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Thread: Why 3.5?

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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    I'm honestly not a fan of "instant-win" spells like that. At least most save-or-X spells well, actually have you roll a saving throw. Not that I'm particularly fond of save-or-die/lose spells either...
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    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
    I could write a lengthy explanation, but honestly just what danielxcutter said.
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Quote Originally Posted by RandomPeasant View Post
    No they don't. It says "a PC may die", not "the PCs are not expected to win". Similarly "tax the PCs to their limit" does not mean "the PCs will lose", it means "the PCs will win with no remaining resources". The text is clearly describing victory at a cost. Or, you know, exactly the thing I said it was.
    "The players might not realize they need to flee" is pretty clear that fleeing is a possible result. Fleeing is not overcoming the encounter, and while they may be able to flee and overcome it later, it does not say this is expected.

    Playtesting that gets the result of "success" when the expected result is "success" is not very useful.
    Ah, I see, you're only interested in playtesting results that have intentionally broken things (stress testing or bug testing). Unfortunately, as already mentioned, this was not called out as a "playtest" game. And considering how long it takes to run pen and paper DnD, I don't think the sort of thing you want is feasible for a very finite number of people playing in a very finite amount of time. The DM is already given authority to fix unexpected edge cases, and the designers are/were more concerned with making sure the expected use cases run as expected, or so I think and find more appropriate.

    And yet your citation that it is incorrect is "sometimes designers are wrong". In the absence of a conflicting source, the point stands.
    No, my citation (or rather, evidence) that it isn't correct is the easily seen proof that a 4th level core NPC Fighter does not compare to a Brown Bear, or a 12th level to a Purple Worm, or an X level Wizard to just about anything. It is exactly the same strength of evidence people use to claim the CR system is broken, because it is the same evidence, minus the skewed starting point. My citation is all of pages 48-50 (quoting entire pages of rulebooks is not allowed, however), where you can find no examples or mentions of classed NPCs, but continuous examples and mentions of monsters.

    You have not provided a citation within pages 48-50, nor one from outside it that usurps its primacy in defining the encounter system. Your stance* that NPC CR=level is in any way a foundation of the CR system is not found within the primary source for that part of the rules, and is easily shown as inaccurate. Do you have anything that can uproot the primary definitions of CR and Encounters from outside their own section? If you have only the one line from a section which defines NPCs rather than the CR and Encounter system itself, you have nothing that overrides the initial definitions. The evidence thus shows that NPC CR does not actually equal their level for either practical use or initial definition (even if it is useful for rewarding xp or as a starting point in estimating practical challenge), and the evidence does not show that the CR system is broken by NPC CR because the system never uses that as part of its definitions (though the second assertion has not yet been made here, it is a common extension and a major reason I've studied this section).

    *Carried by responding to and disagreeing with my response to danielxcutter's stance, which was stated in response to InvisibleBison describing one of the reasons LA and CR are valued differently by the system.


    This is a topic which I find very important, because a vastly huge amount of forum-think is based on this exact misreading of the CR and Encounter system. People say it says things that it does not say, and draw up entire straw castles of justification for their own opinions which they claim are just extensions of the rules and insist are fundamental problems with "the game" which are always true, but are instead based on what is at best an extremely biased reading while those problems are a result of a set of expectations the game never endorsed. I have searched for the citations that would prove them right, and in not finding them discovered that the assertion was less hard fact and more opinion based on a chosen reading. Here there was a discussion comparing CR and LA and this reading was stated as a hard fact (directly contradicting the very existence of LA itself), and so I have explained why this reading is not only not the only one, but in my opinion a clear misreading.

    Since danielxcutter seems to have declined to carry the argument and you have provided no new citations to support it, I have nothing more to add.



    The Balor flies faster than the flight from fly, and can engage at ranges that exceed that of a charge. Dispelling fly looks like it was important, but it was of relatively little real consequence.
    The person who ran the fight explicitly said it was of very real consequence, and it looks to have kept their best attacker out of nearly the entire fight. If you're simply going to reject anything but your own gameplay as evidence, consider why then anyone should accept yours.

    Yes, that's exactly what the use of Spellcraft is for. The ability to identify spells from their effects allows you to differentiate between different spells with similar effects.
    I'm not the only poster that immediately called out the wording of the skill:

    Quote Originally Posted by srd
    Identify a spell that’s already in place and in effect. You must be able to see or detect the effects of the spell. No action required. No retry.
    Spell Immunity has no visible effect. You do not "see or detect" that your spell fails, it simply fails, with the only direct feedback you can claim as "detecting" being that you rolled an SR check and failed. If you choose to give out more information than the skill says to, go ahead, but arguing about rules citations and then making a skill more powerful than the rules say it is, is applying a double standard.

    The skill that would actually excuse this tactic would if anything be Knowledge, to know what sort of things could be causing a phenomenon in order to make an educated guess at which is most likely and respond accordingly. But since Spellcraft takes the place of nearly all rolls regarding spells, it kinda ruins that of its own accord: by bringing up that roll which doesn't actually give the information it only highlights the fact that there's no stated Knowledge DC to know about spells- only rolls to identify and learn them.

    And of course, even "identifying" the spell doesn't necessarily mean you get to look it up- the skill doesn't actually say what that means.

    Making absolute statements about RAW Knowledge and Spellcraft generally doesn't work out, as they're mostly left to the DM.


    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    Paizo intentionally avoided making their own versions of Incarnum, Binding, Initiating, Psionics (well, mostly) etc in order to leave fertile ground for 3PP designers to play in.
    Incidentally since you usually seem to know the PF stuff, if I may ask a quick side question: Why is it that the 3rd party PF publishers were able to re-make all that stuff? I was under the impression that the OGL did not allow that since those were non-OGL books, and yet some (though not all) of the 3PP versions use not only what are obviously the same mechanics but even some of the same terminology.

    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    CR is only the starting point for encounter difficulty. The final number, which I mentioned above, is Encounter Level (EL). That takes into account everything, from the base monster abilities and tactics to the features of the terrain and even the number and capabilities of the PCs. So even if you argue that the CR doesn't change by adjusting these variables, the EL still can (and in many cases will.)
    In fact, the EL itself doesn't actually do anything- as you said, the CR converted into initial EL is just the starting point. A module may state an EL that doesn't match the CRs of the given monsters, indicating the writer has attempted to judge the changes they've made. But there's actually no reason for a DM writing their own encounter to assign a numerical value as a modifier to EL. Lots of people like to just award XP based on the EL and might use that as their method of modifying the XP value, but the EL modifiers given on the table still only correspond to the DM's evaluation ranging from half as difficult to twice as difficult. And if you've already judged it as worth say half XP, you already have the XP modifier you need.

    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    DMG 39: "An orc warband that attacks the PCs by flying over them in primitive hang gliders and dropping large rocks is not the same encounter as one in which the orcs just charge in with spears. Sometimes, the circumstances give the characters' opponents a distinct advantage. Other times, the PCs have the advantage. Adjust the XP award and the EL depending on how greatly circumstances change the encounter's difficulty."

    As explicitly shown in that quote, unexpected/superior tactics are considered a change in circumstance and you're expected to modify the EL accordingly.
    Also again on DMG 50: "Modifying Difficulty: Orcs with crossbows firing down at the PCs while the characters cross a narrow ledge over a pit full of spikes. . . Consider the sorts of factors, related to location or situation, that make an encounter more difficult, such as the following."



    Quote Originally Posted by Elves View Post
    made a system that worked the way they wanted to play, which would be one with much less charm and depth (see 5e).

    Also, remember this is 15-20 years ago. If you look at old threads, standards were lower in general then. We're sitting on 20 years of community knowledge.
    Indeed. Years of uncountable "volunteer playtesters" intentionally stress-testing the game and pooling their knowledge online is going to result in vastly different expectations of the game. I started back in 3.0 reading the PHB and DMG, so my expectations were set before all of that (even if it took me years to realize why I always had that feeling in the back of my head that something was off even as I espoused viewpoints I now reject).


    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    I’m fairly sure most modules have monsters using atypical tactics without adjusting the EL.
    Depends on the module. A lot of early modules actually do give ELs higher than the component monsters and award extra xp, sometimes for things small enough I wouldn't even count them (or would count them as necessary). But a lot of later modules completely ignore this, DM-op'ing their encounters with favorable terrain, ambushes, inability to retreat, and no extra rewards. I found when evaluating the Fortress of the Yuan-Ti adventure that not only were all the encounters above the suggested party level, and one of the monsters was missing a CR increase from size due to HD advancement, but they've got a particular encounter people rated as killer where people just fall into a room full of multiple save or lose auras on top of an extra effect from the room itself, and it's treated as a perfectly normal fight. I've been making an example of it ever since.


    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    I'm honestly not a fan of "instant-win" spells like that. At least most save-or-X spells well, actually have you roll a saving throw. Not that I'm particularly fond of save-or-die/lose spells either...
    I've considered trying to cut save or dies, but the moment you do you realize that what you've got is. . . 5e. Part of what makes 3.x exciting is that yeah, there are spells and monsters that just straight up wreck you in a single roll, and other spells that don't even care about a roll, and those completely arbitrary "Magic is Powerful so deal with it" are a fundamental part of why 3.x feels the way it does- like Magic is Powerful. If you make a game where magic is completely fair, it's not very magical. Magic is the ancient wish-fulfillment trope, it's literally not supposed to be balanced, that's the whole point, and 3.x magic gets that. It can cause all sorts of problems, but the PCs are also supposed to be 1/2 magic users themselves, fighting magic and muscle with magic and steel. 3.x is not alone in having Powerful Magic, but this combines with the rest of the system being so simulation-first, and full of parallel advancement paths, and all that detail and customization and expression via mechanics large and small gets to go forth into a world full of Powerful Magic and Monsters which are dangerous, but also function on many of the same rules, and have been pre-ranked based on level (and indeed can often themselves be accessed by the PCs).

    On the other hand you can make it easier to recover from those insta-fails than 3.5 would have it, when they raised the Raise costs by a factor of 10 for most of the game, which feels like an epiphany I should have had ages ago- increase death by reducing death costs so that players will actually end up dying less horribly (because they get practice).
    Last edited by Fizban; 2022-01-06 at 04:11 AM. Reason: missed half an old sentence deletion
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    3.5e balance being out of whack isn't a feature Fizban, it's a bug. Of course they're very entertaining bugs, so there's nothing wrong with enjoying them inherently, but when you must be a caster to approach anything resembling relevance without serious optimization and even then all you're good at is damage I wouldn't call that great design.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
    I could write a lengthy explanation, but honestly just what danielxcutter said.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    If you make a game where magic is completely fair, it's not very magical. Magic is the ancient wish-fulfillment trope, it's literally not supposed to be balanced, that's the whole point, and 3.x magic gets that.
    This is very subjective. I've heard similar arguments against having actually consistant, non-arbitrary magic systems – "If you can understand it, it's not magic" – and while both that point and yours are certainly legit opinions, they're certainly not everyone's.

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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    I'd say it's a problem when spellcasters are objectively superior to the point where pure martials are completely obsolete. Which... is kinda what's going on with 3.5e.

    If you think it's fun to have such comprehensive, immense power that others don't have, think about how they'd feel. Not everyone enjoys being a glorified cohort at best.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
    I could write a lengthy explanation, but honestly just what danielxcutter said.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Raven777 View Post
    But a Balor that's done fooling around should be played as close to META as a DM can manage.
    That's honestly the rub for me. How does a functionally alien being, whose very biology and psychology are formed of Chaos and Evil and sadism even towards its allies, even define "done fooling around?" Is it the same way we would? Yeah, the tactically superlative option for a Balor would be to make sure no adventuring party has a hope of ever fighting it with a single buff active, and it has both the means and smarts to theoretically do so - but would every Balor find that fun? Even if the "fun" approach means a greater chance of losing the battle? It's down to the DM, and I don't think there is just one clear answer to that question.

    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    Incidentally since you usually seem to know the PF stuff, if I may ask a quick side question: Why is it that the 3rd party PF publishers were able to re-make all that stuff? I was under the impression that the OGL did not allow that since those were non-OGL books, and yet some (though not all) of the 3PP versions use not only what are obviously the same mechanics but even some of the same terminology.
    I can't safely answer that question in any kind of detail without running afoul of the forum rules against legal advice. Rather than do so, I'll make a couple of unrelated observations.

    A PF class whose core concept is "guy gets supernatural powers by drawing elaborate symbols on the ground, and using said symbols to contact and make pacts with beings outside reality for a period of 24 hours, and depending on how well he does with his pacting roll he might have to act the way they want him to act for the duration of said pact" - all of that's a game mechanic.

    If you wanted to write a book where that guy is called a "Binder" and the things he's pacting with are called "Vestiges" however... those names are not game mechanics.

    If you want to know more, I suggest you reach out to the 3PP PF authors who've made and sold the books in question.
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Does anyone have the specific run-down of the fight?
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    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Quote Originally Posted by RandomPeasant View Post



    As always, I'm not convinced by this. The Beguiler and Dread Necromancer are T2. That's worse than the Wizard, but not by a lot. And a chunk of that is because the Wizard arbitrarily gets a half-level bump on spontaneous spellcasters. How big is the gap between a Dread Necromancer that gets new spells at odd levels and a Wizard? I'm sure it's something, but I think "a lot more balanced" is a hard sell for that margin.
    A portion of their T2ness had to do with how easily spells could be added to their list, and the Beguiler has an incredibly broad list of spells with illusions, time, conjuration, mind effecting and other spells.

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    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    3.5e balance being out of whack isn't a feature Fizban, it's a bug. Of course they're very entertaining bugs, so there's nothing wrong with enjoying them inherently, but when you must be a caster to approach anything resembling relevance without serious optimization and even then all you're good at is damage I wouldn't call that great design.
    I didn't say the "balance was out of whack," that's all you. I said there's Powerful Magic, and that half the party is also meant to wield it. You could say that making some magic that Powerful* was unintended as evidenced by further changes in later editions, but I disagree. Magic had Powerful effects before 3.x, and its reduction later does not mean it was not meant to be so in 3.x.

    *Note how I'm treating that as its own term- Powerful with a capital "P," as in significant, arbitrary, supreme within its domain. Not general statements of character "power."

    You have a set of game expectations that makes your complaints about caster/non-caster relevance and optimization requirements true, but that is your expectations, and it's easy to see those do not match those of the designers because following those expectations results in greater problems than the designers anticipate and advise about in their guides to running the game they wrote. You should really not treat the results of your expectations as an absolute, universal, fundamental problem with the game. Tons of people have played the game without those problems simply by not playing that way, not having those expectations. They're not having fun in spite of "entertaining bugs"- there are in fact plenty of people to which your horrible balance woes are completely overblown personal problems you caused yourself.

    Every time you say that the game is broken or unbalanced or some class isn't "relevant," with zero context to make that true, you're putting your version (or rather, your statement, see below) of the game first while ignoring anyone else's, without any visible acknowledgement that your opinion is an opinion. In a further post you even claim it's "objectively" true. It is not. There are no objective truths about the game as a whole, and barely any about even the smallest and most discrete readings of individual rules.

    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    If you think it's fun to have such comprehensive, immense power that others don't have, think about how they'd feel. Not everyone enjoys being a glorified cohort at best.
    So don't play or run the game that way.

    And as a matter of fact, there is a whole other tabletop RPG where a certain portion of the players actually do play "glorified cohorts," in a deliberately asymmetrical combination with other players who are the uber magicians, as a fundamental part of the game. And hey look, DnD 3.x is so huge it can support multiple types of game. The one where you play as the designers expected, and the one where casters are "objectively" (contextually, in that particular type of game) so powerful that some of the players could be playing sidekicks- and also the game where everyone's character is that powerful and the DM dials up all the threats to match them, and. . .

    You count yourself as savvy about this game. I'm pretty sure you don't actually play or run games where some of the players are stuck playing "glorified cohorts," unless they actually want to do that. Which means that the premise you're constantly hammering on as "objectively true," is actually a straw man. Because I don't play that way either. People try to run games that are fun. The DMG tells the DM to use and modify the rules however they need to in order to make the game fun. The default assumption is that people play the game because it's fun, and all you're saying is that running the game a way that isn't fun, is not fun. So if you're not running the game that way, and I'm not, and no one else has said they're having a problem, that means no one is actually playing that way.

    To whose benefit is constant complaining about problems no one is having? This thread is literally about why people choose to play 3.5.

    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    Does anyone have the specific run-down of the fight?
    I linked the Balor fight when I first responded to you about it, here it is again.


    Quote Originally Posted by Batcathat View Post
    This is very subjective. I've heard similar arguments against having actually consistant, non-arbitrary magic systems – "If you can understand it, it's not magic" – and while both that point and yours are certainly legit opinions, they're certainly not everyone's.
    Sure, but it's my and plenty of others' take on it just as much, and I stated why I think it's a part of the original ancient trope even if there are many more branching interpretations of magic now (although if someone had a tracing of fantasy tropes back through history to the oldest stories we have which happened to refute that, I'd gladly eat the words to read it ). I never said anything about magic having to be mysterious though- I think the important part of the trope here is that magic can be arbitrary, with respect to those not doing the magic. A fair system that (for example) always gives you a roll to resist is fair, but it can never invoke the same gut response that you'd get from facing Powerful Magic against which you simply don't get to roll. That sort of magic can still be perfectly well understood and structured. 3.x's extremely structured magic (and even magitech) system already does both.


    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    I can't safely answer that question in any kind of detail without running afoul of the forum rules against legal advice. Rather than do so, I'll make a couple of unrelated observations. . .
    If you want to know more, I suggest you reach out to the 3PP PF authors who've made and sold the books in question.
    Nah, I'll settle for "probably legal stuff more arcane than I'm equipped to handle," no need to bother anyone just for the curiosity. Thanks though.
    Last edited by Fizban; 2022-01-04 at 03:16 AM.
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    Sure, but it's my and plenty of others' take on it just as much, and I stated why I think it's a part of the original ancient trope even if there are many more branching interpretations of magic now. I never said anything about magic having to be mysterious though- I think the important part of the trope here is that magic can be arbitrary, with respect to those not doing the magic. A fair system that (for example) always gives you a roll to resist is fair, but it can never invoke the same gut response that you'd get from facing Powerful Magic against which you simply don't get to roll. That sort of magic can still be perfectly well understood and structured. 3.x's extremely structured magic (and even magitech) system already does both.
    Sure, I don't mind magic seeming arbitrary from an outside perspective. It could be compared to something like real-life math that can seem completely random and arbitrary for someone who doesn't know enough of it. But seeming arbitrary and being arbitrary are different and I find a lot of magic systems (including D&D's) to be the latter (it's structured, yes, but without much internal logic, in my opinion).

    I get that magic should invoke a sense of wonder, what I don't agree with is how it being unbalanced and arbitrary helps with that.

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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Quote Originally Posted by Batcathat View Post
    Sure, I don't mind magic seeming arbitrary from an outside perspective. It could be compared to something like real-life math that can seem completely random and arbitrary for someone who doesn't know enough of it. But seeming arbitrary and being arbitrary are different and I find a lot of magic systems (including D&D's) to be the latter (it's structured, yes, but without much internal logic, in my opinion).

    I get that magic should invoke a sense of wonder, what I don't agree with is how it being unbalanced and arbitrary helps with that.
    Well like I said, I think it's part of the ancient trope. Magic is power, wish-fulfillment. At it's core, it's not meant to be balanced. Either it's the power that gives the hero victory, or it's the overpowering threat that the hero must somehow defeat anyway. You can try to "balance" it, but if the gamers know it's well and truly balanced, it's just a different shade of "sword" or "bow" or "utility skills." There are a lot of people for which, even if they don't realize it, the defining feature of magic is that magic is the best, and if magic is weaker or even just balanced they'll feel it's a bad magic system. And the more rooted in stories where magic is Power, the more likely that is.

    There's a similar root problem behind "pet" classes. Sure, logically you can balance them, but the whole point of a "pet" is inherently unbalanced. The pet is supposed to be a threat to the same foes you personally fight, and you're supposed to contribute against foes the pet fights. If you can't fight on your own, then you can't send the pet away to be in two places at once, you're really just a squishy the pet has to protect. If the pet can't fight on its own, it's a squishy you have to protect. This can all work fine narratively as these are two entities, but when you try to convert it into game mechanics where there are multiple players and one player has a character that is actually two characters, it doesn't work. If the "pet class" actually results in two bodies capable of competing with single-body character classes, it's overpowered. If the pet class has two bodies which are sufficiently weaker, then foes which other basic single-body combat party members can fight will be more difficult for the pet/owner, removing the fantasy of being a badass who also has a badass pet (because when isolated you're clearly not).

    You can of course take a more balanced expectation that a "pet class" character should usually need to be focused in one spot and only has a situational advantage of being able to split up sometimes, but that's not the visceral, gut expectation the person drawn to the concept might be getting from stories with characters who have cool animal companions that can tag-team rescue them from monsters and such. The fantasy expects to be overpowered, because its a conflation of a story with two party members of similar power (one of which is a beast, the power actually coming from friendship with this extra beast character, or in short having a party), trying to turn that into a single character. What usually happens is that when someone writes a "pet" class, it's always on the stronger end or even obviously overpowered. Druid is a full caster, plus a pet. Necromancer builds are full casters, plus a horde or big minion. PF Summoner is a 2/3 caster, plus a pet which I'm told is quite overpowered. Even Paladin and Ranger maintain full BAB, minor casting, and extra abilities, on top of their pets (which are generally considered too weak as written). Add to this the fact that every 3.x character has a certain baseline combat skill and the game's expectations are not very much higher than basic attacks, and merely having one set of basic attacks plus a suitably animal/monstrous attack routine can easily be overpowered compared to some characters.

    And if you actually thread the needle well enough to turn two characters into a balanced single character, well congrats. Still can have people complain that the pet is too weak, or that someone else's character is stronger than theirs because they're not using/thinking of the pet as strongly. I think it's actually easier to thread the needle on pets though, if you're very clear about figuring out your attack/damage/etc expectations for other characters and aren't afraid of making a "combat" character squishier to account for having a whole second body and hit points. You can thread the needle for magic too, but while video games (and MMOs in particular) have been presenting pet classes and magic users as balanced against everyone else, there's a lot more literature reinforcing the Powerful Magic trope to overcome.

    And of course, I like that trope and its representation in 3.x, because I am one of those people who's read lots of Powerful Magic and wants it that way.
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Hmm.

    Okay, in a vacuum, the balor honestly didn't fight that bad? Greater Dispel Magic, Blasphemy, and Implosion are all solid spells, and the decision to use Fire Storm wasn't a terrible one since the party had no actual fire resistance and the balor noticed that.

    That being said, wasting three rounds in a row on SLAs specifically blocked by Greater Spell Immunity? It kinda feels like the DM was going easy on them. I think I would have had the balor try the Implosion or another Greater Dispel Magic then, or ditch spells entirely at that point. And it really should have tried the quickened Telekinesis SLA, even if it hadn't worked.

    The party... well, the combat medic cleric was weird but I guess it's an RP thing. The Barbarian and Hammer of Moradin hitting hard makes sense too. I really don't understand why the Wizard was using Quickened True Strike Multishots though, holy bow or not. I can't be sure without seeing a more detailed breakdown(which doesn't exist, I know) - maybe the Wizard was out of spells? The lack of a mention what the Wizard was doing before that could indicate that they were casting then. Still, that's only like... maybe thirty points of damage, if we're being generous?

    I dunno, it'd make more sense if the wizard was a gish or at least was indicated to have roughly medium-ish BAB from prestige classes but there's no indication of that whatsoever.

    Edit:

    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    [snipped for length]
    I kinda think you're missing the point, though? If two players can do all the cool stuff and the other two have nothing to do but do damage in combat - which is basically what happens without slanting the RP towards the non-casters or additional sourcebooks - plenty of people aren't going to find that fun at all.
    Last edited by danielxcutter; 2022-01-04 at 04:00 AM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    I really don't understand why the Wizard was using Quickened True Strike Multishots though, holy bow or not. I can't be sure without seeing a more detailed breakdown(which doesn't exist, I know) - maybe the Wizard was out of spells? The lack of a mention what the Wizard was doing before that could indicate that they were casting then. Still, that's only like... maybe thirty points of damage, if we're being generous?
    To be fair, I don't much get it either. Obviously they felt that was their best option, but they'd already taken Manyshot, so clearly they'd been planning on it. Maybe they'd done so specifically as a sort of gish-not-gish backup plan because there are foes that spells aren't great against, or maybe they just did it for the lulz. It's pretty comparable to and possibly more efficient than SR: No orbs would be, with few if any spells that could compete with the bow combo in reliability. If I had to guess, I'd say they took it as their backup for conserving spells- against enemies weak enough that say a Reserve feat would be fine, they could hit normal shots, and with True Strike they can upgrade that to Manyshots every other round, and Quickened up to every round, with the added bonus that they get to ignore SR and saves and resistances (while normal spells can already ignore DR).

    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    I kinda think you're missing the point, though? If two players can do all the cool stuff and the other two have nothing to do but do damage in combat - which is basically what happens without slanting the RP towards the non-casters or additional sourcebooks - plenty of people aren't going to find that fun at all.
    And clearly I kinda think you're the one missing the point. The other two players can do cool stuff, it's just not the same stuff (and it's stuff you don't think is cool)*. Taking a full attack from a big monster and surviving is cool. Hitting it back and knowing you can do that all day is cool, even if you consider that "just damage." Executing good tactical positioning to maximize actions and minimize party damage is cool. Having a bunch of skills you can use all day is cool. Plenty of people have/still do play the game and find it fun without massive modification, so clearly this is not an unavoidable problem. If someone doesn't think a build can do cool stuff, they usually won't make that character, problem avoided. If a group finds that the way they want to play makes certain classes less cool than others, they stop using those classes or fix them, but that doesn't mean the game is inherently broken.

    There's a very narrow space where you can say that people new to the game might make certain characters and then play a certain way and find the game having certain problems, and that's a fine thing to point out. But it's a narrow space that people either don't fall into or notice pretty quickly.

    *And I say this from experience. I'm traditionally a diehard caster player, and yet in the game where I was playing a special homebrew "spiker" class with a bunch of supernatural abilities to go with my magic, I was still plenty jealous of the tank build. Who "merely" did things like walk through a high level Blade Barrier to smash in the face of an enemy Cleric, in an Antimagic Field, and then walk back out, or wade into the friendly fire of a Black Tentacles and proceed to grapple and choke out a bunch of Trolls for fun (he had no Improved Grapple, just BAB/Str/Powerful Build). My build was effectively a hyper specialized Battle Sorcerer, but hey look- I wasn't playing an over-optimized "tier 1" and making everyone feel bad (of course, I was effectively playing an over-optimized "tier 2," and one player did feel bad despite having magic of their own, but anyway).
    Last edited by Fizban; 2022-01-04 at 04:52 AM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    To be fair, I don't much get it either. Obviously they felt that was their best option, but they'd already taken Manyshot, so clearly they'd been planning on it. Maybe they'd done so specifically as a sort of gish-not-gish backup plan because there are foes that spells aren't great against, or maybe they just did it for the lulz. It's pretty comparable to and possibly more efficient than SR: No orbs would be, with few if any spells that could compete with the bow combo in reliability. If I had to guess, I'd say they took it as their backup for conserving spells- against enemies weak enough that say a Reserve feat would be fine, they could hit normal shots, and with True Strike they can upgrade that to Manyshots every other round, and Quickened up to every round, with the added bonus that they get to ignore SR and saves and resistances (while normal spells can already ignore DR).
    That still feels really inefficient... I guess SR is still kind of a pain, but wouldn't it still be way more better to cast buffs or BFC spells even if they expected to fail all the SR checks?
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    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    That still feels really inefficient... I guess SR is still kind of a pain, but wouldn't it still be way more better to cast buffs or BFC spells even if they expected to fail all the SR checks?
    The article said they'd already cast "standard buffs." You can name which spells they should have cast, but well- what mid-combat buffs or BFC spells should they have cast? You can probably dig something up, but what are the odds they had that particular spell? The most general unstoppable BFC I can think of is Solid Fog, which people love, except it doesn't do anything- this party was 3/5 melee characters, anything you throw at the Balor is going to get in their way too.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    Well like I said, I think it's part of the ancient trope. Magic is power, wish-fulfillment. At it's core, it's not meant to be balanced. Either it's the power that gives the hero victory, or it's the overpowering threat that the hero must somehow defeat anyway. You can try to "balance" it, but if the gamers know it's well and truly balanced, it's just a different shade of "sword" or "bow" or "utility skills." There are a lot of people for which, even if they don't realize it, the defining feature of magic is that magic is the best, and if magic is weaker or even just balanced they'll feel it's a bad magic system. And the more rooted in stories where magic is Power, the more likely that is.
    Maybe (though the fact that plenty of people play and enjoy games where magic – if not perfectly balanced – is a lot less overpowered than D&D's makes me question it), but I think magic feeling... well, magical is less about it being Powerful and more about it feeling different. That is, that magic can do what non-magic can't. Which D&D magic certainly can, only it can also do what non-magic can do (and usually much better) which leads to imbalance.
    Last edited by Batcathat; 2022-01-04 at 04:34 AM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    The article said they'd already cast "standard buffs." You can name which spells they should have cast, but well- what mid-combat buffs or BFC spells should they have cast? You can probably dig something up, but what are the odds they had that particular spell? The most general unstoppable BFC I can think of is Solid Fog, which people love, except it doesn't do anything- this party was 3/5 melee characters, anything you throw at the Balor is going to get in their way too.
    Probably Haste, that's a bit too short to cast before combat I'd say. And it's not like they had to cast at the Balor - they could have focused on locking down the troll or the marilith while the rest of the party caved its skull in.

    Quote Originally Posted by Batcathat View Post
    Maybe (though the fact that plenty of people play and enjoy games where magic – if not perfectly balanced – is a lot less overpowered than D&D's makes me question it), but I think magic feeling... well, magical is less about it being Powerful and more about it feeling different. That is, that magic can do what non-magic can't. Which D&D magic certainly can, only it can also do what non-magic can do (and usually much better) which leads to imbalance.
    tl;dr It's not that casters can do things martials can't, it's that martials don't really have things to do that the casters can't.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Seward View Post
    Basically the problem with anecdotes involving Balors or Dragons or Tier 1 classed BBEGs or similar "supposed to be super smart" enemies is that any anecdote that involves PCs winning, which will be nearly all of them, will be poo-pooed by a kibitzer claiming dumb tactics on the villain side. Which usually ignores the work the PCs put in to get that advantage, and also the BBEG's motivations, information limits, personality and potentially outside things PCs know nothing of, such as rivals, prior battles, etc. Many of those fights involve PCs choosing an approach that matches what they learned about the enemy. Not just Kn check vs monster weakness, but how they behaved prior to their final fatal encounter with the PCs.
    The Spherical Rothe effect hits D&D 3.5e fandom really hard.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Max_Killjoy View Post
    A game setting does need to be designed to be fun and functional to game in.

    But there's more to good worldbuilding than piling the "parts to game in" on a big pile.

    Farmland isn't there to be adventured in, primarily, but one assumes it's still there and part of the landscape -- just because adventurers don't go there often doesn't mean it doesn't or shouldn't or needn't exist.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Scots Dragon View Post
    The Spherical Rothe effect hits D&D 3.5e fandom really hard.
    I'm sorry the what.
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    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    I'm sorry the what.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Max_Killjoy View Post
    A game setting does need to be designed to be fun and functional to game in.

    But there's more to good worldbuilding than piling the "parts to game in" on a big pile.

    Farmland isn't there to be adventured in, primarily, but one assumes it's still there and part of the landscape -- just because adventurers don't go there often doesn't mean it doesn't or shouldn't or needn't exist.

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    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    Honestly, Blasphemy is a pretty good opener. But IÂ’d expect it to break out the high level SLAs pretty quickly becauseÂ… why wouldnÂ’t it?
    You can talk all you want about attempting to conserve resources, but when you get down to it, the Balor's only limited resources are fire storm, implosion, the Summon, and Quickened uses of telekinesis. Even if you accept that the Balor is supposed to be conserving resources, there's no particular reason for it not to jump to blasphemy and dominate monster, as those are both at-will SLAs.

    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    I'm honestly not a fan of "instant-win" spells like that. At least most save-or-X spells well, actually have you roll a saving throw. Not that I'm particularly fond of save-or-die/lose spells either...
    blasphemy is fine if both CL and HD are tightly controlled, and it doesn't show up as an at-will SLA in the hands of boss monsters. The dynamic of "blow away minions, weaken the boss's lieutenants, do nothing to the boss" is fine, it's just that both CL and HD vary wildly.

    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    "The players might not realize they need to flee" is pretty clear that fleeing is a possible result.
    Fleeing is a possible result of any encounter. The language used is very clear about not taxing players past their limits, when it uses the phase "to their limits" instead of "past their limits".

    And considering how long it takes to run pen and paper DnD, I don't think the sort of thing you want is feasible for a very finite number of people playing in a very finite amount of time.
    People found and reported bugs in 3.5 while it was in playtest, and those bugs made it into the final product. It is entirely possible to do better than the designers did, insisting otherwise is FUD.

    No, my citation (or rather, evidence) that it isn't correct is the easily seen proof that a 4th level core NPC Fighter does not compare to a Brown Bear, or a 12th level to a Purple Worm, or an X level Wizard to just about anything.
    Do all the other CR 4 creatures compare to the brown bear? What about all the other CR 12 creatures and the Purple Worm? What about the templated monsters, that are derived from CR == Level, then modified by a fixed value. Are all templates somehow capable of smoothing out all the issues with converting levels to CR, or is every single template CR entry also a designer error?

    You have not provided a citation within pages 48-50, nor one from outside it that usurps its primacy in defining the encounter system.
    So what? You haven't provided a source in there that conflicts with the claim. You haven't provided a source that conflicts with the claim at all. Your argument is just "designers can be wrong" and "if you look at the data, I'm pretty sure they're wrong". My argument is that the rules say that, in most cases, CR == Level. Until you produce rules that say that is not the case, that is what the rules say, and it makes you wrong.

    The person who ran the fight explicitly said it was of very real consequence, and it looks to have kept their best attacker out of nearly the entire fight. If you're simply going to reject anything but your own gameplay as evidence, consider why then anyone should accept yours.
    So because they made analysis, that analysis must be correct?

    Spell Immunity has no visible effect. You do not "see or detect" that your spell fails, it simply fails, with the only direct feedback you can claim as "detecting" being that you rolled an SR check and failed. If you choose to give out more information than the skill says to, go ahead, but arguing about rules citations and then making a skill more powerful than the rules say it is, is applying a double standard.
    When you cast fire storm, and you see that people take no damage, that is seeing something. When you detect that a spell fails because of infinite SR, that is detecting something. Just because you don't want to admit the possibility that the designers might not understand the game doesn't mean the skill doesn't do anything. That usage is for exactly this situation -- observing an effect that could be caused by multiple spells and determining which caused it.

    Making absolute statements about RAW Knowledge and Spellcraft generally doesn't work out, as they're mostly left to the DM.
    Oh, and we're once again back to "it doesn't matter what the rules say, the DM should just tune it to what they want", which is still a concession of the point rather than an argument.

    Also again on DMG 50: "Modifying Difficulty: Orcs with crossbows firing down at the PCs while the characters cross a narrow ledge over a pit full of spikes. . . Consider the sorts of factors, related to location or situation, that make an encounter more difficult, such as the following."
    Also says absolutely nothing about tactics. I will grant you that something like "Balors engage inside a labyrinth of permanent illusions only they can see through" would be unfair. "Balors use their abilities effectively" is completely fair, and no amount of complaining will change that. Produce a citation that agrees with you, don't just pull random quotes.

    Quote Originally Posted by Lans View Post
    A portion of their T2ness had to do with how easily spells could be added to their list, and the Beguiler has an incredibly broad list of spells with illusions, time, conjuration, mind effecting and other spells.
    The list extension stuff matters at the high end of optimization. The stock Beguiler or Dread Necromancer is still firmly T2 when compared against similarly-unoptimized characters. And the Beguiler's list is somewhat broad, but it's nowhere near the Wizard. You are still primarily relying on Will saves for your offensive spells, even if you do have other options.

    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    I kinda think you're missing the point, though? If two players can do all the cool stuff and the other two have nothing to do but do damage in combat - which is basically what happens without slanting the RP towards the non-casters or additional sourcebooks - plenty of people aren't going to find that fun at all.
    And more than that, the practical effect of the Fighter being ineffective isn't "the Fighter is a cohort" but "the DM constructs adventures so the Cleric's and Wizard's abilities are trivialized". Imbalance lowers the game to the lowest common denominator. You don't get "more game" by adding character classes that suck, you get less. We already have a mechanism for making some characters worse than others. It's called level and it works very well. All the "imbalance is a feature" talk is from people who don't understand the game they're talking about.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    And as a matter of fact, there is a whole other tabletop RPG where a certain portion of the players actually do play "glorified cohorts," in a deliberately asymmetrical combination with other players who are the uber magicians, as a fundamental part of the game. And hey look, DnD 3.x is so huge it can support multiple types of game. The one where you play as the designers expected, and the one where casters are "objectively" (contextually, in that particular type of game) so powerful that some of the players could be playing sidekicks- and also the game where everyone's character is that powerful and the DM dials up all the threats to match them, and. . .
    Oh? Which game is that? That sounds interesting. And like it could be the base for a Fate/Stay Night-like game...

    Quote Originally Posted by Fizban View Post
    *And I say this from experience. I'm traditionally a diehard caster player, and yet in the game where I was playing a special homebrew "spiker" class with a bunch of supernatural abilities to go with my magic, I was still plenty jealous of the tank build. Who "merely" did things like walk through a high level Blade Barrier to smash in the face of an enemy Cleric, in an Antimagic Field, and then walk back out, or wade into the friendly fire of a Black Tentacles and proceed to grapple and choke out a bunch of Trolls for fun (he had no Improved Grapple, just BAB/Str/Powerful Build). My build was effectively a hyper specialized Battle Sorcerer, but hey look- I wasn't playing an over-optimized "tier 1" and making everyone feel bad (of course, I was effectively playing an over-optimized "tier 2," and one player did feel bad despite having magic of their own, but anyway).
    I know what you mean. I used to play a lot of low level games and was a caster nearly every time. And nearly everytime I got jealous at the other characters for having things like "hit points" or "good initiative". What use is being an oh-so-powerful wizard if the fight is nearly over before you get to act?

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    Quote Originally Posted by Tzardok View Post
    Oh? Which game is that? That sounds interesting. And like it could be the base for a Fate/Stay Night-like game...
    Ars Magica.

    And if you think D&D has bookkeeping for your character, you've seen nothing on that game. Both for characters and their dwelling, which is basically a character in itself. Plots span decades and your servants have kids that continue to serve the wizards, all getting stranger and stranger over time as everybody, wizard and mundane, get exposed to whatever high magic area you set up your home in. Also longevity potions and magical accidents tend to make wizards strange too, over time. You start out playing a just graduated apprentice. If you don't die violently, your main character has 80-100 years of play time, and while they don't tend to have kids, they do tend to take apprentices, which mean you are running a lot of characters in a mature campaign.

    Not a beer and pretzel game. More the tabletop equivalent of one of those conquer the world wargames that require you to have a board set up in the basement for a year and very dedicated players showing up every weekend to make a move, while doing paperwork between sessions.

    We had fun with it when me and all my housemates were mostly unemployed in the early 1990s but could never sustain it under more normal circumstances. You can do decent one-offs for a convention-type adventure if all the players understand the system and world though. Part of what makes it work is everybody makes a wizard, a "companion" (mundane with specialized skills) and several "grogs" (straight up bodyguards, of the "armed rabble" variety mostly - a highly skilled martial like an armored horseman or English Longbowman would tend to be a companion). Most of the time wizards are doing research or arcane projects, so a given adventure-style mission will have only 1-2 wizard characters, mostly younger ones, with the rest of the party filled out with grogs and maybe a companion or two.
    Last edited by Seward; 2022-01-04 at 09:02 AM.

  24. - Top - End - #204
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    NecromancerGirl

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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Quote Originally Posted by RandomPeasant View Post



    The list extension stuff matters at the high end of optimization. The stock Beguiler or Dread Necromancer is still firmly T2 when compared against similarly-unoptimized characters. And the Beguiler's list is somewhat broad, but it's nowhere near the Wizard. You are still primarily relying on Will saves for your offensive spells, even if you do have other options.
    I'm pretty sure the list extension stuff matters at all levels of optimization, and with out it they are much reduced in the T2 role. The Beguilers spell list is broader than it should be and has plenty of no save battlefield control for offense as well as buffs like haste that I think are outside the purview of what the Beguiler should have that can be cut as part of a rebalance.
    Last edited by Lans; 2022-01-04 at 09:46 AM.

  25. - Top - End - #205
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    It does kinda feel like they got all the spells Warmage and Dread Necromancer didn’t except for the Conjuration spells.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
    I could write a lengthy explanation, but honestly just what danielxcutter said.
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  26. - Top - End - #206
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Mobile giving me a headache I can’t easily nab the portion of Fizban’s essay that I’d like to quote.

    >3.5 D&D without save or die/no save spells is just 5e

    I’m not buying this one bit. In order to get from 3.5 to 5e you need to also:
    • strip the skill system down to an unmoving collection of die nudges that never promise competency.
    • compact the math of the system to the point that 5e martials make the 3.5e fighter look quadratic when you measure against chaff like low level goblins, among other things.
    • Eliminate most lasting consequences from hazards and creatures
    • Eliminate most options for playing actual large or small characters, or otherwise monstrous characters


    The list goes on. 3.5e is very much itself without no save just lose, or SoD. This is not also removing “nat 20 or die”/“nat 1 or you die”/“save or take lethal damage” scenarios being delivered by effect or attack, which are features of the system players could bumble their way into.
    If all rules are suggestions what happens when I pass the save?

  27. - Top - End - #207
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Quote Originally Posted by danielxcutter View Post
    tl;dr It's not that casters can do things martials can't, it's that martials don't really have things to do that the casters can't.
    This is an argument said a lot and is inherently untrue. A wizard focuses on skills wholly different than the martials/mundanes. Characters themselves build rapport with locals and if someone catches you casting charm the gig is up. A commander might be more inclined to trust the fighter with the charm of a cactus over a gangly wizard who has the charm of an eel. We can argue all about mechanics, that martials can't do anything the wizard can do (be an HP sponge, use combat maneuvers all day long, have higher BAB so they need less buffing to hit targets, less likely to die or be taken out of a fight from fortitude saves, don't need to rely on temporary spells to function as a frontliner, have connections the wizard could not, don't have to split a focus to fill a role, be an always present barrier to keep enemies from reaching backliners easily, etc.) There are a lot of things that martials can do that casters can't. If a wizard would rather spend a polymorph on themselves instead of a fighter that has more natural toughness and BAB, it is going to be worse than just using polymorph on the fighter.

    The focus is so much on what the casters can do that everyone forgets it's a 24hr world out there where casting a spell for every little thing makes the game unbearably tedious. Casters can do everything, just at the expense of a smooth running world because it bogs down into an extra complicated chess match.

  28. - Top - End - #208
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Ignoring that a core Wizard can snap a campaign over their knee despite having like 6 Str before racial and age modifiers if they try hard enough, what about the divine casters? CoDzilla isn’t just because the Druid actually can turn into a gigantic scaled lizard, y’know.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
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  29. - Top - End - #209
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Quote Originally Posted by Darg View Post
    This is an argument said a lot and is inherently untrue. A wizard focuses on skills wholly different than the martials/mundanes. Characters themselves build rapport with locals and if someone catches you casting charm the gig is up. A commander might be more inclined to trust the fighter with the charm of a cactus over a gangly wizard who has the charm of an eel. We can argue all about mechanics, that martials can't do anything the wizard can do (be an HP sponge, use combat maneuvers all day long, have higher BAB so they need less buffing to hit targets, less likely to die or be taken out of a fight from fortitude saves, don't need to rely on temporary spells to function as a frontliner, have connections the wizard could not, don't have to split a focus to fill a role, be an always present barrier to keep enemies from reaching backliners easily, etc.) There are a lot of things that martials can do that casters can't. If a wizard would rather spend a polymorph on themselves instead of a fighter that has more natural toughness and BAB, it is going to be worse than just using polymorph on the fighter.
    Sure, if we're looking at very specific things, there are things non-casters can do but casters can't. But I think it's more meaningful to look at slightly broader situations. Wizards might not be as good at taking a sword to the face or sticking it in someone else's as the figher – but they have plenty of spells to withstand or inflict damage. Wizards might not be as good at sneaking around as a rogue – but they have plenty of spells to handle stealth. Wizards might be not be as charming as a bard – but they have plenty of spells to change someone's mind. And so on and so on.

    And yes, martials doing things all day long while casters run out of spells is supposed to balance the two, but it typically doesn't work great in practice (even without extremes like a 15 minute adventuring day).

    Stuff like bonding with the locals is very situational and hardly something that helps with class balance, especially since you could just as easily run into people more prone to trusting wizards as the opposite.

    EDIT: It occurs to me that bard might be a bad choice to represent non-casters, so let's just say it's a stand-in for characters using non-magical persuasion.
    Last edited by Batcathat; 2022-01-04 at 10:50 AM.

  30. - Top - End - #210
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    Default Re: Why 3.5?

    Also, Cleric and Druid both have Diplomacy as a class skill. And Fighter and Barbarian don’t.
    Last edited by danielxcutter; 2022-01-04 at 10:36 AM.

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