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Grynning
2008-05-02, 04:29 AM
So...I had me an idea for a campaign, and the more I think it over the more I kind of like it. This would be for a more low-fantasy, melee-oriented game (Which I prefer, hence my love of the Conan RPG by mongoose) but I still want to keep it D&D in general flavor. I don't think I really need to explain why I want to eliminate the full-casters (Cleric, Druid, Wizard, Sorceror and any non-core equivalents) but I'd like opinions on how I plan to do it.

Basically, the Bard is now the primary Arcane caster, but instead of spontaneously casting preps from a spellbook like a wizard (therefore gaining more versatility) and works off of Int, and Rangers and Paladins would get their spells per day list upgraded to the same number of slots as the bard. All of them would have access to a wider list of spells, going up to level 6, basically allowing them to "fill in" for the missing classes.

Slight tweaks to all of the Core classes would be made, and I would likely allow the PHBII classes, the Swashbuckler and Hexblade (the fixed version off the website, can't remember the link), and any other class that got 6 levels of spellcasting or less. Certain spells would probably be declared off limits, although I haven't actually gone through and figured out what 6 and lower spells would need to be banned.

So does anyone think this would work, and be balanced and fun?

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-05-02, 04:33 AM
Bard should remain based off of Cha, and maybe stay spontaneous. Cha just fits better. Also, Warlocks, Healers, and Duskblades? Leaving them in? None are overpowered, and it would be interesting to see the Warlock as the most powerful Arcanist in the land.

Kyalid
2008-05-02, 04:34 AM
The Duskblade could be a bit overpowered for the other casters since he is the only one with a pretty good spell list, full BAB a d8 for HD and he's a good melee-char, if you have one he could dominate the setting as either the main-caster or the fighter.

Skjaldbakka
2008-05-02, 05:00 AM
Absolutely. I've been working on modifying the bard to better fit the 'primary caster' role off-and-on for awhile now. I am actually working on making a different sub-class for each specialist type. I've gotten slightly sidetracked by Legends (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=79202), however, and so other homebrewing projects have gone by the wayside.

Cuddly
2008-05-02, 05:32 AM
Personally, I would love to play in such a setting.

Tempest Fennac
2008-05-02, 06:17 AM
Personally, I wouldn't enjoy playing a low magic campaign (admittedly, I'm a mark for high magic settings). I agree with keeping Bards as Cha-based spontaneous casters (and with allowing Warlocks and Healers).

Cuddly
2008-05-02, 06:28 AM
Maybe you could allow bards to learn new "songs" in the form of spells from scrolls and the like, but keep the beguiler casting?

So your bard finds a scroll of, uh mage hand, and learns it. Now he can spontaneously cast. However, make them choose a single school they can learn spells from. I dunno. I like the idea of having bards learn spells like wizards do.

Aquillion
2008-05-02, 06:44 AM
I've heard it suggested before. However, one thing should be completely clear: A bard is not a primary caster, and no reasonable changes are going to turn them into one; even with every other caster in the game removed, they're still not going to be able to rely on casting to be their primary contribution the party -- their primary purpose is not and never will be magic. If you tell people to take that class if they want to focus on magic (people who are uninterested in a character concept based around skills or singing or whatever, say, and just want to have someone focused in the magical arts), they're not going to have any fun at all.

Bards are skill-monkeys with some limited magical support. Outside of PRCs, they are not primarily casters, and people mistakenly play them that way are one of the reasons the class has such an unjustly bad reputation.

If both you and your players are fine with that, it's no problem.

However, wizards are the lesser issue. I assume you're going to leave in Healers as full casters at the very least (they're not that powerful, and without at least one full-casting healer, the entire CR system gets badly disrupted, since things that are supposed to be minor setbacks or threats become completely lethal). But the fact is, there's a reason clerics are so powerful, and it's better than the reason for bards -- most people just don't like playing healbots. If you have someone in your group who does, it's no problem, but make sure you clear this with your group before proceeding.

Basically, I wouldn't recommend devoting time to designing a setting around this. Talk to your group. If they're fine with having nobody playing a primary caster (aside from Healers), then you don't really need to do anything else -- as DM, you can have NPC full casters appear as 'evil wizard' types if you want, or not; either way it's no big deal, and not something that requires any more detailed legwork than usual when setting up a campaign. Likewise, if your group wants to play with primary casters, I doubt there's any way you could make them enjoy a campaign without them.

Obviously, this is also only something an experienced DM should attempt. Challenges and so forth written in the books are written under the assumption that players have access to the basic abilities of a traditional four-person party... monster CRs are influenced by what spells the party's casters are expected to have. You'll have to adjust them yourselves without that.

TempusCCK
2008-05-02, 08:47 AM
The only suggestion I would make is to take a look at everything you throw against the characters very carefully, and think very very hard about whether or not they can handle it without a primary caster. Higher CR enemies are going to annihilate them if you just throw things out willy-nilly from the MM.

My suggestion is humanoids with class levels as the main enemies, as long as they fit the same class restrictions the PC's have.

Human Paragon 3
2008-05-02, 08:58 AM
Sounds interesting. I'm a little afraid that a paladin or ranger with bard casting would be too powerful, though. Here's what I would do:

Paladin A: Bard Casting but Medium BAB (Replaces cleric, and is an OK fighter)
Paladin B: Standard Paladin with the PhBII Non-casting Variant

Ranger A: Bard Casting but Medium BAB (replaces Druid and is an OK Fighter, could also use Wild Shape Ranger variant from the unearthed arcana to be a true druid replacelent)
Rnager B: Standard ranger but with the PhBII Non-casting Variant

All four classes would be viable options, perhaps with a renaming or reflavoring.

Chronos
2008-05-02, 12:10 PM
Bard should remain based off of Cha, and maybe stay spontaneous. Cha just fits better.It depends on the fluff you use for bard spellcasting. Third edition has embraced the notion of bard as spellsinger, with magic inherent to his music (even for his spells; this is why all bard spells have a verbal component). But personally, I've always prefered the flavor that a bard picks up random snippets of magical knowledge in his travels the same way he picks up random snippets of mundane knowledge, combat ability, and everything else. With this flavor, Int-based casting out of a spellbook makes more sence.

Eldariel
2008-05-02, 12:19 PM
I really like this idea. Bards with pumped casting seem unnecessary though; they're just fine as they are, a Jack-of-All-Trades. They're decent in combat, decent skillmonkeys (for all non-Trapfinding purposes, especially with Bardic Knowledge), have decent casting and decent group boosting. Maybe give them Heal at level 6, but beyond that, they should be fine.

Paladin with boosted casting would be all good; 6th level casting from a mostly Divine list sounds perfectly ok. I'd consider changing Ranger into an Arcane caster. That would cut to the wilderness flavour a bit, but on the other hand, Arcane magic is often shown to be 'the magic that draws power from the environment', which would make perfect sense for a wilderness caster, so meh. Bottomline, Bard is really a combination of Arcane and Divine casting, so having one half-Arcane and one half-Divine would make sense. If Duskblade is allowed though, this isn't a problem; just work the spelllist a bit and you'll be fine - a Ranger could be the Druid (give him full Animal Companion and a somewhat earlier, but still limited spellcasting) with Duskblade being the Arcane caster and Paladin doing the Cleric's work (of course, allowing all the variants as the Paladin needs be usable as a healer).


I've always wanted to DM a warrior campaign á la Complete Warrior guidelines; no caster classes at all, just good, oldfashioned warriors. Survivability is indeed an issue as you cannot heal and some monsters are nearly impossible to topple by pure force of arms (almost all of the large things, in fact). The Heal-skill nicely increases in value, although sometimes the characters just don't have the time and have to fight half-HPd.

CR system being obsoleted is hardly an issue issue since the system is ****ed up anyways, so as long as the DM is experienced, he'll have no trouble making encounters by stats rather than by level; levels and CRs are mere guidelines and level 20 Samurai isn't the same as level 20 Druid.

quiet1mi
2008-05-02, 05:34 PM
In reality instead of banning classes that can cast spells, you can make them a multi-class option...

like in order to take your first level of [full-caster here] you need 2 levels of [insert non-full-caster class here].

so you could have fighter 2 / wizard 1...

and half casters [paladins and rangers] are fine as they are because only half of their levels count toward their caster level and their spell list is mainly things that make them more efficient and differnt in combat.

but due to the awesomeness of the dusk blade I would count him as a full caster... just a one with full BAB and D8 hit-die..

And because the Bard is not the herald of the full caster i would not count him as one... (no point a in being a jack of all trades if i can't take enough levels to make my spells effective)

CockroachTeaParty
2008-05-02, 07:57 PM
Have you considered the Tome of Magic classes? An 'un-fixed,' as is Shadowcaster would have access to some of the most powerful magic, but it would be extremely limited in its uses per day and would be much more rare and special. Binders are pretty well-balanced as is, and the Truenamer is a far cry from the power of the core classes. Just make sure that if someone plays a truenamer they know what they are getting into.

Count D20
2008-05-02, 11:24 PM
I've always wanted to DM a warrior campaign á la Complete Warrior guidelines; no caster classes at all, just good, oldfashioned warriors. Survivability is indeed an issue as you cannot heal and some monsters are nearly impossible to topple by pure force of arms (almost all of the large things, in fact). The Heal-skill nicely increases in value, although sometimes the characters just don't have the time and have to fight half-HPd.

Wasn't there a movie or an anime about a group pf samurai ,7 maybe, who protect a holy child?
Is not not healing a common divine gift?
wink wink

Anon-a-mouse
2008-05-02, 11:42 PM
I had a similar idea myself. Get rid of full casters, and create a new class who has a bard's hit dice, BAB and spell progression but casts like wizard and has the wizard's spell list and skills, and a familiar instead of bard music.This would be in addition to the bard rather than a replacement. The bard also gets wildshape, but limited to one genus* of animal, to be chosen at character creation.

* Yeah, I know. But f*** 'em, they're only cat-girls.

Eldariel
2008-05-02, 11:54 PM
Wasn't there a movie or an anime about a group pf samurai ,7 maybe, who protect a holy child?
Is not not healing a common divine gift?
wink wink

Yea, but I like the idea of half-HP characters fighting.

JaxGaret
2008-05-03, 12:07 AM
There was a poll done in the CO forum over on the Wizards boards, to determine the average perceived power level of every class, here are the results sorted by average (I'm too tired to edit it into a proper table right now, maybe later):

wizard 42 9.67 0.45 10.00 10.00 9/10 1
archivist 38 9.63 0.62 10.00 10.00 7/10 3
artificer 37 9.39 0.76 10.00 10.00 8/10 2
druid 41 9.38 0.65 9.50 10.00 8/10 2
cleric 42 9.16 0.76 9.00 9.00 7/10 3
psion 32 8.35 0.73 8.00 8.00 7/10 3
sorcerer 39 8.20 1.01 8.00 8.00 4/10 6
erudite 11 8.15 1.35 9.00 9.00 5/9.5 4.5
beguiler 34 7.79 0.73 8.00 8.00 6/9 3
wu jen 20 7.58 0.94 8.00 8.00 5/9 4
spirit shaman 21 7.29 1.95 7.00 9.00 3/10 7
favored soul 30 7.23 1.03 7.00 8.00 5/9 4
dread necromancer 30 7.10 1.16 7.00 7.00 3/10 7
ardent 12 7.07 1.31 7.00 6.00 5/9 4
warblade 35 6.88 0.90 7.00 7.00 4/8 4
crusader 37 6.62 1.12 7.00 7.00 4/8 4
swordsage 34 6.55 0.89 6.82 6.00 5/8 3
wilder 16 6.46 1.76 7.00 7.00 3/10 7
shugenja 19 6.44 1.26 7.00 7.00 4/8 4
dragonfire adept 23 6.29 0.92 6.00 7.00 4/8 4
duskblade 34 6.09 0.87 6.00 6.00 4/8 4
psychic warrior 32 6.02 1.18 6.00 6.00 3/8 5
warlock 38 6.00 0.90 6.00 6.00 4/8 4
factotum 31 5.98 1.02 6.00 6.00 4/8 4
binder 28 5.96 1.37 6.00 6.00 3/8 5
totemist 14 5.64 1.28 5.50 5.00 3/7 4
rogue 39 5.62 1.27 5.00 5.00 3/8 5
bard 38 5.45 1.52 6.00 6.00 1/8 7
warmage 37 5.41 1.62 6.00 7.00 1/9 8
scout 36 5.27 1.03 5.00 6.00 3/7 4
shadowcaster 22 5.03 1.79 5.13 4.00 2/8 6
barbarian 39 4.99 1.16 5.00 5.00 2/8 6
ranger 39 4.94 1.07 5.00 5.00 2/7 5
incarnate 11 4.94 1.14 5.00 4.00 3/7 4
lurk 11 4.79 1.64 4.00 4.00 2/8 6
dragon shaman 26 4.61 1.44 5.00 5.00 2/7 5
knight 37 4.27 1.03 4.00 4.00 3/6 3
swashbuckler 37 4.24 1.36 4.00 5.00 1/7 6
paladin 40 4.22 1.15 4.00 5.00 1/6 5
soulborn 11 4.15 1.15 4.00 4.00 3/7 4
ninja 33 3.97 1.29 4.00 4.00 2/8 6
fighter 41 3.88 1.41 4.00 4.00 1/8 7
hexblade 36 3.81 1.33 3.50 3.00 2/7 5
divine mind 11 3.67 2.30 3.00 3.00 1/8 7
marshal 29 3.66 1.17 4.00 3.00 2/6 4
adept 5 3.60 1.52 3.00 3.00 2/6 4
monk 41 3.51 1.38 3.00 3.00 2/8 6
healer 29 3.21 2.06 3.00 2.00 1/9 8
spellthief 29 3.16 1.20 3.00 4.00 1/6 5
truenamer 18 2.66 1.68 2.93 3.00 0/6 6
expert 5 2.40 0.55 2.00 2.00 2/3 1
soulknife 25 2.35 1.22 2.00 2.00 0/5 5
samurai 37 1.69 0.66 2.00 2.00 1/3 2
warrior 6 1.67 0.82 1.50 1.00 1/3 2
aristocrat 5 1.40 0.55 1.00 1.00 1/2 1
commoner 5 0.60 0.55 1.00 1.00 0/1 1

The second number after the name of the class is the average rating. You could simply disallow all classes over 6.5, for example. This would have the effect of banning all of the full casters except for the Shugenja, Warmage, Healer, and Wilder, and caster-likes such as the Shadowcaster, Warlock, Truenamer, and the Binder. If you wanted to include ToB classes in your campaign (and, by extension, have them as the most powerful classes in your campaign), you would limit player choice to any class lower than 7.

You can take this a step further and set your campaign class allowance within a range - i.e. limit players to any class between say 4-6, or 7-9, or 4.5-5.5, or whatever you like. It makes for much more balanced parties.