Why do Martials need better things?

[ZZTRaider]

RDM42 wrote:

And people who post in a forum are more likely to be people who have a problem. People who do not have a problem with something, whatever their numbers, are likely less likely to post.

But people who have a problem may not know there are forums. Or maybe they just don't see the point, because they don't think anything will happen as a result. Maybe they've seen all of the people in these threads saying, "there isn't really a problem, it's all in your head" and left.

You're right that the forums are likely to attract certain types of players. That, in and of itself, does not necessarily mean that these concerns don't meaningfully affect people that don't visit the forums.

Frankly, there's no real downside to fixing these issues. If the issues don't affect certain groups of players, then the fixes probably won't either. Groups that dislike the method of fixing it will simply ignore that supplement. But, those people that do consider it a problem (regardless of whether or not they use the forums) can make use of a Paizo-provided solution, rather than hoping their DM is able and willing to spend time to fix the issue.

[Seranov]

Yeah, very few people are saying "I want Wizards to be completely unplayable!" but there are people who will loudly decry any attempt to make the Fighter not garbage outside his single field of combat.

Making the Fighter better doesn't ruin the game for anyone. Bringing everybody between low T2 and high T4 reduces game-breaking shenanigans and makes sure everyone has options*. This is nothing but good for the game as a whole.

*:

Which is why I strongly suggest PoW/Psionics/SoP-only games to anyone who doesn't like the current dynamic of Wizards and Fighters in the same group.

[RDM42]

Except why presume that the people who think the fixes would do harm, which have a significant board presence in and of themselves, don't also have a significant population outside of the boards - if you are going to presume from sampling that of course the "silent majority" simply MUST agree with you?

[kyrt-ryder]

People fear change, we can't help that.

[Bandw2]

RDM42 wrote:

Bandw2 wrote:

RDM42 wrote:

Bandw2 wrote:

well i mean the forum keeps getting posts from new people occasionally complaining about the fighter or rogue, not so much the monk anymore with it's archetypes. these aren't people from the forum, because we've houseruled the issue to death and don't like talking about it that much, these are new people who played the game and had a problem with these classes with their poor options.

And people who post in a forum are more likely to be people who have a problem. People who do not have a problem with something, whatever their numbers, are likely less likely to post.

yes, but because it's a constant affair, it seems evident that the issue is known out there and isn't just about specific people who only frequent the boards.

... That really doesn't follow.

It's a given, it seems, that there is a percentage that thinks it is a problem, and that percentage likes to frequent these boards. You can't really draw any further inferences from that to the wider population.

i'm saying a good percentage of the people who create those threads are first time posters.

[Bandw2]

RDM42 wrote:

Except why presume that the people who think the fixes would do harm, which have a significant board presence in and of themselves, don't also have a significant population outside of the boards - if you are going to presume from sampling that of course the "silent majority" simply MUST agree with you?

because for the most part all the arguments seem to come down to the GM can fix it, and so the GM can ignore the supplement or integrate it with out needing to worry about it much.

if teh fix does come it will be unchained 2.0 or some such, not CRB ultima edition.

[ZZTRaider]

RDM42 wrote:

Except why presume that the people who think the fixes would do harm, which have a significant board presence in and of themselves, don't also have a significant population outside of the boards - if you are going to presume from sampling that of course the "silent majority" simply MUST agree with you?

All I'm saying is that you're making the exact same false assumptions that you're telling everyone else not to. Right here:

RDM42 wrote:

It's a given, it seems, that there is a percentage that thinks it is a problem, and that percentage likes to frequent these boards. You can't really draw any further inferences from that to the wider population.

Saying that the percentage that thinks that martial/caster disparity is a problem is the same percentage that frequents the boards is drawing a further inference to the wider population. Yet, you can't possibly know that. Paizo is in a better position to do so, since it can leverage PFS as an additional source, but even that is an incomplete view of the total population of Pathfinder players.

Since we cannot possibly know with any amount of certainty what the overall opinion on this matter is, there's absolutely no point in trying to argue over it.

But I maintain that if Paizo releases a supplement to address these issues, those that see martial/caster disparity as an issue will be pleased and those that don't will either be unaffected by or simply ignore the supplement. There is potential good here, and the worst case is that some people that disagree will choose not to purchase that product. Nobody is going to get hurt here.

[Michael Sayre]

RDM42 wrote:

Except why presume that the people who think the fixes would do harm, which have a significant board presence in and of themselves, don't also have a significant population outside of the boards - if you are going to presume from sampling that of course the "silent majority" simply MUST agree with you?

I'm pretty sure the people who think that fixing martial/caster disparity would do harm are just a vocal minority here on the forum boards, and aren't really representative of the player base as a whole. After all, the Advanced Class Guide was full of martial characters who had some of the fixes people have asked for (gestalting Fighter and Rogue is one of the oldest suggestions for a low level quick fix around -even if it doesn't solve issues at the higher levels of play-, and that's basically what the Slayer is), and it flew off the shelves despite being one of the most poorly edited books Paizo has ever released.

In both the official Pathfinder Society games I've played in and the other organized play venues I'm part of every week, virtually everyone believes that martial/caster disparity is an issue and they slaver over any new product that gives some options to address it. Those same groups tend to view playing a Fighter as a handicap, something the really skilled players do to see if they can still make a decent character.

Literally the only people I've heard deny that martial/caster disparity exists are a small handful of very vocal posters here on the forums.

[Wrath]

You're calling to make something better that is already amazingly dangerous at high levels when played intelligently (just like the wizard). Fighters are grinding machines at high levels. They have gear to buffer the weaknesses of movement and missing and when they hit with just their first attack then bad guys cry or just outright die.

Giving them more power may well actually break things horribly.
It will certainly make designing games and encounters far harder to balance because imagine what happens to a party of players when the NPC badguys are suddenly all over them now due to epically hard things and dishing out damage in one attack that exceeds the casters HP's by 20 or more.

This is why I think this should all be in house rules. Kirth Gerson has been trying to re write martials for years. His thread is thousands of posts long with many posters and he still hasn't got it done. That's because every change they make introduces whole new areas of broken.

As a point of interest about those who post its broken, go through the collected Archive that Kobold Cleaver recently put together and look at the posters in it. They are the same people from 2010 as they are now. It's very enlightening for determining who feels the problem is there and who doesn't.

The problem might be more a playstyle than a game system. The system is designed for co operative play. From my experience in PFS its more about a number of individuals working for selfish agendas than it is about a group of players working together to play the game. Playing a game outside its design parameters will certainly break it.

If you want to do that, then you're in house rule territory.

[Bandw2]

Wrath wrote:

You're calling to make something better that is already amazingly dangerous at high levels when played intelligently (just like the wizard). Fighters are grinding machines at high levels. They have gear to buffer the weaknesses of movement and missing and when they hit with just their first attack then bad guys cry or just outright die.

none of this matters since we want to give them narrative power, not combat power.

Wrath wrote:

As a point of interest about those who post its broken, go through the collected Archive that Kobold Cleaver recently put together and look at the posters in it. They are the same people from 2010 as they are now. It's very enlightening for determining who feels the problem is there and who doesn't.

interestingly enough they aren't the people who created the threads.

[kyrt-ryder]

Bandw2 wrote:

Wrath wrote:

You're calling to make something better that is already amazingly dangerous at high levels when played intelligently (just like the wizard). Fighters are grinding machines at high levels. They have gear to buffer the weaknesses of movement and missing and when they hit with just their first attack then bad guys cry or just outright die.

none of this matters since we want to give them narrative power, not combat power.

That's not entirely true.

While we don't want to dramatically increase their potential damage output, we do want to increase their methods of delivering that damage and their alternative options for impacting the battlefield.

We want martials who are more flexible/adaptable both off and on the battlefield than present.

Or at least that's my perspective, I may not be an accurate representation of this side of the discussion.

[Anzyr]

kyrt-ryder wrote:

Bandw2 wrote:

Wrath wrote:

You're calling to make something better that is already amazingly dangerous at high levels when played intelligently (just like the wizard). Fighters are grinding machines at high levels. They have gear to buffer the weaknesses of movement and missing and when they hit with just their first attack then bad guys cry or just outright die.

none of this matters since we want to give them narrative power, not combat power.

That's not entirely true.

While we don't want to dramatically increase their potential damage output, we do want to increase their methods of delivering that damage and their alternative options for impacting the battlefield.

We want martials who are more flexible/adaptable both off and on the battlefield than present.

Or at least that's my perspective, I may not be an accurate representation of this side of the discussion.

I concur with this. It is very easy for martials to become cheerleaders to Full Caster showdowns at high levels.

[Seranov]

Wrath wrote:

You're calling to make something better that is already amazingly dangerous at high levels when played intelligently (just like the wizard). Fighters are grinding machines at high levels. They have gear to buffer the weaknesses of movement and missing and when they hit with just their first attack then bad guys cry or just outright die.

Giving them more power may well actually break things horribly.
It will certainly make designing games and encounters far harder to balance because imagine what happens to a party of players when the NPC badguys are suddenly all over them now due to epically hard things and dishing out damage in one attack that exceeds the casters HP's by 20 or more.

This is why I think this should all be in house rules. Kirth Gerson has been trying to re write martials for years. His thread is thousands of posts long with many posters and he still hasn't got it done. That's because every change they make introduces whole new areas of broken.

As a point of interest about those who post its broken, go through the collected Archive that Kobold Cleaver recently put together and look at the posters in it. They are the same people from 2010 as they are now. It's very enlightening for determining who feels the problem is there and who doesn't.

The problem might be more a playstyle than a game system. The system is designed for co operative play. From my experience in PFS its more about a number of individuals working for selfish agendas than it is about a group of players working together to play the game. Playing a game outside its design parameters will certainly break it.

If you want to do that, then you're in house rule territory.

No one with any sense is saying anything about making the Fighter better at hitting things (and he's not even the best Paizo class at the role. Hi, Barbarian!). We are saying that he needs to be better at things other than hitting things. And let's be clear, it takes a METRIC TON of system mastery to actually build a decent Fighter. There are so many trap feats that you can completely ruin any chance you have of being an effective damage-dealer with just one or two bad choices.

The Wizard is no slouch in the DPR department, but you don't seem intent on stripping away a good 90% or so of his out-of-combat utility and versatility to make up for that. Why can't the Fighter be not completely useless when it comes to things that don't involve hitting things? Why should the Wizard be able to play in all parts of the cooperative game while the Fighter can only contribute to one?

I, personally don't have any problems with pretending either Fighters or Wizards don't exist. I am more than happy to continue playing with zero Paizo content. But that doesn't mean that I don't think that Ivery Tower design shouldn't rot in hell.

[JamZilla]

OK I am gingerly stepping into my flame-resistant underpants as I write this post but...

I personally have always been of the opinion that magic-users, especially full casters, should have more options and be more powerful than martials. Fantasy and superhero tropes are resplendent with examples of an all-powerful archmage/power-wielder and they simply are better and more capable than their martial counterparts. It's Dr Strange vs Cap. But what's wrong with that? Both are absolutely awesome characters.

I will also add that I absolutely love playing martials and some of the best fun I've had in my twenty-odd years of gaming has been as a smashy barbarian or a tactical fighter. But I also love the power and versatility of the wizard.

I completely get that from a mechanical point of view people always strive for balance. But why? Why isn't it perfectly reasonable that a wizard who can bend reality itself, or a cleric or is ordained by a (near) omniscient deity have infinitely more options at their disposal than a guy who can swing a sword really hard, even if they do it phenomenally well. That absolutely belittles the martial role of course but I'm just illustrating the point.

Ultimately, I believe that if you build an interesting, engaging character that you have fun playing - whether that's turning armies of orcs into ash or demolishing the evil tyrant's champion in single combat; the game, the system and your GM are all doing their jobs - creating enjoyment and moments to shine.

[kyrt-ryder]

Wrath, have you ever run a campaign for a group of pure martials? What about a group of pure casters, even partial casters like the Bard, Inquisitor and Warpriest?

Right now in order to handle these unusual parties requires a massive amount of work on the part of the GM to make the game fun. To make sure the martials are actually able to complete the adventure, to keep the full casters from crushing everything with zero challenge/threat whatsoever, and to keep the partial casters entertained and involved while they continue to pull out more and more tricks from their hat.

[Bandw2]

JamZilla wrote:

But what's wrong with that?

it's a game, not a book, that's the difference.

power levels should mean something a 12th level anything should be equal to a 12th level anything else. :P

don't worry about your underpants though, i tend to not try to burn people.

though some times when i start getting angry, i start breathing fire, people start screaming, and they no longer invite me to dinner parties...

[kyrt-ryder]

JamZilla wrote:

OK I am gingerly stepping into my flame-resistant underpants as I write this post but...

I personally have always been of the opinion that magic-users, especially full casters, should have more options and be more powerful than martials. Fantasy and superhero tropes are resplendent with examples of an all-powerful archmage/power-wielder and they simply are better and more capable than their martial counterparts. It's Dr Strange vs Cap. But what's wrong with that? Both are absolutely awesome characters.

I will also add that I absolutely love playing martials and some of the best fun I've had in my twenty-odd years of gaming has been as a smashy barbarian or a tactical fighter. But I also love the power and versatility of the wizard.

I completely get that from a mechanical point of view people always strive for balance. But why? Why isn't it perfectly reasonable that a wizard who can bend reality itself, or a cleric or is ordained by a (near) omniscient deity have infinitely more options at their disposal than a guy who can swing a sword really hard, even if they do it phenomenally well. That absolutely belittles the martial role of course but I'm just illustrating the point.

Ultimately, I believe that if you build an interesting, engaging character that you have fun playing - whether that's turning armies of orcs into ash or demolishing the evil tyrant's champion in single combat; the game, the system and your GM are all doing their jobs - creating enjoyment and moments to shine.

The point of a level-based game is that characters of the same level should have the same power.

You want to incorporate an all powerful caster in your game? Give him more levels than everybody else.

You want to incorporate a puny mundane alongside awesome adventurers? Keep him under level 5/6ish in a martial class [preferably Fighter or Rogue or one of the spell-less options for Paladin or Ranger. Barbarian can work too, with the less awesome rage powers.]

[JamZilla]

Bandw2 wrote:

it's a game, not a book, that's the difference.

I partly agree but I tend to look at a campaign as more of a collaborative narrative than strictly a game.

[PIXIE DUST]

Role Playing Game..

Role Playing acting as an adjective to specify the type of game....

So yes... it is a game

[Wrath]

No Kyrt, I haven't.

That's because we play within the design intent. Not intentionally, but it generally works that way when people choose classes.

What I have done is run 5 campaigns into level 20 and played in three now that also went to that level.

When you run the game organically like that, you don't see the issues many talk about, and that's because "builds" shift to cater for the campaign, not the other way around.

When we started carrion crown, most of the players were casters. After a few of them died, most of the party are now Martials.

What I do agree with is how difficult high level design is. That is because we're playing outside the realms of anything we've experienced in our world. The issue really comes from people using low level design principals in high level play.

A book that helps people design high level encounters will be much more effective than asking the company to redesign their game.

As for system mastery, try running a game where you reskin the monsters and players need to rely on skill checks to work out what they can do. Casters struggle a heap when they don't know what weaknesses a critter has and what it's resistant to. Fighting types honestly don't care because they can generally survive a round where things go awry and then lay their smack down. (That's a generalisation by the way, we both know there are situations where the reverse is true).

[kyrt-ryder]

JamZilla wrote:

Bandw2 wrote:

it's a game, not a book, that's the difference.

I partly agree but I tend to look at a campaign as more of a collaborative narrative than strictly a game.

True, but how many people are out there that want to play a second-fiddle role in such a collaborative narrative?

I know I sure as hell don't, nor do I know that anyone else I know does.

[JamZilla]

Plenty in my experience Kyrt. I've known tons of players who love playing the inspirational bards and healing clerics of this world.

But for me it's not always the mechanics that make someone play first fiddle (is that a thing?), it's how they play their characters and rp with everyone else.

For example, I'm currently playing an arcanist in a ROTRL and despite the obvious power of the character, my housemate is playing an oratory bard and the absolute leader of the group. From a story and rp perspective, I play second fiddle to him

[kyrt-ryder]

JamZilla wrote:

Plenty in my experience Kyrt. I've known tons of players who love playing the inspirational bards and healing clerics of this world.

That's not 'second-fiddle.'

Inspirational bards and healing clerics are valuable members of a team.

'Mundane Martial' next to 'God' is not.

[Bandw2]

I play Space station 13, which is completely a game, largely player driven, where they drive the story, still a game. I literally killed 4/5ths of a stations Heads by detonating a bomb that they had prepared in case of a singularity getting loose. blood everywhere. hull breech. I had to steal someone's coat, that's it, and escape on the shuttle, killing most of the heads and destroying the main hallway of the station into a vacuum certainly got the emergency shuttle called and i escaped.

doesn't change that it's a game, and everything needs to be balanced. I mean i had to ACTUALLY lie to the head of science and help him make a bomb so i could get the bomb's code.

[JamZilla]

I think I agree with Wraith that the issue, if there is one, seems more prevelant with certain play styles. Maybe I'm just lucky to have had really great groups over the years and that's coloured my expectations but I have never felt undervalued as a martial in my gaming group nor heard complaints that the party wizard is owning everything on his own because that invariably does not happen

[Kirth Gersen]

Wrath wrote:

Kirth Gerson has been trying to re write martials for years. His thread is thousands of posts long with many posters and he still hasn't got it done. That's because every change they make introduces whole new areas of broken.

Kirth Gersen successfully rewrote martials years more than 3 years ago. The thousands of posts since then are about supplemental stuff like new firearms rules and so on. If you're going to drag my name into this, at least be honest about it.

Before that, Frank Trollman and K successfully rewrote martials for 3rd edition.

This isn't something that hasn't been done, or can't be done.

[ZZTRaider]

Wrath wrote:

As for system mastery, try running a game where you reskin the monsters and players need to rely on skill checks to work out what they can do. Casters struggle a heap when they don't know what weaknesses a critter has and what it's resistant to. Fighting types honestly don't care because they can generally survive a round where things go awry and then lay their smack down. (That's a generalisation by the way, we both know there are situations where the reverse is true).

Well, that's kind of the thing though. At least I've been assuming that when we talk about system mastery in this context, it doesn't include things like recognizing enemies and remembering their strengths and weaknesses; that's called metagaming. So with any enemy a particular character hasn't run into before, it comes down to either making skill checks (typically Knowledge) to learn about it, or surviving a few rounds of combat to see what happens.

When a Wizard runs into an unfamiliar enemy, he has the skill points and a solid Intelligence modifier to have a good relevant Knowledge check to try to figure out how to approach the fight. When a Fighter runs into an unfamiliar enemy, he curses his lack of skill points and hopes that hitting it with his weapon is good enough. And sometimes, like with a Hydra, not knowing the weakness of the enemy is going to make things a hell of a lot harder for the entire party.

[kyrt-ryder]

JamZilla wrote:

I think I agree with Wraith that the issue, if there is one, seems more prevelant with certain play styles. Maybe I'm just lucky to have had really great groups over the years and that's coloured my expectations.

It does vary greatly.

In my own case, the RP and the Combat are basically separate events. The roleplay is the story and the combat is the 'game' so to speak.

If my character is dragging everybody down either because he's not contributing to combat, or because he's burning up other people's resources in order to contribute to combat, then I'm not having fun. I'm being the load and some of my partymates very well may be a bit upset with me for it as well.

[Wrath]

Kirth Gersen wrote:

Wrath wrote:

Kirth Gerson has been trying to re write martials for years. His thread is thousands of posts long with many posters and he still hasn't got it done. That's because every change they make introduces whole new areas of broken.

Kirth Gersen successfully rewrote martials years more than 3 years ago. The thousands of posts since then are about supplemental stuff like new firearms rules and so on. If you're going to drag my name into this, at least be honest about it.

Before that, Frank Trollman and K successfully rewrote martials for 3rd edition.

This isn't something that hasn't been done, or can't be done.

My bad Kirth.

For those interested though, Kirths thread is an excellent source for ideas on making changes in your games.

It's a fairly different beast to pathfinder now though.

[Wrath]

ZZTRaider wrote:

Wrath wrote:

As for system mastery, try running a game where you reskin the monsters and players need to rely on skill checks to work out what they can do. Casters struggle a heap when they don't know what weaknesses a critter has and what it's resistant to. Fighting types honestly don't care because they can generally survive a round where things go awry and then lay their smack down. (That's a generalisation by the way, we both know there are situations where the reverse is true).

Well, that's kind of the thing though. At least I've been assuming that when we talk about system mastery in this context, it doesn't include things like recognizing enemies and remembering their strengths and weaknesses; that's called metagaming. So with any enemy a particular character hasn't run into before, it comes down to either making skill checks (typically Knowledge) to learn about it, or surviving a few rounds of combat to see what happens.

When a Wizard runs into an unfamiliar enemy, he has the skill points and a solid Intelligence modifier to have a good relevant Knowledge check to try to figure out how to approach the fight. When a Fighter runs into an unfamiliar enemy, he curses his lack of skill points and hopes that hitting it with his weapon is good enough. And sometimes, like with a Hydra, not knowing the weakness of the enemy is going to make things a hell of a lot harder for the entire party.

That's the thing ZT, the wizard has to be able to identify what's going to work. That's because he has loads of options that will be quite useless in the situation, but one or two that are awesome. If he doesn't which one to use though, then he wastes one or two turns trying to find out.

I firmly believe this "system" mastery that casters claim here comes mostly from metagaming. Certainly most of the threads where Wizards are compared to fighters that's what you see pulled out.

At higher levels where casters are meant to be gods, you run into rare critters (In the game world they're rare even though the books and threads talk about them a lot). DC just to identify it might be 30 or more (base 20 for rareness plus CR). Then its five points for every bit of info you need after that.

So we have a CR 16 creature that's rare. DC is 36 just to ping it, assuming you have that knowledge. We can assume a caster has ranks in a relevant knowledge so at level 16 they might have 16+3+5(int mod, though probably higher for many players here).

That means you need a 12 or more to identify it, 17 will give you one more bit of advice. And that's it.

Try fighting that effectively as a caster since you may not know anything about its resistances at this stage, or its extroadinary abilities or anything else.

The martials just don't care. They can only hit it, but when they do they damn near kill it.

Play like that and the disparity disappears very rapidly.

In terms of Narrative, you don't have to work hard to design a game around anything. You come up with imformation that's needed and you have ways for it to be found. One of those ways might well be "Speak to my god", another might be "Speak to the church" or yet another might be "Speak to the local soothe sayer".

Only one of those needs a caster in the party. It makes it easier for a party, but isn't necessary for the game.

If it becomes necessary for a caster in order to complete a game, then that is very bad design.

[Anzyr]

Wrath wrote:

If it becomes necessary for a caster in order to complete a game, then that is very bad design.

Try and beat Rise of the Runelords with a party consisting of no 6-9 casters. It's pretty much impossible if your GM plays the enemies even vaguely approaching their INT. And I consider Rise of the Runelords to be a pretty softball AP.

[kyrt-ryder]

Wrath wrote:

That's the thing ZT, the wizard has to be able to identify what's going to work. That's because he has loads of options that will be quite useless in the situation, but one or two that are awesome. If he doesn't which one to use though, then he wastes one or two turns trying to find out.

I firmly believe this "system" mastery that casters claim here comes mostly from metagaming. Certainly most of the threads where Wizards are compared to fighters that's what you see pulled out.

You are firmly wrong, according to my own experiences running the game.

I'm absolutely ruthless about preventing metagaming and enforcing in-character behavior. Knowledge checks abound in my campaigns, and as you may know I'm a fairly forthcoming speaker about the disparity.

Because Wizards and Witches [and Bards and Investigators and Alchemists and to a lesser extent Magi] are amazingsauce at identifying creatures and their weaknesses.

I've even had characters cough up the chumpchange at mid levels to grab themselves a +10 competence bonus item for Knowledge Checks to ensure they make those rolls. And they do, without fail.

Quote:

At higher levels where casters are meant to be gods, you run into rare critters (In the game world they're rare even though the books and threads talk about them a lot). DC just to identify it might be 30 or more (base 20 for rareness plus CR). Then its five points for every bit of info you need after that.

So we have a CR 16 creature that's rare. DC is 36 just to ping it, assuming you have that knowledge. We can assume a caster has ranks in a relevant knowledge so at level 16 they might have 16+3+5(int mod, though probably higher for many players here).

Probably? The casters in my games start with an 18 or higher, usually at least 19. That would result in +9 [or +10 if 20, but those although fairly common are also fairly uncommon] from 28/29 Int after the +6 headband expected at level 16]

Just that +4 over your expectations is sufficient for taking 10. A Magus probably wouldn't have that, but any of the other Int-based casters probably would. And by that level +10 competence bonus is MAYBE 1% of WBL if that.

[I find it interesting you acknowledge that casters are meant to be gods but hold issue with granting the same to martials.]

Quote:

Try fighting that effectively as a caster since you may not know anything about its resistances at this stage, or its extroadinary abilities or anything else.

The martials just don't care. They can only hit it, but when they do they damn near kill it.

IF they can hit it, often enough, while being plastered by SLA's and nasty special attacks. Or Kited by a creature using nasty SLA's while retreating.

Quote:

Play like that and the disparity disappears very rapidly.

If you ever decide to run an Online Gametable game, let me know Wrath. I'd really love to play a Wizard and see how things pan out.

[Bandw2]

Anzyr wrote:

Wrath wrote:

If it becomes necessary for a caster in order to complete a game, then that is very bad design.

Try and beat Rise of the Runelords with a party consisting of no 6-9 casters. It's pretty much impossible if your GM plays the enemies even vaguely approaching their INT. And I consider Rise of the Runelords to be a pretty softball AP.

i will confirm this i had to softball to not kill multiple player's in combats multiple times.

(first round of PCs were a ranger, a bloodrager, and 2 fighters and one magus who never did anything)

[Wrath]

See Anzyr, my group doesn't play that way. We play with a mix of casters and martials who fight together.

Try beating Runelords with just casters and they'll all die in the first 4 levels. A campaign is organic, and everyone is trying to get their characters to survive the whole thing, not just endgame. The problem comes when you drop a caster in at high level who hasn't had to survive and is given carte blanche on what they can build with. The same with any character really.

Try giving a new character in the group access to only what has been dropped in the game and items purchasable at times the other players were allowed to and see what happens.

[Bandw2]

Wrath wrote:

See Anzyr, my group doesn't play that way. We play with a mix of casters and martials who fight together.

Try beating Runelords with just casters and they'll all die in the first 4 levels. A campaign is organic, and everyone is trying to get their characters to survive the whole thing, not just endgame. The problem comes when you drop a caster in at high level who hasn't had to survive and is given carte blanche on what they can build with. The same with any character really.

Try giving a new character in the group access to only what has been dropped in the game and items purchasable at times the other players were allowed to and see what happens.

lordy, casters, you just daze everything the first 4 levels... that's like when daze is useful...

get like a cleric(arm), 1 bard(hammer), 1 inquisitor(hammer) and 1 wizard(anvil) and you'll tear through RotRLs

[kyrt-ryder]

Wrath wrote:

See Anzyr, my group doesn't play that way. We play with a mix of casters and martials who fight together.

Try beating Runelords with just casters and they'll all die in the first 4 levels.

Would you be willing to put this to the test via Online Gametable Sessions? I usually stay away from AP's because I prefer an organic open-world style of roleplay, but I'd be willing to go for it to test this out [and see if I might want to consider participating in APs more often.]

Quote:

A campaign is organic, and everyone is trying to get their characters to survive the whole thing, not just endgame. The problem comes when you drop a caster in at high level who hasn't had to survive and is given carte blanche on what they can build with. The same with any character really.

I have never, ever, ever had a problem getting a caster to survive. Nor have any of my players. This sort of thinking really makes me wonder what I and my GMs must have been doing wrong.

[Bandw2]

off topic, RotRL the only AP for pathfinder i've done, seems to be open enough to allow for going off the path kinda, it sets goal posts and allows the players to navigate to them fairly in any way they want.

even further off topic, i wish someone would GM something for me, even an AP

on topic: kyrk brings up a good point, i've never seen a mundane that was extra beefy compared to a full caster. i mean... just look at that druid... wizard? he just be like, COLOR SPRAY!

[Wrath]

Kyrt, I'm sure we'd be having a ball together if we played. I don't do online any more though as my anxiety/depression is too unpredicatable for the consistency required in those formats.

I will tell about my DMing style though. It will tell you more about why I don't see issues than anything else. It will also tell you why I think a guide to high level play is more important than redesign.

My games respond to player actions, in particular I've spent a deal of time looking at really high power spells/gear/artifacts etc that impact the game. I have things respond as I think would happen, and will often discuss with one or two other DM's about this to come to a reasonable response and make sure I'm not getting to high handed.

I have extraplanar beings keeping an eye on things like wish abuse, powerful items that may fall into the wrongs hands if a group fails, binding or gating abuse, especially outside the actual concerns of the extraplanar creatures involved 9binding and gating is effectively enslaving some creatures) Lawful planar civilisations enter into contracts with high level characters for who and what can be gated or bound or summoned. Break that and trouble happens. Chaotic Good ones actively work to try and prevent this stuff as they see it as enslaving sentient creatures. Evil creatures are trying to do that to the party themselves. Gating in a PC and binding to your will as a Devil is something that's happened to a player of mine once. Just as an experiment, but it was really fun.

Players also gain reputation so that there are places where they can get whatever they want without paying or asking, and there are others where they are so hated that if they're not disguised then they're attacked on site.

I use scry against my party. I use the divination spells against my party. As such, the casters spend as much time trying to prevent that as not. The fighty types probably don't care because occasionally when the casters fail to protect, they just kill whatever comes any way.

I run combats in waves of opponents where effectively you have 5 encounters one after the other with usually less than two rounds in between (sometimes they even overlap).

I break up situations between outdoor, indoor, close quarters vs spread, mixed ability critters etc.

I run divination as a cold war system of espionage. You talk to your deity and get the truth for that moment. The baddies do the same and find out you know their plans so change them. It's tense for my players as they need to work quickly when they find information so it remains relevant. That works weather you have casters in your party or if they're getting their information second hand from churches or patrons.

I have a lot of experience at high level. I know what to expect from both my players and from the game itself. I adapted my design and DMing to cope with it and maintain a great experience for the players I run with.

I don't see an imbalance in the system. I see a lack of experience in DM's in an area that is difficult to comprehend. That's why I think a book that delves into DMing for high level is far more important than a game change. Even if you change the martials, the issues of high level play are not going away. And after all, its high level (12 or more anyway) where you guys are seeing this really big discrepancy happening.

Phew, long post. Sorry if it sounds like I'm blowing my own trumpet, that's not the intent. Just explaining how I run things.

[kyrt-ryder]

How can you have the consistency to show up at table games but not have the consistency to show up at Online Tabletop games? It's just on a schedule exactly like an in-person game... except you don't have to put clothes on and leave the house.

[Wrath]

kyrt-ryder wrote:

I have never, ever, ever had a problem getting a caster to survive. Nor have any of my players. This sort of thinking really makes me wonder what I and my GMs must have been doing wrong.

Probably nothing. To me this is all about play style.

You want something "fixed". I'm happy as is.

It's more than possible that your fix may actually destroy what I enjoy about the game. That's why we have these discussions I guess.

[kyrt-ryder]

I'm just confused why you have casters dying left and right at low levels and mine tend to die less than the beatsticks.

[Wrath]

kyrt-ryder wrote:

How can you have the consistency to show up at table games but not have the consistency to show up at Online Tabletop games? It's just on a schedule exactly like an in-person game... except you don't have to put clothes on and leave the house.

I don't have consistency at table games at the moment either sorry.

Plus I'm in Aus, and getting up at midnight or 2 am or whatever to link up with American players tends to mess with my Circaian rhythm. That's bad for depression

[Wrath]

kyrt-ryder wrote:

I'm just confused why you have casters dying left and right at low levels and mine tend to die less than the beatsticks.

My enemies attack casters as much as martials? My enemies pass saves sometimes? My enemies respond to the actions of the groups and come from other areas of the field of battle?

Or, more likely, at low levels a caster has less ability to survive a crit or an ambush or an unlucky set of rolls than a martial does.

Very unlikely but worth noting is some DM's take care not to kill characters too. Sometimes its unconscious, sometimes its deliberate. Pprobably not an issue in your games though from what I understand.

[kyrt-ryder]

There are american players [such as myself] who don't have a schedule and are totally fine with scheduling in off-hours that would work for you.

I'm sure there are also Australians [maybe even Asians as well] on these boards who'd be happy to participate.

But that consistency issue is a problem without recourse. Too bad, it would have been an interesting experiment.

Perhaps I can round up other people to do that experiment with anyway, the great thing about online gametables is they leave a log of the session behind.

[Bandw2]

Wrath wrote:

I don't see an imbalance in the system. I see a lack of experience in DM's in an area that is difficult to comprehend. That's why I think a book that delves into DMing for high level is far more important than a game change. Even if you change the martials, the issues of high level play are not going away. And after all, its high level (12 or more anyway) where you guys are seeing this really big discrepancy happening.

this is the issue you shouldn't need experience for the game to work.

'W'

Wrath wrote:

kyrt-ryder wrote:

How can you have the consistency to show up at table games but not have the consistency to show up at Online Tabletop games? It's just on a schedule exactly like an in-person game... except you don't have to put clothes on and leave the house.

I don't have consistency at table games at the moment either sorry.

Plus I'm in Aus, and getting up at midnight or 2 am or whatever to link up with American players tends to mess with my Circaian rhythm. That's bad for depression

had/have friends in Aus, it is strange what time zones differences do, it was especially an issue since i also had friends in the UK.

i'm like free 24 hours on Saturdays. :3

[Wrath]

volleyball is a game.

when you play it at beginner level its easy.

play at A grade and its not.

high level play involves knowing lots of interractions and running not just one world but entire cosmos and planes. If you think that isn't the realms of experience, then im not sure what is.

high level play is equivalent to A grade volleyball in many ways.

it is possibly the reason why many campaigns die at mid levels. DMs just don't have the experience or time to deal with level of complexity.

and some folk want to make it more complex by giving martials SU or Ex like abilities. Just house rule them folks.

[Anzyr]

Wrath wrote:

See Anzyr, my group doesn't play that way. We play with a mix of casters and martials who fight together.

Try beating Runelords with just casters and they'll all die in the first 4 levels. A campaign is organic, and everyone is trying to get their characters to survive the whole thing, not just endgame. The problem comes when you drop a caster in at high level who hasn't had to survive and is given carte blanche on what they can build with. The same with any character really.

Try giving a new character in the group access to only what has been dropped in the game and items purchasable at times the other players were allowed to and see what happens.

See when people say "casters" at low level are prone to death I get super confused. Druids/Lunar Oracles/Sylvan Sorcerers/Summoners all get very sturdy pets that if they die can be replaced easily. Not to mention Clerics/Druids/Shamans all have d8 HD which puts them very close in HP to the d10 martial classes. A Wizard is definitely at it's weakest at low level, but even then it's not significantly far behind any class in terms of HP, or to hit simply do to how the number work.

I would happily argue that Druid/Sage Razmiran Priest Sorcerer/Shaman/Master Summoner is one of the strongest possible teams.

[PIXIE DUST]

Idk, 2 master summoners, 1 first world summoner, and 1 synthesist summoner is pretty tough. ..

[bookrat]

Anzyr wrote:

Wrath wrote:

See Anzyr, my group doesn't play that way. We play with a mix of casters and martials who fight together.

Try beating Runelords with just casters and they'll all die in the first 4 levels. A campaign is organic, and everyone is trying to get their characters to survive the whole thing, not just endgame. The problem comes when you drop a caster in at high level who hasn't had to survive and is given carte blanche on what they can build with. The same with any character really.

Try giving a new character in the group access to only what has been dropped in the game and items purchasable at times the other players were allowed to and see what happens.

See when people say "casters" at low level are prone to death I get super confused. Druids/Lunar Oracles/Sylvan Sorcerers/Summoners all get very sturdy pets that if they die can be replaced easily. Not to mention Clerics/Druids/Shamans all have d8 HD which puts them very close in HP to the d10 martial classes. A Wizard is definitely at it's weakest at low level, but even then it's not significantly far behind any class in terms of HP, or to hit simply do to how the number work.

I would happily argue that Druid/Sage Razmiran Priest Sorcerer/Shaman/Master Summoner is one of the strongest possible teams.

I want to play this team, now. And I also want to play the first book of RofRL with just wizards (any archetype, no multiclassing) just to see what happens. I suspect they will not only succeed, but that they'll thrive.

[Blackwaltzomega]

JamZilla wrote:

OK I am gingerly stepping into my flame-resistant underpants as I write this post but...

I personally have always been of the opinion that magic-users, especially full casters, should have more options and be more powerful than martials. Fantasy and superhero tropes are resplendent with examples of an all-powerful archmage/power-wielder and they simply are better and more capable than their martial counterparts. It's Dr Strange vs Cap. But what's wrong with that? Both are absolutely awesome characters.

My problem with it is that it undermines the point of having a level-based system in the first place.

A level twenty fighter, by virtue of being three levels and hundreds of thousands of EXP higher, should be considerably more powerful than a level 17 wizard, but in truth the exact opposite is true. Despite this warrior having twice as much EXP as the caster, the caster has a massive advantage both as a player and as a boss because only one person in this two-by-two comparison can stop time, turn invisible, teleport nearly two thousand miles in six seconds, create small planes of existence, transform into a dragon, cause natural disasters with a wave of his hand, speak the true name of a Planetar Angel and have it jump to his aid, or just pop directly into Heaven to ask to borrow a cup of sugar because the grocery store is just too much bother, and it isn't the guy who's maximum level. The sum total of what makes THAT guy dangerous is that it's going to really hurt if he hits you with his weapon. Everything else is dependent on what magic items he bought. And that's wrong, to me. If you're level 20, your abilities should shape the world around you, not just the guy you're fighting against at the moment. The only thing that should be a threat to you is another level 20 character, a massive army of high-level characters, or monsters that were designed to fight level 20 characters. Not one guy who got MOST of the way to level 20 in an "inherently better class" than yours.

Quote:

I will also add that I absolutely love playing martials and some of the best fun I've had in my twenty-odd years of gaming has been as a smashy barbarian or a tactical fighter. But I also love the power and versatility of the wizard.

I completely get that from a mechanical point of view people always strive for balance. But why? Why isn't it perfectly reasonable that a wizard who can bend reality itself, or a cleric or is ordained by a (near) omniscient deity have infinitely more options at their disposal than a guy who can swing a sword really hard, even if they do it phenomenally well. That absolutely belittles the martial role of course but I'm just illustrating the point.

Ultimately, I believe that if you build an interesting, engaging character that you have fun playing - whether that's turning armies of orcs into ash or demolishing the evil tyrant's champion in single combat; the game, the system and your GM are all doing their jobs - creating enjoyment and moments to shine.

My main thing is I don't think a high-level martial SHOULD be a guy who can swing a sword really hard, which is part of the problem. He was a guy who can swing a sword really hard at level 1, but his thing has just been redefining how hard "hard" is while a guy that is ostensibly an equal member of the team he's on went from doing parlor tricks with light and turning things blue when he'd had to cast more than three times a day because he wasn't good for much else became a reality-warping badass sometime around level 9 and a font of world-shattering power not far beyond that. There's no such thing as an average joe past level 6; when a fully grown rock-troll is a fight of "meh" difficulty for you mano e mano, you are not just some guy with a sword. Even without magic, you are a legendary hero at mid-high level, but it can be annoying some classes don't appear to get this memo and get abilities that feel, well, legendary. At level 10, Wizards are teleporting a thousand miles with a snap of their fingers. Clerics are speaking to gods, asking questions of the heavens that are ANSWERED. Druids are telling the wind and water what to do and being obeyed. A fighter...just got a +3 bonus to saves against fear, that thing paladins have been immune to since level 3.

Spells get very epic very quickly as you level up. Level 1-3 spells, you're mostly just employing your standard magical trickery/holy healing and what have you, but when the 4th-level spells start rolling around, you start doing some big-leagues stuff, and you're just getting STARTED. Feats...not so much. Greater Vital Strike doesn't come online until you're level 16 or 17, and with a great sword, one of the biggest weapons you're going to be using for that? That's like 8d6 damage if you're not using oversized weaponry to try and leverage a little more out of that, so the primary reason this attack you spent three or more feats to get to at 17th level (16th for fighters) isn't weaker than an 8th-level caster's Fireball is the static modifier attached to it from your strength, enhancement bonuses, and power attack...things you would be applying multiple times if you were making your iterative attacks instead of vital striking. And double-standards bother me. If high-level magic is godhood, equally high-level martial arts should be basically indistinguishable from the powers of the gods to the untrained eye. If high-level martial arts are...what a guy with a sword could do in the real world, equally high-level magic should probably be something more like dancing around a fire for three days and nights to make someone you dislike fall down the stairs, and smearing bat guano on someone's front door to make them have minor bad luck the following day.

I'm not saying ALL martials get this raw deal, as paladins and barbarians can get an appropriately epic feel at high levels, but I'd like to see in general more fantastic abilities for full BAB classes at higher levels. Stunning Assault is an effective combat ability, but it's a little lacking in pizazz when you're getting it at the same level your magical friends are reaching the zenith of their magical powers and starting to seriously step into PHENOMENAL COSMIC POWER territory.

I say this as someone who mostly GMs; I make an effort to make everyone feel like a meaningful and valued member of the team, but it'd be nice if the system even pretended it was on my side in making everyone feel like a member of a team of equals rather than requiring me to ignore large portions of it to let one group of my players do something cooler than full-attack all the time. Because this is a TEAM, and I don't want it to be a team of demigods and that one normal guy they keep around because they were buds when they were all scrubs together, and therefore are expected to limit their immense power somewhat to help him feel necessary. (Or worse, a team of heroes and the godlike magician slumming it with them in the knowledge they need him to survive but the reverse is far from true.)

Superman and Batman being on the same team together works in comics because those are purely narrative-driven and therefore it can be declared that only Batman can handle a certain problem, that he will get moments X, Y, and Z to be awesome, and that Superman will never easily overshadow Batman and remind the viewer repeatedly this is not a team-up of equals. But Pathfinder is a game, and if all the players are putting in the same hours, reaping the same EXP, and roleplaying with the same skill, I don't think it should be MY job as GM to make some of them feel special because they don't have any fantastic abilities to help with that unless I change the rules so they do, while at the same time politely asking the guys with fantastic abilities coming out of their ears to tone it down without turning into the fun police. The classes should do this on their own, and I don't feel as much attention has been paid to making the "Badass Normals" BADASS in a larger-than-life fashion the way spell lists change the nature of the game every couple of levels. I just HANDED players the ability to use acrobatics to jump high enough to catch flying baddies and bring them to the ground, or use combat maneuvers without provoking attacks of opportunity unless they fail, or do things like find and shoot a weak point in the ceiling to try and drop debris on a tough enemy, and our games are vastly better for it.

I'm not asking for a completely level playing field, but I'm looking for some interest in making everyone feel like a legend in the game rules rather than trusting in the GM to do that on their own. If the team's ace is a 10, I'd like the weakest guy to be an 8, but as things currently stand, it's all too possible to see something like the ace being a 10 and his opposite number being a 4.