I'm really behind in my wrestling. Last time I watched the most supernatural thing was maybe The Undertaker who was ambiguously undead or something. I guess Ultimate Warrior would count since he was supposed to be some sort of barbarian-ish dingo man from the future with super strength if his comic is to be believed as his wrestling backstory. But I think I missed the lightning and fire shooting.Here you go.
O...kay...
Well either way, as I said, still pointless. We don't need wrestling to justify powerful martials because we'll accept a lot of impossible things martials could be doing and still being relatively normal people. Tropes for it are all over the place.
Wrestling aside, there are tropes and stories galore that can justify a little or a lot of increase in martial classes.
The question and problem for some people is how high they want to turn that dial. There is no question that spell casters were given 1-10 range and martials were not. But how high would people be comfortable with in their own campaigns? And for that matter, would some be more comfortable with spell casters dialed down a bit or a lot?
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I'm just going to quote this guy in full:
David J Prokopetz wrote:
Lately, I’ve run across complaints that modern depictions of the Knights of the Round Table are too “anime” - giving them all sorts of goofy powers, and sending them on weird, over-the-top adventures.
Allow me to point out that the following are all actual things that appear in the older tales about the Knights:
Sir Kay is said to have had the power to grow to giant size, hold his breath for nine days, and radiate supernatural heat from his hands.
Sir Bedivere openly practiced sorcery, and suffered from an accordingly sinister reputation; on more than one occasion, he was saved from being hanged as a witch only by King Arthur’s testimonly to his good character.
Sir Galahad possessed supernatural strength and speed by virtue of his moral and sexual purity - making him a rare example of a male character with virginity-fueled super powers.
Sir Balin once wielded the Lance of Longinus, and blew up an entire kingdom with a single blow. He also fought an evil knight with the power of invisibility.
Sir Marrock was a freaking werewolf.
Conclusion: modern depctions of the Knights of the Round Table aren’t anime enough.
This is the best thing I've read all month.
Wrestling aside, there are tropes and stories galore that can justify a little or a lot of increase in martial classes.
The question and problem for some people is how high they want to turn that dial. There is no question that spell casters were given 1-10 range and martials were not. But how high would people be comfortable with in their own campaigns? And for that matter, would some be more comfortable with spell casters dialed down a bit or a lot?
But it's not just "how high". It's "In what way".
I think most of the "realistic martials" crowd are much more willing to accept boosts if they can be flavored as vaguely reasonable or at least reasonable extrapolations of reasonable things than if they're just "magic, but not calling it magic".
Given how high magic Pathfinder is, it may be less reasonable. I'm still working on feats that use stamina for reasonable boosts to martials doing good things, but the most impactful things have been Path of War and something similar, covenants with mystical creatures, and mundane rune magic. Two of those are outright magic and one of them is almost magic, with Book of Martial Action being more realistic but way less powerful and only serving for save defenses and combat. And I argued before that its basically unrealistic to survive long adventuring in typical Pathfinder adventures without picking up some sort of mundane magic. And that's disregarding how unrealistic they already are.
Lets not forget Lancelot, who may have had a magic sword [lesser compared to Arther's of course] but AFAIK was said to have been the most dangerous of the knights whilst lacking any special powers [aside from absurd sheer skill and strength of arms.]
Granted Lancelot was a later addition to the story and not an original KotRT.
Or in the Fionavar Tapestry where Lancelot is such an accomplished knight that he held off a demonish creature made of stone and powered by the earth by himself and wins with nothing more than skill and a distracting scream at the end. Even a lesser/demi-god was impressed and awed.
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This is the best thing I've read all month.I'm just going to quote this guy in full:
David J Prokopetz wrote:
Lately, I’ve run across complaints that modern depictions of the Knights of the Round Table are too “anime” - giving them all sorts of goofy powers, and sending them on weird, over-the-top adventures.
Allow me to point out that the following are all actual things that appear in the older tales about the Knights:
Sir Kay is said to have had the power to grow to giant size, hold his breath for nine days, and radiate supernatural heat from his hands.
Sir Bedivere openly practiced sorcery, and suffered from an accordingly sinister reputation; on more than one occasion, he was saved from being hanged as a witch only by King Arthur’s testimonly to his good character.
Sir Galahad possessed supernatural strength and speed by virtue of his moral and sexual purity - making him a rare example of a male character with virginity-fueled super powers.
Sir Balin once wielded the Lance of Longinus, and blew up an entire kingdom with a single blow. He also fought an evil knight with the power of invisibility.
Sir Marrock was a freaking werewolf.
Conclusion: modern depctions of the Knights of the Round Table aren’t anime enough.
And we're not even talking about christian myths about saints who could actually fly through the power of faith alone.
I can never understand the anime argument particularly when a lot of anime is influenced by western sources. Heck Full Metal Alchemist just takes place in a fictional Germany with a name swap.
The traditional fantasy argument leaves a bad taste in my mouth as well.
Because you have dark fantasy, urban fantasy, high fantasy, sci-fi fantasy, medieval fantasy, swords and sorcery, and all that.
Pathfinder was written to cater to ALL of them. To me saying "I want traditional fantasy" is a table preference, not how the game is written. Therefore not really a good argument to hold things back from being what they should be as a part of game balance.
Again, whether you call it magic or not has no true bearing on how the mechanics balance against each other. At best it informs how the mechanic functions in relation to others.
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.Seriously though, ignoring the various flirtations with the "Guy at the Gym" fallacy, how often do you ever see someone who could be described as "mundane" actually take down high level monsters, in any medium?
The only place I really see it is...wait for it..."weaboo" stuff. Anime often has baddass normals. Granted, the major characters tend to be chosen ones/magic users/etc., but the dude who is just really REALLY good at hitting stuff is totally a thing.
Video games, too, sometimes. But, again, not much in the way of trad fantasy.
Honestly, the only ones that leap to mind from fantasy are Aowyn and Merry punking out the Witch King and basically anything Garrett Jax does.
I'm curious - why is "too anime" a bad thing in the first place?
Especially when much of Anime itself often borrow heavily from Western mythos, including such things as ancient epics, classic novels, and even the Cthulhu mythos and turns them all into cute girls.
Wrestling aside, there are tropes and stories galore that can justify a little or a lot of increase in martial classes.
The question and problem for some people is how high they want to turn that dial. There is no question that spell casters were given 1-10 range and martials were not. But how high would people be comfortable with in their own campaigns? And for that matter, would some be more comfortable with spell casters dialed down a bit or a lot?
But it's not just "how high". It's "In what way".
I think most of the "realistic martials" crowd are much more willing to accept boosts if they can be flavored as vaguely reasonable or at least reasonable extrapolations of reasonable things than if they're just "magic, but not calling it magic".
Kind of like an ability to throw your shield dealing damage to all your opponents in a 15' radius. 1d6 per two levels of the class. Pretty much a fireball, and it's something a martial class should be able to do.
Heck, it's something Xena did, and it's not magical.
I'm curious - why is "too anime" a bad thing in the first place?
Especially when much of Anime itself often borrow heavily from Western mythos, including such things as ancient epics, classic novels, and even the Cthulhu mythos
and turns them all into cute girls.
I presume for the reason non medieval stasis is bad.
Design Manager
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.Seriously though, ignoring the various flirtations with the "Guy at the Gym" fallacy, how often do you ever see someone who could be described as "mundane" actually take down high level monsters, in any medium?The only place I really see it is...wait for it..."weaboo" stuff. Anime often has baddass normals. Granted, the major characters tend to be chosen ones/magic users/etc., but the dude who is just really REALLY good at hitting stuff is totally a thing.
Video games, too, sometimes. But, again, not much in the way of trad fantasy.
Honestly, the only ones that leap to mind from fantasy are Aowyn and Merry punking out the Witch King and basically anything Garrett Jax does.
Yeah, agreed. And because of the style of Terry Brooks' writing, you never really get a feel for how anime Garrett Jax may or may not be. He tends to go into rooms with powerful, higher level monsters, and then the monsters don't walk out, with very little description of the in-between parts, other than the occasional 30 foot leap. It's almost like one of those anime with a really low animation budget, or who focuses on still-frame art over active animation, where there's few real fights at all and it's mostly just "the heroes arrive, weapons are swung, the enemy disintegrates", like Saiyuki.
If I recall correctly, there was a short story where Jair Ohmsford actually uses the wishsong to allow him to briefly "become" Jax, at which point he proceeds to leap through 3rd story windows, cut steel, and murder magical lizard-men with impunity. The fact that the spellcaster is using his magic to simulate the martial guy's feats speaks to the degree of bad-assery Garrett Jax possessed in that universe. Jax also had a reputation that made seasoned warriors back down without a word being spoken and which gave his word and presence the same weight as that granted to kings.
Still trying to think of anything "trad fantasy" that meets this supposed trope people don't want violated with "anime influences" though... In "Flight of Dragons" (one of my favorite movies as a kid" Sir Orin Neville Smythe is lit up by a dragon who would probably be the equivalent of an adult dragon with numerous buffing spells cast on him by saying a vow as the dragon breathes fire over him and throwing his burning blade so it pierces the dragon's chest and causes the dragon's hydrogen filled lungs to explode in a fiery death burst, after which Orin drops dead from being cooked inside his armor. So maybe Sir Orin comes relatively close to the trope, assuming that dragons in your game world have hydrogen filled lungs that can be ignited by flaming weapons, though "Flight of Dragons" is one of the old Rankin-Bass cartoons which are virtually indistinguishable from anime.
I presume for the reason non medieval stasis is bad.I'm curious - why is "too anime" a bad thing in the first place?
Especially when much of Anime itself often borrow heavily from Western mythos, including such things as ancient epics, classic novels, and even the Cthulhu mythos
and turns them all into cute girls.
Or just because some people don't like it? Some people hate playing humans, or having guns in their game, or the idea of big trains powered by magic or steam.
Everyone and even members of the same table have different ideas of what they'd like for their game. Usually it boils down to personal preferences; someone who loves Japanese flavored movies might really like The Seven Samurai and utterly despise The Magnificent Seven because they hate Westerns.
Thank you. I think I get that wrong a lot. Sorry, Ashiel.Ashiel is a Him, not a Her, btw.
==Aelryinth
No worries. There's nothing wrong with being a girl so I've no problems being referred to as one (:P). I'm comfortable with whatever pronouns people want to refer to me with since it (shouldn't) have any impact on the validity of our shared discussion. :)
Also, thanks for the kind words earlier. (^.^)
For lo, the divine Ashiel is above mortal gendered pronouns!
I presume for the reason non medieval stasis is bad.I'm curious - why is "too anime" a bad thing in the first place?
Especially when much of Anime itself often borrow heavily from Western mythos, including such things as ancient epics, classic novels, and even the Cthulhu mythos
and turns them all into cute girls.Or just because some people don't like it? Some people hate playing humans, or having guns in their game, or the idea of big trains powered by magic or steam.
Everyone and even members of the same table have different ideas of what they'd like for their game. Usually it boils down to personal preferences; someone who loves Japanese flavored movies might really like The Seven Samurai and utterly despise The Magnificent Seven because they hate Westerns.
I understand table preferences, though the argument is also used to attack certain proposals and books (like the Book of Nine Swords in 3.5) as if being "too anime" is some sort of inherit fault.
That's the thing I'm annoyed by. Saying "I won't use X because I don't like it" is perfectly reasonable, if unfeasible in an actual debate about the merits of X.
I presume for the reason non medieval stasis is bad.I'm curious - why is "too anime" a bad thing in the first place?
Especially when much of Anime itself often borrow heavily from Western mythos, including such things as ancient epics, classic novels, and even the Cthulhu mythos
and turns them all into cute girls.Or just because some people don't like it? Some people hate playing humans, or having guns in their game, or the idea of big trains powered by magic or steam.
Everyone and even members of the same table have different ideas of what they'd like for their game. Usually it boils down to personal preferences; someone who loves Japanese flavored movies might really like The Seven Samurai and utterly despise The Magnificent Seven because they hate Westerns.
Its not an issue of people that don't like it as a preference but the people that think it's wrongbadfunweeaboocancer. Which isn't happening much in this thread but its the people I'm making fun of. Like fantasy has one true subgenre and deviating from it are 'too anime' as opposed to 'too high magic for what I want to play', as if a resemblance to anime itself in any way is a dirty thing that sullies the pristine image of medieval Europe.
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[...] as if a resemblance to anime itself in any way is a dirty thing that sullies the pristine image of medieval Europe.
This made me laugh so hard I almost spilled my Dr. Pepper on the keyboard. Well done. After all, we all know that the only true fantasy takes place in a version of medieval Europe that looks suspiciously like New Zealand and features immortal elves and comic-relief dwarves, amirite? And heavens forfend that any of them should ever see higher than 5th level, for that way lies naught but madness.
I presume for the reason non medieval stasis is bad.I'm curious - why is "too anime" a bad thing in the first place?
Especially when much of Anime itself often borrow heavily from Western mythos, including such things as ancient epics, classic novels, and even the Cthulhu mythos
and turns them all into cute girls.Or just because some people don't like it? Some people hate playing humans, or having guns in their game, or the idea of big trains powered by magic or steam.
Everyone and even members of the same table have different ideas of what they'd like for their game. Usually it boils down to personal preferences; someone who loves Japanese flavored movies might really like The Seven Samurai and utterly despise The Magnificent Seven because they hate Westerns.
I understand table preferences, though the argument is also used as an argument to attack certain proposals and books (like the Book of Nine Swords in 3.5) as if being "too anime" is some sort of inherit fault that automatically disqualifies an idea from consideration.
That's the thing I'm annoyed by. Saying "I won't use X because I don't like it" is perfectly reasonable, if unfeasible in an actual debate about the merits of X.
That and it avoids several issues. One being, as I argued above, that the world that is insinuated based on how casters work saying that a fighter is the same level is not going to be possible if he's restricted to realistic physical prowess and non-magic in any capacity. That Fighters are already past believability due to being able to arm wrestle gorillas and grapple bears, but jumping more than 30 ft in the air is just unreasonable. And I'm a guy that argues against things like giving martial things on par with teleporting. It sidesteps the issue by saying that its not a good solution because it has a passing resemblance to an aspect of some anime that share that exact aspects with western stuff. I can understand if the argument was that if it became the norm for martials then it would be impossible to play down to earth campaigns because you don't even have classes that aren't god-like super beings anymore. And then we argue why a fighter could do these things as if there aren't a million and one ways. Minor magic, pacts with a magic thing, lifting weights too much, really really good technique, suicidal courage, grew up wrestling gorillas so often it just eventually got easy, the list goes on.
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I think it's important to distinguish 'in-combat' versus 'out-of-combat' power levels, because you need totally different fixes depending on which ones you're trying to match.
In-combat, many martials aren't currently too bad, though IMO they need (A) mobility buffs and untying from the full-attack paradigm, and (B) more ways to counteract magic.
Some fixes could be thematically very reasonable -- my guess is even those who generally complain about fixes being "TOO WEEABOO" wouldn't oppose them. For example, I've considered using the Combat Stamina system to allow a Fighter to add his CON mod to his saves (some activation cost + some upkeep cost) or to ignore all concealment and magical figments (same).
Similarly, you can increase the abilities of melee martials to deal with flying creatures either by giving them flight (which many people seem to dislike as part of the base class for martials) or by making it significantly easier to ground / root flying creatures. Maybe ammunition with a rune on it that activates on impact and forces a creature to the ground (maybe each one adds ~an effective 300 lb weight to the bottom of the character's feet). Why this isn't already a thing in PF, I don't know.
There's some cross-over between in and out of combat abilities. For example, I don't know why no one's invented a relatively low cost alchemical eye drop to [See Invisibility/Darkvision/Infravision]. Seriously, ever town guard in the history of Golarion would kill for that. There's a very, very heavy demand, which would provide an impetus for this discovery.
Truly out-of-combat, we start getting into things like, "Every martial must have a class ability for inter-planar travel and teleportation," and "Every martial must have a nearly foolproof way to force NPCs to do whatever they want" to match the narrative power of caster classes. These I feel are more problematic thematically, in part because casters can do so many of them already. IMO, they should be (A) slightly toned down for caster classes and (B) made available to martials as story elements on a case-by-case basis if necessary. I don't necessarily see baking them into the classes (though I would love some more skill points on Paladin and especially on Fighter).
Similarly, I think a system where the governing stats for skills determined how many points you got to spend in those skills could be a useful thing.
EDIT: Just to clarify the last statement, since I fat fingered my mouse and accidentally hit submit as I was sitting down with my coffee ... STR based skills would get SP to spend from (maybe some fraction of) your STR bonus, while INT based skills would get bonus SP to spend from (maybe some fraction of) your INT bonus, and so on.
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That and it avoids several issues. One being, as I argued above, that the world that is insinuated based on how casters work saying that a fighter is the same level is not going to be possible if he's restricted to realistic physical prowess and non-magic in any capacity. That Fighters are already past believability due to being able to arm wrestle gorillas and grapple bears, but jumping more than 30 ft in the air is just unreasonable. And I'm a guy that argues against things like giving martial things on par with teleporting. It sidesteps the issue by saying that its not a good solution because it has a passing resemblance to an aspect of some anime that share that exact aspects with...
I think the level these things would kick in is something that gets ignored a lot too. If you're playing in levels 7+, you're not in Lord of the Rings or Conan land anymore anyway. Trying to simulate gritty low level play at high levels is already actively working against the system as written, which assumes you'll have magical weapons, access to flight, and other things that are distinctly high fantasy. Back in 3.5, the Eberron campaign featured a world where people had magical trains, telegraphs, and airships, and the most powerful being on the planet was a CR 13 lich who convinced people to start a religion based on her. That was a high magic setting that tried to insert some grit and noir, and even their lightning trains wouldn't have made sense in a world where the kind of power that gets tossed around at levels 13+ was in play. Trying to shoehorn gritty low level play into higher levels already requires some pretty extensive house-ruling or magical tea time shenanigans, and probably warps the game far more than allowing classes like those in Path of War or Tome of Battle into the game. I think that even Paizo is really starting to acknowledge this though, with things like the Eldritch Guardian and Sensate archetypes, which are basically strict upgrades over the core Fighter chassis over a full 20 level spread. Combine it with the Stamina system, maybe splash a few 3pp feats in there... They're baby steps, but they are steps.
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I presume for the reason non medieval stasis is bad.I'm curious - why is "too anime" a bad thing in the first place?
Especially when much of Anime itself often borrow heavily from Western mythos, including such things as ancient epics, classic novels, and even the Cthulhu mythos
and turns them all into cute girls.Or just because some people don't like it? Some people hate playing humans, or having guns in their game, or the idea of big trains powered by magic or steam.
Everyone and even members of the same table have different ideas of what they'd like for their game. Usually it boils down to personal preferences; someone who loves Japanese flavored movies might really like The Seven Samurai and utterly despise The Magnificent Seven because they hate Westerns.
I understand table preferences, though the argument is also used to attack certain proposals and books (like the Book of Nine Swords in 3.5) as if being "too anime" is some sort of inherit fault.
That's the thing I'm annoyed by. Saying "I won't use X because I don't like it" is perfectly reasonable, if unfeasible in an actual debate about the merits of X.
Its not an issue of people that don't like it as a preference but the people that think it's wrongbadfunweeaboocancer. Which isn't happening much in this thread but its the people I'm making fun of. Like fantasy has one true subgenre and deviating from it are 'too anime' as opposed to 'too high magic for what I want to play', as if a resemblance to anime itself in any way is a dirty thing that sullies the pristine image of medieval Europe.
Anime is, frankly, an insult or inherit fault in some quarters and to some people. It might have to do with rabid fans -- who like many fanatics are obnoxious -- or the thought that all anime is deviant (for a given value of deviant) and full of sex and tentacles and girls in short skirts showing their panties.
Any one of those is grounds in some areas to shun a person, because as we all know shunning is one of the favorite pass times of geeks, nerds, and dorks. The type of thing they like is stupid, ours is best.
You run across people who hate anime and believe it and any influence it brings is THE END OF ALL THERE IS! We saw it with comic book art changing, we see it in table top gaming all the time. I think it is in the Top 5 irrational hatreds for TTRPGs, probably tied with guns/sci-fi in my fantasy.
It's worth remembering, when talking about "traditional fantasy", that not only are the martials not doing magical, anime style feats, but the casters tend to be well below high level PF casters too. (Though the bad guy casters will often have ritual magic at or beyond PF levels - but only as long complex rituals that essentially are the plot.)
Agreed. The amount a mage can do in 6 seconds is truly staggering in Pathfinder. Also, PF completely neglects the idea that attaining high levels of magical power is inherently a dangerous proposition (Shannara), and often attracts unwanted attention (LotR). These ideas tends to act as power limiters on (protagonist at least) mages in a lot of fantasy, and is completely missing in PF land.
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It's worth remembering, when talking about "traditional fantasy", that not only are the martials not doing magical, anime style feats, but the casters tend to be well below high level PF casters too. (Though the bad guy casters will often have ritual magic at or beyond PF levels - but only as long complex rituals that essentially are the plot.)
Truth. If you want to know whether or not it makes sense for a Fighter to be gritty and low powered, look at the spellcasters he's expected to face. Thulsa Doom is essentially a 4th level Mesmerist who has learned a small number of long, complicated rituals that will allow him some small, impermanent access to the very weakest of demons. This is the guy who routinely wrecks Conan's day and would have beaten him handily without the intervention of several other characters.
Not to dredge up any edition warring again, but one thing I thought was really smart in 4E was chopping up magic into spells and rituals. Summon monster IX makes sense as a spell. Gate would make much more sense as an expensive and time consuming ritual primarily performed out of combat. Wish should be a high level ritual, with maybe a quicker version available for the "emulate a lower level spell" function, so on and so forth. While the absolute ceiling wouldn't change much, if rituals were something that anyone with access to the appropriate resources could perform and the more powerful or problematic spells were converted to rituals, you could solve a lot of balance issues. What if any class, Fighter, Rogue, or Wizard, could bust out the ritual book, light a few feathers on fire while inscribing a diagram on the ground, and after 10 uninterrupted minutes complete the overland flight ritual that grants the party 8 hours of flight? What if it was just as easy for the wise old warrior-king to go down into the royal library and pull out his family treasure, a ritual tome with the ritual to summon the angelic patron of his country, as it is for the evil demoniac to do essentially the same thing with his tome of utter darkness? Not only would it narrow a lot of gaps in class power and capability, it would also maintain distinctiveness in how different classes operate in combat while avoiding the "weaboo fightan magiks" complaints. Sure, it's magic, but it's a type of magic that doesn't require an innate magical spark and which anyone with the instructions and materials can perform. You could now have a Fighter who protects his country and himself with magical Nick Fury LMDs created through the simulacrum ritual just as easily as you could have Manshoon and his inexhaustible supply of clones for when Elminster defeats him for the umpteenth time.
What was the original question, anyways?You still haven't answered my original question. I have met every one of your questions, provided examples, evidence, broke down the mechanics, and explained each bit step by step. I have cited Jaron K on the actual definitions of tiers during your tier tangent in hopes of simply getting a basic explanation of your claim in the previous post.
Could you please, finally, stop trying to evade the question and actually answer it? If it is as easy to do as you say then it shouldn't be much of an issue.
Clerics are one divine power away from being better than fighters. Divine favor works until then. The trait that increases luck bonuses by 1 is amazing. Grab the movespeed domain to rub salt into the wound.
Cleric = best martial
*notes in posts that clerics do not match real martials in being a beat-stick*
If you can pose a reason why this isn't true, I'm all ears and ready to learn something new. However, to my current knowledge clerics are amazing but they just cannot match Paladins and Rangers in combat effectiveness. Problem solving? Definitely. Can they do stuff Paladins and Rangers cannot? Without a doubt. Can they match them in a slugfest? No, they cannot.
With these posts: #1: Ranger and Power Attack, #2: Quick glance at Divine Power vs Martial, and #3: 16th level Rangers hit CR 30 on a 4+ to provide rationale against.
I just want Rhedyn to show why his or her claim is reasonable.
EDIT: And shouting "But tieeers!" over and over is not doing that.
EDIT 2: Nor is "It's so obvious that if you don't see it, I'm...
In your games my claim is not reasonable. The to-hit gap between rangers and clerics becomes too large.
I really don't want to debate if the situation in your games is very normal. I've already seen your arguments with people on that and I have nothing new to add.
Edit: "I don't have some secret optimization trick to share with you."
It's worth remembering, when talking about "traditional fantasy", that not only are the martials not doing magical, anime style feats, but the casters tend to be well below high level PF casters too. (Though the bad guy casters will often have ritual magic at or beyond PF levels - but only as long complex rituals that essentially are the plot.)Truth. If you want to know whether or not it makes sense for a Fighter to be gritty and low powered, look at the spellcasters he's expected to face. Thulsa Doom is essentially a 4th level Mesmerist who has learned a small number of long, complicated rituals that will allow him some small, impermanent access to the very weakest of demons. This is the guy who routinely wrecks Conan's day and would have beaten him handily without the intervention of several other characters.No. He's not.
This is one thing that always irritates me. He's not a low level PF character. He's a very powerful wizard/priest working under an entirely different paradigm. It makes no sense to dismiss the rituals when in sword and sorcery works they're usually the main thing the evil wizards do.
*Mind you, I have no idea which Thulsa Doom you're referencing - probably one of the movies, since he's originally a Kull villain. Or maybe comics?
I think that's the point being made.
You'd be more correct, at least in name, with Thoth-Amon. You'd be incorrect about his scale of power. He's got a serious 'One Ring' ....
Huh. Y'know, I never thought about that, but Howard's Thoth-Amon and the Black Ring of Sorcery came out only a few years before The Hobbit, and Tolkien remarked on more than one occasion that he really enjoyed Robert Howard's work, Conan in particular....
Anyways, Thoth-Amon is, by Word of God, the most powerful magic-using being of evil in the entire Hyborian Age, on par with some of the great wizards of Acheron, and yes, he does (in a non-Howard work, written by L. Sprague DeCamp, who took a LOT of liberties with Howard's work) kick Conan's butt in a direct confrontation.
When Conan is sixty years old, and Thoth-Amon is still physically like thirty.
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No. He's not.
This is one thing that always irritates me. He's not a low level PF character. He's a very powerful wizard/priest working under an entirely different paradigm. It makes no sense to dismiss the rituals when in sword and sorcery works they're usually the main thing the evil wizards do.
*Mind you, I have no idea which Thulsa Doom you're referencing - probably one of the movies, since he's originally a Kull villain. Or maybe comics?
Yeah, he is a low level Pathfinder character. He never does anything particularly powerful by Pathfinder standards, and just to emulate the effects of a few 5th level spells he's normally required to perform some crazy, decade-spanning ritual that requires the resources of an entire tribe or nation. In the context of his world, he's one of the baddest mamma jammas around, but compared to a Pathfinder spellcaster, he's a 2nd rate hypnotist. That's the point I'm making. (And yeah, I was thinking more James Earl Jones in the context of Conan, though the underlying point about the things you see him do with magic remains the same).
If Thulsa Doom is what you think a Pathfinder BBEG should be, and Conan is the epitome of a martial character, then your games should probably end right around 5th or 6th level. Restricting higher level options won't make your game more valid, unless you're restricting all the options, in which case, why do we even have levels after 6th? In the world of Conan the Cimmerian as presented in most of the old comics and all the movies, most of the evil wizards are limited to perhaps a single power equivalent to a Pathfinder 3rd level spell, and they're usually stunned when that power fails to work. Any undertaking an evil spellcaster pursues that is more powerful than that bar is usually a dark ritual that requires massive amounts of time and resources to complete, typically for the same result a Pathfinder wizard of 9th level could accomplish in roughly 6 seconds, give or take.
Note that I actually endorse shifting more of the powerful spells over and making them time-consuming rituals as a good balancing option.
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You'd be more correct, at least in name, with Thoth-Amon. You'd be incorrect about his scale of power. He's got a serious 'One Ring' ....
Even Sauron isn't all that powerful though, at least not compared to the scale of magic as presented in Pathfinder. He's an evil Outsider who learned how to craft and influence powerful magic items and has a horde of relatively low CR enemies at his disposal. He and Thoth-Amon may be the most powerful baddies in their respective worlds, but they're still (pardon the language) punk-ass b@#$&es compared to what Pathfinder spellcasters can pull off. If Sauron had the equivalent power of even 7th level spells, the movie would have been 15 minutes long and predominantly featured a dead Ranger, a dead Gandalf, and a quartet of hobbits getting cooked like bunnies while Sauron danced on the ashes of the White Tree.
That's all I'm really trying to say, is Pathfinder is a game of heroic high fantasy. Only at the very lowest levels of play does it emulate the world some people, particularly detractors of giving anything "anime" to martial characters, seem to believe it's intended to emulate.
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No. I don't think Thulsa Doom is what a Pathfinder BBEG should be. I don't think Thulsa Doom is a Pathfinder character at all. That's my point. He doesn't fit in the game system.
Hell, if you squint just right, Morgoth would be a lousy PF BBEG. PF wizards can do all kinds of stuff that he never even touches, even when he's at power levels when he can shape and corrupt the whole planet.
Both of them are working in entirely different paradigms. Not low-level Pathfinder. Not high level Pathfinder. Something.
Right. There are often attempts to shoe horn super heroes and literary characters into Pathfinder's rules and they don't fit, not really. There are people that nod knowingly and say that a character is obviously this class and that level when in reality it's a matter of opinion and a lot of squinting and compromising.
Characters in books are difficult to pin down with stats. You can make something that emulates some aspects of the idea, but more often than not they are hinting at the flavor and that's about it.
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No. I don't think Thulsa Doom is what a Pathfinder BBEG should be. I don't think Thulsa Doom is a Pathfinder character at all. That's my point. He doesn't fit in the game system.
Hell, if you squint just right, Morgoth would be a lousy PF BBEG. PF wizards can do all kinds of stuff that he never even touches, even when he's at power levels when he can shape and corrupt the whole planet.
Both of them are working in entirely different paradigms. Not low-level Pathfinder. Not high level Pathfinder. Something.
Right. There are often attempts to shoe horn super heroes and literary characters into Pathfinder's rules and they don't fit, not really. There are people that nod knowingly and say that a character is obviously this class and that level when in reality it's a matter of opinion and a lot of squinting and compromising.
Characters in books are difficult to pin down with stats. You can make something that emulates some aspects of the idea, but more often than not they are hinting at the flavor and that's about it.
Conversely, when people want to talk about how powerful a pathfinder character should be, it's nice to have a literary reference that we are all familiar with.
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Sslarn, there are no literary characters that can do what a Pathfinder Wizard can do, because what they can do is absolute nonsense.
Because of spell bloat and the ludicrous heaping of spells upon spells that they can get, you could make a reasonable argument that God Almighty isn't on-par with a high-level Pathfinder wizard, and people would take you at least half-seriously. Why? Because there are no functional limits on what a Wizard can do other than the ability to bash the keyboard with your face until you make another spell.
Conversely, when people want to talk about how powerful a pathfinder character should be, it's nice to have a literary reference that we are all familiar with.No. I don't think Thulsa Doom is what a Pathfinder BBEG should be. I don't think Thulsa Doom is a Pathfinder character at all. That's my point. He doesn't fit in the game system.
Hell, if you squint just right, Morgoth would be a lousy PF BBEG. PF wizards can do all kinds of stuff that he never even touches, even when he's at power levels when he can shape and corrupt the whole planet.
Both of them are working in entirely different paradigms. Not low-level Pathfinder. Not high level Pathfinder. Something.
Right. There are often attempts to shoe horn super heroes and literary characters into Pathfinder's rules and they don't fit, not really. There are people that nod knowingly and say that a character is obviously this class and that level when in reality it's a matter of opinion and a lot of squinting and compromising.
Characters in books are difficult to pin down with stats. You can make something that emulates some aspects of the idea, but more often than not they are hinting at the flavor and that's about it.
It's nice, but often skewed by the opinion of person trying to make the point. It's a lot of "Batman can beat anyone" that you get on the comics boards; you can make a case if you try for a high or low level character depending on what you believe.
And for me, a lot of this is based off supporting some broken rules. If you enjoy people falling from orbit and walking away unscathed and swimming for recreating in lava then of course you are going to think most fantasy characters are pitifully low leveled in power.
Conversely, when people want to talk about how powerful a pathfinder character should be, it's nice to have a literary reference that we are all familiar with.No. I don't think Thulsa Doom is what a Pathfinder BBEG should be. I don't think Thulsa Doom is a Pathfinder character at all. That's my point. He doesn't fit in the game system.
Hell, if you squint just right, Morgoth would be a lousy PF BBEG. PF wizards can do all kinds of stuff that he never even touches, even when he's at power levels when he can shape and corrupt the whole planet.
Both of them are working in entirely different paradigms. Not low-level Pathfinder. Not high level Pathfinder. Something.
Right. There are often attempts to shoe horn super heroes and literary characters into Pathfinder's rules and they don't fit, not really. There are people that nod knowingly and say that a character is obviously this class and that level when in reality it's a matter of opinion and a lot of squinting and compromising.
Characters in books are difficult to pin down with stats. You can make something that emulates some aspects of the idea, but more often than not they are hinting at the flavor and that's about it.
It's nice, but often skewed by the opinion of person trying to make the point. It's a lot of "Batman can beat anyone" that you get on the comics boards; you can make a case if you try for a high or low level character depending on what you believe.
And for me, a lot of this is based off supporting some broken rules. If you enjoy people falling from orbit and walking away unscathed and swimming for recreating in lava then of course you are going to think most fantasy characters are pitifully low leveled in power.
That doesn't escape the fact that to make subdued fantasy martial even vaguely a thing that's balanced with caster, casters would need to be more subdued, or if casters stay as high magic as they are Fighters would need to be ultra high concept as well. The point is that we're putting both concepts on the same level track.
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Sslarn, there are no literary characters that can do what a Pathfinder Wizard can do, because what they can do is absolute nonsense.
Because of spell bloat and the ludicrous heaping of spells upon spells that they can get, you could make a reasonable argument that God Almighty isn't on-par with a high-level Pathfinder wizard, and people would take you at least half-seriously. Why? Because there are no functional limits on what a Wizard can do other than the ability to bash the keyboard with your face until you make another spell.
I think the point is that if pathfinder spellcasters are of a different standard than other fantasy spellcasters, so holding martials to the standards of other fantasy martials is silly.
Thor, Hercules and Cu Chulainn all have the god thing going for them, which means they get some uber template strapped onto them granting major stat bonuses for badassness.
Of the three, Cu Chulainn is actually the one that displays the highest level of 'skill'...he can catch and throw a basically unblockable spear with his toes in midair. Thor and Hercules are basically famous for feats of strength beyond mortal possibility. Cu Chulainn is just inhumanly skilled and can go berserk...really, really berserk.
==Aelryinth
He is also responsible for the feat system we have today. 2nd ed had a splat book for the Celts which had special powers known as Feats. These Feats naturally duplicated many of the fantastic abilities legend ascribes to Cu Culainn and other Celtic heroes.