Exactly what levels is there "Caster Supremacy"

[2D8HP]

So I finally bought the 3.5 PHB this month.

I previously bought the 1978 PHB (in '79), the 3e PHB in 2000 (but I never got around to using the rules), and I bought the 5e PHB in 2014 (and have played a tiny bit of 5e since), and somewhere in a box I have the Pathfinder "core rules".

I played and enjoyed a lot of D&D '79 to the mid or late1980's, and some other (less fun) games till '92, and then nothing until starting recently with 5e.

If I play 3.5 and/or Pathfinder I can more than double the games I can play in, which sounds good, but I'm a bit scared to.

One problem is that I don't learn rules quickly anymore, the other are that I have little interest in "builds" and "Prestige Classes", nor in playing a Spell-caster, or in being the waterboy for one, and I keep reading over and over again about how in 3.x there's "caster supremacy".

In the old TSR D&D I played, Fighters were "supreme" at early levels I mostly played, and magic-users were "supreme" at high levels that I really didn't play much in.

Compared to TSR D&D, in 5e you rocket through the levels, and I assume the same is true of 3.x.

I pretty much just want to play "guy with a sword", so at what levels am I likely to notice and be bothered by "caster supremacy"?

Also, how much of this "build" stuff do I have to pay attention to?

[Fouredged Sword]

3.5 is very group sensitive. A group with high optimisation will render people with swords moot from about level 3 or 4. A group with low optimisation will have a solid roll for a guy with a sword through 20.

For the other side of the coin a caster is just about REQUIRED to fight anything significant past level 10 or so. There are defenses only magic can really bypass.

Build is pretty important. You have few build resources and that makes your choices important.

[flappeercraft]

Fouredged sword is right, it depends on optimization level. For example I can get a caster in level 1 to be able to beat a level 5 fighter if I want to with next to no effort but that is getting to high optimization, in low optimization the level 5 fighter would beat the crap out of the caster.

[Kurald Galain]

One problem is that I don't learn rules quickly anymore, the other are that I have little interest in "builds" and "Prestige Classes", nor in playing a Spell-caster, or in being the waterboy for one, and I keep reading over and over again about how in 3.x there's "caster supremacy".
Internet forums such as this one tend to assume a very high level of optimization, which is simply not representative of almost all actual campaigns. For example, Pathfinder has a huge public campaign called PFS that plays up to level 11 (and sometimes 12) and in this campaign people in general aren't bothered by "caster supremacy".

In other words, don't worry about it.

Pathfinder does make it notably easier for a casual player to play an effective "guy with sword" starting from level one, whereas 3.5 makes it easier for a heavy optimizer to deal massive damage as "guy with sword" around level 20.

[Melcar]

So I finally bought the 3.5 PHB this month.

I previously bought the 1978 PHB (in '79), the 3e PHB in 2000 (but I never got around to using the rules), and I bought the 5e PHB in 2014 (and have played a tiny bit of 5e since), and somewhere in a box I have the Pathfinder "core rules".

I played and enjoyed a lot of D&D '79 to the mid or late1980's, and some other (less fun) games till '92, and then nothing until starting recently with 5e.

If I play 3.5 and/or Pathfinder I can more than double the games I can play in, which sounds good, but I'm a bit scared to.

One problem is that I don't learn rules quickly anymore, the other are that I have little interest in "builds" and "Prestige Classes", nor in playing a Spell-caster, or in being the waterboy for one, and I keep reading over and over again about how in 3.x there's "caster supremacy".

In the old TSR D&D I played, Fighters were "supreme" at early levels I mostly played, and magic-users were "supreme" at high levels that I really didn't play much in.

Compared to TSR D&D, in 5e you rocket through the levels, and I assume the same is true of 3.x.

I pretty much just want to play "guy with a sword", so at what levels am I likely to notice and be bothered by "caster supremacy"?

Also, how much of this "build" stuff do I have to pay attention to?

So many times on this forum, people have discussed ways of limiting the top tier spellcasters influence on a game; Wizard, cleric, Druid, Archivist Psion etc... The problem lies not with the classes, but the players behind them. If you are in a group, where one of these persons are a munchkin and makes no atttempt at playing so everyone has the most fun, then that's the person who is the issue, not the class. Therefore you have nothing to fear, if you find the right group!!!

With that said, I don't understand why you say you have no interest in Prestige Classes. They are actually great fluff and cool abilities which can really make the difference if your playing a concept character. They are in other words not power-gaming in and of themselves. Take a healbot. Wanna make one a classic LG, "For the light", power of dawn, kind of cleric, then Radiant Servant of Pelor is a cool choice. What I'm trying to say is its not "play a prestige class, ergo powergaming!!!" Remember that if you don't want to be delimiting your self to half a game!

So what I can tell you is, that the "brokenness" is due only to playing who are being jerks! (in my experience)

[Eldariel]

Depends on what kind of a guy with a sword you wanna play. There are some pretty good spellcasters to that end like Cleric and Duskblade of which Cleric obviously holds up next to anything and Duskblade performs fine for the first ~7 levels, but if you're talking strictly non-magical, again, martials are fine 1-5 but full casters begin taking over after that. However, the truly melee replacing options are pretty open-ended and thus less experienced players are unlikely to want to use those and more experienced players know not to. And like, you can make do being a Warblade/Barbarian/Fighter/whatever in a group of spellcasters on any level - it more depends on the exact nature of the game and how fully the casters need to use their powers.

[daremetoidareyo]

level 6 is the equilibrium point. Casters have fireball, fly, and invisibility by then.

Levels 7-9, the fighter is a necessary meatshield, but the transformative options for casters has them pulling ahead. Polymorph and planar binding show up in level 4, and level 5 has freedom of movement.

Anything after level 10, you should expect that the wizard/sorc/cleric/druid to be the star of the show with completely mundane characters struggling a bit for the ability to solve problems.

[Malroth]

Well, it depends on where you draw the line between caster and mundane, Starting around lv 5 or 6 there are level appropiate enemies that it's just not possible for "guy with sword" to affect in any way on his own and they become more prevalent with level. A good DM will avoid these enemies if it would create a problem. A Bad DM will throw them at a Party starting around Lv 3. Half Progression casters like Bards, or The Pathfinder Magus/Alchemist can deal with these problems as well as a Full caster can, and even the one quarter progression casters like Rangers and Paladin's have tools that can counter many of the anti fighter defenses but Pure Martial Characters like the Fighter or the Barbarian are almost solely reliant on whatever magical treasue you find to be able to contribute meaningfully.

[Deadline]

I pretty much just want to play "guy with a sword", so at what levels am I likely to notice and be bothered by "caster supremacy"?

Also, how much of this "build" stuff do I have to pay attention to?

Right around the time 4th level spells become a thing for your casters. At that level, there are several spells that are just fantastic, and can be real game changers. You don't even have to be dedicated optimizer to break encounters, you could do it by accidentally picking a really good 4th level spell and using it at a halfway decent time.

So the prime levels for "guy with a sword" are pretty much where they were way back in the day. Levels 1-6 are their heyday. After that, the spellcasters start to really be able to bend reality.

That being said, so long as your group is interested in playing as a group, you'll probably be fine. Also, ask the group what optimization level they are looking to play. Is a rookie fighter going to be an issue for them?

The follow-up question is, what kind of "guy with a sword" do you want to be? Fighter? Barbarian? Ranger? Paladin? Duskblade? Knight? Hexblade? Samurai? Warblade? Crusader? And the only real consideration you may want to make towards a "build" would be what Prestige class (if any) you are interested in?

[Fizban]

Glad to see the immediate and overwhelming response is the right one: all the caster supremacy stuff depends on the group making the game that way. That said, a lot of the people who continue playing 3.x, as you've noticed, are all about detailed builds and ridiculous spellcasters. You'll have to make sure the group you're intending to join is one that will welcome your style of character.

To answer the question directly, it's about 10th level. Spells start heating up at 5th, but it takes a few more levels before you have enough spell slots, feats, and the higher level effects that can can be abused. Even the worst spells at lower levels are still constrained by a limited number of slots, d20 rolls, and potentially DM tactics, so you have to put in some effort to really mess things up. After 10th level the spells just keep getting crazier, and the spell slots continue piling up. This is something 5e made a serious point of addressing: spell slots above 5th are very few and 9th level spells in 5e are more like 7th level spells from 3e.

As for playing a simple guy with a sword, the one "build" thing I'd suggest looking up is Melee/Ranged Weapon Mastery from PHB2. It's just an extension of Weapon Focus+Weapon Spec, the little extra push that makes it better than rage so the fighter's attack entry doesn't look so sad next to the barbarian's. If you want to use a shield, ignore the two-handed supremacists and go ahead and use a shield- if you don't use a shield, don't be surprised if you get hit a lot. And as I'm sure you're already aware, a guy with a sword should also have a bow. Tried and true tactics like "stand in front of the squishies" and "shoot things that aren't standing next to you" still work just fine, unless the DM is deliberately screwing with you or expecting everyone to be shooting magic everywhere.

Rather than think of "builds," better to just play your class- and then if you feel you're missing something you could get from another class, take it. Plain fighter or ranger is fine, but you can always grab some barbarian if you want a little rage. Plain barbarian is fine, but you can grab some fighter if you notice a cool feat you want. If you're fine with things, don't worry about multiclassing. Feat choices aren't hard to understand: you read them and take the ones you want.* The fact is, you don't need anything other than your sword-arm (and bow-arm) to contribute: anyone calming you need a fancy build is actually saying you need a fancy build to fit into their style of play where fancy builds are required to compete. As long as you don't take something self-defeating or which you will never use, you're fine. Unless you join a group that requires fancy builds.

*The problem is when there's a bajillion feats, and the answer is that most of them don't matter. Read the feats in the PHB and however many books you feel like, but there's no obligation to read all of them in order to pick the "perfect" feat. Feats are where you make most of your guy with sword decisions, weather you're a fighter (who's main class feature is bonus feats) or something else. Unless you're in Pathfinder where there's a lot more class feature lists to deal with even on non-casters.

As for rocketing through the levels- I dunno how fast it was back then, but if you fight until you need to rest then you should generally level up in about two or three days of fighting as long as there's a boss or mid-boss in there. If the DM just throws monsters at you to grind down then yeah you can level up ridiculously fast, but that's a grinder, not an adventure. I think a rhythm of cluster, rest/travel, cluster, rest/travel, level up, with a scattering of potential random encounters, feels pretty good.

[gkathellar]

All or none, depending on how you play. Oddly, the problem gets worse the less you emphasize combat.

The big thing with casters is that they have a toolkit, and their tools are meant to solve certain problems in certain ways. If they know how to use it, they will be very, very strong. A first level wizard who tosses around magic missile and burning hands may well underperform strikingly. One who uses sleep, color spray and grease, however, is going to be ending a lot of level-appropriate fights in one round. Outside of fights, a wizard loaded with charm person, disguise self, and detect thoughts will likewise pull their weight and then some.

Non-casters, on the other hand, hit stuff and occasionally make skill checks.

This is representative, although the structure of the issue as it relates to combat changes somewhat depending on the specifics. Outside of combat, many of a mid-to-high-level caster's tools are essentially "problem-solved" buttons, and a DM has to treat it as a given that inventive caster players may treat plot points as a checklist. The higher the level, the fewer the barricades that can actually stop them. (For how this plays out in a low-op campaign, look up Tales of the Wyre. It's a fun campaign log, and the heavies account for themselves respectably, but it also illustrates some of the shenanigans that casters can get up to in and out of combat.)

What goes with this is that while casters are very sensitive to skilled or creative play, warriors are very sensitive to optimization. A warrior's in-combat routine is far more of a numbers game, and a poorly-built warrior tends to do about as well as a poorly-played caster, for the simple reason that they can't hit things and get hit too often. Casters also benefit from build optimization, but most can still contribute even with subpar numbers.


Internet forums such as this one tend to assume a very high level of optimization, which is simply not representative of almost all actual campaigns. For example, Pathfinder has a huge public campaign called PFS that plays up to level 11 (and sometimes 12) and in this campaign people in general aren't bothered by "caster supremacy".

In other words, don't worry about it.

Pathfinder does make it notably easier for a casual player to play an effective "guy with sword" starting from level one, whereas 3.5 makes it easier for a heavy optimizer to deal massive damage as "guy with sword" around level 20.

It's worth noting that Kurald is right, with a caveat. Many (not all) of PF's warrior classes require less optimization than their 3.5 equivalents to be effective in combat - PF's fighter, for instance, actually can toss out oodles of single-target damage with minimal optimization.

What PF does not do is give warriors a toolbox, or make them responsive to skilled play in the way casters are.

Take that for what thou wilt.

[Morty]

If you're going to play a warrior, I'd worry less about magic-using teammates and more about not accidentally picking a fighting style the game doesn't support. Using a two-handed weapon is the safest, because shields scale exceptionally poorly and dual-wielding or one-handed duelling are just poor in general if you don't jump through a lot of hoops.

[BassoonHero]

As for playing a simple guy with a sword, the one "build" thing I'd suggest looking up is Melee/Ranged Weapon Mastery from PHB2. It's just an extension of Weapon Focus+Weapon Spec, the little extra push that makes it better than rage so the fighter's attack entry doesn't look so sad next to the barbarian's. If you want to use a shield, ignore the two-handed supremacists and go ahead and use a shield- if you don't use a shield, don't be surprised if you get hit a lot. And as I'm sure you're already aware, a guy with a sword should also have a bow. Tried and true tactics like "stand in front of the squishies" and "shoot things that aren't standing next to you" still work just fine, unless the DM is deliberately screwing with you or expecting everyone to be shooting magic everywhere.
This advice is questionable at best. It reflects the probable intent of the core rules; the problem is that the numbers never worked out.

Weapon Mastery costs too many feats for a nonscaling effect of its magnitude. Shields provide a marginal boost to AC in exchange for a significant hit to damage; shield bashing can be great but it costs several feats. Carrying a bow is fine, but switching weapons costs actions unless you pay a feat, there's a massive penalty to using a bow in combat unless you pay two feats, and maintaining two magic weapons is expensive. "Standing in front of the squishies" is fine if you're in a five-foot corridor where they can't pass. It's also fine if you have the ability to control an area (requiring a pile of feats). Otherwise, the enemy will walk right past you. This is not "deliberately screwing with you"; it's an obvious tactic to any intelligent opponent.

The fighter was supposed to be an all-rounder who can fight competently with a sword and shield, a two-handed weapon, or a bow. The problem is that baseline competence in those areas requires an up-front feat tax, and if you spend your feats paying those taxes then what you've achieved is all-around mediocrity.

[Gnaeus]

All or none, depending on how you play.

It's worth noting that Kurald is right, with a caveat. Many (not all) of PF's warrior classes require less optimization than their 3.5 equivalents to be effective in combat - PF's fighter, for instance, actually can toss out oodles of single-target damage with minimal optimization.

What PF does not do is give warriors a toolbox, or make them responsive to skilled play in the way casters are.

Take that for what thou wilt.

And a second caveat. PFS also comes with some big nerfs for casters. No item creation. No bringing dominated slaves from game to game. No spending weeks casting divinations before entering the dungeon. A lot of the metagame caster supremacy stuff is gone at the start.

[Zanos]

For example, Pathfinder has a huge public campaign called PFS that plays up to level 11 (and sometimes 12) and in this campaign people in general aren't bothered by "caster supremacy".
My experience with PFS is that it's people running super optimized half-casters buffed so thoroughly that their numbers are way outside the range of any of the monsters in their CR complaining that wizards are OP.

[AvatarVecna]

My general rule of thumb: if the group you're in is going to play through 3.5 and PF dungeons the way they would play through AD&D dungeons (the warriors kill things, the rogues deal with traps, the divine casters keep everybody healed, and the mages are utility casters with some fireballs in their back pocket), you'll probably have plenty of fun well into epic without caster supremacy ever being a problem. The game is fairly well designed to support that kind of playstyle into epic, where being higher level just means that everybody's working with bigger numbers. More HP, higher AC and saves, more damage, more spells per day...it's all just a scaled up version of low-level play, much like Godzilla vs Mothra is just a larger-scale fight between a gecko and a moth. And, much like the Godzilla vs Mothra example (in that case, due to the square-cube law), the entire idea falls apart under its own weight if somebody stops to think about it for a second. And that's where the problems of caster supremacy begin: somebody asking "why are we still doing things this way, when {basic core spell} would do it better?".

To be a bit less facetious about things, there are three primary factors that result in "caster supremacy" as you go up in levels, if your group is playing things pretty close to that "ideal D&D game" that hearkens back to the original game, all three of which played a part in my recent thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?544449-Tier-Definitions-(potentially-redefining)) working towards a more codified tier system. People have gone into detail on all these problems thousands of times across the internet in the years since 3.5 became a thing, but to summarize them quickly:

1) NonCasters get bigger tools as they level up, while Casters get bigger tools and more tools and a bigger toolbox.

2) Caster tools get bigger faster than NonCaster tools, with the general exception of pure at-will DPR (and not even that exception, past certain charop levels).

3) NonCasters have lots of trap options and choices are very difficult to change later without it being a DM handout, whereas Casters have enough non-trap options to have a wide variety of overpowered builds, and can generally change between those builds in-game much more easily.

If your group is generally gonna stick closer to the style of game you would've played in previous editions, though, it shouldn't be a problem that comes up except maybe by accident. As is usually the case, a gentlemen's agreement not to be *******s about things should prevent most problems.

[Fizban]

Every time.

Weapon Mastery costs too many feats for a nonscaling effect of its magnitude.
Only if you demand that those feats do special fancy things because in your play style this isn't enough. The correct point of comparison is rage, because that's what its actually competing against by the core design principles. People love rage, even though its a nonscaling effect of little magnitude, and say single class barbarians are fine to play all the time, even though the Weapon Mastery line gives more attack and damage than rage. It's kinda funny.

Shields provide a marginal boost to AC in exchange for a significant hit to damage; shield bashing can be great but it costs several feats.
Bashing has nothing to do with it. Your expections of damage are nothing but your expectations. Shields are 1/2 of the standard scaling part of AC which caps at +7, now try and tell me +7 is marginal.

Carrying a bow is fine, but switching weapons costs actions unless you pay a feat, there's a massive penalty to using a bow in combat unless you pay two feats, and maintaining two magic weapons is expensive.
Willfully ignoring the point. If they're not adjacent to you or your allies you're not taking penalties for shooting into melee, the "oh noes Precise Shot" argument has never been true. Fighters also have plenty of feats if they want to take Quick Draw or yeah just take the ranged line of feats too if they want, once again this is your personal play style that says it's not worth it. The entire Monster Manual was written before the feats and builds you think are required were even possible. And your backup weapon doesn't need to be full power -in fact come to think of it, that's probably one of the major reasons they got rid of +X based DR.

"Standing in front of the squishies" is fine if you're in a five-foot corridor where they can't pass. It's also fine if you have the ability to control an area (requiring a pile of feats). Otherwise, the enemy will walk right past you. This is not "deliberately screwing with you"; it's an obvious tactic to any intelligent opponent.
And as always, it's funny how people who think they know combat so well don't consider the fact that by simply standing there you prevent the enemy from charging (and thus pouncing), force them to spend extra movement to go around, prevent full attacks, and give yourself room for more damage via AoO,- even if you aren't in a 5 (or 10' hi cleric) corridor, which is exceedingly common in the dungeons of Dungeons and Dragons (let alone how the cleric can use magic to *make* a 5' corridor). If combat is over so fast how is delaying somebody by one round or attack not worth it? Because your expectations are that a PC must be putting out massive DPS or Absolute Lockdown every round, which is your idea, not the game's.

The fighter was supposed to be an all-rounder who can fight competently with a sword and shield, a two-handed weapon, or a bow. The problem is that baseline competence in those areas requires an up-front feat tax, and if you spend your feats paying those taxes then what you've achieved is all-around mediocrity.
No the problem is that you play the game in a way that uses the phrase "feat tax," it's really that simple.

2D8HP clearly does not want to play the game in a way that includes the phrase "feat tax," for which I applaud him in not just immediately believing whatever the internet says and sticking to what they like. As to weather those 3.5/Pathfinder tables around him will accommodate that, I wish him luck.

[ATHATH]

If your group is a mid-op group, might I suggest checking out the Tome of Battle classes/feats? It's pretty much when WotC realized "Oh !@#$, we really screwed up this martial-caster imbalance thing, didn't we?" and tried to narrow the gap between martials and casters by giving martials Good Things (TM). The gaps still there, and depending on the group, it's still quite wide, but it's at least narrower with ToB stuff allowed.

Generally, provided that no one in the group is a show-off or a !@#$ and everyone is playing characters that are within two tiers of every other character in the group (i.e. a party of Tier 2-4 characters or a party of Tier 3-5 characters), you should be fine.

[BassoonHero]

The correct point of comparison is rage, because that's what its actually competing against by the core design principles. People love rage, even though its a nonscaling effect of little magnitude, and say single class barbarians are fine to play all the time, even though the Weapon Mastery line gives more attack and damage than rage.


rage [is] a nonscaling effect of little magnitude
At first level, it generally equates to +2 attack/+3 damage. This applies to all melee attacks (less one point of damage for one-handed weapons). Even thrown weapons get a +2 damage bonus. Rage also grants +2 on the two most important saving throws.

This is a substantially better package of benefits than Weapon Mastery, but it kicks in at first level. At eighth level, a fighter could have spent three of their five bonus feats on Weapon Mastery; meanwhile, the barbarian will have better mobility and better survivability. The barbarian suffers a -2 penalty to AC, but cannot be flanked or caught flat-footed. Finally, the barbarian has twice the base skill points and a much better list of skills.

I have no idea where you get the idea that rage is “of little magnitude”.


Shields are 1/2 of the standard scaling part of AC which caps at +7, now try and tell me +7 is marginal.
Armored AC becomes much less important at high levels, because most monsters that threaten to kill a fighter (or barbarian) with ordinary damage have absurdly high attack bonuses. However, if you only want a shield bonus to AC, there's no need to give up the damage of a two-handed weapon. The only reason to dedicate a hand to a shield is if you plan to bash with it.


If they're not adjacent to you or your allies you're not taking penalties for shooting into melee,
What are they doing, then — waiting patiently while you ping them to death 1d8 at a time? If they're not fighting you, and they're not fighting your allies, what are they doing? Are they standing back and using ranged attacks? If so, are you really better off plinking with a bow instead of closing to melee?


Fighters also have plenty of feats if they want to take Quick Draw or yeah just take the ranged line of feats too if they want, once again this is your personal play style that says it's not worth it.
Again, it's entirely possible for a fighter to attain baseline competence at a variety of combat techniques. The problem is that baseline competence isn't very good.


The entire Monster Manual was written before the feats and builds you think are required were even possible.
Which feats are you talking about? The ones I alluded to in my last comment were Precise Shot, Quick Draw, and Improved Shield Bash, whereas you're relying upon Weapon Mastery.


by simply standing there you prevent the enemy from charging (and thus pouncing)
If you're comparing your master-of-none fighter to a pouncing charger, you're going to lose. It will not be remotely close. If, on the other hand, you're not using Lion Spiritual Totem as the baseline for the fighter's opposition, and cheetahs aren't unusually common in your game, then a typical result of standing in front of the wizard is that one opponent will suffer one attack of opportunity on the way to said wizard. There are ways to capitalize upon this, which you reject as powergaming.

Oh, and:


Only if you demand that those feats do special fancy things because in your play style this isn't enough. … It's kinda funny

Your expections of damage are nothing but your expectations.

…once again this is your personal play style that says it's not worth it.

And as always, it's funny how people who think they know combat so well don't consider the fact that…

Because your expectations are that a PC must be putting out massive DPS or Absolute Lockdown every round, which is your idea, not the game's.

No the problem is that you play the game in a way that uses the phrase "feat tax," it's really that simple.

2D8HP clearly does not want to play the game in a way that includes the phrase "feat tax," for which I applaud him in not just immediately believing whatever the internet says and sticking to what they like.
When a substantial fraction of your argument consists of troll-ish remarks about how you assume that someone else plays the game, you might want to consider whether your thesis can stand on its own, and, if not, why that is. I'm not insulting you every other sentence for lack of anything better to say, and I would appreciate the same courtesy in return.

[Calthropstu]

I reccomend pathfinder over 3.5. As a newbie, the pathfinder society will be an invaluable resource and a great place to try builds. They don't have that kind of support for 3.5 anymore.

[Celestia]

A spellcaster doesn't even require a "high level of optimization" in 3.5 to outperform a fighter at level one, just a halfway intelligent player. There are plenty of first level spells that can turn the tide, and some that do even more. A sorcerer with at least 12 charisma and a scythe can singlehandedly win four battles per day with Sleep.

[Drynwyn]

Lots of people have gone on about caster supremacy, so I'l address "builds" and how much attention you should pay to them instead:

You don't need to pay a lot of attention to them, but 3.5 contains an unfortunate number of "trap" options- options that look good/cool on the face of it, but are in practice not worth the investment of build resources most of the time. They're intended as niche tools for unusual builds, but a side effect of that is that they can appear appealing, but waste your resources. You don't need a defined build, in most groups, but you'll have a better time if you avoid these trap options, and focus your feats and the like in one area rather than trying to diversify and ending up consistently mediocre.

[ayvango]

You don't need to pay a lot of attention to them, but 3.5 contains an unfortunate number of "trap" options
Is there any list of it?

[Mordaedil]

We really should make one of the worst offenders and categorize them as why they are traps and list exceptions where they can work.

[Coretron03]

We really should make one of the worst offenders and categorize them as why they are traps and list exceptions where they can work.

High up on that list would be Monkey grip, Spell thematics (the orginal, not the Epic level handbook version) and Natural Spell.

[Malroth]

Every +skill feat that doesn't add to your class list
Every feat in the weapon focus line
Every two weapon fighting feat
Spring attack tree
Every combat manuver feat besides the trip line
All Proficiency feats
Endurance
Diehard
Toughness
Greater toughness
All shield feats
all enemy specific feats outside the mageslayer tree
90% of the combat feats not listed above
Any feat with "vow of" listed in it's name
all Vile feats
All exaulted feats besides Exaulted wildshape
All Monk feats

[Kurald Galain]

It's clearly true that there are way too many feats and items in the game, and the majority of them are lacklustre. Only a small amount are true traps (in that they're actively bad for you) but a lot of them are a simply waste of your resources (in that you could have picked something effective instead).

This doesn't help casters either, because there are also way too many spells in the game, and the majority of those are also lacklustre. What does help is that most casters can experiment with this, and if a spell turns out ineffective they can swap it for a different one the next day. Non-casters (and e.g. sorcerers) are basically stuck with whatever they've picked.

This is why you should basically pick feats/items/spells from a class guide, not from the list of all 1000+ of them in the game. This is equally true for 3E, 4E, and Pathfinder. 5E has avoided this issue only by printing very few options compared to the other three, but despite that it still appears to have caster supremacy.

[Florian]

Also, how much of this "build" stuff do I have to pay attention to?

You should at least understand two of the basics here:

1) D20 has an underlying math that needs a minimum of "performance" at each level (To hit, AC, damage dealt, and so on).

2) Most things come in "chains" and have raising prerequisites along the way. If you want to do something specific, like dual-wielding swords, you should at least look up the relevant feat chains and take a look at the total prerequisites and parts involved, else you'll get annoyed later when your concept doesn't function.

(3) Simplify things by looking up some of the basic class guides, especially when playing Pathfinder)


I pretty much just want to play "guy with a sword", so at what levels am I likely to notice and be bothered by "caster supremacy"?

That is very dependent on group, player and style. You'll probably notice certain "jumps" when they come up, and the possibility that the game suddenly changes. Fly, Teleport and so on.

[ayvango]

Every +skill feat that doesn't add to your class list

All +skill feats. It's way cheaper to get skill bonus through magic items.



Every two weapon fighting feat

With exception to the two weapon fighting itself. It could be used as standard action, applies to throwing knifes. And each knife could be spell storing. Sometimes number of attacks really matters.



All Proficiency feats

Spiked chain is an exception.

P.S. it would be better to continue trap finding in separate topic.

[Fizban]

Oh, and:
When a substantial fraction of your argument consists of troll-ish remarks about how you assume that someone else plays the game, you might want to consider whether your thesis can stand on its own, and, if not, why that is. I'm not insulting you every other sentence for lack of anything better to say, and I would appreciate the same courtesy in return.
I mean, when literally every time I try to say anything that goes against the char-op forumite mentality someone feels the need to not just disagree but directly quote and then contradict me (including people I have reported for trolling, though obviously not you), even in a thread by an OP who specifically says they want advice on avoiding that sort of thing, yeah I get a bit more annoyed every time (and that's not just observation bias, there's enough people on the forum that there's an effectively unlimited number of new challengers who think I've never had this argument before in addition to the old faces I've already gone 'round with, and someone does it every time, so my only option is to re-hash the same thing over and over again or just hold my silence when I'm effectively being called out- you've drawn the re-hash it again card). Accusing people who disagree with their personal playstyle of being a troll is also pretty standard, but you're not one of the usuals so I'm inclined to believe you're genuinely offended (I do admit I was a little rude), and you still seem to be open to discussion so I'll respond to the rest of your points. In a spoiler because huge.


At first level, it generally equates to +2 attack/+3 damage. This applies to all melee attacks (less one point of damage for one-handed weapons). Even thrown weapons get a +2 damage bonus. Rage also grants +2 on the two most important saving throws.

This is a substantially better package of benefits than Weapon Mastery, but it kicks in at first level. At eighth level, a fighter could have spent three of their five bonus feats on Weapon Mastery; meanwhile, the barbarian will have better mobility and better survivability. The barbarian suffers a -2 penalty to AC, but cannot be flanked or caught flat-footed. Finally, the barbarian has twice the base skill points and a much better list of skills.
I have no idea where you get the idea that rage is “of little magnitude”.
Weapon Mastery is +3 attack/+4 damage, as it requires Focus and Spec first. Yes, you gain it gradually over 8 levels, but that doesn't mean that it's not better than rage once you have it. The fighter gains 5 feats in those 8 levels, so they still have two more than the barbarian. Flanking is only a +2 bonus and most monsters don't have any special abilities that trigger on being flat-footed: uncanny dodge is primarily an anti-PC classed foe defense, which is where the game falls apart anyway. The barbarian has more mobility and skills, in exchange for an inferior limited use combat buff that lowers their AC. "Of little magnitude" is just turning your own phrase back against you- rage is obviously a ridiculously good dip, but even char-op calculations have found that the fighter has better DPS, and counting +2-7 AC as little magnitude but +2 attack/+3 damage as huge is ironic.

The save bonuses are nice, but bringing up the thrown damage bonus is also ironic when you'll say that ranged attacks are bad because of Precise Shot and the time it takes to raw a weapon and the magic costs, when very few people use a thrown weapon as their main (they don't have that two-handed damage die or boosted crit) and you have to draw a new weapon for every throw and it costs even more to have multiple magic thrown weapons. I can speculate further, as you'll probably say that Brutal Throw makes it all worth it- treating another specialist build as the baseline. And with those two remaining general feats the fighter can take Great Fortitude and Iron Will if they want. (Ironically once again, barbarian brutal thrower is a build that can use a shield just fine since throwing two-handed wastes your extra attacks so you're using one-handed weapons anyway, and if you don't want to switch-hit with a bow then brutal javelins are a fine choice for a lower feat cost at shorter ranges).

Rage and attack+damage bonuses are pretty much the perfect microcosm of the problem: I've seen people working on char-op builds who swear that Weapon Focus (and Spec, and Mastery) are terrible bending over backwards while jumping through hoops in order to pick up other feats and abilities that are actually giving them less numerical benefit (or are so situational they're not actually worth it), but they aren't evaluating based on that. They're evaluating based on "ewww Weapon Focus," and it's hilarious when it's not just sad.

Armored AC becomes much less important at high levels, because most monsters that threaten to kill a fighter (or barbarian) with ordinary damage have absurdly high attack bonuses. However, if you only want a shield bonus to AC, there's no need to give up the damage of a two-handed weapon. The only reason to dedicate a hand to a shield is if you plan to bash with it.
This is all popular and simply untrue. The char-op response is to point out that with more AC the enemy can power attack less. The simple response is that just because the enemy hits with some attacks, doesn't mean that AC isn't stopping enough attacks. A build that actually has the expected AC by bringing the full set of AC boosters, including and especially the shield, will block plenty of attacks and can furtherr boost their AC with Combat Expertise or fighting defensively against monsters that require even more AC to fight. Reducing your DPS to reduce theirs means your allies have more time to kill the foe, and teamwork is and has always been central to the game: the "melee guy" role is not about DPS, it's about being able to survive in melee and AC is the primary means of doing this, which is why AC bonuses are so tightly controlled. As for Animated Shields: that's a +2 bonus cost, which means it's reducing your AC by 2 until you can afford a +7 shield, at which point you're paying 24,000gp extra to keep your hand open, and those are non-trivial numbers don't even enter the game until after 10th (I consider the standard shield delta to be 4, with +2 heavy being affordable in the 5th+ range or even non-magical Tower at 1st). Or you could take Improved Buckler Defense with one of your many fighter feats for a much better split of -1 AC/-1 Attack/-0gp, or skip on Combat Expertise and use a magic tower shield. People who focus on aggro first have weaker defenses, plain and simple intentional game balance, and because the char-op forumite mentality is all aggro all the time they believe that defense is impossible.

There is one particular caveat, and that's which monster books you're using, because there was a massive amount of monster power creep in response to player optimizaton in several books. Games with optimized parties face optimized monsters, more powerful monsters from these books, or optimized monsters from these books. Very rarely do I actually see an optimizer suggesting encounters with MM1 monsters aside from optimized dragons- and why would they when their preferred playstyle is overpowered compared to those monsters?

What are they doing, then — waiting patiently while you ping them to death 1d8 at a time? If they're not fighting you, and they're not fighting your allies, what are they doing? Are they standing back and using ranged attacks? If so, are you really better off plinking with a bow instead of closing to melee?
Why would you ever expect a melee focused character to use a bow when the enemy is in melee with one of their allies? That's what you say you're expecting when you complain about not being able to afford Precise Shot. If the enemy is in melee with your allies, you get in there because that's what a melee character does. If the enemy is standing back shooting you, then you shoot back. Since the standard party includes two spellcasters and two people who can use bows, the PCs win a protracted ranged engagement. So yeah, you stand back and shoot them for (1d8+str)*number of attacks per round until they die or change their mind and close to melee, and you win. Being laser focused on only one type of engagement is how you waste turns standing around doing nothing or chasing things you can't catch.

Again, it's entirely possible for a fighter to attain baseline competence at a variety of combat techniques. The problem is that baseline competence isn't very good.
Only in your world where multiple feats and bonuses that other characters don't have counts as "baseline," and where only the most powerful builds are considered competent. And yes, it is your world. That is not what the game assumes, it is a playstyle that you (and many other people, and even me to a certain extent) enjoy. The actual baseline is: have weapon, make attack roll. That doesn't mean you can't make a bad character, but the game does not expect a frontline character to do anything more than armor up and swing a weapon. It is evidenced in the design, documentation, and history that predates 3rd edition.

Which feats are you talking about? The ones I alluded to in my last comment were Precise Shot, Quick Draw, and Improved Shield Bash, whereas you're relying upon Weapon Mastery.
You haven't stated what builds you think are acceptable for a fighter, so I'm filling them in: uberchargers and ubertrippers. Because it's always those two. The feats and abilities that make those builds really work were not written until 3.5 splatbooks, some of theme quite late in the run. They were written after the DMG, after the MM1, and have no place in the default balance level of the game- it's just not an arguable position (not that anyone will ever admit it, if you're the first I'll be pleasantly surprised, but that doesn't seem likely because . . ).

If you're comparing your master-of-none fighter to a pouncing charger, you're going to lose. It will not be remotely close. If, on the other hand, you're not using Lion Spiritual Totem as the baseline for the fighter's opposition, and cheetahs aren't unusually common in your game, then a typical result of standing in front of the wizard is that one opponent will suffer one attack of opportunity on the way to said wizard. There are ways to capitalize upon this, which you reject as powergaming.
Yeah, because the ubercharger is overpowered. That's by definition overpowered: the DMG is quite clear on what constitutes difficulty and the CR/EL guidelines. If your character is capable of killing foes of equal CR to their level in one round (which seems to be the char-op expectation of "baseline" competence), then you are almost certainly not expending 20% of your party's resources on that encounter.* Which means your party is beating encounters more easily than they're supposed to. That's not under-powered, nor is it normally-powered: it can only be over-powered.

As for the rest, you're still making a ton of assumptions about that fight. If the monster is within one move+attack and has room to get past you, sure they get to hit the wizard once, after you hit them once. If the wizard is far enough back that they need to double-move and you blocked the charge, that's a whole turn wasted: the wizard can move away and suffer at most one more attack, while you can charge after the foe and get a second attack. And that's all assuming one of the spellcasters doesn't pull a magic trick, which is kinda their whole point of being there.

You want to hate on me for hating on trip builds, but as OP as the trip penalties and Improved Trip itself are, I've got no problem with tripping people on the way past. Only with ubertrippers that stack too benefits to the point that the DM simply isn't allowed to use a whole subset of common monsters.

And finally, going back to multiple weapon paths, you've just walked into the trap. Because the iconic PCs in Enemies and Allies (purported to the the 3e playtesting characters), do exactly that. Tordek is rather disgustingly bad as his 15th level build just starts taking focus and spec for warhammer like he's run out of ideas even though he's got a bunch of ranged feats, for some reason Regdar doesn't pick up spec for longbow after getting focus and improved crit, and Krusk seems to have taken Point Blank Shot at 15th (expecting Rapid at 18th?), but all carry bows and pick up feats to boost ranged weapons. The PHB2 examples are more narrow and unsuprisingly focus on a bunch of feats from PHB2, but again that's all you really need to know: the designers wrote Weapon Spec, and Weapon Mastery, and recommended them. Just because they aren't good enough for your style of game doesn't mean that style of game is the default: it is in fact quite the opposite.

So, analysis? The only things you need to shoot better as a switch-hitter (as opposed to firing into melee as a ranged primary) are Point Blank Shot and Rapid Shot, that's two feats. The only thing you need for variable melee damage is Power Attack. The only thing you need for variable AC is Combat Expertise. That's four feats, which the fighter can take by 4th level, which cover essentially everything. Add in your general feats at 1st and 3rd, and that's enough to have a weapon spec open. You can fill in another weapon spec and have two Weapon Masteries, one for melee and one for ranged, at 9th level. If you're a human or don't want to spend that much on your non-primary attack mode, that's three feats you can spend on whatever you want.

And incidentally, the core of the ubercharger build is just "has Shock Trooper," which costs only two feats after Power Attack. The core of tripping is just Improved Trip and Combat Reflexes, which is two feats after Combat Expertise. The main reason those builds don't take fighter is because "eww fighter," but if they actually stayed in fighter they could easily afford to have their cake and eat it too, because nothing about the Weapon Focus line of feats prevents you from doing any of that, they're just a flat numerical advantage you can have which other characters can't duplicate, if you take at least 4 levels of fighter. As you well know it only takes one level of barbarian to get the vast majority of the benefits.

*And then you'll yell "spellcasters!" and I'll yell "limited spell slots and saving throws!" and you'll yell "four encounters per day!" and I'll yell "learn what *average* means!" Or we could not.
Sorry if I offended in my annoyance, but having re-hashed all that yet again, can we be done now? I mean that honestly, not as a dig- this isn't the thread for it and I really don't have anything more to say on the matter aside from going into greater detail on various points. But I've presented it here in response to you directly rather than searching up old threads and telling you to read them instead.



Throw another +1 at Drynwyn, Kurald, and Florian for expanding on how much attention to put into builds and how you do need to look ahead a little for some feat prerequisites (not all that many though, especially if your DM is nice and lets you change things later as you learn stuff, if needed).

I'd also note that which options are considered traps is also going to be extremely subjective. As evidenced by the very argument dominating the spoiler in this post: tons of people say that the Weapon Focus/Specialization/Mastery line is a trap, while I say it is mathematically superior and an excellent choice for a simple character (as long as you've got the last one- just Focus/Spec is a lot worse), and tons of people say you have to super-specialize in one thing while I say a Fighter can do everything at once at 4th level. It just depends on the group.


So you find a group that's playing somewhere under 10th, has room and is interested in having you. You tell them your circumstances and that you'd like to play a simple guy with a sword: the group will obviously have suggestions. These suggestions are pretty much the easiest way to tell if you're going to fit in with the group, since if their suggestions of a "simple" guy with a sword require too much research or are too complex for your taste, you already know that the character you want isn't going to fit in.

Regarding 3.5, personally I'd say any suggestion of an Alternate Class Feature other than those that remove spellcasting from Paladin or Ranger, is going to be a game where there's enough optimization that there is the *possibility* of spellcasters being supreme. Not a guarantee, but it shows that they expect more optimization than just picking feats and the ACFs in 3.5 that are usually suggested are dramatic power increases.

The most I think could be considered reasonable for a "simple" 3.5 brawler is PHB, Complete Warrior, and PHB2: that'll give you access to all the brawling base classes and most of their feats, with plenty of room for optimization without the massive power jumps of those ACFs I'm not mentioning. Like I said above, just read the base classes you're interested in, look over the feat tables and then read the feats you're interested in, and you're good to go.

Oh, and regarding Tome of Battle: great book, martial adepts are not spellcasters- but they do take about as much effort to learn as a spellcaster, and the man says he's not interested in learning much in the way of new mechanics or playing spellcasters. It's not the right fit.

[Zanos]

High up on that list would be Monkey grip, Spell thematics (the orginal, not the Epic level handbook version) and Natural Spell.
Not taking natural spell is a trap option.

[Fouredged Sword]

Another really good idea is to ask whatever group you find to help you with your character build. This is twofold useful. First it will help you get used to a new system. Second it will push you towards the natural optimization level of the group. High op players give high op advice. Low op players give low op advice, but also play low op games.

The optimization of a game has little to do with how fun it is to play. Low op games are a lot of fun. High op games are also fun. Playing the wrong optinisation level in a game just leads to frustration.

[GrayDeath]

As someone who, when returning to d and d at 2010, wanted the same thing, let me tell you this: IF you are relatively sure you want to play that type of character for a longer time than say one to two campaigns, spend the effort needed to learn the basics of Tome of Battle or for pf path of War.
These two books simply make the "mostly simple guy with sword" so much better that it's still fun and useful to be one in even a medium optimization game.

At least parts of the tomb and all of the path of War books can be legally obtained online in the respective srd s.


Now if you don't want to do that, I third the suggestion to simply find a pfs game or similar and let the group help you build. Should be more than enough for a fresh up. :)

[heavyfuel]

dual-wielding or one-handed duelling are just poor in general if you don't jump through a lot of hoops.

I'd honestly like to see a dueling build that doesn't absolutely suck even after jumping through hoops

[Hyperversum]

Imo, if you have played any RPG for more than 3/4 years there is little point in not playing with the ToB.
You don't like the fluff of it? Just take it out, refluff it to suit your setting. "Standard" mundane gets boring from a playing POV, and since the fluff is fluff and I roleplay my character how I want, what's the point of writing "Figther" rather than "Warblade" on your character sheet?

ToB simply offers an infinity of options compared to "move-attack-5' step-full attack-charge into Leap Attack".
In my party we tried slapping Swordsage manuevers mechanics on the Warblade known ones and school, then slapping all of this again on PF figther standard class. All of this, to create a "Adventurer" kind of swordsman.
It was fun, really, a lot.

And the effort to learn them isn't actually nowhere near those of spellcasters. Manuevers are at 98% some cool attacks or defenses.
Warblade one that wants to mostly hit things with a greatsword?

1) Stone Bones. Use it and if your attack connects, you get RD 5/adamantine. Use this to defend your ass.
2) Steel Wind. Standard Action, hit two enemies in your range.
3) MOMENT OF PERFECT MIND, with necessary caps lock. Show that low level caster that you are not the usual brute, you can resist a Fear Spell not by the only random roll of a dice.
4) Punishing Stance. You are big weapon user that loves to hit things really hard? As a swift action, enter in a stance where you deal more damage and reduce your AC.

It's not that complicated IMO, the rules require you to learn what swift actions and immediate actions are, what are Strike, Counter and Boost manuvers and... what else? Not much imo. And it's not different from playing a figther with a greatsword, if not for the fact that you tank things and hit a lot of people really hard, rather than taking a feat that gives you +1 to the hit roll.

[Calthropstu]

As usual much of the info being given to the op is fairly contradictory, and obtuse. The actual answer you are looking for is quite simple.

None of them and all of them. Caster supremacy can occur with an inattentive gm and a deliberate attempt by the casters to optimize. THIS IS RARE.
The people of this forum recognize the potential is there and many overstate its signifigance. In combat, most casters throw around direct damage or buffs to the melee front line... which does not "auto end" an encounter. The problem arises when mass save or suck spells enter play.

There is a school of people here who consider out of combat utility spells such as teleport overpowered. I disagree, but that debate is for elsewhere. The long at short is this:

If you play a melee combatant class, expect to be a melee combatant. Casters will have options you simply won't, or will require magic to duplicate (fly, teleport, and other such options.)

As for TOB, never used it. I have had fun playing all the core classes and never once as a "mundane" did I feel "useless."

[AvatarVecna]

As usual much of the info being given to the op is fairly contradictory, and obtuse. The actual answer you are looking for is quite simple.

None of them and all of them. Caster supremacy can occur with an inattentive gm and a deliberate attempt by the casters to optimize. THIS IS RARE.
The people of this forum recognize the potential is there and many overstate its signifigance. In combat, most casters throw around direct damage or buffs to the melee front line... which does not "auto end" an encounter. The problem arises when mass save or suck spells enter play.

There is a school of people here who consider out of combat utility spells such as teleport overpowered. I disagree, but that debate is for elsewhere. The long at short is this:

If you play a melee combatant class, expect to be a melee combatant. Casters will have options you simply won't, or will require magic to duplicate (fly, teleport, and other such options.)

As for TOB, never used it. I have had fun playing all the core classes and never once as a "mundane" did I feel "useless."

Teleport isn't overpowered in the "encounter breaking" sense (although when used to enable scry and die tactics it can be quite effective), but rather is overpowered in the "adventure breaking" sense. Some spells render certain plots more or less pointless, and Teleport is potentially one of them. Murder mysteries and investigations have to get a lot more complex to remain relevant once divinations start creeping onto the scene (Zone Of Truth, Speak With Dead, Scrying, etc). Any plot involving long travel distance through dangerous areas where taking an army just makes it easier to get caught (such as bringing a ring to a volcano through orc lands or something) is made a lot easier with mobility boosting spells. Things like Mount, Overland Flight, and Wind Walk make travel a heck of a lot easierb but things like Teleport trivialize it...and can potentially let you cut out large portions of the adventure to get right to the goal. Teleport to the volcano lip and toss in the ring, teleport to Bowser's castle, grab Peach, and teleport out, teleport to the dwarven stronghold so Durkula has less of a lead, etc. When time is of the essence, or the stakes are high and every minute counts, Teleport is a huge advantage even when you're not abusing it for scry n die.

Also, while most of these things can certainly be countered, it's almost universally by other magic. Magic can counter non-magic just fine, but non-magic countering magic cannot be, which doesn't help. Imagine how different the game would be if you could use Hide/Move Silently/Stealth to avoid the notice of divinations, for example.

[Morty]

I'd honestly like to see a dueling build that doesn't absolutely suck even after jumping through hoops

Well, if you use ToB/PoW you'll do fine on the basis that those classes are very hard to screw up. Maneuvers will pull their weight regardless of your weapon being inferior. Without those books, you're up the creek without a paddle.

Which is incidentally why I feel like those discussion overstate "caster supremacy" to massive degrees. There's gratuitous imbalance among non-magical characters before anyone brings magic into it and it's very easy to leave yourself unable to do your job, even if you're fine with the spellcasters' job being substantially greater.

[Calthropstu]

Teleport isn't overpowered in the "encounter breaking" sense (although when used to enable scry and die tactics it can be quite effective), but rather is overpowered in the "adventure breaking" sense. Some spells render certain plots more or less pointless, and Teleport is potentially one of them. Murder mysteries and investigations have to get a lot more complex to remain relevant once divinations start creeping onto the scene (Zone Of Truth, Speak With Dead, Scrying, etc). Any plot involving long travel distance through dangerous areas where taking an army just makes it easier to get caught (such as bringing a ring to a volcano through orc lands or something) is made a lot easier with mobility boosting spells. Things like Mount, Overland Flight, and Wind Walk make travel a heck of a lot easierb but things like Teleport trivialize it...and can potentially let you cut out large portions of the adventure to get right to the goal. Teleport to the volcano lip and toss in the ring, teleport to Bowser's castle, grab Peach, and teleport out, teleport to the dwarven stronghold so Durkula has less of a lead, etc. When time is of the essence, or the stakes are high and every minute counts, Teleport is a huge advantage even when you're not abusing it for scry n die.

Also, while most of these things can certainly be countered, it's almost universally by other magic. Magic can counter non-magic just fine, but non-magic countering magic cannot be, which doesn't help. Imagine how different the game would be if you could use Hide/Move Silently/Stealth to avoid the notice of divinations, for example.

Who said you can't hide from divinations? The divination is asking a deity or deity's minion what happened. What's the spot check of the deity in question?

[Cosi]

Teleport isn't overpowered in the "encounter breaking" sense (although when used to enable scry and die tactics it can be quite effective), but rather is overpowered in the "adventure breaking" sense. Some spells render certain plots more or less pointless, and Teleport is potentially one of them. Murder mysteries and investigations have to get a lot more complex to remain relevant once divinations start creeping onto the scene (Zone Of Truth, Speak With Dead, Scrying, etc). Any plot involving long travel distance through dangerous areas where taking an army just makes it easier to get caught (such as bringing a ring to a volcano through orc lands or something) is made a lot easier with mobility boosting spells. Things like Mount, Overland Flight, and Wind Walk make travel a heck of a lot easierb but things like Teleport trivialize it...and can potentially let you cut out large portions of the adventure to get right to the goal. Teleport to the volcano lip and toss in the ring, teleport to Bowser's castle, grab Peach, and teleport out, teleport to the dwarven stronghold so Durkula has less of a lead, etc. When time is of the essence, or the stakes are high and every minute counts, Teleport is a huge advantage even when you're not abusing it for scry n die.

Also, while most of these things can certainly be countered, it's almost universally by other magic. Magic can counter non-magic just fine, but non-magic countering magic cannot be, which doesn't help. Imagine how different the game would be if you could use Hide/Move Silently/Stealth to avoid the notice of divinations, for example.

I agree with most of this, but the problem is depicting it as a negative. A 10th level character is not supposed to be challenged by the combat challenges that would challenge a 1st level character (such as "a bunch of orcs and goblins"), why should he be challenged by the non-combat challenges that would challenge a 1st level character?


Which is incidentally why I feel like those discussion overstate "caster supremacy" to massive degrees. There's gratuitous imbalance among non-magical characters before anyone brings magic into it and it's very easy to leave yourself unable to do your job, even if you're fine with the spellcasters' job being substantially greater.

The problem is that no one bothers to define what balance looks like before trying to talk about imbalance. If you can't say how the game should behave, how on earth do you expect to usefully characterize the way it does behave?

[P.F.]

If you don't want to play a spellcaster you don't want a Tome of Battle class. This book replaces every instance of "spell" with "maneuver" and every instance of "cast/caster" with "initiate/initiator," and then provides an assortment of new fighter-themed spells, and classes which cast them. There's a version for Pathfinder as well, same thing, adapted to Pathfinder rules.

It's martials for for people who hate materials and casters for people who hate casters. It's literally something for everyone! There are even a few feats that can be useful to non-spellcasters -initiators, for those of us who might rather just play a core fighter, or who think a monk or barbarian might be fun too.

[AvatarVecna]

Who said you can't hide from divinations? The divination is asking a deity or deity's minion what happened. What's the spot check of the deity in question?

First of all, not all divinations are divine in nature, and even the ones that are divine aren't necessarily just asking a deity things, it also covers scrying and the like, which (even if they're scrying a hiding person and can't see them) informs the mage of about where their scrying target is located.

Secondly, I'm not saying you couldn't make a rule like that, I'm just saying that such a rule - and rules like it, where high-level nonmagic can counter high-level magic - largely don't exist, even in epic. The closest to something like that I've found in epic is that somebody who can make a DC 70 Bluff check can register as a different alignment for the purposes of alignment-detecting spells. This lets a CE person go undetected by Detect Evil or Detect Chaos if they choose to emulate a non-Chaotic and non-Evil alignment. Of course, being True Neutral in the first place would let you dodge all four from 1st lvl without a skill check, which is kinda neat if you're fine playing a universal fence-sitter.

I mentioned this as part of what I see as a discrepancy in the system that lends itself towards a caster advantage: there's usually a way to counter non-magic with other non-magic, there's usually a way to counter magic with other magic, there's virtually always a way to counter non-magic with magic, but there's basically never a way to counter magic with non-magic. I think that buffing up the skill system to include counters like this (and then giving most everybody at least a few more skill points to work with) would make things much better.

As a direct answer to your question, the game rules say so. We can make houserules and fixes all we like to make it so things are more even, but the baseline game is "casting>not casting". The game can be played in a way that ignores that baseline, though - usually, by staying well away from the kinds of things that make it obvious, such as "non-healbot clerics", "non-blaster/utility mages", and "druids".


I agree with most of this, but the problem is depicting it as a negative. A 10th level character is not supposed to be challenged by the combat challenges that would challenge a 1st level character (such as "a bunch of orcs and goblins"), why should he be challenged by the non-combat challenges that would challenge a 1st level character?

I'm not trying to give the impression that this is necessarily a bad thing, just that it's a thing you have to keep in mind. It's harder to have "trapped on a deserted island" plot when you can teleport to the mainland the same way it's difficult to have a murder mystery when you can just question the victim. That's not to say it's impossible to have such plots, just that if you want such plots to work when such plot-skipping powers are available, you need to give the PCs some reason not to use those powers. This is usually done either via story reasons ("now that we know about the Cthulhu cult here on the island, we can't leave until we've stopped their plot to destroy the world") or counters ("there's some kind of force field around the island preventing teleportation"). The latter is useful by not being specific to any particular story you might wanna tell, but requires you to be a lot more careful or your players will smell railroads, and that doesn't usually end well.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

If you don't want to play a spellcaster you don't want a Tome of Battle class. This book replaces every instance of "spell" with "maneuver" and every instance of "cast/caster" with "initiate/initiator," and then provides an assortment of new fighter-themed spells, and classes which cast them. There's a version for Pathfinder as well, same thing, adapted to Pathfinder rules.

It's martials for for people who hate materials and casters for people who hate casters. It's literally something for everyone! There are even a few feats that can be useful to non-spellcasters -initiators, for those of us who might rather just play a core fighter, or who think a monk or barbarian might be fun too.

:smallsigh: The fact that maneuvers have stat blocks formatted similarly to spell stat blocks doesn't make them "martial spells" any more than feats are martial spells.

For instance, here's the Ki Blast feat from PHB2:

KI BLAST
You focus your ki into a ball of energy that you can hurl at an opponent.
Prerequisites: Dex 13, Wis 13, Fiery Fist, Improved Unarmed Strike, Stunning Fist, base attack bonus +8.
Benefit: You can expend two daily uses of your Stunning Fist feat as a move action to create an orb of raw ki energy. You can then throw the seething orb as a standard action with a range of 60 feet. This ranged touch attack deals damage equal to 3d6 points + your Wis modifier. The ki orb is a force effect.
If you fail to throw the orb before the end of your turn, it dissipates harmlessly.
When you take this feat, you gain an additional daily use of Stunning Fist.
Special: A fighter can select Ki Blast as one of his fighter bonus feats. A monk with the Stunning Fist feat can select Ki Blast as her bonus feat at 8th level, as long as she possesses the Fiery Fist feat and a base attack bonus of +6 (other prerequisites can be ignored).
Here's the Fan the Flames maneuver from ToB:

FAN THE FLAMES
Desert Wind (Strike) [Fire]
Level: Swordsage 3
Prerequisite: One Desert Wind maneuver
lnitiation Action: I standard action
Range: 30ft.
Target: One creature
Flickering flame dances across your blade, then springs toward your target as you sweep your sword through the air.
A skilled Desert Wind adept can gather flame within his weapon and hurl it through the air. When you initiate this maneuver, you launch a fist-sized ball of white-hot fire at a single opponent.
If you make a successful ranged touch attack, your target takes 6d6 points of fire damage.
This maneuver is a supernatural ability.
When PHB2 came out, no one started saying the monk was turning a martial type into a caster because he can use up part of his pool of Stunning Fist uses to shoot fire at people, even though monks are definitely on the more magical side of the noncaster class spectrum. Yet when ToB comes out, people started saying the monk stand-in was turning a martial type into a caster because he can use up part of his pool of maneuvers to shoot fire at people. Doesn't make any sense.

[2D8HP]

Thanks everyone for the advice and encouragement!

:smile:


:smallsigh: The fact that maneuvers have stat blocks formatted similarly to spell stat blocks doesn't make them "martial spells" any more than feats are martial spells.

For instance, here's the Ki Blast feat from PHB2:
For instance, here's the Ki Blast feat from PHB2:

KI BLAST.....
You focus your ki into a ball of energy that you can hurl at an opponent.
Prerequisites: Dex 13, Wis 13, Fiery Fist, Improved Unarmed Strike, Stunning Fist, base attack bonus +8.
Benefit: You can expend two daily uses of your Stunning Fist feat as a move action to create an orb of raw ki energy. You can then throw the seething orb as a standard action with a range of 60 feet. This ranged touch attack deals damage equal to 3d6 points + your Wis modifier. The ki orb is a force effect.
If you fail to throw the orb before the end of your turn, it dissipates harmlessly....
..
O.P. here.

Um yeah "Ki Blast" and "Fan the Flames" really do look like spells to me, or like the "jutsu's" on the Naruto cartoons my son used to watch.

I'm more into Robin Hood, Sinbad, Fafhrd, and the Gray Mouser (yes I know that the last one worked a couple of spells), as character types.

A first level Magic User (the only arcane spell casters in oD&D) were likely to only be able to cast one spell a day, so not a lot of mechanics to remember.

As I get used to the options, sure I'll want to try more, but I'm a slow learner these days, and I really rather have just a few "mechanics" to remember at first.

Thanks.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

O.P. here.

Um yeah "Ki Blast" and "Fan the Flames" really do look like spells to me, or like the "jutsu's" on the Naruto cartoons my son used to watch.

I'm not saying you should play a ToB character, given what you're looking for; if they're both too magical for you, that's totally fine. I was just saying it's not really consistent to find one to be totally mundane and the other to be "spells for fighters" when they do basically the same thing with slightly different resource management systems.

[2D8HP]

...I was just saying it's not really consistent to find one to be totally mundane and the other to be "spells for fighters" when they do basically the same thing with slightly different resource management systems..
Sure that makes sense.

As someone who"s D&D knowledge is mostly just dim memories of 1970's rules D&D and AD&D, and a tiny bit of 5e, both of the examples you gave looked spell-like to me, and that brings to mind a worry:

I was planning on playing a Fighter, but a Fighter in 3.x seems mostly to be a "Feat" collector, and while some Feats like "Alertness" and "Deceitful" seem easy enough to understand, others seem complex to use.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

As someone who"s D&D knowledge is mostly just dim memories of 1970's rules D&D and AD&D, and a tiny bit of 5e, both of the examples you gave looked spell-like to me, and that brings to mind a worry:

I was planning on playing a Fighter, but a Fighter in 3.x seems mostly to be a "Feat" collector, and while some Feats like "Alertness" and "Deceitful" seem easy enough to understand, others seem complex to use.

I learned to play with AD&D myself as a kid before moving over to 3e, so I know where you're coming from.

Even in the PHB, most fighter bonus feats involve either conditional bonuses (Dodge, Mobility), situational mitigation of penalties (Blind-Fight, Precise Shot), or granting additional capabilities (Spring Attack, Whirlwind Attack), so there are definitely a bunch of moving parts to keep track of despite the fighter having been originally intended to be a simple class for new players.

However, you'll get at most two feats at a given level (or three at 1st if you're human) so you never need to learn too many new mechanics at once. And the combat rules are "chunked up" fairly well; you never need to learn the two-weapon fighting rules if you don't want to fight with two weapons, you never need to learn the shooting-into-melee rules if you don't want to fight with a bow, and so on--yes, you can obviously fight with two weapons or use a bow without having that as your main fighting style, but that means you won't be doing it very often so you can look it up when it comes up or rely on the DM or another player to help you out.

I'd suggest asking the DM if he'll allow retraining feats, so that you could take static feats like Weapon Focus early on and possibly replace them with different ones a few levels later if and when you become comfortable with more complexity. Barring that, just try to avoid Power Attack, Combat Expertise, and other feats that are more "sliding scale" than binary choices for the first few level and you should be fine.

[Malroth]

You could always do a conan style multiclass build. Start as a Barbarian. Multiclass to a thief for a couple levels for out of combat utility then Go Fighter once you know the combat system better and know what Feats you're going to want.

[KillingAScarab]

I was planning on playing a Fighter, but a Fighter in 3.x seems mostly to be a "Feat" collector, and while some Feats like "Alertness" and "Deceitful" seem easy enough to understand, others seem complex to use.That would be why feats became optional in 5th edition, rather than the default.


Even in the PHB, most fighter bonus feats involve either conditional bonuses (Dodge, Mobility), situational mitigation of penalties (Blind-Fight, Precise Shot), or granting additional capabilities (Spring Attack, Whirlwind Attack), so there are definitely a bunch of moving parts to keep track of despite the fighter having been originally intended to be a simple class for new players.

However, you'll get at most two feats at a given level (or three at 1st if you're human) so you never need to learn too many new mechanics at once. And the combat rules are "chunked up" fairly well; you never need to learn the two-weapon fighting rules if you don't want to fight with two weapons, you never need to learn the shooting-into-melee rules if you don't want to fight with a bow, and so on--yes, you can obviously fight with two weapons or use a bow without having that as your main fighting style, but that means you won't be doing it very often so you can look it up when it comes up or rely on the DM or another player to help you out.

I'd suggest asking the DM if he'll allow retraining feats, so that you could take static feats like Weapon Focus early on and possibly replace them with different ones a few levels later if and when you become comfortable with more complexity. Barring that, just try to avoid Power Attack, Combat Expertise, and other feats that are more "sliding scale" than binary choices for the first few level and you should be fine.I would suggest Pathfinder over D&D 3.5 for finding less complex feats. Combat expertise and power attack were fixed in that game by changing them from a sliding scale into a set penalty and bonus which both increase in magnitude as the character can afford greater risks. You can write down your AC both with and without combat expertise on your character sheet, and then you only need to remember which "mode" you have engaged. You can do the same with power attack for your melee weapons.

The Pathfinder fighter also gets bravery, armor training and weapon training to give static bonuses. Weapon training is the most complex of those three, but I like how there is some overlap, for instance, between spears and the thrown weapon group. You don't have to be 100% committed to shuriken or nets with that class feature. Also, while skill points per level weren't increased for fighters, you can choose to gain 1 additional skill point if fighter is your favored class when you level up. Combined with the removal of cross-class maximums and 1/2 skill ranks, this means you can afford to spread your skills out a bit further than in 3.5. Fighters are still narrowly focused, but you might be able to do more than look intimidating.

[Fizban]

I was planning on playing a Fighter, but a Fighter in 3.x seems mostly to be a "Feat" collector, and while some Feats like "Alertness" and "Deceitful" seem easy enough to understand, others seem complex to use.
The fighter has plenty of static feats, they're not very popular but you could absolutely fill up all your feats with flat bonuses and always-on benefits if you wanted. Heck, I'll even run down through PHB, Complete Warrior, and PBH2 and make a list of the simplest melee stuff:

PHB
Exotic Weapon Proficiency: use an exotic weapon.
Weapon Focus, Weapon Specialization, Melee or Ranged Weapon Mastery (PHB2), Greater Weapon Focus, Greater Weapon Specialization: flat attack and damage bonus with chosen weapon (and get a range boost if its a ranged weapon)
Improved Critical: double the critical threat range of your chosen weapon.
Blind Fight: when you roll miss chance in melee, you get to roll twice and take the better (plus some extra benefits).
Improved Initiative: +4 on initiative checks.
Quick Draw: draw weapons as a free action (very useful for throwing weapons)

Complete Warrior
Improved Buckler Defense: you can use a two-handed weapon and a buckler without losing the shield bonus.
Improved Toughness: you get +1 hp per level (does not require basic Toughness, and a Fighter can take it at 1st level)
Monkey Grip: you can use bigger weapon than normal, but take -2 on attacks.
Power Critical: you get +4 on critical hit confirmation rolls.

PHB2
Armor Specialization: you gain DR 2/- when using the chosen armor type.
Indomitable Will: whenever you're hit by a mind-affecting or fear ability, you roll twice and take the better on your will save.
Shield Specialization: you get +1 AC with the chosen shield.
Steadfast Determination: use your Constitution instead of Wisdom for will saves.

And since we want flat bonuses, a little more from-
Races of Stone
Exotic Armor or Shield Proficiency: you can use an exotic armor or shield (usually worth +1 AC)
Heavy Armor Optimization: you get +1 AC and reduce the armor check penalty by 2 with the chosen armor.

There are more feats that a little conditional, but either just remove problems or you'll basically always use, such as:

Combat Reflexes: instead of one attack of opportunity per round, you get some more.
Cleave: when you drop a foe, you get a free attack once per round.
Rapid Shot: when you full attack with a ranged weapon, you can make an extra attack by taking -2 on all your attacks for the round- you basically always want to use this once you have it.
Precise Shot: you no longer have to worry about the penalty for shooting at enemies who are engaged in melee.
Improved Precise Shot: you no longer have to worry about cover, concealment, or shooting into a grapple.

Close Quarters Fighting (Complete Warrior): normally when someone tries to grapple you, you get a chance to hit them first, but some characters or monsters can prevent this. Close-Quarters Fighting means you ignore those abilities and always get that chance to hit them like you normally would have in the first place, and if you hit them you get a bonus to resist the the grapple- it's basically the simplest way to deal with grappling (by stabbing them and not getting grappled). This is the most complicated "simple" feat I would recommend.

And finally, Power Attack and Combat Expertise don't have to be complicated: you can simply treat them as an on/off switch. Just pick an amount that's easy to do the math on and only use that. So if you're getting hit too much, just go -5 attack/+5 AC with expertise, or if the enemy is really easy to hit, just go -5/+5 with power attack.

Oh, for for stuff that triggers based on certain conditions, a good DM will know your character and help you remember. Unless you're trying to make things complicated, you can very easily keep it to just a couple things to keep track of aside from attacking and standing in the right spot.

[Florian]

.As someone who"s D&D knowledge is mostly just dim memories of 1970's rules D&D and AD&D, and a tiny bit of 5e, both of the examples you gave looked spell-like to me, and that brings to mind a worry:

I was planning on playing a Fighter, but a Fighter in 3.x seems mostly to be a "Feat" collector, and while some Feats like "Alertness" and "Deceitful" seem easy enough to understand, others seem complex to use.

Started with oD&D myself, back then.

Ok, no use in being shy about it: Have a chat about your expectations or you will have problems with d20. Classes are no self-contained rules vehicles that you can refluff at any time, because they lack class features that go hand in hand with the fluff, but building blocks that you use to achieve certain goals, like "I want my Fighter to be the Grey Mouser, how to get there? (possible answer: Human Sorcerer 4 / Rogue 3 / Fighter 13....)".

So, truth is, you could write down an pre-AD&D or old Traveller character on a napkin and still have space left aplenty, that doesn´ told true for 3E/4E, which has a higher learning curve, but is actually pretty rewarding for engaging it.

Personal opinion: Go for Pathfinder instead of 3.5E. Free and legal rules on the net, runs smoother and martial classes are more fun. You'll also find that classes like Cavalier or Slayer are at times easier than Fighter, which tends to be on the more complex side of martials.

Don't try to learn and absorb all of it on your own, that's unnecessary. Formulate some thoughts (like: I want my Fighter to be like Gimli the dwarf) and then engage the forum to build and explain the mechanics to you.

[ngilop]

You and I have very similar styles of play from what I have garnered from your various posts. also having gone through every edition


overwhelmingly, and by that I mean only twice. AND one of those times do not count because guy came to forum and had a 'you're stupid unless you play an optimized caster' and go some kind of insane unstoppable elven generalist domain wizard nonsense.

soo rant...

only twice have I ever seen or experienced people play a game like how the majority of GiTPers says you have to play D&D. The rest of the time, people create competent characters at best, and the fighter who has a 16 in Int, puts all his skill points into intimidate (with his 4 Cha) and gets weapon focus and from then on nothing but toughness then wonders why things don't work.

at the table, most people play to have fun and hang with friends.

the forum is a subset of a subset of the population, so do not take what GiTP says as 'gospel truth'

[P.F.]

:smallsigh: The fact that maneuvers have stat blocks formatted similarly to spell stat blocks doesn't make them "martial spells" any more than feats are martial spells.

For instance, here's the Ki Blast feat from PHB2:

Here's the Fan the Flames maneuver from ToB:

When PHB2 came out, no one started saying the monk was turning a martial type into a caster because he can use up part of his pool of Stunning Fist uses to shoot fire at people, even though monks are definitely on the more magical side of the noncaster class spectrum. Yet when ToB comes out, people started saying the monk stand-in was turning a martial type into a caster because he can use up part of his pool of maneuvers to shoot fire at people. Doesn't make any sense.

Well ki blast was more like a hadouken, and uses up one of the monks only better special class abilities for a modest ranged force effect. Situationally useful, but not great, and not entirely out-of-genre. Fan the flames, at least in my circles, looks more like a spell. Even my friend who loved ToB, bought it the day it came out, had the good taste to be embarrassed by that maneuver.

In all fairness to the book, though, most of the maneuvers are combinations of "make an extra attack" and "deal extra damage" and "give your opponent a condition" effects. The kinds of things you really wanted your fighter to be able to do anyway. Just organized, formatted, and implemented like spells.

[Fouredged Sword]

There are two things at play here.

1-"Wants to play mundane charater who doesn't seem mystical."

And

2-"Want something simple to reduce the amount of work required to play."

Tome of battle CAN meet the first requirement. You can do nothing more than hit things with swords in different ways. What it doesn't do is be as simple as a core fighter. You only need to remeber 4-5 maneuvers and 1 stance, but that is on top of the stuff a fighter has to worry about.

And that brings me to my conclusion. Find a Fighter handbook (there are good guides all over the web) to read through. Pay more attention to the things it says NOT to do than the stuff it suggests as the strongest options.

Find a group. Have them help you build.your character. Play for a while. Once you are used to the character and the game you will ether be perfectly happy with the way things are or feeling like you need more options. For the first, keep playing and enjoy. For the second crack open the Tome of Batttle and start taking warblade levels. There is no need to be a teleprting firebreathing ninja. There is plenty of room for a "Guy woth some sword tricks".

All in all, start simple and only complocate things as needed

[Nifft]

Oh, and regarding Tome of Battle: great book, martial adepts are not spellcasters- but they do take about as much effort to learn as a spellcaster, and the man says he's not interested in learning much in the way of new mechanics or playing spellcasters. It's not the right fit. Disagree about the relative effort being equivalent.

Spellcasters have highly complex effects, stuff like "turn into a monster" (i.e. go look at monster books and optimize within a spell) or "summon a monster which can cast spells"(i.e. go look at other monsters in the monster books and figure out which second spellcaster[i] is optimal).

ToB effects are very simple in comparison:
- "Hit with your sword, but roll a Concentration check instead of an attack roll."
- "You deal +1d6 melee damage, but you suffer -2 AC."
- "Hit once more with your weapon but suffer a -2 to attack."
- "Your melee attacks deal +1d6 fire damage for 1 round."
- "You gain Blindsight 30 ft. until you change Stance."

Maneuvers are (somewhat) like spells in their presentation, but maneuvers are [I]nothing like spells in their complexity.



There are two things at play here.

1-"Wants to play mundane charater who doesn't seem mystical."

And

2-"Want something simple to reduce the amount of work required to play."

Tome of battle CAN meet the first requirement. You can do nothing more than hit things with swords in different ways. What it doesn't do is be as simple as a core fighter. You only need to remeber 4-5 maneuvers and 1 stance, but that is on top of the stuff a fighter has to worry about.

And that brings me to my conclusion. Find a Fighter handbook (there are good guides all over the web) to read through. Pay more attention to the things it says NOT to do than the stuff it suggests as the strongest options.

Find a group. Have them help you build.your character. Play for a while. Once you are used to the character and the game you will ether be perfectly happy with the way things are or feeling like you need more options. For the first, keep playing and enjoy. For the second crack open the Tome of Batttle and start taking warblade levels. There is no need to be a teleprting firebreathing ninja. There is plenty of room for a "Guy woth some sword tricks".

All in all, start simple and only complocate things as needed

Warblade is a great suggestion.

IMHO a Warblade focused on Diamond Mind + Iron Heart + White Raven would be neat as an Aragorn stand-in.

Nothing magical, but plenty of ways to answer magic: either through the focus of a swordsman, the raw willpower of a true warrior, or the inspiring words of a leader.

I think Conan can be modeled as a Warblade, too.

[EldritchWeaver]

OP, if you follow the advice of playing PF instead, if you are dissatisfied with move+attack or stand still+full-attack, if you don't like the complexity Path of War, then you could use Spheres of Might (http://spheresofpower.wikidot.com/). It provides additional combat options like shoving an opponent into another opponent and harm them both. This is done by choosing combat talents instead having spell-like maneuvers and do not need a subset to be chosen to be prepared to be able to use them in combat. The most complicated thing is something called the martial focus, which might be necessary to have or need to expended for some talents and subsequently regained for the next use. If that is too complicated for your tastes, with the right build you only need to know the basics of the system and the talents you have chosen and never worry about the martial focus.

[Florian]

As expected, the lunatics come out of the wood and loudly proclaim their favored subsystem, be it ToB or SoP, no matter what the OP wrote about keeping it simple. Disconnect > Reality.

[gkathellar]

As expected, the lunatics come out of the wood and loudly proclaim their favored subsystem, be it ToB or SoP, no matter what the OP wrote about keeping it simple. Disconnect > Reality.

https://i.imgur.com/6YwXXrq_d.jpg

[Calthropstu]

As expected, the lunatics come out of the wood and loudly proclaim their favored subsystem, be it ToB or SoP, no matter what the OP wrote about keeping it simple. Disconnect > Reality.

I have to agree. For your first pf game all you should need is the core rulebook. Period.

[Jay R]

Play and have fun, no matter how much it annoys the Internet.

[Florian]

https://i.imgur.com/6YwXXrq_d.jpg

OP especially pointed out to having an oD&D/AD&D background, being used to playing a Fighting Man / Fighter back in the days and wanting a d20 class / build that is on the same (reduced) complexity level. Disregarding treasure, you could fit the whole character sheet of a Fighting Man on the back of a business card and have everything relevant at hand.

Now switching to d20 is already a huge step-up in complexity, derived stats, more moving parts and all that, but suggesting subsystems where a regular recommendation is to print out stance and maneuver cards so you have the growing set of discreet rules you need to run such a character at hand, seems to be blatantly against the wishes of the OP and simply based on the myopic view of some forumites on the topic of martials.

Personally, I wouldn't even know what to suggest under these conditions, as I think that a PF Fighter needs more system mastery than other martial classes, like the Cavalier/Samurai.

[weckar]

As someone who is not a fan of 'Sword Magic', I personally rather like the Swashbuckler for the more agile fighter type and the Barbarian for the bruiser.

[EldritchWeaver]

As expected, the lunatics come out of the wood and loudly proclaim their favored subsystem, be it ToB or SoPSoM, no matter what the OP wrote about keeping it simple. Disconnect > Reality.

(FTFY.)

Insulting people has been the proven strategy to convince them of being wrong.


OP especially pointed out to having an oD&D/AD&D background, being used to playing a Fighting Man / Fighter back in the days and wanting a d20 class / build that is on the same (reduced) complexity level. Disregarding treasure, you could fit the whole character sheet of a Fighting Man on the back of a business card and have everything relevant at hand.

Now switching to d20 is already a huge step-up in complexity, derived stats, more moving parts and all that, but suggesting subsystems where a regular recommendation is to print out stance and maneuver cards so you have the growing set of discreet rules you need to run such a character at hand, seems to be blatantly against the wishes of the OP and simply based on the myopic view of some forumites on the topic of martials.

Personally, I wouldn't even know what to suggest under these conditions, as I think that a PF Fighter needs more system mastery than other martial classes, like the Cavalier/Samurai.

That's the crux of the matter. The so-called "simplest" solution, take fighter, is the worst one for a newbie on his own, because you need to avoid a huge number of trap options. Suggesting ToB/PoW and SoM recognizes this. OTOH, suggesting ToB/PoW does increase the complexity in way which the OP is too much. SoM has the advantage that new options are modular to the core ones and employ their mechanics where possible. If expending/gaining martial focus is too complicated, just avoid those options which use them. There are still enough left to do interesting things.

If the OP is only interested in doing only a few things at most, then staying in CRB would work, if he gets his character served on a silver platter. In other words, he "merely" needs a prepared build, with all choices chosen (except ranged or melee or both by OP) by someone with system mastery. Then he only needs to play that character effectively. And be happy with that character.

[Calthropstu]

(FTFY.)

Insulting people has been the proven strategy to convince them of being wrong.



That's the crux of the matter. The so-called "simplest" solution, take fighter, is the worst one for a newbie on his own, because you need to avoid a huge number of trap options. Suggesting ToB/PoW and SoM recognizes this. OTOH, suggesting ToB/PoW does increase the complexity in way which the OP is too much. SoM has the advantage that new options are modular to the core ones and employ their mechanics where possible. If expending/gaining martial focus is too complicated, just avoid those options which use them. There are still enough left to do interesting things.

If the OP is only interested in doing only a few things at most, then staying in CRB would work, if he gets his character served on a silver platter. In other words, he "merely" needs a prepared build, with all choices chosen (except ranged or melee or both by OP) by someone with system mastery. Then he only needs to play that character effectively. And be happy with that character.

Ummm, no. No he doesn't. He can do just fine with just about any of the feat trees. Just because YOU find them "sub optimal" doesn't mean they can't be fun.

And PF made a good number of fixes to the so called "trap options." He really can't go wrong with the CRB as long as he has a clear idea of what he wants to do.
I suggest going for great cleave or whirlwind since he wants to be "guy with sword" not "guy with swords." Maybe pick up a couple social feats for some nice buffs there and call it a day.

[EldritchWeaver]

Ummm, no. No he doesn't. He can do just fine with just about any of the feat trees. Just because YOU find them "sub optimal" doesn't mean they can't be fun.

Considering that OP stated that he doesn't want to be bothered by caster supremacy, this implies using an optimal build. The better the build, the longer you can stave of caster involvement.


And PF made a good number of fixes to the so called "trap options." He really can't go wrong with the CRB as long as he has a clear idea of what he wants to do.
I suggest going for great cleave or whirlwind since he wants to be "guy with sword" not "guy with swords." Maybe pick up a couple social feats for some nice buffs there and call it a day.

As long OP uses 3.5, it is completely irrelevant that PF made fixes. And if he chooses PF, then he runs into the issue that PF made feat chains longer. Or more costly in general, if you want to have the same abilities as before. He simply should create a thread for an appropriate build and tell about his preferences. The rest is can be done by people who know their stuff.

[Calthropstu]

Considering that OP stated that he doesn't want to be bothered by caster supremacy, this implies using an optimal build. The better the build, the longer you can stave of caster involvement.



As long OP uses 3.5, it is completely irrelevant that PF made fixes. And if he chooses PF, then he runs into the issue that PF made feat chains longer. Or more costly in general, if you want to have the same abilities as before. He simply should create a thread for an appropriate build and tell about his preferences. The rest is can be done by people who know their stuff.

Fair enough, although fighters in pf get more feats to spend more than negating the expanded list. Also most of the fighter abilities work better in pf anyways, and he has access to a lot more anti spell options too.

[Hecuba]

I was planning on playing a Fighter, but a Fighter in 3.x seems mostly to be a "Feat" collector, and while some Feats like "Alertness" and "Deceitful" seem easy enough to understand, others seem complex to use.

You would be better, in that case, to go with either a barbarian or a rogue. Both are a bit more ready-bake for someone just starting with the system.

[Nifft]

As someone who is not a fan of 'Sword Magic', I personally rather like the Swashbuckler for the more agile fighter type and the Barbarian for the bruiser.

Rogue 3 / Swashbuckler X with Daring Outlaw (CSco) is a simple yet solid build.

[Jay R]

I was planning on playing a Fighter, but a Fighter in 3.x seems mostly to be a "Feat" collector, and while some Feats like "Alertness" and "Deceitful" seem easy enough to understand, others seem complex to use.

That's not a problem for a player, since no character gets all the Feats. You can just use the ones that look fun and easy to understand. For my first game, I'm having a great time with the Feats Power Attack, Combat Reflexes, Improved Trip, Knock Down, Combat Expertise, Improved Initiative, etc.

Don't try to learn all the rules now. Learn the rules that this character needs, in this session.

Try to get really good at a specialized approach, rather than fairly good at everything. My character has mastered tripping, and uses it whenever possible.

Find Feats that work well together, like Improved Trip and Knockdown. Attack once with a Guisarme and high strength, and you get a free trip attempt from Knock-Down. If you succeed at it (at +4), you get a free attack on the prone enemy. When he tries to get up, you get a free Attack of Opportunity. Lather, Rinse, Repeat.

And if your main options use Attacks of Opportunity, then you need two things:
1. Combat Reflexes increases how often you can do it.
2. Learn the Attack of Opportunity rules. They really aren't all that hard. (If you have Combat Reflexes, you get more of them, and the most complicated piece is gone.)

If you have Feat that you can change how you attack, like Power Attack and Combat Expertise, plan in advance when you will use them, and at what level. [Once I know what I need to roll to hit the enemy, I use one of them any time I can still hit the first time on a 2. Power Attack is used when I need to do a lot of damage quickly, and Combat Expertise is used when I'm really the backup, holding them off while the others get the kill.]

Don't try to learn all the rules now. Learn the rules that this character needs, in this session.

[Calthropstu]

That's not a problem for a player, since no character gets all the Feats. You can just use the ones that look fun and easy to understand. For my first game, I'm having a great time with the Feats Power Attack, Combat Reflexes, Improved Trip, Knock Down, Combat Expertise, Improved Initiative, etc.

Don't try to learn all the rules now. Learn the rules that this character needs, in this session.

Try to get really good at a specialized approach, rather than fairly good at everything. My character has mastered tripping, and uses it whenever possible.

Find Feats that work well together, like Improved Trip and Knockdown. Attack once with a Guisarme and high strength, and you get a free trip attempt from Knock-Down. If you succeed at it (at +4), you get a free attack on the prone enemy. When he tries to get up, you get a free Attack of Opportunity. Lather, Rinse, Repeat.

And if your main options use Attacks of Opportunity, then you need two things:
1. Combat Reflexes increases how often you can do it.
2. Learn the Attack of Opportunity rules. They really aren't all that hard. (If you have Combat Reflexes, you get more of them, and the most complicated piece is gone.)

If you have Feat that you can change how you attack, like Power Attack and Combat Expertise, plan in advance when you will use them, and at what level. [Once I know what I need to roll to hit the enemy, I use one of them any time I can still hit the first time on a 2. Power Attack is used when I need to do a lot of damage quickly, and Combat Expertise is used when I'm really the backup, holding them off while the others get the kill.]

Don't try to learn all the rules now. Learn the rules that this character needs, in this session.

Exactly. You don't need all the claptrap, a phb for 3.5 or core rulebook for pathfinder is all you need to get started. Pick up what seems interesting later.

[P.F.]

I run core only, my friends range from 1st-party Paffinder to 3.pf anything goes. Regardless of ruleset, I have not seen a problem with caster supremacy.

[Nifft]

I run core only, my friends range from 1st-party Paffinder to 3.pf anything goes. Regardless of ruleset, I have not seen a problem with caster supremacy.

What level range did you play?

[P.F.]

What level range did you play?

Usually 1through 9 to 10, but we have played games with characters even at epic levels.

[Florian]

Exactly. You don't need all the claptrap, a phb for 3.5 or core rulebook for pathfinder is all you need to get started. Pick up what seems interesting later.

Here I disagree a bit, especially when it comes to PF. The original feat, spell and magic items selection that we now carry along from 3.0 to 3.5 to PF is overly generic, not very supportive and I tend to view it as a "legacy" problem by now, especially the spells.

Edit: For me, that's not a raw power thing, but if I want to play a, say, dwarves viking, I enjoy having the right archetype for it and picking dwarf-fluffed feats that also work with more sub-optimal choices like warhammer and shield instead of the usual cookie-cutter stuff like high-crit weapons.


What level range did you play?

I mostly play APs, so range is 1 to 15-17, but with very cooperative-minded players, absolutely no competition and very little pressure from the players to enforce their "agency" or act outside the AP.
So like P.F. I rarely have anything that even has a whiff of "caster supremacy" to it, with the non-caster classes being overall favored by my players.