I finally understood the caster/martial divide

[Anthrowhale]

See this nice overview: https://minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=11381 (shameless self plug).

You may want to mention Outsider Wings, Hengeyokai, and the graft base approaches to flight.

For buffing, Allied Defense+Improved Combat Expertise can help quite a bit. I also like the Double Team feat. White Raven Tactics is also amazing.

For extra actions, you may want to mention Snowtiger Berserker.

For Debuffing, Boomerang Daze can be quite potent.

For healing, Iron Heart Surge seems essential.

For invisiblity, a good hide check is reasonably achievable. Darkstalker is helpful there.

For seeing stuff, the Anthropomorphic Whale (Blindsight 120') and Antenna Graft (Tremorsense 60') are handy.

You may appreciate the team mundane builds.

I agree that Interplanar transport is the least solvable problem for mundanes.

I've never encountered Bodaks as horde monsters, but if you do you want Death Ward.

An alternative in many situations is simply hiding and sneaking as they are stupid and only have Spot+11. If you absolutely have to fight, then a running (or flying) battle with ranged weapons works as well since the death gaze is 30' and they only move 20'.

[Gnaeus]

On top of that, we discussed varying campaign types, but those tend to be linked, IME, to varying party assumptions. Yes, if your team is a military unit with a leader, the wizard's teleport is a group resource. But that is hardly a default assumption. Just like there is a range of campaign types from Railroad to Sandbox with a lot of ground in the middle, there is a range of party cooperation levels from seamless team to open PVP with even more range. If you are arguing whether to take the Ring to Gondor or Mordor or Erebor, being the only guy with the magic bus definitionally goes a long way towards pushing your character's choices. I know "rogue who steals from the party" is a trope. But I have absolutely seen the conversation "If I ever even SUSPECT that you are stealing from me, you will never receive a heal spell again". Or the one that goes "Players A and B get wondrous items at 50% (what they cost me). C is at 75% until she apologizes for what happened in the tavern, and D is a jerk who can pay market price". Most games I know frown on outright PVP without really solid IC reason, but most will allow IC actions based on IC motivations. ESPECIALLY for player driven, sandbox games. And the barbarian has virtually no party options other than Comply, Leave, or attempt Murder (which is basicly Comply, since leave is usually "remove my character from game" and murder is likely either banned or going to end the game or at best a coin flip as to who gets to remake their character). .

In a more railroady setting of Enter Dungeon, Clear floor by Floor, Repeat, there is less room for player shenanigans. Players are more likely to share a single, relevant goal. But those games also tend to be the most combat optimization heavy, because the win/loss condition tends to be winning the next day of combats, which is only interesting if those combats are both challenging and varied, which means that the characters with multiple ways of resolving combats have an advantage.

[Darg]

Out of curiosity, what 50 charge teleport item has a market value of 9k?

A 50 charge item is half the cost of an unlimited use item. Ring of the Ram is priced for a 9 × 5 × 1800 ÷ (5 ÷ 1) ÷ 2 priced item. You can do the same thing with teleport because it's the same spell level.

[Waazraath]

Bolded for emphasis. I think that part I bolded pretty clearly marks you in one specific mindset, at least the way I was using them. And, done right, it can be a very healthy mindset to have. But it’s not inherently perfect; there are lots of potential fail states to this method. For example, if I choose that my character’s weakness will be Will saves, and then we run through a module that constantly targets such, with Mind Control and Fear effects, while others’ lack of answers to Flight or Invisibility or Fortitude saves hardly matter, then I’m not going to get to play the game as much as everyone else does. At which point, the question is, is that fine with me? Can I (and everyone else) accept that not every role is the same size? Alternately, can I (and everyone else) give me an equal role to play despite my smaller time on stage (and is that unbalanced Balance fun?)?

I’m… oddly in both camps on this one. That is, I’m fine with running a character who was established as having no tactical acumen (and, no, I’m not discussing my signature tactically inept academia mage (drink!)), and sitting out for a 4-hour strategy session. OTOH, long ago I watched an episode of Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends, in which Submariner got taken out due to his dependency weakness, and was all like “**** that! - I’m not making characters like that”. So I’m much less keen on being taken out by such a weakness as “the only one vulnerable to Mind Control” or “the only one who can’t attack at range”.

So the mindset of the player, what types of imbalance and what causes produce that imbalance they find fun, can affect the effectiveness of this strategy at producing an enjoyable experience.

Yeah, 'covering all bases' indeed can be considered as 1 mindset, and it is my default approach - but the outcome of a session 0 can also be (and was in the past) 'whatever do what you like' (the corpse mindset I guess =P) or 'everybody optimize the heck out of everybody so everybody can do anything'.

You may want to mention Outsider Wings, Hengeyokai, and the graft base approaches to flight.

For buffing, Allied Defense+Improved Combat Expertise can help quite a bit. I also like the Double Team feat. White Raven Tactics is also amazing.

For extra actions, you may want to mention Snowtiger Berserker.

For Debuffing, Boomerang Daze can be quite potent.

For healing, Iron Heart Surge seems essential.

For invisiblity, a good hide check is reasonably achievable. Darkstalker is helpful there.

For seeing stuff, the Anthropomorphic Whale (Blindsight 120') and Antenna Graft (Tremorsense 60') are handy.

You may appreciate the team mundane builds.

I agree that Interplanar transport is the least solvable problem for mundanes.



An alternative in many situations is simply hiding and sneaking as they are stupid and only have Spot+11. If you absolutely have to fight, then a running (or flying) battle with ranged weapons works as well since the death gaze is 30' and they only move 20'.

Thnx, I'll update the guide when I port it over to GitP. As for the Bodaks, having a fort save of 1d20 +14 (or better) and a way to reroll saves also goes a long way. That 1/400 chance sucks if it happens, but there's resurrection and the like for that.

[RandomPeasant]

The thing about 'what ifs' is you can make up anything. What if the death cult instead had a red dragon with cold immunity and metabreath-shifted to breathe acid? What if the death cult instead happens to have a corrupted solar who uses Wish to move one party member to the paraelemental plane of ooze?

Indeed. What if? Perhaps you should prepare for a wide variety of possible threats, not just the one that seems most obvious. Yes, you should prepare more for the obvious threat. But the idea that just because you got information that says "this threat is obvious" that somehow means "these threats are ignorable" is just not true.

Looking at the actual in-game events that your character experiences and drawing conclusions from them is metagaming, yet using 'I read in this OOC book that this thing might exist, oh, and I won't even ask the DM if it exists because I don't trust that information to be reliable' is not? Yeah no, that's completely backwards.

The metagaming is the assumption that, just because you experienced a thing that worked one way, all future things must work that way. Yes, you fought an enemy that didn't have some mind magic. The idea that's strong evidence no enemies will have mind magic is, again, just not true. Plenty of enemies don't have mind magic. You could trivially have all your encounters as a 7th level character involve no Will saves and then fight a Mind Flayer the second you turned 8th level, and that would not be weird at all. But you would have use believe that, as a character on the cusp of 8th level, it would be "metagaming" to give any consideration to your Will save.

The trick is to use your readied/immediate action after they move, but before they attack, and to move yourself 90 degrees to the side, and out of their reach, meaning they cant just continue their charge to attack you, unless they have some ability that lets them zigzag their charge.

So if we assume that A) you can act during someone's action and B) moving during a charge stops the charge even if there was a valid charge to your new position and C) the target's reach is less than 10ft, then yes Abrupt Jaunt stops a charge.

I believe this is supported by the shadow mystery that is basically abrupt jaunt at will for 1 round/level that states that if you use it yo avoid an attack, the attack still has a 50% chance to land, so immediate actions must be usable after an action has been declared, but before they have been resolved,

Isn't that worse for you? If you have to use Abrupt Jaunt after an action has been declared, but before it has been resolved, then the Ubercharger can just charge to your new position instead of your old one. You have to be able to act very specifically during another action, not just after it's been declared.

However, the übercharger makes it more obvious when the GM is being a ****, and building something specifically to counter a character. Making it hard for the GM to hide that behavior is good for the health of the hobby.

Yeah, it makes that obvious because the alternative is a character that just ends every fight instantly. That's bad and we don't want that. I agree that you could have characters narrower than the Wizard, but I think something that's, like, Beguiler-level narrow is just fine. It's pretty obvious when every enemy shows up with mind blank and true seeing, but even if that happens you still have some (though much more limited) options, and the ability to get more without just playing a different class.

give extra turns with WRT

WRT is very nice. But it's still in-combat utility, and pretty skewed towards offense. It is, in some sense, polite to have it instead of maneuvers that just make you better, but it's not really the same thing as bringing teleport or death ward to the table. As an Ubercharger, you should have WRT because the way that ToB dipping works makes it close to free, but you'd still pull your weight in basically the same situations without it.

It takes more effort as a martial, but that's common knowledge for this edtion.

It compromises your build. You do not have room to be a Jaunter without significantly damaging your Ubercharging. A Cleric gets raise dead and plane shift for literal nothing.

If you are arguing whether to take the Ring to Gondor or Mordor or Erebor, being the only guy with the magic bus definitionally goes a long way towards pushing your character's choices.

This dynamic is big in another direction too. If you're the only character with an ability that advances the plot, you never get to have any creativity in how that ability is applied. If the party has wind walk and shadow jaunt and teleport, there are conceivably situations where "we need to travel a long distance" might be resolved by something other than "Wizard casts teleport". But if the only option is "Wizard casts teleport", then that's what you do, even if there are other tools that would've been better if you had them (there is, incidentally, a criticism of teleport here that I think is fairly compelling but that no one makes because they're all screaming "game breaker" -- it is such a generally-useful piece of travel magic and available so early that it crowds out other ones and makes choices more contrived.

A 50 charge item is half the cost of an unlimited use item. Ring of the Ram is priced for a 9 × 5 × 1800 ÷ (5 ÷ 1) ÷ 2 priced item. You can do the same thing with teleport because it's the same spell level.

A ring of the ram doesn't actually cast telekinesis. I mean, think the implication of what you're saying here through: are you really supposed to be able to buy a 50-charge item of a 5th level spell for less than a 50-charge wand of a 4th level spell? You think that's how the rules work?

[King of Nowhere]

I don't know if martials/casters is the issue here.

First, you can get a great deal of the things you describe from race, feats, prestige classes. See this nice overview: https://minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=11381 (shameless self plug).

Second, you don't need all those per se. Most characters don't have all those things available at the same time, not even at that level. The party should be able to deal with threats, but every character needing death ward, flying, true sight, teleport - just no.

Third: if you think your char does need as many options as possible, why on earth go for a +5 weapon, let a lone a double +5? Just spend your cash on items that give options, and you'lll have more options! (sounds almost too simple to be truth...)

ok, we spent the last 4 pages dancing around this but:
1) I am not asking for advice about my character
2) I, as character, do not need to be prepared for everything - though wanting to be as prepared as reasonably possible is a healty mindset for any veteran adventurer
3) I, as player, do not need to be immune to everything, or to play at high power, or to always win to have fun.

I was just remarking how playing a few high power, high wealth campaigns got me in a mindset that is very different from how many table plays. And that it's incredible how easy it would be for a prepared caster to screw me up, which is what so many threads on optimization argue - and I never understood before, as my experience was that a martial could always use a pile of gold to cover most of its weaknesses and limitations.

Eh, that’s not exactly right.

At the most basic level, we’re looking at the equivalent of “X damage that works against 80% of opponents, vs 80% of X damage that works on all opponents”. I think you’d be hard pressed to argue that consistency is bad for the health of the game.

no, they are two entirely different things, for a variety of reasons.
1) everyone has a fortitude save. Most people don't have immediate actions or interrupts. SO everyone has a chance to defend against a SoD, most people don't have a chance to defend against an ubercharger.
2) a SoD is a high risk, high reward strategy. if it succeeds, it kills. if it fails, it does nothing - or negligible damage. picking one in place of a different spell is a conscious tactical decision with pros and cons. And ubercharger only has one option; it's not a strategic choice, really.
3) consistency IS bad for the game. That's why you roll a dice instead of always taking 10.
I'm sure I could come up with more arguments if I think some more about it.
basically, you are trying to highlight the one thing ubercharging and SoD have in common ignoring all the differences.
But there are even better arguments to be made after

So, instead, it’s a question of whether the builds are balanced. And, sure, an unbalanced build is bad for the health of a game that cares overmuch about balance. Shrug. That’s user error. And making that obvious is good for the health of the hobby.
However, the übercharger makes it more obvious when the GM is being a ****, and building something specifically to counter a character.

So, you clearly do not care about competitive fights. You frequently describe your table as not caring for balance and competitive fights. here you say that not letting the character win a fight in one round is bad dming.
You express clear disdain for the concept of balance and the competitive fighting that comes from it, you basically dismiss the whole concept of balance as badwrongfun - don't try to deny it, you explicitly say that anyone who cares about an unbalanced build cares "overmuch" about balance.

is that even an argument? this is like some people are arguing which flavor of ice cream they prefer, and you come and say "it doesn't matter the flavor. ice cream sucks anyway, and you should all be ashamed for liking it"

I, for once, would appreciate if you would refrain from belittling other people's preferences.

P.S. I can tell you that if my character can kill any enemy in one round, I expect a good dm to nerf me or to build enemies to fight against me. once my pc is high level with some renown, I expect my enemies to know me and try to adapt their tactics to me in any case, because it makes sense that they would. if I am this walking god that can cruise through every fight without being challenged, it's boring. Worse, if I am this walking god and everything else cannot compete, I can't get involved in the story or the world; why would I? everything else is inconsequential. Even if I could ignore that and get involved, unless I was explicitly introduced as a demigod or something having that much power would strain my suspension of disbelief to the breaking point.

[noob]

A 50 charge item is half the cost of an unlimited use item. Ring of the Ram is priced for a 9 × 5 × 1800 ÷ (5 ÷ 1) ÷ 2 priced item. You can do the same thing with teleport because it's the same spell level.

Arguably per day uses is not the same thing as unlimited uses: there is a limitation which is that you can only use it a bunch of timed per day.
Wait you are using a formulae 100% unrelated to the ring of the ram: the ring does not casts telekinesis and the calculation you made have a result different from the cost of the ring: with your calculation based on per day uses you get 8100 and the ring costs 8600 so not even the number matches out.

[NichG]

Indeed. What if? Perhaps you should prepare for a wide variety of possible threats, not just the one that seems most obvious. Yes, you should prepare more for the obvious threat. But the idea that just because you got information that says "this threat is obvious" that somehow means "these threats are ignorable" is just not true.

The metagaming is the assumption that, just because you experienced a thing that worked one way, all future things must work that way. Yes, you fought an enemy that didn't have some mind magic. The idea that's strong evidence no enemies will have mind magic is, again, just not true. Plenty of enemies don't have mind magic. You could trivially have all your encounters as a 7th level character involve no Will saves and then fight a Mind Flayer the second you turned 8th level, and that would not be weird at all. But you would have use believe that, as a character on the cusp of 8th level, it would be "metagaming" to give any consideration to your Will save.

No, I'd consider it metagaming to prioritize your out of game prior knowledge about D&D over in-character sources of knowledge. The problem isn't so much in thinking about mental attacks before you've encountered one, its the point at which you said 'because my character has this Knowledge skill, I would know that mental attacks are a thing' but then said that oh, you wouldn't actually roll that skill and if the DM told you that with that skill check mental attacks aren't a thing, you wouldn't believe them.

You want to use game mechanics to justify knowing something but then ignore those game mechanics when following them leads to information that disagrees with your out of character beliefs? That's metagaming.

And to be clear, my point about metagaming here isn't 'oh, metagaming is cheat, you're a bad person'. It's that metagaming in this way is self-defeating because DMs can and do change things around. It's a bog standard move to refluff existing monster stat blocks, use custom monsters, change the frequency of game elements in a world to taste, change up the backstories of how and why things are the way they are and how they work, etc. If you bring your external assumptions e.g. into my game and try to protect yourself as you might have been trained to do in someone else's game, you are going to end up throwing away something like 2/3rds of your wealth - as the OP of this thread demonstrated! - that you could have kept if you just asked 'Hey, what does my character know about mental threats in this setting? I've got a +20 Knowledge(Arcana) check.'

If you're not going to ask, or listen to what people tell you, why even invest in Knowledge skills at all? If engaging with the rules that let you check to see what your character knows isn't the point of bringing up a character with a specific Knowledge skill and score, then why bring it up at all? Is it just 'I can say a big number and that makes my argument sound more like it's grounded in something?'. I've played a character with skills breaking the hundreds, and he would say that demons as a category of being have the ability to take two actions per round and can join someone else's Time Stop. And in that campaign, that was true and correct. Do I assume that demons will work that way when I join someone else's game? No. Do I assume demons will work according to the Monster Manual when I join someone else's game? Not without asking how demons work in that game.

And that's not because I don't want to be accused of cheating, its because I know that sort of thing varies. And so I know that I know nothing without actually getting evidence from that DM and from that game, and for my character to posture confidently about their knowledge and expertise without actually verifying that its correct I would in fact be playing the idiot and not the seasoned adventurer.

[Quertus]

no, they are two entirely different things, for a variety of reasons.
1) everyone has a fortitude save. Most people don't have immediate actions or interrupts. SO everyone has a chance to defend against a SoD, most people don't have a chance to defend against an ubercharger.
2) a SoD is a high risk, high reward strategy. if it succeeds, it kills. if it fails, it does nothing - or negligible damage. picking one in place of a different spell is a conscious tactical decision with pros and cons. And ubercharger only has one option; it's not a strategic choice, really.
3) consistency IS bad for the game. That's why you roll a dice instead of always taking 10.
I'm sure I could come up with more arguments if I think some more about it.
basically, you are trying to highlight the one thing ubercharging and SoD have in common ignoring all the differences.
But there are even better arguments to be made after

So, you clearly do not care about competitive fights. You frequently describe your table as not caring for balance and competitive fights. here you say that not letting the character win a fight in one round is bad dming.
You express clear disdain for the concept of balance and the competitive fighting that comes from it, you basically dismiss the whole concept of balance as badwrongfun - don't try to deny it, you explicitly say that anyone who cares about an unbalanced build cares "overmuch" about balance.

is that even an argument? this is like some people are arguing which flavor of ice cream they prefer, and you come and say "it doesn't matter the flavor. ice cream sucks anyway, and you should all be ashamed for liking it"

I, for once, would appreciate if you would refrain from belittling other people's preferences.

P.S. I can tell you that if my character can kill any enemy in one round, I expect a good dm to nerf me or to build enemies to fight against me. once my pc is high level with some renown, I expect my enemies to know me and try to adapt their tactics to me in any case, because it makes sense that they would. if I am this walking god that can cruise through every fight without being challenged, it's boring. Worse, if I am this walking god and everything else cannot compete, I can't get involved in the story or the world; why would I? everything else is inconsequential. Even if I could ignore that and get involved, unless I was explicitly introduced as a demigod or something having that much power would strain my suspension of disbelief to the breaking point.

That has so little to do with the points I was making, it's almost like you made a cut and paste error, and were actually replying to a different post. Let's try again.

Either the character is balanced, or they aren't. If they aren't balanced, that's the problem that needs to be solved. If they are balanced, then how are they bad for the health of the game?

Your answer to that question seem to be (I think) "people can and commonly do optimize their defenses against one but not the other", which is... kinda a funny argument for someone whose opening post indicated a strong desire to cover lots of bases with defenses (albeit in the abstract "defense against being unable to participate" vein). However, it is IMO a really valid argument to make wrt what defenses monsters have. Or would be if it didn't just circle back around to the point of the post you were replying to, that either the math says it's balanced, at Y% chance of Z damage, or it's not.

For, you know, those who care about balance, chocolate, strawberry, or whatever other preference is relevant in this case, that makes people mistake ubercharger as inherently bad for the health of the game, because they only see their preference as valid.

As an aside, maybe your tables don't make use of "take 10", but mine tend to strongly favor speed, so they make great use of "take 10" and "take 20" to avoid bogging the game down with unnecessary rolls.

[icefractal]

If you bring your external assumptions e.g. into my game and try to protect yourself as you might have been trained to do in someone else's game, you are going to end up throwing away something like 2/3rds of your wealth - as the OP of this thread demonstrated! - that you could have kept if you just asked 'Hey, what does my character know about mental threats in this setting? I've got a +20 Knowledge(Arcana) check.'

While that makes sense, IME that's not the kind of question players usually ask, or that the GM is usually ready to answer.

Like when I've asked similar things, I've gotten a variety of answers (paraphrased to be about mind control):
* "Yes, mind control exists, but it's not common. Will you run into it? You'll just have to find out."
* "[main antagonist group] prefers more direct methods, but they do hire mercenaries with their own styles ..."
* "Stop trying to find out challenges in advance, just play your character"
* "You've never heard of that being used" (but then later, it was used; turns out he just meant that it hadn't happened directly to our characters yet and how would we know anything else?)
* "Only really major foes would have it" (useful info, but really major fights are when I'd least like to be taken over, so still something to protect against)

And heck, if someone asked me that same question I'd have a not entirely helpful response. I tend not to use hard mind-control effects, but it's not like I definitively would never do so. If they asked about a specific group in the setting (and had the check to back it up) then I'd give them an answer for that group and stick to it, but "would anyone ever use mind control on us?" is almost always going to be "not often but potentially yes" because I run things at least semi-sandbox and I can't predict who the PCs will end up tangling with.

[NichG]

While that makes sense, IME that's not the kind of question players usually ask, or that the GM is usually ready to answer.

"We don't usually ask this question that could save us lots of money, so I guess we shouldn't ask it going forward..." seems like a really weird position to take though.

Like if the response I'd been getting from RandomPeasant was 'I haven't tried that, I don't think it will work but next time I'll give it a shot and say what happens' or 'I did try that but my particular DM stonewalled me' then that would at least make sense to me as a response. But "People don't usually do that, so I won't" or "I just assume the DM won't tell me or will lie to me so I don't ask and just go forward with my own assumptions" is self-defeating. You pretty much can't lose anything by asking, so insisting so strongly on not asking is like a 'I don't think I'd like the answer' vibe.

Edit: Also it bears mentioning that if this forum prior is really so accurate, then a lot of the time the honest response from the DM should be 'yeah you might have to deal with that' or 'if its in the book, it could happen' or 'if you can use it, NPCs can use it' or 'mindflayers are a thing'. Or even stuff like 'I run a challenging game' that does answer the question without answering it. And again you don't lose anything for having asked, and you can confirm that the resources you're sinking are indeed potentially justified.

And heck, if someone asked me that same question I'd have a not entirely helpful response. I tend not to use hard mind-control effects, but it's not like I definitively would never do so. If they asked about a specific group in the setting (and had the check to back it up) then I'd give them an answer for that group and stick to it, but "would anyone ever use mind control on us?" is almost always going to be "not often but potentially yes" because I run things at least semi-sandbox and I can't predict who the PCs will end up tangling with.

I mean, I gave my response if I were asked that. And at least in the case of my game, someone who didn't ask would be screwed over twice: one because they'd spend resources they didn't need to, the other because the methods of 'control' that things are likely to use in my games would not be blocked by the usual things you would spend resources on in order to protect against loss of agency. Like, Protection from Evil and Mind Blank and the like will not guard you against entering into a binding contract with a fae because thats a karmic effect in my campaigns not a mind control effect. So if you don't ask, its your own fault when you get tripped up with it. But at the same time I want to telegraph these things so that the players think about how to approach them, so its not in my benefit to hide this stuff or try to spring a 'gotcha' - but if a player staunchly ignores what I'm trying to communicate about 'this world' and instead goes based on some forum theorycraft or 'how my previous DM did things', well, its absolutely going to backfire on them.

Even if you aren't doing exotic homebrew stuff, you can say for example "There's a mercenary's guide of major known threats within the 100 mile area, and none of them have 'Mind Control' in their repertoire; but if you go more than 100 miles from here, check again."

[Crake]

So if we assume that A) you can act during someone's action and B) moving during a charge stops the charge even if there was a valid charge to your new position and C) the target's reach is less than 10ft, then yes Abrupt Jaunt stops a charge.



Isn't that worse for you? If you have to use Abrupt Jaunt after an action has been declared, but before it has been resolved, then the Ubercharger can just charge to your new position instead of your old one. You have to be able to act very specifically during another action, not just after it's been declared.

A charge is made up of two components, movement, and an attack. You jaunt after the movement, but before the attack. They dont reset back to their original position after you jaunt just because they no longer have a valid target to attack.

The second part was more specifically for regular attacks, so if someones in melee with you, i believe you can jaunt after their swing starts, but before it lands, effectively avoiding the attack and wasting the action. Or for a ranged attack, after the arrow is fired, but before it hits.

no, they are two entirely different things, for a variety of reasons.
1) everyone has a fortitude save. Most people don't have immediate actions or interrupts. SO everyone has a chance to defend against a SoD, most people don't have a chance to defend against an ubercharger.

The ubercharger equivalent to a fort save is AC. Everyone has AC. Immediate actions were the functional equivalent to death ward in this circumstance. Not everyone has death ward either.

Funnily enough, the only way to have a no-roll, just die effect is through the use of magic. A destruction cleric dweomerkeeper casting a DMM irresistible Implosion as a supernatural spell would have no save, no SR, and not be a death effect, so no creature could resist it, nor would have immunity to it, nor could it be dispelled or countered in any way, short of being in an antimagic field (Or being incorporeal, since implosion can only target corporeal creatures)

[Mechalich]

is almost always going to be "not often but potentially yes" because I run things at least semi-sandbox and I can't predict who the PCs will end up tangling with.

This is important. Traditional D&D includes running dungeons with a wide range of enemies and even random encounters drawn from large tables. Even when focusing on a specific enemy type like 'undead' or 'demons' there's sufficient ingroup variety to launch basically every attack type at the characters. Played straight, high-level D&D demands defenses against everything because the pool of potential antagonists has access to everything even if the frequency is highly variable.

Casters can deal with many of the less-likely scenarios simply by running away and then tweaking their spell loadout. Martials cannot doing anything similar and must either invest in wealth by level or adopt increasingly extreme race/class/feat setups that often severely compromise character concept. That's a big one actually. A player who wants to be a wizard can pick basically any race that doesn't have a negative Int modifier and can even afford to fool around a bit with funky prestige classes or anomalous feat choices and still be fine even in a highly optimized game so long as they pick good spells and items. A player who wants to be a fighter is shackled to a spreadsheet dictating every possible choice just to keep pace. I mean, even if uberchargers or uberarchers or some of the other highly specialized builds are allowed, they are incredibly narrow lanes to be trapped in compared to the freedom allowed the casters.

[Crake]

This is important. Traditional D&D includes …

I think this highly depends on your definition of “traditional” dnd. If you mean ACTUAL traditional dnd, where its basically randomly generated dungeons and monsters, then yeah. But if by traditional, you mean, in a traditional world, then not necessarily. If you’re playing a campaign, not a dungeon, then you might not actually ever go into a “traditional” dungeon in the first place. You may also never fight traditional monsters, instead mostly fighting evil NPCs, and said NPCs may fit into a narrow demographic, depending on the organizations involved.

So honestly, traditional is so poorly defined for dnd, that I’m not sure anyones played a traditional dnd game since 1e.

All that aside though, you dont need to convince anyone that martials have it more difficult than casters, but the whole point is that, having a limited budget for defenses isnt what sets the two apart, because casters also have to pay for defenses.

[Anthrowhale]

Funnily enough, the only way to have a no-roll, just die effect is through the use of magic. A destruction cleric dweomerkeeper casting a DMM irresistible Implosion as a supernatural spell would have no save, no SR, and not be a death effect, so no creature could resist it, nor would have immunity to it, nor could it be dispelled or countered in any way, short of being in an antimagic field (Or being incorporeal, since implosion can only target corporeal creatures)

Not disagreeing with the thesis, but alternate means exist? Surge of Fortune+Sense Weakness+Vorpal Weapon or Supernatural Holy Word with level jacking.

[Crake]

Not disagreeing with the thesis, but alternate means exist? Surge of Fortune+Sense Weakness+Vorpal Weapon or Supernatural Holy Word with level jacking.

Sorry, I didnt mean to imply that THAT was the only way, but rather that through MAGIC was the only way. Your examples further demonstrate that by being through magic.

If martials had a method of guaranteeing a hit, then a 1d2 crusader could also maybe qualify, though there are ways around infinite damage, and the vorpal effect can be ignored by not being vulnerable to decapitation, while supernatural holy word can be avoided by tricking it into thinking you’re good (usually with the good subtype via polymorph). So those all still have some kind of defense.

That said, implosion also has a defense by just casting gaseous form, so i guess i proved myself wrong

[Anthrowhale]

while supernatural holy word can be avoided by tricking it into thinking you’re good (usually with the good subtype via polymorph).

The standard response to alignment shenanigans is to switch between {Holy Word, Word of Chaos, Blasphemy, Dictum, Word of Balance}. You can't be immune to all 5 holy word spells.

However, there are ways to achieve immunity to sonic effects and of course AMF disrupts lots of magical approaches.

Separately, I believe Irresistible spell was errataed as "only" being +10 to the save although people fight over whether it's legit due to not being in WoTC approved book but by the same org. Regardless of which side of that argument you fall on, the published errata is a pretty strong expression of RAI.

[Quertus]

Casters can deal with many of the less-likely scenarios simply by running away and then tweaking their spell loadout. Martials cannot doing anything similar and must either invest in wealth by level or adopt increasingly extreme race/class/feat setups that often severely compromise character concept. That's a big one actually. A player who wants to be a wizard can pick basically any race that doesn't have a negative Int modifier and can even afford to fool around a bit with funky prestige classes or anomalous feat choices and still be fine even in a highly optimized game so long as they pick good spells and items. A player who wants to be a fighter is shackled to a spreadsheet dictating every possible choice just to keep pace. I mean, even if uberchargers or uberarchers or some of the other highly specialized builds are allowed, they are incredibly narrow lanes to be trapped in compared to the freedom allowed the casters.

Hmmm... on "compromising character concept"... 1) what about the concept of "minotaur who hits things with an axe" prohibits them from buying a Winged Cloak, Ring of Protection from Law, or Potion of Water Breathing; 2) what if your concept is something like "mind control Sorceress", and choosing to bravely run away doesn't give you any additional options for dealing with the mindless foes you face?

It feels to me that, if your concept is "guy who can't handle these problems", then handling these problems is outside your character concept. So why would you choose such a concept, then complain if your concept is correctly realized as being unable to do anything?

[noob]

The standard response to alignment shenanigans is to switch between {Holy Word, Word of Chaos, Blasphemy, Dictum, Word of Balance}. You can't be immune to all 5 holy word spells.

However, there are ways to achieve immunity to sonic effects and of course AMF disrupts lots of magical approaches.

Separately, I believe Irresistible spell was errataed as "only" being +10 to the save although people fight over whether it's legit due to not being in WoTC approved book but by the same org. Regardless of which side of that argument you fall on, the published errata is a pretty strong expression of RAI.

You can be immune to all the word spells with horizon walker(it is an oddly specific immunity granted by that prc which is overall very good as a core prc if you are going through a non full caster entry)

[Anthrowhale]

You can be immune to all the word spells with horizon walker(it is an oddly specific immunity granted by that prc which is overall very good as a core prc if you are going through a non full caster entry)

Oh, that's nice.

[Seward]

Just a meta-comment to this whole thread.

A lot of effects never come up in many campaigns not because the bad guys don't have them but because they don't get the chance to use them because they're too dead/crowd controlled/out of range/target the wrong guy/get spell interrupted/have targeting blocked/etc.

Action economy saves more characters than trying to anticipate every problem.

That said, organized play taught adventurers in Living Greyhawk or Pathfinder Society to expect these kinds of problems, no matter what region or adventure path.

Always have some way to stop your character from bleeding out (usually a humble potion of clw outside extradimensional spaces that a teammate can use to save you) available so others can help.

Always buy your own wand of CLW to contribute to out of combat healing.

If you fight primarily in melee and don't fly, get a potion of fly by about level 6. It isn't a terrible idea to have a single decent healing potion or item to get yourself out of trouble on your own actions, or failing that something like an invisibility potion to get out of a tight spot. In lower levels just carry some javelins and splash weapon to make up the gap and to help with swarms. Oil+torches is a good investment at level 1 for a variety of problems, a tradition going back at least as far to the games I played as a preteen back in the late 70s, and still works in baby levels in 3.5. By level 6 though iterative attacks make ranged attacks fairly pointless for people who aren't actually archers, you do so little damage even with a mw/str adjusted bow it's hardly worth doing compared to your primary melee attacks, so get yourself into action even if it costs some gp and one phase buffing.

Have a plan for an invisible opponent. What that plan is depends on your party role, but somebody you can't sense comes up often enough that you don't want to be in a party where nobody has a plan. I've seen this range from "have a well trained pet/familiar/etc with scent to find the square" to see invis items to just really high hearing to various spells either in head or on items, and having a lot of attacks also helps if somebody else pinpoints it and you're chasing 50% miss chances. Very commonly somebody with a level or 3 in a spellcasting class will just carry a scroll of it simply to pinpoint for those who have area effects or lots of attacks to just know the square they're in.

If you are a martial, have a plan for each type of DR, starting at level 1, where any starting character can manage slashing, piercing, blunt, silver (on ammo or a light weapon) and cold iron. Potion of bless weapon can bridge the gap on Dr/good and magic for a melee, magic weapon and oil of align weapon is a bit more for an archer, till you can buy appropriate weapons by L6-10 depending on what you seem to be fighting. Also a nonlethal weapon option like a sap or blunt arrows tends to be helpful. For people who rely on few, large hits, this "plan" can be "reliably hit with power attack+2h weapon in my best weapon" in mid levels or higher, but in low levels you really need the basic gear. (skeletons, zombies, lycantrhopes, fey, even vampire spawn are fairly common low level enemies, as are a number of things including some spells that can be cast that require magic to penetrate, and golems plus stoneskin on casters start getting traction after level 5)

Casters, especially spont casters need a spell or three to cope with magic immune/highly resistant enemies on tap on any given day. Pick ones that are also useful on less exotic enemies. Use scrolls in baby levels till you can learn them for real (or have slots for them). Buffing is an especially easy way to contribute when enemies are immune to your favored spells.

Once blasphemy is a thing, silence scrolls or oil are also a common purchase. Martials who trip or grapple often also pick that up in lower levels if not carried by local spellcasters, because it can shut down a number of threats from primary casters if the person restricting their movement also ends verbal components.

====
Second meta comment on a more later post....

the most common cause of "no roll deaths" in highish level play (tier 14-16ish) that I've encountered is just having a martial in full attack range. Yes, they roll dice, but they'll hit reliably enough and often enough to kill damn near anything in one round. A lot of rocket tag tactics are "get the martial in position to end the biggest threat before it can act (or act again)." Most of the gripes about playing a martial in this range isn't their average combat contribution, dead is a very good thing to be able to inflict on enemies, it's how difficult many find to contribute in out of combat utility, or switch to a support role when their offense isn't effective vs a particular opponent or situation.

[Crake]

If you are a martial, have a plan for each type of DR, starting at level 1, where any starting character can manage slashing, piercing, blunt, silver (on ammo or a light weapon) and cold iron. Potion of bless weapon can bridge the gap on Dr/good and magic for a melee, magic weapon and oil of align weapon is a bit more for an archer, till you can buy appropriate weapons by L6-10 depending on what you seem to be fighting. Also a nonlethal weapon option like a sap or blunt arrows tends to be helpful.

I like the way pathfinder handles this issue, by just having different levels of +X bypass more and more kinds of DR.

[Seward]

I like the way pathfinder handles this issue, by just having different levels of +X bypass more and more kinds of DR.

Agreed. It brought back an old 3.0 idea while explicitly removing the exploit of using a spell to get to the +whatever (those spells exist, but don't penetrate any DR but magic). Pathfinder has a number of small hacks that fix some annoying issues with 3.5, and that's one of them. If you don't like the golfbag of weapons, you can fix the problem by the teens with sufficient WBL investment, although characters find many other solutions than the "Sword of smite anything" my halfling tank built in her day.

[Gnaeus]

All that aside though, you dont need to convince anyone that martials have it more difficult than casters, but the whole point is that, having a limited budget for defenses isnt what sets the two apart, because casters also have to pay for defenses.

And again, that is true but misleading. Yes, everyone is paying for defenses. But if you have more money because you don't need to spend 50% of WBL on weapons, armor, and other critical for your numbers gear, and if you have more money because some of your gear is crafted at 50% cost, and you dont feel a need to have an anti-invisibility defense because you carry see invisibility and that's a good enough, and you have scrolls of situational defense spells you don't expect to need often, you will be able to cover what defenses remain with a much lower total character wealth. These things are all interchangeable except the casters have less fixed expenses, cheaper options and less ground to cover

You could honestly develop a formula for how much WBL each level in each class is worth. As in, Monk 4, +1 to 3 saves, like a slotless +1 save item, slow fall, worse than 2k ring, ki strike useless once we have a +1 enhancement bonus which we need anyway. It would be hard to build in a number for the WBL equivalent of the 11th level of Wizard. But it would very, very obviously be much higher than the WBL equivalent of the 11th level of fighter.

[Anthrowhale]

Agreed. It brought back an old 3.0 idea while explicitly removing the exploit of using a spell to get to the +whatever (those spells exist, but don't penetrate any DR but magic). Pathfinder has a number of small hacks that fix some annoying issues with 3.5, and that's one of them. If you don't like the golfbag of weapons, you can fix the problem by the teens with sufficient WBL investment, although characters find many other solutions than the "Sword of smite anything" my halfling tank built in her day.

Minor side note: Archers are notably good at avoiding the golfbag by using a panoply of arrows paired with enchantments on bows to bypass most DRs.

[Crake]

And again, that is true but misleading. Yes, everyone is paying for defenses. But if you have more money because you don't need to spend 50% of WBL on weapons, armor, and other critical for your numbers gear, and if you have more money because some of your gear is crafted at 50% cost, and you dont feel a need to have an anti-invisibility defense because you carry see invisibility and that's a good enough, and you have scrolls of situational defense spells you don't expect to need often, you will be able to cover what defenses remain with a much lower total character wealth. These things are all interchangeable except the casters have less fixed expenses, cheaper options and less ground to cover

You could honestly develop a formula for how much WBL each level in each class is worth. As in, Monk 4, +1 to 3 saves, like a slotless +1 save item, slow fall, worse than 2k ring, ki strike useless once we have a +1 enhancement bonus which we need anyway. It would be hard to build in a number for the WBL equivalent of the 11th level of Wizard. But it would very, very obviously be much higher than the WBL equivalent of the 11th level of fighter.

A lot of that goes to the martials as well though. Instead of an item of permanent see invis, they too could carry a potion, or wear a scout’s headband. The issue the OP was having was that, if they had to spend an action to activate the defense, in their mind, it was already too late, in which case, the same issue applies to the caster.

And if the caster is able to craft items for themselves at 50%, it stands to reason they could do the same for their party.

The only part of your argument that was reasonably relative was that martials need to spend money on offensive items too, but then do you mean to say that casters dont spend money on things like metamagic rods to empower their spells? And for AC, pretty much every high level caster I know rocks halfweight sectioned plate with 0 acp and 0 asf, allowing them to function completely normally while still benefitting from fullplate AC. Casters need AC too, regular attacks are the most common form of attack and if you just completely forgo it, you’re just making yourself into deadweight.

[Gnaeus]

A lot of that goes to the martials as well though. Instead of an item of permanent see invis, they too could carry a potion, or wear a scout’s headband. The issue the OP was having was that, if they had to spend an action to activate the defense, in their mind, it was already too late, in which case, the same issue applies to the caster.

And if the caster is able to craft items for themselves at 50%, it stands to reason they could do the same for their party.

The only part of your argument that was reasonably relative was that martials need to spend money on offensive items too, but then do you mean to say that casters dont spend money on things like metamagic rods to empower their spells? And for AC, pretty much every high level caster I know rocks halfweight sectioned plate with 0 acp and 0 asf, allowing them to function completely normally while still benefitting from fullplate AC. Casters need AC too, regular attacks are the most common form of attack and if you just completely forgo it, you’re just making yourself into deadweight.

OK, but the potion is definitionally more expensive than the scroll. You will presumably have permanent defenses for common threats, less permanent defenses for less common ones. Most defenses can be acquired in either form and you will focus more on the ones that are most important to you.

1. Could doesn't mean does. The caster could prioritize himself based on limited time. He could refuse to spend exp for other players. He could demand anywhere between 50% and 100%. If my friend the professional artist paints a painting for me, I don't demand that I pay him at his cost for paint. It is not an automatic thing that every PC places the desires of other PCs over their own interests. I played in a game one time where I charged 100% for magic items, and spent the other 50% on gear which I later gifted them which prevented me from having to carry buffs for them I didn't want to bother memorizing. Thats entirely up to the players involved, and it isn't like the fighter has anything useful to bargain with (as in, the cleric tells the wizard he will team craft his wondrous items if the wizard helps with wands and scrolls.)
2. Don't worry, Mr. Fighter. I will give you the same 50% discount on all your scroll and rod needs I give myself. Oh, you need arms/armor? I don't have that one. Try the shop.

There is a massive difference between a caster without a bunch of metamagic rods and a fighter without a level appropriate weapon. Metamagic rods are nice, I rarely have more than one or two. I have never seen a caster in a single game who has that armor. It is absolutely not a requirement for a caster. Certainly not in the way AC is for a fighter. Most casters I see rely on some form of miss chances, ablative defenses (temp hp), contingencies, bodyguards, etc, and if they choose to make AC a relevant defense, they do it with polymorph school for free. Theres a bunch of stuff with like +18 NA that you can stack mage armor on top of, with a quickened shield, and spend 0 for a better AC than a fighter who spent 50kgp.

[Crake]

OK, but the potion is definitionally more expensive than the scroll. You will presumably have permanent defenses for common threats, less permanent defenses for less common ones. Most defenses can be acquired in either form and you will focus more on the ones that are most important to you.

1. Could doesn't mean does. The caster could prioritize himself based on limited time. He could refuse to spend exp for other players. He could demand anywhere between 50% and 100%. If my friend the professional artist paints a painting for me, I don't demand that I pay him at his cost for paint. It is not an automatic thing that every PC places the desires of other PCs over their own interests. I played in a game one time where I charged 100% for magic items, and spent the other 50% on gear which I later gifted them which prevented me from having to carry buffs for them I didn't want to bother memorizing. Thats entirely up to the players involved, and it isn't like the fighter has anything useful to bargain with (as in, the cleric tells the wizard he will team craft his wondrous items if the wizard helps with wands and scrolls.)
2. Don't worry, Mr. Fighter. I will give you the same 50% discount on all your scroll and rod needs I give myself. Oh, you need arms/armor? I don't have that one. Try the shop.

There is a massive difference between a caster without a bunch of metamagic rods and a fighter without a level appropriate weapon. Metamagic rods are nice, I rarely have more than one or two. I have never seen a caster in a single game who has that armor. It is absolutely not a requirement for a caster. Certainly not in the way AC is for a fighter. Most casters I see rely on some form of miss chances, ablative defenses (temp hp), contingencies, bodyguards, etc, and if they choose to make AC a relevant defense, they do it with polymorph school for free. Theres a bunch of stuff with like +18 NA that you can stack mage armor on top of, with a quickened shield, and spend 0 for a better AC than a fighter who spent 50kgp.

Relying exclusively on dispellable buffs as your source of AC and protection seems like a recipie for disaster. Miss chance is negated by seeking arrows, and ablative defenses leave you still vulnerable to having your spellcasting interrupted.

You’re right in the end of course, it is marginally more expensive for martials, but I already agreed with you on that. What I disagree with, is the notion that THIS is the reason for caster supremacy. A caster’s true power comes from never having to engage in the combat in the first place. Who needs defenses when you’re fighting a proxy war, or building up a time-sped demiplane, or manipulating an entire kingdom from the shadows to achieve your own goals.

[Gnaeus]

Relying exclusively on dispellable buffs as your source of AC and protection seems like a recipie for disaster. Miss chance is negated by seeking arrows, and ablative defenses leave you still vulnerable to having your spellcasting interrupted.

You’re right in the end of course, it is marginally more expensive for martials, but I already agreed with you on that. What I disagree with, is the notion that THIS is the reason for caster supremacy. A caster’s true power comes from never having to engage in the combat in the first place. Who needs defenses when you’re fighting a proxy war, or building up a time-sped demiplane, or manipulating an entire kingdom from the shadows to achieve your own goals.

So, you need an expensive item I have never seen in play or heard about in case you get dispelled and then shot by a weapon I have almost never seen in play and have never felt threatened by. I know the discussion has talked a lot about defenses being campaign specific but that's really the clincher right there. I'm not saying I will never be shot by a seeking arrow, but if it hasn't happened in the last 20 years of play I'll probably eat the arrow should it ever come up. Then cast a quickened spell to block line of sight. Obviously your games are much different, but I find that the typical strategy of putting a buffed wizard behind a wall of meat shields tends to be more than adequate to make them the safest member of the party, with or without bothering with AC.

Again, YMMV. But cannot disagree more strongly. High level full sandbox play is the only place that matters, and again, that's not relevant to most games I have been in. It's kind of fun at campaign wrap up to say "and now I walk into the capital of X and kill or dominate the rulers who are defenseless against my T1 might". But I would call what you describe the least important bit of a wizards power. Not relevant at most optimization levels. Not relevant in at least half of campaigns. Not relevant for most of the level range. Not that casters aren't still way better out of combat in other scenarios. They have a lot of lower level tools. But generally things that can be copied with a decent UMD and $$$.

[icefractal]

Again, YMMV. But cannot disagree more strongly. High level full sandbox play is the only place that matters, and again, that's not relevant to most games I have been in. It's kind of fun at campaign wrap up to say "and now I walk into the capital of X and kill or dominate the rulers who are defenseless against my T1 might". But I would call what you describe the least important bit of a wizards power. Not relevant at most optimization levels. Not relevant in at least half of campaigns. Not relevant for most of the level range. Not that casters aren't still way better out of combat in other scenarios. They have a lot of lower level tools. But generally things that can be copied with a decent UMD and $$$.

Fits with my experience as well. Like, I really do enjoy the strategic-scale abilities that many casters have. Fun for thought experiments, but also makes gaining levels feel more satisfying, knowing that now I could do nation-scale things (even if that never comes up on-screen). "I'm really good at killing people," just isn't the same.

But IME, it's few and far between that those kind of things come up in a campaign. Even most high-level campaigns I've played have had some kind of plot, and sidestepping that plot entirely would have been highly unwelcome. And usually the resolution does come down to "find the right people, defeat them in a fight and/or talk to them, do some McGuffin-driven actions, done". Heck, in a lot of cases even the practical utility casters provide toward that quest (divinations, teleportation, etc) is somewhat illusory, because the GM would have provided alternatives if needed.