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I saw RD's post, but I was speaking of caster level bonuses that don't have stop gaps like the ioun stone. I do see I was not clear.
I think Ashiel was just trying to be creative with what you gave her. I don't think she would actually have level 15 characters using Big T as a bio-weapon. I read it more of a joke post than as a serious idea(for a real game). In theory and in practicality it does work to an extent, but just like getting free wishes......
I would not be surprised in the least if Ashiel was being dead serious and would allow it in her game. But maybe I'm wrong.
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So I shouldn't mention that we allow for builds that feasibly could have a feat at every single level, allow casting to progress with prestige classes, or bonus feats (for fighter) or SNA (for rogues), as well as play PF with all the spells and feats available from 3.x and Dragon magazines?
XD
Is it ridiculous? Ohmygods yes.
But it's fun and we can scale for it.
Honestly I think a little cheese creeping into games is good for the DM. It teaches them adaptability and how to scale. If every creature was always level scale appropriate we'd be playing...
that other game which I have threatened to burn on my front lawn.
(hint it's planning on releasing a fifth edition)
burn the blasphemy!!!
But you aren't coming to the rules forum and arguing those are the rules.
You would post such things in the home brew forum and fully acknowledge them as house rules, am I right?
On topic with the "Caster / Non-Caster Problem"
I think it's caused when GMs are too liberal with spells (allowing possible rules abuse) or too strict with the mundane(citing lack of rules as reasons they can't do things they should logically be able to do).
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On topic with the "Caster / Non-Caster Problem"
I think it's caused when GMs are too liberal with spells (allowing possible rules abuse) or too strict with the mundane(citing lack of rules as reasons they can't do things they should logically be able to do).
Yup, which is kind of the topic at hand :)
A lot of it is also vast differences in system mastery between the players with each other, or the players and the GM.
@ Ashiel
Citing things that you have personally written isn't picking a fight, it's bringing context.
It isn't, except when you intentionally twist the context, ignore clarifications, and try to ruin someone's reputation by misrepresenting them. It is incredibly rare that you actually reference anything I've said like I actually said it. You are hostile, and you intentionally try to bait me at every turn. So much so that other people on these very boards have come to my defense before and called you out on your actions. This has to stop.
You don't have a few things you do differently in isolation. You have a history of looking for loopholes and exploits that I cite because it is relevant, much in the same way if someone is taking to RD, they should probably realize his position history is...colorful.
Prove it. Here, I'll even give you a head start. I once posted, for fun, a trait combination that allowed you to begin the game as a Mummy at 1st level. I posted it, noting that I had let my GM know about it and had got the go-ahead, and I did so for fun. I'm actually still playing that PC in my GM's game, and she has become very much loved by the other players (who were actually playing core races by the way).
My character before that? Human Paladin. A character I'm playing in another game online? Human Psion. So go ahead. Cite all you want. Go ahead, bring up my posting histories. Go ahead. We've had arguments over what "friendly" means and you've attacked my stance on things like Charisma and such; and you tried to twist my commentary about opting to illuminate hallways with light-stones rather than trying to scout the hallways solo as me suggesting that it's stealthy to toss glowing rocks down hallways; which shows either an extreme lack of reading comprehension of actual malicious twisting. For a long time, I tried to assume this was just one misunderstanding after another, but I can't convince myself of that anymore, Ciretose. I just can't.
For example, Bob allowed gate to be used to summon a solar in a very specific situation that made perfect story sense. Bob historically is very by the book, for him it is the exception not the rule, and not something he would always allow.
Up thread you said in reference to what controlling a gated creature means "Last I checked, control includes command and/or direction. For example, can a vampire not command its spawn? Can a shadow not direct its lesser shadows? Are you suggesting that "control" should be read as merely "it can't attack me"? That seems bizarre to me. If I have control of something, it means I can use it. Being able to control an RC car doesn't mean that I can merely prevent it from running, but can direct its movements. Controlling my cursor on the screen does not mean I merely keep it from clicking, it means I can direct its selections."
Even the people who agree you can gate a solar didn't take this position.
Duh. What the heck is control supposed to mean? Control means control. You say I'm trying to find loopholes? I'm not the one trying to twist language to try and make something say something it doesn't. I'm not the one that argues that control somehow means "does what it wants except not attack you, except it maybe attacks you anyway, because I don't want to read this as control".
What appears like an personal attack to you is me giving context of what kinds of things you allow in your game, regularly, so that people can understand that when you say "I don't have a problem with X" you also don't seem to have much of a problem letting your players do much of anything.
No, it's you posting random snide remarks in response to my posts, for no apparent reason than doing so; such as with this one in response to my tongue in cheek commentary about using PC tricks against them:
*shakes head, adds to list next to stealthy glowing rocks, moves on*
We all have a post history and a reputation. I am the abrasive curmudgeon who says the game is fine if you follow the rules and use common sense.
Something I actually agree with, most of the time.
In my opinion, you are the permissive parent who gives the kids the car keys as soon as they can reach the pedals, because to hold them back would be cruel.
More like the parent who bothers to make sure that the kids actually know how to drive before throwing them into the street, and who tries to remain consistent with rulings, and try to adhere to he standard of honesty that I expect my children to.
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At the risk of putting myself between two violent explosions:
Ashiel, Ciretose, is it possible that you two could actually agree to a truce?
Something along the lines of: I think you're being ridiculous and I don't agree, but I won't personally attack you for it?
Yeah. I know I should butt out, but really, I agree with the way that Ashiel runs, and I agree that Ciretose has every right to think it's patently ridiculous.
I'm actually interested in both sides, since I do like the rules of PF and I want to see the different ways people can interpret them since I'm only one person and can't possibly think of all the ways my players may choose to view things. This gives me some ideas on different cases for/against.
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System mastery is a huge part of it. I'd say about the other half. The first half being player/DM social interactions.
Who is at war?
We are in a rules thread, discussing if casters are overpowered or not.
I say not if you don't let them twist the rules.
She says otherwise.
Discussions on the internet are only personal if you make them person.
I saw RD's post, but I was speaking of caster level bonuses that don't have stop gaps like the ioun stone. I do see I was not clear.
I think Ashiel was just trying to be creative with what you gave her. I don't think she would actually have level 15 characters using Big T as a bio-weapon. I read it more of a joke post than as a serious idea(for a real game). In theory and in practicality it does work to an extent, but just like getting free wishes......
Thank you Wraithstrike, once again, for being reasonable. Yes, it was a joke, actually. It was nice of you to notice. :P
Free wishes don't actually bother me, since Wish has been nerfed in the extreme. Not really good for a whole lot anymore, given the exceedingly hefty price tag, and the removal of the ability to produce treasure (it used to actually give you 25,000 gp, instead of eating 25,000 gp, for example; or magic items, and stuff like that). Like I said before in the other thread, the Devs knew about the ability to get planar bound entities to grant wishes. It was actually discussed during the playtest, and one of the devs commented that they might remove the option from the efreeti and similar offenders; but they didn't. They did nerf wish however, to avoid creating an infinite-money/treasure loop.
Djinn grant wishes. It's kind of what they do. Nothing in the spell's "always works" category of options is particularly worrisome. Anything beyond that is subject to GM admission or potentially tomfoolery. +2.5 to an ability modifier doesn't scare me at 13th+ level. Pretty mild actually. :)
On a side note, did you see my previous post? I asked you a question, but I didn't see an answer. Here it is again:
I hate the way Simulacrum is written. I wish it could have been fixed during the beta testing, but Paizo was only a blip on my radar at the time.
Would this be more to your liking, dear friend?
School illusion (shadow); Level sorcerer/wizard 7
Casting Time 12 hours
Components V, S, M (sculpture of the target plus powdered rubies worth 500 gp per HD of the simulacrum)
Range 0 ft.
Effect one duplicate creature
Duration instantaneous
Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance noSimulacrum creates an illusory duplicate of any creature. The duplicate creature is partially real and formed from clay, ice, mud, sand, snow, or stone. It appears to be the same as the original, but it has only half of the real creature's levels or HD (and the appropriate hit points, BAB, saving throws, feats, skill ranks, and special abilities for a creature of that level or HD). You can't create a simulacrum of a creature whose HD or levels exceed twice your caster level. A creature familiar with the original might detect the ruse with a successful Perception or Sense Motive check (DC 10 + caster level of the simulacrum spell).
If a creature casts spells as a class (such as a dragon casting spells as a sorcerer), then the duplicate casts spells at half that level (so a duplicate of a creature with 12 HD who casts spells as an 8th level sorcerer would have 6 HD and cast as a 4th level sorcerer). If the creature has spell-like abilities, the duplicate's caster level with those abilities is halved. In addition, the duplicate cannot use any spell-like abilities that mimic spells that wouldn't be available to a spellcaster with caster level equal to the duplicate's HD x 1.5 (so a duplicate with 10 HD loses access to any spell-like ability that mimics a spell requiring a 16th or higher level caster). If the original creature possessed Spell Resistance, the duplicate's spell resistance is reduced for each HD fewer than the original (so a 10 HD duplicate of a creature with 20 HD would have spell resistance equal to the original creature -10).
The duplicate creature retains gross physical characteristics of the original creature, including natural attacks, natural armor, size, ability scores, and traits based on its type (such as construct or undead traits). If the original creature possessed any of the following special abilities or attacks, the duplicate does too: Ability Damage or Drain, Amphibious, Bleed, Blindsense, Blightsight, Breath Weapon (halve any damage dice, to a minimum of 1 die; i.e. 6d6 becomes 3d6), Burn, Change Shape, Channel Resistance, Constrict, Curse, Damage Reduction, Disease, Distraction, Energy Drain, Fast Healing (equal to original's fast healing or 1/2 the duplicate's HD, whichever is less), Fear, Flight, Frightful Presence, Gaze, Immunity, Light Blindness, Light Sensitivity, Paralysis, Plant Traits, Poison, Pounce, Powerful Charge, Pull, Push, Rake, Regeneration (a duplicate instead gains Fast Healing as noted above), Rend, Resistance, Rock Catching, Rock Throwing, Scent, Spell-like abilities, Spell Resistance, Stench, Summon, Swallow Whole, Telepathy, Trample, Tremorsense, Trip, Vulnerabilities, Web, and Whirlwind.
At all times, the simulacrum remains under your absolute command. No special telepathic link exists, so command must be exercised in some other manner (but a simulacrum will not harm you). A simulacrum has no ability to become more powerful. It cannot increase its level or abilities. If reduced to 0 hit points or otherwise destroyed, it reverts to clay, ice, mud, sand, snow, or stone and melts instantly into nothingness. A complex process requiring at least 24 hours, 10 gp per hit point, and a fully equipped magical laboratory can repair damage to a simulacrum. Spells that heal damage are only half as effective on a simulacrum. A limited wish spell may be used to heal the simulacrum of 10 hit points per caster level.
At the risk of putting myself between two violent explosions:
Ashiel, Ciretose, is it possible that you two could actually agree to a truce?
Something along the lines of: I think you're being ridiculous and I don't agree, but I won't personally attack you for it?
I don't want to fight. I've tried to simply ignore Ciretose, but then he only becomes more belligerent. I don't think he is ridiculous. I think he's entitled to his opinion. I just wish he'd stop trying to beat me with it, or start fights. It gets really old. This nonsense has been going on for a year, easy, and just seems to be getting worse. Not long ago, even TriOmegaZero (a personal forum hero of mine actually, because he just seems like an honestly awesome guy) called Ciretose out because even TOZ noticed that he seemed to be singling out my posts and trying to start fights.
I have never wanted for a block feature on the forums, for any reason, until I finally had it up to here with Ciretose. He isn't interested in discussing, he's interested in fighting, and he tries every opportunity he gets to fight with me. I've just had enough. I wish there was a block feature. This is the first forum, ever, and the first time ever, I have ever wanted to block or ignore posts by someone.
Yeah. I know I should butt out, but really, I agree with the way that Ashiel runs, and I agree that Ciretose has every right to think it's patently ridiculous.
Please, don't butt out. I actually appreciate what you're trying to do here. I really do.
Well it looks like he's agreed to stop insulting and attacking you, so perhaps we'll see how that goes.
As long as you both just want to debate, I don't see it becoming an issue again :)
I'm forum hooked so expect me to continue floating around. I'm only a part time mature student and unemployed, with only two games a week.
I need something to keep me from going mentally stagnant.
And I like to think and read. Forums give me both :)
Very much the same here. Welcome to the forums. It's always nice to have a friendly person around. ^-^
Thankyou, it's appreciated.
And honestly, it seems there are quite a lot of friendly people, just a lot of misunderstandings and opinions.
Ah well, you know what they say about opinions...
At least it gives me something to mull over and challenge my status quo.
A stagnant mind is a crime.
Indeed. I'm trying to get a full-time job at a Bookstore not far from here. What a minor dream come true that would be. Being around books all day, and the smell of the coffee. I don't even drink coffee, but it smells wonderful. It'd be so great to be able to read a bit while on lunch breaks. Reading always seemed like such great mental exercise. :)
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Indeed. I'm trying to get a full-time job at a Bookstore not far from here. What a minor dream come true that would be. Being around books all day, and the smell of the coffee. I don't even drink coffee, but it smells wonderful. It'd be so great to be able to read a bit while on lunch breaks. Reading always seemed like such great mental exercise. :)Thankyou, it's appreciated.
And honestly, it seems there are quite a lot of friendly people, just a lot of misunderstandings and opinions.
Ah well, you know what they say about opinions...
At least it gives me something to mull over and challenge my status quo.
A stagnant mind is a crime.
Oh god!! I remember when I worked as a Barista and as a Department head in a bookstore when I was younger..... I drank so much coffee back then that I can't drink it now without getting the shakes.
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Well it looks like he's agreed to stop insulting and attacking you, so perhaps we'll see how that goes.
For the record, I don't think quoting someone is insulting them.
On topic, you can't expect to be taken seriously when you complain about a caster/martial divide when you interpret the rules as liberally as possible to allow the player the most favorable reading in every interpretation because spells are by their nature more subjective.
To say the developers weren't trying to make spells of the same level as close to equal power as possible is ignoring the fact that it is exactly their stated intent.
You shouldn't read the rules for or against your players. You should ask yourself in each unclear ruling two questions.
1. Is this going to cause a problem at my table.
2. Would I try this crap at a table with the devs, were I ever lucky enough to play with them.
If you answer 1 yes, stop, don't.
If you can't answer two yes, admit you are house ruling and make up your own mind about it for your table, but stop posting about it on the rules thread and take it over to homebrew.
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Homebrew material can never ever be wrong, it can be opinionated but it can never be wrong. You can argue about whether it's a good idea but you can never argue right or wrong.
If you are going to argue right and wrong then you have to stick with the rules because the rules are something that you have a basis to argue right over wrong, homebrew you don't.
Oh god!! I remember when I worked as a Barista and as a Department head in a bookstore when I was younger..... I drank so much coffee back then that I can't drink it now without getting the shakes.Indeed. I'm trying to get a full-time job at a Bookstore not far from here. What a minor dream come true that would be. Being around books all day, and the smell of the coffee. I don't even drink coffee, but it smells wonderful. It'd be so great to be able to read a bit while on lunch breaks. Reading always seemed like such great mental exercise. :)Thankyou, it's appreciated.
And honestly, it seems there are quite a lot of friendly people, just a lot of misunderstandings and opinions.
Ah well, you know what they say about opinions...
At least it gives me something to mull over and challenge my status quo.
A stagnant mind is a crime.
Haha! Wow, nurse bring the decaff! XD
I absolutely love the smell of coffee and cremes. I worked at a grocery store for about 2 years before leaving on friendly terms for personal issues. My absolute favorite isle to work on was the coffee and creme isle. Oh my gosh it smelled so good, all the time. It was like happiness as an aroma. Ah...========================================================================
On the main topic (I actually like side topics too, as it gives a bit of a breather), IMHO it's actually not the fact spellcasters wield godlike power at godlike levels (that's to be expected really). The problem is that most non-casters rarely have mundane ways of doing things that are relevant at higher levels. I mean, at low levels, it's pretty cool. Lots of very mundane things can be done with a little ingenuity. Some stuff like dealing with invisible enemies might be solved by scattering a pouch of crushed white chalk around the room (or perhaps using it as an AoE grenade-like weapon), but there's little that supports that sort of thing.
Some things were nerfed in PF, like how rogues could sneak-attack with splash weapons on a direct hit. Stuff like acid or alchemist fires were more useful because rogues and some other classes that added bonus damage for certain hits had a nice energy-damage attack (scouts in 3.5 could move and chuck a flask for 1d6 + Xd6 damage and such).
Martial characters lost lots of combat effectiveness from 3.0 to 3.5, because they lost the ability to move + full-attack, which was a standard part of combat in 3.0 due to 3.0's version of haste allowed characters to move and full-attack, which literally eliminated the biggest complaint about 3.5's martial classes, and their having to find ways to patch their inability to move and be relevant at higher levels.
But it's a little bigger than that too. Most skills have a few set effects. A lot of those effects don't mean much past low levels, don't scale very well, or are pretty limited. For example, beyond tracking, Survival isn't exceptionally useful in most games past low levels. Acrobatics is pretty good, but again becomes less and less useful as the game progresses. There's also little advice or rules to be found in the game for using skills outside of their basic purposes (like giving advice for setting DCs for acrobatic stunts like running along or up a wall and jumping to something else, like a free-runner might do).
Even not noting skills, there's a disturbing lack of abilities that are relevant that aren't spellcasting abilities, both in and outside of combat. For a combat example, let's look at many of the critical feats, and stuff like Deadly Stroke. Most all of these come to late to be of much use. The vital strike line of feats requires too many feats for something to scale half-way reasonably, and so forth. For out of combat situations, there are few non-spells that help solve non-combat situations if it's not immediately covered under a skill.
Pathfinder has made some progress in this sort of thing (such as by allowing magic item properties to be determined with hard Appraise checks) but there's not much progress. Spellcasters still have tons of options, and non-casters still have difficulties adapting to situations both in-combat and during general adventuring purposes. Most make up for their lack of options with magic items, which actually does help. And a lot of people who play martials or more mundane characters (myself included) often really like playing with our magic toys, so this isn't necessarily a game breaker.
Because a roleplaying game is ultimately about imagination, problem solving, and story telling, the kid with the biggest toolbox usually will come out on top in terms of capability for success. However, the overall impression of balance has been strained severely since 3.0, because now mundane characters have difficulties doing what mundane characters usually do. Fighters and Barbarians now have to look for special patches like Mobile Fighter or Rage-Lance-Pounce to actually get returns on their actions like they were getting back at 1st level.
Post 3.0, it's not even about quadratic wizards vs linear fighters. It's that Fighters begin fairly high, and steadily diminish relative to their challenges and peers; while their peers rise to meet their challenges and just grow stronger and more versatile.
That being said, it's not terribly hard to patch it in the core rules by just being smart with what sort of items you buy/create/award. A martial character decked out in intelligent items that use buff-spells on them so as not to waste actions is often well worth the investment. A lot of people consider that sort of thing "cheese" however; which goes back to the saying that Fighters can't have nice things.
lots of pertinent stuff about fighters vs. castersIt's something that we have to grapple with here at our table, and we only manage due to having a fairly cooperative group and adaptive DMs.
Casters start off with a "level tax" until they meet the average, and fighters start off decent out of the box @ 1st.
I tend to think of Casters as ECL characters. They pay for levels of inefficiency and feeling underpowered for the big bonus at the end.
Typically we run rather long distance campaigns, so to give an added oomph to martials there's often "candy" in the way of templates, items and suchlike to balance it out.
I don't have an issue with this, and the only reason why I don't play more martial characters is that I like versatility. The candy our DM hands out if often interesting and very very tempting, but I also am th DM's wife, so playing a character that doesn't get candy avoids calls of favoritism.
Though I probably shouldn't worry about it since nearly every character I've had in his games has ended up horribly scarred by her adventuring days.
In fact, over just five years I can think of two out of the seven who hasn't ended up as a tragedy. The other five have been 1-killed herself after being turned away by everyone/thing they love 2-tortured, assaulted, and ultimately perpetually separated from their loved ones 3-divinely cursed and outcast 4-alone and wandering as a reviled monster 5-owned by an insane/evil archmage and locked in an enormous dungeon full of nasties.
Hm...
Now that I look at that maybe a "talk" is in order...
:P
Haha, hopefully no one will be sleepin' on the couch tonight (unless it's snuggling up with a good movie). :P
I've got a player who has a fighter who has done very well in our online group. He's a half-giant fighter, which means he has nice race/class synergy, but the biggest reason he has done so well is because he's been very keen on picking items that lend to his strategies. He's around 8th level, and has a couple +1 weapons. One of which is a +1 net for snagging people and he plans to make it a +1 ghost touch net one day. He carries a few different weapons. His magic items mostly revolve around little boosts a few times per day, rather than big static buffs.
For example, he has a belt that lets him use enlarge person a few times per day. So in most fights he can get big for a few rounds to run crowd control for the party. Currently one of the spellcasters in the group is working on a magic item that will let him activate lead blade a few times per day. Stuff like that. Eventually, he wants to get a few 1/day abilities on several pieces of his gear, and possibly get some of his gear made intelligent, so that it can help him when the chips are down (such as an armor that can cast remove paralysis or cure critical wounds when he's in danger).
He's been very smart with his money. He isn't super powerful at all times, but he has enough little low-level x/day or x/rounds abilities scattered about on his gear that he has a trick for different situations, which gives him more to do than just swing sticks (but he swings sticks very well!). At higher levels, he will definitely be getting something that gives him freedom of movement and death ward. In fact, we've talked about the possible benefits of getting an intelligent item that can cast spell turning eventually (item readies action to cast spell turning if targeted by a spell, for example). I believe he will do just fine even at higher levels.
Asked Wraithstrike a question..
Sorry I missed it before. I do like that a lot better since I like to be able to sit down at anyone's table without having to worry about how any one GM might rule on an issue.
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Sorry I missed it before. I do like that a lot better since I like to be able to sit down at anyone's table without having to worry about how any one GM might rule on an issue.
Asked Wraithstrike a question..
I think it would make more sense to actually use the CR rather than the HD, since the intent seems to be to limit the power of what you can summor while not limiting what you can summon.
It would be just as open, but less breakable.
I would suggest CR = Two less than actual for real, not buffed by a ton of weird synergistic loopholes, caster level.
And control isn't remote control, but that is a whole other derail...
I always thought CR was a better number to use than HD, but the designer keep referring to HD. I was hoping that would end with 3.5, which outsiders were really efficient with HD, and other creatures were less efficient.
I always thought CR was a better number to use than HD, but the designer keep referring to HD. I was hoping that would end with 3.5, which outsiders were really efficient with HD, and other creatures were less efficient.
I think the reason designers go with HD rather than CR is twofold.
1st) HD is more tangible. Likewise, it determines the raw statistics and abilities of creatures. It is effectively levels that the creatures have. HD is something you can really get a hold of and see a clear difference in power. From a mechanical standpoint, CR is less assured, and is a number that is assigned to a creature based on estimated encounter difficulty and XP value. CR is literally nothing beyond determining the XP value of an enemy. CR is an entirely metagame concept, while HD is more tangible in terms of mechanics.
2nd) Assuming creatures are well designed, their HD should be an indicator of their effective power. While there are some exceptions, generally the level of power of a creature is tied to their HD (again it's the key factor in HP, BAB, Saves, Skills, save DCs, etc). While some creatures have bizarre abilities that are beyond the norm (the Tarrasque being unkillable) most creatures should fall in a certain power range based on HD.
Personally, I've always liked HD. Basing statistics off CR has always seemed backwards to me (like SR = CR + X). Good creature writing is key though.
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I always thought CR was a better number to use than HD, but the designer keep referring to HD. I was hoping that would end with 3.5, which outsiders were really efficient with HD, and other creatures were less efficient.I think the reason designers go with HD rather than CR is twofold.
1st) HD is more tangible. Likewise, it determines the raw statistics and abilities of creatures. It is effectively levels that the creatures have. HD is something you can really get a hold of and see a clear difference in power. From a mechanical standpoint, CR is less assured, and is a number that is assigned to a creature based on estimated encounter difficulty and XP value. CR is literally nothing beyond determining the XP value of an enemy. CR is an entirely metagame concept, while HD is more tangible in terms of mechanics.
2nd) Assuming creatures are well designed, their HD should be an indicator of their effective power. While there are some exceptions, generally the level of power of a creature is tied to their HD (again it's the key factor in HP, BAB, Saves, Skills, save DCs, etc). While some creatures have bizarre abilities that are beyond the norm (the Tarrasque being unkillable) most creatures should fall in a certain power range based on HD.Personally, I've always liked HD. Basing statistics off CR has always seemed backwards to me (like SR = CR + X). Good creature writing is key though.
But HD strength varies widely and isn't reflective of power.
Take the chart on 294 of the bestiary. You have a whole list of creatures that the HD is nowhere near the CR, sometimes almost half of the CR. And even within that chart they can vary substantially.
HD is never meant to be an indicator of power, just an indicator of hit points.
CR is the indicator of power, subjective as it is. So when a spell has a limiting factor that is suppose to be for power, which is what I believe it was intended for spells like Similacrum and Gate, that would be much more practical than HD.
Again, I think the Devs want open spells like the ones above for story purposes, but you can't lets some players have nice things without them trying to abuse them.
I always thought CR was a better number to use than HD, but the designer keep referring to HD. I was hoping that would end with 3.5, which outsiders were really efficient with HD, and other creatures were less efficient.I think the reason designers go with HD rather than CR is twofold.
1st) HD is more tangible. Likewise, it determines the raw statistics and abilities of creatures. It is effectively levels that the creatures have. HD is something you can really get a hold of and see a clear difference in power. From a mechanical standpoint, CR is less assured, and is a number that is assigned to a creature based on estimated encounter difficulty and XP value. CR is literally nothing beyond determining the XP value of an enemy. CR is an entirely metagame concept, while HD is more tangible in terms of mechanics.
2nd) Assuming creatures are well designed, their HD should be an indicator of their effective power. While there are some exceptions, generally the level of power of a creature is tied to their HD (again it's the key factor in HP, BAB, Saves, Skills, save DCs, etc). While some creatures have bizarre abilities that are beyond the norm (the Tarrasque being unkillable) most creatures should fall in a certain power range based on HD.Personally, I've always liked HD. Basing statistics off CR has always seemed backwards to me (like SR = CR + X). Good creature writing is key though.
HD is also a metagame concept that is not really tied to power. You can have 2 HD 13 creatures with and they can be 2 CR's apart or more. That is a big power difference.
If you go by the monster creation chart saves, attack rolls and so on are tied to CR. It also matches the monsters in the books pretty well.
Don't get me wrong here. I'm not saying HD is a perfect measure, but that it is intended to be effectively "monster levels", and are roughly on par with NPC classes, with perhaps certain creatures like outsiders and dragons being note-able exceptions.
Powerful creatures with few HD were one of the things people have criticized when it came to the MM II and subsequent Monster Manuals in 3.x. There are a lot of "gotcha" monsters who are low HD (and often CR as well) who have abilities that are wildly out of proportion for to the rest of their statistics. There's a few in the 3.x MM as well, including many of the fey.
While some aspects of the game have begun to try and experiment with this "CR as a statistic" line of thinking, very little of the game has actually followed with that reasoning. In fact, more of the game would need to. CR = level isn't a bad idea. One of the better "Monster PCs" variants I've seen was to take CR = Level, assume most monsters are using the elite array and deducing their ability modifiers as such, resulting in much lower ability modifiers than normal, and just rolling with it.
But if you want consistency (and believe me, I do like consistency), you would need to change a lot of stuff. Cloudkill would need to auto-kill creatures of CR X or lower, sleep would ignore HD and instead target based on CR, so it might completely rail a bunch of kobolds, merely because they are CR 1/4, while being of little effectiveness against other stuff. Incidentally, this would also lead to effects where not being equipped with level-appropriate gear means that you are more vulnerable to spells and effects, while being equipped with more than level-appropriate gear means you are immune to sleep.
No longer would the HD of things like undead matter, but really just what their CR was. That might even make things nicer for necromancers, since we could cram way more uber undead into a CR cap than a HD cap.
CR is also very abstract. I mean, look at the Tarrasque. He's CR 25. Yet he's actually less challenging to do battle with than a CR 16 Planetar. A 16th level party could curb stomp Big T (or at least ignore him) every day, easily. The Planetar is actually scarier in terms of actually being able to be a threat. The Tarrasque is just hard to make dead, and he jumps really good. That's about it.
But at this point, it's rather irrelevant, because I'm just musing about the ripples in the system and kinda babbling. I'll stop now.
Imagine if someone decided to drop the size of the HD of more powerful creatures and just gave them more to make HD more relevant to power level... (Of course there would need to be many more changes made, requiring too much effort to be worth the trouble)
Either way, to fix the problem of HD not equaling power level would be an extensive project rehashing a good portion of the game. You might as well just create a new system, it's just easier to pull out the GM card to call it.
Imagine if someone decided to drop the size of the HD of more powerful creatures and just gave them more to make HD more relevant to power level... (Of course there would need to be many more changes made, requiring too much effort to be worth the trouble)
Either way, to fix the problem of HD not equaling power level would be an extensive project rehashing a good portion of the game. You might as well just create a new system, it's just easier to pull out the GM card to call it.
Quite true.
HD used to be a key factor in how strong a monster was. A lot of that fell off in 3.x though. Sign of times, perhaps.|
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Don't get me wrong here. I'm not saying HD is a perfect measure, but that it is intended to be effectively "monster levels", and are roughly on par with NPC classes, with perhaps certain creatures like outsiders and dragons being note-able exceptions.Powerful creatures with few HD were one of the things people have criticized when it came to the MM II and subsequent Monster Manuals in 3.x. There are a lot of "gotcha" monsters who are low HD (and often CR as well) who have abilities that are wildly out of proportion for to the rest of their statistics. There's a few in the 3.x MM as well, including many of the fey.
While some aspects of the game have begun to try and experiment with this "CR as a statistic" line of thinking, very little of the game has actually followed with that reasoning. In fact, more of the game would need to. CR = level isn't a bad idea. One of the better "Monster PCs" variants I've seen was to take CR = Level, assume most monsters are using the elite array and deducing their ability modifiers as such, resulting in much lower ability modifiers than normal, and just rolling with it.
But if you want consistency (and believe me, I do like consistency), you would need to change a lot of stuff. Cloudkill would need to auto-kill creatures of CR X or lower, sleep would ignore HD and instead target based on CR, so it might completely rail a bunch of kobolds, merely because they are CR 1/4, while being of little effectiveness against other stuff. Incidentally, this would also lead to effects where not being equipped with level-appropriate gear means that you are more vulnerable to spells and effects, while being equipped with more than level-appropriate gear means you are immune to sleep.
No longer would the HD of things like undead matter, but really just what their CR was. That might even make things nicer for necromancers, since we could cram way more uber undead into a CR cap than a HD cap.
CR is also very abstract. I mean, look at the Tarrasque. He's CR 25. Yet he's actually less challenging to do battle with than a CR 16 Planetar. A 16th level party could curb stomp Big T (or at least ignore him) every day, easily. The Planetar is actually scarier in terms of actually being able to be a threat. The Tarrasque is just hard to make dead, and he jumps really good. That's about it.
But at this point, it's rather irrelevant, because I'm just musing about the ripples in the system and kinda babbling. I'll stop now.
In the case of spells like Cloudkill I think HD works fine as it is intended as a substitute for equivalent removal of hit points. It is a nice balancer for caster monsters with less Hit Dice, much in the same way them having less hit points in general makes them vulnerable.
The reason the Tarrasque is a CR 25 is if it wins initiative, someone in that Level 16 party is going to die, as they are either getting charged and grappled (or swallowed whole), or 6 spines that are +25 to hit that do an average of 26 damage each with a X3 crit from 120 feet. Yes you can run away from it more easily…if you win initiative. If you stick around…
For comparison, you are likely going to get a few rounds on the Planetar before anyone dies, and you have a number of things that will work fine on the Planetar if you are level appropriate when facing it that can take out the Planetar, not to mention that it only has 229 hit points…
A Tarrasque is much, much, more likely to equal death than a Planetar for a level 16 party, and it is much, much harder for a level 16 party to defeat by means other than avoidance than a Planetar. Which is why it’s CR is much higher. (why do I smell another derail coming...)
The bottom line is that you should not be able to summon something more powerful than you are, and control it. That is silly and game breaking.
The best measure of power is CR level, that is what it is for.
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Don't get me wrong here. I'm not saying HD is a perfect measure, but that it is intended to be effectively "monster levels", and are roughly on par with NPC classes, with perhaps certain creatures like outsiders and dragons being note-able exceptions.Powerful creatures with few HD were one of the things people have criticized when it came to the MM II and subsequent Monster Manuals in 3.x. There are a lot of "gotcha" monsters who are low HD (and often CR as well) who have abilities that are wildly out of proportion for to the rest of their statistics. There's a few in the 3.x MM as well, including many of the fey.
While some aspects of the game have begun to try and experiment with this "CR as a statistic" line of thinking, very little of the game has actually followed with that reasoning. In fact, more of the game would need to. CR = level isn't a bad idea. One of the better "Monster PCs" variants I've seen was to take CR = Level, assume most monsters are using the elite array and deducing their ability modifiers as such, resulting in much lower ability modifiers than normal, and just rolling with it.
But if you want consistency (and believe me, I do like consistency), you would need to change a lot of stuff. Cloudkill would need to auto-kill creatures of CR X or lower, sleep would ignore HD and instead target based on CR, so it might completely rail a bunch of kobolds, merely because they are CR 1/4, while being of little effectiveness against other stuff. Incidentally, this would also lead to effects where not being equipped with level-appropriate gear means that you are more vulnerable to spells and effects, while being equipped with more than level-appropriate gear means you are immune to sleep.
No longer would the HD of things like undead matter, but really just what their CR was. That might even make things nicer for necromancers, since we could cram way more uber undead into a CR cap than a HD cap.
CR is also very abstract. I mean, look at the Tarrasque. He's CR 25. Yet
The only way to truly defeat a tarrasque is to actually transport it to another plane or dimension because it says a way to kill it has yet to be found.