Where does the "ToB is too strong" myth come from?

[Darg]

It's actually really simple.

- Crusaders automatically refresh maneuvers at the end of their turn if they have no maneuvers left that are withheld.
- So if they had granted maneuvers equal to their readied maneuvers, they'd have all their maneuvers refreshed every turn.
- White Raven Tactics grants an extra turn, so that would mean you could use it again on the free turn it grants you...and again and again, ad infinitum.

After taking Extra Granted Maneuver, however, your granted maneuvers are always 2 lower than your readied maneuvers.

But wait...what if you didn't actually know enough maneuvers to fill your full complement of readied maneuvers?

When you take levels in an initiator PRC, you can increase your readied and granted maneuvers without increasing your known maneuvers. So if you do that twice with master of nine 2, your crusader readied/granted maneuvers are technically 7/5, but you only have 5 maneuvers known, so after granting all 5 of those there are no more withheld, prompting the refresh button.


Even without White Raven Tactics, crusader getting all their mvs refreshed each turn seems unintended; TOB editors may have had a blind assumption that people would always add PRC mvs known and readied to the same class, but they didn't put that in the text.

It still doesn't work. In the PRC feature descriptions, maneuvers known does not mention anything about you choosing the class that benefits, but maneuvers readied does. Considering that they are in fact the same feature, it requires very very loose reading to even come close to the conclusion that you can split the benefits between classes.

[Elves]

You missed this post

[Xervous]

People said it before and I’ll say it again. If you start from the erroneous assumption of fighter, paladin, barbarian and monk being well balanced you’re going to arrive at some funny conclusions.

[Darg]

You missed this post

I didn't miss it. The bolded statement doesn't have you choose a class to apply the benefit to. Only readied maneuvers does. In class features, both known and readied maneuvers fall under the same feature: maneuvers. As they are the same feature and only one half mentions selecting a class, the logical conclusion is that only one class can benefit from the whole feature at a time just like other similar progression PRCs.

People said it before and I’ll say it again. If you start from the erroneous assumption of fighter, paladin, barbarian and monk being well balanced you’re going to arrive at some funny conclusions.

I have to agree. All of them suffer major MAD if you try to do anything except try to beat things down, and all of them suffer from the lack of skill points and feat taxes required to make them decent. It also doesn't help that special attacks are more likely to hurt than help if you don't invest half your character into a single one trick pony.

The ToB classes get decent skills, maneuvers, and stances that have OoC utility and make performing special attacks and gaining the benefits of useful feats easier and within reach. One can call this overpowered, but it's like calling a sword compared to a knife on the battlefield overpowered when rifles and machine guns are firing into entrenched lines.

[icefractal]

One reason I forgot -
If you have a group of players with various levels of mechanical knowledge, and they all go build their characters separately, it's more likely for an op-savvy player to be the one who shows up with a ToB class, because it's more likely they've heard of it and don't find the added complexity (over a Barbarian, say) to be daunting. And unlike a caster, where an optimized and non-optimized one might look the same at first glance, here the more powerful characters come from a whole separate book and have distinctive mechanics.

Same reason Psionics gets seen as OP, I think, where core casting doesn't.

[Elves]

I didn't miss it. The bolded statement doesn't have you choose a class to apply the benefit to.

"when you gain additional maneuvers known, these add to the maneuvers known of one martial adept standard class you already possess"
I don't know what you think you're seeing here.

[H_H_F_F]

One reason I forgot -
If you have a group of players with various levels of mechanical knowledge, and they all go build their characters separately, it's more likely for an op-savvy player to be the one who shows up with a ToB class, because it's more likely they've heard of it and don't find the added complexity (over a Barbarian, say) to be daunting. And unlike a caster, where an optimized and non-optimized one might look the same at first glance, here the more powerful characters come from a whole separate book and have distinctive mechanics.

Same reason Psionics gets seen as OP, I think, where core casting doesn't.

Interesting thought, and a good comparisonvto psionics.

Then again, the same logic could apply to incarnum, and I've never seen anyone make that claim.

Still, probably a part of the answer.

[Darg]

"when you gain additional maneuvers known, these add to the maneuvers known of one martial adept standard class you already possess"
I don't know what you think you're seeing here.

It's what is not there. It doesnt tell you to choose one class. Therefore the player does not have permission to make the choice of which class benefits.

That permission is only granted under readied maneuvers. As known maneuvers and readied maneuvers are part of the same ability, maneuvers, you only get to choose which class benefits once and you don't have permission to split the choice.

[Elves]

It's what is not there. It doesnt tell you to choose one class. Therefore the player does not have permission to make the choice of which class benefits.

Uh-huh. You know just as well as I do that you could find dozens of places in various parts of character creation where the word "choose" isn't explicitly used, or where if you removed it, the fact of player choice would be just as clear.

As known maneuvers and readied maneuvers are part of the same ability, maneuvers, you only get to choose which class benefits once and you don't have permission to split the choice.

The choice is phrased separately. If anything, you would have to be arguing that DM decides or it's random or something. There's no rule or reason that being part of the same class feature means they must apply to the same class.

Your ally/allies distinction, while not spelled out, is arguable -- it's a possibility within the text. But this one is grasping for straws. Just ain't no substance to it.


If you wanted to houserule this, that wouldn't be the right nerf either, since the ability to split them is a valuable articulation for some builds. What I'd do is that if a crusader has fewer known than readied maneuvers, blank cards get put into their maneuver deck for the missing maneuvers.

Edit: Also, it's not even an effective nerf, since not all +readied PRC levels coincide with +known. Under your ruling you'd just have to take RKV 5/Eternal Blade 6 or a similar combo.

[Particle_Man]

Anyhow, "don't spam WRT more than 1/rd, don't use IHS to turn off the sun, and don't play Idiot Crusaders" are pretty easy fixes that can be made without banning ToB. I might also add "don't spam RKV extra turns more than 1/rd" if as DM you don't like extra turns.

Compared to what you would have to do to reign in wizards, that is easy!

[Darg]

Anyhow, "don't spam WRT more than 1/rd, don't use IHS to turn off the sun, and don't play Idiot Crusaders" are pretty easy fixes that can be made without banning ToB. I might also add "don't spam RKV extra turns more than 1/rd" if as DM you don't like extra turns.

Compared to what you would have to do to reign in wizards, that is easy!

I think extending progression and capping all 9ths classes at 6th level spells would be a nice fix. Gives that high power spike without going too far, reduces the uses per day, and allows room for spontaneous casters to learn more spells of lower levels. It's simple and easy. Casters that stop at 6th instead cap at 5th. Casters that cap at 5th or lower do not change. Levels 20-30 would possess 7th-9th level spells. While I don't think this fixes everything, it's a really nice place to start.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

For the record, you don't even need the PrC trick to pull off an Idiot Crusader. Warblade 1 or Swordsage 1 followed by Crusader 1: choose White Raven and Stone Dragon maneuvers as the first class and there won't be enough 1st level maneuvers left to pick as a Crusader. From there, progress your Crusader initiating with PrCs to give you a new maneuver readied each time you get a new maneuver known (even assigning both to Crusader, known will never outpace readied).

EDIT: Swordsage does require taking either Extra Granted Maneuver, Martial Study, or a level of Warblade as well.

[Drelua]

Oh, now I get it, I misread something someone said and got confused from that. It does seem to me that whether or not you can advance 2 separate classes could be interpreted either way, so having that be limited to one class choice might help. That might just be too specific of a houserule though, WRT is easy enough to fix and apart from that I can't imagine advancing 2 separate classes would be a super powerful option.

Seems just complicated enough that beginner players wouldn't likely think of it, at least. But if someone googled ToB and read "you can use Iron Heart Surge to turn off the sun," they might have a kneejerk reaction to that if they thought it was serious and didn't depend on a questionable interpretation of 'effect or other condition.'

Edit to add:

For the record, you don't even need the PrC trick to pull off an Idiot Crusader. Warblade 1 or Swordsage 1 followed by Crusader 1: choose White Raven and Stone Dragon maneuvers as the first class and there won't be enough 1st level maneuvers left to pick as a Crusader. From there, progress your Crusader initiating with PrCs to give you a new maneuver readied each time you get a new maneuver known (even assigning both to Crusader, known will never outpace readied).

EDIT: Swordsage does require taking either Extra Granted Maneuver, Martial Study, or a level of Warblade as well.

Is there a rule that says you can't have the same maneuver known for 2 different classes? Couldn't find it flipping through the book but I could easily be missing it.

[Elves]

For the record, you don't even need the PrC trick to pull off an Idiot Crusader. Warblade 1 or Swordsage 1 followed by Crusader 1: choose White Raven and Stone Dragon maneuvers as the first class and there won't be enough 1st level maneuvers left to pick as a Crusader. From there, progress your Crusader initiating with PrCs to give you a new maneuver readied each time you get a new maneuver known (even assigning both to Crusader, known will never outpace readied).

You forget Devoted Spirit though.
There are 6x Devoted Spirit, WR and Stone Dragon. And you can only take 3 with crusader to stay even.

non TOB 4
warblade 4 - (5 WR w/tradeout @4th)
swordsage 1 (6 SD)
Mo9 1 with item entry (2 DS)
crusader 1 - (1 WR, 2 DS)

2x Martial Study (Devoted Spirit), Extra Granted Maneuver

Looks like that would do it, but way more intensive and requires you to enter Mo9 with discipline items/martial scripts which is a little skeezy. You do still get 9ths with legacy champion.

It does seem to me that whether or not you can advance 2 separate classes could be interpreted either way

It really can't. "When you gain additional maneuvers known, these add to the maneuvers known of one martial adept standard class you already possess" obviously allows player choice. Darg wants us first to deny that, even though similar language elsewhere is accepted as admitting player choice, then to make a logical leap that because the maneuvers readied language includes the magic word "choose", the maneuvers known must apply to the same one you choose for readied.

Now what about all the levels where you get a new maneuver known but not a new maneuver readied? You aren't allowed to choose, remember, so...is the DM gonna decide which class your maneuver applies to? It doesn't hold together.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

You forget Devoted Spirit though.
There are 6x Devoted Spirit, WR and Stone Dragon. And you can only take 3 with crusader to stay even.

3 maneuvers known from Warblade 1 (or Swordsage 1 + Martial Study); let's say Charging Minotaur, Stone Bones, and Douse the Flames.

Now you take Crusader 1. There are only 3 maneuvers left to take: Crusader's Strike, Vanguard Strike, and Leading the Attack. Thus you know a number of Crusader maneuvers equal to the number of maneuvers granted in the first round; Idiot Crusader at ECL 2. If you take Extra Granted Maneuver as your 3rd level feat, you can go all the way up to Crusader 4 before needing to PrC in order to stay an Idiot Crusader.

Of course, this does assume that I'm remembering one rule correctly: IIRC, you cannot take the same maneuver twice, even with different classes. This trick takes advantage of the limited number of first level maneuvers; as long as your first Crusader level is taken before ECL 5 and you already know 3 of the 1st level maneuvers available to Crusaders, you become an Idiot Crusader by default.

EDIT: Actually, thinking about it, it also assumes that you can't retroactively learn new maneuvers. That once you qualify for higher level maneuvers, you don't automatically learn new ones until you've reached your maneuvers known quota. While I don't think that would happen unless you took a new level of Crusader, it does make directly progressing Crusader questionable if it'd bring you to IL 3 or higher.

[Darg]

It really can't. "When you gain additional maneuvers known, these add to the maneuvers known of one martial adept standard class you already possess" obviously allows player choice. Darg wants us first to deny that, even though similar language elsewhere is accepted as admitting player choice, then to make a logical leap that because the maneuvers readied language includes the magic word "choose", the maneuvers known must apply to the same one you choose for readied.

Now what about all the levels where you get a new maneuver known but not a new maneuver readied? You aren't allowed to choose, remember, so...is the DM gonna decide which class your maneuver applies to? It doesn't hold together.

I'm under the assumption that martial adept classes either share the pool of known maneuvers or have separate pools of known maneuvers. The latter is highly likely due to the wording for PRC features. When you multiclass, you ready and expend maneuvers separately. This means if you share the pool you can have overlapping maneuvers readied. If you have separate pools, as long as you select the same maneuvers you can have more than one of the same maneuver readied. Either way, you aren't starving the crusader of maneuvers.

If you have examples of similar language, please share. If you read what I wrote, then the crux is that "Maneuvers" is a single class feature which dictates both known and readied maneuvers. As the feature itself doesn't contain text about choosing a martial adept class we have to default to the known and readied descriptions. Only the readied description says anything about choosing a class. As known and readied maneuvers are the same feature, then you choose only a single class to benefit for each level just like other progression PRCs. There is no logical leap. It's literally bread crumbs mere millimeters apart.

Of course, this does assume that I'm remembering one rule correctly: IIRC, you cannot take the same maneuver twice, even with different classes. This trick takes advantage of the limited number of first level maneuvers; as long as your first Crusader level is taken before ECL 5 and you already know 3 of the 1st level maneuvers available to Crusaders, you become an Idiot Crusader by default.

I don't believe that is the case:

Maneuvers Known: The collection of maneuvers a martial adept has learned. You can think of this as the Martial adept's spellbook or spell list. A martial adept's class and level determine the number and level of maneuvers she knows.

Multiclass Martial Adept: A character with two or more martial adept classes keeps track of his readied maneuvers, expended maneuvers, and recovery of expended maneuvers separately for each class.

[Elves]

...snip...

You're right, I was way overthinking that. Was treating it like you'd have to get WRT on your 1st crusader level but you can just get it through a feat, item or PRC level later. And yeah, that's actually better than the Mo9 solution -- 3 levels rather than 4 and no prereqs.

I'm under the assumption that martial adept classes either share the pool of known maneuvers or have separate pools of known maneuvers. The latter is highly likely due to the wording for PRC features. When you multiclass, you ready and expend maneuvers separately. This means if you share the pool you can have overlapping maneuvers readied. If you have separate pools, as long as you select the same maneuvers you can have more than one of the same maneuver readied. Either way, you aren't starving the crusader of maneuvers.

You have separate pools, and you cannot learn the same maneuver twice. A maneuver is either known or not, and if it's known it's in one of your pools.

I don't believe this is explicitly stated in the book, though there's evidence throughout. But it was made explicit by CustServ, toward which I'm a lot more charitable when it's clearing up how a new subsystem works or filling in absent info as opposed to making a ruling based on existing info. & IIRC that custserv was done in consultation with the authors.

CustServ also uses the magic "choose" word re: maneuvers known from PRCs:

This is actually covered in the rules, though with all the crunchy bits in the book it’s easy to miss! When you gain additional maneuvers known from a prestige class, you choose one of the martial adept classes that you have and add it to the maneuvers known of that class.

[Darg]

You have separate pools, and you cannot learn the same maneuver twice. A maneuver is either known or not, and if it's known it's in one of your pools.

Where is this stated? Is there explicit text that says you can't chose them twice even with the separate pools? I'm just not seeing anything that says you can't choose the same maneuver with separate classes. If it's like a spellbook as in the quote, then you can't pick the same "spell" for the same class but you can if you have another one.

[Drelua]

I found a repost of the ToB Q&A on another forum here. Under 'General Maneuver Questions:'

Q: Another multiclass question. Can a multiclassed martial adept (eg. Swordsage/Warblade) choose/and or ready the same maneuver for each of it's classes (provided you have access to the same maneuver)? And if you gain a maneuver in one class, can you use it as a prerequisite in gaining a maneuver in the other class?
A: No, you can only ever learn/ready a maneuver once. If you gain a maneuver in one class it can indeed fulfill prerequisites in another class!

Yeah, they said you can't know the same maneuver twice. That seems like a very silly rule to me, since it mostly punishes multiclass characters while creating a loophole for Crusaders. Personally I would rule otherwise, this doesn't seem to have been thought through very well. They didn't seem to consider how they were contradicting an earlier answer regarding Crusaders:

Q: Dear Sage,
Could a crusader (Tome of Battle, p.8) choose to learn or ready fewer maneuvers than he or she would be entitled to?
--Joe & Sam
A: No.
You must learn and ready the full number of maneuvers entitled to you by your level.
Otherwise, you’d be able to cycle through your favorites faster, which defeats the purpose of the crusader’s unique recharge mechanic.

I didn't see any reference to what happens if you don't have enough maneuvers available to learn, so there seems to be a good chance they never considered the possibility.

[Thunder999]

So apparently the myth comes from people arguing about how to endlessly spam a single maneuver with an evidently highly debatable build, and even if you're not using infinite turns with white raven tactics, that's going to give the impression of some supremely cheesy min/maxing.

[Darg]

Interesting. So it comes from an answer in the FAQ that contradicts the book that says to treat it like a spellbook and itself when it says you have a requirement to fill the maneuvers known to prevent the exact exploit made possible by the first answer. As always, the FAQ is, well, the FAQ.

[Crake]

As I always understood it, using WRT on yourself did nothing. Moving your initiative count to just after yourself in essence achieves nothing, as your position in the turn order doesn't move. The only way WRT can be used for infinite turn shenanigans is when you have TWO people with WRT who alternate using it on one another.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

So apparently the myth comes from people arguing about how to endlessly spam a single maneuver with an evidently highly debatable build, and even if you're not using infinite turns with white raven tactics, that's going to give the impression of some supremely cheesy min/maxing.

Of course, the "fair" use of White Raven Tactics is still too powerful for an effect acquired at level 5. It is, in fact, one of the better arguments for why ToB is overpowered. It only falls flat in comparison to changing shape and calling creatures.

[Elves]

So apparently the myth comes from people arguing about how to endlessly spam a single maneuver with an evidently highly debatable build.

Idiot crusader has been accepted for over a decade. That one person in this thread argues against it based on a fringe reading of TOB that rejects the authorial FAQ and enables a bunch of other shenanigans doesn't make it debatable.

The real reason for TOB being controversial has nothing to do with WRT loops. For "casuals", it had several things against it: the weeaboo aesthetics, the sense that it was videogamey, the classes being better than low-op PHB martials, the idea that it forced your fighter to be magical. All of these were grossly overstated. But what they boil down to is that it was something new at the time and presented itself as such, and people are naturally suspicious of new things in hobbies they like.

Interesting. So it comes from an answer in the FAQ that contradicts the book

Where is it contradicting the book? It's not specified one way or the other.

And the FAQ ruling is more functional. If you could learn maneuvers multiple times, any warblade 1/swordsage 1/crusader 1 could put on a discipline item and get 3 uses of any maneuver they qualify for (WRT/IHS/the Diamond Mind counters/etc) since it would become known for all their classes.

As always, the FAQ is, well, the FAQ.

I wouldn't say so. A lengthy FAQ written with input from the actual authors of what was then a newly published book, clarifying how the subsystem works, should be taken seriously.

As someone who in several cases disagrees with FAQ rulings, I want to be clear about my view on it. By default, it should be taken seriously and as an indication of RAI. Where it should be disregarded is where it interprets the written text in a way that doesn't logically hold -- where it shows us its reasoning for a ruling, and we can analyze that reasoning and say it's wrong. For example, with strongheart vest and hellfire warlock, the FAQ argued as you did that the use of "attack" in the strongheart text means its effect only applies against attacks. But then we read on and see the effect actually applies "Any time you take ability damage". Here then, the FAQ's logic is wrong and so its ruling doesn't hold.

It's more nuanced than "FAQ is bad".

[Drelua]

And the FAQ ruling is more functional. If you could learn maneuvers multiple times, any warblade 1/swordsage 1/crusader 1 could put on a discipline item and get 3 uses of any maneuver they qualify for (WRT/IHS/the Diamond Mind counters/etc) since it would become known for all their classes.

Would this really be that unfair? Those abilities still take actions, having 3 classes at an initiator level of 2 doesn't seem like it would be very good, and it wouldn't get much better at high levels. Take 6 levels of each and you have an initiator level of 12, so you could spam the same maneuver of up to 6th level when you could be using 9th level maneuvers. I don't see it being much different from having a multiclassed caster knowing the same spell for 2 or more classes. It's a bit stronger with the way initiator level works, but it's still just 'use weaker things more often.'

[Elves]

A justified skepticism of WOTC Customer Service answers has gone too far when you're going to throw out the authors' word on how their subsystem works just because. You should still have an actual reason for rejecting an FAQ answer.

Would this really be that unfair? Those abilities still take actions, having 3 classes at an initiator level of 2 doesn't seem like it would be very good, and it wouldn't get much better at high levels. Take 6 levels of each and you have an initiator level of 12, so you could spam the same maneuver of up to 6th level when you could be using 9th level maneuvers. I don't see it being much different from having a multiclassed caster knowing the same spell for 2 or more classes. It's a bit stronger with the way initiator level works, but it's still just 'use weaker things more often.'

Ingredient list:
- lesser crown of white ravens (3k)
- a warblade level and a swordsage level
- Adaptive Style feat.

I now have 2 uses of WRT. At the end of my turn I use WRT #1 for an extra turn, then on that WRT turn I use WRT #2. On WRT #2, I use adaptive style to refresh my maneuvers and then use WRT again, rinse and repeat.

This "fix" has resulted in an infinite loop that's even simpler and easier than the idiot crusader. As long as you can only know WRT once, all the exercise above is going to get you is an infinitely low initiative score.

[Kish]

It lets you have infinite turns in a round.

In the exact same way that carrying around enough water to get a party member's head until it means no one needs to worry about wounds that reduce them to negative hit points.

Ban water. Or, you know...adopt a "stupid RAW is just that: stupid" approach. But don't act like ToB is somehow more "broken" than anything else this forum's lovely theoretical optimizers touch.

[Thurbane]

A justified skepticism of WOTC Customer Service answers has gone too far when you're going to throw out the authors' word on how their subsystem works just because. You should still have an actual reason for rejecting an FAQ answer.

^^ Agree 100%.

I think we all agree FAQ has some contradictory and/or unworkable answers, but on the whole, I put more stock in the word of devs on RAW/RAI, more than I do random gamers on the webz.

[Drelua]

A justified skepticism of WOTC Customer Service answers has gone too far when you're going to throw out the authors' word on how their subsystem works just because. You should still have an actual reason for rejecting an FAQ answer.



Ingredient list:
- lesser crown of white ravens (3k)
- a warblade level and a swordsage level
- Adaptive Style feat.

I now have 2 uses of WRT. At the end of my turn I use WRT #1 for an extra turn, then on that WRT turn I use WRT #2. On WRT #2, I use adaptive style to refresh my maneuvers and then use WRT again, rinse and repeat.

This "fix" has resulted in an infinite loop that's even simpler and easier than the idiot crusader. As long as you can only know WRT once, all the exercise above is going to get you is an infinitely low initiative score.

You still need an initiator level of 5, so multiclassing like this might make the trick easier, but it works at a later level. Yes, any method of spamming WRT is broken, but in general I don't see it being much of a problem. The problem here is still the maneuver, not the system, so the maneuver still not being balanced doesn't really illustrate much either way. Are there any other maneuvers that would be too good to have more than once?

If that's still not a good system, what if you could learn a maneuver more than once, but only have it readied from one source? Idiot Crusader would still be doable, but it would take more resources since you'd have to ready all the maneuvers you don't want as a Warblade or Swordsage. Definitely in house rule territory at that point, just wondering if that would make things better or worse.

[Particle_Man]

"Q: Dear Sage,
Could a crusader (Tome of Battle, p.8) choose to learn or ready fewer maneuvers than he or she would be entitled to?
--Joe & Sam
A: No.
You must learn and ready the full number of maneuvers entitled to you by your level.
Otherwise, you’d be able to cycle through your favorites faster, which defeats the purpose of the crusader’s unique recharge mechanic."

I didn't see any reference to what happens if you don't have enough maneuvers available to learn, so there seems to be a good chance they never considered the possibility.

A *very* strict interpretation of this would stop idiot crusader in its tracks by simply not allowing a character to take a level of crusader at all if a character could not learn their full number of known maneuvers (5 in the case of the first class level of crusader) upon doing so.