Design Manager
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Well yeah, because those are martial classes and we have to make sure they are "drool" and are useless according to the tier system. So even if they excel at every single listed non-combat thing mentioned and are pretty good at combat we have to slap them into a low tier so we can complain about full casters more.
Also, for some reason there is no love for the bard. Even though there are bard builds as/more powerful than sorc builds (or were in 3.5), but you know, it shows 6 spell levels so we will put it at a lower tier.
You still display your complete (and I begin to think intentional) misunderstanding of the Tier system, which estimates base potential. And there have been numerous posts in this thread holding up the bard, magus, and inquisitor as some of the "best" classes in the game. Most people designing a class or looking for a new class aren't trying to create or find Tier 1's; they want Tier 3's, classes that can solidly contribute in all aspects of play without hedging anyone else out. The Inquisitor can do basically anything a Fighter can do, usually better, and brings more options and resources to the party, rather than needing to borrow resources to be effective.
The Inquisitor and the Fighter are actually good examples of what the OP was actually trying to find out earlier in the thread, that is, the value of full BAB to an individual class. An Inquisitor running his Judgement and using Bane is better than a Fighter at dealing damage. That's just fact. Before you even count in his spells, his superior saves, his awesome class features, the 3x as many skill points he's bringing in, etc. Judgement + Bane, and later Second Judgement and Greater Bane, is better than the Fighter's full BAB and Weapon Training. The versatility of Judgement and other abilities only widens the gap further. The Bard doesn't get quite as potent without an archetype (though only by a narrow margin), but he improves the whole party simultaneously when he boosts himself, which pretty much makes up for it.
So, and this is what the OP was trying to establish, would you have a problem with an Inquisitor who just flat out got full BAB instead of an effective full BAB and the rest of his abilities, or is there a problem with that? What would the problem be?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I do not understand why you folks that want martials and casters to stand equal are here.
[...]
Don't talk about versatility because that is not what is being sought.
At a certain point, if someone you're talking to explains what they want, and you respond with "no, that's not what you want, obviously, this is what you really wanted" - then of course you're going to lack understanding of your partners in debates. You're ceased to converse with other people at that point and begun to instead debate your own imagination of them, so of course you will gain little understanding into the actual other people from this exercise.
Sorry. You are flat out wrong. I actually do want versatility, and I'm going to keep talking about it.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Raith, I might suggest that how your table operates is not how every table operates. My players are not looking to be railroaded; indeed, they prize their agency as the main characters of a story they're helping to co-author. They'd rather try and fail than feel 'coddled' or catered to. You are right in one respect - the DM's burden and joy is to make sure that everyone at the table is having fun. The entire rest of your post is a gigantic condescending generalization and I'll thank you not to repeat it. Aight? Aight.
I like class balance. We mostly have class balance*. What I think he's against is YOUR idea of class balance, which is just adding a bunch of power to the classes as a small minority of posters scream for it. Just adding more power to classes as people claim they are underpowered does NOT in any way shape or from help 'class balance' and in fact makes things worse.Your opinion. Also your statement that it is a "small minority of posters that think things are imbalanced" is misleading as all hell. The vast majority of all posters are indifferent and likely wouldn't care if anything was tweaked at all.
Some people think the game needs a but of work, me included.
And then there's 3 or 4 people, like you, that show up, claim they're the majority because there's "only" 10 or so people complaining at any one time and peg them as the minority, and use that to somehow prove that because we're the supposed minority, we are wrong.
Once I saw a thread with a pretty neutrally phrased OP that was polling on this topic, and was drawing participation from a wider selection of posters than these threads often do. Probably because it was mostly just posters answering the OP, no need to read the whole thread or debate anything or otherwise make a significant time commitment to posting in the thread. A question, and answers, rather than a discussion to keep up on.
Now, someone in that thread also popped in with an assertion about the opinions of board posters writ large, and I decided to test that assertion by spending a few hours counting up every poster.
(This is just the kind of the personality I have, I guess. As Deth already knows since I recall similarly hitting him up on some historical assertions. Testing assertions is kind of fun overall, even if the process often involves some drudgery and can add up to a lot of hours per post that I probably should have spent on, like, work or something ;) )
Here are my results. As noted in that post, they indicated a consensus of opinion that was actually much stronger and less varied than I had expected to discover.
Now, Deth, if you have any verifiable basis for your assertion that fighter or whatever imbalance is a small minority view, and can link to it, I'd love to consider it. I recognize that the above data remains pretty limited in several ways. Really good data would probably ask several sets of questions in several different polls with some opportunity to contrast different phrasings of the question.
I like class balance. We mostly have class balance*. What I think he's against is YOUR idea of class balance, which is just adding a bunch of power to the classes as a small minority of posters scream for it. Just adding more power to classes as people claim they are underpowered does NOT in any way shape or from help 'class balance' and in fact makes things worse.Your opinion. Also your statement that it is a "small minority of posters that think things are imbalanced" is misleading as all hell. The vast majority of all posters are indifferent and likely wouldn't care if anything was tweaked at all.
Some people think the game needs a but of work, me included.
And then there's 3 or 4 people, like you, that show up, claim they're the majority because there's "only" 10 or so people complaining at any one time and peg them as the minority, and use that to somehow prove that because we're the supposed minority, we are wrong.
Once I saw a thread with a pretty neutrally phrased OP that was polling on this topic, and was drawing participation from a wider selection of posters than these threads often do. Probably because it was mostly just posters answering the OP, no need to read the whole thread or debate anything or otherwise make a significant time commitment to posting in the thread. A question, and answers, rather than a discussion to keep up on.
Now, someone in that thread also popped in with an assertion about the opinions of board posters writ large, and I decided to test that assertion by spending a few hours counting up every poster.
Now, Deth, if you have any verifiable basis for your assertion that fighter or whatever imbalance is a small minority view, and can link to it, I'd love to consider it. I recognize that the above data remains pretty limited.
First of all it's DOKTOR Deth, I did not put my way thru 8 years of BBEG school to be called simply "Deth". ;-)
Next, please read again what I wrote:"...YOUR idea of class balance, which is just adding a bunch of power to the classes as a small minority of posters scream for it. Just adding more power to classes as people claim they are underpowered does NOT in any way shape or from help 'class balance' and in fact makes things worse"
So, we agree agree the Fighter could use a little boost, OK? And I agree that Spellcasters get really brutal once they get 9th level spells, OK? But few games get there, so that doesn't matter that much to me.
So, I don't mind giving the FIGHTER a little boost, as long as it doesn't call for a 2nd Ed.
What I do disagree with is "adding a bunch of power to the classes". I'd like to see the fighter get a little boost or two. NOT a "bunch of power" And by "classES" remember what this thread is about - full BAB classES. Let's go back to your poll: how many folks said the BBn, Paladin or Ranger was underpowered?
NONE.
How many said one or more of those was OP? Four.
Thus, the OP would like to take a nice, balanced wonderful class like the Inquisitor, and give it full BAB. Others have suggested giving all full BAB classes a boost- and for all intents & purposes, a boost that more or less equals spellcasting. And not just ranger type spellcasting either. teleport, fly, etc.
So, yeah- let's give the Fighter a couple boosts, things that can be done w/o a 2nd Ed. Yay! Come up with some ideas. Post 'em in the Suggestions forum (watch them being ignored if they are reasonable)
Leave the other full BAB classes more or less alone. (Note that I would say NO to a few nice paladin or ranger only spells....)
First of all it's DOKTOR Deth, I did not put my way thru 8 years of BBEG school to be called simply "Deth". ;-)
Next [...]
Apologies, sir Doktor.
Anyway, I was mostly focused in that post on the topic of testing the assertion about the beliefs of majorities and minorities of posters, and supplementing my own info on that subject if new stuff was available. If I did not accurately represent the nuance of your own opinion on the topic, my apologies again, but such was, and remains, not my main goal with that post.
However, moving on to that topic:
Come up with some ideas. Post 'em in the Suggestions forum (watch them being ignored if they are reasonable)
Leave the other full BAB classes more or less alone. (Note that I would say NO to a few nice paladin or ranger only spells....)
I've posted a few over the last year or so of these discussions. That which remains my favorite, mainly because every single existing fighter statblock would still work fine.
I actually have a pretty high opinion of the Paladin spell list however. Even without Unsanctioned Knowledge, the expansions it received after Core have made it quite formidable IMO. I admit it still does not really come into its own until probably above Pal10 though.
Ranger is nice too, shorter on shock and awe than the Paladin list but longer on versatility.
Ranger spellcasting likely shares the lack of impressiveness at lower levels however. But then, such are typically cited as the least problematic levels for martial classes anyway.
The problem here, is that the rules account for SO MUCH MORE than just the 'combat/war game.' A huge portion of the physics of the game world and the dynamics of how sentient beings interact is all spelled out in the rules, and spellcasting exploits those rules harder than a 50 cent prostitute.
Regardless of how much out of combat stuff has been added-- PF was based on 3.5 which was based on 3.0 which was based on 2nd Edition AD&D which was based on. . .all the way back to Chainmail. A wargame, which supplied the original core system we still use today.
Ok Nathaniel Love...
You have absolutely no idea just WHAT the tier system means do you? I mean like, WHAT IT REALLY means...
If you’re going to insult me at least take the time to spell my name right; it’s on every single post and it’s my real name.
I understand only what people on these boards have used it for—to push a point of view that Wizards need to be nerfed and that Fighters shouldn’t exist and to generally complain about spell casters. If it has some other purpose, by all means, enlighten me—but if I see the seeds of the same argument in your explanation I will continue to think that we call a spade a spade and a tier system designed to push a view masquerading as some kind of “objective” measure what it is.Ehhh, I say give him a little credit Kirth. He probably offers his players a few choices now and then.
"Do you want to go to the temple dungeon, the mines dungeon, or the seaside dungeon?" For example.
I find this humorous. My games are usually sandbox style. Almost the first thing I say in a session is, “What do you want to do. . .” But it’s still my responsibility to have enemies, allies, situations, locations prepared that the characters can interact with, and it’s still my story—my NPCs who have goals counter to the party and whose actions I determine, ect.
I like class balance. We mostly have class balance*. What I think he's against is YOUR idea of class balance, which is just adding a bunch of power to the classes as a small minority of posters scream for it.Or getting rid of/lessening the tendency of spells to do everything, including superseding everyone else's niches -- I'm fine with that, too. Which sounds like exactly what you say your group does, and how JJ explains his group works -- except you guys do it by gentleman's agreement instead of by houserule.
In other words, you achieve class balance in play by reducing the casters' tier. That's the tier system at work.
On the other hand, Nathaniel and many others think there's balance because their games are one big DM-driven story-time.
In either case, classes are not at all balanced, RAW-wise.
Again, if you are going to take the time to type a 9 letter name to slander me by it, please spell it correctly.
I disagree with your assessment of class balance; I disagree with your methodology to describe it which I feel is designed to support your viewpoint and not objective; I disagree with your assessment of how I run games, and I disagree with your claim that spellcasters need to be neutered for this to be a good game.If I wanted weaker wizards I’d go play a system/setting/game that has weaker wizards. There are a lot out there—Kirthfinder (I’m told), P6, P8, other mods of this game; Monte Cook’s Arcana Unearthed; 4th Edition DnD, Whitewolf’s Werewolf or Vampire; Shadowrun. . .plenty of options if you want something with no Wizards.
I play D&D/Pathfinder because I want an epic high fantasy system where Wizards can do Wizard stuff. Take that out and I’m done with the game, I’ll stick to previous editions which still allow the kind of game I want when I reach for a 3.X based book from the shelf.
You still display your complete (and I begin to think intentional) misunderstanding of the Tier system, which estimates base potential.
Which estimates theoretical base potential weighing all scenarios equally and crediting certain classes for abilities/spells which have never been used in actual games while ignoring others truly potential power based on the simple fact that this doesn’t line up with a pre-assigned ranking.
The Tier system is actually this—Tier 1 9th level casters,
Tier 2—9th level casters who at first glance seem “weaker” and 6th level casters who seem “stronger”, Tier 3—Bards lol because we don’t really understand what they can do or we’d have them higher, plus the rest of the 6th level casters
Tier 4—4th level casters, plus AM Barbarian because we eventually had to stop pretending that this ridiculously powerful build wasn’t absolute worst
Tier 5—non casters
Tier 6—non-player characters
That’s it. It’s a method of claiming that “the more spells the more broken nerf plox” and dressing it up as something else.
