]Um, we're talking a fighter.
Mithral plate armor with Armor training 4 is +7 Dex bonus. I'm not even using celestial armor.Right, I forgot Fighters got armor training to increase their dex limits. My bad, you're right there.
And why am I lowering his TH? Just because you think a 30 Str is low?No, because you mentioned power attacking.
You're comparing someone devoting everything they can into defense, to someone who is intentionally lowering their attack?
No, I'm noting that Power Attack is a feat choice and common combat tactic at high levels to increase your damage.
Expertise, on the other hand, is almost totally optional and used less then Defensive Fighting, and probably less then Defender (since slapping Defender on a +5 Shield is an awesome AC move, and supplementing it with Guardian as an alternative is even better).
So, yeah, you figure in Power Attack for an offense build, and Shields for the Defense Build...those are the two defining things which separate offense and defense.
Even if you don't include PA, AC can scale nicely. And we haven't even TOUCHED sacred, luck, morale, dodge and competence bonuses to AC, not all of which can be offset with similar magic items (although towing around a bard can certainly help).
==Aelryinth
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And the attacker just uses the same Wishes to get +5 inherent Strength. They cancel out.That's what summoning outsiders (genies) is for. By 20 you should have inherent boosts to every stat. (Though some characters might not bother with Charisma.)Inherent bonuses to Dex just for AC purposes are colossally inefficient. Not even with 20th level wealth are they a good investment, because they turn the usual "AC is cheaper or equal to attack bonuses" on its head.
If you're buying +5 inherent Dex, Dex had better be really important to you for some reason other than AC, like it's your to-hit stat.
Uh...most folks aren't fighting opponents also capable of summoning genies very frequently.
That's what summoning outsiders (genies) is for. By 20 you should have inherent boosts to every stat. (Though some characters might not bother with Charisma.)Inherent bonuses to Dex just for AC purposes are colossally inefficient. Not even with 20th level wealth are they a good investment, because they turn the usual "AC is cheaper or equal to attack bonuses" on its head.
If you're buying +5 inherent Dex, Dex had better be really important to you for some reason other than AC, like it's your to-hit stat.
You're going to run into differences of opinion there depending on whether you're using wealth by level as your primary guideline or wizardly capabilities as your primary guideline.
Sure, if you're in the latter circumstance, wish away.
Even if you don't include PA, AC can scale nicely. And we haven't even TOUCHED sacred, luck, morale, dodge and competence bonuses to AC, not all of which can be offset with similar magic items (although towing around a bard can certainly help).
I think we're straying from the point though.
The discussion is not "Can AC keep up?" its "Is offense favored?".
We're still looking at the attacker spending gold on one weapon and pretty much calling it a day, vs. the defender going all out and doing everything they can to keep up or barely pull ahead.
Thats a much larger investment, both in terms of gold value and in planning on the player's part.
It is easier to get a high attack than it is to get a high defense, so yes, I would still say PF favors attack over defense, simply because it is so much easier to have a high attack without actively trying.
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To expand a bit.
Consider also the initiative system.
High intiative is favored by the offense in the first round. A character that attacks a lower initiative opponent is going to have the advantage as that enemy will have lower AC and CMD (flatfooted) and can't make attacks of opportunity.
Thus an offensive group can gain huge headway against an opposing group before the end of the first round, exagerrated even further if a surprise round is involved. Enemies can be eliminated, action advantage can be gained, superior positioning is mine, the fight can already be won.
A defensive minded groups only real advantage is being a slightly better position not to be hurt. If they're not eliminating enemies they're no closer to hurting you.
Than we get into other forms of offense.
When I say "The game favors offense." I'm not saying that the game favors archers and two handed fighters.
I'm saying they favor offensive strategies and tactics. Optimization plays into this by creating characters good at this.
Think about what some of the most overpowered characters are out there. Is it the high ac fighter? The uber save paladin?
No when people come in to talk about overpowered it's about characters who have really solid offensive abilities such as slumber witches, gunslingers, alchemists, nova maguses, pouncing characters of all stripes. Hell, I once got into a knock down drag out brawl on the boards with someone because they believed fighters were overpowered for their capacity to do damage.
The evidence is overwhelming and over a decade high.
I mean, the attacker basically just has his one weapon to worry about, and he's good to go. The defender has a dozen different items he has to juggle, watch for what stacks and what doesn't, its just much more complicated to get everything right for max defense vs. max attack.
Again, saying that PF favors offense over defense doesn't mean that defense isn't there or that defense isn't effective, it just means that its easier to make an offensive build than it is a defensive one.
And thats not even getting into "How many classes and archetypes out there are offensive in nature, vs. how many are defensive in nature?"
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When I say "The game favors offense." I'm not saying that the game favors archers and two handed fighters.
I'm saying they favor offensive strategies and tactics. Optimization plays into this by creating characters good at this.
Think about what some of the most overpowered characters are out there. Is it the high ac fighter? The uber save paladin?
No when people come in to talk about overpowered it's about characters who have really solid offensive abilities such as slumber witches, gunslingers, alchemists, nova maguses, pouncing characters of all stripes. Hell, I once got into a knock down drag out brawl on the boards with someone because they believed fighters were overpowered for their capacity to do damage.
The evidence is overwhelming and over a decade high.
I actually do think the uber save paladin is a pretty solidly powerful character, especially going into the higher levels. And I don't want to overly de-emphasize defense. I've talked a lot about the growing importance of (broad spectrum) defenses in the high level game in past threads.
But part of that is because he's strong in all areas, not solely his saves. Formidable offense (never believe anyone who tells you paladins can't have that), good hp/AC/healing, great saves, good status removal.
Especially for martial characters with high rates of exposure to attack, a strong defense and a strong offense really go together like bricks and mortar at high levels, a lopsided focus on one or the other becomes increasingly unrewarding.
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Stabbity, note that you start with Breastplate and end up with Mithril Full typically. That's also a +4 AC bonus. Your Dex boost is low...it's the 2nd score to get inherents, so it's going to be +5 over starting, not +2. If you're a finesse fighter, it cancels out entirely.
If you figure in Power Attack, as you most assuredly should, your offense falls behind your defense by level. If you are a 3/4 BAB class, you can't even use PA or you risk not being able to hit stuff.
Note that at high levels, doing more per Attack with Power Attack is often less useful then hitting with one more iterative that's doing 30+ damage also, especially if you've got riders on the weapon.
==Aelryinth
I did factor in power attack. The offense scale goes up by a further +5 over those 19 levels if you don't use it, increasing the gap to +14.
I didn't include inherent bonuses, but that only increases the gap for offense since those aren't capped by armor. I did not include fighter class features because I intended my analysis to be somewhat class-agnostic, so it landed on Mithral Full Plate (+3 max dex; I assume you start at 12). That said, you are right that a heavy guy would start with something like Scale Mail for +5 AC and move to Full Plate for +9, so that's +2 I missed, which closes the gap missed for not including an inherent bonus on the offensive stat.
So the conclusion is the same, but both defense and attack scale up by +2 further.
Going into specific builds is a complete rabbit hole that I will not jump down, so if you wish to go that route then I will not be joining. Even my current numbers border on that too closely for my taste, but it was necessary to form any kind of reference point.
I assumed generic full-BAB strength build with 12 starting dex and heavy armor. That applies to a good number of classes, so I just kind-of took a stab at an average.
Remember I didn't say solid. I said ovwerpowered. As in someone makes a thread and complains that their encounters are ruined by it.
In which I think "improve your encounter design" but that's a different argument.
Every once in a blue moon you hear about an untouchable martial or monk but that's about it.
Honestly, 20th level PC PVP stuff really means nothing to this argument.
Monsters usually don't have PC wealth.
Monsters usually aren't even humanoid so they likely don't have a Christmas Tree of items going.
Most games are played through levels lower then 20.
Spells like Displacement or mirror image make arguing over +1 here and there moot.
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Remember I didn't say solid. I said ovwerpowered. As in someone makes a thread and complains that their encounters are ruined by it.
*shrugs* I'm willing to go a bit further and say your well designed uber saves paladin is stronger than a lopsidedly offensive meleer once you get into the high levels.
I'm also not quite prepared to give tactical supremacy (advantage, perhaps) to offensive tactics. Battlefield control in the form of placing obstacles is a basically defensive tactic and will always retain its place as an excellent one.
It does have to be paired with a strong offense to show itself at its best, though. It's always better for half the enemy to be dead by the time the other half get through/around the wall of stone.
Yeah, but again, the talking point for the thread is if one is favored over the other, not which one can be highest.
I'm still siding with the fact that every character gets inherently better at attack with no effort on their part, while defenses require active input in the form of gear to improve alone shows a favoring of offense vs. defense.
Every character in the game gets free offense boosts (free here meaning that no gold, feats, class abilities, etc have to be spent to get it). No one gets free defense boosts (well, they do in the form of saves, but ask anyone their opinion on save vs. die spells, and see if they think things fall in favor of the defense side there).
A butt naked lvl 20 is going to have a higher attack then they did at lvl 1, every single time, no exceptions. A butt naked lvl 20 is going to have to have special builds to have better defenses (like being a monk). Otherwise, that lvl 20 is going to be just as easy to hit as the lvl 1 was (that isn't cancelled out by the exact same improvements from the attacker, like stat increases).
There are a few other considerations as well, such as that offensive spell/special buffs for a friend or the party are more widespread than defensive ones. Not to say there aren't strong defensive non self only buffs kicking around like displacement or stoneskin, but the game is bursting at the seams with powerful offensive or primarily-offensive buffs you can cast on your friends: haste, bard song, good hope, aura of justice, the list goes on and on, and more of them are mass buffs.
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Yeah, but again, the talking point for the thread is if one is favored over the other, not which one can be highest.
I'm still siding with the fact that every character gets inherently better at attack with no effort on their part, while defenses require active input in the form of gear to improve alone shows a favoring of offense vs. defense.
Every character in the game gets free offense boosts (free here meaning that no gold, feats, class abilities, etc have to be spent to get it). No one gets free defense boosts (well, they do in the form of saves, but ask anyone their opinion on save vs. die spells, and see if they think things fall in favor of the defense side there).
A butt naked lvl 20 is going to have a higher attack then they did at lvl 1, every single time, no exceptions. A butt naked lvl 20 is going to have to have special builds to have better defenses (like being a monk). Otherwise, that lvl 20 is going to be just as easy to hit as the lvl 1 was (that isn't cancelled out by the exact same improvements from the attacker, like stat increases).
Offense & defense aren't mutually exclusive.
Every character has both to some degree. It's just which way your character leans.
So saying the offensive character is going to save gold is silly. No smart offensive character is going to NOT buy defensive items as well - even if they do lag a point or two behind their weapon. Due to the scaling diminishing returns system of enchantments - it'd be foolish not to.
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Is a pc effective at 1 hp? absolutely. He can do and take every single actions at 1 hp.
Half-Orc clerics have almost no reason to get rid of their half-orc racial trait for ferocity for example, being in the negative and able to cast a heal spell to get back to full is more than enough.
But anyway, yeah the enemy needs to be either incapacitated (Battlefield control spells) or unconscious (too much damage) for his impact to matter on the battlefield. I have seen many pcs fall unconscious fighting a monster which only had 5 hp left, because taking a full attack from the monster at 200 hp or 5 hp is exactly the same.
Yeah, but again, the talking point for the thread is if one is favored over the other, not which one can be highest.
I'm still siding with the fact that every character gets inherently better at attack with no effort on their part, while defenses require active input in the form of gear to improve alone shows a favoring of offense vs. defense.
Every character in the game gets free offense boosts (free here meaning that no gold, feats, class abilities, etc have to be spent to get it). No one gets free defense boosts (well, they do in the form of saves, but ask anyone their opinion on save vs. die spells, and see if they think things fall in favor of the defense side there).
A butt naked lvl 20 is going to have a higher attack then they did at lvl 1, every single time, no exceptions. A butt naked lvl 20 is going to have to have special builds to have better defenses (like being a monk). Otherwise, that lvl 20 is going to be just as easy to hit as the lvl 1 was (that isn't cancelled out by the exact same improvements from the attacker, like stat increases).
Offense & defense aren't mutually exclusive.
Every character has both to some degree. It's just which way your character leans.
So saying the offensive character is going to save gold is silly. No smart offensive character is going to NOT buy defensive items as well - even if they do lag a point or two behind their weapon. Due to the scaling diminishing returns system of enchantments - it'd be foolish not to.
True.
The question, however, is where the majority of their investment goes.
Honestly I'm of the mind that magic items in and of themselves favor defense based purely on how easy it is to get good defensive items versus offensive ones.
However, all that goes flying out the window once you factor in class abilities and how magic items factor into classes.
Sorry about the AC vs TH debate. Just showing that AC does actually scale faster then TH if you bother to just get the rot normal stuff...especially if you factor in power attack, shields and/or use a 3/4 BAB.
But yes, the game 'rewards' offense. Why? Because YOU decide offense. the game 'penalizes' lack of defenses, because the DM decides what defense to hit you on.
Your reward is killing the enemy quicker and taking his loot.
Your penalty doesn't kill the enemy any faster and get closer to the loot. NOT having the penalty also doesn't kill the enemy faster and get closer to the loot...it just means you stayed on the mountainside, instead of getting kicked off it. Offense means you went UP the mountain.
==Aelryinth
I don't think its that so much as Pathfinder favors whats fun. And for most people, slaying monsters is fun. Most players would gush over "Remember that time we killed a dragon?" more than they would "Remember that time we fought a dragon to a standstill for 3 solid days?".
Defense is passive, offense is active. People enjoy active things more, so more active things get made, and hence more favor for them.
I guess I'm thinking more about how PCs function and whether it is effective to invest in defense. For example, does it make sense to invest half your feats and equipment into defense, and the other half into offense, or should one invest 90% into offense?Most people invest more into offense than defense(Armor class) since it wins fights. The defense I really pay attention to is saves, and if I am a caster miss chance.
Weapons and other offensive items cost more than armor so it is not likely that you will invest in defense equally.
But AC IS a miss chance. Why does everyone forget this?
But AC IS a miss chance. Why does everyone forget this?I guess I'm thinking more about how PCs function and whether it is effective to invest in defense. For example, does it make sense to invest half your feats and equipment into defense, and the other half into offense, or should one invest 90% into offense?Most people invest more into offense than defense(Armor class) since it wins fights. The defense I really pay attention to is saves, and if I am a caster miss chance.
Weapons and other offensive items cost more than armor so it is not likely that you will invest in defense equally.
They don't forget it. It's just confusing since there are actual, well, miss chances.
But AC IS a miss chance. Why does everyone forget this?I guess I'm thinking more about how PCs function and whether it is effective to invest in defense. For example, does it make sense to invest half your feats and equipment into defense, and the other half into offense, or should one invest 90% into offense?Most people invest more into offense than defense(Armor class) since it wins fights. The defense I really pay attention to is saves, and if I am a caster miss chance.
Weapons and other offensive items cost more than armor so it is not likely that you will invest in defense equally.
It isn't a miss chance. A miss chance is a flat chance to miss. An AC is a derived miss chance to miss, modified by attack bonus.
The reason people prefer a 50% chance to be missed is because it works the same whether you are being swung at for +75 or +1. Having an AC at at foe's attack bonus +10 is much more complicated. And as attack bonuses start rising, more difficult.
A couple of months ago I designed a CR 16 (or so) encoutner for a party of 4 13th level characters.
While the enemies have respectable offense, the whole point of their tactic was to defend the boss using multiple tactics (specially teleporting minions).
The players hated that encounter.
Well, the dislike of the encounter was less that it was defensively oriented, and more that the bad guy A.) Ran away and B.) Sprang a reactive defense on me that nobody in the party really agreed on how exactly it worked.
Had he turtled up and eventually taken his lumps, that would have been one thing, but he turtled up and then fled once things turned against him. Very unsatisfying, that.
But AC IS a miss chance. Why does everyone forget this?I guess I'm thinking more about how PCs function and whether it is effective to invest in defense. For example, does it make sense to invest half your feats and equipment into defense, and the other half into offense, or should one invest 90% into offense?Most people invest more into offense than defense(Armor class) since it wins fights. The defense I really pay attention to is saves, and if I am a caster miss chance.
Weapons and other offensive items cost more than armor so it is not likely that you will invest in defense equally.
AC is a "chance to miss". That is not the same as a "miss chance" which has a specific meaning in the game, and works far differently than AC.
If you roll a nat 20 on an attack roll then you do not have a "chance to miss", but you still have to deal with a "miss chance" unless you have some special ability.
Nobody is forgetting anything. You are trying to misuse a term so it is not represented properly.
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I don't think its that so much as Pathfinder favors whats fun. And for most people, slaying monsters is fun. Most players would gush over "Remember that time we killed a dragon?" more than they would "Remember that time we fought a dragon to a standstill for 3 solid days?".
Defense is passive, offense is active. People enjoy active things more, so more active things get made, and hence more favor for them.
"Remember that time the dragon didn't turn us into paste?" is a pretty good one too.
I'm going to chime in and say that Pathfinder rewards defense very, very much. It's cheaper point for point of equipment to invest into defense, you can acquire high ACs relatively easily (even wizards are going to be sporting 40+ ACs at top-tier), and there are many means of acquiring things like damage reduction, resistances, immunities, and miss-% effects, etc. Ignoring these things results in a rather heavy tax (in the form of expensive diamonds mostly).
While it might bug the hell out of people to hear it, it's a lot like WoW PvP. You spec offense, you'll get blown up in PvP by people who bothered to actually pack some resilience instead of pushing DPS hard, because they will survive your attack and will respond with a less potent but plenty powerful response.
As levels rise in Pathfinder, PvE style encounters get massive XP budgets which punish players pushing offense dramatically because the strength of "mook" enemies increases substantially and pushing offense hard means you might kill a little faster (but not always even 1 mook/round) but get utterly dismantled by action economy and/or dogpile tactics. Strong defenses allow you to survive high damage builds while shrugging off trash mobs with little concern.
EDIT: I realize this view is the minority one here. It's kinda funny being "that guy" for once. Pretty firmly stand by this stance though. IMHO it's worth far more to spec defensively because most classes have offense covered anyway.
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While it might bug the hell out of people to hear it, it's a lot like WoW PvP. You spec offense, you'll get blown up in PvP by people who bothered to actually pack some resilience instead of pushing DPS hard, because they will survive your attack and will respond with a less potent but plenty powerful response.
I didn't actually play WoW much (got to 40ish b4 the first expansion) - but I totally agree with the premise.
I think part of the reason that people disdain defense is because, for the most part you can't have one guy 'tank' perfectly no matter what he does. But that doesn't mean that your front-liners should ignore defense too (because of course the archers/wizards do), instead it means that everyone in the party needs to focus defense.
You don't need to sacrifice defense in order to kill the enemy one round faster to protect the squishy party members if there are no squishy party members.
I think offense over defense only because you must maintain 4 different defenses. If you jack up your AC you must also consider Touch AC and worry if you'll be Flat Footed. You also have Fort, Ref and Will saves to consider.
If you want to deal damage to a foe you need (in general) a single stat. Ranged attacker? Dex, maybe Str too. Melee? Str. Blaster caster? Either Int, Wis or Cha.
So if you have 2 fighters, regardless of WHAT equipment or feats they take, at their core one only has to max out Str and To Hit capability to be offensive. The other focusing on defense has to pump Dex, Con and Wis (for AC and saves), consider feats/class features to avoid being caught Flat Footed, feats and items to grant deflection and dodge and others to keep Touch AC decent, and bolster flagging Ref and Will saves with either traits, feats or still more items.
I don't know, it just seems like YES, there's a lot of ways to increase defenses, but there's more there to keep track of. On the offensive side you can laser focus on 2 things: how you hit and maximizing the damage you deal on said hit.
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Yes - but it's not as if 'defense' characters are THAT far behind 'offense' characters on offense. It's a spectrum. You should be somewhere between solid and awesome at both.
If you had to pick one or the other entirely - I might agree with you. But the two aren't mutually exclusive.
And much depends upon your GM. I've heard some players on here complain about mook heavy encounters - even when the actual CR isn't high. My home party would just laugh as the mooks miss us and we pass the vast majority of our saves.
Yes - but it's not as if 'defense' characters are THAT far behind 'offense' characters on offense. It's a spectrum. You should be somewhere between solid and awesome at both.
If you had to pick one or the other entirely - I might agree with you. But the two aren't mutually exclusive.
It works the other way as well.
I think it's worth noting that back in the day AM BARBARIAN was not special because he could ragelancepounce things into oblivion. That could be accomplished by a cavalier with even bigger numbers.
No, what made him special was his defenses. He could pass pretty much any save without rolling a 1. His touch AC was fairly ludicrous. His hit points and damage reduction meant he could weather full attacks in relative ease.
However his actual AC was very low.
Ultimately I consider it silly to focus on defense as part of character build beyond certain minimums. Afterall you don't want to die in one round.
Defense to me is mostly a tactical concern. Your AC means dick if you die to a thousand cuts (and you can even at infinite AC). Your saves don't matter much if you're having dozens of spells hurled at you a turn.
So, it's a better option, ultimately, to embrace defensive minded groupings and aggressive pushes. A mook that dies before it gets to you doesn't factor in your AC, casters constantly being harassed or immediately locked down only test your saves once.
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I think it's worth noting that back in the day AM BARBARIAN was not special because he could ragelancepounce things into oblivion. That could be accomplished by a cavalier with even bigger numbers.
No, what made him special was his defenses. He could pass pretty much any save without rolling a 1. His touch AC was fairly ludicrous. His hit points and damage reduction meant he could weather full attacks in relative ease.
However his actual AC was very low.
I never really understood that. AC is easy to raise, especially on a pouncing barbarian (you've already got beast totem pumping your AC). Barbarians are generally skipping around in at least medium armor to boot.
Part of the reasons I think Barbarians are the "mundane done right" class is because they are in fact so well rounded. You've got great saves, great AC, great DR, great resistances, snap wands and gobble magic, and plant axes in ribcages. :P
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That goes the other way around too. It does not matter If you can kill a mook in one action but get taken out of the combat by the other minions.
In the end, as always, there is no tactic or way to play the game that rule them all.
This reminds me of a 3.5 game I was running which had the original rage-lance-pounce barbarian. A barbarian with pounce, a lance, and shock trooper (applies to-hit penalty to AC instead of attacks), so vs 1 enemy, it was burger-meat.
However there was much laughter when the barbarian was afraid of charging a cluster of enemies because his AC would be so bad that enemy #1 was surely a gonner and enemy #2 might have been hurt, but enemy #3 and #4 would blend him (or her, as the PC was female).
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I never really understood that. AC is easy to raise, especially on a pouncing barbarian (you've already got beast totem pumping your AC). Barbarians are generally skipping around in at least medium armor to boot.I think it's worth noting that back in the day AM BARBARIAN was not special because he could ragelancepounce things into oblivion. That could be accomplished by a cavalier with even bigger numbers.
No, what made him special was his defenses. He could pass pretty much any save without rolling a 1. His touch AC was fairly ludicrous. His hit points and damage reduction meant he could weather full attacks in relative ease.
However his actual AC was very low.
Seconded.
I've never understood why when people build DR heavy barbarians - they seem to take a sort of pleasure in tanking their AC entirely. It's not hard to get a decent AC to combo with the DR and other defenses. And said decent AC can punish their opponents for trying to Power Attack through their DR.
And again - much depends upon your GM. If the GM insists on keeping monsters at base defenses - a barbarian can pounce-kill. But if they actually have them use their own treasure to have armor/gear to buff their defenses - that won't happen. (Not that pounce isn't still awesome - but it isn't rocket tag then.)
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I didn't actually play WoW much (got to 40ish b4 the first expansion) - but I totally agree with the premise.
Well vanilla-wow didn't have "resilience", it was pretty sane in terms of damage output and such for the most part. However when the first expansion came around, PvE and PvP changed a lot, so they added a special stat called "Resilience" which was only for PvP.
Essentially, Resilience reduced incoming damage and/or the potency of bad things by a %. It's kind of a staple statistic for major PvPers. Now in most dungeons & raids and such, everyone wears gear that pushes for the most damage/healing/whatever because the AI is pretty simple-minded.
PvP on the other hand is more like D&D. Every enemy on the field has a human mind and they don't give two spits in the wind as to whether or not you draw aggro on AI foes, they are going to do their best to murder your priests and turn your damage dealers into soup. So a lot of PvP gear emphasizes defensive statistics like Stamina and of course, Resilience. Most people who are hardcore PvPers will recommend a mixture of offensive and defensive gear because pure defense means you won't have enough presence on the field, while pure offense means you'll get blown to bits and not really contribute much.
It's like that in Pathfinder. Most classes by their nature are offensively oriented. As a result, I recommend speccing defense the hardest to plug your weaknesses. You need to be able to hold your own so that you can contribute. Enemies and encounters at high levels are hellishly mean and even if you kill them, that doesn't mean you've actually won the fight yet (sounds funny but that's high-level for you). You need to be able to take a hit (or fifty).
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Yeah - you can tell WoW wasn't really built for PvP in mind. If you ever played WAR - it actually had a sort of tanking for PvP. It couldn't stop you from going after the healer etc, but it could cut your damage in half against anyone but the tank. Though that was still sometimes worth it if they were squishy enough.
It favored being more hybrid due to the focus on PvP. (Ex: several healer classes had their heals/buffs boosted when they did some damage due to appeasing their war god / building fury etc.)
(Pretty good game early - lots of potential - then the main designers left for new projects - and those they left behind to run the game turned it into a crappy WoW clone.)
I think it's worth noting that back in the day AM BARBARIAN was not special because he could ragelancepounce things into oblivion. That could be accomplished by a cavalier with even bigger numbers.
No, what made him special was his defenses. He could pass pretty much any save without rolling a 1. His touch AC was fairly ludicrous. His hit points and damage reduction meant he could weather full attacks in relative ease.
However his actual AC was very low.
I never really understood that. AC is easy to raise, especially on a pouncing barbarian (you've already got beast totem pumping your AC). Barbarians are generally skipping around in at least medium armor to boot.
Part of the reasons I think Barbarians are the "mundane done right" class is because they are in fact so well rounded. You've got great saves, great AC, great DR, great resistances, snap wands and gobble magic, and plant axes in ribcages. :P
I have a 17th level barbarian in +5 Full Plate whose AC is still s&%~ comparatively.
Even with Beast Totem it tops out at like 37.
Granted he has immense saves, DR, a surprisingly good touch AC, and a Breath of Life built into his armor just in case, but AC is hard to make relevant sometimes.
Recently I've decided screw it entirely, Reckless Abandon and Stunning Assault all the way, baby.
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Seconded.
I've never understood why when people build DR heavy barbarians - they seem to take a sort of pleasure in tanking their AC entirely. It's not hard to get a decent AC to combo with the DR and other defenses. And said decent AC can punish their opponents for trying to Power Attack through their DR.
I'm a big believer in layered defenses. At upper levels, my PCs generally have the following.
1. Solid AC for their role (at 20th, cloth-wearers will be gunning for around 40-ish, tanks 50-ish).
2. Damage reductions (barbarians, righteous might, stoneskin, angelic aspect, etc).
3. Save boosters (resistance items, divine grace, superstition, protection from spells, etc).
4. Evade-% (blur, displacement, (lesser) cloak of displacement).
5. Energy resistances (resist energy)
6. Misc defenses (spell immunity, death ward, freedom of movement, spell turning, mind blank, delay poison, fortification armors, evasion, etc).
These things can keep you trucking so you can keep on whacking. A solid front-line AC mixed with DR and miss %s means you can tank some frothy-mouthed beasty's full attack without dying and fortification nearly eliminates sudden burst crits from insta-gibbing you (which is super important since all the martials have auto-crit options). Saves are obvious. The evade-% blocks most sneak-attacking (or costs your foe an extra feat) which is good vs a number of classes and monsters (a surprising number of creatures have sneak attack as a racial), allows you to hide, and serves as a second line of defense against attacks that would hit you. Energy resistances (10-30) aren't going to stop the major blastings but it'll take the sting off of big hits and shut down chip damage from mooks using elemental AoEs. Everything else is to help counter things like enervation-spam, CC, and SoDs).
I have a 17th level barbarian in +5 Full Plate whose AC is still s*+# comparatively.
Even with Beast Totem it tops out at like 37.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that's probably without a shield, and isn't a high Dex-plate (like mithral celestial plate), and you probably don't have your +5 inherents in your Dex yet, perhaps?
Yesh.
I don't have +5 Inherent to my Str yet either though.
If I'd invested in maxing out my Ring and Amulet too it'd be like 6 points higher but this particular character just doesn't give the slightest f$*+. His backstory is all about his misadventures with the ill conceived "let the enemy hit me once before I murder them because honor or something" plan.
It helps that I've been semi-permanently changed into an Earth Elemental, so I'm immune to crits and Sneak Attack, and have 15 feet of Reach (20 with Lunge) so I can attack from a reasonably safe distance as well.
My main point really being that "Barbarian" doesn't necessarily mean "good AC".
It's like that in Pathfinder. Most classes by their nature are offensively oriented. As a result, I recommend speccing defense the hardest to plug your weaknesses. You need to be able to hold your own so that you can contribute. Enemies and encounters at high levels are hellishly mean and even if you kill them, that doesn't mean you've actually won the fight yet (sounds funny but that's high-level for you). You need to be able to take a hit (or fifty).
Yeah, that's something I definitely agree with, and in addition to offensively oriented classes, it goes to the comment I made earlier about the preponderance of buffs being offensive. Offense does tend to take care of itself somewhat more readily, and it's also a lot easier to shore up your offense on an ad hoc basis if it proves necessary.
As levels rise in Pathfinder, PvE style encounters get massive XP budgets which punish players pushing offense dramatically because the strength of "mook" enemies increases substantially and pushing offense hard means you might kill a little faster (but not always even 1 mook/round) but get utterly dismantled by action economy and/or dogpile tactics. Strong defenses allow you to survive high damage builds while shrugging off trash mobs with little concern.
Another one I agree with. It's not really possible to nail down specifics across many different classes and builds, but offensive lopsidedness can often be more rewarding at lower levels and less rewarding at higher ones.
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If I'd invested in maxing out my Ring and Amulet too it'd be like 6 points higher but this particular character just doesn't give the slightest f~@#. His backstory is all about his misadventures with the ill conceived "let the enemy hit me once before I murder them because honor or something" plan.
...
So - basically you could have a reasonably solid AC - but you don't want to for roleplaying reasons. And you can get away with it due to homebrew rules. (does seem interesting)
That's an entirely different ball of wax.
With that much homebrew I don't know if it can really be part of a general argument upon rules balance.
(And frankly - even without homebrew - a GM can allow any character to survive in any circumstances.)
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That seems low. Even without Celestial - with base mithril full plate, at least 16dex (not hard by 17), just +4 ring/amulet & ioun (dusty rose), he'd be at 39 when raging. And that's without really trying.I have a 17th level barbarian in +5 Full Plate whose AC is still s*+~ comparatively.
Even with Beast Totem it tops out at like 37.
It's 38.
Currently I have:
14 Armor
1 Luck
2 Deflect
13 Natural
-2 Size
Dex is 10 because HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE.
Of course everything up to his second iterative hits in the ballpark of a 2-6, and he does like +50 damage per strike, his saves are baller, he's immune to poison, fear, crits, sneak attack, and bleed, and he can re-roll saves everal times, along with DR 6/- and 346 HP, so it's a trade.
Yesh.
I don't have +5 Inherent to my Str yet either though.
If I'd invested in maxing out my Ring and Amulet too it'd be like 6 points higher but this particular character just doesn't give the slightest f%&$. His backstory is all about his misadventures with the ill conceived "let the enemy hit me once before I murder them because honor or something" plan.
It helps that I've been semi-permanently changed into an Earth Elemental, so I'm immune to crits and Sneak Attack, and have 15 feet of Reach (20 with Lunge) so I can attack from a reasonably safe distance as well.
My main point really being that "Barbarian" doesn't necessarily mean "good AC".
Understood. :)
I'm going to assume that your GM might not like the usual methods of acquiring inherent modifiers? :P
Speaking of which, my current players are playing the back-10 now and one of them crafting a candle of invocation and has already made some arrangements with some djinn (Diplomacy is nice) so I suspect the PCs will soon be ready to tier-up and begin facing some of the higher CR stuff.
Honestly I'm so excited because I'm going to get to use my Marilith soon! I can't wait! ^.^
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Of course everything up to his second iterative hits in the ballpark of a 2-6, and he does like +50 damage per strike, his saves are baller, he's immune to poison, fear, crits, sneak attack, and bleed, and he can re-roll saves everal times, along with DR 6/- and 346 HP, so it's a trade.
In all fairness, with that much extra defense, I think it's acceptable to be easy to hit. The crit-immunity is especially nice since criticals at this level can be devastating. When your base HP is only 116 (d12, max 1st, no Con mod), you really don't want to be getting slapped multiple times with a x3 weapon that has a 15% crit chance and auto-confirming. :P
If I'd invested in maxing out my Ring and Amulet too it'd be like 6 points higher but this particular character just doesn't give the slightest f~@#. His backstory is all about his misadventures with the ill conceived "let the enemy hit me once before I murder them because honor or something" plan.
...
So - basically you could have a reasonably solid AC - but you don't want to for roleplaying reasons. And you can get away with it due to homebrew rules. (does seem interesting)
That's an entirely different ball of wax.
With that much homebrew I don't know if it can really be part of a general argument upon rules balance.
(And frankly - even without homebrew - a GM can allow any character to survive in any circumstances.)
What homebrew? Everything I did was rules legal.
Polymorph Any Object is a good spell.
Yesh.
I don't have +5 Inherent to my Str yet either though.
If I'd invested in maxing out my Ring and Amulet too it'd be like 6 points higher but this particular character just doesn't give the slightest f%&$. His backstory is all about his misadventures with the ill conceived "let the enemy hit me once before I murder them because honor or something" plan.
It helps that I've been semi-permanently changed into an Earth Elemental, so I'm immune to crits and Sneak Attack, and have 15 feet of Reach (20 with Lunge) so I can attack from a reasonably safe distance as well.
My main point really being that "Barbarian" doesn't necessarily mean "good AC".
Understood. :)
I'm going to assume that your GM might not like the usual methods of acquiring inherent modifiers? :P
It's more that when I made the guy I didn't realize tomes existed. I found out about them around the same time a +2 Manual of Gainful Exercise dropped in some loot.
But no, we haven't done the "Wish Upon A Star" method. Our Sorcerer left the game, and our Wizard is Construct crafting based, and our Oracle doesn't do Planar Binding and whatnot.
Speaking of which, my current players are playing the back-10 now and one of them crafting a candle of invocation and has already made some arrangements with some djinn (Diplomacy is nice) so I suspect the PCs will soon be ready to tier-up and begin facing some of the higher CR stuff.
Honestly I'm so excited because I'm going to get to use my Marilith soon! I can't wait! ^.^
Mariliths are just a cool monster all around.
Human to Elemental shouldn't be a permanent PAO change, should it? You're not even of the same type.
Just wondering.
==Aelryinth
Human to Elemental shouldn't be a permanent PAO change, should it? You're not even of the same type.
Just wondering.
==Aelryinth
Semi-Permanent, as I said. Orc to Elemental lasts a week.