it can't even hit half the time, and while the trip is nice it doesn't get a racial bonus on the check and is merely medium. There are situations where it's nice, but SNA usually covers those. The 24 hours to get an Animal Companion back are simply not worth it past early levels, unless there's plenty of downtime.


(As for Natural Bond, I've always been of the opinion that you still have to meet the level requirements as given in the Alternative Animal Companions section. The wording of the feat only increases your level for the bonuses, not for the creature itself.)
That's why you do other stuff by that point. Fleshrakers are pretty competitive at level 4, and you get brown bears by level 7. You don't even really care much about your animal companion being good by seven anyway. The trick is that the druid's combined class features are always better than everyone else. For example, at level one, the animal companion is possibly your best class feature. Shooting an entangle, or whatever other battlefield control spell you want at that point, is super good, but you fall under the standard level one wizard limitations. Fighters are at their best at first, and you might just be the best fighter in the party.

As the game continues, the utility of having a fighter goes down, but the utility of being a caster goes up. The animal companion scales a bit better than you're making it out to, but it doesn't even matter. You're outpacing the fighter by using a riding dog, while also being able to summon a giant crocodile. The riding dog is just a disposable meat shield for you to hide behind while you make with the magic. In any case, I think that switching out your dog seems like a good move at level 7. In core, I don't think the options are better than the dog until that point, and out of core, the answer is obviously dinosaurs.

[Elderand]

3E definitely intended for the number of spells per day to balance out their relative power. The argument is over whether they succeeded.

It's worse than just not succeeding, they utterly destroyed any shred of balance there was in older edition.

Spells were always meant to be far more powerful than anything else, but that power came at a price. Very low hp, very few spells per day, hard to get those spells and a important drawbacks to those spells.

3E removed every single one of those drawbacks.
Low hp ? Everything got a lot more hp, including spellcasters (but evocation spells still do the same damage as before, so it became a lot less usefull).

Few spells per day ? They screwed that up by giving bonus spell for high ability score

Hard to get those spell ? The spellcraft check is trivialy easy and no limits whatsoever to how many spell a wizard can learn (you wanted all the spell in Adnd you'd better hope you got an 18 in int at the start and then found a tome of clear thought. Or wasted 10 wishes)

Important drawback to spells ? XP is a river, and lets not get started on thought bottle or other ways to circumvent things. 5000 xp on wish ? that's nothing much to worry about, wish used to age you 5 years.

[RFLS]

Spellcasters are obviously more powerful than their mundane counterparts because having more options means they can more easily leverage a particular solution to a particular problem. Add to this the fact that those options granted to mundanes are often constructed with an eye towards what is actually feasible for mundane individuals. One can imagine swinging a sword and cutting a hydra's head off, one cannot imagine swinging a sword and cutting a hole into another plane of reality, or swinging a sword such that you are propelled through the air on your own power, able to change directions or hover. Meanwhile, spells are designed capable of violating every aspect of reality because that's kind of their whole point.

However, in practice, I've never seen the disparity in power between spellcasters and mundanes become nearly so big an issue as it's regularly discussed in online forums. I also frequently see people come to online discussions utterly shocked that other people have such different impressions of the state of affairs from what they have and I think there's a reason for that.

I think a big problem with the whole 3.5 power mismatch between spellcasters and mundanes in my opinion comes down mostly to a difference in mentality and perception in 4 major areas:

1.) The fact that Oberani Fallacy is a Fallacy doesn't mean it isn't good advice. Saying you can fix a problem is in fact not equivalent to saying there is no problem, this is true. It doesn't, however, mean you also SHOULD NOT make changes to fix that problem when it clearly is causing an unwelcome situation.

For me and my group, what this generally means is a lower tolerance for spellcasting cheese. For example, when we read Abrupt Jaunt, we assumed it had been written incorrectly, and said, "This isn't an appropriate power for a character to have" and rewrote it. The fact that it's never been errata'd doesn't make our judgement wrong in our opinion, and we're not interested in defending the idea that it isn't a problem in theory that Wizards have access to broken abilities like these just because those abilities can be rewritten, just that we in practice actually did rewrite it to what we consider a useful, but not-broken class feature. Meanwhile, we might not put any kind of kabosh on an Ubercharger because "Hey, he's just charging and doing a bunch of damage, that isn't going to break the game"...

In addition, my group isn't shy about bumping up saving throws or adding or increasing SR if spellcasters are being a problem.

2.) The utility of dealing lots of HP damage to debuffed enemies, or of being a vehicle toward efficient use of buffs is undervalued. My group sort of sees this as similar to the following analogy: The Party is a multistage rocket. The wizard and cleric are the engines and support crew that get it pointed in the right direction, ensure its target's position, and the Melee Damager is the Warhead inside it. The argument could absolutely be made that you could replace the warhead with more engine fuel and it'd still explode, or that sometimes you want to put a science team or diplomatic corps in the capsule rather than explosives, and warheads aren't any good there. However, most rockets that are fired in RPGs benefit from warheads being attached. In those cases, warheads that are really damaging are kind of nice to have around. A warhead without a delivery rocket might just be essentially a landmine, but, well, sometimes a landmine is useful too.

As a result, when a player wants to play a warhead, so long as the rest of the party plays the delivery system, it's all going to be fine. If they decide they're going to just play a rocket all on their own, they're going to be less efficient, and the DM is welcome to just have NPCs walk up and step on that landmine if he wants that to be the game anyway.

In my group, literally the very most common use of Dimension Door is to carry the Fighter type to a spot adjacent to an enemy, allowing him to execute a full-attack.

3.) The assumption is of a balanced sequence of events and challenges such that the versatility of a spellcaster is absolutely required, but their limited reapplication is never a detriment. It's always thought in these hypothetical objective game scenarios that, for instance, locked doors are a one or two times per dungeon phenomenon, so a Rogue's ability to spring locks without expending resources is a negligible advantage because this theoretical wizard has sufficient resources to deal with all the locks that are there in this theoretical actuality. If in your dungeons, 80% of the doors are locked or stuck or otherwise, having a big strong guy to knock them down and a rogue to pick their locks can be pretty useful, especially in the first 9 levels of the game, where a wand of Knock is more than 10% of your character's total treasure allotment. On the other hand, if you eschew locked door problems as a matter of course, the Fighter with no access to Knock is at no disadvantage compared with the Wizard who has it. This (and any similar scenario) is a specific level of utility requirement that provides an ideal environment for a spellcaster to dominate noncombat situations. Not having this specific environment does wonders for mundane problem solving such as skill use finding purchase.

4.) (the major failure of perception/mentality that the other side of the argument often falls into. I tried to split this and condense the above into two each to maintain artificial parity, but I really couldn't think of how to do it. Let me assure you I'm not trying to make the point that one side is privileged to a smaller degree of misperception, just these are the four different types of misperceptions I'm aware of and three of them are on the one side.) The people who are surprised to see caster dominance routinely discussed have not seen this property due to the circumstances of their own personal experience, and so never even considered it in the first place. Having never considered it, their own games developed without the presence of those powerful options being leveraged, and so perception slowly became reality.

I'll give a personal example: I personally think Druids suck. I have DMed for them and seen everything from Warmages to Rangers to straight Fighters outperform them utterly in every respect. I have played them and been barely able to fulfil my basic role in the group, surviving mainly on mercy of the DM, or in another instance barely contributing at all, but being safe. I do not understand why they're included on the same level as Wizards or Clerics, as every single one I've seen in a game has been utterly humiliated at every turn with abject, bedwetting, unending failure.

However, the abject devotion they get on the forums gives me pause. I have to assume there's SOMETHING I'm missing about them, some trick or option that seems obvious to everyone else, but that for whatever reason no one in my group ever identified. I have a feeling that having seen Druids suck, we created a self-fulfilling play environment where for whatever reasons, the things other people do with Druids just are never useful, or that we never think to take the right options that would make a Druid good, falling into whatever familiar patterns we have that always lead to Druids sucking. It seems incredible to me whenever I see Druid Advice threads being "Take Natural Spell -> Win", because obviously it's a far more arcane class than such posters think.

One other example of such a misperception is the idea that casters are squishy or risk running out of spell slots, or can't have buffs going all day, or don't benefit from metamagic. These all essentially come down to "I've never played a game at 10th+ level, and assume no one else does either with any regularity". This doesn't work because 10th+ is literally half the game, and people do play at such levels with a great degree of regularity.

So I feel like understanding that the environment we play in has more to do with the power of these classes than either side really realizes, and the recognition that personal experience and perception is doing a lot to shape the different sides of this debate can go a long way towards bridging this gap.

This is the hands-down best argument (in a debate sense) I have ever seen constructed on this side of this particular debate. It's well thought-out and well presented and I just wanted to take a moment to congratulate you.


-stuff about druid power level-

I do agree with you; druids are powerful. I think the point he was making, though, was that his group has a mindset that results in weak druids, for whatever reason, and despite his being aware that the interwebs say otherwise. It's a group thing. In my group (PF), we have a guy that's banned from playing Oracles and from playing characters with only one level in any class. Not because those are actually overly powerful or anything, but because the way we play makes them powerful, and because, subconsciously, we expect those to be powerful and act accordingly.

I actually was going to reply to a lot of people who jumped on the druid thing, but this response should just about cover all of them. I felt like it was a point worth making. *shrug* I dunno if it helps at all.

@tuggyne & Togo

Additional counterpoint: from all reports, Starcraft is absurdly well balanced, but each faction plays very differently.


Gameplay is pretty narrowly defined though. Do you see much table variation in Starcraft? Do the rules, availability of options for each faction, or the goals, vary much? Or is it very well balanced precisely because you can rely on each faction having the same options and goals every game?

So, no, the goals in Starcraft do not vary much (actually, they don't vary at all). However, each race does bring different skillsets to the table. Terrans are mid-game and defense oriented, Toss are late-game and I-don't-know-what-current-meta-is oriented, and Zerg are all about the early game. Each race also lies at a different point on an "optimal cost:number of units" scale. Toss like having a really really high number for that, and Zerg like having a low number, with Terrans right in the middle.

The argument that seems to be being made is that SC follows a 4e balance model, where each race has X unit that does Y for Z cost. That's....not quite right, actually. Each race tends to have analogous units suited for certain tasks, but those units and their abilities vary greatly. Examples of unique abilities:


Widow Mines
Siege Tanks
Brood Lords (I think that's the name. It's been a bit)
Oracles
Motherships
Ultralisks (that cleave is vicious)
Infestors


Anyway. The point is that, while SC is a fairly well balanced game, and the goals for all players are identical, each race has a unique way of achieving the goals. The problem is that the goal is pretty tightly focused, leaving only one solution to each game (kill everything).

EDIT: The resource collection method and building construction differences, while minute, actually have a fairly large impact on early game meta that forces each race to make decisions in different ways.

[Gnaeus]

The solution is to not make characters like that, because that is bad game design. The "Fighter" is bad game design because everyone fights, so either the Fighter is strictly better than everyone else for a large part of the game (and that feels bad) and then he sits out and contributes nothing when the combat music isn't playing (and that feels bad), or he is just as good at fighting but does nothing outside of comment in which case he is less useful.

Better game design would be to have all character be good at fighting in different ways and all characters to have out of combat abilities that allow them to contribute there as well.

Your statement is false, because it is stated as fact, not opinion.

If that is bad game design for you, then any game that you liked I would regard as unplayably bad. Your goals in a game (maximize equality of ability in combat and out of combat) and mine (maximize options in building different types of characters, including utility specialists who aren't good in combat, or combat specialists with little utility) are diametrically opposite. The designer who designed what you wanted would have produced something that I hate, and I wouldn't really regard it as a RPG, because to me, part of an RPG is the ability to design your individual character.

[RFLS]

It's worse than just not succeeding, they utterly destroyed any shred of balance there was in older edition.

This is something I see brought up a lot in balance threads, with varying degrees of debate. I'm curious. Were older editions actually balanced? I've never taken the time (and I should, I know) to read through their rules.

[Elderand]

This is something I see brought up a lot in balance threads, with varying degrees of debate. I'm curious. Were older editions actually balanced? I've never taken the time (and I should, I know) to read through their rules.

Spellcasters were better than mundane at later level, but the disparancy appeard later than it does in 3.5.

Perfectly balanced ? No, better than 3.5 ? yes.

[Emperor Tippy]

Someone earlier compared 4e to Warcraft 2, and I agree. 4e didn't just limit versatility, it made just about everyone the same. There's no variety in how things are handled, at all. They "balanced" things by removing everything that makes building a character fun.

My problem with it as well. It especially pisses me off because I know that they could have balanced it without doing that.

[Gnaeus]

Spellcasters were better than mundane at later level, but the disparancy appeard later than it does in 3.5.

Perfectly balanced ? No, better than 3.5 ? yes.

Disagree. The difference was that the balance changes were less one sided. 3.5, Druid > Fighter at all levels. With a little optimization, Wizard > Fighter or at least equals him at all levels.

Earlier editions, low level spellcasters had so few spells/day that the mundanes really shone at low levels. Fighter 1 > Wizard 1, and a party of Fighter x3, Cleric was actually pretty solid until mid level. There was a much bigger feel that each character had levels where it was good (except monk, who pretty much blew in every edition), but while it may have been better balanced across the level range, at any individual level its balance was still bad.

[maximus25]

Let's take a hypothetical situation here.

Say there's some challenge that both a Wizard and Fighter (Or any noncaster, really) can't overcome. Doesn't have to be a monster, could be an obstacle or something.

The mundane has nothing he can do from now on to overcome the challenge.

The Wizard or spellcaster can go home, take a few weeks, and BUILD a new spell to solve the problem. He can research and figure out a new way to do what he does best, solve problems with spells.



Can't cross a chasm? Give me a week, I'll go learn Fly, or Jump, or Stone Shape, or any other number of spells.

A noncaster doesn't have ANY options to do these things, or if they can it takes far more resources to accomplish.

[eggynack]

[B]
I do agree with you; druids are powerful. I think the point he was making, though, was that his group has a mindset that results in weak druids, for whatever reason, and despite his being aware that the interwebs say otherwise. It's a group thing. In my group (PF), we have a guy that's banned from playing Oracles and from playing characters with only one level in any class. Not because those are actually overly powerful or anything, but because the way we play makes them powerful, and because, subconsciously, we expect those to be powerful and act accordingly.

I actually was going to reply to a lot of people who jumped on the druid thing, but this response should just about cover all of them. I felt like it was a point worth making. *shrug* I dunno if it helps at all.

I got it. I just thought it was super weird. It's definitely interesting that there would be play conditions that would result in weak druids; I just find it difficult to comprehend, given my knowledge of their power. I just thought I'd take the time to demonstrate druidic superiority, because I think druids are made of cool. Druids just tend to be my answer to every argument. Fighters can sword all day, while casters have limited slots? Druids. The DM can limit spell access in order to keep things balanced? Druids. Casters only have a limited period of time per day in which they're buffed towards stabbing folks? Druids. Casters don't always prepare the right spells, and when they don't they're screwed? Druids. It's always druids. There's definitely a tipping point where the spell versatility of a wizard surpasses the druid's capabilities, but druids have this quality that makes them directly comparable with fighters, while still being able to break the game. It's really hard to come up with circumstances where a druid doesn't just fit in perfectly, and outshine most other classes. They exist, but you really have to stretch your brain.

[Turion]

Your statement is false, because it is stated as fact, not opinion.

If that is bad game design for you, then any game that you liked I would regard as unplayably bad. Your goals in a game (maximize equality of ability in combat and out of combat) and mine (maximize options in building different types of characters, including utility specialists who aren't good in combat, or combat specialists with little utility) are diametrically opposite. The designer who designed what you wanted would have produced something that I hate, and I wouldn't really regard it as a RPG, because to me, part of an RPG is the ability to design your individual character.

I'd recommend taking a look at Legend (http://ruleofcool.com). The whole point of the game was to allow specialized characters that still always have means to contribute. It does so very well. Increased utility doesn't necessarily mean lack of specialization or custization. You don't have one character who is "fighter, and nothing else." Instead, you have a fighter who can heal and be the Face (paladin tracks), battfield control fighter (rangerb), debuff fighter (monk) and a bunch of others. These classes are flat-out better at hitting things with other things than, say, the tactician, but still contribute in other ways/outside combat as well.

[Beheld]

Your statement is false, because it is stated as fact, not opinion.

My statement is not false. Any statement of any kind with the word "bad" or "good" in it is an opinion. "Killing people is bad" is an opinion that most people share because we share similar preferences.

My statement about good or bad game design is about the preferences which games should be designed for.


Your goals in a game (maximize equality of ability in combat and out of combat) and mine (maximize options in building different types of characters, including utility specialists who aren't good in combat, or combat specialists with little utility) are diametrically opposite.

No, I am arguing that when designing a TTRPG game, you should attempt to design a game that keeps all the players engaged at all times. While you are certainly free to disagree and argue that keeping all the players engaged all the time is bad, I think in the greater scope of this discussion most people will agree that it is a valuable goal in game design, and the "option" to not contribute as much some of the time so you can surf the internet while other people are playing isn't a good option to have.

[RFLS]

My statement is not false. Any statement of any kind with the word "bad" or "good" in it is an opinion. "Killing people is bad" is an opinion that most people share because we share similar preferences.

My statement about good or bad game design is about the preferences which games should be designed for.

I would say that, while your statement wasn't false, the premises on which you based it weren't adequately stated (and I think Turion touched on that). Essentially (and I'm assuming a few things here), your premise is that a "good game" is one in which all characters can contribute in a unique way without being superseded by one particular set of abilities. On that premise, yes, fighters are absolutely terrible game design, and should be taken out back and shot. However, if the game-design premise on which 3.5 was based was "we want all casters to be superior at everything forever, because high-magic is a thing we want this game to revolve around," then fighters (and wizards) are pretty solid game design (although seriously, Vancian? Why?).

So, the point I'm trying to make is that your statement is unfounded in a vacuum, because there's no universal law of game design, as much as we might wish there were. However, based on a premise many people agree with, and one I'm assuming you hold, your statement was entirely accurate.

[Amphetryon]

Disagree. The difference was that the balance changes were less one sided. 3.5, Druid > Fighter at all levels. With a little optimization, Wizard > Fighter or at least equals him at all levels.

Earlier editions, low level spellcasters had so few spells/day that the mundanes really shone at low levels. Fighter 1 > Wizard 1, and a party of Fighter x3, Cleric was actually pretty solid until mid level. There was a much bigger feel that each character had levels where it was good (except monk, who pretty much blew in every edition), but while it may have been better balanced across the level range, at any individual level its balance was still bad.

In my experience and estimation, the biggest thing 3.X did to muck up "balance" relative to previous editions (such as it was in them) was to get rid of different XP charts for different Classes. There was room to quibble over whether the charts were an accurate representation of potential power, but in general, the fact that Magic-Users/Wizards in previous editions took longer to level from 1st was a mitigating factor (in conjunction with lower number of spells/day) that offset the fact that they were pwning the game by mid-to-late levels.

Assuming you started at 1st, high-level arcanists earned the right to be baddonkey in 1e/2e.

[Beheld]

Assuming you started at 1st, high-level arcanists earned the right to be baddonkey in 1e/2e.

Suck now Rock later is also bad game design.

I have played in many games that started at level 1 and ended before level 5. I have played many games that started at level 10.

Nothing requires you to play 3 level 1-5 games as a Wizard before you start a level 10 game. So you often aren't earning it, either because you didn't suck, or because you never get to rock.

And of course, even in a 1-20 game you can just play a Fighter and then at level 10 retire the character and get a new one.

[RFLS]

Suck now Rock later is also bad game design.

-stuff-


This is an example of your opinion not being in the overwhelming majority (although it may be the majority). A stated premise for good game design would help expand your point. Many people feel that, in a game designed around long-term campaigns where each person is only intended to have a single character, suck-now/rock-later is perfectly valid.

[sonofzeal]

This is an example of your opinion not being in the overwhelming majority (although it may be the majority). A stated premise for good game design would help expand your point. Many people feel that, in a game designed around long-term campaigns where each person is only intended to have a single character, suck-now/rock-later is perfectly valid.
Well, it's potentially valid game design... but it just doesn't work well for a context like D&D. Games which start at 1 and make it up to 20 are rarer than honest politicians. Far more often, games remain low level for most of their lifespan, or start at higher levels. In that context, "suck now rock later" makes no sense whatsoever.

There's also the issue of time scale. Even if you are going 1-to-20, that's something that happens over a matter of years. You're going to be spending literally months in "suck" territory, followed eventually by an eternity of "everyone else being second fiddle". Different rates of growth can be a nice game design tool, but it works best in games that run their course in a single sitting.

Which is not D&D.

[RFLS]

Well, it's potentially valid game design...

Right. That's the key right there. "Potentially valid." I'm not (and will never) claiming that there's only one valid mode of game design. There are some that work better than others, but there's such a plethora that your (general "you") premise or whatever should generally be stated at some point early in the discussion.

[Beheld]

Right. That's the key right there. "Potentially valid." I'm not (and will never) claiming that there's only one valid mode of game design. There are some that work better than others, but there's such a plethora that your (general "you") premise or whatever should generally be stated at some point early in the discussion.

Okay, and the point is that in that exact post I specifically stated the premises which make suck no rock later bad game design. IE, games of D&D do not run from 1-20 with the same characters, people change characters, games start at higher levels, and games die. All the things I said in that post.

[RFLS]

Okay, and the point is that in that exact post I specifically stated the premises which make suck no rock later bad game design. IE, games of D&D do not run from 1-20 with the same characters, people change characters, games start at higher levels, and games die. All the things I said in that post.

*shrug* That post wasn't made in a vacuum; it was an expansion of earlier (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=15388819&postcount=225)points (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=15388920&postcount=228)I brought up. The one you quoted wasn't directed at you, either; I was responding to sonofzeal's response.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Let's take a hypothetical situation here.

Say there's some challenge that both a Wizard and Fighter (Or any noncaster, really) can't overcome. Doesn't have to be a monster, could be an obstacle or something.

The mundane has nothing he can do from now on to overcome the challenge.

The Wizard or spellcaster can go home, take a few weeks, and BUILD a new spell to solve the problem. He can research and figure out a new way to do what he does best, solve problems with spells.



Can't cross a chasm? Give me a week, I'll go learn Fly, or Jump, or Stone Shape, or any other number of spells.

A noncaster doesn't have ANY options to do these things, or if they can it takes far more resources to accomplish.

I realize that there are things that casters can do that mundanes cannot. It's part of the nature of magic in the game system. I am, however, sick-to-death of people coming up with such terrible examples.

A chasm, really? How about the most painfully obvious solution to this obstacle; climb down this side, cross the valley and climb back up the other? :smallannoyed:

Most of the examples I see of things that casters can do that mundanes can't are invalid. What they actually show is that casters can do things -faster- than mundanes. The number of things mundanes genuinely can't do, that casters can, is much more limited than is generally accepted.

[Gnaeus]

My statement is not false. Any statement of any kind with the word "bad" or "good" in it is an opinion. "Killing people is bad" is an opinion that most people share because we share similar preferences.

My statement about good or bad game design is about the preferences which games should be designed for.

A game designer who designs a game with lots of options and terrible balance is a great designer. He is designing a game that I want to play, that I will pay money for, which is his goal. This is good game design, because it is making a product that appeals to part of the market which your game design would not reach.


No, I am arguing that when designing a TTRPG game, you should attempt to design a game that keeps all the players engaged at all times

Then it fails before it begins, because if I do not have meaningful differences in character creation which allow me that range of character creation options, I have disengaged before we sit down at the table. So your game fails at its goals before it starts.



While you are certainly free to disagree and argue that keeping all the players engaged all the time is bad, I think in the greater scope of this discussion most people will agree that it is a valuable goal in game design, and the "option" to not contribute as much some of the time so you can surf the internet while other people are playing isn't a good option to have.

I am entirely uncertain of that, since this is a 3.5 board, and 3.5 (while generally very solid by my design standards) is really bad at your design goals. But even if a majority of people did agree that making all characters equally good in combat and out of combat was a valuable goal in game design, that DOES NOT mean that it is bad design to make a game that presents actual options in character creation, because that game would appeal to a different section of the market, that would hate to play your game.

[eggynack]

I realize that there are things that casters can do that mundanes cannot. It's part of the nature of magic in the game system. I am, however, sick-to-death of people coming up with such terrible examples.

A chasm, really? How about the most painfully obvious solution to this obstacle; climb down this side, cross the valley and climb back up the other? :smallannoyed:

Most of the examples I see of things that casters can do that mundanes can't are invalid. What they actually show is that casters can do things -faster- than mundanes. The number of things mundanes genuinely can't do, that casters can, is much more limited than is generally accepted.
Actually, the problem is really the opposite of what he said. Casters should be able to do things that fighters can't. That's how you have balance while retaining variety. You have different characters with different abilities. The problem, is that fighters can't really do much stuff that casters can't do. It's rare that they'll be able to contribute something to a battle that a wizard can't contribute. That's why the tier three style non-casters are neat. They can actually do things that casters can't do, and that's how you create balance. Granted, the balance is still tilted heavily towards things the caster can do that the non-caster can't do, but that's fixable. If you just keep the number of areas in which the spotlight is on one character rather than another relatively consistent, you get a system that's pretty balanced. Ya see, you can say that a factotum is better than a warblade in one game, but you can also say that a warblade is better than a factotum in a different game. One isn't just strictly better than the other.

[137beth]

I've personally never played in a game where the casters went power crazy and only used the most optimized choices and powers available to them. I recognize that they have the capacity to leave the mundanes far, far behind, but it's just not been my experience.

Are casters overpowered or are mundanes underpowered? Probably a little of both, but I think that the disparity is highlighted by the TO mentality of these (and other) message boards. I don't think in actual play you see as much, but it is still there. Otherwise nobody would ever play a monk, and in every game I've ever played someone has played one. And there's always been a fighter too, now that I think of it.

Part of the reason it works out well in-game is that the "most powerful" options for the pure casters are options which either
a)buff their allies, allowing the non-casters to still contribute,
b)make the enemies weaker, so the non-casters can kill them more easily, or
c)make it easy for their allies to move and hard for the enemies to move, so the non-casters can win easily.

The disparity really shows up if you compare a party of all mundane characters to a party with a couple tier 1s and a couple mundanes, or an all-caster party. The the first case, everyone is underpowered, but some of them are more underpowered than others. In the second case, the martial classes don't feel underpowered, because they've been buffed by the casters. As a result, although the mundane classes themselves are usually weaker, they work out fine in a party with more powerful classes.

[georgie_leech]

Someone earlier compared 4e to Warcraft 2, and I agree. 4e didn't just limit versatility, it made just about everyone the same. There's no variety in how things are handled, at all. They "balanced" things by removing everything that makes building a character fun.

I have to say, I really don't see this. I have plenty of fun building characters in 4e as well as 3e. I've made a stealth-based character who could hide from anyone all the time provided they didn't know about him at the start of the fight, who used a sling and good movement to take out important targets while reamaining away from the frontline.He played and felt completely different than my skill-focused Bard-Jack-of-all-Trades, who always had a relevent skill or Ritual and focused more on debuffing eneimes and buffing allies than doing lots of damage. They were also distinct from my Wizard that focussed on BFC, using walls and other zones or conjurations to force enemies into engaging with Defenders like a Fighter or Paladin. None of them were boring to make, nor did they feel at all samey to play. Even the whole At-Will Encounter Daily Utility power set changes throughout the edition, with psionics going for augmentable at-will abilities instead of encounter abilities, and classes from the Essentials line scrapping it altogether.

[137beth]

Your statement is false, because it is stated as fact, not opinion.

If that is bad game design for you, then any game that you liked I would regard as unplayably bad. Your goals in a game (maximize equality of ability in combat and out of combat) and mine (maximize options in building different types of characters, including utility specialists who aren't good in combat, or combat specialists with little utility) are diametrically opposite. The designer who designed what you wanted would have produced something that I hate, and I wouldn't really regard it as a RPG, because to me, part of an RPG is the ability to design your individual character.

Yea, I'm sorta tired of hearing "X is bad game design!" when people really mean "I'm not a fan of X."

[Kelb_Panthera]

Actually, the problem is really the opposite of what he said. Casters should be able to do things that fighters can't. That's how you have balance while retaining variety. You have different characters with different abilities. The problem, is that fighters can't really do much stuff that casters can't do. It's rare that they'll be able to contribute something to a battle that a wizard can't contribute. That's why the tier three style non-casters are neat. They can actually do things that casters can't do, and that's how you create balance. Granted, the balance is still tilted heavily towards things the caster can do that the non-caster can't do, but that's fixable. If you just keep the number of areas in which the spotlight is on one character rather than another relatively consistent, you get a system that's pretty balanced. Ya see, you can say that a factotum is better than a warblade in one game, but you can also say that a warblade is better than a factotum in a different game. One isn't just strictly better than the other.

I see and understand your point. I only spoke up because the things mundanes "can't do" is so often exagerated.

I mean c'mon, a bloody hole in the ground is an insurmountable obstacle? Really?

Even the quintessential example, flight, isn't completely out of reach. Craft is a class-skill for everyone and a fighter can build a hang-glider (arms and equipment guide page54). It's unquestionably, categorically worse than the results of a fly spell but it -is- flight.

Even magic item crafting isn't a guaranteed no-go. The battlesmith prestige class in Races of Stone grants a non-caster the craft magic arms and armor feat and gives them an effective caster level. That effective caster level -may- qualify them for taking -other- crafting feats.

[Beheld]

Yea, I'm sorta tired of hearing "X is bad game design!" when people really mean "I'm not a fan of X."

It's almost like the word bad expresses some sort of opinion or something!


A game designer who designs a game with lots of options and terrible balance is a great designer. He is designing a game that I want to play, that I will pay money for, which is his goal. This is good game design, because it is making a product that appeals to part of the market which your game design would not reach.

Why is that a better game than a game with lots of options and good balance?


Then it fails before it begins, because if I do not have meaningful differences in character creation which allow me that range of character creation options

There are lots of meaningful difference in character creation which allow for a range of character creation choices without making the game badly balanced. Badly balanced games are not necessary to have character creation options.


I am entirely uncertain of that, since this is a 3.5 board, and 3.5 (while generally very solid by my design standards) is really bad at your design goals.

No it isn't. Aside from Monk who is never good at anything, and the Fighter who is useless outside of combat and mediocre in it, most classes, including the most played classes, like every caster ever made, the Rogue, ToB classes, and pretty much all the prestige classes even the ones that are just more fightery+ give both in combat and out of combat abilities to characters so they can contribute in all facets of the game.


that DOES NOT mean that it is bad design to make a game that presents actual options in character creation, because that game would appeal to a different section of the market, that would hate to play your game.

Once again, making all characters able to contribute both in and out of combat does not mean taking away options in character creation. Wizards, Druid, Clerics, Rogues, Dread Necromancers, Beguilers, Swordsages, Psions, Psychic Warriors, Shadowcasters, Binders, and Truenamers all have both in combat and out of combat abilities, and could be designed to contribute equally to both while still having lots of character options at creation.

The point is that game would appeal to significantly more of the market than the same game with another class called "Fighter" that was twice as good as all those classes in combat, but turned into a doll whenever combat music wasn't playing and the player sat in the corner incapable of influencing the game.

Because the existence of such a "choice" to not play half the game in return for being better at the half you do play is a choice that makes the game worse for not just 50% of people, but 95% of people.

It probably makes the game worse for you, but you seem obsessed with this idea that if all the classes could both fight and contribute out of combat they would all be identical and your choices wouldn't matter.

[Amphetryon]

Well, it's potentially valid game design... but it just doesn't work well for a context like D&D. Games which start at 1 and make it up to 20 are rarer than honest politicians. Far more often, games remain low level for most of their lifespan, or start at higher levels. In that context, "suck now rock later" makes no sense whatsoever.

There's also the issue of time scale. Even if you are going 1-to-20, that's something that happens over a matter of years. You're going to be spending literally months in "suck" territory, followed eventually by an eternity of "everyone else being second fiddle". Different rates of growth can be a nice game design tool, but it works best in games that run their course in a single sitting.

Which is not D&D.
Part of my appreciation for the "suck now/rock later" paradigm of earlier editions came from the fact that virtually every time we played was within that (apparently) rarefied air where we started at 1st, with the intent of getting to 20th. Having played some form of D&D since the late '70s, I can say that 3e was the first time where I was invited to a game that was a) not a "continuation" of an abandoned campaign and still b) started above 3rd level. I've no doubt my experiences may be the minority, but they nonetheless influenced my opinions on how game balance worked in D&D.

[sonofzeal]

Part of my appreciation for the "suck now/rock later" paradigm of earlier editions came from the fact that virtually every time we played was within that (apparently) rarefied air where we started at 1st, with the intent of getting to 20th. Having played some form of D&D since the late '70s, I can say that 3e was the first time where I was invited to a game that was a) not a "continuation" of an abandoned campaign and still b) started above 3rd level. I've no doubt my experiences may be the minority, but they nonetheless influenced my opinions on how game balance worked in D&D.
Yeeessss.... but....

a) How often did that 1-20 (or 1-10 at least) plan actually succeed?

b) Did any character make that jump from "suck" to "rock" in less than two months?

[JusticeZero]

Suck now Rock later is also bad game design.
That said, the argument as stated were actually about the progression rates. Which meant that you have situations as the norm like "Thieves are really weak, and wizards are really strong. Everyone in the party has the same amount of XP. Zodolf the Wizard is level 4. Bangor the Fighter is level 6. Sneeky is 8th level."
Unfortunately those calibration rates were rarely if ever designed well and may have made things worse. They tended to make the quadratic curve even more pronounced on both ends.

To everyone who thinks that "suck now, awesome later" is a good idea, I propose the following class:

2+int skill points, 1d3 HD, weapon proficiency one common weapon, no armor or shield proficiency. Class abilities: At level 18, they gain one rank of Divine Rank, plus one per each additional level. Until then, they're a sickly variant of a Commoner. Seems pretty balanced; to get great rewards you have to push through a lot of suck, right?

[eggynack]

That said, the argument as stated were actually about the progression rates. Which meant that you have situations as the norm like "Thieves are really weak, and wizards are really strong. Everyone in the party has the same amount of XP. Zodolf the Wizard is level 4. Bangor the Fighter is level 6. Sneeky is 8th level."
Unfortunately those calibration rates were rarely if ever designed well and may have made things worse. They tended to make the quadratic curve even more pronounced on both ends.

To everyone who thinks that "suck now, awesome later" is a good idea, I propose the following class:

2+int skill points, 1d3 HD, weapon proficiency one common weapon, no armor or shield proficiency. Class abilities: At level 18, they gain one rank of Divine Rank, plus one per each additional level. Until then, they're a sickly variant of a Commoner. Seems pretty balanced; to get great rewards you have to push through a lot of suck, right?
You probably could've just brought up truenamers and healers. They're basically what you said in a nutshell, except they actually exist.

[Gnaeus]

Why is that a better game than a game with lots of options and good balance?

1. Because some options are legitimately at different power levels. You can't balance natural spell and endurance. If you make it better for you (by balancing at one power level) you necessarily reduce options, and make it worse for me.

2. Because the more options you have, the greater the chance that there will be a combination of powers that is greater than the sum of its parts.

3. Because, as Togo pointed out, Games differ. If my goal is a balanced table where everyone contributes the same to the group (which it certainly is not) Your methodology does not actually get you there better than mine. Players have different levels of skill in play and in optimization. So even if you could somehow make a range of options equal to 3.5 in which all classes had chassis that were mechanically equal in and out of combat, it does not equal equality of outcome at the table. Unless all the classes are just the same (the opposite of options) there will be circumstances in which some classes ability are more useful than others. The cleric of Pelor might be awesomesauce in Ravenloft and useless in the dungeon of traps, and the trapmonkey might be the opposite. This is most easily addressed by having options at a range of power levels so that you can nerf the stronger players or the classes that will be stronger in the setting

4. Maximizing options in power levels allows a maximum range in campaign choice. If I want a low power game where characters fight orcs, I can do that in 3.5. If I want a high power game where only T1s and T2s are allowed because it is an island of magicians and I want to throw really broken stuff at the PCs, I can do that ALSO. If you balance the options of a game at a particular power level, and I want to play at a higher or lower level of power, I need to find a different game. :smallsigh:



There are lots of meaningful difference in character creation which allow for a range of character creation choices without making the game badly balanced. Badly balanced games are not necessary to have character creation options.

I want to make Grunk, the dumb half ogre barbarian who just hits things, because I am stressed out and I want a simple character who just hits things. My buddy wants to make a Grey Mouser Fighter/Wizard/Rogue type. We can't both do what we want, and also play characters who are balanced inside and outside combat.



No it isn't. Aside from Monk who is never good at anything, and the Fighter who is useless outside of combat and mediocre in it, most classes, including the most played classes, like every caster ever made, the Rogue, ToB classes, and pretty much all the prestige classes even the ones that are just more fightery+ give both in combat and out of combat abilities to characters so they can contribute in all facets of the game.

Most classes have some in combat and some out of combat utility, yes. But they aren't remotely equal in that regards. An optimized T1 will be better at both than a T4, some classes are better at utility, others better at combat, etc. 3.5 is really rotten at balance, because it allows a multitude of options. If you think that 3.5 is balanced except for monk and fighter, well, maybe you had better spend some time reading the old forum posts.



Once again, making all characters able to contribute both in and out of combat does not mean taking away options in character creation. Wizards, Druid, Clerics, Rogues, Dread Necromancers, Beguilers, Swordsages, Psions, Psychic Warriors, Shadowcasters, Binders, and Truenamers all have both in combat and out of combat abilities, and could be designed to contribute equally to both while still having lots of character options at creation.

I will respond to your unfounded statement with one of my own. Here goes. No, they can't. If you take away options, you are making the game worse (from my perspective, which is just as valid as yours). When you make the game balanced, you aren't making the game any better (again, from my perspective, which is just as valid as yours). You can't keep the all the options while making everyone able to contribute equally. If you can, show me how.



It probably makes the game worse for you, but you seem obsessed with this idea that if all the classes could both fight and contribute out of combat they would all be identical and your choices wouldn't matter.

No, I don't think you can retain meaningful options while making all classes equal in and out of combat. The fighter example is just a corner case. I DO think that a player should have the ability to make a dumb orc barbarian who sucks at anything but smashing heads if they want (because I have seen players play that concept and enjoy it in 3.5, and I don't think you should take it away from them), but that isn't the limit of the argument. More importantly, I think that expanding options in a game necessarily makes it unbalanced, that balance is not a goal that I put any weight on in game design, and that character options are something I put huge weight on in game design.

[Felandria]

Part of the reason it works out well in-game is that the "most powerful" options for the pure casters are options which either
a)buff their allies, allowing the non-casters to still contribute,
b)make the enemies weaker, so the non-casters can kill them more easily, or
c)make it easy for their allies to move and hard for the enemies to move, so the non-casters can win easily.

The disparity really shows up if you compare a party of all mundane characters to a party with a couple tier 1s and a couple mundanes, or an all-caster party. The the first case, everyone is underpowered, but some of them are more underpowered than others. In the second case, the martial classes don't feel underpowered, because they've been buffed by the casters. As a result, although the mundane classes themselves are usually weaker, they work out fine in a party with more powerful classes.

The problem I have with this line of thinking goes back to how most of my RPG career has gone.

Until maybe a year ago, I would join various groups, I would ask, "what do you guys need?"

And just about every time they'd inform me that I should be a cleric.

And if I wanted to get in the fight, most of the time, they would tell me to stay back out of harms way, to keep the party alive.

I got REALLY sick of this after a while, so I vowed never to be the cleric again.

I eventually made a sorcerer, see avatar, and when it came time to pick spells, the party always suggested I invest heavily in buff spells.

So the fact that most of my D&D experience has consisted of...

1. Playing a caster
2. Being made the party sidekick/tool/assistant

Then I get a little irritated hearing people complain that casters are "Too OP"

Because it gets really tiring being told that I should focus on making the other party members stronger so they can take care of everything or healing the party after they do all the work.

I understand the party needs someone like that often, but it makes one thing completely unneccesary.

The player.

One time, I got tired of standing around being the party water girl, so my cleric jumped into the fray and attacked the monster, and I got a critical and killed it.

And was immediately scolded for kill stealing, after all, the fighter did most of the work and I had stolen his glory.

And I thought, so am I not supposed to get any glory?

Then why am I here?

I get that my experiences are likely different than most of you, but from what I see, a lot of people who play fighters take it as an opportunity to finally be the star quarterback, kill the monsters, get the glory, go to the inn, drink and be merry.

And the clerics and the wizards and sorcerers should be grateful they get to sit at the cool table with him.

And when I read some of the comments here, I know it is not the intention, but it sounds to me like people resent it whenever the casters dare to shine, because we can't make the fighter look bad, they're the stars, and casters should limit themselves to helping everyone else be awesome.

Well, I want to be awesome too.

[JusticeZero]

You probably could've just brought up truenamers and healers. They're basically what you said in a nutshell, except they actually exist.Sure, but anyone who needs to have the problems with quadratic explained like that probably thinks those classes are flavorful and effective.

[JusticeZero]

And just about every time they'd inform me that I should be a cleric.
And if I wanted to get in the fight, most of the time, they would tell me to stay back out of harms way, to keep the party alive.
..a lot of people who play fighters take it as an opportunity to finally be the star quarterback, kill the monsters, get the glory, go to the inn, drink and be merry. And the clerics and the wizards and sorcerers should be grateful they get to sit at the cool table with him.
Well, I want to be awesome too.
Well here's the thing. I too got sick of that. But that was until people discovered that if the cleric/druid/wizard got sick of being the buff buddy, they could flip off the fighter, dump a lot of those "party" buffs on themself, then go solo the whole damned dungeon. It's a bit like looking over at the star quarterback and saying, "You stupid blankety-blank. While you were standing around and yelling about how awesome you were, we changed the game out for a chess tournament. Go get me some water."

[Talya]

I suspect the average pro quarterback is quite good at chess. Dumb school jocks don't tend to make great quarterbacks. :roy: is more the norm.

[eggynack]

Some variety of information
You could always act of your own accord. You have volition and stuff. Clerics can beat face better than fighters can, and you don't have to always perfectly fill the roles expected of you. The reason you don't experience casters as being overpowered, is because you were shoehorned into a less effective role. The thing of it is, no matter how powerful a fighter gets, he's still killing a monster. Wizards start out killing a monster. Then, they start killing encounters, dungeons, kingdoms, and planets. Let them be the all star quarterback. You're a scientist, and you can make nukes.