The Man Keeping the Martial Down

[Talakeal]

OK, now, I may be senile, but, as I recall it, the Force Cage question was me trying to answer how one particular character could not sit out bored 50+% of the time when the GM kept throwing them in time out with Force Cage. So I'm ignoring those responses.

Of the responses I gave you, I'm not seeing 80% Wizard. Let's make the list:

Ranged weapons
flying mounts
magical items that grant flight
sneaking past them
poisoning them in their sleep
booby-trapping their landing zone
break down the walls
pick the lock
go around
kill everyone inside with smoke/water/lava/cave-in
get a man on the inside
battering rams
items of teleportation
just try knocking...
You glue a pen.. a stick to his head, and force him to use it to write in the dirt.

That's using your hand to knock on the door, btw, not using a Scroll of Knock.

Note that the home of UMD - the Rogue - is a "Fighter" class for the purposes of Fighter vs Wizard. Not that any of these solutions require UMD, mind you, but I absolutely reserve the right for the "Fighter" to solve encounters via UMD. Oh, I see you addressed this - you are actually talking explicitly about the 3e Fighter class now, not the conceptual "Fighter". Well, that's… something. I'm not sure what yet. So, why?

Because the Wizard is still just a muggle with magic slapped on, no, there is nothing conceptually that a "Fighter" can do that a "Wizard" cannot. That said, there are plenty of things that a particular Fighter could do that a particular Wizard cannot. Oh, but since we're talking explicit Fighter & Wizard, I'll name two: survive low levels under me as GM, and work in antimagic below level x.

Please note that I brought up Force Cage as an example of why 3.X is bad for martials.

If we are talking conceptually it isn't a problem. In my current game a fighter can evade the area of a force cage while it is still being cast, cut through a force cage with a sufficiently sharp sword, push through it with superhuman strength, or temporarily disrupt it with holy water or cold iron. And that is discounting specific anti-magic techniques are item, and the fact that a fighter is actually worthwhile so casters might actually find it worth the spell to help them out.