Some thoughts on caster balance

[gooddragon1]

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[RatElemental]

The problem is that access to 9th level spells is, generally speaking, grounds to be placed higher than tier 3 in and of itself. I'm not even sure how you'd manage that I think Healer might be the only one not above T3 and that's because with its restricted list it effectively doesn't actually have access to 9th level spells. Maybe if they get 9th level slots but no actual 9th level spells, so they're only good for metamagic?

[NNescio]

The problem is that access to 9th level spells is, generally speaking, grounds to be placed higher than tier 3 in and of itself. I'm not even sure how you'd manage that. Maybe if they get 9th level slots but no actual 9th level spells, so they're only good for metamagic?

Well, if you populate their spell list with nothing but 'garbage' like Meteor Swarm and Storm of Vengeance...

(Also Greater Whirlwind, among other out-of-core options.)

[AvatarVecna]

Honestly, the ability to change out your class features from day to day is what makes Cleric/Wizard/Druid/etc stronger than most classes, but even sorcerer (which is stuck with their decisions forever) is still hella stronger than most other classes just by virtue of spells being so fantastic and by virtue of the 15 minute adventuring day phenomenon. A small selection of versatile, exponentially-powerful spells being cast spontaneously which can be recharged whenever you want is strong.

But also, past maybe 3rd lvl spells, you start getting spells that can basically shortcut story arcs unless somebody somewhere else is using other magic to specifically counter that story-ending spell. Even if you're not trying to break the game, even if you're trying to be a team player and be at your teammate's level, past a certain point you have to go out of your way not to accidentally break certain kinds of stories. The Giant talks about this now and again, and has ways around this built into his comic, but your DM (and more importantly, the player playing the wizard) probably isn't intentionally limiting themselves like this in most games.

"We have to get somewhere" journey plots ala LotR are circumvented with magics that improve overland travel, that allow for flight to bypass most random encounters, or that teleport you to where you need to be without having to even worry about the distance all that much. Frodo's journey to Mordor in LotR was 1350 miles long...but that's not "as the crow flies" distance, they were taking a kinda roundabout path. The actual distance from Rivendell (where the Fellowship was founded) to Mount Doom (where the ring was tossed) was about 700 miles as the crow flies...a single CL 9 Teleport would solve that problem, and at least one person physically present at the Fellowship's formation has personally been to Mt Doom before (Elron, the last time the ring was gonna get thrown in) so if somebody could cast the spell they'd be able to get a good enough description, they'd have a pretty decent chance of being there in two seconds rather than two books. There's a not insignificant chance they'll instead be (on average) 200 miles off in a random direction, but even that's putting them about four months ahead of schedule compared to where they were in the books...and it can just as easily be solved by just casting teleport again.

If Gandalf was a mid-level 3.5 wizard, the whole plot of those books would've been like "hey Frodo, hold onto the ring for a minute, okay? I'm gonna do some magic real quick" [teleport][teleport][teleport] "took a few tries but we're here. Could you throw the ring into that volcano please? It'd end poorly if I tried." "Uh, yeah, okay?" [tosses ring in]

And that's exactly why basically any mage in any story is a plot device under the writer's control rather than the protagonist; when the mage is the protagonist, they're either incompetent, opposed by more powerful mages, or both. Gandalf had to contend with more powerful mages multiple times in LotR, and spent 99% of the time holding back (the other mages doing the same, specifically so they don't accidentally wreck the world again). Harry Potter is still in school, but also he's facing off against one of the most powerful and skilled wizards of the century who's also a lich with several phylacteries. Eragon is a truenamer. Fictional mages have to struggle extra-hard because they have more power; if their problems aren't equally scaled-up, they're gonna run roughshod over everybody.

[pabelfly]

If you want to build a Tier 3 illusion-focused caster, I'd start with the Beguiler, and work out what features to selectively nerf to make it a tier 3.

[Kelb_Panthera]

The problem is that access to 9th level spells is, generally speaking, grounds to be placed higher than tier 3 in and of itself. I'm not even sure how you'd manage that I think Healer might be the only one not above T3 and that's because with its restricted list it effectively doesn't actually have access to 9th level spells. Maybe if they get 9th level slots but no actual 9th level spells, so they're only good for metamagic?

Eh, warmage and dread-necro are both capable of casting 9th level spells and I'd be more than a little hesitant to call either of them T2. Beguiler is kinda sitting on the line. Healer's 9ths include one of the two best, most versatile spells in the level and the overall game.

The healer falls short of T2 for the same reason the others I've mentioned probably do: their list isn't particularly expansive and leaves all kinds of gaps. The fact that it's a prepared caster as well actually works against it, unlike most others. Its list is short and very tightly tied to the class' overall theme. Worse, most of the spells on it are the sort of spells that you need -right now- not tomorrow. If it weren't for the fact that you can overcome the class' weak casting with fairly easy optimizations is the only reason it's not lower than it is. Even then, it's probably the only vancian caster that gets 9ths and is T4 or lower; It can heal like a mofo as long as you don't do anything too dumb with the build but it otherwise does a fairly middling job at anything else even if you build for it. You can't tier a class on Gate alone.

[NNescio]

Eh, warmage and dread-necro are both capable of casting 9th level spells and I'd be more than a little hesitant to call either of them T2. Beguiler is kinda sitting on the line. Healer's 9ths include one of the two best, most versatile spells in the level and the overall game.

The healer falls short of T2 for the same reason the others I've mentioned probably do: their list isn't particularly expansive and leaves all kinds of gaps. The fact that it's a prepared caster as well actually works against it, unlike most others. Its list is short and very tightly tied to the class' overall theme. Worse, most of the spells on it are the sort of spells that you need -right now- not tomorrow. If it weren't for the fact that you can overcome the class' weak casting with fairly easy optimizations is the only reason it's not lower than it is. Even then, it's probably the only vancian caster that gets 9ths and is T4 or lower; It can heal like a mofo as long as you don't do anything too dumb with the build but it otherwise does a fairly middling job at anything else even if you build for it. You can't tier a class on Gate alone.

Then there's Truenamer, which while not a spellcaster, eventually gets access to a 'superior' version of Gate that is effectively usable at-will (with little optimization).

But it's still widely considered terrible because it has otherwise limited options (granted, it's very good at supporting allied casters) that require a ridiculous amount of optimization to even make work.

[AvatarVecna]

What we need to do imo is discover which roles a caster should/"needs to" fill and have each class fill some of those, while avoiding the issues like teleportation being a problem. However, it might be a problem in one game and not in another. So, by making multiple tier 3 casters, a DM could allow and disallow certain ones to fill the roles needed. Probably tricky, but it's an idea.

Note that this is just offering a variant for avoiding tier 2+ so there's no need to compete with tier 2+ classes with these homebrew ones.

Teleport is a prime candidate, but it's also just an example of this phenomenon. If your dungeon is predicated on the party going through the whole dungeon to find the like 5 keys or whatever for this magic puzzle lock, it really sucks when the Wizard just bypasses 99% of your preparations with a Knock spell; low-level rogue has to accept that some lock DCs are just beyond her right now, but not the wizard. Trying to have a murder mystery plot? Hope the murderer doesn't get caught out by idle Detect Evil sweeps while questioning suspects. Hope she has a way of resisting Zone Of Truth without the caster realizing they're doing that. Hope she didn't leave even a shred of evidence behind that can be used for scrying. Hope she remembered to take the proper steps to prevent Speak With Dead from unraveling the whole plot. Hope that a quick Guidance Of The Avatar on a Diplomacy check doesn't get her spilling her guts to her new best friend. Of course, if the adventurers are even higher level, and there's a lot more money involved in the deceased's estate, this can be more simply solved with a quick resurrection and we can all leave, no harm no foul right? Greater Teleport is the extreme example for solving the LotR plot problem (and similar plots), but Plane Shift and Wind Walk can also make journey plots easier to manage. Past a certain point, mages at least have theoretical access to basically any monster ability anywhere in the whole edition, basically any monster serving them faithfully for a short period, granting their own wishes, destroying artifacts/magic items/antimagic fields...and that's without leaving Core. At what point is it balanced to introduce time travel into the mix of things?

And y'know, most spells are crap. Really, 90% of everything is crap, as the saying goes. But the thing is...this game has a few hundred races, about a thousand classes/PrCs, about three thousand feats, and about five thousand spells. Sorcerer 20 gets to pick 43 options from a list of about 2500. Even with 90% of everything being ****, they still have an enormous range to choose from. And for a lot of the decent options that don't directly relate to combat, about 90% of the ones that aren't complete **** just...flatout solve some kind of plotline, unless they're countered with other magic that exists for the express purpose of countering the first magic. Magic can counter magic, and magic can counter non-magic, but non-magic for the most part just...can't counter magic. For quite a lot of problems, you need a mage.

(This isn't the case as bad in 5e, particularly for combat; designers and homebrewers alike are pretty liberal with abilities that shut down caster tactics - because who cares if you shut down 90% of caster options, they've still got dozens more - but they're deathly terrified of shutting down magic weapon damage...because if they shut down that one thing the fighter does, the fighter doesn't have any more options after that.)

Let's say you're a Wizard 7 who took Polymorph cuz it's a classic wizard thing that's cool as hell. You dunno what a good thing to turn into is, so you crack open the monster manual and start sifting through. You want something that meets the HD cap preferably, and preferably something that doesn't suffer too much from losing the abilities Polymorph doesn't let you get.


Adult Arrowhawk is the first 7 HD creature. It's not super-tough (although its got some decent defensive qualities), its main melee is pretty crap, and it loses its ranged electricity ray...but 60 ft fly speed (perfect) isn't too shabby. Good mobility pick, make a note and keep looking.

Hmm, passing a lot of 6/8 HD monsters. Come back later if I can't find good 7 HDs to check on the 6s, and later I'll wanna check the 8s to see what's good for next level.

Belker has 7 HD, an an Ex offense ability, but Elemental isn't a legal polymorph type.

Babau is 7 HD, Sneak Attack, and some decent immunities/defenses. Oh wait, it's an Outsider, not legal type, dangit. Wait, Outsider is a legal type if the original caster is an Outsider, so that's an option if you're a tiefling I guess? Not for me, though...

Hmm...Dire Boar has decent offense without extras, Ferocity is Ex so that's good...decent speed, but no extra reach...scent is nice. Make a note and move on...

...Dire Lion is 8 HD, dang. Next level, next level...

Very Young Black Dragon has 60ft Frightful Presence (Ex, apparently), but no Breath Weapon (Su, apparently). I would've guessed that dragon breath weapons were as inherently biological to them as acid-shooting bugs are IRL, but I guess dragons stop breathing elements inside an AMF? Eh. Decent enough - tough enough-ish, bite/claw/claw, but nothing fancy. Faster than arrowhawk but worse maneuverability...make a note and move on.

Wyrmling Red Dragon gets bite/claw/claw/wing/wing, even better speed (and worse maneuverability) than black dragon had, but smaller frightful presence. Definitely looks like a solid choice if I can get into melee and start full attacking.

Very Young Brass Dragon is about the same as Very Young Black Dragon, except with a burrow speed. Wyrmling Silver is also similarly competitive. Looks like Red Wyrmling is the best dragon we're gonna get right now.

Djinni have 7 HD! Ooh and the wish-granting isn't expicitly Su or Sp in this entry! Oh, noble djinn are 10 HD. Eh, DM probably wouldn't allow it anyway, efreeti sets a good standard on the Wish thing.

Dangit, all the giants have soooooo many HD.

Girallon has decent defenses and decent-but-not-great offense. Pretty good if I can get full attacks, but red dragon is probably better. Make a note an move on.

Griffon has 7 HD, 80ft flight, and pounce! No reach, and base damage isn't exactly great, but pounce is wonderful. Solid pick probably.

Harpy is lame without Captivating Song.

Hmm, Hydra can have 7 HD, how's that go? ...10 ft reach, 7 attacks as a standard action, Ex Fast Healing...oh hey Polymorph is HD-limited, but Pyrohydra has a CR bump not an HD bump, so throw that on. Good god this is just...so much damage being pumped out.

This is probably the point where 90% of the stuff you've looked at gets thrown out at this point: red dragon is now a distant second offense-wise, and Fast Healing 7 is hard to beat at this level for defenses. Griffon's speed coupled with pounce is nice, but damage isn't enough for that to make anything other than a great hit-and-run, and nothing so far really has better defenses than AC 17/Con 20/FH7.

And that's how, just casually reading through the Monster Manual with no idea what you're doing, a Wizard 7 can accidentally stumble on one of the more powerful Polymorph offense options in the game.

[Fizban]

Let's assume that players don't go for the most ridiculous cheese because it would be easy to just say no. However, the main focus here will be: Why not homebrew a bunch of tier 3 caster classes with access to 9th level spells that are fun to play, but still tier 3 (and importantly are able to fulfill the roles that 3.5 expects a party to be able to fill that other classes can't*)? That way an easier balance point can be attained for those who want it.
So I've pretty much washed my hands of any and all "tier" discussion, but for clarity- don't ask yourself what "tier" you want. Instead figure out in detail what it is that the current classes do that you don't want, and then change those things. This must be done before you can even consider adding new toys, if you want to reduce something's power level.

The big question though, why not homebrew a bunch of classes? Well yeah, as you know, plenty of people have done before. We've got fixed list casters for just about every archetype somewhere in there, many claiming to be "tier 3," at varying levels of power and polish. Searching homebrew for "fixed list" will probably bring up a bunch, though not all. Whether they meet your desires is something else entirely, and indeed, it's probably a lot faster for anyone who knows what they want to make it themselves.

I personally intend to make an illusion caster who can:
+Create a potent Imaginary Friend (Ex) that can change form by expending spell slots
+Provide healing by expending spell slots
+Dispel effects by expending spell slots
+Cast illusion spells
+Cast a particular specialized illusion spell that makes use of an item such as a scroll, wand, or staff without needing to umd
Problem is there's already a class that casts almost nothing but illusion spells- what do you think of Beguiler, and how does this compare to it? Beguiler actually does have more than illusion, also the enchantment and bonus "can't be allowed to fail" Dispel/Slow/Solid Fog for immunes. Now, if the class casts literally nothing but a specific list of illusion spells, that might make a difference, but then you run into the problem that illusion spells are so dependent on player and DM interpretation that you pretty much just can't make definitive statements about what that class can do. You can for your game, but something meant to be "objectively X tier" just can't be if it has the PHB general illusions (enchantments have different but similarly subjective problems, which can be more obviously mitigated by changing the spells). Now, a suite of very specific illusion spells that do X because Illusion, that would work, but would also require writing more spells.

If you want spellcasters with more spell options, then there are two things to do: chop the top level spells off down to whatever level has the spells you think should be the maximum, and rewrite the progression to match that (7th is popular), and/or go back to writing actual spell lists. No amount of restriction in spells known is going to change the fact that there are printed spells that are broken, but many of them reside on the high levels, and much of the problem in being able to do anything comes from the fact that the game basically only has two spell lists, so you get half the spells in the game to choose from. PHB-only minus the broken stuff is actually way more limited than most people give it credit for (because they forget you said "no broken stuff"), because those lists are actually quite principled.

Funnily enough, a whole new set of "homebrew" classes which are basically just normal casters with DM written class spell lists gets all the fun of a fix without invoking the dreaded "ban" word.

*Does 3.5 expect certain things from a party? Does it depend on the DM? Is there a chance that a DM might not understand what an encounter would expect and maybe how to deal with that? etc.? Why are people who think Luna isn't best pony wrong?
Yes, 3.5 does expect certain things from a party, but depending on the DM, the game's original expectations may or may not matter. The game expects, to be blunt, a fighter/rogue/cleric/wizard, the fighter meatshielding with AC, the rogue capable of dealing with the occasional arbitrary search/disable/open check, the wizard providing area and AC/DR-penetrating offense, and the cleric providing all the resistance/immunity/etc buffs required to deal with many written monsters. And that's about it. (Yes there are other classes in the PHB, no that does not mean this isn't the base, it just means that you're allowed to play the game differently and reap the rewards/consequences of it).

The Cleric also functions as the true source of almost all the "wizard" role, having most of the effects that supposedly make them OP. They have "flight," (Air Walk) "teleport," (Word of Recall, Double Plane Shift, Wind Walk), Plane Shift at 5th, Find Traps (not that it matters because Rogue, same reason Knock doesn't matter), all of the actual Divinations (Legend Lore and Clairvoyance even in Knowledge domain), Stone Shape at 3rd (Disintegrate says what?), Dispel Magic, Antimagic Field, just about all the flat +bonus spells you'd need to cover any gaps in equipment, etc. In addition to all the spells required to counter monsters, the cleric has pretty much all the "toolkit" you could find yourself needing. It is the Cleric, not the wizard, which guarantees that a sufficiently leveled party can overcome any obstacle if they prepare the correct spell tomorrow, and many monsters absolutely expect the party to counter their abilities with the correct spell, many of which are exclusively on the Cleric list (and in a well designed encounter, the party will be able to run away until they can prepare it).

This is not a bad thing. It is intentional. If you want to have a bunch of cool stuff you could whip out of a book for any adventure, there needs to be a safety valve in the party that will let you do that. If you have players that like knowing/figuring out how to be crazy prepared, you need something that will do that. It's just not actually the wizard that does it. It's the Cleric. And if you take the Cleric out of the cleric, you're gonna need to be prepared for the possibility that the party will not be able to haul out the silver bullet a monster or dungeon expected. You can't get rid of the Cleric without acknowledging this. Most printed modules won't write a dungeon with a specific spell requirement without placing it in the module, but monsters they absolutely will (also mixing and/or advancing monsters from MMs resulting in wildly different power levels throughout most modules).

However, as I said, the core-only Cleric is not nearly as crazy as some people think it is. Aside from all its safety valve stuff, the PHB offensive spells are pretty dang inoffensive, and you could strip out, nerf, or delay them as much as you want (I'd not remove the heavy armor +3/4 though, as part of the safety is being a second meatshield to place). Get rid of Divine Favor/Divine Power/Righteous Might (or make other creature only), Slay Living, Harm, Destruction, Alignment Word, Energy Drain, and Implosion, and I don't really see a problem anymore (Hold Person and Greater Command allow new saves each round, so unless the party was going to one-round them anyway, they should still pose some threat). The Cleric's role in the party is magical fixer+defense, the wizard's role is magical artillery, the fighter is physical defense, and the rogue is "not getting killed by traps/stuff it would be better not to waste a spell on" (quite a lot of things really). But then, that's a "role-based" paradigm that I'm given to understand "tier theory" disregards entirely (one of the reasons I'm done with it)

But you asked if the game has certain things it expects, and uh, yeah, it expects the standard party at a certain power level with each person comfortably living in their role. Not demanding everyone (or anyone) to pass skill checks aside from search/disable/open, nor that they personally have x/y/z magical travel or reality shaping, etc. Naturally the game provides the option of mixing and optimizing everything, because it's fun and sells dozens of books, but the foundation is not based on a gang of multi-capable mystical battle basketweaving ninja orators.

[Biggus]

I got around it (I think) by allowing only illusion spells. Might have to not allow summoning through shadow conjuration and such. I'm thinking fixed spell lists and other means of avoiding the problem spells.


I think this is an interesting idea. The weakest full casters are generally reckoned to be Warmage and Healer, as their spell lists are so tightly restricted around a specific theme, so if you only allowed casters access to a single school that should bring them down to roughly tier 3, except possibly Conjurers and Transmuters. Perhaps give them a single spell of each level from outside their school to allow a bit of flexibility without letting them solve every problem single-handedly.

As well as schools of magic, you could have other specific themes, like buffer (perhaps split into attack-buffer and defence-buffer), battlefield controller, animal mage and so on.

[AvatarVecna]

I think Grod's approach (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?329161-Giants-and-Graveyards-Grod-s-collected-3-5-revisions) did pretty well in these regards.

[Tvtyrant]

There are over 1k spells in D&D 3.5, I believe 100 or so of which are decent. Imagine if you had a caster who had to cast animate wood as its level 1 summon, had only the worst wall, damage and mobility spells. A wizard that has only the bad spells that get red listings on handbooks, but has all of them would likely be tier 3 and pretty decent overall (also very caster feeling.) They would just be irritating as heck to play.

Edit: If spells were as bad as fighter feats Wizards would be as bad as fighters. If Fighter Feats were as good as spells Fighters would be much stronger then they are.

[Troacctid]

In magic the gathering, I wondered for a long time why anyone would want to draw a card and then discard a card rather than just drawing cards. Eventually I discovered that even with no combo backing it up, you could discard a land you didn't need.
Sorry, I just have to ask, did you really never notice that Merfolk Looter costs half as much mana as Archivist?