Nice Things for Martials:

[exelsisxax]

So we all know by now that 3.PF hates martials, and doesn't want them to have nice things. So I decided to start up a christmas list for the rangers, fighters, and rogues of the world that have been passed over by wish-economy wizard santa all these years.

Be specific if possible; i.e. "X should be free for everybody", "X, Y, and Z should be one feat".

This is also not for letting martials be T1 gamebreakers. They should be solid T3 workhorses that can do their job well, and contribute something in situations where their main job is irrelevant. They should not be about giving impossible (ex) abilities out, but giving martials the abilities they should have always had access to. This doesn't mean they can't get things to screw over spellcasters, nor that things can't be changed in such a way to nerf casters indirectly. But in the end, it should always be something FOR martials.


I'll start us off with some classics.

Paladins and fighters should have 4 base skill points.
Weapon finesse should be a universal option like fighting defensively instead of a feat.
All three TWF feats should be merged into one.
Fighters should have a good reflex save.

And some others of my own:

There should exist methods that make 5' stepping to cast a spell dangerous and risky that don't involve multi-feat chains or readied actions.
There should be far more ways than grappling to shut down spellcasting.
Many skills should be made somewhat stronger, and necessary for spells that replicate their function(i.e. disguise/alter self should provide no bonus to anything other than visual inspection). Heal should heal more efficiently and be able to cure ability damage, etc.
Most martials should have more class skills(paladins can't swim?) and bonuses to skills (i.e. fighters should have a bonus to the combat application of multi-use skills)

[legomaster00156]

I would add "more ways to full-attack and move".

[Geddy2112]

I use everything in this blog post (http://michaeliantorno.com/feat-taxes-in-pathfinder/) at my table. Noteworthy things are combat expertise, agile manuvers, weapon finesse, power attack, and deadly aim are now just options instead of feats. Characters count as having the feat for the purpose of prerequisites.
Grouping of combat maneuvers so a maneuver build has more options and did not go feat intensive to be useless every other combat. Merging of dodge and mobility to lower the feat tax for spring attack. Merging of TWF feats.

[Ninjaxenomorph]

Hmm... As for the skill bonuses, I can see different martials having bonuses to certain skills, perhaps chosen from a set when they take the class. (Speaking from PF here), fighters might have Intimidate, the athletic skills, and Knowledge (History) (I like the learned warrior archetype), Barbarians would have Intimidate, Survival, Knowledge (Nature), Rangers would of course have Survival (with a bigger bonus to track, like normal), Kno: Nature, and Diplomacy, Paladins with Diplomacy, Knowledge (Religion or Planes) so they can actually identify before they smite... All these with the martial classes getting 4 skills per level.

I can see lots of feat chains getting collapsed into single progressing feats, like TWF and Step-Up as was mentioned. The Fighter actually getting something besides bonus feats would be good; ToB-like stances might be interesting if they were more generic. Something for becoming really mobile, something for turtling up and becoming nigh-invulnerable, other unique things, so the combat feats aren't the main use of the class. Maybe some automatic magic-harrying thing.

[Psyren]

I would add "more ways to full-attack and move".

This, plus all the martials getting 4+Int skills and Combat Stamina. Replace Rogue and Monk with unchained versions, and give Monk a "Forgotten Ki Power" ability similar to the ninja's Forgotten Trick. And of course, Fighter gets AWT/AAT.

[wookietek]

I've been toying with making Pounce a feat with prerequisites being Dodge and Mobility. No more overpopulation of Spirit Lion Barbarians.

[Kurald Galain]

See, here's the thing. Martial classes deal damage in combat fairly well, so any suggestions that make them do more damage in combat really aren't all that necessary. Their issue, rather, lies in versatility. They get not enough skills or skill points, not enough out-of-combat abilities, and not enough "counters" (like removing conditions from themselves).

Focus on those, not on damage. Their damage isn't the problem.


Weapon finesse should be a universal option like fighting defensively instead of a feat.
No, it should not. Dex is overall a much better stat than str is, and this is balanced by making Str the default attack/damage stat. If dex to hit and/or dex to damage are free for everyone, you've just made almost all str-builds obsolete.


All three TWF feats should be merged into one.
Why?


There should exist methods that make 5' stepping to cast a spell dangerous and risky that don't involve multi-feat chains or readied actions.
There are. Step Up is a single feat, most reach weapons also accomplish this, and tripping a caster keeps them from 5' stepping (and many casters have poor CMD and poor to nonexistent OAs).


There should be far more ways than grappling to shut down spellcasting.
Disruptive feat says hi. Readied action with a bow works fairly well, too. You should be able to sunder or steal their component pouches (meaning there should be a rule against "just carrying five of those").

[exelsisxax]

See, here's the thing. Martial classes deal damage in combat fairly well, so any suggestions that make them do more damage in combat really aren't all that necessary. Their issue, rather, lies in versatility. They get not enough skills or skill points, not enough out-of-combat abilities, and not enough "counters" (like removing conditions from themselves).

Focus on those, not on damage. Their damage isn't the problem.

Exactly, which is why I did not mention ANY damage-increasing change or addition. Regarding pounce/moving full attacks: they should not be the norm.



No, it should not. Dex is overall a much better stat than str is, and this is balanced by making Str the default attack/damage stat. If dex to hit and/or dex to damage are free for everyone, you've just made almost all str-builds obsolete.

That's because Str builds suck, not because dex builds are too good. Dex to damage is nonsensical, though not overpowered. Do you have anything to offer to make Str builds better? out-of-combat options for the power-attacking barb don't really scream "strength-related"



Why?


because 3 feats is too large an investment for the power provided, and that investment precludes more interesting choices(ideally, more interesting choices, especially out-of-combat, than the choices currently available). Those 2 feats saved can go into something interesting.




There are. Step Up is a single feat, most reach weapons also accomplish this, and tripping a caster keeps them from 5' stepping (and many casters have poor CMD and poor to nonexistent OAs).

the step-up line is a massive tax that isn't worth it in any way, spellcasters don't need to 5' away from reach weapons if adjacent, how can you trip someone that isn't provoking an AoO? If step-up, following step, and step-up and strike were one feat i'd agree with you.



Disruptive feat says hi. Readied action with a bow works fairly well, too. You should be able to sunder or steal their component pouches (meaning there should be a rule against "just carrying five of those").
6th level fighters only, penalty is relatively minor, and once again casters can just 5' step away. Readied shots with bows demonstrate the continued strength of archery over melee combat, despite still being poor overall. Readied actions suck because you can't do anything on your turn.
If there were meaningful restrictions on spell components the issue would be easier to address(i.e. sunder on pouches don't provoke), I agree.

[Florian]

Very simple: Occult rituals should replace a lot of spells. Done.

[Kurald Galain]

Do you have anything to offer to make Str builds better? out-of-combat options for the power-attacking barb don't really scream "strength-related"
Look over the deeds of Herakles and Cuchulainn for some good examples. For instance, massive bonuses on climb/jump checks so you don't need magical flight.


the step-up line is a massive tax that isn't worth it in any way,
Yes, but the first feat is great.


spellcasters don't need to 5' away from reach weapons if adjacent,
Come now, any martial worth his salt wears gauntlets or armor spikes. Yes, the rule that a polearm can't hit an adjacent square is stupid and should be removed, but it's easily worked around.


6th level fighters only,
The Disruptive feat can also be taken by e.g. barbarians, rangers, and slayers. If you think the penalty is too small, that's an easy fix (e.g. make it half your BAB with a minimum of 4, something like that).


Readied shots with bows demonstrate the continued strength of archery over melee combat
But archery is still a martial thing.

[Eldariel]

The big ones I like are defensive ones.

1) Better saves in general. AD&D Fighters had the best saves in the game; there's no excuse for only 1 good save and no save-increasing class features on most warrior chassis.
2) More HP. This doesn't really fix anything but it's kinda necessary with the game's HP/damage scaling. Every level in a warrior class gains 2xCon bonus HP. This way high level warrior actually has an advantage over arcane caster (level 20 arcane caster with 24 Con [14 base + 6 item + 4 inherent] has average 6+3.5*19+20*7 = 212,5 HP, level 20 Barbarian with the same stats has 12+6.5*19+20*7 =275,5), and there's some survivability advantage to warrior levels.
3) Simple stuff in the levels. How about being immortal while raging at Barb 10 or deflecting spells at Monk 5 or simply shaking stuff off as a Fighter.
4) Scaling AC bonuses.

This doesn't fix 'em by a long shot but makes them a bit better at what they should be decent anyways.

[stack]

Narrative power, such as contacts that provide plot-relevant benefits.

Options to utilize mundane abilities in interesting or cinematic ways.

Abilities to shake off or delay effects for a short time.

Getting to do anything without 5 prerequisite feats. (looking at you, Paizo)

Agreeing with the damage comments above, martials need to be able to build out, not up.

[exelsisxax]

Look over the deeds of Herakles and Cuchulainn for some good examples. For instance, massive bonuses on climb/jump checks so you don't need magical flight.
unfortunately, those guys mostly just killed things en masse or individual really scary things. That's basically the only thing martials can do.
What uses of climb/acro could be boosted to compete with fly, especially concerning a basis in strength? The only thing i got is better jump/climb ratios and leaping attacks, both of which are mostly "kill stuff better".
If nothing else, double Str/ str to acro bonuses to skill and increased penalties for encumbrance would favor Str builds.



Yes, but the first feat is great.

Come now, any martial worth his salt wears gauntlets or armor spikes. Yes, the rule that a polearm can't hit an adjacent square is stupid and should be removed, but it's easily worked around.
first feat would be workable if it applied to reach weapons, but it doesn't. If it did, it would be "barely adequate" at its job.

Except you could never use gauntlet/reach combo, and paizo FAQ'd (http://paizo.com/paizo/faq/v5748nruor1fm#v5748eaic9qw9) armor spikes to possibly not work anymore either - the wording is bad, as usual.



The Disruptive feat can also be taken by e.g. barbarians, rangers, and slayers. If you think the penalty is too small, that's an easy fix (e.g. make it half your BAB with a minimum of 4, something like that).
Yes, that is indeed less bad. But they can still 5' step away with relative ease. It would be worth something if the penalty applied to their whole turn if they start in your threatened area. I actually like that.



But archery is still a martial thing.

But they need less help. "archer's don't get screwed over by this rule quite so hard" isn't an argument for martials being strong enough. It's an argument for that subcategory needing fewer improvements.

[Psyren]

Why?


Because then they have feats they can spend on less combat-oriented things like Skill Focus, Extra Traits, crafting etc to do more non-combat things. The TWF chain already has gating built into it via its Dex and BAB requirements, so having it as a single feat instead of as a chain is not going to unbalance those characters. And the same goes for other BAB-gated chains like Vital Strike and Dimensional Agility.

[Serafina]

In combat, or out of combat?
Either way, the main issue is versatility and ability to contribute, but it's still two different problems you should approach with different solutions.


In combat, you can do well by just vastly improving combat maneuvers:
- combine most of the feats. Not just within a single maneuver (by fusing the improved/greater/etc. ones), but by actually just allowing you to use multiple maneuvers well
- make sure you can use the combat maneuvers at range, in addition to attacks, etc.
- make sure the combat maneuvers are actually relevant against very large, high-strength, or non-humanoid enemies

Take the classic martial problem of needing a full-round action to do anything worthwhile, be that charging or full-attacking.
Then allow them to draw and throw a bola as part of a charge or move action, and make a trip combat maneuver with it at range. Or draw a dagger and try to disarm someone with it. Or throw some acid as a dirty trick.
Or you allow them to make a free bull rush/drag/reposition maneuver as part of a full attack, charge, or move-action. Because why not have them drive an enemy back with repeated swings of their sword, as well as do damage?
As an added bonus, if you tie that to certain weapons, you can encourage people to have a good amount of weapon variety, which can be pretty neat.

The above, or similar solutions, would give martials more interesting things to do, with increased versatility.
Of course, you can gradually introduce that via class features - make that 11th-level fighter more badass than a 5th-level by giving them two "bonus combat maneuvers", so that they can do both the disarming throw on the charge, and then try to sunder a piece of the opponents equipment with the power of their charge, instead of just one of those things.


Out of combat, more skills points really should be a thing for all non-magic-users, but that only brings you so far. At some point, you just need supernatural stuff. That can be completely out-of-combat stuff, whether that be via some sort of ritual magic, using trophies for magical effects, supernaturally good skills with supernatural effects, or something else.

[Blue Jay]

Regarding pounce/moving full attacks: they should not be the norm...

...Readied actions suck because you can't do anything on your turn.

Random thought related to these two comments you made: how would you feel about a class feature that let you make a single melee attack and ready another attack as a single standard action? It would alleviate some of the drawback of Readying Actions, which would help promote strategic combat and mage lockdown; and it's kind of a middle-ground compromise with "move + full attack."

Or, what about broadening that to give fighters a class feature that lets them stack two standard actions or attack actions into one standard action? You know, like Manyshot + Order of the Bow, or Spring Attack + a martial maneuver, or Attack + Disarm. It might be a fun way to make strategic play a little more attractive. Obviously, it would probably need to work with a white list of options that qualify for it. And maybe a per-encounter limit, too?

[Ilorin Lorati]

I've been wanting to play with turning Style feat chains into advanced prerequisite chains from one feat, similar to Divine Fighting Technique. It might not be a great improvement, but I think it would help a fair bit in terms of versatility and opportunity cost. Add in more ways than a MOMS Monk dip to get multiples (usage of Combat Stamina?) and there's at least some hope there for more than just full attacking without adding a whole new subsystem.

Edit: The same can also probably be applied to other 3+ feat chains. Step Up > Following Step > Step Up and Strike is a good example, maybe. There's no reason for it to be 3 feats, at the very least.

[Elder_Basilisk]

It sounds like about half the suggestions here could be accomplished by copying vigilante and pasting the avenger version under fighter And the stalker version under rogue.

[Grod_The_Giant]

One of the biggest problems, I think, is that so many things in the combat system are gated behind feats. They're either impractically difficult or flat-out impossible, and so, so many martial build resources have to be dedicated just to doing things without penalty. Look at how many suggestions here have already been answered by "there's a feat for that." Sure, there is a feat for it, but you'll only have a few feats available, ever. I mean, honestly? I think you could probably take about 80% of the combat feats in the PHB, turn them into a thing anyone can do, and be fine. That's why ToB is so nice for martials--it gives them the ability to do things without having to invest heavily.

There are a couple hack-y things you can do. More skill points and free skill tricks is a good one. Making combat maneuvers more practical (no AoOs, bonuses based on BAB and/or reduced size modifiers, more ability to mix them with regular attacks) is good. Making movement easier (Pounce becomes a basic part of the rules, 5ft steps scale with BAB, allow movement before full attacking, whatever) is good. Scrapping garbage prereqs (Dodge-and-Mobility, Point-Blank Shot, Combat Expertise...pretty sure they literally only exist as roadblocks) is good. Making Dex-based combat easier is good.

But if you really want to make martials nice? Subsystem. 3.x really turns on subsystems, on having a set of specific abilities that override the general rules. Maybe you expand maneuvers. Maybe you make Stamina-and-Combat-Tricks less feat dependent. Personally, I kind of like the idea of turning skill tricks into something really robust* and grafting them onto non-magical classes. Maybe just cut out Barbarians and Rogues altogether and replace them with things like Totemists and Swordsages. Just... give them something special.


*Write more, covering more situations; grant a bunch of tricks for free, particularly for classes with limited or no access to any other subsystem; and let them be used more often

[BassoonHero]

1. Characters can move up to their speed while full attacking.

One of the most important ways that martial characters scale is by gaining extra attacks. Unfortunately, at BAB +6, the action cost of making all of a character's level-based attacks increases from a standard action to a full-round action. High-level fighters cannot take advantage of their normal level-based attack scaling without giving up a move action.

It's important to note that this is a problem unique to martial characters. When a spellcaster levels up, their spells don't take any longer to cast. Nor must a high-level spellcaster rely on casting several spells per turn; Quicken Spell is an excellent feat, but it's the cherry on top of an enormous sundae. And high-level monsters get plenty special attacks and spell-like abilities that they can use as a standard action; a great wyrm doesn't have to give up its movement to take full advantage of its breath weapon.

At high levels, most opponents who aren't simply dumb tanks can move out of full attack range every single turn, limiting fighters to a single attack. Needless to say, this is a significant handicap, and it's most significant when fighting spellcasters and other "tricky" opponents that martial characters have a tough time fighting in the first place.

It's no surprise that character options that circumvent this handicap are greatly prized. You can pounce using the Barbarian's Lion Spiritual Totem. You can gain "free" movement using Travel Devotion, Anklets of Translocation, or the Belt of Battle. Or you can get your own scaling standard-action attacks by playing a martial initiator, a psychic warrior, or a gish.

Implementing this change would significantly increase the power of martial characters starting at level six. At this point, primary casters already have third-level spells. Mid-BAB characters would start to benefit at level eight, when casters have Improved Invisibility and Solid Fog. As a result, and because existing options to circumvent this problem are already so popular, I'm not particularly worried about the balance implications.

Why let characters freely move while attacking instead of making a full attack a standard action? That would be a simpler rule, but I see it as an unnecessary and illogical restriction. I can easily envision a high-level fighter wading into a crowd of enemies, striking a blow at every step. It's a bit strange for that same fighter to move ten feet, unleash a flurry of blows while standing still, then continue moving. This would be permitted under either system, of course, but I see no reason to *mandate* it.

With this change made, some of the existing sources of extra attacks might use some adjustment. For instance, I could see removing the -2 penalty for Rapid Shot and instead requiring a full-round action to use it. More speculatively, what if you let anyone give up their movement in exchange for an extra attack, starting at level one?

2. Iterative attacks past the first suffer a -5 *noncumulative* penalty.

It *feels bad* to make your iterative attacks at massive -10 and -15 penalties. It feels bad when you hit level sixteen and get an attack at the same bonus as the one you got for free at first level, while opponents' ACs have been scaling sharply for fifteen levels. The abilties you get when you level up should not make you feel bad.

This kicks in for martial characters at level eleven, when the primary casters get sixth-level spells. It kicks in for mid-BAB characters at level fifteen. I don't see any significant balance risk here.

3. Martial characters are competent by default.

This is the laundry-list I think you were looking for: the pile of unnecessary barriers that lock martial characters into narrow specialties.


Characters may freely use Strength or Dexterity for melee attack rolls, thrown attack rolls, and combat maneuver checks. (Weapon Finesse, Brutal Throw)
Unarmed strikes do not provoke attacks of opportunity. Anyone proficient in martial weapons can deal lethal damage. (Improved Unarmed Strike)
Most combat maneuvers do not provoke attacks of opportunity, with the exception of grappling and grabbing an object. (Improved <whatever>)
There is no penalty for making a ranged attack into melee. (Precise Shot)
Shield bonuses apply to your touch AC, and you do not lose the bonus if you perform a shield bash. (Improved Shield Bash, Shield Ward)
Feinting is a combat maneuver, not a standard action. (Improved Feint)


The idea here is that you shouldn't have to invest a feat to attain baseline competence at a basic combat skill. A level-one barbarian with Power Attack should be able to credibly throw a javelin (or a punch). They're *better* at swinging a two-handed axe because they invested a feat into it.

It's worth noting that most of these changes actually simplify the base rules by removing annoying penalties.

4. Feats provide scaling benefits.


Weapon Focus gives +1 to attack and damage rolls, plus 1 per five levels.
Dodge gives a general +1 dodge bonus to AC, plus 1 per five levels.
Two-Weapon Fighting works on all of your iterative attacks.


I think that no explanation is necessary for these changes. Another dozen feats from the PHB could use a major upgrade, and another dozen or more could simply be deleted without losing anything important. Some examples of reimagined feats:


Point Blank Shot: You do not provoke an attack of opportunity for making a ranged attack while threatened.
Improved Unarmed Strike: Your unarmed strike attack gains two weapon qualities of your choice.
Iron Will: You gain a +2 bonus on Will saves. If you fail a Will save against an effect with a duration longer than one round, you may make a second Will save at the beginning of your next turn.
Run: You gain +10' to your base movement speed.
Weapon Finesse: You may use your Intelligence modifier instead of your Strength modifier


5. Skills and martial abilities can effectively counter magical effects.

This is a tough one. Of course, it's easy to give martial characters exotic powers, but it's tricky to equip them with the tools they need to fight wizards without in effect turning them into wizards.

The skill system should play a significant part here. Perception should be reasonably able to counter illusions and magical concealment. Athletics should let you brute-force your way through Solid Fog or even a Wall of Iron. Grod and I have similar opinions about skill tricks, and there have been some great discussions lately about what skills could look like at high levels.

A robust parry combat maneuver would help as well. There are way too many no-save-or-suck ray spells. A parry system could help solve a lot of other problems as well. It's a much better way to fight defensively than the existing options. It helps out dexterity-based fighters, two-weapon fighters, and sword-and-board fighters. It suggests ways to protect your teammates -- actual, effective tanking!

[Catarang]

I usually let my players pick the stat modifier they add to their class skill points per level. So lets say you are making a 5th level Fighter. You decide to pick Strength to add to your skill points, and then whenever you gain skill points from your class you gain 2 + str instead of 2 + int. To keep this from just picking your highest stat, however, I add the caveat that you must use the skill points you gain from your picked stat for skills that use that stat. So if you picked Strength you could put your points in swim, climb, etc. This makes it so that you get characters that are good at the things you assume their class is going to be good at. People still usually pick their highest stat (unless that stat is Con, in which case you should pick a different stat), but it all ends up giving martials extra skill points in a manner that makes sense with how they are building.

Also anyone who gets 2 + stat now gets 4 + stat skill points at each level. Because 2 + stat is just sad and awful.

[Psyren]

I mean, honestly? I think you could probably take about 80% of the combat feats in the PHB, turn them into a thing anyone can do, and be fine.

Agreed. Or if you must have a feat as your entry ticket, make it one feat for several of these benefits. But TWF doesn't need to be a feat. Awesome Blow doesn't need to be a feat. Power Attack doesn't need to be a feat. Weapon Finesse doesn't need to be a feat. On and on and on.

[Coretron03]

I'm suprised. We went this many posts without a mention of Spheres of Might?

While that response nmay be overused, it still is a damn good way to give martials some nice things. It even covers some of the things thet have been mentioned already, like extra skills (War leader gives diplomancy, Fencing gives bluff, Scout gives stealth, plus perception if you spend another talent and Athletics can give a slew of things, Beastmastery can give ride/handle animal, Alchemy gives craft:Alchemy and a whole lot more) to movement types (Athletics gives flight/burrow/ultra fast running, Berserker can give a 100 mile/level teleport, Scout can give tracking, Beastmastery can give a animal companion you can ride) to versatility (Alchemy gives you healing, condition removal, AoE attacks, debuffs through poisions, Warleader gives AoE buffs, Trap lets you spot and disarm traps and place potentially long duration traps, Barrage legendary lets you create stairs and platforms out of arrows, huge AoE's, Infinite ammo and Equipment gives a huge range of Proficiencies and feat equivalents, plus scaling bonuses to deflection based of your armour). This a just a small portion of a list I compiled in about 20 minutes, so there is a lot more things in the systems that fit these categories.

Even in combat, some of the things you can do is amazing. A combination of Guardian and Sheild can make you a true tank, giving penalties to atacking other people, dealyed damage pools, having a large touch ac and trading a AOO for big AC bonuses and is even capable of forcing people to attack you instead of other people or redirecting attacks to your sheild.

The sheer amount of options the system gives you, with few traps (that I can find) and nearly limitless combos ("So wait, I can force that guy 20ft away to attack me, who I can then trip, force him to succeed at a difficult CMB check if he wants to move under his own will and be capable of using his weapon, then I can bullrush him, giving both me and the ally he was originally attacking multiple attacks of opportunity and forcing them to make a save vs stagger? Awesome!") leads this to be one of my favourite systems.

Oh, and it makes tower-sheild-and-pistol combo work well. That's always something i've wanted to do :smallsmile:.

[Dr_Dinosaur]

Use Spheres of Might (optionally also Path of War for more options), whichever feat tax/scaling rules you prefer, and Automatic Bonus Progression.
Port Resolve over from Starfinder. Fold Combat Stamina and its associated Tricks into it. All martial point-pool abilities (Panache/Grit, Arcane Pool, etc) now use Resolve instead.
Also port Soldier and Operative in. Give the Soldier Weapon/Armor Training and the Fighter's proficiencies and call it the Unchained Fighter. Operative flat-out replaces Unchained Rogue, adding Debilitating Injury's effects as additional options for Debilitating Trick, and gaining Trapfinding, Danger Sense, Finesse Training, and reverting Uncanny Agility to Uncanny Dodge and IUD, but losing the Operative's multiattack features.
Everyone gets Skill Unlocks automatically with the right number of ranks. Rogues/Operatives now have the abilities of the Phantom Thief archetype baked in, getting Skill Unlocks early instead of Rogue's Edge.

[Kurald Galain]

One of the biggest problems, I think, is that so many things in the combat system are gated behind feats. They're either impractically difficult or flat-out impossible, and so, so many martial build resources have to be dedicated just to doing things without penalty.

People tend to forget that getting a +2 from a feat is not the crucial difference between being horrible at something and being excellent at it. It sure is nice to have more bonuses like that but it's far from required.

Case in point, any martial can use all maneuvers at will with no penalty and without provoking, by either stealthing or using a reach weapon. It's not that hard, really.

[BassoonHero]

People tend to forget that getting a +2 from a feat is not the crucial difference between being horrible at something and being excellent at it.
This is definitely not what anyone is talking about. (What feat are you talking about that provides nothing but a +2 bonus yet is considered essential?)


Case in point, any martial can use all maneuvers at will with no penalty and without provoking, by either stealthing or using a reach weapon. It's not that hard, really.
You could apply this argument to basically anything -- it doesn't matter whether, say, regular melee attacks provoke an attack of opportunity, because you can simply avoid attacks of opportunity.

And in general, I am extremely skeptical of arguments that a penalty doesn't matter because a certain kind of character can circumvent it. There are already plenty of other advantages to using a reach weapon without needing to penalize characters who don't.

[Grod_The_Giant]

People tend to forget that getting a +2 from a feat is not the crucial difference between being horrible at something and being excellent at it. It sure is nice to have more bonuses like that but it's far from required.

Case in point, any martial can use all maneuvers at will with no penalty and without provoking, by either stealthing or using a reach weapon. It's not that hard, really.
Stealthing mid-combat? Stealthing into melee in combat? Good luck with that, mate, unless you've got a wand of Invisibility or something. As for "all maneuvers at will with no penalty..."

Bull Rush requires you to enter an opponent's space-- reach won't help you there. You'll also frequently face monsters who are both bigger and stronger than you, and/or have extra legs.
Disarm works, though only against a small-ish subset of foes (humanoids with weapons)
Pretty sure Grapple doesn't work with a reach weapon. You'll also frequently face monsters who are both bigger and stronger than you.
Overrun requires you to enter an opponent's space-- reach won't help. It's terrible, though, so no loss.
Sunder works, though inefficiently and against an even smaller subset of foes than Disarm (humanoids with important gear that you don't want to use or sell)
Tripping works, though it requires both a specific weapon and an opponent who isn't too much bigger, stronger, and/or multi-legged. And who doesn't have equal or greater reach than you, which, again, will be many melee threats.

So... by "all maneuvers at will," you mean "disarming and tripping, as long as you have the right gear and you're fighting humanoids of about your size."

[Psyren]

Agreed with Grod - even if we ignore the AoO problem, you pretty frequently need ALL those +2 bonuses just to keep up, and several items or buffs besides. They are indeed quite crucial, both individually and collectively, if you want combat maneuvers to not be a wasted action half the time or more. (Worse than a wasted action, since failing them can actively hurt you. At least a failed spell doesn't usually result in your character prone, disarmed, bleeding out or being put in a full-nelson.) And that's just against the monsters who are roughly humanoid in shape and close to your size - it gets even worse when you start adding in the quadrupeds, or elementals, or the ones with a snake bottom half etc.

For my part, I don't mind needing those bonuses for the math to keep up, but what I do mind is those bonuses being scattered across 3-4 different feats for a single maneuver. Not when you can just as easily have one feat for each (as the Feat Taxes blog post does) and simply gate the bonuses the feat grants you behind level or BAB tiers to keep lower-level encounters from being trivialized.

[Kurald Galain]

Stealthing mid-combat? Stealthing into melee in combat?
Ninja says hi :smallbiggrin:

Aside from that, there's an obvious difference between (a) maneuvers being an all-round decent option when tactically appropriate, and (b) wanting a build that does nothing but spam the same maneuver over-and-over-again and expecting it to work on everything you face. Forums tend to aim for the latter, game designers tend to build for the former.

[Psyren]

I agree they shouldn't work in every circumstance, but there are already monsters that are just plain immune to several ones who represent that kind of variety just fine. I don't expect to be able to disarm a Great Wyrm Dragon or Adamantine Golem - there's nothing there to disarm. But instead, I think relieving that Balor of his whip and vorpal sword is (or should be) a viable strategy.

[exelsisxax]

One of the biggest problems, I think, is that so many things in the combat system are gated behind feats. They're either impractically difficult or flat-out impossible, and so, so many martial build resources have to be dedicated just to doing things without penalty. Look at how many suggestions here have already been answered by "there's a feat for that." Sure, there is a feat for it, but you'll only have a few feats available, ever. I mean, honestly? I think you could probably take about 80% of the combat feats in the PHB, turn them into a thing anyone can do, and be fine. That's why ToB is so nice for martials--it gives them the ability to do things without having to invest heavily.

There are a couple hack-y things you can do. More skill points and free skill tricks is a good one. Making combat maneuvers more practical (no AoOs, bonuses based on BAB and/or reduced size modifiers, more ability to mix them with regular attacks) is good. Making movement easier (Pounce becomes a basic part of the rules, 5ft steps scale with BAB, allow movement before full attacking, whatever) is good. Scrapping garbage prereqs (Dodge-and-Mobility, Point-Blank Shot, Combat Expertise...pretty sure they literally only exist as roadblocks) is good. Making Dex-based combat easier is good.

But if you really want to make martials nice? Subsystem. 3.x really turns on subsystems, on having a set of specific abilities that override the general rules. Maybe you expand maneuvers. Maybe you make Stamina-and-Combat-Tricks less feat dependent. Personally, I kind of like the idea of turning skill tricks into something really robust* and grafting them onto non-magical classes. Maybe just cut out Barbarians and Rogues altogether and replace them with things like Totemists and Swordsages. Just... give them something special.


*Write more, covering more situations; grant a bunch of tricks for free, particularly for classes with limited or no access to any other subsystem; and let them be used more often

I feel like the people that gave such responses didn't read the OP, so I don't bother reading their posts either.

I like the idea of skill tricks, I just haven't seen many good ones for martials. A lot of it is probably just because of how the PF skill system and its ancestors were set up. Basically everything they do is explicitly called out in a spell that completely replaces their function, and does a better job of it. They don't do much at all outside of combat except social skills, but the systemization of those and profession/perform/craft is completely out of line.

So I guess fixing skills is basically the requirement there: wizards have pages-long extremely detailed rules on how to craft virtually any magic item composed of spell effects, and are NOT restricted from going outside that box by the rules - while trying to use diplomacy to gain a noble title is a crapshoot gauntlet of DM rulings.

And now i'm afflicted by the desire to rewrite half the social skills to be useful even if you don't have a wildly permissive DM.

Did anyone ever try creating a list of new (read: better) skill tricks for 3.5, or try to bring the system to PF?



Use Spheres of Might (optionally also Path of War for more options), whichever feat tax/scaling rules you prefer, and Automatic Bonus Progression.
Port Resolve over from Starfinder. Fold Combat Stamina and its associated Tricks into it. All martial point-pool abilities (Panache/Grit, Arcane Pool, etc) now use Resolve instead.
Also port Soldier and Operative in. Give the Soldier Weapon/Armor Training and the Fighter's proficiencies and call it the Unchained Fighter. Operative flat-out replaces Unchained Rogue, adding Debilitating Injury's effects as additional options for Debilitating Trick, and gaining Trapfinding, Danger Sense, Finesse Training, and reverting Uncanny Agility to Uncanny Dodge and IUD, but losing the Operative's multiattack features.
Everyone gets Skill Unlocks automatically with the right number of ranks. Rogues/Operatives now have the abilities of the Phantom Thief archetype baked in, getting Skill Unlocks early instead of Rogue's Edge.


Part of the reason for this thread is the woeful disappointment I feel at SoM. I don't think it accomplished anything, other than making martial characters more resemble the complications of spellcasters. They're still mostly useless at everything other than combat(alchemy sphere excepted) and rely heavily on gimmicks or (Su) disguised as (Ex). I'd rather use PoW in every case, but even that doesn't fix the main problem, though it is far more versatile and interesting than vanilla martials.

I am totally unfamiliar with resolve/starfinder, and have never used the combat stamina system. Could you explain the former, and do you think the latter actually does the job(at least in part)? It seems to me that combat stamina abilities of feats should have been integral upgrades to those feats rather than use-limited and access-restricted bonuses. But again, never actually used it.

[Psyren]

I don't like Skill Tricks, because they're unintuitive. It becomes difficult to audit the skill ranks of a character who has them, because tricks (especially multiple) change the total amount they should have. In addition, a fairly large number of them should just be baseline usages of the skill imo.

I like the idea of Skill Unlocks as a differentiator between the intended "skillmonkey classes" (especially the Rogue, who should be king) and everyone else, however I think the ones in Unchained could use a bit of tweaking. There's several abilities scattered throughout Mythic that I would consider poaching back to a regular PF game for this purpose.

[noob]

Give full wizard casting for everybody.
Now martial characters are playable.

[exelsisxax]

I don't like Skill Tricks, because they're unintuitive. It becomes difficult to audit the skill ranks of a character who has them, because tricks (especially multiple) change the total amount they should have. In addition, a fairly large number of them should just be baseline usages of the skill imo.

I like the idea of Skill Unlocks as a differentiator between the intended "skillmonkey classes" (especially the Rogue, who should be king) and everyone else, however I think the ones in Unchained could use a bit of tweaking. There's several abilities scattered throughout Mythic that I would consider poaching back to a regular PF game for this purpose.

What's the difficulty in tracking skill tricks? Wasn't it just 2 skill points each? With PF's retroactive skill points, that should be easy to check, assuming people are listing their skill tricks. And of course, paying skill points to get nice things doesn't fix the fact that martials lack the build resources to make use of skills. But I do think it would be better to either hand them out for free, make them actual feats or some combination, with bias towards skillmonkeys. I was considering 1 per even level, subtracting your highest level of spell known, up to your base skill points.

Of course, this is indeed assuming skill tricks were made not sucky, and not taxes to make skills do what they should already. Pathfinder does some of that already.

On that note: does consolidating skills a bit further help martials/skillmonkeys at all? Climb and swim being one skill might be nice, but do wizards and magi have enough skill points to just take everything good anyway?

[Psyren]

It's not "difficult" just inelegant. If I look at a character's Int and class levels, I know how many ranks they should have, which should tie out to the ranks they have invested. Skill Tricks muddy that for no real benefit. (I'd either just make them baseline, or if they're truly powerful enough, make them either Traits or Skill Unlocks.)



On that note: does consolidating skills a bit further help martials/skillmonkeys at all? Climb and swim being one skill might be nice, but do wizards and magi have enough skill points to just take everything good anyway?

Starfinder has done a bunch of this. Climb and Swim (along with Jump) have been combined into "Athletics." Fly, Balance, Escape Artist and Tumble have been combined into "Acrobatics." Multiple Knowledges have been combined as well - History, Nobility, Local and Religion all fall under "Culture." Architecture and Disable Device fall under "Engineering." Survival now also includes Handle Animal and Ride. Etc.

In addition, Starfinder has no 2+Int classes, everyone is 4+Int or higher.

[Dr_Dinosaur]

Part of the reason for this thread is the woeful disappointment I feel at SoM. I don't think it accomplished anything, other than making martial characters more resemble the complications of spellcasters. They're still mostly useless at everything other than combat(alchemy sphere excepted) and rely heavily on gimmicks or (Su) disguised as (Ex). I'd rather use PoW in every case, but even that doesn't fix the main problem, though it is far more versatile and interesting than vanilla martials.

I mean, if nothing else SoM give martials movement, a boatload of potential extra skill ranks, and a patch to make maneuvers and other non full attack options worth using, while building on the existing rules rather than introducing martial spellcasting. I like Path of War too, but would rather use it as a supplement for Spheres (but then I use Spheres of Power too, so casters *don’t* have all those skill-replacing spells).


I am totally unfamiliar with resolve/starfinder, and have never used the combat stamina system. Could you explain the former, and do you think the latter actually does the job(at least in part)? It seems to me that combat stamina abilities of feats should have been integral upgrades to those feats rather than use-limited and access-restricted bonuses. But again, never actually used it.
Resolve is a single pool of points all characters have that subsumed all the individual pools in Pathfinder that can also be spent universally to recover some hp or stabilize in a pinch. Incorporating it allows characters who multiclass between many classes with pool mechanics to combine them, making for a more streamlined experience and less reliance on magical healing all in one. Combat Stamina did not do its job, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to add Combat Tricks to the baseline function of Resolve since we have it, opening up a few more options.

[exelsisxax]

Starfinder has done a bunch of this. Climb and Swim (along with Jump) have been combined into "Athletics." Fly, Balance, Escape Artist and Tumble have been combined into "Acrobatics." Multiple Knowledges have been combined as well - History, Nobility, Local and Religion all fall under "Culture." Architecture and Disable Device fall under "Engineering." Survival now also includes Handle Animal and Ride. Etc.

In addition, Starfinder has no 2+Int classes, everyone is 4+Int or higher.

But does this change itself help skillmonkeys, and at least not hurt martials? Or is that more because of the combined alterations in skill points and power of spells?

It's a benefit to convenience, but is there actually a way to do so that helps out the non-magically inclined that isn't just merging martial/monkey skills while leaving magic skills split all over the place?


I mean, if nothing else SoM give martials movement, a boatload of potential extra skill ranks, and a patch to make maneuvers and other non full attack options worth using, while building on the existing rules rather than introducing martial spellcasting. I like Path of War too, but would rather use it as a supplement for Spheres (but then I use Spheres of Power too, so casters *don’t* have all those skill-replacing spells).

Yeah, the elephant in the room is basically the assumption that casters are made non-gamebreaking, which I would personally do by mandating SoP. I don't think SoM accomplishes the goals that SoP did. It is not the extremely flexible toolbox that was expected, it doesn't do a good job of making lots of thematic characters possible, and it's more complicated than necessary. PoW and SoP classes don't have to put up with complicated dependency trees in too damn many spheres to get what they want.



Resolve is a single pool of points all characters have that subsumed all the individual pools in Pathfinder that can also be spent universally to recover some hp or stabilize in a pinch. Incorporating it allows characters who multiclass between many classes with pool mechanics to combine them, making for a more streamlined experience and less reliance on magical healing all in one. Combat Stamina did not do its job, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to add Combat Tricks to the baseline function of Resolve since we have it, opening up a few more options.

While that's certainly better from a design and ease of use standpoint, where does resolve help martials? If it was martial-only, I could see it as a soft replacer for buffs and healing. But if you bring combat tricks into the question, I'd say the stamina abilities should be added into the default feat where they are new abilities. The numbers-stacking tricks aren't interesting and don't help martials where they need it anyway.

[Psyren]

But does this change itself help skillmonkeys, and at least not hurt martials? Or is that more because of the combined alterations in skill points and power of spells?

Uh, of course it helps them. Fewers skills means you can, for example, climb a wall to keep watch and still have points left over. Why do you think it wouldn't?



It's a benefit to convenience, but is there actually a way to do so that helps out the non-magically inclined that isn't just merging martial/monkey skills while leaving magic skills split all over the place?

I don't know what you mean by "martial/monkey/magic" skills. Can you elaborate?

[BassoonHero]

Aside from that, there's an obvious difference between (a) maneuvers being an all-round decent option when tactically appropriate, and (b) wanting a build that does nothing but spam the same maneuver over-and-over-again and expecting it to work on everything you face.
This is exactly the crux of the issue. When basic competence is gated behind feats, it's not worth using a maneuver unless you're going to specialize in it. For example, if you have to invest two feats on Improved Trip to avoid attacks of opportunity, no one is going to make that investment just to have a "decent option when tactically appropriate", and the only characters who use trip will be the specialists. It's almost never worth taking a free attack to trip an opponent, especially when failure on the attempt means falling prone yourself. In almost all cases, you're more likely to harm yourself than your opponent.

On the other hand, if you remove the unnecessary barrier of an attack of opportunity, then tripping becomes just another weapon in a martial character's arsenal. It won't be used all the time, because most characters will specialize in other areas, but it will indeed be "an all-round decent option when tactically appropriate".


Forums tend to aim for the latter, game designers tend to build for the former.
The game designers failed. They created maneuvers that aren't worth using without specific feats that in turn aren't worth taking unless you're planning to specialize. This is the problem that we would like to rectify.


Did anyone ever try creating a list of new (read: better) skill tricks for 3.5
As a matter of fact, yes. It's still a work in progress, but from the discussions we've been having these past few weeks, it sounds like even an incomplete system might be worth posting.


I don't like Skill Tricks, because they're unintuitive. It becomes difficult to audit the skill ranks of a character who has them, because tricks (especially multiple) change the total amount they should have. In addition, a fairly large number of them should just be baseline usages of the skill imo.
Agreed and agreed.


What's the difficulty in tracking skill tricks?
Death by a thousand cuts. Tracking skill points is already a pain for moderately complicated characters. Skill tricks add to the hassle.

[exelsisxax]

Uh, of course it helps them. Fewers skills means you can, for example, climb a wall to keep watch and still have points left over. Why do you think it wouldn't?

I don't know what you mean by "martial/monkey/magic" skills. Can you elaborate?

I mean does it help them in relation to spellcasters, especially INT-based ones, who can also throw skill points around without build investment?

acrobatics: let's be real, it's basically for avoiding AoO on movement. spellcasters don't need or want it, so merging it with parts of escape artist is a freebie for non-spellcasters because they get more skill points in the exchange. Similarly with disguise, bluff, sleight of hand, UMD for skillmonkeys.
On the other hand, spellcasters like K(arcana), spellcraft, K(whatever), and the like. Making those one skill gives every wizard a bunch of skill points for free when they don't need them.

[Psyren]

I mean does it help them in relation to spellcasters, especially INT-based ones, who can also throw skill points around without build investment?

Nobody needs "build investment" for skill points. They're completely separate from class features, and are just things you want your character to be good at doing. You can make a Technomancer who is good at talking to people or a Mystic who is good with computers if you want.

Also, in Starfinder when you gain attributes from leveling, you increase four of them simultaneously instead of just one, and any scores below 17 go up 2 points instead of 1. So you can very easily have decent mental scores even on a martial.



acrobatics: let's be real, it's basically for avoiding AoO on movement. spellcasters don't need or want it, so merging it with parts of escape artist is a freebie for non-spellcasters because they get more skill points in the exchange. Similarly with disguise, bluff, sleight of hand, UMD for skillmonkeys.
On the other hand, spellcasters like K(arcana), spellcraft, craft, and the like. Making those one skill gives every wizard a bunch of skill points for free when they don't need them.

There are no "wizards" in Starfinder; the Int-based caster is limited to 6ths, and everyone is roughly the same power level (or at least, a lot closer together than they were in 3.5 or even PF.)

[Kurald Galain]

This is exactly the crux of the issue. When basic competence is gated behind feats, it's not worth using a maneuver unless you're going to specialize in it.
Precisely, and what you're missing (as pointed out earlier in this thread) is that it is not gated like that. For instance, anyone can wield a reach weapon to trip without OAs; ninjas can use their vanish ability; and there's a couple other counters.

Combat is supposed to be about tactics, after all. Just because an ability doesn't automatically always work, doesn't mean it's worthless now.

[exelsisxax]

Precisely, and what you're missing (as pointed out earlier in this thread) is that it is not gated like that. For instance, anyone can wield a reach weapon to trip without OAs; ninjas can use their vanish ability; and there's a couple other counters.

Combat is supposed to be about tactics, after all. Just because an ability doesn't automatically always work, doesn't mean it's worthless now.

Good thing spells are gated behind multiple requirements, many of which are at odds with the necessities of outfitting them for their intended role, and there are plenty of non-spell methods that can act as counters to spells..

Oh, right, it's the other way around. Because a wizard DOESN'T need to prep burning hands to prep scorching ray to prep fireball, black tentacles gets to hit everything without provoking AoO with massive bonuses not dependent on feats, and dominate person literally cannot miss.

So yeah, SOMETHING in the game isn't gated like that, but it sure as hell isn't combat maneuvers.

[Kurald Galain]

Wait, I can explain this better.

It all boils down to game design. There are several kinds of players, and different people want different things out of the game. If you're playing, it doesn't really matter that there are playstyles other than your own; but if you write a game, you have to balance those or your game won't sell.

Wizards of the Coast has numerous insightful articles about types of players. For example, there's Timmy, Johnny, and Spike. If you're not familiar with them, look them up on the WOTC site. It is important to note that all three are valid playstyles and none of them is better or worse than the others.

You are a Spike player.
Tripping is a Johnny mechanic (and to a lesser extent, Timmy).
This is why you don't like it. If you were to rewrite tripping as a Spike mechanic, then Johnny wouldn't like it any more. That's all there is to it.

[BassoonHero]

Just because an ability doesn't automatically always work, doesn't mean it's worthless now.
This is a rather insulting misrepresentation. No one is saying anything of the sort, and it doesn't help your case to argue against an imaginary opponent.

You point out that some specific builds can gain incidental value from combat maneuvers. No one disagrees with you. Rather, the problem we're talking about is that martial characters in general don't gain that kind of incidental value. It's true that "polearm users" is a broader category than "specialists with Improved Trip", but it's still a small fraction of martial characters in general. Moreover, the reason that non-specialist polearm users are able to make use of tripping and disarming in the first place is that they have an easy way to circumvent the very restriction that many of us would eliminate. (The example of a ninja is even sillier; not only is it completely irrelevant to ordinary martial characters who lack effective stealth abilities, but also the stealthier classes aren't generally very good at combat maneuvers in the first place.)

Merely removing the restriction for all martial characters does not somehow imbue them with superlative tripping and disarming ability. In fact, it has no effect whatsoever on the odds of success! Surely you don't mean to claim that such a change would make combat maneuvers "automatically always work".

[exelsisxax]

Wait, I can explain this better.

It all boils down to game design. There are several kinds of players, and different people want different things out of the game. If you're playing, it doesn't really matter that there are playstyles other than your own; but if you write a game, you have to balance those or your game won't sell.

Wizards of the Coast has numerous insightful articles about types of players. For example, there's Timmy, Johnny, and Spike. If you're not familiar with them, look them up on the WOTC site. It is important to note that all three are valid playstyles and none of them is better or worse than the others.

You are a Spike player.
Tripping is a Johnny mechanic (and to a lesser extent, Timmy).
This is why you don't like it. If you were to rewrite tripping as a Spike mechanic, then Johnny wouldn't like it any more. That's all there is to it.

The bold is so obviously wrong I can hardly believe you typed it out. MTG is so horrifically balanced that they have a schedule by which cards are phased out of legal use so they only dominate the game for a limited duration. They have multiple formats, divided approximately by how pay-to-win they are, each with its own list of permabanned cards. If you showed up at a tournament with a WOtC premade deck, you will lose every single match. If you want to win a vintage match, pony up at least 1K or you can't get close to winning. This is NOT balance, it is interesting and controlled chaos that WOtC barely, and often fails, at keeping in check.

In 3.PF, 9th level casters. Need I go on? It should be obvious at this point that there IS NO BALANCE between full casters and martials.

I don't WANT to break the game, that's why I want martials to not suck. Where's your player archetype for "doesn't want to win if it's the equivalent of punching babies"?

[Catarang]

You are a Spike player.
Tripping is a Johnny mechanic (and to a lesser extent, Timmy).
This is why you don't like it. If you were to rewrite tripping as a Spike mechanic, then Johnny wouldn't like it any more. That's all there is to it.

Assuming I understand the 3 types, and specifically the one you mentioned enjoys tripping, this seems like a poor reason to make tripping gated behind multiple feats. A Johnny player may appreciate the fact that tripping isn’t widely used because it takes multiple feats to even be moderately ok at it, but surely he would appreciate it more if he can use it to combo off of other abilities that makes his play style unique (something I believe is hard if tripping is gated). We shouldn’t make a maneuver esoteric so that for players to enjoy it they have to enjoy the effort it takes to make it not esoteric.

[upho]

It all boils down to game design. There are several kinds of players, and different people want different things out of the game. If you're playing, it doesn't really matter that there are playstyles other than your own; but if you write a game, you have to balance those or your game won't sell.It seems to me you've missed the point. It's as if you were suggesting a new car model should come with a gear box and drive train unable to handle the engine's power, because "different people want different things out of the car".

In the end, Spike, Johnny and Timmy all want their game to work well, even though they may have somewhat different ultimate motivations driving that want that should be reflected in mechanics. Likewise, I'm pretty certain you'll find the even the people posting in this thread have somewhat different ultimate motivations driving their want to give martials nice things.


Wizards of the Coast has numerous insightful articles about types of players. For example, there's Timmy, Johnny, and Spike. If you're not familiar with them, look them up on the WOTC site. It is important to note that all three are valid playstyles and none of them is better or worse than the others.Interesting, but it seems to me the profiles aren't very applicable to a game so fundamentally different from MTG as 3.PF is. (Though 4e had a similar thing to help GMs satisfy the wishes/styles of different players.)


You are a Spike player.
Tripping is a Johnny mechanic (and to a lesser extent, Timmy).
This is why you don't like it. If you were to rewrite tripping as a Spike mechanic, then Johnny wouldn't like it any more. That's all there is to it.No, because Johnny is most likely also fully capable of understanding that the weak tripping mechanics are part of the reason his game has serious flaws, and that fixing those flaws ultimately serves his playstyle/motivations far better than preserving tripping as a niche style. Especially since he knows that fixing combat maneuvers and giving martials nice things won't result in the game running out of niche/odd/challenging stuff for him to explore and show off his talents with.

And coincidentally, I believe this also illustrates some of the fundamental differences between a competitive mechanics-based game like MTG and a cooperative RPG like 3.PF.


I don't WANT to break the game, that's why I want martials to not suck. Where's your player archetype for "doesn't want to win if it's the equivalent of punching babies"?This put a big smile on my face. And expresses pretty much exactly my thoughts.

[NightbringerGGZ]

To start with, there are some optional or new rules which have helped out quite some and could be be further expanded upon.

1. Use of the Background Skill system. This already helps out by giving you two free skill ranks for some of the more flavorful but less routinely useful skills. If you also increase the minimum baseline for standard skills to 4+Int (with corresponding increases for archetypes that grant bonus skill ranks) then quite a few martial classes wind up in much better shape.

2. Give Stamina & Combat Tricks to all full BAB classes, let others gain entry via spending a feat. This isn't a complete fix, but it does shore up some weaker combat feats. The primary negative here is that Paizo was a bit lazy with benefits, often option to just give static number increases. Some of the tricks actually grant additional abilities though and that's a very interesting design philosophy to explore.

3. Allow the use of Skill Unlocks, Occult Skill Unlocks and so on[/B]. A single feat to unlock several new abilities off of a skill is a pretty fair trade off for martials, from a design perspective. The options provided by Paizo are a bit underwhelming, but some of our third-party writers could come up with better options. I'd actually like to see skills unlock (Ex) abilities which actually feel extraordinary.

4. Bring in more talent systems for classes. AAT and AWT were great for the Fighter. The improved talents available to the UnRouge were as well. These systems are great for character variety, but also an additional balancing knob (a term borrowed from Ghostcrawler) for a class. They also help counteract the sheer variety of options casters get from picking spells. I'd like Grit classes to be able to pick from a large pool of Deeds instead of gaining specified ones as just one example.


As for some other ideas:

1. Kill feat taxes, combine combat feats. I've actually started working on an update to the feat taxes blog post for my players, mostly because it is a bit out of date. I've spent a ton of hours evaluating combat feats for my Fighter guide. I'm halfway through the "S" feats and at 82 pages... that's a crazy amount of feats and most are of marginal utility or no utility. There's no reason to have tax feats that nobody wants when there are so many feats you would like. If you combine or grant for free the various "required" feats for certain builds you also grant players the ability to pick between truly specialized feats (thinks like Stand Still or Directed Disarm) or going for non-combat feats for increased utility.

2. I've touched on this a little, but I'd like to see the overall power level of (Ex) abilities increase a bit. Earlier somebody mentioned that jumping could be used in a similar manner to Fly and I agree. The real-world record for a long-jump is a bit more than 29 feet, so a DC29 acrobatics check. Why not grant a fantasy class (Rogue, Swashbuckler, Barbarian) the ability to pull off some crazier jumps or make such jumps without needing skill checks? Shoot, going back to the AAT and AWT example, most of those abilities are (Ex) and there are a ton of really impressive abilities there.

3. New game systems that everybody has access to. Starfinder's extra system for ship-to-ship combat gives characters extra uses for their skills and abilities, with more ways to shine. The foraging and harvesting systems from Ultimate Wilderness could be expanded upon for useful things to do while in the field. Why not adjust item crafting and magic item crafting to not need spell casting? Plenty of fantasy settings use innate properties of crafting materials to impart magical effects rather than permanently applying a spell effect. That's also a system that could go hand-in-hand with foraging & harvesting. Let your Fighter also be your smith, crafting special items that your Ranger harvests from kills.

[upho]

More on topic, a few thoughts on earlier posts:

Weapon finesse should be a universal option like fighting defensively instead of a feat.
No, it should not. Dex is overall a much better stat than str is, and this is balanced by making Str the default attack/damage stat. If dex to hit and/or dex to damage are free for everyone, you've just made almost all str-builds obsolete.No, at least not with a few reasonable options to at least partially sub out default Dex stuff like initiative to mental stats. And note that the suggestion here was to give Finesse for free, not to also give Dex to damage for free.

FWIW, I've been running Paizo + most DSP with free Finesse for more than four years now, with 4 of 5 players being very experienced and competent character builders. It has not made Str builds obsolete in any way, despite easy access to Dex damage via Deadly Agility and even free Piranha Strike. Which isn't strange IMO, since what's pretty much always being ignored in arguments about Dex being superior are all the less immediately obvious advantages Str has, such as:

More substantial direct numeric boosts available.
Several times more numerous direct numeric boosts options available.
Several times more numerous and/or substantial Str based boosts of combat values available (notably to damage and Intimidate).
Benefits from size increases (instead of the opposite).
Requires less investment for baseline functionality.
Works with all melee weapons (and thrown with Powerful Throw/Belt of Mighty Hurling).

So the effect has basically been that Dex has become a more viable option and sees more use, but still less than Str. And perhaps interestingly, especially when it comes to effective martial melee builds not focusing on damage, Str remains superior to Dex.


That's because Str builds suck, not because dex builds are too good. Dex to damage is nonsensical, though not overpowered. Do you have anything to offer to make Str builds better? out-of-combat options for the power-attacking barb don't really scream "strength-related"I mostly agree, but would maybe say that martial melee sucks in general, Str OR Dex based. At least in a Paizo-only game.


The Disruptive feat can also be taken by e.g. barbarians, rangers, and slayers. If you think the penalty is too small, that's an easy fix (e.g. make it half your BAB with a minimum of 4, something like that).Disruptive is pretty awful almost regardless of the penalty, and a good example of how martials are being screwed over. Because the main problem in a real game tends not to be that casters rarely provoke when casting a spell, it's that you can't do anything about the defensive spells already cast. So even if Disruptive made it impossible to cast defensively while threatened, it would still rarely have any impact on the outcome of combat IME, because the caster would a) rarely be threatened to begin with thanks to stuff such as greater invisibility and vastly superior mobility, and b) rarely be hit thanks to stuff such as mirror image, blink, invisibility, blur, displacement, etc.

So IMO, the key thing that's missing here are relatively easily accessible variants of Spell Sunder or other ways to ignore/reduce common defensive spell effects.

[Kurald Galain]

In the end, Spike, Johnny and Timmy all want their game to work well, even though they may have somewhat different ultimate motivations driving that want that should be reflected in mechanics.
Yes, and the main point is they have different GOALS. Their whole concept of when the game works well is different.


Interesting, but it seems to me the profiles aren't very applicable to a game so fundamentally different from MTG as 3.PF is. (Though 4e had a similar thing to help GMs satisfy the wishes/styles of different players.)
The principle is clearly still there. Some players want to play the BIG guy with the BIG sword and are happy when they do BIG damage on a crit, and don't care what their averages or chances are (these people tend to be happy with the martials already!). Some people want to play a role and don't particularly care about mechanics (so you probably won't find them in a forum about game mechanics). Some players like to create weird combos using spells or items that most others haven't considered. And some people want to have a good DPR and care a lot about game balance. This is just a summary, there are clearly some other types too.

Now, if you want to argue that (1) there are WAY too many feats, (2) a LOT of them suck, and (3) many of them have pointless prerequisites; then yes, almost all of these are going to agree with you.

But if you want to argue that a risk/reward mechanic is completely unusable until you've managed to removed the risk, you're going to find that three out of the four types of players I just mentioned do not agree. Risk/reward mechanics have their place in their game, by cutting them out you're needlessly limiting your design space.

Anyway let's get back to the poor ol' fighter.


FWIW, I've been running Paizo + most DSP with free Finesse for more than four years now,
Well, I'm not familiar with DSP so that may make a big difference here. One of your points is that str requires less investment, which is obviously true, but it becomes irrelevant once you start giving dex builds the investment for free. I note that dex builds benefit from size decreases, and this is actually very powerful: enlarging boosts your damage die and your damage modifier, and gives you reach; whereas reducing lowers your damage die, still increases your damage modifier, and also boosts your to-hit roll and armor class.


when it comes to effective martial melee builds not focusing on damage, Str remains superior to Dex.
What do you mean? It strikes me that a dex build has better defenses and more opportunity attacks, for instance.


So IMO, the key thing that's missing here are relatively easily accessible variants of Spell Sunder or other ways to ignore/reduce common defensive spell effects.
Yes, I entirely agree. I've had some success with Blind Fight and the Smash From The Air ability, but these abilities do tend to have too many limitations and prereqs. For example, I love the concept of Spell Sunder, but it requires a rather pointless other rage power as the prereq, and it is once-per-rage meaning you need rage cycling.

For example, something like this.

Cold Iron Strike (feat, requires 3 ranks in spellcraft). When you hit an enemy with a cold iron weapon, choose one magical effect on that enemy (you don't need to name the exact spell; describing it in general terms is sufficient). Make a spellcraft check; on a result of 15 + the level of that effect, the effect is suppressed for one round. Multiple uses of this feat stack.

Seen It Before (feat, requires BAB 8). There are numerous common tricks people used to defend themselves with, and as an experienced warrior you've seen them all before and know how to deal with them. When attacking an enemy, you ignore every first- or second-level spell effect (including metamagic'ed versions thereof) that would make that enemy harder to hit, such as the Shield or Invisibility spells.

[Florian]

Yes, I entirely agree. I've had some success with Blind Fight and the Smash From The Air ability, but these abilities do tend to have too many limitations and prereqs. For example, I love the concept of Spell Sunder, but it requires a rather pointless other rage power as the prereq, and it is once-per-rage meaning you need rage cycling.

I actually like Blinded Blade Style for this and dwarf fighter are pretty good with Spell Sunder and Abundant Tactics.

[Psyren]

Both 5e and Starfinder have made Weapon Finesse free for everyone without repercussions, so I have no problem with backporting that to 3.5 and PF. It very clearly has not broken anything.

[Kurald Galain]

Both 5e and Starfinder have made Weapon Finesse free for everyone without repercussions, so I have no problem with backporting that to 3.5 and PF. It very clearly has not broken anything.

5E has also removed feats, flanking, and OAs for spellcasting from the game by default. You should also backport that, clearly it has not broken anything :smallbiggrin:

[Psyren]

5E has also removed feats, flanking, and OAs for spellcasting from the game by default. You should also backport that, clearly it has not broken anything :smallbiggrin:

Starfinder still has all of those things, so nice try :smalltongue:

Besides which, this is not in good faith. You're talking about a change to the fundamental framework of the game's combat system (e.g. removing flanking.) I'm talking about getting rid of a single feat tax. They're hardly comparable.

[Molosse]

Can't add much more than what people have mentioned here but aye, can't help but feel that Power Attack/Combat Expertise/Deadly Aim and the like should be added as default options for everyone and the core elements of feat chains should be condensed into a single feat that adds additional features when certain gates are passed, be it BaB or other requirements. If nothing else this'll let Martials either invest into multiple avenues of progression or leave them spare feat slots that they can throw into non-combat options.

Finally both condensing a number of skills and adding more options to those skills would benefit characters without access to magic. For example the new Weapon Modification chain of feats from Adventurers Armory 2 is just the worst, but by tying those feats into the Craft skill without requiring a feat tax makes them an interesting addition to a subsystem that has commonly been overwrought with powerful magic and much weaker martial options.

[exelsisxax]

So, to do a similar job of disruptive, would this feat be too weak, considering a +4 BaB requirement neighborhood?



When you deal damage with a melee attack, the target must make concentration checks against that damage until your next turn to cast any spells, SLAs, or supernatural abilities. This is in addition to any other concentration checks, such as to cast defensively. They must also make such a concentration check as your turn ends to maintain use-activated effects such as held or not discharged touch attacks. If you damage a single enemy multiple times only the highest damage is used for all checks this feat forces them to make.


It would be almost impossible for things that fighters and friends hit to cast anything, the problem is accomplishing the hitting against certain targets that can abuse non-AC methods of evasion.

[BassoonHero]

But if you want to argue that a risk/reward mechanic is completely unusable until you've managed to removed the risk...
Literally no one is arguing that. I don't know why you insist on mischaracterizing arguments you disagree with.

Disarming, to pick a representative example, has several risks. You could be hit by the attack of opportunity. You could be disarmed in return. You could fail and waste an action, or succeed but accomplish less than you would have in an ordinary attack (opportunity costs are real costs!). No one is suggesting that it should be "free" to disarm someone any more than anyone is suggesting (as you said a few posts ago) that disarming should always succeed. Nor, I believe, is anyone suggesting that the chance to be disarmed in return should be eliminated. (That would be a reasonable discussion to have, but it's not the one we're actually having.) So removing the attack of opportunity clearly does not remove all risk from the choice to disarm (instead of attacking or taking another action).

With the attack of opportunity, martial characters are faced with trade-offs. Removing the attack of opportunity does not fundamentally change this; it merely adjusts the relative risks and rewards. With the attack of opportunity, it is very rare that a non-specialist martial character would find it worthwhile to try to disarm an opponent (generally, it is only worthwhile when the attack of opportunity is inconsequential). Without the attack of opportunity, it becomes a much more reasonable option for occasional use.

[Kurald Galain]

Literally no one is arguing that.
Perhaps you've missed it, but this guy called Bassoon Hero has argued precisely that, a couple posts up. Here you go,


This is exactly the crux of the issue. When basic competence is gated behind feats,

[Kurald Galain]

So, to do a similar job of disruptive, would this feat be too weak, considering a +4 BaB requirement neighborhood?



It would be almost impossible for things that fighters and friends hit to cast anything, the problem is accomplishing the hitting against certain targets that can abuse non-AC methods of evasion.

It's a bit wordy, perhaps. I think it's comparable to the Magus arcana Lingering Pain (which is also basically "if I hit you, you can't cast any more").

I don't see a problem with it. Back in second edition, any damage while casting was an auto-fail on your spell (since there was no concentration check yet) and I know that 2E wizards were not considered weak either.

[Psyren]

Perhaps you've missed it, but this guy called Bassoon Hero has argued precisely that, a couple posts up. Here you go,

I don't see anything in that quote that corresponds to the massive strawman you're ubercharging.

[exelsisxax]

It's a bit wordy, perhaps. I think it's comparable to the Magus arcana Lingering Pain (which is also basically "if I hit you, you can't cast any more").

I don't see a problem with it. Back in second edition, any damage while casting was an auto-fail on your spell (since there was no concentration check yet) and I know that 2E wizards were not considered weak either.

'continuous damage' being a term does shorten things a bit. Does it count damage as stacking, or independent as my feat? I suppose most casters are likely shut down to 5% success rate anyway, but I'd like to know the RAW.

Also, lingering pain doesn't work on Su casting, while I explicitly want this to. Though I wish there was a better way to distinguish between Su capabilities and the various Su 'casting, but doesn't count as a spell!' things.

[BassoonHero]

Perhaps you've missed it, but this guy called Bassoon Hero has argued precisely that, a couple posts up. Here you go,
All right, let's play that game. What I said:

When basic competence is gated behind feats, it's not worth using a maneuver unless you're going to specialize in it.
What you think that means, "precisely":

a risk/reward mechanic is completely unusable until you've managed to removed the risk
I won't insult you by suggesting that you actually believe that "basic competence" requires removing all risk. But what's the point in misrepresenting what I said when it's all here for anyone to read?

[upho]

Yes, and the main point is they have different GOALS. Their whole concept of when the game works well is different.So what if they have different goals when it comes to certain specifics? As far as I've understood, absolutely no post in this thread argues that you should not cater to different player profiles/playstyles. But you seem to believe that if, for example, baseline combat maneuvers are changed to not be quite as exceptionally awful as they currently are, Johnny will find the game doesn't work as well as it used to do, and that it's less fun for him. More importantly, you're saying that Johnny would feel this way regardless of how much better the game in general would work, regardless of how much less irrelevant his martial PC would become, regardless of how many more tactically interesting choices his PC would have in combat, regardless of how many more character concepts he would be able to make mechanically viable, regardless of how much happier his friends Timmy, Spike and GM would be, regardless of how much more interested they would be in playing with him, and so on.

I'm saying I don't believe that for a second. At least not if Johnny actually wants to play 3.PF and isn't a complete fool or major A-hole. Or as exelsisxax put it:
I don't WANT to break the game, that's why I want martials to not suck. Where's your player archetype for "doesn't want to win if it's the equivalent of punching babies"?


The principle is clearly still there. Some players want to play the BIG guy with the BIG sword and are happy when they do BIG damage on a crit, and don't care what their averages or chances are (these people tend to be happy with the martials already!). Some people want to play a role and don't particularly care about mechanics (so you probably won't find them in a forum about game mechanics). Some players like to create weird combos using spells or items that most others haven't considered. And some people want to have a good DPR and care a lot about game balance. This is just a summary, there are clearly some other types too.

Now, if you want to argue that (1) there are WAY too many feats, (2) a LOT of them suck, and (3) many of them have pointless prerequisites; then yes, almost all of these are going to agree with you.

But if you want to argue that a risk/reward mechanic is completely unusable until you've managed to removed the risk, you're going to find that three out of the four types of players I just mentioned do not agree. Risk/reward mechanics have their place in their game, by cutting them out you're needlessly limiting your design space.I absolutely agree. Which is why I'm not arguing that. Neither is anyone else who has posted in this thread AFAICT.


Well, I'm not familiar with DSP so that may make a big difference here.There are some compensations, such as certain class features allowing you to trade or partially trade the default Dex bonus for a mental stat bonus to some values (such as initiative, Combat Reflexes or AC). So generally, you won't get as high values as an actually Dex based build, but you also won't be crippled by not having a big positive Dex modifier. No class gets all of these though, and some doesn't get any at all while others get features which benefit Dex melee instead. (I think the warder is the class which gets the most of these, and the related class features Defensive Focus (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder/#TOC-Defensive-Focus-Ex-), Tactical Acumen (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder/#TOC-Tactical-Acumen-Ex-) and Clad In Steel (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder/#TOC-Clad-in-Steel-Ex-) are good examples.)


One of your points is that str requires less investment, which is obviously true, but it becomes irrelevant once you start giving dex builds the investment for free.Nobody has suggested doing this AFAICT, and definitely not exelsisxax who you first replied to on this particular matter. Again:

[Free Finesse] =/= [Free replacement of Str with Dex on all combat values]


I note that dex builds benefit from size decreases, and this is actually very powerful: enlarging boosts your damage die and your damage modifier, and gives you reach; whereas reducing lowers your damage die, still increases your damage modifier, and also boosts your to-hit roll and armor class.Yes, but due to how related mechanics work, size increases are nearly always several times more beneficial than decreases for martial melee builds. Or to put it another way, Dex based melee builds would jump at a size increase option which didn't also reduce Dex, gladly trading away any benefits they'd gain from decreasing in size.


What do you mean? It strikes me that a dex build has better defenses and more opportunity attacks, for instance.They typically do. Thing is, as long as the normally Dex based values are sufficient, improving them further isn't even remotely as important as increased size and, more than anything, reach. Since these builds invest heavily in devastating control/debuff melee hit effects and typically use their melee attacks also for actively defending both themselves and their allies, the value of those investments and their usefulness in combat is multiplied with the number of squares threatened. And since at least some of those hit effects are typically dependent on the successful use of combat maneuvers, having a great size (and Str) is often imperative.

Very highly optimized such melee BFC builds can be more effective than any build focused on damage, to the point that they can very reliably take out several enemies of a CR way above their level in less than one round, without taking a scratch. Dex based builds can however only dream of having such prowess.


Yes, I entirely agree. I've had some success with Blind Fight and the Smash From The Air ability, but these abilities do tend to have too many limitations and prereqs. For example, I love the concept of Spell Sunder, but it requires a rather pointless other rage power as the prereq, and it is once-per-rage meaning you need rage cycling.Yeah, Spell Sunder is great only for builds having access to plenty of rage powers and the room for improving them. (Coincidentally, this a good example of why removing the AoO provocation from combat maneuvers is a good idea, Improved Bull Rush currently being yet another requirement for using Spell Sunder.)


For example, something like this.

Cold Iron Strike (feat, requires 3 ranks in spellcraft). When you hit an enemy with a cold iron weapon, choose one magical effect on that enemy (you don't need to name the exact spell; describing it in general terms is sufficient). Make a spellcraft check; on a result of 15 + the level of that effect, the effect is suppressed for one round. Multiple uses of this feat stack.

Seen It Before (feat, requires BAB 8). There are numerous common tricks people used to defend themselves with, and as an experienced warrior you've seen them all before and know how to deal with them. When attacking an enemy, you ignore every first- or second-level spell effect (including metamagic'ed versions thereof) that would make that enemy harder to hit, such as the Shield or Invisibility spells.I like them both, although the first is a bit limited due to the Spellcraft requirement and especially the need for hitting. As is, you need Seen It Before to use it effectively in a majority of cases (basically, if you can actually hit the caster, chances are you've already won).

[Dr_Dinosaur]

Yeah, the elephant in the room is basically the assumption that casters are made non-gamebreaking, which I would personally do by mandating SoP. I don't think SoM accomplishes the goals that SoP did. It is not the extremely flexible toolbox that was expected, it doesn't do a good job of making lots of thematic characters possible, and it's more complicated than necessary. PoW and SoP classes don't have to put up with complicated dependency trees in too damn many spheres to get what they want
I’m curious what dependency trees you see, considering nothing but the Legendary Talents have any prereqs besides the base sphere, and in fact build on existing capabilities in ways SoP and PoW don’t. Also, what options are missing in your opinion? Because skills, flight, crafting, and the like are all in there.

[Triskavanski]

This, plus all the martials getting 4+Int skills and Combat Stamina. Replace Rogue and Monk with unchained versions, and give Monk a "Forgotten Ki Power" ability similar to the ninja's Forgotten Trick. And of course, Fighter gets AWT/AAT.

I don't always like unchained monk. Sometimes I want that high will save and other things it gets.

[Mara]

More classes need to be like the aegis.

Like this fighter homebrew (https://docs.google.com/document/d/11Tczm8Tb3aLHuJ_uD54xZIpSfGTiofbRx3T3gNRNrTE/edit?usp=drivesdk)

Our group play tested this and it worked well.

I think the main problem with PF martials is class design.

[Psyren]

I don't always like unchained monk. Sometimes I want that high will save and other things it gets.

Personally I would have rathered umonks got strong will and bad fort. They're immune to a big chunk of the stuff you'd need a fort save for anyway.

[MeeposFire]

The single biggest thing that needs to be fixed is the full attack action. That is the biggest travesty foisted on weapon users in this game. 3e is the only version of D&D and possibly the only version of a D&D knockoff where attacking and moving is penalized. In AD&D I could move half my full speed and make all my melee attacks. In D&D (the types before and current with AD&D) I could move and attack. In 4e I can move and attack and the same is true in 5e. I am not sure what the designers were thinking when they made that rule but the fact it was never fixed directly is just wrong. That is the biggest boost that ToB does since you can do effective damage while being mobile which is something you cannot do without a lot of dumpster diving and knowledge of the game in 3e.

After that gets fixed you can talk about other less basic things that need to be fixed.

[Florian]

'continuous damage' being a term does shorten things a bit. Does it count damage as stacking, or independent as my feat? I suppose most casters are likely shut down to 5% success rate anyway, but I'd like to know the RAW.

Also, lingering pain doesn't work on Su casting, while I explicitly want this to. Though I wish there was a better way to distinguish between Su capabilities and the various Su 'casting, but doesn't count as a spell!' things.

So, basically introducing a "disrupted" condition would be the easiest way.

[Kaouse]

Sounds like a lot of you guys would love a little system called Kirthfinder (https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B3Q3BFJuenqIeWdxNmdobk1JTFk?usp=sharing). A collection of houserules so complete and thorough that I feel it succeeds in creating a "Pathfinder 2.0" of sorts.

Martial characters are powerful in that system, with access to narrative defining abilities as well as an overhaul of skills (which are greatly buffed) and spells (which are moderately nerfed). To say nothing of the removal of trap options and feats that scale with level/BAB.

But just like with Spheres of Power, the nerf to spellcasting still gives the caster a ton of new and versatile options to make up for what they lost. Ends up being a lot of fun for everybody involved.

[exelsisxax]

I’m curious what dependency trees you see, considering nothing but the Legendary Talents have any prereqs besides the base sphere, and in fact build on existing capabilities in ways SoP and PoW don’t. Also, what options are missing in your opinion? Because skills, flight, crafting, and the like are all in there.

The lack of explicit prerequisites doesn't mean there aren't any. SoM basically runs on your character getting some "combo" that you try to use every round. You need most of the components to do anything interesting, but in no case does it make combat more interactive. You just get to slap some combat maneuvers and conditions on things for most spheres.

I don't WANT flight and other magic on my martials. "but warleader has a legendary talent for raising the dead" is the same as "but martials can sometimes do magic too". Martials only need to be able to do the (Ex) things that virtually every setting already has them doing in order to be useful. Alchemy and traps are nice, but they should be built into skills and not taxes. Athletics has some thing that martials should be able to just do. But in none of the spheres are support for things that magic has been explicitly been provided rules for. Spellcasters have magic item craft rules, rangers can't set an effective ambush. Spellcasters have pinpoint accuracy teleports, a paladin can't call on aid from his order without GM intervention. Alarm, a level 1 spell, outright no-sells any use of stealth. Spellcasters can raise the dead in minutes, but a fighter can't fight past grievous wounds without taking 2 crap feats that barely even do that.

At this point, the fighter even getting a goddamn training montage would be nice.

[Psyren]

I think taxing some of that stuff (e.g. making traps, and fighting through negatives) is fine, so long as other taxes like Power Attack are removed elsewhere. Or at the very least, have a given class grant those for free (e.g. Ranger gets the trap stuff for free, Barbarian gets the Ferocity thing for free), but have there be a feat that grants them earlier, and when you get it from the class, you can either swap the feat out or it grants some bonus benefit to those classes that got it.

[Catarang]

I don't WANT flight and other magic on my martials. "but warleader has a legendary talent for raising the dead" is the same as "but martials can sometimes do magic too". Martials only need to be able to do the (Ex) things that virtually every setting already has them doing in order to be useful. Alchemy and traps are nice, but they should be built into skills and not taxes. Athletics has some thing that martials should be able to just do. But in none of the spheres are support for things that magic has been explicitly been provided rules for. Spellcasters have magic item craft rules, rangers can't set an effective ambush. Spellcasters have pinpoint accuracy teleports, a paladin can't call on aid from his order without GM intervention. Alarm, a level 1 spell, outright no-sells any use of stealth. Spellcasters can raise the dead in minutes, but a fighter can't fight past grievous wounds without taking 2 crap feats that barely even do that.

At this point, the fighter even getting a goddamn training montage would be nice.

I know that in some of R.A. Salvatore’s novels he had certain clearly high level characters able to by-pass magic by just being supernaturally good at what they did. I’m not familiar enough with 2e to point to a certain ruling but I know that characters like Artemis Entreri could sneak past magic traps without springing them and sense when they were being scried upon. Perhaps a feat that progressed with BAB that allowed saves where there weren’t allowed any before could help mitigate a spellcaster’s inherent advatages. I would also recommend allowing martials to all have at least 2 good saves or some other built in way to buff their saves.

[Milo v3]

Alchemy and traps are nice, but they should be built into skills and not taxes. Athletics has some thing that martials should be able to just do.
Those things are built into the skills.... Spheres of Might provides abilities beyond what the skills can do, because it's a martial subsystem not a "We rework the entire skill system so every character in the game is suddenly forced to work completely differently and have every single character and monster buffed rather than helping martials"


Teleporting
Spheres of might characters can do that, it just takes GM permission to take a legendary talent.


rangers can't set an effective ambush.
What? Nothing prevents that at all.


a paladin can't call on aid from his order without GM intervention.
Failing to see how note forcing a specific flavour for paladins down our throats is a bad thing.



Alarm, a level 1 spell, outright no-sells any use of stealth.
If alarm was the correct spell school (as in a divination spell), then users of the scout sphere would be able to stealth through an alarm spell. Though they can detect alarm spells with their keen senses.


Spellcasters can raise the dead in minutes
Scholars can do that in spheres of might.



but a fighter can't fight past grievous wounds without taking 2 crap feats that barely even do that.
It's very easy to make a warrior that can survive horrible wounds in spheres of might.


At this point, the fighter even getting a goddamn training montage would be nice.
... what prevents you from doing that already?


I think taxing some of that stuff (e.g. making traps, and fighting through negatives) is fine, so long as other taxes like Power Attack are removed elsewhere. Or at the very least, have a given class grant those for free (e.g. Ranger gets the trap stuff for free, Barbarian gets the Ferocity thing for free), but have there be a feat that grants them earlier, and when you get it from the class, you can either swap the feat out or it grants some bonus benefit to those classes that got it.
Sort of, most classes and archetypes using the system gain free spheres so barbarian's automatically get the Berserker sphere and Rangers automatically get either Beastmaster or Warleader instead of getting an animal companion or that bonus to direct their allies.

[Knaight]

Looking at other systems, including prior editions of D&D suggests a few other options in terms of both quick fixes and more thorough structural changes. On top of that there's also the matter of how there are some implicit archetypes embedded in even the Fighter that could have been chosen differently. A quick list:

Improved Saves: There's a few competing archetypes for the generic warrior. One of them is a person with grit and determination, able to put up a fight both physically and in the contexts of resisting social pressures, resisting magic, etc. The other one is a dumb brute capable only of violence, easily tricked or befuddled and a prime target for mental manipulation. For some reason the prevalence of weak will saves suggests that PC classes were often made in the image of the second one. Meanwhile back in 2e Fighters had the best saves across the board. At minimum good will saves need to be more common; faster than good saves cropping up and the introduction of medium saves for genuine weaknesses would also be helpful.
Off Turn Movement: That you can take a five foot step back from a melee combatant and cast an entire spell or repeatedly launch arrows at them with impunity is downright stupid. It's also easily solvable by allowing some amount of off turn movement in response to opponent's actions, with martial characters generally being better at this than others.
Physical Skill Bonuses: The basic skill point formula is X+int. That X=2 for all too many martial classes is a common criticism, but the +int is also more than a little odd for some of the skills. Being dumb as a rock doesn't necessarily mean that you have trouble seeing, or moving around, or generally performing non-intellectual skills. Letting other attribute bonuses contribute skill points to certain skills can help with this.
Expanded Skill Lists: I'm going to pick on the fighter again, but it's just an example. It's class skills noticeably do not include Appraise, Bluff, Diplomacy, Heal, Knowledge(local), Perception, Sense Motive, or Stealth. Because apparently a life in warfare doesn't involve learning to be sneaky, standing guard competently, any interaction with deception, or even becoming familiar with equipment. Personally I'd rather just scrap the class skill and cross class skill mechanic entirely, but if that's not happening the skill lists can at least not be terrible.
Zones of Control: Attacks of opportunity are nice to have, but they're pretty bad at constraining opponent's motion. This gets particularly ridiculous in the context of single opponents, where you can't even try to physically get in their way much because of how movement works. A broader area outside your space where you can attempt that would be helpful, while also tying into the off-turn movement mechanics. This is also an area where 4e style marking mechanics would actually make a lot of sense, where you can target specific opponents for interference.
Superior Motion: Getting back to archetypes, there's another point of contention for the basic image of martials. One of them is an action hero, who is likely generally in good physical shape and thus fairly mobile because of it. They can run, jump, roll, fall, etc. better than most. The other is a line soldier as viewed only when fighting in the line, good at fighting but nothing else. I'm thinking that the first of these should be preferred, and that martial characters across the board should get access to movement talents of some sort.


As a quick and dirty patch, I'm thinking a martial talent system that runs parallel to feats and which can grant some of the trickier things above as options (not the skill changes) could to the trick. It would be better built into the system to begin with, but that ship has sailed.

To make it directly competitive with spells, we can define Martial Talent Level as BAB-Highest Available Spell level, while also noting that it can't go down due to leveling. This gets a Fighter, Barbarian, etc. up to MTL 20, while Rangers, Paladins, etc. still get MTL 16. A Wizard only manages MTL 1, a Cleric MTL 6. Then there's a set of mobility, control, and resilience options to take, which emphatically don't help the basic task of just doing damage.

[Psyren]

I know that in some of R.A. Salvatore’s novels he had certain clearly high level characters able to by-pass magic by just being supernaturally good at what they did. I’m not familiar enough with 2e to point to a certain ruling but I know that characters like Artemis Entreri could sneak past magic traps without springing them and sense when they were being scried upon. Perhaps a feat that progressed with BAB that allowed saves where there weren’t allowed any before could help mitigate a spellcaster’s inherent advatages. I would also recommend allowing martials to all have at least 2 good saves or some other built in way to buff their saves.

Entreri is part-shade though, which would almost certainly require a template in 3.5 terms. It's not merely "skill" or "training."

[grarrrg]

*nerd sense tingling*

If you were to rewrite tripping as a Spike mechanic, then Johnny wouldn't like it any more. That's all there is to it.
It is entirely possible for a thing to appeal to more than one player archetype at a time. It might be tricky, but Tripping could be a Johnny AND Spike mechanic.
Johnny likes it, because not everyone is doing it, and you can chain a fair number of shenanigans around it.
Spike likes it, because an opponent on the ground is easier to beat further into the ground.


Where's your player archetype for "doesn't want to win if it's the equivalent of punching babies"?
That'd be a Johnny.
Johnny tends to like complicated things that may not always work, but they'll be interesting even if they fail.
Punching babies is not all that complicated, and has little chance of failing.

[Catarang]

Entreri is part-shade though, which would almost certainly require a template in 3.5 terms. It's not merely "skill" or "training."

This is prior to Servant of the Shard. I am away from book at the moment but will reply later with the answer; I believe it is in the Silent Blade, where he is able to walk into his old wizard friend's private chambers without triggering his clearly magical traps and spells and is able to sense when rival guild mages are scrying him.



That'd be a Johnny.
Johnny tends to like complicated things that may not always work, but they'll be interesting even if they fail.
Punching babies is not all that complicated, and has little chance of failing.

You've been punching the wrong babies my friend.

[Psyren]

This is prior to Servant of the Shard. I am away from book at the moment but will reply later with the answer; I believe it is in the Silent Blade, where he is able to walk into his old wizard friend's private chambers without triggering his clearly magical traps and spells and is able to sense when rival guild mages are scrying him.

Well to be honest, neither of those two things are particularly extraordinary unless his "old wizard friend" is secretly a god. Rogues can bypass traps without triggering them and spot scrying sensors just fine with high enough rolls right now.

[Catarang]

Well to be honest, neither of those two things are particularly extraordinary unless his "old wizard friend" is secretly a god. Rogues can bypass traps without triggering them and spot scrying sensors just fine with high enough rolls right now.

I wasn't pointing these things out solely because they are extraordinary. These are good ways for mundane characters to combat things that usually only magic can do, and I think a good avenue for expanding martial's repertoires are abilities that are in this vein. So maybe creating a feat that allows for extra saving against certain spells based off of BAB progression or editing things like Alarm to allow for sneaking past them based on the casters DC is a good starting point.

[Psyren]

I wasn't pointing these things out solely because they are extraordinary. These are good ways for mundane characters to combat things that usually only magic can do, and I think a good avenue for expanding martial's repertoires are abilities that are in this vein. So maybe creating a feat that allows for extra saving against certain spells based off of BAB progression or editing things like Alarm to allow for sneaking past them based on the casters DC is a good starting point.

By "extraordinary" I didn't mean the D&D ability type sense. I meant that neither of those is particularly remarkable, and indeed, they are things that rogues can do right now without the kind of buffs being proposed in this thread. Even Alarm, though it is much easier to defeat in Pathfinder.

[Dr_Dinosaur]

The lack of explicit prerequisites doesn't mean there aren't any. SoM basically runs on your character getting some "combo" that you try to use every round. You need most of the components to do anything interesting, but in no case does it make combat more interactive. You just get to slap some combat maneuvers and conditions on things for most spheres.

I don't WANT flight and other magic on my martials. "but warleader has a legendary talent for raising the dead" is the same as "but martials can sometimes do magic too". Martials only need to be able to do the (Ex) things that virtually every setting already has them doing in order to be useful. Alchemy and traps are nice, but they should be built into skills and not taxes. Athletics has some thing that martials should be able to just do. But in none of the spheres are support for things that magic has been explicitly been provided rules for. Spellcasters have magic item craft rules, rangers can't set an effective ambush. Spellcasters have pinpoint accuracy teleports, a paladin can't call on aid from his order without GM intervention. Alarm, a level 1 spell, outright no-sells any use of stealth. Spellcasters can raise the dead in minutes, but a fighter can't fight past grievous wounds without taking 2 crap feats that barely even do that.

At this point, the fighter even getting a goddamn training montage would be nice.

Refusing fixes because “that’s magic!” in a system that requires “magic” (meaning things people can’t do irl) to be baseline competent is self-defeating

[Catarang]

By "extraordinary" I didn't mean the D&D ability type sense. I meant that neither of those is particularly remarkable, and indeed, they are things that rogues can do right now without the kind of buffs being proposed in this thread. Even Alarm, though it is much easier to defeat in Pathfinder.

I understood that you didn't mean extraordinary in the d&d ability sense. I merely thought that these were good examples of something that we should expand upon to bridge the gap a little. Also I'm unfamiliar with what you're referring to specifically when you say Alarm is easier to defeat in pathfinder.


Refusing fixes because “that’s magic!” in a system that requires “magic” (meaning things people can’t do irl) to be baseline competent is self-defeating

True but surely there's a large difference in flavor between doing things people can't do irl but something that a fantasy martial hero can do, and raising the dead.

[Psyren]

I merely thought that these were good examples of something that we should expand upon to bridge the gap a little.

What I'm saying is that you can expand those, sure, but you don't really need to. "Bypass traps" and "know when you're being scryed" are both things they can already do, and without feats no less. You'd be better off expanding by giving them other benefits.


Also I'm unfamiliar with what you're referring to specifically when you say Alarm is easier to defeat in pathfinder.

Rogues can spot magic traps in both editions. However, in 3.5 doing so requires a search check, which is a full-round action for each 5-foot square and requires them to be within 10ft. of the square they're searching. In Pathfinder, it requires a Perception check - which is a move action when used actively (half the time), covers a 10-foot square, works at longer ranges, and with the Trap Spotter Talent can be done reactively instead of actively (costing no action at all.)

[Catarang]

What I'm saying is that you can expand those, sure, but you don't really need to. "Bypass traps" and "know when you're being scryed" are both things they can already do, and without feats no less. You'd be better off expanding by giving them other benefits.


These are good ways for mundane characters to combat things that usually only magic can do, and I think a good avenue for expanding martial's repertoires are abilities that are in this vein.

It seems to me like we're saying the exact same thing then.



Rogues can spot magic traps in both editions. However, in 3.5 doing so requires a search check, which is a full-round action for each 5-foot square and requires them to be within 10ft. of the square they're searching. In Pathfinder, it requires a Perception check - which is a move action when used actively (half the time), covers a 10-foot square, works at longer ranges, and with the Trap Spotter Talent can be done reactively instead of actively (costing no action at all.)

I was unaware that a rogue could disarm an Alarm spell