ToB

[huttj509]

There are some good reasons to play fighters, rogues, paladins, even monks, and I think they are too often glossed over in many threads.

If you knowingly choose to, being aware of what the class can do, and what it cannot do, regardless of what it claims to do.

Options at various power levels is a good thing. Someone playing a fighter next to a warblade CAN have fun, if he knew going into it what to expect from his character.

Many casters have various power levels based on spell selection. If someone wants to play a weaker caster, he can knowingly choose weaker spells, or specialized spells, or choose to avoid metamagic.

The problem is that basically, until ToB, melee does not have many options for "stronger" builds. There are some particular feat chains that can work well, but in doing so you restrict the flexibility available.

If there are more combat effective, and less combat effective, options in different roles, the opportunities for someone to play the character he wants increase.

If there is disagreement in the group on what sort of characters they want running together, or what the DM expects, etc, this is not a problem with there being too many options, but a problem with group communication and establishment of targets for character creation.

The problem with banning ToB outright is that core itself contains many many options at different power levels for casters, but only weaker options for the melee types, in general. If you want a lower power game, that's fine. If you and your players wish to only be core melee types, perhaps a more gritty martial feel, that's fine. If you restrict various supplements like the ToB, without touching core in terms of what's available, all you do is place the "guy with a sword" next to the mage of many wonderful options and flexibility, next to the bear of many decent options and flexibility, next to the guy with a sword and the blessings of his diety which enable him to be as effective with the sword as the first guy, and then more options on top of that.

If you want to play the "guy with a sword" in that scenario, go for it, you're the player. If you want to choose to play a barbarian with 8 strength and 6 con, because that's the character you have in mind, I have no problem with that. Combat effectiveness is not the be all and end all. I would advise against forcing someone else to play that role, however, without their knowing agreement.


Summary:

On a scale from 1 to 10, melee generally has a power/flexibility range of, say, 1-5. Magic has a range of 2-11. ToB gives melee some options in the 4-9 range.

Those numbers have no relation to any scale, and are just an example.

Edit: If your melee is playing at a 3 level, and your casters are playing at a 3 level (or 4), and, most importantly, everyone is having fun, I see no need to use the ToB. It's when the casters are up at 8, and the melee can only get near 5 by strictly limiting their flexibility even more, that the refusal to use the ToB would irk me.