Zalabim
2016-05-10, 06:14 AM
Inspiration first:
One of the later posts, but it's a perfect starting post for this thread:
This entire thread is about how full casters have massive impact on the world around. How their amount of powerful options leave the somewhat linear scale of the other classes after lvl 10 or so.
The point isn't about a 1v1 discussion in some abstract white room.
Nor is it about traditional conquering of kingdoms - even though full casters being able to take countries hostage is part of the point.
Look at the amount of things full casters can do at lvl 10 and compare with lvl 18/20. Notice how many NEW types of situations the caster can deal with with ease. Do the same comparison with other classes. Notice how most of them can do what they did better, but not much else.
Going back in time now:
I think the kind of power jumps high level wizards see is not the kind of power jumps you think they are. High level spells last longer, have more range, allow more targets, and have fewer limitations than lower leveled spells with similar purposes. This opens up a few new avenues of interaction, but it would be helpful to be clear about just what those are.
A surprisingly large amount of their new ways to bend reality are actually just their current ways to bend reality with better mechanics, better numbers.
The wizard already had ways to force someone to do something they wouldn't want to do. There's also already ways to frame someone quite convincingly.
You need to go over the spell list for concrete examples of new world-changing abilities that wizards actually get at high levels. That'll be a lot better for discussion than this "wizards can do anything" that we've been working with.
By level 10, hell, by level 5, the wizard is already an amazing tool box for interacting with the world in strange ways.
Point taken - and a very productive way of moving the discussion forward.
Two counter points: a substantial amount of the gained power is that there's so many damn spells - they can combine in quite intricate ways and they mean the wizard has plain more tools to work around with.
I'd love to go into detail, but I know there's an entire thread about that somewhere, and I simply don't have the time to do it all now.
And I don't have the time to to do it all either, but maybe enough people have some time that something will come out of this.
Instead, I'll point out spells that can make it either easy to control the world, or allow for the wizard to pick encounters as he chooses to see fit.
Off topic, I hate the indexing in the PHB. How hard would it be to include page numbers in your various lists???
5th level
Creation (at least if he knows some kind of chemistry)
Geas
Dream
Scrying
Possibly more (Animate Objects, Rary's Telepathic Bond, Geas)
6th level
Contingency (strong way to increase survivability, and can be cast during downtime)
Create Undead (permanent buffing your powers)
Disintegrate (mostly for the removal of whichever material)
Drawmij’s Instant Summons (not as such super strong, but since it can be used during downtime it can further
Globe of Invulnerability
Guards and Wards
Magic Jar
Mass Suggestion
Move Earth
Programmed Illusion
True Seeing
7th level
Etherealness (renders rogues rather redundant quite often)
Forcecage (no saving throw unless you try to teleport or change planes)
Mirage Arcane (radius of a mile, lasts 10 days..)
Project Image
Reverse Gravity (only has a saving throw if there's a fixed object - huge radius)
Sequester (see Drawji's)
Simulacrum (one of the most broken spells/features in the game. If this was a fighter capstone, people would still think it is wicked strong. We can't discuss this one though - Forum Rules)
Symbol (another permanent)
Teleport (strongest mobility feature in the game?)
8th level
Antimagic Field (considering how strong magic is.. this is pretty damn strong)
Antipathy/Sympathy (no saving throw UNTIL the target is within 60 ft. Lasts 10 days)
Clone (hello immortality)
Control Weather (8 hours concentration, can more or less exterminate entire areas, slow armies, etc. - depending on how dispel would work on it, strong or extremely strong)
Demiplane (for those things you can't kill)
Telepathy (you give language to those without it, requires no concentration, perfect scouting and coordination, etc.)
9th level
Astral Projection
Foresight (renders several key class features completely obsolete.. no concentration)
Gate (fiends in your enemies basement)
Imprisonment (bye)
Meteor Swarm (one of the weaker level 9 spells, but a 1 mile casting range is crazy in a world where longbows are the tools of the sniper)
Shapechange
Time Stop
True Polymorph
Wish (We can't discuss this one though - Forum Rules)
The fact that wizard is already pretty damn strong at level 10, doesn't mean that adding an increasing level of more powerful tools to his toolbox is breaking linear power progression less. I've included a few level 5 spells to emphasise the point.
Totally agreed. If a fighter went from 7 DPR at level 1 to 70 DPR at level 10 to 700 DPR at level 20, that wouldn't be a linear progression either, even if the fighter still only did damage. (I think. It'd be a X*1.291549...=Level+1 progression for each level)
My position is that the wizard's high level tools are more in the "more powerful" direction and less in the "new" direction. The reason I think this is that I can find similar, weaker effects in their lower level spells. The most hotly contested high level spells do things that wizards can already do, but more or better, in some cases quite blatantly. Simulacrum (of the caster) literally just does what the caster can already do, Wish is broken just with its ability to cast spells of level 8 and lower, and Forcecage looks like a juiced up Resilient Sphere. High level caster abilities are also obviously nonlinear in the sense that they get a less-than-linear number of uses of them, so I'm sure that's a consideration for balance.
So let's look at some high level abilities, see which ones are new and which ones are better versions of old abilities, and if we can resolve that, maybe figure out what kind of new abilities are needed to balance high level PCs of different classes: New ways to influence the world, or better versions of what they already have.
As an example: "Simulacrum (one of the most broken spells/features in the game. If this was a fighter capstone, people would still think it is wicked strong.)" Fighter Version: "You can use Action Surge once per round. You no longer need to rest before using the ability again."
One of the later posts, but it's a perfect starting post for this thread:
This entire thread is about how full casters have massive impact on the world around. How their amount of powerful options leave the somewhat linear scale of the other classes after lvl 10 or so.
The point isn't about a 1v1 discussion in some abstract white room.
Nor is it about traditional conquering of kingdoms - even though full casters being able to take countries hostage is part of the point.
Look at the amount of things full casters can do at lvl 10 and compare with lvl 18/20. Notice how many NEW types of situations the caster can deal with with ease. Do the same comparison with other classes. Notice how most of them can do what they did better, but not much else.
Going back in time now:
I think the kind of power jumps high level wizards see is not the kind of power jumps you think they are. High level spells last longer, have more range, allow more targets, and have fewer limitations than lower leveled spells with similar purposes. This opens up a few new avenues of interaction, but it would be helpful to be clear about just what those are.
A surprisingly large amount of their new ways to bend reality are actually just their current ways to bend reality with better mechanics, better numbers.
The wizard already had ways to force someone to do something they wouldn't want to do. There's also already ways to frame someone quite convincingly.
You need to go over the spell list for concrete examples of new world-changing abilities that wizards actually get at high levels. That'll be a lot better for discussion than this "wizards can do anything" that we've been working with.
By level 10, hell, by level 5, the wizard is already an amazing tool box for interacting with the world in strange ways.
Point taken - and a very productive way of moving the discussion forward.
Two counter points: a substantial amount of the gained power is that there's so many damn spells - they can combine in quite intricate ways and they mean the wizard has plain more tools to work around with.
I'd love to go into detail, but I know there's an entire thread about that somewhere, and I simply don't have the time to do it all now.
And I don't have the time to to do it all either, but maybe enough people have some time that something will come out of this.
Instead, I'll point out spells that can make it either easy to control the world, or allow for the wizard to pick encounters as he chooses to see fit.
Off topic, I hate the indexing in the PHB. How hard would it be to include page numbers in your various lists???
5th level
Creation (at least if he knows some kind of chemistry)
Geas
Dream
Scrying
Possibly more (Animate Objects, Rary's Telepathic Bond, Geas)
6th level
Contingency (strong way to increase survivability, and can be cast during downtime)
Create Undead (permanent buffing your powers)
Disintegrate (mostly for the removal of whichever material)
Drawmij’s Instant Summons (not as such super strong, but since it can be used during downtime it can further
Globe of Invulnerability
Guards and Wards
Magic Jar
Mass Suggestion
Move Earth
Programmed Illusion
True Seeing
7th level
Etherealness (renders rogues rather redundant quite often)
Forcecage (no saving throw unless you try to teleport or change planes)
Mirage Arcane (radius of a mile, lasts 10 days..)
Project Image
Reverse Gravity (only has a saving throw if there's a fixed object - huge radius)
Sequester (see Drawji's)
Simulacrum (one of the most broken spells/features in the game. If this was a fighter capstone, people would still think it is wicked strong. We can't discuss this one though - Forum Rules)
Symbol (another permanent)
Teleport (strongest mobility feature in the game?)
8th level
Antimagic Field (considering how strong magic is.. this is pretty damn strong)
Antipathy/Sympathy (no saving throw UNTIL the target is within 60 ft. Lasts 10 days)
Clone (hello immortality)
Control Weather (8 hours concentration, can more or less exterminate entire areas, slow armies, etc. - depending on how dispel would work on it, strong or extremely strong)
Demiplane (for those things you can't kill)
Telepathy (you give language to those without it, requires no concentration, perfect scouting and coordination, etc.)
9th level
Astral Projection
Foresight (renders several key class features completely obsolete.. no concentration)
Gate (fiends in your enemies basement)
Imprisonment (bye)
Meteor Swarm (one of the weaker level 9 spells, but a 1 mile casting range is crazy in a world where longbows are the tools of the sniper)
Shapechange
Time Stop
True Polymorph
Wish (We can't discuss this one though - Forum Rules)
The fact that wizard is already pretty damn strong at level 10, doesn't mean that adding an increasing level of more powerful tools to his toolbox is breaking linear power progression less. I've included a few level 5 spells to emphasise the point.
Totally agreed. If a fighter went from 7 DPR at level 1 to 70 DPR at level 10 to 700 DPR at level 20, that wouldn't be a linear progression either, even if the fighter still only did damage. (I think. It'd be a X*1.291549...=Level+1 progression for each level)
My position is that the wizard's high level tools are more in the "more powerful" direction and less in the "new" direction. The reason I think this is that I can find similar, weaker effects in their lower level spells. The most hotly contested high level spells do things that wizards can already do, but more or better, in some cases quite blatantly. Simulacrum (of the caster) literally just does what the caster can already do, Wish is broken just with its ability to cast spells of level 8 and lower, and Forcecage looks like a juiced up Resilient Sphere. High level caster abilities are also obviously nonlinear in the sense that they get a less-than-linear number of uses of them, so I'm sure that's a consideration for balance.
So let's look at some high level abilities, see which ones are new and which ones are better versions of old abilities, and if we can resolve that, maybe figure out what kind of new abilities are needed to balance high level PCs of different classes: New ways to influence the world, or better versions of what they already have.
As an example: "Simulacrum (one of the most broken spells/features in the game. If this was a fighter capstone, people would still think it is wicked strong.)" Fighter Version: "You can use Action Surge once per round. You no longer need to rest before using the ability again."