Core Only Balance

[PurpleSocks]

So I keep seeing people advertising core only games (on various forumns and RL) as they believe that this leads to more balanced play.

Whilst I agree that it removes most of the opportunities for cheese in a build, don't they realise how incredibly hard it is to build a Fighter/Rogue/Paladin/Monk/Ranger/Barbarian that can keep up with a Cleric/Wizard/Druid without the options available in the various splat books?

I could go on about not wanting to be constantly eclipsed by tier1's and how completely ridiculous a core only druid is compared to X but I was wondering if someone has already made this argument before albiet more eloquently, with examples and possibly even a few pretty pictures, that some lovely individual in the playground could point me towards?

[Crake]

I would actually also appreciate something like this, that would help point out the wrongful assumption that closing off splatbooks balances the game

[atemu1234]

So I keep seeing people advertising core only games (on various forumns and RL) as they believe that this leads to more balanced play.

Whilst I agree that it removes most of the opportunities for cheese in a build, don't they realise how incredibly hard it is to build a Fighter/Rogue/Paladin/Monk/Ranger/Barbarian that can keep up with a Cleric/Wizard/Druid without the options available in the various splat books?

I could go on about not wanting to be constantly eclipsed by tier1's and how completely ridiculous a core only druid is compared to X but I was wondering if someone has already made this argument before albiet more eloquently, with examples and possibly even a few pretty pictures, that some lovely individual in the playground could point me towards?

Every game has five sweet spots- 1, 5, 10, 15, 20. Let's examine the difference at each, from a straight-classed fighter with starting 18 strength, and a straight-classed wizard with 18 intelligence. Both human. No magic items, except the Fighter gets a weapon with an appropriate enhancement bonus.

1- Fighter has roughly 5-9 hit points. Respectable. Wizard stays out of range and pings him to death with magic missiles. That's unoptimized. Through on grease, sleep and maybe a casting of Color Spray, and the game is already over.
5- Fighter, at this point, has between 27-47 hit points. Wizard still stays out of range, if the fighter now has a bow, uses Protection from Arrows, kills him with either summoned beasties or fireballs.
10- Fighter has between 55-105 hit points. Wizard uses same tactics as five.
15-... Seriously.
20- ... SERIOUSLY.

You see the problem. At no point here did the fighter have any option save die of horribleness. Never. Replace Fighter with any melee class, just as easy. Especially if you include scry-or-die tactics.

[jamieth]

Every game has five sweet spots- 1, 5, 10, 15, 20. Let's examine the difference at each, from a straight-classed fighter with starting 18 strength, and a straight-classed wizard with 18 intelligence. Both human. No magic items, except the Fighter gets a weapon with an appropriate enhancement bonus.

1- Fighter has roughly 5-9 hit points. Respectable. Wizard stays out of range and pings him to death with magic missiles. That's unoptimized. Through on grease, sleep and maybe a casting of Color Spray, and the game is already over.


L1 wizard can cast 2 Magic Missiles a day, that's 10 damage at most. Assuming a fighter has at least a +1 Con, won't be enough to ping him to death. (Now, I'm not arguing other spells will give Wiz an advantage...)

[Vhaidara]

So I keep seeing people advertising core only games (on various forumns and RL) as they believe that this leads to more balanced play.

They're wrong. In fact, it is more accurate to say that a Splat-only game is more balanced (everything EXCEPT Core). You obviously need to allow something for prerequisite feats, and skills can stay, but removal of Core classes, spells, and Metamagic/Item Creation feats goes a LONG way towards balancing the game.

[Curmudgeon]

Whilst I agree that it removes most of the opportunities for cheese in a build ...
I don't think you're correct there. Natural Spell for a Druid, or the "free Wishes" application of Gate, Planar Binding, & c. are at the top of the cheese scale — and all core. Glitterdust is an incredibly powerful spell, and it's level 2. What way is there to counter a -40 skill penalty? (A scaling penalty of -2/level, maximum -40, would still increase at double the rate of skill ranks and be almost impossible to overcome. But -40 vs. a 3rd level stealthy character is pure smelly Limburger.) Half of the most powerful base classes in the game (of which there are about 200) are represented in the core 11 in Player's Handbook. Core is cheese.

[Khedrac]

1- Fighter has roughly 5-9 hit points. Respectable. Wizard stays out of range and pings him to death with magic missiles. That's unoptimized. Through on grease, sleep and maybe a casting of Color Spray, and the game is already over.
Everything else is fine, but this line is wrong.

1. Fighter has 10 to 14 hit points (max at first level remember), against a wizard he check the range and either charges or draws a longbow. If the wizard can get close enough to use Color Spray before the fighter acts, the wizard wins (grease is great but it's not as good as people tend to think). If the fighter acts first he either charges or uses his bow. Sleep is useless - full round cast means the fighter will hit and interrupt. Magic Missile takes 3 rounds minimum to kill the fighter - the wizard will die first.

Actually how many wizards actually take Protection from Arrows? - it's a very situational spell, one to carry a scroll of rather than memorise I think. At level 5 the fighter might have a magic bow in which case the wizard needs a new strategy. Summons will get interrupted at this point too.

---

Part of the problem is that an ineffective wizard is as useless as (or more useless than) an ineffective fighter. What normally messes up low level fighters is not being good at mental arithmetic! Most players in my experience only use limited amounts of power attack (often just whatever temporary bonuses they have on their attack role) and it weakens fighters by a lot (for a fighter) not to be more flexible and to be able to cover more options.
Wizards with the right spells for the job are top of tier 1 for a very good reason, but descriptions of their capability tend to suggest the party goes into a dungeon, sees what's there then goes away for the primary casters to re-select their spells. Also they don't sound as if they practice resource management on their spells, which leads to short adventuring days and long rest periods to the casters can replenish. Choose the wrong spells for the day and the wizard is totally useless (unable to even buff allies). Some people are naturally better at choosing a flexible selection of spells, this tends to make their wizards more powerful.

Now most people agree that the most broken spells are in the PHB, but in my experience the big ones are only broken if the DM is willing to be lax and the player is trying to abuse. Other more common spells are (in my experience) more broken on a day-to-day basis. For example take the Orb of X spells from Complete Arcane. Yes they are single target, but no save, no SR (and no chance of accidentally hitting your allies) makes these spells really effective if the wizard needs to deal damage - too effective in my general experience. Yes the wizard may have to deal with the firing into melee and cover penalties, but it's touch attacks...
Also a lot of spells from non-core books are niche spells that break (often badly) when taken out of their intended area, and I'm sorry, but just because a spell has been created one does not mean that every high-level wizard has heard of the spell and can take it when they level up as is usually assumed.

So does "Core Only" fix the brokenness? - No, as has been posted, in many ways it makes it worse. BUT, what it does do is make it easier for the DM to control. To often I see players who find a nice neat trick not learn the real rules that limit when and where the trick works - as a DM one has to trust one's players, but at the same time one needs to know the rules they are using to spot mistakes (usually honest ones with my players). The fewer rules that are in play, the less the DM has to learn.
As for party balance - that is best addressed by discussion between the group as a whole. Among other things, discussion means there are more minds working to solve the problem; usually though it means that the overly-dominating casters discover they can have as much or more fun by enabling their follows to be more effective. It is usually better resource management too.

[Vhaidara]

Other more common spells are (in my experience) more broken on a day-to-day basis. For example take the Orb of X spells from Complete Arcane. Yes they are single target, but no save, no SR (and no chance of accidentally hitting your allies) makes these spells really effective if the wizard needs to deal damage - too effective in my general experience. Yes the wizard may have to deal with the firing into melee and cover penalties, but it's touch attacks...

Excuse me? Blasting is awful. As was pointed out, it would take 3 magic missile to kill a same level fighter. Let's look at level 5, when the iconic blast spell comes online: Fireball.
Save for Half? Check
SR? Check
Elemental damage (and therefore subject to resistance) check.

At most, you do 30 damage, before saves or resistances. This max goes up by 6 per level. This means that it get further and further from dealing with targets in a timely manner (enemy HP will scale up faster and more consistently than that). And this is THE iconic blasting spell.

[Grod_The_Giant]

1. Fighter has 10 to 14 hit points (max at first level remember), against a wizard he check the range and either charges or draws a longbow. If the wizard can get close enough to use Color Spray before the fighter acts, the wizard wins (grease is great but it's not as good as people tend to think). If the fighter acts first he either charges or uses his bow. Sleep is useless - full round cast means the fighter will hit and interrupt. Magic Missile takes 3 rounds minimum to kill the fighter - the wizard will die first.
This assumes the first-level fighter has a longbow and decent Dex, which isn't guaranteed. (Certainly not at character creation, when a 75gp longbow is literally half a fighter's average starting gold). Now, an archer fighter does have much better odds against a wizard, since most of the core Wizard 1 spells are short ranged, but...things that could still mess him up:

Mount (there is now a horse charging you. Deal)
Sleep (A 1st level wizard probably has a +4-+6 in Concentration, depending on how good his starting Con was. A longbow only deals 1d8; wizard has a better than even chance of making the Concentration check)
Shield, Mage Armor, and crossbow duel (The Wizard comes out ahead on AC, and probably isn't too far behind on attack bonus at 1st level. Even better with the archetypical Elf wizard.)



Actually how many wizards actually take Protection from Arrows? - it's a very situational spell, one to carry a scroll of rather than memorise I think. At level 5 the fighter might have a magic bow in which case the wizard needs a new strategy. Summons will get interrupted at this point too.
Wind Wall, then.


Also a lot of spells from non-core books are niche spells that break (often badly) when taken out of their intended area, and I'm sorry, but just because a spell has been created one does not mean that every high-level wizard has heard of the spell and can take it when they level up as is usually assumed.
There actually is no RAW limitation on what new spells he can add to his spellbook on level-up-- they're assumed to be the result of the wizard's own research.

But none of this is the real problem. Versatility is the real issue, and it's something none of the PHB martial classes (except maybe Ranger and Rogue) can really handle. The wizard has spells for just about any situation-- and before you say "Schrodinger's Wizard," remember that he can leave slots open and prepare spells anytime he has a few minutes of quiet. Imagine a first-level wizard with a conservative Int of 16, who knows the following spells:

Grease
Unseen Servant
Charm Person
Sleep
Disguise Self
Silent Image

Try to imagine a problem he can't contribute to. Don't forget that he also has a good Int-- he'll have a couple Knowledge skills, and be pretty credible at other Int-based skills like Forgery or Craft. Now let's think of an average Fighter, who we'll be generous and give 4 skill points/level.

Climb
Intimidate
Craft (Weaponsmithing)
Ride

Who looks like they're going to be able to contribute to more situations?

[PurpleSocks]

...So I was kinda hoping someone knew of an article/post which thoroughly did this whole argument. As much as we all agree that core only is horrendously unfair to the non tier 1's, there is the misconception that a core only game is somehow 'better balanced'.

Guys your currently debating how much of an advantage core wizards have over a fighter, which seems to be rapidly descending into how much blasting sucks for wizards. Which whilst valid points have very little to do with my initial question and does nothing to help change this misconception about core.

[Red Fel]

I could go on about not wanting to be constantly eclipsed by tier1's and how completely ridiculous a core only druid is compared to X but I was wondering if someone has already made this argument before albiet more eloquently, with examples and possibly even a few pretty pictures, that some lovely individual in the playground could point me towards?

Oh, go on, you.

There is, if not a general consensus, at least a substantial portion of this forum that acknowledges that the PHB contains some of the most broken elements of the game. And I mean that in both directions - weakest classes, strongest classes, weakest abilities, strongest abilities. Classes that barely function (Monk, Paladin); classes that do absolutely everything (Cleric, Druid, Wizard); classes that just disappoint (Fighter, Ranger, Rogue); spells that crack the game open like a soft-boiled egg (Wish, Miracle, Gate).

Later books would tone down some of the crazy, or beef up some of the weaksauce. But the core - and by core, I mean PHB and DMG, because yes defining core matters goshdarnit - contains some of the most unbalanced, broken material in the entire game. Most of the ban lists I've encountered tend to have a substantial number of elements from core; anything beyond that tends to be banned based on DM unfamiliarity, not broken-ness of content.

There is no argument that I've encountered that could dissuade me of just how broken core is. Nor can I think of a cogent argument in opposition. In theory, such an argument would be based on sentimentality, not on demonstrable fact.

[Sacrieur]

I limit newer players to CRB (PF, o/c), for simplicity and so they don't get overwhelmed.

No matter if you have everything open or not, a responsible DM will find himself having to nerf the squishy casters and buff everyone else. Every DM do yourself a favor and remove Wish, Miracle, Reality Revision, and their lesser variants out of the game. They never should've been put in the game in the first place, least of all in the gem that's supposed to be the CRB/PHB. The logic behind them is, "Because Wizards can do mostly everything, they should be allowed to do everything." In my opinion any ability that has to explicitly say its limits are up to the determination of the DM is desperately in need of being removed or reworked.

In the case of Wish et al. just remove it. Don't try to fix it. They can't be fixed. It's like everyone who created the spell went, "Man, we worked hard building this fun game, now let's ruin it."

[Grod_The_Giant]

...So I was kinda hoping someone knew of an article/post which thoroughly did this whole argument. As much as we all agree that core only is horrendously unfair to the non tier 1's, there is the misconception that a core only game is somehow 'better balanced'.

Guys your currently debating how much of an advantage core wizards have over a fighter, which seems to be rapidly descending into how much blasting sucks for wizards. Which whilst valid points have very little to do with my initial question and does nothing to help change this misconception about core.
Hmm, okay.

Basically, the idea is that practice makes perfect. The initial 3.5 books were written with only internal theorizing and testing, which missed all kinds of things. The playtest druid, for instance, only used wildshape for scouting and utility. As the edition continued, thousands of fans gave the rules thorough stress-testing and wrote about it on the internet, revealing all kinds of unexpected things. Later books were written in light of all that. Take this post from Mike Mearls about the Hexblade:

The hexblade suffers a little because he came on the scene relatively early in 3.5's life. As R&D pushes the boundaries of the game, we learn that some things we thought were risky or potentially broken aren't. Other times, we learn things that look fine don't actually work in play.

Armored mages fall into the first category. Them seem really powerful, but in the long run they aren't. Spells and magic items allow an unarmored mage to build great defenses. The spell mage armor is as good as medium armor, and its duration allows most mages to keep it active at all times. If you compare the hexblade to the duskblade from PH 2, you can see how the thinking has changed. (http://community.wizards.com/comment/13411551#comment-13411551)

So when the designers sat down to write the 3.5 player's handbook, they didn't really have a frame of reference. They looked at something like the Monk, that got all these special abilities, and deemed it powerful-- it's got better AC than a wizard, thanks to adding a second ability score, and more-but-less-accurate, more damaging attacks than the fighter-- plus all these fancy defense and utility abilities. And I'm sure it stacked up fine against a sword-and-board fighter and a fireball-slinging wizard. They looked at blast spells and forgot that things had more hit points than they did in 3e. They saw glitterdust as an anti-invisibility utility and planar binding as risky but iconic

So... yeah. The player's handbook was, in a sense, nothing more than a bunch of untested homebrew. The classes aren't balanced because no-one really knew what they were doing yet. I mean, look at them:

Barbarian-- decent but boring
Bard-- good
Cleric-- one of the strongest classes in the game
Druid-- one of the strongest classes in the game; probably the strongest for a newbie. (It's the only one that breaks the game just by doing obvious cool things like turning into a tiger and summoning bears)
Fighter-- one of the weakest classes in the game; doubly true when there aren't any good feats for him to take. (Improved Trip, Power Attack, and...?)
Monk-- one of the weakest classes in the game
Paladin-- one of the weakest classes in the game without heavy splat support
Ranger-- decent
Rogue-- decent
Sorcerer-- one of the strongest classes in the game
Wizard-- one of the strongest classes in the game.

Of 11 classes, about a third are okay, a third are are ludicrously overpowered, and a third are incredibly weak. And all of them, with the possible exceptions of Druid and Barbarian, are badly designed-- they've got very low optimization floors, meaning that a new player can find himself completely useless if he's not careful. Compare those to late-game classes like the Dread Necromancer, Crusader, or Warlock-- they're decent right out of the box, and can't be pushed nearly as high in terms of raw power.

It's the same for any criteria you look at. Late-edition material is more interesting-- both mechanically and flavor-wise-- more balanced, and actually more newbie-friendly, because the designers had a better grasp on what they were doing.

[Curmudgeon]

Here's an example for you. Using Core rules alone, the Rogue is a class just full of vulnerabilities. I typically use a couple dozen sources for a Rogue character just to overcome the problems with the base class.

Let's start even before taking any class levels, with choice of race. A Rogue should fight smart (see below regarding Knowledge Devotion). A race with bonuses to both DEX and INT is the Silvanesti Elf in Dragonlance Campaign Setting. There's no LA +0 Core race which provides both boosts.

For an inherently stealthy class, it's maddening that there's no standard way for the Rogue to get Hide in Plain Sight. You can get that late (level 13) with the Wilderness Rogue variant in Unearthed Arcana, or early — but only in Forgotten Realms — with the Dark Creature template in Cormyr: The Tearing of the Weave. HiPS lets the Rogue enable sneak attack by actually being sneaky. With Core, there's no answer.

Even when the Rogue is good at hiding, they're totally vulnerable to creatures with other senses like Scent, Blindsight, and Tremorsense. The Darkstalker feat in Lords of Madness fixes that.

The Rogue doesn't deal enough damage to matter in combat. In particular, they don't have any option which scales damage with increasing levels the way Power Attack scales with full BAB class levels. The answer is the Craven feat in Champions of Ruin, which boosts sneak attack damage by +1 per character level. Craven increases the Rogue's vulnerability to fear, but the Uncanny Bravery alternative class feature (ACF) in Dragon Magic fixes that.

In Core people will recommend Two-Weapon Fighting, stating that more attacks are the way to deal more damage. That's actually a recipe for suicide. TWF gives you no benefit unless you make full attacks, which means your melee opponents get to make full counterattacks. Rogues are too squishy to withstand that abuse. A much superior alternative is Snap Kick (Tome of Battle), which gives you an extra unarmed attack whenever you make at least one melee attack. So Snap Kick gives an extra attack on a full attack like TWF, but also works with a standard action attack, a bonus attack (such as provided by Improved Trip), or even an attack of opportunity. And you can buy the Improved Unarmed Strike feat prerequisite in the form of Bracers of Striking (Magic of Faerûn).

With 3/4 BAB the Rogue doesn't hit often enough. And of course if you don't hit you don't do any (sneak attack or other) damage. The combination of Education (Eberron Campaign Setting) and Knowledge Devotion (Complete Champion) feats lets the Rogue leverage their skillful natures by getting bonuses to attack (and also damage) based on Knowledge skill checks to identify creature vulnerabilities. The Collector of Stories skill trick in Complete Scoundrel boosts one of these Knowledge checks significantly, getting you to the maximum Knowledge Devotion benefit several levels earlier.

Too many enemies are immune to sneak attack. Lightbringer Penetrating Strike is an ACF in Expedition to Castle Ravenloft which lets the Rogue still deal out sneak attack damage, but with 1/2 the normal dice, while flanking normally sneak-immune targets. The Rogue can also get weapon augment crystals in Magic Item Compendium; Greater Truedeath allows full sneak attack vs. Undead, and Greater Demolition allows full sneak attack vs. Constructs. Or the Rogue can make use of wands of Grave Strike, Golem Strike, and Vine Strike spells from Spell Compendium, along with the altered wand activation times from Rules Compendium.

Edit: I just counted, and there are 15 non-Core books referenced in this list. And that's just to fix obvious problems, so it doesn't include anything beyond these "bug fixes". I would add extra capabilities from other sources.

[eggynack]

...So I was kinda hoping someone knew of an article/post which thoroughly did this whole argument. As much as we all agree that core only is horrendously unfair to the non tier 1's, there is the misconception that a core only game is somehow 'better balanced'.

Guys your currently debating how much of an advantage core wizards have over a fighter, which seems to be rapidly descending into how much blasting sucks for wizards. Which whilst valid points have very little to do with my initial question and does nothing to help change this misconception about core.
Honestly, these threads exist, and it'd be relatively trivial to find them for either party, but if you expect a thread about core balance issues to be lacking in arbitrary debates and unrelated ridiculousness, then you're expecting something that really doesn't exist. These issues are divisive, and they're vast, and getting lost in the maze that is 3.5 optimization is a nigh-universal issue. There are really two things you can expect from a thread like this, and they're both things that have occurred in this thread. You can get a broad overview of class balance, pointing out what proportions of in and out of core classes fall into each tier (core is heavily weighted towards the outer tiers, and non-core is heavily weighted towards the internal tiers), and you can get some specific examples usually looking at a comparison between two specific classes. You can also get a detailed general sort of thing, but that takes a lot of time, and would be in a long form argument of the form you seek to avoid.

[Doctor Awkward]

Let's start even before taking any class levels, with choice of race. A Rogue should fight smart (see below regarding Knowledge Devotion). A race with bonuses to both DEX and INT is the Silvanesti Elf in Dragonlance Campaign Setting. There's no LA +0 Core race which provides both boosts.

Gray Elf (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/elf.htm#grayElf)


For an inherently stealthy class, it's maddening that there's no standard way for the Rogue to get Hide in Plain Sight. You can get that late (level 13) with the Wilderness Rogue variant in Unearthed Arcana, or early — but only in Forgotten Realms — with the Dark Creature template in Cormyr: The Tearing of the Weave. HiPS lets the Rogue enable sneak attack by actually being sneaky. With Core, there's no answer.

Shadowdancer 1 (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/prestigeClasses/shadowdancer.htm)
Rogue can qualify by level 7.


Even when the Rogue is good at hiding, they're totally vulnerable to creatures with other senses like Scent, Blindsight, and Tremorsense. The Darkstalker feat in Lords of Madness fixes that.

There is nothing in core that has one of those special senses that is also immune to being flanked, except for swarms, but you don't attack those with melee weapons anyway.
You are expected to work with your party in those situations.


The Rogue doesn't deal enough damage to matter in combat. ...wat? In particular, they don't have any option which scales damage with increasing levels the way Power Attack scales with full BAB class levels. The answer is the Craven feat in Champions of Ruin, which boosts sneak attack damage by +1 per character level. Craven increases the Rogue's vulnerability to fear, but the Uncanny Bravery alternative class feature (ACF) in Dragon Magic fixes that.

A core only 10th level Fighter with 22 Strength Power Attacking at a -5 (since it would be tough to afford more than that and still hit) with a +3 Greatsword will deal 2d6+10+3 weapon+2 Weapon Spec+8 Str mod for 30 average damage per hit.
A core only Rogue 9/Shadowdancer 1 with 12 Strength Sneak Attacking with a Sword of Subtlety will deal 6d6+5 weapon+1 Str mod for 27 average damage per hit, with a much higher hit rate due to Weapon Finesse.

And I'd really question Uncanny Bravery with the Craven feat, since one of the prerequisites is that you cannot have a fear immunity.


In Core people will recommend Two-Weapon Fighting, stating that more attacks are the way to deal more damage. That's actually a recipe for suicide. TWF gives you no benefit unless you make full attacks, which means your melee opponents get to make full counterattacks. Rogues are too squishy to withstand that abuse.

Then don't run up to them. If you know they are melee enemies, take a full defensive action and make them come to you. You have everything to gain and nothing to lose.
Rogues are not that squishy. Rings of Blinking are a thing, as are Cloaks of Displacement. With a very high touch AC, evasion, uncanny dodge, and a miss chance you are not an attractive target for anyone.


A much superior alternative is Snap Kick

No it's not.
If a rogue uses Sneak Attack with an unarmed strike, he can only deal non-lethal damage. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/classes/rogue.htm#sneakAttack)
And even if Tome of Battle was an option, Martial Study: Wolf Fang Strike is a much better choice for a feat, since you can attack with both weapons as a standard action, which is still a worse tactical choice than making the enemy come to you.


With 3/4 BAB the Rogue doesn't hit often enough. And of course if you don't hit you don't do any (sneak attack or other) damage. The combination of Education (Eberron Campaign Setting) and Knowledge Devotion (Complete Champion) feats lets the Rogue leverage their skillful natures by getting bonuses to attack (and also damage) based on Knowledge skill checks to identify creature vulnerabilities. The Collector of Stories skill trick in Complete Scoundrel boosts one of these Knowledge checks significantly, getting you to the maximum Knowledge Devotion benefit several levels earlier.

Between frequently targeting Flat-footed AC's and flanking bonuses, Rogues will hit plenty often enough in Core.



Too many enemies are immune to sneak attack. Lightbringer Penetrating Strike is an ACF in Expedition to Castle Ravenloft which lets the Rogue still deal out sneak attack damage, but with 1/2 the normal dice, while flanking normally sneak-immune targets. The Rogue can also get weapon augment crystals in Magic Item Compendium; Greater Truedeath allows full sneak attack vs. Undead, and Greater Demolition allows full sneak attack vs. Constructs. Or the Rogue can make use of wands of Grave Strike, Golem Strike, and Vine Strike spells from Spell Compendium, along with the altered wand activation times from Rules Compendium.


Yes the Rogue has problems, but these really don't cover it.
The real problems with Rogue are the limitations of sneak attack against Huge or bigger targets, since you must reach their vital spots. Also the fact that Sneak Attack fails if the target has any form of concealment, which we have just seen is sold as an item easily enough.

Even out of core Rogue is still a mostly solid class. It's the second best skill monkey out there. 8 skills per level, and access to Diplomacy, Sleight of Hand, Bluff, and copious amounts of stealth allows you to walk away with pretty much any item you want that isn't on fire. There is very little a skillfully played Rogue cannot handle with the proper equipment and judicious application of Use Magic Device.

The biggest reason that Rogue is so rarely used outside of core is that the Factotum is just plain better. Filling the skill monkey role, the Factotum has no cross-class ranks in anything, as well as a high emphasis on Intelligence. Straight rogue is also pretty MAD, and often must use precious feats to make itself more SAD. The Factotum? Ride that Intelligence all the way to Winnersville.

EDIT: And as far as balance issues go, just look up the handbooks for the top tier classes (Druid, Cleric, Wizard), and note how many of their must-have spells are found in core. That's where the power from those classes comes from, not the class features they get from splat books.

[Psyren]

In the case of Wish et al. just remove it. Don't try to fix it. They can't be fixed. It's like everyone who created the spell went, "Man, we worked hard building this fun game, now let's ruin it."

I would argue that wishes can be a great addition to many games. Partial Fulfillment covers nearly all your bases, and PF already fixed the worst part of the spell (i.e. magic item creation.) Meanwhile, Miracle can be a great panic button, and when you think the party is bringing a sledgehammer to a chess match, you can have the deity/power just say "no" - and even refund the spell slot if you don't want to punish them too harshly. All totally RAW.

[Curmudgeon]

Gray Elf (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/elf.htm#grayElf)
I missed that one; I thought it was in Unearthed Arcana for some reason. Still, it's not a good combination for a martial character, with penalties to both STR and CON.

Shadowdancer 1 (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/prestigeClasses/shadowdancer.htm)
Rogue can qualify by level 7.
Yes, it's a great way for a Shadowdancer to get Hide in Plain Sight. How does that address the Rogue problem? Shadowdancer doesn't have sneak attack, 8 + INT mod skill points per level, or Rogue Special Ability options; in short, it's not Rogue. Plus qualifying for Shadowdancer at level 7 means using all of your feats beforehand (plus 23 skill ranks) solely to satisfy Shadowdancer entry requirements, leaving nothing to address any other Core Rogue problems.

There is nothing in core that has one of those special senses that is also immune to being flanked
You seem to have mashed some things together. The point of Darkstalker isn't solely to enable sneak attack against all enemies all the time (though that would be nice) through either hiding or flanking. With some enemies just hiding, simply to avoid being killed, is enough of an achievement. If you can sneak off with the entire treasure hoard without killing anything, that's just dandy. :smallbiggrin:

except for swarms, but you don't attack those with melee weapons anyway.
No, you attack swarms with unarmed strikes instead of weapons. Swarms either take half damage or are immune to weapon attacks. From the Glossary (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/glossary&term=Glossary_dnd_unarmedstrike&alpha=U):
unarmed strike: A successful blow, typically dealing nonlethal damage, from a character attacking without weapons.

A core only 10th level Fighter with 22 Strength Power Attacking at a -5 (since it would be tough to afford more than that and still hit) with a +3 Greatsword will deal 2d6+10+3 weapon+2 Weapon Spec+8 Str mod for 30 average damage per hit.
A core only Rogue 9/Shadowdancer 1 with 12 Strength Sneak Attacking with a Sword of Subtlety will deal 6d6+5 weapon+1 Str mod for 27 average damage per hit, with a much higher hit rate due to Weapon Finesse.
Fighter 10 BAB: +10
Strength 22: +6
+3 Greatsword: +3
Weapon Focus: +1
Power Attack: -5
= +15 to hit

Rogue 9/Shadowdancer 1 BAB: +6
Strength 12: +1
Sword of Subtlety: +1
= +8 to hit

You said the Fighter, attacking at +15 to hit, wouldn't want to lower their attack number any further. Your Rogue/Shadowdancer combo at +8 would not only deal less damage than the Fighter if they did hit, would mostly miss instead and deal zero damage.

And I'd really question Uncanny Bravery with the Craven feat, since one of the prerequisites is that you cannot have a fear immunity.
Uncanny Bravery doesn't make you immune to fear, so there's nothing to question.

Then don't run up to them. If you know they are melee enemies, take a full defensive action and make them come to you. You have everything to gain and nothing to lose.
Who said anything about running up to the enemies? However, you definitely don't want to wait for enemies to come to you if your damage is dependent on sneak attack. Remember, I specifically mentioned Lightbringer Penetrating Strike as a way to enable sneak attack vs. flanked foes, so you would avoid enemies until there's a place to move to in which you could gain flanking benefits.

Rogues are not that squishy. Rings of Blinking are a thing, as are Cloaks of Displacement.
Yeah; the prices are real things, too: 27,000 gp + 50,000 gp = 77,000 gp. That's on top of the 22,310 gp for the Sword of Subtlety you think the Rogue is required to get. These three items already more than double the level 10 expected wealth.

With a very high touch AC, evasion, uncanny dodge, and a miss chance you are not an attractive target for anyone.
What makes you think any of those things matter? Rogues, with light or no armor (to avoid penalizing vital class skills), can be killed with attacks vs. regular AC: the type of attacks most monsters make.

If a rogue uses Sneak Attack with an unarmed strike, he can only deal non-lethal damage. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/classes/rogue.htm#sneakAttack)
Well, that's definitely not what the rules say.
With a sap (blackjack) or an unarmed strike, a rogue can make a sneak attack that deals nonlethal damage instead of lethal damage.
You'll note that the "only" qualifier is solely your addition. The Rogue can make a nonlethal attack, but is not restricted to doing so.

And even if Tome of Battle was an option, Martial Study: Wolf Fang Strike is a much better choice for a feat, since you can attack with both weapons as a standard action ...
What? There are two basic problems with this idea:

It requires the Rogue to have a second weapon, which is additional expense and restriction on actions (such as having a free hand to use Sleight of Hand or activate a wand with Use Magic Device).
Martial Study has no special recovery mechanism (see Tome of Battle, page 40) and thus you can use it just once per encounter. That is nowhere near as good as once per melee attack with Snap Kick.

[johnbragg]

...So I was kinda hoping someone knew of an article/post which thoroughly did this whole argument. As much as we all agree that core only is horrendously unfair to the non tier 1's, there is the misconception that a core only game is somehow 'better balanced'.

Guys your currently debating how much of an advantage core wizards have over a fighter, which seems to be rapidly descending into how much blasting sucks for wizards. Which whilst valid points have very little to do with my initial question and does nothing to help change this misconception about core.

Short answer, I don't think there's a single reference to point your DM to that makes the case, especially not with pretty pictures.

I would refer the DM to JaronK's Tier list, and highlight the fact that what makes Cleric, Druid, Wizard and Sorcerer Tier 1 are mostly Core, PHB spells. Flying, teleporting, scrying, planar ally/binding, summoning, animating dead for minionmancy, contingency, the melee CoDzilla line (divine power, etc), polymorphing--all straight out of the PHB.

Maybe he'd be amenable to Tier 4-5 classes (and maybe the bard) being able to use splatbooks? Maybe splatbook ACFs and feats but not spells? (It's a lot less taxing for the DM to learn ACFs and feats that players take than it is to learn the details of every spell in every splatbook.)

Previous posters have had a really good point about unfamiliarity. Even experienced DM's who argue that the Tier 1s' power is overrated are used to balancing with and around their abilities derived from PHB spells. Other books can be unfamiliar so the DM doesn't know where the hazards are. I remember way back in the early days of 3.5 or maybe even 3.0, a campaign where the Paladin was going around one-shotting everything using a Divine Sacrifice spell that let him take 2 damage per round and add d6 damage per 2 hp lost. (This was followed by my healbot Durkon cleric burning a spell to heal the paladin). The player conveniently forgot the 5d6 damage cap, and no one else owned that sourcebook, and so this went on until I decided to take a look at the actual text of the spell. The DM had to keep scaling up the monsters to match the PAladin's damage output, to the point where no one else in the party (ranger, cleric-rogue, "I forget" and later a barbarian who spent most of her time dominated and fighting the party. Because we hadn't memorized the protection from evil spell's abiltiy to block domination.)

Another point: No-core D&D may be a more balanced game, but it's a completely different game. The flavor feels different, unless you go ahead and pick and choose a "new Core", picking a half-dozen to a dozen "standard classes" for the campaign world, so warblades replace fighters and factotums replace rogues and crusaders replace clerics or whatever.

[eggynack]

Fighter 10 BAB: +10
Strength 22: +6
+3 Greatsword: +3
Weapon Focus: +1
Power Attack: -5
= +15 to hit

Rogue 9/Shadowdancer 1 BAB: +6
Strength 12: +1
Sword of Subtlety: +1
= +8 to hit

You said the Fighter, attacking at +15 to hit, wouldn't want to lower their attack number any further. Your Rogue/Shadowdancer combo at +8 would not only deal less damage than the Fighter if they did hit, would mostly miss instead and deal zero damage.
I think you missed the part where this rogue is using weapon finesse. That boosts the +1 to, say, a +6 or +7, which means a +13 or +14 to hit. You also missed the fact that a sword of subtlety gives a +4 to attack rolls when using sneak attack, which gets you higher than the fighter. One issue, however, is that weapon finesse is really wonky, as it can only be taken at level three, leaving you two levels of crap. Still, the rogue is hitting more than you give them credit for.

Edit: Also, I think the lethal damage on unarmed strikes is a tossup, semantically. It's not clear whether that rule is enabling you to make non-lethal sneak attacks instead of normal ones, or giving you the ability to sneak attack at all, except you deal nonlethal damage instead. Whether you had the ability to sneak attack with unarmed strikes without that rule is irrelevant, because the game could be clarifying that you can in this particular fashion. I'd call it ambiguous.

[Curmudgeon]

I think you missed the part where this rogue is using weapon finesse.
There was no mention of DEX in there, so Weapon Finesse is of unknown benefit. This would also mean that every feat before level 12 is already dictated just to make that specific attack. That's really quite the feat tax. :smallmad:

A Sword of Subtlety is an odd case in the rules. A sneak attack is defined as an attack which deals more damage. That means it's not a sneak attack until the attack hits and is adjudicated as qualifying for that bonus damage, by which time it's too late for a conditional bonus to the attack to be added. Now, it's an easy guess what they intended here, but that's not the same as describing the item so it works that way.

It's not clear whether that rule is enabling you to make non-lethal sneak attacks instead of normal ones, or giving you the ability to sneak attack at all, except you deal nonlethal damage instead. I'd say it is quite clear, if you look at the relevant definitions.
The rogue’s attack deals extra damage any time her target would be denied a Dexterity bonus to AC (whether the target actually has a Dexterity bonus or not), or when the rogue flanks her target. The Rogue already has been stated by this point to have the ability to deal extra damage, which is defined in the Glossary (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/glossary&term=Glossary_dnd_damage&alpha=D).
damage: A decrease in hit points, an ability score, or other aspects of a character caused by an injury, illness, or magical effect. The three main categories of damage are lethal damage, nonlethal damage, and ability damage. (Before Complete Arcane the Rogue could deal sneak attack of all three types, including ability damage. CA changed the rule to make that negative energy damage instead.) That leaves only the explicit option to deal a sneak attack using nonlethal damage.

[Gemini476]

I think you missed the part where this rogue is using weapon finesse. That boosts the +1 to, say, a +6 or +7, which means a +13 or +14 to hit. You also missed the fact that a sword of subtlety gives a +4 to attack rolls when using sneak attack, which gets you higher than the fighter. One issue, however, is that weapon finesse is really wonky, as it can only be taken at level three, leaving you two levels of crap. Still, the rogue is hitting more than you give them credit for.

Edit: Also, I think the lethal damage on unarmed strikes is a tossup, semantically. It's not clear whether that rule is enabling you to make non-lethal sneak attacks instead of normal ones, or giving you the ability to sneak attack at all, except you deal nonlethal damage instead. Whether you had the ability to sneak attack with unarmed strikes without that rule is irrelevant, because the game could be clarifying that you can in this particular fashion. I'd call it ambiguous.

The Sword of Subtlety does give an additional +4 to-hit on sneak attacks, and Weapon Finesse does help a bit. Do note that that's all your feats used up right there, though.

Rogue 9/Shadowdancer 1 BAB: +6
Dexterity 22: +6
Sword of Subtlety: +5
= +17 to hit

Also, you're currently using... what, a 22k gp sword and 16k gp +4 Dex gloves? That's 38k out of your 49k WBL, while the Fighter has a 4k cheaper generic weapon and also probably better stats than the rogue due to SAD but eh. Whatever.

Also, a 22 Str Fighter is actually getting +9 damage from Strength when two-handing. Just saying. They'd do 31 damage on average.


Matching it up against the mean CR 10 AC of 22, we see that the Rogue gets in an average 21,6 damage while the Fighter does 18,6. (Optimum damage, if you wonder, is power attacking for -3 for an average 18,9.) On the following round the Fighter gets in a Full Attack at +17/+12 for 31,05 while the Rogue... what, Full Attacks at +13/+8 for 1d6+2 damage/hit? You'll definitely want some followup, there, even if it's just flanking. You've got a +19 bonus to Hide, sure, but hiding after attacking is a -20 and if you move away to hide that's... well, you start to fall behind the Fighter, is what I'm saying, and you need to do something to keep your edge. Moving away, hiding and making a u-turn sneak attack could work but is tricky, provokes AoOs, and has you suddenly doing less than the Fighter.

(For reference, the Wizard is currently doing 25,4 damage with his CL 10 Fireball and the Average CR 10 Monster Block of Tofu has a mean HP of 136.)

[Nightcanon]

How do people get into RPG as a hobby these days? I ask because I started with 1st Ed, when computer versions were text-based 'open Door with Key' things, and later The Bard's Tale, which were pretty limited.
Many years later I picked up cRPGs like IWD2, TOEE and NWN, and became familiar with 3rd Ed/ 3.5 through them. These are all pretty-much core only in terms of character classess and spells, and seem reasonably balanced- in part because apart from NWN you play a whole party in a co-operative way, and in part because a lot of the options with spellcasting are lost. You get to summon from a limited list of animals/ monsters rather than the whole MM, things like Wish don't exist, and even things like Glitterdust have most utility in synergy with a Rogue to pick off blinded foes with sneak attack, and so on. Question: are significant numbers coming into the game via 'core only' cRPGs where the party set-up and game-engine limitations tend to balance things out compared to PnP? Is that why people seem to think core-only is balanced?

[johnbragg]

How do people get into RPG as a hobby these days? I ask because I started with 1st Ed, when computer versions were text-based 'open Door with Key' things, and later The Bard's Tale, which were pretty limited.
Many years later I picked up cRPGs like IWD2, TOEE and NWN, and became familiar with 3rd Ed/ 3.5 through them. These are all pretty-much core only in terms of character classess and spells, and seem reasonably balanced- in part because apart from NWN you play a whole party in a co-operative way, and in part because a lot of the options with spellcasting are lost. You get to summon from a limited list of animals/ monsters rather than the whole MM, things like Wish don't exist, and even things like Glitterdust have most utility in synergy with a Rogue to pick off blinded foes with sneak attack, and so on. Question: are significant numbers coming into the game via 'core only' cRPGs where the party set-up and game-engine limitations tend to balance things out compared to PnP? Is that why people seem to think core-only is balanced?

I think it's more a familiarity issue. People say "balanced", when whether they know it or not they mean "familiar". You see a class or an ability in a splatbook and react "ZOMG broken killitwithfire" because you easily see the advantages, but the limitations or balancing factors aren't as obvious. Or maybe it's just as powerful as things from Core you accept because it doesn't occur to you to question them because they're not seen as optional.

And to some extent, people have played Core-only or Core-mostly games and they're used to the class balance in Core, to the extent that it feels right. So a more-powerful martial just feels wrong, it's way more powerful than a martial is "supposed to be."

It probably doesn't help that non-Core opens the game up to running to a forum to find the most optimized (broken) spells (and feats and ACFs), which may tend to color the perception of splatbooks.

[Doctor Awkward]

So being immune to frightful presence doesn't count as a fear immunity to you, you think that swarms are vulnerable to being punched because they are only immune to attacks from weapons, and you don't think the Sword of Subtlety actually adds to the attack and damage roll of sneak attacks (which is its explicit design and intent), but you will happily split hairs over whether or not unarmed strikes allow you to hit for real sneak attack damage?

*rubs temples*
Oy...

It's one thing to say "This description is unclear, and we don't know the intent" and another thing entirely to say, "The description is not completely clear, and I'm willfully ignoring the intent."

See the difference is this: completely unambiguous wording on the ability would read something along the lines of, "A rogue can deal nonlethal sneak attack damage by using a weapon that deals nonlethal damage, such as a sap or an unarmed strike."

We don't have that.


And the other core rogue problems cannot be addressed by anything in core. That's why they are core problems. And also, that wasn't really the question. You said that there wasn't a "standard" way for a core rogue to get HiPS. A one level dip in Shadowdancer is not going to stop you from being a Rogue. Especially considering Rogue has two dead levels and one of them is at 20.

And of course you are not going to have all of this equipment by level 10. You are eventually going to get more character wealth beyond the Sword and some gloves. There are levels beyond 10. I literally just picked it at random. Even if there aren't levels beyond 10, so long as you keep playing you are going to get more wealth.

[Morty]

The idea of "balanced in core, ruined by expansions" is a popular one, not just in D&D. And to be fair, it's sometimes true. Just not in D&D 3e.

[Doctor Awkward]

How do people get into RPG as a hobby these days? I ask because I started with 1st Ed, when computer versions were text-based 'open Door with Key' things, and later The Bard's Tale, which were pretty limited.
Many years later I picked up cRPGs like IWD2, TOEE and NWN, and became familiar with 3rd Ed/ 3.5 through them. These are all pretty-much core only in terms of character classess and spells, and seem reasonably balanced- in part because apart from NWN you play a whole party in a co-operative way, and in part because a lot of the options with spellcasting are lost. You get to summon from a limited list of animals/ monsters rather than the whole MM, things like Wish don't exist, and even things like Glitterdust have most utility in synergy with a Rogue to pick off blinded foes with sneak attack, and so on. Question: are significant numbers coming into the game via 'core only' cRPGs where the party set-up and game-engine limitations tend to balance things out compared to PnP? Is that why people seem to think core-only is balanced?

A lot of it also comes from lineage I think.

A common way for people to get into table-top RPG's is because their parent/older brother/creepy uncle plays them, and taught them. And with their teachings came their bias and prejudice. I can tell you from personal experience that there are a ton of old school players out there who think that anything and everything that doesn't conform to their expectations of what would fit in a typical 2E D&D game is overpowered and for munchkins.

In 2nd Edition a single high level wizard was a common boss encounter that could easily challenge an entire party. This is because wizards are powerful, and that's the way things are. Fighters are the meat grinders that do the consistent damage. It's their job to be experts with weapons. Thieves are good at stopping people from getting killed by traps. You always bring a thief. They also occasionally do the sneaky thing and score some really huge damage. A high level thief did five times their damage roll on a successful Backstab. Your entire damage roll, including any bonuses like Dragonsbane, elemental damage, etc. Seeing a thief get lucky and one-shot something was not out of the picture.

So these players will be on the lookout for things attempting to fulfill their "proper" role. Whether or not they are succeeding at filling that role generally doesn't enter into the picture.

[Curmudgeon]

So being immune to frightful presence doesn't count as a fear immunity to you

Prerequisites: Sneak attack class feature, cannot be immune to fear. It doesn't require you to be not immune to a particular fear attack, but to be not immune to (all) fear. You've added an article which is not present in the rules, and that changes the meaning.

you think that swarms are vulnerable to being punched because they are only immune to attacks from weapons
Well, of course. You're not using weapons, so you're not dealing with that specific immunity. It's ridiculous to try to attack spiders with your sword, but you can stomp on them or crush them with your hands. If you've got a big target something which extends the length of your arm and has a fine cutting edge is a good weapon. If you've got many tiny targets, that weapon will just reduce your effectiveness.

and you don't think the Sword of Subtlety actually adds to the attack and damage roll of sneak attacks (which is its explicit design and intent)
I understand the intent. I just think it's worded poorly.

[eggynack]

There was no mention of DEX in there, so Weapon Finesse is of unknown benefit. This would also mean that every feat before level 12 is already dictated just to make that specific attack. That's really quite the feat tax. :smallmad:
I'm not saying you're wrong about rogues. Just saying you're wrong about the particular numbers. As you noted, and I added some to that note with the thing about weapon finesse's ludicrous prerequisite, there are other problems with that rogue build, and rogues in general. Just makes more sense to criticize along those other lines, or these lines with the right numbers.


A Sword of Subtlety is an odd case in the rules. A sneak attack is defined as an attack which deals more damage. That means it's not a sneak attack until the attack hits and is adjudicated as qualifying for that bonus damage, by which time it's too late for a conditional bonus to the attack to be added. Now, it's an easy guess what they intended here, but that's not the same as describing the item so it works that way.
Maybe if you're going hyper-strict, but that's more of a rules oddity than a thing that actually impacts the rules. To my mind, it'd be a lot like calling a monk build's attack bonus wrong because they forgot to factor in the non-proficiency. Either way, the build without the sword would presumably have a different weapon, because that weapon would be pretty awful, which likely means something like an extra +2 to maintain parity with the fighter's sword expenditures, which I guess would also mean a -2 to damage.


I'd say it is quite clear, if you look at the relevant definitions. The Rogue already has been stated by this point to have the ability to deal extra damage, which is defined in the Glossary (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/glossary&term=Glossary_dnd_damage&alpha=D). (Before Complete Arcane the Rogue could deal sneak attack of all three types, including ability damage. CA changed the rule to make that negative energy damage instead.) That leaves only the explicit option to deal a sneak attack using nonlethal damage.

The question isn't so much one of the preexisting base rules for damage as it is what that particular rule is saying. The context is relevant, but I don't think it necessarily removes all ambiguity. The core question, then is which version of "can" is the one being used there. Particularly, is this a thing you can do, or the thing you can do. The thing you noted does incline me to think that the interpretation where you can do both fits better, however.

[Curmudgeon]

Maybe if you're going hyper-strict, but that's more of a rules oddity than a thing that actually impacts the rules. To my mind, it'd be a lot like calling a monk build's attack bonus wrong because they forgot to factor in the non-proficiency.
Perhaps hyper-strict is my default setting. I do take the Monk's nonproficiency with unarmed strikes into account. I do that in the form of an explicit house rule granting them proficiency, because the base rules don't grant it. With all the other abuse given the class by the game designers I felt that some of the gross stupidities exhibited in the class needed correction. (I also let them use, not merely select, their 6 Bonus Feat choices without meeting prerequisites.) What I don't do is just pretend those rules are written differently. It's never worked with badly-written software, and I don't think it works with badly-written game elements either. Different people will have (sometimes surprisingly) different assumptions about what the "obvious" fixes are. It's either the RAW, or a written house rule; nothing hand-waved or assumed in my games.

[eggynack]

Perhaps hyper-strict is my default setting. I do take the Monk's nonproficiency with unarmed strikes into account. I do that in the form of an explicit house rule granting them proficiency, because the base rules don't grant it. With all the other abuse given the class by the game designers I felt that some of the gross stupidities exhibited in the class needed correction. (I also let them use, not merely select, their 6 Bonus Feat choices without meeting prerequisites.) What I don't do is just pretend those rules are written differently. It's never worked with badly-written software, and I don't think it works with badly-written game elements either. Different people will have (sometimes surprisingly) different assumptions about what the "obvious" fixes are. It's either the RAW, or a written house rule; nothing hand-waved or assumed in my games.
The issue is, I'm really doubtful that there exists a game that doesn't use this house rule. The vast majority of people incorrectly assume that the class just has proficiency, and any person with sufficient rules savvy to recognize otherwise would also recognize that the class is really underpowered, even if it is occasionally silly. I suppose it's vaguely possible for the other form of game to exist, but I wouldn't be surprised if it just doesn't. Thus, just as is the case here, it's more expedient to assume that the game operates with the house rule, because even if it might not reflect the way the game is technically written, assuming otherwise doesn't actually reflect the problems that a rogue experiences in somewhere between almost all and all games, and neither does it reflect the imbalance experienced in core only games.

[T.G. Oskar]

Classes that barely function (Monk, Paladin); classes that do absolutely everything (Cleric, Druid, Wizard); classes that just disappoint (Fighter, Ranger, Rogue);[...]


So... yeah. The player's handbook was, in a sense, nothing more than a bunch of untested homebrew. The classes aren't balanced because no-one really knew what they were doing yet. I mean, look at them:

Barbarian-- decent but boring
Bard-- good
Cleric-- one of the strongest classes in the game
Druid-- one of the strongest classes in the game; probably the strongest for a newbie. (It's the only one that breaks the game just by doing obvious cool things like turning into a tiger and summoning bears)
Fighter-- one of the weakest classes in the game; doubly true when there aren't any good feats for him to take. (Improved Trip, Power Attack, and...?)
Monk-- one of the weakest classes in the game
Paladin-- one of the weakest classes in the game without heavy splat support
Ranger-- decent
Rogue-- decent
Sorcerer-- one of the strongest classes in the game
Wizard-- one of the strongest classes in the game.

Of 11 classes, about a third are okay, a third are are ludicrously overpowered, and a third are incredibly weak. And all of them, with the possible exceptions of Druid and Barbarian, are badly designed-- they've got very low optimization floors, meaning that a new player can find himself completely useless if he's not careful. Compare those to late-game classes like the Dread Necromancer, Crusader, or Warlock-- they're decent right out of the box, and can't be pushed nearly as high in terms of raw power.

...I dunno if I should feel offended by this.

To start, I don't say that the Paladin isn't without its issues, but this is taking it too far.

Let's start with "barely function". There's only two things that can reliably come to mind, and the only one I can reliably agree on would be MAD. The Paladin needs several stats to work, but you can leave Dexterity and Intelligence out without suffering so much. Even with 25-pt. buy, you can make a working Paladin - that is, if you consider a 14 on all necessary stats essential (between the starting 8 points and the required 14, you need 6 points, which would leave 24 points to spend; on a 25-pt. allotment, which is the equivalent to elite array, that leaves 1 point to place anywhere else). However, once you start playing, you can effectively ignore one of the four ability scores you need to work: a great deal of the Paladin allotment of spells doesn't require a saving throw, after all. The other would be how its class features work with each other - the Paladin has great proficiencies (equal only to the Fighter), great saves (at least great Fortitude and Will saves; Reflex isn't the Pally's strong point), and its class features aim towards combat and support. Sure: the immunities are kinda overblown (immunity to disease on a class that has potentially the best Fortitude save around, arguing to adding 2 scores plus having its good progression on it, seems redundant), but work well nonetheless. About the only class feature I consider useless is Remove Disease, and only because it's a weekly ability that can be easily replicated by a scroll, or a Cleric in downtime. Charisma + Diplomacy means the Paladin is a fantastic face, along the same lines as a Bard. It can serve as a healer on a pinch, between LoH and its spells; you don't have to focus on it, but using the typical wand to patch up after battle. And, as an adherent to the tanking school of Damage Redirection, Shield Other makes the Paladin a very effective tank: that it can't do Lockdown as effectively as a Fighter when Lockdown matters is something else, but Shield Other is always effective.

Then, to "weak except with heavy splat support". In this case, it's more a victim of the Paladin's insanely high optimization ceiling when all books are open. The "A-Game Paladin" is just that properly-working (not *good*, mind you, since the Paladin is already Good-aligned, and the loads of tricks it can pull off can be pulled by other classes without the same hassle AND without being Tier 1-2), being the recollection of all ACFs and feats that super-power the Paladin into a whole other niche (party support). Compared to that, and focusing on that divide in utility, the Paladin certainly looks lacking. However, the Paladin works decently without it; the difference is that it requires a greater grasp of how to play the class.

Therein, IMO, lies the problem. The Paladin is sort of like an "expert" class: it's notoriously hard to play taken right "out of the box", unlike the Barbarian or Bard. The Barbarian is incredibly easy to play: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and wield a big two-handed weapon. In that regard, the Barbarian is incredibly easy to play. The Bard requires a bit of book-keeping regarding spells, but it does party support incredibly well out of the box, and has a selection of skills that allow for proper specialization. It's also less viable compared to other options - between Divine Power and Righteous Might, the Cleric outfights the Fighter and has better spells, so the Paladin will feel inadequate in comparison. Or, it'll feel inadequate compared to a Solar, which is THE best thing to summon out of a Gate. Compare a Paladin to a Fighter, no biggie (the Fighter edges ahead on feats, which I consider is one of the Paladin's flaws as they sacrifice a handful of uses to horrible Remove Disease); compare to a Barbarian, somewhat less so (the Barbarian's can deal more damage reliably and its skills are more broad in utility than those of a Paladin); compared to a Cleric or Solar, it's just plain unfair.

Compared to a Ranger, though? Completely another niche. I mean, the Paladin can do a pretty decent Two-Hander build and match, if not surpass, a Fighter or Barbarian in utility; the Ranger can't, because it's either Archery (which has its own can of worms, but can be superior in a larger amount of occasions; only proper DR can ruin the Ranger's fun) or Two-Weapon (which induces MAD, of course). The Ranger has a pretty specific niche in being a great tracker and excellent at stealth (moreso than the Rogue); it's not even a trap-disarmer to work as a switch-hitter to a Rogue. Even on spellcasting the Paladin and the Ranger are relatively similar; the Ranger is also a great switch-healer because of CLW, but I don't see the Ranger spell list inherently superior to that of a Paladin. Then, why the Ranger is considered "decent" while the Paladin is considered "weak"? Archery?

Again: the Paladin HAS its issues (the Code of Conduct being the #1 headache; perhaps it's THIS what makes the Paladin weak, that it has a roleplay-based method of screwing the class?), but not to the extent of issues the Monk has, and not to the extent that a Ranger is inherently superior to it, when they're (IMO) fairly similar when you compare them. Note, that this is Core-only, and that at NO moment I mentioned the Paladin's mount. Outside of Core? A-Game Paladin and Wildshape Mystic Ranger, both relying on Sword of the Arcane Order. YMMV, but I'd consider that the top in terms of optimization ceiling.

One more thing, before I continue: I wouldn't say 3e is actually "a bunch of homebrew". I agree more with the idea that there was a lot of baggage from earlier editions. Look at the Monk - it's functionally identical to the 1e version, except for the immunity to ESP (which is sorta reflected in Still Mind). The Paladin is functionally identical to its 2e incarnation; other than Smite Evil (which in 3e proper was usable only ONCE per day) and that spells were acquired earlier, the Paladin changed little between editions. That is - Lay on Hands heals more, but compared to the amount of HP you get, as much as you'd heal in 2e; the same immunities, the same traits as a Fighter otherwise (other than Weapon Focus chain, of course, but that is equivalent to how the Fighter could achieve grand mastery while the Paladin could only achieve skilled levels of specialization)... About the only thing they lost was the free Magic Circle against Evil effect (the Holy Avenger now granted that), and that their holy sword was essentially a class feature that granted a superior, incredibly effective Globe of Invulnerability effect (no, really - the "circle of power" outright negated spells based on the Paladin's level!), and they were really lost in translation, as the idea of where they were located was pretty much there. I agree, though, with subsequent comments - the changes to the classes weren't studied appropriately (i.e. not "playtested" enough, though it's more like "not playtested thoroughly"), and it took quite a while before 3e lost the AD&D baggage and started to focus on tighter mechanics (it was somewhere between Magic of Incarnum and the second set of Completes, where you see more interesting and better-designed classes, PrCs and feats).


A core only Rogue 9/Shadowdancer 1 with 12 Strength Sneak Attacking with a Sword of Subtlety will deal 6d6+5 weapon+1 Str mod for 27 average damage per hit, with a much higher hit rate due to Weapon Finesse.

[...]

Rogues are not that squishy. Rings of Blinking are a thing, as are Cloaks of Displacement. With a very high touch AC, evasion, uncanny dodge, and a miss chance you are not an attractive target for anyone.

Somewhat late in terms of how it was discussed, but a corollary. I looked at the examples given by Curmudgeon, and I noticed something, which is why I dissected the post to these two bits. I'll post Curmudgeon's example in its entirely, but bolding what I want to point out:


Here's an example for you. Using Core rules alone, the Rogue is a class just full of vulnerabilities. I typically use a couple dozen sources for a Rogue character just to overcome the problems with the base class.

Let's start even before taking any class levels, with choice of race. A Rogue should fight smart (see below regarding Knowledge Devotion). A race with bonuses to both DEX and INT is the Silvanesti Elf in Dragonlance Campaign Setting. There's no LA +0 Core race which provides both boosts.

For an inherently stealthy class, it's maddening that there's no standard way for the Rogue to get Hide in Plain Sight. You can get that late (level 13) with the Wilderness Rogue variant in Unearthed Arcana, or early — but only in Forgotten Realms — with the Dark Creature template in Cormyr: The Tearing of the Weave. HiPS lets the Rogue enable sneak attack by actually being sneaky. With Core, there's no answer.

Even when the Rogue is good at hiding, they're totally vulnerable to creatures with other senses like Scent, Blindsight, and Tremorsense. The Darkstalker feat in Lords of Madness fixes that.

The Rogue doesn't deal enough damage to matter in combat. In particular, they don't have any option which scales damage with increasing levels the way Power Attack scales with full BAB class levels. The answer is the Craven feat in Champions of Ruin, which boosts sneak attack damage by +1 per character level. Craven increases the Rogue's vulnerability to fear, but the Uncanny Bravery alternative class feature (ACF) in Dragon Magic fixes that.

In Core people will recommend Two-Weapon Fighting, stating that more attacks are the way to deal more damage. That's actually a recipe for suicide. TWF gives you no benefit unless you make full attacks, which means your melee opponents get to make full counterattacks. Rogues are too squishy to withstand that abuse. A much superior alternative is Snap Kick (Tome of Battle), which gives you an extra unarmed attack whenever you make at least one melee attack. So Snap Kick gives an extra attack on a full attack like TWF, but also works with a standard action attack, a bonus attack (such as provided by Improved Trip), or even an attack of opportunity. *And you can buy the Improved Unarmed Strike feat prerequisite in the form of Bracers of Striking (Magic of Faerûn).*

With 3/4 BAB the Rogue doesn't hit often enough. And of course if you don't hit you don't do any (sneak attack or other) damage. The combination of Education (Eberron Campaign Setting) and Knowledge Devotion (Complete Champion) feats lets the Rogue leverage their skillful natures by getting bonuses to attack (and also damage) based on Knowledge skill checks to identify creature vulnerabilities. The Collector of Stories skill trick in Complete Scoundrel boosts one of these Knowledge checks significantly, getting you to the maximum Knowledge Devotion benefit several levels earlier.

Too many enemies are immune to sneak attack. Lightbringer Penetrating Strike is an ACF in Expedition to Castle Ravenloft which lets the Rogue still deal out sneak attack damage, but with 1/2 the normal dice, while flanking normally sneak-immune targets. *The Rogue can also get weapon augment crystals in Magic Item Compendium; Greater Truedeath allows full sneak attack vs. Undead, and Greater Demolition allows full sneak attack vs. Constructs. Or the Rogue can make use of wands of Grave Strike, Golem Strike, and Vine Strike spells from Spell Compendium, along with the altered wand activation times from Rules Compendium.*

Edit: I just counted, and there are 15 non-Core books referenced in this list. And that's just to fix obvious problems, so it doesn't include anything beyond these "bug fixes". I would add extra capabilities from other sources.

Everything within the asterisks (*) is what I wanted to point out. Both of you use Magic Items, but in addressing the weaknesses (perceived or otherwise) of the Rogue, Curmudgeon uses less-expensive ones. The less expensive the magic item, the higher are the chances you can see them in play.

To compare: the +3 Greatsword costs 18,000 gp; the Sword of Subtlety costs 22,310 gp. That's 4k gp the Fighter is saving, which is enough for an ability-boosting item (+2) or an item that grants +2 to AC (alternatively, a medium +2 armor). The +3 to attack and damage will be far, far more reliable in the long-term than the +4 ONLY on sneak attacks; in comparison, ONLY on Sneak Attacks, you hit with a bonus 2 points higher and deal 2 points of additional damage on average. The Ring of Blinking imposes a 20% miss chance on YOUR attacks, so you're really doing better with the Minor Cloak of Displacement, for continuous miss chance (which in turn activates sneak attacks reliably); the Ring of Invisibility is cheaper if what you're looking is proper invisibility. Ring of Blinking has an issue with Sneak Attacks as well; it's not concealment, but it's a miss chance, so based on what your DM might say, you may end up without Sneak Attacks at all. Even then, it's on average 1 out of 5 successful sneak attacks that you miss.

Those are 3 items that you require, out of...6 suggestions. Half of your suggestions involve "use magic items to compensate". Sure, magic items are expected, but you can't rely that you'll have them at all times, even with WBL - working a build that answers things without magic item constraints makes for a solid build in the end, because then you can focus on adding more power through magic items. This is why I highlighted Curmudgeon's example: of the 15 suggestions he gave, 6 relate to magic items, which is two-thirds of his suggestions. Of those suggestions, five out of six deal with working against one of the biggest issues of Sneak Attack, which is flat immunity, and two of them are redundant with the Penetrating Strike ACF. The last one deals with an alternative to TWF. The rest of the proposed solutions use ACFs, feats or even templates (about the only thing I'd consider rarer than magic items). A combined set of solutions can work for the Rogue without touching a magic item at all - Gray Elf (for Dex & Int, though the Str & Con penalties hurt), Shadowdancer or Wilderness Rogue for HiPS (with the advantage that Wilderness Rogue HiPS is Extraordinary, IIRC), the Knowledge Devotion and Craven feats for additional damage (and fighting smart, rather than fighting only) and the Collector of Stories skill trick. Hide and Move Silently are already skills a Rogue would like to work with, and Dodge at the very least has three feats that can replace it while being more effective (Desert Wind Dodge, Expeditious Dodge and Midnight Dodge), so the real stinker in terms of Shadowdancer is Mobility (YMMV on Combat Reflexes). However, it stresses a point: Core Rogue has issues, which splats help deal with. A full-splat Rogue is effective with better return investment than its alternative in Core, which leads to what I suggest: if you can mix, then, that set of moves with magic items, the effect further improves. The Gray Elf Wilderness Rogue with Education, Knowledge Devotion, Craven, the Penetrating Strike ACF and the Collector of Stories trick, which has already addressed some of the issues in Core, can thus combine the Sword of Subtlety, the Ring of Blinking/Invisibility and the Minor Cloak of Displacement, plus a whole lot more magic items, to multiply the effect and be even more effective than a build without items or a Rogue depending on those, and with a bit of redundancy, the loss of one trait doesn't affect the build in its entirety.

[emeraldstreak]

Paladins' best Core book is the DMG provided the DM is lenient enough to give them a Gold Dragon mount.


The peak of these arguments was ~10 years ago at the then WotC forums. Early on the majority of the posters did not see how skewed the Core is in favor of casters. Also, back then moderation was far more lax than nowadays. That made for some very heated arguments, but every time the casters prevailed. Today these threads are long gone, but their conclusions are ingrained in the common knowledge of DnD posters. Note that the divide is very obvious when you talk to people who never visit forums or otherwise communicate with the community. Very often, they are adamantly convinced that fighters/barbarians/monks are better than wizards/druids. And at their particular, severly underoptimized table, that is true and they don't know any better.


You can forget about comparing the low levels. They were the most popular for an obvious reason for arenas and gauntlets. Barring infinity builds, they were dominated by gish-y style relying on spending WBL very well. Anything higher takes too long to optimize, but will go to full casters.

[Troacctid]

Compared to a Ranger, though? Completely another niche. I mean, the Paladin can do a pretty decent Two-Hander build and match, if not surpass, a Fighter or Barbarian in utility; the Ranger can't, because it's either Archery (which has its own can of worms, but can be superior in a larger amount of occasions; only proper DR can ruin the Ranger's fun) or Two-Weapon (which induces MAD, of course). The Ranger has a pretty specific niche in being a great tracker and excellent at stealth (moreso than the Rogue); it's not even a trap-disarmer to work as a switch-hitter to a Rogue. Even on spellcasting the Paladin and the Ranger are relatively similar; the Ranger is also a great switch-healer because of CLW, but I don't see the Ranger spell list inherently superior to that of a Paladin. Then, why the Ranger is considered "decent" while the Paladin is considered "weak"? Archery?
Sorry, why can't Rangers use two-handed weapons? They have full BAB and martial weapon proficiency, same as Paladins. Absolutely no reason they can't pick up a greatsword and Power Attack all the live-long day. They can even make offhand attacks with their armor spikes while they do it.

Meanwhile, Rangers have loads of skill points to toss around, so they can actually do things out of combat--unlike Paladins, who only have 2 + Int (and are apparently dumping Intelligence), so they can max Diplomacy and maybe one other skill.

[Ephemeral_Being]

Sorry, why can't Rangers use two-handed weapons? They have full BAB and martial weapon proficiency, same as Paladins. Absolutely no reason they can't pick up a greatsword and Power Attack all the live-long day. They can even make offhand attacks with their armor spikes while they do it.

Hang on. Are you serious? This is actually legal? I always assumed that two-weapon fighting, because it specified "off-hand," precluded the use of a two-handed weapon. And/or armour spikes.

Was this clarified somewhere to be a thing? Do armour spikes count as a light weapon, in this case, for a -4 penalty instead of -6?

[Troacctid]

Hang on. Are you serious? This is actually legal? I always assumed that two-weapon fighting, because it specified "off-hand," precluded the use of a two-handed weapon. And/or armour spikes.

Was this clarified somewhere to be a thing? Do armour spikes count as a light weapon, in this case, for a -4 penalty instead of -6?

It's quite explicitly legal.


You can have spikes added to your armor, which allow you to deal extra piercing damage (see Table: Weapons) on a successful grapple attack. The spikes count as a martial weapon. If you are not proficient with them, you take a -4 penalty on grapple checks when you try to use them. You can also make a regular melee attack (or off-hand attack) with the spikes, and they count as a light weapon in this case. (You can’t also make an attack with armor spikes if you have already made an attack with another off-hand weapon, and vice versa.)

An enhancement bonus to a suit of armor does not improve the spikes’ effectiveness, but the spikes can be made into magic weapons in their own right.

[Ephemeral_Being]

It's quite explicitly legal.

Wow. I guess I didn't read how armour spikes worked very closely.

That is awesome. Thanks.

[Arbane]

I remember someone joking that the 'tier number' of a class is the minimum number of sourcebooks required to make a character of that class that can pull their own weight.

Judging from this thread, it sounds about right.

[Platymus Pus]

Excuse me? Blasting is awful. As was pointed out, it would take 3 magic missile to kill a same level fighter. Let's look at level 5, when the iconic blast spell comes online: Fireball.
Save for Half? Check
SR? Check
Elemental damage (and therefore subject to resistance) check.

At most, you do 30 damage, before saves or resistances. This max goes up by 6 per level. This means that it get further and further from dealing with targets in a timely manner (enemy HP will scale up faster and more consistently than that). And this is THE iconic blasting spell.

I'd say this is better.
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/b/battering-blast

[atemu1234]

I remember someone joking that the 'tier number' of a class is the minimum number of sourcebooks required to make a character of that class that can pull their own weight.

Judging from this thread, it sounds about right.

Nah, then Monk would be like Tier 89 or something, because of how much Dmag it takes to make it work.

[Killer Angel]

If you add splatbooks to Core, the power gap between meleers and caster it's still there. Maybe it's even wider.
But low tier classes have more options, and more fun.

[Vhaidara]

If you add splatbooks to Core, the power gap between meleers and caster it's still there. Maybe it's even wider.
But low tier classes have more options, and more fun.

I remember this quote from a similar discussion, maybe a year ago. Wish I'd sigged it so I remembered the whole thing.
Core only: A bear vs an Apache helicopter
Full Splat: A winged bear with bile launchers and cybernetic claws vs an Apache helicopter with cloaking systems and railguns

Either way the bear gets wrecked, but in Full Splat, it gets to look REALLY awesome while doing it.

[Sacrieur]

I would argue that wishes can be a great addition to many games. Partial Fulfillment covers nearly all your bases, and PF already fixed the worst part of the spell (i.e. magic item creation.) Meanwhile, Miracle can be a great panic button, and when you think the party is bringing a sledgehammer to a chess match, you can have the deity/power just say "no" - and even refund the spell slot if you don't want to punish them too harshly. All totally RAW.

Wizards should get deus ex machina on command why exactly? From my DM perspective, if I wanted deus ex machina, I'd just make something up and do it. I create spells or abilities all the time that don't have rules, just a one sentence description of what they do because they're special stuff that only I get to use. For instance, I have an enchantress that can imbue baked goods with enchantment spells that take effect when consumed. Whether or not this is actually possible is irrelevant to me.

In the rare instance I'd want them to have a Wish spell to use, I'd give them a wand or something with a Wish spell in it.

If you want a miracle, the cleric can just pray to their deity. There's no reason to throw in a miracle spell that the player can select and say, "I demand miracle right this instant mister deity!" Then you, as the DM can either decide to grant their request, ignore it, or deny it.

[Gemini476]

Nah, then Monk would be like Tier 89 or something, because of how much Dmag it takes to make it work.

Nah, you're pretty much fine with just the magazine that gives you the Wildshape variant. Although you'll still want more splatbooks if you want to be much more useful than a spell-less Druid.

[Psyren]

Wizards should get deus ex machina on command why exactly? From my DM perspective, if I wanted deus ex machina, I'd just make something up and do it. I create spells or abilities all the time that don't have rules, just a one sentence description of what they do because they're special stuff that only I get to use. For instance, I have an enchantress that can imbue baked goods with enchantment spells that take effect when consumed. Whether or not this is actually possible is irrelevant to me.

In the rare instance I'd want them to have a Wish spell to use, I'd give them a wand or something with a Wish spell in it.

You have to understand that the open-ended uses of Wish are (or should be) the least common. Wish's true purpose as a prepared spell is "Super Anyspell" - a way for the Wizard to get at the one effect the party needs but doesn't have, when they need it, by paying a premium. In high level play this is crucial - the party could end up with all their divine casters erased from existence, Imprisoned, Insane, or otherwise removed from play due to bad luck or bad tactics, and they simply don't have in-game time to hunt down your Wish macguffin to save the day (and conversely, you don't have to pull your punches/redesign every fight until they obtain it, or risk a TPK.) For example, if the Cleric fails a save vs. Destruction or Disintegrate, nobody else might have Resurrection - in comes Wish to save the day.

And of course there are various monsters that simply expect you to have access to Wish.



If you want a miracle, the cleric can just pray to their deity. There's no reason to throw in a miracle spell that the player can select and say, "I demand miracle right this instant mister deity!" Then you, as the DM can either decide to grant their request, ignore it, or deny it.

You might as well say "why is True Resurrection a spell? The cleric can just ask their deity to bring back the dead." This discounts Miracle's use as a Super Anyspell toolbox for Clerics (covered above), as well as the tradeoff it represents from a metagame perspective. If a Wizard or Cleric is holding a Wish or Miracle in reserve, they might feel more secure, but that spell is also taking up one of their highest spell slots until used - making it very useful as a panic button, but making the player reluctant to use it unless absolutely necessary - and until they do, they are weaker than an otherwise identical caster who is using that slot for something more practical. In short, it's a way for a given high-level caster to gain a little control over the game's difficulty without feeling like they're begging you for clemency.

TL;DR high level play is intended to be pretty lethal and unforgiving (because the players get more options to bypass death, it's more reasonable for the designers to expect death to happen than at lower levels) so the designers gave the most powerful casters tools to cover any eventuality or bad luck they or the GM might have missed. You can certainly rely on other sources for those spells to fill that gap, but then you run the risk of it feeling staid and contrived when those methods just fall into the party's lap. (Or worse, you make them difficult to achieve, and the party either wipes or the dead player has to sit on the sidelines for a long time until they pull off whatever challenge stands between them and your 'wish-wand.')

[Morty]

In order to play an effective monk, you only need one non-core book. Take Tome of Battle, play an unarmed Swordsage, and do what a monk is supposed to do, except with a degree of competence.

[Hand_of_Vecna]

So I had an idea regarding the whole Core Only issue, I'd like to hear others thoughts on.

Low-Op DMs and Players can visualize High-Op Core Wizard dieing. He has crazy AC, immune to a lot of stuff, has powerful friends via Planar Binding, he has a Get Out of Jail Free card in the form of Contingency, etc. It would take more than an "Overwhelming" challenge and what they think could do it would probably acyually be foiled by Similcrum, Shapeshifted Solar's, etc. But they can picture it.

When you add in Celerity, Abrupt Jaunt, Crafted Contingency, custom Planes, etc it becomes too much for they to deal with even hypothetically. Even though they know their players will only use some of the mentioned tricks rather than all of them they feel the need to reduce thir options and take away the stuff that drove the scenario "too far". They blame the straw for the camel's broken back.

[Doctor Awkward]

I'm sure that could be the case for some people, but that wouldn't explain the disproportionately large number of players and DMs that think Druids and Fighters are fine the way they are, think Monks are already overpowered, and believe that the most dangerous thing a 20th level Wizard can do is throw a 20d6 Delayed Blast Fireball.

[emeraldstreak]

Enough with the Monk nonsense. Monks optimized for unarmed damage die progression frequently outdo fighters/barbarians, and a straight Monk 20 allowed to use Scorpion's Kama property from the MiC on a two-handed weapon will inevitably outdamage a straight Barbarian or Fighter 20.

[Karl Aegis]

Enough with the Monk nonsense. Monks optimized for unarmed damage die progression frequently outdo fighters/barbarians, and a straight Monk 20 allowed to use Scorpion's Kama property from the MiC on a two-handed weapon will inevitably outdamage a straight Barbarian or Fighter 20.

Is straight Fighter or Barbarian even an option? The classes don't go very far past level 2 without serious splatbooks.

[Gemini476]

I'm sure that could be the case for some people, but that wouldn't explain the disproportionately large number of players and DMs that think Druids and Fighters are fine the way they are, think Monks are already overpowered, and believe that the most dangerous thing a 20th level Wizard can do is throw a 20d6 Delayed Blast Fireball.

Nah, those people haven't even read the book properly. The most dangerous thing a 20th level Wizard can do is clearly Meteor Swarm. That's 32d6 damage!!!!!1 [i9That's enoguh to kill a level 20 Fighter in a single hit!!!!!!1!![/i]

[eggynack]

Enough with the Monk nonsense. Monks optimized for unarmed damage die progression frequently outdo fighters/barbarians, and a straight Monk 20 allowed to use Scorpion's Kama property from the MiC on a two-handed weapon will inevitably outdamage a straight Barbarian or Fighter 20.
The floor is ridiculously low though, and if your ceiling is fighter or barbarian, that's just not all that impressive. There are some interesting things you can pull with the class, like invisibility, martial monk, and maybe abuse of weapon special properties, but it all gets you to reasonably competent rather than out and out good.

[emeraldstreak]

The floor is ridiculously low though, and if your ceiling is fighter or barbarian, that's just not all that impressive.
There are some interesting things you can pull with the class, like invisibility, martial monk, and maybe abuse of weapon special properties, but it all gets you to reasonably competent rather than out and out good.

Yes, comparing to the fighter/barbarian is a low bar in a system with druids. An unarmed swordsage using the same tricks is one of the best Tier 3 classes out there, arguably the very best, but there's only so much you can do without access (other than WBL) to high level spells. Tiers 1&2 can bend reality, no amount of dpr or AC or other mundane stats can make up for that.

[Flickerdart]

Paladin is a great class - if you allow the DMG alternate rules that give it mounts that don't suck. "CR = Paladin level -3" as (practically) the only restriction on what can be a Special Mount is really, really great. A Half-Celestial Light Warhorse (achievable at level 6 since flight adds another effective +1 CR for calculations) brings casting of its own, and gets DR, SR, and energy resistances that make it the envy of any druid's animal companion.

[Boost]

Every game has five sweet spots- 1, 5, 10, 15, 20. Let's examine the difference at each, from a straight-classed fighter with starting 18 strength, and a straight-classed wizard with 18 intelligence. Both human. No magic items, except the Fighter gets a weapon with an appropriate enhancement bonus.

1- Fighter has roughly 5-9 hit points. Respectable. Wizard stays out of range and pings him to death with magic missiles. That's unoptimized. Through on grease, sleep and maybe a casting of Color Spray, and the game is already over.
5- Fighter, at this point, has between 27-47 hit points. Wizard still stays out of range, if the fighter now has a bow, uses Protection from Arrows, kills him with either summoned beasties or fireballs.
10- Fighter has between 55-105 hit points. Wizard uses same tactics as five.
15-... Seriously.
20- ... SERIOUSLY.

You see the problem. At no point here did the fighter have any option save die of horribleness. Never. Replace Fighter with any melee class, just as easy. Especially if you include scry-or-die tactics.

There's a flaw in this: by specifying "no magic items" you're removing a dozen things the fighter could use to potentially turn this into a more even fight. I personally think a well-played wizard will almost always defeat a well-played fighter, but the fighter stands a good chance at a better fight if he has magic items that protect him from mind-affecting spells, instant death effects, energy, and so on. Something as simple as the fighter drinking a potion of Shield negates your entire level 1 tactical analysis.

[emeraldstreak]

Something as simple as the fighter drinking a potion of Shield negates your entire level 1 tactical analysis.

If it only existed.

[Flickerdart]

Something as simple as the fighter drinking a potion of Shield negates your entire level 1 tactical analysis.
Shield is ineligible for potion-making since it's a Personal range spell, but the (considerably pricier) Brooch of Shielding will provide a good defense against magic missiles as soon as the fighter can afford it.

[Zombulian]

Excuse me? Blasting is awful. As was pointed out, it would take 3 magic missile to kill a same level fighter. Let's look at level 5, when the iconic blast spell comes online: Fireball.
Save for Half? Check
SR? Check
Elemental damage (and therefore subject to resistance) check.

At most, you do 30 damage, before saves or resistances. This max goes up by 6 per level. This means that it get further and further from dealing with targets in a timely manner (enemy HP will scale up faster and more consistently than that). And this is THE iconic blasting spell.

I'm sorry but did you just tell the person that was talking about the Orb spells that blasting was bad... by citing Fireball? Everyone knows that Fireball is bad. That's why people don't use it.

[Vhaidara]

I'm sorry but did you just tell the person that was talking about the Orb spells that blasting was bad... by citing Fireball? Everyone knows that Fireball is bad. That's why people don't use it.

I was giving an example of why better blasting was needed. This was to a person claiming that the Orb spells were too powerful.

And no, not everyone knows Fireball is terrible. Just like how there are people who will argue which is the most overpowered: Monk or Complete Warrior Samurai.

[Zombulian]

I was giving an example of why better blasting was needed. This was to a person claiming that the Orb spells were too powerful.

And no, not everyone knows Fireball is terrible. Just like how there are people who will argue which is the most overpowered: Monk or Complete Warrior Samurai.

Yeah upon further review of the post you quoted I'm not entirely sure what was being gained from the points made about the Orbs.

[Hand_of_Vecna]

Enough with the Monk nonsense. Monks optimized for unarmed damage die progression frequently outdo fighters/barbarians, and a straight Monk 20 allowed to use Scorpion's Kama property from the MiC on a two-handed weapon will inevitably outdamage a straight Barbarian or Fighter 20.

So do they think that it's splats that make melee "da Uberz" and casters need a core only environment to keep up? IRL I've only seen Core only as a misguided attempt to balance casters, but sample size of one is negligible.

[eggynack]

So do they think that it's splats that make melee "da Uberz" and casters need a core only environment to keep up? IRL I've only seen Core only as a misguided attempt to balance casters, but sample size of one is negligible.
Well, a core environment does benefit casters. Casters gain a hell of a lot from non-core stuff, but non-casters gain frigging competency. From a tier perspective, the fighter is going from five to four, the paladin is making it to four or even a three if you focus on casting, the monk is maybe hitting four if you optimize a lot, with three if you use wild monk, and so on. Wizards, by contrast, move from tier one to tier one, as do the rest of the tier one classes. You can't get much better than world rending. I could go on for awhile about various things that any given caster gets from non-core, with new spells often topping the list (I really dislike druid 2nd's, for example), but that competency, the ability to really contribute in a chosen role, will always be more useful.

[chaos_redefined]

Only thing that matches what the OP is asking for that I've ever seen:

http://community.wizards.com/forum/previous-editions-character-optimization/threads/1153831

[johnbragg]

Well, a core environment does benefit casters. Casters gain a hell of a lot from non-core stuff, but non-casters gain frigging competency. From a tier perspective, the fighter is going from five to four, the paladin is making it to four or even a three if you focus on casting, the monk is maybe hitting four if you optimize a lot, with three if you use wild monk, and so on. Wizards, by contrast, move from tier one to tier one, as do the rest of the tier one classes. You can't get much better than world rending. I could go on for awhile about various things that any given caster gets from non-core, with new spells often topping the list (I really dislike druid 2nd's, for example), but that competency, the ability to really contribute in a chosen role, will always be more useful.

Any support for the proposal to the core-only DM that either
1. Tier 3-5s can use all the splat they want, Tier 1-2s are limited to Core or
2. Splatbook feats, ACFs, equipment, magic items will be considered, but splatbook spells still get the banhammer?

[eggynack]

Any support for the proposal to the core-only DM that either
1. Tier 3-5s can use all the splat they want, Tier 1-2s are limited to Core or
2. Splatbook feats, ACFs, equipment, magic items will be considered, but splatbook spells still get the banhammer?
It's a reasonable thing, though the inverse might make sense as well. The biggest thing non-core casters get might be the build stuff as opposed to the spells.

Edit: Alternatively, you could go with the method implicitly proposed a ways back. Your tier is how many non-core sources you get to use.

[Gullintanni]

It's a reasonable thing, though the inverse might make sense as well. The biggest thing non-core casters get might be the build stuff as opposed to the spells.

Edit: Alternatively, you could go with the method implicitly proposed a ways back. Your tier is how many non-core sources you get to use.

I ran a game like this once. Most of my players elected to go for lower tier (3 or 4) classes because they liked the flavour that comes from Splat-diving.

I would also support a "Tier 1/2 Core only, Tier 3 or lower unlimited splats" game.

[johnbragg]

Any support for the proposal to the core-only DM that either
1. Tier 3-5s can use all the splat they want, Tier 1-2s are limited to Core or
2. Splatbook feats, ACFs, equipment, magic items will be considered, but splatbook spells still get the banhammer?


It's a reasonable thing, though the inverse might make sense as well. The biggest thing non-core casters get might be the build stuff as opposed to the spells.

Edit: Alternatively, you could go with the method implicitly proposed a ways back. Your tier is how many non-core sources you get to use.


I ran a game like this once. Most of my players elected to go for lower tier (3 or 4) classes because they liked the flavour that comes from Splat-diving.

I would also support a "Tier 1/2 Core only, Tier 3 or lower unlimited splats" game.

Hey OP, I think we have something for you to take back to your DM. Read or re-read JaronK's tier list, and propose that Tier 3-4-5s be allowed to splatbook-dive for anything but spells.

It'll be a lot easier for your DM to consider and track feats and ACFs that characters select and stick with than spells that can be swapped out every adventuring day.

[Curmudgeon]

Edit: Alternatively, you could go with the method implicitly proposed a ways back. Your tier is how many non-core sources you get to use.
You're advocating a linear solution to a power problem which scales at least quadratically. Tier 1 spellcasters with access to 1 book would get quite a lot of extra power from Spell Compendium. Tier 4 characters aren't going to find 4 books that would address all their issues.

Perhaps allowing 2Tier sources would be a better approach. Do you think the CW Samurai is going to be overpowered even with nearly unlimited supplement access?

[Flickerdart]

Quite frankly, book-based power limitations have always struck me as stupid. Any curtailing you're doing is going to be completely incidental.

[eggynack]

You're advocating a linear solution to a power problem which scales at least quadratically. Tier 1 spellcasters with access to 1 book would get quite a lot of extra power from Spell Compendium. Tier 4 characters aren't going to find 4 books that would address all their issues.

Perhaps allowing 2Tier sources would be a better approach. Do you think the CW Samurai is going to be overpowered even with nearly unlimited supplement access?
I guess, though it didn't feel all that far off. Sure, Perfect 1:1 scaling is probably wrong, because something that simple is almost necessarily going to be wrong, but creating a character that operates off of 64 sources sounds actually onerous. A given class in all games might need that many, but a given character can likely operate off of a far smaller number, and while a CW samurai won't be overpowered off of unlimited access, neither will a samurai do much better with 13 books than 12, because the marginal gain from a given book is also not linear.

[T.G. Oskar]

Sorry, why can't Rangers use two-handed weapons? They have full BAB and martial weapon proficiency, same as Paladins. Absolutely no reason they can't pick up a greatsword and Power Attack all the live-long day. They can even make offhand attacks with their armor spikes while they do it.

Other than not having the same survivability than a Fighter, Paladin or Barbarian? The Ranger has a combination of light armor, d8 Hit Die, and no proper damage modifier. The Barbarian also prefers using light armor, but actually is proficient with medium (the only thing it loses is Fast Movement) and has enough hit points to boot (between the Hit Dice and the Con boost from Rage, not to mention that they are more inclined towards Constitution). Rage lowers AC, but the boost to damage is far, far enough. So that's one.

The second is that, if using the armor spikes trick, you'll be rolling in penalties. The basic penalty alone would make you hesitate using Power Attack, and you couldn't add the damage to the Armor Spikes as they're considered light weapons. Thus, you'd be depending, mostly, on the bonuses from Strength, plus a hefty amount of Dexterity to supplement your AC early on, plus high Constitution and Wisdom. That's mostly to take advantage from your free feats - anything else, and you're no different from a Fighter (Weapon Focus/Specialization since you're already focusing on Core), Barbarian (Rage) or Paladin...

...which has its spells. Compared to the Ranger set-up in Core, which lacks spells that boost its fighting skills, the Paladin actually has a few spells that supplement two-hand combat: Divine Favor (boosts attack and defense), Bull's Strength (boosts Strength), Greater Magic Weapon/Holy Sword (makes your weapon magical; GMW can be used before combat starts). So yeah - a Ranger could go THF, but it wouldn't be on its terrain unless it used armor spikes (thus also dabbling in TWF), and only for a mild boost to damage in exchange for a penalty to attack that would hinder PA.


Meanwhile, Rangers have loads of skill points to toss around, so they can actually do things out of combat--unlike Paladins, who only have 2 + Int (and are apparently dumping Intelligence), so they can max Diplomacy and maybe one other skill.

So the true strength of Rangers is that they have 4 skill points more than Paladins? Not their spellcasting (which is somewhat identical, and has both gems and flops, but IMO more flops than gems compared to Paladins), not their class features (aside from the feats and the animal companion, which can't compare to the mount, the rest are either too situational or too specific; pretty much the same with the Paladin), but their skills (and skill selection)? Then why the Rogue is tier 4 rather than tier 3, if your metric is the amount of skills and skill selection?

Also: apparently, Diplomacy isn't "doing things out of combat". Tell that to the Bard. Go ahead, tell the Bard that Diplomacy isn't doing anything. Or, you know, Handle Animal (the same skill they share with Rangers). Or Sense Motive, which isn't just to catch someone in a lie. Impairment is NOT complete inability.

[Flickerdart]

Also: apparently, Diplomacy isn't "doing things out of combat". Tell that to the Bard. Go ahead, tell the Bard that Diplomacy isn't doing anything. Or, you know, Handle Animal (the same skill they share with Rangers). Or Sense Motive, which isn't just to catch someone in a lie. Impairment is NOT complete inability.
The bard is going to be much better at diplomacy (lowercase d) than a paladin due to much higher priority for CHA and various abilities that help them play the social game, so just because bards can contribute out of combat with their social skills doesn't mean paladins can.

Further, the paladin can take Diplomacy and Sense Motive...or Ride and Handle Animal (or a weird mix of the two? I dunno mang). For every paladin that ekes out an extra point in Int, there's going to be one that had to take an 8, or lower. The ranger sucks, but being good at stealth AND animals AND not getting lost in a brightly lit room is one of the things he definitely has over the paladin.

[T.G. Oskar]

The bard is going to be much better at diplomacy (lowercase d) than a paladin due to much higher priority for CHA and various abilities that help them play the social game, so just because bards can contribute out of combat with their social skills doesn't mean paladins can.

It doesn't mean Paladins cannot contribute out of combat, which is the point. The response was "well, at least the Ranger can definitely do something out of combat", and I consider that out of place. The Paladin can do something out of combat, even if it's only scouring up who's evil and who's not (that doesn't need a single skill point to work).


Further, the paladin can take Diplomacy and Sense Motive...or Ride and Handle Animal (or a weird mix of the two? I dunno mang). For every paladin that ekes out an extra point in Int, there's going to be one that had to take an 8, or lower. The ranger sucks, but being good at stealth AND animals AND not getting lost in a brightly lit room is one of the things he definitely has over the paladin.

And yet, why does the Ranger is placed as superior over the Paladin. Note the two examples I placed: Paladins either "barely function" (compare to the Ranger's "disappointment") or are "weak unless they get heavy splat support" (compare to the Ranger's "decent"). Unless I got it wrong, "decent" =/= "suck"; "disappointment" does indicate "suck", but that would also imply that "barely function" goes beyond "suck". Both posters equated the Paladin with the Monk, and that is some serious thing to claim.

Personally, I'd claim Paladins and Rangers, owing to spell support and companion/mount, are relatively equal in potential, but the Ranger edges the Paladin out of combat and the Paladin edges the Ranger IN-combat (the Paladin has more self-buffs, and buffs total, than the Ranger judging by Core spells alone). The higher utility out of combat and the fact that its niche (mostly, as you mention, Stealth/Animal Handling/Tracking) has a wider berth in terms of when it can apply is what gives it an edge. How much of an edge is what I protest - an edge where the Ranger is between "decent" and "suck" while the paladin is between "barely functional" and "weak" is most definitely not that kind of edge. In particular, the "barely functional"; set near the Monk, it's almost shorthand for "unplayable". I hope that's not the message, but the vibe behind it most definitely suggests so, which is...the wrong message. Hard to play, yes: the Code more than ensures that. Unplayable, or at least unplayable out of the box? Hardly.

[Gemini476]

It doesn't have that much bearing on the rest of your post, T. G. Oskar, but I'd just like to note that getting +4 damage from a -2 Power Attack probably isn't as good as -2 from TWF for in exchange for an extra attack dealing 1d6+.5Str+modifiers. It falls behind after 16th level since there's not four TWF feats for some reason, although if you're doing an average 16 damage or more amongst the off-hand attacks you might not care much. (18 Strength at level 16 is enough for that, if you wonder.)

As a tactic it's definitely weak to damage resistance, however.

[NoseFeratu]

I'd argue that a Paladin is much better out of combat than a Ranger- The Paladin spell list is much better, Detect Evil is an amazing ability, and Rangers can't really compete with the Paladin code of conduct in terms of RP flavor.

[Curmudgeon]

Quite frankly, book-based power limitations have always struck me as stupid. Any curtailing you're doing is going to be completely incidental.
You're right; the curtailing is incidental. What I would hope to happen is for players with allowances for many more books than their fellow players to pick up more than just the couple they're familiar with, and start reading. It's the education in what's available that can improve the game for someone who starts out thinking the Monk is a neat class.

[Flickerdart]

You're right; the curtailing is incidental. What I would hope to happen is for players with allowances for many more books than their fellow players to pick up more than just the couple they're familiar with, and start reading. It's the education in what's available that can improve the game for someone who starts out thinking the Monk is a neat class.
Why would limiting the number of books they have make them pick up new ones? If you want players to look up new books, just tell them to look up new books.

[Curmudgeon]

Why would limiting the number of books they have make them pick up new ones? If you want players to look up new books, just tell them to look up new books.
It's not limiting them (as much) in book availability which will make players more likely to check out new material. If you tell players to look up new books they'll think they're being punished, and maybe push back (ask for a pre-made character, for example). Tell them they can use up to 14 more books than their fellow gamers and they might think they're being rewarded.

[Flickerdart]

It's not limiting them (as much) in book availability which will make players more likely to check out new material. If you tell players to look up new books they'll think they're being punished, and maybe push back (ask for a pre-made character, for example). Tell them they can use up to 14 more books than their fellow gamers and they might think they're being rewarded.
Saying "look, you can have 14 books while the other guy gets 4" is a lot like saying "hey, you can keep two of your limbs instead of just one." Unless these players have never been allowed more books, there's no way you will successfully frame this the way you want outside of your head.

[Necroticplague]

I'd argue that a Paladin is much better out of combat than a Ranger- The Paladin spell list is much better, Detect Evil is an amazing ability, and Rangers can't really compete with the Paladin code of conduct in terms of RP flavor.

I don't know about their spell lists (because I don't like playing casters), but I can reply to the rest.

Detect Evil is an almost useless ability outside of some very specific situations, and is mostly just their so paladins don't accidentally fall from associating with someone evil. After all, Evil doesn't necessarily mean much when alignment is a cosmic force. Especially considering how it can be thrown off by some things ("You detect as strongly Evil!" "Yeah, I'm a necromancer. That's just the energy from all the Animate Dead I cast, and says nothing about me beyond that"), or very easily mislead with magic (or less easier mislead with sheer skill).

Similarly, the Code is actually hurtful for RP. Having to make tough decisions is good for RP. A Code takes away all the moral dilemma on some of these choices by putting a hand down on the scale heavily in one direction. Seems like it actually hurts RP by making all paladins act the same way under some circumstances. A paladin doesn't have to deal with character-developing 'am I doing the right thing?' moments, because the answer is obviously 'yep, otherwise I'd have lost most my ability'.

[Flickerdart]

Similarly, the Code is actually hurtful for RP. Having to make tough decisions is good for RP. A Code takes away all the moral dilemma on some of these choices by putting a hand down on the scale heavily in one direction. Seems like it actually hurts RP by making all paladins act the same way under some circumstances. A paladin doesn't have to deal with character-developing 'am I doing the right thing?' moments, because the answer is obviously 'yep, otherwise I'd have lost most my ability'.
Amusingly, according to the paladin's association rules (which are not actually part of the code, but a lot of people think they are) a paladin can never work with an evil being to help redeem it, because he cannot associate with evil, period.

[Eldariel]

Any support for the proposal to the core-only DM that either
1. Tier 3-5s can use all the splat they want, Tier 1-2s are limited to Core or
2. Splatbook feats, ACFs, equipment, magic items will be considered, but splatbook spells still get the banhammer?

The principal issue still is, most of the ridiculous spells that could probably use a rewrite are core, so essentially you're still keeping the most ridiculous/overpowered stuff in game. Replacing those with some splatbook options (e.g. Polymorph with the various Monomorphs) would probably help more.

[Doctor Awkward]

Similarly, the Code is actually hurtful for RP. Having to make tough decisions is good for RP. A Code takes away all the moral dilemma on some of these choices by putting a hand down on the scale heavily in one direction. Seems like it actually hurts RP by making all paladins act the same way under some circumstances. A paladin doesn't have to deal with character-developing 'am I doing the right thing?' moments, because the answer is obviously 'yep, otherwise I'd have lost most my ability'.

{scrubbed}

A DM that doesn't cause a Paladin's to wrestle over his balance of moral and ethical obligations on at least a bi-weekly basis isn't doing his job.

Paladins must respect legitimate authority while also helping people as to the best of their ability. Good does not always equate to nice, and lawful does not always equate to just. The ruling body of a particular land might be total jerks, but that doesn't automatically make them evil. And just because paladins must follow the laws does not mean the are forbidden from bending them, especially if justice will be served.

Picture a paladin as the best kind of public defense attorney: "Your honor, I am well aware that the laws forbid violence in the streets except in self-defense. I just happened to be taking my morning walk when I happened to walk in front of that man's path as he was attempting to stab the peasant. I could hardly have known he wasn't attempting to attack me. What was I doing in that part of town? Why, I was looking for a bauble, sir. One can never have too many baubles."

[Flickerdart]

{scrubbed}

[Doctor Awkward]

{scrubbed}

If the player isn't interested in heavy RP that explores the concepts and interactions of good and law on a fundamental level, then he probably shouldn't be a paladin (or any other class with a Code). Unless your games are nothing but kicking down doors and killing monsters, in which case, by all means...

The Code of Conduct, like alignment, is an RP tool. Not utilizing it to tell an interesting story is not doing your job. And a player claiming you "have it in" for them because you use their class features as part of your game probably has some required reading to do.

The second D&D character I ever played was a paladin, and the advice I was given by the DM at the time was, "Don't wield your morals at people like a club. You are immune to fear, not immune to compromise."

[Flickerdart]

{scrubbed}

[Doctor Awkward]

{scrubbed}

{scrubbed}

In a general sense, DM's dictate what classes people play all the goddamn time, if through nothing else than setting, sourcebook, and/or alignment restrictions.

In a more specific sense, I applaud people that want to play paladins. And by "play" I mean actually play, not just, "Oh it's only a 3 level dip for Charisma to saves, then I'm prestiging into something else." That person clearly doesn't want to play a paladin. Whether or not I would allow that depends on the nature of the campaign.
And my response to the former is always nothing short of, "Paladin? Awesome, they can be really interesting. Make sure you're familiar with the Code though. Here's a scenario you might come across..."

[Red Fel]

A DM that doesn't cause a Paladin's to wrestle over his balance of moral and ethical obligations on at least a bi-weekly basis isn't doing his job.


{scrubbed}

Going to agree with Flickerdart on this one, with a caveat. A DM that doesn't cause a Paladin to wrestle over his balance of moral and ethical obligations on at least a bi-weekly basis has done nothing wrong. Or, rephrased without as many negatives and clauses: A DM is not required to force moral or ethical conflict on any of the PCs, Paladins included.

Here's my caveat. A DM that doesn't present circumstances which would allow the PCs to confront moral or ethical conflict, at least once in awhile, could be doing better. Not that he isn't doing his job, but a moral conundrum every now and again is appropriate, at least in most campaigns. (Less appropriate in, say, a silly campaign, or a golden age hack-and-slash. But otherwise, generally acceptable.) This is true irrespective of PC class; the fact that a Paladin is in the party shouldn't make the dilemmas more or less likely or frequent. All that the Paladin's presence does is create a mechanical consequence for the PCs' actions and decisions. (You know, other than causing them to suddenly ping on Detect Evil.)

Someone who rolls a Paladin isn't giving the DM express authorization to screw with morality for his benefit, anymore than someone who rolls Barbarian, Bard, Druid or Monk. I take issue with DMs who feel they have an obligation to "challenge" that particular character - or, indeed, any character with nettlesome alignment restrictions - on a regular basis.

And how did we get here, again? I thought the OP was about how hard it was to shore up the power disparity without splat. When did we get onto the Paladin code again?

[Elderand]

And how did we get here, again? I thought the OP was about how hard it was to shore up the power disparity without splat. When did we get onto the Paladin code again?

It always comes down to alignement....always !

Engage sarcasm : And they call the far realm a place of madness /Sarcasm

[Flickerdart]

{scrubbed}

[Gemini476]

It's kind of interesting how you get all these stories about DMs forcing their Paladins into moral dilemmas but hardly any about all the other classes who can Fall or become ex-classes.

When was the last time you heard someone recommend that a Cleric should face lots of religious dilemmas or risk losing his spellcasting, or heard a story of a DM forcing a player to choose between respecting Nature and something else? When was the last time a DM made a Monk, Bard or Barbarian "Fall" by changing their alignment?

And that's just the core classes! Only the Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer and Wizard are safe, although I suppose the Wizard can always get his spellbook destroyed. That's pretty much equivalent to a Paladin Falling, right?

[Elderand]

And that's just the core classes! Only the Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer and Wizard are safe, although I suppose the Wizard can always get his spellbook destroyed. That's pretty much equivalent to a Paladin Falling, right?

Ah...no and that's why a good wizard has at least 17 contingency, and 23 alternative spellbooks stashed somewhere amongst various planes and demiplanes in case someone does decide to destroy theirs.

[Sacrieur]

You have to understand that the open-ended uses of Wish are (or should be) the least common. Wish's true purpose as a prepared spell is "Super Anyspell" - a way for the Wizard to get at the one effect the party needs but doesn't have, when they need it, by paying a premium. In high level play this is crucial - the party could end up with all their divine casters erased from existence, Imprisoned, Insane, or otherwise removed from play due to bad luck or bad tactics, and they simply don't have in-game time to hunt down your Wish macguffin to save the day (and conversely, you don't have to pull your punches/redesign every fight until they obtain it, or risk a TPK.) For example, if the Cleric fails a save vs. Destruction or Disintegrate, nobody else might have Resurrection - in comes Wish to save the day.

Wow yeah, god forbid the party have a challenge with real and irreversible consequences. I actually let my players walk into a TPK. It's their own fault for charging in, thinking they're super invincible untouchable gods instead of assessing a situation beforehand. As a matter of fact I don't apply CR to my encounters and base it solely off of what they would find in that situation. So if they raid some dragon lair they shouldn't expect a bunch of young dragons just because they're a lower level.

I removed Resurrection too; death should not be a minor inconvenience (to my players or to the enemies they kill).



And of course there are various monsters that simply expect you to have access to Wish.

Yep, better get creative :)



You might as well say "why is True Resurrection a spell? The cleric can just ask their deity to bring back the dead." This discounts Miracle's use as a Super Anyspell toolbox for Clerics (covered above), as well as the tradeoff it represents from a metagame perspective. If a Wizard or Cleric is holding a Wish or Miracle in reserve, they might feel more secure, but that spell is also taking up one of their highest spell slots until used - making it very useful as a panic button, but making the player reluctant to use it unless absolutely necessary - and until they do, they are weaker than an otherwise identical caster who is using that slot for something more practical. In short, it's a way for a given high-level caster to gain a little control over the game's difficulty without feeling like they're begging you for clemency.

A weaker wizard? OH GOD THE HORROR. What if he's not able to do something as well as someone else ;_;

I'm sure such a player would have nightmares about not being able to solve any problem with a flick of a wrist while a succubus he summoned gives him a lapdance.



TL;DR high level play is intended to be pretty lethal and unforgiving (because the players get more options to bypass death, it's more reasonable for the designers to expect death to happen than at lower levels) so the designers gave the most powerful casters tools to cover any eventuality or bad luck they or the GM might have missed. You can certainly rely on other sources for those spells to fill that gap, but then you run the risk of it feeling staid and contrived when those methods just fall into the party's lap. (Or worse, you make them difficult to achieve, and the party either wipes or the dead player has to sit on the sidelines for a long time until they pull off whatever challenge stands between them and your 'wish-wand.')

Yes, you just spelled out the reasoning why Wizards have Wish, "They can do pretty much everything, so they should be able to do everything. Oh by the way Mr. fighter, you can have an extra die when you critical hit something :)"

[Flickerdart]

And that's just the core classes! Only the Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer and Wizard are safe, although I suppose the Wizard can always get his spellbook destroyed. That's pretty much equivalent to a Paladin Falling, right?
Wizards and sorcerers can also run afoul of Disjoining an artifact and lose their spellcasting, or get Feebleminded (which hurts them leaps-and-bounds more than any fighter), or have their familiars eaten by grues.

There are lots of class-specific ways to bully characters, but the paladin's code is just the easiest way to do it because of how ham-fisted it is.

[Zanos]

Wow yeah, god forbid the party have a challenge with real and irreversible consequences. I actually let my players walk into a TPK. It's their own fault for charging in, thinking their super invincible untouchable gods instead of assessing a situation beforehand. As a matter of fact I don't apply CR to my encounters and base it solely off of what they would find in that situation. So if they raid some dragon lair they shouldn't expect a bunch of young dragons just because they're a lower level.

I removed Resurrection too; death should not be a minor inconvenience (to my players or to the enemies they kill).




Yep, better get creative :)




A weaker wizard? OH GOD THE HORROR. What if he's not able to do something as well as someone else ;_;

I'm sure such a player would have nightmares about not being able to solve any problem with a flick of a wrist while a succubus he summoned gives him a lapdance.




Yes, you just spelled out the reasoning why Wizards have Wish, "They can do pretty much everything, so they should be able to do everything. Oh by the way Mr. fighter, you can have an extra die when you critical hit something :)"
I think you have misconceptions about what a high level character represents. Characters capable of casting 9th level spells don't just laugh at death, they laugh at the laws of reality. They can make new planes, bind the armies of heaven/hell to their will, create new matter from nothing, shape existing matter into any shape they can image, create new sentient beings, and crap rainbows. High level casters possess many abilities that people would reserve for describing what a god could do outside of D&D.

Honestly it's equally ridiculous for mundanes. A high level fighter even could probably carve through an entire army of regular joes with almost no bodily risk. So yeah, that heroes that are so powerful that they personally guide the fates of entire planes laugh at death is not a problem in my view. They are invincible untouchable gods; at least compared to normal folks.

Also, wish costs 5k exp. I can count the number of times I've actually cast it on zero hands.

[Sacrieur]

I think you have misconceptions about what a high level character represents. Characters capable of casting 9th level spells don't just laugh at death, they laugh at the laws of reality. They can make new planes, bind the armies of heaven/hell to their will, create new matter from nothing, shape existing matter into any shape they can image, create new sentient beings, and crap rainbows. High level casters possess many abilities that people would reserve for describing what a god could do outside of D&D.

Honestly it's equally ridiculous for mundanes. A high level fighter even could probably carve through an entire army of regular joes with almost no bodily risk. So yeah, that heroes that are so powerful that they personally guide the fates of entire planes laugh at death is not a problem in my view. They are invincible untouchable gods; at least compared to normal folks.

Also, wish costs 5k exp. I can count the number of times I've actually cast it on zero hands.

In PF, Wish only costs diamond dust.

In any case, I've gimped Gate to be only what the user can perceive, and folding through space-time through dimensions you can't perceive isn't something you can do. I've completely overhauled the death mechanic to make it and the necromancy domain more bad-ass. I even have god-like (beyond wizard level) beings who will come and repair the timeline if it's damaged by unnatural means. In my world, doing anything big is likely going to have consequences.

As a matter of fact, making a private plane would prove difficult as I would require the player to continually fight off hordes of aberrant creatures from the Far Realm.

[Elderand]

In PF, Wish only costs diamond dust.

In any case, I've gimped Gate to be only what the user can perceive, and folding through space-time through dimensions you can't perceive isn't something you can do. I've completely overhauled the death mechanic to make it and the necromancy domain more bad-ass. I even have god-like (beyond wizard level) beings who will come and repair the timeline if it's damaged by unnatural means. In my world, doing anything big is likely going to have consequences.

As a matter of fact, making a private plane would prove difficult as I would require the player to continually fight off hordes of aberrant creatures from the Far Realm.

Ah yes, the whole I'm not actually going to ban things but I'm going to make so annoying you won't want to use it school of "fixing" things.

[Sacrieur]

Ah yes, the whole I'm not actually going to ban things but I'm going to make so annoying you won't want to use it school of "fixing" things.

Not at all, it's just how the nature of things are. It's just "actions have consequences" taken up to the high level. When you make a plane you better well know what you're doing or you could seriously mess up something or have unintended side effects to deal with. No player should be expected to have things happen the way they feel they should happen like some spell is just an "Easy" button. You're seriously messing with space-time here on a huge cosmic scale and you think that it should be just as simple as a full round action and bam everything is perfect now?

The only thing "annoying" is that they would actually have to get creative to make big things to work. I suppose if you wanted to just do things like the book says in some flat, boring world railroaded along to some campaign that's up to you, but I like my worlds alive and full of life where players can choose to do whatever they want to do in a realistic setting. Even so, I don't believe Wish should have been included in the CRB; it's just too broken. The argument that the game is extra lethal high levels so you should make it less lethal is inane.

[Loxagn]

I don't personally understand choosing 'core only' for balance reasons. For classes like the Fighter, the issue has never once been their numbers. Fighters, Paladins, and Barbarians, can throw out all the numbers in the world, numbers that can wipe anything that draws breath off the face of the Prime Material.

The issue is and always has been choices. Fighters, Paladins, and Barbarians have nothing to do outside of combat. And even in combat, their choices are going to be severely limited and abysmally repetitive. They need choices, not another piddly +1 to hit and another useless +2 to damage. Core Only, unfortunately, doesn't leave anybody who isn't a caster with choices beyond 'I full attack again!' or 'I charge again!' or 'I Smite Evil again!'. Paladins have this problem slightly less due to their limited magic, but they have absolute garbage for skills. Maybe you have one that's specialized in something else like tripping or what have you, but because of the nature of Feat Chains, that's usually all they're going to be good at.

Meanwhile, Joe Wizard and Jim Cleric invalidate entire classes with single spells. Allowing books outside of core actually makes things interesting, since fighter-types will have access to books that give them choices and versatility like Tome of Battle, and casters will get access to classes that are potent and specialized without being good at everything like the PHB casters are.

[eggynack]

It's kind of interesting how you get all these stories about DMs forcing their Paladins into moral dilemmas but hardly any about all the other classes who can Fall or become ex-classes.

When was the last time you heard someone recommend that a Cleric should face lots of religious dilemmas or risk losing his spellcasting, or heard a story of a DM forcing a player to choose between respecting Nature and something else? When was the last time a DM made a Monk, Bard or Barbarian "Fall" by changing their alignment?

And that's just the core classes! Only the Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer and Wizard are safe, although I suppose the Wizard can always get his spellbook destroyed. That's pretty much equivalent to a Paladin Falling, right?
The issue is that it's much more difficult to make those classes fall. For the alignment restricted cases, constructing a situation such that the character is pretty much forced to do something so evil, or chaotic, or lawful that they change alignment, is nearly impossible. You can and maybe even should create the temptation, but in any situation so impossible to resolve without doing something out of alignment, actually swapping alignment on that basis is just illogical. The paladins in those stories might fall, but I'd figure that their alignment would usually stay static. Meanwhile, the cleric has a relatively loose code, and if it's made strict then you can always go without a deity, and for the druid, the requirements are specific but narrow. You can't stop revering nature, but an individual situation is difficult to make such that that happens, and if you can force a druid to wear metal or teach someone druidic, then you can probably just kill them.

[Elderand]

Not at all, it's just how the nature of things are. It's just "actions have consequences" taken up to the high level. When you make a plane you better well know what you're doing or you could seriously mess up something or have unintended side effects to deal with. No player should be expected to have things happen the way they feel they should happen like some spell is just an "Easy" button. You're seriously messing with space-time here on a huge cosmic scale and you think that it should be just as simple as a full round action and bam everything is perfect now?

And your alternative, unless you provide players with very clear rules about they can do these things safely, is to just say that the spells you don't like are going to arbitrarily cause player problems if they try to use them.

Besside, it's not about having things happen the way the player feel they should, it's having things happen the way the rules establish they happen.

[Sacrieur]

And your alternative, unless you provide players with very clear rules about they can do these things safely, is to just say that the spells you don't like are going to arbitrarily cause player problems if they try to use them.

Besside, it's not about having things happen the way the player feel they should, it's having things happen the way the rules establish they happen.

Absolutely correct. Established rules are of the utmost importance. However, at a high level, there are deities and epic level creatures that can do some pretty wild things, just as crazy as wild as you can if not more. Players can roll knowledge checks to see if they know about these things and then can use the information they know to build a useful plan. This functions because there are creatures who have desires and ambitions. The reason Far Realm creatures invade, for instance, is because you're creating your plane out of Far Realm space. Now there are ways to combat this, or even some super creative stuff I haven't thought of.

I would never violate the rules. The rules are sacred because they ensure fairness and I'm always going to be fair to my players. I will always tell them beforehand about any rule changes I've made, and if it affects the game or their character, come to an agreement about how to handle it fairly. I'm not being an unfair or cruel DM, I'm just being a neutral DM that views the game world as a neutral entity that neither favors nor disfavors the PCs.

[Psyren]

Wow yeah, god forbid the party have a challenge with real and irreversible consequences. I actually let my players walk into a TPK. It's their own fault for charging in, thinking they're super invincible untouchable gods instead of assessing a situation beforehand. As a matter of fact I don't apply CR to my encounters and base it solely off of what they would find in that situation. So if they raid some dragon lair they shouldn't expect a bunch of young dragons just because they're a lower level.

I removed Resurrection too; death should not be a minor inconvenience (to my players or to the enemies they kill).

And that's fine for your games but it's not what the designers intended, otherwise resurrection et al. wouldn't even exist in the first place.



A weaker wizard? OH GOD THE HORROR. What if he's not able to do something as well as someone else ;_;

I'm sure such a player would have nightmares about not being able to solve any problem with a flick of a wrist while a succubus he summoned gives him a lapdance.

A wizard who cannot access the niche/situational stuff by any means is a wizard who simply ignores them and sticks with his main layout. You're not hurting him - you're hurting the entire party, who now has nobody that can fill in if their cleric gets dusted, or driven permanently insane, or level/ability drained down to single digits.


Yes, you just spelled out the reasoning why Wizards have Wish, "They can do pretty much everything, so they should be able to do everything. Oh by the way Mr. fighter, you can have an extra die when you critical hit something :)"

Not "everything." Anything. There is actually a very important distinction.


In PF, Wish only costs diamond dust.

You realize that actually makes it worse, right? There is no limit to the amount of XP characters can get, and falling behind the party in 3.5 actually means you're supposed to give them more due to how it was calculated. Meanwhile WBL in both editions is pretty much fixed. And while you can get XP for less directly dangerous activities (like roleplaying), raining diamond dust on the players in the middle of town is just slightly more immersion-breaking.

[Troacctid]

You realize that actually makes it worse, right? There is no limit to the amount of XP characters can get, and falling behind the party in 3.5 actually means you're supposed to give them more due to how it was calculated. Meanwhile WBL in both editions is pretty much fixed. And while you can get XP for less directly dangerous activities (like roleplaying), raining diamond dust on the players in the middle of town is just slightly more immersion-breaking.

I disagree. I think sacrificing XP as a cost is an unfun game mechanic, and that Pathfinder, 4th edition, and 5th edition were correct to remove it from the game.

Also, why would diamond dust be immersion-breaking? It's a common spell component. You should be able to find it in Ye Oldde Magicke Shoppe.

[Ephemeral_Being]

Also, why would diamond dust be immersion-breaking? It's a common spell component. You should be able to find it in Ye Oldde Magicke Shoppe.

In what universe? Diamond dust should be a rare spell component. Not a common one. Churches might have a supply. But it wouldn't be for sale. It would be restricted to official use. Your average magic shop wouldn't sell any. If they did, it would be in 25/50 GP quantities. Not 5,000. The average worker makes what? 3 SP per day? An artisan makes 1 GP? There's virtually no demand for diamond dust in the quantities necessary for massive rituals.

Put this in real-life terms. Your local car dealership doesn't have a 2 million dollar car for sale. No one wants one. And the temptation to steal it would be too high. If you have the money and desire to buy one, you have to fly to wherever they are for sale, or place an order, or wait for it to get to where you are. And it's unlikely they would have it on-hand. They would have to build one for you, and tell you when it's ready.

In a world with teleportation, the delivery time issue becomes less important. But I think my point is still fairly solid. You might be able to place an order at your local magic shop, but it's unlikely you would just be able to pick them up then and there. They would have to come from somewhere else. And they might not be available. You place the order, Dwarves get to work mining. You'll get an animal messenger in a few weeks.

[Elderand]

Absolutely correct. Established rules are of the utmost importance. However, at a high level, there are deities and epic level creatures that can do some pretty wild things, just as crazy as wild as you can if not more. Players can roll knowledge checks to see if they know about these things and then can use the information they know to build a useful plan. This functions because there are creatures who have desires and ambitions. The reason Far Realm creatures invade, for instance, is because you're creating your plane out of Far Realm space. Now there are ways to combat this, or even some super creative stuff I haven't thought of.

I would never violate the rules. The rules are sacred because they ensure fairness and I'm always going to be fair to my players. I will always tell them beforehand about any rule changes I've made, and if it affects the game or their character, come to an agreement about how to handle it fairly. I'm not being an unfair or cruel DM, I'm just being a neutral DM that views the game world as a neutral entity that neither favors nor disfavors the PCs.

Given that you have vastly changed the rules to make the use of some spell far more difficult than written by default, you're not just being a neutral DM.

Which is one way to solve the problem with spellcaster. I do however think a gentleman's agreement of "you don't break my world and I won't break your face" to be far more effective.

Honestly DnD is not that bad as long as player don't try to upstage each other and don't abuse RAW shenanigans. That really solve 90% of problems, the rest is solved by giving martial nicer things if needed and banning some class/items/feats/spells if necessery.

[Zanos]

Which is one way to solve the problem with spellcaster. I do however think a gentleman's agreement of "you don't break my world and I won't break your face" to be far more effective.
I don't really think Gensis(at least PF genesis since it's much more specific) is really a gamebreaker in the first place. It gives a 17th/18th level caster a really badass base that is hard for others to access, but if they want to invest gold in creating a fortified demiplane I think that's pretty cool.

You could do worse with 9th level spells than giving people who want to shank you while your sleeping the finger.

[Elderand]

I don't really think Gensis(at least PF genesis since it's much more specific) is really a gamebreaker in the first place. It gives a 17th/18th level caster a really badass base that is hard for others to access, but if they want to invest gold in creating a fortified demiplane I think that's pretty cool.

You could do worse with 9th level spells than giving people who want to shank you while your sleeping the finger.

Absolutly. Genesis is, when not abused for fast plane shenanigans, just a way to get a fancy looking very small plot of land whitout having to worry about swearing fealty or defending form the next green skin invasion. And you get that by paying a very large premium.
And at those level, any dedicated enemy is going to have ways to get to you anyway, it's literraly nothing more than the equivalent of superman no selling bullets. Anything that is twarthed by genesis doesn't matter and anyone that matters will easily be able to deal with it.

[Troacctid]

In what universe?

In a universe where magic is relatively common and adventuring is normal. If you can reasonably expect to buy common magic items like cloaks of resistance and rings of protection for several thousand gp, you should reasonably expect to be able to buy diamond dust at a similar price. It's not like it's only used in 9th level spells--there are plenty of staple lower level spells like glyph of warding and restoration that also require it. You might be buying out their whole stock, but if it's a large enough city, they should have it.

[Zanos]

In a universe where magic is relatively common and adventuring is normal. If you can reasonably expect to buy common magic items like cloaks of resistance and rings of protection for several thousand gp, you should reasonably expect to be able to buy diamond dust at a similar price. It's not like it's only used in 9th level spells--there are plenty of staple lower level spells like glyph of warding and restoration that also require it. You might be buying out their whole stock, but if it's a large enough city, they should have it.
Alternatively, someone capable of casting 9th level spells could just plane shift to the plane of earth.

[squiggit]

So to take this question sort of the opposite way:

What would you say the best tricks a 9th level caster gains out of core?

[Elderand]

So to take this question sort of the opposite way:

What would you say the best tricks a 9th level caster gains out of core?

Chain Gating solars.

[Psyren]

I disagree. I think sacrificing XP as a cost is an unfun game mechanic, and that Pathfinder, 4th edition, and 5th edition were correct to remove it from the game.

Actually, I do agree this is more fun. But it is weaker for the player (if your GM sticks to the guidelines) because WBL is fixed while XP is not.



Also, why would diamond dust be immersion-breaking? It's a common spell component. You should be able to find it in Ye Oldde Magicke Shoppe.

25K GP worth? That would take a major city at a minimum, possibly a metropolis.


Alternatively, someone capable of casting 9th level spells could just plane shift to the plane of earth.

Which goes right back to counting against your WBL since you have to get it by adventuring.

[Vhaidara]

25K GP worth? That would take a major city at a minimum, possibly a metropolis.

One of my GMs actually ran afoul of this problem.
If you have 10lbs of Diamond dust, and that's all there is, and it's valued at 50k, then it takes half of it (5lbs) to make up the 25k component cost. However, not that there's only 5lbs of Diamond dust, those 5lbs are worth more (because it's rarer). So now the 5lbs are worth 25k.

It was a mistake by WotC (and Paizo inherited this) to set the value of spell components is gold. It should have been done in weight, and then the GM can assign a value to any given weight.

[Gemini476]

Actually, I do agree this is more fun. But it is weaker for the player (if your GM sticks to the guidelines) because WBL is fixed while XP is not.



25K GP worth? That would take a major city at a minimum, possibly a metropolis.



Which goes right back to counting against your WBL since you have to get it by adventuring.

You know that WBL is mostly just supposed to matter when you make a new character, right? It's just the average income from random treasure rolls divided by four minus roughly ten percent to account for consumables. Given sufficiently lucky rolls you could rocket past it rather easily in game that doesn't use the MIC's vastly more balanced tables. (Seriously: while the average value of a CR1 treasure is 300gp, you have a 5% chance of getting an Art Object which averages at 1,100gp and maxes out at 12,000gp. And pre-MIC 3E only has three classes of magic items, Minor Medium and Major, with Major ones popping in at 10th level and including pretty much everything that isn't an artifact.)

The suggested balancing mechanic is basically just "fudge the results lower or higher if they've gone several levels deviating from the average". That's... not that impactful, really.

Pathfinder might do it a bit differently, though - I haven't read their DMG-equivalent.



It's also rather easy to game with the right spells, although at that point you might want to ask yourself why your Wizard is adventuring at all rather than retiring to a life of luxury funded by the occasional Wall of Salt or Iron. At the same time the system is pretty hard to game without spells, which mostly just serves to make mundanes less useful (and possibly more common in the risky but rewarding adventuring lifestyle.)

[squiggit]

Chain Gating solars.

Gate is core.

[Aegis013]

Honestly, I refuse to play Core Only games because I get bored with a Fighter/Monk/Ranger/Paladin/Barb/Rogue without splat support because they've got too few options in combat and/or out. But I don't like playing Wizard/Cleric/Druid/Sorc because even if I try to play as a support character it becomes very difficult for the DM to create challenges that aren't just arbitrarily shutting down my abilities, or would squish the people playing the other classes.

Which leaves Bard as the only viable option, but, if we play team Bard, our abilities are rather non-synergistic (Inspire Courages don't stack), and there are too few options in Core to really get four different specialties of Bard. But if I play a Bard and someone else plays Wizard... well, the previous problems come right back, but I'm just on the "feeling useless" side of them.


So to take this question sort of the opposite way:

What would you say the best tricks a 9th level caster gains out of core?

I'd say mostly personal action economy breakers/changers. Things like Celerity or Craft Contingent Spell, Nerveskitter or hummingbird familiars and the like. Those are more likely to show up in a game than say, Mind Rape or Ice Assassins nested together with Smoky Confinement anyway.

[Elderand]

Gate is core.

Oh...I misread that, I thought you were asking for the best trick in core

[Gemini476]

So to take this question sort of the opposite way:

What would you say the best tricks a 9th level caster gains out of core?

Assuming that you meant "outside core"...

Genesis when messing with planar traits, Ice Assassin in general and Craft Contingency seem like the big ones. You've also got stuff like Celerity and Arcane Spellsurge and Divine Metamagic.

Also, spells like Shapechange and Planar Binding just get better and better for each book that is added. Ridiculously so, in some cases.

Oh, and if you're a Druid you're going to love Serpent Kingdoms. And every book that gives more Animals, which is a lot of them. Raptors and Bats and Bears, oh my!


There's also various PrCs like Planar Shepherd or Incantatrix, various feats like Fell Drain and Arcane Thesis, and ACFs like Spontaneous Divination and Abrubt Jaunt.

[Platymus Pus]

In what universe?

Our planet called earth?

[eggynack]

So to take this question sort of the opposite way:

What would you say the best tricks a 9th level caster gains out of core?
For druids, the most obvious gain is spells. I've always quite disliked druid 2nd's and 4th's in core, and out of core options boost those spell levels back in line with the surrounding power level. You also gain some really strong stuff like fey ring for a siabrie, summon fey for a pixie, acorn of far travel for ridiculousness, enhance wild shape which helps a lot of the things I'll mention later, and you just get an overall expansion of capabilities.

A possibly bigger gain, however, is the feats. Aberration wild shape is one of the strongest feats in the game, mostly due to the combo with enhance wild shape, granting access to double spells/round, immunity to magic, crazy vision modes, massive beatstick potential, all kindsa immunities and defenses, or any number of other things. Even if you don't go down that road, exalted and dragon wild shape offer a lot of power, with the former granting crazy dimension door action along with an Ex ability boost on all of your animal forms, and the latter with a host of immunities, movement modes, and miscellaneous abilities. At the same time, you also gain access to rashemi elemental and greenbound summoning, two feats that boost summoning massively. Which is best depends a lot on level, but they do more work than a number of similar feats combined.

Next, you get prestige classes, which obviously top out at planar shepherd, but also include ridiculousness like hathran, or subtle power boosting like holt warden/contemplative. It's a topic oft overlooked for druids, but you can get a lot out of it. Finally, you just bump all of your capabilities up a bit. Your usually human race can become dragonborn anthropomorphic bat or shifter, or also dragonborn desert half-orc, your usually dire bat or assorted beatstick wild shape forms can become a desmodu hunting bat, fleshraker, and so on, and your usually riding dog or bear animal companion can become an also fleshraker, or something magebred. It's just a lot of stuff, and while much of it may seem mundane or practical, much of what makes a druid awesome is mundane and practical.

[Coidzor]

Wow yeah, god forbid the party have a challenge with real and irreversible consequences.

If the consequences can be reversed by Wish at level 17+, then it is you, Sir And/Or Madam, who is doing it wrong as DM.

At least, if you profess to care about having some real and irreversible consequences for player failure.

Wish cannot freely and reliably undo a city being destroyed. It cannot reliably undo a soul being lost and there are several ways of dealing with souls that wish simply cannot touch and any method of addressing such souls is solely within the purview of Powers.


It's their own fault for charging in, thinking they're super invincible untouchable gods instead of assessing a situation beforehand.

At 20th level the PCs are on the scale of godly power compared to ordinary mortals. So unless they're actually going up against something that is a threat to them and they know it(and they should know it, at that level), it's perfectly reasonable for the non-casters to feel justified in kicking down the doors of whatever hovel of a castle some random king is in that has what they want and taking it.

[Flickerdart]

You know that WBL is mostly just supposed to matter when you make a new character, right?
You know that it isn't, right?

[Coidzor]

In any case, I've gimped Gate to be only what the user can perceive, and folding through space-time through dimensions you can't perceive isn't something you can do.

Please restate that in plain English. :smallconfused:

Right now it rather sounds like you just said that Gate can only function on the same plane as the caster, making the spell completely and utterly useless to the point where banning the spell would have been preferable for all parties.


As a matter of fact, making a private plane would prove difficult as I would require the player to continually fight off hordes of aberrant creatures from the Far Realm.

So either a time/WBL tax for their own horde of minions to continually mop up the gribblies or you derail your own plots. Not really seeing the real limiter or desire for it on your end of things, here. :smallconfused:

It ultimately sounds like you're trying to punish yourself and the players for having a cool home base by delaying the interesting parts of the game by having them fight unimaginative gribblies that don't relate to the plot and are basically just nuisance pests that you created by altering planar physics in your setting for no other reason than to give yourself far realms gribblies when your players want a cool home base at high level.


I don't really think Gensis(at least PF genesis since it's much more specific) is really a gamebreaker in the first place. It gives a 17th/18th level caster a really badass base that is hard for others to access, but if they want to invest gold in creating a fortified demiplane I think that's pretty cool.

You could do worse with 9th level spells than giving people who want to shank you while your sleeping the finger.

Indeed.


Chain Gating solars.

Does that metamagic even apply to Gate? I thought Chain Gating was in reference to gating in a solar that then gates in more solars that then in turn gate in even more solars until you have an arbitrary number of solars to throw at the problem. :smallconfused:


Our planet called earth?

Earth is a notoriously poor setting and world to visit, yes. Not much adventuring to be done, rather poor quality loot that doesn't work all that well once you leave, and the majority of the place is one big Dead Magic Zone so many characters are just in risk of being shanghaied there if they do visit.

You're going to be leaving Earth any time you want to cast a spell using Diamond Dust as a component, though, so the difficulties of acquiring diamond dust in our world are immaterial to playing normal D&D.

[Curmudgeon]

You know that it isn't, right?
Gemini is correct. It's the DM's responsibility to see that they provide the minimums established on Table 3–3: Treasure Values per Encounter to ensure that the PCs have, on average, sufficient resources for the challenges they come up against.

The baseline campaign for the D&D game uses this “wealth by level” guideline as a basis for balance in adventures. No adventure meant for 7th-level characters, for example, will require or assume that the party possesses a magic item that costs 20,000 gp.
It's not the DM's responsibility to micro-manage PC wealth (how it's split, and how it's spent) after the treasure is found. If a Sorcerer decides they can get by with little money while a Fighter needs lots, the DM should not "correct" such an imbalance.

[Gemini476]

Gemini is correct. It's the DM's responsibility to see that they provide the minimums established on Table 3–3: Treasure Values per Encounter to ensure that the PCs have, on average, sufficient resources for the challenges they come up against.

It's not the DM's responsibility to micro-manage PC wealth (how it's split, and how it's spent) after the treasure is found. If a Sorcerer decides they can get by with little money while a Fighter needs lots, the DM should not "correct" such an imbalance.

Skimming through DMG p.13 and the "Keeping Game Balance" section, they even suggest to fix temporary imbalances by changing the challenges rather than "the PCs and their powers or equipment." They even mention how a player who got a shiny overpowered magic sword wouldn't like it much if you took it away, although they also showcase their ignorance of the mechanics when they give a Vorpal Sword as an example later. I guess that got left in from 3.0 where Vorpal was better?

Also, from p.51:

Monitor the progress of treasure into the hands of the PCs. For instance, you may want to use lots of high-treasure or low-treasure monsters, yet still hand out a normal amount of treasure overall. The PCs needn’t have average treasure at every stage in their careers, but if an imbalance (either high or low) persists for more than a few levels, you should take gradual action to correct it by awarding slightly more or slightly less treasure.


And the sidebar on p.54 has a bit on adventure design.

Your job is to compare the wealth gained from the encounters in your adventure with the expected wealth gain shown on the table above. If your adventure has more treasure, reduce it. If your adventure has less treasure, plant enough treasure not related to encounters to match the value (see Other Treasure, below).

Your job is also to make sure that wealth gets evenly distributed. The third column in the table above shows that each character should get an equal share of the treasure from an adventure. If a single item, such as a magic staff, makes up most of the treasure, then most of the party earns nothing for their hard work. While you can make it up to them in later adventures, it is best to use the methods described in this chapter to ensure an even distribution of wealth.
That doesn't exactly cover loot gained from outside the standard means, however, nor does it try to tell you that the players must have so or so much money. It just tells you to fudge your random treasure rolls for the entire adventure if they vary wildly from the average or make it hard to split the wealth somewhat evenly. I guess they also didn't consider resale, but that's par for the course really. (Although reselling the magic staff would only get you half its value, I guess.)


Therefore, when the text above Table 5-1 says this:

One of the ways in which you can maintain measurable control on PC power is by strictly monitoring their wealth, including their magic items. Table 5–1: Character Wealth by Level is based on average treasures found in average encounters compared with the experience points earned in those encounters. Using that information, you can determine how much wealth a character should have based on her level.
What they're talking about is not limiting your players to WBL but to adjust treasure awards so they gradually move towards the WBL target. Just like page 51 suggests, in other words. You're just told to monitor their wealth and keep an eye on it to see if there's a need to adjust adventures later on.

[Psyren]

What they're talking about is not limiting your players to WBL but to adjust treasure awards so they gradually move towards the WBL target. Just like page 51 suggests, in other words. You're just told to monitor their wealth and keep an eye on it to see if there's a need to adjust adventures later on.

Exactly - so if you're showering them with diamond dust (or allowing trips to the Plane of Earth to pick it up) routinely, the DMG expects you to deduct these amounts from their future wealth after a while to get them back in line.

Pathfinder more or less says the same thing - deviations from the WBL table should not persist more than a few sessions, and it instructs GMs to create low-treasure encounters to bring the PCs back down if they do.



Does that metamagic even apply to Gate? I thought Chain Gating was in reference to gating in a solar that then gates in more solars that then in turn gate in even more solars until you have an arbitrary number of solars to throw at the problem. :smallconfused:


I'm pretty sure that's what the guy you were quoting meant by the term too.

[Sacrieur]

If the consequences can be reversed by Wish at level 17+, then it is you, Sir And/Or Madam, who is doing it wrong as DM.

At least, if you profess to care about having some real and irreversible consequences for player failure.

Wish cannot freely and reliably undo a city being destroyed. It cannot reliably undo a soul being lost and there are several ways of dealing with souls that wish simply cannot touch and any method of addressing such souls is solely within the purview of Powers.

This is all true, actually. When a player asked me about true resurrection I appended, "as long as the soul is willing and able to return." I had to remove it from the game because it's not how death works in my world (it's way cooler than that, you have clerics going into death to resurrect people). Higher level play just introduces higher level characters to interact with. The threat level automatically scales to the problems they're solve, somewhat.



At 20th level the PCs are on the scale of godly power compared to ordinary mortals. So unless they're actually going up against something that is a threat to them and they know it(and they should know it, at that level), it's perfectly reasonable for the non-casters to feel justified in kicking down the doors of whatever hovel of a castle some random king is in that has what they want and taking it.

Yeah all that +d8 to hit for a fighter like 25% of the time really is a godly level of power. In any case, non-casters can feel justifiably bad-ass at level 20, since I like to try to keep everyone at the same level of power and told my players you may find that non-casters may sometimes get cooler stuff than you do. It's the one thing I will fiat so that everyone is more equal. They'll also find that enemies react to them and learn. In my campaign right now my players just let a bandit run away. I chuckled because now that means the rest of the bandits are going to organize and mobilize against them, but the players haven't realized this yet.



Please restate that in plain English. :smallconfused:

Right now it rather sounds like you just said that Gate can only function on the same plane as the caster, making the spell completely and utterly useless to the point where banning the spell would have been preferable for all parties.

I'm a fan of physics and I built an entire system of how magic operates on the small level. Gate can still be used a powerful system of planar transportation, but how it functions is that it's building a wormhole through space-time. So, you're actually required to tunnel through dimensions that may be between you and the other plane. In my conception of the world, planes are located in 4-space (four spacial dimensions) and surrounded by the Far Realm. For the moment you cast the spell, they need to be able to perceive through the 4-space for the duration of the spell. If there's an intrusion of 5-space into 4-space, they wouldn't be able to travel through it unless they had an ability to perceive 5-space.

This is because the spell has to "fold" or compress space so the planes are touching at this single point in 4-space. In summary, fun stuff with potential vulnerabilities. Anything that would prevent you from folding space will also prevent you from being able to use the spell.

It's quite fun; really. And then there's the time travel :D



So either a time/WBL tax for their own horde of minions to continually mop up the gribblies or you derail your own plots. Not really seeing the real limiter or desire for it on your end of things, here. :smallconfused:

It's just how it works. It's not intended to limit; it's a naturally occurring phenomenon. And yes, hiring some guys to constantly patrol your realm to make it safe is one potential way to make it work. Ignoring the Far Realm could cause the plane to become an aberrant sentient and start attempting to gobble up nearby planes.

I don't really have plots. I have characters with motivations and ambitions that all behave according to these motivations or ambitions.



It ultimately sounds like you're trying to punish yourself and the players for having a cool home base by delaying the interesting parts of the game by having them fight unimaginative gribblies that don't relate to the plot and are basically just nuisance pests that you created by altering planar physics in your setting for no other reason than to give yourself far realms gribblies when your players want a cool home base at high level.

They can have a cool home base, if they choose to do the work required to build one and make it safe against its natural threats. The Far Realm isn't going to sit back and go, "Oh another intruding plane that's completely defenseless? I mean I hate it with a burning passion of one billion black suns, but I suppose I'll just leave it alone."

My players have all cheered on my changes with the equivalent of a standing ovation; so if I'm doing anything wrong I don't see it.

[Karl Aegis]

My players have all cheered on my changes with the equivalent of a standing ovation; so if I'm doing anything wrong I don't see it.

You're bringing a heavily houseruled environment into a discussion of the core rules. Is the Far Realm even in the Dungeon Master's Guide? I know nothing from the Far Realm is in the Monster Manual.

[Sacrieur]

You're bringing a heavily houseruled environment into a discussion of the core rules. Is the Far Realm even in the Dungeon Master's Guide? I know nothing from the Far Realm is in the Monster Manual.

You're totally right, we're way off topic.

[SillySymphonies]

1 Familiarity
For whatever reason(s), not all players are as much invested in the tactical/rules/optimization aspect of the game. These players will usually pick feats, spells etcetera from Core (PHB, DMG, MM) only. The more rules savvy players will and do pick character options from splats (if allowed), but being rules savvy in the first place, they need the help the least. Cf. johnbragg’s cherry picking argument:

It probably doesn't help that non-Core opens the game up to running to a forum to find the most optimized (broken) spells (and feats and ACFs), which may tend to color the perception of splatbooks.


2 Verisimilitude
In cases the DM only (or even mainly) uses Core for world building (because of e.g. convenience or familiarity), limiting players’ options to (mainly) Core helps levelling the playing field and improves verisimilitude:

Another point: No-core D&D may be a more balanced game, but it's a completely different game. The flavor feels different, unless you go ahead and pick and choose a "new Core", picking a half-dozen to a dozen "standard classes" for the campaign world, so warblades replace fighters and factotums replace rogues and crusaders replace clerics or whatever.

[AzraelX]

I would argue that wishes can be a great addition to many games. Partial Fulfillment covers nearly all your bases, and PF already fixed the worst part of the spell (i.e. magic item creation.) Meanwhile, Miracle can be a great panic button, and when you think the party is bringing a sledgehammer to a chess match, you can have the deity/power just say "no" - and even refund the spell slot if you don't want to punish them too harshly. All totally RAW.
Everything after your first sentence sounds like it contradicts your first sentence. Wish and Miracle are extremely lazy consequence-avoiding deus ex machina mechanisms that fly in the face of good sense, good storytelling, good game design, and good balance.

No one should have powers on par with the DM; it doesn't matter if the actual DM gets veto power over them (that generally applies to everything anyways, doesn't it?) These spells are objectively bad by any measure. Either you impose serious enough consequences that they aren't worth using, or people use them; even using such a power once taints the integrity of the campaign, and eyerolls ensue. Someone always walks away from the table feeling cheated out of the experience they wanted.

It's been a long time since I've played in a campaign where these spells weren't simply banned outright. These spells are the opposite of fun. The game isn't enjoyable when the consequences of everyone's actions are always one spell away from being made totally irrelevant (and no, this isn't remotely invalidated by "the DM can use extremely forced fiat to make some small fractional percentage of the major events irreversible").

[Aegis013]

...No one should have powers on par with the DM... These spells are objectively bad by any measure.

Wish and Miracle are nothing compared to the power of the DM, and your objectivity is entirely limited to your own opinion, as expressed by the opposite opinions of others, and thus is objectively not objective. :smallannoyed:

Neither are they bad spells. Psyren has already pointed out the metagame trade-offs for preparation, and the costs of actually using them. But I can tell you as a DM, who has had a game where the 20th level Wizard/Rainbow Servant/Incantatrix and the DMM: Persist Cleric both had Wishes and Miracles prepared and ready didn't cheapen the game. They were still repeatedly challenged.

Using them for "DM-level powers" is suicidal (see partial fulfillment example when wishing for a Staff of the Magi), because there are still potential threats powerful to enough to eat those characters alive. They're for "I desperately need this situational spell, and I don't have it prepared!" moments, which a skilled DM can readily craft. So you pay a big fat tax, both in meta and in GP or XP and use Wish to achieve that spell effect, then you might not have it for the next one.

[Flickerdart]

Wish (and to a much lesser extent, Miracle) is a very well designed spell, most likely by accident. It is a spell that neither you nor your enemies actually want to be cast. Them, because a wish can counter pretty much any offense they are likely to produce, and you because of the XP cost. Simply letting your enemies know you have wish is a conflict deterrent. Miracle doesn't work as well because there's no cost for most of the uses, but then you get into the whole "you're just requesting intervention from your god" fluff that so many people love to pick at, and you're really better off not using it and thus avoiding the argument.

[AzraelX]

your objectivity is entirely limited to your own opinion, as expressed by the opposite opinions of others, and thus is objectively not objective.
You can like something that's badly designed, that doesn't improve it by an objective standard, despite your objectively subjective objections.


They're for "I desperately need this situational spell, and I don't have it prepared!" moments, which a skilled DM can readily craft.
Ignoring the rampant logical fallacies (like "it's not bad because you can kind of manage to lessen its impact if you design your entire campaign around doing so"), this just sounds like bad DMing. It is the opposite of "skilled"; a lobotomized toddler could contrive circumstances to hard counter someone. I feel sorry for any player who is forced to sit at a table where the DM designs the encounters specifically to invalidate their build choices.

If you weren't abusing your DM knowledge to "beat" the players, it would be perfectly reasonable to expect a party to suffer the consequences of not bringing the appropriate tools for handling a situation. Someone skilled at DMing (ie, not someone good at trying to justify bad DMing) wouldn't take such a lazy and questionable approach to creating game content in the first place.


It is a spell that neither you nor your enemies actually want to be cast.
True. Good reason not to have it in the game.


a wish can counter pretty much any offense they are likely to produce
True. Good reason not to have it in the game.


the XP cost.
Regardless of whether the XP cost has any actual bearing on this topic (the availability, use, and effects of the spell are what ruin the game; the penalties for the user don't change this), the discussion started in the context of Pathfinder. There is no XP cost.

[Coidzor]

Regardless of whether the XP cost has any actual bearing on this topic (the availability, use, and effects of the spell are what ruin the game; the penalties for the user don't change this), the discussion started in the context of Pathfinder. There is no XP cost.

Eh, not really. Locking final progression on ability score increases to a high level ability you have to stockpile 5 of doesn't ruin the game.* The ability to trade a spell slot to cast a lower level spell as necessary doesn't ruin the game. Reversing status effects caused by lower level spells and effects doesn't ruin the game. Forcing an enemy to make a save vs. rerolling a previously made save doesn't ruin the game, nor does giving an ally a second chance to make a save.

The only part that's inherently problematic of its capabilities is the nebulous portion that boils down to "ask your DM and roll social engineering vs. rocks fall" which should basically be its own special ritual rather than part of the spell Wish.


*I'll admit I never really enjoyed that angle and would change it myself, but it doesn't really seem to have any interpretation that leads to ruining the game, the availability of chaining a bunch of Efreet to do it early is certainly problematical though, but not necessarily a game ruining issue.

[Aegis013]

You can like something that's badly designed, that doesn't improve it by an objective standard, despite your objectively subjective objections.

Whether or not you believe something is badly designed is your own opinion, therefore, it isn't objective. I said they're not bad spells, but to clarify, I intended to express that I do not find them to be poorly designed (my opinion). I was not trying to claim they are objectively good spells, as I simply have no way to prove this.

Otherwise, your ad hominem attacks are unwelcome and entirely not constructive.

[Flickerdart]

True. Good reason not to have it in the game.
Wrong. It's an excellent reason to have it in the game. A spell of such power creates ripples in the game world merely by existing, which is interesting if you decide to take advantage of it instead of desperately wanting to bury it.

[emeraldstreak]

Wrong. It's an excellent reason to have it in the game. A spell of such power creates ripples in the game world merely by existing, which is interesting if you decide to take advantage of it instead of desperately wanting to bury it.


Frankly, nukes are OP in real world. Broken, even. But they exist, such is the RAW of the universe. And nations find ways to adapt.

[Anlashok]

You can like something that's badly designed, that doesn't improve it by an objective standard, despite your objectively subjective objections.

That goes both ways though: "I think it's a dumb spell" doesn't make it 'objectively badly designed'. It just means you don't like it. And trying to make your points seem more grandiose than they are by doing stuff like that makes you look like an ass.

[Platymus Pus]

Earth is a notoriously poor setting and world to visit, yes. Not much adventuring to be done, rather poor quality loot that doesn't work all that well once you leave, and the majority of the place is one big Dead Magic Zone so many characters are just in risk of being shanghaied there if they do visit.

You're going to be leaving Earth any time you want to cast a spell using Diamond Dust as a component, though, so the difficulties of acquiring diamond dust in our world are immaterial to playing normal D&D.

Saying diamonds aren't actually rare bro.

In the constellation Centaurus, there lies a white dwarf, that has crystallized into a diamond 2,500 miles in diameter and weighing 10 billion, trillion, trillion carats.
They are even the most common on earth.
http://www.gemsociety.org/article/are-diamonds-really-rare/
The ability to cast spells that require it however is.

[Psyren]

Everything after your first sentence sounds like it contradicts your first sentence. Wish and Miracle are extremely lazy consequence-avoiding deus ex machina mechanisms that fly in the face of good sense, good storytelling, good game design, and good balance.

No one should have powers on par with the DM; it doesn't matter if the actual DM gets veto power over them (that generally applies to everything anyways, doesn't it?) These spells are objectively bad by any measure. Either you impose serious enough consequences that they aren't worth using, or people use them; even using such a power once taints the integrity of the campaign, and eyerolls ensue. Someone always walks away from the table feeling cheated out of the experience they wanted.

It's been a long time since I've played in a campaign where these spells weren't simply banned outright. These spells are the opposite of fun. The game isn't enjoyable when the consequences of everyone's actions are always one spell away from being made totally irrelevant (and no, this isn't remotely invalidated by "the DM can use extremely forced fiat to make some small fractional percentage of the major events irreversible").

The thing about high level play is that unintended consequences do happen. Having a player with the power to potentially undo catastrophe in-universe (i.e. not begging the "DM" for help, but appealing to their in-universe deity or tapping the in-universe source of arcane power) can be invaluable.

And frankly, GMs who lack the imagination to make these spells fun are indeed better off just banning them. But I know which camp I consider to be the lazier of the two.


Saying diamonds aren't actually rare bro.

They are even the most common on earth.
http://www.gemsociety.org/article/are-diamonds-really-rare/
The ability to cast spells that require it however is.

In D&D they are, and there isn't a De Beers or similar corporation artificially inflating their value (at least, not in any sourcebook I've read), so citing IRL sources is meaningless.

[Milo v3]

If the value of diamonds was inflated, that'd probably actually be a good thing. Means you don't need as many physical diamonds to resurrect people.

[Gemini476]

If the value of diamonds was inflated, that'd probably actually be a good thing. Means you don't need as many physical diamonds to resurrect people.

The value of diamonds probably is a bit inflated, given how material components are destroyed upon casting.

I have no clue how it relates to the value of IRL diamonds, though. D&D economics are wonky at best before you start to look into specific expensive items.

[Sacrieur]

Wrong. It's an excellent reason to have it in the game. A spell of such power creates ripples in the game world merely by existing, which is interesting if you decide to take advantage of it instead of desperately wanting to bury it.

You can have it exist without having it be on the spell list as something any Wizard can select. Sounds like it definitely should be an artifact like power that shouldn't be just available to any Wizard who happens to reach level 17.



Frankly, nukes are OP in real world. Broken, even. But they exist, such is the RAW of the universe. And nations find ways to adapt.

Yeah by amassing as many as they can and preventing anyone else from getting them. All the more reason why it shouldn't be something just anyone can use or learn. I could see deities outright banning its knowledge.



The thing about high level play is that unintended consequences do happen. Having a player with the power to potentially undo catastrophe in-universe (i.e. not begging the "DM" for help, but appealing to their in-universe deity or tapping the in-universe source of arcane power) can be invaluable.

And frankly, GMs who lack the imagination to make these spells fun are indeed better off just banning them. But I know which camp I consider to be the lazier of the two.

Yeah, anything that's game breaking can be invaluable to the player.



In D&D they are, and there isn't a De Beers or similar corporation artificially inflating their value (at least, not in any sourcebook I've read), so citing IRL sources is meaningless.

I'm sure a high level wizard can figure out how to manufacture diamond dust. Really it's just a matter of generating enough pressure to compress the coal.

---

These arguments aren't reassuring in the least. In a topic about balance you're all defending the most powerful spell in the game as a necessary component. It destroys any possible balance that could exist for the Wizard. Banned schools? Doesn't matter, have Wish so if I ever need a necromancy spell it's okay I can just make it work with my wand of Wish.

The ability bonus conferred by Wish isn't even the cheapest or most economical solution to getting a +5 inherent bonus to your stats. It can be done more cheaply with tomes and lots of other stuff so there's no point to even have except convenience.

Then there's the explicit mention that it can do pretty much everything. The fact it mentions the GM is permitted to perverse it is just a recipe for disaster and can lead to a conflict with your player over how you interpret or do what you want with it. While I'm sure many players are nice people who wouldn't try to, there's no reason why it should have been included to begin with as a regular ol' spell.

Yeah, the Wizard is broken, so remove some of the most broken aspects of it, starting with Wish because it's too bloody versatile and ruins the balance of the game completely. And here people are all getting up in arms about actually attempting to balance the game. Name me ONE thing the Fighter, Ranger, Barbarian, Paladin, or Monk can do that the Wizard can't do better. I'm certain a level 10 Wizard could beat a level 20 fighter and the only real chance of success for any non-caster against a Wizard is to win the initiative and hope that you can reach them and deal enough damage to drop their HP to zero right then -- praying that they don't have something prepared in case this happens.

If Wish were a homebrew spell, it would be criticized for being overly broad, arbitrary, and overpowered. Yet because it's part of the CRB it's okay? It's broken and it shouldn't exist for players to just select.

[Psyren]

It destroys any possible balance that could exist for the Wizard. Banned schools? Doesn't matter, have Wish so if I ever need a necromancy spell it's okay I can just make it work with my wand of Wish.

Overall wizard balance has nothing to do with Wish at all. Druids are T1 without either Wish or Miracle, and so are Witches. Furthermore, Wish comes at a point in the game long after most groups have stopped playing to begin with, and the ones that are still going are obviously much more liberal in terms of "game balance."

And yes, Wish does let them get access to banned schools in a pinch. Not only is this far less potent in PF to begin with (since you're not really "banning" schools anymore), but that's the point - you really might need that emergency button from a school that you haven't been able to use your entire career, and if you're willing to pay a premium to get it, well, welcome to high-level play.

[Sacrieur]

Overall wizard balance has nothing to do with Wish at all. Druids are T1 without either Wish or Miracle, and so are Witches. Furthermore, Wish comes at a point in the game long after most groups have stopped playing to begin with, and the ones that are still going are obviously much more liberal in terms of "game balance."

And yes, Wish does let them get access to banned schools in a pinch. Not only is this far less potent in PF to begin with (since you're not really "banning" schools anymore), but that's the point - you really might need that emergency button from a school that you haven't been able to use your entire career, and if you're willing to pay a premium to get it, well, welcome to high-level play.

Other classes don't get the ability to pay a premium to do anything they want, why should the Wizard?

[Vhaidara]

Other classes don't get the ability to pay a premium to do anything they want, why should the Wizard?

Yeah they do. Scrolls + UMD.

[Sacrieur]

Yeah they do. Scrolls + UMD.

If you're going to argue that every class is tier 1.

[Elderand]

If you're going to argue that every class is tier 1.

Wish isn't what make a class tier 1 anymore than UMD and scrolls do.

[Psyren]

Other classes don't get the ability to pay a premium to do anything they want, why should the Wizard?

Several other classes do actually (Sorcerer, Psion, Wu Jen, Sha'ir etc.) - but to answer your question, classes with the full sorcerer/wizard list (or a different list of similar potency) are intended to become - or at least have the potential to become - masters of arcane magic, and all the power that implies.

For example, CRB 77:


Beyond the veil of the mundane hide the secrets of absolute power. The works of beings beyond mortals, the legends of realms where gods and spirits tread, the lore of creations both wondrous and terrible—such mysteries call to those with the ambition and the intellect to rise above the common folk to grasp true might. Such is the path of the wizard.

[Sacrieur]

Wish isn't what make a class tier 1 anymore than UMD and scrolls do.

Just get a handy haversack and a bunch of scrolls of every spell you may need. See game is balanced because other classes can pretend to be a Wizard!



Several other classes do actually (Sorcerer, Psion, Wu Jen, Sha'ir etc.) - but to answer your question, classes with the full sorcerer/wizard list (or a different list of similar potency) are intended to become - or at least have the potential to become - masters of arcane magic, and all the power that implies.

This is all true; however, consider the balance aspect. The Wizard et al. should be versatile classes with many spells at their disposal, but it shouldn't be overreaching to the point where it invalidates other members of the party.

The power gap is so big a DM has the challenge of making the game completely two levels of difficulty simultaneously. Casters as they are have the potential to make other classes feel like just like peons. While initiator classes helped this, there should be concessions on the top half too. One of them is getting rid of the most powerful ability offered to casters which as I said before, is overpowered and arbitrary.

Deus Ex Machina should never be a class feature.

[Platymus Pus]

In D&D they are, and there isn't a De Beers or similar corporation artificially inflating their value (at least, not in any sourcebook I've read), so citing IRL sources is meaningless.
Unless DnD doesn't actually have a universe, no.
Diamonds are common universally, DnD has the ability to CROSS the universe unlike us.
Elements like diamonds are grossly overpriced RL and even more so in DnD.
Rubies,garnets, etc should all cost more.
The reason diamonds cost a lot in dnd is because it's a reflection on RL where the diamond game is rigged.

[Necroticplague]

Isn't the Plane of Earth supposed to brimming with the dang things, especially where it borders the Plane of Positive Energy (producing the quasi-elemental Plane of Mineral)?

[Firechanter]

Damn, I'm late to the party it seems. Haven't read the entire thread, but maybe I can add my two coppers anyway.

Personally, when someone invites me to a game and announces it will be "Core Only", I simply refuse. (Same as when it's said to be "Low Magic" or "Low Gear", btw, but different story.) I also offer to explain why this is such a bad idea, but usually the other side isn't really willing to listen anyway.

Basically, 3.5 Core can work reasonably well at low levels, but it gets increasingly more problematic from mid-levels on. High levels (13+) are entirely unplayable for mundane characters.
While spellcasters automatically get more and more toys every couple of levels, and an ever-increasing range of options and selections, the situation is exactly opposite for mundanes. And after level 12, Core has _not one single_ new feat choice for mundanes, whereas Casters keep unlocking three more spell levels with exactly 158 spells total, just counting spell levels 7, 8, 9.

So by the time a Wizard learns to travel anywhere in the multiverse in the blink of an eye, or subject a target to 7 life-threatening saving throws with a single spell, the Fighter will start picking a +1 To Hit with his backup weapon because there's simply NOTHING left for him to learn.
And this is generously glossing over the fact that the +2 to damage he picked as his last meaningful feat choice at level 12 already was pretty crappy, at least compared to things like "a Devil must serve me" or "nothing you can do will ever kill me" or whatever.

I could go on ranting like this for an hour, but I'll leave it at that for the moment.

[Psyren]

@ power gap in general: This is a feature, not a bug; if the other players want to be equal in power to a pure spellcaster, they should play one. Magic is intended to be superior to not-magic.

@ Wish in particular: I don't see it as "Deus Ex Machina" when (a) the player still has to choose the right tool for the problem facing them, and (b) they still have to spend their most powerful spell slot + either a boatload of wealth or a boatload of XP. Even sticking to the safe uses, that is still a costly sacrifice and one that is very likely to be wasted or ineffective. But for the clever or desperate, it is an option, and the truly clever can get out of most scrapes without it. You don't see Elminster Wishing every 5 minutes. About the only major problem I had with Wish - creating items from nothing safely, rather than that being either a dangerous use, or being subject to the same limitations as things like Major Creation and Fabricate - was solved in PF.

@ diamonds: Yeah, the value in D&D is a reflection of the inflated value here, that's obviously the metagame reason. But answers like "the Plane of Earth exists, so gems should be easy to get" are overly simplistic and lazy. It's also not even true - MotP:


Thin veins of gemstones, rough and huge, can be found within the plane, and these unpolished jewels often lead the greedy to this plane in the hopes of picking them up with minimal effort. Such prospectors often meet their match in the natives of the Elemental Plane of Earth, who feel extremely attached (sometimes literally) to parts of their home.

They also don't explain why, for example, spells like Major Creation and PAO can't create diamonds usable for spellcasting. Surely if they are as common in D&D as we think they are, magic would reflect that?

And unlike our world, diamonds have intrinsic value in D&D beyond their hardness or aesthetic qualities, because they are needed for (and consumed by) powerful magic.

If you're looking for a fantastic version of DeBeers that is mucking with the gemstone supply, dragons or genies (particularly the Dao/Shaitans) can fill in easily there.

[Firechanter]

@ power gap in general: This is a feature, not a bug; if the other players want to be equal in power to a pure spellcaster, they should play one. Magic is intended to be superior to not-magic.

If that were the case, the designers have failed horribly at communicating this crucial information anywhere. The books keep telling us "1 level = 1 level" and pretend that a Fighter 20 is equal to a Wizard 20. Just like Ftr and Wiz NPCs are treated with the same Challenge Rating.
I still remember the forum discussions of the early 3E days. Back then, people still wrote in all earnest things like "A Wizard runs out of spell slots, while a Fighter can swing all day. In the end, it is balanced". And if there was any opposition to such opinions, it was a tiny minority.
As far as I remember, the "Primary Caster Master Race" revelation did not really take root in the community's heads until after the release of 3.5.

[johnbragg]

If that were the case, the designers have failed horribly at communicating this crucial information anywhere. The books keep telling us "1 level = 1 level" and pretend that a Fighter 20 is equal to a Wizard 20. Just like Ftr and Wiz NPCs are treated with the same Challenge Rating.
I still remember the forum discussions of the early 3E days. Back then, people still wrote in all earnest things like "A Wizard runs out of spell slots, while a Fighter can swing all day. In the end, it is balanced". And if there was any opposition to such opinions, it was a tiny minority.
As far as I remember, the "Primary Caster Master Race" revelation did not really take root in the community's heads until after the release of 3.5.

I have to second this. I just dug up a homebrew class-building or character building system I worked on in 2002, and Wizard magic and "Good Combat Ability" (d10 HD, 1/1 BAB) cost as many points as Wizard magic. (And I may have meant to give Wizards access to all priest spells, reserving necromancy and charm spells as contraband stuff that wasn't commonly available).

Wizards were always supposed to have game-breaking power at late levels, but it was supposed to be balanced by something--frailty at low levels, or low hit points and limited spell availability. "Sucks to Not Be A Tier One" is a result of 3X design, not a goal.

[Coidzor]

You can have it exist without having it be on the spell list as something any Wizard can select. Sounds like it definitely should be an artifact like power that shouldn't be just available to any Wizard who happens to reach level 17.

17th level Wizards aren't just "any" Wizards.


Yeah by amassing as many as they can and preventing anyone else from getting them. All the more reason why it shouldn't be something just anyone can use or learn. I could see deities outright banning its knowledge.

Ok, so in some settings the spell doesn't exist. Welcome to homebrew and houserules.


Yeah, anything that's game breaking can be invaluable to the player.

Not anything and everything, no. Some things just break the game in a way that's unpleasant for everyone involved.


I'm sure a high level wizard can figure out how to manufacture diamond dust. Really it's just a matter of generating enough pressure to compress the coal.

Yes, but it takes them time and effort to devote to that, and, y'know, high level play, hooray. :smalltongue:

Also, most methods of doing so are going to come under the purview of DM fiat rather than being fully RAW with no input from the DM.


It destroys any possible balance that could exist for the Wizard.

Rather exaggerating the safe things you can actually do with Wish. Which are the only things sane players actually use Wish for.


Banned schools? Doesn't matter, have Wish so if I ever need a necromancy spell it's okay I can just make it work with my wand of Wish.

You think Banned schools are something that balances Wizards? You think this is something that is supposed to keep them balanced at high levels? :smallconfused: Why?

Also, why do you allow 9th level spells in wands in the first place and then hold that against the system rather than yourself? :smallconfused:


The ability bonus conferred by Wish isn't even the cheapest or most economical solution to getting a +5 inherent bonus to your stats. It can be done more cheaply with tomes and lots of other stuff so there's no point to even have except convenience.

So that ability is not actually unbalancing, then, despite your point being that Wish is unbalancing because of what it can do? :smallconfused:


The fact it mentions the GM is permitted to perverse it is just a recipe for disaster and can lead to a conflict with your player over how you interpret or do what you want with it.

Yes, a big red flag about using it when it's not appropriate to do so.


While I'm sure many players are nice people who wouldn't try to, there's no reason why it should have been included to begin with as a regular ol' spell.

Even non-nice people are shooting themselves in the foot if they try to get in a **** measuring contest with the DM.


Yeah, the Wizard is broken, so remove some of the most broken aspects of it, starting with Wish because it's too bloody versatile and ruins the balance of the game completely.

Why do you think that being able to access lower level spells is too much versatility for an endgame ability? Especially when they pay a premium to do so both in real cost and opportunity cost?

[Anlashok]

@ power gap in general: This is a feature, not a bug; if the other players want to be equal in power to a pure spellcaster, they should play one. Magic is intended to be superior to not-magic.

Maybe in your pathfinder, where the devs admit their fetishistic obsession with ninth level casters, but this game doesn't seem to agree with this assessment anywhere. 3.5 presents itself with the supposition of parity at levels, at least to a degree.

Moreover, development seems to agree with this. Most of the worst tricks in the game are in core and WoTC employees freely admit that they didn't really know what they were doing with core.

Compare and contrast: Wizard vs Fighter and Warlock vs Warblade. Seems less likely that Wizards intentionally lied to its players about how the game was meant to be handled and more likely that they just had different expectations and unreliable QA with the earlier versions of the game, because that second example shows a good degree of parity in capabilities.

[nyjastul69]

... WoTC employees freely admit that they didn't really know what they were doing with core. ...

I've never heard this before. Can you source it please?

[Flickerdart]

Compare and contrast: Wizard vs Fighter and Warlock vs Warblade. Seems less likely that Wizards intentionally lied to its players about how the game was meant to be handled and more likely that they just had different expectations and unreliable QA with the earlier versions of the game, because that second example shows a good degree of parity in capabilities.
Warlock is Complete Arcane, which was one of the game's first supplements. You also can't really consider it to be a caster, because it operates on at-will abilities of the kind that WotC grossly over-valued early on. I would instead compare the warblade to the ardent or beguiler, both published in the same year, and both much less frustrating classes than warlock.

[Morty]

3e D&D was an attempt to bring the AD&D paradigm and play style into a more "modern", unified and consistent rules framework. It failed, by and large, although the exact degree to which it did is up to personal preference. Later material tends to be more balanced and functional because at least some of the people who designed it could look back at the history of the game and say "Yes, that didn't work - let's try something else". Not all did, though, and those who did have very divergent opinions on what, exactly, didn't work and why. Of course, they couldn't outright say, in official supplements, that the previous books are bad.

Basically, as I see it, 3e D&D was a trailblazer. And that comes with the risk of falling into a bog so that the people who follow you don't have to.

[nyjastul69]

The 3.0 designers were also hidebound by having to make it compatible/convertable with/to AD&D 2e.

[Firechanter]

I've never heard this before. Can you source it please?

While I can't really give you a source, I do _remember_ reading about 3E devs telling of their playtest sessions. The player who playtested the Druid, for instance, never used Wildshape and iirc had something like a falcon for a pet. Of course, under these circumstances they never got any feedback on what kind of faceroll class a wildshaping Druid with a combat pet is.
Again, all this just from memory.

[Necroticplague]

While I can't really give you a source, I do _remember_ reading about 3E devs telling of their playtest sessions. The player who playtested the Druid, for instance, never used Wildshape and iirc had something like a falcon for a pet. Of course, under these circumstances they never got any feedback on what kind of faceroll class a wildshaping Druid with a combat pet is.
Again, all this just from memory.

I also don't have sources, but I remember that druid problem a bit differently. he did wildshape, but only into bird forms to go scouting, and combat was dual-wielding scimitars. Either way, the idea to actually turn into a bear to eat face never came up, for some odd reason.

[Coidzor]

If that were the case, the designers have failed horribly at communicating this crucial information anywhere. The books keep telling us "1 level = 1 level" and pretend that a Fighter 20 is equal to a Wizard 20. Just like Ftr and Wiz NPCs are treated with the same Challenge Rating.
I still remember the forum discussions of the early 3E days. Back then, people still wrote in all earnest things like "A Wizard runs out of spell slots, while a Fighter can swing all day. In the end, it is balanced". And if there was any opposition to such opinions, it was a tiny minority.
As far as I remember, the "Primary Caster Master Race" revelation did not really take root in the community's heads until after the release of 3.5.

It takes a while for the scales to fall from people's eyes. Especially when considering grognardism and people playing 3E like it was 2E just like the dev team did.

And even in 2E, wasn't the consensus that, yes, high level wizards rule and high level fighters are basically just window dressing?

[Psyren]

Maybe in your pathfinder, where the devs admit their fetishistic obsession with ninth level casters, but this game doesn't seem to agree with this assessment anywhere. 3.5 presents itself with the supposition of parity at levels, at least to a degree.

What, because they have the same CR? That means nothing - a Wizard 20 who prepares nothing but Read Magic in every slot and spent all his money on Identify potions will also be equal to a Fighter 20. That's a failure of the CR system (in both games, by the way), not some presumption of the leveling system itself.

And no, it's most certainly not just in "my pathfinder." It's been in D&D since the very beginning:

OD&D: "Top level magic-users are perhaps the most powerful characters in the game, but it is a long hard road to the top, and to begin with they are weak, so survival is often the question, unless fighters protect the low level magical types until they have worked up."

Holmes: "Thus the magic-user starts out as an extremely weak character, but if he survives and rises in experience, he becomes increasingly powerful."

B/X: "Though they are weak at first, magic-users can eventually become very powerful."

Basic (Mentzer): "Magic-users start as the weakest characters, but can become the most powerful!"

Rules Cyclopedia: "Magic-users start as the weakest characters, but can eventually become the most powerful."

AD&D 1e: "Thus, while magic-users are not strong in combat with weapons, they are possibly the most fearsome of all character classes when high levels of ability are finally attained. Survival to that point can be a problem, however, as low-level magic-users are quite weak."

AD&D 2e: "Spells are the tools, weapons, and armor of the wizard. He is weak in a toe-to-toe fight, but when prepared he can strike down his foes at a distance, vanish in an instant, become a wholly different creature, or even invade the mind of an enemy and take control of his thoughts and actions. No secrets are safe from a wizard and no fortress is secure. His quest for knowledge and power often leads him into realms where mortals were never meant to go."

[Coidzor]

I also don't have sources, but I remember that druid problem a bit differently. he did wildshape, but only into bird forms to go scouting, and combat was dual-wielding scimitars. Either way, the idea to actually turn into a bear to eat face never came up, for some odd reason.

I remember it as a woman who was playtesting the druid, or else they were using the pronouns for the character for the person playing the character inappropriately. And as a sword and board scimitar druid.

But otherwise the important bits, not realizing that wildshape can be useful in combat either by turning into a bear and eating face or flying around while casting spells didn't occur to them at all. And also had a bird animal companion of some sort who was basically a pet that wasn't really used and largely ignored.

Monte Cook's essay on Ivory Tower Game Design, which was supposed to be a face-saving explanation for the problems of balance and such in D&D 3.X, seems to be generally regarded as an asspull of post-hoc rationalization rather than an actual explanation for events as they happened.

[Morty]

What it comes down to, I think, is that the people who designed and tested 3.0 simply didn't think about the game the way we do, with the benefit of fifteen years of hindsight. All the problems started coming up when people started doing things the designers hadn't considered. There's a lot of assumptions that didn't pan out - like that full BAB and bonus feats are enough to make a class a competent warrior.

[atemu1234]

What it comes down to, I think, is that the people who designed and tested 3.0 simply didn't think about the game the way we do, with the benefit of fifteen years of hindsight. All the problems started coming up when people started doing things the designers hadn't considered.

And, ironically, despite the fact that balance is derided as being the worst thing about 3e/3.5 (and why they made fourth the way they did), it's the opposite issue with 4e. People are angry that it's MORE balanced. And it's STILL breakable :smallbiggrin:.

[nyjastul69]

I remember it as a woman who was playtesting the druid, or else they were using the pronouns for the character for the person playing the character inappropriately. And as a sword and board scimitar druid.

But otherwise the important bits, not realizing that wildshape can be useful in combat either by turning into a bear and eating face or flying around while casting spells didn't occur to them at all. And also had a bird animal companion of some sort who was basically a pet that wasn't really used and largely ignored.

Monte Cook's essay on Ivory Tower Game Design, which was supposed to be a face-saving explanation for the problems of balance and such in D&D 3.X, seems to be generally regarded as an asspull of post-hoc rationalization rather than an actual explanation for events as they happened.

It's not that casting in WS didn't occur to them, I have a feeling it simply didn't exist. Natural Spell isn't in the 3.0 PH. It first appeared in MotW released about 18 months after the core books were released. Without being able to cast while WS'd, a druid may not even us WS during combat. It was likely seen as a utility ability and not a combat ability. This also needs to be cross referenced with what forms were available in the 3.0 MM.

[Morty]

And, ironically, despite the fact that balance is derided as being the worst thing about 3e/3.5 (and why they made fourth the way they did), it's the opposite issue with 4e. People are angry that it's MORE balanced. And it's STILL breakable :smallbiggrin:.

People are angry about a lot of things in 4e, but boiling it down to "it's more balanced" is so overly simplistic as to be entirely erroneous.

[Orion Hamby]

Perhaps hyper-strict is my default setting. I do take the Monk's nonproficiency with unarmed strikes into account. I do that in the form of an explicit house rule granting them proficiency, because the base rules don't grant it. With all the other abuse given the class by the game designers I felt that some of the gross stupidities exhibited in the class needed correction. (I also let them use, not merely select, their 6 Bonus Feat choices without meeting prerequisites.) What I don't do is just pretend those rules are written differently. It's never worked with badly-written software, and I don't think it works with badly-written game elements either. Different people will have (sometimes surprisingly) different assumptions about what the "obvious" fixes are. It's either the RAW, or a written house rule; nothing hand-waved or assumed in my games.

It's a little thing called RAI heard of it...also poorly written software is a horrible example because it is much harder to write code than it is to write rule(I'm a programmer BTW) you need to stop DMing if you're that strict

[Zanos]

I remember it as a woman who was playtesting the druid, or else they were using the pronouns for the character for the person playing the character inappropriately. And as a sword and board scimitar druid.

But otherwise the important bits, not realizing that wildshape can be useful in combat either by turning into a bear and eating face or flying around while casting spells didn't occur to them at all. And also had a bird animal companion of some sort who was basically a pet that wasn't really used and largely ignored.

Monte Cook's essay on Ivory Tower Game Design, which was supposed to be a face-saving explanation for the problems of balance and such in D&D 3.X, seems to be generally regarded as an asspull of post-hoc rationalization rather than an actual explanation for events as they happened.
Is this the same playtest where the high level groups biggest source of damage was the elf wizard attacking with a longbow with quickened true strikes?

[Curmudgeon]

It's a little thing called RAI heard of it...
Yes, I've heard of it. I've also heard innumerable arguments where people claim entirely different things were intended by the game authors, but not written down as such. RAI is really good for starting debates, but pretty much worthless for settling anything.

[Coidzor]

Is this the same playtest where the high level groups biggest source of damage was the elf wizard attacking with a longbow with quickened true strikes?

*shrug* The collective memory is a funny thing. Something about quickened true strikes and elf wizards rings a bell, though, I must admit.

[atemu1234]

*shrug* The collective memory is a funny thing. Something about quickened true strikes and elf wizards rings a bell, though, I must admit.

Where is this Essay? I feel like reading.

[Seharvepernfan]

So I keep seeing people advertising core only games (on various forumns and RL) as they believe that this leads to more balanced play.

Most often, I see it when people want simpler games where everybody is on the same page and knows what to expect.

It's a really simple thing to bring druids way down in power, and a strict DM keeps wizards from being too OP. The imbalances in design still remain, but in general, I think balance concerns are overblown. Newbs don't know that the classes are unbalanced (and tend to think that monks are powerful) and veteran parties know enough to pick solid options in martials/rogues and avoid cheese with casters.

Even today, 15 years later, I keep finding new tricks and ideas in Core-only stuff. Like, just the other day I had the idea that a reduced halfling can ride the druid's eagle animal companion, at 1st level. Core can keep satisfying for a long time, assuming you really like how D&D plays in the first place.

[Coidzor]

Where is this Essay? I feel like reading.

The Ivory Tower Game Design essay? The original link I hunted down when looking it up is dead and I didn't go through the Wayback machine to see if the internet archive had a copy of it.

Edit: Oh, here you go. (http://web.archive.org/web/20080221174425/http://www.montecook.com/cgi-bin/page.cgi?mc_los_142)

[Troacctid]

Magic also has a concept of "Timmy cards." These are cards that look cool, but aren't actually that great in the game. The purpose of such cards is to reward people for really mastering the game, and making players feel smart when they've figured out that one card is better than the other.

My god...as a Magic player, I'm not sure whether to cringe or vomit.

[Anlashok]

My god...as a Magic player, I'm not sure whether to cringe or vomit.

Think of it as a flowery way to say "We wanted to pad out the set with more cards so when they draw junk cards they feel enticed to buy another pack but we can't actually say that so I'm going to pretend it's for your benefit".

[eggynack]

My god...as a Magic player, I'm not sure whether to cringe or vomit.
Yeah, it seems like a pretty bad misreading of what a Timmy/Timmy card is. What he's describing is a thing in Magic, and it's the necessary spread between the perception of a card and the reality of a card. In particular, a card can appear good and be good, appear bad and be bad, or the other two setups, and each position has its own importance to the game. It's completely separate from what a Timmy is, however. I see Timmy as representing a sort of id, interested in sheer size, and power, and even just scale. Timmy cards can be bad, and many are, but many Timmy cards are quite good, and I think they've been making a concerted effort along those lines recently. I mean we are entering a dragon set, filled with very playable dragons, which is following a series of standard formats with a dragon or two acting as major finishers, and that's pretty much the definitive timmy thing.

Think of it as a flowery way to say "We wanted to pad out the set with more cards so when they draw junk cards they feel enticed to buy another pack but we can't actually say that so I'm going to pretend it's for your benefit".
Nah, that's some separate forces at work, like the fact that they specifically build sets for limited, and that some set of cards are necessarily going to be bad, just by nature of relative power level. On the latter point, the maintenance of a game without the continual problem of power creep requires the creation of some mediocre cards sometimes. It's not actually difficult to just make powerful cards, and making stuff people want is a better way to get them to buy packs than to fill the packs with crap. If they really wanted to, they could just fill packs with the power nine, or maybe some critical legacy or modern cards, and that crap would sell right the hell out, even as players protested that it's reducing the value of their investment. I mean, what's the alternative? Just fill sets with the, to pick an arbitrary number, twenty or so cards that see actual standard play? Hell, that line probably wouldn't even allow something like monastery mentor.

[Troacctid]

Think of it as a flowery way to say "We wanted to pad out the set with more cards so when they draw junk cards they feel enticed to buy another pack but we can't actually say that so I'm going to pretend it's for your benefit".

I know what it means and that's not what it means. It's both an insulting stereotype and a fundamental misunderstanding of the basic concept of "Timmy". First off, the vast, vast majority of bad filler cards are Spike cards, not Timmy cards. Second, the target psychographic profile for a card is largely independent of its power level.

Edit: Somewhat Swordsaged.

[Psyren]

Yeah, it seems like a pretty bad misreading of what a Timmy/Timmy card is. What he's describing is a thing in Magic, and it's the necessary spread between the perception of a card and the reality of a card. In particular, a card can appear good and be good, appear bad and be bad, or the other two setups, and each position has its own importance to the game. It's completely separate from what a Timmy is, however. I see Timmy as representing a sort of id, interested in sheer size, and power, and even just scale. Timmy cards can be bad, and many are, but many Timmy cards are quite good, and I think they've been making a concerted effort along those lines recently. I mean we are entering a dragon set, filled with very playable dragons, which is following a series of standard formats with a dragon or two acting as major finishers, and that's pretty much the definitive timmy thing.

I would argue that "big and good" cards are Timmy/Spike, rather than pure Timmy. I think of big bruisers that either come out too cheaply to cost you much tempo if they're dealt with, or that are very difficult to remove, or both. Darksteel Colossus is a good example.



Nah, that's some separate forces at work, like the fact that they specifically build sets for limited, and that some set of cards are necessarily going to be bad, just by nature of relative power level. On the latter point, the maintenance of a game without the continual problem of power creep requires the creation of some mediocre cards sometimes. It's not actually difficult to just make powerful cards, and making stuff people want is a better way to get them to buy packs than to fill the packs with crap. If they really wanted to, they could just fill packs with the power nine, or maybe some critical legacy or modern cards, and that crap would sell right the hell out, even as players protested that it's reducing the value of their investment. I mean, what's the alternative? Just fill sets with the, to pick an arbitrary number, twenty or so cards that see actual standard play? Hell, that line probably wouldn't even allow something like monastery mentor.

Totally agreed - unless we want our splats to be pamphlets and our sets to be 20 cards long, you're going to get some filler in there. It's nothing to cringe or vomit over, it is what it is.

[Anlashok]

Totally agreed - unless we want our splats to be pamphlets and our sets to be 20 cards long, you're going to get some filler in there. It's nothing to cringe or vomit over, it is what it is.

There's a lot of grey area between having a twenty card set and not having cards that are intentionally designed to be a waste of card stock.

[Psyren]

There's a lot of grey area between having a twenty card set and not having cards that are intentionally designed to be a waste of card stock.

Indeed there is, and that grey area is in the set :smalltongue:

And it's not like you have to buy boosters of the useless feats. If you don't see a use for something yourself, skip over it. Consider it bonus content or something. Some player, somewhere in the world, would have died if not for Toughness or would have missed that killing blow on the BBEG if not for Weapon Focus. All is one and one is all.

[eggynack]

I would argue that "big and good" cards are Timmy/Spike, rather than pure Timmy. I think of big bruisers that either come out too cheaply to cost you much tempo if they're dealt with, or that are very difficult to remove, or both. Darksteel Colossus is a good example.

Well, the big part is timmy, and the good part is spike. My point is that, while adding appeal to one group might sometimes cost appeal to another, the two aren't heavily causally related. In Monte Cook's defense, however, I do think those two things often coming together is a relatively recent thing. His words were likely more true when they were written than they are now, even if his implied absolute connection between timmy cards and some variety of power/apparent power discrepancy is an inaccurate one.

[Grod_The_Giant]

The problem with applying the MtG design psychology to D&D is that the two games share virtually no gameplay elements. A game of Magic is a short-term, competitive thing. If you mess up your deck, you can easily change it. More than that, deckbuilding is (arguably) the main reason collectable card games exist. It's one of the two main skillsets. You go into the game knowing and expecting it. In an environment like that, you can have things that are more or less effective, or that work only in specific combinations or very narrow circumstances-- the game is all about figuring those things out. Having a better desk than your friend isn't a bad thing. In many ways, it's the point of the game, and-- in my experience-- probably the part you spend the most time on.

D&D, by contrast, is long-term and cooperative. Two characters are expected to be equal, one way or another. Gameplay is the focus-- particularly the creative part not covered by rules-- rather than character creation. Heck, for many players, character creation is a burden, something to be sped through to get to the "real" game. It's completely unacceptable to stick people with long-term penalties (even a one-shot lasts for hours longer than most Magic games) because they made bad choices about a non-advertised portion of the game.

Not every class should be the same, sure. Characters should be better at some areas and worse at others. And it will inevitably be possible to find overpowered combos and build game-breaking characters-- that's the price of any open-ended system. But you can certainly design the game so that every class has a base level of competency. Late-game 3.5 did. Classes like the beguiler, warblade, and totemist are all extremely hard to mess up. A new player can speed through character creation as a dread necromancer and do just fine; trying to do the same as a sorcerer is an exercise in frustration and failure.

tl;dr: In Magic, unbalance is acceptable, because deckbuilding is one of the game's focuses. In D&D, unbalance is unacceptable, because character building isn't supposed to be something you spend a lot of time and energy on.

[Aegis013]

There's a lot of grey area between having a twenty card set and not having cards that are intentionally designed to be a waste of card stock.

Some of those cards that appear to be a waste of card stock are actually cards aimed at players like me, Johnny players (or for those who don't know, weird card combo enthusiasts). For example, the Saviors of Kamigawa card One With Nothing (there are better examples because this easily combos with the old Madness mechanics, but it's the first top of the head example). These cards appear outright bad, and most of the time are, but they have very interesting corner-case uses in specific, but not always competitive, combo decks that make players like me giddy when they work in a game.


tl;dr: In Magic, unbalance is acceptable, because deckbuilding is one of the game's focuses. In D&D, unbalance is unacceptable, because character building isn't supposed to be something you spend a lot of time and energy on.

I think if the game were presented differently, unbalance in D&D would be acceptable. Now that we have tools like the tier system and easy access to handbooks it's much easier to gauge how powerful options are, and how difficult they might be to deal with. I think the real problem lies in the presentation that two characters with PC classes (since NPC classes are explicitly called out as weaker) of equal level are presented as equal in scope and scale, when in reality they can be radically different.

If the game included disclaimers that told the reader up front that some classes were simply more versatile or powerful than others, and informed them of which ones, I think the big consideration and complaints about unbalance would be substantially reduced.

[Psyren]

If you mess up your deck, you can easily change it. More than that, deckbuilding is (arguably) the main reason collectable card games exist. It's one of the two main skillsets. You go into the game knowing and expecting it. In an environment like that, you can have things that are more or less effective, or that work only in specific combinations or very narrow circumstances-- the game is all about figuring those things out. Having a better desk than your friend isn't a bad thing. In many ways, it's the point of the game, and-- in my experience-- probably the part you spend the most time on.

D&D, by contrast, is long-term and cooperative. Two characters are expected to be equal, one way or another. Gameplay is the focus-- particularly the creative part not covered by rules-- rather than character creation. Heck, for many players, character creation is a burden, something to be sped through to get to the "real" game. It's completely unacceptable to stick people with long-term penalties (even a one-shot lasts for hours longer than most Magic games) because they made bad choices about a non-advertised portion of the game.

Well hold on now - are there really DMs out there going "oh well, you chose those crappy feats, so you're stuck with that character until 8 months later when the campaign maybe ends. And I'd better not catch you trying to kill yourself off by charging at my dragon naked and unarmed so you can reroll, or I'll make you immortal just to punish you!"

No, what I see instead are GMs saying "yeah, that feat isn't doing much for you, how about you pick a different one?" Or "that feat is kinda weak, let me buff it a bit with this houserule." Or "help, my player is so much weaker than the others/isn't having fun, what do you guys suggest?" And for the first one in particular, my understanding was that the Retraining rules were created to simply formalize something tons of DMs were already doing.

So this assertion that a deck is easier to change than a character doesn't really hold water with me. At least a character can be changed without finishing the game first if you find out it's not working the way you want it to, or there's a GM who can houserule what certain elements do. With a bad deck you're pretty much on your own and have to forfeit, and nobody is houseruling the cards on your behalf either.


Second, character building - I don't know about the older editions, but this is very much a focus of 3.x, and requires every bit as much creativity as the game itself. Hunting through splats to make a killer build, and hunting through spoilers/DBs to make a killer deck - they stimulate exactly the same parts of our imaginations. And both exercises take a great deal of time and energy - but D&D has an advantage here again, because you can stagger out your planning over the course of the whole campaign, rather than presenting a minimum-60-card fait-accompli before you can even sit down and try it out in play.


And finally, your examples - Totemists and Beguilers are extremely easy to mess up. Illusions and enchantments are some of the most complex and DM-dependent spells in the game, and there are very few hard guidelines in the books to help you - what you can do with them depends pretty much entirely on your IRL charisma score. Totemists are clearer in terms of what you can do, but they rely not just upon encyclopedic knowledge of one of the most obtuse subsystems in 3.5, but you have to know the nearly-as-complex natural attack rules back to front as well. Now obviously, making mistakes with either of these classes isn't particularly lasting; you simply wait until the next day (to regain your slots or reshape your melds, respectively) and try something new. But it's not like they're autopilot from the word go.

[Coidzor]

I still dislike the inherent patronization and find it a toxic element in the culture on both sides of the business-public divide.


Well hold on now - are there really DMs out there going "oh well, you chose those crappy feats, so you're stuck with that character until 8 months later when the campaign maybe ends. And I'd better not catch you trying to kill yourself off by charging at my dragon naked and unarmed so you can reroll, or I'll make you immortal just to punish you!"

Take out the hyperbole and yes, there are DMs out there who won't let players repick bad feat selections or bring in a new character and will punish them for suiciding their current gimped character.

Look at most threads about retraining and you'll see that it's by no means universally allowed.


So this assertion that a deck is easier to change than a character doesn't really hold water with me.

It's objectively and inherently easier and more straightforward. To change a character requires seeking the GM's permission and obtaining it for each and every change one wants to make and there is a limit to which one can change one's character. There's no limit to how much one can change one's deck save what is legal for whatever venue one wishes to use it in.


At least a character can be changed without finishing the game first if you find out it's not working the way you want it to, or there's a GM who can houserule what certain elements do. With a bad deck you're pretty much on your own and have to forfeit, and nobody is houseruling the cards on your behalf either.

While the odd game of MtG will last for 4 hours, generally a game of MtG is less of an investment than a single session of D&D, so this is an unsteady basis for comparison. Aside from tournament play where one wouldn't be bringing an untested deck anyway(or would be constrained in some way by the luck of the draw/serial number of booster packs one had available), losing a game of MtG or forfeiting one costs... 10 minutes, maybe? Worst case scenario it reveals that one was interacting with MtG snobs who aren't worthwhile friends or associates if they're going to be ***** about a failed deck experiment?

Yes, GMs can houserule mid-session and on the fly, but generally it appears to be that GMs and players prefer when they do not do so, so that houserules can be carefully considered rather than off-the-cuff or knee jerk.

[eggynack]

No, what I see instead are GMs saying "yeah, that feat isn't doing much for you, how about you pick a different one?" Or "that feat is kinda weak, let me buff it a bit with this houserule." Or "help, my player is so much weaker than the others/isn't having fun, what do you guys suggest?" And for the first one in particular, my understanding was that the Retraining rules were created to simply formalize something tons of DMs were already doing.

So this assertion that a deck is easier to change than a character doesn't really hold water with me. At least a character can be changed without finishing the game first if you find out it's not working the way you want it to, or there's a GM who can houserule what certain elements do. With a bad deck you're pretty much on your own and have to forfeit, and nobody is houseruling the cards on your behalf either.
Decks are easier to change than characters. No, characters aren't necessarily infinitely static, and decks aren't infinitely dynamic, but a game of magic takes a relatively short amount of time, a small fraction of a typical session of D&D, and you can iterate with your deck between games to whatever extent you want, assuming card availability.


And finally, your examples - Totemists and Beguilers are extremely easy to mess up. Illusions and enchantments are some of the most complex and DM-dependent spells in the game, and there are very few hard guidelines in the books to help you - what you can do with them depends pretty much entirely on your IRL charisma score. Totemists are clearer in terms of what you can do, but they rely not just upon encyclopedic knowledge of one of the most obtuse subsystems in 3.5, but you have to know the nearly-as-complex natural attack rules back to front as well. Now obviously, making mistakes with either of these classes isn't particularly lasting; you simply wait until the next day (to regain your slots or reshape your melds, respectively) and try something new. But it's not like they're autopilot from the word go.
I'm not massively familiar with totemists, but for beguilers at least, they are not easy to mess up in a way that is analogous to choosing bad cards. You can give someone a deck full of ancestral recalls (or, y'know, not, because that's not an existing format), but if the player doesn't know what they're doing, then targeting the opponent is always a legal maneuver. The beguiler's character sheet will be fine, and fully playable, but poor play can make the best things bad, and that is a different thing.

[Psyren]

Take out the hyperbole and yes, there are DMs out there who won't let players repick bad feat selections or bring in a new character and will punish them for suiciding their current gimped character.

Look at most threads about retraining and you'll see that it's by no means universally allowed.

Then I have to say that those DMs are seriously missing the point. If the players aren't having fun, their main job is to fix it. And I consider said DMs to be so cartoonishly strict that designing around them is an exercise in foolishness. It would be like a writing a rulebook specifically for JP - that style of play is just too outlandish to be catered to.

[Coidzor]

Then I have to say that those DMs are seriously missing the point. If the players aren't having fun, their main job is to fix it. And I consider said DMs to be so cartoonishly strict that designing around them is an exercise in foolishness. It would be like a writing a rulebook specifically for JP - that style of play is just too outlandish to be catered to.

No disagreement there, but it's still a sentiment I run into with some regularity, where retraining isn't something people are comfortable with or they actively dislike.

The ones who actively take steps to try to prevent or at least punish new characters are extremely depressing but thankfully on the rare side by my understanding.

[Morty]

Boiling down imbalance to the arms race between magicians and non-magicians, and the tier system, misses a lot. I mean, it's true. But it's not all there is to it. If we have two players, and both of them create fighters but one of them has their character use a two-handed weapon while the other picks dual-wielding, the former will be better at the fighter's one and only job (that is to say, running on automatic and dealing damage) in every possible way. That's imbalance, and it happens within the same class and with nary a spell in sight.

Which means it's also erroneous to assume "optimization" always happens to achieve greater power. Because some character concepts need number-crunching and splat-hunting simply to be functional.

[Gemini476]

Boiling down imbalance to the arms race between magicians and non-magicians, and the tier system, misses a lot. I mean, it's true. But it's not all there is to it. If we have two players, and both of them create fighters but one of them has their character use a two-handed weapon while the other picks dual-wielding, the former will be better at the fighter's one and only job (that is to say, running on automatic and dealing damage) in every possible way. That's imbalance, and it happens within the same class and with nary a spell in sight.

Which means it's also erroneous to assume "optimization" always happens to achieve greater power. Because some character concepts need number-crunching and splat-hunting simply to be functional.
THF vs. TWF is pretty bad, yeah, but at least they're not doing the whole "one-handing without a shield" thing. It's a pretty popular archetype with inspirations from Zorro, the Three Musketeers, pirates and who knows what, but it just doesn't work out well in D&D. At all.

Sword & Boarding it up is slightly better but still pretty bad for some unfathomable reason.


There's also a pretty big variance in magic as well - blasting is the posterchild for suboptimal magic, yes, but you really shouldn't forget how the Cure X Wounds spells are so bad that they generally won't even heal one round of damage from an equal-CR opponent.
Or how Enchantment is often suggested as the school to ban since there's so much that's immune to it.

The Evoker, Enchanter and Healbot are the sword & boarders of Tier 1.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Well hold on now - are there really DMs out there going "oh well, you chose those crappy feats, so you're stuck with that character until 8 months later when the campaign maybe ends. And I'd better not catch you trying to kill yourself off by charging at my dragon naked and unarmed so you can reroll, or I'll make you immortal just to punish you!"

No, what I see instead are GMs saying "yeah, that feat isn't doing much for you, how about you pick a different one?" Or "that feat is kinda weak, let me buff it a bit with this houserule." Or "help, my player is so much weaker than the others/isn't having fun, what do you guys suggest?" And for the first one in particular, my understanding was that the Retraining rules were created to simply formalize something tons of DMs were already doing.
Oberani Fallacy. Just because you can change the rules to make things better doesn't mean mean they're not a problem to start with. (Yeah, there are retraining rules in the PHB2, but that's an optional splatbook, presenting optional rules, that are either slow to make major changes (retraining) or require significant investment of gametime (rebuilding quests)).

(Note that I'm not saying that bad DMs are right to make you stick with your bad choices-- personally, I'm the most permissive DM I've ever met when it comes to things like that. But the point remains.)


Second, character building - I don't know about the older editions, but this is very much a focus of 3.x, and requires every bit as much creativity as the game itself. Hunting through splats to make a killer build, and hunting through spoilers/DBs to make a killer deck - they stimulate exactly the same parts of our imaginations. And both exercises take a great deal of time and energy -
It's a focus in 3e because of the problems and imbalances we're talking about, but it's not supposed to be. Do we try to hook new players by talking about the complexities of character creation? No-- we tell them that they can be Gandalf and kill dragons.


but D&D has an advantage here again, because you can stagger out your planning over the course of the whole campaign, rather than presenting a minimum-60-card fait-accompli before you can even sit down and try it out in play.
Or you can find yourself screwed because you made a mistake early in your build, or decided your character worked differently than you wanted, and now all those ____ feats and levels aren't doing anything for you anymore.


And finally, your examples - Totemists and Beguilers are extremely easy to mess up. Illusions and enchantments are some of the most complex and DM-dependent spells in the game, and there are very few hard guidelines in the books to help you - what you can do with them depends pretty much entirely on your IRL charisma score. Totemists are clearer in terms of what you can do, but they rely not just upon encyclopedic knowledge of one of the most obtuse subsystems in 3.5, but you have to know the nearly-as-complex natural attack rules back to front as well. Now obviously, making mistakes with either of these classes isn't particularly lasting; you simply wait until the next day (to regain your slots or reshape your melds, respectively) and try something new. But it's not like they're autopilot from the word go.
Emphasis mine. Yeah, as eggynack pointed out, they're not the easiest to play*, they're hard to make lasting mistakes with. There's no character building issues. No glaring weaknesses to be patched, no major dysfunctions, nothing. You could take nothing but Toughness on either class and still be functional. How many PHB classes can you say that about? (Answer: Tier 1s)

*Although a lot of the Totemists' difficulty is due to the poor formatting of MoI. If you have someone to lay out the actual rules for you, it's not bad.

[Sacrieur]

THF vs. TWF is pretty bad, yeah, but at least they're not doing the whole "one-handing without a shield" thing. It's a pretty popular archetype with inspirations from Zorro, the Three Musketeers, pirates and who knows what, but it just doesn't work out well in D&D. At all.

There are some maneuvers that work well with a free hand. In any case having a d8 + 3 instead of a d10 + 4 (assuming 16 Str) isn't really all that big of a difference to be a horrible choice. Plus there's the whole Dex-based fighting thing (which Zorro would be yeah?).

[Vhaidara]

There are some maneuvers that work well with a free hand. In any case having a d8 + 3 instead of a d10 + 4 (assuming 16 Str) isn't really all that big of a difference to be a horrible choice. Plus there's the whole Dex-based fighting thing (which Zorro would be yeah?).

2d4+4, with better Power Attack scaling.

And the Dex based fighting thing is going to be doing 1d6+0 in core, because you have no means of Dex to damage (and, in 3.5, no way at all of Dex to damage with a rapier)

[Sacrieur]

2d4+4, with better Power Attack scaling.

And the Dex based fighting thing is going to be doing 1d6+0 in core, because you have no means of Dex to damage (and, in 3.5, no way at all of Dex to damage with a rapier)

Yeah in CRB it's clearly better. Although you could use a free hand to hold a charged spell. When you make your full attack action, you can discharge it as a touch attack (if it's a touch spell).

[Necroticplague]

Totemists are clearer in terms of what you can do, but they rely not just upon encyclopedic knowledge of one of the most obtuse subsystems in 3.5, but you have to know the nearly-as-complex natural attack rules back to front as well. Now obviously, making mistakes with either of these classes isn't particularly lasting; you simply wait until the next day (to regain your slots or reshape your melds, respectively) and try something new. But it's not like they're autopilot from the word go.

Huh? Meldshaping isn't that complicated, and the natural weapon rules can are simpler than the rules for manufactured weapons.

[Psyren]

Oberani Fallacy. Just because you can change the rules to make things better doesn't mean mean they're not a problem to start with.

What's your point? Oberoni is for clinical environments like forum threads and RAW arguments. We are talking behavior at actual tables, where there is always at least one houserule or gentleman's agreement, so the fallacy is utterly meaningless in practice.

If you seriously think nobody allows any form of retraining without having PHB2 or Ultimate Campaign at the table, I have a lovely bridge to sell you. Oops, we're playing core-only, you'll have to wait until the campaign is over later this year to change anything! No suicides either, or else!

Are there GMs like that? Absolutely, and I consider them to be woefully harsh and immature, especially to newer players who don't know any better. But thankfully they are a minority in my experience (as Coidzor rightly mentioned.)



It's a focus in 3e because of the problems and imbalances we're talking about, but it's not supposed to be. Do we try to hook new players by talking about the complexities of character creation? No-- we tell them that they can be Gandalf and kill dragons.

"Not supposed to be?" If this is true, why do splats use character options (new feats, new spells, new archetypes/ACFs etc.) as a selling point?

Read the back cover of literally any splat. See how they trumpet all the new toys inside for character creation? They know their audience; that is a core engagement of this game.



Or you can find yourself screwed because you made a mistake early in your build, or decided your character worked differently than you wanted, and now all those ____ feats and levels aren't doing anything for you anymore.


And then your GM, assuming he isn't a raging fascist, should be willing to help you correct your mistake at that point. And if s/he is one - well, you've got bigger problems than your character being suboptimal I'd say.


Huh? Meldshaping isn't that complicated, and the natural weapon rules can are simpler than the rules for manufactured weapons.

I know, but those two topics (along with things like ToB and psionics) still attract a plurality of threads asking how they work even today. Remember, the system mastery around here tends to be above average.

[eggynack]

I think there's a serious problem in the argument from retraining, and it's that the scope at which you think not doing it is unreasonable is relatively undefined. If we take the rules directly from the book, then you're at about a feat change a level. That is really not much. You can technically also alter class with rebuilding, but that generally requires a quest, and is more down to the DM. I don't think that's an unreasonable amount of change to allow, and conversely, I think it's unreasonable to expect all or even most DM's to allow significantly more.

My point is, sure, if the only problem in a build is that a single feat is out of place, then that can be fixed trivially even within the rules, but if the problem is that everything about the character is just a big pile o' crap, then that could be a problem. Changing characters isn't like changing decks, because the specific nature of a character has some impact on the grand scheme of things, both in terms of past capabilities and present appearance, while people don't generally care if you change your deck between games however you want (within the bounds of the format, of course).

[Aegis013]

...if the only problem in a build is that a single feat is out of place, then that can be fixed trivially even within the rules...

That can be as dependent on the player as the DM. Though I think it's more common for it to be dependent on the DM.
I'm like Grod in that I'm happy to allow players to change their builds (even to the point of changing class levels) if it means they'll have more fun. I might get annoyed if it's blatant metagaming like "Oh, we're going to talk to the king? Let me rebuild to be a diplomancer real quick", at which point I'll tell them to buy or cast Psychic Reformation and manage as best they can.

But in my experience, I've had a player who was playing a (0 LA Dragon Mag version) Hengeyokai sparrow Warlock/Binder/Hellfire Warlock. And his character solved several issues for the group was an invaluable in a slime themed dungeon (included some other monsters, since slimes are pretty derptastic, they were mostly just blocking faster routes or optional treasure routes), but after reading on the internet that Shape Soulmeld Strongheart Vest would potentially have saved him the Binder dip for Naberius, he asked me to kill off his character. Personally I thought his build was quite good. He provided substantial utility and damage output for the group, but I respected his request and he came back as a Wizard/Rainbow Servant/Incantatrix.

[Grod_The_Giant]

What's your point? Oberoni is for clinical environments like forum threads and RAW arguments. We are talking behavior at actual tables, where there is always at least one houserule or gentleman's agreement, so the fallacy is utterly meaningless in practice.
There's a fundamental disconnect, still. In Magic, changing your deck is part of the standard game. In D&D, changing your character is an exception.


"Not supposed to be?" If this is true, why do splats use character options (new feats, new spells, new archetypes/ACFs etc.) as a selling point?
Because D&D is heavy on specific details, and WotC decided to make their money by selling details instead of selling, oh, adventure paths. It's not the point. Character creation is something you do once in a D&D campaign. Maybe two or three times if you die and aren't raised. The expectation is that you have one character at a time, and you take the time to explore his story. In a campaign-- ie, the expected gameplay, as opposed to forum theorycrafting-- actual character creation is a tiny fraction of the overall time commitment. One session out of dozens.

[eggynack]

I definitely don't think that the allowance of deep changes is a bad decision to make. In that situation, assuming there wasn't some overwhelming reason not to allow a character replacement, I likely would have been fine with that swap, or even a switch over to the optimal version of that build. I'm just saying that there's a level of character change at which stopping it is absolutely not tyrannical. Some DM's are fine with changing everything about a character or bringing a new one in pretty rapidly, and some are only fine with the game allowed rules for occasional feat swaps, and I suspect that some change their position depending on the specific campaign and motivation. There's a lot of room between, "Your character is set in stone forever," and, "You can change your character however you want between sessions, or even during a session of it doesn't eat game time," and a big part of that range is both far more restrictive than deck building, and not significantly tyrannical.

[Psyren]

There's a fundamental disconnect, still. In Magic, changing your deck is part of the standard game. In D&D, changing your character is an exception.

Persisting with un-fun options is an exception too. Something has to give, and I'm pretty sure I know which one the designers would say should - Fun > All.



Because D&D is heavy on specific details, and WotC decided to make their money by selling details instead of selling, oh, adventure paths. It's not the point. Character creation is something you do once in a D&D campaign. Maybe two or three times if you die and aren't raised. The expectation is that you have one character at a time, and you take the time to explore his story. In a campaign-- ie, the expected gameplay, as opposed to forum theorycrafting-- actual character creation is a tiny fraction of the overall time commitment. One session out of dozens.

Those are not mutually exclusive; indeed, many feats and character options come FROM adventure paths, and the Completes (and their 3.0 predecessors) built on those as well.

As for your expectation - it only holds up if the player created the character successfully in one go, i.e. they chose everything they meant to without any regrets. As PHB2 rightly points out, this isn't always the case, and forcing the player to continue with a character they don't find fun to play just because they made a mistake is not the right answer - both WotC and Paizo agree on this. Resorting to retraining/rebuilding aren't the only ways to fix that, but what they do agree on is that you should fix it.

Now, would I allow someone to change their build mid-combat, probably not - any more than I would be okay with someone changing their deck midstream during a duel. And where I agree with you is that M:TG consequences are lighter. If you realize your deck isn't working, you can simply concede to end the match early and head back to the drawing board right away; whereas in D&D, "conceding" mid-combat has plot implications (e.g. suicide or capture) and so the GM has to get involved there, potentially pulling their punches or having the bad guy rough the heroes up before teleporting out. But in the long run, if you foresee most combats going like that, there is a pretty strong onus on the GM to change things up, or allow the player to do so, otherwise the game will get frustrating fast.

[Morty]

THF vs. TWF is pretty bad, yeah, but at least they're not doing the whole "one-handing without a shield" thing. It's a pretty popular archetype with inspirations from Zorro, the Three Musketeers, pirates and who knows what, but it just doesn't work out well in D&D. At all.

Sword & Boarding it up is slightly better but still pretty bad for some unfathomable reason.

Pretty much. The combat model is crude and primitive, AC scales poorly and having many attacks was vastly overrated during design. Certain styles of combat were basically ignored, and poorly patched up later - the Duelist PrC is a joke, the Swashbuckler class less of one.

Mind you, there's only so much you can do to balance weapon styles if there are basically three variables to work with.


There's also a pretty big variance in magic as well - blasting is the posterchild for suboptimal magic, yes, but you really shouldn't forget how the Cure X Wounds spells are so bad that they generally won't even heal one round of damage from an equal-CR opponent.
Or how Enchantment is often suggested as the school to ban since there's so much that's immune to it.

The Evoker, Enchanter and Healbot are the sword & boarders of Tier 1.

There's that too, yes. And yet, Evocation was considered more valuable than other schools under 3.0's daft specialization rules, IIRC. It all comes down to the assumptions made during the design having nothing to do with how the game is actually played.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Persisting with un-fun options is an exception too. Something has to give, and I'm pretty sure I know which one the designers would say should - Fun > All.
Look, I'm not saying that people should be forced to stick with an un-fun build. All I'm saying is that D&D has a general assumption that your character isn't going to change (apart from leveling up) within a campaign, while Magic has a general assumption that your deck is going to change within a... I don't know what the analogue is. A season? A set?

[Eldariel]

There's that too, yes. And yet, Evocation was considered more valuable than other schools under 3.0's daft specialization rules, IIRC. It all comes down to the assumptions made during the design having nothing to do with how the game is actually played.

Mostly, they come from previous editions (AD&D, specifically) even though the changes introduced in 3.0 completely changed all such evaluations. As such, they essentially balanced for a different system than the one they released the design on. It's trivial to see why this might generate issues. Like sure, 30 damage Fireball is great in a system where even the greatest creatures have 100- HP, but you port that same Fireball over unchanged, but add so many sources of HP that the same creature in the new system would have 700 HP and even normal PCs can easily reach 300; Fireball damage doesn't scale at all so instead of dealing 1/3rd of the toughest enemies' HP in damage it does 1/20th or less. And these two spells are treated identically balance-wise.

Note, this is only the tip of the iceberg; weapon damage suffers a similar fate as do weapon damage dealers (though Power Attack (& friends), Strength-scaling, iteratives and two-handed bonuses save a lot in that regards), damage in general loses a ton of value and weapon users lose a ton of mobility as a consequence of full attacks. And yet, the balancing choices expect for everything to be as before. The whole process showcases the developers' complete and utter blindness to the effects their changes had on the system, a complete lack of any kind of an internal feedback loop or understanding of what they were actually doing; they changed everything and pretended they'd done nothing and hoped for it to work.

[Flickerdart]

Look, I'm not saying that people should be forced to stick with an un-fun build. All I'm saying is that D&D has a general assumption that your character isn't going to change (apart from leveling up) within a campaign, while Magic has a general assumption that your deck is going to change within a... I don't know what the analogue is. A season? A set?
Between matches - you get a sideboard to adjust your deck in tournament play.

[Aegis013]

Between matches - you get a sideboard to adjust your deck in tournament play.

Isn't a match a set of three games? I thought after the first game in a match, you could adjust your deck by exchanging cards with your sideboard.
My lingo might be off though, it's been a long time since I participated in an M:tG tournament (during Kamigawa block, after Mirrodin block, as I recall).

[Psyren]

Look, I'm not saying that people should be forced to stick with an un-fun build. All I'm saying is that D&D has a general assumption that your character isn't going to change (apart from leveling up) within a campaign, while Magic has a general assumption that your deck is going to change within a... I don't know what the analogue is. A season? A set?

Right, I get that - but again, that assumption is based on the premise that you didn't mess up your build.

My original response to you was when you listed this as a key difference for MTG: "If you mess up your deck, you can easily change it." I was merely pointing out that D&D should not be any different in this regard, because the alternative is forcing someone to play a build that is no fun for them.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Right, I get that - but again, that assumption is based on the premise that you didn't mess up your build.

My original response to you was when you listed this as a key difference for MTG: "If you mess up your deck, you can easily change it." I was merely pointing out that D&D should not be any different in this regard, because the alternative is forcing someone to play a build that is no fun for them.
Sure, but you have to add an addendum for D&D: "If you mess up your build, you can easily change it provided the DM allows it." It's a small distinction, but a subtle one. As eggynack and others have pointed out, there are a wealth of reasons why that might not happen, not all of them bad.

[Flickerdart]

Isn't a match a set of three games? I thought after the first game in a match, you could adjust your deck by exchanging cards with your sideboard.
My lingo might be off though, it's been a long time since I participated in an M:tG tournament (during Kamigawa block, after Mirrodin block, as I recall).
Sorry, games is what I meant.

Anyway, I think there's a key difference between MtG and D&D that makes the comparison less useful - MtG is a competitive game, while D&D is a collaborative one. In Magic, you'll change up your deck not because it's bad, but because it's not as good as it could be. In a D&D context, "hey I saw this thread yesterday that had this combo, can I play that now" comes across as a little disrespectful to the game.

[Ephemeral_Being]

Huh? Meldshaping isn't that complicated, and the natural weapon rules can are simpler than the rules for manufactured weapons.

I had to read over the Meldshaping rules for something like three hours before I started to figure out how it works. I STILL don't know if I've got it all right. I think I figured out enough to set up a build for Junkyard Wars, but without anyone to look at it, I might have screwed up. It's a nearly 200 page book to explain how the subsystem works. A subsystem that, while VERY interesting, is not exactly intuitive.

And I would argue the difficulty is in understanding how manufactured weapons and natural weapons stack for the purpose of iterative attacks. Cause I'm still not sure I'm clear how someone with TWF/Multiattack/Rapidstrike would calculate their BAB on every strike.

[Psyren]

Sure, but you have to add an addendum for D&D: "If you mess up your build, you can easily change it provided the DM allows it." It's a small distinction, but a subtle one. As eggynack and others have pointed out, there are a wealth of reasons why that might not happen, not all of them bad.


Sorry, games is what I meant.

Anyway, I think there's a key difference between MtG and D&D that makes the comparison less useful - MtG is a competitive game, while D&D is a collaborative one. In Magic, you'll change up your deck not because it's bad, but because it's not as good as it could be. In a D&D context, "hey I saw this thread yesterday that had this combo, can I play that now" comes across as a little disrespectful to the game.

Let me be clear then - when I say "messing up your build" I mean that your build is so deficient that it struggles to achieve even basic competency given your intended or desired role. I mean that the way the game is going, the player's only viable choices are to retrain, suicide the character and reroll, or stop playing entirely. In those instances, I simply do not see any good reason to deny the first option, unless the relationship has deteriorated to such a point that the GM is practically ready to make the player sit out the campaign entirely.

What I do not mean is "my build is working, but this new book came out - GM, I demand you let me drop X feats and pick up this other new feat/magic item that came out that will do the thing I was doing before but at much less cost to me!"

[Necroticplague]

I had to read over the Meldshaping rules for something like three hours before I started to figure out how it works. I STILL don't know if I've got it all right. I think I figured out enough to set up a build for Junkyard Wars, but without anyone to look at it, I might have screwed up. It's a nearly 200 page book to explain how the subsystem works. A subsystem that, while VERY interesting, is not exactly intuitive.Eh, not really that hard, though the book has serious organization issue.

1. Pick what you want to shape, and where you want to shape it to from a list. How many times you pick is given on your class table. Unless you have a feat, can't pick the same place twice, and the soulmeld lists where you can shape it.
2.Put some essentia into your melds as you want. Your class should list how much esentia you have, and there's a table for the max you can cram into one thing based on meldshaper level.
3.Decide if you want to bind anything. Your class table list how many binds, your abilities list what binds, the soulmeld lists what it does when bound. Binding cuts off use with the magic item in the associated slot.

Annoying caveat: you can bind things to your totem, but not shape it to them.

And I would argue the difficulty is in understanding how manufactured weapons and natural weapons stack for the purpose of iterative attacks. Cause I'm still not sure I'm clear how someone with TWF/Multiattack/Rapidstrike would calculate their BAB on every strike.

Well, the initial question is easy: you make your manufactured weapon attacks as normal, then use your natural weapons, except now all your natural weapons are downgraded to secondary (if they weren't already).

As for the second part: assuming the off-hand is light

Main-2/Off-hand-2/naturalweapon-2/naturalweapon-2/naturalweapon-7

If you're Bab is higher than 5, add another Main with 5 less points of accuracy.

Just follow the rules step-by-step, not that hard.

[Grod_The_Giant]

What I do not mean is "my build is working, but this new book came out - GM, I demand you let me drop X feats and pick up this other new feat/magic item that came out that will do the thing I was doing before but at much less cost to me!"
Exactly. But that is how Magic works. And that's why it's fine for Magic to have crappy, only good in a combo, and/or obscure cards-- the format encourages experimentation, failure, and new attempts, and you need a wide range of stuff to make that happen. The philosophy in D&D is not the same, so the design principles are not the same. Therefore, Monty Cooke is totally wrong about "ivory tower game design."

[Coidzor]

Look, I'm not saying that people should be forced to stick with an un-fun build. All I'm saying is that D&D has a general assumption that your character isn't going to change (apart from leveling up) within a campaign, while Magic has a general assumption that your deck is going to change within a... I don't know what the analogue is. A season? A set?

After a deck is initially created, its contents are constantly is in flux until it has to collapse into one form or another for the purposes of a game or tournament.

After a character is created, that character is set until levelup or permission to retrain or rebuild or create a new character is obtained.

[Psyren]

Exactly. But that is how Magic works. And that's why it's fine for Magic to have crappy, only good in a combo, and/or obscure cards-- the format encourages experimentation, failure, and new attempts, and you need a wide range of stuff to make that happen. The philosophy in D&D is not the same, so the design principles are not the same. Therefore, Monty Cooke is totally wrong about "ivory tower game design."

But I'm not seeing how this somehow means that D&D cannot have these options too. Again, in the annals of time Toughness had to be useful to somebody, and he even gives an example in that article of the theoretical PC it was "designed for." And as eggynack said, you're going to have some filler or mediocre options when a splat/set includes so many. It's just a fact of life.

[Grod_The_Giant]

But I'm not seeing how this somehow means that D&D cannot have these options too. Again, in the annals of time Toughness had to be useful to somebody, and he even gives an example in that article of the theoretical PC it was "designed for." And as eggynack said, you're going to have some filler or mediocre options when a splat/set includes so many. It's just a fact of life.
Because when they're not easily changed (within the standard rules of the game), "only good in narrow circumstances" or "only good in certain combos" become trap options. "Rewarding system mastery" becomes "punishing system unfamiliarity." Doing a bad job on one small part of the game winds up leaving you with problems everywhere else. The proliferation of such traps (feats, classes, races, etc) are one of the biggest reasons 3e is such an intimidating, newbie-unfriendly system.

[Psyren]

Because when they're not easily changed (within the standard rules of the game), "only good in narrow circumstances" or "only good in certain combos" become trap options. "Rewarding system mastery" becomes "punishing system unfamiliarity." Doing a bad job on one small part of the game winds up leaving you with problems everywhere else. The proliferation of such traps (feats, classes, races, etc) are one of the biggest reasons 3e is such an intimidating, newbie-unfriendly system.

Even before PHB2, the "standard rules of the game" were pretty explicit that your job is to change them to keep things fun if necessary (DMG 14, CRB 9.) I mean, we can yell "Oberoni!" to the heavens until we blow away the clouds, but the fact remains that this is a pretty complex game, and designing for groups of all power levels is a very difficult if not impossible task. What one group sees as a "trap option" will be perfectly acceptable for another, and it's near-impossible to tell who is who until after the book is released.

And for all it's so-called unfriendliness and intimidation, it's still the most lasting iteration of D&D by far, so it can't be as off-putting as all that.

[Morty]

Mostly, they come from previous editions (AD&D, specifically) even though the changes introduced in 3.0 completely changed all such evaluations. As such, they essentially balanced for a different system than the one they released the design on. It's trivial to see why this might generate issues. Like sure, 30 damage Fireball is great in a system where even the greatest creatures have 100- HP, but you port that same Fireball over unchanged, but add so many sources of HP that the same creature in the new system would have 700 HP and even normal PCs can easily reach 300; Fireball damage doesn't scale at all so instead of dealing 1/3rd of the toughest enemies' HP in damage it does 1/20th or less. And these two spells are treated identically balance-wise.

Note, this is only the tip of the iceberg; weapon damage suffers a similar fate as do weapon damage dealers (though Power Attack (& friends), Strength-scaling, iteratives and two-handed bonuses save a lot in that regards), damage in general loses a ton of value and weapon users lose a ton of mobility as a consequence of full attacks. And yet, the balancing choices expect for everything to be as before. The whole process showcases the developers' complete and utter blindness to the effects their changes had on the system, a complete lack of any kind of an internal feedback loop or understanding of what they were actually doing; they changed everything and pretended they'd done nothing and hoped for it to work.

That's a good part of it, to be certain, but 3e also adds quite a few entirely new concepts that do not work as intended in a way not entirely related to wonky math. Such as feats, skills, buffet-style multiclassing and prestige classes.

[Grod_The_Giant]

designing for groups of all power levels is a very difficult if not impossible task. What one group sees as a "trap option" will be perfectly acceptable for another, and it's near-impossible to tell who is who until after the book is released.
It's not that hard to make high floor/low ceiling classes, at least not when the system becomes better understood. Most of late-end 3.5 managed it, often while playing around with weird new subsystems at the same time. Compare the monk and swordsage, or the cleric and binder. A lot of homebrew I've seen on this forum manages it. While it's hard to make everything equal without making it bland (see: 4e), it's not that hard to cut off the high and low ends of the spectrum.

So, uh, going back around to the original point of the thread: Late game stuff is better designed because everyone-- including the designers-- understood the game better by that point.

[Gemini476]

So, uh, going back around to the original point of the thread: Late game stuff is better designed because everyone-- including the designers-- understood the game better by that point.

The best example of that, I feel, is the Hexblade vs. the Duskblade. Not only because of the designers coming out and commenting on how they didn't know that casting in armor was no big deal back when they made the Hexblade, but because they fit pretty much the same conceptual niche yet they're pretty different in how they fill it.



Come to think of it, I wonder how long it took for them to realize that Strength was not in fact twice as good as every single other attribute. Or to realize that Magic Missile isn't really all that it's advertised as.

Then again, I don't know if they ever managed to solidify what on earth a Controller was supposed to do in 4E six years later so it could be that they just never learned some of the lessons they really should've. Seriously, even 4E had some problems with how Fighters still had the equivalent of 2+Int skills and most their utility powers were combat-exclusive (which seems to kind of defeat the point a bit). WotC have learned a whole lot during their development of D&D, but there's also a lot that they kind of completely missed.

[Psyren]

It's not that hard to make high floor/low ceiling classes, at least not when the system becomes better understood. Most of late-end 3.5 managed it, often while playing around with weird new subsystems at the same time.

Did they really though? ToB was the most controversial book they ever put out (and don't get me started on the laughable errata), ToM had exactly one well-designed class in it, and MoI confuses people to this day. So I'd argue that, yes, it is in fact "that hard."

I'm not denying they got better at it, but they most certainly did not abolish the need for clemency from the GM when it comes to forgiving PC mistakes.