Index Retiering the Classes: A new home [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

heavyfuel

2018-09-10, 12:53 PM

This is a project started (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?515845-Retiering-the-Classes-Home-Base) by eggynack (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/member.php?48788-eggynack) a long time ago, in a forum far far away (i.e., last year on this forum before it was down a for a while). I won't change much, if anything regarding how eggy did things, this is simply a continuation of eggy's work, though I'll likely take a less active position in the actual discussions mostly due to a time factor (i.e., I haven't been having time). Anything I do change/add will be marked in this indigo colour. Without further ado...

THE PROJECT: RETIERING THE CLASSES

JaronK's tier system for classes (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?266559-Tier-System-for-Classes-(Rescued-from-MinMax)) is pretty neat. Least I think so. A hierarchical arrangement of game objects is tricky to design in the best of times, but it's perhaps at its trickiest in a system as complex as 3.5, and cooperative for that matter. The original system has prevailed throughout the years, sticking around while more complex variations pop up and often fade away. It's a great thing, but also a somewhat problematic one, as various classes in the game were mistiered, or, if they're sufficiently obscure, they weren't tiered at all. Moreover, some of the underlying rules for tiers are a bit on the wonky side. Our goal here is to retier the classes over a long period of time, knocking them out approximately three at a time in a variety of subthreads, and create as perfect a tier list as is plausible. Our other goal is to discuss classes, cause doing that is neat.

This thread, then, has the basic purpose of discussing stuff like procedure, and what classes we should tier, along with any other essential functioning stuff. It will also be a nexus for all the child threads that are devoted to class sets, linking to them and having useful information and such. So, with that out of the way, let's get to the important stuff.

What are the tiers?

The simple answer here is that tier one is the best, the home of things on the approximate problem solving scale of wizards, and tier six is the worst, land of commoners. And problem solving capacity is what's being measured here. Considering the massive range of challenges a character is liable to be presented with across the levels, how much and how often does that character's class contribute to the defeat of those challenges? This value should be considered as a rough averaging across all levels, the center of the level range somewhat more than really low and really high level characters, and across all optimization levels (considering DM restrictiveness as a plausible downward acting factor on how optimized a character is), prioritizing moderate optimization somewhat more than low or high.

A big issue with the original tier system is that, if anything, it was too specific, generating inflexible definitions for allowance into a tier which did not cover the broad spectrum of ways a class can operate. When an increase in versatility would seem to represent a decrease in tier, because tier two is supposed to be low versatility, it's obvious that we've become mired in something that'd be pointless to anyone trying to glean information from the tier system. Thus, I will be uncharacteristically word light here. The original tier system's tier descriptions (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?266559-Tier-System-for-Classes-(Rescued-from-MinMax)) are still good guidelines here, but they shouldn't be assumed to be the end all and be all for how classes get ranked.

Consistent throughout these tiers is the notion of problems and the solving thereof. For the purposes of this tier system, the problem space can be said to be inclusive of combat, social interaction, and exploration, with the heaviest emphasis placed on combat. A problem could theoretically fall outside of that space, but things inside that space are definitely problems. Another way to view the idea of problem solving is through the lens of the niche ranking system (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?314701-Person_Man-s-Niche-Ranking-System). A niche filled tends to imply the capacity to solve a type of problem, whether it's a status condition in the case of healing, or an enemy that just has too many hit points in the case of melee combat. It's not a perfect measure, both because some niches have a lot of overlap in the kinds of problems they can solve and because, again, the niches aren't necessarily all inclusive, but they can act as a good tool for class evaluation.

Tier one: Incredibly good at solving nearly all problems. This is the realm of clerics, druids, and wizards, classes that open up with strong combat spells backed up by utility, and then get massively stronger from there. If you're not keeping up with that core trio of tier one casters, then you probably don't belong here.

Tier two: We're just a step below tier one here, in the land of classes around the sorcerer level of power. Generally speaking, this means relaxing one of the two tier one assumptions, either getting us to very good at solving nearly all problems, or incredibly good at solving most problems. But, as will continue to be the case as these tiers go on, there aren't necessarily these two simple categories for this tier. You gotta lose something compared to the tier one casters, but what you lose doesn't have to be in some really specific proportions.

Tier three: Again, we gotta sacrifice something compared to tier two, here taking us to around the level of a swordsage. The usual outcome is that you are very good at solving a couple of problems and competent at solving a few more. Of course, there are other possibilities, for example that you might instead be competent at solving nearly all problems.

Tier four: Here we're in ranger/barbarian territory (though the ranger should be considered largely absent of ACF's and stuff to hit this tier, as will be talked about later). Starting from that standard tier three position, the usual sweet spots here are very good at solving a few problems, or alright at solving many problems.

Tier five: We're heading close to the dregs here. Tier five is the tier of monks, classes that are as bad as you can be without being an aristocrat or a commoner. Classes here are sometimes very good at solving nearly no problems, or alright at solving a few, or some other function thereof. It's weak, is the point.

Tier six: And here we have commoner tier. Or, the bottom is commoner. The top is approximately aristocrat. You don't necessarily have nothing in this tier, but you have close enough to it.

If you have any suggestions for modifications to this setup, go ahead, but I think the general format of, "Each tier is worse than the one above, and can be that in a large number of ways," is solid. It's a structure that can plausibly handle the addition of random new classes and systems without breaking down.

Important notes, procedural and otherwise

Tier Voting Procedure:The basic procedure here will be to vote on classes in the suitable thread. Threads will stay open for an indefinite quantity of time, though I could get bored in like a year and someone else could take up the thread altering game (I, heavyfuel, reserve the same right). I'll be checking and altering the numbers reasonably often to match changes in vote, and you can alter your vote whenever you want. I expect each thread to handle roughly three classes, though I could see some going up to five or six. We probably don't need to spend two entire threads covering classes that are obviously tier one, for example. Votes don't necessarily have to take on integer values, though I'm gonna say you should stick to rationals, cause supporting the alternative seems too hard and not worth it. I don't really have much I can do with, "Tier three sometimes, tier four other times," and, "High tier two," is just going to be a two, so make sure that whatever you do can be reasonably put into a fancy spreadsheet.

One really important thing here is that you can't just toss a vote out into the void with no information and then just leave. You need some solid justification for your vote, and preferably some interaction with the discussion. If you don't, it's not that big a deal, cause you can always add justification, but your vote may not be counted until then, and you'll may be notified if you've been left out. Our goal here is accuracy in tiering, and if you think a class is tiered in a certain way premised on incorrect knowledge, then that should be plainly visible from what you're saying about the class. A few sentences is reasonable, a paragraph or two is quite good, and a few posts on the topic is great. Generally speaking, the more controversial a class is, the more explanation you're going to want to give, and the same is the case for individually weird votes. Just giving a wizard a 1 and saying, "Jeez, you called this a one explicitly in your initial post. How much detail do you really want me to give?" is likely sufficient. Doing the same about a class that's had ten pages of individual attention is probably not.

On ACF's, feats, items, dips, prestige classes, and so on:The default here will be to consider everything that isn't a class or prestige class, and nothing that is a class or prestige class. A general assumption is that the more obscure something is, the less likely it is to be on any particular character, and thus the less it should factor in. What matters most are things that a class has access to or makes good use of by dint of their class features. If a commoner can do it just as well, it's not a major class consideration. One major exception to this is individual game objects that merit a tier adjustment in and of themselves, and that largely lack for substitutes. The same may sometimes be the case for two object interactions, but that's more of an edge case and should be looked at on a case by case basis. When these things happen, we'll split off the ACF or feat (or item, but that's rarer) altered class and call it its own entry.

In all cases, use your best judgement and discretion. I think we'll get some good results here.

The Threads

The Icarnum Classes: Incarnate, Soulborn, Totemist (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?568774-Retiering-the-Classes-Incarnate-Soulborn-Totemist&p=23358636#post23358636)

The Expanded Psionics: Psion, Psychic Warrior, Soulknife, Wilder (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?569280-The-Expanded-Psionics-Psion-Psychic-Warrior-Soulknife-Wilder&p=23373106)

The Auraists (Re-Done): Divine Mind, Dragon Shaman, Marshal (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?569997-Retiering-the-Classes-Divine-Mind-Dragon-Shaman-and-Marshal-(re-done)&p=23392694#post23392694)

Completing the Psionics: Ardent, Erudite, Lurk, Psychic Rogue (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?570457-Retiering-the-Classes-Ardent-Erudite-Lurk-Psychic-Rogue)

The Stray Dogs: Knight, Noble, Swashbuckler (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?570925-Retiering-the-Classes-Knight-Noble-Swashbuckler)

The Dragon Magaziners: Mystic Ranger, Trickster, Wild Monk (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?571537-Retiering-the-Classes-Mystic-Ranger-Trickster-Wild-Monk&p=23439210)

The Generic Classes: Generic Expert, Generic Spellcaster, Generic Warrior (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?572023-Retiering-the-Classes-Generic-Expert-Generic-Spellcaster-Generic-Warrior)

The Rankings

These are the classes from most higher to lower tier. All numbers are integers, but the decimals were taken into account when ordering (see spreadsheet at the bottom of post for detail). As for rounding up/down, the system was: a class that ranked at X.50 or better was put in Tier X, classes that ranked X.51 or worse were put into Tier X+1.

Tier 1
Cleric: Tier 1
Druid: Tier 1
Sha'ir: Tier 1
Shaman: Tier 1
Archivist: Tier 1
Wizard: Tier 1
Artificer: Tier 1
Wu Jen: Tier 1
Spontaneous Druid: Tier 1

Tier 2
Death Master: Tier 2
Spontaneous Cleric: Tier 2
Erudite: Tier 2
Psion: Tier 2
Sorcerer: Tier 2
Evangelist: Tier 2
Spirit Shaman: Tier 2
Urban Druid: Tier 2
Mystic: Tier 2
Ardent: Tier 2
Dread Necromancer: Tier 2
Beguiler: Tier 2
Favored Soul: Tier 2
Mystic Ranger: Tier 2

Tier 3
Wilder: Tier 3
Shugenja: Tier 3
Trickster Spellthief: Tier 3
Bard: Tier 3
Jester: Tier 3
Totemist: Tier 3
Swordsage: Tier 3
Warlock: Tier 3
Crusader: Tier 3
Binder: Tier 3
Psychic Warrior: Tier 3
Warmage: Tier 3
Warblade: Tier 3
Dragonfire Adept: Tier 3
Healer: Tier 3
Wild Shape Ranger: Tier 3
Duskblade: Tier 3
Factotum: Tier 3
Lurk: Tier 4
Psychic Rogue: Tier 3

Tier 4
Wild Monk: Tier 4
Incarnate: Tier 4
Shadowcaster: Tier 4
Rogue: Tier 4
Barbarian: Tier 4
Scout: Tier 4
Adept: Tier 4
Spellthief: Tier 4
Paladin: Tier 4
Ranger: Tier 4
Ninja: Tier 4
Savant: Tier 4
Fighter: Tier 4

Tier 5
Marshal: Tier 5
Truenamer: Tier 5
Sohei: Tier 5
Hexblade: Tier 5
Monk: Tier 5
Battle Dancer: Tier 5
Divine Mind: Tier 5
Mountebank: Tier 5
Samurai (OA): Tier 5
Dragon Shaman: Tier 5
Magewright: Tier 5
Swashbuckler: Tier 5
Soulborn: Tier 5
Noble: Tier 5
Knight: Tier 5
Soulknife: Tier 5
Expert: Tier 5
Samurai (CW): Tier 5

Tier 6
Aristocrat: Tier 6
Warrior: Tier 6
Commoner: Tier 6

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1X27p3nPoO2VNwYsP_YlLvdge1sWbYHw0-PP4XO80A20/edit?usp=sharing. This is the updated spreadsheet. Big thanks to Troacctid for getting it up and running.

heavyfuel

2018-09-10, 12:54 PM

The Archived Threads

These are the old threads, from when Eggy was leading the project. I'm pretty sure all of them are over a year old, so it's best to avoid posting in them to avoid necromancy. They'll still be listed here for the purpose of research on why the forum thinks class X is in tier Y.

The Fixed List Casters: Beguiler, Dread Necromancer, and Warmage (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?515849-Retiering-the-Classes-Beguiler-Dread-Necromancer-and-Warmage&p=21722395#post21722395)

The Obvious Tier One Classes: Archivist, Artificer, Cleric, Druid, Sha'ir, and Wizard (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?516137-Retiering-the-Classes-Archivist-Artificer-Cleric-Druid-Sha-ir-and-Wizard&p=21731809#post21731809)

The Mundane Beat Sticks (part one): Barbarian, Fighter, Samurai (CW), and Samurai (OA) (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?516602-Retiering-the-Classes-Barbarian-Fighter-Samurai-(CW)-and-Samurai-(OA)&p=21747927#post21747927)

The Roguelikes: Ninja, Rogue, and Scout (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?517091-Retiering-the-Classes-Ninja-Rogue-and-Scout)

The Pseudo-Druids: Spirit Shaman, Spontaneous Druid, Urban Druid, and Wild Shape Ranger (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?517370-Retiering-the-Classes-Spirit-Shaman-Spontaneous-Druid-Urban-Druid-and-WS-Ranger&p=21774657#post21774657)

The Jacks of All Trades: Bard, Factotum, Jester, and Savant (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?517967-Retiering-the-Classes-Bard-Factotum-and-Jester&p=21794327#post21794327)

The Tome of Battlers: Crusader, Swordsage, and Warblade (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?518495-Retiering-the-Classes-Crusader-Swordsage-and-Warblade&p=21815193#post21815193)

The NPCs: Adept, Aristocrat, Commoner, Expert, Magewright, and Warrior (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?519155-Retiering-the-Classes-Adept-Aristocrat-Commoner-Expert-Magewright-and-Warrior&p=21838412)

The Vaguely Supernatural Melee Folk: Battle Dancer, Monk, Mountebank, and Soulknife (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?519701-Retiering-the-Classes-Battle-Dancer-Monk-Mountebank-and-Soulknife)

The Miscellaneous Full Casters: Death Master, Shaman, Shugenja, Sorcerer, and Wu Jen (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?520291-Retiering-the-Classes-Death-Master-Shugenja-Sorcerer-Wu-Jen&p=21878654#post21878654)

The Wacky Magicists: Binder, Dragonfire Adept, Shadowcaster, Truenamer, and Warlock (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?520903-Retiering-the-Classes-Binder-Dragonfire-Adept-Shadowcaster-Truenamer-Warlock&p=21898782#post21898782)

The Slow Casting Melee Folk: Duskblade, Hexblade, Paladin, Ranger, Sohei, and Spellthief (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?521476-Retiering-the-Classes-Duskblade-Hexblade-Paladin-Ranger-Sohei-Spellthief)

The Pseudo-Clerics: Evangelist, Favored Soul, Healer, Mystic, and Spontaneous Cleric (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?522562-Retiering-the-Classes-Evangelist-Favored-Soul-Healer-Mystic-Spontaneous-Cleric&p=21942496#post21942496)

The Auraists: Divine Mind, Dragon Shaman, and Marshal (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?523449-Retiering-the-Classes-Divine-Mind-Dragon-Shaman-and-Marshal)

heavyfuel

2018-09-10, 12:58 PM

Reserved because you never know.

There should be a thread for the Magic of Incarnum classes up in a few minutes.

PhantasyPen

2018-09-10, 02:38 PM

What happened to Psionics?

heavyfuel

2018-09-10, 02:43 PM

What happened to Psionics?

It's the next post

EldritchWeaver

2018-09-11, 11:10 AM

In regards to this part of your post, I have a question:

Tier one: Incredibly good at solving nearly all problems. This is the realm of clerics, druids, and wizards, classes that open up with strong combat spells backed up by utility, and then get massively stronger from there. If you're not keeping up with that core trio of tier one casters, then you probably don't belong here.

Are you considering that on average, wizard builds will be more Tier 4 than Tier 1? Since you include eggynack's votings and implicitly his way of rankings, I would say no.

heavyfuel

2018-09-11, 11:59 AM

In regards to this part of your post, I have a question:

Are you considering that on average, wizard builds will be more Tier 4 than Tier 1? Since you include eggynack's votings and implicitly his way of rankings, I would say no.

Simply because most players won't play a Wizard to its full potential doesn't mean the class is Tier 4. It still has tier 1 potential.

Luccan

2018-09-11, 12:11 PM

Oh sweet this is back. I was disappointed when it dropped off, a comprehensive tier list would be great.

eggynack

2018-09-11, 12:29 PM

In regards to this part of your post, I have a question:

Are you considering that on average, wizard builds will be more Tier 4 than Tier 1? Since you include eggynack's votings and implicitly his way of rankings, I would say no.
I don't think it is correct that more wizard builds are tier 4 than tier 1, first of all. What even is a wizard build? Hand even the worst possible "normal" wizard (meaning a wizard with at least some intelligence, and with either gold or the items that were purchased with that gold) to a good optimizer, and that terrible wizard will be excellent within a week at the outside. Second, if a wizard is supposedly at tier 4, and the other classes are being played at the optimization level that would get you there, then where is, say, the bard? Or the sorcerer? Or, hell, the fighter or monk? If the wizard sucks, I'd contend that the other classes will typically suck worse. Not universally true, of course. Some classes have intensely high floors. But the wizard's high ceiling makes up for some of that.

The ultimate rule of thumb for tiering, in my opinion, is that a class should be ranked higher than worse classes and lower than the better classes. I have a bit of definition in there about what the tier kinda looks like, but I consider that a largely secondary concern. Sure, your crap wizard may be incapable, at the moment, of doing literally everything, but they still quite likely have decent combat stuff with a smattering of utility, and that counts for a lot in such an environment. I think it fair to claim that the wizard, even accounting for the wide range of optimization levels, is more powerful than anything of lower tier, and reasonably comparable to everything of the same tier. There are advantages and disadvantages compared to the other tier ones, but it evens out reasonably well.

All that said, I think the wizard faced arguably the most controversy of any class in the "obvious tier one" thread. They ranked higher than artificer, but lower than everything else, and the fact that everyone knows the class made it a bit of a lightning rod. As a result, I'd recommend you check out the thread in question, because I suspect it has all the objections you're pointing out now, as well as rebuttals to those objections, and general discussion of how the wizard properly fits into the tier system framework.

Oh sweet this is back. I was disappointed when it dropped off, a comprehensive tier list would be great.
Agreed, with all the vague hypocrisy that entails. It was a sweet project, that produced the approximate results I'd expect (which I see as a good thing, given that the place you generally want a tier system to land is that it approximates the expectations of people that know the system well), and had some good arguments for those results.

Luccan

2018-09-11, 12:49 PM

PunBlake

2018-09-11, 12:53 PM

@heavyfuel, I just wanted to point out that the results of the linked Aura-ists thread are not included in your list of rankings here. The old spreadsheet gives an average of T5 for each.

heavyfuel

2018-09-11, 01:55 PM

Oh, BTW, the Auraists thread, as you may have noticed, never actually got tallied all the way. Are you going to redo that thread or just take the general consensus? And will you be using a spreadsheet to measure how close to other tiers each class gets?

@heavyfuel, I just wanted to point out that the results of the linked Aura-ists thread are not included in your list of rankings here. The old spreadsheet gives an average of T5 for each.

I think the forum went down mid auraists thread and then it was forgotten. I'll probably redo the thread, but since we already have a start on the forum's opinion it's not really a priority.

eggynack

2018-09-11, 02:14 PM

I was getting pretty lazy about upkeep at that point, probably owing partially to that server breakdown, but apparently not that lazy, cause everyone but Deanno was already on the sheet. There was a decent number of votes too, given the topic, with marshal getting 13 votes.

Anyway, the results were that everyone got tier five, with marshal at the top with 4.57, then divine mind with 4.69, and then dragon shaman with 4.92. I edited the aura thread and the home base thread with those results. Still don't have most of the sub-threads linked to the aura thread, but the home base one is for some reason. Not sure it matters overmuch at this point. That was always probably the second most aggravating part of maintaining the threads, after occasions where the spreadsheet broke down.

EldritchWeaver

2018-09-11, 05:43 PM

I don't think it is correct that more wizard builds are tier 4 than tier 1, first of all. What even is a wizard build? Hand even the worst possible "normal" wizard (meaning a wizard with at least some intelligence, and with either gold or the items that were purchased with that gold) to a good optimizer, and that terrible wizard will be excellent within a week at the outside. Second, if a wizard is supposedly at tier 4, and the other classes are being played at the optimization level that would get you there, then where is, say, the bard? Or the sorcerer? Or, hell, the fighter or monk? If the wizard sucks, I'd contend that the other classes will typically suck worse. Not universally true, of course. Some classes have intensely high floors. But the wizard's high ceiling makes up for some of that.

A "wizard build" is simply a single-classed character with wizard levels. Why is that important? Because your tiering said, you should average all possible builds. But since there are far more non-Tier 1 choices than Tier 1 choices, most wizard builds will be not Tier 1. It would be an understatement to say that there is one Tier 1 for one million non-Tier 1 builds. To arrive still a Tier 1 for a wizard with employing an averaging algorithm requires that you weight Tier 1 builds more than a million other builds. I wouldn't have a problem, if you had said, you are looking for the ceiling.

The ultimate rule of thumb for tiering, in my opinion, is that a class should be ranked higher than worse classes and lower than the better classes. I have a bit of definition in there about what the tier kinda looks like, but I consider that a largely secondary concern. Sure, your crap wizard may be incapable, at the moment, of doing literally everything, but they still quite likely have decent combat stuff with a smattering of utility, and that counts for a lot in such an environment. I think it fair to claim that the wizard, even accounting for the wide range of optimization levels, is more powerful than anything of lower tier, and reasonably comparable to everything of the same tier. There are advantages and disadvantages compared to the other tier ones, but it evens out reasonably well.

Of course such a wizard is better than a fighter. That wizard is still somewhat optimized. If we use a magic missile wizard, then we have the same niche as the fighter. And is worse, since as soon you run out of spells you need to use the crossbow of shame. The fighter being better at hitting people is achievable with the same amount of optimization.

eggynack

2018-09-11, 06:05 PM

A "wizard build" is simply a single-classed character with wizard levels. Why is that important? Because your tiering said, you should average all possible builds.
I think you're missing the point of my question as regards the term "wizard build". When evaluating build, is it under the assumption that current choices will be future choices, or does the fact that the build is flexible matter? Consider a more obvious example. What is a cleric build? Well, feats, race, skills, and so forth are really difficult to change, so that I'd call definitely part of the build. But for a cleric to be bad, their spells must be bad. So, is a cleric that prepares cure light wounds in every slot a "bad cleric build"? I'd assert that the answer is no. Within a single day, I could change all those cure light wounds into good spells, and it would cost nothing. This spell list is not intrinsic to the build, and the most intelligent spell list in the world could be modified in the opposite way.

Wizards are more static than clerics, but they're more flexible than the vast majority of classes in the game. As such, it's hard to pin down how you'd wind up with a bad wizard build. You could drop intelligence, pick terrible spells, and waste as much money as is possible (maybe even using VoP), but that's an unusual setup. I'd more likely expect a bad wizard to have decent intelligence, enough that all accessible levels of spell are castable, along with some reasonably liquid resources with which to buy spells, and such a build could be easily turned good trivially.

But since there are far more non-Tier 1 choices than Tier 1 choices, most wizard builds will be not Tier 1. It would be an understatement to say that there is one Tier 1 for one million non-Tier 1 builds. To arrive still a Tier 1 for a wizard with employing an averaging algorithm requires that you weight Tier 1 builds more than a million other builds. I wouldn't have a problem, if you had said, you are looking for the ceiling.
Your terminology here is a bit imprecise, if perhaps necessarily so. Tier is a measure of class, not of character, so the notion of a tier 4 or whatever wizard build is a bit problematic. What I meant before was that this supposedly tier 4 wizard might not actually be tier 4. The way you'd want to actually measure the tier of a particular character, for the purposes of tiering the class, is by setting that optimization level constant among all classes and seeing where the wizard ranks.

With that in mind, how precisely do we arrive at a tier 4 wizard? I'm not saying it's impossible, but I'd suspect it's fewer situations than you'd think. Consider the example of the magic missile wizard below. Okay, sure, a wizard that does nothing but blast isn't gonna be the best. However, access to AoE's (I can't imagine this crap wizard won't pick up fireball when available) and such means the fighter isn't going to be significantly stronger than the wizard. Clerics and maybe druids won't necessarily be doing better either. Fixed list casters and ToB classes have a real advantage here, but I'd expect an environment this low power to be pretty narrow in terms of tiering. A plausible theoretical tiering, then, could be ToB/fixed list as tier one, most other classes including wizard as floating randomly in the middle three or four tiers, and commoner and such hanging out at 6.

Of course such a wizard is better than a fighter. That wizard is still somewhat optimized. If we use a magic missile wizard, then we have the same niche as the fighter. And is worse, since as soon you run out of spells you need to use the crossbow of shame. The fighter being better at hitting people is achievable with the same amount of optimization.
You said the majority of wizards are these supposed tier 4 wizards. If "tier 4 wizard" means magic missile wizard, then I'd dispute this assertion. Wizards simply have way too much list, very nearly forced on them, for everything to converge around this magic missile wizard, especially as level increases. Keep in mind also, along the same lines as the flexibility comment I made above, a weak player can plausibly start playing their wizard stronger if so inclined. They have no such option for a fighter.

When you combine all these factors, what you wind up with is wizards near the very top at higher levels of optimization, wizards also near the top at moderate optimization, if lower than a lot of other tier ones, wizards pretty decent at low optimization, and wizards kinda hanging out in the mediocre class soup at the absolute floor. It's better than what most classes get, and adds up, in my opinion, to tier one.

ExLibrisMortis

2018-09-11, 08:58 PM

But since there are far more non-Tier 1 choices than Tier 1 choices, most wizard builds will be not Tier 1.
Not all choices are equally likely to be made, and not all choices have the same impact. The kind of choices that make a set of wizard builds tier 4--such as not having sufficient Intelligence to cast your highest-level spells, or not having the anatomy to complete components--are very, very unlikely to be made, and in fact run so counter to the general theme and purpose of the class, that they can't be considered anything but outliers. And even then, an equally unoptimized class of a lower tier is probably no stronger.

In other words: Optimizer or no, people just don't play deaf-mute-no-armed-illiterate-zombie wizards. And if they do, such a character wouldn't be appreciably worse than a deaf-mute-no-armed-illiterate-zombie bard, while all the sensible wizard builds still contribute to its higher tier.

Cosi

2018-09-12, 09:24 AM

I think there's some validity to the idea that you ought to account for the low floor of Wizards. Yes, if you handed a good player a bad Wizard, they could turn it around. But if most players aren't good, that doesn't seem super relevant. That said, the distinction doesn't seem super important, as even a poorly optimized caster will still be fairly effective, because all you really have to do to be good as a Wizard is pick good spells and cast them. I had one game with a new player playing a Sorcerer whose effectiveness was determined almost entirely by whether he thought the blasting spells or the BFC spells at a given level were cooler. At 1st level he picked sleep and won a lot of encounters single-handed. At 6th level he picked fireball and was less effective.

However, I do think that this project made a mistake in how it was structured. I don't think enough work was put into figuring out how people were going to expect these rankings to work, and as a result people are going to look at these ranking and expect them to be something they aren't (just as they did with JaronK's tiers). You can shout until you're blue in the face about what you're trying to do, but the reality is that people will look at "Tiers" and read "Power Rankings", then get confused because you put weak generalists over strong specialists.

Grod_The_Giant

2018-09-12, 12:39 PM

It...might be worth sorting the list of tiered classes? Either by name or by ranked tier.

Troacctid

2018-09-12, 03:52 PM

However, I do think that this project made a mistake in how it was structured. I don't think enough work was put into figuring out how people were going to expect these rankings to work, and as a result people are going to look at these ranking and expect them to be something they aren't (just as they did with JaronK's tiers). You can shout until you're blue in the face about what you're trying to do, but the reality is that people will look at "Tiers" and read "Power Rankings", then get confused because you put weak generalists over strong specialists.
They ARE power rankings though. And it's generally strong generalists outranking strong specialists, and weak generalists outranking weak specialists.

Cosi

2018-09-12, 07:00 PM

They ARE power rankings though. And it's generally strong generalists outranking strong specialists, and weak generalists outranking weak specialists.

I think the rankings of the Factotum and the Rogue are enough to refute that. The Rogue has access to all the best skills, can do enough damage to shred most enemies with Sneak Attack, and bypasses immunities with a couple of items. The Factotum is a dysfunctional class that depends on splat material from a different campaign setting, a specific interpretation of a web enhancement feat, and favorable rulings on its own dysfunctional abilities. Yet the Factotum ranks above the Rogue because people see "it can do anything" and forget to check if it's actually good at doing those things.

The "generalist" niche is just not a reasonable one. If the enemy has AC 30, having three different attack options at +7 is no different from having no attacks at all.

Troacctid

2018-09-12, 08:48 PM

I think the rankings of the Factotum and the Rogue are enough to refute that. The Rogue has access to all the best skills, can do enough damage to shred most enemies with Sneak Attack, and bypasses immunities with a couple of items. The Factotum is a dysfunctional class that depends on splat material from a different campaign setting, a specific interpretation of a web enhancement feat, and favorable rulings on its own dysfunctional abilities. Yet the Factotum ranks above the Rogue because people see "it can do anything" and forget to check if it's actually good at doing those things.

The "generalist" niche is just not a reasonable one. If the enemy has AC 30, having three different attack options at +7 is no different from having no attacks at all.
It can be true that Factotum is poorly designed and overrated while simultaneously being true that it's more powerful than Rogue. I guess you can correct me if I'm wrong but I don't remember the argument for Factotum > Rogue being that Factotums are better because they have less power but more versatility. I'm pretty sure it was because the people voting that way considered slow-progression spellcasting to be more powerful than sneak attack.

EldritchWeaver

2018-09-13, 02:02 AM

They ARE power rankings though. And it's generally strong generalists outranking strong specialists, and weak generalists outranking weak specialists.

Regardless if they are power rankings or versatility rankings or a mixture, fact is that they ignore the effort to get to that supposed rank. A badly optimized wizard won't be to different from a class which provides Tier 4 builds consistently. The naive expectation is "wizard = power" by merely choosing the class.

Luccan

2018-09-13, 02:23 AM

Regardless if they are power rankings or versatility rankings or a mixture, fact is that they ignore the effort to get to that supposed rank. A badly optimized wizard won't be to different from a class which provides Tier 4 builds consistently. The naive expectation is "wizard = power" by merely choosing the class.

Exactly. It's naive to assume that all classes require no actual work to build well. In fact, not a single PHB class works like that, so it'd probably be a fairly inexperienced player who thought playing a mage simply auto-pressed the I Win button. That being said, a Wizard's ceiling is high, very high. Even an inexperienced player can easily get them to tier 4 or 3, because Wizard options that sound powerful usually are powerful. Whereas options for, say, a Fighter that sound powerful are quite often not.

It's also worth noting most High Tier classes that require some build knowledge to function at their tier are actually easier to build. Wizards really only need a good spell selection to reach Tier 1, because it's their spells that make it possible to be there in the first place. Fighters need good feat (and possibly ACF) selection to even try to push on T4/T3 border, and I'm not sure they can even cross it. As you move to the lower tiers, good builds require more investment. Sure, a few almost do it for you: The fixed-list casters reach their tiers with no effort at all (but are also mostly stuck in those tier for not having enough build options). But then you have the Bard: no way to change your bad spells between levels and a partial reliance on skills makes it far easier to screw-up than a Wizard. As you move further down the list, you not only lose some power and versatility, you lose a significant ability to change your poor choices.

EldritchWeaver

2018-09-13, 06:56 AM

Exactly. It's naive to assume that all classes require no actual work to build well. In fact, not a single PHB class works like that, so it'd probably be a fairly inexperienced player who thought playing a mage simply auto-pressed the I Win button. That being said, a Wizard's ceiling is high, very high. Even an inexperienced player can easily get them to tier 4 or 3, because Wizard options that sound powerful usually are powerful. Whereas options for, say, a Fighter that sound powerful are quite often not. From starting at no knowledge at the low end to emperor tippy at the high end spans a large continuum. I don't claim that everyone stays at the low end, but climbing to the top is a very involved process. Most will not manage. Choosing very powerful options isn't enough, if you don't use them well. 3.5 polymorph isn't without reason considered being broken. But you actually need to read all the monsters and know which ones are particular useful given a certain situation. If you don't, you nerf one of the most powerful features by yourself.

eggynack

2018-09-13, 07:23 AM

EldritchWeaver

2018-09-13, 08:12 AM

I think you really underestimate the rhetoric surrounding the tiers. Is there bias towards higher optimization somewhat baked in? Sure. But all the stuff you're talking about has been talked about a billion times, and we've tried our damnedest to account for the broad range of optimization levels. This is in no way new to this set of threads.

Why is that not not mentioned in the OP? My complaint is that someone who doesn't follow the threads, does not know how the evaluation is done, and that tier x refers to the potential, not to the automatic success, when simply taking that class.

eggynack

2018-09-13, 08:26 AM

Why is that not not mentioned in the OP? My complaint is that someone who doesn't follow the threads, does not know how the evaluation is done, and that tier x refers to the potential, not to the automatic success, when simply taking that class.
It is, as far as I can tell. Explicitly stated is that tier is calculated across an averaging of both level and optimization level. So, third level poorly optimized wizards are counted, and so are 17th level Tippy wizards. Tier x refers to neither potential nor to automatic success. It refers to this broad averaging notion.

Troacctid

2018-09-13, 11:51 AM

Yeah, it's been a point of discussion in quite a few threads. I know I've personally ranked classes like Monk, Rogue, Paladin, and Truenamer lower because of it.

Nifft

2018-09-13, 01:24 PM

Sleven

2018-09-13, 11:57 PM

RoboEmperor

2018-09-14, 12:11 AM

Artificer does the same thing that other tier 1s can already do, but does it worse in almost every way, yet is still tier 1? If WBL abuse is available to Artificers, it's available to everyone else, except real casters can do it better, because--you know--everyone forgets how much more it costs artificers to craft items:

Artificers are broken not because of crafting but because of early access.

1. Planar Binding at level 8 instead of level 11 like wizards. Planetars who has 14th level cleric spells accessible are bindable at level 8.
2. Access to 9th level spells at level 7. Divine Crusader Spell List is OP. I made a build that revolves entirely around CL7 Scrolls of Wish.
3. Craft Reserve lets you craft items whose xp cost is beyond what you can normally craft. Rod of Excellent Magic for example, craftable at level 19 on an Artificer.
4. Summon Giant, a spell normally available at 15th level is available at 8th level. That is 7 levels of early access.
5. Free Persistent Spell in the form of Metamagic Item infusion. It's just as strong as a DMM:Persist Cleric, except by passing the wand around he can buff the entire party with Persistent Spells, so they are better than DMM:Persist Clerics.

Spellcasters break games because of out of combat shenanigans not direct combat spells and Artificers have access to virtually every single out of combat shenanigan in the game at level 7.

Artificers are tier 0 not tier 1. They do everything tier 1s do at least 2 levels earlier, minimum, but as the above examples show it can be as much as 6-10 levels earlier.

Sleven

2018-09-14, 12:54 AM

Artificers are broken not because of crafting but because of early access.

1. Planar Binding at level 8 instead of level 11 like wizards. Planetars who has 14th level cleric spells accessible are bindable at level 8.
2. Access to 9th level spells at level 7. Divine Crusader Spell List is OP. I made a build that revolves entirely around CL7 Scrolls of Wish.
3. Craft Reserve lets you craft items whose xp cost is beyond what you can normally craft. Rod of Excellent Magic for example, craftable at level 19 on an Artificer. At level 15
4. Summon Giant, a spell normally available at 15th level is available at 8th level. That is 7 levels of early access.
5. Free Persistent Spell in the form of Metamagic Item infusion. It's just as strong as a DMM:Persist Cleric, except by passing the wand around he can buff the entire party with Persistent Spells, so they are better than DMM:Persist Clerics.

Spellcasters break games because of out of combat shenanigans not direct combat spells and Artificers have access to virtually every single out of combat shenanigan in the game at level 7.

Artificers are tier 0 not tier 1. They do everything tier 1s do at least 2 levels earlier, minimum, but as the above examples show it can be as much as 6-10 levels earlier.

I can't help but disagree. To me it's a false assumption to say that rules abuse is okay for one class and not for others. Anyone can access wish abuse at level 1 by repeating the same three words. After all, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. If you get early access, I won't mind having some for myself by any means necessary. In reality, most tables expect you to use the same standardized spell progression as everyone else (it's standardized for shops, etc., after all). And if they don't and no one cares, anyone can do it already anyways.

The craft reserve is meaningless in the specific comparison I was making. Spellcasters are already using sacrifice rules and liquid pain or joy to craft everything XP free. So it's hardly a novel mechanic.

Spellcasters have similar access to unlimited metamagic producing shenanigans. Not everyone can use your wands either, so that reality needs to remain salient in the scope of any potential discussion.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-14, 04:43 AM

I can't help but disagree. To me it's a false assumption to say that rules abuse is okay for one class and not for others. Anyone can access wish abuse at level 1 by repeating the same three words. After all, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. If you get early access, I won't mind having some for myself by any means necessary. In reality, most tables expect you to use the same standardized spell progression as everyone else (it's standardized for shops, etc., after all). And if they don't and no one cares, anyone can do it already anyways.

The craft reserve is meaningless in the specific comparison I was making. Spellcasters are already using sacrifice rules and liquid pain or joy to craft everything XP free. So it's hardly a novel mechanic.

Spellcasters have similar access to unlimited metamagic producing shenanigans. Not everyone can use your wands either, so that reality needs to remain salient in the scope of any potential discussion.

How is using spell lists of PrCs "rule abuse"? If PrC spell lists are rule abuse, then how come Liquid Pain and Ambrosia aren't? Crafting scrolls of wish with Liquid Pain results in literally infinite wealth. You can outfit your entire party with epic gear in a few days with Liquid Pain and you're saying this isn't "rule abuse"? And using scrolls scribed by independent spellcasting PrCs are? That is some logic you're using.

With this logic you could say every class in the game is tier 4 and if any class does something to bump them up a tier then they are abusing the rules and aren't allowed to do that.

Using PrC spell lists is the Artificer's entire schtick be it in the form of Spell-Storing Infusion cast for free via Concurrent Infusion, or by using UMD to craft magic items. Saying this is "rule abuse" is the same as saying wizards casting spells is "rule abuse". And you're incorrect in thinking most tables don't allow spells from PrC lists. There are tons of handbooks out there for artificers and literally every single one tells you to use this handbook http://bg-archive.minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=12661.0. I personally haven't met a single DM that banned artificers from using PrC lists. I did meet a DM who banned specific PrCs, but no one banned it outright.

Whatever spellcasters can do, Artificers can do it much earlier. They may not be able to do it better because of Save DCs and whatnot, but they can do it significantly earlier and that's why they're tier 0. Including items. An artificer can obtain a Phylactery of Change at level 5. Other classes can't.

If you're saying spellcasters are better than artificers after you house rule every advantage they have away, allow wealth breaking shenanigans, and only look at the classes at level 20, then yeah, sure, spellcasters are superior to artificers.

EldritchWeaver

2018-09-14, 06:51 AM

It is, as far as I can tell. Explicitly stated is that tier is calculated across an averaging of both level and optimization level. So, third level poorly optimized wizards are counted, and so are 17th level Tippy wizards. Tier x refers to neither potential nor to automatic success. It refers to this broad averaging notion.

Then let's try it backwards. Let's say there is a class called Roflstomper which has a community consensus of being Tier 2. What conclusions can you draw from that?

eggynack

2018-09-14, 07:30 AM

Then let's try it backwards. Let's say there is a class called Roflstomper which has a community consensus of being Tier 2. What conclusions can you draw from that?
The conclusion is that the class, when averaged across all levels (placing more emphasis on the mid-levels) and across all optimization levels (placing more emphasis on moderate optimization), is worse at solving problems (weighted by how likely a given problem is to show up) than any tier one class, better at solving problems than any tier three class, and not too far away from other tier two classes in this regard. Or, at least the conclusion is that most people believe that to be the case.

Cosi

2018-09-14, 08:00 AM

Regardless if they are power rankings or versatility rankings or a mixture, fact is that they ignore the effort to get to that supposed rank. A badly optimized wizard won't be to different from a class which provides Tier 4 builds consistently. The naive expectation is "wizard = power" by merely choosing the class.

I certainly think that it would be better to have rankings that reflect optimization effort. But it is true that "optimization effort" is hard to define. And since every class uses different tools to optimize, it's very easy to put your foot on the scale for a class you like by defining the things they need as low optimization. Like the Druid? Clearly the important optimization problem is in the spell selection other classes have to do, not the rules parsing needed to understand Wild Shape. Like the Wizard? Clearly the important optimization problem is using non-class resources to expand your list, not putting together Spontaneous Divination + Versatile Spellcaster. And so on and so forth for every class there is. You could come up with a consistent and reasonably fair set of rules, but it would be hard to do.

Choosing very powerful options isn't enough, if you don't use them well.

Using sleep or evard's black tentacles well is just a matter of casting them on your enemies and not your allies. That's not at all hard, and I've seen entirely new players figure it out almost immediately. Doing that already puts you on par with the best non-casters. Picking up pretty much any of the utility spells they can't replicate puts you ahead.

AFAICT this is also why daily re-spec flexibility is so highly regarded.

Players are expected to be making mistakes and learning from them, so the ability to respond to the knowledge you gain from the events of the previous day or session (by swapping spells / soulmelds / vestiges / animal shape / etc.) is valuable.

Only if the class has a bunch of crappy options. Which is sort of a weird argument to be making in favor of a class being good. Also, things like the Retraining rules mitigate the value of this somewhat.

Then let's try it backwards. Let's say there is a class called Roflstomper which has a community consensus of being Tier 2. What conclusions can you draw from that?

What conclusions do you think people should be able to draw from that? That's at least as important.

eggynack

2018-09-14, 08:36 AM

Only if the class has a bunch of crappy options. Which is sort of a weird argument to be making in favor of a class being good. Also, things like the Retraining rules mitigate the value of this somewhat.

The inverse is also a pretty weird argument. That being that the wizard would be higher tier if they just didn't have most blasting spells on their list, because then a weak player would be more likely to pick black tentacles. And that's probably true, ultimately. Either way, I think the resolution to this issue is simply that there are various degrees of power where this is concerned. Just having all of your options be good is likely the best, and in this context the ability to fix mistakes isn't all that pertinent. That's something like a warblade. Somewhere below that is classes that have bad options available, but who can get rid of them pretty easily with some time. That's something like the wizard. Below that is classes with bad options who cannot get rid of them. So, the sorcerer. Thus, what you're saying isn't precisely a refutation of this claim, so much as it is the assertion of a yet higher level of power.

Troacctid

2018-09-14, 12:53 PM

When classes like Barbarian and Fighter are in the same tier as classes like the Adept, Sohei, Ranger, and Paladin, it's clear there is a lack of understanding the role spellcasting (even partial) plays in increasing power and versatility. I don't see any reason for Hexblades being in a lower tier than Fighters. I'm sure we all agree the designers undershot their power goal, but it's still better than straight fighter by a long shot.
Hexblade is substantially worse at the job it's supposed to do: fighting. It flounders around for most of the campaign being a crappy version of a Paladin with no armor and no special mount. Its curse is garbage, its bonus feats are a cruel joke, and its native spellcasting is nerfed into the ground. I would absolutely rather play a Fighter.

Adept frankly should be T5. It's the classic "The food stinks and the portions are too small." The class has a serious dearth of daily resources, making it very difficult to contribute to more than one or two encounters in a day, and even in those encounters where you do contribute, your slow spell progression means your contributions are unlikely to be impressive.

Sohei is barely even a spellcaster, let's be real.

The tier list (presumably) takes into account ACFs and class specific feats, yet Monk is in a lower tier than Fighter and Barbarian? It trounces both in role versatility and damage. I mean, all mundanes belong in the same tier more or less... but, please, the monk hate on this forum has gone beyond the point of ridiculousness.
I'd absolutely rank the average Fighter above the average Monk. The baseline is much higher, especially in the early game. A typical Fighter will have better AC, better damage, and better to-hit than a Monk of the same level. Admittedly, Monks can actually have some social skills, which helps them a little, but not enough to make up for just being BAD at the thing they're supposed to be good at. And while ACFs can bump the class up to a higher grade, the majority of builds will wind up in the 5 range.

For the record, I think I had Fighter at 4.5, Monk at 4.8, Ranger and Paladin at 4, Hexblade and Adept at 5. I forget what I put for Barbarian. Probably 4.

Using PrC spell lists is the Artificer's entire schtick ...
It's clearly not.

Sleven

2018-09-14, 03:31 PM

-snip-

No actually, it's more to the point that WBL is considered part of the game rules and design. If you're willing to disregard that for the artificer, then you should be willing to disregard it for other players equally as well. Which is why standard spellcasting is what's typical. Even if it isn't, if you're playing by the book, artificers can't just "skip ahead" in their WBL just because they craft things earlier, because the DMG says you shouldn't be (assuming a RAW table). Everything is calculated at full value, not what you crafted it at. So no, there is no such thing as the super equipped level 7 artificer with every item in the game. I'd rather quote WotC's official stance on the DMG's guidelines than a handbook, so here it is (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ask/20070303a).

If lower CL spells are on the table, anyone can use those spells from other sources in their crafting as well (via scrolls, services, etc.), it's not like this is exclusive to artificers. In some ways, they can even do it better, since they can actually make a CL7 wish scroll any time in their career. An artificer can only make a CL7 wish scroll at level 7, because once they hit 8, all their items must be CL 8.

As far as XP mitigation goes, I think pointing out that XP mitigation is not a novel idea (and is explicitly part of the rules for all classes in multiple areas) reinforces the fact that the artificer lacks real class features that distinguish it from others.

Hexblade is substantially worse at the job it's supposed to do: fighting. [...] Adept frankly should be T5. It's the classic "The food stinks and the portions are too small."

To me this line of thinking confirms my suspicion about the tier list in general: there's a combat encounter bias, unless your skill selection is rogue-tier. It doesn't really do a good job of handling the versatility of classes that find themselves in-between the two. Which is where I find classes with stunted casting (like hexblade) mostly residing.

To me, hexblade survives better in the early levels by virtue of Arcane Resistance and Mettle alone. Additionally, Summon Familiar is a huge action economy boost. Survivability and action economy advantages are no small thing in my assessment of a class' value. Out of combat, being rewarded for having Charisma, also helps when skills like Bluff and Diplomacy are on your class list (something that fighter lacks). I also see the utility in the hexblade's limited list. Spells like Charm Person and Unseen Servant serve many roles in and out of combat, are useful from the level you get them until the end of your career, and only serve to add to a hexblade's power and role diversity. I feel the same way about the adept's limited (but potent) spell list.

Ima address sohei separately at the end of my post.

I'd absolutely rank the average Fighter above the average Monk. The baseline is much higher, especially in the early game. A typical Fighter will have better AC, better damage, and better to-hit than a Monk of the same level. [...] And while ACFs can bump the class up to a higher grade, the majority of builds will wind up in the 5 range.

Massive monk wall-of-text here :smalltongue::
The math on flurry of blows tends to go in flurry's favor at the early levels where one is most vulnerable. To me, that counts for something. Monks also do better on saves-based survivability, which once again, I consider extremely important. Touch AC goes in favor of the monk, while general AC is a landslide for the fighter (particularly at early levels). Even their available skills (e.g. stealth and perception-based) promote survivability in ways that AC can't always account for. Unarmed strike helps alleviate one of the martial classes' greatest burdens: expending significant WBL on weaponry. I will agree, that not every monk is taking Mantis Leap or worshipping Shar. However, diving into the rich resource of available feats and ACFs is really what puts the monk ahead of most mundanes. The ceiling for monk is significantly higher than fighter or barbarian and, frankly, I've never seen that taken into account in any tier list. Keep in mind, I'm of the school of thought that all mundane (non-casters) should pretty much be in the same tier, but that doesn't mean there aren't differences, just not meaningful ones.

Sohei

I'll admit, I've only had the opportunity to play sohei once. But my suspicion is that it's more than most of the people who rated the class. They're extremely defense-oriented, but have plenty of great buff spells that help them keep up offensively, particularly when combined with Ki Frenzy (which is frankly a better version of rage). Eventually they get Divine Power, bridging any gap Ki Frenzy couldn't fill entirely. It's true the sohei has less utility options than partial caster classes with more splat support (like Paladin), but I still believe their limited spell list gives them an edge over classes like fighter and barbarian. Just having a spell like Shield Other available to play party tank in an impactful way goes a long way in diversifying the class, while immunity to Stunning at level 5 and Mettle at 9 (with 2 good saves) are huge boosts to the "beatstick" vibe they exude. And hey, they get diplomacy (which is apparently an important metric in the tier list).

Let's also not forget that sohei got an update for 3.5 that made Ki Frenzy better and gave them a tireless rage equivalent in addition to the Diehard feat at level 3. But I'm not sure if the tier lists have ever taken updates into account (after all, we're still talking about OA samurai, like the 3.5 update never happened).

eggynack

2018-09-14, 04:03 PM

To me this line of thinking confirms my suspicion about the tier list in general: there's a combat encounter bias, unless your skill selection is rogue-tier. It doesn't really do a good job of handling the versatility of classes that find themselves in-between the two. Which is where I find classes with stunted casting (like hexblade) mostly residing.
Gotta say, I find this argument super interesting/amusing given that the last set of threads had a big argument about an unfair bias against strict combat assessment. I think this was primarily in the fixed list caster thread (and maybe in the home base thread) regarding the warmage. I recall thinking that combat should take up roughly 50% of the assumed game-space, with social and exploration stuff taking up the other 50%, on the assumption that the game's mechanics tend to fixate on combat.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-14, 06:04 PM

It's clearly not.

I guess this is where we'll have to agree to disagree. The "artificer level +2" is clearly early access. I don't think using PrC spellcasting list was the intent of the developers especially concerning spell-storing item, but it's there, and these two imo is what makes the Artificer tier 0.

I am going to agree with Sleven that Artificers without early access is worse than regular spellcasters which means early access is literally the biggest advantage Artificers have, which means every optimized Artificer should capitalize on the early access, which makes it their entire schtick.

No actually, it's more to the point that WBL is considered part of the game rules and design. If you're willing to disregard that for the artificer, then you should be willing to disregard it for other players equally as well. Which is why standard spellcasting is what's typical. Even if it isn't, if you're playing by the book, artificers can't just "skip ahead" in their WBL just because they craft things earlier, because the DMG says you shouldn't be (assuming a RAW table). Everything is calculated at full value, not what you crafted it at. So no, there is no such thing as the super equipped level 7 artificer with every item in the game. I'd rather quote WotC's official stance on the DMG's guidelines than a handbook, so here it is (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ask/20070303a).

If lower CL spells are on the table, anyone can use those spells from other sources in their crafting as well (via scrolls, services, etc.), it's not like this is exclusive to artificers. In some ways, they can even do it better, since they can actually make a CL7 wish scroll any time in their career. An artificer can only make a CL7 wish scroll at level 7, because once they hit 8, all their items must be CL 8.

As far as XP mitigation goes, I think pointing out that XP mitigation is not a novel idea (and is explicitly part of the rules for all classes in multiple areas) reinforces the fact that the artificer lacks real class features that distinguish it from others.

1. I think you're misunderstanding what I am saying. I said breaking WBL with Liquid Pain is wrong so your argument that craft reserve is worthless is wrong and it makes no sense that a table that allows Liquid Pain does not allow PrC spell lists.
2. The entire point of crafting is to double your WBL at the cost of xp. So... you're saying it's WotC's official stance that Artificers should only get half of what other players get because they can craft items? Because that's not what that Q&A says.
3. Only Artificers can make CL7 scrolls of wish. Other characters must make them at CL9. And I believe you're misunderstanding item creating rules.
4. You need multiple Scrolls and Services to craft an item since you expend required spells every single DAY of construction. Do the math, you will see it is significantly more expensive to craft an item using Scrolls and Services than just buying the item outright. The exception is scrolls since you only need the spell once instead of per day, and even then it costs almost as much as just buying it outright.

In any case you're being hypocritical here. "Everyone must buy scrolls of standard spellcasters." "In order to rob the Artificer's advantage I'm going to allow PrC Spelllists in the market."

5. Artificers being forced to make CL 8 wishes doesn't matter, at all. The cost to make a CL 7, 8, and 9 scroll of wish is identical. Being able to craft a higher CL wish is a good thing, not a bad thing.

I agree with you that Artificers whose entire schtick is just crafting items is inferior to spellcasters. That's why I thought Artificers were awful and stayed away from that class for 3 years. But that's not what Artificers do in a high-op table. Artificers in a high-op table abuse their early access one way or another and this is what makes them superior to spellcasters by far. Stop trying to deny this fact. Ability to cast spells like Planar Binding at level 8 with no wealth at all is unique to Artificers and no spellcaster can achieve this. Not even Nar Demonbinders and Demonologists. That is how powerful the Artificer's early access is. An Artificer casting Summon Giants in combat literally trivializes encounters completely. Significantly more than Black Tentacles.

Nifft

2018-09-14, 06:23 PM

Using sleep or evard's black tentacles well is just a matter of casting them on your enemies and not your allies.

(...)

Only if the class has a bunch of crappy options. Which is sort of a weird argument to be making in favor of a class being good. Also, things like the Retraining rules mitigate the value of this somewhat.

Either you're missing the value of re-spec, or you're claiming that some of the best Wizard spells in the game are "crappy options" -- which would still be wrong, but differently wrong. Please clarify if you did mean the latter.

Assuming the former: you should be aware that a spell like sleep or color spray will be useless if your opponents are immune to mind-affecting effects. For example, a squad of skeletons guarding an ancient tomb.

A Wizard can make a tactical retreat and come back 9 hours later with more relevant spells; a Sorcerer lacks this option. This is a scenario which can easily occur in a real game, and I've seen it several times from both sides of the screen.

Retraining is like swapping out a spell at level-up: it's better than nothing, but it's not sufficient to turn a T2 into a T1 -- nor a T4 into a T3.

eggynack

2018-09-14, 06:36 PM

Either you're missing the value of re-spec, or you're claiming that some of the best Wizard spells in the game are "crappy options" -- which would still be wrong, but differently wrong. Please clarify if you did mean the latter.

That strikes me as a false dichotomy. There's also the third option, that when Cosi said "crappy options", he was referring to crappy options. There is zero indication that his post was talking about black tentacles as a crappy option. You kinda just melded two parts of the post together arbitrarily. That said, the argument is pretty straightforward. What's better for a weaker player power-wise, preparing a bunch of tenser's transformation for awhile before swapping for a good spell, or just not having tenser's transformation as an option at all, thus forcing them to just pick the good spell?

Nifft

2018-09-14, 07:22 PM

AFAICT this is also why daily re-spec flexibility is so highly regarded.

Players are expected to be making mistakes and learning from them, so the ability to respond to the knowledge you gain from the events of the previous day or session (by swapping spells / soulmelds / vestiges / animal shape / etc.) is valuable.

Only if the class has a bunch of crappy options. Which is sort of a weird argument to be making in favor of a class being good. Also, things like the Retraining rules mitigate the value of this somewhat.

That strikes me as a false dichotomy. There's also the third option, that when Cosi said "crappy options", he was referring to crappy options. There is zero indication that his post was talking about black tentacles as a crappy option. You kinda just melded two parts of the post together arbitrarily. That said, the argument is pretty straightforward. What's better for a weaker player power-wise, preparing a bunch of tenser's transformation for awhile before swapping for a good spell, or just not having tenser's transformation as an option at all, thus forcing them to just pick the good spell?

It's not a false dichotomy at all -- I said that swapping spells was one of the reasons why high flexibility was well-regarded, and Cosi responded with what you see quoted above. (And Cosi's stuff quoted above is wrong, just in case that was unclear.) I quoted Cosi talking about sleep because in the same post he both extols a couple of spells, and calls swapping spells a "crappy option". This is absurd on its face, and I want that absurd juxtaposition to be as blatant as possible.

You've made a separate argument, which is also valid: your argument is that having more options should be regarded as better than having fewer options, and this is strictly true if the fewer options are a strict subset of the more.

I think your argument has very little to do with mine, except insofar as we both appear to be correct.

eggynack

2018-09-14, 07:40 PM

It's not a false dichotomy at all -- I said that swapping spells was one of the reasons why high flexibility was well-regarded, and Cosi responded with what you see quoted above. (And Cosi's stuff quoted above is wrong, just in case that was unclear.) I quoted Cosi talking about sleep because in the same post he both extols a couple of spells, and calls swapping spells a "crappy option". This is absurd on its face, and I want that absurd juxtaposition to be as blatant as possible.
But Cosi didn't call swapping spells a crappy option, or even assert that it's negative in the least. He claimed that your stated advantage, the ability to pick bad spells and then learn from your mistakes, is a somewhat odd one to argue. Compare two wizards, one with sleep, color spray, and silent image as their only first level options, and another with those three spells but also, I dunno, jump. The latter wizard has a marginal advantage in a higher optimization game, because the player is presumably aware that jump is typically not all that good, but the former wizard is probably better in terms of the tier system, because jump can operate as something of a trap option. Or, in short, better to not have the bad spell than to have the ability to recognize that the bad spell is bad and use that information.

I think you're just blatantly misrepresenting the argument in question.

You've made a separate argument, which is also valid: your argument is that having more options should be regarded as better than having fewer options, and this is strictly true if the fewer options are a strict subset of the more.
I didn't argue that more options is strictly better. I think Cosi has a good point. I don't it refutes the advantage the four spell wizard has over the four spell sorcerer, but it's an interesting position.

Cosi

2018-09-14, 08:11 PM

The basic problem with Artificers is that the difference between an Artificer who blows chunks and one who blows up the game is entirely a difference of degree rather than kind. With a class like a Cleric or a Beguiler the "fair" builds are doing things that are fundamentally different from what the unfair builds are doing. They can do sandbagged unfairness like the Artificer, and that's part of their power, but they can get by without touching the abusive parts of their toolkit at all. On the other hand the Artificer cheese tricks and the Artificer normal behavior both come down to "dumpster dive for spells and screw around with the magic item creation rules". What is the bright line supposed to be that includes "1st level Artificer makes Scrolls of glitterdust" but not "1st level Artificer makes Scrolls of animate dead and desecrate"?

Also the class blows chunks until it can find a ~+10 bonus to UMD.

Either way, I think the resolution to this issue is simply that there are various degrees of power where this is concerned.

Well, yeah. That's why you should be doing tiers completely differently from every attempt to do them previously. Pick a fixed power target, then rank classes by "how hard is it to build to this target", "how hard is it to play to this target", and "how likely are you to dramatically over or under shoot this target". Then you get rankings that are actually clear and actually tell you something useful.

I recall thinking that combat should take up roughly 50% of the assumed game-space, with social and exploration stuff taking up the other 50%, on the assumption that the game's mechanics tend to fixate on combat.

The game's mechanics are almost entirely combat. And places where the game defines any kind of performance expectation are almost entirely combat. The number of CRed non-combat encounters is on the order of the number of monster books, not the number of monsters. Sure, you can make arguments about competence relative to other characters, but then you have to look at the benchmark for people who are combat only. And that leaves you with the conclusion that you basically need scry, plane shift, and teleport to qualify for Tier Three on the basis of non-combat abilities.

I am going to agree with Sleven that Artificers without early access is worse than regular spellcasters which means early access is literally the biggest advantage Artificers have, which means every optimized Artificer should capitalize on the early access, which makes it their entire schtick.

That's kind of a circular argument, isn't it? Marshals who don't cheese their Diplomacy check into the stratosphere and turn everyone they meet into a Fanatic immediately are worse than spellcasters, which means that Diplomancy is the biggest advantage Marshals have, which means every optimized Marshal should do that, which makes it their entire shtick. That's not even that absurd of an argument, really. Marshals get free Skill Focus (Diplomacy) and Diplomancer builds frequently go for Motive Charisma to double dip. That doesn't mean Diplomancy isn't stupid cheese.

2. The entire point of crafting is to double your WBL at the cost of xp. So... you're saying it's WotC's official stance that Artificers should only get half of what other players get because they can craft items? Because that's not what that Q&A says.

The point of crafting is to take the gold you get from selling random loot and turn it into the exact loot you want without paying the 50% penalty for selling stuff. The Artificer isn't supposed to get double WBL, it's supposed to get regular WBL without having to rely on the mercies of the random magic item tables.

3. Only Artificers can make CL7 scrolls of wish. Other characters must make them at CL9. And I believe you're misunderstanding item creating rules.

Everyone can buy a Candle of Invocation at 5th level. You're not special.

"In order to rob the Artificer's advantage I'm going to allow PrC Spelllists in the market."

I mean, if Artificers exist, surely some of them sell their scrolls. Why wouldn't you be able to buy them? It seems to me that the argument that I should be able to become more powerful for no real reason because Artificers exist in the campaign setting is exactly identical to the argument that Artificers should be able to become more powerful for no real reason because Divine Crusaders exist in the campaign setting.

Ability to cast spells like Planar Binding at level 8 with no wealth at all is unique to Artificers and no spellcaster can achieve this.

Sure you can. Even under the most restrictive interpretation of the Wizard's spell acquisition mechanic, it can grab a spell on its list off a scroll at whatever level the scroll is. Fixed list casters can swap any of their 4th level spells for planar binding with Apprentice (Spellcaster). Artificers aren't special because they can break the game. They're special because the only way they contribute is by arbitrarily capping the amount of broken they are.

Either you're missing the value of re-spec, or you're claiming that some of the best Wizard spells in the game are "crappy options" -- which would still be wrong, but differently wrong. Please clarify if you did mean the latter.

I literally do not understand how you read my post and came away with an understanding of my position that lead you to believe this was a useful argument to make. I said that respecing to correct mistakes only matters if there are mistakes for you to make. There are other reasons to respec, but the specific reason you brought up is one that doesn't increase a class's power in any real way. A player who corrects mistakes they made in their build is necessarily no stronger than one who never made those mistakes to begin with.

A Wizard can make a tactical retreat and come back 9 hours later with more relevant spells; a Sorcerer lacks this option. This is a scenario which can easily occur in a real game, and I've seen it several times from both sides of the screen.

Yes, that is an advantage of the Wizard. I never said it wasn't. But it's not a mistake on the Wizard's part. sleep and color spray are high expected value spells. It is therefore rational to select them in situations where you have no priors about expected opposition (or priors that indicate you'll face things that are vulnerable to them). The idea that it retroactively becomes irrational to have prepared them because you ended up in a situation where they have low actual value is fallacious. The fact that they have low worst case value does make them less valuable to characters who cannot replace their spells (such as Sorcerers). They might be better off selecting spells like grease that have a more even power distribution. But none of that has anything to do with players making mistakes. A mistake would be selecting something like burning hands, which simply has a lower expected value than available options.

It's not a false dichotomy at all -- I said that swapping spells was one of the reasons why high flexibility was well-regarded, and Cosi responded with what you see quoted above.

Dude, context. You said that correcting mistakes was valuable, and you gave swapping spells as an example of that. The swapping arcane lock (a bad spell) for glitterdust (a good spell) because arcane lock is a waste of your time is different from swapping glitterdust (a generally good spell) for command undead (a situationally absurd spell) because you know there's a Zombie Minotaur in the next room. That's absolutely an advantage Wizards and other prepared casters have, but it's pretty specific to them. The Binder does not have comparable variance it the utility of its abilities.

EldritchWeaver

2018-09-15, 08:23 AM

The conclusion is that the class, when averaged across all levels (placing more emphasis on the mid-levels) and across all optimization levels (placing more emphasis on moderate optimization), is worse at solving problems (weighted by how likely a given problem is to show up) than any tier one class, better at solving problems than any tier three class, and not too far away from other tier two classes in this regard. Or, at least the conclusion is that most people believe that to be the case.

What conclusions do you think people should be able to draw from that? That's at least as important.

It is missing the optimization floor and ceiling. It is missing how likely you achieve a certain power/versatility level, in particular how much effort it takes to achieve the highest ranking in regards to building the character as well in regards to playing the character*. It doesn't tell you how well suited the class can be to solve certain challenges, in particular, if you can tackle all challenges a class can with a singular build and if yes, how much time and effort it takes to switch your tools, and if not, how big the subset of those challenges is. All in all, currently the conclusion of eggynack does not mention this. I don't see, how he could get that missing information either.

The Tier system as is compresses so much stuff into a single number, that it loses most of its meaning. It basically says:

Tier 1: Can break game in a dozen ways, can participate in every challenge as primary supporter.
Tier 2: Can break game in a few ways, can participate in many challenges as primary supporter.
Tier 3: Doesn't break game, can participate in half of the challenges as primary supporter.
Tier 4: Might not break the game, but can participate in few challenges as primary supporter.
Tier 5: Breaks the game by being too ineffective.

But why you place a class in any Tier is not obvious. Case in point, the artificer discussion, where not understanding how high-op builds work puts them down two ranks.

*I had a druid with spontaneous access to the whole spell list and still managed to play it worse than the monk... Granted, starting out with a high-level character when playing the first time doesn't help either.

eggynack

2018-09-15, 08:47 AM

It is missing the optimization floor and ceiling. It is missing how likely you achieve a certain power/versatility level, in particular how much effort it takes to achieve the highest ranking in regards to building the character as well in regards to playing the character*. It doesn't tell you how well suited the class can be to solve certain challenges, in particular, if you can tackle all challenges a class can with a singular build and if yes, how much time and effort it takes to switch your tools, and if not, how big the subset of those challenges is. All in all, currently the conclusion of eggynack does not mention this. I don't see, how he could get that missing information either.

The Tier system as is compresses so much stuff into a single number, that it loses most of its meaning.
Of course the tier system compresses some information. Different systems have different utility. This system in particular has the benefit of ease of use and relative accuracy. That each class has a single number associated makes a project like this possible in the first place, which means that some kind of reasonable consensus can be reached. However, for its accuracy, it is one of the less comprehensive systems out there. By contrast, something like the niche ranking system (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?314701-Person_Man-s-Niche-Ranking-System) benefits from telling you where and how a particular class will be useful, but it sacrifices things like wizard/sorcerer delineation (even in more extreme forms, where a version of the sorcerer with only one spell known of each level would presumably rank pretty highly), and it's difficult to say whether the massive system is super accurate, and it doesn't give a strong holistic vision of how the classes compare.

It basically says:

Tier 1: Can break game in a dozen ways, can participate in every challenge as primary supporter.
Tier 2: Can break game in a few ways, can participate in many challenges as primary supporter.
Tier 3: Doesn't break game, can participate in half of the challenges as primary supporter.
Tier 4: Might not break the game, but can participate in few challenges as primary supporter.
Tier 5: Breaks the game by being too ineffective.

Big correction. Breaking the game is in no way an aspect of this tier system. The other part of the definition has the issue that it only considers primary supporters. A class that can operate only decently in every situation would be ranked tier five by your system. In reality, theoretically anyway, you measure the amount the class does with regards to the challenge in question, and then do the same for all other challenges, and their combined degree of achievement is compared to that of the other classes. This may not be precisely how tiers are found, because actually doing it would take insanely long, but it's what the tiers are meant to mean at the end of the day.

But why you place a class in any Tier is not obvious. Case in point, the artificer discussion, where not understanding how high-op builds work puts them down two ranks.
Of course why a class is placed in a tier is non-obvious. If it were obvious, then voting and discussion would be utterly pointless. If you want to learn the underlying reasoning for their placement, there is an entire thread over there, and, had you been here when the threads were still active, you would have been able to contest any particular argument made for their placement. I'm not artificer dude, so I can't personally tell you whether it was the correct placement, but this argument is ultimately not one against the tier system, but instead one against people who think it is the correct placement. Maybe you're right. Maybe they're ranked too highly. Or, y'know, maybe you overestimate how hard it is to build and play an artificer.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-15, 11:42 AM

That's kind of a circular argument, isn't it? Marshals who don't cheese their Diplomacy check into the stratosphere and turn everyone they meet into a Fanatic immediately are worse than spellcasters, which means that Diplomancy is the biggest advantage Marshals have, which means every optimized Marshal should do that, which makes it their entire shtick. That's not even that absurd of an argument, really. Marshals get free Skill Focus (Diplomacy) and Diplomancer builds frequently go for Motive Charisma to double dip. That doesn't mean Diplomancy isn't stupid cheese.

Aren't spellcasters better at diplomacy than Marshals? By far? Like the Bard. I mean spellcasters have spells like improvisation, divine insight, guidance of the avatar, moment of prescience while marshals have nothing. I admit I'm not too familiar with Diplomacy shenanigans but don't spellcasters have the ability to get that silver tongue thing that lets you diplomacy in 1 round? If marshals have that too then it still proves my point that Diplomacy is not exclusive to Marshals so your entire example fails.

No, the advantage Marshals have over Spellcasters is Ubercharging not diplomacy and even if they maximize their ubercharging to the stratosphere they are still worse than spellcasters which is why they are tier 4. And correct me if I'm wrong, but it is my understanding that Spellcasters can ubercharge better than marshals, which is exactly why they are tier 1. They do literally everything marshals can do better.

The point of crafting is to take the gold you get from selling random loot and turn it into the exact loot you want without paying the 50% penalty for selling stuff. The Artificer isn't supposed to get double WBL, it's supposed to get regular WBL without having to rely on the mercies of the random magic item tables.

Worthless gear is worthless. So an Artificer, who has cherry picked equipment at WBL v.s. a different character who either has random crap that is most likely suboptimal or worthless at WBL or has cherry picked equipment at half WBL. Yeah I think the Artificer still has double wealth than other characters.

I mean, if Artificers exist, surely some of them sell their scrolls. Why wouldn't you be able to buy them? It seems to me that the argument that I should be able to become more powerful for no real reason because Artificers exist in the campaign setting is exactly identical to the argument that Artificers should be able to become more powerful for no real reason because Divine Crusaders exist in the campaign setting.

Yeah so Artificers' scrolls render every single scroll made by spellcasters obsolete which is why they're weaker than spellcasters. Nice argument? In fact why don't you go all the way and say "A spellcaster with Leadership and an Artificer Cohort is better than an Artificer and therefore artificers are inferior to spellcasters."

Sure you can. Even under the most restrictive interpretation of the Wizard's spell acquisition mechanic, it can grab a spell on its list off a scroll at whatever level the scroll is. Fixed list casters can swap any of their 4th level spells for planar binding with Apprentice (Spellcaster). Artificers aren't special because they can break the game. They're special because the only way they contribute is by arbitrarily capping the amount of broken they are.

If you're saying Spellcasters are superior than artificers in Tippy's world where every single spell in the game is an arcane transmutation spell at its lowest level achieved by a giant organization of transmutation variant wyrm wizards then sure. Ok. You're right.

Cosi

2018-09-15, 06:13 PM

Tier 1: Can break game in a dozen ways
Tier 2: Can break game in a few ways

No, this is literally never a useful metric. Classes don't break the game. Abilities break the game. If you want to rank gamebreakers, make a list like this one (http://tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=1156). Notice how none of them are classes.

Tier 5: Breaks the game by being too ineffective.

I'm glad to see this acknowledged as something that also breaks the game.

Aren't spellcasters better at diplomacy than Marshals? By far?

Suppose there was a class that was exactly like the Wizard, except it had ten times as many spell slots of each level. Would that push the Wizard down a tier, or is power dependent on absolute capabilities rather than relative ones?

Worthless gear is worthless. So an Artificer, who has cherry picked equipment at WBL v.s. a different character who either has random crap that is most likely suboptimal or worthless at WBL or has cherry picked equipment at half WBL. Yeah I think the Artificer still has double wealth than other characters.

Casters don't need gear.

Yeah so Artificers' scrolls render every single scroll made by spellcasters obsolete which is why they're weaker than spellcasters. Nice argument?

If I can buy the principal benefit of having an Artificer in the party, why should I have an Artificer in the party instead of having another Wizard and buying some cheap scrolls?

If you're saying Spellcasters are superior than artificers in Tippy's world where every single spell in the game is an arcane transmutation spell at its lowest level achieved by a giant organization of transmutation variant wyrm wizards then sure. Ok. You're right.

I'm saying that if you're allowing Artificers to get spells early, there's no bright line stopping Wizards, Beguilers, Clerics, or Erudites from also getting spells early. It's not a unique capability.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-15, 08:21 PM

Suppose there was a class that was exactly like the Wizard, except it had ten times as many spell slots of each level. Would that push the Wizard down a tier, or is power dependent on absolute capabilities rather than relative ones?

Maybe. You might have to create a new tier like tier 0, or move all tiers down a tier and make the 10x spell slot wizard class tier 1. I guess you could just put them in the same tier but with a 10x difference in power I think they should be in separate tiers.

Casters don't need gear.

An Artificer with 0 wealth is still superior to Casters with 0 wealth because Spell-Storing Item's early access power is significantly more powerful than any spellcaster's spells or class feature. Later levels when Early Access doesn't matter Spellcasters are better but until then, which is like a good 70% of the game, the Artificer reigns supreme.

If I can buy the principal benefit of having an Artificer in the party, why should I have an Artificer in the party instead of having another Wizard and buying some cheap scrolls?

Because you can't buy the principal benefit of having an Artificer unless in the Tippyverse. If you're in the Tippy then yes, Spellcasters > Artificers.

I'm saying that if you're allowing Artificers to get spells early, there's no bright line stopping Wizards, Beguilers, Clerics, or Erudites from also getting spells early. It's not a unique capability.

There is. It's called a class spell list. I mean sure, technically you can spell research epic spells into 1st level spells with a really permissive DM but at that point, you know, all classes are identical because they can just buy such scrolls and UMD it.

Whether Artificers are superior or Spellcasters are superior is significantly dependent on the campaign and table, but imo in standard d&d world where markets have magic items available within the guidelines in the DMG, where high level magic items and spellcasters are rare and PrC NPCs are extremely more rare, Artificers reign supreme. But in a custom setting where every spellcaster and prestige class is a dime a dozen to the point all standard magic item crafters are out of business Spellcasters reign supreme because like you said, you can just buy all of the Artificer's benefits cheaply.

Cosi

2018-09-15, 08:48 PM

An Artificer with 0 wealth is still superior to Casters with 0 wealth because Spell-Storing Item's early access power is significantly more powerful than any spellcaster's spells or class feature. Later levels when Early Access doesn't matter Spellcasters are better but until then, which is like a good 70% of the game, the Artificer reigns supreme.

spell storing item costs XP to use. There's an infusion to get around that, but IIRC it's 4th level. At which point the other restriction on spell storing item (no spells above 4th level) kicks in. Is there a point where using spell storing item is more powerful than Wizard or Druid casting? Sure. But it's like two or three levels. At low levels, you're blowing XP to do anything. At high levels, your versatility is not as good as the power of other characters.

Early access is still a dumb trick that is not unique to the Artificer. There is no world where you will be allowed to make Scrolls of wish but people will not be allowed to buy Candles of Invocation.

Because you can't buy the principal benefit of having an Artificer unless in the Tippyverse. If you're in the Tippy then yes, Spellcasters > Artificers.

Why not? The benefit of the Artificer is that you can make magic items. It's not like they're special magic items you're not supposed to buy, the Artificer takes time to make them based on their price. Seriously, how is "I can make these scrolls because Divine Crusaders exist" a different argument from "I can buy these scrolls because Artificers exist". Because your entire position rests on the first being legitimate, but the second being cheese.

There is. It's called a class spell list. I mean sure, technically you can spell research epic spells into 1st level spells with a really permissive DM but at that point, you know, all classes are identical because they can just buy such scrolls and UMD it.

This is the exact kind of special pleading people use to justify why their favorite class is super powerful because all its tricks are clearly low optimization. The Artificer craps all over spell list restrictions. The notion that other classes will be forced to abide by them while you make scrolls of wish before 10th level is laughable.

Doctor Awkward

2018-09-15, 10:13 PM

Artificers are broken not because of crafting but because of early access.

1. Planar Binding at level 8 instead of level 11 like wizards. Planetars who has 14th level cleric spells accessible are bindable at level 8.
2. Access to 9th level spells at level 7. Divine Crusader Spell List is OP. I made a build that revolves entirely around CL7 Scrolls of Wish.
3. Craft Reserve lets you craft items whose xp cost is beyond what you can normally craft. Rod of Excellent Magic for example, craftable at level 19 on an Artificer.
4. Summon Giant, a spell normally available at 15th level is available at 8th level. That is 7 levels of early access.
5. Free Persistent Spell in the form of Metamagic Item infusion. It's just as strong as a DMM:Persist Cleric, except by passing the wand around he can buff the entire party with Persistent Spells, so they are better than DMM:Persist Clerics.

Spellcasters break games because of out of combat shenanigans not direct combat spells and Artificers have access to virtually every single out of combat shenanigan in the game at level 7.

Artificers are tier 0 not tier 1. They do everything tier 1s do at least 2 levels earlier, minimum, but as the above examples show it can be as much as 6-10 levels earlier.

Artificers are incredibly capable out of combat.

It's in combat that they suffer compared to other Tier 1's, especially wizard's and sorcerers.

They cannot abuse the action economy in the same way, since they are required to hold wands, staves, and scrolls in their hand in order to use them. Nor do they reliably have access to every conceivable spell the same way a wizard of equal level would.

There are other practical in-game considerations as well. Yes an artificer can provide metamagic effects to a wand on the fly, but doing so repeatedly is prohibitively expensive, as costs for creating wands and scrolls skyrocket when you are increasing the caster level to gain the most benefit from them, such as in the case of Magic Vestment. So while a DMM Cleric can prepare the same round of "morning prayers" for the party every single day at no personal cost, an artificer will have to save his for the day they think the big important battles will be.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-15, 10:26 PM

spell storing item costs XP to use. There's an infusion to get around that, but IIRC it's 4th level. At which point the other restriction on spell storing item (no spells above 4th level) kicks in. Is there a point where using spell storing item is more powerful than Wizard or Druid casting? Sure. But it's like two or three levels. At low levels, you're blowing XP to do anything. At high levels, your versatility is not as good as the power of other characters.

Early access is still a dumb trick that is not unique to the Artificer. There is no world where you will be allowed to make Scrolls of wish but people will not be allowed to buy Candles of Invocation.

As long as liquid pain isn't involved there's nothing wrong with scribing scrolls of wish since you're essentially trading an entire level for one casting. I am very puzzled why you think this is on par with Candles of Invocation. I only mentioned wish because I've been using a build like that but there are plently of non-wish early access spells that are very powerful. Genesis for one. Greater Planar Binding is another. Smart use of 9th level spells like shapechange and time stop will result in a profit

And Candle of Invocation is not broken. It's a horribly cost inefficient item whose sole purpose is to start wish loops. If your table doesn't allow wish loops go ahead and buy as many candles of invocations as you want. You will be worthless broke deadweight after a single encounter. If your table does allow wish loops then the entire tier system is pointless. Since we're talking about tiers I suggest you stop trying to use wish loops to justify your arguments.

In fact I'll summarize what you've been saying through out the entire discussion

"Fighters can buy Candles of Invocation and achieve pun-pun so all classes are equal and nothing matters which is why Artificers are inferior to Spellcasters. Because Spellcasters need to resort to Wish Loops to surpass Artificers."

Instead of blathering random TO tricks that lead to pun-pun as the basis of your argument, I suggest you take a moment to think things through and use non-TO tricks that don't make the entire d&d system obsolete as the basis of your argument. My argument is very simple: Artificers have access to PrC spell lists without any TO wish loop shenanigans which gives them early access to very powerful spells and that is why they are superior to spellcasters. What's yours? Is it: All class can become pun-pun by buying candles of invocation so spellcasters are superior? Is that it?

You're trying to give spellcasters PrC spell lists by rule lawyering that wizards can add any scroll including not only arcane spells that aren't on their spell list, but also divine spells and scrolls that are neither arcane or divine to their spellbook. So your argument is... what? I can rule lawyer wizards to add any spell in the game into their spellbook and therefore they're stronger than artificers? Is that it?

Why not? The benefit of the Artificer is that you can make magic items. It's not like they're special magic items you're not supposed to buy, the Artificer takes time to make them based on their price. Seriously, how is "I can make these scrolls because Divine Crusaders exist" a different argument from "I can buy these scrolls because Artificers exist". Because your entire position rests on the first being legitimate, but the second being cheese.

Access to PrC Spell Lists is unique to Artificers, Wyrm Wizards, Recasters, and Chameleons or the like.
Yeah sure, wizards can totally add spells that are neither arcane or divine to their spellbook by buying said scrolls created by artificers and therefore are superior to artificers. Yeah, whatever.

You know what, you're right. You're totally right. According to you because wizards can add every single spell in the game to their spellbooks regardless whether they're arcane or not, they are superior to artificers especially since every single class can buy candles of invocation and start a wish loop. Whatever, this argument makes total sense.

Rogues are tier one because they can buy every spell a wizard can cast and UMD it. If rogues can buy the principal benefit of having a Wizard in the party, why should I have a wizard in the party instead of having another rogue and buying some cheap scrolls?

So your counter argument to my claim that Artificers are superior because of their early access to higher level spells is... I can just buy scrolls and cast them myself therefore any class that can buy scrolls and cast them themselves is superior to Artificers?

I don't want to be rude but if your next argument, once again, involves methods that makes the class system completely irrelevant I am going to stop participating in your discussion.

Access to PrC Spell Lists is unique to Artificers, Wyrm Wizards, Recasters, Chameleons and the like. Not wizards or any class that can buy scrolls.

If your argument is "Early Access doesn't mean jack" that's a valid argument that doesn't render the class system obsolete and this is where we'll agree to disagree.

Artificers are incredibly capable out of combat.

It's in combat that they suffer compared to other Tier 1's, especially wizard's and sorcerers.

They cannot abuse the action economy in the same way, since they are required to hold wands, staves, and scrolls in their hand in order to use them. Nor do they reliably have access to every conceivable spell the same way a wizard of equal level would.

There are other practical in-game considerations as well. Yes an artificer can provide metamagic effects to a wand on the fly, but doing so repeatedly is prohibitively expensive, as costs for creating wands and scrolls skyrocket when you are increasing the caster level to gain the most benefit from them, such as in the case of Magic Vestment. So while a DMM Cleric can prepare the same round of "morning prayers" for the party every single day at no personal cost, an artificer will have to save his for the day they think the big important battles will be.

Yeah that's my argument. Out of Combat Shenanigans are significantly more powerful than In Combat shenanigans. Artificers get early access to high level out of combat shenanigans while spellcasters don't therefore Artificers are superior to spellcasters by a noticeable margin to the point I think they should be one tier level higher than spellcasters.

Cosi

2018-09-15, 10:54 PM

As long as liquid pain isn't involved there's nothing wrong with scribing scrolls of wish since you're essentially trading an entire level for one casting. I am very puzzled why you think this is on par with Candles of Invocation.

Broken: Trading 5th level WBL for one casting of wish.
Not Broken: Trading 7th level WBL for one casting of wish.

Yes, you don't have to settle for only one wish from a Candle. But you don't have to settle for only one wish from a Scroll of wish either. If you want to argue with a straight face that 7th level is the appropriate time for characters to get wish, I'm all ears. But I doubt anyone will or should take you seriously.

It's a horribly cost inefficient item whose sole purpose is to start wish loops.

Broken: Using Chain Binding to get gear beyond what is appropriate for your level.
Not Broken: Getting scrolls of spells with spell levels higher than your character level.

Instead of blathering random TO tricks that lead to pun-pun as the basis of your argument

They're your TO tricks that lead to Pun-Pun. You just seem to think that if you don't go all the way to Pun-Pun, they stop being broken. Again, you can make that argument, but it's not a good argument.

You're trying to give spellcasters PrC spell lists by rule lawyering that wizards can add any scroll including not only arcane spells that aren't on their spell list, but also divine spells and scrolls that are neither arcane or divine to their spellbook. So your argument is... what? I can rule lawyer wizards to add any spell in the game into their spellbook and therefore they're stronger than artificers? Is that it?

Rules Lawyering: Wizards treating planar binding as a 4th level spell.
Not Rules Lawyering: Artificers treating planar binding as a 4th level spell.

The rules are very clear on what Wizards can do. Any scroll they decipher can be scribed into their spellbook, provided it is on their list. No provision is made for type of scroll or level of spell.

I don't want to be rude but if your next argument, once again, involves methods that makes the class system completely irrelevant I am going to stop participating in your discussion.

The fact that you think this is a good point means you're not reading my posts properly. My entire point is that your arguments for the Artificer being good are not exclusive to it. Any class can break the game. Most game breaking tricks can be limited to merely be very good. The Artificer is not special in this regard, and your posts about how you can do X broken thing with the Artificer are therefore bad arguments.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-15, 11:02 PM

The fact that you think this is a good point means you're not reading my posts properly. My entire point is that your arguments for the Artificer being good are not exclusive to it. Any class can break the game. Most game breaking tricks can be limited to merely be very good. The Artificer is not special in this regard, and your posts about how you can do X broken thing with the Artificer are therefore bad arguments.

So if I am understanding your argument correctly, you are saying that access to PrC Spellcasting is not exclusive to Artificers, Wyrm Wizards and the like, while I am saying it is.

Your argument includes buying magic items, existence of very advanced magic shops, and a very liberal reading of wizards' spellbook mechanics, I call foul play on all 3, and you're saying it's not foul play.

Alright, I guess this is where we'll agree to disagree. I am calling foul play on all 3 and you're claiming their not, and it seems none of us are willing to change our opinions, so I guess that's that.

Cosi

2018-09-15, 11:16 PM

So if I am understanding your argument correctly, you are saying that access to PrC Spellcasting is not exclusive to Artificers, Wyrm Wizards and the like, while I am saying it is.

PrC exclusive spells, maybe. Though Warmages can access those through Apprentice (Spellcaster).

Your argument includes buying magic items, existence of very advanced magic shops, and a very liberal reading of wizards' spellbook mechanics, I call foul play on all 3, and you're saying it's not foul play.

Wealth is a part of the game. If you want to reject it, stop talking about crafted magic items because your Artificer has no wealth.

The argument that I can buy Artificer scrolls to become more powerful is exactly the same as the argument that you can scribe Divine Crusader scrolls to become more powerful. In both cases, the thing being leveraged for power is the existence of another class.

It's a reading that results in something that the Artificer can do. If that's okay for the Artificer, it's okay for the Wizard.

Literally every single instance of you "calling foul" is just base hypocrisy. All your complaints apply to the Artificer, and unlike the Wizard it doesn't have anything good to fall back on. Your arguments are bad. Just like the Artificer.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-15, 11:39 PM

Wealth is a part of the game. If you want to reject it, stop talking about crafted magic items because your Artificer has no wealth.

Again, spell-storing item requires no wealth and gives access to PrC Spell lists. You're going in circles. Your opinion that Early Access doesn't mean jack has been noted and is disagreed by me so this is where we end our discussion concerning no-wealth artificers v.s. wizard.

I say access to Summon Giants, Planar Binding, and the like at level 8 makes them far superior to wizards, you're saying it's not. There's nothing more to discuss. Casting Summon Giants all day even if it costs XP, or binding a 12hd outsider to do all your fighting for you at level 8, 9, and 10 IMO is way too good and you're saying it's not. There's nothing more to discuss.

As someone who played plethora of Planar Binding characters exclusively I deem the Artificer as the best Planar Binding class in the game because of their early access to Planar Binding, Greater Planar Binding (with wealth), and Mindrape (with wealth) regardless whether or not you have access to a metropolis or a tippyverse magic mart makes them on an entire different league of a Planar Binder than a wizard who has to wait until level 15 for greater planar binding and level 17 for mindrape which wowed me to no end which is why I insist Artificers are on an entire different league than wizards. Even if Divine Crusaders don't exist I can force a 18hd outsider into eternal servitude with Limited Wish at level 13 with the Artificer while a wizard has to wait until level 15. Artificers are still better.

There are other out of combat shenanigans the Artificer can pull but as I have tunnel vision concerning these matters I cannot give you any since I have no interest in the other out of combat shenanigans.

The argument that I can buy Artificer scrolls to become more powerful is exactly the same as the argument that you can scribe Divine Crusader scrolls to become more powerful. In both cases, the thing being leveraged for power is the existence of another class.

It's a reading that results in something that the Artificer can do. If that's okay for the Artificer, it's okay for the Wizard.

Literally every single instance of you "calling foul" is just base hypocrisy. All your complaints apply to the Artificer, and unlike the Wizard it doesn't have anything good to fall back on. Your arguments are bad. Just like the Artificer.

No it's not. Both Artificers and Wizards may require existence of other PrCs for access to PrC spell lists, but that's where the Artificer's requirements end. Wizards need the existence of that exact PrC character AND requires it to go into the business of magic marts AND requires the Wizard to have access to said magic mart.

And I'm still not understanding how a wizard is scribing spells that are neither arcane nor divine into their spellbook.
In addition, I'm failing to understand how a wizard can prepare a spell in a spellbook that is not on their class spell list, or is on their spell list but is at a different level. So I am highly doubtful of your claims.

And Again your method is identical to claiming a Rogue is identical to a Wizard in power because it can buy and UMD every spell in the game.

So no, I'm not being hypocritical. I have said again and again in a perfect tippyverse magic mart setting with your questionable ruling that wizards can prepare and cast all spells even if they are neither arcane nor divine nor on the wizard spell list, wizards are superior to Artificers. But if your campaign isn't the type to have scrolls of Polymorph Any Object readily available to 1st-3rd level mundanes for permanent duration polymorph Artificers are superior.

So I am calling foul play. Whether you believe tippyverse magic marts are fair or not is irrelevant. They are not according to the DMG's guidelines and therefore my mind will not change. If you disagree then so be it. I am not being hypocritical but you're free to believe that as I doubt you can persuade me otherwise with your current arguments.

Cosi

2018-09-15, 11:59 PM

Your opinion that Early Access doesn't mean jack has been noted and is disagreed by me so this is where we end our discussion concerning no-wealth artificers v.s. wizard.

I said Early Access is not unique. Also it's broken, particularly in the applications you've been describing. A Warmage can use Apprentice (Spellcaster) to turn one of their redundant orbs into planar binding. Read my damn posts. I have not been avoiding mentioning this. For what it's worth, I do think that spell storing item is a legitimate argument in the Artificer's favor. It's just not enough to put them on par with casters.

And Again your method is identical to claiming a Rogue is identical to a Wizard in power because it can buy and UMD every spell in the game.

Well, yes. If people said that the Wizard was good because it has Scribe Scroll that would be a legitimate argument. But they don't say that. They say the Wizard is good because of the spells they cast, which the Rogue cannot buy.

I have said again and again in a perfect tippyverse magic mart setting

Translation: under the RAW rules for buying magic items.

with your questionable ruling that wizards can prepare and cast all spells even if they are neither arcane nor divine nor on the wizard spell list

Translation: you don't understand how spells work (spells do not have an inherent property of "arcane" or "divine"), and think that "can Wizards prepare spells in their spellbook" is an open question.

Also you seem to not have read my posts, because I have 100% conceded that spells need to be on the Wizard list for Wizards to cast them.

I am not being hypocritical

Yes, you are. If it is legitimate to assume you can scribe Divine Crusader spells, it is legitimate to assume you can buy Artificer scrolls. It is exactly the same argument.

EldritchWeaver

2018-09-16, 08:03 AM

Of course the tier system compresses some information. Different systems have different utility. This system in particular has the benefit of ease of use and relative accuracy. That each class has a single number associated makes a project like this possible in the first place, which means that some kind of reasonable consensus can be reached. However, for its accuracy, it is one of the less comprehensive systems out there. By contrast, something like the niche ranking system (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?314701-Person_Man-s-Niche-Ranking-System) benefits from telling you where and how a particular class will be useful, but it sacrifices things like wizard/sorcerer delineation (even in more extreme forms, where a version of the sorcerer with only one spell known of each level would presumably rank pretty highly), and it's difficult to say whether the massive system is super accurate, and it doesn't give a strong holistic vision of how the classes compare.

The flaw of the current niche ranking system is also a flaw of the Tier system.

Big correction. Breaking the game is in no way an aspect of this tier system. The other part of the definition has the issue that it only considers primary supporters. A class that can operate only decently in every situation would be ranked tier five by your system. In reality, theoretically anyway, you measure the amount the class does with regards to the challenge in question, and then do the same for all other challenges, and their combined degree of achievement is compared to that of the other classes. This may not be precisely how tiers are found, because actually doing it would take insanely long, but it's what the tiers are meant to mean at the end of the day.

Maybe my summary missed the mark in aspects, but my point is, that the number doesn't tell you enough. If you play in an intrigue campaign, the emphasis on what you consider desirable shifts. Which classes become undesirable, is not obvious. You can suspect that a lower ranked class has more flexibility and that you can make them work, but that rogue may do well compared to a fighter.

Of course why a class is placed in a tier is non-obvious. If it were obvious, then voting and discussion would be utterly pointless. If you want to learn the underlying reasoning for their placement, there is an entire thread over there, and, had you been here when the threads were still active, you would have been able to contest any particular argument made for their placement. I'm not artificer dude, so I can't personally tell you whether it was the correct placement, but this argument is ultimately not one against the tier system, but instead one against people who think it is the correct placement. Maybe you're right. Maybe they're ranked too highly. Or, y'know, maybe you overestimate how hard it is to build and play an artificer.

A big part of the discussion is that the Tier system is too nebulous, too undefined to give much support in ranking classes. Everyone has a different interpretation which leads to a different outcome. Averaging those outcomes means averaging interpretations, but no one can say what the average interpretation is. My claim that wizard is Tier 4 can be argued with, even if you say that people don't build deliberate crap wizards with Int 9-, that the vast majority of players has a low system mastery and so overall the average converges there. I don't know the Artificer either, but if the same rules allow for interpretations where two different people come up with differences of two Tiers regularly, then I would check if the rules are tight enough. In particular, if you have hidden assumptions unstated.

Troacctid

2018-09-16, 08:20 AM

It's not really that nebulous. It's a ranking of classes by overall expected power level, primarily emphasizing levels 3–15ish, and weighted to account for variance in optimization and player skill. I think that's plenty clear—it just isn't very granular.

eggynack

2018-09-16, 09:06 AM

The flaw of the current niche ranking system is also a flaw of the Tier system.
No, it's not. The tier system obviously has wizard/sorcerer delineation, given that they're separated by an entire tier, and the holistic thing is resolved by the fact that the tier system makes no implicit or explicit demand that every "niche" be ranked equally. Also, we blatantly haven't had, and neither would we need to have, hundreds of insane voting rounds. The ideal voting version of the niche ranking system would probably end up with a thread for every class, where every class gets 17 separate niches to argue over.

Maybe my summary missed the mark in aspects, but my point is, that the number doesn't tell you enough. If you play in an intrigue campaign, the emphasis on what you consider desirable shifts. Which classes become undesirable, is not obvious. You can suspect that a lower ranked class has more flexibility and that you can make them work, but that rogue may do well compared to a fighter.

And that in particular is the advantage of the niche ranking system over the tier system. Different systems do and tell you different things at different levels of accuracy and usefulness.

A big part of the discussion is that the Tier system is too nebulous, too undefined to give much support in ranking classes. Everyone has a different interpretation which leads to a different outcome. Averaging those outcomes means averaging interpretations, but no one can say what the average interpretation is. My claim that wizard is Tier 4 can be argued with, even if you say that people don't build deliberate crap wizards with Int 9-, that the vast majority of players has a low system mastery and so overall the average converges there. I don't know the Artificer either, but if the same rules allow for interpretations where two different people come up with differences of two Tiers regularly, then I would check if the rules are tight enough. In particular, if you have hidden assumptions unstated.
Hence these threads. People do have weird unstated assumptions, and the original tier system is a good example of that. JaronK was oddly assuming, say, that factotums generally use FoI, while healers do not use sanctified spells. These threads deal with those assumptions in two key ways. First, voting has the utility of evening things out. The more votes you have, the more likely the result is to be correct, and, in the specific case of this issue, weird assumptions one way will frequently be countered by weird assumptions the other way.

Second, and more importantly, discussion has the capacity to reveal and deal with these strange assumptions. If your assumption is, to fit the example you gave, that wizards have less than nine intelligence, then that allows people to convince you and others otherwise. And, of course, it gives future voters basis to agree or disagree with your vote. Maybe the end result of all this discussion is that someone changes their mind. Regardless of the direction that mind changing goes, I think that's a great thing.

Separately, I disagree that some two tier differences is an issue. Looking at the vote counts on the spreadsheet, it looks like it occurs very atypically, and such occasional divides are to be expected. Most votes are going to fall near the center of the bell curve, but sometimes you're gonna have an outlier. I do not want definitions so exacting that everyone lands incredibly close to each other. That would both remove the need for voting, and risk my personal assumptions and biases poisoning the system.

Nifft

2018-09-16, 08:39 PM

The flaw of the current niche ranking system is also a flaw of the Tier system.

I would love to see more niche ranking systems.

IMHO the current one has value, so I don't want to ignore it entirely, but I think it could be improved upon.

Make a new one, if you have the time and inclination. If you want to include stuff like level-appropriate targets for each niche, or niches which are only relevant for a range of levels, that's even better.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-17, 12:05 AM

It seems you're right. With liberal amounts of rule lawyering there is more than one way to get the Demonologist's Planar Binding on your class spell list such as Extra Spell while ignoring the FAQ, Apprentice Spellcaster like you said, and the Drake Helm or any other poorly written spell known increaser. Maybe Runestaves?

You're incorrect about spellbooks. Everything about scribing spellbooks from scrolls is under "Arcane Spells" and "Arcane Magical Writing" so you need an Arcane Scroll. But whether a Wizard can scribe an Arcane Demonologist's Planar Binding into their spellbook seems to be ambiguous enough to be legal under RAW even when using the Rule Compendium since a spell being on a "class spell list" doesn't require a spell level.

So I will concede.

I think the Artificer is superior because they have early access to all PrC spells without any feat or wealth investment.

I think the Artificer is superior because they have early access to expensive magic items that are otherwise unavailable due to WBL like Phylactery of Change at level 5-6, which is superior to its spell counterpart in every way possible until higher levels. This means until spells are more powerful than every magic item in the game (7th or 8th level spells. Maybe 6th?) the Artificer is superior. Even the scroll of wish on the Divine Crusader spell list. A wizard cannot afford one until high levels but an Artificer can by paying 5,000xp, an option not available to wizards.

I think the Artificer is superior because they can ignore most demographics restrictions like maximum GP limit on sold items.

I think the Artificer is superior because although they're weaker than spellcasters at later levels, they are strong enough for most of the game where as spellcasters need to wait more than half the game to do their shtick most of the time.

But Early Access is not unique to Artificers so i guess it's not a huge enough gap in power to claim an additional tier level. You really only need early access to one out of combat shenanigan to carry you until you get normal access to all of them and since you can build your wizard to get one I guess they're on similar levels regardless whether one is superior than the other at different points in the game.

So I will concede.

But I still stand by my original point against Sleven. Artificers are all about Early Access and that's why they're tier 1. Not because of crafting. Artificer's crafting results in Early Access both in the form of WBL and required caster level. Compared to a wizard they have the feats to spare to get Extraordinary Artisan early while wizards don't especially if they're getting feats like Extra Spell or some other shtick.

heavyfuel

2018-09-17, 08:19 AM

New thread is up! Psionics part 1, where will cover the classes from the XPH.

Link. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?569280-The-Expanded-Psionics-Psion-Psychic-Warrior-Soulknife-Wilder&p=23373106)

I think next thread will be the redo of the Auraists, and then I'll do the Complete Psionics one. Unless someone has a better suggestion.

Spreadsheet is still not up, though I think I'll have the time to do it today, since Mondays are a little more lax time-wise. Speaking of Mondays, I've decided I'll start a new thread weekly instead of every couple of days as Eggy was doing previously.

Since the Incarnum thread is still going, I won't update this thread's OP with the tiers just yet. I might give it another week or three before I do it.

remetagross

2018-09-17, 10:22 AM

Thanks heavyfuel, I am pleased to see thin very interestng enterprise back on the table! It has not failed to already deliver winded, complicated, and enlightening arguments, just like the previous iteration :D

Lans

2018-09-19, 02:23 AM

I'm porting this back here because my reply had even less to do with the topic at hand.

And we have reached the fundamental problem of Tier Systems derived from JaronK's work. They insist on including things that are not power in something that is going to be used as a power ranking in roughly 100% of cases. If you tell someone that some class is "higher tier" than another class, they will understand that as meaning "more powerful". Because that is what it means in the context of every other tier system anywhere.

Of course, "versatility" isn't actually meaningfully distinct from "power". If you bump up the numbers on a power you already had, you can overcome some new challenges. If you get a new power, you can overcome some new challenges. Separating the terms, if it can be done at all, is simply not a useful exercise. Particularly because no one ever bothers to define testable standards for these things.

Equally, "power" does actually mean "capacity to overcome more challenges". People understand the statement "the Wizard is more powerful than the Sorcerer" as having meaning despite the fact that Wizard and the Sorcerer draw from the same spell list. Arguing that because someone doesn't give a full page explanation of every word they use they must agree with your definitions of those words is a pretty shady rhetorical technique.

Consider that argument eggynack is talking about for a second. Are we really supposed to believe that it's impossible to be worse than the Wizard, better than the Bard, and have daily respec capacity?* Consider the hypothetical "Sorcerer, but with Incarnum". It's a Sorcerer that loses no abilities, but gains some amount of Incarnum, which they can shuffle around daily like any other Meldshaper. Under JaronK's model or any other that isn't just straight power, this class can't be Tier Two. Which implies either that adding abilities to a class reduces its tier, that there is no amount of Incarnum a Sorcerer could gain that is smaller than the difference between Sorcerer and WIzard**, or that versatility only counts in conjunction with power. Those first two are pretty farcical, and the third is a concession to the argument that power should be dominant in rankings.

Also I'm 90% sure that at this point this discussion belongs in the main thread for this project, not the psionics thread.

*: No, I don't care about "versatility". Because users won't, and unless this whole project is about growing our collective and individual internet fame, the foremost consideration needs to be on the user. Also, give a test for distinguishing between versatility and power before you make an argument that depends on them being different.
**: Or wherever you think the biggest gap is. If you believe this claim is false for the Sorcerer and the Wizard but true for the Beguiler and the Druid, don't get so caught up in the specific example I've chosen as to miss the general principle.

I think about it this way, a barbarian has more power than a warrior, but not any more versatility, they can basically do the same type of encounters, just the warrior can't do them as well. Where the barbarian is going in an wrecking a monster with a CR 2 higher than his level the warrior is doing the same to one 2 lower.

Like if the party encounters 4 hill giants at level 11, the warrior could go handle one of them, 4 warriors could handle 4 of them, and 1 barbarian could handle 4 of them.

A commoner would have less versatility as if the encounter happened it would be unable to handle 1 hill giant at level 11 and 4 commoners would be unable to handle 4 of them.

Basically what you do has to be somewhat level appropriate, and we should disuss what this means, or it doesn't count.

Cosi

2018-09-19, 06:34 AM

I think about it this way, a barbarian has more power than a warrior, but not any more versatility, they can basically do the same type of encounters, just the warrior can't do them as well. Where the barbarian is going in an wrecking a monster with a CR 2 higher than his level the warrior is doing the same to one 2 lower.

But isn't that a kind of versatility? Why would (for example) being able to handle a Diplomacy encounter and a Climb encounter be "versatility" but being able to handle a Mind Flayer encounter and a Bodak encounter not be? This kind of thinking strikes me as bizarre because it collapses the vast majority of challenges for which there are rules (and hence for which a nominally objective discussion can be had) down to one thing, and is generally accompanied by arguments that assume non-combat abilities count as utility pretty much regardless of strength.

Basically what you do has to be somewhat level appropriate, and we should disuss what this means, or it doesn't count.

I think this is absolutely true, but it necessarily comes at a cost of devaluing non-combat options, because those don't have well-defined where they're level appropriate. At what level is it appropriate to get knock? How valuable is knock after that level? We have no idea, because the game doesn't (probably correctly) define "open a lock" as a leveled challenge.

NamelessNPC

2018-09-19, 11:05 AM

But isn't that a kind of versatility? Why would (for example) being able to handle a Diplomacy encounter and a Climb encounter be "versatility" but being able to handle a Mind Flayer encounter and a Bodak encounter not be? This kind of thinking strikes me as bizarre because it collapses the vast majority of challenges for which there are rules (and hence for which a nominally objective discussion can be had) down to one thing, and is generally accompanied by arguments that assume non-combat abilities count as utility pretty much regardless of strength.

To expand on this
There's a value that I've always, in my mind, used to consider why, exactly, is the psywar or inquisitor better than the fighter or cavalier (these are all pf, but it's the same). That value is combat utility/versatility, and it's something you can't really appreciate if you consider combat to be this one discrete thing. Combat is a lot of different things, and the most common type of encounter.
It's not the same to be able to do 1 thing in combat (let's say, mounted charge for a lot) that having the ability to fall back to a number of different things. A psywar can also charge for a lot, but if you can't charge you can always grow huge to block a corridor, or teleport tactically, or spit acid, or get temp hp, or boost her ac/to hit/damage according to the situation.

Lans

2018-09-19, 11:07 AM

But isn't that a kind of versatility? Why would (for example) being able to handle a Diplomacy encounter and a Climb encounter be "versatility" but being able to handle a Mind Flayer encounter and a Bodak encounter not be? This kind of thinking strikes me as bizarre because it collapses the vast majority of challenges for which there are rules (and hence for which a nominally objective discussion can be had) down to one thing, and is generally accompanied by arguments that assume non-combat abilities count as utility pretty much regardless of strength. Being able to handle a mindflayer encounter and a bodak encounter would be an example of versatility, but being able to handle an ogre encounter and a hill giant encounter would be more of a power issue.

I think this is absolutely true, but it necessarily comes at a cost of devaluing non-combat options, because those don't have well-defined where they're level appropriate. At what level is it appropriate to get knock? How valuable is knock after that level? We have no idea, because the game doesn't (probably correctly) define "open a lock" as a leveled challenge. The way i think of it is that as long as the abilities is solving problems at that level, it is level appropriate. I can't think of anything off hand that would stop being level appropriate.

Cosi

2018-09-19, 11:27 AM

Being able to handle a mindflayer encounter and a bodak encounter would be an example of versatility, but being able to handle an ogre encounter and a hill giant encounter would be more of a power issue.

I don't really see how you can make that distinction, unless you collapse combat by CR, and I don't think that's supportable. A Shadow is clearly a different challenge from a Hill Giant (in that we can easily imagine a character who can defeat one but not the other), and at that point I think you have to make some really fine and hard to properly define distinctions to get the idea that Ogres and Hill Giants are the same encounter.

The way i think of it is that as long as the abilities is solving problems at that level, it is level appropriate. I can't think of anything off hand that would stop being level appropriate.

I think this overvalues non-combat abilities. Since there aren't defined guidelines, we can always imagine that some particular utility option might be useful at some level, which means that if you get a utility ability at 1st level, you're getting credit for that ability even though you wouldn't get credit for a comparably powerful combat ability.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-19, 11:43 AM

Andor13

2018-09-19, 12:02 PM

It's kind of weird that nobody brings up the pillars here.

Early in 3e there was a lot of discussion about how the game was built around 3 pillars, Combat, Exploration, Social.

Combat is well understood.

Social is a handful of skills, and some special abilities. It could boil down to "Deal with NPCs without killing them."

Exploration is dealing with environmental challenges. Terrain, Climate, Puzzles, Traps, etc.

So a fighter is miserable because he only deals with Combat, and requires significant system mastery even there. So you might rate him as 3,5,6 averaging out 4.6

A Wizard, who has Charm, Flight, and Plentiful Combat options is strong in all 3 pillars. 1, 1, 2 = 1.3

A Bard is very strong in the social pillar, and support elsewhere. 4,4,1 = 3

A PF Aegis is strong in Combat and Exploration, but brings nothing to Social. 2, 1, 6 = 3

For the Tier system it would probably be worth while to add a 4th pillar to cover the ability of some classes/abilities to recast a problem into a pillar the character is strong in. The Wizard being the exemplar of this. OTOH this is far more a facet of player skill and creativity than class features themselves, I dunno.

Troacctid

2018-09-19, 12:05 PM

The pillars are mentioned in the OP.

Andor13

2018-09-19, 12:38 PM

The pillars are mentioned in the OP.

True, or at least alluded to, but they don't show up much in discussion. I missed it in the op, to be honest.

Blue Jay

2018-09-19, 01:01 PM

It...might be worth sorting the list of tiered classes? Either by name or by ranked tier.

Here, maybe insert these into the opening post:

Class Tier
Adept 4
Archivist 1
Aristocrat 6
Artificer 1
Barbarian 4
Bard 3
Battle Dancer 5
Beguiler 2
Binder 3
Cleric 1
Cleric (Spontaneous) 2
Commoner 6
Crusader 3
Death Master 2
Dragonfire Adept 3
Dread Necromancer 2
Druid 1
Druid (Spontaneous) 1
Duskblade 3
Evangelist 2
Expert 5
Factotum 3
Favored Soul 2
Fighter 4
Healer 3
Hexblade 5
Jester 3
Magewright 5
Monk 5
Mountebank 5
Mystic 2
Ninja 4
Paladin 4
Ranger 4
Ranger (Wild Shape) 3
Rogue 4
Samurai (CW) 5
Samurai (OA) 5
Savant 4
Scout 4
Shadowcaster 4
Sha'ir 1
Shaman 1
Shugenja 3
Sohei 5
Sorcerer 2
Soulknife 5
Spellthief 4
Spirit Shaman 2
Swordsage 3
Truenamer 5
Urban Druid 2
Warblade 3
Warlock 3
Warmage 3
Warrior 6
Wizard 1
Wu Jen 1

Class Tier
Archivist 1
Artificer 1
Cleric 1
Druid 1
Druid (Spontaneous) 1
Sha'ir 1
Shaman 1
Wizard 1
Wu Jen 1
Beguiler 2
Cleric (Spontaneous) 2
Death Master 2
Dread Necromancer 2
Evangelist 2
Favored Soul 2
Mystic 2
Sorcerer 2
Spirit Shaman 2
Urban Druid 2
Bard 3
Binder 3
Crusader 3
Dragonfire Adept 3
Duskblade 3
Factotum 3
Healer 3
Jester 3
Ranger (Wild Shape) 3
Shugenja 3
Swordsage 3
Warblade 3
Warlock 3
Warmage 3
Adept 4
Barbarian 4
Fighter 4
Ninja 4
Paladin 4
Ranger 4
Rogue 4
Savant 4
Scout 4
Shadowcaster 4
Spellthief 4
Battle Dancer 5
Expert 5
Hexblade 5
Magewright 5
Monk 5
Mountebank 5
Samurai (CW) 5
Samurai (OA) 5
Sohei 5
Soulknife 5
Truenamer 5
Aristocrat 6
Commoner 6
Warrior 6

Troacctid

2018-09-19, 01:02 PM

I would sort the by-tier rankings by ranking within that tier (highest to lowest mean score).

RoboEmperor

2018-09-19, 01:03 PM

Exploration is a pillar? How is exploration a pillar? I have never, ever experienced "exploration" that required resource investment in this game including traps that need disarming or destruction. Cheap mundane gear like rope overcomes all of them and magic overcomes all of them even easier. The thought that "exploration" is just as important as combat or NPC relations is baffling.

Also bards are a spellcasting base class in core. As such they have way more than enough support material to let them excel in combat so while I wouldn't put them on the same level as sorcerer I wouldn't say they're exclusive to "support" even without Sublime Chord. Definitely more dangerous and more powerful than a barbarian.

Troacctid

2018-09-19, 01:13 PM

RoboEmperor

2018-09-19, 01:22 PM

So you wouldn't give any consideration to effects like detect magic, divination, secure shelter, teleport, knock, arcane eye, etc?

I think you need to explain a little more for me to understand.

I put scouting as part of combat. So divinations, prying eyes, or some fodder with telepathy are all combat related since you're doing all this to kill something.

If you use these things to spy on NPCs or the like instead then they are part of NPC relations.

Traveling by marching, horseback, or teleport... how is that a "pillar"? Since when is inconsequential commute time a pillar? I mean even in video games where random encounters happen absolutely no one would say overland travel is a "pillar".

Secure Shelter and rope trick? Still inconsequential stuff that can be handwaved away with a survival check and the like.

Using divination on a landscape to figure out the best mode of transportation? Again, does this really merit as much weight as combat or NPC relations? You spend 1second thinking about this stuff and that's the end of it.

Or am I missing something huge here?

Troacctid

2018-09-19, 01:27 PM

RoboEmperor

2018-09-19, 01:36 PM

The combat pillar is what you do in actual initiative rounds. The interaction pillar is the actual social interactions with the NPCs. Gathering information is part of exploration, as are travel, wilderness survival, traps, puzzles, obstacles (e.g. locked doors), stealth missions, and so on.

In the Niche Ranking System, Sage, Scout, Thief, and Trapfinder are all exploration-related roles.

Well I guess because fighters don't have information gathering other than that skill check, I guess it makes sense to make a separate pillar for that? But that just means all spellcasters are a 1 at that while most if not all mundanes are not.

I dunno. I guess "exploration" is "utility" as in out-of-combat-non-npc-related ability? I guess that sort of makes sense I guess. If I made the pillar I'd call it "utility" instead of "exploration".

Troacctid

2018-09-19, 02:22 PM

It's fundamentally a tool for describing the different modes of gameplay that are considered core to the D&D experience. Most adventures will include a mix of the three, so it's useful to be able to contribute something for all of them.

remetagross

2018-09-20, 09:57 AM

Andor13

2018-09-20, 10:27 AM

Exploration is a pillar? How is exploration a pillar? I have never, ever experienced "exploration" that required resource investment in this game including traps that need disarming or destruction. Cheap mundane gear like rope overcomes all of them and magic overcomes all of them even easier. The thought that "exploration" is just as important as combat or NPC relations is baffling.

Exploration covers interacting with the environment. It's where you get the sense of wonder from strange new vistas or creepy tombs or alien cities. If you've never once had to expend resources to fly, or go underwater, or plane shift, or cross a plain of fire, or deal with a choking atmosphere then I don't know what to tell you. Traps, puzzles, jungles, weather, deserts, oceans, space, mountains, you've never had to deal with any of that? I mean, do you have your monsters delivered by room service?

heavyfuel

2018-09-20, 10:29 AM

Alright so heavyfuel, are we wrapping up the Incarnum and first batch of psionic classes? Got an editable version of the big Googl Sheet somewhere? What's next? We're slowly grinding through all the base classes, I don't know if much remain apart from the Complete Psionics ones...

I'll wrap them up in upcoming weeks.

I still haven't had time to do it. Life's been crazy, and it doesn't help that I've been having issues with my laptop *sigh*

I don't think we'll be 100% done after Complete Psionics. I might do a thread or two with some popular Dragon Magazine classes and another one with any stray dogs that we might have missed. But yeah, this project was just me wrapping up what eggy started, and I only rekindled it because I knew there wasn't much left to do. :smallbiggrin:

Lans

2018-09-20, 11:36 AM

I don't really see how you can make that distinction, unless you collapse combat by CR, and I don't think that's supportable. A Shadow is clearly a different challenge from a Hill Giant (in that we can easily imagine a character who can defeat one but not the other), and at that point I think you have to make some really fine and hard to properly define distinctions to get the idea that Ogres and Hill Giants are the same encounter.

Well, we can look at how they are different and if the giant is just a mostly scaled up version of the ogre we can consider them basically the same encounter. This is something that would require some parsing.

I think this overvalues non-combat abilities. Since there aren't defined guidelines, we can always imagine that some particular utility option might be useful at some level, which means that if you get a utility ability at 1st level, you're getting credit for that ability even though you wouldn't get credit for a comparably powerful combat ability.
This could be the case, but I think we can weight the abilities in a way that is reasonable. Like a coupon with the value of 1/20 of a cent. It technically has value, but its basically 0.

But we can look at specific abilities to see how they line up. Things like a bonus feat, a die of sneak attack, or rage have combat value even at later levels, but a d6 of eldritch blast would not.

Troacctid

2018-09-20, 11:38 AM

But we can look at specific abilities to see how they line up. Things like a bonus feat, a die of sneak attack, or rage have combat value even at later levels, but a d6 of eldritch blast would not.
Why would a d6 of sneak attack be valuable, but not a d6 of eldritch blast?

Lans

2018-09-20, 11:42 AM

Why would a d6 of sneak attack be valuable, but not a d6 of eldritch blast?

Because sneak attack gets added onto another attack, while the eldritch blast is a completely separate attack.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-20, 11:59 AM

Because sneak attack gets added onto another attack, while the eldritch blast is a completely separate attack.

Unless you're gargantuan using a gargantuan two handed weapon while power attacking I don't think it really matters especially since you can get iterative attacks off of EB using that glaive thing.

Lans

2018-09-20, 12:12 PM

Unless you're gargantuan using a gargantuan two handed weapon while power attacking I don't think it really matters especially since you can get iterative attacks off of EB using that glaive thing.

Then you're getting maybe 5d6 damage with a full round worth of action. Thats not good. Not good at all. And I don't understand the gargantuan hammer thing.

RoboEmperor

2018-09-20, 12:20 PM

Then you're getting maybe 5d6 damage with a full round worth of action. Thats not good. Not good at all. And I don't understand the gargantuan hammer thing.

I was just saying the damage you deal with a medium or light weapon one handed is not really that big of an advantage to claim superiority to eldritch blast especially since you can get iterative attacks off of eldritch blast too unless your weapon is dealing massive amounts of damage because of its size or power attack

Troacctid

2018-09-20, 01:44 PM

Because sneak attack gets added onto another attack, while the eldritch blast is a completely separate attack.
An extra d6 of eldritch blast is added onto your eldritch blast attack.

Blue Jay

2018-09-20, 02:07 PM

I would sort the by-tier rankings by ranking within that tier (highest to lowest mean score).

Okay, just copying/pasting from the old Google doc:

Class Tier
Adept 4.12
Archivist 1.06
Aristocrat 5.76
Artificer 1.18
Barbarian 4
Bard 2.92
Battle Dancer 4.73
Beguiler 2.24
Binder 3.18
Cleric 1
Cleric (Spontaneous) 1.76
Commoner 6
Crusader 3.17
Death Master 1.59
Divine Mind 4.69
Dragon Shaman 4.92
Dragonfire Adept 3.28
Dread Necromancer 2.22
Druid 1
Druid (Spontaneous) 1.31
Duskblade 3.34
Evangelist 1.86
Expert 5.26
Factotum 3.36
Favored Soul 2.26
Fighter 4.48
Healer 3.31
Hexblade 4.69
Jester 3.07
Magewright 4.94
Marshal 4.57
Monk 4.7
Mountebank 4.84
Mystic 2
Ninja 4.36
Paladin 4.18
Ranger 4.22
Ranger (Wild Shape) 3.31
Rogue 3.85
Samurai (CW) 5.27
Samurai (OA) 4.85
Savant 4.37
Scout 4.08
Shadowcaster 3.82
Sha'ir 1
Shaman 1
Shugenja 2.83
Sohei 4.6
Sorcerer 1.82
Soulknife 5.15
Spellthief 4.13
Spirit Shaman 1.87
Swordsage 3.09
Truenamer 4.59
Urban Druid 1.93
Warblade 3.26
Warlock 3.16
Warmage 3.2
Warrior 5.8
Wizard 1.11
Wu Jen 1.19

Class Tier
Cleric 1
Druid 1
Shaman 1
Sha'ir 1
Archivist 1.06
Wizard 1.11
Artificer 1.18
Wu Jen 1.19
Druid (Spontaneous) 1.31
Death Master 1.59
Cleric (Spontaneous) 1.76
Sorcerer 1.82
Evangelist 1.86
Spirit Shaman 1.87
Urban Druid 1.93
Mystic 2
Dread Necromancer 2.22
Beguiler 2.24
Favored Soul 2.26
Shugenja 2.83
Bard 2.92
Jester 3.07
Swordsage 3.09
Warlock 3.16
Crusader 3.17
Binder 3.18
Warmage 3.2
Warblade 3.26
Dragonfire Adept 3.28
Healer 3.31
Ranger (Wild Shape) 3.31
Duskblade 3.34
Factotum 3.36
Shadowcaster 3.82
Rogue 3.85
Barbarian 4
Scout 4.08
Adept 4.12
Spellthief 4.13
Paladin 4.18
Ranger 4.22
Ninja 4.36
Savant 4.37
Fighter 4.48
Marshal 4.57
Truenamer 4.59
Sohei 4.6
Divine Mind 4.69
Hexblade 4.69
Monk 4.7
Battle Dancer 4.73
Mountebank 4.84
Samurai (OA) 4.85
Dragon Shaman 4.92
Magewright 4.94
Soulknife 5.15
Expert 5.26
Samurai (CW) 5.27
Aristocrat 5.76
Warrior 5.8
Commoner 6

Lans

2018-09-20, 11:07 PM

An extra d6 of eldritch blast is added onto your eldritch blast attack.

My example was meant to indicate a character that had a d6 eldritch blast at a high level, ie they had one or 2 levels of warlock in there buil

Lans

2018-09-24, 12:50 AM

I think the definitions need a little bit of work.

eggynack

2018-09-24, 01:57 AM

I think the definitions need a little bit of work.
In what way?

heavyfuel

2018-09-25, 10:49 AM

A day late, but it's up.

The Auraists Re-done.
(http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?569997-Retiering-the-Classes-Divine-Mind-Dragon-Shaman-and-Marshal-(re-done)&p=23392694#post23392694)
The only reason I managed to have it up this week though is because I literally copied and pasted Eggy's previous post.

Since the discussion on Psionics and Incarnum classes seems to have died out, I'll be tallying the points in the near* future, as well as getting the spreadsheet up.

One thing I did notice is that the Mundane Beatsticks is tagged as "Part 1". Which classes would be in a part 2?

Anyway. Discuss away.

*definitely before November, probably not before mid-October

Luccan

2018-09-25, 10:55 AM

eggynack

2018-09-25, 01:10 PM

Swashbuckler, knight... that might be it? Any mundane with full BAB remaining, but I think that's it.
Yeah, I have literally no idea what that list was supposed to look like, but those two classes are pretty assuredly on it. There's probably some third class that's mundane enough to qualify. Can't for the life of me think of what it would be though. Entirely possible I forgot I'd need to set aside one of the classes I put elsewhere.

Cosi

2018-09-25, 01:27 PM

eggynack

2018-09-25, 01:53 PM

Were the UA generic classes ever going to get done? I didn't see them on the first page, though I didn't check very hard.

I never opened with a list of classes I was planning to do in the first place. The plan was to just do classes until people stopped having classes to suggest that seemed worthwhile to tier. The UA classes would have probably shown up at some point, though I obviously don't have much influence on what winds up tiered now.

Lans

2018-09-26, 01:29 AM

In what way?

Maybe some discussion on what counts as a problem, how do defensive abilities tie in.

eggynack

2018-09-26, 03:04 AM

Maybe some discussion on what counts as a problem, how do defensive abilities tie in.
There is some definition of what constitutes a problem there. Not sure what'd be added to it. As for defensive abilities, they impact both metrics of problem contribution capacity. In particular, they make the party more likely to succeed against a problem, because of the lack of death, and they reduce resource expenditure on a success, because getting hurt tends to drain resources in one way or another. There's not that much difference between hitting an enemy twice a turn and only hitting once a turn but getting twice as many turns (assuming the attacks have the same to-hit, or whatever).

zfs

2018-09-26, 09:58 AM

Were the UA generic classes ever going to get done? I didn't see them on the first page, though I didn't check very hard.

Is there a setting-specific or Dragon magazine martial somewhere to go with Knight and Swashbuckler?

Looking at the list of already-tiered classes it looks like Noble hasn't been touched yet. It's Dragonlance material, which I know is sort of nebulously 1st party, but since Mystic was tiered, it seems like Noble deserves a look. It's a pretty barebones class with some team-buffing class features and a Gather Information type ability. Oh and they can choose any single cross-class skill to be a class skill, so they're an option if you want an obscure skill on your class skill list. You'd think it would be a rich class gold-wise because you have to take it at Level 1 and it reflects a "high background" but the DCS book doesn't print starting gold apparently.

There are some Kingdoms of Kalamar base classes but those are almost certainly outside the purview of this exercise, since they're just 3rd party with a "Seal of Approval" from WotC.

Pretty sure that about covers all the 1st party non-Dragon Mag material except for things like the minor Champions of Valor variants and Eidolon/Eidoloncer, which really don't merit much discussion.

Troacctid

2018-09-26, 11:33 AM

Looking at the list of already-tiered classes it looks like Noble hasn't been touched yet. It's Dragonlance material, which I know is sort of nebulously 1st party, but since Mystic was tiered, it seems like Noble deserves a look. It's a pretty barebones class with some team-buffing class features and a Gather Information type ability. Oh and they can choose any single cross-class skill to be a class skill, so they're an option if you want an obscure skill on your class skill list. You'd think it would be a rich class gold-wise because you have to take it at Level 1 and it reflects a "high background" but the DCS book doesn't print starting gold apparently.

There are some Kingdoms of Kalamar base classes but those are almost certainly outside the purview of this exercise, since they're just 3rd party with a "Seal of Approval" from WotC.

Pretty sure that about covers all the 1st party non-Dragon Mag material except for things like the minor Champions of Valor variants and Eidolon/Eidoloncer, which really don't merit much discussion.
DCS is unambiguously first-party. It was published by Wizards of the Coast. I'm not aware of any nebulousness regarding it.

From Dragon Magazine, I think we still need Trickster Spellthief, Mystic Ranger, and Wild Monk?

Eidolon and Eidoloncer seem safe to skip, but we should probably cover the generic classes.

That leaves our to-do list as Ardent, Erudite, Generic Expert, Generic Spellcaster, Generic Warrior, Knight, Lurk, Mystic Ranger, Noble, Psychic Rogue, Swashbuckler, Trickster Spellthief, and Wild Monk. Am I missing any?

zfs

2018-09-26, 11:47 AM

DCS is unambiguously first-party. It was published by Wizards of the Coast. I'm not aware of any nebulousness regarding it.

Yeah, after posting that I realized that DCS is definitely 1st party and it's only the other Dragonlance supplements that are nebulous.

That leaves our to-do list as Ardent, Erudite, Generic Expert, Generic Spellcaster, Generic Warrior, Knight, Lurk, Mystic Ranger, Noble, Psychic Rogue, Swashbuckler, Trickster Spellthief, and Wild Monk. Am I missing any?

That seems to be everything, which nicely spans 4 threads - Generics, Complete Psionics + Psychic Rogue, the 3 Dragon Mag variants, and the 3 remaining mundanes.

heavyfuel

2018-09-26, 12:21 PM

After Complete Psionics, I'll make a thread with whatever stray cats I find, assuming these classes don't really fit together to make a post of their own. The Noble will likely go here as well as Swashbuckler and Knight. These will be followed by the Generic Classes.

There'll probably be a thread or two with the more popular Dragon Mag classes as well, assuming there's enough material on them. I'm really not familiar with most of the magazines.

Should there be a thread about classes from Online Articles? I'm only aware of Psychic Rogue, but if it's the only class then I'll just throw it in with Complete Psionics.

Dunno if there will be more to do afterwards.

liquidformat

2018-09-26, 12:39 PM

Can we tier the racial paragon classes? They may only be 3 levels but they are quite interesting because of the variety of abilities they provide...

Troacctid

2018-09-26, 12:46 PM

There'll probably be a thread or two with the more popular Dragon Mag classes as well, assuming there's enough material on them. I'm really not familiar with most of the magazines.
For your convenience: https://imgur.com/a/XRTS2r5

Should there be a thread about classes from Online Articles? I'm only aware of Psychic Rogue, but if it's the only class then I'll just throw it in with Complete Psionics.
Psychic Rogue is the only one. I would put it with the Complete Psionics classes instead of Divine Mind.

Can we tier the racial paragon classes? They may only be 3 levels but they are quite interesting because of the variety of abilities they provide...
I think they function more like prestige classes than base classes.

Luccan

2018-09-26, 01:33 PM

heavyfuel

2018-10-01, 09:23 AM

New post is up!

Completing the Psionics: Ardent, Erudite, Lurk, Psychic Rogue (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?570457-Retiering-the-Classes-Ardent-Erudite-Lurk-Psychic-Rogue)

Lans

2018-10-01, 05:35 PM

Once we are done we should go back over the classes by tier to find discrepancies.

Troacctid

2018-10-01, 07:41 PM

Definitely.

@heavyfuel, I went ahead and updated the spreadsheet. If you message me your email, I can give you editing privileges. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1X27p3nPoO2VNwYsP_YlLvdge1sWbYHw0-PP4XO80A20/edit?usp=sharing

heavyfuel

2018-10-01, 09:24 PM

Once we are done we should go back over the classes by tier to find discrepancies.

Definitely.

Maybe. There doesn't seem to be as much interest in these more recent threads as there was back when eggy was doing them. Maybe cuz the most interesting classes were done back then? I dunno. Still, something to keep in mind.

@heavyfuel, I went ahead and updated the spreadsheet. If you message me your email, I can give you editing privileges. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1X27p3nPoO2VNwYsP_YlLvdge1sWbYHw0-PP4XO80A20/edit?usp=sharing

You... you what? Really?! Thank you! I'll pm you shortly.

Cosi

2018-10-02, 10:10 AM

Maybe. There doesn't seem to be as much interest in these more recent threads as there was back when eggy was doing them. Maybe cuz the most interesting classes were done back then? I dunno. Still, something to keep in mind.

I think it's more that the best-known, and most obviously mis-tiered classes were done then. Very few people know enough about the Lurk or the Ardent to have strong opinions that differ from forum consensus.

Also, I wouldn't want "go back and check with more arguments" so much as "figure out a framework for testing to see if the rankings are doing what we want, and then test them".

Troacctid

2018-10-02, 02:03 PM

You... you what? Really?! Thank you! I'll pm you shortly.
It was pretty easy once I figured out it just needed to be transposed. Once the columns and rows were swapped it was a simple copy-paste job. :smallsmile:

I think it's more that the best-known, and most obviously mis-tiered classes were done then. Very few people know enough about the Lurk or the Ardent to have strong opinions that differ from forum consensus.

Also, I wouldn't want "go back and check with more arguments" so much as "figure out a framework for testing to see if the rankings are doing what we want, and then test them".
The key I think is that revisiting can be done in bigger batches and with a different eye. For example, we could cover a whole tier in each thread, or even two tiers, and talk about any classes that seem out of place, and which classes are at the top and bottom of their tier.

Not sure what you mean about testing them.

remetagross

2018-10-03, 02:24 AM

Wow, Troacctid, right I hadn't noticed, but Wilder is now Tier 3! That is a significant change from its previous status of a Tier 2 class. It's as much of an improvement from the former tiering system as Beguiler ending up Tier 2 instead of 3.

Cosi

2018-10-03, 08:19 AM

Not sure what you mean about testing them.

If the Tiers are any use to anyone, they must do something that has a measurable effect on the game. All I'm suggesting is that we should put some effort into figuring out how to measure that effect.

Troacctid

2018-10-03, 10:35 AM

Personally I think the first step to making them useful would be to present them in order in the OP rather than in a randomized list.

heavyfuel

2018-10-03, 11:33 AM

Personally I think the first step to making them useful would be to present them in order in the OP rather than in a randomized list.

I was thinking about putting them there alphabetically, but since anyone can Ctrl+F the class they want I might as well put them in Tier order

Edit: And it's done. The OP now list the classes in Tier order rather "done-ness" order.

Blue Jay

2018-10-03, 12:36 PM

Responding to a comment in the Complete Psionics thread that would be off-topic there:

Think about the Factotum for example. RAW says Cunning Surge should be a standard action, making it useless. Now take a look at the Factotum thread and see people ignoring this fact and assuming games will be played with Cunning Surge as a free action just like every other Factotum ability.

The RAW for this particular point is actually quite messy:

Using an extraordinary ability is usually not an action because most extraordinary abilities automatically happen in a reactive fashion. Those extraordinary abilities that are actions are standard actions unless otherwise noted.

So, we're left to decide whether or not Cunning Surge is one of those things that "automatically happens" or one of those things that "is an action." There's not really any guidance on this, so I would personally to lump it in the "usually" group unless I had good reason to think otherwise (Cunning Surge is easy to interpret as being part of the extra standard action you take, so I don't really see how it would count as a separate action).

Rules Compendium made it simpler:

Using an extraordinary ability is a free action unless otherwise noted.

-----

But your point stands: strictly literal RAW is not the best standard to tier classes against: they should definitely be tiered based on consensus (or, failing that, majority vote). Do you think it's worthwhile to spend effort on finding a consensus for classes with pivotal contentious points?

Troacctid

2018-10-03, 12:53 PM

I was thinking about putting them there alphabetically, but since anyone can Ctrl+F the class they want I might as well put them in Tier order

Edit: And it's done. The OP now list the classes in Tier order rather "done-ness" order.
You could just have a little header for each tier.

But your point stands: strictly literal RAW is not the best standard to tier classes against: they should definitely be tiered based on consensus (or, failing that, majority vote). Do you think it's worthwhile to spend effort on finding a consensus for classes with pivotal contentious points?
Not really? I think it's fine to just assume the common sense ruling. Especially since contentious points rarely affect tiering anyway.

heavyfuel

2018-10-03, 01:15 PM

We have apparent RAW contention in regards to (Ex) abilities, but this contention is only apparent. The Primary Source Errata states that the primary source for (Ex) abilities is the Monster Manual. The Monster Manual, in turn, says they are free actions but that there are exceptions, exceptions such as the one in the Player's Handbook, which says that, when not reactive, they are usually standard actions. Cunning Surge isn't a reactive ability.

Whatever Rules Compendium says is irrelevant from a strict RAW perspective. (note that I don't personally agree with this, I'm just talking about strict RAW)

As for your final question: No I don't think it's worth the effort. The OP already tells people to use their best judgement in regards to things that may or may not be allowed at a table and I feel like people that are voting from a strict RAW perspective and people who are voting from a more practical perspective tend to even each other out to a good balance.

Troacctid

2018-10-03, 01:18 PM

Whatever Rules Compendium says is irrelevant from a strict RAW perspective. (note that I don't personally agree with this, I'm just talking about strict RAW)
Why would it be? It's explicitly considered authoritative when it contradicts a previously published source.

OgresAreCute

2018-10-03, 01:35 PM

Why would it be? It's explicitly considered authoritative when it contradicts a previously published source.

Nah, only when it's convenient for my forum arguments.
By the same token, the nerfs in Complete Psionic don't actually exist because the XPH is authorative and CPsi is just a splatbook with no rights.

heavyfuel

2018-10-07, 03:01 PM

Tomorrow I'll post the "Stray Dogs" thread. Unless I'm missing something, the classes will be:

Knight, Swashbuckler, Noble.

Any others?

Generic classes will be done later, as will Dragon Mag classes

heavyfuel

2018-10-07, 05:06 PM

New post is up!

The Stray Dogs: Knight, Noble, Swashbuckler (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?570925-Retiering-the-Classes-Knight-Noble-Swashbuckler)

I changed my mind and posted it today. Tomorrow's gonna be super busy, and there's a good chance I won't be able to sit in front of the PC, so I thought it better to expedite rather than postponing it.

Next post will be about the Dragon Mag classes, which means the end of the "traditional" classes. Generics will come afterwards. I don't think we should a post on Racial Paragon classes, even though they can be taken at lv1, they work more like PrCs than Base Classes.

liquidformat

2018-10-10, 09:23 AM

So I am scratching my head on magewright being tier 5, adept tier 4, and warmage tier 3. I find it strange that anything with level 9 spells would be tier 3, is that just because of their spell list? Magewright and adept strike me more as bottom of the barrel of tier 3 and not tier 5 and 4 respectively. I mean I can understand hexblade being tier 5 if for no other reason than the lack of afcs from splat books but magewright seems clearly better than it and most of the time even better than a lot of the things in tier 4.

Cosi

2018-10-10, 09:29 AM

Warmage is Tier Three because it's base list is pretty bad -- you get like one decent BFC spell per spell level and maybe all the evocations add up to another decent spell's worth of utility -- and most people don't incorporate the list expansion options it can use into their ranking. IMO that's obviously the wrong way to rank things, but I'll grant that if you're not counting e.g. Bloodline feats, the spell list on its own isn't much better than what a Warblade is doing. It also feels a little weird to rank it with the Beguiler and Dread Necromancer, both of which are clearly superior.

Troacctid

2018-10-10, 09:53 AM

liquidformat

2018-10-10, 10:09 AM

I mean I took Bloodline feats into account, I just don't think that they'll be used by every Warmage, so I weighted them accordingly. I think a typical Warmage is going to be most comparable to a Crusader or Warblade in power level.

I had Adept in T5 with Magewright, but I guess I ended up being in the minority on that one.

why do you think adept and magewright are t5 though? that is where I am getting confused.

I can kind of see the T3 argument of the warmage, they are kind of goofy. At low levels building them out how they were designed to be they can actually do some pretty impressive damage but they are hard to keep useful without a solid understanding of them and a dm willing to let you abuse them. Though I still find it a bit strange that a class with 9th level spells would be T3.

Luccan

2018-10-10, 10:32 AM

why do you think adept and magewright are t5 though? that is where I am getting confused.

I can kind of see the T3 argument of the warmage, they are kind of goofy. At low levels building them out how they were designed to be they can actually do some pretty impressive damage but they are hard to keep useful without a solid understanding of them and a dm willing to let you abuse them. Though I still find it a bit strange that a class with 9th level spells would be T3.

Magewright and Adept have extremely limited spell lists and almost no spells per day, plus fewer spell levels than a bard (capping out at 5th level spells). On top of that, Adept has exactly one class feature and the Magewright has 0. Why would they be T3, a tier still low enough that spell access isn't the only thing that matters?

As for Warmage, well yeah it gets 9ths, but it's mostly dedicated to dealing damage. Warmages in general have terrible utility.

Troacctid

2018-10-10, 12:10 PM

why do you think adept and magewright are t5 though? that is where I am getting confused.
Why do you think they're not? They're practically unplayable.

heavyfuel

2018-10-15, 04:29 PM

Almost didn't have time for this today, but here it is, a new thread:

The Dragon Magaziners: Mystic Ranger, Trickster, Wild Monk (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?571537-Retiering-the-Classes-Mystic-Ranger-Trickster-Wild-Monk&p=23439210)

Go nuts!

Edit: I was gonna update the spreadsheet and I saw that (presumably) Troacctid had already done that so, thanks for the help. Again :smallsmile:

heavyfuel

2018-10-22, 04:29 PM

Last post is up! The Generic Classes: Generic Expert, Generic Spellcaster, Generic Warrior (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?572023-Retiering-the-Classes-Generic-Expert-Generic-Spellcaster-Generic-Warrior)

Thanks to all who have been participating in this! I'll shut down voting in two weeks, though I don't think we'll need that long. See ya then :smallcool:

Troacctid

2018-10-23, 04:52 PM

Once we are done we should go back over the classes by tier to find discrepancies.

Maybe. There doesn't seem to be as much interest in these more recent threads as there was back when eggy was doing them. Maybe cuz the most interesting classes were done back then? I dunno. Still, something to keep in mind.

The key I think is that revisiting can be done in bigger batches and with a different eye. For example, we could cover a whole tier in each thread, or even two tiers, and talk about any classes that seem out of place, and which classes are at the top and bottom of their tier.
Thinking about this again. What if we just designated the home thread as the discussion hub for revisiting the classes whose threads have already concluded?

For example, it's come to my attention that I missed the vote for spontaneous divine casters, so instead of bumping the old thread, I could say here that I think Evangelist, Favored Soul, and Mystic are all 2 (given their Sorcerer-adjacentness), Spontaneous Cleric is 1.6 (better than a Psion, but not better enough to break into T1), and Shaman is 1.2 (it's a worse Druid, but there's a lot of room to be worse than Druid and still be T1).

Lans

2018-10-24, 12:49 AM

Thinking about this again. What if we just designated the home thread as the discussion hub for revisiting the classes whose threads have already concluded?

For example, it's come to my attention that I missed the vote for spontaneous divine casters, so instead of bumping the old thread, I could say here that I think Evangelist, Favored Soul, and Mystic are all 2 (given their Sorcerer-adjacentness), Spontaneous Cleric is 1.6 (better than a Psion, but not better enough to break into T1), and Shaman is 1.2 (it's a worse Druid, but there's a lot of room to be worse than Druid and still be T1).

Those seem workable. Especially the voting

eggynack

2018-10-24, 01:15 AM

Y'know, there was always some intent by some folks to do some sorta rework of the "Why Each Class is in its Tier" thread, primarily using quotes from the sub-threads as the basis. I dunno how precisely that would operate, but I could plausibly see it incorporating some degree of discussion.

Troacctid

2018-10-24, 01:20 AM

weckar

2018-10-24, 03:15 AM

Other than skewing the averages, what is the point of the decimalised tiers? Seems to overcomplicate things a great deal.

eggynack

2018-10-24, 03:32 AM

Other than skewing the averages, what is the point of the decimalised tiers? Seems to overcomplicate things a great deal.
If you're talking about the voter end, I dunno what the downside is. It makes getting stuff like the mode more annoying, but it allows for some bonus precision and doesn't actually introduce complication in any way I can detect. If you don't care about the specific ways people voted, then all that's gonna matter is the output number. If you do care about that, wouldn't you rather know exactly what that voter thought? In any case, it's not something I precisely encouraged when the system started, but people did it and seemed to like doing it, and I saw no real basis for objection.

heavyfuel

2018-10-24, 09:42 AM

Thinking about this again. What if we just designated the home thread as the discussion hub for revisiting the classes whose threads have already concluded?

Sure, I see no reason why not.

Though I like the idea of having 6 threads to review Tiers as a whole, and see if we might have missed something. No reason we can't have both ideas. I'll start them on the 5th of November to give time for everyone to cast their votes and the current discussions die out, and we can use the Home Base in the meantime for any class anyone might want to tier.

To be honest, I kind of want to have these threads to cast my own votes, since I was a silent follower of the threads back when Eggy was running :smallbiggrin:

Snowbluff

2018-10-24, 12:26 PM

Spontaneous Druid was made T1? Was the definition of T2 rewritten without my knowing?

Troacctid

2018-10-24, 12:31 PM

Spontaneous Druid was made T1? Was the definition of T2 rewritten without my knowing?
Nope, it's still "Lower than T1, higher than T3."

Luccan

2018-10-24, 01:02 PM

Spontaneous Druid was made T1? Was the definition of T2 rewritten without my knowing?

I'm not actually sure what the arguments were on that one, don't believe I voted. But that might be something to be addressed here now or later in the threads re-examining each tier as they now stand.

weckar

2018-10-24, 02:58 PM

Well, it IS a highly subjective system, after all.

eggynack

2018-10-24, 03:12 PM

I think that, regardless of the specific numbers associated, the current ordering of classes is pretty solid here. Spontaneous druid strikes me as superior to death master, and inferior to wu jen. Given that the former has a rating of 1.59, and that the latter has a 1.19, it makes sense that spontaneous druid would wind up as the lower bound for tier one, at 1.31. It's a sweet class. I was skeptical of the rating at first, but a good pile of spells known along with wild shape and the animal companion ultimately convinced me.

Lans

2018-10-25, 12:17 AM

Spontaneous Druid was made T1? Was the definition of T2 rewritten without my knowing?

I think it had to do with a combination of what you can cover with summon natures ally and wildshape.

Snowbluff

2018-10-25, 10:27 AM

I think it had to do with a combination of what you can cover with summon natures ally and wildshape.

I think that, regardless of the specific numbers associated, the current ordering of classes is pretty solid here. Spontaneous druid strikes me as superior to death master, and inferior to wu jen. Given that the former has a rating of 1.59, and that the latter has a 1.19, it makes sense that spontaneous druid would wind up as the lower bound for tier one, at 1.31. It's a sweet class. I was skeptical of the rating at first, but a good pile of spells known along with wild shape and the animal companion ultimately convinced me.

Doesn't make much sense. A Spont Druid simply doesn't have the 100% access to the spell list (ie Sorcerer versus Wizard, the de facto definition of the two tiers). Wildshape IS NEVER a consideration for tier listing past T3, where "basic competence" is measure, as it's simply much weaker than say, summoning an earthquake to destroy the enemy fortress. T1 and T2 shouldn't even be considered in terms of combat, as you've evolved past that when you decide to play a T1 class as a T1.

The only argument that could be made would be that druid simply doesn't have enough OP, gamebusting spells to fill out the Spont Druid's full spell knowledge.

Lans

2018-10-25, 11:31 AM

Doesn't make much sense. A Spont Druid simply doesn't have the 100% access to the spell list (ie Sorcerer versus Wizard, the de facto definition of the two tiers). Wildshape IS NEVER a consideration for tier listing past T3, where "basic competence" is measure, as it's simply much weaker than say, summoning an earthquake to destroy the enemy fortress. T1 and T2 shouldn't even be considered in terms of combat, as you've evolved past that when you decide to play a T1 class as a T1.

The only argument that could be made would be that druid simply doesn't have enough OP, gamebusting spells to fill out the Spont Druid's full spell knowledge.

I don;t think access to all of a spell list is the definition that we are using. I think its being based on being able to cover at least X% of encounter and if a spontaneous caster has the right spell to cover that for enough levels it is tier 1.

I think its a combination of the wildshape expandng feats with the spell enhance wildshape to cover things beyond what is normally covered

OgresAreCute

2018-10-25, 11:47 AM

I don;t think access to all of a spell list is the definition that we are using. I think its being based on being able to cover at least X% of encounter and if a spontaneous caster has the right spell to cover that for enough levels it is tier 1.

I think its a combination of the wildshape expandng feats with the spell enhance wildshape to cover things beyond what is normally covered

What Psion + Metamorphic Transfer or a Sorcerer with Polymorph and Assume Supernatural Ability? Psion didn't make tier 1.

Lans

2018-10-25, 12:27 PM

What Psion + Metamorphic Transfer or a Sorcerer with Polymorph and Assume Supernatural Ability? Psion didn't make tier 1.

The duration of those is a big issue.

Troacctid

2018-10-25, 12:50 PM

Doesn't make much sense. A Spont Druid simply doesn't have the 100% access to the spell list (ie Sorcerer versus Wizard, the de facto definition of the two tiers).
What, are you really going to rank the Spirit Shaman above it? Seems silly to me. Look at the classes in T2—Spontaneous Druid is stronger than any of them. The distinction between T1 and T2 is simply power level. Nothing more. Spontaneous Druid has almost all the power of the Druid, which is the strongest class in the game to begin with.

You know the biggest reason why Sorcerer is lower tier than Wizard in the first place, right? Not because of spontaneous casting. Spontaneous casting isn't inherently worse than prepared casting. Knowing more spells but having to prepare each slot in advance every day is honestly a fair tradeoff in many cases. Sorcerer is lower tier than Wizard because its spell progression and class features are worse. Because the game designers thought, incorrectly, that spontaneous casting with limited spells known was the stronger mechanic, and nerfed the sorcerer hard to compensate for the perceived imbalance. Favored Soul got the same treatment. Spontaneous Druid doesn't have that problem, though: it gets all the class features and the full T1 spell progression of the Druid.

eggynack

2018-10-25, 02:57 PM

Wildshape IS NEVER a consideration for tier listing past T3, where "basic competence" is measure, as it's simply much weaker than say, summoning an earthquake to destroy the enemy fortress.
You're considering wild shape in an insanely narrow way. It's a super relevant ability. Even on the most basic level possible, high quality flight forms are right there, acting as the druid's best method of accessing flight. Or the best method of any class, I'd suspect. It also offers the other movement modes if you want, particularly burrowing and swimming. Dire tortoise is also available without any feats or spells, granting a high quality action economy majig. Add on enhance wild shape and you get a variety of useful vision modes, along with weird junk like fast healing/regeneration, useful immunities, and reanimating the dead.

But that's just basic wild shape. Make that exalted wild shape and we get blink dog form, one of the most powerful tactical teleportation abilities in the game. Make that dragon wild shape, and you get... a lot. Tons of immunities, way better flight forms, way better vision modes, and cool abilities all over the place. And one of those abilities is throwing out mini-earthquakes, for maximum irony points. More importantly, it means stuff like true seeing, freedom of movement, some degree of planar travel, and even a weird metamagic reduction thing if you want it.

Make that aberration wild shape, and you get way more. Double spells every turn, the ability to go ethereal at will in a way that still offers some interaction, immunity to magic, weird minion generation, and, of course, a bunch of cool vision modes and immunities, as is typical. Yeah, none of this is pertinent to a tier one character. Wild shape is a crazy ability.

Kalkra

2018-10-25, 11:56 PM

Is Psionic Artificer in the same tier as normal Artificer?

Troacctid

2018-10-27, 03:33 AM

Is Psionic Artificer in the same tier as normal Artificer?
Good question. It is certainly much worse, isn't it? I think I'd personally put it around where I put the psion, which would bring it down a tier, yeah.

Thunder999

2018-10-27, 11:45 AM

Psionic artificer is even better than normal if spell to power erudite exists and lets you have all the spells, though I'm not sure if that's even worth considering.

Troacctid

2018-10-27, 12:12 PM

Psionic artificer is even better than normal if spell to power erudite exists and lets you have all the spells, though I'm not sure if that's even worth considering.
Only the erudite has the ability to make that conversion.

I guess we never tiered StP Erudite separately either, did we? I don't think it breaks into T1, for the record. Erudite is worse than Psion to begin with; StP mostly just makes up the gap.

Cosi

2018-10-27, 07:02 PM

StP is shenanigans. It should only be evaluated if you're going to evaluate every other class's shenanigans, and there are classes with way better shenanigans than that.

heavyfuel

2018-10-27, 08:24 PM

I pretty much agree with Cosi, but there's still time for another stray dog post to cover Psionic Artificer and StP Erudite (and any other class/relevant acf). Don't think it's necessary though

Kalkra

2018-10-27, 09:07 PM

I pretty much agree with Cosi, but there's still time for another stray dog post to cover Psionic Artificer and StP Erudite (and any other class/relevant acf). Don't think it's necessary though

If you do, you might also want to include Zyceryll binder. (Unless that was already covered and I just missed it.)

Troacctid

2018-10-27, 11:16 PM

StP is shenanigans. It should only be evaluated if you're going to evaluate every other class's shenanigans, and there are classes with way better shenanigans than that.
How is it shenanigans? It's not even that good.

If you do, you might also want to include Zyceryll binder. (Unless that was already covered and I just missed it.)
I believe we took it into account for the original ranking.

Cosi

2018-10-28, 02:13 PM

How is it shenanigans? It's not even that good.

Shenanigans isn't about pure power, it's about depending on DM permissiveness. They're generally related, because there's not really a whole lot of point in trying to argue with your DM to get an allowance that doesn't make you more powerful, but they're not the same thing. StP is shenanigans because you have to meet a NPC who knows a spell to learn it, and the particular spells that NPCs you meet know are up to the DM's discretion. There's no meaningful difference between that and getting a favorable DM ruling on how a feat or magic item works.

heavyfuel

2018-10-28, 03:27 PM

If you do, you might also want to include Zyceryll binder. (Unless that was already covered and I just missed it.)

I believe we took it into account for the original ranking.

We did take it into account. Plus, doesn't that come online at like Lv 11? That's like tiering a PrC at this point.

How is it shenanigans? It's not even that good.

Shenanigans isn't about pure power, it's about depending on DM permissiveness. They're generally related, because there's not really a whole lot of point in trying to argue with your DM to get an allowance that doesn't make you more powerful, but they're not the same thing. StP is shenanigans because you have to meet a NPC who knows a spell to learn it, and the particular spells that NPCs you meet know are up to the DM's discretion. There's no meaningful difference between that and getting a favorable DM ruling on how a feat or magic item works.

Again, I agree with Cosi on the definiaiton of "shenanigans". Bad shenanigans are still shenanigans (aaaaand semantic saturation)

Troacctid

2018-10-28, 06:20 PM

I realize you have to learn spells from NPCs, but it's not like that stopped us from tiering the standard Erudite. Certainly it didn't stop us from tiering any of the Vancian spellbook-users.

Clearly there are extremes where in one game you might have unlimited access to all spells, while in other games you have no access at all. But I think most StP Erudites will fall somewhere in the middle. As with other classes, we can account for that variance by considering the tier ranking as something of a weighted average of all the most likely outcomes.

TL;DR it's not shenanigans and also we can tier it just fine.

Cosi

2018-10-28, 06:35 PM

A Wizard (or Erudite, which works mostly the same) can learn a new spell by gaining it at level up, by copying it from a scroll, or by copying it from a NPC's spellbook. If you claimed that you got access to all the spells you wanted to learn for free because other Wizards showed up and let you copy them, that would in fact be shenanigans. But that's not what people claim. If you want to claim that needing to pay for scrolls to learn new spells knocks the Wizard down to the level of the Sorcerer, feel free to do that, but that's not an argument most people will find compelling.

The StP Erudite learns spells as discipline powers, and because the only place an Erudite can learn discipline powers that is compatible with spells is "NPCs", the StP Erudite can only learn from NPCs. This puts its access to any particular spell firmly in the hands to fhe DM, or, shenanigans.

I'm not saying you can't rank it. But if you do, you need to separately rank "the Rogue, but the DM rules you can take any feat as a bonus feat" and "the Warmage, but the DM rules that you can get any spell with Apprentice (Spellcaster)" and whatever other ruling-dependent abilities people can come up with. Because those are exactly as legitimate as saying your Erudite can get planar binding no questions asked.

Troacctid

2018-10-28, 07:53 PM

Nobody said it had to be tiered as "All spells, no questions asked." I don't see a reason why it couldn't be evaluated under the assumption that most Erudites will simply have access to some spells.

Cosi

2018-10-28, 08:18 PM

Luccan

2018-10-28, 11:14 PM

I'm not sure StP Erudite is worth ranking on its own. It either rises a tier or it doesn't and we don't have a reasonable way to account for what different DMs are going to hand out. We can assume some spells, yes, because your DM is letting you use StP in the first place, but it isn't like scrolls where cost and rarity can be somewhat taken into account.

I guess then what I'm arguing is an StP might outrank a standard Erudite just barely, but not enough to be a definitive T1. Like some other T2s there are ways one could do it and it's certainly built in to this class, but I don't think the difference matters enough to do an entirely new vote for it.

Edit: The only other way to do it is to assume what we did with the book-casters: You might not get every spell you want, but you get all the ones you might need. In which case its a T1 no question.

Troacctid

2018-10-29, 12:37 AM

Because getting access to any spell is DM fiat. Can you make arguments about how this isn't really DM fiat? Sure. But you can make those arguments for pretty much everything that falls under DM fiat. If you're not giving the Warmage the benefit of the doubt on Apprentice, or the Rogue the benefit of the doubt on bonus feats, there's no reason to give the Erudite the benefit of the doubt on spell access.

Again, I am not saying you can't rank it. I'm just saying that if you do rank it, you're committing to also ranking every other argument anyone can drag up about how if we just follow interpretation X for ability Y class Z gets way better. You could do that. You maybe even should do that. But if you're not willing to do that, ranking the StP Erudite is just special pleading.
This...doesn't really follow. StP isn't the same class under a different rules interpretation. It's a variant. It's well established by this point that variants can be tiered separately from the main class.

I'm not sure StP Erudite is worth ranking on its own. It either rises a tier or it doesn't and we don't have a reasonable way to account for what different DMs are going to hand out. We can assume some spells, yes, because your DM is letting you use StP in the first place, but it isn't like scrolls where cost and rarity can be somewhat taken into account.

I guess then what I'm arguing is an StP might outrank a standard Erudite just barely, but not enough to be a definitive T1. Like some other T2s there are ways one could do it and it's certainly built in to this class, but I don't think the difference matters enough to do an entirely new vote for it.
I don't think it makes it into T1 either—but I think a lot of people would expect it to rank that high, which means either it lands in T1 and is distinct from the standard Erudite, or it lands in T2 and defies many readers' expectations. Either way, it seems relevant to the mission of this project.

Cosi

2018-10-29, 06:31 AM

This...doesn't really follow. StP isn't the same class under a different rules interpretation. It's a variant. It's well established by this point that variants can be tiered separately from the main class.

It's a variant that is dependent on things up to the DM's discretion to function. "Do you meet a Wizard who knows nerveskitter" is a question that is answered with "ask your DM" just as "does Apprentice (Spellcaster) let a Warmage learn haste" is. If you're ranking one, rank both.

Troacctid

2018-10-29, 11:43 AM

We're not tiering "StP Erudite with Nerveskitter." The ACF isn't contingent on access to any specific spells.

Cosi

2018-10-29, 06:10 PM

You think "trade a bonus feat for Spellcraft as a class skill" is worth ranking separately? Because that's what StP is if you don't make assumptions about spells.

ExLibrisMortis

2018-10-30, 07:26 AM

You think "trade a bonus feat for Spellcraft as a class skill" is worth ranking separately? Because that's what StP is if you don't make assumptions about spells.
The wiki page for "false dichotomy" shows your picture, doesn't it?

Yes, we'll make assumptions about spells. We'll assume that common spells (for example, the ones used in NPC statblocks, often recommend spells, and famous spells) are readily available, obscure spells are not, and 9th-level spells (as well as divine spells) are unavailable. We won't make assumptions at the level of "spell x, yes or no", and yes, that does mean that individual posters will rate the StP erudite slightly differently. That's okay; that was already happening, and tiering will work just fine.

RoboEmperor

2018-10-30, 08:54 AM

Cosi is all over the place.

In one argument he says "Wizards can buy a spell of 4th level Planar Binding since by RAW they can buy any magic item lower than the gp limit in DMG demographics so they're better than Artificers."
In another "StP Erudites can't buy any spell in the game so they're worse than wizards"

>.>

Make up your mind.

Snowbluff

2018-10-30, 10:05 AM

What, are you really going to rank the Spirit Shaman above it? Seems silly to me. Look at the classes in T2—Spontaneous Druid is stronger than any of them. The distinction between T1 and T2 is simply power level. Nothing more. Spontaneous Druid has almost all the power of the Druid, which is the strongest class in the game to begin with.

You know the biggest reason why Sorcerer is lower tier than Wizard in the first place, right? Not because of spontaneous casting. Spontaneous casting isn't inherently worse than prepared casting. Knowing more spells but having to prepare each slot in advance every day is honestly a fair tradeoff in many cases. Sorcerer is lower tier than Wizard because its spell progression and class features are worse. Because the game designers thought, incorrectly, that spontaneous casting with limited spells known was the stronger mechanic, and nerfed the sorcerer hard to compensate for the perceived imbalance. Favored Soul got the same treatment. Spontaneous Druid doesn't have that problem, though: it gets all the class features and the full T1 spell progression of the Druid.
The difference is NOT power level it is variety.
Spirit Shaman still gets all of the spells and it can use all of them.
Spont Druid can only use some of the spells.

That is why sorcerer is a lower is a lower tier than wizard. Being a spell level behind is not as a big deal as not getting access to every option to break the game. He just gets "a handful of nukes" rather than an arsenal.

You're considering wild shape in an insanely narrow way. It's a super relevant ability. Even on the most basic level possible, high quality flight forms are right there, acting as the druid's best method of accessing flight. Or the best method of any class, I'd suspect. It also offers the other movement modes if you want, particularly burrowing and swimming. Dire tortoise is also available without any feats or spells, granting a high quality action economy majig. Add on enhance wild shape and you get a variety of useful vision modes, along with weird junk like fast healing/regeneration, useful immunities, and reanimating the dead.

But that's just basic wild shape. Make that exalted wild shape and we get blink dog form, one of the most powerful tactical teleportation abilities in the game. Make that dragon wild shape, and you get... a lot. Tons of immunities, way better flight forms, way better vision modes, and cool abilities all over the place. And one of those abilities is throwing out mini-earthquakes, for maximum irony points. More importantly, it means stuff like true seeing, freedom of movement, some degree of planar travel, and even a weird metamagic reduction thing if you want it.

Make that aberration wild shape, and you get way more. Double spells every turn, the ability to go ethereal at will in a way that still offers some interaction, immunity to magic, weird minion generation, and, of course, a bunch of cool vision modes and immunities, as is typical. Yeah, none of this is pertinent to a tier one character. Wild shape is a crazy ability.
Okay, since we're making assumptions on how to build now, I need to point out that builds aren't accounted into the Tier discussion either.
However, it's good.
But doesn't break the game (T1 and T2).
And combat isn't necessarily a measure of ability to break the game (sorry Choker).

That's the brakes on this issue. "Is this breaking the game?"

eggynack

2018-10-30, 11:38 AM

Initial snip
You really need to read the tier definitions we're using in this thread. They are distinct from the original definitions, because the original definitions were, in some regards, pretty awful. The only thing that actually matters, and this is true of both this tier system and the original, is whether a given class is better than another. That said, I'll go through specific respects in which what you're saying doesn't match up with current tiering methodology, and why the tiers currently operate in this new way. Keep in mind that a lot of this new stuff actually matches up with things from the original system. The original was just internally contradictory in places, meaning that both your understanding and my completely different understanding are equally supported.

The difference is NOT power level it is variety.
Spirit Shaman still gets all of the spells and it can use all of them.
Spont Druid can only use some of the spells.
The primary metric we're using is neither power level nor versatility, but rather problem solving capacity. As Cosi noted awhile back, if a single option is more powerful, then that constitutes a form of versatility in and of itself, so creating a distinction between these two notions is hazy at best. This is true of the original as well. To quote, "The Tier System is not specifically ranking Power or Versitility (though those are what ends up being the big factors). It's ranking the ability of a class to achieve what you want in any given situation." Does the spontaneous druid do this more than any tier two class? If so, then tier one should be a serious consideration.

That is why sorcerer is a lower is a lower tier than wizard. Being a spell level behind is not as a big deal as not getting access to every option to break the game. He just gets "a handful of nukes" rather than an arsenal.
A game breaking metric makes literally no sense. A lot of the game takes place at low to mid level. This means that, in order to use this metric, we either must discard the vast majority of things a wizard does, like color spray, web, wall of stone, and so forth, or pretend these good but mundane spells are nukes. Later you claim that flight isn't breaking the game, so what are we even talking about here?

Okay, since we're making assumptions on how to build now, I need to point out that builds aren't accounted into the Tier discussion either.
Builds are absolutely accounted for. Builds absolutely were accounted for. Even the original tier system assumed "equivalent optimization". How are you even supposed to assess, say, a sorcerer under this model? You could say, "Well, the sorcerer could know polymorph," but already you're talking about a build object. Knowing any spell represents a build, so discussing the spells a sorcerer has access to, at all, makes no sense under this model. Understanding of power level is impossible without accounting for the wide possibility space of builds. Let us not ignore, here, that JaronK talks about various builds in his system all over the place.

However, it's good.
But doesn't break the game (T1 and T2).
And combat isn't necessarily a measure of ability to break the game (sorry Choker).

That's the brakes on this issue. "Is this breaking the game?"
I've already talked both about how a game breaking metric is intrinsically absurd, and about how such a metric is especially absurd if it doesn't account for a way better overland flight effect, so here I'll just ask: What are you talking about? Like, practically? Aberration wild shape is insanely game breaking. In a billion different ways. Was it not clear that you can all of these things on a single build? Is it not clear how at-will etherealness that lasts hours could be pertinent outside of combat? Or minion generation? How is it possible that you're discounting in-combat stuff to this extent in your assessment of game breaking capacity? If a measure of game breaking exists, this seems like a singularly awful one.