Modifying a Crusader

[ZhanStrider]

My group has a guy who wants to at a crusader in a group if a swordsage, a monk, and a ranger. My DM feels that crusaders are a little more powerful than the rest of the party, and wants to mod them. Anyone have an easy idea on how to make the crusader a little less powerful while not removing his ability to function?

[Big Fau]

...Don't? The Crusader starts off powerful, but the Swordsage should be keeping up with him throughout the campaign. If anything, the DM should be trying to encourage the Monk and Ranger to come here and let us help them keep up with the Swordsage and Crusader (especially since the Swordsage will be stepping all over the Monk's toes).

[Slipperychicken]

Crusader and Swordsage are T3, Ranger is T4, Monk T5.

Balance here depends on how the group built their characters. Crusader and Swordsage are good out-of-the-box, while Ranger and Monk take some work to be as good.

If you already have a Swordsage which hasn't overshadowed the Monk, I don't think a Crusader is going to rock the boat too much. They're good at soaking damage, can hit as hard as anyone else (since most maneuvers can't combo with Full Attacks), and have some minor teamwork abilities, but that's about it.


Perhaps you can post a rough idea about each one's build (i.e. class levels, race/templates, feats, preferred weapon) and playstyle (tactics)? That would help a lot, since balance is always relative to the group you're playing with.

[ZhanStrider]

...Don't? The Crusader starts off powerful, but the Swordsage should be keeping up with him throughout the campaign. If anything, the DM should be trying to encourage the Monk and Ranger to come here and let us help them keep up with the Swordsage and Crusader (especially since the Swordsage will be stepping all over the Monk's toes).

I don't know, everyone I've heard talk about it says swordsage is pretty nerfed in comparison to crusader and warblade. A swordsage can't take damage or deal it as effectively as a crusader, unless I've missed something key.

[ZhanStrider]

Crusader and Swordsage are T3, Ranger is T4, Monk T5.

Balance here depends on how the group built their characters. Crusader and Swordsage are good out-of-the-box, while Ranger and Monk take some work to be as good.

If you already have a Swordsage which hasn't overshadowed the Monk, I don't think a Crusader is going to rock the boat too much. They're good at soaking damage, can hit as hard as anyone else (since most maneuvers can't combo with Full Attacks), and have some minor teamwork abilities, but that's about it.


Perhaps you can post a rough idea about each one's build (i.e. class levels, race/templates, feats, preferred weapon) and playstyle (tactics)? That would help a lot, since balance is always relative to the group you're playing with.

The swordsage (me) is sort of taking the skirmisher role, and doin. A lot of desert wind and shadow hand. He'll end up being part caster and going Jade Pheonix Mage who mostly does melee. Dagger and sword wielder

The monk is flat out glass cannon, who of course goes unarmed. His str is over twenty at level 1 with racial bonuses from being a lizardfolk.

I have no idea about the ranger. The player has never played a no spellcasters before. No idea on where or how this will work for her.

The crusader is going to be a plain old tank, but other than that no specifics as we haven't ironed out this class for the campaign yet.

[DR27]

I don't know, everyone I've heard talk about it says swordsage is pretty nerfed in comparison to crusader and warblade. A swordsage can't take damage or deal it as effectively as a crusader, unless I've missed something key.Irrelevant. None of the ToB classes are crazy with the damage. Don't worry about damage numbers - worry about the number of situations that each character is useful. The swordsage is going to have a bunch of those. And not be useless in combat. Crusader is going to be sitting around doing nothing semi-often when it's not combat time.

[ZhanStrider]

Irrelevant. None of the ToB classes are crazy with the damage. Don't worry about damage numbers - worry about the number of situations that each character is useful. The swordsage is going to have a bunch of those. And not be useless in combat. Crusader is going to be sitting around doing nothing semi-often when it's not combat time.

Fair enough

[ZhanStrider]

Crusader and Swordsage are T3, Ranger is T4, Monk T5.

Balance here depends on how the group built their characters. Crusader and Swordsage are good out-of-the-box, while Ranger and Monk take some work to be as good.

If you already have a Swordsage which hasn't overshadowed the Monk, I don't think a Crusader is going to rock the boat too much. They're good at soaking damage, can hit as hard as anyone else (since most maneuvers can't combo with Full Attacks), and have some minor teamwork abilities, but that's about it.


Perhaps you can post a rough idea about each one's build (i.e. class levels, race/templates, feats, preferred weapon) and playstyle (tactics)? That would help a lot, since balance is always relative to the group you're playing with.

Update: the crusader is going for mostly white raven and dabbling in devoted spirit. He's a player who likes to make the most broken and powerful character possible.

[Amphetryon]

Update: the crusader is going for mostly white raven and dabbling in devoted spirit. He's a player who likes to make the most broken and powerful character possible.

With White Raven and Devoted Spirit, he's most likely going to be boosting the rest of the party's offense, while acting as an in-combat damage mitigator, both by using Devoted Spirit to heal and by creating enough of a threat to allow other party members not to get hit as often as they otherwise would.

In other words, that build looks like he's trying to be a team player. Nerfing his build will most likely result in reducing the efficacy of every other PC in the party, relative to where he would be putting it.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Update: the crusader is going for mostly white raven and dabbling in devoted spirit. He's a player who likes to make the most broken and powerful character possible.

Then be sure your DM makes a ruling at character creation that the maneuver White Raven Tactics cannot be used on the character initiating it.

The Monk would have a better time going Monk 2/ Psychic Warrior 18 for his build, with the feat Tashalatora from Secrets of Sarlona. That makes his Psychic Warrior levels count as Monk levels when determining his AC bonus, Unarmed Strike damage, and Flurry of Blows class feature.

The Ranger should go Scout 4/ Ranger 16 (not necessarily in that order) with the feats Swift Hunter in Complete Scoundrel and Greater Manyshot (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/psionicFeats.htm#greaterManyshot). If he prefers to go melee over archery, Wild Shape Ranger (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#ranger) 5/ Master of Many Forms 7/ Warshaper 4/ Nature's Warrior 1/ MoMF 3 with Combat Reflexes, Power Attack, Alertness, Leap Attack, Frozen Wild Shape, Robilar's Gambit, and Defensive Sweep.

Neither one of them should have any difficulty keeping up with the ToB characters.

[DR27]

+1 for Biff's suggestions - keep the flavor of classes, get them all roughly equal in power/versatility

[TaiLiu]

He's a player who likes to make the most broken and powerful character possible.
Who has informed you of this?

[Big Fau]

I don't know, everyone I've heard talk about it says swordsage is pretty nerfed in comparison to crusader and warblade. A swordsage can't take damage or deal it as effectively as a crusader, unless I've missed something key.

Swordsages keep up. They aren't meant to do damage; they control the field a fair deal better than the other two classes. Plus you're going Jade Phoenix Mage, easily the second best PrC in the Bo9S (since spellcasting is usually potent). You're going to be the most powerful character in the party, unless the Monk takes Psion levels and uses Tashalatora+the Slayer PrC to become a Psionic Gish himself.

"Overpowered" is a very subjective term. For some people Monks are broken, while others know that Wizards and Clerics are absolute campaign-wreckers. the Crusader and Swordsage are very balanced compared to the latter, and overpowered compared to the former.

[ZhanStrider]

Who has informed you of this?

Months of observation XD. He originally was making a low powered bard but appearently he just wants to smash things again.

[DarkSonic1337]

Months of observation XD. He originally was making a low powered bard but appearently he just wants to smash things again.

This time he's being a really good team player though. He will overshadow an unoptimized Monk and Ranger, but it will be in the sense that he's helping them be amazing more than their own abilities are.

[Kennisiou]

Biff's suggestion is a great idea. Making powergamers optimize around supporting is a great way to allow them to be powerful without feeling like they're overshadowing the party. That ranger may not realize it, but most of his effectiveness is going to be because the crusader is making him so much better at what he does through his white raven maneuvers.

Also, suggesting the monk multiclass as a psychic warrior is a solid idea, as is suggesting the ranger look into multiclassing or rebuilding. How he should go about doing that really depends on what he really wants to be doing as a ranger. If it's archery stuff, he should consider looking into ranger/scout tricks or perhaps ranger/factotum tricks instead (6 levels of ranger and then factotum with a focus on applying poisons to multiple enemies through constantly greater manyshotting them out at people with multiple standard actions isn't a bad build, although arguable it's completely doable without those 6 ranger levels).

Also, totally don't underestimate swordsage's damage output either. While their damage is generally not as great as warblade/crusader, the desert wind maneuvers allow access to more ways to deal that damage out, including large area damage that Cru and WB can have a hard time dealing and a few maneuvers that let the SS strike at a distance.

[Xerlith]

I have one thing to say:

Song of the White Raven

Ask the Crusader if he wants to mix in the initial Bard idea.

[eggynack]

Months of observation XD. He originally was making a low powered bard but appearently he just wants to smash things again.
This... um... the... yeah. Bards and crusaders are at about the same power level. A person who wants to break the game doesn't usually play a crusader, unless they're using one of the three or four crusader based tricks that are brokenish (1d2 crusader, white raven tactics, idiot crusader, maybe ruby knight vindicator). From my position as a distant computer screen watcher, it seems like he's trying to make the team helpingest characters possible, given that both of them are oriented around ally focused melee buffs. Ask if he's using those tricks, and if he is, ask him to tone it down, or otherwise tell the DM to do that stuff. Otherwise, his character is probably at around balanced, and it should be approximately fine. I mean, he might overshadow the monk, but he might also overshadow the monk by secretly making his combat stylings worthwhile, and that's a better thing.

[Big Fau]

I mean, he might overshadow the monk, but he might also overshadow the monk by secretly making his combat stylings worthwhile, and that's a better thing.

To be fair, towels overshadow the Monk.