Pathfinder: Full BAB = Tier 4? [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Person_Man

2014-02-07, 09:09 AM

So within 3.5, there are four full BAB Tier 3 classes; Warblade, Crusader, Wildshape Ranger, and Duskblade. Also, anyone with access to Divine Power (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/divinePower.htm) (Cleric, Favored Soul, Archivist, Artificer, etc) can also get full BAB when they need it, or all/most of the time via metamagic shenanigans.

Within Pathfinder, all of the full BAB classes are usually described as Tier 4. This includes all the currently published 3rd party Pathfinder full BAB classes that I've read. (Though I'm greatly anticipating some upcoming work from Dreamscarred Press).

A high level Pathfinder Paladin with a Special Mount arguably comes the closest to Tier 3, in that you do one thing well (Meat Shield: You have two creatures to control, are immune/resistant to a lot of stuff, can deal decent damage against some enemies), plus you remove status conditions efficiently and play the party face.

But no full BAB Pathfinder class really feels like a Tier 3 or higher class. The Talents/Powers/Deeds/Bonus Feats/etc provided by full BAB are extremely granular (provide small bonuses/abilities). You can't change them out from day to day. And none of them are open ended or flexible like Summons or Wildshape.

Are there any Tier 1-3 full BAB Pathfinder classes I'm not aware of? Or was this a purposeful design decision? And if so, can someone point me to a forum post where a designer specifically says so.

I've also created a survey in order to gauge people's opinions on this matter:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/2Y2QTGG

Thanks in advance.

chaos_redefined

2014-02-07, 09:27 AM

Spore

2014-02-07, 09:32 AM

Fighter and Cavalier would have a word with you.

Meth In a Mine

2014-02-07, 09:33 AM

stack

2014-02-07, 09:34 AM

I agree with the Warblade, Crusader, WS Ranger and duskblade, but Favored Soul and Artificer? How did they get Full BAB? I thought they had 3/4 BAB.

Retread what you quoted, he references the spell divine power.

Psyren

2014-02-07, 09:42 AM

Pathfinder Divine Power does not give you full BAB so it's not relevant here.

Sacred Servant Paladin is T3 with full BAB.

Meth In a Mine

2014-02-07, 09:48 AM

Retread what you quoted, he references the spell divine power.
I will note that Divine Power is 1 round/level. It doesn't last very long.

Hand_of_Vecna

2014-02-07, 09:48 AM

Fighter and Cavalier would have a word with you.

I'm not an expert in Cavalier or Pathfinder Fighter, but I'm very curious what puts them in a higher tier than Zhentarum Dungeoncrashers.

Psyren

2014-02-07, 10:00 AM

I'm not an expert in Cavalier or Pathfinder Fighter, but I'm very curious what puts them in a higher tier than Zhentarum Dungeoncrashers.

I think he's saying they're T5 actually (which they are without certain archetypes.)

Well, Cavalier can be T4 with the right mount optimization, though typically you'll have to be Small so you can bring your wolf mount into the dungeon/tower with you.

Krazzman

2014-02-07, 10:08 AM

Pathfinder Divine Power does not give you full BAB so it's not relevant here.

Irrelevant as 3.5 Divine Power was referenced.

The trend seems to be like this but even 3/4 bab classes are shafted if they don't have "real" spellcasting (like Magus/Summoner) although in DnD are a few no spell 3/4 bab classes on Tier 3 (Swordsage/Totemist etc)

grarrrg

2014-02-07, 10:17 AM

I will note that Divine Power is 1 round/level. It doesn't last very long.

You will note that he noted it first.
Emphasis added:

So within 3.5, there are four full BAB Tier 3 classes; Warblade, Crusader, Wildshape Ranger, and Duskblade. Also, anyone with access to Divine Power (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/divinePower.htm) (Cleric, Favored Soul, Archivist, Artificer, etc) can also get full BAB when they need it, or all/most of the time via metamagic shenanigans.

I think he's saying they're T5 actually (which they are without certain archetypes.)

Well, Cavalier can be T4 with the right mount optimization, though typically you'll have to be Small so you can bring your wolf mount into the dungeon/tower with you.

Don't forget Gunslingers. They are virtually the same as Fighters.

Seerow

2014-02-07, 10:19 AM

To be fair Warblade and Duskblade are both sore points that have been the focus of argument as to whether they qualify for tier 3. (Personally I still refuse to believe Duskblade qualifies. The level of utility it has compared to say a Bard is just abysmal, and its combat prowess isn't amazing enough to make up the difference), and Wildshape Ranger was a half-baked variant of an existing relatively weak class. (That said if we are counting variants Mystic SotAO Ranger probably is a solid tier 3 as well). So 3.5 isn't particularly good in this respect either.

Also, I'd peg the Aegis out of Pathfinder as a Full BAB Tier 3, if a low one. But then again it's also not directly from Paizo, which may be why it was ignored. Either way, it gets a fair chunk of PP (less than Psiwar, but he also gets his armor which gives lots of convenient buffs the Psiwar would be spending power points on) which it can spend on either bonus armor customizations or a Super-UMD (see the armor customization that lets you store power stones and shards in your armor and spend your PP to use them without consuming it), and he can swap out his power stones effectively at will, and his armor customizations several times a day.

Generally designers of both systems overvalue BAB dramatically. Where it should be a relatively low impact thing to go from medium BAB to full, instead we are trapped in design hell, with almost anybody going up to full BAB losing more than half of what they'd have otherwise. Seriously go check out the DSP Incarna playtest thread (http://dreamscarredpress.com/dragonfly/ForumsPro/viewtopic/p=40004.html#40004) where you have someone honestly arguing that they feel the Daevic needs to be nerfed because its full BAB losing only 30% of the effectiveness of a medium BAB class isn't enough.

Psyren

2014-02-07, 10:25 AM

Aegis is T4; they are good at combat but little else, much like Barbarians and (most) Soulknives.

They are capable of some WBL-mancy by implanting stones but that is about the extent of their versatility.

Irrelevant as 3.5 Divine Power was referenced.

It's still not relevant to the topic at hand. He brought it up as a comparison point with 3.5 (saying that a wide variety of tiers can get full BAB) but regardless, that's still not the case in PF.

The trend seems to be like this but even 3/4 bab classes are shafted if they don't have "real" spellcasting (like Magus/Summoner) although in DnD are a few no spell 3/4 bab classes on Tier 3 (Swordsage/Totemist etc)

Ninja is 3/4, and it's still T3 despite not having "real spellcasting." Ditto various Qinggong monk combinations.

Don't forget Gunslingers. They are virtually the same as Fighters.

Yarr.

Seerow

2014-02-07, 10:31 AM

They are capable of some WBL-mancy by implanting stones but that is about the extent of their versatility.

Turning consumable stones (read: Extremely cheap) into powers known is a pretty huge deal. It gives them far more variety in what they are capable of than a Duskblade or Warblade, with a small enough investment of wealth that it's negligible.

Psyren

2014-02-07, 11:04 AM

It certainly helps but I don't think it's enough to put them at T3. By 18th level you can have a maximum of two 1st-level, two 2nd-level, two 3rd-level and two 4th-level powers harnessed; storing even this small amount costs 20 21 of your 23 available CP at that level, leaving your suit able to do very little else. Compare to the Gifted Blade, who is also capped at 4th-level powers but gives up none of the features of his blade to do so, and doesn't have to spend WBL every time he changes his powerset. And every time you reconfigure them away, the attached stones are flushed whether you used them or not.

You also don't have much control over the powers you gain. You have to rely on found stones - even if you can craft them, you're limited to powers you've already found, or powers that the rest of the party can donate to you. Even a Warlock doesn't need Magic Mart's address.

Person_Man

2014-02-07, 11:10 AM

Fighter and Cavalier would have a word with you.

I'm not sure what you're saying here. But it's my opinion that the Fighter, Cavalier, Ranger, Barbarian, Samurai, and Gunslinger are all Tier 4 or Tier 5, depending on the level of optimization and Archetypes.

Low-mid level PF Fighter in particular is arguably weaker then a low-mid level 3.5 Fighter, in that Pathfinder Feats (the Fighter's main class ability) provide much smaller bonuses and abilities compared to 3.5 Feats, and the PF Fighter lacks access to Dungeoncrasher and Zhentarum ACF's. (Though at high levels, the bonuses and abilities from the additional PF crunch and access to higher level PF Feats start to be more meaningful).

I've read Aegis once and it felt Tier 4ish to me. But I'm open to the idea that with the right exploit it could be Tier 3. Though it is worth noting that it's DSP and not Paizo.

Generally designers of both systems overvalue BAB dramatically. Where it should be a relatively low impact thing to go from medium BAB to full, instead we are trapped in design hell, with almost anybody going up to full BAB losing more than half of what they'd have otherwise. Seriously go check out the DSP Incarna playtest thread (http://dreamscarredpress.com/dragonfly/ForumsPro/viewtopic/p=40004.html#40004) where you have someone honestly arguing that they feel the Daevic needs to be nerfed because its full BAB losing only 30% of the effectiveness of a medium BAB class isn't enough.

That's exactly what prompted this thread. I just didn't want to derail it.

Also, I'm a huge fan of DSP products in general. I'm just wondering how they and other future Full BAB classes are going to fit into the larger Pathfinder system of classes in terms of balance. I want to try and get a measure of how valuable full BAB should really be.

Seerow

2014-02-07, 11:14 AM

It certainly helps but I don't think it's enough to put them at T3. By 18th level you can have a maximum of two 1st-level, two 2nd-level, two 3rd-level and two 4th-level powers harnessed; storing even this small amount costs 20 of your 23 available CP at that level, leaving your suit able to do very little else. Compare to the Gifted Blade, who is also capped at 4th-level powers but gives up none of the features of his blade to do so, and doesn't have to spend WBL every time he changes his powerset. And every time you reconfigure them away, the attached stones are flushed whether you used them or not.

The attached stones being flushed when you change things is the bit I forgot. That does significantly weaken it. I was figuring you could get away with just 1 stone of each level (for 10 of your CPs) and swap out your stones as needed.

Losing the stone every time you swap is a major restriction I'd either not noticed or completely forgotten about, and does drop its value significantly.

NightbringerGGZ

2014-02-07, 11:15 AM

I think he's saying they're T5 actually (which they are without certain archetypes.)

Well, Cavalier can be T4 with the right mount optimization, though typically you'll have to be Small so you can bring your wolf mount into the dungeon/tower with you.

Velociraptor Mount with the right archetype :smallbiggrin:

subject42

2014-02-07, 11:25 AM

Generally designers of both systems overvalue BAB dramatically. Where it should be a relatively low impact thing to go from medium BAB to full, instead we are trapped in design hell, with almost anybody going up to full BAB losing more than half of what they'd have otherwise.

From what I've seen in the past, the "value" of full BAB has almost nothing to do with the bonus to hit or extra iterative attacks. Instead, full BAB classes generally only cause problems because they can pile up a lot of the better, BAB-locked combat feats into one character. An example of this in 3.5 was the ubercharger.

It seems like using BAB as a feat prerequisite is more of a problem than BAB itself.

Psyren

2014-02-07, 11:29 AM

I think "full BAB T3+" should primarily be in the realm of archetypes, which are more easily regulated at the table. It's much less stressful for a DM to say "I don't like Sacred Servant" or "I don't like Ectopic Artisan" than "I'm banning Paladin/Aegis." And a skittish DM can also say "I'll let you try this archetype for awhile, but if you overshadow the group please switch to a different one" without necessarily mandating an entirely new character for that player.

T3+FB isn't overpowered in a macro sense, i.e. compared to much more powerful full-casters, as we all know. But for lower-Op groups it can feel that way because those tables inevitably/unconsciously compare them to Fighter/Ranger, or more saliently, to the 3/4 BAB T3s like Bard and Magus.

IIRC the Bloodrager ran into thorns during the playtest too as people complained about why anyone would play a Barbarian or Fighter anymore.

The attached stones being flushed when you change things is the bit I forgot. That does significantly weaken it. I was figuring you could get away with just 1 stone of each level (for 10 of your CPs) and swap out your stones as needed.

Losing the stone every time you swap is a major restriction I'd either not noticed or completely forgotten about, and does drop its value significantly.

No worries. It's definitely high T4, don't get me wrong - certainly stronger than Barbarian, and most Paladins - and they do have an advantage in the WBL-mancy department of not needing to spend as much on armor, which frees up some dough for stones. It's just the reliance on magic-mart/DM providence to unlock its potential that I don't like.

One cool thing you can do is cram a buttload of stones into your suit and rely on UMD, since Aegi get a lot of bonuses. Of course, that flushes them even faster, but at least you can throw in utility ones like Psychoport for emergencies.

Seerow

2014-02-07, 11:30 AM

From what I've seen in the past, the "value" of full BAB has almost nothing to do with the bonus to hit or extra iterative attacks. Instead, full BAB classes generally only cause problems because they can pile up a lot of the better, BAB-locked combat feats into one character. An example of this in 3.5 was the ubercharger.

It seems like using BAB as a feat prerequisite is more of a problem than BAB itself.

The real issue is that BAB doesn't provide that big of a boost, even accounting for the feats you mention. Seriously, I doubt that even factors into Paizo developers' minds when balancing a new class. They see full BAB and decide it has to be around the same power level as a Fighter, and the class suffers for that.

subject42

2014-02-07, 11:34 AM

They see full BAB and decide it has to be around the same power level as a Fighter, and the class suffers for that.

I've seen that exact quote, earnestly delivered, on the DSP playtest boards a few times. It blew my mind. Paizo doesn't really make their discussions as public, but you're right, it probably shows up there, too.

Der_DWSage

2014-02-07, 11:52 AM

I think there's a sub-issue to deal with here, too.

Full BAB = This Class is designed to handle melee combat.
This Class is designed to handle melee combat = They don't need any other real routes to victory. They can hit things hard. What more do they want?

As someone mentioned earlier, Paladin is probably the closest to T3. I'd say they scrape at it earnestly, and succeed at getting there with the smallest bit of optimization. Barbarian Rages...the right ones can make them T3.5, I suppose. But the others...well, they have mildly varying ways in how they hit things. Fighters get all the feats, and slightly bigger numbers. Rangers get to track things, and then kill them, if they get lucky. Barbarians without really good Rage Powah get to froth at the mouth, and then hit them with a stick.

So it's a combined issue of 'overvaluing full BAB' and 'Full BAB design philosophy.'

Person_Man

2014-02-07, 01:10 PM

So the main lessons I've learned from this thread are:

If you want to write a Pathfinder class with it's own meaningful subsystem, make it 3/4 BAB or 1/2 BAB. Even if it makes sense from a balance and fluff perspective to have full BAB, people will cut you a lot more slack if you leave it at 3/4 BAB, so you don't have to nerf your subsystem or add annoying requirements to it (MAD, very limited uses, odd restrictions, etc).

If it's really that important to you to have a full BAB Pathfinder class, avoid writing any ability that is directly comparable to any ability from an existing full BAB Pathfinder class. This includes any kind of to-hit or damage bonus and any Bonus Feats, because gods forbid that you give your class a Bonus Feat and progression in your new subsystem, when all the Fighter gets is a Bonus Feat and +1 to resist Fear.

If it's really that important to you to have a full BAB Pathfinder class, try and make your most powerful and interesting abilities appear to be as simple as possible, and require a high level of rules mastery in order to be truly useful (Archetypes, selecting the right Feat for synergy, exploited the open ended nature and some supplementary material from a splat book, etc). So if you have a low optimization group with a Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, and Your New Class, the guy playing Your New Class won't overshadow the rest of the group unless he really knows what he's doing and the DM is cool with it.

Fax Celestis

2014-02-07, 01:23 PM

Gifted Soulknife might qualify as t3, especially if you invest in liberal applications of Expanded Knowledge.

The Aegis also is full BAB and is sort of Incarnum-esque in its flexibility, so it might also qualify as T3.

Kudaku

2014-02-07, 01:40 PM

I believe the upcoming Warpriest partially breaks this assumption if it stays true to its revised playtest version. It's a 6th level spellcasting progression divine class that gains a class ability called Sacred Weapon. Sacred Weapon allows the character to treat his warpriest level as his base attack bonus when making attacks with any weapon he has weapon focus with.

He still counts as 3/4th BAB when qualifying for feats, though.

subject42

2014-02-07, 02:33 PM

If it's really that important to you to have a full BAB Pathfinder class, avoid writing any ability that is directly comparable to any ability from an existing full BAB Pathfinder class. This includes any kind of to-hit or damage bonus and any Bonus Feats, because gods forbid that you give your class a Bonus Feat and progression in your new subsystem, when all the Fighter gets is a Bonus Feat and +1 to resist Fear.

Come on now. Don't use hyperbole. The PF fighter totally gets a bonus to hit and damage in up to FIVE whole weapon groups (http://www.pathfindersrd.com/classes/core-classes/fighter#TOC-Weapon-Training-Ex-).

Eldaran

2014-02-07, 03:14 PM

I do feel Aegis is T3. Especially once you count Ultimate Psionics. They can get augment as a swift action with a feat, meaning they can easily grab any customization on the fly. Need energy resist, swift action. Need flight, swift action. Need burrow, swift action.

Moreover, thanks to Harness Shard they can get +10 to any skill basically at will, and they can switch them around with ease. Normally you're paying 1k each use, but it costs an Aegis only a power point.

They're also incredibly effective at being durable. They're the only class I can think of that gets improved evasion and improved stalwart (mettle), which makes you highly resistant to spells. Add that to really high AC, DR, and Fortification for mundane attacks.

Bigbeefie

2014-02-07, 03:20 PM

Seerow

2014-02-07, 03:24 PM

icefractal

2014-02-07, 03:45 PM

Gunslinger (at at least 6th+ level) is sort of Tier 3 in terms of what it can deal with. It doesn't really have versatility (although a Mysterious Stranger Gunslinger at least has good social skills), but it can deal with a lot of types of foes - flying, long-range, minions, swarms, DR, concealment - all easy to solve with the right deeds and feats. And they do enough damage to kill most things in short order.

While theoretically, a Bard brings much more to the table in terms of versatility, in many campaigns a Gunslinger will have more practical impact on the encounters.

Dusk Eclipse

2014-02-07, 03:48 PM

How do you kill Swarms with guns? Do they get AoE deeds or something? (Note: Not familiar at all with the Gunslinger)

Bigbeefie

2014-02-07, 03:55 PM

How do you kill Swarms with guns? Do they get AoE deeds or something? (Note: Not familiar at all with the Gunslinger)

I believe they get a cone spray ammo...like a shotgun.

Psyren

2014-02-07, 04:05 PM

How do you kill Swarms with guns? Do they get AoE deeds or something? (Note: Not familiar at all with the Gunslinger)

"Scatter" guns, like the blunderbuss or dragon pistol, fire in a cone. I think you might need alchemical cartridges to truly damage a swarm though.

I do feel Aegis is T3. Especially once you count Ultimate Psionics. They can get augment as a swift action with a feat, meaning they can easily grab any customization on the fly. Need energy resist, swift action. Need flight, swift action. Need burrow, swift action.

Moreover, thanks to Harness Shard they can get +10 to any skill basically at will, and they can switch them around with ease. Normally you're paying 1k each use, but it costs an Aegis only a power point.

Eh, I'm still not sold. The shard thing is just more WBL-mancy (though at least they can craft these, unlike the stones), but they are still limited in application since you need a standard action to activate the shard. So you can't, say, activate a shard of Sense Motive in response to someone's feint attack, or activate a shard of Escape Artist and then get out of someone's grip in the same round.

Recustomizing on the fly wasn't really the problem - the problem is that any stones you Harness get flushed when your recustomize even if you didn't use the powers in them. Also they can't craft stones on their own, so they have to rely on what they find in loot or the DM providing access to magic mart. That doesn't bode well for T3 in my eyes.

You can probably optimize them up there like Incarnates can but I'm just not seeing it.

You're funny.

This elitist attitude is very unhelpful.

Gunslinger (at at least 6th+ level) is sort of Tier 3 in terms of what it can deal with. It doesn't really have versatility (although a Mysterious Stranger Gunslinger at least has good social skills), but it can deal with a lot of types of foes - flying, long-range, minions, swarms, DR, concealment - all easy to solve with the right deeds and feats. And they do enough damage to kill most things in short order.

"Lots of damage" isn't enough to get into T3 though. The hallmark of T3 is "useful when that one thing isn't appropriate" - outside of combat, gunslingers suffer for lack of things to do, just like fighters.

Seerow

2014-02-07, 04:13 PM

This elitist attitude is very unhelpful.

With the alternative being getting back into a decade old argument for the thousandth time, I'll take the quick and generic dismissal for 1000 alex.

bekeleven

2014-02-07, 04:21 PM

"Lots of damage" isn't enough to get into T3 though. The hallmark of T3 is "useful when that one thing isn't appropriate" - outside of combat, gunslingers suffer for lack of things to do, just like fighters.

So Warblades are T3 because they have 4+Int skills and their list includes diplomacy?

Psyren

2014-02-07, 04:22 PM

So Warblades are T3 because they have 4+Int skills and their list includes diplomacy?

I'm personally in the camp who considers them to be T4 so you're asking the wrong guy.

Lord_Gareth

2014-02-07, 04:23 PM

Lord_Gareth

2014-02-07, 04:26 PM

So Warblades are T3 because they have 4+Int skills and their list includes diplomacy?

They've also got available mobility to get around/through certain challenges (such as traps & chases). Admittedly I place Warblade as low/borderline T3, but having played them in several campaigns I can safely say that there was never a challenge in which I could not meaningfully contribute without resorting to fiat.

Person_Man

2014-02-07, 04:38 PM

You basically need to get over the Tier Rating.

Play a class because it does what you want to do...not because its Ranked as tier 1 or 5.

Reason is because the entire campaign needs to be played.

At level 1 those lower tier classes seem to be stronger and it is them who gets the T1 wizard to the height of his power. Without the other classes he might not have survived to reach his T1 power level.

I understand where you are coming from, and empathize with your position. But I hope that you can also understand my perspective.

When I DM, I want each player to have a good time. If one of the players is new or inexperienced or just not savvy or interested in optimization, he might pick a lower Tier class and/or choose options that result in him having less fun once he learns about the unintentional consequences of his choices.

For example, a player might choose a Fighter because it fits his general character concept and it sounds cool. But then he discovers that he's not particularly useful outside of combat except for threatening NPCs (Intimidate) and understanding some threats in a dungeon (Knowledge: Dungeoneering), and even then his Skill checks are only occasionally successful because the Fighter is not Cha or Int based and the Skill mechanics are sometimes poorly scaled. And in combat he finds himself overshadowed by the other players. He hits occasionally and deals moderate damage. Other classes hit consistently and deal higher damage with status effects and have many other interesting things that they can do.

Now if everyone is playing around the same Tier and/or optimization level, it's far less of a problem, although it can get boring if every player takes the same action almost every round of every combat. D&D is a cooperative game, not a competitive game.

Or if a particular group doesn't use the game mechanics very often, this issue can be less important. You could spend a lot of time roleplaying between characters, you could adjudicate the results of roleplaying between players and NPCs without Skills or with a homebrewed variant, you could spend a lot of time solving riddles and puzzles, you could disarm traps via logic and decision making instead of Disable Device or spammed Summons, you could spend a lot of time exploring the campaign setting, and so on. But that illustrates the strength of a good DM and players, not good game mechanics.

And when I write a class, I want it to be fun and balanced. I want it to fit into games and provide new options without causing new problems. So I ask what players and DMs think, and try and calibrate my games and writing accordingly. This inevitably leads to categorizing each of the available classes, figuring out their strengths and weaknesses, and attempting to ensure that each class has sufficiently varied option so that it's fun to play without breaking the game. And thus you get Tier or Niche or similar ranking systems, and discussions like this one.

subject42

2014-02-07, 04:47 PM

So Warblades are T3 because they have 4+Int skills and their list includes diplomacy?

I think their utility is heavily dependent on their feat and technique choices. If he took martial study for a few of the shadowhand teleporation abilities, and can tunnel through the dungeon with stone dragon attacks he's going to be more useful than the guy who's essentially a barbarian.

icefractal

2014-02-07, 04:47 PM

I'd say the Gunslinger is in about as versatile a place as the Warblade. Not like a Bard or anything (although again, in many campaigns it will be more effective than a bard in practice), but Warblade level, sure.

* Mysterious Stranger archetype can be Charisma-heavy, can get Bluff/Diplomacy via traits if desired.
* Tactically speaking, its range usually beats a Warblade's mobility.
* Also tactically speaking, has better AoEs via alchemical ammo (until 17th level, at least).
* For general movement, it's going to be relying on items, sure. Warblade isn't that amazing in this category either though - no flight until rather high level.
* Warblade gets better short-range teleportation, but that requires spending feats. Items can provide that too, and neither one has long-range TP.
* Neither one of them has any strategic-level abilities like what most casters have.

As for Stone Dragon tunneling - meh, that's just hitting things until they break. Anyone with an adamantine weapon (or just high enough damage) can do that. Beyond low-level, full attacking beats the stone dragon manuevers anyway, for walls made of less than obdurium.

Vanitas

2014-02-07, 05:40 PM

I think Paladin is tier 3.

Zweisteine

2014-02-07, 06:03 PM

You're funny.
Fixed that for you.

So Warblades are T3 because they have 4+Int skills and their list includes diplomacy?

Not just. They also have maneuvers, which give them a high level of combat power. I consider tier three to cover two (and a half) categories. Either those who can be reasonably good at many things, or those who can be very good at one thing. (Tier 2 is classes that can be godly at one thing, tier one can be godly at anything.)

Keep in mind, though, that that definition is only my opinion, and is a bit (intentionally) vague.
Bard, Binder, Wildshape Ranger, FactotumBeguiler, Dread Necromancer, Crusader, Swordsage, Duskblade, Warblade

Beguiler might belong in the other category.

Seerow

2014-02-07, 06:05 PM

Fixed that for you.

I wasn't being sarcastic. I read the post, it made me laugh. Definition of funny.

TuggyNE

2014-02-07, 10:33 PM

It's still not relevant to the topic at hand. He brought it up as a comparison point with 3.5 (saying that a wide variety of tiers can get full BAB) but regardless, that's still not the case in PF.

Your argument here does not appear to address the main thrust of this thread, which is that full BAB, while overvalued in all 3.x editions, is overvalued more by Paizo and most PF 3rd-party publishers. Specifically that there are no T3+ classes with full BAB, in contrast to 3.5, which has a number of T3 classes as well as most T1/T2 classes.

If anything, the observation that T1/T2 classes in PF cannot get full BAB, while in itself a positive balancing factor, is even more indicative of the overvaluation being addressed here.

Gemini476

2014-02-07, 11:40 PM

If anything, the observation that T1/T2 classes in PF cannot get full BAB, while in itself a positive balancing factor, is even more indicative of the overvaluation being addressed here.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that the reason that they don't give full casters full BAB is because they don't want classes to intrude into others niches (*coughRoguecough*). That's an alright idea, but it has issues.

Mostly because those niches are pretty small to begin with, but also because for some unfathomable reason Paizo focuses all of their balancing errata on mundane things rather than casters. Mundanes don't really have much of a niche to begin with - Full BAB just means one more attack than the Magus, in contrast with old editions where "Extra Attacks" was a class feature in and of itself.

When did WotC realize that Full BAB wasn't that powerful, anyway? Somewhere between the Hexblade and Duskblade, I expect, but I don't actually know.

Axinian

2014-02-07, 11:53 PM

When did WotC realize that Full BAB wasn't that powerful, anyway? Somewhere between the Hexblade and Duskblade, I expect, but I don't actually know.

That's exactly it. I remember an article or something where they flat out said that they overestimated the Hexblade, and "armored mages," in general, and they made the Duskblade better than they would have during the Hexblade's time because of it.

I can't seem to find the article right now though. Any help on that front?

Psyren

2014-02-07, 11:57 PM

Your argument here does not appear to address the main thrust of this thread, which is that full BAB, while overvalued in all 3.x editions, is overvalued more by Paizo and most PF 3rd-party publishers. Specifically that there are no T3+ classes with full BAB, in contrast to 3.5, which has a number of T3 classes as well as most T1/T2 classes.

I'd say it's less about "overvaluing" and more about upsetting the apple cart. Thing is, this state of affairs only seems to be a problem for a small minority of people, most of whom are on these forums (or thematically similar ones like BG). No publisher, whether Paizo, DSP, Radiance House or anyone else, can hope to please everyone and it's pretty foolish to try.

If full-BAB T3s don't cause an uproar at your tables, by all means make more of them; but the publisher has to address the most common denominator and those are the folks who will inevitably make the Fighter/Ranger/Paladin comparison (and draw negative conclusions upon doing so.) Indeed, I would wager that Path of War is getting more leeway in this regard from the DSP brass largely because it's aimed at the very people who were enamored of the ToB design idiom and want more of that sort of thing. But their negative reaction to even certain fluff (e.g. Jade Throne) leads me to believe that there is only so far they're willing to push that particular envelope. The sheer divisiveness ToB has to this day is a morass that few designers would want to step into willingly and certainly not with their primary/flagship product line.

So to sum up - I agree with you that they are doing this, but I think they have good reasons to do so, and I think you (and those who share your views) have the power to fix it yourself if it's truly that onerous a status quo.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 12:05 AM

I'd say it's less about "overvaluing" and more about upsetting the apple cart. Thing is, this state of affairs only seems to be a problem for a small minority of people, most of whom are on these forums (or thematically similar ones like BG). No publisher, whether Paizo, DSP, Radiance House or anyone else, can hope to please everyone and it's pretty foolish to try.

If full-BAB T3s don't cause an uproar at your tables, by all means make more of them; but the publisher has to address the most common denominator and those are the folks who will inevitably make the Fighter/Ranger/Paladin comparison (and draw negative conclusions upon doing so.) Indeed, I would wager that Path of War is getting more leeway in this regard from the DSP brass largely because it's aimed at the very people who were enamored of the ToB design idiom and want more of that sort of thing. But their negative reaction to even certain fluff (e.g. Jade Throne) leads me to believe that there is only so far they're willing to push that particular envelope. The sheer divisiveness ToB has to this day is a morass that few designers would want to step into willingly and certainly not with their primary/flagship product line.

So to sum up - I agree with you that they are doing this, but I think they have good reasons to do so, and I think you (and those who share your views) have the power to fix it yourself if it's truly that onerous a status quo.

Will you marry me, Psyren?

Drachasor

2014-02-08, 12:09 AM

Granted, their entire marketing scheme is focused on the more reactionary 3.5 players who were really upset over 4E. I think they could have modified the base classes when PF came out to be more balanced without a problem. Certainly they could have improved the Full BAB ones quite a bit more. The Fighter is particularly embarrassing here, imho. (So's the rogue, but it isn't full BAB).

You don't need to go the ToB route to get to low tier 3.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 12:13 AM

Drachasor

2014-02-08, 12:19 AM

*cough* Paladin *cough*

I don't think the PF Paladin is Tier 3. It's an improvement of the base 3.X Paladin (though worse than some ACFs). This improvement moves it up a Tier to T4, but it just doesn't have remotely enough flexibility to get to T3.

Honestly, a carefully built PF Barbarian with all PF books allowed is closer to being T3.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 12:29 AM

I don't think the PF Paladin is Tier 3. It's an improvement of the base 3.X Paladin (though worse than some ACFs). This improvement moves it up a Tier to T4, but it just doesn't have remotely enough flexibility to get to T3.
Have you ever seen an archer oradin? Party face, main damage dealer, dragonslayer, demonslayer and tank.

But I think the Paladin is t3 mainly comparing him to the ToB classes. PF Paladin deals at least as much damage, is a better face, has lots of utility with his spells and mercies, can customize his wepon or have a personal minion, has better durability with swift action Lay on Hands... that's a lot better than having several different ways of adding a fitsful of d6 to your damage rolls, IMHO.

Drachasor

2014-02-08, 12:36 AM

Have you ever seen an archer oradin? Party face, main damage dealer, dragonslayer, demonslayer and tank.

Social skills, hitty, hitty, hitty, can take some hits. Not very impressive.

And shut down by a Wind Wall and a few dozen other things. And if you're going Oradin, you're already having to mix in another class.

Having social skills is nice, but they were weakened in PF and that alone isn't enough to get you into T3 when it is just combined with hitting things.

"Tank" isn't even a thing really. Anyone can be a "tank" unless their class REALLY sucks. The game ain't an MMO....you actually don't want people to hit you.

Compare to a Warblade who also have a lot of skills, can also ignore DR if needed, but combine that with a lot more mobility and the ability to IHS a wide variety of affects.

Nihilarian

2014-02-08, 12:57 AM

He can heal, he can deal damage, has mobility from his mount or flexibility with a bonded weapon, he can be the party face, he's tough as nails and is even tougher when you factor in swift action healing himself. He has access to good spells, too. I see no reason why the Paladin can't carry both a melee and a ranged weapon, his smite evil doesn't care.

So the base Paladin is good in-combat and good out of combat, before we even get into archetypes like Sacred Servant and feats such as Unsanctified Knowledge. The only thing that gives me pause is Smite Evil only working on evil people. Still, given all the options available, I'd say he can push himself to a low tier 3.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 01:01 AM

Social skills, hitty, hitty, hitty, can take some hits. Not very impressive.

And shut down by a Wind Wall and a few dozen other things. And if you're going Oradin, you're already having to mix in another class.

Having social skills is nice, but they were weakened in PF and that alone isn't enough to get you into T3 when it is just combined with hitting things.

"Tank" isn't even a thing really. Anyone can be a "tank" unless their class REALLY sucks. The game ain't an MMO....you actually don't want people to hit you.

Compare to a Warblade who also have a lot of skills, can also ignore DR if needed, but combine that with a lot more mobility and the ability to IHS a wide variety of affects.
Smite Evil ignores DR as well, no Warblade maneuver has more mobility than a flying mount, IHS is broken and Paladin gets high saves + immunities + mercies that actually work instead of that.
Oradin tanking has nothing to do with MMO - you deal a lot of a damage and you protect others from damage, while being able to take a lot of damage. You don't even need to be an oracle to do an oradin (though it sure helps) - you just need to cast Shield Other.
If Warblade is t3, PF Paladin is t3 as well, IMHO.

He can heal, he can deal damage, has mobility from his mount or flexibility with a bonded weapon, he can be the party face, he's tough as nails and is even tougher when you factor in swift action healing himself. He has access to good spells, too. I see no reason why the Paladin can't carry both a melee and a ranged weapon, his smite evil doesn't care.

So the base Paladin is good in-combat and good out of combat, before we even get into archetypes like Sacred Servant and feats such as Unsanctified Knowledge. The only thing that gives me pause is Smite Evil only working on evil people. Still, given all the options available, I'd say he can push himself to a low tier 3.
My opinion exactly.

Alent

2014-02-08, 01:45 AM

@ the OP: I made the mistake of speed reading the Daevic thread as much as I could before the troll's posts started to give me a migraine. Threads like that remind me of why I don't play pathfinder anymore. :smallfrown:

What's kind of sad is, I think his complaints about damage actually had a sensible motivation, given that Pathfinder seemingly buffed base damage output while deliberately reducing the HD of what feels like every core creature in the MM without reducing the CR adequately. I don't agree with him by any stretch, but I can understand why someone who doesn't understand why their CR appropriate challenges wilt under a reliable damage build would be adverse to anything that even looks like a damage buff above and beyond what was already done.

I would love to see a rebuild of the 3.5x engine that uses BAB to scale weapon damage instead of attack numbers the same way CL scales spell damage, just to see how people react to it.

I kind of think people would be less bothered by melee getting neat things if BAB to CL was less of an apples to oranges comparison.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-08, 03:02 AM

As Kudaku pointed out, the upcoming Warpriest class is going to have full BAB is everything but name, when wielding his sacred weapon (which could be any weapon he wants it to be). So there ya go, one (probably tier 3) class with magic and full BAB(ish), if you want to play that.

Drachasor

2014-02-08, 03:40 AM

Smite Evil ignores DR as well, no Warblade maneuver has more mobility than a flying mount, IHS is broken and Paladin gets high saves + immunities + mercies that actually work instead of that.
Oradin tanking has nothing to do with MMO - you deal a lot of a damage and you protect others from damage, while being able to take a lot of damage. You don't even need to be an oracle to do an oradin (though it sure helps) - you just need to cast Shield Other.
If Warblade is t3, PF Paladin is t3 as well, IMHO.

I know that Smite Evil ignores DR, that's why I brought it up. The Warblade can ignore DR on Constructs, multiple enemies in the same fight, etc, etc. The Paladin can only ignore DR on a small selection of evil enemies each day. That's a lot less useful.

IHS is very clear in what it is intended to do and if you want to go RAW it is clear too (though extremely powerful). So saying "it's really good" isn't an argument. A Paladin is not immune to the most deadly effects in the game. His mercies aren't bad, but they aren't really great either (also, they aren't really different from what a Paladin could already do via spells). Overall they are are fairly niche, and as we already know healing is pretty niche as well.

And they don't get a flying mount unless the DM makes a houserule. The rules are very clear that their mounts are quite limited. "Exotic" mounts for them are things like a Camel, not a Pegasus and even that requires DM approval. The PF Paladin has no native flying ability.

Overall the problem with the PF Paladin is that they really can't overcome any challenges a 3.5 Paladin couldn't overcome. They are better at these challenges than a 3.5 Paladin, but overall they are still very limited in focus and scope.

They have problems with non-evil enemies (and there are a LOT of these).
They have problems with flying enemies, especially ones that have any of the many, many counters to ranged attacks.
They have problems when a lot of enemies in a day have DR even if they are evil.
They can't do stealth well.
They are less MAD, but still MAD (physical stats are important as is Charisma, but they don't need Wisdom now).
Unless they can use their mount, they are not very mobile -- and even using it they aren't as mobile as a T3 melee like the Warblade or Magus.

Being good at healing just doesn't make up for these problems. Fundamentally you just have a class that's good at combat under some circumstances, can do social encounters (which is less powerful in PF than in 3.5), and can do healing. And let's not forget that they can't really be good at all social encounters. 2 skill points per level is very few, not enough to really be good at all social encounters -- let alone being good at anything else. Especially if Int is a dump stat, which it almost has to be given their MAD stats.

Compared to a Warblade they ARE lacking. Though if you prefer a more Paladin-like comparison, they are lacking compared to a Crusader. Granted the TOB classes aren't perfect, and could certainly have used some some ranged disciplines (though there are manevuers that work with ranged attacks). They are still much more flexible overall though, including being able to handle more physical obstacles and having the skill points for non-combat encounters as well.

Person_Man

2014-02-08, 03:38 PM

So, is the consensus to just write Tier 3 full BAB Pathfinder classes and just do your best to be kind to the "what about the Fighter" crowd? Or to just leave full BAB as their thing, and be content with 3/4 BAB without having to nerf your subsytem in order to mollify the public playtest people?

Seerow

2014-02-08, 03:43 PM

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 03:56 PM

I don't think you're going to find a consensus on that question.

Exactlyy. If you're not writing professionally, you shouldn't care about it anyway.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 04:09 PM

I know that Smite Evil ignores DR, that's why I brought it up. The Warblade can ignore DR on Constructs, multiple enemies in the same fight, etc, etc. The Paladin can only ignore DR on a small selection of evil enemies each day. That's a lot less useful.

[QUOTE=Drachasor;16953300]IHS is very clear in what it is intended to do and if you want to go RAW it is clear too (though extremely powerful). So saying "it's really good" isn't an argument. A Paladin is not immune to the most deadly effects in the game. His mercies aren't bad, but they aren't really great either (also, they aren't really different from what a Paladin could already do via spells). Overall they are are fairly niche, and as we already know healing is pretty niche as well.
You realize IHS doesn't work against most of the stuff it should work against, right?
Healing is not niche. Healing status conditions (like mercies do) is very important, actually.

And they don't get a flying mount unless the DM makes a houserule. The rules are very clear that their mounts are quite limited. "Exotic" mounts for them are things like a Camel, not a Pegasus and even that requires DM approval. The PF Paladin has no native flying ability.
Empyreal Knight archetype.

Overall the problem with the PF Paladin is that they really can't overcome any challenges a 3.5 Paladin couldn't overcome. They are better at these challenges than a 3.5 Paladin, but overall they are still very limited in focus and scope.
Which makes no difference, really. That's one of the categories for tier 3 - good at several things.

They have problems with non-evil enemies (and there are a LOT of these).
They have problems with flying enemies, especially ones that have any of the many, many counters to ranged attacks.
They have problems when a lot of enemies in a day have DR even if they are evil.
They can't do stealth well.
They are less MAD, but still MAD (physical stats are important as is Charisma, but they don't need Wisdom now).
Unless they can use their mount, they are not very mobile -- and even using it they aren't as mobile as a T3 melee like the Warblade or Magus.
All of those problems apply to classes like Crusader, Warblade and Swordsage. Crusaders might not even have the maneuver they need when they need it. All of the ToB classes want a mental stat as well as physical stats.

Compared to a Warblade they ARE lacking. Though if you prefer a more Paladin-like comparison, they are lacking compared to a Crusader. Granted the TOB classes aren't perfect, and could certainly have used some some ranged disciplines (though there are manevuers that work with ranged attacks). They are still much more flexible overall though, including being able to handle more physical obstacles and having the skill points for non-combat encounters as well.
The Warblade is lacking compared to the Beguiler, to the Dread Necromancer, the Binder and probably more guys at tier 3. It even being tier 3 is heavily contested. My point is that if a Warblade is t3, then a Paladin is t3 as well.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-08, 05:07 PM

They have problems with non-evil enemies (and there are a LOT of these).
They have problems with flying enemies, especially ones that have any of the many, many counters to ranged attacks.
They have problems when a lot of enemies in a day have DR even if they are evil.
They can't do stealth well.
They are less MAD, but still MAD (physical stats are important as is Charisma, but they don't need Wisdom now).I'm picking nits here, and overall I think that the Paladin sits atop of tier 4 but isn't in tier 3, but I do disagree on a couple of points.

3. That's pretty much any character, though, and can be gotten around pretty easily with an appropriate variation of weapon materials and a couple blanches. At mid-levels I normally carry a cold iron weapon of some kind, for example.

4. I don't see why they would be any worse at it than anyone else. They don't get a +3 modifier to it, but if they max out their dex and the stealth skill, they'll be as good at it as most characters are. If they're wearing their heavy armor, sure, but no one tries to stealth in heavy armor.

5. I disagree that this is so much MAD, as it is the ideal amount of ability score dependency. Also, at least with the Paladin the Charisma bonuses help him to overcome shortcomings in other areas like Wisdom and Dexterity, at least to his saving throws.

Psyren

2014-02-08, 05:30 PM

Will you marry me, Psyren?

Whoa there, slow down! Buy me a drink first. :smallbiggrin:

I don't think the PF Paladin is Tier 3. It's an improvement of the base 3.X Paladin (though worse than some ACFs). This improvement moves it up a Tier to T4, but it just doesn't have remotely enough flexibility to get to T3.

Honestly, a carefully built PF Barbarian with all PF books allowed is closer to being T3.

Sacred Servant is absolutely T3 and can even get to T2 at higher levels (free 16th-level cleric cohort.) Empyreal Knight, despite the loss of Divine Grace, could feasibly get there as well with his variety of summons.

As Kudaku pointed out, the upcoming Warpriest class is going to have full BAB is everything but name, when wielding his sacred weapon (which could be any weapon he wants it to be). So there ya go, one (probably tier 3) class with magic and full BAB(ish), if you want to play that.

Indeed, this might help some folks scratch their itch.

So, is the consensus to just write Tier 3 full BAB Pathfinder classes and just do your best to be kind to the "what about the Fighter" crowd?

The "what about the Fighter" crowd is currently the majority. So your advice would have to be reversed in a way.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 05:55 PM

That's pretty much any character, though, and can be gotten around pretty easily with an appropriate variation of weapon materials and a couple blanches. At mid-levels I normally carry a cold iron weapon of some kind, for example.
If you choose weapon bound, the enhancement modifiers themselves overmoce some kinds of DR as well.

5. I disagree that this is so much MAD, as it is the ideal amount of ability score dependency. Also, at least with the Paladin the Charisma bonuses help him to overcome shortcomings in other areas like Wisdom and Dexterity, at least to his saving throws.
Well said.

Person_Man

2014-02-08, 06:57 PM

Exactlyy. If you're not writing professionally, you shouldn't care about it anyway.

I'm doing some freelance work on the side. I want the people I write for to like and use what I write, and care about their opinions.

The "what about the Fighter" crowd is currently the majority. So your advice would have to be reversed in a way.

Yeah, having spoken to several currently published Pathfinder writers and lurking a lot on the boards, that was my gut reading of the situation as well, and it's become more and more confirmed as I do research into it. I just can't put my head around exactly why. I'm going to gather more opinions on the matter over on the Paizo and DSP boards, but I'm edging closer and closer to just not writing full BAB classes. Or if I do write them, making them as directly comparable to the high Tier 4/low Tier 3 Paladin as possible (in terms of number of Skills, pacing of abilities, rough power level of abilities, etc) so as to avoid controversy.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 07:05 PM

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-08, 07:08 PM

Yeah, having spoken to several currently published Pathfinder writers and lurking a lot on the boards, that was my gut reading of the situation as well, and it's become more and more confirmed as I do research into it. I just can't put my head around exactly why. I'm going to gather more opinions on the matter over on the Paizo and DSP boards, but I'm edging closer and closer to just not writing full BAB classes. Or if I do write them, making them as directly comparable to the high Tier 4/low Tier 3 Paladin as possible (in terms of number of Skills, pacing of abilities, rough power level of abilities, etc) so as to avoid controversy.Honestly the best explanation I can give for it is that 3e/PF games are in a really weird space where we have some nostalgia for the positives of a game system that we still play, while ignoring or not recognizing the downsides of that system.

The closest comparison to it, that I can think of, is the relationship between advanced metrics and scouting in basketball player evaluation.

Psyren

2014-02-08, 07:11 PM

I just can't put my head around exactly why.

I can think of two reasons:

1) Fighter/Barbarian/Ranger/Paladin work at most tables. So anything with full BAB that is a tier or more above these is going to be looked at with at least suspicion. It's possible they may only work due to houserules or DM boons that the group isn't even fully conscious of, but they work nonetheless.

2) Most of the ways that people use to get full BAB classes to T3 are either unattractive or controversial. ToB for example, takes heat for feeling "too anime" or otherwise straining suspension of disbelief. But giving them 6th-level casting instead opens up rifts between those who consider this unfair to classes like Bard and Magus. Giving them 4th-level casting, but with sufficient discounts/buffs to make it T3, not only causes those same complaints to arise, but can create legitimate balance concerns once you consider other casting classes who can now gain those spells earlier than they should (via Extra Spell/Expanded Arcana etc.)

Drachasor

2014-02-08, 07:14 PM

Healing is not niche. Healing status conditions (like mercies do) is very important, actually.

Healing IS a niche. It isn't that it doesn't matter, but that it isn't enough to bump someone up to Tier 3. The Paladin is T5 in 3.5 for good reason. Mercies don't actually give them much healing capability they didn't have with spells before.

Empyreal Knight archetype.

Archetypes, like ACFs in 3.5, are something to be considered separately from the base class.

Which makes no difference, really. That's one of the categories for tier 3 - good at several things.

In terms of overcoming problems. While they are better than a 3.5 Paladin, they are simply not so much better they go up 2 Tiers. A lot of their improvements are still very limited in what sort of creatures they apply to for instance.

All of those problems apply to classes like Crusader, Warblade and Swordsage. Crusaders might not even have the maneuver they need when they need it. All of the ToB classes want a mental stat as well as physical stats.

Any of the initiators can get the prepared maneuver they need in a fight. Just because a Crusader might not have it Round 1 doesn't mean his DR overcoming maneuver isn't relevant to the fight.

Maneuvers also help against DR by generally making actions into one big attack, which works better than multiple smaller attacks.

The Warblade is lacking compared to the Beguiler, to the Dread Necromancer, the Binder and probably more guys at tier 3. It even being tier 3 is heavily contested. My point is that if a Warblade is t3, then a Paladin is t3 as well.

They Warblade is barely T3. The Beguiler and DM are nearly Tier 2. Naturally the Warblade is lacking. The Warblade, however, is still notably more flexible in a fight than a PF base Paladin. The Warblade can overcome a larger variety of combat challenges easier and more easily adapt to the unexpected. They are also able to handle non-combat challenges better.

Sacred Servant is absolutely T3 and can even get to T2 at higher levels (free 16th-level cleric cohort.) Empyreal Knight, despite the loss of Divine Grace, could feasibly get there as well with his variety of summons.

Again, Archetypes and ACFs have to be looked at separately from the base class. There's a reason why the Wildshape Ranger is T3 but other Ranger variants are not.

I'm picking nits here, and overall I think that the Paladin sits atop of tier 4 but isn't in tier 3, but I do disagree on a couple of points.

3. That's pretty much any character, though, and can be gotten around pretty easily with an appropriate variation of weapon materials and a couple blanches. At mid-levels I normally carry a cold iron weapon of some kind, for example.

4. I don't see why they would be any worse at it than anyone else. They don't get a +3 modifier to it, but if they max out their dex and the stealth skill, they'll be as good at it as most characters are. If they're wearing their heavy armor, sure, but no one tries to stealth in heavy armor.

5. I disagree that this is so much MAD, as it is the ideal amount of ability score dependency. Also, at least with the Paladin the Charisma bonuses help him to overcome shortcomings in other areas like Wisdom and Dexterity, at least to his saving throws.

(3) Except Initiators have special DR-penetrating maneuvers. They also tend to do one big attack which works better against DR than multiple smaller attacks.

(4) A Paladin going with a Dex build is paying a pretty high cost given how Con and Charisma are very important to them. Strength is important to their ranged attacks. Something would have to give. As you even touch on with (5) Dex is one of the candidates for a low score. We're considering actual Paladin Builds here, not rebuilding the character for each encounter.

If you choose weapon bound, the enhancement modifiers themselves overmoce some kinds of DR as well.

And then they don't get a mount. Their mobility is even worse and their damage goes down.

Yeah, having spoken to several currently published Pathfinder writers and lurking a lot on the boards, that was my gut reading of the situation as well, and it's become more and more confirmed as I do research into it. I just can't put my head around exactly why. I'm going to gather more opinions on the matter over on the Paizo and DSP boards, but I'm edging closer and closer to just not writing full BAB classes. Or if I do write them, making them as directly comparable to the high Tier 4/low Tier 3 Paladin as possible (in terms of number of Skills, pacing of abilities, rough power level of abilities, etc) so as to avoid controversy.

PF was aimed at the most reactionary elements of 3.5 fans. People who were angry at 4E and wanted things mostly kept the same. Generally the sort of people they felt 3.X core was mostly balanced.

Seerow

2014-02-08, 07:22 PM

Giving them 4th-level casting, but with sufficient discounts/buffs to make it T3, not only causes those same complaints to arise, but can create legitimate balance concerns once you consider other casting classes who can now gain those spells earlier than they should (via Extra Spell/Expanded Arcana etc.)

This doesn't necessarily need to be an issue. Making 4th level casting better doesn't necessarily mean giving say a 7th level spell as a 4th level spell. It can be as simple as giving caster level = class level, more spell slots starting earlier, spontaneous casting from their full spell list, feats/abilities like Battle Blessing, etc. Basically things that won't transfer well to other classes, but make the quality of life for the half caster much nicer.

It doesn't help pure mundanes, but it's an easy way to make a caster with only 4th level spells attractive without making the Wizard even more broken.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 07:29 PM

This doesn't necessarily need to be an issue. Making 4th level casting better doesn't necessarily mean giving say a 7th level spell as a 4th level spell. It can be as simple as giving caster level = class level, more spell slots starting earlier, spontaneous casting from their full spell list, feats/abilities like Battle Blessing, etc. Basically things that won't transfer well to other classes, but make the quality of life for the half caster much nicer.

It doesn't help pure mundanes, but it's an easy way to make a caster with only 4th level spells attractive without making the Wizard even more broken.

Isn't that the stance they took with Bloodrager at the end?

Psyren

2014-02-08, 07:30 PM

Again, Archetypes and ACFs have to be looked at separately from the base class. There's a reason why the Wildshape Ranger is T3 but other Ranger variants are not.

A Wildshape Ranger is still a Ranger and a Sacred Servant Paladin is still a Paladin. You said "PF Paladin isn't T3," not "Base PF Paladin isn't T3." I happen to agree that a paladin without archetypes doesn't go above T4.

This doesn't necessarily need to be an issue. Making 4th level casting better doesn't necessarily mean giving say a 7th level spell as a 4th level spell. It can be as simple as giving caster level = class level, more spell slots starting earlier, spontaneous casting from their full spell list, feats/abilities like Battle Blessing, etc. Basically things that won't transfer well to other classes, but make the quality of life for the half caster much nicer.

It doesn't help pure mundanes, but it's an easy way to make a caster with only 4th level spells attractive without making the Wizard even more broken.

The caster level thing they pretty much have, because they are only -3 in PF and you can erase 2 of those with Magical Knack.

The rest though I totally agree with - spontaneous casting from their list and earlier access to spells would be great improvements. Unfortunately, I don't think that even those would get them to T3. After all, even if it's not spontaneous, they do currently have access to their entire list.

Seerow

2014-02-08, 07:33 PM

The caster level thing they pretty much have, because they are only -3 in PF and you can erase 2 of those with Magical Knack.

The rest though I totally agree with - spontaneous casting from their list and earlier access to spells would be great improvements. Unfortunately, I don't think that even those would get them to T3. After all, even if it's not spontaneous, they do currently have access to their entire list.

Basically what you'd end up with is a Duskblade without 5th level spells, but with a list that has more utility and the ability to cast all of their spells as a swift action.

I have no idea what Paizo's Paladin/Ranger spell lists look like, but give the Paladin/Ranger in 3.5 spontaneous access to their entire spell list and spells per day more in line with a Duskblade (just without the cantrips or 5th level spells), and I can see it easily being a Tier3. The spell lists aren't that bad, the method the classes have to access their spell lists make it horrible.

Isn't that the stance they took with Bloodrager at the end?

I have no clue. I stopped paying attention to development on that pretty early on.

Nihilarian

2014-02-08, 07:36 PM

You keep referencing the warblades ability to punch through DR. The base paladin punches through DR. It doesn't have to prepare maneuvers for it, it does it automatically against one enemy for the duration of the encounter.

And if you're against someone you haven't used Smite Evil on?

For mounted chargers, you make 1 big attack instead of a bunch of smaller ones. DR is not a problem.

If you chose weapon bond, you can pump up the enhancement bonus, and DR stops being a problem.

If you're a mounted archer, you can cast GMW or take the Clustered Shots feat. Either way, DR is no longer a problem.

DR is never going to be a problem for a properly built paladin, and will rarely be a problem for an improperly built paladin.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 07:37 PM

Basically what you'd end up with is a Duskblade without 5th level spells, but with a list that has more utility and the ability to cast all of their spells as a swift action.

I have no idea what Paizo's Paladin/Ranger spell lists look like, but give the Paladin/Ranger in 3.5 spontaneous access to their entire spell list and spells per day more in line with a Duskblade (just without the cantrips or 5th level spells), and I can see it easily being a Tier3. The spell lists aren't that bad, the method the classes have to access their spell lists make it horrible.

As opposed to the Duskblade, who simply had a horrible spell list and that's it.

Seerow

2014-02-08, 07:38 PM

As opposed to the Duskblade, who simply had a horrible spell list and that's it.

Exactly. And people still try to argue the Duskblade is tier 3. I'm certain the Ranger and Paladin have gems among their 3rd and 4th level spells that blow away anything the Duskblade can do as far as utility goes.

Nihilarian

2014-02-08, 07:46 PM

Exactly. And people still try to argue the Duskblade is tier 3. I'm certain the Ranger and Paladin have gems among their 3rd and 4th level spells that blow away anything the Duskblade can do as far as utility goes.Even if they don't, they can cheat. Unsanctioned Knowledge, Sacred Servant and Nirmathi Irregular come to mind. Though two of those are archetypes.

krackenjack

2014-02-08, 08:32 PM

I would love to see a rebuild of the 3.5x engine that uses BAB to scale weapon damage instead of attack numbers the same way CL scales spell damage, just to see how people react to it.

I kinda love that idea! You could even apply the BAB-based damage bonus differently to different weapons to show how their use differentiates more in the hands of an expert. Heck, add that to full BAB classes only and you get a strong point back in the "uniqueness" categegory.

That said, it sounds like the biggest limiting issue with the tiers could be solved by increasing skill points. Most full BAB classes get shafted on skill points as is. Give them more and they have something to do when their one main skill is not applicable.

Heck, you could even pull in something like versatile performer for other classes. For fighters: pick one warleader role; you may use your BAB in place of skill modifier for three applicable skills. Roles include: Commander, Master of Horse, Quartermaster, Drill Sergent, etc.

Person_Man

2014-02-08, 08:47 PM

I can think of two reasons:

1) Fighter/Barbarian/Ranger/Paladin work at most tables. So anything with full BAB that is a tier or more above these is going to be looked at with at least suspicion. It's possible they may only work due to houserules or DM boons that the group isn't even fully conscious of, but they work nonetheless.

That's.... extremely reasonable.

I guess I really don't grok it because I'm an avid fan of every edition (though 4E is my least favorite), and try to bring new material to the table when it comes out. So if Class A was written first, and Class B was written second and fills the same set of niches better and makes the game more fun for a player without upsetting other players, I see no reason to hold on to and defend Class A just because it was written first. And if a player wants to use Class A, I let him. But I also let him try out Class A homebrew fixes. And if he still wants to use pure RAW Class A, he "coincidentally" finds a little extra treasure that's very appropriate for his build. And if that doesn't work, hey lets spend more time roleplaying and whatnot.

2) Most of the ways that people use to get full BAB classes to T3 are either unattractive or controversial.

Also true. Part of the problem may be old folks like me (I'm 36), who grew up playing earlier editions and have not quite let go. Outside of spell selection (for casters), Class customization didn't really exist very much outside of the fluff. Attributes were randomly generation. Feats didn't exist. Skills were class specific. Treasure was randomly generated. Magic users could "win" all sorts of encounters with their spells, but they had fewer of them, and resting to recover spells outside of an inn was very dangerous because of random encounters. And combat was quick and deadly (and sometimes avoided when possible), and usually resolved in the "theater of the mind," and thus often lasted only one or two rounds. So you might have 10-20 combats in one tabletop sized floor of a dungeon, which you went through in a single afternoon.

So having having "all day" higher attack bonus, more hit points, better armor, the ability to make extra attacks, "exceptional Strength," etc, were actually really valuable.

But they're just not nearly as valuable in 3.5 or PF, where such benefits can be gained many many different ways.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 09:20 PM

So having having "all day" higher attack bonus, more hit points, better armor, the ability to make extra attacks, "exceptional Strength," etc, were actually really valuable.

But they're just not nearly as valuable in 3.5 or PF, where such benefits can be gained many many different ways.
I think the biggest problem is actually HP bloat. You get to a point where damage simply isn't the best option in combat. This happens in 4e, even - many encounters are simply over because everyone has used everything they had, but the monster stays around to be killed by at-will spam, simply because it had too much HP.
With less HP, everything becomes more important. An extra attack usually meant another dead enemy. Weapon damage was actually relevant in levels other than the 1st. I think a red dragon has something like 92 hp in AD&D. Monsters have 400~500 hp in 3rd and 4th edition.

Kudaku

2014-02-08, 09:29 PM

There was a lot of noise kicked up on the Paizo forums over the recent Crane Wing 'errata', but it also got some interesting designer/developer replies. Among a few others, these are particularly interesting:

(...)One small note, since I have seen this come up again and I feel I need to clarify a bit.

In regards to balancing the system around the core.

We recognize that there are some aspects of the game that are not "even" or "balanced" when looked at from certain perspectives. The bard is just not as good at melee combat as the fighter. The cleric is no match for the rogue in terms of skills. Etc. The core set up certain paradigms when it came to some of these relationships. When we are releasing new material, we keep these relationships in mind. If we ignore them and start changing the balance in books further down the road, we end up with a great deal of conceptual drift and, depending on the area of drift, some pretty bad issues of power creep. Its not that "fighter's can't have nice things" or any of the other catch phrases that we see come up again and again. It has more to do with us playing within some defined roles that make the game what it is. We have plenty of play within that system and we are constantly attempting to explore new areas and expand what characters can do, but we want them to do so in a way that they are still a recognizable part of the game. (...)

Aelryinth wrote:
Jason,

I think part of the problem is that you've set your limits in the wrong places.

Classes with magic don't need skills, and don't need to be able to fight as well as the fighter. Magic takes care of that for them.

Classes without magic need to have those things intrinsic to the class that casters don't have to deal with.

There is no way to justify a completely non-magical character like a fighter or rogue not having a ton of skill points. When skills are what you rely on in life, you have them. You don't have magic to do the job for you.

Likewise, if you don't have magic, you should have better core saves and endurance, because you're not relying on spells.

It's a trope in EVERY fantasy genre that experienced martials are ungodly effective at fighting against magic without magic, because they have no choice in the matter.

Having the two classes that have NO magic have only one good save is NUTS. Having a fighter, the Olympian of combat and non-magical special forces guy of the fantasy world, only have 2 skill points when he's the COMBAT GENIUS of the classes, is nuts. Rogues, having no way to fight other then fighting, not having full BAB is nuts, especially since they, unlike all the other medium BAB characters, don't have any abilities that buff their ability to hit (even the monk has flurry!).

So it's not that we mind you keeping characters to their roles. It's that we think you've defined the roles poorly in regards to some of the classes, particularly those without magic.
We certainly understand where you are coming from on this and we look for ways to ensure that every character and a fun and compelling way to interact with most phases of the game. Where we run into trouble is when folks decide that only one phase is important and all must be balanced in that phase.

Lets just take the rogue for example. I could, quite easily, put out a book that gave the rogue full BAB. Now new players who want to play a rogue will need that book, in addition to the core, unless they want to be told over and over again by other players and the community as a whole that they are playing a poor alternative. I could, instead, reprint the core with a rogue with a full BAB. Now, everyone would need to pick up a new core rulebook. In either case, I am making decisions for your table (and wallet) through my design choices. Meanwhile, calls of power creep and a stealth new edition will run rampant, none of which is good for the game as a whole.

The point of this is that there are a lot of factors to consider when balancing rules and mechanics. What might seem like an easy fix has a lot of deeper ramifications for the game system as a whole. There is no question that the core rulebook is the most common book at the table. It has to, by definition, form a sort of baseline for the game. As I said, we have room to play within that framework, in terms of theme, power, and overall options, but we try to keep it close (across all frames). Now, that said, there are some inequities. We know about them and try to design ways to lessen burdens and problems without violating some of out other overall principles. Its a delicate balancing act. There have been missteps. We are trying our best to fix them as we go along, and we appreciate the folks that have understanding and patience in this regard.

Personally I'm somewhat unconvinced by his rogue example (give rogues full BAB). While simply altering the BAB bonus of rogues is a very jarring and simplistic fix, a series of modifications could fairly easily make the rogue more viable. For a better example what I'd personally consider a successful internal rebalance of a class, consider Quinggong. The Quinggong Monk is more or less considered the addition that made monks playable and that archetype was added in Ultimate Magic.

Person_Man

2014-02-08, 09:35 PM

I think the biggest problem is actually HP bloat. You get to a point where damage simply isn't the best option in combat. This happens in 4e, even - many encounters are simply over because everyone has used everything they had, but the monster stays around to be killed by at-will spam, simply because it had too much HP.
With less HP, everything becomes more important. An extra attack usually meant another dead enemy. Weapon damage was actually relevant in levels other than the 1st. I think a red dragon has something like 92 hp in AD&D. Monsters have 400~500 hp in 3rd and 4th edition.

Agreed.

IIRC, in older editions bonus hit points per level from Constitution was capped at +2 for non-warriors, and bonus hit points from hit die stopped around level 9. It's part of what made hit points (and small bonuses to-hit and damage and AC and whatnot) a much more meaningful resource. I hope they bring it back in 5E.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-08, 09:35 PM

There was a lot of noise kicked up on the Paizo forums over the recent Crane Wing 'errata', but it also got some interesting designer/developer replies. Among a few others, these are particularly interesting:

Personally I'm somewhat unconvinced by his rogue example (give rogues full BAB). While simply altering the BAB bonus of rogues is a very jarring and simplistic fix, a series of modifications could fairly easily make the rogue more viable. For a better example what I'd personally consider a successful internal rebalance of a class, consider Quinggong. The Quinggong Monk is more or less considered the addition that made monks playable and that archetype was added in Ultimate Magic.Also, unless I'm mistaken, the ninja class is pretty universally considered to be a better rogue than the rogue. Also, they put all their core content online for free, so it's not like the player would necessarily have to buy a new book to... eh I could go on but it's beside the point.

It's a really bad example, but I can understand his position. It's a fear of obsoleting past material, which makes sense when the desire to use past material is why many people picked up Pathfinder.

Kudaku

2014-02-08, 09:38 PM

Also, unless I'm mistaken, the ninja class is pretty universally considered to be a better rogue than the rogue.

You could argue that the ninja is to the rogue as the quinggong monk is to the CRB Monk...

I think part of the problem is that most people see the ninja as a separate class, while the Quinggong improves the monk from the inside.

Well, that and the (implied) Asian flavor of the ninja compared to the western flavor the rogue has. It gets some of the same hatred the monk does.

Vanitas

2014-02-08, 10:36 PM

Agreed.

IIRC, in older editions bonus hit points per level from Constitution was capped at +2 for non-warriors, and bonus hit points from hit die stopped around level 9. It's part of what made hit points (and small bonuses to-hit and damage and AC and whatnot) a much more meaningful resource. I hope they bring it back in 5E.

That's pretty much it, yeah. I don't think it's coming back in 5e, unfortunatelly.
5e is going to be very different from the playtest for me to stop playing Pathfinder. Hell, it would have to be basically "Pathfinder, but very well balanced" for me to even think about switching.

grarrrg

2014-02-08, 10:51 PM

You could argue that the ninja is to the rogue as the quinggong monk is to the CRB Monk...

I think part of the problem is that most people see the ninja as a separate class, while the Quinggong improves the monk from the inside.

Well, that and the (implied) Asian flavor of the ninja compared to the western flavor the rogue has. It gets some of the same hatred the monk does.

Ninja + Trap Finder (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/campaign-traits/mummy-s-mask/trap-finder) trait....yeah...

Although there are some interesting Rogue archetypes that trade away Trapfinding (and are thus not valid for a Ninja to take).

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-08, 11:06 PM

Ninja + Trap Finder (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/traits/campaign-traits/mummy-s-mask/trap-finder) trait....yeah...Why is that even a thing?

grarrrg

2014-02-08, 11:14 PM

Why is that even a thing?

Cause PF hates Rogues too?

Seerow

2014-02-08, 11:16 PM

Cause PF hates Rogues too?

Honestly giving out trap finding is the least rogue hating thing PF has done to rogues.

Making trap finding a class restricted thing was a dumb idea to begin with in a game where you are supposed to be going into dungeons and dealing with deadly traps.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-08, 11:33 PM

Seerow

2014-02-08, 11:35 PM

The thing is... it had become the only niche the rogue had left save for a few class archetypes.

Yes, so go back and start complaining about how the rogue had nothing but trapfinding. Trapfinding is a godawful niche to have, and shouldn't have been niche protected in the first place.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-08, 11:37 PM

Yes, so go back and start complaining about how the rogue had nothing but trapfinding. Trapfinding is a godawful niche to have, and shouldn't have been niche protected in the first place.I'd rather complain that it has one thing, than that it has nothing. I'm not really mad about the rogue being bad, as much as I am disappointed that I can't find a reason to recommend for someone to play the rogue.

Seerow

2014-02-08, 11:45 PM

I'd rather complain that it has one thing, than that it has nothing. I'm not really mad about the rogue being bad, as much as I am disappointed that I can't find a reason to recommend for someone to play the rogue.

You're really overreacting here. I despise most of what Paizo has done to the game, but even I can't work up any sort of outrage over Trapfinding becoming available to non-rogues. It's just not a thing. Even when it was rogue exclusive, nobody cared. Without a rogue, either your DM ran a lot of traps and you used other methods to get around them (like cheap/free magical minions), or your DM said "Oh you don't have a rogue" and didn't use traps often, if at all. In either case having a Rogue in the party adds very little.

The rogue deserves nice things. If making Trap Finding available to others makes people suddenly realize the Rogue doesn't have anything worth noting, then I consider them taking Trap Finding away to be a net positive, because maybe it will convince people that Rogues need to be improved. (or, of course, people can get the wrong message and cry about other classes getting trapfinding and fail to address the real problem. That is a thing too)

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-08, 11:50 PM

You're really overreacting here. I despise most of what Paizo has done to the game, but even I can't work up any sort of outrage over Trapfinding becoming available to non-rogues. It's just not a thing. Even when it was rogue exclusive, nobody cared. Without a rogue, either your DM ran a lot of traps and you used other methods to get around them (like cheap/free magical minions), or your DM said "Oh you don't have a rogue" and didn't use traps often, if at all. In either case having a Rogue in the party adds very little.

The rogue deserves nice things. If making Trap Finding available to others makes people suddenly realize the Rogue doesn't have anything worth noting, then I consider them taking Trap Finding away to be a net positive, because maybe it will convince people that Rogues need to be improved. (or, of course, people can get the wrong message and cry about other classes getting trapfinding and fail to address the real problem. That is a thing too)I would hope your long term vision of people addressing the problem comes through, as it would make me very happy. I'm still disappointed that it ever came got to this point.

Kudaku

2014-02-09, 12:00 AM

Why is that even a thing?

First of all it should be noted that Trap Finder is a campaign trait for Mummy's Tomb, and thus isn't intended to be available outside of that storyline - presumably that AP will have a large amount of traps from the start and the writers don't want to force people to play a rogue. To the best of my knowledge only three archetypes offer Trap Finder as a class feature (urban ranger, cryptbreaker alchemist, archaeologist bard), and two of those do not come online at level 1.

Secondly, I'd argue that trait is actually a boon for rogues - I wish it was a general trait instead of a campaign trait and houseruled it as such for my home games. The more characters that have the option to deal with traps, the larger the chance that the adventure writer (professional or otherwise) will include traps in the storyline. If more APs and campaigns include traps then the rogue's niche becomes more viable.

Finally, I don't like the idea of a niche being so sharply limited - apart from three (?) archetypes, the rogue is the only class in the game that can use the disable device skill to counter magical traps.

All that said, I do think the rogue desperately needs better options to be competitive and I'm holding out hope that the upcoming ACG will offer those improvements. A series of rogue talents that pick up Improved & Greater feint and reduces the action cost for feinting to a swift action, for instance.

Seerow

2014-02-09, 12:06 AM

Personally, ever since I found out that the Ravenloft 3.5 book exists, I've felt that the Rogue should get the Lightbringer ACF as a free feature (ie get to deal half sneak attack damage even against enemies immune to sneak attack).

I'd also like to see some of the stuff from Complete Scoundrel rolled in. Skill Tricks and Luck Feats particularly are two things out of that book I love that could become rogue features, emphasizing his roguishness and make the rogue more generally useful.

Vanitas

2014-02-09, 12:11 AM

Kudaku

2014-02-09, 12:14 AM

There are only a few things that the PF rogue can't deal sneak attack damage to though - off the top of my head that's swarms, ooze, and elementals. Incorporeal undead are immune by default, but ghost touch weapons allow sneak attacks as normal.

Granted when those enemies show up it sucks to be a rogue, but unless you're playing an unusual campaign I can't really imagine those monsters dominating the enemy play roster.

Nihilarian

2014-02-09, 12:17 AM

Why is that even a thing?Because Paizo hates rogues, just like every other non-spellcaster.
Scout archetype is the only reason.Funny thing, Ninja qualifies to take Scout as well.

That said, there are a few archetypes that are decent. Probably not worth losing easy access to swift action invisibility, but it's there. In particular, I like the Half-Orc racial archetype.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-09, 12:47 AM

grarrrg

2014-02-09, 01:13 AM

To the best of my knowledge only three archetypes offer Trap Finder as a class feature (urban ranger, cryptbreaker alchemist, archaeologist bard), and two of those do not come online at level 1.

Dipping Guide (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=12613046#post12613046)
3rd Post

Trapfinding (anything with "Disarm Magical Traps")
Alchemist 1A (Crypt Breaker)
Alchemist 2A (Trap Breaker)
Bard 1A (Sandman)
Bard 2A (multiple archetypes)
Oracle 1A (Seeker)
Ranger 1A (Trapper), or 3A (Urban Ranger)
Rogue 1
Sorcerer 1A (Seeker)

Aspis Agent 1
Balanced Scale of Abadar 1, only Temporarily disables Magic traps
Brother of the Seal 2
Cyphermage 1?, Can only detect "writing" based traps, can detect them with Perception or Knowledge (Arcana), can disable them with Disable Device or Spellcraft
Field Agent 1, optional (can also be taken at 3, 6 or 9)
Pathfinder Delver 1

5 Archetypes at level 1 (ignoring Rogue), another 4 archetypes at level 2, and 1 at level 3.

Scout archetype is the only reason.

Scout working for Ninja notwithstanding...
A Skulking Slayer (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/races/core-races/half-orc/skulking-slayer-rogue-half-orc) Scout is downright hilarious! GROK SNEAK ATTACK!!!!

Rake (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/rogue/archetypes/paizo---rogue-archetypes/rake) and Thug (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/rogue/archetypes/paizo---rogue-archetypes/thug) both provide decent bonuses to Intimidate builds (although Thug really only needs a 1 level dip, and Rake can get by with a 1 level dip if you have other sources of Sneak dice).

Sniper (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/rogue/archetypes/paizo---rogue-archetypes/sniper) is nice for...sniping. There is a Ninja Trick that does the same, but you have to select it multiple times, whereas Sniper gets the same effect "free" every 3 levels.

Kudaku

2014-02-09, 01:13 AM

I don't think that swarms are actually immune to sneak attack damage, just weapon damage.

Swarms are only immune to weapon damage if the individual creatures making up the swarm are Fine or Diminutive - if the creatures are tiny or larger they instead take half damage from weapon attacks. For instance a bat swarm (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/animals/bat/bat-swarm) is immune to weapon damage, a rat swarm (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/animals/rat/rat-swarm) is not.

It's one of those finaggly little rules it's easy to forget - I only thought of this because I ran into a swarm encounter last week.

Edit:
Dipping Guide (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=12613046#post12613046)
3rd Post

Bookmarked, cheers! :smallsmile:

Drachasor

2014-02-09, 05:15 AM

A Wildshape Ranger is still a Ranger and a Sacred Servant Paladin is still a Paladin. You said "PF Paladin isn't T3," not "Base PF Paladin isn't T3." I happen to agree that a paladin without archetypes doesn't go above T4.

When people talk about the Ranger not being T3 they mean the class in general. A specific exception exists which is not what people mean when just talking about the Ranger. I don't see why the Paladin is any different.

But sure, there might be archetypes that up a class to T3 status.

For Sacred Servant, they seem to hit T1 status by level 16 most definitely. Free Planar Allies without having to pay any cost. So that's two Planetars out at once basically with the 1 day/level duration. And they can prepare different spells that way too. This possibly hits at 12th or 8th level, but you'd really have to go and look at all the monsters. Given the vast number of outsiders though, this does seem likely. I don't think they hit T3 before that though, unless there's some crazy domain power they can pick up.

georgie_leech

2014-02-09, 05:22 AM

I think the biggest problem is actually HP bloat. You get to a point where damage simply isn't the best option in combat. This happens in 4e, even - many encounters are simply over because everyone has used everything they had, but the monster stays around to be killed by at-will spam, simply because it had too much HP.
With less HP, everything becomes more important. An extra attack usually meant another dead enemy. Weapon damage was actually relevant in levels other than the 1st. I think a red dragon has something like 92 hp in AD&D. Monsters have 400~500 hp in 3rd and 4th edition.

Quibble: Monsters from MM3 onward generally have more damage with slightly lower defences resulting in quicker battles. For what it's worth, the games I've run/play in rarely result in at-will "spam" unless players nova early in the adventuring day, or the Striker has been optimised well below average for the group.

Person_Man

2014-02-09, 06:39 PM

Honestly giving out trap finding is the least rogue hating thing PF has done to rogues.

Making trap finding a class restricted thing was a dumb idea to begin with in a game where you are supposed to be going into dungeons and dealing with deadly traps.

So back in yee old 1st/2nd edition, the Thief/Rogue and their subclasses were the only ones with access to Open Locks, Hide, Move Silently, Find Traps, and probably a few other things I'm forgetting. They were class abilities. It was their thing, and only their thing. It's why someone would play a Rogue. He was actually really valuable.

The benefit of Find Traps was that it found traps automatically. But if you failed your roll (which happened a lot - your success chance started out pretty low), you could still find and disarm traps with observation and logic. Your DM would describe a room to you. You would poke things with a 10 foot pole. Carefully open doors (or bash them to avoid touching the lock). Navigate the different tiles on the floor based on the pictograms encribed in them. And so on. Go back and reread some of the old Gygax modules. For a while, the logic puzzle of traps was half the game.

Seerow

2014-02-09, 07:16 PM

So back in yee old 1st/2nd edition, the Thief/Rogue and their subclasses were the only ones with access to Open Locks, Hide, Move Silently, Find Traps, and probably a few other things I'm forgetting. They were class abilities. It was their thing, and only their thing. It's why someone would play a Rogue. He was actually really valuable.

Except anyone could hide. They just had to MTP the DM into accepting that you were hiding. Because if you lock yourself in a closet and someone walks into the room and is instantly aware of you, because you are not a rogue, players will throw a fit. Similarly, as you described below, anyone could find traps. They just had to MTP out looking for the trap. Open Locks was a harder one to replicate, but just about everything a rogue could do, anyone else could do either via magic tea party or "roll a d20 get under your stat" (which was typically higher chance than the rogue's skills until very high level anyway).

Skills have always been a dumb niche to protect, and trapfinding worse than most.

But if you failed your roll (which happened a lot - your success chance started out pretty low), you could still find and disarm traps with observation and logic. Your DM would describe a room to you. You would poke things with a 10 foot pole. Carefully open doors (or bash them to avoid touching the lock). Navigate the different tiles on the floor based on the pictograms encribed in them. And so on. Go back and reread some of the old Gygax modules. For a while, the logic puzzle of traps was half the game.

I played games in that style a long time ago (I got started on AD&D). I hated it because as soon as it became clear the DM was willing to use traps, the whole game slowed down to go through the routine of checking every possible square for every possible kind of trap we could think of, and then getting screwed and killed by a trap anyway because the DM thought of something our routines wouldn't catch.

Glad that style of game is gone.

Psyren

2014-02-09, 07:27 PM

Spuddles

2014-02-09, 07:57 PM

I suspect it isn't so much a deliberate design decision as much as paizo overestimating the value of full BAB. Same thing happened with 3.5 core, and I haven't seen any indication of Paizo actually looking at what happens when the casters do things other than blast.

Seriously? Most of the control spells were seriously nerfed. Web isnt autowin at level 3; black tentacles is more in line with a fighter of the wizard's level, etc.

Irrelevant as 3.5 Divine Power was referenced.

The trend seems to be like this but even 3/4 bab classes are shafted if they don't have "real" spellcasting (like Magus/Summoner) although in DnD are a few no spell 3/4 bab classes on Tier 3 (Swordsage/Totemist etc)

With very few exceptions, most things are shafted if they dont have real spellcasting in dnd.

So Warblades are T3 because they have 4+Int skills and their list includes diplomacy?

Yep, basically. I feel that a PF paladin is T3. If it had 2 more skill points per levl, it'd basically be a crusader and everyone would agree it's t3.

Lord_Gareth

2014-02-09, 08:00 PM

Yep, basically. I feel that a PF paladin is T3. If it had 2 more skill points per levl, it'd basically be a crusader and everyone would agree it's t3.

To the people who keep saying this - what does the paladin do in fights that involve non-evil enemies? Like, seriously?

Seerow

2014-02-09, 08:10 PM

To the people who keep saying this - what does the paladin do in fights that involve non-evil enemies? Like, seriously?

He takes the Moral Highground Feat

Moral Highground
Prerequisite: Smite Evil, Stick-Up-Your-Butt Class feature (Read: Paladin Code of Conduct)
Benefit: Your righteousness unparalleled, and you know you are always in the right regardless of what you do. Your Smite Evil ability may now be used on any creature, regardless of their actual alignment.

Psyren

2014-02-09, 08:11 PM

To reiterate for the umpteenth time, PF Paladins - without archetypes - are solidly T4.

Yawgmoth

2014-02-09, 08:16 PM

He takes the Moral Highground Feat

Moral Highground
Prerequisite: Smite Evil, Stick-Up-Your-Butt Class feature (Read: Paladin Code of Conduct)
Benefit: Your righteousness unparalleled, and you know you are always in the right regardless of what you do. Your Smite Evil ability may now be used on any creature, regardless of their actual alignment.This could never be an actual PF feat because it would actually benefit a melee character.

Nihilarian

2014-02-09, 08:17 PM

To the people who keep saying this - what does the paladin do in fights that involve non-evil enemies? Like, seriously?Charge attacks and archery can still deal good damage, Lay on Hands still function fine and not all spells on the Paladin list require an evil person to target. They're also still obscenely tough.

grarrrg

2014-02-09, 08:23 PM

This could never be an actual PF feat because it would actually benefit a melee character.

It's "OK" because they have spell casting.
Yeah, that's the ticket, spell casting, yeah...

chaos_redefined

2014-02-09, 08:46 PM

Seriously? Most of the control spells were seriously nerfed. Web isnt autowin at level 3; black tentacles is more in line with a fighter of the wizard's level, etc.

They were aware of what happened in 3.5. And then they put some nerfs in, and then ignored any evidence that this was insufficient.

charcoalninja

2014-02-09, 08:48 PM

To the people who keep saying this - what does the paladin do in fights that involve non-evil enemies? Like, seriously?

Let's see. We'll take one of my favourite Paladins, an Archerdin. And we'll have him at level 7 so we don't have the Sacred Servant Archtype owning everything. Elite array 16, 14, 14, 13, 10, 8

S - 16
C - 14 (level bonus in CON)
D - 16
I - 10
W - 8
Cha - 14

We'll make him human for kicks. The one I played was an elf, so I changed a few things. The +2 anywhere in human goes to Dex.

Feats:
1) Point Blank Shot
1B) Precise Shot
3) Rapid Shot
5) Power Attack
7) Extra Lay on Hands (I usually use this one because I take the Oath of Vengence archtype and sacred servant so I can burn Lay on Hands attempts to fuel more Smites.) Otherwise Craft Wonderous Item is good, but we can go with Furious Focus as well.

Favoured Class bonus goes to skills giving us 4 skillpoints per level. They go in Spellcraft, Diplomacy, Knowledge Religion and Stealth.

Against a non evil enemy he can:
A) talk to them and use diplomacy to come to a reasonable solution.
B) Stealth around them at +10 to stealth before any WBL additions
C) Or he shoots his arrows at: +7BAB+3DEX+1enhancement+1PBS-2Rapidshot = +10/+10/+5/+5 dealing 1d8+4 damage per arrow. If he has any Bane arrows he's up to +12/+12/+7/+7 for 1d8+6+2d6 damage per hit.
Divine Favor puts him at: +14/+14/+9/+9 for 1d8+8+2d6 damage per hit.
Bracers of Archery Lesser put him at: +15/+15/+10/+10

One spell down, and vastly below WBL and he hits a Remorraz, the first non evil CR 7 baddie I could find on a 5 or higher for 2 attacks, and an 10 or higher on the second, I don't know what that amounts to via the math but I don't think that's terrible.

So he has a respectable archery routine, or he could do the whole melee thing:

BAB+7+3STR+1enhancement+2Divine Favour-2Power Attack = +11/+6 for 2d6+4(STR)+1(ENH)+2DF+6PA=2d6+13 per attack. If he flanks he's up to +13/+8 which means he hits the Remoraz on a 7 or higher on his first attack and a 12 or higher on his second. Only 2 points off his archery numbers, he's no barbarian but I wouldn't say that's a terrible attack routine.

He can also in this hypothetical fight:

Tank! for reals - Compel Hostility lasts 7 rounds and forces will saves to attack anyone but him.

Heal! - Lay on Hands 7/day for 3d6 damage curing Fatigue and Disease (utility out of combat too!) for straight up combat use take Dazed. Once combat ends he uses wands of cure light wounds to patch everyone up.

Buff! - Divine Favour gives a +2 luck bonus to hit and damage, can cast it on other buddies for more fun. Bestow Grace gives someone their CHA bonus to saves, great for party Battle Oracle or Sorcerer. Shield Other takes half someone's damage. Bless gives the whole party a +1 to hit. Bulls Strength could be used if someone decided not to buy a +STR item. Righteous Vengeance gives him additional combat bonuses.

Pearls of Power are pretty economical so having a few around to make better use of your spell list is pretty rockin. And that's just scratching the surface of the Spell List.

How many different things does a Paladin have to do well in order to qualify? Because he's got a craptonne of things to do here IMO.

inertia709

2014-02-10, 12:46 AM

The Holy Warrior cleric variant sacrifices domains for full BAB and d10 HD, so that's one example of a Tier 1 with full BAB.

Nihilarian

2014-02-10, 01:21 AM

The Holy Warrior cleric variant sacrifices domains for full BAB and d10 HD, so that's one example of a Tier 1 with full BAB.Where is this?

avr

2014-02-10, 02:09 AM

Where is this?
Nowhere in PF. The D&D version doesn't have the effect suggested either.

Vanitas

2014-02-10, 02:17 AM

Nowhere in PF. The D&D version doesn't have the effect suggested either.

Actually, it's from Pathfinder Chronicles Campaign Setting. You lose domain powers but get full bab and d10 Hit Die.

Psyren

2014-02-10, 02:33 AM

Actually, it's from Pathfinder Chronicles Campaign Setting. You lose domain powers but get full bab and d10 Hit Die.

Note that, despite the name, this book isn't actually a Pathfinder RPG book. Rather, it's a 3.5 book for the Pathfinder setting itself (back when Pathfinder was simply a set of 3rd-party materials for 3.5) before they went and spun Pathfinder off into its own game.

For instance, note that PCCS came out a year before the CRB's first printing, and that it includes fluff for things like psionics in Golarion that haven't made it to the Pathfinder RPG yet.

PCCS was updated and superseded by ISWG.

Person_Man

2014-02-10, 09:29 AM

Except anyone could hide. They just had to MTP the DM into accepting that you were hiding. Because if you lock yourself in a closet and someone walks into the room and is instantly aware of you, because you are not a rogue, players will throw a fit. Similarly, as you described below, anyone could find traps. They just had to MTP out looking for the trap. Open Locks was a harder one to replicate, but just about everything a rogue could do, anyone else could do either via magic tea party or "roll a d20 get under your stat" (which was typically higher chance than the rogue's skills until very high level anyway).

Skills have always been a dumb niche to protect, and trapfinding worse than most.

So I'm not sure if Skills are a worthwhile niche that should be protected for certain classes or not.

But (purely out of nostalgia) I'm going to to defend my childhood gaming experiences for a moment - I think that having traps that anyone could find and disarm through observation and reason while also having 1-ish "Skills" class was really fun.

In an ideally constructed dungeon, you had multiple paths to achieve each step along the path to your goal. Path A might have monsters, Path B might have a trap, Path C might involve finding a secret door hidden behind a book case (which wasn't a cliche when I was 12 years old - or at least I wasn't aware of it), and so on. If you had a Skills class with you, you had more options, because he could use Stealth and Pick Pockets (ie, get keys or passwords or treasure from enemies), and could find some Traps without the danger of accidentally tripping them. Skills were a very valuable resource that helped you protect your other resources - hit points, spells, and limited use treasure (potions, scrolls, etc). But if you didn't have a Skills guy, you could still get through any of the paths, you just had to be very smart/lucky, or you had to spend some of your other resources. Your goal wasn't to "clear" every part of the dungeon. Your goal was to get through it, do whatever you needed to do for the campaign (find the McGuffin, slay the boss enemy, rescue the princess, etc), and get out.

I think this play style is dramatically better then the default 3.0/3.5/PF play style I usually see related to traps, where they are found by 1 dice roll, disarmed with 1 dice roll, and if you fail you take some inconsequential hit point damage (because hit points are bloated and healing is very easy to come by). Seriously, why even go to the trouble of putting traps in your dungeon at all and taking the time to describe them if each of them takes just two die rolls and 30 seconds of game play to resolve?

Having said that, I think that there is a superior third way that has evolved over time. Make traps more consequential. Include multiple steps in the finding and disarming process. Have observation and logic grant bonuses (or penalties) without being completely determinative on the Perception/Disable Device checks. Include some traps in combat, where the hit point damage is meaningful. Have traps that destroy treasure, so disarming them grants a real reward. Have traps that kill NPCs (that PCs want to keep alive) or otherwise effect the plot. Have traps that act as alarm systems, which changes the nature of combat. And so on.

My current gaming preference is to use the hybrid/consequential method I just described. But given the choice between old school D&D and the default "roll Search then Disable Device and then move on" options, I'll choose old school any day of the week.

And now back to the topic at hand...

Note that, despite the name, this book isn't actually a Pathfinder RPG book. Rather, it's a 3.5 book for the Pathfinder setting itself (back when Pathfinder was simply a set of 3rd-party materials for 3.5) before they went and spun Pathfinder off into its own game.

For instance, note that PCCS came out a year before the CRB's first printing, and that it includes fluff for things like psionics in Golarion that haven't made it to the Pathfinder RPG yet.

PCCS was updated and superseded by ISWG.

Yeah, but it's a tacit admission (by at least one writer) that going from 3/4 to full BAB is roughly equal to giving up Domains. I personally think that it's a terrible idea to give Tier 1 classes access to full BAB. But just looking at how valuable Domains are in 3.5 and comparing it to full BAB, I could see why it could be seen as a logical tradeoff.

Interestingly enough, I've posted this thread over on the Pathfinder forum as well. And while there are clearly a lot of smart people with good comments, the general conversation has quickly turned into an argument about Tiers and whether or not any ranking system should exist at all. I find that fascinating. I mean, it's one thing to say that full BAB is worth X amount or Y amount or should be worth Z amount, or that the Tier system is bogus and we should use the Niche ranking system or some other system. It's another thing entirely to say that things shouldn't be categorized at all while at the same time not departing too far from previously established classes in substance or fluff.

Drachasor

2014-02-10, 10:07 AM

So I'm not sure if Skills are a worthwhile niche that should be protected for certain classes or not.

They aren't. But something like skill tricks or other special abilities that use a skill seems like something that it is good to be special to some classes. Similarly to how martials should have special things they can do with a weapon that BAB doesn't cover.

Interestingly enough, I've posted this thread over on the Pathfinder forum as well. And while there are clearly a lot of smart people with good comments, the general conversation has quickly turned into an argument about Tiers and whether or not any ranking system should exist at all. I find that fascinating. I mean, it's one thing to say that full BAB is worth X amount or Y amount or should be worth Z amount, or that the Tier system is bogus and we should use the Niche ranking system or some other system. It's another thing entirely to say that things shouldn't be categorized at all while at the same time not departing too far from previously established classes in substance or fluff.

In my experience, it is very difficult to get any sensible discussion about rule balance or the like on the official PF forums. I think this is because PF is marketed at the more reactionary D&D elements of 3.5, and caters to people that dislike balance examinations, TO, looking for rules problems, and so forth.

Psyren

2014-02-10, 10:35 AM

Yeah, but it's a tacit admission (by at least one writer) that going from 3/4 to full BAB is roughly equal to giving up Domains. I personally think that it's a terrible idea to give Tier 1 classes access to full BAB. But just looking at how valuable Domains are in 3.5 and comparing it to full BAB, I could see why it could be seen as a logical tradeoff.

That would probably be JB or JJ, both have dev credit on that book.

I doubt they thought it through to that extent. Instead they were probably just thinking "Let's have a martial cleric. But they still need to heal so lets not take all their spells away. How about we just strip the domains out instead?" i.e. the typical tunnel vision mistake of forgetting that the cleric list can and frequently does way more than heal, and that even without domains, domain slots and domain powers they would still be one of the most powerful spellcasters in the game. The fact that they did not repeat this mistake in PF proper - even with the advent of archetypes where they could strip even more out of the class like its ability to channel - indicates to me that they sat down and said "wtf were we thinking?"

Interestingly enough, I've posted this thread over on the Pathfinder forum as well. And while there are clearly a lot of smart people with good comments, the general conversation has quickly turned into an argument about Tiers and whether or not any ranking system should exist at all. I find that fascinating. I mean, it's one thing to say that full BAB is worth X amount or Y amount or should be worth Z amount, or that the Tier system is bogus and we should use the Niche ranking system or some other system. It's another thing entirely to say that things shouldn't be categorized at all while at the same time not departing too far from previously established classes in substance or fluff.

What's fascinating about it? You should know that threads about tiers are responded to with at least distrust over there by now. The perception is that folks who care about them are concerned with power over just playing the game. I happen to disagree with that and think the system is a valuable tool to be aware of at all levels of play - a starting point - but the attitude/reaction towards it that you're seeing shouldn't be anything new to you.

Seerow

2014-02-10, 11:36 AM

But (purely out of nostalgia) I'm going to to defend my childhood gaming experiences for a moment - I think that having traps that anyone could find and disarm through observation and reason while also having 1-ish "Skills" class was really fun.

Look, I can get the nostalgia. When I was 8-12, playing with a group of kids my own age, that was more or less how things worked.

But what I described is how things worked when people started getting older and savvier, and wanting to keep their characters alive. Especially if the DM wasn't so kind as providing "The monster hallway" and "The trap hallway" as you describe.

A median approach would be a really high chance of knowing a trap is nearby, and then fiddle around until the group figures out how to disable it. But it's still going to end up being highly dependent on DM and player attitudes and will generally boil down to players coming up with their list of things to try, and the DM trying to do things not on that list to try to shake things up. And then it's all much simpler to just use Summon Monster 1, or the small elemental reserve feat, to just set off the trap from a safe distance and move on.

I agree with you that the current method of traps is mostly inconsequential, but the old way of doing things isn't just inconsequential, it was an active disruption to the game, and that's my problem with it.

Personally, I like a lot of the trap advice in Dungeonscape. It acknowledges that random traps that just drain resources are generally bad design, and traps should be placed in places where they will matter. You have a nasty trap on the front door to keep low level people who shouldn't be there out, but don't expect it to deal with the party. If you have random traps, have monsters nearby ready to ambush the players when the trap goes off, to take advantage of their weakened state before they can heal it off. Have traps in rooms with monsters who know it's there to take advantage of it (either to maneuver enemies into the trap, or to activate it themselves in the case of a buffing magical trap). (at low levels) Have the BBEG with a secret passage out and have the passage trapped, so when he decides to make a getaway, he runs through the passage, activates the trap, and the PCs have to either waste time dealing with the trap (letting him get away) or run through the trap right after what should have been a rough encounter, making them much more threatening than normal (and still looking forward to a fight on the other end). And this is ignoring the new encounter traps there (which are pretty hit and miss on design, and can explicitly be beaten by stabbing the trap to death).

That said, I would be interested in seeing a redesign of the trap rules that in general made them more interesting to deal with. Even just having multiple rolls to me seems pretty boring, but I have no idea how to make them more interesting without turning it into a clone of the combat minigame (ie traps have HP, and each disable roll deals X damage to the trap. Each round you are working on the trap the rogue gains X fatigue, if that exceeds his hit points the trap defeats him. Or something along those lines)

Psyren

2014-02-10, 01:01 PM

There are ways to make traps more interesting but still use skill rolls; it just takes a little creativity. For example, I could have a massive trap-filled room with a switchboard panel and some monsters, set up in such a way that if the traps are ignored they could cause a lot of problems for the PCs.

I would position the workings of the traps so they can't be totally disabled; rather, the Rogue can affect them by accessing the aforementioned panel, which also happens to be a relatively safe zone from both the traps and the monsters. By rolling successfully. he can suspend their functioning for 1 round per check, and only for one or two of the traps in the room at a time. The rest would continue to function as normal. This introduces a strategic element whereby the rogue needs to cooperate with the party to know the best part of the trap to shut off from round to round.

For example, part of the metatrap could have pit traps open up in random sections of the floor every round (the "missed splash weapon" rules are a good way to randomize this.) This would be combined with monsters that can either fly, walk on walls, or are simply suspended from the ceiling, thus granting them an advantage over the PCs. However, if the party wizard can make everyone fly, the rogue can feel free to leave that trap running and suspend another one instead - say, the arrow slits on the sides of the room that spray poisonous bolts in a regular pattern each round.

On failed rolls, every trap in the room would be active for that round. Conversely, I can grant boons for particularly high disable rolls - say, if the rogue beats the DC by 10 or more, he can suspend a given part of the trap for 2 rounds instead of one, or retarget a certain trap to hit the monsters while avoiding his allies for 1 round. Using the pit traps again, I could have a good roll allow him to choose which panels will open up, or with the dart traps, I could let him change the pattern of the dart volley such that it targets the enemies and opens up wider safe zones for his allies to stand in.

This setup also fosters roleplay opportunities. It's not often that the rogue is in a position of power over the other members of the party, or that they place their lives in his hands. Typically while the rogue is out in front scouting, only his own welfare is at risk. Here however, the rogue can selflessly do his best to aid his comrades, or spitefully enact some long-awaited vengeance as he drops the preachy paladin into a pit for a round. You can even throw a few moral dilemmas in - say, activating one panel opens a hidden recess with more treasure in it, but doing so also activates swinging blades out in the main room where the rest of the party is fighting. Now the rogue can decide if he wants to make things more dangerous for the rest of the group in order to acquire more treasure, and even has control over whether he shares this knowledge with the party.

Vanitas

2014-02-10, 04:56 PM

Ssalarn

2014-02-11, 01:07 PM

I'm doing some freelance work on the side. I want the people I write for to like and use what I write, and care about their opinions.

Yeah, having spoken to several currently published Pathfinder writers and lurking a lot on the boards, that was my gut reading of the situation as well, and it's become more and more confirmed as I do research into it. I just can't put my head around exactly why. I'm going to gather more opinions on the matter over on the Paizo and DSP boards, but I'm edging closer and closer to just not writing full BAB classes. Or if I do write them, making them as directly comparable to the high Tier 4/low Tier 3 Paladin as possible (in terms of number of Skills, pacing of abilities, rough power level of abilities, etc) so as to avoid controversy.

The really bonkers thing, is that if I built a class like the Magus, whose Spell Combat and auto-buffs give him the functional equivalent of full BAB, no one would bat an eye. But if the class has that full BAB chassis, it instantly has to follow Fighter progression. It's bonkers. Fighters are cool because they have an ass-load of feats. If I made a melee class with 3/4 BAB, auto-enhancing abilities that boost my attack by +5 and give me an additional attack with my chosen weapon plus a limited spell list, it would be better than the Fighter and no one would bat an eye. In fact, I pretty much just decribed the Magus, Inquisitor, and Bard. There is something about full BAB that tweaks with people's perception of balance at a primal level.

I can go in mathematically and show how an Inquisitor, Magus, or Bard is better on every front, but it's not a big deal because the Fighter's full BAB clearly means he's better at Fighting. If I make a full BAB class whose primary focus is on increasing the value of his hits over the accuracy, putting him mathematically in the exact same place as an Inquisitor, I've crossed a line. I just don't get it.

@Person_Man

Stick with 3/4 classes who boost up to effective full BAB. Your life will be easier.

subject42

2014-02-11, 01:26 PM

I can go in mathematically and show how an Inquisitor, Magus, or Bard is better on every front, but it's not a big deal because the Fighter's full BAB clearly means he's better at Fighting. If I make a full BAB class whose primary focus is on increasing the value of his hits over the accuracy, putting him mathematically in the exact same place as an Inquisitor, I've crossed a line. I just don't get it.

It's even more interesting when you look at what DSP and Paizo have done with the Psywar or the Monk, where they have 3/4ths BAB, but can qualify for some feats as if their BAB were equal to their levels. On top of that, most psywar variants even get a to-hit bonus that effectively gives them full BAB.

Now I'm interested. How much would the fighter change, capability-wise, if it has 3/4ths BAB, but an additional +X to hit that provides virtually full BAB on top of the small bonuses from weapon training, and could qualify for a subset of combat feats as if it had full BAB?

Ssalarn

2014-02-11, 01:36 PM

Now I'm interested. How much would the fighter change, capability-wise, if it has 3/4ths BAB, but an additional +X to hit that provides virtually full BAB on top of the small bonuses from weapon training, and could qualify for a subset of combat feats as if it had full BAB?

Not at all. That's the thing. There is an over-valuation of what full BAB is actually worth. If full BAB were worth as much as it's being posited to, than the NPC Warrior class would virtually interchangeable with a Fighter (it's not). The Ranger, Paladin, and Cavalier would also be super OP, because they have full BAB and much better abilities than the Fighter (they're not).

And that's the thing. There is this very strange mindset about how "magical" a class with full BAB is allowed to be. If I create a Ranger archetype who gets UMD and trades out some of his situational abilities for a focus ability that allows him to boost his skill checks, there's no worries. But, if I make a class with the same chassis as the Ranger, and instead of giving him UMD and skill boosts I give him the ability to prepare a limited number of magical constructs that allow him to simulate a narrow margin of spell-like effects with the same action economy as UMD and magically boost his skills through a similar manner, I've stepped over a line.

This isn't hypothetical either, this is happening right now. It just boggles the mind a bit. I could lower the Daevic's BAB to 3/4, boost his class granted to-hit values, and no one would bat an eye. I don't want to do that, but it's a place I'm coming very close to going just to resolve this problem of perception.

subject42

2014-02-11, 01:43 PM

Not at all. That's the thing. There is an over-valuation of what full BAB is actually worth. If full BAB were worth as much as it's being posited to, than the NPC Warrior class would virtually interchangeable with a Fighter (it's not).

Interesting, I would have expected it to be highly dependent on which feats the class would be qualify for based on level, rather than BAB. Thanks.

This isn't hypothetical either, this is happening right now. It just boggles the mind a bit. I could lower the Daevic's BAB to 3/4, boost his class granted to-hit values, and no one would bat an eye. I don't want to do that, but it's a place I'm coming very close to going just to resolve this problem of perception.

From a mechanics perspective, I rather like the idea of every class having 3/4ths BAB and two good saves. It gets rid of a lot of balancing variables that way. Other than making it full BAB on principle, why wouldn't you use 3/4ths + bonuses?

Person_Man

2014-02-11, 01:47 PM

Seerow

2014-02-11, 01:57 PM

So clearly there are a variety of viewpoints, especially over on the Pathfinder mirror thread (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qoa2&page=4?Pathfinder-Classes-Full-BAB-Tier-4). I'd like to know how many people fall into each camp, so I've made a survey.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/2Y2QTGG

Feel free to share it with anyone you know who plays Pathfinder.

Please share the results.

I'm interested to see how many already existing full BAB classes shouldn't exist at all when a bunch of Paizo players forget things like "The Paladin exists" and don't select healing as something the full BAB class should be able to do.

Edit: Holy crap that paizo thread. "The only reason one class is better then another in a game are because people decide to order them after all. Then to complain that one is on top and the other on the bottom. Obviously somethings are going to be on the bottom if you decide to place them in an order."

Ssalarn

2014-02-11, 02:04 PM

Interesting, I would have expected it to be highly dependent on which feats the class would be qualify for based on level, rather than BAB. Thanks.

From a mechanics perspective, I rather like the idea of every class having 3/4ths BAB and two good saves. It gets rid of a lot of balancing variables that way. Other than making it full BAB on principle, why wouldn't you use 3/4ths + bonuses?

Honestly? Because there's a lot of classes that do that already, and I don't have to make up abilities to allow a class to use feats it should be able to use if I just give it full BAB :P

The Fighter is an example of an archaic design paradigm. When Paizo took over the OGL, they had to maintain the integrity of the classes they were assuming, so they basically just piled additional stuff on to the existing classes to get rid of things like dead levels. For a lot of classes, this was great. For a class like the Fighter, it was just a bad-aid on a gaping wound and a stout kick in the teeth. The Fighter 2+Int skills. Every other class with 2+Int skills has access to spells that give effective boosts, reliance on an ability mod that is skill relevant, etc. The Fighter has Armor Training, a class ability that actually makes him more MAD to be of use. A raise in the Max Dex cap is only useful if you have the Dex to fill it. Bravery is so situational it's almost laughable, and when combined with the Fighter's poor Will, it's almost useless because of how slowly it scales and how small the bonuses are. Unfortunately, all of these things combined to form what would be considered the baseline for a full BAB class going forward. Which, honestly, doesn't make a lot of sense to me considering the fact that the Ranger, Paladin, and Cavalier all have full BAB and so much more utility than the Fighter it isn't even funny. But there you have these weird idiosyncracies that make people think it's okay. "The Paladin has to be Lawful Good!" Not a balancing point. "The Ranger has to be Fighting a Favored Enemy to get his big bonuses!" Instant Enemy don't give a damn. Also, built in Flanking buddy is nearly as good as (if not better than) Weapon Training before you count in his Favored bonuses.

It's all about perception. If the hypothetical Fighter got access to Combat feats with an effective BAB equal to class level, and the scaling on Weapon Training were +9 instead of +4, or if his favored weapon were automatically treated as having an enhancement bonus higher than it's actual on some sort of scale, or whatever, you'd have the same class, but a completely different paradigm of perception. In fact, you'd basically have the Warpriest without any spells or Fervor :P

Person_Man

2014-02-11, 02:04 PM

Edit: Holy crap that paizo thread. "The only reason one class is better then another in a game are because people decide to order them after all. Then to complain that one is on top and the other on the bottom. Obviously somethings are going to be on the bottom if you decide to place them in an order."

The first rule of Tautology Club is the first rule of Tautology Club! (http://xkcd.com/703/)

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-11, 02:10 PM

From a mechanics perspective, I rather like the idea of every class having 3/4ths BAB and two good saves. It gets rid of a lot of balancing variables that way. Other than making it full BAB on principle, why wouldn't you use 3/4ths + bonuses?Full BAB allows for proper combat feat access and easier bookkeeping of your attack bonus compared to the latter.

Spuddles

2014-02-11, 02:29 PM

That paizo thread is such a mess.

I love how the people that say the tier system doesnt exist because you cant compare classes also dont want classes with full bab to get narrative power because then if you were to compare classes they would be unbalanced.

Ssalarn

2014-02-11, 02:30 PM

Full BAB allows for proper combat feat access and easier bookkeeping of your attack bonus compared to the latter.

Very much this. Why go through a lot of obnoxious variables when the table result is that I will always be doing this thing that gives me a boost anyways? Why not just use the existing framework to put a class right where it should from character creation on?

That paizo thread is such a mess.

I love how the people that say the tier system doesnt exist because you cant compare classes also dont want classes with full bab to get narrative power because then if you were to compare classes they would be unbalanced.

It's the circle of "I don't want to ackowledge your thing because if I do I can't use it implicitly to deny it's existence".

Sigh.......

I also really liked how someone from that thread referred to me as a GitP regular when I've been on the Paizo forums much longer than them and only started chatting with you all leading up to the Dreamscarred Incarna project. Not really here nor there just.... I take issue at "If you're not with me, you're against me!" philosophies. can't we all just get along and have discussions like real human beings?

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-11, 02:47 PM

It's unfortunate that the paizo thread was so quickly derailed into talk of the validity of tiers, instead of talking about the original topic. I wonder if you had simply removed the word "tiers," or didn't use them as shorthand the response would have been any different.

"There are only a few classes in 3.5 that have Full BAB and access to large amount of magic, or EX abilities," or something of that nature, for example.

Lord_Gareth

2014-02-11, 02:48 PM

I posted. (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qoa2&page=4?Pathfinder-Classes-Full-BAB-Tier-4#179)

Now to see if anyone listens.

Seerow

2014-02-11, 02:53 PM

I posted. (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qoa2&page=4?Pathfinder-Classes-Full-BAB-Tier-4#179)

Now to see if anyone listens.

Incoming response: "If you don't like the way classes are being designed, go design your own anime weeaboo fighter, just don't make me read it!"

subject42

2014-02-11, 03:29 PM

Very much this. Why go through a lot of obnoxious variables when the table result is that I will always be doing this thing that gives me a boost anyways? Why not just use the existing framework to put a class right where it should from character creation on?

I'm not necessarily saying that these are good reasons, but I can see two reasons for it.

1) It keeps the reactionary elements happy.

2) A lot of "broken" builds in 3.5 and Pathfinder exist because classes received class features that allowed them to access an unbounded (or loosely bounded) set of abilities.

The first example that comes to my mind is the cleric, who automatically has access to every cleric spell ever published, which meant that the strength and value of the cleric increased over the life of the product. Yes, they were still broken in core, but being able to mine for spells to an arbitrary depth caused even more problems over time.

The second example is the fighter receiving a ton of combat feats, with almost all of them using BAB as their primary access restriction. Near the end of 3.5's life, the large number of available fighter bonus feats led to strange and unexpected synergies that gave birth to builds like the Ubercharger. (Disclaimer: This doesn't make the fighter not terrible overall. It just makes them either powerful enough to trivialize one niche while being useless everywhere else.)

The existence of those unexpected synergies isn't necessarily bad, but when designing a class, it's something to consider.

</devil's advocate>

Suddo

2014-02-11, 03:44 PM

Kudaku

2014-02-11, 04:33 PM

I would like to point out that with the playtest of the Advance Class guide we got to see deeper into the mind of the Pathfinder development team. Full BAB means Paladin Casting at best so no spells until 4th level and such. Combined with Battle Clerics (or whatever they were called) just getting some fighter feats for his 7-9 level spells I have come to believe that BAB equals Tier 4 for Pathfinder. Why because Martials can't have nice things.

I'm guessing you read the original play test and not the revised edition? The Warpriest (battle Cleric) gets a class feature that grants him full BAB with weapons he has Weapon Focus with, 6th level spellcasting progression, a self-buff swift action spell mechanic, a host of other class features as well as a fair amount of bonus feats.

Judging by the revised play test I'd say It's a solid tier 3 class.

Big Fau

2014-02-11, 04:40 PM

Edit: Holy crap that paizo thread. "The only reason one class is better then another in a game are because people decide to order them after all. Then to complain that one is on top and the other on the bottom. Obviously somethings are going to be on the bottom if you decide to place them in an order."

I've been following this thread, and seeing that circular tautology actually made me cringe. No hyperbole, I physically cringed as if in pain. It saddens me that people see a list regarding something they like and immediately disagree with it.

Vanitas

2014-02-11, 06:01 PM

I've been following this thread, and seeing that circular tautology actually made me cringe. No hyperbole, I physically cringed as if in pain. It saddens me that people see a list regarding something they like and immediately disagree with it.

It's so sad. People dare to disagree with the sacred teachings of JaronK. Oh, woe is me! The humanity!

Coidzor

2014-02-11, 06:01 PM

It's so sad. People dare to disagree with the sacred teachings of JaronK. Oh, woe is me! The humanity!

Sorta just continuing to miss the point with a quip like that. :smallconfused:

Lord_Gareth

2014-02-11, 06:11 PM

Sorta just continuing to miss the point with a quip like that. :smallconfused:

Pretty much this.

Vanitas

2014-02-11, 06:15 PM

Sorta just continuing to miss the point with a quip like that. :smallconfused:

No, this whole thread is missing the point of the tier system.
It's descriptive, not prescriptive; going around saying "omg, they really should make those classes tier 3" is prescriptive in itself.
Any balance point is acceptable in the tier system. Paizo's design goals clearly put most combat focused characters at tier 4. There is homebrew that is not within these bounds, even - you're free to use it in your games.
Some people, however, like their balance point at tier 4. And hey, those people are Pathfinder's target audience. So they make their game for that audience. And it sells a lot, because it's a lot of people.
This thread is all about how anyone who likes this balance point at 4, anyone who doesn't use upper tiers to their full potential, is doing it wrong. It's all about how only this select group of people actually know how the game is "supposed to be played". You disagree with these guys? "Poor you... you don't know what you're talking about."
This is outrageously prescriptive behavior. This is missing the point.

P.S.: I apologize to Person_Man for this; his goal seems to be understanding how he could adjust his designing chops to this environment, but this thread took a wrong turn somewhere.

Coidzor

2014-02-11, 06:17 PM

No, this whole thread is missing the point of the tier system.
It's descriptive, not prescriptive; going around saying "omg, they really should make those classes tier 3" is prescriptive in itself.

So you admit that thinking it's prescriptive and not descriptive is missing the point but also deny it at the same time. :smallconfused:

NightbringerGGZ

2014-02-11, 06:27 PM

Not trying to gang up on you Vanitas, but I was a bit confused by your last post myself. Would you mind trying to explain that again? I may just be a bit slow today.

Vanitas

2014-02-11, 06:27 PM

So you admit that thinking it's prescriptive and not descriptive is missing the point but also deny it at the same time. :smallconfused:

I think you misunderstood what I said. I'm not denying anything. I'm saying the elitist attitude of "omg you noobz dun luv tem tierz" does not match the goals of the tier system itself.

Coidzor

2014-02-11, 06:33 PM

I think you misunderstood what I said. I'm not denying anything. I'm saying the elitist attitude of "omg you noobz dun luv tem tierz" does not match the goals of the tier system itself.

Granted, I have to catch up with the thread in its entirety, but my interpretation of the attitude in the specific case was more "oh, 12 gods, yet more people who think that the tier system is some kind of code of conduct for playing the game for some as yet unidentified reason. Why are there so many people who hate it when they don't even know what it actually is when what it is is really easy to grasp within the first few paragraphs of reading the various posts detailing it?"

It's one thing to prefer playing at T4, it's another thing to have fits of apoplexy from seeing the word tier because of a gross misunderstanding.

Seerow

2014-02-11, 06:35 PM

I think you misunderstood what I said. I'm not denying anything. I'm saying the elitist attitude of "omg you noobz dun luv tem tierz" does not match the goals of the tier system itself.

Really you came in here and turned the conversation into that when we were all shaking our head at a guy who literally described tiers as "People arbitrarily listing classes then complaining one class is at the top and one is at the bottom."

I mean, it's not that your argument doesn't have a place, but coming in when you did responding to what you did like you did really does come off as wrong. Take a step back and reread the last page or so of posts.

Vanitas

2014-02-11, 06:38 PM

"Why are there so many people who hate it when they don't even know what it actually is when what it is is really easy to grasp within the first few paragraphs of reading the various posts detailing it?"
Because of elitism and threads like this, of course.

It's one thing to prefer playing at T4, it's another thing to have fits of apoplexy from seeing the word tier because of a gross misunderstanding.
It's one thing to prefer playing at T1, it's another to have fits of apoplexy every time someone disagrees with JaronK.

Really you came in here and turned the conversation into that when we were all shaking our head at a guy who literally described tiers as "People arbitrarily listing classes then complaining one class is at the top and one is at the bottom."

I mean, it's not that your argument doesn't have a place, but coming in when you did responding to what you did like you did really does come off as wrong. Take a step back and reread the last page or so of posts.
Did you see Big Fau's quote? He literally said it's sad that someone disagrees with a list. How dare anyone have their own opinion?! That's my beef.

Seerow

2014-02-11, 06:44 PM

Did you see Big Fau's quote? He literally said it's sad that someone disagrees with a list. How dare anyone have their own opinion?! That's my beef.

Yes I saw it. Did you see the quote he was responding to? It wasn't just disagreeing with the tier list. It was literally making the claim that anyone who so much as references the tier list is using circular reasoning based on a list that they don't just disagree with, but feel is 100% arbitrary.

Yes, that is facepalm worthy. No, that isn't the same as not thinking the tier list is right, or even something you should reference. It's literally referring to a large chunk of the community as a bunch of dogs chasing their tails. And yet somehow Big Fau is the bad guy here?

Get a grip dude.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-11, 07:23 PM

I don't know how fully I expanded on my thoughts about the original question, but I'll just cross-post what I said in the paizo thread.

[Link] (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qoa2&page=5?Pathfinder-Classes-Full-BAB-Tier-4#218)
Personally, I would prefer the latter, as I don't personally see the fighter's niche as one that needs protecting. Though, to be honest, I'm not exactly sure what that niche is, but I think it's more than just having full BAB, otherwise Ranger, Paladin, Barbarian, and all the other Full BAB classes would already be trampling all over it. It's more than just being good at a style of combat, as the Ranger's always been great at TWF and Archery and now has options beyond that, the Barbarian does THF/Pounce Charging, and now there are classes specifically designed for firearms, mounted combat, and soon swashbuckling.

I guess if there is any identifiable niche to the fighter, it's that it purposefully has almost zero built-in flavor. Anything the character brings to the table has been brought by the player, and it has the flexibility to (fail to fully) bring to life many different types of characters. However, if you're designing a class to have more class abilities, it will probably have more flavor than the fighter, so that niche won't be in trouble.

So, don't worry about the fighter, but perhaps more care should be tendered towards the other classes. I'd like the thread to at least get a little bit back on topic.

Vanitas

2014-02-11, 07:39 PM

Yes I saw it. Did you see the quote he was responding to? It wasn't just disagreeing with the tier list. It was literally making the claim that anyone who so much as references the tier list is using circular reasoning based on a list that they don't just disagree with, but feel is 100% arbitrary.

Yes, that is facepalm worthy. No, that isn't the same as not thinking the tier list is right, or even something you should reference. It's literally referring to a large chunk of the community as a bunch of dogs chasing their tails. And yet somehow Big Fau is the bad guy here?

Get a grip dude.
You know what? You're right.
I overstepped myself. I apologize.
Big Fau, sorry if I came down too strong on you. I was way out of line.

BlackDragonKing

2014-02-11, 08:21 PM

I don't know how fully I expanded on my thoughts about the original question, but I'll just cross-post what I said in the paizo thread.

I'd like the thread to at least get a little bit back on topic.

I believe your point is a good one. The Fighter is the martial Tabula Rasa, in my view; there's no inherent flavor you're latching onto beyond the fact that they're good at fighting, and since nearly every other class ever made (and most of the homebrew/third-party classes) has an inherent flavor the fighter does not, Full BAB classes are not entering the Fighter's specific niche.

I do think it's kind of annoying that the Fighter is a Tabula Rasa who's not particularly good at that either, since the class's flexibility is almost exclusively limited to what feat tree it's willing to invest in while its skill progression is absolutely pathetic unless you're playing as a Human with good Intelligence, which is usually the fifth slot on the Fighter's list of priorities. :roy:

As far as the tiering thing goes, I view it as a useful GM tool for analyzing how much a class is capable of in the right/wrong hands. A party with a group of fighters, rogues, and monks is going to be very easy to create challenges for, because their strengths tend to be in narrow, predictable areas. A party that is mostly clerics, wizards, druids, and so on is going to have considerably higher problem-solving abilities the GM needs to take into account to create good challenges for them. It doesn't mean that it's wrong to play the fighter instead of the wizard or anything like that, but it does mean that the GM is going to have a very easy time making challenges the Fighter will struggle with while the Wizard can easily circumvent a number of challenges with its sheer flexibility unless the GM is more careful.

The notion that the tiers only exist from looking at the classes in a certain order is fairly ridiculous, though. My Pathfinder group is looking ahead for what options will be available to build towards with time. The one in our group play testing the Slayer class will be built towards absurd two-weapon fighting damage, to the point getting her to melee range with a single target can often be a winning strategy in and of itself.

The player intending to make a wizard, however, discussed a build that can stop time for a day as one of their endgame options. I don't think I need to draw a map to demonstrate that the Wizard's problem-solving capacity is going to outstrip the Slayer's pretty handily in the endgame, especially since the Slayer's poor mental roles mean there's not a lot for her to do when the Bard or Paladin uses Diplomacy or when a target can stay out of her reach. Considering that, I don't think that there's any real problem with a character who is REALLY GOOD AT FIGHTING to have options that let them solve more problems when "punch it really hard" isn't the answer.

Kudaku

2014-02-11, 08:28 PM

BlackDragonKing

2014-02-11, 08:37 PM

I've always found that the wizard and the fighter are strange counterpoints because they're both tabula rasas - the wizard gets pretty much no class features except spells, the fighter gets pretty much no class features except feats.

If the wizard concept had been broken up into thematic and niche-based spellcasters akin to the (PF) magus, the beguiler, the dread necromancer etc and the fighter concept had been broken up into thematic and niche-based martial classes akin to the barbarian, the paladin, the ranger etc there would have been a much more interesting group of classes.

I think the separation is on a couple of levels, personally.

For one, the Wizard gets arcane schools, which means even the wizard that DOESN'T pick a specific flavor to its casting has a flavor in that it attempts to master them all. Any arcane school gives you a couple of class features, although they're still rather dry compared to the raw flavor of the Pathfinder sorcerer's bloodlines.

Secondly, the Wizard gets a lot of skill points than the fighter, meaning it can pick up a lot more unique skill sets than Mr. 2 points a level. Its class skills are considerably better than the fighter's in most situations, it can still get good at cross class skills, and one of the key things is that there are a TON of Int-based skills with a lot of utility while the guy whose stats went to STR and CON with DEX as a distant third finds two skills, which aren't even all that great, key off of the stat he's best at unless he practically WASTES a feat making his strength work with his charisma on Intimidate.

Kudaku

2014-02-11, 09:05 PM

I think the separation is on a couple of levels, personally.

For one, the Wizard gets arcane schools, which means even the wizard that DOESN'T pick a specific flavor to its casting has a flavor in that it attempts to master them all. Any arcane school gives you a couple of class features, although they're still rather dry compared to the raw flavor of the Pathfinder sorcerer's bloodlines.

While the fighter gets weapon training and armor training... I did stipulate "pretty much" since I consider both arcane schools and the fighter perks fairly underwhelming as class features compared to options other classes get. Still, a fair point.

Secondly, the Wizard gets a lot of skill points than the fighter, meaning it can pick up a lot more unique skill sets than Mr. 2 points a level. Its class skills are considerably better than the fighter's in most situations, it can still get good at cross class skills, and one of the key things is that there are a TON of Int-based skills with a lot of utility while the guy whose stats went to STR and CON with DEX as a distant third finds two skills, which aren't even all that great, key off of the stat he's best at unless he practically WASTES a feat making his strength work with his charisma on Intimidate.

I should have clarified that I was talking about class features, not characters. While there's frequently a gap in carry capacity (for the fighter) and skill ranks (for the wizard), the baseline wizard class only gets two skill points as a class feature and the baseline fighter class doesn't gets a bonus to his encumbrance limit as a class feature.

The class skill list is interesting, since apart from the giant spread of Knowledge skills the fighter actually has roughly the same amount of class skills than the wizard. It's just such a shame that he got saddled with all the crap ones.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-11, 09:32 PM

The class skill list is interesting, since apart from the giant spread of Knowledge skills the fighter actually has roughly the same amount of class skills than the wizard. It's just such a shame that he got saddled with all the crap ones.Also, while true that the wizard gets better skills on average (the lack of swim and climb is always annoying when you need them), class skill lists aren't a huge advantage in Pathfinder. They're worth a +3 bonus to those skills, and while that's not completely insignificant, they don't give much of a boost to a class.

Seerow

2014-02-11, 09:39 PM

Also, while true that the wizard gets better skills on average (the lack of swim and climb is always annoying when you need them), class skill lists aren't a huge advantage in Pathfinder. They're worth a +3 bonus to those skills, and while that's not completely insignificant, they don't give much of a boost to a class.

That's worth 1 feat per skill! That's huge! Nerf rogues!

Feint's End

2014-02-11, 10:57 PM

That's worth 1 feat per skill! That's huge! Nerf rogues!

You just might have won the thread good sir.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-11, 11:21 PM

I really don't like linking to a post in the paizo thread that is anti-tier list because it just fuels a meaningless fight that is off-topic and unhelpful. It strikes me as people who are against any use of advanced metrics in pro sports vs the people who see sports as a game played by robots and not people. But...

Raptor Jebus does it get tiring being told that the tier system isn't helpful based on misinformation about the tier list.

*[Link] (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qoa2&page=6?Pathfinder-Classes-Full-BAB-Tier-4#251)

*Please go over there if you want to discuss it.

Vanitas

2014-02-11, 11:34 PM

I really don't like linking to a post in the paizo thread that is anti-tier list because it just fuels a meaningless fight that is off-topic and unhelpful. It strikes me as people who are against any use of advanced metrics in pro sports vs the people who see sports as a game played by robots and not people. But...

Raptor Jebus does it get tiring being told that the tier system isn't helpful based on misinformation about the tier list.

[Link] (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qoa2&page=6?Pathfinder-Classes-Full-BAB-Tier-4#251)

Why are you linking then? Why can't you keep that discussion there?

Just to Browse

2014-02-11, 11:41 PM

So...Healer. 9th level spellcasting. Tier 5. Oh, and Articifer, tier 1, no spellcasting.Slam DUNK. That post made me giggle.

Nihilarian

2014-02-11, 11:43 PM

Slam DUNK. That post made me giggle.I'm... not sure you can define the artificer as a noncaster. Unless it's talking about the PF version?

Lord_Gareth

2014-02-12, 12:11 AM

I'm... not sure you can define the artificer as a noncaster. Unless it's talking about the PF version?

The infusions are remarkably like spells, but they take so long to use that the Artificer could safely not be called a spellcaster. He uses magic, yes, but the dynamic and especially speed thereof defines him as something unique. Of the various T1 classes, Artificer is perhaps the most vulnerable to being caught out with his pants down.

Vanitas

2014-02-12, 12:56 AM

The infusions are remarkably like spells, but they take so long to use that the Artificer could safely not be called a spellcaster. He uses magic, yes, but the dynamic and especially speed thereof defines him as something unique. Of the various T1 classes, Artificer is perhaps the most vulnerable to being caught out with his pants down.

Nonsense. Tony Stark is always ready for everything.

DarkOne-Rob

2014-02-12, 07:40 AM

I have been reading and had a question in the same vein as Person_Man's (I think):

Is there anything inherently imbalanced about the chassis of a given class versus another?

For example, Person_Man asked about part of the chassis of martial classes (Full BAB) and it's relation to tiers. Could the same question be asked of those classes with good Will saves? How about 4 or 6+Int skills?

I have had a discussion with a friend on the subject of tiers that went round in circles for days. During that discussion I came to the conclusion that the basic outlines of the classes didn't look so bad at first glance, but when you add the spells of the tier 1-2 classes and compare them to the (disappointing and over-specialized) feats and Rogue Talents that things start to look pretty bad pretty fast.

So the issue of balance (from what I can see) is one of the individual spells, feats, etc... and not the BAB in and of itself.
--------------------------------------------------

That being said, I for one see no inherent problem with a Full BAB class in tier 1 or 2, though I would not expect general community acceptance.

Maybe just try a Fighter that can completely change their selection of bonus feats after an hour of practice in the morning? Incentivize Intelligence somewhat, and I think that would be a nice class to test!

Psyren

2014-02-12, 08:44 AM

Artificer gets magic items so cheaply it may as well be a caster. They can craft them earlier (e.g. fireball at 3rd-level instead of 5th), discount them with the crafting pool, disenchant other items to regain CP points, they get the feats for free at or even before the levels that they could be taken normally, and most importantly, they can take 10 on their checks even in combat to make their spellcasting reliable. I definitely consider them to be casters.

I think the separation is on a couple of levels, personally.

For one, the Wizard gets arcane schools, which means even the wizard that DOESN'T pick a specific flavor to its casting has a flavor in that it attempts to master them all. Any arcane school gives you a couple of class features, although they're still rather dry compared to the raw flavor of the Pathfinder sorcerer's bloodlines.

Secondly, the Wizard gets a lot of skill points than the fighter, meaning it can pick up a lot more unique skill sets than Mr. 2 points a level. Its class skills are considerably better than the fighter's in most situations, it can still get good at cross class skills, and one of the key things is that there are a TON of Int-based skills with a lot of utility while the guy whose stats went to STR and CON with DEX as a distant third finds two skills, which aren't even all that great, key off of the stat he's best at unless he practically WASTES a feat making his strength work with his charisma on Intimidate.

Wizards also get Arcane Discoveries, which may as well be class features since only they can access them. There's some unique stuff in that list.

Person_Man

2014-02-12, 08:53 AM

Initial results of the survey are in. So far 21 people have answered.

You are a Paizo employed author writing a new full BAB Pathfinder class for an upcoming supplement. Which of the following are acceptable methods for how you think this new class can be structured (choose all that apply)?

{table=head]Design | # | %
Static | 6 | 28.57
Subsystem | 19 | 90.48
Mixed | 9 | 42.86
[/Table]

Which of the following niches/roles should a full BAB Pathfinder class be able to fill, assuming that any particular class will only be able to fill some subset of them, and the writer does a good job of balancing the total resources (including BAB) that the class gets?

{table=head]Niche | # | %
Battlefield Control | 20 | 95.24%
Buffer | 13 | 61.90%
Curiosity | 14 | 66.67%
Debuffer | 16 | 76.19%
Dominator | 6 | 28.57%
Game Changer | 6 | 28.57%
Healer | 14 | 66.67%
Meat Shield | 21 | 100.00%
Melee Damage | 21 | 100.00%
Mobility | 21 | 100.00%
Party Face | 17 | 80.95%
Ranged Damage | 20 | 95.24%
Sage | 15 | 71.43%
Scout | 16 | 76.19%
Thief | 11 | 52.38%
Summoner | 6 | 28.57%
Trapfinder | 12 | 57.14%
[/table]

If you want to see the detailed answers (I shortened them to fit in the chart or take the survey yourself, you can still do so here:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/2Y2QTGG

21 people is is no way representative of anything, other then the 21 people who choose to read the thread and complete on the survey. It's a shame I can't get 400+ randomly selected Pathfinder players who buy supplements to answer this survey, so that it would be more representative.

I appreciate all the feedback I've received from everyone. In particular, I want to that the people who have helped keep both discussions on track. I really am interested in what people think, how much getting full BAB should be worth compared to other abilities, and not advocating for any specific position or ranking system.

grarrrg

2014-02-12, 10:28 AM

Nonsense. Tony Stark is always ready for everything.

Nonsense. Batman is always ready for everything.

Tony Stark shows up half-drunk and goes *pew pew* and the problem explodes.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-12, 02:45 PM

Alent

2014-02-12, 02:57 PM

Going off the poll statistics after thinking about it some more, I have a question for the thread. Is there any reason a Full BAB/Tank character shouldn't be able to any of the niches on Person_Man's list? Obviously they shouldn't be able to do all of those these things (that would make them a very powerful cleric), but is there any inherent reason that they shouldn't be able to so something like summoning or trapfinding?

I'll post a more detailed reply after work, but before I leave I just wanted to point out that there's a place for some sample corruption there.

For example, I wouldn't want to see a full BAB class summoning because I don't really like the way minionmancy slogs down a game. I could see people who don't want to see minionmancy of any flavor saying no to that question because they don't like 1/2 BAB classes summoning hoards of monsters or gating in solars, not because they don't actually think a full BAB class should be able to do it.

Nihilarian

2014-02-12, 03:23 PM

Going off the poll statistics after thinking about it some more, I have a question for the thread. Is there any reason a Full BAB/Tank character shouldn't be able to any of the niches on Person_Man's list? Obviously they shouldn't be able to do all of those these things (that would make them a very powerful cleric), but is there any inherent reason that they shouldn't be able to so something like summoning or trapfinding?If by "Summoning" you mean bringing something into this world that wasn't there before, or transporting something half a world away with a snap of his finger, then no, the fighter should not be capable.

Now, if you widened the definition to include all forms of minionmancy, then I'd absolutely agree that the fighter should be capable of getting a squire or a band of mercenaries. I don't think it should be the base option, but available.

Seerow

2014-02-12, 03:34 PM

If by "Summoning" you mean bringing something into this world that wasn't there before, or transporting something half a world away with a snap of his finger, then no, the fighter should not be capable.

Now, if you widened the definition to include all forms of minionmancy, then I'd absolutely agree that the fighter should be capable of getting a squire or a band of mercenaries. I don't think it should be the base option, but available.

The question isn't about the fighter, it's about any full BAB class.

That said, I generally dislike summoning. I think it is okay for a class that is limited to basically just that, who then uses their actions to control the summons. In which case the summon is almost like a transformation except their body is still on the field, just not appearing to do much. And I don't think a full BAB character should have summoning of that sort, as they should be combat capable on their own. Basically I personally like summoning being used when that is the summoner's only way to contribute to combat, which would rule a full BAB summoner out (barring some weird mechanic like your summons using your BAB because you're controlling them).

But in the general D&D/PF sense of summoning where you just bring a handful of low CR creatures onto the field to give support? I see no reason why a full BAB class couldn't do that. I wouldn't care to see one, but I don't see any reason why one specifically couldn't exist. Hell, the Ranger has Summon Nature's Ally 1-4.

Psyren

2014-02-12, 03:59 PM

Seerow

2014-02-12, 04:12 PM

I would say that Summoner, Dominator, Battlefield Control and Sage are roles that a full BAB class does not need to be able to fill. Possibly also debuff, though that is pretty vague - even martial things like bleeds or trips are debuffs after all.

It all depends on how you're defining the roles.

Battlefield Control and Debuffing are two that I absolutely think a martial class SHOULD be doing. Think a reach focused fighter with lots of feats for stopping enemy movement, moving them where you want, and just generally making sure anything within X feet of you depends largely on what you want to happen. And this is a basic build that is already possible as a 100% mundane, much less what a less mundane but still martially focused character can do.

Similarly, Debuffing is already something martial characters have access to. Fear stacking via Zhentarim, there's a few feats out there that let you daze or sicken on a successful attack, that sort of thing. I'm pretty sure there's some stuff in ToB that applies status conditions as well. Going outside the purely mundane you also have stuff like the Hexblade whose entire purpose is debuffing enemies.

Dominator is something that I don't think a martial character needs, much the same as a martial character doesn't need summons. But I do think similar restrictions should be in place as well, and as long as domination exists as it does I see no reason why a more martially focused bard archtype or revamped marshal or blackguard couldn't in theory have access to those types of abilities.

Sage is something that anyone should in theory be able to fill. It's literally just "Has a lot of skill points invested into knowledge skills". A full BAB character might be expected to focus his skills elsewhere, but if someone wants to put all of their skill points into "I know things" as a Fighter, why stop them? This goes double for more specialized archtypes like the Ranger (why shouldn't they know everything there is to know about their favored enemies?). [Edit: Unless the sage role also includes divinations and such. I don't remember Person Man's niche system well enough to be sure. If it does, then yeah a regular Fighter doesn't need to be able to fill that role, but a Full BAB class still certainly can. See: Ranger and Paladin (either or both should have access to a lot of the divination tools that Druids and Clerics do).]

Coidzor

2014-02-12, 04:28 PM

I would say that Summoner, Dominator, Battlefield Control and Sage are roles that a full BAB class does not need to be able to fill. Possibly also debuff, though that is pretty vague - even martial things like bleeds or trips are debuffs after all.

I don't think that's really the question though, whether or not there's a *need*. :smallconfused: Most people accept that there are certain roles any given class won't really fill. It's about (being able to conceptualize) the possibility of doing those things and having Full BAB as far as I read it.

Martial debuffing is definitely a concept though, and has been for a while despite the relatively poor support, though Hexblade is the clearest example I can think of as far as base class in Pathfinder's lineage. Granted, it does sort of bleed into martial battlefield control in some cases.

Alent

2014-02-12, 08:36 PM

And finishing my thoughts...

From a game balance perspective, I see no reason why a full BAB class can't be a summoner. Leadership is not be a class feature, but it's existence makes it clear that all characters are already expected to have minions at one level or another.

I can imagine a very flavorful magical full BAB type up there at the front lines, animating/conjuring animated shields or armor or skeletons to act as battlefield control and as an actual wall of tanks while using spells to equalize the damage between his magical minions and himself. Such a character's power level would likely be comparable to Dread Necro, so I don't think it's that "full BAB can't/shouldn't" fill those roles... but again, my personal bias is against that given the way it would makes that guy's turn a smokebreak for everyone else.

Trapfinding is more questionable. I would discuss if it actually merits a niche before I entertain the thought of "is there anything wrong with a full BAB trapfinder?" Without thinking too deep on it, I see no problem with there being a full BAB trapfinder- I honestly thought Barbarian was one for quite a while.

I've said before, I don't think the full BAB chassis represents what it was meant to represent. So I see nothing wrong with allowing full BAB to fill any of the niches, so long as it stays distinct, and emphasizes the physicality we are intended to infer from the full BAB chassis.

I realize that's not a very good set of answers, but... when you're talking about what MIGHT exist... it's really hard to be specific without making an actual proposal.

subject42

2014-02-12, 09:15 PM

From a game balance perspective, I see no reason why a full BAB class can't be a summoner. Leadership is not be a class feature, but it's existence makes it clear that all characters are already expected to have minions at one level or another.

I can imagine a very flavorful magical full BAB type up there at the front lines, animating/conjuring animated shields or armor or skeletons to act as battlefield control and as an actual wall of tanks while using spells to equalize the damage between his magical minions and himself. Such a character's power level would likely be comparable to Dread Necro, so I don't think it's that "full BAB can't/shouldn't" fill those roles... but again, my personal bias is against that given the way it would makes that guy's turn a smokebreak for everyone else.

I'm one of the people who voted against a full BAB summoner. I have three reasons for it:

A general dislike of full BAB, or more accurately, varying BAB.
A general dislike of summoning because of the "go take a smoke break" effect.
Concern about cross-purposes. If you're going to have full BAB, it feels more like you should be using that BAB to do things, rather than having other game entities do it for you. If you could somehow base the summon result off of your BAB (virtual summons providing flanking or something), I could probably buy into the idea. At that point, though, is it still "summoning"?

Trapfinding is more questionable. I would discuss if it actually merits a niche before I entertain the thought of "is there anything wrong with a full BAB trapfinder?" Without thinking too deep on it, I see no problem with there being a full BAB trapfinder- I honestly thought Barbarian was one for quite a while.

In Pathfinder, the Trapper Ranger archetype gets trapfinding. Honestly, other than making the rogue go cry in the corner, it makes perfect sense thematically and doesn't seem to break things at all. I would consider the Barbarian a trapfinder too, but just not in a conventional fashion.

Person_Man

2014-02-13, 11:39 AM

I personally have no problem with a Full BAB class filling any Niche, except for Game Changer, which I don't think any class should have access to pre-Epic.

When you think about it, full BAB is basically just a strait forward way to fill the Melee and Ranged Damage Niches, and to a lesser extent helps out with Battlefield Control via Combat Maneuvers. You want to hit stuff with weapons? OK, here you go. But it's not actually the most effective way to fill those Niches. Compare the damage a Barbarian/Fighter/Paladin/etc can do to a Summoner or any full caster. The full BAB classes might have an advantage on the first round, but after that, it's not even close. So it's just odd that this particular class resource would be considered such a big thing by so many.

Spuddles

2014-02-14, 12:41 PM

Drachasor

2014-02-14, 12:50 PM

Hmm, Full BAB Summoner should make copies of himself in some fashion, imho.

Spuddles

2014-02-14, 01:05 PM

Fighter chassis, feats and everything, can also use Summon Monster half level times per day. Treat casting level, access to spells as a wizard of his level. Or summon nature's ally.

You could do this with just about any set of abilities- cherry pick entangle, web, slow, solid fog, black tentacles for bf control. Psionic dominate/charm for domination.

It adds a lot of magic to a fighter, something a lot of people have problems with. But they dont have to use it. But it also adds a lot of archetypes available- mostly variants of evil sorcerer fighters or nature's ally or whatever.

If you want to be strictly martial, use some variant of ToB and refluff/tweak the mechanica if it feels to much like casting. Hell, just reprint the maneuvers table so they look less like spells.

But in any case, full BAB, 11 bonus feats from a mediocre to bad list, and a handful of Sp abilities a day is still T3 territory.

Person_Man

2014-02-14, 02:57 PM

Updated results. We now have 37 responses (up from 21):

You are a Paizo employed author writing a new full BAB Pathfinder class for an upcoming supplement. Which of the following are acceptable methods for how you think this new class can be structured (choose all that apply)?

{table=head]Design | # | %
Static | 13 | 35.14%
Subsystem | 33 | 89.19
Mixed | 15 | 40.54%
Other|2 | 5.41%
[/Table]

The "Other" responses both said something to the effect of do whatever you want.

Which of the following niches/roles should a full BAB Pathfinder class be able to fill, assuming that any particular class will only be able to fill some subset of them, and the writer does a good job of balancing the total resources (including BAB) that the class gets?

{table=head]Niche | # | %
Battlefield Control | 35 | 97.22%
Buffer | 22 | 61.11%
Curiosity | 19 | 52.78%
Debuffer | 30 | 83.33%
Dominator | 10 | 27.78%
Game Changer | 9 | 25.00%
Healer | 20 | 55.56%
Meat Shield | 36 | 100.00%
Melee Damage | 36 | 100.00%
Mobility | 25 | 69.44%
Party Face | 27 | 75.00%
Ranged Damage | 34 | 94.44%
Sage | 22 | 61.11%
Scout | 29 | 80.56%
Thief | 21 | 58.33%
Summoner | 10 | 27.78%
Trapfinder | 23 | 63.89%
[/table]

If you want to see the detailed answers (I shortened them to fit in the chart or take the survey yourself, you can still do so here:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/2Y2QTGG

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-14, 03:08 PM

Healer receiving fewer votes than Party face is kind of hilarious to me.

Seerow

2014-02-14, 03:46 PM

Healer receiving fewer votes than Party face is kind of hilarious to me.

I'm not surprised. A lot of people associate full BAB with "Fighter" and "Fighter" with "The hero that gets the kingdom and the girl at the end of the adventure", which fits in well with the party face, despite the Fighter traditionally being awful at that

subject42

2014-02-14, 03:52 PM

Healer receiving fewer votes than Party face is kind of hilarious to me.

What does it take to fill a "party face" role relative to a "healer" role? It seems like the former only requires attribute scores and skill points to cover 80% of sceanarios, while the latter would require full-blown class features of some sort. The smaller mechanical requirements might explain some of that disparity.

Coidzor

2014-02-14, 04:13 PM

I wonder if people's answers would change if they had the first page without examples of classes that already do that and then a second page with examples of classes that already do...

Seerow

2014-02-14, 04:37 PM

Whereas the Fighters ability to kill stuff is valued very highly because it matters in almost every single session ever played.

In this paradigm, the tiers shrink down dramatically, and become:

Tier 1-- Wizard, Druid, neutral or evil cleric/oracle, Barbarian, Summoner, 3.5 options enabled bard
Tier 2-- Ranger, Paladin, good cleric/oracle, 2WF/blenderizer rogue, PF bard
Tier 3-- other rogues, monks
Tier 4-- NPC classes

I'm speechless.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-14, 04:40 PM

I'm speechless.What? Where is that from?

Seerow

2014-02-14, 04:41 PM

What? Where is that from?

Person Man's thread on the Paizo forums. Page 8ish I think.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-14, 04:52 PM

Person Man's thread on the Paizo forums. Page 8ish I think.This post? (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qoa2&page=8?Pathfinder-Classes-Full-BAB-Tier-4#397)

Yeah, his games sound to be very combat oriented/focused (or he perceives them to be), and as such things like "DPR," and being good in combat in general is much more important to him than everything else.

Coidzor

2014-02-14, 05:03 PM

I'm speechless.

I wonder... is that a reference to that one really broken Barbarian build that's largely dependent upon having a mount that's better than the Barbarian in every conceivable way and apparently can see enemies from miles away and get up to them nigh-instantaneously due to their mount and do enough damage to kill everything that was published at the time of the combo's discovery?

Alent

2014-02-14, 05:05 PM

I wonder... is that a reference to that one really broken Barbarian build that's largely dependent upon having a mount that's better than the Barbarian in every conceivable way and apparently can see enemies from miles away and get up to them nigh-instantaneously due to their mount and do enough damage to kill everything that was published at the time of the combo's discovery?

Likely. His tier list is based entirely on Raid DPS logic. :smallfrown:

... wait... his list doesn't have fighter on it...

Seerow

2014-02-14, 05:09 PM

Likely. His tier list is based entirely on Raid DPS logic. :smallfrown:

It does baffle me how a group that hates optimization so much can reconcile that with preferring a measuring stick based so heavily on optimization.

... wait... his list doesn't have fighter on it...

When someone pointed that out he said he omitted it because it depends too much on feat selection, but it hovers between tier 1 and tier 2.

Person_Man

2014-02-14, 07:34 PM

Likely. His tier list is based entirely on Raid DPS logic. :smallfrown:

So it is in fact possible to construct games where full BAB classes seem to be on par or have an advantage over everyone else. But that requires a very specific play style by the DM and all of the players. In fact, many of my 1st and 2nd edition games played like that.

Of course, hit points were much more limited, warrior classes got a lot more hit points and were the only ones that could benefit from very high Con, attacks were very limited and warriors were the only ones who got extras, to-hit and damage bonuses were far more limited, healing was much more limited, combat was much quicker and more numerous, etc. Pathfinder isn't like that, but it's possible to recreate those conditions in many ways if every player and the DM makes certain choices.

If that's the reality that someone plays in, I could understand why they would make the argument that Full BAB OMG NO MAGICKS! (That's how all the kids are talking today, right?) It's misreading the Pathfinder system as a whole, but it still reflects their reality.

BlackDragonKing

2014-02-14, 08:40 PM

So it is in fact possible to construct games where full BAB classes seem to be on par or have an advantage over everyone else. But that requires a very specific play style by the DM and all of the players. In fact, many of my 1st and 2nd edition games played like that.

Of course, hit points were much more limited, warrior classes got a lot more hit points and were the only ones that could benefit from very high Con, attacks were very limited and warriors were the only ones who got extras, to-hit and damage bonuses were far more limited, healing was much more limited, combat was much quicker and more numerous, etc. Pathfinder isn't like that, but it's possible to recreate those conditions in many ways if every player and the DM makes certain choices.

If that's the reality that someone plays in, I could understand why they would make the argument that Full BAB OMG NO MAGICKS! (That's how all the kids are talking today, right?) It's misreading the Pathfinder system as a whole, but it still reflects their reality.

I don't see why not, really. The Aegis is a full BAB class that has some interesting utility in the sheer freedom of movement well-customized armor gives it. Being stuck at tier 4, where you can just do one thing, is really the problem. Tier 3, where the Magus, the Inquisitor, and our friend the Bard live, is the ideal tier in my opinion. If it absorbed the other four into itself, the game would be a happier place.

This man Nathaniel Love on the Paizo forum, I do not think he is fully grasping how EVEN IN TERMS OF SIMPLY KILLING ENEMIES the level 9 caster has options a martial cannot hope to compete with. I have heard the numbers a fighter or barbarian can put out against a monster, while the Wizard player I know has mused offhandedly about a build that can STOP TIME FOR A DAY as one of its options at high level. I don't think I need to draw a map to demonstrate that "24-hour time stop Wizard" is not going to be too fussed about winning fights that the billion-and-a-half damage fighter is going to find tricky.

Psyren

2014-02-14, 09:26 PM

I'm speechless.

So is this thread now just a discussion thread for a different conversation happening somewhere else? I don't think just crossposting sound-bytes and reaction shots to those sound bytes is all that productive.

If we really want to get to the heart of this issue, we need to understand why weak (T4-T5) full BAB classes are so often perceived to be strong - or at least capable - by the playerbase at large. It is because they are perceived to be strong enough already, that any full BAB class designed to be even stronger is seen as overkill.

I think one of the problems with our understanding is the definition of T5 itself, or at least the placing of certain classes under its umbrella. To wit:

"Tier 5: Capable of doing only one thing, and not necessarily all that well, or so unfocused that they have trouble mastering anything, and in many types of encounters the character cannot contribute. In some cases, can do one thing very well, but that one thing is very often not needed."

The fighter's niche is melee damage. And while they're not the best at it, the standard for avoiding T5 isn't "best" - it's "good enough." Fighters don't need much optimization to be "good enough" - especially not at the levels most people play at - and furthermore, "melee damage" is a role that I would say is often needed at most tables. And for campaigns without a combat-heavy focus, fighter is indeed a bad choice - but in those campaigns, players will naturally avoid classes like fighter anyway, which renders its shortcoming moot in practice.

avr

2014-02-14, 09:44 PM

Updated results. We now have 37 responses (up from 21):
So less than half think that dominator, game-changer and summoner are OK. This makes sense to me, they're the 3 I left out myself. If you want 75% agreement than a bunch of others drop out, which weirdly includes Healer so paladin-analogues are out. If you want 100% agreement then even ranged damage drops off this list ... which makes me wonder what those two people were thinking.

Vanitas

2014-02-14, 09:54 PM

So is this thread now just a discussion thread for a different conversation happening somewhere else? I don't think just crossposting sound-bytes and reaction shots to those sound bytes is all that productive.

It's not productive, it's incredibly elitist and it's also very rude.

Psyren

2014-02-14, 10:09 PM

It's not productive, it's incredibly elitist and it's also very rude.

With the rampant hostility to all things Paizo here I'm not surprised. But it also doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things so don't let it get to you.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-14, 10:12 PM

Coidzor

2014-02-14, 10:20 PM

To add to Psyren's point, PFS has seemingly rehabilitated organized play, which is a good thing. More and more players are getting their experience from playing organized game, with usually well-written campaigns. Paizo's campaigns are also popular enough that most people are using them.

One downside, and this does influence the perception of class imbalance, is that because the game is "more" balanced at low levels (where all the above material starts) that there isn't a problem.

I don't think I've ever heard any real complaints about their adventure paths beyond the occasional oversight, I must admit.

*sidenote*
The Paizo thread was locked, as both sides were basically just calling each other dumb and backwards and stinky poop-faces.

Yeah... There's a reason I don't really have much to do with their forums, not the least of which is that I don't want to lose access to my purchases because I disagreed with a developer.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-14, 10:21 PM

With the rampant hostility to all things Paizo here I'm not surprised. But it also doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things so don't let it get to you.I would say that there is less hostility towards Paizo (not that there is none, as there clearly is some), but towards the loud amount posters who are simply irrationally reactionary to any mention of change for the sake of balance. I hold them to be in the same ire as the people who call Pathfinder "The Caster Edition," especially when they go so far as to say that the Tier list is a "system designed to push a view [specifically that casters are overpowered] masquerading as some kind of 'objective' measure."

I unhypocrtically hate all of it, and take none of the blame for the thread being locked.

Whoops.

Psyren

2014-02-14, 11:12 PM

Extremism and hyperbole are indeed bad on both sides.

*sidenote*
The Paizo thread was locked, as both sides were basically just calling each other dumb and backwards and stinky poop-faces.

I'm shocked. Shocked I tell you.

One downside, and this does influence the perception of class imbalance, is that because the game is "more" balanced at low levels (where all the above material starts) that there isn't a problem.

But even without scenarios and pre-mades, the vast majority of games are played at low levels anyway. It's just easier to do.

Better still - they were smart enough to come up with Mythic, a way to staple game-changing abilities onto existing characters without requiring them to get to high levels first. You retain the simplicity of lower levels, but open up the Bestiary/MM so that the players can handle higher CR threats.

Big Fau

2014-02-14, 11:25 PM

With the rampant hostility to all things Paizo here I'm not surprised. But it also doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things so don't let it get to you.

At least a (nontrivial) percentage of that hostility is mine.

BlackDragonKing

2014-02-14, 11:38 PM

Extremism and hyperbole are indeed bad on both sides.

I'm shocked. Shocked I tell you.

Well, this is the internet, and this IS the "hot-button" of 3.P D&D. You can find similar levels of extremism in and around this debate; take the debate about the effectiveness of investing in crossbows, where discussion reached a point that the people arguing for changes labeled them a "trap" option that almost punishes the player for trying to get good with them while the side against making changes to make the crossbow and the longbow more "equal" options claimed the other side wanted water balloons to be as effective as arrows. Discussing system balance and if the rules ought to be changed ruffles feathers anywhere.

But even without scenarios and pre-mades, the vast majority of games are played at low levels anyway. It's just easier to do.

Better still - they were smart enough to come up with Mythic, a way to staple game-changing abilities onto existing characters without requiring them to get to high levels first. You retain the simplicity of lower levels, but open up the Bestiary/MM so that the players can handle higher CR threats.

Mythic actually works both ways, I would say; it can be used to bulk up low-level play, certainly, but I think it can also be a preferable alternative to epic levels in high-level play (and even in mid-high) to add a certain flair to progression. I think the Mythic tiers can come into effect at nearly any point in play and work well when the GM knows what they're doing.

Psyren

2014-02-14, 11:55 PM

At least a (nontrivial) percentage of that hostility is mine.

I'm well aware.

Mythic actually works both ways, I would say; it can be used to bulk up low-level play, certainly, but I think it can also be a preferable alternative to epic levels in high-level play (and even in mid-high) to add a certain flair to progression. I think the Mythic tiers can come into effect at nearly any point in play and work well when the GM knows what they're doing.

Indeed, that's what's so great about it - you can use it at all levels, including pseudo-epic. It was a pretty great idea, though some of the actual path abilities could use some tweaking.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-15, 12:03 AM

But even without scenarios and pre-mades, the vast majority of games are played at low levels anyway. It's just easier to do.

Better still - they were smart enough to come up with Mythic, a way to staple game-changing abilities onto existing characters without requiring them to get to high levels first. You retain the simplicity of lower levels, but open up the Bestiary/MM so that the players can handle higher CR threats.I like the concept of mythic rules, but I've never been a fan of the fact that the reason they were created was because high level play is broken/disallowed in PFS, and the module writers rightfully wanted a way to put a Balor or similar CR enemy in their games. Always kind of struck me as a white flag.

BlackDragonKing

2014-02-15, 12:11 AM

I like the concept of mythic rules, but I've never been a fan of the fact that the reason they were created was because high level play is broken/disallowed in PFS, and the module writers rightfully wanted a way to put a Balor or similar CR enemy in their games. Always kind of struck me as a white flag.

It can evoke a very interesting kind of high fantasy, though, and arguably in a more balanced way than actual high levels do, from what I can see of the paths. It does add some of that pizzaz E6/E8 can't really have otherwise, which I like, and they're more evocative than "the same but more" epic levels for the actual high-level campaigns.

Plus, the GM can have some fun with mythic tiers. Running out of things for your epic-8 party to do? Suddenly, HIGHLANDER! There can be only [insert party size here]! :smallbiggrin:

Drachasor

2014-02-15, 12:44 AM

Psyren

2014-02-15, 02:53 AM

I like the idea of mythic rules too. I have the same complaint though. Also from the playtest material at least I was not impressed with the implementation.

No need to look at the playtest material, the release version is all up on the PRD/PFSRD now.

I like the concept of mythic rules, but I've never been a fan of the fact that the reason they were created was because high level play is broken/disallowed in PFS, and the module writers rightfully wanted a way to put a Balor or similar CR enemy in their games. Always kind of struck me as a white flag.

That was a reason, but not the only reason. Besides, if they had gone with standard epic, you'd have the same 35 problem where high-level non-mythic/epic casters are able to steamroll mythic/epic challenges. Or more accurately, that's still the case in PF, but the system is designed around it instead of it not being intended.

As BDK noted, this can give your campaign a very Highlander feel. Regardless of level, your party can take on a mythic opponent, and if they win, they have a chance of becoming mythic themselves - no matter what level they are. It's just cool.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-15, 03:04 AM

That was a reason, but not the only reason. Besides, if they had gone with standard epic, you'd have the same 35 problem where high-level non-mythic/epic casters are able to steamroll mythic/epic challenges. Or more accurately, that's still the case in PF, but the system is designed around it instead of it not being intended.

As BDK noted, this can give your campaign a very Highlander feel. Regardless of level, your party can take on a mythic opponent, and if they win, they have a chance of becoming mythic themselves - no matter what level they are. It's just cool. Oh, I'm sure the system works very well for what it's intended goal was, and I didn't expect (or want) an epic level handbook. I would most likely rather play the game as a mythic character than play a high level campaign. Though, in my case, that's probably because super high level games are nigh-impossible for me to enjoy because they are so ****ing tedious.

Out of combat challenges are a joke because wizards and clerics really do have all the options available to them at this point. Combat, which was once immediately ended after the first 2 successful rounds, is now immediately won after the first 2 successful rounds, but doesn't end for another 10 either because they won't die or you have to chase them all over the map.

Which, I should be clear, is not a problem with PF, but one with 3e games in general.

Psyren

2014-02-15, 10:35 AM

Out of combat challenges are a joke because wizards and clerics really do have all the options available to them at this point.

I think this is part of the disconnect going on in this thread. To some here, "all the options" means the caster can solve everything with a snap of his fingers. But I would wager that to most other people playing the game, "all the options" just causes data overload/paralysis of analysis. Or they rely on a handful of tricks, the DM occasionally subverts those, and they end up challenged just like they were before.

Combat, which was once immediately ended after the first 2 successful rounds, is now immediately won after the first 2 successful rounds, but doesn't end for another 10 either because they won't die or you have to chase them all over the map.

This is another thing I don't see. In my own group's games for instance, combat lasts 4 rounds minimum even at low levels, and that's with 6-8 players in the party. It can take quite a while and everyone gets the chance to do their signature thing(s). We typically have 2-3 big combats like this per session, and the casters typically end up burning through their resources just to stay/keep everyone else alive.

Now I would wager I tend to have more players than a typical setup - but if your fights are ending in 2 rounds at any level your DM probably needs a crash course in encounter design. Cakewalks are no fun for either side.

Nihilarian

2014-02-15, 11:30 AM

I like the idea of giving martials Mythic Tiers to help close the gap with spellcasters.

Person_Man

2014-02-15, 01:43 PM

I'm up to 44 responses on my survey. But the basic breakdown hasn't changed at all, so I won't bother reposting the chart of responses unless it breaks 50.

Looking through the results again, there seem to be 5 areas of near universal agreement as to what Niches a full BAB class should fill; Melee Damage (98%), Meat Shield (95%), Mobility (93%), Battlefield Control (90%), and Ranged Damage (89%).

I could write a full BAB Pathfinder class that does each of those things well (and I probably will). But this presents two problems.

First, I'll have a hard time writing a cool ability that does not duplicate a Feat in some way. For example, if I write a an ability which more or less duplicates Whirlwind Attack (which has terrible pre-reqs and should be available much sooner in order to be useful), people will complain that it's better then what the Fighter can get.

Second, other then Mobility, none of those Niches are non-combat roles, which limits the ability of full BAB classes to contribute to roleplaying and exploration encounters.

Nihilarian

2014-02-15, 01:54 PM

60% is still a majority. That number includes debuffer, sage and scout for example.

But honestly I wouldn't worry about it too much. Make what you want, and if it's good people will like it.

Drachasor

2014-02-15, 01:56 PM

I like the idea of giving martials Mythic Tiers to help close the gap with spellcasters.

Yeah, that would be nice. Unfortunately Mythic Casters get much better things than Mythic non-casters.

Coidzor

2014-02-15, 02:06 PM

Beowulf DW

2014-02-15, 02:37 PM

Alent

2014-02-15, 02:40 PM

This is another thing I don't see. In my own group's games for instance, combat lasts 4 rounds minimum even at low levels, and that's with 6-8 players in the party. It can take quite a while and everyone gets the chance to do their signature thing(s). We typically have 2-3 big combats like this per session, and the casters typically end up burning through their resources just to stay/keep everyone else alive.

Now I would wager I tend to have more players than a typical setup - but if your fights are ending in 2 rounds at any level your DM probably needs a crash course in encounter design. Cakewalks are no fun for either side.

It may drift off topic and need to go to another thread or PMs, but can I ask if anyone in your group is using some of the full BAB TO DPT olympics builds? (The level 10 ones) I'm just curious, my group was never able to make PF combats last that long due to how things broke down into lightning tag as soon as someone started using Hero lab to do DPT work.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-15, 02:51 PM

I think this is part of the disconnect going on in this thread. To some here, "all the options" means the caster can solve everything with a snap of his fingers. But I would wager that to most other people playing the game, "all the options" just causes data overload/paralysis of analysis. Or they rely on a handful of tricks, the DM occasionally subverts those, and they end up challenged just like they were before.I wouldn't say that those things didn't happen, but I would say that they didn't engage me because I knew I had we had the right tool somewhere and if we thought about it for a sec we could figure out what it was. The overload of data thing is something that I've experienced, though.

This is another thing I don't see. In my own group's games for instance, combat lasts 4 rounds minimum even at low levels, and that's with 6-8 players in the party. It can take quite a while and everyone gets the chance to do their signature thing(s). We typically have 2-3 big combats like this per session, and the casters typically end up burning through their resources just to stay/keep everyone else alive.

Now I would wager I tend to have more players than a typical setup - but if your fights are ending in 2 rounds at any level your DM probably needs a crash course in encounter design. Cakewalks are no fun for either side.I should have been more clear with my language. Combat is "ended" in that the victor has been determined (there is only 1 or 2 enemies left, all the enemies have nearly no health left, they've all been hit by a save or lose spell, etc.). My experience is that it's very hard to come back in D&D/PF. The enemies are normally defeated after a couple more rounds, yes. Now, I have had combats that actually ended in 2 rounds or so, but those are rare and very lucky/unlucky.

With very high level combat, I found that it's just as hard for someone to really comeback as it is in earlier levels, but it is much easier for someone to prolong an encounter ending, either because the size of space of combat is increased making it hard to maneuver the DPS into position, the number of buffs people bring to the combat is increased, enemies leave (with plane shift or teleport) when they're losing so you have to chase them or start again, you leave (with plane shift or teleport) when you're losing so you have to do a chase sequence and then start the fight again, etc.

Nihilarian

2014-02-15, 02:59 PM

Yeah, that would be nice. Unfortunately Mythic Casters get much better things than Mythic non-casters.Of course they do, they're casters. :smallannoyed:

Anyway, the idea is that at 7th level or so anyone without spellcasting gets a Mythic Tier, which advances as usual. Full spellcasters don't gain the Mythic Tier at all. Partial Spellcasters are a bit tougher to decide.

I was also thinking that a buff spell cast on a mythic character would gain the mythic bonuses. So, an Enlarge Person spell cast on a fighter would increase his size category twice, while the same spell cast on a druid would only increase his size once. Not sure about this one, though.

Spuddles

2014-02-15, 05:48 PM

So the game is too complex and too many people are just bad at playing it and would actually prefer something much simpler but don't realize it, essentially?

Basically.

If you ever go to /r/dnd, which is about as anti-optimization a board as you can find, if you bring up rule 3a, section II.5 clauses 1(c) through 2(f), you will be told that you are a terrible person and the DM is there to stop your munchkinning.

Then someone will post a link to youtube armchair historian lindybeige and a bunch of people will decide that spiked armor should have a higher ACP and an AC penalty.

It's weird how people want a really complicated simulationist game thar reflects what they think reality is like yet also not taking the time to already read all those rules, or consider the ramifications of those rules.

Kudaku

2014-02-15, 06:08 PM

Please forgive me for not reading through 8 pages, but has anyone brought up the classes in the ACG at all? Where would classes (or what we saw of those classes) with full BAB end up on the tier list? I only bring it up because we all a decent look at them, and they are official Paizo material.

In particular, I'm thinking of the Bloodrager. Seemed like an angrier Duskblade to me, but I'm no expert.

The Warpriest has been mentioned a few times as a class that's most likely tier 3 but gets (sorta) full BAB. I haven't read the Bloodrager in a while but from what I can recall it seemed like the spellcaster aspect was an arcane version of the paladin/ranger - the class struck me as ~tier 4.

Classes with full BAB in the ACG:
Bloodrager
Brawler
Slayer
Warpriest (sort of)

Until the ACG is actually published these classes are somewhat nebulous though, we don't really know how they'll turn out till we're paging through the finished book.

3WhiteFox3

2014-02-15, 06:19 PM

Of course they do, they're casters. :smallannoyed:

Anyway, the idea is that at 7th level or so anyone without spellcasting gets a Mythic Tier, which advances as usual. Full spellcasters don't gain the Mythic Tier at all. Partial Spellcasters are a bit tougher to decide.

I was also thinking that a buff spell cast on a mythic character would gain the mythic bonuses. So, an Enlarge Person spell cast on a fighter would increase his size category twice, while the same spell cast on a druid would only increase his size once. Not sure about this one, though.

I once had an idea to use Mythic Tiers as a balancing tool for the lower tiered characters. However, I was stumped about what to do about multiclassing. The original idea was to simply have it so that each character gained a Mythic Tier equal to their balance tier - 3. So a monk (Tier 5) would get two Mythic Tiers in a path of his choice.

What stumped me was how to prevent people from starting off as a Monk and going straight to another higher tier class without completely disallowing multiclassing or restricting it heavily.

With your idea we could do something similar but with the E6 rules. Play an E6 game, however, with a slight change.

Tiers 1-2: They cannot gain Mythic Tiers.
Tier 3: Instead of using the extra XP for a feat they may store up left over experience until they can spend at least 6000 xp to gain a mythic tier.
Tier 4: They start with one free Mythic Tier and may spend 4000 xp to gain another one.
Tier 5: They start with two free Mythic Tiers and may spend 2000 xp to gain another one.

For multiclassed characters their Tier is the same as the class that they possess the most levels in. In the case of a tie, which ever class has the higher tier is considered to be the character's tier.

Squirrel_Dude

2014-02-15, 07:16 PM

It's weird how people want a really complicated simulationist game thar reflects what they think reality is like yet also not taking the time to already read all those rules, or consider the ramifications of those rules.There is certainly a large amount of armchair physics, biomechanics, and psychology that goes into DMs trying to rejigger their world to be more simulationist. I always kind of roll my eyes whenever I hear a DM ascribe their changes to common sense or for the sake of "realism." It doesn't mean I wouldn't want to play with them, but it always kind of offputting to me.

avr

2014-02-15, 10:13 PM

For example, if I write a an ability which more or less duplicates Whirlwind Attack (which has terrible pre-reqs and should be available much sooner in order to be useful), people will complain that it's better then what the Fighter can get.
PF is often quite forgiving of getting something once/day or based off a semi-limited resource (ki, grit etc.) earlier or more easily than fighters do.

Second, other then Mobility, none of those Niches are non-combat roles, which limits the ability of full BAB classes to contribute to roleplaying and exploration encounters.
Skills, not magic. People are willing to accept that a ranger has lots of skill points and gets bonuses to some uses of them.

BlackDragonKing

2014-02-16, 01:05 AM

Skills, not magic. People are willing to accept that a ranger has lots of skill points and gets bonuses to some uses of them.

I've got to wonder why the Fighter can't have good skill progression but the Ranger can, personally. It's been bugging me.

Let's go with three martial classes, to make my point.

The Rogue lives and dies by their talents. They are not casters, but neither are they great warriors. They pick up tricks and learn all kinds of different techniques to make their sneaky work go smoother. Their 6+Int Skill progression makes perfect sense.

The Ranger has some similarities to the rogue, but they are a rougher, tougher sort of character. A slower skill progression still makes sense to me.

But the Fighter's only abilities that do not refer directly to armor or weaponry besides Bravery, which is an almost complete non-factor in evaluating the Fighter, are its bonus feats. This implies that the fighter's "flavor", in as much as the class designed to be as vanilla as possible has one, is that the fighter works twice as hard as anyone else to learn a much wider variety of abilities; mostly ones other classes can learn with more work at slower intervals, but some unique ones. However, this seems to imply to me that the fighter should also have high skill progression because their character ONLY stands out in how quickly they pick up tricks and talents other classes lack, and yet their skill progression is rock-bottom, to the point any INT penalty fighters barely have skills at all if they're not Human. I don't follow how people think it makes perfect sense that the Ranger has 4+ skills per level, but that the fighter "needs" to progress its skills at half that speed. Virtually every other class in the game that gets 2+Int has MAGIC, but the fighter's capacity to diversify its abilities beyond extra feats remains second to the BARBARIAN, who you really don't expect to be picking up skills that don't relate to hitting things faster than the fighter.

Alent

2014-02-16, 02:08 AM

I've got to wonder why the Fighter can't have good skill progression but the Ranger can, personally. It's been bugging me.

Let's go with three martial classes, to make my point.

The Rogue lives and dies by their talents. They are not casters, but neither are they great warriors. They pick up tricks and learn all kinds of different techniques to make their sneaky work go smoother. Their 6+Int Skill progression makes perfect sense.

The Ranger has some similarities to the rogue, but they are a rougher, tougher sort of character. A slower skill progression still makes sense to me.

The way 3.5 chose to simplify certain class percentile dice abilities and NWPs into skills, then Pathfinder chose to simplify skills probably leads directly to this problem. When you no longer have the cross-class skill penalty, this causes the gap between the mundanes to become much smaller as far as skills go, and I think this starts to run into some old AD&D holdover prejudices that were present in 3.0/3.5.

I think Fighters don't get perception as a class skill because Rogues are supposed to be better at hearing things, it's right there on a 2e rogue's character sheet: "hear noises". Fighters capping at the cross-class max for listen preserved this, but that suddenly goes away if fighters are a mere trained bonus away from equality with a rogue.

The only 2e class features Rogue really still has as class features are sneak attack and trapfinding, so to give the illusion of his old self with all those class abilities and NWPs, he gets 8 + int skills per level, and the fighter only gets 2 + int.

Mixed with the more reactionary elements of Pathfinder's playerbase who want to maintain a certain degree of status quo that may only go back to 3.5 or go all the way back to OD&D, it starts to make more sense. It has absolutely nothing to do with actual game balance, but it makes more sense.

Drachasor

2014-02-16, 05:20 AM

PF is often quite forgiving of getting something once/day or based off a semi-limited resource (ki, grit etc.) earlier or more easily than fighters do.

And it is overly fond of giving people lots of little resources to keep track of. The worst ones are the Keep Track of Uses By ROUND abilities. Ugh! Too many of those.

It really would have been nice if they had a universal system. Monks might call their stuff Ki, Magus and Wizards arcana, Clerics call it spirit, Fighters call it grit or determination....but it would all be the same. Your classes would determine how you can use it.

Alent

2014-02-16, 05:33 AM

And it is overly fond of giving people lots of little resources to keep track of. The worst ones are the Keep Track of Uses By ROUND abilities. Ugh! Too many of those.

Yes. :smallannoyed:

Every time I played PF bard I ended up with dozens of sheets of lined paper all over my room that had dozens of turn tracking marks like this:

http://understandinggraphics.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/lines-for-counting.png

It really would have been nice if they had a universal system. Monks might call their stuff Ki, Magus and Wizards arcana, Clerics call it spirit, Fighters call it grit or determination....but it would all be the same. Your classes would determine how you can use it.

Depending on how it's done, that could be interesting. I rather like Ki/Grit, it just feels like the subsystems are lacking options.

Sayt

2014-02-16, 07:15 AM

Might I suggest a pencil and eraser?

And honestly, to me the only difference between a 3.5 Barbarian getting X rages per day which last for Y rounds, and a PF Barbarian getting Z rounds of rage per day is the granularity. Furthermore, the barbarian can be a bit freer with their rages (And Bards their music) because they don't have to worry about activating it and then wasting a quarter of their precious resource because the fighter landed a x4 crit and the encounter ended.

Only need one round of rage? Only use one round.

Psyren

2014-02-16, 10:20 AM

So the game is too complex and too many people are just bad at playing it and would actually prefer something much simpler but don't realize it, essentially?

This kind of thinking is part of the problem. The game is actually not that complex in practice; if there are 1000 ways to open a door, and you are inexperienced and thus only know 5 of them, but one of those 5 opens the door, you're not going to notice or care about all the remaining ones that you didn't know.

It may drift off topic and need to go to another thread or PMs, but can I ask if anyone in your group is using some of the full BAB TO DPT olympics builds? (The level 10 ones) I'm just curious, my group was never able to make PF combats last that long due to how things broke down into lightning tag as soon as someone started using Hero lab to do DPT work.

I know what TO is, but what's DPT?

In any event, no build with "TO" in the name is going to be (or should be) used at any table I'm at, no.

I should have been more clear with my language. Combat is "ended" in that the victor has been determined (there is only 1 or 2 enemies left, all the enemies have nearly no health left, they've all been hit by a save or lose spell, etc.).

Oh, I know what you meant. But it's still poor encounter design if combat can regularly get that way within 1-2 rounds.

For example, one of the tactics I hear on these boards a lot is "at low levels, the wizard can end the entire encounter with a Sleep or Grease spell." This requires all the enemies to obligingly be coming at the party in a neat 10' radius; in the case of the former, they also need to have no way of potentially disrupting a 1 round casting time.

What's more - if you have so few combats that your casters are always comfortable firing off their big guns, because they know they'll never be caught with their robes around their ankles, that's also a problem. The purpose of encounters is to make the players manage their resources; if they never have to do that because your encounters are so few or unchallenging, there's no point to having them in the first place.

Spuddles

2014-02-16, 10:42 AM

@Psyren

I've always found the downplaying of the frailty of low level wizards obnoxious. It's a relative simple matter to have n+1 encounters in an adventuring period where n=number of relevant spells wizard has prepared.

And it is overly fond of giving people lots of little resources to keep track of. The worst ones are the Keep Track of Uses By ROUND abilities. Ugh! Too many of those.

It really would have been nice if they had a universal system. Monks might call their stuff Ki, Magus and Wizards arcana, Clerics call it spirit, Fighters call it grit or determination....but it would all be the same. Your classes would determine how you can use it.

Have you considered 4e? It uses a same system, different names for all classes. Much harder to break to the degree that 3.PF is.

Might I suggest a pencil and eraser?

And honestly, to me the only difference between a 3.5 Barbarian getting X rages per day which last for Y rounds, and a PF Barbarian getting Z rounds of rage per day is the granularity. Furthermore, the barbarian can be a bit freer with their rages (And Bards their music) because they don't have to worry about activating it and then wasting a quarter of their precious resource because the fighter landed a x4 crit and the encounter ended.

Only need one round of rage? Only use one round.

Or just rage cycle and have unlimited rage.

Alent

2014-02-16, 11:17 AM

I know what TO is, but what's DPT?

In any event, no build with "TO" in the name is going to be (or should be) used at any table I'm at, no.

Damage per Turn. (Because DPS isn't quite right.) I was just curious, as DPT builds are one of the common "that class is fine" arguments.

DPT optimization isn't of course in favor of the full BABs, With the exception of the ubercharger barbarian on a flying mount build the awards usually goes to alchemist or summoner last I checked, but it can be astonishingly easy to pick up a candidate for the Lv 10 DPT olympics and build a character around him.

The subject originally came up as part of a game balance discussion if I recall correctly, someone testing if all the characters performed in combat at the same level, and found most of the peak TO damage builds were reasonably close save for a few supersucks (monk) and omgwhy builds (synthesist summoner).

Oh, I know what you meant. But it's still poor encounter design if combat can regularly get that way within 1-2 rounds.

For example, one of the tactics I hear on these boards a lot is "at low levels, the wizard can end the entire encounter with a Sleep or Grease spell." This requires all the enemies to obligingly be coming at the party in a neat 10' radius; in the case of the former, they also need to have no way of potentially disrupting a 1 round casting time.

What's more - if you have so few combats that your casters are always comfortable firing off their big guns, because they know they'll never be caught with their robes around their ankles, that's also a problem. The purpose of encounters is to make the players manage their resources; if they never have to do that because your encounters are so few or unchallenging, there's no point to having them in the first place.

I'm torn between yelling "Amen" and "Preach it, brotha'!" to this. I loathe the vulnerability and lack of effectiveness of vancian casters at low level, and pretty much only play them in "start at level x" campaigns.

Seerow

2014-02-16, 12:14 PM

I'm torn between yelling "Amen" and "Preach it, brotha'!" to this. I loathe the vulnerability and lack of effectiveness of vancian casters at low level, and pretty much only play them in "start at level x" campaigns.

I almost exclusively play casters in lower level games, and have rarely had a significant problem with being ineffective. If anything, the squishiness and restrictions of fewer spells per day is generally overstated.

Seriously, the Wizard is the only caster among the tier 1s that's actually squishy at all at level 1. Cleric gets the same armor and 2 fewer hitpoints than the fighter. Cleric also has the benefit of 6 daily turn undead uses, and any Divine or Devotion feats basically effectively triples his spells per day (since a good divine/devotion feat is equal to or better than a 1st level spell). Druid has slightly worse armor and doesn't get turn undead, but gets a great mini-fighter as a backup companion.

Even with the Wizard's squishiness though, he has the option to have a familiar giving +3 hp (bringing him up to comprable levels with the Cleric/Druid at level 1. The last wizard I played actually had the highest 1st level hp in the party, and still kept almost dead even with the Fighter up through level 6), his real issue as far as squishiness goes is low armor. It is definitely an issue (especially since level 1 is when armor actually works as a good defense), but not a crippling one (since level 1 is also when staying in the back is actually a decent defense, since enemies tend to lack the mobility and/or defenses to get around a couple of melee characters without dying), and the Wizard's offensive ability will turn a TPK into an easy encounter a couple of times per day, making his inclusion in the group more than warranted. A 1st level Wizard isn't the powerhouse he is by level 8-10 or beyond, but he is not exactly "dead weight waiting to be blown over by a strong breeze"

Psyren

2014-02-16, 12:25 PM

I almost exclusively play casters in lower level games, and have rarely had a significant problem with being ineffective. If anything, the squishiness and restrictions of fewer spells per day is generally overstated.

No one is saying you should be ineffective. Just, y'know, challenged. Needing to rely, at least a little, on the other schlubs around the table with you. A good DM will find ways to do that, because one guy able to easily rip through/trivialize every encounter without needing his teammates is boring for everyone. And not a single person that I can see said they should be "dead weight waiting to be blown over by a strong breeze" either, so I have no idea where this even came from.

Seriously, the Wizard is the only caster among the tier 1s that's actually squishy at all at level 1. Cleric gets the same armor and 2 fewer hitpoints than the fighter. Cleric also has the benefit of 6 daily turn undead uses, and any Divine or Devotion feats basically effectively triples his spells per day (since a good divine/devotion feat is equal to or better than a 1st level spell). Druid has slightly worse armor and doesn't get turn undead, but gets a great mini-fighter as a backup companion.

Clerics are indeed tough - but they have to be, because there is very little they can do at range at low levels, so they end up in melee more often than wizards do. Druids I agree are (perhaps unfortunately) the best of both worlds, which is why the solution there is to make them need to budget their stats or else be mediocre all around. 3.5 Wildshape does not ask for that tradeoff at all, while PF Wildshape does a better job of it (in addition to nerfing the animal companion.)