3.5! How do you explain canonical legendary fighters in your campaign?

[Jon_Dahl]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)

[weckar]

Don't include or rewrite those characters in your game.

[Draconium]

Well, the Fighter is sub-optimal compared to the ToB classes at it's base level. However, it's perfectly possible to optimize anything to the point where it's good. That being said, I use my own NPCs, and if I had to create a legendary martial without ToB, I could... but I wouldn't use pure Fighter. I'd start out with Fighter, using ACF's like Dungeoncrasher to give him a specialty, then dip into other classes before moving on to a Prestige class that makes him even more dangerous. War Hulk come to mind. In that way, he's still primarily a Fighter, but he's much better than just a base Fighter would be.

Also, Fighters may be sub-optimal compared to other PC classes, but they're a lot stronger than most NPC classes (if only because of the feat overload, which allows them to specialize in certain fighting styles that are otherwise too feat-intensive to be effective), and that's what most of the common people are. So a Fighter could easily be legendary in power compared to normal people.

[Red Fel]

Don't include or rewrite those characters in your game.

This.

I don't like cases of informed ability. These are characters who are set out as being particularly and uniquely awesome, who likely don't live up to the hype. As such, I wouldn't use them the way they're written, or at all.

Now, an alternative is to use characters who excel in a field in a manner unique to that field. For example, a legendary Fighter may not be able to stand up to a legendary Wizard, but he is still a legendary Fighter - leader of armies, expert in combat, probably a lauded champion in arenas or tournaments. That's fine. I have no problem limiting the reputation of such figures to their martial prowess - being dwarfed by spellcasters doesn't change the fact that awesome character is awesome.

Further, just because a character is martial doesn't mean he is a Fighter at all, or at least, exclusively. He could be a Cleric who focuses on buffs, or a Barbarian, or any number of other things. Most people in my campaigns don't refer to characters by a metagame construct like class name. So there's that.

[OldTrees1]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)

Disclaimer: I am one of those few that likes the Fighter class and fixes it so it exists alongside ToB.

Jarlaxle, Bruenor, Robilar, and Warduke all exist independently of WotC's 3.5 attempt at a Fighter base class. To include these Fighters into 3.5 requires translation. If WotC had been successful at their attempt, then you would merely stat them up as WotC 3.5 Fighters. However since WotC did not succeed, you need to use another solution.
1) Use a different class mixture and otherwise use system mastery to squeeze out more. (Examples: ToB, or Martial Rogue + dips)
2) Correct WotC's mistake with a better attempt at a Fighter base class
3) Since these are unique NPCs, tack on ad hoc abilities to reach the power level (adjust CR) you desired for the NPC.

I prefer a mixture regardless of if I am a player or the DM.

[Janthkin]

I'm recalling Jarlaxle having a fairly extreme number of magic items; I always pegged him as a Rogue or Rogue/Fighter multiclass (2e). I'm sure he (& various others) have been published in a variety of forms over the years, but it's important to remember that when Salvatore initially created his characters, he was working from a AD&D/2e mindset. (E.g., Danica was obviously a first edition Monk.)

But for me, the topic just doesn't come up. My groups don't play in established settings very often, and even when they do, they don't run into the big names (either because the PCs need to be the heroes in their own stories, or because they'd just want to kill Drizzt - see the Baldur's Gate games).

[Darrin]

1) A well-build Fighter 20 (such as Jack B. Quick (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=17031211&postcount=30)) can have some interesting tactical options that make it interesting to play.

2) Anti-magic fields and dead magic zones are a thing. Heck, in the Forgotten Realms, magic stops working and the gawds walk the earth every other Twosday, isn't it?

3) Some people confuse Gawd-Mode Wizard with Logic Ninja's Being Batman (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?104002-3-5e-The-Logic-Ninja-s-Guide-to-Wizards-Being-Batman). The ideal role of the wizard is to give the fighter something to hit, preferably in a way that it can't hit back. That's the fighter's job: to hit things. A proper Batman or BFC wizard can still go Gawd-Mode if he's willing to put in the time and effort for that, but most of the time it's just easier and more efficient to lock down the monsters and let the fighter do his job. In a well-balanced party, the meatbag still has an important role.

But the most important reason:

The sharp object spell doesn't take up any spell slots. It doesn't cost PP or use up spell points. You don't have to be a wizard, anybody can pick it up and use it. You can use it over and over again, and with some notable exceptions it still works on 95% of everything in the game. At D&D's most fundamental level, the game rules quantify and distribute narrative control via Hit Points. If you have the capability to reduce something's HP to zero, then you get to *control* what happens to it. A fighter swinging a greatsword may be boring or uninteresting compared to the wizard, but it's still a reliable and viable strategy in a lot of situations.

As far as the "legendary" goes, casting spells or swinging a greatsword doesn't make you a legendary hero. Heroes are just people who are forced to make decisions in bad situations and then strive to make the best out of the consequences of those decisions. If you want an interesting story, then put a good person in a situation where every option is bad, and see what happens.

[Keltest]

Frankly, many of them exist through plot armor. I recall Bruenor being put into a coma once by getting stabbed, and even the high priest of his kingdom couldn't wake him up from it for a long while. Meanwhile Regis, the decidedly non-fighter rogue of the party, gets shanked by a goblin spear in the original trilogy and is none the worse for wear after a bit of rest, even though it went all the way through him. They are as (in)vulnerable as the plot demands.

I do think though that outside of settings like the forgotten realms where you can barely spit without hitting a mid level wizard, mundanes have a much greater role. Surviving a zombie horde becomes quite a feat when there isn't a wizard around to cast stoneskin on you, or a cleric around to turn them all.

[ExLibrisMortis]

It's easier for a fighter to become famous. Everyone knows a wizard can do anything, it's just not impressive anymore. If you hear of a fighter who beat the dragon, now that's something worth noting.

[Elder_Basilisk]

Greyhawk may be instructive in this regard. High level martial types are capable and feared but unless they have political position they are generally (important) pieces in the game of thrones rather than players. If they are players, it is due to their political position rather than their personal prowess. The highest level wizards and clerics on the other hand are players in their own right regardless of whether they have direct political power.

Turrosh Mak is a legendary fighter (or barbarian) and Turin Deathstalker is a legendary assassin. 99% of PCs would be well advised not to make an enemy of either character. On the other hand, most of the movers and shakers of the setting who are independent of political affiliations are wizards (or clerics but Canon Hazen is the only one who comes to mind immediately). Rary and Tenser and Mordenkeinen are major political actors independent of whether they happen to be leading a nation at the time or not. High level fighters and paladins like King Belvor of Furyondy and Lady Karystine can be significant but that is largely due to their political position. Turin Deathstalker is significant due to his role in the Greyhawk council and assassin's guild. (Otherwise, you might worry about him being hired to gank you but the Theocrat of the Pale wouldn't worry what he thinks of the Midmeadow situation). If King Belvor were not King of Furyondy, he would not be someone Iuz needs to take account of in his grand plans (though that would be cold comfort to whatever unfortunate band of villains happened to run across the 15th level paladin).

On the other hand, King Belvor and Iuz are both going to ask if Tenser or Mordenkeinen might get involved and if so, how, when they are planning their grand strategies.

Of all the warrior types, Lord Robilar is probably the only one who has a history of being a world shaking force in his own right (if I recall the lore correctly, he went and killed a couple dragons important to the wizards' plans when he felt like he wasn't getting proper respect and (along with the wizards of the circle) was instrumental in both the imprisonment and release of Iuz) but is generally thought of as Rary's henchman.

EDIT. It's also worth noting that it is only the highest level and most active spellcasters--Mordenkeinen, Tenser, and Rary and a few others--who achieve this kind of significance. A lot of high level wizards who don't reach those august heights are significant in exactly the same way as their martial counterparts. For example, prince Melf is significant in world politics because of the knights of Luna and being near the throne of Celene, not because he could personally wreck a company or two of soldiers. He could, but that's not what makes him significant. And he's not a schemer or a power on the level of Rary, Mordenkeinen, or Tenser.

EDIT 2. This is kind of a tangent post because I think the implied premise of the original post is that "if the fighter class is terrible then legendary fighters won't live up to their rep." I deny the premise A. the fighter class isn't nearly as bad as a lot of people on the playground think it is. B. in general, NPCs--especially high level NPCs--shouldn't be showing up on your game table to do their thing in round by round combat anyway. That kind of garbage is why people complain about Elminster and Drizzt in the Forgotten Realms. C. If they do show up, they should still be able to do some very impressive things simply by virtue of being high level (see the Lord Robilar example above). If your PCs are comparable then you are probably running a rather high level game and it's entirely appropriate. After all, they are probably legends too. D. If you are complaining about official statblocks, the problem is hardly limited to fighters. Plenty of wizards and clerics in canon have pretty weak builds when they're actually put on paper. If nothing short of Incantatrixes and warblades don't suck in your mind you'll have to rebuild them all anyway.

[LudicSavant]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)

We rewrite them as Warblades or some other suitably interesting build.

[Sayt]

When they're not appearing mechanically in session, legendary figures do not need to conform to the mechanical rules of the game. They're part of the story.

When they do show up, it's the GM's prerogative to make **** up.

The problem is that fighters tend to A) be Mechanically Boring, B) be unable to answer may of the hard-counters that full-casters and higher monsters get access to, and C) have abilities in story that are mapped poorly or weakly onto the rules (Especially after edition changes)

Also, the legendary figures tend to be Larger Than PC (In the same sense of Larger than Life)

That's my 2c, anyway.

[Pluto!]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)
1. Who?
2. Why do they have to exist?
3. Why do they have to be pure fighters?

Seems like a non-issue.

[Garktz]

I know there is an issue with bringing historical debate up, but that is not my intention at all.

Think about every single "famous" military guy in our history, they were not strong or great warriors in and to hand combat, but they were best at strategy, moral for the troops and whatever.
D&d lvl 20 fighter super famous doesnt need to be able to fight single handed a balor when the balor threats his kingdom, but he needs to command effective enought his troops to defeat him, and when he is weakened, go for the final blow.

They could be just brilliant generals or whatever, not just "great arena warriors"....

[Elkad]

Remember that in the earlier editions where many of those Fighters were part of the story line, they were pulling ahead in levels about the same time Magic-Users start to go nuts with power.

Fighters have a big HP advantage as well. Non-fighter classes were capped at a +2 Con bonus.

Fighters got a free horde of followers (and a castle) too.

SOD/SOS spells are much less of an issue, as you can't boost DC, so high level characters only ever fail on a Nat1.


3,000,001 XP Fighter
20th level, HP=9d10+33+(20xConbonus) HP=177ish with 20 con

3,000,001 XP Magic-User
18th level, HP=11d4+7+(18xConbonus (capped at +2)) HP=70 with 16con, and more con doesn't help.

[Eldariel]

If nothing short of Incantatrixes and warblades don't suck in your mind you'll have to rebuild them all anyway.

Okay, class considerations be as they may, I find your general analysis of the characters sound: a solid piece on Greyhawk politics and movers. This remark I have quoted though: I feel compelled to ask about the implied equivalence here. Planar Shepherds and Incantatars I could see, but Warblades? I posit most of the premade high level Wizards are generally doing Wizard-things regardless of their build, no matter how bad their builds (even the FR Marty Stu Elminster, with his random useless levels, is still an Epic Wizard with all the world-shattering power that entails): all you need to do is check that some of their sensible spells prepared and the Wizard is a world-shaping entity, certainly worthy of awe and respect.

Even the strongest Warblade barely wields much power over any legendary Fighter on the grand scale purely on the basis of his abilities though. He'd would still be stuck with mostly political influence, fearsome his personal combat ability though may be. And then there were Incantatars: a rather significant step up from an average premade Wizard, being able to keep up all their immortality and magic forever to the point that it would take them a lot of effort to get themselves seriously inconvenienced if they wanted to. Powerful to a fault almost; still playing with the same toolset as a premade Wizard of course, but with the difference of being inherently many times better prepared.

[Concrete]

People have a tendency to become legendary for the things they do, not the things they could do if they wanted to. A man who could technically defeat a room full of assailants might go through his life in relative obscurity, while an out-of-shape mall cop could be hailed as a hero for saving six people from a knife-wielding maniac.

A fighter that kills a city-threatening beast a Wizard could technically kill, but doesn't, becomes a hero, and his legend grows. The wizard, on the other hand, might be famous for what he did in the meantime, which could be to make a teleportation spell 12% more efficient, which is huge within his field, but not so much outside of it. So he's praised by his fellow wizards, but the common man couldn't give a damn.

Or maybe, a Wizard and a Fighter fights off that same beast, but the wizard was completely burnt out after doing something equally important, but less noticeable, or went out of his way to hide his involvement, because he simply didn't wish to be famous. (Think some versions of the stories about King Arthur and Merlin.)
Or maybe the Fighter simply became more famous because it's more appealing to hear a story about a man who went up against a dragon with a pointy piece of shiny metal, than a story about the guy who snapped his fingers to make a dragon go to a negative energy plane.

Or maybe, the bard of the party simply liked the fighter more, and made the wizard look like a loony in a bathrobe who went around turning frogs into slightly larger frogs while Sir Beefcake the Magnificent slew mythical beasts left and right.

[Janthkin]

Or maybe, the bard of the party simply liked the fighter more, and made the wizard look like a loony in a bathrobe who went around turning frogs into slightly larger frogs while Sir Beefcake the Magnificent slew mythical beasts left and right.Always tip your bards.

[jjcrpntr]

Frankly, many of them exist through plot armor. I recall Bruenor being put into a coma once by getting stabbed, and even the high priest of his kingdom couldn't wake him up from it for a long while. Meanwhile Regis, the decidedly non-fighter rogue of the party, gets shanked by a goblin spear in the original trilogy and is none the worse for wear after a bit of rest, even though it went all the way through him. They are as (in)vulnerable as the plot demands.

I do think though that outside of settings like the forgotten realms where you can barely spit without hitting a mid level wizard, mundanes have a much greater role. Surviving a zombie horde becomes quite a feat when there isn't a wizard around to cast stoneskin on you, or a cleric around to turn them all.

and Bruenor jumping into a pit to fight a dragon to the death. Only to reveal a few chapters later that he just happened to grab a scimitar from Dritz that gave him immunity to the dragon fire allowing him to live.

Pretty much where I lost interest in those books. The characters exist on heavy plot armor.

[Flickerdart]

Just because there's a book somewhere that says Jarlaxle was this so-and-so badass doesn't mean it's true in your game world. Hell, maybe Jarlaxle wrote that book himself, got it published, and now everyone things he's this amazing guy.

[Starbuck_II]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)

Jarlaxle: Well, he has spells since he is a Drow. He isn't a pure Fighter officially. He is a F/R/Duelist. He could move silently, hide in shadows. He preferred ambushes. He could accurately also use wands and such, which is why I say high UMD skill (In 2E, you didn't need UMD, just knowing a command word technically)

http://www.oocities.org/[email protected]/Pages/RoguesGallery/JarlaxleBaenre.html

Bruenor Battlehammer is a Fighter exactly. Nothing special. It is his allies supporting him that determines if he is epic.


Warduke is exactly as strong as his magic items. He has a helm of darkvision/See Invisibility that causes his eyes to grow red when in use. He has a magic sword that is +X (unstated) Flaming Human Bane, his sword is called Nightwind. Somehow, he tamed a Nightmare as his mount. Moderate Fortification Adamantine 1/2 Plate.


So other than Bruenor, the are legendary due to their many magic items.

[illyahr]

Always tip your bards.

Exactly this. You'd be surprised what a well-placed word to the right person can do to your reputation.

[Gnaeus]

1. Math. Most game statistics suggest that there are a lot of fighters for every wizard. If 5-10 fighters die for every wizard, but there are 100 dudes with swords for every mage academy grad, you are gonna wind up with more fighters than wizards.

2. Companionship. It is not absolutely necessary for the fighter to be equal to the cleric or wizard for him to be worth bringing along. Maybe they like him. He took ranks in camp cooking and is pleasant to be around. He saved the clerics life at level 1 and he goes through doors first and now he is level 18. Maybe he has good ideas, or makes good tactical plans.

3. The 4 man, evenly balanced and leveled party facing level appropriate challenges is a metagame phenomenon based around gamist needs. Maybe he works for an organization and has spent a lot of time leading teams 3 levels below him. Or he is a beloved retainer in a higher level party who stays in the back and retreats from heavy opposition. Even if a level 10 fighter can't beat an ECL 10 threat, he's pretty likely to be tough against an ECL 7. Maybe he works in a humanoid rich area and was level 8 before he ever killed anything that wasn't an orc or goblinoid. Be cautious. Build up your WBL. Don't feel bad if you get 0 exp in the adventure where you get enough money for your new magic item.

[Darth Ultron]

Well, your assuming that D&D is only played One Way. Lets call it the Playgrounder Way, just for a name. And the Playgounder Way, changes, ignores, alters, rewrites and interpreters the rules of the game One Way. And, also, the Playgrounder Way as absolute ways all the personal, social and group things must be done. And all together this all makes the world of ''fighters are useless and magic is super duper awesome''.

So, the first thing you can do is not play the game in the Playgrounder Style. And...amazingly...that fixes the problem.


Though note even if your a follower of the only way the game must be played is the Playground Style, you can still change things. After all, a great many of the houserule automatic changes that playstlye makes to the game over power magic....so you could just add some balance for fighters.

[Eldariel]

So, the first thing you can do is not play the game in the Playgrounder Style. And...amazingly...that fixes the problem.

I'd like to try this. What kind of gameplay are you talking about?

[Âmesang]

Suddenly I'm reminded of Richard Garriott's first major computer game, Akalabeth (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akalabeth:_World_of_Doom), where you play as a guy wanting to become a knight… and to do so you have to single-handily face a number of monsters, last of which is a balrog. :smalltongue: It certainly explains why the town guards in later Ultima games were so tough.

[Garktz]

I'd like to try this. What kind of gameplay are you talking about?

My last campaign went along these lines:

The wizard is now playing a 2 weapon combat str based ranger, because the rogue did more dmg than her fireballs and her disintegrate
the DM thinks the best way to play a dragon is to make him land and full attack the frenzied berseker, he thinks evocation is the best school ever because it does dmg...
the ranger never bought "special materials arrows" to bypass dr of any type


Now, in the new campaing, im playing the wizard, they are kind of mad at me because i banned evocation and i can´t do dmg to things so my contribution to the party is close to none even though they are killing most of the monsters either blind, feared, exhausted, or prone and unable to stand up...
at least they give me credit for knowing what we are going to fight thanks to the divinations :/


So yeah, for them Piergeiron the Paladinson (paladin 17) was a really badass when we met him

[Keltest]

My last campaign went along these lines:

The wizard is now playing a 2 weapon combat str based ranger, because the rogue did more dmg than her fireballs and her disintegrate
the DM thinks the best way to play a dragon is to make him land and full attack the frenzied berseker, he thinks evocation is the best school ever because it does dmg...
the ranger never bought "special materials arrows" to bypass dr of any type


Now, in the new campaing, im playing the wizard, they are kind of mad at me because i banned evocation and i can´t do dmg to things so my contribution to the party is close to none even though they are killing most of the monsters either blind, feared, exhausted, or prone and unable to stand up...
at least they give me credit for knowing what we are going to fight thanks to the divinations :/


So yeah, for them Piergeiron the Paladinson (paladin 17) was a really badass when we met him

You should sit out a fight, read a book or something. See how well they do without their wizard making things sit still for them.

[fishyfishyfishy]

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be?


Class levels are a completely meta-game level construct that characters are unaware of. I see nothing wrong with making these characters have class levels that are all from the Tome of Battle in a higher power game.

[Âmesang]

So yeah, for them Piergeiron the Paladinson (paladin 17) was a really badass when we met him
Of course he's badass! He can remove disease four times a week! :smallamused:

[Coidzor]

Divine choice, godsblood, pure cussedness.

As for Jarlaxle and their ilk, I'll custom make them, same as any notable NPC, unless I see someone else's spin on it that will do.

[EugeneVoid]

In my campaign, the killing blow the legendary fighter did against an ancient necromancer created a huge mountain range and, past the mountain range, a desolate waste.

Just because something isn't technically possible RAW doesn't mean its always been that way. You can take inspiration from LotR ages.

Or you can just create a history that's wacky and zany like mine :).

[LTwerewolf]

Just because there's a book somewhere that says Jarlaxle was this so-and-so badass doesn't mean it's true in your game world. Hell, maybe Jarlaxle wrote that book himself, got it published, and now everyone things he's this amazing guy.

It's something he would do. One of the reasons he was important was because he made everyone think he was important. As soon as someone wised up about that if he couldn't handle it via a ridiculous amount of magical items, he got the hell out of dodge. Rarely did he ever actually DO things. I had a Jarlaxle-esque character that was level 3 with a load of umd skill and he got level 10 characters thinking he would completely destroy them.

[JyP]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)
to be a fighter, you need to encounter other fighters, which are usually part of the town's guards, mercenaries, knights, and so on : they are everywhere, there's no prerequisites. And you are able to fight on many kinds of situations, with many armors and weapons, and true versatility.

to use a ToB class, it is implied that you have to find a master, train at a monastery, be a true expert on your dedicated weapon or style.

It's even worse for most classes : entry requirements, from background point of view, shows that characters are special snowflakes (blessed by a god, apprenticed to a wizard...) . A standard adventuring group in an average game world would contain mostly fighters and rogues, you need Eberron or the Playground to have high fantasy and magic everywhere.

[Keltest]

to be a fighter, you need to encounter other fighters, which are usually part of the town's guards, mercenaries, knights, and so on : they are everywhere, there's no prerequisites. And you are able to fight on many kinds of situations, with many armors and weapons, and true versatility.

to use a ToB class, it is implied that you have to find a master, train at a monastery, be a true expert on your dedicated weapon or style.

It's even worse for most classes : entry requirements, from background point of view, shows that characters are special snowflakes (blessed by a god, apprenticed to a wizard...) . A standard adventuring group in an average game world would contain mostly fighters and rogues, you need Eberron or the Playground to have high fantasy and magic everywhere.

Or the Forgotten Realms, where they have so many magic users they need to feed some to Elminster every year just to keep the population under control.

[Quertus]

Remember that in the earlier editions where many of those Fighters were part of the story line, they were pulling ahead in levels about the same time Magic-Users start to go nuts with power.

Fighters have a big HP advantage as well. Non-fighter classes were capped at a +2 Con bonus.

Fighters got a free horde of followers (and a castle) too.

SOD/SOS spells are much less of an issue, as you can't boost DC, so high level characters only ever fail on a Nat1.


3,000,001 XP Fighter
20th level, HP=9d10+33+(20xConbonus) HP=177ish with 20 con

3,000,001 XP Magic-User
18th level, HP=11d4+7+(18xConbonus (capped at +2)) HP=70 with 16con, and more con doesn't help.

Was I playing 2e wrong? I thought you only got your con bonus when you got hit dice, not when you got bonus HP.

So my math would be 9d10+45+33 vs 11d4+22+7, or about 133 vs 56.

BTW, why are we comparing characters with 20 con in 2e? Don't get me wrong, my signature character was a wizard who put his natural 18 in con, but did you often get a 20 con in 2e in your experience? Also, why the assumption of only failing saves on a 1? Fighter 20 has saves of 3/5/4/4/6 - even with a ring of protection +3, he'd still fail his save vs spells on a 2 :smalltongue:

[Uhtred]

Suppose a fighter manages to get to level 20, and, through the magic of strongarm bracers and an exotic weapon proficiency feat is wielding a Minotaur-sized Minotaur Greathammer. That's a 60-lb weapon, which, naturally, has the Speed enchantment.
He can swing that 60-lb hammer FIVE TIMES in six seconds, with giant-like force and relative accuracy.
He may not be able to call fire from the sky or summon demons, but compared to 95% of the world's humanoid population he is scary as all heck.
He can also drop that hammer and pick up a composite longbow and loose five arrows in six seconds with the Rapid Shot feat, also with giant-like strength and relative accuracy.
To a peasant, he's gorram Superman, a one-man wrecking crew he could never hope to be.
And what is reputation? Is people talking, is gossip. Fighter wades into combat, cleaves all day, and for peasant, that reputation is solid, is fact.

[Flickerdart]

To a peasant, he's gorram Superman, a one-man wrecking crew he could never hope to be.
And what is reputation? Is people talking, is gossip. Fighter wades into combat, cleaves all day, and for peasant, that reputation is solid, is fact.
What is a peasant doing on the same battlefield as a 20th level fighter?

[torrasque666]

What is a peasant doing on the same battlefield as a 20th level fighter?

Militia conscript? 20th level fighter the guy may be, and handle the individual forcesof the army by himself, but he can't be everywhere at once. And besides, you need someone to lug around your potions.

[Uhtred]

We've got historical precedent. In Viking-era England, Saxon lords would employ small groups of Housecarls, trained warriors that were armed and armored and housed and trained on the lord's dime. But in times of war, he would raise the fyrd, a militia of peasants who would make up the bulk of an army, and the Housecarls would lead their divisions.
Also, in the words of Monty Python's peasants:
"Must be a king."
"How do you know?"
"He hasn't got s*** all over him."
Even the 20th-level fighter's gonna have to ride through a craphole village at some time or another.

[Flickerdart]

We've got historical precedent. In Viking-era England, Saxon lords would employ small groups of Housecarls, trained warriors that were armed and armored and housed and trained on the lord's dime. But in times of war, he would raise the fyrd, a militia of peasants who would make up the bulk of an army, and the Housecarls would lead their divisions.
The Housecarls are not 20th level fighters. They're maybe level 3, at best level 6. That I have no problems with.

But a 20th level fighter battles the most powerful demons of Hell and ancient dragons. What is he doing on a battlefield where any number of peasants can make a difference?

[Quertus]

And what is reputation? Is people talking, is gossip. Fighter wades into combat, cleaves all day, and for peasant, that reputation is solid, is fact.

Love the reference! Can't wait for season 2.


What is a peasant doing on the same battlefield as a 20th level fighter?

Well, mom, I've got to get to level 2 somehow. How am I going to afford to raise a family of my own with lousy max ranks at level 1? Would you rather I got better at my craft alone in the swamps against goblins, or on the battlefield with superman by my side?

[Garktz]

The Housecarls are not 20th level fighters. They're maybe level 3, at best level 6. That I have no problems with.

But a 20th level fighter battles the most powerful demons of Hell and ancient dragons. What is he doing on a battlefield where any number of peasants can make a difference?

Take the lords of the rings as an example.
Sauron could decimate humas left and right, but he had his army of orcs, same way isildur had his amry of men...

Lvl 20 warrior and his army fighting the balor and his army...

[Flickerdart]

Well, mom, I've got to get to level 2 somehow. How am I going to afford to raise a family of my own with lousy max ranks at level 1? Would you rather I got better at my craft alone in the swamps against goblins, or on the battlefield with superman by my side?
Given how much collateral damage Superman's fights have, I'd pick the swamps. Also, eat your vegetables.

[Prime32]

Just because there's a book somewhere that says Jarlaxle was this so-and-so badass doesn't mean it's true in your game world. Hell, maybe Jarlaxle wrote that book himself, got it published, and now everyone things he's this amazing guy.Isn't this implied to be true for Elminster? As in, Elminster travelled to Earth and either wrote the Forgotten Realms setting himself or told Ed Greenwood what to put in it? :smalltongue:
(And then he, Raistlin and Mordenkainen ate all the food in Ed's house)

[GreyBlack]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)

Easy: Readjust your expectations. I remember once reading an article about how Einstein and Aragorn can be explained at level 5, and Gandalf is no stronger than maybe level 10 ECL. A fighter with 20 ranks in Jump, 22 strength and Skill Focus at a bare minimum can jump literally over a 2 story building. It's not the world-shattering power that mages have, but it's still pretty damn miraculous.

[Darth Ultron]

I'd like to try this. What kind of gameplay are you talking about?

It has lots of components, some of the main ones are:

*The game must be fair, and by fair it must be bias in favor of the players.

*The players get to decide all rulings and interpretations in the game rules. Though mostly the DM is a willing accomplice here.

*The game rules must always be interpreted in favor of the players.

*The game can contain no negative things, other then what is in the rules.

Even just the first one, making the game unfair, fixes a lot of the so called problems.

[Cosi]

I don't really know that it's a problem if some rulers are weak and pathetic. The PCs might well want to take over a kingdom at some point, and that's much easier to do if the king is kind of lame.

The alternate explanation is that Wizards can get, make, or hire whatever they want (between lesser planar binding, fabricate, major creation, and wall of stone they can do it at level 9) and as such have no reason to adventure until they rule a kingdom. But if a Fighter wants a hall full of wenches and mead, he has to go around killing people until he kills someone with a hall full of wenches and mead, or some grateful peasants build him one. As such, he is likely to end up high level.


It has lots of components, some of the main ones are:

Those are less examples and more vague ad hominems. How, for example, does the playground insist that:


*The game must be fair, and by fair it must be bias in favor of the players.

Are there examples of that? Maybe a ruling where you think the playground consensus violates RAW/RAI/common sense in favor of the players?


*The game can contain no negative things, other then what is in the rules.

How could a game contain anything that is not part of the rules? That's like complaining that only those things which are real exist. It does make any sense.


Even just the first one, making the game unfair, fixes a lot of the so called problems.

Okay, you've made the game unfair. Periodically, rocks fall and everyone dies. How are Fighters better?

[squiggit]

Okay, you've made the game unfair. Periodically, rocks fall and everyone dies. How are Fighters better?

Yeah, but what if the rocks only fall on the wizard. Instead of killing the fighter the rocks break open after murdering the wizard to reveal millions of GP in magical equipment and finery inside?

Wizards are terrible in a setting where that happens.

[Garktz]

Are there examples of that? Maybe a ruling where you think the playground consensus violates RAW/RAI/common sense in favor of the players?

Well, everyone expects the pcs to fight kind of cr apropiate treats, nobody expects to the pcs to run into a venerable black dragon at level 5 and get eaten....
That is making the game fair/unfair to the players to me.... when you play you take several things for granted that makes the game "fair" to the players.. (cr apropiate, magic items, similar op levels....)

[Deadline]

Wizards are terrible in a setting where that happens.

In a setting where that happens, the wizard is the most important member of the party. Seriously, what party wouldn't be sure to walk around with their very own loot meteorite lure?

[Florian]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)

There´s an underlying logical fallacy that happens when people confuse "Rules for playing a Game", as in the PHB with "Rules for how the game world works", as in a Campaign Setting.

The former deal only with us, the people sitting around a table, and provide a common ground for communication and a help on how to handle things between us.
That´s pretty much why you won´t find rules on how to scratch your arse, because we should all be pretty much in agreement how that works, unlike, say hitting something.
That´s also why we disregard a lot of rules, because their application doesn´t lead to a meaningful outcomes or to even more disagreement on the subject matter, like, say, we don´t have house cats killing commoners on a regular basis as that doesn´t make any sense.

There is only an indirect connection between this kind of rules and what happens in the setting, like the actual physics and how things really work.

There´s a simple acid test for this: Some guy takes a girl hostage and puts a knife to her throat. What happens then? Cut throat and dying or 1d4 damage?

That´s pretty much why something explained to be in-game reality in the setting rules is just that: correct and real. Warduke being a badass who really rules? That´s so, then.

[Flickerdart]

There´s a simple acid test for this: Some guy takes a girl hostage and puts a knife to her throat. What happens then? Cut throat and dying or 1d4 damage?
Couple things.

1) Your average commoner has 2 hit points. 1d4 damage is plenty to kill her.
2) Since the girl is at the guy's mercy, the appropriate mechanic is coup de grace, not an attack.
3) Many people don't actually know how to properly slit a throat (hint: pulling a knife across underneath the chin is not the right way). It's reasonably likely that an untrained hostage-taker will fail to kill the girl.

You don't need to ignore the rules if you know how to use them properly.

[Starbuck_II]

There´s a simple acid test for this: Some guy takes a girl hostage and puts a knife to her throat. What happens then? Cut throat and dying or 1d4 damage?

That´s pretty much why something explained to be in-game reality in the setting rules is just that: correct and real. Warduke being a badass who really rules? That´s so, then.

What you could do is simple everyone has sneak attack (1d6). Then knives to throat are pretty bad. Since commoners onlyt have 1d4 hp + Con.

Rogue gets base sneak attack + class Sneak attack (these stack): yes, this mean, Rogues deal 1d6 more than normal.

[charcoalninja]

Couple things.

1) Your average commoner has 2 hit points. 1d4 damage is plenty to kill her.
2) Since the girl is at the guy's mercy, the appropriate mechanic is coup de grace, not an attack.
3) Many people don't actually know how to properly slit a throat (hint: pulling a knife across underneath the chin is not the right way). It's reasonably likely that an untrained hostage-taker will fail to kill the girl.

You don't need to ignore the rules if you know how to use them properly.

I like this post.

[atemu1234]

Don't include or rewrite those characters in your game.

This is my basic viewpoint; when my Level 20 Warblade can beat your Level 80 fighter, there's an issue.

[Elder_Basilisk]

The Housecarls are not 20th level fighters. They're maybe level 3, at best level 6. That I have no problems with.

But a 20th level fighter battles the most powerful demons of Hell and ancient dragons. What is he doing on a battlefield where any number of peasants can make a difference?

Presumably, he's there for the same reason that the rest of the NPCs are: because he doesn't want his neighbors to be killed by the villains, their stuff taken, and their women kidnapped and sold into sex slavery. Or maybe he's the bad guy and he's there to kill his neighbors, take their stuff, and sell their women.

Could he just say, "you guys all go home, I've got this?"

The defender? Maybe for smaller battles it would work. 50 raiders, he can probably take especially if they don't recognize him immediately and try to rush him. Maybe he doesn't though because he doesn't want to take all the "risk" or doesn't want the people to depend upon him and grow helpless without him or worse yet, become belligerent and start picking fights counting on their 20th level fighter to win all the fights for them at not risk to themselves.

And, unless he is especially well prepared he can't take 1600 bad guys who can all see and target him at the same time (If all 1600 take one bow shot, that's still 80 hits including 4 confirmed crits for something like 396 damage). And before people go off on a tangent, neither can a 20th level wizard/sorcerer. In both cases, it requires specific preparation and possibly even a specific build which are not necessarily well suited to taking on normal CR challenges. Though the wizard/sorcerer has an easier time preparing for that kind of a situation and does have some ways he can probably handle it). But even if he is set up with armor of invulnerability and right build type to take on an army by himself and win, it doesn't matter because a big enough army does not need to kill him in order to accomplish its goal. (Again, this is also true of the wizard but to a lesser degree. The right shapechange could make the wizard largely invulnerable to the arrows but if he's flying around as a dragon, he can still only roast one small group at a time). Let's imagine that any time a foe is adjacent to him, he takes an action and kills that foe and nothing that any enemy can do can harm him. On round 1, he kills one enemy and 1499 move past him towards the town he is protecting. Round 2 he kills another. Now there are 1498. If they split up out of visual range of each other in groups of ten or twenty, most of them will get through. He will survive, like Conan in Beyond the Black River, but everything he was trying to protect will be destroyed. On the other hand, give him an army of 1000 peasants and commoners with him and they can chase down those roving bands. They can be in 100 places at once and any time a group of enemies amasses to take them out, the 20th level hero can mess them up.

What about the attacker? Why does he bring a horde rather than just doing it all himself? He might do it to disguise his presence. If he's the "masked marauder general" rather than "High Lord Badity Bad" people probably can't tell his 20th level self from an 8th or 10th level fighter and consequently, the chief paladins and wizards of the land who are looking for Lord Badity Bad won't immediately know it is him and mobilize against him. But there is a more important reason: If he wants to loot the entire city by himself, 95% of the population will be able to get away--he can only chase one group at a time--and it's going to take forever to go from house to house and loot everything thoroughly and even then he can only load up so many wagons or bags of holding before he runs out. The army will loot much more efficiently and can manage all of the wagon teams it will take to bring his booty and slaves back to his forbidden fortress.

The use of low level troops should be intimately familiar to players of wargames. Even in games where it is possible to field an unbeatable titan, doing so is not always a reliable way to win. If you need to keep a certain number of enemies from exiting the map, your one titan may not be able to be in enough places to stop them. If you need to hold several areas of the map to win, your titan can only hold one of them. If you need to protect a certain objective, your titan can easily win every battle but you can still lose because he couldn't stop all of the enemies. By fielding only an unbeatable titan, you could lose before any dice are rolled. That's why the 20th level characters brought the armies with them. To loot, hold territory, scout, pursue, and generally do all of the things that can only be done with a lot of boots on a lot of different pieces of ground.

[Flickerdart]

And, unless he is especially well prepared he can't take 1600 bad guys who can all see and target him at the same time
Damage reduction says hi.

Also, an army is not a hivemind of soldiers that is perfectly coordinated and shares all senses. The amount of logistics necessary to get 1600 dudes to do anything at all simultaneously is staggering, and while they are getting sit up, the fighter goes up to them and starts the meat grinder.

In war, the way to win was never killing all the enemy dudes, because enemy dudes are inconsiderate and never stick around. When you see Legendary Steve suddenly appear and disembowel your general, you're not going to attack Legendary Steve, because then you're the next in line for tickets to the pain train. You're going to start running away.

[Endarire]

Lore and mechanics are at odds. Hype up the lore or change the mechanics.

[Gnorman]

Or just cap the whole shebang at level 6, when "high-level fighter" is still a concept that instills some amount of fear.

[Telonius]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)

How do I explain it? I don't. It's one of the mysteries of the world. Like, "Who thought investing their life energy into making an Apparatus of Kwalish is a good idea?" Or, "Who made all of those Tridents of Fish Command we keep finding," or, "How are there still Goblins in the world if adventurers keep killing them," or even, "Why would anyone not attack a statue on sight, on the off chance it'll turn on you?" 20th-level Fighters simply are. They make no sense, but they're part of the world.

[Gnaeus]

This is my basic viewpoint; when my Level 20 Warblade can beat your Level 80 fighter, there's an issue.

I doubt that. It isn't clear that your warblade 20 can even beat the 27th level cohort of the 45th level cohort of my 80th level fighter. For that matter, fighting an 80th level fighter looks a lot like fighting a wizard 20. Heck, my level 80 fighter has magic items that are better than a warblade 20. My epic rod of the wyrm creates a CR 24 red dragon that casts as a sorcerer 17.

Sure, all of those things are non fighter specific, but that's kind of the point. It doesn't really matter as much that a fighter 20 can only beat a wizard 12 or an adult red dragon by WBLmancy as that he is a guy who can solo a wizard 12 or adult red dragon at all and that makes him a badass. He might not be able to beat a warblade 20. But most people are not warblade 20s,

[Denomar]

This question kinda borders on the tippyverse. Are you assuming that there are no legendary fighters because no one plays them? My answer is the world is not run by power gamers who believe that attempting to break casters are the only way to play the game.

Instead in some cases it is run by people who are very simply good at killing other people who have personalities that command respect and lineal titles that grant them the crowns and power.

[Darth Ultron]

I guess the real answer is that if your going by the ''crazy super optimized way'' is the only way to play the game...

Then you must enhance the fighters to match that.

The ''by the book'' fighters are made assuming a very weak unoptimized game. If your game is not like that, you need to change all the stats.

[Venger]

This question kinda borders on the tippyverse. Are you assuming that there are no legendary fighters because no one plays them? My answer is the world is not run by power gamers who believe that attempting to break casters are the only way to play the game.

Instead in some cases it is run by people who are very simply good at killing other people who have personalities that command respect and lineal titles that grant them the crowns and power.

it's not about the out of game point that no one plays pure fighters.

it's about the in-game fact that straight fighters cannot deal with level appropriate challenges, so would not survive until level 20.

it's fine to say they have their positions due to political cronyism, but that really doesn't have anything to do with what class they're in.

[charcoalninja]

Legendary fighters exist because some people are really good at killing things, and do so for long enough to be recognized for it. That and (at least in PF) Fighter isn't actually a bad class and is quite scary infact. He doesn't need to be able to solo wizards, but just be able to kick some serious tail.

In PF there are so many options available now that Fighter is more than capable of keeping up with the game. He needs to iron man it a bit for some things (or dip Barbarian for spell sunder) but otherwise he can pretty much butcher whatever you want to send his way.

[Gnaeus]

it's about the in-game fact that straight fighters cannot deal with level appropriate challenges, so would not survive until level 20.

it's fine to say they have their positions due to political cronyism, but that really doesn't have anything to do with what class they're in.

A does not lead to B. Why would a fighter need to ever beat a level appropriate challenge to level?
1. The exp chart I'm looking at says that 4, 19th level fighters can get exp from a CR 15 encounter. In a game, a party of PCs will never intentionally squash adventures way below party level, because it would be boring and take forever. But as NPC fighter dude, I'm generally thrilled to keep getting safe missions to survive and slowly build up.
2. He has a party, right? Just because he can't win fights doesn't mean fights don't get won. I'm sure there are people in the real world who still go hunting with their friend who can't hit anything. Maybe the cleric and the wizard have been carrying them for 10 levels, but he's their buddy and they like him.
3. Why would the career WBL of an NPC mirror that of a PC? What if that "political cronyism" you talked about took the form of you leading a dozen of your dad's crossbow men to kill goblins while your rode around on a warhorse wearing magic plate mail and a magic shield and ring of protection starting at level 1. What if this NPC got lucky and wound up in possession of some way over WBL item.
4. What would the life of a noble fighter even look like? Lots of court intrigues maybe? Maybe frequent but generally non lethal duels with other Knights. Possibly lead an army into battle (safely, from the rear). All those things sound like exp to me. Maybe your wizard uncle sends teams of outsiders to help you level.
5. This is a world where gods actually intervene in people's lives and play favorites. If the god of luck or battle takes a liking to you, that's probably a better indicator of long term success than class.

There are lots of ways a fighter could reach high level. Most of them just make boring stories. And remember, a lot of fighters start out for every wizard. They can take the attrition.

[Venger]

A does not lead to B. Why would a fighter need to ever beat a level appropriate challenge to level?
1. The exp chart I'm looking at says that 4, 19th level fighters can get exp from a CR 15 encounter. In a game, a party of PCs will never intentionally squash adventures way below party level, because it would be boring and take forever. But as NPC fighter dude, I'm generally thrilled to keep getting safe missions to survive and slowly build up.
Right, I didn't say it did.

sure, that's true if he's allowed to cherry pick every single combat encounter he ever fights. random encounters are a thing. you don't always get to pick on weak monsters with those. you might run into something cr appropriate, or even a few over if it's a challenging or harder encounter


2. He has a party, right? Just because he can't win fights doesn't mean fights don't get won. I'm sure there are people in the real world who still go hunting with their friend who can't hit anything. Maybe the cleric and the wizard have been carrying them for 10 levels, but he's their buddy and they like him.

actually, no, not necessarily. PCs generally have parties (discounting solo play for the purposes of the discussion) but there's not really a reason that any given NPC would necessarily be part of a party. I know iconics like say robilar were, so they had wizards to leech xp from during party combats, but we were talking about just high level fighters in general. yeah, it's possible he's just been sponging xp


3. Why would the career WBL of an NPC mirror that of a PC? What if that "political cronyism" you talked about took the form of you leading a dozen of your dad's crossbow men to kill goblins while your rode around on a warhorse wearing magic plate mail and a magic shield and ring of protection starting at level 1. What if this NPC got lucky and wound up in possession of some way over WBL item.

I never said anything about wbl, so I'm not sure what you're talking about. cronyism doesn't have anything to do with money. it means giving a political position to someone who is your friend. so if rary made himself king of someplace and gave robilar a lordship there (for example, I'm not up to date on FR lore, not saying this is what happened)

what you're saying is that they could grind without difficulty if they were allowed to violate the rules. sure, that's definitely true, but that was my point: a single classed fighter playing the game normally wouldn't be able to advance through the ranks by himself without cheating.

I'm sure it's possible a fighter npc could've just hacked away at an aristocrat's ghost brute shrieker farm to slowly accrue experience, and while that would explain his high level mechanically, it's kind of weird to make a guy who punches mushrooms all day your leader.


4. What would the life of a noble fighter even look like? Lots of court intrigues maybe? Maybe frequent but generally non lethal duels with other Knights. Possibly lead an army into battle (safely, from the rear). All those things sound like exp to me. Maybe your wizard uncle sends teams of outsiders to help you level.

okay, so again, if a fighter is arbitrarily rewarded large ad hoc xp rewards from non-combat encounters he can advance through the levels quickly. well, sure, but that's not how accruing combat xp in D&D works for pcs. that's exactly my point, he'd have to resort to stuff like this to level up because he cannot survive a normal combat by himself.


5. This is a world where gods actually intervene in people's lives and play favorites. If the god of luck or battle takes a liking to you, that's probably a better indicator of long term success than class.

yes, divine intervention is certainly an option.

There are lots of ways a fighter could reach high level. Most of them just make boring stories. And remember, a lot of fighters start out for every wizard. They can take the attrition.
right. you can use a combination of these things to explain how a fighter is someone of influence. they'd have this from popular, political, divine, or gm favoritism, it wouldn't be something they got via killing a lot of monsters was all I was saying.

[Denomar]

it's not about the out of game point that no one plays pure fighters.

it's about the in-game fact that straight fighters cannot deal with level appropriate challenges, so would not survive until level 20.

it's fine to say they have their positions due to political cronyism, but that really doesn't have anything to do with what class they're in.

But the OP was definitely asking how to explain legendary npc fighters such as "Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke". The Op doesn't seem to suggest that those characters faced all their challenges alone and were in fact solo players. They asked how we can justify them existing at that level. To which I say that all those characters had other extenuating circumstances from magical items to magical friends to lineal positions to answer how they ended up at their. However I don't think that's the spirit of the question itself.

The question from my perspective seems to be more about them problem of one of those characters meeting a party (who are all stereotypical Munchkin Playgrounders who only play Tier 1 state of the art power gamed characters). When that party is told they have met a person of authority and legendary ability that party scoffs. How could this be that someone is more famous then they are, they only hit things with an axe! So, no, its not about the fact that no one out of game plays pure fighters. Which isn't true by the way, but is a discussion for a different thread.

That question is what leads to the tippyverse where everyone's an epic level wizard gating in barrels of xp for them to consume. Its not a diagetic perspective that the people who live in a world are aware of all the ways to power game their lives (thus choosing to be wizards from birth).

[GreyBlack]

Actually, I'm now curious what sorts of things would have to be explained for "canonical legendary fighters in your campaign." Do you mean just dudes who got famous for being able to take down a dragon? Any fighter can do that; hell, I recently played a Barbarian who took down a Great Wyrm Red Dragon who was enslaving the population. Just because I couldn't create a demiplane doesn't make that feat less remarkable to the average person.

[Venger]

But the OP was definitely asking how to explain legendary npc fighters such as "Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke". The Op doesn't seem to suggest that those characters faced all their challenges alone and were in fact solo players. They asked how we can justify them existing at that level. To which I say that all those characters had other extenuating circumstances from magical items to magical friends to lineal positions to answer how they ended up at their. However I don't think that's the spirit of the question itself.Right, that definitely makes sense


The question from my perspective seems to be more about them problem of one of those characters meeting a party (who are all stereotypical Munchkin Playgrounders who only play Tier 1 state of the art power gamed characters). When that party is told they have met a person of authority and legendary ability that party scoffs. How could this be that someone is more famous then they are, they only hit things with an axe! So, no, its not about the fact that no one out of game plays pure fighters. Which isn't true by the way, but is a discussion for a different thread.

That question is what leads to the tippyverse where everyone's an epic level wizard gating in barrels of xp for them to consume. Its not a diagetic perspective that the people who live in a world are aware of all the ways to power game their lives (thus choosing to be wizards from birth).
here I feel is where the disconnect lies.

I didn't say everyone is (or should be) only playing batman wizard style characters. I just mean that even with a relatively normal party, you're going to notice a disconnect between what your group has been able to do so far versus monsters, and what a character who, if going by his printed canonical stats is supposed to be able to do, especially for characters whose histories include a bunch of fights with monsters.


Actually, I'm now curious what sorts of things would have to be explained for "canonical legendary fighters in your campaign." Do you mean just dudes who got famous for being able to take down a dragon? Any fighter can do that; hell, I recently played a Barbarian who took down a Great Wyrm Red Dragon who was enslaving the population. Just because I couldn't create a demiplane doesn't make that feat less remarkable to the average person.

I'd imagine there'd be a similar explanation to however that happened, such as the dragon not using its casting.

but that's a perfect example, and (I think) what the op was talking about:

the party runs into your character as an NPC, a lvl 20 barbarian, and he says "hey guys, I killed a great wyrm red dragon. nbd"

I'm sure they'd wonder how that happened. a barbarian beating a 19th level sorcerer is impressive enough. beating a 19th level sorcerer who's also a bigger, meaner brute than you is really difficult assuming normal circumstances.

Jon_Dahl, is this the situation you were wondering about?

[Jon_Dahl]

Right, that definitely makes sense


here I feel is where the disconnect lies.

I didn't say everyone is (or should be) only playing batman wizard style characters. I just mean that even with a relatively normal party, you're going to notice a disconnect between what your group has been able to do so far versus monsters, and what a character who, if going by his printed canonical stats is supposed to be able to do, especially for characters whose histories include a bunch of fights with monsters.



I'd imagine there'd be a similar explanation to however that happened, such as the dragon not using its casting.

but that's a perfect example, and (I think) what the op was talking about:

the party runs into your character as an NPC, a lvl 20 barbarian, and he says "hey guys, I killed a great wyrm red dragon. nbd"

I'm sure they'd wonder how that happened. a barbarian beating a 19th level sorcerer is impressive enough. beating a 19th level sorcerer who's also a bigger, meaner brute than you is really difficult assuming normal circumstances.

Jon_Dahl, is this the situation you were wondering about?

Before I say anything, I want to note that the direction of the discussion is definitely not off-topic and the level is a lot higher than in the previous thread. I have to re-create all the threads that didn't start well, seriously...

I don't feel that the OP needs any clarification and I feel that if I attempt to clarify it, it will only create more confusion. But I'm a nice guy, so I will answer your question, even though I feel it's a really bad idea:
The basic idea of the question is that if Fighter is such a useless class (some think that, some don't) then how come incredibly famous and high-level (some epic-level) fighters walk the earth? There are several legendary fighters, such as Jarlaxle, who are apex predators of their respective worlds. And they are literary fighters. Like fighterfighters.
The question can be divided into sub-groups:
a. How did this come to be?
b. How can they stay at this level? For a day, for a year etc.
c. What, in general, can make 1st-level fighter to become Jarlaxle or Lord Robilar?
d. Can I do this, with my 1st-level PC fighter, in your game?

[Eldariel]

The basic idea of the question is that if Fighter is such a useless class (some think that, some don't) then how come incredibly famous and high-level (some epic-level) fighters walk the earth? There are several legendary fighters, such as Jarlaxle, who are apex predators of their respective worlds. And they are literary fighters. Like fighterfighters.
The question can be divided into sub-groups:
a. How did this come to be?

I'm assuming this question concerns how a Fighter might've reached level X, rather than how they became legendary (as the latter is trivial; right word in the right ear and Westley the Stableboy becomes Dread Pirate Roberts). There's practically nothing limiting the advancement of a character. Many a characters never face ethereal abominations. Some might just fight enough Orcs of useful levels to become legendary, and be lucky enough to survive. "ECL" is a metagame concept after all - in-world, there's nothing other than characters' own reason and circumstances restricting the kinds of experiences they might acquire should they survive.

Also, some characters may not play out as Fighter the Class at all. There's for instance the item wizardy path of Jarlaxle where the character is for all intents and purposes a Wizard, but only by virtue of his wealth (and by extension, equipment) rather than his own ability. There's absolutely nothing like WBL for NPCs so a lowly level 1 Aristocrat may well have all the power of a level 20 Wizard in his millions worth of magic items. As most things in the game world don't face things most campaigns would throw at the PCs, there's considerably more variability in what can survive.


b. How can they stay at this level? For a day, for a year etc.

Strictly speaking, a Legendary Fighter will often be able to not engage anything outside his payroll. After all, just because level 15 Fighter cannot defeat Elder Dragons alone doesn't mean that a level 15 Fighter would have to go fight Elder Dragons. Lord Robilar or Jarlaxle, both are very opportunistic and know their own strengths and limitations. They also have powerful organizations providing them with both, power and protection. That allows them to survive. Jarlaxle in particular is a perfect example of a smart, calculating warrior who knows precisely whom he can beat and whom he can't - and in turn, with whom to talk and whom to backstab with what backup.

Ultimately, a character's own combat potential is often secondary to their mental abilities (measured in-game by Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma). If a level 15 Fighter has the powers of a level 7 Wizard, a level 15 Fighter won't pick fights with anything a level 7 Wizard couldn't defeat. Instead of dying against the eldritch horror, he'll use his considerable resources to acquire help and face it with a team/artifact that allows him to stand a chance. He can't do this with his class abilities but in-world he probably has means, even if not as many as a Caster who could actually use his powers to directly get help (in the scope of few seconds, no less). Foreplanned is forearmed.


c. What, in general, can make 1st-level fighter to become Jarlaxle or Lord Robilar?

It's worth noting that nowhere have I mentioned anything necessarily related to class. The character may or may not be a 1st level Fighter. The NPCs certainly wouldn't be used from books. My Elminster (if I really wanted to use a Mary Sue for some reason) wouldn't be the book Elminster. None of my NPCs would be from the books. Jarlaxle seems to me a Rogue or a Factotum/Warblade as clear as day. He's socially very adept, he fights with his wits and he's resourceful. He also possesses strategic skills enough to warrant some White Raven maneuvers. Nothing a Fighter can't do but the skill points would be stretched thin and it's harder to model using Int to fight on a pure Fighter; this would simply be more faithful a representation of the character.

My Robilar would most likely be a Bard/Warblade or Bard/Crusader: he clearly has a massive inspirational impact on a battlefield by just being present. He'd of course have his titular Gambit (would point towards Crusader - I can't imagine him going down very easily) and lots of swordsmanship. All the feats that model Robilar are about his tricks and special maneuvers so modelling him as a warrior with a slightly larger set of tricks is only natural.

They'd look just the same on the top, of course. You'd never know the classes he has either way. Perhaps he's a Fighter with lots of skills and Martial Study, or perhaps he's a Warblade or a Rogue. I don't make it a habit to tell anything about the builds if the players themselves don't have means to figure it out (someone with Martial Lore, Sense Motive or Knowledge: Local/History would certainly be able to figure stuff out about them). The game is about their characters so they get the information their characters can get.


d. Can I do this, with my 1st-level PC fighter, in your game?

Honestly? I probably would not want to run a game with a pure Fighter, unless I'm specifically running a game for lower powered classes (mind, there are valid reasons to take Fighter levels but "I want to play a character who fights" isn't one of them). And that's something I hate to do since I have to spend a lot of time worrying about if the PCs can deal with X - higher-powered classes generally allow me to just throw a world at the players and see how the players work it out. I also generally don't like to mix party levels nor give anyone huge amounts of extra wealth, as those become factors hard to scale and measure. I'd thus prefer that you, as my player, just make a character in line with the rest of the party and most of the time that's not going to be a pure Fighter (unless you've got great deals of system mastery and the party is mid-powered at most).

However, your character could certainly become a Robilar or a Jarlaxle. What's behind the curtains might be different (details would depend on the powerlevel of the campaign), but the character and his abilities would still allow you to mimic Robilar, at least far as his personal prowess goes (building your legend in the world would be up to you and have nothing to do with your class, of course). Jarlaxle would be tricky but we could probably work something out as while I don't like throwing millions of extra at a player, I also don't enforce WBL so if you manage to acquire such wealth by wits or guile, it's yours to keep.

[Gnaeus]

random encounters are a thing. you don't always get to pick on weak monsters with those. you might run into something cr appropriate, or even a few over if it's a challenging or harder encounter

Running away is a thing people do. Or talking. If you are sandboxing, and PCs died every time they met an over level encounter, not many sandboxes would go well. He travels in fairly safe areas. He keeps his ear to the ground for the likely threats, and he isn't afraid to leave and tell the duke if stuff is messed up.



actually, no, not necessarily. PCs generally have parties (discounting solo play for the purposes of the discussion) but there's not really a reason that any given NPC would necessarily be part of a party. I know iconics like say robilar were, so they had wizards to leech xp from during party combats, but we were talking about just high level fighters in general. yeah, it's possible he's just been sponging xp

Agreed. Parties may be the exception, not the rule, although maybe they are over or under represented in the ranks of fighter 20s. I would think that single fighters wandering around by themselves would be the rarest career path. Most common, after level 1, IMO, will be an officer leading large groups of soldiers. I would expect something like (level 2-3, a corporal, leading 10 guys, 4-5, a sergeant, with maybe 20. 6-9, an officer, with 50+ men and maybe a low level caster for fire support. 10+ a general, leading an army.) Robilar presents another way it could go. IIRC, he was like 19 in a party with an average level way below him. He isn't an exp leech. He is the big gun who can tank the CR 15 for a few rounds while poor level 8 Melf shoots off a couple more acid arrows.



you're saying is that they could grind without difficulty if they were allowed to violate the rules. sure, that's definitely true, but that was my point: a single classed fighter playing the game normally wouldn't be able to advance through the ranks by himself without cheating.

Cheating? He isn't playing a game. WE are playing a game. In every "what would you do in if DND were the real world" thread I have seen, someone suggests that they will start power leveling by killing cats or some other under CR non-threat. Fighter is a dude. At level 20, probably a smart dude. He wants to live. He doesn't pick fights where he thinks he will die. Thats how you become an old soldier.


I'm sure it's possible a fighter npc could've just hacked away at an aristocrat's ghost brute shrieker farm to slowly accrue experience, and while that would explain his high level mechanically, it's kind of weird to make a guy who punches mushrooms all day your leader.

Yeah, about that. So, I'm a guard or a foot soldier. Would it be wierder to follow Sir Stable, the cautious grizzled veteran of 30 campaigns in the goblin wars, known for careful soldiering, or Killer, the Murderhobo who wandered into town to loot the tomb of an ancient king and who will leap head first into any ruin that seems likely to contain treasure?

You know how knights fought wars in the real world? They put on so much armor that the only way they were going to die was an unfortunate arrow to the eye. Then they rode over people on their huge armored horses. If their side lost, they rode away. If they got captured, their families ransomed them back. People followed THEM into battle. Why not NPC fighter?



okay, so again, if a fighter is arbitrarily rewarded large ad hoc xp rewards from non-combat encounters he can advance through the levels quickly. well, sure, but that's not how accruing combat xp in D&D works for pcs. that's exactly my point, he'd have to resort to stuff like this to level up because he cannot survive a normal combat by himself.

Before, you were complaining because I suggested he would be in a party when he wasn't a PC. Now, you are suggesting that unlike PCs, he may get more exp from non-combat encounters. Yes, he is an NPC.

Why would he need large ad hoc rewards to advance quickly? When I think of a 20th level character, the picture in my mind is an old guy. A grizzled combat veteran. An aging wizard. The Pope. My sorcerer started play at age 16. Based on his leveling speed, he will be casting epic spells before (in our world) he would be old enough to drink or vote. If it takes the NPC 40 times as long to level as the PC, so what? The PC hits level 20 at age 18 and the NPC when he is in his 50s or 60s. Thats kind of what I would expect for people who aren't favored by DMs to be PCs. If he gets 100 exp for some difficult out of combat interaction, Woot! And thats humans. That dwarf or half elf may have 150 years to hit level 20. A full elf might have 1500. He has to earn 15 exp/month.

[Deadline]

The question can be divided into sub-groups:
a. How did this come to be?

They came to be in an earlier version of D&D. The fighter wasn't better in older editions, but I think the monsters, for the most part, were weaker. You still had linear fighters and quadratic wizards in older versions of D&D. Also, many of the characters mentioned thus far are author creations. Which means the game rules don't apply to them at all. Plot armor and author fiat answer most of your questions.


b. How can they stay at this level? For a day, for a year etc.

I'm a little unclear on this, but are you asking how they survive by continuing to face level appropriate challenges? Because most likely they don't. They're done adventuring, and are now political movers and shakers.


c. What, in general, can make 1st-level fighter to become Jarlaxle or Lord Robilar?

A campaign with lower challenge encounters, monsters that aren't always played to their abilities, or a solid party that helps the character along.


d. Can I do this, with my 1st-level PC fighter, in your game?

Yes, but most people I've played with who choose to play a fighter grow disillusioned and bored with it before long. The Fighter just doesn't have a lot of versatility with what it can do. I do try to focus more on a story and narrative aspect to my games these days, with the combats being fun tactical bits thrown in, so it's certainly possible to play a fighter in that instance (the focus there is on your character, and less on your mechanical abilities). Also, I don't run a very lethal game (no one dies to a random goblin schlub or the like, but characters can die when we get near the end of the campaign when dramatically appropriate), which will certainly help the fighter.

[Karl Aegis]

Step 1) Organize Crusade against Orcs.
Step 2) Attack Orcs in Orc territory, possibly reclaim land lost to orcs
Step 3) Loot sharpened sticks and rocks tied to sticks used by orc warriors
Step 4) Gain enough experience to be threat to Orcish independence
Step 5) Make it to Orc stronghold
Step 6) Have large portion of army killed by veteran orcs with actual equipment
Step 7) Keep feeding experience to veteran Orcs every few years so veteran Orcs become too high of a level to attack anymore.
Step 8) Wonder if feeding experience to Orcs was good idea

Decades of war is probably a good way to gain some levels. If you send out young and inexperienced warriors to give your enemies enough levels to raise their CR high enough to give you experience while simultaneously denying your enemies wealth by level by not giving your warrior decent equipment and they'll come to you. If they have basically the same equipment as they did when they were starting out (or less, use that sunder) you'll have no trouble slaughtering them. Use your few magic-users to divine whose death will cause the army to scatter and loot any equipment you can find to give to your blacksmith and/or armorer so you'll have equipment for more higher level orcs the next time you get attacked. If you find extra food even better. Celebrate afterwards and spend some time with the lady-orcs.

[TheCrowing1432]

Well, you're forgetting a lot of these characters were made back in 1st or 2nd edition dnd where Fighters were a lot more powerful, IIRC Fighter was actually one of the most powerful classes in the game in 2nd edition.

That being said these are characters in a book not classes in a tabletop. The things they do arent restricted by their classes, even though they are "Fighters"

[Eldariel]

They came to be in an earlier version of D&D. The fighter wasn't better in older editions, but I think the monsters, for the most part, were weaker. You still had linear fighters and quadratic wizards in older versions of D&D. Also, many of the characters mentioned thus far are author creations. Which means the game rules don't apply to them at all. Plot armor and author fiat answer most of your questions.

Fighters were very much so better in earlier editions. Take for instance AD&D 2e (the version I have the most experience with). They might not have been as good as Wizards - they never had the same strategic versatility. But already the fact that they'd get an extra attack over everyone else, things would have way less HP overall (and Fighters comparatively have a much larger HP advantage; about as if they got 2xCon Mod to HP), there's no such thing as full attack (thus allowing move + attack out of the box), fighters have the best saves overall and near-magic-immunity higher up, spells are immediately disrupted upon damage with no Concentration/Defensive Casting & co. gives them huge leg up over their 3e competitors. They may have just been balls of stats but at least they were balls of impressive stats requiring a modicum of effort even from a caster to dispose of, and posing a significantly higher threat to enemy spellcasters if nearby.

[Deadline]

Fighters were very much so better in earlier editions. Take for instance AD&D 2e (the version I have the most experience with). They might not have been as good as Wizards - they never had the same strategic versatility. But already the fact that they'd get an extra attack over everyone else, things would have way less HP overall (and Fighters comparatively have a much larger HP advantage; about as if they got 2xCon Mod to HP), there's no such thing as full attack (thus allowing move + attack out of the box), fighters have the best saves overall and near-magic-immunity higher up, spells are immediately disrupted upon damage with no Concentration/Defensive Casting & co. gives them huge leg up over their 3e competitors. They may have just been balls of stats but at least they were balls of impressive stats requiring a modicum of effort even from a caster to dispose of, and posing a significantly higher threat to enemy spellcasters if nearby.

Yes, monsters had fewer hitpoints (and did less damage, as well). I seem to recall our fighter having comparable hitpoints to a Dragon we fought. But once you're talking 4th level and higher spells, the fighter had the same problem as he has now, he can hit something pretty hard, but that's about it. The whole "name level" and getting your own fortress (at level 10 was it?) helped a little bit, but still. And because monsters dealt less damage and could take less punishment, you'd see the fighter more able to take on dangerous foes and still prevail. Everything except for the fighter was weaker in earlier editions, which made the fighter seem more powerful by comparison. The problem is, in 3rd edition everything except the fighter got a power boost.

[Scots Dragon]

The problem is, in 3rd edition everything except the fighter got a power boost.

More to the point; fighters got nerfed in 3rd edition. In 2nd edition, a fighter could move and attack multiple times right out of the Player's Handbook, and benefited the most from stuff like strength and constitution. The multiple attacks also did not have any penalties associated with them; all of a fighter's attacks had the same THAC0, unless they came from offhand weapon usage.

The fighter lost these advantages in 3rd edition, at the same time as everything else being boosted dramatically in power.

[Mechalich]

More to the point; fighters got nerfed in 3rd edition. In 2nd edition, a fighter could move and attack multiple times right out of the Player's Handbook, and benefited the most from stuff like strength and constitution. The multiple attacks also did not have any penalties associated with them; all of a fighter's attacks had the same THAC0, unless they came from offhand weapon usage.

The fighter lost these advantages in 3rd edition, at the same time as everything else being boosted dramatically in power.

Pretty much this. Essentially all of the legendary setting-based characters were designed during 1e or 2e and utilizing 1e or 2e assumptions. Those assumptions are very different in a huge number of ways from 3.Xe assumptions.

A good example: play Baldur's Gate II. High level fighters in that game can easily go toe-to-toe with NPC wizards (and yes the fights are confined to specific areas, so the advantages of fly are removed, and the NPCs aren't super-optimized). A huge part of the reason was the way saving throws worked in 2e. Since saves were on a flat scale, high-level fighters just got better at saving things, and with save boosting items would successfully save against save or sucks all the time (also magic resistance, being a flat percentage, was way more of a hindrance than scaling spell resistance ever was - ever summon a skeleton warrior in BGII and watch it flatly ignore like an entire high-level spell arsenal?).

Straight-up martials at the upper end of the power scale in 2e are highly unlikely and presume a lot of lucky save roles (especially early in the career) but they are orders of magnitude more believable than under 3.X assumptions.

The bottom line is that, while no edition of D&D has ever has a rules base that produces the Forgotten Realms, the 2e rules base comes a lot closer than the 3.Xe rules base does.

[Scots Dragon]

The bottom line is that, while no edition of D&D has ever has a rules base that produces the Forgotten Realms, the 2e rules base comes a lot closer than the 3.Xe rules base does.

I'd argue that it's slightly off, since most of the development on the Forgotten Realms actually was done in AD&D 1e, and was at least partly derived from a campaign that he ran. The differences between AD&D 1e and 2e are almost negligible enough to say that, yeah, the Forgotten Realms could arise from AD&D 2e, because it effectively actually did.

[ericgrau]

I assume that many of playgrounders don't like the fighter class and think it's suboptimal and that you use books like ToB, right?

Jarlaxle, Bruenor Battlehammer, Lord Robilar and Warduke are all pure fighters. How can this be? How do you use these NPCs in your games, since they represent such an incredibly weak class? I would just like to know that how do your perception of the strength levels of different classes translate into your game worlds.

(I've tried a similar thread two years ago, but I didn't get that much out of it)

It's pretty simple. Either (a) don't allow higher levels of optimization for anyone or (b) convert them to higher optimization versions.

You're forgetting that tons of forumless players play pretty low optimization and a straight fighter can do pretty well.

[Scots Dragon]

It's pretty simple. Either (a) don't allow higher levels of optimization for anyone or (b) convert them to higher optimization versions.

You're forgetting that tons of forumless players play pretty low optimization and a straight fighter can do pretty well.

A much easier option, really, for including a somewhat more accurate-to-canon version of the NPCs? These are your rulebooks...

https://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic567878_md.jpg

https://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic505818_md.jpg

https://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic1440411.jpg

[Keltest]

Something else to note is that in first and second editions, different classes needed different amounts of XP to level up. If you have a fighter and a wizard with the same XP, the fighter could well have a level or two on that wizard, further bridging the power gap because fighters just flat out got stronger faster.

[Beowulf DW]

I know there is an issue with bringing historical debate up, but that is not my intention at all.

Think about every single "famous" military guy in our history, they were not strong or great warriors in and to hand combat, but they were best at strategy, moral for the troops and whatever.
D&d lvl 20 fighter super famous doesnt need to be able to fight single handed a balor when the balor threats his kingdom, but he needs to command effective enought his troops to defeat him, and when he is weakened, go for the final blow.

They could be just brilliant generals or whatever, not just "great arena warriors"....

Half and half on that account. Alex Dumas was a terrific general who would also lead his best men on what basically amounted to special forces missions after he had already laid out a strategy. Genghis Khan and Oda Nobunaga were both great warriors in their own rights, as well.